The Teacher waited until he had exited the skimmer before announcing itself. “Welcome back, Flinx.”
He nodded absently, knowing that the ship’s internal pickups would note and interpret the gesture accurately. “Good to be back. Ready for departure.”
“Impatient. Always impatient. It’s not good for your blood pressure.”
He turned down the corridor that led, not to the bridge, but to the relaxation lounge. “Neither were my last days here. Not for the first time, I’ve lingered too long in a place where I shouldn’t have. We have a planet-sized weapons platform to locate. Let’s get going.”
“Repairs are completed. Unless there is an imminent threat I am presently not detecting, I would prefer to activate the systems relevant to departure gradually, in the event any unexpected fault should make itself known.”
“That’s right. I’m impatient, and you’re overcautious.” Slightly miffed, he entered the lounge area. Activated for his return, the waterfall and pool gurgled their own aqueous welcome. Carefully monitored and space-restricted small flying things zipped and darted through the air. Pip opened an eye to track several, then closed it. The lounge held no surprises, and she was not in the mood to exert herself in search of familiar amusements.
Gratefully, he sank into the waiting lounge chair. In its latest manifestation, it had configured itself to resemble a sloping pile of rocks. Preternaturally soft rocks, for all that they perfectly duplicated the look of unyielding basalt. Pip fluttered off to settle herself among some nearby pink plants. Music seeped into the lounge area, and into his consciousness. Something by the Muralian Quartet; soothing and undemanding. The Teacher knew him well.
“As soon as you feel comfortable with your condition, go ahead and lift,” he mumbled. “I might fall asleep, and there’s no need to wake me. Changeover will do that.”
“Understood.” A pause, then, “You appear discontented.”
“A condition you’ve never previously observed in me,” he snapped back sardonically.
“Though your occasional communications were intended primarily to check on the status of my repairs to self, I was given to understand that you had embarked on a mission to heal the sick and injured among the locals. Familiar as I am with the extensive spate of human actions and reactions, I would think this kind of activity would leave you both with a sense of accomplishment and feeling good about yourself and the time you have spent here. Did you fail to heal those who came seeking your aid?”
“Oh, I healed them, all right.” Stretching out in the malleable, cushioning quasi-stone, he accepted the cold fruit drink offered up by one rock. “Dozens and dozens of them. And in doing so, I gained the reputation among them of being not a skilled physician or even a traditional shaman, but a god. This utterly unjustified status apparently made a couple of neighboring political entities nervous enough to declare war on the country where I happened to be staying and—helping.” He downed half the glass of juice. “All three are presently fighting a war about it.”
The Teacher’s analysis was immediate. “Then when they learn you have departed, the reason for the war will be removed and the fighting will end.”
Staring into the foliage that the ship’s automatics so assiduously maintained, Flinx wondered if he should order up a libation stronger than fruit juice. “That was my thought. Then the local politician I befriended, who nonetheless tried to forcibly keep me from leaving, pointed out that the leaders of those attacking this region would think stories of my departure nothing more than a diversionary ploy on the part of those they’re fighting.” He waved the glass in a small arc. “Based on what this official told me, even if all concerned parties were to see you leave, the attackers still wouldn’t be convinced. They might think I stayed behind, or only lifted off to fool them so I could land later and further aid their wicked enemy.”
“I see.” The Teacher’s use of metaphor was flawless. “Then all sides need to be convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt.”
Blinking, Flinx sat up so sharply that several peculiar-colored vines in his immediate vicinity which had started twisting toward him suddenly drew back, coiling in upon themselves.
“Oh no. No. Didn’t you hear anything I just said? I’ve caused all this trouble by involving myself in local affairs, when I should have stayed on board and done nothing but eat, drink, sleep, and wait for you to finish your repair work. Now you’re saying that instead of taking my leave and minimizing the damage I’ve already done, I should stay and somehow try to persuade these traditional enemies to stop their fighting and go back to the way things have always been?”
