The Starfarers Quartet Omnibus

by Vonda N. McIntyre

  “Where does she live?”

  “I don’t know,” Zev said. “But Satoshi’s house is over there, and it has a big bathtub.”

  Infinity looked very worried. “Damn, if people didn’t pay attention...”

  Infinity let his eyelids flicker, going into a communications fugue with Arachne. Zev felt a warm spot at the back of his mind that meant an emergency message. He grabbed at it, hoping it was from J.D. He glanced at the exterior planetoid image, which had followed him obediently into the lilacs.

  The emergency message was not from J.D.; it was the message Infinity had just sent to everyone on board, warning them again not to stay out too long.

  Chandra had apparently read the message, too.

  “You just told me that,” she said querulously, as Infinity led her across the field. Zev followed, pulling Satoshi along.

  With Zev helping Satoshi and Infinity helping Chandra, the cold little group reached the partnership’s house. Inside, the warmth of the air closed in around Zev but barely touched him. He wished he were bathing in the hotsprings where the divers lounged and played.

  Stephen Thomas sat at the kitchen table, wrapped in a red kimono, drinking hot tea. His wet clothes lay in a pile near the door, soaking one of Satoshi’s floormats.

  “I was about to come looking for you guys,” Stephen Thomas said mildly to Satoshi. Then Infinity came in with Chandra. “Christ on a toboggan, what happened to her?”

  “Is there more tea?” Infinity said.

  Stephen Thomas had already jumped up to get more mugs. He gave one cup of tea to Infinity for Chandra.

  Satoshi stared at the water dripping from his clothes and hair onto one of the floor mats he had made. He moved off the mat, but stumbled. Stephen Thomas steadied him, wrapped Satoshi’s hands around a warm mug, and held them there. With his help, Satoshi sipped the tea.

  Zev hurried down the hall to the bathroom, shedding his wet, cold clothing. By the time he reached the blue glass tub, the household controller had already responded to Stephen Thomas’s orders. Hot water gushed into the tub, and the rock-foam floor heated itself. He felt much better naked, with warm air folding itself around him, warm stone beneath his feet.

  Infinity and Stephen Thomas followed him into the big bathroom, bringing Chandra and Satoshi.

  “I got some good stuff.” Chandra sounded drowsy. Zev had heard her say the same thing before — when she nearly drowned in the divers’ wilderness, before he got her to the artificial lung.

  “Don’t go to sleep!” Infinity chafed Chandra’s hands. “What you almost got is frostbite,” he said. “Not quite, but close.”

  Stephen Thomas helped Satoshi into the big tub. Infinity turned Chandra toward it, too, but she held back.

  “I don’t like water,” she said.

  Zev jumped into the tub. The hot water stung his chilled feet.

  “It’s okay, Chandra,” he said. “Remember? You were okay when you swam with me.”

  He took her cold hand and drew her forward. She resisted, then relaxed and came to him and stepped delicately over the rim and into the water.

  The tub was more than big enough for three people. Maybe land people liked bathtubs they could nearly swim in. That seemed strange to Zev, to want to be in a place not quite big enough for swimming. He gave up trying to figure it out, and let himself sink into the tub beside Chandra. She had stopped shivering. She held her teacup close to her face, breathing the fragrant steam.

  Lying between Zev and Chandra, but with his feet pointed the other direction, Satoshi was coming back to himself. Stephen Thomas sat on the edge of the tub, mostly covered by the kimono. Zev wondered how his changes were progressing. Claws had begun to form in the clefts where Stephen Thomas used to have toenails.

  “I don’t believe I said that stuff,” Satoshi said. “Sad for the little trees? God.”

  “You get confused when you get hypothermia,” Infinity said. He was the only one of them still fully clothed; he was also the only one of them who had spent time outdoors without getting soaked to the skin. He shrugged inside his heavy jacket.

  “Are you okay?” Stephen Thomas asked.

  “Yes,” Infinity said quickly. “Sure, why?”

  “You look uncomfortable.”

  “It’s too hot in here.” He let his eyelids flicker. “Esther and Kolya and Griffith are checking on people,” he said when he opened his eyes. “I better go help. Will you folks be all right?”

