She took a breath and stood without help. The boy moved back and leaned against the control desk. His eyes never left hers. As she looked down at him, she felt her rage building again against his feral insolence. She rubbed at her wrist. Her neck and arm were sore. Perhaps the arm was broken. His violence against her had no precedent since the humans had revolted centuries before.
From behind her came a new voice. "Excuse me, Lord Ull. Is everything all right in here?"
A warrior human stood in the doorway, his eyes lowered, awaiting her answer. If he had seen anything, she could only give him one answer to his question. Three more warriors stood beyond him in the passageway.
Chapter Ten: Something in Return
Tommy's vision blurred at the edges then cleared, as if he almost had a migraine. He could only lower his gaze and wait. What he had done in the last few minutes was as complete a surprise to him as it must have been to Lord Ull. He had learned that throw years before in martial arts class, but to have remembered it now... It does work much better with some strength behind it, he thought.
The claw wounds across his shoulder hadn't bothered him while he held her to the floor. Now, the cuts throbbed. He could feel trickles of blood running down his arm and chest. His pants felt damp at the belt under his tunic. If the warrior saw blood, he would have questions. What would Lord Ull say? He knew that many humans in this situation, maybe most humans, would promise anything to get off of the floor, and would then have him killed. The way he had chosen seemed the single solution to this mess, but it depended on Lord Ull keeping her word.
Tommy realized he had stopped breathing when he heard her say, "Why do you ask? Have there been problems in the rest of the ship? I was told the ship was not struck during the attack."
"No, Lord Ull. The ship is intact. However, the cargo in many holds has shifted or been thrown off of shelves because of the jolting, and a number lords and humans are reporting injuries. Many are panicking because no one understands what happened. No one has ever felt such shaking before."
Lord Ull turned to glance at Tommy, and back at the warrior. "Carry this message. The People's Hand has defended herself against the raiders, and she has won. The jolting you felt were her guns firing for the first time in two generations."
The warrior bowed slightly. "Yes, Lord Ull. We will do as you say."
Ull closed the hatch behind them, then gestured at Seth and Baek. "You two go into the room below. This feral and I have much to discuss."
When the two humans had lifted the trapdoor and scurried down the ladder, she sat down in the chair at the control desk. "I will not be able to stay here long. Soon, I must attend a meeting of the council. Someone must organize the salvage of The Extended Claws. I understand the situation and must help."
She rubbed her neck. "You forced me into an agreement. In spite of that, I gave my word when I could have accepted the alternative. Dying might have brought me more honor, but I chose to live.
"We will proceed as we have agreed, but I must ask one thing of you. You must stop looking into my eyes. A lifetime is not overcome in an instant. I will honor my word, but every time I see those eyes looking directly at me, I want to tear out your throat."
A surge of relief swept through Tommy. They did have a contract. He lowered his eyes. "Yes, Lord Ull."
She made the undulating whistle he had heard before. "I know that is pretense, wild human. I must go. Come to my quarters tomorrow morning after your first meal. We will discuss the remainder of the contract then. I leave it to you to make sure those who overheard this tell no one." She paused. "If they do, our contract will be voided by the council, and I may be dead. You certainly will be, and it will not be my doing."
As she rose from her chair, a voice came from the speaker on the wall. "Ull, are you still there?"
"You can answer from here," Tommy said, and pressed a button on top of the table. "Just speak. She will hear you."
"Yes, I am here," Ull said.
"A Kadiil vessel is beside the wreckage. What should I do?"
"Do nothing. I will come to the bridge" Ull replied, and left through the door.
I wonder what that was about, Tommy thought as he pulled up the trap door. "Seth, Baek, come up here. We have things to discuss."
# # #
Tommy controlled his emotions until he got to his room, then, with the door closed behind him, he collapsed on the floor next to his bunk and trembled. How could he have done that? What had he gotten into now? Tears rolled down his face. If only he could share this with someone! Anyone he talked to on this ship would be horrified, including Seth and Baek. Those two already knew too much for their own safety. They had made it clear they didn't want to know more.
He felt something soft hitting the side of his face. He lifted his head to look into Potter's eyes. Tommy pushed into a seated position and wiped tears from his cheeks. "You almost lost me, Potter. You still might." He pulled Potter into his lap. "You know, Ull has eyes like yours. Her pupils are vertical. I didn't notice the last time I saw her." He scratched under Potter's chin. "She's not as strong as I thought she would be, though. I think you could whip her."
Potter purred and tried to stretch using his shoulder as a post. Tommy winced and pulled him down. "OK, I got lucky. She wasn't expecting me to fight back. None of her slaves would have fought her. They’d stand there while she ripped the flesh from their bodies. Are the cats here as tame as the humans?"
Potter butted his hand and rasped an "Eeeoow?"
Tommy turned him over. Potter liked having his belly scratched but wouldn't take too much of it. "I wonder what the rest of the lords are like. For sure, they must all be used to getting their own way. From humans anyway."
