Ammonite Planets (Omnibus): Ammonite Galaxy #1-3 (74 page)

“No, you metallic witling! I meant, does it get narrow enough for me to reach the other side with my feet?”

“Why did you not say so? No, it does not.”

Six had progressed another half a metre during the exchange. “Then I will just have to continue, won’t I?”

“I can see no other alternative, certainly.”

“So let’s do it.” Six bit his bottom lip so hard that he drew blood, but he was so concentrated that he didn’t notice. He was edging his right foot to a tiny crevice way to the side when he heard the most hideous cacophony behind him, and nearly fell off the rock face altogether. “What in Sacras is that?”

“The avifauna have reached the girls and have seen that they are close to the surface. They are attempting to climb this very stretch of rock now. They seem somewhat eager to reach the surface of the planet.”

Six pressed his whole body into the rock face. “You mean that all the avians are rampaging up this very chimney?”
 

“That would seem to be the case.”

Below them, Six could hear the cries of the two girls, clearly warning him that now the avians had smelt the fresh air they were no longer content to stay meekly behind their adopted friends.

“How far to the indentation?”
 

“Another three metres.”

“Then help me get there, fast! If those birds run over me in their haste to get free then their claws will tear me to ribbons!”
 

The tiny globe examined the surface on the instellite with attention, and then began to give remarkably clear instructions. Six found himself obeying it blindly, only concentrating on reaching those small notches and grooves in the surface which the visitor was telling him about.

He could hear the strident cries of the avifauna as they neared his position. They were screeching their triumph to each other, and the sound reverberated around the stone, a gathering mixture of call and echo which seemed to blast over him like a physical push, making him teeter, and nearly loose his grasp. The thought of hurtling down all three hundred metres made his throat close up and his face burn. It took him a few moments before he could concentrate sufficiently again to hear the visitor.

“—You are nearly there. Just two more steps. Now, put …”

Six, running on autopilot now, found himself obeying the video camera, and tried to block out the wave of sound which was nearly upon him.
 

At last his fingers found the small ledge that the visitor had told him about, and with a terrific effort, he pulled himself onto it, laying his body lengthwise along it, and flattening himself against the narrowing rock, face to it.
 

They had been close enough for him to be able to make out the individual birds as they hauled their way up the stone face. They were gasping with the effort, too, and it was clear that even having four appendages provided with claws was not enough to make this ascent easy. Six huddled in his narrow refuge, making himself as small as he could.

Then the leading avians were on him. He felt bird after bird scramble past his position, each one grappling for a hold on the slippery surface. Their claws were long enough to catch him as they reached over the top of the ledge, and he felt his skin break under the bodywrap.
 

Each time an avian moved over his crevice, there was a tug in the material as the claw forced its way free again, catching on the threads, and pulling Six out of his scant refuge. He pressed into the indentation with every single bit of his body, trying to counteract the force pulling him off his shelf. More than once his whole body was hanging off the precipice by the time the avian in question had passed. He barely had time to shuffle back into the recess before the next one was upon him. His own breath was coming in tortured gasps, and he was sure that his last moment had come.

At that moment he felt the touch of some sort of insect against his face, and it took all of his self-control not to jerk back away from the rock. Whatever it was that had decided to move across his skin, it was taking its time. He felt leg after leg as it stepped across him, and cringed inside, waiting for the mortal sting. He didn’t even dare to breathe, in case the insect would regard that as a threat. Sweat stood out along his forehead and he felt slightly sick. Still he forced himself to hold still. It was one of the most difficult things that he had ever done. The insect crossed his face in a leisurely manner, and disappeared into the rock, thankfully unaware of his difficulties.

As suddenly as they had arrived, the avifauna too were gone. He could hear them above him now, their screeching becoming triumphant as the first birds reached the surface. Six carefully shifted to the edge and turned his face upwards. Sure enough, the circle of sky was showing the birds in silhouette as they reached safety. It must be late morning, he realized, because he could see the yellow-orange sun clearly overhead. He blew out a long, tense breath and struggled to get his body back in a vertical position on the rock. If he had survived that, there was no way that he was going to fail now. Not going to happen, he decided. What those booby birds could do, so could he!

AND HE DID, but the person who arrived at the top was not the same one who had set off. His fingers were cracked and bleeding, he was shaking all over, and he seemed to have reached a sort of catatonic state of perpetual fear. But he was there, and it was not exactly the right time to collapse in self-congratulation. He looked around to see if the avians were still around, but they seemed to have vanished altogether. He scrambled to his feet, and began to run towards the shuttle, after asking the visitor to go back down and keep the girls company. Once at the pod it was a moment to collect the two high-tensile ropes which came as standard issue, and head back to the gaping hole in the planet’s surface which he had just emerged from. 

