The sergeant's spear blurred. With a yelping, breathless grunt, the wing runner was on his back, looking cross-eyed at the spearpoint inches from his face.
"You're dead," Alden said. "Next?"
Another troublemaker stepped forward at a nod from the "leader."
This one had a few white hairs lacing his amber coat. His tail twitched back and forth. He accepted a real spear from a companion and assumed a more cautious stance.
An experienced warrior this time, Alden thought to himself. Good.
The 'cat held the spearpoint forward, left hand grasping near the blade. His right arm was fully extended behind him, holding the shaft like a harpoon. He crouched and took a step to his right. Lightning-fast, he lunged with the spear. Pete stepped inside the thrust, knocking it aside as he turned and drove the butt of his own spear into his opponent's midriff.
Somehow the Lemurian's face showed surprise as he doubled over with a "woof!" Pete reversed the spear and made a classic thrust, ending just short of the chest. Then he turned and looked at the gathering crowd. The point he'd made was obvious. One down, one gasping for air, and Pete Alden wasn't even breathing hard.
Some of the land folk cheered in their curious high-pitched, chittering way, but Pete knew it was more who he'd bested than how he'd done it.
That wasn't what he wanted to get across. "Chack, speak for me," he said.
He walked in a circle, scowling. Gradually, the cheering faded and he started to speak. Before he could, the big Fristar Lemurian stepped forward. He was tall enough to look Alden in the eye. He wasn't as heavily built as the Marine, but Pete had to concede that he was probably stronger. Muscle rippled under the dark fur as he drove his spear into the ground in formal challenge. There was a sudden hush.
"Why do you humiliate the Fristar clan in front of these mud-treaders, Tail-less One? You who is a person of the Great Sea?" Chack translated as he spoke. Pete took a step closer to him and returned his glare.
"If you're humiliated it's not because of anything I've done. Your pride makes you believe you're a better warrior than you are. Besides, among my people, I'm a mud-treader too. Walker has clans, just like you, and we're all ruled by our High Chief. For us, that's Captain Reddy. I obey him, but I'm chief of my own clan. The Marines." He turned and looked at the gathering sea of faces. All training stopped as more recruits pressed forward to hear, and maybe see a fight.
"Among my people, Marines are the warrior clan. All they do is fight.
Sometimes they fight at sea and sometimes on land." He grinned. "Sometimes they even fight in the sky. To Marines it makes no difference. We fight the enemies of our people wherever they are." He paused, considering. "We've made alliance with your people and we've seen the Grik for what they are. Your enemy is now the enemy of my people. That makes 'em my enemy and I'll fight 'em because that's what I do. In the meantime, it's my duty to train you to be better fighters. To fight like Marines.
That means fighting them anytime, anywhere, at sea or on land. That's what it'll take to defeat them.
"They aren't coming to steal your things, just to loot and plunder. If the history of your Scrolls is true, they're coming to wipe you out!Walker's people are your allies, and that puts them in danger as well. So anything less than your very best makes you my personal enemy! Do I make myself clear?" He turned, snatched the spear out of the ground, and flung it down, accepting the challenge—the formal challenge—that meant blood could be spilled.
"There! We can fight if you want, and I promise you'll be dead so fast you won't even know how it happened." He looked at Chack. "Or you can fight him, if you're afraid of me, but he'll kill you just as fast. Because I taught him how!" He looked at the tall leader of the Fristar group.
"So what'll it be? You want to die? Or do you want to learn how to really kill?"
The Lemurian returned his stare. Around them, all were silent, expectant . . . afraid. The formal challenge was rarely made, and when it was, there was almost always only one outcome. All were nervous about the political ramifications. Fristar, at least, would leave the fragile alliance that had been forged at the council. No one really expected the American to lose, and there was always bad blood after a formal challenge was met.
The big Lemurian looked down at the spear. He put his foot beside it and, with a grunt, kicked it away, withdrawing the challenge. There was an audible sigh of relief.
"Then show me, Maa-reen. Show me how to kill."
