Lost and found_ a novel - Alan Dean Foster [87]
“One survivor out of four would suffice to provide an explanation.” Brid-Nwol was running out of contesting capital, and knew it. “The others could be purged.”
“Profit,” Klos-Jlad observed sagely, “entails risk. Death is the bottom line. Revenue rises above it. I say the association votes to redouble its efforts to recover the missing inventory—alive. Time enough later, if no other choice remains, to implement termination.”
Reluctant in light of the deaths that had been inflicted by the Tuuqalian and the humiliation that had been exacted by all four of the absent inventory, the association decided to proceed as the venerable Klos-Jlad recommended. It was thus agreed: Further attempts would be made to recover the inventory. But at the insistence of Brid-Nwol, Shub-Kirn, and others of similar persuasion, Pret-Klob was compelled to place a time limit on the recovery effort. If the missing inventory had not been recovered in marketable condition within one more ten-day, then the hunting teams would exchange their capture strategy for one of outright extermination.
While Pret-Klob was not comfortable with this decision, Bren-Trad and his allies were positively livid. The fervor with which they continued to voice their objections was laudable, but they were outvoted. Profit or no profit, if the inventory had not been restored within the agreed-upon time period, steps would be taken to eliminate it. Pret-Klob sighed internally. No one was satisfied with the final outcome of the consultation. Such was the life of a chosen manager. With luck, and if all went well, the wandering stock would be safely recovered, healthy and in fully saleable condition, and that would be the end of the unruly disputation among members. If not—if the process went wrong, or the specter of something ugly and unforeseen materialized . . .
More than almost anything else, he dreaded the prospect of having to sign off on a write-down of the value of a portion of ship’s inventory.
13
The view out the port should have been awe-inspiring. Shifted stars and glossy nebulae in far denser concentrations than were visible from anywhere on Earth formed a galactic sky electric with swaths and streaks of color as pure as the elements of which they were composed. Walker could only stare in silence. The sight was mind-numbing, not inspirational. Instead of primal beauty, it only reminded him of how far he was from home, and how unlikely it was that he would ever see it again. Next to him George stood on his hind legs, balancing himself upright with his front paws on the lower edge of the transparency. If the dog’s emotions were similarly affected by the sight, he did not show them. Absorbed in examination of a nearby storage bin, Sque ignored both them and the view, while a contemplative Braouk squatted thoughtfully nearby and recited strange verse under his breath.
Forgoing the reality of the breathtaking spectacle’s crushing magnificence, Walker turned away. To shift his thoughts from the hopelessness the view incited within him, he speculated on the port’s purpose. What was it doing here, away from general access corridors, buried deep within a dark, narrow serviceway? Had it been installed as an afterthought by the ship’s designers? Was it placed here on a whim, to provide an unexpected diversion for any Vilenjji who happened to find themselves in this remote and little-visited part of the enormous vessel? Or did it serve some purpose unknown and unimaginable to him, a visitor from a distant world for whom such technology prior to his abduction had never been anything more than a separate section of the daily news? One to which he paid attention only when it affected the stock market.
He didn’t know. Neither did Sque, or Braouk. It was simply a port, an unexpected window on the universe located in an unlikely place. To learn the reason for its peculiar placement one would have to inquire of the Vilenjji, or the ship’s builders.