The Eternal Enemy (25 page)

“Everything looks so different,” Straka said.

“I'll say,” Jackson said.

But no matter how much they each insisted things were different, that
they
were different, Markos knew better. Deep down inside, nothing of them had been changed. They were still the same people, still the same chauvinistic Terrans, the same opinionated, prejudiced beings. They were still the people who had sided with Van Pelt. The people who had chased him across the Galaxy.

“Just look at the bulkheads,” Wilhelm said. “You can see the structural defects there. And look—stress marks here,” he said, pointing to a ripple in the metal they would never have been able to see before.

Markatens stood by, trying to melt into a corner of the room, trying to make sense out of what everyone was talking about. He clutched the recorded crystals in his hands, waiting patiently for them to be needed. The crew had carried them across with them, though they hadn't really known what they were.

“These chairs aren't that comfortable anymore,” Martinez said.

“Did you see the swirl in this table?” De Sola asked, pointing to the top of the plastic table mounted in the deck. “Probably appears naturally from vacumolding.”

“You'll get used to it this way,” Markos said, slightly amused at their discoveries. It was something he had gone through on Gandji, though for him it had been a painful experience, each difference spotted a revelation of horror.

“I doubt it,” McGowen said. “We must not be seeing the same things.”

“We are. I've just been seeing the differences longer, and I don't notice them as differences. It's just the way I see now. My mind's adapted.”

“That figures,” Jackson said.

Everyone ignored him.

“I never thought I'd survive that trip,” Kominski said.

“I know what you mean,” Katawba said. “I've never felt more alone, more vulnerable.”

Martinez laughed. “What a high! Watching Aurianta below, huge and swollen, Alpha Indi a small disk—”

“I wasn't worried,” Jackson said. “If
he
could make it, I knew I would,” he said, motioning toward Markos with his head.

“Well, what's next?” Straka asked Markos.

Markos shrugged. “There's a lot we have to do before we can leave. We should probably start with the crystals.” He held out his hand toward Markatens. Markatens handed over one of the crystals. “Put the others on the table,” Markos said.

“Does he have to come along?” Jackson asked.

“No,” Markos said. “And neither do you.”

That seemed to do the trick. Markos could read the colors that seeped from Jackson's eyes, slight though they were, and knew he had dealt with him properly.

“One of problems is that all of our information is either dated or secondhand. We've never captured a Hydran, so all we know about them is here,” he said, holding out his hand, “and in those,” he said, pointing to the crystals on the table. “They're about all we have. None of you have seen what's inside them, but I want you to try to now.”

Markos described how to enter the crystals' structures and what to look for inside. Straka was the first to pick up one of the crystals. The other crewmembers looked on as she gripped it in her hands. She had little trouble figuring out how to use it properly. Markos was pleasantly surprised at how quickly they were adjusting to their new capacities and capabilities. One by one the crew followed her example. All but Jackson.

“What's the matter,” Markos asked him.

“What makes you think something's the matter?”

“Well, you haven't picked up one of them yet.”

“I will. Just tell me something,” Jackson said.

“What?”

“If you can change things so easily, why the hell don't you change your voice? Have you got any idea what it sounds like?”

“My hearing hasn't been altered that much.”

“That's not what I asked. Why not change it?”

“Does it bother you that much?” Markos asked, his patience wearing thin.

“Yes.”

“Good. It bothers me too. That's why I never changed it. It helps remind me of something I never want to forget. Now, pick up the crystal.”

Jackson's eyes leaked a dark blue, the Haber way of saying no, and said, “Sure. Why not?”

He reached over and grabbed the nearest crystal. Markos was amused by Jackson's inability to lie. Jackson's innermost emotions would leak through his eyes until he learned how to control them better. Until that time Markos had a real window into Jackson's mind.

Markos looked over the crew. Straka's eyes were mirroring the colors she read within the crystal's structure, flashing by at incredible speed. Like reading with her lips, Markos thought. He hoped they could understand the way the images were coded in those colors. It was a lot like asking a human to plug himself directly into a computer and understand its binary language without an interface, he thought. Only we Habers have a small advantage there.

Straka dropped the crystal as if it had suddenly been electrified and had shocked her. She looked over at Markos. Yellow tinged with blue seeped from her eyes—just enough of it for Markos to recognize her confusion and disbelief. “These are the creatures the Habers are at war with? These are the Hydrans?”

Markos nodded.

Straka took another crystal, placing the one she'd just finished to one side.

Wilhelm dropped his crystal. “My God,” he said. “Just like that. Burned them all. Nothing else. Just burned them away!”

“Just like Van Pelt did,” Markos said.

“What? Van Pelt? Get serious!”

“It's true,” Markos said. “I was standing watch at the time. That was what made me run, seeing him do that.”

“I don't believe you! He said you'd done it!”

“It's true, Wilhelm. They were young Habers. Unarmed, totally incapable of understanding aggression.”

“I can't believe it. I know Van Pelt was over the edge, but he wasn't that far gone.”

“Then don't believe it. It doesn't matter anymore.”

Wilhelm picked up another crystal, the one Straka had placed aside. Straka was well into her second one. De Sola and Martinez were going through their crystals silently, without showing anything in their eyes. Markos was sure they were being moved by the experiences stored inside; they just weren't the types to show it. Kominski seemed sane enough, capable of delving into the record of destruction in his crystal. Jackson placed his on the table and turned to face Markos.

“Is this your idea of a joke?” he demanded.

“What?” Markos asked.

“Fighting these things? How many of them are there?”

Markos shrugged. “I don't know.”

