Spherical Harmonic

by Catherine Asaro

  Greetings, Husband.

  Greetings, Wife. I’m glad you decided to exist again.

  I smiled. I too. I lifted my arm, feeling unreal. Starlight reflected in the silver mesh that sheathed my limbs. I touched Eldrin’s cheek with a dreaming brush of my fingers.

  “Pharaoh Dyhianna.” That came from far away, blowing across an endless plain. I turned my head slowly, floating between realities. A woman stood on the other side of the chair. Jinn Opsister. Good officer, Opsister. A man hovered next to her. Bayliron. The doctor from Havyrl’s Valor. A fine doctor. I tried to speak, but the words blew away like wind.

  Bayliron paled. “Can you bring more of yourself here, Your Highness? We’re only reading about fifty percent of your body.”

  Fifty percent? How odd. If Eldrin hadn’t been here, I would have drifted back into the web. But I couldn’t; I had too many responsibilities.

  Focus.

  Coalesce.

  “My greetings,” I whispered. The words still sounded far away, out understandable now.

  “Greetings, Your Highness.” Jinn also seemed disquieted. “Our honor at your presence.”

  Another oddity Usually people only said the honor business when I first appeared somewhere. But I had been in this chamber for days according to my neural chronometer. Then again, maybe I hadn’t been here. I didn’t know exactly what happened when I dispersed into psiberspace.

  The honor is mine,” I murmured, whispers on the wind.

  “Can she be taken out of the chair?” a man asked.

  I recognized that voice. Turning my head, I perceived another blur. It stood about a meter in front of the chair, which was as close as anything could come with all the control panels in the way.

  “My greetings, Chad,” I said.

  The blur resolved into Chad Barzun. “My greetings, Pharaoh Dyhianna.”

  “Have we arrived at Earth?”

  “We’re passing the asteroid belt now, above the plane of the ecliptic.”

  My mind drifted. “How do you know we aren’t under the ecliptic?”

  He blinked. “Well, yes, it could be either. We’re ‘above’ as Earth defines its northern hemisphere.”

  “Does Earth know we’re here?”

  “Very much so. We’ve an escort. One hundred thousand Allied ships.”

  I jolted out of my dreamy contentment. End session.

  DISENGAGING, the chair thought. Its exoskeleton unfolded from my body.

  I leaned forward, pushing at panels. As the techs helped free me from the chair, I spoke to Chad. “How have the Allieds taken our appearance?”

  “Calm. But stunned.” He came around to where Eldrin stood, so I could hear him better. Their proximity created an eerie effect, a slight rippling of their bodies, as if he and Eldrin interfered like waves. Caught in my dream-like state, I felt only a mild curiosity, no alarm at all.

  “I saw the record of your communications with Yamada at Delos,” Chad said. “Imagine that reaction, multiplied many times.”

  What I remembered most was Yamada’s relief when we left. Enough of our fleet had remained to occupy Delos, though. That way, if this failed, we would still have a negotiating point, albeit a small one. But a great difference existed in our situation here, compared to Delos.

  “We’re outnumbered,” I said.

  “To some extent.” Chad paused. “The Allied fleets are stretched thin, though. They’re spread across Skolian as well as Allied space, helping clean up after the Radiance War.” His hawk-like visage blurred. “We’ve revealed a weakness in their defenses. They thought it was impossible for a fleet to come in the way we did.”

  “It is impossible,” Eldrin said.

  Impossible? And why did Eldrin sound so odd? It wasn’t hard. It was glorious.

  For you, yes. It would kill anyone else. Eldrin touched my face, tracing his fingertip from my temple to my cheek. As he lowered his arm, his finger rippled like water. It is so strange, Dehya, that you are so fragile and yet so strong at the same time.

  My lips Curved Upward. I’m a fierce one.

  Chad was watching us. I caught his wistful thought; he wondered what it was like to converse as a telepath.

  “Do you think the Allieds will attack us?” I asked him.

  Chad shook his head. “So far, they have shown no inclination to do so, but they’ve given us no response about your family, either.”

