Spheres of Influence

by Ryk E. Spoor

  DuQuesne caught a flash of mirth from Oasis Abrams—just a moment of a crinkle of laugh-lines around the emerald eyes, a quirking upward of the corner of the perfect lips.

  The other two did not seem so amused; in fact, it was nearly a minute before—to his surprise—Michelle Ni Deng spoke. “You are the Leader of . . . the Faction of Humanity.”

  “I am.” Ariane managed a sour smile. “I didn’t ask for the job, I didn’t know I was in line for it, but I’ve got it—and before either of you says anything, I am not handing that authority over to anyone unless I believe my successor understands what he or she is dealing with, and can handle it well enough so I don’t need to worry about it any more.”

  Oscar Naraj had an expression of equal parts outrage, puzzlement, and sympathy—an impressive combination, DuQuesne had to admit. “I do not mean to sound . . . stupid, Captain Austin, but, just to clarify . . . from the Arena’s point of view, you, personally, are the leader of the entire human species?”

  “Yes.”

  Naraj muttered something in an Indian dialect that DuQuesne couldn’t quite catch. “And would you mind,” he said, and now his voice was hard, edged with annoyance and some lingering disbelief, “explaining to me, then, why you did not include this—I would think absolutely crucial—piece of information in your summaries?”

  “Do you want the truth, or the excuse?”

  Naraj blinked. Then he smiled briefly. “I think I will take the truth, even if you think it so unpalatable.”

  “All right, then.” Ariane looked up and away for a moment, as though seeking support from the very cause of the problem. “Simply? What would you people have done if I had told you?”

  “Well, we certainly wouldn’t have just come charging out here without having the authority to negotiate!” Ni Deng said frostily.

  “Right,” Ariane agreed, and her tone brought Michelle Ni Deng up short. Full-blown captain mode, “look of eagles” and all. “You would have insisted I—and perhaps my entire crew—stay back home unless and until I turned the leadership over to someone more suited, or at the least until I delegated authority to you. As I stated, I have no intention whatsoever of doing that until I’m sure the person taking the job has, as DuQuesne would say, the jets to swing that load, and no one will have that who hasn’t already been here, and learned the ins and outs.

  “So we would have been stuck arguing for weeks, maybe months longer, while the Molothos methodically search for our only Sphere so they can put a whole invasion force on the surface instead of a scouting party. Not happening while I am in charge, Ambassador. And I am in charge here, and I will do my best to make sure that we don’t get blindsided by those monsters—or,” she looked pointedly at both of them, “anyone else.”

  “Are you—”

  Oscar Naraj gestured and Michelle Ni Deng cut her outraged protest short. “I . . . see.” He frowned, obviously thinking. And that’s dangerous, but other than just shooting him there’s no stopping him from thinking. “Then should I simply take my people and leave?”

  Ariane sighed, and looked—just slightly—less intimidating. “I’m not saying that, no. You both have skills and experience no one on Holy Grail had. And I don’t have any objection to you talking to people—as long as I know about it, and as long as you’re willing to listen when someone who’s experienced explains the pitfalls—especially how you might get goaded or tricked into a Challenge. Understand, we cannot afford a Challenge we have not extensively planned for—and even then, it could really go completely wrong.

  “And obviously if I want to ever get rid of this ridiculous position as Leader of Humanity, I need people who come here and become familiar enough with it to replace me. So no, Ambassador.” She gave a professional smile, but there was some warmth behind it. “I would very much like you to stay and help. All of you.” The smile turned rueful. “God knows we’ll need all the help we can get!”

  Naraj allowed a chuckle. “Very well. Then shall we have lunch, and you shall tell us how you would like to proceed?”

  Ariane’s smile grew more natural. “I think that is an excellent suggestion, Ambassador.”

  Not bad, Ariane, DuQuesne thought as she led them to one of the dining areas. But don’t you start relaxing now.

  Because they sure aren’t.

  CHAPTER 13

  The room stretched away in front of Simon, and to both sides, to such distances that he momentarily groped for a true sense of scale. Bakana, he thought. It simply cannot be this large.

