by Ivan Cat
Below, the globe swelled to fill Karr's view and there were finally spots of land. The surface of the ocean was dotted with tiny ring-shaped islands, the circles seeming almost too perfect to be natural.
And all the while Long Reach continued to drift away, a ball of fire plunging through thin stratospheric clouds. Karr's companion of so many years, the only living creature he had been allowed to care about, was dying.
Down, down they plunged, thirty thousand feet, twenty thousand feet, both ships piercing the planet's terminator. Day turned into night.
It gave Karr no comfort that he had done a better job than he thought during those brief moments when Long Reach had responded to its braking controls; both ships were going down in the general area below the weather satellite, where the colony would have been planted. Karr blinked watering eyes as Long Reach disappeared, a soft red glow behind thicker clouds at the horizon.
Now it was just Karr and the heavy lifter.
Buffeting increased in the denser, low altitude air. Time for final descent. Saving himself hardly seemed to matter in the depths of Karr's anguish, but Karr rattled through the landing procedure even though he could barely read the instruments. "Everything seems fine," he said in a wavering voice.
Pieces of the lifter began to break off.
"Encountering a bit of turbulence. We've done our checks. Leveling off for final approach." There was no hope of a vertical landing on one of the small islands, but Karr could ditch in the water—if he got the lifter down below one hundred and fifty knots. He checked the airspeed: four hundred knots. Karr turned up the cowl fields.
"Damp it down. Damp it way down," Karr recited. "Bleeding speed. Three ninety, three fifty-five...."
Altitude dropped to under a thousand feet. Surface details resolved. Individual waves tossed on the surface of the ocean. The lifter whooshed over an island covered in spindly trees, their puff-ball tops tossing in the vehicle's wake.
"Three hundred, two eighty. Slow lifter, slow."
Karr felt the world reaching up to swat him. The lifter was coming in way too fast and the physics were unforgiving. Below one fifty the lifter would hold together, above that speed the hull would experience catastrophic failure.
Whoop, whoop! Abort! warned a klaxon.
"Two seventy."
Karr wasn't going to make one fifty.
"Come on lifter, slow, slow."
Here came the water, rushing up with frightening speed.
Whoop, whoop! Abort!
Karr grabbed a handle above his head and yanked down with all his might. Solid rocket cells ignited, flashing hot under his seat. Ceramite windows shattered overhead and Karr lost consciousness as he shot out of the cockpit into the bittersweet air of an alien world.
VIII
Overesteem a leader and the people become powerless, Overvalue possessions and the needy become thieves, Overcling to life and the living become assassins.
—Feral aphorism
The four of them spoke in Khafra light-code:
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The dining hall was beautiful. More beautiful—as far as the domestics were concerned—than any other place in the Enclave. Golden rays shone down from clouds of floating glowbeads. Gold light, the color of happiness. It filled the grand room. It shone on intriguing, lonely things the humans called art and statues. It shone on the long white-clothed table, the sparkling see-through glasses, the gleaming metal and ceramic eating things. It shone on the feast plant, around which the table was built; it made the stunted branches, steaming waxy seedpods, and leathery leaves seem almost beautiful. Almost. And the light shone down on a wooden floor so glossy that, reflected in it, the domestics could see themselves and the forty humans that were gathered in their fine Consular robes and glittering badges and pins.
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Rusty, the oldest of them, sighed. <
Patton looked around the assembled humans. <
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Rusty looked at Patton, also confused.
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Spike didn't get the chance to finish his sentence, because at that moment every bullet-shaped head in the dining hall cocked toward the entry doors. The humans, as usual, paid little attention.
Tesla flung the doors open.
Webs, a young Subconsul, snapped to attention. "Prime Consul Olin Tesla," she quickly announced.
Tesla nodded briskly in the silence that followed, his gaze scouring human face after human face.
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But Jenette's domestic underground had warned their humans with inconspicuous bumps on their legs or scratches on their feet. Everyone involved had time to put on their secret-hiding faces. The Prime Consul learned nothing from his abrupt, late entrance. Looking disgruntled, he moved to the head of the long table. The other humans followed him to their places. Toby, Tesla's domestic, lead the way, using his large size to intimidate the other domestics.
