by Jean Kilczer
Chancey paused. “You know, superstar,” he told me, “someday, you're going to have to tackle the really important stuff.” He chuckled and continued scraping.
I looked at Joe and smiled crookedly.
He nodded and turned back to the door. “I'm getting too old for this feces.” He pressed an ear against the door.
I gently touched the new welt and closed my eyes. I'm twenty-seven-years old, or maybe twenty-eight. Being an orphan, I'm not sure. “So am I,” I told Joe. “So am I.”
Chapter Three
The desert night air was sharp as knives. The sun waited in the wings behind a range of black hills. We stayed to the shadows of stone structures and made our way into the unguarded ammo dump. Here in the BEMs' military camp, there was no reason for them to post guards, except perhaps at the perimeters.
It hadn't been easy pulling Joe through the window, but poor Huff had scrapes and bleeding cuts on his hips from his passage between bars and through the grooved cement window. He left a lot of fur back there. He never cried out or complained, though, as I'd braced my foot against the outside of the wall and pulled on his forearms, while Chancey and Joe had leaned their shoulders against his rear and pushed from the inside.
We had perhaps an hour before first light and the discovery of our escape. We intended to put it to good use.
Inside the ammo dump I strapped on a holster with a charged laser stingler and stuck a second one behind my waistband. Joe and Chancey did the same. Huff strapped two small flash beamers around his hind legs. I found backup batteries for our weapons and stuffed them into four field backpacks, then adjusted the straps for human and Vegan body forms.
“Keep guard by the door,” Joe told me.
I slipped into a backpack as I went there and peered outside. Huff watched beside me as I helped him into his backpack. His predator's night vision was much sharper than my own.
Joe and Chancey found explosives, a timer, fuses, and some other stuff and set the charges.
Chancey grinned around a wire clamped between his teeth. “They'll be looking for their weapons on Denebria's two moons.”
I think Chancey gets bored so easily that he's only truly alive when he's in deep shit. I bit my lip as I scanned the terrain around us. I had to admit to that particular insanity myself.
Two BEMs strolled by in the distance. “Get back inside, Huff,” I whispered. “Your white fur gleams in the moonlight.”
He moved into the shadows of the tent.
I watched the BEMs' domed heads nod as they strolled on tentacles, and quieted my thoughts. How far did their tel links reach? If they detected us, could they bring the whole camp down on our heads like a swarm of bees destroying an intruder? “Quiet your thoughts,” I told my companions. “There's a couple of BEMs out there.”
To the east, dawn was lifting the curtain of night. A warm glow smeared the sky above dark hills as Denebria rolled toward daylight.
“C'mon!” Joe told me. “We set the charges for thirty minutes. By then the sun will be up and so will our time here.”
He led the way across a tarmac. “Look for the lifeboat,” he told us. “That's still our ride out.”
“To where?” I asked as we searched the pads among land and air vehicles. “The lifeboat can't make it off planet.”
“Somewhere past the BEMs' front lines,” Joe said.
“You think the Denebrians are fighting back?” I asked.
We trotted along a dark path toward two space shuttles and land vehicles.
“I think there are at least skirmishes, if not an organized defensive,” Joe said, panting. He raised a hand. “Wait! What's that?”
“Ah, shit!” Chancey exclaimed.
The burned hull of our lifeboat lay beside a BEM land craft with a broken wing and bent wheels, and some scrap metal.
“They probably didn't know how to work the controls,” I said. “Which begs the question. Will we know how to drive one of their vehicles?”
Joe motioned us toward a small land and air craft. “We'll find out. In twenty minutes all hell is going to break loose. Should give us time for a quick course in alien instruments.”
“Joe,” I said, “once they realize that we've escaped and they're looking for us, they can combine the hive mind from different points. They'll locate us like we're a red flag on a map.”
“Any suggestions?” he asked as we approached the craft.
“Just don't talk, and try not to even think!” I told him.
He nodded as we reached the craft's door. It was unlocked
“Easier said than done.” Chancey climbed inside.
“Consider the stakes,” I told him and climbed aboard.
“I have tried not to think,” Huff said. “It is difficult.”
