Fluency (25 page)

The female Sectilius was in the process of donning an armored suit, exactly like the one Jane was wearing. The woman was e
xceedingly thin, tall, lithe, sharply featured—to Walsh’s eyes, alien and suspicious.

She was ordered to stop what she was doing. She answered calmly, matter of fact, in Mensententia that she meant no harm, that she intended to protect herself from the violence of this b
izarre, chaotic world. These men couldn’t comprehend her, nor Walsh, but Jane could and the following sequence made her blood run cold.

Two soldiers advanced on her while other soldiers crowded the unresisting, catatonic Sectilius men, slumped at the controls of the vehicle. The soldiers ordered the woman to stop again as she slipped one arm down into the suit. She narrowed her eyes and slowly continued, no expression of any kind on her face. They tried to stop her physically. She pushed them away with a force that clearly surprised them.

There were angry words, cursing. A shot rang out. The Sectilius woman looked down at her torso, registered that she’d been wounded, and shouldered the suit, which instantly enveloped her. She returned fire, obliterating the man who’d just shot her with a single concussive blast from her wrist. The camera rocked violently and it was hard to tell what was happening for a few moments. When it righted itself, bullets were pinging off the Sectilius woman as she staggered forward, arm raised, sending out a few more pressure waves before she collapsed.

The screen went blank for a moment then lit up again in a new location. This scene was very different—the contrast was stark. Bright light flooded the room from above. It was a surgical suite filled with gowned, masked men crowded around the center of the
room. It was very quiet. The men spoke in low murmurs as they worked over someone.

Then she heard an agonized moan.

Jane involuntarily put the back of her hand to her mouth and tasted blood as the mechanical hand smashed her tender lips.

One man smoked a cigarette nearby, watching the proceedings with intense absorption.

The camera moved in. Men with oiled hair and horn-rimmed glasses glanced up and stepped aside. One of the Sectilius was naked on an operating table. It was the short, stocky male—his body corded with dense musculature.

The camera moved in closer, revealing that his body was flayed and cut wide open from neck to groin. They were dissecting him. He was alive and awake and in agony.

Jane could sense Walsh’s unarticulated emotions. It was very clear. He approved of this.

Jane fell to her knees against the glass and wretched. Ei’Brai stopped the flood of the memory and she thanked him for that kindness while she recovered her composure.

If Ei’Brai saw this in Walsh’s mind—from the beginning? That explained a few things.

When she was able to stand again, she choked out, “I will not let them do that to you!”

“How will you prevent it? They will be curious about the similarities and dissimilarities between my kind and homologous creatures on your world. I have seen in your mind, my form is not unfamiliar to you, yet my intellect, my abilities, are singular—you have encountered nothing that compares in your cumulative experience as a species. The precedent has been set. Surely you must see that this is the natural conclusion to any alien introduction to your culture. They will not be able to help themselves.” All his concentration was fixed on her every move, every thought. “You, however, are different. You know me as they cannot.”

She shook her head slowly, perplexed. “Ei’Brai, I won’t let that happen.”

“I’m gratified that your intent is unadulterated, but I’m less certain that this pledge is truly within your dominion. A brief appearance in your skies, messages to your many governments with all the necessary information is in order—in your own words, with your reassurances—that will more than fulfill that portion of the mission.

“Eventually another diplomatic ambassador will be dispatched from the Unified Sentient Races to your world, assuming the coal
ition still exists—that will permit a more equal footing, less risk to any single individual, such as myself. Certainly you can see that logic dictates we must proceed immediately to Sectilius for a full investigation into the genocide of the Speroancora Community, to discover the extent to which the fleet has been affected, Sectilius itself, or if this was an isolated event. Now that the ship’s binary systems recognize the presence of a Quasador Dux, there is nothing to keep us here. The time has come. We are much delayed.”

