But although he thought he had settled all the conflict, he found that
it returned when he was lying in his bunk, or when he stood in the dome
and watched the stars, while they moved through the Antares system
toward the captive sun and the tiny planet Lharillis.
_It's in my power to give this to all men...._
Should a few Lhari stand in his way?
He lay in his bunk brooding, thinking of death, staring at the yellow
radiation badge. _If you fail, it won't be in our lifetime._ He'd have
to go back to little things, to the little ships that hauled piddling
cargo between little planets, while all the grandeur of the stars
belonged to the Lhari. And if he succeeded, Vega Interplanet could
spread from star to star, a mighty memorial to Rupert Steele.
One day Vorongil sent for him. "Bartol," he said, and his voice was not
unkind, "you and Ringg have always been good friends, so don't be angry
about this. He's worried about you--says you spend all your spare time
in your bunk growling at him. Is there anything the matter, feathertop?"
He sounded so concerned, so--the word struck Bart with hysterical
humor--so _fatherly_, that Bart wanted insanely to laugh and to cry.
Instead he muttered, "Ringg should mind his own business."
"But it's not like that," Vorongil said. "Look, the _Swiftwing_'s a
world, young fellow, and a small one. If one being in that world is
unhappy, it affects everyone."
Bart had an absurd, painful impulse--to blurt out the incredible truth
to Vorongil, and try to get the old Lhari to understand what he was
doing.
But fear held him silent. He was alone, one small human in a ship of
Lhari. Vorongil was frowning at him, and Bart mumbled, "It's nothing,
_rieko mori_."
"I suppose you're pining for home," Vorongil said kindly. "Well, it
won't be long now."
The glare of the captive sun grew and grew in the ports, and Bart's
dread mounted. He had, as yet, had no opportunity to put the radiation
counter out of order. It was behind a panel in the drive room, and try
as he might, he could think of no way to get to it unobserved.
Sometimes, in sleepless nights, it seemed that would be the best way.
Just let it go. But then the Lhari would detect Montano's ship, and kill
Montano and his men.
Did he believe that? He had to believe it. It was the only way he could
possibly justify what he was doing.
And then his chance came, as so many chances do when one no longer wants
them. The Second Officer met him at the beginning of one watch, saying
worriedly, "Bartol, old Rugel's sick--not fit to be on his feet. Do you
think you can hold down this shift alone, if I drop in and give you a
hand from time to time?"
"I think so," Bart said, carefully not overemphasizing it. The Second
Officer, by routine, spent half of his time in the drive room, and half
his time down below in Maintenance. When he left, Bart knew he would
have at least half an hour, uninterrupted, in the drive room. He ripped
open the panel, located the wires and hesitated; he didn't quite dare to
cut them outright.
He jerked one wire loose, frayed the other with a sharp claw until it
was almost in shreds and would break with the first surge of current,
pulled two more connections loose so that they were not making full
contact. He closed the panel and brushed dust over it, and when the
Second Officer came back, Bart was at his own station.
As Antares fell toward them in the viewport, he found himself worrying
about Mentorians. They would be in cold sleep, presumably in a safe part
of the ship, behind shielding, or Montano would have made provisions for
them. Still, he wished there were a way to warn Meta.
He was not on watch when they came into the planetary field of
Lharillis, but when he came on shift, he knew at once that the trouble
had been located. The panel was pulled open, the exposed wires hanging,
and Ringg was facing old Rugel, shouting, "Listen, Baldy, I won't have
you accusing me of going light on my work! I checked those panels eight
days ago! Tell me who's going to be opening the panels in here anyhow?"
"No, no," Rugel said patiently, "I'm not accusing you of anything, only
being careless, young Ringg. You poke with those buzzing instruments and
things, maybe once you tear loose some wires."
Bart remembered he wasn't supposed to know what was going on. "What's
this all about?"
It was Rugel who answered. "The radiation counter--the planetary one,
not the one we use in space--is out of order. We don't even need it this
landing--there's no radiation on Lharillis. If it were the landing gear,
now, that would be serious. I'm just trying to tell Ringg--"
"He's trying to say I didn't check it." Ringg was not to be calmed.
"It's my professional competence--"
"Forget it," Bart said. "If Rugel isn't sore about it, and if we don't
need it for landing, why worry?" He felt like Judas.
"Just take a look at my daybook," Ringg insisted, "I checked and marked
it _service fit_! I tell you, somebody was blundering around, opening
panels where they had no business, tore it out by accident, then was too
much of a filthy sneak to report it and get it fixed!"
"Bartol was on watch alone one night," said the Second Officer, "but you
wouldn't meddle with panels, would you, Bartol?"
Bart set his teeth, steadying his breathing, as Ringg turned hopefully
to him. "Bartol, did you--by mistake, maybe? Because if you did, it
won't count against your rating, but it means a black mark against
mine!"
Bart hid his self-contempt in sudden, tense fury. "No, I didn't! You're
going to accuse everybody on the _Swiftwing_, all the way from me to
Vorongil, before _you_ can admit a mistake, aren't you? If you want
somebody to blame, look in a mirror!"
