by Eric Flint
One of the scavengers swung a wooden club that struck Jommy squarely in the forehead. The blow would have killed a normal human, but even Jommy's slan strength was not enough. His legs went limp, and he fought to remain conscious. The men surrounding him laughed, grabbing his arms and holding him.
"What shall we do with him, Deacon?"
"Hey! I've got an idea! Let's break him into little pieces, just like he chopped Thompkins in half." The scavengers glared at the partial body severed by the falling vault door. The detached legs continued to jitter, as if impatient to be on their way. The redheaded man squatted beside the lower half of the bloody torso, clearly wondering what might be inside the vault, but unable to open the door.
Deacon, the knife-wielder, was unimpressed. "If he'd been busy fighting alongside us, he wouldn't be in two pieces now. Thompkins got what he deserved." He tapped the dagger tip against his cheek as he considered possibilities. Jommy then noticed the leader wore a gruesome necklace from which hung several discolored and shriveled strips of flesh. They were unmistakable. Slan tendrils—as trophies!
Still struggling weakly, Jommy cursed his stupidity. He should have been watching more closely, aware of other dangers. He'd been so excited to find the disintegrator at last, and the thick vault walls had shielded him from outside thoughts and senses. He'd forgotten about the human mob mentality.
"Shall we take turns killing him?" said one heavy browed young man. His voice was eager and high-pitched.
"We can only kill him once, Jerome. Don't be stupid."
"Oh. I meant kill him partway, lots of times."
Deacon fingered the blade. "As long as I get to keep the tendrils." He stroked the disgusting strands at his neck. "I hate slans as much as the next man, but I do like my collection." Jommy could barely focus on the man who paced around him, toying with his knife, drawing out the moment. "As much as I'd enjoy torturing this snake for the next week or so, there's too much loot to be had. So let's get on with it."
Jommy found a surge of energy, fought furiously, and threw off two of his captors. Then someone pummeled him again with the thick, wooden pole. He staggered, barely able to think straight. The pain rang in his ears.
"Knock him down and turn him over, then hold him real still." He stroked the discolored tendrils on his necklace. "I don't want to get ragged ends."
The men did as they were instructed. Jommy barely remained conscious. "I'm not your enemy," he croaked. "You don't need to hurt me."
The scavengers snickered and guffawed. "Oh sure, slans aren't our enemies. The whole city's blown up around us, but that was a slan gesture of friendship, wasn't it?"
Deacon bent over with his long knife, whispering in his ear. "You slans think you're superior to us because of your tendrils. They give you some kind of super mind powers. Doesn't seem fair to me. I think you should feel like one of us mere mortals for a few minutes before you die." Deacon yanked Jommy's thin golden tendrils, pulling them straight.
A sudden icy fear plunged down Jommy's back. "No, don't!" With heroic strength he nearly knocked aside the four men holding his shoulders.
Deacon made a quick slash. The knife blade cut swiftly, severing the tendrils in a single sweep.
Jommy felt an indescribable blaze as if a lightning strike had gone off in his mind. The pain was incredible. He felt suddenly blind. Deafness roared in his ears and in his thoughts, but he could still hear laughter echoing in the background. He heard a low moaning sound that warbled higher, then lower, and he realized that it was his own voice expressing his agony. He couldn't move, couldn't fight any longer. He felt utterly helpless.
Deacon stood up with an evil grin, holding his hand high. In a clenched fist, he held twitching fleshy tendrils. Tiny droplets of blood oozed out of the amputated ends. He waggled them in front of Jommy's glazed eyes.
Jommy groaned, seeing only red confusion. Deacon and his gang could easily kill him now. He couldn't find the will inside of himself to resist.
"Pathetic." The square-shouldered man stepped away, satisfied with what he had done. The rest of the mob came forward to finish up. Awash in agony, Jommy tried to face them, to fight one last time.
Then they looked up into the sky, shouted, and scattered in all directions. A shadow like a giant hawk swept over the debris of the palace, then explosions rocked the rubble nearby. Jommy squinted, saw one of the tendrilless ships cruising very low. The pilot took potshots at Deacon and his mob, like shooting fish in a barrel.
As the unexpected attack continued, Jommy crawled into the uncertain shelter of a fallen wall. The tendrilless pilot could easily have targeted him, but instead seemed interested in blasting away at the frantic scavengers as they clattered through the shifting rubble of the collapsed palace. Some of Deacon's men shot their firearms at the ship, but its hull was far too tough.
Groaning, feeling little more than his pain and his absolute loss, Jommy crawled and staggered, trying to get away from all the various enemies who wanted him dead. He ducked into a black crevice, out of sight, as the tendrilless ship came back around, searching for him.
CHAPTER 28
Back at Granny's ranch, Kathleen waited anxiously for the summit meeting, now that Altus Lorry and the Tendrilless Authority had agreed to the terms. She had done everything possible to be of assistance to her father, but until the emissary ship arrived from Mars, she and Gray had little to do but wait. If the President could talk sense into the tendrilless leadership, convince them of what had really happened in their history, her father just might cement a peace between humans, slans, and tendrilless. It was their best chance.
