by Judith Tarr
She had to be thrilled with it all, and eat a big piece of pie. Everybody was there on the roof on maybe the last really warm evening of the season; the stars were out, and people sang, and some of the interns had got up a band that wasn’t bad at all.
It was one of the best night-before-birthday dinners she could remember. She wished she could have enjoyed it, and not been all knotted up thinking of what was supposed to happen tomorrow.
The transport was on its way. It would hit orbit around midnight. In the morning the shuttle would come down.
Mother went with Aisha when it was time for bed, and tucked her in. It hurt to take the kiss and the hug the way she used to when she was little, and not be able to tell Mother all the things that were spinning around in her head.
“It’s going to be all right,” Mother said. “Just relax and let it happen. It will be over in no time, and then you’ll never have to worry about it again.”
“I hope so,” Aisha said.
Mother smoothed Aisha’s hair back from her forehead and smiled. If her smile was a little shaky, Aisha couldn’t blame her. “Go to sleep,” she said. “Don’t worry about school tomorrow. I’ll come get you when it’s time to get ready.”
All Aisha could do was nod. Mother kissed her again and went away. She lay with dinner sitting like a rock in her stomach, and thought about throwing up.
She’d been practicing the sun-shield that Rama had taught her. She was getting good at it, she thought, but other things had started happening, maybe because of it. Those, she wasn’t as sure of.
A few days ago, she’d woken up to find herself floating half a meter above the bed. It wasn’t a dream. She didn’t crash down when she realized where she was. She stayed there, drifty and peaceful, until it dawned on her that this was really impossible. Then the air dropped out from under her.
It had been wonderful when it happened. Terror came after, when she remembered the Corps. But there was the sun, wrapped around her, roaring and flaming. Keeping her safe.
Tonight she opened the door in her mind where the floating was, and let the bed sink slowly away. She couldn’t sleep like that—if anybody found her, Psycorps wouldn’t even bother to test her, it would just take her away—but as long as she was awake, it was hard to resist.
It felt like floating in the ocean. Things like fish swam around her, a flicker of shadow and gleam: people sleeping or thinking or wandering through a dream. If she wasn’t careful she could slide right inside them, but Rama’s sun worked to keep her in as well as Psycorps out.
Thinking about him brought him up beside her. Unlike everybody else, he knew she was there. Warmth washed over her. If he’d been there in person, she would have seen him smile.
Then she could sleep. Nothing could touch her. Anything that tried would have to get past him first.
~~~
The Psycorps agent came in on a Spaceforce shuttle: leaner, quieter, and much faster than transport and tourist shuttles. It landed on the plain with not so much as a bump, right in front of Aisha and the parents and Vikram with the rover.
The agent’s name was Lieutenant Zhao. He was young, pretty, and shockingly cheerful. He looked nothing like the grim psi master Aisha had been expecting. He wasn’t wearing black, either. His uniform was dark green, like conifers, and he even smelled a little like one.
She had slept better than she ever thought she would, thanks to Rama, but she still felt scratchy and out of sorts. Mother had let her sleep through morning barn cleaning, then brought her breakfast in bed, and helped her get dressed and braid her hair.
She had a headscarf over the braids now, like a grownup, and a new dress in her favorite color, which was the soft deep purple of Nevermore’s sky after sunset but before the dark had completely come down. Aunt Khalida had given her thirteen silver bracelets, one for each year of her life. They felt strange on her thin brown arm, but she liked the way they slid up and down, chinking softly together when she moved.
Lieutenant Zhao smiled at her and kissed her hand, which made her blush all over. She knew he was doing it because he was trained to, so if there was anything to find, she’d be too relaxed and trusting to hide it. But she also knew he meant it. He did think she was pretty, and he was glad to meet her.
She was so far off balance she almost forgot to hide behind the sun. She remembered just in time. She even managed to smile, though she couldn’t look him in the eye.
He was probably used to that. He had three gold buttons on his collar. Level three—that was high. They only went to five, though there was a rumor of more that nobody talked about. All the way up to nine.
All the more reason to keep her barrier up. He bowed to the parents. “Dr. Nasir. Dr. Kanakarides.”
They bowed back, not as low. Pater’s thick black eyebrows were even closer together than usual. He didn’t like Psycorps. At all. Most people didn’t. Mother had to smile for both of them and invite Lieutenant Zhao back to the house—as if he wouldn’t go there anyway, whether she wanted him to or not.
It was Mother who sat next to Lieutenant Zhao in the rover. Vikram was up front, driving, and Aisha was in the back, trying not to cling to Pater. She was determined to keep her chin up and her best face on.
This was going to take forever. There would have to be greetings and coffee and a tour of the house and the site. It would be hours before the test could even start.
But when they got to the house, Lieutenant Zhao smiled as brightly as ever and said, “I know you’re eager to get this over with. Doctors, is there a room we can use, with full computer access?”
The schoolroom was ready, with the bot shut away in its cabinet, and Jamal off doing whatever he wanted. Mother and Pater had trouble leaving Aisha there. She had trouble letting them go. Lieutenant Zhao’s smile drove them out, and he shut the door and sealed it behind them.
