Beowulf's Children
Chapter 3

ICE ON THEIR MINDS

All happy families resemble each other, each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.
-LEO TOLSTOY, Anna Karenina

    Justin chuckled as he headed toward Avalon Town's main street. Jess amused him. Saving the eel was just like her. Had she done it only to antagonize Zack? She usually had several reasons for anything she did.
    He swiveled aside to let a stream of half-naked boys and girls playing some spontaneously generated variant of tag scamper past. They giggled and sang, tripped, rolled ignoring their bruised shins and shoulders, and ran out into the fields. The game might progress until midnight, when exhaustion, not security, dictated an end to play. The grendels were dead. The only things that could harm a human child were the dogs, and they wouldn't. Children had never been safer, nor held more precious.
    The streets of Camelot were broad and well paved, with private gardens where vegetables and fruits were nurtured into bloom. Intimate hothouses and hobby sheds were tucked along every byway.
    Justin's favorite garden was behind Carolyn McAndrews's place. In neat, furrowed rows she cultivated roses, carnations, tulips, and daisies. Within the plastic-sheet walls of her hothouse lived Avalon's greatest-and only-orchid collection. Human shapes moved inside the hothouse: Carolyn herself, followed closely by a small brood of children. She had seven in all, three fast after the Wars, and another four in more leisurely fashion. The latest was barely out of diapers. The oldest two had children of their own. Coleen, the youngest of the first group, still lived at home, but lately she spent most of her time studying. Coleen wanted to go back to the stars.
    She'll outgrow that, Justin thought. He had. It wasn't possible, not now, not in Coleen's lifetime. There was just too much to do with this world before they could rebuild and refuel Geographic-and beyond that was the problem no one could solve. Slower-than-light travel meant decades between stars. Stay awake and die of boredom, or go into frozen sleep and risk hibernation instability, ice on my mind. He shuddered.
    He saw motion through the plastic, and hurried past. Carolyn McAndrews was coming out of the greenhouse. He was out of sight before she emerged.
    Carolyn had been like an aunt to him until he was twelve or so. He had sensed her withdrawal without understanding it. She did well with children, couldn't cope with adults. She was damaged, and knew it. Hibernation instability if you were polite, ice crystals in the brain if you were accurate, ice on your mind if you were rude, it was all the same thing and it affected all of them. Justin remembered the shock when he'd found it out. He'd been searching through the computer for something else, and found closed files, and-
    His parents, Zack, the adults, all damaged, all unwilling to trust their own judgment. How to survive? Think in advance, use collective wisdom. Make rules; talk them through; change them endlessly. In a crisis, follow them blindly.
    It wasn't hereditary. Carolyn was right when she said "But I make good babies . . ." Carolyn and her sister Phyllis-her late sister Phyllis, killed in the final minutes of the Grendel Wars-had gone into cold sleep as a pair of Earth's best and brightest, and wakened with their emotional stability shattered. Others had come out judgment-impaired or simply stupid.
    But we don't have ice crystals in our brains, Justin thought. We don't have to make rules and obey them blindly. He'd been shocked when he first realized that. Now they taught it to the Grendel Scouts when they were old enough. The big secret: the adults have ice on their minds.

    Every turn through the warren was comfortable to him . . . in some odd way, too comfortable. Everything on the island was safe, and sometimes it chafed.
    In a world of fewer than five hundred people, every detail, every sight, every face becomes tediously familiar, comes entirely too readily to mind. He'd seen the next house uncounted thousands of times. It slid in and out of his mind so effortlessly that it felt like an extension of his own flesh.
    The house frame was the same prefabricated rod structure employed by most of the First. Over the years, its exterior had been modified with simulated stone sculpted to imitate rock blasted and hauled from a distant quarry. Some of it was rock blasted and hauled from a distant quarry . . . 
    The porch was broad. There was a swinging bench with a striped awning to protect it from the sun. Justin vaulted the fence one-handed, calling "Tio Carlos!" There was no answer by the time he reached the top of the stairs. He poked his head in, and looked around. 
    He smelled coffee.
    This was every bit as much his home as Cadmann's Bluff. He used to spend two or three nights a week here. He was seventeen, eleven Avalon, by the time he moved to Surf's Up. These well-worn stones and boards still smelled like home. At Cadmann's Bluff the smell of coffee was rare; but this house always smelled of coffee.
    The taste had shocked Justin the eight-year-old. Jessica and others of the Star Born had acquired the taste, but Justin never had. Coffee was bitter. Still, he loved the smell.
    The house was crammed with bric-a-brac carved from stone and thornwood and seashells. Weird sculptures of grendel bone were shelved under a broad window above a row of complex topological puzzles molded of composition plastic. There were hypercubes one disassembled to convert into Klein bottles, and Gordian knots only Cassandra could untie. Every inch of the walls was covered with handcrafted delights. Most of the incredible creative output was the product of one mind, the mind of Carlos Martinez.