  That didn’t sound promising. “Do we have news from Prince Havyrl on Lyshriol?”

  Incongruously, Eldrin suddenly grinned. “He got married.”

  I blinked. “What?”

  “He married a young woman, an empath who has helped him heal.”

  “Heal?” I was growing confused. “From what?”

  “The nightmares,” Eldrin said. “The sensory deprivation.”

  This conversation felt oddly languid. Out of place. And where was Ragnar? It wasn’t like him to be out the loop if anything happened.

  Good gods. Why was Eldrin here? What happened to everyone’s fear that his convulsive rage would explode again, endangering my life?

  Chad vanished.

  Eldrin vanished.

  The Chair vanished.

  The chamber vanished.

  I plunged into dark mist.

  What—?

  Dehya. The thought rumbled. Come back.

  Who was that?

  Mother, go back.

  Taquinil?

  The mist cleared and the Triad Chamber reformed. The Chair had taken me back up in the dome.

  Dehya, can you hear me? Eldrin asked.

  Drrrrynnnni? My thought was muffled. Reverberating.

  Focus.

  Who the blazes had thought that?

  A comm on the Chair lit up. An annoyed voice came out of it. Mother, I’m a grown man now. I don’t need you to coddle me:

  Taquinil. Why did his thought come out of the comm? That was impossible. I don’t coddle you.

  Well, this isn’t the time to start.

  I don’t understand what you mean.

  You don’t need to stay here. I’m fine.

  Stay here?

  In psiberspace.

  I’m not in psiberspace.

  The universe rippled.

  The universe rippled.

  The universe rippled.

  Dehya, focus.

  Who are you? Psiberspace was turning into a regular Starport Central.

  No techs were bringing down the chair. No recovery team was taking me out of it. I hung here in the starlight, alone except for impossible thought-voices on the comm.

  Mist silvered the chair until I could no longer see it. A great stillness surrounded me.

  Whispers grew. Louder. Not whispers. Distant shouts. Far away. Curious, I opened my eyes, though I hadn’t realized they were closed, or even that I had eyes.

  The Triad Chair had descended to the floor again. I could see all of it below me, as if I were separated from my body. Techs swarmed over the chair, unfastening a limp form from its heart. Dr. Bayliron gently pulled robot arms away from the body. Chad Barzun and Jinn Opsister stood back while the techs and medics worked. Ragnar was striding back and forth, more agitated than I had ever seen him before.

  Interesting. That was my body.

  I concentrated, and the shouting became louder. Her heart’s stopped!

  Ragnar stopped pacing, his face contorted. Flaming hell, do something!

  Apparently I was dying.

  I preferred that didn’t happen.

  I concentrated, trying to collect back into my body.

  Vertigo hit me like a fist. Ah, no. My chest hurt, hurt, hurt—

  “Stat,” someone shouted. “Get a shocker in here!”

  Forcing my eyes open, I found myself in the chair. Techs were working all around, fast and expert as they disengaged me from the chair’s mechanical embrace. My nausea surged. So much pain. How long had I been here, my chest hurting, my body on fire?

  Pain…

  Then they had m
e out and onto an air-stretcher. With my last desperate threads of conscious thought, I wondered if we would reach the hospital before or after I died.

  27

  World of Legends

  Virtual reality had advantages. It wasn’t the same as being with a real person, but it came close. In a good system, even touch felt so authentic, you couldn’t tell the difference between that and the real thing.

  But you knew; your loved one wasn’t really there.

  So Eldrin came to visit while I was dying.

  “Dehya, you can’t do this,” he told me, sitting by my bed in a dark blue chair. “You escaped the Traders. You survived Opalite. You can’t die now.”

  Opalite wasn’t so bad. I meant to speak, but only thoughts came. This was a computer-generated simulacrum; Eldrin was actually on Havyrl’s Valor and couldn’t pick up my thoughts. It was a good sim, though. He came across as real even to me, who had been married to him for fifty-seven years.

  He leaned forward. “Damn it, Dehya, don’t you die. We haven’t finished our argument.”

  “Argument…?” I asked.

