by Diana Palmer
“You might also remember the Spheres that were captured by the Rojoks,” Mourjey broke in. “If the Rojoks have them, they hold the key to the complete obliteration of every member race of the Council. The military information alone which they contain will guarantee our defeat. I’m sure some of you remember slavery?”
The Rigellian delegate pursed his yellow lips. “Some of us also remember the Great Galaxy War,” he said quietly. “Another like it and some of us would be obliterated regardless.”
“Freedom has a price,” Lawson said philosophically. “But fighting Rojoks isn’t your only option now. You have a choice between fighting the Rojoks or fighting the Rojoks and the Centaurian Empire as well. Would any of you care to match the cream of your military forces against the Holconcom?”
There was a long silence, interspersed with urgent whispers. Council members glanced at each other in obvious apprehension.
Lokar spoke for them. “Some of us have also suffered the penalty for provoking the Holconcom, and remember it well. Nor do I harbor concern for the Holconcom ship, which has been cut off by the Rojok vessels,” he added with an amused glance at the Centaurian delegate, whose fine lips pulled into a very human smile. “My sympathy, rather, is for the Rojoks. We will call a vote.”
Lawson saluted Lokar and left the chamber. He knew when he left what the outcome would be. He only regretted that it had taken so many lives, and Tnurat Alamantimichar’s threat, to open the eyes of those diplomatic moles. So many human lives, so many atrocities…
Then he remembered the reference to the Holconcom rescue operation. He permitted himself a tiny smile. The Bellatrix. It had to be. And Captain Holt Stern and his crew were alive after all. But for how long? Humans and Holconcom together, in a confined space, under pressure. The Holconcom would slaughter them with little provocation. They knew nothing of humans. Only Dtimun had any real experience of them, and he was notorious for his dislike of the entire species. His heart sank. Perhaps it would have been more merciful for the humans if a Rojok blast had claimed the Bellatrix with all aboard!
The harsh sound of Rojok voices brought Lyceria back to consciousness. Waves of vertigo wound through her head as she tried to sit up on the bed. She peered through the dim light toward the door. Behind it, a flood of Rojok voices rushed in at her. Three voices; one obliging and placating, one defensive, one harsh and threatening.
The autodoor zipped up. One lone Rojok entered the small cubicle. He walked with authority. He was tall, reddish-skinned, hard-muscled. His long shock of blond hair was neatly trimmed, flowing down over the high collar of his black, long-sleeved uniform jacket. His slacks followed powerful legs down into heavy black boots. His slit-eyes peered at her from a lean, stern face that showed no emotion. His sleeves displayed a pattern of mesag marks that denoted high rank, as did the long hair, which only officers were permitted to wear. He had faint scars on his face, and lines around his eyes. He was a warrior.
Lyceria stood up, only a little intimidated, preparing herself for whatever was to come. “Am I now to be taken to Ahkmau?” she asked.
A flicker of shock touched the alien face. The Rojok’s eyes narrowed and his jaw tautened proudly. “It is not the custom of the Rojok,” he said in perfect Centaurian accents, “to condemn royalty to the death camps.”
“No?” A tiny smile touched her full lips. “I was told that if I did not comport myself as expected, I would be placed there.”
The Rojok glared toward the door where the other two aliens stiffened, quickly saluted and moved back a safe distance. In different circumstances, the action would have been amusing to Lyceria.
When he looked back at her, his eyes were still narrow with fury. “No more threats will be made against you. You have my word.”
“It is said,” she replied, “that the word of a Rojok is as the wind.”
“Is it also said of the word of Chacon?”
Her eyes flashed brown at the Rojok as she recognized him from textdiscs. Here was no ordinary soldier. This was the most powerful field marshal of the Rojok army, the most famous of them all.
“You!” She stepped forward, momentarily forgetting the required dignity of her station. “Murderer of women and children! Torturer of boys!”
A muscle in his cheek flinched. “The attack on Terramer was perpetrated without my knowledge,” he stated flatly. “As was the murder of your brother. Those responsible will be punished.”
