"Ordinary?" The Japanese sounded wistful.
Clive permitted himself a tight smile. "Extraordinary, then. But still, a mortal, a human."
"She is gone," Takamura said. "Lieutenant Yamura will succeed me." He drew his sword. It glinted in the light of the multiple suns. He raised it in a salute to Clive Folliot; then in another, to the disappeared aerial machine. He knelt, reversing the sword, holding its point to his sternum, and plunged it deep into his heart.
Where Takamura had moved and spoken with military correctness and had commanded the prompt and disciplined obedience of his subordinates, Yamura acted with the confident arrogance of the Oriental potentate that Clive Folliot had observed during his days in Madagascar and Zanzibar. The result was a fawning subservience that Clive found disquieting to observe. Even during his brief stay in New Kwajalein, Clive had come to have high respect for Takamura—for the man's propriety, his sense of duty and honor. He was an officer with whom Clive would have been proud to serve, had circumstances been different. And the men of the Sixteenth Airborne Marine Detachment were men whom it would have been a privilege to lead.
But Yamura was another story. The assumption of superiority, the demand for obedience to person rather than to crown and empire, the abuse of the comforts and perquisites of command—Clive had seen these before and he knew to what they led: resentment, treachery, a shirking of duty, the placement of self above community. In a word, tyranny—and the ultimate, inevitable downfall of the tyrant. The suns danced above New Kwajalein Atoll. Junior Lieutenant Osamu Yamura sat behind a field desk, staring at the two strangers, the Occidental and the even stronger dwarf, who stood before him, staring back. Dislike was obvious, immediate, unspoken, and mutual.
"What am I to do with you two?" Yamura asked. His elbows planted on the table, he spread his fleshy hands before his shoulders, palms upward as if in exasperated supplication.
The question may have been a rhetorical one, but Clive Folliot answered nonetheless. "It is obvious, Lieutenant. We share a common plight. At best fellow castaways, at worst fellow victims of some plot so complex and remote that we can only guess at its nature, our only hope is to make common cause."
"Where is the Sacred?" Yamura jerked his head upward, indicating vaguely the sky into which Annie had disappeared in the Nakajima.
"I find it hard to accept your terminology. As I said to the late Lieutenant Takamura—"
"My predecessor is dead," Yamura cut him off. "I am commander now. I am in charge here. Do not forget that, Briton, and do not quote to me from conversations between yourself and the dead man." He stroked his salt-and-pepper mustache with a fleshy hand. "A change in command of this unit was long overdue, anyway. My predecessor did us all a favor by removing himself from the picture."
"I do not share your obviously low opinion of Lieutenant Takamura, Lieutenant Yamura—but be that as it may, what has happened, regrettable though it is, cannot be undone. I repeat, we are the common victims of forces and operatives which we do not comprehend, but which obviously wish us no well. Our salvation, if salvation is possible, may well lie in an alliance between us."
"You seem to regard yourself as my equal, Folliot."
"Major Folliot, if you please, Lieutenant. And while my rank is clearly well above your own, I will not insist upon excessive deferential displays on your part. In fact, if the truth be known, I will confess to certain impulses toward egalitarianism."
Yamura pounded the field desk with a heavy fist. "You misunderstand me, Briton! You are my prisoner. You and your slave."
"Finnbogg is not my slave, sir."
"Your animal, then."
"Nor is he an animal. Finnbogg is a man."
"Enough!" Again the Japanese pounded his desk. "I will brook no contradiction from you! You are my inferiors! Both of you! As was the fool Takamura! The fool! Takamura had no right to command! He had no understanding of command! I should have removed him long ago!"
The lieutenant's face was red, a spittle appeared at the corner of his mouth.
A sergeant and two privates stood nearby. The sergeant—Clive recognized him as Chuichi Fushida, the commander of the raiding party that had captured Annie—signaled one of the privates and the latter ran to Lieutenant Yamura with a cloth and wiped the corner of his mouth. The lieutenant swung a meaty arm and knocked the marine backward.
Yamura leaned forward, his forehead pressed against the palms of his hands. His breathing was loud and ragged.
