No need to think of that until the time came. He hooked the lenses back on his belt.
"Back to report?" Fylh began to lower himself over the edge of the pinnacle.
"Back to report," agreed Kartr soberly.
2. Green Hills
" — a stream bed with vegetation and indication of better land to the north. Request permission to break out one of the sleds and explore in that direction."
It was disconcerting to report to a blank mask of bandages, surprisingly difficult, Kartr found. He stood at attention, waiting for the Commander's response.
"And the ship?"
Sergeant Kartr might have shrugged, had etiquette permitted. Instead he answered with some caution.
"I'm no techneer, sir. But she looks done for."
There it was — straight enough. Again he wished he could see the expression on the face under that roll upon roll of white plasta-skin. The quiet in the lounge was broken only by the breath, whistling and labored, moving in and out of Mirion's torn lips. The pilot was still unconscious. Kartr's wrist ached viciously and, after the clean air outside, the smog in the ship seemed almost too thick to stomach.
"Permission granted. Return in ten hours — " But that answer sounded mechanical, as if Vibor were now only a recording machine repeating sounds set on the wire long ago. That was the correct official order to be given when the ship planeted and he gave it as he had so many countless times before.
Kartr saluted and detoured around Mirion to the door. He hoped that there was a sled ready to fly. Otherwise, they'd foot it as far as they could.
Zinga hovered outside, his pack on his shoulders, Kartr's dangling from one arm.
"The port sled is free. We've fueled it with cubes from the ship's supply — "
They had no right to do that ordinarily. But now it was sheer folly not to raid the stores when the Starfire would never use them again. Kartr crawled over the battered hatch to the now open berth of the sled. Fylh was already impatiently seated behind the windbreak, testing the controls.
"She'll fly?"
Fylh's head, the crest flat against the skull like some odd, stiff mane of hair, swiveled and his big reddish eyes met the sergeant's. The cynical mockery with which the Trystian met life was clear in his reply.
"We will hope so. There is, of course, a fair chance that within seconds after I set us off we will only be dust drifting through the air. Strap down, dear friends, strap down!"
Kartr folded his long legs under him beside Zinga, and the Zacathan fastened the small shock web across them both. Fylh's claws touched a button. The craft swept sidewise out of the hull of the Starfire, slowly, delicately until they were well away from the ship, then it arose swiftly with Fylh's usual disregard for the niceties of speed adjustment. Kartr merely swallowed and endured.
"To the river and then along it, hover twenty feet up — "
Not that Fylh needed any such order. This was the sort of thing they had done before. Kartr edged forward an inch or two to the spy-port on the right. Zinga was already at the similar post on the left.
It seemed only seconds before they were over water, looking down into the tangled mass of bright green which clothed its banks. Automatically Kartr classified and inventoried. It was not necessary this time to make detailed notes. Fylh had triggered the scanner and it should be recording as they flew. The motion of the sled sent air curving back against their sweating bodies. Kartr's nostrils caught scents — some old, some new. The life below was far down the scale of intelligence — reptile, bird, insect. He thought that this desert country supported little else. But they did have two bits of luck to cling to — that this was an Arth planet and that they had landed so close to the edge of the wasteland.
Zinga scratched his scaled cheek reflectively. He loved the heat, his frill spread to its greatest extent. And Kartr knew that the Zacathan would have much preferred to cross the burning sands on his own feet. He was radiating cheerful interest, almost, the sergeant thought a little resentfully, as if he were one of the sleek, foppish officers of a Control or Sector base being escorted on a carefully supervised sightseeing tour. But then Zinga always enjoyed living in the present, his long-yeared race had plenty of time to taste the best of everything.
The sled rode the air smoothly, purring gently. That last tune-up they had given her had done the trick after all. Even though they had had to work from instructions recorded on a ten-year-old repair manual tape. She had been given the last of the condensers. They had practically no spare parts left now —
"Zinga," Kartr demanded suddenly of his seat mate. "Were you ever in a real Control fitting and repair port?"
"No," replied the Zacathan cheerfully. "And I sometimes think that they are only stories invented for the amusement of the newly hatched. Since I was mustered into the service we have always done the best we could to make our own repairs — with what we could find or steal. Once we had a complete overhaul — it took us almost three months — we had two wrecked ships to strip for other parts. What a wealth of supplies! That was on Karbon, four — no, five space years ago. We still had a head mech-techneer in the crew then and he supervised the job. Fylh — what was his name?"
"Ratan. He was a robot from Perun. We lost him the next year in an acid lake on a blue star world. He was very good with engines — being one himself."
"What has been happening to Central Control — to us?" asked Kartr slowly. "Why don't we have proper equipment — supplies — new recruits?"
"Breakdown," replied Fylh crisply. "Maybe Central Control is too big, covers too many worlds, spreads its authority too thin and too far. Or perhaps it is too old so that it loses hold. Look at the sector wars, the pull for power between sector chiefs. Don't you think that Central Control would stop that — if it could?"
"But the Patrol — "
Fylh trilled laughter. "Ah, yes, the Patrol. We are the stubborn survivals, the wrongheaded ones. We maintain that we, the Stellar Patrol, crewmen and rangers, still keep the peace and uphold galactic law. We fly here and there in ships which fall to pieces under us because there are no longer those with the knowledge and skill to repair them properly. We fight pirates and search forgotten skies — for what, I wonder? We obey commands given to us over the signature of the two Cs. We are fast becoming an anachronism, antiques still alive but better dead. And one by one we vanish from space. We should all be rounded up and set in some museum for the planet-bound to gawk at, objects with no reasonable function — "
"What will happen to Central Control?" Kartr wondered and set his teeth as a lurch of the sled stabbed his arm against Zinga's tough ribs and jarred his wrist.
"The galactic empire — this galactic empire," pronounced the Zacathan with a grin which told of his total disinterest in the matter, "is falling apart. Within five years we've lost touch with as many sectors, haven't we? C.C. is just a name now as far as its power runs. In another generation it may not even be remembered. We've had a long run — about three thousand years — and the seams are beginning to gap. Sector wars now — the result — chaos. We'll slip back fast — probably far back, maybe even into planet-tied barbarianism with space flight forgotten. Then we'll start all over again — "
"Maybe," was Fylh's pessimistic reply. "But you and I, dear friend, will not be around to witness that new dawn — "