• • •
Prakuyo exited the apartment fully suited up, protection against what was, for him, the unbearable cold of the core. The rest of them would put on cold suits on the way down. Polano met them at the lift. Ship security had taken complete control of the core berth that ordinarily belonged to Phoenix. It might be the kyo ship attached out there at the moment, but Phoenix crew guarded the access, and it was, Jase had said, ship personnel that were there to work safety, so they would be, until the very last moment, within ship territory and within reach of intervention, if they suddenly didn’t like the tone of things.
But what could they do? Bren asked himself. The kyo were hardly likely to attack the paidhi-aiji while he was outside the kyo ship, especially with their own representative beside him, and once within— At what point, except gunfire coming in their direction, or kyo interference with his bodyguard—or even then—could the paidhi-aiji refuse a venture that aimed at the very heart of his job, a venture that stood the primary chance of solving the situation before it escalated to what had happened at Reunion?
He couldn’t refuse, no matter what met them on the kyo side of the airlock. Whatever lay behind this invitation, he had to find a way to deal with it. That was the nightmare, all the way down, while they prepared, with the little baggage they did carry, to go out on the lines.
The front safety man went. Prakuyo followed directly, a vanishing spark in the dark.
They were alone, without the possibility of the kyo overhearing, for the first time since Prakuyo had set foot among them.
“One has not had the opportunity to consult,” he said. “One has no idea how long this venture might be or even where it might take us.”
“We are here,” Banichi said. “Man’chi holds, Bren-ji, and in this, the Guild does not advise. We shall protect you.”
So long as any of them had breath. He knew that. It was on him not to bring things to conflict—wherever it required him going. Whether he was back and safe in three hours. Six years. Or never.
He was out here. He was about to grab that line. And then he was going to do—what? A reciprocal tour of the kyo premises? That might be all it was.
He somehow didn’t think so. Prakuyo had pointedly avoided certain questions. Prakuyo was, whatever else, canny, capable of trickery, and motivated by something other than nostalgia for past favors.
He took a deep breath of dry, freezing air.
“We shall go,” he said, and Banichi and Jago went out on the lines, to be first in, whatever awaited them in the kyo ship’s airlock. Bren launched himself, with Polano’s small assist, and felt Tano and Algini hit the line behind him.
Passage through the dark and biting cold toward a distant point of light.
It assumed a surreal character. Fear? Oh, abundant. Trust? Only in the four around him. They had done something as scary as this—himself, the dowager, and Cajeiri together—but then the stakes had been Phoenix and five thousand refugees.
Now it was Phoenix, five thousand refugees, Alpha Station, and the planet atevi and humans lived on, and it was cold as hell.
The entry tube gaped like a yellow flower bell, receiving them into its safe confinement, and the safety man saw them in, where they had to let go of the traveling line. Banichi and Jago secured handholds inside the tube and took hold of his arms, steadying him as Tano and Algini came in behind him. There was no immediate sight of Prakuyo.
All right? the safety man queried them with a gesture.
All right, he answered with the same signal, and the safety man made a gesture toward the curve ahead, which was lighted, and where Prakuyo was not.
That way. That was where Prakuyo had gone. Without them. He tried to ignore the alarms that disappearance raised.
The safety man showed them two buttons on the turnaround stanchion for the line. One stopped it. One started it . . . by implication, if they needed to come back.
Bren signaled understanding. So did Banichi, for the rest of them. And the safety man punched the green button, took the available handgrip, and left them, returning to the station lift, dwindling into dark, one star moving away.
Bren turned toward the interior of the tube, carefully, because rebound here was dangerous; but Banichi established a gentle hold on him, and with mutual help, they made fast progress along the hand rigging, into the lock.
No Prakuyo. The lock cycled, agreed that the tube was pressurized, green-lighted the opposing door, and opened it on a similar stretch of corridor, a long, twisting passage.
With no Prakuyo.
“We go,” Bren said, fighting for breath, shivering in a longer than usual exposure to core conditions.
