The creature saw her. “Terribly sorry,” it said, sounding sincere. “Didn’t mean to be so dramatic, but my biggest problems are always the landings. Hadn’t guessed anyone would be out and about on deck on a night like this anyway, and particularly not you.”
She was still nervous and resisting the urge to fly or otherwise flee, but she summoned up her courage. “You know me?”
“Well, bless my soul! Never laid eyes on you in my life. Don’t have to, though, if you’re the only Amboran on this vessel.”
“I am Jaysu, Priestess of—”
“Oh, I know that,” the creature responded. “Pleased to meet you. Name’s Zicanthripes, but most everyone calls me Eggy. Terribly undignified, I know, but I’ve gotten used to it.” He paused for a moment, then seemed to realize that he’d neglected some vital piece of information, or, perhaps, assumed more than he should have. “I’m your contact. I’m from Core.”
“You—You are of Cobo, then?”
“Oh, goodness me! No! These chaps live so far down I’m not terribly certain what they are! If they even were in the top layers of the ocean here they’d fall apart. Deep pressure types, y’see. No, I’m an Ixthansan. As air breathers, we don’t use much of anything the folks of Cobo want or need, but since the ocean is our element, we can use the waters and the life that’s only in the upper fifty meters or so of the ocean. We’re also from a nontech hex, which is kind of limiting, so it’s handy sometimes to have base ships in Cobo where we can do some fancy things. It’s a treaty, y’see. We don’t use our depths at all, couldn’t even get down that far without being crushed like a spoiled grape, but they can use even a nontech region for whatever sort of agriculture they do. So, we have a deal. They get free use of our bottom and we get free use of their top. Works out fine.”
“You—You are a marine mammal, then? I do not see well in this darkness.”
“Oh, goodness no! I suppose our ancestors were birds, possibly like yours. There’s a mild similarity in the way we’re built. The difference is that you fly in the air and we fly in the ocean.”
Eggy stepped forward so the light from the nearby forward lounge windows caught him and she could finally make him out.
He didn’t walk very well; it was actually a highly comical gait, the legs too short for more than waddling along. The feet were birdlike, though, but like aquatic birds, wide and webbed with long curved claws at the end. He also had wings; stiffer, barer than her own, and situated along the sides of the torso. Unlike her, though, the wings were also hands, the tips ending in grotesque fingers after the bones had first curved around to form and support the wing. The neck was short but flexible, and the head far more avian than humanoid, as hers was, with a flexible, dark-colored bill that was perhaps half the width of a duck’s in proportion to the body, yet resembled a duckbill more than anything else. The nostrils were atop the bill, and in back of the whole thing were two large eyes that resembled not a bird’s so much as a cat’s eyes, changing with and reflecting the light. It appeared smooth and inky black, but when it waddled a bit closer, it looked like short fur. It was neither bald nor fur-covered, though; they were densely packed feathers.
“You look a tad uncomfortable,” Eggy commented. “Why don’t we go inside and talk for a bit?”
She welcomed that idea, although she asked, “Won’t they find you and charge you for passage?”
He chuckled. “Perhaps they will, as far as it goes, but I’m only here for a bit. I’ll consume nothing costing the line anything, and I’ll make my own exit. If they wish to send a bill to the embassy for a few hours’ passage in mid-ocean, they’re welcome to try.”
It really was a large but ungainly creature, and she couldn’t imagine what it was like in the water. It was difficult to think of such a strange and oddly constructed being as existing comfortably in any environment.
He seemed to catch her thoughts, or was used to others thinking it and guessed at the subject.
“We are designed for the water, as you are truly designed for the air. Unlike you, we don’t need to ever land. Our country is a great mass of floating, living sea grasses that provide all the support we require, which is primarily for laying and hatching eggs. I believe that flying for you is no different than swimming for us. For all the differences in our appearance, you’re about as comfortable aboard this thing as I am. Just imagine being able to fly at all times, finding food, companionship, everything you require, without ever landing save to keep the young safe until they can join you. We’re weightless in our environment, and we can chase down, outrun, or do virtually anything in that element. Gravity is the only enemy, and that’s only when we’re out like this.”
He made it sound almost poetic, and she could at least imagine what it might be like, applying her own joy of flight with never having to fight the pull to earth.
“You have a message for me?” she asked him.
He seemed amused. “I thought it might be the other way around. I’m curious, though. Why do you take my word for it that I’m from Core? I know I frightened you with that entrance, and I’ve said and shown you nothing to indicate that I’m really on the side of the just, but you have accepted it.”
She hadn’t even thought about it. “No one can lie to me without my knowing it, and the truth is always evident to me,” she told him honestly. “If you had been playing me false, I would have known it.”
“Indeed? Never saw my like before, yet you are that confident? If you aren’t being naive, then you’re one of the most dangerous folks to have around in any conversation. Good heavens! Everyone would always have to tell the truth around you! The whole of civilization would be jeopardized!”
