The Legacy of Heorot
Chapter 33

THE LAST STAND

Thou hast covered my head in the day of battle.
THE BOOK OF COMMON PRAYER

    The horses were thinking about letting her catch up. Carolyn cursed the stupid animals in her mind; she didn't have breath for more. Thirst was a fire in her throat. Her burning legs were ready to collapse, and her ride receded coyly before her.
    The horses stumbled from time to time. She'd have to get those ropes off them if they were to have any chance to live. 
    They wheeled to the left. She followed.
    The stream was a sudden surprise. It was small and pretty and it ran in graceful curves. She hadn't seen it lower down. It might curve south and join the Amazon; it might seep into the water table and disappear. She could hear it bubbling now, and the thirst rose up in her like a grendel.
    The horses lined up to drink. They didn't flinch as she joined them. She had swallowed two cupped handfuls before she noticed how dirty the water was. She was downstream, and the horses had fouled the water.
    She spat out the grit. Thirst was still there, but she took the time to free the horses from the line of ropes. Do everything slowly and carefully. Fool yourself into being calm. She patted their necks, she called them by name, she walked around and among them and knelt to drink clean water upstream. And saved her life thereby.
    When her belly was a cold fullness, she stood and looked back.
    Far down toward the edge of storm, a cloud of spray rose from the stream.
    Something dark came out of it. Came fast. Charlie had gone for water first, but now he was on speed and coming for the horses. Carolyn stepped back behind a rock that was only hip high. Knelt. She concentrated on arming the harpoon gun. She didn't lift her head until she was armed. 
    Just her eyes peeped over the rock.
    The horses were scattering, all but Shank's Mare. Shank's Mare had gone thirty meters before the thing tore into her. Now she thrashed with blood spraying from her ravaged hind leg--Charlie had developed a habit--and the black streak circled back to bite away half of the horse's head. Shank's Mare convulsed, then collapsed like a bag of old laundry. The grendel hooked her with its tail and dragged her back into the stream.
    Carolyn stood up and walked forward. There was no running from a grendel. Charlie was occupied and the time was now.
    The horses had hidden her, and then the rock, but now . . . Charlie must have seen her at once. The grendel came straight at her, pulling the mass of the horse and a mass of water too, moving no faster than a jogger. It realized its problem and stopped to shake the horse free. Carolyn shot it from six meters away.
    The harpoon exploded against Charlie's wide face.
    The grendel came for Carolyn. It was free of the horse, and it accelerated like the best of motorcycles. Carolyn wouldn't have had time to move even if she'd had the nerve and another weapon. The thing went past her in a wind that twisted her around, and she saw it smash into the hip-high boulder, bounce over it, land tumbling, look about--
    Look with what? The blast had torn its face entirely away, leaving cracked red-and-white bone. No eyes, no nose, most of the mouth blown away. A grendel's ears were nearly invisible, but she couldn't believe those weren't gone too.
    There was blood in Carolyn's mouth. She had bitten deeply into her lower lip. Blood soaked into her trousers, and a line of pain crossed her leg above the knee: the tail of the thing must have brushed her. She lowered the harpoon gun and felt the pain in her cramped hands. "Stupid," she whispered. "Stupid, Charlie. Pulling a horse! I hope your sisters are that stupid."
    Charlie's tail was a blur like the blades on a Skeeter. She charged in a straight line, with no clear target. Only by accident did she intersect the stream. She stopped then, sank underwater, then lifted again. To breathe. The snorkel was gone too.
    Carolyn became aware that she was grinning like a grendel.
    The rest. Where were they? She couldn't see them; the ground curved strongly, but they must be at least several hundred meters downslope. Three grendels--and two harpoons left. She remembered a line from Dickens and told herself, "I have every confidence that something will turn up." 
    She knelt to drink again, then set off to join the horses.

    The mist was thin now. The sun had burned it away, giving them a warm afternoon.
    Thank God. Grendels on speed would move through that heat.
