Deathstalker Honor

by Simon R. Green

  By the time Owen had taken all this in, the airlock opening had already disappeared behind a mat of bloodred vines. He struggled back through the clinging foliage and tried to cut through the vines with his sword, but the blade clung stickily to the vines, and he had to jerk hard to pull it free. He raised his disrupter and took aim. The energy beam punched a hole through the vines, and went on to do untold further damage inside the airlock. The blackened vines tried to catch alight, but the rain quickly put a stop to that. Owen watched numbly as the vines slowly but deliberately repaired and covered over the hole he'd made.

  "Ah," said Moon. "Now, that is unfortunate."

  Owen lost it completely. A shriek of pure rage and frustration burst out of him as he stamped around in a circle, hacking with his sword at any vegetation that got in his way. "That is it! That is bloody it! Not only have I lost my second yacht in a crash landing, not only have we now been cut off from all our supplies and extra weapons, not only is it at least twenty miles between here and the Mission, but it is pouring rain and I don't have my cloak with me! I am soaked! I hate being wet like this! Hate it, hate it, hate it!"

  He kicked viciously at a patch of vines, got his foot tangled, and fell over. No one was stupid enough to laugh. He surged to his feet again, his face crimson as the surrounding vegetation, breathing hard. Moon looked at Hazel.

  "Has Owen changed while I was gone? He never used to do that."

  "No," said Hazel. "He didn't. Everyone stay put here while I go and have a quiet word with him."

  "My Owen never did anything like that," said Midnight. "He was far too dignified."

  "My Owen did all kinds of things," said Bonnie, tugging reflectively at one of her piercings.

  "I'll just bet he did," said Midnight.

  Hazel left Moon trying to make sense of the undercurrents in those last few comments, and moved cautiously forward. Owen was leaning with his head against the coal black bark of a tree trunk. His breathing had slowed somewhat, but he still had his sword in his hand. Hazel hadn't found Owen's outburst funny at all. In all the time she'd known him, he'd never once lost his temper like that. Given what he was capable of, if he got angry enough, Hazel found his sudden loss of control worrying. She stopped a respectful distance away and cleared her throat politely. Owen didn't look around.

  "Go away, Hazel."

  "What's the matter, Owen?" she said quietly. "It wasn't that bad a landing, all things considered. I mean, we're alive."

  "It wasn't the landing," said Owen, staring off into the scarlet jungle. Rain ran down his face, and dripped from his nose and chin. "It's… everything. I am just so damn tired of everything going wrong. This was supposed to be a simple mission: show up, flash the powers, kick a few Hadenman butts, and move on to more important matters. Now look at us. Stranded in the middle of nowhere on a hellplanet colonized by lepers, while all hell is breaking loose in the Empire. I shouldn't be here. I should be out there, fighting the aliens or the Hadenmen or whatever the hell Shub's throwing at us this week. I have a duty, an obligation, to use my abilities to help Humanity. But no, I'm stuck here in the back of beyond when I'm needed elsewhere."

  "You're needed here too," said Hazel. "Saint Bea wouldn't have asked for us unless things were really desperate here."

  "They're lepers," Owen said brutally. "They're dying anyway. The Empire needs us more."

  "Every planet, every people, is just as important as any other," said Hazel. "Didn't your time as an outlaw teach you anything? It's not just the big, important planets like Golgotha that matter. Everyone matters. I know what this is all about. It's hurt pride. You thought you could just drop in here, act the hero for Saint Bea, and then move on to something more high-profile. Instead you screwed up. You, the Deathstalker, the living legend. You think you're the only one that can save the Empire from its enemies. Well, you're wrong. The Empire is perfectly capable of defending itself without you. Even the mighty Deathstalker can't be everywhere at once. Humanity survived perfectly well before we marvelous Maze people came along, and they'll manage just as well when we're gone. The Maze may have made us more than human, but it didn't make us gods. Now cut the crap and shape up, or I'll slap you a good one."

