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  Not unexpectedly, the inside of Braouk’s mouth had been hot and wet. George had enjoyed the warmth but was now forced to engage in an orgy of licking to try to glean the Tuuqalian equivalent of dried saliva from his fur. In contrast, Sque had actually enjoyed the additional moisture but had reacted poorly to the increased temperature. All that mattered, really, was that both of them had survived the experience.

  Minimal maintenance illumination provided just enough light for them to see by. Walker would only have stumbled around blindly in the murky enclosed space, but both the dog and the K’eremu had much more acute night vision than any human. The unlikely pair had the benefit of George’s sensitive nose as well.

  That was not why they had been chosen to try to make the escape, however. It was because of the four conspirators, only they were small enough to fit inside the Tuuqalian’s voluminous orifice, and only he had a mouth large enough to hold someone else. That left Walker out of the oral loop, so to speak. Also, it was vital that Sque, who alone among them knew something of Vilenjjian technology, be among those who attempted the breakout. It was decided that George should go along to provide assistance, and to watch her back, such as it was.

  Walker had shrewdly noted that the only possible route out of the enclosures, the only places that were not secured by the electrical barriers put in place by the Vilenjji, were the small circular lifts that three times a day supplied food and water to the captives. These could not be used in escape attempts, had not been used, for the self-evident reason that anyone trying to flee through the short-lived openings, even if they succeeded in squeezing through the temporary gap without getting crushed by the machinery, would easily be spotted by sophisticated surveillance equipment and dealt with appropriately. How to carry out such an attempt while concealing it from watching Vilenjji was a challenge that had occupied his thoughts for some time.

  It was only while watching Braouk dine one day that a possible solution as absurd as it was audacious had occurred to him. Assured by the initially unenthusiastic Tuuqalian that he could manage his part of the scheme, there remained the problem of distracting the Vilenjji and somehow persuading them that Braouk had eaten the individuals he had ingested instead of just holding them in his mouth the way a squirrel stores nuts. Eventually, it was the Tuuqalian himself who came up with the idea of going on a hunger rampage.

  “After all saying, it is well known, Tuuqalian berserks,” was how the big alien had put it. Familiar as they were with his periodic rages, he believed that one more would not arouse any unusual suspicions among the Vilenjji. To further enhance the drama, Walker would react to Braouk’s feeding frenzy with as much emotion as he could muster. Anything the human chose to do by way of response, Braouk assured him, the Tuuqalian could and would ignore. And, the dog marveled as he lay on his belly and listened to the ceaseless hum and whir and click of busy machinery all around them, it had worked. So far. He and Sque had made it safely outside the enclosure boundaries, perhaps the first captives of the Vilenjji ever to do so. Assuming the Vilenjji believed the evidence of their own electronic eyes, they could reasonably come to no other conclusion than that the small quadruped and decapod were both demised and in the process of being digested. Which meant no one would come looking for them.

  “You’ve got to hand it to Marc,” he whispered, trying to look every which way at once. “For a human, he’s pretty damn clever.”

  From within the rust-red splay of tentacles bunched up next to him, the K’eremu replied, “I confess I was initially dismissive. The audacity of it defies logic. Yet here we are, for the first time since our captivity, free from the caging of the detested Vilenjji. If only for these few moments of freedom, I am grateful for your friend’s primal cunning.” In the near darkness, watchful eyes glinted. “Given time and sufficient aspiration, I would of course have concocted a similar stratagem myself.”

  Sure you would, George thought sardonically—but to himself. Having taught Marc how to grovel slavishly, he was not about to disregard his own counsel. If they were going to build on their immediate success, they needed to sustain the full concentration and enthusiasm of the dank cluster of crafty coils resting alongside him.

  He wondered how Marc was doing, still trapped up above, still acting the part of the grievously outraged. He had no doubt that his human was at that moment probably wondering precisely the same thing about him.

  Lying there in the almost blackness next to the clammy K’eremu, his fur still thickly matted with the sticky residue of Tuuqalian mouth moisture, the dog marveled at what they had already accomplished.

  “I’ll bet we are the first captives to ever escape from a Vilenjji enclosure.”

  Nearby, Sque’s flexible form was a conical shadow in the dim light. “I cannot say for certain, but we are certainly the first to do so in all the time I have spent on this disagreeable vessel.” Eyes shifted. “Odd as it may sound, while reposing within our large companion’s capacious mouth and struggling to avoid suffocation therein, it came to me as to how I can adequately deal with my own somewhat quirky tastes.”

  “You mean your addiction.” As he scanned the dark accessway in front of them, the dog was panting softly.

  Sque was sufficiently aloof to ignore the recurring aspersion. “Our present position places us just outside the good Braouk’s environment and just inside the grand enclosure.” One tentacle pointed toward the food lift they had dodged in the course of making their escape. “A similar device for supplying food and water lies beneath every individual ecosystem. As you know, these are in turn arranged in a circle around the circumference of the grand enclosure.” The limb continued to gesture. “If we follow these successive food lifts around the curve of the zone where captives are kept, we will eventually reach our own. I will then have access to those food squares that are synthesized specifically for my digestive system, and you for yours.”

