“Kindly thought you fellows had, though,” Belgeddes said.
“Doesn’t bother you to talk about it though, I notice,” Dewhurst said, looking up at a corner of the ceiling.
“Not the same thing, friend,” Wade replied. He handed back the replica 8-bore. “Talk isn’t the real thing, you know.”
Reed snorted. “That the three of us know quite well.”
Dewhurst offered the rifle to Belgeddes. “Here,” he said. “Do you fancy a try?”
Belgeddes threw up both hands in mock horror and said, “Heavens, no! Palling around with Dickie, I’ve made an effort, but I was absolutely hopeless. Isn’t that so, Dickie?”
Wade chuckled. “‘Fraid it is, yes. When Tom’s got a rifle in his hands, the safest place to be is in front of the target.”
“Well, since we’ve got the gallery anyway . . .” Reed said. He touched a button on the control panel. The empty room became a reed-choked riverbank. A bipedal “lizard” the size of a cow darted past, glancing toward the humans.
“Hobilo,” Reed said in satisfaction. He drew a modern rifle with a fat magazine of rocket-assisted projectiles from the counter’s stores. “Unless this disturbs you, Wade?”
The older man chuckled and leaned against the back wall. “Not in the least, my boy,” he said. “So long as it’s you.”
Another lizard trotted by. Reed turned and fired. The rifle lifted in his hands with a hisscrack! as the simulated projectile broke the sound barrier beyond the muzzle. The lizard continued running.
Dewhurst shouldered the antique elephant gun. A huge carnivore burst out of the swamp. Reed fired twice, missing each time, while Dewhurst tugged in vain at his triggers.
“This damned thing doesn’t work!” he shouted as the holographic monster bore down on him.
Belgeddes leaned past Dewhurst and lifted back one of the 8-bore’s exposed hammers. “Got to cock these old smoke-poles, laddie,” he said.
Dewhurst yanked the front trigger again. The simulated recoil knocked him flat as the holographic carnivore vanished around him.
“Reminds me of a time on Kesterman Two . . .” began Wade, smiling indulgently at the other men.
AIN AL-MAHDI
Clouds in the upper stratosphere of Ain al-Mahdi whipped in holographic clarity past the curved bulkhead of the Starlight Bar, as though the structure of the Empress of Earth was really transparent.
“Not much to see,” Reed muttered. “We’d have a better view of the landing in the Social Hall.”
“Everybody goes to the Social Hall to watch the takeoff and landing,” objected Dewhurst
Da Silva swirled his drink morosely and said nothing. Reed would be leaving the ship here. The five men had achieved a prickly sort of kinship which Da Silva, at least, would be sorry to lose.
“What they see on the ceiling of the Social Hall isn’t real,” said Wade. “It’s a computer construction of what the view would be if we were above the Empress looking down.”
“This isn’t real either,” Dewhurst said. He gestured to the curved image. “It’s just interference patterns in light.”
“Well, if it comes to that,” said Belgeddes, “what you see here—”
He tapped the autobar with his knuckles. It made a flimsy sound.
“—is just reflected light, too. You know what Dickie means.”
“Another round?” Reed offered.
To the general chorus of agreement, Wade said, “Really, shouldn’t I pay for . . . ?”
“My treat, old boy,” said Reed. “On the occasion of getting home safe. Despite the war.”
He cleared his throat and added, “Hope the rest of you are as lucky.”
“Going to look for a beach walker while you’re here, Wade?” Dewhurst gibed.
“Didn’t look for the first one, friend,” Wade said as he took a glass of whiskey from Reed.
“I’ll grant you’re an expert on the difference between real and imagined, that’s so,” said Dewhurst.
“Reed was right about them probably being extinct by now anyway,” Belgeddes said. “You’ve got to remember that we’re dinosaurs, Dickie and I.”
“There’s dinosaurs on Hobilo,” Reed said. “Near enough.”
Ain al-Mahdi’s vast primary swung into view, filling much of the holographic sky with its multihued luster. The men paused, staring at the sudden beauty.
“That’s worth seeing,” said Da Silva.
On the wall above the autobar, the bead of red light representing the Empress of Earth backlighted the turquoise and tourmaline sea monster indicating Ain al-Mahdi; and the Brasil’s blue glow settled over Calicheman, the agate head of a bull.