“I’m so sorry. I didn’t understand before. I didn’t know. Please, let me help. Whatever you need. Oh my, your arm … is that a compound fracture? Sit, I’ll call for a physician. And maybe my son, too. He’s about your age. Meeting you would change his life. All you’ve been through. I can’t wait to tell him I met you, before I mean, and that I got a chance to make up for it. But the doctor first, of course—”
Pizlo cut him off with a curt wave of his trunk and never broke stride. “You want to help? Open the gate.”
The man leapt to the controls and a second later the maintenance gate opened, its halves receding into the surrounding walls. Pizlo sped through.
“Lock it behind me. If anyone comes after, keep them from following. I’m leaving and it won’t be safe for them up top.”
“No, of course. I don’t understand how it’s safe for you. Do you want me to come with?” He followed the teen through, pausing at the control station on the other side. “I can code-lock the gate from here just as well. That would keep anyone from following and maybe I can lend a hand when you get up top.”
Pizlo flinched at the earnest need in the man’s voice. “No, really. Stay here. I’m good. Um … thanks.”
Lights came up in the corridor as he stepped beyond the maintenance gate, harsher and brighter, a clear demarcation that he was leaving a place for Fant. The unforgiving sterility of space lay ahead of him and whether the builders of this place had intended it as a reminding metaphor or not, there was nothing of life in this corridor. He pressed on and arrived at last at the elevator to the surface. His ill-fitting environment suit lay where he’d left it. Pizlo paused only long enough to shove his feet into the boots. He snatched up the helmet with his trunk and hauled the legs of the suit up with his good hand and then was moving again. He fell into the elevator, punched the button for the surface, and pulled himself into the clothing, not even attempting to slide his broken arm into its sleeve. He forced himself to slow down and perform the safety checks that his precognition had brought to him, visions of all the ways he could die if he ignored them dancing through his consciousness. He disregarded the stifling feel of the suit’s sleeve on his trunk as the readout in his helmet read green. Soon after, the elevator’s door opened onto the corridor leading back to the disguised airlock and the surface of Ulmazh.
Pizlo refrained from running—it would only cause him to leap and crash into the ceiling and risk damaging his environment suit—hurrying toward the far end of the corridor in a series of carefully controlled bounds. He cycled the lock, flung himself within and slapped at the close-button with the empty mitten of his trunk sleeve, gripping the handle by the outer door, preparing to fling himself over the surface of Ulmazh the instant the airlock allowed.
The moon’s rotation had carried the city’s entry point into a spot of relative darkness. The searing red light of Ekkja lay somewhere beyond the horizon. The soothing blue white of cloud-wrapped Barsk was nowhere in sight. There was an abundance of starlight, and the hurried arc of tiny Wella as it tore across the sky, confusing everything with faint and ever-shifting shadows.
After the brightness within the corridor and elevator, Pizlo couldn’t see anything on the moon’s surface. His eyes had always been weak, and he’d long since learned not to rely on them. Jorl’s ship was where he knew it to be and he set off for it without hesitation.
* * *
DRUZ’S voice met him as he entered the airlock. “What is happening, Little Prince?”
“We’re leaving,” he said. He ignored the protocols that insisted he stay suited until past the next set of seals. He pounded on the intercom with his fist. “The outer hatch is sealed. Lift now, please. It will be fine.”
“There is a not insignificant possibility of harm to you if we depart before the final lock cycles. It won’t be long—”
“Druz, listen to me. I’ve seen the probabilities, and seen beyond them. I’m good. But Jorl and Rina are not. Time is everything right now. Go!”
The airlock fell silent save for the hiss of building pressure. A moment passed and a rumbling vibration knocked Pizlo off his feet. He bounced off the wall and crashed to the floor as Druz accelerated the ship and fought off Ulmazh’s claims of gravity. The inside of his suit felt wet. He was bleeding. A lot. Possibilities fell away now that they were moving, but the outcome was still far from fixed. He understood that now. He kicked off the rest of his suit and removed his helmet as the inner hatch unsealed. Druz awaited him on the bridge. He’d promised her an explanation but doubted any of it would make sense.
