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McKie stared across Bahrank through the slits The city was nearer now Their rocking descent swept his gaze up and down Chu&039;s towers, which lifted like silvery organ pipes out of the Council Hills The far cliff was a series of rey Chu&039;s Warrens lay smokey and hazed all around the fluted towers And he couldouter wall Squat forts dotted the wall&039;s top, offset for enfilading fire The city within the wall seemed so tall McKie had not expected it to appear so tall - but that spoke of the population pressures in a way that could not be e ended at another battlefield plain streith bodies of metal and flesh, the death stink an inescapable vapor Bahrank spun his vehicle left, right, dodged piles of torn equipment, avoided craters where mounds of flesh lay beneath insect blankets Ferns and other loere beginning to spring upright after thecreatures sported in the ferntops, uncaring of all that death Aritch&039;s aides had warned McKie that Dosadi&039;s life existed amidst brutal excesses, but the actuality sickened him He identified both Gowachin and Hureen skin of a young Gowachin fe her arms, especially revolted him McKie turned sharply away, found Bahrank studying hi Gowachin eyes Bahrank spoke as he drove
"There&039;re informers everywhere, of course, and after this" His head nodded left and right "you&039;ll have to ht&039;ve anticipated"
A brittle explosion punctuated his words So struck the vehicle&039;s aret And again The clanging ofall around thelass over the view slits
McKie suppressed his shock That thin glass did not shatter He knew about thick shields of telass, but this put a new dimension on what he&039;d been told about the Dosadi Quite resourceful, indeed!
Bahrank drove with apparent unconcern
More explosive attacks cae in the jungle beyond the plain
"They&039;re testing," Bahrank said He pointed to one of the slits "See? They don&039;t even leave a lass"
McKie spoke from the depths of his bitterness
"Sometimes you wonder what all this proves except that our world runs on distrust"
"Who trusts?"
Bahrank&039;s words had the sound of a catechism
McKie said:
"I hope our friends knohen to stop testing"
"They were told we couldn&039;t take ree to pass us through?"
"Even so, they&039;re expected to try a few shots if just to keep races with h a series of dazzling speed changes and turns for no apparent reason McKie lurched against the restraints, felt bruising pain as an elbow hit the side of the cab An explosion directly behind rocked them up onto the left track As they bounced, Bahrank spun them left, avoided another blast which would&039;ve landed directly on theing from the explosions, felt the machine bounce to a stop, reverse as more explosions erupted ahead Bahrank spun theed full speed ahead right into an unbroken wall of jungle With explosions all around, they crashed through greenery, turned to the right along another shadowed muddy track McKie had lost all sense of direction, but the attack had ceased
Bahrank slowed theh his ventricles
"I knew they&039;d try that"
He sounded both relieved and amused
McKie, shaken by the brush with death, couldn&039;t find his voice
Their shadowy track snaked through the jungle for a space, giving McKie time to recover By then, he didn&039;t knohat to say He couldn&039;t understand Bahrank&039;s a concern over such violent threat
Presently, they ereen as a park lawn It dipped gently doard into a thin screen of growth through which McKie could see a silver-green tracery of river What caught and held McKie&039;s attention, however, was a less, pock-walled grey fortress which lifted from the plain in the rowth screening the river Buttressed arms reached toward theate," Bahrank said
Bahrank turned them left, lined up with the center of the buttressed arh the tube," he said
McKie nodded Walls, tubes, and gates: those were the keys to Chu&039;s defenses They had "barrier and fortress minds" on Dosadi This tube would run beneath the river He tried to place it on the map which Aritch&039;s people had planted in his raphy of this place, its geology, religions, social patterns, the intimate layout of each island&039;s walled defenses, but he found it hard to locate himself now on that mental map He leaned forward to the slit, peered upward as the reat central spire with its horizontal clock All the hours ofsnicked into place
"Yes, Gate Nine"
Bahrank, too busy driving, did not reply
McKie dropped his gaze to the fortress, stifled a gasp
The ru pace, aimed directly toward that black metal barrier At the last instant, when it seemed they would crash into it, the barrier leaped upward They shot through into a diate thundered closed behind the beneath the tracks
Bahrank slowed them, shifted a lever beside him The machine lifted onto wheels with an abrupt reduction in noise which made McKie feel that he&039;d been deafened The feeling was heightened by the realization that Bahrank had said the sa to him several times
"Jedrik says you come from beyond the far mountains Is that true?"
