Quietus

by Tristan Palmgren

  He was given very little time to wonder. Three figures were approaching from the direction of the nearest wart-like building. They marched as though in gravity. Their legs bent the wrong way, and their feet were tiny. Their skin was deep black and shone like polished metal. They wore no clothes, but, as they got closer, he saw they had no genitals. He couldn’t stop staring. The strangers had no ears, no hair, and nothing to distinguish men from women. Their eyes were too pristine a white, but their irises were human, brown and hazel.

  Their leader spoke with a woman’s voice. For how strange they all looked, it was remarkable how plain her voice sounded. “Why didn’t you contact us before lifting off?”

  Habidah couldn’t quite meet her eyes. “When I heard all of this, I panicked. I couldn’t–”

  The stranger cut her off with a wave. Niccoluccio saw for the first time that her fingers were webbed. Her toes were like her fingers: long and dexterous, capable of gripping. Also webbed. “Why did you fly your team members to a native village before traveling to us? Your passenger boarded the shuttle only a minute after landing. I doubt you had enough time to discover all this then.”

  Habidah tightened her lips and didn’t answer, though this time she was able to meet the stranger’s stare.

  “Dr Shen, I’m placing you under arrest. The two of you will be memory-rooted until we can figure out just what you’re trying to accomplish.”

  Niccoluccio said, “She’s telling you enough of the truth.”

  Habidah and the stranger looked back at him at the same time. He said, “I don’t know much about this place, but I know a lot more than I should. I know this is a planarship. I know it comes from a world floating in an interstellar dust cloud like black velvet, that blocks all the stars except the sun. You grew up with empty skies.”

  It was impossible to tell anything from the stranger’s expression. Eventually, she nodded to him. One of her companions moved to him. The other stepped behind Habidah, who remained the center of their attention.

  “Is this necessary?” Habidah asked.

  “Truly,” the stranger said. “You’ve resisted us for months. We’re only astonished you’ve gone to these extremes to interfere.”

  Her companion urged Niccoluccio forward with a firm, insistent prod to his shoulder. By carefully keeping one foot rooted on the “ground,” Niccoluccio could shamble forward, a vague approximation of walking.

  He moved slowly at first, still feeling as though he might fly off into the orange expanse. He tried not to look up. He locked his eyes on the buildings ahead. They had no doors or windows. Aside from their shiny, black surfaces, they appeared disturbingly organic, like the nodules outside.

  The crewwoman who’d spoken led the way. When she reached the nearest wall, she vanished into it as though she’d done nothing more than step into a fog bank. Niccoluccio held his breath and kept walking. The world folded over him. As though he’d stepped over a ledge, what was left of his stomach fell away from him.

  By the time the disorientation released him, he and his captors were in an entirely different place. They stood on a shiny, circular platform, about thirty feet in diameter, immersed in a light gray mist. The mist came no closer than the edge of the platform, as though held back. If there was glass there, he saw no sign of it.

  The platform was sinking. The mist whipped past, faster and faster. The floor’s grip had magnified. Niccoluccio doubted he could lift his feet if he tried. The acceleration was not any more uncomfortable than freefall, aside from the blood rushing to his head, but it certainly wasn’t natural. Even if his captors hadn’t been here, he still would have been a prisoner.

  At first, nothing more than a pale glow came through the fog. Niccoluccio couldn’t see any more of the people around him than their silhouettes. The light swiftly brightened until all at once the mist fell away. Niccoluccio shielded his eyes.

  The platform dropped into a vast open sky, with clouds receding above them and a distant yellow-green surface far below. No – the ground rose and curved around them, as if they were falling upside down from a deep canyon valley. Treetop foliage flashed across the canyon walls. But the “trees” were regularly spaced, too close to the ground, and there were no breaks in the cover.

  The crew stood as though nothing remarkable were happening. Only Habidah looked uncomfortable, and she seemed more put off by their captors than anything outside. She glanced back to Niccoluccio. He held her gaze for the moment it lasted.

