Brain Ships - Anne McCaffrey [57]
Thirty minutes for each capture. . . .
They couldn't have done it if not for Tia's multitasking abilities and all the servos under her control. Right now, a set of servos were setting up crates all over the compound, near the hiding places of the Zombies. The Zombies seemed just as frightened of the servos as they were of Alex in his suit. By running the servos all over the compound, they managed to send every one of the Zombies into hiding. They ran servos around each hiding place until they were ready to move to that area for darting and capture. By now, the Zombies were getting hungry, which was all to the good, so far as Alex and Tia were concerned. One trap was being baited now—and Alex was on his way to the hidden sniper position above it. Meanwhile, the rest of the servos were patrolling the compound except in the area of that baited crate, keeping the Zombies pinned down.
A second hair-raising moment had occurred at dawn, bringing Alex up out of his bed with a scream of his own. The Zombies had gathered to greet the rising sun with another chorus of howls, although this time they seemed more—well, not joyous, but certainly there was no fear in the Zombie faces.
Once the first servo appeared, and frightened the Zombies into hiding again, the final key to their capture plan was in place.
They would catch as many of the Zombies as possible during the daylight hours. Alex had marked their favorite hiding places last night, and by now those patrolling servos had those that were not occupied blocked off. More crates would be left very near those blocked-off hiding holes. Would they be attractive enough for more of the Zombies to hide in them? Alex thought so. Tia hoped he was right—for every Zombie cowering in a crate meant one more they could dart and pack up—one more they would not have to catch tomorrow.
One less half-hour spent here. If they could keep up the pace—if the Zombies didn't get harder to catch.
Alex kept up a running dialogue with her, and she sensed that he was as frightened and lonely as she was, but was determined not to show it. He revealed a lot, over the course of the day; she built up a mental picture of a young man who had been just different enough that while he was mildly popular—or at least, not unpopular—he had few close friends. The only one who he really spoke about was someone called Jon—the chess and games player he had mentioned before. He spent a lot of time with Jon—who had helped him with his lessons when he was younger, so Tia assumed that Jon must have been older than Alex.
Older or not, Jon had been, and still was, a friend. There was no mistaking the warmth in Alex's voice when he talked about Jon; no mistaking the pleasure he felt when he talked about the message of congratulation Jon had sent when he graduated from the academy—
Or the laughter he'd gotten from the set of "brawn jokes" Jon had sent when Tia picked Alex as her partner.
Well, Doctor Kenny, Anna, and Lars were my friends—and still are. Sometimes age doesn't make much of a difference.
"Hey, Alex?" she called. He was waiting for another of the timid Zombies to give in to hunger. The clock was running.
"What?"
"What do you call a brawn who can count past ten?"
"I don't know," he said good-naturedly. "What?"
"Barefoot."
He made a rude noise, then sighted and pulled the trigger. One down, how many more to go?
* * *
They had fifty-two Zombies packed in the hold, and one casualty. One of the Zombies had not survived the darting; Alex had gone into acute depression over that death, and it had taken Tia more than an hour to talk him out of it. She didn't dare