[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
Nancia longed for a softperson's physical extrusions.
220
AttneMcCaffrey & Margaret Batt
It would be enormously satisfying to take Fassa by the shoulders and shake her
out of the trance in which she had fallen. MP%y couldn't softpersons keep
transmitting datastreams while they were processing?
She had to content herself with blinking Fassa's cabin lights and assaulting
her with raucous bursts of music from Flix's latest sonohedron.
"Do I take it," she inquired when satisfied that she had the girl's attention,
"that you recognize some salient features?"
"Yes... I think so, anyway." Of course, Fassa would have no control over the
visual detail, not to mention the accuracy, of whatever images she'd stored
from her previous visit. She would be dependent on whatever her non-enhanced
biological memory could provide. Recognizing this, Nancia didn't count on
learning much.
"Those gardens on the side of the mountain," Fassa said. "He had the terraces
in place a year ago, but nothing was planted. I thought it was something to do
with the mine."
Nancia switched the signals going to Fassa's display screen to show the mine
entrance. Blue-uniformed figures moved in and out, pushing wagons on railings
that curved around the side of the mountain. A mag-
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ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
nified display showed that the figures were shambling
Angalia natives, neady dressed in blue shorts and shirts and working together
with the precision of a choreographed dance. One native heaved a sack from the
mine entrance and tossed it over his head; another casually moved into place
just in time to catch it; by the time he'd turned, a third native had backed
his wagon down the rail system and into place to receive the load.
"Amazing," Nancia commented. "I thought the An-
galians couldn't be trained."
"Blake," Forister said hollowly, "has certainly been a busy little boy."
PARTNERSHIP
221
"It doesn't look all that bad so far," Nancia pointed out Fassa, do you # or
the others # recognize any-
thing else?"
She let the display screens sweep over a panoramic view of the mesa and the
surrounding countryside.
Suddenly Fassa gave a cry of recognition. "Oh, God,
he's left the volcano!"
Nancia halted the display and studied it. An evil-
looking bubble of brown and green mud heaved and burst and formed again,
roiling continuously in the midst of the tall grass covering the rest of the
basin.
"I don't suppose planting flowers would do much to disguise it," she agreed.
"You don't understand." Fassa sounded close to tears. "That's how he controls
them # how he makes them do things for them. If the Loosies don't please him,
he cooks them alive in that boiling mud! I saw it done last time # I'll never
forget those screams."
"Alpha? Darnell?" Nancia queried the other two.
"That's right," Darnell told her. "Revolting."
Alpha nodded silently, the movement barely visible to Nancia's visual sensors.
She could think of no more encouraging words for
Forister.
Micaya persuaded Forister to let her confront Blaize initially. "I'll wear a
contact button," she promised him. "You and Nancia can see and hear everything
that goes on."
"It's my duty# " Forister began.
"Mine too," Micaya interrupted him. "The young man is more likely to confess
if he doesn't think he can bring family influence to bear."
"He can't," Forister said grimly. "I'm not here to in-
tercede for him."
"Yes, but he doesn't know that," Micaya pointed out-
Nancia kept all her external sensors trained on
222
Anne McCajfrey & Margaret Ball
Micaya'as the general picked her way along a path of rounded volcanic stones
to the door of the permalloy hut. On both sides of the path, feathery grasses
and blazing tropical flowers grew in exuberant, uncon-
trolled patterning, throwing up their seed-heads and blooms above Micaya's
crisp silver-sprinkled hair.
Nancia recognized Old Earth species mixed with
Denebian starflowers and the singing grasses of
Fomalhaut II, a joyous blaze of pink and orange and purple flowers.
Micaya entered the hut and Nancia's field of vision
contracted to the half-circle covered by the contact button. In the shadowy
hut, stacked high with papers and bits of machinery, Blaize's red head glowed
like a burning ember before the computer screen that held his attention.
Page 123
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
"Blaize Armontillado-Perez y Medoc," Micaya said formally.
"Urn. PTA shipment? I'll sign for it in a minute. Just got to finish this one
thing...."
The contact button's resolution wasn't enough for
Nancia to read the words on the computer screen, but she recognized the
seven-tone response code that chimed out when Blaize slapped his open hand on
the palmpad. An interplanetary transmission # no, inter-
subspace; he had just sent something to ... Nancia rummaged through her files
and identified the code. To
Central Diplomatic headquarters? What could they have to do with Angalia, a
planet where no intelligent sentients existed? Had Blaize's net of corruption
drawn in some of her father's and Forister's own colleagues?
