Showdown on the Planet of the Slavers

by Helena Puumala

  He had draped an arm around Kati’s waist, and found that his eyes kept being drawn to her, as they walked along. It was good to be with her, even if the joint project had slipped, perhaps too much, out of their control. But life was what it was, and his plan for them was to take a room at Mikki’s Bed and Breakfast for the night, and to cozy up to one another before it became necessary to deal with the inevitable fall-out from what he knew that Chrysalia and Lank were plotting. Llon had gone with them; that was something. And Max was on the ship as well. Neither of them were noded, but they were middle-aged men and trustworthy. Assuming, of course, that Llon, being who, or what, he was, would not simply disappear when he had seen the end of the cosmic wrinkle which he wanted to see ironed. Mikal ought to have asked Xoraya about that—she seemed to have had a lot of lore about the Guides, or Watchers. However, he was not about to try to contact the Xeonsaur woman at the moment, even if she was still reachable with ESP. He wanted to spend time with the woman he loved; the rest of the galaxy’s women could wait.

  When they approached what had been Gorsh’s compound, they could see that the old, stone building had collapsed into an immense pile of rubble. The collapse had been an unexpectedly neat event: the rubble of rock was almost totally contained within the confines of the original edifice. The ground had heaved around the perimeter; there were cracks radiating out into the surrounding lawn, but, other than that, a first glance could detect no extraneous damage.

  Nabbish turned to Mikal, as Mikal and Kati approached the scene, shaking his head.

  “I have never seen such a neat collapse of a building in my whole life,” he said. “It looks like we didn’t have to rush to save the day, after all. Although, I did send Morg and his men to check all the surrounding buildings and he’s to report to me what damage they suffered, and let me know immediately if there are fires, or anything else dangerous, that needs to be attended to.”

  “The Cellar Spirit did a fantastic job of containing the explosion,” Kati said, gazing upon the scene. “Much better than anything we had any right to hope for.”

  “Mikal and Kati, come here and take a look at something,” Seleni called to them, from where she was standing beside what had been the building’s foundation. “You’ll be able to see, and appreciate, this.”

  Kati and Mikal went, holding hands, to where Seleni was. Kati peeked down into the rubble where the Wise Woman was pointing.

  “Pixies!” she said, surprised. “Lots and lots of them! Now where did they come from...?”

  Her words trailed off as realization came to her.

  “The Cellar Spirit!” she cried. “The blast, and the effort that it made to contain it, broke the Cellar Spirit into thousands of fragments which then transformed themselves into pixies! Oh, wow! This place has turned from a hostile environment into a fairyland! Whatever the Salamankans may want to build, or create here is going to be wonderful!”

  Seleni nodded, smiling.

  “Think of the gardens that will grow all around here, tended by the little fairies,” she said. “You are right. It is going to be wonderful.”

  Was that the silvery laughter of the Lady of the Lake that Kati and Mikal were hearing?

  *****

  “Mikal, did you want to get in touch with your superiors in the Federation?” Nabbish came to ask.

  Mikal and Kati ware chatting with local civic leaders who had come to marvel at the demise of the Citadel, and the disappearance of the Gorshes and Chrush.

  “That old man that Judd was palling around with, he gave me the creeps,” one of them had been telling Mikal, when Nabbish had arrived. “I could never understand why they were such great friends. Judd alone, we might have been able to deal with, and possibly even keep within bounds, as far as his local holdings were concerned, but that ancient guy loomed, scaring all of us with his preternatural weirdness.”

  “The murk from the Citadel cellars spreading out didn’t help,” his neighbour added. “Its spread had speeded up. I remember my father saying that it had been there, in the cellars, forever, so far as he knew, but it stayed there, and didn’t grow—mostly because the cellars weren’t used for anything for a long time—but when Gorsh took over, started using the place, and especially after the old man came, it started to seep out.”

  Mikal grinned at the City Elders before turning to Nabbish.

  “Have you found a communications console with void-crossing capability?” he asked. “Meaning that we don’t have to wait until we get back to Strone before I report to the capable Maryse r’ma Darien?”