  Eldrin froze, his eyes widening. Softly he said, “Thank the saints.” He hinged his hand around mine, his touch warm. Almost real.

  Then it hit me: Why would doctors put a dying Pharaoh in a virtual sim? Ah, hell. This was another weird Kyle space creation.

  His voice caught. “Welcome back, Wife.”

  “What argument?” I asked.

  He laughed shakily. “I don’t know. We’re always having one. I figured that might stir you up.”

  Hmmm. That sounded authentic.

  A voice spoke somewhere, indistinct.

  Eldrin turned to someone I couldn’t see. “I think so.”

  “You think what?” I asked, confused.

  The room faded. Eldrin went too, which saddened me. Instead of one of those nightmare Triad Chamber scenes, though, this time a normal hospital room took shape. I was lying in bed wearing a white sim-suit that covered my body like a supple velvet skin. Dr. Bayliron leaned over me, his face concerned. Two robot medics, humanoid in shape, were checking the many monitors arrayed around my bed.

  I peered at Bayliron, wondering if this was another illusion. “Did you have me in a VR simulation?”

  “Yes. Your husband wanted to talk to you.” He spoke with a doctor’s comforting tones, but strain underlay his words. “How do you feel?”

  “A little tired.” His drawn expression puzzled me. “Doctor, did I phase out in the Triad Chair?”

  He spoke quietly. “For three days. We couldn’t see you, except a silver outline every now and then.”

  Three days? Good gods. No wonder he seemed upset. “How did you know I was still there?”

  He set his hands on the rail that kept me from rolling out of bed. “The communications in the fleet continued to work, with all the new psiberspace links. And the chair sensors registered your presence.”

  “Couldn’t you pull me out?”

  He shook his head. “We might have disrupted your state and lost you for good.”

  So strange. What had the chair been doing? Its intelligence was so different, it was hard to fathom even when I was joined with its mind.

  I pulled myself up into a sitting position. “I need to check the Chair’s records.”

  He lifted his hand as if he meant to lay it on my shoulder, stopping me. Then he paused. People never touched me unless absolutely necessary. Otherwise, my bodyguards became upset, both the human and mechanical ones.

  He sighed, lowering his arm. “Your Highness, you must rest.”

  “I’ve been nonexistent for three days,” I grumbled. “I need exercise.”

  He gave a soft laugh. “Perhaps so. But humor me.”

  I bestowed him with my curmudgeon look. “Oh, all right.”

  “The techs tried to download the Chair’s records. But it won’t cooperate.”

  I stretched my arms, assuring myself I really was solid. “Cooperation is a human attribute. Triad Chairs don’t have those.”

  He regarded me uneasily. “Do you think the Chair caused your problems?”

  “Not with intention.” I searched for words to describe what I only understood on a subconscious, instinctual level. “The Chair is alive, but it isn’t even remotely human. It coexists with us when we work in it. If we have a full Triad, that stabilizes the interaction. But with just me, it’s less—” I hesitated to say less stable. Instability was a human concept defined by what made humans comfortable. “It’s less attuned to its human partners. So it is less likely to interact in ways we understand.”

  His forehead furrowed. “Isn’t Web Key Eldrinson also in the Triad?”

  My mood dimmed, like the shadow cast on the sun by the moon during an eclipse. If Eldrinson had truly died, the Allieds had probably told his family and ISC Headquarters by now. We may have heard nothing simply because we were cut off from them. But if the family wanted to make it public, I suspected we would have at least picked up rumors. Or perhaps he still lived, saints willing. Neither Eldrin nor I wanted to start another wave of grief among our people until we knew the full situation.

  All I said was, “The Triad has two people, I’m fairly certain. But we haven’t been working with the Chairs for some time now. The longer we go without interaction, the less attuned to us they become.” Sorrow tinged my thoughts. We needed the anchor of the late Imperator, Kurj, with his massive, muscular mind. To say the Chairs had mourned his death these past few years would be giving them human traits they didn’t possess. But in their own way, they experienced his loss.