Potter flipped over and offered his head again for scratching. Tommy lifted him under his front legs and gave him a hard stare. "Are you my cat, or am I just a petting machine who feeds you? Am I in charge of you, or are you in charge of me?" Potter pushed away with a hint of claws, and jumped to floor. "I'll take that to mean you don't want to answer."
He watched Potter leap onto his bunk and begin cleaning himself. Tommy managed a smile. "Thanks, Potter. I needed someone to talk to. I guess you're it from now on."
He tossed and turned in his bunk for a while, but he was too tense to sleep. Finally, he decided to go for a walk.
The passageways were dark and nearly deserted, and he soon found himself in the radial passage leading to the observation window he had been to before. Maybe if I look outside, at the raider's wreckage, he thought, I'll understand Lord Ull's anger.
The ship had moved close to a swarm of debris, and landers moved slowly among the pieces. One of landers was attached to a larger fragment. What appeared to be humans in space suits right out of a movie moved into a gap in its side.
That was a lords' ship. Humans had probably been on board, too. Humans or not, Tommy's computers and programs had killed many living beings. He wasn't sure how he felt. He knew he should feel remorse. His mom would have been talking to him of remorse and the need for forgiveness. He didn't feel that way, though. He was certain he would rather they were dead and he was alive than the other way around.
Maybe Lord Ull was unhappy about all the lords his systems had killed. That didn't feel right, though. Lord Ull had said he had destroyed everything; not that he had killed everyone.
He watched for a while longer then got up to leave. The landers were too far away to see what was happening. Maybe he could go to sleep now.
# # #
The next morning his shoulder was stiff and sore, and the deep scratches were red and inflamed. He had washed them thoroughly before going to bed, but he needed something more. Instead of eating breakfast, he searched for antibiotics in the drug warehouse. The pond Ull swam in might have anything in it.
His second try at sleep the previous night hadn't been much better than the first. The more he had thought about what he had done, the more impossible it had seemed. His actions were like a dream he
had created to escape, but the claw wounds on his shoulder made a lie of that thought. His mind had kept circling from the impossible encounter of the previous day to the equally impossible meeting he would be having the next day. Now, the next day was here, and he was riding the elevator to Lord Ull's deck. He still wasn't sure what he would ask for or what he would say.
He went alone. He had thought of taking Potter, but that would have been crazy. Who took a cat to a meeting? Besides, after a night to think on it, Lord Ull might have changed her mind. If so, he wanted Potter to survive. He hoped Potter would miss him, but the humans wouldn't kill him. Potter was too good a mouser. That wouldn't influence Lord Ull if she were in a killing mood.
The same two warriors waited for him. This time, he followed them to Ull's door without comments.
He found Lord Ull swimming in her pond. She flipped over on her back long enough to order the warriors to get out and close the door, and continued her swim.
He had compared her with a skinny bear before, but now, seeing her in the water, she looked more like an otter except for her size. She swam using the thrust of her muscular tail, with her arms drawn closely beside her body and her legs trailing. Neither of the latter did much except guide her swift movement. She disappeared under the water and reappeared in front of him.
"You will find a rock at the pool's edge on the other side." She said. "Meet me there."
Tommy found her waiting in front of the rock shelf, treading water effortlessly with her tail, her head and shoulders above the surface of the pond.
"Our custom is to bargain among ourselves while in a pool. We will adapt to other arrangements, but since this is my chamber, we will follow The Peoples' custom, at least for me. Take off your sandals and sit on the rock's edge."
Tommy's first thought was how easy it would be for her to pull him off the rock into the water to drown, then he decided she didn't need the extra advantage and did as she asked.
This isn't so bad, he thought. If we were standing or sitting on land, she would be looking down on me. This way I have height on her. Just remember not to look directly at her!
"Well, feral, the bargain's terms are of your making. What is it you want to add?"
On his way from the elevator, Tommy had decided he had to work his way into this. He had some ideas about what he wanted, but he didn't understand Lord Ull well enough to know if he had any chance of getting any of it. He still wanted to go home most of all. The arrangement had to include that. Ull said she would help him escape when they returned to Earth, but that might be years. He wanted security and a certain amount of freedom--whatever Lord Ull could give--and he wanted to continue to learn about this ship and its situation. And, of course, he wanted to continue the computer work. Maybe he wanted that more than the security. After all, what security could a human find on this ship?
"Lord Ull, may we talk first about what happened yesterday?"
The water swirled behind her. "Why? Do you want to rub my snout in my defeat? Why would I allow that?"
Tommy shifted on the hard stone. He had to be careful. "No, Lord Ull," he said. "I am confused. I repaired your ship's guns. I stopped your enemies from destroying The People's Hand. I do not understand why that made you want to kill me. Without knowing why, anything I ask for might drive you into another rage."
The water around Ull churned. "You presume much, feral human, but I agree with you. You would do well not to provoke me again.
