"I have told nothing," she signed indignantly. "He is not stupid. He sees negative indications."
Smooth Hand shook his head, and turned to Keff. "Too many problems, too little funding."
"Too many natural resources are used up," Snap Fingers added. "We have few heavy metals. Send to colonies in centuries past, get no return." He chattered a complex series of descending notes which Keff didn't need IT's help to translate as a losing program. There were outcries of protest, and the brawn kept turning his head to see everyone who wanted his attention.
"Don't think of it in terms of immediate return," Tad Pole complained, pursing his wide lips distastefully. He turned to the crowd. "See here, my friends, you have no respect for the world as it was fifty years ago, when we had a working program. You're ignorant of your own history. So many strides forward were made as a result over hundreds of years of space study! You forget your past!"
"You do not look to the real future! Program failed. Bad use of funds, of the best minds!" signed Snap Fingers. "I and other members of Cridi Inward see no reason to continue burying good food under the swamp. It's a waste of time. Equipment doesn't work properly."
Big Voice took immediate umbrage. "The equipment is properly made and maintained!"
"Well, we keep seeing anomalies on scopes, like other spacecraft," Snap Fingers said, seeing that he had offended the blustering councillor.
"Well, now we know that those could be true," Smooth Hand signed, with a polite nod to Keff.
"That is true. Yet it does not change facts." With less bombastic gestures, Snap Fingers continued. "Our economy could not support any more failures."
"Yes!" Smooth Hand said. "We would like to recoup losses from space program."
"And that is why laying sole claim to Sky Clear is important to Big Voice," Narrow Leg's daughter said, making a distasteful moue. Big Voice emitted his shriek of protest once again, this time with a five-times multiplier attached. Keff winced.
"There is nothing wrong with honest profit!" Big Voice said.
"If profit does not come at the expense of lives," Snap Fingers retorted.
"Gentles, gentles," Keff said, and held up his hands, "please. Facts? I know nothing of your recent history."
Through the confused mixture of Cridi music and gesture, Keff managed to discover that the last successful launch of a spacecraft had been fifty years past. Several tries had been made thereafter, but no vehicle had managed to clear the system since then.
"Have received no messages, no artifacts from other colonies," Narrow Leg added, spreading his hands at shoulder level. "Abandoned? Destroyed? Technological setbacks like Sky Clear? We do not know."
"Three launches, three expensive disasters," indicated Snap Fingers. "I blame the equipment."
"As do I," Narrow Leg said.
"No," Big Voice said emphatically. "Not in the last one! It must be because of radiation or ion storms or some unknown natural menace!"
Narrow Leg turned to Keff. "Our space program is crippled. There is something wrong with the drives, or the shielding, that it cannot carry a craft swiftly enough out of the way of space storms, or protect them well. Once out of range of the Core of Cridi, have to rely upon actual machinery, and it has been shoddy."
"How dare you?" Big Voice demanded, embarrassed.
Narrow Leg pointedly turned his back on the other. "The technicians who built can ignore small faults, like badly fitting seals or insufficiently tightened components. Astronauts don't know about them, can't guard using their own devices because range of power is limited to atmosphere of Cridi. Fault-boom! Again and again, just out of atmosphere."
"Storms have become more virulent," Snap Fingers said. "Can we trade with the humans for better technology? We have much to offer."
"There is nothing wrong with the technology!" Big Voice said furiously.
"No," Narrow Leg said, coolly, watching the yellow-brown Cridi swell until he looked as if he might pop. "Only with the construction management."
Keff, ever the diplomat, wanted to follow upon Snap Fingers's suggestion. This was much more of what he hoped would happen in council. "Yes, of course we'd be happy to offer machinery or advice, or whatever you need. I know we'd love to exchange goods and ideas with you. We are fascinated with your power control system. We've never seen anything like it. Our, er, brothers and sisters on Ozran have learned to use it, and I know our government has shown an interest in what we've told them."
"And you?" Big Eyes asked.
"Well, at present I can't use it," Keff said, trying to explain his lack of the necessary telekinetic spark.
"Modification?" One frog signed quickly to another. The topic spread around the room, even superseding the discussions in which the three Ozranians were involved.
The room filled with the cheeping of formulae and wild signing of hands.
"There is virtue in the notion of trade, Core technology for superior Central Worlds spacecraft," Smooth Hand said, stroking his jaw with his long fingers.
Big Voice protested once more, but his argument was losing ferocity as he was ignored by everyone around him. "No, not superior! I tell you, it is the ion storms!"
"Sounds unlikely to me," Carialle told Keff, after running her telemetry. "I didn't notice any undue amounts of radiation, or that much floating debris on the outskirts of this system. I'll contact Central Worlds about ion storms in this area. Warn the council I'm about to launch a message probe. Ask them to let it out of atmosphere. I don't want it returned to sender."
Keff conveyed Carialle's information. At once, there was a fresh flurry of argument, which Smooth Hand quickly put down.
"Of course you may communicate with your government," he said genially. "Convey our compliments, and thank them for their assistance."
Tad Pole perked up. "I should still like to witness the launch of your message rocket," he said. "In fact, may I not have a tour of your ship?"
"Tell him he's very welcome," Carialle said. "I'll tidy up. I might even bake a cake."
"I'll tell him," Keff said. "Cari, do you know what it means that the Cridi have lacked a space program for the last fifty years?"
"Yes," Carialle said with such gusto that Keff winced. "Nothing out of system in all that time. It means the Cridi weren't my salvage squad. I can't tell you how glad that makes me. That only leaves me wondering all the more who they were."
"Don't worry about that now, Cari. We're doing so well with the Cridi. Let's tackle one problem at a time. When this is all shipshape and Bristol fashion, to everyone's satisfaction, I still say we should go out looking for your boojums."
"You bet we will," Carialle said. "But I'm so relieved about the Cridi, I love them all, even that squeaking blowhard, Big Voice."
"I'll tell him so, although I don't think he'll appreciate your description very much."
"Well, think of some diplomatic way to tell him. I'm recording the message to CW now. See you in a few nanos."
Chapter Five
Before he left for the ship with Narrow Leg, Keff collected Tall Eyebrow and the others. Smooth Hand, seeing that all were now on fire to discuss exchanges with the Central Worlds, adjourned the meeting. Tall Eyebrow seemed as if he welcomed the rescue. All four outworlders were grateful to leave, but had to promise to appear in the great hall again in the morning to continue the discussion on citizenship. Narrow Leg led Keff and the Ozranians out of the damp hall and into what was left of the day. It had been raining hard. The air still smelled like a gym locker, but Keff took a deep breath, glad to expand his lungs.
Sunshine glittered on the ornamental paving surrounding the Main Bog building, picking up light from bright specks of mica or quartz. The sculpted, multicolored granitelike rock felt rough and uneven under his boot soles, but the visual effect was one of undulating ocean waves, most soothing to the eye. Design was important to the Cridi. Keff appreciated their painstaking attention to detail. Plants sprouted out of pillar tops and along the guardrails of ramps. Tall buildings containing hundreds of apartment flats poked up through the thick trees, looking as though they had evolved organically themselves. Since all Cridi had access to Core power and therefore could fly, entrances to the flats were as likely to be up as down: on protruding ledges of smooth stone, in sculpted baskets like giant nests, carved like a child's slide through a miniature waterfall. Mosaics seemed to have been formed by stratification in the rock walls instead of being imposed upon them by artistic hands. Huge golden insects with multiple wings like living jewels hovered over V-shaped blossoms in the many planters, sipping nectar. Keff half-expected one of the Cridi to dart out a long tongue and devour one.