“And what punishment will return my brother to me, Commander Chacon?” she asked bitterly. “Tell me that.”
“I cannot undo what was done. Atrocities are frequently committed in the name of war, by all soldiers.” His eyes softened slightly. “Come. You will be provided more suitable quarters.”
“In your prison, no doubt.”
He watched her quietly, with eyes as deft as a hunter’s aim. “Your bitterness is understandable. But bitterness is an acid. Beware, lest it eat you alive.”
“Grief is not shared with outworlders,” she told him.
“Not among Rojoks.” He stood aside to let her pass. “Have you eaten?”
“I care for nothing,” she replied. Inside, her ribs felt near collapse from the three-day fast.
“You will eat,” he said, “or you will be fed forcibly. Do you understand? I will not allow you to commit suicide.”
“Allow?” She looked at him defiantly, with brown anger coloring her pupils. “And do you think to dictate to me?”
He smiled. A thin, self-confident smile that was disconcerting. “Until the war is over, at least. You are a political prisoner. As such, you will tolerate my ‘dictates.’”
“And the consequences?” she chided. “Shall you send me to Ahkmau?”
“If you continue to oppose me, you may be sent to my harem,” he warned mockingly.
Had she known how, she would have blushed. A mingling of color touched her eyes, and she hid them from him. Dtimun would teach this Rojok choapha manners. Among other lessons the Holconcom would provide.
Stern was still nursing hostility when he went into the mess hall with Madeline and Hahnson two “days” later. The tension in the room was so thick it could have been filleted.
The compartment was filled to capacity, with humans and Centaurians sitting uncomfortably integrated at the long tables. The close quarters bred tension.
The ship was still running from the oncoming net of Rojok ships, which it had managed to avoid with amazing tactical skill. Stern was beginning to believe the C.O.’s reputation for eluding superior forces. Apparently there was some sort of technology in use that was able to broadcast false ion trails to lead the Rojok ships astray. How long that would continue to work was anyone’s guess. Meanwhile, hope was growing that the vessel would make neutral Benaski Port in time.
The situation aboard the Morcai, however, was growing desperate. In the past twenty-four standard hours, disaster had been averted by seconds on every deck. The mixture of aliens and humans grew more explosive by the minute. Thanks to the translators, the humans understood enough Centaurian to realize that they were being chided, denigrated and insulted with every other breath. The Holconcom were eloquent about their distaste for having to share quarters with those they thought of as inferior beings. They abused the humans for being unable to meet the same physical challenges as the Centaurians. They chided them for their lack of stamina. The humans, on the other hand, knew that the Centaurians were clones, and treated them with contempt. Among human colonies, clones had no status, no rights, and were frequently kept in cooling tanks in suspended animation and used as spare parts for their originals.
Some of the Centaurians had to move out of their quarters to accommodate the unexpected guests aboard their vessel. The humans got in the way of routine. They didn’t understand Centaurian discipline, they didn’t follow the protocols, and they acted as if they owned the ship. Stern made no attempt to smooth things over. Hahnson had, but his misgivings grew when he noticed how careless Stern’s attitude was
to the growing danger. He’d mentioned it to Komak, who frowned and commented that perhaps a word to Dtimun would be wise. The exec offered to speak to his commanding officer for Hahnson, and not mention it to Holt Stern. Hahnson dreaded having Stern find out that he’d gone behind his back. But something was different about his captain; something radical. He looked around him at the integrated mess hall and wondered how anyone could think combining the groups a good idea. The Centaurians had never known physical contact with other races except in war, and these humans knew nothing of how they fought on a battlefield. Hahnson had known humans to have nervous breakdowns just from seeing the Holconcom fight. Stern had never seen them in combat. Perhaps that helped explain his odd lack of concern for his men.
Madeline was watching a group of Centaurians and humans at another table with growing concern. The “accidental” elbowing by the humans was all too conspicuous, and the chiding tones were unmistakable despite the language barrier that even the rudimentary translators were working valiantly to correct.