“You destroyed almost unimaginable resources when you shattered The Extended Claws. If the rumors are true, they had been preying on other Nesu ships for hundreds of years, and had used their spoils to repair every device on board. With their resources we could have repaired The People's Hand. We could have made our ship new again."
Tommy almost looked at her. "But they tried to destroy us!"
"It may have seemed so, and there was some small risk that they would. They wanted to disable us because they wanted what we have."
"Would it have made a difference to the crew if The People's Hand had only been disabled?"
"They could not have taken the drive. If we had been left with enough supplies to survive and the means to calculate transit coordinates, we could have gone to our Gathering place and waited for help from our kin. We would have had a chance, just as the raiders would have had a chance for survival, except for what you did."
He could feel her gaze on him. "Never," she said, "has there been a gunner such as you. I searched the logs of all of The People's ships. In a hundred such encounters, three was the most hits either side received. Often, even one hit is enough to cripple. Most often, one hit on both sides resulted in mutual withdrawal." Tommy risked a quick glance. Her eyes seemed to glitter, even in the indirect light of the chamber. "With you in the targeting room, it is death to attack this ship."
Tommy risked another direct glance at Ull, "And yet you seem to think that is bad. I heard you wonder how they knew we would be here. If they knew, so could others. Does every ship you meet abide by the same rules you do?"
"No, this is The People's custom. Others might not."
That he hadn't known before! Species other than Nesu had starships!
"So, you were angry because I destroyed the means to repair your ship?"
Her tail swirled beneath her, lifting her head to his level. "Yes! You have seen the lists from the guilds. The People's Hand has so much broken equipment, eventually some small thing will die, and the ship will die as well."
Tommy watched her in the edge of his vision, trying to read some expression on that pointed face. "If you had computers from the raider to repair the ship's guns, would your next defense be as effective?"
She paused a long time before replying. "Are you telling me it would not?"
"Lord Ull, I am not the gunner that did all of the damage to the raider ship. I did not aim the guns or tell them when to fire. The Earth computers I installed and the programs I wrote did that. I just turned the system on and picked the target. Any one of The People... anyone trained with the computers could have done the same."
Ull swam to the edge of the pond and leaned against the rock edge, her eyes fixed on Tommy. For a long time, the only sound came from the waterfall splashing into its pool and the waves lapping against the shore.
"Your words offer many possibilities if they are true. Are Earth computers so much better than those on this ship? The broadcasts from Earth revealed them doing extraordinary things, but I assumed that was just traders' exaggeration."
"Yes, they are better. I do not understand why they are, since you have interstellar travel and we do not, but in comparison to Earth's, your computers are primitive and slow. A moment ago you said that with items from the raider, you could make this ship new again. What if I told you that is still possible? What if I told you The People's Hand could be better than new?"
Ull slapped the water beside her. "When I traded for those computers and took you, I hoped only to give us life until we could find true replacements. Are you suggesting the temporary replacements be made permanent?"
Tommy ignored the water on his face and continued with his argument. Ull must draw her own conclusions. "Why were you not able to jump away from the raider as you did when it attacked before?"
She slapped the water again. "The first time, we detected the raider when it exited transit into the system. While the raider calculated a short transit to try to move closer, we calculated our transit to leave. Since we planned to go much farther, their calculation was less complex and completed sooner. If the raider had exited closer, we would not have escaped. The second time, the raider was upon us. We could not set up and calculate the transit parameters."
"Was this a limitation of the lords doing the work or of the computer doing the calculations?" Tommy asked.
"Entering our destination's coordinates is done quickly. We must then wait for the navigation computer to calculate the transit parameters."
"So, if you did those calculations with a co
mputer over a hundred times faster, would that be helpful?"
Ull hesitated. "You can make that happen?"
"I am sure I can."
After a moment’s hesitation, Ull flipped backward and dove beneath the water, her tail following in an arc that covered him with water. She surfaced again near the waterfall in a gigantic leap, then dove and leaped a second and third time, circling the pond. With each jump, she pulled a film of air under the surface with her that bubbled away as she rolled. The bubbles in her fur gleamed beneath him as she passed, and her wake sent waves splashing over the rock and his rolled up pants legs. When she reached the trough's bottom next to the waterfall, her leap took her out of the water to a rock. From there, she scampered from rock to rock beside the trough, almost on four legs, her long back bending double at the start of each jump, until she reached the top. Her next jump took her face first, down the S-shaped trough, and into the pool with a gigantic splash. Two porpoise leaps out of the water brought her in front of him, where her head popped up from the water in the same place as before.
Her long, pulsating, whistle drove through his eardrums. "Yes! If you can do that, it would be helpful!" she said. "What must I give you to make this happen?"
Tommy shook off the water and thought about his answer. His first thought was to try to drive a hard bargain just to fix the transit computer, but Lord Ull was not stupid. She would figure out he was already making those kinds of improvements. The truth was he didn't have much to offer that she couldn't coerce in some fashion. Somehow, she had to see him as more than a feral human trading partner.
"Lord Ull, how can I make a bargain with you?"
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