“Nothing you can do can make them go back to the way they’ve always been.” The ship-mind’s tone was unusually somber. “You have walked among them, and that in itself is enough to change them, and their respective societies, permanently. Once observed and recorded, the reality of Flinx and what he represents cannot be undone. But if you are the cause of this war, and it will not cease simply with our departure, then you must somehow find a way to put an end to it. To not attempt to do so constitutes moral abnegation of the worst kind.”
Flinx would have looked away from the admonishing ship-mind, except that in essence he was inside it. No matter which way he glanced, he was still looking at it—and it at him.
“I already have a conscience, thank you very much.”
“It would appear not to be in attendance. Did it perhaps get left behind on the surface?”
Thoroughly annoyed, he swung his legs over the side of the pseudo-stone lounge and sat up, setting his empty glass aside. It immediately vanished into an appropriate receptacle.
“What do you expect me to do? I’ve already made a mess of things by trying to help these people. I should have adhered to Commonwealth procedure for dealing with Class Four-b civilizations. Any further incursion on my part is only likely to make things worse.”
The ship-mind was imperturbable. “Searching my records, which as you know are quite extensive, I am unable to access any record where stopping a war incontrovertibly made things worse for those in imminent danger of dying as a result of it. One who can end such conflict and chooses not to invariably finds himself morally compromised.”
Staring hard in the direction of the nearest visual pickup, Flinx narrowed his gaze and announced in the most steadfast voice he could manage, “I’ve done too much here already. The local Dwarra will just have to work out the matter of whether I’m still on their world or not among themselves. Prepare for departure!” With that, he swung himself back onto the lounge, closed his eyes, and requested that instead of another glass of refreshing juice, the ship’s synthesizers provide him with an appropriate soporific.
Having stated its opinion and recorded its owner’s reaction, the Teacher commenced to do as it was told. Methodically, and at a leisurely pace that reflected prudence as opposed to urgency.
It could not directly disobey an order. But when options were available, there was more than one way in which it could proceed to comply.
The explosive-packed disc was as big as a bale of tethet feed. Landing just short of the rock-and-earthen bulwark that had been hastily thrown up on the west side of the Pedetp River, it detonated with enough force to knock the nearest Wullsakaan defenders off all four of their feet. When the dust and smoke finally cleared, it could be seen that the explosion had left behind a crater deep enough to swallow a good-sized cargo wagon. Dazed but determined, the rattled defenders picked themselves up, dusted themselves off, and prepared once more to defend their piece of sacred ground. But any interested observer could measure the depth of their fear by the width of their oculars. They did not need a seer to tell them what would happen if another such explosive landed in their midst, instead of in front of or behind them.
From his command position atop the highest hill to the west of the river, His August Highborn Pyrrpallinda of Wullsakaa observed the ongoing battle and fretted silently. Always willing to defer to experience and knowledge, he h
ad taken the advice of his general officers and staked the defense of his realm on retaining control of the river.
It was not a difficult decision to take. This time of year, the Pedetp was in full spring flood. Attempts by the enemy to sneak troops across on rafts and boats had been thwarted by the current. Where the Pedetp was narrow, it ran fast, and the would-be invaders could not make the crossing quickly enough to reach the opposite shore before they were discovered and intercepted by Wullsakaan patrols. Where it was wide and ran slow, such attempts were easily spotted in time for defenders to cut the would-be invaders to pieces. After a few such failed attempts, the combined forces of Pakktrine Unified and Jebilisk had focused their energies on the ancient trio of massive stone bridges known as the Dathrorrj Triplets.
