Timothy Zahn - Cobra Strike

The forty-eight Cobras and fourteen scientists who would be landing on Qasama were chosen and trained. The Baliu demesne expressed their displeasure at funding a second mission on what still amounted to speculation, but well before the training period was over Jonny and Stiggur were able to change the aliens' minds.

And less than a month after the Dewdrop had returned from Qasama, both it and the Menssana lifted quietly from the Capitalia starport and headed back.

Night on Qasama.

The villages along the eastern arm of what was now referred to as the Fertile

Crescent were dark as the Menssana drifted down on its gravity lifts. Dark, but visible enough in infrared scanners. The roads connecting the towns were visible, too, the network narrowing like a filigree arrowhead to point at the most southerly village at the end of the crescent... with but a single road northward connecting it to the rest of Qasaman civilization.

The Menssana stopped first along that road, some twenty kilometers north of town; and when it lifted again it had left twenty-two people and the two aircars behind. The aircars themselves lifted before the ship was out of sight, bound on missions of their own; and, almost lazily, the Menssana swung southward toward the sleeping target village, its sensors taking in great gulps of electromagnetic radiation, sound, and particulate matter and spitting out maps and lists in return. The ship circled the village once, maintaining a discreet distance to avoid detection. When it finally set down in the forest some fifty meters from the wall, the forty passengers who emerged had a fair idea what they were getting into.

Within half an hour, though no one else yet knew it, they had taken the town.

The mayor got a full two steps into his office before his face registered the fact that someone else was sitting on his cushions-and he managed another step and a half before he was able to stop. His eyes widened, then narrowed as surprise turned to anger. He snapped something; "Who are you"? the Menssana's computer translated it.

"Good morning, Mr. Mayor," Winward said gravely from the cushions, his newly reconstructed eyes steady on the other's mojo. "Forgive the intrusion, but we need some information from you and your people."

The mayor seemed to freeze at the first words from the pendant around Winward's neck... and as his eyes searched the Cobra's face the blood abruptly drained from his cheeks. "You!" he whispered.

Winward nodded understanding. "Ah, so Kimmeron circulated our pictures, did he?

Good. Then you know who I am... and you know the foolishness of resistance."

The mayor's gun hand was trembling as if in indecision. "I wouldn't advise it,"

Winward told him. "I can kill both you and your mojo before you can draw.

Besides, there are others with me-lots of others-and if you start shooting the rest of your people probably will, too, and we'll just have to kill a bunch of you to prove we can do it." He cocked his head. "We don't have to prove that, do we?"

A muscle in the other's cheek twitched. "I've seen the reports of your carnage," he said grimly.

"Good," Winward said, matching the other's tone. "I hate having to cover the same ground twice. So. Are you going to cooperate?"

The mayor was silent for a moment. "What do you want from us?"

Quietly, Winward let out the breath he'd been holding. "We want only to ask your people some questions and do a few painless and harmless studies on them and their mojos."

He watched the mayor's face closely, but he could see no obvious reaction. "Very well," the Qasaman said. "Only to prevent unnecessary bloodshed, I will give in.

But be warned: if your tests aren't as harmless as you claim you'll soon have more bloodshed than you have taste for."

"Agreed." Winward stood and gestured to the cushions and the low switch-covered console beside it. "Call your people and tell them to leave their homes and come into the streets. They may bring their mojos but must leave their guns inside."

"The women and children, too?"

"They must come out, and some will need to be tested. If it'll make you feel better, I can allow a close relative to be present while any woman or child is being questioned."

"That... would be appreciated." The mayor's eyes held Winward's for a moment,

"To what demon have you sold your soul, that you are able to return from the dead?"

Winward shook his head minutely. "You wouldn't believe it if I told you," he said. "Now call your people."

The Qasaman pursed his lips and sat down. Flipping a handful of switches on the console, he began speaking, his voice echoing faintly from the streets. Winward listened for a moment, then reached to his pendant and covered the translator mike. "Dorjay: report."

"Situation quiet at the long-range transmitter," Link's voice came promptly through his earphone. "Uh... looks like the mayor's message is starting to stir up things out there now."

"Look sharp-we don't want anyone sneaking in there to send an SOS off to

Sollas."

"Particularly as they'd catch us dismantling and studying all the nice equipment in here," Link added dryly. "We'll be careful. You want me to continue managing the gate and motor patrols, too?"

"Yes. It'll get pretty hectic here once the psych people get their business going."

"Okay. Keep me posted."

Winward tapped the mike once to break the private connection and then covered it again. "Governor Telek? How're the pickups coming over?"

"Perfectly," Telek's voice said in his ear. "Got some good baseline readings on the mayor while he was heading through the building, and the high-stress ones there in the office look even better."

"Good. We'll get things started here as soon as we can. Any word yet from the outrider teams?"

"Just routine check-ins. Dewdrop's not reporting any obvious troop movements, either. Looks like we sneaked in undetected."

Which should mean they'd have a few hours or even a day or two before the rest of the planet realized they'd been invaded. After which things could get sticky.

"Okay. Dorjay says the tech assessors are already pulling things apart, so you'll get some data coming in on that front soon. Out."

The mayor leaned back from his console to look up balefully at Winward. "They will comply with your demands," he said. "For now, at any rate."

Getting his courage back? That was fine with Winward-the more mood swings the

Qasamans went through, the more useful the data the hidden sensors would get.

Provided the mayor didn't get too courageous. "Fine," the Cobra nodded. "Then let's go out and join them while our people get things organized. After you give me your gun, of course."

The Qasaman hesitated a split second before sliding the weapon out of its holster and laying it atop the console. "Okay; let's go," Winward said, leaving the gun where it was. If Telek's theory was right, chances were he could pick up the weapon without drawing a mojo attack... but he wasn't ready to make a test case out of it, not yet.

Silently the Qasaman rose to his feet, and together the two men left the office.

The section of forest the outrider-two team had put their aircar down into was reasonably sparse, as such things went, reminding Rey Banyon more of the woods they'd seen on Chata than the denser forests of Aventine's far west region where he'd grown up. The good news was that the openness aided visibility; the bad was that it allowed for larger animals to live here. By and large, a fairly even trade.

But for the moment the forest's denizens, large and small, were keeping their distance. Eyes sweeping the vicinity of the aircar, he listened with half an ear to the conversation between Dr. Hanford and the Dewdrop in orbit above them.