But that was the least of it.
The Telvarna now became a problem. The Kelly had somehow evaded both Barrodagh’s and their inspections. And what about Eusabian’s plan to dispose of the tempath after start-up? Did Anaris approve? If not, then what of Hreem, who was obviously intended by Barrodagh as a counter against Captain Vi’ya?
He had to bite back his questions, for Anaris said, “Oh. Here we are.”
The bubble opened up ahead, decanting them into the ship bay, and revealing yet a new strangeness, Lysanter standing in its center gazing around with evident satisfaction.
At first the ring of boot heels on the deck scarcely registered with Lysanter. This could not be the Avatar yet, for the whine-thump of the Ogres was absent. But there was no challenge from the guards with Lysanter, and Eusabian had given strict orders that no one but the scientist and his guards should enter before him on this occasion.
Lysanter peered over his compad, then stared in shock at Anaris and his secretary. How had he gotten around the guards at the far door?
Lysanter made a hurried bow, not missing Anaris’s faint smile. Fear tightened his neck muscles. There would be a confrontation; Lysanter wished fervently he could be elsewhere when Eusabian arrived. But that was impossible.
“My lord,” he said. “I did not expect you so soon.”
Anaris’s smile broadened into challenge, which seemed to increase the worry in Morrighon’s face. He, too, was expecting trouble.
“No. You didn’t,” Anaris replied.
“If I may ask, lord, did you find another adit? If so, it would indicate additional activity, and the sensors reported none.”
“That is interesting,” Anaris replied neutrally.
No answer, then.
Anaris looked around with an air of expectation, which contrasted starkly with Morrighon clutching his compad much as the servant of an ancient warrior might have grasped his master’s buckler in the face of an enemy of unknown puissance.
Morrighon straddled what he evidently took to be a stasis clamp. Lysanter, noting the lines stress had graven in the man’s face, forbore to tell him it was only a quantum interface—clamps would only interfere with the process of forcing the ships.
Lysanter followed Anaris’s gaze, his lifted brows echoing the scientist’s own astonishment at the opening of the first ship bay, many years before.
Womb, he thought, wondering how Anaris would react if he used the organic simile. But the impression was inescapable: a vast egg-shaped cavern with a tall central mound. The ruddy walls pouched out in glands and blisters from which the Urian vessels—glistening spheres of pale translucence—were slowly emerging, centimeters per day. Banks of lights hanging from scaffolding all around and overhead sparked shimmering highlights from the webs of cable and quantum interfaces festooning the nearest gland, from which a ship protruded almost halfway, more than any other. But the glints from the Urian ships seemed subtly wrong, giving the impression of a painting with careless perspective. Lysanter had never been able to discover why.
Anaris gestured at the ship. “My father grows impatient.”
His tone was neutral; Lysanter couldn’t read its significance. But he’d learned that Anaris tolerated, even sometimes demanded, far bolder speech than the Avatar.
“It has only been a week since the bay opened, lord. And we lost a great deal of time verifying the additional Ogres.” It wouldn’t hurt to remind the heir of the priorities he, Lysanter, had to observe. “As well,” he continued, “the forcing process is delicate.” He looked down at his compad, linked to the array governing the interfaces on the ship blister. “This one will be ripe in less than six minutes now.”
He heard Morrighon suck in his breath, and Lysanter wondered if he’d gone too far, but Anaris showed no reaction at all to the organic simile. He seems to accept the station as it is.
Lysanter made a mental note to check the record from interface monitors. Perhaps Anaris’s arrival had left some traces: if he’d found some new adit, it must have opened within the last quarter hour, following the previous circuit of the guards.
Morrighon’s gaze shifted sideways a second after the Ogres’ whine-thump echoed from the other side of the tall mound in the center of the bay. The swales and hollows of the Urian quantum-plast smeared the sound.
Anaris paid it no heed. “Does the speed of the process correlate with the increase in station power?”
Lysanter glanced toward the entrance to the bay. It would be better if the Avatar did not find them talking. He feared becoming a counter in the confrontation between Eusabian and his son. But I already am. And Anaris was exploiting that fact.