"There!" As the last notes of the code chimed out, Blaize swung round, a
seraphic smile on his freckled face. "And what # "
His expression changed rapidly and almost comical-
ly at the sight of Micaya Questar-Benn in full uniform.
"You," he said slowly, "are not PTA."
PARTNERSHIP
223
"Quite correct," said Micaya. "Your activities have attracted some attention
in other quarters."
Blaize's jaw thrust out and his freckles seemed to take on a glowing life of
their own. "Well, it's too late.
You can't stop me now!"
"Can't I?" Micaya's tone was deceptively mild.
"I've sent a full report to CenDip. I don't care who your friends in PTA may
be, they'll have to leave An-
galia alone now."
"My dear boy," said Micaya, "haven't you got it back-
wards? You're the one employed by Planetary Technical
Aid. Or rather, you were."
Nancia had been so caught up in the dialogue, she never noticed when Forister
slipped out of her central cabin and made his way down the stairs. She was as
starded as Blaize when Forister appeared in the door-
way of the hut, just on the periphery of her view from the contact button.
"Uncle Forister!" Blaize exclaimed. "What's going on here? Can you help# "
"Don't call me uncle," Forister said between his teeth. "I'm here with General
Questar-Benn to stop you, boy, not to help you!"
Blaize went green between the spattering of freck-
les. He closed his eyes for a moment and looked as if he wanted to be sick.
"Not you too?"
"You didn't think family feeling would extend so far as helping you exploit
and torture these innocents?"
"Torture? Exploit?" Blaize gasped. "I # oh, no.
Uncle Forister, have you by any chance been talking to a girl named Fassa del
Parma y Polo? Or Alpha bint
Hezra-Fong? Or Darnell # "
"All three of them," Forister confirmed, "and #
what the devil is so funny about that?"
For Blaize had all but doubled up, snorting with repressed laughter. "My sins
come back to haunt me,"
he gasped between snorts.
224
Anne McCaffrey &f Margaret Ball
PARTNERSHIP
225
"I don't see what's so funny about it." Pollster's own face had gone white and
there was a pinched look about the corners of his mouth.
Page 124
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
"You wouldn't. Not yet. But when I # Oh, Lord!
This is one complication I never # " Blaize sputtered into hysterical [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
zanotowane.pl doc.pisz.pl pdf.pisz.pl fopke.keep.pl
Nancia longed for a softperson's physical extrusions.
220
AttneMcCaffrey & Margaret Batt
It would be enormously satisfying to take Fassa by the shoulders and shake her
out of the trance in which she had fallen. MP%y couldn't softpersons keep
transmitting datastreams while they were processing?
She had to content herself with blinking Fassa's cabin lights and assaulting
her with raucous bursts of music from Flix's latest sonohedron.
"Do I take it," she inquired when satisfied that she had the girl's attention,
"that you recognize some salient features?"
"Yes... I think so, anyway." Of course, Fassa would have no control over the
visual detail, not to mention the accuracy, of whatever images she'd stored
from her previous visit. She would be dependent on whatever her non-enhanced
biological memory could provide. Recognizing this, Nancia didn't count on
learning much.
"Those gardens on the side of the mountain," Fassa said. "He had the terraces
in place a year ago, but nothing was planted. I thought it was something to do
with the mine."
Nancia switched the signals going to Fassa's display screen to show the mine
entrance. Blue-uniformed figures moved in and out, pushing wagons on railings
that curved around the side of the mountain. A mag-
Page 122
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
nified display showed that the figures were shambling
Angalia natives, neady dressed in blue shorts and shirts and working together
with the precision of a choreographed dance. One native heaved a sack from the
mine entrance and tossed it over his head; another casually moved into place
just in time to catch it; by the time he'd turned, a third native had backed
his wagon down the rail system and into place to receive the load.
"Amazing," Nancia commented. "I thought the An-
galians couldn't be trained."
"Blake," Forister said hollowly, "has certainly been a busy little boy."
PARTNERSHIP
221
"It doesn't look all that bad so far," Nancia pointed out Fassa, do you # or
the others # recognize any-
thing else?"
She let the display screens sweep over a panoramic view of the mesa and the
surrounding countryside.
Suddenly Fassa gave a cry of recognition. "Oh, God,
he's left the volcano!"
Nancia halted the display and studied it. An evil-
looking bubble of brown and green mud heaved and burst and formed again,
roiling continuously in the midst of the tall grass covering the rest of the
basin.
"I don't suppose planting flowers would do much to disguise it," she agreed.
