The phalanx leader-drone insisted their time on this failed world was limited. It was cold and the air was miserably thin. Mitsu was to retrieve her cache of information on the Enemy and perverted ones immediately so they could return through the grid.
The rain forest stretched around them to the west, an impenetrable dark mass, rich with sound even at night. It smelled glorious, after the sere poison of the flek world, wet and green, brimming with compatible life. She started to speak, then broke off in a fit of coughing, her breathing passages still irritated. She hunched over and closed her eyes, fighting to control the spasm.
About thirty feet away, a small stream cascaded down the mountain and over rocks. She lurched to her feet, thinking a drink would help her abused throat. Even this unexpected movement alarmed her warrior escort and they enclosed her with their towering white bodies. This close, she could smell their distinctive odor and remembered how the hrinn hated it.
"I need—water," she choked out. "Let me pass!"
The ones between her and the stream parted just enough for her to squeeze by. She knelt on the wet bank and scooped up a double handful. After the bitter flatness of the water earlier, this was cool and soothing. She let it trickle down her tortured throat, then bathed her face.
"We must go," the phalanx leader said behind her back. Its voice was harsh with disapproval.
"This shell does not have good night sight. It cannot find the cache in the dark," she said without turning around. The forest began about ten paces beyond the stream. The breeze stirred a strip of low bushes and she could smell their fragrance. So close. If only she could lose herself in there, hide out until dawn, then search for her lost squadmates. Perhaps they had gone back to the base camp. Once reunited, she and Heyoka would form a battle plan, destroy the grid and drive these sodding flek into the sea.
"We can guide you," the phalanx leader said stubbornly.
And they could. Like hrinn, flek had superior night sight. Flek technology employed light for other things, transport among them. They did not require artificial light in order to see at night. "No," she said. "We will wait for dawn. It won't be long, and when it's light, I'll be able to find it quite easily. This shell must rest until then. You will keep watch."
She bathed her face again, then stretched out on the mossy bank. The damp earth beneath her cheek smelled wonderful. She dug in her wet fingers and felt the mat of tiny living roots beneath.
The quick, precise four-beat rhythm of flek steps surrounded her as they set up their perimeter, two of them even splashing across the stream to the opposite bank. Damn. She closed her eyes, trailed one hand in the water, and waited for them to grow careless.
When Heyoka located Mitsu and the flek again, they had not moved from the cavern entrance. Were they guarding the grid? He watched from the trees as she discussed something with one of the warriors, then dispersed them to stand guard while she lay down to sleep.
Since she wasn't bound, or agitated, or resisting them in any way, it was quite clear she'd gone over again. The realization hit him like a blow. He hadn't really believed it before. It wasn't her fault, anymore than if she'd taken a laser bolt to the head. He knew that, but he still felt sick. He had put her in danger's path. If it was the last thing he ever did, he would see her free of them.
He made a quick count. At least thirty, a full fighting unit, and more might be stationed out of sight or back inside. An additional undersized drone with an unfamiliar body configuration moved into his line of sight, some variety of tech perhaps. It carried an array of instruments and busied itself taking readings of the soil, water, and air. He didn't like the looks of that. Flek had attempted at least once to make this world over, and, even though they'd failed, five of its six islands were still poisoned ruins.
Perhaps the great chemical engines that were to have transformed this island had malfunctioned, or the laka would have died too. Flek technology had no doubt improved over the last forty-eight years. If they were set to try again, they might well succeed this time.
Mitsu was surrounded on three sides by warrior-drones and several more had crossed the stream. They were all armed and he'd never get at her with any kind of direct assault. He cudgeled his weary brain for a solution. If he went back for Onopa and Montrose, the flek would probably move on by the time he returned, and Montrose was injured anyway. This might well be his best chance to rescue her.
Ears flattened, he ghosted through the vines and trees, huge patches of fernlike plants, relying on his nose for guidance as much as his eyes. Thunder rumbled overhead; a storm seemed to be moving down the mountain. He could smell the rising humidity.
He climbed upstream until the flek were well out of sight and earshot, then broke cover and crossed to the stream. The rushing water glimmered white over the rocks at the fall line as he slipped into the current.
