by Elana Brooks
Time to get back to the main point. “Are you ready to see the rest?”
Miheel sobered. “Yes, please.”
Adrian launched into the third Memory. Miheel watched in rapt fascination as it played out. After it finished, he was silent for a long time.
Adrian didn’t want to rush him. He was trying to persuade Miheel to betray his own people and side with the enemy. That was a huge thing to ask There was a very real chance that if Miheel accepted, his actions would lead directly to his species’s extinction. Adrian couldn’t expect the Seraph’s decision to be easy, no matter how strongly his religious ideals might prompt him to accept. But as the seconds stretched into minutes and Miheel still didn’t speak, eventually he had to say something. “Well? What do you think? Are you willing to help us the way Gabeel did?”
Miheel’s tail lashed and his fins quivered. He looked away. “Tell me more about your people. Why do your electromagnetic transmissions portray you as body-bound and treat psychic abilities as fiction if some of you have access to the astral realm? The high-castes have always maintained that we would easily subdue any resistance you might attempt since it would be merely physical.”
Adrian bit back impatience. Of course Miheel would be reluctant to throw in his lot with humanity if they were doomed to lose. He launched into a summary of the Covenant’s history and the reasons they’d chosen to keep their powers secret. Miheel perked up as Adrian described how they were recruiting and training new members, but drooped again when he admitted how Steve’s false visions had fooled them and how far behind their preparations were from where they’d hoped to be when the colony ship arrived.
“So Commander Sarthex has already employed one strategy against you successfully.” Miheel ducked his head and raised his top set of fins, although he stopped short of covering his face. “Our leader is ruthless and cruel. He won’t hesitate to destroy you if he can. If I and the other Bleaters help you and he finds out, he’ll torture us physically and mentally before he kills us.”
Adrian spread his hands, feeling helpless. “I promise, we’ll do everything we can to shield you from discovery.”
Miheel lowered his fins. “I believe you would try.” But indecision still radiated from his mind.
Fighting to keep his voice calm despite his mounting desperation, Adrian said, “Is there anything else you’d like me to tell you about my people? Although I guess if you’ve been watching our TV broadcasts you already know a lot more about us than we do about you.”
“Our leaders only allow the lower castes to see a small selection of the transmissions. I suspect they choose the most unflattering ones.” Miheel hesitated, his fins trembling. “There was something in the final Memory you showed me. This matter of two of your kind… joining…”
“We call it a soul bond,” Adrian offered.
“Soul bond,” Miheel repeated thoughtfully. “The ones who did it became far stronger than they were before.”
“Yes,” Adrian said. His heart ached with the pull of his horribly stretched bond, and the back of his throat hurt with the knowledge that it would never be unstrained again. He prayed for it to last just a little longer. “Your people don’t make that kind of bond?”
Miheel drew back. He blocked most of his reaction, but Adrian picked up traces of disgust mixed with reluctant fascination. “Never. The idea is… off-putting. Even more so than the extensive physical contact between individuals your transmissions show. I mean, I know that’s how your species reproduces, but you treat it so… casually.” He waved his fins. “I did interpret the Memory correctly, yes? The ones who joined were reproductive pairs? Are all ‘soul bonds’ formed between such pairs?”
“Yes, the relationship has to be sexual. Or at least potentially sexual,” he amended, thinking of his own situation. “Although not necessarily one that could result in children. Same-sex pairs can bond, and infertile couples. Only lovers, though. Even really strong friendship isn’t enough.”
“That must be why we have no equivalent phenomenon.” Miheel seemed more relieved than bothered by the thought.
Adrian hesitated. He shouldn’t let the conversation get sidetracked. But maybe if he kept Miheel talking about neutral subjects for a while, it would give him time to get used to the idea of doing what Adrian asked.
Besides, he was curious. Ever since the Covenant had reached the conclusion that the Seraphim were physical beings, not spiritual ones, they’d speculated about their reproductive biology. Some theorized that the different sizes were different sexes, others that only males crewed the ships, still others that they were uni-gendered. Did they lay eggs like the reptiles they resembled, or bear live young like mammals, or employ some other system with no parallel on Earth? Now he had the chance to solve the mystery. “Your people reproduce differently than we do?”
