Dryland's End
Page 58
Azura had to ask several of them where he might find Lars’son. Ay’r followed his wanderings through the house and finally out a sleep chamber to a small terrace that commanded an unimpeded view of both beach and rocky sides of the island.
“Fine!” Lars’son gestured them to sit. He was naked save for a pair of briefs. Evidently, he’d been sunning himself. Ay’r noticed a Drylander youth in one corner, playing a musical instrument he had never seen before, who stood up suddenly and left the terrace. Azura remained standing. These little moments gave Ay’r the time to look over Creed Lars’son. Another racial genotype, of the extreme Caucasoid type, but like the Drylanders, he was tall and lean and blond; his long, straight flaxen hair burnished by sunlight with gold and silver. His eyes were the same ice blue that Ay’r had seen among Monosilla folk, but his features were defined much more sharply.
What most set Lars’son apart, Ay’r instantly calculated, was that even though he must be close to 600 years old and here on his own sleep chamber terrace, sunbathing and being serenaded, he still retained a sense of power in repose, of the ability to leap into instant and utterly committed action.
“Fine! Fine!” Lars’son repeated. “Zhon Azura has seen to all of your desires.”
“Yes, completely.”
“And you’ve seen your father?”
“Briefly, yes.”
“And he’s told you all about the Greater Plan?”
“Azura did, but not entirely. You’re to tell me the rest.”
“What do you know?”
“I witnessed an abduction in Bogland,” Ay’r said. “And one of my companions was implanted. But I didn’t know what for, until now.”
“And now that you do?” Lars’son smiled: strong, long white teeth. Most of them originals. Without waiting for an answer, he went on, “We knew that someone was here. But we scarcely suspected that it would turn out to be you!”
“I think it’s wrong: the abductions, the implants,” Ay’r said.
“Even though those who become Islanders possess advantages they’d never dream to possess? Even though they are brought up to current galactic standards of Ed. and Dev.? Even though they’re happy?”
“Yes.”
“I’m not sure you’re aware of everything we happen to know about this lovely planet,” Lars’son said.
“If you’re talking about the coming disaster, yes, I’m aware of it. We experienced the Night of the Four Moons at the observatory.”
“You have managed to get around!” Lars’son seemed impressed. “The more Drylanders we take, the more will be saved. However, we can’t save them all.”
“What about the women and children?”
“Some children will be saved. We’ve stepped up our activity. But it was long ago certified that male youths possess the complete stock of seeded genes. As far as that goes, we’ve already saved the Drylanders.”
“How? Your shield can’t last forever – not against the continued onslaught which we predict will occur.”
“The islands aren’t attached. They move. We’ll move to the safe areas.”
“Even so, it won’t be enough!” Ay’r insisted.
“No! You’re right. We’ll have to leave Pelagia.”
“How? In the Fasts you came in?”
“We’ll use the Fasts we arrived in, yes. But we’ve been outfitting two old Bella=Arth. weapons freighters we chanced upon outside of this system in our explorations. I suppose they were abandoned during the war. Their crews must have committed suicide around the time of the end of the nest cities on Deneb XII. It took us days Sol Rad. to clear out their dry and emptied husks.”
“Which means you have room for how many?”
“Two thousand.”
“Why don’t we help you? We’ll go back and get larger Fasts. That way, we can save all the Drylanders.”
“Think about that, Ay’r. Think about the problems involved after we’ve saved them. Without the kind of Ed. and Dev. we’ve provided for those who have become Islanders, most of them would disbelieve you, flee from you. And those who did opt to come along, how many of them would be able to adjust to so totally changed a life, on a new planet?”
“The family I traveled with accepted change.”
“’Nton Ib’r’s family. Splendid stock. But, Ay’r, they would. As would a few more families we’ve kept our eyes on, all of them in the high mountain valleys. You’re a Species Ethnologist, you must know how difficult it is to uproot Humes from one spot to another on the same continent or world. How many generations are needed for the change to settle in? How many die simply of exile and heartbreak. And, anyway, if you did help, what does that mean, exactly? Who would be helping, Wicca Herself? She’d never help us.”
“She’d help the other Drylanders,” Ay’r argued. “Alli Clark would persuade her.”
Lars’son seemed to be considering. “It could only be done after I was certain that our people had gotten off Pelagia safely. And that might not happen until after much of Dryland is already suffering catastrophe. I’m sorry, Ay’r, but my first duty is to –”
“The Greater Plan! I know.”
“To our people, was what I intended to say. To our spouses and children.” Lars’son tried to soften it. “Even so, we will have come away with ten times the number we arrived with. And the seeding stock will remain intact.”
“It just doesn’t seem enough.”
Lars’son smiled. “You’re just like your father. How many times has he argued in exactly those words, and felt the same anguish you feel?”
“Let’s not close this conversation. Meet with my companions, P’al and Alli Clark. They’re both intelligent and thoughtful. Perhaps together you can work out something.”
“Fine. Fine! We’ll all meet together. Later on. Right now, I want just to talk about you.”
