CHAPTER 4
JOHN AND THE ROC
It took Kate more than an hour to walk to the Sheriff's Office. By speaking with fellow pedestrians she first confirmed that it was located at the far edge of Space Port City, at least three kilometers away from all Corporation office buildings, storage warehouses, lumber yards, and apartments. The landscape she walked was dominated by small, primitive wooden houses and bicycle paths, an occasional huge tree or two, and at least one small bar for about every couple of dozen houses. It all reminded Kate most of old pictures and video she had seen of Earth centuries ago; Space Port City could have almost passed for a nineteenth century Earth town of perhaps five to ten thousand persons.
The abundance of drinking establishments was no surprise. The whole planet was advertised to be 'dry' alcohol-wise, but in true frontier style, the make-shift bars openly advertised boot-legged beer and whisky. Though it was more than an hour before noon, as she walked by several bars she heard loud music and glimpsed through open doors patrons already occupying many of the barstools.
Hot, hungry, thirsty, and tired of walking and lugging around a suitcase through the heavy wet atmosphere and high gravity, she was more than once tempted to stop at one of the less seedy looking bars. One man even whistled at her as she walked by and shouted some sort of suggestion that she didn't quite totally catch but could imagine. She smiled at that, the incident made her think of her frontier hometown on Mars. Men were men wherever they were, which had both its good points and bad.
The widely scattered houses were tiny, hastily constructed structures that reminded Kate of some of the shanty-towns on Mars, though here the houses were made of wood instead of heat-fused ceramics, except for the ceramic chimneys. Stacks of cut wood in every yard indicated that wood was actually used as fuel, something that had been inconceivable on Earth for hundreds of years. No smoke exited any of the chimneys, however; besides the fact that it was mid-summer and heating was only needed for cooking, the chimneys were doubtlessly equipped with scrubbers designed to remove nearly all particulates.
Other than the early-lunchtime bar crowd there were few people to be seen, and Kate reasoned that most inhabitants must be at work, which on Aves consisted largely of construction, logging, or farming. Walkers and bicyclers far outnumbered those with powered carts, so at least she didn't feel too out of place as she wheeled her suitcase down the road, occasionally dodging slow moving traffic.
She paused frequently to study wildlife and take still photos and videos with her COM. The further she got from the center of Space Port City, the more birds she saw. A few were sparrows similar to those she had seen at the Port, but other 'small' birds were more prevalent, particularly flocks of starlings and family groups of cow birds. On Earth most of these types of birds had lived in forest clearings and then in farmed areas, and finally in human cities and suburbs, where they eventually suffered near extinction. They seemed right at home here.
The birds were evidently patrolling the shanty-town for insects, which like the birds were enormous, many of them larger than her hand. A few were as big as cats or dogs. Most looked familiar, and she immediately entertained the outrageous notion that they were all of Earth origin, just as the birds and trees appeared to be. Whatever their origins they were fascinating; frightfully huge and ugly, but ornately colorful, odd, and of a size to easily observe.
A few meters ahead, Kate noticed dozens of arm-long chunks of tree bark mysteriously moving through the grass towards a meter-high mound of loose earth. When she got closer she realized that huge rat-sized ants were carrying the bark towards the mound, then up and into a hole at its top. She stood farther back and watched, alarmed by the size of the creatures, but fascinated.
Moments later a bird cried out from above and there was a flutter of great wings as half a dozen screaming starlings landed among the ants and stuck at them with sharp bills. The starlings were bigger than the sparrows and quick as Earth-leopards, and their blows were powerful and deadly. The ants immediately retreated towards their hole, where a few escaped, but the birds quickly killed most of them. A few of the insects were eaten, but most were picked up in strong bills and flown out of sight. Kate, stunned by the sudden violent episode, was relieved to see them gone, both ants and birds.
She could see why the birds were tolerated by humans despite their frightening size and power. The enormous insects they helped control were revolting, and besides being likely consumers of human crops and food, must be very dangerous. The training materials had emphasized bees, spiders, and other venomous creatures, but some of these creatures appeared to Kate to be large enough to attack and perhaps kill humans even without use of massive amounts of poisons. She felt extremely fortunate that the preparation regimen on the space ship had included ingestion of chemicals to repel all insect-like creatures. The ants were monstrous, and probably nearly all poisonous, to some degree, and carriers of all manner of pathogens. She shuttered to think about what sort of toxins and diseases that even an ant might carry.
She continued to see occasional grackles. These huge birds ate a few insects, but seemed for the most part to be occupied watching the other birds, as if they were overseeing their actions. Often they appeared to be squawking orders to starlings and cow-birds. Twice she saw grackles chasing sparrows away, while tolerating the cowbirds and starlings.
Several times she noticed a big black grackle watching her. The birds looked so much alike that it could have been Blackie, still following her, but she couldn’t tell for sure if it was him or not. She assured herself that it was absurd to imagine that she was being followed by the same bird that she had seen at the Op-Center.