  Owen finally turned his head and looked at her, and something in his cold eyes made Hazel wonder if she'd gone too far. But she held her ground, and after a moment Owen relaxed just a little, and tried a smile.

  "You wouldn't really hit me, would you?"

  "Damn right I would."

  "Okay, I surrender. No more tantrums. Let's go and see what kind of a fix Saint Bea's got herself into."

  Hazel hesitated. "Are you… all right now, Owen?"

  "No. But I am back in control. I'm just… tired. Tired of things never going right for me. Just once I'd like to take a trip on a ship that doesn't crash, or get attacked, or land me up to my ass in trouble. You said it yourself: I'm supposed to be the great hero, the savior of Humanity, and I can't even make my own life work out properly."

  Hazel had to laugh. "Owen, everyone's life is like that. Now, let's get back to the others and work out what we're going to do next before we all drown in this bloody rain. Doesn't it ever let up?"

  "Not for the last few million years. Maybe we could fashion umbrellas out of the local plants."

  "I don't think they'd like that," said Hazel, looking around her at the surrounding vegetation, all of which seemed to be constantly if slowly on the move. "This stuff gives me the creeps. Plants should know their place."

  They returned to the others to find Bonnie and Midnight ostentatiously not talking to each other. Moon had given up trying to make sense of the situation, and was pretending interest in a quivering purple shrub the size of a small house. Owen gave his crashed ship a last look. It was already so deeply buried under crimson vegetation that it might never have been there.

  "All right," he said loudly. "Cut the chatter. It's at least ten miles to Saint Bea's Mission, so the sooner we get started, the sooner we can get there and get out of this rain. Oz, give me directions to the Mission."

  "Of course, Owen. Just head out of this clearing in the direction of those three trees leaning together, and I'll guide you from there. I feel I should brief you about some of the more impressive local vegetation. It can be rather dangerous."

  "You mean it's poisonous?"

  "More like homicidal. Animal life never really got started here, so the plants prey on each other for space, light, water, rooting, etc. Down the millennia they've developed some very nasty tactics, and lots of ways of expressing their displeasure when thwarted. I suggest you all stick very close together, and be prepared to defend yourselves."

  Owen passed this on, and the others received it with varying degrees of disgust.

  "As if this planet wasn't unpleasant enough," said Bonnie. "Bad enough my piercings will probably rust up in all this rain, but now we have to hack our way through miles of killer plants. I can feel one of my heads coming on."

  "Look on it as a challenge," said Midnight. "A warrior never quails from adversity."

  "You look on it as a challenge," said Bonnie. "And I'll stand back and watch you doing it."

  "Cool it," said Hazel. "I mean, come on; how dangerous can a few mobile shrubs be?"

  "I have a horrible feeling we're going to find out," said Owen. "Moon, you take the point. Feel free to shoot or cut up anything at all you don't like the look of. And let's try to set a good pace, people. I hate to think what this place is like when it gets dark. And in case you were wondering, yes, all our torches are back in the ship."

  "Somehow, I'm not surprised," said Hazel. "God, I hate rain."

  * * *

  They followed Oz's murmured directions into the rain-soaked crimson forest, fighting the urge to look back at the mound where their ship had been. The Sunstrider II was their last link with civilized, technological Empire. From now on they were on their own.

  There was little shelter to be found anywhere, rain dripping remorselessly from
every surface. They were all soon soaked to the skin, and rain squelched inside their boots with every step. Their hair was plastered to their faces, and they had to keep blinking their eyes to clear them. The ground under their feet was mostly mud, flattened and compacted like stone in places, but it could change without warning into inches-deep gunk in which the party slipped and skidded, when they weren't tripping overexposed roots or various kinds of creeping vine or ivy.

  It was a constant struggle to push their pace to more than a slow walk, and the unrelenting rain beat down on them like a feeble but persistent bully. After a while Owen took off his jacket and draped it over his head in an improvised hood. It meant he was now cold as well as wet, but it was worth it for the simple relief it offered. The others soon did the same, except for Moon, who didn't seem at all bothered by the rain, and couldn't understand why everyone got so surly when he said so.

