“Magnify main screen to northwest at eleven of a clock port side,” Jon said. “Arm missile launchers. Targets are coming in fast in uneven deployment. Fire when locked on.”
The forward screen magnified the advancing waves of avians, looking so evil that both Perdimia and Cuiva, standing out of the way at the entrance to the bridge, gasped at their appearance.
“Aren’t we going airborne?” Caleb asked.
“No need,” Nimisha said. “Lordee, they’ve got some big ones today, haven’t they, Jon?”
“Are they all that size?” Caleb sounded properly awed.
“I mean the boulders they’re carrying to drop on us,” Nimisha said. “It’s not the size of the predators that makes them so dangerous. It’s their payloads.”
“Why?” Caleb asked. “Repellers should be able to cope with rocks.”
“Screen’s giving you a false picture of their actual size, Cal. Some are bigger than the Fiver from that armed tail to the nasty snout,” Nimisha said. “The Sh’im are as good marksmen as we are, but we’ve learned to shoot down as many as possible before they get in too close, because any hits over the repeller shields leave an awful mess to scrape off. Not to mention a stink in the summer.”
“I think we’ll catch most of these before they get anywhere near the perimeter of the shields,” Jon said, making a minute correction in trajectory just as the Fiver opened up. “Good man, Casper.”
“Not if Globan got there first,” Nimisha said, her expression gleeful.
“Not this time. Globan’s manning the gig, don’t you remember? Syrona’s in the skiff.” He turned his head slightly toward the three observers. “We managed to fit the Fiver’s skiff with homemade rockets. And our allies are operational, too,” he added as the batteries on the heights began bracketing the still distant avians. “Used the Poolbeg’s ordnance—what hadn’t been destroyed by scraping along the wormhole. That’s proof enough for me of the wisdom of having AI helms for emergencies.”
“I gather that the Acclarke’s AI took over when it was sucked into the wormhole?” Caleb asked.
Nimisha gave a wicked laugh. “I got the distinct impression that Meterios went paralytic.”
“Then wasn’t it fortunate that the AI was preprogrammed,” Caleb said wryly. “I gather the Poolbeg was not?”
“Captain Querine was a damned good pilot, and Peri Swanick was the jig on helm and had taken us safely through two asteroid belts earlier on—” Jon nodded Sh’im-like. “—but no human reflexes are fast enough to handle a transit as treacherous as that wormhole. You’ll see that from the state of the other wrecks.”
“Fiver got off with only minor scrapes and Helm is still apologizing,” Nimisha said.
“I think I see what you mean about the attackers.” Caleb pointed to the screen as they all watched avians disintegrating in the air, their disparate parts leaving bloody trails as they dropped to the plains well before the spread of the settlement. “Your confederates are good marksmen.”
“More avians attacking from starboard, coming in over the hills,” Helm said.
“Order Globan and Syrona to intercept,” Jon said. “Hoping to catch us with the sun in our eyes, are they?”
“The avians have that much intelligence?” Caleb asked, surprised.
“Whatever they use for brains is sufficient to make them a real nuisance,” Nimisha said. “We’d hoped that Doc’s little ploy would work.”
“What was that?” Caleb asked.
“Leaving out treated bait that would inhibit yolk-formation in the females,” Nimisha said. “We haven’t had a raid in so long I was hoping that had done the trick. In the last two spring seasons we’ve cleared out as many nests as we could find.”
“Don’t you hunt them?” Caleb asked.
“Constantly,” Nimisha said.
“You never hunted at home, Mother,” Cuiva said in a scared little voice. She was standing right up against Perdimia, who had a comforting arm about her.
“Hunting here is not a sport, Cuiva, dear. It’s a necessity—both for food and survival, as you are witnessing,” Nimisha said.
“I perceive the distinction, Mother.”
“We’d’ve spared you this, believe me,” Jon said, his fingers busy on the touch panel to adjust the launchers’ trajectories. “The avians have an uncanny instinct for appearing at precisely the most inappropriate moments . . .”
“Like when our crops are ready to be harvested,” Nimisha added, desperately trying to find some way to alleviate Cuiva’s distress. “You don’t have to watch, you know.”
