“You’ve heard what happened to our drones.” It was less a question than a statement, and Ichiko simply nodded mutely. “Are you thinking that the problem with your flitter was related to what happened with the drones? You’re thinking the arracht were involved? How would that even be possible?”
Ichiko took a sip of her tea and shrugged. “I certainly don’t see how. There could be some natural phenomena out there that we’re missing or something else entirely. I don’t have the answer. But maybe we can find out. I persuaded Saoirse to take a com-unit, as you suggested. AMI, link with Nagasi’s AMI, would you, then call Saoirse—it’s about Low Third there, so she should be awake.”
“I know,” Ichiko answered. “You can do the same: if you want us to see you, just say ‘holo connection’ as you press the call button.”
Saoirse nodded. They saw her gaze fall on Nagasi, and her eyes widened. “Who’s that with you?”
“Hello, Saoirse,” Nagasi said. “I’m Lieutenant Commander Nagasi Tinubu. I work with Ichiko.”
“Don’t let him fool you,” Ichiko interjected with a laugh. “Nagasi’s my boss, and I work for him. I was telling Nagasi about my trip to the archipelago and how interesting it was. He was especially interested when I mentioned Kekeki and the arracht. However, I really don’t know much about the arracht at all, so we thought we’d call you.”
Saoirse’s eyes widened further, and she glanced from side to side as if trying to find a way to escape. “I don’t know . . .” she began. “I’m not . . . The arracht? I don’t know what to tell you.”
“Well, we know from the historical record what they look like and that the Mainlanders hunted them,” Nagasi said. “Even you Inish hunted them at first. I’ve read mainland reports from around the time of your Great Fishing War about the arracht sinking fishing boats and drowning those inside—which makes them sound rather dangerous, yet you Inish fought to protect them. So are the arracht dangerous?”
“No,” Saoirse answered quickly, then: “Or only to those who would try to hurt them. They fought back to protect themselves. Yeh can’t blame them for that.”
Nagasi glanced at Ichiko with that statement, one eyebrow raised. “And how can the arracht determine who’s friendly and who’s not? Are you saying that they’re intelligent enough to understand the difference?” Nagasi persisted.
“No.” Again, the answer came too quickly. She was looking at Ichiko, pleadingly.
“I asked Rí Angus the same question,” Ichiko said to Nagasi with a warning glance and a minuscule shake of her head. Don’t push her too hard . . . “I told him that on Earth whale hunting was stopped because we felt whales were too intelligent for us to hunt them like animals—I have to admit that my birth country was one of the last to finally stop that practice, unfortunately. Rí Angus told me that the arracht simply didn’t need to be treated the way they were. Whatever the reason, the arracht stopped attacking boats once the hunting of them stopped. The Rí didn’t elaborate past that.” But if the arracht stopped attacking the boats once the hunting of them stopped, that’s something an intelligent species would do . . . She glanced at Nagasi, knowing he’d be thinking the same. “That’s one reason why I feel I need to go back out there,” Ichiko finished.
“When are yeh coming back out?” Saoirse asked, her voice sounding grateful for the change of subject. “Will it be soon?”
“I plan on returning to First Base within the next cycle or two. I’ll call you on the com-unit when I’m back on First Base so that we can make arrangements.”
“Good,” Saoirse answered. She looked again toward Nagasi. “My mam is calling for me. She’ll come looking if I don’t answer, and I can’t let her see this com-unit. It was good to meet yeh, Commander Tinubu. Ichiko, call me as soon as yer back.” They saw her reach down to the com-unit. The portal collapsed, and Saoirse was gone.
“Somehow I suspect that if we called her back, she’s not going to answer,” Nagasi commented dryly. “Of course, now that we’ve used the com-unit, that doesn’t matter.”
Nagasi’s AMI said in Ichiko’s head, and she saw Nagasi nod at the statement.
Ichiko’s AMI said nothing—not surprisingly, since the AMIs usually followed rank hierarchy.
“Nagasi, this isn’t right,” Ichiko said heatedly. “I won’t be part of us spying on Saoirse and the Inish.”
There was sympathy in his eyes, but he gave his head a slight shake. “Having the link open could potentially give us the answers to the questions you have, Ichiko,” he said. “You can’t deny that.”
“And those answers would come at the cost of my betraying Saoirse’s trust.” Ichiko shook her head. “No. I won’t do that, Nagasi, not without her knowledge. Not when I’m trying to gain her trust. It’s not ethical—and you know that.” And I’ll go to the captain if I have to. She hoped that Nagasi would understand the unsaid threat.
Nagasi bit at his upper lip. His fingertips drummed at his desktop as he stared at Ichiko. Finally, he sighed. “Remove the open link, AMI,” Nagasi said.
Wishing she didn’t feel she had to do this, Ichiko thought to her own AMI.
“Happy?” Nagasi asked Ichiko.
“Mostly, but I shouldn’t have had to ask,” she told him.
“We could have learned a lot from that open channel.”
“I never told Saoirse that we’d be using the com-unit to listen in on her. And I won’t keep the channel open without her permission.”
