by Timothy Zahn
“But there’s nothing to lose by trying,” she continued, pushing her fears and her annoyance into the back corner of her brain where she kept a lot of her experiences with Trake’s group. “Wisp?” she called, raising her voice. “Wisp? Come here, please. I need you. Actually, I need three of you.”
She paused, waiting. She hadn’t seen Wisps very often when she was working with her team, but now that they were listening for her call they seemed to show up pretty quickly. She wasn’t sure where they hid the rest of the time, but wherever it was—
“There,” Kahkitah said, pointing over her shoulder.
Nicole spun around, tensing. Three Wisps were gliding toward them, their faces expressionless as always. She shifted her weight slightly, ready to make a run for it if the Shipmasters had gotten to them, too.
To her relief, they came to a halt a couple of yards away from her. She gave it another second, just to be sure.
“They seem all right,” Kahkitah murmured.
Nicole nodded. “We need to go through there,” she told the Wisps, pointing to the wall. “To the Q1 arena on the other side of the heat-transfer duct.”
The Wisps didn’t move. Nicole counted out three more seconds, just to make sure they weren’t going to charge. Then, bracing herself, she stepped to the nearest one, turned around, and backed into it. Its arms enfolded her—
We want to go to the arena, she thought again toward the Wisp. Can you take us there?
The arena is behind us, the Wisp replied. Do you wish to be carried the entire way?
Not that arena, Nicole said. The one past the duct, the one in Q1.
The Wisp paused as if considering that. Just past the duct is another section of the Fyrantha, Nicole said. I know you can’t see all of it, but you should at least be able to see the first corridor or two, right? The arena should be right past the duct.
Yes, the Wisp said. I see now. Yes, we can take you there. Your companion, too?
Yes, Nicole said. The entrance should be somewhere nearby.
Yes.
And to Nicole’s relief a section of the wall opened up about six feet to her right, sending the familiar blast of hot air across her. As the Wisp turned and glided toward it, she had a quick glimpse of the other two taking hold of Kahkitah and also heading for the opening.
They were right on the edge of the duct when it suddenly occurred to Nicole that all the Shipmasters really had to do was let one of their Wisps duplicate the usual behavior pattern, and they could dump her into the duct before she had even a hint anything was wrong.
Fortunately, by the time that thought occurred to her they were already at the threshold, the Wisp gripping her had unfurled its wings, and they were floating up and across the flood of hot air blasting up from below.
Maybe it was because Nicole was still recovering from that latest flash of fear, but they were halfway across before it abruptly registered that while they were going across they were also going up.
I asked you to take us to the arena, she thought at the Wisp.
We are doing so, the Wisp assured her.
But the arena should be straight across from where we started.
There is no entry point straight across from that corridor, the Wisp answered. We are instead taking you to the upper level.
The upper level? As far as Nicole could remember, she’d never seen an upper level in any of the arenas. Was Q1 different?
She was about to find out. The Wisp had leveled off, and an access panel was opening directly across from her. Beyond, its image blurred and distorted by the roiling air, was some kind of room. The Wisp took her through the opening, lowered her gently to the floor, and opened its arms.
Nicole took a step forward, looking around. At first glance the room seemed to be something like a wide balcony, with a waist-high ceramic barrier and a six-foot-tall transparent material above it that looked out and down into a brightly lit area. But a second, closer look showed her that there was a curve to the balcony, reaching out to both sides of the inner sky area and disappearing around the edges. A circular balcony, then, that completely surrounded the arena?
A soft whistling came from behind her. “An observation gallery,” the translation came. A Ghorf hand stretched out over her shoulder, pointing. “And a recording studio?”
Nicole felt her throat tighten. Kahkitah was pointing at a pair of stands perched at the front edge of the balcony. On top of the stands were small rectangular boxes, their front faces angled downward. Several other pairs of stand-and-box combos were spaced around the balcony, she saw now, always two of them together, always angled to look downward. Beside some of them were what looked like full-face binoculars on their own stands, also angled downward into the arena. At regular intervals around the rim she could also see small control consoles with muted lights.
Aside from her and Kahkitah, the place seemed deserted.
Nicole turned back to the Wisps, who were still standing just inside the now closed access door. “Wait here,” she ordered. “We may want you to take us somewhere else.”
“Please,” Kahkitah prompted.
Nicole pursed her lips. “Please,” she added.
The Wisps didn’t move, but Nicole had the sense that they were settling in to wait. “Okay,” she said, touching Kahkitah’s arm. “Let’s see what the Fyrantha’s whipped up for us this time.”
eight
Up to now Nicole had seen grasslands, jungles, and the mix of terrain types that she’d first found in Q4. But the Q1 arena topped them all.
It was the seashore.
A full seashore, too, complete with a rolling ocean that filled the right-hand third of the arena. On the left-hand section, closest to their current vantage point, there was a narrow beach with some scattered sticks that gave way to a mass of low, reed-covered dunes behind them. Beyond the strip of reeds were low hills with a mix of grass and short, wide-canopied trees. A rapid, white-water stream flowed down from a tall hill about midway across the land area, disappearing behind a tall, rocky bluff that jutted out of the beach, then reappearing as it emptied into the ocean. On the other side of the stream a second bluff rose from the beach, this one a little taller and even more rocky than the closer bluff. Nicole couldn’t see much past the two bluffs and the stream’s big hill, but it looked like there was another narrow stretch of beach on that side of the stream. The ocean ran right up to the base of the twin bluffs, with crashing waves that splashed another five or six feet up the rock with each surge of the surf.