Chancey and I exchanged glances.
Behind black dunes, sheets of golden sunlight ignited clouds in blazing swathes of red light. I could almost hear the music of dawn.
“Beautiful, isn't it?” I said as I slipped out of my backpack.
We went to the instrument panel of the small ship. It was a maze of gauges and switches.
“Glorious.” Huff paused at the open door to stare at the sunrise. “Oh, Ten Gods of the Land and Ice and Snow, your creations stir my liver.”
“Get inside,” Chancey told him and closed the door, hitting Huff's snout.
“Take it easy on him!” I told Chancey.
“Yeah, yeah.” He shrugged out of his backpack and sat down slowly on the flat chair with the holes for tentacles. “I can't make head or tail…” He shook his head as he concentrated on the panel. “Maybe this one.” He pressed a large, protruding red button.
The sprinkler system turned on and showered us with streams of water.
“Shit!” Chancey exclaimed.
“Never mind, shit,” Joe said. “Shut it off!”
Chancey did and the sprinklers shut down. Floor vents drained the water.
We stared at each other through dripping hair. Huff shook himself off and if possible, we were even wetter.
Chancey studied the panel and lifted his hands in a gesture of futility. “I don't know where the fuck to begin.”
Joe wiped water droplets from his watch. “Ten minutes. Doesn't look good. When the ammo dump blows, they'll come looking for us. Let's get out of here.”
“Wait a minute, Joe.” I put a hand on Chancey's shoulders to steady myself and closed my eyes. “Don't anybody talk. Don't even think.”
I quieted my thoughts and pictured my mental shields. They were already down. I opened myself and probed for thoughts, for the chatter of the hive within the camp. It came as a buzzing of many minds. Some held back thoughts to allow others to link through. Some slept and dreamed in fantasy landscapes. Those were the minds I was after, the vulnerable sleeping minds, if I could sneak past the watchdog thalamus with the projection of a sweet smell. The sense of smell rode through passages unguarded by the watchdog. I conjured a red rose and gave it my memory of aroma.
A young BEM dreams of cruising above a village. Below, Denebrians slave in fields. He fires his cannons in orgiastic bursts of flame. Plumes of fire rise where there had been houses.
I was not in his dream to judge, though my stomach felt queasy. I gently directed his thoughts to the instrument panel of his fighter. Time to go home and brag about my kills, I sent and added a sensation of pride and accomplishment. Older brothers will admire me.
I watched the instrument panel through his inner eye. Mission accomplished! I sent. Request permission to land.
And there it was. The procedure for landing.
I backed out of the crotefucker's dream on silent wings, opened my eyes and took a breath.
“Move over, Chancey,” I said. “We just have to reverse the procedure. How difficult can that be?”
“Whatever you say, superstar.” Chancey grinned and slid over.
“Two minutes,” Joe announced quietly.
Huff whined and squeezed his eyes shut.
I quieted my mind and concentrated on the panel. I was a pretty good hovair pilot. I could hold those craft rock-steady in the sky, and fly a nape of the earth maneuver that left my gonads back on the ground.
I brought the little alien craft to life without another shower and pointed her nose skyward.
Behind us a plume of red fire and a blast that hurt my ears announced the demise of the ammo dump. Three of us cheered. Huff howled.
The desert camp and red dawn dropped away as we raced westward toward a Denebrian city. It lay ahead in a huddled pool of yellow lights that sparkled in dry air like a cluster of diamonds.
Our hearts leaped up with the ship, until we realized that she had no Star Positioning System.
“No SPS?” Joe said through gritted teeth.
“It's a small land and air craft, boss,” Chancey told him. “You want egg in your Guinness?”
“Uh, Jules?” Joe said. “Did you happen to pick up the operation of the ship's weapons from that dream?”
“Yeah. A little,” I said. “The BEM was killing Denebrians like the proverbial flies. Why?”
“Because here they come.”
“Christ and Brahma,” I muttered.
Four BEM fighters were coming out of the rising sun, closing in on us for the kill.
