“LOOK, JIM, I just can’t find any other logical explanation for the destruction of the probes and these.” Ezra Keroon waved a handful of probe pics, so blurred that no detail could be seen. “One, maybe two probes could malfunction. But I’ve sent off seven! And Sallah—” Ezra paused a moment, his face expressing the sorrow he still felt at her loss. “Sallah told us that there had been no damage report for the probe garage. Then we have the Mariposa. It did not hit the surface. Something hit it just about the same time one of the probes went bang!”
“So you prefer to believe that something down on the surface prevents inspection?” Jim Tillek asked wryly. He leaned back in his seat, easing shoulder muscles taut from hours of bending and peering through magnifiers. “I can’t credit that explanation, Ez. C’mon, man. How can anything on that planet be functioning? The surface has been frozen. It can’t have thawed appreciably in the time it’s been swinging in to Rukbat.”
“One does not have such regular formations on any unpopulated surface. I don’t say they can’t be natural. They just don’t look natural. And I certainly won’t make any guesses about what sort of creature made them. Then look at the thermal level here, here, and here.” Ezra jabbed a finger at the pics he had been studying. “It’s higher than I’d anticipated on a near-frozen surface. That much we got from the one probe that sent data back.”
“Volcanic action under the crust could account for that.”
“But regular convex, not concave, formations along the equator?”
Jim was incredulous. “You want to believe that plutonic planet could be the source of this attack?”
“I like that better than substantiating the Hoyle-Wickramansingh theory, I really do, Jim.”
“If Avril hadn’t taken the gig, we could find out what that nebulosity is. Then we’d know for sure! Hoyle-Wickramansingh or little frozen blue critters.” Jim’s tone was facetious.
“We’ve the shuttles,” Ezra said tentatively, tapping his pencil.
“No fuel, and there isn’t a pilot among those left that I’d be willing to trust to do such a difficult retrieval. You’d have to match its orbital speed. I saw the dents on the Mariposa’s hull myself where the defense shields failed. Also, we didn’t bring down any heavy worksuits that would protect a man out in a meteor storm. And if your theory’s correct, he’ll get shot down.”
“Only if he gets too close to the planet,” Ezra went on cautiously. “But he wouldn’t have to, to get a sample of the trail. If the trail is nothing but ice, dirt, and rock, the usual cometary junk, we’d know then that the real menace is the planet, not the trail. Right?”
Jim eyed him thoughtfully. “It’d be dangerous either way. And there’s no fuel to do it anyhow!” Jim opened his arms in a gesture of exasperation.
“There is fuel.”
“There is?” Jim sat bolt upright, eyes wide with surprise.
Ezra gave him a wry smile. “Known only to a chosen few.”
“Well!” Jim made his eyebrows twitch, but he grinned to show that he took no offense at having been excluded. “How much?”
“With a thrifty pilot, enough for our purpose. Or maybe, if we can find Kenjo’s main cache, more.”
“More?” Jim gawked. “Kenjo’s cache? He scrounged fuel?”
“Always was a clever driver. Saved it from his drops, Ongola said.”
Jim continued to stare at Ezra, amazed at Kenjo’s sheer impudence. “So that’s why Kimmer’s nosing about the Western Barrier Range. He’s out trying to find Kenjo’s cache. For his own purposes or ours?”
“Not enough to get anyone’s hopes up, mind you,” Ezra continued, holding up a warning hand. “Maybe it’s not too bad a thing that Tubberman sent off the homer. Because if it is the planet, we need help, and I’m not too proud to ask for it.” Ezra grimaced. “Not that Kimmer said anything to anyone when he made off with the big sled and enough concentrated food and power packs to stay lost for years. Joel Lilienkamp was livid that anyone would steal from his Store. We don’t even know how Stev found out about Kenjo’s hoard. Except that he knew how much fuel the Mariposa had in her tanks eight years ago. So he must have figured out someone had saved fuel back when Kenjo made those reconnaissance flights.” Then, as Jim opened his mouth, he added, “Don’t worry about Kimmer taking off even if he finds fuel. Ongola and Kenjo disabled the shuttles some time back. Kimmer doesn’t know where we stash the fuel sacks here. Neither do I.”
“I’m honored—by your confidence and the cares you have so carefully laid on my bowed shoulders.”
“You walked in here three days ago and volunteered your services,” Ezra reminded him.
“Three days? Feels like three years. I wonder if my skimmer’s been serviced.” He rose and stretched again until the bones in his spine and joints readjusted with audible clicks. “So, shall we take this mess—” He gestured to the mass of photos and flimsies neatly arranged on the work surface. “—to the guys who have to figure out what we do with it?”
Paul and Emily listened, saying nothing, until both men had finished expressing their conflicting viewpoints.
“But when the planet is past us in the next eight or nine years, Threadfall will stop,” Paul said, jumping to a conclusion.
