That smart and agile cat had waited until the rhinolo had reared his head to toss the tree, and in a swift reverse move, as soon Kam could no longer see the bull’s eyes in their sockets, changed direction to the bull’s right. He narrowly crossed back in front of the onrushing beast, passing below its muzzle and the still rising tree, now operating below the rhinolo’s inescapable tunnel vision.
This trick was a hunting technique Kam had learned from frilling with experienced rippers. How to dodge a rhinolo charge after they thrust up with their horn and missed you. What Kam lacked was the massive fangs and bite-force of an adult ripper, repeatedly attacking a front leg when passing so close under their raised heads. Enough such passes, by multiple rippers, and the stresses placed on the injured limbs would tire a big animal until it stumbled.
Kam wasn’t trying to do that at all. He was simply distracting the beast, using his superior agility to give the slower Ryan a head start towards safety. The facial numbness and vision reduction, along with the supposed “tree” branches on the rhinolo’s back was Ryan’s doing.
It had happened when the boy leaped off the tree trunk directly towards the bull’s hump, when the bull lowered his head to ram the tree and couldn’t see the boy. Snatching his jazzer from his holster, he aimed at the left side of the animal’s face as he passed ten feet above. That was to numb the left side facial and neck muscles and try to impair the vision in the left eye, if the eyelid sagged closed. This was so Kam would have a blind side to run to when he changed directions. Ryan slid down the sloping long back and hit the ground running.
His dad had explained that the dense muscle mass, heavy bones, and thick hides of a rhinolo made them nearly immune to the effects of a jazzer. Unless you were extremely close. Nearly in physical contact, in fact. A tactic was considered fatal for a jazzer user.
Before the rhinolo could complete its turn to the right, where it would see the slower running boy with its perfectly good right eye, Kam produced his best pouncing scream. Which, considering the ridiculous size disparity between him and the bull, why should that concern a full-grown rhinolo?
However, the sound came from its oddly tingling blinded left side, so he defensively whirled back to face towards the deeper woods, seeking the close origin of that scream with his good eye. Kam, having done all he could to confuse and delay the beast, had already started his own considerably faster dash after Ryan. He flashed past the old bull on its blind left side as it spun back to face in the wrong direction.
They had a hundred feet to cover to reach the ten-foot outer fence, which was too tall for them to jump, and the fine mesh wasn’t suited for climbing. They had to slow down to get through the ground level shoulder-sized hole Ryan had cut. Then race to the trench under the electric fence, another ten feet away.
Kam overtook Ryan when they were still thirty feet from the outer fence, but he slowed to look back at the sound of bellowing and thumping feet. The rhinolo had recognized the deception, and had spotted its fleeing tormentors. Its building speed was already impressive. The boy, also glancing back, frilled Kam to get through the hole first, so he wouldn’t slow them both down.
Reluctantly, Kam leaped ahead and nearly dove through the opening in the wire, scratching his side in the process. Ryan dove, and slid face first to reach the opening and pulled at the sides to get through. He’d deliberately made the opening small and snug, to keep it from being noticed after the missing section was wired back in place. Now it snagged on his shirt. Kam bit onto the back of his shirt collar to help tug him through, tearing a caught sleeve on the wire.
Scrambling to his feet, Ryan started for the trench, and a glance backwards nearly made him wet his pants. The bull, up to at least forty miles per hour, and pushing his legs for more, was almost on them. This time the frill from Kam insisted that Ryan hit the trench first, and the mental image was that he’d be right behind him.
Even as the boy dove headfirst again, at the open trench almost at the bottom wire, he heard the snort of triumph as the raging beast smashed through and crushed down the outer fence, obviously no more than ten feet behind them now. Kobani reflexes and adrenaline, combined to allow Ryan to draw his jazzer with his right hand, and pull the hunting knife from his belt with his left while still in the air. He twisted to land on his back, dead center of the trench, and mere inches below the deadly wire. As he landed on his back, he kicked with his feet to shove himself farther under the main fence to make room for Kam, aiming his jazzer at the bull’s other eye. He knew they couldn’t escape now, but he wasn’t quitting. An impact as Kam landed on his legs spoiled his aim at the bull’s head, but he pulled the trigger on the jazzer anyway. The deadly horn passed inches above them, and only the trench had placed them below its thrust.