    On the way out to the workshop, he passed Carlos's bedroom. The bed was wide and spacious and rarely lonely. Justin's "Uncle" Carlos had married only once: he'd gone "down the rapids" with Bobbie Kanagawa. The marriage was six hours of bliss, bloodily annulled by a grendel attack.
    Holotape of that awful event was required viewing. The attack patterns had been analyzed endlessly. They'd all heard the lecture, too often.
    Carlos had married only once and became a widower the same day, but he had half a dozen acknowledged children. Some lived with him, some with their mothers. He was rumored to have more. You could never be sure who had been in that bed. His gametes get a huge return on investment for making him . . .
    The burr of a high-intensity drill grew louder, more jarring as he approached the high-domed workshop behind the house.
    The path between house and workshop was crowded with sculpture. Naked goddesses cavorted with satyrs rendered in volcanic stone. Impressionistic cloud cities carved in some kind of webbed driftwood. The eruption of Vesuvius whittled from an enormous bone flown back from the mainland, years before.
    Carlos was an accomplished wood sculptor before he left Earth for Avalon. Over the years he'd gained skills in metalwork, glassblowing, and odd, "found" art. He was, beyond question, Camelot's premier graphic artist. There was probably no single home on Avalon that didn't have a plaque, lamp, sculpture, or doorplate signed with his rakish scrawl.
    Katya Martinez opened the workshop door before he could get to it. Her faceplate and baggy coveralls disguised flaming red hair and a flawless body. She was a month younger than Justin's nineteen adjusted Earth years-or about twelve Avalonian cycles. Athletic, which made her attractive in ways that Trish, who lifted weights, never would be.
    Katya's mother had died early enough that Justin had no memory of her, but he'd heard her talk about it. Three of the First had died of strokes in the space of four days, and one had been Carlotta Nolan's current love. Ice on their minds: damaged arteries in their brains held for a few years, then tore open. Carlotta had fallen dead during the triple funeral, and that made four.
    Katya had grown up in this house, with no female role model or too many of them depending on who you asked, but she had never been in any doubt as to what sex she was. For years Justin thought of her as another sister, like Jessica. Then one day that had changed very quickly-
    A flame-jet flared to silhouette two welders in coveralls in the workshop behind her. "Katya. How's the anniversary piece coming along?"
    She flipped up her faceplate, and gave him a radiant, brown-eyed, broad-mouthed smile. It had been months since Katya and Justin had played games. "Fantastic. Dad's welding Madagascar into place just now."
    "Let me get into safety gear. I'm down for a couple hours-thought I'd say hi."
    Katya nodded enthusiastically and slipped past him. Justin pulled on heavy woven cotton overalls, and belted them in the front. By the time he finished, Katya was back to hand him a pod of beer. They watched each other while they drank. "I thought that you were taking the Grendel Scouts out for an overnight." 
    "Were, yes. Didn't you hear the alarm?"
    "Alarm?" She brushed a crimson strand of hair out of her face, and sipped deeply. "Nope. What's up?" 
    "Big eel. Came right up the Miskatonic and the Amazon, right through the Hold. We captured it. It looks pretty harmless, but it's the first grendel-sized carnivore we've seen on the island, and it's bound to get some attention . . . "
    "Over at Aquatics?"
    "Yeah." He tossed the empty pod into the trash. Two points.
    "Keep me posted."
    She held the door open for him. He was very aware that her fingers brushed his thigh as he passed her.
    Four shadowy figures crouched around an eight-foot curved metal bas-relief of the African continent. The huge silhouette would soon be attached to the Earth globe under construction just north of Camelot's main gates. A series of overhead winches kept Madagascar in place while one man waved semaphore to the others.
    Plasma torches spit as the piece fitted into place. Metal ran in glowing rivulets, and the air sang with the smell of scorched iron. Justin finished pulling his gloves on, and hurried to help.
    "Hola, Carlos!"
    "Hola, Justin. Que tal? Como estas?" Carlos glanced away from the model for just a moment. Almost instantly, there was a high, annoying whir. "Un momentito-" 
    The winch was malfunctioning, and the three-foot chunk of Madagascar-which weighed over a hundred kilos-sagged.
    Carlos and Justin put their silver heat-blocking gloves against the lower edge, where the metal still smoked, and lifted. The heat pulsed hungrily at their fingers, but didn't burn.
    "At the top! At the top!"
    Assistants screwed two large C-clamps into place, and Madagascar was realigned.
    Torches sizzled. Carlos turned his face away from the intense light.
    He stripped off his gloves. The major work finished, his assistants buzzed about, welding here and there, cooling with jets of water, then beginning to buff.
    He held a broad, muscular hand to Justin. "Wasn't expecting you until day after tomorrow. Australia is next." 
    "I'll be back."