Although Kate was particularly fascinated by the birds and anxious to study them, she also felt strong apprehension, particularly with regard to the grackles. Was there a malevolent intelligence behind their dark stares? Seeing the huge, powerful birds in action was frightening. She had to keep reminding herself that they weren’t hostile, and that they were only birds. But what did being only a bird mean here on Aves? The man at the port had said they might be as smart as dogs. Had their intelligence been determined scientifically? They were definitely exhibiting social behavior, though much of it could be instinctual. Had that been studied? On Earth or Mars she would simply access the applicable science via COM accessible computer networks; here on Aves she was apparently prohibited from doing that.
Ahead of her, the shanty town ended and a field of some sort of waist-high grain stretched into the distance for several kilometers to a distant line of trees. Scattered throughout the field hundreds of near human-sized black, gray, and gray and brown-headed figures strode purposefully, occasionally pausing and swiftly plunging their heads down into the grain. It took only a moment to realize that these were yet more birds, again starlings and cowbirds judging from the closer ones, feeding on insects in the fields. Scattered among the cowbirds and starlings were dozens of much larger grackles. The blackbirds strutted about pompously, heads bobbing, obviously watching the other birds and squawking at them, again as if they were directing their actions.
As she watched, a grackle loudly squawked and hundreds of starlings noisily took to the air on wings that spanned over four meters, and in seconds relocated to a new section of the field, where they resumed feeding. The scene reminded her of old videos of Earth birds feeding on lawn insects and worms, except that the scale here was skewed towards a surreal gigantism. These birds were each more than a thousand times more massive than their counterparts on Earth.
They were occasionally eating grain as well as insects, Kate noticed. She also noticed that hers appeared to be the only human eyes watching them. Most of the people she saw didn’t pay much attention to any of the birds. This was obviously an example of the cooperation with the birds that Keto had spoken of, but advanced to an incredible degree. It was becoming increasingly apparent to Kate how so vast a crop could be raised by only a small number of humans. For each human farmer, there were hundreds of giant b
irds controlling hordes of ravenous insects.
At the edge of the field, where the road she had been walking on ended, stood a shockingly ramshackle building the size of a typical shanty home that featured a crude hand-painted sign over the porch that said simply "Sheriff's Office".
Any faint hopes she had of salvaging her assignment on Aves were shattered at that moment. She had a strong impulse to not even bother going in, but the door was open, so she walked to the doorway and looked inside.
A hairy, burly, mountain of a man wearing a cowboy hat and a star-shaped badge on his dirty tan work shirt lounged with his huge boot-clad feet propped up on a desk that faced the door at the front of the room. Kate said a silent prayer, hoping that this was not John Weltman. Behind him were three primitive jail cells, wire cages really. Two of them were occupied by filthy looking, snoring men stretched out on cots, the third cell was empty. As Kate stepped inside and out of the hot suns, one of the sleepers woke up, burped loudly, stumbled to the toilet along the rear of the cell, unzipped his pants and peed into the toilet with his back to her.
"You’ve got to be Mrs. Furly," stated the big man at the desk, sporting a wide smile. He was truly enormous; he must have massed two hundred kilos, most of it muscle.
"Furly?" Kate responded.
"Wife of the guy in cell two," he explained, pointing with a huge thumb to the middle cell in back of him, which held the still-sleeping, snoring man. "You called and said you'd come get him, assuming he can walk yet. He had a big night of drinking, if you catch my drift, but nothing unusual, him being a farmer. We made sure he got his anti-hangover pills, so he should come out of it fine. In a few weeks when the harvest starts the poor bastard won't have time for bars no more, so go easy on him; that's my advice to all you farmer wives."
"I’m not his wife. My name is Dr. Katherine Deborg, and I'm looking for John Weltman. Would that be you?"
"Nope," said the huge man, grinning as he rose from his chair and reached out to shake Kate's hand. Her hand and her arm halfway to her elbow disappeared in his surprisingly gentle grip. "Sorry, I should have known you ain't Furly from your Directorate scientist uniform, but I ain't seen its like in years. I'm John's deputy, Harold Forge, but folks call me Tiny, for obvious reasons. Sheriff Weltman had a bad night his own self. That's him in cell one." He pointed to the tan-haired, still peeing man that stood with his back to them. "John, there's a lady doctor here looking for you," said Tiny loudly over the sound of splashing urine.
“A what?” The man zipped up and turned to look wide-eyed at Kate, than shook his head as if trying to clear it. He was a relatively tall and perhaps handsome man in his early thirties that badly needed a shave and a bath. "Is this Thursday, Tiny? I told you to wake me when it was Thursday.”
