“We’d better keep everyone inside,” she said. “It seems safe to assume that they radioed for help. That means a rescue party is on the way.”
Benson nodded. “Thank God we don’t have anyone out there at the moment,” he said. “It looks like we caught a break.”
Margaret was inclined to agree, but as the day wore on, and the adults took turns on sentry duty, there were no signs of a Ramanthian rescue party. Or anyone else for that matter. Although there was always the possibility that ground troops had been ordered to respond from the west—something the humans wouldn’t be able to see because of the intervening hill. That was Benson’s theory—and it made sense. When darkness fell, and the evening meal was over, the adults took turns telling stories until it was time for the children to go to bed. Since John could stand sentry duty all night without fatigue, and could see in the dark, the rest of them could get a good night’s rest knowing that the android was on duty. That’s why Margaret was sound asleep when the robot came to wake her. A beam of light washed the walls around the socialite, and she held up a hand to protect her eyes. John spoke with the same calm tones he might have used to announce the arrival of a guest at the Napa Valley estate.
“I’m sorry to disturb you, ma’am,” the android said formally. “But it’s my duty to inform you that a life-form bearing a strong resemblance to a Ramanthian entered the valley from the west and is presently taking a nap where the house used to be.”
Margaret was up by then and pulling her clothes on. “A Ramanthian. You’re sure?”
“Yes, ma’am,” John responded gravely. “I’m sure.”
“And there’s only one of them?”
“Yes, ma’am,” the robot replied patiently. “There’s only one of them.”
“Did you tell Benson?”
“Yes, ma’am, I did,” the android confi?rmed.
“Good,” Margaret said, as she strapped a gun belt around her waist. “Go back and tell Lisa to stay with the children. I’ll be with Benson.”
The group had a pair of night-vision binoculars they had appropriated from the men who attempted to kill them immediately after they left the highway. And Benson was already using them when Margaret emerged from the mine to stand next to him. “So,” she wanted to know, “was John correct?”
“He sure as heck was,” the maintenance man answered.
“It’s weird. . . . But here, take a look for yourself.”
Margaret accepted the binos, brought them up to her eyes, and swept the area below until a greenish blob appeared. Then, after she fi?ddled with the controls, the picture came clear. There, lying on his side as if sound asleep, was a Ramanthian soldier, or aviator, if this particular bug had been aboard the ship they’d seen the previous day. “It looks like he’s asleep or dead,” the socialite commented. “Maybe they weren’t able to get a message out. Maybe he was injured, left the crash site looking for help, and couldn’t walk any farther.”
“Maybe,” Benson allowed grimly. “But regardless of what happened he’s a problem. If the chits see him, they’ll land right in our front yard. Maybe they’ll spot the mine, and maybe they won’t. But why take the chance? I say we go down and deal with him before the sun comes up.”
The plan made sense. So Margaret went to tell the others, ordered John to come along, and followed Benson down into the valley below. They were careful to step on rocks wherever possible in order to avoid creating a trail. Once in the valley, the humans circled the body, before approaching it with weapons at the ready. Margaret noticed that a faint odor of formic acid hung in the air around the Ramanthian as Benson prodded the body with his rifl?e. There was no response so Margaret decided that it was safe to move in and examine the corpse more closely. Margaret had seen Ramanthians before, and even spoke with some during prewar diplomatic functions, but never under circumstances such as these. The fi?rst thing she wanted to do was search the body for any objects or bits of information that might prove useful. Then, just to satisfy her own curiosity, Margaret was hoping to establish the cause of death. With those objectives in mind, she forced herself to grab hold of the aviator’s harness in an attempt to roll the alien over. And that was when the trooper uttered a groan. Margaret jerked her hand away as Benson raised the rifl?e. “Holy shit! The bastard is alive!”
“You know I don’t like that kind of language,” Margaret said primly. “Come on. . . . Let’s prepare the sling you were talking about.”
“But it’s alive!” Benson objected. “I should shoot it fi?rst.”
“You’ll do nothing of the kind,” Margaret replied fi?rmly.
“Is that the way you would like them to treat us? Now, hurry up. Or would you like to have a Ramanthian patrol fi?nd us out here?”
It was that argument as much as anything that convinced Benson to take the coil of rope off his shoulder and work with John to prepare a sling. Then, once the carefully knotted rope was laid out next to the aviator, it was a simple matter to roll the alien onto it. That produced another groan, but the bug was still unconscious insofar as Margaret could tell, and that was good. Because she had nothing to offer the Ramanthian for his pain.
Margaret led the way as Benson and the android carried the aviator up the hill to the mine, where Lisa was waiting.
“We’ll take him back to one of the side galleries,” Margaret instructed, and turned to lead the way. The main shaft ran straight back into the hillside. The gradient slanted upwards, so the miners could move their fully loaded carts more easily, but the iron rails were long gone. Lights, all powered by carefully camoufl?aged solar panels, lit the way. Side tunnels, some of which had been enlarged over the years, provided rough-hewn rooms for sleeping, eating, and storage. And it was in one of the latter where a table had been placed so that the Ramanthian could be laid on his side. The same position he had been found in and the only one that would accommodate the alien’s wings. The fi?rst task, to Margaret’s mind at least, was to assess the extent of the alien’s injuries in case there was something that she or her companions could do to help. Benson wanted no part of the activity, but Lisa was willing, and having rigged some lights, the two women conducted an inch-by-inch examination of the alien’s body. And that was when they discovered that a section of the Ramanthian’s exoskeleton was not only broken, but pressing in on the aviator’s internal organs, which had most likely been damaged as a result. Margaret knew that the question of why the scout ship had crashed, and why there hadn’t been any signs of a search, would probably go unanswered. But one thing she did know was that the alien in front of her had gone down in what he no doubt saw as enemy territory, had suffered a terrible injury, and still found the courage to try and walk out. So while she hated the Ramanthians as a group, the matron couldn’t help but admire the being in front of her, as she pressed her fi?ngers