Ay’r still felt resentful. “What’s there to say? By the way, whatever experiment I may be, I’m really embarrassed by all this kneeling and ‘First of the Entire Men!’ business. Can it be stopped?”
“Put up with it just a bit longer. When all the Islanders have seen you, you’ll be able to relax again. At the moment, you’re a sensation.”
“What does it mean?”
“Didn’t they tell you? It means you’re the first Islander. The firstborn child ever of the surgical procedure technically called Relfian Vivipar-turition.”
“You mean my mother was like ’Nton? A man with a womb?”
“Your mother was the very first man with an functional womb.” Now it was all making sense to Ay’r.
“Then that’s why the Matriarchy couldn’t locate my mother?”
“Not if they were looking for a woman.”
“Because my mother was a male.”
“A man. We don’t accept MC derogations here. Humes are women and men ...”
“But ...” Ay’r was still groping. “Who? Which man?”
“I thought you would have guessed by now. Especially since through your newfound cosmetic technology, you’ve managed to bring your physical features back to what they probably would have been if your father hadn’t changed them to make you fit in better with your MC peers.”
And when Ay’r still didn’t understand, Lars’son stood up and gestured for Ay’r to follow him into the sleep chamber and into the bath, where one wall was a full-length reflector.
“I thought you would have known the moment you walked onto the terrace and I didn’t get up and kneel down to you. Look,” Creed Lars’son said.
Ay’r looked at the two men facing him, one taller and older and more sunburned, but otherwise ... deeply ... stunningly similar.
“Remember, Ay’r, I carried you inside my body four uncomfortable months. And every minute of those four months, I hoped and I feared.”
Ay’r stood there, thinking, either this is an elaborate hoax, or ...
“Is this true?” he finally asked.
“What did your father say?”
“He said to c
ome here. That you’d explain everything.”
“Well, haven’t I?” Then he added, “You’d better enjoy all this adulation. Until about twenty Pelagian years ago, you were absolutely unique in the universe. But now” – he stopped and laughed – “There! I did it!”
“Did what?”
“What else?” Creed Lars’son laughed. “I began talking like a mother!”
Chapter Ten
Mart Kell skidded to a near halt, then leaped and let the air-sandals whirl him along the curved walls of the fountains in the center of Connaught Memorial Park. All-night partiers from a local underground cafe (“Old Chips for New” had recently been a Cyber repair depot and now was the chicest club in the City) had come out for fresher air, and several of them applauded his grace and speed. Doubtless none of them knew he had to do this to gather enough velocity to get onto a particularly high ramp he’d need to shortcut him directly onto Power Avenue.
As he whirled, he half heard, half saw one of the Park’s holo-screens flash on with an Inter. Gal. Bulletin. He couldn’t stop for it now. His velocity was building right for the jump, just past that wall and ... he leaned over, straightened his body, then felt the whoosh of Hesperian night air on either side of his roller-visors as he took the leap onto the ramp. The air-sandals touched a half meter from the apex and Mart threw his body forward to help the momentum. He was over the apex and going down, and the whoosh of air was almost deafening, as it would have been blinding going at this rate if he hadn’t the visor on.
Power Avenue was as empty as it usually was, but he remembered passing an antique, enclosed holo-station somewhere along its length before. Yes, there it was, the news holo still on. He slurried to a stop, held his Plastro finger guards against the transparent wall and watched.
The scene displayed was Hesperia’s own governmental Fast port, and there were a half dozen City officials all but jostling for position to meet those emerging from the huge Fast that had just landed. Mart tapped on his own ear-set, kept tapping until he found the channel and listened as the announcer began.
“Acting Metropolitan of the Church of Algol is stepping out and being welcomed by Quinx Councilor, Eba’i Pore. A short while ago, before landing, the Interstellar Church Elders made a formal request for politico-religious exile status in Hesperia, and their request was granted. The Acting Metropolitan is about to speak now.”
The tall, elderly Maudlin Se’er, surrounded by a group of his black-robed, desiccated acolytes looked even more hollow-eyed than when Mart had last seen him. When he began to speak, the Se’er’s voice was carefully modulated, as only those superb orators knew how to, reflecting an entire range of emotion, from tragedy to determination.
“It grieves me to have to inform you that last night Sidereal Time,” the Acting Metropolitan began, “the Church of Algol lost its Thirty-Seventh Interstellar Metropolitan. Detained in a holding cell of the Matriarchal Council Headquarters upon Melisande, in the Regulus Prime system, His Holy Efflorescence, Gn’elphus the Second, took his own life in Ultimate Sacrifice.”
The old Se’er appeared to break down and slump. Several bony hands belonging to his followers reached out and supported him, and he cast a pietistic glance upward at the holo-cameras. From his new position, he continued in an even more broken voice.
“He had no choice... . Many hundreds of the Church of Algol have been arrested and imprisoned upon the Matriarchal Center Worlds – without provocation or cause! No accusations have been made against them, no charges raised, no explanations provided to the Acting Synod. In protest, His Holy Efflorescence took his life. The Church has asked for sanctuary for its officiating members.”
He tried to stand. Behind him, hooded Se’ers chanted, “Avenge Gn’elphus! Avenge his sacrifice!”