“Depends on whose theory you favor,” Jim said, grinning with good-natured malice. “Or how advanced Ezra’s aliens are. Right now, if you buy his theory, they’re keeping us at arm’s length while the Thread softens us up.”
Paul Benden brushed away that notion. “I don’t credit that, Ezra. Thread was ineffective on the previous try. But the Pluto planet could be defending itself. I could live with that much of your theory based on the evidence.”
Emily looked squarely at Jim. “How long will this gunge fall if it’s from your cometary tail?”
“Twenty, thirty years. If I knew the length of that tail, I could give a closer estimate.”
“I wonder if that’s what Avril meant,” Paul said slowly, “by ‘it’s not the . . .’ Did she mean that it wasn’t the planet we had to fear, but the tail it brought from the Oort cloud?”
“If she hadn’t taken the Mariposa, we’d have a chance of knowing.” Emily’s voice had a sharp edge.
“We still do,” Ezra said. “There’s enough fuel to send a shuttle up. Not as economical a vehicle as the Mariposa but adequate.”
“Are you sure?” Paul’s expression was taut as he reached for a calc pad on which he worked several equations. He leaned back, his face pensive, then passed the pad over to Emily and Jim. “It might just be possible.” He caught and held Emily’s gaze. “We have to know. We have to know the worst we can expect before we can plan ahead.”
Ezra raised a warning hand, his expression wary. “Mind you, they can’t get close to the planet! We’ve lost seven probes. Could be mines, could be missiles—but they blow up.”
“Whoever goes will know exactly what and how big the risks are,” Paul said.
“There’s risk enough in just going up,” Ezra said gloomily.
“I hate to sound fatuous, but surely there’s one pilot who’d take the challenge to save this world,” Paul added.
Drake Bonneau was approached first. He thought the scheme was feasible, but he worried about the risk of a shuttle that had certainly deteriorated from eight years’ disuse. He then pointed out that he was married with responsibilities, and that there were other pilots equally as qualified. Paul and Emily did not argue with him.
“Marriage and dependent children will be the excuse of practically everyone,” Paul told their private counselors, Ezra, Jim, and Zi Ongola, who had been permitted four hours of work a day by his reluctant medical advisers. “The only one still unattached is Nabhi Nabol.”
“He’s a clever enough pilot,” Ongola said thoughtfully, “though not exactly the type of man on whom the future of an entire planet should ride. However, exactly the type if the reward could be made attractive enough for him to take the risk.”
“How?” Emily asked skeptically.
Nabhi had already been reprimanded a dozen times and served Cherry Duff’s sentences for social misdemeanors such as being caught “drunk and disorderly,” several work delinquencies, and one “lewd advance.” Lately he had somewhat redeemed himself by being a good squadron leader, and was much admired by the young men he led.
“He’s a contractor,” Ongola said. “If he should be offered, say, a charterer’s stake rights, I think he might well go for it. He’s griped about the disparity in land holdings often enough. That could sweeten him. He also fancies himself as a crack pilot.”
“We’ve got some very good young pilots,” Jim began.
“Who have had no experience in space with a shuttle.” Ongola dismissed that notion. “Though it might be a good idea to choose one to go as copilot and give them the feel. But I’d rather trust Nabhi than a complete space novice.”
“If we suggest that he was also our second choice, rather than our last one . . .” Emily remarked.
“We’d better get on with it, whatever we do,” Ezra said. “I can’t keep stalling questions. We need data and we need a sample of the stuff in that trail. Then we’ll know for certain what our future is.”
Bargaining with Nabhi began that afternoon. He sneered at the flattery and the appeal to his competence and demanded to know just how much the trip was worth in terms of a holding and other rights. When he demanded the entire province of Cibola, Paul and Emily settled down to their task. When Nabhi insisted on being granted charterer status, they agreed with sufficient reluctance to satisfy the man that he was ahead in the bargaining.
Then Emily nonchalantly mentioned that Big Island was now untenanted. She and Paul managed to suppress their relief when he immediately seized on the notion of occupying Avril’s former property.
Nabhi said that he wanted the shuttle he had used during the ferrying operation and he specified the personnel who were, under his supervision, to handle the Moth’s recommissioning. He waved aside the fact that all the people he named were already heavily involved in crucial projects. He would only make the trip if he was satisfied that the long-disused shuttle checked out technically. But the other inducements were his immediately.
He then demanded Bart Lemos as his copilot, with the condition that Bart, too, would be given charterer status. Paul and Emily found that particularly unpalatable, but agreed reluctantly.
Nabol’s attitude toward both admiral and governor immediately altered, becoming so arrogant and pompous that Emily had to struggle to contain her dislike of the man. His smile of triumph was only one degree less than a full sneer as he left their office with the signed charterer’s warrant. Then he commandeered one of the speed shuttles, although it was needed for an imminent Threadfall, and went to inspect his new acquisition.
The admiral and the governor formally announced the venture, its aims, and its personnel. The news managed to outweigh every other topic of interest with one exception: the transfer of the twenty-seven mature eggs to their artificial hatching ground.