  “There’s one in Gorsh’s apartment—not in his office, but in his personal quarters,” Nabbish replied. “Jaqui showed it to us. Morg said that he was sure there was one somewhere, but he didn’t know where, and it wasn’t in his office. Then I thought to ask Jaqui—that’s one bright young woman, and shrewd to boot—and she led us to it.”

  “You mean the one they called Jaqui the Whore?” the townsman who had been the last of them to speak, asked, surprised. “I thought she was just Gorsh’s whatever you’d call it. A young girl dragged into an unpleasant situation without anyone asking her how she liked it.”

  “That’s pretty much how things began for her, I believe,” Mikal said. “But she ended up using her position as Gorsh’s fancy woman to get a lot of information for my Team. We would not have been able to get it without her.”

  “And it’s a good thing that she did get it for us,” added Nabbish. “Whatever Chrush had created to trigger the explosion must have also served the purpose of triggering a massive wipe-out of the records in Gorsh’s computers. Jaqui’s in the office, right now; when I left, she was staring at the screen wanting to know where all the sensitive files had disappeared.”

  “Well, those two, Gorsh and Chrush, definitely had their backsides covered,” Mikal sighed. “I don’t doubt but all that was a part of Chrush’s contribution to the effort. He’s probably done this sort of thing before, and hotfooted it elsewhere in the galaxy when events finally caught up to him.”

  “So do you think that’s what’s happening right now?” the townie asked. “Do you think that he and Gorsh—and Milla—are going to get away to start their criminal businesses somewhere else?”

  “With Chrysalia on their trail, and Lank’s know-how on her side, no,” Mikal replied. Then he sighed. “I hate to say it, but her plan is starting to sound more sensible to me all the time—in spite of the personal consequences to me.”

  He took hold of Kati’s hand again and turned to Nabbish:

  “Let’s go see about using this void-crossing console. The sooner I can alert Maryse as to what’s coming, the sooner she can start mitigating the crap that’s going to hit the fan. And we can get some Federation help for Waywardians working things out for themselves.”

  “And don’t forget the slaves, Mikal,” Kati added. “You know that I want them all free, and in charge of their own fates.”

  Mikal grinned at her.

  “It doesn’t matter if I forget to mention the slaves while you’re around me. I can count on you to remind me, sweetheart.”

  *****

  “Now that we’re free to wander anywhere we want to in this town, Kati, how about we go and get ourselves a room at Mikki’s Bed and Breakfast, before finding a place to eat,” Mikal said after he had had his across-the-void chat with Maryse.

  The chat had been a short one, since the final outcome of the operation was still up in the air, although Mikal did warn Maryse that he was pretty sure that certain of his Team members were going to be breaking the leave-no-dead-bodies rule. Which would mean that a thorough investigation of the operation by the Federation judiciary would have to be completed before Mikal could lead any more missions.

  “I suppose that I’ll find you plenty of tasks to do in the office and on the Space Station while we wait for the wheels of justice to grind,” Maryse had said in response to his statement. “Besides, it would be a good time for you and Kati to register your marriage, an
d for her to go through the Peace Officer training course. I’m sure she’ll whizz through that; the new recruits we gathered on Vultaire are all done with academics, and ready for the practical part of their schooling.”

  “If I can divert her from her determination to chase after every slave that Gorsh ever sold,” Mikal had sighed. “She can be one single-minded woman when she wants to be.”

  He had uploaded the information that had been in Gorsh’s computers from his node to Maryse’s storage console, glad that there was a whole office in The Second City of Lamania to probe into its intricacies. Kati had fetched Chrush’s libris from the flyer in which she had stashed it, ages ago, it seemed, and Mikal had uploaded its contents into Maryse’s console as well, with a warning to treat it with kid gloves and a strong stomach.

  So with the practicalities taken care of, and evening coming on, it had made sense to take a little time for the two of them to become reacquainted.

