Timothy Zahn - Conquerors' Pride

Wherever they'd been heading, they had arrived.

It was fourteen minutes before the sudden rumbling vibration that indicated they'd made planetfall. The noise and motion died away, and for another fifteen minutes Pheylan sweated in the dim light, his survival-pack flechette pistol gripped in his hand, waiting for his captors' next move.

When it happened, it happened all at once. The pod's exit hatch at his left was abruptly rimmed with light, and with a crackle of superheated metal and a cloud of brilliant sparks the hatch cover blew outward, landing with a muffled clang on the deck below. A cool breeze flowed in through the opening, carrying with it the stink of burned metal. Setting his teeth, Pheylan pointed his gun into the air flow and waited.

No one tried to come in. But then, no one had to. Sooner or later he would have to come out on his own, and waiting until he ran out of ration bars would gain him nothing. Sliding his pistol into the inner pocket of his jacket, he unstrapped from his chair and worked his way through the cramped space of the pod over to the blackened opening. The edges were still warm, but not too hot to touch. Getting a grip on the handholds, he looked cautiously out.

The light outside was too dim to see very well, but he could make out a row of indistinct silhouettes facing him from three or four meters away. Worming through the opening, he dropped to the deck beside what was left of the hatch cover. "I'm Commander Pheylan Cavanagh," he called, hoping the quaver in his voice wasn't as noticeable to them as it was to him. "Captain of the Commonwealth Peacekeeper starship Kinshasa. Who are you?"

There was no reply, but one of the shadowy figures left the line and stepped toward him. He stopped a meter away, and Pheylan had the impression that even in the dim light he was having no trouble looking the prisoner over. "Brracha," he said in a deep voice; and as he did so, the lights in the room came up.

And Pheylan finally got a clear look at the creatures who'd destroyed his ship.

They were roughly human in height, with slender torsos and a pair each of arms and legs in more or less human arrangement. Their heads were hairless, the faces roughly triangular in shape as large brow ridges over the deep-set eyes narrowed to hawklike beaks. They were dressed in tight-fitting footed jumpsuits of a dark shimmery material, with no insignia or other ornamentation that Pheylan could see.

Nor were there any obvious side arms in sight. Pheylan eyed them, wondering if it was possible that the basic concept of hand weapons could somehow have passed them by. If so—if that meant they might miss the flechette pistol in his jacket pocket—

There was a movement to his right, and he turned to see another of the aliens step through an archway into the bay, a long folded towel of what looked like their jumpsuit material draped around the back of his neck. He came up to the alien facing Pheylan, who turned and took the material. Their heads, Pheylan saw now, extended farther back than he'd realized, curving back and under to the neck and to a low spinal ridge that jutted out from their jumpsuits. The ridge terminated just above the legs in a flat, eellike tail that seemed to twirl continually in a tight corkscrewing spiral.

The alien spokesman turned back to Pheylan and held out the material. "Tarr'ketarr brracha," he said in the same deep voice.

Pheylan focused on it and saw that what he'd taken to be a long towel was in fact another of their jumpsuits. "No, thank you," he said, shaking his head and tapping his chest. "I prefer to wear my own uniform."

The alien opened his mouth slightly, and a long dark-red tongue jabbed outward at the jumpsuit in his hands. "Tarr'ketarr brracha," he repeated.

Pheylan grimaced, but it was obvious that they had their minds made up. It was also obvious that unless he wanted to haul out his gun and start shooting, there weren't a lot of options open to him. Stripping off his uniform, he put on the jumpsuit.

It was a perfect fit—amazingly perfect, in fact, right down to the slight but annoying bulge around his waist he'd been promising himself to get rid of for the past two years. Clearly, it had been custom-cut for him; and while that eliminated any potential problems of movement or breathing, it also left him no loose nooks or folds where he might be able to conceal his pistol.

The point turned out to be moot. He was still figuring out how the fastening strip worked when the second alien stooped and collected his uniform and equipment, then turned and disappeared back the way he had come.

The spokesman took a step to the side. "Brracha," he said. Again the tongue snaked out, stiffened to point briefly to the alien's right, then retracted again into his mouth.

Pheylan looked in that direction. There was the outline of a large hexagonal-shaped hatchway on the bulkhead, probably the door his pod had come in through. The request was obvious, and as with the jumpsuit there wasn't anything to do but obey. He headed toward it, the alien spokesman stepping to his side as the rest of the line formed up behind them. As they approached the hatchway, it folded outward, letting in a burst of cool, spicy-pungent air.

The sky outside was blue with a scattering of white clouds. As the hatchway continued to open and Pheylan got closer to it, he saw first the tops of tall gray-green objects—the local equivalent of trees, he decided—and then, between him and the trees, a complex of low, flat buildings. From his angle it was difficult to be sure, but they looked as if they were the same linked-hexagon design as the aliens' ships.

A dozen more of the aliens were waiting for him on the ground, standing in a line facing a flat ramp that had been run up to the edge of the hatchway. Pheylan started down toward them, trying to get a look at everything without being too obvious about it. The building complex seemed to be backed up against the gray-green forest, with a wide-open space between it and the landing area. Here and there a few plants still grew, but most of the ground around the complex was a uniform reddish dirt. An indication that it had been only recently finished, he decided, a hunch supported by the second complex clearly still under construction just off the landing area to his right. At the edge of the forest, midway between the two building complexes, was a small geodesic shape with the ominous look of a weapons dome about it.

He reached the foot of the ramp and stopped. "I'm Commander Pheylan Cavanagh of the NorCoord Union," he identified himself again. "Captain of the Peacekeeper starship Kinshasa. "

The middle three aliens in the line stepped forward; and now that he was closer, Pheylan could see that their jumpsuits were a different design from those his shipboard escort were wearing. The two flanking aliens stopped a meter away, while the one in the center took another step toward Pheylan. "Mirras kryrrea sor zhirrzh har'proov," he said. His long tongue extended, curved back beneath the lower beak almost to his neck. "Svv-selic: Too'rr," he said. The tongue swung around to his right to point toward the alien there. "Nzz-oonaz: Flii'rr." The tongue swung around to his left —"Thrr-gilag: Kee'rr."

"Cavanagh," Pheylan repeated, sticking out his own tongue and trying to point to himself. Not surprisingly, it didn't work very well. "Earth," he added, hoping he was guessing right about what had been said.

"Cavv-ana," the alien repeated. "Urr't."

"Close enough," Pheylan said. "Now let me try. Siv-seleck: Too-err—"

"Svv-selic: Too'rr," the alien corrected him sharply.

"Right," Pheylan said. "Siv-selick—"

"Svv-selic: Too'rr," the alien insisted.