THE VULTURE SWAM THROUGH THE DARK WATERS OF
Chanchuk away from the Lodge of the Reverend Mother. At the moment,
Vulture was female, but that would soon change—the new target
and identity had already been selected. It was mostly a matter of
awaiting the opportune moment when the key elements of the
operation would come together.
It was spring in this part of Chanchuk; the covering ice had all
long since broken, melted, and flowed away to the Great Sea and the
water was now a comfortable six degrees Celsius, not at all bad.
Visibility was always poor this close in to the coast and was never
very good at any depth. Not that Chanchukian eyesight was poor; the
inner, transparent lid on each eye allowed the eyes to be open and
alert at all times, but there was only so much light and there were
incredible shadows and distortions. One quickly learned to trust
sound over sight down here.
Chanchuk had been one of Master System’s more creative
inventions, both as a world and culture and as creative biological
redesign.
It was probable that, when the great computer decided to
disperse humanity throughout a full quadrant of the Milky Way
galaxy as part of its imperative to ensure human survival, it
always had biological redesign in mind even if the slowness of
terraforming hadn’t forced that decision on it. It was not
enough to carry off ninety percent of the population of Earth to
new worlds; it was also important to make them so different and so
unique to their new habitats that they would have little desire to
return to Earth even if such a chance were afforded them. The
greater the differences—and physiological differences back on
Earth far simpler and more basic than these had been the basis for
much human hatred and prejudice—the less chance over the
passage of time that scattered humanity would ever even dream of
reuniting.
Chanchuk had presented particular problems to the great
computer. Its land surface was fierce, violent, and not terribly
habitable by any great numbers. The tropics were a steamy hell; the
rest was desert, tundra, or high and inaccessible mountains, all
without any hope of large-scale agriculture. Only the vast seas had
any promise, and could become the breeding grounds for hordes of
specialized sea creatures who would reproduce in profusion over the
whole of the planet’s waters. And to keep their numbers from
choking off other marine life, there would have to be large numbers
of predators, until the most predatory of all, humankind, could
establish itself firmly and permanently on the new world.
Partly because of the predators required at the start, and also
because of the need to maintain a humanlike culture under the
difficult conditions presented by so vast a seabed, the people of
Chanchuk had to be sea dwellers but not creatures of the sea.
Vulture “smelled” rather than saw the entrance to
her lodge and made for it, then came up quickly into the entry
chamber and back into the air. The average Chanchukian female could
hold her breath for up to an hour and dive as deep as a thousand
meters without artificial aid, but they were still air-breathing
mammals and it was always a pleasure to breathe air again.
An entry chamber was never very fancy; it was like the vestibule
of a good home, where you left your mess before entering the decent
parts of the house. Like most, it was lined with absorbent
dahagi, a giant sea sponge that felt wonderful when you
shook off the water and then rolled around for a few moments. Then
it was up to the inner entry chamber, where a special fan and
heater would finish the drying process thoroughly and quickly.
Afterward, one was presentable enough to enter the main lodge. It
was an addition only for the elite of the Center; the masses were
allowed no such technology and relied on natural breezes or lived
with being wet.
Vulture entered the Great Room and noted that the lamps were lit
in spite of the fact that it was still day. She looked up at the
skylights above and saw dark clouds; the roar of a good rainstorm
echoed dully inside as the storm beat upon the solid lodges of the
People. Funny how the two worlds hardly interacted from a
Chanchukian point of view. Vulture had been out all day, but until
she’d entered the Great Room she had no idea that it was
raining.
Butar Killomen of the spaceship Kaotan was preparing a
snack in the kitchen area—it smelled like hai ka, a
particularly tasty candy that was a Chanchukian favorite. She
looked far different from the muscular, tailed, hairless
gray-skinned creature she had been born as, but that was the price
of the rings that would bring their freedom. Vulture liked her much
better this way, and certainly Killomen didn’t seem
particularly upset by the change.
Of course, the key to any success they had to date was that all
of them were outcasts and fugitives from their own people. Killomen
had been a freebooter, living outside of and between the cracks of
the system. Except for those from Earth and some from the late crew
of the Indrus, all of them had been pretty much
unique.
The people of Chanchuk were covered with a thick, oily fur in
shades ranging from golden to red to brown to black. On land they
were bipeds, with broad hands and fingers that were linked
two-thirds of their length with thick black webbing. The ears,
although sensitive, were fur-covered and resembled mere depressions
in the side of the flat, squat head. The noses were broad and
black, with flaps that closed and sealed when underwater, flanked
by thick, long whiskers and a mouth that looked small but could
open to swallow something half the size of the head. The
twin-lidded eyes—the inner lid transparent as glass and
actually increasing sensitivity to light—were brown, rounded,
inset balls perfectly suited for the two worlds of Chanchuk, water
and air, although it made them nearsighted to a degree and painted
their world in patterns of sepia-stained monochrome while bringing
any object into startling three-dimensional life. That was what the
few on this team missed most: color. But they’d gotten used
to it by now.
The bodies were thick, impossibly lithe, almost plastic in their
ability to bend any which way. In the water, the legs and long,
webbed feet formed a single horizontal tail that could propel them
with dolphinlike speed. On land, they bent outward, slightly
bowlegged, the feet bent forward to allow a comic, yet quite
serviceable, walk, and the thick membrane that bent in the water to
serve as a dorsal fin hung down to become a balance-aiding
paddlelike tail. Raven said that they reminded him of the Pacific
sea otter, but none of those who were actually down here in that
form had ever seen or heard of such a creature.
Killomen turned and nodded to Vulture. “Everything
set?”
“As much as can be,” came the reply.
“There’s no way to deceive the SPF once we pull
it—the old girl never seems to have the damned thing off her
finger—but if all the stuff Clayben and Raven designed for
this job works, it shouldn’t be difficult to get the ring.
The getaway mechanisms are all planted and primed; they could get
lucky, but the odds are with us this time for a change. I doubt if
it’ll work twice, but it should do here. At least this time
we’re risking the smallest number of people and we’re
far more experienced and sophisticated about this than
before.”
Min Xao Po entered from the bedroom, looking sleepy, but she had
obviously overheard everything. Min and co-conspirator Chung Mung
Wo, both of the crew of the freebooter Chunhoifan, had the
oddest adjustment problems to Chanchuk. Both had been male and were
now female, for one thing, and both were also finding it difficult
to adapt to a culture that was in every way, including
biologically, a matriarchy. This, on top of the physiological
changes, was bad enough, but both men had been ethnic Chinese whose
ancestors had come from the barren northwest of China centuries
before. In spite of the startling environmental differences and the
sex-role reversal, the language and many of the customs of the
people of Chanchuk were very close to that which their own people
had taught to them. The dialect difference was what one would
expect after over nine hundred years of separation, and there was a
new set of words better able to handle the watery nature of
Chanchuk. It had been a shock, but they’d been the logical
choice for this mission.
Besides, they were damned good marksmen and one was an ordnance
specialist, the other a communications expert. Their skills had
determined the method and the personnel for this
“caper,” as Raven called it. After close to a year on
Chanchuk as natives, they had adapted surprisingly well.
“So when do we go?” Min asked Vulture.
“I think we’ve been here long enough,” Vulture
responded. “I want you and Mung to run through the sequence
with us and check out all the equipment one last time. I
don’t want anything going wrong because of timing, equipment
failure, weather, or anything else. A physical check of the remotes
is too time-consuming, but we can run a receiver check on each.
Guns should be fully charged, everything ready to go. Bute,
we’ll need the canisters in position as soon as I settle in.
I prefer living in that place as one of the consorts as little time
as possible. When I absorb someone, the genetic design dominates
and shapes me just as it does the original. I almost got trapped
that way once before and this is far more dangerous, at least for
me. If everything comes off correctly, I’ll get the ring, but
I’m sure as hell not going to be a lot of help. If we fail to
knock ’em out long enough, or if one single SPF guard is left
awake, I’m stuck and everything’s back to square
one—if any of us survives.”
“We know that,” Killomen responded impatiently.
“We’re chomping at the bit to go. All we have
to do is sneak around and shoot straight. You have the toughest
job. You’re sure you can neutralize the
neurotoxin?”
“I’ve done it easily in all the tests, but that was
when I knew exactly when it was coming and could concentrate. You
know the drill. If I’m not out, with or without the ring,
within fifteen minutes of the start of the operation, or if any
alarms bring in the forces, you forget me and fall back. We scrub.
If we can’t get the ring, there’s no purpose in anybody
dying.” She looked at Killomen and frowned. “Something
still worrying you other than everything that’s worrying
me?”
She shrugged. “No, I have this odd feeling, that’s
all. I’ll believe that we can get away with this without
getting ourselves killed when we do it.”
Vulture put a hand on her shoulder and gave the Chanchukian
equivalent of a sour grin. It looked awful. “Nobody lives
forever, unless I eat them,” she said.
Min looked uncomfortable at that and changed the subject.
“What about you, though? You are certain that no one in
Center security suspects you?”
“Oh, they suspect something,” Vulture
admitted. “That’s why they wired all the Center lodges
and why we had to go through that godawful business of neutralizing
the bugs and installing believable recordings. Their general theory
is that we have enough spies that we can pick out, snatch, and
replace a key figure with our own mind-printed duplicate, no matter
what their computers tell them about the security of their
mindprint processes. That’s why all the SPF here have monitor
implants, as do Center security and the
administrators—especially those who have any access to the
Holy Lama. I almost blew it because of that implant when I took
over this body. I’m not exactly brilliant and alert when
I’m absorbing someone and my automatic response was to expel
the foreign object. Fortunately I hadn’t begun merging minds
and had the sense to figure it was some kind of implant and
transfer it, too. I’m ready for it now, and they’re
convinced that there’s no way we can snatch somebody long
enough to mindprint and duplicate them without their knowledge. And
they’re right, too. If they ever knew what I could really do,
they could shut me down cold.”
“That is the other reason I worry,” said Butar
Killomen softly. “If they were somehow to learn about you, to
stop you—what good would even four rings be? We need you. You
have become our ace in the hole.”
