Enough chairs ringed the table for everyone to sit down. A glass water pitcher and four exquisite glasses set with semiprecious stones sat on the table. Gleaner art.
After a short awkward silence, Jhailing Jim said, “Thank you for coming,” in a way that seemed to include them all, and then he focused on Jason and Yi. “How are you doing?”
Yi said, “Fine.”
Jason looked stubborn. “You mean without you? We’re fine.”
Jhailing countered. “Your training has been interrupted. Do you feel well?” Jhailing looked pointedly at Jason.
“I’m worried about Chrystal.”
“There is nothing you can do from here, and you cannot get there fast enough to change her fate.”
Jason’s voice came out clipped and cold. “I don’t have to be pleased about that.”
“Nor do I,” Jhailing replied.
Yi narrowed his eyes. “Aren’t there Next closer to the Deep? Can they help?”
“No.”
Even though Jhailing turned his attention to Charlie next, Charlie had the distinct feeling that the three robots were continuing the conversation they had started out loud silently. He couldn’t have explained why he thought so—perhaps something in the way they sat, or the way that Jason, at least, looked slightly distracted. At any rate, Jhailing turned to him and said, “Thank you, Charlie. When you didn’t show up on the Deep with Nona we were hoping that you’d come here.”
“This is my home. Of course I came here.”
“Lym is where we came from also; we share ancestors.”
Was Jhailing implying that the Next believed they had a right to Lym? A deep and profound anger had started crawling through Charlie’s nerves and he didn’t trust himself to speak.
The robot continued. “I asked Amfi to bring you quickly. We needed to speak with you before you go to Manna Springs, and before we do. All of the Next on Lym will be revealing ourselves shortly, and we would like to negotiate a peace agreement with you before that.”
The anger turned to ice. “With me? Why not the town leaders?”
The robot cocked its head at him, as if it were trying to imitate a human expression and failing. “Aren’t you still the ambassador for Lym?”
Charlie glanced at Amfi, who watched, wide-eyed. She nodded so faintly he wasn’t sure she did it on purpose. Davis was quieter and seemed to have turned inward. “Wouldn’t that be Manny?” Charlie asked. “After all, I have no particular authority here.”
“Sure you do,” Amfi said. “You are related to Manny, and you are a founding family. You’re widely acknowledged as the greatest ranger we have.”
“I doubt that.”
“Ask any of us.”
“I tolerate the gleaners. That doesn’t make me great.”
Jhailing interrupted the conversation. “There is no reason for anyone to know that you did not negotiate this with my counterpart from the Bleeding Edge.”
Charlie sat back in his chair, furious. It took a while before he could even parse through the implications. He had already talked to Manny and he hadn’t told him anything about a deal. But he hadn’t seen him in person. So he could say he hadn’t wanted to use open communications channels. Nona would know he hadn’t negotiated anything on the Satwa.
He might be in the best position to have this conversation. He knew a lot more about the Glittering than he had before.
He couldn’t lie to Manny or ask Nona to lie for him. “I might be able to get permission to negotiate with you.”
“There is no time. If you and I can’t talk, we will simply reveal our terms in Manna Springs in a few days.”
Charlie got up and paced. He’d have to leave the cave to call. What if he called Manny and Manny said no? “What’s the hurry? Why not wait a few weeks and negotiate with Manny?”
“There are many plans in motion. If they all wait for convenience, they will never all be accomplished.”
“What plans?”
“I am only able to talk to you about what will happen here,” the Jhailing Jim said. “Speaking of that is more than you and I can do well in the time we have left.”
Charlie stopped, looked at Amfi and Davis. A ranger and two gleaners. And maybe two people from the Glittering who used to be human. It wasn’t the right team. But what would he throw away if he refused?
The Jhailing said, “We want to share Lym with you.”
He should just shut up and walk out. This wasn’t diplomacy. It wasn’t in the open. And he really, really didn’t have any right to do this.
Someone had to do it.
God damn it. He paced all the way around the room before he spit out a question. “How long do you plan to be here?”
“We are not prepared to negotiate a specific time at the moment.”
“How many of you?”
To Charlie’s surprise, Yi spoke. “How many physical incarnations is a better question. For example, I have now met four Jhailing Jim’s, or perhaps three in four different bodies. You should negotiate over the amount of physical space on the ground.”
“Thank you.” So Yi wouldn’t allow him to make a major mistake. Interesting. “Can you explain what you want in those terms?” he asked the senior Next.
The robot didn’t hesitate. “We will need access to the spaceport and to be settled fairly close to your leaders. We would be happy to take the land adjacent to the spaceport to the west where it is empty.”
Charlie hadn’t stopped pacing. His feet shuffled softly on the rock surface, his steps unable to keep up with his thoughts. What would Manny do? He tried to remember the bones of conversations across the years, most of them about topics he hadn’t really cared for much at the time. “We need that land to expand the Spaceport. Can you pull up a map?”
He wasn’t at all surprised when one appeared in the air between them. He drew a circle across some flat land used for growing food now. It was some distance from the spaceport, but they could grow food somewhere else. “Will this do? I suggest you request ingress and egress between this place and the spaceport.”
