The last thing a wise man would do is locate a drowning tigress in deep water, but that is what Locklear did. Kit, no swimmer, literally climbed up his sodden flightsuit, forcing him into an underwater somersault, fine sand stinging his eyes. The next moment he was struggling toward the light again, disoriented and panicky.
He broke the surface, swam to a piling at the end of the walkway, and tried to hyperventilate for another hopeless foray after Kit. Then, between gasps, he heard a spitting cough echo in the space between the water's surface and the underside of the walkway. “Kit!” He swam forward, seeing her frightened gaze and her formidable claws locked into those rough planks, and patted her shoulder. Above them, someone was raising Kzin hell. “Stay here,” he commanded, and kicked off toward the shallows.
He waded with his sidearm drawn. What he saw on the walkway was abundant proof that the priesthood truly did not seem to learn very fast.
Five bodies sprawled where they had been shot, bleeding on the planks near deep water, but more of them lay curled on the planks within a few paces of the shore, piled atop one another. One last acolyte stood on the walkway, staring over the curled bodies. He was staring at Scarface, who stood on dry land with his own long w'tsai held before him, snarling a challenge with eyes that held the light of madness. Then, despite what he had seen happen a half-dozen times in moments, the acolyte screamed and leaped.
Losing consciousness in midair, the acolyte fell heavily across his fellows and drew into a fetal crouch, as all the others had done when crossing the last six meters of planking toward shore. Those units Locklear had placed beneath the planks in darkness had kept three-ton herbivores in stasis, and worked even better on Kzinti. They'd known damned well the priesthood would be using the walkway again sooner or later; but they'd had no idea it would be this soon.
Scarface did not seem entirely sane again until he saw Kit wading from the water. Then he clasped his mate to him, ignoring the wetness he so despised. Asked how he managed to trip the gangswitch, Scarface replied, “You had told me it was on the inside of that piling, and those idiots did not try to stop me from wading to it.”
“I noticed you were wet,” said Locklear, smiling. “Sorry about that.”
“I shall be wetter with blood presently,” Scarface said with a grim look toward the pile of inert sleepers.
Locklear, aghast, opened his mouth.
But Kit placed her hand over it. “Rockear, I know you, and I know my mate. It is not your way but this is Kzersatz. Did you see what they did to the captive they took last night?”
“Big man, short black hair? His name is Gomulka.”
“His name is meat. What they left of him hangs from a post yonder.”
“Oh my God,” Locklear mumbled, swallowing hard. “But— look, just don't ask me to help execute anyone in stasis.”
“Indeed.” Scarface stood, stretched, and walked toward the piled bodies. “You may want to take a brief walk, Locklear,” he said, picking up a discarded lance twice his length. “This is Kzin business, not monkey business.” But he did not understand why, as Locklear strode away, the little man was laughing ruefully at the choice of words.
Locklear's arm was well enough, after two days, to let him dive for his w'tsai while Kzinti villagers watched in curiosity — and perhaps in distaste. By that time they had buried their dead in a common plot and, with the help of Stalwart, begun to repair the pinnacle's canopy holes and twisted hinges. The little hand-welder would have sped the job greatly but, Locklear promised, “We'll get it back. If we don't hit first, there'll be a stolen warship overhead with enough clout to fry us all.”
Scarface had to agree. As the warrior who had overthrown the earlier regime, he now held not only the rights, but also the responsibilities of leading his people. Lounging on grassy beds in the village's meeting hut on the third night, they slurped hot stew and made plans. “Only the two of us can make that raid, you know,” said the big Kzin.
“I was thinking of volunteers,” said Locklear, who knew very well that Scarface would honor his wish if he made it a demand.
“If we had time to train them,” Scarface replied. “But that ship could be searching for the pinnacle at any moment. Only you and I can pilot the pinnacle so, if we are lost in battle, those volunteers will be stranded forever among hostile monk— Hostiles,” he amended. “Nor can they use modern weapons.”
“Stalwart probably could, he's a natural mechanic. I know Kit can use a weapon — not that I want her along.”
“For a better reason than you know,” Scarface agreed, his ears folding across the fire at the somnolent Kit.
“He is trying to say I will soon bear his Kittens, Rockear,” Kit said. “And please do not take Boots's new mate away merely because he can work magics with his hands.” She saw the surprise in Locklear's face. “How could you miss that? He fought those acolytes in the cave for Boots's sake.”
“I, uh, guess I've been pretty busy,” Locklear admitted.
“We will be busier if that warship strikes before we do,” Scarface reminded him. “I suggest we go as soon as it is light.”
Locklear sat bolt upright. “Damn! If they hadn't taken my wristcomp — I keep forgetting. The schedules of those little suns aren't in synch; It's probably daylight there now, and we can find out by idling the pinnacle near the force walls. You can damned well see whether it's light there.”
“I would rather go in darkness,” Scarface complained, “if we could master those night-vision sensors in the pinnacle.”
“Maybe, in time. I flew the thing here to the village, didn't I?”
“In daylight, after a fashion,” Scarface said in friendly insult, and flicked his sidearm from its holster to check its magazine. “Would you like to fly it again, right now?”
Kit saw the little man fill his hand as he checked his own weapon, and marveled at a creature with the courage to show such puny teeth in such a feral grin. “I know you must go,” she said as they turned toward the door, and nuzzled the throat of her mate. “But what do we do if you fail?”
“You expect enemies with the biggest ship you ever saw,” Locklear said. “And you know how those stasis traps work. Just remember, those people have night sensors and they can burn you from a distance.”
Scarface patted her firm belly once. “Take great care,” he said, and strode into darkness.
The pinnacle's controls were simple, and Locklear's only worry was the thin chorus of whistles: air, escaping from a canopy that was not quite perfectly sealed. He briefed Scarface yet again as their craft carried them over Newduvai, and piloted the pinnacle so that its re-entry thunder would roll gently, as far as possible from the Anthony Wayne.
It was late morning on Newduvai, and they could see the gleam of the Wayne's hull from afar. Locklear slid the pinnacle at a furtive pace, brushing spiny shrubs for the last few kilometers before landing in a small desert wadi. They pulled hinge pins from the canopy and hid them in the pinnacle to make its theft tedious. Then, stuffing a roll of binder tape into his pocket, Locklear began to trot toward his clearing.
“I am a kitten again,” Scarface rejoiced, fairly floating along in the reduced gravity of Newduvai. Then he slowed, nose twitching. “Not far,” he warned.
Locklear nodded, moved cautiously ahead, and then sat behind a green thicket. Ahead lay the clearing with the warship and cabin, seeming little changed — but a heavy limb held the door shut as if to keep things in, not out. And Scarface noticed two mansized craters just outside the cabin's foundation logs. After ten minutes without sound or movement from the clearing, Scarface was ready to employ what he called the monkey ruse; not quite a lie, but certainly a misdirection.