The sky was blotted out as the huge body loomed over them, and Ryan expected to be trampled and crushed into mush. He screamed.
There suddenly was an actinic blue-white flash, and something jolted through the ground into Ryan’s entire body, causing him to arch his back in a spasm. Just before the world blacked out, he heard a tearing sound and an immense thud, and he felt pressure shoving him down and backwards.
****
Something wet and raspy feeling was repeatedly moving over his face. Ryan blinked and shoved at whatever it was.
“Wake up! We need to get inside, and I can’t do it alone.” The words cane with an emotional mixture of relief, anxiety, and annoyance.
“Kam? What happened?” He asked this aloud.
Kam put a dirty paw on his mouth. “Mind Tap, slow thinker. Sam and Doc Trent must have heard the crash, and they’ll be alert for any sounds now. The rhinolo is dead, and so is the electric fence I think. I’m not about to touch either one to find out for sure.”
Ryan looked up and didn’t see the main fence rising above him in the trench. To his left he saw what had to be the dusty and smelly blue rump of the rhinolo. It had defecated, making several big dung plops as it spasmed and died, probably a result of muscle contractions as it was electrocuted. He noticed he had stinging scrapes on his face, and one arm, where the rough hide had slid over him.
Touching Kam’s frill, he said, “It fell on us and slid past the trench as it knocked down the fence.”
“My scraped back fur is proof of that.” Kam retorted. “Did you go to sleep? You yelled and I felt your mind go quiet when the bull slid away. I jumped up to run but you didn’t move. I thought you were dead at first.”
Ryan thought a few milliseconds. “The electric fence did that, through the feet of the rhinolo into the ground. Dad told us never to touch a dead animal that was touching the fence wire, because some of the electricity might still be passing though it into the ground. He said we could also be shocked or killed if we touched or stood close to the dead animal.”
“I felt something, but it didn’t feel as strong as your mind shows it was for you. It hurt you more than me. Why did it do that?”
Ryan shrugged, “Because you were on my legs and pants, and not pressed on the damp dirt like me? I don't know. We can think about this later. We need to get inside the house fast.”
As he stood, he saw the heavy fence was partly under the dead rhinolo, and some wires were draped over its head. The strands were spread wide enough apart on the ground they could step between them to reach the house, even if they were still sending electricity. Ryan doubted they were “hot,” but saw no reason to test the notion.
Thinking at speed, now that his mind was clearing, he looked at the outer fence where the bull had ripped its way through. Spotting the wire cutters, pliers, and repair wire where they’d been left on the ground, he dashed over to put them in his pockets. Then they carefully made their way past the mountain of flesh, avoiding the wires on the ground, and ran to the wall of the house.
Tired beyond words, Ryan slipped the loop of the rope around Kam, who stayed on the ground while the boy climbed into the attic. Then, with Kam using his claws to help, the boy pulled the hundred pounds of cub up to where he
could get a claw grip and climb inside.
Looking down at the meat and his backpack they had left behind, he knew he had to go back down to send that up, or the evidence of their expedition would be revealed. Without those clues, all anyone would know is that a rhinolo charged into the electric fence and died.
This time, Ryan tied knots in the rope for better handholds, and help Kam get a firm grip with his teeth to help lift. Climbing down, the boy looped the rope snuggly around each pack of meat, for Kam to walk backwards through the attic and pull through the vent hole. Eventually, the equally tired cub helped the exhausted boy make the final trip up that ever-higher seeming wall.
Making a decision, as he replaced the vent in the open hole, Ryan Tapped, “The meat will keep up here overnight, and we have time before mom drives home tomorrow afternoon, to sneak it into the basement freezer. Let’s clean up and go down to see Doc.”