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The other domestics hurried to clear a path—even Patton, who particularly disliked Toby.
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The humans remained standing around the table. When the shuffling and adjusting subsided, Tesla bowed his head and stacked his fists over his heart. All the humans did the same.
Webs spoke again in a formal voice, "Strong is the Body, pure of thought and action."
"Pure is the Body, strong against temptation," Tesla and the others responded.
"As it was on Evermore," Webs continued.
"Never shall it be in the New Ascension," the others solemnly finished.
Tesla sat. The forty Consuls and Subconsuls did the same, Webs with some relief that she had not messed up the invocation. The domestics recognized this as their cue and the small army of quadrupeds disappeared out alcove holes around the dining hall walls. They reappeared moments later bearing an array of foods that humans considered succulent: alemani-hopper forelegs with suckers stripped and replaced with sprigs of pepper-thistle, the beheaded body of a pugg coated in orange sweet-goo, something called a faux-chicken which was cut into thin strips and served over tuber skins.
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Tengen's muzzle curled as he took a dish to Panya Hedren. <
Bronte glared at Tengen. <
Tengen might have said more, but at the last moment realized he was within Panya's field of view and wisely decided not to flash in her presence.
Having placed the dishes
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The humans inhaled the sumptuous odors, or licked their lips, but none made a move for the food.
"Please," said Tesla, nodding stiffly, "eat."
They waited as he took the first mouthful, then followed suit. As they ate, Tesla made an effort to set them at ease with conversation and by showing a lot of teeth—something humans did when they were happy, but something Tesla rarely did. As far as the domestics could tell, this did not seem to have the desired effect. However, since Tesla was the most powerful among them, the humans laughed when he laughed and looked concerned when he looked concerned, and did not speak what they really thought, as was proper in human society. But the mood did lighten, slowly, and what did it was not Tesla's stiff attempt to play host, but the glasses and glasses of droobleberry-ferment. After a time, spots of conversation began to break out here and there. Some humans even laughed.
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"—so he says, I don't care if you do it with her anymore, just don't use my hairy ass as a score board!" Burke guffawed and elbowed Panya, who turned a lovely shade of pink (one of the few colors humans could produce on their skins).
"Oh Burke! Don't be crude," she said, unable to a repress a grin.
Some of the nearby humans laughed. Some did not; in particular, those who were more inclined to be concerned with rules and proper appearances remained stony-faced. Also, those humans on hormone inhibitors seemed uneasy with the content of the story.
"Indeed, well..." the human sitting at the end of the table opposite Tesla smiled nervously. Dr. Pondur Yll was old like Tesla, but where Tesla had become leaner and harder, Yll had become more wrinkled and infirm; where Tesla's hair was short-cropped and still grew over most of his head, Yll's was long and gathered like a tail, but thin. Yll seemed anxious to find another subject. "And how are you feeling, Madam Hedren?"
All eyes turned Panya's way. "Couldn't be better," she replied, basking in her newfound celebrity. She patted her ripe belly. "And the quads couldn't be better. Oooh!" Panya squealed, feeling an internal kick. "I think they're getting impatient."
"We've been blessed," Burke said happily.
"Thanks to Dr. Yll," Tesla said, honing in on the dialogue from his end of the table. The Prime Consul held up his glass. "A toast to Dr. Yll and his wonderful fertility drugs."
Yll seemed even more nervous at that toast than Burke's off-color story, but he drank as the rest of the table drank.
Burke Hedren held up his own glass and said, a little too loudly, "And to Jenette!"
Panya sniffed and rolled her eyes.
"To Jenette Tesla," Jenette's supposed fiancé, Bragg, chimed in from his seat near Tesla.
"To Jenette Tesla," Colonel Halifax, also seated near Tesla, agreed.
Some of the Consuls flinched guiltily and the Prime Consul frowned at the mention of Jenette's name—his eyes darted to her empty seat—but everyone drank.
The meal proceeded. The domestics gathered up empty droobleberry-ferment flasks.
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Tengen nodded at Tesla, Yll, and Halifax. <
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Tesla, Yll, and Halifax were the only remaining ancients. Tesla and Yll had changed over the years. Halifax's stalky frame and leathery, scarred complexion never seemed to change from year to year—except to become more scarred.
