Another glance over his shoulder and Zentz began a wet, ragged breathing that Rico could hear a dozen meters away over the surf. He placed his back tight against Nevi's.
"Shit, Nevi, a head that grows a body," he whined. "Let's get back to the foil."
"Shut up."
Nevi stopped and looked over the scene behind Snej. It was nearly the same view that Rico had: black rocky stretch of beach between the tide and the cliff, a cluster of large basalt boulders and a foil draped with the wet shards of an unexploded hylighter. In the downcoast distance the great expanse of sea glowed like green lava against the black cliffs.
"Where are they?" Nevi asked her. "I want them."
A two-toned whistle told Rico that the Zavatans were in position to rush the two men. He noticed that his illusion of Snej didn't cast a shadow.
Don't think I can manage that, too, he thought. Talking will be enough of a challenge.
Her shadow melted from her feet on the hylighter skin to where it met the beach, no more. It lay parallel with the other lengthening shadows of the day, but amputated at the rim of the skin. The tide already rushed the edges of the image, breaking up the light. With luck, Nevi wouldn't notice.
Rico smiled, concentrating on Snej, and quickly thanked Avata in the back of his mind.
"Put your weapons down," Snej said. "It is finished."
But no sound came from her lips.
"Shit!" Rico muttered.
Zentz responded with a burst from his lasgun. It came so fast that it startled Rico out of the illusion and it pulverized a rock just a meter in front of him. Avata brought the lost image back. Nevi fired, too, advancing them another step.
"It's not real," he told Zentz. "Watch yourself."
"Maybe we're dusted," Zentz said. "All this hylighter cra..."
"Ever know two dusters to share the same hallucination?" Nevi asked. He stopped a pace from Snej, squinting.
"Something's not righ..."
Rico held his breath. If Nevi stepped across the plane of the image, he'd see Ben and Crista, and Rico wouldn't be able to see Nevi. The entire area over the downed hylighter became a dome of imagination, a hypnotism of light, a life sculpture.
***
There must be a threshold of consciousness beyond which a conscious being takes on the attributes of God.
- Umbilicus crew member, Voidship Earthling, from The Histories
Mose's eyes were open so wide that he looked even smaller to Twisp than he had when a refugee band had carried him in half-starved ten years ago. Memories - they kept him from the kelp as they drew Kaleb. Twisp had watched the struggle for nearly a quarter-century. The kelp must be like a drug to Kaleb.
Not the kelp, Twisp thought. The past.
Twisp knew, too, how the kelp always drew him to a particular part of the past, a particular year, a particular woman. Twisp had thought her the most beautiful woman on Pandora. Later, after Flattery and the others had been removed from the hyb tanks, Pandorans got a look at unmutated humans for the first time in over two hundred years.
They were all so testy about being clones, Twisp recalled, when "clone" wasn't even something you could see.
He remembered the bitter ceremony, with Raja Lon Flattery presiding, in which the hyb tank survivors purged the telltale "Lon" from their names forever. It was done with a ridiculous solemnity, and did not bestow on Flattery's people any of the attributes that Pandora demanded of them: better reflexes, more intelligence, teamwork.
"What they didn't tell you in school," Twisp told Mose, "was that Flattery couldn't control Kareen Ale. She was killed, like Kaleb's parents, by Flattery's death squad. She was the first victim. There are those who believe it was Nevi himself who did it. Shadow Panille was head of Current Control in those days. He was in love with Kareen Ale. The combination killed him, too. He was my friend."
Twisp's voice barely rose above a whisper.
"I quit searching the kelpways, finally. I prefer my memories the way they deal themselves out. The kelp keeps them too true. Memories are not the drug for me that they are for some. I prefer to go to the kelp for the now, not the then."
"The kelpways would pink my wattles mightily, Elder," Mose said. "The blue dust takes me to my heart and leaves me there sometimes. I don't know where it would leave me in the kelp."