“Very.” Miheel peered at Adrian. “I suppose if all you know of us is what you showed me, you wouldn’t have any way of knowing.”
“I’m not asking you to share anything secret, or private, or that would make you uncomfortable,” Adrian hastened to assure him.
“Don’t worry,” Miheel said. “I’m happy to explain.” He seemed relieved that Adrian was no longer pressuring him to commit to humanity’s cause. “In fact, I can show you, if you like. That will give you a much better understanding than anything I could say.”
Adrian wasn’t sure what he was getting himself into. He hated to waste time on inessentials when every minute he spent aboard the Seraphim ship increased his chances of getting caught. But their hiding place seemed reasonably secure. Miheel was clearly eager to share. The better Adrian understood him, the better he’d know what arguments were likely to sway him. And if Adrian survived to carry what he learned to the Covenant, the insight the new information provided might prove vital.
So he opened his mind to Miheel. “All right. Let me see.”
This time the Seraph established the mental connection. A vision bloomed in Adrian’s mind.
A vast crowd of Seraphim hovered near the surface of the ocean, rising to breathe and diving again. In the sky the sun was setting, staining the clouds with bright washes of pink and orange. A moon, smaller than Earth’s but brighter, shone full as it lifted above the opposite horizon.
A cluster of huge Seraphim at the center of the crowd began a deep, throbbing hum. It vibrated through Adrian’s bones. After several minutes the ring of Seraphim around them, a step down in size, joined in with a higher, harmonizing note. A longer pause, and the next ring added a new tone to the chord.
As the fourth ring began to hum, Adrian felt his own throat vibrate, and he realized this was a personal memory Miheel was sharing. The Seraph hovered in the midst of the throng, his whole body attuned to the music, a deep thrill building within.
Three more rings joined in, two large ones, the last just a fringe of tiny Seraphim with shrill soprano voices clinging to the edges of the crowd. The hum built and built, along with Miheel’s ecstasy and that of every other Seraphim in the circle, reverberating though their communal telepathy. As the moon reached a certain angle above the horizon, the hum reached frantic urgency, and Miheel’s body convulsed in orgasmic pleasure. A orifice between his lowest two fins opened and ejected a cloud of milky fluid into the water. All around, the other Seraphim did the same.
The hum dropped to a deeply satisfied purr, but didn’t stop. The Seraphim swam through the pearlescent waves, the rings wheeling slowly in alternating clockwise and counter-clockwise arcs, a grand stately dance. When Miheel reached a point a quarter of the way around the circle, the rings stopped turning and the hum began to rise in volume again.
The moon was nearly overhead. All the Seraphim fixed their gazes on it, frantic anticipation building again in their voices and bodies. This time the pleasure was even deeper and more urgent than before. As the mass orgasm hit, Miheel’s center two fins spasmed and an opening between them poured forth more milky fluid.
The hum faded, gradually dying away.
Miheel took a deep breath and dove beneath the surface, swimming through swirling, shimmering, moonlit clouds, twisting and rolling and writhing in a display of exuberant acrobatics. The rings lost their careful definition and Seraphim of all sizes mingled without regard for caste.
They danced for hours, until the moon sank and the sun emerged. Then the gathering broke up. Miheel swam slowly away, gradually congregating with other Seraphim of similar size as they headed for the city far below. They left the milky cloud behind on the surface, sparing it no further thought.
Adrian blinked as Miheel ended the memory. His face was hot, although he picked up no hint of shame or shyness in Miheel’s thoughts. It figured. If sex was something the whole community did together, it wouldn’t make much sense to regard it as private or embarrassing.
Miheel sighed, grief and longing heavy in his mind. “That was the last Spawning Ceremony before we fled. Even the strongest of the young conceived that night never came to awareness, never gathered to the Welcoming, never received castes and names. They all perished, still mindless wanderers, when the sun burst and the flames fell.”
