The D’neeran Factor (23 page)

When she understood its intent, however, she wanted to scream again, and could not.

*   *   *

The commissioners of the Polity rarely all met together in the flesh; for once all of them were here. Andrella Murphy had been a little distance from Earth when Rodrigues called her, going home to Willow, and was breathless from a last-minute rush to Admin. Not only the six of them knew what was going on. After Lady Koroth's announcement some hours before, everyone knew.

Struzik gave Murphy time to settle in a chair before he called the meeting to order. Murphy's single glance at Jameson was anxious; the others were nervous or resentful, angry or triumphant. He knew that all of them, even Murphy, had already taken steps to dissociate themselves as thoroughly as possible from the
Endeavor
Project. The groundwork would be laid—had been laid for months, no doubt—and all the subtle machinery would begin working as soon as they had a little more information. They would have it in a minute now, and he would be left to face the storm alone. He had never expected anything else, and had accepted the risk from the beginning.

“I think,” Struzik said, “Starr has a new report for us.”

From long habit Jameson spoke calmly, his face betraying nothing.

“I spoke a few minutes ago to Aziz Khan on the
Mao,
” he said. “I'm sorry to say he had a worst-case confirmation.
XS-12
has been destroyed by enemy action.”

He looked past them to the end of his career, and waited for the frozen silence to end.

al-Nimeury leaned forward and said, “What weapons?”

“Simple lasers, Aziz Khan said.”

“Why? If these aliens have Inspace capability, why not anti-gravity derivatives?”

Jameson resisted an impulse to inquire how he was supposed to guess why aliens used one weapon and not another. He said, “Aggies are very destructive. It may be they wanted to preserve the vessel for study. Aziz Khan said there's very little debris, not nearly enough to account for
XS-12
's full mass.”

Murphy said, “Is there any trace of them?”

“No. You know how easy it is to disappear using Inspace. They know too, evidently.”

Katherine Petrov had not been listening. She said, “They've taken it away, then?”

“It appears so.”

“Then they've got everything…”

Her old hands hovered anxiously. Jameson said, “Maybe not, Kate. They might have made a mistake. Aziz Khan says the nature of the debris indicates central control took a direct hit. Main data storage almost certainly was destroyed, and the backup may have been damaged.”

“Why?” said Murphy. “It doesn't make sense. Why waste the computer?”

“The theory is that their prime target was a human prisoner. It's likely that Lady Hanna, as the logical contact, was the first to come into their hands. It would not make sense to us, but when I notified Lady Koroth—” His eyes were on Murphy, but he found he was seeing Iledra's face, with its barely hidden pain. “Lady Koroth said if they are indeed telepaths they may find it easier and less time-consuming to interrogate a prisoner than to analyze human language and mathematics and hardware.”

“You're sure Lady Hanna's alive, then?” Murphy looked worried but far from hysterical—and not nearly so thunderously angry as al-Nimeury.

“Quite sure.”

Arthur Feng said, “How much does she know?”

“Too much,” Jameson said wearily, thinking of that intent young face. “She has detailed knowledge of D'neeran defense capabilities. She's state-of-the-art where Polity defenses are concerned, although she's never been in a position to know the details.”

Petrov said, “We'll have to assume she tells them. And that they're hostile.”

Jameson said nothing. According to “Sentience,” a defensive
posture to a newly encountered intelligent species was inappropriate when a telepath made the contact. But according to “Sentience,” not to mention humankind's cherished beliefs about intelligence, such a species would not, as its first act of contact, destroy a human space vessel.

Struzik murmured, “It'll have to be max security.”

A storm of voices broke out. Jameson listened without comment. Probably it should be max security. He would speak with Damon Taylor, president of his own world's general council and the man responsible for Jameson's presence on the Commission, but he thought “maximum security” would be Taylor's first words. It was expensive, it was frightening, it interfered with commerce and lawful travel and it was of questionable value, given the nature of Inspace transit, but probably it should be max security. Until they found out what was going on. If they ever found out what was going on.

“But—” Feng's voice rose above the babble. “Three conventions next month in Foresight alone. Foresight alone! And anyway they don't have the computer data. And Lady Hanna might not tell them anything.”

al-Nimeury growled, “I do
not
want to count on that.”

There was an overtone in his voice Jameson recognized, something more than the bruise to pride the
Endeavor
Project had been. al-Nimeury simply disliked D'neera, and violently distrusted D'neerans. It was only an extreme form of a widespread prejudice; Coopers had made themselves into a human unity and combined a checkered assortment of settlers into a human whole against great odds. They were hard on outsiders.

Maximum security was the only realistic choice. It would take days to implement; there was no time to waste; even in this room, which was supposed to hold humanity's coolest heads, there was a shadow of fear. Jameson cast his vote without a word, knowing it might be his last.

When they got up to leave, Struzik nodded to Jameson, who recognized the signal to wait until the others were gone. But Struzik, who gently pried whenever he had the chance, only wanted to gossip, and Jameson was in no mood for gossip.

“You know everything I know,” he said.

“I know. Still…” Struzik hesitated. “We've never had to do this before.”

“No.”

“Dust off the contingency plans…We never really expected hostile aliens.”

“Somebody did,” Jameson pointed out. “That's why the plans are there.”

“But I never thought we'd have to use them.”

Jameson shrugged. “You take your chances,” he said.

“
Your
chance. Your idea.”

Jameson waited, watching his oldest Earth-born friend.

Struzik said, “How much did you know?”

