Hero!

by Dave Duncan

  It must have been a long shot to have missed, though. Vaun had won the Doggoth marksmanship medal five years in a row.

  No more firing. Only the ringing in his ears spoiled the silence. He opened his eyes. “Thanks!” he said. “What did you see?”

  There was no answer. He twisted around, and Feirn had gone. He pushed himself up on his hands and knees.

  Blade was still there, lying with arms and legs spread at odd angles, facedown in a patch of red weeds. Where the back of his head should have been was a bloody rock. Blood and brains had splashed out all around, on the vegetation and the stones.

  Strange that the one thing that was absolutely inevitable for everyone always seemed so unthinkable, and always came so unexpectedly.

  The misfortunes of war! What good are all your medals now, Lieutenant? You worked like hell for them, you said, to be like Admiral Vaun, you said. But you forgot luck, Lieutenant. You didn’t put luck in your recipe, and Admiral Vaun was always a lucky shit—didn’t you know that? And you were an unlucky son of a bitch. Admiral Vaun went from mud hovel to the top of the dungpile in one big bound, but he didn’t do it with medals, he did it with luck. You won no medal for luck, did you?

  You won’t ever see that strealer mounted, Lieutenant.

  Suddenly Vaun retched. Heedless of aches and biting pains, he scrambled away from the corpse, moving on all fours, dragging the Giantkiller. He wriggled down below the skyline, until he felt safe.

  Feirn was halfway up the opposite slope, trudging gamely southeast, hair on one side of her head blowing like copper flame in the wind. The other side of her scalp was bald. He hurried after her.

  Poor Blade! Freak accident. That sort of thing was supposed to happen to the other guys, the bad guys, not to the good guys. But Red and Brown and White and Yellow hadn’t thought of themselves as bad guys. They hadn’t thought of Vaun as a bad guy, either. They’d wanted to help their unfortunate damaged brother. The crew of Unity hadn’t been bad guys. They’d been unlucky, because Prior had been unlucky.

  Feirn paid no attention when he reached her side.

  “Feirn…”

  “I know. I saw.” She continued to hurry straight ahead.

  “This is war, and…” He stopped, feeling that silence might be a better tribute, knowing that the words must be said. He put an arm around her. “I am very sorry,” he muttered. “He was a fine boy. I liked him.”

  For a moment she leaned against him as they walked. “Vaun, I was wrong.”

  “Wrong about what?”

  “About Blade. He made love very well.”

  Krantz!

  She shook off his arm. “Now get the hell out of here!” she said shrilly.

  “Feirn—”

  She stopped and pointed east. “You go that way! I cut around to the south. That was what we agreed.” She glared up at him with a face like a death mask, pallid skin scorched in places and swollen, grotesquely smeared with filth and blood. Her blue eyes were unnaturally, crazily bright.

  “Nonsense.” He tried to put an arm around her again, and she backed away. “We go together.”

  “Vaun! Did you do all this just to rescue Blade?” There was a squeak of hysteria in her voice, but there was more anger.

  “Of course not.”

  “To rescue me, then? Is that all?”

  He hesitated, staring at her, astonished by her fury. He had never observed the resemblance to Maeve so strong—it made him want to lash out with angry, hurting words. Maeve had always been the only person who could hurt him, and he supposed he’d always resented that ability. Even after he’d thrown her out, he’d known that she could still hurt him…What was the question?…Doing this to rescue Maeve’s daughter?

  “Not entirely. Partly.”

  “Don’t be a fool!” she yelled. “This is a world we’re talking about! This is a war! Blade was right—we don’t matter! You and I don’t matter! The world does! You go straight! I’ll cut around. Devil take the hindmost, you said.”

  “I can’t leave you!” Go back to face Maeve…

  “Yes, you can! You must! If that was me up there, and Blade down here, you’d split up, wouldn’t you?”

  “I suppose so.”

  “Then go!” she screamed, pointing. “Hurry!”

  Still he hesitated.