Lysanter tried to hide his accelerating anxiety. “Yes, lord. So it will continue to accelerate as the power increase the tempath set in motion during the last probe continues.”
Anaris turned his attention to his father, who was rounding that central structure, his tread heavy. He was flanked by a squad of uniformed Tarkans; at his side Barrodagh walked rapidly, his shoulders hunched with apprehension which appeared equally divided between the ship glands all around and the two battle androids behind the Tarkans.
The scientist marveled again at the smooth synchrony of the Ogres’ movement, so perfect that the sound of their progress gave no hint there was more than one. Eusabian always operated them in the terror mode.
Lysanter bowed as the Avatar came to a halt by the emerging ship.
“Lord, this one will be ready in three minutes,” he said, hoping to deflect to Eusabian from Anaris’s early arrival.
From the look on Barrodagh’s face, he knew he could not evade the questions later, and the Bori would not believe his protestations of ignorance. But I have a counter to that.
The scientist breathed in silent relief when Eusabian addressed his first remark to Anaris, without a flicker of emotion. “You will find these useful in rebuilding the fleet after the attack.”
So much for relief. Lysanter heard the order implied in those few words: his already over-scheduled staff would have to furnish someone to tear apart these ships for the hyperwaves and the other parts they could use.
Anaris inclined his head, then looked around with a proprietary air that could not fail to irritate his father. Sweat broke out on Lysanter’s forehead.
“Odd, though, that this bay does not open to space.” Anaris flicked a glance Lysanter’s way. “We are deep within the station here, are we not?”
“Yes, lord.” He gestured at the mound. “That appears to hold an adit opening into the well through the Chamber of Kronos.”
Anaris’s brows lifted. “Then you suspect these ships would be launched into the crystallized fivespace at the heart of the station?”
Lysanter nodded, wondering what a passenger on such a journey might see. Surely it could not be fatal—what would be the purpose?
Eusabian gestured impatiently, dismissing Anaris’s question. “No matter, these will never be launched, no more than those in the first bay.”
The console nearby bleeped.
“One minute, Lord,” Lysanter said, indicating the luminous yellow line painted around the gland where it swelled from the juncture of floor and swaled wall. “There will be some movement of the quantum-plast inside the line.”
Eusabian stepped back, behind the line. The Ogres stood so still the highlights on their polished armor seemed etched in. The floor trembled briefly underfoot, the suggestion of a groan. Then silence. The ship appeared to grow larger, until it emerged from the gland, which withdrew into the wall with a ripe smacking sound.
Barrodagh winced.
A pucker formed near the Avatar, closest to the ship. A subtle modulation of the ship’s translucent skin suggested it was rotating about its vertical axis, with the pucker moving against the rotation to stay oriented, but the scientist knew this was an illusion. Experience with the ships in the first bay, years before, had revealed this to be an indication of the activation of the ship’s systems.
And
then, as the Avatar moved forward over the line, Lysanter remembered that Eusabian had never visited the first ship bay. He saw the same realization dawning on both secretaries’ faces, while Anaris smiled faintly. The scientist lunged forward, then froze as one of the Ogres swiveled its head so one face looked at him. “Lord!” he squawked in a strangled voice.
But it was too late. Eusabian touched the ship—an oblique counter to Anaris’s oblique defiance—and the pucker slurped open, revealing a dimly glowing interior. The Avatar peered inside, then stepped back, gazing narrow-eyed over his shoulder at Lysanter with surprise and displeasure.
Lysanter bowed, rigid and formal, as if the protocol could snatch back the moment of error. “Lord, as my reports on the first bay noted, the Urian vessels appear to imprint on the first sentient to touch them, who must then be present for further operations on the ship.”
As if in confirmation of his words, the pucker writhed shut with a nasty eructation. Eusabian stared at the ship, then stepped forward. The pucker opened. He stepped back behind the line again, and the pucker closed. The Avatar contemplated the Urian vessel.
