The Man-Kzin Wars 07

CHAPTER SIX

Carol Faulk waited for the centrifuge in her head to quit spinning. It did not, and the rotor seemed a bit unbalanced to boot.

There had been too many changes since they had first detected the kzin ships back in the Sun-Tzu. And all of them far too quickly.

The battle between the Sun-Tzu and the kzin spacecraft. Bruno nearly burning out his brain from the EMP. The dogfight between Dolittle and the ratcat singleship. Then the moon-ship of another alien race somehow dropping them from nearly 0.8 lights to nothing, and the whiplike aliens from that huge craft dismantling Dolittle. Not only did she and Bruno wake up in an alien zoo near a comatose kzin, but now another type of alien confronted them. Too much.

Intelligent creatures with two heads, one of which spoke Belter Standard! They looked like bizarre mutant deer costumes from a masquerade party, with one-eyed heads at the ends of what should be arms. Like dual hand-puppets.

Puppeteers? Carol considered.

She shook her head again. The cobwebs were starting to clear, but slowly. She had to put her mind on a battle footing. Curiosity began to overtake shock in her mind. Okay, she thought. So you are facing three sets of aliens now. What's the big deal?

These newest aliens waited in what seemed somehow like politeness. The big one, loaded down with weaponry, said nothing and made no move.

Carol wanted to take control. Maybe there was a way out of this mess.

Yeah, right.

Bruno continued to chuckle softly at the implausible sight of the two creatures, with an almost hysterical undertone. Was it too much, too fast for him?

"Knock it off," she hissed at him. "Why? They look like something out of three-D, put together by people suffering from… ah, chemical enhancement. Kidvid aliens.”

"Yeah," Carol whispered, smiling despite herself. "A puppet show on braindust." "It's a little tough to take them seriously. And that might not be smart." Carol frowned and narrowed her eyes. Bruno was right; the aliens looked more laughable than imposing at first glance. The Outsiders appeared far more frightening. Because they were more alien looking? Or because they had defeated a kzin singleship and dismantled Dolittle?

Even with the snaky necks, the three-legged aliens looked silly. But what about the big one's weapons? she reminded herself. Her singleship fighter-pilot reflexes were making the back of her neck crawl. That subconscious danger signal made her very suspicious. Carol had learned to trust her hunches while fighting kzinti in the borderland of Sol.

Things were seldom what they seemed in space. Carol poked Bruno in the ribs with a forefinger for emphasis. "I think you're right. Don't underestimate them.”

"I agree," he nodded.

"The big one in particular seems locked and loaded for a whole herd of angry bandersnatch. Look at the gear it's carrying, Tacky, Edged weapons and laser tech at the same time? Makes no sense." Bruno's smile faded as he thought it over. "Thing about aliens is… " he began. "… they're alien," she finished with him in a tired chorus. "Many thanks to your old buddy Buford Early." "The real one, that is," Bruno agreed. Carol took a deep breath and faced the three-legged aliens visible through the bubble-window. "How do you know us?" she demanded.

The smaller of the two aliens' twin heads suddenly whipped up, facing one another eye to eye. Just as quickly, the aliens necks returned to their previous posture. Carol wondered what that meant. "Captain Faulk," it fluted in mellow tones, "time is, as I stated earlier, of the essence. Still, it would perhaps be more conducive to swift results if we shared names. Labels are, after all, important to your species. Am I not correct?”

Carol felt an incongruous smile spread across her face. She just couldn't help it. The aliens two heads cocked in different directions, the single eyes in each head blinking with almost human-looking lashes. "Captain Faulk?" it sang. "Is this communications module translating my words properly? You are not responding.”

"Oh, we understand you," Bruno broke in, sounding both tired and amused. "We just have a little trouble believing in you." The alien looked at Bruno for a few seconds, then turned back to Carol. "We, too, have difficulties when meeting new species. May I continue?”

The odd alien waited until Carol finally shrugged agreement. "Excellent," it warbled. "You may call me Diplomat, after my profession." One head gestured cautiously at its companion. "This one you may address as Guardian, or… " Here the alien paused, an odd and somehow hesitant note in its voice. "… Warrior." Carol pulled on her lower lip. "Are we out of the waveform guide and into the emitter array, then?" After a pause, the smaller alien's twin necks snapped upward, the two flat heads facing each other, eye to eye. Again, the heads immediately returned to a normal posture.

