Conquerors' Pride

"I see." Holloway picked up a small plastic sample box from the scattered electronic equipment and stacks of paper cluttering the desk and handed it to her. "Take a look. Tell me what you think."

Melinda took the box and looked through the lid. Inside, nestled in the palm of a camouflaged glove, was a thin, dark-brown disk, slightly curled at the edges. "It looks like a slice of sausage," she said. "Where did it come from?"

Holloway gestured to the camouflaged men. "Sergeant Janovetz?"

"We found it just north of the settlement," a raw-boned man near the middle of the group said. "In a little cubbyhole built into a sort of white pyramid thing the Conquerors have got set up on Overview Ridge."

Melinda frowned at Holloway. It had been barely two days since the Conquerors had invaded. "They're moving equipment in already?"

"They moved these in, anyway," Holloway said. "There appear to be four of them: one each north, south, east, and west of the settlement."

"Pretty good-sized, too," Janovetz said. "The one we saw was about three meters tall and a couple wide at the base, with probably a couple hundred of these cubbyholes cut into it."

"Some kind of defense station?" Melinda suggested. "Or a sensor array?"

"The positioning's right for either one," Holloway agreed. "Only problem is that the pyramids seem to be completely inert. No active or passive electronics, no power sources, no metal. Nothing." He nodded at the box. "Except those things."

Melinda looked into the box again. "How many were there?"

"There were four others in the cubbyholes we could see," Janovetz said. "Could have been more—we couldn't see into the top ones. Most of the holes were empty, though."

"Plenty of room for expansion, then," Melinda said.

"My thought exactly," Holloway nodded. "Means we'd better find out what the hell those things are. Preferably before the Conquerors get a whole shipment of them in."

"I understand," Melinda said. "I'll do what I can."

It was after midnight when she finally unsealed the flap door of the biochemical bubble and stepped wearily out into the dim nighttime lighting of the main medical ward. To her complete lack of surprise, Holloway was waiting there for her.

"Doctor," he murmured, getting up from where he'd been sitting against the rock wall and shutting off his plate. "Any progress?"

"Some," Melinda said, glancing at the rows of sleeping injured. Burn patients, most of them, victims of the Conquerors' laser weapons. "Can we talk somewhere else?" she whispered. "I don't want to wake them."

"Sure," Holloway whispered back. "This way."

He led her past the cots and the medic's duty station to the huge curtains that had been rigged at the edge of the rock overhang to keep light from leaking out. Holloway found an edge and a minute later they were outside in the cool mountain air. "What did you find out?" he asked.

"Not very much, I'm afraid," Melinda said. "It definitely follows the same genetic plan as the Conqueror tissue. But all that means is that it probably originated on the Conquerors' homeworld. The cellular structure is extremely tight-packed, which in humans might suggest either part of a sensory cluster or the central nervous system."

"Sensory cluster," Holloway murmured thoughtfully. "Maybe we were right about the pyramids being sensor stations."

"Maybe," Melinda nodded. "Again, that's what it might suggest in humans. We don't know what the Conquerors' patterns are like yet. One other thing: the cellular structure appears to be extremely uniform, with only the edge being made of a different material. Again, in terms of Earth biology that would suggest it's not an egg."

"Could it be a cutting or budding of some kind? I seem to remember that some plants and animals reproduce that way."

"Some do, yes," Melinda agreed. "Most of the ones we know about are fairly primitive, but that doesn't necessarily mean it can't occur in more advanced animals. I don't think the pyramids are Conqueror nurseries, though, if that's what you're getting at."

"Why not?"

"For one thing, I think I've got a good candidate for sexual organs in our Conqueror specimen," Melinda said. "If I'm right, it means they shouldn't reproduce via unisexual buds or slices or whatever. For another, why would anyone put a nursery out in the open like that? Especially in the middle of a war zone?"

"I was thinking more along the lines of an incubation site for one of the Conquerors' homeworld animals," Holloway said. "Something vicious that would help distract us from our fight against the Conquerors themselves. These things were pretty well protected—I don't think you heard, but each of the holes was covered by a little mesh door. Janovetz had to break a catch to get it open."

"No," Melinda said, suppressing a shiver. "I hadn't heard that."

Suppressed or not, Holloway noticed. "You cold?" he asked. "We could go somewhere else to talk."

"I'm all right," Melinda said, looking up at the stars and the thin clouds drifting across them. "I was just wondering whether it's safe to be out in the open like this."

"We're all right," Holloway assured her. "I don't think the Conquerors have anything that can still fly at the moment. Whatever their expertise at full line-ship combat, they don't seem nearly as adroit at this close-in planetary work. I'll have to thank your brother someday for his thoughtfulness in providing us with those Copperheads."

Melinda winced. "I'm sorry, Colonel. The idea was never to cause this much trouble for anyone."

"It's all right," he said. "I just hope they're able to find your brother Pheylan."

Melinda twisted around to stare at his silhouette. "How did—? Did the Copperheads tell you?"

"Actually, they were even more closemouthed about it than you were," Holloway said. "But it's been simmering in the back of my mind for a couple of days now. A private rescue mission into Conqueror space was the only halfway reasonable thing I could come up with. I assume from your reaction that I was right."

"Yes." Melinda looked up at the stars again. Wondering what their chances really were of finding Pheylan. Or whether he and Aric would both disappear into the darkness.

"You can't fight their part of the war for them," Holloway said quietly into the silence. "All you can do is try to handle your part, and let them be free to do theirs."

"That's easy for you to say," Melinda said.

"You think so?" he countered, his voice suddenly hard. "I have friends and family, too, you know. They're sitting in ships and ground stations all over Lyra and Pegasus Sectors, waiting for the Conquerors to attack. I can't do their worrying for them. Neither can you."

Melinda took a deep breath. "You're right. I'm sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry about," Holloway said, his voice calm again. "I've been in the Peacekeepers for twenty years now. It took me the first ten to learn how to let go. Anything else you can tell me about the sausage slice?"

"Not really," she said, forcing her mind away from Aric and Pheylan and back to the task at hand. "What I need to do now is run biochem tests on both the slice and the Conqueror body and do some comparisons. Do you suppose there's any chance of getting another slice, perhaps from one of the other pyramids? Or are the Conquerors protecting them too well?"

"Interesting you should bring that up," Holloway said. "Janovetz's team came under assault about three klicks out from the pyramid. It was his opinion that trying to get that close in again would be suicide unless we were willing to risk sending in some serious air cover, which I'm not. But I was looking over the recorder report just now, and I noticed that it was only on their way in toward the pyramid that the team encountered any real resistance. Once they were right there beside it, the attacks stopped."