Manta's Gift

by Timothy Zahn

  Something brushed past his fins. He tensed, focusing his attention on the air.

  To discover a stream of delicate reddish-silver leaves flowing past them.

  "Here we are," Beltrenini announced, settling them into the middle of the fast-moving river. "Food for two. Wait a pulse—let me turn around into the flow. Makes it easier."

  She swiveled a hundred eighty degrees around, turning them to face the winds that were sweeping the silvery plants along. Raimey opened his mouth, and let them flow in.

  Even with four days of hunger to add spice to the menu, he quickly decided that the stuff looked better than it tasted. Still, it wasn't bad, and it was definitely filling. Best of all, there weren't any big ugly Protectors around to chase him away from it.

  "How's the feemis?" Beltrenini called down around a mouthful of food.

  " 'sgood," Raimey said, his own mouth almost too stuffed to get the words out.

  "Take it easy," she warned. "Don't choke yourself. There's plenty to go around."

  "You sound like my mother," Raimey muttered, swallowing that bite and looking around as he opened his mouth wide for the next. Just because there were no Protectors around, of course, didn't mean they had the silver stream all to themselves. There were two more of the big Counselors ahead and a little bit below them, grazing along at the bottom edge of the run. And in the distance off to the left he could see what appeared to be a group of Qanskan children feeding in the middle like he and Beltrenini were.

  He frowned suddenly in midbite. Qanskan children?

  "Well, I was a mother myself once, you know," Beltrenini reminded him. "Your mother still alive?"

  "No, she was killed by a Vuuka," Raimey said mechanically, peering hard off to the left. No mistake; there were at least a dozen small Qanska over there. Or at least they looked like Qanska. They certainly weren't Vuuka or Sivra or Pakra.

  Trouble was, whatever they were, they were far too small to have made it this deep without the kind of elevator ride Beltrenini had given him. And there were no larger Qanska anywhere nearby.

  Were his eyes playing tricks on him? Could the silvery glint of the plants be messing up his estimation of distance?

  "I'm sorry," Beltrenini said. "When did it happen?"

  "It was a long time ago," Raimey said. "Just before I switched from Midling to Youth."

  She let out a low, vibrating rumble of surprise. "And you survived to adulthood? Whoa. You must have had a really supportive herd."

  "One of the Protectors kind of looked after me," Raimey told her. "Look over to the left. Are those children over there?"

  "What?" she said, swiveling her whole body around. "Where?"

  "Those small Qanska," Raimey said, trying to point. But his tails were squeezed up against Beltrenini's belly, and she wouldn't have been able to see the gesture anyway. "Looks like twelve or fifteen of them."

  "You mean those Brolka?" she said. "There are thirteen of them over there."

  Brolka? "Yes, if that's what they are," Raimey said. "I've never seen one before."

  "You're joking."

  A cold chill ran through Raimey from snout to tailtips. In that single heartpulse, Beltrenini's voice had gone from casually chatty to something dark and ominous.

  What had he said? Had admitting his ignorance about these Brolka somehow given away his true identity? "I—uh—" he stammered.

  "There aren't any in Centerline?" she demanded harshly. "None at all?"

  "I don't know," Raimey said. "All I said was I'd never seen one. Maybe our herd just didn't run into any."

  For along ninepulse she was silent. Raimey held his breath, oblivious to the silvery feemis streaming past his snout. What in the name of Pakra droppings had he said?

  "Maybe," she said at last. "I guess there's no point in worrying about it. Well, eat up."

  The rest of the meal was eaten in silence. Raimey keep an eye on the Brolka, trying to figure out what was so important about them. They didn't move quite like regular Qanska, he decided, but that was about the only conclusion he was able to come to. They kept drifting farther away as they ate, eventually vanishing completely from his sight.

  "How are you doing?" Beltrenini called. Her tone, Raimey noted, had regained most of its earlier good cheer. "About done filling that empty hole yet?"

  "Sure, I could call it a day," Raimey agreed. "I'm ready to leave. Unless you weren't planning to go back to Level Four?"

