Edge of Dark (49 page)

Her jump carried her close to him, also against the wall, but unable to stand. She balanced in a crumpled fashion, one hand clutching a pipe to be sure she didn't fall to the floor. The man's head had been staved in and his neck broken by the impact.

She had killed.

She, who had lived her life in drum circles and spent time creating new life with test tubes. She who hated fights and even arguments. She who had only killed in the quiet white silence of science, and who had never killed a human.

Chrystal screamed.

CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT

NONA

Nona felt squashed between the man who had helped pull her through the cargo bay and Satyana, who practically sat on Dr. Nevening. Logos and insignia inside the little ship showed it was Gunnar's. Maybe that was better than the military.

They pulled quickly away from the cargo bay, the acceleration keeping everyone in awkward positions. After about five minutes, the sandy-haired pilot punched the autopilot and the ship slowed to a more manageable speed.

“Thanks,” the Historian said, his voice muffled by Satyana's arm.

“You're welcome.” The pilot grinned widely; a man pleased with his work. The cockpit was so small that it took awkward moves to untangle and pass each other and find places to sit properly and belt in. They were short one seat, and so one of the crew sat on a cabinet.

Satyana looked relieved. This could be a real rescue complete with actual saviors, regardless of the fact that Nona didn't trust Gunnar anymore.

She would have to see him soon as the Voice anyway, have to be polite.

“Do you have any water?” the Historian asked.

“You were great,” Nona told him. “Where did you hide that stunner? Did you have it the whole time?”

“Some of the military weren't thrilled with the idea of stealing us. They gave us their secondary weapons.”

“When?”

“In the big room. Where we ate.”

The pilot moved the other man off the cabinet and pulled out water bulbs, handing them around. “Anything else?”

Nona drank, the water immediately reviving. “News.”

Satyana looked around the interior of the little ship as if it would yield answers to some question. “Did everyone get out?”

“We got all of the councilors, Ma'am. Two assistants had to be left behind. They were stunned and we couldn't carry them. But my bet is they'll be left. They have no value.”

“Do you know which assistants?” Dr. Nevening asked. “Mine?”

“We don't know. They were both male.”

Nona took a deep breath. “What about Chrystal? Is there any news of Chrystal?”

“Who's Chrystal?” the pilot asked.

Satyana asked, “Where are we going?”

“Someplace to hold the court. We're planning to use your
Star Bear
, ma'am. There's already some logistics arriving there, and a lot of security.”

Satyana looked pleased. “I think that will work just fine.”

“What did the military want with us?” Nona asked.

“If the Council is incapacitated, control legally falls to them in a time of war.”

“We're not at war, not yet,” Nona protested.

“You could argue either side of that,” the Historian pointed out.

“News, please?” Satyana said. “Who has control of what?”

The man who hadn't spoken yet did so now. “The military has control of the middle of the station, but we've cleaned them out of the forward section. There's still protests inside of course, but they're mostly impromptu.”

“Who's protesting?” the Historian asked.

The man who had been on the cabinet answered this one, a laugh in his voice. “People who want peace and people who think the people who want peace are crazy, and I think some people who just want to be part of something.”

Dr. Nevening nodded, as if reassured by the answer.

The pilot picked up the story. “The Shining Revolution ships moved off after you were stolen by the military. They seem pretty happy with their acquisition though—they have the robot.”

“That's Chrystal.” Nona gasped and grasped Satyana's hand. Satyana returned the handclasp, her face white.

“You know her?” the pilot asked.

“I do.”

Before long, the pilot said, “We're about to land.”

Satyana combed through Nona's hair with her fingers and did the same to hers. She frowned at her reflection in a hand mirror she had found in the cabin's tiny supply box, but they were docking and there was no obvious way to get more presentable.

Gunnar himself waited for them. He scooped Satyana into a quick embrace, his face so full of relief that he looked genuine for a moment. After he let go of Satyana, he greeted the Historian formally before shaking Nona's hand. Their eyes met, and she swore she saw compassion there. Damn him. She didn't need or want his compassion.