Vulture sat back on her tail and sighed. “I believe you
underestimate yourselves. At the start I would have said so, too,
and perhaps been right, but now—I’m not so sure that
anyone of this company can be denied.” She clapped her hands
together sharply and stood up as straight as the Chanchukian body
would allow. “Come! Min, wake Chung and tell her to get
herself out here ahead of her tail. If all this brooding has not
caused the hai ka to burn to a crisp we shall all sit
around and drink strong tea and stuff ourselves with such decadence
and be pretty damned positive it’s almost over. Although we
are creatures of water and air now, you three will always be in
your element only in space, and it is to there that we will return
in very short time!”
Chanchuk, for all its differences, retained the basic system
imposed by Master System on the vast majority of human worlds,
including Earth. The basic culture was taken from ancient,
pre-Master System Earth, then refined, stylized, and simplified by
both Master System’s design and the planet’s cultural
isolation for over nine hundred years.
Over the masses, serving Master System and running the world in
secret, were the elect—the smartest, the most ambitious, the
best of the people. They alone had access to technology, and they
ruled with it, co-opting anyone who might be a threat to the system
into the leadership, or eliminating them if they could not be
co-opted. A series of regional Centers divided up control of the
world; over them all was a chief administrator who was the ultimate
boss of the world—but still subject to Master System’s
will.
From their Centers, this elite ruled millions of people divided
into feudal quasi-states under warlords with their castlelike grand
lodges and private armies. The technology available to these
masses, even the warlords, was primitive, the ways archaic, but the
system was effective. About the only oddity Chanchuk presented was
its near universal adherence to Buddhism, but this Buddha had a
broad and unnaturally fat Chanchukian head and body, and was, like
the priesthood and holy ones here, most certainly female. This
distinctive Master System touch was dictated more by practicality
than any intent to maliciously pervert the old ways; the religion,
an odd but ancient offshoot of Buddhism, was, except for the sexual
roles, pretty faithfully intact.
On Chanchuk the females ruled; the males were, on the whole,
small, fairly weak, short-lived, and not very bright. Clayben
analyzed the place and, because of this anomaly, suspected that
Chanchukians were based upon a real alien race and not one created
by Master System.
Clayben and Star Eagle were disquieted by the idea that this
world might have once contained a sentient race that looked and
lived much as the colonists did, but one that would not be co-opted
and would not surrender. Master System’s core instructions
extended to human life; it was the prevention of human racial
genocide or suicide that had led to its creation by well-meaning
scientists so long ago. But that was human. Was the computer, in
fact, capable of cold genocide against any race that had not sprung
from human stock? Had it done so here? And, if so, how many other
races had been eliminated and supplanted in its grandiose
scheme?
“Master System was created by human minds,” Hawks
had pointed out. “And human minds have always had a veritable
gift in some parts of the world for the elimination or subjugation
of any race or group that stood in the way of the powerful and
their needs.” Hawks, of course, was what the Europeans
generally referred to as an “American Indian.”
Vulture was the least disturbed by these thoughts. It, too, was
a creature of technology and human minds, and didn’t quite
feel the weight of broad moral questions the way the others did.
The immediate problem was disturbing enough.
Wa Chi Center had been as easy as the others to penetrate, and
in spite of its more diffuse nature, with its citylike collection
of lodges and fragmented if interconnected offices, was a familiar
system by now. The chief administrator certainly had a name once;
but now she was just known as the Holy Lama in the language of the
people. She was old, and smart, and generally antisocial. The only
time she seemed to emerge from her Sacred Lodge was for ceremonial
or religious occasions—she was believed by the masses and
even by most of the educated technocrats of Wa Chi Center to be the
latest reincarnation of a demigod who was the messenger between the
Heavens and the World. As such, she was the highest lama, the
supreme religious authority, and a deity in her own right. There
were a few—very few—occasions when she had to appear,
to preside, but when she did she was always surrounded by so many
guards and other people that it would have been impossible to get
near her, let alone steal the ring she seemed to always wear on her
finger.
Even if there were a way to snatch it and somehow keep from
being killed by the guards or mauled by the crowd for sacrilege,
the alarm would be sounded and getaway would be next to impossible.
That meant taking her where she was most vulnerable, where she
depended on the automated and physical security systems—in
the Sacred Lodge in the middle of Wa Chi Center. For Wa Chi was not
merely a Center but also a vast temple complex, the seat of a
mighty theocracy.
Vulture, as usual, had worked her way close to the ring and then
had “eaten” and become a security official with access
to the Sacred Lodge. Usually the top people were very sophisticated
and very knowledgeable about the system and the history of the
world and its people, and this, along with their privileged
position, made them into cynics only playing the role of a
primitive for the masses. Here, though, perhaps because of the
original cultural cohesion of the first colonists, the elite had
the knowledge, but not the cynicism. It was clear that the Holy
Lama believed in her faith and her deity as much as her subjects
did and took it quite seriously. She spent a good deal of time in
prayer and communion with the spirits—although she was also
clearly a damned good and efficient administrator who had her
finger on the pulse of her world and everyone of importance in it
and a fine grasp of the technology involved.
Unlike the other priestesses, however, the Holy Lama was not
celibate, nor was she supposed to be. Indeed, she was to bear as
many children as possible, all of the females to be raised as
priestesses for the other Centers and even for the warlord
districts, their authority being their lineage to the demigoddess
herself. When their mother ultimately passed away, the entire
female line would gather and among them one would be anointed as
having received the spirit of the deity and become the new Holy
Lama. It was generally, although not always, the one who was
youngest and most capable of continuing the line, yet experienced
in the ways of the Centers and Chanchukian politics and culture.
The sign was that the Sacred Golden Ring fit the new one’s
finger. Somehow, it always did. This Holy Lama had been twenty-nine when called, and
was now thirty-six. Chanchukian females sexually matured late by
human standards, and she was probably good for another eight or ten
children before her child-bearing years were past. For this and
other reasons, some genetic, some traditional, her inner sanctum
was maintained by a small cadre of males—her consorts. While
some priestesses, including heads of Center staff departments,
could and did see her, such meetings were always carefully
monitored; the slightest deviation from protocol or normal routine
was certain to raise an alarm. The local guards were fanatics and
since they had been supplemented by SPF forces, it would be damned
near impossible to steal the ring under the usual conditions. Well,
that wasn’t quite true. In fact, Vulture could probably steal
the ring without a fight and maybe only a mild argument.
She’d never leave even the room alive, though. The guards
might hesitate for fear of harming the Holy Lama, but the SPF
wouldn’t care about such restraint.
The only privacy, the only real place that one could snatch that
ring with some impunity, was in the Holy Lama’s bedchambers,
and only one female was ever allowed in there. Only an oversexed
and undermuscled consort had a real chance at the theft. Working
out how to become one had taken a lot of time and thought as well,
and now their hopes rested in a small vial of a synthesized hormone
that Vulture carried.
No one who was not a true priestess could gain an audience with
the Holy Lama, and even then, only those priestesses who had
submitted to virtual sterilization and the removal of certain key
glands to prevent the males from being stimulated. Vulture now was
in such a position, and had the hormone that would nullify the
operation. Even so, this would be the second attempt. Creating a
problem or scandal sufficient to require a summons to an audience
was hard enough; doing it twice had been both difficult and risky,
but the first time the plan hadn’t worked. Vulture had never
gotten alone with a consort for anything near the time required to
do the job. This time, she hoped, they had it all correct. Even
after all this time and all this hard work, in the end success
still depended a great deal on luck just to get the opportunity to
pull off the very thing the SPF was looking for and was confident
could not be done.
The first big risk would be the signal Xao would send when the
summons came. After careful analysis, Master System had figured out
how the pirates had used its own orbital subcarriers to talk freely
in the past and had shut that route down. Xao, however, was a
communications wizard and had come up with a neat trick of tapping
into and imitating the calls of several of the duty operators from
Center security to the SPF control craft. The frequencies were
rather easy to track, and although the transmissions themselves
were in code, Xao had been quick to note that the frequent
communications checks from planet to ship and back were in the
clear. By the time Vulture was entering the Holy Lama’s
lodge, Xao would transmit a radio check using a series of coded
phrases that sounded very much like what the SPF used, but would
also trigger the automated relay probes of the pirates of the
Thunder. It would not do to steal the ring and perhaps
even escape Chanchuk if there was no way short of a space battle to
get them picked up.
Vulture swam to the security lodge, which was surrounded by both
electronic and Chanchukian SPF guardians, and while in the drying
room also provided the necessary finger, eye, and blood tests that
verified her identity as Mung Qing, High Priestess of the Lord
Buddha, older sister to the Holy Lama, and head of the liaison
division, which gave orders to and correlated reports from the
various other Centers spread around the world. It was an important
job for Chanchuk, although not terribly useful to Vulture’s
purpose. It did, however, afford several key opportunities, which
was why she had spent so much time sizing up and then taking over
this particular individual: it provided access to all levels of
security; it provided the right of access to the Holy Lama,
if necessary; it provided a number of ways to cause the conditions
that would make that necessary; and, just as important, because her
rank was hereditary and her relationship to the Holy Lama close,
she could make mistakes now and then without losing her job or
perhaps even her head.
Once cleared, she removed the robe of the priesthood from her
backpack as well as her medallion of office and, after putting the
medallion around her neck, put the plain tan robe over her body.
Then she went up the ladderlike stairs to the security offices
themselves.
To one born and raised primitive and ignorant, everything up to
this point would have seemed pretty routine, and even the security
checks would be taken as some magical ritual, but once upstairs it
was a far different story, like stepping from some primordial age
into the highest of high technology. She nodded to the crews on
duty at the various consoles, gave a cold stare to Colonel Chi
who’d preempted a rather large and needed office for SPF
affairs, much to the resentment of everyone local, and made her way
down toward her own office. Chi noted the stare with bemusement,
then walked after her.
“A thousand pardons, Holiness, but I would like to speak
with you for a moment.”
Vulture did not stop, but, making the other keep up, walked into
her own office and picked up a large stack of data files marked for
her attention. She then proceeded to the soft mat that served as
her chair and around which was a raised semicircular wooden area
that was her desk, ignoring the colonel for the moment. The SPF
officer, however, could not be denied. They never could, and for
all her politeness and respectful titles, Chi had about as much
religion as a water bug and perhaps less.
