The Only One

to hear, but we heard enough."
    "It's been a long time since anyone's used those receivers," Petro stated.
    In obvious appreciation of the technology involved, Romjha squinted at the demolished fighter. "What brought them down?"
    "A missile. From a system in the skyport."
    He glanced sideways at Aleq. "The skyport was auto-defended against an air attack? The robot guns were deadly against us, but..."
    "It surprised them, too."
    "All these years and I never figured that out." Romjha exhaled audibly. "It proves how little we know of our own home." His voice turned sorrowful, reminding Taj of the numerous funerals over which he'd presided.
    "This is a historic day. For the first time, we know for certain that others like us still live, that not all are dead or imprisoned by oppressive regimes. What we can assume about the rest of the galaxy has changed.
    These outsiders came here in good faith. Brave men they were. Later we'll hold a vigil for them, as if they were our own."
    "A vigil?" Aleq blurted out. "A celebration's what we need. They're alive!"
    Taj and Petro swung their rifles toward the sound of shouts, and Romjha rose to his feet as five shadows appeared from the smoke and darkness.

Chapter Five
    Taj squinted down the barrel of her rifle. Three of the people running toward her were the remaining raiders. The other two were strangers. Outsiders.
    Her lips pulled back in a snarl. Her finger flexed over her trigger. One shot, two, and these suicidal thrill seekers will no longer be a problem. They would bring no more attention from the warlords, nor would they make Romjha consider chasing off to fight a war he couldn't win.
    Aleq laid his hand over the muzzle of her rifle and gently pushed the weapon down. She swallowed, saw that her hands were shaking.
    "They're not the enemy, Taj," he said. "They're like us."
    "They don't look like us." They were bigger, stronger, healthier than the men she knew, save Romjha and Petro, who were phenomena among their own people. Yet if these strangers had tech, then it followed they might have decent food, shelter, and medical care, too. Such luxuries would account for their size.
    The outsiders wouldn't stay for long on Sienna, Taj knew. If they had the tech it appeared they did, they'd be rescued by their people and taken off-planet quickly enough. They weren't here to help the people of this planet; they were here to fight. But what if they seduced Romjha with tales of the worlds beyond, and he left with them on an idealistic, unrealistic mission to destroy the warlords?
    Taj's back crawled with foreboding. Her hands twisted impotently around her lowered rifle as she watched the quintet approach.
    The two outsiders wore dull-colored clothing that appeared to be uniforms stripped of identifying insignia.
    The larger of the pair bore his comrade on his back. His shirt was missing a sleeve, revealing a sweat-slick, muscular arm wider in circumference than Taj's thigh.
    "That's Jal," Aleq explained. "The wounded man is Cheya. He took shrapnel in the leg."
    Cheya would need an experienced healer's attention, Taj realized with a sinking feeling. She hoped he would make it. The healers were a rover's ride away. Like the raiders, she knew how to tend the usual injuries, but the healers discouraged amateur interference, claiming it caused infection and death more often than not.
    "That's all there were, Romjha," Aleq continued. "Two of them."
    The group tumbled into the shelter of the gutted tank. The odors of scorched clothing and overheated metal mixed with the tang of blood, sweat, and fear. The outsiders may not be familiar, Taj thought bleakly, but the scent they carried was. It was the smell of war.
    The outsider named Jal fell to his knees and eased his comrade from his back as gently as one would lay down a child, though Cheya was nearly as tall as Jal. A hasty field dressing had been wound tightly around the wounded man's upper right thigh—Jal's missing sleeve, Taj realized. Blood had soaked through it, turning the grayish cloth brown-black. In full daylight it would have been gory red. Taj was glad it was night.
    As the remaining three raiders reported to Romjha, hastily debriefing him, Taj scrutinized the outsiders.
    Their boots were made from real leather, she guessed, sniffing at a faintly exotic scent in the air. This wasn't footwear hand-stitched by women sitting around the fire, nursing babies and trading stories. Nor were their uniforms made of homemade cloth.