Orphans of Earth (17 page)

“I didn’t say I approved,” Axford responded. “I just said I could understand where they’re coming from. To them, survival is the most important thing—not fighting and dying.”

“That’s as may be,” said Sol. “But it doesn’t help us much, does it? If we’re to stand any chance against the Starfish, then we’re going to need all the information we can on them
and
the Spinners. And so far, they haven’t told us anything that might be useful.”

“Look,” said Alander, “it’s too early to jump to conclusions. I mean, these two can’t possibly represent their entire race. Maybe they’re extremists—the only ones fool enough to volunteer for seek-and-destroy missions such as this. And if they are extremists, then what are the moderates like? Would
they
be more inclined to talk to us and help us? Instead of wasting our time here, maybe we should be looking to talk to others that might be more cooperative and sympathetic.”

Sol nodded. “If we only knew where they were...”

Axford cleared his throat for their attention. “The records in their hole ship are locked with some sort of numerical key I can’t get around, yet,” he said. “However, I can tell you their destination after 61 Ursa Major. It’s Alsafi—a KOV star not on the main mission register. Main sequence but older than Sol, and not far from here. They had it programmed in case they needed a quick getaway.”

“I know it,” said Sol. “The mission to Dsiban had a scheduled flyby. But why there? It’s not even close to Hera.”

“I have no idea,” admitted Axford. “I’m just telling you what was in the hole ship AI when it merged with
Mercury
.”

“We could check Dsiban to see if the survey team arrived there,” suggested Alander. “The
Geoffrey Landis
wouldn’t have flown by Alsafi itself, but its secondary mission would have.”

“Who piloted that one?” asked Sol. “Lucia, I suppose?”

“It was,” he said. “But that’s hardly relevant.”

“Her track record is far from irrelevant, Peter,” said Sol. “We have no record of her
ever
arriving at her target system, so why should she be at Dsiban?”

“There’s always a chance, Caryl,” he said. “You can’t afford to ignore the possibility that she might have useful data.”

Thor stirred in her insulated, virtual space but didn’t intrude upon the argument.

“You’re forgetting something,” said Axford. “It would’ve only taken her twenty-five years to get there. She would have been long gone by the time the Roaches even arrived.”

Alander looked at him, then nodded. “That’s true,” he said. “I guess we have no choice but to jump in blind.”

Axford’s grin was wide. “Any volunteers?”

The rolling resonance of an ftl transmission rang through the expanded cockpit. On the far side of the invisible boundary, the alien captives looked up, chittering between themselves as if in alarm.

Or amusement
, thought Thor.
Are they laughing at us?

“Time for the daily bulletin already?” Axford said to her. “My, doesn’t time fly when you’re entertaining aliens?”

Sol ignored the comment. When the transmission was complete,
Mercury
played its contents in full. It began the usual way, with Sol’s plea for cautious contact between the colonies and the various alien races traveling through surveyed space. Several new drops had been discovered as a result of all the exploration taking place along the Spinner front. Failed missions were downplayed, as were the latest Starfish kills. Hatzis felt herself grow cold when the figure appeared. Nine dead colonies. Not all had died in the previous twenty hours—they were still finding the ruins of colonies unlucky enough to have missed the warnings—but not all of them were old, either. A significant number of them must have been victims of sneak attacks.

She skipped to the bottom of the transmission, to the roll call of dead systems. The coldness in her gut turned to stabbing ice as she read that one of them was HD92719: her home system.

Thor felt herself lift out of the illusion that she was Sol as she reviewed the Overseer files that had come in at the same time as the Sothis transmission. Grief flooded through her as she fought to comprehend the simple but painful truth: everyone on the
Krasnikov
was dead! Rob Singh, Vince Mohler, Donald Schievenin, Nalini Kovistra, Angela Wu—
everyone.
The planet of Thor, if the other destroyed systems were anything to go by, lay in ruins right now, its biosphere traumatized by the falling of the orbital towers tethering the gifts to the ground.

And she hadn’t been there because Peter Alander needed baby-sitting.