~~~
Lieutenant Zhao was still smiling when he turned back to Aisha, but there was a strong tinge of sympathy in it now. “This won’t take too terribly long,” he said, “and I promise it won’t hurt.”
She was so stiff inside she could hardly move. She sat where he told her to sit, in the chair that Jamal usually sat in, and he sat facing her. His expression was more serious now as he linked in to the house computer and overrode the passwords.
She held her breath, but he didn’t go exploring in the system. He just wanted to patch through to the shuttle and from there to the worldsweb.
His eyes changed when he closed the connection. Someone else was there, too: someone older, sterner, and closer to what Aisha had thought he would be.
This other person didn’t introduce itself. It said, “Sera Nasir. Relax, please, and focus here.” Lieutenant Zhao held up his hand. There was something in it. It looked like a databead, but databeads were inert. This had light in it, and colors swirling around and around.
The sun shone inside her. It was made all of light, with coils and swirls of plasma, and a herd of spots that had come around from the far side just this morning. She watched them follow one another across the face of the sun.
On the other side of that, she could feel small pricks and stabs and the occasional jolt, like a spark of electricity. It was like being examined by a slightly out-of-sync medbot. It poked here, prodded there. It tried to get a reaction in one place that she knew should have yowled back, but the sun was so bright, nothing could touch it.
After what might have been a nanosecond or an hour, the sequence of irritations stopped. Aisha looked through the sun at Lieutenant Zhao’s face. The stranger was still there, just for a moment, staring hard at Aisha as if it suspected something. But it went away, and he blinked and took a deep breath and smiled with a touch of wistfulness. “There, Sera Nasir. That’s it. You’re done.”
She needed to take a breath, too. “What happened? Did you find anything?”
“Nothing significant,” he said. “I’m afraid you’re not a candidate for Psycorps.”
She couldn’t collaps
e right there. She had to stay upright, stay awake, and say something that didn’t sound too terribly elated.
She had to keep her barrier up, too. Nobody had to tell her not to let her guard down for one instant as long as Psycorps was in this system. She’d failed the obvious part of the test, but Psycorps hadn’t got where it was by being easy to fool. Lieutenant Zhao would be keeping an eye on her until he left.
Still. The worst part was over. All she had to do now was keep her head down and not do anything stupid.
15
Khalida fully intended to stay out of Psycorps’ way. She spent the day in the vault, labeling and inventorying artifacts.
Through the computer she knew when Aisha’s test results came through. Minimal psi, barely enough to measure. Aisha would not be leaving Nevermore with the agent.
Khalida was happy for her—surprised, but happy; she would have sworn Aisha would test positive. She was happy for Rashid and Marina, too. The last thing they needed to do was lose their daughter to the Corps.
There would be a real celebration tonight, now the elder of the Brats was safe. Khalida saluted her with a cup that, according to its label, dated from a century or so before the Disappearance.
As she lowered it, she looked up into a stranger’s face.
Level Three Psycorps, with lieutenant’s bars and the name Zhao above the pocket of his uniform. He was one of the meet-and-greet unit: attractive well past the point of prettiness, open-faced and honest and ferociously well-intentioned.
That did not mean he was any kind of idiot. It took more than strong psi powers to make level three. It took brains, and a certain talent for working the system.
She set the cup down on the sorting table. His glance asked permission; she shrugged. He picked it up.
Testing for impressions. She hoped he got a mind-full. She had been handling it with gloves; the last human touch the cup had had was some five thousand years ago.
It must have worn off: Lieutenant Zhao put the cup down with a faint sigh, as if disappointed. “It’s finely made,” he said. “Very beautiful.”
She nodded. The silence stretched to the awkward stage.
That was an old game, and MI played it as well as Psycorps. Khalida reached for the next artifact in the series, a bronze dagger with an inlaid ivory hilt, and recorded its image and the label attached, with keyword strings and cross-references.
Lieutenant Zhao broke first. He retrieved something from his pocket and slid it across the table.
Her mind took a while to put it in context. It was a set of captain’s bars. “Don’t tell me they promoted me.”
“They did,” he said, “Captain Nasir. You have orders also, which I’m to see you download and acknowledge.”
“MI is using Psycorps to do its dirty work? When did that start?”
Lieutenant Zhao’s smile was wry. “Shocking, isn’t it? They’ve tried every possible permutation of computerized message. Rather than send a hardcopy letter to be further ignored, they happened to discover that I would be passing through at this convenient time. I’m to observe and record your receipt of the orders, and then accompany you to the transport. MI will direct you from there.”
“What if I refuse? I’m on leave.”
“Your leave ended six Earthdays ago,” Lieutenant Zhao said, “and you failed to apply for an extension. Technically you’re AWOL, but your superior officer in this system chooses to be lenient. She has to dock your pay, that’s regulations, but she won’t put you on report.”
That was better than Khalida deserved. She studied her hands, which had closed tightly around the dagger. Its blade was sharp: she felt the sting of the cuts.
She really did feel it. Amazing. She was barely tempted to experiment, to cut deeper and see what happened.