  The jungle stretched off in every direction for as far as they could see into the driving rain. Dark-boled trees soared hundreds of feet up into the sky, their branches weighed down with curling leaves the color of blood. Owen reached up to touch one of the leaves, and then swore mildly as the serrated edge opened his fingertip like a razor. He gripped the leaf more firmly, and was surprised to find it thick and pulpy, and unpleasantly warm to the touch. He let go, and sucked thoughtfully at his lacerated finger, ignoring Hazel's acerbic remarks with the ease of long practice.

  Owen was becoming increasingly convinced that on some level the jungle was aware, if not actually sentient, and knew intruders were passing through it. Leaves rustled as the party approached, and fell silent after they were gone. Vines circled slowly on tree trunks like dreaming snakes, and tall stalks would turn to face the party as they passed, quivering agitatedly till they had been safely left behind. Owen also couldn't help noticing that at least half the vegetation seemed to be slowly but determinedly stalking the other half.

  The first attack caught them all by surprise. Long, flailing tendrils with inch-long thorns lashed out at them from every side at once, striking with unexpected strength and speed. The barbs drew blood, and the tendrils sought to wrap themselves around their prey with springy tenacity. But they parted easily under the keen edge of a steel blade, and the oozing remnants sprang away again. More tendrils struck down from above, but the party stood their ground, hacking and cutting about them till the tattered remnants were forced to retreat. Owen drew his disrupter and blasted one of the areas where the bloodred tendrils had seemed to spring from. The others followed suit, and soon there were a half dozen small fires burning around them. There was a certain amount of quivering and rustling in the surrounding foliage, but what was left of the tendrils showed no signs of further aggression.

  Owen put his gun away and looked at the others. "Anyone badly hurt?"

  "Just scratches," said Hazel. "Damn, those things were fast."

  "Should we do something about the fires?" said Moon. "They could spread—"

  "Let them," said Midnight, wiping away blood from a cut on her face that had come dangerously close to an eye. "Treacherous bloody things. Let them all burn."

  "The rain should take care of the fires," said Owen. "And the surrounding foliage looks too drenched to catch sparks. But let's try to remember, there could be colonists' settlements not that far away, so if you have to use your guns, aim carefully."

  "Yes, leader," said Bonnie. "I'm sure that would never have occurred to us. How ever did we manage till you came along?"

  Owen ignored that and gestured for Moon to lead off again.

  The slow march continued, slogging through deepening mud until their legs ached from the strain. Moon continued to treat it all as a casual ramble, stopping every now and again to pull up some unfamiliar piece of plant life, compare it against his data banks, and announce happily that since it wasn't officially identified, he had the right to name it. Unfortunately, this tended to involve very labored puns in Latin, which no one but Moon understood or appreciated, so after a few pointed death threats from certain members of the party, he kept his enthusiasm to himself, silently studying everything that didn't shrink away fast enough.

  Given the general denseness of the jungle, and the way all the plant life fought for every square inch of light and rain, Owen had expected to spend most of his journey hacking a path with his sword, but after the incident with the barbed tendrils, the jungle seemed to be going out of its way to slowly open up a path before them. Owen thought some more about how aware the jungle might be. He raised the subject with Oz, who responded with a running commentary on what was known of Lachrymae Christi's plant life. Most of this was monumentally boring, and Owen tuned it out until something odd caught his attention.

  "Hold it, Oz, back up. No insects at all here? Are you sure?"

  "Quite sure. Like animal life, they just never caught on here. The plant life is so aggressive on all levels that all other kinds of life never found an ecological niche to prosper in."

  "But if there's no insects, and as far as I can see no flowers… how do the plants propagate? How does fertilization occur?"

  "Well, it certainly doesn't involve the birds and bees. Take a look over to your right, about four o'clock."

  Owen looked, and saw two large masses of foliage moving together, rocking back and forth. "Wait a minute. Are they doing what I think they're doing?"

  "I'm afraid so. You should think yourselves lucky you didn't arrive in the rutting season. Do you want to know how the trees do it?"

