by Chris Walley
“It is, formally. But this is where it really is. Now, what I’m about to show you, you mustn’t speak of.” As he said it, he realized with dismay that it sounded like he didn’t trust her. “I m-mean I can rely on you. It’s just that . . .”
“We have to be careful,” she said, finishing his thought and ending with a sigh, one that seemed to come from deep within. “Vero, I do not dislike secrecy. I love the strategy of chess: the bluff and the counterbluff. But I never realized until recently how, as a way of life, it could wear you down. But lead on.”
Vero led her to a lift. “Oh,” he said gesturing to the ceiling, “a warning. We’re being watched. Surveillance.”
“Another sad necessity.”
Once inside he called out, “The foundations.”
There was a chime of acknowledgment and the lift started down.
“A deep basement,” Perena said twenty seconds later. “We’re still descending.” As she spoke, the lift slowed to stop.
“Welcome to the underworld. Based on an original idea by Perena Lewitz.”
“Is that credit or blame?”
The door opened to reveal a low, featureless tiled tunnel that ran off either side of them.
“It is something of a labyrinth. Follow me. Do you get claustrophobic, P.?” he asked as they walked.
“Thankfully not. I spend much of my life in a metal can.”
“Like a sardine.”
“The fish?” He heard the puzzlement in her voice.
“It’s an old saying. I think they must have kept them as pets in metal tanks. Oh, never mind.”
Vero tugged open a heavy door in the left-hand wall. Beyond were more branching corridors, but with more light and more noise: the purposeful chatter of people, the buzz of electrics, the thuds and hammering of fabrication.
“This is where we do the serious stuff,” Vero said.
Over the next ten minutes he showed her the labs, the rooms with bunks, and the storage spaces, then introduced her to some of the people there.
Perena seemed to scrutinize everything, especially the items in his office: his folding bed, the picture of his family on the wall, the crowded desk, the stacked files, and the bubbling coffee percolator. Her sharp questions showed her grappling with all she saw.
“Is there surveillance here?”
“No. I see no need to watch myself.” As he said it, he felt the humor fell flat.
Perena’s smile was merely the ghost of one. “Good. If you did, I would really worry.”
She walked over to his shelves and peered at some of the bound volumes, running a fingernail under the title of one of the books: Early Twenty-First Century Warfare: An Overview. She pronounced the words clumsily and Vero remembered that her Historic was not English.
“Sometimes I spend days and nights here,” Vero said, feeling a need to justify himself. “Brenito’s place is too far away. . . . Would you like a coffee? I drink too much of the stuff.”
“Please.”
She’s troubled. He handed her a mug of coffee.
“What do you think?”
“Impressive. You are very talented. You are, in your way, a genius.”
“Thank you. But you’re worried.”
“Am I that transparent?” She pouted.
“Where you are concerned, I am very sensitive.”
He saw a flash of something in her eyes. Pain.
She shook her head. “No, Vero. Please. We buried that.”
“For the time being.”
“No!” There was almost a desperation to her tone that caught him by surprise. “I can’t. . . . I don’t think it’s wise to hold out any hope there. That might badly betray us.”
Now it was his turn to sigh. “Point taken. But you worry about what?”
He was aware of her eyes probing his face. “I worry about you and this place—this project. Always being underground, being secretive, scheming. I worry that you have drifted into this underworld and will stay here—that it will possess you. A permanently secretive and subterranean Vero.”
Her words bothered him. “Do you think that is a danger?”
“Don’t you?”
“Well, I suppose so. I take your warning seriously, P. I really do.”
“You are so involved in all this.”
She is right. It has become part of my life.
“P., the way I see it, there are two things. The first is that I have no family here, no roots—just good friends. I’m not Merral. He could go back to his family, Forestry, and Ynysmant at a moment’s notice. I can’t. So this project is my life now. So there’s that.”
He saw from her expression and the slight move of her head that she understood. “And the other thing is that this is the great battle of our age and I have been thrust into the heart of it. I have lain awake at night worrying that we might fail because I have been lazy or careless.”
“In many ways that’s commendable. But the evil around us is pervasive and so subtle that I think we are all at risk. You, me, and even Merral. We must take care.”
There was silence that lasted for several minutes.
“Vero,” she said softly, “how badly are we in trouble?”
“Badly. S-so badly that I don’t even know how b-badly.”
“Tell me.”
“We have inadequate weapons and, above all, inadequate information. We are faced with a vague and terrifying enemy. We need a breakthrough, P.”
“Then we must pray we get one.”
“I do pray. But any news on your side?”
“No. But . . .” She paused, as if unable to continue. “I have thought of something recently. A wild idea. A way that, if we have no choice, we might try. But it is a way that, if things fell out right, might just work.”
There was a silence that he soon realized she was not going to break.
“I remember the envoy’s words,” he said, “about a ‘costly way’, a way ‘that only the very bravest will take.’ Is this what you are talking about?”
Her face was stern. “Perhaps. I don’t want to say any more.” She looked at the wall clock. “I need to go.”
