This was a city unlike any she’d seen, an unearthly place of crystal towers and globes and chess piece symmetry.
“It’s Moonlight,” said Collingdale. “We know the thing’ll go after this one.” He gazed at the omega’s image on the overhead.
But if the omega cared, or even noticed, there was no indication. Collingdale paced the bridge for hours, eyes blazing, his jaw clamped tight. He was talking to the cloud, cajoling it, challenging it, cursing it. And then apologizing to Kellie. “I’m sorry,” he said. “It’s goddam frustrating.” Somewhere he’d picked up a wrench and he stalked about with it gripped in one fist, as if he’d use it on the omega.
Kellie watched.
“Nobody’s afraid of you, you bastard.”
THEY WERE GETTING too far away from the cloud, so she cut the image, took the shuttle back on board, swung around behind the omega, and repeated her earlier maneuver, easing the Hawksbill down directly in its path again.
She also suggested they board the shuttle, and run the operation from there.
“No,” he said. “You go if you want. But the shuttle’s too small. Too much lightning out there. It gets hit once, and it’s over.”
She thought about ordering him to comply. She was, after all, the vessel’s captain. But they were running an operation, and that was his responsibility. His testosterone was involved, and she knew he’d resist, refuse, defy her. The last thing she needed at the moment was a confrontation. She relaunched and repositioned the vehicle, making a great show of it.
“I think it’s a mistake,” she said.
He shook his head. “Let’s just get the job done.”
“Have it your way. We’re ready to go.”
Collingdale stared hard at the navigation screen, on which an image of the shuttle floated. “Bill,” he said, “let’s have the cube.”
A box appeared. It was silver, and someone had added the legend BITE ME on one side. Its dimensions were similar to those of the hedgehog and the city.
But it didn’t matter.
Kellie put down a sandwich and some coffee while they waited. Collingdale wasn’t hungry, thanks. He hadn’t eaten all day.
He ran the cube in a fixed position, and he ran it tumbling. They were pulling away from the cloud again, and Kellie watched while Collingdale changed the colors on the visual, from orange, to blue, to pink.
“I guess,” he said finally, “it knows we’re just showing it pictures.”
“I guess.”
“Okay,” he said, “let’s recall the shuttle. We’ll try the kite.”
“Tomorrow,” she said. “We don’t do anything else until we’ve both had some sleep.”
ARCHIVE
We’ll try again in a few hours, Mary. We have to swing around and get back in position. And it’s the middle of the night, so we’re going to shut down for a while. Stupid damned thing. But we’ll get it yet. If Hutchins is right and it really chases the hedgehogs, it’ll chase the kite.
— David Collingdale to Mary Clank
Friday, December 5
BLACK CAT REPORT
Thanks, Ron. This is Rose Beetem, onboard the Calvin Clyde, now about one week from Lookout. Our latest information is that the omega is still on course to attack the Goompahs in nine days. When it does, the Black Cat will be there, and so will everybody in our audience. We’re hoping the Academy team can do something to distract this monster, but we’ll just have to wait to see.
Back to you, Ron—
chapter 37
On the surface near Savakol.
Friday, December 5.
JULIE SAT IN the lander, which was perched on a sea-bound rock too small to describe as an island, and watched the transmissions coming in from the Hawksbill. She followed the flight across the top of the omega, felt a thrill when the hedgehog came to life directly in front of it, held her breath when the ship and the shuttle began their turn to port. She kept Digger and Whit informed, talked with Marge on the Jenkins, and shared her disappointment when the omega failed to take the bait. She had expected the projections to work; had not in fact been able to see any chance they would fail. But there it was.
The next phase of the operation, deploying the kite, would not start for several hours, and Julie was going to be up all night helping Marge. So she kicked her seat back and closed her eyes. Once she woke to see sails passing in the distance, but she knew that if anyone got close, Bill would alert her.
Gulls wheeled overhead. In the background she could hear Bill talking, sometimes with Whit, sometimes with Digger. At Digger’s insistence, he was using his own voice.
Savakol was one of the smaller cities, and there was consequently less walking around to be done. They expected to be finished by midafternoon.
This was Julie’s first mission of consequence. She’d talked to some of the older Academy people before coming to Lookout, and most of them had never done anything that was close to being this significant. Her father had led the mission that first discovered the omegas; and she enjoyed being part of the first effort to rescue someone from them.