It was only chest-deep, so he waded out to the middle, then immersed himself, leaving only his nose and eyes exposed, and let the current take him. A series of low falls lay between him and Mitsu, tricky to negotiate, but the flek would not expect infiltration from that direction. He rolled over on his back, aimed his feet at the V of rushing white water, as he had been trained, and approached the first set of boulders.
His right shoulder took a glancing blow as he plunged over and he bit off a curse. The water smoothed out into a pool, then picked up speed and careened toward the next falls. He could see two V's between the submerged rocks this time and had to guess which was the safest. He aimed for the one on the right, but raked his ankle on a sharp edge and drew blood.
At this rate, he'd be in pieces by the time he got there, he told himself. Some Ranger he was these days. He tightened his muscles as the third and last falls loomed.
This one had a steeper drop, which was to his advantage, if he could keep from braining himself on the rocks. Once he was over, he would dive to the bottom, then surface beside Mitsu.
And once you have her, he asked himself, what are you going to do? She's gone flek again. She'll fight you tooth and nail, just like she did on Anktan and she's ferociously efficient for her size.
Well, there were methods of keeping a captive quiet. Rangers were schooled in those too. Once she realized who he was and that she was safe, she might well snap out of it again.
But would he and the rest ever be able to trust her again at their backs?
The gentle susurration of water over the rocks soothed Mitsu to the point where she wasn't quite asleep, but drifting a bit, almost dreaming. Sleep dragged at her, a deep midnight blue, so tempting, but she couldn't let go. The sun would be up soon and she had to make her escape before then. It would be much harder to elude flek in full daylight.
The island breeze sighed against her hair, warm and languid. She was so tired, a weariness that saturated both head and limbs, reaching all the way back to Anktan. How long had it been since she felt both safe and sane? She couldn't rememb—
A powerful hand seized her wrist, and, with a quick jerk, tumbled her into the stream. Her mouth opened reflexively to cry out and she inhaled a shocking lungful of water. Choking, she thrashed and opened her eyes, but saw only liquid blackness.
Laser bolts sizzled through the water and she felt the heat of them on her face. The imprisoning hand drew her deeper. She reached down to the knife hidden in her boot. A second hand came out of the darkness to pin her free wrist and draw her onward through the water. Her lungs burned with the need to breathe and the bubbling stream sounds were fading. She could make out nothing beyond the terrible ringing in her ears.
She kicked out, made contact with a body less than a foot away. She fought to kick it again, but was flipped over and held tightly so that was impossible too. Who would want to drown her like this? Not the flek, she thought. They were putting her to use. Kei, perhaps? The laka?
The water picked up speed. She twisted, trying with the last of her strength to free herself. Everything was receding. Or maybe she was receding, sliding along a dark tunnel, toward another place, black as onyx, silent and isolated, another reality.
In the darkness, her head struck something immense and solid. She cried out with the last of her air as night closed around her like a great cold fist.
At the first red-orange hint of dawn, Kei and Visht shook the stiffness out of their backs and stood. The rain-laden wind buffeted their faces, blew their fur back the wrong way, and yet Kei felt strangely at peace. He had not heard the Voice in the depths of the night, and he had not really expected to, but Bey would remain up here on the peak, close to sky and stars and clouds, as was proper. Wherever and whatever the big brown/on/buff was hunting now, he had died with honor and that would have been of paramount importance to him.
"Now," Kei said, looking askant at Skal, who perched glowering on a boulder a body length above, "we must find the others and see if the flek have returned. They could already be in the middle of a fight without us."
"Who are you to say what we must do, rag-ear?" Skal rose bristling to his full height, His handclaws sprang free; he was clearly spoiling for another fight. "I am strongest! I say what we do, and I have not yet decided!"
"This cannot wait," Kei said, his own shoulders bristling in response to Skal's abrasive scent. "Flek invaded Anktan once before and they may return, if we show weakness. After all this time, we have a chance to finally draw blood and our huntmates below may already be dying!"
Skal prowled back and forth on the narrow ledge, but there was an acrid undercurrent of nervousness in his scent that had not been there before. "The flek fled to its own world. It saw how many we were. It won't come back."
