by James Palmer
Rebani raised an eyebrow in surprise as he handed the valet-bot his heavy cloak. Carrying the garment, Josef stalked from the room in a gait which was, in its way, graceful. He seemed to mumble softly to himself as he did so, as if under his breath.
Beneath the cloak, Rebani Kalba wore a gray double-breasted tunic and jodhpurs without insignia. Frilly white fabric sprouted from the neck of the tunic, which was collarless. From his belt hung an odd, spherical metal device that was bisected by a cylinder. The cylinder, tapering to a near point at the long end, was large enough to serve as a handle, but had no grip. No other protrusions were visible on the metal sphere. It resembled a weapon, but was unlike any Bal, versed in the armament of dozens of cultures, had ever seen.
Bal Tabarin realized it was the famed Veloceter, weapon of choice of the Monitors, powered by force of will.
“If you go with Josef, he’ll take you to a cabin,” Bal suggested, eyeing the weapon unobtrusively. Rebani nodded, and followed the valet-bot, glancing about the ship in a manner that reminded Bal of a sponge soaking up liquid. He didn’t like it.
Bal Tabarin silently watched the Sabour depart. Shortly, the metal valet-bot returned, and Bal said, “Prepare for lift-off.”
“Of course, sir,” replied Josef Four-Eight-Zero in an unenthusiastic tone that left little doubt about his feelings concerning space travel. He shuffled along in his odd gait to the cockpit of the ship, followed by Bal.
As Josef read and adjusted numerous flight instruments, Bal seated himself at Ancaios, the astrogation computer – it took an entire holotronic brain, and a specialized one at that, to compute the complex calculations of interstellar space flight – and laid in the course to Annalon, the inhabited planet in the nearest system, to which Rebani Kalba had earlier referred.
“Ready for lift-off, sir,” announced Josef. Bal thought he heard the valet-bot mumble, “as ready as she will ever be”, but couldn’t be sure.
“Ready for lift-off,” echoed Bal Tabarin, turning to the main helm console.
“Excuse me while I find adequate shelter,” said Josef as he shuffled from the cockpit, sounding as if he expected imminent disaster.
Gravity lens adjusted, the ungainly ship rose gracefully into the air, the goose becoming a swan, and sped away from the surface. Once outside the Roche limit, the oval ship disappeared from the velvety blackness of space in a flash as it made the jump into hyperspace.
With the ship now on automatic pilot, Bal left the cockpit, and went to his cabin.
The room more resembled a museum than ship’s cabin, decorated with cultural icons from dozens of planets. Colorful war masks and primitive weapons hung on walls. Examples of several styles of pottery stood side by side on shelves with fertility statues of both wood and stone, each with exaggerated male or female anatomy. On one side of the spacious room lay a plain bed, on the other a large desk, piled high with artifacts and ancient texts made of paper. A bulkhead dividing the chamber showed that the room had once been two, and a wall removed between them to create one large living area; this chamber was Bal’s home, not just the Captain’s Cabin.
Removing his smudged vest as he approached the over-sized desk, Bal dropped it to the floor.
“Library function,” he said, and the desk began humming softly. As he unfastened and removed his soiled shirt, Bal continued speaking: “Cross-reference the visual of the gem I had synthesized with all existing gems which bear inscriptions.” He added what he could from his own recollection of the gem he had taken from the village, removing his trousers as he did so.
Naked, Bal went into an adjoining bathroom and activated the sonic shower, then, with an afterthought, returned to the desk.
“Separate task,” he instructed. “Compile list of inscripted gems in mythologies by culture-slash-planet.”
That done, Bal returned to his shower.
On the lowest setting, the sonic waves of the shower almost tickled like a slight breeze. Bal raised the shower a setting higher, the one most Humans normally used; the lowest setting was used by soft-skinned Sentients who feared rupturing their thinly-covered veins or gelatinous beings who would be shaken apart by more forceful vibrations. The waves bombarded his body, shaking loose filth and dead skin until they fell to the collection area at his feet. It took several minutes to scour his entire body clean.
