The Fleet Book 2: Counter Attack (21 page)

She walked in her socks to the ship. The odor of fresh blood was strong inside; the bodies of the men lay in pools of it. She used her self-hypnotism to keep her mind clear, treating the bodies as if they were merely meat, and stepped carefully to the storage compartment. Henry kept her covered from the port. She made no false move; she had seen how accurately he aimed his laser, and how quick his reflexes were.

She got out the rope and brought it back. Now there was some blood on her socks; she had been unable to avoid it. But this was no time to be squeamish about details; her own blood, and the success of the mission, were on the line. She said nothing.

Back outside, Henry made her go to a nearby copse of young trees. There he made her form nooses and put them over her own ankles and wrists; then he had her lie down while he looped the ends of the cords around trees and drew them tight. Only then did he put away the laser and strip off his own clothing.

Quiti was spread-eagled on the turf, her arms, and legs anchored by the cords so that she could not bring them in. Still she kept her teeth clenched and spoke no word. Her fit of grief as she first stepped out of the ship was the only expression of emotion she had allowed herself.

“It doesn’t make any difference, you know,” Henry said as he kneeled beside her and ran his hands along her body. “I never expected your desire, or even your approval; I just want your body, one time. You can sweet-talk me or curse me or just play zombie; my pleasure comes from having a lovely woman who would never submit voluntarily.” He squeezed her right breast, then her left. “Soft like a woman,” he said again, trying to provoke a reaction. She made none.

He built himself up to a pitch of erotic excitement, his strokes and pokes having the opposite effect on her, then straddled her. He let his weight come on her, moving his chest against her breasts, squeezing the last bit of sensation from the contact before getting into the primary act. He did not try to kiss her, evidently cautious about possible biting. The right side of his head was near her face, the outline of a vein showing as his excitement mounted.

Suddenly her head jerked up. The pin she had clenched between her teeth jabbed into the vein.

His head turned, stung—and her second thrust with the pin caught his right eye, puncturing it.

Now he screamed with pain and rolled off her, clutching at his face. The pain was in his eye, but the venom was in his vein, moving toward his heart. The pin was poisoned; she had held it dry between her lips the whole time, awaiting her chance to use it. Only a tiny weapon, a barb that projected beyond her lips only when those lips flattened against the target, but a deadly coating.

Within thirty seconds Henry’s heart stopped. His body convulsed as its other functions tried to continue; then he was dead.

Quiti turned her head to the side and carefully spat out the pin. It was deadly yet; she wanted none of its coating on her. The riskiest part of her operation had been the setting of it between her teeth; had it scratched her as she slid it down from her hair to her mouth, or had her forced tears wet it so that the venom dripped into her mouth . . .

She had survived, and even gotten through uninjured, though her body felt unclean where he had handled and kneaded and pressed on it. She would have accepted the rape if she had to, to get the proper opportunity to score on him with the pin; fortunately she hadn’t had to. She wasn’t prudish, but she preferred to indulge on a voluntary basis, not involuntary. Some year, when she found a man who truly respected her, she would show him what kind of pleasure a healthy woman could give.

But she still had a problem. She was securely bound, and could neither slip the nooses nor bring a hand in to untie them. She had tied them herself, but had done it right, because Henry would have known if she had not. She had done nothing to provoke him, because one slap across the mouth would have killed her, had he but known it. She had protected herself and her pin by making no other moves.

But there was one other thing Henry had not thought about. Quiti was of a variant humanoid species that had redeveloped prehensile feet. The terrain was extremely rugged on her home planet, with rugged vegetation to match; man had returned largely to the trees. Genetic manipulation had restored what other humanoids had lost: the ability to use the feet almost as cleverly as the hands. Hence the contemptuous nickname, “monkey.” Her kind tended to run lithe rather than fat, because excess weight was a liability when swinging in the trees. She really could climb like a monkey, and hang by one hand or one foot.