  George considered. “Won’t the Vilenjji, or their equipment, notice if food bricks are missing before they’re served up top?”

  “Nourishment is provided thrice daily,” she replied. “A brick or cube here and there ought not to be missed. Even if the absence of one or two prior to delivery are, our captors are far more likely to put it down to an aberration of preparation or delivery rather than theft by individuals they have already presumed dead. In any event,” she added as she began to move stealthily forward, “we have to eat.”

  George could not argue with that. Though still too excited by their success to really be hungry, he saw the wisdom of eating to keep their strength up. Squeezing out from beneath the heavy metal overhang, he followed Sque as she led the way along the deserted accessway.

  It did not remain deserted for very long. Though her eyesight was a degree sharper than his, he was the one who heard the slight whispering of air approaching.

  “Something’s coming!” he muttered anxiously, looking around for a hiding place.

  “Here.” Sque led the way back into a dark recess between two high metal rectangles. They were warm to the touch, and mewed like kittens trying to hold a high “C.”

  The device that came trundling toward them down the accessway had no head and not much of a body. It did have a lot of limbs, a number of which terminated in specialized tools. These concerned George considerably more than the machine’s lack of a clearly defined cranium.

  “What if it looks this way?” he whispered to his companion even as he tried to shrink farther back into the unyielding alcove.

  “With what?” Sque shot back. “I discern no obvious visual receptors.”

  “Maybe it doesn’t need eyes. Maybe it uses other mechanical senses.”

  “Maybe it has big ears,” she hissed. George went silent.

  Traveling on some sort of air propulsion system, the scooter-sized device approached their place of concealment. Directly opposite, it halted. George wanted to whimper, but held his breath. The machine lingered there for a long moment, hovering less than an inch above the floor, b
efore resuming its programmed itinerary. As it receded down the accessway, both escapees cautiously peered out from within the recess.

  “It looked right at us.” George hesitated as he watched the machine disappear around a distant curve. “At least, it seemed like it did.”

  Half a dozen of Sque’s tentacles wriggled animatedly. “I do not believe it even saw us, or otherwise detected our presence. I had hoped that would be the case, and logic suggested the possibility. But it is one thing to hypothesize and another to survive.”

  “You bet your last limb it is.” A relieved George trotted out into the corridor to join her.

  “It is a characteristic of all but the most advanced automatons that they are designed to carry out only those directives that have been entered into their undeviating neural cortexes. Never having been encoded to look for escapees or intruders, assuming no other captives have ever escaped before, it is rational to presume that they would not recognize one such if they ran right into them.”

  “So what you’re saying is that we ought to be able to move around freely in the presence of everything but the Vilenjji themselves?” The dog’s tail was wagging briskly again.

  “That is what I am saying.” The speaking tube swayed energetically. “What I am going to do, however, is try to avoid contact with automatons wherever possible. I would rather not make the encounter of the one device designed to be the exception. But it appears that we certainly have some flexibility where such encounters are concerned.” She resumed scuttling down the accessway.

  “It did stop across from us, though.” George could not get that nagging little fragment of encounter out of his mind. “It must have detected our presence.”

  “Detection is nothing. Reaction is everything,” Sque declared meditatively. “I theorize it decided we were other devices, not unlike itself. A useful subterfuge that we hopefully will not have to rely upon too frequently.”

  The truth of the K’eremu’s assessment was proven in several successive encounters. Each time they came upon a busy motile device they could not avoid it either ignored them, went around them, or waited for them to pass. Each time, they waited for a posse of armed Vilenjji to come looking for them. And each time, they were left in peace, as before, to continue their progress.

  George was starting to feel a little lost. Much of the machine and instrument-filled service area that lay beneath the individual enclosures looked identical to every other part “How do you know how far to go, Sque?”

  Her reply was composed, assured. “I routinely memorize every detail of my surroundings. The relevant information was refreshed every time we visited the Tuuqalian’s enclosure. Tahst—we are here.”

  The food bricks and cubes and occasional odd shape that had piled up on and alongside the familiar circular lift looked no different to George than those of any others, but one taste was enough to set the usually reticent Sque to swooning.

  “Joqil!” she exclaimed. She seemed to collapse in on herself, only to inflate larger than ever a moment later. “How I have missed it.”

  “It’s been barely a day,” George grumbled. “You really do need your fix, don’t you?”

  “Nothing is broken,” she responded immediately. “Or do I miscomprehend your metaphor?”

  “Doesn’t matter.” His own stomach growled. Eloquently. “I could use a snack myself.”

  “Of course. I will take what I can carry.” Silvery eyes met his. “Unless, of course, I can prevail upon you to acknowledge the necessity of providing first and foremost for the most indispensable member of—”

  “No,” George barked—but quietly.

  “I am not troubled, having anticipated such a primitive and benighted reaction.” Loading up several tentacles with as many of the food cubes as she could carry, she started back the way they had come.