"With the dust, you face your own conscience," Twisp said. "In the kelp you face the conscience of us all. That does pink your wattles, all right. It demands truth, and singularity of attention. One is easily lost in the cruel maze of someone else's life. Kaleb has learned to filter the kelp as we learn to filter our senses."
"What will he find in there, Elder?"
Twisp shook his head.
The red, green and blue lights intensified and their flicker quickened until the cavern was awash with light. The borer workers left their machine to stand at poolside with the others who gathered in wonder.
"I have heard of this," said one, "but never have I seen the like."
"Not even his mother, the great Scudi Wang, was such a one," said another.
Twisp found it difficult to hold back the torrent of words that memory triggered at his tongue. Memories - they kept Twisp out of the kelp, just as they drew Kaleb inward. The kelp was like a lifeboat to Kaleb, an anchor to Twisp.
A strange mist coalesced above the top of the pool. Every atom in the cavern became charged with a visible hum, and everything above the waterline glowed in a cool green haze. Half-formed images - fragments of someone's past - flickered in and out of the haze. Twisp saw fire and a baby at the breast, a memo to Captain Yuri Brood, the brown, sensual curve of a wet breast in candlelight. It was a tumble down a soundless tunnel, just the slosh and thlip of the sea accentuating the drift.
Twisp had the sense of reliving something, of deja vu without the vu. He heard a voice out of the mist, a woman's voice.
"He will contact one of the upcoast Oracles," it announced, "there is news of Crista Galli and the others. Through me Kaleb will meet my son, and through him, Raja Flattery. He will explore Flattery's inner being. Without secrets he cannot rule, and with the kelp there are no secrets. Kaleb will pick up the DNA path that leads to Flattery's hatch. Avata will transmit what he sees there throughout Pandora."
The whole cavern had become the stage for a giant holo projection. Soon, the babble and squall of life that went with the images swelled in the background. The mist had become a whirling ball of color and sound, its movements jerky and confused.
"Kaleb must focus his attention," Twisp said. "It is easy to get lost following the maze of someone else's life. He must filter Avata as we filter our senses. Then we will have a plan."
***
One who withdraws oneself from actions, but ponders on their pleasures in the heart, such a one is under a delusion and is a false swimmer of the Way.
- Zavatan Conversations with the Avata, Queets Twisp, elder
Flattery took his afternoon coffee in the Greens, enjoying an impromptu stroll among the orange-throated orchids. They clung to the rock clefts deep in the cavern, their blossoms a pastel cascade. Condensation drip-dripped its paltry rain on leaves and wet rock, on the great flat surface of the pool.
Kelp lights surged bright in the pool, reflected in from the nearby bed. He paused a moment. This was something different, and the kelp, like Flattery, seldom did anything different.
Flattery turned on his heel and dog-trotted back to his command bunker.
"I ordered this stand of kelp pruned," he snapped, and jabbed a finger seaward for emphasis. "I want it pruned now."
Marta snapped something into her messenger.
"Not good enough," Flattery said. He signaled his personal squad.
"Franklin, see that it's done. Use the mortar unit down on the beach."
"Aye, aye."
Franklin carried a pouch at his waist. Inside were the sandals, papers and diary of the first man he'd ever killed. He said he was saving them for the man's family, they would want them
. Franklin slipped with a warrior's shadowy ease out the hatch.
"We can't loosen up, now," Flattery told Marta. "Everything will go perfectly if we don't get careless. That kelp bed is our only back door. We need it secure now. Do you understand my concern?"
Malta nodded, then sighed.
"Well," she said, "I have some concerns of my own. Strange things are happening to communications." "What kinds of 'strange things'?"
"Random transmission sources of high-speed images, hundreds of sources, strong ones, and they seem to be all around us."
"They are all around us," he hissed. "That kelp. Well, we've taken care of that. Damage news, Orbiter news, Crista Galli news?"
"Nevi and Zentz have landed. They spotted the Galli girl and Ozette and anticipate no problem bringing them in."
"LaPush?"