  They found a small restaurant with a lakefront terrace, and an intriguing menu, which was willing to accept Mikal’s Federation credit chits which he had asked Maryse to issue for him. Kati had shaken her head at the sight of these—fresh out of Gorsh’s office printer—and pointed out that the Team had Waywardian funds in flyers, a flit, and a space ship, plus plenty of communicator crystals to sell.

  “Seems, though, that all the people who can access the money are in space at the moment, and the crystals are mostly in Strone, on Spacebird Two, or in a locked safe in a locked hotel room,” Mikal had responded, shrugging. “They’ll find an eventual use. These chits are a part of our expenses, anyway; besides, it doesn’t hurt to get these people habituated into Federation transactions.

  “You noted that the clerk at Mikki’s didn’t bat an eyelash at my method of payment?”

  “You did point out that we were friends of that aunt and nephew combo, Chrysalia and Lank,” Kati said with a grin. “The clerk was probably aware of their connection to the lace crystal consortium.”

  “Lace crystal consortium!” Mikal snorted. “You’re starting to talk like Free Trader, rather than a Federation employee, which you are!”

  Kati giggled.

  “If I have to turn into a Free Trader in longer term to finish the job of hauling all those younglings out of slavery, I will,” she said.

  “I was afraid that you’d say that,” Mikal replied glumly.

  He was very glad that Maryse wanted Kati on her staff. She would figure out a way to keep Kati from haring off somewhere.... Wait a second—had Maryse not mentioned that the new recruits were ready for fieldwork? And had he not just unloaded all of Gorsh’s data for Maryse’s office to sift out? How long would it take Maryse to work out that locating, and hauling to Lamania, all the bodies Gorsh had sold, would be excellent training for the new staff?

  He felt much better already. Kati could round together all the chattels on Wayward, and help them decide what to do, where to go, depending on how much Xanthus and Xoraya could do for them without breaking any more Xeonsaurian rules. Then he and Kati could return to The Second City, Lamania. They could settle into his quarters, and start a life together.

  “You just thought of something that pleases you,” Kati said, arching her eyebrows. “I don’t even need ESP to tell that.”

  “I’ll keep it to myself for the moment,” Mikal replied with a happy grin. “I’m looking forward to the food we ordered. And to tonight.”

  He lifted his wine glass.

  “To us. And to tonight.”

  Kati lifted hers, too, and they clinked glasses.

  It would be a delightful night; she did not need ESP to know that, either.

  *****

  It was morning and Kati was luxuriating in the opportunity to be lazy and in feeling like she must be the happiest, luckiest woman on Wayward. She was still in bed, although Mikal had left her to use the shower; she figured that she could linger there until he came out, and it would be her turn to wash. The two of them still had work to do on the planet, besides waiting for The Spacebird Two to return and report.

  Kati’s peace, and thoughts of Mikal showering, were interrupted by a familiar mental touch, a touch so sure and calm that it was hard to credit it to an adolescent boy.

  “Murra!” she greeted him. “Is everything all right at the hotel? And with your patients?”

  “Something is a little strange,” Murra acknowledged. “Although I’m not sure if anything is particularly wrong. That’s why I’m disturbing you and Mikal; maybe one of you, or between the two of you, you can figure it out.”

  “Go on.” Kati tugged the showering Mikal into the communication, causing him to drop a squeeze bottle of cleansing agent on the shower floor.

  “Kati, that was clumsy,” Murra chided her.

  “I know, but Mikal does put up with me,” she responded with a giggle, while Mikal retrieved the bottle.

  “Silly woman,” Mikal sent, and Kati could imagine Murra rolling his eyes at them.

  “What’s going on, Murra?” Mikal then asked, in such a collected manner that Kati was envious.

  Mikal had taken it upon himself to take lessons from Murra, she realized, and because he had been a good student, he had surpassed her in the arts psychic! He was always doing that, she realized, following where she led, and then breezing by her!

  “That’s why I’m such a good Agent,” he subvocalized with a mental laugh. “I’m not shy about picking up stuff from others, and I don’t let the grass grow between my toes!”

  “What is going on,” Murra interrupted their mental banter, “amounts to a couple of things.”

  He got their full attention immediately.