The Acting Metropolitan seemed ready to say more, but he found he couldn’t go on, and covering his haunted face with his hood, he turned away. The holo switched back to the Inter. Gal. reporter, a female Hume.
“The number of those Se’ers detained by the Matriarchy is not known but thought to be close to seven hundred. The precise reason for the arrests is also not known, although many diplomats believe that the Se’ers are being used as scapegoats for the many reported housing riots upon Matriarchal Center Worlds. A great many from the Church who managed to escape those planets are expected to join the Acting Metropolitan in seeking sanctuary in the City.”
Wicca Eighth! Mart thought. She’d always hated Gn’elphus, always hated the Se’ers, and now She thought She’d found a way to get rid of them. A foolish error. But then, She had made several errors recently as She felt control slipping from Her fingers. And doubtless, as Her desperation grew, She would make even more errors and possibly more disastrous mistakes.
But the worse She showed Herself and Her policies to be, the better it would be for the Quinx, for the City.
Mart tapped off his ear-set and turned away from the holo-station. He was late for his own meeting. He had to hurry.
A short while later he was on the ion-lift rising to the seventeenth-story main VIP suite of the abandoned Ophiucan. Starship Lines terminal. Once on the terrace, he removed the sandals, slung them over his shoulder, dropped his hood to uncover his face and hair, and removed his visor, making sure that Kri’nni could see him through the fluted iridium-glass doors.
Even though he’d only called this meeting a half hour ago Sol Rad., and had used an emergency code between them to do so, Kri’nni was already there, draped comfortably over a sofa and adjoining chair, viewing a porto-PVN and inhaling from her ever-present Soma pipette.
“I didn’t think you’d get here in time,” she said.
“Stopped to watch a holo. All about the Church of Algol!”
“The way I’ve heard it, whichever good little Maudlin Se’er ices Momma gets to be the new Metropolitan.”
“That’s a pretty high reward.” And Mart lifted off his Plastro-tunic.
“Sex? At this hour?” Kri’nni gave him her odd laugh. “I thought this was an emergency.”
“Not really. I just didn’t want anyone else to know anything about our meeting. Especially as I’ve got something new for you.”
Laced into the lining of the tunic he had removed was a long, sheer ultra-Plastro pouch. Mart ripped it out and dangled it over her pipette.
“A present? For me?” Kri’nni gurgled. Then, more seriously. “What’s in it? Delta Ophiucan Sopazine?”
“Better than that, Kri’nni. Halo-Zedrezine. Freshly degurged and pH-balanced for Bella=Arth.s.”
“Halo-Zedrezine? I thought that was just a rumor?” Although she did not let go of the pipette, two other palps itched forward to touch the pouch.
“It’s Mart Kell’s business to turn rumor into reality. Kri’nni, love, this is the reality. Halo-Zedrezine. From my own private Sopa-Farms on Zeta Ophic.”
One palp couldn’t stay away; it caressed the pouch.
“What strength?”
“Eighty-two. That about right for you?”
“I’ve been known to go up to eighty-four, but it will do. Why don’t I finish this pipette and ... care for a hit?”
“Not me. I’m still on duty.”
He watched her undo the pouch expertly – a job requiring at least two hands – test the drug’s texture, ooh a little, then slip the crystalline substance into the pipette. He was about to explain that a drop of any natural oil would mix it when he felt a quick knife edge across the skin of one shoulder.
“You don’t mind, do you?” she asked. “I’m a stickler for the old ways: I like to mix it with some of the seven essences.”
His perspiration and blood in this case. But because Kri’nni had used the underside of one palp with its natural anodynes, the long, thin, surface cut was already painless, healing as he looked at it.
She mixed with the pipette and sipped a little. “Nice.”
“Glad you like it. You’ve been very helpful to me lately, Kri’nni. Just wanted to pay you back.”
No surprise that Kri’nni knew where the City Fleet had gone to. She knew everything. Too much.
Mart watched her pipette draining the pouch. “I’ll be at Groombridge when I’m needed. Don’t worry. But I didn’t want anyone beside ourselves to know I was derelict of duty. Hence my use of our one-to-one emergency call.”
“I thought it might be something like you playing hooky, Mart. Still, there’s an eight-hour Fast jump between Hesperia and Groombridge. Any action there will be long over by the time you hear of it.”
The pouch was almost empty, and he still didn’t notice any effect on Kri’nni.
“No action should happen for twelve hours yet. Long enough for me to do what I have to do here and get back.”
“You seem awfully certain about that, Mart. Is there something I don’t know?”
“Not a great deal, Kri’nni. A detail or two. When I had Jon Laks send those turncoat Cybers to Cray 12,000, I had Laks prepare a microscopic tap for them to transfer. It was a calculated risk. The tap was located on a hair follicle of one of the turncoats, and there had to be physical contact between the two Cybers for it to work. But they turned out to be as eager to lay their mechanical hands on the traitors as Laks said they would be. And once the contact occurred, our little tap simply hopped over and attached itself to the other Cyber’s hair, and from there it worked its way inside and into a spot where it could be useful.”