Silent Dances (10 page)

arrows, a lariat, a piece of flint, the Clovis point she'd made herself, and a

small hatchet.

"Yeah, but you're still missing something," Jib told her, then tossed her a

small box.

Surprised, Tesa opened it. It was a Swiss Army knife.

Jib had one, a deluxe model. It had been his mother's, and was his pride and

joy. Whenever anyone needed an obscure tool, Jib always seemed to have

it on his knife.

Tesa had coveted that knife, that perfect all-tools-in-one. She looked at her

friend, dumbfounded, and turned the knife over in her hands. On the other

side, engraved in the red plastron, were the initials of Jib's mother.

Tesa looked shocked. "Jib, this is
yours!"

He shrugged. "I couldn't let you go to this wild world without the right knife. I

changed some of the tools." He eagerly unfolded the new items. "Here's a

micro cell analyzer, and I'll bet you can't guess what this is!" He pulled out a

short
tubular thing with a telltale on the end.

She shook her head, still stunned.

"It's a bioscanner," Jib signed. "If someone comes within twelve meters of you, this light will flash. That's in
any
di rection, land, sea, or air!"

"Jib," she signed, "I can't take your mother's knife .. She ran her fingers over its stiff leather case, decorated with curling, intricate Maori designs.

"You told me that you're supposed to give away the stuff
that means the

most to
you," Jib protested.

Impulsively, Tesa reached into her inside jacket pocket, removing a piece of

quill-worked leather. Smiling, she un wrapped her eagle feathers and

handed one to him. It was his turn to look surprised.

46

"Tesa, you
can'
t
give me this. You
earned
it," he signed,
half in delight, half
in protest.

She gave him a quick kiss and a Maori nose-rub. "Soon
you'll finish
your

courses and do your pair project, and before you know it, you'll be on

another
planet
, working. Who knows, maybe you'll end up at Trinity with

me. But you'
ll ea
rn
that
feather.
In the meantime it'll inspire
you to great things. And
when
you look at it you'll think of me."

He held the white-tipped tail feather of a golden eagle respectfully. Its quill

was wrapped in leather, decorated with beadwork. Leather thongs with

large, colorful pony beads dangled from it. "Do you really think I need this to

think of you?"

Tesa touched his hand that held the feather. "We'll write?" He nodded, then

they began loading the baggage onto a nullgrav transport before they

dissolved into a mess of blubbering good-byes.
But, as
Jib led the
unit
out the door on his way to the loading dock, Tesa turned back for a last look at

their suite. Jib had turned the living room's holo to the Black Hills. There

were two eagles flying there now. For once, the sight of them made her

smile
. Clutching her new knife, Tesa followed Jib out, closing the door

behind her.

47

Margaritka Tretiak handed Tesa a cold glass of fruit juice. "Tesa," she

signed in Grus, "wake up. Drink this."

"It's been barely an hour since we started the wake-up," Dr. Li Szu-yi

reminded Meg. The health specialist of the
Singing Crane,
the Terran space

station orbiting Trinity, was a plain, brown-skinned woman in her forties.

Reed-thin, she had short, dark hair, almond eyes, and a cool businesslike

manner. She peered into the young woman's eyes. "Besides, she probably

doesn't know a thing about the missing voders."

Meg felt disoriented herself. An early arrival meant both women were still in

hiber-sleep when the
Norton
had docked with the
Crane.

"Neither of you have had enough time to get the hibernation drug out of your

systems," the doctor continued. Meg noticed that Szu-yi never looked

directly at Tesa when she spoke.

Tesa drank the juice down, holding the glass in both hands. Meg wanted

nothing more than to get off the station. The one-gee gravity made her feel

old when she wanted to feel buoyant. What she wouldn't admit was that

everything about the
Crane
reminded her of Scott. But before they could

leave,

48

she had to find out what in hell had happened to their voders.
Tesa combed

fingers through her hair
,
rearranging two feathers she
'
d tied there.

The crew were beginning to straggle in, stealing sideways glances at Meg,

acting like strangers.
She should
'
ve expected that
.
When she'd left she
was in pain and grieving for Sco
tt
. She would have to reassu
re
them
that she was okay and, most impo
rt
ant
,
that this young woman was

just the person they needed.

"
I've talked to Captain Stepp
,
Meg," Lauren Nichols said. The crew
'
s p
ri
ma
ry
computer tech and data analyst was round,
Anglo, and thirty-five.

Meg always thought of her as "pert,"
with tight
,
brown curls framing a
pretty face
. "
The Captain's shipping invoice," Lauren continued
, "

ordered that container down
-
loaded onto the S
. V.
Holly
du
ri
ng a
regular cargo
tr
ansfer at space station
Orion,
while you and Tesa were
hibe
rn
ating."

"That'
s
ri
diculous
,"
Meg grumbled
. "
I logged the datacard onto the
lading bill myself
.
What made them think those voders were supposed

to be delivered to the
Holly?"

"Ask 'em to give us a copy of the bill, will you, honey?"
Bruce Carpenter
'
s
soft drawl startled Meg
.
What surp
ri
sed her mo
re
was how much
she'd missed him. He had loved Scott, too, even though they'd never

agreed on anything. Lanky, of medium height
,
Bruce's thinning red

hair seemed to have become sparser. She couldn
'
t remember it being

so gray, either.

He hugged her, kissing her forehead. "
I really missed you, ol girl," he

whispered.

