Radiant (10 page)

"And now?"

"Now the Unity has small settlements there. One of which just sent a distress call."

"What kind of distress call?"

"A nonspecific SOS. Someone just pressed a MAYDAY button, and now isn't answering the comm."

"So let me guess," I said. "The Unity tried to call everyone else on Muta to see if anybody knew the reason for the Mayday. None of the other settlers responded."

"Exactly. Muta's gone completely silent. We have to find out why... and try to save any survivors."

"Why us?" I asked. "Doesn't the Unity have ships in the area?"

"No. The Unity only has a dozen ships in their entire fleet—huge damned things called luna-ships because they're the size of small moons. Mostly, the lunas keep to the core of Unity space, making short trips between well-populated planets. Muta's a long way off from other Unity holdings—and it only has a few thousand colonists, so it's not worth visiting often. A luna-ship drops by two or three times a year. The rest of the time, Muta is on its own."

"What about the Greenstriders? Even if they sold the planet, it's still near their territory. Don't they have ships within a few light-years?"

Festina shook her head. "From what we can tell, the Greenstriders give Muta's system a wide berth... although they
do
have a number of unmanned observation posts nearby."

I rolled my eyes. "That says a lot, doesn't it?"

Festina nodded but didn't speak... like a professor at the Academy, waiting for me to explain, though she already knew what I meant.

"There's something bad on Muta," I said. "Bad enough to scare off the Greenstriders. Or more likely, the bad thing killed every Greenstrider colonist, since I can't imagine Greenstriders leaving their land, no matter how frightened they got. The Greenstrider government wrote off Muta as too dangerous for further settlement, so they sold the planet to the Unity. Even then, the Greenstriders didn't want to turn their backs on whatever had killed their people... so they built unmanned observation posts as an early-warning system in case the bad thing on Muta started to spread."

"My thoughts exactly," Festina said. "And the Unity?"

"Full of themselves, as usual. They only colonize high-quality planets, which are never easy to come by. So they bought Muta, even though they must have known the Greenstriders had run into trouble. The Unity is famous for believing it can succeed where others have failed. They founded some settlements on Muta, probably filled with elite survey teams on the lookout for danger... but obviously they weren't as good as they thought."

"That's the way I see it too," Festina agreed. "Lucky for us, we don't have to
live
on Muta. Just go in, rescue survivors, and get out."

I looked at her. "It won't be that easy."

She sighed. "I know. All this"—she waved her hand at the city around us—"the Balrog did this for a reason. It had advance knowledge that we'd be called to Muta, and it decided to come along."

"Inside me."

"Inside you."

"Why?"

"I don't know," Festina said. "Do you think the damned moss confides in me?" Her face remained hard for a moment, then softened. "Look. I won't say the Balrog is benevolent. It has its own agenda and gleefully manipulates people to achieve its ends. But at least the Balrog is sentient. It respects sentient life. And if there's something on Muta that's been killing settlers, the Balrog
can't
be on the killer's side. If anything, the Balrog might intend to eliminate the killer. Maybe the Balrog will score points with the League if it makes Muta safe."

"So why make the trip inside me?" I asked. "If the Balrog wants to play hero, why not teleport to Muta on its own? It could smother the killer with spores, the way it smothered Zoonau."

"Maybe the Balrog wouldn't win a direct confrontation. Maybe it needs to land on Muta incognito."

"And I'm the Trojan horse?"

"That's not necessarily..." But her words were drowned out by a thunderous crash over our heads. Li's shuttle had arrived.

The rope walkways of Zoonau had lasted for millennia. Like
chintah
concrete, they weren't nearly as simple as they looked—each rope was an amalgam of artificial fibers and microbes that could heal any fraying or decay. They could not, however, heal outright breakage... like the snapping and slicing caused by a several-ton shuttle coming straight down from the top of the dome.