Flashes of memories from the other engrams filtered through her via Sol. She experienced new worlds and old ones, felt fresh insights from distant facets of her own mind, learned the names of more Orphans... But it was all meaningless to her.

Then a new memory burst across her mind: she saw golden machines bursting in two while sheets of unimaginable energy brighter than the sun effortlessly tore great holes in a small, green planet’s atmosphere. Silver star shapes, rotating like the blades of giant saws, gathered energy and then hurled it back at anything within range. She recognized the fear of the mind witnessing it and knew also that she,
Caryl Hatzis,
was sacrificing herself in order that others might see more closely just how the Starfish operated.

This is 64 Pisces
, called the mind of the dying woman.
This was Ilmarinen; this was my home...

Debris rained down upon the helpless world, while fire burned its sky. The work of the aliens was almost done. She felt the ringing of the hole ship around her as the aliens closed in for the kill, wondered if the transmission was still continuing, forced herself through the onset of personality breakdown as her engram found itself thrust into experiences her original had never anticipated, gathered her resolve around her—she
would
survive; she
would
see it through; if it saved one life,
if it saved Sol,
it would be worth it—and—

The transmission from Ilmarinen ended abruptly and in blackness. A tag had been added to the file, and Thor watched as Sol read it. The Overseer file from 64 Pisces had been broadcast while the kidnap mission had been en route to Vegas from 61 Ursa Major, and had gone out with no thought to subtlety. The final thoughts of Hatzis of Ilmarinen had been detected by every colony within two hundred light-years. There was no mistaking the transmission for what it was, given that it came on its own. The deathbed experiences, even secondhand, were sparking panic all across surveyed space.

“There’s a problem,” said Sol, pushing forward through Thor until she was back in full control.

“So I gather.” Axford didn’t look smug, and she was grateful for that.

Alander looked confused for a moment. “What’s going on? Is this to do with the transmissions you—?”

“I can’t explain right now,” she cut in. “It’ll take too long, and I have to go.”

Then Sol was gone, and Thor was thrust back into her artificial body before she was entirely prepared. Her confusion overrode automatic balance systems, and she pitched forward onto her knees with a gasp.

“Are you all right?”

Alander was halfway across the cockpit before she was fully aware of what was happening.

“They’re all dead,” she said through gritted teeth, brushing aside his outstretched hand. “Thor is dead.”

“Your colony?”

She nodded, using the couch to help her climb to her feet.

I will not cry. I will not cry.

Alander straightened with her. “I know how that feels, Caryl,” he said.

She shot him a sharp glare. “You patronizing little fuck,” she said viciously.

He took a step back. “No, I didn’t mean it like—”

She shook her head, and he shut up, throwing his arms up in defeat and turning away from her.

“That’s a whole heap of trouble old Sol is going back to,” Axford mused. “People will be howling for evacuation and resettlement. Hole ships will become the most precious commodity on the market. Everyone will be looking for somewhere safe to hide. And guess what, people? There’s nowhere safe. You either fight or you die. They’re the only options. It’s survival of the fittest, dressed in spaceships not bearskins.”

“Or we could do what our alien friends here have done for the last twenty-five hundred years,” suggested Alander. “Tail the Starfish and not let ourselves be seen, scavenging what we can, when we can.”

It was only intended as a quip, but it gave Hatzis the urge to strike out at him. She knew her anger wasn’t really for him, though. As much as he pissed her off at times—all the time, these days, it seemed—lashing out at him simply wouldn’t satisfy the fiery emotions she felt needed immediate release.

Sensing movement behind her, she turned to see one of the aliens staring at her through the invisible barrier. Its faceplates moved in odd ways, creating a shifting series of line-drawn expressions, none of which made sense. Its mouth changed shape several times until it became an upside down triangle, stretched far out into each cheek. Inside the lipless mouth, sharp projections slid into view at the front. The plates around its eyes narrowed, and its black eyes glinted in the light.

She narrowed her eyes. “Is that thing
smiling
at me?”

Alander stepped up beside her and peered closely at the alien. “It certainly seems to be,” he said. “But smiles aren’t necessarily friendly. Those teeth look
sharp
.”