    Carlos stepped away from the globe, leaving it to the younger artists. The African continent brushed his ceiling. On the wall opposite were blueprints for Australia. 
    "Have you got the basic mold finished?"
    "No," he sighed. "That's what I want you for. Two days' work, maybe. Then he can cast it. Then . . ." He shrugged. "Almost finished. It's been a year. In another month, maybe, it's done."
    Justin slapped his mentor's shoulder. Carlos was Latino, with predominantly African genetics. Even with his hair streaked gray, he was still disgustingly handsome. Carlos Martinez was Cadmann Weyland's best friend. About fifty-five Earth years, thirty-five Avalon, and in decent condition, but Justin knew that when Carlos cast an eye at the Seconds, especially the younger women, he felt his years.
    There was a certain sadness in Carlos's face. Perhaps being so close to the completion of a dream? Sometimes that did it . . . 
    "Cual es su problema, Tio?"
    Carlos chuckled. "For years I wanted to build this. You know, the north road is going to be a crossroads one day. Gateway to a metropolis. We have Surf's Up, and the mountain colony . . . Explosive growth soon now, as more of the Second have their children. And in fifteen years, whew." 
    "Terrific, huh? And how many of those bambinos will be yours?"
    His smile was calculatedly mysterious. "Six that I'm sure of. Not everyone wants to gene scan, so who knows?" 
    "Cassandra," Justin said. 
    "But she will not tell."
    Justin chuckled. "A little of that New Guinea flavor here."
    Carlos waved a hand at the young men and women laboring in his shop. "These are my children, though. Not just Katya, but like you. Learning sculpture. Learning history. The ones who care." 
    "The others will come around." 
    "Hope so. Now what can Uncle Carlos do for you?" Justin explained about the eel. "Zack will want to kill it as fast as possible. Destroy the eggs."
    "Knee-jerk reflex. I'll deal with him. Your father will want it studied." Carlos thought for a moment. "Might want those eggs destroyed, though. No telling what they'll hatch into." 
    "Eels."
    "Samlon become grendels. We don't have any examples of harmful larval stage and harmless adult, but-" 
    "I see the point, but I don't agree. And that's the point. We think there's going to be a row over this at the council meeting, and I wanted to take a little straw vote, find out where we'd stand." 
    "What's the problem?"
    "The problem is that it's our eel. It's our island, really-we're going to inherit it. And we can't just kill everything that comes up the river or flies in from the mainland. Eventually, we have to know how we fit in with this planet, or we'll be stuck here on this island forever."
    "You could stay here for ten generations, easy," Carlos observed. "Plenty of land."
    "We don't want to." 
    "Some of you don't want to."
    "Some means damned near all," Justin said. "Starting with me."
    Carlos studied him. "I don't blame you," he said at last. "Listen-I think that your father will side with you-he believes that strength is safety. And knowledge is strength." 
    "Are you suggesting that Zack would like to hide his head in the sand?" 
    "Can you entirely blame him?"
    An arc of sparks jetted out, turning the floor into a summer night's sky. The stars died.
    "We almost lost, amigo," Carlos said quietly, watching Madagascar. "We make a lot of noise about how heroic it all was. But listen between the lines." His eyes were deadly calm. "We almost lost." 
    "I know that it was 'tough-"
    "No," Carlos said. "I didn't say that it was 'tough.' I didn't say 'it was a struggle.' I said that we almost lost. All of us. Wiped out. If it hadn't been for a fluke of grendel behavior-that you can drive them crazy with the smell of their own speed-they would have slaughtered every living thing on this island."
    Carlos sat at the edge of one of the benches, and picked up a thermos, uncapping it to take a sip. He scanned the pieces of Earth strewn about his studio. There in one corner was India, mother to Man's civilizations. Suspended from the ceiling was Africa, possibly mother to Man himself. Already in place north of the colony was Europe, which had birthed the scientific method, and the Americas, creators of the technologies that had finally taken man to the stars.
    In that moment Carlos seemed old, deeply fatigued; but a light flickered behind his eyes that was almost ecstatic.
    "To our home, "Carlos said, and took a long sip. The hair at his temples was almost white, and the skin on his forearms was loose over the wiry muscle. "I'll never see Earth again, muchacho. Earth is an abstraction to you. A place the old folks talk about. Pictures we show you, tapes we play. Dead voices of dead people. But it was our home." 
    "We haven't heard from Earth in twenty years!" Justin said, instantly ashamed of the mockery that had crept into his voice.
    "Not a thing," Carlos agreed soberly. "And that means something different to every one of us. But back during the Grendel Wars, all that mattered was that we couldn't go home, and we couldn't win. We were all going to die, and there would be no one to bury our bones. We wanted to die here, to be a part of the soil-" He laughed coarsely. "But not as grendel shit. Anyway-at the meeting tonight, please understand why we are the way we are. If we are too protective of you, it's because you are all we have." 
