Vari's Choices

by Laura Jo Phillips

  “Absolutely fascinating,” Jay said as he continued to stare at the image.

  “You think the image Rodnil showed you is one of these siphonophores,” Declan said, his eyes fixed on Vari as he sorted through what she’d told them so far, as well as comments she’d made on the Leaper. He smiled. “You think it’s made up of Doftles.”

  Yes, I do,” Vari said.

  “But the Doftles are not part of a larger organism,” Kai said. “The twelve we encountered on the Leaper were individuals. Weren’t they?”

  “Yes they were,” Vari agreed.

  “Then why do you think they’re one of these siphonophores?” Jay asked.

  “For one thing, Rodnil referred to the image he showed me as the Colony. For another, he died because he was alone. He told me that they could not be separate like our kind, that they required connection. It made no sense to me at the time, but it does now.

  “I wondered if the echo I heard in all of their hearts except for Rodnil’s had something to do with that connection when he mentioned it to me. Now I’m as sure of it as I can be without proof, which the council and Dr. Davis will provide.”

  “But, as Kai pointed out, the Doftles aren’t connected into a cohesive whole like this jelly fish,” Declan said.

  “No, they’re not, and I think that’s part of their problem.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I know, I’ll come back to that in a minute,” Vari said. “With the sole exception of the forests of Korin 2, which are stationary, every siphonophore I found lives either in water, or in the air.”

  “That makes sense,” Jay said. “Gravity would cause a variety of problems for such a creature.”

  “Exactly,” Vari said. “As you know, the only physical sample the council has had to test was a single arm. They found it to be extremely dense in all respects. The bones are thicker and heavier than any they’d ever seen. Their skin and flesh are almost impossible to penetrate unless Kunian steel is used. The question is, why would any species require bodies such as that?”

  “There could be any number of reasons,” Jay said.

  “That’s true, and I’ve read the theories. But none of them were formulated with information I now have.”

  “That they’re siphonophores?” Kai asked.

  “Yes, in part.”

  “But they aren’t siphonophores anymore,” Declan pointed out.

  “They are, and they aren’t,” Vari said.

  “Meaning?” Jay asked.

  “I think that a siphonophore made up of Doftles evolved on land. Unlike the Forests of Korin 2 which, as I mentioned, are the only land siphonophores I could find, the Doftle were not stationary. That means gravity was almost certainly a problem for them. As the whole can only be as strong as the sum of its parts, Doftles developed their current physicality to make the Colony stronger and less vulnerable to injury, probably as a response to predation, as is often the case. Naturally, the larger and denser the Colony became, the heavier and slower it became.

  “But their siphonophore was made up of intelligent beings who understood the Colony’s strengths and weaknesses. There was a limit to how large they could become as a land creature subject to the forces of gravity, and they knew it. So, they created technology that would allow them to escape into an environment without gravity.”

  “You mean space, don’t you?” Jay said.

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Why do you think that? Why not air or water?”

  “Because the Colony Rodnil showed me was floating through space.”

  “Wait,” Jay said, holding up one finger as his brow furrowed. “You said the Colony was a single, large, organism. Did they merge together into one creature and build a single large ship to live on? Or did they break down into individual Doftles, build smaller space vehicles, then combine them in space?”

  “The latter,” Vari replied.

  “How can you know that?” Kai asked in surprise.

  “Because once I got this far in my thinking I had the same question, which caused one of those chunks of Doftle memory to come loose.

  “I haven’t fully processed the information in that chunk of memory, so to speak. But here’s what I do know. The Doftles were hunted close to extinction. They were forced to separate into individuals as a survival mechanism rather than an evolutionary response. As a result, even though they were no longer a siphonophore in the true sense of the word, they were still connected to one another, and they still needed each other to survive.

  “They built machines, escaped into space, and then combined them into what appeared to be one massive organism. For the first time in their existence they were safe, which explains why they have such an aversion to being what they call planet bound.”

  “Astounding,” Jay murmured.

  “Yes, it is,” Declan agreed. “But how did one of the Colony’s tentacles end up here, in the Thousand Worlds?”

  “The Colony was completely self-contained, and it reflected the Doftles themselves in many ways. Specifically, it was one large machine capable of separating into smaller, individual machines when necessary.

  “It wasn’t uncommon for Tentacles to temporarily detach for various reasons. Exploration, research, games of strategy. I don’t want to call them war games as they were intended to be mental exercises only. This, by the way, explains why Wolef overheard some Doftles referring to their presence here as part of a game.

  “As difficult as it is for me to believe, the Doftle are actually a peaceful race. They weren’t out to cause harm, or take over worlds, or anything like that.”

  “What changed them?” Jay asked.

  “In the course of one of those games, a Tentacle encountered a phenomenon in space and suffered a good deal of damage. The Doftle in charge of the Tentacle spotted a world that had an atmosphere compatible with their own, so they landed to make repairs. The name of that world was Xantara.”

  The conference room fell silent for several minutes while they all contemplated the enormity of what Vari had just said. Then Declan leaned forward and put his arms on the table.

