Seas of Venus(133)

A few quarts of water sloshed in the lifeboat's bilges. Tiny toothed things flashed and quivered there. They were fighting over the disarticulated bones of a human hand.

"C'mon, Brainard," Kohl said. "Have a beer at least. Keep your strength up."

Rufus chuckled. "The condemned man drank a hearty meal," he said.

"Want to see what happens when stinging nettles get through a Free Company's perimeter?" Lilly said with enthusiasm as he changed chips.

A tall, fit-looking man in a blue-and-silver uniform stepped off the slidewalk in front of the recruiting office. His exposed skin had the mahogany tan of surface radiation. He reached toward the door with a chip-coded key in his hand.

Brainard stood up.

"Aw, c'mon, Brainard," said Rufus as he struggled to rise also. "You don't really wanna do this."

When the mercenary saw the group of young men, he shifted the key to his left hand and did not unlock the door. "Yes?" he called across the slidewalk.

His right hand hovered at waist level, almost innocently. His little finger carefully teased open the flap of the pistol holster which completed his uniform.

"I've come to enlist," Brainard said loudly as he strode toward the slidewalk.

"Aw, Brainard," Kohl muttered.

A professional smile brightened the recruiter's face. "Then you've come to the right place," he said as he reached toward the door again.

"And why spend the effort to die on the surface?" said Kline rhetorically as he sucked on the bottle he had already emptied. "Life in the Keeps is just fine the way it is!"

The slidewalk carried Brainard sideways, though he crossed it in two quick strides. He walked back along the berm.

In the center of Iowa Keep and every other domed city beneath the seas of Venus was the Earth Memorial. An image of Mankind's home blazed, representing the white light of the self-sustaining silicon reaction in the rocks of the actual planet. A wreath of black crepe encircled the display.

The armored doors of the recruiting office spread before Brainard like the jaws of death.





19


May 18, 382 AS. 1125 hours.




Wilding hallucinated.

He sensed his environment as if every detail were engraved in crystal. He had infinite time to pore over his surroundings and rotate them through his viewpoint.

Pores on Brainard's cold face as the ensign knelt with his back to the water.

Pressure blotches where the enlisted men gripped Brainard, four scarred hands holding each of his.

Individual scales jeweling the sides of fish. Sunlight shone through clouds and clear water to turn fanged horrors into things of miniature beauty.

Wisps of sand drifting in vortices near the mouth of the tunnel fifty feet away, marking movements of the monster within the plenum chamber.

"Right," said Brainard. "Is everybody ready?"

Yessir/Yeah/Uh-huh/Yessir

A wide variety of syllables, timbres, volume—and it all had the same meaning. You are willing to die for us, so we will stand by you. A computer would not understand, but men understood.

Hal Wilding understood for the first time how Nature ordered the jungle—and what it meant to be a man.

"Mr Wilding," said Brainard. His voice trembled minusculely with fear and anticipation. "Are you ready?"

Wilding nodded. "I'm ready," his voice said. His mind marveled at the precise normality of the words. "I understand."

Doubt flecked the corners of Brainard's eyes, briefly there—and gone. No use worrying, and no time for it either.

"All right," the ensign said. "I'm going in." He lurched backward into the glassy water.

Large fish swirled shadows at the limits of visibility. They were drawn by sound and movement aboard the hovercraft, but they sensed also the huge moray which laired beneath the vessel. They would not attack—unless enough blood scented the water to overwhelm their instinct for self-preservation with the desire to kill.

Crabs marched closer in the shallows. Their legs stirred the fine sand of the bottom into a smoky ambiance through which the flat, spike-armored carapaces drifted sideways. The crabs' outstretched fighting claws scissored open and closed, for the moment cutting only water.

The moray's tunnel was still and dark. The hovercraft shivered as a slimy body brushed its underside.

Ensign Brainard kicked, stirring the surface.

The four enlisted men looked more like corpses than they did able-bodied humans. The cuts, scrapes and sores that covered their bodies were individually minor, but the cumulative effect would have sapped the will of the strongest of men. Their faces were stark. They knew that they would have to pull their commander out of the water more swiftly than the moray could strike; and all of them doubted their ability to succeed.