An excited Sam Weiman and Grm begged a moment of Thian’s time as the Washington and the fleet she led made their way toward the next suspect system.

“I know this may sound absolutely ridiculous,” Sam began, with Grm bouncing up and down on its flippers beside him. “But I’ve been thinking about pheromones, our odors”—he tapped his chest—“and theirs.” He pointed astern, meaning Arcadia or system Cj-70, which was now a good week behind them. “I think smell has a lot more to do with Hivers than we may have adequately investigated. When we had Operation Shanghai under way, I automatically took samples of the air as we went from place to place—sort of a headspace analysis, the sort we’d do with alien insects—in each collection point. I believe that the Hivers have been classified as basically insectoids. I also had Commander Kloo add gas chromatography to the remotes to keep track of any pheromone alterations. At any rate, Grm here and I have discovered that these pheromones are distinct, identifiable chemical compounds, especially when the queen made replacements for the attendants we took from her quarters.”

“Really?” Thian raised his eyebrows in surprise. “More than interesting,” he went on, “since Earth Prime forwarded me in his latest report of the general situation at Blundell news that my sister Zara is working on the Mrdini hibernatory problem.” He turned to Grm and spoke in Mrdini with a quick but respectful bow. YOU MAY NOT HAVE HEARD THAT THE MRDINI FRIENDS OF CLARF’S PRIME AND T-2 DANO WERE PART OF THE TRAGEDY AT CLARF’S MAIN HIBERNATORY. MRDINI HAD GRACIOUSLY REQUESTED ZARA AS PRIME MEDICAL HUMAN TO HELP REVIVE AND HEAL THE VICTIMS.

Grm, however, bowed, its poll eye covered slightly by its lids in deference to the sad incident. DID HEAR. AS XENBEE, THIS ONE KNOWS THAT SPECIAL PHEROMONES ARE USED IN HIBERNATORIES. BUT NOT WHICH ONES. Grm nodded but indicated for Thian to continue. DEEPEST, MOST SACRED INFORMATION KNOWN ONLY TO KEEPERS WHO ARE TRAINED TO MANAGE HIBERNATORIES. It gave a little shudder.

“I wonder what sort of smells we exuded on our first visit to that queen’s quarters. She sure aired the place out in a hurry.”

“The point is,” Sam went on, giving Grm another apologetic bow, “that if we knew what pheromones the queen produces under which circumstances, we might find a way of ... of sort of replacing certain pheromones and thus producing a more pacific attitude. Reducing their size and aggressiveness: making them more like the Arcadians. Has anyone done a ‘headspace analysis’ of the Heinlein queen?”

“I can certainly find out,” Thian said at his most cooperative. “Wouldn’t it be ironic if pheromones were the key to the Hiver problem as well as the Mrdinis’? We’ve been too busy, he thought to himself, having to eliminate the Hivers to discover how to contain them. But that difference in size between Arcadia’s workers and those at Xh-33 and by the Heinlein queen’s must be significant.

Back at Iota, and genuinely glad to be there, he saw little enough of Zara—she rarely even slept at the Tower House right now, trying to save the victims of the Clarf hibernatory’s breakdown. He hunted with Petra and Ewain, careful to keep up an easy relationship with them and their parents. He had no trouble finding female companionship of the type he preferred in Iota Aurigae City.

Two days later, they had just finished shifting another six big daddies, when Earth Prime asked for a few words with Vagrian.

Damia grinned and gestured for Vagrian to answer while she and Afra left the Tower ... just as if, Vagrian thought very carefully, they couldn’t have “heard” whatever Jeff Raven said if they wished. He doubted they would stoop to listening, since both were scrupulous in Talent protocol and traditions and Afra was a methody Capellan.

Beg pardon? Vagrian gripped the armrests of his couch in surprise.

I hardly know what to say, sir, Beliakin replied, swallowing figuratively and literally, but I’ll certainly do my best to prove my abilities.

Vagrian was still so stunned at his unexpected good fortune that he said the first thing that came to mind.

Won’t take me long at all, sir. And he was out of his couch and descending three steps at a time, the clatter causing Keylarion to stare at him. Then he also realized that Xexo hadn’t come up out of his engineering pit and the generators hadn’t been turned off.

“I’m going to a new Tower,” Vagrian cried as he passed the two. “I’ve got to pack. I’ll have my own Tower.” He caught at the doorframe with both hands to stop his reckless forward momentum since Damia and Afra were in the little lounge, grinning at him.

