A Day for Damnation twatc-2 Page 18

  "Fifteen minutes-half an hour. I'm not sure."

  "Terrific. Grab that canister. Spray the hatch. The hinges. The handles. Everything. Outline it."

  "Right."

  She had to work around me, but she was thorough. By the time she finished, the foam over the break was already hardening. Gingerly, I took my hands away from the panel I was holding. It stayed put. I took the canister from Lizard and gave it another spritz around the edges. Good.

  I turned around and looked at her. She was giggling. She pointed at the door. "I always wanted a window-"

  "Huh?" I turned back to the door. The patch had a glass window in it. And a warning: CAUTION. DO NOT OPEN THIS PANEL WHILE-The rest was obliterated.

  I was too tired to laugh. I pointed toward the front of the ship. "Call whatsisname. Tell him we're okay. And-" I lowered my voice, "-tell him Duke's in pretty bad shape."

  She searched my face. "As in `Duke's on the roof and we can't get him down'?"

  "Yeah-better start preparing him."

  I pulled off my O-mask and goggles, and climbed into the back to see what I could do for Duke. He was still moaning about his legs being red and burning. I pulled back the blanket and looked. The terramycin had done its job. The pink strands were gone from his legs-but the purple and red strands were longer. It was worm fur! But-why? How-?

  Duke's whole body was hot. The console said his temperature was 102. His face was dry. His skin was red and cracked. His eyes were puffed up so badly, I was sure he couldn't see out of them, but he turned his face toward me and managed to croak something. I didn't understand. I had to put my face closer. "What-?"

  "Ho ... go ho ... tay ho. . . ."

  "Home? Right, Duke. We're on our way. Just hang on a little longer, okay?" I squeezed his arm in what was meant to be a reassuring gesture, but he writhed at my touch. "I'm sorry-just hang on, Duke. A little longer. Danny's coming to get you. Your son-"

  He turned his head away from me.

  There was nothing more I could do for him. I climbed back down to the front of the ship. Lizard was just signing off. She nodded to me. "They're rigging a crab and a zip line."

  I grunted and sank down into my seat. "Everything okay back there?" she asked.

  "Yeah," I replied. I wasn't very convincing.

  She reached over and patted me. "You're doing fine, McCarthy. Hang on just a little longer."

  I looked at her sourly. "That's what I just told Duke."

  "Sorry," she said.

  "We're gonna lose him. I know it-"

  "Jim-"

  "I am tired of all this dying!" I said. "I hate it! I just hate it!" I could hear the raggedness in my own voice and how loud I sounded in the cramped cabin of the chopper, and abruptly I realized just how close I was to the edge.

  I turned away from Lizard and buried my face against my arm, trying to create even a small private space for my frustration. I motioned behind me for her to just keep her distance and please not say anything. "No-just leave me alone for a while. Okay?"

  "Sure. Okay."

  The chopper was cold. There were tiny patches of frost on the walls where the freezer had sprayed-and ice crystals. It smelled of cotton candy and shelterfoam. There was a faint pink haze in the air, but it wasn't strong enough to cover the smell of our sweatand the other smell too. The smell from the back of the ship.

  We sat in silence. We listened to the eternal sound of the Chtorran ecology eating. We watched its myriad tiny forms scuttling across the windshield of the chopper. There were a lot less of them now. They probably didn't like the light and had gone elsewhere. The only critters left were the ones that didn't care.

  One of the pink furballs was humping right across my field of vision. Almost mechanically, I picked up my camera and began photographing it. The creature had a tiny puckered mouth and it vacuumed up everything in its path. Maybe this was a larval worm. I wondered if I'd live to find out. I wondered if this would be my legacy-these pictures.

  "Hey-" I lowered the camera and looked at Lizard.

  "What?"

  "I just realized. Duke's only a captain. How come Danny's a colonel?"

  "You want the truth?"

  "Yeah!"

  "Do you know much about what happened in Pakistan?"

  "Not a lot, no. That was a long time ago."

