Eric Russell: Wasp

Fifty yards farther along the road stood an especially tall tree with a peculiarly wrapped growth around its trunk and a very gnarly branch formation. He fixed it firmiy in his mind and for good measure lugged a tablet-shaped slab of stone onto the grass verge and stood it upright beneath the tree.

The result resembled a lonely grave. He stared at the stone and with no trouble at all could imagine words inscribed upon it: James Mowry—Terran. Strangled by the Kaitempi. Could be an omen, a forecast that already he had signed his own death warrant. There was a compensatory comfort: he did not believe in omens.

Dismissing ugly thoughts about the Kaitempi, he started trudging along the road, his gait suggestive of a slight bow-leggedness. From now on he must be wholly a Sirian, physically and mentally, name of Shir Agavan, a forestry surveyor employed by the Jaimec Ministry of Natural Resources, therefore a government official and exempt from military service. Or he could be anyone else so long as he remained plainly and visibly a Sirian and could produce the papers to prove it.

He moved good and fast while slowly the sun sank toward the horizon. He was going to thumb a lift, wanted one with the minimum of delay but also wanted it as far as possible from the point where he’d left tbe forest. It would be wise to divert attention from the real scene of his appearance. Like everyone else, Sirians had tongues. They talked. Others listened. Some hard-faced characters had the full-time jobs of listening, putting two and two together and without undue strain arriving at four. His chief peril came not from guns and garrotting-cords but from over-active tongues and alert ears.

More than a mile had been covered before two dynocars and one gas-truck passed him in quick succession all going the opposite way. None of the occupants favoured him with more than a perfunctory glance. Another mile went by before anything came in his own direction. This was another gas-truck, a big, dirty, lumbering monstrosity that wheezed and grunted as it rolled along.

Standing by the verge, he waved it down, puttiug on an air of arrogant authority that never failed to impress all Sirians save those with more arrogance and authority. The truck stopped jerkily and with a tailward boost of fumes. It was loaded with about twenty tons of edible roots. Two Sirians looked down at him from the cab. They were unkempt, their clothes baggy and soiled.

“I am of the government,” informed Mowry, giving the staterment the right degree of importance. “I wish a ride into town.”

The nearest one opened the door, moved closer to the driver and made room. Mowry climbed up, squeezed into the bench seat which was a close fit for three. He held his case on his knees. The truck emitted a loud bang and lurched forward while the Sirian in the middle gazed dully at the case.

“You are a Mashamban, I think,” ventured the driver, conversationally.

“Correct. Seems we can’t open our mouths without betraying the fact”

“I have never been to Masham,” continued the driver using the sing-song accents peculiar to Jaimec. “I would like to go there someday. It is a great place.” He switched to his fellow Sirian. “Isn’t it, Snat?”

“Yar,” said Snat, still mooning at the case.

“Besides, Masham or anywhere on Diracta should be a lot safer than here. And perhaps I’d have better luck there. It has been a bad day. It has been a stinking bad day. Hasn’t it, Snat?”

“Yar,” said Snat.

“Why?” asked Mowry.

“This soko of a truck has broken down three times since dawn. And it has stuck in the bog twice. The last time we had to empty it to get it out, and then refill it. With the load we’ve got that is work. Hard work.” He spat out the window. “Wasn’t it, Snat?”

“Yar.” said Snat, still half-dead from the effort.

“Too bad,” Mowry sympathised.

“As for the rest, you know of it,” said the driver, irefully. “It has been a bad day.”

“I know of what?” Mowry prompted.

“The news.”

“I have been in the woods since sunup. One does not hear news in the woods.”

“The ten-time radio announced an increase in the war-tax. As if we aren’t paying enough. Then the twelve-time radio said a Spakum ship had been zooming around. They had to admit it because the ship was fired upon from a number of places. We are not deaf when guns fire, nor blind when the target is visible.” He nudged his fellow. “Are we, Snat?”

“Nar,” confirmed Snat.

“Just imagine that—a lousy Spakum ship sneaking around over our very roof-tops. You know what that means: they are seeking targets for bombing. Well, I hope none of them get through. I hope every Spakum that heads this way runs straight into a break-up barrage.”

“So do I,” said Mowry, squirting pseudo-patriotism out of his ears. He gave his neighbour a dig in the ribs. “Don’t you?”

“Yar,” said Snat.

For the rest of the journey the driver maintained his paean of anguish about the general lousiness of the day, the iniquity of truck-builders, the menace and expense of war and the blatant impudence of an enemy ship that had surveyed Jaimec in broad daylight. All the time. Snat lolled in the middle of the cab, gaped glassy-eyed at Mowry’s leather case and responded in monosyllables only when metaphorically beaten over the head.

“This will do,” announced Mowry as they trund1ed through city suburbs and reached a wide crossroad. The truck stopped, he got down. “Live long!”

“Live long!” responded the driver and tooled away.

He stood on the sidewalk and thoughtfully watched the truck until it passed from sight. Well, he’d put himself to the first minor test and got by without suspicion. Neither the driver nor Snat had nursed the vaguest idea that he was what they called a Spakum—literally a bed bug—an abusive term for Terrans to which he’d listened with no resentment whatsoever. Nor should he resent it: until further notice he was Shir Agavan, a Sirian born and bred.

Holding tight to his case, he entered the city.

This was Pertane, capital of Jaimec, population a little more than two millions. No other place on the planet approached it in size. It was the centre of Jaimecan civil and military administration, the very heart of the foe’s planetary stronghold. By the same token it was potentially the most dangerous area in which a lone Terran could wander on the loose.

Reaching the downtown section, Mowry tramped around until twilight, weighed up the location and external appearance of several small hotels. Finally he picked one in a sidestreet off the main stem. Quiet and modest-looking, it would serve for a short time while he sought a better hideout. But having reached a decision he did not go straight in.

First it was necessary to make up-to-the-minute check of his papers lest anything wrong with them should put a noose around his neck. The documents with which he had been provided were microscopically accurate replicas of those valid within the Sirian Empire nine or ten months ago. They might have changed the format in the interim. To present for examination papers obviously long out of date was to ask to be nabbed on the spot.

He’d be trapped in an hotel, behind doors, with Sirians all around. Better the open street where if it came to the worst he could throw away his case along with his bandy-legged gait and run like the devil in pursuit of a virgin. So he ambled casually past the hotel, explored nearby streets until he found a policeman. Glancing swiftly around, he marked his getaway route and went up to the officer.

“Pardon, I am a newcomer.” He said it stupidly, wearing an expression of slight dopiness. “I arrived from Diracta a few days ago.”

“You are lost, hi?”