Jack
Rogan chuckled. “I find it almighty dangerous, Jack. That’s why we’re keeping you close. I’m counting on Nam and myself to counter it if something goes wrong. But frankly, the safest thing we can do with it is bring it as quickly as we can to the place where we’re most likely to find the tools to get a handle on it. We absolutely can not let you go home like this, and no moral choice would have allowed you left behind on Chald. It would also be reckless to turn you over to Ministry idiots who have less of a clue than I, so I’m staying with you. Besides, in the meantime, you just might turn out to be useful.”
“Useful?”
“Oh aye.” Rogan picked at a bit of potato, then stopped and set his fork down. He clasped his hands and looked at Jack. “Tell me about the girl, Jack.”
“The girl….” His mind ran through several possibilities before deciding the one Rogan must mean. “You mean the one in Aum?”
“The very same. What do we know about her?”
He was mystified by the question. The girl had been a utter stranger to him. “Nothing. Except, I’m sure she’s an American and… she throws around flames, just like me.”
“Truth. In a like manner to yourself, although perhaps not to the same excess. In addition, she attempted to stop us from leaving twice. It’s three times, if she sent that squad. And she pulled off what I should think would have been an impossible feat, recruiting warbeasts to her fight. Now, is that all we know?”
Jack frowned, and reflected. A question that had been bugging him came to mind. “I’ve been wondering how she knew.”
“How she knew what?”
“You probably couldn’t hear her.” He studied the lock again as he thought about it. “The first time we met her, she called me ‘the missing policeman they’ve been looking for on Earth.’ I’m sure I was in the news for a day or two, back home, but she looked like she’s been a castaway for months.”
Rogan meditated on his ale, mulling over the new information. “Interesting. It suggests she has rapid communication with Earth. Rapid communication between the wilderness on Chald and an off-the-way world like Earth implies a sophisticated organization.”
He looked back up at Jack. “The fact that she knew who you were would match well with another fact that you didn’t note. The other thing we know.”
“What’s that?”
“The girl and the cat are related somehow–” Rogan took a swig of the ale, and swallowed. “–And they appear to be opposed.”
Jack gave a puzzled frown. “Why do you say that?”
“When one appeared, so did the other. And the cat was clearly after her, the second time.”
“The second time, we chased the cat and ran into her.”
Rogan shook his head and raised a finger. “She was already there when the cat showed up, and she was leading a cloaked squadron of Ilidi warbeasts to ambush us. The cat just sensed her before we did. It may have saved us by rushing them. The fact that it detected the woman before Nam did, I might point out, suggests either the lass called the cat, or the cat is very much fixated on her. Given the hash it was making of her battle plan, my bet is the lass did not call it.”
Rogan picked his fork back up again and impaled a chunk of steak. Holding it up like a pointer, he expounded once more.
“In summary, the girl is from Earth. Our victims are from Earth. We last saw Benjamin on Earth, and he seems to be from there. The cat somehow ties to the girl, and to the ethen. Since the mad warbeast from which you obtained that ethen was at a key junction for Benjamin’s route, the odds are it was related to all this as well.”
“We could add that the ethen attached itself to the first Earther with high flux sensitivity that showed up, but we don’t know yet whether that was chance or another clue. But the ethen, the cat, Benjamin, the girl and Earth are all related somehow.”
His eyes had a shrewd glint as he smiled and delivered his key point. “So, as an Earther in possession of a certain cat and a certain ethen, I reckon you’re vital to my case.”
