IronStar (9 page)

“Ahhhh… yahhhh… luaaahhh… tha” she
sang. Akaray stared up at her in sudden wonder, as her alien, alto voice
somehow picked up the thread of the Realm’s ancient Deathnaming chant:

“Captain William Karin Leitch,
Commander, Regnum Survey Service… Shuah…

“Lieutenant Commander Howell
Docking Junior, first officer… shuah!” Akaray sank back onto his heels beside
her, solemnly attentive, somehow telling her this was
right
, and somehow
understanding and sharing her terrible pent-up grief in a bond that transcended
all language:

“Master Chief Samuel Chuwan Lee,
Fleet Engineer Second Class… shuah!

“Lieutenant Junior Grade Gerald
Archibald Parvane Sykes, Helm Second… shuah!

“Lieutenant Doris Amelia Finch,
Sensor Specialist First Class…
aieeeeya
… shuahhhh…” A whisper of wind
lifted a few puffs of ash from the earth around them.

“Ensign Sara Margellen Roe, Sensor
Specialist Third Class… shuah!

“Lieutenant Angela McKay Foley,
Contact Specialist First Class… shuah!

“Lieutenant Doctor Harrah Lynn
Burnham, Life Science Specialist First Class … shuah!”

“Regnum Survey Ship
Arvida-Yee
,
registration Romeo Sierra eight eight niner three eight… shuah…sha.” Kirrah’s
palms met, finally, over her head. The pinch of ash tasted bitter on her lips.

By unspoken agreement, the pair
left the desecrated, silent village walking hand in hand, and in the last gray
light of that long, long day, they found shelter among a cluster of trees a
short distance off, snuggled down in one another’s arms, and fell asleep
immediately.

“The revenger of blood himself
shall slay the murderer: when he meeteth him, he shall slay him.” - The Book of
Numbers, 35:19; King James Translation, original circa 1400 B.C. Terra.

Towards the end of her last dream,
Kirrah was sitting on the porch by the small creek, at the back of her Aunt
Risa’s old house. It was evening, her aunt was sitting on that big overstuffed
couch across from her, reading by the glow of the sunset. Insects were chirring
as the day cooled. Her aunt put her book down and sighed a deep, contented
sigh.

“What is your question, Kirrah
dear?” she asked.

“Uh, I was thinking, Aunt Risa,” (
how
did she know I had a question?
Kirrah wondered)… “In the memory I have of
falling, you know, out of my, out of the ship…” Aunt Risa smiled softly at her.
“…there was that very bright light on everything, just at the end… what was
that?”

“Oh, yes.” Her aunt’s head cocked
slightly sideways, like it did when the young Kirrah had asked a particularly
insightful question. “Sammy really did get that second Kruss ship, the little
one, that fired its railgun at you. Even after he’d been… well, after.” Her
aunt’s lips pursed in that way they did when someone had done something very
rude.

“He’d done a very good job with his
missile spread, even better than that other nice young man, Howie
something-or-other. And that, dear, is why…”

“That’s why I haven’t been worried
sick about a Kruss landing on
my
planet, isn’t it?
Isn’t
it?”
Kirrah always loved getting it right for Aunt Risa, and Aunt Risa never made
her feel bad when one of her logical leaps missed.

“Quite so, dear,” answered Aunt
Risa. “Although you must remember, it’s not quite
your
planet…”

Kirrah woke slowly, surfacing out
of a deep, dream-filled sleep, lying awkwardly on her left side. Stiff muscles
protested at the night’s irregular surface as well as the previous day’s hard
use.
Take a number
, she thought muzzily. I’m too busy hurting
inside
…
yet to her surprise, the intense wound-up-tight feeling around her heart had
unwound a little… quite a bit, actually… the grief was still there, the brutal
reality of the loss of her shipmates, yet somehow it did not seem as
immediate
as it had before …before whatever that was, that she and Akaray had done last
night.
No wonder he started bawling when I made that ‘universal peace
gesture’, back at the pond,
Kirrah thought.
I happened on the starting
posture for that …ceremony he knew was waiting for him, back at the village.

Now something new was there where
her grief had been so strong; something even stronger, oh my, and
darker
,
something very much like anger - no, more
solid
than anger. Something
with a voice of its own:
So they had desecrated this village on
her
planet, so they had shot an arrow into
her
eight-year-old friend, so
they had butchered
her
friend’s family and village…

At the touch of Akaray’s hand
shaking her right wrist, Kirrah’s eyes opened fully, to the sight of multiple
dark brown furry legs standing and shuffling in her field of view.
I have
got
to stop waking up like this
, was the first thought that popped into her
head.