Kate’s heart sunk when she noted that he wore a small, star shaped badge on his dirty work-shirt. Tiny wasn’t kidding. This disheveled man was indeed Sherriff John Weltman, the man she had traveled half a hundred light-years to work with.
Tiny shrugged his giant shoulders. “Sorry boss. Guess I lost track too.”
The sheriff shook his head again to clear it as he washed his hands and face in a small sink. “Lady, are you a scientist from the Space Directorate?"
"That's right."
"Shit. I was going to meet the Ship, and shave and so forth first."
"The ship disembarked passengers almost three hours ago," Kate noted.
"Sorry. Are you a bird expert, like I asked for? Where's the rest of your science team?" He hurriedly dried his hands and exited the cell by pushing the barred door open. The cell door wasn't locked. Neither was Furly's, Kate noticed.
Kate shook his still somewhat damp hand reluctantly. "I don't know what you asked for, but I'm a biologist, and I do know quite a lot about Earth birds. I don't know what 'team' you're referring to; the Directorate sent only me, as far as I know."
"They sent only you? You've got to be kidding! Hey, you’re too young, and you don't even look like a scientist."
"What do scientists look like? You don't look like a sheriff to me."
"You ever see a sheriff before?"
"No. You ever see a scientist?"
"Too damn many. Most of them not worth spit."
"Well I certainly wouldn't want to change your notions of scientists Sheriff, so I'll just be on my way." Kate turned on her heel and walked out, considering for a moment if she should bother to stop at the Science Center and humbly beg Helmins for work, or head straight for the Op-Center for a ticket straight home. Straight home, she decided. The Directorate would be pissed; they would likely fire her when she got home. But the hell with it. Right now she was too angry to care.
This whole thing was crazy. Was she expected to work out of a jail cell, if she could find one not already occupied by drunk farmers or peeing sheriffs? What she thought was going to be the most exciting career experience imaginable had turned into a stupid bureaucratic fuck-up of some kind, one that had already cost her a month of her life to get here and would cost her another month to get back home.
Weltman was suddenly at her shoulder, walking along with her. "Hey, not so fast, Doc. Listen, I'm very sorry about the screw-up, but now that you're here, what's the rush?"
"I’m tired, hot, and pissed off, but I wouldn't want to miss a flight out."
"Not likely. No flights leaving Aves for at least a month."
Kate stopped dead in her tracks. "A month?"
"Right. Or maybe even two months. By the way, the months here are twenty eight days so they’re similar to Earth months, though the days are a bit longer. Can’t help the years being so long, there are twenty months to an Aves year, and a couple leap-days in the mix also.”
“Up to two months until an out-flight? Why?”
“Within two months they'll start to ship the crop out, once it’s picked and processed. They're sort of collecting ships on Aves till then. Almost all the trans-warp transport ships that humanity has got are here already, as a matter of fact. In the meantime, how about doing some biology for me? You know, like I requested and you were assigned to do?"
"I don't know what you requested, but I don't think that it would be possible."
"Why not? You're a biologist, right? And you know about birds? I requested bird experts."
"I'm not an ornithologist. As a matter of fact there aren’t very many of those, since there are damn few birds anymore, except here. But I do happen to know quite a lot about birds, much more than most biologists. Some of my undergraduate work was done at New Princeton on Mars. As you probably know, Mars indoor habitats harbor a lot of Earth flora and fauna. They have a huge aviary there, and most of my projects including my PhD thesis involved the study of actual living birds."
"Well, we've got plenty of actual living birds for you to study here on Aves, that’s for damn sure. Big ones!"
She shook her head. "You don't understand. Helmins says that I won't have access to the research of his science staff. I'd be starting from scratch. Worse, I have almost no science equipment, or laboratory techs to perform specialized analysis. Science is something a team of people do, building on what other scientists have already done and are doing. I can't do it alone and working out of my suitcase."
"That reminds me," he said, as he reached into a pants pocket and unfolded some sort of hand-held electronic gizmo. He stepped closer to Kate and pointed it at her and then at her suitcase. It started to buzz loudly.
Abruptly he reached out to her shirt collar and yanked off a button, and before she could react he threw it onto the road and smashed it against the stones with his boot heel.
"What the hell are you doing?" Kate asked, outraged.
Weltman picked up the smashed button and showed it to her. Tiny strands of wire and other odd electronic bits spilled out of the broken button. "You were wired. Probably switched buttons with you on the ship. There's more in your suitcase too."
Stunned, she opened her suitcase and the Sheriff quickly found other 'bugs'
on each of her shirts, which Kate smashed herself. "Son of a bitch!" she muttered angrily. “Bugging people that way is illegal, even for governments and law enforcement organizations.”
“At least there don’t seem to be any implants.”
“Implants! You suspected I might have illegal bio-tech implants?”
“Stranger things have happened,” he replied. "Now, where were we? What if I can get you some stuff?"
"Stuff?"