By the time the sun was well below the horizon, they were clean, went downstairs and he casually waved to Doc as they passed the family room. He was still watching the Tri-Vid, while Ingrid snored in her bedding within the large playpen. They made two satisfying large snacks, and told Doc they were going to bed early.
He waved with his left hand, smiled in a lopsided manner that looked somehow secretive, and turned back to the hologram show he was watching on Tri-Vid.
Despite his usually fast Kobani thought processes, Ryan was getting into his bed before he replayed in his mind that wave, and the odd smile from Doc. He considered the crooked smile was part of the man’s brain damage. Naturally, he’d not said anything to Ryan about the electric fence being down, since he couldn’t speak. The message from Sam, displayed on the bottom of the Tri-Vid, conveyed that information, as a visual alert from the house AI. There would have been an audible warning as well.
Loss of power to the fence wasn’t unusual, nor a high short-term risk. It happened every few months when some animal, sometimes an antelope, a yak last winter, Jenkins dogs or wild gazelles, and even a moosetodon made it past the outer fence. They could cause a short circuit if they died and failed to fall clear of the wires, as had the rhinolo.
Constant protection was not as vital now that the smartest predators, the wild rippers and other savanna cats, were no longer a threat to people. Most other savanna animals, with experience and observation, were smart enough to stay away from the deadly “not-live vines” that killed. Even their gazelles, not terribly bright themselves, rarely made that mistake. They couldn’t tell if the wires were hot or not, so never touched them.
In the morning, with his alarm set to get him up at seven, Ryan was confounded to find Doc already in the kitchen making Ingrid cereal, and for the first time in Ryan’s experience, was pecking at the rarely used keyboard for the kitchen computer link to Sam. Most people spoke to their AIs.
“Hi Doc. I didn’t know you could talk to the computer.”
The old man smiled and nodded, and finished his entry to the AI. Then, awkwardly using his left hand, he printed something on a notepad he had fished from a pocket, along with a stylus he carried.
Writing was another thing Ryan had not known Doc could do. In fact, it was almost a lost art today, with typing available but seldom used, because voice worked with even a simple AI. It was a short note, but tedious for the hyperactive Kobani youngster to wait for him to finish. The old man grinned as he passed the sheet to the boy when he was finally done.
It read, “I can’t speak words Ryan, but writing left handed is possible for me, only it’s clumsy and slow for a natural right-hander. I just asked Sam to play the video of the fence rupture. He says the fence is completely down on the side by the garage.” There was that lopsided smile. Even more cryptic up close.
“Huh. By the garage he said?” He made the question sound nonchalant. He felt more confident than ever after all he and Kam had made it through yesterday. They had been meticulous to stay well out of coverage of the front and rear cameras.
He gave Doc the unfortunate news. “The front and rear cameras don’t cover the small sections of fence at each end of the house. Those are blind spots. Mom and dad already know about that. We won’t see anything from those recordings. Want me and Kam to go out back in the enclosure to take pictures with a portable video camera?” He assumed the handicapped old man wouldn’t risk going outside himself with the electric fence off-line, even with a ripper cub and a four-year old Kobani child as his protection.
The second note was just as long in being composed.
He’d written, “No need, your mom told me she will be home before noon today.” Lopsided grin again.
Faking a look of wonder for his audience of one, Ryan said, “I’ll bet it was something big if it actually tore down the fence. I’d like to go in the backyard to play and take a look, if it’s OK.”
The next note put an entirely different expression on Ryan’s young face.
It read, “Guess not, lad. This morning I finished running a network connection that your dad left undone until he returned home. It puts the barn on Sam’s network. The recorders for the new cameras he installed are out there.” The lopsided smile was much wider, and he winked.
“She told me you and Kam are cleaning up your own dead rhinolo. You’re both apparently grounded forever.”
The Smuggler and the Crime Lord
The spotter, tipped off by his bribed contact in the Brisbane Space Port Authority, watched as the old, dark gray and midsized freighter, deftly and quietly settled on the cargo area’s tarmac, obviously using a Normal Space Drive. Obvious was an understatement, because most of the decrepit freighters that slunk into Brisbane used cheaper thruster technology. They landed with a roar of thruster flames.