But now it was not the core. They were technically outside the station, making their way along a long, temporarily pressurized tube to a kyo airlock for a ship that rode above them.
That airlock, far ahead, opened as they rounded a slight curve, revealing a small shadow within a misty cloud of escaping air—a shadow one hoped was Prakuyo.
The parka wasn’t adequate for the cold out here. Prakuyo’s suit was by far the better idea—especially, he suddenly realized, for the heat-loving kyo. Which made one wonder, was Prakuyo’s disappearance that simple? Had he rushed ahead simply to escape the cold?
“Freezing,” he managed to say, and his aishid took the cue and carried him along faster than his chilled muscles could manage.
The small figure became, indeed, Prakuyo waiting for them, beckoning them in.
The lock thumped shut. Warm, moist air blasted into the lock, and the inner door opened.
This part he remembered. They entered into a smaller chamber, the lock closed behind them, and the chamber began to move, much like the core lift, in a way that caught them up with the ship’s internal parts. Feet found the floor, numb as they were. Prakuyo released his helmet, drew in a breath of the warm, moist air.
“Good, good,” Prakuyo said, unsealing his suit: “Safe.”
The parkas were cold enough to freeze the moisture, a shining skin that crinkled and shed ice crystals with movement, with no warmth to offer comparable to the air. Bren began to shed his, with Jago’s assistance, while his aishid shed their own. There was no sign of others in this kyo version of the station’s lift, just a row of large storage containers. Prakuyo touched a plate on one of those containers, and the top slid back, affording a place to put the chilled cold suits. Another touch, this time to the wall, and a door slid back on a more upright closet for Prakuyo’s helmet and Prakuyo’s suit, which fairly well stuck to the surface inside.
A third touch, to the opposite wall, and another door opened on a dim, brown metal corridor. They followed Prakuyo out and down that corridor on removable grating that showed conduits and pipes below their feet, likely to do with the airlock. Weight a little greater than Alpha, though not as different as he remembered. Heavy, damp air that challenged his lungs, and twilight lighting. Detail was shadowed in that dim light, but Banichi and the others doubtless saw better than he did, heard more than he did.
The curious thing, after living with three kyo for a day—was the silence. There were machine sounds, low hum of fans, something starting up, but no sound of life other than their own steps on the grating.
Another doorway. The grating gave way to brown tilework, and the bare walls to hanging drapery. This—he remembered. His aishid would remember—not the same ship, he thought: not the same ship, or they had changed the drapery. Greens, browns, here. Angular geometric designs and occasionally a drapery of curving lines. Aesthetics? He wondered. Or . . . on a sudden thought as he began to see repetition of design . . . writing? Signs?
“Come,” Prakuyo said, pausing a moment, and opened another door, this one on a downward spiraling ramp. Though attached to the station, the ship stood active, maintaining walkability in all its levels—not so large a ship as Phoenix. Its curves were more extreme.
The ramp led into a level below the airlock, a darker, slightly cooler, dryer place, another hallway, bu
t barren. And a chair where another kyo sat. That one extended legs and rose, with a little flutter of booms.
“Stay,” Prakuyo said, and that person gave a little bob and sank back again, crosslegged, in the curious bowl-like seat.
“Bren,” Prakuyo said, and paused. “Not aishid. Safe. You come.”
Safe? And asking his aishid to stand back? Not reassuring.
But Prakuyo advanced only a little distance, then stopped near a recessed area in the wall.
“Wait, nadiin-ji,” he said to his aishid, and joined Prakuyo.
In that slight recess beside Prakuyo was a clear door with ventilation slits, and beyond, a huddled gray shape on a bowl-shaped bench.
He was looking into a cell.
“Up,” Prakuyo said sharply, from where they stood, and the dim shape moved, turned a shoulder, achieved ragged hair and a glimpse of glaring dark eyes in a bearded, shaggy human face.
