"d.a.m.nation!" the captain hollered, as he paced back and forth in the tail cargo hold. His eyes were maniacally wild. "They weren't shadowing us!" One of the crewmen had suggested that, believing that one of the fighter ships had been in their last s.p.a.ceport and followed them, radioing for support and the pirate mining ship.

"If they were shadowing us, they would've chased us off earlier. Wouldn't've let us get the choicest elements. They weren't shadowing us. Someone radioed out and notified them where we were going. It took them five days to reach our position."

He stormed from the bay, face red from NGC7078 and his anger. He found Luis sorting through his uncut stones. Melka surprised him, dragged the smaller man up by the collar of his suit, holding him so only his toes touched the floor.

"So you paid me to mine for you. And the pirates paid you to reveal my stars. I ought to kill you. Toss you out the air lock and watch you explode." Spittle flew from Melka's lips, and his eyes held Luis', freezing the smaller man.

Luis couldn't speak, overcome by the madness and fury in Sean Melka's eyes. He tried to swallow, but found he couldn't manage that either. All he could do was sweat and listen to the pounding of his heart, the sound thunderous in his ears.

"Dad!" It was Reah's voice, and it was followed by a high-pitched whine.

The captain crumpled, stunned. Grateful and flabbergasted, Luis picked himself up off the floor and staggered back a few steps, thanking her. Captain Melka's chest rose and fell regularly, but his eyes were closed. He was unconscious.

"You stunned him good," Luis managed. The words were hoa.r.s.e, and he worked to get some saliva in his mouth. "I owe you my life."

A generous smile was splayed across Reah's porcelain face. Her eyes were locked onto Luis'.

Unblinking, they reminded him of her father's.

"I didn't notify any pirates," he began, wanting to explain his innocence to someone. "I don't know any pirates. He thought I did. He told me where we were going just before we left the port. And thought I...

But I didn't. I wouldn't."

"I did."

He saw something else in her eyes at that moment, a wildness, a madness. He opened his mouth to say something else, but stopped himself and tried to put everything together. What could he say? Why was she doing this? What next?

"Its all about money, really." She answered his unspoken questions. Her voice was ice. "The raiders payme well, money I don't have to share with my father. Still, I don't call for them until he's mined plenty-the cream from the dying sun. Money from them. Money from Dad's mining." She shrugged.

"Besides, it makes his old age more interesting, running from pirates, looking over his shoulder. I'm helping him in a way, giving him a thrill, keeping him from getting complacent in his last years."

"Agitated like a dying star," Luis mused. "But he thinks I..."

"Of course he thinks you called them. And I'll tell him he was right. Tell him you were pulling a laser on him." She did that then, replaced the stungun and tugged a small laser pistol from her pocket, aimed it at her father and lanced him in the leg. His body quivered in response, but he remained unconscious. "I rushed in here trying to warn him, but you shot him before I could do anything. And so I retaliated." She turned the weapon on Luis, and he looked about for something to hide behind.

"Y-y-you're mad!" he stammered, backing up toward a tall crate.

"The stars do that to you." Her voice was still cold. She thumbed the trigger and a small white beam shot forward and stabbed at Luis' chest, burning through the suit and the skin beneath, finding his heart. She fired again and again, though he was dead before he hit the floor.

She turned to regard her father. "I'll get the men to carry you to the medtent," she said, knowing he couldn't hear her. "Tomorrow we'll find another dying star. One, I think, that has diamonds."

KEEPING SCORE.

by Michael A. Stackpole

Michael A. Stackpole is an award-winning game and computer game designer who was born in 1957 and grew up in Burlington, Vermont. In 1979 he graduated from the University of Vermont with a B.A. in History. In his career as a game designer he has done work for Flying Buffalo, Inc., Interplay Productions, TSR, Inc., Hero Games, Wizards of the Coast, FASA Corp., and Steve Jackson Games.

In recognition of his work in and for the game industry, he was inducted into the Academy of Gaming Arts and Design Hall of Fame in 1994. He's the author of The New York Times best-selling series of Star Wars X-wing novels, and the fantasy novels Once a Hero and Talion: Revenant, and The Dark Glory War.

