Asimov's SF, July 2010

by Dell Magazine Authors

  Janip had switched to a map display that showed him the locations of the cats and the human posse. He added a feed from the hawks, just to provide him with some diversion, and selected omniscient view. If he was going to watch a bird and cat fight, he might as well let his system show him how it probably looked from the outside, instead of staring at confused closeups of fur and snarling faces.

  As a delaying tactic the attack was only moderately successful. The cats reared up and slashed at the hawks with their claws the first time the hawks dove at their faces. Then the controller running the animals made them ignore the next attack and keep running. The hawks fluttered from cat to cat, pecking and clawing at their backs and shoulders, and the cats maintained their pace without breaking stride.

  Janip checked the map display and realized the cats would reach him before he connected with Elisette and her partner. He made another switch to the left, up the side of the valley, and advised Elisette of the change. “I'm moving us up the slope. About fifteen meters. There's less plant life. And I think we run better on slopes than the cats do."

  "Just don't forget we're on horses. Horses have their limits, too."

  "Can't your hawks go for the cats’ eyes?"

  "We'll get you out of this, Janip. Just keep moving. Just stay ahead of the posse."

  Was this a good time to smother his natural feelings under a blanket of calm? Would he be better off if he let his muscles and his brain operate like they belonged to somebody who knew his whole future was at stake?

  He glanced back and realized he had let Fari fall behind again. He waved her forward and she stumbled over a bump in the ground and lost another half step.

  "You don't have to save your energy, Fari. They're only about five minutes ahead."

  A bird flapped its wings in front of his face. An angry white-feathered mask shrieked at him. He batted at it reflexively and it held its place and shrieked again.

  He lowered his head and drove himself forward. The bird beat its wings over his back for a moment, then the shrieking moved away. He looked back and saw Farello hitting at it with her arms.

  "Keep running. Cover your face. Like we did with the insects."

  Farello bent over. She lurched toward him with one hand pressed against her face and the other hand punching at the bird.

  Elisette's hawk fell out of the sky. Two sets of wings thrashed around Farello's head. The hawk shot upward and Janip and Farello stared at the mangled thing flapping on the ground.

  Janip strode toward Farello. He grabbed her arm and jerked her away from the dying bird. “How much longer, Elisette?"

  "Two minutes. At the pace you're going now."

  "You can't go any faster?"

  "Horses have bones, Janip. They won't do us any good if they can't carry you out of here."

  * * * *

  He got his first direct look at the two cats when they reared above the bushes about fifty meters ahead. They dropped out of sight and Elisette's hawk skimmed over their position.

  Janip studied the terrain around him. On his left, the slope steepened, the flora thinned, and the side of the valley merged with a towering rock face. On his display, Elisette and her companion were closing in from his right front. A circle marked the area in which Sivmati's posse was working its way through the obstacles behind him.

  "What do you want us to do, Elisette? Stand fast or try to go around the cats? We might get past them if you used the hawks again."

  "Are they acting like they're going to attack?"

  "They gave us a clear warning and held fast. It looks like they're trying to fix us here."

  "Move closer. Straight ahead. Put a little extra distance between you and Sivmati's gang."

  Janip slipped his hand off Farello's arm. He took a careful step forward.

  The cats reared up again as he finished the third step. He added a fourth step and they reinforced the warning with a pair of sharp, raspy snarls.

  He peered over the cats, toward the point where his display located Elisette and her companion. He could just make out two heads when he edged to the right and looked past a mound covered with a thick mass of vines.

  He raised his arm. “I can see you, Elisette. I can see your heads over the bush."

  The cats broke into an attack that carried them over the obstacles in long, arcing bounds. He had switched on his defensive program, just in case it still had some value, but the operators working the cats had obviously neutralized that option about as fast as he'd assumed they would.

  They weren't going to kill him. Sivmati needed a live bargaining chip. But they could cripple a leg. Or chew it off. And leave him that way, securely hobbled, while they continued their haggling. . . .

  "Follow me, Fari. Elisette's almost here."

  A cat swerved toward him. It blocked his path ten steps in front of him and brought him to a halt with a warning snarl.

  Janip showed the cat's operator the palms of his hands. Farello had actually backed up. The other cat had run between them and dropped into a crouch a single, easy bound from her position.

  "They've got us locked in, Elisette. It's up to you."

  "We're on our way. Take them out, Lersu."

  Janip had never ridden a real horse but he had fought his way through his share of horse-and-swordplay simulations. In the fantasy version of mounted combat, the horses always moved at a gallop when they attacked and the designers usually reinforced the effect with yells, pounding hooves, and a touch of appropriate music. Elisette's partner advanced in complete silence at a speed that was only a few percentage points faster than the pace he had been maintaining. Janip didn't see any sign anything had changed until he realized Lersu had pulled ahead of Elisette.

  Lersu was holding a swivel-mounted stunner in his right hand, with the sighting glasses lowered over his eyes. He was wearing a fuzzy yellow cap that blanketed most of his head, but you could assume he had equipped himself with a brain-machine link before he had donned his headgear.

  The cat guarding Farello screamed. It leaped across the brush, teeth bared, and she turned and ran down the slope.