Vulture sighed, looking through the stack of work and not
looking up at her uninvited visitor at all. “Colonel, we have
much work to do today and some very difficult problems to deal with
that are no concern of yours. We are on the same side here, but we
did not invite you; were it not for your arrogance and patronizing
attitude, as well as that of your troops, we might have a better
relationship. So stuff the politeness and get to the
point.”
Chi smiled. These high-born priestesses were all like this, and
she was used to it, although the SPF had some cause for its
superior attitude. Chi had begun, as did all SPF children, as the
lowest of the low and, when of age, was a mere private. The route
to colonel had been difficult and earned on ability and merit in
spite of a bloodline at least as good as these stuck-up shamans
who’d attained their power and rank and position by merely
being born into the right family.
“Very well, then. General Wharfen, Commander of the System
Peacekeeping Forces, is nervous. When General Wharfen gets nervous,
everyone under him gets much grief, and right now his eye is on us.
Although it has been many years since a ring was stolen, the
general is convinced that these so-called pirates will make a move
and soon. He is reinforcing our positions on the worlds with rings
considered most vulnerable and placing our forces there on full
alert.”
“Male paranoia, Colonel,” Vulture responded
haughtily. “When one takes orders from a male, one
must expect such things.”
Chi choked off a rejoinder, well aware that the high priestess
knew that Chanchuk’s sexual order was not universal among the
other races of humanity and that ones like Wharfen were every bit
the equal of either one of them in abilities. She had no intention,
however, of getting sidetracked into a debate on universal male
psychology.
“There was a colonel like myself, a Janipurian named
Privi, who was given a similar assignment to my own a few years
back. Privi died—slowly and uncomfortably—in an object
lesson to the other division commanders that I was forced to
endure. I have no intention of being the next object lesson. My
orders prevent a wholesale disruption of the system on this world,
but I assure you that if the SPF must seize full control of
security here and elsewhere on this planet and mindprint the
locals, regardless of rank or position, I assure you I can and will
do so.”
The high priestess looked up at her, impassive and apparently
unmoved. “You have evidence that this is more than paranoia?
After all, one ring in—what?—five years? We do not even
understand what all this fuss over the Holy Lama’s ring is,
anyway. If it is so important, why not simply secure it!
You have the force.”
The colonel shook her head. “I have no idea what the rings
represent nor do I wish to know, although it is said that together
they represent some threat to the system’s order and safety.
How that can be I have no idea, and, again, I do not want to know,
nor do you. Such knowledge, I think, would mean death.”
“Death is relative, whether you believe it or not,
Colonel,” said the high priestess who was also the Vulture.
“However, the manner of death as well as the conduct of life
is important, we will grant that. Still, does it not trouble you
that these pirates know and you do not? One wonders what
sort of secret is so terrible that it must be kept from one’s
allies even when the enemies of the system know. Still, what
concern is it of ours except that your presence here disrupts the
order and flow of society?”
The colonel reached into her parcel belt and brought out a
photograph and passed it over to the priestess, who took it and
looked at it. It showed a small, round object with what looked like
a thick collar covering about a third of its girth and which was
used as a base. “So? What is this thing?” she asked,
knowing exactly what it was. The discovery of one or more was
inevitable, particularly considering the amount of time this
mission had taken.
“It is an independent, remotely operated, near-space
engine,” the colonel responded, taking back the photograph
and putting it back into the belt.
“A spaceship? That hardly looks like anything we ever
imagined as a spacecraft.”
“Not a spacecraft, no. An engine. Only the engine, some
fuel, and a very small core command module that appears to respond
only to a simple off-on signal. The entire purpose of the thing
appears to be to take off.”
“Indeed? And then what?”
“Nothing. It’s just an engine and fuel. There
isn’t room for much of anything else, although something as
small as the ring could fit in it—if it were placed in one of
the access ports and somehow secured. It was found by accident in
Win Tai Province. Some klitchi farmers were being menaced
by a warog that they managed to wound and then were forced
to chase. As you know, the creatures are monsters when
wounded.” Klitchi was a sea grass that was a staple
of the Chanchuk diet, much as rice had been for their ancient
Earth-human ancestors. The warog was one of the
sea’s great carnivores, although not generally a danger to
humans unless wounded or unless it tasted blood. “They
practically stumbled over it, camouflaged and neatly set up on a
rock outcrop near the surface but well away from the
village.”
“Why was this not reported to us at once?”
“Ah . . . our people at Win Tai Center
intercepted the thing, recovered and analyzed it, and it was
decided that we were best able to handle it. We did not feel that
it was necessary to inform you at the time.”
“Necessary! It is our function! How dare you!
Have you, then, already usurped the maintenance and administration
of Chanchuk? If so, why come to us now?”
“No, not yet. Rest assured on that. And I am telling you
now because we are going to need your help in coordinating the
various Center security staffs. We must know if there are more of
these things, and finding them will take a concentrated and
intelligent search. They did not fly down there and put up their
own camouflage—someone had to place them and hide them. Win
Tai is a very long way from here. This had to be a backup, an
emergency system, not intended for use unless necessary. It is not
of our manufacture, and the manufacturing capabilities to build
such a thing do not exist on Chanchuk. Marine growth and oxidation
of the device indicate it has been in place no more than a year and
a half, possibly no more than eight or nine months. We must know
where any others are, and quickly!”
Vulture looked at the colonel smugly. “You have just stood
there telling us how all-powerful and omnipotent you are. Please,
be our guest. Go out and find all you can.”
“You know we haven’t a prayer of doing it on our
own. We don’t know this world. We are visitors here, even if
we are of the same race. The device is diabolical in its
cleverness. There is no element in its composition that is not
found in nature here one place or another. Nothing for
instrumentation to seize upon. They are small, and well hidden,
most certainly well away from populous areas and off usual travel
routes. But in each case, someone placed it where it is.
Either a stranger had to come through who would be noticed or a
local was employed, either voluntarily or through kidnapping and
mindprinting. We should be able to track these down—but not
by ourselves. We require all the resources at your command and the
experience of the best people you have at each Center.”
It wasn’t a bad opening. “We have no authority to
order such a thing, nor would there be any enthusiastic cooperation
considering our relations since you arrived. Only the Holy Lama
herself could command this. Has she been informed?”
“My orders from the commander on analysis of the device
and the problem have only just arrived from headquarters. Master
System believes that an intensive search will prod any pirates now
present to hasten their plans and try for the ring before all of
their devices and their plans are uncovered and all avenues of
escape are cut off. Even now a number of frigates are headed here,
each carrying a complement of automated fighter craft. They will be
in place within five days from today. So far we think we have
contained this discovery, but once the search is launched everyone,
including the pirate agents, will know. They will make a frantic
attempt on the ring—and we will catch them.”
Five days. Not much time, but more than enough if everything
worked according to plan. Once the operation was placed in motion,
it had to go pretty fast. Not only Chi but most of Center would
immediately notice the disappearance of a key high priestess, and
while Vulture could become anyone she chose, she could not be two
people at once.
Vulture nodded to the colonel. “Very well. We will attempt
an appointment with the Holy Lama as soon as practical on this
matter.”
Chi glared at the priestess. “I would suggest that it be
very quickly, Holiness.” She made that last
word sound like something obscene. “You people here seem to
forget yourselves and just what maintains your fat, comfortable
lives here and your precious religion. I want that authority and
cooperation by tonight. If not, I will be forced to report that
this Center and its chief administrator are refusing full and
complete cooperation and are to be considered to be in rebellion
against the system. Then we’ll see how well your little games
play against Vals with the full authority of Master System and full
control of your computers, power facilities, and apparatus of
control. You tell the Holy Lama that.”
And, with that, the colonel stomped, gave a stiff military-style
salute, pivoted, and walked out the door feeling very secure and
satisfied with herself.
It was no idle threat, either. Such a statement would have any
high priestess in a panic and the Holy Lama passing bricks and
scrambling to protect her domain. For Vulture, it was just what she
most wanted coming from an unexpected and wonderful direction. She
punched the intercom.
“Have the complete recorded transcript of the conversation
with Colonel Chi transmitted to the Holy Lama immediately on
emergency priority,” she ordered crisply. “Then get me
all the data you can on this alien thing they found, the
area, and region—all the details.” She paused a moment.
“And find out exactly who among our own people in Win Tai and
in the chain from there to here did not immediately report
everything to me and get their excuses. Inform them that the Holy
Lama will judge them by their names and their excuses and relieve
them of all clearances and authority until that judgment is
rendered. Understand?”
“Yes, Holiness,” came the somewhat shocked response.
“At once.”
By the time the summons from the Sacred Lodge came, Vulture had
managed to put together a very neat package, ostensibly to brief
the Holy Lama but actually to brief Vulture. Politically there was
no excuse for the two field agents and the high priestess at Win
Tai not to report everything no matter what they were told or
ordered to do by SPF officials. It was Wa Chi Center’s job to
deal with the SPF; it was the responsibility of subordinate chief
administrators and their staffs to work for and solely in the
interest of Wa Chi. And, of course, it was politics—or at
least ambition—that caused them to betray their trust.
Promotion was slow and reward was not generally a factor in this
culture and society, and no matter how closed the culture, these
people were, well, human. Their excuses were lame—the field
agents maintaining they did their job and that wasn’t to send
on the material to Wai Chi; the C.A. at Wa Chi stating that she had
been assured it was all sent. Maybe with a static, inbred,
hereditary hierarchy you got that lazy and that incompetent, but
Vulture knew it was different, at least in this case. They were
betting on Chi’s permanence and influence, and they bet
wrong.
Vulture picked up her communicator and called home. All lines in
and out, even the secured ones, were continuously monitored, of
course, but the kind of information she had to impart wasn’t
anything apparently subversive. Butar answered.
“We shall not be home until very late,” Vulture told
the other agent. “We are summoned to an audience with the
Holy Lama at sixteen-thirty hours and there is no telling how long
it will take nor what we will be commanded to do after.”
