Michael Kube-McDowell - Odyssey

Aranimas nodded gravely. “I will give you that opportunity.”

Answering Derec’s query about a place to work meant going deeper into the confusing maze of the raider ship. Unlike when he had been inside the asteroid, Derec found it impossible to retain any sense of direction. There were too many turns, too short sight lines, and too few absolute references. Once he lost track of where he was in relation to the command center, it was over.

Despite being lost, Derec was still collecting useful information with every step. He learned that different parts of the ship had slightly different atmospheres, and the storage corridors acted as interlocks between them. In one section, something in the air made Derec feel as though a furry ball were caught in his throat. In another, yellowish tears ran from Aranimas’s eyes. Only the caninoid seemed at home in all the atmospheres.

The ship was not only a maze, but a zoo as well, featuring at least four species. Derec sawfive of Aranimas’s kin, all of high rank to judge by the activities Derec saw them engaged in. Curiously, the caninoid seemed to be the only one of his kind aboard.

Most numerous were the gaunt-faced Narwe, several of whom had been recruited by Aranimas to carry the robot parts. The Narwe were short bald-headed bipeds with gnarled skull ridges like false horns, which made them look fierce and formidable. But it was clearly only protective coloring, for Aranimas and the caninoid alike cuffed and bullied the Narwe without fear.

The fourth species was the most interesting and the most elusive. Inside the compartment where Aranimas’s eyes began to tear, Derec caught a glimpse of a strange five-limbed wall-clinging creature not unlike a giant sea star. It retreated as they approached, and was gone from sight by the time they reached the spot.

Fascinated as Derec was by the parade of alien biologies, he was also concerned about having so casual a contact with them. He knew that his own body was host to a rich biotic community: bacteria, viruses, fungi, and parasites. He did not know just how different the aliens were from him. He hoped they were wildly different. The more similar their fundamental structure was to his, the greater the risk that his symbiotes could endanger them or theirs endanger him.

He could only hope that Aranimas had either taken precautions or determined that no precautions were necessary. He based that hope on the fact that the raiders had evidently had some previous contact with humans. The scavenged robots and the aliens’ command of Standard proved that.

But that was another mystery for his lengthening list. Derec was positive that human beings had never crossed paths with even one intelligent alien lifeform, much less with four of them. To understand interplanetary politics, he had to know history and economics, but not xenobiology.

Did the raiders’ presence mean that he was far out on the fringes of human space? Or had knowledge of the contacts been made a state secret, meant only for those with a need to know? Were the raiders pirates, prospectors, or pioneers? Had they perhaps come looking for the same thing the robots had been looking for? And having found it, were they carrying him toward their home, or his?

They were questions with serious consequences. Tensions were high enough between Earth and the Spacers without any random factors to jumble the picture. An attack of the sort Derec had already witnessed, directed against one of the many human worlds with no planetary defense net, could bring on war.

Which brought Derec back to the silver artifact. If it was as important as the robots’ search for it implied, if it was powerful enough or important enough for the raiders to come after it, then it was too important and too powerful to be left in the raiders’ hands. As much as he hated to be thinking about anyone’s problems but his own, Derec had an obligation to try to reclaim it for humanity.

Mercifully, the lab was located in a section with a normal atmosphere, though the air was a bit warm and dry. While Aranimas settled into a chair and supervised the Narwe’s arrangement of the robot parts on the open areas of the floor, Derec browsed the workbench and wall racks with the caninoid at his elbow to answer questions. By the time he finished, the Narwe were gone.

“Explain each step as you perform it,” Aranimas said, crossing his arms as though settling in.

“Do you intend to sit there and watch?”

“I intend to learn what you know.”

“Then I hope you’re a patient sort,” Derec said.

“According to your story, it took you only a short time to convert an article of clothing into an escape propulsion system,” Aranimas said. “This should require even less time, since you only need to turn a robot into a robot.”

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Derec said, throwing his hands in the air. “I’m not sure I’m going to be able to do it at all, much less in an hour or two.”

“Explain the problem,” Aranimas said.

Derec bit back a laugh. In the hopes of loosening the noose Aranimas had around his neck, Derec had been rehearsing complaints that the equipment in the lab was ill suited, too crude, anything to lower Aranimas’s expectations.

But his dismay was real, not manufactured. He had prepared himself for instruments designed for nonhuman hands, to having to have one of the raiders at his elbow coaching him. But he had not been prepared to do without what he thought of as the basics.

“The problem is you don’t have the right tools,” Derec said. “I need a diagnostic bench, an etcher, micromanipulators-There’s nothing in here that would even pass for a chip mask or circuit tracer-”

Even as he spoke, he realized that he should not have been surprised. Aranimas would not be so curious about robots, would not need to have Derec repair them, if the culture which he represented were capable of making them. The fact that the raiders employed gunners instead of autotargeting systems should have tipped him off that their computer technology was deficient.

Aranimas stood. “Such tools as are available will be brought to you. Describe what you need to Rrullf”-Aranimas’s shortened version of the caninoid’s name was almost pronounceable-”and she will bring them to you or take you to them.”

She? Derec cast a surprised glance at the caninoid. Interesting .

“Thank you,” he said to Aranimas, and started to turn away. As he did, a thousand bees settled between his shoulder blades and began to sting him wildly. Gasping, his knees buckling, he grabbed for the edge of the workbench to keep from collapsing on the floor. He did not need to see to know that Aranimas had the stylus trained at the middle of his back.

“Do not make the mistake of trying to deceive me,” Aranimas said coldly as the pain held Derec firmly in its grip. “I may be ignorant of your art, but I am not foolish.”

“I-I-”

“Save your words of apology,” Aranimas said as the bees flew away. “Show me results.”

Doubled over the workbench, Derec turned his head in time to see Aranimas return the stylus to whatever hidden pocket was reserved for it. Clearing the phlegm from his throat, he nodded weakly. “Right, boss.”

When Aranimas was gone, the caninoid’s face twisted into its macabre grin. “ ’Urr lucky Aranimas wants robots so bad. Otherwise I guess ‘u be dead now.”

“Thanks for the cheery thought,” Derec said. “What exactly does he want them for?”

“Can’t ‘u figure? Aranimas wants to replace Narwe with robots. Aranimas iss sick of Narwe crying scenes.”

“Do the Narwe know what he has in mind?”

“Narwe been on best behavior since the boss told them,” the caninoid said cheerfully. “What ‘u need to work?”