  “One: Xanthus came back in the night from where he had been astrally—in deep space, I think—so tired that he went immediately to rest inside his body, and asked me not to disturb him, at least not until the mind-tangler wore off. He warned me that he might sleep on, even after that. Xoraya had come out from under the drug by that time, feeling amazingly good. She told me that the Planetary Spirits were helping her to transition back into the physical world, so she did not go through the difficulties that usually accompany waking up from under the tangle-juice. But now she and I have to talk to one another; she has lost her psi-powers, and I think that she regrets that, at least somewhat.”

  “I think she does,” agreed Kati. “She told me that when she came from under it on Vultaire. Apparently it’s a little bit tough to get comfortable being in a body after you have been flitting around astrally for some time.”

  “And that brings us to item number two: When I woke up this morning, she was out of the gurney, and behaving very erratically. Her behaviour was quite embarrassing as a matter of fact. I couldn’t quite understand it, and she’s disturbing everyone who comes by, especially the men. She’s going around, sniffing men’s buttocks, that’s what she’s doing. And then holding her nose and saying: ‘oh no, you won’t do, you smell all wrong!’ She even did it to me!”

  “Xoraya is doing that?” Kati was flabbergasted. It seemed very out of character.

  Mikal burst out laughing. Kati could hear the laughter physically, through the bathroom door, as he turned off the shower, and began to towel himself.

  “I think I know what’s the matter,” he subvocalized. “Xoraya and I happened to talk about it while we were waiting for Gorsh’s men to catch up with our flit on Tarangay. Poor Lizard-woman! She’s gone into heat! Her body desperately wants to fertilize the ova she’s producing, Xanthus is unavailable, and there are no other Xeonsaur men within light years! So her instinctual brain is having her check out every half-way likely-looking male that she sees, just in case one of them might ‘smell right’!”

  “Oh. Well, the Waywardian law-enforcers are pretty freaked out, and the hotel people are talking about throwing her on the street, only Nabbish pointed out that we can’t have her doing what she’s doing on the street. Somebody’ll hurt her, and you can’t have an Xeonsaur abused, even if she’s acting totally crazy. ‘Tho
se people are a legend,’ he said. So I said I’d get in touch with you two, and see if you had any suggestions.”

  Mikal came out of the bathroom, wrapped in a towel, and pointed a finger at Kati in bed.

  “Get showered, sweetest of women,” he said out loud. “Looks like we have to get to that hotel.”

  “In the meantime,” he subvocalized to Murra, “I would suggest that you get Nabbish to find out if they have such a thing as a bridal suite in that hotel. If they do, and it’s available, engage it for two or three weeks—that should be enough time, if I recall correctly what Xoraya told me. Then take Xanthus there in his gurney and persuade Xoraya to accompany him. Lock the door securely from the outside, and do not open it except to take in meals for the two of them on trays.”

  “What?” Murra was scandalized. “You want us to lock up the two of them?”

  “Yeah. Apparently Xeonsaur men often will do it to their wives on their home world. Some men don’t want their wives to lie with every male who comes by, but apparently an Xeonsaur woman in heat will do precisely that. She doesn’t care who fertilizes her ova, as long as they get fertilized. Apparently some men are quite liberal about it, and will announce the fact that the wife is in heat to their friends and acquaintances, inviting them to help with satisfying a voracious female sexual appetite. But since Xoraya has only Xanthus available, he will have to deal with her desires, regardless how he feels about his wife’s condition. He’ll wake up soon enough, and my guess is that he’ll have a busy week or two—maybe three—ahead of him.

  “So lock ‘em up. That way Xoraya won’t be embarrassing human males, and Xanthus will simply have to do his duty.”

  “Sounds like there really is such a thing as too much of a good thing,” mused Kati as she headed for the shower.

  “I suspect that the next time Xoraya goes into heat—in about a hundred years or so—Xanthus will be among those Xeonsaur men who invite in every male they know to help with the hard work,” Mikal said, admiring Kati as she slipped out of her flimsy robe without bothering to close the bathroom door.