by Timothy Zahn
“Yeah, but she can still read your mind.”
“She read my min’, she’s gonna see a whole heap o’ ugly,” Rylan retorted, his eyes still hard on Tanya. “You readin’ me, curve?”
“It doesn’t take a ghost to know you’re all here because you’re mourning Chau Sara,” Tanya said, fighting against the red haze of anger that had suddenly formed across her eyes. Curve? Curve? How dare these idiot hard-shells talk to her that way? How dare they blame her or Ulavu for something that had happened over a decade ago, especially something neither of them had been involved with?
“Like wha’ you care about Chau Sara?” Rylan bit out. “Y’ugly pal burned it. He burned it.”
The red haze in front of Tanya’s eyes took on the appearance of tongues of fire. You want to see something burn? she thought viciously toward him. How about you? You want to see you burn?
Because she could do it. She could set him on fire where he stood, turn him into a blazing torch of screaming stupid. They wanted to wallow in bitterness here in this useless retrograde bar? Fine. This idiot could be part of it. Show them what the destruction of Chau Sara had really been like.
For that matter, why stop with him? There were a whole bunch of people here who had nothing to do but pick at the scabs of past memories. Maybe a little real danger and pain would snap them back to the real world, a world that the ghosts and the rest of the Dominion forces—and yes, the protoss, too—had fought and bled and died for to make everyone safer.
Tanya Caulfield. Ulavu’s voice came into her mind, flowing over her fury like cool water. Calmness.
For some ghosts, Tanya knew, a cautioning word from a friend or colleague was like throwing a cutoff switch. For her, it was never like that. But even with her self-control wavering, she could recognize Ulavu’s logic. More than that, she was freshly aware that someone whose judgment she valued was watching.
Taking a deep breath, she pressed a finger against the side of her head, a little bit of mental encouragement for the implant that was even now feverishly sifting out various brain chemicals from her bloodstream and rerouting neural flow patterns.
And then, to her relief, the haze faded away. She had control back and could once again think straight.
She looked around the crowd, no longer seeing them as potential targets for her power but as simple, ordinary people. Time to put frustration aside and start thinking tactically.
All right. Rylan was clearly the leader here. If she could talk him down, she should be able to defuse the situation.
If she couldn’t talk him down, she would have to break him.
Tanya? Ulavu spoke again into her mind.
I’m all right, she assured him. Trust me. “Even those who didn’t have loved ones on Chau Sara felt the shock and horror of that day,” she said, a shiver running up her back.
“Easy t’ say,” Rylan said contemptuously.
“Easy to feel,” Tanya bit back. “I’ve been there. I’ve seen the devastation. Cities reduced to ash. Mountains shattered. Lakes and rivers vaporized and their beds broken and half melted. Plains turned to glass. Even after all these years, the only life that’s started to come back are a few lichens and some bits of moss.”
“Yeah, I’ve seen it, too,” Rylan said, his voice low, his gaze lowered to the floor.
Then, abruptly, his eyes came up and his finger jabbed accusingly toward Ulavu. “And it was his people who did it.”
Tanya sighed. So much for talking him down. “His people did, yes,” she said, searching her peripheral vision for inspiration. The psionic booster hanging at Ulavu’s waist was heavy enough to throw, but delicate enough—and expensive enough—to be strictly a last-ditch weapon. There were no liquor bottles within easy reach, and even if there were, she didn’t want to seriously harm anyone. At least, not anymore.
On the bar beside Ulavu was a glass stein half full of beer. It wasn’t much, but it would have to do.
Slowly, casually, she drifted across the circle toward Ulavu and the stein. “But it was the protoss leadership who made that decision, and other protoss who carried it out. Ulavu wasn’t part of either group. You’re right—their response to the zerg infestation was absolutely inexcusable. But we’ve paid them back,” she added, again sweeping her gaze around the crowd as she came to Ulavu’s side. “Trust me—we’ve paid them back in full.” She raised her hand toward Ulavu in emphasis. “And as I said, Ulavu wasn’t even there. You’re surely not going to hurt an innocent protoss for the crimes of his—”
“Inn’cent?” Rylan cut in. “Who th’ hell says any o’ th’ damn fish-faces are inn’cent?” His hands, which had been opening and closing restlessly at his sides, abruptly bunched into fists. His center of mass leaned forward, one foot starting into a stride toward the hated alien standing in front of him—
Tanya grabbed the stein and hurled the contents straight at Rylan’s face.