  But it was. The ceilings, set with arched windows from which streamed beams of what seemed pure, natural sunlight (though, perhaps, by the tint, not Earth’s sunlight), rose one hundred meters or more; yet it was low, almost oppressively low, compared to the extent of the room it covered.

  Shelves kilometers long dwindled, perfect perspective lines, so far that the clear air began to soften the edges like the peaks of mountains on the horizon. And on those shelves . . .

  Soft laughter penetrated his stunned consciousness, and he looked over to see Relgof with an expression and pose that Simon recognized as mirth. “Ahh, my friend, it is always a reward to see the reaction of a first-time visitor to the Archives of the Analytic.”

  “My . . . God,” Simon said, and for once he meant the reverent tone. “This . . . this really is . . .”

  “. . . the collected knowledge of the Analytic, in the original form—paper, electronic, carven in ancient tablets found on Spheres where no living being had walked in a million years, written upon metal sheets, absorbed in scent-matrices, recorded on nanotechnological writing pads or as patterns of light deep within crystals, written words and spoken, holographic images of motion and thought, all of them here, all studied, categorized, and preserved, the thoughts and hopes and fears and learning of a million worlds across a million years. Yes, it is, and it is my pleasure to welcome you here, where very few save our own Researchers have ever stood.”

  Simon stood for a few more moments, just staring in awe. He could see some shelves built for things rather like Earthly books; others with row upon row of recording media; yet others that were more supports for huge monoliths of stone or steel; and still more holding less-identifiable objects that hummed or sparkled or flickered.

  Enough rubbernecking, as DuQuesne might say. I have work to do. “Why here on Nexus Arena? You have many Spheres of your own.”

  “Many thousands of Spheres of our own, yes. Yet . . . where else, Simon? No other place is so central, and—you can understand—no other place is even imaginably so safe. A Sphere can be lost in a Challenge, or—though rarely—by direct conquest from without. But nothing can challenge Nexus Arena, nothing can conquer it or force its way in, unless it were something that could shake the foundations of the universe itself. And here, in one of the Great Faction Houses, we have room almost beyond limit.”

  He nodded. “Of course. I had suspected as much, but it was worth asking. Then the information I seek is, obviously, somewhere here.”

  “Undoubtedly.”

  Simon noticed movement, and saw a Researcher of a semi-ceratopsian build climbing into one of many half-egg-shaped objects scattered about the Archive. The polished white and silver egg rose and flew silently down the rows, carrying the Researcher with it. Well, that answers one of the questions I had. Fifty-meter-high shelves and many-kilometer-long aisles could have defeated me before I started. “And I can stay here . . . ?”

  “As long as you like, Simon. We were agreed on the value of your gift, and now that you have read its text to us, it is now part of our knowledge—and absolutely fascinating, I will add.” Relgof’s filter-beard flip-flopped in happy excitement. “You may return any time over the next year and a half, and spend as much time as you wish.”

  “That is . . . extremely generous, Head Researcher.” Simon was astonished. Being allowed unlimited access to this facility for a year and more? Even with the relatively limited hardware I can use in the Arena, I can learn so very much in
that time . . . “Where is the . . . index, reference work, whatever you might call it, that I would use to find my way around this paradise of knowledge?”

  Relgof paused and tilted his head. Oh-oh. I know that pose. Something both serious and amusing.

  “It may be, my friend, that you will not find our gift quite so generous as you think at the moment—although I believe in the end you will still see it as more than fair.

  “Still, you understand that knowledge is our currency. The discussion was . . . heated as to exactly what to give, and how to give it. I am Head Researcher, but that position can of course change, so I am obligated to satisfy at least some of the demands of my colleagues. Some of them . . . have interests and alliances of their own which may not be aligned with yours, I am sorry to say. I could possibly have gotten you the precise information you asked for, but nothing else—and it might have been in a rather limited format.”

  I see. “And . . . ?”