“Take all the time you need to pack, Vagrian,” Damia said cheerfully. “And congratulations. We didn’t think we’d have you long. Not with your kinetic strength.”

“I won’t take long,” he promised, and stifled the urge to teleport to his room. He did, however, use his kinetic Talent to start gathering up his belongings in the house onto the bed, and was rolling his disks into shirts and sweaters before he was out of sight of the Lyons. Then he ’ported to his room and speeded up the process of packing. Since he’d seen Damia ’port his things into her house, he had no qualms about ’porting them back to the Tower yard by the personnel carrier that was always racked in one of the side cradles.

Damia and Afra were coming down the Tower steps as he jogged up from the house. He said all that was suitable for a leave-taking, grinned at their repeated congratulations, waved a farewell and thanks to Xexo and Keylarion, who came out of the Tower to see him off.

Afra closed the cover with one last smile. Of course, Vagrian didn’t feel the transfer, not one being done by the Iota Aurigae Tower. He did hear a male voice accept transfer : Got ’im, Damia. Thanks. Greetings, Beliakin. Perry here. Then he heard a great deal of exterior noise as his personnel carrier settled into its destination cradle. We’ll meet later, Beliakin. Do get into the Tower as soon as possible. We’re quite busy.

The tenor voice sounded slightly breathless, which suggested to Vagrian that this Perry—one of David of Betelgeuse’s sons, wasn’t he?—was multitasking. A tap preceded the opening of his carrier and he felt a rush of fresh air, warmer than Iota’s, filled with myriad smells—mostly of building materials, paint, oil, grease and Human sweat.

“Hi, I’m your expediter, T-2 Vagrian Beliakin,” said the dark-haired woman looking in at him. “My name’s Beejay, T-3 ’pather.” She stepped back to allow him to exit the carrier, her grin broadening with just the sort of appreciation for his masculinity that Vagrian appreciated.

After the quiet of Iota Aurigae’s Tower facility, the hectic activity here—in a hilltop clearing which had obviously been leveled for the Tower—and the noise were an assault on his ears. Glancing round to identify what and where the diverse noises were coming from, he saw Humans and ’Dinis everywhere, putting up sections of buildings, roofing, dashing from one of the many open large drones for supplies, so that the place appeared totally populated instead of the most recent colony world. Beyond the immense clearing, beyond the mounds of dirt that had been pushed out of the way for the Tower, he could see wave after wave of odd-looking tree types spread out in all directions, and up the foothills of mountains not quite as sharp, or young, as Iota’s.

“Takes a bit of getting used to,” Beejay said, grinning. “All that greenery. Hiver ruins are all overgrown too.” She held out her hand and Vagrian hastily responded by touching her long, blunt fingers: yellow/citrusy/flowing, were what he got from their touch. She had an attractive, rather than pretty, face and a compact but feminine body. Her grin widened and she cocked one narrow eyebrow in a mutual appreciation of the information conveyed. “’Port your stuff into the L section—the lounge is the first room.” She pointed. “Nice one too. We got our quarters built yesterday and nothing’s sorted out. Though the Tower is. That’s why we’re not all here to meet you. Vaclava, our T-3 expediter, is in direct contact with Perry on the Asimov with a long list of things we need yesterday. Janfinde’s fussing with his generators because he’s got a shimmy he has to fix before we’re actually operational. Hope you can reach the Asimov in just a merge because we’re stuck for so much right now ... C’mon.”

Vagrian’s T-2 kinetic strength was put to an immediate testing, but the merge techniques he had acquired when Damia and Afra had him work with their Aurigaean latents and their two youngest children couldn’t have been better experience. The metal stairs up to the “Tower” lacked carpeting and it was a cupola like Clarf’s. Comformable couches were brand-new—someone had guessed his height and width right, though, so he had no fault to find with that, though he hoped the screens were more securely hooked to the still-unfinished walls than they looked. Beejay must have done a lot of merging, because as soon as she had settled on her couch, she opened her mind to him. By the time Perry called a lunch break, Vagrian realized how much he missed the oomph of working with T-1’s, even Ewain’s stolid mind.

“C‘mon,” Beejay said, “the Navy supplies our grub and it’s captain’s-table quality.” He would have eaten anything, but he rather thought he’d miss Damia’s inventive menus.

The “lounge” had no furniture, bar the duffels stacked around its circular form and the trestle table in the exact center with rough benches on either side, facing windows with magnificent views. Steaming-hot food was waiting on the table, and shortly the rest of his Tower staff gathered to eat.