    Justin nodded. "All right, amigo-but just remember-you can't keep making our decisions for us. And the more afraid you are, the more you had better let us grow up." 
    "I do remember being your age, Justin. So cocky. So . . . invulnerable. That was before Bobbie died, and there was nothing I could do to save her." He tilted his head to stare at the floor. "And you know? There was a moment there where I tasted my own death so clearly, when it was so . . . real, that I would have given up anything." He paused. "Even Bobbie. For another few moments of life." 
    Carlos took another drink. Justin caught the odor of fermentation from the thermos. "You never see yourself the same way again, amigo. You never quite get it back." 
    He grinned crookedly, mocking the pain in his own voice. "You're all we have left, Justin," he murmured. "And just maybe all that there is." As if aware that he had almost crossed some invisible line, he stood. "Back to work," he said brusquely.
    Justin hiked a thumb at the globe. "Looking good," he tossed over his shoulder on his way to the door. He let it slam behind him.

    The first comm shack had been a frail thing, tin and wood, but that was before the Grendel Wars. Now the colony's communications and computers were housed in a fortress, stone and concrete walls, massive doors, small windows. Above each door was a small room filled with boulders and rubble poised to fall on any potential invader.
    The Merry Pranksters had once filled one of those chambers with wet cotton. They'd watched through videocameras as Joe and Edgar Sikes walked into the trap. The momentary shock and horror, then the laughter, man and boy waist deep in wet cotton, throwing gobs of it at each other . . . but Zack and the other Earth Born hadn't been amused. The repercussions hadn't died out for months, and now entrance to Comm Control was monitored by TV cameras and recorded by Cassandra, and you couldn't get in unless the duty watch people let you.
    The communications building controlled all contact with the Orion spacecraft Geographic still in orbit above, the branch settlements around the island, and the automated mining apparatus on the mainland. The main communications board was also the colony's defense center, manned constantly as a human backup for the main computer defense systems. None of that had been needed for twenty years.
    Rules, Justin thought as he buzzed the interior. They set up their rules. Fine for them, but now we have to take turns standing watch with the First. It wasn't hard duty, and privately Justin appreciated the enforced reading and study time that Comm Watch provided, but it was another point of contention between Star Born and Earth Born.
    Edgar Sikes opened the door.
    "Ho. Edgar, I need a favor. I have to talk to my dad." 
    Edgar didn't seem surprised. "No can do. Cadmann's down south, and that's as much of an address as he left us." 
    Edgar was eighteen, pudgy, and brighter than hell. A childhood back injury had kept him from early participation in sports, and he had the reputation of being more interested in computers than people, someone worth knowing if you needed information, but never the first to be invited to parties. He was slightly younger than Justin. They had never been particularly close, but now Edgar's father Joe was married to Justin's stepsister Linda. Justin wasn't sure what relationship that created between him and Edgar. Close enough that he could ask Edgar for a favor. "Let's talk about it." 
    Edgar shrugged and stood aside. 
    "Greetings, Justin-san."
    It wasn't surprising to find Toshiro Tanaka in the Comm Center. Toshiro didn't sleep, at least not until nearly dawn and then not for long. He took advantage of that: other Star Born could get Toshiro to cover their shift at the center. Toshiro was going to sit alone and read or play computer games all night anyway, and by taking someone's shift he built up obligations. Like Carlos, Toshiro never wanted for coffee or tea.
    "Greetings, Toshiro-san." Justin suppressed a grin. He wasn't completely sure how to take this new kick Toshiro was on. Toshiro was always polite, always smiled, but Justin had read about the manners of the Tokagawa culture Toshiro seemed to be fascinated with. They always smiled, even when they were about to chop your liver out. "You've told them about the eel, then? Joe, he told you?" 
    "A little," Joe said. "You saw it too. Tell us." 
    Joe was sprawled in a massive sculpture, a chair and footstool Carlos had carved from the hard, dense, twisted grain of a horsemane root system. Carlos had installed it for his own watch. Butts and boots and elbows had polished and scarred it, but Justin believed it would last as long as Avalon.
    Joe Sikes was graying, slope-shouldered and a little paunchy despite his best intentions. He was one of the three heroes of the Grendel Wars, holding a place just below Carlos and not far below Cadmann Weyland himself. Justin's generation believed as an article of faith that all First had ice on their minds, but it wasn't easy to see what disability that gave Joe Sikes. The self-doubts characteristic of the First bothered him less than anyone except Cadmann. Sikes always seemed to be working on something. He was strong on industrial development, which included maintaining and establishing the mines on the mainland, and Justin had always found him easy to talk to.
    That changed, sort of, when it became clear that Sikes and Linda were much more than casually involved. Justin had never been able to justify his feeling of resentment, other than feeling that Joe was too damn old for her. And he was First, the damaged generation.
