He tried not to think about spiders. Or mutated bodies. Or the sickening feeling of being shoved through a non-existent wall. The thrum of the ship against his back was soothing, hypnotic, and he tried to focus on that. How many hours had he been awake, anyway? He didn’t want to call up his chrono to find out. He looked over at the nav screen and saw the outer ring passing by in all its ravaged glory, along with a few bots that perked up as they flew by. But they kept to their perches. Thank God. Thank God. Shenshido was growing smaller by the minute now, as they picked up speed and headed for . . . where? It didn’t matter to him. Anywhere that wasn’t Shenshido.
He should claim the empty chair and strap himself in, but he didn’t have enough energy left to move that far. Weakly he slid down the wall, lowered his head, and focused on breathing steadily, as the doomed station faded into the distance.
All those traveling from a natural planet to the outworlds shall be tested for communicable diseases before leaving home. Those who are judged to pose a risk to public health will be denied passage.
Those immigrating to the outworlds may be tested again upon arrival, at the local Guildmaster’s discretion. Persons judged to pose a risk to the public health will be quarantined, to be sent home on the first available transport.
In the event of a dangerous pathogen appearing in the outworlds, a Guildmaster may quarantine such people, organizations, and/or stations within his node as necessary to contain the infection, until proper medical response can be determined. A Guildmaster will not be held responsible for any losses or damages accruing from justified quarantine, unless negligence of management can be proven to the satisfaction of the Guild’s current leadership.
Founding Charter of the Ainniq Guild, Section 3 (also called the Mandate of Protection)
HARMONY NODE
INSHIP: ARTEMIS
WHEN THE glow of Shenshido’s exterior lighting was little more than a pinpoint, indistinguishable from the sprinkling of distant stars, and the skimmer was well on its way to the middle of nowhere, Ru turned control over to the autopilot. She would have liked to stay at the controls, just in case someone tried to pursue them—a distant possibility at this point—but she needed to check on both her passengers.
With a soft groan she shrugged out of her jacket, then removed the makeshift armor she’d been wearing underneath it. Beneath those layers she was sweat-soaked and sore; a breeze from the ship’s ventilation chilled the moisture on her skin, which was deliciously refreshing. She savored it for a few seconds, then got up and headed toward the medpod, leaving the armor on the floor along the way.
The Sarkassan was seated next to the medpod, knees drawn up before him, head lowered to meet them, clearly exhausted. Maybe even asleep. She checked the readings on the medpod, muttering a summary as she went, in case he was still awake. “Blood pressure’s better. Looks like three ribs are broken and the left femur fractured. There’s a crack in the skull, too; looks like he took one hell of a blow. Lots of soft tissue damage, but vital organs all seem to be functioning. Assuming the brain is undamaged, he might make it through this.” She looked at Micah. “You okay?”
Slowly he looked up. “Define okay.” A hint of a dry smile flickered across his lips. “I’ll survive, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“We’re out of the station’s innernet range. If that really was the source of your trouble, it should be gone now.”
“Thank you,” he said softly. His amber eyes were bloodshot, a disconcerting combination of colors. “For getting me out of there.”
“My pleasure,” she assured him. “You can take off that insect shell if you want.”
It took him a moment to realize she meant his armor. Struggling to his feet with a groan, waving off her attempt to assist him, he fumbled for the buckles that held his breastplate on. But either he was too tired to work them, or the angle was just wrong. “Someone helped me get into this,” he muttered.
“Here.” She reached out to him. “Let me help.”
He opened his mouth to protest, but exhaustion won out. He raised up one arm so that she could duck under it and attack the buckles on that side. Sweat and dirt had slicked the plastic and clogged the hinges, making them hard to open. “Damn,” she muttered. “This isn’t winning any design awards, that’s for sure.” Finally she got them released. The cuirass split open like a clamshell and she helped him wriggle out of it sideways, which caused his T-shirt to bunch up under his arms. With a sigh of relief he pulled it down.
She grinned. She couldn’t help it.
“What?” he asked. “What’s wrong?” He followed her gaze to his chest, and then flushed. He’d put the pink shirt on inside-out—probably to hide the insipid design on it—but sweat had rendered the fabric almost transparent, and the outline of frolicking kittens showed through, along with a cheery banner that spelled out HAI KAWAII! backward.
He started to say something . . . then he just leaned back against the wall and started laughing. Exhaustion, embarrassment, and relief all echoed in the sound, and it struck nerves within her. She started to laugh as well, helplessly, a bizarre but effective catharsis.
Finally the fit passed for both of them, and he gathered enough breath to gasp, “My regular wardrobe is much more stylish.”
“Black T-shirts with gaming slogans, no doubt.”
“Nice black T-shirts with gaming slogans.”
She wiped a tear from her eye. “Tully and I kept some spare clothes in the skimmer. I haven’t had a chance to clear his out yet.” Or didn’t have the desire? “He was heavier than you, but about the same height; some of his clothes might fit. You can take anything you want.” She gestured toward the narrow door at the rear of the skimmer. “There’s a cleaning cubicle back there, too. Not exactly luxurious.”