“If it were launched, where would it go?” Anaris asked, sounding amused. “Another Suneater, do you suppose?”
Eusabian glanced across the intervening space at him and smiled coldly. “When I have dealt with the Panarchy, an experiment will be arranged.” Then the Avatar gestured to Lysanter. “It is well. You will continue.” The Ogres whirred to life and followed him as he departed, Barrodagh glancing back in terror and resentment.
As the amplified whine-thump died away, Anaris looked at the ship and said, “I would not recommend summoning the Avatar for experiments on this ship. It would best remain undisturbed, I think.”
Lysanter bowed again, keeping his gaze on his shoes as he listened to the leisurely tread of the heir moving away. Morrighon followed, not looking back.
The scientist let his breath out in a long sigh, rolling his head on his neck. He looked over at the next-ripest ship, mentally rearranging his day so that he could imprint it and all others, as he had the first ones. Then he glanced thoughtfully at the adit mound. The strange conditions deep in the well might be preferable to being caught between Anaris and Eusabian.
Lysanter shuddered, hoping he would never be brought to make that choice, as in the corridor outside the bay, Barrodagh struggled to keep up with Eusabian’s long strides, his fear of the Ogres warring with the greater fear of being left behind in the nightmarish red-glowing tunnels.
The Avatar marched on, lengthening his strides. Barrodagh gritted his teeth, ignoring the ache in his cheek and jaw as he toiled to keep up. He knew that his lord had been annoyed at the heir’s appearance in the ship bay, an emotion intensified by the exchanges after, but he did not as yet know how much—or what would be the results.
It was no longer possible to predict what Eusabian would say or do. Despite Barrodagh’s unremitting efforts, his control seemed to be unraveling: over the Avatar, who had the Ogres and his narks and whatever programs Lysanter had given him; over dataspace, despite the excellent programs that Ferrasin obediently supplied from Arthelion. It was as if the computer had taken the Avatar for a model and evaded monitoring—
Eusabian stopped at an intersection. Ahead, down one tunnel, Barrodagh glimpsed cables and natural lighting and the smoothness vouchsafed by stasis clamps. One longing glance, then he turned his back. He dare not show his desire to be gone from this area, for who knew what the Avatar might find amusing to do? He was no longer predictable in any useful sense, as though his growing power was estranging him from merely human motivations.
But Eusabian waved a hand in casual dismissal of the Tarkan squad, and then he looked down at Barrodagh. “You will return to your duties.” He entered an adjacent tunnel, one still in its original state. The thud of the Tarkans’ boots didn’t quite mask the loud whine-thump of the Ogres.
Barrodagh scrambled to follow the Tarkans, hoping their presence would protect him as he considered the Avatar’s brief words. It could have been worse, he decided. The implication that his duties needed returning to—that he had left something undone—was an ungentle reminder of Eusabian’s irritation at the lack of warning that the heir had appeared at the bay first.
Breathing through his mouth, his clothing clammy with sweat, Barrodagh raced up the tunnel after the Tarkans, feeling a slight sense of relief when they turned onto a more civilized and well-traveled concourse. He slowed when he’d reached the safety of busy techs and minions. From some of the latter he forcibly commandeered a runabout, and returned in somewhat more comfort to his quarters, where he tabbed up the most urgent of the reports and feeds queued up during his absence.
Anger twinged his aching cheek as the image of Lysanter windowed up, the ship bay out of focus in the background.
“Serach Barrodagh, I am unsure why I was not informed of the device possessed by the Rifter chaka-Jalashalal, which is obviously of Urian origin, but I suppose your manifold other duties might have distracted you . . .”
Barrodagh clenched his teeth, intensifying the ever-present deep ache. The time stamp on the message indicated it had been sent moments after he’d left the ship bay with Eusabian. It was obviously composed to preempt his questions about Anaris’s early appearance there.
Barrodagh shook his head irritably as Lysanter finished his polite but firm demand for the remaining part of the shestek for experimentation. Hreem would be furious, and bored, and thus even less controllable. Perhaps it was time to turn him loose.
