The Garden - Melissa Scott [63]
"They aren't really dangerous," Grayrose said,
"but they will try to attack sometimes. I try to avoid them-I don't like killing them."
Paris gave her a quick glance, trying to divide his attention between her and the source of the strange sounds. "So why not just stun them? Revek's phaser is standard Federation issue, I can see that from here. Even if you didn't have the system before, you could have gotten it from him."
"Why?" Grayrose asked in return, and her voice was tinged with sadness. "They would just do it again and again until they pushed hard enough-got close enough, or posed enough of a danger-that I or another would have to kill them then. It's necessary- required."
"But they might not attack you again," Paris began, and heard something in the grass to his left. He spun, leveling his phaser by instinct, and caught the barest glimpse of something brown moving between the heavy stalks.
"Gardener," Revek said, shortly, and thumbed his phaser to a killing level.
Grayrose beat her wings again, lifting herself ponderously into the air, an odd-looking phaser suddenly visible in her hand. Paris hesitated, then touched his own controls, adjusting the phaser to heavy stun. He wouldn't kill, not if he could avoid it-Starfleet training was too strong-but he could easily believe that it would take significant power to bring down one of the creatures they had seen earlier.
"To your right," Grayrose cried, and fired. The bolt from her phaser dissipated harmlessly in the air above the field, but the streak of light was clearly visible. Paris focused along it, leveling his own weapon, and something burst from among the heavy stalks. He fired, knew he'd missed, but Revek fired an instant
later, and the creature stumbled to its knees. Another one, bigger than any of the other creatures Paris had seen, loomed above it, and he fired again, brought it tumbling over the body of its companion.
"Clear?" Revek called, not taking his eyes from the field, and Grayrose's voice came fluting back.
"Clear. I see no others."
Revek gave a sigh of relief. "Come on, let's get back to the shuttle before any more of them show up."
Paris hesitated, looking at the piled bodies. One, the one he'd shot, was only stunned, but the other- He wrinkled his nose at the smell of scorched fur. It was definitely dead, but he should still examine it, take readings for the doctor to analyze later. He reached for his tricorder, but Revek caught his arm.
"Come on," he said. "We need to get back to the shuttle."
"But-" Paris broke off at the look on Revek's face.
"Do you want her to have to finish that one off? Don't make her notice it's still alive."
Paris glanced at Grayrose, back on the ground again, her face turned studiously away from the piled bodies. There was something about the way she was avoiding them, and him, that convinced him, and he started down the path after her.
They reached the beach without hearing any more sign of the creatures, and Revek gave a sigh of relief as they stepped awkwardly onto the shifting slope.
"We should be all right now," he said. "They don't generally follow beyond the fields."
"Really?" Paris said, involuntarily, and Grayrose gave him a curious glance.
"What do you mean?"
Paris hesitated, wishing he'd kept his mouth shut, but the Kirse was regarding him with a friendly intensity that was surprisingly compelling. "I would
have thought that the creatures-gardeners-would try to get people on the beach." He slipped as he spoke, and Grayrose gave a silvery laugh.
"Oh, I see, to give them an advantage. But with phasers, it's less so."
"I suppose," Paris answered, and picked his way more carefully, scowling at the blue-swirled sand under his feet. Revek, he saw, with some bitterness, had already reached the area stabilized by the shuttle's fields, and was almost halfway to the hatch.
Grayrose touched his shoulder. "I appreciate what you did, back there," she said, softly, "and I am grateful."
Paris blinked, startled,