Chapter 25

Venezuela

Robbie was morosely checking Jaron’s figures again. His conclusions about resurgence of several endangered species were hard to credit, but she could find no errors. There’d been something somewhere else that might explain it, but she just couldn’t find it in all his neatly scribed pages. After weeks spent studying his various papers and notes, all the information had turned to mush in her head. She needed a break.

Shutting down the console, she stormed out of the lab and into the evening light. Another day, come and gone with her barely noticing. She blinked and reoriented herself.

The dawn light. She’d worked through the night without realizing. It took an immense amount of effort to understand Jaron’s work and to decide how to publish it without stepping on too many professional toes. In two more months she’d be back in the academic world while Jaron would be well buffered by his precious forest. Fully two months up-river, and still Jaron was pissing her off. A long-distance irritant.

Perfect. She blinked her eyes trying to adapt them to brightening light. At last she could see the trail she wanted and followed it down to a bend in the Orinoco. She peeled back her coverall and shoved it down, kicking out of her boots as she did so. She pulled her legs free and tossed her t-shirt and underwear on top of the pile. She had one foot in the cool river water when she heard a loud splash. She almost dove in anyway, she wouldn’t mind fighting with a crocodile or two. It might even cheer her up.

Instead, she squished back across the muddy bank and pulled out the repulser. She stabbed it down into the soft muck and flicked it on. With a roar of protest, Josiah, the neighborhood croc, surfaced and moved upstream with a broad lash of his tail.

Robbie dove in and let the fresh water sluice the long night off her body. The sweat, the frustration, the immobility of desk work were all shed as she swam against the current. She could overpower it, but she knew that Josiah was not far off and certainly not happy from being slapped by the repulser. She wanted to rage against the water but contented herself with just wearing out her body. For an hour, maybe more, she worked against the current until, with the suddenness of a falling tree, she was wiped out.

Her arms throbbed as she moved back to the bank. She crawled out onto a rock and let the morning heat dry her off. Josiah was just in sight, riding the fine line of hating the repulser and desire for a taste of her flesh. It was nice to know someone wanted her, even if it was only a predator.

Predators. Of course. Wilkson’s article. No wonder it wasn’t in Jaron’s notes. The Amazon had lost over a dozen amphibian predators in the last two decades. Of course there was a resurgence in threatened, prey species. Jaron had discovered their return, but he hadn’t known why either. He hadn’t even admitted in his notes that he’d been unable to discover the cause. But she knew.

Damn, she actually was good. Not just some front for Jaron. That was what had been growing inside her. Not anger at Jaron avoiding her, well, not just that rejection. But rather that she was Jaron’s string puppet. Well, she wasn’t. She knew things he didn’t. She let forth a whoop, gave Josiah a jaunty salute of thanks and turned for her clothes.

Standing next to them was a small woman in a natty lavender pantsuit and neat lace-up boots that had clearly never seen mud. Her brown-blond hair tumbled down her back. She was so petite that Robbie felt like a WEC attack tank even being near her. Robbie made no move to cover herself, she wasn’t the intruder after all.

“Who are you and what are you doing here?”

“I was thinking of going for a swim. How’s the water?”

“Fine,” her mouth replied without much volition from her. She recovered with a quick shake of her head sending a cloud of spray from the unruly, mouse-brown mess.

“Provided you don’t mind having Josiah watch you.”

On cue the croc surfaced and splashed back in with an aggravated roar at two such tender morsels standing so near yet so out of reach.

She turned back and the woman was stripping down, though her boots took some doing to get out of. Whoever she was, she was everything Robbie wasn’t: shapely legs, rounded hips, tiny waist, and a stylishly petite bosom. Robbie steadfastedly remained the beached whale on the riverside rock.

“Maybe he’d best watch out for me.” With an impish grin, the woman dove in and began swimming upstream just as Robbie had, not too fast, but strongly. As her arms drove out of and back into the water, Robbie noticed the long sinewy muscles that showed the fitness in her unsolicited companion.

Robbie watched her in silence. How could a woman like this end up in the middle of the Orinoco? There were no roads, which meant there was a flyer back at the station.

Perhaps “Why?” was the more important question. The existence of Orinoco station had been carefully purged from her and Jaron’s papers before publication. Even the data she’d sent to Wilkson was all from the other side of the Sierra de Curupira mountains deep in the Amazon. She and Jaron had correlated it against local findings, mostly her own observations, but no published data mentioned Orinoco.

There was only Jaron and herself who knew about the station. No—there was one other.

Robbie focused her eyes on the woman now rising out of the water like a sea nymph rising out of a Botticelli painting, not the least winded by her workout.

“SJ, I presume.” And she’d bet next year’s tuition, that wasn’t the woman’s real name.

She nodded gracefully and rather than hustling back into her clothes, picked a tree trunk near Robbie and perched upon its rough bark.

“You are more than you appear.”

