OF GODS AND BEASTS
The paraglider had been made and Mawgri had brought it home the night before, so I had already inspected it and found it true to my specifications. I woke eager to go to the mountain, but Mawgri, to tease me, pretended to want to loll around in bed.
“Come back. What is your rush?”
“Mawgri, You know this is important to me. I know from the logbook—‘the sacred, unreadable book’—that Captain Hennessey and his ship are in the cave on the mountain.”
“Very well. I’ll go with you to the airbase.”
“Airbase?”
“Yes, the Emperor Sacacon is having one of his best, most trusted pilots fly you, and he has ordered a cameraman to film your flight, so they can study how you manipulate the paraglider. We have two hours before flight time.”
We cleaned and dressed. I donned my uniform and full body armor with weapons and helmet. Mawgri, who had pulled a simple black bodysuit over his pale green-and-yellow scales, said, “Ah, you are magnificent: the warrior of Earth.”
“Cut the cracks. I’m ready. All my bags are packed. Don’t forget to take them with you.”
“I won’t.”
“When will you come to get me?”
“Tomorrow morning. That will give you a day and night on the mountain.”
“Let’s go.”
Luvark, assigned by the Emperor, drove us in the yellow car, but we didn’t discuss what we were up to. I told him I was testing a new parachute that Sacacon wanted for his paratroopers. The drive to the airbase took us down the mountain, across the plateau, and down another ridgeline.
From our final descent, I could see the airbase below in the desert basin, and I then realized how intensely the Saca Empire was preparing for conflict. The airbase was huge, encompassing kilometers and kilometers of runway, at least a dozen different strips, and hundreds of hangers and other buildings. Up close were shiny single-engine metal propeller planes, some with broad flat noses and others with pointed noses. There must have been hundreds of those types of planes, some of which were taking off and landing and flying around the base in formations. Farther away were two-engine propeller planes bristling with guns and with open bomb bays. Across from those were other unarmed two-engine planes that must have been cargo planes. Around all of those planes, mechanics and weapon-loaders streamed back and forth like ants. Much farther, beyond the smaller planes were huge four-engine bombers, which were likewise being serviced with antlike Putkurs.
“I can see that Saca is indeed readying for war.”
Luvark said, “Za Malcolm, what other choice do we have with Radimeer making so many threats?”
The gate of the airbase was heavily guarded, so Luvark had to stop and present his pass from the emperor in order to enter. The guards glanced at it and waved us in. Luvark hadn’t driven more than a half kilometer into the base when he turned right and headed to a hanger where small single-engine planes waited. He stopped beside the first hanger, and we got out of the car and pulled the yellow paraglide chute from the trunk. I had packed it into a bright red parachute pack given to me by Sacacon.
A pilot came up to us and bowed and said, “Za Mawgri, Za Malcolm, I am glad to meet you. I am your pilot, Captain Jirkra.”
Mawgri said, “Greetings, but only Za Malcolm is going with you. I have other business to attend to and must leave him to your care.”
Captain Jirkra bowed to him. “By your leave.”
Mawgri gave me a little salute and grin and then turned, rejoined Luvark in the car, and off it sped back to Sacawyz.
Jirkra led me to a small, single-engine airplane with two front seats and two back seats. The cameraman was loading his gear into the back. Jirkra said, “Za Malcom, you will sit up front next to me. When you are ready to jump, let me know, and then wait for my signal.”
We squeezed into the little airplane, Jirkra started the engine, which sputtered, roared and finally settled into a high hum like an angry bee. The noxious, carbonic exhaust floated around us. He spoke into a radio and voices answered him. Then we began rolling down a runway, gained speed, and at last rose slowly into the air. When we had gained enough altitude, Jirkra leveled the plane and said, “My instructions are to fly to the Mt. Zaput area for you to begin your dive. None of the fighter formations will be practicing in that sacred and forbidden area, so it will be safe for us.”
I settled down and enjoyed the scenery. To the east I could see the desert basin dotted with oil derricks drilling into the earth. We were about a kilometer up in the atmosphere and flying parallel with the ridge on which Sacawyz was built. Soon we passed over the city, and I tried to pick out Mawgri’s villa and finally thought I saw it with a tiny yellow car in front. Then the air grew cool and the mountains grew taller and were covered with dark foliage.
Then as we flew parallel to a high plateau, Jirkra leaned toward me and said, pointing a scaled finger ahead to a high mountain covered with black fir trees except for its barren rocky top, “That’s Mount Zaput. The village at the foot of the mountain is where the ecclesiastic guards live to protect the mountain. I’m climbing to two kilometers.”
