by David Geary
Hutch was horrified to discover she'd lost the little finger of her right hand. "How'd that happen?"
"Not sure," she said. "I think it got me when I pulled it loose from Janet."
She closed off the wound as best she could. Son of a bitch. If they'd been able to recover it, it could have been grafted back by the ship's surgeons. But they weren't going to go back looking.
"Finished?" asked George nervously. "I think they're still around." Hutch could hear them out there, tiny legs scratching against stone, claws clicking. But they seemed to be in the rear now.
Neither Carson nor Janet would be able to walk without help. "We need to make a travois," said Hutch, looking around for suitable dead limbs.
George frowned. "We don't have time for construction work." He found a couple of dead branches and fashioned walking sticks. "Best we can do," he said, distributing them. "Let's go." He directed Maggie to help Janet. And provided a shoulder for Carson. "Hutch, you bring up the rear," he said. "Be careful."
They moved out.
It was slow going. Frank was no lightweight, and George was too tall. He had to bend to support Carson's weight, and Hutch knew they would not make it all the way back to the shuttle. Not like this. Maybe they could find an open spot somewhere. Get Jake to come for them. Use the shuttle to crash through the trees and get them out. If they provided a signal for him to home in on—
George fired his weapon. They heard the familiar crab-shriek. "Damned things are almost invisible," he said. "That one was ahead of us."
Where the hell was Jake? Hutch tried again to raise him. But there was still no response. That silence now suggested an ominous possibility.
Hutch looked with frustration at the trees, which could provide no sanctuary since the branches were far beyond their reach.
"This isn't working," said Carson finally, disengaging himself from George and sitting down. "If you didn't have to worry about me, you could carry Janet, and you could move a lot faster. Give me a pulser, and come get me tomorrow."
"Sure," George said. "I'll hold the pass, boys. You go on ahead." He shook his head. "I don't think so."
They were leaving a trail of blood. Hutch traded places with Maggie. Then they started again. Occasionally, Maggie fired her weapon. And it seemed to have gotten personal. "Little bastard" she'd say, "take that." And: "Right between the eyes, you son of a bitch."
She exhausted another pulser. They had three left.
Hutch reluctantly gave Maggie her weapon. "What do you think?" asked Carson.
"We need to get off the ground," said Janet. "We need a tree."
"Find one our size," said Maggie. And then: "How about a wallT
"Yeah," said George. "That should work. The upper level might be safe. If the bastards can't climb." He looked at Hutch. "Can we contact the Perth!"
"Not directly. Somebody would need to activate the shuttle relay."
"Wouldn't matter anyhow," said Carson. "They couldn't help. Their shuttle's down here."
His dressing was soaked with blood. Hutch added more foam.
They'd stopped in a small clearing to do repairs, when George held up a hand. "Heads up," he said. "They're here."
Hutch had to fight down an urge to break and run. "Where?" she said.
They came out of the high grass from all directions, and they came in overwhelming numbers. They moved forward with near-military precision. Hutch, Maggie, and George formed a circle around the others and killed with a will. White beams bathed the advancing horde. The brachyids died. They died in rows, but if the lines wavered, they did not stop. Scorched carapaces littered the area, and the grass and bushes caught fire. Carson and Janet, without weapons, squeezed back and tried to keep out of the way. The air filled with the smell of charred meat. A crab trailing smoke caromed off Hutch's foot.
George fought with coolness and calculation. Standing at his side, Hutch almost felt she didn't know him. He was smiling, enjoying himself. The gentle innocence was gone.
Their attackers moved with malice and purpose. Hutch sensed feints and sallies and organization in the attack. Their eyes locked on her and tracked her. No crab on the beaches of her youth had ever seemed so aware of her presence.
Maggie's pulser was fading, going red.
The things came on relentlessly.
The fear that they were not going to get out was beginning to take hold. Oddly, that suspicion induced a series of conflicting emotions in Hutch, like currents in a quiet lake: she was almost simultaneously calm, terrified, resigned. She joined George in taking pleasure in the killing, wielding her beam with deadly satisfaction. And she began to consider how the end might come, what she should do. She decided she would not allow herself, or anyone else, to be taken down alive. She located Carson and Janet with sidewise glances. Carson was riveted by the battle, but Janet caught her eye and nodded. When the end comes, if it comes, do the right thing.
The dead, smoking shells continued to pile up. Hutch thought she detected some reluctance in the animals trying to breach the rising barrier, but they were incessantly pushed forward by pressure from behind. She found, increasingly, she could expand her field of fire, and attack the rear ranks. The zone
of smoldering meat around them began to act as a shield.
She took a moment to reduce power.
Black smoke was getting into her eyes. She killed two more, and spared one that lurched crazily away from her and ran into a tree.
"We've got to run for it," said George. "Before they regroup."
"I'm in favor," said Hutch. "How do we manage it?"
"The bushes." He pointed to the side. He was shouting, to be heard over the din. Most of the creatures were on the trail, front and rear. "Punch a hole through the bushes," he said.
Hutch nodded.
"Everybody hear that?" called George.