  The platform kept accelerating, faster and faster, and turned toward the farthest surface. As in a nightmare, the ground lurched at them. All at once, it became clear that it wouldn’t stop in time to “land.” Niccoluccio’s breath hardly had time to catch before they fell right through with no more sound than a whisper.

  They emerged in a crimson expanse crisscrossed with bright yellow lines like threads of sunlight. Every few seconds, a pulse of light traveled along one like a ripple down a string. The acceleration eased. So did the blood rushing to his head, and the force sealing his feet to the platform.

  Habidah turned and took a few steps closer to him. “You described one of the Core Worlds,” she said, quietly.

  “If that’s what they’re called,” Niccoluccio said.

  Neither the woman nor her companions moved. Niccoluccio knew, without asking, that they were listening, even from distances at which it seemed they couldn’t have heard. Habidah asked, “Why would your master describe those to you, but not a planarship?”

  “It didn’t describe them. I told you about my dreams.” But not about the music, the tuning orchestra. He still couldn’t.

  The sun-threads twirled and intertwined like snakes fighting. They twisted so close that it seemed that they would knot, but Niccoluccio never got to see it. Their platform must have met another surface. The light disappeared all at once.

  The next area was much smaller, an egg-shaped space with gray walls only five hundred feet away. They also seemed to be traveling much more slowly – which was odd, since Niccoluccio couldn’t recall feeling deceleration.

  This space was also strung like a spider’s web, but much more thickly, and the threads were larger. People moved upon them. Most were also ink-skinned. Others were missing limbs, or were asymmetrically multi-armed. They walked on all sides of the threads, or into silver spheres. There was no sense of direction, even up or down.

  The crewwoman who’d spoken earlier said, “My name is Osia. You’re taking this all in better stride than I had imagined.”

  “I do not feel like it.”

  Osia nodded to Habidah. “How much did she tell you about this?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Many people find memory-rooting extremely unpleasant. It’s exactly as invasive as it sounds. Ways and Means will examine your memories directly. It’s not physically harmful, but the invasion of privacy is difficult for certain personality types to tolerate.”

  He met Osia’s gaze. “I believe you’d use it on me regardless of what I told you now. I didn’t learn about any of this from Habidah. I don’t believe I could have, either. On the journey here, she told me that she’d never been on a planarship, and only in orbit twice. You can probably confirm that in your own records.”

  Habidah turned toward the vista, so that no one could see her face.

  Osia said, “I was hoping you would tell us something about all this in your own words before we began.”

  “Would it change anything you’re about to do?”

  She didn’t need to answer.

  The platform rushed toward one of the silver spheres. He flinched at the moment the platform impacted. Darkness engulfed everything. The feel of the air changed. A cold breeze slid through his robe, tossed the hair over his tonsure.

  Somewhere in the dark, Osia said, “I don’t understand what either of you thought to win by this.”

  Habidah muttered, “Certainly not personal gain.”

  “What, then?”

  Habidah said, “I could ne
ver stop what you and the amalgamates are trying to do. It’s too far beyond me. But I can make a small difference, maybe.”

  The shadows lightened and lifted. Moon-white walls enclosed them. A sinewy, veinlike corridor wormed into the bowels of the vessel. Niccoluccio’s escort poked him forward.

  Multiple closed portals lined the walls and ceiling, distinguishable only by their grayish color. Their destination was one of the nearer portals. Niccoluccio stepped through into a broad gold and domed chamber. It had no lamps or lights, but it was nearly blinding, as though the walls shone. The only pieces of furniture were a bare, rectangular table, and couches around the far walls. The seats were cushioned, twice as large as they needed to be, and reminded him of the shuttle’s acceleration couches. The table, by contrast, had nothing but a stand joining it to the deck.

  Niccoluccio reached the table and ran his hand across it. It was perfectly smooth and hard as marble. This was where he needed to be. He didn’t know how he knew that, but he was certain.

  He turned. Osia was looking at Habidah. “What did you mean?”