The plane nosed up into a shallow climb and soon we were above the mountain in cold air. The cameraman tapped the captain to let him know he was ready. “All right, Za Malcolm, anytime you want, you can jump.”
I opened the door, which slid back into the fuselage. “Thanks,” I said. “Here goes.” I stepped out into the frigid air and fell, arms and legs spread. I never looked at the plane, but I knew it would be circling and the cameraman would be shooting. I fell a few hundred feet and then I pulled the ripcord. The chute popped out, filled and suddenly opened, jerking me upward into a draft. I grabbed the lines and tested to make sure I knew which were which; then I parasailed in a broad counterclockwise circle. The paraglider functioned smoothly. On the western arc, I saw the mountain below me and drifted that way. I could hear the airplane buzzing somewhere above me. The bird’s eye view was magnificent. Saca was a beautiful land with its deserts, dark valleys and broad mountains. Since I was still above the mountain, I circled again, but a tighter circle, so when I came around to the west, I would yet be slightly above the mountain. I came around and saw I was almost even with its broad top. I knew that the cave was on the eastern side just above the tree line. I circled again, tighter, and when I came around I was just below the tip of the mountain. Then I performed a figure eight, which was something acrobatic for the cameraman, but also gave me a good view of my target area as I swept back and forth. I turned abruptly toward the mountain and went skimming for the tree line. Then before me to the right, I saw the dark mouth of the cave. I adjusted the chute so it took me there, and I dropped down gently onto the ledge in front of the cave, released the chute pack, and walked quickly inside the cave as the chute, now with little weight to impede it and caught by the wind, blew up and north and disappeared around the mountain.
The cave seemed dense with darkness, and my eyes had little time to adjust from the bright white of the sky when a voice said, “Nice landing, Za Malcolm.”
I pulled my flashlight from the belt and shined its tight stream of light toward the voice, which seemed familiar. It wasn’t Mawgri’s voice, but it belonged to someone I had spoken to before. The light fell on the yellow eyes and scaly face of Sacacon. I bowed and said, “Sacacon, what are you doing here?”
“I came to visit my god. I figured I could help you on your mission, too. And, by the way, let’s drop the royal formality. You and I are both educated enough to know that it’s a bunch of crock. What I love about Mawgri is that he knows it, too, and we long ago came to an understanding as equals—one of the few real friends I have.”
Sacacon was dressed in warm brown hiking boots and thick clothing with none of the pomp of an emperor. Beside him were a backpack, a rifle and a valise. He held two picks in his imbricated left hand. He leaned one pick against his leg and offered me the other. “Shall we go find my god?”
I felt his tongue lightly and companionably on my forehead and said, “Yes, let’s.” I grabbed the pick and we set off for the rear of the cave. As we walked, I said, “I gather that Mawgri has told you what I found in the book.”
“Yes, and I wasn’t surprised. Why would a god write in a book when it could write in the sky or on the face of a mountain if it wished its worshippers to know something? And why write in a language the worshippers could not understand? That never made sense. A god would only write in another language, if that were the language of the gods and there were many of them, which defeats the idea of one god.”
At the rear of the cave, we took the picks, which had one sharp, pointed tip at one end and at the other end a three-pronged iron claw for pulling away rocks, and began to remove rocks and stones and boulders until there was enough room for a Putkur to enter, which left plenty of room for a human. We hunched over and duck-walked into the burial site, for that is what it was.
Once inside, we stood next to the spacecraft, the lighter from Martian Moons. Inside the craft were three skeletons wearing spacesuits. Next to one was a pistol. I picked up the pistol and saw that engraved on the handle was “C. Hennessey, Love, Dad.” I showed it to Sacacon and read the inscription aloud. “It was perhaps a gift for graduating from a military academy.”
“Take it with you. . . . So this suit of bones is Christopher Hennessey, the founder of our religion and composer of our written language and the one who taught us to read and write. We owe him a lot. He really did do us a service by advancing our civilization hundreds of years. Who knows what we would have become otherwise?”
He held up a square of hide and fur that had covered the body. “This must be the skin of the zebok he killed, which became his shroud.”
“What if the Stuwkreen had arrived to find you illiterate hunters and gatherers and worshippers of trees and rocks?”
“That is not a pleasant thought. But here’s a better thought: You humans have been around for eons and are more advanced than we in the Za system. I would love to visit your system.”
“Such a thing is possible, but only if humans become aware that you are here. Another possibility is that the Stuwkreen take you there. I think they will soon have that capacity.”
