He put out his final cigaret. The planet filled the bow screen. Robot mechanisms could do a lot, but now there must also be live piloting … or a streak in Vixen’s sky and a crater blasted from its rock.
At the Hooligan’s speed, she crossed the tenuous upper air layers and hit stratosphere in a matter of seconds. It was like a giant’s fist. Flandry’s harness groaned as his body hurtled forward. There was no outside noise, yet, but the flitter herself shrieked in metallic pain. The screens became one lurid fire, air heated to incandescence.
Flandry’s arm trembled with weight. He slammed it down on the drive switches. Chives’ slight form could not stir under these pressures, but the green tail darted, button to dial to vernier. Engines bellowed as they fought to shed velocity. The vessel glowed red; but her metal was crystallized to endure more than furnace heat. Thunder banged around her, within her. Flandry felt his ribs shoved toward his lungs, as direction shifted. Still he could only see flame outside. But his blurring eyes read instruments. He knew the vessel had leveled off, struck denser atmosphere, skipped like a stone, and was now rounding the planet in monstrous shuddering bounces.
First then did he have time to reactivate the internal compensators? A steady one gee poured its benediction through him. He drew uneven breath into an aching chest. “For this we get paid?” he mumbled.
While Chives took over, and the thermostat brought the turret near an endurable temperature, Flandry unbuckled and went below to Kit’s stateroom. She lay unstirring in harness, a trickle of blood from the snub nose. He injected her with stimulol. Her eyes fluttered open. Briefly, she looked so young and helpless that he must glance away. “Sorry to jolt you back to consciousness in this fashion,” he said. “It’s bad practice. But right now, we need a guide.”
“Of course.” She preceded him to the turret. He sat down and she leaned over his shoulder, frowning at the viewscreens. The Hooligan burrowed into atmosphere on a steep downward slant. The roar of cloven air boomed through the hull. Mountains rose jagged on a night horizon. “That’s the Ridge,” said Kit. “Head yonder, over Moonstone Pass.” On the other side, a shadowed valley gleamed with rivers, under stars and a trace of aurora. “There’s the Shaw, an’ the King’s Way cuttin’ through. Land anywhere near, ’tisn’t likely the boat will be found.”
The Shaw belied its name; it was a virgin forest, 40,000 square kilometers of tall trees. Flandry set his craft down so gently that not a twig was broken, cut the engines and leaned back. “Thus far,” he breathed gustily, “we is did it, chillun!”
“Sir,” said Chives, “may I once again take the liberty of suggesting that if you and the young lady go off alone, without me, you need a psychiatrist.”
“And may I once again tell you where to stick your head,” answered Flandry. “I’ll have trouble enough passing myself off as a Vixenite, without you along. You stay with the boat and keep ready to fight. Or, more probably, to scramble out of here like an egg.”
He stood up. “We’d better start now, Kit,” he added. “That drug won’t hold you up for very many hours.”
Both humans were already dressed in the soft green coveralls Chives had made according to Kit’s description of professional hunters. That would also explain Flandry’s little radio transceiver, knife and rifle; his accent might pass for that of a man lately moved here from the Avian Islands. It was a thin enough disguise … but the Ardazirho wouldn’t have an eye for fine details. The main thing was to reach Kit’s home city, Garth, undetected. Once based there, Flandry could assess the situation and start making trouble.
Chives wrung his hands, but bowed his master obediently out the airlock. It was midwinter, but also periastron; only long nights and frequent rains marked the season in this hemisphere. The forest floor was thick and soft underfoot. Scant light came through the leaves, but here and there on the high trunks glowed yellow phosphorescent fungi, enough to see by. The air was warm, full of strange green scents. Out in the darkness there went soft whistlings, callings, croakings, patterings, once a scream which cut off in a gurgle, the sounds of a foreign wilderness.