A Fire Upon The Deep by Vernor Vinge

Author:Vernor Vinge [Vinge, Vernor]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2010-07-23T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 27

According to the clock, it took less than half an hour for the Skroderiders to make it back. It seemed a lot longer to Pham Nuwen, even though he tried to keep up a casual front with Ravna. Maybe they were both keeping up a front; he knew she still considered him a fragile case.

But the Riders’ cameras showed no more signs of the killer butterflies. Finally the cargo lock cracked open and Blueshell and Greenstalk were back.

“I was sure the wily tusk-legs was just pretending there was strong demand,” said Blueshell. He seemed as eager to rehash the story as Pham was.

“Yeah, I thought so too. In fact, I still think those butterflies might just be part of an act. It’s all too melodramatic.”

Blueshell’s fronds rattled in a way that Pham recognized as a kind of shiver. “I wager not, Sir Pham. Those were Aprahanti. Just the look of them fills you with dread, does it not? They’re rare these days, but a star trader knows the stories. Still … this is a little much even for Aprahanti. Their Hegemony has been on the wane for several centuries.” He rattled something at the ship, and the windows were filled with views of nearby berths in the repair harbor. There was more Rider rattling, this time between Greenstalk and Blueshell. “Those other ships are a uniform type, you know. A High Beyond design like ours, but more, um, … militant.”

Greenstalk moved close to a window. “There are twenty of them. Why would so many need drive repairs all at once?”

Militant? Pham looked at the ships with a critical eye. He knew the major features of Beyonder vessels by now. These appeared to have rather large cargo capacity. Elaborate sensoria too. Hm. “Okay, so the Butterflies are hard types. How scared is Saint Rihndell and company?”

The Skroderiders were silent for a long moment. Pham couldn’t tell if his question was being given serious consideration or if they had simultaneously lost track of the conversation. He looked at Ravna. “How about the local net? I’d like to get some background.”

She was already running comm routines. “They weren’t accessible earlier. We couldn’t even get the News.” That was something Pham could understand, even if it was damned irritating. The “local net” was a RIP-wide ultrawave computer and communication network, perhaps a billion times more complex than anything Pham had known—but conceptually similar to organizations in the Slow Zone. And Pham Nuwen had seen what vandals could do to such structures; Qeng Ho had dealt with at least one obnoxious civilization by perverting its computer net. Not surprisingly, Saint Rihndell hadn’t provided them with links to the RIP net. And as long as they were in harbor, the OOB’s antenna swarm was necessarily down, so they were also cut off from the Known Net and the newsgroups.

A grin lit Ravna’s face. “Hei! Now we’ve got read access, maybe more. Greenstalk. Blueshell. Wake up!”

Rattle. “I wasn’t asleep,” claimed Blueshell, “just thinking on Sir Pham’s question.

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