We looked around the lighter, but I found nothing else that I could take with me. Sacacon, however, recognized that the engine of the lighter might be an advancement over anything his people currently had, and might help his side in the looming conflict with Radimeer. He studied its dimensions, made some notes and finally returned to my side.
“That engine could be useful.”
“But how do you get it out of the cave and down the mountain past the ecclesiastic guards?”
“I’ll think of something. After all, I am Zacon’s chosen ruler and the de facto head of the religion.”
“How did you explain your climb up the mountain?”
“To commune with Zacon and seek guidance for the political crisis.”
“Then all you have to say is that Zacon has left a gift for his people, but it must be extracted from the cave.”
“Yes. I’ll start the process as soon as I return to Sacawyz.”
“I would like to bury the crew.”
“Ok. Let’s do that.”
We dug a trench next to the lighter, pulled out the three suited human skeletons and laid them at long last to rest and covered them with earth. I said a few words honoring them, especially Captain Christopher Hennessey.
We returned to the mouth of the cave and looked out over Saca land. “You have a beautiful country,” I said.
“Yes, and it has been good to us. I hope we can defend it well and survive this contest with Radimeer.”
“The civilization that empowers the most people usually wins in otherwise equal contests. You have begun to empower your people by educating them and moving them toward self-government and by encouraging individual achievement, and your chief ally is the democracy Kunwyz, which has the most empowered people, so I’m optimistic you will prevail . . . if not at first, then ultimately.”
He leaned against the outcropping at the mouth of the cave and looked at me inquiringly, “What do you think of Mawgri?”
“What do you mean? You know he is trustworthy.”
“He is so many things, but does anyone really know him? Do you know him?”
“I love him, but I see what you are getting at. He never reveals everything, so I always have a sense that he is keeping part of himself to himself alone.”
“What is that part that no one knows, that no one can see into?”
“I don’t know.”
He stood erect and brushed his hands over his stomach. “I’m getting hungry. Did you bring anything to eat?”
“No, just water.”
“All I brought is water and a few tak tortillas. We’ll have to hunt something if we want to eat tonight. Mountain zeboks live on the side of the mountain. Of course, we don’t have to eat. Fasting can aid religious communion.”
“A healthy body leads to a healthy mind.”
“Yes, I believe that more than the other. Let’s go hunting.”
Descending into the tree line north of the cave was Sacacon’s idea. He had brought his rifle and thought we would have better luck on the north side of the mountain, which rarely was visited by Putkurs.
He was right. The north side of the mountain stepped down in a series of escarpments following geological terraces. On each terrace were purple meadows among the forest of black trees. Something shrieked and howled in the distance, a terrible, threatening yowl.
“What was that?” I asked.
“That is a creature you don’t want to encounter. It’s the cry of the bashi, a fanged predator that rules these wilds. It calls to claim its territory and keep other bashis away. It is a fierce, savage animal, but it avoids Putkurs if it can.”
I followed him down into the gloomy shadows of the dark trees until we were at the edge of a small meadow in which grazed a small herd of wooly ungulates, their heads moving back and forth as they crunched through the violet sage and purple grass and blue flowers.
“Here are wild northern zeboks. That young female looks healthy.” He nodded toward a plump brown nanny at the edge of the herd.
He raised the rifle, aimed and fired one shot. The zebok at which he had aimed fell, and the remaining alarmed, surefooted beasts hoofed noisily away, snorting and huffing and scrambling onto an outcropping of stone.
We walked into the meadow and found the downed beast lying among the plum grass and blue flowers. “Right through the heart,” said Sacacon, kneeling down over his kill. “A lucky shot.”
He pulled a long, sharp, curved knife and gutted the steaming animal. Then he tied its hooves together, found a branch that was long enough and slid it between the legs to make a transporter. We hoisted the zebok carcass by its hooves and toted it back to the cave.
I went in search of forked limbs to make a roasting spit while Sacacon skinned and beheaded the zebok. I also went to the trees to gather a load of wood and tender for the fire.
While doing so, I heard an especially fierce, piercing shriek close by. Made apprehensive by the cry’s startling proximity, I dropped the load of wood, stood and looked around. Not more than thirty meters away, a large black and tan muscular bear-like animal, glared at me with red eyes and snarled, opening its mouth wide and showing long incisors and smaller teeth, all sharp and deadly for seizing and cutting flesh—a bashi. I pulled my pulsegun from its holster and waited, hoping that the beast would not attack and that I would not have to kill it. Remembering all the resources of my armor, I flicked on the force field, which covered me as a shimmering bowl.
