The creatures turned and made for the meadow, except for two Xankatikitiki, one of whom was still and silent, the other barely moving.
Now what? Benita asked herself. They’d come back. She’d better finish off the moving one. She stepped out into the clearing, moving quickly toward the moving Xanka, gun in pocket, hand on gun. She did not see the stooping form above her until the tentacles closed around her. She was lifted, hoisted, up, up, turned upside down and then swallowed, glurgle, glurgle, glurgle, her way down the long throat oiled by jets of stinking liquid, choking from the stench, dropped into a sac half-filled with stinking ooze.
Gagging, she sagged against one side of the stomach and peered upward, catching a glimpse of light among the tentacles. She thrust the gun up in trembling hands, held her breath and fired. Once, turn slightly, twice. Turn slightly again, three times, then a fourth. She should have pierced the body in several places, right up at the top. The walls of her prison trembled. High above her the tentacles lashed. Then, slowly, slowly, the creature fell, changing from a smokestack to a lengthy culvert, down which Benita began to crawl, sloshing, toward the roots of a tree, barely visible in the moonlight. Around her, the flesh of the creature still shook, and a high keening moved up the scale toward inaudibility.
She arrived at the dead, lax tentacles just as the predators came back from the meadow, talking loudly among themselves. The translator was still giving her the gist of it, still in a whisper.
“Odiferous Tentacle, Oh, Stinky, what’s happened to you. Look, look, Stinky’s down. Stinky’s leaking! Oh, Stinky emits death stenches! Alas, alas! Oh, Mrrgrowr is dead, see him lying there, dead and gone, his strength gone, his proud head fallen low, oh, alas, alas.”
“Do they all say alas?” murmured Benita.
“I’m translating freely,” admitted the machine. “I lack synonyms for alas.The Fluiquosm is asking if it or they got away. The Xankatikitiki say they must depart immediately with their fallen comrades, the burial rituals of their people demand it. The Wulivery say they must also depart, taking their commander with them . . .”
Benita very much wished to exit the commander. Her legs were beginning to burn, as though they were being digested. The tentacle end lay amid a cluster of evergreens, however, so she took the chance and crawled out beneath the low branches of the nearest. Behind her, the body of the dead Wulivery was tugged into the clearing. There were bustling sounds.
“Quolzikkaz closmmi wozzik.”
“The Fluiquosm wonders how many creatures it took to kill three of their group, why they were not seen, and how they got away,” murmured the translator. “The Fluiquosm are discussing moving the prey creatures to their own larder, after the Wulivery and the Xankatikitiki leave . . .”
Benita started, gritted her teeth and began to move out of her hiding place. She still had a few shots left. Maybe she could hit a Fluiquosm when it started to move one of the humans. It stood to reason she’d be able to tell where it was from the way the packaged body was moved. . . .
“Shhh,” said a voice at her ear.
Slowly, in total terror, she turned her head to confront the huge, compound eyes of … an Inkleozese, who spoke at some length, unintelligibly.
“The Pistach are on their way,” whispered the translator. “I strongly suggest that you stay here very quietly while we conduct our business. Our being here makes the ensuing time an official matter. It will be tiresome, time consuming, but do be still. They will not speak freely if they know you are listening.”
“The others . . .” murmured Benita, gesturing.
“They will not be harmed, and they will not move on their own. Only you were given the ability to shake off the Fluiquosm mindfog. Immunity to common types of predation is a usual gift to give an intermediary. We do not like persons of any planet interfering with official intermediaries.” The Inkleozese went up the trunk and out along a branch, where it disappeared among the leaves.