“He might have left us segregated,” Madeline said angrily. “This forced integration is going to cause a riot before we ever reach Benaski Port.”
“Forced?” Hahnson eyed her. “Did Dtimun give orders to integrate at mess? I can’t believe he’d risk it.” He frowned as he studied the other diners. “This could result in a slaughter. Are you sure it was the C.O.?”
Madeline scowled. “Well, no. But if not him, then, who…?”
“I integrated our ship’s complement with the Centaurians,” Stern said carelessly. “They’ll have to learn to get along one way or the other, and the sooner the better.”
“Are you nuts?” Hahnson exclaimed. “Don’t you know what’s going to happen if one of our men lays hands on one of the Holconcom?”
“The Holconcom will sit there and take it, of course,” Stern replied smugly. “You yourself,” he added to Hahnson, “told me that the commander threatened to kill the first one of his men who fought back if there were any confrontations.”
“The commander still doesn’t realize just how physical humans are,” Hahnson protested. “I’m the only one he’s spent much time around, and we never came to blows!”
“Try the green jell,” Stern said casually, lifting a spoonful to his lips. “It tastes like anything you imagine it to be. It’s ingenious.”
“Holt…”
Hahnson never finished the sentence. Before he could, an ominous clatter of hyperplastic hitting the deck cut him off. A brief, stunned silence followed the commotion.
A Bellatrix crewman shot to his feet, glaring down at a Holconcom noncom beside him. “That’s it, you damned cat-eyes!” he roared, red in the face. “I’ve taken all the insults and all the sarcasm I’m goin’ to take from you!”
The Holconcom pointedly ignored the outburst and kept eating.
Confident now, the human grew bolder. “No guts,” he spat at the alien. “You guys are all talk. Come on, stand up and let’s see if you bleed!”
Hahnson gaped at the crewman. He knew the man. It was one of the engineers, Declan Muldoon, and he was one of the most levelheaded humans he’d ever known. It wasn’t like Muldoon to actually start a fight.
Just as Hahnson started to relay that opinion to his colleagues, Muldoon laid a heavy hand on the Centaurian he was baiting and, deftly turning him, threw a heavy-handed right cross to the alien’s jaw.
The Holconcom sat and stared at the human, unmoved by the blow, which would have felled any crewman at Stern’s table.
“Tough guy, huh?” Muldoon persisted, grinning. “Try this on for size!” He threw another punch, putting everything he had into it. The Holconcom absorbed it as easily as he had the first. But his eyes began to dilate. As he turned toward the human, Madeline saw the elongated cat-eyes slowly turn brown.
“Stern, do something while there’s still time,” Madeline said quickly.
But the Bellatrix’s captain only sat watching the byplay with oddly blank, dark eyes.
Suddenly a low, soft growl began to grow in the silence that followed the human engineer’s next deliberate blow. The sound built on itself, like a low roar that quickly took on the ferocity of a jungle cat’s warning cry. It exploded abruptly in a high-pitched inhuman scream that froze Stern’s heart in his chest with a terror that bordered on panic. The blank look left his eyes as his jaw dropped. He’d never heard such a nightmarish sound in his life, even in combat.
“My God!” Hahnson whispered. “The decaliphe!”
Before the soft words died on the air, the Holconcom regular was on his feet. He began to crouch, his eyes darker by the second, his hands slowly assuming the shape of a cat’s open paw. They flexed. Beneath the tips of the fingers, steel claws began to extend in gleaming sharp points. It was a form of bionic engineering that none of the humans had yet seen.
Madeline pushed Stern, but he didn’t react. He was frozen in place by the low growl that built again in the Centaurian’s throat.
Madeline grabbed for Stern’s Gresham and fired it at point-blank range, into the back of the Holconcom, with the setting on maximum burn. It should have killed the alien. It should have dropped him to his knees at least. It did neither. She fired again, cursing under her breath, with the same result.
“What in the seven netherworlds…!” Madeline exclaimed huskily.
