Xiù tried not to surrender to panic as she and the weird worm alien traded hits. He was strong, perhaps as strong as she was, and when he managed to hit her it was as hard as one of their guns. She was quicker and managed to parry most of his blows, guiding them aside and occasionally knocking him off-balance. Some of his punches got through, however, and this alien was smart enough to kick when she ducked. She kicked back, and hammered his limbs with strikes, but unlike with the other aliens he did not break under the blows. In fact he didn’t even show any sign of pain.
Was he a machine, a cyborg? A month ago she would have called it science-fiction, but she was currently fighting a worm-headed alien on behalf of sapient racoons on another world, so standards had to be relaxed a bit. Her chi sao told her nothing… there was no tensing of muscles before a strike, no relaxation when he would advance or fall back. It was like she was fighting a training dummy, except this dummy hit back, and her bruises and aches were piling up.
She’d gradually ramped up the strength of her blows against his limbs, and if she wasn’t sure before, she was certain he was a machine now. Metal rang as she kicked his knees and rained elbow strikes on his forearms, blows that could and had dismembered opponents at the start of their sudden insurrection. She’d bitterly come to the conclusion that he was too strong to hold back, and she’d best be prepared to kill again, cursing in her own mind for jinxing herself by complaining about the weakness of her previous foes. But the only fleshy part of him was his worm-like head (her stomach queased at the thought of even touching it) and despite how much faster she seemed to be compared to everyone else he was still too quick in pulling his head in, like a turtle, whenever she managed to leap high enough to grab at it. Her tries were rewarded with punches to the gut or chest, and once he even succeeded in knocking her down.
What could she do? She wished she’d paid better attention to Sifu… she’d only ever expected to use her martial arts on the screen or maybe at a forms competition. She never expected she’d ever have to actually fight!
What would Sifu say? She struggled to think. Well, probably the first thing he would say was that to keep trying what didn’t work wasn’t bagua. Continue the circle, try another direction, adapt. But how could she adapt to fighting an enemy who was all machine?
Except… he wasn’t all machine, was he? He breathed, she could hear it. His head was like a worm… was the rest of him wormlike as well? Was he a tube of flesh in a metal human-like body?
Ew. Gross.
But it gave her an idea. She leaped back, out of his range, catching her breath. On a passing whim she made her return to a fighting stance fancy and elaborate. It seemed to confuse him a little, and it raised her spirits a bit.
I’m ready for my scene, Mister Wong.
The human female had been fighting Mij the way she’d fought most of the guards and thugs who had blocked their way… with mercy, striking at limbs to debilitate rather than kill. But the annelid had no limbs… his body was a mechanical suit, a vehicle that he rode within. She was wasting her strength. Her blows made the room ring loud enough to make Trig flinch, but didn’t do much. Ayma couldn’t even tell her… even if Trig would allow her to shout advice, Xiù wouldn’t understand what she was saying.
But Xiù was clever, possibly even as clever as a Gaoian or Corti. Ayma could tell when the human had realized. As she’d watched, she saw the character of Xiù’s blows change, if only slightly. They seemed to stick a bit longer, as if they were not just hits but shoves as well. Her body motion became even more dance-like, circling Mij in his cybernetic suit, hammering him from all sides and flowing around his counters like water. The Allebenellin was knocked backwards, bit by bit, until he had to brace against the wall just to protect his rear. Xiù stopped circling and continued to punish his body… the most armoured part of the suit, but… was Mij panting?
It was inevitable in any martial art, especially in one known to be lethal like baguazhang, that a student would ask about dim mak, or the “Death Touch”. Sifu handled the oft-repeated question with far more patience than Xiù would have after so many repetitions.
No, the Death Touch didn’t exist, he said, except in fantasy and in pure raw luck and accident. But that didn’t mean that the basic concept was useless. Attack the centre line, he said. Send your force through the flesh and disrupt the chi inside.
Xiù wasn’t sure how seriously she’d taken that aspect of her training, but she applied it against Mij with desperation turned to determination. She stopped trying to damage his limbs and only worried about parrying his hits; when she struck back it was against his centreline. That was one thing about all these aliens; they did a shoddy job of defending their bodies.
He would try to hit her, and she’d guide the blow aside with bei shen zhang or some other rolling movement, trying to conserve her energy until she would lash back with either a palm or a fist, drilling into his centre with all the power she could muster. Being so close he naturally tried to kick her away, but whenever he tried she would hook his foot with her own, stretching him out and knocking him off-balance, until he gave up trying.
She slammed her hand again and again against where the solar plexus would be on a human, or the midpoint of a spine. She walked the circle around him, and he had problems keeping up. Eventually he had to back against a wall just to keep her from getting behind him. So she punished his front, and the reinforced wall he was pressed against actually began to crumple slightly.
It was working! The wormlike alien had actually paled, and though it was weird to see a worm with a mouth she could tell he was struggling for breath. He was flesh inside the suit, just very long and narrow. He was as fragile as any of the other aliens, and her attacks were knocking him around inside!
Sifu would be so proud!
“Mij, what is the matter with you?” Trig snapped. In front of him, his pulse pistol still to her head, Ayma grinned ferally.
