Freedom's Challenge

by Anne McCaffrey

  He turned his back on the Eosi whose horrified expressions were probably the first honest reactions they had shown in centuries. He heard several gasps at what was an insult to their dignities.

  “Are they all dead yet?” Zainal asked, padding down the line of the Eosi who looked more like collapsed bags of shuddering and putrid flesh to the one that had been his brother. The Eosi host that had subsumed Lenvec still retained some of its genuinely youthful, and recognizable, facial appearance. This was fast turning to a viscous mess and to the size of the original host before subsumation. There was so little of Lenvec left even after the short time the Eosi had inhabited it. But enough to have waged a stupid and futile war against the planet which sheltered Zainal.

  “I think that does it,” the Emassi security officer said, tipping back a helmet to reveal Kamiton, a mightily relieved Kamiton. “I didn’t think we’d bring it off. I really didn’t.”

  “I always knew it was the only feasible way of eliminating them all,” Nitin said, stepping around a slow-moving rivulet of varicolored fluids.

  “We didn’t” Tubelin remarked, pointing toward the screens, some already blank.

  “Those fourteen will be scrambling to leave. They do not have enough power to regain command,” Zainal said. “Now, all we have to do is get out of this level. The sooner the better.”

  He moved toward the door—staggered would be more accurate since his emaciation and the nerve whip welts were real, if the wounds were somewhat exaggerated by dramatic additions of blood and excrement. Leaning against the wall, he shook the bulb that had been secreted between his “force” bracelets.

  “Who has the stuff?” He looked around, one shoulder resting against the wall.

  “I do,” and Kasturi came forward, holding out the flask and the little tundish with which he carefully added the lethal dust to Zainal’s innocuous-looking device.

  “Better do it all round,” Kamiton said, “while we’re where we can’t be observed.”

  Tubelin shook his head. “Even with nose plugs, the stench is awful. Will the doors keep it out long enough?”

  “Call the other guard in,” Zainal suggested.

  Nitin was nearest and, opening the door enough to see the real guard, beckoned him in. The smell wrinkled the man’s nostrils but he was too well trained to show either revulsion or hesitation. He had time to take in the scene of the mass execution. In fact, he caught his breath in astonishment and terror. And that was sufficient to inhale enough of the free dust particles in the air of the long room to ensure his demise.

  Quickly, the detail assembled outside again.

  “You did it? I can smell you did it,” their bogus guard said, touching his nostrils to make sure his nose plugs were in place.

  “Anyone passed by?” Zainal asked, and their colleague shook his head, looking relieved.

  “Then let’s get out of here,” Kamiton said, settling his helmet correctly on his brow. He looked about as the security detail formed up and nodded as Zainal resumed his inert posture between his “guards.” He had no trouble at all assuming an expression of intense and smugly self-congratulatory pride as he led his detail back the way they had come.

  The dissidents were by no means in the clear yet. Anyone with some urgent message for a Mentat could arrive in that corridor. The absence of guards at the door would be the first thing noticed and then, undoubtedly, the presence of an incredible putrefying stench would seep into the corridor. Since this was a space station, there were devices all over that should detect unusual alterations in air circulation.

  On the space station, down on the planet and across Catteni-occupied space, other dissidents awaited news that the execution had been successful. There had been enough to secure the most important Eosi installations. Once deprived of orders, many other Catteni would be so totally confused that they would not protest Emassi rulers. They had been trained too well to operate on orders and not on their own initiatives. As Zainal had said, there might not be that many Emassi dissidents but most of them were in critical positions, or could assume them. One of their number ranked high in the security section, and he had deftly changed assignments on the station to include more rebels, as well as preparing himself to take control of the space station if the executions were successful. He could do only so much until he knew the coup achieved its prime objective.

  It was Ugred, in the central communications and security section of the station, who could then send the coded message to those waiting to hear, and act upon it. On receipt, those who had waited almost a lifetime would go into action and initiate actions that would forever end Eosian domination.