The full veterinary contingent assisted the biologists in that maneuver. Sorka Hanrahan and Sean Connell, in their capacities as advanced veterinary apprentices, had also done some of the early analysis and tedious documentation for the project, working under Kitti Ping’s close supervision. It didn’t take long to accomplish the transfer, but Sorka noticed that the amount of dithering was aggravating her lover. But the project meant more to him than his exasperation with worried biologists, and he suppressed his irritation. Finally the eggs were placed to the complete satisfaction of Wind Blossom, Pol, and Bay: in a double circle, seven on the inner ring, twenty on the outer, with the warm sand banked high around them to imitate the natural environment of dragonets.
“The whole thing could have been done in a third of the time,” Sean muttered darkly to Sorka. “So much fuss is bad for the eggs.” He scowled at the precise circles.
“They’re much bigger than I thought they’d be,” Sorka said after a moment’s silence.
“Much bigger than they thought they’d be,” Sean said in a scoffing tone. “I suppose we’re lucky that so many survived to this stage—a credit to Kit Ping, considering all that had to be done to create them.”
Sorka knew that it meant as much to Sean to be a part of the project as it did to her. They had, after all, been the first to discover one of the wild nests. Eager but tired, she was balancing on one of the edging timbers, keeping her feet off the uncomfortably warm sands of the artificial hatching ground.
Although the transfer was complete, the helpers had not yet dispersed. Wind Blossom, Pol, and Bay were deep in discussions with Phas, the admiral, and the governor, who had taken an official part in the removal. Sorka thought that Emily Boll particularly looked drawn and exhausted, but her smile remained warm and genuine. They, too, seemed reluctant to leave.
Most of the Landing population of dragonets had been in and out of the Hatching Ground, darting up to the rafters and vying to find roosting room. They seemed content to watch; none of them had been bold enough to examine the eggs closely. Sorka interpreted their little chirps as reverent, awed.
“Would they know what these are?” she asked Sean softly.
“Do we?” Sean retorted with an amused snort. He had both arms folded across his chest; he unlaced one to point to the nearest egg. “That’s the biggest. I wonder if it’s one of the golds. I’ve lost track of which was put where in that dance we just did. There were more males than females among the ones lost, and Lili’s opened book on which of us get what.”
Sorka gave the egg a long speculative look. She thought about whether or not it was a gold, and then decided, somewhat arbitrarily in her own mind, that no, it was not. It was a bronze. She did not tell Sean her conclusion. Sean tended to debate such issues, and that moment, surveying the first clutch of “dragons,” was not a moment to spoil. She sighed.
Dragonets had become as important to her as horses. She readily admitted that Sean could make his fair behave better than she could hers. He could and did discipline his for effective use during Threadfall. But she knew that she understood any of them—hers, his, or those impressed by anyone else on Pern—better than he did, especially when they were injured fighting Thread. Or maybe her sensitivity, developed over the last couple of months along with her pregnancy, tended toward maternal caring. The doctor had said she was in excellent health and had found nothing in her physical profile to suggest problems. She could continue riding as long as she felt comfortable in the saddle.
“You’ll know when you can’t ride anymore,” he had told her with a grin. “And you’ll have to curtail ground crew at five months. That’s no time for you to be swinging the weight of a flamethrower about for hours on end.”
Sorka had not yet found the proper moment to inform Sean of his impending fatherhood. She fretted about his reaction. They had saved enough work credits to make the Killarney holding a substantial one, but not with Thread falling. Sean had not even mentioned Killarney since the third Fall, but that did not mean he did not think about it. She saw the faraway look in his eyes from time to time.
She had thought he would mention Killarney when his father returned Cricket from his stud duties. But he had not. With everyone working double jobs just to keep essential services going, very few people had time to consider private concerns. Sean and Sorka spent what leisure moments they had keeping their horses fit, riding them out beyond the swath of destruction for an hour’s grazing.
The main door opened to admit one of the security engineers, and there was an instant reaction from the gallery of winged watchers. Sean chuckled softly. “They don’t need a security system in here,” he murmured to Sorka. “C’mon, love, we’ve got surgery in five minutes.”
With backward glances at the, circles of mottled eggs, the two apprentices reluctantly went back to work. As they crossed one of the alleys, they had a clear view of the donks slowly moving the shuttle Moth into takeoff position.
“D’you think they’ll make it?” Sorka asked Sean.
“They’ve been busy enough,” he replied sourly. Neither Nabhi Nabol nor Bart Lemos had made himself popular since the sudden rise to charterer rank. “Still, I wouldn’t be in their shoes for anything!”
She giggled. “Spacer Yvonne. You’ve never told me, Sean, did that help you on the drop?”
