She struggled to her feet, still holding the cup and lurching against the person lying sideways to her. She saved herself from falling on her face by propping her free hand on a cocked, bony hip.
“Sorry,” she said automatically but the body didn’t so much as twitch.
It also felt cold and rigid through the coverall material. Startled, she peered up at the gaunt, odd-cheeked face—a Deski, and from the open mouth and staring eyes, another casualty to Cattenti mass productions.
“You poor devil,” she murmured, shaking spasmodically. She got up in the next try, as much to get away from the corpse as to get to the water. That was her first priority.
She started in a direct line to the stream before she noticed what some people were doing in and around the water and veered uphill. As she neared the stream, she saw that it bordered this field, coming from beyond the oddly formed tall vegetation and cascading in almost steps down past the field and beyond the trees on the lower edge. The sound of the water rippling spurred her stumbling steps into a firmer stride. Only the severest self-control kept her from dropping to her belly and burying her face in the clear stream. The water was divinely clear, running over a rocky bottom. Such a stony bed would filter out most impurities. Besides, the Catteni had put them close to water so they’d probably tested it. No one farther down the stream had yet snowed ill effects, although the way in which they were contaminating the stream disgusted her. Still, the water before her was clear. She dropped to her haunches and rinsed the cup, doing a bit of polluting herself as a film of the residue in the cup was carried away. She only allowed herself to scoop out enough to cover the bottom of the cup. She sipped once to moisten dry lips. Sipped again and rinsed the cool, sweet water around in her mouth, letting the parched tissues absorb the moisture. Her throat demanded its share. She swallowed slowly, attempting to trickle the water down drop by drop. They landed coldly in the pit of her stomach and her system insisted on more of the same. By then her taste buds had revived enough to appreciate the taste of the water, better by far than any designer water she had ever drunk either at home in Philadelphia or in Colorado. Good, simon-pure, mountain spring water.
A loud altercation started among the people downstream of her. Well, maybe not an unpleasant argument for there seemed to be cupsful of water thrown about. A few people moved away, out of the range, content to watch as they drank from their cups. She watched and sipped. She was not about to get embroiled in any group, not until she had figured out a few details: like where were they? What were they doing here? Were there any Catteni in discreet guard over them? What besides knives were in those crates and who had taken control of them? She intended to get at least one knife. Preferably two—one to hide in her boot. That once-derided survival course had included instructions on how to sharpen, use, and throw a knife. And the guys on the top of the crates were humans.
Thirst eased somewhat, her stomach started growling. She reached in her coverall and took out the package, carefully opening it. That was why they’d been given food ahead of time, then. To eat at this destination. Water laid on. As she’d also no idea how long she’d been without eating, or drinking, she broke off a third of the bar and carefully nibbled at that, interspersing it with more judicious sips of water. By the time she’d finished her portion, she felt considerably better.
She rose and looked around her with a keener interest. More bodies were moving among those laid out like disaster victims, row after row. The field must be a couple of acres at least and it was covered. Here and there were empty places where people had roused. There were more empty spaces—she counted—than the number of upright people she could see. How many had been chased off by the guys on the crates?
She dipped her cup for one more draught of cold, pure Adam’s Ale and sipped as she hiked slowly around the bodies, toward the crates. When she could see both sides of the crates, she realized that there were quite a few people lounging on the far side: mostly Terrans and some of them female. That was reassuring.
“Whatcha guardin’ there, fellas?” she asked when she got close enough, giving a friendly wave with her free hand.
Kris was accustomed to reactions to her tall lanky self. It never hurt to be blonde and moderately attractive. Until the men got past the usual trite remarks and innuendoes, she kept her smile intact and kept sipping her water a few safety lengths from the nearest one.
“Anybody sussed out where we are or what they’ve done with us?” She directed that query to the men on top of the crates. She could see now that most of the containers had been broken open to discover the contents. She saw other items besides knife blades of which there seemed to a great many.