    The grendels struggled in knots. Screams of challenge crowded the air. Chilled the blood. There was war where Mits had dropped the spurting tank of speed soup. A mere seven grendels had rounded that distraction to reach the Skeeter.
    They must have been the bright ones. They screamed challenge at each other, circled each other, they took turns butting the cabin walls and the door; but not one had died. 
    Mits sat in the cargo hold fingering an ax. He watched dents appear in the steel. "I have to admit it's getting to me," he said.
    "It's the only entertainment we've got," Stu said. He cracked a window and set his comcard in it with its solid-state memory set to record. "And this is for the National Geographic Society." 
    "You're nuts," said Mits.
    Maybe. But today would see the end of one species. Grendel or man. This, these final sounds of struggle, would be preserved for posterity. 
    Someone's posterity.

    Too many. Cadmann knelt at the western edge of the veranda. He fired carefully, making each round count. There wouldn't be nearly enough ammunition. Not rifles, not spear guns.
    "Wound up," Jerry said beside him.
    "In place," Joe Sikes said. "Let her fly." The crossbow bolt flew out, over the lip of the bluff, to shatter a jar of speed extract. Something screamed defiance down there. Jerry grinned like a thief. "Winding," he said.
    "Watch it!" Carlos shouted. He fired his spear gun: the grendel had come over the low wall of the veranda. The explosive bolt caught it at the withers and crippled its left side. It began to drag itself toward them. Harry Siep ran up and smashed its head with an ax. The tail lashed out and knocked Harry against the wall. 
    "Siep?" Joe Sikes yelled. 
    "Kicking. Stupid but kicking."
    For the moment there were no more grendels. "Hang on here a minute," Cadmann said. Carlos nodded. Cadmann sprinted across the veranda to the eastern corner where Omar and Rick had set up a machine gun. Five riflemen stood with them.
    "Omar. Take the gun over to Carlos and set up there." 
    "Uh--" 
    "Over there. By Carlos. Set up there," Cadmann said. 
    "All right." Rick reached out to lift the gun.
    "Not by the barrel," Cadmann said.
    "Oh." The barrel wasn't glowing, but it was hot enough to boil water.
    Cadmann stood on the wall and used his binoculars to scan the area downstream. Seems strange to do this in a battle. Never to worry about them shooting back.
    Grendels all along Amazon Creek. Too many of them. But for every grendel in the water, six more faced them on land. In twos and threes they toppled from the internal heat; in twos and threes they attacked the defenders of the stream, and died or won--and if they won, they became the new defenders. Grendels on speed, grendels cooking themselves from inside, couldn't reach the water because other grendels kept them from it. And none of those presently threatened the house. 
    But there were attackers enough.
    If they could be stopped far enough away--But they couldn't be. Cadmann touched numbers on his comcard. "Ida. What's your status?"
    The dentist's voice was strained. "Maybe five minutes of power in the Skeeter. No more than that."
    Five minutes. They'd spread the solar panels, but the sun hadn't come out in time. "Not enough time. Unload the superspeed. Load up the kerosene."
    "Kerosene. You want me to fly around with kerosene with five minutes' flying time?" 
    "That I do." 
    "And then what?"
    "Ida, the next wave may get through. If they do, you and that kerosene will be critical. Spray around the house, just below the veranda. Then throw flares into the soup. Then go uphill and land." 
    "And pray I'm far enough from the fire."
    "Something like that. Will you do it?" If she wouldn't, who would? Fifteen minutes to put another pilot in place. Carlos? Me?
    "Yeah, I guess so--"
    Explosions rocked the plateau. The cattle, penned to the east, lowed and stomped. 
    And attracted grendels.
    Some sped across the perimeter. Cadmann saw several of them actually collapse before they could reach the cattle. Ran out of speed. They're burning up.
    Wiser, stronger siblings hooked the twitching dead and dragged them away.
