The Petey B set down just outside the port, landing as slowly as she'd taken off from Vaudevillia. Her descent was announced by a shower of bright-colored leaflets as they drifted over the landscape—or to be more precise, while the landscape drifted by underneath the Petey B. Using the lattice ship's inertial drives meant that Hanson's Reach rotated under them and they slowly matched up to the planetary rotation.
The leaflet were vivid bits of butterfly-bright paper that were cut and shaped to fly like little wings in all directions, They spread the word that the Petey B, home of Petey, Byrum and Keep, the Greatest Show In The Galaxy, was beginning a limited engagement on Hanson's Reach, setting down by special arrangement just outside the main center of population and commerce.
"Limited?" Pausert asked, since he'd heard of no set departure date.
Mannicholo shrugged. "Limited to as long as their money holds out."
The Petey B certainly provided a spectacle that was as good as a parade as they set down. And, once they were down, the set-up was a show in and of itself.
If Pausert hadn't been busy helping, he'd have wanted to watch. It looked as if every man, woman, and especially child that could possibly get to the showboat was standing out there, gawking. Stages were deployed, the stays and struts that held up the synthasilk of the tents popped open, tents were hauled up, canopies unfolded, bleachers and benches arrayed, rigging rigged and ropes winched tight, bunting and flags strung out to flap and snap in the breeze, and lastly, the huge banners depicting all the delights to be found within were dropped down to hang from every vertical surface—and all of it was done to a chant of "Push 'em back! Haul 'em back! Take 'em back! Ho!"
What that was supposed to mean, nobody seemed to know. But it was effective, because it wasn't all autowinches and robot-pulleys that did the work, it was muscle and sweat of people and beasts. The huge fanderbags were hitched in teams to pull up the biggest tent-poles; grumbling and complaining, the humpities did the same for the smaller poles. And every hand that might be useful was put on a rope for the several hours it took to get the showboat up and running.
And when they were all finished, the Petey B looked very like the showboat of Pausert's memories: all bright-colored flags and banners and synthasilk veiling the workaday exterior of the lattice ship, so that it hardly looked like a thing that could go to space at all. And for the first time since they'd hitched up with the Petey B, Pausert began to feel a tingling sensation of dread and fear and excitement that had nothing whatsoever to do with all of the predicaments that had brought them here.
CHAPTER 13
The free Sedmon, still in the portside alleys of Gerota Town, had to pause and lean against the wall to cope with the nausea and the pain.
"What's up, chum?" said one of a pair of crop-haired spacers who had just turned the corner. "Too much of the local rotgut?"
The Sedmons were now very wary of even the most innocuous seeming encounter. The free Sedmon watched these two with some caution. "Just stomach cramps. I ate some dodgy local food."
The other spacer grinned. "Stick to the grog next time. At least you've got a decent excuse for being sick. You need any help?"
The Sedmon was still far from trusting. The two of them were coming a little too close, and something in the second fellow's voice sounded a bit off. "Just trying to find the rest of my crew. There are ten of us off the Vanel. Have seen a bunch of guys—one of them the size of two of me—trundling around? They're probably looking for me by now. Or do you know where 'Voyager Smiles' is? It's a posh little gift-shop we were heading for."
If they had been thinking of any funny stuff, the two weren't anymore. "Thora's place? It's just around the corner to your left," said the first speaker, tugging at his friend's arm. "Come on, Merk. We've got things to do."
Sure enough, the Sedmon found what he'd set out to look for. The gift shop was an expensive-looking establishment in a considerably more respectable street a mere two blocks from the spaceport. A much safer street, too, from its appearance.
Inside, the Sedmon gave the haughty proprietress a near heart-failure. The Daal's agents did have certain code recognition symbols—individual ones, so not a bit of good came of torturing or drugging them out of someone. The words that Thora Herrkin heard from the lips of the slightly shaky-looking man were not something she was prepared for. But she knew that she'd better give him the best cooperation and help possible.
* * *
The Sedmon in the truth-shock chair, on the other hand, was giving his captors as little help as possible. It was possible for him to do that, because, now that he was aware of what was coming, he could split the electroshock between the selves of the hexaperson. The sensation made all of them feel more than a little ill, but it was bearable.
So, he just resigned himself to a period of unpleasantness. Indeed, he was almost serene about the whole matter. One of the great advantages of being a hexaperson was that he had complete and total confidence in his closest associates. And why not? They were him, after all.
* * *
Evening and the local ISS headquarters were both close. For the sort of money the Daal had on call, recruiting a few ex-troopers willing to do a great deal with no questions asked had been an easy enough task. And from Thora, who was now very eager to oblige, the Sedmons knew of the disastrous happenings on Pidoon—and that the Venture had, once again, abruptly and mysteriously disappeared.
"Some of them are still on the run, sir. It's a bit confusing but a woman reputedly called Captain Elin and a couple of her men are hiding out somewhere—along with a local hoodlum called Fullbricht. The ISS can't find them, but my partners know where they are. They're in a small farm just outside town next to the lake. Fullbricht keeps a boat there he uses for dropping, ah, ferroplast 'statues' into the water."
The Sedmon scowled—not at the ruthlessness involved in submerging corpses, but at the pettiness of the whole situation. Local criminals and their pitiful attempts at being murderous. Bah. In times past, the Daals of Uldune had terrified entire star sectors. They were moments—not often, but this was one of them—when the Sedmons regretted their modern civilized ways.
The hexaperson cheered himself up with the thought that, on the other hand, they still weren't all that civilized.
"We'll arrange a visit, then," he said coldly, "just as soon as we have the matter in hand dealt with."
A shifty-looking man in spacer's clothes was ushered into the back office of the gift shop where the Sedmon had set up his makeshift temporary headquarters. The man handed over a spaceship lock-key and a chronometer. "The chronometer got brought to the hock-shop about twenty minutes back. One of the boys extracted the key from Slick Wullie."
"Ah," said the gift shop proprietress. "Do you want him dealt with?"
The free Sedmon winced. His captive clone was being tortured again. "No, there is no point in drawing attention to the matter any further. Is my ship still being watched?
"Not since about ten minutes back," said the ever-efficient Thora.
"Good. Let us proceed, then."
The Sedmon, along with Thora and the hired mercenaries, went back to the Thunderbird in a nondescript van. A few minutes later, they set off for ISS headquarters with a cutter and two cylinders. One had a highly illegal anesthetic in it. It was nearly odorless, and fast acting. The other was a rather unpleasant standby. But the Sedmons were rather tired of taking the pain, and they'd never been fond of the ISS to begin with.