“Told you, didn’t I?” Beejay said, grinning when Vagrian lifted the lid from a covered dish and inhaled spicy aromas. Had Damia somehow managed to send along his food preferences: hot and hotter? “Of course, there’s space here for a proper kitchen and I really do like to cook. We can have non-T staff if we want, and I suspect you may want to request help. We’ll have a lot to do getting started.... Hi there, Vaclava. Meet Vagrian.”

Vaclava shyly offered her hand to Vagrian and he felt violet /lavender scent/liquid. She slipped in opposite him, a quieter, younger personality than Beejay. He’d have to deal carefully with her. He learned later this was her first post after being trained by the Bastianmajanis on Altair. He sensed a charming determination to do everything right the first time. Janfinde, who was brown/nutmeg/cautious, brought the smells of grease and oil with him, though he had changed to fresh clothing before joining them at the table.

“I’ve a CPO coming down tonight, Tower,” Janfinde said, filling his plate, “to help me tune the number two. We should be running on our own power by morning.” And that was the last thing he said, concentrating on his food.

Beejay had enough conversation to cover his silence and Vaclava’s shyness, and pulled out of Vagrian the details of where he’d been, what he’d done and all about the assassination attempt, which had been, she was sure, played down by Perry and Captain Osullivan, commander of the Fourth Fleet. She admitted coming from Procyon’s planet, Truro, wrinkling her nose because her homeworld had as much a reputation for oddball cults and preserves as Capella had for strictly methody ways. Truro also harbored many of the clairvoyant or prescient Talents and some of the more gifted Talent therapists. As a T-3 ’pather, she’d decided to enlist when the call came out through Truro’s Talents that Blundell was in need of high T’s on well-paid short-term contracts that could be extended.

So she’d come to see what a new world looked like.

“Not that I expected it to be a Hiver world, but hey, well”—she shrugged, her ready grin wry—“new Tower, good chow, the Navy’s been real helpful and those ’Dinis are a hoot and a half. You don’t have any?” She made a pretense of looking around her.

“Only the ones I met at Iota Aurigae,” Vagrian replied with a slight, self-deprecating grin. “But they’re likable and they can work all the hours God gave the day. Which reminds me, how long a day do we have here?”

“Twenty-five hours, fifteen minutes. No one’s bothered to figure out a leap year yet, but at this latitude we have about twelve hours of daylight.” She pointed upward. “Perry insists we keep to an eight-hour working day.” She glanced down at her wrist. “And we’re due to work the second half of it like right now.”

Dutifully Vagrian rose, gesturing at the dirty plates and dishes remaining from a completely consumed lunch.

“You’re the kinetic.” Beejay gave him a vivid mental glimpse of the galley on the Asimov. “The head cook gives us hell if we break anything. Captain’s service, you see, not plastic.”

Vagrian nodded understandingly, and with a dramatic wave of his hand, the dishes disappeared.

Beejay jutted her chin out as if she were looking, grinned and straightened up. “You’re neat! Stroganoff will love you!”

“Stroganoff?” Vagrian exclaimed, remembering that he’d been served what Damia called scurrier Stroganoff.

Beejay made a cross over her chest. “Swear by all I hold sacred, that’s her real name. Mina Stroganoff. And she hates being teased about it.”

“I never tease someone who can cook like that. Let’s assume our Tower positions, shall we?” He included the shy Vaclava Soolik in his courtly gesture. He did a two-fingered salute to Janfinde, who nodded in acknowledgment and went back to his truculent generators.

By the end of the eight-hour day, Vagrian was exceedingly grateful to Perry’s insistence on set hours. His last task of the day was to bring down the CPO engineer who was going to help Janfinde.

Anything that comes in to the Asimov from now on can wait until morning. There was something like droll humor in the Prime’s tone. We’re expecting fuel drones, but there’ve been priorities going astray, so no night-light work down there until our reserves are sufficient. Get a good night’s rest and thanks for your help today, Beliakin. Look forward to meeting you face to face. Captain Osullivan sends his regards too.

Another delicious meal awaited the Talents and made the CPO’s eyes gleam greedily.

“You guys got it made,” he said, restlessly waiting until Beejay, acting hostess, told him to seat himself and dig in.

“Prime eating,” was the CPO’s opinion, even though Janfinde set the pace of eating to get back quickly to the ailing number two generator.

After he’d cleared the table of dirty china, Vagrian thought to ask if the CPO would need to be transported back to Asimov too.

“Well, sir, Captain Beliakin, if it’s all right with you, when we finish, I’ll just doss down here until after breakfast.” And the man’s wide, hopeful grin relieved Vagrian of one last duty. What he really wanted was a shower and a bed.

