<1 guess not,> Maii admitted.
said Maii.
Roche asked, curious to see a mind with a shield.
Maii guided her to the spot where the man’s mind should have been. All Roche could see was a steep, circular lip, like the edge around a very deep crater. No matter how Maii tried, she couldn’t get inside or even look over the wall.
Roche said.
Maii took her on a whirlwind tour of the habitat, showing her shielded and unshielded minds, minds with epsense powers and no epsense at all, minds that had been damaged by epsense attacks and minds that possessed strange outgrowths into n-space that the reave couldn’t explain, except to say that she had seen their like before and that they didn’t seem to serve any purpose. Roche tagged along for the ride, an eager student delighted to have discovered a new skill.
she asked the Box, explaining briefly what she was experiencing.
Roche stopped, feeling a new pressure on her mind.
Maii asked. Roche went cold. She hadn’t thought that the link with the girl might expose the existence of the Box inside her.
She was unable to think of anything even remotely convincing. she said lamely.
Roche felt a short, sharp probe penetrating deep inside her mind—then abruptly the girl was gone.
Roche rocked back into her chair, stunned by the girl’s absence. The real world flooded her senses, dispelling the gray clarity of n-space.
Maii said, reaching out and taking her hand, gripping it tightly through two layers of hazard suit glove. <1 shouldn’t have looked. But when I felt you talking to it...> A profound sense of remorse came with the words.
Roche didn’t know what to do. Although the girl hadn’t actually said it, there was no doubting that she now knew about the Box. That went against everything Roche and the Box had arranged; it could even jeopardize the Box’s mission for the Crescend.
But it didn’t have to be a problem. If Maii told no one, the secret stopped there—and unless Roche told the Box, it would never know either.
The simplest thing, she thought, might be to trust the girl.
she said.
The girl nodded.
Roche couldn’t put the girl’s mind at ease on that score,
Maii’s thoughts were tinged with an annoyance Roche could relate to. But that was all history now; the present had given her a whole new set of problems to deal with.
said Roche. There was a long stretch of silence which she ended with:
said Maii eventually.
said Roche.
<1 understand, Morgan,> said the girl.
Roche cut in quickly. Her attitude surprised even herself. A month ago when she had first met the girl, she would have been furious with what Maii had just done. But her time with the young Surin had tempered her hostility toward reaves—or at least toward this one.
she said.
Maii hesitated for a second, then diffused once more into Roche’s mind. This time they headed in a different direction, outward and away from their current location. As they traveled, the number of minds they passed slowly increased, then abruptly fell away to virtually nothing, until they were left facing just four anomalies in the n-space plain.
Three of them she wouldn’t have recognized, but the fourth one she knew immediately. It was a sudden hole in n-space, as though someone had dropped a ball bearing made of neutronium onto a rubber sheet.
she said.
Maii seemed momentarily taken aback.
Roche said.
Again Roche struggled for words.
Maii thought for a moment, then said:
said Roche.
Maii said thoughtfully.
Roche nodded to herself, thinking: An enigma... she asked.
Roche wondered, thinking aloud.
Maii drifted away for a second as she concentrated on something else.
Roche did as the girl said, guessing immediately what she was after. If Roche could see one clone warrior so clearly, why not another? Ansourian had seemed so certain that there was another one on board the habitat....
They swept rapidly over the population of the habitat. Minds blurred and merged into a strange landscape that dipped and fell around Roche. As she became accustomed to it, she started to find a sort of coherence to what she saw: there were few sudden dips or highs, as though minds that were alike tended to congregate even without being aware of it, or else individual minds were influenced by those around them. Only a few stood out, and then only because they were so tall among the others. She didn’t know what that meant; possibly nothing. It wasn’t what she was looking for, anyway.
She didn’t know how much time passed before she saw something. Time seemed meaningless. Likewise, she had no idea where her mind might have been in the real world....
<
Wait!> she suddenly shouted.
Maii brought them to an immediate halt.
Roche, unable to move of her own will, could only describe what she was seeing as best she could.
And it did. The same abrupt drop in n-space to a depth she could neither see nor imagine.
Mail’s mind roamed across the gray vista.
Roche’s stomach fell at the sudden realization: there were two clone warriors on the habitat!
Maii seemed to be having trouble deciding which mind to look at. <1 can’t pin them down as well as you can, Morgan. Wait a second.> They headed back to the location of the first one.
said Maii,
Roche’s concern slipped back a notch as another realization hit home:
Maii said, jumping back to the place where Roche had spotted the second clone warrior. It had moved, and Roche had to keep giving Maii directions so they could keep up.
