Dinosaurus Planet Survivors
- Автор: Маккефри Энн
- Серия: Dinosaur Planet #2
- Язык: английский
- Жанр: Научная фантастика
Электронная книга - «Dinosaurus Planet Survivors». Краткое содержание книги:
“Only Kai and I knew that.”
“Bakkun might have guessed,” Kai said slowly.
“By what we didn’t say rather than what we did?” Varian asked. Kai nodded.
“We ought,” Kai went on, “to have invented a message from the ARCT.”
Lunzie snorted. “I don’t think that would have kept the heavyworlders satisfied once they’d had their bloody rest day… and tasted animal protein. Brings out the worst in them every time.”
A taut silence ensued, broken as Varian shuddered, then said, “But Divisti’s garden produced sufficient vegetable protein to support twice as many heavyworlder appetites.”
“I’d say they waited,” Lunzie began, picking at her lower lip for a moment before she continued. “They would have tried to locate the shuttle and the power packs which young Bonnard so cleverly concealed. They knew Kai’d sent out some sort of message, before Paskutti smashed the comunit? Well, then, they’d have had to wait to see if assistance arrived. They would have had to assume also that we’d rig some sort of distress beacon to attract rescue, even if it did take the Thek forty-three years to bother to investigate.”
Varian broke in excitedly. “You don’t suppose that they could have rigged an alert for a landing?”
“No way.” Portegin shook his head violently. “Not with the equipment they had. Remember it was replacement parts they took with the stores, not full units.”
“Yes, but Aygar spoke of iron mines and they’ve been working a forge.”
Portegin kept shaking his head. “Bakkun was a good all-round engineer but even with all the matrices I’ve got, I couldn’t make that sort of a scan system, not planet wide, and that’s what they’d need.”
“So,” Kai said in summation, “they waited to be sure ARCT wasn’t making the scheduled pick-up. They also waited until they could be reasonably certain our distress signal was unheard and then too weak. Then they sent the homing capsule to one of the Heavyworld colonies inviting settlers and technicians.”
“And if a colony ship, large enough to transport enough people and supplies is to make the journey profitable, they’d have to build a landing grid,” Triv exclaimed.
“Which explains why they left the very good settlement they had in the secondary camp,” Varian cried.
“And why Aygar chooses to meet you there rather than at their new site,” Lunzie finished with a sour grimace. “Such an undertaking also explains forty-three years.”
“Even for heavyworlders, it would take years to clear this sort of jungle and hold it back while they got a grid in place,” said Portegin with some awe.
“Probably with a homing device built into the acknowledging capsule to confirm arrangements and approximate time of arrival,” Triv added.
The group reflected on this solution with no joy.
Triv broke the silence. “I’d opt for us to come from a Fleet ship, a cruiser. They make periodic reports to a Sector HQ and no one in his right mind messes with a cruiser.”
“Would Aygar know that?” Varian asked facetiously.
“No, but the captain of the incoming ship would,” Triv replied.
“And a search party could have been set down here to check on the distress call while the cruiser goes on to the Ryxi and the Thek planets.”
“Now that our identity is established,” Kai said with an attempt at heartiness, “I suggest we transfer to the campsite built for Dimenon and Margit. If it still exists.”
“Don’t see why it wouldn’t,” Triv said. “The heavyworlders wouldn’t have wasted belt power dismantling and transporting it.”
“Wouldn’t we go to the original site?” asked Portegin.
“We did,” Varian replied, “but Kai got attacked there didn’t he? So we move to the second auxiliary camp.” She rose and stretched. “And we’d also better fill in the holes of the vine screen. Then the sleepers will be safe.”
The next morning, Triv took one of the smaller sleds to investigate the secondary camp which had been sighted for Dimenon and Margit to use as a base for their explorations of the southwestern part of Ireta’s main continent. Assisted by Varian and Lunzie, Portegin gathered the matrices removed from the other two small sleds and the undamaged units in the shuttle. He was optimistic that with these components, he could rig working comunits in the two small sleds and the four-man sled, plus an ordinary homing beacon, consonant with their role as a rescue team from a Space Fleet cruiser.
Lunzie proved the deftest in making minute welds with the heated tip of a surgical probe, all the while muttering about the misuse of her precious medical equipment on inanimate objects.
Varian’s usefulness to the project was short lived. She was unable to limit herself to controlled dexterity for long, and announced that she was better suited to shifting vines than matrices. It was hard, sweaty labor, hampered by Ireta’s sudden squalls and then steamy sun heat. The vines clung with tenacious webs of sticky fibers to the rock, so she hacked away, pried loose, and tugged at the tendrils to rig a full curtain across the entrance. At the same time, she rigged fiber ropes to pull the vines back to allow for the entry and exit of the sleds. She coaxed additional new vine tendrils across the chasm, setting them to fill in. At the rate vegetation grew on Ireta, the cave ought to be densely screened in a matter of weeks.
Triv returned with the welcome news that the other camp had survived, although it had become the residence of creatures large and small. However the fortified posts were functional so that, once cleared of intruders, the camp would be habitable.
Lunzie made good use of the vines left over from Varian’s camouflage trimming and created emergency rations from the vegetable matter and more light blankets from the residual fibers. These were packed into the two smaller sleds while Kai was made comfortable in the larger. Lunzie made a last check on the sleepers and set the time release for additional sleep vapor. As Triv pulled back the vine curtain, using Varian’s cords, the three sleds emerged just as the evening rain began to splash down. They landed briefly on the cliff, while Triv joined them and took over the controls of one sled from Lunzie who then joined Varian and Kai in the larger.
As Varian lifted, she searched the leaden skies. “No giffs!”
“They’ve sense enough to come in out of that rain,” Lunzie said, drying her hands as she looked at the raindrops battering the canopy.
“They followed me, you know.”
“So you told me. Not superstitious, are you, Varian?” the medic asked with an ironic chuckle.
“Enough to prefer their company to their absence.”
“They stood guard a long time,” Kai said in his husky voice.
“You’re both allowing them far more intelligence than they deserve.”
Varian turned her head to give Kai a broad grin which he answered. Then the rain squall quickened and she had to keep her attention on flying for the rest of the journey.
Although Triv and Portegin had arrived in advance of the four-man sled, Kai was struck by the eeriness of landing in the gloom of Iretan twilight at a campsite which he knew had been uninhabited for over four decades. It seemed to have slept, unchanged, as they had.
Rationally, he knew that part of its lack of change was due to the rocky site, but the dome which Dimenon and Margit had set up was only slightly browned by wind and weather. A small fire burned on the hearth outside. It’s light was cheering and it’s smoke a partial deterrent to insects until the force field could be powered up. The pack was quickly connected and crackled immediately with tiny spurts as insects were vaporized. Small bits of char drifted down as Kai stiffly made his way from the sled to the dome. He was heartily disgusted with his weakness and kept to himself the fact that he still had no feeling at all in the areas where the fringe had sucked deepest. He couldn’t prevent furtive glances for fringes lurking beyond the veil. He worried briefly if the creatures could be stopped by the force field. Of course they could-Force fields had even held back the stampede of the herbivores… for a time.