Now, if only this idea works, he thought.

The dovecote was where he remembered it, behind an ill-kempt group house in the neighborhood bordering the harbor. Everyone was asleep apparently. But Fiben nevertheless kept quiet as possible as he cut a few wires and crept into the coop.

It was dank and smelled uncomfortably of bird. The pigeons’ soft cooing reminded Fiben of Kwackoo.

“Come on, kids,” he whispered to them. “You’re gonna help me fool your cousins, tonight.”

He had recalled this place from one of his walks. The proximity was more than convenient, it was probably essential. He and Sylvie dared not leave the harbor area until they had disposed of the tracer.

The pigeons edged away from him. While Sylvie kept watch, Fiben cornered and seized a fat, strong-looking bird. With a piece of string he bound the ring watch to its foot. “Nice night for a long flight, don’t ya think?” he whispered, and threw the pigeon into the air. He repeated the process with his own watch, for good measure.

He left the door open. If the birds returned early, the Gubru might follow the tracer signal here. But their typically noisy arrival would send the whole flock flapping off again, starting another wild goose chase.

Fiben congratulated himself on his cleverness as he and Sylvie ran eastward, away from the harbor. Soon they were in a dilapidated industrial area. Fiben knew where he was. He had been here before, leading the placid horse, Tycho, on his first foray into town after the invasion. Sometime before they reached the wall, he signaled for a stop. He had to catch his breath, though Sylvie seemed hardly winded at all.

Well, she’s a dancer, of course, he thought.

“Okay, now we strip,” he told her.

To her credit, Sylvie did not even bat an eye. The logic was inescapable. Her watch might not have been the only tracer planted on their person. She hurried through the disrobing and was finished before him. When everything lay in a pile, Fiben spared her a brief, appreciative whistle. Sylvie blushed. “Now what?” she asked.

“Now we go for the fence,” he answered.

“The fence? But Fiben—”

“C’mon. I’ve wanted to look at the thing close up for some time anyway.”

It was only a few hundred yards farther before they reached the broad strip of ground the aliens had leveled all the way around Port Helenia. Sylvie shivered as they approached the tall barrier, which glistened damply under the light of bright watch globes placed at wide intervals along its length.

“Fiben,” Sylvie said as he stepped out onto the strip. “We can’t go out there.”

“Why not?” he asked. Still, he stopped and turned to look back at her. “Do you know anyone who has?”

She shook her head. “Why would anybody? It’s obviously crazy! Those watch globes …”

“Yeah,” Fiben said contemplatively. “I was just wondering how many of ’em it took to line a fence around the whole city. Ten thousand? Twenty? Thirty?”

He was remembering the guardian drones that had lined the much smaller and much more sensitive perimeter around the former Tymbrimi Embassy, that day when the chancery building exploded and Fiben had had his lesson in ET humor. Those devices had turned out to be pretty unimpressive compared with “Rover,” or the typical battle robot the Gubru Talon Soldiers took into battle.

I wonder about these, he thought, and took another step forward.

“Fiben!” Sylvie sounded close to panic. “Let’s try the gate. We can tell the guards … we can tell them we were robbed. We were hicks from the farms, visiting town, and somebody stole our clothes and ID cards. If we act dumb enough, maybe they’ll just let us through!”

Yeah, sure. Fiben stepped closer still. Now he stood no more than half a dozen meters from the barrier. He saw that it comprised a series of narrow slats connected by wire at the top and bottom. He had chosen a point between two of the glowing globes, as far from each as possible. Still, as he approached he felt a powerful sensation that they were watching him.

The certainty filled Fiben with resignation. By now, of course, Gubru soldiery were on their way here. They would arrive any minute now. His best course was to turn around. To run. Now!

He glanced back at Sylvie. She stood where he had left her. It was easy to tell that she would rather be almost anywhere else in the world than here. He wasn’t at all sure why she had remained.

Fiben grabbed his left wrist with his right hand. His pulse was fast and thready and his mouth felt dry as sand. Trembling, he made an effort of will and took another step toward the fence.

An almost palpable dread seemed to close in all around him, as he had felt when he heard poor Simon Levin’s death wail, during that useless, futile battle out in space. He felt a dark foreboding of imminent doom. Mortality pressed in — a sense of the futility of life.

Fiben turned around, slowly, to look at Sylvie.

He grinned.

“Cheap chickenshit birds!” he grunted. “They aren’t watch globes at all! They’re stupid psi radiatorsl”

Sylvie blinked. Her mouth opened. Closed. “Are you sure?” she asked unbelievingly.

“Come on out and see,” he urged. “Right there you’ll suddenly be sure you’re being watched. Then you’ll think every Talon Soldier in space is coming after you!”

Sylvie swallowed. She clenched her fists and moved out onto the empty strip. Step by step, Fiben watched her. He had to give Sylvie credit. A lesser chimmie would have cut and run, screaming, long before she reached his position.

Beads of perspiration popped out on her brow, joining the intermittent raindrops.

Part of him, distant from the adrenaline roar, appreciated her naked form. It helped to distract his mind. So, she really has nursed. The faint stretch marks of childbearing and lactation were often faked by some dummies, in order to make themselves look more attractive, but in this case it was clear that Sylvie had borne a child. I wonder what her story is.

When she stood next to him, eyes closed tightly, she whispered. “What… what’s happening to me right now?”

Fiben listened to his own feelings. He thought of Gailet and her long mourning for her friend and protector, the giant chim Max. He thought of the chims he had seen blown apart by the enemy’s overpowering weaponry.

He remembered Simon.

“You feel like your best friend in all the world just died,” he told her gently, and took her hand. Her answering grip was hard, but across her face there swept a look of relief.

“Psi emitters. That’s… that’s all?” She opened her eyes. “Why… why those cheap, chickenshit birds!”

Fiben guffawed. Sylvie slowly smiled. With her free hand she covered her mouth.

They laughed, standing there in the rain in the midst of a riverbed of sorrow. They laughed, and when their tears finally slowed they walked together the rest of the way to the fence, still holding hands.

“Now when I say push, push!”

“I’m ready, Fiben.” Sylvie crouched beneath him, feet set, shoulder braced against one of the tall slats, arms gripping the part of the wall next to it.

Standing over her, Fiben took a similar stance and planted his feet in the mud. He took several deep breaths.

“Okay, push!”

Together they heaved. The slats were already a few centimeters apart. As he and Sylvie strained, he could feel the space begin to widen. Evolution is never wasted, Fiben thought as he heaved with all his might.

A million years ago humans were going through all the pangs of self-uplift, evolving what the Galactics said could only be given — sapiency — the ability to think and to covet the stars.

Meanwhile, though, Fiben’s ancestors had not been idle. We were getting strong! Fiben concentrated on that thought while sweat popped out on his brow and the plastisheath slats groaned. He grunted and could feel Sylvie’s own desperate struggle as her back quivered against his leg.