They pursued Yoshi’s idea, making a studied ritual out of accepting the native collection of goods and replacing the stash with one of their own. Then they settled down to watch. When no one and nothing put in an appearance by nightfall, they turned in for the evening and turned on the brace of monitoring vidicams around the site.
The pile of goodies was still there in the weak morning light. But something else was missing. All four of the stockpiles near the cache had been relieved of their bright blue coverings.
While Pinski had his crew replaced the tarps with extras from their shuttle’s supplies, Rhys and company checked the recordings. It had been a foggy night, which is to say a normal one, and shapeless wings of mist trailed across the camera eye or rolled along the ground. Rhys began to realize that virtually anything could be concealed in that.
“What’s that?” Rick asked, pointing a finger to what looked like a field of tiny stars in a slowly swirling nebula. “Fireflies?”
Rhys squinted at them. “Or the local equivalent. We’ve seen them before.”
“Sure. Over the bog. Never in camp.”
“They may travel at night. They’re certainly not our traders. ”
Rick grinned. “Oh, I don’t know. Maybe if a whole bunch of them teamed up…”
Rhys gave him a mock-severe glare. “I suppose you’d like your signature to be on the report that identifies a local insect as the species Tanaka has to do business with?”
Rick turned his attention back to the monitor screen. “Not a chance.” “Not a chance” pretty much described their attempt to ferret any new visual evidence out of the video. There was darkness, fog, more darkness and a flotilla of brightly-lit insects. Rick hit on the idea of turning off the picture and focusing on the sound. That yielded little more—only the sound of plastic clips being sprung and tarpaulins being tugged from their mounts and dragged away through the primordial ooze.
There was nothing for it but to attempt tracking the missing tarps. Under normal circumstances, following a drag trail would have been a simple task, but Bog’s springy soil and general sogginess made it a hit or miss game. There was nothing like a discernible spoor, but only broken fern fronds and irregularly depressed patches of earth. They found the trail; they lost it; they found it again. Then they found a place where it appeared to fork.
“It looks like they split up,” Rick observed. “One tarp was dragged off that way,”—he pointed northeast— “another toward the lake. And from the look of that—” He broke off to examine a third swathe of disturbed ground and foliage. “Two toward the eastern plateau.”
Rhys straightened from his own perusal of the trails. “Roughly, one deeper into the forest, one toward the amphibian population and two toward the reptile village.”
“Coincidence?” asked Yoshi.
“Let’s find out. The simian tree-houses are closest. Let’s try that direction first.” Rhys led on, following the on-again, off-again trail until they came within sight of the nearest tree village. He was scanning the foliage above and before when Rick gave a shout.
“Pay dirt!”
Rhys, Yoshi, and the several members of the site crew who had joined them, hurried in the direction of his voice. He had found one of the missing tarpaulins snagged over a small sapling and a couple of ferns. A handful of small avians bathed themselves in the water that had pooled in its draped folds.
One of the site crew made a move to reclaim the tarp; the birds fled, chittering. Rhys put a hand up to stop the man. “Leave it. They paid for it, after all.”
“But it’s just sitting here, gathering water.”
Rhys dabbled a finger in the pool vacated by the birds, then glanced toward the village where a group of the simian inhabitants watched with mild interest. “Indeed. Yoshi… set up a monitor pack to take in the tarp and its immediate area. Then we’ll be on to the next site.”
“Why bother, Doc?” Rick asked. “Doesn’t this pretty much prove that the simians are our sentients?”
“There are two other trails to follow, Roddy. Trails that may lead to other conclusions entirely.”
They took a couple of swamp buggies to the reptile colony next. Both of the missing tarps were located with ease sheerly by contrast to the earth-toned surroundings. Like the first one, these had been draped in deceptive abandon over protruding objects so that fresh water from the humid atmosphere pooled in the low points. They found the first of the two roughly two-thirds of the way between their base camp and the reptile colony. The other was just outside the village at which Rhys had attempted to barter some time before. And this one was in use—a group of the reptilians were gathered about it sipping in turns from the vivid puddles while one or two avian friends showered beneath drops of spillage. Rhys took notes, Yoshi made a video record, then they continued to the third site.
It took longer to find the fourth tarp. Blazing blue notwithstanding, the lusher colors and foliage around the lake made spotting difficult. But spot it they did, near sunset. Once again it appeared to have been set up to collect fresh water. The five person team from the site crew took their buggy and returned to camp immediately, having no particular desire to bivouac in a true swamp overnight. Rhys hardly noticed their absence. Nor did he particularly notice the presence of Raymond Godwin, who, realizing the importance of recent events, thought it in his best interests to stay close by.
By the time Rhys and his cohorts had set up camp, the rude water collection system had been in use several times by both amphibians and avians. Review of the monitor packs Yoshi had set up at the other tarpaulin sites showed similar use by both simians and reptiles.
“Are they all sentient?” asked Godwin irritably as they sat in the twilight and watched the activity over the lake. “Have we stumbled onto some sort of… of alien co-op?”
Rhys, watching the movements of aquatic life in and around of one of the waterlogged lodges, shook his head absently. “So it would seem. Damn! They communicate with each other—how do we get them to communicate with us?” Rhys fell silent, gazing out over the lake as the alien sun pulled in its green-tinted skirts, plunging the swampy glade into sudden dim twilight. He reached for a camp-light. Yoshi’s hand fell on his arm, sending an inexplicable army of goosebumps marching up and down its length.
“Rhys, look at this.”
“This” proved to be billows of the tiny Bogian fireflies that, though nearly invisible by day were anything but at dusk. It was as if someone had released a cloud of willful sparks; the fireflies danced over the face of the thick water and the water’s surface gleamed in reply. It was a rare and remarkable sight. The mass of insects was so bright, the camp-light seemed superfluous.
Rhys, unable to withdraw his arm, glanced at Yoshi’s face in the spectral glow. Her eyes were bright mirrors of wonder. His, suddenly captive, watched the glow of alien fire in them. “Bioluminescents,” she murmured, “never cease to amaze me. I’ve never seen so many all in one place.”
“Oh, and here come a few more,” said Godwin dryly.
A few more was a gross understatement. A small, compact fleet of the fireflies was flitting through the tall grasses and ferns that bordered the lake. They moved at a leisurely pace, taking time to spiral skyward now and again before coalescing into a puff of green-gold brightness.
“That’s odd…”