Reunioner, Bren thought. Some survivor who hadn’t come to the exit, who hadn’t been willing to be evacuated.
Who might, all this time, have been questioned by the kyo and might have told them God knew what . . . granted they had gotten past the language barrier. He’d always suspected Prakuyo understood more ship-speak than he had admitted to. Could Prakuyo have questioned this man, gotten information that made him doubt the truth of what they’d told him? Perhaps that accounted for the hint of distrust that lay beneath his affability.
Or was the problem that they’d gotten nothing out of this man?
Was this the purpose of the kyo’s visit? That he should lend his skill to—whatever they wanted with this man? Who on Reunion could be worth so much effort, to bring him all this distance?
“Who are you?” Bren asked in ship-speak, the safest, most obvious question. And: “Are you all right?”
The man got up—he was dressed kyo-style, in thin robes. Hair and beard, a great deal of both, were matted and snarled. But the stare . . .
The stare was that of a man seeing a ghost. A step forward in the dim light. And another. A hand lifted . . . and those staring eyes looked past him, widened—
The man recoiled against the back wall so fast his aishid reacted, weapons out. Prakuyo flung out an arm between them and the door, forbidding, and Guild weapons went to safe position.
“We are safe,” Bren said in Ragi, on a half breath. And in kyo: “Prakuyo-nandi. Safe. Safe.” His heart was pounding. The man in the cell sat tucked up in the bowl-like bench at the back of the cell, staring at them from under that matted mane . . . could one grow that much hair in two years?
“Who are you?” Bren asked again, in ship-speak.
No response. Maybe it was his bodyguard, armed and quick on the trigger, that alarmed the man. “Nadiin-ji,” he said quietly, “stand back somewhat. I am in no danger. This man is a prisoner and unarmed. The door may be transparent, but it is not slight.”
“Nandi,” Banichi said, and drew everybody back a little. Their dark skin and black clothing faded into the shadows of the dim hallway, but golden eyes flickered as they caught a little reflection—the light came at that sort of angle, and that sight would not reassure the man.
“More light?” Bren asked and Prakuyo waved a hand over a nearby wall control. The ambient brightened. The man in the cell tucked up, pulling knees to chest, squinting as if his eyes were unaccustomed to bright light.
“Safe,” Bren said in kyo. “Come. Come to the door.”
Not a move. Not a twitch.
He said, then in ship-speak. “You’re safe. Come. Get up. Come here and talk to me.”
The look stayed much the same. There was no clue as to whether the shaggy prisoner understood kyo or ship-speak. One began to fear the man might not be altogether sane.
“What’s your name?” he asked again in ship-speak, sharply this time, and got a response at last.
“Who the hell are you?” The voice came out strained, little more than a whisper. But coherent. “Are you even real? God . . . am I that far gone?”
At least he could talk. Arms stayed around knees. Features, expression, were all obscured by dark, tangled hair.
“I’m quite real. They brought me here to talk to you.” That much had to be obvious. “Will you talk?”
Eyes flickered, from him to Prakuyo to his aishid, then:
“What are you?”
“A negotiator. A translator. I can do neither if you don’t talk to me. Can we try again? What’s your name?”
“Guy.”
“Guy.”
A nod. Slight, within the mop of hair.
“Is that all of it?”
“Guy Cullen. Who are you? What are you?”
“My name is Bren Cameron.” And bearing in mind Prakuyo was beside him, and knew a little ship-speak, caution was in order, what he said about himself, what he said about his relation to this man. “I’m a representative for the atevi.”
“Atevi.”
“Behind me.”
Blink. Twice. As if the name meant nothing to him. A Reunioner—maybe a panicked holdout from the evacuation—wouldn’t know atevi. Wouldn’t know any of the things that had happened.
“You stayed on Reunion.”
“Don’t know Reunion.”
That was a poser. “Phoenix, then?”
Second shake of the head.