He gave her face a long and searching look, a light smile tugging his lips. Then he put his arm about her and hauled her into his side. “All I could think about was proving to you I wasn’t scared. But, by Jays, I was!” Then his expression changed and he halted, turning her roughly to him, both hands feeling across her stomach and pulling the bulky shipsuit taut across her body. He glared accusingly at her. “Why didn’t you tell me you’re pregnant?”
“Well, it’s only just been confirmed,” she said defiantly.
“Does everyone else know but me?” He was furious with her; for the first time in their years together, he was mad at her. His eyes were flashing and his hands rested hard across her thickening waistline.
“No one knows except the doctor, and he doesn’t have to ground me for another three months.” She pulled defensively at one hand to make him release her. “But there’s Killarney and I know you think about it . . .”
“Your mother knows?”
“When do I have a chance to see her? She’s minding half of Landing’s babies, as well as my latest brother. You’re the only other one who knows.”
“Sometimes you baffle me, Sorka,” Sean said, his anger abating. He shook his head. “Why wait to tell me? Killarney’s a long way off in our future now. We’re committed here. I thought you understood that.” He put both hands on her shoulders and gave her a stern shake. “I’ve wanted to be the father of your children. I want you to have only mine. I want it to be now, too, Sorka love, but I didn’t think I had the right to ask you to bring a child into the world the way it is.” His voice fell into the special tender tone he always used when they were making love.
“No, it’s the best time to have a child. Something for both of us to have,” she said. She did not add “in case,” but he knew what she was thinking and tightened his grip on her. His eyes compelled hers to look at him. The fury had been replaced by resolution.
“Immediately after surgery, we’re going before Cherry Duff. This is going to be a two-parent child, or my name’s not Sean Connell!”
Sorka burst out laughing and did not stop until they reached the surgery shed.
Ongola had ended up as arbiter on the reconditioning of the space shuttle Moth. Nabhi Nabol had been driving the refit crew demented, interrupting them at critical moments of repair, demanding to know if that circuit or this segment of hull had been checked. Despite the fact that he had a good working knowledge of the complexities of a shuttle, he delayed more than he assisted. The shuttle Mayfly, lying next to the Moth, had been sectioned off into offices for Ongola, Fulmar, and Nabhi, with a half-dozen comm lines so that Ongola could handle other commitments while on hand at the shuttle. His office was festooned with probe pics and survey maps, as well as with the various launch windows open to Nabhi. Nabhi would often come in and stand broodingly staring at the orbits, picking at his lower lip. Ongola ignored him.
The basic condition of the Moth had been surprisingly good: there had been practically no perishing of interior circuits or lines. But everything had to be double-checked. In that Ongola agreed with. Nabhi. It put quite a burden on Fulmar’s engineering team, but that was not where he disagreed with the autocratic Nabhi.
“I wouldn’t care what he asked me to do,” Fulmar told Ongola, “if he’d only ask politely. You’d think he was doing me a favor. Are you sure he’s as good a driver as he thinks he is?”
“He is good,” Ongola reluctantly admitted.
“I’d’ve preferred the mission in Bonneau’s hands,” Fulmar replied, shaking his head sadly. “But with that big stake, kids and all, I can’t fault his refusal. It’s just that—” He broke off, raising his big, work-stained hands in a helpless gesture.
“The mission has got to succeed, Fulmar,” Ongola said, giving the man an encouraging clout on the shoulder. “And you’re the best man to see that it does.”
In the thirteenth week after Threadfall, the pattern suddenly shifted. As the squadrons reached the projected site, which was mainly over unoccupied lands, only the top of the squadron saw the leading edge. It was well north of their position: the gray shimmering stain on the horizon was all too easily identified.
“Hell and damnation!” Theo Force cried, ramming a call through to Ongola at Landing. “The damned stuff’s shifted north, Zi. We’ll need reinforcements.”
“Give me the coordinates,” Ongola said, issuing crisp orders and gesturing, to Jake to get in touch with Dieter or Boris. “Go for it. We’ll scramble another squadron or two to help. I’ll alert Drake.”
Boris was found, and made some quick calculations. “It’s going to hit Calusa and Bordeaux. It seems to have shifted north by five degrees. That doesn’t make sense. Why on earth would it shift so suddenly?”
There was no answer to his question. Ongola rang off. “Have you the week’s roster there, Jake? Check where Kwan is today. I’ll call Chuck Havers at Calusa.”
Sue Havers answered the phone. After her initial shock at the news, she rallied. “We’ve several hours then, don’t we? And it could just miss us? I hope so. I don’t know where Chuck is working today. Thank you, Zi. And,” she added, her voice less assured, “are you calling Mary Tubberman, or should I warn her?”
“We’ll send Ned along.” Ongola disconnected.
Shunning was very hard on the relatives. Ned was entitled to assist his mother and his younger brothers and sister in fighting Thread. If he chose also to assist his father in the emergency, there would be only family to witness it. Tubberman had been quick to clad his buildings with metal, so his stake was as safe as those precautions could make it. He would get no other help.
