Defending Hippotigris Smith, T.L. (classic books to read txt) 📖

Schaeffer was away, best not to outright break them intentionally. He went down the terrace, giving us each a hand down, me first. We both helped Lizzy, until a female arrived to accompany her, proving the Parredet were keeping tabs on us.

At the base of the cliff, the female stayed with us, but dropped back a discreet distance as we walked through the village commons studying the cliff carvings. Lizzy was the artist among us, but after a few minutes I could see a flow, a pattern, far more intricate than the cave. We followed as much as we could from the ground. As we moved further from our point of residence, the carvings changed. There seemed to be breaks, like turning pages.

“Eras. What we saw was an abbreviated version.” Lizzy held her arms out to encompass the current cliff face. “This section is an entire era.” She stepped back. “They recorded every moment of their history, documented for the next generations, to never be forgotten.” She looked further down the range. “Somewhere we’ll be added.”

“Let’s hope it’s a good annotation.” I’d joined her as she’d moved back far enough to look up the cliff a bit more easily. “So, the cave, why that, if they have all this?”

“Book blurbs.” Lizzy looked at me. “We grasped the truth faster in those few feet, than we did looking at thousands of feet.” She spread her arms out. “Now you’re prepared to read the whole book and believe.”

“You mean comic strip vs. War and Peace.” Remy turned away from us. “This goes on and on, virtually the whole mountain.”

“I believe, but never expected anything like this. We need to go back to the beginning, record as much as possible and figure these people out. There’s so much we need to know, like where they used to live. Why they rejected all their technology to live like this.” I looked around, at our escort. “Why a clearly intelligent species had chosen to continue living like this.”

“Don’t criticize.” Lizzy snapped at me. “If these people faced a catastrophic history, this is their answer, to return to nature.” Lizzy drew as she spoke, something she’d done since she was a kid, probably what made her such a good writer, being able to split her thoughts so completely.

“I wasn’t criticizing.” I hadn’t meant to. “I’m worried.”

Lizzy looked up at me. “So am I.”

What was about to happen on this peaceful planet was terrifying. “Let’s get everything we can.”

Lizzy was quick to get the female to understand what we wanted. Getting to the beginning of the story was far more difficult. We found out just how large this village was. We did as much as we could, returning at nightfall.

We barely had MREs out of our packs when Schaeffer slipped off the back of a Parredet, with a great deal more ease than he’d left. He bowed to the gentle giant before turning to us. “It’s not our people over there. I got word out to reroute our other ship, with soldiers.”

“And in the meantime?” His arrival took me off guard. Our new friends never even raised an alarm at his return. At least any I heard. Yinet knew, showing up only a bare second after Schaef.

He gave Yinet a bow, then Lizzy a proper smooch, as a mate should.

“What’s the plan?” Formalities grated on my Kazan nerves, considering what was going on behind our backs.

Schaeffer sat down with Lizzy, switching back to the serious officer I knew. “We need to send a scouting party out to see exactly what’s going on over there. I brought back some… tools.” He looked up as Gerret joined our group. “As the Parredet are skilled at moving about quietly, we need to enlist their help in this. A party of soldiers with Parredet escorts.”

Lizzy was quick to know her role, drawing out a quick sketch. Gerret nodded.

“I’ll take a party of males back to our camp to get soldiers. Four. I don’t want so many as to make it impossible to maintain stealth.”

“Four, with us that makes eight, and twice as many Par...”

“We’re not going.” Lizzy interrupted Remy, getting a glare I’d only seen him use a few times in our years together.

Schaeffer nodded. “Four soldiers and me. The rest of you remain here.”

“Wait a minute. I’m no slacker.” Remy riled. “You want to see what they’re doing. I’m an engineer. I can tell you what they have for equipment.”

Schaeffer turned his glare to Remy. “No. If they see us, they’ll aim to kill. I want to get in and get out. You can identify equipment from the vids.”

Remy fumed at being rejected, at being left on the sidelines. That wasn’t conducive to his personality.

Unfortunately I agreed with Schaef. “If I stay, you stay.”

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

The recall of our sister ship was approved. It would be restocked and armed, but would take two weeks for them to arrive. In the meantime we had to act as if we didn’t know the other camp existed and hope the spy didn’t get wind of our plan.

The Parredet helped us maintain surveillance on the enemy, sending data on the mining operation for Remy to analyze. Our soldiers were brought into the forest, as close to enemy territory as possible, then paired up with Parredet to help them trek the rest of the way in.

Schaeffer handled the soldiers while I played diplomat, schmoozing the matriarchal village leaders. Clan Mothers, as Lizzy corrected me often. She and Yinet were virtually inseparable as Lizzy worked to translate their history and culture, discovering children’s sign language a great tool. The writer in her was in heaven.

I kept Batista’s bouts of jealousy in check, not letting her out until the end of the day, when Remy and I were finally alone.

Two weeks seemed like forever, but it took that long to set up our invasion of the mining camp. The soldiers from the sister ship would be shuttled downside once the assault was ready to start, creating