Children of Zanar 1: The Zanari Inheritance

by Niall Teasdale

  ‘Something wrong?’ Thea asked.

  ‘No,’ Kaya said. ‘Yes. I’m… I don’t know… Sleeping with you on Giltanish Prime was one thing, but now we’re here and–’

  ‘And I haven’t explained about Cassandra yet.’ Thea nodded. ‘Well, now’s as good a time as any. Leave your shirt on. We’re going for a walk.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Central control.’ Thea started for the door, pulling her tunic back on. ‘You are going to meet Cassandra.’

  ‘Huh? I thought I’d already met her.’

  ‘Yes… And also no. Better explained once you see. Come on.’

  Thea’s cabin was aboard the Sword, housed in the upper part of the forward section of the Oracle. Once they got out of it, however, Thea took Kaya down to the deck below and to a heavy-looking door which appeared as though it did not get opened very often.

  ‘Forward of here is the main sensor array and the analysis consoles for that,’ Thea said. ‘Behind this door is the main control centre for the Oracle of Zanar. And in another way, behind this door is the oracle of Zanar.’

  ‘I… don’t understand,’ Kaya replied.

  ‘No, probably not.’ Thea looked around at the door. ‘Open it up, Cassy. It’s time you two met properly.’

  There was a pause, and then the huge door slid sideways to reveal the chamber behind it. Lights came on with a flicker that somehow suggested they were rarely used. Kaya frowned and stepped through into what did, sort of, look like a control room. Along both sides there were banks of computer systems, racks of them complete with blinking lights, small screens across which text scrolled, and various slots where portable storage devices of various types could be plugged in. There was a console on each side, but nothing which seemed to be for extended use and certainly no obvious flight control system.

  In the centre of the room was a column, bolted to floor and ceiling. It was featureless at first glance, but when Kaya got closer, she could see seams. It was such a centre point of the room that it had to be something important.

  Of Cassandra, there was no sign.

  ‘Okay,’ Thea said. ‘Um, this might be a bit of a shock so… brace yourself.’

  ‘For what?’ Kaya asked. ‘I don’t see anything that–’ She stopped as the seams opened up on the column. Slowly, the metal shields retracted upward into the ceiling, revealing some sort of tank hidden within the column. It took Kaya several seconds to realise what she was seeing floating in the tank, wired into the ship as though it was another component in the control system. Which, in a way, it was…

  Hello, Kaya, Cassandra’s voice said into Kaya’s mind. I hope my real appearance doesn’t cause too much distress.

  ‘I…’ Kaya stopped to compose herself. ‘Can… Can you actually hear me?’

  Yes, I can hear you.

  ‘Um, you’re a disembodied brain. What’s the Cassandra I’ve seen walking around the ship?’

  A robotic avatar I control remotely. Especially when we have guests, I prefer to present the fiction that I still have a body to walk around in.

  ‘Oh. Yes, I can see why you’d– Who did this to you, Cassandra?’ The last came out in a rush as the burning question in Kaya’s brain refused to stay put.

  Thea, would you mind?

  ‘As you wish,’ Thea said and it was obvious that Cassandra had been transmitting to them both. Thea walked over to the column, running her fingers over the glass. Within it, the fluid Cassandra’s brain floated in was a slightly bluish colour, which did not do a lot for the flesh inside it, but there was not a lot you could do to make a naked brain attractive. ‘Cassandra was born a bit less than two and a half years before me,’ Thea went on. ‘She was… brilliant. We met when I was six, advanced for my class I must admit, but compared to Cassy I was a simpleton. Don’t argue, Cassy. I was.’ Thea looked around at Kaya and smiled. ‘She helped me with my work at school, pushed me to do better. We became fast friends. I knew there was something a little wrong with her, but I didn’t really understand until years later.’

  Thea paused, stroking the glass a few more times before moving away. Kaya was not sure what the memories were like for Cassandra, but they seemed to hurt Thea quite enough for both of them.

