“That for the right wing of the Army of Liberation,” he observed profoundly to those on his left. “Chant leaders? Who will lead the chants?”
Uffts by dozens vociferously demanded to be appointed. He appointed them all. He furnished them with slogans. Shortly there were bands of the pig-like creatures swarming over the countryside shrilling:
“Uffts triumphant! Uffts supreme! Uffts are now a single team!” There was another, “Uffts have risen up to fight! Tremble, tremble at their might!” A simpler one was still more successful, “Uffts, uffts, on our way! Uffts, uffts, rise and slay!”
The aboriginal population of Sord Three—the uffts—spread over an astonishing area as they scrambled up hillsides and flowed down the descending slopes. Those with satisfactory slogans to chant tended to stay more closely together, and to shout more loudly. Link’s inventiveness gave out, and he appointed a Committee for Marching Recitatives to create other slogans and to pass on words of genius devised by anybody who happened to consider himself a genius.
There was much squabbling, and some remarkably bloodthirsty marching chants were devised, but the committee throve.
With a fine disregard for practicality but a completely sound estimate of the voluble mind, Link established all committees in an admirably vague state so any ufft who wanted to belong to any committee
There were hills in the distance, and Link more or less headed for them. The afternoon sun was hot. The ground was only thinly covered with vegetation. It was probably a good idea to head for an area where herbivorous creatures like the uffts could find something to eat. The hills looked green. And they might be cooler.
He set the marching pace at a comfortable strolling rate. He was leading the uffts who earlier had been besieging Harl’s household and shouting insults at its inhabitants. He was creating the diversion needed for Harl to take a pack-train to a neighbor’s Household and stock up with foodstuffs to endure a siege.
He found his role congenial. He liked novelty. He liked excitement. On occasion he enjoyed tumult. The present situation supplied all three. He was almost regretful that it wouldn’t last. He considered it certain that when the Ufftian Army of Liberation got tired of walking, it would sit down on its haunches as quadrupeds do, and rest, and get discouraged, and eventually go home. Meanwhile, though, he was a generalissimo of a strictly improvised army.
There were troops of uffts scrambling up hillsides and down again, shrilling, “
The original marching slogan had been modified. Link admitted to himself that it was improved. His Committee for Marching Recitatives had, astonishingly, turned out some others. As time passed they began to appear spontaneously in ever-forming and ever-re-forming groups of uffts. They continued to appear in new forms as the afternoon wore on. There were other signs of initiative. Uffts came galloping to his side to identify themselves as—self-appointed—commanders of the rear guard, the scouts, the Undefeatable Reserves, the Ufftian Commandos, the Rangers, the Guerillas and other military groups, and to tell him that all went well with their commands. They went away with their appointments confirmed by his acceptance of their reports. In some cases they simply went off to form the units they had just designed for themselves.
Sunset approached. The hills grew higher and steeper. The vegetation grew less sparse. Link began to be astonished by the persistence of the uffts in what he’d thought would be not much more than an hour or so of dramatic make-believe. He began, indeed, to worry a little.
There were deep shadows on the hillsides when an ufft from the self-appointed advance-guards came galloping back from the leading part of the march. He pranced splendidly in a half-circle, came alongside Link’s unicorn, and said in a strictly military manner:
“General, sir, the colonel in command of the advance-guard asks if you wish to occupy the abandoned human Household in the valley to the left, sir. He suggests that for logistic reasons it may be a suitable temporary headquarters. There’s a large spring, sir, with good water. What are your orders?”
“By all means occupy it,” said Link. “We’ll at least bivouac there for the night.”
But he blinked at the now-steep hillsides around him. It was almost dark. The situation began to seem less than merely amusing. The uffts really meant this revolt business! He hadn’t taken them seriously. It was not easy to do so now. They acted like children, to be sure. But children would have gotten tired of this play-acting and marching long ago. Children, indeed, would have abandoned the encirclement of Harl’s Household.
It occurred to Link that the uffts had more brains than he’d credited them with. They were desperately concerned about the stun gun with which they’d been peppered the night before. If such weapons were to be available to the humans on Sord Three, the uffts would be in a very bad fix. They couldn’t fight back. They had little hoofs instead of hands, and their brains were of no use to them because they lacked fingers and especially an opposable thumb.
Naturally, in the presence of human co-inhabitants of Sord Three, they had to lie to themselves to be able to endure their handicap. They pretended to despise humans. They were childishly bitter. They scornfully said that to have hands instead of hoofs was a shameful thing. But they knew, just the same, that the introduction of stun guns on Sord Three would make them utterly helpless as against humans. So with a naive desperation they were taking the only action they could imagine, under the only leadership they could consider qualified. It was not wise action. It could hardly be effective action. But Link felt obscurely ashamed of himself. He’d started it.
The hillsides to right and left became steeper and the valley in which the Army marched became deeper. Link saw his following more or less as a mass for the first time. There were some thousands of the uffts. They would have covered an acre or more in the closest possible marching order. Spread out, they were an impressive lot of creatures.
Here there was a band of a hundred or more, keeping close together and silent for the time being. There was a knot of twenty or thereabouts, chanting a slogan as they marched. He noticed that they looked weary. They also looked absurd. And they were totally unsophisticated in such practical matters as self-defense against men mounted on unicorns and carrying spears. They could be hunted down as corresponding creatures have been hunted down on ten thousand colonized worlds. The only difference between them and the wild lower animals of other planets was the uffts had brains. But brains in the absence of an opposable thumb left them ridiculous.
The swarming, now leg-weary small horde of uffts swung into a narrower valley which entered this one from the left. Far up this second valley there were human structures. Even in the gathering dusk they could be seen to be abandoned. The valley walls were almost precipitous. Rock strata of varying colors alternated in slanting streaks of stone. Link saw a stratum of extremely familiar peach-colored stone. He shrugged his shoulders.
The uffts flowed on, in small clumps and big ones, some few as individuals, many in pairs. Weariness was breaking down the undisciplined bunching of the march. They were now merely a very large number of very weary small animals, sturdily following Link’s leadership because he’d made a speech, and they couldn’t do much but make speeches themselves, and so could not estimate the uselessness of speechmaking.
Some of them began to hurry, now. There was a small stream, which dwindled to a thread down the valley up which Link now rode morosely. Near the deserted and crumbling structures it was larger. At its source it was a considerable spring. Link saw crowds of the uffts drinking thirstily, and moving away, and being replaced by others.
His own escort—he realized suddenly that some uffts had appointed themselves his personal escort and staff—moved on to the human structures. The roofs of the smaller buildings had collapsed. The Household or village must have been abandoned for many years. The largest structure would correspond with Harl’s residence. It had been the residence of the Householder of this place. Doors had fallen. Windows gaped.
Link’s escort stopped before it.
“I suppose,” said Link, “that I’d better take this over as my headquarters.”
“Yes, sir,” said an ufft’s voice. “You’ll give us more orders in the morning, sir? You’ve plans for the War of Liberation, sir?”
“I’ll make them,” said Link. He was vexed.