"That's not what the Black/on/black said!"
"I have no interest in that cull-face's useless words!" Skal's handclaws gleamed red in the raw morning light. "Like the humans he's so fond of, he talks and talks, but words do not win fights! He's a burnt-out toothless wonder, fit only to be a doddering old Teller entertaining nurselings! He looks like us on the outside, but inside he's a soft-skinned human. He has no idea what it really means to be hrinn!"
Long simmering anger surged through Kei. His ears flattened. "You hung back," he said, "in the cave, when you should have taken the lead. I asked you for help, but you said to let the flek escape! No wonder you were the only one uninjured."
"I was trying to read the arising pattern/in/progress," Skal said sullenly. "You saw what happened to all those who rushed in. There was no point in acting until I sniffed out its shape."
"You want to know what pattern rises around us?" Kei met his eyes with brash disrespect. "I think I caught a whiff of fire/in/water."
Skal snarled at the naming of the notorious hrinnti pattern of bitter deception.
"As Leader, you should have been first into that chamber, before all other males, and certainly before any female! Instead, you let a young cull like Naxk take the lead while you watched your huntmates bare their throats to death and did nothing!" He had lost the right to Challenge, but he knew suddenly that he could no longer just turn his eyes away and follow this one.
Humans did not always select the biggest or strongest of their kind to lead. The Black/on/black had explained this repeatedly during training back at the base. They believed that experience, temperament, and intelligence counted at least as much as strength and size and speed.
Without warning, Skal blueshifted and was upon Kei. He stumbled backwards beneath both their weight, struck his head on the rock ledge and felt unconsciousness snarling like a huge black beast at his throat. He struggled to tear his way out of the encroaching darkness. Though he had been unworthy to offer Challenge himself, Skal had attacked first, as was his right. Kei was now fully justified in responding.
The joy of battle sang in his ears, or perhaps it was only the pounding of his blood, but it sounded and felt like pure joy. This, unlike all the drilling and following of pointless orders, this, he knew how to do. This was what all hrinn were meant for, from the day they first fought their way out of the nursery. He shook his head until his ears flapped, fought to see, all the while raking Skal's body with feet and handclaws.
The other bellowed with pain. The weight on his chest eased. Kei lurched onto his feet and blinked furiously. The air seemed hazy and he could only make out vague forms. Where was his opponent? He lashed out in wide arcs, unable to make solid contact.
A boot scraped to his left, toward the rock. He whirled and his foot caught on something heavy and limp—Bey's lifeless body. He stumbled, then, before he could recover his balance, Skal leaped on him again from above.
His opponent's teeth slashed at his throat. He felt the hot gush of his own blood soak his fur. Beaten again, he thought numbly, as he had been so many times at the claws of the Black/on/black. Clearly, whatever the name of this pattern, it did not mean for him to lead. Perhaps it was better to die honorably, so that others, more capable than he, could blaze the difficult trail before them. This war was so important. It was only a matter of time before the flek swept back over Anktan again. He felt it in his teeth and claws.
Then he heard Skal's sneering voice again in his mind. "I say when we hunt and how, and the time is not now. Let the flek go back where it came from." Skal wasn't the one to lead either. He probably wouldn't know this pattern if it bit him!
With a roar, he broke free and threw Skal off. The black-and-white rolled away, snarling, came up into a fighting crouch. His black eyes glittered at Kei in the dim morning light.
"If the time to hunt is not now," Kei said, "when will it be? Tomorrow? The next day? Or perhaps never?"
"We were few!" Skal skulked just out of reach. "The flek was armed. It had already cut everyone else down! Someone had to keep his head!"
"We were few?" Blood soaked Kei's neck and matted his fur. The hot, rich smell of it enraged him further. "It was only one, but now it will come back and bring thousands more! We could have stopped it before, but how will we now fight thousands? Did you understand nothing of what happened on Anktan? These are not honorable enemies who fight one to one. They war ship to ship, world to world!"
