Crudrat, page 22
“No?”
“Too much gravity and none of the smell. You know, that metallic nose tickle? This one remembers it vividly from when Quy first turned on the targeting coils.”
“Do you? We Hydraborn have poor nasal sensors, I had no idea the simulator lacked this detail. It is usually used for training those who have never been in battle before, and it is rare for a seasoned wari to return to the simulator and notice a flaw. Thank you for telling me.”
“What do I do now?” Maura stripped off the coils and stood up.
“The Patrona will be back shortly. I shall give her my report. Then you will continue on to your next test.”
Maura nodded. “Thank you for your supervision.”
The green-scaled man nodded curtly and disappeared into another room.
Maura waited.
Eventually, the Patrona reappeared. She had added more jewelry in the interim, and switched her headdress for a larger and more impressive one.
“Eeaa tells me you did very well for a first timer.” She looked like she’d rather not believe such a report. “For once my nibling appears to have neither lied nor exaggerated. Remarkable. I will take these results into consideration, but you should know my decision is also based both on your previous informal testing over the last few spins, and those exams that are still to follow.”
For the next test they made her fight.
Maura was not much surprised by this. The Patrona led her in and down to one of the four main courts of the recreation area. Turns out there was an easier way down than jumping, stairs right through a hole in the plaster floor, off to one side.
Maura trotted on down them alone and came out into the pit and chaos.
It was all about what they made her fight.
Animals. Not little food creatures like the kitchen quy. Nor useful smarts, like the murmel. But big, nasty teeth-riddled things, which looked more into hunting human than feeding or helping them. Four of the critters waited for her, all interested in Maura-meat. She turned fast to get back up the stairs but someone had capped over the entrance and there was nowhere to go but front-ways.
She hadn’t even a weapon. For a people that seemed pretty obsessed with sticks and knives and the like, the Kill’ki were remarkably unwilling to give her any.
Maura did what she was best at. Ran. She flipped forward, up over the charging beasties and took off straight across the court. The beasts wheeled about and chased after her. They had big, heavy haunches, coarse thick fur, and a good deal in the claw area to go with the teeth. They were also prone to slobbering.
Maura took in the space about her. A big open square of a room. High walls on all sides, no good hand-holds, a few stone platforms to one side, and a wide expanse of plaster floor. Nothing to use as a weapon. Not that she was sure it was a right mind set, simply to kill a critter for following its nature. Even if that meant following her.
She made for one of the stone platforms and jumped on top of it.
The four animals charged, all those teeth and claws heading her way, and Maura stayed as long as she dared, crouched atop the stone, luring them forward. They hurled themselves at her. At the last possible tick, she dove into a somersault, a long arc over their heads, and sped away again across the plaster floor. She peeked back. In their tumble and haste, they’d managed to knock the massive stone block over and toward the wall.
Maura dashed around the court, noting she’d drawn a bit of a crowd watching from above. There were no ticks to go about recognizing faces or count how many were watching. She ended her mad dash back atop the knocked over stone platform, balancing on its side.
The four creatures hurled themselves at her, snarling. Not so bright, these beasties. She jumped over them once more, this time not bothering to dive, just propelling herself up and forward in one massive leap, and began the lap again. Given her stamina, and their stupidity, they could probably go about repeating that pattern all shift.
But they’d hit against the platform hard enough the second time to slide it a good handsbreadth across the plaster floor. Not quite up against the wall, but enough for Maura. She went for one last lap — got up as much speed as she could, the creatures chewing away at the air beyond her heels, and spun the wall at the far end of the court. It was one of her favorite blade moves, placing one hand to the tunnel side, and flipping vertically feet-over-head, around the hand.
It certainly confused the critters. They balked, stumbling up against one and other and the hard stone, giving her a good head start as she charged back across the court directly at the tipped-over platform. Getting up real momentum, she used the platform as springboard to propel her up against the wall, touched down one, two, three, steps up, and just managed to grab the top of the wall with one hand. It was enough for a crudrat, she could hoist with the other hand and pull herself right up and over the top.
She was suddenly face to face with a group of very surprised looking spectators. Not knowing what else to do, she scanned the crowd and made her way around to where the Patrona sat. Dr Sillous, Quy, Korakay, Asherat, and number of others were all perched near her.
“Unusual approach.” The Patrona was noncommittal and grave.
“Now I see where you get all those muscles and calluses,” said Dr Sillous thoughtfully.
“How are the leathers feeling?” Asherat was clearly trying not to look impressed.
Maura could be wordy about that. “Brilliant! No pinching, no folding over or hiking up, nothing loose to get caught, no movement restriction. A bit indecently tight,” she paused at his annoyed look, “by Wheel standards,” she hastily modified, “but really brilliant.”
Quy, typically, was angry. “You didn’t even give her a weapon,” he accused his aunt.
“That was not part of her test,” replied the Patrona. “Considering she stole the first knife she used. Penalties are my province and I choose to enact them in this instance.”
Clearly, the Patrona was still bitter about that.
Quy narrowed black eyes at his aunt, but held his tongue for once.