  “I think you got to us in time,” Satoshi said. “We’ll keep an eye on Chandra, though. Thanks.”

  Infinity left. It seemed to Zev that as well as being uncomfortable he was upset, but no one said anything about that. Stephen Thomas stroked Satoshi’s shoulder; Satoshi lay up to his neck in the hot water and stared into the steam; Chandra... who could tell, by looking at her, what Chandra thought or felt?

  Satoshi had not even noticed when Zev tried to tell him he was getting too cold, and that made Zev feel hurt. He let himself relax, took a deep breath, and submerged completely in the comforting hot water. His breathing automatically ceased.

  He was suddenly surrounded by splashes and shouts. He sat up again, spilling water over the side of the tub.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “I was afraid you’d passed out!” Satoshi said. “I thought you were going to drown!”

  “I won’t drown,” Zev said. “It’s warmer, okay?”

  “Okay,” Satoshi said doubtfully.

  Zev took Satoshi’s hand, and submerged again, keeping hold so Satoshi would know he had not died.

  o0o

  J.D. gazed through the Chi’s transparent wall. Nemo’s planetoid had expanded from an obscure point of light to a perceptible disk. The stars spread out beyond it, a field of colorful, dimensionless points. The starship was a shape of variegated light and darkness, approaching fast. It looked different from when she had left.

  J.D. glanced toward its image; she asked the Chi for magnification.

  “Omigosh!”

  The surface of each silvered crater no longer lay concave within the rock, but had swelled into a hemispherical bulge. Only the one J.D. had entered remained in its original shape.

  Messages flew back and forth and around Starfarer, within Arachne, an excited whisper in the background of J.D.’s mind, as her colleagues discussed the planetoid’s changes, noticed new ones, and speculated.

  “Nemo!”She sent the communication direct, without thinking or worrying about it, without the usual hesitation of direct contact with another being.

  “I am here, J.D.”

  “Your ship — your body... it’s changing.”

  “My body is changing,” Nemo agreed.

  “I’ll be there soon.”

  “I am anxious to see you.”

  The Chi closed in on the worldlet, spurred by J.D.’s anxiety, edging close to the safety limit of its fuel supply.

  Chapter 12

  The Chi landed near Nemo’s crater. The tunnel extension remained, lying relaxed on the ground. It rose like a snake and fastened itself around the airlock. J.D. waited impatiently for the lock to cycle. As soon as it opened, she hurried into Nemo’s warm, caustic air, plunged down the slope, and followed the intricate path by memory and scraps of the lifeline.

  Eagerly, she anticipated the touch of Nemo’s speech through her new link. She could almost, but not quite, recreate the multidimensional spaces Nemo had shown her. She reached for them, tantalized; they remained just beyond her grasp.

  “Nemo, I’m coming.”

  “I am anxious to see you,” Nemo said again.

  She burst into Nemo’s chamber, into warm bright light. Her throat burned.

  Everything was silent, motionless. The silken sacs bulged, waiting. J.D.’s LTMs perched halfway up the surrounding curtains, watching, recording, electronically probing the plump and iridescent chrysalis.

  J.D. moved cautiously toward Nemo’s shell. The single free tentacle twitched, its fur standing out, ruff
ling, smoothing itself.

  “I’m here,” J.D. said. Her comment spun off into a sleek new surface.

  Instead of words in Nemo’s reply, she discerned a feeling of welcome and gratitude. She sank down next to the chrysalis.

  She waited.

  The chrysalis began to shift and churn. At first random, the motion evolved into a regular wave of contraction from back to front. A second wave began, opposing the first. The waves canceled each other, separated.

  The chrysalis alternated between stillness and slow rippling, like the tides, like birth contractions.

  The welcoming surface in J.D.’s mind quivered and fragmented, leaving emptiness.

  “Nemo?”

  Silence.

  One of the mother of pearl circles along Nemo’s flank dissolved. Iridescent liquid splashed out like blood. Tiny fringed appendages probed through the new hole. A small new creature pulled itself free. One after another, the pearl disks melted and dripped away. The creatures dragged their amorphous bodies from Nemo’s chrysalis, fell into the mother of pearl puddles, and writhed, splashing and squeaking.

