<I have risen far, remember. As have you.>
<Far enough to directly carry out the Tukar’ramin’s orders?>
<Indeed. We can bring needed firepower to bear.>
Quath felt sudden tightness as her subminds understood the implications of Beq’qdahl’s seemingly innocuous words. The Tukar’ramin was out of contact. A wall of hot static had descended between Quath and the great Hive to the south.
Quath said joshingly, <Firepower? Ground-groveler, I do not need to kill.>
<You hunt, do you not? Such work is always dangerous.>
<I hunt to capture.>
Beq’qdahl’s shimmering voice-tastes took on a hedged air. <So you do. We can rout the Nought packs and drive them toward you.>
<That is too full of risk,> Quath said stiffly.
Beq’qdahl made a flavor of dry mirth. <For such as we, old burrower?>
<No—for the Noughts. They will stand and die before they retreat much farther. They are already cornered.>
<Noughts flee before us, that is an eternal rule.>
Beq’qdahl was either boasting for the benefit of the podia around her or being crafty beneath her air of idle arrogance.
Quath said, <These will hammer at us.>
<Let them!>
<Recall an earlier battle we had?> Quath said pointedly.
<We were unprepared then.>
<And the Noughts were less desperate,> Quath countered.
Beq’qdahl sent a spike of wry amusement. <Noughts are by definition always desperate. And you only need one, correct? The rest we shall slaughter.>
Quath made her decision. <Come forward, Beq’qdahl. I am losing your signal. There is some static.>
<Yes, I smell it here also. Some difficulty back toward the Hive, I believe.>
The squat outlines of the podia moved quickly. They seemed to flow around the outcroppings and faults that marred the valley floor. Quath had a good vantage to see them. She found Beq’qdabl and sighted in on her old friend and rival.
<Hold there!> Quath cried. Try as she might, she could not keep wavering tones from undercutting her stern carrier wave.
<What?> Did Beq’qdahl’s hormone-tinge carry irritation, or the darker musk of crafty guile?
<You should move westward if you seek Noughts.> Quath hoped this ruse would deflect them.
<We register Noughts at the crest of the mountain, not down here.>
<I have those trapped. Another evening of study and I shall snare my Nought.>
This was only a partial lie. Quath felt her Nought’s faint, strumming flavor atop the mountain even now. In truth, she could not get the heady, enticing scent of it to leave her now—a disturbing fact. But she needed time to locate the Nought precisely. Then she had to devise a way to capture it without provoking a struggle that might kill the Nought instead.
<We are sure it is up there,> Beq’qdahl said mildly.
One of Beq’qdahl’s companions cut in, <Pap-gorger, let us by! We come to forage, not to jabber.>
Quath’s proboscis clacked angrily at this insult, and found the offending one in her target array. <Careful, quad-pod.>
<Let us drive them toward you, venerated and tired one,> the companion added.
Quath gave them back quick, raucous contempt. <I can outrun you all, dung-shapers. And you shall not pass.>
Beq’qdahl suddenly sent a sharp, bile-laced taunt: <Out of the way, cyst-sucker!>
<No.> Quath aimed at Beq’qdahl, began to charge her capacitors… and found a curious reluctance steal over her.
<You have always stolen the fruits of my labor!>
Quath said simply, <Come no further.>
<Or tripped me from behind!>
<No more warnings.>
The podia spread into an attacking fan formation. <Now!> Beq’qdahl called wildly.