“Which room’s mine?” he asked Beejay.

“Yours is the last door facing the corridor. Not much in it yet, but the shower water should still be hot. We haven’t got everything set up,” she said, “what with other priorities, but the bed’s good. We’re to get proper furniture later and you can choose.... Wait! Look at that! Worth a few minutes’ watching,” she added, pointing to the western-facing window as Iwo’s sun set, gilding the evening clouds with gold and orange that seemed to linger long after the primary was finally out of sight.

“See what you mean,” Vagrian said appreciatively. Then he nodded her a good night as he looked down the corridor for his door. He ’ported his duffels in that direction.

Bare the accommodation was, with a desk, a chair, a desk lamp in his “lounge.” A door set in the west wall led into a bedroom, golden in the last of the dusky light, furnished with a wide bed that had a double sleeping bag on it. There was a wide bench. Sliding panels covered the closet space on one side of the door, and to his left there were rough shelves and in the south wall another door, which opened into a well-equipped bathroom.

Someone got priorities right. Towels hung on a rack and a variety of toiletries were lined up on the space by the handbasin. As he stripped, he crossed to the bed and tested it. Yes, someone knew the priorities: the bed had some sort of soft layer and was firm beneath. Just right! He walked naked to his bathroom, ’porting shut the doors he hadn’t bothered to close behind him. The shower stall was also a surprise: big enough for two. The water, while warm, was more hot than cool and there was enough of it for him to get a good scrub.

When he left the bathroom, the air had already cooled in the bedroom. A light on the headboard had come on automatically, so he made his way quickly to the sleeping bag, which he would doubtless be glad of if the night got much cooler, and lay down. He turned on his stomach and applied relaxing techniques to a mind spinning with work and myriad impressions. His last thought was that he had not had time to do something to Laria’s favorite mare before he’d left Iota. Then he remembered that she was also Petra’s mount and he owed the Iota Lyons. Maybe he even owed Laria. His own Tower ... Vagrian Beliakin slept the sleep of the just.

“Emergency code from the Xh-33 Moon Base, sir,” the communications officer said, swinging her chair round to face him.

“Put it up.”

There was the usual time lag due to the distance between the Asimov and the Xh-33 system.

“Captain Osullivan, Wisla Makako here.” The screen showed the Oriental features of the facility’s commander. “All hell’s breaking loose down there on the Main Continent. Queens leading armies of really big...” The screen now switched to the surface carnage with queens leading some of the biggest creatures, which Osullivan recognized as augmented “worker” types from his captaincy of the Genesee. “... dangerous looking types.”

“Is the situation more serious than your reports of earlier skirmishes over field boundaries?” Osullivan asked, his eyes intent on the scene. During the pause between query and answer, the captain sent quick orders. “Prime Perry, on the bridge right now!” Osullivan had never given the T-1 such a direct order, in fact didn’t even realize he hadn’t couched it as tactfully as he usually did. Perry ’ported beside him and Osullivan had only to point to the screen’s grim scene to explain the summons as he continued firing off orders. “Helm, set an immediate course for the Xh-33 system. Top speed. Fortunately we’re not spatially that far from it. Send a signal to Iwojima that they’re on their own for the next couple of days. We’ll be back in orbit as soon as we’ve assessed the situation. Perry, the Moon Base has only a T-3 kinetic.”

Makako was replying: “This seems to involve all the queens on the Main Continent, sir, and I wouldn’t call it a ‘skirmish.’ I’d call it an all-out war. The carnage is unbelievable!” Her wide-eyed expression reinforced her dismay.

“Has she said what started that?” Perry demanded, eyes glued to the scene. “Is the Moon Base in any danger?”

Osullivan shook his head as the Asimov could be felt surging forward in star-speckled space until the stars blurred.

“There’s no way the queens can reach the Moon Base. Remember? We destroyed their spheres and scouts. Makako has reported that they’ve reopened their mines, but ore must be hard to find. New shafts have been sent down. On all the continents, by the way.”

“There must be far too many queens, sir,” Makako was reporting now. “I’ve counted forty separate battlefields and several queens contesting ground in one.”

“Nothing you can do about it, Commander,” Osullivan said by way of reassurance, and then turned to Perry. “Prime, please make contact with Earth Prime whether he’s at Blundell or Callisto. He needs to know about this. We really do need a telepath at every installation, even if he or she only receives.” The last was said in a low murmur of regret.