"Are you all right, Lieutenant?" Clive turned and addressed Fushida. "Is your officer ill, Sergeant? He seemed almost—irrational. And now this display. He may be on the verge of apoplexy! Have you a medical officer with your unit?"
The sergeant said, "Prisoner, be quiet!" But as he said it, his eyes conveyed a different message. He was concerned, and his expression indicated that he was desperately seeking a way out of the dilemma that the death of Takamura and the accession of Yamura had created.
Yamura had returned to a more nearly normal condition. He lowered his hands, raised his face, glared at Clive Folliot and at Finnbogg. "The Sacred was an Occidental woman. She was in your company when my men took her, and it was you who freed her, last night."
"Yes," Clive acknowledged. "All of that is true."
"Where is she?"
Was the question an idee fixe? Was Lieutenant Yamura unshakably convinced that Clive and Annie were in communication, or at least that Clive had been aware of Annie's destination before ever she flew away in the glistening Nakajima?
"If you insist that Miss Annie is a sacred creature, I will no longer quarrel with you," Clive said. "Perhaps, in a way, she is—for she seems possessed of an angelic innocence despite having been raised in a world more perverse than either yours or mine, Lieutenant. But still I assure that I do not know where she has gone. The machine—you call it a Nakajima, do you?"
"Type ninety-seven, yes."
"A flying machine."
"An airplane."
"As you will. I must tell you that such things exist only in the imaginations of visionaries and madmen, in my world. If in yours and Miss Annie's they are everyday objects, you are far ahead of 1868—as is quite proper. But I do not know how the airplane operates, nor have I the faintest idea of where Miss Annie may have traveled in it. As a guess, and nothing more, I might surmise that she has returned to the valley from which your marines kidnapped her. Does that not seem a reasonable supposition, Lieutenant Yamura?"
"Very well. You will lead us there!"
"You wish to go there? You and all your men?" The fleshy officer sat in contemplation for an interval that seemed to drag on endlessly. Finally he said, "Sergeant Nomura will go. He is our pilot. The Nakajima is his responsibility. He will pay the penalty if it is lost. He will return it to New Kwajalein if it is recovered. He will bring the Sacred with him." Yamura nodded two, three, four times in agreement with himself. "Nomura and Fushida, Sergeant Fushida to command some men. Yes. That will be enough. And you, Major, and your animal as guides."
Clive had hoped to talk his way out of New Kwajalein. In a way, he had succeeded. But he and Finnbogg seemed to have reverted to the status of prisoners. Still, it might be easier to escape from a small party of Japanese marines than from the entire Sixteenth Detachment.
"Very well, Lieutenant. Finnbogg and I will accompany your men."
Yamura shouted at the sergeant who stood near him. He delivered a few sentences of instructions in Japanese. Clive Folliot and Finnbogg waited until the tirade subsided. When it did, Yamura stood up abruptly, knocking the field table tumbling.
Before it could crash to the ground, the two privates lunged forward and caught it, setting it back on its feet. The sergeant, meanwhile, had turned pale. He sucked air between his teeth, bowed to the lieutenant, then stood rigidly at attention.
Yamura disappeared into his lean-to.
The sergeant shouted a command to the two privates, who scurried off in opposite directions. As soon as the privates were gone, the sergeant turne
d back to Clive. He saluted smartly. "Sergeant Chuichi Fushida, Imperial Marines, at your service, sir." Clive returned the salute. "I know you, Sergeant. My memory is not that poor."
"Yes, sir."
"I must apologize, Major Folliot, for my man's conduct."
"What conduct is that?"
"My man who struck the Sacred with his carbine."
"Poor decision. Not the right thing to do, I agree. Well, though, speaking for Miss Annie, she certainly seems unhurt. I would think the apology would be accepted."
"I am most grateful, sir."
"You're going back with us, eh?"
"I sent my men for Sergeant Nomura, our pilot."
"Quite understand. Here they come now." He turned to his side. "Come along, Finnbogg. You've been awfully quiet, old fellow. Not contemplating further acts of mayhem, are you?"
Finnbogg snuffled. "Want Annie."
"I'll bet you do. Suppose we all do, eh? Well, these Nihonjin don't seem quite as bad as they might be. Let's be off."