  “And so I allowed them to argue me into what they found a rather amusing yet, they felt, ultimately useless generosity. Namely, you have full access to the Analytic’s Archives . . . but no access to the Indices of Knowledge, which only a full Researcher may have.”

  Simon realized his mouth had dropped open and he was simply goggling at Relgof, who at least had the decency to restrain his mirth after a single chortle. “I . . . what? This entire library of the gods and I won’t even know what’s where?” He felt anger rising and didn’t bother to hide it. “Head Researcher, I can’t even imagine what in God’s name possessed you to ‘allow’ this? What possible—”

  “Simon, please. I understand your anger, and it’s quite justifiable . . . for the moment. But the fact is simply this: I was making a wager, a wager with myself against their assumptions.”

  Simon looked at him. “A . . . wager? On what?”

  “The group which were being obstructive,” Relgof said, “were interested in granting you as little as possible while gaining your prize in return. This struck them as an ideal method—giving you everything you asked, and more, but removing your chances of finding the key facts, leaving them as a single rope hidden in a forest of kelp. But I felt they were missing a key element: that you, yourself, conceived, built, and tested the Sandrisson Drive, the first of your people to do so, one of only a few thousand such in the history of the universe. Even if you cannot find your answers to the Sky Gates here, I believe—I absolutely believe—that you can derive an answer yourself.

  “So I took a risk, yes. A risk that you might possibly not be as capable as I believe you are, against the ability for you to sample the knowledge of the Analytic freely, for the space of a year and a half.”

  Simon looked around again. For a few moments, his anger only increased, along with a feeling of overwhelming futility. It was an impossible task, and even finding anything useful in that nigh-endless Archive . . .

  But Relgof’s tone penetrated, finally. Those were not the words of someone who had managed to put one over on a sucker, but . . . “You have that much faith in me?”

  Relgof spread his arms and bowed. “Have I not been at the side of Humanity almost since its arrival? Have I not watched you all closely? You chose your crew, Doctor Sandrisson, no one else, and that crew has done extraordinary things. I have faith that the man who brought them here is at least as extraordinary.”

  Simon looked up at the towering shelves; but now he felt a tiny shift within himself, a feeling of stubborn certainty. I am standing within the greatest repository of knowledge in the entire universe; even if I pull out books and records at random I cannot imagine I would fail to find something interesting.

  He turned back to Relgof. “I . . . thank you for your faith, Rel. Really, I do.” He surveyed the nigh-endless expanse. “I just hope I can live up to it.”

  Relgof bowed again. “I thank you for your understanding . . . and I wish you good luck.”

  Simon watched his friend—and he is my friend, I think, and a good one—leave through the door they had entered by, and then turned to face the Archives. Once more their infinite expanse nearly daunted him.

  Yet . . .

  Yet . . .

  There was something almost . . . familiar.

  That makes not the slightest bit of sense, you know, he thought. You’ve never been here, and not a bit of this is actually familiar. I’m not even sure I’ve seen anything vaguely like this place, even in a simgame.

  The feeling refused to go away, however, and he found himself walking swiftly along, jumping into one of the egg-shaped craft and urging it forward. He did not quite understand how he knew how to operate the thing so well, but even that thought was distant.

  Another part of him was simply growing more confused. He wasn’t sure why he was going in this direction, or where this feeling of certainty came from.

  A flicker of memory came . . . a surge of energy, of Shadeweaver and Faith working together desperately, trying to contain the power that Ariane Austin had neither the knowledge nor training to control . . . The floor heaving, contacts broken, all the power of both . . . and perhaps of Ariane herself . . . momentarily focused through him . . .

  He couldn’t remember that moment clearly; it had blurred, faded, and he realized that he had in fact avoided thinking of it since shortly afterwards. But I think I took down notes just afterwards . . . I have to read them. I think . . . something happened.

  The silver and white egg had stopped, and his hand reached out, grasping a jointed object like a foldable piece of parchment. He looked on alien script written by a species he had never met, one perhaps a thousand years or ten thousand or a million years gone, and there was no translation, none of the Arena’s usual tricks . . .

