Thieves of Light

by Michael Hudson

  "I'm not afraid."

  "If you say so," Parcival said politely. "The important thing is that you remain calm and listen carefully to everything that you're told-"

  With a rush, Jarvis's mental logjam began breaking up. " From Earth," he sputtered. "A stupid thing-why would you say-of course you're from Earth! There's nowhere else to be from-"

  His voice trailed off as a great bulk moved into the doorway, blocking the light streaming through. Moving on two legs stout enough to have belonged to century-old birch trees, the inhuman figure stepped through the opening.

  Jarvis gaped. In size and appearance both, it was a monster, all teeth and scarred scaly skin and huge oval eyes. With its head thrust forward like a lizard, Jarvis could see the beginning of a line of rounded spines starting at its nape and continuing down its back. A thick muscular tail lashed back and forth slowly, the tip brushing the floor of the chamber with a sound like a straw broom on concrete.

  What it was, where it could be from-these were unfathomable mysteries. But the thing that puzzled Jarvis even more was that the beast was wearing what could only be called fatigues, sleeves rolled up to the elbow, legs tucked into thick-soled black boots. On the beast's right shoulder was some sort of insignia in electric blue and gold; strapped to its right calf was a brown-handled throwing knife in a scabbard.

  "As you're starting to realize, there are many subjects on which you're not fully educated," Parcival said with a sympathetic smile. "Christopher Jarvis, may I introduce Nar-lex-ko-li-hon, Sergeant of the Ninth Platoon of the Guardians of Light-and a true Photon Warrior."

  Jarvis stared at the alien, then at Parcival, then back at the alien. "I don't believe any of this," he said. "I was in the Photon Center, playing a match-"

  "This isn't play, Bhodi Li," Li-hon said. "The Photon-"

  "You speak English!"

  "You hear English," Li-hon corrected.

  This time Jarvis saw that the alien's stiff lips and dancing tongue moved like in a badly synchronized movie. Whatever sounds it really was making, he could not hear. If it's making any sounds at all "I'm not buying it," Jarvis said, shaking his head. "That's a costume, and this is some kind of trick. I don't know what you did to me in the Center, but it's not enough to make me think that anything like you can be real."

  "Where do you think you are, Chris?" Parcival asked before Li-hon could respond.

  "I don't know," Jarvis said, throwing his hands in the air. "Somewhere in the Center. A back room somewhere."

  "Would you like to go out through the door with me and see where you are?"

  A little tremor of doubt ran through Jarvis. "Yeah. Yeah, I'd like that just fine," he said nevertheless.

  "Li-hon?" Parcival said as though asking permission.

  "This is not the customary procedure."

  "He has to know, or we'll get nowhere. I warned you about that."

  "Very well," the creature agreed. "I will meet you in the chart room after."

  "Done. Come with me, Chris," Parcival said, turning and leading the way.

  Outside the chamber, Jarvis found himself following the boy down a wide corridor that reminded him of the tunnel in his high school between the boiler and utility rooms. Brightly colored tubes and conduits masked much of the ceiling. Some were transparent, with a viscous blue-green liquid bubbling through them. Some had side branches that came down the walls to what looked like high-tech fuse boxes with five-by-five grids of glowing lights.

  But even though he could connect what he was to things he knew, nothing he saw really looked familiar. "Are we in the basement?" he asked hopefully.

  "No," Parcival said, stopping at what seemed to be a blank spot in the right wall. He touched his hand to a diamond-shaped panel, and the wall opened up into another doorway. Glancing back first to see that Jarvis was with him, Parcival stepped through.

  "I want to know how you do that," Jarvis said, dogging the boy's heels. Then he stopped short, and his mouth went dry. The cylindrical room they had entered had a window-a wide slab of glass that divided the far wall in half.

  Except it couldn't be glass, because the view out the window was of the Earth.

  It was the Earth as he had never seen it, from hundreds of miles up: land and sea and cloud all gliding by beneath him like a NASA film come to life. Parallel streamers of clouds like white furrows cut across the sky, echoed by shadows on the multihued brown landscape. The light-colored shallows and sand bars showed up clearly against the darker ocean depths.