There was a somewhat pregnant pause from Killomen, who
then responded, “Very well, Holiness. We shall prepare
nothing for you, but we will leave something in the storage
compartment in case you come in hungry and late.”
“Do not bother, child. It might well be three days. Just
enjoy yourselves and do what you want to do. We will
cope.”
And that was that. Three days from now, at a predetermined time,
things would start to pop—if Vulture managed to pull off her
part at all. If not, it gave enough time for the high priestess to
return home and call it off.
At a bit after sixteen hundred, Vulture packed all the materials
into a watertight bag, sealed it with the official security seal,
put it on, and went out for the short trip to the Sacred Lodge. The
staff eyed her in awe and wonder, knowing she was going to see,
even converse with, the Holy Lama herself. They might as well get a
good look. If all went well, some time in the early morning a
little bit of a worm would sneak into the security computer system
with the order from the Holy Lama dispatching her to Win Tai to
take personal charge of things. They didn’t have access to
skimmers and the like here; the Centers had to be located too close
to the masses to make any ostentatious display of technology
possible. There were quick ways, certainly—and the
SPF could have gotten her there in hours—but it would not be
in character to use them. Using the speediest modes of travel
available to Wa Chi Center, it would take someone three or four
days to reach Win Tai. That might be cutting the timing close and
her cover might be blown, but it was better than nothing.
With luck, and if the Holy Lama didn’t ask for her or
summon her when she was supposed to be somewhere else by order of
the Holy Lama, the high priestess might not be missed until it was
far too late.
The Sacred Lodge was grandiose, even underwater. The whole
support structure and base glowed incandescently, and, unlike the
other lodges, seemed to sit not on wood supports but on some kind
of translucent marble columns. Statues of the Great Buddha were
inset around as well, and scenes highlighting the cardinal
principles of this odd offshoot of Buddhism were carved on thick
bands around the columns. There were both electronic and human
guards as well, the latter armed with very efficient and
non-mass-culture rifles with automatic sights adjusted for use in
water or air.
The Grand Entrance was a womblike tunnel full of twists and
turns. The curves were there for a reason: they gave security
plenty of time to look over a visitor while she presented a perfect
slow target who could be cut off by lightning-fast door seals at
the least suspicion. Nobody got very far by accident or without an
invitation.
Once in the drying chamber, however, one had to hand over all
parcels and items of clothing to be passed through sensors while
presenting eyes, fingers, and blood samples to special security
computers not connected to the main computer network and controlled
entirely from within the temple. This was a relatively new
procedure ordered by Master System itself a few years before. It
knew that the pirates had gotten into the security system of
Janipur and wanted to make very certain that no spy, no matter how
clever, could influence the gateway to the one who wore the ring.
The system was totally automated as well; it even included a
mindprint routine to make absolutely certain that anyone
entering was just who they seemed to be. The transmuters might fool
all the physical safeguards, but duplicating both physical and
mental characteristics perfectly was considered by Master System as
next to impossible.
As usual, Master System was wrong. To the Vulture, who was
designed to fool just such mechanisms, it was child’s
play.
She reclaimed her belongings on the other side of the security
door and went up to the waiting chamber. It was sumptuously
furnished and the gold relief on the religious scenes engraved in
the walls was awe-inspiring. The fact that some of those gems and
intricate designs concealed monitors made any move here highly
unlikely. Here was where luck had failed in the first attempt, and
where luck needed to be far better this time. Damn it, this
was about as impregnable a place to get in and out of as
could be designed under the limits of a colonial Center. She
settled down on a soft couch and waited.
A small door opened opposite her and one of the Seed of Buddha
entered carrying a small tray.
The males of Chanchuk were less than imposing. The average
female was perhaps a hundred and sixty-five centimeters tall and
weighed perhaps fifty-five to sixty kilograms; the average male was
perhaps a hundred and twenty centimeters, many shorter, and usually
did not weigh more than thirty-five kilos. They also had a bushy
mane of hair around their heads that was usually slightly lighter
or darker than the rest of their body hair and often was dyed to
give great contrast. They often went to great lengths in wearing
various jewels and other ornaments to make themselves stand out to
any females who might be looking. Most incongruously, they had two
small but very firm breasts that actually produced milk on a
continuous basis. Still, they had one attribute that made them
instantly attractive to the opposite sex, as the large golden
codpiece this one wore attested.
Males really were rather weak. Fewer than two in seven made it
past their first year and they were subject to more diseases before
they reached puberty, which cut their numbers down even further. Of
course, even though they numbered only thirty percent of the adult
population, there were more males than were required for
procreation, particularly when they had such raging libidos. In
general, males kept house for a number of women who could then
space their children so that it would not affect the group’s
income or disrupt their lives unnecessarily.
The females bore the young, but the males nursed and raised
them. In this biological system the males had all the sexual lures
but were small and weak and very dependent. They were such
prisoners of their continuous hormones—unlike females whose
hormones got out of whack only briefly every month—that
culturally they were considered incapable of more than running a
household and were not all that bright. Most education, at least,
was denied them, and their roles were rigidly fixed. Whether or not
they really had higher IQs than anyone credited was something
Vulture hoped to find out.
The male stopped and bowed slightly before Vulture.
“Greetings, Holiness. I am Cho. We met when you were here a
few months ago. Might I offer some tea and biscuits? The Holy Lama
will see you soon.”
Vulture nodded and allowed the tea to be poured. She remembered
Cho, all right. She almost had him last time, but she
couldn’t get him far enough out of the monitor range.
There was no sexual attraction felt by either now, of course.
There never was around a priestess; after she’d been gutted
of her sexual apparatus and even had her biochemistry adjusted to
that of an asexual being, there wasn’t much to arouse
interest. Without the glandular odors, the male wouldn’t find
a eunuch particularly attractive.
Idly, Vulture reached down to her vaginal area, found and
squeezed hard and somewhat painfully on a tiny hard spot just
beneath the skin. A tiny, surgically implanted vial gave way and
exuded a substance through the pores of the outer skin layers. The
high priestess was now no less a eunuch, but for the brief period
until the stuff washed off or lost its potency, she began exuding a
real glandular come-on. The odor was not noticeable on a conscious
level—just another in the mix of body odors—but it
would, Vulture and Clayben theorized, have an interesting effect on
any males in close range who might be very confused but still would
find her suddenly very alluring.
There was no immediate effect, although she got as close as she
could to Cho. Still, after a little while and some small talk, Cho
seemed to become a bit distracted and she could see him catching
himself as his hand moved to his crotch.
That was just an opener, however. From this point, a high
priestess who came also had to leave.
A chime sounded, breaking the scene, and Cho jumped up.
“The Holy Lama will see you now,” he said, sounding a
bit throaty and breathless. He went to the main door, and it opened
in front of him. He entered, and she followed, and they went down a
short hall that opened into a large office the opulence of which
was breathtaking.
The Holy Lama looked up from her desk. “All right,
Cho—go play with yourself. We have business,” she
snapped in a hard, professional voice. The little male bowed,
turned, and left, closing the inner doors behind him.
She was still relatively young, yet the pressures of the dual
jobs of chief planetary administrator and top priestess to a major
religion were already showing on her. The eyes were as hard as the
voice, and the fur on the face and along the arms already seemed to
be tinged with gray.
“So, are we still running things or aren’t
we?” the Holy Lama asked, getting directly to the point.
“We are—to a point,” Vulture responded.
“Colonel Chi is a soulless person, but with all the human
failings of ambition and arrogance. She is used to giving orders
and being obeyed instantly, and she has no respect for or loyalty
to any culture or beliefs other than her own militaristic
upbringing. One can tell that she is just itching for an excuse to
declare full martial law, depose us, and turn Chanchuk into a
godless police state.”
The Holy Lama, as always, had the ring right on her finger. Four
little birds against a black jadelike background laid into an
ornately jeweled golden ring. It was so tempting to just become the
Holy Lama and obtain it by right of possession, but it wasn’t
possible. Everything in this room was being recorded; there was no
way that there would be the fifteen or more minutes necessary to
make the change without some kind of alarm being raised—and
no way to block security from later watching a recording of what
had happened and thus discovering just what the Vulture’s
power really was.
“Let us see your case,” the Holy Lama said, and it
was handed over. The highest of priestesses broke the seal and
studied the documents and the picture of the device for some time,
deep in thought. Finally she said, “This isn’t good.
Chi may be a soulless bastard, but she does have a point.”
She put down the papers and stared at her ring. “We would
live our next incarnation as a water slug to know why this is so
important that aliens would risk lives and worse for it and Master
System would go to this sort of extreme to stop them. If it were
not a required badge of office, we would just take it off and give
it to the SPF and tell them to go throw it in the sun or something.
There is no real religious connotation to it. It is just a very
pretty ring from the Mother World and the old days.”
Vulture shrugged. “If you wish, it could be done. You
could give it to us now and we would take it to Chi and have done
with it and her.”
“If that were true, we would not hesitate to do so, but do
you know what the security monitors would do if this thing left
here without being on our finger in a prearranged audience? No,
they feel that if the Holy Lama is sealed away in this ornate
mausoleum, it cannot be gotten. We wonder, though. If there were
such a thing as absolute security, we would not get away with much
of what we get away with now, would we? Master System would have
roared in here and mindcleaned the lot of us—and our
ancestors, too—if that were true.” She sighed.
“We would almost like to meet one of these pirate thieves.
If, somehow, we could truly be convinced that this ring could aid
in disrupting or even blowing apart this foul and evil system and
its master machines, we would be tempted to present it to them
freely. But—this system cannot be broken. Not by the likes of
a jeweled ring.”
Vulture was so heartened by that comment—which would be
judiciously edited out of the recording by the Holy Lama’s
own special programs before it got to security and Colonel
Chi—that she longed to tell all. There was just no way that
the chance could be taken. It might be possible to convince the
chief administrator that the rings could really do it, but first
Vulture would have to convince the old girl that the sister
she’d grown up with and known all her life was actually an
artificial entity, then convince her that this entity was working
for the pirates and not Master System out to trap treasonous chief
administrators, and, finally, that the pirates could get all five
and use them.
Better to steal it—if Vulture could, somehow, manage to do
even that.