“We will have to take a few extra ticks to set up the modular test. Given your unusual ability to simply climb out of the court arena.” The Patrona sounded annoyed.
Maura wondered how else a body was to get away from beasties. Seemed a bang up solution to her. Have I failed again?
The Patrona signaled three wari to come over. Maura recognized them as Quy’s semi-cousins from her very first day in Pikillacta. She hadn’t seen them since, but all three looked much the same — all over white, with different lengths of fuzz, and black skin where kill markings were shaved into face and shoulder. They wore the same Kill’ki wrappings in bright colors, and the customary amount of wari weaponry and jewelry.
The large female stepped forward, her gold necklaces jangling melodically. “Your orders, Patrona?”
Maura felt a terrible sweating panic – was she up against these three fully trained armigers for the next test? And me – not a weapon and not a lick of skill. I don’t stand a chance.
“Remove all lifts and portable obstacles from the modular arena,” instructed the Patrona.
The three nodded.
“Follow us,” said the smallest one to Maura with a grin.
Maura moved to do so, and as she did, Quy slotted a metal stick-like object into her left hand. Without looking at him or reacting in any way, Maura, all hidden movements, slid the rod up her tight leather sleeve.
“It will be fun to see how you take to narrow dimensions. I enjoyed that last show, by the way. A bit short, and a bit tame, but certainly different.” The small wari had an expression suggesting he really had enjoyed it and wasn’t just talk-making.
“No one has ever simply leaped out of the court before,” said the medium sized wari. Maura wasn’t sure if his tone indicated awe or disgust.
Despite her fears, the three warriors merely led her down and around to a different court, and then left her to her own devises while they moved furniture. The new court was quite small, or so Maura was thinking, until the three disappeared ‘round the end of it, proving it was no end at all but a bend. They returned carrying one of the massive stone platforms, which they pushed into the holding area near Maura. She was impressed by their obvious strength. They proceeded to do this several more times before giving Maura three little waves, one from each, and disappearing back the way they’d come in.
Maura moved forward into the court, cautious. She needn’t have bothered, no one and nothing was in there with her. The area was constructed out of a series of very high walled passages, and Maura took a quick jog ‘round and about to try and get the lay of it. Not a lot to work with, no hand holds, no easy way out, and she simply wasn’t tall enough to run up a wall that high without a platform to aid.
Why did it always come down to height? Too tall for crudrat, too short for Kill’ki.
Maura slid the weapon Quy had given her out of her sleeve.
In the stands above, she heard the Patrona shout, “Quy, you didn’t!” and string of attached profanity.
It was a long metal stick thing with a stiff knobby switch halfway up. She clicked the switch up, carefully, and a wicked little blade shot out one end. Maura rather liked it. It had the same length and heft as her old crud scraper from tunnel time. She whirled it about a bit for testing, swinging it behind her head and under her arms, as if she were scraping a blade. Nice.
Still nothing happened.
Maura got tired of twirling the weapon and crouched to rest, staying alert.
She was beginning to wonder if anything would happen at all when a soft thunk sounded. She stood.
Still nothing.
Eventually, three opponents rounded a bend in the passage before her — one Jakaa Nova, one Kill'ki, and one of the all-red Shosanshee. Two sets of eyelids, Maura’s brain reminded her proudly. Much good such knowledge did her now. She realized she’d never asked the Patrona – or Quy, or Asherat, or Korakay for that matter – how to best fight any of the aliens that now surrounded her. She’d been so concerned with getting along, with not intruding or getting herself noticed, she hadn’t even wondered what their weaknesses were – or their strengths. An armiger would have asked. A wari would have asked. Was that, too, a failing mark against her?
The Patrona was right — Maura was no warrior. But Maura did know enough about the Coalition by now to realize that the three now blocking the way before her weren’t yet full warriors but still quoin. Which was more training than Maura had, but still was, the Patrona probably felt, closer to fair. Or perhaps it was in the testing rules.
They each held a pair of nasty looking knives made of some kind of sharpened stone, one in each hand.
Maura did the only thing she could. The only thing she was good at. She used crudratting against them and moved – straight at them.
At the last second she twisted to one side, skittered partway up the wall, and leaped out.
One. Two.
She stepped from the head of the Shosanshee, to the shoulder of the Kill’ki, catapulting herself from there forward into speed. Six stone blades slashed at her, one hit her ankle, but skittered harmlessly off the leather. A good barter indeed, she really had gotten the better end of that deal.
Two of the quoin took off after her — the Kill’ki and the Shosanshee. The Jakaa Nova went in a different direction, obviously intending to cut her off.
There was a nice long stretch to pick up speed and gain some space. While Maura did both, she also slid the trigger switch on Quy’s weapon, and heard it sink back inside itself again. She tucked the metal rod back up her sleeve, at the same time thinking she’d love a few pockets in these leathers of hers.
She’d learned the lay of this maze-like court, and had a pretty good idea where the Jakaa Nova might pop up again if he were coming around to head her off. So she grabbed at next corner with both hands, swinging her legs around the bend first, into the passage, and hit the Jakaa Nova running towards her with both feet, hard, to the sternum. The quoin oophed and fell back against the wall.
