“You’ve been isolated here for days on end,” Dr. Brunk said. “I certainly can’t blame you if you’re a little
antsy. Nevertheless, I must insist that you stay inside until we’re sure there’s no danger.”
Sarah wondered if they would ever be out of danger, now that the Visitors had come. If they could only hold out until the weather got colder. The toxin in Earth’s ecosystem turned out to work in cold climates, where the bacteria went into a dormant stage in winter, becoming active in the Spring thaw. The toxin burned itself out in hot climates, where it was unable to go into a dormant stage. The Visitors would die if they stayed past the first frost . . . unless they had the antidote Nathan Bates had developed for friendly aliens like the one who had been coming to help Dr. Brunk. The Visitors could easily have analyzed the Red Dust and the antidote if some had fallen into their clutches. Given their superior technology it was even possible they had developed it without a sample of the antitoxin. That was why Dr. Brunk’s works was so important. That was why they must survive. “We’re out of food,” Dr. Brunk said.
“Good,” Sarah replied. “We can both stand to lose a few pounds.”
Dr. Brunk smiled. “I suppose so.”
Neither of them wanted to say it aloud, but both feared that the Visitors were closing in on them. The pleasant Indian Summer temperatures had been working against them, making their chances of survival most unlikely. Somehow, each hoped that if such despair were not uttered, there might yet be some hope—a slim hope, but a hope nonetheless.
Dr. Brunk sat down in the filthy old armchair. He put his pipe to his mouth and searched for matches. Sarah went to the mantel and took a box of kitchen matches to him.
“Thank you,” Dr. Brunk said, lighting his pipe. “Do you remember how worried I was that it would get cold a couple of days ago?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Now I wish it would freeze,” she said. “Freeze solid and kill those goddamn lizards.”
“We might die too, Sarah.”
“It wouldn’t matter. Somebody would find the new toxin here with our bodies, and the world would at least have a weapon to fight them with.”
Against her will, tears welled up and ran down her cheeks. She turned away from Dr. Brunk and sank into the old sofa on the other side of the cabin’s tiny living room.
Dr. Brunk removed the pipe stem from his mouth. “Oh, Sarah,” he said, “I’m so sorry. I never thought it would turn out like this.”
He went to her and sat down, holding her hand. “It’s hard, I know. But we didn’t have any choice but to flee when we heard the Visitors were coming. We’ve done the best we could, and now we have to hope things are going to work out somehow.”
Sarah dried her tears, thankful at least for Dr. Brunk’s sympathy. The she noticed something. “Dr. Brunk, listen,” she said.
“What is it, Sarah? I don’t hear anything.”
“That’s just it. Usually the birds are very noisy this time of day, but there isn’t a sound coming from outside this cabin.”
Dr. Brunk rose and went to the door. He quietly opened it and looked out into the little clearing and the forest beyond. “You’re right,” he said. “It’s completely silent. I don’t see so much as a chipmunk moving out there either.”
Sarah tried to hide her terror, but she knew Dr. Brunk could see it. She saw it in his eyes too.
“I’ve never known this to happen out here,” he said lamely.
“That’s because nothing like this has happened before,” Sarah replied.
“Sarah, don’t jump to conclusions. It might not be anything. ...”
“They’re coming, Dr. Brunk,” Sarah said, cowering on the sofa. “They’re coming for us now.”
Chapter 27_
Willie stood on the beach, Visitor guards all around him as he faced Ronald, the forest just a few meters behind him.
“I am going to set you free now, Willie,” Ronald said. “I have not treated you badly in the past few days so that you would have your wits and physical agility today. You will have this entire island as your playing field. It is not very large, perhaps a dozen kilometers across, and there are, shall we say, obstacles, but there are also things that you might use to your advantage, if you remain calm and logical.”
