I reached the edge of the glideway and rolled onto solid ground. Giving myself one final half-roll onto my stomach, I started to push myself back to my feet.
Only to slam flat onto the deck again as Doug leaped onto my back, growling straight into my ear.
I don’t know much more of a reprimand for my uncivil behavior the watchdog had planned to deliver once he had me down. But whatever it was, it was instantly preempted as his growl turned into a startled yip and he toppled sideways off me, a trio of bright red balls tied together by red cords suddenly appearing across his side, belly, and back.
I leaped to my feet, catching sight of a second Filly as he shot past on the fast edge of the glideway, and ducked as a second spinning flash of red shot just over my head. It was some kind of bola weapon, I saw now, with the added bonus of an adhesive to make sure that once the target was down he stayed that way. The newcomer was already heading away toward the slow edge of the glideway, gazing balefully back at me as he readied a third bola. Farther ahead down the corridor, I could see that my first opponent was back on his feet and also moving toward the slow edge.
So now it was two against one. And with Doug tangled up in his bola, he wasn’t going to be available for me to use as a shield or throwing weapon unless I picked him up and carried him with me.
And then I caught sight of a figure approaching on the other glideway. He was too far away for me to tell whether he had a Shonkla-raa throat, but from his stiff posture and air of alertness I suspected he wasn’t just some random citizen returning from dinner.
Suddenly, it wasn’t two against one, but three.
And now I was well and truly trapped. If I did nothing, the third Filly would shoot past me, step onto the unmoving part of the corridor, and I would be bracketed. If I ran, no matter which glideway I chose, there would be an opponent on my tail within seconds.
Better to make a bad choice, I decided, than to lose by default. Clenching my teeth, I stepped back onto my original glideway and headed as quickly as I could toward the fast edge. So far only one of the Shonkla-raa had demonstrated he was carrying any weapons, and I would rather be facing him when he threw his next bola than have my back to him.
But once again, the Shonkla-raa had thought things through. The one with the bolas had already stopped moving toward the corridor; but instead of attempting to close the distance to me he was merely standing there on his section of glideway, waiting for me to pass him by on my faster section.
At which point, I realized, I would be only about half a glideway’s width away from him. Even with the speed differential, I would be pretty damn impossible to miss.
But there was nothing I could do, nowhere I could go. I crouched down, making myself as small a target as I could, angling my arms into defensive combat positions in front of me. If I could catch the bola on my arms and torso and keep it away from my legs I would at least still have the theoretical option of running. I swept to and past him, and he raised the bola to throw.
And abruptly jolted forward as something slammed hard into his back. Even as he tried to regain his balance, a second object slammed into him, jarring the bola loose from his hand and sending him flailing forward to crash face-first onto the glideway.
I looked across at the other glideway. While my full attention had been on the Shonkla-raa with the bola, the Filly approaching from the other direction had closed the distance between us and stepped off onto the corridor floor.
Only it wasn’t a third Shonkla-raa, as I’d thought.
It was Emikai.
Even as my brain registered that fact, he swiveled around, brought the gun in his hand to bear on the remaining Shonkla-raa, and fired.
But his target was already in motion, diving toward the glideway’s fast end and taking Emikai’s pancake-sized projectile in a glancing blow off his shoulder instead of getting it full-force against his torso. The pancake ricocheted off the wall, did another bounce off the ceiling, and went wobbling off somewhere behind me. The Shonkla-raa himself hit the glideway chest-first, lay there just long enough for the speed gradient to spin him around and align him along the glideway the way it had already done twice to me, then rolled his way quickly over to the fast track. The other Filly, the one Emikai had first shot, had also managed to get himself to the same part of the glideway and was following his comrade as fast as it could take him.
“Compton!” Emikai called. “Let them go.”
I didn’t need any persuasion. I crossed the glideway, watching as the two prone Fillies disappeared off into the distance, and stepped off.
Emikai hurried up beside me. “Are you all right?” he asked.
“I’m fine,” I assured him. “Thanks for the assist.” I looked down at the weapon in his hand, short-barreled but with a long grip and an extended magazine. “Nice toy. What does it fire?”
“They are called expanders,” he said. “Expanding impact disks, non-lethal but with a high degree of stopping power.”
“A beanbag gun,” I said, nodding. “We use them sometimes in the Confederation. I usually prefer snoozers—you can get a higher magazine count with them. But of course they don’t have any stopping power to speak of. I don’t suppose there’s any chance I can persuade Captain Lyarrom to issue me one?”
“I doubt it,” Emikai said. “I only have one myself because I have been temporarily reinstated as an enforcement officer aboard Kuzyatru Station.”
I felt my eyebrows creeping up my forehead. “Congratulations,” I said. “Someone recognized your skill and merit?”
“Someone recognized the anomalies in the evacuation drill coverage,” Emikai corrected, his voice going grim. “This has them seriously concerned.”
“No doubt,” I agreed, wondering what the hell he was talking about. “Am I supposed to know what that means?”
“Exactly my point.” Emikai looked over his shoulder. “But come—I believe your msikai-dorosli is going to need our assistance.”
I’d almost forgotten about Doug. I turned to see him limping toward us on three legs, his fourth partially tied to his belly by the balls and cords still glued to him. “So he is,” I agreed, starting toward him. “Tell me about this evacuation drill.”
“They are safety drills that are scheduled at irregular intervals, each usually involving a single sector or subsector,” Emikai explained as he fell into step beside me. “They are supposed to be announced in every public area within the drill region, with a duplicate message sent to each comm within the area.”
“Which area was involved?”
“Subsector 25-F-4, extending from the medical dome outward to the edge of the sector and for five corridors to either side of this one.” He looked at me. “The area we are currently in.”
I stared at him, a creepy feeling running through me. “My comm never went off,” I said. “Neither did Minnario’s.”
“Nor was it announced in this corridor,” Emikai said, his voice and blaze going dark. “Or in the side corridor leading to Attorney Minnario’s quarters. That was the discovery that led me to request a weapon and come looking for you.”
“I’m very glad you did, too,” I said. “How many comms besides Minnario’s and mine were left out of the general announcement?”
Emikai sighed. “As best as could be established, none.”
No wonder I’d had the whole place to myself. “Cute. Seems a little like overkill, but still cute. Any idea how they pulled it off?”
“We know some of it,” Emikai said. “The order for such drills comes from the office of the sector overseer. This one seemed to follow the proper protocol, which is why it was passed and activated.”