  "This is nuts," Jarvis muttered.

  "I hope you understand now-"

  "I'm on a spaceship? In orbit?"

  "Yes-a scoutship belonging to the Photon Alliance," Parcival said. "You were brought here from the Photon Center by a spacetime transporter link."

  "But things like this aren't real!" Jarvis protested.

  "You're being dense," Parcival said impatiently. "Look around you. Look out there. Don't you believe what you see? Would you rather believe you're crazy? Or that we're tricksters?"

  "But what's it all about?"

  "Sergeant Li-hon is waiting to tell you-if you're ready to listen."

  Jarvis looked away from Parcival and down on the Earth. It was all ocean underneath them now except for a string of three islands, each ringed by its own pale green atoll and capped by tiny white cloud puffs.

  It was real. It could be nothing but. And if it was real, then he was where Parcival said he was, and-hard as it was to accept-Li-hon was what he seemed to be.

  "I guess I'm ready to listen."

  Parcival smiled and clapped Jarvis on the shoulder familiarly. "I knew you'd be okay. Come on, then. Li-hon is waiting."

  "Just a minute. If this is all what it seems, what are you doing here? What's your relationship to the big lizard? Are you a prisoner or something? A toady?"

  Parcival laughed unexpectedly, and only then did Jarvis realize his pun. "I'm a Photon Warrior," the youth said. "Sergeant Li-hon is my commander."

  " You're a Photon Warrior?"

  "Yes."

  Jarvis shook his head. "Nothing personal, but there must not be much to getting in, then."

  Parcival's expression darkened. "It's lucky for you that it's me you said that to," he said tersely. "If you'd said it to nine out of ten Warriors, they'd have used the floor or the nearest bulkhead to wipe the smirk off your face. If you were lucky, by the time they'd satisfied their honor, you'd only have a few broken bones. Me, I'm not that sensitive to ignorant comments. If somebody's dumb enough to think that just because I'm smaller than them I couldn't possibly be a danger to them, that's fine-it gives me that much more edge if I ever have to kill them."

  Jarvis stared. "You mean it, don't you?"

  "Every word. Now come on-the sergeant's waiting."

  Parcival led Jarvis to a six-sided compartment full of unfathomable electronics consoles. The one object Jarvis recognized by its function was the small hexagonal table at which the alien sat.

  "Is he ready?" Li-hon asked Parcival.

  "I think so," the boy said, settling onto an open stool on the nearest side of the table.

  That left Jarvis the only one standing. He looked from Parcival to Li-hon questioningly.

  "Sit down, Bhodi Li," the sergeant said in answer to the look. He waited a moment until Jarvis had complied, then went on: "Bhodi Li, as we sit here talking, there is fighting on seventeen worlds between the Guardians of Light and the forces of the Arrian Alliance. It is a struggle that threatens all civilized worlds, including your own Earth."

  "Do you mean that there's seventeen planets out there with life on them? Seventeen different kinds of life?"

  "For the most part, the fighting has been confined to uninhabited worlds. In fact, it may be said that those worlds are what the fighting's about. But if the Arrians gain the advantage there, no one doubts that they will carry the fight to the home worlds of Light. And there are many more than seventeen home worlds. There are, in fact, ninety."

  Jarvis g
lanced sideways at Parcival. "Is this on the level?"

  "We didn't bring you here to lie to you," Parcival said.

  "Maybe-maybe not. Who knows about this?" Jarvis asked. "NASA? The government?"

  "No one," Li-hon said. "No one but those who have displayed sufficient skill to be considered for a place among the honored Guardians. You have been thinking of Photon as a game, and for those of average skill it will never be more than that. But for those with special gifts, it is an audition. The game is played, with variations appropriate to the native technologies, on-how many, Parcival?"

  "Twenty-eight," the youth supplied.

  "On twenty-eight worlds. Each time a player of promise enters the arena, his efforts there are recorded and studied-"

  "And when they get good enough, you recruit them?"

  "That's why we are here, Bhodi Li," Li-hon said. "To offer you the honor of challenging for a place among us and the glory of contributing to the defense of your home world."