"An office to work in and some data, to start with. Some scientific reports too, probably. And someone to work with you in the field."
"How? And who?"
"Don't ask how. Maybe I have some connections. As to who, you're looking at him."
"You?"
"I’ll do what I can. Listen, I have a degree in flight engineering. I was part of the original expedition that discovered and explored Aves, back when folks still talked to each other openly about what they were finding here and what they thought about it. I’ve lived here for seven Earth-years. I know more about this planet than the Corporation wants me to know, believe you me."
"You were part of the original Aves exploration team?"
"The co-pilot. The Corporation picked me up after I did a four Earth-year hitch in the Space Directorate, looking for smugglers ferrying drugs and what-not between the Earth and the Moon."
“So you know Frank Lambert then, the Directorate scientist already stationed here?”
“Sure. We’re drinking buddies. I’ll take you to see him, for all the good it will do us. He’s not wrapped too tight, if you catch my meaning.”
“They didn’t tell me that. But then they didn’t tell me much at all.”
“I know about as much as anyone about the birds, too.”
"OK, Aves expert, if you know so much, what do you need me for?"
Weltman looked all around, scanning nearby houses and trees. His searching eyes stopped when they found a grackle, staring back at him from a nearby roof top. "Come with me to where we can talk more freely, Doctor."
Kate followed his gaze then laughed. "You don't want to talk in front of that bird?"
"Correct," he replied, coldly serious. "Especially not in front of a blackbird. You get into the habit of being careful, if you want to live on Aves for long. Come with me, and we'll talk about it." He nodded to indicate a side street.
Kate hesitated. "I still haven't agreed to do anything for you, Sheriff, so what would be the point?"
"Listen, just let me buy you lunch, talk, and then you can make up your mind. What do you have to lose? You can't get off Aves for two months anyway. Besides, you've come a very long way to see Aves; why don't you relax and let me show you a little bit of it? I imagine that this place is a biologist’s dream."
“Or nightmare.” But she shrugged, her anger waning. OK, he was right, what did she have to lose? Besides, she was tired and starving. "All right," she agreed.
Weltman led the way up a well-traveled side-street. "It's not far.”
“If it’s air conditioned I’ll like it just fine.”
“Like a lot of places on Aves it’s sort of partly air conditioned, by Earth standards. I'd offer to wheel your bag Doctor, but you seem like the independent type."
Kate pulled the suitcase handle over to him. "Not that independent. And call me Kate."
He smiled a little as he grasped her bag. "Call me John then, Kate. You'll find the place where we're going to eat lunch pretty damn interesting itself. It's owned by another of the original expedition crew. The expedition leader, as a matter of fact: Captain Jack Martin."
“THE Jack Martin? I remember seeing him in the early Aves news releases. He owns a bar now?”
“Not just a bar, THE bar. Wait until you see it.”
"I’ve just walked past maybe a dozen bars. What's unusual about his?"
"First and foremost, it’s got Jack in it, and besides being an interesting guy and a truly great man Jack knows about as much about Aves and its birds as anyone alive. Second, there's the decor."
"What about it?"
John Weltman laughed. "You'll just have to see it."
The rest of the walk involved small talk, mostly. John was particularly interested in hearing about Mars. Despite his pilot profession while in the Directorate and the Corporation, he had never set foot on Mars, and was immensely curious to find out more about it from a Mars native.
Weltman didn't want to talk a great deal about himself, but Kate was able to pick up bits and pieces that led her to believe that after the discovery of Aves he had some sort of personal and professional difficulties and a serious falling out with the Corporation. They would have shipped him off Aves a dozen times over, except that like Jack Martin, his being part of the original expedition gave him the legal right to stay as long as he wanted to.
Weltman explained that the blue collar workers that elected him Sheriff liked the idea of a man that wasn't in the Corporation's pocket. The Corporation didn't mind him being Sheriff as long as he didn't seriously cross them. He was definitely in hot water with them over directly requesting scientists from the Space Directorate, but he didn't give a shit. Kate liked his attitude.
After a short time she couldn't help but notice that they were walking towards a large stand of trees that stood between the outskirts of Spaceport City and a huge field of what looked like waist-high Earth corn. The trees were immense; many of them far exceeded in size the one at the OP-Center. This relatively small patch of forest encompassed more living material than she ever imagined.
Traffic picked up again the further they went; most of it still men and women on bicycles or walking, and much of it headed in the same direction that they were going. There were also motorized carts, but only a few. Most powered vehicles were constructed of solar energy absorbing composites that powered nearly silent electric motors.
Everyone they came across smiled and waved at Weltman, and many warmly greeted him verbally and shook his hand. He responded in kind. Kate’s opinion of the Sheriff gradually improved. Besides, when smiling, he was almost handsome.