  The cat guarding Janip charged him with the same histrionics. He stood his ground and Lersu's stunner cracked twice.

  "Get up behind me,” Lersu said.

  "Get the other cat. It's chasing Fari back to the posse."

  "Elisette told me to get you. She'll take care of the other cat."

  Janip studied the stranger looking down at him. He couldn't evaluate Lersu's facial expressions but he could hear the hint of tension in his voice.

  He dropped to a crouch and ran toward Farello. “You take both of us, Elisette. That was the agreement."

  "The posse's too close. Get on Lersu's horse. We'll get her out later."

  "Don't let him stun me. You take both of us. Or no eyes."

  "We have a contract, Janip."

  "And you implicitly agreed to take Fari when I told you she was with me. You aren't my only potential customer."

  "Hit the other cat, Lersu. Her, too, if you have to."

  Farello was still running like she was treating every bump and tangle as if it was a valid excuse to zigzag or slow down. The cat had locked onto her heels and started punctuating her steps with a snarl that should have added some heartwarming numbers to the accounts of the genetic designers who had put it together.

  Lersu rode past Janip at a slow trot. His stunner cracked. The cat stiffened in mid-snarl and he fired again and brought Farello down.

  "Get her on the horse, Lersu,” Elisette ordered. “Will you please be kind enough to get out of that mess, Janip?"

  Lersu slid out of the saddle. He crouched beside Farello and Janip stood his ground and watched.

  Lersu's horse crashed to the ground. Lersu snapped his head around and Janip realized he had heard a stunner crack.

  He threw himself behind a wide, spiky shrub. He hadn't seen anybody moving through the bush but he could hear more stunners on his left. Sivmati's advance forces had moved
within firing range.

  "Hold them off, Lersu. Get the woman behind some cover. Janip—crawl over there and start dragging her this way. Do what I tell you or believe me I'll leave you both crippled and let you spend the next century begging Sivmati for whatever medical help his little village can scrape together. You aren't the only one who knows how to drive a bargain."

  Janip scurried across the ground through flights of disturbed insects. He could hear Lersu's stunner firing with a rhythmless deliberation that indicated he was only shooting at targets he could see.

  The cats would have recovered by now if they had been hit with a standard back-off charge. Lersu had rammed them with a harsher setting. Farello was sprawled across the ground like he had assaulted her with the same force.

  Janip noted the red delivery patch on her neck and relaxed. Elisette had come prepared. He would just have to make sure they didn't use the same drug on him.

  He grabbed Farello's collar and started dragging her toward Elisette.

  "I'll tell you when you're out of their range,” Elisette said. “Then you can pick her up and carry her."

  "How long will she be drugged?"

  "Long enough to get you out of here. Concentrate on moving. I'll take care of the tactics."

  "What will you do if they take Lersu?"

  "What good will it do them?"

  "I had a feeling you'd say that."

  "He's in his element. Sivmati's zealots would have to get very lucky."

  Elisette started calling targets. Most of them were on the right—in the general direction of the stream. Sivmati's best move would be an advance that pushed a group past Lersu on that side. They would close in on Elisette and come between her and the skimmer on the stream as they advanced.

  In the games he had played, Janip had been encumbered by awkwardly shaped weapons when he crawled. The mass he was pulling now was as uncomplicated as a sack but it weighed a lot more than a low-impact stunner. And aroused emotions that were significantly more volatile than the feelings he would confer on a bag of trade goods.

  "Get up, Janip. Drag her. Don't try to carry her."

  Janip aimed himself at Elisette as soon as he stood up and hurried toward her without checking out the situation.

  "Can you ride, Janip?"

  "A horse? No. I've never done it."

  "Here's my standard instructions."

  Janip approved the reception and a visual appeared on his display. Elisette had already slid out of the saddle and posted herself beside her horse's head.

  "Drape her in front of the saddle. This is no time to be romantic. Head for the stream. On this route. The skimmer will pick you up. We'll hold them off and retreat."

  A route had joined the mounting visual on Janip's display. They hung Farello across the horse as if she really was a bundle of inanimate supplies and Janip eased himself into the saddle.

  The horse started moving. Elisette broke into a run and headed for a position that would add more firepower to Lersu's left flank.

  "I've still got your mount under control,” Elisette said. “The route map is a contingency item. Just stay on board. You pay for any repairs on your passenger."

  * * * *

  The horse was carrying an extra stunner but Janip left the weapon in its holster and concentrated on urgent matters like the fine art of remaining mounted while you tried to present your pursuers with the smallest target the human body could achieve

  The arithmetic didn't look encouraging. Sivmati and his posse had two adversaries outnumbered five to one—or better.

  On the other hand, one of the people opposing Sivmati was a woman with a notably resolute personality. You couldn't assess the odds with a simple unadjusted head count. . . .

  He was about two hundred meters from the stream when Elisette let him know things might not be going quite as well as she'd hoped. The cover had thickened as he approached the stream and the horse was pushing through a mass of high, thick stems. Vines and low lying plants brushed against its lower legs.

  "Be prepared to use the stunner,” Elisette said. “I'm working my way toward you. But I may not get there before they do."