    Everywhere grendels were dying, but the line of corpses moved closer and closer to the house. Grendels fought each other, dragged each other away, climbed over their own dead in a mindless fever to reach the house.
    A cluster of grendels broke through the mob, racing for the livestock. Omar Isfahan clambered out onto the hill. He lifted a spear gun, sighted with unsteady hands.
    He missed. The grendels became suddenly, horribly aware of his presence, and streaked for him. Before Cadmann had time to yell warning, Isfahan was down, three grendels at him. He screamed once, and then there was nothing left to scream with.
    "Jerry! Inside," Cadmann ordered.
    The doctor hesitated for a brief second. "Right. Going." 
    The cattle had gone mad. They broke free of the pens and stampeded. Grendels brought them down one by one. Grendels died of heat prostration trying to drag butchered cows to safety, or they ran out of speed and were crushed beneath the hoofs of the herd.
    The cattle raced to the low wall, over, down the mountainside. Grendels followed.
    It was as if a signal had been given. The grendels surged forward, up the hill. Grendels exploded in the minefield, but others were weaving along the safe path. Bullets found some of them; other grendels stopped, considering, looking for an enemy. Too many came on.
    Gunfire erupted from within the house. And grendels fell. Flame throwers coughed their last bit of jellied fuel, and scorched monsters reeled away, streaking for the stream. 
    Monsters crowded up the hill. 
    "Ida? Now."
    "Need a couple more minutes," she answered. "Getting that damned water tank out--"
    "Right. But get going as soon as you can." Cadmann raced across the veranda. "Deadfall," he shouted.
    "Si." Carlos followed. They left the veranda and raced down the hill.
    The deadfall: an enormous boulder, held in place by large chocks. Above it were dozens of smaller boulders ready to plunge down, along the cleared path through the minefield.
    Chocks held the deadfall boulder in place. A dying grendel crouched against the chocks.
    "Son of a bitch!" Cadmann shouted.
    Carlos grinned and fired. The explosive shell struck the grendel in the chest. It leaped upward--and struck its head on the boulder above, and fell in a heap, still blocking the chocks.
    "Aw, shit," Carlos said.
    "You said it. Here." Cadmann handed him the rifle. "Hold 'em off while I pull." 
    "You'll need help--
    "Bullshit I need help! You watch for grendels." 
    "All right."
    The corpse might have weighed eighty kilos. They were getting big, and this one must have fed well. Not too much to drag, but awkward. Cadmann reached for the tail. It lashed. Spikes caught his thigh. He fell heavily against the boulder. 
    "Amigo--" 
    "Look out ahead!" Cadmann shouted.
    More grendels coming. Cadmann desperately reached the lines holding the chocks in place. "I got it. Be out of the way!" 
    "For sure."
    He heaved against the lines. The chock moved slightly. He pulled again. It was hard to brace his good leg against the rocks and still have purchase on the line. He pulled again. The corpse moved; crimson foam ran from its back, frothed down against the wooden chocks. This time when he pulled, the chocks moved--
    Carlos was firing rapidly now.
    One final heave. The chocks came loose. The massive boulder seemed poised in space. Then it began to roll. Down, followed by a mass of others.
    Carlos joined in his shout of triumph.
    A grendel came over the large boulder, sprang between the smaller boulders, tried to dance among them. It didn't quite succeed. A rock the size of a footstool hit it in the side. Carlos shot it twice more. Still it thrashed forward, toward Cadmann, who lay with his legs toward it, legs spread, monster crawling up, up, between his legs. Cadmann writhed, twisted. The grendel fell onto his uninjured leg. Something snapped. Pain surged.
    Carlos stood staring wildly. Grendels below them. He couldn't shoot and carry Cadmann at the same time. He looked the question.
    "How the fuck do I know?" Cadmann said. He was surprised at how soft his voice was. The grendel hadn't moved. Sixty kilos of dead meat. Both legs screamed their agony in his brain; he couldn't think past that. I've used up all my adrenaline. Like a goddam grendel uses up its speed. No adrenaline, and I don't even care what happens.