  First, they had to escape the station before loyal Catteni discovered the deaths and, in turn, eliminated the perpetrators. The Emassi in control could do only so much to assist the dissidents. And it would take time for the others to complete their takeover.

  • • •

  THE FIRST SIGNAL WAS THE RETURN OF THE prisoner detail.

  “Was the Ix finally satisfied?” a High Emassi fleet officer asked, pausing to watch the prisoner dragged by, leaving a trail of blood.

  “The Ix went into spasms again,” Kamiton said smugly. He had to swallow against the nervous laughter inside him at the so accurate remark.

  “What’ll happen to him?” The Emassi nodded down at the prisoner.

  Kamiton barked an unpleasant laugh. “You know the games Eosi will play with those who displease them. I am glad I can hand him over,” and Kamiton pointed to the floor, “to the cells. He’s got until the convocation ends.”

  With a suitable bow to an Emassi of superior rank, Kamiton curtly gestured for the detail to move forward again, across the main corridor of the space station.

  If his glance took in the high-security window of space station control overlooking this space, it was more part of a general survey than a signal. He did settle his helmet more securely on his head as he crossed to the grav shaft that would take his detail and its prisoner to the lower levels.

  Reaching the appropriate level, the detail marched along, still dragging its prisoner, down the corridor and to the ship bays that ringed this level of the station, and the security Emassi paid no attention to others going about their duties.

  They reached their destination. Kamiton tapped in the security code for the locked room, and he curtly beckoned to the two carrying Zainal to bring him through first. The others hastily filed in. As soon as the panel closed, Zainal was swung up on his feet. Kamiton passed him moist towels to clean off the blood, grime, and also the slime, which was actually an antihistimine cream to protect him from the lethal dust. Kasturi peeled off some of the multiple nerve whip welts—carefully—since the first layer was genuine. Tubelin washed down his legs, while Zainal did his own arms: both used some degree of care for the gouges and slices that were visible were also genuine, if realistically enlarged. Nitin was opening a cabinet and taking out the Drassi security uniform and passed the helmet to Zainal. The erstwhile prisoner quickly inserted into his now clean cheeks the pads, which Sandy Areson had made for his first impersonation. He pulled off the unkempt wig, wincing as the glue stuck to the skin of his forehead a moment, revealing a properly trim Drassi hairstyle underneath. He put his legs through the trousers, his arms through the tunic, stood first on one leg while a boot was pushed on and tied and then on the other for the second boot to be shoved on his foot.

  The change had been achieved in seconds. No one would have suspected a delay of any kind as a detail marched out of that antechamber and toward the shuttle on which they had arrived.

  “You got a reward?” asked the Emassi in charge of that section of the hangar deck, intercepting their path to the officially marked security shuttle.

  “I expect to be honored at the next official ceremony,” Kamiton said, swelling his chest. This was quite truthful, as Kamiton’s reward was the command of the planet.

  “You did well, Emassi.”

  Kamiton merely nodded as Zainal, posing as a
n alert Drassi, opened the shuttle door so his officer could enter. The rest of the detail—and the hangar section Emassi didn’t think to count or he would have come up with the wrong number for patrol strength—filed in. The hatch slid closed and was locked on the inside and the hangar Drassi waved them off, opening his com link with hangar control to assure the security guards that all was in order for the departure of this shuttle.

  • • •

  KRIS MANAGED TO KEEP GOING THOUGH THE days seemed even longer and the nights were even more dangerous with her longings for him. Until she began to do silly things in her assigned duties, like garbling messages on the com unit. Or weeping over Zane when he had only a scratched knee, not a broken leg, and Sarah had to pinch her sharply to end the incipient hysterics. Dorothy Dwardie suggested a mild sedative. Even in the daze, which seemed to surround her during the long weeks, she did notice that someone was nearby: Sandy, Sarah, Dorothy, and occasionally Peggy and Marge. The presence of ex-Victims among her watchers afforded her a little private amusement: the carer being cared for. But she hadn’t the energy to smile over the irony. Dorothy’s presence was soothing, especially after Kris surfaced out of her self-absorption sufficiently to realize that Dorothy was probably suffering, too. Chuck had been seeing a lot of the psychologist but, as Dorothy was somewhat of a private person, Kris wasn’t at all sure if the “seeing” went both ways.

