CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
In the instrumentation bay aboard the orbiting Varuna where the survey probes were fitted out and checked, Kerry Heeland floated below a probe in one of the service cradles, disconnecting an underbelly camera that was malfunctioning and would have to come out. He felt frustration and despondency. As a Kronian, he had been outraged by Gallian’s murder. And then the whole thing had taken on an additional personal dimension with the shooting and incarceration of Owen Erskine, who had been a close friend of Heeland’s as well as a work colleague. He couldn’t understand why everyone down there didn’t just go for Zeigler’s thugs en masse the way Owen had tried to do. Surely there were enough of them. So there was risk, and a few would very likely get hurt. But few worthwhile things in life had been achieved without some kind of risk. Just about everybody else that he had talked to in the Varuna felt the same. But there was little they could do up here, isolated in the ship, with all communications to ground routed via Zeigler’s headquarters, and the supplies they depended on transferred down to the surface. So they carried on with their jobs as directed. And they waited.
A duty operator from the Probe Director Section drifted in through the far doorway, singled out Heeland, and propelled himself across. “We’ve got a transmission from the surface coming in on emergency band,” he said, keeping his voice low. “It’s Landen Keene. He’s asking for you personally.”
Puzzled, Heeland left what he was doing and followed the operator back into PDS. They stopped at the console of screens monitoring the probes and airmobiles currently deployed. The line flashing red on one of the displays identified the signal as coming from the disabled probe at Joburg. Keene’s face, haggard, windblown, and unshaven, was staring from the screen indicated by the alarm signal. “Okay, I’ll handle this,” Heeland said tersely. The operator nodded and moved away to another station.
“Lan,” Heeland muttered. “What in Hell… ?”
“Explanations later.” Keene’s voice was croaky and weak.
“You’re at Joburg?”
“Yes. Look, I wanted your help on something, but things have gotten even more complicated now. First, can you get access to the Varuna‘s long-range communications somehow? I need to get a message to the Aztec if it isn’t too late already. They could be next.”
Similar thoughts had crossed Heeland’s mind. “That could be a tough one,” he replied. “Control is locked into OpCom down on the surface.”
“I know. But the channels go out on the ship’s lasers. There has to be some way of tapping in up there.”
“You’re talking to the wrong person for this, Lan.”
“I guessed that too. But you’re the only one I knew how to contact via this probe’s E-band.”
“I’ll have to check with the comm techs and see,” Heeland said after a pause. “What was the other thing?”
“Did you know that Zeigler has been arming the natives here at Joburg and training them?”
Heeland’s face hardened. “No, I didn’t. But we don’t get to learn about much of anything up here.”
“Jorff just left here with two flyers carrying Rakki with his pals and all the soldiers. I want to find out where they went and what they’re doing.”
Heeland shook his head. This was confusing. “Wait a minute… . You’re there at Joburg, and you know they were training Rakki’s guys, but you don’t know where they went,” he checked. So you weren’t with them?”
“Of course not.”
“So how did you get there?”
“I said, explanations later. I’m here with Charlie Hu. We started out in one of the site runabouts, but it got wrecked. Charlie’s sick but being taken care of. But is there some way of finding out where Jorff and the others went? Can you track nav beacons on the flyers via the sat grid from up there?”
“Normally, yes. But like I said, control is being concentrated at surface OpCom. We’re locked out of it.” Heeland thought over the possibilities. “Do you think they’re being brought in to beef up Zeigler’s strength at Serengeti?” he suggested. “His numbers are pretty thin.”
“If it were just the troops that left with Jorff, then maybe,” Keene replied. “But why Rakki and his general staff too? I’ve got a hunch something bigger could be going on somewhere else.”
“Like what?
“Have you forgotten Pieter Naarmegen and those people in the Scout out there?”
Heeland punched the console in suppressed fury. “But why?” It wasn’t that he wouldn’t have put it past Zeigler. He just didn’t see a reason.
“I don’t know, Kerry. But everything has gotten crazy. Who knows what might be going on? Can we get through to someone at Serengeti to find out it they show up there or not? You can patch me through. Let me worry about if I’m traced.” Even if Keene had a working compad with him, it wouldn’t have the range to connect directly.
“We’d still be identified too,” Heeland said. “The incoming message ID would be from here.”
“There’s got to be a way,” Keene insisted.
Heeland thought frantically. If this was his chance to help do something positive, he wasn’t about to let it slip away. “The runabout that you abandoned. Were the comms still working in it?”
“I don’t know. It did have local functions. I copied some files out of it just before we left. What did you have in mind?”
Heeland answered slowly, still checking through the sequence in his mind. “If I can relay you to the runabout, I might be able to set it to auto-repeat from there. That way the incoming signal at Serengeti would just identify the runabout. I assume it’s out in the wilds someplace. If they locate it, you don’t care?”
“I already said, let me worry about things like that, Kerry.”
“It might work. Can you remember the runabout’s number or its net ID code?”
“The vehicle number was SU27. I don’t know about the ID. We never used it.”
“Let me try that.”