    "Five meters of fun," Justin said. "Zack just about had kittens. 'Kill it! Kill it! You have your orders, you know the rules, kill it!' "
    "Glad you didn't," Edgar said. He tapped computer keys, and the image of Big Mama Eel rippled across the computer screen. "Looks harmless enough. Maybe we'll learn something."
    Joe Sikes grunted agreement. "Yeah, but we still got problems from the mainland. Give Zack too much to think about, we'll overload the system."
    "No possible relationship," Edgar said. He jerked a thumb at the screen where the eel swam steadily around and around in the tank. "No way that's going to explode." 
    Say what? Justin said, "Explode?"
    "Well, I agree again," Joe said. "But Zack may not. Justin, you're gonna love this." 
    "Yes," Toshiro said. "Most serious. Baffling." 
    "What in the world are you talking about?" Justin asked.
    "Linda's working the new stuff up in the waldo room, let her tell you," Joe Sikes said. "We've had little problems at the mining site before. This is a big one, but maybe it's just more of the same." 
    "Which will do well enough," Toshiro said. 
    "You sound worried."
    Toshiro shrugged. "Concerned. A setback." 
    "Hell, you're not going to live long enough to go back to Japan no matter what happens," Justin said. "So you can stop worrying." 
    Toshiro smiled politely.
    "Well, it's true," Justin said. "Coming back with me?" 
    "Thank you, I am on duty here," Toshiro said.
    Justin nodded and crossed the large central control room toward the green door at its far end.
    "That wasn't very nice," Joe Sikes told him. He jerked his head toward Toshiro, who was now absorbed in some kind of computer game involving medieval Japanese warriors.
    "Well, yeah, you're right, but it's still true," Justin said. "There's no way we'll build enough industry to fire up Geographic and go back to Earth or anywhere else. Not that I'd go. I can't figure why he wants to."
    Edgar Sikes shrugged. "Beats me, I guess. I asked him once." 
    "What'd he say?" 
    "Roots." 
    "Eh?"
    "Roots. Can't say I blame him. How'd you feel if you were the only white kid here?" 
    "I don't think I'd notice."
    "Toshiro does," Edgar said. "There were four Orientals in the Earth Born, but they're all dead in the Grendel Wars. Anyway, that's what he said. I asked him why he wanted to see Earth again, and he said 'Roots.' "
    The waldo room was at the rear of the telecommunications building. "Cassandra, ready or not, here I come," Justin said, and waited for the door to open. It didn't. He frowned.
    "Sorry, I've been doing some reprogramming," Edgar said. "Let Justin in, please, Cassandra." The door swung open.
    He was immediately assailed by a sweet-sour triple dose of Eau de Diaper. His sister Linda was seated at the robotics control panel. Her blond pigtails made her look even younger than her seventeen years. She leaned back into a thick leather chair, silvered goggles covering her eyes. She might have been asleep. A hand-carved cradle that could have been built in the fourteenth century, but in fact was a product of Carlos's workshop, stood next to her workstation. A three-month-old baby watched as if he knew what his mother was doing.
    Joe shushed the baby unnecessarily, then tiptoed over to Linda and planted a big juicy one on her lips.
    Sis leapt out of the illusion sputtering, waving her hands in alarm. Then she pulled her goggles off, and sighed.
    "Joe Sikes, I hate when you do that." She peeled off her headset, and stood to hug Justin.
    "Hey, Cad," he said to the baby. The three-month-old was still fat and wrinkly, his stubby little fingers reaching out and trying to grasp a chunk of the world. His watery blue eyes struggled to focus.
    Linda had discovered boys when she was fourteen, and when she was fifteen they discovered her right back. She had been extremely popular and enjoyed every minute of it, a dozen lovers in as many weeks. Then she was pregnant, and suddenly she was tired of casual sex, tired of popularity, tired of the game.
    And bang, she was attached to Joe Sikes, elderly, slope-shouldered, hardworking Joe Sikes. Justin remembered thinking it was pure lust. His little sister was one of those rare women who became almost ethereally beautiful as she swelled and neared term. If so, lust had ripened into something more stable-but a palpable erotic haze still shimmered in the air between them. His step-sister had found a husband and lover. She had also found a friend and teacher, and under Joe's instruction was rapidly developing into one of the most capable of the Second's engineers. Now she studied-Aaron had once said that while the First had ice on their minds, Linda had integral equations on hers-worked, and nursed her baby, and the only way to see her was to come to the command center.
    "What we got?" Joe Sikes asked. His forefinger traced a lazy circle on the back of her neck.
    "Geographic relays checked out," Linda said. "I'm certain that the, uh . . . will you stop that for a moment? Thank you. Nothing garbled in transmission. We're getting the right data, and it still looks the same, there are explosions in the mines." 
    "Explosions," Justin said.
    "In the mines," Edgar repeated. "Ain't we got fun?" 
    "That sounds-" Justin stopped. "Can't be grendels." 