Maura dashed on, not waiting to see if he stood again, or if his companions would stop to help, trip over him, or manage to keep going.
She ran so fast ‘round the next corner, she had to slap her hands and rebound away from the opposite wall. In front of her was a T in the passageway — two choices of direction. She took neither. Instead, she judged from the footsteps that those behind had caught up to her just enough. She took a quick dash up the wall, and pushing off and up with all her strength, the big muscles in her thighs screaming, flew into a long back dive over their heads. Ending in a twist, she landed facing back the way she’d come and sped off again.
There had been only two behind her. The Jakaa Nova was still separated from the others.
‘Round the next bend she saw him coming at her. She put on a quick burst of speed, dodged to the side, leaped up, placed both hands to the side of his face, and shoved down, as though he were a beltway rail Maura wanted to vault over. Maura used the Jakaa Nova’s own body to brace against, and ran sideways, parallel to the floor, along the wall, all the while shoving downwards, leveraging pressure to compensate for lack of physical strength. The Jakaa Nova reeled to the side, and Maura ran on.
No one was following. Which meant the other two were also trying for a frontal approach.
Maura met them coming at her just after she made that realization. She ran toward them, without pause. They both took up some kind of fighting stance, low, grounded, balancing on the balls of their feet. Armigers only knew weapons and wari seemed the same. Maura intended to go at them with her body as the weapon. Bet they’re not used to that.
She dove at the space between them, doing a side flip through the small gap, tilting so her front fist and back foot whipped, one after the other, into the nose of the Shosanshee as she passed through, the shorter and more accessible of the two.
The Kill’ki made a grab for her, dropping one knife. It shattered with a high tinkling sound on the plaster. Glass knife, not stone?
Maura squirmed her way out of her grip, blessed the leathers again, and ran on.
Around several corners and down a few more straight stretches and Maura gained a good deal of velocity. She’d also thought up a plan.
All three aliens appeared before her once more — the Kill'ki at the front and the other two flanking her. Good, thought Maura, she’s the tallest.
Maura ran forward, trying not to look at the knife the Kill’ki held, a shifting rapidity of sharpness. She charged directly at her, as though to use her for another wall run, but at the last moment, swerved to one side. Maura used the Kill’ki’s knee, hip, waist, and shoulder with her left leg, and the wall with her right, to tic-tac straight up. At the quoin’s shoulder, Maura shifted balance over, her right foot coming against the top of that fuzzy head. For a split second she was entirely balanced on top of the Kill’ki and then she sprang, landing atop the wall.
20
When there is nothing else, countervail.
~ Coalition Proverb
After that, it was all easy. Maura ran along the wall top, narrow, but not a challenge since they were about the same was the metal beams ‘round her old spaceport’s tag end. She jumped over the passageways below, smooth and simple, balancing the landings perfectly. She made her way, one after the next, back over to the stands where the Patrona, Quy, and the others sat, mouths slightly open.
She took up stance, all self-conscious, before them. Now what?
She seemed to have drawn quite a crowd this time. A number of different aliens were gathered, having watched her tightrope over wall-tops towards them. Everyone was all agog, except Quy. Quy had seen her run the beltway. He had some small notion of what a crudrat could do.
Maura handed him back his unused weapon.
“Crudrats don’t use blades, we dodge them.” She looked to the Patrona, and said, rather bold and daring, “Running a scyther is still harder.”
Dr Sillous recovered speech first. “Are you saying that any Wheel-made crudrat could do,” he paused, “that.” He waved his spade tipped hand at the partitioned court below.
Maura gave this question some serious consideration. She’d been the best in her sector. And some other ‘rats suffered from lack of innovation — not many would think to turn the run itself into the fight. “Most could suss to it, if told how,” she finally said, trying for honesty, “But not all have the noggin to think it up to start.”
“But can they all twist, flip, and jump about like that?” Korakay was looking mightily impressed.
Maura shrugged. “What, that? For certain. Whatcha all think crudratting was about?”
The Patrona seemed at a loss, but for once something Maura had said obviously made her really think, instead of only get annoyed. “And these are the same crudrats who, when they become too big and strong, are unwanted? Like you were when my nibling found you?”
Maura nodded.
“And what, exactly, happens to them, if some pustule of a Kill’ki doesn’t come along and inadvertently provide them with other options?”
“What exactly happens?” Maura hesitated.
“Yes. What exactly?”
“This one can only speak to her own spaceport."
“Good enough for us.” Dr Sillous leaned forward slightly looking very interested. “Quy remembers the coordinates, right Quy?”
“Of course,” replied Quy looking offended.
“Well,” Maura frowned. Then she spat it all out in one go — her future as might-have-been. “Generally we get our licenses pulled. That’s the little chip that allows a reject to work the scythers. Once that happens, we’re air wasters. Armigers – them’s like your wari – will hunt a body down. If they feel like it. Mostly they don’t much care, so they leave a reject be. There’s no way and nowheres to nosh. Some of us make it through spins begging for scraps, but since they shut off the crossgenetor arena, them’s scarce pickings. So we look to starvation and death within a turn.”