“There’s never enough to go round, sir.... Lieutenant Balidovino.” Perry turned toward the duty engineer. “I’ll need to draw on the generators for this distance.”

“As you need, sir,” Balidovino replied, fingers poised on the pressure plates of his engineer panel.

“Yeoman, my compliments to Commander Voorhees, and I’d like him on the bridge as soon as possible,” Osullivan added, rubbing his jaw without moving his eyes from the battle.

“Yes, doubtless they’ll want an evaluation from the science officer,” Perry said, crossing his arms on his chest. Then he closed his eyes as he telepathically leaped the long distance to Earth.

Quite imposing in that attitude, Osullivan thought, surprised at his own observation. Perry was no more powerfully built than any of the other Primes Osullivan had met, but there was an aura about the dark-haired, sharp-featured Betelgeusian that made him appear much bigger and ineluctably more powerful.

“My apologies, Earth Prime.” Perry spoke aloud as well as telepathically so that Osullivan knew what was said. Replies would come back, through his mouth but in Jeff’s voice. “But a situation has developed on Xh-33 that you should see through my eyes.” Perry opened his. There was a slight pause, and then Perry’s voice deepened, closer to Raven’s tone. “So that’s what happens when queens do not migrate. An awesome sight. Hmmm, and these creatures are much larger than those that were found by the Washington on Arcadia. Yet that is a much older colony and hasn’t yet overburdened its planet’s resources. A puzzle, what? Captain Osullivan?” Perry turned to Osullivan with a slight grin, encouraging response.

Lieutenant Commander Jan Voorhees came striding onto the bridge and stopped dead when he saw what was on the main screen, his eyes widening.

“A puzzle indeed ...” Osullivan waved a helpless hand at the scene and the hideous, unceasing massacre, with broken limbs and scattered parts oozing viscous internal liquid.

“This is one time”—Raven’s voice came through Perry’s mouth—“when we allow the conflict to proceed. Ask Makako to keep recording. I’m calling up our own xenbees to ‘see’ this through me.”

“Sir,” Voorhees murmured to the captain, “we should get pheromone readings ... once they’ve stopped fighting. That could be vital information.”

“Quite right, Mr. Voorhees,” Jeff Raven’s voice replied, startling the man. Earth Prime chuckled through his link to Perry. “However, even if Humans have been able to move among Hivers without being noticed, I recommend hazmat gear and full masks.”

“Of course, sir, since we don’t know what effect such violent pheromones, even poisonous gases from all those visceral parts, could have on Humans,” Voorhees said, running a nervous hand through thinning blond hair. “And if the prevailing winds happen to carry the stink to the other continents ... well, I hate to speculate what reaction would occur.”

“Good point,” Jeff Raven said. “I’ll mention that to our experts. We have, by the way, discovered a T-10 in the perfumery business who has volunteered to lend us his nose in identifying the smells. He’s supposed to be good at more than the flowery stuff.” Perry’s voice dutifully echoed the amusement in Jeff Raven’s tone, and one of Perry’s eyebrows raised in surprise. “My xenbees are rubbing their hands in an excess of delight to know we can get samples of the dominant pheromones. Preferably as soon as possible after the battles end.”

“I’ll have a team standing by either from here or from the Moon Base, but I request permission to lead it.” Voorhees deferentially looked at his captain, who nodded permission. Then Voorhees turned to Perry. “Is that possible, Prime?” Perry nodded. “Respond in your own time, Commander Makako.”

The response lag was shortening as the powerful Asimov sped toward the Xh-33’s system.

“Sir,” Makako replied, shaking her head, “I would hate such ... butchery ... to extend to the other continents. Right now the weather system is mild with moderate winds blowing east to the sea. My Met officer says there are rain clouds over the intervening ocean. According to him, we might have as much as thirty-six hours before those winds reach the next landmass. We’ll keep a strict eye on it. Continent Two is nightside and doesn’t show any disturbance ...” Her voice trailed off briefly.

“Have you hazmat gear on the base?”

Another pause. “Yes sir, as well as the crew who placed the remotes in the queens’ collectives. I’ve put them on standby.”

“Very good, Commander. Inform us when ... the fighting is over.”

“Commander Makako, Blundell wants you to copy whatever is already recorded and tube it,” Perry said with Jeff’s voice. “I’ll pick it up myself from your base in fifteen minutes from my mark.... Mark! We need to have some idea of how they fight.”

- “Yes sir,” Makako said, looking toward Perry and rather startled to hear another voice issuing from his mouth. “I’m ordering a copy and it’ll be in a message tube at lock 482, sir, in fifteen minutes.”