Willie nodded, noting how uniform the circle of guards was, a perfect geometric shape surrounding him and their master. It was the prelude of the ninj-ki-ra, the ritual of death. He had never witnessed it before, but it was legendary on the home world. An ancient tradition, the ninj-ki-ra was now practiced only by the military, and only in extreme cases involving treason. Undoubtedly, Ronald was stretching the rules by invoking it in Willie’s case, but it probably didn’t seem so to him.
“You understand what you must do?” Ronald asked him now.
“Yes,” Willie said. “I must try to survive.”
“And you know what that means, don’t you, my little philosopher?”
Willie shook his head.
“You must kill me—” Ronald’s reptilian mouth split
into a grin, his forked tongue sliding out as he savored this moment. —if you can.”
That would be Ronald’s ultimate triumph of course. Willie perceived that the captain feared the preta-na-ma. He would replace it with this game of murder, or, in the unlikely event he died himself, turn Willie into a murderer. Thus he would invalidate the principles to which Willie now devoted his life—or so he believed.
“Though you will hunt me like a wild beast,” Willie said, looking straight into Ronald’s eyes through the inscrutable dark glasses, “I will not attempt to kill you.” “Then you will die,” Ronald grated, his voice rising over the lapping waves.
“Perhaps, but only my body will be dead. My spirit will live on.”
Ronald hissed in rage, furious that he had not yet broken Willie.
“We will see how much of you lives,” Ronald said. “Go now!”
Willie took one last look at his nemesis and turned around. The soldier behind him stepped back, breaking the crimson circle of soldiers to let him pass.
Willie moved forward one pace. He hesitated for a second, and then passed out of the broken circle. The game had begun.
Running toward the shelter of the forest, he glanced over his shoulder. The circle of Visitors had not moved. As Ronald promised, he would wait thirty minutes before entering the forest. Willie would have time to hide, at least, and time to think about some sort of defense against Ronald’s weapons.
He welcomed the enveloping darkness as he entered the woods. Trees with white bark soon gave way to larger pines. Willie had seen the latter in California, but the white trees were unfamiliar. How much there was to learn, and now there was very little chance that he would ever have another opportunity to educate himself on the flora and fauna of his adopted planet.
There was little time for anything now except thoughts of survival.
Tiny, bushy-tailed mammals scurried out of his way as he ran—squirrels, if he remembered correctly. His footsteps pounded noisily across the carpet of dead leaves. He didn’t know where to go, only that he should get as far away from Ronald as possible.
If Ronald were to observe the ninj-ki-ra to the letter, as Willie believed he would, the guards would remain behind. Only Ronald himself would hunt Willie. If Ronald could be defeated, then Willie would be exonerated. He would be expected to return to his people, of course, in that unlikely event. But that would be an impossibility; he had cast his lot with the people on Earth. His ethics forbade him to tum his back on them, no matter what the consequences.
Willie labored heavily, running while he wore human garb and the pseudo skin. He would make better progress if he wore nothing but his own skin.
He stopped, leaning one hand against the rough bark of a pine tree. It was warm enough, though he knew that the temperature could drop very rapidly this far north. Even in Los Angeles, there were times when he was grateful for the thermal protection of the pseudo skin. Nevertheless, h
e must chance going on without it now, for he could not allow it to slow him down.
Removing his jacket and trousers, he began to peel away the artificial human epidermis.
Slowly and elegantly, Willie pulled one fingertip at a time free. He then perforated the pseudo skin around the wrists, using the calcium-carbonate fingernails of one hand, and as soon as he had pulled off the skin like a glove, the claws on his own hand.
Using the same method, he cut open the front of the pseudo skin with a talon from the collarbone to the groin. Next, he pulled the false neck away from his green, armored flesh, skillfully stretching the pliable material until he was able to pull the face over his head like a mask. He couldn’t afford to concern himself with the visual scanners that served as eyes, expensive and delicate as they were. One of them popped out onto the leaf-strewn humus and vanished as he pulled his legs, ankles, and finally his feet out of the pseudo skin he had not taken off since he had come to live among humans.