“Just getting clean would be one hell of a luxury,” he assured her.
“You look like you could use a few hours of downtime. Feel free to pull out a bunk. I’ve got some things to take care of up here.”
He pushed himself off the wall, then hesitated. “I don’t know how to thank you . . .”
She waved it off. “You helped me figure out what was going on in there. And to get this one out.” She nodded toward Ivar. “We’re more than even.”
“Still,” he said. “I owe you.”
There was no way to respond to that, so as he started toward the rear she turned her attention to the next job. The lock on the hidden armory closet verified her identity, and the wall panels guarding it slid open. She picked up her breastplate and—
“Holy shit,” she heard.
She turned to find Micah staring at the armory. It was a pretty impressive collection, and an eclectic one. Firearms and charge rods and flamethrowers hung next to gas grenades and knives and crossbows, and even a pair of swords. Everything was in twos—save for a charge pistol and shock rod that were obviously missing mates—and strapped securely to the wall, in no-G fashion. “Holy shit,” he muttered again.
Ru was grinning. “Just a few basic supplies.”
“Is that a Frisian K-1 triple-stage assault rifle?” he asked.
She nodded. “You have a good eye.”
“I thought those were illegal in the outworlds.”
“They are illegal in the outworlds. Your point?”
“I’m . . . I’m just surprised, is all. I thought outriders gathered information. Not . . . whatever you’d need an armory like this for.”
The humor in her eyes diminished a bit. “That’s not a simple story, or a short one. Maybe later.” She touched a control and a deep drawer slid out of the wall; she hefted his cuirass into it, then hers. The blue light of a sterilizer came on as it closed. “Needless to say I’d prefer our guest not know about this collection.”
“Well, yeah. Yeah. That goes without saying.”
She hung up her weapons and shut the closet door. Like
the slideaways, it was now virtually invisible. That was an important feature, in case hostiles ever boarded the skimmer.
As she watched him walk toward the rear of the ship, already pulling off the kitten shirt, she realized what she had just called Ivar. Our guest. Hers and Micah’s. Was that just force of habit? Or a reflection of how much she hungered for an ally, a partner? Be wary of trusting him too much, an inner voice warned. You can’t afford to lose perspective just because you want to trust someone.
* * *
The first part of her report to Jericho was easy to write: a simple narration of her experiences, with supporting data appended to it. But the conclusion called for a subjective analysis, and that gave her pause. She deleted five different versions before coming up with one she was willing to send him.
. . . I believe it would be an act of cruelty to leave these people as they are, twitching on the strings of a mysterious puppet master. If Bello’s theory is correct, and the signal that imposed sensory distortion on the locals is being channeled through Shenshido’s innernet, it should be possible to remove the people from this station with minimal risk, provided they are digitally quarantined until their brainware is verified clean of contamination.
But if the attack on Harmony was orchestrated from Shenshido, our puppet master may be able to control his victims across great distances. Until we understand the mechanism of that control, and the limits of his power, refugees should be handled with extreme care.
She rubbed her forehead with weary fingers, trying to massage away the throb of an oncoming headache. Her wellseeker offered to treat it, and after a moment she accepted. Slowly the pain eased, but not the stress behind it. Her next words, she knew, might subject Shenshido’s victims to further suffering. But images from the station were playing out in her mind—fighters armored in cannibalized furniture parts swinging primitive makeshift weapons at one another, surrounded by bodies that had been crushed or slashed or broken—and though her stomach turned at the thought of leaving anyone in that hellhole, they were all part of a much larger game now. And the stakes were too high to take chances.
As soon as we rescue the people here, we will have tipped our hand to their manipulator. He’ll expect the Guild to assign its best brainware specialists to search out his identity, and with the resources that Guera can assign to such an effort, it’s only a matter of time before some clue is found. The smart thing for him to do would be to sever all his manipulative connections, abandon his communication channels, and lay low for a while. If he indeed does that, we may never find him.
She paused. I’m glad it’s Jericho’s job to make this decision and not mine. She’d passed judgment on her share of colonies, and helped determine the fate of whole populations, but Shenshido felt much more personal. Perhaps it was because the people there were native to the outworlds, citizens of the galactic human community that Guera had so painstakingly created. Not colonists who had been isolated from the rest of humanity for so long that they had no idea what was being denied them.
And they’d begged her for help. That was very personal.
I trust you to handle that challenge as you see fit. Meanwhile, let me know if there is some further service you wish from me. I assume that any such request would be accompanied by a generous offer of compensation. This is dangerous shit, Jericho.
I will remain at this location one Standard Day to receive your response.
She reread what she had written, decided it was the best she was going to be able to do, and added one more note to the bottom. Send me whatever info you’ve got on a game designer named Micah Bello.
ENCRYPT
COMPRESS
CONFIRM PRIVATE CHANNEL
DOUBLE RETINAL SCAN REQUIRED TO OPEN
SEND.
