"Come on," Pyanfar said, low and harsh—Fast, move it— don't hold us up and don't try anything fancy, Gilan Tahar. She gestured toward the door that led out; and a sense of overwhelming oppression closed about her. Haral was out of sight, beyond the door. The metal bars, the cruelty of the place afflicted her to the soul, infectious and bewildering. Kill occurred to her and hunt, and her claws flexed out on reflex. It was the fear-smell, everywhere about the ship, endemic among the kif.
The guide-guard turned and walked to the door, silently directing her, out of this place with the prize she had gained. A handful of hani lives,. A promise—a kifish promise.
"The hakkikt will get my report," she said, not to let the chance pass. "He'll ask, kif." She walked out, relieved to find Haral still there, hand on gunbutt, at a standoff with the kifish guards. "Come on. We're leaving.''
Hilfy came panting onto the bridge and leaned on Tirun's chair back as Khym arrived, as Geran and Tully turned at their places. "We lose any of that accessway?" she asked Tirun.
"It's still sound," Tirun said. "Pressure checks up. We're in contact with Jik and Goldtooth on open channels—captain'd skin us if we used that code—''
"What do they say?"
"They're not happy. Jik says he's getting some people out onto that dock—"
"Gods rot it, Tirun, Pyanfar's with the kif—we've got to get in there—"
"Hilfy—" Tirun turned around, flat-eared and dark-eyed. "For godssake you're talking about the gods-be hakkikt! What do you want, raid Harukk? They've pushed, we got 'em. What more do you want us to do? Go in shooting and get 'em both killed?"
Hilfy let her breath flow out, leaning there on Tirun's seat back and being the fool and knowing it. Her joints were loose, either the run topside or outright panic. "Get Tahar up here. It's her crew the captain's risking her hide for—and Tahar knows those kif out there."
Tirun's ears lifted and nicked back and forth in indecision. "Well, we can use the extra hands up here. Do it, Geran." Another wide flick of the ears, a rumpling of her broad nose and lift of her lip. "And it occurs to me we've got one other mind on this ship knows those kif."
"Skkukuk," Hilfy said. A falling feeling hit her gut. She knew her own unreason on the matter; and it was Tirun's command. Tirun's say. Not hers to argue in any case.
"If we need him," Tirun added, with another twitch of the ring-laden ears—veteran of a hundred crises, Tirun Araun, cagy and hard to take. And all the while her sister Haral was out there in trouble with Pyanfar— one forgot that the two of them had that desperately close personal bond. Tirun made one forget—doing what wanted doing with no hesitation, no self-interest between her and the ship. Hilfy looked at the old spacer and at Geran Anify, whose efficiency covered com and scan, trading functions back and forth with Tirun like a smoothly functioning machine while the world came apart about them; and for the first time in her adolescent life she truly knew the measure of her seniors, and knew what she had yet to reach—It hit like a blow to the gut, what she was, what they were; and she was not likely to live long enough to
get there. But even that thought was a selfishness Tirun would never take the time for in a crisis. She saw it all in a flash like a shellburst, a moment of panic; and then she found the wobble in her knees had gone away and she discovered some scrap of something Tirun-like in a place she had never known she had it stored, down where she kept her temper.
To a mahen hell with yourself, Hilfy Chanur, and your fears and your precious wants—The ship's got a problem.
"—Tahar's on her way topside," Geran said; another light flared on the com pane!, another call; Hilfy itched to reach out and intercept it, taking her station back, but Geran had it, Geran occupied her seat, Tully positioned next to her where Geran could assist him, with his eyes firmly on the scan, watching for any move out of Kefk: even something as small as a construction pusher could take them out, if it went crashing into their vanes; or if some saboteur EVA'd out through a service access and limpeted some explosive to The Pride's big vane panels, or to the yoke. It would cripple them at the least. Make any jump out of Kefk uncertain, enough to kill them if they tried it. Enough—
—o gods, to force them to negotiate—
"Tirun," Hilfy said, leaning on Tirun's chairback. "If they damage us— they've got Pyanfar and Haral in reach. That may be what they're trying. Take us if they can; cripple us if they can't—Nothing personal on the kif s side: if you get a chance to put an uppity ally down and subordinate 'em, you do it."
