Spear of Light (17 page)

“We know,” Nayli said. Chrystal had almost seduced her into a wrong belief, but Paol didn't need that story. “How long until we leave?”

“Two hours. Can I take you around to meet some of the people who want to fight for you?”

Vadim frowned. “I know you trust them all, but we can't afford for the Next get a hint that we're here. We'll meet with your top two or three recruits.”

Paol looked thoughtful. “Maybe the top four? Would that be okay?”

Vadim and Nayli shared a long glance, and Vadim nodded. He was always the most cautious. “Yes,” Nayli said. “But no more, and don't tell them why they're coming.”

Paol left, returning in less than an hour with four people: Two women and two men. Three had an arm full of captain's tattoos. All of them were hard-eyed. One woman was more modified than the Shining Revolution liked, with synthetic arms and hands.

Nayli watched Vadim work them, asking question after question about how they felt about the Next and what they wanted and whether or not they would be willing to kill for the ideal of pure unaltered humanity. She catalogued the micro-expressions playing across their faces and noticed the smallest nuances of body language and tone, paying particular attention to the woman with the synthetic hands.

She signaled Vadim with the use of particular phrases when she concluded there were no spies among them.

He stopped.

Silence fell for just a moment, and Nayli asked the final question. “Are you willing to die for an idea?”

The overly modified woman flinched.

Nayli made sure that Vadim noticed before she accepted their individual answers, all assurances that they would be willing to die for the Shining Revolution, willing to die for humanity. Willing to die at Vadim and Nayli's command.

They left. When he returned, Nayli told Paol, “The redheaded woman who flinched gets no more information. Tell her thank you, and tell her we liked her. Keep her hopeful. The others will be fine.”

Vadim added, “Thank you for your work gathering support.”

“It's easier than it ever was,” Paol said.

“We appreciate your loyalty.” Nayli planted a kiss on each of his cheeks, and they left.

Fifteen minutes after the
Next Horizon
took off, the
Shining Danger
warmed up in the waiting bay. Nayli's hands roamed her controls, checking sequence after sequence, weapon after weapon. In the couch next to her, Vadim did the same. There were two ways to release everything, two complete systems they could use to drive the ship. They flipped control between the two and back again.

She glanced at Vadim. “I want it. I want to do this.”

He grinned. “All right.”

Permission to leave crackled over the loudspeaker. Nayli flew out as carefully as possible, doing her very best to imitate a simple trader. It took twenty very long minutes to clear the station's airspace.

She used the time to bring Stupid up between them, this time dressing the virtual avatar in a see-through version of a simple soldier's uniform. “Are you ready, Stupid?”

“I have a course correction prepared.”

“Do we still have time?”

“Yes.”

She smiled. “I thought so.” The moment they were free of the station's control, she adjusted course and gave the engine twice the juice.

It responded.

The
Shining Danger
had never looked like much, but that was part of her cover. She had some of the best engines and controls made, and she and Vadim had crew who maintained them meticulously. Stupid wasn't.

They didn't have to come up behind the
Next Horizon
. They had to pass it.

She kept expecting to alarm it, to see it change course or to hear it had fired at them. Apparently the Next didn't consider themselves in much danger.

Maybe the super-smart robots weren't that smart after all.

“Ready?” she asked Vadim.

“Always.” He smiled. “Yes.”

“Stupid?”

“Forty-three seconds.” The machine started counting down at ten. Some people would let the machine fire, but she had never been one of them. The last few seconds went by slowly.

Five . . . four.

She took a deep breath.

Three . . . two . . . one.

Her thumb released the first shrapnel missile, her index finger the next. Her pinky released the fifth.

The
Next Horizon
didn't react until the first bomb exploded far in front of it, sending out a net of what amounted to dangerous missiles at these speeds. They were lost from that moment.

“Oh come on, fight back,” she whispered. If it was too easy, they wouldn't even look like heroes.

A laser weapon fired at them, broad and wide.

She was ready, and fired thrusters to move them away from the beam.

No problem.

Fights in space were slow.

Nayli started singing. She had this one.
They
had this one. She was so sure, she unstrapped and flicked Stupid's image into a corner so she could easily cross to Vadim without being engulfed by her own AI avatar on the way.

He met her halfway, his mouth falling hard onto hers, his kiss demanding and exultant all at once.

He tasted like triumph.

Stupid said, “They've started to slow,” from the corner.

Vadim said, “Start the music.” He must have pre-programmed what he wanted; the classical music that slowly swelled into the room sounded quite dramatic and martial. Battles in space were silent, undramatic. The music gave it reality and structure, made the far-off scene vibrate through Nayli's bones.

Stupid spoke again. “The right engine sheared off. They're broadcasting a mayday.”

Vadim's hand curled around her cheek.

She turned inside of his arms, looking at the monitors where Stupid was playing stats.

Vadim hugged her tight into him, folding her back against his chest. He was warm and alive, and a reminder that nothing on the ship they were destroying now even breathed.

How could she have almost lost this one true way of knowing her own soul?