It took him a long time to get the girls up. The main problem was finding something suitable for a safe anchorage on the end of the rope. That took the best part of an hour, with Six finally settling on a crevice on the far side of one of the ridges which ran past on either side of the entrance to the cavern. He tied several strong knots in the end of the rope, and then snagged it through the crevice, tugging and pulling until it was firmly caught. Then he wrapped more of the rope around himself, and took the weight of the girl. It seemed to work well. Diva insisted on sending Grace first, and the Sellite girl managed the climb in about ninety minutes, although Six could see that she hadn’t enjoyed it much when she emerged from the gaping mouth of the cavern. She shook her head, and then unwound the rope from the body sling she and Diva had fashioned. Sitting on the edge, she lowered the rope down again for Diva, and then stationed herself behind Six, to help with the weight.

That made things even easier, and this time it was only an hour’s struggle for Diva. The Coriolan girl came out of the black depths with a whoop, carefully placed the bag with the amorphs in it safely on the ground, and then threw herself onto the short grass of the gully, rolling over and over in absolute glee.

“We thought you were a goner, Six, when the avifauna took off up the chimney after you!”

“It was a close run thing,”
 

“I helped,” said the visitor.

Six frowned, and then rolled his eyes. “I suppose you did,” he admitted.

“That is the second time I have saved your life!”

“Yeah, yeah, but who’s counting, right?”

The machine buzzed industriously. “I am,” it said.

Six shook his head, and gave a sigh. “There’ll be no bearing it at all from now on,” he predicted.

Diva grinned, and got to her feet. “Seriously, though – did you see the way the avifauna swarmed up the chimney wall? Unbelievable!”

Six had heard that tone to her voice before. Diva was contemplating an adoption.

“You can’t take one home,” he told her. “It would pine for those nice juicy spiders.”

“Don’t be silly. Of course I couldn’t take one home.” But she looked disappointed. “It was fun though, wasn’t it?”

“Tremendous. Nothing like being shut in an underground cavern with some murderous fluid, I find. Really gets the blood flowing. Then of course, there is the exhilarating sharp climb up an impossible cliff face just to round the whole day off.”

Diva gave him a push, and he let himself fall dramatically into the greenery, where he lay groaning, pretending he had broken something.

Grace ran up, with a worried expression on her face, but Diva just grinned. “He’s only playing, Grace,” she said. “Leave him there. The wind will be up soon, and it is so strong that he’ll be pushed to his feet anyway.”

Six pulled a face and struggled up. “Perhaps we should get inside the shuttle, before those hurricane winds arrive?” he suggested.

“Perhaps we should.”
 

Once inside the shuttle, Six slid up to the console and checked all the instruments. “We should be all right,” he said. “The winds are due to start up in about ten minutes, though, so we will have to postpone the trials with the amorphs until tomorrow. Visitor, can you check back with your live counterpart on the Independence, and tell Arcan about everything that has happened?”

“You can tell him yourself, ninny,” said Diva, pointing to the interscreen on the control panel. “He knows perfectly well how to use one of those, remember?”

“I hope he’s all right,” he said, pressing the predis button in readiness, and acknowledging that she was right with a wry smile and nod to the visitor. “Because if he is not we are probably going to be stuck here on Boobyland.”

“Don’t call it that!” snapped Diva.

“So what do you want to call it, lady muck?”

“Something appropriate. Let’s see. How about Pictoria? Since we’re in the Pictoris system?”

Grace nodded. “Perfect!”

Six looked skywards. “Whatever!”

Once Arcan had confirmed that he was able to function still without the parts of him which had disappeared on the planet, and that their loss could be, although with some effort, compensated, Diva did a little dance on the spot.

“We made history today! Nobody else in the binary system has ever set foot on Pictoria!”
 

“Nobody else would want to,” grumbled Six, trying to look superior until Grace threw an empty nutripack at him.

THEY SPENT THE rest of the evening huddled inside the space shuttle, and all the night trying to get some sleep. Diva had let the three amorph specimens out of the bag soon after their arrival; it seemed pointless to keep them shut up when they probably had the capability to tunnel out through the hull. They kept a keen eye on them; at the least sign of anxiety they would open the hatch, they decided, wind or no wind. But the amorphs seemed quite unfazed by the change in their circumstances. They scintillated a little, apparently pleased to be out of the confines of the bag, and then settled quite happily into a corner and held that position as if they were dormant.

The night was long and it proved practically impossible to sleep. The winds were so strong that they buffeted the shuttle mercilessly, and although their calculations had shown that the strong hull would resist, it was hard to feel much confidence in mathematical calculations when the whole shuttle was shuddering and leaning at a perilous angle downwind. The morning calm, which arrived with a sudden disappearance of the howling which had tormented them all night, found them all jaded, and rather bad-tempered.