For whatever reasons, Lieutenant Yamura dispatched the party on foot. No pedal cart today, meaning that the expedition, which might have reached Clive's previous camp in an hour or less, spent all day trekking through the hills.
At first the two sergeants alternated as commander while the privates marched stolidly to their count. Clive and Finnbogg insisted on setting their own pace. When they set out, Finnbogg was grim and silent. The longer they paced, the more animated he became, scampering away and returning to the party. The Japanese carried their ammunitionless carbines with fixed bayonets. Whenever Finnbogg separated himself from the party, Sergeant Fushida or Sergeant Nomura would grow nervous. But Clive stayed nearby, and Finnbogg always returned.
The dwarf's spirits had recovered to the point where he began to sing, this time chorus after enthusiastic chorus of "The Old Rugged Cross."
Finally, they rounded the familiar hillside that would lead them to Clive's camp. Dusk had fallen. The multiple suns had not set—there was nowhere for them to do so in this strange, inside-out world— but they seemed to dim and brighten alternately, creating the equivalent of night and day. The storm of the previous night was not repeated; there were few clouds, and the evening was not unpleasant.
Finnbogg raced ahead, bounding joyously.
In a few minutes he was back, his head down, his shoulders drooping.
"What's the matter?" Clive asked.
Finnbogg took him by the hand and urged him forward.
This was the right place, no question about that. The features were exactly those they had left little more than twenty-four hours earlier. There were scuff marks on the ground where the pedal cart had turned.
But there was no sign of the Nakajima Model 97.
There was no sign of Annie.
There was no sign of Horace Hamilton Smythe, or of his prisoner, Private Shigeru Onishi.
There was only a roughened area in the dirt, where a struggle had apparently taken place not long ago, and a darkened patch in the middle of it.
Clive Folliot squatted beside the darkened patch, rubbed his finger in it, and studied the result. The dark matter was red and sticky. There was little question that it was blood, and it had been shed so recently that it had neither dried completely nor been totally absorbed by the earth.
Behind Clive, Sergeant Fushida began to laugh.
CHAPTER 25
Like a Tale from the Brothers Grimm
"A fool! Lieutenant Yamura is a great fool!"
Clive turned his head. Still squatting beside the half-dried bloodstain, he peered up at the marine sergeant. Sergeant Fushida stood over Clive, a ceremonial sword in his hands. The two marine privates stood behind him at rigid attention, their carbines at the ready, bayonets fixed. In a moment of frozen awareness, Clive caught sight of Finnbogg behind the two privates, tensing the muscles of his mighty limbs to launch himself in attack.
Clive yelled, "Finnbogg, no!"
The dwarf drew back, a puzzled expression on his face.
Beyond him, Sergeant Nomura, the pilot, was scouring the area, possibly in search of tire tracks left by his Nakajima Model 97. There were tracks, all right, but Clive could see none that had not been made by the pedal cart. That was, if the tracks of the cart and those of the flying machine were distinguishable from each other.
"What do you mean?" Clive asked. He was taking a risk, he knew, by stopping Finnbogg at the very moment of the latter's attack on the Japanese. But they had proved amenable to talk prior to this moment. An attack by Finnbogg on the privates would probably have provoked an immediate—and fatal— stroke at Clive's neck by Sergeant Fushida's glittering sword. Talk was better.
"You say Lieutenant Yamura is a great fool. What do you mean by that?" Clive repeated.
"I mean that he is not a good leader. He has no respect for the men. No respect for the empire. He is concerned only with himself. Lieutenant Takamura was a good officer. Lieutenant Yamura is a bad one."
"I quite agree." Clive rose slowly to his feet. He didn't wish to alarm the sergeant. Not while he held a sword and Clive had only the cyberclaw tucked in his trousers—miraculously, after the events of the past two days, still tucked in his trousers.
Sergeant Fushida grunted—a peculiar verbal habit of the Japanese that Clive found both annoying and bewildering. The sound could mean almost anything, and a wrong guess on the hearer's part might prove disastrous.
"What do you propose to do?" Clive asked. "There is no apparent sign of your Nakajima machine. I suppose your colleague Sergeant Nomura will have something to say about that. But 'the Sacred,' as you call her, is certainly not here. And my colleague Sergeant Smythe and his prisoner have also disappeared, leaving this as a clue to puzzle us."