THE VULTURE SWAM THROUGH THE DARK WATERS OF
Chanchuk away from the Lodge of the Reverend Mother. At the moment,
Vulture was female, but that would soon change—the new target
and identity had already been selected. It was mostly a matter of
awaiting the opportune moment when the key elements of the
operation would come together.
It was spring in this part of Chanchuk; the covering ice had all
long since broken, melted, and flowed away to the Great Sea and the
water was now a comfortable six degrees Celsius, not at all bad.
Visibility was always poor this close in to the coast and was never
very good at any depth. Not that Chanchukian eyesight was poor; the
inner, transparent lid on each eye allowed the eyes to be open and
alert at all times, but there was only so much light and there were
incredible shadows and distortions. One quickly learned to trust
sound over sight down here.
Chanchuk had been one of Master System’s more creative
inventions, both as a world and culture and as creative biological
redesign.
It was probable that, when the great computer decided to
disperse humanity throughout a full quadrant of the Milky Way
galaxy as part of its imperative to ensure human survival, it
always had biological redesign in mind even if the slowness of
terraforming hadn’t forced that decision on it. It was not
enough to carry off ninety percent of the population of Earth to
new worlds; it was also important to make them so different and so
unique to their new habitats that they would have little desire to
return to Earth even if such a chance were afforded them. The
greater the differences—and physiological differences back on
Earth far simpler and more basic than these had been the basis for
much human hatred and prejudice—the less chance over the
passage of time that scattered humanity would ever even dream of
reuniting.
Chanchuk had presented particular problems to the great
computer. Its land surface was fierce, violent, and not terribly
habitable by any great numbers. The tropics were a steamy hell; the
rest was desert, tundra, or high and inaccessible mountains, all
without any hope of large-scale agriculture. Only the vast seas had
any promise, and could become the breeding grounds for hordes of
specialized sea creatures who would reproduce in profusion over the
whole of the planet’s waters. And to keep their numbers from
choking off other marine life, there would have to be large numbers
of predators, until the most predatory of all, humankind, could
establish itself firmly and permanently on the new world.
Partly because of the predators required at the start, and also
because of the need to maintain a humanlike culture under the
difficult conditions presented by so vast a seabed, the people of
Chanchuk had to be sea dwellers but not creatures of the sea.
Vulture “smelled” rather than saw the entrance to
her lodge and made for it, then came up quickly into the entry
chamber and back into the air. The average Chanchukian female could
hold her breath for up to an hour and dive as deep as a thousand
meters without artificial aid, but they were still air-breathing
mammals and it was always a pleasure to breathe air again.
An entry chamber was never very fancy; it was like the vestibule
of a good home, where you left your mess before entering the decent
parts of the house. Like most, it was lined with absorbent
dahagi, a giant sea sponge that felt wonderful when you
shook off the water and then rolled around for a few moments. Then
it was up to the inner entry chamber, where a special fan and
heater would finish the drying process thoroughly and quickly.
Afterward, one was presentable enough to enter the main lodge. It
was an addition only for the elite of the Center; the masses were
allowed no such technology and relied on natural breezes or lived
with being wet.
Vulture entered the Great Room and noted that the lamps were lit
in spite of the fact that it was still day. She looked up at the
skylights above and saw dark clouds; the roar of a good rainstorm
echoed dully inside as the storm beat upon the solid lodges of the
People. Funny how the two worlds hardly interacted from a
Chanchukian point of view. Vulture had been out all day, but until
she’d entered the Great Room she had no idea that it was
raining.
Butar Killomen of the spaceship Kaotan was preparing a
snack in the kitchen area—it smelled like hai ka, a
particularly tasty candy that was a Chanchukian favorite. She
looked far different from the muscular, tailed, hairless
gray-skinned creature she had been born as, but that was the price
of the rings that would bring their freedom. Vulture liked her much
better this way, and certainly Killomen didn’t seem
particularly upset by the change.
Of course, the key to any success they had to date was that all
of them were outcasts and fugitives from their own people. Killomen
had been a freebooter, living outside of and between the cracks of
the system. Except for those from Earth and some from the late crew
of the Indrus, all of them had been pretty much
unique.
The people of Chanchuk were covered with a thick, oily fur in
shades ranging from golden to red to brown to black. On land they
were bipeds, with broad hands and fingers that were linked
two-thirds of their length with thick black webbing. The ears,
although sensitive, were fur-covered and resembled mere depressions
in the side of the flat, squat head. The noses were broad and
black, with flaps that closed and sealed when underwater, flanked
by thick, long whiskers and a mouth that looked small but could
open to swallow something half the size of the head. The
twin-lidded eyes—the inner lid transparent as glass and
actually increasing sensitivity to light—were brown, rounded,
inset balls perfectly suited for the two worlds of Chanchuk, water
and air, although it made them nearsighted to a degree and painted
their world in patterns of sepia-stained monochrome while bringing
any object into startling three-dimensional life. That was what the
few on this team missed most: color. But they’d gotten used
to it by now.
The bodies were thick, impossibly lithe, almost plastic in their
ability to bend any which way. In the water, the legs and long,
webbed feet formed a single horizontal tail that could propel them
with dolphinlike speed. On land, they bent outward, slightly
bowlegged, the feet bent forward to allow a comic, yet quite
serviceable, walk, and the thick membrane that bent in the water to
serve as a dorsal fin hung down to become a balance-aiding
paddlelike tail. Raven said that they reminded him of the Pacific
sea otter, but none of those who were actually down here in that
form had ever seen or heard of such a creature.
Killomen turned and nodded to Vulture. “Everything
set?”
“As much as can be,” came the reply.
“There’s no way to deceive the SPF once we pull
it—the old girl never seems to have the damned thing off her
finger—but if all the stuff Clayben and Raven designed for
this job works, it shouldn’t be difficult to get the ring.
The getaway mechanisms are all planted and primed; they could get
lucky, but the odds are with us this time for a change. I doubt if
it’ll work twice, but it should do here. At least this time
we’re risking the smallest number of people and we’re
far more experienced and sophisticated about this than
before.”
Min Xao Po entered from the bedroom, looking sleepy, but she had
obviously overheard everything. Min and co-conspirator Chung Mung
Wo, both of the crew of the freebooter Chunhoifan, had the
oddest adjustment problems to Chanchuk. Both had been male and were
now female, for one thing, and both were also finding it difficult
to adapt to a culture that was in every way, including
biologically, a matriarchy. This, on top of the physiological
changes, was bad enough, but both men had been ethnic Chinese whose
ancestors had come from the barren northwest of China centuries
before. In spite of the startling environmental differences and the
sex-role reversal, the language and many of the customs of the
people of Chanchuk were very close to that which their own people
had taught to them. The dialect difference was what one would
expect after over nine hundred years of separation, and there was a
new set of words better able to handle the watery nature of
Chanchuk. It had been a shock, but they’d been the logical
choice for this mission.
Besides, they were damned good marksmen and one was an ordnance
specialist, the other a communications expert. Their skills had
determined the method and the personnel for this
“caper,” as Raven called it. After close to a year on
Chanchuk as natives, they had adapted surprisingly well.
“So when do we go?” Min asked Vulture.
“I think we’ve been here long enough,” Vulture
responded. “I want you and Mung to run through the sequence
with us and check out all the equipment one last time. I
don’t want anything going wrong because of timing, equipment
failure, weather, or anything else. A physical check of the remotes
is too time-consuming, but we can run a receiver check on each.
Guns should be fully charged, everything ready to go. Bute,
we’ll need the canisters in position as soon as I settle in.
I prefer living in that place as one of the consorts as little time
as possible. When I absorb someone, the genetic design dominates
and shapes me just as it does the original. I almost got trapped
that way once before and this is far more dangerous, at least for
me. If everything comes off correctly, I’ll get the ring, but
I’m sure as hell not going to be a lot of help. If we fail to
knock ’em out long enough, or if one single SPF guard is left
awake, I’m stuck and everything’s back to square
one—if any of us survives.”
“We know that,” Killomen responded impatiently.
“We’re chomping at the bit to go. All we have
to do is sneak around and shoot straight. You have the toughest
job. You’re sure you can neutralize the
neurotoxin?”
“I’ve done it easily in all the tests, but that was
when I knew exactly when it was coming and could concentrate. You
know the drill. If I’m not out, with or without the ring,
within fifteen minutes of the start of the operation, or if any
alarms bring in the forces, you forget me and fall back. We scrub.
If we can’t get the ring, there’s no purpose in anybody
dying.” She looked at Killomen and frowned. “Something
still worrying you other than everything that’s worrying
me?”
She shrugged. “No, I have this odd feeling, that’s
all. I’ll believe that we can get away with this without
getting ourselves killed when we do it.”
Vulture put a hand on her shoulder and gave the Chanchukian
equivalent of a sour grin. It looked awful. “Nobody lives
forever, unless I eat them,” she said.
Min looked uncomfortable at that and changed the subject.
“What about you, though? You are certain that no one in
Center security suspects you?”
“Oh, they suspect something,” Vulture
admitted. “That’s why they wired all the Center lodges
and why we had to go through that godawful business of neutralizing
the bugs and installing believable recordings. Their general theory
is that we have enough spies that we can pick out, snatch, and
replace a key figure with our own mind-printed duplicate, no matter
what their computers tell them about the security of their
mindprint processes. That’s why all the SPF here have monitor
implants, as do Center security and the
administrators—especially those who have any access to the
Holy Lama. I almost blew it because of that implant when I took
over this body. I’m not exactly brilliant and alert when
I’m absorbing someone and my automatic response was to expel
the foreign object. Fortunately I hadn’t begun merging minds
and had the sense to figure it was some kind of implant and
transfer it, too. I’m ready for it now, and they’re
convinced that there’s no way we can snatch somebody long
enough to mindprint and duplicate them without their knowledge. And
they’re right, too. If they ever knew what I could really do,
they could shut me down cold.”
“That is the other reason I worry,” said Butar
Killomen softly. “If they were somehow to learn about you, to
stop you—what good would even four rings be? We need you. You
have become our ace in the hole.”