At the edge of the grove of trees the gravel road that they had been walking on abruptly stopped and was replaced by one made of some sort of dark brown chunky substance. Kate picked up a piece of it before she realized that it was tree bark. Other chunks were wood chips.
"The Captain says they used to use tree scraps this way on Earth too," commented Weltman, "years ago, before most of the Earth trees were gone. On Aves it's used for most of the roads. It won't hold up as good as stone or ceramics, because it composts into dirt and some of the damn bugs eat it away quickly, but as long as the lumber industry is going strong it's probably going to be the road material of choice. Stone is pretty hard to come by, in most areas, and the birds are always eating it, if it’s the right size for them to use in their gizzards. South of here we found the ancient rocky remains of an extinct volcano that furnished most material for the concrete landing field. Having a good source of stone is one big reason that we built the port here. But bark and chips is better than mud anyway. In the Spring we have melting snow and rain on much of Aves like you wouldn't believe."
They walked past a large hand-painted sign:
'THE ROC BAR.
Thirsty friends with credits welcome,
Official Corporation business PROHIBITED.
Private Property; stay on the paths,
and if possible try to NOT feed
or disturb THE DAMN BIRDS.'
"This is the largest patch of privately owned land on Aves," explained John. "It includes the grove of trees and the surrounding corn field. The Captain got it by right of discovery in accordance with Directorate laws; if it was up to the Corporation he'd be long gone."
"He's a troublemaker like you?"
John laughed. "Not exactly. He's a troublemaker in a class by himself. Even the Corporation has to respect him. He's an icon, an institution. I'm just a minor elected official. Very minor."
She glanced back
at the sign. "What does the Captain have against birds?"
"If you were here several Aves years ago, you wouldn't have to ask that question. We old timers have all lost friends and loved ones to bird attacks. Not to mention fingers, ears, arms, legs, etc. The birds were damn near as bad as the bugs. But the Captain has made his peace with the birds, or at least with some of them."
"What have you lost?"
Weltman suddenly sobered and tensed, as hate and perhaps despair filled his brown eyes. "Plenty,” he said coldly, almost spitting the word. “Enough so that I don't care to talk about it, not even to myself. Especially to myself."
Conversation stalled awkwardly at that point, and Kate focused more on the forest, and made remarks about what she observed to the sullen Weltman. Gradually he began to calm down and discuss Aves with her again.
The trees and other life forms were indeed remarkable. Acorns the size of coconuts littered the ground beneath impossibly huge Oak trees. Pine-cones as big as watermelons lay beneath pine trees. Golf-ball sized wild berries grew on bushes bigger than houses. Startlingly loud birdcalls of several types came from tree and bush, and Kate fleetingly saw several huge birds, busily pursuing and eating the frightfully large insects that crawled, hopped, and flew everyplace, and eating berries and other plant life.
She recognized immediately that the insects were again ants, beetles, flies, and other familiar Earth insect types, though of gigantic size. She wasn't an insect expert, but to her all of them certainly looked like Earth creatures. Several dragonflies with meter and a half wingspans darted among the birds, catching flies nearly as large as earth rats. Despite her scientific training to view nature objectively, her skin crawled at the sight of them. She glanced about nervously, anxious that the bugs would attack her and Weltman, but they all remained several meters away from the humans, as advertised.
"Yep, it's the bugs that bug everyone the worst," said Weltman, observing her reactions. "A bee sting or spider bite can be fatal. Before the biochemists came up with effective bug repellent, it was touch and go here, between the bugs and the birds. They damn near named this planet Bug World, but I heard that the Corporation wisely axed that bright idea. That would have made it a lot tougher to get settlers to come here, that’s for damn sure."
Kate identified additional bird species, including finches, warblers, a squat little brown wren that seemed to have an over-sized head, and an even smaller bird with prominent green coloring that hovered before one huge flower after another, acquiring nectar using its long beak. The rapid flapping of its wings made a strange deep sound. “That’s a male ruby-throated hummingbird, but it’s big as an Earth eagle!” she exclaimed. “Just think how big an Aves eagle would be!”
John smiled widely at her remark, and Kate was glad to see that he was fully out of his earlier gruff mood.
She heard The Roc Bar before she could see it, in the form of retro-rock electric guitar, drum, and synthesizer noise that emanated from deeper within the forest. Turning a curve in the path she saw that filling a small clearing ahead was the oddest building that she had ever seen in her life. It looked like it may have started as an unusually large but conventional wooden house, but on top of it and all around it were dozens of strange additions, many of them larger than the original building.
No two sections of the resulting structure matched in terms of architecture or color. The building was a crazy-quilt patchwork of boxy multi-colored cubes, cylindrical spires and rough-planked rectangular barns. There were stained-glass windows and doors leading to a dozen haphazardly protruding wood decks. This was more processed wood than she had ever before seen in one place, Kate realized, with the exception of the titanic stacks of curing lumber she had glimpsed closer to the space port. A few of the Corporation buildings at the port were larger, particularly the warehouses and grain storage bins, but they were constructed of metal and ceramic composites, not wood.