Discarding the pseudo skin under a bush, Willie stretched his limbs in a way that he had almost forgotten, his posture at such times was so alarming to humans. It was good to be physically free at last, even under these less than ideal circumstances. Exhilarated, Willie began to move deeper into the forest, searching as he ran for some means of slowing down Ronald.
Which way should he go? Perhaps it didn’t matter, as long as he didn’t leave an obvious trail that Ronald could pick up easily. It would probably be best to take some of the more difficult paths, for if he followed the more accessible routes, Ronald would surely be right behind him. Willie jumped into a thicket, the sticklike branches lashing his skin.
Here he had the advantage over a human, his homy hide shielding the sensitive tissue underneath his scales for the most part, though the soft underparts of his arms and legs suffered a stinging laceration from time to time. Still, it was not intolerable pain and did not slow him down significantly. He gritted his teeth, realizing they were the false human teeth that went with his terrestrial disguise. He tugged at them as he crashed through the bushes. The dentures were designed to interlock with his fangs, but he worked them free in a few moments and tossed them into the underbrush.
The false teeth met with a terrifying roar as they landed. Willie was rooted to the spot, unable to move at all in the presence of such a fearsome noise. Standing as still as a statue, he peered into the thicket to see what manner of creature he had stirred by the ill-timed toss of the teeth.
An enormous beast lumbered toward him, huge and black and hairy, with imposing claws and fangs. It rolled forward on its powerful legs like an engine of destruction.
Willie’s heart leaped up into his gullet at the sight of the monster. His first impulse was to ran for all he was worth, but somehow he remembered the preta-na-ma, sensing that he would not escape the creature’s clutches by fleeing.
Willie stood his ground, facing the huge animal.
This surprised it. It slowed its pace until it was barely moving at all. The brute was of the family Ursidae, Willie was quite sure. He had read about bears in illustrated books; fascinating creatures. Why did it want to attack him?
He attempted to communicate with it through the
preta-na-ma. At the sound of the chanting, the bear’s ears picked up. It sidled up to Willie and sniffed his claws inquisitively.
Still chanting, Willie reached out and touched its enormous head. The chant rippled through Willie’s body and passed through his mind into the bear’s skull. Tongue lolling, the great beast allowed Willie to stroke it.
“We know each other now, my friend,” Willie said. “You can share your troubles with me.”
Closing his eyes and concentrating, Willie saw a darkness, unadulterated by the slightest hint of color or light . . . and then there was a glimmer ... a vision of a dark cave surrounded by a thick undergrowth . . . and inside the cave there were the bear’s young.
“Ah,” said Willie, “you are a mother protecting your young from intruders.”
The female bear made a soft mewling sound as Willie petted her. She licked his open claw.
Willie looked further into her rudimentary mind. He saw that there were tiny fruits on the wild bushes that formed much of the bears’ subsistence. Reaching out, Willie plucked a few from a branch and fed them to her.
As she ate, he projected a desire to see her cubs. The bear hesitated for a moment and then lumbered off into the bushes in the direction from which she had come. Willie followed her, snapping branches to make his way easier.
Willie reflected that he had never communicated with an animal so successfully. He attributed it to his heightened perception due to the preta-na-ma.
Almost hidden by the bushes was the cave mouth. After the mother, Willie crawled inside and was greeted by three frightened bear cubs. The mother nuzzled and licked them, and after a few moments they were calmed. Willie picked a few berries and fed them.
“I must go now,” he said after the cubs had eaten out of his hand. “If I stay here, the one who hunts me might kill you too.”
The bears made a sad honking sound, which Willie heard for a few minutes as he moved off into the woods again.
Chapter 29
It was time. Ronald stepped through the circle of guards and started into the forest. His soldiers were under strict orders not to follow.
In his lightweight, armored uniform, Ronald would be well protected; only his head would be a target. His tongue lashed into the cool autumn air as he considered how likely Willie’s chances were.
