Lost and Found (26 page)

“I am not a spacer,” Sque was forced to admit. “Perhaps if I could see an image showing our current location I might be able to recognize whether the arm where we are at present is the same one that holds cherished K’erem.”

When Tzharoustatam’s three hands came together at the fore point of his body, all nine fingers interlocked in an entwining that was as complex as it was elegant. “I am afraid that our present location is not situated in either of the main galactic arms. Much of civilization, including Seremathenn, lies closer to the galactic center, in the vast mass of stellar systems that wheel around the great gravity well at the center of our star cluster. As the Vilenjji would not dare to commit their outrages in its immediate vicinity, it must be assumed that your homes lie somewhere on the galactic outskirts, relatively speaking. From our present position you would be fortunate indeed to select the correct arm.”

“What if we could do that?” Walker found himself wishing he had paid more attention to the fragmentary bit of astronomy to which he had been exposed in school. But he’d had none in college, and in high school had been too busy memorizing defensive assignments for upcoming games to be bothered with trying to remember the locations of stars.

“Why then,” Sque informed him dryly, “we could eliminate all those suns that obviously do not correspond to our own, and then among those that do, all scannable systems devoid of planets, thereby leaving us with only a few million star systems to research to find our own.”

“Oh.” Walker was crestfallen.

Tzharoustatam continued with his encouragement. “It would not be quite so challenging. There exist instrumentalities that can further eliminate those systems containing worlds that are clearly not habitable, and that can seek out and identify communications adrift between the stars. If the correct arm is chosen for exploration and a general idea of location—inner, central, or outer region—is selected, it should be possible to reduce the number of potential locations to a few hundred systems.”

“A few hundred. If we are lucky.” Braouk was noticeably more depressed than usual. “Even at interstellar velocities, it could take more than several lifetimes to find far distant Tuuqa.”

“My people would be even more difficult to locate,” Sque commented. “We are not active travelers, or talkers, preferring as we do the company of our own individual selves.”

Or maybe nobody else can stand you, a downcast Walker thought unkindly. “Then if we can’t go home, what’s going to happen to us?”

“Seremathenn!” their host told them cheerfully. “Seremathenn is going to happen to you. It is
my
home, the home of my kind, and a nexus of civilization for a substantial portion of this part of the galaxy. I must warn you that in arriving there you will all be subject to a certain degree of culture shock—”

“Speak for the others,” Sque whistled tersely.

“—to which I am confident you will all adapt. That you have survived in Vilenjji captivity for so long and in such good physical condition is a sign of your ability to accustom yourselves to new and unique circumstances. You will have the benefit of empathetic assistance from private as well as governmental sources. I am sure you will adjust positively.”

“But,” Walker began plaintively, “while we’re grateful in advance for any hospitality that might be extended to us, what we really want is to go
home.
”

“Yes yes.” Tzharoustatam was nothing if not understanding. “But there is the small problem of choosing a direction, and securing the means, and affecting the proper timing. Not something, I regret, that falls within my sphere of responsibility. In order to pursue the matter further you must in any event control your impatience and your desires until we reach Seremathenn. At that time you will, I am certain, be put in contact with those authorities who are best positioned to look after your wishes.”

These consoling words were all efficiently translated by the Vilenjji implant. No doubt accurately, with careful regard being paid to colloquialisms, slang, and inflection. Walker had only one problem with it. The problem was that he felt he had heard it before, in the course of doing business back home, and on more than one occasion.

Though courteous and even politely affectionate, it felt all too much as if their host was delivering unto them that ominous business benediction widely known back in inconceivably distant Chicago as the brush-off.

16

Seremathenn was a beautiful world, not unlike Earth, the vision of which in the viewer was dominated by streaks of cloud as white as the Sessrimathe starship and a single large, heartbreakingly symbolic ocean. Walker did not have much time to contemplate the rapidly swelling image because he and his companions were instructed to prepare themselves for landing in a manner as respectful as it was distinctive.

These Sessrimathe, they admire us, he found himself thinking as he struggled to comply with the instructions for arrival. For what we have endured, for what we have survived. For what we tried to do in our attempt to escape from the Vilenjji ship. They just don’t admire us enough to get us home.

Maybe he was being unfair, he told himself. Maybe Tzharoustatam had been entirely honest when he had told them there was no practical way of finding their homeworlds. Maybe he, Walker, was refusing to believe it because to accept the facts as stated would be to admit to himself that he would never see anything familiar ever again—not his friends, not his condo, not Mr. and Mrs. Sonderberg’s corner deli, not his world. All the things he had followed so closely for so many years—shifts in the market, the Bears and the Bulls (in their sporting as well as financial manifestations), movies, music, television, all the cares and cries and consolations of Earth—meant nothing now. He was being obliged not only to put aside his former life, but his former existence as a human being. Abduction had forcibly transformed him. Deprived of everything he had once known, what was he now? What was to become of Marcus Walker, B.A., M.B.A. University of Michigan, starting outside linebacker his junior and senior years, Phi Beta Delta, late a shining light of the firm of Travis, Hartmann, and Davis, Inc.? They were landing.

