He turned to see the wall of flame not ten meters behind him and retreating rapidly. The rest of the platoon was standing in a loose circle, sable silhouettes against the solid glare. When he brought a hand up to examine it, he saw his carapace was glowing a dull vermilion as the weave of thermal fibers hurriedly expelled their excessive loading. He reviewed his status, relieved to see his Skin's reserve bladders had retained their integrity; with them and the spare bloodpaks he could easily make it back to the spaceport.
Laughter and delirious whoops began to fill the general communication band. The shouted jubilation had a strong note of hysteria.
Ash was still falling, but Lawrence extended his sensor range, trying to see what lay through it The second wave of wildfire was still rampaging out ahead of him, lurid flames chewing their way voraciously across the tigergrass, sending up a broad veil of smoke and yet more ash. He couldn't believe so much destruction had spread so quickly. The holocaust they'd unleashed was easily over a kilometer wide now and still expanding. He wondered how far it would continue for. Not that there was much guilt associated with the thought. Santa Chico must be used to such events.
"Can't raise the captain," Ntoko said.
"You reckon the fire's reached him?"
"Could be. The Skins will come through okay. Don't know about the vehicles."
"You want to go back and check?"
"No. We keep going unless ordered different Even then I'm not keen."
"Sure."
"One good thing, nobody's going to be creeping up on us unseen now."
"Sarge, there's nobody left to creep up on us." His sensors had found a small mound that was the remains of a new-native. It looked like a lump of coal.
There was no hint of where the road had lain across the land. They checked their inertial guidance and started marching again. A couple of them were unhappy about leaving Kibbo and Foster behind, but Ntoko quelled their dissent with a few gruff words about how the guys would want the platoon to reach the spaceport.
The ground was still furiously hot, although it didn't present too much of a problem for their thermal fiber weave. As they walked they found patches of tigergrass and even trees that the fire had completely bypassed. There didn't seem to be any particular reason for any of them being spared. Vagaries of the land. Streams too broad for the flames to leap. Even some scrub trees with fat spire leaves that were resistant to the flames entirely, standing alone and unblemished amid the scorched desolation.
A broad ridge of rocky ground had saved the village from the firestorm. They examined it through the continuing fall of ash. Their sensors detected movement among the buildings. Ntoko decided they couldn't ignore it.
By the time they arrived, the carpet of delicate loose ash was a couple of centimeters thick, covering everything. Gusts would stir it up in small twisters, but that just rearranged it. Nothing was free of the mantle. The skirt of tigergrass around the buildings swayed and quivered in the breeze, as if trying to shake the flakes off. But they were too small, too insidious to release their hold.
The village homes were simple structures, broad circular towers with domed roofs, never more than two stories high. They seemed to be made from a pale cream coral with a rough, grainy surface that was a magnet for the ash, allowing it to lodge in every crinkle. Windows were arches covered with a thick membrane, laced with delicate silver veins.
The new-native inhabitants were mostly bipedal, smaller than the average human, with shaggy hair that continued down their spines in a thick mane; in some cases it extended out along their arms almost to the elbow. Their shirts and jerkins were cut to allow the hair to flow through. It was often braided. Bright-colored beads were favored by the children.
There were exceptions. Feline hominoids who struggled to stay upright, dropping down to use their forelimbs to walk a few paces. A squat giant that looked like a cross between a sumo wrestler and a troll. Delicate spindly elves, whose legs seemed too slim to support their bodies.
They didn't look alien, Lawrence thought, so much as primitive, although their hides were the typical Santa Chico tough, translucent amber, and none of the bipeds had a terrestrial human rib cage and abdominal arrangement. Ridges around their torsos were more insectile than anything else. Their faces, though stiffer than skin, still managed to express basic emotions, although that could have been just the eyes. Sullen glances were more or less the same the universe over.
Ntoko took Lawrence and Amersy into the village with him, deploying the rest of the platoon outside. They were subject to blank stares from the inhabitants who stood in open doorways. New-natives in the streets moved aside to let them pass. It was the first time their authority had ever been acknowledged, even if it was at gunpoint.
Lawrence's sensors detected a small level of electronic activity in the buildings, nothing above desktop pearl level. They seemed almost devoid of mechanical or electronic technology. Certainly there were no vehicles in evidence.
The new-natives appeared uncertain what to do about the Skins; they were waiting for them to set the agenda. As they walked into the center of the village more new-natives appeared and followed at a respectful distance. Unless half of the homes were deserted, the numbers didn't match up. Lawrence wondered how many villagers had been in the group beating the birds out of the tigergrass. And how many had survived.
Ntoko stopped beside a big overhanging tree that had a coating of the ubiquitous ash. "Anybody want to tell me what's going on here?"
"You fired our lands," a voice said. It was heavily accented, but had the easy lilt of Spanish roots.
Lawrence identified its owner, a woman who wouldn't reach his shoulder. Her luxuriant hair was snow-white, though whether that indicated old age he wasn't sure. She had a flat face, with several creases in her cheeks, giving her jaw a considerable degree of flexibility. The robe she wore was decorated with silver piping: a DNA helix had been embroidered down the front in scarlet and turquoise.
"You the big chieftain around here?" Ntoko asked.
"No. I am Calandrinia." She combed a hand through her hair, shaking out the latest dusting of ash.
"You going to talk to me?"
"Are you going to kill me?"
"Not unless you give me a reason."
She bared her teeth, which were long enough to qualify as tusks. "I have many reasons, but I won't be acting on them today."
"Well, thank you. Now you want to tell me what the fuck is going on around here?"
"You violated our lives. This is how we respond. What did you expect?"
"Less violence would be a good start. You people have got to be crazy. Do you know how much firepower we've got backing us up?"
Calandrinia showed her tusks again. "Less than you started with."
Lawrence used his secure command link. "Sarge, can I talk to her?"
"Sure, go right ahead if you think it will get us anywhere. I hate a smartmouth."
"Thanks." Lawrence was never quite certain, but Calandrinia seemed to turn to him just before he started talking. "I'd like to know, why did you abandon your factories?"
"Why does anybody abandon anything, Earthman? They are obsolete and irrelevant. Now we grow whatever we need directly."
"But your products weren't obsolete on Earth; they were damn useful. Why stop exporting?"
"If Earth wants medicines it should make them for itself."
"Well, for a start, without the cash from those exports you won't be able to import the products you don't make here."
She laughed at him outright. "If we don't make it, we don't want it. If we don't want it, we don't make it."
"So that's it? You've kissed good-bye to technological civilization? You're all happy regressing?" Somewhere at the back of his mind was the question of how many times he would have this conversation, and on how many planets. Regressor types seemed to get everywhere.
"Technological, no," Calandrinia said. "Mechanical, yes. What do you need machines for? Biological systems are much more efficient at providing for us."
"You can't make biological equivalents of everything."
"Not everything your society requires in order to function, no. But then we don't have your kind of society anymore. We've adapted ourselves, not bent the world to our vision. Worlds are too big for that. Why live in isolated settlements built on dead, irradiated earth when you can modify yourself to enjoy the freedom of the whole world?"
"That must be quite an ideology you've got here, to convince people they have to leave their past behind."
"It's not ideology, it's evolution. You know our ancestors came here with the intent of modifying themselves; why are you so surprised by what you found?"