Chapter 14: The Long Stalk

It had been called the Futile Gesture. Now my old Cosmic Intruder star ship had been renamed the Long Stalk by my Vix family. That star ship was bait for a trap—a HoChaRa operative that had orchestrated at least three attacks on the Paxlyn Domain. I had been one of those attacks—a plague carrier. I had blunted the second attack at the planetary zoo. Three days had passed since the trap had been baited.

I had the same nightmare eight times during those three days. I dreamed that the HoChaRa agent was a legal Paxlyn Domain citizen—and I knew her! The dream world is like looking into a mirror for me—right and left are swapped. You can gauge my degree of consciousness by whether I use my left hand or right. If I'm writing backwards with my left hand I'm drunk or high or in a deep slumber. This condition makes it difficult to recall my dreams. It is especially difficult for me to remember dream faces. I asked Garma for help.

Vix communicate telepathically. I am an untrained partial telepath—the Vix are working to correct that. Garma put me to bed with the Vix I connected most strongly with—Silvia. We were going to share dreams. And we did...

Ever run on all fours, tongue hanging out, tail high? I was Vix. I was Nolan. Silvia was my mate. We were hunting an evil human. Part of me was emotionless machine, totally logical if not exactly rational. Part of me was monkey boy and very emotional. Mostly I was HUNTER. Silvia and I were sniffing out that HoChaRa intruder—someone poaching on Vix turf. In the dream world I was seeing everything from the Vix viewpoint.

Waking left me disoriented. My body was all wrong. I had experienced this disorientation before—I had shared dreams before. It would take me a while before I was completely right. Fortunately I wasn't going to be flying anything for a few hours.

"Let's take the Long Stalk out for a test flight," I suggested. "We can give Matilda something to put on her show. Everybody wins."

The subtext was that announcing a test flight would trap our prey. Scoo gave that snorting chuckle that is a Vix belly laugh. I had an excellent profile for our prey. She was human and female—anybody else would stand out on Paxlyn Domain. She had been on Paxlyn Domain for a long time—from my viewpoint, two or three decades was a long time. She was someone who could move freely without triggering alarms. Perhaps she had multiple identities—but there would be a single main identity, one that was bullet-proof.

I feared that I knew the woman we were after.

Telepathy permits rapid transfer of images, sounds, emotions. Numbers and text? Not readily transferred. But Silvia could recognize the face of my prime suspect—and her scent, and her telepathic profile. Remember—it was just suspicion on my part. Telepathy isn't adequate probable cause on Paxlyn Domain—not yet! It is subjective and few humans are telepathic. Scoo and the Vix might change that—or might not.

Preparations for an afternoon 'test-flight' of the Long Stalk was expedited by Council, the computer program governing Paxlyn Domain. I put 'test flight' in quotation marks because the Long Stalk wasn't going anywhere. Even professional engineering officers, spaceship pilots and us navigators could be fooled. We don't directly experience space—it would kill us. So would exposure to fusion power plants or the maneuver drives. It isn't ancient times when galley slaves powered oars or when aircraft had open cockpits. We only knew space through our instruments—unless we took a space walk, and then we'd better wear an environmental suit or it will be our final walk. As long as nobody left the air lock, they wouldn't be aware that the Long Stalk, formerly the Futile Gesture, was still docked in a secure berth.

Matilda was in a tizzy as she made last-minute preparations for departure.

"I seem to be mistaken," I said as she got a video crew together. "You don't do scripts. You want spontaneous. This trip is just a short hop around the planet. Nothing major. Merely routine. Shouldn't take more than three hours."

"I want the show to be good!" Matilda wailed.

"It will be," I said. "The Vix are going to monitor the old crew in their former positions."

Passengers don't know what goes into making ready for space. My old shipmates were not in on the gag—but were told that the preparations had been completed and were instructed to run down their checklists. The abbreviated pre-flight took only a half hour—and we were "off."

Paxlyn Domain is a naked society. Most of the females don't wear anything—ever. It helps with security because only a few small items can be hidden. Clothes mean more contraband. Tool bags and equipment cases increase the amount of weaponry pirates can smuggle aboard for their highjack attempt. Matilda had to board naked—but her five-woman video crew wore jump suits and had quite a bit of video gear. I could smell their nervousness. Space flight affects some.