  ‘Cassy was born with a genetic anomaly no one caught. It affected her nervous system. Progressively. When I first met her, she was not as quick or dextrous as most girls her age, but she could walk and run and play. By the time we were old enough to realise that maybe we were interested in making our friendship something a little more… intimate, Cassy couldn’t walk. Her hands trembled if she tried to do anything involving delicate movements. The doctors were treating her, trying all sorts of techniques to regenerate her failing nerves, but they gave her a couple of years before she would need machines just to keep her alive.’

  ‘That’s terrible,’ Kaya said. ‘And that’s, um, not really a useful thing to say…’

  Thea gave Kaya a small grin. ‘Oh, she confounded them. She kept going for a decade even though breathing was hard and she could barely move her arms. Her brain wasn’t affected, you see, and she had so much talent. Psi talent, yes, but not just that. She’s a genius.’ Thea glanced at the brain. ‘Yes, you are. Modesty doesn’t become you.’ Thea returned her attention to Kaya and the smile on her face was more genuine. ‘She didn’t have much to do but read, so that’s what she did. She absorbed information like a sponge, turned herself into one of the Protectorate’s greatest experts on the science behind psi. She turned the field on its head, came up with new theories. Still, I don’t think things would have turned out quite so, um, happily if it wasn’t for one of her psi talents. Cassy is a precog.’

  Kaya’s eyes widened. ‘She can see the future?’

  ‘Sort of. Ask her to explain it sometime, but what precognitives do is look at the present. All of it. Somehow. There’s never been a precog that wasn’t also a fairly powerful clairvoyant and Cassy is a powerful clairvoyant. Normally, like any other psi ability, they would be limited by the hyper limit barriers, but precogs can bypass that somehow and catch just a glimpse of everything, everywhere. Then they extrapolate that into the future. It’s never conscious. They can’t control it. Some have dreams, while others can only see things related to themselves. Cassy gets visions. She saw the fall of Zanar years before it happened, but it wasn’t believed until nothing which could be done would change it.’

  ‘So, you can change it?’

  ‘Uh-huh. It’s an extrapolation from now. It’s all probabilities. Even just knowing that the future is likely to turn out one way could be enough to change the outcome. Usually it’s more complicated than that. Some things she sees are basically impossible to do anything about. Some things are easy. Anyway, Cassy’s talent for prediction, combined with her mind in general, was considered too unique and important to lose. Precogs are really rare. So, they built the Oracle of Zanar around her. She helped design it. It keeps her alive, even if she’s nothing but a brain now.’

  Kaya nodded, but she was frowning. ‘Okay… But what does this have to do with you and me, and you and Cassandra?’

  ‘Ah.’ Kaya was surprised to see that Thea was actually blushing a little. ‘Well, even before all this, I was a sort of sexual surrogate for Cassy. When she couldn’t have a physical relationship with me, or anyone, I went out and got her the experiences. I trained myself up in telepathy so I could do it. I’d have sex, and I’d send the sensations I was feeling to Cassy. When she finally got the avatar she uses along with the Oracle, we finally got to do something a bit more physical and we’ve never stopped. But… Well, we’ve been doing this for hundreds of years, Kaya. We get together some nights and we enjoy ourselves, but we aren’t exactly lovers any more. Cassy sleeps with Sienna and Jinny sometimes too. Occasionally, if we have someone else aboard, she’ll go with them.’

  ‘Okay…’

  ‘And I’m not saying I won’t spend a night with her, even if I’m spending nights with you, but Cassy doesn’t mind so lo
ng as you can handle it.’

  I don’t, Cassy said. I’m a disembodied brain. I take it where I can get it and I certainly don’t begrudge Thea taking a new partner. She’s quite picky about serious relationships.

  ‘But it does depend on you,’ Thea said. ‘If you’re not comfortable with it… Well, I’m the one losing out, but I’m old enough to cope.’

  ‘Well…’ Kaya said. ‘I guess I won’t really know if I’m okay with it until we try.’

  Thea’s lips twisted into a slightly mischievous grin. ‘Does that mean I get to show you what a gravity bed can do for your sex life?’

  ‘I guess you do. Isn’t it a bit difficult to do anything in that field?’

  ‘Oh, it’s just a matter of manipulating the field controls. Consider it an incentive to improving your telekinetic abilities. For now, you’ll just have to make do with being under my complete and total control.’