He would soon find out.

They thought they had prepared themselves. Walker was sure their previous months spent in captivity aboard the Vilenjji vessel, coupled with their extended escape attempt and subsequent rescue by the Sessrimathe, had primed him for almost anything. George was of similar mind. Both anticipated Seremathenn to be something like Chicago, only on a . . . well, on a galactic scale.

As ever, the only things shared by imagining and experiencing were their suffixes.

The great conurbation of Autheth had not been built; it had been grown. To Walker and George the description of its manner of fabrication sounded more like magic than science; to Braouk it smacked of ancient alchemy; and to Sque—while acknowledging its beauty and marvels, the K’eremu dismissed the technique with an airy wave of several appendages.

“We amuse ourselves with similar construction modi on K’erem, though admittedly to a lesser degree. Having no need to congregate in such preposterous numbers, our analogous efforts are focused more on aesthetic refinement than vulgarities of scale.”

Leaning over quite far, spearpoint-sized teeth very close to the human’s shoulder, Braouk whispered tartly, “Unable to handle, each other in kind, self-loathing.”

“What’d friend monster say?” a curious George asked his human. Walker lowered his voice so that Sque, clinging firmly to a forward viewport, could not overhear.

“He said the K’eremu don’t build like this because they can’t stand each other’s company.”

Panting as he relaxed comfortably in Walker’s lap, the dog nodded knowingly.

Though the towering, arching structures that formed the colorful artificial canyons through which they were presently soaring had been designed to serve practical purposes, that in no way mitigated their beauty or the admiration they extorted from the visitors. In addition to the companionable foursome, the silent transportation vehicle carried another dozen of their fellow abductees. Other craft, Walker and his friends had been assured, were taking equally good care of the remaining captives. Reminiscing fondly about the gentle Sesu and the beautiful Aulaanites, he hoped they were coping adequately.

Since the prospect of having to sex every Sessrimathe they met presented him with an awkward challenge, Walker gladly accepted the testimonial of their recently assigned guide Cheloradabh that she was female. Certainly her attire yielded no clues as to her gender. Physically, she seemed little different from the male Tzharoustatam or the neuter Choralavta. Walker decided that he could survive indefinitely without the need to be made personally conversant with the details of the germane distinctions.

“How do you ‘grow’ buildings like these?” he inquired as they dipped and wove a path through the soaring structures without so much as threatening any of the other vehicles utilizing nearby airspace.

“Applied biophysics,” she informed him. Or at least, that’s how the implant in his head interpreted her words. He suspected there were technical refinements that could not easily be translated. “It would take more time and expertise than I possess to explain it to you in detail.”

“He would not understand anyway.” That was Sque, ever helpful. “I would be interested in hearing some of the specifics myself, at some future date and time. For now it is enough to know that biophysics are involved.” She remained fixed to her chosen port. Walker experienced a sudden desire to shove her head down into her body until both were as squashed together as her tentacles. It was an urge he had learned to resist, having had many opportunities during the preceding months to practice such restraint.

“Where are we going?” George asked aloud.

As the transport efficiently piloted itself, Cheloradabh was able to assume a comfortable tripodal stance of relaxation and reply to their questions at leisure. “Novelty is difficult to quantify. On a world such as Seremathenn it is rare, and therefore valuable. You are a story that demands telling, and there are many eager to listen.”

Walker understood. “The media. We’re going to have our pictures taken.”

“I am not certain what you mean by that, but your likenesses were made available to every residence, office, and place of activity on the planet well before your ship arrived here,” she explained. “Visuals of you all have long since become familiar to the populace. Actual presence is now requested.”

The human was not deterred. “I follow you. We’re expected to give interviews, to explain what happened to us. I’m tired, but I can understand the interest. We owe the Sessrimathe at least that much for rescuing us from the Vilenjji, even if it is for novelty’s sake.”

Sque looked back from where she had attached herself to the window. “We would have managed a successful escape without any outside help.”

Though a suitable response occurred to each of them separately, her companions studiously ignored her.

When the transport finally slowed, it came to rest atop a tower of water. Not a water tower, such as could be found even in the heart of Chicago, but a tower of water. While Sque, comfortable on the perimeter of an aqueous environment, exited confidently from the transport, her friends were more tentative.

“None of us breathe liquid,” Walker told Cheloradabh. “We’ll drown.”

“Drown? Oh, I understand.” Two of three hands indicated the impossible rippling partition that appeared to bar their way. “That is not water. It is fluid . . . ,” she spoke a word the Vilenjji implant could not translate. “You are in no danger. We are all of us oxygen breathers together. Please.” She gestured again.