  "Me?"

  "Why are you surprised? Haven't you boasted that there is no one who is better in the arena than you?"

  "But that's completely different-"

  "Are you refusing the honor offered?"

  "I'm just trying to understand," Jarvis protested. "If you've got so many worlds, why do you recruit from places that don't even know the war exists? Can't you get enough from the homeworlds?"

  "The kind of war we're fighting isn't anything like in the twentieth century," Parcival said. "It's more like a medieval combat where both sides send out their champions and everybody else sits on the sidelines and drinks mead. There's no mass armies, not yet anyway."

  "Then I'm even more confused. If you only need a few soldiers, why can't you find them inside the-what did you call it, the Photon Alliance?"

  Parcival said, "Every species has something special to contribute. And the more resources the First Guardian has to call on, the stronger we are."

  "The First Guardian-what is that, your president, or king or something?"

  "The First Guardian is the supreme commander of the Guardians of Light, to whom Parcival and I have both sworn our service and allegiance," said the alien. "To complete the answer to your last question, there is also a matter of honor."

  "Honor? What's honor got to do with it?"

  "The First Guardian knows that to announce our existence to Earth would cause great shock and disarray. But the First Guardian also knows that if Earth did have full knowledge of the crisis, it would insist on contributing to its own defense. This way, we are not responsible for Earth experiencing either the pain of learning or the shame of life obligation," Li-hon said.

  "If that's what you're trying to do, you're not as smart as you think you are," Jarvis said. "You kidnapped me in front of hundreds of people. You may have had a secret, but you sure don't now."

  Parcival smiled in silent amusement as Li-hon answered. "If you refuse the honor, the device that brought you here is capable of replacing you at the instant you were, as you call it, kidnapped," the alien said. "You will remember nothing, and you will never have been missed." He hesitated, then added, "Now we have answered enough questions. It is time for you to decide."

  "Not so fast," Jarvis said sharply. "Okay, so if I say 'No thank you,' I go back. What happens if I accept? Does that make me a Photon Warrior?"

  "No," Parcival said. "That's only the beginning."

  "No one becomes a Photon Warrior without passing through the Three Refusals," Li-hon said. "Three times, you will be asked to give up your challenge. After the first refusal, your education will begin. After the second, your training. After the third, your service. Only then will you be a Photon Warrior. Only then do you become a Guardian of the Light. If you fail at any point, or give up your challenge, you will be returned to Earth just as we have already described."

  "And until then, what's happening at home? Time doesn't stop for them."

  "No," Parcival said. "The timeline proceeds for them. But nothing's real, and nothing's permanent. When the transporter replaces you in their past, the Universe itself will edit out the invalidated events. Don't expect to understand it now."

  "Enough," Li-hon said. "Bhodi Li, you have earned on merit the right to challenge for a place among the Guardians of Light. Will you give up your challenge?"

  Jarvis looked at Parcival, then at Nar-lex-ko-li-hon. What a choice, he thought. I'll say yes, I'm out of this free, without even any memory of it to make me feel like I chickened out. If I say no, I can go to the stars — but only as a soldier-in-training for a war that I've got no stake in. Or no stake that I can see, anyway. What a choice — but what a chance -

  "No," he said firmly. "I won't give up my challenge." Parcival smiled and raised a clenched fist, while Li-hon nodded approvingly. "Parcival will show you your quarters," the sergeant said, rising up on his powerful legs. "We'll get underway as soon as the flight checks are complete."

  CHAPTER FIVE

  En route to the crew quarters, Jarvis learned that the ship was named Fraanic. Parcival explained that a fraanic was a small tree-living creature from a world in the Sadr system.

  "It screams bloody murder when a predator comes near," Parcival said. "It makes a sound kind of like a cat being put in a blender tail-first."

  "How would you know what that sounds like? Or maybe I shouldn't ask."

  "It's just an analogy," Parcival said impatiently. "I like cats. Anyway, it makes a perfect name for a scoutship, don't you think?"

  "You have bigger ships?"