Despite all the turmoil and uncertainty, Kathleen knew she could count on Jommy to get through, to find his disintegrator if it was at all possible—and to investigate the slan hideout from the maps in Peter Cross's logbooks.
She had felt a pure love for Jommy as soon as they'd been reunited; their thoughts, their hearts, were linked through their tendrils. Slans could know each other's minds, could look inside each individual soul. She knew Jommy was a good person, and she knew she loved him. From the moment they had encountered each other in that first slan redoubt, years ago, it seemed as if she and Jommy had lived a lifetime together.
But then the slan hunter's bullet to her head had crashed everything into silence. Some long time later, after a slan medical miracle had helped her recover, Kathleen was amazed to find herself alive but dismayed to be without Jommy. Completely separated, cut off. She knew he had to believe she was dead. For a long time she had been so miserable, but when they were reunited in the grand palace, all her agony had passed away like smoke in a rain shower.
Missing him, she busied herself in Granny's kitchen, helping the old woman bake apple pies to welcome the representatives for the important meeting. "You mark my words, girl, once they taste Granny's apple pie, they won't have any further thoughts of war and killing in their minds. I might even sell them the recipe—if the price is right."
Kathleen was better versed in politics and scientific studies than she was in cooking, but she enjoyed working beside Granny, rolling out the dough, peeling and slicing apples, sneaking a few bites whenever the old woman wasn't looking. When Granny thought Kathleen was paying no attention, she snitched a few bites as well.
When the pies were in the oven, filling the house with a delicious cinnamon-sugar aroma, Kathleen went out to the hangar shed and studied the rocket-plane Jommy had built. She instinctively understood the controls, the design. Jommy's genius never ceased to amaze her.
Also waiting for the tendrilless emissary to come, her father wandered around the ranch house and found her in the hangar. "A splendid machine, isn't it? If only we could find the lost slans, we could have a whole race of people building advanced vessels and weapons like that. With such geniuses at our disposal, no tendrilless would dare threaten Earth. They might just as well hide in their Martian city and never show their faces again."
"Given the chance, Jommy could probably do all t
hose things by himself," Kathleen said, forcing a smile.
Gray detected something in her voice. "You're concerned about him, aren't you?"
"Of course I am. I know how dangerous the city is and . . . and Father, I love him."
"I didn't need slan tendrils to figure that out, Kathleen."
She blushed. "I suppose it's obvious." She turned from the silver rocket-plane, noting the red fins and the personal symbol Jommy had painted on its side. "I'm going back to study his father's notebooks. Maybe I'll learn something there."
While the President went off to plan his negotiations and prepare for the meeting as much as possible, Kathleen entered the brightly lit underground rooms. She looked at the encrypted diagram again, studying the tremendous headquarters that the slans had used in the original wars.
She stared at the designs and notes, amazed at all the work one man had done while trying to protect his wife and young son. Peter Cross had sacrificed everything for them, and then Jommy's mother had also been killed. How many more sacrifices would be required? They had already paid such a high price.
Thinking of Jommy, she tried to sense him with her tendrils. Their connection was strong enough that she detected him even far away, though she couldn't capture specific thoughts. An uneasiness tingled through her, and with a gasp she understood that this was more than just a flickering contact. This was strong emotion, a powerful urgency—Jommy sent his panic out like a beacon. Or a scream!
Was he trying to contact her, or was he just afraid—or in pain? Kathleen closed her eyes to concentrate, and her tendrils quested like antennae to pick up any thought he might be sending. She caught a flash inside of her mind.
Yes, Jommy was in danger, struggling. Many men, punching him. He fought back, but more attackers came—and they had weapons. She sensed a flicker of a knife, a gleaming blade that burned a perfectly clear image in her thoughts.
Someone touched Jommy's tendrils, lifted them away . . . and then as clearly as if a siren had blasted in her ears, she felt a slash of pain as hot as a molten wire.
Unable to stop herself, Kathleen screamed. Suddenly all of Jommy's thoughts, all awareness of his presence, went black and silent. The afterimage of pain inside her head still throbbed.
"Jommy!" she cried aloud. "Jommy!"
She quested out, but received no answer. No thoughts whatsoever. Just silence.
She was completely cut off. Sobbing, she ran out of the laboratory room and up the stairs, shouting for her father, for Granny, for anyone who would come to her. As tears poured down her face and the memory of the pain continued to pound in her head, she ran into Kier Gray.
He grabbed her. "What is it? Kathleen, tell me, what happened?"
"It's Jommy. Jommy's dead!"
* * *
[TO BE CONTINUED]
Kevin J. Anderson is the author of many books and stories. A. E. van Vogt died in 2000 and was the author of Slan as well as many other books and stories.]
To see Kevin J. Anderson's works sold by Amazon, click here.