  Lizard sighed. "Fifteen years is not a long time ago."

  "I was only nine years old," I protested.

  "I was in high school," Lizard replied. "Anyway, did you ever hear of the Rawalpindi Incident?"

  "That I heard of."

  "Well ... your Captain Anderson back there-only he was Lieutenant Anderson at the time-was... ah, actively involved."

  "How actively?"

  "They gave him orders. He followed them."

  "I must be stupid," I said. "I don't understand what you're trying not to say."

  "Captain Anderson did his job. People got killed. A lot of them. Mostly on the other side. That happens a lot in a war. Captain Anderson deserved a medal. Instead, they gave him a court-martial."

  "Duke-?"

  Lizard nodded. "He was acquitted-but then so was Lizzie Borden, and look at how many people remember her."

  "Jeez, I didn't know any of this-"

  "Not many people do any more. I had to look it up myself. It's very interesting reading. Captain Anderson can have a promotion anytime he wants. All he has to do is retire."

  "No way. Not Duke."

  "Mm hm. A lesser man might have resigned his commission. Captain Anderson didn't. You ought to look up his statement to the court. That's the most interesting part. It's about the real meaning of service; he said, `Commitment means not quitting just because the job got tough."'

  "But they never promoted him after that?"

  "Right. "

  I thought for a moment. Her explanation made sense-except it didn't. I looked at Lizard sharply. "There's something else you're not telling me, isn't there?"

  She didn't answer. "Well ... ?" I prompted.

  "All right..." she sighed. "You'd better hear it from me, I guess."

  "Hear what?"

  "The other reason you were pulled out of Colorado is that Danny asked me, off the record, to find something a little less dangerous for Captain Anderson. You know, he's over fifty?"

  "Duke?"

  "Yeah, Duke."

  I glanced to the back of the chopper. I'd never thought of Duke as really old.

  "I told you I looked up his record. It's impressive. So I asked for him to be assigned to me. You were part of the package, so you got pulled too. But it could have happened anyway. We're pulling a lot of personnel out of the Rocky Mountain District right now for California."

  I grunted a polite acknowledgment. I didn't like the implications. Lizard reached over and put her hand on mine. She waited till I looked up at her. Her eyes were incredibly blue. "Listen, stupid. I did mean what I said about your expertise. I could have put you and Duke anywhere, but I asked for you in my section because the two of you are exactly what I need right now. I especially appreciate your sense of the Chtorran ecology. I've learned to appreciate it even more in the past two days."

  "Thanks," I said grumpily. I even meant it.

  "Are you unhappy about that?"

  "Listen-" I said. "As long as we're telling the truth ... the only reason I'm the best worm expert in California is that there aren't any others. You think too much of my abilities."

  "You haven't done too badly here."

  "There's no trick to that."

  "Oh? Really?"

  "Sure. You just ask yourself what could make this situation worse. Then plan for that. If it happens, you look like you know what you're doing. If it doesn't, you're still better prepared to handle whatever does happen."

  "You're kidding."

  "Nope. Try it." I gestured toward the windshield. "What could make this situation worse?"

  She said, "Looking out the window and seeing a whole family of worms surrounding the chopper."r />
  I glanced at my watch. "Probably within fifteen minutes."

  "You don't need to be so cheerful about it."

  I shrugged. "It's hard being right. You get cocky. Besides, what else can go wrong?"

  She looked at me sharply. "You don't want this transfer, do you?"

  "No, I don't," I said candidly. "I don't like the way it's been handled. It's been too abrupt. And I don't like leaving a job unfinished. We were making real progress in Colorado."

  "Uh huh." She nodded. "You want to know something about that?"

  "What?"

  "Nobody's ever going to pull you off an important job unless the one they're putting you on is even more important. You might want to remember that. It's true even when there are other considerations."

  She meant Duke.

  Behind us, his breathing had gotten painfully loud. And it seemed even more ragged and uneven than before. I wondered if he was even going to last until the blimp arrived.

  We sat in silence for a while.