Then suddenly behind me, I heard the crack of a rifle. The bashi screeched and rolled over and thrashed about in the brush. Sacacon ran past me, stopped near the bashi and shot again. The thrashing stopped.
I flicked off the force field, ran and stood beside the emperor and looked down at the beast, now just a lump of flesh and fur and bones cooling on the cold dirt of the forest. I estimated that the creature weighed twice as much as I, and its feet held sharp claws as deadly as its teeth.
Sacacon said, “The fact that it stopped near you and shrieked was not a good sign. It was warning you to clear out of its territory. I couldn’t be sure it would attack or not; I couldn’t take the chance that it wouldn’t have.”
“I’m glad you didn’t. But I was safe, waiting for it to make the first move.”
Pulling out the curved knife, he said, “They have two basic moves: a straight on sprint ending in a slashing knock over, or a circling and closing until they think they have the advantage. Since he wasn’t circling, I feared he would soon sprint. They have been known to back away from Putkurs, but from you he wasn’t picking up the scent of a Putkur. In fact, its bit of confusion probably gave me time to come down.” While he talked, he used his curved knife to skin the Bashi, made a bundle of the skin and head and hoisted that on his back. “This will make a nice trophy. In the old days, to kill a Bashi was a sign of bravery and command, a signal that one was a leader. So I will take it back with me and tell the story of how I fought a Bashi and won. Good public relations. My people will take it as a good omen for the coming conflict.”
I bundled the sticks and branches together and carried them in my arms. Walking back to the cave, I asked, “Do you think it followed the trail of blood from the zebok?”
“Likely. The blood was fresh, so it might have thought it was following a wounded animal.”
He set the Bashi pelt aside.
Then we made the spit and built the fire and set the zebok flesh to roasting inside the cave, so the heat was captured and warmed the cave. From his pack, Sacacon pulled a little golden slavva to rub into the meat.
“You seem at home in the woods,” I said.
“Remember that we Putkurs were nomads before we settled into cities. Hunting and camping and fishing are still considered essential skills for an adult male. Our favorite hunt is to ride an arbez into the desert and run down a smagos among the brush. On another trip when I have more time, you can go with me on such a hunt if you like.”
“I would like to.”
“Well, before darkness falls, I have something for you.” He found the valise and carried it into the light outside the cave. I followed him. He unlocked the valise and opened it. Inside was the logbook of Captain Hennessey. He lifted it and handed it to me. “You have more use for this than I do. Take it.”
I took it. “Thank you, but why?”
“Now that I know what is in it, it can serve no purpose for the empire. Once it is interpreted, the religion of Zacon will be finished, and I need the religion at least until the war with Radimeer has ended.”
“What did you tell the priests?”
“I told them I was returning the book to Zacon.”
“Then you can say that in return Zacon gave you the engine.”
“Good. You’re a quick learner. I will rise early and take the Bashi pelt to the village and begin my story. By the time that happens, you should be with Mawgri on your way to Kunwyz. Well, let’s eat.”
I put the logbook into my pack and then joined Sacacon for dinner. I hadn’t realized how hungry I had become until I took the first bite of zebok. We each had plenty to fill our stomachs, along with the tak tortillas and water. By the time we had finished, the black night had enveloped the mountain. I trod out to gather more wood and built up the fire, so it would keep the cave warm until morning.
When I woke, I was alone in the cave, morning had whitened the sky at the mouth of the cave, and the fire had been reduced to glowing embers. I ate some leftover zebok, drank some water, gathered my things together and went out to the lip of the cave and waited for my beloved Mawgri.
Below, where Sacacon had killed the bashi, predatory flying creatures were circling and settling. Those creatures were scavengers and reminded me of buzzards, but they had brown and black feathers and a bald head and neck and not a beak, but a mouth with small, sharp teeth for gripping and tearing flesh. Mount Zaput and its environs was a cold, dark, sublime and savage wilderness, a perfect place for meeting a god or a devil.
END
"Of Gods and Beasts" was first sent to a fiction contest judged by Ursula K. Le Guin, a science-fiction writer whom I have long admired. I didn't have a true science-fiction story available at the time, so I took a chapter from my sci-fi novel Interplanetary Secret Agent: Book One: Putkwyz, converted it into a short story and sent it to the competition. It didn't win, of course. My favorite short story by Le Guin is "The Ones Who Walk away from Omelas." I first read her when I was a teenager and was enthralled. One of her most famous novels is The Left Hand of Darkness. "Of Gods and Beasts" is included in the short story collection Touch Me, 2009.
Another favorite female sci-fi writer is Anne McCaffrey, who wrote The Ship Who Sang, another story I read when I was a teenager.
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