ordered.
"You'll do no such thing," Gantulga said. He was approaching Zoltan with sidearm raised. There was a grinding sound as the nearest cocoon split all the way, and the developed adult began to emerge. "Put your hands on your helmet," Gantulga said. Contadino approached Zoltan slowly, his face in a blue grimace behind the helmet shield. "Giann, let me take care of this."
"Zoltan, ignore them and toss the charges!" Kovacs shouted. Zoltan looked over at the hatching creature as it began to plant white, muscular limbs on the ground. Whip-like tendrils, perhaps antennae, unfurled from beneath a red cephalon, and forward limbs began dragging the entire mass toward the water. The other adults began to follow the same procedure. An unfamiliar arrangement of muscles rippled over their arched, pale bodies. The black tendrils undulated violently, smacking the surrounding rocks.
"You son of a bitch," Contadino said and rushed toward Zoltan. Suddenly one of the tendrils whipped around and penetrated Contadino's suit. He screamed briefly as he was lifted high into the air. The tendril cracked again, and Contadino was tossed into the ocean.
"I should kill you where you stand," Gantulga said.
"I have weapons powerful enough to stop them. Let me. You now know they're hostile."
"I don't know anything, and neither do you. You attacked them."
"So you're going to stand there and defend them after they killed one of your crewmates? This world needs to be made safe for a human presence. I don't know whose side you're on, but I'm on the side of humanity." Now the creatures all had left their husks behind as they dragged themselves down the self-made path toward the water.
"You think that because in centuries hence we might have a waystation or an observation post on this world, that gives you the right to exterminate everything—everyone—who already lives here?"
"Don't talk about rights out here. We are lightyears from any earthly law. See an opportunity, grab it. It's that simple."
"I don't have time to deal with your malfunctioning mind's amorality. Sorry if it must be this way, but I will use lethal force to stop you."
"Morality? Save your schoolboy conventional thinking for the insulated comforts of your home, which was provided to you by the economy and might of Global Unity."
"Morality exists independently of any social entity's ability to enforce it."
"I grow weary of your naivete. The only law out here is the survival of the fittest."
"Wrong. I am the law." Gantulga fired. A bright green line flashed in the mist with a thunder-snap, and Zoltan crumbled into embers. The metallic pieces of his suit glowed yellow in the heap of black ash.
"He might have surrendered!" Feher said. "Or we could have disarmed him, taken him prisoner."
Gantulga holstered his weapon while staring at Zoltan's remains. "He didn't know the difference between morality and law." He turned to Feher. "I was never going to let him live, not since he destroyed one of those beings. I just wanted to determine his motivations."
"Gantulga!" Kovacs was screaming over the comm line. "What did you do?"
"Doctor Tao is in the lab with her," Gantulga said to Feher. "Come on, we have to go save him."
Feher looked at him, and then nodded in his helmet.
"Don't worry, I'll try to take her prisoner first," Gantulga said. Feher nodded again, but Gantulga did not see. He had started walking toward the skiff.
Feher followed. He paused once to look back, and saw Zoltan's ashes strewn in a long, black line by the wind. The mist momentarily parted, but Feher could not catch a glimpse of the massive animals. There remained only ripples on the surface of the sea.
* * *
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