IMAGINATION'S PLACE
FICTION

 

THE HUNTER'S PRIZE
By; Speaker Gerald A. Polley

 

Part 2


"A lie, my Lord!" said the Lupan commander, "A despicable lie! We traded an expensive cargo of Liken Weed, a substance The Humes use as a medical preparation. We took the women in fair trade. They said they were surplus...criminals and destitutes that their men had no use for. This charge of abduction is a lie! They merely wish to take our cargo and retrieve their women also, with this false and baseless charge!"
"It seems to be," said the royal representative, "that it is our commander's word against yours, and I think I will stick with my commander! Perhaps there has been some misunderstanding and you feel you have been cheated, that is the reason for this charade. If you withdraw now, I will feel obliged to forget that you entered our territory with military forces, and threatened our people. Take your men and depart. We will not surrender what is rightfully ours. You Humes must learn to play the game. When you have lost something, it stays lost. You cannot win it back by bluff. You see, I know your traditions, your aversion to killing the innocent.
You will not explode a bomb killing all the women and children in this settlement, no matter what the cost. that would violate your code of honor."
"No," said the Hume, "but we WOULD detonate a bomb to kill our own people to keep them from becoming slaves. That IS within our code of honor. Any others that die in the result, their blood would be on the hands of those responsible for the enslaving. As much as we hate to kill, we hate slavery even more. And we will meet death before we will endure it. You know our history proves that, if you have studied our culture."
The royal representitive nodded. "Yes," he said, "I know of your people's insane loyalty to this imaginary ideal. Come sir, step aside. Let us speak in private and settle this matter."
The Speaker nodded to his men and making his way through the crowd stepped off to the side with the Lupan noble.
"Look, sir," said the noble. "I HAVE studied your history, I take your threat seriously. I know what hapened when your first colony ship made contact with the Zarins and the terrible restitution you took on The Zarins for that act. But be reasonable, man. You have put men in an impossible position. I cannot back off. What is this thing, this freedom? Can you feel it? Can you hold it? Can you taste it? Is the freedom of these few women worth war between our people? If you disgrace us like this, humiliate us, it will surely mean war. Our great King could do nothing else to regain our honor. The women will be well treated. We have very strict laws. Would they not prefer to surrender this freedom rather than cause the bloodshed that will be sure to follow if you take them home?"
"If you must ask such a question," said The Speaker, "then you do not know my people at all. And I can never explain to you what freedom is. Perhaps someday you will understand, but I could not explain it to you. There, however, will be no bloodshed, no war. Your king is no fool. I know enough of YOUR history to understand that. True, at my colony I only have ten cruisers and you alone, here, have twenty-five. But your kingdom only has six systems with six major planets and a couple of dozen inhabited planetoids. Where our Republic has thirty-six systems with over fifty major planets and one-hundred planetoids within a month we would have a fleet here that would sweep through your kingdom, and within a year it would be ours.
Your pride is great, but your wisdom is greater. Even the alliance you are considering between yourself and the Zarins will not be enough for a head-on conflict with The Republic. And you know that, also. You will concede to all the demands I have mentioned before, and you will concede now. I grow impatient.
And, you will concede to this, also. One of our women was killed by your crew, on the journey here. If your commander does not confess to this crime, according to our Law I will have to execute him and his entire crew. You will instruct him to admit his guilt and accept his punishment.
There are thirty in your crew, twenty-five in the Zarin crew, as I must take one-hundred for the one we lost, I will take forty-five unmarried males to make the difference. This will be your people's punishment for the raid. We will also take an additional hundred as hostage but they will be returned as soon as the pilot of the vesel overhead returns safely to our system.
Of course we will need a couple of ships for the return journey. We will keep those, also. PLUS the raider."
"You're mad!" said the Lupan noble. "Completely mad! Never! Never will I agree!"
The Hume took a small communication's device from his belt and brought it up to his mouth.
"Do you hear me, Thunderbolt?" he asked.
"I read you, ground point!" the device acknowledged.
"Set detonation for forty seconds," The Speaker said, "and activate on my signal. Negotiations have failed. The final moment must occur!"
"Understood," the instrument responded. The Speaker sat a dial on the instrument and the number 45 appeared in red numerals on the tiny screen, slowly counting down. When the numbers reached forty The Speaker pressed a button and the numbers turned white.
"Bomb charged and activated," the instrument responded. The Speaker held the instrument up to the Imperial representative so that the Lupan could see and hear the numbers counting down. "Beep! Beep!" went the instrument as the numbers changed.
"You're bluffing!" the Lupan said. "By the greatest of all Lords,, you're bluffing! You couldn't. There's three million people in this city. You couldn't!"
The numbers kept counting down and the Hume only continued to stare at the Lupan.
"You'll die, too!" the Lupan cried. The Speaker only nodded. The Lupan looked up into the sky. "I agree!" he screamed, "I agree! Stop the countdown!"
The Hume had already pressed the button on the instrument but spoke into it afterwards.
"Discontinue! Discontinue! Shut down sequence! Did you receive!"
"Received and understood!" the instrument answered. "Shutdown at .02....standing by."
"Of course you know," said The Hume, "each of the ships we lift in will be equipped with a bomb exactly like the one overhead. One stun beam......POOF!"
The Lupan was wiping tears from his eyes.
"I understand," he said, "because of my dishonor, because of what I have done, you must take me as one of those you will not return. All you say is true. My king would understand. But after so dishonoring him I could not return."
"Are you married?" asked The Hume.
"No, betrothed, but not married."
"Good," said The Hume. "We will take only unmarried men. Something that slipped my mind...the families of the raider's crews....they come too."
"Damn!" said the Imperial representative, "what will you want next, the city treasury?"
The Hume began to smile then laughed. "No!" he said, "I think what we have taken will be payment enough! Now! Order the crew's families here immediately. Give your people their instructions. I want to get underway."
And they were, within the hour. Five Lupan cruisers escorted them all the way back to their own system and waited there to pick up the one-hundred hostages after the bomb ship returned. There was a slight problem, however, the detonator on the bomb was stuck in the last two seconds of the countdown, and refused to reset! Being far too dangerous to be left laying around, the bomb was ejected into deep space and struck with a stun beam to detonate it. The Lupan noble standing with the Speaker at an observation point viewing the operation, turned to him.
"You weren't bluffing," he said, "you really weren't bluffing!"
"No," said The Hume, "I was praying to The Lords you would give in. The bomb WOULD have gone off."
The Lupan nodded. "My people have learned a costly lesson," he said, "a lesson I am sure will not be forgotton. Never will you again be troubled by my kind. But tell me something, your people call us two names, Lupan and Werewolf. The first I understand, but what does the second mean?"
"Ages ago," said The Hume, "among our people there were legends of men that turned into wolf-like creatures when the moon was full. Our common name for you, Lupan, means wolf. Werewolf means a man-like wolf. Both names fit because to us you resemble both these creatures, the real, and, the mythological!"
"Quite interesting!" said The Lupan. "What do you intend to do with me?"
"Put you to work!" The Hume said. "Whatever you like."
"I would like to be your servant," The Lupan said. "I would like to learn more about your ways."
"I see no reason," said The Speaker, "that that can't be arranged."
It was not long before the two adversaries became friends, and that their races became friends. There would be a few more incidences, but in time each would come to respect the other, and there would be trust and peace between them.

 

THE END

 


 

 


 

 

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