Tirun's ears moved. She heard. Hilfy flung herself the few paces across the deck to take the seat next to Tully, to take over scan function with eyes that could read and hands that could use the buttons.
And:
"—They were about eight kif," Geran was saying to someone on the com. "No. No. No, captain. Let me ask my— Let me—Let me ask our duty officer, captain.—Tirun, it's Vigilance. Ehrran's sending crew out there to secure the docks."
''Gods rot it—Give me that.''
"She's just broken contact."
XIII
They rode the lift in Harukk, nine hani and two armed kif, and the door let them out onto the access level of the ship, into the dim light and colder air of that final passageway that was open to the docks.
We're going to make it, Pyanfar thought, which she had doubted down below, in the prison-hold. She had doubted everything until the kif got them to the lift and two got inside the lift car with them, outnumbered at least at that range and within that car; and she believed it almost entirely when she saw that door open and let them out onto the right level of the ship, in a corridor with no ambushes and no waiting contingent of kifish guards just a way out. She glanced once at Haral in the course of a look over her shoulder at the kif and the Tahar crew, and caught a flicker of Haral's ears and eyes that worked like telepathy: same thought: We're near, captain, maybe we got a chance of getting away with this after all.
Pyanfar turned and kept walking at the pace their guide set. This time there were stares from passers-by, curiosity at last—recalculation what kind of game was being played here, she reckoned. What kind and by whom.
''That damn fool,'' Jik said over com. ''She no do, she no do—"
And broke contact abruptly. That was Jik's comment on Rhif Ehrran's decision to go out on Kefk docks. Hilfy heard it along with the rest, and looked to her right as captain Dur Tahar arrived on the bridge at a fast pace.
"What's this about my crew?" Tahar said forthwith, out of breath.
"We're working on it," Hilfy said, and got out of her seat, scan set to alarm. Dur Tahar on The Pride's bridge deserved at least one crew member on her feet to fend her off Tirun's neck, and Khym had just risen to appoint himself—not the best situation.
"So what's going on?" Tahar asked, casting a look toward Command, where Tirun, in urgent communication with Goldtooth, had no time for talking. "What's the trouble?"
"—Well, what do they say?" the gist of that conversation ran from Tirun's side. "The hakkikt got any good reason why we just got our airlock shot up? Why we got gods-be vermin running loose all over our lowerdeck? Where's our captain, huh? They know?"
What Mahijiru command had to say to that was inaudible.
"Captain's out trying to get your crew released," Hilfy said to Tahar. "Meanwhile we just got shot at. You want to take a crew post, captain? We're up to our noses in problems. Scan would be real helpful just now. Tully doesn't read real good.''
She expected objection of rank. Tahar lowered her ears and started for the indicated post with never an objection. But Tirun swung her chair about before Tahar could get to it. "Belay that. Goldtooth says he can't reach Sikkukkut. Kif are being obstinate. They're stalling. It wasn't any accident." Tirun got out of Haral's chair and with a wave at Dur Tahar, hurled herself into Pyanfar's instead. "Sit," she said, hitting the seat's turn-control. "Take number two, Tahar. I'll fill you in. Hilfy— Khym. Get that by the gods kif up here. I want to talk to him right now."
&n
bsp; Hilfy caught Khym by the arm and moved.
No one sat in Pyanfar's place. But it was being done. No foreign clan sat in The Pride's seats. But they did that too—they did anything that gave them a better chance.
They pelted down the main corridor; and of a sudden there was the electric thump of the generators coming up, a vibration all down The Pride's steel spine. Khym skidded on one foot and stopped, turning back before Hilfy grabbed him by the arm.
"That's power-up!" Khym cried.
"That's precaution," Hilfy said, and hauled him about again into a run for the lift. "We're not pulling out. Tirun wouldn't do that. For godssakes follow orders."
So our systems are all the way hot. So the kif know we can move. Or shoot. They can take us out. We can take Kefk Out with us, if it comes to that. That's what Tirun's letting them know.
"Kkkt," the kif said, on guard at Harukk's lock—"kkkkt:" when it saw what it faced, softly and with an edge a hani could read. Pyanfar kept her hand near her gun and flattened her ears as it looked like challenge.
