"Two bits!" Fenstermacher shouted.
Chapter 17. Returning the Favor
MacArthur awoke and could not remember. He looked about the cave and saw Fenstermacher sitting next to the fire. A murky grayness filtered into the cave.
"Fensterma—Winfried! What time is it?" he groaned, forcing open sleep-crusted eyes. He remembered the animal and turned to look at it. It was staring at him.
Fenstermacher glanced out at the foggy morning. "About a half hour to sunrise, gruntface. It's hard to tell, it's so foggy out," he replied.
MacArthur stretched. "Then I haven't been asleep very long."
Fenstermacher laughed. "You lost a whole day, jarbrains. You've been asleep through all four watches and then some."
MacArthur shook the stiffness from his good shoulder; he must have lain on it the whole night. He coughed, trying to wet his cotton-dry mouth. "I believe you," he mumbled as he rolled out of his bag, unsteadily putting his legs beneath him. His body ached with the accumulation of abuse.
"Quinn and Shannon want to see you. I'm supposed to go get 'em," Fenstermacher said. MacArthur heard footsteps and turned to see Lieutenant Buccari materialize from the mists.
"Well…go get them," Buccari ordered. Fenstermacher smiled and flipped an exaggerated salute as he trotted into the fog.
"Good morning, Corporal," Buccari said. "You've had a good sleep." She walked to the animal and held out a finger. The beast reached out and eagerly clasped it, emitting a delighted squeak. Buccari smiled, her green eyes sparkled. Her perfect features were framed by a five-day auburn stubble. MacArthur was enchanted.
"Eh, good morning, Lieutenant. Don't be too hard on Fenstermacher. He just wanted to give me a chance to, eh.. take care of, uh.. nature' s call." MacArthur self-consciously pulled on his jumpsuit and sat down to pull on his boots.
"Of course! I'm sorry," she said, blushing. "I'll watch Tonto."
"Tonto seems to know who you are, sir," he said. "He likes you." MacArthur held her eyes with his and smiled happily. She remained outwardly impassive, but her eyes brightened.
"I brought him in," she said, staring him squarely in the face. "We're going to take Tonto back to where you woke up. Go take care of whatever you need to do. I'll let Commander Quinn know."
"Yes, sir. And thank you," he said. MacArthur passed the returning Fenstermacher and received directions to the latrine. Fenstermacher told him about the hot springs and highly recommended he take a dip.
"You stink bad," was the way Fenstermacher put it. MacArthur laughed heartily and slapped the boatswain's hat from his head, sailing it off into the rocks. MacArthur stumbled stiffly down the hill, leaving Fenstermacher swearing with his usual surpassing skill.
* * *
They approached the cliff edge. Buccari marched at a hard pace behind MacArthur, frequently making eye contact with the injured creature carried papoose-style on the corporal's broad back. Quinn and Shannon came after her. Tatum brought up the rear. Tonto stared into the air. Buccari looked up and was not surprised to see soaring black specks.
"Sarge," MacArthur said, stopping, the cliff only paces away. "This is where I woke up. Maybe we should make camp and see what happens."
"Why don't we just put it down and back away?" Shannon asked.
"Tonto might run off," MacArthur said. "That won't prove anything."
"What are we trying to prove?" Shannon asked.
"Good question, Sergeant," Quinn replied. "I guess we'd like them to understand what we're doing—that we're returning a favor." The commander walked toward the edge of the cliff, remaining comfortably removed from the lip. He looked along the precipice and then back into the skies. "I agree with Corporal MacArthur. Let's make camp," he said.
Buccari shucked off her heavy pack, went up to MacArthur, and unstrapped the injured creature. Its body was passively limp. It intently watched the skies.
"Why don't I take Tonto away from the group and sit with him," she said. "Maybe something will happen if they see him walking around."