The ambush seared scarlet light through the mauve jungle. Sara had felt it coming a heartbeat before beams flicked out-things had gotten too quiet for a second. The enemy fire manifested as full shafts of light instantly linking shooter and target, then snapping off, since light traveled far too fast for even the most augmented eyes to see it as tiny bolts. Ruby spears stabbed down from high branches, or slanted in from around the boles of trees, here and there, as the Zsytzu warriors shifted impossibly fast through the jungle.

Sara cut left and spun, slamming her back against the trunk of a tree. Her body armor absorbed most of the impact, and she continued to spin, then dropped to a knee on the far side of the tree and brought up her LNT-87 carbine. The green crosshairs on her combat gla.s.ses tracked along with the weapon's muzzle, showing her where it was pointed. The top barrel stabbed red back at the ambushers, burning little holes through broad leaves and striping trunks with carbonized scars. Fire gouted from the lower barrel as chemical explosives launched clouds of little flechettes at the unseen attackers.

Next to her, Captain Patrick Kelloch, the fire-team's leader, laid down a pattern of raking fire that covered their right flank while she concentrated on the left. Flechettes shredded leaves and vaporized plump, purple lotla fruit. She thought she saw a black shadow splashed with green, and hoped one fewer laser was targeted back at her, but the Zsytzu were harder to hit than she'd ever found in virtsims.Bragb Bissik, the team's heavy-weapons specialist, stepped into the gap between the two human warriors. Un-derslung on his ma.s.sive right forearm were the eight spinning rotary barrels of the gatling-style Bouganshi laser cannon. Into each barrel was fed a small lasing cell, consisting of a chemical reagent that released a lot of energy really fast. The cell converted that energy into coherent light of great power and intensity that blazed for almost a second once the reaction had been started. The cannon whined as the barrels spun. The red beams slashed in an arc, nipping branches from trees and burning fire into the jungle's upper reaches.

The weapon spat the smoking lasing cells out into a pile at the hulking Bouganshi's feet. The brilliant red beams bathed him in b.l.o.o.d.y highlights. Hulking and broad-shouldered, the Bouganshi could have been a demon from any number of human pantheons, and Sara hoped the Zeez would find him purely terrifying.

As Bragb's fire raked the higher branches, two beams stabbed out from the ground to hit the Bouganshi's broad chest. Sara shifted her fire right, intersecting it with Kell's a.s.sault on the origin point of one of those beams. A purple wall of foliage disappeared in a cloud of smoke and mist. Something screamed, then something screeched, barely heard above the thunder of the fire-team's weapons. Red beams winked off from the Zsytzu line, then never appeared again.

Kell raised a hand. "Hold fire. They've run, I'm thinking."

Sara remained in her crouch as burned leaves fluttered down and smoldering twigs peppered the ground.

"Makes no sense for them to run. They had us."

"Close." The Bouganshi slapped with a three-fingered hand at the smoking black scars on his purple-and-gray, camouflaged body armor. "Heat, no crust."

She checked her armor and saw a couple of dark furrows melted in it. "Likewise, toasted not burned."

"Better than I was expecting." His azure eyes bright, Kell gave her a nod. "Bit different than simming. It is, isn't it?"

Sara tucked a wisp of blonde hair back up under her helmet. "In sim they're relentless. They never break off like this."

"That's because, la.s.s, you're using Qian simware. Much as they hate the Zeez, they grant them a bit more honor than in reality." Kell thumbed a clip free of his 87 and slapped a new one home. "For an honorable kill, you need an honorable foe. Only simZeez act that way."

Sara Mirke frowned. "I'm not clear on your meaning, Captain."

"Qian like order in their Commonwealth, hate mystery, and hate dishonor. They don't like to acknowledge it exists. Quirky, our masters." Kell rose and waved the others forward. "Let's see what we got."

Still covering the left flank, she moved out in Kell's wake. Bragb came behind, watching their rear. They went up a slight slope and over the splintered remains of underbrush, on the other side of the crest the land sloped down into a tree-choked ravine, through which ran a small stream. Halfway down the hillside a body lay against a tree, twisted against itself, with a gray-green rope of intestines pointing back uphill.