  Yet Simon realized he did understand, that it made sense . . . and even as a surge of triumph went through him, Simon Sandrisson felt the chill breath of fear.

  CHAPTER 14

  “I thank you for being so open-minded, Captain,” Oscar Naraj said to her with a more genuine smile than he had given in the first few hours after learning the truth. A couple of days to look at things and mull it over has at least given him some perspective . . . I hope.

  “I won’t say I’m open-minded on this subject, Ambassador—actually, I’m pretty certain I know exactly what’s going to happen—but I’m willing to let you and Deputy Ambassador Ni Deng try anything as long as one of us is there to keep anything Arena-related from going wrong.”

  The Grand Arcade was the one truly neutral location in the Arena—and thus the only place Ariane would let them try to meet the Molothos. All the Factions traded here and no matter their attitude towards other creatures, that included the Molothos—perhaps even more than many, since as a Great Faction they had a huge need for trade.

  This also allowed her new guests more chances to become used to the strangeness of the Arena and see the thousands of other species that Humanity would have to interact with in one way or another.

  Ambassador Naraj stared in wonder at the immense expanse of open-air and enclosed markets, stalls, restaurants, amusement centers, and other things possibly less identifiable. Ni Deng’s expression was awed, perhaps a touch frightened at first, but it swiftly became more chagrined. “I admit . . . this is somewhat overwhelming, Captain,” she said finally. Her eyes tracked a large, multilegged lizardlike creature with an upright torso—a Daelmokhan, Ariane thought, one of Sivvis’ people—walking alongside a Daalasan and carrying on an animated conversation, while another creature of unfamiliar species—some sort of strange floating gasbag—drifted next to them, occasionally flickering and gesturing.

  “That’s an understatement,” she said with a smile.

  “I think it’s exciting!” Wu said, then looked somewhat contrite. He really was trying to manage the silent stoic bodyguard approach, but sometimes . . .

  “Oh, it is certainly that, Wu Kung,” Naraj agreed. “But overwhelming . . . yes. I admit I have had relatively little experience in more fantastic simulation areas�
�not my preferred sort of game—and perhaps that might have prepared me a bit better. I understand you, Captain Austin, were quite the aficionado in such games.”

  She nodded, grinning. And that saved my ass in ways you can’t imagine. “True enough—but believe me, you two are doing humanity proud, as Gabrielle might say. We were still pretty much gobsmacked after this long, and we’d at least spent time working our way through our Sphere before we got here. You’re doing just fine.” She pointed. “Here, let’s get a little something to eat. Hi, Olthalis!”

  The blue-green, jellyfish-like alien was behind his usual stall near one of the main thoroughfares of the Arcade, moving on tendrils too delicate to support him in Earthly gravity; Ariane knew that the Arena provided each visitor to Nexus Arena with its own proper environment so that all were on equal footing here. Olthalis waved a pair of tendrils in a complex pattern. “A pleasing sight always, that of a customer and leader! Ariane Austin of Humanity! The currents flow well today?”

  “Well enough, Olthalis. Ambassador Naraj, Deputy Ambassador Ni Deng, this is Olthalis of the . . . Dispersants, is that correct?” At Olthalis’ back-and-forth affirmative gesture, she continued, “of the Dispersants of the Chiroflekir. Olthalis was the first merchant with whom we dealt, and he’s been very helpful in helping us get supplies and learn what we can and can’t eat or drink here, along with Mairakag Achan—you’ll meet him later.”

  “It is an honor and pleasure to meet you, Olthalis,” Oscar Naraj said cheerfully. “We very much appreciate your assistance. ‘Dispersants’ . . . would that be a particular, oh, political group of your species, then?”

  The same affirmative gesture, followed by a negative one. Yes and no? “The Dispersants travel the currents, journey to the far reaches, return to the seas and join the Contemplative. Within the Contemplative there are political groups.”

  “Ah!” Ni Deng said, brightening. “An intelligent species with at least two lifecycle stages, then?”