“Oh Christ.” Jackson shook his head. “You know, Markos, I never really liked you. You never gave me much reason to. But recruiting me to help fight these insects—”

“We're not sure they're insects.”

“They're insects, all right. Can't you even tell that? I refuse. I flatly refuse to fight them. It would be suicide. If we had an army, then I'd consider helping. But just the nine of us—”

“But you've only read one crystal.”

“One was more than enough.”

“Look at another, Jackson. You may see they're not all that powerful an enemy. There's one crystal in particular—one with Triand fighting them on Theta Alnon. That one should show you more—”

“Forget it. I've seen enough,” Jackson said.

“Let him be, Markos,” Straka said. “If he doesn't want to help, we'll just leave him behind.”

Markos looked at Straka, a questioning yellow tinged with blue in his eyes.

“Just make sure you alter his physical structure so that he'll be incapable of causing any trouble on Aurianta's surface,” Straka said.

Jackson reached for another crystal. “All right. I got your message.”

Markos was starting to appreciate Straka's presence. There was an art to handling Jackson, he realized, and confrontation was not part of the art.

Jackson was the same as he always had been. They'd never really gotten along. But then, no one ever really got along well with Jackson. He can mutter and mumble, complain and bitch, get into a fight now and then, but none of that matters, Markos thought. Just as long as he doesn't make serious trouble. He was just what the Habers needed on their side: a true killer with a fine sense of survival. With Straka helping to keep him in line, there was a chance their mission could succeed.

McGowen, on the other hand, didn't seem right. He'd been a lot more volatile, active, similar to Jackson in some ways. He used to supply Jackson with the sparring he needed. That could be why Jackson's been lashing out at everyone, Markos thought. To try to find a new counterpart.

McGowen must have undergone some personality change when Alpha had touched him. Alpha had little firsthand knowledge of human anatomy and psychology. Markos remembered how heavy-handed the Habers had been when bringing him back to life on Gandji. They approached the human condition as if it were an integrated circuit in need of repair. Except that the Habers' tools were hammers.

When they were finished with the crystals, he would take the time to discuss what they'd observed, making sure the similarities and differences from his own conclusions were noted. He would turn on the on-board computer and let it listen to the discussion. Maybe then, when it was over, the computer could draw a logical, consistent view of what the Hydrans were like, where they had truly come from, and what they were attacking.

Perhaps someone would come up with a decent plan of attack.

Then again, maybe not.

Markos was the one responsible for figuring out how to win the war. None of them had any experience in that. None of them was really a soldier. In either case, they were not going to move the
Paladin
until Markos was sure where they were headed, why they were headed there, and what they would do when they arrived.

20

The ship no longer resembled the
Paladin.
Its once-smooth, globular shape was broken up by a ring of Haber ships attached to its hull, surrounding it like a belt at midships. The Haber ships alternately faced forward and aft to give the
Paladin
added versatility in acceleration in both directions. The computer had pointed out the need as the parameters of their mission became clearer; they would need landing boats, escape boats, fighters, and reconnaissance ships, all of which had to be added to the
Paladin
's basic structure. The Haber ships were the right size and were powerful enough individually to out-accelerate the
Paladin.

The added acceleration alone would have made the delay caused by modifying the
Paladin
's hull worthwhile. They knew nothing about the Hydrans' ships, so the
Paladin
's, improved maneuverability could possibly swing any battle in space their way. Markos looked at it this way: every added advantage was a necessary precaution for survival.

The Old One was extremely helpful when it came time to attach the smaller ships to the hull of the
Paladin.
His native ability to touch and change made the hull's atomic structure seem obvious. He taught the crew which electrons to move and which ones to absorb to make the attachment sturdy enough to withstand the tremendous stress and yet be reversible in an instant if they needed to free one of the ships as a fighter. They improvised nonpressurized airlocks between each ship and the
Paladin
to maintain the big ship's integrity.

The most difficult part of the modification proved to be the process of tying in the controls from each wedge-shaped ship to the
Paladin
's bridge. They tried running the control circuits directly through the hull but found they were spending far too much time insulating one molecular layer from another. Without the insulation the system would have grounded out and been worthless.

De Sola hit upon a workable solution—using existing wiring, that of the life-support systems. He rerouted and doubled the wiring's function, then created a switching device on the bridge. Once on the bridge, the circuits were divided so that life support and systems analysis went to one control panel, while the engine controls and monitors went to a different control panel.

Initially only one wedge-shaped ship had any armament. They duplicated lasers and field nullifiers in each of the remaining seven ships and added a full complement of weapons to the
Paladin
just to be safe. The weapons controls were tied into another control panel on the
Paladin
's bridge.

The weapons controls had an override switch and duplicate controls in the command chair.

With the
Paladin
as the mother ship, and the eight wedge-shaped Haber ships as its scouts, Markos thought they had enough of a chance to justify risking everyone's life.

“We're ready to head out,” Straka said.

Markos nodded, barely listening. He stood on the bridge, eyes fixed on the slowly turning Aurianta. The planet's beauty made him long for its surface, for home. He hated the role he was stuck in, the responsibility thrust onto his shoulders. He would have given anything to be able to return to Peace, to his house there, to spend the rest of his days in quiet meditation. Seeing the planet from this distance only made the feelings and desires stronger.

“Markos? We're ready,” Straka repeated.

Markos shook his head and forced himself to look away from Aurianta. “Fine,” he said.

“Not quite. The Old One wants to come,” Straka said. “And so does Markatens.”

“I was afraid of that.”

“They don't want to go back to the surface. The Old One says that you owe him, that his life should have been over long ago. He says he's broken so many taboos, nothing matters anymore except seeing this through to the end.”