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Updated: June 27, 2025
When the Chief Ranger went out the door, Sindbad did not try to follow, but he uttered one mournful little cry of protest and loss. "So he wants a trouble shooter, does he?" Tau asked. "All right, I'll try to hunt out his goblins for him; it'll be worth that to visit Khatka!"
The quirk of good humor had gone again, and there was an edge in the Chief Ranger's voice which cut. "Poachers on Khatka would welcome the Patrol in place of the attention they now receive." He came into the mess cabin, Jellico behind him, and Dane pulled down two of the snap seats. He was holding a mug under the spout of the coffee dispenser as the captain made introductions.
"Burn tonight, hurt some tomorrow; all well soon. No burn very bad." Dane ruefully prepared to pay the consequences of his first brush with the unpleasant surprises Khatka had to offer. Dane regarded his throbbing feet morosely.
"But I do not believe that lions were ever so friendly toward my ancestors." Dane would have removed the cat, but the Khatkan arose with Sindbad, still purring loudly, resting in the crook of his arm. The Ranger was smiling with a gentleness which changed the whole arrogant cast of his countenance. "Do not bring this one to Khatka with you, Captain, or you will never take him away again.
With the Five Families to push and lead, a new civilization developed, and when Survey came to call they were no longer savages. Combine bought the trade rights about seventy-five years ago. Then the Company and the Five Families got together and marketed a luxury item to the galaxy. You know how every super-jet big shot on twenty-five planets wants to say he's hunted on Khatka.
Brilliant bursts of flowers were splotches of vivid color, and the attendant insect life was altogether too abundant. Dane tried to tally his immunity shots and hoped for the best. At the moment he wondered why anyone would want to visit Khatka, let alone pay some astronomical sum for the privilege.
If there is a canker of trouble on Khatka, then Lumbrilo is close to its root." "Nymani!" The Chief Ranger's voice was the crack of a lash. "Will you forget again that you are a man, and run crying for shelter against a shaft of light? As this off-world Medic says, Lumbrilo fashions such as that to drive us into our enemies' hands!"
Tau asked the Chief Ranger. "Surely during the centuries since your ancestors landed on Khatka you must have adapted to native water. You couldn't have lived otherwise. We must use the purifier, but must you?" "There is water and water." Asaki shook his own canteen, his scowl growing fiercer as the gurgle from its depths was heard. "From springs on the other side of the mountains we drink yes.
And between, this fortress held by men who dared both the heights and the depths. The wildly burgeoning life of Khatka had surrounded the off-worlders since they had come here. There was something untameable about Khatka; the lush planet lured and yet repelled at the same time. "Zoboru far from here?" The Chief Ranger pointed north in answer to the captain's question. "About a hundred leagues.
Dane took his turn with the rest at that chore, thankful that the business of cutting their way through that mass of greenery slowed them to a pace he could match if not in comfort, then by willpower. But the sand worms were not the only troubles one could encounter on Khatka.
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