Gateways 07_ What Lay Beyond - Diane Carey [30]
With his mind racked at the probabilities dying out here right now, for one Keller moved away from Braxan. When they were alone on the field, when the free dancer came for him, he didn’t want to be anywhere near her. Strobe lightning and candlefly fog damned his vision. The nearest free dancer must almost be down! He closed his eyes and stripped the tricorder strap off his shoulder. His fingers were cold, slow. Fear balled up in his stomach. He hadn’t bet on this as his last act, but it would have to write its own poetry later. Maybe he’d be a legend someday, like Ennengand.
Suddenly he stumbled and fell to one knee, yanked hard by a force on his left arm. His tricorder flew from his hand, its strap raking his arm as he grabbed for it.
“Hey hey!”
He twisted, still on his knee, off balance. Over him, Luntee was aiming the tricorder directly at him.
“Hey!” Keller shouted. He lunged, but fell short.
The tricorder chirrrupped and set up the electrical interference, with its short-range focus aimed at Keller. A few seconds… the deed was done.
Now he would never be chosen! He would give the free dancers a burning mouth.
Too far away to change anything or know what to do, Braxan called through the curtain of panicking candleflies. “Keller! What are you doing! The free dancer is descending!”
With a shove Keller vaulted to his feet, knotted his fists, and would’ve struck Luntee if they had been two paces closer. “How’d you know? How could you possibly know about that?”
Luntee held the tricorder as casually as a Starfleet yeoman. Somehow he seemed to regret what he was being forced to do. “I have lived here a lifetime. Energy is our tonic. Now I’ve been to the Outside and I know all things behave in strange dances.”
He dumped the tricorder on the mats, turned, and raced away from the center of the Feast Grid. He didn’t realize Braxan was already immunized.
But now Keller was immunized too. If the free dancer chose neither of them, time would run out before another decision could be hammered into place. Luntee would still be able to keep his people here.
Pretty simple. One-dimensional, like this pewter pot they lived on.
“I’ll be damned,” Keller grumbled. “All right, I can play too.” He turned and shouted over the noise from overhead. The free dancers were getting closer. “Kymelis! Kymelis, wait! “In a clique of hunters, some of whom were her family, the stocky Elder squinted her one working eye at him. “More? But we have descent!”
She pointed to the sky, to the giant bulbous animals growing larger and larger.
“This decision is too important!” Keller called. “There’s only one way to really be sure. Luntee will stand on the plain with Braxan and me. All three of us take our chances.”
“Why should this be?” Luntee demanded. “Order has already been established!”
Keller turned to Luntee and suddenly there was no one else in the universe but these two men and their challenge. “If your voice remains, there won’t be any doubts. Braxan will do what you want. I will too. That’s my promise to the Living.”
Through the haze of heat waves and candleflies, Kymelis and several hunters hurried back toward the center of the Grid. She was already thinking. Her one eye was crinkled with puzzlement. “What is this way of thinking?” she asked.
“Why should I stand with you?” Luntee demanded. “You are my surrogate. Braxan represents the hunt challenge. All is correct!”
“Don’t be so tied to your rules that you make a big mistake.” Keller peeled off his mail shirt and tossed it to Donnastal. It flushed and eddied like water between them. “I’m ready.”
Luntee hunched against the flash and wind and turned to Cyclops. “I reject this! He uses our rules against us!”
“He’s afraid of real random order,” Keller pointed out.
Cycl Kymelis looked up at the lowest free dancer, a truly horrifying sight no matter how many times experienced. “All things come from random order,” she said, and looked at Luntee.