Mayday Orbit Read online

  Across the south edge! Bending north again, they steered close for concealment. The full furnace heat billowed over them; smoke stank and stung, grass crackled, flames whirled with a great hollow bawling. The earth under the fire glowed white, overlaid with a tinge of hellish blue; and then red and tawny sheets flowered up to the smoke roof. Boom went a bomb; foam jetted and clung, pale amidst flying sparks. Flandry’s front wheel crossed a tentacle of the spreading suppressor. His machine slewed around. He put down the outrigger wheel before he was thrown, gunned his engine, and pulled clear. Bourtai was lost to sight. He proceeded half blind.

  Wasn’t it time for her to signal the newcomers? He squinted with bloodshot eyes at his instrument panel, dialed the radio, heard a babble of commands and reports. “Come on, lass” he shouted uselessly into the racket. “Don’t be shy. Come on!”

  Suddenly her voice was crisp from the speaker.

  “Attention, men of the Mangu Tuman. Attention. I give the Tebtengri call for help, ya-u-la, freemen aid a freeman. I, Bourtai, daughter of the noyon Ivan Ogotai, who fell with the Tumurji at Rivers Meet. Ya-u-la! I, escaped from captivity in Ulan Baligh, am now driving along the east face of the wildfire. Behind me is a man from Holy Mother Terra. This I declare true: he is from Terra Herself; hunted by the Khan as I am hunted. He aided my escape and he will aid Altai to liberty. Send a boat and pick us up before Oleg’s men do.' I shall maintain a signal on this band for your guidance. Ya-u-la! Hear Bourtai Ivanskaya of the Tumurji.”

  Flandry threw a glance over his shoulder. If the enemy had someone listening on this frequency that the Tebtengri employed, fun and games must be expected.

  A craft rushed from the hidden sky. A moment it poised, listening with directional antennae. The red light picked out Oleg’s emblem on the flanks. Down near ground level, it streaked after the girl.

  Flandry whipped his varyak around and darted toward darkness. The airboat boomed unheedingly past him. A momentary flare-up in the background lined Bourtai. The Khanist pilot saw her too. A blaster beam stabbed. She made her wheels sprint. The incandescent lance turned in chase. Flandry converged on her. She saw him and tried to wave him away. He waved back: This way, follow me!

  Another vessel, smaller and with a strange insigne, appeared. Its gun drew a line across the line of the first beam. A voice rapped from Flandry’s radio: “Lackey of the usurper, is this how you observe the holy truce?”

  Both ceased fire. The vessels circled each other like hostile dogs, a few meters above the earth. “I made no move against you or yours,” said Oleg’s pilot. “I am after certain outlaws. Stand aside, or you yourself will have broken the peace.”

  Flandry and Bourtai edged close together and rolled not too slowly from the scene. A smoky veil descended. The boats were hidden. “If those two keep arguing,” Flandry called to her, “and meanwhile another Tebtengrian homes on your signal—”

  “Yaaahr she screamed.

  He twisted about. His eyes strained and watered in a universe of turbulent smoke. Enough light came through, painting it blood color, for a few meters’ vision. He saw Bourtai’s varyak roll over, hit the ground and bounce in a cinder cloud. The girl had thrown herself clear. She struck, curled into a ball, and tumbled through the grass.

  That which had pounced on her and had upset the vehicle sprang in pursuit. Flandry had an instant’s glimpse of a shaggy head and monstrous body, legs too long even for that height. He yanked his gun from the holster and whipped his machine around.

  The demon shape bounded over grass already scorching. Bourtai lay motionless. Dead, or just the wind knocked from her? The creature stooped above. Flandry lowered his third wheel, halted, and took aim.

  A hand as big as his head plucked the blaster from him.

  He didn’t stop to look behind. His foot kicked the accelerator. The motor snorted. The varyak stayed where it was.

  Flandry leaped off. Two giants held the vehicle fast. A third, looming out of acrid black clouds, snatched at him. He glimpsed eyes and teeth, ducked and started running. The one who held Bourtai straightened, tucking her casually beneath an arm. Flandry couldn’t rescue her. Wouldn’t another Tebtengrian boat ever show?

