There was a grunt on the open comm channel and the nauallis looked away. Gretchen tucked the comp back into its bag with a pleased expression on her face.
"At the university, on my first dig, the pit foreman tried to teach all of us – all the first-term students – how to look for things on the ground. He gave us thirty minutes on a newly mown soccer field to find all the things he'd hidden. Seemed very silly to us – the grass was cut short, the field was almost perfectly flat – where could you hide anything? I managed to find a copy of Schulman's Techniques of Radiocarbon Analysis by tripping over the damned thing."
Gretchen smiled wryly and shrugged her shoulders. "The flatness of the field was an illusion – it wasn't entirely flat, there were little dimples or furrows in the grass – and we felt very, very stupid when he took us around and picked up all the things he'd laid out for us to find. More books, pencils, a belt, a hammer, a walking stick. A whole set of white plastic rulers he'd laid along the goal box lines. It's funny to think, now, how blind we were to things right in front of us."
Anderssen stretched. Her back was tight and sore from assembling sheets of tile all day.
"Most people don't think looking at the ground and searching for things is a skill. But it is." She pointed out into the darkness. "Today, you covered the debris field thrown out by the crash centimeter by centimeter. I really doubt you missed a single bit of metal or ceramic or wire. Did you?"
Hummingbird lifted a hand and made a "turning-over" motion. "I don't think so."
"Two questions come to mind, master Hummingbird." Gretchen felt as if she were approaching a flighty horse or a sleeping, irritable dog. "I can't make you answer them, but it would be helpful if I knew how to help you do this…thing."
The weight of the Nбhuatl's gaze grew heavy and Anderssen started to sweat, feeling as if an exam had suddenly been placed in front of her.
"First, you didn't pick up every piece of debris out there – only some of them. How could you tell there were materials the microfauna couldn't digest? You weren't using a comp – in fact, do you even have a comp with you?"
Hummingbird grunted and there was a hiss as he bit idly at his breathing tube. "There is a comp in the Midge. A powerful one."
"But you didn't use a comp today." Gretchen didn't wait for an answer. "You put the bits and pieces of indigestible debris back down on the ground. Sometimes you just adjusted them a little where they lay." Her heart was beating faster now and a curl of sweat was trickling down the side of her neck. "If I…if I went out there tomorrow morning, with this map, would I be able to find those fragments? I wouldn't be able to, would I? They'd be…invisible. Indistinguishable from the rock and gravel and sand out there."
Another hiss, followed by an almost-sigh. "With your map, you might be able to find some of them. All of this must be done in haste, which always leads to mistakes."
Gretchen stared at the nauallis. He turned his attention to the threesquare wrapper and empty chocolate tube in his hands. Slowly, he folded them up into a tiny ball which he placed in a pocket of his djellaba. Finally, she shifted to keep her legs from going to sleep.
"Will you answer my questions?"
"There are more than two!" Hummingbird replied in a tart voice. "Will you be content to let me be? I agree – I do need your help to escape from this world. I am entirely human and do not wish to be marooned here or consumed by the little creatures in the sand. If you stay out of my way, all of this will go much faster."
"How could you tell which fragments needed to be hidden?" Gretchen leaned forward, her voice rising. "Can you see a difference? Do you have special lens setting on your goggles?"
"No." Hummingbird shook his head in amusement. "This is part of my training."
Gretchen grew still. "Can you teach me how to tell the difference?"
"I will not," the nauallis replied with a dismissive snort. "Though I'm sure you think your career would benefit from such knowledge."
Anderssen settled back on her haunches. "If I could do what you did today, we would have been finished sanitizing this site yesterday and already on our way to Mons Prion. Two can cover more ground than one." She cocked her head to one side, squinting at him. "What if you are hurt? Or injured in an accident? Who will finish the job then? I won't be able to. The evidence of man – of the Empire – will be left scattered all over this world. Ready to be found by whatever you fear will come hunting us."
"I cannot teach you what I know." Hummingbird's voice sounded irritated. "You are a woman and my skills are a man's knowledge. I do not know how to train you properly." He stood up. Gretchen rose as well, a slow steady anger curdling in her gut.
"That is a remarkably stupid thing to say. Why should my gender make a difference?"
"It does," Hummingbird said. "Men and women are…different. They see differently. There is…there is some danger if you interfere with my work. Danger which springs from you. I think, when we get to Prion, we should make camp a distance away, so I can dispose of the relay by myself."
Gretchen shook her head in amazement at his naivetГ©. This must be religious…some artifact of cult practice from centuries ago. It has to be. I'm stuck on this planet with a mentally disturbed Imperial agent. How delightful. "What about this shuttle? How are you going to make it disappear? The smaller pieces I can understand, but most of the hull isn't going to be eaten away. Can you hide the shuttle in plain sight?"
"No." Hummingbird looked up at the dark mass of the shuttle wing. "In truth, I don't want to entirely hide the wreck, just obscure its origin."
"How? By filing off all the serial numbers?" Gretchen asked incredulously.
Hummingbird laughed – a short, sharp bark – and adjusted his breathing mask. "No – that would be a tedious effort. The comp cores were destroyed in the crash and the spaceframe mangled. The rest is only metal and ceramic. By the time we leave this world, most of the wreck will be in even worse shape than it is now. If someone examines the remains, they will draw a different conclusion than you would expect." Gretchen could hear a grim smile in his voice. "They will find a different trail."
"Leading them where?" Anderssen tried not to sound suspicious, but failed.
"Far from Imperial space," Hummingbird said. "To a dead world with no relation to Anбhuac or humanity at all."
"What world?" Gretchen felt almost itchy with curiosity. "Why would a dead world send a shuttle here?"
"The homeworld of the Mokuil is dead now," the nauallis said quietly. "But once they were a powerful, star-faring race. Their ships visited many worlds, even some near this backwater. Here is the truth, Doctor Anderssen: We have little time here and we are in great danger. I am rushing to confuse those who will follow. I hope – and this may be a frail hope, yet it is all we have – they will find the clues I've left behind and they will be led away from human-controlled space. They will go coursing into the dead realm of the Mokuil and find…nothing."
Gretchen stood up, feeling a chill at the undiluted seriousness in the man's voice. "Did the Mokuil find a world like this one? A place where the First Sun people had trod?"
Hummingbird nodded. "We believe so." He raised a hand to forestall another question. "We do not know what they found. All we know is they were powerful and curious and then their civilization was destroyed, leaving only ash and ruin. The best we can do is hide quietly among their corpses, hoping to avoid notice."