  Habidah said, “At this point, the best way I can hurt you is to not tell you.”

  Osia asked, “Do you know where you are? We’ll find out in a matter of minutes. You lose nothing by telling us.”

  “Listen to you. You don’t even know how to make threats. This isn’t transactional. It’s not about bargaining A for B. I’m out to stop this, and I’ll fight you however I can.”

  “I can tell you one way in which I’m very much human.” Osia waved two fingers at the table. “You really piss me off.”

  The other two crewmembers flanked Habidah.

  Niccoluccio stepped between them. It was suddenly important that Osia interrogate him before Habidah. “She told you the truth when she said she didn’t understand.” He looked at Osia. “I won’t fight whatever you’re going to do.”

  Osia stared deep into him. Niccoluccio tried his best to hold her gaze. Some basin of strength was welling up inside him, forcing him. Osia had to subject him to interrogation before Habidah. Something important hinged on Osia not grasping how important that was.

  Osia lowered her hand and nodded toward him.

  The two crewmembers were at once behind him. They tugged his feet off the deck and pulled him atop the table. Once he was there, its surface gripped him.

  He laid his head back. It was the most uncomfortable bed he had ever felt. It reminded him of the first time he’d seen his novice’s cot at Sacro Cuore, though even that hadn’t been made of stone.

  Osia’s servants pried his hands off his stomach and laid them beside him. The pull on his hands and wrists amplified until it was as strong as manacles. “I’ll cooperate,” he repeated.

  Something underneath his head hummed. At first, he thought it came from the table. The feeling traveled from the back of his skull to his ears. It was a low rattling, and then a cacophony of pitches. That orchestra, rehearsing.

  Shadows appeared around the chamber. The cadence of the ceiling was changing. The lights under the walls were invisibly shifting, focusing on him.

  Whatever machine Osia meant to use on him hadn’t started yet. The music in his head was his own. It was a sound, a feeling, as real as the force holding him. The strings and melodies he’d heard until now had been a warm-up, the clef setting the pitch.

  Off to the side, Habidah shook her head and stalked to the edge of the chamber. She took one of the cushioned seats.

  Niccoluccio closed his eyes, allowed the rehearsal to end, and the performance to begin.

  37

  Meloku’s legs had become a mass of flayed nerves. Her chest and throat burned. Still she ran ahead of Galien. He stumbled after her more by momentum than by choice. More than once, he’d fallen and she’d just pulled him along until he found his footing. Galien’s breath came in ragged gasps. He’d tried to ask questions when they’d set out, but she’d robbed him of the strength.

  She was astonished he’d kept up as well as he had. Even without her demiorganics, she was among the healthiest, fittest people on this world, and her stomach was still a knot of pain. Her ration bars hadn’t lasted long without her demiorganics boosting her metabolism. She couldn’t block out the agony in her legs or the fire in her chest. She could hardly think.

  They were almost there. In truth, they hadn’t had much farther to go. If they’d been dragging Fallard’s men, they would have had another day of walking. Now it was merely sunset, and Meloku recognized the landscape. The shape of the forest to the west and the gentle hills ahead were too distinct to be coincidence.

  She topped the next hill and halted. Galien nearly crashed into her. The decrepit barn sat in the field ahead, half-collapsed. The sunlight was at too steep an angle to reveal anything but shadows inside.

  The shuttle should have been parked next to it, but it was missing.

  The field base’s security systems had surely spotted her. Mission procedure held that, should any of the natives get too close to the field base, the shuttle should be flown to a safer position. She doubted that was what had happened. The field base’s sensors would’ve seen who she was.

  She resumed running, pulling Galien. The burning in her limbs had gotten worse. Just a few hundred more meters and then she could rest, she lied to herself.

  She let go of Galien’s wrist right before she reached the barn doors. She heard scuffling and then a thud as he crashed into the wall. She was already through the doors and into the darkness.

  The door leading downward was already open. Kacienta and Joao were framed in the artificial light, running to meet her. Joao ran past to check on the man she’d left outside.