After securing Risa's laughing promise not to fly to join her "mate," Chack left her at the parade ground to continue her studies and headed back to Walker. His Home. He didn't really know when it had occurred, but at some point all the ambitions of his previous life were supplanted by what he'd become. He was no longer a wing runner on Salissa Home. He was a bosun's mate, in charge of the Lemurian deck division on USS Walker, duly sworn into the Navy of the United States, just as all the accepted "cadets" had been. He had only a vague idea what the United States were, but that made no difference. He'd become a warrior and now he was a destroyerman. He loved Salissa and always would, but he'd changed clans just as surely as if he'd become fas chief of another Home like he once aspired to do. That was an ambition for who he'd been before. He giggled at the irony of his outrage over Silva joining his clan. Now he'd joined Silva's. That didn't mean he wanted him for a brother.
He was encouraged despite Sergeant Alden's gloom. Unwarlike as he once was, the people of Baalkpan were even worse. Yet at least they were trying. It took actual combat to crack his pacifist shell and his dispassionate evaluation of the land folk as warriors didn't escape his sense of irony either. He believed they would fight. Some weren't so sure, but if he could do it, they could too. A lot was riding on it. Most of the Homes in the bay had joined the alliance, but had not committed themselves to offensive operations. They'd taken a wait-and-see approach. The expedition they planned was basically a raid, a reconnaissance in force. The objective was information, primarily, but depending on what they learned, they were prepared to follow up with more attacks. Perhaps, if the Grik were as yet no more numerous than some evidence suggested, they might even defeat them—and fairly quickly. Captain Reddy hoped they could at least cleanse them from the Java Sea and establish a "Malay Barrier" behind which they could further prepare. It was a giddy thought. The captain projected cautious optimism, and Chack envied how he did that. He'd learned a lot about the fantastic war in the other world, and he knew that the mistakes and uncertainty that plagued the Amer-i-caans there now drove Captain Reddy to avoid the same issues here. If they did, they must succeed. Terrible as they were, the Grik couldn't be as formidable as the Japanese had been.
In this happy frame of mind, he ambled along, the Krag muzzle down on his shoulder, picking his way through the fishmongers and handcarts that packed the wharf near the pier. He glanced up and saw Walker, snugged to the dock, smoke curling from her aft funnel once more.
"Chack."
He turned, and his heart flipped in his chest. Before him stood Selass, her silken silver fur radiating sunlight. The armor she wore, much like her father's, flashed with pink-red fire. As always, she was magnificent. She was armed with a scota and was headed for the parade ground herself.
He'd seen her there several times, training. Sometimes she sparred with Risa. Chack's ears lay flat and he bowed low.
"I greet you, Selass-Fris-Ar. You are well?"
"I am well . . ." She paused and blinked sadness. Chack nodded.
"You still mourn Saak-Fas. I understand. I hope the pain will pass with time."
Her eyelids flashed impatiently. "I do not mourn him! If I ever did, the sadness is gone. But . . . I have another sadness."
He blinked concerned query. Her eyes flashed and she almost growled with frustration.
"You will make me say it, then, I see! Has your revenge not run its course?"
"Revenge?"
"Yes, revenge! For leading you on, toying with you, and making you a fool! Don't you think
I've suffered enough? Saak-Fas was the fool! Now he's gone . . . and I am glad. I was wrong about you. I thought you weak.
But I also thought you loved me. I hoped you would still want me. Was I wrong about that too? I see you often, yet beyond casual greeting you have not spoken. Will you make me beg?" She blinked furiously. "Very well! I was wrong about Saak-Fas and I was wrong about you. I do want you now!"
Stunned, Chack could only stare. For so long, his fondest wish was to hear her say such words. Now, though they stirred him, they didn't bring him joy. They only brought confusion and a trace of sadness. He gently replied.
"You did not make a fool of me. I did that myself. I was a fool. I was what you thought I was. But I'm no more that person now than a grawfish is still a graw-fish after it sheds its tail and gills and flies out of the sea.
I admire you in many ways, Selass, and am flattered that you desire me.
But I do not pine for you. I suppose I do still love you, but it does not consume me as before. I've had much else on my mind of late. Your admission and . . . declaration have come as a surprise. May I consider it?
