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killing themselves. We screwed up, but in little bits and pieces. The whole
stayed the same, and the basic values of spirit, community, and honor heldup.
Then the Europeans came.
No problem at first just another crazy set of empires. Hell, they brought the
horse to America and the native people took to it with a vengeance. But they
also had the guns and they were comin' out of a period of wars where there'd
been so much killin' for so long they were hard and mean and intolerant of
anybody else. A war between the Crow and Blackfoot took maybe weeks and killed
a few folks until honor was balanced and a settlement reached. Them Europeans
fought one called the Hundred Years
War. They were different and war is the best way to generate new technology.
They had us cold and they didn't see us as much more than ignorant savages. We
were different, not even Christian, and we had different looks and darker
skin. In two hundred and fifty years they killed a lot of us, destroyed all
our nations and cultures, burned the Mayan libraries, and penned up a lot of
us on the worst patches of land in the middle of nowhere like prisoners. We
fought but they had the guns and the numbers."
"I know little of that," China said, "but I knew of course of the European
conquest of the Americas. It was Master System who reversed things and
restored the tribes where it could, was it not?"
He nodded. "Yeah, sort of. We're better than we were 'cause we're in charge
and not cooped up, but it's not really the way it was. It's the way Master
System figured it should be for economy's sake. Same goes for the Polynesians.
The Europeans marched in and took over and even after they left there wasn't
much left of the old culture but shows for tourists. Hawks figures that what
happened here, on Alititi, was that Master System kind'a made a deal with some
Pacific folks who wanted to turn their back on the modern world and get back
to what they saw as the basics. They're ugly as sin and they live in a crazy
kind of world, but it's theirs, and it works. See, that's what's got Hawks so
round the bend. We'resittin'
up here, not many of us, but with more power at our command than they dream
their gods might have, and they got something we want. All them other rings
we didn't have to destroy nothing. We tried to do it so quick and quiet that
not many folks even got hurt. But here, now, Hawks has been handed this thing.
You know the best way to find a needle mixed in a haystack?"
She shook her head. "No."
"Your burn the haystack and sift through the ashes. That's what Hawks is bein'
asked to do repeat history. Kill who-knows-how-many innocent people, destroy
their culture, ransack a world to find a ring.
He's bein' pressured to do to them what the Europeans did to our people, only
faster, which means even dirtier and deadlier. The cowboys and injuns changed
places, and he didn't bargain for that."
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The alarm rang in the quarters of each member of the council of captains.
Hawks was outside playing with his son when he heard it and rushed inside.
"Yes?"
"Ships in the Alititian system," Star Eagle reported.
Hawks frowned. "A task force?" That would be disastrous, for it would mean not
only that the already difficult and dangerous job was getting impossible, it
would also mean that the SPF had discovered the deception the pirates pulled
on Matriyeh and had maybe captured some of their people left behind there.
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"No. A small SPF vessel. Data indicates the probability that it is a tactical
ship a mobile command post rather than a true command ship designed for
orbital work. It might be a forward scouting party for a task force, perhaps
not. It is being covered by two Val fighters."
Hawks thought a moment, then snapped his fingers. "Chi! Has to be! Star
Eagle we have to get somethingin there close and fast! They won't want to stay
around long in plain view. Too much danger of giving the location away. Chi's
not taking any chances, though. She's gonna booby trap the ring."
"That is bad," the computer responded.
"Uh uh! It's the best break we've had, and right in the nick of time, too! To
booby trap it they're gonna have to send some people down there. Odds are
they've got some Alititian SPF in that ship who have some tribal ties to
whoever's holding the ring. Hell, there might be SPF down there all the
time but there's no way to contact them. Star Eagle
we have to know precisely where they go down to the surface! Precisely!
And they must not know we're doing it!"
"Working on the problem. We have the inactive base camp fighter there and the
relay fighter inactive in solar orbit. Their scanners are not the best but we
dare not risk a punch right now. If I could get that second base camp fighter
up, I'd have a fighting chance. There are only three ships and they will not
establish orbital positions for a couple of hours. Perhaps I can get that one
on the ground off when they are positioned right. I will try."
"You must! No matter what nasty business Chi and her Vals are pulling, they're
doing work for us we couldn't dream of accomplishing. Come on, Star Eagle!
They are going to point an arrow right to where we must look! You cannot
fail!"
But it was several hours of nail-biting as they all sat around in the common
waiting for word.
Finally Star Eagle reported, "I have it, I think, and I've correlated it with
our own surveys. They apparently have no receiver on the ground and so they
had to send a pod down with their people. The region is in the southern
hemisphere, a tiny island in an unusually quiescent geologic region. Obvious
when you think of it. They would not place the ring where it would be likely
to bemelted in volcanic fires or lost by seaquake. It is well away from the
base camp halfway around the world, almost. Our prisoners had no data at all
on any region beyond their own and their neighbors. We will require more
prisoners from the immediate area to get hard information, and they will have
to be taken with greater stealth than we used the first time. We will need
specimens from the proper tribe or nation, but ones who will be considered
missing a natural if sad turn of events rather than obviously kidnapped. We
can't just walk in on these people. There must be permanent party SPF down
there."
"I agree," Hawks replied. "First we have to wait for them to leave not just
the planet but the system.
Make certain that they are gone, too, and that they leave no surprises behind
in the system that we don't know about and can't counter. Then we'll need
high-resolution surveys of the entire area. We can assume a general similarity
to the ones we know, but there will be regional differences. We must know
them.
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Then Raven, here, can work out how to make a few of them vanish."
It must have been a real welcome home celebration, because the pod remained on
the island for nine days. The ships, however, were not idle during that
time the Vals looked over much of the inner solar system, and definitely with
mischief in mind. Had the rebel band not beaten Chi to the place, the
additional monitors and sophisticated sweep and I.D. systems installed by the
Vals would have been virtually undetectable, just as those small fighters from
Thunder were not detected by the newcomers.
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