TWENTY-SEVEN
Numb, exhausted and heartsick, Zenn allowed herself to be herded back through the Symmetry Dancer by Pokt and the half-dozen Khurspex with him. There was no sign of Charlie or the simstriss. Time passed in a disconnected jumble – a shuttle ride, a docking port, a quick march to a smaller intership ferry, Pokt saying nothing, pushing her ahead of him, the Khurspex crowding into the ship, occasionally stumbling into one another in their deteriorating state, their dank sea smell now tinged with the scent of accelerating decay. The ferry eased into motion, and with no other place available, she slumped down to sit on the floor, unable to stop the horrifying images that refused to stop replaying in her mind: the sub in the grasp of the furious lurker, dragged out of sight to vanish into the black, hopeless depths of the Tson.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked finally.
“To the service ship,” the Skirni said. “From there you will be placed into the stonehorse.”
“Why? What will happen then?”
He bulged his eyes at her. “Pokt knows. Pokt knows much more than you. I have read your diaries. On the shards from your room. You did not suspect what was placed within you, even when it should have been clear. The joinings you shared? With the animals? Yes, I know what grows inside you. The time is ripe. You will enter the stonehorse. These hideous Spex will go homeward. And this business will be concluded.”
Even in her dazed state, the thought of an in-soma run into the skull of a living Indra was enough to provoke a cold stab of fear. “What business?”
“That which ends the years of wandering.” He shook his head at her. Suddenly animated, he hopped up out of his seat. “Years of the Skirni homeless among the worlds. Worlds that turned us away, made us scrape and grovel. And we, we who were denied a planet of our own, we will say who can have a world. We will possess the Indra ships. And we will say who can go from star to star. We will say who walks on green grasses and who lives their life in the cold arms of mother-void. The Skirni will say.”
So that’s what the Cepheians promised them.
Zenn almost pitied him. Almost.
“That’s not true, you know.” She tilted her head up at him.
“What is not?”
“Your allies won’t let the Khurspex hand over the Indra fleet to you. Or to anyone else.”
“You don’t know what you say,” he said, snorting.
“Why should they? Why would they give you the ships when they could keep them for themselves?”
“Lies. Pathetic lies.” But she could see her words struck a chord. “The friends of the Skirni know our value. The Skirni have long survived in the ships of the Accord. We are everywhere yet are so despised we are noticed nowhere. The scorn of others has become our hidden strength.”
“Yes. But what about when you’ve served your purpose? Why won’t these friends of yours just toss you away?”
“You know nothing,” he scoffed, but his mottled color darkened, his hands clenched and unclenched as she spoke. “You simply fear such power in the hands of the Skirni.”
“Oh? What if it is the Skirni who are fools? What if your friends deceived you? Then the Skirni get nothing.”
“No. That is not how it will go.” A wicked smile split his pug-face. “The Skirni have taken steps. To assure we get what is deserved. I am done listening here.” Then he waddled forward to stand next to the Khurspex operating the ferry, muttering to himself.
A short time later, the ferry docked. Pokt ordered Zenn through the side hatch. They entered a larger ship with an open deck area holding a scattering of supply containers. Along one side of the deck was a row of nine or ten compact surgical bays set into alcoves. In them, Zenn could see operating tables, banks of diagnostic scanners and other equipment. The ship was probably a mobile medical unit or rescue craft. Beyond the surgery bays, she could see all the way forward to the pilot’s console at the bow. The pilot’s chair had its back to them.
“The Tson’s mini-sub has gone offline.” The sound of the voice from the unseen person in the chair drew a gasp of shocked recognition from Zenn. Then, the chair rotated, revealing a human male. He wore a vermillion soldier’s jacket. “Your friends should have surrendered,” Stav Travosk said matter-of-factly, the silver-gray eyes showing no emotion.
“You? You’re the ally?” Zenn said.
“Ally?”
“You and the Authority… the Skirni.”