Another ship landed. The Futurist and the Biologist disembarked, as well as a single assistant. The assistant made her way right to the Historian, who grew a wide, genuine smile on his face, visibly shedding tension. Nona liked him for that.

“What about the Architect?” Satyana asked.

“He's here. So is Winter.”

Satyana smiled widely. Britta appeared as if from nowhere, the huge woman suddenly by Satyana's side, one arm almost crushing her boss.

“Follow me,” Gunnar said. “We need to get you ready. The Next aren't going to give us a break on this decision because your hair isn't right.”

“How do you know?” the Futurist grumbled.

Men and women surrounded them with food, clean clothes, combs, and cups of hot stim. Apparently there wasn't time for a shower, but at least they'd look like decision makers when they hit the stage.

Gunnar directed traffic in and out. Three of his security detail wandered throughout the room, basically getting in the way.

Two women gently washed Nona's face with warm, white washcloths. After they pronounced her reasonably clean, they gave her a choice between three sets of garments. She picked a severe black pantsuit with a purple scarf and knee-high black boots that gave her an extra inch of height. The women complimented it with mother-of pearl earrings and a set of graduated nano-pearls in perfect rounds. A tall, silent man strung a thin, bone-conducting wire by each ear, which would be both a microphone for when she spoke and a radio to receive stage directions.

Nona glanced wearily at the mirror. In spite of being tired and worn out and scared for Chrystal, she had to admit she looked capable. The black made her look strong, and older. The makeup job had transformed her face into something beautiful. The clothes were far better than she usually wore, soft and silky. She closed her eyes and whispered her mantra inside of her head. “I am strong enough to do this. I am strong enough to make a difference.”

When she opened her eyes, she found Satyana looking at her with approval. Surely that was for her outfit and not for the silent words she had just said, but it felt like it covered both. Satyana's dark hair had been brushed glossy and her lips painted maroon, and she held the bodice of a black silk dress up while a robot zipped the back. A woman stood beside her holding a cascade of lace flowers.

Satyana's voice carried across the whole, crowded room. “We'll be using the same stage that Ruby Martin made her debut on long ago.” For once, Nona didn't feel resentment toward her mother's famous friend. “We'll have tables and chairs up there in the same configuration you're used to in court. There will be some audience—mostly my crew—but people from nearby may be here as well. We'll have guards. It will be as safe as we can make it, and we'll be able to record
and
broadcast. Does anyone have any questions?”

The Economist was buried under four sets of hands, whose owners were struggling to do something interesting with her hair. “How are we going to handle the people's vote position?”

Gunnar answered. “I've asked Satyana to take the role of Headmistress, although not the vote. That goes to the people. Satyana will moderate the votes.” The look on his face dared anyone to challenge him.

No one did.

“You have a half an hour,” he said. The room came back alive with movement and small talk.

The same fear that had crashed down on her when Satyana first told her she had a role came down even harder. She was going to vote for peace, but which option? Help the Next or ignore them? Was she voting against Charlie? She missed him. For that matter, she missed Jason and Yi.

And Chrystal. She kept trying not to think about Chrystal, but it just wasn't possible.

Gunnar interrupted. “The Shining Revolution has a broadcast they want us to see. It's live. Those of you who want to watch can follow me to a room across the hall.”

Nona nearly beat him to the door.

The room across the hall turned out to be a private theater where Satyana and her staff often watched performances on the main stage. Couches and comfortable chairs oriented toward the wall screen. Everyone had come, even many of the assistants and makeup people. As they filed in, the screen showed a picture of the stage being set up for the vote. Three people and a handful of small robots wandered across the stage setting up chairs and microphones.