  Suddenly, Lizard said, "You son of a bitch."

  "Huh?"

  "You did it again." She pointed. I looked.

  Outside the chopper, there was something moving through the edges of darkness-something just beyond the warm circle of our lights. Its eyes glimmered and flashed as it glanced toward us. It was that reflection that had given it away.

  "Is the spotlight working?" I asked.

  "The nose light is out, but I've got one overhead. Hang on." She touched her control panel. A bright beam sprang out across the clearing, suddenly catching the little silvery-pink figure by surprise-it was centered in the rosy pool of light. The creature blinked and froze in the sudden glare. It was round and furry and as cute as a baby abominable snowman. Pink dust hung in the air around it.

  "Oh-" gasped Lizard. "Is that a bunnydog?" Her eyes widened in wonder.

  "Yeah," I said sourly. I lifted the camera to my eye. The creature was only thigh-deep in the powder. That meant the cotton candy was settling.

  "He doesn't seem scared of the light, does he?"

  "No. Just curious. These creatures don't display much fear of anything. Do you see the others?" There were more bunnydogs in the dimness behind it. We could see them in the reflected glow. They were motionless too.

  Lizard was grinning. "You just blew one. These are not worms."

  I said, "I've still got ten minutes."

  The bunnydog blinked and unfroze then. It scratched behind one ear, rubbed its face with its paws, made a face at us, then turned and ambled out of the spotlight.

  "Well, I guess he told you," said Lizard.

  "Yeah, but what?"

  The other bunnydogs were getting curious now. One at a time, they began taking cautious little hops toward the chopper. They pushed through the powder in quick spurts of motion, stopping often to look ahead and ponder. They cocked their heads sideways to listen, their ears flopping open as they did so. I held my camera steady and recorded every moment of it. I thumbed the controls and zoomed in for closeups. These pictures were going to be important.

  There was something funny about the shape of their mouths; they seemed permanently pouted-their muzzles were oddly blunted. As I watched, one of them straightened up and turned to its companion, pursing its lips as if kissing the air. The other replied with a kissy-face of its own. They looked like puppies who'd been pulled off Mamma's tit. Of course! Their mouths were shaped more for sucking than for chewing!

  How very... odd.

  I watched-and photographed-as the bunnydogs continued sniffing closer to the chopper. Every so often, one or another of them would lower its muzzle to the dust and suck and chew. Were they going for the powder-or the creatures feeding on the powder? I couldn't tell. But I knew it was important-it was part of the bigger question. Were these creatures sentient? Were they omnivores? Were these the sentients we were looking for?

  Their nostrils and eyes were slits against the powder-but every so often, one of the creatures would pause and straighten and look at us, blinking its eyes wide for a quick curious instant; then we could see that the bunnydogs actually had very large round eyes. Puppydog eyes. Probably that was their normal configuration-when they weren't rump-deep in dust.

  I said, "This is very very bad news."

  Lizard glanced at me. "Huh?"

  "We've been telling people that the Chtorran ecology is extraordinarily vicious, right?"

  "Uh huh."

  "And we've got pictures to prove it, right?"

  "Go on. . . ."

  "So-how long do you think we'll be able to sell that story after these creatures are seen by the public?"

  "You're right," she said. "This is bad news."

  I continued recording the bunnydogs' cautious inspection of the chopper. "We're going to have to put the lid on this. At least until we know what we're looking at. These creatures could be the most dangerous of all. And we might not find out what the danger is until it's too late, because we're so distracted by how cute they are."

  The first of the bunnydogs reached the wind'shield then. It climbed up the side of the chopper and peered in at us, blinking owlishly. With its paws flat against the glass, it looked like a small child peering in the window of a candy store. It sucked at the surface-tasting it, no doubt.

  "I keep wanting to say awww," whispered Lizard.

  "It's a fucking teddy bear-a goddamned fucking teddy bear!" I growled. "What a dirty trick."

  The bunnydog licked its chops politely. I wondered what that meant.