“If this has been part of your life, Mother, and will be part of mine, I must learn to accept it.”
“Well said, Cuiva,” was Caleb’s accolade.
Cuiva stood up straighter, gently disengaging herself from Perdimia’s support. She watched for a few more moments while the Five B’s missiles joined the hails from the smaller ships, cutting down the avians as they tried to swoop down on the eastern side of the settlement.
“Aren’t aerial displays often put on to welcome visitors to new planets?” Cuiva asked, trying for a lighter tone.
“Not quite this kind,” Nimisha said, but she gave her daughter a grateful glance. Then a heartbeat later, she added, “I think that might have been their last fling. At least today. We certainly have decreased the numbers they can put in the air. Fiver?”
“Yes, ma’am?”
“Do the cliff batteries see any more incoming from the east?”
“Casper here, Nimisha. Syrona, Globan, and I are going to make sure. Reset the trajectories to lob shots over the hills, will you? Just in case?”
“Will do,” Nimisha said, glancing over to see Jon’s fingers busy on the touch controls.
“Reset,” he said, his hands poised to hit the toggle at the first hint of more trouble.
“Any ground casualties?” Caleb asked with understandable concern.
Nimisha started to nod, then switched to shaking her head, and asked Helm to bring up the side screens to show where his crew, the other humans, and the Sh’im had taken refuge well under the repeller shield that protected the settlement. A siren blared out the end of the emergency. Those in the Five B could see the excited reception of the all clear, with humans dancing around with the much smaller Sh’im as if they had established friendly relationships during the air raid.
“There’s no ill wind that doesn’t blow some good, is there,” Nimisha said, rising and stretching the tension out of her shoulders before she embraced her daughter. “Better now than during the Necklacing.”
When Jon saw the stricken look on the girl’s face, he added hurriedly, “They’re dawn or dusk attackers, Lady Cuiva. Your ceremony’s safely scheduled for noon.”
“So my birthday fireworks were a little early,” Cuiva said and, though her voice was a little shaky, she managed a fairly humorous grin.
“Attagirl!” Jon grinned approvingly at her.
“D’you have any more surprises like this on your Erehwon?” Caleb asked in a dry tone.
“None quite as dangerous as those,” Jon said. “As Nimisha mentioned, we haven’t had a raid in a while. Either they saw you landing and thought to catch us off guard . . .”
“If they’re clever enough to think of such a thing,” Nimisha put in.
“Which I doubt,” Jon replied. “They should have got the message that now we’ve got ships, the cliff batteries, and enough ammunition to keep hammering them until they leave, that maybe they should give up.”
“Or,” and Nimisha didn’t like to voice the suspicion, “they’ve called in reinforcements from the other continents and that means they’re more intelligent than we’ve suspected.”
“Fiver’s Helm wishes me to inform you that the number of avian casualties is the largest so far on record,” reported the Five B Helm.
“I can’t say I’d be sorry if the species does commit mass suicide,” Nimisha said. “Oh, I shouldn’t say such things, love,” she added when she saw the st
ricken look on Cuiva’s face. “But those monsters killed so many of the Poolbeg’s crew.”
“My deepest apologies, Captain Svangel,” Cuiva said with formal but sincere remorse. “I had no idea you had suffered any casualties from those dreadful creatures.”
“How were you to know, Lady Cuiva?” Jon said kindly.
“Briefly, are there any other predators of that ferocity that we have to guard against while we’re on-planet?” Caleb asked.
“There’s a smaller continent,” Jon said, “that has some very large grazers that can be dangerous if something stampedes them but we tend to stay clear of their herds whenever possible. The smaller grazers are easily frightened and very fast in making strategic retreats. We haven’t seen any of the slime slugs on this continent . . .”
“Which is just as well,” Nimisha said with a grateful sigh.