The entrance at the end of the driveway they were following was almost totally blocked by an assemblage of dozens of bicycles and motorized carts of all sizes. Open double doors led into a barn-like section that appeared to be the largest part of the structure.
As she stepped into the dimly lit building Kate first noticed the air-conditioning. The air was at least ten degrees cooler and much drier inside. Though still hotter and damper than she was used to, it was much more comfortable here than outside.
Her attention was immediately drawn to the crowded bar at the left side of the huge room, the half-dozen motley looking musicians to the right side of the room, and the even more motley looking couple of dozen patrons scattered between them, standing or sitting at wooden tables, talking, laughing and guzzling beer while they largely ignored the band. Practically everything was made of real wood, instead of plastics or ceramics. Tables, chairs, floor, bar; everything was wood. After standing there gawking for a few moments a mischievously grinning Weltman grasped the top of her head and gently tilted her gaze upward.
"By the gods!" she muttered as she stumbled back several steps. A meter above and in front of her face, talon-tipped, yellowish toes larger than a man's legs were open and poised to plunge down and grab her. A second equally motionless, massive, four-toed, sharp-taloned foot hung five meters from the first. They were part of a dead creature, she realized almost immediately, but her heart was still racing.
Her gaze moved further upward, to the immense, brownish, feathered body, and finally to the hellish, open beak and huge, cruel, hate-filled eyes that stared down at her. Golden feathers flared out from the neck and back of the head like a crown. From sharp tip of beak to end of tail feather the body had to be over ten meters long, and the wings, swept back and up as though the beast were plunging down towards the bar patrons, would have spanned well over twenty-five meters if spread fully. Hung from the ceiling by strong plexicord, the huge stuffed bird filled the entire middle of the big room. "Is it real?"
"Damn right it's real!” Weltman replied. “It ain't as impressive dead and stuffed, but believe you me, we can all be happy that damn thing is dead and stuffed. It killed and ate a dozen of the crew before we finally brought it down with a laser cannon."
"But it's incredible! Why haven't I seen it in news reports?"
"How many immigrants would we get if this thing was publicized? The Corporation has a complete news blackout on T-rex sized predator birds, among other things. Besides, we don't often see them around here anymore. This one probably originated in the mountains far west of here. There are some larger than human-sized rodents there that they seem to feed on, not to mention some monster bugs. There are even larger water birds, near the oceans and in areas of large rivers or lakes. That’s one of the reasons we settled inland."
There were photos on a wall that showed the bird being stuffed and mounted which Kate reviewed with interest while Weltman got her a sandwich and a mug of beer from the bar.
“Impressed by the Roc of the Roc Bar?” he asked when he rejoined her.
“Very, especially considering that it is probably not even a particularly large specimen.”
“How so?”
“First it’s a male, and with predatory birds males are usually smaller, if you can call five Earth-side tons of bird small. Second, notice the white feathers at the base of the wings and tail? That means that this was a juvenile bird.”
Weltman whistled as they sat down at an empty table. “No shit! Wait until I tell the Captain. But what you are telling me is based on knowledge of Earth birds, and this is Aves.”
She shook her head. “Aves or not, this IS a golden eagle. I did a paper on them once. All damn day I’ve been seeing giant Earth birds and other life-forms, there can be no doubt about it. If birds were still widely populating Earth, everyone on this planet would easily recognize the creatures on Aves for what they are.” She took off her uniform jacket and lay it atop her suitcase, so that she could better savor the relative coolness of the bar.
“Amen sister,” said a gruff voic
e. “That’s what I’ve been saying for years.” A big imposing man in his late fifties, with head and face covered in long gray hair that seemed to sprout from everywhere except his piercing gray eyes and red nose and lips, was approaching them from the direction of the bar. He limped using his right leg and crutches; his left pant-leg ended about where his left knee should have been.
A handsomely feathered ‘little’ bird hopped along a few steps in back of him. The top of its head was black, as was the front of its neck. Its cheeks and the back of its neck were white, while most of the rest of it was Gray. Kate recognized it immediately as a black-capped chickadee. Though one of the smallest birds she had seen on Aves, up close and inside a building it still seemed to be enormous.
Weltman popped to his feet, snapping to attention. “Good day, Captain. This is Doctor Kate Deborg from the Space Directorate. Kate, this is Captain Jack Martin. Oh, and the bird is Cheepers."”
"At ease, John. Captain Jack or Captain or simply Jack, Kate," he said with a warm smile, as he reached out to shake firmly her small smooth hand in his huge rough one. Then he pulled up a chair and made himself comfortable at their table. “Well, scientist, what do you think of my Eagle?” He grinned and waved a big hand towards the huge hanging bird.
