Freedom's Landing

"And you're a creature of habit?" she grinned at him, accepting the warm liquid. It was some sort of herbal tea which was an improvement on bare, naked hot water.

"Pull up a stone," he added and she sat on the one just to his right. "I want you to go with Zainal, here, and Slav and the Deski Coo, and suss out what other surprises this place has in store for us.

No sense in thinking we're safe in this ravine. One of the egg-heads mentioned that there are indications this," and he waved about the walls of the ravine, "may get flooded in spring. High-water marks and scrapings of trees on the sides, higher up than we can stand, and I ain't that good at treading water." With a start Kris wondered if he was quoting an old Bill Cosby routine.

"I want you to take several days circle around our position here," and he gestured.

"Go straight out as far as you can go in a day's march, making a map of the terrain. Zainal here says he knows how to map. He's picking up English real good. Officer material for sure." This last Mitford said in a lower voice and with a grin meant for Kris alone.

"Seeing as how you know him, and seem to be able to charade things to Slav and Coo, you'd be the human in the team. Unless you got any real objections to the duty."

"Is there going to be trouble for the… ah…aliens, Sarge?"

"Ain't there always?" Mitford said in a cynical tone. "I can trust you, Bjornsen," he added in a dark low tone.

"You've proved you can hack it, too."

"Thanks, Sarge," and Kris felt a good deal taller for that unexpected praise.

"And with the Catteni along, he'll see you don't come to harm."

"Thanks, Sarge, she said, this time wryly. Build "em up to knock "em down, but she grinned to show she had ii8 no ill feelings. It was enough that the sergeant wasn't as misogynistic as some career soldiers she'd heard about.

"I want you to draw additional rations from Greene for all of you.

Seems like the Deski can't stomach the red meat and they need somethin' in their diet, though what it is I haven't been able to figure out." He sighed.

"That's another reason I'm sending one along with you And you're to eat!" He shot one thick index finger at her so suddenly that she rocked back. "We've got enough to supply patrols away from camp. That stuff may be less tasty than field rations, even, but it's got all the nutritional crap you need to march on. Get another issue of blankets and an extra coverall. Got it?"

"Got it, Sarge," she said, her hand half way to her brow to salute when she realized that might not be appropriate even if it was an instinctive reaction to his manner.

"Good," and he grinned in the firelight, having caught that abortive gesture. "Zainal, get the rations and supplies and move out at your leisure."

"Leisure' in army parlance meant right smart. So, in next to no time, they were making their way in dawn's early light up the ravine and into undiscovered country.

Zainal led at a spanking pace that didn't seem to alter, whatever the terrain they had to traverse. But, like Mitford, he did call a halt when full daylight lit the skies.

The first thing Zainal did was tie a knot in a thin strip of blanket, of which he had quite a few tucked inside a thigh pocket. A tally rope? Well, they had no writing materials and Zainal, strong as he was, couldn't exactly carry a sheet of rock with him to chalk up the miles.

Or should she say "klicks' since she was on a military operation?

"What are you counting, Zainal?" she asked.

"Steps, so I know distance," he said in Barevi.

"Oh…" and that steady pace now made sense. "What's the Catteni word for miles, or kilometres? How do you measure distance?"

"My…step. - he said tentatively in English.

"Stride is the better tem," she said.

"Stride is one Catteni pleg."

"Pleg for the leg," she said, using her own brand of aide-rninoire. "Make a stride for me, please?"

"Hnunm,' and he complied.

Stretching her own long legs to their limit, she could lust about make the same length. "Hmmm. Over a metre then. Hmnnn. Well, I could almost spell you on a level surface so you could have a break."

"Hmmm,' he said again, blinking rapidly as he sifted the meaning of her words.

So she "charaded' what she'd said and then he understood with a grin.

"One pleg is almost dead on a metre. One pleg, one metre," she said.

Slav and the Deski were watching, too, their expressions keen enough to show they were interested in the demonstrations. So she pointed to the Rugarian, gestured for him to take a stride. His was the same length as hers, but the Deski's was much longer since he had spider-like, long leg-bones. Although Kris tried to get Slav to tell her what a pleg was in his language, and attempted to extract the same information from the Deski, she had no success.

Both kept saying stolidly "pleg, pleg' A plague on it, she thought but smiled and patted each in turn before she sat down again to get the good of the rest period. She wasn't sure if they didn't care to have a language lesson or if they had some obscure reason for sticking so perversely to the Barevi words. Both Rugarian and Deski had rather flat, inflectionless voices, but then what she knew of Catteni was flat and inflectionless, too.