Kell nodded. "One less to play with."

"Too bad it wasn't the Primary."

A gruff chuckle humphed from the Bouganshi's throat. "Too much Qian virtsim.""Better to take the juniors first, Sara." Kell knelt by the body, emphasizing just how small the black-furred Zsytzu was. In life, it would have looked like a crossbreeding between a chimp and a wildcat, with tufted ears rising high. It had a long black tail which Sara knew was not prehensile, though she checked herself on that a.s.sumption. Most of the stuff I know comes from virtsim, so is subject to that Qian programmer bias. The closed eyes should have been rather large, the closed mouth should have had nasty fangs, and the hands should have ended in savage claws, but as nearly as she could see they remained sheathed.

She shivered. The dead creature looked like nothing so much as a school child dressed up in some elaborate costume. "It's like we're making war on children."

"More so than you know." Kell produced a knife from a boot sheath, turned the Zsytzu's head to the left, and cut up along the neck and behind the ear. He exposed the skull and dug out a small, cylindrical device that had been inserted into a hole behind the right ear. The thing trailed two wires. "The Primary will be severing the link, but intel will want it."

Sara looked away from the body and busied herself plucking a stray flechette from a tree. "We continue on the patrol, or head back?"

"We push on." Kell smiled over at Bragb, who reciprocated, exposing a mouth full of serrated white teeth. "We're ahead in the game, and they need to know that."

"I'm not sure I understand."

"I know, la.s.s, which is why you're out here with us." Kell waved the Bouganshi forward. "Take point, I'll get the rear. We'll let Lieutenant Mirke continue her learning experience."

"Point." The Bouganshi hefted his weapon and marched along the ridgeline, then down into the game trail they'd been following before the Zsytzu had hit them. Bragb moved off at a pace that Sara thought was less than prudent and when she turned back to complain to Kell, she saw he'd slung his LNT by the strap over his right shoulder.

"This has got to be a game because you two are playing by rules I don't understand."

"War's not really a game, at least, not from the Qian point of view. Same can't be said of the Zeez, which is why the Qian hate them so much." Kell tipped his helmet back, exposing a lock of brown hair pasted to his forehead. "You know the Zeez only allow males to act as warriors, and that males come in two flavors. Juniors are born five or so to a litter, along with a Primary. They're augmented these days so the Primary can give them direct orders but, for all intents and purposes, the little hoppers are the mental equivalents of five-year-olds. The juniors can remember a command or two and carry them out, but without the Primary, they're very limited."

"I know, which is why killing the Primary is so important."

"That depends, Sara. If you're killing the Primary right after he's given his brothers an order to get some sleep, well then, well done and more of it. If, instead, he's just told them it's time to kill the enemy, and he's been a bit vague on defining enemy, you have little homicidal beast-ies roaming about."

"Omni-cidal, Kell." The Bouganshi glanced back, flashing a white curve of grin. "If understanding of Terran is correct."

"I'm corrected, Bragb." The team's leader smiled easily. "The Zsytzu seem to have a view about this conflict with the Qian Commonwealth that isn't quite clear to the Qian. Being as how the Zeez areaugmented, fight differently, and have an annoying habit of being hard to kill, the Qian really want little to do with them."

"Which is why we're here." Sara sighed. The Qian Commonwealth had approached Mankind at a period when Men had only moved to a few of the other planets in the solar system. The Qian took humans in through something of a protectorate program, giving them faster-than-light travel- which they suggested humanity would eventually discover- and integrated them into their galaxies-spanning empire.

Humanity contributed what it could, and some of the better exports were soldiers. A few were even seconded to the elite Qian Star Guards, with all of them serving in the Black-star company.

As Kell had explained as they were inbound to the world Lyrptod, the Zmnyl-grar qert-dra, as the Blackstars were known in Qian, had a name that could be read two ways. The black star emblazoned on the shoulders of their armor was an emblem feared in the Commonwealth, but in Qian the name could also be read to mean black hole. Recruits for that unit came mostly from Ward worlds, and while the Qian used them to show the worlds that they valued their contributions, there was little doubt that the Blackstars were held in contempt by their Qian commanders.