She carried the animal on her hip toward the edge of the cliff and sat down on warm granite. Carefully unwinding the cloth swaddling, Buccari unbound the creature's wings and legs and stood him erect. She held him by a light leash. Tonto stood calmly, staring into her eyes or glancing past her into the skies. Buccari was absorbed with clearing the animal's bindings and dressings. Occasionally she lifted her gaze, but she mainly focused on the creature in front of her. The others busied themselves setting up camp.
Tonto stood erect, taller than Buccari in her sitting position. She leaned back and watched the hunter hop about, never putting tension on his leash. He whistled and clicked and stretched his good arm, extending the membrane and allowing it to flutter in the wind, all the while keeping the broken arm close to his body. Buccari was intrigued with the mechanics of the wing. A bony appendage emanating from the animal's forearm extended the wingspan past the wrist and hand for almost a meter. At full extension the wrist and hand acted like an overcenter lock, holding the wing rigid on the down beat. When the wing was stowed, the arm rotated and the appendage folded back on the forearm, arranging the excess webbing around the creature's lower back in a smooth fold. She watched the creature as it gracefully stowed the good wing.
Buccari also marveled at the animal's fine fur. She reached out to the silky pelt. The animal watched her hand stroke its fur and, after several strokes, leaned against the pressure, its eyes closing to slits. Suddenly the creature's pliable muscles hardened into iron; its eyes opened wide and stared directly over her shoulder, toward the cliff. Buccari looked up to see Quinn, MacArthur, and Tatum frozen in action poses. Shannon had a pistol in his hand, and Tatum had grabbed a rifle. Buccari rolled to her knees and slowly turned her head.
Two hopelessly ugly animals, generously scarred, stood between her and the precipice. Like the humans behind her, they were postured dynamically, eyes slit to combative intensity. The newcomers wore thick leather chest and groin protectors, and one carried a pike that was half again as long as the creature was tall. Involuntarily Buccari cleared her throat. The fierce creatures' eyes darted to her, registered no threat, and snapped back to the men. She moved onto unsteady legs and found herself to be a head taller than the newcomers. She reached down and disengaged the clip holding Tonto' s harness and leash. With a slight shake of her hand the harness came loose. She stood up and pushed the injured creature toward the newcomers.
Tonto grabbed her finger.
Buccari looked down at the clinging animal and tried to smile. She gently broke loose, took three steps backward, and waited. Tonto hopped over to his comrades, while the creature with the pike waddled forward and placed the weapon at Buccari's feet. Uncertain what to do, she turned and looked at the men. She sighed with relief as Tatum and Shannon put their weapons on the ground. MacArthur, finger to his lips, walked over to Tatum and pulled Tatum' s knife from its calf scabbard. He moved past Buccari and laid the knife at the feet of the foremost animal. MacArthur stepped next to Buccari and picked up the pike at her feet. The animal bent easily and picked up the knife. And then it bowed, elegantly. MacArthur bowed in return. Standing erect, MacArthur startled everybody, including the beasts, by cheerfully whistling the seven-note ditty. As if rehearsed, Tonto, standing close to his fellows, whistled the same notes in return but stopped short of the last two. MacArthur firmly whistled the two final short notes.
Tension palpably lessened, but movements were still guarded, nerves taut. The newcomers grabbed their injured comrade and hopped to the cliff's edge. Without looking back, they pushed off and dropped from sight. Piercing screams shattered the silence.
Chapter 18. Gorruk
"They deserved to die," Gorruk snapped, his huge body trembling, his brow tufts oscillating like tuning forks.
"You are hopeless," Jook rumbled. "Why do you act so? You represent my regime. Executing an entire regional government was stupid!" They lounged in Jook's private chambers, drinking kotta wine and smoki
ng precious wahocca cigars. The imperial entourage had been dismissed.
"Regional bureaucrats!" Gorruk roared, surprised, and growing angry. He expected commendation for his decisiveness. "They would not obey procurement orders. My armies must be fed."
"Yes, yes, it is critical that your forces be provided for—their moment draws near—but even useless bureaucrats have purpose," Jook lectured. "There will be utter chaos until they are replaced. Tax revenues will disappear."
