It would stink to high heaven.

He didn't have long to wait.

Fiben smiled as the first squawks of consternation began to emanate from the chancery. Within moments the doors and windows burst forth with feathered explosions as aliens boiled out of the building, chirping in panic or disgust. Fiben wasn't sure which and he didn't really care. He was too busy laughing.

This part had been his idea. He broke a peanut and tossed it up to catch in his mouth. This was better than baseball!

Gubru scattered in all directions, leaping from upper balconies even without antigravity gear. Several writhed on broken limbs.

So much the better. Of course this wasn't going to be much of an inconvenience to the enemy, and it could only be done once. The real purpose was to watch how the Gubru dealt with an emergency.

Sirens began to wail. Fiben glanced at his watch. A full two minutes had pa.s.sed since the first signs of commotion. That meant the alarm was given manually. The vaunted Galactic defense computers weren't omniscient then. They weren't equipped to respond to a bad smell.

The watch buoys rose from the fence together, giving off a threatening whine, whirling faster than before. Fiben brushed peanut sh.e.l.ls from his lap and sat up slowly, watching the deadly things warily. If they were programmed to extend the defense perimeter automatically, whatever the emergency, he could be in trouble.

But they merely spun, shining with increased vigilance. It took three more minutes, by Fiben's watch, for a triple sonic boom to announce the arrival of fighter craft, sleek arrows resembling sparrow hawks, which streaked in to pa.s.s low over the now empty chancery building. The Gubru on the lawn seemed too nervous to take much cheer in their arrival. They leapt and squawked as sonic booms shook trees and feathers alike.

A Gubru official strutted about the grounds, chirping soothingly, calming its subordinates. Fiben didn't dare lift his monocular with the protector-drones at such high alert, but he peered to try to get a better view of the avian in charge. Several features seemed odd about this Gubru. Its white plumage, for instance, looked more luminous, more l.u.s.trous than the others'. It also wore a band of black fabric around its throat.

A few minutes later a utility craft arrived and hovered until enough chattering avians had stepped aside to give it room to land. From the grounded floater a pair of invaders emerged wearing ornate, crested breathing masks. They bowed to the official, then strode up the steps and into the building.

Obviously the Gubru in charge realized that the stench from the corroded gas pipes posed no threat. All the noise and commotion was doing much more harm to his command of clerks and planners than the bad smell. No doubt he was , upset because the work day was ruined.

More minutes pa.s.sed. Fiben watched a convoy of ground vehicles arrive, sirens wailing, sending the agitated civil servants into a tizzy again. The senior Gubru flapped its arms until the racket finally cut off. Then the aristocrat waved a curt gesture at the supersonic fighters hovering overhead.

The warcraft swiveled about at once and departed as swiftly as they had come. Shock waves again rattled windows and sent the chancery staff shrieking.

"Excitable lot, aren't they?" Fiben observed. No doubt Gubru soldiery were better conditioned for this sort of thing.

Fiben stood up on his branch and looked over toward other areas of the park. Elsewhere the fence was lined with chims, and more streamed in from the city. They kept a respectful distance back from the barrier guardians, but still they came, babbling to each other in excitement.

Here and there among them were Gailet Jones's observers, timing and jotting down every alien response.

"Almost the first thing the Gubru will read about, when they study Library tapes on your species," Athaclena had told him, "will be the so-called 'monkey reflex' . . . the tendency of you anthropoids to scurry toward commotion, out of curiosity.

"Conservative species find it strange, and this tendency of humans and chims will seem particularly bizarre to avian beings, which tend to lack even a semblance of a sense of humor."

She had smiled.

"We will get them used to this type of behavior, until they grow to expect those strange Earthling clients always running toward trouble . . . just to watch.

"They will learn not to fear you, but they should . . . speaking as one monkey to another."

Fiben had known what she meant, that Tymbrimi were like humans and chims in this way. Her confidence had filled him, as well-until he saw her frown suddenly -and speak to herself, quickly and softly, apparently forgetting that he understood Galactic Seven.

"Monkeys . . . one monkey to another . . . Sumbaturalli! Must I constantly think in metaphors?"

It had perplexed Fiben. Fortunately, he did not have to understand Athaclena, only know that she could ask anything she wanted of him and he would jump.

After a while more maintenance workers arrived in ground vehicles, this time including a number of chims wearing uniforms of the City Gas Department. By the time they entered the chancery, the Gubru bureaucrats on the lawn had settled into the shade just outside, chirping irritably at the still potent stench.

Fiben didn't blame them. The wind had shifted his way. His nose wrinkled in disgust.

Well, that's that. We cost them an afternoon's work, and maybe we learned something. Time to go home and a.s.sess the results.

He didn't look forward to the meeting with Gailet Jones. For a pretty and bright chimmie, she had a tendency to get awfully officious. And she obviously bore some grudge against him-as if he had gunned her down with a stunner and carried her off in a sack!

Ah well. Tonight he would be off, back into the mountains with Tycho, carrying a report for the general. Fiben had been born a city boy, but he had come to prefer the kind of birds they had out in the country to the sort infesting town of late.