  Feirn stamped her foot furiously, and staggered as her ankle twisted. “Ouch!” He reached out to steady her, their eyes met—and suddenly they both laughed.

  “Dumb!” he said. “Come on, let’s go together.”

  “Please, Vaun! I can walk and I can fly a torch! Two have twice the chance of getting word through! Stop being a fucking romantic idiot!”

  Who was she to call him a romantic idiot?

  “For Blade’s sake!” she begged. “Don’t let him have died in vain.”

  She was right, of course. He could go straight, and probably faster. Two had twice the chance.

  “All right. If you see me get away, then you climb that south hill.” He pointed. “I’ll send a torch there to pick you up.”

  She might have tried to smile, but either contempt or pain turned it into a grimace. “Thanks worlds! Scat!”

  “You’re your mother’s daughter, Feirn! you’ve got courage!”

  She screamed wordlessly at him, and turned, staggering away over the shingly ground.

  She was absolutely right, of course.

  Vaun faced to the east. He forced himself up to a jog, and deliberately headed for the nearest pair of pepods that chittered and scrabbled at the base of the next hill. He ran right between them, but they ignored him, although his scalp pricked and his gut knotted. Nivel! Quild! Roker! He passed by safely, and after that it was easier. There were hundreds of them, yet soon he was paying them no more heed than thorn bushes.

  After a while, he realized that the Giantkiller still dangled on his shoulder. He should have given it to Feirn, although even a wide-spectrum weapon like that would probably not prevail against a whole thicket of pepods; they were just too damned fast.

  He did not try to run full out. Even a slow jog was hard to maintain on such rocky ground; a twisted ankle would finish him. That was another worry the pursuit did not have, for there were many more of them. They were certainly armed, so if even one of them won the race, that would count as a victory. Again Vaun thought how unfair this contest was, and anger fueled his aching muscles.

  Soon he had to slow down even more. His ribs felt like red-hot bars in his chest, and one knee kept threatening to give way under him.

  Damn them! He was going to win this race if it killed him!

  It would certainly kill them.

  He preferred not to think about that. He had made his decision; he must live with it. Or die with it. If they took him alive, he supposed they would kill him this time. He could not live in the hive now. Mark or no mark, he would die of shame.

  He wondered how Feirn was doing. She had farther to go, and she was only human. She was in at least as bad a shape as he was, but she had turned out to be much tougher than he had expected. He had never understood her at all. Her motives might be muddled, but she did not lack purpose and drive. She knew what she wanted and went for it—as gate-crasher and stowaway she’d done splendidly. As seductress she’d been balked, but only by events beyond her control. Had Roker not intervened, she’d have gained what she wanted of Vaun very easily. When Vaun slipped out of reach, she’d had her spare hero ready to hand. Now Fate and the Brotherhood had snatched him away.

  War! Waste! Good boy, Blade, wasted.

  And poor little redhead. If the brethren didn’t get her, then the pepods would.

  How would he ever face Maeve if Feirn died in this mess? Of course, that was a very hypothetical situation at the moment; he was not very likely to see Maeve again.

  The sun was dazzling, right in his eyes. He was staggering a lot now. He suspected he had lost blood somewhere, or else it was mere pain that was sapping his strength. He wondered what was fueling him now�
��rage? Pride? Probably shame—it was easy to shine in a collection of randoms, but when he tried to compete against his own kind he balled-up utterly.

  He’d long since passed through the first group of pepods, and now he could see another of the brutes ahead, so he was almost into the second thicket. That meant he was coming close to the strip. He was going to win this if it killed him…

  He reeled up the side of a steep hillock with a rocky top, dropping to his knees and scrambling the last bit with his head down. And finally he lay flat and crawled, gasping for breath and nauseated by the pain in his ribs. That was so bad that it let him ignore all the other sore places. He mustn’t lie here too long or he’d never get himself on his feet again.

  He had trouble focusing his eyes against the sun.

  There were pepods almost all the way to the strip. And…damnation!…there were pepods all around the hangar itself. At least a dozen that he could see from where he was. So Feirn had lost anyway. He felt a shameful release of guilt when he saw that. There was no way he could have gotten Feirn, or Blade, past the vermin without a radio screamer.