  “I apologize, Dorothy,” she screwed up enough courage to say one afternoon when she was assigned to help Dorothy teach the orphans some basic R’s.

  “Why? You’re doing a very good job, you know.”

  “Not of handling my emotions.”

  “Oh?” Dorothy smiled kindly at her. “You’re very Human, Kris, and this is a very trying time for you.”

  “And you, too?”

  “Me?”

  Kris thought for a moment she had exceeded propriety, but then Dorothy flushed and turned her face away.

  “You have the right to be worried about Chuck. I am, too, when I stop being selfish enough to realize that he’s in jeopardy as well.”

  Dorothy looked down at her hands, which picked at a frayed seam in her coverall. “There’s nothing been said…I mean, I do like his company. In fact, he’s a surprising fellow. All that ruggedness, and he’s not bad-looking either, though not the sort of man I’d say was my type…”

  Kris managed a wry smile. “Chuck’s not what he appears to be.”

  “No,” and Dorothy gave a wistful sigh, “he’s not. Yes, Dick?” And her tone abruptly altered to her professional manner as one of the orphans held out his slate for her to correct.

  That ended that exchange of confidence but it was Zane who pulled her out of her depression. It upset him terribly to see Mommy in tears when he asked where Daddy was. So he stopped asking and that made her heart ache even more. When she realized that he had stopped asking, she began to tell him tales about Zainal every evening as she put him to bed. He liked those stories a lot more than the ones she read to him. Relating their first explorations together helped Kris get a grip on herself. It also made the missing man not half as “missing.” The discreet observation tapered off and people were nice to her in whatever jobs she was assigned to do. Not too nice, for she would not have tolerated condescension from Janet or Anna Bollinger. Those two must be secretly delighted with her situation: “only what she deserves, carrying on like that with a…Catteni male.”

  So as the days dragged into a week and the weeks to the month, and then days beyond that elapse of time, she became almost inured to his absence and refused to believe that his absence would be permanent. Zainal would survive as he had survived so much: such as the flitter crash he had walked away from the day she first met him. She clung, also, to the rationalization that because they had been so close emotionally as well as physically, she was certain that a lover’s prescience would have subconsciously known he had died. She really didn’t think she was assigned most frequently to com desk duty in the bridge because she could translate Catteni messages. She decided even Ray Scott had a heart after all. She might even be the first to hear his voice. But there was little enough chatter via the com sat. Amazingly little. But this was as close as she could get to Zainal, wherever he was and whatever he was doing.

  She was asked to sit in on all the Council meetings, so she forced herself to listen to what John Beverly could report. Dystopia had been very grateful for the supplies and so had NoName. Beverly had brought back a delegation from each planet, and they had been welcomed. If there were ironic comments from some who envied Botany its advantages, that was the luck of the draw. Of course, they wanted to know every detail about the Farmers, saw their machinery in action on the big continent, saw what had been contrived of the parts, and envied the Botanists their Bubble which awed them, one and all.

  None of them spoke Catteni or even Barevi, and some of those on NoName eyed the Deski and Rugarians with suspicion. (John said very little in those meetings about the inhabitants of Dorado—at least until the KDM took the visitors back with more supplies and equipment, which Botany felt it could spare.) When Laughrey and his crew set off to return the visitors to their respective planets, he told the Council that Dorado was off his list. He had been proudly told how all the ET’s had been killed, generally as soon as possible after they had been dropped.

  “Seems that the ‘aliens’ had been killed because they were ‘different’ and not mentioned as God’s creatures anywhere in the Bible,” John said. “And I won’t say I got the courtesies my rank can expect. In fact, they ignored me whenever they could, but my crew wouldn’t let ’em, thank God.”

  “Let’s cancel them out of consideration then, shall we?” Jim Rastancil said and tore up the sheet headed DORADO. Others did the same and Kris felt a small twinge of satisfaction break through the numbness that she carried around with her.