"Snatched by the kelp. The pilot was caught in our charges, condition unknown."
Snatched by the kelp!
All this kelp talk was making Flattery nervous. He caught himself running his sweaty hand through his hair. Aumock's gaze caught his own, and he knew that his guard had seen that moment of fear.
"Kelpways secure?"
"We think so," she said. "We -"
"You think so?"
"Brood's squad is aboard the Orbiter. No further reports. The Holovision Newsbreak that was scheduled from the Orbiter did not air."
"We're on auxiliary power," the colonel interrupted. "Failure at main plan... shit, it's no wonder that these troops got through our security. They are our security. "The Reptile Brigade,' we called them. Shit."
"Does that mean a 'Code Brutus'?" Flattery asked.
The colonel shook his head.
"No, Director. This is an isolated unit of troops, here. Their objective was the power station and now that they've taken it we expect them to defend it."
"Defend it?" Flattery raged. "They don't have to defend it, they blew it up! What would you do if you were them?"
"I'd - I'd know that I'd crossed the Rubicon," the colonel said. "Since there's no turning back, I'd head right for the top."
"Well, goddammit, take appropriate measures. Your ass is on the line here, too, mister."
Marta flagged his attention.
"I ordered sub coverage of the seaside entry doubled," she said. "I received no confirmation and don't know whether they heard me. Also negative messenger contact with the beachside mortar. The response we get is gibberish."
An icy panic tightened his stomach.
Not the kelp, he thought. It can't be that. It has to be somebody controlling the kelp. But who?
The likely possibilities came to two: Dwarf MacIntosh or the ambitious and resourceful Captain Brood. Crista Galli was an unlikely possibility. Suddenly Flattery felt the full impact of this interference.
We're cut off, he thought. Our whole strength was in coordination, and now we're cut off.
A rally was clearly in order.
"We got a little flabby, people," he said, "a little careless. This harmless little exercise could have cost us our butts, let's tighten up our action."
He'd caught them with their pants down, whipped them a bit, now he'd have to coddle them, comfort them.
"Reports on the bomb in the upper office just in."
He picked up Maria's messenger and held it over his head.
"Dick and Matt are alive, the rest didn't make it. May the perpetual light shine upon them."
They all responded, "May the perpetual light shine upon them," and drew a little closer out of reflex.
"It could have been us, folks. It could still be us if we don't tighten up. Consider direct orders the only secure communication. Information in, nothing out."
"Aye, aye."
Viewscreens and holo stages in his bunker began to flicker, barely perceptibly, then splashed high-speed displays of color throughout the room. Occasionally he glimpsed a face he recognized in the blur. It was his own face.
"What do we know about Current Control?" he asked.
His staff and guards stood transfixed in the surreal wash of color that visually drenched them all. They stagger-stepped to their posts, displaying the same disorientation that Flattery himself felt.
"Current Control turned the kelp in sector eight loose," Marta reported, "then it turned loose all the kelp worldwide. Sensors now indicate that everything's intact. The kelp appears to be online again. High suspicion for Gridmaster failure."
"Brood's mission?"
"No news. Holovision covered the launch site incident with a Newsbreak report on the deaths of the Tatoosh field crew 'at the hands of Shadow extremists.'"
The colors that dazzled the room remained as bright but their swirl slowed to a less dizzying rate. Flattery thought he detected a woman's voice, faint in the distance, somehow familiar. Almost as though she called his name.
"Continued fighting in food distribution centers," Marta said. "Too many looters to shoot. The usual 'we're hungry now!' crowd. Some of our people opened warehouses. All stores outside our perimeter have been breached."
That's thousands of shuttleloads of food, he bristled. That's my contingency, my lifetime Voidship supply.
"Dried grains to feed three thousand for ten years," he said. "Dried fish enough to feed fifty thousand. Add water, pat together and cook. Instant wine - add a package to a liter of plain water and stir. Bread and fish for the multitudes, water into win... if this Voidship could time-travel I could be Jesus Christ himself. Shit."