It seemed she was starting to heal after all.
Lieutenant Zhao was waiting. This time he won: there was no point in fighting it any more. Khalida opened the file that was strobing and screaming at her through the house link.
It was official. She was Captain Nasir.
She had not asked to be promoted. She certainly had not wanted it. But there it was.
The orders were short, blunt, and to the point. Report soonest to Spaceforce vessel Leda. Await further orders.
When orders came in stages, that was never good news. Without explanation or apology, Khalida ran back through the file of unread messages. The first third were all about the commendation, the second third informed her that she had been promoted, and the last third all said the same thing: Report somewhere and wait.
That meant it was really bad. But not, she noted, absolutely or desperately urgent, if it had taken this long for them to send someone to fetch her.
She clicked on another file, one that she had been thinking about sending, but had never quite brought herself to do it. There it was, her resignation, signed and sealed but not, yet, dated.
She called up today’s date, tipped it in, but when the Send key blinked at her, she sent it back into storage instead.
“Give me time to think about it,” she said to Lieutenant Zhao.
“I can give you forty-eight Earth hours,” he said. “After that, I’m afraid I’ll have to arrest you.”
“Not if I resign,” she said.
“They won’t accept your resignation.”
“They have to.”
“Not since you’ve gone AWOL,” said Lieutenant Zhao. He honestly seemed to sympathize. “Do take the time. I’ve always wanted to visit the mysterious Nevermore. But in forty-eight hours, I have to bring you in. Willingly or otherwise.”
He saluted her crisply, softened it with a smile, and left her there with her captain’s bars and her orders and her hopeless state of confusion.
It was her own damned fault for avoiding what she knew would have to happen. MI was spread thin. Any operative who was even close to functional was expected and required to function.
Which left open the question: Was she functional? Regulations forbade her to make that determination. Command would decide—and Command well might decree that she was.
She finished what she was doing. She cleared the table, got everything inventoried, and backed up and saved the files. Her chrono said it was still daylight. She was expected at dinner, to help Aisha celebrate her reprieve and her new, untrammeled future.
Khalida could do that. Someone ought to be happy. Why not Aisha?
She was maudlin already, and there was not a drop of wine or liquor on this side of the planet. Rashid was traditional that way.
Now there was a reason to head back into space. Khalida opened a file for it, labeled and saved and stored it. There was already a file for reasons to stay, which had swelled past a hundred a long time ago.
16
Everything wanted to happen at once. Instead of leaving on the same day like a polite and sensible Psycorps agent, Lieutenant Zhao stayed. He stayed in the shuttle and not in the house, but the shuttle was still on Nevermore. Aisha was getting very tired of keeping her barriers up.
He stayed because of Aunt Khalida. MI had called her back, and he was supposed to make sure she got there.
That meant she was leaving. And so was Rama.
“Did you know he’s rich?” Jamal asked that afternoon.
Aisha was supposed to be resting. She had a bit of a headache, but she’d started to think about going out to ride Jinni. A long ride, as far away from everything as possible.
Jamal showed up in her room before she could get her riding clothes on, and perched on the hoverchair that she mostly kept tethered in the corner. She didn’t know why she let him stay. It was obvious he’d come to annoy her.
A buzzing began in her back teeth and worked its way around to the top of her head. That was the firewall going up, and the parental controls turning off. No one outside could listen in.
“All that gold Rama had on him,” Jamal said. “It’s worth more than you would believe. He could buy most of a small planet, if he had any u
se for one.”
She frowned at him. “How did you find that out?”
Janal shrugged the way he did when he was determined not to feel guilty. “I caught him while you were having your test, forging travel papers. He’s good. Not as good as I am, but good.”
“You didn’t.”
“I had to,” Jamal said. “If he’d messed up, it would have traced back to us.”
“So you helped him.” Aisha sighed. “You know those artifacts belong to the Department of Antiquities.”
“Not if he can claim them under the aboriginal property laws.”
He actually said that as if he knew what it meant. Aisha only did because she ran a search on the term. “You know about him?”
“It’s kind of hard not to,” he said. “He’s nowhere in any database. Considering where we found him and what he was wearing, I had to conclude, logically—”
“Stop talking like a schoolbot,” Aisha said irritably.
Jamal stuck out his tongue at her. “I set up an account for him, and showed him how to build an identity. He’d already figured out most of it. He learns fast.”
“You know what you’re unleashing on the spaceways,” Aisha said. “The Dread Pirate Gallifrey was nothing to what he’ll be.”
“I know,” Jamal said. “It will be beautiful.”
“I think you lack a moral compass,” Aisha said.
“Now you’re talking like a bot.”
Aisha was past ready to get out of there, but she knew her brother. “All right. What are we really doing here?”
He bounced in the hoverchair, up and down and up and down, the way he used to when he was five years old. She kicked him to make him stop.
Finally he came out with it. “It’s over. The message came on the shuttle. The expedition has to shut down. We get to finish the season, but then we’re done.”
Aisha wheezed. His words had punched all the air out of her. “What—they can’t—”