  So it was up to him, and all his efforts to rescue the two humans had been wasted. He could very likely have walked out of the hive in the night and just left. He could have spared himself all this punishment! Somehow his wounds seemed to hurt much more when he thought of that. Brethren were supposed to be rational, not romantic, girl-rescuing idiots.

  He glanced to the north. Pepods thick as flies, everywhere.

  And brethren, among them.

  At least a dozen specks were moving much too fast to be grazing pepods. Brethren, crossing a wide, flat meadow. Running strongly. They still had farther to go that he did, but they were going much faster. In a few minutes they would…Joshual flagging Krantz!

  Beaten! Defeated!

  Right ahead of those runners was a final ridge, and from there they would have a clear view of the hangar and the strip. They could pick him off from there when he arrived, easy. Or they could just blow up the torches with a hardbeam. They could win the race without even completing the course!

  When the Brotherhood took the high ground, the game would be lost. There was no wild stock settlement within walking distance, or none that he could reach before he was hunted down from the air.

  Beaten!

  HE WANTED TO weep.

  It was the sense of failure. He despised himself for betraying the hive, yes, but he hated even more the thought that he had failed the other side through sheer incompetence. Being a fool felt much worse than being a traitor. The cold seeped into his bones, and despair into his soul. Pain and exhaustion nibbled away at his mind, and he felt himself fading, stiffening on the icy rocks of Kohab.

  The randoms didn’t have a hope now. The Q ship was coming, and when it struck, the brethren would unleash the pepods as well and compound the chaos. Disaster.

  Arkady was very close to Hiport.

  And there were pepods at Arkady—double jeopardy.

  Chitter!

  Vaun raised his head from the cold stones and peered down the slope. Pepods. Lots of pepods.

  He remembered Nivel. A worthless, crippled peasant…

  If Vaun could somehow draw the pepods away from the hangar, then Feirn might still have a chance of getting through.

  He shivered: Now there was a really crazy idea.

  A suicidal idea. If he provoked one pepod, all the rest would attack him, and there must be a hundred of them in the vicinity. Furthermore, they would turn on Feirn, also, wherever they were. And the disturbance would inform the brethren of his location. Insane.

  On the other hand…

  Pepods apparently distinguished random from brother with no trouble at all. The one that killed Nivel had gone right past Vaun in his ditch, and that had been years before anyone started trying to train them. If a brother suddenly turned dangerous…what then? Would they attack the solitary random in the area and continue to ignore the brethren? Not likely, surely. And if one brother is bad, aren’t all brothers bad? How smart were they?

  That depended on how many you linked up, or so Tan had hinted. Well, there were more in view around this hummock than Vaun had seen in his life before. Paging the Great Pepod…

  And if brother and random were so obviously different, then just maybe the brutes wouldn’t react to a random at all on this occasion.

  It was a wild card, but it was all he had left in his hand.

  “Feirn!” he whispered. “Oh, Feirn! I hope this doesn’t undo all my good work, child. If it does, well I’m truly sorry. If it doesn’t, then you may yet have a chance.” She had nothing to lose now.

  He struggled painfully to his knees, and eyed the nearest pepods. His flesh crawled as he remembered Nivel’s screams. He made a mental note to keep some reserve in the gun for himself at the end.

  The brethren to the north were almost across the meadow. No use waiting until they started up the slope.

  If Nivel had found the courage, then he could.

  Vaun set the Giantkiller on riotbeam, which could blind humans on an eye shot, but otherwise merely scorched them, with no serious injury. He doubted it would hurt pepods, either, but it might annoy them.

  He experimented on the nearest couple, and yes, it annoyed them very much. They spasmed as if he’d given them an electric shock, and their claws and mandibles and pseudolimbs rattled and clattered furiously. From leisurely rock pickers, they became whirling dervishes of fury, going nowhere—flailing around on the spot, unable to locate their assailant.