He gave Pokt a scornful glance. “Oh, the valiant Skirni network. Allies, yes. But the Authority? Hardly.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Clearly.” He smiled at her tortured look. “You’re surprised? That the New Law refused to stand by and watch humanity be overwhelmed. The Authority is finished. Or they soon will be.”
“You’re a spy,” she said, the terrible truth dawning. “For the New Law.”
“I prefer ‘patriot’. Someone who refuses to let my species succumb to a tidal wave of alien filth.”
Behind her, Pokt emitted a snort. She turned to see him glaring at Stav, who appeared oblivious to either his insult or the Skirni’s reaction.
“Now it’s time.” He stood and came toward her. “The Indra is ready for you.” Her shock was overtaken now by stark fear closing around her chest like a deathly cold hand. “Pokt, your presence is no longer required. Go to the Delphic Queen and wait. I’ll contact you when I want you to bring him.”
Zenn’s throat tightened.
Father!
Pokt regarded Stav, then went the hatch leading to the shuttle they’d just come from.
“I should enjoy seeing it,” the Skirni said. “The placement of the nexus into the stonehorse. Why do I not wait?” His beady eyes flicked to Zenn, then away again. “I could wait until you have made the interface and the Indra ships are secured.”
“No.”
“Is there some reason I should not see it? It will be a shining moment. When the Indra fleet is taken and we divide our prize.”
“I said no.”
“Are we not allies, the New Law and the Skirni?”
“What? Of course we are. Pokt, we don’t have time for this.”
“But if we are? Equals? Why should Pokt not stay and witness the ending of our plan?”
Stav clamped his eyes shut, turned his head away, then swung back to the Skirni.
“I do not explain myself to you, Pokt.” The Skirni didn’t move. “I said go and wait on the Queen.” There was brittle anger in his voice, silver eyes flashing.
Pokt met Stav’s gaze and gave him a hostile smile in return. He glanced again at Zenn, back at Stav, and then he turned and went through the hatch.
Visible through the bow view screen behind Stav, the vast Khurspex structure was suspended in space, floating like an immense, ungainly wagon wheel. At its center was what had once been a starship, but was now a surreal composite vehicle of spires, connective struts, loops of massive ductwork and bizarre engineering permutations, a free-form construction with no visible bow, stern, up or down that Zenn could identify.
Stav saw her staring at it. “There, in the center.” He pointed to the viewport. “The meta-ship. Built for the Asyph, what the Spex call the Helen’s Indra. Built so the Asyph can take the Spex back to wherever they go to spawn more of their kind.”
Now, in the shadow below the meta-ship, extending out into space, Zenn saw her, the Helen’s Indra. The whole of the creature’s mighty head was exposed, floating serenely in the open vacuum, looking strangely vulnerable despite its size. There were four small bronze-gold spheres moving in lazy orbits around the Indra’s head – sedation satellites, keeping her calm and docile.
“Nearly in position,” Stav said, leaning into the console to make a final adjustment for their approach.
“But you… the Encharan slug. You saved my life.”
“Couldn’t let you be damaged, could I?”
“How did you even know?”
He looked up at this.
“Microtransmitter. At the party. Once I knew it was you behind the mask, I needed to keep track of you. Your hand?”
Yes. She remembered now, the feeling that he’d held her hands in his a little too long. That’s when he planted it. She examined one hand, then the other. In the center of her right palm, a tiny black speck, no bigger than a dust mote, just under the skin.
“And, of course, that’s why I mentioned the visit to the Indra chamber to the Captain. It all fell nicely into place. The safe room there. Most protected site on the ship during a forced tunnel event.”
“But if you had a tracker in me this whole time…”
“It went offline when the Helen tunneled,” he said, his attention back on the console. “We’d anticipated this might happen. It shouldn’t have mattered. But the Spex drones were late getting started. And the Captain was a bit too clever for us. And, as it turned out, too clever for himself. Enough chitchat.”
He came and took Zenn roughly by the arm and led her aft. He gestured to a long, narrow object stowed in shadow near the far bulkhead. The sight of the thing made Zenn pull back against Stav’s grasp. He only gripped her harder.