Jhailing Jim stared at the map. “If we also get access to the water, and permission to fashion a seaport.”
Charlie drew his brows together. “What do you need a seaport for?”
Jhailing didn’t answer. “Our habitat will be walled. We will want a mixing zone—an area where we and humans do business together.” The robot drew a larger circle around the space that Charlie had just given him. “This will be big enough.”
“Will we be able to pass behind your wall?” Amfi asked.
Jhailing turned to her. “If invited.”
“Then that is how you can come here,” she said.
Charlie smiled. “And into Manna Springs. They are already frightened there, and they will want to know you won’t invade them.”
“We should have free access to the capital of Lym.”
Charlie stiffened. “I cannot give that. I may not be able to give what I have given, but I know I cannot allow you to live and move easily in Manna Springs.”
Jhailing sat down and smiled. “There will come a day when this feels like prejudice, and when these rules are taken down.”
Charlie glanced at the soulbots. “That’s not this day,” Charlie said. “You must also be invited into the restored areas.”
“There are some that we plan to mine.”
Charlie almost choked on the words he wanted to use to react to that. But Amfi had told him the Next had been searching the land for certain minerals. The demand was no surprise. He had to walk another full circle of the room before he managed to ask, “What places do you want?”
The list the robot started with was completely unacceptable.
“You may have two of those,” Charlie said. “Neville and,” he stopped, almost choking, “Neville and part of the Misted Rose Range on Goland.”
“We would also like three of the Palagi Islands.”
Charlie furrowed his brow. “Those are settled. The land
is all owned.” He shouldn’t be doing this. It should take far more time, and a bigger team.
Yi spoke up. “You can build your own islands off of Neville.”
Jhailing fell silent, and Charlie suddenly realized that they were almost certainly talking between themselves. Maybe they had been doing that the whole time. He couldn’t let Yi to negotiate for Lym. He didn’t know enough about it. “Look,” he said. “That’s going to be all I can convince people to allow. I can’t waltz into Manna Springs and announce that I’ve given up half of Lym to people’s worst nightmares.”
Everyone in the room stared at him.
“I can’t. I can’t even bring them this. This is all things we’re giving. What are you going to give us?”
“Why, the right to become like us, of course.”
Was it joking? “How about something we want, like free access to your starship technology?”
Yi whispered in his ear.
Charlie added, “And the information we need to develop navigation AI’s as good as yours.”
“No.”
His anger had built enough that he said, “I need a break.”
“There isn’t enough time,” Jhailing said.
“What do you mean?” Charlie asked. “What’s happening?”
“A Next ship will be in orbit within a few hours. We should finish this conversation and get to Manna Springs.”
Charlie stood up, pacing, restless. “I have no idea if I can even sell this deal, or if I have the authority to even have the conversation.”
“If not you, then who?” the robot asked.
“Damn it.”
Davis said, “Surely we can take a short break. We’ll be back soon.” He looked at Charlie. “Jason and Yi should stay here.”
Charlie nodded. If they could talk to the Jhailing, then they could let it listen. “I’m sorry,” he told them.
To his surprise, Jason answered. “I understand. We are no longer you.”
“But I appreciate your help very much,” Charlie said.
Davis led Amfi and Charlie out of the room and down a long corridor to an empty cavern hung with bright and colorful tapestries that depicted nature in one form or another. He noticed waving grasses decorated with small blue flowers, a mountain and sunrise, a seascape. “These are beautiful. Are they gleaner art?”
Davis smiled. “Some are generations old.” He looked proud.
Amfi came up to Charlie and stood very close to him. She took his hand in hers and looked up at him, her eyes full of gratitude and worry. “This is the most dangerous time for Lym in either of our lives. Perhaps ever. What you’re doing matters. Thank you.”
He stared at her, feeling an angry lump in his throat and sick to his stomach. “I don’t know enough to do this.”
“No one does.”
Davis observed, “The soulbots have thought of details that we would not even have understood we could ask about.”
Amfi asked, “How much do you trust them?”
“A lot,” Charlie replied. “But not completely.” He still paced, only now he had more room to do it in. “By the way, I’m certain that your captive is no such thing. He’s a guest.”
“He would have to get through three sets of doors to get out.”
“I bet it would take him five minutes.”
Amfi shook her head. “Don’t start beating your breasts, either of you. Everyone in this room loves Lym. This matters. The deals we make today will save lives.”
“And take some,” Charlie snapped. “Unless we can move whole populations of wild animals.”
Amfi looked at him calmly. “We can’t make the Next go away.”
She was right. He took a deep breath and turned away, trying to get composed, to think. The air smelled of rock and silence and ghosts who might have once lived here. “Okay. I know. Can we pull up a map? In there? One we control? I want a record that we can refer to in town.”
“Yes,” Davis said. “Is there anything else you need?”
Yes. Time. To know he had the authority to do this. To have anybody else here doing it, except that if he weren’t doing it, he would wish he was in here doing his best to protect the things he loved the most. What did he want? A thousand things. Manny. Nona to talk it over with. “I was just trapped on a spaceship for a very long time. I want sky.”