Bal adjusted the showerhead for deep muscle penetration, and let the waves sink into him, massaging the tired and sore muscles as efficiently as the probing fingers of a professional. As he enjoyed the pain-pleasure of the sonic shower, Bal tried to remember where he had heard of an important gem that bore indecipherable inscriptions – there were many such unimportant ones – but could not. The computer would locate it, Bal hoped. Finally, relaxed and refreshed, he shut off the showerhead, and stepped from the small chamber.
Bal returned to the large desk, which still hummed busily. Exhausted by a long night of activity, and relaxed by the sonic shower, he went to the bed, and lay down. He was asleep before he knew it.
Bal Tabarin dreamed of a jigsaw puzzle he had possessed as a child. It depicted a colorful tent village in the scrub desert of the planet Ban-Ouran, and called “The Trees of Ban-Ouran”, after the natives, nomads whose skin resembled the bark of trees, gray and wrinkled. In the dream, Bal put together a life-size version of the puzzle, a milky void beyond, but the piece he had in his hand wouldn’t fit any place he tried it. Inexplicably, he didn’t try another piece, intent on finding the spot this one belonged.
A chime sounded, waking Bal. The sound indicated the computer had the results of its search. Bal blinked once, slowly, and realized he remembered what he had dreamt about. That was an unusual occurrence for him. What few dreams he could recall, he could make no sense of, and therefore put no stock in their content. As he rose from the bed, Bal idly wondered what the milky void in the dream had represented.
Bal stretched, and realized the puzzle had captured his imagination, as a child, and started a lifelong interest in exotic places and more exotic people. He returned to the desk, and, noticing the chronometer display, saw hours had passed while he had slept, and promptly forgot his dream.
Bal cocked one ear, as if listening for some sound of an eavesdropper outside his cabin, then, apparently not trusting his auditory sense, said, “Visual only.”
Lines of words that Bal had devised himself, a pidgin language composed of some of the more obscure dead tongues of the Milky Way, which included Dorlan and Jamadian, scrolled up on the screen. Bal’s steely eyes glittered in the wash of soft light from the display screen.
Rebani Kalba sat cross-legged on the floor in the cabin Josef had taken him to, the gem Bal had taken from the village hovering in the air before the Sabour’s face, lit by an inner flame. In this respect it resembled a fire diamond, but was not one of those sought-after jewels. His eyes closed, Rebani breathed slowly, but deeply, as regular as a metronome.
Long hours had passed without change in human or gem.
Abruptly, the door to the cabin swished open, jolting Rebani from his meditation. The gem fell to the hard floor, clattering as it did so. Bal Tabarin, in the doorway, seemed not to have noticed the levitating gem, his face twisted in a grimace of anger, steely eyes blazing.
“You miserable cheat!” he snarled, teeth bared.
Rebani scooped up the gem in one smooth motion, and rose to his feet. “What are you talking about?”
Hairs on the back of his neck bristling, Bal pointed accusingly at the gem in Rebani’s hand. “You knew that’s worth more than fifty thousand econs.”
“I do not know its worth in econs,” Rebani said sternly, “but I’m willing to pay fifty thousand econs for it.
“As we agreed,” he added meaningly.
“If you don’t know its worth, why are you willing to pay such a large sum for the gem?” Bal retorted.
Bal saw consternation pass across Rebani’s hawk-like countenance like the shadow cast by a fast-moving cloud. Finally, the Sabour
replied, “It spoke to me.”
Bal Tabarin’s jaw dropped noticeably. “It spoke to you?”
Rebani nodded. “Not with words,” he explained. “Surely you’ve received a look from a being, and known what he was thinking.”
“Yes,” Bal said slowly, forgetting his anger. It was quickly replaced by skepticism. “How do I know you’re telling the truth?”
Rebani’s face became stony at the insinuation. “I give you my word as a Sabour.”
Bal frowned. He thought that Sabours couldn’t lie – or weren’t allowed to – but wasn’t sure; he knew they lived by some sort of moral code. “I’ll accept that, for now.”
Considering the implications of the Sabour’s claim, Bal turned to leave.
