The Light-Years Beneath My Feet

by Alan Dean Foster

  When the coughing had died down, she approached her opposite number and drew the two fingers of one hand down the center of Saluu-hir-lek’s chest. “On a battlefield, shrewdness sometimes worth more than extra battalions. I readily confess I myself find this distinctive proposal appealing. But not for me decide alone. Proposal must be put to Council of Toroud-eed.”

  The general indicated his understanding. “Naturally must be. Would be same for me if situation reversed. Meanwhile, fighting between us must continue. But perhaps not unrestrained. Is normal time for customary reassessment of strategic positionings. Troops shift here, catapults and arbalests move there. Now is time for repairing and reprovisioning. Latter is most necessary.” Restraining his amusement, he gestured in Walker’s direction. “New ‘commanders’ agree with this assessment.” Approaching closer to her, he drew his own hand across her shoulder.

  “Best for forces of both Kojn-umm and Toroud-eed to rest and take stock.” He performed what Walker now recognized as the Niyyuuan equivalent of a meaningful wink. “Both armies needs be prepared for whatever significant confrontation is to be coming. Not to be suggesting anything, but only by way of illustration, is worth mentioning as example that is goodly marching distance from border of Toroud-eed to ancient walls of Biranju-oov.”

  11

  It is agreed!”

  Viyv-pym entered the big dwelling wagon that had been reserved for the use of the aliens. Half of it was occupied by Walker, George, and Sque. The other half was reserved for the use of Braouk. Even so, the Tuuqalian was crowded. Typically, he did not complain—though given his general melancholy it would have been hard to tell the difference from his usual state of mind even had he chosen to do so.

  After the excited Viyv-pym had finished delivering her news and withdrawn, George hopped up onto the side sleeping platform that had been added to accommodate him. “Great. Now no matter what happens, we’re stuck with it.” He turned a jaundiced eye on Walker. “I was a member of a pack once. It’s great—unless things don’t go well, food runs short, and they decide to turn on and eat the weakest member of the group.”

  Walker nodded somberly. “Then we’d better keep working to ensure that there’s plenty of ‘food’ to keep the armies of dear old Kojn-umm and Toroud-eed busy.”

  “Speaking of consumption,” Sque ventured, “I presume you have given thought as to how eventually to deal with Biranju-oov, assuming that our initial plans proceed as well as we hope?”

  “I’m working on it,” Walker assured her touchily. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.”

  “I am always ahead of myself.” She curled her tendrils around her, forming a platform of tentacles at her base, and blew a contemptuous bubble in his direction. “It is the K’eremu way. It is one reason why we are always ahead of everyone else.”

  At least he wasn’t alone in this, Walker reflected. If things got difficult, he could always turn to Sque and George for advice. For obvious reasons, he hoped he would not have to do that.

  At the moment, Viyv-pym’s celebratory announcement was a clear indication things were going well. Very soon, word should come that the armies of both Kojn-umm and Toroud-eed had begun moving. Not toward one another, but southwestward, and fighting with one another all the while. From what he had learned about Biranju-oov, it would not be easy to assault, even by the more-or-less combined forces of Kojn-umm and Toroud-eed. If resistance proved as stalwart as expected, the real difficulty would involve keeping the attacking armies of two traditional enemies focused on their new target instead of on each other, while maintaining the fiction of the latter.

  Such uncertainty and confusion proved advantageous when the time came to march. Expecting the forces of Kojn-umm to retreat or those of Toroud-eed to surrender, the civilian populations of both realms as well as observing media were flabbergasted when both began marching away from Herun-uud-taath—parallel to one another, and not back toward Kojn-umm. If worldwide media coverage had been extensive before, now it seemed as if every mobile scanner and famous commentator on the planet materialized around, behind, or above the skirmishing columns. As the marching forces continued fighting among themselves, disputing the changing territory that separated them, neutral military analysts found themselves at a loss as to how to describe what was happening.

