Vale of Stars (28 page)

“I see no reason to refuse, Yallia. Let me know when you are—”

“I’m ovulating in six days. We should try for the next few. If we don’t catch this cycle, we’ll keep trying.”

“Sexually?” Lawson asked, with no hint of expectation or lechery in his voice. The question was purely an information-seeking one.

“For a few cycles, at least. If that doesn’t work, then we’ll give science a chance.” Yallia looked at him and smiled. This time, her smile was not sarcastic or bittersweet. “I’ll see you tonight,” she said, and started back to the common area where her children and grandchildren waited.

*   *   *

“You’re looking very well, Yali,” Kuarta said when she saw her daughter. She tried not to notice the hatred riding high in her offspring’s eyes or feel the almost palpable resentment that seemed to come off Yallia’s very skin. Kuarta had seen her daughter hundreds of times since her exile more than twenty-four years before, but the visits had been increasingly hostile and therefore less frequent as Yallia grew older. It had been almost a quarteryear since her last visit.

“I’ve asked you not to call me that,” Yallia said venomously. The two stood facing one another in the small Dome that was the Research Enclave. The research staff was sympathetic to Kuarta’s wishes and had provided her a small room, an unused lab, to meet with her daughter. They were alone.

“Sorry,” Kuarta said and sank heavily onto a chair.

“I suppose you’re here to find out how I’m doing. I heard about your mother’s death, of course.”

“Of course. But something tells me you don’t want me to ask, do you?”

Yallia was not biting. “No, I do not. I do not understand why such news should affect me. I barely knew her, and what little I do know of her makes me think I should be jubilant at her passing.”

“Like you would be at my own?” Kuarta sank the barb deep.

Yallia shrugged. “You bore me, you raised me for a short time, then you abandoned me here. Your death would mean nothing more than a loss of another Domer. Something we
Outsiders
do not mourn.” Yallia placed a bit of extra emphasis on the Domer term for the Family.

Kuarta did not let the hurt show. The last several visits had been almost as bad. But she did not wonder why her daughter saw her regardless of her feelings. She had hoped, years and years ago, it was out of some vague sense of family or even love, but her pragmatic mind had dismissed those thoughts. Yallia needed her mother for information about Dome society.

“Speaking of the Domes, what shall I tell you this time?” Kuarta said, a hint of sarcasm entering her voice.

“What are your numbers like?” Yallia asked without hesitation.

“I think there are about a quarter million or so.”

“Any more you are planning to exile?”

Kuarta winced at the accusation, but answered. “There are no new hybrids that I know of. Oh, you might be interested in this. Dr. Onizaka was honored at the seventy-fifth anniversary ball about ten days ago.”

Yallia nodded with mock enthusiasm. “Oh, fabulous. Nice to see the Domers appreciate good work. What’s she working on now—goats?”

Kuarta understood the reference. It was an Old Earth legend about transferring sins onto an animal. Dolen would probably be able to track down the exact story. “I’m not sure,” she answered.

“Wonderful. How wonderful for her. Why should a single instance of attempted genocide spoil an otherwise brilliant career raping an entire planet?”

Kuarta sighed and said, “Look, dear, if you want me to go, I’ll go. I can bring a detailed report on Dome activity for you the next time I come, all right?”

“But, Mother,” Yallia said with sickly sweet acidity, “how will you assuage your feelings of guilt and remorse if you don’t see me periodically?”

“You think this does that for me? You think I’m here so I can receive your abuse and feel like I have somehow atoned for what I did?” Kuarta was breathing heavily, trying to fight back tears. “I’ve spent almost twenty-five years in agony thinking about what I’ve done, thinking what I could have done differently. I see you not to atone, but because I love you.”

“You Domers must have a different definition for that term,” Yallia said dryly. “I don’t want to hear about your feelings, Kuarta. I need to collect data for my Family. This Research Enclave—how important is it to your Domes?

Kuarta searched her daughter’s face for a long time—looking for something she herself didn’t even understand. Perhaps she was looking for the remains of a young girl of three who had once been happy.

The question and its implications slowly sank into Kuarta’s mind. “What do you mean, how important is the Enclave?”

“If something were to happen to it, I mean. How would your Domes look upon the loss?”

