Алан Дин Фостер - Relic

“We have to get dressed, Cherpa. There’s a problem.” She nodded, watching him intently, and did not try to contradict him or waste time with unnecessary questions. “There’s another sentient species, the Vrizan, who are also studying this world. They—they and the Myssari don’t really seem to like each other much. For one thing, they argue over who should own certain scientific discoveries.” As he talked she was sliding into a singlet that fit like a second skin. “Right now I think they’re arguing over who owns us.”

Fully clad, she snatched up the doll and held it close. “Are they nice people, too, like the Myssari?”

He started to reply and found himself hesitating. What, after all, did he know about Vrizan society beyond what his three-legged friends had told him? His brief encounters with them had been nothing if not contradictory. For all he knew, the people of their homeworld might be as accommodating and supportive as those of Myssar.

The Myssari, however, were a known quantity. He recalled the confrontation on Treth. Regardless of the scout’s blandishments and whatever other racial characteristics they possessed, the Vrizan there, at least, had shown themselves to be interested in him but notably less… polite than the Myssari.

Snatching up a water dispenser and a couple of sucrose-laden twists—Myssari snacks that were perfectly acceptable to the human digestive system—he took her hand.

“Where are we going, Bogo?” Taking two steps to his every stride, she kept pace easily.

“I don’t know yet,” he muttered. “I don’t know.” What he did know was that he did not want to be caught between two violently disputatious groups of aliens. “We have to hide, at least for a little while. And I haven’t any idea where to hide. I don’t know this outpost very well.”

She smiled brightly. “I know where we can hide.”

He eyed her in surprise. “You do? Where?” Higher up within the outpost the sound of fighting rose and fell, angry waves of noise crashing on an insufficiently distant shore.

“Outside.”

He stared at her. “We can’t ‘hide’ outside. There are dangerous animals outside and…”

He stopped. How could he presume to lecture someone who had grown up and survived all their life in this hostile environment on the dangers of native fauna? She knew more about what lurked in the mudflats than he could learn if he had years in which to study it. But there was also the matter of her mental imbalance. Did she know what she was talking about, or was she just being innocently agreeable?

Something loud and metallic went smash in the distance. Bending, he brought his face close to hers. “What does Oola say?”

Cherpa looked at her doll. “Oola says if there’s danger we should get the hell out of here right now .”

He straightened. “Come on then.”

They encountered no one, Myssari or Vrizan, as he led the way down toward the only one of the outpost’s surface-level exits he could recall having passed and identified. It was helpful that it lay on the opposite side of the installation from the driftec landing platform, which by now was possibly under the control of the encroaching Vrizan. Myssari resistance to their intrusion would likewise be concentrated in that area. Indeed, as he and Cherpa descended a stairwell designed to accommodate its three-legged builders, the sounds of fighting receded into the distance.

It occurred to him that they could remain where they were, hiding in the stairwell, in the hope that the Myssari would beat off the incursion. On the other hand, if he was wrong…

Beset by circumstances that were nothing if not confusing, he opted to keep moving. Moments later they were standing in the maintenance chamber he remembered from the one formal tour of the outpost to which he and his companions had been subjected. Then he had thought it a waste of time; now he was grateful for it.

All that was required to get the membrane lock that was integrated into the portal to yield was the touch of his warm hand. Holding on to the side of the opening, he leaned forward and looked out. In the absence of a moon, it was exceedingly dark. Swinging himself out and around so that he was facing the exterior of the structure, he took a couple of steps downward. Other than the fact that the wide individual rungs were spaced more closely together vertically than they would have been on a human ladder, primate hands and feet had no difficulty negotiating a descent intended for Myssari technicians. The close spacing, he decided, would make it easier for Cherpa.

Tilting back his head to face the portal, he held tight to a rung with one hand and extended the other upward. “Come on, Cherpa. It’s okay. I’ll help you—”

Scampering past him while still clinging to her doll, she sped down the entire length of the ladder and dropped silently into the mud before he had time to fully react. Her upturned face barely illuminated by starlight, she met his gaze.

“Hurry up, Bogo!”

Carefully making his way down the rest of the ladder, he resolved that from now on he would not offer help to the girl unless she specifically requested his assistance.

It was late enough for the mud to have shucked off most of the day’s accumulated heat. Following her lead, he lay down in it and turned on his back so that only his face was exposed. The dark, clammy ooze immediately began to seep into his clothing, finding openings where he imagined none existed, working its way into the corners and crevices of his body. He tried not to think of the glut of alien microorganisms that were being carried along on the tide of organic sludge.

“This way,” she urged him. “Like this.”

Looking to his left, he saw that utilizing a modified back crab crawl, she had begun to work her way away from the outpost. By dint of pushing and shoving, he mimicked her as best he could, though she had to repeatedly stop and wait for him to catch up.

Traveling on his back had its advantages, he persuaded himself. With all but a portion of their faces concealed by the mud, they were much less likely to be spotted by eager-eyed Vrizan, even if the intruders thought to scan the outpost’s surroundings. Also, he could look back at the buildings as they moved away from them. In the dim light it was possible to make out little more than the integrated structure’s general outline and the lights that gleamed from numerous ports. The sounds of fighting faded as they moved farther and farther away from the complex.

These were replaced by the natural night sounds of the mudflats. Peeping and hooting, soft squeals and insistent squeaks, chirps and grunts and bellows began to compete for his attention. Occasionally turning his head from side to side revealed intermittent shadows rising above the flat surface only to disappear quickly into the depths. One time, the firmer ground beneath him sank away and he found himself struggling to swim back to more solid footing. The Myssari had constructed their outpost where the mudflats were shallowest. Elsewhere, he knew, the mud was kilometers deep. In such places lived relatives of the nalack: eyeless monsters he preferred not to envision.

The outpost’s silhouette had grown small when he began to notice the lights around him. Half were comparatively motionless. The rest swarmed at varying speeds around his suspended form. They flickered to life like so many thousands of tiny, individual illuminators. Present in every color of the rainbow and in shapes ranging from the animated to the purely geometric, they brightened his immediate surroundings to the point where he could see Cherpa clearly. With only her face visible above the surface, she looked like a ceramic effigy from an ancient time, when humans had worn masks and makeup to celebrate pagan rituals.