Mass Effect

by Catherynne M. Valente

  Yorrik had, at long last, pushed beyond all endurance, fallen asleep. The iso-shield still shimmered between the dreaming elcor and the wracked corpse of Jalosk Dal’Virra leaning against the almost-invisible barrier. The stars still blinked by outside, too fast to count.

  The hanar Ysses stood above him, tall and rosy and gleaming. The captain’s voice echoed in the empty lab as Ysses raised itself on its tentacles and released the iso-field. The body inside toppled out with a wet sound as it hit the floor. Yorrik did not wake.

  Ysses giggled. It turned around and glided past the tables stained with dried dye, past the krogan microscope, past the ruins of the stuffed volus, past Horatio, past the dormant laser scalpels, to the quarantined medbay door. It giggled again as it pressed its gelatinous limb against the security pad and undulated slowly, hacking the correct code out of the interface never meant for its species.

  The persistent quarantine tone ceased to chime. The soft red light stopped flashing through the glass walls. The medbay doors glided open.

  Ysses giggled again.

  “The Day of Extinguishment has come,” it whispered, and floated out into the long, open hall that led out into the screaming chaos of the unsuspecting ship.

  I trust you to organize and conduct yourselves in a civilized manner in this time of crisis. Rest assured that all possible steps are being taken to discover the source of these problems and determine a quick and effective solution. Do not panic. With a little luck and ingenuity, we will all be safely back in our pods in a few days and the next time we open our eyes all we’ll see before us is the Andromeda galaxy in all its wonder and infinite promise. Everything is going to be all right.

  This has been your captain, Qetsi’Olam vas Keelah Si’yah. Please remain calm and return to your respective environmental zones. May our ancestors be with us. Thank you and good luck.

  The captain’s message began again. It cycled through and repeated on the hour, every hour, as the longest night in the history of the galaxy wore on.

  PART 2

  KEELAH SE’LAI

  12. SYNTHESIS

  The Radial had been beautiful in its own way. Once.

  By the time Anax Therion and Borbala Ferank fought their way to the heart of the ship, it was no longer.

  Now the flower arrangement that had seemed so important on Hephaestus Station, so necessary to their long journey into the unknown, lay smashed and shredded on the floor of the spacious blue-black hexagon, pollen and juices smeared all over the thick glass walls of the six converging environmental zones. Glass walls that did little to muffle the cacophony of voices on the other side, yelling and arguing and screaming, and the occasional firing of a biotic charge—and biotic accidents and biotic attacks sound much the same. The pale lerian ferns of Kahje lay torn to pieces, their tiny pods stripped off. The red usharet flowers from Rakhana had been pulped and wiped down the alcoves like blood. The elcors’ thick onuffri bulbs had been ripped off their stalks and carried off, the batarian spice cones dashed against the bolts between the hexagon’s walls until they shattered. Someone had trampled the volus’s carnivorous kympna lobes, leaving boot prints on their petals. And the quarian keleven roots had been utterly devoured, leaving only their tough, leathery cores strewn around the Radial.

  Hello… everyone. This is your captain speaking. Please remain calm and return to your respective environmental control zones. There is not enough acclimatization equipment for everyone, and we must conserve the supplies we have.

  A volus Anax did not recognize ran screaming up out of the fumy ammonia-riddled depths of his zone. He slammed his fists against the glass, shrieking in fury: “I’ll kill you both! You did this to me! You did this! It hurts! It hurts so much. It huuuuurrrrts—”

  There was a sickening pop. Blue liquid sprayed against the inside of his yellow eye-goggles. The volus slumped to the ground.

  “That is not good,” Anax said.

  “That’s impossible,” Borbala breathed, her tone more of fascination than disbelief.

  Anax shrugged. “Not really. The volus suit’s main function is to provide constant high pressure similar to that on Irune. If he were to develop severe edema, his limbs would swell considerably, and the equalization between pressures would become intolerable.” She smiled ghoulishly, trying desperately to hold on to some sense of humor. “Pop,” she said softly.

