The Great Hydration

Nevertheless the unknown camp presented an opportunity which the quick-thinking Karvass immediately seized. He made for the camp, followed by the Analane. Depending on whoever was in the camp, they might find allies or at least disconcert their pursuers.

On the other hand, Hrityu admitted to himself, the camp might contain yet more enemies.

Once having heaved themselves over the ridge the blowcraft slid down it with alacrity and shot across the desert, fanning out.

On the edge of the strange camp, the two fleeing craft found themselves caught in a deadly triangle.

All five vehicles now came to a stop. Gamintes and Crome clambered from their craft. They stood waving their flingers, jeering and laughing.

“We are lost,” Kurwer muttered. “What aid will there be for our tribe now?”

Hrityu took time to notice the inhabitants of the camp. They were humanoid, but their bodies were clad in material of some kind. They were pale green in colour, and lacked head crests. Three stood by one or the big machines. Another had just emerged from one of the little pavilions.

Suddenly Hrityu realized where he had seen their like before—in the Pavilion of Audience, where members of a strange tribe had been accused of stealing the radiator.

And, incredibly, had swallowed water.

A Crome voice floated across the air. “Ho, Analane! Do you see our Gaminte brothers with us? They know that we have requested a war of extermination, and say the Tlixix are certain to agree. They are here to join us in the sport. We allow you the honour of being the first to face death!”

“So that is why the Gamintes are travelling with our enemies,” Hrityu said grimly to his friend. “The Tlixix want us out of the way quickly. I wonder why?”

“It was ever their way,” Kurwer replied dolefully. “They see some advantage in cultivating the Crome. Perhaps they wish to use them as they use the Gamintes.”

“Let us hope they all perish together when the Artaxan alliance strike!”

Hrityu picked up his flinger. They stepped down from the wheelcraft and crouched beside it for what cover it gave. Flenching blades clanged against the side of the vehicle. Uttering ululating cries, a group of Crome charged.

Suddenly Kurwer sprang to his feet, head-crest rigid with anger.

“Come, Hrityu! Let us not die like lizards in a hole!”

He ran from cover, directly at the Crome. “Crome filth! You have eaten your last prickle stalk!”

A blade hurled itself from the shaft of his flinger. The group of Crome threw themselves to the ground, so that it whirred harmlessly above them and fell into the sand.

Before he could reload, one of the Crome had raised himself, taken aim and released his own blade.

And the aim was true.

On seeing the landcraft coming towards him, Northrop ducked back into the tent to get the two essentials when meeting aliens for the first time: a means of communication, and a weapon. He thrust a DE beamer in his belt, then spent a few seconds dumping the language conversion into an interpreter set, fastening it round his neck and putting the plugs in his ears.

Outside, the drama was developing. The hovercraft had surrounded their prey and come to a stop on the edge of the camp, appearing to ignore its existence. Two types of dehydrate were clambering from them, waving weapons and shouting insults.

One type was coal black and bore wiry silver hair. The other was quite different: a vivid green, with exaggeratedly wide shoulders, and several crests sweeping over their skulls.

Nervously the bondmen at the drilling rig were watching events, staying close to its bulk. Northrop turned his attention to the other two vehicles, those which were boxed in. The occupant of the boat-like craft was also green, but a much lighter hue. Once again a different species, he thought. From the wheeled vehicle two slight humanoids descended and crouched beside it for cover. They were an almost glowing blue. A memory stirred in Northrop’s mind. He had watched observations made through the interferometric telescope, and on them he had seen an identical wheeled vehicle with two blue dehydrates. It had been in the parking lot of the world market run by the lobster creatures. The vehicle was quite striking: it had inner wheels which continued to turn even when the craft was stationary. This could, supposed, be the same vehicle and the same two humanoids.

That most fleeting, most distant of acquaintanceships was perhaps what irrationally influenced Northrop’s next act. The impending fight was hopelessly one-sided. The three defenders stood little chance. All the warriors carried some or other version of the standard weapon on Tenacity—a sort of spring-loaded gun which shot rotating blades. He saw two or three of these go shimmering towards the wheeled vehicle, clanging against its side.

A group of greenskins charged.

Suddenly one of the blueskins leaped from the cover of the vehicle with a shout of defiance. He projected a blade, but this flew over the heads of the attackers as they threw themselves to the ground.