He turned back. The arm holding the transmitter began to cramp. Chen switched hands, raised it again.
Hold it still, Grace said snappishly. Then, Wait.
‘What is it?’
Movement approaching rapidly, two-eight-zero degrees. Large mammal.
Chen whirled, slipping the rifle from his shoulder and holstering the transmitter. “How close?”
One hundred meters, closing at 18 meters per second.
“Dammit, Grace!” He burst into a run. The Chance’s ramp looked a kilometer away.
How about you try frequency-matching a random algorithm with—
“Oh, shut up,” he gasped. “How—?
Fifty meters.
“I’m not going to make it.”
No.
Chen skidded to a halt, dropped to one knee, and brought the rifle stock to his shoulder. ‘Power up, Grace. Weapons online.’
Behind him, he heard the engines hum to life, a steadily increasing vibration that trembled the platform. But over the bass rumble, he could hear a crashing in the jungle, approaching fast.
Twenty meters.
Ten.
The space of a breath.
And then a huge, tawny form bounded from the foliage and sailed onto the platform. A flood of adrenaline sharpened Chen’s vision, quickened his heartbeat.
The beast was sleek, its fur short, dappled. Muscles bunched and rippled in its shoulders as it paused, its massive head raised, nose twitching as it scented the air. Claws like scimitars clacked on ceramic-coated steel. Chen swallowed as its eyes, dark and luminous, fixed on him. Its head cocked.
A familiar surge suffused Chen’s chest. He felt a grin stretch his lips as excitement and fear commingled, his breathing speeding, deepening. He was on his feet. The rifle sight zoomed, locked on the base of the thick neck. His trigger finger tightened.
The big cat blurred into motion. Recoil jarred Chen’s shoulder once, twice, three times. Energy pulses sliced the air. An impression of bared teeth and glistening gums. So close!
A sledgehammer blow slammed Chen’s side, and he found himself flying, the world doing a slow cartwheel before his eyes. A flicker of platform, ship, colony, jungle, platform, ship...impact.
Blackness.
Light.
Green foliage waved in staccato visual bursts.
Chen sucked in a deep breath. His arms twitched. Sudden sound; recoil pushed the rifle into his shoulder. He bolted upright.
Blinking, he stood. His head felt loose, perceptions flickering like old film. His limbic system screamed of danger.
Instinctually, unthinking, he flicked the switch on his rifle for blanketing fire, then held down the trigger. A blinding sheet of energy streamed from the barrel of the weapon, pulses too fast for the eye to follow scything everything within reach. Backpressure sent him stumbling backward, his rifle jolting upward, energy bolts tearing rents in the clouds above.
Silence. He was sitting down, back against a tree. A red light on his rifle blinked insistently—charge drained. Looking down, he realized his finger was still clenched tight on the trigger. A deep breath. Chen pried his hand free, let the rifle droop.
An insistent something intruded on his thoughts.
. . . Chen! Yu Chen!
He looked up. “Grace?” he said, then swallowed. “What . . . ?”
It’s still alive. Sixteen meters, forty degrees. And there’s movement in the colony.
“The . . . colony?”
Yes, the colony. Hang on.
A sudden prick jabbed at the base of Chen’s neck. He inhaled sharply, squeezed his eyes shut. Artificial adrenaline and painkillers spiked his system as Grace triggered the en-suit’s built-in medtech.
Better?
‘Yeah. Thanks,’ he thought. ‘Now run that by me again?’
Hostile is sixteen meters at forty degrees, alive, not moving. Colony showing activity. Party approaching.
“Brilliant,” he muttered. “Now they show up.”
Chen levered himself to his feet and shouldered his rifle. He drew his pistol. ‘Who’s coming to see us?’
Twelve colonists. Various ages. Hostile still not moving.
Chen grimaced. The painkillers would only last so long, he knew; tomorrow would be brutal. He grasped his weapon with both hands and began to run.
