Anvil of Stars (43 page)

Humans and Brothers had come up with something unarmed, innocuous—in so far as any starship could be innocuous, heralding the arrival of potential rivals or partners—and even jaunty.

"The moms say it can be built," Martin said. "They say it will fly, and it will be convincing."

"Do they say anything about our fitness to be allies?" Hans asked. The circles under his eyes had darkened. He spent much of his time alone in his quarters, as he sat now, in the center of the room, legs crossed.

A second cushion waited empty nearby; Rosa might still share his quarters occasionally. Yet the condition of a few vases of sickly flowers showed that she had probably not been here for several days.

"Are we fit for the Job?" Hans asked.

"I don't know what they think," Martin said. "Rex caused a lot of bad feeling. If the Brothers can experience something like bad feeling…"

"What would they have thought if I'd executed Rex right there, on the spot?" Hans said. "Would that have made them happy?"

"Would have made things much worse," Martin said.

"Well, if they don't like us now, they're going to really have it in for us in a couple of days," Hans said.

"Why?"

"Rosa's on her own," Hans said. "You should have been here, Martin. She refuses to slick, she looks me right in the eye, and she says," he began to do a fair imitation of Rosa's strong, musical voice, " 'I have been shown what you are. I have been shown that you are mocking me, and holding me back from my duty.' " Hans grinned. "At least it took her this long to catch on. Not bad for delaying action, right?"

Martin looked away.

Hans' grin vanished. "She's going to start up again, Martin, and this time she really has something good for us. She's damned near psychic, and she's tuning in to our inadequacy. 'We have sinned. We are not worthy of the Job.' Good stuff to toss out now, right?"

"Where is she?" Martin asked.

"I don't know."

"I'll ask Ariel to look out for her."

"Yes, but who will keep her under control? She should be the one banished and locked away. Before she's done, she'll have us all at each other's throats." Hans picked up the wand and projected the ship's design again. "Who's going to be on board?"

"The moms and snake mothers think there's a small chance the Killers might have information about the Brothers. The Brothers are willing to let the crew be human—"

Hans laughed with a bitter edge that set Martin's neck hair on end. "It's probably a suicide mission. How kind of them."

Martin's jaw worked. "Don't underestimate them, Hans. They want to go. They want to do the Job as much as we do."

"I'd rather survive to see it done."

"At any rate," Martin said, "I thought, subject to your approval, that it would be better psychologically and politically if we took the chance, and had Brothers on the crew. "

Hans rotated the ship's image, poked his tongue into his cheek, rolled it over his teeth beneath closed lips. "How do we explain two species aboard, if we party with Leviathan's citizens? "

"Hakim and Giacomo are working up a whole fake history. Two intelligent species from one star system, cooperating after centuries of war. The alliance is still fragile, but the crew is disciplined—"

"We're better at making up stories than the Brothers, I hear," Hans said.

"After a fashion."

"Where's the origin?"

"Hakim has found a buttercup star about forty light years from Leviathan. For the Trojan Horse, that would mean a journey of about four hundred years. The crew will have just come out of deep freeze."

"They get this bucket up to, what, one fifth, one sixth c? What's the drive?"

"In theory, laser propulsion and solar sail to the outskirts of the home system, primitive matter-anti-matter beyond, no sumps, no conversion technology," Martin said.

"And the Killers won't know this is all crap? Can't they detect drive flares at forty light years? Didn't their probes hit on this star system?"

"For a ship this size, detection of drive flares at forty light years would be almost impossible. The moms say the chosen system shows no signs of being visited. They say the ruse probably will work."

Hans rolled his tongue across his teeth again, looked away. "If they say it, it must be so."

"Do you approve the design?"

Hans shrugged. "It looks fine to me. Who's going?"

"That's your decision, of course," Martin said.

"I'm glad you've left me something to do."

Martin did not rise to the gibe. "If you're having a problem with any of this, or with me, best to talk it out now."

Hans looked at Martin darkly. "I'm worried about crew morale. I'll be damned if I can find any easy solution, or any solution at all."

"Isolate Rosa," Martin said.

"There are about twenty Wendys and Lost Boys who would be very upset if we isolated Rosa. She's been quiet, but busy."

