by Robert Reed
The other humans exchanged glances, deciding who would reply.
Finally, the youngest old man said, “Coral-splitters, yes. But they wouldn’t be any use in tearing down a forest.”
“What would be?”
“We don’t make a habit of discussing the issue, but our District does maintain a small number of bombs designed to cut wood, not coral. They can demolish any tree trunk, and we keep them in case an outlying area has troubles.”
The human was describing civil war.
Father put on a satisfied expression. “But you’re sure that our great enemy, the papio, attacked us. Yes?”
The generals were happy with that conjecture.
“The papio in conjunction with traitors,” Father said. “They must have infiltrated the Corona District with allies.”
Each man relaxed his arms, in one way or another saying, “Yes.”
“But we don’t have any traitors.”
The middle general blinked. “We?”
“The District of Districts,” Father said. “None of our citizens want that young boy dropped into oblivion.”
“There are probably a few wicked sorts,” his superior said. “But not many, and nobody of consequence, I would think.”
“Why would you think that?” Father asked.
Again, the responses came too quickly—stated and then followed by more clinical evidence that looked sewn onto the reflexive mess. Basically, the men inhabiting those silk uniforms were convinced that they knew everybody of worth and had measured each of their souls without error.
King hadn’t moved since before this meeting began. He was supposed to keep his distance, pulling lessons from this slow, polite interrogation. But then the Archon of Archons now gave him the quickest glance possible followed by a subtle nod, which was his signal to step forward—a tall armored creature with fierce green eyes and two determined mouths.
Generals preferred the company of generals. They tolerated civilian leaders but preferred not to notice the leader’s child. Standing at attention, they faced List while explaining what they knew that was certain and what they could surmise without too much imagination. Conspirators inside the Corona District had used the papio, unless the treachery flew the other way. Terrible weapons had been smuggled into the highest portion of the forest, and while evidence would be uncovered quite a lot might be learned in future days, the generals thought it vital to warn the civilian at his desk that the whole story might never be known.
“Oh, I agree with that,” Father said.
Faces grinned, not relaxed but not scared either. These were creatures with long careers, honors earned without once fighting a serious battle. These were masters in the realms of public speaking and sure, solid words delivered with authority, particularly during practiced meetings. Father would end their careers today. He had explained his plan to King before the men were let into his office. With his voice high and sharp, he had confided, “These are not the men to lead the fleet tomorrow.”
“Where are we going tomorrow?” King had asked.
“Indeed,” his father had replied cryptically. “That’s my point exactly.”
Now King approached the four humans, stopping only when the generals nervously glanced his way.
Father pretended to be irritated by the boy’s presence. He pretended to look at a stack of useless papers. Then he focused on the doomed soldiers, saying, “Perhaps you should explain this papio bomb to me. Exactly how big is it, able to drop all of those trees?”
Tired backs needed adjustments.
“I assumed it was a single weapon. Am I wrong?”
The generals had a lesson to deliver. The youngest said, “There weren’t any reports of papio aircraft. So more likely, our enemies would use a series of demolition charges. Materials could be smuggled through the wilderness in small quantities, presumably over many days and nights.”
“I suppose that is more reasonable,” said Father.
Again, the generals glanced at the peculiar creature standing still as a statue near his tiny parent.
With a sigh, Father said, “Well, at least the Diamond boy survives.”
Everybody but King nodded happily, that lone bit of good news worth repeating again and again.
“So,” Father began.
Nobody spoke.
“Some secretive group planted explosives inside several trees—explosives brewed by our eternal enemies—and then the trees came down, killing tens of thousands of citizens.”
The men said nothing, perhaps hoping silence would help their circumstances.
“Early reports are sketchy,” Father continued. “But I was speaking to Prima just before you arrived. She claims that one of Diamond’s bodyguards tried to trap him on Marduk, assuring his death.”
“Well, a huge plot like this,” the middle general began.
Then he hesitated.
