Anne McCaffrey - Dinosaur Planet

“Tanegli, get the rest of the stores!”

Tanegli was back a second later. “There aren't any power packs left, Paskutti. I thought you said there were.”

“So there aren't. We've enough in the sleds and the lift-belts for some time. Start loading.”

Tanegli went back into the storehold and, after a noisy few moments, emerged, staggering under a plasack full of jumbled supplies.

“That clears the storehold, Paskutti.” Tanegli glanced around the staring faces of the captives and, laughing uproariously at some private joke, left.

“No protests, Leader Kai? Leader Varian?” Paskutti's tone and smile were taunting.

“Protests wouldn't do any good, would they?” said Varian. She spoke so calmly that Paskutti frowned as he regarded her. The limp arm had obviously been broken by his mishandling of her, but there was no sign of pain or anger in her voice, merely an amused detachment.

“No, protests wouldn't, Leader Varian. we've had enough of you light weights ordering us about, tolerating us because we're useful.” He used a sneering tone. “Where would we have fit in your plantation? As beasts of burden? Muscles to be ordered here there and everywhere, and subdued by pap?” He made a cutting gesture with one huge hand.

And then, before any one realized what he intended, he swooped on Terilla, grabbed a handful of the child's hair and yanked her off her feet, letting her dangle at the end of his hand. At Terilla's single, terrified scream, Cleiti jumped up, beating her fists against Paskutti's thick muscular thigh, kicking at his shins. Amused and surprised by such defiance, Paskutti glanced down at Cleiti. Then he raised his fist and landed a casual blow on the top of Cleiti's head. She sank, unconscious, to the deck.

Gaber erupted and dashed at Paskutti who held the cartographer off with his other hand, all the while dangling Terilla by her hair, the girl's eyes stretched to slits by the tautness of his grasp.

“Tell me, Leader Varian, Leader Kai did you send a message to the Theks? One second's delay and I'll break her back across my knee.”

“We sent a message,” replied Kai promptly. “Mutiny. Heavy-worlders.”

“Did you ask for help from our estimable supervisors?” asked Paskutti, giving Terilla a shake when he thought Kai deliberated too long in answering.

“Help? From Theks?” asked Varian, her eyes never leaving the helplessly swinging girl. “It would take them several days to ponder the message. By then, your . . . operation will be all over, won't it? No, we merely reported a condition.”

“Only to the Theks?”

Now Kai saw what Paskutti needed to know: whether or not a message had also been beamed up to the satellite. If so, he would have to alter his “operation” in accordance.

“Only to the Theks,” said Kai, the mind-dominated part of his emotions wanting to add “now release the girl”.

"You know what you need to know," screamed Gaber, still attempting to reach Paskutti and make him release Terilla." You'll kill the child. Release her! Release her! You told me there'd be no violence. No one hurt! You've killed Trizein, and if you don't let go of that child . . ."

Paskutti casually swatted Gaber into silence, the cartographer hit the deck with a terrible thud and rolled to one side. Terilla was dropped in a heap by Cleiti. Kai couldn't tell if the girl had been killed by the mishandling. He glanced surreptitiously at Lunzie who was staring at the girls. Some relaxation about the woman's eyes reassured him: the girls were alive.

Beside him, Triv had completed the preliminaries to Discipline. Now he, too, would wait until his strength could be of use. The hardest part was the waiting until such time as this controlled inner strength would be channelled into escape. Kai breathed low in the diaphragm, willing himself to the patience required to endure this hideous display of brute strength and cruelty.

Dimenon was rousing but, although he moaned in pain, Lunzie did not attend him. Margit, Aulia and Portegin kept their eyes front, trying not to focus on scenes they could neither stop nor change.

Tanegli came storming up the ramp to the shuttle, his face contorted with anger, a man controlled by his emotions, no longer the calm rational botanist, interested in growing things.

“There isn't a power pack in any of the sleds,” he told Paskutti but he strode right up to Varian, grabbing her by both arms and shaking her. Kai willed her to feign unconsciousness. Such handling might impair any chance of that broken shoulder healing properly.

“Where did you hide them, you tight-assed bitch?” he cried.

“Watch your strength, Tanegli. Don't break her neck yet?” said Paskutti, stepping forward in his urgency to arrest the angry man.

Tanegli visibly pulled back some force of the blow he had levelled at Varian. Nevertheless, her head rolled sharply backwards but as she righted herself, her eyes were still open. The marks of Tanegli's fingers were vivid weals on her cheek.

“Where did you hide the power packs?”

“She's broken her left shoulder. Use that as goad,” said Paskutti. “Not too much . . . just enough. Can't have her passing out with pain. These light weights can't take much.”

“Where? Varian, where?” Tanegli accompanied each word with a twist to her left arm.

Varian cried out. To Kai's ears, the echo was false since, in the throes of Discipline, Varian wouldn't feel pain right now.

“I didn't hide them. Bonnard did.”

Margit and Aulia gasped at this craven betrayal of the boy.

"Go get him, Tanegli. Find out where those power packs are or we'll be backing the supplies out of here. Bakkun and Berru will have started the drive. Nothing can stop it once it starts." Paskutti twitched with a sense of urgency now." She'd know where he is. Tell me, where? Varian?"

Varian suddenly hung limp in Tanegli's grip. He let her drop to the deck with a disgusted oath and strode to the open lock. Kai heard three more steps before the man stopped, shouting for Bonnard to come. Then Tanegli called for Divisti and Tardma to help him search for the boy.

Paskutti looked down at Varian's crumpled figure. Kai hoped that the man didn't suspect that she was only pretending. An expression close to the snarl of a fang-face crossed the heavy-worlder's face, but he was expressionless again when he turned to Kai.

“March!” Paskutti gestured peremptorily to the lock. He motioned to Lunzie and the others to move; with flicks of his forefinger he indicated that each was to carry one of the unconscious ones. “Into the main dome, all of you!” he ordered.

As they crossed the compound, Dandy was lying dead in his pen, back broken. Kai was glad neither Cleiti nor Terilla would see their pet. The ground was littered with scattered tapes, charts, exposed records and splintered discs. Inadvertently he trod on one of Terilla's careful drawings of a plant. Forcing deep breaths from his diaphragm, he controlled the fury he felt at such wanton destruction.

The main dome had been stripped of everything useful. The unconscious were laid on the floor the others motioned to stand by the farthest arc from the iris lock.

Outside, the search for Bonnard continued. Paskutti was now glancing first at his wrist chrono and then at the plains beyond the force-screen.

Kai's heightened hearing caught the faint sound of his name. Carefully he turned his head and saw Lunzie staring at him, saw her imperceptibly indicate that he was to look outside. By shifting slightly he could see out, could see two dots in the sky, the black line beneath, a tossing black line, a moving black line and then he knew what the heavy-worlders had planned to do.

The force-screen was strong enough to keep out ordinary dangers but not the massed attack of stampeded creatures. The camp's advantage of height above the plain and forest would be cancelled. The heavy-worlders were herding the animals right up where they wanted them to do their damage.