  The hum of an opening hatchway came from across the room, followed by the quiet tread of booted feet. Then Chad appeared at Bayliron’s elbow. “Pharaoh Dyhianna. It is good to see you.” Although he appeared unruffled, the relief in his mind was sharp and vivid.

  “My greetings, Admiral.” The EI for this room had probably notified him when I regained consciousness. “I’m glad to be back.”

  His rugged face gentled. “Your husband sends his greetings.”

  The memory of Eldrin’s touch warmed me. “Was that really him in the VR sim?”

  “Very much so,” Bayliron said. “He was with you, in VR, the entire time you were unconscious. About four hours.”

  Eldrin, you thaw my life. I thought. I couldn’t speak such personal sentiment here, though. Instead I asked, “So we’ve been in the solar system four hours?”

  “About,” Chad said.

  Odd. That was when the chair was supposed to have released me. I thought back to my strange “dialogue” with it, which had consisted of it submerging me in illusions. “Did you only manage about a fifty percent recovery when you tried to bring me out of the chair at the appointed time?”

  Chad started. “Yes. How did you know?”

  “You told me.”

  He paused, and I could tell he didn’t want to contradict me. Finally he said, “We didn’t speak, Your Highness. You weren’t even solid.”

  Well, being translucent did put a damper on conversation. I remembered so much, though. “You said we were passing the asteroid belt. You also said we had an escort of about one hundred thousand Allied ships, but that the Allied fleet was stretched thin.”

  “It’s all true.” He pushed his hand over the iron-gray stubble of his hair. “But I didn’t tell you.”

  I considered. “I think our ‘conversation’ was the Triad Chair’s way of letting me know the situation.” I thought back over the experience. “Eldrin was there, too.”

  “He never left Havyrl’s Valor” Chad said “He is still on channel two, though. Shall I put him through?”

  My mood picked up. “Yes. I would like that.”

  Chad touched a button on the rail of my bed, and it morphed into a comm mesh. Then he said, “Prince Eldrin, your wife is on two.”

  “Thank you, Admiral.” Although Eldrin spoke with the formality he used around people we didn’t know well, I heard his relief. His voice brightened
the hospital room, at least to me.

  “Greetings, Husband,” I said.

  “I’m glad you’re back, Dehya.”

  I grinned. “It was that handsome face of yours. It revived me.”

  Amusement lightened his voice. “You sound a lot better now.”

  “I am.” I thought back to my “conversation” with him. “Dryni, did Vyrl recently marry a young woman? An empath?”

  “Actually, yes. How did you know? I just heard.”

  “I had an episode in the Triad Chair when I thought you and I were talking. You said his marriage helped him heal from nightmares. From sensory deprivation. It sounded like your nightmare.”

  “But I dreamed I was my father. Not Vyrl.”

  “It must be connected.” I pushed down the rail of my bed and swung my legs over the edge.

  Bayliron moved to block my departure. “Your Highness,” he said, using the overly respectful tone people invoked whenever they were about to say something they knew I didn’t want to hear. “You must stay in bed.”

  “I’m fine.” I tried to push him aside. He was a lot bigger, which made him rather akin to a rock. “Please remove yourself.”

  “I can’t do that, ma’am.”

  “Doctor Bayliron.” I pulled myself up as tall as possible, which meant the top of my head came to his shoulder. Looking up, I said, “I don’t have time to be sick.”

  He sighed. “Your Highness, if I give you clearance to get up, you must stop pushing yourself so hard. One of these days you will collapse.”

  I sensed his resistance weakening. “I’ll be careful.”

  He gave me a doubtful look, but he did move aside and let me slide off the bed. The white Luminex floor felt cool and smooth under my bare feet.

  After various formalities, Bayliron took his leave with the robot medics. The gold one paused at the door and pulled out a soft-chair with laundered clothes on it. I recognized the blue jumpsuit I had worn in the Triad Chair.

  I sent a wireless message to the robot’s El brain: Thank you.

  You are welcome, Your Highness. Its tone felt metallic.

  Chad was watching me. “Your bodyguards are outside. I’ll be on the bridge. When you’re ready, they can bring you up.”