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only occasional clusters of upper-deck ship-folk, a few drunk or disarrayed
but most of them chattering happily, returning home, he supposed, from affairs
hi honor of the humanoids.
Feeling conspicuous in his rough, green cloak, he clung uneasily to his role
of servant on some solitary errand, trying to hurry without seeming to,
walking down the platform until he could reach a handbar at a respectful
distance from his betters.
He heard the sirens moaning before he had gone a block. Though his heart was
hammering, he waited for the intersection before he swung off and slouched as
slowly as he dared into the downway.
Orange-painted patrol cabs were screeching from two directions by then, and
the slideway was grating to a stop. Afraid to look behind him, he imagined
footfalls in the ringing din.
At the first tunnel down, and the second, the air was still alive with sirens,
as if the whole patrol force had been mobilized to surround him, but those
below seemed quieter. A dozen levels down, he stepped off.
Playing the galleyman here, he felt a little more at home. It was a work
tunnel lined with small shops and factories, most of them now closed and dark,
though here and there a flashing holorama showed a bar still open. With the
slidewalks off for the night, he could hear voices and music in the bars.
Piled refuse rotted on the platforms, and industrial fumes edged the icy ail.
These workfolk, it struck him, would be easy victims of the humanoids.
What now?
Walking along the cluttered platform, he had begun to feel a little calmer.
The tunnel was nearly empty. The few solitary figures hastening through the
gloom had no reason to notice an- other galleyman. Until the sirens picked up
the trail, he had at least a moment free.
He longed to rejoin Cyra and his father, but even if he could somehow find
them the humanoids might be following. He thought wistfully of Bosun Brong,
even of Nera Nyin. A few more ships might be leaving with supplies for the
Zone, he supposed, before the humanoids took over everything, but he had no
quota for passage.
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A lean, beer-breathed woman hauled at his sleeve, tugging him toward a bar. He
shrugged her off and tramped on around a little crowd of workfolk standing
under a news holo at a tunnel intersection.
" preparations to receive them."
Panic arrested him when he heard that ringing voice and saw the Navarch's
blue-blazing eyes looking straight at him. Heart stopped, it took him a moment
to recall that a holo image couldn't see.
"Now or never, we must choose!" people stood awed and gaping, captured by the
rhodo power beneath that white-maned mask.
"I speak for the life of Kai." Its more-than-human voice rolled and echoed
down the tunnels. "If we choose life, we have certain essential steps to take.
The Bridge must legislate a forinal acceptance of humanoid service. The fleets
must prepare adequate landing pads for their transports. Most urgent of all,
the shipwatch must hunt down the few lunatic terrorists who oppose their
coming.
"Once they arrive, there will be no terror. No more violence, no more war, no
riots or strikes, because there will be no more injustice to set one person
against another. They promise total happiness for every human being, but that
cannot begin until these criminal madmen have been destroyed."
"Fleetfolk, likely." A reeling man in galley green pushed himself in front of
Keth. "They don't need humanoids. Not with us to serve them."
" three dealers in terror," the Navarch's stolen voice was pealing. "Members
of the infamous Lifecrew. Ryn Kyrone and Cyra Sair are leaders of the gang.
Murderers, shipfolk! Monstrous killers!"
The galleyman was offering an open bottle. When Keth shook his head, he lifted
it to his own lips but then forgot to drink.
"Just today, they murdered four trusted and beloved members of my own staff."
The simulacrum paused, eyes dropped as if in grief. "People I had sent to
bring them our amazing news. Trapped in a tubeway pod and slaughtered with
some hidden weapon."
"Bastards!" The bottle had slipped out of the galleyman's hand and lay
gurgling in the litter at his feet. "I'd gut them like mad mutoxen!"
Keth turned and bent to conceal a flash of satisfaction. That hidden weapon
must have been a monopole. Cyra and bis father must have used it to defeat the
masked machines sent to capture them. Perhaps they were still at large!
" third member of the gang, even more dangerous." He heard that brazen boom
again. "Keth Kyrone, son of that murderer and master of the same monstrous
art."
Staring open-mouthed at the holo, the galleyman gripped Keth's arm.
"Beware of him, shipfolk! He's hiding somewhere among you, perhaps even now
washing the innocent blood of a fair young girl from his foul hands. His own
crimes are unspeakable  hideous beyond belief. Watch for him, shipfolk! Kill
him on sight!"
"We'll gut the bastard!" The galleyman hauled at him savagely. "Won't we,
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mate?"
He forced himself to nod.
"You won't believe me, shipfolk. The facts will turn you ill. This Keth Kyrone
has proved himself inhuman a merciless monster parading as a man. Only
tonight, in the midst of our happy celebration of the humanoids, he forced his
way into Vara Vorn.
"He found his defenseless victim there, alone and undefended. Fleetmate Chelni
Vorn, the young and lovely cousin of Commodore Zoor. She had been with us
aboard the Fortune, and the whole ship's company had learned to love her. I
myself have wished she might have been my own daughter."
Blowing its nose, the machine produced a mellow hoot.
"The monster, it seems, had met her at school. In her euphoria over the
humanoids, she may herself have opened the door to her own dreadful death.
We'll never know. But, shipfolk, we do know what the monster did."
Keth wrenched to free his arm.
"The monstrous Keth Kyrone ripped the skin off that lovely child while she was
still alive." The giant voice quaked with horror. "He raped her as she died.
Sadly, I have to say that he escaped before the patrol arrived. He's still at
large among you, dripping with that girl's life-blood."
The galleyman was clutching blindly at him as he tried to edge away.
"Watch for him, shipfolk. Watch every man you meet. He carries a forged quota
card with the name J. Vesh. He is doubtless armed, with the same blade he used
to flay that child. If you see him anywhere, don't risk a word. Don't waste an
instant. Kill him where he is!"
"Let's get him, mate!" The galleyman had turned to look for him, blinking
drunkenly. "Let's take his bloody hide!"
"Here are holostats," the machine was pealing. "Study them well, and search
every tunnel. Let no suspect escape in case of innocent error, you have my own
personal promise of a pardon. I am authorizing a million-point reward, to be
paid from my own discretionary funds, for the death of each of the three. I'll
request the Bridge to double that when it meets tomorrow. Admiral Vorn, in
addition, is offering another million to the killer of the monster who
murdered his niece.
"Shipfolk, the holostats . . ."
The Navarch's commanding image dissolved into one he had given Chelni the
Wintersend before. Head bare and hair windblown, teeth gleaming through a
somewhat wistful smile, he thought he looked strangely fresh and young,
certainly too diffident to kill.
"The most inhuman monster! See the sneering evil on his features and watch for
him, shipfolk!"
Shrinking toward the tunnel wall and Into his hood, trying to hide his face [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]