“Is that a whole lake?” Kahkitah asked from beside her, his whistling sounding awestruck.
“More like a small ocean,” Nicole said. Was that something moving among the low trees? “I don’t think you get waves like that in a lake.”
“Yes, of course,” Kahkitah said. “Yet how are there waves in here at all? The ocean seems too small for waves to be natural.”
Nicole snorted. “Nothing in this place is natural, Kahkitah,” she said. “Look down there in the trees—there, just past the dunes on this side. Is that someone in a green jumpsuit?”
“Yes, I see him,” Kahkitah said. “I think that’s Iosif.”
“Who?”
“Iosif,” Kahkitah repeated. “He’s part of Miron’s green repair group.”
“Right,” Nicole said. Their own blue group hadn’t had a lot of contact with the green group, and she’d never had a chance to learn all their names or faces.
But she remembered that the greens’ usual work area was behind the blue’s hive. If they were here, that would explain why that part of the Fyrantha had been deserted earlier when she’d traveled through it.
But what were they doing here? If Kahkitah was right about Jeff and the blue group being taken by the Shipmasters—
She tensed as it suddenly clicked. Up to now the Shipmasters’ pattern—or at least the pattern she’d seen—had been to pit two different alien races against each other. But if they were serious about finding out if humans could fight, the
easiest way to do that would be to throw two human teams at each other.
And it wasn’t like they would have to fine-tune the Wisps and their teleporter gadget to find them, either. All they had to do was march them halfway across the Fyrantha.
“We have to get down there,” she told Kahkitah, studying the area as best she could, trying to see who was where. But it was a waste of effort. The trees seemed reasonably short, but their leaf canopies were wide enough to block most of the area beyond the dunes.
Still, it made sense for the Shipmasters to split up the groups by people who already knew each other. If the green group was on this side of the stream, then Jeff and the rest of the blue group must be on the other side. If they were going to fight, there had to be a way to get back and forth between them.
Only she couldn’t see any way to do that. The stream cut across the whole land area, from the hive end of the arena all the way to the ocean.
And it wasn’t like any of the streams in the Q4 arena. Those were slow, lazy things, usually narrow enough to step over and equipped with small bridges where they weren’t. This stream was a lot faster, spraying water and foam over the banks as it rolled down the cliff. It was also much wider, ten or twelve feet across, way too wide to step over. Unless there was a bridge somewhere between the two bluffs that she couldn’t see from her position, it would be dangerous to cross.
“Look—there’s a doorway back there,” Kahkitah said, pointing past her face. “At the very back, below those tree canopies.”
“Yes, I know,” Nicole said, trying not to sound too irritated. Of course there was a door back there—those were the fighters’ living areas when they weren’t out fighting. “Forget that for now. We need to find a way into the arena.”
“It’s right there,” Kahkitah said, sounding puzzled as he shifted his finger to point straight across the observation deck. “Those stairs.”
Nicole frowned, peering across the balcony. All she could see was a coloring like more of the arena sky. “I don’t see anything.”
“You have to look past the reflection on the inside of the material,” Kahkitah said, as if that was the easiest thing in the world. “The material between us and the arena seems to pick up the sky colors, which makes it invisible from below—”
“Yeah, yeah, I got that,” Nicole said, not bothering to hide her frustration this time. She’d already figured out that that was why she hadn’t seen the similar observation deck in Q4. She’d always assumed the Shipmasters had hidden cameras up there; she’d never dreamed they had a whole wraparound room to hang out in. “You can see stairs over there?”
“Yes,” Kahkitah said. “Come. I’ll show you.” He started off to the right around the edge of the deck. Taking another look at the arena, Nicole started to follow—
And for the second time that day slammed squarely into a Ghorf as Kahkitah abruptly stopped. “Kahkitah—” she bit out.
“Look,” he said, his whistling sounding odd as he pointed to the wall. “Are those…?”
Nicole looked where he was pointing, a shiver running up her back. Standing upright in a rack beside a desk and another of the consoles were six long, slender black tubes.
Greenfire weapons.
“They sure as hell are,” she confirmed, forcing her voice to remain steady. The deadliest weapons she’d seen yet aboard the Fyrantha. The things that had made the difference between victory and defeat for the Micawnwi. The things that had nearly killed Jeff.
And here they were, six of them. Not locked up, not hidden away, not riding in the back end of a Shipmaster’s centaur armor.
Ripe for the taking.
Because, really, what did it matter anymore? No matter what happened down there, the Shipmasters were bound to find out how well humans could fight. Nothing could stop that now. She didn’t know what kind of gear Fievj would give them for their private little war, but a set of greenfire weapons would absolutely give Jeff the edge they’d need to live through it.
