Being in a higher position than the caravan below, the leader was able to see the centre of the cause of the noise before those below. On the horizon there had appeared a large cloud of dust, which was moving steadily forward, as if hiding the source of the noise in its centre. If he was frightened, he was enough of a leader not to show it to his followers. He had already told them that it might be something they could add to their spoils and he repeated this opinion now.
Still straggling out behind the caravan, Adriann and Deneer were now able to see the dust cloud on the edge of the horizon, and, as they could see it, so could the Statemen, who spent more time turning in their saddles than looking to the front. Eventually, they ceased to move forward at all, but stood in small groups, resting on their reins and speculating between themselves as to what it could be that was after them.
One group was engaged in urgent discussion, the result of which was that the trader Bakkar, who was one of the plumpest and most prosperous-looking members of the party, took his horse out of the line and trotted it back to the two Guides. He reined in between them as they stared back at the gathering cloud of dust:
“We want to know. Are they Mutants?”
Deneer took a moment to withdraw her concentration from the approaching threat, then turned to glare at the questioner, the glint in her eyes making him quail:
“Get back with your own people.”
The man’s face was pasty grey and damp with fear. Even so, he braced himself up enough to ask:
“Shouldn’t we do something, not just stop here? Shouldn’t we try to outrun them?”
Deneer realised that her first reaction had been unreasonable and toned down the glare. She often forgot that these were just ordinary mortals, motivated by selfishness and fear, not by the higher philosophy of the code that sustained the Guides. Her renewed answer was couched in softer tones, though just as firm in its resolve:
“No, we will not run. It will do no good. We will tell you what to do soon. Now rejoin the others.”
She turned back and concentrated on the ever-growing dust cloud. Bakkar paused for a second, then understood that this was the last word that he was going to get out of either of them. Reluctantly, he turned his horse and trotted back to join his fellow Statemen in the caravan, but not without glancing back again and again at the growing dust cloud. The noise from within it was getting louder by the second and was stoking a deeper fear in all who listened, except for the calm Guides.
He reined in next to Marcus Karl, one of the younger members of the party. It was not Marcus’s first journey out of Helix. He had been to Triton before and now he was returning to be married. He even had a pass to make his home there. He was tall with a boyish handsome face and clear blue eyes, the physique and looks of a Guide rather than a Stateman. Now he asked:
“What did the Guides say?”
The fat man shrugged:
“You know what these Guides are like, so much with themselves all the time that they give away nothing. They would not tell me—but they’re as worried about that cloud as we are. It must be Mutants and they must be going to attack. I suggested that we make a run for it, but the stuck-up cow wouldn’t hear of it.”
Marcus sighed. He had only been a few hours in the company of Mr. Bakkar, but already he had learnt that that was a few hours too many:
“We’re just to wait then?”
“Wait? How can we? I say they’re wrong. I say we run.”
Marcus shook his head and put a restraining hand on the man’s arm:
“My father has often told me of the Guides; you must trust them without question in the wastelands. He swore that he would always trust one of their number with his life.”
The man snorted:
“Your father. What does he know? Why, he’s not even allowed to leave the City.”
The rebuke was true enough, for Marcus Karl’s father was an important man in the hierarchy of Helix. He was the leading doctor in the City, both in charge of the clinic and the consultant to the Lord Zirpola himself—not that there was apparently any work for him to do in this connection, for the Lord Zirpola was said never to have had a day of illness in his life. He was a strong man, a natural leader. He was above the need of a doctor. Nevertheless, Marcus’s father was on permanent stand-by. That was why he had not been allowed to travel with Marcus to the wedding—and now the Mutants might attack and overcome them and he might never see his father alive again.
The cloud had been coming closer and closer and was now finally resolved into its real form. There were eight of the strange machines, like great mechanical horses. On each sat a man, and each man wore the uniform of an Obedience Enforcer from Helix, with the special helmet that all such Enforcers wore when outside the City. As Marcus turned and saw them the only comment he could think to make was:
“Oh, God.”
Deneer and Adriann saw and recognised the uniform of the riders. To them, the Enforcers had always been enemies. They turned their horses and spurred them up, one riding on each side of the straggling, mostly halted column, shouting their commands as they went:
“Dismount, dismount quickly. Form a circle. Jump to it.”
Hastily, the Statemen obeyed the orders of their protectors and all became confusion as they slid off their horses in varying degrees of panic and bewilderment. Some remembered to calm their horses, trying to keep them quiet and subdued; others leaped from the saddles of their beasts as if they were on fire, their minds filled only with the coming threat and the thought of how they might save themselves. Even nine hundred years of living with the results of man’s cruelty to himself had done little to change the selfishness of human nature.
However, even in the midst of this confusion, with Adriann and Deneer trotting round and round the group, giving encouragement and advice where they could, they were eventually formed into a tight defensive circle, at least the best result that could be obtained.