“You’ll be familiar with the instrumentation on this.”
The in-soma pod was a gleaming new Royce Insomic, smaller and sleeker than the aging Gupta-Merck unit in which she’d trained. Top-of-the-line equipment. Any other time, Zenn would have been thrilled to see what it could do.
“I’m not checked out on this model,” she said flatly, searching for anything to say that would delay him, put off the inevitable. “It’s newer… too complicated.”
“Not a factor. The pod’s autopilot is preprogrammed. Your only job is to facilitate system ops. That and compensate for any anomalies on the way to the hypertrophal lobe.”
The HT lobe. The organ at the center of the Indra’s brain, the living quantum field-generator that enabled the stonehorse to outrun the laws of physics – and carve a path through the very fabric of space and time.
“What do you expect me to do in there? If I survive?”
“Nothing. Nothing at all. The Indra will engage the nexus once you’re in position. It’s a homing reflex, hardwired into their behavior.”
“I won’t do it,” she said, trying to hide the dread growing inside her. “You can’t threaten me now.”
Zenn thought of Jules and the others, water pouring into the sub, the lurker dragging them down into the icy black; limp, cold bodies floating somewhere entombed, deep, soundless… No, Stav couldn’t use her friends as a weapon against her. Not now.
“I had a feeling it would come to this,” he said. “And I’ve taken steps to help you overcome your reluctance. You will do your part. You’ll become an agent of purification, in spite of the alien corruption growing inside you. In spite of your small, selfish desires.”
He motioned at the console and a virt screen rose up into the air. An image came into focus – a human body lying on an operating gurney in a sickbay, the Delphic Queen’s sickbay. The air around the body shimmered and heaved with the energy of a restraining field. The body immersed in it moved sluggishly, as if in fitful sleep. Her heart began to pound as she saw the long braid of hair suspended in the field – hair the same color as hers. The figure’s eyes were closed. The facial muscles twitched ever so slightly.
“Father.” She spoke the word in a half whisper. “What have you done to him?”
“He’s restrained, that’s all. To keep him manageable.”
Zenn stared at the sleeping face, her mind a whirlwind of emotion.
Stav spoke to the screen, pronouncing his words with exaggerated clarity, making sure whoever was listening on the other end understood.
“The Skirni Pokt is on his way. I will contact him when I want the prisoner brought over. Then you can join the others on the Asyph’s ship. Understand me?”
From off-screen, a Khurspex’s pale, eyeless face leaned into the image. A noise from somewhere out of view attracted its attention and it turned away.
“No, wait…” Stav said. But the Khurspex had already pulled back out of camera range to investigate. “Tell Pokt to–” Then the screen abruptly went dark.
“These creatures…” He growled to himself, turned to the view screen at the bow. “It’s almost time for the Asyph meta-ship to leave. Makes the Spex even more worthless and unpredictable than usual.”
Zenn followed Stav’s gaze to the screen at the front of the cabin. She now saw that several ferries and shuttlecraft had disembarked from the surrounding ring and were all making for the central ship, like moths to a flame.
“No one wants to be left behind,” Stav said, eyeing the small armada. He smiled at her. Zenn looked away.
“I won’t,” she said, but this time, her voice wasn’t as steady. “You can’t do anything to make me.”
“What I can do to you is only part of what can be done.”
Stav pushed a pressure point on his sleeve screen, and a small opening in the ceiling of the nearest medical bay slid open. What descended from it was alive. Coiling down from the opening were half a dozen thick, knobby gray-green vines, each one terminating in a three-way assortment of talon-like hooks, scissoring claw blades and suction cups, all writhing in the air with a slow, precise menace.
“The Khurspex aren’t killers. But this ship we’re on, hijacked along with the others, must have belonged once to a race much less squeamish than the Spex. When properly stimulated, the bio-med devices aboard this craft produce effects on a living body that are nothing short of unbelievable.” He regarded Zenn calmly as she watched the vicious-looking vines. “Your father will be here shortly. What becomes of him then – “ he patted the surgical bay, “– is up to you.”