  If the two armies continued to challenge one another, then they could not be prohibited allies. But if they were marching together toward a single, as-yet-undefined goal, then they could be nothing else but. Troops on the ground knew only what they had been told, which was very little and not especially informative. Continue to advance as instructed in good order, and attack and defend against a perfidious nearby enemy that was doing exactly the same. As for the general staffs of both armies, who presumably had some grasp of the mysterious overall strategic picture that must lie behind such unprecedented maneuvers, when they were interviewed each and every senior officer was conspicuously closemouthed.

  Something rare and uncommon was happening. Of that, the mystified commentators were certain. When basic geography and some simple extrapolation suggested that both massed forces were stumbling in the general direction of the realm of Biranju-oov, pointed questions as to intentions were put to officers on both sides. All such inquiries were directed up the line of command, at whose terminus the increasingly frustrated inquirers received nothing more informative than pleasant greetings and expressions of regret at the lack of information that was available for general dissemination.

  Certainly, it was a march like no other. As soldiers repeatedly attacked and fell back on both sides, their actions were covered in unprecedented depth by the brigade of media observers. Passing to either side of both parallel columns, or above it, casual travelers and commercial transporters added observations of their own. Media and public not only wondered what was going on, but what the ultimate objective was of the unprecedented clash.

  By the time the two battling armies swerved away from Biranju-oov’s modern capital—with its flexformed buildings, extensive sprawl, and busy spaceports—and headed for the old walled city, savvy observers thought they had finally divined the intent of the unprecedented exercise. There was to be an attack on the maritime realm’s traditional defenses, in the traditional manner, by wholly nontraditional elements. For while the forces of Kojn-umm and Toroud-eed began to establish proper bivouacs and bring forward their siege engines, they continued to brawl actively with one another. If the latter was some sort of ruse, the commentators hovering above the incipient battlefield observed, it was being perpetrated with a vengeance: soldiers from both sides continued to die in the seemingly endless series of ongoing clashes.

  As if this battlefield situation were not unconventional enough, the military command of Biranju-oov that had settled into the old city found itself presented with not one but two entirely separate sets of articles requesting its surrender: one from each of the attacking armies. Though essentially identical in content, they were put forward by two different delegations. The response of the old city’s defenders to this confusion was straightforward.

  “Kill them all,” Commander in Chief Afyet-din-cil instructed his subordinates, “and we sort out internal arrangements later.”

  Unlike Kojn-umm and Toroud-eed, whose traditional approaches were defended by fortresses built to control mountain passes, the capital of Biranju-oov was a seaport of notable lineage. While fighting commenced around and before the old walled city and its two fortresses that backed onto a deep cove, the massive modern capital itself had been built up around the greater harbor off to the south. Only tradition preserved the old city’s importance. To make war on the capital proper would require modern weapons and tactics whose use was of course forbidden among the Niyyuu. So the defense of the realm was focused on the old city’s ramparts. These were stronger facing the sea, from whence assaults had traditionally come in ancient times. For Biranju-oov to be attacked from the land was unusual, but not unprecedented.

  Every day,
units from the army of Kojn-umm or Toroud-eed would test the strength of the old city’s walls and the resolve of their defenders. These attacks were never made in tandem. The two armies made no effort to coordinate their assaults. On a couple of occasions, in fact, these first probes ended in complete confusion when the soldiers involved ignored the city walls and their baffled defenders to turn viciously on each other. At such times the guardians of traditional Biranju-oov would be left gaping in amazement at the fighting taking place on the ancient floodplain below them and wonder what in the name of the Ten Travails of Telek-mun-zad was going on.

  No one had ever heard of, nor were there any records of in the long history of Niyu, a three-way war.

