‘Investigate?’
‘As we speak, OLOSS has amassed a presence at Intel and Jandowae stations. That has made it more difficult for me to move my own people around.’
Thales frowned, not really understanding the implications. ‘Do you have restrictions on your movements, Commander?’
The grey eyes hardened. ‘Of course not. But I am watched by both sides. I must consider all aspects and possibilities when I take action.’
‘Are you saying that your only course of action is inaction?’ asked Thales.
‘Not inaction—caution.’
‘They can amount to the same thing,’ Thales challenged him mildly.
‘Ah. You scholars do love to debate—’
‘The answer is obvious to me, Lasper,’ interjected Bethany. ‘And I don’t believe that you can’t see it too.’
Farr raised an eyebrow at his sister, his expression so bland as to be almost obtuse. ‘And what is that, Beth?’
‘Find out who sent the Saqr there. Attack it from that angle.’
‘Well done, little sister. I see you can still think the way I taught you, if only when pushed.’
Bethany’s cheeks coloured, but she didn’t respond.
Lasper went on. ‘And you are correct. I do know who has sent them there. And in that lies another challenge.’
‘It’s the Extros, isn’t it?’ she whispered.
He nodded. ‘And so you can see my problem. One injudicious move in either direction could spark something that cannot be stopped. Even for the life of my niece, I will not risk a war in Orion.’
‘But you promised the Baronessa,’ protested Thales.
‘The Baronessa could well be dead,’ he said matter-of-factly. ‘Although I admit to a certain interest in her abduction. Perhaps the Extras have become wary of her influence.’
‘She is not dead. Josef Rasterovich will find her,’ said Bethany emphatically.
‘The God Discoverer has some clear objectives of his own and they don’t include rescuing eccentric women.’
Bethany tucked her thin hair behind her ears and lifted her chin in a gesture Thales was used to seeing. ‘That is where you have always fallen down, Las. Not seeing the things driven by simple emotions.’
‘While you, my dear, have always given in far too readily to simple primitive urges.’
Beth became very still, as if holding herself in check, while Lasper turned his sharp scrutiny onto Thales. The grey eyes were a weapon, needling at him. Finally, Farr looked back at his sister.
He stood to leave. ‘You’ll have to tell him, Beth,’ he said softly. ‘In the end.’
* * *
Later, Thales and Bethany lay in the bed, holding hands. A weight had descended upon them both. Thales knew his own depression to be a mingling of frustration and indecision.
‘What can I do now? Lasper will not be rushed into an intervention when the stakes are so complex,’ whispered Bethany.
Thales squeezed her hand. ‘While the shift station is in the hands of the Extros there is nothing you can do.’
‘But I have to act in some way. You understand that, don’t you?’
He nodded, although they lay in darkness. ‘How can I find out about the DNA?’ he asked her.
‘Other than breaking into Lasper’s labs?’
Thales moved his face closer to her ear. ‘That’s what I meant.’
She stiffened. ‘Thales?’
‘I know all you want to do is help your daughter, Beth. But the fact is that no one can get through to Araldis. The shift station is blocked.’
‘You don’t understand. I abandoned her. She’s down there struggling to survive against the Saqr. I have to do more than sit and wait.’
‘You can’t,’ said Thales flatly. ‘But I can.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘The DNA was meant for illegal purposes on Scolar. If I can bring news of that to the Sophos, then perhaps they will listen to me on other things.’
‘You want to go to Scolar?’
‘I would see Gutnee Paraburd confined.’
‘Is that the only reason you wish to return?’
‘For the most part.’ He told her then about Villon and the malaise that had overtaken his society.
She listened intently until he’d finished, then she rolled towards him, their lips almost touching. ‘Do you think they killed him? The philosopher?’
‘I am sure of it.’ He felt her skin warming where it touched his.
‘How terrible, Thales.’
‘The laboratory creature on Rho Junction told Tekton and me that the DNA targeted the orbitofrontal cortex. You know more of biology than I. Is it possible that such a thing would cause behavioural changes?’
