by Timothy Zahn
“Hello?” a tentative voice came.
Tanya turned to find Whist standing in the hatchway, his eyes flicking back and forth between her and Ulavu. “Yes?” she said.
“Erin said you were acting a little twitchy,” he said, taking a careful step inside. “I thought as long as I was up I’d check on Ulavu’s injuries, too.”
I am healing, Ulavu assured him.
“Good.” Whist cocked an eyebrow at Tanya. “How about you?”
“I’m fine,” Tanya said. A lie, of course, but not as much of one as she’d expected. Ulavu’s betrayal still hurt terribly, but at least they’d started talking again. “I’m glad you’re here, though. We were just about to tackle a serious question.”
“Which is…?”
“Why Erin is still alive.”
“Okay, that’s not the question I was expecting,” Whist said. “You want to elaborate?”
Tanya waved at his armor. “The psyolisks got within a hair of taking you out, right?”
“More than once.” Whist shrugged. “You get used to it.”
“They nearly took out Dizz, too. And, I find out now,” she added, feeling a twinge of guilt, “they took a solid crack at Ulavu, as well. So how did Erin get out without a scratch?”
Whist opened his mouth…closed it again. “Well…Ulavu was right there. I assume you were protecting her, right?”
To the best of my ability. Ulavu gestured at his bandages. But my ability in that battle was sorely diminished.
“Exactly my point,” Tanya said. “Erin had a gauss rifle and was doing a fair amount of damage with it. But with Ulavu running at only half speed behind her, they must have had several opportunities to take her down.”
“But they didn’t,” Whist said slowly. “In fact, it looks like they didn’t even try. So why not?”
They wanted her to survive the battle, Ulavu said. To return to Korhal IV.
“But why?” Tanya persisted. “They didn’t care about the rest of us. Why her?”
Perhaps she has been infested, Ulavu suggested grimly. She lay on the open ground several times, some of those times with her helmet off. Could spores have infested her?
“Not likely,” Whist said, stroking his lower lip. “Infestations aren’t that fast or quite that easy. And she’d certainly be put through the full grid of tests and micro-scans before they let her anywhere near Korhal again. Could it be something to do with her job? She’s the only xenobiologist among us.”
“Wouldn’t that make her the first one they’d want to kill?” Tanya countered. “If Zagara’s hiding something, Erin’s the one who would spot it first.”
“Unless they’re not hiding something and want her alive to confirm that.” Whist snorted. “But in that case, why try to kill any of us?”
“Exactly,” Tanya said. “We’re getting played here, and we need to figure out what the game is.”
“Yeah.” Whist gestured. “Come on.”
Where are we going? Ulavu asked.
“We’re grabbing Erin and heading to the cockpit,” Whist said. “If we’re going to have a skull session, we might as well gather all the skulls we have.”
—
“There goes another one, Emperor,” the tactical officer said tautly. “It’s angling in…veering off now.”
With a conscious effort, Valerian unclenched his teeth. That was the fourth devourer to fly near the survey team’s dropship in the past two hours.
Fortunately, it was also the fourth devourer to ignore them. “You’re sure it didn’t get any acid on them?” he asked.
“It never got within range, Emperor,” the officer assured him.
“I guess those psi blocks are still working,” Matt said, coming up behind Valerian. “Handy gadgets. We may need to make them standard issue.”
“Assuming no one ever wants to talk to anyone,” Valerian pointed out sourly. “Which could be very handy right now.”
“Yes,” Matt agreed. “Ironic that we can tell when it’s safe for them to shut the blocks off, but we can’t tell them unless they shut the blocks off.”
Valerian glanced at the chrono. And it would be another forty minutes before the next of the on-the-hour communications Matt had set up with Halkman’s team. Until that time, Halkman’s psi blocks would stay up.
And maybe they’d stay up for a long time after that, too. The number of flying zerg that had approached the dropship had gone up dramatically in the past couple of hours. Halkman would hardly shut off the blocks, even on schedule, if there was a mutalisk paralleling him at the time.
