DS02 Night of the Dragonstar (25 page)

The conflict came to a head when one of the scientists from Jakes’s research team stood up and spoke calmly but with conviction. “Colonel, I think we are overlooking a very basic fact here. A fact which is extremely germane to our situation.”

“All right,” Kemp said. “What’s that?”

“We should not forget that we are totally on our own now. We are cut off from the Earth and all her ties and obligations. In essence, we are a tiny little nation.” The man paused for dramatic effect, and Phineas interrupted him.

“What exactly are you trying to say?”

“Simply this: I feel that we may be making a mistake by continuing to accept the power and authority structure which existed when we were still connected with the Earth.”

“What do you mean?” Mikaela Lindstrom asked defensively
—
she already had a good idea what the man meant.

“I mean that there is no IASA in hyperspace, Doctor. I mean that I have very strong doubts about listening to a man whose mistakes have left us in this practically hopeless situation.”

“Now see here!” Kemp shouted, his face flushing instantly with anger.

The crowd erupted into a wild and passionate discussion, everyone talking at once, and no one able to hear anyone else. Things escalated into shouting matches and then threats. Mishima and Mikaela attempted to quiet the crowd, but it was a difficult process. The scientist who had started this round of chaos had obviously touched a raw nerve in many of the survivors, and Mishima knew it was an issue that would demand some kind of quick resolution. The group would never be able to function and work and live together with this kind of dissension and distrust.

Finally the shouting subsided into talking, and finally into a soft murmur. Mishima had everyone’s attention. “It’s obvious that we have some problems here,” he said. “Let’s try to solve them instead of fighting, all right?”

“That’s right,” said Colonel Kemp. “I agree with the suggestion that we may be making a mistake by retaining the old authority structure. I for one am willing to stage free elections
—
right now if everyone wants them.”

Bob Jakes stood up and said essentially the same thing. The survivors discussed it among themselves, and several people stood to offer suggestions.

It was a long and grueling process, but eventually a plan and a structure of government were hammered out. The group came up with a largely democratic structure of committees, answering to a ruling council of elected representatives. There was to be no single authority figure, and all decisions would be made by the council unless the majority demanded a referendum vote on major Issues.

Nominations were taken for committee heads, and for the members of the ruling council. Not surprisingly, Jakes, Lindstrom, Mishima, and Kemp himself were among those nominated for the positions. Ballots were created, and a general election was held. For purposes of decorum, all nominees were asked to leave the room during subsequent discussion and voting. After the nominees had cast their own ballots, they left the Saurian nursery and gathered outside on the steps to the building.

“An interesting turn of events, isn’t it?” Jakes said, trying to keep things light, but it seemed to Mishima that no one else was in the mood to smile or joke.

Especially troubled by the entire electoral process was Phineas Kemp. He had not spoken or even looked anyone in the eye since the revisionist talks and action had begun. If the colonel didn’t win a seat on the council, Mishima wondered how the blow to his ego would affect him.

They waited almost an hour before someone invited them back into the meeting room, announcing that the ballots had been counted and the results were now official. Mishima and the others took their seats, and the election officer read off the names of the winners of the committee chair positions. There were few surprises, and Mishima personally felt that the group had demonstrated wisdom in their choices.

Next, the names of the winners of seats to the ruling council were announced: Robert Jakes, Mikaela Lindstrom, and Mishima Takamura were among the five people named, but Colonel Phineas Kemp was not.

MIKAELA LINDSTOM
was arguably the closest person to Phineas Kemp, and even she had a difficult time gauging the effects of the election and his “fall from power,” as he had come to call it. For the first few days there seemed to be a period of reorientation for everyone. There was much organization to be done, tasks and assignments had to be recognized and given out, priorities established, and methods of accomplishment tested and worked out.

Being a member of the council was an exhausting experience during those first few days, and Mikaela felt that she hadn’t been able to give Phineas the attention he needed during that time. She had become fairly friendly with Rebecca Thalberg, and she kept telling herself that she would have to sit down with Becky sometime and have a serious woman-to-woman talk about the care and feeding of a particular IASA colonel.

Phineas had attempted to busy himself in the construction project along the Saurian Barrier, and Mikaela assumed that it would be the best thing for him to do
—
have a project that would keep him occupied. There was also the major work of establishing a small human settlement in the city of Hakarrh. Thesaurus and his minions had generously donated one of the outdoor bazaar sites, complete with tents and stalls for the humans, and there was much work to be done in getting the area habitable. Phineas had selected a gaily colored tent for himself and Mikaela, and he spent the evening hours attempting to build furniture for their new home.

Mikaela noticed that while everyone referred to their situation as though it were a very temporary thing, their actions belied such notions. It appeared as though everyone was digging in and setting up for a life among the Saurians that might last indefinitely. It was one of those things that Mikaela suspected everyone must be thinking about but choosing not to discuss.

Everyone except perhaps Phineas. In the evenings, when they would sit down and talk by the heat and light of the lanterns, he would speculate on where the great ship was going, when it might pop out of ultramathematical space and back into the galaxy, and what might be waiting for them. There was also something about the way Phineas talked of these things that disturbed Mikaela. Phineas spoke as though he truly believed he was responsible for every bad thing that had happened.

It was as though there was a great cancerous guilt growing inside him, threatening to consume him. And that scared Mikaela very much.

And so, when she arrived at their tent one evening and didn’t find him there, she became extremely worried. Asking about in the immediate area gained her nothing. No one had seen him all afternoon. Calls to Takamura and Jakes and Becky Thalberg only served to cause them to worry along with her, since none of them had seen Phineas either.

Takamura inquired at the construction site by the Barrier and learned that Phineas had left the job recently and had been seen entering the Mesozoic Preserve.