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

YI

Yi ran alone. Thinking. Waiting. A Jhailing had asked for him, but it had not yet told him how to get in contact, or whether it would appear inside of him or in the flesh. That was all right. He was used to waiting. In the meantime, he reveled in small motions, in diffusing heat, in feeling the sun and the breeze as they fought each other for control of the air temperature.

Nexity was growing fast. The Wall had stopped getting taller, and housing and walkways and a wider exercise track had appeared basically overnight. For the Next, matter was not only movable and formable but could be transformed into a rubbery surface that was the perfect hardness to allow speed and exactly rough enough for excellent traction. Almost all day and night, Next of all kinds ran along the path in the center of the Wall, charging themselves with the cleanest and best energy, lubricating their joints, meeting, or simply thinking. Yi would never have expected robots to be more active than flesh, or to take such pure joy in running.

He had never liked running before.

Each footfall was a chance for precision, each moment an opportunity to balance evenly, each push forward a chance to increase his velocity.

I'll be beside you in just a moment.

The Jhailing. It came up faster than he expected, wearing a smooth bipedal body that looked less human than Yi but still more human than most Jhailings. It had no indication of gender, and it ran naked. The places where its limbs joined its body looked like water flowing.

Are you one of the Jhailings I already know?

Yes. I came from the ship that created you, and I saw you become.

I had hoped for that. I have questions.

Neither of their bodies breathed or produced sweat, but still there was elegance in the Jhailing's movements that Yi felt certain he didn't share.

It didn't invite his questions, but instead said,
I have an assignment for you.

Yes?

I want to know what is happening in Manna Springs. You know the woman, Nona Hall. I want you to bring us together to talk.

They will kill her if they see her speak to you. They may kill her if they see her speak to me.

I trust you will find a way. She comes to visit her lover.

Only twice in the last two weeks.

So you must go to her. I will ride inside you.

He wondered if he got a choice. At first he had simply been amazed, but now he found it strange, almost violating, when a Jhailing stayed inside of him, even though it didn't bleed into his own personality in any way. It remained spooky.
Is there another way?

Can you think of one?

Not really. But isn't it violating your treaty if I carry you into Manna Springs?
Only he and Jason were allowed. And that agreement had been made with Charlie and Manny. They might be turned down now.
It will be dangerous even for us, even if we disguise ourselves.

Can you get Nona into the Mixing Zone?

It was listening to him?
I'll try.

They came to the bridge where the view from the Wall was the sea, huge and vast and so bright in the late afternoon sun that his eyes adjusted to take in only the tiniest bit of light. He had been born and raised in a station, and he found the idea of water that went forever the most fascinating and terrible thing on Lym.

Two taller, sleeker Next ran around them, long legs flashing in the sunshine.

Human-like emotions troubled him more and more, made him feel weak and tied to his old self when he really wanted to just keep
becoming
. They were like a weight. Not all of them. Love and tenderness still felt good. But fear? Fear of big, vast things like open space and the sea were illogical, and he didn't see any good that they did, any reason he needed them. Still, they clung to him.

Before becoming one, he would never have ascribed fear to robots. He still had his questions.
Jhailing? I don't entirely know what this place is. What is it that you want to do? Why did the Next come here?

We needed some of the trace minerals that were here, and we prefer to work with the full energy of the sun.

That is a means. Not a goal.

A beat.
There is a mystery that we hope to solve. You may have a role in helping us to solve it. But I am not yet ready to speak to you about that mystery, not in detail.

Jhailings were always frustrating. Yi counted a hundred steps before he said,
Your language suggests that you and I are not the same species. When do I become one of you?

You are.

Then why are you hiding things from me?

For your own good and ours.

That answer makes me feel as if I am three years old.
The sea was beside them now, on their left. A small fleet of boats bobbed on the surface of it. Fishermen? Scientists from Manna Springs?

I am sorry about that.

Yi believed it. No Jhailing Jim had ever lied to him except through omission.
What can I do to become more able to separate from this body, to move between bodies the way you do?

More practice braiding. You must become separate from your ego and yet still be yourself.

No wonder some human mystics loved the Next so much.

Yi had braided with all of his family now, joined into that strange state of two-ness that left him intact but more than himself. Sex for soulbots. With his family, he could learn more of what he already knew and also small and special new secrets. It still wasn't the same as learning what he could be. For a moment he felt like a teenager about to ask a girl on a date.
Can I braid with you?

You are not yet flexible enough.

Once more he felt like a child or perhaps a rejected teen. Who would want to relive those years?

They were above the city again. From up here it looked like a series of silver baubles strung together with the black lines of pathways and, here and there, the green of a park. The parks were for the newly changed so that they had a place to contemplate what they had become when they were still human enough to take comfort in wild things.

Be careful
, the Jhailing said.
Becoming is balancing on the knife edge of sanity. It can be done; we all succeeded. Everyone that you see here succeeded. But in this time of accelerated becoming there is greater risk.

For all of its magnificence, Nexity was not huge. They were soon by the sea again. Other Next ran ahead and behind. One was fat and rather cute, and he wondered why it had chosen that shape.

Light bloomed close to them, a crack of sound.