Located within shouting distance of one another, the three bridges had been so solidly constructed by the ancients, and so conscientiously maintained by their Wullsakaan descendants, that they were as solid and stable as the riverbed in which their stone supporting columns were deeply grounded. As soon as the disposition and intent of the advancing enemy forces had been perceived, many of Pyrrpallinda’s officers had argued for mining and destroying these critical approaches to the capital. Others had deplored the call for destruction of one of the country’s most important commercial transit points. By the time it looked as if a consensus might be reached, it was too late: the combined armies of Pakktrine and Jebilisk had reached the bridges. Immediately, enemy barbolt sharpshooters had taken up positions allowing them to cover the bridges’ foundations. That rendered the question of mining and blowing up the approaches moot, since any sappers who attempted to get near the structures would find themselves under immediate heavy fire, and would be picked off.
By the same token, repeated attempts by brave but foolhardy Jebiliskai riders to cross and take control of the bridges had been repulsed by clouds of bolts and lances from its Wullsakaan defenders. The Dathrorrj Triplets stood essentially untraveled; a bruised, battered, chipped, and scored no-Dwarra’s-land stretching essentially intact across the boiling, surging white water of the snowmelt-fed Pedetp. On its western side, the defenders of Metrel City had rapidly raised defensive barricades and other fortifications. The longer enemy forces failed to gain control of the bridges, the stronger these defenses became.
Until now.
Adjusting the multiscope on its mount, Pyrrpallinda peered through the eyepiece. The series of magnifying lenses was focused on a pair of devices the likes of which had never been seen before. They had been brought up behind the Pakktrinian lines several days ago and had been in action ever since. Pakktrine military engineers had been scurrying busily around both objects ever since they had been detached and rolled into position on their multiwheeled mounts.
The first launch had been a shock; not only to the Highborn, but to everyone on the Wullsakaan-controlled shore of the Pedetp. Shock had given way to response, which had proven notable only for its ineffectiveness, and then to a kind of dull realization. While officers and engineers anxiously tried to think of a way to counter this new means of warfare, the soldiers manning the defensive ramparts could only hunker down and pray to Rakshinn, or whichever deity they favored, that the terrible new weapon would not be aimed in their direction. A disturbingly high and growing number had already seen their prayers ignored, and the death toll continued to grow longer with every discharge of the new Pakktrinian weaponry.
A distant hiss signaled the imminence of the latest launch. Through the scope, the Highborn could see the Pakktrinian operators of the fiendish device scatter for cover. An explosion of vapor obscured his field of vision. Raising his gaze from the eyepiece, his eyes tracked the path of another disc as it described a smooth arc through the cloud-filled sky. The disc grew larger and larger, until it landed well behind the multiple defensive lines immediately opposite the approach to the central bridge. There followed another of the horrific explosions that had become all too common during the previous couple of days. He lowered his gaze back to the scope’s eyepiece. The Pakktrinian operators were already recharging and reloading one of the two massive steam catapults.
Both weapons had been carefully and strategically positioned well out of range of Wullsakaa’s most advanced weapons, and were therefore essentially invulnerable. Taking them out would mean sending a force across the bridge. That, Pyrrpallinda’s advisors had assured him, would amount to signing the death warrants of every soldier ordered to participate in such a foredoomed enterprise. So the Wullsakaan defenders could only squat, and watch, and hope, while the increasingly accurate Pakktrinians gradually got the hang of operating their new weapons.
“By tomorrow, Highborn, they’ll have the range of all our positions, and should be able to begin targeting them accurately,” the senior officer standing nearby told him. The old soldier was forced to hobble about on not one but two prosthetic forelegs, one on each side. There was nothing wrong with his mind, however.
“If they get across the Pedetp,” another commented, “we’ll have no choice but to fall back to the fortress.”
Pyrrpallinda knew that. He also knew that it would leave all the land between the river and Metrel City open to pillage and destruction by the invading forces. He was prepared, to an extent, to accept that loss. Homes could be rebuilt, crops resown, goods replaced. What troubled him was the obvious fact that these new weapons could stand off at an unreachable distance and slowly but steadily reduce the great fortress of Metrel to a pile of blackened stone and concrete. Not to mention what they could do to a frightened, panicky population crammed inside those walls.