Hutch turned toward Janet and Frank. "Can you guys manage on your own? Until we get clear?"
Carson looked at Janet.
"/ can hop," she said. "Let's go."
Hutch wasted no time. She swung her pulser toward the shrubbery George had indicated and burned the hole. Several crabs were moving back there, and she killed one while George held the rear. The bushes were thick, and she feared they might bog down in them. Protecting her eyes, she tried to ease the path for Janet. Once, twice, she stopped and drove off attackers.
But by God they were moving again.
Minutes later, they came out on a grassy hillside.
"Where''s George?" said Maggie, looking behind them.
Hutch opened a channel. "George, where are you?"
"I'm fine," he said. "I'll be right along."
"What are you doing?"
"Hutch," he said, in a tone she had never heard him use before, "keep going. Get to the wall. I'll meet you there."
"No!" she howled. "No heroes. We need you here."
"I'll be there, dammit. Frank, will you talk to her?" And he signed off.
"He's right," Carson said.
"I'm going back for him—"
"If you do, we're all dead. His only chance is for ms to get to high ground. Now, come on—"
Charred grass and crab-parts crunched underfoot. George followed Maggie, but the crabs came too quickly. He turned and fired. There was no point in his hurrying, because he could go no faster than the people in front of him.
The attack slowed. A few individuals charged, but for the most part, they seemed to understand where the limits of his field of effective fire lay, and they remained outside that range. He backed through the bushes.
They kept pace. And he could hear them on both sides.
He fought down an urge to break and run. He listened for pulsers ahead, and was encouraged to hear only the sounds of people clumping through forest.
In whatever dim perceptions they had, the brachyids understood and avoided the pulser. They did not charge him, at least not in large numbers. They had learned. He needed to use that fact to buy time.
/> He didn't dare move too quickly. Didn't want to come up on his companions before they'd gained the safety of the wall. So he stopped occasionally, and, when the creatures approached, sometimes singly, sometimes several abreast in their pseudo-military formations, he turned back on them, and drove them off.
Hutch's frantic call unnerved him. He'd been able to hear her both on the link and on the wind. They were still very close. Damn—
The possibilities for ambush were everywhere. But no sudden rush came, no charge from the flank, no surprises. They merely stayed with him. And that was okay. If they were targeting him, they weren't chasing the others. And fast as they were, he was quicker. As long as he didn't have to carry anyone.
He plunged into high grass, too high for him to see them directly, but he could see the stalks moving. He kept going until he came out onto rocky terrain. Where he could see. Where they'd make easy targets.
Let Hutch and the others get as far away as they could.
"Where's the wall?" asked Carson.
They'd reached the top of the slope. Maybe another half klick. "Ten minutes," Hutch said. And, to Janet: "You okay?"
Janet and Carson were limping along as best they could, supported by Hutch and Maggie. "Yeah. I'm fine."
Hutch would have kept George on the circuit, but she had her hands full with her injured comrades, and she didn't want
to distract him. But it was hard to keep back the tears.
Carson was quiet. His forehead was cool, and his eyes looked clear. When she tried to talk to him, he only urged her not to stop moving. "I can keep up with you," he said.
They followed their own trail through cut thickets, watching for the foliage to open on their left and give them a view of the wall. They had to be dose now.
Without warning, Janet collapsed. Hutch caught her, lowered her gently to the ground. "Break," Hutch said. "Take a minute."
Carson did not sit. He hobbled to a tree, and leaned against it.
Janet was pale and feverish. Drenched with sweat. Hutch activated her commlink. "George?"
"Here, Hutch."
"Please come. We need you."
George signed off and committed the misjudgment that cost him his life. He had succeeded in buying adequate time, and might have disengaged and rejoined his friends within a few minutes. But the crustacean army lined up behind him was too tempting a target. He returned to the tactic that had been working so successfully. Thinking to thin out his pursuers, he turned on them, and walked the pulser beam through their ranks. It was red now, failing quickly. But it was enough.
They scattered, making no effort to come after him. And they burned and died as they scuttled away. He pursued with singleminded thoroughness, killing everything that moved. Fires ignited, and the shrieks of the brachyids filled the twilight.
But when he turned back, the ground before him was moving. He played his beam across the new targets. It did not stop them, and he had to concentrate its power on a single animal to kill it.
They advanced deliberately in that sidewise gait, and the scalpels were erect. To his rear, the fire was building. No escape that way.
High on the dark hill, he glimpsed his comrades' lamp.
It looked very far away.
He plunged through an opening in the shrubbery. And they were waiting for him.
24.
Beta Pacifica III. Tuesday, April 12; one hour after sunset.
They saw the flames below, in the dark.
"He'll be okay," said Carson.
Hutch hesitated, looking back. The entire world squeezed down to the flickering light. She wanted to talk to him again, reassure herself. But she remembered Henry's anger: Where were you when we were trying to get a few answers? All you could contribute was to hang on the other end of that damned commlink and try to panic everybody.
Miserably, supporting Janet, she set off again. How different everything looked now. The beam from her lamp fell across a tree that had been split by lightning. "I remember this," said Maggie. "We're close—"
Moments later, a scream ripped through the night. It rang across the trees, vibrated in the still air, erupted into a series of short cries. Hutch called out to him and turned back.