She didn’t understand the comment and would have liked to know why he thought her “dangerous,” but she sensed that he was at least partly speaking tongue-in-bill, as it were, and decided not to press the point. There were things that many of these strange creatures said that she knew she’d never truly understand. Instead she decided to get right to business. “So you have no message for me?”
“Oh, a few things, but first things first. I realize you haven’t been aboard here very long, but if you can truly sense the just and the ungodly, then are any of the ungodly aboard? And can you describe them?”
“A large green spider-thing,” she told him. “Pleasant enough, but he radiates an evil I cannot quite describe. I find it difficult to cope with someone who has manners, education, vast experience, even a sense of humor, yet seems to have absolutely no moral sense at all. He seems to divide everyone and everything into ‘useful’ and ‘not useful,’ and I’m afraid that anyone in the second category is pretty much irrelevant to him if they get in his way. He is, I believe, the most dangerous person I have ever met, yet so far he radiates no particular intent toward me.”
“He has a name?”
“He says that we could not pronounce nor understand it. He calls himself Wally.’”
“Interesting. Any companions?”
“Two horrid little creatures that resemble the small apes of the coastal cliffs of Ambora, but they wear clothing and have serviceable wings. I believe they can fly if need be, although not great distances. They also sit around smoking horrible smelling little cigars and giggling at inane things. They are as evil and cold as their spiderlike companion, but I do not think they are very clever, either of them. They work for him.”
“Hmrnm… Well, at least you know your enemies. Anyone else?”
“It seems as if everyone on this ship, even half the crew, have some sort of coldness or cruelness in them, but those stand out because they appear to be the ones interested in me.”
“Well, you watch them. We have no idea who the Askoth is, but he was behind the securing of a piece of the Straight Gate only last month. We have to assume he’s working for Chalidang, if not directly, then as a freelance agent, a hired gun. They need some operatives that aren’t of the races in their alliance and can breathe air just to do some background dirty work. Assu
me that they know you are with us, and also assume that they will not hesitate to move against you, even kill you, if they think you are a threat. I would strongly recommend that you cease doing what you were doing tonight and be very social with the other passengers and crew here as much as possible. You may not like them, but these types do not like to do nasty things around lots of witnesses. Stick to your cover story and stay in well-lit, populated areas.”
“Just as others cannot be false with me, I cannot lie to them,” she told him. “It is not something that I have any choice over. It is a part of my calling.”
If Eggy had shoulders, his motion would have been an easy shrug. “So don’t lie. Just don’t tell them what you don’t have to. You are going to Quislon for religious reasons, and for an exchange of religious thought. That is by no means untrue.”
“But they know it’s more than that.”
“Yes, they do. But they can lie, and usually love doing it. Just keep telling yourself to never volunteer information. That is almost always sufficient.”
Eggy was clearly not the religious type, nor comfortable with those who were. He couldn’t help wondering if this priestess wasn’t going to wind up spider dinner, unable to protect herself. He’d never seen such a helpless young thing before, at least unless it was a dumb fish swimming toward an Ixthansan hunting pack.
“Have your spider and winged apes dropped where they are getting off?” Eggy asked her.
“They are being met at sea, as I understand it,” she replied. “Only I get the idea from the time line expressed that they will be leaving close to either Quislon or Pyron.”
“Yes, that fits. They’re after the Quislon part of the Straight Gate. Well, they won’t find this as easy as Pegiri, but I won’t underestimate this sort.” He reached into a natural pouch in his abdomen, something she’d not suspected was there, and brought out a tiny object which he held out for her to take. She did so, and examined it.
“You know what that is?”
“No, not really,” she admitted.
“Well, it’s a camera. Takes pictures that can be printed or digitized. It’s quite simple. You just hold it in your hand so that that little gemlike spot isn’t covered, and point that spot at whoever or whatever you want to photograph. Squeeze here, and the picture is taken. We want you to take pictures of our spider friend, his henchmen, and, for that matter, anybody else you don’t feel is a saint who’s aboard. Don’t worry about whether the subject’s in the picture or anything like that. It’s a very smart little camera and it knows what we want. When you’re done, someone, maybe me, probably somebody else, will pick it up and take it off to a hex Gate, where it’ll go to Zone. There they can identify and check out everybody. Can you do that?”
“I—I suppose so. Anything else?”
“Well, first you must take the photos in a high-tech hex, so please take them in Cobo if you can, and don’t bother in a nontech or semitech environment because the thing won’t work. Second”—he reached back into the pouch and took out a small plastic-looking device, a wafer-thin hexagonal block with a red area in the top center—“take this. When you’re alone in your cabin and are sure nobody is lurking about, press this red spot. It will give you a general briefing. Use this tonight if you can, too. Don’t worry about security, except being overheard—once you use it the first time, it will respond only to your touch. When you don’t need it anymore, toss it overboard. No, I’m not joking. It will dissolve long before it hits anything and it won’t foul the water.”
She took it and stared at it, wondering if it was even moral to use such devices. Finally she decided that, after all, she had been the one who volunteered, and she put it in her small belt purse.
