by Vernor Vinge
There was no answer for a moment, just the sound of mumbled argument. Ezr noticed that the Emergent flight technician, Xin, hadn’t said a word. He watched his Podmaster with a wide-eyed, stricken look.
Then Jimmy was back on the link: “Damn you. So you gutted the weapons systems. But it doesn’t matter, little man. We’ve prepared four kilos of S7. You never guessed we had access to explosives, did you? Lots of things were in with those electric jets that you never guessed.”
“No, no.” Nau was shaking his head almost aimlessly.
“As you say, Podmaster, this is your hospital ship. There are your own people here besides our armsmen in coldsleep. Even without the ship’s guns, I’d say we have some negotiating leverage.”
Nau glanced beseechingly at Ezr and Qiwi. “A truce. Until we’ve settled the rockpile.”
“No!” shouted Jimmy. “You’ll wriggle out soon as events don’t have you by the throat.”
“Damn it, man, it’s your own people aboard the Treasure”
“If they were out of coldsleep, they’d agree with me, Podmaster. It’s showdown time. We’ve got twenty-three of your people in the sickbay plus the five in your maintenance crew. We know how to play the hostage game, too. I want you and Brughel over here. You can use your taxis, all nice and safe. You have one thousand seconds.”
Nau had always seemed a very calculating type to Ezr Vinh. And already, he seemed recovered from his shock. Nau raised his chin dramatically and glared at the sound of Jimmy’s voice. “And if we don’t?”
“We lose, but so do you. To start with, your people here die. Then we’ll use the S7 to blow the Treasure free of its moorings. We’ll ram it into your damn Hammerfest.”
Qiwi had listened with pale, wide-eyed shock. Now suddenly she was bawling. She launched herself toward the sound of Jimmy’s voice. “No! No! Jimmy! Please don’t!”
For a few seconds every eye was on Qiwi. Even the frantic closing of hoods and gloves ceased, and there was only the loud moaning of the temp’s mooring web as it twisted slowly about. Qiwi’s mother was aboard the Far Treasure; her father was on Hammerfest with all the mindrot victims. In coldsleep or “Focus,” most of the survivors of the Qeng Ho expedition were in one place or the other. Trixia. This is too much, Jimmy. Slow down! But the words died in Ezr’s throat. He had trusted everything to Jimmy. If this deadly talk convinced Ezr Vinh, maybe it would convince Tomas Nau.
When Jimmy spoke again, he ignored Qiwi’s cry. “You have only nine hundred seventy-five seconds, Podmaster. I advise you and Brughel to get your butts over here.”
That would have been hard to do even if Nau had bolted out of the temp. He turned to Xin and the two argued in low voices.
“Yes, I can get you there. It’s dangerous, but the loose stuff is moving at less than a meter per second. We can avoid it.”
Nau nodded. “Then let’s go. I want—” He fastened his full-press jacket and hood, and his voice became inaudible.
The crowd of Qeng Ho and Emergents melted away from the two as they headed toward the exit.
From the speaker link, there was a loud thump, cut off abruptly. In the auditorium someone shouted, pointing at the main window. Something flickered from the side of the Far Treasure, something small and moving fast. A fragment of hull.
Nau had stopped at the auditorium doors, He looked back at the Far Treasure. “System status says the Far Treasure has been breached,” said Brughel. “Multiple explosions in aft radial deck fifteen.”
That was coldsleep storage and sickbay. Ezr couldn’t move, couldn’t look away. The hull of the Treasure puckered out in two more places. Pale light flickered briefly from the holes. It was insignificant compared to the storm of the Relight. To an untrained eye, the Treasure might have looked undamaged. The hull holes were only a couple of meters across. But S7 was the Qeng Ho’s most powerful chemical explosive, and it looked as if all four kilograms had gone up. Radial deck fifteen was behind four bulkheads, twenty meters below the outer hull. Extending inward, the blast had most likely crushed the Far Treasure’s ramscoop throat. One more starship had died.
Qiwi floated motionless in the middle of the room, beyond the reach of comforting hands.