But Janet anticipated the move. "No! You can't help him." She grabbed her and held on. "My God, you can't help him, Hutch—"
Janet was considerably stronger, but she could not have restrained her more than a few seconds had Carson not gotten there quickly. They fell in a pile.
"There's nothing you can do," he said.
She screamed.
"You'll make it for nothing." It was Maggie, looking down at her.
"Easy for you," said Hutch, hating the woman. "When other people die, you're always safely away!"
And the tears came.
The wall looked bright and safe in the glow of the lamp.
Get to the upper level. Hutch's vision had blurred, and she was close to hysteria. "Hold on," Janet told her. "We need you."
The lower strip, the portion they had thought of as resembling a roadway, emerged from the hillside to their right. Halfway across the glade, it rose vertically almost two meters. Not much under ordinary circumstances. Bri tonight was another matter.
It was a difficult climb with only one foot available. But Carson, supported by Maggie from below, and pulled by Hutch, and perhaps encouraged by the whisper of moving grass, negotiated it, although not without losing more blood. Once he was up, however, Janet became an easy proposition.
Hutch did a quick survey out across the top of the wall to assure herself there would be no surprises. Satisfied, she sat down and got out the medikit. "Let's have another look at everybody," she said in a flat voice.
Janet appeared to be going into shock. Hutch got her legs up, propping them on a mound of earth, removed her own jacket, and drew it over her. Carson was in better shape. When she had done what she could for both, she looked at Maggie's mutilated hand.
"How does it feel?"
"I'll live."
"I'm sorry," Hutch said. "I really didn't mean what I said back there."
"I know."
She changed the dressing. But tears continued to roll down her cheeks and she kept getting everything wet. Maggie had to finish the job herself. Carson hobbled over and sat beside her.
Hutch stared into the dark. The fires had burned out, and the night was growing cool. A crescent moon floated in the trees. "He's gone," she said.
Carson put an arm around her, but said nothing.
"I don't—" She stopped, pulled back, and waited until she had control of her voice. "I don't want to leave him out there."
"We'll get him back," Carson said.
Janet did not look good. We need to keep her warm. Maggie contributed her jacket. Hutch gathered some branches and built a fire. The wind began to pick up, and the temperature was dropping. Carson looked pale, and Hutch feared he might go into shock. "It's going to get cold," she said. "We don't want to spend the night out here."
Carson gazed wearily into the fire. "I don't see what choice we have."
"We can get the shuttle."
"How do we do that! I can't walk back there. Neither can Janet, for God's sake."
"I don't mean everybody. I mean me."
"And what would you do after you got there?"
"Bring it here."
The treetops were tied together and shut out the sky. "And do what? You can't get through that."
"Sure I can. If we remove a tree or two."
Carson's eyes found hers.
"It's all we've got," she added.
"Wait for daylight."
"We may not have until daylight. Janet's not in good shape."
He glanced at Maggie. "What do you think?"
Maggie's eyes were wide with fatigue and horror. "I think it's her call," she said.
She hasn't forgotten what I said. Hutch felt desperately tired of it all.
It would have been best, of course, if she could st
art at once. But there were things that had to be done first.
She needed to find the right tree to take down. She thought they could get away with one, and she found it well out along the wall, past the ruined stairway. It was close enough that they could reach it with a pulser; and she judged that it would leave a hole big enough to get through with the shuttle. That latter point was touch and go, but she was hopeful. If it didn't, they'd deal with it when they had to.
Next, she selected a pickup site, and helped get Janet and Carson to it. Just the use of the term seemed to revive their spirits. Once there, she rebuilt the fire. They were far out over the valley now, and close to the treetops. Branches and leaves reddened in the glow of the flames.
While Hutch got ready to leave, Maggie wandered to the edge, studied the target tree, and looked down. It was about five stories.
"You know what to do now?" Hutch asked.
"Yes. We'll be waiting when you get back."
They had only two functional pulsers left. But Maggie's had gone red. Hutch had the remaining one. She held it out.
Maggie shook her head. "Take it with you. You might need it."
"You need it to take the tree down. Anyhow, I'm not going to shoot it out with the little bastards." Janet's breathing didn't sound so good. "Got to go." Their eyes caught and held. "When we get out of here," she said, "I'd like to buy you dinner."
Maggie smiled. It was an uninhibited smile, ringed by tears. "Yeah," she said. "I'd like that."
"Be careful," said Carson.
She strapped the lamp to her wrist and started back along the top of the wall. The night closed over her.
The smell of the sea was strong, and the woods below were full of the sound of insects. George's final cries echoed through her mind, and she was desperately afraid.
Her mind would have conjured up images of his last moments had she allowed it to. But she let the shock effect numb her imagination. She tried to concentrate only on what needed to be done, to push her fears and her loss aside.
She hurried back along the wall, watching the forest floor rise. Ahead, shrubbery blocked her view of the glade.
And she heard them. Directly ahead.
Below, the forest floor was quiet.