Martin raised his eyebrows, baffled.

"I'm working on it," Hans said with forced cheer. "You seem to be doing well with this stuff. Keep it up." He waved his hand as if shooing a fly and made a wry face. "Hell with it. Forget what I said. Brothers and humans. You choose the human crew. I'd like to be on the ship, but I don't think that will be possible. So pick yourself. You'll be number one again, at least aboard the Trojan Horse."

Martin stood beside Hans for a few more seconds, but Hans had nothing more to say, lost in his thoughts.

Two days before separation, humans and Brothers exhausted from endless drills and conferences, Leviathan a growing point of light and remotes spread to their farthest extent, Martin was overwhelmed by far more information than he could possibly absorb. In his rest periods—now reduced to one or two hours a day—he slept fitfully, images of Leviathan's bizarre coterie of fifteen worlds haunting his dreams.

Theodore Dawn sat in a wood-paneled library with him and pulled out book after book, opening them to pictures of ill-defined threats and dangers until, with a laugh, Theodore simply tossed the books into the air. "We always knew we'd die, didn't we, Marty?"

"You're already dead," Marty said.

"We're Brothers under the skin. But even if we die, so will they," Theodore said.

"Who?" Martin asked, wondering if he meant the Killers of Earth, or the Brothers.

He awoke with wand clutched in his hand, and no answer.

"Three ships, Greyhound, Shrike, and Trojan Horse," Hans said, projecting the designs of all three before the seven occupants of the schoolroom: Eye on Sky, Silken Parts, Stonemaker, Twice Grown, Paola, Ariel, and Martin.

Eye on Sky and Ariel would be going with the Trojan Horse and Martin. Stonemaker would be in charge of Shrike.

Hans said, "You've all worked out the Trojan Horse's mission: envoy and explorer for a young, naive two-species civilization, four hundred years in space. Enough clues to make the Killers think that in the four centuries since Trojan Horse left its system, the civilizations have probably become much, much stronger, and would not appreciate having their early explorers destroyed… Donna Emerald Sea and Silken Parts are designing costumes reflecting the cultures." He smiled. "Sounds like the Brothers are learning the art of fiction."

"But this is lying," Stonemaker said. "The difference was clear, we we thought."

"Strategically, no difference," Hans said. "Greyhound and Shrike have enough weapons and fuel to cook four of the fifteen planets, or enough to blow one planet completely apart, into orbit about itself if we aren't interfered with—no defenses—a big if… The human crews are ready."

"Brothers are ready," Stonemaker said, smelling of ripe fruit and cut grass.

"Then we bring the plan to both crews." Hans raised his hands and the Brothers lifted their splayed heads high. "Courage!" he said. "Does that translate well? "

"It is the smell of being born," Stonemaker said.

"Couldn't put it better myself," Hans said.

Martin came awake to a soft touch on his shoulder. He had fallen asleep in the schoolroom, leaning against a wall. He rubbed his eyes and saw Erin Eire kneeling beside him. "Too much drill?" she asked.

He stood and stretched. They had two days until the split; preparations had come flooding down on them, and he was embarrassed that his exhaustion had made him drop off in a public place. "Trying to sleep before super deceleration."

"Uh huh," she said, unconvinced. "Donna guided the Wendys and a few Lost Boys in costume manufacture. Moms provided the fabric and did some assembly. We thought you'd like to see them. I think they're pretty neat, myself."

"Sure," Martin said. Erin led him past groups of other humans, sleeping. Many Smells and Dry Skin conferred with Giacomo near the star sphere; everybody looked exhausted except Erin Eire, who as always was bright-eyed, calmly confident.

"Where's Hans?" Erin asked as she walked steadily ahead.

"Putting together battle plans with Stonemaker, last I heard," Martin said.

"Trojan Horse's crew won't know the battle plans?" Erin asked. "In case they're captured?"

Martin shook his head. "No strategic weapons. What can we do?"

"Pray, I suppose," Erin said tersely. "We've been working in Kimberly Quartz's rooms, just up ahead…"

Rosa stepped from a side corridor, Jeanette Snap Dragon close behind. They blocked Erin and Martin's way. "We need to talk to Martin," Jeanette said.

