The Burning Ground

7. Into the wild blue…

Shadith swung the chair around, stretched, groaned, and ran her hands through her hair. “Vumah vumay, that’s done.” She glanced from the piles of debris to the anxious, waiting faces of the locals. “The Fence is gone.”

Yseyl closed her eyes and went very still.

Hidan grinned, tucked xe’s rifle under xe’s arm, made a broad sweeping sign of triumph. When the sign was done, though, xe’s grin shrank to a tight smile. +Ptaks been circling this place and trying to get in through the door for the past half hour.+

Shadith listened and heard through the noise of the storm a confused and muted muttering barely louder than the hum of the station behind her. A reach told her a crowd of wet, mean, frustrated Ptaks were milling about outside; as yet there was no organization in that mob, just a few individuals around the Exec who were focused on the codex, a few others trotting off to circle about the building, hunting, no doubt, for the place where the intruders breached security. She rubbed at her back. “They won’t be getting in, I changed the… urn… keys. You’ve been watching. Has anyone noticed yet that the glass is out in that storeroom window?”

+I haven’t thinned many Ptaks back there, just a few who keep trotting around and around the building, I think because they’re too steamed to stand still.+

Yseyl shuddered and opened her eyes. “Syon would have started shooting if they found the hole and tried to get in. Start the fire and let’s go. I don’t see any reason to hang about.”

Shadith glanced toward the Ptak techs. Tied, gagged and blindfolded, rolled up against the wall under the windows, they wouldn’t have a chance once the fire got going. They were awake now, frightened and furious. “Right, but we’ll switch the order of things. Ghost, you and the others mask up and head out, P11 give you a few minutes’ start before I touch off the fire.”

Yseyl stopped a moment in the arch, looked back. The mask hid her face, but Shadith had no trouble reading her suspicion and speculation. A moment later she was gone.

Shadith leaned back in the chair and contemplated the Ptaks. “Listen carefully,” she said. “The others will be out and clear in a few minutes. Well on their way into the mountains. You’ll never find them. This is their home ground. I came into this for ethical reasons. That Fence is an abomination in the face of God, so I have destroyed it. Be warned, what I have done, I can do again. I will remove your gags before I go to join my allies. In their anger they would have left you to burn to death, but I will not. I have programmed the shield to go down and the door to open ten minutes after I leave. Yell for your people to come get you. Tell them that the kephalos has been infected and will fail five minutes after the door opens.”

Shadith set the stunner to broad beam, clipped the collapsed ladderpole to her belt, and vaulted through the window. She hit the ground with a loud splash, slid across the gelatinous mud, and finally managed to scramble to her feet. Half blinded by the rain, disoriented by the slither, she dropped to a crouch, touched the triggering sensor on the stunrod, and swept the field through a wide arc. As she rose, she reached in a quick check of the area. No active minds anywhere close. She groped for the narrow path she’d sliced into the thorn hedge, eased through it, jumped the body of a stunned Ptak and ran for the trees.

Away from the lights and the buildings with the foliage dripping about her, the darkness was intense. The ground was soaked and slippery underfoot; though the leaves gave her some shelter, each time she brushed against a branch, it unloaded; itself over her and she was wet through after her first few strides.

As she headed for the end of the lake and the Drill Field, she tried to run and scan at the same time. That was a mistake. Her foot slipped off a root she didn’t notice and hit a patch of clay mud. She went down hard, her head glancing off the tree, her other knee twisting as she fell on it, the stunrod flying from her hand.

For a moment she lay there, dazed and hurting, then she heard Ptak shrieks and the splatting of feet off to one side.

She struggled up, gasping at the pain in her knee. There was no time to search for the rod and maybe no need; between the rain and the mud the Ptaks shouldn’t be able to learn much from it. And they already knew an offworlder was involved. She took a step, gritted her teeth, and limped as fast as she could toward the Drill Field.

Swing that leg, plant the foot, lurch forward, over and over, grab onto branches to take at least a little weight off the knee, swing lurch splat. Confusion around her. Sound of rain hitting the leaves, rain in her face, cold and dreary, trickling down her neck. Wind. Mud. Mud. Mud.

A shout. The light brightened around her, unsteady light, wavering through the boles of the trees. They got the door open and the draft hit the fire. For the glow to reach this far, it must be going good. Ah Spla! Ten minutes gone already?

Step. Slide. Slither. Gasp. A gust of rain hit her in the face. Arm crooked over her eyes so she wouldn’t be blinded by the downpour, she lurched another two steps and was out of the trees. She hunched her shoulders, and continued to limp toward the field she couldn’t see. The rain battered at her, blew into her face until she was half drowned.

A shout. Ptaks! Close behind her. She swung awkwardly around, fumbling for the cutter at her belt. She could just make out two dim gray forms heading for her. “Ah Spla, why did there have to be two cool heads in that lot?”

She lifted the cutter, but before she could use it, she felt the aura of a stun beam going by too close and saw the Ptaks crumpling into the mud.

“Shadow, Wann said you were hurt.” Yseyl’s voice. Shadith turned. “Fell and twisted my knee. My own dumb fault. Appreciate the assist.”

“Ha.” Yseyl moved closer. “Use my shoulder. You forget you’re the only one who can fly that thing?” Shadith managed a chuckle. “Nice to be needed.”

She turned the flier in a tight circle above the caldera. “Thought you might like a look at the damage.”

The roof of the Control Center collapsed at that moment in a shower of sparks; in spite of the heavy downpour the suddenly released flames leaped twenty feet into the air. The thorn hedge was smoldering and several of the closest houses were also burning.

Pressed against the window as if they couldn’t get enough of the sight, the Pixas were silent, a fiercely triumphant silence. Zot clapped her hands and giggled, then she, too, went quiet, snuggling up against Yseyl.

Yseyl hesitated, set a hand on the child’s shoulder. She saw Shadith watching her, stared back with angry denial, then turned her head away.

Hm, maybe Digby will have himself a ghost for hire. I don’t think that relationship is going to work out. Assassin and little mother don’t seem to be compatible occupations. “Right. If you seat yourselves and get comfortable, we’ll be on our way. Before I take you back to the camp where we started, I want to go look at where the Fence was. Just to make sure it’s really down, not an aberration in the software. Thought you might like to see that, too. Or rather, not see it.”

Luca threw herself, into the front, seat, drawing Wann down beside her. “Yes,” she said. “I want to see it. I want to see it gone.”

Khimil slapped his hand hard against the side of the cabin. “Yes. I saw that cursed thing every day when we were on that coaster working our way south. Syon, remember the time the wind caught us and Cap’n Dakwe was drunker’n thuv?”

“Urr. We coulda been ashed.” The young mal shivered, edged up close to Hidan, took xe’s hand, and held it against his face.

Xe freed the hand, patted his shoulder, then seated herself beside Nyen.

As soon as the rest had sorted themselves into the seats, Shadith took the flier into a sweeping circle, and sent it racing west as dawn pinked the sky behind them.