"Who the hell you calling old?" She laughed. "
Lot more snow on
your
head
than when
I left."

Moving to a chair
,
Bruce sat with arms crossed, stretching his legs out.

"If we had that bill
,"
he said to Lauren, "we might be able to find the
error."

The technician turn
ed to the infirma
ry
's comm unit.

Bruce,
Lauren
,
Meg, and Scott had been the core of the colonizing

team that had first discovered
Trinity. The four of
them had elected to

stay when their- company ship had leftMeg and Scott because they

believed that the Grus were intelligent, and Bruce and Lauren in spite of

their doubts. The four had always worked as a team, and after fifteen

years of space-hopping they were practically family.

"
Lauren
,
call Peter in here
,
please
,"
Bruce requested. "Maybe he can
get to the bottom of this."

49

"Right," Lauren answered, and turned back to the comm. "Does she know

anything about it?" Bruce asked in a low voice, indicating Tesa.

"I'll ask her," Meg said. She could see the young woman's confused

expression.
Poor kid,
she thought,
I'd planned an organized briefing session,
not this. She looks so lost.
Meg remembered suddenly that Tesa's birthday

had passed while they were in deep-sleep. She was twenty now, and had

left her teens while asleep with no one but a stranger to even think of
it.

"Tesa," Meg signed in Grus, "we can't find those new Mizari voders. Is there any chance they're in your luggage?" It was a long shot, but Meg was

desperate.

Meg could see Tesa thinking it through, fuzzily.

"Ask her again," the doctor said. "She didn't understand."

"She understands just fine, give her a chance," Meg answered curtly.

"The Mizari voders?" Tesa signed, finally. "They went in with our cargo. Did you check--"

Meg turned away from Tesa at the sound of a new voice. "I've got that lading

data from Captain Stepp, Meg," a black man said from the doorway. "Want to

give me your data-card so I can compare? By the way, it's sure good to have

you home
again."

Peter Woedrango, the
Crane's
chief
engineer
, software specialist, and

ecologist, gave Meg one of his expansive smiles as he took her card. The

tall Senegalese man had his computer link in his ear and a pocket crowded

with computer pens. He was good-looking, with a shaggy mane of hair and

laughing eyes.

Tesa tapped Meg. "Can we go to Trinity now?"

Meg felt a stab of guilt.
This is terrible. I turned
away
while she
was
in the
middle of a sentence. I haven't introduced her to a soul. This voder thing has

me too rattled to think.

"Captain Stepp," Meg signed, "can't leave till we know what happened to the voders, and you and I can't go planetside until this is solved."

Tesa nodded
,
glancing self
-
consciously at the strangers.
"She'll feel a lot better after dinner and a night's sleep," Dr. Li
announced to the room.

"Szu-yi, please stop talking about Tesa in third person," Meg said quietly.

The doctor pressed her lips together.

50

"Sleep!
"
Tesa signed abruptly
. "
I've been doing nothing but sleep for
the past month
!
C
an
't we go
?
Please?"

Meg was surpri
sed. "You understood her?"

Tesa smiled wry
ly
. "
How hard is it to understand àno-go' when you

see one?"

"
What was all that about
?"
Bruce asked
,
interested. Befo
re
Meg could
an
swer
,
Peter interrupted
. "
Meg, both your data
-
card
an
d the lading
bill tell Captain Stepp to transfer our voders to the
Holly."

"Those things are
halfway to Novaya Rossiya by now," said Lau
re
n
,
ruefully
. "
Maybe your brother can send them back, Meg."

"How could that
happen?"
Meg demanded
. "
It's impossible!"

Peter shook his head. "
You could
'
ve picked up an error while that card
was accruing its approvals
.
Gove
rn
ment cards a
re
used over
an
d
over
.
After you tr
an
sferred the data onto the lading bill
,
something
happened
,
the data hiccuped or eroded somehow and old orders

came through instead
."
He shook his head
. "
You know the gove
rn
ment
.
Penny
-
wise
,
pound foolish."

"What are we supposed to do without those new voders?" Meg fumed. "
It
took
months
to get them."

"We'll contact StarBri
dge
,"
Lau
re
n assured her. "We'll get new ones
,
don't wor
ry.
I'll tell Captain Stepp she c
an
go." Meg w
an
ted to scream.

Tesa tapped her lightly again,
distracting her. "The voders are gone
?"

she asked.

"
Yes," Meg signed
,
and explained what had happened. Tesa frowned
,
then began rummaging around in her belt pouch.

"Forget the voders," Bruce suggested. "
Let's start this meeting over
.
This
young lady
'
s gonna think she got dumped into a crowd of rude

techno-types. Nobody
'
s even said hello." The gray
-
haired m
an
stepped forward
,
holding out his h
an
d.

Tesa hesitated,
then took it as he said softly
, "
How do you do, my

darling
?
I'm Bruce Carpenter
,
resident meteorologist
an
d

xenoichthyologist
.
Hope you'll enjoy working with us."

"Bruce,"
Lauren complained,
rolling her eyes. "She's
deaf!
How much of that do you expect her to understand?"

"I'll bet she's a champeon lip-
re
ader
,"
Bruce said. He gave
the Indian woman a conspiratori
al smile
,
which Tesa retu
rn
ed.

51

"Got a nice firm handshake
,
too. You
'
re gonna be all
ri
ght."

"I'd like to see anyone lip-read `
xenoichthyologist'! Hon estly, Bruce!"