Infinity's Shore (81 page)
Authors: David Brin
T
HE EARLIER HOLOSCENES HAD BEEN CONFUSING, but these new images left Lark stunned, breathless, confused. He had no way to grasp the blazing spectacle â¦Â mighty tubes of boo, their bottoms explosing in flame â¦Â scores of them, jetting upward like a swarm of angry fire bees.
The distant camera veered as the corvette struggled to evade a volley of makeshift rockets. The view lurched so suddenly, Lark's stomach reeled and he had to look away.
The others seemed just as amazed.
Ling
laughed aloud, clapping both hands, while Rann's face mixed astonishment with dismay.
Then what's happening must be good.
Lark allowed a spark of hope to rise within.
Ewasx, the Jophur, vented gurgling sounds, along with snatches of Galactic Two.
“
Outrageous â¦Â treacherous â¦Â unexpected â¦Â unforeseen!
”
Tremors shook its composite body, quivering from the peak down to its basal segment. Most of the elderly, waxy toroids were familiar to Lark. Once, they composed a friend, a sage, wise and good. But a newcomer had taken overâa glistening young collar, black and featureless, without appendages or sensory organs.
Both Ling and Rann cried out. But when Lark turned around, the holoscene was all whiteâa blank slate.
“The corvette,” Ling explained, her voice awed. “It's been destroyed!”
A shrill sigh escaped the Jophur. The tremors turned into convulsions.
Ewasx is having some kind of fit
, Lark thought.
Should I attack now? Strike the master ring with all my might?
Ling was babbling excitedly about “the other rocketsâ” But Lark had decided, striding toward the shuddering Jophur. His sole weapons were his hands, but so what?
Lester, you pulled off a fantastic wolfling trick. Asx would have been proud of you.
Just as old Asx would have wanted me to do this.
He brought back a fist, aimed at the shivering master ring.
Someone seized his arm, holding it back in a fierce grip. Lark swiveled, cocking his other fist at Rann. But the bull-headed Danik only shook his head.
“What will it prove? You'd just make them angry, native boy. We remain trapped here, at their mercy.”
“Get out of my way,” Lark growled. “I'm gonna free my traeki friend.”
“Your friend is long gone. If you kill a master ring, the whole stack dissolves! I
know
this, young savage. I've put it in practice.”
Lark was angry enough to turn his attack on the burly Danik. Sensing it, Rann released Lark and stepped back, raising both hands in a combatant's stance.
Yeah
, Lark thought, dropping to a crouch.
You're a star-god soldier. But maybe a savage knows some tricks you don't.
“Stop it, you two!” Ling shouted. “We've got to get readyâ”
She cut off as a chain of low vibrations throbbed the metal floorâmighty forces at work, growling elsewhere in the vast ship.
“Defensive cannon,” Rann identified the din. “But what could they be firingâ?”
“The rockets!” Ling replied. “I
told
you, they're coming this way!”
Realization dawned on Rann, that sooners might actually threaten a starship. He cursed, diving for a corner of the cell.
Lark allowed Ling to lead him as the battleship shivered, its weapons firing frantically. A mutter of distant detonations crept closer as they held each other. The moment had a heady vividness, a hormonal rush, mixing the pleasure of Ling's touch with sharp awareness of onrushing death.
Yet Lark found himself hoping, praying, that the next few moments would end his life.
Come on. You can do it, Lester. Finish the job!
The fragment of the Egg lay against his chest, where its last outburst had left seething weals. He clutched the stone amulet with his free hand, expecting throbbing heat. Instead, Lark felt an icy cold. A brittleness that breath would shatter.
FROM THE NOTES OF GILLIAN BASKIN
WE'RE ALL FEELING rather down right now. Suessi called from the second dross pile where his work crew just had an accident. They were trying to clear the area around an old Buyur ore-hauler when a subsea quake hit. The surrounding heap of junk ships shifted and an ancient hulk came rolling down on a couple of workersâSatima and Sup-peh. Neither of them had time to do more than stare at the onrushing wall before it crushed them.
So we keep getting winnowed down where it hurts most. Our best colleaguesâthe skilled and dedicatedâinevitably pay the price.
Then there's Peepoe, everyone's delight. A terrible loss, kidnapped by Zhaki and his pal. If only I could get my hands on that pair!
I had to lie to poor Kaa, though. We cannot spare time to go hunting across the ocean for Peepoe.
That doesn't mean she'll be abandoned. Friends will win her freedom, someday. This I vow.
But our pilot won't be one of them.
Alas, I fear Kaa will never see her again.
MAKANEE finished her autopsies of Kunn and Jass. The prisoners apparently took poison rather than answer our questions. Tsh't blames herself for not searching the Danik agent more carefully, but who would have figured Kunn would be so worried about our amateur grilling?
And did he really have to take the hapless native boy with him? Rety's cousin could hardly know secrets worth dying for.