Davis led them out, and they stood between the rock wall and the waterfall. The roar of it calmed him, as if the water took some of his unease and stress and sent it plunging into the lily-lined pool fifteen meters or so below them.
He shivered in the wet air, grateful for the bracing cold. All around the valley, fall colors mixed with dark greens. The air smelled faintly of impending snow.
Droplets from the waterfall slowly soaked his hair as Charlie breathed and breathed and breathed.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
NONA
Nona stood beside Dr. Nevening, who shifted his weight from one foot to another with an air of impatience. She leaned over to him. “Are you okay?”
“We’re running out of time.”
Before she could respond, General Finlay bellowed, “Form a line. Form a single line.” Chaos ensued as captives tried to stay together and guards ordered them to separate. Nona stuck close to the front of the line, near Satyana and the Historian. The others were spread in groups of two or three and separated by soldiers. “Listen up!” the general yelled. “We’ve got word that part of our planned route might not be safe. We’ll be going a different way, which will take longer.”
The Futurist asked, “Why can’t we stay here?”
“There are far more people to protect you at our base, sir. We wouldn’t want to risk our future.”
Nona groaned inwardly at the awkward pun.
“Move out!” the general called, his two-word sentence sounding like it ended in an exclamation point. He stood by the door as the first of his soldiers filed out, and he was still standing there as she and Satyana crossed the threshold. Satyana hesitated for moment and caught his eye. “Thank you.”
He beamed.
As soon as they were far enough past him that he wouldn’t overhear, Nona whispered “What were you thanking him for?”
“Thinking I’m grateful and compliant.”
Nona laughed and felt a tiny bit better.
They walked, the soldiers’ boots making more noise and clatter than any of the captives’ shoes. Twice, Nona spotted moving ships outside of windows, and once she glimpsed a line of people outside of a ferry lock that they passed near. Since they were separated from the Historian, she stayed with Satyana. She lost her sense of direction as they walked up one corridor after another and passed from one habitat bubble to another. They were mostly in offices or warehouses. Occasionally, sunlight brightened a hallway through a bubble window, sometimes softened by a shade. Nona struggled to stay alert. Her feet had started to swell, and her thigh muscles ached from the unaccustomed exercise. She took out one of the energy gels she had purloined from the food table and sucked on it. It tasted bland and somewhat awful, but it helped a little.
It felt like they’d been marching all day, although it couldn’t be later than afternoon, since she still saw the sun through shades from time to time. They were in a long hallway full of doors to offices and storerooms when Satyana slapped her on the back. “Left,” she hissed. “Run!”
Adrenaline shocked her system and she obeyed, turning left, almost bumping into Dr. Nevening who held a very small stunner in his fist. He looked triumphant. On the ground in front of him, a soldier lay prone in the boneless sleep of the stunned.
To their right, a dimly lit corridor curved away from the wider one they were in. She sprinted for it.
The Historian raced ahead of her, faster than she had expected him to be. She had to work hard to stay on his heels, Satyana right behind her. Additional footsteps followed them, fleeing feet rather than chasing feet. They weren’t the same irritating thump of boots she’d been hearing the last few hours.
Pipes and cables hung above her head. They must be racing through the utility guts of a segment of the station rather than the living quarters.
Every breath felt like a knife in her lungs. In spite of the pain, Nona kept running, looking for someone familiar. Surely there was a plan?
The corridor opened up in front of them and became a cargo bay, filled with shadows and huge boxes.
Someone grunted behind them and fell, probably stunned. Fresh adrenaline drove Nona faster. Her breath screamed in her ears, a high wheeze.
Dr. Nevening stopped abruptly and she ran into him.
Hands grabbed her. Unfamiliar, a little rough. A voice whispered in her ear. “Run with me.” She couldn’t place it. A glance showed a man in a uniform, but not Diamond Deep military. She didn’t recognize him.
She and the uniformed man dodged cargo containers and maintenance bots. She made a flying count, catching glimpses of people as she ran. She was pretty sure there were six in their group now—all of the others must have been caught or gone a different way. She and the Historian and Satyana and three people in uniforms that she didn’t recognize.
They rounded a corner to the rumble of a low-throated engine. Her benefactor rushed her into a small ship behind the doctor, with Satyana behind her. The hatch slammed shut and one of the uniformed men started giving the ship verbal commands.
They took off with no suits and no safety lessons and no seat belts.
The pilot wore the insignia of Gunnar Ellensson’s shipping company.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
CHRYSTAL
Chrystal ran. She only knew a few routes on the ship: she had to turn and trust and calculate and hope. She tried a maintenance corridor, but it didn’t go far and didn’t have a second door. She retraced her steps. The corridor was still empty. She ran on, her footsteps almost soundless.
Two doors led nowhere but into offices.
Traps.
As she passed a corridor, someone shouted. She picked up pursuers. She left them behind shortly, but others would come, others who knew the ship better.
Surely she raced under and around cameras; she wasn’t fast enough to be invisible. The blue dress probably wasn’t helpful.
Edge of Dark Page 35