Vulture sat back on her tail and sighed. “I believe you
underestimate yourselves. At the start I would have said so, too,
and perhaps been right, but now—I’m not so sure that
anyone of this company can be denied.” She clapped her hands
together sharply and stood up as straight as the Chanchukian body
would allow. “Come! Min, wake Chung and tell her to get
herself out here ahead of her tail. If all this brooding has not
caused the hai ka to burn to a crisp we shall all sit
around and drink strong tea and stuff ourselves with such decadence
and be pretty damned positive it’s almost over. Although we
are creatures of water and air now, you three will always be in
your element only in space, and it is to there that we will return
in very short time!”
Chanchuk, for all its differences, retained the basic system
imposed by Master System on the vast majority of human worlds,
including Earth. The basic culture was taken from ancient,
pre-Master System Earth, then refined, stylized, and simplified by
both Master System’s design and the planet’s cultural
isolation for over nine hundred years.
Over the masses, serving Master System and running the world in
secret, were the elect—the smartest, the most ambitious, the
best of the people. They alone had access to technology, and they
ruled with it, co-opting anyone who might be a threat to the system
into the leadership, or eliminating them if they could not be
co-opted. A series of regional Centers divided up control of the
world; over them all was a chief administrator who was the ultimate
boss of the world—but still subject to Master System’s
will.
From their Centers, this elite ruled millions of people divided
into feudal quasi-states under warlords with their castlelike grand
lodges and private armies. The technology available to these
masses, even the warlords, was primitive, the ways archaic, but the
system was effective. About the only oddity Chanchuk presented was
its near universal adherence to Buddhism, but this Buddha had a
broad and unnaturally fat Chanchukian head and body, and was, like
the priesthood and holy ones here, most certainly female. This
distinctive Master System touch was dictated more by practicality
than any intent to maliciously pervert the old ways; the religion,
an odd but ancient offshoot of Buddhism, was, except for the sexual
roles, pretty faithfully intact.
On Chanchuk the females ruled; the males were, on the whole,
small, fairly weak, short-lived, and not very bright. Clayben
analyzed the place and, because of this anomaly, suspected that
Chanchukians were based upon a real alien race and not one created
by Master System.
Clayben and Star Eagle were disquieted by the idea that this
world might have once contained a sentient race that looked and
lived much as the colonists did, but one that would not be co-opted
and would not surrender. Master System’s core instructions
extended to human life; it was the prevention of human racial
genocide or suicide that had led to its creation by well-meaning
scientists so long ago. But that was human. Was the computer, in
fact, capable of cold genocide against any race that had not sprung
from human stock? Had it done so here? And, if so, how many other
races had been eliminated and supplanted in its grandiose
scheme?
“Master System was created by human minds,” Hawks
had pointed out. “And human minds have always had a veritable
gift in some parts of the world for the elimination or subjugation
of any race or group that stood in the way of the powerful and
their needs.” Hawks, of course, was what the Europeans
generally referred to as an “American Indian.”
Vulture was the least disturbed by these thoughts. It, too, was
a creature of technology and human minds, and didn’t quite
feel the weight of broad moral questions the way the others did.
The immediate problem was disturbing enough.
Wa Chi Center had been as easy as the others to penetrate, and
in spite of its more diffuse nature, with its citylike collection
of lodges and fragmented if interconnected offices, was a familiar
system by now. The chief administrator certainly had a name once;
but now she was just known as the Holy Lama in the language of the
people. She was old, and smart, and generally antisocial. The only
time she seemed to emerge from her Sacred Lodge was for ceremonial
or religious occasions—she was believed by the masses and
even by most of the educated technocrats of Wa Chi Center to be the
latest reincarnation of a demigod who was the messenger between the
Heavens and the World. As such, she was the highest lama, the
supreme religious authority, and a deity in her own right. There
were a few—very few—occasions when she had to appear,
to preside, but when she did she was always surrounded by so many
guards and other people that it would have been impossible to get
near her, let alone steal the ring she seemed to always wear on her
finger.
Even if there were a way to snatch it and somehow keep from
being killed by the guards or mauled by the crowd for sacrilege,
the alarm would be sounded and getaway would be next to impossible.
That meant taking her where she was most vulnerable, where she
depended on the automated and physical security systems—in
the Sacred Lodge in the middle of Wa Chi Center. For Wa Chi was not
merely a Center but also a vast temple complex, the seat of a
mighty theocracy.
Vulture, as usual, had worked her way close to the ring and then
had “eaten” and become a security official with access
to the Sacred Lodge. Usually the top people were very sophisticated
and very knowledgeable about the system and the history of the
world and its people, and this, along with their privileged
position, made them into cynics only playing the role of a
primitive for the masses. Here, though, perhaps because of the
original cultural cohesion of the first colonists, the elite had
the knowledge, but not the cynicism. It was clear that the Holy
Lama believed in her faith and her deity as much as her subjects
did and took it quite seriously. She spent a good deal of time in
prayer and communion with the spirits—although she was also
clearly a damned good and efficient administrator who had her
finger on the pulse of her world and everyone of importance in it
and a fine grasp of the technology involved.
Unlike the other priestesses, however, the Holy Lama was not
celibate, nor was she supposed to be. Indeed, she was to bear as
many children as possible, all of the females to be raised as
priestesses for the other Centers and even for the warlord
districts, their authority being their lineage to the demigoddess
herself. When their mother ultimately passed away, the entire
female line would gather and among them one would be anointed as
having received the spirit of the deity and become the new Holy
Lama. It was generally, although not always, the one who was
youngest and most capable of continuing the line, yet experienced
in the ways of the Centers and Chanchukian politics and culture.
The sign was that the Sacred Golden Ring fit the new one’s
finger. Somehow, it always did. This Holy Lama had been twenty-nine when called, and
was now thirty-six. Chanchukian females sexually matured late by
human standards, and she was probably good for another eight or ten
children before her child-bearing years were past. For this and
other reasons, some genetic, some traditional, her inner sanctum
was maintained by a small cadre of males—her consorts. While
some priestesses, including heads of Center staff departments,
could and did see her, such meetings were always carefully
monitored; the slightest deviation from protocol or normal routine
was certain to raise an alarm. The local guards were fanatics and
since they had been supplemented by SPF forces, it would be damned
near impossible to steal the ring under the usual conditions. Well,
that wasn’t quite true. In fact, Vulture could probably steal
the ring without a fight and maybe only a mild argument.
She’d never leave even the room alive, though. The guards
might hesitate for fear of harming the Holy Lama, but the SPF
wouldn’t care about such restraint.
The only privacy, the only real place that one could snatch that
ring with some impunity, was in the Holy Lama’s bedchambers,
and only one female was ever allowed in there. Only an oversexed
and undermuscled consort had a real chance at the theft. Working
out how to become one had taken a lot of time and thought as well,
and now their hopes rested in a small vial of a synthesized hormone
that Vulture carried.
No one who was not a true priestess could gain an audience with
the Holy Lama, and even then, only those priestesses who had
submitted to virtual sterilization and the removal of certain key
glands to prevent the males from being stimulated. Vulture now was
in such a position, and had the hormone that would nullify the
operation. Even so, this would be the second attempt. Creating a
problem or scandal sufficient to require a summons to an audience
was hard enough; doing it twice had been both difficult and risky,
but the first time the plan hadn’t worked. Vulture had never
gotten alone with a consort for anything near the time required to
do the job. This time, she hoped, they had it all correct. Even
after all this time and all this hard work, in the end success
still depended a great deal on luck just to get the opportunity to
pull off the very thing the SPF was looking for and was confident
could not be done.
The first big risk would be the signal Xao would send when the
summons came. After careful analysis, Master System had figured out
how the pirates had used its own orbital subcarriers to talk freely
in the past and had shut that route down. Xao, however, was a
communications wizard and had come up with a neat trick of tapping
into and imitating the calls of several of the duty operators from
Center security to the SPF control craft. The frequencies were
rather easy to track, and although the transmissions themselves
were in code, Xao had been quick to note that the frequent
communications checks from planet to ship and back were in the
clear. By the time Vulture was entering the Holy Lama’s
lodge, Xao would transmit a radio check using a series of coded
phrases that sounded very much like what the SPF used, but would
also trigger the automated relay probes of the pirates of the
Thunder. It would not do to steal the ring and perhaps
even escape Chanchuk if there was no way short of a space battle to
get them picked up.
Vulture swam to the security lodge, which was surrounded by both
electronic and Chanchukian SPF guardians, and while in the drying
room also provided the necessary finger, eye, and blood tests that
verified her identity as Mung Qing, High Priestess of the Lord
Buddha, older sister to the Holy Lama, and head of the liaison
division, which gave orders to and correlated reports from the
various other Centers spread around the world. It was an important
job for Chanchuk, although not terribly useful to Vulture’s
purpose. It did, however, afford several key opportunities, which
was why she had spent so much time sizing up and then taking over
this particular individual: it provided access to all levels of
security; it provided the right of access to the Holy Lama,
if necessary; it provided a number of ways to cause the conditions
that would make that necessary; and, just as important, because her
rank was hereditary and her relationship to the Holy Lama close,
she could make mistakes now and then without losing her job or
perhaps even her head.
Once cleared, she removed the robe of the priesthood from her
backpack as well as her medallion of office and, after putting the
medallion around her neck, put the plain tan robe over her body.
Then she went up the ladderlike stairs to the security offices
themselves.
To one born and raised primitive and ignorant, everything up to
this point would have seemed pretty routine, and even the security
checks would be taken as some magical ritual, but once upstairs it
was a far different story, like stepping from some primordial age
into the highest of high technology. She nodded to the crews on
duty at the various consoles, gave a cold stare to Colonel Chi
who’d preempted a rather large and needed office for SPF
affairs, much to the resentment of everyone local, and made her way
down toward her own office. Chi noted the stare with bemusement,
then walked after her.
“A thousand pardons, Holiness, but I would like to speak
with you for a moment.”
Vulture did not stop, but, making the other keep up, walked into
her own office and picked up a large stack of data files marked for
her attention. She then proceeded to the soft mat that served as
her chair and around which was a raised semicircular wooden area
that was her desk, ignoring the colonel for the moment. The SPF
officer, however, could not be denied. They never could, and for
all her politeness and respectful titles, Chi had about as much
religion as a water bug and perhaps less.
