Chap. 415 To Catch a Thief
Data looked at his datalink as they made their way towards Rigel. He felt a huge sense of satisfaction. I knew he’d come back, that trap worked like a champ.
“It looks like no one comes out here,” said Commo, “Look how high the grass is. And the trees, they’re growing, too.”
“This is what we hope the commons will look like in a few years,” Raylan said, “All it will take is some planting and time. Nature will do what she does best-erase our actions.”
The others laughed.
“Well, the kids do come out here, precisely due to the fact that there’s no adults to tell them what NOT to do. Like climb up these buildings and then slide off.”
“Oh, yeah, they do,” Engineering said, “And then they complain about a broken leg. They keep the healer busy.”
“They come out here for other reasons, too, a lot of them end up pregnant afterwards.”
Even more laughter erupted. “I better be careful,” Commo said, drolly, “I don’t want that. It wouldn’t be the plants getting them that way, would it?”
They all laughed, suddenly realizing that it was fun to just to be out there, doing something productive OUTSIDE.
Data’s datalink pinged. “Hello!” he said, “The lout downloaded a map of Landing.”
“Huh,” Raylan said, “He’s been out here often enough, you’d think he wouldn’t need one.”
They scanned as they walked. I should ask Francie to have her fire lizards scan for L’ichen. He pinged her.
“Oh, Raylan, it’s so sad,” Francie said. He could hear the sorrow in her voice.
“You’re with the dragon?”
“Yes, and he’s so bad. He’s…well not long, now.”
“I know, hon. Would you send your fire lizards out to see if they can find L’ichen?”
“I did. So did K’ndar, his Siskin knows what he looks like. There’s no sign of him, and I think they went high enough to see all of Landing.”
“Where could he have gone? We’re heading east, towards Rigel.”
“I don’t know, love, and please, if you don’t mind, I’m..oh, this poor dragon. I’ll let you know what happens.”
“Okay. You don’t need to call. The dragons will tell me.”
The others looked at him.
“No sign of him from the air,” he said, unnecessarily.
“Wait a minute,” Data said, and stopped. They clustered around him.
“Problem?”
“The map of Landing that L’ichen downloaded?”
“Yes?”
“It’s the original map, from twenty five hundred years ago. NOT from our time, the newest one was released a year ago.”
What? They clustered around him to look at his datalink.
And it pinged again.
“Ah. When he downloaded the map, it triggered the trap and it’s showing me where it is.”
“Where is he?”
“It shows him at the reverse osmosis water treatment plant, that’s on Proxima, just ahead of us!”
“Brought to bay!” Engineering cried, and burst into a run that was a bit beyond her abilities. I’m going to catch this lout if it’s the last thing I do, she thought.
They ran, fully expecting to see L’ichen hiding near the treatment plant towers. When they got there, huffing and puffing, they saw: no one. But they did hear a datalink, chiming, as if calling them.
It was on a cement bolster, at chest height, by the entry door into the plant.
“That bastard,” Data snarled, “He knew we are tracking him via datalink.”
He picked it up. “And he left us a message.”
“What does it say?” the others said, panting from their run. Most of them hadn’t run in ages.
“It says, “Nice try, asshole. Do you like my delayed ping? I’m long gone. Drop it before you get hurt.”
“What does that mean?”
Data’s hand said, um, boss? this thing is getting hot. Like REALLY hot.
Data flung the datalink as far as he could. It landed in an area that was unvegetated. The datalink exploded with a shower of sparks and flames.
The rest gasped.
“What happened?”
“He boobytrapped his datalink. It’s far more advanced than ours, after all, he’s from the future, and the folks in Arr and Dee are constantly tinkering with improving our datalinks, among other things. I think what he did was activate a destruct signal that caused his to burn up.”
“Interesting, what? That this is the only spot where you could have dropped it without setting the vegetation alight,” Raylan said. “Only someone who loved plants more than anything else would do that.” It’s just one more nail in the case against L’ichen, he thought
“But he’s not here! How did he trigger it?”
“I think I know. He also had a delay signal, something that makes it chime like it did when I got in range.”
.
“Oooh, that’s playing dirty,” Commo said. “This has stopped being a search to ask him questions and now it’s a hunt for someone intentionally trying to hurt us.”
“And yet,” Engineering said, “You have to admire his cunning. This is like hunting a susi. They’re smarter than dogs, by a long shot.”
“You didn’t hunt them did you? They’re a native species.”
“Aye, true enough. And we did, before the Charter was rediscovered and enforced. I didn’t personally kill them, I was just a kid, but our Holder sent us out to hunt down the susi packs as he was convinced they were killing his sheep. Now we know it was giant wherries killing them because we’d killed off their natural predators, the susies. It took the Charter being enforced for the susi population to recover and the Holder was smart enough to realize he’d made a mistake. Now, they’re left alone and the giant wherries have gone back to their natural prey. But I tell you, susies are incredibly smart. It wasn’t easy to get near one, never mind kill it. If they don’t want you to see them, you’ll never see ‘em.”
Data tried to steer the mission back on track. “So now we have to figure out where the shaff L’ichen went. I don’t believe we have any tracking dogs here.”
“I don’t think so. But we DO know where his second ping came from, this morning. It’s on Rigel. The map he shows the warehouse district. And that’s just ahead.”
They looked at three very large buildings.
“There’s no sign of anyone having been out here since spring,” Engineering said. “The grass is hip high.”
“I agree,” Data said, “but the database shows he sent the first ping this morning from this building right here. And the map he just downloaded says it’s called “Shuttle Maintenance Bay 2.”
“These things are huge,” Commo said, “They’ve got to be got to be at least thirty meters long and maybe the same high.”
“Those shuttles must have been big,” Raylan said.