Qian pride concerning their warrior tradition contributed heavily to this view, and was the source of Sara's being tossed into a mission before she even had time to unpack her belongings from the trip to join her unit. While Qian workers and the female leaders were all heavily augmented, Qian warriors were not.

They were bred true and quite formidable, with those belonging to the Guards being of the highest caliber.

Sara, on the other hand, was what was colloquially referred to on Terra as a "graft." Genetic engineering on Terra had eliminated genetic disease, but environmental factors and spontaneous mutations meant children were still born with defects. These children were sold to corporations who then treated them and trained them, selling their contracts to companies or governments who needed their skills. Nas-toyashu Corporation had used her in its Rota program, making her into a warrior. Test scores short-listed her for liaison with the Commonwealth and landed her the place in the Blacks tars.

"Well, we're here, la.s.s, because we're expected to handle this problem with some delicacy." Kell laughed lightly, a sound which seemed natural within the violet jungle.

Lyrptod, when surveyed initially, had fallen into the Ward world cla.s.s. The humanoid indigs had a tech level equivalent to the settlers who formed the United States, though explosives development had not occurred. They lived in a theocracy that preached pacifism and salvation from the stars, so when the Qian came down, they were welcomed. The Commonwealth quarantined the world, which was located back a bit from the Zsytzu frontier, leaving it open only to scientific teams studying the flora and fauna.

No one was quite certain when the Zeez inserted a team, but scattered sightings were reported back to the Commonwealth. Kell and his team were dispatched to Lyrptod to figure out why the Zeez were there while their insertion ship, the Chzrin, orbited the planet. They'd established a base camp in the vicinity of a number of sightings and engaged on patrols for a week without incident.

Given the nature of the world, and its location, the Zsytzu presence posed little threat to the Commonwealth, but the nature of interstellar warfare demanded some sort of response. Because s.p.a.ce had few natural features that barred hypers.p.a.ce travel, frontiers didn't really exist. The only way you could hit an enemy was to land on a world where you knew he had a presence. Learning why the Zeez were in Lyrptod could help determine other potential targets, or if they would be coming back in force. If so, scattered forces could be gathered to hurt them.

"Delicacy, yes, sir." She resisted the temptation to sling her weapon over her shoulder. "I know it's anatural preserve. I'm surprised you didn't have us collect up our sh.e.l.ls."

"Saw you getting that flechette, la.s.s. Good enough for me, though the skulls and their think-team would probably like more policing of the battlefield." He stretched his arms out to the sides and let his gloved fingers play over velvety ferns. "The point about the Zeez and war being a game for them is this: a lot of their objectives don't seem to make a lot of sense for the Qian. For example, why they would send a team here is baffling, so we get to deal with it. I'm not thinking we're going to be finding out what they are up to, and the Qian wouldn't understand it if we did. We get rid of them and we'll have done our job."

Sara rolled the flechette needle between her fingers and thumb. "You're not expecting another ambush right now because of why, then?"

"It's the focus thing: the juniors handle a couple orders at a time. Shifting them between attack and run modes takes a bit of transition, which is why they tend not to retreat."

He jerked a thumb back toward the ambush site. "In past incidents they've fired upon indigs in the jungle, driving them off. I'm thinking their current orders are such that they engage briefly and scarper. There may be one out there watching us, but they're not going to hit us, not right now. We killed one of them, so that will take a new plan, and the Primary will be wanting to think on it a while."

"I understand the logic, but is that a safe a.s.sumption to make?"

"I hope so, la.s.s." Kell winked at her. "Since I'm last in line here, likely I'll be the one they fry first."

Up ahead, the Bouganshi crouched at a point about ten meters back from where the trail opened onto a meadow. The stream which had been running through the ravine to their right bled down and out into a marshy area on the edge of a lake. The gra.s.ses in the meadow rose to hip height and had gone from a lavender to a bright golden color, contrasting beautifully with the lush purple jungle and violet-tinged waters of the lake.

Sara took that whole vista in with a glance, then focused on a tree near the lake edge. She felt fairly certain, based on its dark gray trunk, that it was dead, but the branches were not bare, clawing at the sky. Instead they were covered with blue foliage, iridescent in nature, that fluttered with a breeze that neither rippled the water nor rustled the gra.s.ses.