Vulture sighed, looking through the stack of work and not
looking up at her uninvited visitor at all. “Colonel, we have
much work to do today and some very difficult problems to deal with
that are no concern of yours. We are on the same side here, but we
did not invite you; were it not for your arrogance and patronizing
attitude, as well as that of your troops, we might have a better
relationship. So stuff the politeness and get to the
point.”
Chi smiled. These high-born priestesses were all like this, and
she was used to it, although the SPF had some cause for its
superior attitude. Chi had begun, as did all SPF children, as the
lowest of the low and, when of age, was a mere private. The route
to colonel had been difficult and earned on ability and merit in
spite of a bloodline at least as good as these stuck-up shamans
who’d attained their power and rank and position by merely
being born into the right family.
“Very well, then. General Wharfen, Commander of the System
Peacekeeping Forces, is nervous. When General Wharfen gets nervous,
everyone under him gets much grief, and right now his eye is on us.
Although it has been many years since a ring was stolen, the
general is convinced that these so-called pirates will make a move
and soon. He is reinforcing our positions on the worlds with rings
considered most vulnerable and placing our forces there on full
alert.”
“Male paranoia, Colonel,” Vulture responded
haughtily. “When one takes orders from a male, one
must expect such things.”
Chi choked off a rejoinder, well aware that the high priestess
knew that Chanchuk’s sexual order was not universal among the
other races of humanity and that ones like Wharfen were every bit
the equal of either one of them in abilities. She had no intention,
however, of getting sidetracked into a debate on universal male
psychology.
“There was a colonel like myself, a Janipurian named
Privi, who was given a similar assignment to my own a few years
back. Privi died—slowly and uncomfortably—in an object
lesson to the other division commanders that I was forced to
endure. I have no intention of being the next object lesson. My
orders prevent a wholesale disruption of the system on this world,
but I assure you that if the SPF must seize full control of
security here and elsewhere on this planet and mindprint the
locals, regardless of rank or position, I assure you I can and will
do so.”
The high priestess looked up at her, impassive and apparently
unmoved. “You have evidence that this is more than paranoia?
After all, one ring in—what?—five years? We do not even
understand what all this fuss over the Holy Lama’s ring is,
anyway. If it is so important, why not simply secure it!
You have the force.”
The colonel shook her head. “I have no idea what the rings
represent nor do I wish to know, although it is said that together
they represent some threat to the system’s order and safety.
How that can be I have no idea, and, again, I do not want to know,
nor do you. Such knowledge, I think, would mean death.”
“Death is relative, whether you believe it or not,
Colonel,” said the high priestess who was also the Vulture.
“However, the manner of death as well as the conduct of life
is important, we will grant that. Still, does it not trouble you
that these pirates know and you do not? One wonders what
sort of secret is so terrible that it must be kept from one’s
allies even when the enemies of the system know. Still, what
concern is it of ours except that your presence here disrupts the
order and flow of society?”
The colonel reached into her parcel belt and brought out a
photograph and passed it over to the priestess, who took it and
looked at it. It showed a small, round object with what looked like
a thick collar covering about a third of its girth and which was
used as a base. “So? What is this thing?” she asked,
knowing exactly what it was. The discovery of one or more was
inevitable, particularly considering the amount of time this
mission had taken.
“It is an independent, remotely operated, near-space
engine,” the colonel responded, taking back the photograph
and putting it back into the belt.
“A spaceship? That hardly looks like anything we ever
imagined as a spacecraft.”
“Not a spacecraft, no. An engine. Only the engine, some
fuel, and a very small core command module that appears to respond
only to a simple off-on signal. The entire purpose of the thing
appears to be to take off.”
“Indeed? And then what?”
“Nothing. It’s just an engine and fuel. There
isn’t room for much of anything else, although something as
small as the ring could fit in it—if it were placed in one of
the access ports and somehow secured. It was found by accident in
Win Tai Province. Some klitchi farmers were being menaced
by a warog that they managed to wound and then were forced
to chase. As you know, the creatures are monsters when
wounded.” Klitchi was a sea grass that was a staple
of the Chanchuk diet, much as rice had been for their ancient
Earth-human ancestors. The warog was one of the
sea’s great carnivores, although not generally a danger to
humans unless wounded or unless it tasted blood. “They
practically stumbled over it, camouflaged and neatly set up on a
rock outcrop near the surface but well away from the
village.”
“Why was this not reported to us at once?”
“Ah . . . our people at Win Tai Center
intercepted the thing, recovered and analyzed it, and it was
decided that we were best able to handle it. We did not feel that
it was necessary to inform you at the time.”
“Necessary! It is our function! How dare you!
Have you, then, already usurped the maintenance and administration
of Chanchuk? If so, why come to us now?”
“No, not yet. Rest assured on that. And I am telling you
now because we are going to need your help in coordinating the
various Center security staffs. We must know if there are more of
these things, and finding them will take a concentrated and
intelligent search. They did not fly down there and put up their
own camouflage—someone had to place them and hide them. Win
Tai is a very long way from here. This had to be a backup, an
emergency system, not intended for use unless necessary. It is not
of our manufacture, and the manufacturing capabilities to build
such a thing do not exist on Chanchuk. Marine growth and oxidation
of the device indicate it has been in place no more than a year and
a half, possibly no more than eight or nine months. We must know
where any others are, and quickly!”
Vulture looked at the colonel smugly. “You have just stood
there telling us how all-powerful and omnipotent you are. Please,
be our guest. Go out and find all you can.”
“You know we haven’t a prayer of doing it on our
own. We don’t know this world. We are visitors here, even if
we are of the same race. The device is diabolical in its
cleverness. There is no element in its composition that is not
found in nature here one place or another. Nothing for
instrumentation to seize upon. They are small, and well hidden,
most certainly well away from populous areas and off usual travel
routes. But in each case, someone placed it where it is.
Either a stranger had to come through who would be noticed or a
local was employed, either voluntarily or through kidnapping and
mindprinting. We should be able to track these down—but not
by ourselves. We require all the resources at your command and the
experience of the best people you have at each Center.”
It wasn’t a bad opening. “We have no authority to
order such a thing, nor would there be any enthusiastic cooperation
considering our relations since you arrived. Only the Holy Lama
herself could command this. Has she been informed?”
“My orders from the commander on analysis of the device
and the problem have only just arrived from headquarters. Master
System believes that an intensive search will prod any pirates now
present to hasten their plans and try for the ring before all of
their devices and their plans are uncovered and all avenues of
escape are cut off. Even now a number of frigates are headed here,
each carrying a complement of automated fighter craft. They will be
in place within five days from today. So far we think we have
contained this discovery, but once the search is launched everyone,
including the pirate agents, will know. They will make a frantic
attempt on the ring—and we will catch them.”
Five days. Not much time, but more than enough if everything
worked according to plan. Once the operation was placed in motion,
it had to go pretty fast. Not only Chi but most of Center would
immediately notice the disappearance of a key high priestess, and
while Vulture could become anyone she chose, she could not be two
people at once.
Vulture nodded to the colonel. “Very well. We will attempt
an appointment with the Holy Lama as soon as practical on this
matter.”
Chi glared at the priestess. “I would suggest that it be
very quickly, Holiness.” She made that last
word sound like something obscene. “You people here seem to
forget yourselves and just what maintains your fat, comfortable
lives here and your precious religion. I want that authority and
cooperation by tonight. If not, I will be forced to report that
this Center and its chief administrator are refusing full and
complete cooperation and are to be considered to be in rebellion
against the system. Then we’ll see how well your little games
play against Vals with the full authority of Master System and full
control of your computers, power facilities, and apparatus of
control. You tell the Holy Lama that.”
And, with that, the colonel stomped, gave a stiff military-style
salute, pivoted, and walked out the door feeling very secure and
satisfied with herself.
It was no idle threat, either. Such a statement would have any
high priestess in a panic and the Holy Lama passing bricks and
scrambling to protect her domain. For Vulture, it was just what she
most wanted coming from an unexpected and wonderful direction. She
punched the intercom.
“Have the complete recorded transcript of the conversation
with Colonel Chi transmitted to the Holy Lama immediately on
emergency priority,” she ordered crisply. “Then get me
all the data you can on this alien thing they found, the
area, and region—all the details.” She paused a moment.
“And find out exactly who among our own people in Win Tai and
in the chain from there to here did not immediately report
everything to me and get their excuses. Inform them that the Holy
Lama will judge them by their names and their excuses and relieve
them of all clearances and authority until that judgment is
rendered. Understand?”
“Yes, Holiness,” came the somewhat shocked response.
“At once.”
By the time the summons from the Sacred Lodge came, Vulture had
managed to put together a very neat package, ostensibly to brief
the Holy Lama but actually to brief Vulture. Politically there was
no excuse for the two field agents and the high priestess at Win
Tai not to report everything no matter what they were told or
ordered to do by SPF officials. It was Wa Chi Center’s job to
deal with the SPF; it was the responsibility of subordinate chief
administrators and their staffs to work for and solely in the
interest of Wa Chi. And, of course, it was politics—or at
least ambition—that caused them to betray their trust.
Promotion was slow and reward was not generally a factor in this
culture and society, and no matter how closed the culture, these
people were, well, human. Their excuses were lame—the field
agents maintaining they did their job and that wasn’t to send
on the material to Wai Chi; the C.A. at Wa Chi stating that she had
been assured it was all sent. Maybe with a static, inbred,
hereditary hierarchy you got that lazy and that incompetent, but
Vulture knew it was different, at least in this case. They were
betting on Chi’s permanence and influence, and they bet
wrong.
Vulture picked up her communicator and called home. All lines in
and out, even the secured ones, were continuously monitored, of
course, but the kind of information she had to impart wasn’t
anything apparently subversive. Butar answered.
“We shall not be home until very late,” Vulture told
the other agent. “We are summoned to an audience with the
Holy Lama at sixteen-thirty hours and there is no telling how long
it will take nor what we will be commanded to do after.”