Gorruk glared sulkily at the Supreme Leader. The politics of government were too much for his direct mentality. He struggled, resisting mightily the urge to throw the emperor-general's own past back in his face. General Jook' s history—the scourge of the unification wars—was replete with mayhem and terror.
"You cannot threaten death whenever someone disagrees with you," the ruler preached. "I have learned this the hard way. Too much fear can be counter-productive. You create only martyrs."
"Yes, Jook," Gorruk replied. "But—"
"You will address me in the proper manner!" Jook bellowed. Both giants, staggered by drink, lurched to their hinds; the yellow scent of their mutual anger exploded into the air. Subtly concealed doors burst open, and a dozen armed members of the palace guard burst into the chamber, powerful snub-blasters aimed to kill. Air circulators kicked in.
Gorruk, exceedingly clever, was also extraordinarily courageous. The general, standing erect, deigned not to look at the guards.
"You will address me in the proper manner," Jook said smoothly, an imperious smile creeping over the wide expanse of his grainy features.
"Yes, Exalted One," Gorruk said at last, smiling only with his mouth.
Jook laughed, a ground-shaking rumble. He dismissed the guards with an impatient jerk of his beaker, splashing wine. "Oh, too well do I understand you," he sneered, nodding his monstrous head. "Yes, it is difficult being the general, my comrade; but it is far more difficult being the emperor-general."
"I must defer," the surly general snarled without sincerity.
Jook poured another great vessel of wine. "Tell me, General Gorruk, what is your opinion on this matter of the aliens?"
Gorruk' s intellect struggled to rein in his fury. With effort he suppressed his bile and focused on the new subject, little improving his temperament. "The aliens…my leader?" he snorted. "Routed into space for another four hundred years, perhaps forever. History taught us well."
"Hmm, I wonder," Jook replied. "What have we really learned?"
"Your Excellency?"
"Who knows what really happened four hundred years ago?" Jook asked.
"We were attacked from space, and the decadent governments of the nobility were destroyed. The generals defended the planet."
"And ruled with wisdom and perfection ever since. You have read too much official history, General," Jook said, growing introspective. "Our planet was attacked, but by whom, by what? The generals did not defend the planet—the attackers just went away. They just went away."
"But the Rule of Generals was established all the same," Gorruk said. "The noble houses lost their hold on power, and—"
"And our planet has never been the same," Jook interrupted. "The global trade networks and economic exchange agreements that were natural extensions of the noble houses were never reimplemented. The hemispheres became separated by more than just the equatorial deserts."
"But we have solved our problems," Gorruk said, amazed at Jook' s revisionism. "Our populations no longer overwhelm our resources. We have not suffered famine in over two hundred years, and crime is all but eliminated."
"True," Jook agreed. "Famine has been superseded; it is a poor government that allows its soldiers to die of starvation."
"Our armies have united the entire northern hemisphere," Gorruk said. "Given the right conditions we will reunite the planet. We will make possible a global prosperity and security that never before existed, even under the nobility."
"So says the history written by our militant ancestors," Jook said. "I am told the nobility read from different volumes."
"Bah," Gorruk said. "Their version of history is irrelevant."
"And yet our noble friends are not so helpless," Jook said. "They have assumed positions of responsibility and power in all the technologies and sciences—and even the military. And they have regained power in five southern hemisphere countries. Perhaps they are trying to rewrite history, eh, General?"
"Perhaps. And perhaps after we have conquered those renegade southern nations we should clean the vermin out of all houses."
"Hmm, it has been considered," Jook mused. "But no one has yet figured out how to make the economy run without our noble friends. The global economy has never been as robust as it was before the Rule of Generals. Even without kingdoms to rule, the nobility control the purses of the world."
"Our world has changed, Your Excellency," Gorruk responded. "Do not forget, during the Reign of Ollant the nobility directly controlled both the northern and southern prosperity spheres—a significant advantage."
"True," Jook said. "The southern tribes are spiteful and noncooperative. The deserts have given them false security for too long.