‘I could make some guesses if I knew more about the DNA.’
‘That is what I thought. Will you help me?’
She slipped her arm across his body and squeezed hard: her unspoken answer.
Thales felt her tremble. She cared for him, that was clear. But what could he give her in return? Could he give her love? He didn’t know. Rene was still his wife. And Bethany... Bethany was comfort and a reasoned voice. Bethany was experience. Beth was...
He kissed her cheek and settled into her embrace.
* * *
Thales started awake some time later from a dream. He felt hot. The room was too warm, as though the climate setting had been altered.
And Beth was not there.
He lay quietly for a moment listening for sounds of her in the bathroom. She was not modest in the way Rene had been and didn’t require privacy when at her ablutions. She’d scorned his natural reserve, describing what it had been like on Dowl in the confinement module.
‘‘Josef and Pet know my backside better than I do,’ she’d told him without joking.
Muffled sounds brought him more thoroughly awake.
The bathroom door was open but the door through to their living area was closed. It hadn’t been before they went to bed. What was she doing out there that might cause disturbance? Was she unable to sleep?
Concern and curiosity pulled him from the bed. He moved quietly to the door, pausing to lean his ear to it. Distressed noises filtered back to him.
He pushed the door open.
Bethany stood over near the apartment’s front door, her figure lit by the door icons. The front of her nightdress was open, her eyes closed and mouth creased in pain. Beside her was a stranger; a heavily gilled and scaled Mioloaquan with modified limbs and primitive facial features. The Mio’s sharp teeth and fish mouth were clamped around her nipples and its fins were lashing at her side, whipping against her flesh.
‘Beth!’ he gasped in a strangled voice.
She swivelled, eyes flicking open, pleasure-glazed and confused. When she saw Thales her expression sharpened. The Mio pulled his teeth roughly from her breast. Thales did not miss the flush spreading across her chest and the quickening of her breath at the pain.
‘What...’ He went no further with his question, but turned and slammed the bedroom door on her. He sat on the edge of the bed feeling sick and faintly—disgustingly—aroused.
And angry.
Why had she done this? And almost before his eyes?
He knew of masochism. It was an ancient practice. But on Scolar it was understood that deviant sexual practices were a sign of sublimated frustrations and low self-worth, not a true, healthy expression of sexuality.
Neither he nor Rene would ever entertain such thoughts or practices.
Rene. He wanted to leave right then. Run to his home, and his wife, and his bed; to the comfort of the things that he knew and trusted.
But that was fallacy. Rene had betrayed him as well.
‘Thales?’ Beth switched on the light as she entered the room and came to stand in front of him.
He couldn’t look at her; could think only of the pleasure in her glazed eyes.
‘I’m sorry not to have been more discreet. But sometimes I need more than wh
at we share.’
‘Need more? Are you saying that I cannot please you?’ he said hoarsely.
She didn’t look guilty. Nor did she seem to want forgiveness. ‘I care for you. You’re pure, Thales; so naive and idealistic. But that is not enough. I have sought pain for a long time. It’s part of me, and you are only temporary. A beautiful, temporary gift. You have a wife, Thales, who you yearn to see. You are... what I might have been.’
His head jerked up.
This time she gave a hollow laugh. ‘You didn’t need to tell me about her. Nothing could be more obvious. Even you could not pretend that what you feel for me is anything more than convenience.’ She reached forward and stroked his hair. ‘I don’t judge you for it, Thales. So please don’t judge me. You asked me for comfort and I gave it to you. Would you deny me the same even if my comfort sometimes takes a different form?’
She sounded calm, but he detected the brittleness in her voice.
‘Your brother knows of your... preferences, doesn’t he?’