“Thank you, Commander Makako. Let’s hope we can stop the ...”

“Butchery? Slaughter? Genocide?” Perry supplied synonyms in his own voice without a trace of emotion. Then once more Jeff Raven spoke through the link. “The queens demonstrate a curious killing rage. Similar to old berserkers. My regards to you, Captain Osullivan.” As soon as those words were out of Perry’s mouth, he altered his stance and nodded to the captain to indicate that he was no longer in contact with the Earth Prime. The generators whined down to a lower level.

“Berserkers?” Osullivan said, turning to Perry. “Yes, an apt term. Organize that landing party, will you, Mr. Voorhees? We want to be ready. Pheromones? How interesting.”

Voorhees saluted and immediately left the bridge to organize his team.

Perry stepped slightly closer to the captain’s chair and said softly, “One thing is certain, sir. Those records may have a salutary effect on those who criticized Admiral Ashiant’s destruction of the spheres.”

“I should certainly hope some good comes of that.” Osullivan waved his hand in the general direction of Xh-33. Then his upper body shivered in a sudden convulsive shake. “Thank you, Prime, for your assistance.”

“You’re welcome, sir.” Perry exited through the door of the short passage from the bridge to the Talents’ lounge.

He went immediately to the alcove that housed the lounge’s refreshment facility and poured a hefty glass of the strongest brandy of a very respectable selection of spirits and wines. He drank it in one gulp.

“Perry?” his wife, Adela, asked sleepily, from the door of their bedroom. “What was that all about? Etienne’s never done that before.”

“A question for Earth Prime that was urgent. Want a drink?” He held up the bottle.

She frowned prettily. “No, I can go right back to sleep if you’re beside me.” She was a T-3 kinetic, able to ’path when in contact with someone, and then only someone she knew well.

“I’ll be right there, dear,” Perry said, and poured a second but smaller drink. With her beside him to neutralize what he had just seen, he too could go back to sleep.

“It seems to be pretty much over,” Commander Makako was saying over the appalling vista of destruction down on Xh-33. “We know some of the queens have taken refuge in their quarters, and suspect many are injured. Haven’t established how many died, but of course, their ... workers or warriors, or whatever we should call them, were without leadership. While we watched as some fled, a lot of the leaderless were wasted by whatever actively directed queen’s group was nearby. Winds remain moderate. When Commander Voorhees joins us, my surface party’s ready to go.”

Holding up his device, Voorhees said, “It might be a bit clumsy but it’ll give the readings needed,” adding to the captain, who was regarding the instrument with a frown, “Probably selenoaldehydes or selenoketones. I’ve accessed what data we have on queen pheromones. They can vary a lot. Include thioketones at times if there’s enough sulfur around.”

“I also have four portable GCs,” Makako said, with practically no pause between his words and her response. “We used them when we made our first surveys down there to plant the remotes.”

“I’ve four xenbees to come along from the Asimov to help, if that’s all right.”

“No problem,” she replied. “Main boat bay is cleared except for the shuttle to get us downside.”

The screen switched from the battlefield to Makako in her hazmat gear in the boat bay. her surface team and the shuttle behind her.

“Prime Perry, would you be good enough to ’port the Asimov party to the Moon Base?” Osullivan asked.

“I’ll even give them a boost,” Perry said with a droll grin. The generators whirred and Voorhees and his team disappeared. “When you’re settled, sing out.” He paused, in a listening attitude, and then leaned on the generators.

“They’re here,” Makako said on the screen, blinking her slightly slanted eyes in acknowledgment of their arrival. “Commander Voorhees is now transferring his men to my shuttle.”

“Where do you want to be set down, Commander?” Perry asked.

“Sir?” Makako’s expression was a query.

“See that relatively empty spot, Perry?” Osullivan pointed to the area: a vegetable field that had been trampled down but was clear of corpses. It wasn’t far from a queen’s collecting facility.

“Yes sir. Are you ready, Mr. Makako?”

“As ready as we’ll ever be!” Makako sounded resigned.

“Get us as many samples in and out of the queens’ quarters as possible. I know that the Hivers generally ignore us, but how they’d react now ... is debatable. Keep alert. Is that clear?” Osullivan said.

The baritone of Voorhees chorused with Makako’s lighter soprano in a unison “Yes sir.” The hum from the generators was deeper and Perry reached out and deposited the shuttle. The com officer switched to the planet’s surface, and the shuttle was already in place.

