Read Children of Scarabaeus for Free Online Page B

went AWOL. A few weeks later, you were found in the Valen Sector in the company of rovers. The rover ship was boarded by Crib milits, but you overpowered Crib Administrator Natesa and refused to surrender.”
    “Be sure to add felony assault and desertion to that list.”
    “I’ll make a note. However, for the moment, my interest lies—”
    “Is Finn alive?”
    Theron looked mildly annoyed by the interruption. Edie didn’t know him well, but she guessed he was that military type who suffered mild annoyance whenever he had to deal with civilians.
    “He is indeed alive. He’s a former Saeth, isn’t he? That’s trouble I’d rather not have to deal with.” Before Edie could demand to see him, Theron continued. “I have every intention of handing him over to Natesa when you report to the Learo Dochais . You’ll have your way, Ms Sha’nim. Now my interest lies in the planet VAL-One-Four. I understand you call it Scarabaeus, and the name seems to have stuck around here.”
    Edie’s fingers fluttered to the beetle shell at her throat, the remains of a creature she’d found on the planet before human technology destroyed it. The beetle had inspired her name for the planet and the rovers had adopted it. The Crib must have confiscated the Hoi Polloi ’s archives before the ship made it to the junkyard—otherwise they wouldn’t know her private name.
    “What about it?” Edie tried to sound innocent. But she knew what had happened, and her stomach sank. She knewthat when Natesa had caught up with the rovers near Scarabaeus, a probe had been sent. Even if Natesa hadn’t been interested, reports of the planet’s strange development had found its way to Theron. Edie knew the direction his military mind would have taken: bioweapons.
    Edie’s hopes that Scarabaeus would be left in peace evaporated.
    “You’ll recall that I was in charge of the seeding operation eight years ago,” Theron said. “I’m now in charge of the exploration of the planet and I have a team stationed there. When I heard you’d been found, I immediately traveled here to meet you. Over the past few months, we have observed some very strange activity on Scarabaeus. The rate of evolution is two orders of magnitude faster than it should be. In theory this should lead to widespread ecosystem collapse, but that’s not happening. In addition, our attempts to control the biocyph have been met with violent defensive reactions.”
    “What does this have to do with me?”
    “I need your help in understanding exactly what’s happening.”
    He’d asked no questions, but waited for Edie’s input nonetheless. She quickly ran through her options. His cyphertecks probably already knew far more about the planet’s current state than she did. She’d spent only a few hours there—a year ago.
    She attacked. “You illegally tried to terraform an advanced ecosystem. Are you so surprised by the results?”
    Theron gave a thin smile and sat back in his chair. “Ah, but it’s not that simple. The BRATs dropped on Scarabaeus by the initial team failed to germinate. We sent an unmanned probe one year later to confirm this. Yet clearly they did germinate at some point after that. And now we have this bizarre ecosystem, highly mutated, evolving at an alarming rate under the control of distorted biocyph that seems to have forgotten it’s supposed to be making a Terran-like world.”
    “I was only a trainee on your team,” Edie reminded him. “You’re asking the wrong person.”
    “And the right person would be…? Your team’s cypherteck was killed by a stowaway eco-rad on the trip home.”
    Bethany had been her friend as well as her trainer. “Whatever happened, it wasn’t her fault. It was probably some faulty biocyph.”
    “Well, let’s not play the blame game. You’re the Crib’s top cypherteck, Edie. You tell me why the terraforming got out of hand over the past few years and turned the planet into a nightmare jungle.”
    “How would I