Ship and station names meant nothing to the man, and his speech was off, some syllables hardly voiced. It could be injury. It could be a speech impediment, or maybe an artifact of disuse. Maybe the man wasn’t understanding him that well; or maybe the man was just holding back information.
“Where do you come from, Mr. Cullen?”
“Negotiate me out of here. Get me out and I’ll tell you.”
So. Holding back.
He lifted an eyebrow. Controlled expression. Suspicions occurred to him—a kyo setup to get a reaction. A tame prisoner, working with them. There was a word for that, a word with origins lost in some obscure past, something he’d been accused of more than once in his career: Stockholm syndrome.
Was this man some ages-old offshoot of a Phoenix base pre-dating Reunion, perhaps, pretending ignorance? Second or even third generation prisoner, playing a part for—what? Freedom?
The prisoner’s initial reaction to seeing him had been intense, instant as reflex: a damned good act—or honest shock. Maybe it had been his aishid that provoked that reaction. But amid so much that was alien—the focus had been on him.
Regroup. Give him the benefit of the doubt, for starters. “I understand. You don’t want to betray places. You don’t want to endanger those you care about. But I can’t get you out if I don’t know why you’re in. So let’s start with something the kyo already know, but I don’t. How did you come aboard this ship?”
“Loaded on with all the other cargo.”
“When? How long ago?”
“Hell if I know. Year? Two? Quit caring a long time ago.”
“Where?”
“Hell if I know.”
“You were somewhere before that.”
“Another cell. Another ship.”
“And before that?”
“I don’t know. I don’t remember. And even if I did, why would I tell somebody standing on that side of this door—dressed like that. Where’s that from?”
Things were not right, not right, not right. It was a puzzle Prakuyo had set him, a puzzle with sinister overtones, and he was miserably failing it, with his own credibility at stake. He was set this puzzle, he was expected to solve it, and his success or failure would affect a great deal more than this man’s outcome, or his own.
“Mr. Cullen, I’m in the employ of the atevi government; the clothing comes with the job. The kyo asked me to come here. The kyo evidently wanted me to see you. You want to be a puzzle. That’s fine. But if you sincerely want my help, you’d do well to stop cowering over there and come up to the door and talk to me.”
Another sullen glare. “I’m not telling you a damned thing.”
Had Phoenix left a crew at the Gamma fuel station when they’d abandoned Reunion? Crew the kyo had gathered up from the fueling site and held for over a decade?
“Mr. Cullen. I don’t know how much time I’ll have with you. I don’t know how you got here or what you did to get yourself locked up. Species being species, I’d like to help you, but you’re not giving me any means to do that.”
Cullen made a tighter knot of himself. Head bowed against his knees. “Just go. Get out of here!”
“You were transferred from another ship. I take it this was a kyo ship?”
A tense pause, then a sharp nod.
“And before that?”
“My own ship.”
“Your ship. Not Phoenix. A mining craft, maybe?”
Cullen glared up at him under that shadowed mop of hair. “No damn miner. A starship. A ship fighting these bone-faced bastards.”
The floor just dropped out from under all reason. He hoped a career practicing atevi impassivity kept shock from being evident, but it felt as if all the blood had drained from his brain, his face, his hands. He folded his arms and tried to take in a reasonable breath.
“Where, Mr. Cullen? Where do you fight them?”
“Wherever we meet them.”
“How long have you been at war?”
“Eighty, ninety years, about that. What rock have you been living under?”
Ninety years? Ninety?
Everything, everything began to make terrifying sense. He was standing still, trying to give no clue what he was thinking, but shaken to the core, and telling himself it had to be a trick, a trap, something other than a vast, star-spanning circle. Coincidence couldn’t stretch that far . . . that they had just met what Phoenix had been hunting for centuries.
Phoenix’s own point of origin. Human space. A location lost from Phoenix records hundreds of years ago, when some trick of space and starship physics had thrown them off their course and into the radiation hell that had cost the ship so dearly.
Cullen had nothing to do with Braddock or Phoenix or Reunion . . . other than a distant common ancestor.
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