  Commentators from other realms and other continents exhausted themselves trying to find explanations for what was taking place. Whenever it appeared that the besieging armies were beginning to act in concert, they would fall to fighting among themselves. Just when the defenders of Biranju-oov believed the offensive against their integrity was about to fall apart, the forces of one army or the other would launch a furious individual assault against them. Or a battalion of Toroud-eed would attack and fall back only to have the assault taken up by the opportunistic forces of Kojn-umm.

  Scrutinizing all this were powerful realms who had initially worried that a formal alliance had been forged between Kojn-umm and Toroud-eed. Concerned at first, these interested onlookers now found themselves adrift in a sea of bemusement. What kind of allies consistently attacked one another, even as they were assailing a third party? Was there a real danger to other lands here, a genuine threat, or would the assault on well-defended Biranju-oov collapse under the weight of its own disorientation? Being uncertain of what they were seeing, these outside observers were understandably unsure how to react.

  There was some talk of several realms uniting to move against the attacking forces. But which ones? Those of Kojn-umm, of Toroud-eed, or both? No apparent rationale for such a mobilization existed. With confusion deepening among the onlookers, it stood to reason that it might also be deepening among the participants. Accusation of a formal alliance being a serious matter, it was decided to wait, and continue to watch, and see what happened. Besides, intervention in such disputes was always expensive, in terms of both soldiers and public treasure.

  Of those involved, happiest of all were the media, who while covering the unprecedented and inexplicable tripartite conflict found themselves enjoying viewer attention that bordered on the historic. His individual impact on the battlefield being unprecedented, Braouk was a particular focus of attention. He submitted to a steady succession of interviews with a mixture of patience and resignation. At least these did not last long. All it took was for some commentator to inquire about the Tuuqalian’s passion for recitation, whereupon an obliging Braouk would respond with an example. Ten or fifteen minutes of listening to unbroken moody Tuuqalian saga was invariably sufficient to cause even the most dedicated interviewer to insist that he or she was suddenly needed elsewhere.

  The interest in Braouk also served to deflect attention from his less-imposing companions. Sque spent much of her time in solitary moist meditation in the specially hydrated wagon compartment that had been fabricated for her. Though devoid of forbidden modern technology, it was sufficient to keep her happily humid. Though known to food preparation specialists, Walker’s fame had not spread quite as far and wide as Biranju-oov, a realm that was sophisticated but not intimate with Kojn-umm. As for George, he was regarded as little more than a talkative novelty, a designation that suited him fine. The time they had spent in Kojn-umm had given him his fill of inane interviews.

  So it was that with the military preoccupied with the conduct of the assault and the media focused on its ongoing action and details, no one noticed when a ten-day following the commencement of the siege, one thick-bodied biped and one short quadruped riding a borrowed tibadun slipped out of the Kojn-umm camp in the middle of the night. They headed not for the front lines, or for the parallel encampment of the forces of Toroud-eed, but back along the winding route the advancing armies had taken. After riding a modest distance back the way they had come, they abruptly changed their course and angled sharply to the south.

  Reaching their first objective, they abandoned the tibadun. The animal promptly whirled and headed back in the direction of its distant stable mates. Standing on the ground cover of a minor shipping corridor, it was not long before the modern communicator Walker carried was able to hail an empty, automated public transporter. Ascertaining that their interrealm credit was good and notwithstanding their outrageous appearance, the vacant on-duty vehicle descended so that they could board. Having spent time researching their intended destination prior to their arrival outside the old city of Biranju-oov, human and dog relaxed in climate-conditioned comfort as the nearly silent transporter obediently accelerated toward the capital city of the realm.

  The modern city.

  Far, far from home, the unlikely pair of travelers commented on the size and extent of the Niyuan metropolis with a self-confidence that would have amazed their old friends. Their composure had a basis in experience: after all, they had seen Seremathenn. Traveling at high speed between ceramic-clad towers and forests of brilliantly lit residential complexes, the modern, efficient transport zipped them through the outskirts and deep into the central conurbation proper in less than an hour.