Rety herself can shed no light on the matter. Without anyone to interrogate, she volunteered to help Suessi, who can certainly use a hand. Makanee recommends work as good therapy for the poor kid, who had to see those gruesome bodies firsthand.
I wonder. What secret was Kunn trying to protect? Normally, I'd drop everything to puzzle it out. But too much is going on as we prepare to make our move.
Anyway, from the Jophur prisoners we know the Rothen ship is irrelevant. We have more immediate concerns.
THE Library cube reports no progress on that symbolâthe one with nine spirals and eight ovals. The unit is now sifting its older files, a job that gets harder the further back it goes.
In compensation, the cube has flooded me with records of other recent “sooner outbreaks”âsecret colonies established on fallow worlds.
It turns out that most are quickly discovered by guardian patrols of the Institute of Migration. Jijo is a special case, with limited access and the nearby shrouding of Izmunuti. Also, this time an entire galaxy was declared fallow, making inspection a monumental task.
I wonderedâwhy set aside a whole galaxy, when the basic unit of ecological recovery is a planet, or at most a solar system?
The cube explained that much larger areas of space are usually quarantined, all at once. Oxygen-breathing civilization evacuates an entire sector or spiral arm, ceding it to the parallel culture of hydrogen breathersâthose mysterious creatures sometimes generically called Zang. This helps keep both societies separated in physical space, reducing the chance of friction.
It also helps the quarantine. The Zang are unpredictable, and often ignore minor incursions, but they can be fierce if large numbers of oxy-sapients appear where they don't belong.
We detected what must have been Zang ships, before diving past Izmunuti. I guess they took us for a “minor incursion,” since they left us alone.
The wholesale trading of sectors and zones makes more sense now. Still, I pressed the Library cube.
Has an entire galaxy ever been declared off-limits before?
The answer surprised me.
Not for a very long time â¦Â at least one hundred and fifty million years.
Now, where have I heard that number before?
WE'RE told there are eight orders of sapience and quasisapience. Oxy-life is the most vigorous and blatantâor as Tom put it, “strutting around, acting like we own the place.” In fact, though, I was surprised to learn that hydrogen breathers far outnumber oxygen breathers. But Zang and their relatives spend most of their time down in the turbid layers of Jovian-type worlds.
Some say this is because they fear contact with oxy-types.
Others say they could crush us anytime, but have never gotten around to it. Perhaps they will, sometime in the
next
billion years.
The other orders are Machine, Memetic, Quantum, Hypothetical, Retired, and Transcendent.
Why am I pondering this now?
Well, our plans are in motion, and soon
Streaker
will be, too. It's likely that in a few days we'll be dead, or else taken captive. With luck, we may buy something worthwhile with our lives. But our chances of actually getting away seem vanishingly small.
And yet â¦Â what if we do manage it? After all, the Jophur may get engine trouble at just the right moment. They might decide we're not worth the effort.
The sun might go nova.
In that case, where can Streaker go next?
We've tried seeking justice from our own oxy-cultureâthe Civilization of the Five Galaxiesâbut the Institutes proved untrustworthy. We tried the Old Ones, but those members of the Retired Order proved less impartial than we hoped.
In a universe filled with possibilities, there remain half a dozen other “quasi-sapient” orders out there. Alien in both thought and substance. Rumored to be dangerous.
What have we got to lose?
KaaG
LEAMING MISSILES STRUCK THE WATER WHENEVER he surfaced to breathe. The spears were crude weaponsâhollow wooden shafts tipped with slivers of vol-canic glassâbut when a keen-edged harpoon grazed his flank, Kaa lost half his air in a reflexive cry. The harborânow a cramped, exitless trapâreverberated with his agonized moan.
The hoonish sailors seemed to have no trouble moving around by torchlight, rowing their coracles back and forth, executing complex orders shouted from their captains' bulging throat sacs. The water's tense skin reverberated like a beaten drum as the snare tightened around Kaa. Already, a barrier of porous netting blocked the narrow harbor mouth.
Worse, the natives had reinforcements. Skittering sounds announced the arrival of clawed feet, scampering down the rocky shore south of town. Chitinous forms plunged underwater, reminding Kaa of some horror movie about giant crabs.
Red qheuens
, he realized, as these new allies
helped the hoon sailors close off another haven, the water's depths.
Ifni! What did Zhaki and Mopol do to make the locals so mad at the mere sight of a dolphin in their bay? How did they get these people so angry they want to kill me on sight?
Kaa still had some tricks. Time and again he misled the hoons, making feints, pretending sluggishness, drawing the noose together prematurely, then slipping beneath a gap in their lines, dodging a hail of javelins.
My ancestors had practice doing this. Humans taught us lessons, long before they switched from spears to scalpels.
Yet he knew this was a contest the cetacean could not win. The best he could hope for was a drawn-out tie.