  "No!"

  "Suit yourself. You've led a really sheltered life in some ways, Owen."

  The AI went back to talking about how the rain drained away through the ground, and ended up in vast subterranean lakes that fed the jungle's great root system, and Owen went back to not listening.

  They trudged on for another hour or so, getting even wetter and more miserable, before the jungle moved against them again. They'd fallen into a plodding routine, following the path that opened up before them, until Oz suddenly pointed out that the path was slowly but surely turning them off course. Owen yelled for everyone to stop, and they all snapped out of their half daze, guns at the ready. Owen calmed them down and explained the situation, and took the point so he could follow Oz's directions more exactly. But when he tried to turn aside from the path, the red foliage clumped stubbornly together before him, forming a thick, ragged wall. Owen drew his sword and cut the wall with all his strength, but just as before, his blade clung stickily to the foliage, limiting the amount of damage he could do. He pulled his sword free, stepped back, and opened fire with his disrupter. The energy beam blasted a narrow tunnel through the plant wall, lined with blackened and burning edges. But as soon as Owen moved forward, the scorched sides just closed together again, like a slow-moving man trap.

  "Stubborn, isn't it?" said Hazel. "The jungle really doesn't want us deviating from the path it's chosen."

  "Maybe it's hiding something," said Midnight. "Some vulnerable part of itself."

  "Little baby jungle things?" said Bonnie. "Could we be trespassing on a nursery?"

  "How long would it take us to go around whatever it is?" said Moon, looking at Owen.

  Owen consulted with Oz and then shook his head. "Depends on how large an area the jungle is protecting. Let's try curling around it. If it looks like it's taking us too long, we'll see what high explosives will do. You do have some, don't you. Hazel?"

  "Never without them," said Hazel cheerfully.

  Owen led the way cautiously around the blocked-off area, gun in his hand, and looked carefully about him for possible traps or ambush points. For the first time he was forced to consider the possibility that parts of the jungle might not just be aware, but actually sentient. He tried to visualize what kind of drowsy, sluggish thoughts a plant might think, and wasn't surprised when he couldn't.

  He led the way for a good half hour before realizing something was wrong. Apart from the foliage drawing slowly back in front of him to form the path, nothing in
the jungle was moving. Not a vine or a branch or a leaf. He stared about him into the endless twilight, straining his eyes against the denseness of the jungle and the never ending rain, but all was still and silent. The only sound was the heavy squelching of his party's boots diving in and out of the mud, and the steady patter of the rain. Owen hefted his disrupter. His instincts were screaming that he was walking into a trap, but he couldn't see anything dangerous or even threatening. If anything, the path ahead seemed wider than usual. But he was haunted by a sense of imminence, of something about to happen. Hazel moved up beside him.

  "You feel it too, don't you?" she said quietly.

  He nodded. "The jungle's watching us. It's planning something."

  "Intelligent plants," said Hazel. "Spooky. Would it help if I apologized for all the salads I've eaten?"

  Owen smiled briefly. "I doubt it. You see anything?"

  "Not a damned thing. What do we do?"

  "Keep moving, and be ready to react whenever whatever it is hits us. We've fought Hadenmen and Grendels. I doubt there's anything a bunch of plants can throw at us that we can't handle."

  "Getting cocky again, Deathstalker."

  While they were busy talking, the ground dropped out from under their feet. Owen's stomach lurched as he plunged down into the mud and just kept going. He scrabbled about him for something to cling onto, but all the surrounding vegetation had drawn back out of reach. There was only the mud, thick and confining, sucking him down. The others were yelling all around him, and from what he could see were just as badly off as him. The mud began moving, circling like a slow-motion whirlpool. The mud was already up to Owen's waist, and he was still sinking. He fought to stay upright, and tried to remember what he'd heard about dealing with quicksand. You were supposed to be able to swim in it, if you kept your nerve, but when Owen tried to move his legs, they barely responded at all. The mud smothered his movements easily, thick and clinging and bitterly cold.