Carmel nodded, satisfied. “Come on,” she said to the helm first. “You’re even worse off than I am.” Taking him by the arm, she drew him off the bridge.
Nick swallowed the last of his coffee and gestured Mikka into the command seat.
“Routine approach,” she told her people as she took over Nick’s board. “There’s nothing special about this. The Amnion gave us instructions. We’ll follow them.
“Karster”—Karster was targ second, a taciturn man with the size and unformed features of a boy—“rumor has it the Amnion can detect weapons—even weapon status—at incredible distances. Shut everything down. Then set your board to power up on one key. I want to be able to go combat-ready as fast as possible.”
Without a word, Karster began to work.
Trying to distract herself from her apprehension, Morn tapped keys across the data board, pulling everything from scan, helm, and communications together. But she was in no condition to concentrate on it. She couldn’t keep her mind away from Nick and dread.
He’d begun to walk the bridge like a man who needed exercise to focus his mind. Again and again he passed in front of Morn; he passed in front of all the stations. But he didn’t glance at her or anyone else: his attention was fixed inward. Nevertheless on each circuit Morn saw the vitality slowly come back into his eyes, the energy return to his movements.
“Vector,” he said without looking at the engineer, “we need insurance. I want you to rig a self-destruct. Key the thrust drive to explode—tie in the fuel cells, torpedoes, matter cannon, anything that can generate brisance. Give me enough force to take out a big chunk of the station. If something goes wrong, I want to be able to hold Enablement hostage.
“The Amnion,” he commented sardonically, “don’t like destruction.
“If you need help, ask Morn. She’s got access to the way we arranged it the last time.
“Set it up to Mikka’s board.”
“That’ll take a while,” Vector replied evenly. “The engineer I apprenticed with didn’t teach suicide.” His smile widened. “I’ve never wanted to kill myself. I would rather be dead.”
“You’ve got until we dock,” Nick snapped.
“Then I’d better get started.” Lifting himself upright with his arms, Vector limped through the aperture.
Around the bridge, scan, helm, and communications handled the ordinary business of approach. They passed information and adjustments back and forth. Scorz murmured into his pickup in a voice like machine oil.
Ignoring them, Nick continued with his instructions.
“Mikka, you’ve done this before. It’s your job to make them believe the threat. If you hear me call for help—or if you just think we’ve been gone too long—tell them what Vector did. Send them diagrams, tell them what to scan for, anything that will convince them we can self-destruct on a prohibitive scale. Demand us back in one piece. And a safe departure.
“Make them believe it. The whole point of a gamble like this is to make it so real that we don’t have to use it.”
Mikka nodded once, roughly. “I’m not like Vector,” she grated. “I’ve studied suicide.”
Grinning, Nick asked Morn how much time he had left.
She checked her log and told him, “Five minutes.”
“Scorz.” Nick stopped beside the communications console. “I want you to tight-beam this to the precise source of their last transmission. No leakage, no eavesdropping. Let me know when you’re ready.”
Morn could hardly read her board. Pressure mounted inside her; in spite of coffee and adrenaline, her brain felt swollen, almost tumorous, in her head. She wished she could get Enablement Station on video. She wanted to know what the place she dreaded looked like. Scan told her only that it was shaped like a huge globe, instead of the torus preferred by human designers. But there were no stars near enough to illuminate the station, and its own lights were still out of range.
The ship was being nudged slightly off trajectory by Enablement’s gravitation. The helm second made a jerky correction.
Scorz reported, “Ready.”
Unable to do anything else, Morn watched as Nick keyed communications himself and said, “Captain Nick Succorso to Enablement Station. I have a reply to your proposal.”
Then he stopped and waited.
The fighting gleam was back in his eyes; the lines of his face had regained their eagerness.
He was answered almost immediately.
“Enablement Station to presumed human Captain Nick Succorso. Reply is required. Conformity of purpose must be achieved. You will be repelled otherwise.”
As if he were reciting a formula which he found privately ludicrous, Nick replied, “Conformity of purpose is mutually desirable. Sanctuary is not. Hazard to us will disappear if we can achieve conformity of purpose.” His tone made a sneer out of the alien cadences. “You require an account of the discrepancy between known reality and presumed identification. We require medical assistance. We also require credit.” He named a sum large enough to pay for an entirely new gap drive. “I propose that we achieve conformity of purpose through the mutual satisfaction of requirements.”
A pause hummed gently in the speakers. Then the voice returned.
“The sum you require is large.”
Nick shrugged. “The knowledge I offer is precious. It has relevance to all Amnion dealings with human space.”
Another pause.
“What is the nature of your medical difficulty?”
Nick turned his grin on Morn. “We have a pregnant human female. Her fetus is unacceptable among us. We require a fully mature human child.”
This time there was no pause. “Presumed human Captain Nick Succorso, all your requirements are large. Specificity is necessary. How do you offer to account for the discrepancy between known reality and presumed identification?”
“Blood sample,” Nick replied succinctly.
“In sufficient quantity?” demanded the voice.
“One deciliter.”
After a moment of rumination, the voice said, “The quantity is sufficient.”