  J.D. watched, amazed, frightened, wishing she could do something to help, wishing she knew the normal progress of the change so she could be sure that what was happening was right. Were the new creatures attendants, or were they parasites, feeding on Nemo’s flesh?

  The new creatures washed themselves in the liquid pearl; their bodies condensed and hardened like organic precious stones. They pulled themselves beneath Nemo’s twisting chrysalis.

  J.D. reached out spontaneously to grasp Nemo’s uncovered tentacle, but stopped with her hand just short of it, taking in its warmth. She was reluctant to cross the last millimeter, afraid her touch might disrupt the change.

  The opposing waves of contraction strengthened and met, meshed and augmented. Nemo’s chrysalis writhed violently.

  The shell burst with the high, tense scream of ripping silk. J.D. held herself motionless by force of will. Her heart pounded.

  The edges of the shell pulled apart, shredding and tearing, falling to the floor in ribbons of color. The opening exposed a dark, crumpled, angular mass.

  The single tentacle writhed and convulsed and lashed around J.D.’s wrist. It was as hot as an electrical wire with too much current flowing through it. J.D. gripped the tentacle and held it. She thought of comfort, reassurance. She had never borne a child herself, or attended a human childbirth, but she had witnessed an orca bearing her young one. The divers and the orcas had given her the privilege of sharing their joy. She hoped Nemo was doing the same.

  The angular mass moved. A bundle of sticks rose from the destruction of the chrysalis, drawing with them a fine film like a veined soap bubble, like the swimming webs of a diver’s hands. The sticks resolved into fan-shaped frameworks, several pairs emerging from the length of the broken chrysalis. The veins engorged; the skin lost its transparency, but its iridescence increased. Delicate scales of color formed a pattern as complex and seductive as the alien maze. The new wings were as thin as gauze, yet J.D. could stare into their depths forever.

  She broke her gaze and squeezed her eyes shut, disoriented.

  She was scared.

  If my instincts about Nemo were wrong, she thought, it’s too late now.

  She shivered, and repeated to herself: It’s my job.

  It was her job, and she could not change the way she approached it. Maybe eventually — maybe inevitably — she would regret leaving herself open. But for now she would expose herself to whatever Nemo chose to offer.

  The head of the new being emerged last, rising from the tangle of shredded skin. Iridescent facets of chitin interlocked to form its surface, glistening like the carapace of a beetle.

  But the eyes were Nemo’s, a ring of compound lenses protected by a mobile lid that opened, blinked, and closed halfway, languorous.

  Nemo’s wings stretched high above her, ten meters, fifteen, reaching to the roof of the chamber, brushing it with their tips. Five sets of wings, and at least one more trapped closed where Nemo’s body disappeared into the floor of the chamber.

  The wings fluttered. Dry now, they rustled like moths, and J.D. understood the name of Nemo’s species. Europa had thought the name an insult, but she had never known its meaning. Embraced and dazzled by the fluttering wings, J.D. felt sorry for the alien humans. They had accepted the judgment of Civilization. They had never given Nemo’s people a second thought.

  The knowledge both depressed and encouraged her. She had come into space hoping, perhaps, to find a utopian system that would magically rescue Earth from all its problems. At the same time, she feared perfection. She distrusted easy answers.

  There are no easy answers, J.D. said to herself. And Civilization isn’t the perfect organism Europa represented it to be. They may have the right to judge us. But they don’t have the right to judge us without appeal!

  “Nemo?”

  “I am here, J.D.”

  “I’m glad to have you back,” J.D. said.

  “I’m glad to be done with the change.”

  J.D. did not know what to say, because the change meant Nemo soon would die.

  The pearl creatures crawled out from beneath Nemo’s body, pulling with them shreds of Nemo’s shell. One snatched up a bit of the shredded chrysalis and shoved it into its mouth. The iridescent fragment crinkled like paper and disappeared.

  Like a horde of fuzzy ants, the tiniest animals swarmed up Nemo’s wings and groomed them.

  “I thought you were beautiful before your metamorphosis,” J.D. said. “And I think you’re beautiful now.”