THIRTEEN
Ksecs passed, busier than any time in Ezr’s life. The horror of Jimmy’s failure hung in the back of his mind. There wasn’t room for it to leak out. They were all too busy simply trying to save what they could from the human and natural catastrophes.
The next day, Tomas Nau addressed the survivors on the temp and at Hammerfest. The Tomas Nau that looked out of the window at them was visibly tired and lacked his usual smoothness.
“Ladies and gentlemen, congratulations. We’ve survived the second harshest Relight in the recorded history of OnOff. We did this despite the most terrible treachery.” He moved closer to the pov, as if looking at the exhausted Emergents and Qeng Ho huddled in the auditorium. “Damage survey and reclamation attempts will be our most important jobs over the next Msecs…but I must be frank with you. The initial battle between the Qeng Ho and Emergent fleets was immensely destructive of the Qeng Ho; I regret to say that tas nearly as bad for the Emergent side. We tried to disguise some of that damage. We had plenty of equipment spares, medical facilities, and the raw materials we brought up from Arachna. We would have had the expertise of hundreds of senior Qeng Ho available once the security issues were resolved. Nevertheless, we were operating near the edge of safety. After the events of yesterday, all safety margins have vanished. At this moment, we do not have a single functioning ramscoop—and it’s not clear if we will be able to scavenge one from the wreckage.”
Only two of the starships had collided. But apparently the Far Treasure had been the most functional—and after Jimmy’s action, its drive and most of its life-support system were junk.
“Many of you have risked your lives over the last Ksecs trying to save some of the volatiles. That part of the disaster appears to be no one’s fault. None of us had counted on the violence of this Relighting, or the effect that ice trapped between the diamonds might have. As you know, we’ve recaptured most of the large blocks. Only three remain loose.” Benny Wen and Jau Xin were working together to try to bring back those and several smaller ones. They were only thirty kilometers away, but the big ones massed one hundred thousand tonnes each—and all they had for hauling equipment were taxis and one crippled lifter.
“OnOff’s flux is down to two point five kilowatts per square meter. Our vehicles can operate in that light. Properly suited crew can work briefly in it. But the airsnow that drifted out is lost, and we fear that much of the water ice is gone too.”
Nau spread his hands, and sighed. “This is like so many of the histories you Qeng Ho have told us of. We fought and fought, and in the end we’ve nearly made ourselves extinct. With what we have, we can’t go home—to either of our homes. We can only guess how long we can survive on what we salvage here. Five years? One hundred years? The old truths still hold: without a sustaining civilization, no isolated collection of ships and humans can rebuild the core of technology.”
A wan smile came briefly to his face. “And yet there is hope. In a way, these disasters have forced us to concentrate all our attention on what our missions were initially dedicated to. It is no longer a matter of academic curiosity, or even Qeng Ho selling to Customers—now our very survival depends on the sophonts of Arachna. They are on the verge of the Information Age. From everything we can tell, they will attain a competent industrial ecology during the current bright time. If we can last a few more decades, the Spiders will have the industry that we need. Our two missions will have succeeded, even if at far greater human cost than any of us ever imagined.
“Can we last three to five more decades? Maybe. We can scavenge, we can conserve… The real question is, can we cooperate? So far, our history here is not good. Whether in offense or defense, all our hands are drenched in blood. You all know about Jimmy Diem. There were at least three involved in his co
nspiracy. There may be more—but a security pogrom would just diminish our overall chances for survival. So I appeal to all of you among the Qeng Ho who may have been part of this plot, even peripherally: Remember what Jimmy Diem and Tsufe Do and Pham Patil did and tried to do. They were willing to destroy all the ships and crush Hammerfest. Instead, their own explosives destroyed them, destroyed the Qeng Ho that we were holding in coldsleep, and destroyed a sickbay full of Emergents and Qeng Ho.
“So. This will be our Exile. An Exile we have brought upon ourselves. I will continue to do my best to lead, but without your help we will surely fail. We must bury what differences and hatred there may be. We Emergents know much about you Qeng Ho; we have listened to your public network for hundreds of years. Your information made a critical difference to us as we regained technology.” That tired smile again. “I know you did it to make more good Customers; we are grateful nevertheless. But what we Emergents have become is not what you expect. I believe we bring something new and wonderful and powerful to the human universe: Focus. It is something that will be strange to you at first. I beg you to give time a chance here. Learn our ways, as we have yours.