Kuarta mulled the question over, then said, “You’re going to destroy it.”

“We’re tired of being studied.”

“When are you going to attack?”

“That hasn’t been decided yet.”

Kuarta leaned back in her chair. “It’ll be soon. Before I return to the Dome to warn them.”

Yallia smiled wolfishly. “Very good. When I go back to my own government, I will tell them you are warning the Dome of our actions. There will be no other choice but to attack immediately.”

“You’re using me to leverage your own government.”

“A small repayment for your actions years ago.”

The sudden return to personal attack caught Kuarta unprepared. She stood violently, the chair behind her crashing to the ground. “That’s why you’re going to kill a dozen people in the Enclave? To get back at me?”

“Don’t be melodramatic, Mother. It’s a military maneuver, nothing more.”

“Let me arrange for the Enclave personnel to leave with me, at least.”

“Why? What’s a few dead Domers?”

“I don’t believe you. You can’t be this cavalier about human life.”

Yallia snorted. “Domer life, you mean.”

“
Human
life.” Kuarta said, angrily. She was suddenly reminded of Jene and Dolen arguing a similar point twenty-four years ago.

“Domers would see a distinction.”

Kuarta did not dispute that: Yallia was right. But there were still twelve lives at stake. She took another tack. “If you kill the scientists inside the Enclave, the Domes will respond with force. Do you want that?”

Yallia looked uncertain for a half second, then her face returned to stoic resolve. She rose and said, “All right. Your Domers won’t be killed. I’d tell them to leave now, because we won’t wait. Unless they want to see our…mutations in action.” Kuarta was momentarily frozen in terror. What had her little girl become?

“I—I’ll start the evacuation,” Kuarta said, and found her arms preparing themselves for a hug. She put them back down awkwardly. Yallia watched her with scorn, then left the room swiftly, not looking back.

“You’ve got a predator eyeing us,” Khadre said to her companion, looking over his shoulder at the instrument panel.

“I know. I’m secreting countermeasures right now,” Viktur said, manipulating the controls of the biomech submersible.

Khadre watched the monitors intently, keeping close watch on the sleek, shark-like animal that had been gliding towards the sub. As she watched, the predator slowed, then veered off sharply, disappearing into the darkness.

“It worked. He’s gone,” she reported.

Viktur grunted. “How much have we got left?”

“Enough. In a few hours, we’ll be full again.” Khadre watched the display for a few seconds, noting the slow increase in countermeasure fluid as the biomech sub’s glandular system churned out more of the foul milky substance. The sub was capable of staying under for quite a long time, although many of the more mechanical systems would have to shut down and recharge periodically.

“You need to eat soon,” Khadre noted, pointing at a sector on the holographic readout.

“I know. But I’ve got a good hour left before power-down. I just want to clear this ridge first,” Viktur said, eyes locked on the drone’s forward sensor image. The visual sensor was almost useless at this depth of four kilometers—the drone’s bioluminescence provided light for only a few meters, even with the supersensitive photoelectric sensors the drone was equipped with. High frequency sonar was far more effective at this depth, but Viktur hesitated to use it. Khadre’s working theory that at least some of the marine life must use sonar to communicate kept him skittish about broadcasting inadvertent messages to the underwater population.

“Still nothing?” Khadre asked softly. Viktur didn’t answer, though from his body language she could guess the answer was “no.”

Khadre looked down at the pressure-glass bottom of the tiny research skiff. Somewhere down there was the biomech drone the two had nicknamed “Nimmo,” after a character in a book Viktur had claimed to have read. She had designed the drone with her dother Rann, an Original who had raised her as a dother despite having no genetic connection to her. Rann had been skilled in biomechanology and had trained Khadre well. “The Domers don’t go in for deep marine studies,” Rann had told her during one of their many late-night sessions in the lab. “They have only scratched the edge of the ocean so far.”

“Why not?” Khadre had asked her.

“I don’t know. Not enough people, too much cost, I suppose. Keeping those Domes functional is their main concern. That and terraforming the planet. Doesn’t leave a lot of energy or interest for the sea.”

