by Diane Duane
"Biotech matter," said Delde Sola, detaching another sample and this time managing to get it into a sample capsule before it disintegrated. "Apparently self-augmenting, purpose apparently overtly tendonal, duplicating the tendons' function outside the body since those inside the body have been resorbed or have lost elasticity and no longer function. Biotech matter is either contaminated by or purposely perfused with the bacterial cultures mentioned earlier. Possibly a symbiotic relationship. Culture should be done with an eye to understanding the association of the two materials and determining whether one somehow affects the growth or structure of the other." She glanced over at one of her other instruments, raised her eyebrows. She was getting that angry look again. "First diagnostics on mucus indicate presence of high level of proteins and enzymes that in some conditions would function as psychoactives, and other proteins constructed in mimicry of corticosteroids, neurotransmitters, and messenger hormones primarily involved with rage and pain reactions. Endorphin levels zero." She put aside the tissue samples that she had been retrieving from the lungs and liver and reached down for the heart, lifting it and slicing it free. A great gout of the green pus ran out of the aorta, and Gabriel found it almost impossible not to take that personally. He had to turn away and concentrate on his breathing for a moment.
"Entire cardiovascular system has apparently been either invasively compromised or devolved to secondary status," said Delde Sota, slicing the heart open the long way and peeling it carefully apart. "No possible perfusion from this system. Possibility that perfusion is being managed by the mucus held around and within the body. Oxygen level however is almost nil, suggesting some other form of transport, possibly ATP-beta or -gamma, of the anaerobic type." She frowned. "Investigation will be required of the aqueous humor."
Gabriel briefly misunderstood her and wondered what might possibly be funny about this situation. Then he got a look at the long needle Delde Sola had produced, and he suddenly realized where she was planning to stick it. He turned away hastily. To him eyes were intensely personal. He winced, unable to stop himself.
After a moment, "Humor is contaminated with aforementioned bacterial melange culture," said Delde Sota dispassionately. "Analysis follows."
She paused, and after a few seconds Gabriel dared to look back again. Delde Sota was simply looking down at the body, her big dark eyes plainly sorrowful; but the frown was also still there, an expression suggesting she was looking for something that she had not yet seen.
Gazing down at the skin of the neck, she reached down to do another moment's worth of dissection, peeling the skin away there and examining the tendons. They were wasted like all the other true tendons in this body, but there was something strange about the tendon strand on the body's left-hand side. Delde Sota leaned close, narrowing her eyes a little, and Gabriel got a feeling that somewhere in there her optical magnification was being greatly increased.
"Traces of an old incision," she said, "cutting nearly straight across and through the tendon, incising the cricoid cartilage as well, the wound stopping three centimeters before the opposite tendon. Much older than-"
Then she stopped, peered closer.
"Unusual finding;" she said. "Old sub-sheath cyst. Nodular, but the shape is atypical."
Gabriel had to look at that-and agreed. He was no medical expert, but it did not seem to him that cysts would normally be square.
Delde Sota reached down and started to excise the cyst, then changed her mind, and left it in place. Instead she reached out for another tool, a much more delicate and fine-bladed knife. She wiped the puslike slime away from around the tendon and began to dissect away the top of the cyst. Very delicately she did it, as if peeling away one layer of thin, wet tissue paper after another.
Gabriel, who briefly found himself regretting having to make do with unmagnified vision, now leaned closer despite the smell, because he saw something.
A chip. A tiny chip about a centimeter square, buried inside layer after layer of tendonal material that had overgrown and encysted it. Delde Sola glanced up at Gabriel, eyes meeting his in a look of alarm, but peculiarly, also of triumph.
"Electronic material," she said, "almost certainly of known-space provenance, dating to ten years before this date, plus-minus one year. Typical of ID chip sometimes used to store medical information for emergency use."
Very delicately Delde Sota exposed it. Then one strand of her neurobraid undid itself and wavered down toward the surface of the chip, brushed it, then sank into it.