Then the guard waved them on with the dark flourish of a sleeve. Pyanfar strode out into the chill of the access and turned abruptly, with a scowl for the kif and a concern that all their party made it out clear.
The Tahar crewwomen walked as best they could, Gilan on her own, Naun and Vihan doing the best they could to support Haury between them. Nif and Canfy with Tav. Haral came last, dour and grim—no bending, no show of weakness. Sikkukkut had not forgotten them; Sikkukkut would be curious what they would do, would be suspicious of connivance—
—would cut their throats at the first hint things were not as represented to him; or at the first suspicion hani motives had confounded him.
Come on, keep it moving—Pyanfar put impatience into a scowl at Gilan Tahar and spun on her heel the instant Haral cleared the lock, outbound and down bound for the docks.
"Kkkkt," the kif Skkukuk said, lifting his hooded head from his nesting-spot on a clean bed in a clean cabin. "Kkkt. Young Chanur—''
"Up," Hilfy said. She kept her gun in holster and made no move to threaten. Khym was behind her, and that was more than sufficient.
"I am weak with hunger. Hani, it is a waste—"
"Get up, kif. Move. We've had a little problem with' your dinner. It's all over the ship. Our hatch has a nice new burn-scar on it. That's what we want to ask you about."
"Treachery," Skkukuk said. He stirred himself and came off the bed, using a hand to catch his balance. "Kkkt. Treachery."
"You understand it real well," Hilfy said. "Come on. Let's go topside and discuss it with the crew."
"Not my doing," Skkukuk said, "hani, it was not my—"
"Out!" she said.
Skkukuk came out toward them. Khym grabbed himself a handful of kifish robe at Skkukuk's nape, and Skkukuk twisted and rolled his eyes in alarm. The jaws clicked alarmingly. "I offer no resistance, I want to go to your bridge, there is no need—''
"I'll bet you do," Hilfy muttered, and grabbed his arm while Khym took the other side, hauling the kif along clicking and protesting. Something black and small fled down the hall and scuttled around the corner into a lesser-used corridor.
"I have given you my weapons," Skkukuk hissed, struggling to free his arms. "Let me go! Let me go, hani fools! I am yours, I am loyal to the captain—"
"In a mahen hell," Hilfy muttered.
They reached the bottom of the ramp, down by the gory row of heads, and Pyanfar looked back yet again with her hand laid on the AP gun she wore. The Tahar crew women did the best they could, keeping Haury Savuun on her feet and keeping moving; and Haral brought up the rear—clear enough that Haral would gladly have gone faster on this stretch, but there was a limit to what the Tahar kin could do; and there were several watching clutches of kif, down by the dockside and up above them on the ramp. "Kkkkt," the sound came to them from above and below. "Kkkkt."
Well, look at those fools, Pyanfar translated it to herself, and her hair bristled. She glanced a second time at the Tahar, at Moon Rising's first officer in particular, the moment that they passed out of earshot from either end of the ramp. "Ker Dur's safe," she said quickly. "That's the truth. And I got your ship back. You're free. How are you doing?"
Gilan's eyes seemed to pass in and out of focus, a widening and narrowing of the dark-in-amber as what she had said got through. "Captain's with you—And Moon Rising?"
"Both in my keeping. You're safe. We're getting you back into safe territory fast as we can, going to turn you loose— Don't you wilt on me, gods rot you, look alive!-—We've got a long way to walk, Gilan Tahar. No transport on this dock / want to use."
"Aye, captain." Gilan's voice was hoarse and earnest. "We're with you."
Kif were to either side of them. Kif clicked and muttered, in mirth at the sight they saw—
Sfik, Pyanfar thought with a sinking heart. This ragged crew of hani demonstrated—gods help them all—hani vulnerability. Not enemies, the kif don't see Tahar as enemies to us. We're treating them wrong. It's a trap, by the gods, Sikkukkut's own sense of humor, not to send them with a kifish escort. To make us take them ourselves. Hoping one of them will faint on the way and make a scene.
"Captain—" Haral said from a few paces behind.