Weltman repeated what Kate had told him. The Captain didn’t seem to be surprised at the assertion that it was a juvenile male. “We don’t usually tell folks that this was really one of the smaller eagles that we encountered. They’re scared enough of this one. But the important point is that you already think that these are really Earth birds, though giant ones?”
“It looks that way to me. North American birds, to be precise. I’ll know for sure once I do a genetic analysis.”
“The Corporation must have done that a hundred times over; they just won’t tell anyone the results," said Weltman.
"Of course they would have examined genetic structure,” agreed Kate. I'll be starting my own analysis today."
"Well young lady, you’re a real fire brand,” said Jack. “No wonder you have George all worked up.”
“Governor George Keto?”
“Yep. He came in here about a half-hour back to warn me not to cooperate with you.”
“He did?”
“Of course he did. That’s what the Corporation told him to tell me.”
“So will you cooperate with me?”
“Of course I will. I don’t work for the damned Corporation anymore, and I sure as hell don’t take orders from my old cook.”
“Your cook?”
“George Keto was ship’s cook on our discovery voyage,” explained John.
Captain Jack shook his head and laughed. “That little weasel! He makes a damned good Corporation puppet.”
“He seemed pleasant enough to me,” remarked Kate.
The Captain shrugged. “He really isn’t a bad sort, compared with actual Corporation management. George likes to think of himself as the people’s man, though he equates Corporation interests totally with those of the people. But tell me Doctor, if your studies do show that these are Earth birds and plants and so-forth, what will it mean? How could something like that be explained?”
“I don’t know Captain, but have you thought of the alternative?” Kate asked.
“Which is?”
“That the life here is completely alien, though it must have been made to outwardly appear to be copies of Earth life.”
Jack nodded. “Sure I thought of it, but in either case I’d want to know how and who and why, but the Corporation doesn’t want to know, or at least it doesn’t want the public to ask.”
"Why?"
"That's an easy one," said the Sheriff. "At the very least, there could be a public and scientific uproar that would upset agriculture and logging schedules. In their worst case scenario, the Corporation could totally lose control of the planet, especially because they've kept the whole question relatively quiet for so long. Everything being done here on Aves could be in jeopardy."
"That could mean a loss of trillions of credits," said Kate.
"Which is why the Corporation doesn't want even its own scientists doing much science," said Jack.
Kate shook her head. "But it's so obvious, even to a non-scientist! How can they ever expect to keep this a secret? How have they kept it a secret this long?"
Jack shrugged. "We’re a long ways from Earth, Kate. Then there’s the timing of it. Do the math."
"After this first big crop comes in, they won't have to keep it secret," explained Weltman. "There'll be so much pressure to settle Aves and get even more food products to Earth that nobody will care about how life on Aves got started or anything else.”
"As to how they've kept secrets so far,” said Jack, “it's a combination of three things, besides distance from Earth. First, there's damn few people on Aves with more than an elementary school education, and they screen and oversee the professionals very carefully. Second, they control all information coming in and out of Aves. You won't find any references on Earth birds here on Aves, except maybe in the science buildings, and most folks can’t get to those. And third, hardly anyone from Earth or Mars has ever even seen a live Earth bird or forests. You're a very rare exception."
"Oh, and one more major factor, probably the biggest of all," added Weltman. "People want to succeed here on Aves, and so they want the Corporation to succeed. They've been told that if they let the cat out of the bag they'll lose their homes and jobs here. So they very much want to believe the standard Corporation line about parallel convergent evolution and so-forth. It’s practically an article of faith here on Aves.”
Jack laughed. “Kate, my old grand-daddy told me that when he was a kid there were lots of folks that didn’t even believe that evolution happened on Earth. Unbelievable, but true. Even now, there are some religious groups that believe only what they want to, instead of believing what they see, what makes logical sense, and what science says.”
“There was a Human Brethren member on my flight in. What’s with that?”
“They make great farm laborers,” explained Jack, with a shrug. “They’re used to farming and living primitively. And they pay no attention at all to scientific or political questions. I can do the math. The Corporation loves them.”
"So what do you gentleman want with this scientist? Do you want me to somehow get word out to the Space Directorate and the public about this stuff?"
"Absolutely not," said Weltman emphatically, with his Captain nodding in agreement. "Not yet, anyway. That's why I destroyed your electronic bugs without bothering to find out if they were Corporation or Directorate bugs. We want Aves to succeed too. That means that for now we want the Corporation to succeed; with no big scandals, at least until after the harvest. So as tempted as you might be to somehow communicate to the Directorate how hosed things are here on Aves, we’d prefer that you not do that. Besides, the Directorate leadership back on Earth is probably riddled with Corporation infiltrators working to squash any such stories. You’d just get yourself in trouble."
"Then why am I here?" Kate asked.