She started and her eyes went wide. She stared at Gabriel. Before he could say anything, she put her fingers to her lips in a gesture that most humanoids understood, then pointed to the wall screen. Gabriel looked at it. It had been scrolling a text revision of her dictation until now. Now, however, the screen showed various binary characters, but centered among them were the words: DARSALL, OLEG Born 08 12 2459 Posted Borealis colony, Silver Bell, 01 18 2486 Gabriel's breath went right out of him.
Silver Bell!
The Second Galactic War, besides endless other damage, had caused the destruction of the drivespace communications relays that had connected the Verge with the rest of human space. Time and money and opportunity to repair them had been lacking for a long time. Not until fourteen years after the signing of the Treaty of Concord was the relay at Kendai restored. With its restoration had come the first message from the Verge for more than a hundred years-a message that had been trapped in drive-space for years, awaiting the repair that would allow it to be heard. "Borealis colony Silver Bell in Hammer's Star, calling any FreeSpace Alliance vessel . . . We are under attack by ... Repeat, the colony is under heavy attack by unknown forces. Send help. Repeat, send help. It's May 3rd, 2489. We need help, damn it! Please-"
It had repeated again and again. The Concord had immediately sent the fortress ship Monitor to investigate, but when it reached Hammer's Star, there was no one left on the planet Spes where Silver Bell had been. The colony had been completely destroyed. Though Monitor contacted other Verge colonies, none of them knew what had happened to Silver Bell. The colony's destruction remained one of the great mysteries and tragedies of the end of the Long Silence, but here was one Oleg Darsall, breaking this particular aspect of the Silence at last. "Does it check?" Gabriel asked Delde Sota.
She looked thoughtful for a moment, then nodded. "Grid access confirms someone of that name on the colonists' active list," she said. She looked down with an expression of terrible pain and confusion. "Is this what happened to all of them?"
Gabriel didn't want to think about it-or rather, he did, but not right here, not with the awful truth of it lying half-dissected on the floor in front of him.
"Autopsy must be continued in much greater detail in secure environment," said Delde Sota. "Recording pauses this time and date while transport and security are arranged." She sat back on her heels and looked down at the creature that had once been Oleg Darsall. "Conjecture:" she said to Gabriel, "this is information that will be profoundly destabilizing in some areas, and it must be disseminated to the Concord immediately. However, all channels here are routinely monitored." Even here inside Sunshine, she mouthed "by VoidCorp" at him in such an obvious way that, just for that moment, Gabriel had to work hard not to burst out laughing. But at the same time, something else was on his mind.
Off to one side of the cargo bay was a simple thing for use when you were suited up and your communications gave out, a plastic pad on which you could write and then erase the written words by lifting the top sheet of plastic away from the one underneath it. Gabriel got up and fetched it, then used the little stylus clipped to the pad to write the words "Lorand Kharls." Gabriel quickly showed them to Delde Sola, and after she looked thoughtfully at them he lifted the plastic sheet and erased the words. "Maybe you would not want to message him directly," Gabriel said, "but he would be in a position to reach the people who should know about this. He should be able to arrange to pick up the body without attracting too much notice."
The two of them looked at the poor creature lying on the floor, and Gabriel once again had to resist the urge to shudder all over. "Response: acceptable suggestion," said the doctor. "Meanwhile, body must be put in cold/stass until pickup." She thought for a moment, then said with just a shadow of the more normal wickedness in her eyes, "Statement: your phymech is faulty. Records confirm that from last visit." "That was the excuse we gave inbound," Gabriel said.
The doctor nodded. "Opinion: consistency highly salutary. Statement: 'service' therefore will ensue. Expect service pallet in fifteen standard minutes, plus minus two minutes. Pallet will remain forty minutes. Instruction: remove/disarrange spare parts inside pallet to pallet service carry pack. Do not damage, parts to be recycled. Extra corpsewrap will be provided." "I understand," Gabriel said.