Ongola then contacted Drake and ordered him to avoid the Tubbermans’ stake. Drake at first protested that they couldn’t leave any Thread on any ground, shunned or not.
“Ned can protect that much with his mother’s help, Drake, but we cannot assist Ted Tubberman.”
“But it’s Thread, man.”
“That’s an order, man,” Ongola replied in a steely tone.
“Gotcha!”
Ongola then informed Paul Benden and Emily Boll of the pattern’s alteration.
“Ezra will say that proves intelligence directs Fall,” Paul remarked to Emily as they conferred.
“It’s heads we lose, tails we lose, as far as I can see,” Emily replied, heaving a sigh.
“It’s as well we don’t have to wait long to find out.” Paul nodded toward the grid where the Moth was undergoing the final countdown. None of the technicians had been allowed to scramble for additional support squadrons. Their assignments on the shuttle had just become all-important.
Following the courtesy now well established, Drake Bonneau checked in at the Havers’ stakehold on his way back from end of Fall which had just tipped Bordeaux across the Jordan River. He landed within sight of the Tubbermans’ arger home.
“Ned and Mary were out with flamethrowers,” Chuck told the squadron leader, “and then, for some insane reason, Ted drove them back into the house. There couldn’t have been much damage, or we’d have seen results.”
“Well, you’re all right here,” Drake said heartily.
“The ground crew arrived well in advance. But does anyone know why the pattern’s shifted?” Sue asked. Weary with fighting, she needed some spark of reassurance.
“No,” Drake replied cheerfully, “but we’ll probably be old!”
He accepted a cup of the refreshing fruit drink that the oldest Havers girl brought him and his crew, then said goodbye. Drake had obeyed Ongola’s order to bypass the Tubberman stake during Fall, but after what the Havers had said about Ted, he was curious. In his opinion, all Thread had to be destroyed, even if it fell on a shunned homesite. Thread did not care about human conflicts: it ate. Drake did not want to see a little burrow get started because of man-made restrictions.
Therefore, as he took off, he made a leisurely turn right over the Tubberman property. He saw Ned standing on the green patch surrounding the house. Ned waved and gesticulated rather wildly, at which point Drake felt obliged to follow orders and turn northwest towards Landing.
He was having a quick bite to eat in the dining hall when Ned Tubberman found him.
“You saw it, Drake, I know you did. You have to have seen it,” Ned said, excitedly pulling at Drake’s sleeve to pull him to his feet. “C’mon, you have to tell them what you saw.”
Drake pulled his arm free. “Tell who what?” He forked up another mouthful of the hot food. Thread-fighting gave him an incredible appetite.
“Tell Kwan and Paul and Emily what you saw.”
“I didn’t see anything!” Then suddenly Drake had a flash of pure recall: Ned standing on a green square, a green square that was surrounded by scorched earth. “I don’t believe what I saw!” He wiped his mouth, chewing absently as he absorbed that memory. “But Thread had just been across your place, and Chuck and Sue saw your father stop you flaming!”
“Exactly!” Ned grinned hugely and again pulled at Drake. The squadron leader rose and followed Ned out of the room. “I want you to tell them what you saw, to corroborate my statement. I don’t know what Dad’s done.” The grin faded and some of the buoyancy drained from Ned Tubberman. “He says shunning works two ways. Mother told me that he locks himself away in his laboratory and won’t let anyone near it. My brothers and sister go over to Sue’s all the time, but Mother won’t leave Dad, even if he isn’t in the house much. She keeps the place ticking over.”
“Your father’s been experimenting with something?” Drake was confused.
“Well, he’s got botanical training. He did say that until help came, the only defense was the planet itself.” Ned slowed his pace. “And that patch of grass must have defended itself—somehow—against today’s Fall, because it’s still there!”
Drake did tell Kwan, Paul, Emily, and the hastily summoned Pol and Bay. Ned insisted that he had seen Thread fall on the ground-cover plants, had not seen them wither or be ingested, and that by the time Drake had overflown the stake, there was no evidence that Thread had ever fallen on that twelve-by-twelve-meter rectangle.
“I couldn’t hazard a guess as to how he’s done it,” Pol finally said, looking to Bay for agreement. “Maybe he has been able to adapt Kitti Ping’s basic program for use on a less complex life-form. Professionally I have to doubt it.”
“But I saw it,” Ned insisted. “Drake saw it, too.”
There was a long silence, which Emily finally broke. “Ned, we do not doubt you, or Drake’s verification, but as your father said, shunning works both ways.”
“Are you too proud to ask him what he’s done?” Ned demanded, his skin blanched under his tan, and his nostrils flaring with indignation.
“Pride is not involved,” Emily said gently. “Safety is. He was shunned because he defied the will of the colony. If you can honestly say that he has changed his attitude, then we can discuss reinstatement.”
Ned flushed, his eyes dropping away from Emily’s tolerant gaze. He sighed deeply. “He doesn’t want anything to do with Landing or anyone on it.” Then he gripped the edge of the table and leaned across it toward the governor. “But he’s done something incredible. Drake saw it.”
