Battleground (19 page)

A
R
CH HARM HAD BEEN A
historian in his other life. For him, the ancient question that went “Why are we here?” was not a philosophical one.

The first time he asked that question, in a small town on a D'neeran prairie, his father had responded with an image that combined the town of their previous residence with an image of Arch's maternal grandmother, whom his father greatly disliked (though he still liked Arch's mother). This was Arch's first introduction to the reasons humans moved about as they did. He canvassed his agemates to find out why
they
were there, wondered who had first come to L'enka and started a town, and thus was launched on a path that only fascinated him more as time passed. Eventually, as a sideline, he studied the history of F'thal, was so interested that he became an expert at an early age, and took up the history of Girritt, such as it was, with equal enthusiasm. He had been an unsuccessful applicant to the Zeigan Project when Starr Jameson headed it, and Hanna, who had made that first contact, had chosen the project's handful of direct contact personnel, all of them D'neerans. Arch had not been unqualified, but there were better candidates at the time (none of whom had wanted anything more to do with Contact after Zeig-Daru).

Arch was perfect for this mission, though. He was so immersed in his subject that even though he knew Hanna well, his core perception of her was her role in history. And Hanna liked obsessive specialists. If they did not always see a larger picture, they did contribute to it immeasurably. It was Arch, therefore, who finally got to meet with a being Soldiers called a record-keeper, there being no broader word for “historian.”

Kwek Warrior might have been a prepossessing female of her species, but her species was not Arch's. He only knew she was female because Hanna, informing him of the meeting, had used the pronoun “she.” Kwek was not in crèche mode, and the coveralls she wore did not hint at her numerous breasts. The rooms where they met were as utilitarian as all the rest of Soldiers' spaces and dominated by a bank of equipment Arch guessed were computers and their peripherals, all looking rather scraped and dented, and so bulky that it was evident they were neither organic nor quantum-based. Faint noises hinted at the ever-present video screen pouring out war, speeches, and public assemblies, but someone, presumably Kwek, had shoved a tall gray cabinet in front of it, hiding it from view.

Arch almost missed Kwek's greeting, because his attention was fixed on one unexpected feature in the room: one of the tall, tapering tumblers these people used stood on a counter, a few forlorn-looking blossoms sticking out of its mouth. It was the first hint of decoration anyone had seen on Battleground.

He became aware that he was expected to say something, and said hastily, “Sorry, I think the translator glitched. Would you repeat?”

“Very well. Guest, I am Kwek Warrior and I have three hundred and twenty summers.”

“Host, I am Arch, and I have forty summers. I am here to learn about your people's past.”

Kwek said, “With which year do you wish to begin?”

Arch had decided to leave prehistory alone for now, so he said: “Your earliest written records, or maybe images of them, if you don't have the artifacts here. Those would be clay tablets, perhaps, or carved stone.”

“What?” said Kwek, or so it came out of the translator.

“The earliest written records that human beings left were engraved in media like rock or baked clay,” Arch explained—patiently, because Hanna had taught her students that it often took some time to get contiguous human and alien frames of reference to overlap. “Later records might survive on parchment or some other form of organic material. In some cases the content, taken in context with other data, allows dating to a particular year, or even to a particular day. Other times, we can only come up with an estimate.”

He was open, as instructed, to anything he could pick up from Kwek without touching her thoughts in any way she might perceive. He was getting an odd mix now: curiosity, confusion, and oddest of all, a sense of comprehension accompanied by—fear. But it did not seem to be Arch she feared.

She said, “You must state a year.”

Arch said thoughtfully, “All right. Let me see your records for the year one.”

“There are none,” Kwek said. With relief; she was on surer ground. The reply did not surprise Arch.

He said, “This is the year of the four thousand six hundred and twenty-sixth summer, according to transmissions we retrieved in our approach. Do I have that right?”

“That is correct.”

“So you are compiling records for year four thousand six hundred and twenty-six.”