He turned around, grabbed the tree trunk with both arms, and started lowering himself. That was when, suddenly, something that felt like a big flat hand slammed hard against his back, knocking all the breath out of him.

Fiben clawed at the trunk. His head rang and tears filled his eyes. He managed just barely to keep his grip on the rough bark as branches whipped and leaves blew away in a sudden wave of palpable sound. He held on while the entire tree rocked, as if it were trying to buck him off!

His ears popped as the overpressure wave pa.s.sed. The rip of rushing air dropped to a mere roar. The tree swayed in slowly diminishing arcs. Finally-still gripping the bark tightly-he gathered the nerve to turn around and look.

A towering column of smoke filled the center of the Emba.s.sy lawn where the chancery used to be. Flames licked at shattered walls, and streaks of soot showed where superheated gas had blasted in all directions.

Fiben blinked.

"Hot chicken in a biscuit!" he muttered, not ashamed at all of the first thing to come to mind. There was enough fried bird out there to feed half of Port Helenia. Some of the meat was pretty rare, of course. Some of it still moved.

His mouth was bone dry, but he smacked his lips nonetheless.

"Barbecue sauce," he sighed. "All this, an' not a truck-load of barbecue sauce to be seen."

He clambered back onto the branch amid the torn leaves. Fiben checked his watch. It took almost a minute for sirens to begin wailing again. Another for the floater to take off, wavering as it fought the surging convection of superheated air from the fire.

He looked to see what the chims at the perimeter fence had done. Through the spreading cloud of smoke, Fiben saw that the crowd had not fled. If anything, it had grown. Chims boiled out of nearby buildings to watch. There were hoots and shrieks, a sea of excited brown eyes.

He grunted in satisfaction. That was fine, so long as n.o.body made any threatening moves.

Then he noticed something else. With an electric thrill he saw that the watch disks were down! All along the barrier fence, the guardian buoys had fallen to the ground.

"b.u.g.g.e.r all!" he murmured. "The dumb clucks are saving money on smart robotics. The defense mechs were all remotes!"

When the chancery blew up-for whatever unG.o.dly reason it had chosen to do so-it must have taken out the central controller with it! If somebody just had the presence of mind to grab up some of those buoys . . .

He saw Max, a hundred meters to his left, scurry over to one of the toppled disks and prod it with a stick.

Good man, Fiben thought, and then dropped it from his mind. He stood up and leaned against the tree trunk while tossing off his sandals. He flexed his legs, testing the support. Here goes nothiri, he sighed.

Fiben took off at full tilt, running along the narrow branch. At the last moment he rode the bucking tip like a springboard and leaped off into the air.

The fence was set back a way from the stream. One of Fiben's toes brushed the wire at the top as he sailed over. He landed in an awkward rollout on the lawn beyond.

"Oof," he complained. Fortunately, he hadn't banged his still-tender ankle. But his ribs hurt, and as he panted sucked in a lungful of smoke from the spreading fire. Coughing, he pulled a handkerchief from his coveralls and wrapped it over his nose as he ran toward the devastation.

Dead invaders lay strewn across the once pristine lawn. He leapt over a sprawled, Kwackoo corpse-four-legged and soot-covered-and ducked through a roiling finger of smoke. He barely evaded collision with a living Gubru. The creature fled squawking.

The invader bureaucrats were completely disorganized, flapping and running about in total chaos. Their noise was overwhelming.

Slamming sonic booms announced the return of soldiery, overhead. Fiben suppressed a fit of coughing and blessed the smoke. No one overhead would spot him, and the Gubru down here were in no condition to notice much. He hopped over singed avians. The stench from the fire kept even his most atavistic appet.i.tes at bay.

In fact, he was afraid he might be sick.

It was touch and go as he ran past the burning chancery. The building was completely in flames. The hair on his right arm curled from the heat.

He burst upon a knot of avians huddling in the shadow of a neighboring structure. They had been gathered in a moaning cl.u.s.ter around one particular corpse, a remnant whose once-bright plumage was now stained and ruined. When Fiben appeared so suddenly the Gubru scattered, chirping in dismay.

Am I lost? There was smoke everywhere. He swiveled about, casting for a sign of the right direction.

There! Fiben spied a tiny blue glow through the black haze. He set off at a run, though his lungs already felt afire. The worst of the noise and heat fell behind him as he dashed through the small copse of trees lining the top of the bluff.

Misjudging the distance, he almost stumbled, sliding to a sudden halt before the Tymbrimi Diplomatic Cache. Panting, he bent over to catch his breath.

In a moment he realized that it was just as well he'd stopped when he had. Suddenly the blue globe at the cairn's peak seemed less friendly. It pulsed at him, throbbing volubly.

So far Fiben had acted in a series of flash decisions. The explosion had been an unexpected opportunity. It had to be taken advantage of.

All right, here I am. Now what? The blue globe might be original Tymbrimi equipment, but it also might have been set there by the invader.