  That was not good enough. He sprayed the thicket at random.

  Chitter!!!

  They found him. They came for him, and riotbeam was not an adequate deterrence. He barely had time to toggle higher power before a dozen were almost up the hillock. He burned them with green light. They exploded into orange flames. A few rolled back down the slope; most just stayed where they were, burning and crackling. And the rest kept coming from all directions. He rose to his knees, and then to his feet, firing almost continuously, twisting and turning to keep track. They were so fast! In minutes he had a flaming hedge in front of him, and that was some defense, but they were smart enough, or numerous enough, to come around the ends.

  Soon he was gasping and coughing and weeping in the acrid white smoke. The heat of burning pepod licked cruelly at the burns he already had. He had started a war and he was in the thick of it. He was going to suffocate.

  Then, in a momentary breather, he heard a distant fusillade. Between the billows of smoke, he saw green flashes to the north, and white clouds floating up into the china-blue sky.

  He laughed aloud. He’d done it! He’d wakened the Great Pepod and set it on the Brotherhood like an attack dog!

  Except that he was near the teeth himself. He whirled again. and fired, and jumped, and. still they kept coming, rushing out of the smoke at him. He built an almost complete ring of fire around his eyrie, and although the horde still thrashed the ground in fury, they were staying beyond it. The first few had already collapsed into burning sticks and disconnected embers. Yet even that seemed to be enough to discourage the others. Now he could rest a moment—at least until he choked to death or the fire burned down or the Giantkiller ran out of charge. With streaming eyes, he sneaked a look at the vid, and it showed twenty percent remaining.

  Oh!

  How much had he used just to sea! the tunnel? Had it been on full charge in the rack?

  He must remember to save enough to burn his brains out before the pepods got him. Realizing that he was on his feet, and that scopes could see through smoke better than he could, he sank down to his knees and leaned against a boulder.

  Chitter!!! said the pepods, gibbering beyond the barricade.

  Between his coughing spells Vaun cursed them with every vile oath he could think of. Murderous weeds! Curse of the planet. Couldn’t be stamped out without a worldwide simultaneous campaign—which had never proved practical and would have had to find every seed anyway.
/>
  Rather like the Brotherhood, in fact.

  There was a lot more smoke to the north, and the firing was still continuous. So the brethren were not safely barricaded inside a laager, as he was, and could have no spare time to worry about the airstrip, even if any of them were within sight of it.

  The fire was burning low at a couple of spots. He jumped up and flashed a few of the pepods beyond it, widening his barricade.

  Sixteen percent charge remaining.

  The smoke billowed. He caught glimpses of hundreds of furiously writhing pepods around his fortress. He could hear their clickings as a steady roar. They weren’t going to give up.

  He peered east. Feirn? The strip looked clear of pepods, as far as he could tell through his tears. There was a thin spot developing on the west of his laager. Feirn, where are you?

  There! Yes! There she was, one tiny figure running for the strip, and not a pepod in sight! But oh, so far from the hangar still! Hurry!

  Then he heard the snap of a firearm and saw a thin line of green light that stretched from the northern horizon to end in his own chest.

  As he went down he thought, Damn! Now I’m not going to know how this ends.

  THERE IS NO pain, just a great pressure as if a huge lump of ice is growing in his lungs, a strange floating feeling. He cannot even feel the rock beneath him. His eyes blur, but the smoke seems to be thinning.

  The question now is whether he can die before the pepods get him. His ears don’t seem able to distinguish fire noise from pepod. He tries to find the Giantkiller, but he can’t even find his hands.

  Hurry, Feirn, hurry! You can do it now, Feirn! Get your ass out of here. Call home. Call your mommy. Call anyone. You’ll be a heroine, Feirn. Save the world, Feirn!

  Hurry! I want to know what happens.

  She should be there by now. What is the girl doing? Running a preflight check? Counting the airsickness bags? Hurry, Feirn, hurry! I want to know.

  No pain, but the pressure in his chest is growing. He thinks he is about to split apart. Cold, cold…