  Yes, by heaven! At sight’s edge he spied the shape. It dipped low and hung quiet. The pilot must be staring into unrestful gloom with eyes not adapted. Flandry dashed in that direction. Breath was anguish in his dried lungs.

  The ground thudded behind him. The strider caught up, took him by the waist, and flung him over one hairy shoulder.

  Upside down, he saw the other savages. There were four in all. Two squatted by the varyaks, deftly lashing them to long, thick poles. Grunting, they lifted one machine between them, the carrying rod supported on their collarbones. The two who bore the prisoners picked up the remaining varyak with their free hands. Bourtai’s transmitter must have gone dead when she was knocked over, for the Tebtengrian vessel did not follow. As the giants trotted northeastward, Flandry’s bobbing eyes saw the flyer hover a minute more, then lift again and vanish. A moment afterward, a Khanist boat arrived. It didn’t stay either.

  Smoke blotted out vision. When he could see again, Flan-dry found himself being carried across the steppe at some ten kilometers per hour. The fire was already remote from him, dwindling and dying in the night.

  The varyak heaters were still in operation, blowing enough warm air across him to maintain life. He wondered if it made any important difference.

  V

  Several times in that long night the savages halted for a rest. On the first occasion, they tied the humans’ ankles together and their hands behind their backs, crowded around one varyak and baked themselves. Dumped in the grass, Flandry tried at once to worm free. But the thongs were too skillfully knotted. He struggled to his feet. “Bourtail” he called, low and hoarse. “Can you hear me?”

  “Aye.” He saw her rise like him, half visible beneath one gibbous moon. The steppe was a lake, hoarfrost tinged copper, shadows running mysteriously before the wind. It whispered and rustled. “Aye, Dominic. Are' you hurt?” “Mostly in my pride ... so far. I was afraid you . . . when you went off your saddle at such a speed . . .”

  She achieved a chuckle. "Any nomad child learns that art.”

  They inched toward each other. “Who are those gargantuas?” he asked.

  “Voiskoye.” She had come close enough that he could read grimness in her expression.

  “That doesn’t tell me much, you know.”

  “Wild ones. Long ago, in the early days on Altai, when chaos often prevailed as folk sought a means of living suitable to this planet, a small band of criminals fled onto the steppes, which were then sparsely populated. Somehow they survived. The first generation or two lived largely by raiding lonely farmsteads; and they stole women. Then Altaians ceased to farm, while the Voiskoye learned to live as hunters. They still do so. Because their numbers are not great and the plains are very large, no one has troubled much about them. Sometimes they steal or kidnap, sometimes they barter, but most times they are never seen. I did not know there was a band hereabouts. They must have come toward the fire hoping to kill any game animals stampeded in their direction. Then they saw us and—” She drooped against him. The dark head bowed with weariness.

  Flandry made himself ignore his own aches and consider the giants. There was sufficient light. They seemed more caucasoid than the average Altaian, probably because their ancestors had happened to be. Within a mane of black hair and a waist-length tangle of beard, their features were big-nosed, heavy-browed, almost acromegalic. He noticed again that a disproportionate percentage of their incredible height —two and a quarter meters—was thigh and shank. But the torsos were stocky rather than lean. They wore shaggy tunics, nothing else save necklaces of teeth or bone. Their accoutrements included flint-headed axes, boomerangs, and knives obviously forged from steel scraps. While they appreciated the varyak heater, they didn’t actually seem to mind the chill that gnawed at him.

  He wondered wha
t they lived on. No, wait, that was easy. (If only this headache would go away and let him think!) Just as Terrestrial vegetation had overrun the planetary tropics, so would those Terrestrial animals that the nomads herded. Some, drifting free, would revert to a wild state. . . . Yes, he could remember dully how Bourtai had passed through a flock of big queer-looking creatures to break their trail, ages ago. . . . Giant forms would soon develop. A fresh biological type in an environment with lots of unfilled ecological niches can evolve explosively.

  Even man. Take a few dozen hunters. Keep their descendants inbred, to intensify any traits they may possess; but breed them fast, seven generations per century, and subject them to merciless natural selection. Besides metabolic adjustment to diet, temperature, and the rest, you will soon get a changed body. Size is advantageous for conserving heat as well as for running down prey. Under such conditions, nature will not need much more time to create a new breed of man than man does to create a new breed of dog.

  The question must be asked: "What do they want us for?”