    "Unless they've learned to use grenades," Edgar said. 
    "Now, there's a grim thought. Something break in?" 
    "Not bloody likely," Joe Sikes said.
    Justin nodded agreement. The mines didn't exactly have doors. "So what is it? Machinery failure?"
    Linda looked worried. Her face was thinner than Jessica's but somehow softer at the same time. Little Cad had been good for her-good for the elder Weyland, as well. At least six children would eventually call Cadmann "Granddad." Colonel Weyland doted on all of them, but Cadzie, as the colonel's first namesake, would get special attention. Justin felt a pang of jealousy, followed by an answering pang of shame.
    "I'll do a show-and-tell at the meeting tonight," Joe said. "We'll want to make an emergency trip up in maybe a week." He was pugnacious and happy, and Justin didn't understand that.
    "You think it's that serious?"
    "Kid, this isn't a conveyor belt breakdown. Here-Cassandra, show us Mine Disaster Three." A phantasm formed above a holopad. It looked like an ant farm done in neon vermilion.
    Joe set his blinking cursor where several tunnels joined in an angular lump. "It looked like a momentary flare of heat-very sharp-here in the processing equipment. And the sensors actually burned out. Weird. The entire assembly is completely jammed. The repair robots can't get to them. It's like something warped the entire unit out of alignment. Linda took a sonic profile of the entire operation. Look at the patterns of vibration leading up to the incident-" 
    A graph of sound patterns replaced the ant farm: the usual jagged hills and valleys produced by running machinery, punctuated by a sudden and violent pulse.
    "We're going to translate that into sound. Listen-"
    Chug chug chug. 
    Tung.
    "Jesus Christ," Justin said.
    Joe's lips twisted in a bitter smile. "The Merry Pranksters."
    For a moment, nobody said anything. Then Justin cleared his throat. "That's a pretty nasty accusation. They've never done anything like this." 
    "First time for everything." 
    "You're just unhappy about getting wet."
    "Nah, that was fun." He looked at Edgar and got an answering nod. "This is something else."
    "So how could they have done it?" Justin demanded. "The only way to get all the way to the mining site is with Robor. Or one of the Minervas. God knows they're under control. How could they get in?"
    "And that would be the point, now, wouldn't it?" Joe's usually even tones went flat and nasty. "It was impossible to carve fifty-foot buttocks on Isenstine Glacier, wasn't it? And wasn't it impossible to use seismic charges to send Morse code limericks to the geological station?" 
    Justin restrained a chuckle, and raised a hand in protest. "That may be true-but they've never done anything destructive, and you know it. What would be the point? This isn't their style, Joe." 
    Joe's head cocked, and he waited. 
    "This isn't funny! It's just vandalism."
    Joe patted Linda's shoulder possessively. "It was just a matter of time before they crossed the line," he said. "The point was always to get our attention, wasn't it? I know that there are certain residents of Surf's Up-"
    Justin started to protest, but Joe waved him off. "You may know who they are, and you may not. That doesn't concern me at the moment. What does concern me is that this has gone far enough."
    "Something goes wrong, and the first thing you do is blame it on us Star Born. We're not the only ones on this planet, Joe. If this was caused by a human being-" 
    "What else would you suggest?" 
    "Don't know. Some kind of natural phenomenon."
    "Underground explosions aren't very natural," Joe said. "Edgar has been saying the same thing. Got an answer?"
    Edgar shook his head. "Not me. Time to go relieve Toshiro." He strode off quickly.
    "Right. Edgar can't explain it and neither can you."
    Justin spread his hands helplessly. "All right, I don't think of anything, but-Suppose it was caused by a human being, why think it was one of us? You Firsts have a lot higher wacko factor."
    "I remember. 'Ice On My Mind.' Someone spelled that out in alfalfa, two years ago. HI drops functional IQ. It doesn't cause emotional damage."
    "Carolyn McAndrews," Justin said. And Mom's been getting harder to live with . . . 
    "All right, I'll give you that one," Joe said. "But I don't believe it was a First, and neither do you."
    Justin felt his fingers knot into fists. "Double-talk. All of you came to this planet coasting on your freezing intellectual egos. Thought you were the smartest things in the known universe. Then most of you lost a few points-some more than that. Add the Grendel Wars. Pretty high fear factor there, you know? Hey, sis-does Joe still wake up screaming? Still scaring Cadzie at two in the morning . . . ?" 
    "Stop it," Linda said. Her voice was coldly serious, "And stop it now." 
    "You're crossing the line, Justin," Joe said. 
    "You too," Linda said, but it didn't sound the same.
    She's made her choice, Justin thought. And it's not any of the Second. To hell with that. "Just remember that. There is a line-" 
    "Justin-"
    "No, Sis, let me finish. There is a line, and we'd better both remember it. You can say Surf's Up did this as a prank-but it's your side doesn't want anyone going to the mainland. We all want to go."
