The Man-Kzin Wars 07

CHAPTER THREE

Guardian held out the glittering datacube to Diplomat. Part of her mission was to protect her frail passenger, true. Establishing rank, however, had little to do with protection. She made the little puppeteer stretch to take the information matrix. It forced him into an extended-neck posture of submission.

Such an act was tradition and test both, Guardian reminded herself. How would the little talker react?

Diplomat avoided Guardian's eyes in dutiful respect, taking the cube with his left mouth. No challenge there.

Still, Guardian noted, his posture was as brave as possible for a puppeteer of his bloodlines. She blinked twice in acknowledgment. Diplomat's act of polite esteem secretly pleased her, though she maintained her stern expression, still holding the other puppeteer in her gaze.

Diplomat was small and vulnerable and obviously very frightened – with good reason. She was delighted that he was trying to hide his emotions, to hold his necks a bit farther away from his body in a show of what was – to him – courage.

Despite all of Guardian's threats and insults to Diplomat, she enjoyed looking after the other puppeteer. A small puppeteer like Diplomat required Guardians protection, and it warmed her to feel that needed duty. It would be a deep pleasure to die for her charge.

She would never admit as much to the little creature, of course. Guardian's facade forced other puppeteers to treat her opinions with respect and attention and more than a little fear. Her personal feelings did not enter into this or any other mission of behalf of the Hindmost.

To a Guardian of the puppeteer race, duty was All.

Such was the purpose for which Guardians had been born and bred over millennia. Duty to the Hindmost, always; such were the first words a foal of the Guardian caste heard in creche. And it was the last thought to be prized, at the end of a long life of service.

Guardian glowered a bit more to reinforce the image she projected. Diplomat bowed to her with both necks and turned to his own control console. There was a slight crunching sound as he broke the Hindmost's Seal with his teeth.

Guardian was not looking forward to the next few minutes. It would have to be handled most carefully.

I am a Guardian, she thought, not a melody-mumbling Psychists.

But a Hindmost's Command was exactly that: a command.

As she watched from the corner of her left eye, Diplomat inserted the datacube into his console reader. He whistled up the hyper-icons with a minimum of flourish, looking cool and efficient. Not a surprise, truly. Warrior knew that Diplomat was a Field Operative, not some Homeworlds fop – despite the ornate grooming on his back pelt.

Still, she was not fooled by appearances.

Guardian allowed herself a tongue-flick of a wry smile at his studied sham of confidence as Diplomat's console screens began to flicker with data. She returned to her own control console, activating the forceweb. The static charge crackled pleasantly against her battle armor, firmly holding the soldier puppeteer in place.

Unless Guardian handled Diplomat's study of the datacube's contents just so, the little puppeteer would drop into another bout of catatonia. Guardian was secretly indulgent of her charges on such missions, yes, but there was little time available for out-of-breeding-season pelt-carrying.

"Well, Honored and Wise One," she asked with rough humor, "do you care to share your initial impressions?”

"I thank you," Diplomat fluted deferentially. The tone was smooth and controlled. "I shall need some time to review the encoded information to give a proper reply.”

Guardian glanced at Diplomat. She could tell nothing of his mood or reaction from his tone or posture. Swallowing right-to-left-to-right in thought, she began to choose her words carefully.

Gently, the Guardian puppeteer told herself. But quickly…

Without music in her voice, she spoke in flat, unpuppeteer-like tones for emphasis. "I know something of the mission before us, Diplomat. I was very far in front of the Hindmost when the Outsider message was first received. Later I was in Herd with the Deepest Council, and helped prepare your briefing contained in the datacube. This is a task for Guardians only, not for puppeteers too enamored of their own burrows.”

Perhaps Guardian's false air of superiority would prick the little puppeteers own substantial pride. Such an approach often resulted in the insulted one forgetting fear – and getting on with the task at hand.

In any event, Guardian had issued an old, old insult, but one which carried little real sting. Puppeteers had not inhabited burrows and caverns since the dawn of recorded history. Guardian paused, waiting for Diplomat to respond to the crude song-phrase.

The little puppeteer said nothing, his posture giving away nothing.

Good, she mused. This one is as skilled as the Deepest Council argued.