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Rusty's muzzle screwed up as he tried to think. <
Tengen did the math on his four-thumbed paws.
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Rusty considered. <
Tengen counted on his thumbs again. His colors took on alarmed hues. <
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As Rusty and Tengen exited through the alcoves with empty flasks, Bronte entered.
Going to the long table, she moved methodically up and down each side, attending the feastplant. A seedpod steamed before each seated human. These she sniffed for correct temperature, drawing air over baleen-like nasal furrows in the roof of her mouth. Then, using her long teeth, she injected a tiny amount of immune venom to stimulate the chemical reactions within. Rust spots started to appear on the tightly wrapped leaves. Only when Bronte was satisfied with all the seedpods did she withdraw and allow the next course to be served.
Rusty and Tengen returned to the hall with more flasks of droobleberry-ferment. Tengen's worried coloring had diminished, but not his penchant for questions.
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Rusty wobbled his head, the equivalent of a human shrug. <
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Rusty kept an eye on Tesla, who was showing a lot of smiley teeth at the amount of ferment that they were serving. Rusty didn't think that was a good sign.
The feast proceeded. Course upon course of fine food made its way from kitchens hidden behind the alcove exits to the table. Then came the main course. All dishes were removed and wide platters placed under the now brick-red seedpods. At a signal from Bronte, each domestic lined up along the table and simultaneously injected a bit more venom into the waxy stalks behind the pods. Even the most wary Consuls were enraptured as the seedpods unwound like flowers. Puffs of aromatic steam unveiled clusters of red nodules. Translucent sauce dripped onto the platters. This was the pièce de résistance, grown to order while the humans supped.
The humans attacked the nodules with long, narrow forks.
"Is this not superb?" asked a plump man three chairs down on Tesla's right. The man's face pinched with ecstasy as he chewed a morsel. "I find it quite superb."
Tesla responded cautiously, "A simpler diet suits me better, Dr. Bigelow." Tesla obviously did not like Consul Dr. Clarence Bigelow. Bigelow bulged from a Consul uniform big enough for any three other colonists, but Tesla always acted deferential; as Bronte was constantly telling the other domestics, Bigelow was very smart and his position as chief physicist in charge of the Enclave's energy production made him an important human in the Chamber of the Body.
"I applaud it," said Bigelow; he shot a smile in Bronte's direction. "I applaud this entire affair."
Tesla looked disgruntled, but said nothing.
Bigelow continued. "The problem with this colony—" Bigelow always said colony and not Enclave, which seemed to annoy Tesla further, "—is that no one has any sense of style." Bigelow flourished a hand festooned with metal rings. "This hand-to-mouth existence rubs it out of us. It's not good for the soul. I ask you, Prime Consul, why did we come to this planet if not for passion and vision?" Bigelow was one of the last few dozen or so humans who had come from off-planet, and whose ages now ranged from twenty-four to twenty-nine. They had arrived by fugueship, precious berths that might have been filled by breeding-age colonists allotted to young children in order to secure the participation of parents deemed absolutely necessary for the survival of the colony. Initially considered a waste, these juvenile colonists had turned out to be a blessing now that all the other adults were dead. Bigelow and hi
s kind comprised most of the members of the Chamber of the Body.
Another delicacy disappeared into Bigelow's cavernous mouth. Fat lips sucked pudgy fingers. "I for one will not go quietly, into mediocrity but rage, rage against the dying of the light."
Tesla grunted, unable to disagree with the sentiment, and ventured to taste the feastplant.
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Toby had also noticed Tesla's dislike of the food and, anxious to please lest he feel his master's wrath, hurried over to Bronte. <
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Bronte relented, scurrying off submissively. She returned a few minutes later with a covered dish, which Toby snatched from her and placed before the Prime Consul. Tesla eyed it suspiciously, but lifted the lid, revealing a plate of boiled flat-grains with no salt. When no other humans were looking, Tesla patted Toby on the head.
"Good boy, Toby."
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The domestics scurried back to their places around the table.
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A group of humans burst into raucous laughter.
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Many foolish humans were intoxicated, and even some of the scientists. Intoxicated humans did not fare well against Tesla's surprises.