“I did indeed see ground cover where there shouldn’t’ve been any,” Drake conceded.
“Could your mother present evidence on his behalf?” Paul asked, seeking an honorable way out for Ned’s sake.
“She says he only talks to Petey, and Petey says he’s sworn to secrecy, so she hasn’t pushed him.” Ned’s face twisted with anguish for a long moment, then it cleared. “I’ll ask her. I’ll ask Petey, too. I can try!”
“This has not been easy for you either, Ned,” Emily said. “All of us would like to see the matter happily resolved.” She touched his hand where he still gripped the table edge. “We need everyone right now.”
Ned looked her steadily in the eyes and gave a slow nod. “I believe you, Governor.”
“Sometimes the duties to which rank entitles me are more than its worth,” Emily murmured to Paul as the hatch of the shuttle finally closed on Nabhi Nabol and Bart Lemos. She spoke quietly, because every young man in Nabhi’s squadron had come to wish their leader good luck. She turned and smiled at them, leading the way off the grid to the safer sidelines, and waited dutifully with the technicians for the takeoff.
They waited and waited, until both admiral and governor were giving the meteorology tower anxious scrutiny. Just when both had decided that Nabhi was going to renege, as they had half suspected he would, they heard the roar of ignition and saw the yellow-white flame pouring out of the tubes.
“Firing well,” Paul bellowed over the noise. Emily contented herself with a nod as she plugged her ears with her fingers.
She did not know much about the mechanics of shuttles, but the young men were grinning and waving their arms triumphantly. The look of relief on Fulmar’s face was almost comical. Majestically the shuttle began its run up the grid, its speed increasing at a sensational rate. It became airborne, the engines thrusting it in an abrupt but graceful swoop up. The flame became lost in the blue of the sky as the observers shaded their eyes against the rising sun. Then the puffy contrail blossomed, billowing out as a tracer for the shuttle’s path. The technicians who had made it possible cheered, and clapped one another on the back.
“Gawssakes, but it’s good to get a bird up again,” one of the men shouted. “Hey, what’s wrong with them?” he added, pointing to several fairs of dragonets zipping at low level across the grid out of nowhere, crooning oddly.
“Who’s having a baby?” Fulmar demanded.
Emily and Paul exchanged glances. “We are,” she said, sliding quickly into the skimmer. “See? They’re going straight to the Hatching Ground.”
Looking up toward Landing, there was no doubt that fairs of dragonets were streaming in that direction. No one lingered on the grid. The roof of the Hatching Ground was covered with the crooning and chittering creatures. The cacophony was exciting rather than irritating. When the admiral and governor arrived, they had to make their way through the crowd to the open double doors.
“Welcome in nine-hundred-part harmony,” Emily muttered to Paul as they made it to the edge of the warm sands. There they halted, awed by the sense of occasion within.
Kitti Ping had left explicit instructions on who was to attend the birth day. Sixty young people between the ages of eighteen and thirty, who had already shown a sympathy for the dragonets, had the privilege of standing around the circle of eggs. Wind Blossom, Pol, Bay, and Kwan stood to one side on a wooden platform, their faces flushed and expectant.
The dragonets’ song outside remaining softly jubilant while the crooning of those who had found roosting space inside sounded like subdued encouragement, almost reverent.
“They can’t know what we expect for today, can they, Paul?”
“Young Sean Connell”—Paul pointed to where the young man stood beside his wife around the eggs— “Would have you believe that they do. But then, they’ve always been attracted by birthing! After all, they protect their own young, against attack.”
A hush swept around the arena as a distinct crack was heard. One of the eggs rocked slightly, the motion drawing excited whispers.
Emily crossed her fingers, hiding them in the folds of her trousers. She noticed, with a slight grin, that others were doing the same. So much hung on the events of that day, on the first hatching and on what Nabhi Nabol was irrevocably committed to doing.
Another egg cracked and a third wobbled. The chorus became beguilingly insistent, striking an excited chord in every one watching.
Then all of a sudden, one of the eggs cracked open and a creature emerged, damp from birth; it shook stubby wings and stumbled over its shell, squawking in alarm. The dragonets answered soothingly. The young people in the circle stood their ground, and Emily marveled at their courage, for that awkward creature was not the graceful being she had been expecting, a beast remembered from old legends and illustrations held in library treasuries. She caught herself holding her breath, and exhaled quickly.
The creature extended its wings; they were wider and thinner than she had expected. It was so spindly, so ungainly, and its very oddly constructed eyes were flashing with red and yellow. Emily felt a flush of alarms The creature gave a desperate cry, and was answered reassuringly by the multivoiced choir above. It lurched forward, its voice pleading, and then the cry altered to one of joy, held on a high sweet note. It staggered another step and fell at the feet of David Catarel, who bent to help it.
He looked up with eyes wide with wonder. “He wants me!”