  It did not take long to find the lift that supplied the Sierra section Walker inhabited. The dog’s own resettled urban alley environment was right next door. Not wanting to embark on the next move until some time had passed and the riotous occurrence in the Tuuqalian’s preserve had faded from the minds of their captors, they settled down to allow George to eat his fill. Nibbling on a food cube, Sque kept watch on the accessway. From time to time preoccupied automatons would pass, busy in both directions. As always, they ignored the watchful K’eremu and the munching dog.

  Actively feeding his face, George felt a pang of guilt. Somewhere above their heads and farther around the great carousel of individual enclosures, Marc and Braouk must be consumed with worry, wondering what if anything had happened to their two smaller companions. Worse, to maintain the illusion of discord they had employed to distract and confuse the Vilenjji, from now on they would have to avoid one another and could not even seek surcease in each other’s company or conversation. To do so might raise alarm, or at least suspicion, among perceptive Vilenjji, who might well wonder how one alien who had seen his closest friend eaten by another could remain friends with the perpetrator of such an outrage. That meant Braouk would have to stay in his enclosure while Walker eventually returned to his. As punishment, and precaution, Braouk was sure to be locked down in his environment for the foreseeable future. Not that the big Tuuqalian would mind. He was used to being penned up.

  It would be interesting to see how he would react and what he would do, George mused, if he ever got loose. Though their personal acquaintance was not deep, George had acquired the distinct impression that forgiveness was not a particularly Tuuqalian characteristic. The dog hoped to be around at least long enough to behold proof of that.

  11

  Resisting the urge to creep close to their friends’ respective food lifts when these were delivering their regular allotments of food so George could inform their coconspirators of their ongoing success, the two oddly matched but equally determined escapees embarked upon a thorough investigation of the area beneath the captivity enclosures.

  “Too chancy,” Sque had argued when George had first proposed whispering up proof of their continued survival. “While no visual surveillance devices located aboveground would detect us, there is too much risk of an aural pickup catching your words. Until the right moment, our friends will have to survive without reassurance.”

  To this George could only nod. The K’eremu was correct. It was not worth risking everything they had achieved thus far just to bark up a word of encouragement to Marc, alone in his enclosure. In his mind, the dog knew that the K’eremu’s caution was well considered.

  But despite her company, and her illuminating if sometimes caustic conversation, it did nothing to assuage his growing loneliness.

  They conducted their observations and study in the form of a widening spiral, commencing their research beneath the approximate center of the grand enclosure and working their way gradually outward. Though not one of the multitude of service mechanicals challenged their presence, or paused long enough to carry out more than the briefest of scrutinies in their direction, the escapees took no chances. Whenever they sensed movement, they stopped whatever they happened to be doing and concealed themselves as best they could from the passing automatons.

  It was not difficult to do. The underside of the grand enclosure and its peripheral individual ecozones was a jungle of conduits, servos, conveyance devices, customized life support systems, both optical and hard transmission lines, and much more. Not to mention the elaborate installation that was required to supply individually calibrated food bricks and liquids to captive representatives of dozens of different species. In reference to the latter, Sque went into some detail as to how the sustenance synthesization system worked. George ignored most of the speech. It was not relevant to their immediate situation; his scientific background consisted of rooting through garbage bins to find those bits that were edible; and he was much more interested in finding the critical switch, or circuit breaker, or button, or whatever the appropriate designation was for shutting down the barrier that kept his friends caged up top.

 
His indifference to her lecture miffed the K’eremu. “Assuming you possess sufficient cerebral folds to be capable of it, how will you ever rise above your present state of scholarly deprivation if you do not make an effort to improve yourself?”

  “I’m willing to improve myself.” George spoke as the two of them approached an especially well-lit area boasting unusually high ceilings. “Find me a groomer. I’ll even stand still for a bath.”

  Sque made disapproving sounds. “Mere physical modifications mean nothing.”

  “Is that so?” The dog pointedly eyed the assortment of adornments that decorated the K’eremu’s epidermis. “Then why don’t you get rid of all that junk jewelry you’ve got stuck all over yourself? You look like an itinerant garage sale.”

  Sque stiffened perceptibly. “It is not ‘junk.’ It is not even properly what you call jewelry. My accumulated qus’ta is an affirmation of my individuality; one that is vital to every K’eremu.”

  “Uh-huh. Like ‘vote for’ buttons, except yours all say ‘vote for me!’ ”

  “I fail to comprehend any deeper meaning behind your primordial ravings.”

  “You think that’s primordial ravings, you should see me when I find a steak bone somebody’s thrown out.” Ears suddenly cocked forward. “Getting pretty light up ahead. Think we should turn back?”

  The brief acrimony forgotten, Sque turned her attention to the accessway that loomed in front of them. It was much wider and higher than any they had encountered previously, and far more brightly lit.

  “By now we should be beneath the outermost edge of the circular enclosed zone. It may be that we have even progressed beyond its limits.” She edged sideways until she was under the cover of a swooping mass of metal and ceramic. Following, he found himself envying her ability to change direction without having to turn her body.