Rann knew what she was talking about. No one was really studying the sea, at least not the deep ocean, the way Khadre and Viktur were. That was what had pushed Khadre to the water. She could be a pioneer here. Although, she had to admit, there were many days on which she wondered if the Domers weren’t right to ignore the sea. She had spent the last nine months studying various marine flora and fauna, categorizing, labeling (the novelty of naming the creatures herself had long since worn off, although her companion still delighted in the game) and otherwise classifying organism after organism, without anything truly revolutionary happening. She knew from countless discussions with the older scientists that discovery often came after years of study, not months; still, she was beginning to wonder if the sea would reveal anything of interest to those outside her field. She longed for the day when what she discovered would truly be her own.

Except, of course, for Viktur. She looked up at him and smiled. He was a good man, he just never saw further ahead than a few hours. He could solve almost any task that was set him because of his single-mindedness, but a visionary he was not. That was what had drawn Khadre to him. She planned on asking him soon for a child, hoping his practicality would balance her idealism and result in a perfect blend of genes. She was not in love with him—Viktur did not rouse passion or lust. Khadre was under no illusions as to why she was attracted to him; he would make a good father. That was more than enough for her.

The two had been working on the skiff for nine months, but had known each other for many years, having gone through upper school together. He had been impressed by her “calm fire,” as he had put it. “You always seem ready to jump for joy at some discovery,” he had said on the night he had proposed the working partnership. “I want to be there when it happens.” Khadre had kissed him then—not emotionlessly, but affectionately.

“Uh, Khad?” Viktur said suddenly in a tone of voice that brought the young scientist back to the present with jarring abruptness. “Something’s up. Take a look at that,” he said, keeping his hands steady within their direction gloves and indicating the holo in front of him with a nod of his head. Khadre looked at the holographic representation of Nimmo’s sensor image. She raised her eyebrows when she saw that Viktur had engaged the high frequency sonar for better image resolution.

“Looks like a kelp bed. So?”

“It’s a big one.”

Khadre shrugged. “We’ve seen big beds before. What’s….” She stopped and leaned in closer. “Back up. Gimme a full field view.”

Viktur adjusted a control, and the image slowly pulled back as Nimmo reversed.

The two stared at the image for a full ten seconds before Khadre said in a hushed whisper, “Could that be a natural formation?”

“You’re asking me? I’m the sub jock. You’re supposed to be the scientist.”

Khadre did not answer. What she was seeing was not possible—every instinct in her said that. But it was there. No malfunction in Nimmo’s sensors could account for what she was seeing.

Pale green strands of kelp waved gently in the current of the water, rising perhaps ten meters above the surface of the ocean floor. This, by itself, was unremarkable. The sea plants had been studied by scientists before Khadre and rapidly dismissed as simple vegetation of the deep, unworthy of serious study.

What was impossible was the neat arrangement of the kelp bed—rows upon rows of kelp in straight lines formed an almost perfect square about two hundred meters on a side, if Nimmo’s high-frequency sonar could be trusted.

“Recorders on?” Khadre asked urgently.

“Never been shut off. We’re getting all of this.”

“Swing us around. Try and get the whole bed.”

Viktur manipulated the controls, and Nimmo’s scullers propelled the drone forward. Viktur backed away from the bed formation until the whole square was visible on sonar.

“What’s that?” Khadre said, pointing to a collection of sliver-thin objects at the extreme northern edge of Nimmo’s viewfield. Viktur swung Nimmo about and closed slowly on the objects.

“Looks like a school of sea cows,” Viktur said, using the informal nomenclature he had devised for the fat, dirigible-like creatures he and Khadre saw occasionally. There were about twenty of them.

“This deep? We’ve never seen them past three hundred meters before.” Khadre stared at the slowly growing images. “Why aren’t they moving?”

As the images on Nimmo’s sensors grew larger and sharper, one of the creatures stood out as different. Khadre pointed anxiously. “There! Another predator?”

“I don’t think so,” Viktur said after a hesitation. “It’s too small. And it has…tentacles, I think. Let me get a little closer.” A few seconds later, Khadre nodded. “Yeah, those look like tentacles. I don’t believe we’ve ever seen this one before, Viktur,” she said proudly. “Another new species.” Khadre was still giddy with the anticipation of discovery. First, the strange vision of the square kelp bed, now this new species.