There was a somewhat pregnant pause from Killomen, who
then responded, “Very well, Holiness. We shall prepare
nothing for you, but we will leave something in the storage
compartment in case you come in hungry and late.”
“Do not bother, child. It might well be three days. Just
enjoy yourselves and do what you want to do. We will
cope.”
And that was that. Three days from now, at a predetermined time,
things would start to pop—if Vulture managed to pull off her
part at all. If not, it gave enough time for the high priestess to
return home and call it off.
At a bit after sixteen hundred, Vulture packed all the materials
into a watertight bag, sealed it with the official security seal,
put it on, and went out for the short trip to the Sacred Lodge. The
staff eyed her in awe and wonder, knowing she was going to see,
even converse with, the Holy Lama herself. They might as well get a
good look. If all went well, some time in the early morning a
little bit of a worm would sneak into the security computer system
with the order from the Holy Lama dispatching her to Win Tai to
take personal charge of things. They didn’t have access to
skimmers and the like here; the Centers had to be located too close
to the masses to make any ostentatious display of technology
possible. There were quick ways, certainly—and the
SPF could have gotten her there in hours—but it would not be
in character to use them. Using the speediest modes of travel
available to Wa Chi Center, it would take someone three or four
days to reach Win Tai. That might be cutting the timing close and
her cover might be blown, but it was better than nothing.
With luck, and if the Holy Lama didn’t ask for her or
summon her when she was supposed to be somewhere else by order of
the Holy Lama, the high priestess might not be missed until it was
far too late.
The Sacred Lodge was grandiose, even underwater. The whole
support structure and base glowed incandescently, and, unlike the
other lodges, seemed to sit not on wood supports but on some kind
of translucent marble columns. Statues of the Great Buddha were
inset around as well, and scenes highlighting the cardinal
principles of this odd offshoot of Buddhism were carved on thick
bands around the columns. There were both electronic and human
guards as well, the latter armed with very efficient and
non-mass-culture rifles with automatic sights adjusted for use in
water or air.
The Grand Entrance was a womblike tunnel full of twists and
turns. The curves were there for a reason: they gave security
plenty of time to look over a visitor while she presented a perfect
slow target who could be cut off by lightning-fast door seals at
the least suspicion. Nobody got very far by accident or without an
invitation.
Once in the drying chamber, however, one had to hand over all
parcels and items of clothing to be passed through sensors while
presenting eyes, fingers, and blood samples to special security
computers not connected to the main computer network and controlled
entirely from within the temple. This was a relatively new
procedure ordered by Master System itself a few years before. It
knew that the pirates had gotten into the security system of
Janipur and wanted to make very certain that no spy, no matter how
clever, could influence the gateway to the one who wore the ring.
The system was totally automated as well; it even included a
mindprint routine to make absolutely certain that anyone
entering was just who they seemed to be. The transmuters might fool
all the physical safeguards, but duplicating both physical and
mental characteristics perfectly was considered by Master System as
next to impossible.
As usual, Master System was wrong. To the Vulture, who was
designed to fool just such mechanisms, it was child’s
play.
She reclaimed her belongings on the other side of the security
door and went up to the waiting chamber. It was sumptuously
furnished and the gold relief on the religious scenes engraved in
the walls was awe-inspiring. The fact that some of those gems and
intricate designs concealed monitors made any move here highly
unlikely. Here was where luck had failed in the first attempt, and
where luck needed to be far better this time. Damn it, this
was about as impregnable a place to get in and out of as
could be designed under the limits of a colonial Center. She
settled down on a soft couch and waited.
A small door opened opposite her and one of the Seed of Buddha
entered carrying a small tray.
The males of Chanchuk were less than imposing. The average
female was perhaps a hundred and sixty-five centimeters tall and
weighed perhaps fifty-five to sixty kilograms; the average male was
perhaps a hundred and twenty centimeters, many shorter, and usually
did not weigh more than thirty-five kilos. They also had a bushy
mane of hair around their heads that was usually slightly lighter
or darker than the rest of their body hair and often was dyed to
give great contrast. They often went to great lengths in wearing
various jewels and other ornaments to make themselves stand out to
any females who might be looking. Most incongruously, they had two
small but very firm breasts that actually produced milk on a
continuous basis. Still, they had one attribute that made them
instantly attractive to the opposite sex, as the large golden
codpiece this one wore attested.
Males really were rather weak. Fewer than two in seven made it
past their first year and they were subject to more diseases before
they reached puberty, which cut their numbers down even further. Of
course, even though they numbered only thirty percent of the adult
population, there were more males than were required for
procreation, particularly when they had such raging libidos. In
general, males kept house for a number of women who could then
space their children so that it would not affect the group’s
income or disrupt their lives unnecessarily.
The females bore the young, but the males nursed and raised
them. In this biological system the males had all the sexual lures
but were small and weak and very dependent. They were such
prisoners of their continuous hormones—unlike females whose
hormones got out of whack only briefly every month—that
culturally they were considered incapable of more than running a
household and were not all that bright. Most education, at least,
was denied them, and their roles were rigidly fixed. Whether or not
they really had higher IQs than anyone credited was something
Vulture hoped to find out.
The male stopped and bowed slightly before Vulture.
“Greetings, Holiness. I am Cho. We met when you were here a
few months ago. Might I offer some tea and biscuits? The Holy Lama
will see you soon.”
Vulture nodded and allowed the tea to be poured. She remembered
Cho, all right. She almost had him last time, but she
couldn’t get him far enough out of the monitor range.
There was no sexual attraction felt by either now, of course.
There never was around a priestess; after she’d been gutted
of her sexual apparatus and even had her biochemistry adjusted to
that of an asexual being, there wasn’t much to arouse
interest. Without the glandular odors, the male wouldn’t find
a eunuch particularly attractive.
Idly, Vulture reached down to her vaginal area, found and
squeezed hard and somewhat painfully on a tiny hard spot just
beneath the skin. A tiny, surgically implanted vial gave way and
exuded a substance through the pores of the outer skin layers. The
high priestess was now no less a eunuch, but for the brief period
until the stuff washed off or lost its potency, she began exuding a
real glandular come-on. The odor was not noticeable on a conscious
level—just another in the mix of body odors—but it
would, Vulture and Clayben theorized, have an interesting effect on
any males in close range who might be very confused but still would
find her suddenly very alluring.
There was no immediate effect, although she got as close as she
could to Cho. Still, after a little while and some small talk, Cho
seemed to become a bit distracted and she could see him catching
himself as his hand moved to his crotch.
That was just an opener, however. From this point, a high
priestess who came also had to leave.
A chime sounded, breaking the scene, and Cho jumped up.
“The Holy Lama will see you now,” he said, sounding a
bit throaty and breathless. He went to the main door, and it opened
in front of him. He entered, and she followed, and they went down a
short hall that opened into a large office the opulence of which
was breathtaking.
The Holy Lama looked up from her desk. “All right,
Cho—go play with yourself. We have business,” she
snapped in a hard, professional voice. The little male bowed,
turned, and left, closing the inner doors behind him.
She was still relatively young, yet the pressures of the dual
jobs of chief planetary administrator and top priestess to a major
religion were already showing on her. The eyes were as hard as the
voice, and the fur on the face and along the arms already seemed to
be tinged with gray.
“So, are we still running things or aren’t
we?” the Holy Lama asked, getting directly to the point.
“We are—to a point,” Vulture responded.
“Colonel Chi is a soulless person, but with all the human
failings of ambition and arrogance. She is used to giving orders
and being obeyed instantly, and she has no respect for or loyalty
to any culture or beliefs other than her own militaristic
upbringing. One can tell that she is just itching for an excuse to
declare full martial law, depose us, and turn Chanchuk into a
godless police state.”
The Holy Lama, as always, had the ring right on her finger. Four
little birds against a black jadelike background laid into an
ornately jeweled golden ring. It was so tempting to just become the
Holy Lama and obtain it by right of possession, but it wasn’t
possible. Everything in this room was being recorded; there was no
way that there would be the fifteen or more minutes necessary to
make the change without some kind of alarm being raised—and
no way to block security from later watching a recording of what
had happened and thus discovering just what the Vulture’s
power really was.
“Let us see your case,” the Holy Lama said, and it
was handed over. The highest of priestesses broke the seal and
studied the documents and the picture of the device for some time,
deep in thought. Finally she said, “This isn’t good.
Chi may be a soulless bastard, but she does have a point.”
She put down the papers and stared at her ring. “We would
live our next incarnation as a water slug to know why this is so
important that aliens would risk lives and worse for it and Master
System would go to this sort of extreme to stop them. If it were
not a required badge of office, we would just take it off and give
it to the SPF and tell them to go throw it in the sun or something.
There is no real religious connotation to it. It is just a very
pretty ring from the Mother World and the old days.”
Vulture shrugged. “If you wish, it could be done. You
could give it to us now and we would take it to Chi and have done
with it and her.”
“If that were true, we would not hesitate to do so, but do
you know what the security monitors would do if this thing left
here without being on our finger in a prearranged audience? No,
they feel that if the Holy Lama is sealed away in this ornate
mausoleum, it cannot be gotten. We wonder, though. If there were
such a thing as absolute security, we would not get away with much
of what we get away with now, would we? Master System would have
roared in here and mindcleaned the lot of us—and our
ancestors, too—if that were true.” She sighed.
“We would almost like to meet one of these pirate thieves.
If, somehow, we could truly be convinced that this ring could aid
in disrupting or even blowing apart this foul and evil system and
its master machines, we would be tempted to present it to them
freely. But—this system cannot be broken. Not by the likes of
a jeweled ring.”
Vulture was so heartened by that comment—which would be
judiciously edited out of the recording by the Holy Lama’s
own special programs before it got to security and Colonel
Chi—that she longed to tell all. There was just no way that
the chance could be taken. It might be possible to convince the
chief administrator that the rings could really do it, but first
Vulture would have to convince the old girl that the sister
she’d grown up with and known all her life was actually an
artificial entity, then convince her that this entity was working
for the pirates and not Master System out to trap treasonous chief
administrators, and, finally, that the pirates could get all five
and use them.
Better to steal it—if Vulture could, somehow, manage to do
even that.