"Will your 'morgue' be a safe place for this body to lie?" came Enda's voice over comms from the forward area.
The doctor replaced her instruments in her "bag" and waved a hand at it. The bag promptly folded itself up into a much smaller size and shape than should have been possible. "Statement: surveillance cameras 'intermittently damaged'/disconnected in morgue," she said, with some satisfaction. "Death at least requires privacy." She glanced around her. "Query: phymech functioning correctly after installation?" "As far as we can tell."
"Opinion:" Delde Sola said, "outdated/poor model, replace as soon as possible. Offer: will assist in obtaining discount," she looked at him thoughtfully and added, "should you survive." Gabriel shivered. "I would prefer to," he said.
The doctor got a slightly concentrated look and then said in somewhat expanded idiom, "Opinion: you have become a target. Opinion: since when you take yourselves out into unpopulated places you seem to court attack, there would seem to be wisdom in staying in-system. Query: will you take advice from me?"
"Why not?" Gabriel said.
"Warning: advice does not always work, despite best intentions," the doctor said. "Meanwhile: opinion follows. Safety perhaps lies for you now best in numbers. Grith is nearest and most populated, also a place where becoming lost will be easier, but before you go there, go to this cafe-" She stroked the wall screen and a map of the docking rings came up. She showed Gabriel a small area, area 14, ring 6. "Present time is local evening, most of the regulars will be there. Look for a sesheyan in a dark beishen with a red stripe. It is distinctive. So is he. His name is Ondway. He and I have had dealings in the past. He will be able to recommend a place where you may hide and make inquiries, safe from attack ... for a while. Outside of that-" She picked up her bag and shrugged. "Other assistance may be provided if possible. Meanwhile, prediction: life may not be quiet for you. Meanwhile, query: diet/electrolyte balance change?"
Gabriel rolled his eyes at her, glad to have an excuse to get up himself and turn his back on the grisly object on the floor. Man, said something in the back of his mind, that was a man once. Be careful. "I haven't had a lot of time to worry about my diet," Gabriel said, heading toward the airlock with her. "Right now there are other things that look more likely to kill me first."
"Warning: do not be too sure," Doctor Sola said. "Opinion: all unwitting, you seem to bear before you great difficulty, great change. Warning: beware, harbinger, how it changes you." She made her way forward, bowed to Enda, and then slipped into the lift and vanished.
The pallet arrived as promised, and Gabriel "showed" it into the cargo bay area with considerable relief. He thought he might have to stay and instruct it, but the pallet extruded its manipulating arms and went to work with such skill and certainty that Gabriel went away feeling quite sure that the "oversight" that he and Enda had discussed earlier was in full use: that it was Delde Sola's eyes that were looking through the pallet's sensors, her hands that were wrapping Oleg Darsall for his next brief journey. After about half an hour, the job was done, and the pallet took itself away with a drape over it and various "spare parts" from the phymech festooning it. All during this, Enda kept herself in the sitting room, not stirring out. When the pallet was finally gone, Gabriel went in to sit with her, rather concerned. "Are you all right?"
She tilted her head to one side and sighed. "No. Well, perhaps it should be explained. It is not that fraal have difficulties with death. Death is an error. Some of us feel that someday all errors will be put right, including that one. Yet there are some deaths ..." She tilted her head again, that repeated gesture of negation. "Do humans not speak of the 'smell' of death?"
"Yes," Gabriel said and swallowed. His stomach was not entirely settled at the moment, and the concept she was mentioning was not entirely welcome. "It has one, all right." "And of the smell of evil?"
"I'm not so sure about that," Gabriel answered, a little doubtfully, "but we do speak of it." Enda sighed and rubbed her eyes. "Evil. How does one quantify such a thing as if it were a bulk supply, something that came by the dekaliter? Yet indubitably it exists. What we saw there: that smelled evil to me. Some mindwalker talent was moving, perhaps, wakening unsuspected. Perhaps a warning." She shrugged, a very weary and helpless gesture. "I cannot say, but I am glad she did not decide to use the table."
