Greg headed for his quarters to shower and change.
But less than ten minutes later he was back outside,
trying to calm down one of the Norj research teams,
who had discovered an Earth reporter in their hut, open-
ing drawers and recording everything in sight. In an
effort to reach some kind of understanding, Greg gath-
ered the senior reporters together with Olsen, Ingerson's
colleague: the OG officer briefly outlined the case for
security and propriety, and casually mentioned that the
Ezgara commandos now patrolling the perimeter were
very keen to ensure the Hegemony envoy's safety from
any threat and were fully capable of doing so.
At the mention of the Ezgara, glances were
exchanged and Greg noticed a certain shared nervous-
ness. Hmm, so they do have a reputation, he thought.
Or should it be notoriety}
After that it was a hectic rush to get ready for the
presentation, to finalise the programme of events, nego-
tiate a compromise between Andrei and the university
ecologist who had turned up at the last minute, and
arrange for some of the excavations to be roped off,
since some reporters were still poking their noses where
they shouldn't. In between all that he managed to meet
some of the VIP guests, shaking hands and exchanging
the usual pleasantries, and made sure that his mother
and Uncle Theo knew where their seats were. At one
point he caught sight of Catriona through the crowd,
just after she had sent him a comm-note to let him know
that she had arrived.
Then came news that High Monitor Kuros had
disembarked from his official zeplin and was about to
ascend the cliffside path in one of the electric visitor
cars. Greg alerted Catriona and Chel with prearranged
signals and hurried over to the central plaza area.
Catriona appeared seconds after he got there, looking
tense in a formal, high-collared kirtle suit made from
some dark brown ridge-textured material. After an awk-
ward, smiling pause they shook hands, a clasp which
Catriona seemed to break first - or maybe it was
because he was holding her hand for a moment too
long.
'It's good to see you again, Catriona,' he said. 'I hope
this PR exercise isn't interrupting your work the way it
is mine, though I understand our guests specifically
requested that you take part.'
She gave a wry half-smile, tucked a few stray dark
hairs behind one ear, at which Greg felt a tiny thrill. He
kept smiling.
'Well, I can't deny that there's other things I'd rather
be doing,' she said. 'But they asked for me so here I
am.'
A thought occurred to him. 'You don't think it's any-
thing to do with your Enhanced past?'
'Why should it?'
He shrugged. 'Perhaps they're curious about why the
Enhancement project came about.'
She regarded him. 'Hmm. Do you ever wonder why,
Greg?'
Before he could answer, the Uvovo scholar Chel
arrived. He had an anxious, slightly jittery air about him
but he seemed otherwise alert and ready for the task ahead
so Greg launched into a summary of the programme.
'Okay, this is the plan. The Underminister for Culture
will give the official welcome to the Sendrukans and the
other guests, then Catriona will deliver a short presen-
tation on the early discoveries made here on Giant's
Shoulder and later on Nivyesta. After that, I'll give an
overview of the various archaeological sites and the
main finds, and Chel will finish with the Uvovo per-
spective on themselves and Humans, past and future.
How does that sound?'
Catriona nodded. 'I'm happy to lead off - gets it over
with.'
'I too am satisfied,' said Chel. 'I shall learn from both
your performances.'
Greg laughed. 'Good things, I hope.'
After that, the demands of the occasion took over as
all the guests went to their seats and Greg and the others
waited by the low podium. Two of the peculiar Ezgara
bodyguards came into view from the right, stalking
through the ruins in advance of the Sendrukans.
They were a tall humanoid race, and although he had
seen shots of them on the vee, that did not prepare Greg
for the impact of their presence. There were four alto-
gether, three walking single-file behind the High
Monitor who strode leisurely along with the
Underminister for Culture marching briskly at his side.
With a mean height of ten and a half feet, they were
much taller than Humans, tall yet not spindly, their
torsos broader and in proportion, and it was true - next
to them, Humans did look almost childlike. Their attire
was elegant, richly detailed and multilayered with semi-
opaque, long-sleeved garments over stiff, almost
breastplate-like inner ones - the three attending
Sendrukans wore pastel shades of yellow, green and grey while the High Monitor was decked out in striking ultramarine blue counterpointed by magenta patterns and trim. Head-dresses there were, bulbous pale-blue ones with dangling tassels for the attendants, a tall, black, oddly helical one for their superior.
As the Sendruka approached, Greg half-turned to Catriona and in a low voice said:
'I'm glad you can stay behind - the new research data is fascinating.'
'Just how fascinating?'
'Sensor scans showing passages and chambers inside Giant's Shoulder.'