Eggy bobbed his head, apparently in satisfaction. “Got to go now. Being on land like this for very long makes me itch, even if it is just a ship. Any message you want to send to Core while I’m here?”
She thought. “No, nothing I haven’t said. I thank you for this, though. It gives a bit of purpose to the day.”
“And that’s literal,” he reminded her, waddling back toward the door. “Remember, you’ll be out of Cobo and into a semi-tech environment on this route in only thirty-two hours unless they’re forced to reduce speed. Get it done, and good luck to you!”
“I do not believe in luck,” she told him as he left the interior of the ship. But I do believe in destiny, she added to herself.
“Although not true bugs, having spines and some internal structure as well as a soft but naturally protective exoskeleton, they have a communal insectlike social organization that is centered in underground complexes,” the voice from the small hexagonal player informed her. “Place this unit on the floor and step back at least one meter,” it instructed.
She was puzzled, still fascinated by the idea of voices from tiny little wafers, but she did as instructed.
As soon as she stepped back, an image formed in the air directly over the tiny thing. It was not a tiny image, but about half life size, and it startled her and triggered her panic reflex until she caught herself and realized that it was just a picture.
“This is a Quislonian,” the voice informed her. “Most of them look just like this. There is no specialization, as there is in the insect world, for example.”
The thing was really ugly, and she had to pull all of her training from within to keep from being revolted by it. A giant segmented scorpion with a drooling mouth and a lot of feet wasn’t exactly her idea of a friendly race. They were more gruesome than the big spider, which, at least, had texture and color and a sense of individuality.
“The Quislonians are organized into tribal groups each led by a prince. The prince is the only male in the tribe; all others are sacrificed to their gods shortly after birth. The prince spends most of his time impregnating the others of his tribe; otherwise he acts both as high ruler and as high priest, although both roles are essentially ceremonial. There is a council of senior wives, headed by the prince’s mother, who organize the daily lives and activities of the colony and dispense aid and favors in the name of the prince. Princes do look different from the females; you will recognize one in a moment if you get to speak to one. It is most likely you will deal with, at best, the Prince Mother. Prince Mothers are identified because they dye their bodies the colors of the tribe, and the dye patterns indicate rank within the hierarchy. Only the Prince Mother also has a dyed head.”
The image changed, and she saw the same creature essentially colored, with each of the segments a different color. She suspected that the order of the colors indicated the rank and perhaps title within the tribe, but it would be a code she’d never try to crack.
“The tribes are autonomous,” the voice continued, “but all are subject to a single tribe that is at the pinnacle of society because it controls access to a central volcano that forms the core of their worship. It is active, but erupts with slow, thick lava that is rarely explosive and flows with slow deliberation. They, and most others, could outrun it. It is not, of course, constantly erupting, but there is always lava in the central crater. They appear to believe that their god or gods lives in the crater and can control it. You may take that as you will. Know, though, that the volcano also sits at the geographic center of the hex, which means that the Zone Gate actually emerges from the side, and access to it is also via the premiere tribe, whose sole function is religious. The male there has a title that translators make as ‘King,’ and his mother is the ‘Queen Mother,’ but there are, again, religious offices that are more important. They generally leave the more secular tribes alone, but a pilgrimage is required once a year, at which time high rites are done in a massive religious exercise around the volcano. This is what you are going to attend, and it is also where what our enemy wants and we must protect what is most vulnerable.”
She wasn’t at all sure she liked this, and understood why Core had withheld the nature of these people until she was committed to go. She had felt that, within certain limits, there was a co
mmonality of culture at its most basic level between even the likes of those water-breathing Kalindans, the ones she’d met on board, and the others who allegedly came with all of them to this world. But these—these were not only physically unlike anything else she’d seen or known, they appeared to have a belief system that would be very difficult to accept. How could a race as ancient as the others on this world still be worshiping a volcano and throwing its men into it?
Why did Core, who seemed to know at least a little bit about everything, think that Amoboran beliefs were compatible enough with these people as to create a dialogue between she and them? Oh, she could see why they hadn’t had much luck with these people, but, she thought, ones like Core were cold in a different way than the evil ones aboard this vessel, but spiritually empty nonetheless. Core had once been a machine, and she could well believe it. To those with no souls, all religion would look pretty much the same.
Almost as if it could read her mind, the voice continued, “Do not dismiss the Quislon religion as some sort of primitive sacrificial cult. It is quite sophisticated, but it does have its unpleasant aspects, we realize. The sacrificial part certainly seems extreme, but in one sense it is no different than another religion’s commandments on dietary laws or cleanliness rituals where a social good—such as making sure a population didn’t eat things that made them sick—is incorporated into a belief system so that it is universally enforced. The society, physically and even in its genetic design, cannot tolerate multiple males. They are smaller, weaker, and will not live long without a great deal of attention, but they are essential for the equivalent of sperm. Rather than watch most of them die very young for lack of what would be required to sustain them as social invalids, a ritual exists so that their inevitable deaths are given meaning while not impacting on the very limited resources their harsh land provides them. Genetically, biologically, only one of them is going to survive and prosper.”
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