CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The third gate in the center sanctuary opened, and Security Major Avrenti stalked into the prisoners'

courtyard.

The base of the triangle—the support for the escapers—went into operation.

Sergeant Major Isby leaned on his stool and lifted the bandage away from the stump of his leg to get a little more of the dim sun above.

Lance Corporal Morrison, on the second-level balcony, dropped his propaganda leaflet.

Major F'rella, at the far end of the prisoners' courtyard, curled one tentacle under—another Tahn recorded as entering—and, with her second brain, continued puzzling over whether that unusual archaic Earth tune written by someone named Weill could be polyphonically hummed using six of her eight lungs.

Technician Blevens yelped—supposedly at the heat of the caldron he had just touched—and dropped the caldron on the floor of the prisoners' kitchen.

The klang rang through the courtyard.

And the word was out.

"Great One protect us," Cristata said. "And now it is time to go."

Instantly Markiewicz dropped her improvised spade and began slithering backward, away from the face of the tunnel. She, like any sensible tunneler who might have to pass inspection at a moment's notice, worked naked.

Cristata grabbed her legs and helped yank her back toward the nearest way station. He looked at her body, interestedly. He was wondering why some, of the religious humans he had met saw shame in a body without covering. And suddenly he had a flash. Of course. They realized that their bodies should have been fur rather than pale flesh. They were ashamed of what they should have been instead of what they were.

Cristata, finding that thought worthy of his next meditation with the Great One and thanking the Great One for one more enlightenment, scurried back up the shaft after Markiewicz.

Markiewicz tugged on her coverall, and then they burst out of the tunnel, into the courtyard, as the paving stones slid away and then closed. Two soldiers dropped a very smelly basket of lichens over the stones and busied themselves peeling them for the evening meal.

Sorensen was lowering the eighteenth plate of glass into position, with Kraulshavn waggling final instructions when the boot thudded against the door. The plate came back up and went hastily down onto the table beside them while Kraulshavn signed frantically for clues.

Tahn. They're approaching.

Clots!

Kraulshavn pulled at the cord hanging close to him, and the ties of a mattress cover, fastened to the rafters above them, came open. Dust clouded down around them.

All the pieces they had worked on that day would have to be laboriously cleaned and sterilized before the project could continue.

Sorensen swore as the two beings slid out the door of the workshop, into the corridor, and closed the door behind them. Their waiting watchman relocked the door, then covered it with more dust blown from a small bellows. He took one final precaution: Just in case the Tahn checked the corridor with heat detectors, he drooped a length of live lighting wire from the overhead so that it dangled across the cell door. Burn marks had already been artistically painted on the door, and the wire occasionally spit sparks.

Any heat pickup would, everyone hoped, be attributed to that continuing short.

The watchman wondered what the clot the two beings were doing inside that workshop. But as Mr.

Kilgour had reminded him, that was na' his't' fash aboot. He headed for the courtyard.

What was going on inside the workshop was the slow, laborious construction of the computer that Sten needed.

Dreamers often wondered what would happen if they could appear in another, earlier time and build some sort of common tool that would make them gods, or even kings. The problem they never considered was that almost all technology required six steps of tooling before that trick item showed up.

And so Sten's computer had to begin with a chip—a series of chips.

No one would have recognized what Sorensen and Kraulshavn were constructing as a computer chip, however.

Their "chips" were cubes, almost a third of a meter to any side. For simplicity's sake, they had decided to use a basic design of a twenty-four-layer chip. Each layer was a slab of glass. Each slab had the circuitry scratched on its surface and then acid-etched. Where each resister, diode, or whatever belonged, an open space was left. Full-scale components were either built or stolen by the working parties. The circuitry was then "wired" as molten silver was poured into the acid etching. The chips' connecting legs were hand constructed of gold and wired in. Twenty-four of those plates made up each chip.

They had twelve chips ready and were about a third of the way through their task.

Both Sorensen and Kraulshavn wondered where Alex planned to put together their computer. He had not told them, and they recognized that as yet they had no need to know. They also wondered what Kilgour was planning to use for a storage facility. Another impossibility—but somehow they thought that there would be, when the time was right, an answer.

Security Major Avrenti paced through the prison corridors. He growled at the prisoners, ignoring greetings and the obligatory shouts as the Imperials ordered themselves to attention as he entered each chamber.

He imagined himself a psychic octopus, each strand of his being wisping out, trying to get the feel of his charges.

Were they hostile—indications of a potential riot? Were they smug, hiding a secret joke—indications of an escape in the planning? Were they sullen—hope abandoned? Avrenti continued his tour.

Kilgour watched the Tahn stroll down a corridor and stepped back out of sight.

"What's he doing?" one of his cohorts whispered.

"Ah dinnae ken," Alex replied. "Hae y' aye rec'lect tha' any ae th' Tahn be psychic?"

"Clottin' hope not."

"We'll dinnae take th' chance," Alex decided.

Avrenti finished his inspection and exited the prisoners' quarters into their courtyard. He paused a moment, waiting for some kind of impression. Then he saw, in the courtyard's center, a medium-sized—each way—Imperial painting the courtyard. His paint had been made from wallplaster soaked in water. His brush was a knotted rag. He was painting what appeared to be a star.

Avrenti walked up to him.

The Imperial—Avrenti searched his mental fiche and remembered him as one Kalguard or Kilgour, a minor, unimportant being—seemed oblivious to the Tahn.

"What are you doing?"

The Imperial bolted to attention, whitewash splattering.

Avrenti frowned—some of the droplets had landed on his tunic.

"Ah 'polgize," Kilgour stammered. "Ah dinnae ken y' creep."

Avrenti barely understood what the Imperial was saying but took it as an apology. "What are you doing?"

"Keepin't th' Campbells off."

"The Campbells?"

"Aye."

"What, may I ask, are they? Or it?"

"Thae'll weird, dread six-leggit beasties whae live on treacheries an' soup."

"Nonsense," Avrenti snorted. "I've never seen anything like that."

"Aye," Kilgour agreed. "M' star's ae worker, ain' it?"

Avrenti looked closely at the Imperial. There was not a trace of a smile on the prisoner's face. "Yes.

Carry on."

"Aye, sir."

Kilgour went back to painting his star, and Avrenti went out through the three gates, his mind intent on whether he should alert Commandant Derzhin to the possibility that some of the Imperials might need psychiatric care.

Alex finished his paint job, walked three times around it, then started back for his quarters. Very well, he thought. Tha' Avrenti's noo psychic. He's just most intent. He'll hae two watchers on him when'ever he com't through th' gates frae noo on.