She had maybe a quarter second to make this work. But she’d already run the numbers and knew what she needed to do. The flash point of ethyl alcohol in this concentration should be around fifty degrees, while the temperature at which human flesh started to register first-degree burns was about forty-four. An uncomfortably narrow target zone, but she’d trained long and hard to fine-tune her pyrokinesis to that kind of precision. She flash-heated the beer in midflight, watched Rylan’s eyes widen in disbelief as it splashed into his face—
An instant later the surprise turned to shock as the scalding liquid punched a faceful of pain straight through his liquor-soaked nerves.
He roared in agony, his bunched fists changing to flat palms slapped over his eyes, that first forward step collapsing into an off-balance stumble backward. Confused, disoriented, and hurting, Rylan—along with his big, bad, brave attack against the hated symbol of the whole protoss race—had screeched to a halt.
And everyone in Dante’s knew it. In that same stunned pair of seconds, the mood of the crowd shifted as their chosen hero faltered.
Tanya gave it another second to sink in. Then she took Ulavu’s arm and again sent her gaze across the crowd, pausing to catch the eyes of the biggest men in sight. A couple of them held her gaze, but most of them quickly looked away. Rylan was clearly a bigger force here than even she had realized. “I don’t think Rylan’s up to a fight tonight,” she said calmly. “So we’ll be leaving now.” She hesitated. “And please believe me that we’re as sorry about Chau Sara as you are.”
No one disputed the point. No one said anything at all. With Ulavu in tow, she walked boldly toward the crowd. This time all three rings opened for her without resistance.
A minute later they were out in the chilly night air.
There was no great need for you to come to my aid, Tanya Caulfield. Ulavu’s thought came as she steered him toward her borrowed hoverbike. That terran would not have caused me harm.
You sure about that? she countered sourly. Because it damn well looked like he was getting ready to cause you harm.
For a moment Ulavu seemed to ponder that, his thoughts swirling by too rapidly for Tanya to keep up with. You used your gift in a public forum, he said at last. Will your superiors not be unhappy with you?
Tanya winced. Yes, they would definitely be unhappy. She was the ghost program’s secret weapon, and they’d gone to incredible lengths to keep her power under wraps. They’d be well past unhappy, more into furious territory.
But only if they knew.
I’m hoping they don’t find out, she said. All anyone in the bar saw was me throwing beer into a man’s face. They’ll think his reaction was just from getting alcohol in his eyes.
There will be no burns?
Nothing obvious. I kept the heat below the flash point, and it wasn’t in contact long enough for any serious reddening. A little, maybe, but nothing too visible.
Again, Ulavu pondered. But the terran himself will know.
The terran himself was roaring drunk, Tanya reminded him. I’m guessing the memories will be so hazy th
at he won’t remember exactly what stopped him.
You are guessing? Or you are hoping?
A little of both, Tanya conceded. She fixed him with a stern gaze. Let’s talk about you, now. What were you doing in there?
I am a researcher, he said, his mental tone going full-bore protoss pride. I wished to see and understand the sense of those who had lost companions and family to protoss errors.
Tanya grimaced. Protoss errors. Did they still think of the destruction of an entire planet full of innocent terrans as simply an error?
The anger was starting to flow again. Sternly, she forced it back. And do you understand?
He gave the mental equivalent of a sigh. There remains much pain. Much anger.
And none of us blames them a bit for that, Tanya said pointedly. So do not try something like that again. You hear me? Because the next time, I might just let them show you what terran pain and anger look like.
There is no need for that, Ulavu said, a grim edge to his mental voice. As you said, we were paid back in full.