***
Consciousness, the gift of the serpent.
- Raja Lon Flattery, number five model, Shiprecords
A lean-faced security, armed with both stunstick and lasgun, blocked MacIntosh at the hatchway to Current Control.
"Halt!"
He motioned Mack and his men to stop, and gripped a handhold to keep his bearing.
"Obiter Command," Mack said, "who the hell are you?"
"Security," the man said, and emphasized his point with his lasgun. "Captain Brood has the details. We are under the Director's orders to secure Current Control."
MacIntosh pushed off from the bulkhead behind him and sprang the gap. A push to the shoulder and a spin to the wrist later, MacIntosh had both the stunstick and lasgun. The sputtering security was pinned head down against the passageway bulkhead by two of Mack's firefighters.
"You'll get the hang of it in a day or two," MacIntosh said, and smiled, "if you live that long. Whether you live that long depends on how much you tell me, right now."
"That's all I know," he said, his voice edging a whine.
"Airlock time," Mack said. His men tumbled the security down the passageway to the freight airlock adjacent to Current Control.
"No, no, don't do this," the security pleaded. "That's all I know, that's really all I know."
"How many in your squad?"
"Sixteen."
Mack opened the inner hatchway to the airlock.
"My information says different - how many came up on this load, and are there more already aboard?"
"It's just us, Commander. Sixteen troops and sixteen techs."
"Where are they?"
Silence.
"Airlock time, gentlemen," Mack said. "Let's decompress slow. Anything you might think of to tell us, you can tell us from inside the lock. We'll stop decompressing when we've heard the whole song."
As Mack spun the hatchdog closed behind the security, he saw a half-dozen more of his men step off the elevator in full gear. Mack twisted the dial that sent air hissing audibly from the lock. His prisoner immediately became hysterical.
"Shuttle crew is ours," he said. "Two troops, three crew stayed aboard. Holo crew was two troops, three techs. OMC crew was three troops, two techs. Current Control, four troops, four techs, counting myself and Captain Brood. The rest secured the Voidship. Please, don't let the air out. Don't put me out."
"Keep him inside in case I change my mind," Mack ordered. "We can add to our collection here as things develop. We need Brood so
we can find out what Flattery's up to. Hooking up the OMC, taking over Current Control and the Voidshi... sounds like things are going worse for the Director than he lets on. Maybe he's getting ready to take the Voidship for a little spin around the system."
The intruder code, a tone-and-light warning, flashed at all corridor intersections. It was a drill that Mack had never taken seriously, now he wished he had.
"Rat, you and your people take the shuttle. Barb, you work the Voidship and know it better than anybody here. Take Willis and his engineers. Remember, no lasguns. You have your vacuum suits on, use them. The rest of us will handle this little nest here. If Flattery doesn't trust us anymore, let's make it worth his while."
Mack knew that he had the edge over Brood as long as they met in the near-zero gravity in Current Control. Brood's techs might figure out the old hardware that ran Current Control, but the new organic hookups throughout the Orbiter and ship, grown by Islanders specifically for MacIntosh, might be a surprise. These kelp fibers bent light and encoded messages chemoelectrically within cell nuclei. This enabled kelp to bring light to the ocean depths and messages to the Orbiter. The switching speed and capacity of kelp hookups far outstripped any hardware that Pandorans had developed.
Too late, Raj, Mack thought. Current Control will never be the same.
Brood could only fail. In the time it would take his techs to figure out Mack's secret system they would all be grandparents.
***
The is is holy and the void is home.
- Huston Smith
Hot suns melted through the thick, post-squall mist to scorch the albino nose and exposed arms of Crista Galli. When an offshore gust caught the mist in a whirl it freshened her hot skin like silk. She had felt the whump of breakers in the surf beyond the fog and now she could see just how close the waves really came.
"Tide's shifted again," Ben told her.
He held her right hand but his voice sounded empty with distance, thick-tongued. He blinked a lot, and his motions were slow, exaggerated.
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