On the other hand, if she helped the blue group, it would mean hurting or even killing some of the green group. Did she have the right to take sides when it meant the lives of other people?
She felt her lips curl back in a snarl. Damn right she did. Protector or not, she’d started out as the blue group’s Sibyl, and if it came to choosing sides that was where she would land. She’d taken Trake’s side often enough when there’d been arguments within his group. Once or twice she’d even taken Bungie’s side, though usually only when he’d already been on Trake’s.
She was still eyeing the weapons when Kahkitah put a hand on her shoulder and shoved her to the floor.
“Wh—?” was all she managed before his other hand clamped over her mouth.
“Shh!” a barely audible birdsong whistled in her ear as the hand covering her mouth turned her head a little ways to her right. “Shipmasters!”
Nicole tensed as she peered over the balcony barrier. They were there, all right: Fievj and two others, wearing the kimono-and-sash outfits she’d seen them in once before when they thought no humans were around. They were striding in from a stairway she hadn’t noticed before, leading off the balcony about twenty feet from the panel the Wisps had used to bring in her and Kahkitah.
The panel the Wisps were still standing in front of.
Nicole hissed silently between her teeth. Damn. What was Fievj going to think about Wisps just standing around their area? Especially Wisps that weren’t from here in Q1? Or would the Shipmasters even have a way of knowing where they’d come from?
She bit down on her lip. Of course they would know. The first order Fievj gave—and was ignored—and the whole thing would blow up.
There was another soft whistle in her ear. “This way,” Kahkitah said, gently pushing her head back out of sight below the level of the barrier as the hand on her shoulder urged her toward the stairway he’d pointed to earlier. Nicole took one last lingering look at the greenfire weapons—
“You!” Fievj snapped. “What are you doing here?”
Wincing, staying in a low crouch, Nicole let Kahkitah hustle her around the curve of the balcony, not daring to look behind her. Probably Fievj was talking to the Wisps, and hopefully none of the Shipmasters had spotted her or Kahkitah. But whether they had or not, this was no place to hang around.
The conversation behind them had shifted to something that sounded both puzzled and irritated by the time she and Kahkitah came in sight of the stairway. It was right where he’d said it would be, though how he could have seen it through the reflective layer she couldn’t guess.
Getting from the barrier across the balcony was going to be the real trick. Luckily, either the Shipmasters were as bad at seeing through the glare as Nicole was or else their full attention was still focused on the wayward Wisps. She and Kahkitah reached the stairs without being challenged.
The stairway was similar to the one she’d used to get to the top of the Fyrantha once before: narrow, dimly lit, and curving around so that it was impossible to see how long the walk was going to be or where they were going to end up. Unlike the one the Shipmasters had used to get to the balcony, this staircase only went down.
Neither the length or the single direction seemed to matter to Kahkitah. He didn’t hesitate, but headed immediately down the steps, rising from his own bent-waisted crouch only when he was far enough down that the deck would block any view of him from the Shipmasters at the far end of the balcony. Nicole, with nothing better to offer and with caution pretty much already out of the equation, followed close behind.
The stairway went down a long way, though considering how far above the arena floor they’d started that wasn’t surprising. Still, Nicole had hoped the stairs would lead to another set of corridors where they would at least have a couple of options as to what to do next.
No such luck. They reached the bottom to find a single door blocking their way.
“This must lead into the arena,” Kahkitah murmured thoughtfully. He ran his hands
along the material, then gave a tentative push. The panel responded by swinging outward from the stairway, revealing a glimpse of sand beyond it. “Shall we enter?” he asked, holding it open a crack.
“Yeah, just a second,” Nicole said, frowning at the door. She’d been all through the Q4 arena and had never seen anything like a door handle on any of the walls. If there wasn’t an inside handle, and if they went through and let it close behind them, they probably wouldn’t be able to get it open again. That would leave only the four main doors as possible exits.
Actually, there might only be two doors here. If this arena was arranged like the others, two of the usual doors would be positioned across the ocean.
Besides, those greenfire weapons were up this staircase. That wasn’t an option she was ready to give up on quite yet.
On the other hand, even if they figured out a way to sneak in without Fievj spotting them from their eagle perch, a propped-open door would surely catch someone’s attention sooner or later.
She started at the sudden sound of tearing cloth. She looked over to see that Kahkitah had somehow torn a spiral strip from his jumpsuit sleeve. “Here,” he said, handing it to her. “Tie a knot at one end.”
She frowned, taking the cloth. What in the world—?
And then, she got it. Smiling tightly, she tied a double knot in the end, then doubled it again just to be safe. “Ready?”
“Ready,” Kahkitah confirmed.
“Okay.” Taking a deep breath, hoping fervently that Fievj was still talking to the Wisps and not looking into the arena, she pushed open the door and stepped through.
She’d worried that they would emerge on the beach, completely open to view from above. Fortunately, their door was farther back, a little ways in from where the dunes met the trees, a spot that should be fairly well hidden from the observation balcony. She slipped through, held the door for Kahkitah, then dropped onto her knees and set the strip of cloth on the ground with the knot inside the stairway. Kahkitah had already taken hold of the door, and now eased it shut, closing the strip into the crack.