“Knives, hatchets,” the man said. He was a heavyset man in his mid-to-late thirties and had the unmistakable air of the military in his stance. He had two knives tucked in his belt, one in each boot to judge by the way his pants bulged out at his ankles. His thermal blanket was stuffed with other items for it bulged across his chest. “Some medical kits with basic bandages and that orange stuff the Cats poured on anything that bleeds.”
“You in charge then?”
He made a gesture with one hand ana a second Terran jumped down, a knife on his open palm, the handle toward her. He was as well equipped with extras as the first speaker.
“Can I show you how to use it, beautiful?” the guy asked, leering at her.
“You mean—like this,” she said, taking the knife from his hand, hefting it a moment to get its balance before she flicked it into the nearest crate, which it penetrated enough to hold it firm.
“Whoa!” The man jumped back, hands up in front to fend her off. Above her she caught sight of a blade in the military man’s hand. “Didn’t mean no offense, sister.”
“No offense taken,” she said airily and retrieved the blade, checking the point to be sure it hadn’t been nicked. “Good steel.”
“It’s not steel,” the military man said, hunkering down so he was on a level with her. He held out a weaponless hand. “Nice to see a woman who knows the value of a knife. Chuck Mitford.”
“Army?” she asked.
“Marine,” he replied firmly and correctingly as marines generally did after such a question.
“Kris Bjornsen. Where’d you get taken?”
“Recently?” He spoke with considerable bitterness. “Or do you mean on good ol’ Terra?”
“Both,” she said and went back to sipping what water hadn’t spilled out of her cup when she’d shown off her knife skill.
“Some damned fools started a riot at one of the discipline assemblies,” he said in a growl and in the southernish drawl that had become military standard among American forces. The other man looked about to erupt. “Okay, okay, some of the poor dumbheads they were whipping to death were Terrans, too, but damned stupid to attack Catteni even if there were a helluva lot more of us than them.” He made a throat noise of disgust.
“We’ve taken enough from them, sarge,” the other man said, his resentment boiling over.
Mitford acted like a sergeant, too, Kris thought and decided he’d be a good ally.
“And look where it got us,” he barked back. “Arnie here’s never been against a superior force. Thinks being brave is all there is to overcoming dictators.” He ignored Arnie then. “I was on leave from my unit in Lubbock, Texas, when we got pearl-harbored. Haven’t found a trace of my family.” He shut his mouth tight then.
“Denver,” Kris said. She turned to Arnie. “You?”
“DC.”
She hadn’t encountered anyone from the Philadelphia area so maybe the rest of her family was still safely at home. If that was a safe place to be with Catteni overlords.
“Could I have some of those medical supplies, if they’re going begging?”
“Sure,” and Mitford walked along the top of the crates while she followed on the ground. Arnie stayed a discreet step behind her. “I figured someone had better take charge of supplies like these,” and he pointed down to
yet another crate of knives. At the next one he stooped and came up with a hatchet, which he handed to her. “Here. Might as well have one of these, too. There aren’t more ration bars so make the ones you got do until we can figure out what’s edible on this effing planet.”
“I’d planned to,” she replied, tucking the hatchet in the belt at her back. She’d hack off a piece of the thermal blanket to make sheaths for knives and hatchet. Mitford handed her a compact kit, already supplied with a broad shoulder strap.
“Hasn’t got much medicine. Cats don’t use it, seems like. Tough mothers!”
“Hey, sarge,” yelled a man, running full tilt toward them, and pointing back over his shoulder. “There’s a Catteni! He’s waking up. Let’s kill the bastard before he does.”
Roaring out an order for others to join him, Mitford jumped down, a knife already in his hand.
“Wait a minute,” Kris said, holding up her hands. “If a Catteni’s here with us, he’s as much a prisoner as we are.”
“Who cares? He’s a Cat and Cats should die,” Arnie said, moving around her.
Kris started after them, running to catch up with Mitford, who was the leader.
“Sarge, I saw one Catteni in the same hold as I was. And he’s a good guy.”