  “Rodnil told you to find the Colony and bring it here.” Vari nodded. “Would that mean the end of the Thousand Worlds? Or the end of the Doftles in the Thousand Worlds?”

  “I’m not sure yet,” Vari replied. “Rodnil seemed sane to me. His thought patterns were different than the other Doftles, and there’s also the fact that he was the one arguing against killing the children. But, most compelling of all to me is the fact that the Eternal Pack worked long and hard to be sure I had Rodnil’s knowledge and memories in my head without losing a single scrap of it.”

  “You’re right,” Declan said, nodding. “That’s definitely compelling.”

  "Here’s something else to ponder. I asked Rodnil why he was different, and he didn’t know. It was a new change for him. I think the Eternal Pack made him sane specifically so that I could get information from him.”

  “There’s one thing in particular that bothers me about this,” Kai said. “If the Doftles are so smart, and so advanced, why did they help the Xanti in the first place? And why did they stay hidden for all those thousands of years?”

  “I don’t know why they stayed hidden,” Vari replied. “Yet. But I know the answer to your first question. If you look at that jellyfish, you can count the number of tendrils coming off of it. The Colony that Rodnil showed me has so many Tentacles it would take a computer to count them all. So many that some type of organization and order was required for it to function as a whole.

  “Each Tentacle has its own hierarchy, very much like a city or town. There are craftsmen, tradesmen, farmers, scientists, and much more in each Tentacle. But they’re still connected, and still subject to the will of the main body. More than that, they need the main body to guide them, to keep order, and to make decisions for them. But the Doftles of the lost Tentacle no longer had that. So they found a substitute.”

  “The Xanti,” Declan sai
d.

  “Yes. That’s why they followed the Xanti even though they had to teach them everything. Even though the Doftles were smarter, and more advanced. They needed someone else to be in charge. To make the decisions and tell them what to do. It’s part of who and what they are. They put the Xanti in that role because they had no one else.

  “In return, the Xanti taught them to be paranoid and brutal, which went against everything the Doftles believed in. That, and being drenched in massive doses of Chaos combined to shatter their sanity.”

  “I could almost feel sorry for them now,” Kai said with a grimace.

  “Yes, almost,” Jay agreed. He met Vari’s gaze. “You believe your best chance of stopping them is to find the Colony.”

  “Yes, that’s exactly what I believe.”

  “The universe is a mighty big place, Miraku,” Declan said. “How can you ever hope to find a single entity despite its size?”

  “That’s why I needed to speak with Salene,” she replied. “Some of the images Rodnil showed me were of the mass abduction of the women of Kinah. That event occurred about nine thousand six hundred years after the Doftle and Xanti had united as allies. Even after all that time, the Doftle were afraid to go near that part of our galaxy, and resisted it as strenuously as they could without exposing their fear. The Xanti insisted, and since the Doftles had placed them in control, they had no choice but to obey.”

  “Why were the Doftles afraid?” Declan asked.

  “Because Kinah is very close to the Doftles’ home star system, as such things are measured. The last thing the Doftles wanted to do by then was encounter the Colony.”

  “Why?” Jay asked.

  “Because they’re insane, but not stupid. They knew the Colony would take one look at what they’d become and destroy them outright.”

  “Wait…what?” Declan asked, sitting up straight again, his eyes fixed on Vari’s. “The Colony can destroy the Doftles?”

  “Can, and will,” Vari said. “At least, that’s what Rodnil believed. I got the impression from him that they could do so with very little effort, too. He also said that finding the Colony was the only way to stop the Doftles.”

  “So if we find Kinah, we’ll be close to the Colony.”

  “Relatively speaking, yes. I’m hoping that if we can get that close, another chunk of information will tell us where to go next.”

  “That’s why you told Salene you want to do this.”

  “In large part, yes. There’s also the inescapable fact that there’s a world of males out there who are in desperate need of females. It hits a little too close to home to ignore.”

  “There’s no arguing that,” Declan said. “You’re right, Vari. We need to find Kinah.”

  “I have a question,” she said. “Why did our Princes choose you, and the Bihotza, to go in search of Kinah?” After looking at each other for a moment, they all shifted their gazes to her, the expressions on their faces unreadable.

  “After everything I’ve told the three of you, you better not tell me that there’s more to the Bihotza than is commonly known.”

  “But it’s true,” Declan said, smiling. “This time, however, it’s also true that we’re going to explain what we mean.”

  “Good.”

  “We have Blind Sight, as you already know. But that’s not the only Xanti device we have on our ship. The one pertinent to this conversation is something we call a Jumper.”

  Vari frowned as she ran through all that she knew about the Xanti, but she couldn’t remember reading anything about a jumper. She didn’t have eidetic memory though, so it was possible she’d just forgotten. Just as was about to shake her head and ask for more information, she remembered a brief passage from a report she’d read. Her eyes widened.

  “No,” she said breathlessly. “Really?”

  “Really what?”

  “Sorry,” Vari said. “I’m just a little excited here. Do you really have one of those door making devices that the Xanti had?”

  “Yes, we do,” Jay admitted. “It’s a closely held secret, of course.”

  “But…how?”