    "So do I," Joe reminded him. "No quarrel there. Now let me give you something to think about. How do you suppose we were chosen to come on this expedition?"
    "I've read all about it," Justin said. "Cassandra has the records."
    "Like hell she does," Sikes said. "Cassandra has the official records, but they're dry as dust. Laddie, some of us worked to get here. Did you ever think who chose the colonists?"
    "Well, it was a board appointed by the directors of the Geographic Society," Justin said. "So?"
    "A board of shrinks," Sikes said. "Psychiatrists and social workers. Ruth Moskowitz was one of them. And they picked just the kind of people you'd expect them to." 
    Justin frowned. "I don't see what you're getting at." 
    "No, I suppose you wouldn't," Sikes said. "Let me put it this way. Damn near all the colonists were exactly the sort of people the shrinks wanted them to be. Colonel Weyland was an exception, a military man picked for his profession. Then there was Carlos. He qualified on brains, but the shrinks would never have picked him, so his father bribed the selection board. He wanted Carlos as far from the family as possible. As for the rest-" Joe shrugged. "Some were people the shrinks approved of, and some, a few, maybe more than a few, wanted to go so bad they worked at it, found out what the shrinks were looking for, and played head games." 
    "And you were one of those?"
    "Maybe it's time-" Whatever Linda had been about to say was drowned out by the sudden wails of the baby. Linda glared at both of them. She swept her child into her, arms, holding him close. "There . . . there." She kissed his wrinkly forehead. "Just stop it, both of you. I don't know who the Merry Pranksters are, but I can't believe that anyone, First or Second, would do something like this deliberately. It's not funny, it's dangerous." 
    "So what is it?" Joe demanded.
    "I don't know. I think it's the planet surprising us again. And that damned eel has got everyone upset." 
    Justin searched his heart, searching for the voice that would say that she was right, or wrong. She was right. 
    "All right," he said finally.
    Linda grinned. "Now, I can't have two of my four favorite men mad at each other . . . "
    "Four?" Joe forced his mouth into a neutral position.
    "Sure, now that Cadzie is here . . ." 
    "And your brother, I guess . . . and Cadmann?" 
    "Sure."
    And whoever was the father of the baby would make five, Justin thought. He could see that Joe Sikes was thinking the same thing. There was a long and awkward pause. "Linda, isn't there some way to find Dad?"
    She shrugged. "Edgar might be able to. He's smarter than I am."
    Justin kissed Cadzie good-bye, and went back out to the main room. Edgar had taken Toshiro's place at the main console and was splitting his attention, watching some kind of holoplay through his goggles. Toshiro had another set. Whatever they were doing it was together, and not visible to anyone not wearing the head-mounted displays. Justin thumped him on the back of the head. "Edgar?" 
    "Yeah?"
    "About that favor you owe me. I know that my dad doesn't have his tracer turned on, but can you locate him?" 
    Edgar flipped the lid of his lenses up. He stood up to stretch, elaborately, fingers linked over his head. His pudgy body was an upright spear, its tip twisting in a slow circle. Edgar had hurt his back, long ago, and it had never quite healed.
    "Go straight into Sun Salutation," Toshiro said. "Head loose as you come down. Hands farther back, take your weight with just your arms as you jump straight back . . . hold it . . . elbows back, down slowly. Now inhale, chest forward-"
    Edgar was puffing a little as his head and shoulders came up, but he was way improved since the-last time Justin had seen him. Toshiro's training was having its effect. Short of breath, but he wasn't complaining. Edgar finished the sequence, grinned at Justin while he emptied and refilled his lungs, and said, "Cadmann's not wearing a personal tracer. He disabled the tracer on the skeeter." 
    "Dad likes his privacy." 
    "You bet. I don't know exactly where his lodge is." 
    "Nobody does, except it's south of Isenstine Glacier."
    Edgar grinned at him wickedly. "Well . . . what's in it for me?" 
    "First pick, next catch." 
    "Even stringfish?" 
    "No problem." 
    "Well, okay. Take over the watch, Toshiro-san?" 
    "Certainly. I relieve you, Edgar-san."
    "Thanks. Okay, Justin, let's see what I've got." Edgar led him over to another console away from where Toshiro sat. "Geographic has images of the fuel dumps he uses. Here-" Edgar's fingers tapped silently at a virtual keyboard display. The wall in front of them turned into a vast field of ice and rock: the wasted expanse of Isenstine Glacier that fed both the Amazon and Miskatonic. Three tiny dots glowed redly. "There. About eight hundred miles apart."
    "Spare fuel cells. Each cell takes him about five hundred miles. So he carries two backups, and has emergency dumps as well. That's Dad." 
    "Not that they're roughly in a straight line-" 
    "And the last one ends about three hundred miles north of the end of the glacier. Dad and Moms are collecting plants. The nearest cacti are probably six hundred miles from the south tip of the glacier." 