Now Mikaela was panicked. There was no reason for Phineas to go into the Preserve. She took out the OTV, entering the forest in search of Phineas. Perhaps an hour of artificial daylight remained when she entered the thick cathedral-like vault of tall trees and fronds.

Using the vehicle’s infrared heat-imaging sensors, she was able to pick up the trail of a warm body that had recently passed through the area. Her instruments told her that the body was approximately Phineas Kemp’s size, and she had to hope that she was following him rather than a human-size dinosaur.

The heat imager followed the trail as a bloodhound might follow the scent of a fugitive. Mikaela watched her instruments carefully, but she also watched the amount of light still available. If she didn’t find Phineas within the hour, she would have to return to Hakarrh. Even in the OTV, she didn’t want to be out in the Mesozoic Preserve at feeding time-not if she had a choice in the matter.

She spotted him fifteen minutes later.

He was moving with an aimless, slow, shuffling walk across a small meadow. Mikaela stopped the vehicle and watched him as he headed for an outcropping of rocks at the edge of a ridge. He didn’t appear to be paying any attention to his surroundings, and she wondered how he had wandered this far without running afoul of a predator. When Phineas disappeared behind the rocks, she reached for the OTV’s hatch.

That’s when she heard the shot.

It was single report, a soft
crack
that was muffled somewhat by the thick foliage and vegetation.

Oh, God! No! she thought as she raced the engines up to speed and ripped the vehicle across the meadow, heedless of anything except reaching him. The crazy bastard! The egocentric, crazy bastard!

Stopping at the base of the rocks, Mikaela jumped down and headed for the rocks. As she cleared the first ranks of the formation, she saw him. He was sitting up, leaning back against the rocks with the revolver still in his hand. His eyes were open, and he was staring at her in surprise.

“Mikaela! Good Christ, you scared me. What’re you doing here?”

She stepped forward and exhaled slowly, trying to stop trembling. At the base of the rocks where Phineas sat was the carcass of a Comsagnathus
—
a small bipedal dinosaur no more than a single meter in length. It looked like a miniature Allosaurus built for speed and quickness. There was a bullet hole in the center of its skull, looking like a dark, third eye.

“The bugger tried to jump me,” Phineas said, pointing at the tiny predator’s body with the barrel of his gun. “I had to pop him one.” He laughed nervously.

“Phineas, I was looking for you. You scared me.”

He laughed again, this time with more obvious effort. “Listen, I scared myself.”

“It’s not safe out here, Phineas. We’ve got to get back.”

“I know. We will. Don’t worry about that. But let me finish what I’m trying to say. I might not be able to later.”

She felt reassured by the way he talked now. They were close to the OTV. It would be all right to remain there a little bit longer, despite the cry of carrion eaters, still far off but inevitably closing in.

“All right,” she said. “Go on.”

“I came out here because I didn’t know what I was feeling anymore. I didn’t know what I was going to do with myself.”

He looked at her with the expression of a lost little boy, and her heart went out to him. She wanted to take him in her arms and hold him, but she knew that he had some things he wanted to say. It would be best not to interrupt him.

“It’s not hard for me to understand why they voted me out, Mikaela. I’ve been a real fuck-up lately, I know that. But it has been hard for me to live with it, with not being a leader anymore. Not being a decision-maker. It’s what I’m used to, damn it.”

He looked at her, and there were tears in the corners of his eyes. It was a side of Phineas Kemp that she had never seen.

“I’ve always been a chief, Mikaela. And I’m afraid I won’t be able to make it just being an Indian. I’m very much afraid.”

“It’s okay to be afraid,” she said, coming to his side. “We all have things we’re afraid of.”

“I’m learning that, but I’m a slow learner, I think.”

She looked at him, kissed him tenderly, then pulled back to look at the gun. “Were you really thinking of using that?”

Phineas shook his head. “I don’t know. I don’t think so. Every time I thought about actually pulling the trigger, actually trying to imagine myself doing it, I just couldn’t get the picture right. It just wasn’t
me,
you know?” He laughed sadly. “Who knows, maybe I’m even afraid to do that. “

“That’s not fear. That’s just good sense. We need you, Phineas. I need you.”

“Sometimes I can’t imagine why.”

“Because you’re you, that’s why.” She smiled and kissed him again. “Sure, you’re feeling lousy right now
—
you’ve been rejected, and you’re the kind of person who has not had much rejection in your life. You’ve never realized that there are millions of us that live with it all the time. You’ll get used to it, Phineas. It’s not the end of the world.”

He smiled for the first time. “Somehow that old clich
é
doesn’t sound right under the circumstances.”

“Phineas, don’t talk like that.”

“Well, really, what’s going to happen to us? Don’t you ever wonder why this ship started up again, and why it whisked us off to God knows where?”

Mikaela nodded and put her head on his shoulder.

“Of course I do. Everyone is wondering about the same things,” she said. “But it’s no reason to give up.”

“Who said anything about giving up?” Phineas stood up and pulled her close to him, kissing her gently. Somewhere in the forest there came the cry of a beast.

“We should be heading back,” Mikaela said. “It’s getting to be feeding time.”

They walked slowly back toward the vehicle, but Phineas paused and looked around, as though appreciating the vastness of the Mesozoic preserve for the first time.

“What’s the matter?” Mikaela asked.

“Nothing ... and everything.” Phineas laughed softly. “This is a hell of a crazy place, and I almost let it beat me. I wasn’t ready for all the things that happened this time around, but I’ll be ready the next time.”

“Are you sure there’ll be a next time?” Mikaela asked.

“No,” said Phineas. “But I sure as hell hope so!”