The smile that lit up her face was like a little girl’s. “With my size and choice of clothes, I can get away with a hell of a lot more than most.”

Robbie couldn’t help herself. A laugh burst forth. She decided that she could get to like this person.

“Why are you here?”

“Not yet.” She leaned forward and, gathering her long hair into a thick ponytail, twisted a cascade of water onto the ground. “Are you alone here?”

Robbie nodded. She hadn’t planned on it, but with Jaron gone, she could answer honestly.

SJ, who’d offered no more of a name, looked disappointed. “I’d hoped that he’d found you.”

“Who?”

“Robert.”

“My name is Roberta.”

“What? You aren’t Isabel.” The nearly nameless woman’s face twisted in confusion.

“Roberta. That was my mother’s choice. But Robbie’s been my nickname since before I could talk.”

“You’re not male?”

“What, did the breasts give me away? Or was it the lack of male genitalia dangling between my legs?” Robbie clamped her jaw. She’d had enough of that shit from slender little girls in school and she’d be damned if she was going to take it from another under-nourished little twit who’d invaded her jungle, patron or not.

The woman shook her head as if to clear it and then her merry laugh burst forth. A quick hand rested on Robbie’s arm a moment and was gone.

“You’re the university student. Robbie Enlara. The one I’ve been sponsoring. It never struck me to check the name. The governor of the remains of Eastern Canada is very male and is also named Robbie.” She laughed again. “I’m so sorry.”

Robbie unsteamed enough that she could see the joke, but not enough to be amused.

“So, did you find Isabel?”

“Who the hell is Isabel?”

Once again the confusion landed between them. Josiah released another cry of frustration.

SJ spoke very slowly. “You didn’t find a young woman named Isabel?”

“No.” Was this woman and her guessing games even rational? Didn’t she know anything?

“What’s her name?”

Then Robbie remembered that had been Jaron’s sister’s name.

“His name.”

“His?” SJ released another high burst of giggles that sounded half embarrassed and half surprised.

“His? I sent a woman named Robbie to befriend a man named Isabel.” She held onto her sides in pain as she laughed. Something about that kicked the woman right into near-hysterics. SJ rolled off her log and landed in the mud of the river bank smearing the slop all up one side and into her hair.

Robbie tried to fight the smile, but the laughter was too infectious. She too was soon in agony holding her sides from watching this powerful patron who had sponsored the wrong person to find another wrong person in the heart of the Venezuelan jungle.

When at last they recovered their breath, SJ took another dip to scrub off the mud. She reemerged from the river like Venus on a Half Shell, trying to unsnarl her hair with her fingers like a little girl.

“I’d like to meet him. What’s his name? Where is he?”

She flung the wet mass of hair over her shoulder and looked about her eagerly.

Jaron going skinny-dipping with two women. Now there was an unlikely image. “Jason. Up-river. Gone these two months.”

“And you’ve been here just thirty-two days. That explains the earlier data spike.” Her bright blue eyes met Robbie’s. “I’m sorry. Men are such jerks. Even my son. Good boy, but, well, very male.”

“You have a son?”

Now the woman looked down toward the river and was a long time in answering. At last she straightened her back and stared at Robbie as if daring her to deny it.

“A son. Yes, I have a son. He’s twenty-two.”

Robbie would have guessed she was the one who was twenty-two, not forty-something. Yet there was something about the eyes that made her believe the woman.

SJ sprang to her feet and headed for her clothes. “C’mon. There’s something I want to show you.” She picked up her lavender underwear, exactly the same shade as her suit, but covered with little blossoms.

“Besides, I expect Josiah is pretty sick of bumping his nose against your repulser field.”

# # #

Robbie lumbered along behind SJ. The forest that opened for her delicate step slapped at Robbie with broad branches and raised its roots for her to stumble over. She’d walked the trail daily this season and last, yet it had changed somehow.

As they entered the clearing, a long, elegant flyer of some model that screamed of wealth filled the center of the clearing. Then a squad of six WECs came into sight. Jaron would be terrified if he knew. Had this woman perhaps come for him? She seemed nice, but was it merely a costume that covered a spine of hard steel? Jaron’s DNA must exist a hundred places about the station in fingerprints, hair follicles, and on his journals.

A big man, nearly as big as Robbie, came forward and stopped in front of SJ.

“You went swimming? In that river? How do you expect me to protect you if you do things like that?”

“At ease, Commander Levan.”

The man snapped into parade rest.

“That’s not what I meant. I had Robbie with me. I was perfectly safe.”

The man’s cold gaze turned to assess her. Robbie resisted the urge to flex her muscles or, better yet, bat the man aside. His inspection paused especially at her hands and her eyes. She didn’t blink or look away.

He finally shrugged. “Perhaps.”

Robbie bristled at the slander, but SJ forestalled any protest by putting a small hand on her forearm. “That is high praise from our good commander. Please take it as such.”