“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Rebani called to Bal as the latter reached the doorway. Bal turned to face the Sabour.
“How do you know the gem is worth more than fifty thousand econs?” asked Rebani.
Bal Tabarin smiled a toothy smile, one which was not altogether unpleasant, though somewhat reminiscent of the view a swimmer gets just before being devoured by a shark. “The gem seems to be a Sacred Heart.”
One of Rebani’s brows raised quizzically. Bal continued, “The gem matches the description of the Sacred Heart gem in the possession of a Dr. Jardin Fackler Pyx, except for its shape, of course. I can’t be sure until I’ve scanalyzed my gem, naturally,” he said, emphasizing the “my gem” part of the sentence.
Rebani Kalba the Sabour had heard of the Sacred Heart gem, of course. Every Sentient being in the Milky Way had heard of the gem – unique in galactic civilization and therefore priceless. Lit by an extraordinary inner brilliance and resistant to cutting, it was rumored to have been stolen from a temple thousands of years earlier, passing from owner to owner over the centuries, with strange tales attached to its possession. The Heart was generally believed among the superstitious to have supernatural powers.
“I didn’t know there was more than one of them,” Rebani said slowly in a puzzled tone.
“There’s not supposed to be,” Bal answered, neglecting to mention that he had found that some primitive civilizations had legends of gems of great power, and that some modern Sentients believed the Sacred Heart to be one of these.
“Then perhaps we should visit this Dr. Pyx, and find what we can find.”
Bal shook his head. “That may not be possible.”
Rebani’s eyebrow raised imperiously. “You know this Dr. Pyx?”
“Of him,” Bal corrected. “Only by reputation. He hasn’t let anyone examine the Heart since it came into his possession several deca-kilochronons ago. I doubt he’ll let us see it.”
“I am a Sabour,” Rebani, eyes hooded, stated, as if that was all the explanation needed. “We will see.”
“You’ve chartered my ship, so if you want to go see Dr. Pyx, then we’ll go see Dr. Pyx,” Bal said, conveniently establishing Rebani’s liability for all future expenses incurred during the Sabour’s investigation of the gem, Bal’s gem. No matter how the arrangement with the unusual gemstone turned out, Rebani was paying the bills until that matter was settled, in the Corruban adventurer’s view.
Bal left Rebani’s cabin, smiling to himself at his quick maneuvering. The door swished shut noisily behind him as he contemplated the speaking gemstone.
In the cabin, Rebani Kalba held the gem before him, gazing at the shimmering glow at its center. “I will find out what you are.”
The bright glimmer abruptly disappeared, as if in defiance of the Sabour’s claim.
3 / In Which It Is Discovered Still Waters Run Deep
Visually, hyperspace is the polar opposite of normal space, a vast expanse of white interrupted by seemingly random dots of black. It is a virtual certainty that these ebony pinpoints are not stars, nor any physical structure like stars, according to the foremost scientific thinkers in the Milky Way. The common theory is that the Human mind – rather, the Sentient mind, for Humans comprise only a percentage of the galactic population – is incapable of perceiving hyperspace as it truly exists, and, out of a need to comprehend, conjures an image which is familiar, and therefore comforting. Perceiving hyperspace as it truly is, the theory goes, would drive a mind insane. Even so, it is a common occurrence for sentient beings to feel uneasy the first few times traveling in hyperspace, becoming accustomed to it with repeat journeys, much like sailors gaining their “sea legs”.
Bal Tabarin, as comfortable in hyperspace as planetside, brought The Vagabond Lady back into normal space with only the slightest of lurches. “Returning to N-space,” he said aloud, although he was alone, out of habit.
In the early days of interstellar travel, hyperspace jumps were an all-or-nothing proposition: A ship couldn’t change course in H-space; it had to be in normal space to do so. And each jump used an enormous amount of energy, so pilots tried to make sure they knew where they were going before they left. More than one had ended up losing money on a cargo haul because of a miscalculation. These days, Ancaios was capable of making such alterations in course, and travel was simply a matter of being adequately prepared for the long journey, which could take weeks, or even months.
