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CHAPTER TWELVE
REITH CONFERRED WITH his victory-flushed lieutenants. "We won today because
they took us light.
They still can bring overwhelming force against us. My guess is that tonight
they will organize a strong war party: all their rafts, all their troops. Then
tomorrow they will come forth to punish us. Does this sound reasonable?"
No one made dissent.
"Since we are committed to hostilities, best that we take the initiative, and
try to arrange a few surprises for the Chasch. They have a poor opinion of
men, and we might be able to do them some harm. This means taking our limited
fire-power to where it can do the most damage."
Bruntego the Gray shuddered and clasped his hands to his face. "They have a
thousand Chaschmen soldiers, and more. They have sky-rafts and energetic
weapons-whereas we are only men, armed for the most part with catapults."
"Catapults kill a man just as dead as energy beams," Reith commented.
"But the rafts, the projectiles, the power and intelligence of the Blue
Chasch! They will destroy us totally and reduce Pera to a crater."
Tostig the old nomad demurred. "We have served too well, too cheaply in the
past. Why should they rob themselves for the sake of sheer drama?"
"Because that is the Blue Chasch way!"
Tostig shook his head. "Old Chasch perhaps. Blue Chasch no. They will prefer
to besiege us, starve us, and take the leaders back to Dadiche for
punishment."
"Reasonable," agreed Anacho, "but can we expect even Blue Chasch to behave
reasonably? All Chasch are half-mad."
"For this reason," said Reith, "we must match them caprice for caprice!"
Bruntego the Gray said with a sniff, "Caprice is the only quality in which we
can match the Blue
Chasch."
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The discussion continued; proposals were set forth and debated and at last
agreement was grudgingly reached. Messengers were sent forth to arouse the
population. Amid some small protest and wailing, women, children, the aged and
the uncooperative were marshaled aboard drays and sent off through the night,
to a dismal gorge twenty miles south, where they would establish a temporary
camp.
The militia assembled with all its weapons, then marched off through the night
toward Belbal Gap.
Reith, Traz and Anacho remained in Pera. The cage containing the Green Chasch
warriors had been swathed in cloth and loaded aboard the raft. At sunrise
Anacho took the raft aloft and sent it sliding in that direction toward which
the Green Chasch sat staring: north by east. Twenty miles passed beneath, and
another twenty; then Traz, who sat watching the Green Chasch through a
peephole, cried out, "They are turning, twisting about-toward the west!"
Anacho swung the raft toward the west, and a few moments later a Green Chasch
encampment was discovered in a grove of grass-trees beside a swamp. "Don't
approach too closely," said Reith, examining the camp through his scanscope.
"It's enough to know that they are here. Back to Belbal
Gap."
The raft returned south, skimming the palisades which faced west toward the
Schanizade Ocean.
Passing over Belbal Gap, they settled upon a vantage point overlooking both
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Dadiche and Pera.
Two hours passed. Reith became increasingly fretful. His plans were based upon
hypothesis and rational supposition; the Chasch were a notoriously capricious
race. Then from Dadiche, to Reith's vast relief, came a long dark column.
Looking through his scanscope Reith saw a hundred drays loaded with Blue
Chasch and Chaschmen, as many others carrying weapons and crates of equipment.
"This time," said Reith, they take us seriously." He scanned the sky. "No
rafts visible.
Undoubtedly they'll send something up for reconnaissance, at the very least
... Time to be moving.
They'll be coming through Belbal Gap in a half-hour."
They took the raft down to the steppe and landed several miles south of the
road. They rolled the cage to the ground, pulled away the covering cloth. The
monstrous green warriors sprang forward to peer out across the landscape.
Reith unlocked the door, slipped back the bolt and retreated to the raft,
which Anacho at once took into the air. The Green Chasch sprang forth with
ear-splitting yells of triumph, to stand like giants. They rolled their
metallic eyes up at the raft, raised their arms in gestures of detestation.
Turning swiftly north, they set off across the steppe, at the stiff-legged
Green
Chasch jog.
Over Belbal Gap came the drays from Dadiche. The Green Chasch stopped short,
stared in wonder, then jogged forward to a clump of Bart-furze and stood
immobile, almost invisible.
Down the track came the great days, until the line of vehicles stretched a
mile across the waste.
Anacho slid the raft up a dark gully, almost to the ridge, and landed. Reith
searched the sky for rafts, then looked out across the panorama to the east.
The Green Chasch, among the gartfurze copses, could not be seen. The war force
from Dadiche was a menacing dark caterpillar crawling toward the ruins of old
Pera.
Forty miles north the Green Chasch were camped.
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Dobre pomysły nie mają przeszłości, mają tylko przyszłość. Robert Mallet
De minimis - o najmniejszych rzeczach.
Dobroć jest ważniejsza niż mądrość, a uznanie tej prawdy to pierwszy krok do mądrości. Theodore Isaac Rubin
Dobro to tylko to, co szlachetne, zło to tylko to, co haniebne.
Dla człowieka nie tylko świat otaczający jest zagadką; jest on nią sam dla siebie. I z obu tajemnic bardziej dręczącą wydaje się ta druga. Antoni Kępiński (1918-1972)
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