To see the works of A. E. van Vogt sold by Amazon, click here
Fish Story, Episode 5
Written by Eric Flint, Andrew Dennis, Dave Freer
Illustrated by Barb Jernigan
The Whale at Bay
"—and that's when you went to Nineveh." Sheila Rowen took another long pull from her tankard. "It's right there in the Bible, He-Who-Calls-Himself-Jonah. So please explain to the jury—sorry, the peasant mob with pitchforks, imitation thereof—how there's any room in there for my client—"
She used the now half-empty tankard to point to the mini-whale on the table. "—to have engaged in this conspiracy you're talking about?"
The little homunculus standing on the table peered up at her. Then looked around at the other people staring down at him.
"Isn't that called 'leading the witness'?" he complained.
"More like dragging the witness with chains," I said, belching. "Grossly improper in a court of law, and any competent judge would have ruled her out of order five minutes ago. Unfortunately, we're not in a court of law and if there's any judge about—competent or otherwise—he's keeping his light well hidden under a bushel. Nothing here but a bunch of drunks, several of them intemperate. Well . . . Actually, all of us are intemperate or we wouldn't be souses. But some of us are also bad-humored." I used my tankard to point at the big redheaded carpenter. "Shockingly so, in the case of this one."
Sheila leaned forward and stuck her finger in Jonah's face. "So answer the question, shorty."
Jonah now looked to the redhead for support. The carpenter seemed unhappy with Sheila's aggressive courtroom technique, but all he did was shrug. Couldn't very well do otherwise, of course, seeing as how he'd just gotten done threatening my client Captain Ahab with dismemberment.
Jonah planted his hands on his hips. "Well, this sucks. And I'll tell you right now that as soon as this is over I'm sending a strong letter of protest to the Connecticut Bar Association."
"We're in California, actually," said Dryck Spivey.
"Venice, to be precise," added James Watters.
"Oh." The homunculus glanced around. "Looks just like the one in Hartford. Don't you guys in the Brotherhood have any imagination? Well, silly question. But I'd think you could at least afford to hire an interior decorator."
He gave the redheaded carpenter a sour look. "Or is your sponsor's rep over here still claiming they're broke on account of the child support?"
The redhead smiled. "Hey, he's a big mutt. And the legal bills over the custody dispute are a constant drain on the treasury." He nodded toward me and Sheila. "Lawyers charge by the hour, you know. We're talking a lot of hours, by now."
Jonah sneered. "Save it for the chumps. Fine. I'm writing a strong letter to the California Bar Association." He jabbed a tiny little finger up at Sheila. "You're as good as disbarred already, lady."
The finger jabbed at me. "You, too. Aiding and abetting, in clear violation of your oaths."
"We're Brits, you little ass. Ask us if we care whether the colonials let us practice in their courts or not."
"He still hasn't answered the question," said Rowen. "Can I borrow your pliers, Red? Oh, never mind."
She rummaged in the Purse of Death, still planted on the table, and came out holding a stapler. "This'll do well enough."
Jonah sidled back. "What kind of screwball carries a stapler in a purse?"
"She's a lady lawyer," pointed out Spivey. "I'd recommend you start talking. Consider the implications of 'screwball.' She probably will start stapling various parts of your body together. And we certainly won't try to stop her, being sane and reasonable men who long ago learned the folly of interfering with drunk, overmuscled, tattooed, screwball lady lawyers in a stapling frenzy. They pack on you, once the smell of blood starts spreading."
Sheila took a grab at him, but Jonah scampered aside. "Hey! Take it easy! This is just a case of mistaken identity!"
"Huh?"
"Mistaken identity, I said. What's the matter, you have trouble with three-syllable words?"
Sheila sneered. "I can recite whole pages of publishing contracts in my sleep, twerp. The yeomanlike 'huh' was a reference to your preposterous—not to mention problematical, dubitable, uncompassable, rococo, phantasmagorical—"
"Okay, okay, lady, you made your point."
"—and cockamamie claim that there's more than one Jonah in the Bible. And before you even think of trying to claim there is, you stand forewarned that I am an expert on the subject."
I squinted at her. "You never told me or the lads you were some sort of Biblical scholar."
Rowen made a face. "Am not. Came from a religious family. Had to do Bible readings every Sunday, week in and week out. A psychologist I dated once told me that's what explains the addiction to tattoos and alcohol and the general irreverence."
I thought about it, as I drained the last of my tankard. "Well, it's a theory."
"Only date that ja
ckass ever got with me and that one ended right there. It's an insult, what it is."
"Well . . . Look, Sheila, it's just a fact that you're a souse and covered with tattoos—I won't even get into the body-building madness—and—"
"Yeah, sure. But I worked at all that, and damned hard too." She emitted, wonder of wonders, a very lady-like sniff. "It's offensive to see hard-earned adult vices dismissed as mere childhood by-products. How would you like it if I told you the reason your avarice is so transcendent that every single one of your clients refers to you as The Vampire except the one who calls you The Tapeworm, is because you were deprived of enough birthday presents as a wee lad?"