Keene thought for a moment longer. “Those high-altitude airmobile platforms that you showed me—that transport and launch probes. Are they still controlled from up there, in the Varuna?” he asked.
“Yes. They’re primarily for directing planet-wide reconnaissance. Why?”
“Do you have one of them in this area right now?”
“There’s one about fifty miles southeast of the base.” There was usually a probe on-station in the general vicinity of Serengeti, monitoring weather and geological developments. “It’s recently deployed, still with three probes on board.”
“Can you move it closer this way?” Keene asked. “As a precaution. Having some high-level eyes up there might be useful.”
“Will do.” Heeland composed a command to move the center of the airmobile’s flight pattern to a new location and sent it off. Then he called up the register of ground vehicles at Serengeti. Site Runabout SU27 was listed as out of service. It responded when he interrogated its ID code.
Sariena was in the labs, reading a report on the plots of meteorites and debris orbiting Earth, when the call from Keene came through on her compad. At least, that was her official task. More surreptitiously, she had become something of a clearing house for information fed back from many eyes and ears around the base. A spirit of resistance was establishing itself that would be ready to erupt when the opportunity presented itself.
She had learned from past experience never to be too surprised at anything that developed once Keene was involved. “You made it? You’re at Joburg?” she said without preliminaries.
“Just—last night.”
“Why so long?”
“Predictably, we had problems.”
“Yes, you look like it. Be careful, Lan. If you don’t already know, Jorff is there. He’s equipping Rakki’s Tribesmen with firearms and training them.”
Surprise showed on Keene’s face. “How did you know?”
“Shayle has an inside source,” Sariena said simply.
Although obviously curious to know more, Keene merely nodded. The details could wait until later. “They left here this morning—Jorff, two of Zeigler’s troops, Leisha, Rakki, and the whole squad,” he said. “One thought is that they might be coming to Serengeti.”
Sariena thought for a moment, then shook her head. “I don’t think so, Lan. Kelm also left here earlier with a party of guards. And it seems that Zeigler is getting ready to go somewhere. Something seems to be happening. But whatever it is, it’s not here.” Keene stared hard from the tiny screen. Behind him, apparently some distance back, Sariena caught a glimpse of a figure holding a spear. “Do you know you have company, Lan?” she asked.
“Yes, don’t worry about it. They’re my escort… . Look, can this source that Shayle has find out more? This is urgent. We need to know now. I think they might be going after Naarmegen and the others in that Scout.”
Sariena felt her mouth go dry at the thought. “But why? For what purpose?” she whispered.
“Who knows? To teach everyone else a lesson? To give Rakki’s soldiers an easy first-blood lesson and show them that the Sky People aren’t invincible? Whatever goes through the minds of people who want things like this.”
“I’ll go and find Shayle now,” Sariena said. “You’ll be there?”
“There’s not much else in the way of places to go,” Keene answered.
The rendezvous point chosen for Jorff’s two flyers to meet up with the one bringing Kelm and the backup force from Serengeti was a desolate valley on the west side of the central mountain chain known as the Spine, about halfway between Serengeti and Carlsbad, where operation Usurper was to be carried out. The plan was for Rakki’s newly trained force to bear the brunt of the action, both as a morale booster for them and to suitably impress the Cave Tribe of how much they stood to gain from coming over as allies once Jemmo was gone. The method to be employed was modeled on former Terran riot and crowd control tactics. Reconnaissance probes were already deployed in the area and would be moved in close to locate Jemmo before the attack went in. When it did, the assault force would be able to go straight for the target, relying on speed and shock to numb any potential resistance into inaction until it was too late. And if something did go wrong that warranted calling in the support, it would be good experience for Kelm’s troops too.
Kelm, Jorff, and Leisha stood together on the ground, watching as the three craft that had taken off minutes previously completed their circuit and came down in the same positions they had been in for the three static rehearsals. Sims was the first out of the leading bus, shouting orders and waving Rakki’s warriors on as they emerged past him at a run, fanning out to secure the flanks. The smaller personnel flyer that had landed beside it disgorged the snatch squad led by Enka, while the backup team from the second bus slightly farther back advanced to take up covering positions. Considering the insanely short time he’d had to pull anything together, Jorff had done amazingly well, Kelm conceded inwardly. But it wouldn’t do to let himself be seen with too soft a public image.
“Too ragged and slow forming up on the left flank,” he said. “And the third man along there is going to kill himself or somebody else, holding his weapon like that. Get them back inside, and let’s run through it again on the ground.”
“Sir,” Jorff acknowledged, and began shouting orders.
Kelm turned to Leisha. “How much longer before Zeigler and the others get here?” he asked her.
“Due in just about forty-five minutes,” she told him.
Considering the haste, the demonstration they had just seen would no doubt be satisfactory. But Kelm thought they could do even better. “Let’s make this a good, snappy one. Then two more drops from circuits,” he called to Jorff. “You think we can impress the boss?”
“You bet.”
There was some jostling and milling about going on around the doors, Kelm saw. But that wasn’t too important. The practice hadn’t been to get them back in.