"Listen, you!" Ringg's pent-up rage exploded. He seized Bart by the
shoulder and Bart moved to throw him off, so that Ringg's outthrust
claws raked only his forearm. In pure reflex he felt his own claws flick
out; they clinched, closed, scuffled, and he felt his claws rake flesh;
half incredulous, saw the thin red line of blood welling from Ringg's
cheek.
Then Rugel's arms were flung restrainingly around him, and the Second
Officer was wrestling with a furious, struggling Ringg. Bart looked at
his red-tipped claws in ill-concealed horror, but it was lost in a
general gasp of consternation, for Vorongil had flung the drive room
door open, taking in the scene in one blistering glance.
_"What's going on down here?"_
For the first time, Bart understood Vorongil's reputation as a tyrant.
One glance at Ringg's bleeding face and Bart's ripped forearm, and he
did not pause for breath for a good fifteen minutes. By the time he
finished, Bart felt he would rather Ringg's claws had laid him bleeding
to the bone than stand there in the naked contempt of the old Lhari's
freezing eyes.
"Half-fledged nestlings trying to do a man's work! So someone forgot the
panel, or damaged the panel by mistake--no, not another word," he
commanded, as Ringg's crest came proudly up. "I don't care who did what!
Any more of this, and the one who does it can try his claws on the
captain of the _Swiftwing_!" He looked ugly and dangerous. "I thought
better of you both. Get below, you squalling kittens! Let me not see
your faces again before we land!"
As they went along the corridor, Ringg turned to Bart, apology and
chagrin in his eyes. "Look--I never meant to get the Bald One down on
us," he said, but Bart kept his face resolutely averted. It was easier
this way, without pretense of friendship.
* * * * *
The light from the small captive sun grew more intense. Bart had never
known anything like it, and was glad to slip away and put the dark
contact lenses into his eyes. They made his eyes appear all enormous,
dilated pupil; fearfully, he hoped no one would notice. His arm smarted,
and he did not speak to Ringg all through the long, slow deceleration.
When the intercom ordered all crew members to the hatchway, Bart
lingered a minute, pinning the yellow radiation badge in a fold of his
cloak. A spasm of fear threatened to overwhelm him again, and
nightmarish loneliness. He felt agonizingly homesick for his own
familiar face. It seemed almost more than he could manage, to step out
into the corridor full of Lhari.
_It won't be long now._
The hatch opened. Even accustomed, as he was, to Lhari lights, Bart
squeezed his eyes shut at the blue-white brilliance that assaulted him
now. Then, opening slitted lids cautiously, he found that he could see.
A weirdly desolate scene stretched away before them. Bare, burning sand,
strewn with curiously colored rocks, lay piled in strange chaos; then he
realized there was an odd, but perceptible geometry to their
arrangement. They showed alternate crystal and opaque faces. Old Rugel
noted his look of surprise.
"Never been here before? That's right, you've always worked on the
Polaris run. Well, those aren't true rocks, but living creatures of a
sort. The crystals are alive; the opaque faces are lichens that have
something like chlorophyll and can make their food from air and
sunlight. The rocks and lichens live in symbiosis. They have
intelligence of a sort, but fortunately they don't mind us, or our
automatic mining machinery. Every time, though, we find some new lichen
that's trying to set up a symbiote cycle with the concrete of our
bunkers."
"And every time," Ringg said cheerfully, "somebody--usually me--has to
see about having them scraped down and repainted. Maybe someday I'll
find a paint the lichens don't like the taste of."
"Going to explore with Ringg?" Rugel asked, and Ringg, always ready to
let bygones be bygones, grinned and said, "Sure!" Bart could not face
him.
Vorongil stopped and said, "This your first time here, young Bartol? How
would you like to visit the monument with me? You can see the machinery
on the way back."
Relieved at not having to go with Ringg, he followed the captain,
falling into step beside him. They moved in silence, along the smooth
stone path.
"The crystal creatures made this road," Vorongil said at last. "I think
they read minds a little. There used to be a very messy, rocky desert
here, and we used to have to scrabble and scratch our way to the
monument. Then one day a ship--not mine--touched down and discovered
that there was a beautiful smooth road leading up to the monument. And
the lichens never touch that stone--but you probably had all this in
school. Excited, Bartol?"
"No--no, sir. Why?"
"Eyes look a bit odd. But who could blame you for being excited? I never
come here without remembering Rhazon and his crew on that long jump. The
longest any Lhari captain ever made. A blind leap in the dark, remember,
Bartol. Through the dark, through the void, with his own crew cursing
him for taking the chance! No one had ever crossed between galaxies--and
remember, they were using the Ancient Math!"
He paused, and Bart said through a catch of breath. "Quite an
achievement." His badge still looked reassuringly yellow.
"You young people have no sense of wonder," Vorongil said. "Not that I
blame you. You can't realize what it was like in those days. Oh, we'd
had star-travel for centuries, we were beginning to stagnate. And now
look at us! Oh, they derided Rhazon--said that even if he did find
anyone, any other race, they'd be monsters with whom we could never
communicate. But here we have a whole new galaxy for peaceful trade, a
new mathematics that takes all the hazard out of space travel, our
Mentorian friends and allies." He smiled. "Don't tell the High Council
on me, but I think they deserve a lot more credit than most Lhari care
to give them. Between ourselves, I think the next Panarch may see it
that way."