Fushida returned his sword to its scabbard, eliciting a sigh of relief from Clive Folliot, and squatted beside the Englishman. He peered at the thickening blood on the ground. "Huh! We may never know," he said aloud. Then, sotto voce, "I am supposed to have my men kill you."
Clive gaped at the man.
"Yes." Fushida nodded. "The only choice Yamura gave me was to do it myself. That is why I drew my sword."
Clive's mind raced. This was like a fairy tale, something from the Brothers Grimm, something that he had not heard in twenty-five years. "Hansel and Gretel," that was it. Finnbogg might have learned the story from Neville; the brothers had heard it together from their nanny. The cruel stepmother ordering the woodsman to take his children into the woods and kill them ... the woodsman too kind- hearted to perform the act. ...
"Are you going to do it?" Clive asked.
"I cannot!" Fushida shook his head, fury and anguish mixed on his features. "I am a marine! I will kill for the emperor! I will kill in battle! But I will not commit cold-blooded murder!"
"Glad to hear that, Sergeant, believe you me!" Clive pushed himself upright.
Sergeant Fushida did the same.
They stood toe to toe.
"But what now?" Clive asked again.
Instead of answering the question, Fushida shouted at his fellow sergeant.
Nomura approached Fushida and Clive Folliot. "No," he grumbled, "the Sacred has not been here. My Nakajima has not been here. No, I would have seen its tracks in the earth."
"Then where?" Fushida asked. He spoke part of the time in the Q'oornan patois, part of the time in Japanese.
Nomura shrugged his shoulders and gestured toward the sky. '"You know as much as I, of this strange world."
"I do not," Nomura disagreed. "I have never flown in the Nakajima Model ninety-seven, Hiroshi. In Kawanishis in the home islands, and to jump onto Kwajalein. But never in the Nakajima, and never in this world."
Nomura nodded. "You are right, Chuichi. Let me tell you, I saw very little of this world. Only the one flight, the flight to the castle when we obtained the crown. But this is a strange world. An inside-out world. Instead of living on the surface of a solid ball, we are on the inside of a hollow one."
"Ev
eryone knows that!"
"Yes? Major Folliot?" Nomura turned toward Clive.
"We had surmised as much, Sergeant."
"Very well. They could be anywhere. I do not know how the Sacred was able to make the Nakajima fly. We have no fuel. I have even experimented with attempts to distill saki still further, to make pure alcohol and use it as aviation fuel, but without success."
Fushida permitted himself a small laugh.
From the direction opposite that of New Kwajalein Atoll there arose a hideous screaming sound. The Japanese marines, Finnbogg, and Clive all froze in their tracks, then turned slowly to see the source of the screaming, which grew louder by the moment.
In satisfaction of Clive's expectation, the screaming came from Shriek. The great arachnoid had rounded a hill and was scuttling forward on four legs, moving with astonishing speed, screaming at the top of her voice.
She halted as far from Clive and the others as a cricket bowler from the batsman. Clive could see two human forms held in two of her amazingly thin, amazingly strong arms. Her mandibles were gnashing, her eight eyes blazed.
The combination of the sight of the arachnoid and the sound of her bloodcurdling screams started the two marine privates to quaking. Their sergeants did better. Each of them drew his sword. They stood their ground, turning their eyes from Shriek to Clive and back. They seemed to guess that the eight-limbed creature was associated with Folliot, although they had no idea how this had come about.
Clive started toward Shriek.
With her two free hands she began plucking quilllike hairs from her swollen abdomen. She drew back her hands and then snapped them forward, each one once, then each one again.
Clive had covered perhaps a fourth of the distance toward her; from the corner of his eye he could see Finnbogg moving parallel to himself. Folliot halted and turned his head to follow the course of the quills as they whirred past his ears.
They struck the four Japanese—Fushida, Nomura, the two privates. The four marines set up a common howl, not of rage or pain but of sheer, distilled terror. Clive knew now what Shriek had done. She had caused her body to secrete a chemical that induced the reaction in the Japanese marines and had then used her flying quills to inject it into them, as if she had been a surgeon administering a hypodermic needle to a patient or a viper administering its venom to its victim.