  "Oh, sure," was the cheerful reply. "The Alliance classes ships by the size of the fractional drive they carry. We're running under a one-mass-as small as they come. Our platoon's assault ship, the Zephyr, has a three-mass. The biggest ships we ever use run a six, though there're civilian freighters and general carriers out of Foppo that go as high as an eight."

  "Seems like what you'd want to do is jack up a scout with an eight and get there that much faster."

  Parcival shook his head. "It doesn't work that way. This ship is just as fast as a carrier with an eight-mass. The only difference favors this ship-its quicker, more agile."

  "Because it's smaller?"

  The youth started down a ladderway. "Because it has less mass," he called back over his shoulder. "Do you know any tensor calculus? If you do, I can explain it all to you in ten minutes."

  Jarvis followed him down. "No. I barely passed Introduction to Trigonometry."

  Waiting for him at the bottom, Parcival looked disappointed. "Oh, well. In that case, I couldn't explain it to you in ten years." He gestured at the new surroundings. "Are you lost yet?"

  "Not quite."

  "The layout of the ship is really pretty simple-unless you need to go into the tech crawl ways. The upper deck has the transporter chamber, the chart room, the bridge, the mapping and sensor stations. Downstairs there are all the personal areas-berths and galley and such. That's my quarters there," Parcival said, pointing at what looked like a blank wall.

  "I think I've got it-except I have trouble spotting the doorways."

  "Look for the touchplates. The doorways are always to the right."

  "Must have been designed by lefties."

  "As a matter of fact, the race that builds these is exclusively left-handed. You know, you're taking this all very well," Parcival said approvingly as he led Jarvis to the end of the corridor. "You wouldn't happen to be a science fiction fan, would you?"

  "You mean, like, books?"

  "Sure. Heinlein-Asimov-Silverberg-Doc Smith."

  Jarvis shook his head. "No. I don't read much." Then he added, "But I've seen the Bud Light space station commercial a lot."

  Parcival chortled and reached out to a touchplate on the right wall. "In here," he said as the doorway appeared.

  The cabin was no larger than a walk-in closet even before Parcival showed Jarvis how to fold down the cot and unfold the collapsed storage bins. "Sergeant Li-hon couldn't turn around in here, much less relax," Jarvis sai
d. "Are all the cabins this small?"

  "Yes and no. The sergeant has a double-wide. And the cabins are modular-the shipwrights can customize the space to the species that are going to be aboard. This is a standard human berth. Mine's just like it."

  "How many people are on this ship?"

  " Fraanic can accommodate eight. But you've already seen everyone who's aboard."

  "You and Li-hon are the whole crew?"

  "You're thinking about this all wrong. You wouldn't say the family car had a crew, would you?"

  "Do you mean flying this thing across the galaxy isn't any harder than driving the Buick to the grocery?"

  "Actually, it's easier."

  "Who's the pilot? Li-hon? Or you?"

  "The ship is," Parcival said, edging toward the door. "Nothing personal, Chris, but you've played four matches today without a shower. Why don't you take some time to check out the washrooms and then come on back upstairs? There are fresh coveralls in the washroom locker. You can leave your Photon gear in the storeall there. You won't be needing it."

  Jarvis frowned. "I'd like to watch us leave orbit. How long until we get under way?"

  "We're already under way."

  "But I didn't feel anything-"

  "Why did you expect to? It's the fractional drive that's moving us, not a reaction engine. No rocket that's ever been invented would get us where we're going in less than a thousand years. And if anything faster had been invented, we'd be splattered over the aft bulkheads the first time we lit it up. We're not going to the moon, Chris-our destination's nineteen light-years away."

  "Nineteen light-years," Jarvis repeated."I have no idea how far that is. How long will it take us to get there?"

  Parcival smiled. "A little less than two days."

  A distracted look came onto Jarvis's face, and he nodded in absent acknowledgment. Parcival turned away and slapped the touchplate familiarly.

  "Parcival?"

  The youth looked back.

  "Why do you call me Chris, but he calls me Bhodi Li?"

  "Because I understand that your Photon name is something you put on and take off with your gear. Because Bhodi Li happens to be a warrior name in his language. Why'd you pick that name, anyway? It doesn't mean anything in English."