He looked at her expectantly.

“Yes.”

“And you have records from the year four thousand six hundred and twenty-five, counting down.”

“Yes.”

“How far—no, what is the lowest numbered year?”

“Four thousand three hundred and one,” Kwek said immediately.

Arch couldn't take the statement literally. He said, “But that's only a little over three hundred summers ago.”

“Yes. We also have records for the years four thousand three hundred two and three hundred three, four thousand three hundred twenty-one, a portion of four thousand three hundred twenty-two—”

She went on until Arch stopped her. There were huge gaps. He let it go and groped for another question.

“What are the years numbered
from
?” he said. “How do you know which year was year one? Did something happen in that year?”

“Creation,” Kwek said.

“Creation?”

“Yes,” Kwek said.

“Creation of what?”

“Everything. The world, Soldiers, the universe, everything. At least, we call it year one. The fact is that the counting is not certain. I think. I know my predecessor miscounted, so maybe her predecessor did, and maybe his did.”

Arch was focused on that astonishing statement about the year one. He said, “You can't believe that. What about the fossil record? What about astrophysics? You must have astrophysics!” He hesitated; the translator had made a
no referent
noise for
fossil
. “Wait—” he said. Frames of reference, he reminded himself.

“Do you mean,” he said—he had started to say
you can't mean
—“that everything that now exists came into existence all at once, all at the same time, in the year one?”

“Yes,” Kwek said again. The answer was unequivocal. But there was an edge of doubt. A lonely doubt; an unhappy one.

I must be missing something
, Arch thought.

“Do all Soldiers believe as you do?”

“Yes. It is the truth,” Kwek said. Miserably. Then she added, “There are some who believe otherwise. They go to That Place.”

Arch, thinking a historian's thoughts about histories of orthodoxy, thought she meant hell. To be sure, he said, “Just where is That Place?”

Then, to his astonishment, Kwek turned to the computer bank and spoke a series of instructions. A map of the hemisphere appeared, and Kwek put a finger on ocean. Arch had a wild vision of a sort of watery anti-inferno.

“It's underwater?” he said.

“No. We do not put it on maps because it does not matter.”

Then Arch remembered. There
was
land where Kwek pointed. He had studied maps of Battleground intensively, anticipating that geography would play a significant role in the treasury of knowledge he expected to ransack. The land in question was not a single body and none of its units were large; humans had classified it as an archipelago.

“Does it have a number?” he asked; for Battleground designated landmasses and groupings of masses not by name but by number.

“No,” said Kwek. “It is just That Place.”

Then she looked quickly over her shoulder. He couldn't read the alien face, but there was no mistaking the emotions pouring from her: longing and grief.

“I wish I could go there,” she said.

The recording better come out right
, Arch thought. Maybe Hanna could make some sense of this.

“Why do you want to go there?” he asked.

“Because I doubt,” she said, barely above a whisper. “Thoughts come that I never had before, I ask myself questions I did not think of before. Why is history empty of so many years? Why would Abundant God attempt to deceive us by creating bones of animals that did not ever exist? Why have we never decisively defeated the Demon, why has nothing changed in all the summers of my life, why do some Commanders go away and never return though it is secretly said they survive?”

Arch thought:
I am out of my depth.

He said, “Do you think you could get permission to visit our ship? Observe our techniques, look at our records—”

Any excuse to get her there, where others could help him sort it out.

“I do not think so. No one else has gone.”

“I don't think anyone has been invited yet. Kwoort,” he said, inspired. “We'll ask Kwoort if you can go. You know Kwoort?”

“Why, yes. He is ranked next to the Holy Man.”

“We can get his authorization, I'm sure. I think. Will you come?”

Kwek said, “Yes. And afterward, maybe I will go to That Place, and not return here.”