Adrian opened himself to Miheel’s melancholy, putting aside for the moment any analysis of what he’d seen. He mourned with the Seraphim for everything they had lost.
Everything—if Adrian and the rest of the Covenant succeeded—they would never have again.
Chapter 29
After a while Miheel shook his head, dispersing his sorrowful thoughts. He turned back to Adrian with forced brightness. “Perhaps you might share a memory of your people’s ceremony with me.”
“Maybe sometime.” An image flashed through Adrian’s mind: the moon, Beverly beneath him, eyes locked, souls and bodies joined in surging ecstasy—
He stuffed the memory back behind his eyes, blocking it from Miheel. “Not now, though.” From the inquisitive way the Seraph looked at him, he suspected the creature had caught a glimpse, but thankfully Miheel didn’t pry.
The implications of what Miheel had shown him were starting to register. “No wonder soul bonding is such a foreign concept to you. Not only do you not mate the way we think of it, you don’t have any other family relationships, either. No siblings, no parents, no children—”
Adrian had to pause for a moment as grief jabbed him. He’d always thought he’d probably get married and have kids eventually. Then for a few precious days he’d pictured a future with Beverly. Would she have wanted children, someday when this war was over? It was a lot easier these days for an interracial family and mixed-race kids than in the past, but there would still have been challenges. He’d been eager to face them, to defy anyone who dared imply they shouldn’t be together.
Now all that was moot. He was going to die childless. He couldn’t even pretend their lovemaking might have resulted in pregnancy—astral sex was pretty foolproof as birth control. For Beverly’s sake he was glad, but at the same time he mourned what might have been.
“I’m only familiar with those concepts from your transmissions.” Miheel regarded him with kind but baffled curiosity. “Why does talking about them make you sad?”
Adrian groped for words to explain. “I thought I’d found the woman I would be with forever. We bonded our souls—that’s what made me strong enough to come all the way here from Earth. I fell in love with her. But she left me. She didn’t love me enough to stay.”
Hesitant compassion colored Miheel’s thoughts. “It’s painful to lose a friend. Although I’m not sure I understand you completely. Your pain is far stronger than I felt when I learned of Gabeel’s death, and we were the closest of friends.”
Adrian wished he would drop the subject. He felt completely inadequate to the task of explaining love to a species with no experience of it. He did his best to formulate the simplest explanation Miheel would accept. “Humans consider our relationships with each other extremely important. With the people closest to us, it’s like very strong friendship, but more. When you love someone, you care what happens to them even more than what happens to yourself.” He forced the words past a tight throat. “So for example, I’d rather die myself than let Beverly die. I’ll give my life to save hers if I have to.”
Miheel regarded him with something like awe. “Some of God’s prophets have spoken of such deep friendship. Any of us would sacrifice our life for the good of all our people, but to feel that way about a single other—it’s a very strange thought.”
Adrian laughed, feeling a little hysterical. “Yeah. It’s strange for us, too, even when we’re in the middle of it.” He shook his head hard. “Anyway. Fascinating as all this is, we need to focus on what I came here for.”
Miheel stilled. “I suppose we must.”
“So. Are you willing to work with us? I need an answer one way or the other.”
Miheel’s breath hissed in and out of his nostrils. Finally he said, “We have no other hope but your planet. Our supplies won’t last long enough for us to reach another.”
“I know. I’m sorry.” Adrian spread his hands. Despair threatened to choke him. His mission was going to fail, and he couldn’t even blame Miheel. If their positions were reversed, he’d refuse to work toward his species’s destruction, too. “We don’t want your people to die. If we can find any way for all of us to survive, we’re willing to work toward that end.”
Damn it, he’d done his best. But the task he’d been given was impossible. Even Rabbi Sensei couldn’t have pulled it off. The Covenant would just have to win this war without allies.
He deliberately made his voice and thoughts uncompromising. “But we won’t let you take Earth. We won’t let you add water to our oceans. We won’t let you kill billions of our people. If that means the Seraphim must perish, so be it.”