"We shall fix that!" Gorruk exclaimed. "My armies will be ready."
"Yes," Jook said, "but in the meantime, we should not overlook other opportunities. Let us return to this matter of the aliens. Our Minister of Internal Affairs believes the second invasion was different—"
"Yes, we were prepared," Gorruk interrupted. "We intercepted and destroyed the alien invaders before they came close enough to attack."
"But who were they, General?" Jook asked. "How come they to fly between the stars? Were they the same race that attacked out planet four hundred years ago? Who knows? But we should pay heed to Et Kalass' s activities. Our noble friends have even gone to the expense of funding a expedition to Genellan."
"I have heard of this alien mystery ship!" Gorruk said. "A waste of time and money. Even if true—which I doubt—any alien ship-wrecked on that ice planet is long dead. We can ill afford to expend energy sniffing about for alien bones. We have a war to plan and execute."
"Where is your curiosity, General?" Jook asked.
"I am a soldier.. not a scientist," Gorruk answered.
"Nevertheless, General," Jook said, "Old Kalass is up to something. I desire you to watch our good minister's actions. Let us not discount Genellan too readily. Perhaps, just perhaps, there is something there. It would be wise to have an agent on the scene. You can do something, can you not?"
"I always send the best," Gorruk snarled.
Chapter 19. Exploration
"Everyone's talking about your argument, Sharl," Hudson said, plopping down next to her on the lake beach. "You went thermal."
"Damned difficult to have a confidential discussion around here," she replied.
"Sorry I butted in, but we heard you yelling and thought you were in trouble. You were about as confidential as a collision alarm."
"Sound carries up in those rocks," she said.
"Particularly swear words," Hudson mumbled.
"I got pretty cranked up, eh?" She laughed. "Well, I'm not sorry."
"The commander looked angry. Very angry."
"He'll get over it," she said, her smile fading. "I had to get him to stop moping about his wife. To start making decisions. And if he wasn't going to start exploring for a better place to settle, then I sure as shit was. MacArthur says there's a valley down the river that has everything we need, and MacArthur knows what he's talking about. This plateau is going to be frozen hell in less than three months."
"Everyone's with you, Sharl. They know you're right," Hudson said, "but nuking the commander sure made them nervous. Thought Shannon was going to wet his skivvies when you ordered both of them on patrol."
She chuckled and lay backwards, stretching out in the firm sand. A fleet of wooly clouds passed in review, highlighting the dark clarity of the stark blueness. Two stars twinkled dimly at the zenith. Unseen, a
jumping fish made a noise like a hollow barrel being thumped. A flock of tiny gray birds, common now with the maturing summer, flitted low over the shore, swerving to avoid the earthlings. A flower moaned somewhere.
"I wonder if it will make any difference?" she said presently. "What? Shannon wetting his—?" Hudson turned to face her. "This planet's longer day and year. Will we live longer, too?" "Why should that make any difference?" Hudson answered, bending over to pick up another rock.
"Why not?" Buccari mused. "Our bodies might adjust to the daily and annual cycles. Our bodies may choose to live the same number of days, or maybe the same number of winters. That could mean we might live ten or twenty percent longer in absolute time."
"Nice dream, but I don't think so," Hudson replied, walking to the water's edge. "The body won't know the difference."
"I'm not so sure. It may take a few generations to make a difference. If nothing else, we're sleeping the same six to eight hours every day, so we get an extra two point two three hours of waking time. The percentage of time we sleep has gone down."
Hudson contemplated her logic. "You might have a point, Sharl. But I bet we have to pay it back somehow. You don't get something for nothing."
"Even the months are longer," Buccari remarked, "assuming you use the big moon as the reference. It takes thirty-two days between full moons."
"Actually the little moon might be more convenient," Hudson said, throwing the rock into the lake. "Takes fourteen days to cycle. We double the period and have a twenty-eight day moon month just like on Earth. Whatever, it's sure nice to have long summer days."
"Let's see how we feel after spending a winter here. A winter like we've never seen. We need to get off this plateau."
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