"You're not alone," Gabriel said. "Not even wire brushes and Dessol would have helped it after that." "What?" She blinked those huge burning blue eyes at him in complete confusion. Gabriel grinned, if a little weakly, and told Enda the terrible marine joke to which the repeated punch line is "Wire brush and Dessol, ma'am," citing the name of the famous disinfectant and the honorific due to the commanding officer as she did her inspection. When he delivered the punch line for the last time, Gabriel watched Enda carefully, curious to see what the response would be.
She pitched forward with her face in her hands and began making peculiar wheezing noises. Gabriel bent over her, even more concerned than he had been before. But after a moment Enda sat upright again, and he saw that she was laughing so hard that she could not make a sound. Little pearly tears were rolling down her face.
It took her many minutes to recover. "Now," Enda said, "now you have seen a fraal weep, which means great things will happen to all who saw it, or so they say who do not often see fraal weep. And now, if ever, I need a drink, for fraal do not weep often. Let us by all means go to the bar of which Delde Sola told us. There we may meet the sesheyan to whom she recommended us, and there perhaps I may tell this joke and see how many people of other species laugh." She opened her eyes wide and got up, heading for her quarters to get a clean shirtsuit. " 'Wire brush and Dessol'!" She began wheezing again. Gabriel thought that changing into a new smartsuit was entirely a good idea. After the events of the previous hour or so, he was not feeling terribly clean. There was no time for a scrub. On the station, thought Gabriel, we might stop by the cleanup facility and have a water shower. It was one of those luxuries that, like the rest of marine life, was likely enough gone forever, and that Gabriel badly missed. Unlimited hot water. Such a little thing it seemed at the time. How little we appreciate what we have... They went back into the Collective's dome area, checked one of the maps there, and located area 14, ring 6. They made their way there, quietly discussing what they would do about the cargo bay the next day. Gabriel had made time to run the hull diagnostic programs one more time, and he was less than happy about the damage.
"We should stay at least long enough to get the hull weave-patched," he said.
"I have never been too sure about these patching processes," Enda said, sounding unconvinced. "One hears all kinds of glowing testimonials about them on the Grid, but one never knows anyone who's had them personally. Were I of a suspicious turn of mind, I would suspect this is because no one who has them done comes back."
"Oh, come on, it's perfectly safe," Gabriel said. "A metal reweave: they go in at the molecular level and rearrange the crystal structure of the hull. It comes out stronger than it was to start with." "So they would like you to believe," Enda said. "I still would prefer to see some testimonials from satisfied users."
"Oh, come on, Enda," Gabriel said.
"You're just shy about trying new things."
"So would you be," Enda said, "if you were pushing three hundred and wanted to see four hundred."
They came around the bend of the corridor and found themselves looking at a set of white-paneled doors with only a small discreet see-through panel set midway up one of them.
"Is this it?" Gabriel asked. "Nothing here but the number over the door."
"Let us find out."
They pushed the doors open and stepped in. Behind them, the doors immediately closed, and they found themselves facing a curtain, which Gabriel cautiously pushed aside.
Gloom.
They stood there for a moment and let their eyes get used to it, gloom and the smell of wetness and growing things. It was surprising when you had just come in out of the general aridity of the dome's corridors. Very faint lights, like distant point sources, and a very pale glow as of midnight in a summery place, shone down from the ceiling, partially blocked away by the gently moving shadows of leaves and branches. The leaves were real, not projections or holographic illusions. Trees and ferny, bushy plants of every kind stood around in huge containers, bending up against the surprisingly high ceiling before curving down again. Creepers, here and there starred with pallid flowers, hung down and brushed against Gabriel's face as they made their way into the room. The place was filled with a faint spicy fragrance that he could not identify.
Enda sniffed and said, "Galya. It is a wonder they can get it to grow here. Someone involved with this place must be a very skilled gardener. Can you see yet?" "Pretty well."