Wait, Grace said. More hostiles. Six of them, four hundred meters and closing. All directions.
Chen bolted.
Leaves slapped against him as he pushed through the thick foliage at a dead run. Vines grabbed his ankles. Ahead, the rusted white of the platform came into intermittent view.
Three hundred meters.
He erupted from the jungle into the relative clear around the platform. A jump, a plant of one foot on a fallen log, a flying leap onto the stained grating.
Two hundred.
From the corner of his eye, Chen could see a small party approaching the platform walkway from within the barrier. He turned his head slightly. The man in front—tall, gray beard protruding around a slimline breathing mask—raised his hands as he approached the forcefield. It shimmered and drew back. The party passed through.
One hundred.
He turned back toward his ship’s ramp, putting his head down. It was close. He would make it.
“Hold, traveler!”
Chen stumbled, slowed.
Fifty.
“What?”
The tall man raised one arm. “Hold!” he said again.
Thirty.
Chen spun, his pistol at the ready.
The jungle swayed and rustled and discharged six massive, muscled carnivores. They leaped with exquisite grace onto the landing platform and walkway before Chen, sextuple death machines with eyes and fangs aimed toward him. He felt the prickle of their attention in his spine. Pink tongues protruded between razor teeth.
‘Acquire targets, Grace,’ he thought.
A thin hum of hydraulic actuators indicated the repositioning of pulse emitters. But the Chance boasted only four. Two felines against one slim pistol. Chen shrugged inwardly. It would be quick, at least. Perhaps he could save a few of the colonists with his actions.
‘Return to Central when it’s over, Grace. Reintegrate.’
It’s not done yet, she said.
He smiled as he drew a bead on the nearest beast. “All right, then.”
The voice cut above the whine of the Chance’s engines, a sharp bark of authority. “Traveler, I said hold!”
Chen eased his finger back from the trigger and exhaled through his teeth. The animal in his sights blinked and yawned. Its jaws were cavernous. When its eyes opened, it fixed Chen with a bright gaze and settled onto its haunches.
Footsteps approached. Chen spared a glance over his shoulder, saw the tall man approaching, a small knot of people hanging back behind him.
“Traveler.” His voice was gentle. “Stand easy.”
“Easy?” Chen echoed. “Staring at imminent death?”
The man’s voice seemed weary. “You have it wrong, traveler. There is no death here.”
“Tell that to my ribs.”
“You misunderstand.”
Chen snorted. “Then help me sort it out.”
A firm hand landed on his shoulder. “Gladly.”
The man stepped past him, hands spreading wide. He moved toward the felines, smiling. Chen blinked, then darted forward, grabbing at the tall man’s arm. “What are you doing?”
“Nothing I haven’t done before, stranger.”
Gently, but firmly, he pulled free of Yu Chen’s grasp and walked toward the big cats. Nonplussed, Chen watched, the barrel of his pistol wavering, as the man moved forward. The nearest beast stretched, its spine curving, claws scraping furrows into steel, its eyes fixed on the approaching figure. Lips pulled back from teeth. Chen half-raised his gun.
And then, with a languid slump, the cat lay down on its side, raising its head to nuzzle the tall man’s hand. The long tongue flicked out to lap at the ex
tended wrist as the man ruffled the fur behind the tufted ears. Chen looked on, his jaw making a solid attempt to unhinge itself.
‘Grace?’
Her response, when it came, seemed tinged with the machine equivalent of chagrin. I got nothing.
“Uh . . .”
“You see?” the man said. “The leoniyes pose no threat to us, or you.”
“But” —Chen took a deep breath, winced at the sudden pain that radiated along his ribcage— “one attacked me!”
The man’s face darkened. “Did it?”
“It knocked me halfway to the outer clusters!”
“It hit you?”
“Yes!”
A raised eyebrow. “Then where are the claw marks?”