“There’re no good Cats!” Mitford said in a snarl, chopping at the air with one flat, finger-braced hand.
“There are,” she said just as fiercely. “And if it’s the one I think it is, don’t kill him.”
“You’re asking too much, girl.”
“Not right away at least. Use the sense God gave you, Mitford,” she said. “If it’s the Catteni I think it is, he’ll know a lot we have to find out about this place. Unless there were some guide books in those crates.”
Mitford halted so abruptly, the three men right behind him bounced off his back. Narrowing his eyes, he glared at her.
“And how would you know that about him, girl?”
“Because I watched him being hunted by other Catteni. They blasted him out of the sky, and then blew up the crashed plane and searched all around until they were damned sure he’d been blown up in it.”
“Then how come he’s alive and here?” Arnie wanted to know.
“Because I thought he was an escaped slave like me and hid him under the falls until the hunters left. Only then we got captured together,” Kris said, which was true enough. “When I came to in the prison, I assumed he’d been released. Cattenis can’t hold grudges past twenty-four hours, you know.” Mitford gave a curt nod of acknowledgment. “They must have hated him real bad to dump him in with us. Besides which, you’d only be doing the Cats’ dirty work for them.” Mitford scowled at her and she realized that she’d been clever to bring that up. “Hell’s bells, man, they’d expect us to waste him, wouldn’t they? So let’s find out—first—what he knows. Then you can kill him.” She said that cheerfully, hoping to God and little green apples that Mahomet would be able to show himself useful enough so that they wouldn’t kill him. She found it odd in herself to think that way about the Catteni but he wasn’t like the others…
“We sure could use some gen about this place,” Mitford agreed reluctantly, glancing around. He gave a convulsive twitch. “Place is too neat for an unsettled world and I’d rather know what we got to contend with now before we stumble into big kimchee with only knives and hatchets.”
He strode on then, to the man who’d discovered the Catteni. He pointed in the proper direction and then followed them. It was Mahomet all right, and she bent down beside him, turning the heavy head to expose where she’d belted him with the tool. A scar was there but it was well healed.
“Ohho,” she said.
“Ohho, what?” Mitford asked as the other men ranged themselves around Mahomet. Their expressions were unfriendly and most of them had knives in their hands.
She pointed to the scar. “I clobbered him there. And it’s healed. We were a long time getting here.”
“Kill him now before he wakes,” Arnie said in a snarl, leaning over, knife hand raised.
“No!” Mitford’s word snapped Arnie erect. “The girl’s got something in keeping him alive, and able to talk. Don’t tell me he speaks English?” There was a little more respect for her in Mitford’s eyes now and Kris realized that he’d been thinking she’d been Mahomet’s toy.
“Enough lingua Barevi for us to understand him.”
She splashed the little water that was left in her cup over the Catteni’s face and he reacted by lifting a hand to his face and moving stiffly from side to side. When his foot connected with someone’s leg, she could see him tense. He drew his leg back and, in one quick lithe movement, was on his feet, arms held slightly out from his sides, alert and ready to defend himself despite the knife-carrying odds against him.
“Easy there,” Kris said, stepping in front of him. “Remember me?”
He shot a quick glance at her but his eyes went right back to Mitford. Though the Sergeant wasn’t holding a knife, Mahomet had immediately taken him as the leader. Kris gave him full marks for quick appraisals.
“Yes. You stole the commander’s flitter,” he said in lingua Barevi.
“You did?” Arnie exclaimed. “You bitch!” And he shoved his face right up at her. His breath was vile but she held her ground and glared down at him, once again glad of the extra inches that had made her adolescence a trial. “I got force-whipped because of you!” He jerked his coverall off his shoulder so she could see the weals still purple on his skin. “So did fifty others at the discipline assembly they called because of you! She’s as bad as he is. No wonder she wasn’t for killing him.” Arnie glanced at the other hard faces, willing them to join him.
“Stuff it, Arnie,” Mitford said, holding his right arm up in a karate-chop position. “We can deal with her later, too, but let’s first find out what this mother knows.”