He led her above ground to the door of the unfinished apartments. There, her hand on the glass of the door, she turned to him. “What does Merral think about your underground base?”
“He doesn’t know.”
She seemed surprised. “Why not?”
“He’s too close to Clemant and the others.”
Perena nodded. “This is what I feared. It’s how it begins, isn’t it?”
“What?”
“We lie to our enemies and then—for the best reasons, of course—we lie to each other.”
“So, you think I should tell him?”
“No.” There was a sad weariness in her tone. “But do you see that if it goes on like this we are in trouble?” Her look seemed probing. “And drastic measures may be needed.”
“Such as?”
“That’s my secret.” She kissed him on the cheek and walked swiftly away.
One evening in late July, Merral and Luke went for a walk along one of the promontories protruding into Isterrane Bay. The light was fading and the sky was full of a bulging heaviness of gray clouds from within which thunder rolled every few minutes.
“How are you Merral? Honestly.”
“Struggling, Luke.”
“Any specifics?”
“The fact is that we simply do not know enough about what we face. We have recovered almost nothing from that ship at Fallambet. We know almost nothing about our enemy. They may be called the Dominion and they may be run by a lord-emperor. That’s about it.”
“I am aware of that. It troubles me too.”
“And the little that we do know suggests our weapons are inadequate. We know we can’t stop their ships in space and we suspect we can’t stop the Krallen on the ground. It is not a happy scenario.”
There was a long brooding silence. “You—we—need help. Don’t we?”
; “Yes. Very much.”
“And are you praying for that help?”
“In truth, not as much as I should.” The words were painful, but Merral was reminded that he had agreed to accountability. “I suppose I live in the hope that we’ll come up with some technological development that will save us. That’s where the focus is.” He hesitated. “I suppose.”
There was a long silence in which he felt guilty.
“The technology may help, but I would think praying for an answer is a pretty good idea.” Luke’s words were gentle. “Wouldn’t you?”
“Yes. I shall more specifically ask for help.”
“Good. And I will too. If truth be told here, I haven’t prayed as much about it either. And it’s a problem I have known about. I think we all have.”
“One other thing, Merral,” Luke said as they walked. “I’ve seen Clemant’s anomalies map.”
“And?”
“It’s bad and getting worse. But trust me, the reality is far worse.”
“How?”
In some unspoken mutual agreement, they stopped walking.
“The map’s too shallow.” Luke stared out to sea. “It only measures surface phenomena. It takes no account of what’s happening beneath all this. But I’m talking regularly with the soldiers and some of the congregation leaders. What they all report—and what I see—is that there’s a growing spiritual coldness and carelessness. An apathy, a dryness. It’s amazing, after all we have gone through, and all we face. But we see it in congregations, we see it in people. There’s no joy, no spontaneity. It’s a sort of formalism.”
In the gathering gloom, Merral was aware of Luke’s dark eyes peering at him. “Are you surprised?”
“No. To be honest, I have seen it in myself. My spiritual life was boosted by the memorial service, but otherwise, I guess it’s been a slow decline. That’s part of the issue with prayer.”
“I can sympathize. But the trend is alarming. We are being drained.”
“Yes. But if it’s any consolation, Luke, we don’t have long to wait before the crisis is upon us.”
The chaplain nodded. “Six weeks they say?”
“Less. Say five. At maximum.”
There was a grumble of thunder.
The chaplain sighed. “It’s a strange thing to say, Merral—it may even be morally wrong—but I wish this war would come soon. The longer we have to wait, the less we will be what we once were. Where it counts, we weaken daily.”
“I know. But we don’t have long to wait.” Merral gazed at the gray dullness of the clouds. “They are on their way. And they will be here soon.”
“May God be merciful to us,” Luke said quietly.
“Amen,” Merral responded.
As they walked back, he said, “Every morning, Luke, I tell myself that perhaps today will be the day that I get a call from Space Affairs that they have spotted new intruders. And when that message comes it will change everything.”
But the message that did come was very different.
14
Two days later, the chime of his diary woke Merral in the middle of the night. He shook himself and peered at the clock on the diary screen.
One thirty-five. An extraordinary time for a message. Has the ship been sighted?
His pulse quickened when he saw the message: Unrecognized caller.
“That shouldn’t happen.” This was his private line. Only those who knew how to reach him used it.
“This is Merral D’Avanos.”
The screen stayed blank and a voice spoke. “Greetings, Commander Merral D’Avanos. I am Betafor Allenix.”
Merral’s first impression was that the voice was odd; it was high pitched but had a strange, rather glassy timbre. The way the words were spoken was distinctive too; they were precisely spaced and apparently pronounced with care.
“Allenix? I’m sorry, that name means nothing to me.”
“We have not been . . .” There was a pause almost as if the caller was thinking of the word. “Introduced. I am on Ilakuma Island. I have with me an injured human being who needs urgent medical treatment. His flesh has some sort of . . . infection and I am anxious for him to be treated. I wish to make a deal.”