“Then accept him!” Pol bellowed, gesturing for one of the stewards to come forward with a bowl of food. “Feed him! No, don’t anyone else help you. The bond should be made now!”
Kneeling by his new charge, David offered the little dragon a hunk of meat. It bolted that and urgently cried for more, pushing at David’s leg with an imperious head.
“He says he’s very hungry,” David cried. “He’s talking to me. In my head! It’s incredible. How did she do it?”
“The mentasynth works, then!” Emily murmured to Paul, who nodded with the air of someone not at all surprised.
“Ye gods, but it’s ugly,” Paul said in a very low voice.
“You probably weren’t much to look at at birth either,” Emily surprised herself by saying. She grinned at his quick glance of astonishment.
David coaxed his new friend out of the circle of people and toward the edge of the Hatching Ground, calling for more food. “Polenth says he’s starving.”
Bay had ordered plenty of red meat to be available, butchered from animals that had adapted well to the improved Pernese grasses. The young dragonets would require plenty of boron for growth in their first months, and would best absorb it from the flesh of cattle,
Another egg cracked, and a second bronze male made a straight-line dash to Peter Semling. A shrill voluntary came from Peter’s fair of dragonets. There was a long wait before any more activity. A worried hum developed among the watchers. Then four more eggs abruptly shattered, two with unexpectedly dainty creatures, one golden and. one bronze, who partnered themselves with Tarrie Chernoff and Shih Lao; the other two were stolid-looking browns who took to Otto Hegelman and Paul Logorides.
“Do they expect them all to hatch today?” Emily asked Paul.
“Let’s go around to Pol and Bay,” Paul said. They inched their way to the right, pausing to admire David Catarel’s bronze, who was bolting down hunks of meat so fast that he seemed to be inhaling them. David looked ecstatic.
“Well, they could,” Pol replied when they reached him. He was masking anxiety well. Wind Blossom was not, and barely acknowledged the quiet greetings of admiral and governor.
“They were engineered within a thirty-six-hour period. The six that have hatched were from the first and second groups. We might have to wait. In our observations of wild dragonets, we know that laying the eggs can take several hours. I suspect the greens and golds may be like one of the Earth vipers, which can keep eggs within her body until she finds an appropriate place, or time, to lay them. We know that naturally clutched eggs do hatch more or less simultaneously. This,” he said, pointing to the Hatching Ground, “is a concession to Kitti Ping’s reverence for the ancestral species’ habitat. Ah, another one’s cracking.” He consulted the flimsy in his hand. “One of the third group!”
“Six males, but only one female,” Bay said quietly. “To be frank, I’d rather have more females. What do you think, Blossom?”
“One perfect male and one perfect female are all we need,” Wind Blossom said in a tight, controlled voice. She had her hands hidden in her loose sleeves, but there were deep tension lines in her face and her eyes were clouded.
“Peter Semling’s bronze looks sturdy,” Emily said encouragingly. Wind Blossom did not respond, her gaze was fixed on the eggs. “Are they as you anticipated?” she asked, looking at Pol and Bay.
“No,” Bay admitted, “but then it was Kitti who had the requisite image in her mind. If only . . .” She faltered. “Ah, another gold female. I believe that Kitti Ping made the choices gender imperative. For Nyassa Clissmann. And such charming creatures!”
Emily failed to see charm in the hatchlings, but she was glad to see so many live ones. But what had Kitti Ping had in her mind when she altered the dragonet ova? Those were not dragons of any kind Emily knew. And yet she had an unexpected vision of a sky full of the creatures, soaring and diving, breathing flame. Had Kitti Ping had such a vision?”
“The shuttle!” Pol said suddenly. “Did I hear it take off?”
“Yes, he made it,” Paul replied. “Ongola will keep us informed. We don’t have enough fuel for a direct flight. The shuttle’ll have to coast a week before it reaches the trail.”
“Oh, I see.” Then Pol refocused his attention on the eggs.
The crowd shifted as some people had to return to complete unfinished tasks and others moved in to take their places. Food was brought to the biologists and the leaders on their dais, and wooden benches to sit on. Wind Blossom remained standing. Food was also taken to the circle of hopeful dragonriders. The dragonets’ encouragement did not abate. Emily wondered how they could keep it up.
It was dark before there was any further movement, and then all at once a brown and two golds cracked their eggs. Marco Galliani got the brown, and Kathy Duff and Nora Sejby the two golds. There was a good deal of cheering.
The crowd at the opening thinned, while the dragonets kept their posts and continued their encouraging song. Emily was becoming weary and she could see fatigue catching up with the others. She was half-asleep when Catherine Radelin-Doyle impressed her gold.
“Do they always go female to female?” Emily asked Pol. “And male to male?”
“Since the males are expected to be fighters and the females egg-carriers, Kitti made it logical.”
“Logical to her,” Emily said, a trifle bemused. “There aren’t any blues or greens among them,” she suddenly realized.
