Cat-people, dog-people, still here in man’s home, carrying on war with Rations. But where were the men? How long since they had disappeared? And why had they gone? Were the Rations responsible? Ayana could hardly believe that. Even though those horrors might be able to muster whole armies, they could not have cleared out their masters, masters who were equipped with the weapons she knew existed here—the kind she had seen the cat-person wearing.
One of the patients stirred, opened his eyes. Large and green, they stared straight into hers. His ears flattened to his skull, he drew himself up against the wall of the chamber, his clawed hands coming up in menace.
He must believe she was one with the Rations! But now they had a common cause. How could she ex-plain? Unless by understanding where he was, what was happening, he would know—
The look in those green eyes, cold and measuring, daunted Ayana. She edged away from the window, decided it was time to check again on the sleepers. But this time went more slowly. If the cat-people, the dog-person, should turn on her, too— She could use the weapons, but if she did she would never learn the truth, perhaps never herself escape from this place in which the inhabitants apparently hunted each other with ferocious zeal.
Ayana stood looking down at Tan. When she left he would remain. So she must give him a chance. He was no longer one with her. If he had ever really been so, but he was one of her kind. And she believed that these filthy new allies of his would turn on him viciously when they discovered what had happened. She should return the stunner to him, give the rest of the sleepers an extra spray so they would still be under when his sedation wore off. In the meantime she would try to prevent any more arrivals. The door at the end of the hall had no locks that Ayana could understand. But she closed it and then piled there all the loose and heavy objects she could turn into a barricade.
When she had finished Ayana stumbled back to the renewal chamber so tired she could barely urge one foot before the other. She had Extend pills, enough to renew her energy for the final dash out of here. But she would not waste those by premature use. There were E rations, one tube, in her belt loops. She turned the cap to heat and waited until she could twist that off and squeeze the semi-liquid contents into her mouth.
Having eaten, she went to look in the chamber. Time was passing far too fast, she might be pushed to a move soon.
Those inside were all conscious. The one cat-person who had first revived was standing. As she watched, he reached down to draw another up, a female, the scars of her wounds still rawly red but closed. There was another male, and the dog-person, who, Ayana saw, had moved away from the other three, fitting his back into a corner as if he expected to be attacked.
There came a sudden sharp sound, enough to bring a weapon into Ayana’s hand, set her looking about wildly. Then she realized that the light on the control board had gone out, the hum of the machine was sub-siding. Apparently the chamber had turned itself off. Perhaps some indication that the work was done.
Now that the time had come to release the captives, Ayana found herself hesitant. The manifest anger in the male’s expression— But they were weak, helpless, and she was armed—With the stunner ready in her right hand, she spun the lock with her left. The door opened.
They were gathered just within as if ready to bolt for freedom, the three cat-people to the fore, the dog-person behind. Ayana heard hisses—a rumble of growl. She did not want to use the stunner, it might plunge them all straight back into captivity.
“No—“ But they could not understand her, of course. However she babbled on as if they could. “Friend—friend!”
Their ears were flat to their skulls, their fangs exposed, their hands up with claws extended. If they came at her she would have no recourse but to shoot.
“Friend.“
A louder growl in answer. Ayana moved aside, retreated slowly, step by step, leaving a clear path between them and the door through which Tan and the Rations had earlier brought her. Though she still held the stunner at ready, she waved them on in a gesture she hoped they would understand.
They moved slowly, stiffly, but gave no sign of pain. They moved with their heads turned toward her, their eyes watching. Then they reached the door and were gone, though for a moment or two she could still hear the shuffle of their feet.
Ayana breathed a sigh of relief. Her waiting was done. Now she must make good her own escape. She went for the last time to the huddle of the Ration party, giving the Rations a dose of stunner ray and then laid the weapon in Tan’s lax hand.
He groaned and she jerked back as if he had made to seize her. He must be close to waking. She must get away fast— Ayana turned and ran, stopping only by the renewer to catch up her kit, following the path of the released captives.
She was afraid to use her torch. Luckily there seemed to be a very dim light here, enough to show the way. She must concentrate on the route she had tried to memorize when they brought her in. But first the Extend pills. Her chest hurt as she breathed after that last spurt of speed. Ayana groped within the kit. Two ought to be enough. She mouthed the tablets.
They were bitter, and she had trouble swallowing them dry. But she hurried on even before they worked, so she was in another passage when that aching fatigue lifted. Ayana felt not only completely rested, but alert of mind, able to do anything. The euphoria which was a side effect of such a large dose of Extend gripped her and she forced herself to remember that this feeling of superb well-being was only illusionary.
This passage—had they come this way? But they must have— The trouble was that one of these ways looked exactly like another. Where had they left Jacel? She had tried to establish landmarks on the way in but had found few. And there were several places of forking corridors. She must remember—she must!
She had no warning. Out of some shadowed way she had not even glanced into, they sprang. Furred arms closed about her thighs as one attacker struck with force enough to crash her to the ground.
Furtig studied their captive. So—this was a Demon! Though a female, not a warrior. But still a Demon and as such to be feared. He heard a soft hiss of breath. Eu-La, somewhat accustomed now to the wonders of the legendary lairs, had moved beside him and with her Liliha. While behind them came two of the In-born males carrying a box with a coil of wire laid on its cover.
The Demon was awake. When they had taken her captive, she had fallen heavily and struck her head, so they had taken her easily enough before she could reach for weapons. And now here came Jir-Haz, to whom they owed the capture itself.
“You can do this?” Furtig asked Liliha. “Speak to the Demon in her own tongue?”
“We hope to do this thing. By listening to Demon voices on their tapes we can understand their words. But we cannot make those same noises ourselves. But perhaps with this”—she laid a proprietary hand upon the box—“we can twist our speech enough for her to understand our questions.”
But the Demon spoke first. She had been looking from one to the other of them, first in what Furtig relished as open fear (thus proving that the warriors of the People could strike fear even into Demons) and now with something close to appeal. For she spoke to Liliha, at first so fast and in such a gabble of sound, Furtig could make little of it.
However, Liliha, her ears attuned from very young years to the teaching machines, did sort out enough of those uncouth noises to make sense.
“She wishes to know where she is—and who we are.” Then, the Inborn having set one end of the wire into the box, Liliha took up a disk fastened to the other and held it close to her mouth, speaking slowly and carefully into it.
“This is the lair of Gammage. We are the People.”
It was weird, for they could hear Liliha’s words. But also there was a secondary gabble, like a blurred echo following.
The Demon’s face was so strange, so unlike that of a rational being that one could hardly hope to learn anything from her expression. But Furtig dared to imagine she was surprised.