I shut off the ship's lights. “Hang on!” I said as I hit the boosters. The small, swift craft sprang into the western night sky, pinning us to the uncomfortable seats. Leaving daylight behind. I made a dash for the city, hoping to lose ourselves among its lights. Four sets of headlights followed our erratic path.
“Follow this!” I muttered and drove the craft down in a shuddering plunge between the black walls of a canyon. The moons silvered a narrow snake of a river at the bottom and afforded me enough light to stay off canyon walls.
“Jesus Christ!” I heard Joe squeeze out between teeth. “If they don't kill us, he will.”
Huff howled. A sound that held the lonesome wail of creatures against an indifferent nature that squashes her offspring.
“Dammit!” I muttered as the four sets of lights followed our path. The BEM pilots had the oysters to negotiate the narrow air space between walls. In fact, one was gaining. Their lights blinked out and on as they traversed the winding walls behind us.
“Here we go,” I said. I slowed the craft and threw on full reverse thrusters. It was a maneuver I'd learned back in Lost Vegas, Earth. The craft lurched over its left wing in a sickening dive that brought the narrow river up to fill the forward viewscreen. To their credit, my three companions remained silent, though they might have been too scared to object. I tugged back on the stick and forced the agile craft into a pull-up that seemed to defy gravity. My stomach caved against my backbone as sheer walls dropped away. I banked the craft, using the path of the river below to guide us. The lights behind blinked out around the last turn. I pulled the craft's nose up and streaked skyward.
We tore shreds of clouds with our wings. I stayed inside cloud cover and turned the craft toward the city.
No lights followed.
“OK,” I said. “We lost them. Chancey, you want to take over?”
He stared at me, his jaw loose. His eyes fixed. His hands still clamped to the panel. “Yeah,” he said.
“What do you mean?” Joe slammed his fist on General Agrari's desk, “There's no SPS!”
The general, tall and narrow even by Denebrian standards, his flat chest sunken, his slender shoulders hunched forward, jumped and pushed his chair away from Joe. His long brown fingers clutched the armrests.
Joe, Chancey, and I stood before Agrari's desk in his office on the main street of Korschaff, the Denebrian capital. Huff was asleep back in the parked ship.
“Uh, General,” I said, “how do you reconcile those idealistic beliefs with an attack by a race of beings who eat their dead enemies?”
“We turn it aside, as water parts.”
I glanced at Chancey.
“It's going to be Bambi against King Kong,” he said.
“Tell me you have a light starship, General,” Joe said too quietly, “that my team and I can take to Alpha.”
“I'm sorry to disappoint you, my alien cousin, but no, we have no such ship.” He scratched the reedy brown skin on his high, plated forehead, “We are a peace-loving people with no desire to soil our culture by outside contact, and certainly no desire for that obscenity you call war.”
I backed away from Joe as he leaned forward and gripped the edge of the general's desk.
Chancey took his arm. “C'mon, boss,” he said softly. “We're getting nowhere here in a quick hurry. These tags want to turn the other cheek? They're going get smacked on that one, too.”
Joe stared at me.
“What?” I said.
He grabbed my arm and pulled me closer to the desk. “You see these two welts, General?” He pointed at my cheek. “That's what comes of defying your newfound cousins, the BEMs!”
The general raised his shaggy brown brows. “We have petitioned the visitors for peace and they have complied.” He waved toward me. “He must have insulted their heritage.”
“I—“ I began.
“Only their dinner plate.” Chancey smirked.
“I don't believe this,” I said. “General, do you have carnivores on your world?”
“Yes. Of course. Of a lower order.”
“Did you ever try to talk them out of their predatory natures?”
“The visitors are not animals, my cousin,” he said tersely. His round mouth, creased with brown furrows, pursed into a narrow pigeon hole. A sign, I thought, of irritation. “It is possible to reason with them as one civilized culture to another.” He brushed a caked dirt stain from his green coveralls.
“About as possible, my cousin,” I answered, “as reasoning with your dinner.” I turned to Joe. “This BEM invasion's going to be a slaughterhouse.”
Joe straightened. “By the time Alpha gets word that the BEMs have landed, and launches a counterattack, it may be too late.”
Chancey unholstered his stingler and laid it on the desk. “Do your people know how to use a weapon?” he asked the general.