* * *
RISING up from the airless grip of relatively tiny Ulmazh was much quicker and easier than a controlled push through the atmosphere of the much larger planet it orbited, but he’d impressed upon Druz the need. Crossing the thin strip of space between the two hadn’t taken long and after some emergency first aid, a sling, and an IV to replenish his blood, he and Abenaki had used the remaining time prepping the stasis bed in the infirmary. The Procy’s intimate knowledge of it proved an unexpected boon.
The ship fell from the sky with a determination greater than all the rain of Barsk. It was late morning, and most of the boats from Keslo had long since set off. Those gone fishing were far enough out as to not notice a spacecraft aiming for the dock, and those traveling to other islands wouldn’t return until Druz had taken off again. Other vessels getting in their way wouldn’t be a problem. Jorl had called in some favors and island officials had declared a temporary medical emergency to clear pedestrian traffic from the Civilized Wood all the way down to the harbor.
That last had been a mistake.
“There are people on the dock, Little Prince,” said Druz over the yacht’s intercom. “Thousands of people. I doubt the structure is rated for so many. If even a portion of it fails, as seems likely, they’re in serious danger.”
Pizlo stood in the hold, one hand and his trunk over a control board that would extend and maneuver a gangway to the pier once the hatch opened so they could take Rina onboard.
“That makes no sense. No one should be there.”
“I have the dock on the screen now,” said Abenaki. “I’m looking at a whole lot of no one.”
“They’ve seen the ship,” added Druz.
“How can you be sure?”
“They were standing still before, but now many of them are jumping into the water and swimming toward us. Many of the others are singing. Well, chanting, really.”
“Chanting? Can you make out the words?”
“Yes, we’re close enough now, but … you should hear this for yourself. Patching the audio through to this channel…”
Their voices echoed through the hold, hundreds of voices repeating two syllables, over and over. Piz. Lo. Piz. Lo. Piz. Lo.
The sound cut off and Druz came back on. “I’m uncertain how to proceed. If Jorl and his daughter are down in that throng, I can’t see them. What do you want to do?”
Pizlo shut down the control board. “Send Abenaki to the infirmary to get some koph. I’m on my way to the bridge.”
“Why?”
“Because we have to find another way in, and you’ve never been there. Take us up. Maybe if the people down there see us fly away, they’ll leave the dock before it collapses.”
“Understood. But why are they calling your name? I thought because of the circumstances of your birth they couldn’t so much as acknowledge you.”
“Yeah,” said Pizlo. “That’s changed. They adore me now.”
* * *
HE sat at the second navigation board, transposing a location as he knew it in his head to coordinates that the ship would understand. The Procy had returned with the koph about the same time as he’d sat down. He locked in the last bits just as the first perception of nefshons came to him along with a nausea that might have been from whatever meds Druz had added to his IV, or the toxic effects of so much koph in such a short span. He passed control of the board to Druz. “Take us there. I have to talk
to Jorl, and then I’m heading to the volar airlock.”
He reached for Jorl’s nefshons and they came to him in a rush. He didn’t bother with a mindscape. Jorl was there, standing in front of him in emptiness.
“Pizlo, are you ready for us? We’re at the top of the funicular but there’s been a delay of some kind. The car’s stuck at the bottom.”
“Change of plans. Instead of staying out of your way, there’s a mob of people crawling all over the dock. That’s probably why your rail car is stuck. Doesn’t matter. You’d never make it to the pier and it wouldn’t be safe to try.”
“We have to try! We need to get Rina into the stasis bed.”
“We will. But we’re going another route. Go to the balcony that opens on Arlo’s Chimney. I’ll meet you there.”
He let go of the connection to Jorl and opened his eyes to the bridge. Druz and Abenaki both stared at him.