Oh, this is different
, chirped
some cheerfully insane corner of her mind.
See, this isn’t ‘Matey’ your
twenty tonne mastodon-analog, not even close! These are ordinary Terran
horses
,
and they have
saddles
! And riders!

Well, you wanted a crack at the
raiders,
went through her mind as Kirrah surged up to her knees,
battle mode engaging, sidearm coming up in a smooth deadly arc to face the
threat…
NOT coming up… why not? Because your new eight-year-old friend is
clinging to your right wrist with both hands and all his strength, that’s why
not…

“
Keerrah! Jasa! Jasa, jasa,
Kirrah! sho’Teescha! Eesa Teescha!
”

“What? Akaray! Not now!” Kirrah’s
semi-coherent struggles to free her gun hand from his frantic grip ceased
abruptly as her battle mode analysis poured in:

Four - six - seven unknowns,
mounted, four with weapons drawn or drawing. Those three are wielding bows; the
arrows cannot penetrate your suit, but a headshot will kill you. Based on their
central upper-body aimpoint, the archers do not believe the suit will protect
you. Generating Tactical Options:

Option One: break the boy’s grip;
fire on the three archers, fourth opponent with half-drawn sword no immediate
threat; other three unknowns appear armed, not currently in threat posture.
Opponents unfamiliar with beamer weapon, the surprise will confuse them.
Projected tactical outcome: probable victory. Contra-indications: Minor risk of
taking lethal headshot; significant risk to unprotected boy; unknown (probably
minor) risk from possible unseen participants.

One of the men was looking at her
quizzically, as though she were some puzzle to be worked out.
You have no
idea!
thought a small, remote observer in her mind. He was very young,
barely twice Akaray’s age and blond, with that same disconcerting open gaze.

Option Two: stand down, make no
threatening moves, retain Option One at hot standby. Projected tactical
outcome: parley. Contra-indications: Any of three archers can retarget your
unprotected head faster than helmet or beamer can respond, consequences severe,
probability low; Possibility of betrayal by boy due to unknown factors,
consequences unknown but undesirable, probability very low.

In the slow-motion stretched time
of battle mode, Kirrah could see the swordsman’s eyebrows rising as he seemed
almost to track her thoughts.

Significant non-tactical concerns:
insufficient data to classify unknowns as neutrals, allies or enemy. Relevant
additional data: presumed ally Akaray obviously wishes no-combat; noting arrows
used by these unknowns are clearly longer and different style than used against
villagers.

Recommendation: Scenario Two,
conditionally: monitor bowmen’s aimpoints, re-evaluate if standown not promptly
reciprocated.

As soon as Kirrah stopped pulling
against his desperate grip, Akaray released her wrist and stepped around in
front of her, directly between her and the drawn bows. To her relief, all three
bowmen immediately diverted their aim away from the boy and her, one man
relaxing his draw… two… three.
Whoosh
! (
How long was I holding
that
breath?
) The fourth “threat posture”, a thin pale man with dark curly hair
and cold, steady gray eyes, sat frozen with his sword still half-drawn.
I
can live with that for now,
she thought.

Akaray held up a finger, waving it
to get her attention,
which he cannot totally have: simultaneously watching
seven armed, mounted men for threats is a bit… distracting,
Kirrah
realized. His finger pointed to her:

“Kirrah.” Two of the riders
exchanged quick, puzzled glances. Two others looked briefly skyward. Finger now
pointing backward at himself, the child continued:

“Akaray”.
Yeah, yeah, I got that
part
, she thought distractedly…
what’re the words for ‘friend’ and
‘enemy’, that’s what I want, and
in the right order
!
His slender
finger was now wagging back and forth between them:

“Jasa! Jaaa…sah!”
Oh… Ok, let’s
hope that’s
‘friend
’… was that half-drawn sword sliding slowly back into
its sheath? Dammit, how can I watch all seven men when everyone keeps
moving
a little bit, can’t those horses stand
still
?
Now Akaray turned,
making exaggerated hand motions between his chest and the arc of riders, his
clear eyes still carefully on her face:

“Jasa,” he said very distinctly.
Ok,
I guess that’s clear enough
, Kirrah thought.
You’ve been scoring 100
percent as a guide so far. I wonder which one’s the leader… come to think of
it, getting that wrong is probably less dangerous than letting this confrontation
drag on
. Making eye contact with the dark-haired swordsman, Kirrah
holstered her sidearm, extended her right hand palm up, and said:

“
Jasa
”. Akaray fairly sagged
with relief. She then looked each man in the eye.
Damn! Horses weren’t as
tall as those big grazers…
mu’uthn
, but they were tall enough to put a
mounted man’s eyes uncomfortably above those of a kneeling woman
. She swept
her hand in a gesture taking in the whole group, and repeated “
Jasa
”. As
she slowly stood upright, the remaining weapons were lowered and the men began
to dismount.

