Thousandstar

  "That might be neutral. Just an aural scan, no transfer, necessary to verify the situation before acting."

  'Maybe,' she agreed dubiously.

  They had no more time to consider. Swoon was rolling back, still pursued by Slitherfear. She was leaking water from a wound; he had evidently caught her and gouged out a small chunk of flesh with one pincer. "Help me, Heem!" she sprayed. "He will kill me, then you, unless we fight him together. I can not roll much more."

  'Help her,' Jessica decided. 'She is no threat to us! He is!'

  "First this, just in case," Heem sprayed. He touched the machine's control-globe, moving the indicator to the neutral double-knob-line position. Then he rolled out to intercept the Squam.

  Slitherfear immediately turned his attention to Heem. He knew where his most formidable opposition rolled. Swoon rolled around behind the machine and settled, trying to stop her leakage of fluid and recover strength. "Be alert for him, Heem!" she jetted. "He caught me by moving slow, then leaping suddenly forward. He's invulnerable! I tried to lead him over the edge of a drop I found, but he was too cunning."

  'I thought we were going to fight the Squam together,' Jessica grumped. 'She's turning the whole job over to us.'

  "Will the machine abolish him?" Swoon sprayed, nudging up to it. Her wound seemed to be closing nicely.

  "That machine is too dangerous to use!" Heem sprayed, alarmed. "It may react against the operator." But his keenest worry was that she would try to use it against the Squam—and catch the HydrO instead. Because he and the Squam would be moving quite rapidly and erratically. Her "help" could be disastrous!

  'Especially since we aren't sure about that setting we put it on,' Jessica agreed. 'It may be neutral—but it could be something else. Like self-destruct.'

  Slitherfear leaped, his whole body flexing, propelling himself from the floor. All three appendages extended forward, pincers closing.

  Heem rolled adeptly to one side and fired his sharpest, hottest jet at the most accessible juncture: the emergence of limb from torso.

  He scored. The effect on the overconfident Squam was devastating. That limb went lax, not even able to fold properly into its slot. "You thought you had an easy mark, did you." Heem sprayed, not caring that the creature could not understand him without the translator. "Now we settle it, killer of juveniles!"

  Slitherfear was wounded, but not stupid. He oriented on Heem more carefully now, keeping his two remaining pincers close to his body, allowing Heem a fair shot only at the useless limb. Naturally Heem did not waste his effort on that. He rolled around, but the Squam turned with him, on guard. It was necessary to get close, to score a crippling shot—but then he would be within range of the pincers.

  Slitherfear lunged at him. Heem rolled back, this time finding no opening. He had beaten the other Squam, so long ago in the arena, by forcing him to close up completely, so that he could not fight, then nudging him into deep water, Slitherfear refused to be cowed, and in any event, there was no water here. The monster lunged again, cautiously, and Heem retreated again, seeking an opening that did not materialize. This was no easy contest!

  'The only easy contests are those in which Erb tears up Squam, or Squam tears up HydrO, or HydrO needles Erb,' Jessica said. 'By developing your finesse with needles you have merely achieved parity. You still must find a way to defeat an equivalent adversary.'

  Some encouragement! Again the Squam lunged, and again Heem dodged. 'Look out!' Jessica cried, as Heem banged into the base of the Ancient machine. He had been paying attention only to the Squam, neglecting his environment. He rebounded from the metal—and Slitherfear leaped twice as fast and far as before and caught him with one pincer-set.

  "That's what he did to me!" Swoon sprayed, rolling back. She was not much help either.

  The pain was terrible, but Heem focused on the necessary. Because the pincers were anchored in his flesh, they could not be retracted or moved quickly. He aimed carefully and slanted a single hard needle into the vulnerable juncture.

  Again, the effect was gratifyingly immediate. The pincers went slack. The Squam had lost another extremity! One more and he would be helpless, and Heem would be able to orient his needles at leisure, drilling in between the scales until he punctured the vulnerable interior. He was not merely a match for this monster, after all; he had an easy victory! His visual accuracy and coordination were devastatingly effective.