She removed her hand from his head and sat on the bed, careful not to touch her body against his. ‘Yes. He despises me for it, and for my attraction to alien species. Lasper is like you in many ways; an idealist and a purist about some things. That’s why I don’t shrink from it now. I won’t give him the pleasure of guilt or embarrassment.’ She took Thales’s hand gently in her own. He felt her tremble. ‘I don’t proclaim my habits to the universe, but I won’t deny them either.’
‘Then why have you hidden them from me to suddenly throw them in my face?’
‘Mio came to me unexpectedly. I had thought you would stay sleeping. You always sleep so soundly, Thales. Like a child.’
Like a child. Thales’s throat constricted, and he had a sudden desire to be free of the apartment. He stood abruptly and reached past her for some clothes.
MIRA
‘The B-Bare World?’ stammered Mira. ‘What is that?’
‘Return to the nutrient wall and move forward,’ instructed Wanton-poda. The Extro was at eye level and bobbing in agitation. ‘Mira-fedor will meet resistance. Mira-fedor must overcome that. Wanton-poda will wait for you in the Bare World. Wanton-poda will appear different.’
The cephalopod floated quickly across the chamber and entered the wall with a soft pop.
Mira shook the remains of the Siphonophores from her hands and followed. Adrenalin still coursed through her body. She felt sick at what she’d done. And confused.
Her confusion was overwhelmed by anxiety as the wall subsumed her and she again found herself unable to tell horizontal from vertical or forward from backward.
Then a boost of energy surged through her body, and she felt light and wonderful.
‘Mira-fedor.’ She heard Wanton-poda’s voice, but couldn’t locate the creature. ‘Mira-fedor, hurry.’
Mira forced her arms and legs to go through the motions of walking even though her senses told her she wasn’t moving. She persisted with it until finally she felt the beginnings of some resistance.
As she continued to paddle her limbs, the force working against her grew stronger.
A peculiar contradiction of sensations assaulted her body. She felt energised as the wall continued to feed her, but the force she ran against began to weigh on her, crushing her body.
She became aware of sounds.
Other languages. Stern tones. Warnings. She selected a humanesque voice from the rest and concentrated on it.
‘You are leaving the Protected Environment. Take appropriate precautions.’
And another.
‘Humanesque Host, remain inside.’
Her arms and legs began to tire, despite the nutrient wall’s energy infusion, and the crushing sensation turned to suffocation.
Her involuntary functions would not do their work. Her lungs would not...
‘Mira-fedor. Follow.’ Wanton-poda’s voice.
She heard a loud noise, like tearing fabric.
But her legs had stopped moving and her hands only paddled weakly, as if she was waving. If she could just breathe, if...
And then she felt the movement again. Deep inside her belly, an agitated violent turning as though the baby would take control of her.
Volition returned. She was able to breathe and lift her knees. Her walking strides became running strides, her arms pumping in a rigid, disciplined way. A way she had never used them before. Never known she could.
And suddenly she was inside the tearing noise, and the wall peeled away from around her and she felt the wet, hot brush of wind. Something solid and real smacked against the soles of her feet and she fell forward to her knees gasping in dry air and crying and coughing.
Dashing the tears from her eyes, she gulped in some steadying breaths and looked for Wanton-poda.
But the place she had come to—the Bare World—was in darkness.
She sat on her heels and took stock.
Then cautiously, she began to feel out the area around her. Sand and rock, she thought. Little rocks, like the edge of a desert. She breathed more deeply, taking time to assess the air. It tasted and smelt dry but clear and palatable. The heat would be worse in the daylight. If the daylight comes.
The child within her still moved frantically. She soothed it with a rub to her belly. There was plenty of room for it yet, but in time those kicks would be like daggers to her ribs and sides.
‘Mira-fedor,’ said a faint voice.
She peered into the near-dark for Wanton-poda. ‘Where are you?’
‘I am close by. There will be daylight soon and I would warn you, I will seem different.’ The cephalopod sounded so quiet and distressed.
She kept her voice as soft. ‘Where are we? And how are you different?’