  "No, no, we can go together," Beltrenini said. "It's getting late, and I like Level Four best for sleeping. Besides, you still haven't told me why you're out here alone."

  "How about you?" Raimey countered as Beltrenini started easing them upward out of the feemis stream. "You're here alone, aren't you?"

  "That's different," Beltrenini said quietly. "I was bonded, once. He died."

  Raimey grimaced. "I'm sorry," he said. "I didn't mean to bring up a painful subject. When did it happen?"

  "A long time ago, just like you," she said. "Back when he was a Protector and I was a Nurturer. He was killed defending our children's herd."

  She waggled her fins in emphasis. "But we weren't talking about me. We were talking about you, and your lack of companionship."

  "But I have companionship," Raimey protested smoothly. "I've got you, right?"

  "Flattery won't grow the drokmur," she said, waggling again. Still, she sounded secretly pleased by his comment. "Come on, quit stalling. Or were you going to try and tell me all the female Breeders from your herd had already died? Along with all the female Breeders from the nine neighboring herds?"

  Raimey sighed. "No, she's still alive. She just picked someone else to bond with, that's all."

  "So why didn't you just pick someone else yourself?"

  Raimey grimaced. "It's not that simple."

  "Of course it's that simple," Beltrenini persisted. "Okay, so you liked this one better. Big deal. Weren't there any others you could have chosen? Besides, didn't the Nurturers insist? Oh," she interrupted herself. "So that's why you took off across the winds. They ordered you to bond with someone else, and you were too stubborn to do so."

  "Actually, I left before anyone had a chance to give any orders," Raimey admitted. "Though if they had... I probably would still have run."

  She snorted. "You have got to be the strangest Qanska I've ever met, Raimilo," she said. "Okay, let's hear the story. The whole story."

  TWELVE

  Milligan shook his head. "Sorry, Colonel," he said. "Even with boosters, they're definitely out of range. We could try chasing the spy probe after them, but that's the best I can offer."

  "But don't forget that we don't know anything about their senses," McCollum warned. "If you get the probe too close, you could spook them."

  Faraday glared at the displays, making a supreme effort to hold on to his already strained patience. Typical. The first new creatures they'd spotted since Raimey's first couple of months on Jupiter; and now the damn things had wandered off before they could collect any real data on them.

  And if that female Counselor's reaction was any indication, there was something important about these Brolka things. Maybe even something critically important.

  But there were realities up here, too. And one of those realities was that there was only so much equipment to go around. "No, we'd better leave it on track," he said reluctantly. "If we move it, we might lose track of Raimey completely. The Five Hundred would have our heads if that happened."

  "Don't know why," Beach grumbled. "If he's looking for their stardrive, he's doing a lousy job of it."

  "At least he's trying," McCollum said.

  "Is he?" Beach retorted. "You sure couldn't prove that by me. If this is all the territory he can cover in a year and a half of wandering, we're going to be here until the sun burns out."

  "Somehow, I don't see the Five Hundred being patient enough for that," Sprenkle murmured.

  "I'm surprised they've lasted this long," Milligan agreed with a snort. "Speaking of the Five Hundr
ed, has anyone seen Mr. Hesse surface yet?"

  "He's back, and he's been through Receiving," Faraday said. "Aside from that, I haven't seen him."

  "When was that?" Milligan asked.

  Faraday pulled up the station log on one of his displays. "About an hour ago."

  "That doesn't sound good," McCollum muttered. "He's usually down here three minutes after they green-light him in."

  "Sometimes faster than that," Sprenkle agreed. "Sounds like he's bringing bad news."

  "What do you expect after that last profile you sent to Earth with him?" Beach growled.

  Sprenkle spread his hands. "Hey, I have to write what I see," he protested. "If it's obvious Raimey's pining for a lost love, what am I supposed to say?"

  "You didn't have to make it sound so much like he's gone over the edge," Beach said with a sniff.

  "You want me to lie?" Sprenkle shot back. "If I'd wanted to do that, I'd have gone into politics."

  "You ask me, we've all gone into politics," McCollum said.