"Still," Guardian continued, "I and my caste follow the Hindmost's Song Called Out from Far Behind. You are to act as the Hindmost's Representative to the helium beasts, and perhaps do more." Guardian's heads stared at one another for a split second in a dry chuckle of puppeteer humor. "I only hope that you acquit yourself with honor, for your mouths speak for all puppeteers this day.”

Diplomat's right head lifted from one of his console screens, the stream of data freezing in place as he looked away.

"Guardians are not known for their elegant conversational ability," Diplomat sang with just the slightest edge of reproach. "You are attempting to placate and groom my thoughts. The currycomb of your words and manner is not necessary, truly.”

Guardian cocked her right head, impressed. "Well spoken, Little Talker. I do seek to maintain your calm.”

"That is why I carry mood modifiers," the other puppeteer reminded her. "I am afraid, yes, but I acquitted myself well with the Q'rynmoi, did I not?”

"You acted like a Guardian that day, Little Talker." Warrior clicked her teeth together, squinting in respect.

Diplomat's heads faced one another, then blinked twice at her graciously. "I sense and accept the spirit of the compliment. Though few of my caste would see it as such with both eyes.”

Warrior snorted.

"Prepare me, then, for this mission of ours," hummed Diplomat, all humor evaporated.

Guardian turned both her eyes to face Diplomat.

"There are new threats in space, near our own domain." Warrior's words again lacked music, jarring the Herd-conditioned air in the lifebubble with intensity. Her right head weaved slightly, and her left tongue touched knobbed lips for a moment.

Even Guardians can feel fear, she reminded herself, It simply does not rule us, as it does the Little Ones.

"The helium beasts," Guardian continued, "have brought us news from a sector outside the realm of our race. Evidence of two new species, aggressive and threatening to puppeteer business and well-being." Diplomat rolled his left eye with the beginnings of impatience. "I do not understand the countermelody implicit in your song, Guardian. The Outsiders have done us a service with this doubtfully free information, I assume.”

She said nothing.

"But the Outsiders are allies," Diplomat sang in a falling tone of disbelief. "Our arrangements have been profitable for centuries." "True enough, Little Talker," she replied. "What are you not singing to me, Guardian?" Guardian pointed with a right forked tongue at Diplomat's console. "You will find the answers there." "I repeat myself, with all due respect to your station and grooming: prepare me," chided the little puppeteer. Guardian whistled like a teakettle, then stood stock-still. "The Hindmost," she clipped, "does not entirely trust these particular Outsiders. There is some new agenda present." Her left head dipped down to a leg holster containing what appeared to be a tightbeam disruptor, touched it for reassurance, and returned to station. She watched Diplomat shudder and droop his necks, both eyes slightly closed. The first step toward withdrawal. At length, he mastered his fear, raising necks with still-twitching neck muscles. Guardian was impressed. "You are to be the Hindmost's Voice," she reminded him. Diplomat blinked agreement. "I understand my duties, Guardian.”

"Perhaps medication would be useful," Guardian suggested. The little puppeteer chirped agreement. He reached into his supplies and tongued a blunt triangular lozenge of drugcud into his left mouth.

Guardian understood Diplomat's confusion about the Outsiders. The coldlife sentients had helped lift the puppeteers from their pre-technological society over one hundred thousand years past; had sold the puppeteer race the gravity planer, the hyperdrive, and endless safety devices.

Even the Mover of Worlds. Most importantly, the Outsiders had allowed the puppeteers to act as their agents among warmlife sentient races, for a very modest percentage. But the Outsiders always had their own agenda, and it was one that no non-cryogenic creature could possibly appreciate. It pleased her to see Diplomat square his heads. His posture was subtly more vibrant. Perhaps the drugs were helping after all. "I shall review the datacube for more details, though I reserve the right to ask further questions," he declared. "May I ask how long until we rendezvous with the Outsider ship?”

"Less than an hour," Warrior replied. "Prepare for maneuvers. The helium beasts have set up a number of force curtains around their vessel. I do not know why.”

Guardian chirped a command to her console, and activated Diplomats forceweb.

She paused, then snaked her left head around to look at Diplomat. He met her gaze with a chemically enhanced calm.

"You had better chew more drugs, Little Talker. You will need them." She turned back to her console, adjusting schematics. But she kept one head inclined slightly toward her passenger.

The datacube's contents scrolled across the twin screens in front of Diplomat, one for each head. Within a few minutes, he stopped the screens, opened his supply pack again, and swallowed another, larger drugcud. Diplomat whistled, and data resumed its inexorable flow across his screens.