But Kwoort—when Hanna was roused from deep sleep to call him—denied permission. He did not even do it in person; it was Prookt who conveyed the refusal to Hanna. And shortly thereafter, an alarmed and disbelieving Arch was escorted to a room much like the one where Hanna had been a quasi-hostage—only this one had a lock on the outside.

•   •   •

He
knew something was wrong as soon as the two Soldiers came for him, and knew before they reached the room that they meant to lock him in. He managed to go into it calmly and silently, and then he screamed in thought,
H'ANA!!!

She had just left Communications, puzzled by Kwoort's action but longing to return to the dark relief of sleep—until that shout of panic made every tired muscle jerk. She lost her balance, grabbed at air, and found herself on the floor, weak with Arch's fear.

She knew a lot about fear.

Her hands were clenched. She was alone in the corridor and grateful for it; no one would distract her. She relaxed her hands deliberately, all at once and then finger by finger. She fed the sensations to Arch in a steady stream, felt the adrenaline rush begin to ebb in both of them.

That's good, Arch. That's good. Now a deep breath. Good. Another one. Let it out slowly . . .

Jameson used to guide her this way when he waked her from blood-soaked nightmares.

Again. Again . . .

Better,
Arch thought.

Show me what happened.

Not much, on the face of it: two Soldiers, a locked room.

Did they take your com unit?
Images, not words.

No . . .
Not a word either: relief and hope.

Use it. Report to me as if I didn't already know, as if you were true-human.

She was on her feet, running back to Communications, when he made the audible report, sounding calm enough now. She had already alerted Metra by the time she got there.

“All personnel on the surface will be evacuated at once. And I will contact Commissioner Vickery,” Metra said from Command, and Hanna said, “You do that, but try for Starr Jameson first,” which Metra did not take kindly. Hanna shrugged; Vickery might have surfaced, but nobody was going to pay any attention to him. Her priority was Kwoort.

But Kwoort would not talk to her. All her efforts got her were low-level Soldiers, who kept repeating, as she called again and again from Communications, that Kwoort Commander would be notified of her attempt to reach him.

“I want to go down there,” she told Metra, and Metra said, “No.”

“Then I'll touch him telepathically.”

“No.”

“He's not responding! How else am I supposed to find what he's up to?”

“Later. When evacuation is complete.”

Half an hour passed, Hanna touching Arch at intervals.
Nothing's happened,
he said each time.
Endeavor
's shuttles left and returned in flashes of light. A few specialists dragged their feet. Metra talked to those herself, the message unequivocal:
Move
now
. Or you'll be stunned and carried.
The last of them—the physiologists, the most stubborn, who had gone with Joseph—were finally retrieved. Hanna did not like Metra any better, but the captain's command in evacuating personnel was faultless. The whole exercise had taken just under forty minutes.

Then Arch said, tense but no longer afraid:
I'm free—they're letting me go—

—thank God. Use the com unit again.

Metra was suddenly at her shoulder, angry and impatient. She had tried to reach Vickery, impotent though he might be, with no better result than Hanna had gotten from Kwoort. Vickery's staff had referred her to Jameson. Jameson had referred her back to Hanna.

“They're letting Arch go,” Hanna told her.

“How do you know?”

“He told me—wait, this is him.”

Voice now: “H'ana? I was wrong. I'm told there was a misunderstanding. The Soldiers escorting me were supposed to take both of us, the record-keeper and me, to a rendezvous point, so we can go back to
Endeavor
together. The captain can send a shuttle as soon as she's ready.”

That is not true. Prookt said Kwoort's decision was definite.

Arch:
And the Soldiers were clear about their orders, that was no mistake—

Metra had cleared nonessential personnel from Communications. She would have liked to clear Hanna, too, but functioning as liaison with Kwoort's proxies made her essential. Hanna had shut out telepathic communication with her team, all except Arch now back on
Endeavor
; their anxiety for Arch was too distracting. Metra had not hesitated to alert the trailing, almost-forgotten warship, but she had refused to allow Hanna to communicate with Jameson.