The Human Blend - Alan Dean Foster [110]
Advancing with a menacing scowl while trying not to step on those who had fallen or been knocked down, the Fillie Gumbo’s long-haired bouncer began separating combatants by picking them up, pulling them apart, and tossing them aside. Since he stood over two meters tall and weighed somewhere in the neighborhood of a quarter ton, none of the Naturals or Melds presently engaged in physical disagreement saw fit to contest the bouncer’s progressive deconstruction of the circumstances in which they found themselves. Cuts and bruises were overlooked and insults forgotten as the bar’s enforcer wearily plowed his way through the swiftly disintegrating skirmish. As near as Ingrid could tell, he never hit a single participant.
While rapidly dissipating, though, the widespread clash had not quite concluded. With her fascinated attention focused on the bouncer, she failed to see one of the participants stumbling in her direction. Fortunately the traditional fisherman Meld’s left hand, whose fingers had been maniped into a series of four reels, was not mounting any hooks. Melded to mute the glare off water, his maniped eyes were glazed. Adapted for waterproofing, the skin of his legs that was exposed beneath his ragged-hemmed shorts scraped roughly against her. Seeking safety from the potentially dangerous drunk a jumpy Wizwang darted behind an overturned table. Whispr did not.
“Hey, fack off, squint-face!” Despite a notable disparity in mass, her slender companion unhesitatingly inserted himself between her and the weaving, oncoming local.
Lashing out as he spun around, the latter struck at Whispr with his reel hand. The blow hit home. Seeing his opponent still standing, the drunk looked surprised until he remembered that he wasn’t wearing any of his work hooks. Even so, the bare-reeled swipe was edgy enough to rip through the bottom half of Whispr’s thin tropical shirt and into the flesh beneath. He staggered from the blow. Astonishing herself, an infuriated Ingrid picked up a bottle and swung at their attacker. The wild swing connected with the fisherman’s nose, itself middling melded the better to allow its owner to cope with having to labor all day in high heat and humidity.
Blood flowed. She gasped. Not at the gush of blood, a sight with which she was intimately familiar, but at the realization that she had initiated it. All her adult life she had worked to stop such outpourings.
“Dear me, doctor,” a voice called out. “I didn’t realize that you, of all people, had also bought a ticket to this backwater travesty of primate interaction.” Having edged his way around the rapidly subsiding fight, Wizwang was beckoning to her from his latest place of concealment near the Fillie Gumbo’s entrance.
Regaining control of her actions if not her emotions, Ingrid resumed her jerky stop-start flight in his direction. As they retreated Whispr continued to position himself between her and the remaining brawlers. Though admirable, his incongruous chivalry proved unnecessary. The last of the fighters was either down, had given up, or like one overwhelmed Meld seeking to escape the attentions of the determined bouncer, had leaped over the railing to land with a percussive splash in the dark water below.
Safely outside the bar Wizwang hurried them past buildings that alternated between hopeful and ramshackle.
“My transport’s right over here. I’ll run you around the island and back to the boatel.” He glanced over at a panting, wide-eyed Ingrid. “Safer than trying to walk. The town streets are well lit, but so are too many of its citizens.”
“Thanks,” she responded gratefully. Her attention shifted to her other companion, who continued to remain alert for any further trouble. “Thanks to you too, Whispr, for …” Her words trailed away as she caught sight of something plastered against his skin where his lean flank had been exposed by the flailing fisherman. Her lips parted and her eyes widened slightly as she recognized it.
“That’s a zoe.” Their eyes met awkwardly and he quickly looked away. His obvious discomfiture heightened her