“Plenty of scavengers, usually small and ground burrowers that are attracted by the smell of blood. In fact, I suspect they’re already at work on this morning’s carnage,” and Jon gestured to the hills from which the last attack had come and then the distant area beyond the repeller screen, “cleaning up the . . . remains. Lakes and rivers, other than the ones we have seined out and made safe here at Clifftown and the five Sh’im towns, are not suitable for bathing. I’d warn your crew, sir. We have domesticated deer-like creatures to use as a farm and draft animal and the Sh’im are trying to get some other types that might be stronger for such things as hauling heavy loads.”
“Sir—” Kendra Oscony, Ian Hadley, and Nazim were all trying to get through the hatch at the same time. Kendra, being the slimmest, slid in sideways, saluted. “Reporting for duty.”
“Good of you, XO,” Caleb said, “but I’m given to understand that the natural . . . denizens of the planet will remove the . . . remnants of the recent air attack.”
“They will?” Hadley asked, his eyes wide. “Some of those—” He cleared his throat hastily and rephrased what he had been about say. “—monsters are the biggest things I’ve ever seen alive.”
Jon explained about the scavengers, and Caleb issued the warnings with the advice to pass them on until he could post the notice as well as vids of the indigenous wildlife.
“Those Sh’im are dead shots,” Hadley said, shaking his head in approval.
“With only three digits to work with, too, on controls built for five,” Nazim said.
“I gather you had a chance to become acquainted with our allies?” Jon asked, grinning.
“Hell’s bells—sorry, ma’am,” Ian interrupted himself with a grimace at his rough speech. “Before your com message reached us, we’d been tackled and sat on, so we couldn’t make a dash back here to assist.”
“Whoever was flying that gig is some pilot,” Kendra said approvingly.
“Globan Escorias, formerly of the Acclarke,” Jon said.
“Escorias has a reputation for being a clever pilot,” Kendra said with a grin. “Then who was manning your Fiver, ma’am?”
“Please address me as Nimisha, Kendra,” she said firmly, and Kendra made a grimace of apology. “Helm handles the Fiver’s offensive.”
“And the Five B’s, as well,” Caleb said, forestalling Kendra’s next question.
“Sort of makes gunners redundant, doesn’t it?” Hadley said with dismay.
“Only if you’re shy of personnel, Ian,” Nimisha said. “We need marksmen when we hunt for food here on Erehwon, so if that’s an interest of yours and your commander has no objections, I’m certain you can join a hunt.”
“Young Tim tells me he leads them,” Ian said, still slightly miffed.
“Young Tim?” Cuiva asked.
“Syrona’s twelve-year-old,” Jon said. “He’s our resident language specialist.”
“He was displaying his skill during the raid,” Kendra said, grinning. “And taught us a few words and when to nod and when to shake our heads,” she added with feeling.
“That’s where Cherry is,” Ian Hadley said. “She’s got units she’ll want to adapt but she’s vowel deep in the sounds the Sh’im make. You never mentioned their size or their three fingers.”
“There’s a lot we haven’t had time to mention,” Nimisha said, thinking of the other surprises in store for her daughter.
“I think Lady Cuiva’s feeling a bit faint, Lady Nimisha,” Perdimia began.
Even as Nimisha rushed to help get Cuiva to the nearest chair, she added, “Nimisha, please, Perdimia. And Cuiva. We don’t have my dam to scowl at us for dispensing with formalities. Sometimes we’ve precious little time to worry about protocol on Erehwon. Cater, what’s Cuiva to have next?”
“Broth and it’s ready.”
“Oh. Would you get it please, Perdimia?”
“Is it just dizziness?” Caleb asked, anxiously.
“I’m fine, really I am,” Cuiva replied, but the hand she tried to use to dismiss her problem was noticeably shaking.
“What do you expect, overloading the girl with so much excitement barely out of sleep?” Doc said. “Cater’s put the necessary additives to the broth”
“Perhaps if you took her to the relative quiet of the Fiver,” Caleb suggested.
Nimisha and Jon exchanged guilty glances. “Relative quiet” with young triplets depended entirely on their whimsical feeding times.
“Casper’s?” Jon suggested and immediately cancelled that idea. “No, Hope and the twins will be there.”
“What’s the matter with the Fiver? It’s only a step away. I’ll carry her,” Caleb began.
“Let’s let her drink the broth first, shall we?” Nimisha said brightly.