As the data packet headed out toward Harmony, she heard footsteps behind her, and turned to see Micah approaching. He was wearing one of Tully’s shirts, which hung a bit loose on him, but at least it was clean, and his face was a healthy-looking color, not the chalky hue she remembered from back in the tunnels. She didn’t know what color a Sarkassan was supposed to be, so she was guessing this was an improvement. Note to self: research Sarkassa’s Variation. Now that all the dirt and blood had been scrubbed off, he didn’t look half bad: a little taller than she was, a little thinner than Tully, and he moved with a confidence that suggested underlying fitness. It was hard to judge his age, as so many signs of that could be minimized by telomere therapy, but the youthful sparkle in his eyes suggested he hadn’t yet needed such intervention. His natural coloring, now visible, was striking, his fair skin a dramatic backdrop for the Sarkassan markings. All in all not bad, though the sight of him looking fresh and clean reminded her how much she could use a scrub herself.
She gestured toward the other pilot’s chair. “Have a seat. As you can see”—she indicated the screen—“there’s not much out there. Seemed a good place to wait for instructions, while catching our breath.”
He started to turn the chair toward him, and then stopped, clearly surprised by something. Suddenly she realized that Tully’s oversized glass phallus was still strapped into the seat. She flushed. “It was my partner’s—”
“Hey!” He put up his hands quickly. “Didn’t ask. Don’t need to know.”
“It was a gift from a glassblower on Betalon Five.” She leaned over and unclipped the safety harness to free the thing. “It was one of his favorite artifacts, so I brought it along to remind me of him.” She opened a small slideaway under the navigation display and carefully set the artwork inside. “I’m not used to traveling alone.”
He hesitated. “Can I ask what happened? Or is that too personal?”
For a long moment she didn’t answer. She’d promised herself she wouldn’t share details of Tully’s death with anyone, but this wasn’t some arrogant Guild official wanting lurid details to spice up his debriefing report. She and Micah had depended on each other while escaping Shenshido, through a maze of delusion and death, and that made for a strange sense of intimacy. “He used the wrong bodily organ for thinking,” she said at last. “He paid the price.”
“Damn. I’m sorry.”
She shrugged. “Shit happens.”
He sat down in Tully’s seat and studied the display screen; the chair whirred softly as it adjusted to his body. “Never have I been so grateful to see empty space.”
Despite herself she smiled. “Trust me, it can get boring after twenty years.”
“But you don’t stay awake for all that time, though, do you?”
“Enough of it to be bored. Deceleration starts as soon as you enter a star system, and safety regs don’t allow for stasis after that point. It can take months to reach the target and establish a viable orbit. Lots of time to kill.”
He glanced behind him. “In this small ship? How do you not go crazy? Wait, don’t tell me. Virts?”
She ignored the bait. “This is just our lander. The mothership has facilities to keep mind and body healthy. At least that’s the theory. Once we start collecting data from a colony—maybe even picking up on their communications—there’s more than enough work to focus on. We need all the information we can get to make realistic predictions about what we’ll face when we arrive.”
“How accurate are your predictions?”
“Usually pretty good. We’ve got specialized software that can look at how a station or ship was designed and extrapolate all sorts of social patterns. Sometimes we argue about the interpretation of what it tells us, but it’s usually close to the mark.”
“Do you place wagers on those arguments?” His dark eyes were sparkling. “See who comes closest to guessing right? I know I would.”
She smiled slightly. “I would never admit to such a thing.”
“And if things don’t go smoothly, despite that? Is that what all the weapons are for?”
The smile faded. With a sig
h she leaned back in her seat. “You really want that story?”
“If you’re ready to tell it.”
For a moment she just stared into space. What words did you choose, to communicate such a dark truth? It wasn’t something she usually shared with outsiders, and part of her felt it should stay that way. But another part of her hungered to bring this strange wanderer into her world. She wasn’t used to living in it alone.
“The job of an outrider team is to travel to a colony that Earth abandoned, and to bring back the information needed for Guera to launch a recovery operation. Most of those journeys end in disappointment. Sometimes we find relics—the remains of houses, irrigation channels, hothouses. Sometimes there are grave sites. Sometimes there’s nothing. Alien forests and seas have swallowed up a fledgling colony, leaving us nothing to study. We may not even know what shape the colonists were when their struggle to survive finally ended. What can we do in such cases, besides move on to the next world and hope for better?”
She sighed heavily. “The colonies that did survive . . . you never know what you’ll find. The earliest ones, like Guera, had time to adapt to their new homes before Isolation began; some of those colonies are quite well developed, and may even have space travel of their own. But other colonies were cut off before they got all the supplies and personnel that a new colony needed to survive. When their children were born with what they perceived as horrific deformities, when the home planet cut off all contact without warning, they had no idea why these things were happening. All they knew was that Earth had abandoned them in their time of need, and they hated it for that. Later generations might come to blame Earth for all their troubles, even ones the Terrans had nothing to do with. They needed to blame someone, and an absent scapegoat is the best kind, as it can’t fight back.”
“Amen to that,” he muttered.
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