"Jedrik says it" He tried to
Bahrank was concentrating on a line of thought, however, as he drove the floor of the dim tube
"There&039;s a rumor that you Rimmers have started a secret settle to build your own city"
"An interesting rule line of overhead lights in the tube left the cab&039;s interior darker than it&039;d been outside, illuminated by only the faint reflections from instruments and dials But McKie had the odd sensation that Bahrank saw hi every expression Despite the iht persisted What was behind Bahrank&039;s probing?
Why do I feel that he sees right through ed from the tube onto a Warren street Bahrank spun therey shadows
Although he&039;d seen many representations of these streets the actuality deepened McKie&039;s feelings of So dirtyoppressiveso many people They were everywhere!
Bahrank drove slowly now on the silent wheels, the tracks raised off the paving The big h narrow little streets, so black All the streets were shaded by overhanging upper stories whose height McKie could not judge through the slits He saw shops barred and guarded An occasional stairway, also guarded, led up or down into repellent darkness Only Humans occupied these streets, and no casual, pedestrian expressions on any of theri eyes peered at the passing vehicle Bothof the Labor Pool
Noting McKie&039;s interest, Bahrank spoke
"This is a Human enclave and you have a Gowachin driver"
"Can they see us in here?"
"They know And there&039;s trouble coainst Human"
This appalled McKie, and he wondered if this were the source of those forebodings which Aritch and aides would not explain: destruction of Dosadi from within But Bahrank continued:
"There&039;s a growing separation between Humans and Gowachin, worse than it&039;s ever been You may be the last Human to ride with me"
Aritch and coer, and distrust, but they&039;d said nothing about species against speciesonly that someone they refused to name could destroy the place fro to say? McKie dared not expose his ignorance by probing, and this inability dismayed him
Bahrank, e onto a wider street which was crowded by carts, each piled with greenery The carts moved aside slowly as the armored vehicle approached, hatred plain in the eyes of the Humans who moved with the carts The press of people astonished McKie: for every cart (and he lost count of them within a block) there were at least a hundred people crowding around, lifting ar of people who stood shoulder to shoulder around each cart, their backs to the piled contents and obviously guarding those contents
McKie, staring at the carts, realized with a shocked sense of recognition that he was staring at carts piled with garbage The crowds of people were buying garbage
Again, Bahrank acted the part of tour guide
"This is called the Street of the Hungry That&039;s very select garbage, the best"
McKie recalled one of Aritch&039;s aides saying there were restaurants in Chu which specialized in garbage from particular areas of the city, that no poison-free food asted
The passing scene compelled McKie&039;s attention: hard faces, furtive movements, the hate and thinly suppressed violence, all of this ie And the numbers of these people! They were everywhere around: in doorways, guarding and pushing the carts, skipping out of Bahrank&039;s path New smells assaulted McKie&039;s nostrils, a fetid acridity, a stink such as he had never before experienced Another thing surprised him: the appearance of antiquity in this Warren He wondered if all city populations crowded by threats from outside took on this ancient appearance By ConSentient standards, the population of Chu had lived here only a few generations, but the city looked older than any he&039;d ever seen
With an abrupt rocking motion, Bahrank turned their ht theht, saw an arched entry in a griloom
"Down there&039;s where you meet Jedrik," Bahrank said "Down those stairs, second door on your left It&039;s a restaurant"
"How&039;ll I know her?"
"Didn&039;t they tell you?"
"I" McKie broke off He&039;d seen pictures of Jedrik during the Tandaloor briefings, realized now that he was trying to delay leaving Bahrank&039;s armored cocoon
Bahrank appeared to sense this
"Have no fear, McKie Jedrik will know you And McKie"
McKie turned to face the Gowachin
"go directly to the restaurant, take a seat, wait for Jedrik You&039;ll not survive long here without her protection Your skin&039;s dark and soreen to the dark in this quarter They remember Pylash Gate here Fifteen years isn&039;t long enough to erase that fro about a Pylash Gate had been included in McKie&039;s briefings and now he dared not ask
Bahrank moved the switch which opened McKie&039;s door Immediately, the stink of the street was a proportions Bahrank, seeing him hesitate, spoke sharply
"Go quickly!"
McKie descended in a kind of olfactory daze, found hi on the side of the street, the object of suspicious stares fro aas the cutting of his last link to the ConSentiency and all the faht protect hi life had McKie felt this much alone