<1, uh...> Roche realized then that it wouldn’t be so easy. N-space bore little relation to the real universe, except in the broadest terms. She could tell that the clone warrior was one of many in a group of people, and that that group of people was a subset of the larger group that comprised the population of the habitat. But beyond that...
Maii let go of her for a moment. When she returned a second or so later, she explained that she’d been exploring the scene more closely on her own.
The girl sounded alive in a way that Roche hadn’t heard before; maybe the thrill of guiding someone around on her own turf for a change accounted for that. she said,
Roche said.
There was both excitement and frustration in the reave’s voice.
Roche said, confident in this newfound sense. Cane’s mind had been as different from the others as a crater was to a mountain.
Maii said. She sent a mental shrug.
Roche accepted that. The hope she had felt a moment before was tempered by the thought that her gift might prove too unwieldy to rely upon. But it was a step in the right direction. If the difference was a real one, and she could detect it, there was always a chance that there were others like her who also had this ability. Out of all the high-power reaves on board the Phlegethon there had to be at least one who would replicate it.
The only trick would be proving it, and that meant coming into contact with another clone warrior.
As she and Maii lingered around the impenetrable mind in the administer’s audience, Roche couldn’t help but feel a little apprehensive about that.
8
Perdue Habitat
955.1.32
0330
Roche took the chance to speak to Haid and Kajic once she and Maii had tested her vague ability to its limits.
Haid said when she had finished bringing them completely up to date on the situation.
Roche replied. She added:
Haid said.
When she asked Kajic about the status of the ship, he was more relaxed.
Roche asked.
said Haid.
Roche pondered Haid’s choice of word, and found it apt. He might exude calm and patience, but she knew Vri was wound like a spring. She wondered what it would take to make him snap.
she said, knowing Maii would overhear. <1 don’t want him rushing in with guns blazing because he thinks I’m up to no good.>
Haid said. <1 imagine your radio silence isn’t helping any.>
Roche dropped back into the real world while Maii conversed with the Surin warrior. They didn’t talk long, and Maii’s expression was sour when they were finished.
she said.
Roche didn’t want to intrude upon that pain. She and Maii sat in silence for a long while, thinking private thoughts. It was odd for Roche after such mental intimacy to be alone again in her skull.
Or nearly so...
the Box asked.
she said.
the Box reassured her, echoing her own thoughts.
<1 guess so.> She was glad to be reminded that epsense gave her a way to converse with the others without the Box overhearing—especially at times like these, when she didn’t feel like talking to the AI. She was afraid of letting slip that Maii knew about the Box’s survival. The Box probably wouldn’t approve, and she couldn’t help but wonder whether it would take any steps to ensure the girl’s silence.
Very little time had passed when Maii lifted her head and said:
Roche stood and shut the helmet to her suit. Maii did likewise. A minute later, the door clicked and opened.
“I’m sorry I took so long,” he said as he entered, his voice loud as it filled the quiet of the room. “Pacecca’s kept me busy, and Inder
deep is running behind schedule.”
“Are we going now?” Roche asked.
“Yes.” He started to lead the way, then turned back. “I do understand your need for security,” he said, “but it would attract a lot less attention and suspicion if your visors were open.”
Roche did as he suggested. The risk of physical assault was small, and the hazard suits wouldn’t be as effective as combat armor anyway. If they were recognized, so be it; as it was, she had made no attempt to hide her identity when they arrived at the station. Someone looking for her would have found her regardless of an alias, or a visor covering her face.
Maii did likewise, and when Ansourian caught his first glimpse of her face, he smiled amicably.
“It’s nice to see you properly,” he said. “You have a very strong mind.”
“The Vax were taught the technique by a senior adept passing through from Guo.” Seeing no sign of recognition, he explained: “The Guo Sodality is dedicated to epsense training and study in the Middle Reaches; its senior adepts are renowned throughout our region for their strength and subtlety. The technique they taught us has been handed down along certain family lines in order to secure their places in the hierarchy of our culture.”
“We noticed a lot of shielded minds in one particular spot in the habitat,” Roche said.
He nodded. “That would be the audience chamber,” he said. “That is where they would gather at this time.” He half smiled. “Sometimes I wonder if there are any actual thoughts going on behind those shields.” He shrugged. “But that’s politics for you.”
Roche debated whether to tell him about the two clone warriors, but decided to wait until she was sure. “Shall we go?”
“Yes, of course,” he said, leading them out the door and into the corridor.
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