“With everyone’s willing support, we can survive. In the end, we can prosper.”
Nau’s face vanished from the display, leaving a view out on the rearranged surface of the rockpile. Around the room, Qeng Ho looked at one another, talked quietly. Traders had enormous pride, especially when they compared themselves with Customers. To them, even the grandest Customer civilizations, even Namqem and Canberra, were like brilliant flowers, doomed by their beauty and fixed position to fade and wither. This was the first time that Ezr had seen shame on the faces of so many Qeng Ho. I worked with Jimmy. I helped him. Even the ones who didn’t must have gloried in Jimmy’s first words from the Far Treasure.
How could something go so wrong?
Ciret and Marli came for him. “Some questions related to the investigation.” The Emergent guards took him inward and up, but not to the taxi dock. Nau was in Vinh’s own “Fleet Manager’s” office. The Podmaster sat with Ritser Brughel and Anne Reynolt.
“Have a seat…Fleet Manager,” Nau said quietly, waving at Ezr’s place at the middle of the table.
Vinh approached it slowly, sat down. It was hard to look Tomas Nau in the eye. The others…Anne Reynolt seemed as impatient and irritable as ever. There was no trouble avoiding her gaze, since she never looked directly into his eyes anyway. Ritser Brughel seemed as tired as the Podmaster, but he had an odd smile that flickered on and off. The man was staring hard at him; Vinh suddenly realized that Brughel was brimming with unspoken triumph. All the deaths—on both sides—were nothing to this sadist.
“Fleet Manager.” Nau’s quiet voice brought Vinh’s head around. “About J. Y. Diem’s conspiracy—”
“I knew, Podmaster.” The words were somewhere between defiance and confession. “I—”
Nau held up a hand. “I know. But you were a minor participant. We’ve identified several others. The old man, Pham Trinli. He provided them with protective coloration—and almost died for his trouble.”
Brughel chuckled. “Yeah, he got half poached. Bet he’s whimpering even yet.”
Nau turned to look at Brughel. He didn’t say anything, just stared. After a second, Ritser nodded and his demeanor became a sullen imitation of Nau’s.
The Podmaster turned back to Vinh. “None of us can afford rage or triumph in this. Now we need everyone, even Pham Trinli.” He looked at Vinh meaningfully, and Ezr fully met his gaze.
“Yes, sir. I understand.”
“We’ll debrief you later about the plot, Fleet Manager. We do want to identify all those who need special watching. For now, there are much more important things than raking over the past.”
“Even after this, you want me to be Fleet Manager?” He had hated that job so much. Now he hated it even more, for entirely different reasons.
But the Podmaster nodded. “You were the proper person before, and you still are. Furthermore, we need continuity. If you visibly and wholeheartedly accept my leadership, the community as a whole has a better chance.”
“Yes, sir.” Sometimes it was possible to atone for guilt. That was more than Jimmy and Tsufe and Pham Patil could ever do.
“Good. As I understand it, our physical situation has stabilized. There are no ongoing emergencies. What about Xin and Wen? Are they going to be able to rescue those ice blocks they’re chasing? Getting them more fuel is a priority.”
“We have the distillery online, sir. We’ll begin feeding it in a few Ksecs.” And could refuel the taxis. “I’m hoping we’ll have the last ice blocks grounded and in the shade within forty Ksec.”
Nau glanced at Anne Reynolt.
“The estimate is reasonable, Podmaster. All other problems are under control.”
“Then we have time for the important, human issues. Mr. Vinh, we’ll be putting out several announcements later today. I want you to understand them. Both you and Qiwi Lin Lisolet will be thanked for your help in tracking down what is left of the conspiracy.”
“But—”
“Yes, I know that there’s an element of fabrication there. But Qiwi was never in on the conspiracy, and she has given us solid help.” Nau paused. “The poor girl was ripped apart by this. There’s a lot of rage in her. For her sake, and for the sake of the whole community, I want you to play along with the story. I need it emphasized that there are plenty of Qeng Ho who are not irrational, who have pledged to work with me.”