  Nemo’s wings swept down, brushing J.D.’s face, and up again. They quivered, and the quaking sound filled the chamber with the sound of leaves in the wind. The wings were much more mobile than the wings of moths or butterflies; the articulated framework moved the surfaces like bird wings.

  The tentacle around J.D.’s wrist relaxed and drew away. She had almost forgotten it; she flexed her fingers and shook her hand to get the blood flowing again. Nemo brushed her cheek, her shoulder, with the tip of the tentacle.

  Creatures crept from folds in the floor, from pores in the curtains, creatures different from the attendants of Nemo’s previous form.

  A whole group of larger attendants, nearly the size of housecats, bumbled out. They looked like giant sowbugs with a mass of small, slender hind legs and a cluster of thick, pudgy-toed front legs. Each time one bumped into another they slowed, till they all coalesced into a pile.

  J.D. turned some of the LTMs toward the new attendants. She let her eyelids flutter, tapping into the transmission, hoping for more information than her own senses could supply.

  Her connection to the LTM link exploded, leaving her stunned and confused and frightened.

  The attendants scuttled around, multiple feet scrabbling and scratching on the floor in frenzied motion. They scrambled toward the LTMs and engulfed them, climbing over them, tumbling recklessly.

  Nemo’s pleading voice penetrated her disturbed link. “J.D., stop, stop.”

  All J.D. could think of to do was shut down the LTMs. They folded beneath the attendants, and cut off their sensors.

  The attendants fell away from the LTMs. From giant sowbugs to tentacled shrimp, they withdrew and returned to Nemo’s side.

  “Nemo, what happened?” J.D. was shaking. The dissolution of the link was too much like what had happened to Feral. “That’s how I watched your metamorphosis — I thought it would be safe for you!”

  “But, J.D., I am different now,” Nemo said, “and my attendants are different.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  She did not know what else to say. She locked all the LTMs — her attendants — on passive systems only, and set them to record.

  “What about my link to Starfarer?”

  Nemo hesitated. “It’s very strong, and very near...”

  J.D. got the hint. She sent a quick message back to Starfarer: I’m okay. But I’d better shut
down communication for a while.

  With a word of understanding and regret from Victoria, a yelp of protest from Zev, and a curse of apprehension from Stephen Thomas, J.D.’s perception of her link to Starfarer vanished into silence.

  “Did I cause you harm?” J.D. asked Nemo. “Are you hurt?”

  “I’m unhurt. But there’s not much time.”

  Nemo’s tentacle stretched out, wrapped itself around one of the silken sacs, and drew it in, slowly, painfully.

  “What should I do? Can I help?”

  “You may help,” Nemo said.

  J.D. hoped the obvious thing to her was the obvious thing to the squidmoth. She picked up the sac in both hands and presented it in front of Nemo. It was astonishingly heavy.

  “What happens now?”

  “I combine my genetic material with the genetic material of the juvenile parents of my offspring.”

  The single tentacle curled around the sac. Nemo’s head reared up, exposing a gaping, toothless mouth. Like a frog’s tongue, the tentacle drew the sac inside.

  “Nemo, what — ?”

  “I cannot speak with you now, J.D..”

  Nemo’s adult body was slender and mobile, unlike the ponderous squidlike juvenile body. The legs and the feather-gills and the rippling horizontal fin had vanished — transformed into wings? Or was that too simple an analysis?

  Nemo’s wings began to beat, in a wave from front to back. The motion of the wings eased the bulge of the sac through Nemo’s new form, expanding the translucent, peacock-hued skin before the sac, contracting behind it. The colors changed over the bulge of the egg sac, flowing from iridescent red through orange, yellow, green, blue, purple.

  The egg case hesitated at a second, smaller bulge in Nemo’s body, beneath the last free pair of wings. The two shapes touched, merged, engulfed each other; and then the egg case continued to move.

  Nemo’s wings fluttered faster, harder, creating a low, trilling whirr that filled the air. The giant sowbugs streamed from their congregation and surrounded Nemo’s body where it entered the floor. Using their front appendages, they massaged the egg sac and pushed it along. It disappeared beneath the level of the floor. The whirring wings relaxed, and drooped. The attendants fell away and crawled blindly around, undirected, slowing as they touched, till they lay again in a compact, pulsating mass.