  She had to, in her capacity as Emassi in charge of the refugees, visit them in their valley. Mostly she listened to complaints about their lack of amenities, the need for additional clothing since none had brought sufficient with them. She supplied them with Catteni ship suits, which appalled Milista. She also supplied them with needles and thread as most of the women, and certainly the children, would swim in the standardized garment. Sarah made her include some lengths of fabric since the last “shopping” trip had brought back great rolls and bales found in a warehouse. Sarah had included a child’s sewing book with sufficient illustrations to give even the Catteni women useful instructions.

  Sandy Areson had done an inventory on supplies in the mess hall and came back, looking both exasperated and amused.

  “They’ve been living off the ration bars of which there are none left.” Sandy shook her head. “As useless a bunch as I’ve ever seen.”

  “I could cook for them,” Bart said who’d volunteered to come along on this “light duty.”

  All three women pounced on him.

  “No way, José!” Emassi Khriss said. “But who knows enough Catteni to teach them how to cook? And it has to be female. I’m not going to let them know that Human males can and do cook.”

  “Zainal makes a mean grilled rocksquat,” Sarah said and then flushed, having inadvertently reminded Kris. “Sorry, luv.”

  “I wish you would all stop pussyfooting around the subject of…Zainal. But we can’t return starved women.”

  “Ha! None of them are starved, and the kids at least are playing,” Sandy said.

  “Only the younger ones,” Kris pointed out.

  “Maybe we should send the older ones down to keep Bazil and Peran company in the Maasai camp,” Bart suggested.

  Kris considered that. She had even considered bringing the boys up to the valley. But…she didn’t have that authority yet…and hoped she really wouldn’t have to deal with that pair. Well, Chuck would be handling them as “males”—if Chuck got back. She found her hand halfway to her belly and drew it back. No sense in giving anyone any more to talk about.

  “What ab
out making Janet teach ’em?” Bart said, his eyes twinkling. “It’d be her Christian duty.”

  Kris burst out laughing and almost went into the weeps because she’d let go of the rigid command she’d been exercising on herself. Sniffing and wiping at her filled eyes, she plastered the grin on her face after the initial and genuine outburst of laughter. The others looked so pleased with her reaction.

  “Now that was plain mean of you, Bart Tomi,” she said. “I just wish I had the nerve to order it.”

  “I think,” and Sandy cocked her head at Kris, “you could just about order Ray Scott to jump rope with those kids and he’d do it.”

  “Beth Isbell cooks—does a lot of the pastry in the hall, at least—and she’s a Catteni speaker,” Sarah said. “Let’s check in and see if she’d take the duty on. I think we’d better leave Bart and a couple of other men here to be sure she’s safe.”

  “Why should we fuss over them, if they’re so stupid they even let the fire go out,” Raisha asked, pointing to the chimney. She’d come aft from the bridge with Joe Marley to find out how long they’d be on the ground.

  “Zainal,” and Kris didn’t hesitate on his name, “promised to keep them safe and that means keeping them fed, too, so they don’t have a real complaint to lodge against our hospitality. And clothed. Some of us had to learn to do basic things when we got here. I’ll go check in and ask.”

  “None of us were lords, or ladies, of all we surveyed either,” Raisha said, and then sighed. “But you’re right. Why should we fault them for ignorance when all of us are ignorant of something or other that we’ve never had to do before.”

  Sally Staffer agreed to accompany Beth who was a good friend. Sally liked to sew, was teaching some of the older orphans, and her Catteni was excellent. Lenny Doyle, Dowdall, Bart, three ex-soldiers from the last drop, and Patti Sue returned and set up tents for themselves and the three female instructors.

  And that minor hiccup was smoothed over. Not that the Catteni women were pleased to be forced to do slave work. The three soldiers instructed the older boys on how to catch fish from the stream. They’d been sitting around doing nothing since they were old enough to have started some sort of training for their life’s work. They were happy enough to form a small detail and marched up and down. Their mothers also seemed happier to have them occupied.