Between the Strokes of Night

There were also personal reasons that went beyond his job as advisor. The girl seated next to him disturbed Wolfgang. It was not just that she was friendly, she was also tall and dark-haired and had a willowy build that reminded him of Charlene Bloom. He deliberately looked the other way.

Demmy was not discouraged. After a period of quiet eating, she stared around them and said, “This place seems so peaceful after Pentecost. Not dangerous at all.”

Wolfgang glanced back at her from the corner of his eye. At some time — probably during Planetfest trials — Demmy’s nose had been broken, and had not set quite straight. It gave her face and her smile an odd and attractive asymmetry. “Not dangerous, unless you do something stupid,” he said gruffly. “The only time I’ve had somebody get into trouble, he went wandering off by himself.” “He died?”

“No. He fell down a sink hole and broke his leg. His monitor told us where he was, otherwise he’d have been in worse trouble. If the hole had been deeper he’d have been a goner — the monitor signals don’t travel far through rock.” Wolfgang had deliberately raised his voice, including everyone in the conversation. “That’s another thing to remember; even if you take all your clothes off to go skinny-dipping, you still wear your monitor.”

He stood up. “Right. You’ve finished eating. We came out to see the world, not sit in one place all day. Let’s go.”

Demmy was on her feet in one easy movement. “Do you still think we’ll see some karnoos?”

“If we’re lucky. We’re getting close to their territory. But if they hear us they’ll bolt. They run twice as fast as any of you, so from now on we walk quietly, and no talking.”

It was a little bit of misinformation. It was true about the speed of the karnoos, but they didn’t hear well and they saw even worse. But Wolfgang’s words should end Demmy’s persistent efforts to talk to him.

He walked over the brow of the hill and started down the other side. There was a trick to running these training outings. You had to lead the way, but you also needed eyes in the back of your head to know what everyone in the party was doing. Tilda and Jonas, for example, were behind the rest of the group, talking to each other and paying no attention to anyone else or where they were going. Wolfgang said nothing until they reached the flat valley bottom, with its soggy ground and growth of fronded reeds taller than a human. Without a word, he gestured to the others to go on past him and waited for Tilda and Jonas. They came to within a meter of where he stood and then stopped, startled. “You want a private chat?” Wolfgang pointed back toward the settlement they had started from. “That’s the place for it. If you want to learn about Kallen’s World, you’d better keep up with the rest and watch what’s going on. Otherwise you’ll stay home next time.”

He was still talking when he heard the noise from behind him. It was a rumble, together with a breathy swish of reeds moving against each other. He shouted, “Run uphill!” and started in that direction, head turned to make sure the others were following.

They didn’t wait — they were, after all, Planetfest winners — but the soggy ground slowed progress. Three people, one of them Demmy, were still in the flat valley bottom when the reeds parted. Five karnoos hurtled blindly toward them like armored tanks.

Demmy and the other woman threw themselves out of the way, but the man, a heavily-built youngster named Timko, slipped. Even so, he almost made it by flattening himself to the ground. One of the karnoos ran right over him, and merely seemed to brush his left leg as it went by. Wolfgang heard a snap and a gasp of pain, and saw the white of exposed bone. Then the karnoo had passed on. Wolfgang stood and listened. He heard only the sound of the retreating karnoos and Timko’s groans.

He hurried forward and bent at Timko’s side, at the same time thumbing the emergency button on his call unit. “Camp, we need a lift out, soon as you can make it. We have an injury.”

“Critical?” A voice answered at once.

“No.” Wolfgang was studying Timko’s leg. “But nasty. Compound fracture of the lower leg, tibia and fibula.”

“On our way. We have your coordinates.”

Wolfgang was already sliding the medical unit from his belt when Timko said, “What’s that for?” His face was pale and the sweat ran down his forehead, but his voice was under control.