  She can be a real meany, Cassandra said and there was laughter in her thought.

  ‘Somehow,’ Kaya said, ‘I think I’m going to regret this, but… Let’s go to bed, Thea.’

  Have a good night, Kaya. And remember, there’s plenty of time to catch up on your sleep tomorrow.

  19/2/483.

  Sienna had been busy. Now everyone except Geogracus was gathered in a conference room up on the top deck, which Kaya had not even known existed, to hear Sienna’s report on Jay.

  The room was fairly large, with a circular table forming the centrepiece. Around that were ten chairs. It gave the impression of no one being in charge, though there was a natural tendency to defer to Thea as she sat down, called everyone to order, and immediately passed the baton to Sienna. Thea just had that something about her that said ‘leader.’

  ‘All right,’ Sienna began, ‘the first thing you should all know is that Sor Colder is not Sor Colder. Jay Colder is an alias.’

  ‘Figures,’ Kaya said. ‘He lied about just about everything else.’

  Sienna flashed Kaya a smile, though it was not an especially happy one. ‘In this case, he had a little more reason to. He claimed to have been kicked out of his family, and that was true. It’s just that his family name is Bowrain. His real, full name is Jaylacus Bowrain.’

  ‘Don’t I know that name?’ Thea asked.

  ‘He’s in the database,’ Cassandra said. Or, now that Kaya knew the secret, Cassandra’s avatar said. ‘He’s from one of the lesser family lines with only a vague relationship to Darvin.’ She turned to Kaya. ‘Darvin is the current head of the family and would have had to disown Jaylacus himself for the censure to take effect.’

  ‘So, why was he kicked out?’ Kaya asked.

  ‘He had a plan to climb further up the family tree,’ Sienna replied. ‘He has two older brothers and an older sister, so his chances of becoming anything more than a glorified clerk in the family business were quite slim. He chose a different path. He tried to seduce Darvin Bowrain’s third daughter, Amidahara, hoping that he could arrange a marriage with her before her parents found out. He had her under his thumb.’

  ‘That sounds familiar,’ Kaya grumbled.

  ‘But Darvin’s security agents turned out to be better than Jay thought. They were caught when they tried to elope.’

  ‘What you’re saying is that he makes a habit of seducing gullible young women,’ Kaya said.

  ‘Young women with a strong desire for romantic involvement,’ Sienna corrected. ‘Though, from all accounts, Amidahara is something of a free spirit; she is not gullible in the traditional sense. I suspect she saw the pairing as a means of thumbing her nose at her parents. They married her off to someone “more suitable” fairly soon after the attempted elopement. You, Kaya, are not gullible either. Jay took us all in. I’d say something about men at this point, but even I have to admit that they aren’t all like Jaylacus. His psychology is aberrant. One can blame his upbringing, but he has suppressed the normal capacity to empathise with others. He simply does not feel the pain he causes and his only goal is advancement. His hope was that handing you over to the Bowrains would allow him to worm his way back into the fold.’

  ‘I don’t see how I could have done that for him.’

  ‘You were the proof he needed. Proof that Kadal Narra was creating more zanari. He had something, but you were the final piece of evidence.’

  ‘What did he have?’ Thea asked.

  ‘You aren’t going to believe this. Or like it. The package you delivered to those people on Abertine was actually a set of data cards. The case was camouflage, making it look like something large. They could have shipped the whole thing in a pocket. Jaylacus stole those data cards and hid them in a compartment in the stock of his shotgun. Those contacts had contacts, however. The Abertine patrol officers were looking for Jaylacus in that bar, not Kaya. Kaya was, at first, just a convenient way to get off-world before he was caught. When he realised who Kaya was and what we were, of course, his plans changed.’

  ‘I retrieved the data cards,’ Cassandra said. ‘They detail a number of experiments Narra has conducted in several systems. There is also a complete list of systems used as test sites, but without the detail.’

  Thea frowned. ‘Does Jay know who he stole them from?’

  ‘Yes,’ Sienna replied, ‘but they were simply a middleman. He doesn’t know who the ultimate recipient was, but he believes the data was meant for an organisation dealing in genetic augmentation, or a group opposed to it.’