Kif were taking up a stance along the dockside ahead, across their path. It was walk through or detour round.
"We don't bluff," Pyanfar said, and put an exaggerated swagger in her step, her hand on the gunbutt. On a second thought she took the AP from the holster and flicked the safety off, carrying it barrel-down and swinging as she walked. "Out!" she yelled down the way, and gestured at the kif with a wave of the gunbarrel. "Praise to the hakkikt, you scum, we're on his business with these prisoners and you'll keep your noses out of it!"
There was slow movement, timed, she reckoned, just to brush against them in retreat—pushing it. But they were going to move. She kept the gun free and her finger on the trigger, reckoning Haral behind her was taking a similar attitude and backing her up.
"Hani!"
A kifish shout behind them. She stopped at once and braced wide-legged with the gun aimed two-handed at the crowd in front; and knowing Haral was turning similarly braced toward trouble behind them.
"Three of 'em," Haral's voice reached her backturned ears; back brushing against her back. "Migods—! A kif’s been hit! Someone shot a—"
Pyanfar let off a warning shot over the leading kif’s heads as she spun to Haral's side and saw one kif on the dockside deck and a second and a third in the act of falling. Sniper-fire. Her other foot hit the deck and she shouldered Gilan Tahar in a move toward the tangle of gantries and lines along the ship-berths. "Cover," she yelled. "Rot it, out of the open, move it!"
The Tahar crew ran. She stopped and spun again to see Haral covering their retreat, with fire coming from somewhere, with kif falling and kif firing back and a chittering of kifish voices in tumult.
"Get cover!" Pyanfar yelled at Haral, and Haral fell back in haste. Fire popped across the deck and exploded off something behind them with a deafening shock and a sting of particles.
"Go!" Pyanfar yelled, turning and waving the Tahar vehemently to move—to gain what ground they could; and: "Move!" Gilan Tahar echoed the order, and lent her good arm to drag at Canfy Maurn. "Come on! Let's get out of here!"
Kif firing at kif.
Akkhtimakt's partisans, rising against Sikkukkut.
"We got a revolution on our hands," Haral gasped, coming up beside her with her arm about Haury Savuun and Tav and Naun panting up behind. "Captain—we got—"
A shot exploded near, and Haral flung up her gunhand to shield her eyes, staggering. Pyanfar spun about and pasted a shot in the general direction of fire.
"By the gods, they fire this way, they get it—"
—A volley came back, a clanging thunder, an impact that flung her backward and cracked her head against the deck. She rolled and scrambled for cover, blind.
"Captain!" Haral cried.
"Give me the kif," Tirun said; and listened while Hilfy and Khym held their own kif immobilized and furious between them.
"Shut up!" Hilfy said to Skkukuk; and maybe it was that or maybe it was the news pouring out over the console speaker that hushed him.
"—Honor to the hakkikt Sikkukkut an'nikktukktin," the voice said. "A suicide attack by rash elements has endangered your captain and her subordinate. We are presently moving in reprisal. We advise all ships in this command to exercise extreme watchfulness for external attack during this crisis. Pride of Chanur, refrain from rash action. The hakkikt will deal harshly with these adventurers."
"Watch him," Hilfy muttered, and dived for com. "Tully. shift down. Take number one scan—Tahar captain's got monitor up there—"
Tully bailed out. She hit the seat and snatched up a complug, coming into the tail of Geran's few seconds delayed retransmission of the kifish message down the mahendo'sat link. "Jik's got that," Geran muttered, as the kif finished and Aja Jin acknowledged on that channel.
"This is The Pride of Chanur," Hilfy sent back on the kifish link, unauthorized and in haste. "Harukkcom—-where's our personnel? What location?"
''I will ask authorization for that information, Chanur com.''
"They fear," Skkukuk hissed at her back, "The hakkikt Sikkukkut is in distress—He does not have them prisoner. ..."
Hilfy twisted round in her chair and stared full into the kif’s red-rimmed eyes. "Why?"
"Because, young Chanur, he says they are in danger. He admits a weakness. He promises retaliation. This is not control of the situation. It is not his doing. He would not claim weakness even in subterfuge."
The Kif Strike Back cs-3 Page 25