第76节

'That's not true,' hissed Steve. 'I told you way back. I care what

happens to you."

Jodi treated him to a penetrating, sideways glance and laughed again.

'You wanna know something, Brickman?

Not that it makes any difference but - I don't think you've ever really

cared about anybody in your whole life."

Steve watched her walk away. His chest felt like an empty, frozen

cave. She's wrong! he told himself. He recalled what Donna Monroe

Lundkwist had said to him when they'd put the bomb in the barrel after

the passing-out parade. Donna, his classmate and rival at the Air

Force Academy, who had asked him to kill her as she lay paralysed by a

crossbow bolt buried in her spine. She had been wrong about him too.

It wasn't true. It wasn't!

And it was not female vanity that caused Jodi to remark upon her

disfigurement; she no longer felt whole. The ideal of unblemished

physical fitness was inculcated in Trackers from day one. They might

vary in size, build and appearance but, seen en masse, they all looked

as if they'd come off the same production line. There were no dwarfs

or beanpoles. Everybody was strong, healthy, clear-eyed and well

proportioned. Heroes like Poppa Jack, Steve's guard-father, dying

gracefully from the inside out from radiation-induced cancer, were

paraded in their Wheelchairs, but permanent invalidity did not exist.

No malformed or brain-damaged infants ever emerged from the delivery

rooms of the Life Institute, and it was an accepted .fact that Trackers

who had the misfortune to be severely disabled or disfigured through an

underground accident or while on overground operations never recovered

from surgery.

The proposal to power the flying-horses using rockets was conveyed to

Min-Orota through the usual intermediaries.

Two days later, Cadillac received a secret summons to appear before the

domain-lord. This was their fifth meeting and, as before, he was

conveyed in a sealed carriage-box to the palace at Ba-satana then

conducted via the back stairs into a small chamber reserved for private

audiences.

From the knowledge he had gained by tapping into the Iron Masters'

psyches, Cadillac knew their relationship was without precedent - and

unlikely to be repeated.

Face-to-face meetings between slaves and domain-lords were just not

possible, and these covert assignations had proved to be the most

convenient way of circumventing the restrictive protocols. To

Cadillac, the fact that Min-Orota had gone to such lengths was a sign

of the esteem in which he was held. His desire for 'standing' was so

overwhelming, it never occurred to him that this esteem had a built-in

time limit and had only been accorded for tactical reasons.

Seated between two of his closest advisers, Min-Orota - who had a good

grasp of Basic - listened intently as Cadillac explained his plans with

the aid of detailed sketches which Steve had helped him prepare. He

then waited with bowed head while the domain-lord discussed the

proposal with his advisers in Japanese - unaware that Cadillac had been

quietly absorbing the language since his arrival in Ne-Issan and could

understand everything they were saying.

When the three Iron Masters had concluded their deliberations, one of

the advisers informed 'Brickman' that his proposal had been accepted.

The necessary authorisations would be issued and the materials he

required would be delivered to the Heron Pool. It was, said the

adviser, Lord Min-Orota's desire that he commence work without delay.

Bowing low, Cadillac humbly expressed his deep gratitude - and silently

blessed Mo-Town, the Great Sky-Mother.

As soon as the materials arrived, Cadillac and Steve set to work with

the help of six Trackers who had been assigned to what had been grandly

called the 'power unit'. Cadillac had chosen the candidates

personally, unaware that Steve had made sure Jodi and Kelso were among

those selected. He'd done this by priming Jodi with the basic facts of

solid rocketry, and had told her to share the data with Kelso. So when

Cadillac lined up his workforce and asked if anyone knew anything about

rocket propulsion systems, they 'were able to raise their arms and step

forward with confidence.

And whenever they ran into a problem that couldn't be solved on the

spot, Steve promised to thinkabout it overnight. The next morning, he

always had the answer.

Cadillac, who was able to absorb this new information as fast as Steve

acquired it, couldn't figure out how Steve always managed to keep one

step ahead.

The reasons were c