  Meloku almost pushed through Kacienta. Kacienta grabbed her shoulder. The strength of the grip confirmed one of Meloku’s fears: Kacienta had active demiorganics.

  Kacienta asked, “What the fuck is–”

  Meloku interrupted: “Were you in on this?”

  Kacienta looked at her, uncomprehending. Meloku took a risk. She jammed her arm under Kacienta’s throat and shoved her into the barn wall. The planks shuddered. Any more force, and she’d give away the fact that her augmented muscles were offline. If, of course, Kacienta didn’t know already.

  Meloku asked, “Are you working with Habidah?”

  “No,” Kacienta choked. “Habidah stole the shuttle.”

  Meloku let go. She turned toward the ramp leading downward. Kacienta rasped, “How did you know to get here? Did Ways and Means find out?”

  “I lost contact with Ways and Means,” Meloku said, and started downward.

  She wasn’t expecting the smell of smoke at the bottom. Dust tickled her nose. Three lights lining the walls had gone out. Those lights were rated for five hundred years of continuous use.

  The walls ahead had buckled. So many lights had gone out that the corridor was half shadow. Debris from the broken lights remained scattered on the floor. The damage led in the direction of the communications chamber.

  Kacienta had recovered herself. Her bootsteps followed Meloku. She asked, “Who did you bring along?”

  “He’s a native,” Meloku said.

  “Not again,” Kacienta said. “Not you, too.”

  “Just take care of him,” Meloku snapped. The door to the communications chamber had been jarred open. She sidled through.

  The farthest wall had been rent as though by an earthquake. The light from the corridor was barely enough to illuminate the room, but it showed her all she needed. The bare guts of the base’s gateway mechanism had been exposed. The aperture projectors, two rapier-sharp metal needles, jutted from the interior floor and ceiling. To a human eye, their tips seemed to touch, but they were actually infinitesimally far apart. They were surrounded by power conduits, transformers, and heat sinks. A mass of tubing coiled around the base of each emitter, held fast by thin gold-silver threads.

  The moment she’d stepped inside, she knew exactly what had happened.

  Beads of glass cracked a
nd crunched under her boots. Without demiorganics, she wouldn’t be able to manipulate anything. She would need help.

  Kacienta stepped into the chamber a few steps behind, as if afraid. Meloku felt like a parent coming home after the kids had wrecked the place.

  Meloku asked, “Habidah took the shuttle to Ways and Means, didn’t she?”

  “How’d you know?”

  “It’s the only place on this plane worth going to.”

  The gateway, she figured, must have been used to transport something from this plane, to another. Her enemy had more than enough power already here.

  Meloku said, “You told me Habidah stole the shuttle. So who went through the gateway?”

  Kacienta didn’t even ask how she’d guessed that. “It was her pet monk. But he came back. Is that why you brought the other native here? To do the same thing? Is this some kind of amalgamate trick?”

  “What? No. He’s just a man. Tell Joao to get him food and water. Tranquilize him if he complains.”

  A neat cleft had split the floor down the middle. Meloku stepped over it, toward the rent in the wall. In spite of the destruction, the gateway mechanism was wholly intact. Not a sliver or wire out of place. It had been built to withstand earthquake-like stresses, but everything around it hadn’t. The compression waves had sheared through the earth, rock, and walls, ripping metal like paper. It was probably unsafe to be here. The chamber might collapse.

  Kacienta said, “Joao and I still don’t have any idea what happened here. It’s got us thinking we’re up against some god, some extraplanar power–”

  Meloku turned, gave her a withering look. It worked; Kacienta stopped babbling. Meloku asked, “How long ago did they leave?”

  “Who?”

  Meloku said, through strained patience, “Habidah and her monk.”

  “Two hours,” Kacienta stammered. “We can’t contact our satellites, but last the ground sensors saw, they were headed to Ways and Means. They must have reached it by now. If Ways and Means let them, I mean.”