I assure you my aim is not `revenge' or to hurt you in any way. Let us speak again, after the expedition. After we know what sort of war we face. If my answer is still important to you, I will give it then."
Shame, sadness, and consternation flashed across her eyelids, but she finally bowed and with a quick nuzzle under his chin that almost crushed his resolve, she flashed away toward the parade ground. For a very long time, he watched her weave through the throng until she was lost to view.
With a stab of guilt and astonishment, he realized he'd not even thought about her in weeks. He would have to do that now.
Matt stood on the bridgewing with a cup of . . . something in his hand. He grimaced at the foamy brew. He couldn't remember what Juan called it, but it was the local equivalent of coffee, evidently. It might even be a kind of coffee; it came from crushed, roasted beans. Not many Lemurians drank it. They used it as medicine, as a treatment for lethargy. Matt hadn't had any before, but it had earned a following among the crew. Some just called it "java" or "joe," as they always had. A few of the die-hard factionalists called it "cat-monkey joe" or "monkey-cat joe," but just as "'Cats" was becoming the general compromise term for the Lemurians, "monkey joe" was gaining steam for the brew. It seemed to follow somehow. Whatever they called it, the stuff sure didn't look like any coffee Matt had ever seen, although the aroma wasn't entirely dissimilar. Maybe it was the yellow-green foam.
The foam slowly dissipated and the liquid beneath was reassuringly black, but there remained a bile-colored ring around the edge. He willed himself to take a sip and tentatively explored it with his tongue. Not bad, he decided, surprised. There was a kind of chalky aftertaste, but that wasn't unusual for any coffee Juan made. And it did taste like coffee. Not good coffee, but the similarity was enough to fill a dreadful void he hadn't really recognized. He smiled.
Walker was tied to the new fueling pier and the special sea and anchor detail was withdrawing the hose from one brimming bunker and preparing to fill another. Chief Gray watched their progress like a hawk, lest they spill any of the thick black fuel oil on his somewhat pale deck. Under the circumstances, Matt doubted that he'd really mind if they did. This transfusion of Walker's lifeblood had raised everyone's spirits to such a degree that it would be difficult for even Gray to summon much genuine ire over a splotch on the deck.
The benevolent thunder of the main blower behind the pilothouse was almost enough to mask Matt's uneasiness about the expedition they were about to begin. An expedition that they'd planned and prepared for weeks, awaiting only this final detail. Fuel. When enough had finally been pumped, transferred, and refined, some was brought to Walker so she could fire up a boiler to run her pumps and get ready for the short trip upriver. All the while, the massive copper storage tanks on the shore continued to fill, awaiting her at the pier. Now, all was in readiness.
The rest of the expedition consisted only of Big Sal and half a dozen of the larger fishing feluccas. Together they waited, moored in the inner channel. Two other Homes had actually volunteered as well, but for this operation they would be too many. As soon as Walker completed her fueling she would join the task force and they'd enter the Makassar Strait.
From there, Walker would range ahead, screening her slower consorts.
Matt looked forward to being unleashed on the open ocean, where his ship could stretch her legs, but he felt trepidation as well.
It was a bold plan that he and Keje had designed and there was a lot of risk involved. But if they were successful they stood a chance of learning— at long last—quite a lot about the enemy. The lessons Matt had learned on the short end of the intelligence stick had been pounded well and truly home, and he'd managed to instill in Keje, at least, a similar obsession for information. So much was riding on this! Initially, success might accomplish little more than their destruction of the Grik ships in the strait—or the Asiatic Fleet's little victory in almost the same place against the Japanese. But he'd hoped that, in the long term, the strategic dividend would be all out of proportion to the effort, particularly if it led to sufficient information to roll up the Grik. If they knew the enemy dispositions better, Walker alone still had enough ammunition to wreck a lot of Grik ships. With victory, or even a breathing space, they could continue to strengthen their friends, look for Mahan, and maybe begin their search for other humans too. Those were Matt's ultimate goals. With bunkers full of fuel, they even seemed attainable.
Larry Dowden entered the pilothouse. "Skipper," he said, saluting as Matt turned.
"Exec."