Josef had checked the ship’s larder and found it woefully inadequate for the long voyage to Narbossa, where Dr. Pyx – and the Sacred Heart – resided, so an additional stop was required to restock ship’s supplies before continuing to Narbossa.
After finishing checking Ancaios’ work, Bal remained in the cockpit, pondering the gem, as the ship jumped toward its new destination. Knowledge of “psychic crystals”, the kind fringe spiritualists touted, was common. Of course, some of these were genuine, making it so much harder to debunk the fakes. And, if Bal remembered correctly, a Monitor’s Veloceter weapon used a crystal which reacted to psionic waves like a quartz crystal did to electricity: Put in energy, get out physical force; it was a psychic Peizo reaction.
Bal Tabarin decided the gem was some sort of psychic crystal, which would explain the Rebani’s reaction to it. And explain his interest in it, in the order of fifty thousand econs. The Corruban wasn’t sure the Sabour knew more than he had said, and wasn’t sure that he didn’t. Bal took it for granted that he did. Even if a Sabour was forbidden from telling falsehoods – and Bal didn’t know that to be the case – Rebani hadn’t said he knew no more than Bal, only that he hadn’t known the gem’s value in econs. He had been very precise in his wording, and it reminded Bal, to his disgust, of some of the things he himself had said in the past.
In N-space, days passed as The Vagabond Lady sped through the timeless void of hyperspace toward Kell, the supply stop.
The door to Bal Tabarin’s spacious cabin swished open, and Josef shuffled in, acting uncannily embarrassed, torso cylinder slumped forward, head rotating from side to side as if to make certain no being saw his seeming shame. It was quite a display, one programmed to arouse empathy in Sentients. Gazing at his master, he lamented, “Has a ‘bot ever been given so ignominious a task?”
Ignoring Josef’s complaint, Bal asked anxiously, “Did you get it?”
“Of course,” Josef replied, proffering the unusual gem he held in one over-sized hand.
Bal took it without another word, and placed it on a clear space on the large desk. He told the desk, “Scanalyze.” The desk hummed noisily as it went about its assigned task.
“Reduced to common thievery,” bemoaned Josef, behind Bal.
“It’s not thievery,” growled Bal Tabarin. “This is still my gem until I get paid for it,” he explained, conveniently overlooking the fact that he had stolen it from a native village. He had, he told himself, left them something just as valuable – to them. They lacked the technology to discern the difference between the two gems. Therefore, they had lost nothing. Perception was sometimes reality, Bal told himself. His conscience – what of one he possessed – was therefore clear.
While the desk did its work, Bal turned to face Josef. “Will he notice it missing soon?”
/>
“Probably,” drawled Josef in an irate tone, having regained his composure. “It was lying in plain sight.”
One of Bal’s steely eyes narrowed as he digested this news. Was the gem in plain sight out of trust, or because it was easier to keep an eye on that way? After a moment’s thought, Bal chose the latter; a Sentient didn’t often go wrong underestimating another’s virtues.
Which meant he had to return it before the Sabour noticed it missing. He said to Josef, “Go find Rebani, and keep him occupied.”
“Really, sir,” protested Josef. “I am not an entertainment-bot.”
Bal’s face darkened as he scowled at his valet-bot, causing Josef to turn diplomatically and leave the cabin, shuffling along in his unusual gait.
The desk abruptly chimed. It had sounded sooner than Bal had expected. He went to the desk, and watched the read-out as it scrolled on the holovisor display screen. Bal swore softly as he read that the scanalyzer was unable to determine the composition of the gem.
The results did not state that the crystal was made of an unknown material, but that the scanalyzer was, for some inexplicable reason, unable to get a reading from the gemstone. The report lacked even the crystal’s mass and dimensions, which could be obtained by more mundane, mechanical methods. The Corruban had never before received such a response from the desk, which was instrumental in his work.
Instructing the desk to perform a lengthy self-diagnostic test on itself, Bal Tabarin briefly considered the idea that the gem didn’t want to be analyzed, then discarded it.