  “No, I mean—how can the volus have it? Their suits… I don’t even know what one looks like under there. But shouldn’t it keep them safe? And shouldn’t they all have Yoqtan antibodies, if they get it as kids?”

  “I’ll ask Irit next time I see her. I think for now we must accept that any of us are vulnerable, no matter how unlikely that might seem. As for antibodies… there is a human sickness called shingles. A human can only acquire it after surviving chickenpox. It is the same illness, but it only returns to an immune system which it has already compromised. An organic body is a strange and terrible place, Borbala Ferank.”

  Unfortunately, all cases so far have been fatal. Please remain calm.

  “If I have to hear that one more time, I am going to shoot the first audio array I see,” growled the batarian. “How did we get the world’s prissiest captain? Just say: We’re all going to die, you’re on your own, have a nice day and be done with it, woman.”

  They peered down into the hanar section. Several of them were clustered around one preaching. One had open sores on its tentacles, but no one seemed to be moving away from it. The elcor hallways were dark and still. The batarian ones were a riot of accusations and shots fired. Therion put her hand on the drell-zone glass. The area within was awash with glittering blue light. She felt tears start in her eyes. My people are so clever, she thought. So much cleverer than we are credited for.

  “What’s that?” asked Borbala.

  “The drell biotics have captured the sick in Singularities. It knocks them out, gives them some peace, and isolates them from the healthy population. And it’s beautiful.” A few Singularity bubbles drifted into view, the dying drell inside looking almost as though they were meditating.

  Borbala looked at the bubbles for a long time, catching her breath. She wiped a streak of blood off her thigh—what was left of another batarian who rushed them back in the maze of corridors connecting the decks. He’d been so angry, bellowing, trying to spit on them, ranting that if he had to die, they would too—they hadn’t wanted to take him down, but he was past saving. They’d shot him together, so neither had to carry the sin alone.

  “I’ll be bad cop,” Borbala mused. “Obviously.”

  The drell smiled without happiness.

  Ferank and Therion let themselves into the quarian section. Therion’s air filter wasn’t strictly necessary here, since the quarian zone was set to common environmentals—Citadel standard. They never had any intention of leaving their suits, anyway, and a deep-space ship was home climate to a quarian. What sense was there in pumping their quarters full of Rannoch’s atmosphere? Wasted energy. The pair of them walked down the residential halls—it was quiet in quarian town. Of course, it would be. They alone had nothing particularly to worry about. Their suits would protect them. No one was sick. They waited patiently in their quarters for instructions—doors open to friendly traffic. Those quarians unfortunate enough to wake up in the initial cryopod failure were gathered six and eight and even ten to a room, despite there being more than enough space for them to spread out. On the Fleet, an empty room was very nearly a crime. They waved their gray three-fingered hands as the drell and the batarian walked by like guards in a prison, all but running a nightstick against invisible bars.

  “I need to speak to Malak’Rafa,” Anax Therion said to each cluster of nervous but optimistic and healthy quarians. They shook their heads, speculated on where he might be, claimed not to know him, apologized. And they moved on down the corridor.

  “I need to speak to Malak’Rafa,” Therion said again at the doorway to a smaller room, probably meant for a menial l
aborer or low-ranking nobody-in-particular. Four quarians were seated around the dining table, three male, one female, playing some kind of card game rigged up out of bits of repurposed scrap plastic. The taller male was clearly winning. Anax could see it in his posture.

  “Who is inquiring after him?” said the tall winner, ticking his head to one side.

  “My name is Anax Therion, this is Borbala Ferank. We’re part of the Sleepwalker team that discovered the pathogen. Malak’Rafa was part of the previous one.” She decided on a small lie. “We are seeking out all the members of Yellow-9. Someone on this ship knows what happened.” She shrugged. “It might be one of them.” Three of the members of that team were floating dead and frozen in space light years behind them.

  “Then I am he,” said one of the shorter, less lucky card players, and turned to face them.