For that matter, even without a visual he was taking a risk every time he shut them off. No one knew how flying zerg hunted or what their internal sensory range was, which meant there was no way for Halkman to truly know how far away was safe enough.
Which, boiled down to its essence, meant there was a good chance the survey team would remain incommunicado until it arrived at Focal Point Three.
“At least they got the transcription and Cruikshank’s battle report,” Valerian said. “They’ve got all the information we do.”
“Except for the tiny little fact that the protoss are gearing up to incinerate the planet,” Matt murmured.
Valerian grimaced. And the even more ominous fact that the Dominion fleet was preparing to join in that attack.
One of the most terrible duties of a commander was the job of choosing which soldiers or units to send to certain death. As emperor, Valerian held a similar responsibility.
He’d long since accepted that burden. But he would never, ever get used to it.
Matt took a step closer to him. “I just came over to inform you, Your Excellency, that the Yamato cannon ramp-up is proceeding as scheduled. It should be ready by the time the survey team reaches Point Three.”
So he was still pushing the whole Emperor Arcturus the Second thing? Fine. At this point all Valerian could do was ignore it. “Thank you, Admiral,” he said. “What’s the status of the evac team?”
“They’ll be ready before the Yamato cannon is,” Matt said. “Also, the psi emitter is ready. If you still want to use it.”
Valerian eyed him. “You don’t think we should?”
“There are some definite risks involved,” Matt said. “The techs say it should have a range of fifty klicks, so if we put it that distance from Point Three, it should draw all the zerg away.”
“But?” Valerian prompted.
“But we don’t know it’ll only project to fifty klicks,” Matt said. “If the range is longer, it could draw one batch of zerg straight to Point Three even while it’s drawing another batch away. Furthermore, we’ve never used one on a zerg-owned planet before. There may be side effects we won’t know about until we try it.”
“Understood,” Valerian said. “But the alternative is to leave the survey team on its own or to send down Cruikshank and another set of troops. We already saw how well that worked.”
“Yes, we did,” Matt conceded. “So we deploy the emitter?”
“Yes,” Valerian said. “There’s a good spot northeast of Point Three, at right angles to the dropship’s current vector.”
“I’ll give the orders,” Matt said. Pulling out his comm, he strode away.
“Two mutalisks on scope, Emperor,” the tactical officer put in. “Angling across the vector. Projection is they’ll miss the dropship by about half a klick.” He looked up at Valerian. “It’ll work, sir,” he added quietly. “I’ve seen emitters in action. It’ll work.”
“Thank you, Commander,” Valerian said. “I hope you’re right.” He nodded toward the displays. “In the meantime, keep an eye on those mutalisks. A very close eye.”
—
The group standing in the cockpit’s hatchway remained silent as Erin read the transcript of Valerian’s conversation with Zagara, followed by Cruikshank’s report of the action at Focal Point Two. Whist, who’d made sure to grab the copilot seat when they first entered, listened with half his attention while he pe
ered through the canopy with the other half. The landscape below looked peaceful enough, but he didn’t trust it for a minute.
He didn’t trust the sky, either. Twice during Erin’s recital Dizz tapped his arm and pointed at a devourer or a group of mutalisks off toward the horizon.
Fortunately, none of the creatures approached the dropship, and they were usually visible for only a minute or two before they headed off on other business. But the whole thing left Whist with an acid taste in his mouth and a twisted knot in his gut. There was no way to know whether any of those encounters were coincidental or the result of someone keeping an eye on them. Either way, being caught in midair was not the kind of situation he wanted to find himself in.
“Okay, so that’s everything we’ve got,” he said when Erin had finished. “The question—the same one we’ve had from the start—is what the hell is going on. Starting with what the psyolisks are and what the things in the pods are.”
“It seems obvious that the psyolisks are there to guard the pods,” Dizz said. “It also strikes me that they’re pretty damn rotten at their jobs.”
“I beg to differ,” Tanya countered. “They nearly took us down and did a number on the protoss and Cruikshank’s force.”
