Dagger replied, a bit breathlessly but sounding surprisingly well controlled, “I take it you’ve never seen a real brush fire you little asshole? You do know they can go against prevailing winds, spread out in long lines, create firestorms that suck air in to feed them, and generally not do what you want them to do?”
Tirdal had known some of that. The rest sounded very reasonable and he realized he — they — had been lucky the grass was merely weather dry and not kindling dry from drought. That was not a mistake he should have let himself make from eagerness. On the other hand, risk was an essential part of war. He should push the man more, since he seemed worried.
“Dagger, a few degrees of flames and carbon monoxide with sulfur isn’t bothersome to Darhel. I may decide to do that again. It’s my turn to chase now.”
“Oh, quit with the bullshit. I’ve seen Darhel burned in accidents. You’re as easy to cook as we are. That was either an accident, or you’re really clueless out here.”
“If so, Dagger, it doesn’t speak well for the humans I’ve been learning from,” he said.
Dagger apparently decided to ignore that. He seemed to be getting smarter. Instead, he changed the subject. “That was rather clever, hiding the box on the bug. It would have been really clever to keep it low, where I couldn’t see it sticking out like a saddle on a boar.” There was a slight smugness pervading the control in his voice. And the control was obvious to Tirdal. Dagger was trying hard to suppress his emotions. Suppression, however, was not what he should do. They should flow, not be bottled up. And Dagger seemed to do exactly the opposite of what anyone wanted…
“I felt you needed the hint,” he said to goad Dagger. “So far, you’ve shown little ability to outthink or outtrack anything smaller and brighter than these bugs.” The bugs were impressive, though, he thought as he skipped behind one and dropped back into the stalks. They were the size of Earth’s extinct rhinoceri.
“I tracked Ferret, and he was supposed to be the vaunted master of it. You remember Ferret? I think he was wetting his pants when he realized I could see him. He was in good cover, too. Better than you’ve ever had. But the fickle finger of fate holds the trigger. And if you’re so good I need a hint, why’d you drop the box and hide in the weeds?”
“Very simply, Dagger, I found your tracer some time back. It no longer serves my purposes to have you follow it. That was a ruse to keep you where Ferret could stalk you,” he said. He also could use Ferret as a mythical ally. And as the man was now dead, Dagger couldn’t cross check. “Now that Ferret is gone, I have no need to make things simple for you anymore. You’ll have to do some real tracking. It’s time for you to learn a few things.”
With that, he rose back to a crawl, though this crawl was as fast as a good jog for a human, fingers and toes extended like a lizard’s, but reaching far forward and behind to reduce the profile they cut in the grass.
“I’m going to kill you, you alien freak,” Dagger said.
Tirdal spoke again to keep Dagger talking rather than shooting. “Really, Dagger, you should acquire calm, not just the outward symptoms. One should focus not upon the blankness within, but the blankness without, allowing it to draw the storm.”
Dagger interrupted his spiel. “I’ve got a philosophical question for you, Tirdal.”
“Yes, Dagger?”
“If a Darhel gets his head blown off in the middle of the forest, do the trees hear anything?”
“There, Dagger, you’ve made progress. You’ve acknowledged your anger. Now allow it to draw your fear of competence with it, and learn to feel. Only then will you be able to track a Darhel on flat ground without the tracer.”
The crack of a projectile echoed across the savanna. One of the large herbivores twitched and staggered, trod in a circle as its sharp-edged feet threw clods of sod and grass. It was seeking its antagonist, and confused at not finding one. Moments later, it lined up on a nearby bull and charged. There was nothing wrong with its gait. The armor-piercing projectile had done no more than chip its carapace and annoy it. And that should be another lesson for Dagger, Tirdal thought. The beast’s thoughts had spiked at the shot and were now subsiding back to normal. Dagger needed to do the same thing, and disappear behind the noise of the local life.
Dagger wasn’t stupid. He knew the conversation had been designed to distract him. Anyway, a good sniper worked better in silence. To say nothing could be the scariest statement of all. And the damned Elf wasn’t going to trick him into not using the tracking module. That whole jab had been an attempt to throw him off. It hinted of “fairness,” and Dagger was not one for “fair” when “effective” was available. He’d use the tracker, the superior range of his weapon, his cunning and precision. And, he’d use his human ability to kill. To do otherwise would be silly. Let the Darhel mutter his philosophy. Dagger would shoot beads instead.
He took deep drafts of air, both to revitalize his flagging strength and to calm his nerves. Now he had to get into a state that Tirdal couldn’t track. That would mean his tools would give him the advantage. His tools that didn’t depend on emotion.
Tirdal really was desperate, he reminded himself. He was talking, running, hiding the box, setting fires. It was all very annoying, some of it was foolishly dangerous, and all of it meant he was out of practical ideas. This was a battle. A low-scale battle between only two combatants, but still a battle. Some damage was inevitable. Tirdal had trouble inflicting it directly — probably he couldn’t kill and was hoping to push Dagger into getting injured, thus leaving him here in a cowardly fashion.
For a moment he remembered his own threat to Ferret, but that had been vengeful, not of necessity based on fear. Anyway, Ferret was dead, cleanly killed one-on-one.
Otherwise, Tirdal was just hoping for a lucky shot to catch Dagger, and all Dagger had to do was stand up to the fire, figuratively, and dish out what Tirdal couldn’t take. He’d gone face-to-face with Ferret, this gutless troll should be easier. And that’s what he was. Not an Elf, but a troll. A filthy little freak from a race of freaks who needed humans to fight for them. So here it came.
Dagger was going to head for those trees, get a good position, and at this range he could watch the Darhel’s brains splatter as the round hit. That would be sweet.
Dammit! Calm! It’s just an exercise. Locate the target, paint the target, shoot. Just like that bet with Thor. Just like the range. Afterwards was the time for a beer and a boast. And that artifact would be all the boasting he’d ever need. It would make him part of the war stories people passed around. Better yet, it would be one of the true ones.
He performed a maneuver that would have made his instructors proud. With an enemy at close range, he exfiltrated unseen and secured a new position. Chameleon at full power, because that was one of the things the Darhel couldn’t track, and he really didn’t care how much juice it ate up now, as he wouldn’t need it after today, he squirmed snakelike, curving through the grass. Straight lines are a giveaway of intelligent activity, and a long, winding path would not only be harder to see, but if seen would be mistaken for an animal track. He did as little damage as possible. His rifle was slung over his shoulder, a loop of the sling held in his hand as a drag. Some of the beetle and flyer forms were disturbed at his passage, but nothing larger, and those only twitched because of the movement, not because they noticed this strange apparition.
Movement ahead made him stop short. He held utterly still, breath clenched, as he examined the shape. It was a small scavenger form, about a half meter long, and it trudged on past at an angle. Good. He resumed crawling, seeing the copse dark ahead. He’d pick one about three trees in, which would give him a clear enough field of fire, and provide both screen and some hard cover.