“Ah, most of them,” Gunny said. “General, you want me to put an end to this?”
“No, I will,” Kris said, and stepped between the two apparently rival groups.
~You came to my ship in peace and harmony. I will have nothing else on my ship. In peace and harmony, you may leave it.~
~We came as one to your ship. We will leave as one,~ the bald woman spat.
~We are no longer one. I will not leave, I have sworn it,~ her husband spat.
~The men will carry your bloodless body home from this hunt,~ she spat right back. The look on her face was tinged with eagerness.
~Nobody will bleed out their lifeblood on my ship,~ Kris said.
The old woman raised her staff and ran at Kris, swinging it down hard.
Kris had kept on her spider-silk underarmor, something she didn’t normally do aboard ship, but then, she didn’t normally invite armed natives home for dinner either.
Armored or not, Kris didn’t like the look of that staff, but the blow was easily sidestepped. Gunny would be proud of her use of her hand-to-hand training.
Or not.
As Kris stepped in to strike a blow at the old woman’s abdomen, the alien flung herself down and rolled under Kris’s strike.
Recovering, she rolled back onto her feet and brought the stick up, ready to swing it again.
Jack stepped forward. ~Enough of this,~ he shouted.
~No, Jack. Wait.~
Kris backed away from the woman. ~Must all of you fight to choose the path for all of you?~
~That is the way of it from days of old,~ the bearded man said. ~We fight until one side yields or dies.~
AND WITH THE OATH HE SWORE, IT’S TO THE DEATH FOR HIM, Jacques provided on Nelly Net.
BEFORE YOU OPEN YOUR GREAT BIG MOUTH AGAIN, MY DEAR, ARE YOU WEARING YOUR SPIDER SILKS? Jack asked.
YOU BET, Kris answered.
OKAY. YOU’RE A BIG GIRL. DON’T GET YOUR THROAT SLIT.
~I am not from the days of old. I am from the stars,~ Kris said. ~We fight not for what the sunset saw but for what the sunrise will see. I say to all. Let her fight me for your path.~
That got a discussion going among them. It was apparent to all that the odds were pretty even if they all went at each other. It would be a long and bloody fight. Kris wondered how many families were split like the sick child’s mother and father. Did they really want to go at each other with stone knives?
The words flew fast and furious. Fists were shaken. For a while, Kris feared the two sides were going to split again into two different ones? Or into four camps?
Kris took the debating time to catch Gunny’s eye. “Bring me my totem stick.”
He grinned and brought her a puggle stick from the locker where the Marines stored their “playthings.”
The sight of a Sky God with a stick of her own might have gone a long way to settling the matter. Kris got the feeling that a lot of the natives wanted to see a fight between their wisewoman with her flint-armed totem and this strange brightly colored totem of the star walkers.
Finally, the graybeard stepped forward. ~We will do it after your way.~
The bald woman spat at him. ~You’re heart is blinded by a will you cannot surrender yourself to.~
~My heart turns its back on that will,~ he said, and turned his back on his wife.
The woman screamed and would have beaned him with her stick if Kris hadn’t gotten her puggle stick in between her rage and his head.
And took advantage of the woman’s blind rage to get a backhanded blow in that knocked the wind out of her.
The woman backed away from Kris.
Kris chose not to push her advantage. While her puggle stick was nicely padded, it had a major disadvantage over the woman’s stick. The bald woman could turn her stick into a long club. Kris’s stick was intended for thrust and parry in close.
This would not be a one-sided fight.
As Kris expected, once the woman caught her breath, she roared her anger, let the stick slip through her hand until she held it by the very bottom, and tried to club Kris over the head.
Kris sidestepped, angled her own stick to take the blow, and slide it down to the deck. Kris then stomped her shoe down on the club, careful of the sharp flint flakes, and almost knocked the stick from the woman’s grasp.
But the short woman used her diminutive size to drop to the deck and roll, thereby rolling the totem out from under Kris’s shoe.
“Ah, thank heavens for good Marine boots,” Kris said, and danced away before the woman could recover and take another swing.
“Good going, Admiral,” Gunny called. “You almost took it away from her.”
“If I get her stick, do I get to lead her clan?” Kris called to Jacques.
“Your guess is as good as mine,” the anthropologist answered.
The two women circled each other. The circle started wide, then got smaller.
The woman did what Kris expected. She charged Kris, holding the stick at its middle. She tried one quick hit at Kris’s head, then swiftly swung the other end low for Kris’s knees.
This kind of fighting was what Kris’s puggle stick was designed for. Kris parried both, easily, then took over the lead, going for the woman’s bald head, then her middle, then head again and middle, in rapid succession.
The woman struggled to keep up, but quickly fell behind. She lacked a modern diet and hours of practice at this. Kris crowded in, pushing from the middle as well as with the ends.
The woman fell back, but this time Kris pursued. Once, the woman landed a blow to Kris’s shoulder with her sharp flints, but Kris’s spider silks blunted it. Now Kris was landing blows. Hers were well padded. The Corps wanted its solders aggressive and well trained, not banged around and in the hospital.
Still, the woman felt the sting of the hits on her bare skin.
She also felt the sting as the crowd’s roar went up for Kris.
Kris finally got in a strong shove, and the woman sprawled backward. Her grip slipped on her totem, and it flew out of her hands.
Kris stood over her. ~Do you yield?~
The woman pointed at Kris. ~I hit her shoulder. The points did not cut her. She is a thick-skinned demon!~
The drop bay was dead quiet in a second.
OH, OH, came from Jacques.
HOLD ON BEFORE ANYBODY PANICS, Kris answered.
She dropped her puggle stick and went to the gray-bearded man. ~Do you have your knife?~
He produced it.
~Cut my finger,~ Kris said, offering her thumb.
~Cut her shoulder,~ the woman on the deck demanded.
That would not work. Unless . . .
Kris unbuttoned her khaki shirt, and slipped out of it. For what she had in mind, she’d have to ditch her pants.
~She is a woman!~ seemed to come as a universal surprise.
~As is your wisewoman,~ Kris said, and began to skinny out of her spider silks. When her second skin lay on the deck, she offered the old man her shoulder.
~Cut me here.~
He did. Maybe more than he needed to. She bled.
Kris wiped her hand in her own blood and held it up for all see. ~I bleed red just like you. The skin I wear that turns back a spear point is the craft of our makers. This is the path I walk with my soft skin. I open that path to you. Follow me or get off my ship,~ Kris said, and turned away.
Jack met her with a blanket.
Dr. Meade was also there to slap on a bandage. “I better take care of that. It could leave a nasty scar.”
Kris headed for the medical center, where the boy was still fighting his battle with man’s oldest enemy. Before she moved into the antiseptic field, the graybeard came up to her.
~Where you go, we will follow. All of us.~
~Good.~ The fight was worth the blood.
29
Kris woke up the next morning, hurting in a lot more places than her shoulder.
Jack put an arm over her.