Dowden glanced furtively at the other men on the bridge and lowered his voice. "Sir, I have it on good authority . . . the Mice have sneaked on board. I didn't see 'em, but I'm pretty sure they did."
Matt frowned. "Didn't they get the word when I ordered all fuel project personnel to remain behind?" Many of Walker's crew would miss the expedition. None was happy about it, but aside from having necessary assignments, Matt didn't want all his eggs in one basket anymore. Letts would remain and continue coordinating industrialization efforts, aided by Perry Brister, who was also in charge of supervising the construction of defensive works. Letts had worked himself out of a job on the ship. He was too valuable in his new, expanded role. Besides, Matt didn't want a repeat of whatever had caused the mysterious shiny black eye that he wore. Officially, he'd tripped. Karen Theimer would stay and teach their growing medical corps. Matt knew that leaving the two together would only intensify the resentment of his other officers, but it couldn't be helped. One of the nurses had to remain, and Sandra simply refused. He was glad he hadn't given the order when others were around to see him back down. He was furious with her . . . and glad she was coming. As far as Letts and Theimer were concerned, maybe "out of sight, out of mind" was the best course to pursue.
"I didn't tell 'em personally, but shoot, Skipper, I never see 'em even when they're aboard. Everybody knew it, though; the order's been posted for a week. They just ignored it."
Matt shook his head. "And they can claim they never saw it and so they didn't, in fact, violate a direct order." He sighed. "No sense throwing them off. Besides, they'd just hide." He thought for a moment. "Nobody else `deserted' back to the ship? Bradford? Lieutenant Brister?"
Dowden shook his head, grinning wryly. "Bradford almost did. He's supposed to be helping Brister with the fortifications. He is an engineer, after all, but he didn't want to miss the show. Nakja-Mur finally bribed him with a safari to hunt down a `super lizard.' Nothing short of that would have worked, I bet."
Matt chuckled, and then his expression became serious again. "I owe him. But as far as the Mice are concerned . . . Well, I'm not going to bring them up on charges. They're too damn valuable—I can't believe I just said that!—and that's exactly what I'll have to do if I make a big deal about it.
Their rig's going fine with just a caretaker now. They're no
longer indispensable, just . . . valuable."
He looked at the men working on the fo'c'sle. They were having difficulty with their usual chores since the cramped space was even further encumbered by a large apparatus that Matt hoped would soon prove useful. Some of the men stared curses at the thing as they maneuvered around it, and firing the number one gun to starboard would be tough while the thing was rigged for sea. But if that gun became essential to the operation, they'd failed anyway.
"Let them stay. They've earned it. But if they pull a stunt like this again, I won't care if they learn to piss oil. Make sure that information reaches them, if you please."
"Yes, sir."
Together, they walked across the pilothouse and Matt peered over the wing rail at the water. Even this far upriver, it was getting choppy. Above, the sky was like lead: a low, monochromatic overcast with none of the flighty characteristics of the usual daily squalls. The heavens seemed to exude a restrained, pregnant power.
"Looks like Adar's right," he mused aloud. "We may be in for a real blow." He turned and grinned at Dowden.
"Perfect."
Ben Mallory couldn't believe he was flying, particularly in such heavy weather. After the conversation in which Captain Reddy told him they'd have to wait to look for Mahan—and why—he'd been afraid the PBY would be treated like a museum relic. He'd been wrong. If the plane could let them know what was coming—and didn't fly too far—the captain was reluctantly willing to risk it. Especially now that the radio worked.
Mallory was battling through the driving wind and rain north of a cluster of tiny, rocky islands off the southwest coat of Celebes. The world was gray, and the sea below was a roiling, foamy white. The thundering, rattling, swooping turbulence was enough to make him sick, and he was enjoying every minute. He spared a quick glance at his copilot. The young sable-furred 'Cat was peering through a pair of binoculars through the open side window. His name was Jis-Tikkar, but he liked "Tikker" just fine. He was a good companion and a fast-learning "wrench." He worked as hard as anyone keeping the plane ready to fly. On this, his very first actual flight, he was enraptured by the wonder of soaring high above the world at a measly hundred and ten miles an hour. Oh, how Ben missed his P-40E!
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