Actually, today had begun when he awoke in the notch of a tree, a few miles outside the walls of Port Helenia, where plate ivy parachutes festooned the stripped branches of a winter-barren orchard…
Irongrip jabbed, then punched out with a hard right. Fiben ducked under his opponent’s arm and riposted with a backhand blow. It was blocked, and the bones of their forearms made a loud crack as they met.
… The Talon Soldiers had shown grudging courtesy, so he rode Tycho hard until he arrived at the old prison…
A fist whistled past Fiben’s ear like a cannonball. Fiben stepped inside the outstretched arm and swiveled to plant his elbow into his enemy’s exposed stomach.
… Staring at the abandoned room, he had known that there was very little time left. Tycho had galloped through the deserted streets, a flower dangling from his mouth…
The jab wasn’t hard enough. Worse, he was too slow to duck aside as Irongrip’s arm folded fast to come around to cross his throat.
… and the docks had been filled with chims — they lined the wharves, the buildings, the streets, staring…
A crushing constriction threatened to cut off his breath. Fiben crouched, dropping his right foot backward between his opponent’s legs. He tensed in one direction until Irongrip counterbalanced, then Fiben whirled and threw his weight the other way while he kicked out. Irongrip’s right leg slipped out from under him, and his own straining overbalance threw Fiben up and over. The Probationer’s incredible grasp held for an astonishing instant, tearing loose only along with shreds of Fiben’s flesh.
… He traded his horse for a boat, and headed across the bay, toward the barrier buoys…
Blood streamed from Fiben’s torn throat. The gash had missed his jugular vein by half an inch. He backed away when he saw how quickly Irongrip found his feet again. It was downright intimidating how fast the chen could move.
… He fought a mental battle with the buoys, earning — through reason — the right to pass through…
Irongrip bared his teeth, spread his long arms, and let out a blood-curdling shriek. The sight and sound seemed to pierce Fiben like a memory of battles fought long, long before chims ever flew starships, when intimidation had been half of any victory.
“You can do it, Fiben!” Robert Oneagle cried, countering Irongrip’s threat magic. “Come on, guy! Do it for Simon.”
Shit, Fiben thought. Typical human trick, guilt-tripping me!
Still, he managed to wipe away the momentary wave of doubt and grinned back at his enemy. “Sure, you can scream, but can you do this?”
Fiben thumbed his nose. Then he had to dive aside quickly as Irongrip charged. This time both of them landed clear blows that sounded like beaten drums. Both chims staggered to opposite ends of the arena before managing to turn around again, panting hard and baring their teeth.
… The beach had been littered, and the trail up the bluffs was long and hard. But that turned out to be only the beginning. The surprised Institute officials had already started disassembling their machines when he suddenly appeared, forcing them to remain and test just one more. They assumed it would not take long to send him home again…
The next time they came together, Fiben endured several hard blows to the side of his face in order to step inside and throw his opponent to the ground. It wasn’t the most elegant example of jiu-jitsu. Forcing it, he felt a sudden tearing sensation in his leg.
For an instant, Irongrip was rolling, helpless. But when Fiben tried to pounce his leg nearly collapsed.
The Probationer was on his feet again in an instant. Fiben tried not to show a limp, but something must have betrayed him, for this time Irongrip charged his right side, and when Fiben tried to backpedal, the left leg gave way.
… grueling tests, hostile stares, the tension of wondering if he would ever make it in time…
As he fell backward, he kicked out, but all that earned him was a grip that seized his ankle like a roller-press. Fiben scrambled for leverage, but his fingers clawed in the loose soil. He tried to slip aside as his opponent hauled him back and then fell upon him.
… And he had gone through all of that just to arrive here? Yeah. All in all, it had been one hell of a day…
There are certain tricks a wrestler can try against a stronger opponent in a much heavier weight class. Some of these came back to Fiben as he struggled to get free. Had he been a little less close to utter exhaustion, one or two of them might even have worked.
As it was, he managed to reach a point of quasi-equilibrium. He attained a small advantage of leverage which just counterbalanced Irongrip’s horrendous strength. Their bodies strained and tugged as hands clutched, probing for the smallest opening. Their faces were pressed near the ground and close enough together to smell each other’s hot breath.
The crowd had been silent for some time. No more shouts of encouragement came, from one side or the other. As he and his enemy rocked gradually back and forth in a deadly serious battle of deceptive slowness, Fiben found himself with a clear view of the downward slope of the Ceremonial Mound. With a small corner of his awareness, he realized that the crowd was gone now. Where there had been a dense gathering of multiformed Galactics, now there was only an empty stretch of trampled grass.
The remnants could be seen hurrying downhill and eastward, shouting and gesticulating excitedly in a variety of tongues. Fiben caught a glimpse of the arachnoid Serentini, the Grand Examiner, standing amid a cluster of her aides, paying no attention any longer to the two chims’ fight. Even the Pila referee had turned away to face some growing tumult downslope.
This, after talking as if the fate of everything in the Universe depended upon a battle to the death between two chims? That same detached part of Fiben felt insulted.
Curiosity betrayed him, even here and now. He wondered. What in th’ ivorld are they up to?
Lifting his eyes even an inch in an attempt to see was enough to do it. He missed by milliseconds an opening Irongrip created as the Probationer shifted his weight slightly. Then, as Fiben followed through too late, Irongrip took advantage in a sudden slip and hold. He began applying pressure.
“Fiben!” It was Gailet’s voice, thick with emotion. So he knew that at least somebody was still paying attention, if only to watch his final humiliation and end.
Fiben fought hard. He used tricks dragged up out of the well of memory. But the best of them required strength he no longer had. Slowly he was forced back.
Irongrip grinned as he managed to lay his forearm against Fiben’s windpipe. Suddenly breath came in hard, high whistles. Air was very dear, and his struggles took on new desperation.
Irongrip held on just as urgently. His bared canines reflected bitter highlights as he panted in an open-mouthed grin over Fiben.
Then the glints faded as something occulted the lights, casting a dark shadow over both of them. Irongrip blinked, and all at once seemed to notice that something bulky had appeared next to Fiben’s head. A hairy black foot. The attached brown leg was short, as stout as a tree trunk, and led upwards to a mountain of fur…
For Fiben the world, which had started to spin and go dim, came slowly back into focus as the pressure on his airpipe eased somewhat. He sucked air through the constricted passage and tried to look to see why he was still alive.
The first thing he saw was a pair of mild brown eyes, which stared back in friendly openness from a jet black .face set at the top of a hill of muscle.
The mountain also had a smile. With an arm the length of a small chimpanzee, the creature reached out and touched Fiben, curiously. Irongrip shuddered and rocked back in amazement, or maybe fear. When the creature’s hand closed on Irongrip’s arm, it only squeezed hard enough to test the chim’s strength.