She glanced sharply at him. 'Is that right? And how would you get hold of such information?'
He shrugged. 'Let's say a little space-bird told me. Fascinated yet?'
Her sharp look softened. 'Aye, okay.'
Then they were face to face with Underminister
Hansen and High Monitor Utavess Kuros. As Hansen
introduced each of them in turn, the Sendrukan inclined
his head and then, surprisingly, politely shook hands.
Kuros's hands had a light tan hue and were large with
long, slender fingers adorned with a few plain red rings,
and a grip whose firmness matched Greg's. The High
Monitor said little beyond expressing his pleasure at
^ being here and his anticipation of the event to come, all
spoken in perfect, if accentless Anglic, his voice level,
melodious, kindly. His face was broad, its features flat-
ter than a Human's, with a high forehead and large dark
eyes that seemed perpetually mournful or at least weary-
wise. Despite his preconceptions, Greg found himself
warming to the alien - it was an effort to remind himself
of the AIs that shared these aliens' heads.
The audience settled down as the High Monitor and
his attendants reclined in their specially provided chairs.
Underminister Hansen gave the official welcome from
the podium before introducing Greg. Greg briefly
explained about the three presentations, and finished
with a quotation from Haakon Greig, one of the
colony's early chroniclers: 'History has much to teach
us, and occasionally resorts to beating us over the
head
if we don't pay attention.'
A light ripple of applause accompanied him from the
stage. Then, as Catriona took his place, he noticed one
of the Ezgara bodyguards patrolling a stretch of the
temple rampart behind the audience, a sombre reminder
of his earlier encounter.
Cat was a little nervous and faltering to begin with,
but she soon gained confidence as she gave a concise
overview of archaeological discoveries since the colony's
founding. A display screen, one of the new compact
folding ones, was used to show locations and dates, then
a couple of researchers brought out a few artefacts to
pass round the audience. Greg smiled - the folding
screen had worked first time, and no finds were dropped
or broken. When she was finished the audience began
applauding politely while remaining seated, but the
Sendrukan Kuros got to his feet as if to accord her spe-
cial approval. The other Sendrukans also rose, as did
Greg, grinning widely as he clapped, glancing over his
shoulder to see the rest of the audience following suit.
At that very instant he heard an odd sound like some-
one snapping their fingers close by. Out of the corner of
his eye he noticed a figure falling backwards ... then saw
it was High Monitor Kuros, his arms flailing. Greg
thought in that moment that someone must have pushed
him, but when one of the Sendrukan attendants moved
to help there was another cracking sound and the atten-
dant jerked and sprawled sideways, purplish blood
blossoming from his neck.
In a few seconds the orderly, polite audience was
transformed into screaming, stampeding chaos.
My Godl Greg thought, diving for cover. We're being
shot atl
He scanned the shambles of overturned chairs and
stragglers making for sections of wall to hide behind, des-
perately looking for his mother and Uncle Theo. He saw
no sign of them but two of the Ezgara were there, as were
the OG officers, shielding the High Monitor as the two
surviving attendants struggled to carry him out of danger.
'Greg! - over here!'
Craning his head round he saw Catriona and his
mother beckoning to him from the lee of a ruined wall
which stretched almost unbroken to the site entrance.
Reasoning that the gunman would be focused on the
High Monitor, he steeled his nerve and dived across a
patch of open ground to another mossy outcrop of
stonework. From there he dashed to the long wall, join-
ing his mother and Catriona.
'Are you both all right?' he said.
'We are fine, Gregory, fine,' said his mother. 'Such a
disgrace that this should happen, and a shame on all of
us! To think that there are still fools among us who try
to solve an argument by picking up a gun. And Theodor
is away to try and find whoever is ...'
'Wait. Uncle Theo went looking for them?'
His mother sighed and nodded. 'Still thinks he is
thirty-five. Says it's part of his new responsibilities.'
'Right, Mum, which way did he go?'
'He said the shots came from the ridge overlooking
the site . . .'
Greg shuffled to the side, peering round and up at the
mass of dense foliage and the treetops beyond.
'Are you thinking of going after him?' Catriona said
suddenly.
'I am.'
'Then I'm going with you.'
Looking at her he saw that she was smiling a smile
that said, Just try stopping me.
'Two heads are better than one,' she added.
'And certainly present a better target,' he said. 'Right,
then, let's be off.'
His mother shook her head again, this time in exas-
peration.
'Try not to be as foolish as my brother, will you?'