  The Squam lunged—for the Ancient machine. That had been Slitherfear's objective! He had been maneuvering for this approach, not really trying for Heem—and now all three limbs were back in action. 'Heem, we've been suckered!' Jessica cried with dismay.

  Heem was completely unrolled. All his practice, for nothing! All his confidence, false! The Squam had known what Heem would try, and pretended it was working. Heem had deceived himself, thinking he could—

  'Heem, we haven't lost!' Jessica screamed. 'We've just taken a small tactical setback. He expects you to give up now, but you won't. Get back in there and fight!' And she drove him forward with the image of a booted Solarian foot, swinging at him.

  Heem jetted so violently he virtually hurtled across the chamber. He smashed into the Squam—but this time Slitherfear held firm, braced for the impact, trying to maintain possession of the machine. Heem needled at all three extremities simultaneously, utilizing the salvo accuracy he had practiced against the rats.

  And for once the Squam really had underestimated him. Slitherfear fell back in pain. His limbs had not been nullified, but the needles had obviously hurt. Heem rolled after him, needling again in the same places, deepening the hurts. He also shot a jet at the air-intake hole. The Squam choked again, but fastened one set of pincers firmly on Heem's flesh, near enough to the spot just injured to prevent Heem from needling effectively. Heem tried to pull away, but could not without leaving his flesh behind. This time he was really caught.

  He felt something awful. Not just the fact of his predicament, but a kind of sickness suffusing him, fuzzing his awareness, causing him to hate his very existence. All his civilized values seemed meaningless; it was better to deal on a purely selfish basis, to destroy all opposition ruthlessly, to—

  'Heem, it's the scrambler! It's scrambling your aura too, and mine, where they overlap his. It's driving us both crazy! We've got to get away!' But he couldn't get away. The pincers were inexorable. They held too big a section of his flesh. If he ripped free, he would die. Yet if he did not—

  'Remember Sickh!' Jessica cried. 'How you moved her out of the water!'

  What did Sickh have to do with this? Oh. Heem thought it impossible, but he tried. He jetted himself into a violent roll, drawing the Squam along after him, and the creature's body fell over his own and crashed to the floor beyond. It was after all possible! But the triple claw retained its cruel grip.

  Heem rolled on, over Slitherfear, needling him in passing, keeping him distracted while velocity built up. He rolled beyond, drew the Squam up again, and slammed him over again, and needled him again. Slitherfear might have been able to stop it by shifting his weight at the appropriate moment to counter Heem's effort, but did not understand what was happening. HydrOs always tried to pull away from Squams, not to roll over and under them!

  Heem found a looseness developing between scales, where the Squam's body was being wrenched about, and needled there repeatedly. A third time he hauled the Squam up, this time slamming him into a wall. He needled the gap between scales again, using his hottest water.

  'Heem—' Jessica cried.

  He heaved Slitherfear up yet again, to slam him again.

  'Heem, I think you can stop. I think he's dead.'

  He paused. He no longer felt the sickness of the scrambler; his mind was clearing. The claw still gripped, but it was a death grip; the animation was fading from the body of the Squam. The creature could only take a certain amount of shock, when its whole body was involved; its armor became a liability. Heem had killed his enemy by beating him to death.

&nb
sp; Heem shifted his body cautiously. Now he was able to draw himself free. 'I think he was weak, too,' Jessica said. 'From the rigors of the race, and his unnatural stomach, and that awful scrambler. He thought he could win by treachery and brutality. When you showed that you really could fight him—'

  "You showed him," Heem sprayed. "You drove me, you guided me when I was defeated. You saw clearly the paths I could not find, that made victory possible. Without you—"

  'I had faith in you,' she said. 'Because with all your alien foibles, such as lack of limbs and sight, you're still a better man than any I know at home. I—'

  "No, my turn! I love you, alien female! Without you I could not have won. Without you I could not endure."

  "Heem of Highfalls!" It was Swoon of Sweetswamp, near the Ancient machine, recovered enough to hail him with a jet. She was of course unconscious of his internal dialogue. "Do you survive?"

  "I survive," he sprayed. "The Squam is dead."