  "The varyaks for metal, of course,” Bourtai mumbled.

  “That’s an evasion, sweetheart, as well you know. What do they want us for?”

  She hunched into herself. “They are said to be cannibals.” “But too seldom encountered for anyone to be sure, eh? Well, we aren’t in their kitchen yet. Brrrr! I could almost welcome a nice hot casserole. Come on, let’s go defrost.” He must cheer her up before she troubled to stump with him to the other varyak. That passive resignation, which is the other face of a stoic culture, was upon her. At length they huddled above its heater and felt iciness depart.

  “Hm,” Flandry said, “the radio on this one still looks workable.” He wriggled into position for some knob twiddling. If he could raise the Mangu Tuman! A hand pulled him aside. A broad coarse visage grinned down. “Hey!” Flandry wailed. “You aren’t supposed to understand about radios.”

  The giant squatted beside the girl. Flandry crawled bade. When he attempted the dials again, he was casually pushed off.

  “They may not understand machines,” Bourtai said bleakly, “but they know that machines are dangerous to them. Guns kill, boats fly off. You will be given no chance.”

  “Reckon not,” Flandry sighed. He experimented with talking to his captor, but soon learned that the Voiskoye language had drifted too far from basic Altaian. Exhausted, he slumped and fell into an uneasy sleep.

  When the trek resumed, he did by signs persuade them to carry him and Bourtai piggyback, rather than feed sack fashion. That was some help. So was the biltong given them to chew and the water from a leather bag. Nonetheless, he had never spent a more miserable twenty hours.

  They reached camp a while after sunrise. Flandry was put on the ground and untied. “Oof!” he groaned, and sat. His ankles wouldn’t bear him. But he scanned the scene alertly.

  Grass had been trampled over a large circle. Pup tents of hide surrounded one big tepee on which various cabalistic designs were crudely drawn in clay pigment. Fires burned in shallow trenches; skins and strips of flesh hung on poles to dry. Utensils were earthen; tools were mainly wood, stone, and bone. In general, the camp looked paleolithic. However, through the open flap of the tepee Flandry glimpsed cloth and metal.

  Two hulking women stood guard over die prisoners. Otherwise the tribe, perhaps a hundred adults and three times as many naked children, crowded about the varyaks. Ah, that was a marvel! The four hunters who had brought this prize were cheered, slapped on the back, danced around and presented with necklaces. At the height of festivities, one came from the tepee and painted their faces.

  Flandry watched him narrowly. The chief or medicine man, or whatever he was, had outlived most of his followers, judging by his grizzled locks. (Probably few Voiskoye reached forty. Hunger, accident, disease, and blizzard devoured them.) He was shorter and less powerfully built than the average, though still overtopping a Terrestrial. His garment was fringed with tails and ornamented with beads. He wore a headdress not unlike an ancient shako. Cicatrices decorated his breast, and shrewdness marked his features. It was soon obvious that he had waited in his tent and had begun by rewarding the heroes for purely ceremonial reasons. His glance kept straying toward the captives. When at last he could leave his people to jabber at the machines and prepare for a banquet, he approached Flandry with evident eagerness.

  Hunkering down, he said in accented basso Altaian: “What kind Izgnannikh you?”

  “What kind what?” Having recovered some strength, the Altaian leaned forward. Bourtai looked on with hopeless eyes.

  “You . . . two Izgrumniki. Not so? Herders, ordu folk, what you call yourself. We say Izgnanniki. She there common sort. Never see one like you. How?”

  “I,” said Flandry with what he hoped was impressiveness, “am from Holy Mother Terra.”

  He met neither disbelief nor acceptance. A mask appeared to drop over the heavy face. For entire minutes the giant peered at him. Only one hand moved, stroking the long beard.

  Finally, very slowly: “Izgnanniki tell Trout Terra. Say men come from star name Terra. Not so? Ha. You look ata-moi—what say—strange.” A thick finger pointed at the foreign shape of hair, eyes, nose, smooth chin. “You name?”

  “Captain Sir Dominic Flandry, Intelligence Corps, Imperial Terrestrial Navy,” he intoned with full magniloquence.