Quiti, already the butt of sexist attention because of her gender, had not cared to add to it by showing off her feet. Therefore she had worn special shoes, braced to accommodate her feet so that she could walk in comfort, that made them appear normal. She had left her socks on when she stripped for Henry, maintaining that concealment, also aware that that slight bit of coverage made the rest of her body seem more naked. So the man hadn’t challenged it; he already had access to the portions of her that interested him.

The feet, unlike the hands, were set at right angles to the supporting limbs. Thus they were able to do what the hands could not: twist back to set their fingerlike toes against their own ankles. First she flexed the toes to slide off the socks; then they set to work on the nooses, loosening them. What a mainstream human could not have done at all, she did readily: she untied her feet with her feet. She could have done it before, but again, had wanted no indication of her potential. The man had had to believe that she was entirely helpless. Indeed, she had been helpless enough, while he held that laser pistol!

Once the feet were free, she hiked her body up to give slack to the wrist ropes, then raised her feet to untie the remaining knots. This limberness was part of it; those who depended on trees for support had to be able to take and hold a grip with any extremity, and to exchange grips readily.

She dressed quickly, not bothering with the blood-tainted socks or the shoes; her feet were tough, and it was good to have them fully functional again.

Now she had a job to do. She returned to the ship and lifted the twenty-five-kilo plasma tube. She wiped off the blood that was caking on it, then had an idea. This thing was intended to be carried and operated by two men, but there was a harness so that one man could do both in an emergency. She made her way to the supply chest and brought out that harness. It would add to the total weight of the package, but she needed it.

She put it on the tube, then hefted the assembly to her back. It was an awkward process, but she was in fit condition and could handle it.

The plasma pipe had to be fired line of sight. She was close enough; all she needed was elevation. So she headed up the mountain before her, using hands and feet to draw herself up efficiently. The men had never given her a chance to, prove herself; she regretted that they could not see her now.

That reminded her in a moment of how her guard had dropped, of their brutal deaths. A choke formed in her throat. They had been, for all their unconscious snobbery, decent men; they had not deserved to be so casually slain. She had not been close to any of them, and not just because of the sexism; she simply preferred not to mix duty with pleasure. After she proved herself in combat and had credits of her own, she could consider romance. She could have accepted a secretarial or maintenance position, as many women did, but had insisted on frontline duty, partly because of her need to prove herself and her planet. Now at last she had her chance to do that duty as it should be done. But how terrible that this chance had come only because of the brutal murder of the rest of the complement!

She was soon panting and sweating. The air was pleasant, but the loaded climb was more than enough to compensate. That tube weighed half as much as she did!

She persevered, and soon reached an outcropping of rock that overlooked the relatively level expanse beyond. And there was the battery! There was no mistaking the huge laser cannon that could score on anything that passed within a light hour and farther if the target was stationary in space. The fleet dared not pass within range of that monster!

She eased the tube to the ground. She removed it from its harness and set it up against a split rock, wedging it into place. She put her eye to the scope set along its top, and nudged the tube until the distant cannon came across the cross hairs. That was all that was necessary; there was no recoil as such, only a rush of light-swift plasma blasting through the air.

She fired and there was a crack of thunder, not from any detonation of the weapon, but from the heat of the bolt’s passage through the air.

The cannon disintegrated, and a fireball formed. Quiti smiled. She had taken it out!

She started to put the harness back on the tube, but then hesitated; it was still too hot. Maybe she didn’t need to carry it back to the ship anyway; it was for one purpose only, and that purpose had been fulfilled. She had better get herself back to the ship as fast as possible, for the hornets could soon be buzzing. It depended on how solid an establishment this battery was; if it was a full complement, there would be auxiliary forces patrolling the region, and these would be searching for the source of the attack. Let them find the plasma tube, much good would it do them now! Even if they figured out how to fire it, where was their target?