“And if Captain Keshmiri had said we’re to do it anyway?” Nagasi asked her.
Ah. So he did understand what I was thinking. “Then I’d tell Saoirse to take the damn box and earpiece and toss them in the ocean. Better yet, I’d tell her to attach it to this Kekeki and let her swim away with it.”
Nagasi pursed his lips. “That would be deliberate destruction of ship property and a gross violation of your contract. The captain could toss you in the brig,” he said, then chuckled in his deep, rich voice. “And I’d expect nothing less of you, Ichiko.”
“Were you really going to leave that channel open?”
Nagasi grinned. “Only if you didn’t protest, though I was fairly sure you would,” he said. “But since we don’t have the open com, I expect you to give me a minute-by-minute report on your trip. This stuff about the arracht—well, the possible implications are staggering, as I suspect you’re aware. Don’t leave any details out at all. Everything could be important . . .”
* * *
Saoirse put the com-unit in the drawer under her bed, placing it in the boxed collection of seashells she’d put together as a child. The earpiece she left in, making sure her jaw-length hair was down over it. She went into the clanhouse kitchen from which she could hear people talking. The low voices she heard went silent as the wooden floor creaked under Saoirse’s weight. Her mam was sitting with Rí Angus and Rí Keane of Clan Craig at a wooden prep table scarred with ancient knife cuts. A pot of tea sat in a woven cozy in the center of the table, and the trio all had their hands wrapped around steaming mugs, the smoke from their pipes draped in the air. Their faces
swiveled toward her as one as she entered.
“When is that Ichiko intending to come back here?” her mam asked, taking the pipe stem from her mouth. Saoirse suppressed a surge of guilt, wondering if they suspected she had the com-unit and this was a clumsy trap. “I plan on coming back to First Base within the next cycle or two . . .”
“I have no idea,” she answered. “For all I know, Ichiko’s wandering around Dulcia with Minister Plunkett, or still at First Base, or back on their ship. Or maybe she’s gone to one of the other towns to see what they’re like.” She shrugged. “Yeh know as much as I do, Mam. She’ll be here when she gets here. Or are yeh planning to tell her she’s not welcome to return?”
“There’s no need to take that kind of tone with us, Saoirse,” her mam said, frowning.
Rí Angus sighed. “Saoirse, yeh know why we’re concerned. Kekeki made it clear—”
“Kekeki allowed Ichiko to come here,” Saoirse interrupted before he could finish. “I already told Mam about that. Surely, she’s told the two of yeh already.”
“Aye, she has,” Rí Keane spoke up, exhaling a cloud of blue-gray aromatic smoke before setting his pipe down on the table. “And I suspect Kekeki made the decision only because yeh were with the woman. If the Terran had been alone, she’d be food for the spiny walkers.”
“And if that had happened, Rí Keane, we’d now have a whole flock of angry Terrans here on Great Inish, trying to figure out why their stupid machine crashed,” Saoirse replied heatedly. “Or worse, they’d have smashed Great Inish from orbit and killed the lot of us for Ichiko’s death. So yeh should all be glad Kekeki was wise enough to change her mind, no matter why she did so. As for me, I look forward to Ichiko coming back here. I think that—”
Saoirse stopped in mid-sentence. A new voice intruded, not that of anyone at the table but one that sounded only in her head: Kekeki. Looking at the others, she knew they were hearing it as well. “We would talk with Saoirse about this Ichiko. Alone. Saoirse, yeh should come to us.” And with that statement, the sense of connection with the arracht vanished.
Saoirse looked at the others, trying to read the expressions on their faces and failing. Her mam’s gaze was on the window, staring out toward the bell tower on An Cró Mór and taking a contemplative sip of her tea. Rí Keane had picked up his pipe again, wreathing himself in smoke. Rí Angus’ lips were a tight line, but they loosened as he spoke. “I’ll row yeh over if yeh can be ready by Low Fourth.”
Saoirse nodded. “Thanks, Uncle. I’m ready now.” Do any of you know what Kekeki wants to talk about? she wanted to ask. But she closed her mouth. Rí Angus grunted and pushed his chair back from the table. He downed his tea, grabbed his pipe, and pulled his folded flat cap from his jacket pocket. Her mam continued to stare at the window while Rí Keane sucked on his pipe. Neither of them said anything.
“We’ll be off, then,” Rí Angus said.
* * *
At 19:30, Ichiko was standing in front of Luciano’s door. It opened without her knocking. “Hey,” he said. “My AMI told me you were out there. Come on in. Our dinner’s already here and hot.”
She entered, noting that Luciano had set the table and that the meal appeared to be identical to the ichijyu sansai that he’d ordered when they’d had the argument and she’d stormed out. She wasn’t sure whether that was intended as a message to her or what that message was supposed to convey. She felt her stomach roil uneasily, though she tried to smile at Luciano as she sat. He lifted the covers from the plates, letting fragrant steam rise from all the dishes except the cucumber salad. “Dig in,” he said. “I gave us both chopsticks, but honestly I’m just going to use a fork rather than embarrassing myself.” He lifted the utensil, waving it toward her, and chuckled.