“Where . . . ?” Chen looked down at his en-suit. It was rumpled, yes, slightly stained, but intact. He glanced to where the reclining cat’s claws had raked furrows in the steel of the landing platform, then back to the side of his suit.
“If it had wanted to kill you, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.” The man offered a small smile. “It was . . . playing.”
“You’re serious.”
“Yes.”
‘Grace?’
It . . . computes. It appears he’s speaking truth.
“But . . .”
A movement off the right of the platform caught Chen’s eye. He pivoted, snapping his pistol into position. His injured ribs grumbled portents of tomorrow’s pain. Foliage decimated by a full-auto burst from a CD-600 pulse rifle swayed and rustled. A broad, blood-streaked face pushed through the greenery, mouth agape, tongue lolling.
“Oh,” the tall man said, a world of disappointment condensed into a single syllable.
The big cat pulled itself forward, out of the clutching foliage, its muscled forelimbs bunching, straining. Its hindquarters followed. Chen’s stomach dropped three stories.
The animal’s hind legs had been shredded. Deep, cauterized channels had been plowed in its flesh, energy pulse holes burned through muscle and bone alike. It moved with a pathetic limp, its hindlegs twitching and flopping ineffectually. A high keening noise burst from its throat when it saw the group on the platform. The assembled felines, standing, responded in kind, their sympathetic wails penetrating.
A soft huffing sounded behind him. Chen turned. The tall man’s companions—a motley group of men, women, and one child—were staring at the injured beast. The child, a girl, began to cry quietly.
“There, Marya,” the man said, brushing past Chen to go to the girl’s side. “Do not weep. All will be well.”
The girl pressed her face into the tall man’s stomach, her small frame shaking with sobs.
“Stranger,” the man said, regarding Chen once more, “I must ask that you leave.” Cordial his words might have been, but there was no mistaking the anger in his tone.
Chen took a deep breath, then another. He clenched his teeth. “There was a distress call . . .”
The tall man blinked. “Pardon?”
“The distress call said—”
“Friend, we sent no distress call. We ask nothing from Central, save our independence.”
“It said,” Chen went on, anger clipping the edges of his words, “you were suffering breaches. The cats were killing people.”
“Ah.” The man looked down at the girl, brought his hand up to stroke her hair. A smile ghosted his lips. “I see.”
“What?”
He released the child, bent to murmur something in her ear, then turned toward Chen. “That signal,” he said, “is more than a decade old.”
Chen blinked at him. His mind hit high gear.
A ten-year-old signal? Inner sphere distortion. It had to be. But hadn’t he checked for that? He’d run the message more times than he could count.
‘Grace?’
Silence.
“Grace?”
The communiqué wasn’t date-stamped. She sounded defensive. Interference.
Chen squeezed his eyes shut. Not again. Had he really made the same mistake twice?
Really?
When he opened his eyes, the colonists were staring at him. The big cats on the platform were staring at him. The dying feline in the jungle was staring at him. Somewhere in the center of his chest, a hard, small knot of self-judgment stared at him, too.
Perhaps, Chen thought as he heard the uncomfortable apologies spill from his lips, it was time to retire after all. Surely one of the fringe worlds could use a man of his skills.
Surely.
‘Damn those inner-sphere transmissions,’ he thought.
Indeed, said Grace.
Early colonists’ adventures may indeed become the foundation of legends for the generations which follow. In Jennifer Brozek’s tale, a grandmother regales her grandchildren about when colonists and aliens struggled over water, and it took a child to lead the way to understanding.
DUST ANGELS
JENNIFER BROZEK
Dac smiled a brave smile at Ken then closed the stockroom door with a finality that reminded her that this room, this safe haven, could also be their tomb. She heard her husband riveting the boards in place as she turned and saw twelve sets of excited, terrified eyes watching her.