Shuttles were not meant to be comfortable at the best of times, and squeezing three of them in for a whole night – together with the visitor and three specimens – was not anybody’s idea of fun.

Six was not feeling sunny. “Typical! There’s Arcan, loafing around in a spacious space trader he’s got all to himself, and here we are, crammed like sardines in this suppository.”

“Six!” said Grace automatically.

“The orthogel entity is under great pressure,” rebuked the visitor. “He has lost part of his matter, and his physical integrity may be compromised. You should not speak of him like that.”

“Yeah. I should worship him from afar, I suppose?” Six was quite ready to be argumentative. He never liked to let anybody down in that respect.

“The orthogel entity is omnipresent,” it clacked. “A mere 3b like you should not criticize it.”

“He isn’t omnipresent on this planet, tin-pot, is he? He disappeared and let himself get eaten by a lake, didn’t he? How omnipresent is that? Unless he’s turned into one of these amorphs, that is?”

“He is a superior being, like myself.”

Six questioned the validity of that last statement by means of an incredulous laugh, which did not best please the tiny sphere.

“I will prepare the experiments,” it huffed, “you will find me outside.”

“Drop it, Six, will you?” Diva was crotchety too. “Why can’t you just humour the visitor like everybody else?”

“Why should I? He thinks he’s such a miracle! And he hasn’t done very much at all, has he? If you think about it, I mean. Not like Arcan!”

Grace couldn’t let that pass. “You have an awfully short memory, Six. He saved your life, last year. And Ledin’s! What more do you want?”

He gave a grunt. “I suppose you are right.”

“I know I am.”

BY THE TIME they took the amorphs outside into the chill morning air it was quite late, and they found several avifauna perched on the ground around the space shuttle, examining it with great interest. Diva was pleased. “See! These ones don’t seem afraid of us!”

“Give them time. They have only just met you.”

Diva stuck her tongue out at him.

“Well they can’t stay,” he said.

They made their way through the hatch. Once they were outside Diva spoke again.

“That was strange, wasn’t it, yesterday? Why do you think the avifauna congregate around the ortholiquid? These aren’t.”

“Because of the heat,” Six said immediately. “It’s obvious, when you think about it. “Orthogel – so I suppose this ortholiquid too – transmits all the excess temperature to its surroundings. So the rock all around the basin was much warmer than the rest of the planet, didn’t you notice? The birds must shelter in there when the winds start up each day.”

“And the surface of the instellite around the ortholiquid was covered with water vapour which was running down the walls into pools – it almost looked like one of those sauna places you have on Coriolis, Diva. I saw a couple of avifauna drinking from one of the natural hollows in the rock. I suppose the difference in temperature condenses out some of the water vapour in the air. I think they use it as a source of water, as well as heat,” added Grace.

“I shall be sad to leave them though,” mused Diva.
 

“I could tell. I thought you were going to say you would stay on the planet.”

“Of course I wasn’t! But they are great, aren’t they? Just think how nice it would be to take some back to Kwaide, or Coriolis.”

“They are pretty dumb, these booby birds,” said Six.

“The only booby around here has two feet and no name!”

“If it weren’t for me we would still be in that awful cavern!”

“That’s true. You had better just hope that Arcan was right about getting over the loss of the three bracelet rings, otherwise we will be stuck in orbit around this planet and our only chance will be to come back down here and mingle with the avians, wondering where our next lunch is coming from.”

“I certainly wouldn’t be wondering that,” scorned Six. “Not with all these booby birds cuddling up to me!”

“How
could
you!” Diva jumped to her feet. “As if we could ever, ever eat one of them.”

“Speak for yourself, lady ethical. You only say that because you have no idea what it is like to be really hungry.”

“I would rather starve!”

Six gave her a skeptical look. “You wouldn’t, if it came to it, but if you want to believe that then do, by all means.”

“So now you think you know better than me, do you?”

“Yes.” Six nodded his head. “Definitely!”

“That is a load of garbage!”

“Oh, very highbrow, Diva!”

“You know I don’t eat meat!”

“You know that stew you liked so much on Kwaide last year? The one Ledin made especially for you and Grace?”

Diva narrowed her eyes, “Yes, what?”

“You know – that time you asked for seconds?”

“Are you trying to tell me that was meat? That’s not true! I would have noticed! You are having me on!” She looked absolutely horrified. Six burst out laughing, pleased that he had managed to take her in. Then she saw something that made her forget about taking revenge on Six.