“My requirements are indeed large,” Nick continued at once. “What I offer is also large. You require specificity. This is my proposal. The human female and I will enter Enablement Station. We will be taken to the place where the child may be matured. I will concede one deciliter of my blood. Then the child will be matured, and I will be given an acknowledgment of credit. When these matters have been accomplished, the human female with her child and I will return to our ship. Captain’s Fancy will depart Enablement Station immediately. We will depart Amnion space at our best speed.
“In this way, conformity of purpose will be achieved.”
Without delay, the voice commanded, “Await decisive reply. Continued approach is acceptable,” and stopped transmitting.
Nick didn’t switch off the pickup or bridge audio. He stood with his head cocked to one side, grinning as if he expected an answer right away.
Morn forced herself to turn her head, scan the bridge. Like her, Karster on targ and the scan second wanted to ask questions; Mikka scowled her concern; Ransum twitched nervously; Scorz shifted his weight as if the seat under him were slick. Nevertheless Nick’s expectant stance kept them all quiet.
Seconds passed, measured out by the ship’s chronometers. Known reality and presumed identification must be brought into conformity. What did that mean? What could it mean, except the thing she feared?
Ransum, the helm second, couldn’t endure the silence; she was too tense. “Nick—” she began.
Instantly livid, Nick fired a glare at her that withered her in her seat. Like the crack of a whip, he barked, “Shut up!”
Just as instantly, he resumed his attitude of calm poise.
Morn felt that the bridge was collapsing around her, sinking into Nick as if he were a black hole.
Then the speakers came to life; they seemed to blare as if Scorz had inadvertently turned up the gain. Nick snapped alert,
balancing on the balls of his feet with his hands ready.
“Enablement Station to presumed human Captain Nick Succorso,” the Amnioni voice said without preamble, “your proposal is acceptable. Conformity of purpose will be achieved through the mutual satisfaction of requirements. Immediate acknowledgment is required.”
Nick jabbed a punch at the empty air; his teeth flashed like a predator’s. Distinctly he recited the formula.
“It is acceptable. Conformity of purpose will be achieved through the mutual satisfaction of requirements.”
Then he reached across the communications board to switch off the pickup.
Brandishing his fists, he shouted triumphantly, “Got you, you sonofabitch!”
Only the reassuring shape of the zone implant control in Morn’s pocket kept her from whimpering.
Enablement Station loomed into video range, but now she had no time to study it. For the better part of two hours, she channeled information to Vector, who wasn’t inclined to suicide, and suggestions to Karster, who didn’t know enough about his board to set up an adequate batch command. And then Captain’s Fancy began to receive docking instructions from Station. Data research was required to determine the degree of compatibility between the ship’s equipment and Enablement’s.
She was too busy to panic—or to ask any more questions.
Dock was less than half an hour away when Nick ordered Alba Parmute to the bridge and told Morn to leave the data board.
As she got out of her seat, she hid her hands in her pockets so that he wouldn’t see them shaking.
“Give Mikka your id tag,” he ordered. “I don’t want Enablement to know they’ve got a chance at a UMC cop. They don’t normally cheat—but that might tempt them to make an exception.”
Morn hated to surrender her tag. But she also couldn’t deny that he was right. And the time when she could have opposed his intentions was long past: it was on the other side of the gap.
She pulled the chain over her head and handed her id tag to the command second.
Nick gestured her to accompany him off the bridge.
Clenching her teeth in an effort to hold her voice steady, she asked, “What now?”
“Meet me at the suit lockers,” he replied briskly. “Amnion air is breathable—sort of—but we’re going to treat this like EVA. That gives us some extra protection. They can’t trick or force mutagens into us while we’re wearing those suits. And suit communications can reach Mikka from anywhere on Enablement.”
Before she could reply, he strode away.
She almost went after him; she didn’t want to be alone, not now, with a crisis she dreaded ahead of her, and no idea how far she could trust anyone. The thought of an EVA suit gave her an odd comfort, however. She was grateful for a chance to carry her own atmosphere with her; grateful to wear a layer of impermeable mylar and plexulose between her skin and anything Amnion.
The only problem was where to put her black box. She considered that difficulty as she hurried toward the lockers. EVA suits had plenty of pouches and pockets; if she put her control in one of them, she could reach it at need.
But what if the Amnion required her to take off her EVA suit in order to force-grow little Davies?
The idea chilled her like ice down her back.
It was plausible—even predictable. How could she reach the control then, in front of witnesses? Probably in front of Nick?
And how could she bear all her fears without the help of her black box?
Trembling from the core of her bones to the tips of her fingers, she decided to keep the control in her shipsuit.
In fact, she needed its help now. When she reached the lockers—before Nick could catch up with her and see her change—she combined functions and intensities to cast a haze over her emotions; a haze which numbed her dread, but still allowed her to think. Then, while false neural relief eased her tremors, she selected an EVA suit in her size, checked its status indicators to be sure it was ready, and began putting it on.
Nick was only a minute behind her. He approached the lockers grinning, his eyes alight with risks. As he pulled open his personal locker and took out his suit, he remarked in a tone of grim pleasure, “You’re going to have a hell of a story to tell your kid. He’ll be the only brat in the galaxy whose parents thought he was worth taking chances like this for. I don’t even want the little bastard, and yet here I am.”