Ordinarily, the Lookout flight would have been offered to a senior captain first, but apparently either no one was available or, more likely, nobody was interested in a two-year operation. She’d applied and, to her surprise, gotten the assignment. She’d had mixed feelings when it came through, second thoughts about whether she really wanted to do it. But she was committed and saw no easy way out. Especially when her folks had called and tried to dissuade her. In the end they’d said okay, have your own way, but be careful, stay clear of the cloud.
That seemed a long time ago, and if her social life had fallen off a bit, she was nevertheless feeling good about what she was doing. She’d have preferred staying with the Hawksbill and going after the omega with Collingdale. It would have been nice to go home and tell her father she’d helped shoo the thing off. But this was okay. She was close to the action, and that was really sufficient.
Half asleep, she watched Whit record a boating regatta at a lakefront. He was putting everything he could find into his notebook, capturing ball games, debates in the park, haggling over prices at the merchants’ stalls. The regatta featured half-dressed Goompah females paddling boats while a crowd cheered them on. They all wore green and white, which seemed to have some special significance because green and white banners were on display everywhere.
Digger explained that the seminudity was traditional with these events. He didn’t know why, and no one seemed unduly excited by it. The females did wear wide-brimmed white hats, however, which—to the delight of the crowd—were forever flying off.
Julie drifted into sleep, and dreamed that she was back at the University of Tacoma, listening to somebody lecture about Beowulf, how Grendel represented natural forces, the dark side of life, the things people have no control over. Then she was awake again listening to the sea and the gulls and Digger.
“—Having a problem,” Digger was saying. “Julie, do you hear me?”
“What’s wrong?” she asked, awake and surveying the screens. There were five of them, carrying an image of the omega, a satellite view of the three sailing vessels the Goompahs had sent east, a picture of the rainmaker they’d delivered the previous night, a revolving picture of the open sea around her, and, from an imager carried by Digger—
— A torchlight parade. Of Goompahs.
They were on a beach. Some were wearing robes. Others stood watching.
“I think they’re going to do another sacrifice,” he said.
Julie knew about the Goompah who’d walked into the sea. He’d worn a white robe, and everyone else had worn black. There was a single white robe among the marchers. Worn by—it looked like—an elderly female.
“I’m on my way,” said Whit, breaking in.
“Aren’t you guys together?”
“No,” said Digger. “We split up to cover more ground.”
Black-robed Goompahs were chanting. And a crowd spread across the beach, growing, and joining in. Julie couldn’t understand a word of it.
Digger was frantic: “I’m not going to stand by and watch it happen again.”
Whit had broken into a run. He wasn’t in great shape, and pretty soon he was breathing hard.
Julie should have kept quiet. But she opened a channel. “Hey,” she said, “keep in mind these aren’t people.”
The screen with the torchlight marchers went blank.
“Digger,” said Whit, “you okay?”
“Fine. Don’t have time for the imager.”
“What’s happening?” asked Julie.
“The head Goompah’s making for the water.”
Digger had begun to run across the beach. She could hear his shoes crunching the sand.
Whit gasped that he was close by, and Digger shouldn’t do anything until he got there, and Digger replied that there wasn’t time and he wasn’t going to sit still again.
“Hey,” she said. “This is not my business, but we’re supposed to stay out of it.”
“She’s right.” Whit again. “Religious ceremony.” Blowing hard. “The Protocol.”
“Forget the Protocol.”
“Does she have a sword?” asked Julie.
“They have a javelin. And she’s in the water. Up to her hips. Doesn’t look as if she can swim a stroke.”
“I see them,” said Whit. “Javelin’s in the air.”
“Julie.” Digger’s voice. “How soon can you get here?”
Julie’s harness was descending around her shoulders. She started punching buttons. “I’m just over the horizon.”
“You got a tether handy?” asked Digger.
“Bill,” she said, “let’s go. What’s the tether situation?”
“There’s an ample supply of cable in the locker.”
“Good. Activate the lightbender.”
“Handing the javelin off,” said Whit.
She could hear Digger charging into the water. “Get here,” he said, “as quickly as you can.”
SHE LIFTED OFF the rock, staying only a few meters above the surface, and turned toward shore. It was early afternoon, a gray, depressing day, the sun hidden in a slate sky. The mountains that lay immediately west of Savakol dominated the horizon.