Robbie nodded tightly, but she’d watch the man carefully. He in turn nodded his approval as if he could read her decision, implying perhaps he could.

“Report.”

It was as if Robbie had suddenly ceased to exist. Levan focused totally on the task at hand. Though one false move and she was sure that she’d find out just how wrong that assessment was.

“As scans indicated, only the one resident. A male and apparently a large bird, were in residence for eight to ten weeks but have been gone at least seven weeks. We don’t know who, due to your stricture against net interface. A large collection of data was found on the local net, but none was recorded or disturbed per your orders.”

“Gone eight weeks, Commander.” She nodded toward Robbie. “Otherwise, excellent. Robbie, I haven’t much variety to offer, but would you care to eat with us?”

“Let’s see. Last I ate was an energy bar yesterday morning.”

SJ’s laugh sparkled about the clearing. “I’ll take that as a yes.”

# # #

SJ sipped a chilled, white wine as Robbie polished off her third plate of turkey and trimmings from the flyer’s surprisingly well-stocked larder.

“Better? Sorry, it’s dinner in my last time zone, I didn’t think to bring breakfast.”

Robbie settled back into the plush seat that fit even her large frame with a deep sigh. She’d never been in such a transport. A dozen deep leather armchairs grouped around three little tables. The luxury of pale blue carpeting and dark, cherry-wood paneling were belied by the weapons rack at the door and the pilot and gunner who had not left the forward part of the craft. The light whir of the various outside scanners made a constant low background hum during the meal. The squad remained on patrol about the craft, only Levan joining them inside.

Whatever else was going on, her belly was full and happy. “Dinner in the morning is no problem with me, ma’am. I rarely find time to go foraging for even a guava or mango and too often that means an energy bar for three meals a day.” She patted her belly. “When I remember at all. This was wonderful. Though I’ll have to swim an extra hour with Josiah to keep my girlish figure.”

SJ had the kindness to laugh. “Good. He’ll like the company. Now there is something I’d like to enlist you in, a little project I’ve gotten started.”

“After a meal like that, I’d do just about anything.”

She set aside her wine and straightened her lapels which were already perfectly in place.

“I need to build a jungle.”

Robbie tipped her head to the right and left trying to clear the water out of her ears. But there wasn’t any. Was that all this woman was? Some rich bitch with her daddy’s guards?

“A fancy atrium to amuse your guests at a charity benefit? Why are you wasting my time? Though I appreciate the meal, best I’ve had in a long, long time.”

Suzie raised a finger. “Remember, ignore the costume and the frame. It’s the mind that has to think bigger, much bigger.”

“What?” Robbie mocked her in a prissy little voice. “A cute park, perhaps?”

“Yes.”

She looked at the glowering Commander Levan, but he gave her no indication of how to judge the sanity of her host.

“I need a four-and-a-half hectare self-sustaining jungle assembled as a complete, closed-system habitat: flora, fauna, soil, bacteria. All of it.”

Robbie started to think it over. It was a neat problem, just big enough to be possible. “That’d be forty-five-thousand square meters. Area you could walk the perimeter of in fifteen minutes if the trail were clear. That lets out Josiah. But Harold, Jaron’s parrot, could do well. Let’s see, major tree like Sumaumeira or Ceiba wants maybe four-hundred square meters, that means eighty maximum, course they’d start small, thin them in fifty years.”

“We’ll move them full grown.”

Robbie nodded. “Okay. Full grown. They only need a meter of soil to grow in, but I’d go down at least three to guarantee proper drainage and there are some essential bacteria that live down at that level. Starting full grown is easier on the other biota, too. Then you could…”

She blinked away the mental picture she’d been building. “What am I doing? You’re nuts, lady.” How had she even started to think about such a ridiculous thing? She was getting as bad as Jaron, all snuggled up so deep inside his brain that reality just passed him by while he was watching.

“Absolutely.”

Levan actually cracked a slight smile at SJ’s pert reply. But it was wiped away the instant Robbie looked at him. She could recognize the man’s strength, something Robbie of all people could respect, yet he attended this woman like a mama elephant watching over the future king of the herd. Was it possible she should be taken seriously?

“You want a personal, private jungle of your very own? Why come to me? Can’t you order one from your home nursery?”

SJ leaned in. “You lost a key word in there, self-sustaining.”

Robbie waved a hand negligently through the air. “Sure. For how long? Longer than your party? A week? A month? I’m a jungle specialist, not a gardener. Maybe I should go now.”

Levan’s level gaze informed her that wasn’t a likely option until she was formally dismissed. The woman seemed unperturbed by Robbie’s disbelief.

“How about a half century for a starter? Perhaps more but certainly not less.”

Robbie leaned forward and opened her mouth. When nothing came out on her third try, she sat back and tried to shake herself awake.

“Fifty years?” Her voice was little more than a croak to her own ears.

“Yes. The estimated travel time to the nearest star with a potentially viable planet.”