“While still losing all the pods both times,” Dizz said. “I’m not saying they’re not seriously nasty. I’m saying that as bodyguards, they’re running zero-for-two.”
“I’m still stuck on whether they’re the same species,” Whist said. “And I want to know what happened to the ones in the empty pods. Or if the pods were always empty,” he added, to forestall Erin’s inevitable objection, “why they were in the cavern in the first place.”
Zagara stated that all the xel’naga essence had been used, Ulavu pointed out. Perhaps the extra pods were meant for additional adostra they were unable to create.
“Because they ran out of essence first?” Whist pursed his lips. “Seems like poor planning, but I guess it’s possible.”
“There’s still Erin’s question about the psyolisks,” Tanya said. “If they’re a matured form of adostra, and the adostra are from some non-zerg species plus xel’naga essence—”
“Hold it,” Dizz interrupted. “Check this out.” He nodded at the canopy.
Whist frowned. Half a dozen flying zerg were cutting across their path straight ahead, heading northeast. “Yeah, they’re flying. So?”
“Right, they’re flying,” Dizz said. “They’re flying northeast.”
“Again, so?”
“So every zerg I’ve seen flying for the past hour and a half has been heading that direction,” Dizz said. “You think there’s a sale on premium creep or something over there?”
“These zerg don’t eat creep,” Erin said. “The plants exude nutrients—”
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” Dizz said. “Whist? What do you think?”
“I don’t know,” Whist said, frowning at the zerg flapping their way across the dropship’s path. “An hour and a half, you say?”
“That’s when I first noticed it,” Dizz said. “It could have been going on longer.”
“And always northeast?”
“Always northeast.”
“What in the Dominion could they be running from?” Erin murmured. “The psyolisks? Something else over there?”
Whist hissed through his teeth as it hit him. “Oh, hell,” he muttered. “They’re not running from, Erin. They’re running to.”
“To—?” Dizz looked over at Whist, and Whist saw the sudden dawning of the light. “Oh, no. They can’t be serious.”
“What is it?” Erin asked. “What’s going on?”
“I think Cruikshank’s landed a psi emitter,” Whist told her. “How wonderfully stupid of him.”
But those devices are not safe, Ulavu protested.
“Yeah, no kidding,” Whist bit out. “When did safety matter to the top brass?”
“Or common sense,” Dizz added.
“Okay, now you’re scaring me,” Erin said. “What’s the problem? I thought they were used on the battlefield all the time.”
“They were,” Whist said. “And the brass loved ’em, because they were terrific at drawing zerg away from civilian areas.”
“They were also hell in a boxcar for those of us in the field,” Dizz said. “Not only do they concentrate the enemy into a massive wall of teeth and claws, but they also erase the last bit of battle caution in those tiny little zerg brains.”
“I didn’t think zerg had any battle caution,” Tanya said.
It is not so much caution as positional awareness, Ulavu said. During normal combat zerg do not wish to run into one another, so they space themselves out somewhat. A psi emitter suppresses that awareness.
“The professor’s got it,” Dizz confirmed. “And whatever we might have gained by letting them run all over one another wasn’t worth it. Trust me.”
“Yeah.” Whist raised his eyebrows at Ulavu. He’d made the protoss a conditional promise, but if they were going into combat again, everyone needed to be on the same page. “Speaking of professors and all, Ulavu has something he needs to tell everyone.”
“He does?” Erin asked, turning toward him.
I do, Ulavu admitted. You have known me as a researcher. I am something more. He drew himself up to his full height. I am a warrior. To be specific, I am a Nerazim, a dark templar.
For a moment no one spoke. Whist threw a surreptitious glance at each of them in turn, trying to read their reactions. Erin was dumbfounded, with a growing tinge of awe and fear. Dizz had the look of a man who’d already had suspicions and was merely having those suspicions confirmed. Tanya was nursing a quiet pain, but not a fresh one. Apparently, Ulavu had already confessed his secret to her.
