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 his 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.