“Nothing to keep us here?” she asked, incredulous. “What about the illness that killed your crew? Are Walsh and the others going to infect Earth with it? What about Compton? Is he cont
agious? I’m not just going to sit back and ignore all of that and let you zoom off into space!”

“It is improbable they are infected. Far less likely that it will be capable of replication in any meaningful way. Contagion is highly unlikely.”

“Improbable? Meaningful? Highly unlikely? You mean you don’t know? I can’t gamble with their lives that way. I will
not
gamble with Earth that way!”

“Commander Mark Walsh chose not to step onto the diagnostic platform. That was his election and does not affect you. You have not been infected. Nor has Dr. Alan Bergen.”

Again, certainty.

Jane stood resolute before him. “I’ve trusted you. Now you must trust me. We should go back to Earth, bring our best scie
ntists onboard. I’ll teach them Mensententia and we’ll deal with this thing, whatever it is. Then, we’ll talk about Sectilius. Decades have passed since the attack—a few more months will hardly matter in the greater scheme of things. I’m certain there will be volunteers for that kind of mission—people far better suited to the role of Quasador Dux than myself! I’ll be careful. I’ll be adamant with my government. I’ll be strong. I won’t let them bring anyone on board that I don’t trust.”

“This is not a negotiation.” His voice had suddenly taken a di
fferent tone, resonated on a different frequency.

She felt small stirrings of unease in her belly. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“I possess the power of eternal night—the balance between dusk and dawn for your Dr. Alan Bergen.”

Her heart fluttered in her chest. She felt weak.

His finger was on the trigger. If she didn’t agree to his terms, he would end Alan’s life.

Jane backed up a step and shook her head. Panic rioted through her. “You can’t be serious! Why would you resort to that? You’re insane!”

He was extremely agitated. The sensation of barely leashed power that she’d felt from him early on pervaded her perception of him again now. His arms were whipping and swirling around him. He inhaled through his mantle, exhaled through his funnel more rapidly than seemed to be necessary, and this required tense countermeasures to maintain his place in the water opposite her. His mental touch was shielded, though. She had a hunch he might be bluffing, but she couldn’t be sure.

He sounded contemptuous, his voice vibrating louder inside her head than it ever had before. “I am rational. You are allowing yourself to be motivated by fleeting emotional states, instead of by reason. Elimination of this individual would free you. I am needed elsewhere, immediately. You and I are bound to this mission. This supersedes your paltry desires for intimacy.”

She stared at him, open-mouthed, outraged that he was so dismissive of Alan’s life. Her voice cut like a knife through the air, so angry that she had to speak out loud. “He is more to me than that and you know it.”

Ei’Brai growled, “I have not waited this many solar cycles to find my end, desiccating and bleeding in your primitive surgeon’s theatre. I am far too valuable an individual to meet dusk in such a manner.”

Her voice also dropped to a lower register. “Alan is equally valuable to me, to the people of my world. Be careful where you tread, Ei’Brai, or I may just let the asteroid give you this dusk you speak of.”

But he was going on as if he hadn’t heard her, “In fact, one se
ssion with a Sectilius mind-master would relieve you of these insecurities, allow you to embrace your inner desires, fully transmute you into the commanding individual you are meant to be.”

She was afraid to force his hand. “I’m fine how I am. Stop this charade. You’re bluffing.”

“Am I?” Ei’Brai sputtered. Then a wall came down and a crashing torrent of experience broke through—she was gasping and choking inside the gel—except it wasn’t her. It was Alan.

She fled to the controls that had freed her just hours before, looking for the command that would give Alan the air he needed, but Ei’Brai was concealing them from her, masking everything so it seemed like gibberish.

She refused to give in to panic.

Withdrawing from him in a rush, she came back fully back into herself and severed the link between them. She turned on a dime and strode back down the gantry, ordering the helmet closed as she went. Eleven swift paces to the left, she stopped at a precise point and raised her arm. The blast cannon would discharge with a mere flicker of thought.