“Kitti programmed the heavier males, but I believe they’re to carry sperm for the entire range. The greens will be the smallest, the fighters; the blues sturdier, with more staying power; the browns sort of anchor fighters with even more endurance. They’ll have to fight four to six hours, remember! The bronzes are leaders and the golds . . .”
“Waiting at home to be egg-carriers.”
Pol gave Emily a long look, his tired face reflecting astonishment at her sarcasm.
“In the wild, greens don’t have good maternal instincts. The golds do,” Bay put in, giving the governor an odd glance.
“Kitti Ping kept as much natural instinct as possible. Or so her program reads.”
“There!” Nabhi said, leaning back from the console, his swarthy face intense with an inner satisfaction. “Kenjo wasn’t the only one who could save fuel.”
Bart stared at him, surprised and confused. “Save it for what, Nabhi?” He spoke more sharply than he meant to, but he had been wound up with tension that would not ease. It was not that he did not trust Nabhi as a pilot—Nabhi was a good driver, or Bart would not have been talked into participating in the insane venture, not for the choicest land on Pern.
“To maneuver,” Nabhi said. His mocking grin did nothing to ease Bart’s disquiet.
“Where? You’re not . . . you wouldn’t be mad enough to try to land on the farking planet?” Bart clawed at the release straps, but Nabhi’s indolent gesture of negation aborted the effort.
“No way. I came to get the pods or whatever.” His smile then broadened, and Bart was amazed at the humor in it. “Our course is basically the same one Avril took.” He turned his head and looked directly at his copilot.
“So?”
“They said the gig blew up.” Nabhi’s smile was pure malice. “Turn on the screens. There might be some interesting flotsam. Diamonds and gold nuggets and whatever else Avril took with her. No one needs to know what else we scooped up out of space. And it sure beats mining the stuff ourselves.”
By midnight Pol and Bay decided to examine the remaining eggs and slowly did the rounds. Wooden platforms had been brought out for the candidates to rest on, since the heat in the sand was enervating. None of the chosen was willing to forgo the chance at impressing a hatchling by leaving the Ground.
When the two biologists returned, Pol was shaking his head and Bay looked drawn. She went immediately to Wind Blossom and touched her arm.
“The rest of the first group show no signs of life. But already the outcome is better than projected. We detected viable signs in the others. We can but wait. They were not all conceived at the same time.”
Wind Blossom remained an unmoving statue.
Sean nudged Sorka in the ribs to wake her up. She had fallen asleep leaning against him, her cheek against his upper arm. She was instantly alert and aware of her surroundings. Sean pointed to the biggest of the eggs, which sat almost directly in front of them. He had taken that position at the outset, and finally, after his long vigil, the egg was rocking slightly.
“What time is it?” she asked.
“Nearly dawn. There’s been no other movement. But listen to the dragonets. Listen to Blaze. She’ll have no throat left!”
They had noted their own dragonets early during that long day, and Sorka had taken heart from their constant choral encouragements.
“That egg over there has been moving spasmodically for the last two hours,” he said in a quiet tone. “The one beyond it rocked for a while, but it’s stopped completely.”
Sorka tried to contain a yawn, then gave in to the compulsion and felt better for it. She wanted to stretch, but another candidate was draped over her legs, fast asleep. Beyond, the other candidates began to wake.
At some point while Sorka had been dozing, the admiral and the governor had left. Pol and Bay were leaning into each other, and Kwan’s head was on his chest, arms limp in his lap. Wind Blossom had apparently not moved since she had taken up her watch.
“She’s uncanny,” Sorka said, turning away from the geneticist.
A single great crack startled everyone, and the egg before them parted into two ragged halves. The bronze hatchling walked out imperiously, lifted his head, and made a sound like a stuttering trumpet. Everyone came to attention. Sean was on his feet, and Sorka pushed at his legs to urge him on. She need not have worried. As he locked eyes with the hatchling, Sean gave a low incredulous groan and moved forward to meet the beast halfway. Their fair was bugling with triumph.
“Meat, quickly,” Sorka called, beckoning to a sleepy steward. Hoping that the heat in the building had not soured the meat, she ran to meet the man, grabbed the bowl, and returned to thrust it into Sean’s hands. She had never seen that utterly rapt look in his eyes before.
“He says his name is Carenath, Sorka. He knows his own name!” Sean transferred food from the bowl into Carenath’s mouth as fast as he could shovel it. “More meat. Hurry, I need more meat.”
Everyone in the Hatching Ground was wakened by his vibrant voice. Then the other egg broke open, and a golden female sauntered forth, chittering and looking about urgently. Sorka was too busy passing bowls of meat to Sean to notice until Betsy tugged at her arm.
“She’s looking for you, Sorka. Look at her!”
Sorka turned her head and suddenly she, too, felt the indescribable impact of a mind on hers, a mind that rejoiced in finding its equal, its lifelong partner. Sorka was filled with an exultation that was almost painful.
My name is Faranth, Sorka!