"You don't understand." Fassa sounded close to tears. "That's how he controls
them # how he makes them do things for them. If the Loosies don't please him,
he cooks them alive in that boiling mud! I saw it done last time # I'll never
forget those screams."
"Alpha? Darnell?" Nancia queried the other two.
"That's right," Darnell told her. "Revolting."
Alpha nodded silently, the movement barely visible to Nancia's visual sensors.
She could think of no more encouraging words for
Forister.
Micaya persuaded Forister to let her confront Blaize initially. "I'll wear a
contact button," she promised him. "You and Nancia can see and hear everything
that goes on."
"It's my duty# " Forister began.
"Mine too," Micaya interrupted him. "The young man is more likely to confess
if he doesn't think he can bring family influence to bear."
"He can't," Forister said grimly. "I'm not here to in-
tercede for him."
"Yes, but he doesn't know that," Micaya pointed out-
Nancia kept all her external sensors trained on
222
Anne McCajfrey & Margaret Ball
Micaya'as the general picked her way along a path of rounded volcanic stones
to the door of the permalloy hut. On both sides of the path, feathery grasses
and blazing tropical flowers grew in exuberant, uncon-
trolled patterning, throwing up their seed-heads and blooms above Micaya's
crisp silver-sprinkled hair.
Nancia recognized Old Earth species mixed with
Denebian starflowers and the singing grasses of
Fomalhaut II, a joyous blaze of pink and orange and purple flowers.
Micaya entered the hut and Nancia's field of vision
contracted to the half-circle covered by the contact button. In the shadowy
hut, stacked high with papers and bits of machinery, Blaize's red head glowed
like a burning ember before the computer screen that held his attention.
Page 123
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
"Blaize Armontillado-Perez y Medoc," Micaya said formally.
"Urn. PTA shipment? I'll sign for it in a minute. Just got to finish this one
thing...."
The contact button's resolution wasn't enough for
Nancia to read the words on the computer screen, but she recognized the
seven-tone response code that chimed out when Blaize slapped his open hand on
the palmpad. An interplanetary transmission # no, inter-
subspace; he had just sent something to ... Nancia rummaged through her files
and identified the code. To
Central Diplomatic headquarters? What could they have to do with Angalia, a
planet where no intelligent sentients existed? Had Blaize's net of corruption
drawn in some of her father's and Forister's own colleagues?
"There!" As the last notes of the code chimed out, Blaize swung round, a
seraphic smile on his freckled face. "And what # "
His expression changed rapidly and almost comical-
ly at the sight of Micaya Questar-Benn in full uniform.
"You," he said slowly, "are not PTA."
PARTNERSHIP
223
"Quite correct," said Micaya. "Your activities have attracted some attention
in other quarters."
Blaize's jaw thrust out and his freckles seemed to take on a glowing life of
their own. "Well, it's too late.
You can't stop me now!"
"Can't I?" Micaya's tone was deceptively mild.
"I've sent a full report to CenDip. I don't care who your friends in PTA may
be, they'll have to leave An-
galia alone now."
"My dear boy," said Micaya, "haven't you got it back-
wards? You're the one employed by Planetary Technical
Aid. Or rather, you were."
Nancia had been so caught up in the dialogue, she never noticed when Forister
slipped out of her central cabin and made his way down the stairs. She was as
starded as Blaize when Forister appeared in the door-
way of the hut, just on the periphery of her view from the contact button.
"Uncle Forister!" Blaize exclaimed. "What's going on here? Can you help# "
"Don't call me uncle," Forister said between his teeth. "I'm here with General
Questar-Benn to stop you, boy, not to help you!"
Blaize went green between the spattering of freck-
les. He closed his eyes for a moment and looked as if he wanted to be sick.
"Not you too?"
"You didn't think family feeling would extend so far as helping you exploit
and torture these innocents?"
"Torture? Exploit?" Blaize gasped. "I # oh, no.
Uncle Forister, have you by any chance been talking to a girl named Fassa del
Parma y Polo? Or Alpha bint
Hezra-Fong? Or Darnell # "
"All three of them," Forister confirmed, "and #
what the devil is so funny about that?"
For Blaize had all but doubled up, snorting with repressed laughter. "My sins
come back to haunt me,"
he gasped between snorts.
224
Anne McCaffrey &f Margaret Ball
PARTNERSHIP
225
"I don't see what's so funny about it." Pollster's own face had gone white and
there was a pinched look about the corners of his mouth.
Page 124
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
"You wouldn't. Not yet. But when I # Oh, Lord!
This is one complication I never # " Blaize sputtered into hysterical [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]