Her teeth ground together in defiance. She turned the helmet to face him with a servo-motor whir.

“Your life support lies behind this wall, Ei’Brai. If you
dare
to hurt Alan, I will destroy that equipment and you will suffocate—not as quickly as Alan, but you will suffocate, nonetheless—while I watch.”

“You may injure yourself in the process. You will be stranded here,” he said warily.

“I don’t care,” she uttered with deadly certainty. She wasn’t bluffing. She’d do it. She’d kill him if he murdered Alan.

She sensed an easing of Alan’s distress and allowed herself to take a long, relieved breath.

She felt the need to press her advantage, to challenge him. He wanted her to lead, but then gave her ultimatums to force the issue? It sounded like an antagonistic maelstrom in the making, not a peaceful working relationship at all.

Was she actually considering taking him up on his offer? Did she really have a choice?

“Ask yourself, Ei’Brai—am I your enemy or your ally? Do you trust me as your Quasador Dux—or is this mutiny? Confirmed mutineers on this ship receive the death penalty, under Sectilius law.”

She wasn’t precisely sure how she knew that, but she did know it and it was damn useful information.

Ei’Brai’s gaze was unwavering. His limbs slowed. His voice was solemn. “Does this mean you accept the appointment to the rank of Quasador Dux, Dr. Jane Holloway?”

There was gravitas in this moment. She knew it.

Instinct told her that her life had been spent barreling toward this moment. Every decision she’d ever regretted, she’d agonized over. There was no time for that now. She had to take the upper hand somehow. She had to trust her gut. She barely hesitated. “I do.”

As soon as those two words transmitted to him via thought, she realized what he’d been doing. In that moment a new channel opened between them and she experienced Ei’Brai on an entirely new level. The ship hummed through him—now through her as well. She could be aware of any part of it that she pleased at any given moment, through this connection with him. There were no walls between them anymore. She could see any part of his inner dialogue or memory that she might want. She could monitor any system or any individual.

In that moment, all Ei’Brai felt was raw relief. His bravado was instantly supplanted by a release of anxiety and a flood of reassurance and calm. So much so that it affected even her. That was a small comfort as she quickly uncovered the series of machinations he’d used to bring her to this point. His deceptions, which he deemed a series of necessary tests, were laid at her feet. He begged her forgiveness for them.

She looked over at him. His limbs were drawn together to a point and he had maneuvered his body so that he faced slightly away from her, more laterally than vertically at the moment. It was a form of submission.

She lowered her hand and intuitively used her new access to check on Alan. He slept peacefully. He hadn’t just gone through any kind of trauma. That had been a ruse.

She shook her head, utterly baffled. “You tricked me!”

“A regrettable and heinous act of subterfuge. It will not happen again—is not even possible now, as I’m certain you have ascertained. I am completely open to you, at your service.”

She staggered back a step as he revealed that the xenon gas
…the transformation of the nepatrox…these were all carefully concocted tests to see how she would handle herself under pressure, to see where her loyalties would lie, to evaluate her sense of fairness, her self-control—all to see if she would measure up to his exacting standards. He wouldn’t serve just anyone, it seemed.

“Calculated risks,” he hummed deferentially.

That included the interlude with Alan—testing her ability to accept cultural differences and not put her own ego first when feeling affronted.

“I need to sit down.” She backed into the wall and slid down to the floor with a heavy clunk. Drawing her knees to her chest, she opened the helmet to rest her forehead on crossed arms.

“You put people’s lives at risk.” It was an accusation. That was the part that rankled the most.

He did not sound the least bit defensive. Instead, he resumed his patient, instructive air. “Normally, every potential leader among the Sectilius, myself included, is assessed in an academic setting under naturalistic, simulated conditions by accomplished proctors. This was not possible in your case. Therefore, I created a real-world scenario and endeavored to minimize risk, while kee
ping the overall goal of assessment within similar parameters, always with the goal to preserve life when possible. There is much at stake.”