    "So the lodge is probably in this area somewhere-" 
    "Assuming that the straight line holds true," Justin said. 
    "Yeah. Well, additional evidence-"
    Edgar spoke softly to Cassandra. "Cassie, I want to look at previous dates when Colonel Weyland took his tracers off-line." 
    "Weyland data is restricted," Cassandra said.
    "Pretty please," Edgar said, and muttered something else Justin couldn't hear.
    "Wilco," Cassandra said.
    Edgar grinned. "Search Geographic satellite watch for unusual infrared spots during just those periods." He looked at Justin, face screwed up in speculation. "Ha. Has he ever made an emergency landing?"
    "Last year. A rotor almost went. He was down overnight." Justin searched his memory. "And three years ago. Got caught in a bad storm. Put down overnight." 
    "The rotor should be on the maintenance records." Edgar muttered to Cassandra. Thermal maps of the glacier flashed by, held for the dates that Cadmann Weyland was known to be on one of his jaunts, and then rolled on. Justin watched in fascination as Edgar searched until two map images came into focus. They looked as if they had been taken from about two miles up, and on each of them, tiny heat pulses flared.
    "Campfires." Edgar was utterly smug. "The dates probably match. Your dad put down overnight. First one matches the maintenance record. Second . . . ah. It was one of those nasty little solar-flare storms. Must have gotten hairy up on Isenstine." 
    "And?"
    "Your dad took a hard left turn here. Tricky. Then . . . Skeeter range is five hundred miles. Your father carries at least one spare, and doesn't like to space his fuel dumps further than eight hundred miles apart. That probably puts him about here-" 
    "Give me a vegetation map," Justin said.
    Cassandra displayed some of the vegetation to be found in the area. "He brought back some Avalon succulents last time. Does that narrow things?"
    Cassandra searched, and came up with a twenty-square-mile sprawl that met all of the conditions.
    "Not bad," Justin said. "Look for heat sources." Four little pulses of red appeared. "Volcanic, on a cycle?" 
    "I've got a better idea," Edgar replied. "Cassandra-when was the last routine scan?"
    Her familiar voice was warm and cool. "Eighteen hours ago, at the present level of magnification."
    "Nighttime. Give me a thermal scan. Compare it to the chart we just made . . . and compare it again to . . . say, anything before three days ago, back to a month." 
    Edgar turned to Justin. "Does that about cover it? When was the last time your dad was out?" 
    "About two months."
    "Good enough. So all we should have out there are some geysers, and maybe another hunter. Not likely in that little area, but maybe. Exclude all of that, and we'll have his campfire . . . "
    "He likes wood-burning stoves," Justin said suddenly. "He's got a cabin, but it'll have a chimney." 
    "And . . . bingo."
    They were looking directly down at a mass of trees near the eastern edge of Isenstine glacier. "Camouflaged," Edgar mused. "You could skeeter right over and never see it. That fire is stone dead now."
    "Dad would put the fire out. He's very serious about that kind of thing."
    "So. Time for the stove to cool. Figure he left five hours ago . . . "
    Edgar rolled his eyes up, and thought. "With refueling . . . the skeeters make about a hundred and eighty kilometers tops . . . he should be right about . . ." He poked his finger at the map. "Here. Give or take fifty kilometers or so." 
    He grinned up at Justin. "Betcha," he said, and went for magnification. Geographic wasn't in position, but he diverted one of the weather satellites to optical mode. Cassandra kept cleaning up the image, searching for something moving against a white background . . .
    They went in through the mountains, and past the savage crevasses of Isenstine Glacier. Justin could almost feel the cold.
    And there it was, a flickering shadow. A red circle enclosed it and Cassandra zoomed in to show something that looked like a brine shrimp larva skittering across a pond. It was there one moment, gone the next. But Cassandra was on its track, now, locked on, and Cadmann was caught.
    It was Skeeter II, its silver-blue length magnified by satellite optics. The view was from not quite overhead. It was a tiny bit of metal and plastic, a thing of Man flying across an impersonal wasteland. It carried plant samples and three of the human beings Justin Faulkner loved most in all the world.
    "He'll need to make one more fuel stop," Edgar said. He laced his fingers behind his head and leaned back in his seat. His round face wore a smile of enormous self-satisfaction. "But that won't take fifteen minutes. This close to home he'll probably want to push it. I'd set ETA at about three hours." 
    "Edgar . . . " Justin grinned. "Sometimes . . . " 
    "I know," Edgar said. "Sometimes I amaze even me." 
    "Three hours before he shows . . . " Justin glanced at his watch. "I want to get at him with a full report before anyone else can tell him what's happened." He squeezed Edgar's shoulder. "Thanks a lot, Edgar." 
    "First choice. Stringfish." 
    "You got it."
    Justin ran out of the communications room, ideas and thoughts of saltwater eels swimming dizzily in his head.