  It slowed only when nearing their chosen destination: the seat of Biranju-oov’s honored and much-admired government. There, local security took over the transport’s internal guidance system. It did not bring them to a stop, nor did it deliver them unwillingly to a waiting station packed with armed guards. Instead, as covertly prearranged, they were efficiently channeled past monumental marbleized office complexes dating from the realm’s venerable past, across meticulously maintained parkland speckled with pastel-hued lights and effervescent horizontal fountains, to finally slow as they neared an unspectacular but recently erected structure located on the far side of the complex’s center.

  Guards did meet them there immediately upon their disembarkation, but the slender, highly trained soldiers were present to serve as the visitors’ escort, not as their apprehenders. After many, many ten-days exposed to hand-to-hand combat that utilized only traditional primitive armaments, it was something of a shock for both Walker and George to find themselves paralleled and guided by Niyyuu armed with sleek, compact energy weapons.

  It being the middle of the night and the Niyyuu no less diurnal than the pair of alien visitors, the building was largely deserted. What work was being done was being carried out by individuals in isolated offices. Perhaps the busiest place was the Media Relations Section, but it was located in a different structure entirely. As was customary, all strategic military planning occurred in the delegated war rooms scattered along the length of the old city’s walls. As both visitors well knew, the use of advanced computational devices or communications systems was by Niyyuuan convention not permitted.

  That did not mean that every defender of Biranju-oov was at that moment posted somewhere within the old city or atop its solid stone walls. Four of the most powerful members of its general staff were at that moment awaiting the arrival of the two aliens. Tired and irritable, frustrated by the lack of progress of the ongoing struggle but unable to significantly alter its evolution, they waited for their visitors in a general state of mind best described as bothered and bewildered, if not actually bewitched.

  Predictably, the emotions they felt were largely repressed as Tavel-bir-dom, three-term premier of Biranju-oov, focused his attention on the nocturnal arrivals. The biped was bigger than he had been led to expect: not particularly tall, but very, very broad. In contrast, its companion was smaller than the premier had anticipated.

  I could break its neck with one swift kick, he mused silently. It was hard to imagine such an oddly matched pair, and from the same planet at that, as the source of so much confusion.

  “It late, sleep nec
essary, and I for one not desire this meeting.” Responsible for the command of half the realm’s armed forces but finding himself largely sidelined by the current land-based assault, Admiral Jolebb-yun-det had arrived in a fouler mood than any of his contemporaries. His greeting showed it. “Better to have something of worth to say, or I personally tempted disregard articles of agreement sealed by government agency responsible and have you put in national zoo for younglings to throw food bits at.”

  Taking a couple of steps forward, George hopped up uninvited onto a low empty cabinet and made himself comfortable. “We’ll do our best to make sure you haven’t lost sleep for nothing.” He glanced at his companion. “Offer them the bone, Marc.” The dog winked at the admiral, whose small round mouth, painted in war colors of alternating yellow and blue, contracted in bemusement. “It’s a really big bone. Big and tasty.”

  Shadim-hur-lud, representative of the Citizen’s Parliament of Biranju-oov, gazed down at the impertinent hairy creature. “I not put off a sound rest to be taunted by alien riddles.” Her wide-eyed attention shifted to the patient Walker. “If you have something say, sentient, speak it now.”

  Taking a step toward them, Walker drew something from a pouch fastened to his belt. No one in the room flinched. The visitors had already been triple-scanned for weapons, sharp objects, and explosive chemical combinations. Had they carried any on or within their persons, it would have been detected by the relevant security equipment that swathed the small meeting room in an aura of complete protection.

  Though no bigger than Walker’s middle finger, the projection unit generated between himself and the sleepy representatives of the government of Biranju-oov a detailed three-dimensional image of the field of battle. A few flickers of interest showed among the assembled. Not at the use of a technology that was familiar to them all, but at the fact that so strange and unique an alien was making effortless use of it. As Walker spoke, tiny images shifted and moved within the roughly rectangular field.