He was torn with indecision, a place he hardly ever visited. If he surrendered, the soldiers of Pakktrine and Jebilisk would take control of the country and keep control until they were satisfied that the alien “god” was truly no longer helping their traditional Wullsakaan foes. An occupation was never a pretty thing. There would be brigandage, assault, and casual murder. But eventually the occupiers would leave, and the realm would survive—albeit at a cost.
Not incidentally, he might also be asked to make a show of goodwill by forfeiting his life, as a gesture of good faith. This might help to shorten the occupation. As Highborn, he was prepared to do this on behalf of his people, though it was a sacrifice he would prefer to avoid.
As he stood wrestling with his thoughts, the horrendous distant hissing of steam being explosively released reached him again. The second steam catapult had fired. The ample package of explosives it flung westward landed not on the bulwark that had been raised up across the approach to the third bridge, but directly in front of it. When the smoke cleared, the aftermath was sobering. A large gap showed in the laboriously raised earthworks where the explosives had blown a hole. The contingent of soldiers who had bravely been standing their ground there had vanished.
Rapidly and in good order, fresh troops were moved forward to defend the gap in the defenses. Laborers worked frantically to move dirt and rock to repair the hole. They would have it repaired soon enough, Pyrrpallinda knew. But it was a losing equation, a fight of attrition whose end was obvious to anyone with the slightest knowledge of tactics. Wullsakaa would run out of soldiers before Pakktrine ran out of explosives.
Silently, he called down a succession of curses on his enemies. The minions of Jebilisk his army could deal with, and the soldiers of Pakktrine as well, but technologically Pakktrine Unified had always been a double-step ahead of his people. Too few institutes of scientific learning, too many places of unthinking adherence to old ways, had put Wullsakaa behind its long-established rival. He tried not to imagine what other devastating developments the industrious engineers of Pakktrine might have hidden beneath their cowls.
“Highborn?”
Turning away from the scope and its depressing field of view, he found himself confronted by Treappyn, Srinballa, and his two other senior counselors. The quartet of general officers stood behind him. Drawn from the best minds Wullsakaa could produce, these eight were the finest
source of advice available to him.
If the battle was lost, they would also be the ones who would have to suffer the orders of the triumphant occupiers, since in that event His August Highborn Pyrrpallinda of Wullsakaa would most likely find his head forcibly separated from his body. He had confidence his advisors would do no less under excruciating circumstances.
Letting out a soft hiss, he faced them squarely, all eight gripping flanges turned upward, his torso raised as high from his lower trunk as his muscles could manage, Sensitives erect, every epidermal flap held open in a gesture of acquiescence. Everyone winced as the latest Pakktrinian bomb landed much too close to the hill on which they were assembled.
“I thought up here we were out of range of these infernal new devices,” a senior officer snarled. “We will have to move.”
“Yes,” agreed Treappyn absently. His concern of the moment was not for his own personal safety, but for the condition of his liege. “Highborn? You wish to say something?”
Thus prompted, Pyrrpallinda put the proximity of the blast out of his mind and addressed his advisors slowly and with care, showing that he had given his words more than casual thought.
In his time as advisor not only to Pyrrpallinda but to his predecessors, Srinballa had seen much. He was not easily shocked. He would have conveyed his feelings to his liege in response to the short, terse speech more directly by entwining Sensitives with him, but Pyrrpallinda kept his distance.
“August Highborn, you cannot mean to turn over the keys to the country with so little attempt to defend it!”
Pyrrpallinda gestured to indicate sympathy with his advisor. “Good Srinballa. Well-meaning Srinballa. What is the use of fighting if one knows the fight is already lost? I would rather see a hundred Wullsakaans murdered by rampaging Jebiliskai in their wild red robes than a thousand brave soldiers brought down by weapons they have no chance of countering.” For affirmation, he turned to the quartet of senior officers. Not one of them disputed his depressingly accurate analysis of the present military situation.