Sitting high on the saddle of the leading Death Machine, Polna was able to see the activity in the distance as the circle was formed. In truth, the sight came as a relief to him. It was one thing to fight and try to overcome and capture one of the Guides, it was quite another to carry that fight into a group of Statemen, with the danger of killing an innocent member of one’s own kind.
Since he and his troop had set out from the City in pursuit of the caravan, the thought had hung over him and he had dreaded having to make the choice. But the decision taken by the Guides to group the Statemen together meant that the fighters had decided to meet the danger head on, away from the people they were set to defend. Polna, who lacked the streak of ruthlessness shared by Ankar Moor and Lord Zirpola, but who was, nevertheless, a cruel man when the need arose, gave thanks that, in his view, it was now going to be a fair fight.
With the circle formed, the two Guides were ready to go forth to meet their enemy. They moved forward and away from the group. It was then Adriann was reminded that there was one more task to perform, as Karissa spurred her pony forward, determined to remain at her mother’s side. Adriann smiled down at her calmly, then pointed back to the defensive circle:
“Go back.”
The little girl looked troubled and steadfastly refused to turn the pony round:
“I want to stay with you.”
Adriann was touched by her daughter’s trust, but worried for her safety. She would be a clear target by herself; among the Statemen she might have a chance:
“Go with the Statemen. You are to stay with them until it is over and I come for you.”
The little girl was still not willing to obey. Her face screwed up as if she was close to tears, though no member of the Guides or their families had ever been known to cry, and glanced towards the oncoming column. She was obviously more afraid for her mother than for herself:
“Please, Adriann. Let me stay.”
Her mother was still gentle, even understanding, but nonetheless firm towards her offspring:
“No. When you are bec
ome a Guide, then you will be your only master, but for now you must obey me. You will stay with these people. They will protect you as one day you will be able to protect them. Have no fear, I will come for you.”
Abruptly, she turned away. There was no time left for argument. She rode away from the defensive circle to come once more alongside Deneer, who had tactfully moved away a little while Adriann had talked with her daughter. With hesitant reluctance, Karissa turned the head of her pony and walked the tiny creature across the space to the defensive circle of the Statemen.
Deneer did not take her eyes off the oncoming threat for a moment as Adriann fell in alongside her again. Her whole concentration, conscious and subconscious, was on the threat that was moving rapidly towards them, the noise coming louder and louder in the still air. She was trying to work out some strategy for battle, letting her mind enter a pool of calm and flatten out ready for the fight that she was sure lay ahead:
“There are eight of the strange metal horses. There can be no question. It is us they come for.”
Adriann nodded:
“Yes. We must flank them. We must deflect their blade.”
The two women now turned their heads to face one another, their eyes looking on to one another and becoming mirrors of each other’s soul, as was the way of the Guides. They sank down into the consciousness for the ritual that is such an essential part of their philosophy, the ritual of Union and temporary co-operation. Deneer began the ritual of the code in a flat, trance-like voice:
“Our Union is limited.”
Adriann responded with the formal nod, never for an instant taking her eyes away from the other girl’s:
“I agree. We are our own masters, but are now as one.”
Deneer returned the nod and the moment of ritual was now at an end. They would fight as if they were one person within the same consciousness until the danger was over. Then the Union would be broken and each would become her own master again and go her separate way. For now they were a part of a single whole.
Each woman rejected the thought of the Whistler and instead drew from her belt the anti-matter blaster she carried. Abruptly they went into action, turning the heads of their great horses away from one another and galloping at full tilt across the canyon in opposite directions, in an effort to draw a split in the oncoming group.
Polna rasped into his communicator:
“Remember, we want them alive if we can. No blasters unless you are forced. Now go to it.”
And, as the Statemen in their circle and the Mutants at the entrances to the caves looked on helplessly, the great duel began.
Polna barked out an order for the teams to split, four charging after Adriann, his own group veering off in pursuit of Deneer. As if they were two parts of the single whole, as the ritual of the code had made them, the two women reined in at the same moment, turned their horses and began to charge towards the great machines, their blasters at the ready.
As they closed with their enemies, they uttered the bloodcurdling war cry of the Guides and fired, but, owing to the speed of the approach of their enemies, a speed to which both were unused, they missed their targets and were forced to weave their horses to avoid the hail of darts fired at them by the Enforcers.
Marcus was one with the other Statesmen as they watched the attack, awed as the horses charged the machines, breathless with fear as they disappeared in a cloud of dust between them, then relieved as they emerged unscathed on the far side.
Deneer wheeled round to prepare her steed for another charge and a similar movement from Adriann came only a second later. The latter dropped beneath the level of the flank of her horse for this second charge and, as the darts winged on their futile way above the top of her head, she levelled her blaster under the neck of her mount and aimed at one of the riders who had come against her.