The screen changed views suddenly, showing the logo of the Shining Revolution. A well-muscled man and an equally well-muscled woman stood back to back in dance positions, holding hands and looking outward. As if cradling them, a stylized version of the words, “Humanity, Free and Clear” ran in a half-circle below the dancers.

Sitting between the Historian and Satyana, Nona went cold and stiff with fear. She didn't want the screen to move on from the logo.

CHAPTER SIXTY-NINE

CHARLIE

Charlie stared at the map Davis had projected on the wall. All of the others—Amfi and Davis, the soulbots, the Jhailing Jim, looked as well. A silence full of import had descended on the room. Blue marked the places the Next had agreed not to go. Yellow showed the places they would mine, and base, and have rights to travel to and from. There were two yellow cities where the Next would be allowed to put as many people as they could fit inside the boundaries. Charlie pictured high, ugly towers full of robots.

In many cases the colors on the map touched without blending: A hard line Charlie saw as fences, although he'd fought to keep open corridors for wildlife. In some places the yellow and blue came together and created greens, soft or hard depending on a variety of factors. Commerce and blending of . . . not races. Flesh and metal.

There was far more blue than yellow or green; at least ninety percent of the planet was blue. Charlie still hated the map. He'd done his best, but deep inside he felt certain he could have done even better, gotten more for them. Manny should have been here.

He'd spent his life dealing with the scars humanity had carved into Lym's surface and then left behind. How much more damage would the Next do? Every spot of yellow might as well be red, representing a likely bleeding hole in the carefully managed ecosystem.

He startled when Amfi hugged him. The tears caught in her eyelashes surprised him more.

“Are you okay?” he whispered.

“Thank you,” she said. “I didn't know it would come to this.” She glanced at the robot. “I didn't know. I'm glad you were here.”

He crushed her to him. “I don't blame you.” She smelled of cave and wild food and sweat.

Thank you,” she said again, and stepped out of his embrace.

Her eyes which were still damp, and a tear-track had cleaned one cheek.

“Thank you,” he said. “We did this together.”

She smiled, soft and a little tentative. It emphasized the wrinkles around her eyes.

Jhailing Jim crossed the room and held out his hand. It was one of his most robotic parts, with metal fingers that could bend in more directions than the human hand.

Charlie stared at the hand and then at the robot's eyes, which were a guileless blue as clear as glass.

No tears there.

He held his own hand out and grasped the robot's hand.

Jhailing Jim closed his hand over Charlie's, the pressure as calibrated as Manny's handshake, and said, “Thank you. It is far better than war would have been.”

As he let go of the robot's hand, Charlie glanced at the map again. He still felt it like a flu, as if every inch of land granted to the Next had come with blood and nutrients.

Of course, it wasn't over. He needed to get to Manna Springs and talk to Manny, to convince him to accept this deal.

Charlie glanced at Yi and Jason, who were both sitting very still. He suspected they were talking with Jhailing. The more powerful Next seemed able to talk to humans and hold conversations with the soulbots with no problem, but Jason and Yi sometimes showed it when they multitasked, particularly Jason. At the moment his face had gone so slack he looked like a normal household robot in the off position.

Charlie tried to get their attention. “We should go.”

They startled, even Yi. They must have been deep in silent conversation. He reminded himself to ask Yi about that at the next opportune moment.

Yi's face turned from blank to an expression Charlie couldn't read, his features hard. Then his lips thinned to anger in an expression as tortured as Charlie had ever seen on the soulbot. “Is there news coverage here?”

Charlie glanced at Davis and Amfi.

Davis nodded. “Follow me.” He led them all, including Jhailing, to one of the smaller rooms in the cave and powered up the lights and a screen that actually hung from the wall instead of displaying
on
the wall. Perhaps some of the old technology Davis had mentioned earlier. Or just the most expedient thing when your walls were made of cracked and marbled stone. The resolution was clearer than any wall display Charlie had seen. At the moment, the sigil of the Shining Revolution took up the whole thing, the hand-locked dancers taller than Charlie by half again.