She smiled. "That tree is covered with b.u.t.terflies."

"Or the nearest evolutionary equivalent, yes."

Bragb cast a glance back at Kell. "Not fair. To you, if it lives in water, it is a 'trout.' '

The team leader sniffed and raised his chin. "Fish are n.o.ble creatures, not bugs. Evolution being what it is, there are plenty of fish around. Probably some in that lake."

Sara chuckled lightly. "Can we go down there?"

The Bouganshi nodded. "Seems safe."

"Sure. If they're watching us, give them something to watch." Kell came up and sidled around Bragb, then led the way down the trail. It wound its way down a steep hillside, then along a high patch of ground that bordered the swamp. Nearing the lake he slowed and looked for a dry path toward the sh.o.r.e.

"Bragb, you watch our backtrail. Lieutenant, if you want, you can recon the bugtree.""And you will survey the trout population?" Sara shook her head as she pushed the flechette through the strap on her LNT-87, keeping the steel needle in place. "And then come back here fishing sometime?"

Kell crouched at the sh.o.r.e and peered into the murky water for a moment, then turned to look at her.

"Lieutenant, if you'd done the study of Lyrptod..."

"If I'd had the time to study the data..."

"... you'd know there is nothing of commercial value to exploit here, and you'd know that taking wildlife without a study-permit is quite illegal." He shrugged. "Of course, an informal scientific survey, well, now, that couldn't be consi..."

The water boiled in a rush of bubbles as a huge, mottled gray-and-purple creature lunged up and out at Kell. Its leathery flesh, though glistening with water, had the same armor plates grown into it as the Bouganshi's skin did. The beast's mouth flashed open, white peg teeth contrasting with light blue flesh, then snapped down. The creature caught Kell by surprise, closing its mouth over him, leaving his legs kicking and arms waving as it raised its maw and tried to choke him down.

Sara's carbine came up instantly and she emptied a clip at the beast. She sprayed her fire over the water, aiming at its midsection, churning the water into froth, but not stop-ping the monster from sliding back beneath the surface. Her empty clip hit the ground and another had been slapped home in an eye blink, which was just enough time for her to realize gunfire wasn't going to stop the thing.

Before she could cast her weapon aside, Bragb came on a sprint and hurled himself into the lake. With a glittering silver, crook-bladed knife in one hand and freed of his cannon and its bulky ammo pack, the hulking alien splashed down noisily, spraying water everywhere. He sank from sight for a second, then his right hand rose with the dagger and fell. Once, twice, then too many times for her to count. A black stain filled the water. The creature's flat tail lashed, breaking the surface, then Bragb came up, gasping. Water cascaded from him, then he went down again.

A heartbeat later he came up and coughed, once, hard, then struggled to the sh.o.r.e. He had the creature's tail in one hand and dragged the thing from the lake. Ragged gashes had been opened along its twelve-meter-long spine-not all of them made by the knife-and the rhythmic little gnashing of its teeth indicated it wasn't quite dead yet.

That didn't stop the Bouganshi, who contemptuously spat out a hunk of green meat. Bragb flipped the creature onto its back, then stabbed his knife in near the hindmost of the three pairs of legs and cut along up toward the middle. The wound gaped and verdant guts came pouring out, along with the distended gray sack that was the monster's stomach. Another slash opened it. The Bouganshi reached in and dragged Kell from the stomach, sliding his slime-covered body onto the golden gra.s.ses.

Sara dropped to her knees and swiped a hand across Kell's lips, then opened his mouth, cleared it with a finger, and lifted up on his neck to open his airway. She pinched his nose shut, then covered his mouth with hers and breathed.

One breath, two, and a third. She shook off a glove and felt his throat for a pulse.

He had one, good and strong. She started to breathe for him again, but he pushed her away, rolled onto his side and puked. He sucked in a loud noisy breath, then coughed and vomited again. He tried to come up on all fours, but abandoned the effort and stayed down on his right side.

"You okay, sir? Anything broken? Bragb?"Kell weakly waved a hand.