“Neatly done, Perry.” Osullivan settled back into the bridge chair, rubbing his jaw as he watched. “Please inform Earth Prime that Operation Nose is under way.”

“I have, sir, and I’ll just gather my team in the lounge and keep a watch, just in case we have to rescue anyone.”

“Good idea,” Osullivan said.

Balidovino transferred the landing site to the main screen as the figures emerged cautiously from the shuttle and began spreading out. The four under Voorhees’s command headed toward the nearby Hiver facility, while Makako was gesturing for her group to fan out, making for the first of the many piles of inert worker bodies, a dead queen lying on the ground at the forefront. “Hope they don’t need any rescuing.”

Perry nodded and exited through the door to the Talents’ lounge, calling up his team members. He was rather pleased with those unassisted ’ports, especially the shuttle.

Your father would pin your ears back, Perry, came Jeff Raven’s voice in his head.

Perry shrugged. Sorry, Prime. My team would have taken time to assemble, since this wasn’t on today’s schedule.

Perry kept his reply neutral, but he was strong and able for the work he’d just done.

That’s not what interests the xenbees here, Jeff replied, and absented his presence from Perry’s mind.

“What’s the problem?” Adela spoke from their bedroom door. “The team wasn’t due to meet ... Oh, yes. I see. Can I get you something?”

“I can get my own,” he said with a grateful smile. “You get dressed.”

“Admiral?” Voorhees spoke into his com unit, turning his head up in a reflex action toward the Asimov and the observers he knew were watching.

“What’s wrong, Voorhees?”

“Sir, if I remember the dimensions of the workers mentioned in Prime Thian’s report on that planet he surveyed ... called it Arcadia, didn’t he?”

“Go on,” the Admiral encouraged him.

“This fellow’s a good twenty centimeters longer in the leg, and its body is at least ten longer. And see ...” Voorhees poked at an extendable limb, hacked off at the first joint. “This one’s got a mallet, hammer...” He prodded it with his finger so that unbroken spikes were visible. “Now that’s a wicked modification, or do I mean mutation?”

“It certainly is,” Osullivan said. “Get it recorded and do a spot check on other worker bodies ... or should I call them warriors, if that’s what they’ve put in place of shovels and rakes?” Osullivan turned to his com officer. “Put me on a wide com line. I want to get all surface units to check if all the ... workers”—he made an ironic grimace—“are the same.”

The order was duly given and accepted.

“Can’t tell the players without any markings,” one of her team remarked.

“According to my GC readings, each queen must stink different,” said another, “and boy, am I glad I’m in a hazmat suit and can’t smell a thing!”

“Button up,” Makako said firmly.

Then Voorhees’s voice came on line just as he and his four entered the facility. “There’s a badly wounded queen in here, her egg bulb is collapsed on one side, lost most of her hind legs to the second joint and has only one front arm with palps. She’s making for her quarters and there’re little scuttlers coming out to assist. They aren’t her usual attendants. She’ll squash ’em.... No, they’re managing, several on each side of a joint. Spread out, men, and let’s see how many she has left of her Hive. Miko, you’re the shortest—check the waiting area down that right-hand tunnel.”

“Sir, I’m getting heavy concentrations of the selenoaldehydes,” one of his team said.

“I’d expect that inside a collection facility. Wonder what they’ll be in the queen’s quarters.”

“Off the scale, prolly,” another remarked with a snort.

“Let’s get to the queen’s quarters. There may be some interesting variations of Hiver patterns on her main screen. You have that recorder, don’t you, Hickey?”

“Yes sir, but even with the help she’s getting, I don’t see how she can make it back. She’s oozing with every step.”

“As well for us. The left-hand tunnel leads to her quarters, Hickey. Gallard, stay back and warn us if she gets too close.”

“Not that she has an arm left to do anything with,” murmured Gallard.

“She’s not the one who fights,” Hickey replied with disgust. “She’s got all them worker-warrior types we saw dead up above.”

“Fighter or not, someone mauled her good.”

The watchers on the ship could see Makako’s team working farther away from the landing site. They were some ways from any other collective, stepping across sizable vines which had been ripped from supporting posts, Hiver bodies caught in the tangles.

And so the searching went. When Voorhees’s team had exited from the facility, they returned to the shuttle and sent the first reports back to the Asimov, then purged the portable GCs for their next stop. Voorhees took the shuttle up, cruising at a low level until they caught up with Makako’s point. Then they veered slowly in another direction, landing on top of another facility. There weren’t even any corpses around it. The queen’s quarters were empty, although Gallard thought he heard tiny scrabblings against one wall.