    Carlos fired twice. Cadmann couldn't see what he was shooting at.

    The grendels leaped like fleas among the bounding boulders. The deadfall was taking its toll: he could see smashed grendels, he could hear the weakened challenge-screams of grendels facing death. How do you see death, amigos? A mature grendel the size of a mountain?
    But a grendel in the air had no control of its path. They leaped, and Carlos took them at apogee, rapid-fire practice with pop-up targets, shoot and forget.
    It was over. The slide continued, a horde of rocks among the horde of grendels, crossing the brook and onward. How long had it taken? A minute? Less. 
    And he had leisure to help his friend.
    Cadmann was no more than half conscious. One leg was crushed; the other looked broken. Carlos worked his way under him and heaved. Cadmann was lifted from the ground, a big man in high gravity, and Carlos walked. Weaponless. Both hands occupied.
    The stench of speed was a shroud. It hung in the air thick as fog; it clouded his mind. There was nothing to think about anyway. Pick up Cadmann and walk until you're in the house. Depend on hysterical strength. Any passing grendel is on his own.
    A larger grendel climbed one of the bigger boulders left by the deadfall. It perched there, looking them over. Carlos paid little attention; he had to watch his feet; he was on uncertain footing, with a mass of ninety-five kilograms sagging from his shoulder. The grendel climbed down at leisure, hooked the ravaged corpse of a heifer and went away. The door was closer.
    Cadmann stirred, tried to say something, gave up.
    Joe Sikes was in front of him, then up against him. When Cadmann's weight eased off, Carlos almost fainted in relief. Then they were through the door, and Harry Siep closing it behind them, and Mary Ann swearing as they eased Cadmann to the floor.

    Mary Ann saw Phyllis McAndrews die. It didn't have to be. She could have come in earlier, but she'd stayed at the communications console a moment too long. What could she have been hearing from Geographic? Whatever it was--
    By the time she turned to run to the door a grendel had got behind her. It was heat-exhausted. Its sides heaved, and it was no longer running as a blur. It was still faster than a man, and stronger. It charged, struck Phyllis, and she fell.
    For a moment Mary Ann hoped that Phyllis could throw the weakened creature off. Then its teeth closed. Blood spurted hotly over its muzzle as it tore her face away.
    From behind her Joe Sikes fired three times. Twice at the grendel. Once lower . . .
    Mary Ann turned and threw up.
    Carlos dragged Cadmann into the room. Someone had let the dogs out: Tweedledum met them at the door, barking and trying to lick the blood off Cadmann's leg. Carlos brushed him aside.
    Mary Ann handed her rifle to a now sober Jill and went to Cadmann. He wasn't quite unconscious. He stared up at her, through her, with pain-dilated pupils. He tried to say something. It made no sense.
    "Ida," he said.
    "Ah." Carlos took out his comcard. "Ida. Cadmann says go now." 
    Nothing answered.
    "I'll go look," Joe Sikes said. 
    "Get her moving--" 
    "Sure." Sikes went out through the back of the house. 
    "We've done what we can," Carlos said.
    Cadmann stared at him for a moment, then nodded. All the strength seemed to drain out of him at once. 
    Mary Ann bent over.
    Carlos helped her slit his trouser legs. There was blood, and a sliver of bone knifed out of the left leg. "Spiral fracture," he said. She was amazed at how calm she could be. I'll collapse later. For now she had work to do.
    Blood flowed freely from the right thigh. "Venous blood," Carlos said. "It flows, not spurts. Jill--give us a hand here, please."
    Cadmann's mouth worked as he fought to speak. No words came out, but he coughed and a bubble of blood formed at his lips.
    "Bruises. Perhaps a punctured lung. The thing fell hard against him," Carlos said.
    "You're in charge," Cadmann muttered. "Get out of here." 