There should be more, she thought. Then shook her head of iron gray hair. The rest would be hidden in other homes. She could not protect them all. However, looking at the children before her made her realize how frightened they were and how much they needed her to be a safe haven in the storm. She smiled at them. “Look at you. Snuggled down like it was story time.”
“We get a story, don’t we, Dac? Momma promised.”
That was Sho Whelan with his ginger hair and almond-shaped dark eyes. The youngest here at five.
Dac nodded. “Of course.” She stepped through the room, weaving her way through the cluttered room of shelves and makeshift beds, to the rocking chair that the children had automatically left empty. “But today’s story will be special.”
“Why?”
The rumble of something exploding too near for comfort silenced the room. Much of the excitement disappeared in the growing fear of what could happen. Dac smiled, turned in a flamboyant arc to get the children’s attention back on her, and sat down.
“Because this story is true.” Dac settled into the old rocking chair, a relic from another world, and put the pulse rifle to the side—within reach but out of the way. She held up her hand to forestall the next question bubbling up. The children were polite and well-mannered but it was an extraordinary time and tempers ran hot.
“When we came to New Montana on one of the first colony ships, our town was simply called ‘Haven.’ Nothing more. Nothing less.” She watched Sho’s face screw up in confusion and glanced to the other children. They knew where this was going. Every child over the age of five knew . . . and still they leaned forward, eyes bright.
“But . . .” Sho stopped himself and looked around at the other children, knowing that sometimes his questions upset them.
Dac smiled. “Why is the town called ‘Angels Haven’ now? That is what this story is about.” She raised her gloved hand. “And how I got this.”
Sho’s eyes widened as he stared at That Which Should Never Be Mentioned.
“Are you ready?”
Again, something either hit the ground with tremendous force or landed too close for comfort. The ground rocked with a roaring sound from the north. Dac kept her face as neutral as possible and continued on without waiting for an answer. “This is the story of the Dust Angels and how they came to be. The first thing you need to know is that my name wasn’t always Dac. It was Elsa . . .”
*
Haven, for all its hardship, was a godsend. The years on the colony ship had taken their toll. Far too many people died from illness in the close quarters. More became insane. We need fresh air and sunlight or we die. Just like all living things. Of course, I was born on the colony ship. I didn’t see sunlight until we left the safety of our quarters. Mom being pregnant with m
e is what got my parents on the ship to begin with.
When we landed, New Montana was in the last stages of terraforming. Ships towing asteroids of ice were still months and months away. There was no Lake Degrasse or Lake Tyson. The polar caps were barely a blip on the screen. Those came later. When they did, it saved the planet from failure.
Did you know, once it was a crime to waste water of any type? It was sacred. First offense, imprisonment and hard labor. Second offense . . . exile.
We only had three ways to get it: a protected water table deep in the ground, the recyclers from the colony ship, and moisture farms. The protected water tasted the best. I was a little girl, just older than you, Sho, and my main chore was to collect water from the well. It was a cranky old thing with a pneumatic pump but it worked. I just had to make it work with a bit of sweat and quiet swearing. You know how stiff pumps get, even when they’re powered.
Haven wasn’t like it is now. There was no grass or trees or bushes. It was miles and miles of dirt, dust, and rock. I would see whirlwinds of dust called ‘dust devils’ by my parents. I never really agreed with the term. They didn’t looked evil to me. They looked like the wind playing in the dirt. We don’t get them anymore. Not since the lakes were created and integrated into the terraforming.
One day something fell from space. A meteorite we thought. Not unheard of and, despite the light in the sky, the explosion wasn’t so bad. It didn’t really hurt the buildings. Then again, plaststeel is awful hard to hurt. The thing it did do was break the recycler from all the ground shaking.
This was somewhere between devastating and a catastrophe. Everyone had to ration water more than before. No showers. No washing dishes unless it was with third-use water. And, besides drinking water, the crops got the most of it. Or we would’ve starved. It was hard. The land was hot, hard, and thirsty. It made all of us like it.
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