  “About five years ago we visited a world that had once been used by the Xanti as a depot for spare parts and equipment. We ran into a man who’d smuggled a few items out before the people destroyed the depot and the warehouse after the death of the Xanti and their guards.

  “On a hunch, we purchased what he had even though we weren’t sure what any of the devices were. We brought them back to Jasan and Dr. Davis helped us figure them out.”

  “What did you get?”

  “We got one fully functional Blind Sight unit which is installed on the Bihotza,” Declan replied. “We got a couple of devices that boost our speed significantly, though only one of them was operable. The council attempted to reverse engineer the other one, but like all Xanti technology, tampering with it caused its memory boards to erase themselves.

  “We got three Jumpers, which is what we call the device that creates doors. Of those, again, only one worked. It was still in its shipping crate and hadn’t even been opened. The other two not only didn’t work, but were also missing parts, though it was determined that there were enough parts between them to make one operational unit. If ever a way can be found to do that without wiping the memory boards.

  “There were also three devices which allow other ships…ships that don’t have the Jumper, to open and close the created doors. We have two of them. The council has the other one locked away for safety. Like the other devices, they’ve been afraid to tamper with it.”

  “So we can jump our way across the galaxy,” Vari said. “That’s amazing.”

  “We’ve experimented with the device,” Kai said. “Very carefully, as you might imagine. It’s fairly simple to use.”

  “That’s not surprising,” Vari said. “The Xanti were extraordinarily cunning and devious, but they weren’t nearly as intelligent as everyone thought. The Doftles did most of their thinking for them.”

  “We’re starting to get that,” Jay said. “The problem with using the Jumper in unknown space is that we don’t actually know where anything is, which is why it’s called unknown space. We don’t want to jump into something. Like a planet, for example.”

  “There aren’t any safe guards to prevent that?” she asked in surprise.

  “If there are, we have no way of knowing it since we don’t have a spare one to experiment with.”

  “What does that mean for us?”

  “It means we can jump, but only to points we’re able to determine are clear of obstacles.”

  “That’s not so bad,” Vari said. “You can see a long way in space.”

  “Yes, you can,” Declan said. “What else did Rodnil show you?”

  “Nothing that I’ve processed yet. It’s a little frustrating to know there’s a lot of information that I can’t access in my own brain, but as I’m neither dead nor a zucchini, I can live with it.”

  “Zucchini?” Jay asked.

  “Vegetable.”

  “Ah.” Silence fell for a long moment.

  Declan pushed his chair back and stood up. He turned around, bent down over Vari and lifted her into his arms.

  “What are you doing?” she asked in surprise.

  “Taking you to bed,” he said. “It’s time for dessert.”

  Chapter 14

  “Even though the destruction of Xantara wiped out their entire race, we’re still being plagued by the Xanti,” High Prince Garen said after the recording ended.

  Vari sipped her coffee and said nothing. She was so glad she’d thought to ask for the previous day’s discussion to be recorded so she didn’t have to repeat everything, but at the same time, she hated watching herself on a vid screen. She was glad Jay had remembered to edit out the more personal portions of their conversation, too.

  She barely listened as the men talked, letting her mind wander to what was coming next. She grimaced to herself when she realized she had a lot of packing
to do in her future. It was the one thing she disliked about traveling, which was why she always traveled light with as few items as possible.

  Even with the Jumper, they’d likely be gone many months. Possibly a year or more. She was going to need more than one pair of jeans and a kevlex outfit. In fact, she’d probably have to go shopping for more clothes.

  It was ironic that she’d spent her entire childhood wishing she could go shopping, only to discover she disliked it intensely. It wasn’t the activity itself that bothered her. It was the overwhelming abundance of choices. Her life was complicated enough. Worrying about what clothes to put on seemed ludicrous in comparison. She wanted to look nice as much as any other woman. She just didn’t want to spend a whole lot of her day working at it.

  “We received a message from Salene yesterday informing us that she’d put her foot in things where you’re concerned, Vari,” Garen said, startling her with the sudden change in topic.

  “If you mean she told me about Nia after I twisted her arm a few times, yes, she did.”

  “I don’t like it,” Faron said. “I know you’re no longer a child, but I don’t think that’ll matter to the shadow people.”

  “The only shadow person I plan on talking to is Nia, Ata, and I don’t think she’ll spread the word. Even if she does, it’s a risk I must take.”

  “Why?” Dav asked. “I understand why the Colony must be found, and I understand why you need to be the one to find them. But why not use the information you got from that Doftle to find the Colony? There’s no reason for you to open yourself up to the shadow people again. And please don’t tell me it’s for Kinah. I want to help them too, but not at the expense of your life.”

  “I tried getting the information from my head, Dede,” Vari said patiently. “As far as I can tell, I can’t access information until I need it and, apparently, I don’t need that right now. If we don’t get help from Nia, we might as well just sit here and wait to see what happens next.”

  “Are you saying that without Nia to guide you to Kinah, you won’t find the Colony?” Faron asked.

  “Yes, Ata, that’s what I’m saying, and the Eternal Pack agrees. I have to do whatever’s necessary to find the Colony because they’re literally our only chance.”