    Carlos looked down helplessly. "I'll find Jerry--" 
    "He's in the back room," Mary Ann said. "I don't know what you're supposed to do, but it's your job now. We'll find Jerry." 
    Tweedledum barked in rage at the clerestory.
    Something crawled up through the stream. Three of the dogs met it there, crowded to get at it. The grendel, weakened, managed to get its teeth into Tweedledee's neck before the other dogs tore it apart.
    Tweedledum turned from the corpse, licked at his sister's wounds. She whined softly and died.
    Stu rushed in, rifle in hand. "The Skeeter's up! They're burning out there! Burning and running away--" 
    There was a sudden burst of gunfire from outside, and twin screams, human and grendel.
    The roof sagged, bulged inward. Two grendels fought to push in through the clerestory.
    Jill grabbed a spear, shrieked, and stabbed one in the throat. It writhed, whipped its tail, and she backed off. The spear remained in the wound.
    It fell into the living room. It pawed weakly at the spear, eyes ablaze with hatred and pain. It tried to go on speed, but had nothing left. They clubbed at it, everyone striking at it, dogs darting in.
    The roof collapsed, and two more grendels fell through. One landed nearly atop Jill, and had its jaws in her leg before anyone could move.
    Mary Ann shot it, shot again, then turned, hearing a splash. More grendels. More. Coming in up the stream bed, up the stream that ran through the living room.
    She fired at full automatic. The gun stopped almost immediately. Out of ammunition. The grendels were still coming. She looked back toward Cadmann--
    A river of fire flowed down. It flowed from the bedroom into the living room, under the earthen walls of the house. Flames danced from the water, and Mary Ann thought she had lost her mind.
    "Sikes!" Carlos shouted. "He's poured the kerosene in the river!" 
    Joe Sikes. I owe you. I guess I already paid.
    The fire flowed down to engulf the grendels. They turned downstream, fleeing in terror.
    And then there was quiet, save for coughing from the smoke. There were no live grendels in the house. 
    Another volley of shots.
    Somewhere a grendel screamed.
    The surviving colonists pulled smoldering furniture and cloth against one of the earthen walls, then smothered the heap with a blanket.
    Cadmann stirred and looked at Carlos. He tried to say something.
    "Madre de Dios," Carlos said. "Shut up for a moment!" 
    It was very quiet in the room.

    The veranda was covered with blood. Four men, one woman, three grendels; all dead.
    Below the veranda and as far downhill as Carlos could see, the plateau was littered with corpses. Men and dogs and cattle; but mostly grendels. Hundreds and hundreds of grendels.
    Some lay still. Some crawled, torn nearly in half, trailing entrails from shattered bodies. The air hung heavy with the stench of kerosene and burnt meat. Patches of fire burned twenty meters from the veranda. Ida had brought the fires very close indeed.
    The stream no longer burned. It was also no longer choked with grendels. They had retreated in front of a river of fire. Grendels seeking cold had fled from the river and died in the hills.
    Other people came out of the house and down from the roof. Gunshots from up above the house: one, two, three, then silence. Rick Erin held a bloody spear. He held it high and shook it in defiance.
    The command console had been knocked off its table. Hendrick limped over to pick it up and set aright. He touched the switches, and lights glowed.
    Tau Ceti was low on the horizon. Carlos limped out to the edge of the plateau and looked out. The mist had dissipated. He looked for grendels on speed, and found none. Here and there a grendel dragged the corpse of a grendel or a cow toward the water. He saw them met by emerging grendels, and torn apart.
    Something had happened. Something had changed, and Carlos knew it. The grendels knew it!
    Human beings were no longer prey. Man was the ultimate killer on Avalon. Grendels were smart enough to learn. The survivors now stalked each other instead of the aliens from the stars, the creatures who had brought death to thousands of Avalon's former masters. 
    "Geographic--" 
    "We're here. Are you all right?"
    Hendrick looked toward Carlos. His face was grimy and haggard, his eyes bright. "What do I tell them?" 
    "Tell them we've won."