He paused. “And now the most important thing. You heard my speech, the part about learning Emergent ways?”
“About…Focus?” About what had they had really done to Trixia.
Behind Nau, the sadistic smirk flickered once again across Ritser Brughel’s face.
“That’s the main thing,” said Nau. “Perhaps we should have been open about it, but the training period wasn’t complete. Focus can make the difference between life and death in the present circumstances. Ezr, I want Anne to take you over to Hammerfest and explain it all to you. You’ll be the first. I want you to understand, to make your peace with it. When you have, I want you to explain Focus to your people, and do it so they can accept it, so what is left of our missions can survive.”
And so the secret Vinh had pushed to know, the secret that had driven every dream for Msecs, was now to be revealed to him. Ezr followed Reynolt up the central corridor to the taxi lock. Every meter was a battle for him. Focus. The infection they could not cure. The mindrot. There had been rumors, nightmares, and now he would know.
Reynolt waved him into the taxi. “Sit over there, Vinh.” In a paradoxical way, he preferred dealing with Anne Reynolt. She didn’t disguise her contempt, and she had none of the sadistic triumph that oozed from Ritser Brughel.
The taxi sealed up and pushed off. The Qeng Ho temp was still tied down to the rockpile. The sunlight was still too bright to allow it to be released. The purple sky had faded back to black, but there were a half-dozen comet tails streaking the stars—sundry blocks of ice that now floated some kilometers away. Wen and Xin were out there somewhere.
Hammerfest was less than five hundred meters from the temp, an easy free jump if Reynolt had wished it. Instead they floated across the space in shirtsleeve comfort. If you hadn’t seen it all before the Relight, you might not guess the disaster that had happened. The monster rocks had long since stopped moving. Loose ice and snow had been redistributed across the shadow, larger chunks and smaller and smaller and smaller, a fractal pile. Only now there was less ice, and much less airsnow. Now the shadowed side of the jumble was lit as by a bright moon—the light reflected from Arachna. The taxi passed fifty meters above crews working to reemplace the electric jets. Last time he had checked, Qiwi Lisolet was down there, more or less running the operation.
Reynolt had strapped down across from him. “The successfully Focused are all on Hammerfest. You can talk to almost anyone you please.”
Hammerfest
looked like an elegant personal estate. It was the luxurious heart of the Emergent operation. That had been some comfort to Ezr. He’d told himself that Trixia and the others would be treated decently there. They might be held like the hostages of Qeng Ho history, like the One Hundred at Far Pyorya. But no sensible Trader would ever build a habitat rooted in a rubble pile. The taxi coasted over towers of eerie beauty, a fey castle spiring up from the crystal plane. In a short time, he would know what the castle hid… Reynolt’s phrasing finally took hold of his attention. “Successfully Focused?”
Reynolt shrugged. “Focus is mindrot on a leash. We lost thirty percent in the initial conversions; we may lose more in the coming years. We had moved the sickest ones over to the Far Treasure.”
“But what—”
“Be quiet and let me tell you.” Her attention flicked to something beyond Vinh’s shoulder, and she was quiet for several seconds. “You remember becoming sick at the time of the ambush. You’ve guessed that was a disease of our design; its incubation time was an important part of our planning. What you don’t know is that the microbe’s military use is of secondary importance.” The mindrot was viral. Its original, natural, form had killed millions in the Emergents’ home solar system, had crashed their civilization…and set the stage for the present era of expansion. For the original strains of the bug had a novel property: They were a treasure house of neurotoxins.
“In the centuries since the Plague Time, the Emergency has gentled the mindrot and turned it to the service of civilization. Its present form needs special help to break through the blood-brain barrier, and spreads throughout the brain in a nearly harmless way, infecting about ninety percent of the glial cells. And now we can control the release of neuroactives.”
The taxi slowed and turned precisely to match Hammerfest’s lock. Arachna slid across the sky, a full “moon” nearly a half-degree across. The planet gleamed white and featureless, cloud decks hiding its furious rebirth.