Kris’ mouth was dry all over again and she was scared cold. But she couldn’t have let them just kill Mahomet out-of-hand. She owed him, if only because she’d put him in jeopardy before the twenty-four-hour moratorium had passed. She was sure that was why he was stuck here with the rest of them. She’d inadvertently told the truth. Cattenis had hated him enough to make sure he came to a dead end.
“Hey, sarge,” someone yelled across the field and they looked over their shoulders. In the interval quite a few people had roused and were now homing in on the crates. Reinforcements were needed.
“C’mon, you,” Mitford said to Mahomet and jerked his head to indicate the Catteni should move with them. “And you,” he added coldly to Kris.
Kris briefly considered a belated apology to Arnie and decided not to make the effort. Arnie didn’t seem the forgiving type and she might even make matters worse. Mahomet had not moved and when two of the men swiped at him with their knives, he ignored them and gestured for Kris to precede him. Quickly she fell in behind Mitford, hearing the surprised exclamations from the men.
“See how well he knows her,” one of them said in a salacious tone of voice.
“She conked him, didn’t she?”
“Yeah, but before or after, Murph?”
“Before, Murph,” she answered for herself, making her voice as strident as she could. That wasn’t too difficult considering how scared she was. The situation had turned very ugly. “And that goes for anyone with the same dirty ideas.” Looking straight ahead, she strode as confidently as she could back to the crates.
Once there, Mitford signed two of the men to take her and Mahomet behind the crates until he was finished with the new arrivals. He jumped up to his vantage point and, arms cocked on his belt, began his spiel. “I’m here to see that these supplies get doled out properly. So one at a time.” He repeated the advice in lingua Barevi, speaking with a fluency that Kris hadn’t expected.
Arnie was helping Mitford on the crates but some of those who had been lounging on the ground behind the barricade got curious and wandered up to Kris and Mahomet.
“What’s
with the Cat?”
“Mitford’s going to question him,” said the lankier of the two, a good head taller than Kris and nearly as tall as Mahomet.
“Okay, Murph, give Arnie a hand with the supplies now,” Mitford said, jumping down. “Now, Cat, tell me why we should keep you alive.”
“What is needed to know?” Mahomet asked in Barevi, his voice even, his manner diplomatic.
Kris let relief flood through her. Thank God he had sense enough—for a Catteni—to know how dangerous his situation was.
“Where we are. Who lives here. Any bad animals. What can we eat that won’t kill us.” Mitford tapped the blanket where his ration bars were stashed. “These won’t last long.”
Mahomet let out a dry rasp, tried to clear his throat to form words. Kris knew he’d be as dry as anyone else but she didn’t dare ask for the favor of water for him. She mustn’t be seen to favor, much less help, him.
“Here, give me that cup, Bass,” Mitford said, snapping his fingers at one of the onlookers who had a cup in his hand.
“Huh? Give a Cat a drink?”
“If that helps him tell us what we need to know. Give it. You’ve been guzzling water for the past hour.”
“I like that!” But Bass handed over the cup. “I want it back.”
Mahomet held up his own cup and, with a nod of his head toward Bass, accepted the water Mitford doled out. He took a small sip, rinsing his mouth, and then a longer one.
“I remember some details. This planet surveyed. I did not read all.”
“What did you read then?” Mitford demanded.
“Longer day, mild climate, some…” He frowned, trying to find the words, “species not other found. Three types deathly.” He paused for another sip and then circled the cup to indicate the field. “Better go from here soon. Open field dangerous.”
“Then why was we put down here?” Arnie demanded from his vantage on the crates. “So we could all get killed?”
“No.” Mahomet shook his head, a rueful grin on his lips. “To live, to fight what is here. This how Catteni settle planets—the not easy ones.” He finished the water then, knocking it back in his throat, tapping the cup on his teeth to be sure he had received the last drops. Then he stood there, his eyes going slowly from one face to another and coming back to Mitford’s.
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