Ronald hoped this one would at least try to fight. In the past, he had conducted the ninj-ki-ra on a handful of planets. It was always enjoyable, and always a good way to keep the troops in line. But he had to admit to himself that there was more to it than that. He found the traitor’s embracing of the preta-na-ma disturbing. It was of course against the law to practice the old religion, and now Ronald saw why. It superseded one’s love for one’s planet, one’s people, and it permitted the weak to rationalize treason as a spiritual awakening, as Willie had done. It was unconscionable, intolerable. Willie would have to pay the price for his folly.
Such things were not permitted in the great city of Tontran, Ronald reflected as he moved aside a branch with his laser pistol. But when he was little more than an eggling, he had gone to the provinces with his guardian, and there he had seen elderly ones practicing the preta-na-ma. His guardian had yanked him away from the forbidden spectacle, later explaining to him the evils of the old beliefs.
Why did the preta-na-ma refuse to die? Now it had
even come across space and reared its ugly head on Earth.
It would take great strength to stamp it out, but it would be done. He would initiate the task today, with the destruction of Willie.
And if Willie fought back, so much the better. Not only because it would provide superior sport, but it would also prove the shallowness of the superstitions. It was all very well to speak of nonviolence and dying before taking another’s life—until you were actually faced with the possibility of death because of those very beliefs. He would soon see how strong Willie’s faith was.
Ronald winced as a shaft of light penetrated his dark glasses. His world, with its thicker layer of carbon dioxide, was easier on the eyes, though a little warmer than Earth. Still, it was remarkable that they had found a planet so close to Sirius with a breathable atmosphere and so much water. Surely the adherents of the preta-na-ma could see that it was divinely ordained, he thought sardonically.
Tiny mammals with enormous bushy tails jumped out of his way without so much as a sound. Ronald admired their agility; he would imitate it in the hunt.
He spied a depression in the leaves. Willie had been here, or a human . . . perhaps it was Dr. Brunk, his ultimate quarry. Willie had no way of knowing he was so close to the man he had come to Cutter’s Cove seeking, and now he would lead Ronald to Dr. Brunk. What delicious irony.
Ronald squatted to examine the track. It appeared to b
e leading to the right. Willie must have decided to follow a more difficult path than the one Ronald was on now. Soon a broken branch confirmed Ronald’s suspicion. It would be easier to follow Willie now than if he had kept moving straight through the forest.
“You make the hunt too simple,” Ronald said aloud.
He started into the thick underbrush but soon lost his way. He found no more traces of his prey.
Forced to double back, Ronald returned to the spot where he had found the footprint. Perhaps Willie was more clever than he’d thought, Ronald speculated. His trail led into the bushes and disappeared. The undergrowth was simply too heavy to follow.
Perhaps Ronald should circle around the bushes. It would take Willie some time and considerable effort to fight his way through, and then only to find Ronald waiting for him when he emerged on the other side.
Ronald clucked his tongue at the thought of it. How very amusing ... if it worked.
He stepped softly through the leaves, starting to work his way around the bushes, which appeared to be nearly a kilometer wide.
Something caught his eye. Ronald turned and leveled his laser at it. A patch of tan, the same color as Willie’s jacket, behind a lone bush outside the thicket.
Was the game to end so quickly then?
“Come out!” Ronald commanded.
There was no response from behind the bush..
“I know you’re there,” Ronald barked. “Now come out before I shoot!”
The thing behind the bush didn’t stir. Ronald squeezed off a warning shot next to the bush. A tuft of white smoke swirled into the air and vanished, but Willie did not come out from behind the bush.
Ronald moved closer, until he was standing less than a meter from the bush. He knew Willie couldn’t charge him while he was armed. Was Willie dead?
Ronald bounded over the bush, pointing his laser at what he thought would be Willie. Instead, he found the clothes his quarry had been wearing, and the shredded remains of a human pseudo skin.
Ronald laughed. “So he goes naked in the woods now, like the child the preta-na-ma tells him to emulate.” And though he could not quite admit it to himself as he continued stalking Willie, the prospect disturbed him. Willie was not playing the game the way Ronald had hoped he would.
V 09 - The New England Resistance Page 8