  "Amen, sister," Milligan said.

  The budding argument subsided into a roomful of grumpy silence. It was amazing, Faraday thought blackly as he looked around, what a difference five short years could make. Back when Project Changeling had just been getting underway, the whole team had been excited and upbeat, ready to watch and learn and be part of the cutting edge of humanity's frontier.

  Now, in stark contrast, they'd become tired, touchy, and about as burned out as he'd ever seen anyone get.

  What had happened to them? Was it just the monotony of watching Raimey swim endlessly around the atmosphere, eating colorful plants and fending off predators? Was it the subtle pressure of the media and the less subtle pressure from the Five Hundred for Changeling to show some progress? Was it the fact that, as McCollum thought, the politics of the situation had seeped like polluted groundwater into the more noble and aloof science and technology they were used to?

  Or was it something a little closer to home? A failure of leadership, perhaps?

  A failure of Faraday's leadership?

  There was the soft thud of footsteps on metal flooring. "Welcome back, Mr. Hesse," he said without turning around. "How was Earth?"

  "I'm afraid Mr. Hesse won't be joining us just yet," a clear female voice said.

  Faraday turned, blinking in surprise. The woman standing just inside the doorway was well past middle age, with pure white hair and a face lined with wrinkles so deep that they looked almost like scars.

  And from the way those wrinkles had settled comfortably into a solid, no-nonsense look, it was clear that was her default expression. "Excuse me?" he said, standing up. "May I help you?"

  "My name is Arbiter Liadof," she told him. Her eyes swept the room, pausing briefly on each of the startled faces turned back toward her. "I'm the new representative of the Five Hundred on Project Changeling."

  "I see," Faraday said carefully, a hard knot forming in the pit of his stomach. He had never met Katrina Liadof, but he had heard furtive references to her during the long preparations back on Earth. She was one of the top movers and shakers of the entire Five Hundred, a woman who had never held a Council position for the simple reason that she preferred to do her work in the shadows behind the throne. "I wasn't aware there was a problem with our old representative."

  Her quick-glance evaluation of the room completed, she turned those dark eyes onto Faraday. "Mr. Hesse has served adequately up until now," she said evenly. "But it appears that Project Changeling has glided itself into a rut. I'm here to pull it out."

  "I see," Faraday said, fighting back the automatic surge of defensiveness. Changeling was in a rut, he had to admit, though hardly one of his or anyone else's making.

  Besides, annoyance wouldn't buy him anything here. Diplomacy, clearly, was the order of the day. "At any rate, we welcome you to Jupiter Prime," he added. "We're honored by your presence."

  "Actually, you're resentful of my presence," she corrected him, still watching his face. "Or else you're terrified of it. Those are the two more probable responses."

  Faraday's first instinct was to drop into the old military pattern of duck-and-cover: keep your head down, shift blame in any and all directions, try to get the official sledgehammer to come down somewhere else.

  But he resisted the impulse. A failure of leadership, the phrase whispered again through his mind. And part of leadership was to be the one standing under that sledgehammer. "Perhaps the more probable," he said evenly. "But not the only ones. Tell me, Arbiter Liadof, do I have anything personally to fear from you?"

  The lines in her forehead deepened, just slightly. Maybe she'd been expecting a duck-and-cover, too. "No particular reason I know of," she said.

  "Do any of my people?" he asked.

  She didn't even bother to look at them. "I don't deal with routine hirings and firings," she said shortly.

  "Well, then," Faraday said, inclining his head in a small bow. "In that case we aren't terrified by your presence, nor are we resentful. We are, however, still honored."

  For a long moment she gazed at him, her expression a mixture of thoughtfulness and suspicion. Faraday held his breath; and then, to his relief, she smiled. A tight, knowing smile, but a smile just the same. "In that case, I thank you, Colonel Faraday."

  She held his gaze another moment, then leisurely looked around the room again. "Now. I wish to learn about my new responsibilities. You will show me around."