But there was no reason to comply quickly with Lysanter’s request, not until he had a better idea of what Morrighon was up to, for it could be no one else who had given Lysanter the vid of Hreem’s disgusting pastime.
Barrodagh dictated a quick, temporizing reply to Lysanter and went to the next message. More whining from Corianor about the danger of the corridors. Barrodagh didn’t bother with a reply; the other should have thought of that before he started his attempts at winning the favor of the grays by harvesting and trading work counters for Ur-fruit. Now I get the benefits while he suffers the danger.
The smile this thought engendered faded as Barrodagh went through the rest of his messages, unable to rid himself of the nagging urgency that there was still something he’d missed. He scanned the critical data and gnawed absently at a knuckle when he saw that Ferrasin’s latest worms had again been blocked—even worse, there were apparently more areas of dataspace now mysteriously inaccessible, and he could not track whoever was doing the blocking.
Barrodagh remembered a search he’d initiated earlier. He tabbed it up, sending it as usual through decryption and printing and then destruction.
The flimsies spat out onto the welter of papers already littering the desk, and he pounced on them, reading fast, then he sat back and drew a deep breath.
All right, he now had proof—of a sort—that someone had tampered with the spy-sensor in the Rifter crew’s quarters. Probably Tatriman—on Morrighon’s orders. He ground his teeth, ignoring the flashes of pain in his jaw, as he scanned for word groupings based on what Marim had let fall during chat in the rec room. “Vi’ya said . . .” “Jaim said . . .” “You know, we were just talking about that, and . . .” Yet there was no evidence of any such conversations on the recordings from the crew cabin. Unless Marim was lying—which was also a possibility.
Barrodagh leaned back, considering how to get more data from her. He had to find someone to get her talking more indiscriminately.
The rest of the crew was worthless, and there was no one else—except Hreem. Yes, it was indeed time to let Hreem out and about. He was purportedly their enemy, though—being Rifters—they were as likely to ally as to betray each other, depending on which course held out the greater prospect of profit.
Why would he set Hreem free? There had to be a reason, of course, and one that had nothing to do with the real reason. The Ogres were the obvious one: Eusabian was pleased, and therefore some measure of fre
edom would be granted the man who had brought them from Barca. And letting him roam free will blunt Hreem’s anger when Lysanter takes his shestek away, and underscore in his mind his sense of safety with respect to Riolo and the Ogre traps. Hreem must not get any hint of Riolo’s double-dealing.
Barrodagh laughed as he reached for his comm.
o0o
Hreem palmed the door control, wincing at the sound the chatzing thing made when it opened. It reminded him of his night’s sleep—or what passed for a night’s sleep in this blungehole. He’d tried to turn the light out, but after four or five times it glowed back on, each time more reddish than before. Then there was that logos-loving wall behind his bed, puckering and making weird sucking noises. Kissing noises. At least he had a dyplast shield over the bed now, so he didn’t have to worry about anything awful falling on him.
Finally he sat up in bed and yelled, “Dead or not, Norio, if I get hold of you you’ll wish you’d never heard of this Telos-chatzing Suneater!”
The wall had given one extra ripe, juicy scroinch, but Hreem turned his head in the other direction, ignoring it. He was no longer afraid; angry, yes, but if he hadn’t been so bored and tired he’d have wanted to laugh.
After a short time the noises went away, and so did the light. He’d slept then.
And now, for the first time since he’d come to this chatz-forsaken blunge-pit, he was being permitted to leave that room and do some exploring. Not that he expected a station full of Dol’jharians and their minions to be much excitement. But anything was better than those weird walls.
He stepped out into the tunnel and looked down its ovoid length, curving like the insides of some huge beast. Disgusting place—how could these ice-nackered Dol’jharians stand it?
A couple of techs in gray overalls crossed an intersection.
“Hey,” he called. “Where’s the rec room?”
They both looked back at him, then went on.
“Chatzing blunge-suckers,” Hreem said loudly, but they did not react. Because no one speaks Uni except for Barrodagh, damn it.
The Thrones of Kronos Page 38
