Free Star Trek by Kevin Killiany

thoroughly and directly.”
    â€œYou quote well.” Slilila chuckled. “Which is as directly and thoroughly as a youth exempted use of weapons can take responsibility for the solution.”
    When the Smaunif spoke, Nasat tinkled from Pattie’s combadge, lying with its rag among Solal’s lunch trash. Fortunately, it was close enough to the cage that the sounds could seem to be coming from Pattie. She tried to help the illusion by waving her antennae every time the combadge repeated the Smaunifs’ words.
    Solal belatedly realized what was happening. He hurriedly scooped up the combadge, bundling it tightly in the trash and rag, then stuffed the lot into the waste can on the cleaning cart. He had the wit to park the cart next to Pattie in case any further sounds emerged.
    Solal left with Slilila, apparently already late for some shared chore, leaving Pattie with her combadge less than a meter away but completely inaccessible.

Chapter
11
    T he devastation covered several thousand acres.
    A dense carpet of what looked like saplings, though Corsi realized they were trees built along a more normal scale, washed up around the base of the giant banyans. The abrupt demarcation between rain forest and what looked like conifers must have indicated something about the soil, but Corsi didn’t know what.
    From her vantage point beside Copper on a low branch of one of the giant banyans, Corsi could see a giant rectangle of the conifers about a kilometer distant had been clear-cut. There were several low buildings of wood and metal near the center of the cleared area. Just beyond them was what looked like a broad straight road to nowhere. A landing strip, she decided, for something very large or something that needed as much margin of error as they could give it. To the right of the buildings a shallow basin, perhaps a hundred meters across, had been dug in the soil and lined with metal. The thin metal tower at its center confirmed her suspicion it was an antenna. Corsi was not an expert on agronomy, but much of the cleared land seemed to be in various stages of cultivation. Not so much a working farm, she decided, as an experiment to see what would grow.
    Whoever these people were, they were here to stay.
    More immediately significant was a broad road, a dozen or so meters wide, that was being carved through the trees directly toward the rain forest. Progress appeared to have been slow, trees felled near the edge of the cleared area had had time to turn brown. But the leading edge of the incursion was close enough for Corsi to hear the thud of hand axes.
    â€œHow long have they been here?” Corsi asked.
    Copper batted at his left ear. “Long enough to do what you see.”
    â€œMany meals?” Corsi guessed. It was plain the K’k’tict didn’t measure time. “I’ve been meaning to ask: What does that left-ear gesture mean?”
    â€œSurprise, embarrassment, confusion.”
    â€œAh. We do this for the same thing,” Corsi slapped her forehead.
    â€œYours is a violent people,” Copper said.
    â€œMany would agree with you. But we have learned to moderate our violent nature through reason and compassion.” She indicated the clear-cut forest below. “That is not the work of my people.”
    Copper batted at his left ear again.
    â€œHowever, my people are not the only ones of this general design,” Corsi added, spreading her arms to indicate her two-arm, two-leg construction. “If we could get closer, I may be able to tell you who these rude guests of yours are.”
    Copper began descending, which Corsi took as expressing a willingness to take her closer to the strangers.
    The forest floor beneath the giant banyans was covered with a variety of fernlike plants, most only about knee-high; chest-high on K’k’tict. There was no real underbrush, and the areas between banyan root systems were like broad boulevards. It was Corsi’s