Guardian had kept silent while Diplomat popped the second mood regulator oval. Now her heads whipped up and faced one another, eye to eye. She growled without her usual roughness.

"Yes," she crooned, "now you grasp the Hindmost's concern firmly with both mouths. Two warlike races with interstellar capability, and weapons of mass destruction." She paused for effect, waiting.

"They have intruded into contested Outsider geometry with reaction drives and nuclear explosives?" Diplomat asked not believing.

"Just so. And not so very long after the Pact.”

The little puppeteer drummed a hoof. "I am expected to communicate with these captives.”

Guardian blinked agreement. "The datacube contains the two downloads to your translator module. You will be able to talk to them, Little Talker.”

Diplomat continued to look at the information scurrying across his screen. He scrabbled in his pack, swallowed another regulator of drugcud. "One of them is a… carnivore." He had difficulty with the word, which was a puppeteer obscenity, unused in polite society.

"Indeed," she replied. "They are the larger of the two species, are they not? The ones that call themselves the kzin? But they are not the issue that most concerns the Hindmost, Little Talker, nor me. It is these… humans. Perhaps you recognize their morphological type.”

Diplomat fluted confusion, then fell silent as more data flowed across his screens. He shuddered, and his own forked left tongue touched his lip-fingers repeatedly. He stopped dead, tonguing the left screen to freeze mode.

Ah, Guardian thought. The hoof strikes home.

Diplomat wailed a sudden musical siren of alarm.

Guardian's heads looked at one another again in the puppeteer expression of humor. "I was wondering," she softly sang to Diplomat, who was making sounds like a demented calliope, "when you would make the connection.”

Diplomat swiftly wrapped his necks around his body, still keening in fear. The screens froze and then blanked for lack of an operator.

"These… humans are clearly Pak breeders, though they do appear different in many ways." Guardian reached over with a long neck into her own medical bag, and removed a hypospray of sedative.

Guardian considered the petite puppeteer quivering before her. His necks were tucked so tightly around his body that he looked like a foal's plaything.

She swallowed in sequence, considering. Despite appearances, this cowardly little Diplomat had saved an entire puppeteer colony world from destruction by the Q'rynmoi. Guardian knew of few of her caste Herdmates who were willing to face the personal dangers that Diplomat had. It was a difficult story to believe, however, seeing him in this state.

It was said by the Hindmost's psychists that Diplomat's corrective mindsculpting after that event had been incomplete; they had advised more memory flensing before releasing him to active status.

A Hindmost's Command remained exactly that, however. The Deepest Council had concurred.

She considered that perhaps there was more to this delicate little talker than met her own Guardian eyes. She couldn't put her lips quite on it, but there was something different. Something almost brave, despite his periodic catatonic states and whining manner. He would clearly need her help to complete this mission, as well as the reverse.

"You remember the Pak, my little Diplomat, don't you?" She spoke almost conversationally as she calmly injected the near catatonic puppeteer in the right neck. The hypospray made a hissing sound, loud in the tiny lifebubble. Guardian made adjustments to the ventilation system, flushing out Diplomat's fear pheromones with fresh, Herd-conditioned air. Diplomat stopped screaming, trembled for a moment and then seemed to fall asleep. She tightened his forceweb harness remotely.

Guardian looked at her own heads again. "Yes. The Pak are not extinct, after all. Despite the efforts of three sentient races and ten thousand years of effort." She deopaqued a small portion of the hull directly in front of her console made a few further course corrections.

Guardian settled back into her own forceweb harness and whistled a duet with herself softly. The tune soothed her, and reminded the soldier puppeteer of her first days in creche.

It was a marching song, ancient beyond measure. The music was said to be common when Guardians ancestors had led entire herds of Diplomat's forebears to new grazing grounds with the turn in seasons. The arpeggios sang volumes about order, confidence, and glowing success.

After a few moments, she reached over with a head, and fondly patted the back of the sleeping puppeteer next to her.

"Two warrior races," she sang quietly. Forked tongues flicked over both sets of lip-fingers. "Two threats to the security of the Race." Warrior paused, watching their blinking course plot intently on the hullscreen.

"Or perhaps three," she added, after reflection.

The Outsider ship grew still larger as the Wisdom of Retreat approached rendezvous.