“Druz, as you come up on those coords you’re going to see a big hole in the green. It’s a shaft that cuts all the way down to the Shadow Dwell. Get as close to that opening as you can. I’ll rappel down it until I reach Jorl and secure Rina. Abenaki, come with me. I’m going to need your help to rig a grapnel and harness.” Without waiting for a reply he started running through the ship.
The Procy followed. “Why do your people have holes cutting top to bottom through your forests?”
“They’re … monuments. Memorials. This one is called Arlo’s Chimney.”
“Oh. Who was Arlo?”
“My father.”
* * *
TOO quickly, but not quickly enough, they were braking through the air above Keslo. Pizlo waited in the airlock on the underside of the foot of the ship. The outer door was open. How many doses of koph had he taken recently? It was too much. He needed to sleep, needed to purge the poison of it from him. Both would have to wait.
Wind and rain howled through the hatch. He stood poised to leap through open air toward what seemed a tiny hole in the rainforest canopy. The straps of a support harness cut into his body and for once he wished he could feel the pain of it. He didn’t know what kind of transportation Jorl had arranged for Rina, and a variety of hooks and cables lay wrapped around his waist. The ship had surely reached the chimney first, but they wouldn’t be far behind.
The future was stupid.
In one version, they’d mistakenly landed in the harbor and hordes of desperate Fant had boarded the ship to force apologies on him, beg forgiveness, ask to learn from him how they could be better, more generous beings. They still loathed all other abominations, just not him. They knew him, loved him more than they loved themselves. And their love had kept him from reaching Rina and securing her into the ship’s stasis bed in time to keep her body from destroying itself.
In another outcome, some other portion of Keslo’s citizenry had decided to seek out Jorl. He had helped raise him, after all, and who better to share their new insights with? Again, they blocked Rina from him and prevented her access to safety. Then there was the version where despite all precautions the grapnel malfunctioned, or a knot slipped, or a cable snapped, on and on down ever decreasing probabilities that all resulted in Rina’s death. Stupid stupid stupid. Like the universe wanted him to fail and wanted her to die.
Pizlo was having none of it.
He jumped from the airlock, determined to contradict the wishes of the universe.
* * *
ONCE he’d cleared the open air and actually entered the mouth of the chimney, the rest of his fall was familiar. The six-sided shaft opened up around him, turning in a slow helix as it dropped. He knew every handprint of it all the way down, what to touch to slow his descent, where to grab or push. He didn’t need two good arms and could have done this part in his sleep.
He reached the top of the Civilized Wood, and midway through it one side of the chimney opened onto a public balcony. School groups came there sometimes, choral groups as well, to experience the weird acoustics such shafts made possible. And though this chimney was named for Arlo, his newly adoring public wouldn’t know to seek him here. The balcony was empty. He broke his fall, and hung.
He didn’t wait long. Jorl and Dabni raced toward him down the approaching boardway dragging a wheeled cart between them. Some sort of folding bathtub perched atop the cart, water sloshing from it as they reached the balcony’s railing and brought it to a stop. Rina lay inside.
“Is the stasis bed ready?” Jorl was out of breath, his ears down and back, his eyes wild.
Even before answering, Pizlo was swinging to the railing and unwinding the grapnel from about his waist, working out the best way to secure it to the tub. “Yes, it’s all primed.”
“The settings differ by race,” said Jorl.
“That’s what Druz said. She’s already searching databases for the proper calibration for a juvenile Lox. The generic setting will serve to start and we’ll fine-tune it once we’re underway.”
“Yes, but—”
Pizlo waved him off. “This isn’t going to work. I’ll spend more time wrapping up the tub than we can spare. Give her to me.”
Jorl lifted his daughter from the water and handed her to Pizlo who cradled her against himself with his trunk and one arm. It was awkward but he wouldn’t have to hold her for long. Despite the cold water dripping from her, her skin was hot. As he held her close she whimpered.
