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"Big. Shaggy mane. A lion with an attitude."
"Maybe like a bear?"
"Maybe. Probably. I don't know, I've never seen a bear."
Potter nodded. "And you drove it off with the rifle."
"That's right, so?"
Potter didn't answer right away, but only went back to his tea. "Do you hunt a lot, Mister Miller?"
"Not animals."
"I didn't think so. I used to hunt a lot when I was young. Sometimes, on Survey trips like this one, I'll stalk a local animal that looked game. In my years on Survey duty, I've seen a lot of strange animals that do a lot of strange things. But there's one thing I've never seen, Miller. Can you guess what it is?"
"Why spoil your fun?"
Potter smiled. "I've never seen an animal on an alien world that was afraid of man. They aren't capable of it, you see. How could they be? They've never seen a man before. Our scent is different, but not threatening, assuming they even smell us at all. They don't see us as a threat, they can't possibly. Like the American grimly bear. Do you have any idea how many settlers it killed, and how many grizzlies the settlers had to kill, before the bears learned that man was dangerous? That man's rifles were dangerous? And grizzlies at least come from the same genetic soup as we do."
Potter shook his head. "Nope. You have to kill such animals, Miller. They don't scare. And it isn't because they're too stupid to be afraid of Man; they just don't realize how dangerous human beings can be."
There was a long silence, during which Potter finished his tea before concluding: "But I do."
Miller watched him silently.
"That was a clumsy lie, Miller. That contrived gesture of crosses for the graves was another." Potter stood up and tossed his cup away. "And they'll cost you. I'd have been happy to blow your head off for killing Ike, or just getting him killed. But this is better. I don't even care how or why you did it, now. I'm just looking forward to turning you over to the CoDo Bureau of Investigation for murder. Who knows? You might get lucky; maybe they'll sentence you to Involuntary Colonization and you'll get sent right back here." He went to the door and turned, silhouetted for a moment in the hatch. "Won't that be nice?"
"Potter," Miller said, "you know that won't happen. You can kill me and leave me here, and BuReloc will have your ass on general principle. You can take me back and turn me in, and BuReloc will squeeze the CBI, and I'll walk, and maybe BuReloc will have your ass anyway, just to make an example of tramp spacers who get delusions of moral grandeur."
"I suppose there's a third choice."
"Of course. Keep your mouth shut. I don't profit from this escapade; it's my job. But you and your crew could stand to gain a great deal from what I learned out there. If you're smart. Just sit tight, shut up and wait for the Survey bonus checks to start rolling in. At the very least, I can promise you that your frostbitten Mister Co
Potter looked at him, his face an impassive mask, then nodded again. "Good night, Miller."
It was six hours later, and darker than ever. The sky outside was black with snow-laden, lowering clouds that sealed the tops of the mountain ranges, a layer of ephemeral paraffin topping a jar of secret preserves. Neither the light of Byers' Star nor Cat's Eye's radiant energy penetrated to the land beneath. The valley was a great bowl, and the lid was on. The repaired Shuttle One was nearly ready for takeoff; aboard Shuttle Two, the survey crew's temporary home, most people still slept.
Miller awoke at the prick of a needle into his thigh. He spun about to grasp the handgun kept tucked beneath his left arm, but found only his armpit.
"Live a little longer." The voice was an anonymous whisper in the dark, followed by a flat click of a hammer being pulled back; Miller recognized the sound of his own pistol. "Convince me you're just trying to warm that hand."
"What is it?" Miller felt the pain in his hip going away, and with it any sense of urgency or resolve.
"What did you and Ike find up in the hills that was worth killing him for?"
Miller tried not to answer, but immediately realized there was no real point. He no longer had any control over what he said. "Ore-" The words grunted past his best efforts to stop them. "Crystalline-ore-in the rocks."
"Good. And what kind of crystalline ore was it?"
"Diamonds." Miller found himself unable to suppress a sly giggle.
"No, now really."
Miller's eyelids were heavy, but he wasn't sleepy. "Half-diamonds," he said, almost gri
Miller returned from the euphoric place he'd been drifting toward with the subtlety of a train wreck. Tears brimmed over his eyes and coursed down his cheeks as he gasped for air, getting only more mitten. After long seconds, the gag was removed.
"Now," the voice said, and Miller's soaring pain rendered it still more anonymous: "One more time; what was the crystalline ore you found in the hills?"
Miller gagged, unwilling to believe that the pain was receding again, until the hollow ache in his bowels faded enough to prove it to him. "Zirconium."
A finger tapped his wound, light as a feather; it felt like an anvil dropped from orbit. "Nothing special about zirconium," the voice pointed out.
"Hafnium!" Miller gasped. "The ore is a new form of zirconium crytolite; it's loaded with hafnium, twenty times the amount found in the richest terrestrial samples. Almost eighty percent hafnium."
The voice was silent. "We are talking about the hafnium used in nuclear reactor rods, aren't we, Mister Miller?"
Miller nodded.
"And you took samples of this ore, to prove to the CoDominium that you weren't crazy?"
Miller asserted every iota of his will, finally sure he could resist answering. "Yes. Worth billions for energy, weapons technology . . . The moon's too valuable to use as a CoDo dumping ground, the deportees would wind up owning the Grand Senate in a few decades."
The voice said nothing, and Miller could feel the drug pulling him farther and farther away. A tiny flare as another needle entered his arm.
"I don't think so, Mister Miller," the voice said. Then something like: "Not the deportees," but Miller couldn't be sure, for by that time he was dead.
Potter looked down into Miller's sightless, staring eyes.
He thought he should be able to compose some poetic statement on the irony of life and death and justice, but all he could think of was what a monumental fuck-up this mission had turned out to be.
Potter had awakened before anyone else to find Miller dead. Co
Potter crouched next to Miller and tried to close the eyes; the lids kept parting, widening to finally expose the bright, blue, dead pupils.
I always thought they stayed closed, Potter mused. The Captain of the Fast Eddie turned to Co