Still uncertain, they crossed the waiting accessway. That in itself took some nerve, since the Sessrimathe-sized bridge linking transport and destination was not wide and spanned a drop of several thousand feet. Only Sque with her ten grasping limbs was not intimidated by the chasm between structure and transport. Of the remaining trio, George managed the crossover best, thanks to his low center of gravity. The taller Walker and Braouk both had to wrestle with vertigo.

The humming, waterfall-like wall parted at their approach. Beyond, they found themselves in a high hallway that appeared to be composed of different-colored liquids. While heights troubled two of them, fortunately none were susceptible to motion sickness. Defying appearance, the dark green floor beneath their feet had the texture of ocean but the consistency of hard rubber.

Fluid hall and liquid floor were no more difficult to accept than the bubble within the not-water to which they were escorted. Instructed to enter, they found themselves floating free within a globe of pale blue radiance. Unable to find a secure purchase, Sque resorted to bunching her appendages tightly beneath her. Though they drifted as if weightless, the presence of gravity was signified by the absence of nausea.

The illumination surrounding them brightened. Curvilinear blue walls faded. Faces appeared where walls had been. The majority were Sessrimathe, but not all.

In these surroundings it was Walker’s turn to shine. Favoring privacy, Sque declined to respond to any inquiries unless they were specifically directed her way. Braouk exhibited a shyness heretofore only suspected, while George was content to correct or supplement his human’s responses. That left Walker, whose profession required him on any given day to deal with hundreds of questions from dozens of different individuals, to reply to the flurry of queries. While not the floor of the Exchange back home, he found that he slipped easily into the role of spokesman for the foursome.

Yes, they were all right—and grateful for the opportunity to express their appreciation to their benevolent saviors the Sessrimathe. This gratitude appeared to go down as intended. Yes, it was true they had no idea where their respective homeworlds lay in relation to Seremathenn, or any other part of galactic civilization. Did they bear their captors any ill will?

“Careful.” Peering out from her wrapping of tentacles, Sque took notice of the question long enough to deliver a discreet warning.

She doesn’t want us to appear uncivilized,
he thought. It made sense. The last thing they wanted to do was show evidence of any traits that could be used to support a distorted Vilenjji version of events.

“We are of course saddened and depressed by what has happened to us. While we are grateful for your hospitality, we would all of us naturally rather be on our way home. As to those who forcibly abducted us, we are confident that they will be treated appropriately by whatever entity is responsible for dealing with such matters.”

Something nudged his leg. Glancing down, he saw a floating George bumping up against him. “Nice. Remind me to have you along the next time I run into a certain pair of rogue Dobermans on upper Eighty-second Street.”

The questions went on for more than an hour, until Cheloradabh mercifully called a halt.

“More opportunities to converse with the newly arrived ill-starred will follow at specified times. Now you must pardon them, for as the biped pointed out, they are wearied from their experience.”

Led out of the bubble, they found themselves once more standing on solid dark water. Walker thought he could see small bits of iridescence moving within it, though whether lightning-quick bursts of energy or equally fleet living things he could not have said. Though he was not conscious of any of the busy Sessrimathe moving to and fro around them staring in his direction, he still looked up guiltily. What opinion would humans form of an alien visitor who spent his time gawking in astonishment at ordinary walls and floors?

Exiting the tower by a different portal than the one through which they had entered, they rode a smaller transport over cityscape that alternated with open woodland and glistening bodies of water. Half an hour later they slowed and began to descend into what appeared to be a forest of gigantic trees. For a second time that day, physical appearances proved deceiving. The impossible forest was as much composed of run-of-the-mill wood as the tower had been of ordinary water. Instead, the colossal “trees” were fashioned of another synthetic, mimicking material that had been employed as much for aesthetic as structural effect.

It
felt
as if they were entering a huge, hollowed-out tree. The interior
smelled
like thriving, flower-fraught vegetation. There were even hosts of tree-dwelling creatures skittering about. They reminded him of the individual iridescent flashes he had noticed in the floor and walls of the not-water tower. Such, apparently, was the nature of Sessrimathe construction. Elsewhere on Seremathenn there might be edifices fashioned of faux sand, buildings built of warm ice, structures composed of fake flesh. On a world of incredibly advanced technology, would not ordinary housing make as much use of advanced physics and new materials as starships and weaponry? The Vilenjji had built a better cage. The Sessrimathe built a better habitat.

Leading them into a vein in the “wood,” Cheloradabh guided them to a knot in one branch. Having noted earlier the aversion of some of her charges to heights, she had thoughtfully chosen a vertical offshoot of the central structure instead of a horizontal one. A wave of her forward limb caused the apparently solid wall in front of her to shimmer into sparkling sawdust. Once beyond, they found themselves standing in a large room whose perfect oval shape was marred only by bumps and protrusions in the walls and floor. Eyeing these suspiciously, Walker suspected they served some purpose other than mere decoration.