The Holconcom group had risen in unison. They were standing, watching the other Holconcom who crouched in front of Muldoon.
Hahnson got to his feet. “Twenty Greshams wouldn’t stop him now!” he told Madeline. “He gave the decaliphe—the death cry. Only Dtimun can bring him down! Hold the other men back, no matter what the Holconcom do, if you can. I’ll get the C.O.”
He was out the door at a dead run. Madeline moved forward with the Gresham leveled, ignoring Stern, who still sat as if in a trance.
“Hold it!” Madeline barked at two human noncoms who were in the process of rising from their seats. “Move and I’ll drop both of you,” she added, her green eyes backing up the threat. They sat down.
But Lieutenant Higgins, the Bellatrix’s exec, rose from his chair despite the threat of Madeline’s Gresham. Across from her, the Holconcom regular was moving with a catlike stalking gait toward Muldoon, who had by now realized his peril and had begun to back away, his face mirroring his fear.
“He’ll kill Muldoon, if we don’t do something,” Higgins pleaded huskily. “He’s my friend. If we could just get Muldoon out of here…! You don’t know what they’ll do if the alien actually attacks Muldoon.” He nodded toward the Holconcom. “You haven’t seen them fight. I have.” He swallowed, hard. “There won’t be enough of Muldoon left to bury, and then they’ll go for the other humans in a solid mass. They can’t help it, Doctor, it’s the way they fight…!”
Another sharp, catlike cry from the Holconcom interrupted him.
The hairs on the back of Madeline’s neck stood up, but she held her ground. She had, after all, been an officer in the Amazon regiment, long before she became a doctor. “Move toward him again,” Madeline told Higgins, “and he’ll have company. It’s Hahnson’s show. He knows what he’s doing.”
The rest of the Holconcom were still standing, and when the humans began to stand, as well, the Centaurians’ eyes began to grow darker and the pupils dilate.
Hurry, Strick, she thought silently. She wasn’t certain what the outcome would be, but she was inclined to believe Higgins. She’d heard things about the way the Holconcom fought, as a unit. None of the Amazons had ever seen them in combat or been liaisoned with them. The Centaurians had no female military, due to their obviously backward culture, she thought wickedly. But she had a feeling that if any of the humans made a move toward Muldoon, the Holconcom would mass and there would be a massacre. Higgins meant well, but his interference could bring about the very situation he feared.
Muldoon was looking paler by the minute, but he stood firm. “Go ahead. Kill me. Or try to kill me,” he taunted the Holconcom.
/> “Shut up, Muldoon!” Madeline called to him, in a tone that demanded obedience.
He gave her an odd look. One of the other humans turned to the Centaurian next to him and put up his fists. There were more growls. The Holconcom began to merge into a mass of red uniforms.
God, Madeline thought in anguish. There was nothing else she could do. If Hahnson didn’t hurry…!
She heard the autodoor opening behind her with relief, and moved her eyes to it.
But it wasn’t the C.O. It was Hahnson, grimacing. “Komak’s going after him,” he told her.
“Think we have time?” she wondered with black humor, taking her eyes off Muldoon for an instant.
It was enough. Higgins sprang into action. He went for the Holconcom bracing Muldoon and clipped him at the knees.
Incredibly the Holconcom was like a solidly rooted tree. He didn’t move an inch. But his hand did. He caught Muldoon by the throat with one hand, flung the human away and slammed him to the deck, where he lay still, unmoving. Then he turned toward Higgins.
“Oh, God!” Madeline ground out when she saw the Centaurian’s eyes. They were black. Pitch-black. As black as death. She’d never seen that color, but she’d read about it…
She fired the Gresham, again and again and again, but the emerillium propelled plasma spray simply bounced off. She could hardly believe her eyes. Then, just as the Holconcom reached Higgins, there was a sound behind her.
“Mashcon!” The single word had the ring of steel hitting rock. It froze the humans in their stances, like action figures. It muted the building growls of the other Holconcom.