Miheel looked at him for a long time, his fins gently waving. At last he spoke. “We would react the same way if your people threatened our home planet.”
Adrian sighed and gave him a crooked smile. “Of course you would.”
Miheel’s voice strengthened. “Gabeel found a friend among your people. Now so have I.” He extended the tip of one fin toward Adrian. “If you wish to call yourself my friend.”
Adrian’s throat tightened, hope rekindling in his heart. “I would be honored to.” He reached out and lightly touched Miheel’s fin. The Seraph’s skin felt like soft leather tightly stretched over bone. “My friend.”
Miheel maintained the contact as he fixed Adrian with a serious gaze. “I don’t want to remain loyal to the leaders of my people, who would slaughter innocent beings and steal their world. I would rather take the part of those who defend what is theirs. My friend Gabeel did so, and I’ve long admired him for it. Now it’s my turn to follow the commands of God, not just in thought, but in deed.”
Relief swept through Adrian in a great rush. Even if he accomplished nothing else, his mission here hadn’t been in vain. But he pushed it aside. Much remained to be done if the Covenant was going to be able to take full advantage of Miheel’s decision. “I can’t thank you enough.”
“No thanks are necessary.” Trepidation colored Miheel’s thoughts, though Adrian could tell he was doing his best to project calm courage. “What do you wish me to do?”
Adrian smiled at him, projecting emotion along with the expression so Miheel would understand. “First, I need to contact the other two friends Gabeel recommended—Rafeel and Ureel. He said Rafeel was a doctor and Ureel was—something like a funeral director?
Miheel bobbed his head. Adrian wasn’t sure if it was a Seraphim gesture or if he was imitating the human one. “On our home world Rafeel was a physician. Here on the ship our bodies remain in deep sleep with little need of care, so he works as a life-support technician, maintaining the sleep tanks. When we emerge from our tanks his services and that of the other physicians will be vital, for a number of problems can occur with the transition back to full life. I’m sure Rafeel will be willing to listen to you and support your cause. In Bleater meetings he’s been vocal in deplo
ring our leaders’ actions.”
The Seraph rippled his middle fins. “Ureel performs rites for the dead. In our past there were other faiths besides that of the Bleaters, but it’s been many lifetimes since they faded away. Now most Seraphim believe nothing exists beyond the physical and astral planes. Yet still they feel it’s not right to dispose of the bodies of those who’ve died as if they were only another sort of waste. So we employ individuals to conduct ceremonies before bodies are consigned to their fates—at home they were given to the ocean; here they’re recycled, on the rare occasions when an astral from is killed or a tank malfunctions and allows its occupant to die. Bleaters are tolerated in the role of Ceremonialist, perhaps because the others sense that for us the ceremonies are more than just empty words. Ureel is the only Eel-caste on the ship who’s openly known as a Bleater. I don’t know how he’ll react to your request. He’s private in nature, not sharing his true thoughts or feelings with anyone. But Gabeel was his close friend. If he recommended him to you, perhaps he knew more of Ureel’s inclinations than I do.”
Adrian nodded as Miheel made each point. “Can you take me to them, so I can plead my people’s case?”
Miheel considered. “Rafeel is on second shift; he’ll be taking his free shift now. Ureel isn’t part of a shift; he sleeps until his services are needed. The only other time he wakes is to attend Bleater meetings. The next one is scheduled for two days from now.”
“Rafeel first, then. Can we contact him during this shift?”
Miheel flexed the curves of his body, sending Adrian a feeling of anxious resolve. “It will be risky, but I think we can. If we move through the decks and walls to the common areas, then disguise ourselves as individuals who have the right to be there now, we can likely escape notice. But we must be very careful to avoid our doubles. You can continue to appear as Fereel; we know he won’t be about. We must do nothing to attract the attention of the Order Police. They’d quickly realize we were disguised. I’d be sent to Corrections, and you—” He shuddered. “Likely you’d be taken to Commander Sarthex for interrogation and execution.”
