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at Moorkith. "So?"
"So, why didn't you put down the right answer?"
"I did."
"You did."
"Think about it."
He frowned. "Oh. But did you mean Yes, I have a sex. Or, Yes,
I want sex?"
"Whichever way you want to take it."
Moorkith paused and stepped back. He licked his lip. Arteria
knew what he was thinking: Do I make the pass? What if I guess
wrong and she's a he? Or he's a she. Arteia had no idea which way
Moorkith swung, and so had no idea which alternative intimidated
him.
Which way would he jump? Lee Arteria sent no signals; but
she never bluffed.
He hadn't made his move when INS arrived. Ah, well. He who
hesitates is lost.
"We don't even know if the spacemen were in Minneapolis," Ike
Redden insisted. "All you did Captain Arteria, was bust a few sci-fi
crazies holding an illegal meeting."
"Strictly speaking, Mr. Redden," Arteria responded, "the
meeting itself was not illegal. The warrant was for harboring
fugitives."
"Sci-fi nuts," said Moorkith. "Technophiles. It should be illegal."
"Nevertheless, there is the First Amendment."
"You tell him," said the Army rep.
"Maybe we need another exception. After all, Flag-burning and
disrespectful singing of the Anthem are not covered by the First.
The destruction of Mother Earth is at least as important as those
issues." Moorkith smiled thinly. "Got a couple of technophiles to
volunteer for reeducation, anyway."
Arteria hid a wry smile. And from what I could see of those
two fans, its going to be interesting as to who educates whom.
Redden rapped the table. "Please. That is not the business of
this task force." He ran a hand through his hair. "We are searching
for two aliens who entered the country illegally. If we don't locate
them quickly, we will all look very foolish."
Translation, thought Arteria: You will look very foolish.
What must it be like to mold your entire life around
bureaucratic ladder climbing? To interpret every issue in terms of
attaboys and awshits on your performance appraisal? Couldn't
Redden see that there were principles at stake here? At least
Moorkith had principles. Wrongheaded, but principles.
"The spacemen must be in Minneapolis," insisted the State
Police commander. "It's the only big city reachable from the crash
site. They had to head there. They would be too conspicuous in a
small town. Our man at Fargo Gap told us that a van from
Minneapolis drove through there the night of the crash, and they
were asking about the air scooper."
Army frowned. "The same night? How did they know about it?"
"There was a girl with them. She claimed that her
grandparents lived nearby. They'd seen it come down and phoned
her."
"You think they were technophile subversives going to pick up
the spacemen?"
State Police hesitated. "It seems likely," he admitted and
hastily added: "In hindsight."
"Got an ID on the girl?" Arteria asked.
"No. We might have, but it wasn't our detail. One of your
people was in charge."
"Who?"
"An engineer captain named Scithers."
Scithers. That explains some things.
"Didn't you search the van," asked Moorkith, "when they came
back? You had roadblocks up by then, surely."
State Police bristled at the implied insult. "Once we were
informed that the spacemen were not in their vessel, we had to
take that into account, yes. A maroon van did leave North Dakota,
but there was just one man in it. It may not have been the same
van."
Redden looked at the ceiling. "Two maroon vans travelling
Fargo Gap in opposite directions the same night," he said to no one
in particular.
"Then the others in the van must have gone west," said
Shirley Johnson. "Or north, to Winnipeg."
Army grunted. "The Winnies would shelter them, all right."
"No," said State Police. "The tracks across the glacier were
headed east. That's why we checked out all known technophiles in
Minneapolis." He looked at Arteria. "With that sci-fi outfit meeting it
looked good. Damn it, it still looks good."
"Agreed. We didn't find them though," Arteria said. They were
there, though. I wonder how they worked it?
Redden waved a hand in dismissal. "The tracks were Eskimos.
Illegals who crossed over from Canada. We found them in Brandon,
looting." He turned to State Police. "But this van. You claim that a
whole load of them went west through the Gap but only one came
back?"
"That's what the trooper remembers. He was almost sure it
was the same van."
"Almost sure," said Moorkith with a smirk.
Redden held up a hand to forestall any argument. "And they
asked about the air scooper. We should follow up on it. Lord
knows, we have few enough leads. Have you identified the van,
yet?"
The State Police captain shook his head. "Just the color-
maroon. The license plate was a fake. Belonged to a car registered
in Brandon."
"Fake. Why didn't you arrest him, then?" Moorkith demanded.
"The computer was down. No way to check it until too late."
"Computer was down," Arteria mused. But lots of citizens
switched plates. Too many nitpicking regulations, like an eternal
swarm of mosquitos. The police had nearly stopped noticing.
"What about the girl?" Redden asked.
"Okay, what about the girl?"
Redden gave an exasperated sigh, and looked again at the
ceiling, as if he expected to find allies there. "Are you checking for
grandparents near the crash site?"
State Police set his jaw. "No, sir. That's in North Dakota."
"Fuck North Dakota. What is this, a state's rights convention?
This is a national security matter. If we don't show some results
soon, the task will be taken out of our hands."
And that won't look good on your record, will it? Whoever
found the downed spacemen would shine like a star in this crowd.
Not the Minnesota State Police. The search would be outside
his balliwick. It probably was already, but these fools didn't see it
yet . . .
Wait, now. Army, across the table from Arteria, was smiling
like the cat that ate the 500 pound canary. He's on to something;
or he thinks he is. And he's got a national writ, like the Air Force;
so state borders don't bother him. And Johnson, she would try to
track their quarries by channeling to some two-million-year-old
avatar.
Where was the FBI? Was Redden keeping them out for
jurisdictional reasons; or were they running their own search? Or
both. Wouldn't that be a hell of a note, if the FBI found them first!
There wouldn't be any interdepartmental squabbles to hold them
up.
"We can make a request to the North Dakota State Police,"
said the state cop. "We can ask them to run a cross-check of local
residents against Minnesota van owners. If we find a last name
match . . ."
"Better check it, against all residents of Minneapolis," said
Moorkith. "Its a granddaughter, remember And she wasn't driving
the van."
Redden shook his head. "I've got a better idea. Our people will
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