Skal charged Kei again, but this time Kei wrenched himself into blueshift. He had made no preparations, and was injured and exhausted. He would pay for it, he knew, was already paying for it, with the fearsome drain of cellular energy. The rocks and the sky and Bey's corpse were stained a shimmering deep blue and he was shockingly, dangerously cold. Skal's movements s l o w e d. Time stretched out. From his chill, blue perspective, he watched Skal's claws inch toward his neck and considered. He could duck aside, slash Skal's throat, shove him over the cliff or break his neck where he stood, but Skal's death would only reduce their numbers even further.
If you would be Leader, then lead! he told himself. He dropped back out of blueshift, sidestepped Skal and used the momentum of his charge to throw him, a Ranger trick, which did not require that one be tall or fast or brimming with energy.
Skal thudded heavily to the rock and Kei pressed bared teeth to the tender throbbing vein in the neck where the blood sang close to the surface. His black eyes held Skal's from above. "Yield," he said hoarsely, "or I will end this here and now!"
"I am Leader!" Skal struggled, but stopped when Kei slashed just deep enough to nick the vein. "You dishonored yourself, when you ran away! You saw how the squad turned away from you afterwards! They'll never follow you!"
Dishonor. He would never escape the taint. It would always be with him. He did not deserve to win. For a breath, he almost backed off, then an image rose up in his mind: Kei, as he would have been, honorably dead in the cave at the flek's feet. No subsequent warning would have been given to the rest of the Rangers above. No Kei would have fought alongside the Black/on/black and Visht and Kika and Naxk. First Oleaaka, then perhaps Anktan would have been overrun.
At last, he understood the choice he had made back there. "If I had stood and fought in the cave, when the flek first came through, I would have died honorably, just like Bey," Kei said. "Instead, I lived to fight another day and make the flek pay. Do you wish to do the same, or shall I grant you a thoroughly honorable death?"
Skal stilled beneath him. His breathing was ragged, the smell of his seeping blood overpowering. Kei had all he could do to stay his claws.
The former Leader turned his eyes away in the traditional gesture of surrender.
After Second Breeder lost the captured translator in the forest, he wandered about in the cool night shadows for a good long while, hoping to come across her cowering somewhere. She was damaged, after all, and probably in pain. How far could she go? Instead, he found nothing of interest except the other three errant breeders.
"Why didn't you go back into the cave?" he asked. "The crystal trees were singing again and it was bound to be glorious down there. Perhaps the colorless one even returned and would have told his secrets!"
Tenth Breeder looked to the other two. They dropped their dispirited gaze. Their hands drooped. Their shoulders were downcast. "We were afraid," Tenth said. "After what happened to Sixteenth, this isn't amusing anymore."
Thunder cracked. Dark, brooding clouds had drifted over the mountains and blotted out the nascent dawn. Second beat his forehands restlessly against his sides. "What happened to Sixteenth is not important," he said. "Like all of us, he would have been put down anyway, after the Feast of Leavetaking. What matters is that, by leaving, we finally have the chance to think exciting new thoughts, choose our own actions."
"I'm so hungry," Eighth said glumly. "I don't care about new things anymore. I just want to go back to the compound and eat."
"Then go!" Second brandished his alien light-stick, though he prudently kept his fingers off the protruding knobs that had activated it before. "I want to sing that new song I remembered, and make more songs! I want to . . . to . . . attack someone!" He savored the feel of that lovely new word.
He broke into his new song with its delightful bold rhythms. After a moment's hesitation, the other three sang with him, and by the end, he could see their shoulders lifting.
"Now," he said, feeling larger and braver than ever before, "let's go back to the compound and take as much food as we like."
"Take food?" Tenth said.
"All the melons and shellfruits we want," cried Second, "as well as a gleaner and a translator to talk only for us! Then we'll go back down into the cave, wait for it to sing, and do whatever we like."
"I do want to touch the crystal trees again," said Tenth. "I could feel the life brimming in them. They spoke to me. I just don't understand yet what they are saying."
"You will," Second said solemnly, "just as I am remembering more of what we used to be with every step. I don't care what the keepers say. My body-memories make me think drones were not always the timid creatures we are today, and very soon we will find our true voices. The laka will have to listen to us then."