16
THEO
The higher he climbed the denser the forest became,
low-level branches and hanging vines intertwining with
the humid undergrowth to form tangles of greenery he
sometimes had to go round. Nor did it help that the
ground grew increasingly uneven, weed-choked, strewn
with fallen trunks, rotting branches and half-buried
rocks. But despite the obstacles his sense of direction
was unwavering - when that first shot hit the High
Monitor, old reflexes made him follow a likely trajectory
back into the thickly forested ridge, corroborated by the
second shot which took down the Sendrukan attendant.
So now Theo had the sniper's location pegged in his
mind, a target he was homing in on. Of course, hunting
for an armed assailant while kitted out with a cudgel
improvised from a piece of branch probably wasn't the
wisest course of action, but it was better than no action.
He grinned, knowing what Rory and the others would
have to say about taking risks at his age.
Ja, gentlemen, was his imagined response. But I've
learned bow to take such risks and stay alive!
After another ten minutes of climbing over boulders
and trudging across sloping, boggy ground, he reached a
spot on the ridge where the tree cover thinned. Looking
east he got a good view of Giant's Shoulder, the clusters
of ruins and the boxy, grey-green huts and storage units.
It was near here, he was sure of it.
Keeping to cover, Theo surveyed the vicinity and
soon noticed a denser mass of foliage not far away.
Cautiously he slipped through the undergrowth towards
it, realising that it was a jutting spur of rock swathed in
greenery. He slowed to a wary approach, convinced that
the gunman was long gone yet keeping his cudgel ready
in case. The humid air seemed suddenly warmer, the
sound of birds and insects fading as his own movements
became amplified in his own ears . ..
Crouching, he sidled between creeper-wound bushes,
edged round a gnarled tree bole, and there it was, a
sniper lair. The weedy grass was crushed flat in a long,
narrow patch where the gunman had lain down and
stretched himself out. And there, of all things, was the
gun, a scoped Ballantyne rifle with a sculpted wooden
stock, a weapon he recognised from personal experi-
ence. Of the shooter there was no sign, no belongings,
no leavings, nothing but the weapon and the impression
in the grass. Squatting next to it he almost reflexively
reached out to the rifle's stock but stopped himself.
'Good idea, Major,' said a voice nearby. 'Wouldna
want to get yer prints on it.'
Theo stood swiftly and brought up his cudgel two-
handed, only to see a familiar face looking out from the
foliage. It was the special forces soldier he had met at
Sundstrom's villa, Sergeant Donny Barbour if Rory's
informant was right. He nodded and balanced the
cudgel on his shoulder.
'So,' he said. 'Business or pleasure?'
Barbour gave a sardonic smile as he stepped into
view. He wore core-brown camouflage which extended
to the floppy hat and huntin
g gloves that hung at his
waist.
'Got assigned to deep patrol,' Barbour said, hunker-
ing down for a closer look at the crushed grass. 'Was up
in a tree further back, scanning the surroundings, when
our boy got his first shot off. Had a good idea where it
must've come frae and was looking this way when he
took his second. Next thing, he came running out of
here like the hounds of hell were after him.'
Theo stared down at him. 'So he just dropped the
rifle and ran.'
'Aye, Major - he didn't throw it off into the bushes or
anything, just put it down, got up and breenjed out. He
was moving at a good speed, too, didna trip or catch
himself, just flew through those trees and all they vines
and bushes like a ghost.' He got to his feet. 'Not a civil-
ian, had to be trained. Could be a mountain-man,
somebody from one of the trapper towns ... but that
doesn't feel right. Why leave the rifle?'
'Couldn't he be from an elite unit?' Theo said.
'Maybe even one you don't know about.'
'Top of my list,' Barbour said with a bleak smile.
'Listen, Major, it's time we were both elsewhere - a
couple of those Ezgara are heading this way and we
don't want them getting any wrong ideas.'
'How do you know?' Theo said, half-suspecting the
answer.
Barbour tapped his right ear. 'Got an obs link out
among that audience. Now what you want to do is go
back the way you came but carry on up over the ridge -
your nephew and Miss Macreadie went that way. Might
be wise to find them - safety in numbers.'
He grinned and pointed to the gap in the bushes
through which Theo had entered. But when Theo
looked back round Barbour was gone with just a few
leafy sprigs nodding in his wake. He chuckled to himself
and retraced his steps, found a faint animal trail marked
with recent shoe prints leading up towards the crest of
the ridge. A couple of minutes later he reached it, then
saw that the path led along a hillside to a steeper sloping
ridge further on. Picking his way along he paused on the
crest of the next ridge, overlooking a shadowy, tree-
cloaked gorge, and listened to the sounds of the forest.
Amid the rustles of tiny denizens and the sigh of fitful
Michael Cobley - Humanity's Fire book 1 Page 14