  "Certainly, Arbiter Liadof," Faraday said. It hadn't been a request; but then, he hadn't really expected one. It had probably been years since Katrina Liadof had done anything but give orders. "If you'll come this way..."

  "...and so she left," Raimey concluded. "And then I left. And I've been out here ever since."

  Beltrenini flipped her tails. In amazement or disbelief; Raimey wasn't quite sure which. "That's quite a story," she said. "That's it? All of it?"

  "That's it," Raimey assured her. It wasn't, of course, though there was no way Beltrenini could know that. He'd left out such minor details as who he was, and where he'd come from, and the fact that Drusni had refused to bond with him because he was a half-breed monster. But it was the whole story as far as Beltrenini was ever going to be concerned.

  "Interesting," the Counselor commented. "It wouldn't win you any honors in the herd's story circles, but I can see how it could still hurt. What I don't see is why you don't just forget her and move on to someone else. I mean, you only get about four and a half dayherds of breeding time, and you've already squandered one and a half of them. The way you're going, you'll wake up some sunlight to find that you're a Protector, and that you've missed your chance to bond with anyone."

  "So what?" Raimey said. "What's the point of bonding at all if I can't do it with the one I want? I'd be better off alone."

  "Don't give me that," Beltrenini said severely, flipping her tails in annoyance. "This obsession of yours with getting exactly what you want or else not taking anything at all is as selfish and self-destructive as anything I've ever seen. It's also completely ludicrous. Who gave you the right to demand perfection every single time, anyway?"

  "That's easy for you to say," Raimey snapped. "You got the mate you wanted."

  "Who says?" she countered tartly. "As a matter of fact, Kydulfo was my third choice. I was his fifth."

  Raimey winced, the taste of shame trickling into his mouth. "Oh," was all he could come up with to say.

  " 'Oh,' " she mimicked. "And yet, we did well enough. We had five broods, you know. Six healthy young Qanska." She paused. "And in time," she went on quietly, "we came to care very deeply for each other. Even now, I miss him terribly."

  "I'm sorry," Raimey said, feeling embarrassed and depressed, not to mention ashamed. She was right: Who had given him the right to demand perfection?

  But this was Drusni he was talking about. Drusni. How could he possibly settle for second-best after her? How could Beltrenini even expect him to?

  "Being sorry won'
t feed the Pakra," Beltrenini chided. "If you want this to mean anything, then you make sure you learn from it. My advice is that you go back, find yourself a nice female Breeder, and get on with your life."

  "I don't have to go back for that," Raimey pointed out. "I could find someone here and save myself the trip."

  "No," she said firmly. "You have to go back. If she cares about you as much as you said she did, even as just a friend, she's probably worried sick about you."

  Raimey snorted. "I doubt it. Not with Pranlo there to keep her company."

  "That's nice," Beltrenini rumbled. "You say you love her, and then go ahead and insult her in the same breath. I'll say it again: If she cares about you at all, she's going to be worried."

  Raimey swished his tails restlessly. "I'll think about it."

  "You do that," Beltrenini said. "Meanwhile, it's about that time. I'll see you at sunlight, right?"

  "Uh... sure."

  "Good," she said. "Sleep well." Her gently fanning fins fell still, and her breathing slowed and evened out. A ninepulse later, she was asleep.

  Raimey gazed at her, feeling a surge of envy at her ability to fall asleep so easily. It had been ninedays and ninedays since he'd been able to do that. Maybe her conscience was less troubled than his.

  Or maybe she was just old.

  He peered into the gathering darkness. In the distance he could see other Qanska settling down to sleep: Protectors and their Nurturer mates, floating and twisting together in the eddy currents. There was a loose group of the larger Counselors, too, drifting in his and Beltrenini's direction. Some of them were settling down for the sundark in pairs; others, like Beltrenini, were alone.

  I should go, he told himself. Beltrenini was right: A lone Breeder like him didn't belong here. Besides, if he waited until sunlight, she would just nag him some more about going back to face Drusni. That was something he didn't particularly want to hear.

  On the other hand, if he left her, where would he go? Back to the equator? Not a chance. Just float around some more? What was the point of that?