Father called to him by name, not rank.
The man swallowed. “The Corona District is utterly incompetent when it comes to security. As I have said more than once . . . ”
“They are not incompetent,” Father said.
The general of generals scoffed at that statement.
“Shut up,” Father said, leaning across his desk, one stick-like finger stabbing the air. “For the last four hundred days, my office and my good people have worked hard to place agents inside Prima’s security apparatus, and the results have been lousy, more often than not.”
His audience wasn’t happy with that revelation.
“Espionage,” said the middle general.
“Why wasn’t I informed?” asked the top general. “What are we talking about? Intelligence missions against an ally?”
“The work happily wears any name you give it,” said Father.
The general of generals was outraged. “Plots of this sort aren’t supposed to be hatched and nourished by the civilian element.”
“Yet they were,” said the Archon of Archons. “I’m an ambitious, conniving man with thousands on my staff, and I managed to launch a dozen operations under your oblivious noses. Does that adequately define the situation?”
Silence.
“And now you’re so desperate for explanations that you’ll claim that a few treacherous people managed to carry out a grand attack, and a security network that made my life difficult was just as ignorant as you three.”
Generals looked silly when their shoulders slumped, when their busbies tilted and their uniforms seemed to deflate.
King laughed with his insulting mouth.
“There are other possibilities,” said the youngest old man.
“I’m well aware of that,” said Father.
“If Prima is culpable,” said the general.
“Let’s assume that my colleague and dear friend is innocent,” Father said.
“Then the papio are in charge,” the general of generals allowed. “With their military skills and key agents in Prima’s staff, everything is possible.”
Father used the hardest voice he could muster. “Be careful what you believe. Our peace has held for generations. We must be exceptionally cautious when we start blaming one old enemy.”
“The papio helped,” the general maintained.
“Everybody is a suspect,” the Archon declared, finally rising to his feet.
The generals offered weak shows of teeth.
“Of course we’ll mobilize,” said Father. “The Districts have rules, have protocols. My office has called a worldwide alert. Every military resource will be readied. I intend to follow our primary plan for a large-scale attack on an outer district. Half of our fleet must be ready by tomorrow, and because I want to sleep tonight, I insist that each of you resigns before offering yourself to military court, in preparation for a lengthy examination of records and motivations.”
Soft human faces grew softer. Nothing should have been a surprise, yet twice in the same day, these creatures were astonished by a surprise attack.
Father waited
for some trembling voice to ask, “Why?”
Two of them sputtered the question, and he said, “I don’t believe any of your stories. We don’t have any substantive evidence, and indeed, as you warned, we might never have a respectable picture of the truth. But you also told me that we have comparable weapons, if only in small stocks. And if there is a conspiracy at work inside my District, my three ranking officers are staggering incompetents who can’t appreciate their deep weaknesses.”
Each general angrily professed his innocence.
But Father was never moved by innocence. And he didn’t care about guilt on this score. He had already explained his thinking to King. War was not equations on a long page. War was brutal and real and urgent, and what mattered was putting younger men in charge of the human fleets. And that was the only reason why the Archon presented the old men with their replacements’ names, waiting for signatures and stamps.
“I know very little about military matters,” Father continued, “but I’m going to ride with our fleet tomorrow, out to give Prima whatever help she deserves.”
“And I’ll go with you,” King said.
Father let a grin show. “But what if I tell you to stay here and study?”
“I won’t.”
“What if I send a hundred soldiers to restrain you?”
Father and son had planned this game, this loud show. But the generals weren’t paying attention to the family drama, and they weren’t looking at the papers in their hands. All that mattered were their personal miseries, standing inside the bud-green silks and their wrinkled flesh, wet eyes close to leaking tears.
That was why King picked up his father’s massive desk.
