When the Devil Dances

Much of the intelligence that humans gathered on the Posleen was from one of three sources: the sensor net scattered through the woods, high-intensity telescopes scattered across the face of the moon and special scatterable, short-lived mobile “bots” that could be fired from artillery shells.

Since this latest globe landing, all of the sensors in line of sight of Clarkesville had been systematically eliminated, every set of bots sent in had been localized and destroyed and the Posleen had put up a blanket of smoke over most of the area they were organizing in. It bespoke something very unusual. And now they seemed to be actively patrolling.

“We gotta get into the area,” Jake pointed out. “To get there we gotta cross the stream.”

“Next time, we’re humping in SCUBA gear,” Mueller grumbled. “Then we swim across the lake.”

“I don’t know how to SCUBA,” Sister Mary whispered.

“I don’t know how to swim,” Nichols admitted.

“Babies,” Mueller grumped. “We’re taking out babies. Don’t they teach you anything in Recondo?”

“Sure,” Nichols said. “How to do a repulsion jump. I think I’ve used it as much as you have SCUBA training.”

“Tonight,” Mosovich said. “We’ll move out at two ohmygodhundred. Standard formation. If we make contact, follow SOP, rally here. Sister Mary, call up the arty and make sure they’re awake for our crossing.”

“Gotcha.”

“Chill until then. Tonight’s going to be busy.”

* * *

“You have had a busy day, eson’sora.”

Cholosta’an laid his crest down and bobbed his head to the older Kessentai, uncomfortable with the unusual term. Like many others it had been ferreted out of the Data Net by acolytes of the unusual master of this Globe-force, but it was unfamiliar to the majority of Posleen. It had echoes of a genetic relationship, father to son or sibling to sibling. But they were overtones only; the term meant neither father nor master but something similar to both. Defining the relationship, however, was an ongoing process.

“It has been… interesting.” The ever-present smoke of the main camp stung his eyes but at least now he understood the reason for it. The humans, too, had maps, and ways of seeing from the sky. Most of those had been destroyed automatically, the reason, apparently, that the Alldn’t equipment engaged what appeared to be harmless targets. But there were other ways; communications had been… intercepted from the orbital body. The humans even had eyes there.

Orostan fingered his harness in thought as he idly drifted his command saucer back and forth. The continuous movement of the tenar was a habit the smarter God Kings learned. On this benighted ball the less smart didn’t last long. “You understand maps now?”

The young Kessentai looked around at the purposeful activity of the encampment and flapped his crest. “I believe so. They are similar to the graphics of a construction survey. Once I connected the two it got much easier, but thinking of them flat rather than raised was tricky. And learning is one thing, but it takes experience to set a skill.” He had been born with many inherently transferred skills, not least the skills of battle but also a large nonviolent skill set ranging from how to construct a polymer extrusion machine to how to build a pyramid made of nothing but one foot blanks of steel. However, gaining new skills was harder, it required both time and materials to repeat the processes over and over again. Map reading at a “skill” level would take some time.

The oolt’ondai clacked his teeth and pulled out a roll of paper. “Well, for today you need to send half your oolt out on patrol. The rest will move to an outlying camp that is being prepared. Can your cosslain handle the patrol?”

“What is the nature of this ‘patrol’… thing?” the young Kessentai asked.

“Another of Tulo’stenaloor’s human practices. Oolt’os are sent out to walk on the roads and in the hills looking for humans that might be spying on us. We lose a few to their damned artillery, but it keeps prying eyes away.”

“But…” The Kessentai fluttered his crest in agitation. “I can send them forth and tell them to keep an eye out for humans. But it sounds like you have something else in mind.”

“Indeed,” the oolt’ondai said with a clack of humor. “Other groups already go forth. Send them to the attention of Drasanar. He will have them follow a patrol group on their path. After they know it they will be set to follow it until told to stop. Can they be trusted out of your sight?”

“Oh, yes,” Cholosta’an admitted. “My cosslain are actually quite bright and I have three in my oolt. Any of them will be capable of following those directions.”

“Good, send one half of the oolt to the attention of Drasanar, he is the patrolmaster. Then send the other half to the,” the oolt’ondai paused as he tried to get his mouth around “Midway.” Finally he got out a map and pointed to it. “Take them to the camp here. Turn them over to one of the Kessentai in charge of constructing the camp and return. We’ve many things to do and not much time to do it in.”