“Are you SURE the ping came from INSIDE this building?” Engineering asked, “because you can plainly see that it’s never been opened, it’s covered solidified ash.”
Data bridled. “It gets the coordinates from the Yokohama, and she’s usually within a half meter of true. So yes, I’m SURE the ping came from inside. Or maybe atop. But I can’t see that high up.
“I’m going to walk all around it,” Commo said, “He had to have found a way in.”
They joined her. The grass, even this late in the winter, harbored hundreds of insects that objected to their intrusion. On the ground they found the remains of tunnel snakes, hacked up by the wherries that hunted them. A few overwintering avians swooped overhead, half heartedly hunting the insects.
They ended up at their starting point, not having found so much as crack in the ash.
Engineering shook her head. “Now he’s got my dander up. I’m calling my team to come out with some tools. I have a good idea where the pedestrian door is. We’ll find out how this lout got in, if he did.”
Commo was not convinced. She did a larger circle around the building. And found something. “Hey! Come here, there’s a structure here!” she called.
A small bunker, the vertical walls about a meter high, was hidden in the deep grass. A metal door, set at a 45 degree angle, was covered in moss. Raylan reached down and brushed it away.
“It says, “Fuel Storage Bunker 2”.
“Hmm, that makes sense,” Engineering said, “Their shuttle fuel was probably highly flammable. You don’t want that stuff anywhere near where you are working.”
“It’s locked, too,” Raylan said, “But you know, this lock, it’s new. It doesn’t look all weathered. And you can see where the person who locked it picked it up and then dropped it, there’s no moss underneath it.”
He looked closer. “Look. See the rest of the moss is still damp from the dew. The lock is dry.”
“Bet my lunch who ever did this has the key in his pocket.”
“No doubt,” said Engineering, “but I have The Universal Key that will open it.”
“I never heard of a universal key.”
Engineering laughed. “Sure you have!” She said into her datalink, “Bring a hacksaw!”
——————————————————————————–
The boys were busy raking the soil where their class planting project was designated.
“We have to make sure that the soil is exposed,” one said, “then we wait a few days to see if anything comes up that we don’t want.”
“How do we tell what we want to grow and what we don’t?” said one.
“Um, I don’t know? But this list here, it’s got the names of plants that we’re going to plant just before the spring rains come in. Science is going to get us the seeds we need, and then we’ll get pictures of the plants when they’re babies and after they grow up.”
“Just leave it alone,” said a male voice behind them.
They looked up to see an old man who’d seemingly came out of nowhere.
“Who, um, who are you?”
One of the boys felt his heart begin to pound.
“I’m no one. Which one of you stole my backpack?”
“WHAT?”
“We didn’t steal no backpack.”
The one boy began to back up.
“Yes, and you, the one backing up, you stole my backpack.”
“No, I didn’t, I saw you, you came out of the library, but you didn’t have a backpack.”
He grabbed at the boy, who brandished his rake. “I didn’t do nothing. Leave us alone.”
“Leave us alone!” another shouted, “We didn’t steal anything!”
L’ichen tried to grab the boy. “You did. I saw you.”
“You’re crazy. I never saw you in my life, I’ve never stolen a thing,” he shouted.
“ONE of you did and I’m going to thrash every one of you till you give me my backpack.” He pulled his dagger and lunged at them. The boys dropped their tools and bolted in all directions. The one who’d seen him, though, ran straight for Security.
——————————————————————————–
Chief Elene had just left Jansen’s office when her datalink pinged.
“Who calls?”
“Ma’am, this is Security. There’s an elderly man outside your library, he’s threatening people with a dagger. He’s yelling about a stolen backpack.”
“Oh, shaff, I know who he is. One of the boys brought one to me, sir, and I have it with me right now. It’s full of stolen artifacts. That man is a dragonrider named L’ichen, he is from the future, and he’s been stealing artifacts from all over Pern. He’s a thief and a criminal. I want him arrested.”
“Are you in the Library? If so, lock the doors, we’re on our way right now.”
“I’m not, I’m safe in Landing Main.”
“Don’t go into the library until we clear it, Chief.”
“I won’t.”
“You say he’s a dragonrider? I heard the dragons cry. It’s not one of ours, is it?”
“No, it was this thief.”
“He’s not with it?” She could hear he was moving fast.
“No. He was here in my library and then left, I don’t know where he went, but our dragonriders have been with the dying one most of the morning and he’s definitely not with them or his dragon.”
“What kind of dragonrider is he that he just lets his dragon die?”
“He’s…he’s deranged, I think. And a criminal.”
The man whistled.
“I’ll bring extra muscle.”
“That’s not a bad idea, but he looks to be about seventy years old and acts like it. I don’t think he’ll be able to beat one of your lads up.”
“Maybe not, but when he threatens to stab a couple of kids who were minding their own business, he just might attack my folks. Don’t leave until I call you to say it’s safe.”
_______________________________________________________
Security got to the library to find a group of people standing outside, all talking at once.
“Is there anyone inside?” the chief asked.
“Not now, but this man came in, waving his dagger around and accusing us of stealing his backpack. He went into Chief Elene’s office and turned over her desk and started tearing maps off the walls. That’s when we all figured it’s a good idea to get out of there.”
“It was.”
Another person said, “Chief, I was the last one out. I heard the dragons cry and suddenly the madman, he began to scream, he came out tearing at his hair and shrieking like it was on fire. Then he ran that way.” He pointed.
“He ran THAT way? Not towards the dragon meadow?”
“No, sir. The meadow is behind us,” he said, turning around, “That man, he ran kind of crooked, you know? Like he was hurting? But he ran fast for an old man.”
“Okay. Pass the word to everyone, there’s a madman on the loose, steer clear..and let my lads handle him.”