The Siege of Eternity

Actually, he thought, Dr. ben Jayya and his old biowar staff would be glad for something to do that was more along their lines of expertises; but while he was alerting the laboratory chiefs a breathless corporal rapped on his office door. "There's some kind of trouble with the turkey, sir," he panted. "Dr. Adcock thinks you ought to come."

Even before Makalanos got to the isolation room he could hear Dopey's excited yammering. Pat One was waiting for him at the door. "He's been like this," she managed to get out before the little creature turned to him, great fan almost glowing with passion.

"Lieutenant Colonel Makalanos! What have you done with my bearer? Is he dead?"

Makalanos glanced at Pat One for help, but she only shook her head worriedly. He tried his best. He said, trying to be placating, "If you mean the one at Walter Reed-"

"I do not mean the one at Walter Reed! I mean the one I agreed to let you take to your Starlab for the purpose of obtaining food, which it appears we no longer need, and devices for your study, which I now believe I should never have permitted. What have you allowed to happen to him?"

Puzzled, Makalanos did his best. "As far as I know, nothing has happened to him."

"As far as you know!" Dopey sneered.

"Which is pretty far, actually," Makalanos said levelly, "but it's always possible something has happened I don't know about. If you'll try to calm down, I'll go to my office and check." Turning, he gave Dannerman a curt nod. "You come with me."

In his office, he turned on the agent. "All right. What happened?"

Dannerman shook his head. "Beats the hell out of me, Colonel. We told him about his food package coming-your order, Colonel."

"I know what my order was. What did he do?"

"He seemed pleased, that's all."

"Pleased? Not surprised?"

"Just pleased. Then he complained for a while about the food he's been getting, as usual, and then, all of a sudden, he went ape. He said we'd killed his bearer."

Makalanos scowled. "Just like that?"

"Just like that. There wasn't any warning, just one minute he was pissing and moaning as usual, then all of a sudden he was having fits. I tried to tell him that killing the Doc was the last thing we wanted to do, because we needed him, but he wasn't listening. Shaking all over. Screeching. As close to hysterical as I've ever seen him. We couldn't calm him down, even though we kept telling him the Doc was all right." He paused there, and then asked, "He is all right, isn't he?"

Was the creature all right? The obvious way to find out was to query headquarters. What was wrong with that was that Makalanos felt a little foolish about asking that sort of question on nothing more substantial than the unsubstantiated conjecture-or hunch, or suspicion-of the bizarre little beast from space. Colonel Makalanos didn't like to feel foolish.

He liked it even less when the Bureau duty officer assured him that of course the Doc was all right, the Starlab party was busily loading Scarecrow materiel into the LuftBuran at that very moment. "Anyway," she added, "when they're through there'll be a report, so why don't you just watch your news screen?"

Nettled, Makalanos sent Dannerman back to give Dopey the word and do his best to keep him quiet. Then he considered what he should do next. Was it worth reporting Dopey's hysterics to the deputy director?

It probably was, he thought-but when he tried to get through he found the D.D. was not taking calls-was getting ready to head for Kourou himself, to be there when the LuftBuran landed with its cargo.

He swore to himself. Colonel Makalanos was as good at following orders as at giving them, but what orders was he to give to deal with Dopey? And who was to tell him what to do, with Brigadier Morrisey off somewhere in orbit and the deputy director too busy even to answer his phone?

D. S. Fennell, that was who; the one who had signed his latest orders. Makalanos put in a call to her on the coded line, and found her impatient, harried, annoyed at being bothered-but willing to talk. She listened briefly, then shook her head. "Did you tell him the Bundles for Beasties were on the way? And that didn't cheer him up? Well, just do the best you can, Priam."

"I wish I knew more of what was going on," he complained.

"Don't we all? But what's to tell? There was a Chinese submarine shadowing the tug with the capsule, but be warned them off from territorial waters and now they're headed south. To Kourou, I guess. And there were a couple of Mexican frigates that got too close and had to be chased away-and, naturally, a lot of diplomatic complaints, but screw them. So everything's under control ... I hope. Now can I get back to dealing with all this crap, please?"

"I guess," Makalanos said reluctantly. "Daisy? What are you doing with this Starlab stuff? I thought you were assigned to head up all the rest of the Bureau's business?"

Unwarranted Exclusion of Peaceful Shipping