Tanya nodded silently. The war had indeed exacted a terrible toll on the protoss. Many of them had fallen in battle. Their homeworld of Aiur had been devastated and abandoned. Their society had been ripped apart, some of the factions eventually coming back together, others turning away from the rest of their people.
And worst of all, the Khala, the mystic psionic connection that had bound the protoss in thought and purpose for centuries, had been destroyed. Years after that cataclysm, they were still struggling with what it now meant to be protoss.
Was that desperate cultural struggle the reason Ulavu had been abandoned by his people? Was their attention so turned inward that they had no energy to spend in bringing him back and integrating him into their slowly redeveloping society?
Or was it something darker? Had he done something specific that had turned them against him?
Because sometimes making enemies was easy to do. Sometimes it was painfully easy to do.
She closed her eyes briefly, the emotional scab momentarily peeling back. She hadn’t meant to lose control that day four years ago. Hadn’t meant to offend or anger the rest of the ghosts by ignoring their efforts to calm her down.
It had been Ulavu who’d gotten through to her, who’d snapped the spiral of anger and chaos long enough for her implant to get the upper hand. The incident had resolved, and everyone had escaped unscathed. Even the ghost who’d started it, who Tanya still believed richly deserved all the scathing anyone could give him.
But the resolution had come at a cost. The failure of the other ghosts to calm her had been bad enough, but the fact that an alien had succeeded had ultimately created a barrier of resentment that Tanya had never been able to penetrate or tear down. Ever since then, it had been her and Ulavu against the world. She still lived and worked among the ghosts, but she would never again truly be one of them.
And very soon, they wouldn’t have even that much of her.
She sat down on the hoverbike’s saddle, conscious of the frustration hovering just beyond the wall of self-control. Hopefully a stronger wall than had once been there.
The big question now was what would happen to that self-control when she left the program.
Under Emperor Arcturus such a thing would have been unthinkable. Ghosts were ghosts, and they were in the program until they died. Period.
But Emperor Valerian was a new kind of leader. He’d cut way back on the brain-panning for marines—some said he’d stopped it entirely, but no one really believed that—and he’d also decided that ghosts who wanted to leave the program could do so.
As far as Tanya knew, she was going to be the first to take advantage of that option. And it raised a whole new list of questions.
Would they leave the implant in place? Surely they wouldn’t just take it out. Maybe they would give her a new one, something designed to let her live as a civilian without turning irritating people into Roman candles everywhere she went.
Surely they wouldn’t take it out. Would they?
Rylan still concerns me, Ulavu said, his tone going thoughtful.
I already told you not to worry about him, Tanya said.
I am not worried, Ulavu assured her. Merely curious. How did he know you were a ghost?
Tanya frowned. In the heat of the moment, the oddness of that identification had breezed right past her.
But Ulavu was right. How had Rylan known? She hadn’t identified herself, and she was wearing civilian clothing. No idea, she admitted. Maybe someone from the barracks hangs out at Dante’s Circle and talks about a protoss in the ghost program.
Perhaps, Ulavu said. That would not be a good thing.
Tanya snorted. You think?
I do, Ulavu said seriously, apparently missing the sarcasm in her tone. But since you speak of the barracks, should we not return there?
Abruptly, Tanya realized she was sitting on the hoverbike, staring out at the city, while Ulavu waited patiently. Absolutely, she agreed, gesturing to the passenger seat. Come on—I’ll give you a ride. Try not to be conspicuous.
He drew himself up to his full height. Try not to be conspicuous?
Tanya sighed. A conspicuous protoss. An equally conspicuous pyrokinetic. Both of them rejected by their people. They really did deserve each other. Okay, forget inconspicuous, she said. Just try not to fall off.
“I understand the Dominion’s concerns, Emperor Valerian,” Envoy Louise DuPre said, her pleasant alto voice in sharp contrast with the flinty look in her eyes. “But you must also understand ours. The Umojan Protectorate suffered greatly under your father’s territorial ambitions. We’re not really interested in giving you the foothold he was never able to extort from us.”