Normal, Carol reflected, for a three-legged alien. And where was the beasts brain? Not in those tiny flat heads. The midsection? The creature spoke, the voice unmistakably that of a sultry-throated young human woman. "Ah, I at length apprehend your meaning from symbolic context. It is an attempt at something like discordant synthesis, or… humor." Bruno chuckled out loud and leaned close to Carol's ear. "I see that your Belter lack of humor is appreciated even by alien species," he whispered, breath warm and comforting.

Carol ignored him, looking directly at the weaponry carried by the larger alien. She then raised an eyebrow at the smaller one.

It whistled a high melodic note. "To answer your unspoken supposition, Captain Faulk, you have nothing to fear from my quiet companion. Under normal circumstances, you would never have the opportunity to perceive that particular caste of my race.”

Bruno crossed his arms and spoke up. "That is what you say, my friend.”

Carol was slightly annoyed at Bruno's interruption, but he did have a point. Military discipline had its drawbacks.

"Quite so, Mr. Takagama," replied the little alien. "However, I should point out that had I or our hosts intended you harm, you would not have been repaired and awakened.”

"Repaired?" Carol was confused.

"Of course. You both received a very high dosage of ionizing radiation and were severely damaged during your… ah… acquisition." The small alien hummed for a moment. "Of course, you were not so severely damaged as your more aggressive and combative opponent in the next environment locus.”

It gestured with a loose-lipped head toward the clear aperture Carol had seen earlier. That bubble-window still displayed the fallen kzin next to his singleship. The whitish tendrils wrapping the orange-furred figure were moving slowly.

Bruno nudged Carol. "That ratcat must have received Principle knows how high a dose when the Sun-Tzu exploded. How could they repair such damage so quickly?”

Before Carol could reply, the larger of the two aliens trumpeted loudly. The other alien fluted and sang back.

"My esteemed colleague is quite correct," the smaller alien crooned, honey voiced. "The briefing with our hosts was quite explicit that haste was crucial. There is not time to deal with these niceties, as I mentioned earlier. We must take action, with your help.”

"I don't understand," Carol frowned.

"Nor should you at this point. Suffice it to say that because of your… altercation… with these… kzin creatures… you have succeeded in rousing forces you would not have wished to disturb, had you but known. That difficulty must be addressed immediately.”

The larger of the three-legged aliens trumpeted again, a martial brass band.

"Again, my colleague is quite right," sang the alien called Diplomat in clear bell-like tones. "If we live long enough to address the problem properly.”

Frustration grew in Carol. She knew that they were in trouble, but it irked her not to know that trouble's extent. "At least tell us what will be done with us, why we have been captured.”

The little alien cocked both heads at Carol in different directions. "You have not been captured, Captain Faulk.”

"What would you call it, then?" drawled Bruno. "It seems to me that the universe has been pushing us around a lot.”

"Mr. Takagama, are you feeling well? Paranoia is not a common condition for your naive species, according to my briefings. As for the term 'capture,' I would think the word 'rescue' more appropriate, were I you.”

"Rescued from what?" asked Carol, feeling a cold chill run across her shaven skull and down her back.

Now they were getting to it. "From the Zealots," replied the small alien. "A delicate balance of power has been upset by your unwitting actions.”

Carol did not like the sound of this. "Zealots?" The alien called Diplomat sang quickly. "There exist different factions of our low-temperature hosts.

Some are traders in information and goods to life-forms like ourselves. Other factions have… ah… more obscure concerns." "Obscure?" Bruno prodded at the alien, seeming just as out of place as Carol felt. "You mean hostile?" A slow roll of one of the heads, flashing eyes. "The Zealots are a Traditionalist group with very different attitudes than our hosts. They will arrive soon, and will attempt to destroy us all. Thus, we must most assuredly not be present at that time." Again, the enclosure with its false sky and too-green grass seemed to whirl around Carol. The alien ground pushed firmly up against her feet, but she felt as if she were in free fall.

"Bruno?" she murmured. She glanced over and saw that his eyes were narrowed, face pinched. "Yes, Captain-my-captain?" Carol sighed. "We appear to have fallen right into someone else's war." A snort. She felt Bruno squeeze her arm. "You sure know how to show a fella a good time." Carol turned back to the aliens. "What happens now?" She needed more information, fast, but the issue of their fate needed to be settled first.

Again, the creature cocked both heads in different directions. An expression of confusion? "What every intelligent being would do under these circumstances." Carol licked her lips. "And that would be?… " "We run," chorused both the little alien and Bruno.