"Why?"
"Because I know some of their secrets."
"What kind of secrets?"
"How they maintain their grip over the people of Clarion."
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50
Paul decided to let that rest for a while. "We should level with Sabre. Tell him what he wants to know so he can protect you."
"Nobody can protect me from the Holy Order." Paul sipped again from the cup. "Do you have the stream coordinates for Clarion?"
Dorland shook his head.
"Then how can we get there?"
"We'll go with Selmer."
"He's already gone."
"Selmer wouldn't give up that easily. He'll be back tonight. Tell Jeffrey to watch for him in the auditorium and let him know I want to talk to him."
"We'll never see him again. He said you had just one chance."
"He'll be back."
Chapter Five
PAUL FELT A BRIEF INSTANT OF VERTIGO WHEN
the scoutcraft broke out of the stream after the final skip. The bank of vidscreens above the control console flickered, and the screen in the center cleared with a view of a brownish-green planet.
In the pilot's chair beside him, Selmer Ogram gave the drive system a final command and leaned back to look at the screen. "Home at last!" He looked over his shoulder at Dorland Avery in the rear passenger compartment. "Look familiar?" Dorland offered no response. He was hunched in one corner of the wide seat, staring up at the vidscreen. His face was expressionless. He had been immersed in his own thoughts during the entire trip.
Ogram turned back to the console. "Well, it looks good to me."
Paul had fervently hoped they would never see Selmer Ogram again after his departure through the window of Dorland's dressing room. But
Ogram had returned to the auditorium for the 51
§2 William Greenleaf
evening show just as Dorland had predicted. Fresh clothing and a shaved face had changed his appearance enough to get him past the guardsmen at the door, but Jeffrey Hanes had found him easily in the balcony.
Ogram hadn't seemed at all surprised by
Borland's change of heart. He wasn't happy at the prospect of taking an extra passenger, but Paul made himself a nuisance until Ogram gave in. Paul had wanted Jeffrey Hanes to come, too, but Ogram stood his ground in refusing that request.
In real distance. Clarion was less than a hundred light-years from the planet Fynnland, but the trip had taken a long and tiring six hours. For obvious reasons, Ogram couldn't file the skip sequence with NavSec, and had been forced to use mass-plus planets and stellar objects for skip points instead of the UNSA sector stations that would have provided a shorter route.
Which meant that Paul had had a full six hours to wonder what awaited him and Dorland on Clarion. We need your help. The situation at home has gone from bad to impossible. Sabastian wants you to come back.
That had been Ogram's message to Dorland in Dorland's dressing room—that and a few vague statements about the Holy Order and a man named High Elder Brill and something called the Sons of God. Paul had questioned him during the trip, but Ogram had refused to elaborate.
"You'll find out when we get there," he had said. But he had freely given Paul information about the planet itself, and it was clear that Erich Frakes was right about at least one thing: Clarion was a ninety-nine. That was UNSA jargon for a planet that had the atmosphere and water and other ingredients necessary to support human life without artificial—and expensive—help. According to Ogram, the climate was mild in the area where the
CLARION 53
colony had taken root. The animals were small and docile, although none had been domesticated. Edible, too—but Paul wasn't surprised to learn that nearly everyone on Clarion was a vegetarian. That was typical on colonized worlds where Terrandescended livestock weren't bred. Humans had always been squeamish about eating alien flesh. Ogram had mentioned one thing that struck Paul as an oddity: the planet's entire population still lived in a city at the site of the original colony. The sector ship Vanguard had put them down two
hundred years ago, and they had never strayed in all that time. Clarion had never been mapped or explored.
Beep.
Paul looked over as Ogram pressed a combination of keys on the console. Luminous lines of figures built across the readout screen. After a moment he pressed another console key. Beep. The screen changed.
"Whoops."
Ogram pressed another key and the screen
changed again, accompanied by another tone from the console.
"Damn!" He leaned over to consult 'a sheet of stiff white paper that was clipped to the console beside him. Dark-lettered notes were scrawled across it.
"Trouble?" Paul asked. He realized suddenly how isolated they were. If something went wrong with the stasis drive or control system . . .
"Nothing I can't fix," Ogram muttered. He searched the keypad and punched another key, then grunted with satisfaction when the screen lighted with a new message. He glanced at Paul and shrugged his shoulders apologetically. "Guess I should've gotten more hands-on practice." Paul stared at him. "You should have—
practiced? Don't you know how to fly this thing?" 54 William Greenleaf
Ogram gave him a hurt look. "Of course. I spent a week studying the manual." He waved at the rows of data that still scrolled across the screen. "I may have missed some of the details, though." Paul realized with a sinking feeling that Ogram was serious. The flight from the surface of Fynnland to the skip zone had been rough, but Paul had attributed that to the condition of the aging scoutship. Now he wasn't so sure. Skipping through the stream was handled by the drive engines and navigation computers, but reaching the surface of the planet below would require piloting skills . . .
"You learned to fly from a manual?"
"Sure." Ogram grinned. "We had to translate from old Espana. Some of the pages were in pretty bad shape, but I think we got most of it." He searched the control panel, jabbed at something with a forefinger. "See, you push this blue button and wait for something called translation."
"Transition," Paul corrected. He had sat in the front with Dorland's pilot often enough to pick up some of the jargon. During transition, the stream driver switched control to the stasis system for atmospheric flight.
"Whatever." Ogram frowned at the console when nothing happened. He leaned over to consult the card beside the readout screen. "Oh yeah, this light has to be green. To make it green you push these three switches up." He demonstrated. "Now we have to wait for the computer to beep, then we'll be ready to go."
Paul turned around in his seat to look into the rear compartment. Borland's head rested against the back of the seat, and his eyes were closed. Possibly asleep—Paul knew the last few hours had taken a lot out of him. More likely he was meditating. That was Dorland's way of sorting out his feelings. Paul had learned soon after they met that Dorland was subject to wide mood swings. Now he
CLARION 55
was somber and uncommunicative, drawn deeply into himself.
Beep.
Paul's thoughts were disturbed again by the sound from the console. He turned around as system lights winked from amber to green. Ogram punched out an instruction on the keypad, then nudged the drive control panel out of the way and unfolded the flight wheel. He consulted the manual again, then touched one of the hand controls. The stasis engines roared and the craft shot forward, throwing Paul back into his seat.
"Take us an hour or so to get down," Ogram said. If we live that long, Paul thought, rearranging himself in the seat.
Ogram gestured at the vidscreens. "Beautiful, isn't she?"