  He crossed his arms over his chest. Malak’Rafa vas Keelah Si’yah looked like every other quarian—they were by far the most difficult interrogation subjects. Anax hated questioning quarians. You could not see their faces, their pupils dilating, their sweat response, the dryness of their lips. And they didn’t care about anything but their fleet, so threatening them was useless. The lights didn’t seem to be working in here either. Shadows and dim pale-blue emergency lighting turned Malak’Rafa into a dark statue. Until he saw Anax in her volus suit, shoved his chair violently backward, and leapt up.

  “Keelah se’lai, what kind of a bosh’tet am I even looking at?” marveled the quarian medical specialist in a thick but not impenetrable and certainly not unattractive Fleet accent. He gestured at the drell in the volus suit.

  “A drell, I assure you,” Anax said. “May we have the room?”

  The other quarians nodded and drifted off calmly. It was not that they were not worried, for the ship, for the others—but they were not worried for themselves, and it made all the difference. None of these people were going to run at them screaming in the depths of space madness, firing whatever weapon they’d dug out of a locker or someone’s luggage, demanding to be fed. No one else could eat the quarian’s dextro-protein food anyway, so they were altogether in better shape than most.

  “Listen, kid,” Borbala began, settling down on one of the other card players’ chairs. “This ship is under attack. You have to know that. Just because no one is torpedoing us out of the sky doesn’t mean we’re not under attack.”

  “I really wish I could help,” Malak said, and he really did sound like he meant it.

  “You can, Sleepwalker,” Borbala said casually. “Everything was fine until your team went on shift. So why don’t you tell us—what did you do while the rest of us were napping, you naughty boy?”

  The quarian went ramrod stiff. Oh, Anax thought. How unexpected. What did you do?

  “Am I the only one of my team awake?” the quarian asked, expending some effort to keep his voice calm. “Keelah Si’yah, locate Systems Analyst Soval Raxios.”

  Illegal query. Soval Raxios is not on board the Keelah Si’yah.

  Why does this seem to keep coming back to Soval? Therion thought. “The computers have trouble finding anyone at the moment. Senna is trying to fix it,” Anax apologized quickly. If he didn’t know she was dead, she might be able to use that. It was always to one’s advantage to know something another did not. “Why did you ask about her specifically?” Anax asked.

  “She’s… She’s a friend. She can tell you that I didn’t do anything during our cycle but check life signs on 20,000 cryopods.”

  “Just a friend?” Anax pressed. The quarian said nothing.

  Borbala Ferank barged in as any easily bored batarian would. “Listen to me, Malak’Rafa. This ship is under attack. Someone on your Sleepwalker team did something to help that along and the captain says it was most likely you. We’ve been awake and dealing with your mess for some time now, so there’s no use lying about it. But everyone has their reasons. I’m sure you didn’t mean it. Let us help you.”

  Therion winced. Risky. She would never have been so forward. This was why she detested the whole framework of good cop, bad cop. She had had quite enough of bad cops in her life. Bad cops were sloppy. Bad cops shot their clip too soon.

  “Impossible,” said Malak, shaking his head. “I have known Qetsi’Olam since we were both children on board the Chayym. Since we were fitted for our first suits together. When the geth attacked our birth ship, only Qetsi and I survived. I know her better than the sister I never had. We took our Pilgrimages together at the salarian biodiversity station. When those racist little insects pulled their hazing stunt and compromised her suit on a group outing, I nursed her back to health. We developed the vapor-biotic to cleanse her lungs of that crawling yelik algae together, and brought it back to our home ship. We took leadership of the Nedas movement together, to find a new hope for our people. We took our first wounds together fighting the geth. And we took meetings together with the Initiative to build this ark and fly it beyond the visible stars. Twins are less close than we are. Qetsi’Olam would suspect her own two hands before she suspected me.”

  Anax Therion was no novice. She had spent her time on Hephaestus Station reading personnel files while the others laughed and talked and drank and danced. Only on that last night had she joined them, joined Soval… She suppressed the memory. Soval didn’t matter now, except as evidence. She knew very well who Malak’Rafa was. She’d planned to use it in seven to nine minutes. But plans were easily enough changed.

  Malak’Rafa shocked her. The quarian reached out and squeezed her hand tenderly. “If I knew anything, Anax, I would tell you, I promise. But nothing happened. Nothing at all unusual. I think maybe we should all go and see the captain. She’ll tell you I’d never do anything to harm any ship, least of all this one.”