The Administrator had been smug through most of the short and vicious fight, but then Xiù had suddenly gained a second wind. The others, still huddled in a crowd at the entrance to the room, had been watching the battle with nervousness and then elation… as if the underdog team had suddenly turned a sporting event around, rather than the ultimate fate of their lives. Their cheers had only enraged the Corti administrator even further.
“Mij, finish it! Mij!” Trig snapped. “By the stars-” Trig moved the pulse pistol away from her head, aiming at Xiù, thinking to rescue his beleaguered henchman.
It was the moment Ayma had been waiting for; her claws unsheathed and she lashed out at his extended arm. Gaoian claws were relatively tiny, but they traced a trio of furrows down his arm which immediately leaked blue liquid. The Corti cried out and then snarled, trying to bring the pistol back to shoot her, but she seized his arm and struggled. The others, almost not believing what they were seeing, hesitated before surging forward.
Trig managed to shove her off, knocking her down. He saw the angry crowd rushing him and fired randomly into it, and Ayma heard cries of pain. He looked back at her, and she saw murderous fury there. The pulse pistol swung back to aim at her head-
A fleshy rope lashed out, catching him in the wrist. The pulse pistol was sent flying, and Trig cried out in agony and fell to his knees, clutching at his arm.
Ayma looked up and saw Xiù standing there, looking as angry as when little Myun had been threatened. Clutched in her hand was Mij himself… without his power armour. She’d managed to grab hold of him, ripping him out of his suit and then using him as a living whip to strike down his boss. The annelid gurgled in her grip, struggling for breath, the long coil of his body flopping uselessly against the floor.
Ayma struggled to her feet. She glared down at the snivelling Corti. “We win.”
Trig initially didn’t want to cooperate. That was easily solved: Xiù simply took hold of his good wrist and squeezed until the researcher was quite agreeable. She hadn’t even needed to be asked, easily interpreting the argument between the Administrator and Ayma. After that, Trig was only too happy to send a distress signal on their behalf.
Nearly twenty of their captors were shepherded into the holding area where the “subjects” had been kept, stripped of their weapons and given medical supplies to treat each other, since their former lab subjects lacked the know-how. Outside the cage stood three angry Gaoian females armed with fusion swords and the implied assistance of their human ally. Mij was locked in a tank with an air-permeable lid found in one of the labs, good enough to keep the worm from somehow wiggling out and trying to get back to his armour.
Trig was allowed to treat his broken wrist, though with Xiù’s digits poised at the back of his neck. The Corti was smart enough to know that anything untoward would result in his head impacting into (and knowing the human’s strength, through…) his fine, impeccable-quality desk. The Gaoians questioned him the entire time.
Ayma was disappointed to learn that the translator even didn’t have Xiù’s language programmed into it. In fact, the installation database didn’t even have the name of her homeworld, nor its location. Trig had been careful about hiding his steps and preserving his “plausible deniability”… the location had been supplied only to the ship’s crew, and they were long gone.
Xiù was alone, and Ayma wondered if she understood that.
One planetary rotation after their successful escape and seizure of the installation they received a response to their distress call. Even better, it was a Gaoian ship! It was good news and drew cheers, even as they mourned the loss of Hamfa, Ujali, and Minin.
The captain of the ship was appalled by the deaths of the three females, and Ayma appreciated the fact that he seemed quite sincere, not merely acting for the sake of improving his mating prospects. The ten surviving females and four cubs were given berths, while Trig was shoved into the brig. The installation’s distress call was left running, as they would be leaving the prisoners and Mij for someone else to deal with. If no one came… well, Ayma didn’t care.
The ship’s crew were professional and efficient. The one hiccup came when it came to decide what to do with Xiù.
“She isn’t Gaoian, Mistress,” the captain protested. “She’s alien! She consumes nearly four times as much oxygen as one of us, and if her appetite is as you say-”
“You’re heading straight to the homeworld, aren’t you?” she demanded. “You said… what? A five rotation journey? Surely we wouldn’t deplete your consumables that quickly!”
“Yes – I mean, no – but what about other concerns? Alien beings, particularly from uncontacted worlds, carry unknown diseases! And if she’s as violent as you’ve reported-”
“She was violent in our defence, Captain!” she snapped. “If you don’t threaten us or the children I think you’ll find her quite agreeable. As for disease, she was implanted with the Corti long-term suppressor. We all were. We’ll just leave hers in place until we’re certain, distasteful though it may be.”
The captain was wilting, watching his hopes for enticing her as a mating partner dwindle as he argued. “Why would you concern yourself for an alien female? She isn’t clan!”
Ayma looked over at where Xiù sat in the corner of the docking bay. Two of the cubs scrambled all over her, but she held them up as easily as if they were made of soft pillows. Myun hung from her outstretched arm, chittering with Gaoian laughter, and Xiù responded with her own barking version of the same. The human could literally tear some of the fiercest mercenaries in existence limb from limb, yet Ayma had no fear for the little cub as Xiù bounced her lightly. The human had proven she knew how and when to use her strength.
“You’re wrong, Captain,” Ayma answered. “She is clan. And we don’t leave clan behind.”