“Wait,” said Dabni. “Please, take her doll, too. She’ll want it when she wakes up.” She tucked Kokab under the strap of his bandolier.
From down the boardway came a cry. They all turned. Tens of people were rushing toward them.
Jorl gasped. “What is happening?”
“My fault,” said Pizlo. “Klarce sent my echo down. I didn’t think it would … well, I didn’t think.”
“It’s no one’s fault,” said Jorl. “More importantly, it’s in the past now. History. Go, look after Rina. We’ll deal with this.”
“It’s not just these people, Jorl, it’s the entire planet.”
“I understand. And between Dabni and me, we know more about nefshons and memes than anyone alive in the galaxy. We’ll fix it. Not today, but soon. I promise. Now go.”
There was no future in which Pizlo was going to win that argument. He stood on the balcony railing, briefly gripped the loose cable with his trunk and pulled, two short, two long, two short. High above, Abenaki responded to the signal and activated the pulley in the airlock. Pizlo began the long ascent back up the chimney. By the time his adoring public reached the railing he was well out of sight.
THIRTY-FIVE
THREADS OF PERSONALITY
AS part of being Klarce’s assistant, Temmel had received basic medical training. Moments after the Abomination of Keslo had fled, he was at the councilor’s side. Her breathing was labored and her pulse erratic. Moving her seemed unwise but he brought in cushions from the outer office and made her as comfortable as circumstances allowed. He swallowed some koph and reached out for help.
Bernath was his first thought. He didn’t know her well, mostly from reports, but she dealt with innovation and he needed something miraculous. He briefed her as best he could, and to his relief she promised to join him quickly, accompanied by the physician and the physicist who had accompanied her to Ulmazh. He didn’t know what use a physicist could be but he recognized Lotle’s name from past reports and knew her to be an expert on life extension. Keeping Klarce alive surely qualified.
When the three of them arrived it was Ryne who took charge. He began by powering down the discs on the floor, releasing the long-dead councilors who had hovered helpless and confused, trapped by technology.
“Lolte, when you’re sure she’s stable, lay her across this disc.”
She nodded. “Of course! That’s … was that one of the applications you’d intended?”
Ryne shook his head, the nubs of his trunk delicately activating the manual settings of the disc before him.
“What good will that do?” said Temmel.
“Destabilize? As in dissipate? I thought that only happened with death.”
She gave him a hard look. “Not if we move her to that disc. Grab her feet and lift when I tell you to.”
Temmel complied. “I still don’t understand. You say she’s dying. How will this help?”
Ryne made way for them. “It will prevent diffusion. That may not prevent discorporation, but if her body insists on dying it won’t be because her mind led the way.”
“So you’re saying there’s a chance?”
Bernath laid a hand on Temmel’s shoulder. “There’s always a chance. Whether she takes it is up to her.”
They moved Klarce in place and settled in to wait.
* * *
ABENAKI had aided Pizlo in securing Jorl’s daughter into the suspension bed. She lingered just long enough to confirm that the young Fant somehow demonstrated a mastery of the control system and was happy to depart. She’d gone to the guest quarters Druz had assigned her when they’d arrived on Barsk and for the last two days had mulled over the things the Fant had said when he’d first come aboard. They disturbed her, and at last she sought out Druz where she sat at the board on the yacht’s bridge. She’d stopped in the ship’s galley on the way and arrived with food for them both. While Druz ate, she shared her questions and concerns. The senator’s assistant seemed in no hurry to reply, finished the meal at a gourmand’s pace, and held up one hand to forestall any further questions while she checked their progress on her controls.
Their ship was on its way to the portal that would take them from Ekkja’s system and move them lightyears away to the next stage of their trip. It was the irony of space travel that the massive span between stars happened in an instant, and crossing the gap between neighboring portals in the same system demanded days to go from one to the next.
The Moons of Barsk Page 35