  "Then you are the winner of the Competition. Yet if I had not distracted the Squam, weakening him by the chase—"

  "True," Heem agreed, feeling generous. "Your presence helped. It got him away from the machine, gave me time to study it."

  "So you understand the operation of the Ancient device?"

  "Somewhat, perhaps, thanks to your—"

  "Then would it not be fair to share the victory with me? The honor to Star HydrO would be unabated, and there is enough in this complex for more than a single Star to exploit. The mechanisms of the tower, the machine—there must be other things too, of similar value."

  "There are other treasures," Heem agreed, thinking of the planetarium. "Yet the rules of the Competition specify—"

  "The rules specify that the winner takes the site," she sprayed. "But who is the winner when it has taken more than a single entity to achieve it? This becomes in effect a relay race, and all who participated in the winning effort should share in the profits of that victory."

  'She does have a point,' Jessica agreed internally. 'I think you could afford to agree. The agreement might not have force with the Competition Authority, but that would not be your fault. Offer her a quarter share of the proceeds of the site.'

  "Would you consider a quarter share for your Star?" Heem asked Swoon.

  "I would prefer a half share," Swoon sprayed. "I could be most appreciative, Heem, in the name of the Star I represent. My transferee can promise you rather substantial long-term personal recompense—"

  'She's trying to bribe you, Heem!' Jessica exclaimed indignantly.

  "And I myself can offer you quite immediate short-term pleasure," Swoon concluded. She jetted a supremely evocative erotic flavor at him.

  'And now she's trying to seduce you again!'

  "It is an attractive enough offer," he sprayed to her internally. "There is no finer pleasure than—"

  'Damn it, don't tell me about that!' she cried angrily. 'I can't—oh, hell, I'm just being a jealous female! I get so tired of participating in these things in the male costume instead of the female.'

  "Yes, of course," Heem sprayed, chastened. "I will decline her offer."

  'No, don't do that. I have no right to—' She couldn't finish the thought. 'I'll be leaving you soon anyway. I love you, Heem, whatever happens. I would not deny you your pleasures. I would not be the dog in the manger.'

  "The what? Where?"

  She flashed him a picture of a four-legged, tooth-faced creature standing in dehydrated vegetation, threatening another creature who evidently desired the vegetation. Heem could make little sense of it.

  'What it means is that I can't be the kind of female you need, but I don't want to be a female canine either. There is a special word for that.'

  But Swoon was spraying again. "Perhaps your offer is sufficient, Heem. My Star might be satisfied with no more than this machine. Do you know what it is, how it operates?"

  "I believe it is a research tool set to banish auras from given hosts, or to superimpose auras on occupied hosts. Be careful not to jog the activator-globe."

  "Which globe is that?" she jetted, alarmed.

  "The clear, empty one, I believe. That is the one the Squam touched, to banish the Erb." He rolled closer. "Now if you'd like to celebrate our agreement in the HydrO fashion—" It was not serious, in that he had no intent to reproduce—no, never that!—yet he wished it could have been Jessica. It was the alien female he was holding in his mind and longing for, as he sprayed romance at Swoon.

  But this time Swoon did not return that kind of spray. She was now behind the Ancient machine, orienting it on him. "I believe we can dispense with that, Heem. I have what I need."

  Alarm shocked through Jessica. 'Heem, look out!'

  Heem froze, horrified. "What are you doing, Swoon?" But he already had a notion. Betrayal.

  "I am taking the entire site, Heem, since you were foolish enough to yield to me the key to victory."

  "But I thought you wanted to share, to indulge in—"

  'Ha!' Jessica exclaimed bitterly. 'She only used her sex appeal to get what she wanted from you: information about the operation of the machine, so she could use it without killing herself. She's a conniving bitch—and I fell for it too, because I wanted you to be happy. Men often make concessions for sex alone; women seldom do. I only regret I allowed my own concern to interfere with my logic. I failed you, Heem—in the one thing I was really equipped to help you in. Protection against deceitful, cynical, excellent-tasting females.'