Thirty minutes later, sitting
around an efficiently-built cookfire while gratefully licking sweet crumbs and
a last bit of breakfast grease from her fingers, Kirrah wondered what all the
earlier fuss had been about. Akaray had introduced himself formally to the men
as ‘
Akaray shu’Malafoth’shuah sho’Malamethsha’shuah
’, at which several
eyebrows had been raised, and murmurs exchanged among the riders. They had all
inclined heads briefly to him and he had solemnly returned the gesture, then
the dark-haired swordsman had briefly touched Akaray’s lips with two fingers,
and brought them to his own lips. Kirrah, after a quick consultation with her
wristcomp, had introduced herself as “Kirrah shu’Roehl sho’Draconis”, a little
unsure whether the third name should be based on geography or political
allegiance.

At the moment her young friend was
fairly babbling away. He seemed to enjoy being the center of attention of
people who could actually
talk
. No doubt he was telling the story of the
raid, his narrow escape, and his later adventures with the strange …tourist.
Every now and then, one of the men - especially the tall one with the dark,
curly hair and gray eyes, what was it… ‘
Irshe
’(?), would glance over at
her. His expressive eyebrows seemed to flow up and down his forehead in
response to Akaray’s words and (to her mind) rather extravagant gestures. She
was no doubt being portrayed as a goddess with superhuman powers up to and
including breathing underwater and wielding of lightningbolts, and without the
wit to walk around a
tso’ckhai
lying in plain view on the
not-grass
,
nor avoid a
hanak
in the woods, nor to stay out of the
irwua-
pond.
Oh well
, she thought,
first impressions aren’t everything
.

Speaking of first impressions,
Irshe had been admirably efficient about setting up camp, delegating duties
with practiced ease. Kirrah’d had a bad few moments when three archers had
suddenly and simultaneously unlimbered their weapons, but she swiftly realized
the prudence of posting guards while in obviously hostile territory. Assuming
that’s what they were doing, wherever they’d disappeared to so quickly…
We
jasa’s
look out for one another, don’t we?
And there were
nine
men, not
seven. Two archers had been standing
behind
her during those first tense
moments – apparently hers was not the only mind on the planet with an active
tactical paranoia. Speaking of which, judging by the height of the intervening
low bushes, a head shot was the
only
clear shot the two backup archers
would have had available against her.
Brrr…. So much for Tactical Option
One… recalibrating paranoia settings now…

Her wristcomp was greedily sucking
up the torrent of alien syllables, its ready-bar already well up from the
simple “eye, nose, elbow, sky” sort of point-and-speak vocabulary lessons she
had practiced with Akaray on yesterday’s long march. It would not do to become
totally dependent on a device to communicate with her new friends in the long
term, Kirrah reflected, but she was more than willing to use its speechsynth
capabilities to get a few basic facts straight in the short term.

While two of the men began
repacking their gear, Irshe and two others, um, Ana’the and Prax’soua, made a
brief but thorough inspection of the ruined village. They returned after ten
minutes, carrying a few of the short arrows, a bit of gray and white mottled
cloth that seemed to her eye undistinguished from the other debris, and a
slightly singed bundle of clothing which went a long way toward covering and
warming Akaray.
That and a good bath
, Kirrah thought,
assuming
there’s water available here that doesn’t try to eat you
. A medium-length
light brown cape was offered to her, which after a moment’s hesitation, she
accepted and draped around her shoulders. Sending an ‘I’m-one-of-us’ message
seemed more important at the moment than keeping her survival suit fully
exposed to sunlight: its energy management system was parsimonious enough, and
reported a near-full charge. Several of the men were covertly eyeing her suit,
with what she guessed was more of a professional/military than lustful
interest.

At a short, sharp whistle from
Irshe, the men mounted their horses. Irshe, by now pretty clearly the leader,
held down a hand to Akaray, who with a run and a bound soared up into the saddle
behind the gray-eyed soldier, where he grinned immensely. At a nod from Irshe,
one of the men… Prax’soua, a beefy, scarred and totally competent-looking
brawler, leaned down and offered Kirrah his muscular arm.
Oh, shit!
she
thought, realizing what was expected of her.
This is where the
lightning-wielding goddess falls on her ass…