Chapter 55

For several weeks they had enjoyed benign weather. Leaving aside the omnipresent smog, the skies had generally been comparatively clear. Occasional rainshowers temporarily drove the humans under the pavilion's cover, or made them wish they were there—a particularly drenching downpour woke Meiersdottir and Igwanda in the middle of one night's sleep too far away from the pavilion to make it worth while retreating and left them with sodden sleeping gear and clothing—but for the most part it was clement enough that shelter was seldom needed.

Their first real storm on the planet struck suddenly. Meteorological equipment aboard the Gardener had been tracking it for two days but it seemed destined to bypass them safely. Suddenly Igwanda's fairly casual perambulation around the meadow as he monitored bits and pieces of the current sessions was interrupted by Shaw's urgent voice over his communicator.

"Carlos, sorry to say it, but you have trouble coming. We've been tracking a big storm that just veered off toward you, and you're going to get hit hard in about an hour and a half."

The colonel drew away from the others. "How bad, Bernard?"

"High winds, gusts up to about eighty klicks. Shitload of rain. Worst of all, a lot of electrical activity. If you can't hear the thunder yet you will soon, and there's big-time lightning."

Lightning would indeed be a problem, exposed as they were in an open field. The pavilion, as the tallest feature for several hundred square meters, would be a natural target for strikes, and with its wooden supports wasn't properly grounded. A direct hit could prove dis­astrous.

"Can you come for us, Bernard?" asked Igwanda.

"Not into that," the first officer replied. "You're going to have to ride it out."

"All right," Igwanda said calmly. "I believe we can do so safely. But I must prepare our group for evacuation here."

Akakha, who still shadowed him everywhere, was nearest at hand, and he turned to the alien. "Akakha, my mothership tells me there is a big storm coming. Much wind, much rain, thunder and lightning. It will not be safe for us to stay here. Will you allow us to go into one of your houses until the storm passes?"

"Yes, Igwanda," the alien replied immediately. "The house where—" he halted abruptly.

The colonel understood: the building where they had been attacked. "That house is good, thank you. We must make plans to go there immediately, though, the storm is very near." He strode off quickly to begin gathering his charges together from their sessions—too quickly to hear Akakha behind him begin, "Igwanda, what is thunder, what is lightning?..."

It took several minutes to assemble the dozen humans who were presently on the planet; several were quite reluctant to end their discussions early and Igwanda had to spend time overcoming their resistance. But the approaching storm soon made itself evident with steadily growing peals of thunder and visible, if still distant, lightning bolts, which finally expedited the process. As they gathered the colonel began giving instructions. Those who were not already in their electrified clothing—many had switched to more abbreviated attire for daily wear—were to don it immediately; "it will provide some grounding in case of lightning strikes," the colonel explained. "They must be activated, though. Do so if I call; I will warn the Edenites first." The suits would indeed save lives, but in a way the colonel never envisioned.

Within twenty minutes he had gathered them into a loose approximation of a formation. Akakha, Joe and several of the other aliens joined him in leading the way as the group straggled across the field toward the settlement. The storm was palpably coming closer, with winds already picking up sharply, as they passed through the overgrowth toward the settlement and the building in which they were to take shelter.

It was as they emerged from the overgrowth, perhaps fifty meters from their destination, that a major lightning bolt struck not far behind them. The humans jumped, but the aliens' reaction was far more dramatic; they froze in place and then turned toward the humans with eyes wide. All of them were suddenly trembling. In fear? Igwanda thought. But they must have seen such storms before...

His thought was cut off by Akakha moving quickly to him. "Igwanda," he said urgently. "Too late. No time. You run, hide." The colonel gaped at him. "Run, hide, now. Quickly. Go!" The last was louder than any sound he had ever heard an alien produce; only later did he realize that it was not just a single voice he heard, but a cry from all of the aliens in perfect unison.

A second even louder crash of thunder came, but Igwanda barely heard. It was drowned out in his mind by the echo of Heisinger's voice repeating, again and again, a single word: "berserkergang!" And even as Akakha lunged at him in obvious menace, eyes as wide as they could expand, he understood.

"Suits!" he bellowed. He muttered the word that activated his own charge even before Akakha reached him, sending the alien reeling along with two others behind him, and spun to face the humans trailing out behind him. "To me, quickly! Suits on, gather to me!" He ignored two sharp blows to his back—knife-thrusts blunted by the material of his clothing, he recognized dismissively—and took in the scene at a glance.