Lost and found_ a novel - Alan Dean Foster [83]
Some twenty minutes later, when both man and dog were starting to get antsy, Braouk lowered her back to the floor. Holding several small objects in her tentacles, she continued her work. Studying that flat, alien face when she was finally finished, it was impossible to tell for certain, but Walker had the distinct impression she was pleased with the results of her work.
“What did you do?” he asked as they resumed moving down the corridor.
“Arrogance is its own reward,” she told him, without the slightest hint of irony. “The Vilenjji will respond to my efforts, but not until they announce themselves. If I have done my work well, that should be sometime tomorrow, ship-time.”
“But what did you do?” George reiterated, trotting along between her and Walker.
“Made some improvements to the delivery system, I hope. A pity we cannot linger in the vicinity to observe the results. We shall simply have to imagine them.” Horizontal black pupils regarded the human. “Your kind does have imaginations, does it not?”
“Vivid,” Walker assured her.
“One doubts . . .” Her voice trailed off momentarily. “I will endeavor to create a mind-picture sufficiently rudimentary so that even you can understand.” She proceeded to do so.
Dven-Palt advanced cautiously. From the communicator on her arm, a voice called out to her. It being a restricted linear transmission, only she was able to hear it.
“Anything as yet?” Pret-Klob was asking.
“Not yet,” she murmured back. In her other hand she gripped a snadh. Unlike every other device the Vilenjji had employed while recapturing their scattered inventory, the snadh was not intended to net, immobilize, shock, tranquilize, or otherwise render harmless individual life-forms. The dozen small, explosive, hyperkinetic spheres it held under pressure were designed to kill.
The presence of such death-dealing devices was required because the lethal specimen from Tuuqalia was among the four captives still at large within the ship. At least, it was assumed four were still at large. No one was discounting the possibility that the berserker Tuuqalian had killed and quite possibly eaten the other three. So the determined quintet that was tracking them in this particular service corridor had come prepared, if need be, to kill as well as capture.
No one wanted to have to terminate the Tuuqalian. It was an exceedingly valuable specimen and represented high profit to the association. But having already lost several of their colleagues to its fury, they were not prepared to make further sacrifices in the name of revenue.
When the support sensor in Sector Jwidh had initially alerted the monitors to the presence of organic life in Section Thab, there had been some expressions of disbelief. Aside from wondering how the captives, or captive, had succeeded in entering the restricted area in the first place, it was quite a surprise to see how far from the enclosures they had traveled. Not that it mattered. They were only wandering. A little longer and a little farther than the rest of the recovered inventory, perhaps, but still only wandering. There was nowhere for them to go.
And now that their presence had been detected, the recovery team led by Dven-Palt was about to put an end to their undesirable liberty. In the end, the superior species always won out.
Two of the team carried snare boosters. The heaviest recovery equipment in the Vilenjji capture arsenal, it would not only incapacitate a Tuuqalian, but contained within its strands sufficient soporific to simultaneously render two or three of the giants unconscious. The less dangerous escapees, if they still survived, were of minor concern. Virtually any confinement device would serve to restrain them sufficiently for recovery.
They were now very near