Agrari closed his eyes and touched the wrinkles between his brows. “Please, remove that obscenity from my desk.”
“I give up!” Chancey scooped up his stingler and holstered it. “They're going to go down like clay putzes,” he told Joe. “I'm out of here!” He strode to the door.
“Where the hell are you going, Chancey?” Joe said. “These Denebrians don't even want us walking their streets.”
“Back to the ship. I want to have an intelligent conversation. With Huff!” He slammed the door behind him.
“What kind of a general are you,” Joe asked, “without an army, or weapons to defend your people?”
“I am the General Coordinator for the Goods of the Stock.”
“Whatever the hell that means,” Joe said.
“It means, cousin,” Agrari responded, “that I regulate the stores of food for the general good.”
“Come on, kid. Chancey's right. We're wasting our time here.”
The sun threw yellow casts of slanted light as it dipped into late afternoon. The air was still humid, with the pungent smell of thick bushes and weeds as we walked toward the ship, parked beneath a tall tree for camouflage from the air.
Without vehicles, the silence of the city was only broken by buzzing insects busy at day's approaching end. We were at the perimeter of Korschaff. Across the wide stone street, a government compound of tall, unadorned angular buildings of black wood and stone spread out to the foot of a mound of shale.
“Spartan, isn't it?” I commented.
“It has the charm of a dead Altairian hodge-snucker.”
To our right, the lowering sun warmed rows of stores where Denebrians strolled, all wearing the inevitable green coveralls and yellow, straw hats. The children seemed lost under the wide-brimmed hats.
“Munchkins,” I said and chuckled. But my smil
e faded as I thought of my six-year-old daughter Lisa, living in Denver, planet Earth, with my former wife Althea and her new husband. Althea is Joe's daughter. I missed my little girl. We had grown close during our dangerous encounters on planet Halcyon. “I wonder how Lisa's doing?” I said and bit my lip. “I'll bet she's growing like a weed.”
Joe nodded. “If we get our hands on an SPS, our second call will be to Althea and my wife. You can talk to Lisa.”
“There's something I always wanted to explain to you, Joe.”
“About leaving your wife and infant daughter to spend five years chasing a mammal on Syl' Terria?”
I nodded. It was a subject that was taboo between us. But this was as good a time as any to breach it. I stopped. Joe did too and turned to me.
“It was because of Ginny,” I said. “I was afraid I'd do something stupid and get Lisa killed too.
“Well, I figured that much.” He started walking again and I followed him. “I told Althea the two of you were too young for marriage,” he said, “and you were too reckless. Still are.”
He stopped again and I walked into him. “Those years,” he said, “when Al was hoping you'd return, and telling Lisa about her dad, I was glad you didn't show up at our door. I don't know what I would've done to you.”
The look in his eyes made me take a step back. “I was scared, Joe. I thought that somehow or other, I'd get Lisa killed too.”
“That was plain stupid!”
“It was a gut feeling I couldn't shake.”
We started walking toward the ship again and I wondered about Althea's new husband. “What's Charles like?”
“Solid as a brick shit house. Just about as boring, too.”
“Sounds like the kind of tag who'll take good care of Lisa.”
“You would've taken good care of her.”
I shook my head. “I don't know, Joe. There's something inside me that yearns for the excitement of taking risks. I take chances even when I don't have to.”
“Ain't that the truth.”
As we walked, I thought of my young sister Ginny. She'd been killed when I crashed a hornet cub into the Rocky Mountains. I had been a reckless teenager and Ginny begged to see the peaks she called The Three Sisters. We were orphans and I'd wanted to please her, so I took the hornet cub to heights it was never meant to reach. When it crashed, Ginny was thrown out the door and I couldn't grab her in time. She slid down a rocky outcrop. Her face as she reached for me and screamed was an image that haunted my dreams, even though Sye Morth, a Loranth friend between lives, had assured me in tel links that her kwaii, her soul, was in another body on a far planet. One that was inhospitable to humans. Spirit, that enigmatic entity from Halcyon, had demanded that I leave her in peace. He was in touch with Great Mind and I honored his directive.