“She can stay here, of course,” Caleb said, “but we thought you’d like her with you.”
Kendra cleared her throat. “I think that perhaps there are others staying in the Fiver?”
She managed to avoid direct eye contact with Nimisha by striding over to the dispenser and asking for two coffees. She brought one back to hand to Caleb, who absently thanked her.
“Yes,” Nimisha said, still not quite having the moral courage to deal Cuiva yet another shock, “that’s right, Kendra.”
“We have children,” Jon said bluntly. “We had no way of knowing how long any rescue mission might take,” he went on, addressing Cuiva more than the others.
“Understandable,” Caleb remarked amiably. “First duty of the marooned explorer is to survive.”
Nimisha was relieved at how well Caleb reacted to the initial announcement. If only he doesn’t fault Jon when the full truth is known.
“It is one reason exploratory crews are mixed,” Jon added, carefully choosing his words and still looking straight at Cuiva.
“You mean, I have a brother or sister?” Cuiva asked.
“Not slow on the uptake, is she?” Kendra remarked drily.
“Twins, in fact,” Jon said very brightly. “They run in my family. I’m a twin.”
“Oh, Mother, if you knew how I yearned for siblings . . .” Cuiva had recovered sufficiently to hug her mother enthusiastically. “Boys or girls?” she asked Jon.
“Actually, both.” He cleared his throat, and rattled on, trying to get to the critical part—the recent arrival of the triplets. “Tim was the only child who survived our initial attempt to increase the human population. There was a pretty nasty fever we couldn’t seem to reduce with what medicines we had left. Just before Nimisha arrived, Syrona got pregnant with Hope, who’s four now. Then Syrie had twins, too.”
“She did?” Cuiva replied, blinking.
Caleb was beginning to wonder at the curious recital of Erehwon genesis, but all Cuiva heard was the last.
“Twins?” She exclaimed, her eyes round, “Mother, you had twins?”
Nimisha gave a nervous laugh.
“Two sets of twins did much to increase the esteem in which the Sh’im hold us humans,” Jon continued laboriously.
“More than your ability to destroy those avians?” Caleb asked, more confused than surprised. “And
erect repeller shields?”
“I think it’s a species sort of thing,” Nimisha put in. “Sh’im females start breeding at two years, have two to three offspring every year for the next ten.”
“But we’re humans,” Caleb said in objection.
Kendra cocked her head and then ducked away, grinning.
“Oh, please, Mother, could I meet our twins right away? How old are they?” Cuiva asked eagerly.
“I’d say about three years,” Kendra said. “They were with Dr. Qualta and Valina Kelly when the attack started. Your sister resembles Lady Rezalla. Don’t know who the boy looks like.”
“Then will you kindly tell me exactly what’s bothering the pair of you?” Caleb asked in a command tone. “You’ve acted with common sense and practicality, considering your situation.”
“What bothers us—” Jon began again, and stopped.
“Is that our Doc”—Nimisha rushed in with the rest of the explanation—“is of the opinion that there’s some element in the soil of this planet that encourages fertility. Grazers and even the boks have multiple births, too.”
“So who’s on the Fiver?” Cuiva asked.
“Triplets,” Nimisha said and pointed a finger at Jon and then at herself. “We’ve named them Tionel, Tyrone, and Teresa.”
Cuiva stared, shocked, for a long moment at her mother, gulped, and then burst out laughing. “So I’m big sister to five brothers and sisters?”
“I’m afraid you are, dear heart, but don’t for an instant think that diminishes my love for you, my firstborn and body-heir.”
Cuiva embraced her mother so tightly that Nimisha gave a little squeak. “Of course not, mother mine. Only we’ll have to figure a way to keep such news from Lady Rezalla. She’d be appalled!”
The tension that had been growing during that drawn-out recital evaporated in laughter and congratulations.
“I must say, Mother, you have certainly provided me with a spectacular birthday,” Cuiva said, standing and urging her mother to her feet. “I must see them. I really must.” She turned to the Doc. “And don’t you dare deny me.”
“Joy is a far greater stimulant than any I could give you, young Cuiva.”
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