One of the avians was on the move. It made a few ungainly jumps to take it to the top of the nearest ridge, pushed off hard with its back legs, and then veered in mid glide to turn along the valley and so avoid crashing into the next ridge. It coasted for quite ten seconds, and then flapped its gigantic wings enough to rise slightly into the air again, the back wings stretched out behind it, forming a sort of tepee. As soon as it regained a little height it brought its back legs forward underneath it, and the back wings splayed out horizontally, helping to keep it aloft. The other birds waited for a few moments, and then followed their leader as it headed back to the nearest butte. They were only able to rise a few metres at a time, and in a fairly long distance, but were certainly more efficient than mere gliders would have been.

“Look! They can fly properly after all! Have I time to follow them, to see how far they can fly and where they go?”

Grace grinned. “Sure. Six and I can do the tests with the amorphs. Just don’t get lost!”

Diva had already leapt up onto the ridge. “I won’t! And I will get plenty of samples of the vegetation, don’t worry!”

“Just be back here before the wind gets up!”

“Of course.” Diva took the nearby ridge in a couple of large jumps, and then launched herself off the top into the neighbouring gully, disappearing from sight.

Six turned to Grace. “Time to work,” he said. “For some of us.”

THEY TOOK THE three amorphs they had brought up with them over to the nearest lumps of rock and set up the high definition camera and stand which came with the new space trader. With this, they could slow each frame down, and, hopefully, see what was happening.

It took them quite a few hours to set up everything correctly. Once they were ready, Grace picked up one after the other of the amorphs, and they filmed each creature’s reaction carefully. All three times the amorphs lay uncomplainingly for a few seconds, and then somehow burnt her hand, forcing her to drop them.
 

They couldn’t repeat the flashes of light which they had seen down in the subterranean chamber, and the reason for the heat transfer wasn’t clear when they played back the videos.

“All we can say is that they can use heat,” said Six, looking rather disappointed. “I suppose they use it to defend themselves from predators like the bats.”
 

“Or us!” Grace agreed, bending down again to examine the film more carefully. “I think you must be right, though I can’t see why that should burn us, can you?”

He gave a shrug. He had no further knowledge of even ordinary superfluids, and this was beyond him.
 

Grace pointed down at the amorphs. “What shall we do with them now? Should we take them back to one of the caves?”

“Let them go, of course – what else? And before you say it, NO, you can’t take them home with you. Honestly, between you and Diva …! What’s the betting she will want to take her avifauna home too?”

“Then I will take them back to the lake,” decided Grace. “They don’t look as if they are used to being out here, and they might not be able to find their way home.”

“Grace, they
are the ones that live here on Pictoria!”

“I know, but they’re so small.” She bent down to pick up one of the creatures, which promptly disappeared.

Grace closed her eyes and then opened them again. There were still only two. The other had simply vanished. “Err … Six …”

He turned around to her. “What?”

“One of them just vanished.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, that would mean …” He trailed off himself, as the second amorph disappeared right under his eyes. They both hurried to stare at the third amorph, which duly winked out and vanished. Grace’s mouth had dropped open.
 

“Six! They are like Arcan! They are
quantum
!”

Six was looking around for the visitor. “You’ll have to upgrade these things! You got it wrong!”

The video camera chittered. “I don’t get things wrong,” it said mechanically. “I am not like you!”

Six narrowed his eyes. “No. That is why Arcan transported us directly into the upper atmosphere of a gas giant, I suppose?”

“Sckrssckkskkkkkch!” said the tiny globe.

“I accept your apology.”

“Sckkkrsskk. Skkkkkch!”

THEY WERE SERIOUSLY worried by the afternoon. They had spent the rest of the day cataloguing the geological specimens they had taken, and taking photographs of some of the nearby area. Diva should have been back hours before. They were long past the point of no return, and her late arrival meant that they would all have to spend another night on the planet’s surface. Apart from that, she was cutting it very fine with the wind, which was due to start up in another twenty minutes. Six had worried himself into a foul temper, and Grace was not enjoying the idea of sharing another night’s insomnia with him in this enclosed space.

“I am going out to look for her!” For about the fiftieth time, he got to his feet.

“NO! You can’t. You have no idea where she is, and no chance at all at finding her on foot. The rest of the avifauna left hours ago, and the visitor has already been all over the immediate area. We just have to wait here. Sit down, please!”

Reluctantly, he allowed his legs to bend, and he slumped back against the bulkhead. “How dare she do this to us!” he grunted. “She must have known how worried you would get!”

Grace looked up at him under her brows, but wisely refrained from comment.

“Well she needn’t think she is going to get a hero’s welcome when she does finally deign to arrive! And she is probably risking her neck in the process. She must know we can’t do anything until tomorrow!”