  Janip reached for the holster. A stunner cracked somewhere on his right. He had already lowered the sighting glasses and slipped a brain-machine link under his hat.

  "Can you make this animal go faster, Elisette? I can't see the stream yet but the display says we're almost there."

  Motion jerked his head around. A figure had stepped from behind a stem.

  His stunner cracked while the other weapon was still being raised to firing position. The would-be ambusher sagged to the ground and he peered into the shade.

  "They're here, Elisette. I just survived an ambush. Sivmati's foot soldier stepped into the open without raising his stunner first."

  "Dismount. On your left. You can't see us but we're on your right."

  A stunner cracked. Janip put the dismounting instructions on his display and climbed out of the saddle. Elisette had just advised him she felt he was more valuable than her horse. He shouldn't assume she would flatter Farello with the same honor.

  He fell into a fast walk beside the horse's shoulders. He still couldn't see the stream itself but he could make out the sheet of light that marked the break in the forest.

  The horse sagged toward him without any warning. He grabbed Farello's jacket with his free hand and lurched away from the wall of animal flesh that was collapsing on top of him.

  He ended up huddled behind a bush with Farello sprawled behind the horse with her face pressed into a mass of vines. “Keep moving,” Elisette said. “We're covering you."

  He looked around. The only moving creatures he could see had wings and extra legs.

  "You're beginning to try my patience, Janip."

  A route appeared on his display. Two stunners fired simultaneously. He clutched the handiest spot on Farello's clothes and started crawling the last twenty meters between him and the stream. He knew the ground cover was scratching the exposed parts of Farello's face but he didn't have time to turn her on her back.

  He could be sitting in the skimmer right now if he had left Farello behind. Was he just being stubborn? Was he sticking to a course of action merely because he had started it and he couldn't bring himself to change?

  His mother had insisted people need to form long-term bonds. She felt she would still be living with his father if he had survived the calamity David Jammet had brought to their world. You grow together, she said. You build connections that are so strong nobody else can give you the same thing.

  He could see that. But did he want to create bonds like that with somebody he had met during a bad time? Somebody who had been deliberately modified to attach herself to him?

  "I'm coming up behind you,” Elisette said. “Get her on her back. You on one side, me on the other."

  He looked back and saw Elisette scrambling toward him on all fours. She pulled up beside him while he turned Farello over and tapped her finger at the precise spot on Farello's shoulder she wanted him to grab.

  "Have you noticed you haven't heard any stunners for the last couple of minutes, Janip? Sivmati's organizing a mass rush—the last resort of the unimaginative tactician."

  The slope of the ground steepened. They had entered the final tangle that bordered the stream. Crawlies and flyers erupted around them with every shift of their bodies.

  "Here they come,” Lersu said.

  Voices screamed and bellowed on their right and rear. Sivmati's warriors had been maintaining vocal discipline and communicating by their implants, but now they succumbed to the ancient human impulse to howl like an animal when rushing toward an armed enemy.

  Elisette sprawled behind the nearest patch of cover. “Keep going. Get up and crouch. They're too busy running to shoot."

  Janip pushed himself up. A dot on his display located the skimmer. It had moved upstream, to stay out of range, and now it had turned and started racing back.

  Lersu and El
isette were firing steadily—one arhythmic crack after another. Farello's foot caught in a thick vine and he jerked it free without worrying about damage or pain.

  He splashed into the water seconds before the skimmer pulled up in front of him. Farello's inert mass rolled over the side into the cargo space in back. He threw himself into the space between the seats and huddled against the damp on the deck.

  The skimmer rocked. “Let's go,” Elisette said.

  The skimmer lurched forward. Janip raised his eyes above the seats and saw half a dozen people standing in the water, near the spot that marked Lersu's position on his display. A woman raised a stunner and he dropped to the deck and stayed there until Elisette advised him they were safe.

  * * * *

  Elisette started bargaining for Lersu's release while they were still racing up the river toward Belita Falls. Sivmati knew he couldn't use Lersu the way he had hoped to use Janip, but he wasn't averse to a bit of ransom.

  "I should bill you for everything I'm losing on this,” Elisette said. “If you hadn't insisted on dragging Sivmati's irresistible devotee with you, we would have packed you on a horse and ridden away before they got within ten minutes of us."

  Janip busied himself with Farello's recovery and held his tongue. Margelina had already activated her bank's formidable public relations system. Three news feeds had transmitted urgent requests for statements.

  "Keep it to a minimum.” Margelina said. “You've got a very saleable story."

  Janip turned toward Elisette and transmitted his view of her to the news feeds. It was the first time he had ever talked to a planetary audience but he had been watching other people do it for seven standard decades.

  "I just want to emphasize that we all owe my liberator a great debt,” Janip said. “Elisette has defended the rights of every trader on Conalia. She has defeated the kind of piratical behavior that destroys free trade and the economies that depend on it. Everyone on the planet should be grateful."

  Elisette couldn't stand up at the speed the skimmer was making, but she managed a small wave and a half nod that communicated the right mixture of graciousness and humility. She had watched a few news feeds, too.