  “The problem is, something happened on your watch, Malak. And it’s enormously important that we find out what it was. Were you ever separated from your team, for any amount of time?” Therion asked. “Maybe it wasn’t you. Maybe one of your friends snuck off while you weren’t looking.”

  “No,” Malak’Rafa said quickly. Too quickly. He hardly let the drell finish her question. “We were either in visual range of each other or on live vidfeed throughout the cycle. Yellow-9 follows protocol.”

  Therion sat back. Interesting. She knew for a fact that was a lie. She’d watched all the teams on the security footage. She hadn’t expected him to lie. She didn’t think he himself was actually at fault, the way Borbala presumed everyone to be at fault for everything. She only assumed he had seen something the vids might have missed. That shadow in the shadows, that persistent movement just past the range of the cameras. But why was he lying?

  Borbala got up and started pacing, embracing her role as an impatient, embittered policeman. “What about Jalosk Dal’Virra?” the batarian barked. “Did he seem normal to you? Any effects from cryostasis? Any odd behavior?”

  “Jalosk? No. He’s… He’s a good worker, I suppose. Finished early. And then hung around Kholai like a lovesick puppy. I think he was actually starting to believe that hanar’s depressing drivel.”

  “What drivel?” coaxed Anax, sitting up straight. “That Day of Extinguishment nonsense?”

  The quarian nodded, glancing nervously at the pacing Ferank. “You must have heard it on Hephaestus, it’s just… constant. Like a broken vidscreen. But after we shared our final meal together, I noticed that Jalosk was really listening. On Hephaestus and on our cycle. I felt a great deal of pity for him. Kholai’s philosophy is… like alcohol. At first you are laughing, but soon enough you weep, and then you slide into the black and do not come out. The last thing Kholai said to me before it went back into stasis was: The only peace in the universe is entropy. I will see you at the end of all things, my brother. That’s one of their hymns. They say it to each other all the time. It’s not good for them. I hoped… I hoped beyond hope that in Andromeda, they would see the possibility of a new life rather than the certainty of death. How beautiful something new coul
d be. And then… And then, just before he left for the batarian cryodeck, Dal’Virra said the same thing to me. I will see you at the end of all things.”

  “And that didn’t seem suspicious to you?” Borbala laughed.

  But Malak’Rafa shook his head. “No, not at all. I can’t believe you’ve never listened to Kholai’s sermons. That hanar never stops talking.” It certainly has now, Therion thought. The quarian recited from memory in a long-suffering voice, “‘Only the Enkindlers know when the Day of Extinguishment will come. Take no action to hasten it, for all deeds are meaningless, and to strive toward accomplishment is to arrogantly elevate yourself to their glory. The holiest bear happy witness to the rot of the universe, but have no part in it.’ They are the laziest cult I have ever encountered. They quite literally believe any action at all is a sin. I am genuinely surprised they went so far as to seek out the ark and book passage.”

  “Perhaps there has been a new revelation,” Borbala said darkly.

  “Perhaps,” shrugged Malak.

  “And what about your friend, this… Soval?” asked Anax, her voice full of feigned hesitance, as if she had never known her, never seen her shining face dancing in the tavern lights on Hephaestus. “Did she also listen to the hanar?”

  “Soval… Soval.” Therion watched the way his shoulders moved when he said her name. “She did, but not like Jalosk. She’s the happiest girl I’ve ever known. She was a poet back on Kahje. She wrote ‘Each of Us Dying is the Soul Name of Rakhana,’ do you know it? It’s very good, if a little on the nose. Her husband is political, a revolutionary, at least in his own mind. But she isn’t like that at all. Soval didn’t listen to Kholai so much as she talked to it. I think she really thought she could change that jelly’s outlook on life. Show him that the galaxy is not a mistake. That joy in living is not a sin. We had our last meal all together. Threnno, Soval, and Kholai sang some Citadel song together. It was nice. No one argued. No one acted strange. And that’s all I saw, I swear to you by the new homeworld we seek in Andromeda.”