Behind him sirens wailed and floaters began arriving in a continuous, fluttering whine. Smoke swirled about him, whipped by the chaotic comings and goings of great machines. Fiben hoped Gailet's observers on the roofs of the buildings nearby were taking all this down. If he knew his own people, most of them would be staring slack-jawed or capering in excitement. Still, they might learn a lot from this afternoon's serendipity.

He took a step forward toward the cairn. The blue globe pulsed at him. He lifted his left foot.

A beam of bright blue light lanced out and struck the ground where he had been about to step.

Fiben leaped at least a meter into the air. He had hardly landed before the beam shot forth again, missing his right foot by millimeters. Smoke curled up from smoldering twigs, joining the heavier pall from the burning chancery.

Fiben tried to back away quickly, but the d.a.m.ned globe wouldn't let him! A blue bolt sizzled the ground behind him and he had to hop to one side. Then he found himself being herded the other way!

Leap, zap! Hop, curse, zap again!

The beam was too accurate for this to be an accident. The globe wasn't trying to kill him. Nor was it, apparently, interested in letting him go!

Between bolts Fiben frantically tried to think how to get out of this trap . . . this infernal practical joke. . . .

He snapped his fingers, even as he jumped from another smoldering spot. Of course!

The Gubru hadn't messed with the Tymbrimi Cache. The blue globe wasn't acting like a tool of the avians. But it was exactly the sort of thing Uthacalthing would leave behind!

Fiben cursed as a particularly near miss left one toe slightly singed. d.a.m.n b.l.o.o.d.y Eatees! Even the good ones were almost more than anybody could bear! He gritted histeeth and forced himself to take a single step forward.

The blue beam sliced through a small stone near his instep, cutting it precisely in half. Every instinct in Fiben screamed for him to jump again, but he concentrated on leaving the foot in place and taking one more leisurely step.

Normally, one would think that a defensive device like this would be programmed to give warnings at long range and to start frying in earnest when something came nearer. By such logic what he was doing was stupid as h.e.l.l.

The blue globe throbbed menacingly and cast forth its lightning. Smoke curled from a spot between the lingers and tumb of his left foot.

He lifted the right.

First a warning, then the real thing. That was the way an Earthling defense drone would work. But how would a Tymbrimi program his? Fiben wasn't sure he should wager so much on a wild guess. A client-cla.s.s sophont wasn't supposed to a.n.a.lyze in the middle of fire and smoke, and especially not when he was being shot at!

Call it a hunch, he thought.

His right foot came down and its toes curled around an oak twig. The blue globe seemed to. consider his persistence, then the blue bolt lanced out again, this time a meter in front of him. A trail of sizzling humus walked toward him in a slow zigzag, the crackle of burning gra.s.s popping louder as it came closer and closer.

Fiben tried to swallow.

It's not designed to kill! he told himself over and over. Why should it be? The Gubru could have blasted that globe at long range long ago.

No, its purpose had to be to serve as a gesture, a declaration of rights under the intricate rules of Galactic Protocol, more ancient and ornate than j.a.panese imperial court ritual.

And it was designed to tweak the beaks of Gubru.

Fiben held his ground. Another chain of sonic booms rattled the trees, and the heat from the conflagration behind him seemed to be intensifying. All the noise pressed hard against his self-control.

The Gubru are mighty warriors, he reminded himself. But they are excitable. . . .

The blue beam edged closer. Fiben's nostrils flared. The only way he could take his gaze away from the deadly sightwas by closing his eyes.

If I'm right then this is just another d.a.m.ned Tymbrimi . . .

He opened them. The beam was approaching his right foot from the side. His toes curled from a deep will to leap away. Fiben tasted bile as the searing knife of light tore through a pebble two inches away and proceeded on to ...

To hit and cross his foot!

Fiben choked and suppressed an urge to howl. Something was wrong! His head spun as he watched the beam cross his foot and then commence leaving a narrow trail of smoky ruin directly under his spread-legged stance.

He stared in disbelief at his foot. He had bet the beam would stop short at the last instant. It hadn't.

Still . . . there his foot was, unharmed.

The beam ignited a dry twig then moved on to climb up his left foot.

There was a faint tickling he knew to be psychosomatic. While touching him, the beam was only a spot of light.

An inch beyond his foot, the burning resumed.

His heart still pounding, Fiben looked up at the blue globe and cursed with a mouth too dry to speak.

"Very funny," he whispered.

There must have been a small psi-caster in the cairn, for Fiben actually felt something like a smile spread in the air before him ... a small, wry, alien smirk, as if the joke had really been a minor thing, after all, not even worth a chuckle.

"Real cute, Uthacalthing," Fiben grimaced as he forced his shaking legs to obey him, carrying him on a wobbling path toward the cairn. "Real cute. I'd hate to see what gives you a belly laugh." It was hard to believe Athaclena came from the same stock as the author of this little bit of whoopee cushion humor.

At the same time, though, Fiben wished he could have been present when the first Gubru approached the Diplomacy Cache to check it out.