“This is Second Officer Weiks,” the pilot said, activating all the speakers in the ship. “Is there any officer aboard who ranks me?” He listened to the growing silence and, when he spoke again, his voice was choked and unclear.
“Sound off in rotation, officers and men, from the Engine Room north. Sparks, take it down.”
Hesitantly, one by one, the voices checked in, while Weiks activated the hull scanners and looked at the milling fury below.
“Seventeen, that’s all,” the radio operator said with shocked unbelief, his hand over the microphone. He passed the list to the Second Officer, who looked at it bleakly, then slowly reached for the microphone.
“This is the bridge,” he said. “I am taking command. Run the engines up to ready.”
“Aren’t we going to help them?” a voice broke in. “We can’t just leave them out there.”
“There is no one out there to leave,” Weiks said slowly. “I’ve checked on all the screens and there is nothing visible down there except these attackers and their beasts. Even if there were, I doubt if there is anything we could do to help. It would be suicide to leave the ship. And we have only a bare skeleton flight crew aboard as it is.”
The frame of the ship shivered as if to add punctuation to his words. “One of the screens is out, there goes another, they hit it with something. And they’re fixing lines to the landing legs. I don’t know if they can pull us over, and I don’t want to find out. Secure to blast in sixtyfive seconds.”
“They’ll burn in our jets, everything, everyone down there,” the radio operator said, snapping’ his harness tight.
“Our people won’t feel it,” the pilot said grimly, “and, let’s see how many of the others we can get.”
When the spacer rose, spouting fire, it left a smoking, humped circle
of death below it. But, as soon as the ground was cool enough, the waiting riders pressed in and trampled through the ash. More and more of them, appearing out of the darkness. There seemed no end to their teeming numbers.
2
“Pretty stupid to get hit by a sawbird,” Brucco said, helping Jason dinAlt to pull the ripped metalcloth jacket off over his head.
“Pretty stupid to try and eat a peaceful meal on this planet!” Jason snapped back, his words muffled by the heavy cloth. He pulled the jacket free and winced as sharp pain cut into his side. “I was just trying to enjoy some soup, and the bowl got in the way when I had to fire.”
“Only a superficial wound,” Brucco said, looking at the red gash on Jason’s side. “The saw bounced off the ribs without breaking them. Very lucky.”
“You mean lucky I didn’t get killed. Whoever heard of a sawbird in the mess hall?”
“Always expect the unexpected on Pyrrus. Even the children know that.” Brucco sloshed on antiseptic and Jason ground his teeth together tightly. The phone pinged and Meta’s worried face appeared on the Screen.
“Jason, I heard you were hurt,” she said.
“Dying,” he told her.
Brucco sniffed loudly. “Nonsense. Superficial wound, fourteen centimeters in length, no toxins.”
“Is that all?” Meta said, and the screen went dark.
“Yes, that’s all,” Jason said bitterly. “A liter of blood and a kilo of flesh, nothing more bothersome than a hangnail. What do I have to do to get some sympathy around here, lose a leg?”
“If you lost a leg in combat, there might be sympathy,” Brucco said coldly, pressing an adhesive bandage into place. “But if you lost a limb to a sawbird in the mess hall, you would expect only contempt.”
“Enough!” Jason said sharply, pulling his jacket back on. “Don’t take me so literally and, yes, I know all about the sweet consideration I can expect from you friendly Pyrrans. I don’t think I’ll ever miss this planet, not for five minutes.”
“You’re leaving?” Brucco asked, brightening up. “Is that what the meeting is about?”
“Don’t sound so wildly depressed at the thought. Try to control your impatience until 1500 hours, when the others will be here. I play no favorites. Except myself, that is,” he added, walking out stiffly, trying to move his side as little as possible.
It was time for a change, he thought, looking out of a high window across the perimeter wall to the deadly jungle beyond. Some lightsensitive cells must have caught the motion because a tree branch whipped forward and a sudden flurry of thorndarts rattled against the transparent metal of the window. His reflexes were so well trained by now that he did not move a muscle.
Past time for a change. Every day on Pyrrus was another spin of the wheel. Winning was just staying even, and when your number came up, it was certain death. How many people had died since he first came here? He was beginning to lose track, to become as indifferent to death as any Pyrran.
If there were going to be any changes made, he was the one who would have to make them. He had thought once that he had solved this planet’s deadly problems, when he had proved to them that the relentless, endless war was their own doing. Yet it still went on. Knowledge of the truth does not always mean acceptance of it. The Pyrrans who were capable of accepting the reality of existence here had left the city and had gone far enough away to escape the pressure of physical and mental hatred that still engulfed it. Although the remaining Pyrrans might give lip-service to the concept that their own emotions were keeping the war going, they did not really believe that this was true. And each time they looked out at the world that they hated, the enemy gained fresh strength and pressed the attack anew. When Jason thought of the only possible end for the city, he grew depressed. There were so many of the people left who would not accept the change, or help of any kind. They were as much a part of this war and as adapted to the war as the hyperspecialized life forms outside, molded in the same way by the same generations of mixed hatred and fear.
There was one more change coming. He wondered how many of them would accept it.
It was two hours before Jason made his appearance in Kerk’s office. he had been delayed by a last minute exchange of messages on the jump-space communicator. Everyone in the room shared the same expression, cold anger. Pyrrans had very little patience and even less tolerance for a puzzle or a mystery. They were so alike yet so different.
Kerk, gray-haired and stolid, able to control his.expression better than the others. Practice, undoubtedly, from dealing so much with offworlders. This was the man whom it was most important to convince because, if the slapdash, militaristic Pyrran society had any leader at all, he was the one.
Brucco, hawk-faced and lean, his features set in a perpetual expression of suspicion. The expression was justified. As physician, researcher and ecologist, he was the single authority on Pyrran life forms. He had to be suspicious. Though at least there was one thing in his favor: he was scientist enough to be convinced by reasoned fact.
And Ehes, leader of the outsiders, the people who had adapted successfully to this deadly planet. He was not possessed by the reflex hatred that filled the others, and Jason counted upon him for help.
Meta, sweet and lovely, stronger than most men, whose graceful arms could clasp with passion, or break bones. Does your coldly practical mind, hidden in that beautiful female body, know what love is? Or is it just pride of possession you feel toward the off-worlder Jason dinAlt? Tell him sometime; he would like to know. But not right now. You look just as impatient and dangerous as the others.
Jason closed the door behind him and smiled insincerely.
“Hello there, everybody,” he said. “I hope you didn’t mind my keeping you waiting?” He went on quickly, ignoring the angry growls from all sides.
“I’m sure that you will all be pleased to hear that I am broke, financially wiped out, and sunk.”