“Nick—” Her zone implant could only calm her incrementally: tight layers of fear had to be peeled away before they could be numbed. And he hadn’t yet answered the most important question gnawing at her. Carefully she asked, “What do they mean, ‘Known reality and presumed identification must be brought into conformity’? I don’t understand.”
He didn’t look at her; he was busy with his suit. But his grin sharpened. Away from the bridge and other people, he was willing to explain.
“I told you I let them give me one of their mutagens, but it didn’t take. ‘Known reality’ is that when human beings get that mutagen, they turn Amnion. Pure Amnion—RNA, loyalty, intelligence, everything. ‘Presumed identification’ is that I’m apparently the same man I was before they treated me. What I’ve offered them is a chance ‘to account for the discrepancy’—to find out why their mutagen didn’t take.”
Only the emissions of her black box enabled Morn to pursue her question.
“Why didn’t it?”
His laugh was harsh enough to draw blood.
“I’ve got an immunity drug. Your precious Hashi Lebwohl gave it to me. Data Acquisition at its finest. The real reason I came here before was to test it for him.”
That was the reply she’d dreaded. UMCP corruption. And a betrayal of humankind so profound that its implications shocked her out of her calm. Her zone implant might as well have been switched off. Abysms of treachery seemed to gape around her like the gaps between the stars.
Not Hashi Lebwohl’s treason: not the UMCP’s.
Nick’s.
“And you’re going to let them have it?” she demanded. “You’re going to let them take it out of your blood and study it, so they can learn to counteract it?”
His laugh sounded like a snarl. His tongue twisted inside his cheek: between his teeth, a gray capsule appeared.
“I haven’t taken it yet.”
He shifted the capsule back against his gum.
“It’s not an organic immunity. It’s more like a poison—or a binder. It ties up mutagens until they’re inert. Then they get flushed out—along with the drug. The immunity is effective for about four hours.
“I’m not going to take it until after they sample my blood. That way they won’t learn anything. The drug won’t be in my system yet. And if we’re lucky we’ll be long gone before they finish their tests.”
He was planning to cheat the Amnion.
Abruptly his gaze slid away from hers. “I can’t give it to you. They’ll need your blood, too, or else they won’t know enough about you to force-grow your brat. I can’t take the chance that they’ll find the drug.”
Before Morn could react, the intercom chimed, and Mikka’s voice said, “Five minutes to dock, Nick. Secure for zero g.”
The zone implant seemed to take forever to gain control over Morn’s wailing nerves.
CHAPTER 12
For a while she drifted as Captain’s Fancy cut internal spin; she and Nick clung to the zero-g grips and floated together. Like him, she’d left her faceplate open. But she couldn’t meet his gaze. He was focused on her acutely. Congested blood darkened his scars, and his gaze burned. Her eyes stared past his as if she were stunned.
She should have set her zone implant higher. Its effects weren’t enough. She was about to meet the Amnion for the first time. It was possible that she was about to lose her humanity altogether, that the genetic core of her identity would be taken from her. She should have set her implant’s emissions high enough to make her completely blank. Then at least she might have been spared this visceral, human dread
.
But the control was in the pocket of her shipsuit, inside her EVA suit. She couldn’t reach it now.
She and Nick had lost the floor as if they were in freefall, but that was an illusion. The station’s mass plucked at them, urging them to let go of the grips; the bulkhead past her boots began to feel like the floor. Still she and Nick held on. The floor would shift again when Captain’s Fancy docked—when the ship surrendered herself to Enablement’s internal g.
“One minute,” Mikka Vasaczk’s voice announced from the intercom. “No problems.”
Morn’s identity was already under attack. Even without mutation, her understanding of her self and her life was being altered; force-grown to a different shape.
Nick had an immunity drug for the Amnion mutagens.
It had been given to him by Hashi Lebwohl—it belonged to the UMCP.
And the UMCP had withheld it from humankind. The cops, her people, had left all human space naked to alien absorption, when they had the means to effectively end the threat.
What kind of people did such things? What kind of men and women had she and her father committed themselves to?
Vector Shaheed was right. The UMCP is the most corrupt organization there is.
How could she have been so wrong? How could her father and her whole family have been so wrong?
A jolt shuddered through the hull: impact and metal stress. The contact relayed the hum of servomechanisms, the clampdown of grapples and transmission cables, the limpet attachment of Enablement’s sensors. On a human station, Morn would also have heard the insertion of airlines, the brief hiss of equalizing pressure. Not here: human and Amnioni only breathed each other’s air when they had no other choice.
She and Nick dropped to the new floor.
Mikka said, “Dock secure, Nick. Vector confirms drive on standby. We’re keeping power up on all systems. They won’t like that, but without it we can’t destruct.”
Nick nodded as if he were replying, but he didn’t key the intercom. To Morn, he muttered, “Don’t look so terrified. Nothing is going to happen to you unless it happens to me first.” Then he grinned sourly. “If you don’t count having a baby.”
Forbidden Knowledge: The Gap Into Vision Page 23