The ropes weren't the only casualties. They were tied to numerous supports: to buildings, to stanchions, to the dome itself. If a rope happened to be stronger than its end attachments, the attachments gave way first. Screw bolts got wrenched from the walls of skyscrapers, spilling chunks of
chintah
into the streets below. Pylons buckled and bent, or broke clean off and plunged earthward like spears. The glass of the dome resonated with pops and bangs and clatter. Occasionally, some cat's cradle proved strong enough to hold the shuttle's weight, at least temporarily; but Li just applied more downthrust, pressing the craft into the web of ropes until they collapsed under the strain. Panicked Cashlings ran for cover, while the more courageous (or foolhardy) called the newswires again. Dust and debris showered around us as rope ends whizzed past at high speed, slashing like bullwhips. Festina threw herself on top of Tut to protect him. I could only flatten facedown on the roof and hope I didn't get slammed by some jagged piece of concrete.

My eyes were closed against flying dust. I covered my ears with my hands to block the roar of the shuttle's engines. Wind buffeted around me. Yet I was still
aware
of exactly where the shuttle was. Not through vision, hearing, or the feel of disturbance in the air, but through sheer mental comprehension.

I just
knew
the shuttle's position. Knew too where everything else was: Festina, Tut, nearby Cashlings, falling
chintah.
I didn't sense these things through the chaos. I just knew.

And I knew more about those people and things than just their position. I could sense... I had no simple word for what I was perceiving, but it seemed like some kind of life force. An aura. I sensed the ordered, monastic community of plants and microbes inside the
chintah.
The chaotic labyrinth of Tut's madness. The watery shallowness of the Cashlings. The avalanche karma of Festina Ramos, distorting the space around her like a black hole, so that the woman herself was almost invisible within.

I could sense the Balrog's life force too. Inside me. The alien was filled with a powerful karma like Festina Ramos... but not an avalanche, not a black hole. A peaceful placid presence, undemanding, unyielding, neither hot nor cold, neither light nor dark, just
there:
inhabiting every part of my body like a calm and calming mist.

Or so it seemed... if I could trust this revelation. This sixth sense.

My people have long believed there
are
six senses: the usual five recognized by Westerners, plus the Faculty of Mind. Whenever I had to explain this concept to non-Buddhists, I'd mumble about the Mind's "ability to extract meaning from raw perception." Putting things together. Making logical deductions. The Mind didn't gather input per se, but processed input from the other senses and was therefore part of the sensory system. Yes, it was a sixth sense... sort of.

But suppose—at least for higher beings—the Mind really
was
a sense organ. Suppose it didn't just process input, but could somehow accumulate input on its own. Unmediated perception. Could that have been why the ancients classified Mind as a sixth sense? And we moderns had invented weak arguments to explain away the old beliefs rather than admitting our blindness.

But now I could sense the world. I knew everything's place and its nature. I also knew how I'd acquired this new mode of perception.

"Balrog," I said under my breath. "Please stop."

The radarlike awareness vanished immediately... leaving me with nothing but dust, wind, and an emptiness where the comprehension had been. The emptiness wasn't painful—I didn't feel blind and bereft, as if some part of me had been gouged away. I felt no craving to have the uncanny perception back. I was just aware of the absence. Like when you cut your hair, and for a while you're cognizant of what's missing.

"Is that how you do it?" I whispered to the Balrog. "Is that how you seduced Kaisho? How you think you'll seduce me? You share a bit of your awareness... and then, like a perfect gentleman, you stop when you're asked. But you make sure I know the offer is still open. A sixth sense that's mine anytime I want, and all I have to say is please. Like a kiss hovering a millimeter from my lips—I just have to lean in and take it. Is that how you'll make me let down my guard?"

No answer. But I remembered the way my Mind's eye had perceived the Balrog's life force: calm, peaceful, wise... like a Buddha.
Exactly
like a Buddha. As if the Balrog had knowingly portrayed itself in the guise I'd find most trustworthy.

Another aspect of the seduction. I was supposed to conceive of the Balrog not as a parasite, but as a saintly creature of pure enlightenment.

"Suppose I were a Christian," I said to the Balrog. "When I looked at you, would I see Christ? If I were a Hindu, would I see Ganesha? Or Krishna? Or Kali? And when you showed me Festina and Tut, did I really sense their inner selves? Or were you just repeating what I already knew about them, so I'd believe your mystic sixth sense could reveal hidden truths? Was it all just a trick to tempt me into inviting you back? To get me interested in taking another look?"