“Nothing,” Jameson said, understanding the question perfectly.

“Tell me the truth, Jamie. You thought she might have been right all along, didn't you? Being scared of them as she was?”

Jameson did not answer. Struzik said. “This puts you in a spot, doesn't it?”

“You might say that.” Jameson had made mistakes before, but he could not recall another that had endangered the whole human species. In a day or so the pack would be in full cry. It would be folly to dispense with his experience in a time of crisis, but he did not know if Taylor would be able to avoid it.

Struzik began, “All the fuss about
Endeavor
in the first place—”

“Seems to have been justified.”

Jameson started out the door. Behind him Struzik said, not without sympathy, “You really put your foot in it this time, Jamie.”

“Don't call me that,” Jameson said automatically, but his heart was not in it.

*   *   *

Hanna found humiliation could do things simple pain could not. The boundary in her mind between rape and the pleasures of love had been clear; that made it worse. Rape was a true-human crime which she had heard of but never met, and she had faced the possibility of the start of war with Nestor with a certain equanimity. If it happened she would endure it, and when there was a chance—even if years passed before
the chance came—she would kill the man who did it. The principle was as clear to her as anything in her life, her mastery of this part of herself indisputable and a foundation of her existence. In this matter there were no gray areas.

What happened to her now was different, and beyond enduring. Bad enough, insane enough, to have the paths of pleasure charted by some monstrous being unmoved as the tool it used; but each time, at the end, to want what it promised! The instrument was forbidden everywhere except Valentine; her own experience had shown her why; it took away your humanity. The body had its own imperatives, and no matter how she set her will the moment would come when she gave in to them, and her will would be broken. And when she wept in shame and self-hatred the pain would come again, and it would be harder to resist that too.

Stop. Stop. Oh please, I beg, oh please.

I will not. Thus were beasts destroyed before you time-ago; in this and other ways: We learned.

Abject I crawl, I beg, implore, I will do anything save speak!

That too. How not? Ask when. There is no escape. Of all agonies that is the worst: no ending nor escape.

Pain merged with pleasure, she got them mixed up, the creature was as close as her self, the bond was irresistible. Yet she resisted.

Answer, if thou lovest me. A single flame. The heavens thus. Knowest thou this benchmark?

I know….

And this? No? Then this?

No! I will not.

You will.

The universe contracted to Hanna and The Questioner. She resisted, surrendered, forgot she was human, remembered. The past died in the evil present. The little certainty that was left her blurred and dissolved; but The Questioner was certain. In an unguarded moment he let her see his sureness that he hammered at a fracture point, that she would split cleanly as a crystal, and he would not let her shatter into dust.

*   *   *

On Tuesday night Jameson went home and immediately broke an ampoule of a high-powered tranquilizing drug under his nose. After a minute he did it with another and the
world slowed around him, and the muscles of his back and legs reluctantly, lingeringly relaxed.

He was leaning against the wall of his study, his breath clouding its shining surface, when the room said, “Ms. Guilbert is calling.”

“Just give me audio in here…Henriette?”

“Hello. You told me to call you today.”

“Did I?”

“Umm-hmm.”

He shook his head, a gesture she could not see.

“I'm sorry, Henry. I haven't had any sleep for a couple of days and I don't know when I'll be able to get free.”

“I thought that was probably—Starr?”

“Yes?”

“Can I ask you a question?”

He smiled in spite of his weariness. “You know the rules about answers.”

“You'll either tell me the truth, not answer, or lie to me.”

“That's right.” He had laid the rule down solemnly early on, and Henriette rarely asked about the Commission.

“Are you worried?”

“No,” he lied.

After a pause she said. “They're saying President Taylor is going to recall you.”

“Who's saying that?” (Besides half the Heartworld council and sometimes Taylor too, he thought.)

“It's on all the newsbeams. They're saying—well. Somebody said you're a megalomaniac and you shoved the
Endeavor
Project through, knowing how dangerous it was.”

She sounded uncertain. Very likely she believed it. Damned if he was going to defend himself to Henriette; she had never listened to a word of his public statements before she met him, and rarely did so now.

“Cut your losses, Henry.”

“What?”

“Never mind. Henry, my appointment will not be revoked. A minority faction in the council will try to pass a resolution demanding my resignation. They won't have nearly enough votes. That'll be the end of it. It happens all the time, Henry, in one form or another.”

“All right.” She sounded dissatisfied. A village mayor's assistant would not suit her.

“I must go now. I'll call you as soon as I can.”

He went to his bedroom, thinking the last thing he wanted right now was Henriette beside him in the big bed. No, not quite the last thing; he could do without partisan politics just now too.

He barely had time to get his clothes off before the dope put him to sleep.

The promise and the threat were nothing to Hanna, nor had she the clarity of mind to wonder what could follow. She could not move. When she was sick from time to time they turned her like a slab of meat so she would not choke to death; she could not and would not have done it by herself. Her mind also had retreated. For some time she had not felt anything; blessedly detached, for a little while she wandered the golden hills of her home. Once it was night, the moonless star-clouded night of D'neera. It seemed that at some time she had wanted to soar into the bright cloud, borne by her own wonder and curiosity. That could not be right. The stars were too terrible. Her mother said, H'ana, when will you be home? Soon, darling, she answered.

And where is this place? someone asked in her dream.

Here, you see, not far from the gentle sea.

And if I wish to go there from another star how may I find it?

Dutifully she began to think of astrogation. And remembered in a surge of terror what asked the question.