  The Voisko jumped to his feet, pulled a carved bone from the pouch at his waist and shook it toward the sun and the man. “You no make zaporo!” he roared furiously. “I kill. Kill now. Zaporo for me. Me only. Nyennekh, nyen nekh, shviska upolyansk!”

  “What does he mean?” Bourtai whispered.

  “He thinks I tried to—” Flandry discovered that Altaian, like many languages postdating the origin of space travel, had no word for “magic” or any related concept—“he believes certain phrases and rituals have special powers to help or harm. See, he’s warding off the hypothetical effects of what I said. It must have sounded like a strong formula to him. If they do eat us, I daresay they’ll believe they’re gaining any special potencies we may have.”

  She spat her contempt.

  “No zaporo,” Flandry soothed the giant. “Only my name. See, nothing happened. I only told you my name.” “Zaporo mine,” the other growled, somewhat mollified. “I make zaporo, good for us, bad for enemies. I tribemaster. You understand?” The shrewdness returned. . “If you not make big zaporo, you not from Terra. Not so?”

  Since the Voisko didn’t squat again, Flandry rose too. He had recovered that much from the trip here. Being used to nonhuman races taller than man, he was put at no psychological disadvantage by having to look up at the witch doctor. He twirled his mustache and murmured. “Well, I never said I couldn’t, just that I didn’t. On that occasion.” “You caught like animal,” the Voisko scoffed. “Terra man be caught like animal? Not so.”

  “I was taken by surprise,” Flandry said. “And naturally, your hunters were full of the zaporo you had given them. I own to not being all-powerful. But ... we do have certain tricks where I come from.”

  An awkward delay ensued, since his interlocutor’s rusty Altaian failed. The whole idea must be rephrased and threashed out, which Flandry thought rather spoiled the effect. However, such slowness did help drive the concept home, that anyone who claimed to be a Terran should be handled with care.

  “My name Kazar,” the chief told him. “Not real name. Real name secret so enemies not make zaporo on me. Name I use, Kazar. Name you use, Vlanary. Not so? We talk.”

  “Uh, how do you happen to know Izgnannikh speech?”

  Kazar scowled. “Years ago, me young, just old ’nough be called man. Hard winter. Many starve. Go with father and other men, take Izgnannild animals. Herdsmen see us. Shoot guns. Most Voiskoye killed. Me captured. Live with herdsmen three years. Do what herdsmen tell me do. Jahangir, they name.”

  “A tribe now supporting Oleg Yesukai,” Bourtai chimed in. “I have heard of them. They are poorer than most, which
has made them hard. They would not be above enslaving a prisoner. Especially one who we hardly regard as human.”

  Kazar brooded darkly at her. “Jahangir beat me. Me do dirty work. Escape. Come home. Now me kill Izgnannild where can.”

  “Whoa!” Flandry stepped between him and the girl. “Not this one. Haven’t you heard? There’s a war among the nomads. Her people are fighting the same ones who captured you.”

  “Yes, me know ’bout shooting on steppes, in sky. Me see Izgnanniki dead mark by Izgnannikh weapons.”

  “So we’re friends together, eh?” Flandry beamed.

  The lion head shook. “No. All Izgnanniki enemies to Voiskoye.”

  He’s doubtlessly right, Flandry realized. Not being worth cultivating as allies, the savages were considered and treated as dangerous nuisances by both nomad factions. “You know about radios?” he said. “Let me radio this woman’s people to come get her and me. They’ll be pleased. It would be worth a lot of metal to them.”

  For a moment Kazar hesitated. Then, decisively, with a chopping motion of one huge hand: “No. Izgnanniki hear we have you, they come. We give you. They give metal? Not so. They shoot!”

  Bourtai’s anger flashed. She jumped to her feet. “What’s that? Do you mean the Tebtengri would break an oath? Why, you louse-bitten rat, if you even knew what ‘oath’ means—”

  Kazar reached past Flandry and cuffed. Bourtai rolled over. Flandry glared, decided resistance was useless, and knelt by the girl. She sat up, holding her head. The bruise on her temple began to turn blue. "You all right?” he breathed. It was astonishing how anxious he felt.

  She nodded numbly. A female or two snarled and edged toward her. Kazar waved them back. “You keep still,” the chief ordered her.

  The Terran climbed erect. His full weariness struck home. He could only croak: “You get no use from me if you harm the woman. Understand?”