An involuntary small smile curved Ichiko’s lips. “I’ll probably use a fork myself. I’m out of practice with chopsticks.”
“Which dish am I supposed to start with?” Luciano asked her. “Is there an etiquette to this?”
That gave Ichiko pause. Luciano usually jumps right in . . . to everything. Is he being cautious because of me? “Not really,” she said, “other than in Japanese culture, everything is served separately and is there for a reason. You have a staple carbohydrate—that’s the rice. There’s fermented food, like the miso and the vegetables in it, which are supposed to be good for digestion. The soup’s good for hydration. Then there’s the main dish of fish, which is rich in protein. You also have the side dishes of vegetables: the cucumber salad and the potato stew, which is also in beef broth. As for etiquette, you’re not supposed to mix things. like mixing your side dishes with the rice, which some people consider ‘soiling’ the rice. At least, that’s what I remember from when my grandmother would make ichijyu sansai meals for us.”
Luciano nodded, though Ichiko wondered if he’d really listened to what she’d said or cared about the answer. She dipped her spoon into the miso soup; Luciano echoed her movement.
“Nagasi sent me a brief summary report on your trip to the archipelago through my AMI,” Luciano said as they sipped at the miso. “It sounded interesting. He mentioned the issue your flitter had on the way over—have you had the flitter checked out?”
“Lieutenant Bishara ran a full diagnostic as soon as I returned. She couldn’t find anything obviously wrong, but she said the flitter’s flight recorder was ‘utterly whacked’—that’s the technical term she used . . .” Ichiko smiled again at the memory. “. . . for a few minutes at the same time I lost control of the flitter. But there wasn’t anything her techs could find to indicate a cause. It seems to be an anomaly. Just to be safe, she wiped the software on all the flitters at First Base and reinstalled the systems. AMI, send Luciano the records that Lieutenant Bishara sent to me.”
“Good. I’ll have Engineering look those over and see if they find something Bishara’s people may have missed.” Luciano set down the spoon and picked up the fork. He stabbed at the fish, taking a bite on his fork and chewing contemplatively before swallowing. “You want to go back there, don’t you?”
“I do, very much,” Ichiko told him. “There’s more there we should learn—that we need to learn before we leave. I’m certain of it.”
“Nagasi also mentioned that you stopped him from using the com-unit you gave that girl to record Inish conversations.”
“Did he tell you why?”
“He did.” Luciano put down his fork and laid his hand on top of hers. Ichiko began to pull it away, then stopped. “I would say that you had a perfectly admirable reason for making that demand,” Luciano finished. “So when are you going back to figure things out?”
“As soon as I can,” she answered. His hand was still on hers, his fingers stroking her skin.
“The next shuttle down is tomorrow morning at 07:00,” Luciano told her. “I’ll make sure that you have a seat on it.” He paused, staring at her. “But you won’t be leaving for hours yet,” he added.
She could hear what was unsaid in that statement. “Luciano . . .”
He didn’t answer. He just looked at her, his hand still resting on hers.
“Let’s finish dinner,” she told him. “Then we’ll see what happens.”
Luciano nodded. He lifted his hand away from hers. “That’s good enough for me,” he said.
* * *
Saoirse watched Kekeki rising from the depths underneath the Sleeping Wolf, past the lighted openings of the arracht dwellings that glimmered along the cliff wall. The tentacles on the arracht’s limbs wriggled and flexed, writhing like a nest of sea anemones and pushing against the rocks as her flat tail propelled her upward, the blue flecks along her spine and short arms glowing like the electric lights Saoirse had seen in Dulcia.
The arracht broke the surface, sending a wave surging over the ledge on which Saoirse stood, the water breaking over Saoirse’s boots. The arracht’s front arms
slammed down to hold her erect and out of the water, gill casings opening and closing over the red lace of the gills along her body’s pale underside. Her long neck and head, touched with the parti-colored patches of plotch, towered over Saoirse; the yellow eyes along her eyestalks moving as she stared down.
Saoirse heard the clicks and pops as the arracht began to talk a moment before the words came to her mind in that impossible Inish accent. “Yeh’ve come alone, as we asked. Good. We wish to know if the Terran woman truly intends to come here again.”
“She does,” Saoirse told her. “I know she wants to learn more about the archipelago.” And about yeh arracht . . . Saoirse tried to hold the thought back but couldn’t.
“And us. Aye.” Kekeki blew air in what nearly sounded like a wet laugh to Saoirse. “We worry about what her people mean for us. Yer people hunted us, but we could mostly hide from yeh or fight back when we needed to in order to protect ourselves. With those up there”—several fingers lifted, pointing toward the roof of the cavern—“we might not be able to hide, and we might not be able to easily fight back. At least, not yet. We worry about this. So we ask yeh, as the one who knows the sky-people best: do they intend us harm?”
“I only know one of them,” Saoirse answered.
“Is one not like all?”
Amid the Crowd of Stars Page 18