  There were other bunnydogs climbing up the side of the chopper now. Within minutes, the window was full of tiny little faces peering in at us.

  "I, uh-hate to say this," said Lizard, "but I'm starting to get scared."

  "Me too. I never thought I'd be afraid of a herd of teddy bears."

  "They just keep staring at us. What do they want?"

  "I don't know." I was still recording. "I think maybe they're just curious." I lowered my camera. "I want to try something. Will you record this?"

  "Sure." She took the camera from me. "Okay, go ahead."

  I leaned forward in my seat and placed my hands up against the glass, opposite the paws of the first bunny. Its paws were no larger than a baby's.

  The bunnydog blinked. It tried to sniff my hands through the windshield. It sucked at the glass. Then it stopped and frowned. It looked puzzled. It blinked and tried again. This time, it licked the glass. Its tongue was soft and pink. The other bunnydogs watched curiously.

  "That doesn't seem very intelligent," Lizard said.

  "It is if you've never seen glass before. It's testing." The bunnydog blinked at me again.

  I blinked back at it-a big oversized gesture. The bunnydog showed its teeth.

  I showed mine. As wide as I could.

  The bunnydog-there was no other word for it-smiled. I smiled too-a big ridiculous grin.

  "I think you're communicating," Lizard said.

  "I wonder what we're saying to each other?"

  "It looks like, `for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health.. . "'

  "Bite your tongue," I said. But my face was frozen. I was still smiling broadly at the bunnydog. "Maybe we're negotiating a peace treaty... . "

  The bunnydog made a face. It pulled its cheeks out into a grotesque expression. And held it.

  "I dare you," Lizard said.

  I swallowed. "The things I do for my species." I made a face back at the bunnydog. I hooked my fingers in my mouth and stretched it wide. I crossed my eyes and stuck out my tongue and touched the tip of it to my nose.

  The bunnydog fell off the window in surprise. So did all the others.

  "Oh, God-I think I've insulted them."

  The bunnydogs were rolling around in the powder, stamping their feet and drumming up big clouds of pale pink dust. They looked like they were having a collective seizure.

  "Or something," Lizard said. "Maybe they're laughing themselves to death."

 
I looked at Lizard; she had the camera still recording. She pointed it straight at me. "This-" I said angrily to posterity, "-is not the way Captain Kirk always did it!"

  TWENTY-SIX

  THE BUNNYDOGS climbed back up on the windshield and stared at us for a while longer. I made some more faces at them. They made some more faces at me. Gradually, they lost interest in that game and drifted away to explore other parts of the chopper. We heard them scrabbling across the top of the ship and scratching at the observation bubbles.

  "I better see what they're up to-" I grabbed the camera and headed for the back. I stopped and peered up into the turret. One of the little cutenesses was peering back down at me. I waved at it facetiously-it waved back-then I closed the shutter in case Duke woke up again.

  On a hunch, I peered out through the tiny accidental window in the door patch. "Holy Hannah-" I jammed the camera against the glass and started shooting. There were bunnies all over the dead worm! The ice had evaporated from its fur-now it was just a big collapsed bag of dead pudding-but the bunnies were climbing up onto its back, patting it curiously and chittering at it. They looked like they were trying to wake it up. One of them was even peering into its mouth

  Lizard called me then. "Hey, McCarthy-something's happening. "

  "Wait a minute-"

  "I mean it! You better get down here!"

  She was right. Something was happening. The bunnies were suddenly dropping off the dead worm and moving forward again. I swung down to the front of the chopper and climbed back into my seat.

  Lizard pointed off to the left. "Over there. Look-the bunnydogs have all stopped to listen."

  She was right. The little round creatures had fallen still-they were listening for something. They had their heads cocked sideways and their expressions were expectant.

  Beyond, in the darkness, something was stirring up the dust. It rose brightly in the glare of our lights.

  The bunnydogs stiffened expectantly.... I could feel my heart rising. This was it.

  And then the first worm poured over the dunes and down into the drifts.