“There must be a hospital there.” Merral paused, perplexed at the idea of striking a deal on a matter of medical treatment. Then he realized to his surprise that he had no idea whether the caller was male or female. Male, he tentatively decided. “Sir, I’m afraid I don’t see that this has anything to do with me.”
“A correction please. My preference is to be treated as a female person. It is a grammatical convention that I value.”
I have an insane midnight caller. Merral sat up on the edge of the bed. I must see Maria Dalphey to find out how they have managed to call me and to make sure it doesn’t recur.
He was about to interrupt when the caller continued. “And this matter is something to do with you. The sick man is Kezurmati Azeras. He is the sarudar—you would say perhaps second officer—of the True Freeborn vessel Slave of Rahllman’s Star. This is the ship that was destroyed. He and I are the sole . . . survivors.”
Overwhelmed by so much that made no sense Merral latched on to a single phrase. “Slave of Rahllman’s Star? Whoever you are, you’re mistaken. There is no such vessel, at least not here—”
He stopped, suddenly aware that his hands were shaking. The words Ilakuma, True Freeborn vessel, and sole survivors flashed in his brain.
He hit the mute button on the diary. “Lloyd!”
As a heavy thud and a frantic clatter from the adjacent room confirmed that he had been heard, he toggled the mute off.
“Miss Betafor,” Merral said slowly, his mouth peculiarly dry, “let’s take this step by step. First, who are you?”
“Betafor will suffice. I am an Allenix unit.” The voice was odd, he realized, hearing now a strange synthetic edge to it.
There were rapid footsteps in the corridor outside. The door was flung open and the light came on. Blinking, Merral looked up to see Lloyd standing in the doorway, dressed in shorts and a vest and clutching the ugly double-barreled gun that was his current weapon of choice.
Merral raised a finger to his lips and beckoned him over. “Please explain, Betafor. Wait! I’m going to record this. Is this okay?”
“Yes. I assumed you were recording. Or is this an Assembly protocol I am not aware of?”
“Conversations are considered private unless permission is given.”
“Even in war?”
“That’s an interesting issue.”
“I give permission. Now listen, there is a lot to explain. I am an Allenix unit. We are used throughout the True Freeborn and Dominion worlds for observation, negotiation, and translation. I am one of the two such units that were on the vessel.”
“You’re a machine?” If so, this is not at all like we have. Our machines never mimic human speech in this way. The technology protocols prohibit it.
“Commander, I prefer that the term machine not be used.”
Lloyd’s mouth gaped wide.
“I am best described as an . . . intelligent synthetic organism. Other terms such as a synthetic person or even a nonbiological organism might be usable. We could discuss the terminology at length another time. But you will find it easier to deal with me if you treat me as you would a human being, a female human being.” There was an edge of exasperation in the tone.
“Let me see you.”
“Later. There are other things to do now.”
Merral puzzled over the idea of a machine that could express emotion. “Please continue.” He turned to Lloyd and mouthed, Get Vero. Fast!
His aide nodded and slipped out of the room.
The strange voice spoke again. “I have a sick man here who needs help. I do not have suitable medicines. I do not understand ailments of the human flesh. A condition of the arrangement—the deal—is that the knowledge that the sarudar and I exist is kept secret. Only the absolute minimum number of peop
le must know.”
Merral realized that this machine—he found it hard to think of it as a female—had an excellent command of Communal. “Why?”
“I will explain. Let me elaborate the condition. My researches indicate that the general survey craft Nesta Lamaine is now repaired. I suggest that tomorrow Captain Lewitz and a copilot of her choice, fly you, a doctor, and Sentinel Enand south to Ilakuma tomorrow. All are to—”
“Wait! How do you know who we are? And how did you get access to me?”
“Commander, I know these things because most of your . . . communications systems are still open.”
“Oh,” Merral replied, suddenly feeling appallingly vulnerable.
“Good. Now—”
“No!” cried Merral, suddenly almost overwhelmed by his memories of what happened at Fallambet Lake. “Why should I trust you or anything from that foul ship? I was on board it. I saw what was there. It was evil.”
There was a long silence. “Commander, I understand your concern. I need to explain more things. There have been . . . humans that you had no knowledge of far beyond you in space. Until around half a standard year ago, there were two groups: the True Freeborn and the Dominion of Lord-Emperor Nezhuala. They fought and the Dominion won. But at the last battle, a group of men from the True Freeborn seized a Dominion ship, the Rahllman’s Star, and fled here. The sarudar is the only survivor of those men. It is the Dominion who are your enemy. And they are coming.”
“A moment! I need time to absorb this.” Merral tried desperately to assemble the ideas—two human groups, a war between them, the ship being stolen—into some coherent pattern. Yet as he thought about it, he realized that it made some sort of sense. The crew had been hiding, but not just from us.
“You need to talk to the sarudar about that ship and what was on it,” said Betafor. “As for myself, you must understand that I am only a machine. I was merely a . . . translator. I am programmed to serve.” There was a hint of pleading in the voice.
“But that programming may continue. You may still serve the True Freeborn as you call them.”
“I do not. The destruction of the ship has released me from their service. You will find me trustworthy.”