  ‘That narrows it down… not at all.’

  ‘I can only work with what’s in his mind, Thea.’

  ‘I know. Cassy, you’ll go over the data on these cards?’

  ‘Of course,’ Cassandra replied, nodding. ‘I’ve already begun a full analysis.’

  ‘Good. Sienna, what have you done about Jay?’

  ‘I’ve removed his memory of events on Abertine and with us,’ Sienna said. ‘He won’t remember anything about the data, or us.’

  ‘He won’t remember me?’ Kaya asked.

  ‘No. If he sees you on the street, he won’t even recognise you. Or any of us. It’s the safest way. However, I decided that he needed some… punishment for his actions, so I also did a little work on his mind to reinstate all those emotive capabilities he should have anyway. When he wakes up, I suspect he’ll look back on all the other people he’s hurt, including his very first conquest, and suddenly realise what he’s done.’

  ‘That’s… evil.’ Kaya’s lips curled at the edges as she thought it over. ‘I like it.’

  Jinny giggled. ‘Wow, Kaya, I never thought you had that kind of vindictive streak in you. Good for you, girl!’

  Port Town, Harroway Alpha, 20/2/483.

  Thea and Kaya appeared in a back alley off one of the main thoroughfares of Port Town. Jay was hanging over their shoulders and Kaya almost dropped him as the disorientation of the teleport hit her.

  ‘You okay?’ Thea asked.

  ‘Will be,’ Kaya replied. ‘I’ll get used to doing that eventually.’

  ‘Yes, you will. Let’s get this guy sat down so I can give him the stimulant and we can get out of here.’

  They had dressed Jay in some of the clothes he had left aboard the Oracle when he left with Kaya, and strapped his shotgun in place, fully loaded but without its payload of data cards. Together, Thea and Kaya propped him against a wall, out of sight of anyone walking past, and Thea took out a one-shot injector, pressing it to Jay’s neck. There was a hiss.

  ‘It’ll take him about thirty seconds to come to,’ Thea said. ‘Get ready to be dizzy again.’

  ‘It’s not really dizzy,’ Kaya said. ‘It’s more like–’ The cold emptiness of hyperspace swallowed her words and, though she realised she was once again looking at the teleport room on the Oracle, she had to pause before she could go on. ‘It’s more like my brain needs to reboot.’

  ‘Package delivered?’ Fay asked from the control console.

  ‘I’d have made an analogy involving garbage and an alley myself,’ Thea said. ‘But,
yes.’

  ‘Good. Cassandra says she has some information from the local data networks.’

  ‘Why am I sure that it won’t be good news?’ Kaya said.

  ‘I’d imagine that would be due to recent events,’ the filarax said, pushing her mouth into one of her not-quite-natural smiles. ‘It’s my hope that a little peace and quiet might return you to your former, more optimistic state.’

  ‘Maybe. Should we go see what Cassandra’s found?’

  They did not have to walk far since the conference room was on the same level as the teleport room and Cassandra was waiting for them there. ‘We’ll hold in orbit here for an hour or so,’ she said, ‘then I plan to pull out of the system. We can go out to a local brown dwarf and consider what we plan to do from there.’

  ‘Why the desire to be away from here?’ Thea asked. ‘Not that here is worth hanging around for, but still…’

  ‘I found a couple of postings on the BCU Security bulletin feeds. One is a missing person notice for someone matching Jaylacus’s description. The other is a request for the immediate reporting of “unusual psi activity.” Both notices offer rewards for any information. It would appear that the Bowrain family have some information regarding us and they are seeking Jaylacus to fill in the details.’

  ‘But that won’t help them,’ Kaya said. ‘Will it?’

  ‘Sienna can’t remove memories, only make them inaccessible. Something could, theoretically, make them resurface and the Bowrains may have someone who can remove the blocks the way Sienna put them in. It would not be trivial, but it would be possible.’

  Thea gave a small shrug. ‘Nothing much we can do about it. Cassy, take a look at that list of test sites and find us one a long way away from here. We’ll head out there and see what we can uncover. If they do get their hands on Jay’s memories of us, we won’t be anywhere near where they’ll start looking.’