Erin stepped aside. "Don't take too long. I'm going to show off the costumes."

"For a masquerade?" Rosa asked caustically. She looked if anything even more exhausted than Hans.

"You should leave," Jeanette said pointedly to Erin. Erin looked to Martin.

"If she wants, she can stay," Martin said.

"This is a private audience," Jeanette said.

"Who's giving the audience?" Martin asked.

"I thought you might have some promise," Rosa said. "Now I have my doubts. Let her stay, men. Word will get around faster." Rosa turned her full attention on Martin. "There's a separate crew forming. We're choosing a new Pan."

Martin folded his arms, too tired to express much surprise. "Oh?"

"I'm inviting you to join the crew. Some have said you'd be an asset."

"I said you would," Jeanette added, as if defying him to disappoint her.

"What good is a separate crew?"

"The ship is splitting," Rosa said. "Those who go with me have their freedom, Those who go with Hans… That's up to them. Will you join us?"

"We're dividing in three to perform a mission," Martin said. "There's no plan to let you or anybody take a ship."

"We've voted to split," Jeanette said, face flushed, left hand quivering. "You shouldn't stop us. Hans shouldn't. It would only prove how much freedom we've lost."

"I have concluded that Leviathan is innocent. We're in the wrong place," Rosa said.

"You've been told?" Martin asked without sarcasm.

"I've been told," Rosa said. Erin lifted her eyes and tilted her head to one side.

"Let's talk with Hans about it," Martin suggested.

"Hans is our enemy," Jeanette said. "He's—"

"Please," Rosa said, touching her arm. "Nobody's our enemy."

"How many agree with you?" Martin asked.

"Enough to make a difference," Rosa said.

"I'll meet with your people, then," Martin said.

"Without telling Hans?" Jeanette asked.

Rosa watched him closely, expression taut but not agitated.

"Without telling Hans. Erin, I'll see the costumes a little later."

Erin nodded and marched off.

"This is strictly between you and me," Martin called to her.

"Of course," Erin said. "Your secret."

"I'll call the people," Jeanette said.

"Do that," Rosa said. Jeanette ran down the corridor, vanished around a corner. "Hans taught me that extremes accomplish nothing. If I receive privileged information, I'm not about to give it to just anybody."

"Good," Martin said.

"You needed my words once, didn't you?" Rosa asked.

Martin saw no reason to lie. "They were attractive."

"But Hans' influence soured you. You thought I supported him and his plans, that he had co-opted me."

"It seemed that way."

"It wasn't that way. Hans took what he wanted from me, and I learned what I needed to learn. I must say, I miss the innocence of those first few weeks, when I could behave as the word took me."

"The word of God," Martin said.

Rosa shrugged. "Something speaks to me. Call it God if you need a name. For me, it's just a very powerful friend to all of us. We live in confusion… It clears away the confusion. "

Jeanette returned. "We're meeting now," she said.

Rosa had made new quarters for herself on the perimeter of the ship's second homeball.

Fifteen Wendys and five Lost Boys had gathered among the flowers. Rex Live Oak squatted on the floor next to a potted rosebush, glancing at Martin, turning away after a brief staring contest. The air thickened with an unpleasant mix of flower scent and stress.

Rosa took the center of the room.

"I've brought Martin here to explain our position," she said. "We are not planning a mutiny. We are simply asking to be allowed to go our own way. We opt out of the Law. "

How can they? Don't they feel it, the dying Earth, hear it in their blood and flesh?

"We'd hate to lose so many of you," Martin said. "I'm willing to listen, though."

"The aliens who have joined us are not acceptable," Rosa said. "They don't like us, and frankly, most of us don't feel comfortable with them."

"We're working with them," Martin said. "We're getting along pretty well, I think. Most of us." He looked at Rex, but Rex did not meet the challenge.

"I have been told their work does not fit with our own," Rosa said. "They have a different moral standard."

"If anything, their moral standard seems a little higher than our own, from what I've seen," Martin said.

"It is different, and that's sufficient. I have been told that it is not right to mix our destiny with the destinies of those not human."

So what is it, an abomination in the eyes of the Lord? That was Theodore Dawn talking in his head, tone bitter, voice nasal, a caricature of all that Theodore had hated.