The Archon wanted people to be impressed with his son. He wanted his generals to talk about the child’s warrior spirit. But this was too loud, too bold. With a glance, List told King to quit. But Father’s papers had slid free and the desk hung in space, needing somewhere to go. So with his total strength and a contrived flash of rage, King flung the lump of bloodwood partway across the spacious office, watching its flight and then the hard landing that shattered every seam.
“Send a thousand soldiers to sit on me,” he told those cowering old men. “Do it. Please do it. But we’ll go to war a thousand soldiers weaker.”
That young boy generated every possible reaction in people.
Prima was no exception.
Diamond revealed empathy inside the coldest soul, amazement in the most banal. What he meant to the world might leave twenty passionate, conflicting opinions inside the same average head. Some citizens couldn’t sleep with their worries. A mad few claimed to feel his presence—a black chill or a blazing second sun transforming everyone and everything. Even in his presence, the boy was a conundrum. Sometimes he was the wondrous child, charming and sweet and reassuringly ordinary. But then suddenly he became an odd face and a smile that meant nothing. A rational person had to wonder if every appearance was camouflage, an exterior worn by a crafty monster biding its time, waiting for the world to lose its focus, its strength.
Compassion and suspicion lived inside Prima. Seeing Diamond that first time, she wanted to take care of him, marshaling the powers of her office and District in his defense. Yet she also feared him in the deepest worst ways. There were nights without sleep and more nights infected with wild dreams, and odd as it seemed, the only reliable cure for the doubts was to board the hub elevator early in the morning, standing beside a stern, silent gentleman dressed in a stern, silent gray and white uniform, the two of them rising to the highest reaches of the forest.
There was no darker, more oppressive place in the world.
In normal times, barely a whisper of sunlight reached that bleak terrain, and then only noticeable to eyes accustomed to the night.
Yet the world’s roof was plastered with life. Not the trees, no. Named trees and tiny nameless trees weren’t the end of the Creation. Roots snaked only part way inside the fleshy black sky-reef. Learned scientists described that reef as lichen, but instead of being green with algae it was full of organisms that consumed the long-light that no human eye could resolve. Rising from the sun, that portion of the spectrum was relentless, passing through wood and every human body, and the spherical shape of the world served to focus these energies against higher regions, up where the oil-infused reef was deep enough for the gigantic bloodwoods to cling with their greedy, oversized roots.
Prima had climbed the high, half-lit reaches above the District of Districts, but she preferred her home with its blackness and the shallower roots, and in particular the spongy bladders filled with phloem, dangling heavy and rich in the morning gloom. She loved the great dish-shaped basins that hung from trees like intricate shelves, one beside the next in close order, each gathering up the highest drops of rain. Strange creatures thrived where light was rare. She particularly liked the bizarre little animals that flew through the trapped water, fins and pink gills flapping. In that realm, an Archon could find the time to remove her shoes and stockings, sitting on the brink of a favorite basin where the trail was maintained and ropes were strung across the gaps. Then the toes went into the chill water. Many of the water-flyers lacked eyes, but they seemed to taste her flesh in the currents, and when they felt especially brave, they would dart forward, enjoying little nibbles of human skin.
Worries about the boy brought Prima to the world’s ceiling.
And so did the King monster living in List’s house, and the rumors of two more mysteries, whatever they might be.
Just the idea of these creatures was a lure, a nectar perhaps, or perhaps the bait in a trap. Prima could never be as close to the ends of the Creation as she was there, and it was possible to sit in the dark, feeling bony mouths chewing harmlessly at her toes. And in the dark, as alone as any Archon could be, she was able to consider each impossibility.
“Madam,” said a man’s rough voice. “You wouldn’t recognize this place now.”
Prima was standing alone in her office, the call-line pressed hard against her ear and her mouth. “Tell me,” she said.
“There’s smoke everywhere, and sunlight,” said the fletch’s captain
“Of course,” she said.
The line crackled for a few moments, threatening to break. But the voice returned in mid-sentence, telling her, “ . . . but the ignition failed or they didn’t finish the setup.”