Still no answer. I didn't expect one.

"Never again," I said. "Don't do that to me, ever. I don't believe what your sixth sense shows me, and I definitely don't need it. Just leave me alone."

But I knew even then, I wouldn't hold out forever. Forever was too long not to give in eventually. To take just another tiny peek.

The shuttle settled on the ziggurat's roof. When I lifted my head, Festina was already standing, dusting
chintah
off her uniform. She looked down at me. "So. Did
you
arrange for the shuttle?"

"I said we might need immediate transport. I wanted to meet the shuttle at the nearest landing pad, but it's being flown by a diplomat who doesn't think other people's laws apply to him."

"Oh," Festina said. "A dipshit. I know the type." She sighed. "Who is it? Anyone I should know?"

I reported what I knew about Li and Ubatu. I couldn't recite their résumés, but I could sketch their personalities. (Inwardly, I wondered:
what would their life forces look like?)
After I'd finished, Festina asked for more details... and in the ensuing conversation, she invariably abbreviated "diplomats" to "dipshits." It proved she was an Explorer of the
old
school. For some reason, they all loved profanity and rough talk. Maybe to shock the more genteel navy personnel around them. I could never swear like that myself—I'd been raised with Bamar manners, which abhor harsh speech—but once I got used to it, Festina's crudeness made me smile. Weren't her words just another chant to scare away demons?

As I finished my précis on Li and Ubatu, the shuttle's access door opened. No one came out, but Li spoke over the shuttle's loudspeakers. "Admiral Ramos! It's an honor. Would you care to come aboard?"

Festina turned to me. "Are you ready?"

I looked around the rooftop. Pieces of equipment lay scattered around us, though a lot had blown away in the wind from the shuttle's descent. "Let's pick up the pistols and the first-aid kit. Otherwise, the Cashlings might hurt themselves."

"You do that," Festina said. "I'll get your partner."

I wanted to tell her
I'd
handle Tut. Being gene-spliced, I assumed I was stronger than she was, even though we were the same size... and a man Tut's height would be heavy, despite his beanpole frame. But before I could speak, Festina slung Tut over her shoulder in a firefighter's lift and began waddling with him toward the open hatch. I hurried about gathering the gear we didn't want to leave behind.

As I collected equipment, I surreptitiously tucked and tugged at my chemise in an effort to cover myself more decently. I didn't like the thought of Li and Ubatu leering at me on the trip back. However, I needn't have bothered. By the time I climbed inside, I had the entire passenger cabin to myself... except for the unconscious Tut, slumped in one of the chairs and belted securely with a crash harness. Festina and the diplomats were all in the cockpit, with Li occupying the pilot's seat, Festina the copilot's, and Ubatu a pull-out chair blocking the doorway. Ubatu called back over her shoulder, "Stay in the cabin, Explorer. Take care of your partner. Admiral Ramos wants to talk with us up here."

I had a split second's glimpse of Festina's face showing the plaintive look of a woman who definitely
didn't
want to talk with ambitious dipshits. Then the cockpit door shut, leaving me on my own.

Li took off at once. I almost lost my balance as the floor shifted beneath me, but I caught hold of a nearby seat and steadied myself. Grappling myself into place next to Tut, I got belted in and checked that he was all right. He'd remain unconscious for at least six hours, but he'd been buckled up snug and safe. All I could do was let him sleep it off.

Which left me at loose ends. Trying not to think. Staring at the bite wounds on my feet—so small they'd heal completely in a day or two. By the time we reached Muta, no one would be able to see where I'd been boarded by fuzzy red hijackers. I'd be the perfect Trojan horse.

But I didn't want to brood about the spores in my blood. Casting about for other subjects to occupy my mind, it occurred to me that Li had interrupted my last communication with Captain Cohen, long before I'd had a chance to make a full report. I tongued my transmitter, contacted
Pistachio's
ship-soul, and was transferred to the captain.

"What's going on down there?" Cohen asked. "The mayor of Zoonau is up in arms. He wants to arrest the lot of you for wanton destruction and public endangerment. Did something go wrong with the Balrog?"