Emperor Valerian Mengsk suppressed a sigh. He’d hoped that his six years of more enlightened rule would have at least diminished the long shadow of his father’s brutal methods. Apparently, it hadn’t. “I understand your concerns as well,” he told DuPre, keeping his own voice as calm as hers. The slightest hint of aggression, or even mild irritation, and she would instantly label him as Arcturus Mengsk the Second, and any hope of putting a rapid-response base in the Umoja system would be gone.
But there was an even more pressing problem. Several Dominion planets had suffered massive destruction of their fields and croplands during the war, and were still having trouble recovering. The sheer cost of transporting food and other necessities to those worlds was straining Valerian’s resources to the limit, and another war could push the whole Dominion over the edge into famine. The Umojan Protectorate’s advanced biotech could go a long way toward helping move them away from that line.
Unfortunately, about the only thing the Dominion had to offer in exchange was protection from a resurgence of the zerg, and the Protectorate wasn’t interested.
“Please be assured that my only intention is to guard the Protectorate and the Dominion’s southern flank against attack. The last thing you want is an infestation taking root before we can get a counterstrike force in place.”
“I think we’d be able to handle an infestation without your help,” DuPre said.
“Really?” Valerian asked. “Because if you’re counting on protoss assistance, I strongly suggest you don’t. Hierarch Artanis has enough trouble of his own without borrowing any from the Protectorate.”
DuPre smiled thinly. But something in her eyes told Valerian that this was exactly what she and the Protectorate were counting on. “And you know this from your vast experience with protoss?”
“I know this from my ability to read the undercurrents of culture, society, and politics,” Valerian said. “It’s painfully clear that they didn’t come out of the war in any better shape than the rest of us did.”
“Perhaps,” DuPre said. “May I speak bluntly?”
Valerian gestured to her. “Please.”
“The zerg are a potential threat,” she said. “The Dominion is a definite threat. Perhaps not as great as when Arcturus Mengsk was
emperor,” she continued quickly before Valerian could respond. “But whether or not you yourself have territorial ambitions, the fact remains that many in your government still want to see the Umojan Protectorate as part of the Dominion.”
“I don’t know if I’d categorize it as many,” Valerian said. “And rest assured that we’re weeding them out of sensitive positions as quickly as we can find suitable replacements.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” DuPre said. “When you’ve succeeded in that effort, and perhaps offered further proof of the Dominion’s commitment to its current borders, we’ll be happy to speak again.”
A muted light glowed on the throne’s small armrest status board. Scowling, Valerian looked at the display. He’d given strict instructions that this meeting wasn’t to be interrupted for anything less than the end of the world…
Single leviathan, repeat, single leviathan has entered the system. Appears to be on course for Korhal IV.
Valerian felt a muscle in his cheek twitch. Leviathans were the zerg transport of choice, massive spacefaring creatures that the Swarm had infested and subsequently transformed into armored carriers capable of both interplanetary travel and ground-to-orbit flight. Their huge interior chambers could house tens of thousands of combat-ready zerg.
And despite the emphasized words in the brief alert, in Valerian’s experience leviathans never traveled alone. Never.
DuPre was still listing the conditions Valerian needed to meet before the Umojan Protectorate would be willing to sit down at the negotiating table. “Excuse me, Envoy DuPre,” Valerian interrupted. “A situation has arisen, and I must leave.” He stood up, locking his eyes onto hers. “A leviathan has just appeared in the Korhal system, heading this way.”
He had the minor satisfaction of watching her face go pale. “The zerg?”
“I don’t know anyone else in the Koprulu sector who uses leviathans,” he said. “I’ll leave orders to have your ship prepped immediately, assuming you wish to leave.”
“I do,” she said, her words coming out mechanically.
“I don’t blame you.” Valerian raised his eyebrows. “And when you get back to Umoja, perhaps you and the Ruling Council will want to revise your threat assessments. The ones where the zerg are only a potential threat.”