She ignored him, turning to Axford. “Drop the barrier,” she said. “Let it out.”

“As you wish,” said Axford with amusement.

“What—?” was all of the objection Alander managed to get out before the sudden rush as air pressures equalizing indicated that the barrier was down.

“This isn’t funny, General,” said Alander nervously. From the corner of her eye she could see him edging away from her. “Bring the barrier back up!”

The plane delineating the former boundary blurred as the yellow-tinged atmosphere the hole ship had provided for the aliens spilled into the human section. Once Thor was sure the boundary was completely gone, that Axford wasn’t simply baiting her, she leaped. The Roaches had necks that looked flexible but sturdy, so she went for the place in its chest where the soft-looking hole had appeared. She put all her strength behind the blow, lunging at the alien in the hope of freeing all of her emotions as the images of her dead crewmates flashed before her eyes.

Nalini, Donald, Vince, Cleo, Susan, Angela...

But the alien was too fast for her, and one of its mighty legs kicked up and out before she got anywhere near its chest plates. Rigid toes dug into her stomach and flipped her aside.

She smelled iodine as it went past in a blur, leaping for Alander. The sound it made was like two trains shrieking by in both directions.

She hit the wall hard and went down near the other alien, the “priest.” It was slowly coming to its feet, its movements jerky, cautious, perhaps. She wanted to kick out at it, but the intense pain in her midriff forced her into a gasping ball.

“Axford!” she heard Alander bark as the creature came at him, its arms raised in readiness to rain blows down upon him. Before it could, however, a deafening crack split the air, and the barrier was back, curved in ungainly ways to separate human from alien.

The attacking alien bounced off it with a roar, kicking out in anger, its wing sheaths snapping up and down in rapid movements.

“Ambivalence take you!” it screeched.

“I think it just told us to go to hell,” said Axford as his conSense illusion strolled over to where Hatzis lay gasping on the floor. He leaned over her. “You okay?”

“Of course she’s not okay!” Alander snapped. “What the hell did you think you were doing?”

Axford shrugged with a self-satisfied smirk. “She wanted the barrier lifted,” he said innocently.

Alander knelt beside her, reaching under her shoulders to help her up. She half managed to stand, hunching over the terrible burning in her gut. Every movement caused her pain.

“Those bastards are dangerous,” she muttered, wincing as she spoke.

“And never forget it,” said Axford from off to one side. “I-suits can only do so much.”

Alander glared at him. “That’s why you did this? To teach her a lesson?”

“Come off it, Peter. She wanted that barrier down. She’s been busting for a shot at these aliens all along. She needed to get it out of her system, that’s all. And now, hopefully, she’s done just that.”

She knew he was right; she had, quite literally, asked for it. Nevertheless, his smug attitude was seriously rubbing her the wrong way.

“Come on,” she heard Alander mumble. “Let’s get you back to
Pearl
.”

Over his shoulder she could see the alien priest, its black-and-white expression completely illegible. It was impossible to tell where its all-black eyes were actually looking, but she knew it was watching her every step of the way.

* * *

“How are you feeling now?”

She was lying on the couch in the cockpit, with Alander crouched beside her. She nodded slightly in response to his enquiry. It was the best she could do at the moment.

“There’s no blood,” he said. “Nor any wound, for that matter.”

His reassurances didn’t help. She felt as though her digestive tract had been turned to jelly.

“There wouldn’t be,” she said. “The I-suit stopped the blow from killing me, and it’ll repair what damage did get through, I’m sure.”

“Would you like me to take you...?” He stopped before finishing the sentence, looking pained on her behalf.

“Home?” She laughed, but it was empty and humorless. “How, Peter?” The enormity of her loss welled up in her with greater urgency than the pain of her injury. For the first time, she truly had an inkling of what Sol had felt when the Starfish had destroyed the Vincula.

He hung his head, embarrassed. “Earlier on,” he started. “I didn’t mean to be insensitive—”

“I know,” she said. “We’ve all suffered losses. The only thing we can do about it is get on with life. Move on. Right?”

He shrugged. “If you believe Axford, then yeah, I guess so. Darwin and all that.”