  "I'm sorry about this, Heem, I really am," Swoon sprayed. "You're a tough, apt HydrO who did help me get my ship, and I'd love to copulate with you. But I have so much more to gain by winning the Ancient site for my transferee's Star."

  "But you can't win!" he jetted at her. "The aural printout will show you were not the first."

  "I'll take that chance. You were the first—but you killed another competitor, the Squam. That makes your victory suspect. We none of us are clean, Heem, but the Competition Authority will not be eager to roll to the enormous trouble and energy to run this competition again. In the end, the race goes to the fittest, and the fittest is the survivor—and I am that survivor. It's certainly a better chance than what I'd have if you live. The Competition Authority would not have honored our deal."

  "I think they would!" Heem sprayed. "The rationale of the relay race, of more than one contributor to the victory—I believe such a compromise is better than the alternative of condoning murder! I accepted your rationale—why can't you?"

  "You are charming, Heem, in your naivete." She extended a section of herself toward the machine's globe.

  Heem rolled for her, but she was too fast. She banged the activator-globe. Power lurched out from the lens, bathing him, but a flashback also bathed Swoon. There was a terrible wrenching.

  In a moment—perhaps more than that, for Heem could not judge how long he had been unconscious, if indeed at all—he recovered his orientation. He remained on the floor, and Swoon remained at the machine. His aura had not been abolished! The neutral setting—

  Then he became aware of something else. He was whole, yet there was an absence, a loss—

  "Jessica!" he sprayed desperately.

  There was no answer. He felt for her presence in his being, and found nothing. He was alone.

  "Oh, alien female!" he sprayed. "That Ancient machine did function—weakly! It did not abolish me, it abolished the less-entrenched aura. It wiped you out!"

  Yet self-preservation still motivated him. No, not that; rather it was the need for vengeance. Swoon had murdered Jessica; Swoon must pay the penalty, Heem surveyed the physical situation. Swoon still hunched by the machine. A backlash of power had encompassed her; she had evidently been stunned. He could kill her now. He did not care about his own ultimate fate. He intended to punish Jessica's murderer. He would needle her at close range, without mercy.

  He rolled in close. Swoon stirred. He readied his needles—but had to orient carefully, because now he lacked the visual coordin
ation he had come to depend on. He was blind. His needles would not have their former accuracy and timing. He must do this with extreme concentration—

  "Heem," she sprayed weakly.

  "Do not plead for mercy," he sprayed savagely. He knew he should simply needle her, but was compelled by his nature to communicate, to justify himself, even to his enemy. "You killed my love; I shall kill you. You took the light from my perception; I shall destroy your perception. You betrayed—"

  "Heem—wait. I am Jessica."

  "Do not seek to deceive me again!" he raged, his spray so hot it vaporized close to his body. "I believed you once. I am not twice a fool!" Then he froze. How had she known of Jessica?

  "Heem—I was retransferred," she sprayed. "The machine setting—the two-balled line—it must have meant not neutral, but exchange."

  He hardly dared believe, yet he so much wanted to. "Prove this to me."

  "Your nightmare of the Squam—your illegal memories—"

  "You could have guessed of those! You may have suffered another incomplete metamorphosis!"

  "Then my nightmare, as a Solarian—clone masquerading as a male—a strange man tearing off my garb, betraying my secret in public—"

  Heem's doubt collapsed. "No one else could know of that! Yet how could you have been exchanged, and not me. And not the two female auras of Swoon's host? They are not with me."

  "Because we are all females, Heem, and you are male. The two other auras bounced; they remain here in this host, stunned by my forced arrival. You also bounced, having no male host available within the focus of the machine. Only I was female, with a female host to transfer to. Only I was able to move when compelled. You and I have been through something like this before; we recovered from the shock more quickly. I have assumed control of this body."

  A tremendous relief washed through him. Jessica had survived! He had revenge on Slitherfear. He had won the competition, and would be restored to favor among his kind. All his frustrations had abruptly been abated. Never had he felt so good!

  "Oh, Heem!" Jessica continued. "Now at last I can spray love with you! Quickly, before the Competition Authority arrives and transfers me back to Capella. Come, my love—"