A squeeze on the trigger button and both the Obedience guard and his frightening Death Machine disappeared into the void, to float forever in timeless space. Even the man’s strangled scream was lost amid the roar of the machines. But now, under the threat of annihilation, another of the guards who had gone against her lost his head, perhaps from excitement, perhaps from fear: such emotions are so close to each other in battle, and, as Adriann wheeled her steed again for a further charge, he pressed the button that activated the rear anti-matter blaster pods. An instant later, both Adriann and the great animal had disappeared in a green and crimson flash. She did not cry out in the moment of her death, but accepted it as the ultimate and inevitable fate of a Guide.
Little Karissa had been standing at Marcus Karl’s side with her pony. Now, as he stared out into the field of battle, she disengaged her tiny hand, leapt upon her pony and spurred it forward out of the protective circle:
“Adriann!”
Deneer was riding full-tilt at the machines once more, oblivious to the annihilation of her companion, concentrating only on her part of the fight for victory and life. For the briefest of moments, Karissa’s sudden charge caught her eye and distracted her as the little girl spurred the pony forward towards the cave-pocked sandstone cliffs and the spot where she had witnessed the death of her mother.
That second of distracted hesitation was time enough for Polna and his men. Deneer’s mount was hit by a volley of darts and, with a whinny of fear, it fell unconscious beneath her, spilling her forward on to the sand, her anti-matter blaster falling from her hand and skidding across the ground some distance from her.
Polna saw the result and shouted exultantly into his transceiver:
“Now, get her. She is helpless.”
Deneer was at an almost hopeless disadvantage, but no Guide gave up the fight until it was lost. As the leading machine roared down on her and its rider fired his dart from the special pistol, she leapt high into the air, passing safely over the machine, landing easily behind it and close to the fallen blaster. Now she lunged desperately for it, rolled over with it in her hands, before raising herself up to fire at her next attacker. Polna screamed:
“Nail her.”
She squeezed the trigger, but the action came too late as a hail of darts caught her in the chest, knocking her backwards off-balance. The blaster shot passed harmlessly over the heads of the riders as she fell back unconscious on the sand.
The men turned and slowed their machines to a halt before dismounting and surrounding their fallen enemy. Polna looked down on her and admired her for both her looks and ability to give battle:
“Good work, men. Now load her up quickly and let’s get out of here.”
As two of the Enforcers lifted Deneer on to the back of one of the machines and tied her down, Polna turned to another of his men and pointed towards the huddle of the defensive circle:
“Form the caravan into a single column. Get them turned and moving back to the City. Tell them we will protect them—move!”
The man joined with two of his fellows and they remounted their Death Machines and moved over to the column, stopping in an impressive cloud of dust and revving their engines to induce the right level of fear and respect in their captives.
The leadman then dismounted and produced a small bullhorn. Marcus Karl turned to Bakkar and frowned.
“I do not understand. They are Obedience Enforcers from the City. Why would they attack us?”
Bakkar shrugged. He had no answer to the question and was filled with a terror for his own life which precluded him from trying to think of one.
The orders of the Enforcer boomed out at them, magnified by the power of the bullhorn.
“We have been sent to rescue you. You were to be led into a trap. The Guides were in league with the Mutants. You must return to Helix. Form yourselves in a single file—quickly!”
Marcus strode forward, angry and confused, but not afraid.
“I am supposed to get married in three days—in Triton. I demand to be allowed to go on.”
As the others remounted their horses, afraid and anxious to obey the Enforcer, the man with the bull
horn walked up to where Marcus was holding his ground.
“You feel that is good reason to query our instructions?”
Marcus felt more nervous than he showed on the surface. But he was no coward and was not going to give up without some show of resistance.
“But I must get to Triton. Why have you overcome our Guides?”
“I told you. They were in league with the Mutants.”
“That is a lie. No Guide has ever been in league with them. They are the enemies of the Guides, just as they are ours.”
The man smiled grimly.
“We take our authority from the Lord Zirpola. They are his enemies and would lead anyone from Helix into danger and death. Another caravan will be going in a few days. You will be able to get your permit renewed then. But now you must return to the City. Do you want us to arrest you or will you be peaceful and co-operate?”
The threat of arrest hung in the air. Once arrested a Stateman seldom got clear of his captors. Reluctantly, Marcus turned back to his horse and mounted up. The guard went back to his machine.
In the confusion of the end of the battle, neither Stateman nor guard had taken any further notice of what had happened to young Karissa. She had trotted forward to where her Mother had disappeared, the tears streaming down blinding both her vision and her judgement. At the cliff face she had dismounted from her pony and the leader of the Mutants had looked down upon her, checking that there was no guard or Guide following her, before making the moves to effect her capture.
By the time Karissa became aware of her danger, it was too late. She found that she was surrounded by the Mutants with their misshapen, deformed bodies, their peculiar skin colours, their salivating mouths with the two rows of razor-sharp teeth and their bulging watery eyes. She was snatched up by clammy hands as she almost fainted from the strong pungent smells put out by the Mutants and pulled into the caves where the stench became so unbearable that she could hardly breathe.
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