“What are we talking about?” she asked.
“The bladders, madam. Somebody pumped fuel into Hanner’s oldest bladders. We’re guessing by the smell, but the alcohol’s been spiked with explosives. That would make the blast hotter and much quicker.”
“Inside the bladders?”
“Yes, madam.”
“Which was brought there how?” she shouted.
“In drops and dribbles, I’d guess.” The captain paused, and the roar on an engine sounded. “If I seeded this entire area—what exploded and what didn’t—then we’d be talking about a hundred loads of high-quality papio fuel and explosives.”
“Papio,” she repeated.
“That’s what I’m guessing, madam. And the detonators are definitely papio. Which makes it double-lucky that Hanner didn’t come down too. The papio have great detonators.”
Did the man know how he sounded, praising the murderers?
“But are we safe now?” she asked.
“Your tree?” The voice became quieter, as if he were holding the call-line away from his mouth. “Hanner will survive the day, madam. And we can drain this bomb out without too much risk. But the fuel is toxic and the explosives have some ugly chemicals. This mess has already seeped through the bladder walls, poisoning the wood for a hundred paces in every direction. Long-term, we’re talking about abandoning Hanner before she dies and drops on her own.”
Prima straightened her back, narrowed her eyes. “Thank you.”
“But we think, we hope, the fires are done burning,” he continued. “So at least the damage won’t spread farther.”
&
nbsp; Plainly, the captain wasn’t seeing what she saw. The first fire might be done, but a far worse blaze was beginning.
“Madam?”
The Archon said nothing.
“Can you hear me, madam?”
But she had nothing to say. Standing alone and feeling alone, she thought about the mouths that had lived inside those dark basins of rainwater. Did the attached minds—those little white drops of brain—ever ask if there were better places in existence?
Did they believe in brighter realms?
And would that be a comfort, knowing it was so?
FIVE
The woman never pretended to be their mother, not when she did her duties and not inside their minds. Explaining her place, she told the other papio that she was a door between the Eight and the world. Her deep voice and uncompromising attitude colored everything. Some of the Eight always loved her, while others felt that way only afterwards. One or another might ask to know her feelings. Did she love them, and if so, in what order did she love them? These weren’t fair questions, and she told them so. But then she would answer the question, claiming to love each of them equally, even though that was untrue. She also assured them they shared a wonderful body, a beautiful body, and everyone wanted to believe those words even more than the promises of love: this contrivance of flesh and imagination was the Eight, and it was lovely, and the woman rightfully saw magnificence standing before her.
She was tiny beside them.
Every papio as small, and the clever monkeys scrambling through trees were smaller still.
The woman first visited the outpost soon after the Eight were discovered. She was one body among the government dignitaries and important scientists—the quiet assistant to a high-ranking doctor. That man didn’t like the Eight. He saw an abomination and the need for hard measures, and that’s why he was quickly sent away. The initial examination was hers, and with important people watching, she worked with her eyes and fingers, then razors and swords and a sequence of increasingly elaborate machines, exploring the conundrum that the Creators had bestowed on humanity.
Eight creatures lived inside a bag of sloppy, ill-ordered flesh. Maybe they were together at the beginning of everything, or maybe they merged inside the corona’s stomach. There was no way to know. Piercing the skin with sound and metal, the doctor identified each enduring mind as well as the different flavors of meat. In those days, the Eight had a few sloppy eyes and ears, temporary limbs and no working stomach. They were close to helpless when the doctor bathed them with sugar water and injected pulverized meat inside them. Despite that miserable diet, they managed to grow, gaining insights and little talents as the body became huge. Their first good hands were tendrils. They made holes that pretended to be mouths. Then through the force of clumsy shared wills, they created muscle and various stomachs, and a kind of bone appeared inside that knotted confused flesh, defining arms and legs and ribs and the interlocking disks that joined into one broad backbone wrapped around eight distinct spines, each springing from a mind with its own voice.
