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"Certainly," Nyarowlll said, standing up. "Now?"
"Chief?" Bill said.
"Let me go get my bag," the SEAL replied, walking out of the room. When he
came back in he was carrying an M-4 and wearing a combat harness. "Okay, I'm
dressed."
"Will there be an issue with bringing weapons with us?" Bill asked.
"Not at all," Nyarowlll replied, walking towards the rear of the house. "It is
a justifiable action. However, when you meet the emperor they will have to
remain outside."
Bill mulled that over as they approached the gate. Two SWAT
team members were watching it carefully, as if it would start dumping . .
. whatever she'd called them at any time.
Nyarowlll stepped through with total aplomb and Bill followed her into the
looking glass.
The far side was a large room, about fifteen meters high, with a concrete
floor and walls. The ceiling, which looked to also be concrete, was held up
with heavy metal beams that were riveted together. The construction looked
vaguely familiar to him but he couldn't place it.
Then he noticed the odor. There was a catlike musk but overlaying it was what
he identified as wood and coal smoke. He hadn't smelled coal smoke in years
but it was distinctive. There was also a smell like rotten fish or a salt
marsh; the place must be near the ocean. The room was cold, cooler than the
Central Florida evening they had left, and there were three small potbelly
stoves heating it. One of them was glowing cherry red. The room was lit with a
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large number of lamps which Bill tentatively identified as oil lamps.
There were about twenty cats in the room, most of them colored like Nyarowlll
and almost indistinguishable but a few colored a light tan with brown
markings. Some of them wore leather aprons and others bore harnesses made of
leather and carried what looked like laser pistols that had been modified for
wood stocks. One of the ones wearing an apron came over to Nyarowlll
immediately and they carried on a conversation that sounded like a cat fight,
meanwhile stroking each other's ears. After a bit of that Nyarowlll came back
over to them and waved to one of the doors.
"We have a transfer device," she said, opening the low door and waving them
through.
Bill had to duck nearly in two and when he reached the far side he saw another
gate.
"This gate does not go to another planet but to a linked gate on this planet,"
the felinoid said, stepping forward. "It is quite safe."
Bill looked at the SEAL, then shrugged, following the cat through another
looking glass.
In a moment he was standing in another room. It was much smaller with fine
wood paneling, a terrazzo inlay floor, and lined with low-low even for the
cats-benches that were covered in rich furs of an unusual shade of blue. There
were two more of the soldier cats in the room, bigger and beefier than the
ones in the gate room. Both carried the laser pistol/rifles and were eying the
SEAL warily.
"I'll be just a moment," Nyarowlll said. "You'll have to leave your weapons
here."
Nyarowlll spoke to the soldier cats and then passed through the door with a
perfunctory ear wipe to each.
Bill got a more careful look at the weapons the cats bore and reached some
conclusions. The body of the weapon was made of what appeared to be plastic or
ceramic composite with a barrel that was metal, probably a heavy metal. The
shoulder piece, on the other hand, was wood and was connected to the main
weapon by metal bands that wrapped around a very strangely curved pistol grip.
The ammunition pouches were formed and hardened leather secured by a brass
clip.
They looked about right for some sort of power pack.
"Doc," Miller said, glancing around the room. "These guys don't make those
weapons."
"Yes," Weaver replied. He glanced over at the SEAL who was looking dyspeptic.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing," Miller said in a muffled voice. He was looking around at the floor
with a pained expression and finally swallowed.
"Couldn't figure out what to do with your tobacco juice?" Bill said,
smiling.
"Always something you can do with it," the chief growled. He unbuckled his
combat harness and laid it on one of the couches, setting the M-4 down on top
of it. Then he pulled out a clasp knife from his pocket, a pistol from the
back of his trousers and a knife out of his boot. "That had better be here
when I come back," he added, pointing at the pile.
One of the cats made a sinuous head motion then stepped over to the pile,
lowering his weapon from high port. He gestured at the rifle in interest.
Miller picked up the M-4 and dropped the magazine, then jacked a round out of
the chamber and handed the weapon to the cat who, after a moment's hesitation
touched a stud on his own rifle and removed a small, silver oblong and passed
the rifle to the chief.
"There's no sights on this thing that I can see," the chief said as the cat
hefted the M-4 and then looked at the sights. He said something to his
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companion who responded with a series of hacks. It might have been disgust, it
might have been laughter. The cat lifted the M-4, figured out how to shorten
the stock, which made it just about perfect for him, and looked through the
sights, keeping his finger away from the trigger. The pistol grip was too
large for him but so was the one on the ray gun.
"I bet one of those guys could handle the kick on an M-4," Weaver noted as the
cat lowered the weapon and then examined the cartridges.
He pointed out the bullets to his companion again who made a sinuous head
motion and spat a couple of times. There was a discussion that sounded like
two cats stuck in a barrel going on when the door opened and Nyarowlll,
followed by a cat that just looked older, came through.
"The emperor will see you now," Nyarowlll said, gesturing through the door.
"Don't fiddle with that while I'm gone," Miller said, handing back the ray gun
and then accepting his M-4 in return.
There was a short corridor outside the room and another door with two of the
"heavy" cats guarding it. These bore not just the ray guns but
short swords that looked oddly ceremonial. The older cat opened the door and
they ducked through, it was very low for them although the corridor had been
about normal height, into a small office. A cat that looked about Nyarowlll's
age was sitting in front of a low desk that was just about covered in paper.
On one side of the desk an odd, capped tube jutted up through the floor.
Behind him was a large window that was open a crack at the bottom despite the
chill. From it came the sounds of a street, if metal wheels on rock and a
strange oinking could be called street sounds.
Five more cats were in the room, two heavies, one by the door and one by the
window on the far wall and three that were all older than the cat behind the
desk. One of them was wearing a combat harness that was missing ammunition
pouches but did have some silver embroidery that might have been rank
markings. He was an old tom, scarred in quite a few places, one ear nearly
torn off, eyepatch over his left eye and missing his right arm from just below [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