She hurried away as the sound of the explosion reached her. What a satisfying noise! It made up in part for the losses her mission had taken; these were now echoed by worse losses for the Khalia.

The return was much faster than the trip out had been. Now she was able to use feet and hands to full effect without the enormous burden of the weapon. She could clamber along branches that were too weak to support her loaded weight, and leap from tree to tree instead of trudging along the ground.

She hesitated as she approached the ship. Henry’s naked body, its mouth open in the rictus of the agony of death, reminded her of the slaughter within. But she had to enter, because she had to make contact with the other ship. They were supposed to coordinate after their missions were accomplished, and compare notes on the outlook for avoiding capture by the enemy during the coming week. It could get pretty tight. The broadcasts were coded; if the enemy ever broke the code, there would be real trouble. But of course if the enemy had cracked the code, this mission would never have made it to the surface of the planet. The ship’s special radio would be a real prize for the Khalia!

She nerved herself for the blood and entered the ship. She stepped over the, bodies again and went to the radio chamber. She activated it and gave her message: “MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. FOUR LOST. STATUS? QUITI.” Then she touched the Send key, and the radio fired out a compacted blip of coded information that only an alert and properly tuned receiver could catch, and that only a Fleet receiver could interpret. On a primitive planet like this, with its nearest base a smoking ruin, the chances were excellent that the enemy would never even realize that a message had gone out.

In a moment the radio gave the response, in its machine monotone: “MISSION DITTO. NO LOSSES. STAND BY FOR UNION. GOOD JOB, QUITI. LUTHER.”

She slumped with relief. She had feared that something similar could have happened to the other, crew. Soon, they would be here to clean up the mess and make the necessary reports, and she, could go back to being innocent, ignored “Cutie.” Then she could relax the hypnotic block that kept her sane and functional during this crisis.

Cutie.
Something bothered her about that. Of course she resented that demeaning nickname, but that wasn’t it. There was something else.

She wanted to get out of the ship, away from the horror it contained. But she delayed. What was nagging her? Her intuition, supposedly a foolish female trait, was operating, and she had learned never to ignore it.

Something about the message. She reactivated the radio. “Replay message,” she told it.

It repeated the message, exactly as before, concluding with “Good job, Quiti.” And of course the signoff of the mission leader, Luther. It was the first time he had complimented her on her work; he was just as bad as the others about her status as a participant. But of course she
had
done a good job; she had completed the mission when the men could not. The compliment was in order.

So what was bothering her?

She played the message back another time. Then, abruptly, she had it.

Luther had given her name correctly. Luther wouldn’t have done that. None of them would. To them she was “Cutie” arid nothing else. Except “honey,” or possibly “monkey.” That alone was irrevocable, because it was unconscious.

Luther had not sent that message.

That galvanized her. She almost leaped into the “tack” chamber and grabbed several slabs of hardtack. She gulped down water. Then she took a survival pack, stuffed the hardtack into it, and another package of water, and slung it over her shoulder.

She almost danced over the bodies, heedless of the tacky blood her toefingers encountered. She plunged out of the port and ran across the glade, adjusting her pack. She flung herself into the foliage at the edge of the slope.

She continued on up the mountain, her ears alert for the approaching scoutship. It should take it a while to arrive, since it had to orient on her ship, and its crew might not have been ready for an instant takeoff. But she had to cut the risk as much as possible.

She made it to the ledge where she’d left the plasma tube in half the time she had taken before. The weapon was undisturbed. There was no sign of activity at the defunct battery; evidently it was after all only a minimal complement, with no reserves for the unexpected. That was a break for her.

She hefted the tube in its harness; it was now cool. She carried it back toward the ship, but not along the precise route she had taken. She located an outcropping that overlooked the site of the ship. The ship itself was not visible; they had of course parked it under the cover of overhanging trees at the far edge of the glade. The lengthening shadows covered any other evidence of the landing. But she had a fair notion where it was.