Whist let the silence stretch out, wondering who would break it first. Predictably, it was Dizz. “Okay,” he said briskly. “I wondered how you and Erin survived back there. I knew I hadn’t shot those psyolisks off you and it would have taken some really fancy over-the-shoulder work for Whist to have done it. Welcome aboard. Next time it’ll be your turn to take point.”
Tanya cleared her throat. “Actually, we haven’t solved the question of how Erin survived. That’s one of the things—”
And without warning, the dropship slammed to a near-halt and twisted halfway up onto its right side.
Whist grabbed his armrests, dimly aware that the three standing behind him were scrambling for whatever handholds they could get as they were thrown off-balance. “Dizz?” he snapped.
“Damn,” Dizz breathed, sounding almost more awed than alarmed. “We’ve been grabbed.”
“We’ve what?”
“We’ve got eight mutalisks hanging from the hull,” Dizz said tightly. “Make that ten. And—damn it all—two more have just jammed themselves into the main thrusters.”
“They’re bringing us down?” Erin asked, her voice trembling.
“Worse.” Dizz pointed at the canopy as the horizon skated sideways. “They’re taking us where all the rest of the damn zerg are going.
“They’re taking us to the psi emitter.”
“Damn it all,” Matt was snarling toward the sensor station’s intercom as Valerian hurried across the bridge toward him. “What the hell is the holdup with those Wraiths?”
“What’s happened?” Valerian asked as he reached Matt’s side.
“A swarm of mutalisks has hijacked the dropship,” the admiral said tartly. “Hangar Control, I asked you a question.”
Valerian felt his throat tighten as he found the proper display on the wraparound. He’d assumed Matt’s explanation had been some sort of strange metaphor.
It wasn’t. A group of mutalisks had literally grabbed the survey team’s dropship and hauled it off-course. They appeared to be taking it—
He swallowed a curse. Of course. They were taking it to the psi emitter. Where every other zerg within a fifty-klick radius was also gathering.
“There’s a glitch in the docking-bay hatch,”
Matt gritted out. “They can’t get anything out.”
“What about the Wraith squadrons on patrol?”
“They’re all out of position,” Matt said. “Either too far out or on the far side of the planet. They can’t get to the dropship fast enough.”
“Any idea how or why this happened?”
Matt shook his head. “Best guess is that it has something to do with either the emitter or whoever’s running the psyolisks. Or both.”
And there was only one of those factors that the Dominion had any control over. “Bluff stated; bluff called,” Valerian said sourly. “Fine. Shut down the emitter.”
“See, that’s the problem,” Matt growled. “We can’t.”
“You can’t?”
“Because we didn’t want the zerg to be able to shut it down, either,” Matt said. “So it’s locked down solid. And just for good measure, the techs also encased it in a standard field bunker before dropping it.” He hissed between his teeth. “Seemed like a good idea at the time.”
“I’m sure it did.” Valerian stared at the display. In that case, there was only one option left. “What’s the smallest nuke we can deliver from orbit?”
Matt’s eyes widened. “You want to nuke the planet?”
“Just that one small section of it,” Valerian assured him. He turned and caught the comm officer’s eye. “Inform Hierarch Artanis that we’re going to launch a nuke,” he ordered. “One only, and as part of a rescue mission. It is not to be seen as the opening of full-scale operations against the planet. Make sure he understands that.”
“Yes, Emperor,” the officer said, clearly caught off-guard but taking the order in stride.
“Then contact Overqueen Zagara,” Valerian added. “Give her the same message, and tell her I’ll speak directly to her in a few minutes.”
“Yes, Emperor.”
He turned back to Matt. “Admiral?”
“We’ve got a ten-kiloton tactical weapon,” Matt said. “Usually ground-based or ship-to-ship, but it should survive entry.”
Valerian ran a quick calculation in his head. Assuming they could get it to the target fast enough, the dropship should still be out of range of even the peripheral wind blast. “Get it ready,” he said. “Launch on my command.”