Dora shook her head. “There’s nothing there. I dove and checked.”
Esiankiki Salunke was still looking at the water and the lily pads. “No. I mean that the ration packs might have fallen out of the shuttle. Into the surrounding water.”
“Which might have any number of dangerous species in it,” Ben Hwang pointed out.
The voice that rose in polite dissent was that of his assistant, Hirano Mizuki. “We have not seen any so far, and we have been wading to and from the shuttle for over an hour. If any local fauna was going to be attracted by our movement, or by what little of our scent enters the water around the cuffs of our duty-suits, I believe it would have appeared by now.”
Dora screwed up her almost elfin features. “Yeah, but even if you’re right about the food being lost through that hole in the fuselage, that means it could have fallen out at any point along the two kilometers over which we bumped and skittered before coming to a stop.”
“I must disagree.” Nasr Eid looked around the impromptu group which had been attracted by the discussion. “If that hole in the fuselage had been inflicted during the initial impacts, the subsequent shocks should have torn off the shuttle’s entire tail, no?” He glanced around the group.
After some delay, Keith Macmillan agreed. “Almost certainly.”
“And either way, it does no harm to look in the shallows around the wreck,” Hirano finished. “Does it, Captain?”
Caine had let the debate continue because he himself was of two minds on the matter. On the one hand, the armpit-deep water into which the tail of the shuttle had sagged was a complete unknown, and in new environments, the unknown was to be presumed hazardous until proven otherwise. On the other hand, moving on foot with only five days of food meant they were not going to get very far on their own rations. And there was simply no way to know and no reason to presume that any of the local flora or fauna was safe for human consumption. They could cut rations, sure, but that would cut their rate of progress. So if there was any reasonable chance of locating some additional food—“Let’s be clear about this: there is one excellent reason not to search the surrounding water for ration packs. All hypothesizing aside, we just don’t know what might be lurking in there.” Hirano seemed ready to pout. “But our ability to survive and keep moving is determined by our caloric intake. So we’ll take the risk to search for the ration packs but on a volunteer basis only.” Caine removed his filter mask, handed it to Ben Hwang: the air smelled of musk, marsh, and loam, with hints of something akin to a mix of cloves and cinnamon. “Who else will go?” Xue started to put up his hand; Caine shook his head. “Sorry, Mr. Xue. I appreciate your eagerness, but you are not eligible. You are both anchor watch and, for the time being, Dr. Hwang’s attending physician.”
Macmillan kicked at the lichen streaked shore. “I never have gone swimming on an alien world,” he observed. “Might as well go home being able to say that I did, though.”
Salunke, Hirano, and Betul signaled their willingness also.
“Okay,” said Caine, “let’s go fishing.”
“Let’s hope you’re not the bait,” Veriden muttered from her seat on the bank. Just before she frowned and rose to join them as they waded back into the water.
* * *
Caine slogged up the bank, blowing out water that smelled, perversely, akin to fresh cut grass with a hint of coffee.
Ben Hwang squinted at him. “You realize, of course, that you could be killing yourself. The microbes in that water—”
“May finish me, and the rest of us, more quickly than starvation. Yes. But unless we want to trust in fate and an early rescue, I don’t see that we have much choice.”
Xue, glancing at Hwang, nodded faintly. “I have been having that very debate with the honored doctor from the first time you submerged.”
Hwang huffed diffidently. “I very much hope I am wrong. In the meantime, I thank your for your services, Mr. Xue.” Caine did not hear the tone of polite dismissal, but evidently Xue did. With a shallow nod, he rose, walked the short distance to the line of packs that were being restocked according to the group’s most urgent needs, and set about removing most of the useless elements of each combopioneer set. Even when communicating in English, the Chinese retained subtle social and rhetorical codes which allowed persons of different — or the same — station to send a variety of cues. In this case, Hwang’s message had obviously been: “Please leave me alone with Captain Riordan.”
Caine waited until Xue was fully involved in his task. “What’s up, Ben?”
“You asked me to look at the vial Ms. Veriden ostensibly recovered from Danysh’s body. I did.”
Caine glanced at Gaspard. “Have you shared your findings with the ambassador?”
Gaspard continued to watch the heads of various team members rising and sinking beneath the water at the midpoint of the craft. “This is the first moment that we have had any privacy. Please update us, Doctor.” Having found nothing immediately alongside the jagged gash in the vehicle’s side, the searchers were moving further aft, examining the lily pads before resuming their search.
Hwang nodded, winced as he reached into his pocket. “This is what happened when I tried to take a sample.” He produced the vial. The vaguely cubical, fleshy mass at the bottom had been replaced with a brown ooze. “As soon as I uncapped the container, it deliquesced. With extraordinary speed. Gave off a nasty smell; like rotting patchouli. I recapped the vial as quickly as I could.”
“And did that stop the reaction?”
“Not immediately. It slowed, but continued for as long as there was air left in the container.”
Riordan kept his voice low. “That’s what happened to the organism they took out of Nolan Corcoran’s body during his autopsy, just a little more than a year ago.”
Gaspard started but said nothing.
Hwang nodded. “So I recalled. But you reported that the Dornaani — well, Alnduul — told you that they had put that organism in his body. To help his heart.”
That and possibly other things, as well. “Correct.”
Gaspard stared hard at the slime in the vial. “Are you suggesting that the Dornaani might be behind this sabotage? And the attack?”
Caine shook his head firmly. “No. If the Dornaani wanted us dead — which makes no sense — we’d be dead. Most of our sensors can’t even see their ships if they don’t want to be seen. So whatever attacked the Slaasriithi shift-carrier wasn’t their technology. And Danysh’s security screening indicated that he could not have been contacted by the Dornaani beforehand, so I can’t see how they could possibly be behind his sabotage.”
“So is it just a coincidence, then?” Gaspard wondered. “Or could someone else have the ability to geneer an organism that destroys itself after it has been used?”
“It certainly is a possibility, so we can’t conclusively assign this biotechnology to any one of our neighbors’ flags. We only know that something analogous has been employed by the Dornaani. Ben, do you have any idea how this thing”—Riordan aimed his chin at the vial—“manages to deliquesce so quickly? It was already looking pretty sloppy when Veriden found it.”
“If Veriden ‘found’ it,” Hwang corrected with signal emphasis. “Actually, if one’s xenogenetic science is advanced enough, and one chooses the right organism, it would not be so difficult to build a failsafe switch into its basic biology. You could create a hormone or protein that activates when the creature’s autonomous functions stop. Those hormones could work like triggers to initiate changes in the membranes that protect the life-form from its own digestive juices.” He shrugged. “That’s only one possible method of achieving this outcome.” They both looked into the vial; faint misty wisps rose up from the formless goo.