‘The Bare World exists outside our reality. Post- Species Hosts do not come here at all. It is merely a structure, if you please; a platform for the worlds that Hosts have chosen to live in.’
‘If the islands and the seawater are only virtual, then why did they feel so utterly real? Why didn’t I need some device to perceive them?’
‘Post-Species Host worlds are not virtual, at least, not in the primitive sense that Mira-fedor means. What Mira-fedor experienced actually existed—with some modifications. Wanton-poda, however, is different because it no longer has its Host body. Poda did not survive the transition into the Bare World.’
‘Oh,’ Mira whispered, shocked. ‘I am sorry.’ Tears spurted from her eyes and she pressed her fists to them. ‘Are you in pain from losing it?’
Wanton-poda didn’t baulk at her direct question. ‘Yes. In many ways. Wanton would ask for silence now while it adjusts. Wanton will look different. Don’t be frightened by the change.’
‘Are we in any danger while we wait?’ It had been so long now that she had feared one thing or another that it seemed a logical concern.
‘Wanton does not believe that we will be followed here by its kind. However, Wanton has not been in the Bare World before, though prediction would say the dark is safe enough.’
‘I have one last question, Wanton-poda.’
‘Hasten, please, Mira-fedor.’
‘The creature being birthed on the island, the Saqr, what do you know of it?’
‘Wanton-poda sensed Mira-fedor’s extreme fear of it.’
‘Si. Is it a Post-Species Host like you?’
‘It is a Host body being prepared for use. Wanton had much to do with its regenesis.’
‘For use by one of your kind?’ Mira tried to keep the impatience from her voice.
‘Not necessarily,’ said Wanton-poda. ‘Some Host bodies are used for other things—in the way humanesques have used lesser species. Post-Species do not use barbaric behaviour modification, however. Redirection at the DNA level is much more efficient. Now, Wanton requires Mira-fedor’s silence.’
Mira uncramped her legs and sank into a more comfortable position. Her questions would have to wait. She turned her attention back to her surroundings. The temperature was r
eminiscent of Araldis and her skin seemed to welcome it. She glanced behind her. The darkness seemed thicker there as if it harboured an object. Yet she didn’t trust her senses while her body was in so much turmoil.
She continued to stroke her belly, talking to the baby in her mind for the first time in the way she did with Insignia. I’m not sure how you helped me but I know that you did. What manner of person are you to exert such force of will from the womb?
Unlike Insignia, the baby did not respond. And yet she felt the beginnings of attachment. Somehow the child had helped her. Perhaps it would not be like its father.
So the baby seemed to settle within her, and for some precious long moments she relaxed onto the sand.
And then the dawn came.
It crept upon her as she dozed, a subtle change of colour: inky to something less dense and then a true, colour-filled lightening. It was a sound that woke her though.
For a moment she thought a child cried. But as her senses focused she knew it not to be crying but a whining; pain-infected.
Her eyes roamed the grainy landscape ahead. Arid like Araldis but rocky, close by at least. She reined her gaze in closer to locate the sound.
It came, she thought, from a tiny dark stain on the sand, not far from her feet and no bigger than the palm of her hand. She pulled her knees in to move her feet away from it.
As the day struck in a bold dash of gold and stark ochre, she alternated between examining her surrounds and observing the stain.
The Bare World, it seemed, was just that—a barren moonscape of rock and sand but imbued with colours she had never seen in earth before. Seams of blue ran through the small ridges of rock and the sand around her glinted with hints of orange and pink and green. And yet there was a deadness about it that did not come from a lack of atmosphere.
Life had been here and then removed. She sensed it.
As the daylight brightened her perception of things, the small stain near her feet resolved into something of more substance but less appeal. It looked, Mira thought, like a slice of the livers that Faja often cooked for the alien children who needed high-iron diets. There were many substitutes for fresh organs, but Faja insisted on feeding her children as well as she could. The livers would arrive once a month, cryopacked, from one of her off-world suppliers.
The Sentients of Orion Page 68