“The scuttlers, prolly.”

The screens were dead.

“They die when the queen does?” Hickey asked.

“Probably,” Voorhees said. “Concentration in here is only parts per trillion, sir, much lighter.”

There were over 240 known Hive facilities on the Main Continent, and battles had been fought in every direction around them as queens led their warrior-workers out to either defend their Hives or attack others. When the massed assaults ended, thirty-two facilities still had queens, some of them badly injured: two were combing through their egg reserves, beginning to fertilize eggs in a valiant attempt to repopulate their Hives. The surface team did not have to physically inspect all of them. Life-form readings, set to queens and the large warrior-workers, showed which facilities had queens and provided a rough assessment of their remaining minions. Recordings had been made of pheromones in a sufficient variety to give the scientists much to study.

Perry lifted the shuttle safely back to the Moon Base. The moment the shuttle doors opened, alarms in the boat deck went off.

“Do we stink that bad?” Gallard asked.

“You do,” was the response of the lieutenant on duty in the base headquarters. “You go through decontam until you register zero on the stinkometer and you guys are thoroughly deodorized. That okay with you, Commander?”

“If we reek enough to set off the alarms, we should clean off before we undress,” Makako agreed, and waved the troops toward the decontam facility. Since the unit held only one person at a time, there was a tedious wait.

“They still stink,” Gallard said, wrinkling his nose at the last man to hang his gear up in the storage closet. “I’ll never get rid of that reek.” He felt his hair, rubbed down his arms and legs. “Yuck! Commander, can we use enough water to get really clean?”

“Permission granted,” Makako said, devoutly wishing she had enough cologne left to get rid of the residual smell. She lifted her arm to her nose.

“All in your mind,” Voorhees said, grinning.

“If it is, I’m in real trouble,” Makako murmured to him. “And that shuttle still stinks. We’ll have to moor it out in space for days. It’s permeated the metal. Gods, those pheromones are pervasive.”

“All in your mind,” Voorhees repeated, enjoying his tease of the commander.

The com unit buzzed for Makako’s attention: “Prime Perry says he’s moved the personnel carrier to the gym so you won’t have to back through boat bay, sir, until it’s been deodorized.”

“Thank him.” He held out his hand to Makako. “Pleasure working with you.”

She shook his hand solemnly. “And with you, but gods, how I hope we don’t have to do it again.”

“Sir,” the com unit continued, “Met says wind’s picking up. What do we do about that? XO says all that smell moving to the eastern continents might be bad.”

Makako groaned. “Get back to the Asimov. We’ll have to do something ... maybe seed some clouds and dilute those pheromones. Some of my readings were off the scale and most of ’em were subtly different.”

“I’ll tell what comes up in the analysis, soon’s I know myself,” Voorhees said and then called for his four to come with him to catch their ride back to the Asimov.

Though the ’port was swift, the five men exuded enough residual pheromones to cause the ensign who opened the carrier to recoil with disgust written all over his face.

“Beg your pardon, sir,” he said sheepishly.

“Into the showers, all of you,” Voorhees said. “Tell the captain I’m taking our readings up to the lab. I’ll shower again there.”

“Yes sir, but Captain Osullivan’s orders were for you to contact him immediately.” The ensign gestured to the boat bay’s com unit on the upper level.

“All right,” Voorhees said, resettling the bag of data disks that contained the readings.

“What’s this about a bad Met report, Voorhees?” asked Captain Osullivan.

“Winds have picked up. Can we do something about diluting the pheromones it’s carrying to the east? I’m on my way to the lab, sir, but I really don’t want to bring a pong to the bridge, if you don’t mind.”

“Appreciate that, Mr. Voorhees. Report when you’re ... deodorized.”

“Yes sir.”

Voorhees then made it straight to the ship’s well-equipped laboratory and started his technicians on a preliminary report on pheromones, levels and types. Either the ensign had warned them or constant proximity to lab smells had dulled their olfactory nerves, but none of them so much as wrinkled a nose when he came near them.

“Do a quick assessment and inform Prime Perry when it’s ready to be forwarded. We’ll do the detailed chemical analyses later.” He caught one of the yeomen by the arm. “Get me a clean shipsuit from my cabin, will you, Naves?”

“Yes sir, right away, sir.” The man jogged out of the lab.

Does he really need it? Or is it all in his mind? Jeff asked.

I’ve a message tube ready for ’portation, sir. There was an edge of amusement in Perry’s voice. See what your scientists think.