“You see, we Marines are also taught how to disable, and even kill, members of an allied Eatee race. Would you like to know how long it will take me to render you unconscious, miss? Tell you what. Why don’t you start counting?”
Athaclena heaved and bucked, but it was useless. A painful pressure closed in around her throat. Air started getting thick. Distantly, she heard Prathachulthorn mutter to himself.
“This universe is a goddam awful place.”
She would never have imagined it could get blacker, but an even deeper darkness started closing in. Athaclena wondered if she would ever awaken again. I’m sorry, father. She expected those to be her last thoughts.
Continued consciousness came as something of a surprise then. The pressure on her throat, still painful, eased ever so slightly. She sucked a narrow stream of air and tried to figure out what was happening. Prathachulthorn’s arms were quivering. She could tell he was bearing down hard, but somehow the force wasn’t arriving!
Her overheated corona was no help. It was in total ignorance and amazement — when Prathachulthorn’s grip loosened — that she dropped limply to the floor.
The human was breathing hard, now. There were grunts of exertion, and then a crash as the cot toppled over. A water pitcher shattered and there was a sound like that a datawell would make, getting smashed.
Athaclena felt something under her hand. The ampule, she realized. But what had happened to Prathachulthorn?
Fighting enzyme exhaustion, she crawled in a random direction until her hand came down upon the broken datawell. By accident her fingers brushed the power switch, and the rugged machine’s screen spilled forth a dim luminescence.
In that glow, Athaclena saw a stark tableau… the human mel straining — his powerful muscles bulged and sinewy — against two long brown arms that held him from behind.
Prathachulthorn bucked and hissed. He threw his weight left and right. But every effort to get free was to no avail. Athaclena saw a pair of brown eyes over the man’s shoulder. She hesitated for only a moment, then hurried forward with the ampule.
Now Prathachulthorn had no psi-shield. His hatred was open for all to kenn if they had the power. He heaved desperately as she brought forward the little cylinder and broke it under his nose.
“He’s holdin’ his breath,” the neo-chimpanzee muttered as the cloud of blue vapor hovered around the man’s nostrils, then slowly fell groundward.
“That is all right,” Athaclena answered. From her pocket she drew forth ten more.
When he saw them, Prathachulthorn let out a faint sigh. He redoubled his efforts to get away, but all it served was to bring closer the moment when he would finally have to breathe. The man was stubborn. It took five minutes, and even then Athaclena suspected he had fainted of anoxia before he ever felt the drug.
“Some guy,” Fiben said when he finally let go. “Goodall, they make them Marines strong.” He shuddered and collapsed next to the unconscious man.
Athaclena sat limply across from him.
“Thank you, Fiben,” she said quietly.
He shrugged. “Hell, what’s treason an’ assault on a patron? All in a day’s work.”
She indicated his sling, where his left arm had rested ever since the evening of his escape from Port Helenia. “Oh, this?” Fiben grinned. “Well, I guess I have been milking the sympathy a bit. Please don’t tell anybody, okay?”
Then, in a more serious mood, he looked down at Prathachulthorn. “I may not be any expert. But I’ll bet I didn’t win any points with th’ old Uplift Board, tonight.”
He glanced up at Athaclena, then smiled faintly. In spite of everything she had been through, she found she could not help but find everything suddenly hilarious.
She found herself laughing — quietly, but with her father’s rich tones. Somehow, that did not surprise her at all.
The job wasn’t over. Wearily, Athaclena had to follow as Fiben carried the unconscious human through the dim tunnels. As they tiptoed past Prathachulthorn’s dozing corporal, Athaclena reached out with her tender, almost limp tendrils and soothed the Marine’s slumber. He mumbled and rolled over on his cot. Especially wary now, Athaclena made doubly sure the man’s psi-shield was no ruse, that he actually slept soundly.
Fiben puffed, his lips curled back in a grimace as she led him over a tumbled slope of debris from an ancient landslide and into a side passage that was almost certainly unknown to the Marines. At least it wasn’t on the. cave map she had accessed earlier today from the rebel database.
Fiben’s aura was pungent each time he stubbed his toes in the dim, twisting climb. No doubt he wanted to mutter imprecations over Prathachulthorn’s dense weight. But he kept his comments within until they emerged at last into the humid, silent night.
“Sports an’ mutations!” he sighed as he laid his burden down. “At least Prathachulthorn isn’t one of th’ tall ones. I couldn’t’ve managed with his hands and feet dragging in the dust all the way.”
He sniffed the air. There was no moon, but a fog spilled over the nearby cliffs like a vaporous flood, and it gave off a faint lambience. Fiben glanced back at Athaclena. “So? Now what, chief? There’s gonna be a liornet’s nest here in a few hours, especially after Robert and that Lieutenant McCue get back. Do you want I should go get Tycho and haul away this bad example to Earthling clients for you? It’ll mean deserting, but what the hell, I guess I was never a very good soldier.”
Athaclena shook her head. She sought with her corona and found the traces she was looking for. “No, Fiben. I could not ask that of you. Besides, you have another task. You escaped from Port Helenia in order to warn us of the Gubru offer. Now you must return there and face your destiny.”
Fiben frowned. “Are you sure? You don’t need me?”
Athaclena brought her hands over her mouth. She trilled the soft call of a night bird. From the darkness downslope there came a faint reply. She turned back to Fiben. “Of course I do. We all need you. But where you can do the most good is down there, near the sea. I also sense that you want to go back.”
Fiben pulled at his thumbs. “Gotta be crazy, I guess.”
She smiled. “No. It is only one more indicator that the Suzerain of Propriety knew its business in choosing you… even though it might prefer that you showed a little more respect to your patrons.”
Fiben tensed. Then he seemed to sense some of her irony. He smiled. There was the soft clattering of horses’ hooves on the trail below. “All right,” he said as he bent over to pick up the limp form of Major Prathachulthorn. “Come on, papa. This time I’ll be as gentle as I would with my own maiden aunt.” He smacked his lips against the Marine’s shadowed cheek and looked up at Athaclena.
“Better, ma’am?”
Something she had borrowed from her father made her tired tendrils fizz. “Yes, Fiben.” She laughed. “That’s much better.”
Lydia and Robert had their suspicions when they returned by the dawn’s light to find their legal commander missing. The remaining Terragens Marines glared at Athaclena in open distrust. A small band of chims had gone through Prathachulthorn’s room, cleaning away all signs of struggle before any humans got there, but they couldn’t hide the fact that Prathachulthorn had gone without a note or any trace.
Robert even ordered Athaclena restricted to her chamber, with a Marine at the door, while they investigated. His relief over a likely delay in the planned attack was momentarily suppressed under an outraged sense of duty. In comparison, Lieutenant McCue was an eddy of calm. Outwardly, she seemed unconcerned, as if the major had merely stepped out. Only Athaclena could sense the Earth woman’s underlying confusion and conflict.