That this old model ship had a modern tachyon powered drive, which could provide dependable gravitational and inertial control this deep in a gravity well, was further evidence that this was the freighter Gunther was on a retainer to spot. His contact told him the ship had transmitted a computer identification sequence that said it was an independent freighter, registered out of Kreiger’s Hope and named the Sparrow, with Fred Smith as its Captain.
Gunther’s crime lord employer believed this freighter visitor to New Australia, making its fourth landing here at the Port of Brisbane, was actually a smuggler’s ship named the Falcon, with an unknown new Captain that claimed to be the owner. That particular ship had once smuggled many kinds of profitable contraband between the planets of Bollovstic, Poldark, Gribble’s Nook, and Khartoum’s Destiny. It had upgraded its Tachyon Traps and had a new Jump drive that accessed the third level of Tachyon Space, making its Normal Space drives uncatchable by any planet’s budget strapped law enforcement craft once it lifted, and faster in Jump to the stars than all but the newest military ships, who didn’t normally exercise jurisdiction in civil matters.
That was all before the Krall’s first two planetary invasions, of course. Disorganized Bollovstic had fallen to the murderous aliens in less than eighteen months. Poldark was in its third year of fighting a methodical and measured Krall invasion, which everyone knew would slowly lead to their defeat, even with all the help the Planetary Union could possibly provide their armies. Gribble’s Nook had simply been abandoned by the mining interests that owned the lightly populated planet, after it suffered the first heavy Krall raid, leaving its wealth to the aliens, who proved uninterested in using the resources of the valuable mineral rich world. They didn’t want territory, the Krall only wanted to fight.
Khartoum’s Destiny, the remaining planet of that smuggler’s web, and the most lawless, was a pesthole Rim world ran by dozens of self-styled Sheiks, who all longed to return to the Islamic republic it had been when it was first settled. That was long before women gained ruling control of all human worlds and formed a central government. The men of Khartoum believed Shaytan had inspired infidel women scientist, who worked with jinni, to produce the virus of the Gene War, which had killed nearly all the men in Human Space, leaving women in charge everywhe
re.
Over three centuries, the self-declared Sheiks had eventually reasserted themselves as powerful and ruthless rulers of each of their territories on Khartoum. They maintained their control and Rim world status by refusing to join the Planetary Union as a New Colony. However, without a military, they were forced to pay lip service to the rules of conduct that the populous female dominated HUB worlds of the Planetary Union imposed. The PU could take them over if provoked far enough. Khartoum now was using the PU’s distraction with the Krall, to expand their interstellar smuggling and power base.
Gunther’s boss, Mitch “The Switch” Carmody, sought to increase his own smuggling empire, located as it was here on a side of Human Space far from the Krall war. Establishing smuggling ties with Khartoum, located on the same side of the Rim of human settled worlds, was one way to get ahead of his local crime competitors, if he could link up with that wider and long established smuggling network.
The Falcon, calling itself the Sparrow when it came here, was obviously still up to some sort of nefarious business, despite having lost access to most of its previous illegal markets. Otherwise, why use the added layer of subterfuge and expense of buying a phony registration code? Whatever the Falcon’s owner/operator was doing here, he was doing it under Carmody’s nose, in his own territory. There was no way that insult and intrusion into the local crime lord’s business could go unchallenged. However, killing the man and his crew, then taking the ship, might not be the most profitable thing for Carmody to do. Satisfying, yes, but money came first.
The spaceport was within Carmody’s criminal territory, as was all of Brisbane in fact, the second largest city on New Australia. This ship’s owner, if he was the Fred Smith declared to be the ship’s captain, might be a way to achieve an introduction to one or more of Khartoum’s Sheiks, or their representatives. The Sheiks were not noted for their welcoming attitude to many past underworld figures that were not of their same faith. As numerous beheaded offenders could attest. Had they been able to speak, of course.
Koban Universe 1 Page 12