Weltman and his Captain both settled back in their chairs and chugged down some beer. "Bad shit's happening," declared the Sheriff, grimly. "The Birds are behaving well, these last two years, but maybe too damn well, and there are things happening with them that we don't understand. But by far our biggest problem is that people are disappearing mysteriously."
“Disappearing?”
“Disappearing without a trace. It started two Aves-years ago, in late summer. It was much worse last summer.”
"And lots of birds have been disappearing too," said Captain Jack. "The blackbirds are building up to something, and I'm not sure that even the Corporation knows what it is."
"You talk as if they're intelligent, even sentient."
"I think they just might be," said Jack, "but just how sentient they are is one of the things we want you to find out."
Weltman finished his current mug and signal
ed the barkeeper for more beer. "As for me, I don’t give a rat’s ass about science. I want you to help me solve my missing people problem. I’ve pretty much eliminated humans as suspects, so I know that the birds must be involved somehow. They’re the only likely possibility. That's where you come in, bird expert."
"Isn't the Corporation interested in missing people?"
"Not openly, and they want me out of it. They want me dealing only with the small stuff. Drunks, juvenile crime, drunk and disorderly loggers and farmers, unpaid rent: that sort of thing. Any serious crime can get to be political, and they want the Corporation cops to quietly deal with it. Because of restrictions, they’re the only ones with access to decent crime-fighting technology. But this one has even them stumped."
"The missing people problem, you mean?"
"Right."
"Why do you think that birds are doing it?"
Captain Jack laughed. "You can see how big they are, and you haven't been here long, if you think these are dumb animals. First let me show you a couple of things." He turned to look at the Chickadee, which had been hanging back a few meters from the table, watching them closely. "Come here, Cheepers," he said.
The little bird hoped over to him. "Jack feed Cheepers?" it asked, in a clear sing-song voice.
"Good God, it talks!" said Kate, astonished.
The bird turned a bright eye towards Kate. "Kate friend? Kate feed Cheepers?" it asked her clearly.
"It knows my name!"
"It was listening to us talk," explained Captain Jack. "It figures a customer's name out, than asks them for food using their name. That's how it makes its living here in the bar." Kate had only a crust of bread left from her sandwich, but Jack reached into a bulging pants pocket, pulled out a huge roll and handed it to her. "Just hold it out towards him; he won't hurt you."
Kate held the roll out at beak level, which was about waist high. Even this relatively small bird was likely capable of biting her hand off. The bird hopped forward, snatched the roll from her gently, and then hopped away, disappearing through a back doorway.
"Damn," said Kate, disappointed to see it go. "What else can it say?"
"Many dozens of words. I had a little brown bird here up until a few weeks ago that I swear could converse like a human, using thousands of words. One more thing to show you." He stood up, then picked up his full beer mug before walking off. "You bring your brew too, Doc, you'll probably need it."
The Captain led them through a door behind the bar, a kitchen and a labyrinth of hallways before they entered a second huge barn-like room. Dozens of stuffed birds lined the walls. Kate's jaw dropped open and she gasped. Mounted here were great hawks, owls and dozens of smaller birds of all sorts. "I can truthfully tell newcomers that the Eagle out front is from hundreds of kilos west of here, and maybe they won't have nightmares. Besides, without using it as a draw I'd have probably gone out of business. But these bruisers were local to this area. Some still are."
"Holy smokes," Kate said, stepping forward to examine the massive stuffed owl that stood in the center of the room. It stood over seven meters tall on great taloned feet that looked as wicked as those of the eagle.
"This is my rogue's gallery, and that great horned owl is the one that got my leg," said the Captain, with a grim smile. "We had been here a year and I was being a bit careless, out where we were clearing land. That bastard massed about four metric tons in life, and was faster than you would believe. But at least hawks and owls generally act as individuals or in pairs. It's the ones that flock that worry me the most. Like that grackle." He pointed to the stuffed blackbird that stood over two meters tall and must have massed at least a couple of hundred kilograms in life. "You've probably seen these around town. They're smart and sneaky. Sometimes they seem cowardly maybe, but they're opportunists. Don't trust them, that’s my best advice. Don't ever turn your back on a grackle.
"But in the early days the most deadly hunter of humans were these beauties." He pointed to the magnificent specimen that was mounted next to the grackle. "I still advise that they be shot on sight." Compared to the grackle this bird had a shorter, heavier bill and neck, but generally matched the big blackbird in size. However, this bird's blue, white, gray, and black feathers were incredibly beautiful.
Captain Martin shook his head, perhaps remembering parts of the past that he didn't want to. "These things are fast and smart and deadly. They attacked us in flocks. Well coordinated attacks. Yeah, in that first year the damn blue jays were the worst by far." The Captain glanced at John Weltman, and Kate followed his gaze. The Sheriff was staring at the stunning blue jay with undisguised loathing.
****