The Dark Imbalance (35 page)
Read The Dark Imbalance Online
Authors: Sean Williams,Shane Dix
Tags: #Science Fiction, #Fiction, #Space Opera
“If you did, there is no guarantee that the High Caste would accept your change of heart,” he said, his voice almost scolding.
“I understand.” She wasn’t sure if that option would have made her feel better, anyway. If things went badly with the enemy, she didn’t want that decision hanging over her, to be made again and again.
She had given the enemy the freedom to fight; she had given her own kind the freedom to lose. When gods interfered in the affairs of mundane Humans, she doubted any decisions were easy. But that didn’t make her feel any better.
The Crescend waited for a moment, as though to see if she would speak, then said: “Perhaps we will talk again some day.”
The thought didn’t fill her with pleasure. “Perhaps.”
“Goodbye, Morgan Roche.”
* * *
How much time passed after the Crescend left, she didn’t know. She wasn’t really thinking at all. Making the decision had drained her, leaving her feeling strangely empty.
“You have a visitor, Morgan.”
Roche turned to see Kajic’s hologram coalescing in the wall display.
“Who is it?” she said wearily.
“Defender-of-Harmony Vri.”
“What does he want?”
“He hasn’t said.”
Roche sighed.
Roche tilted the bed closer to upright and braced herself. She wasn’t doing anyone much good moping around.
“It’s all right,” she said aloud to Kajic. “I’ll have to deal with him eventually, I guess. Send him in, Uri.”
The doors to the medical center opened and the tall soldier stepped through. His armor shone as always, golden and feathered like some Humanoid phoenix. He took four precise paces to the end of Roche’s bed, where he stopped and bowed slightly from the neck.
“Thank you for seeing me,” he said.
The bed tilted farther so they were closer to eye level. “How can I help you, Vri?”
“I wish to suggest another compromise.”
She suppressed a sigh. “What now?”
“First, I want to say that I understand why it was not possible for negotiations to take place between you and the Agora on the
Phlegethon.
The circumstances at the time were not conducive to such discussions. So I do not blame you for this additional delay.”
She was relieved about that. She’d half expected him to storm in, making demands and claiming she was deliberately stalling.
“Secondly?” she prompted.
“I have become aware that your work here may ultimately benefit the Surin Caste as a whole,” he went on. “While I do not feel that Maii should play any role in this, I accept that she has made her decision—and since that decision can be interpreted as one serving the interests of the Agora, I also accept that it is not my role to intervene.”
Roche watched him as he spoke. His broad, furred features were composed and thoughtful. He had obviously considered these words in great depth before coming to her with them.
“I’m glad about that, Vri,” she said, a touch cautiously, wary of the sting in the tail. “But what’s your point?”
“It is my hope,” he said, “that you will also see my superiors’ point of view, which is that Maii has been separated from the culture that might arguably be best for her development. Before her childhood is over, it may be beneficial to expose her to aspects of our Caste that give us pride. There is no denying that she has been hurt by members of our Caste, but all the Agora desires is the opportunity to right that wrong.
“I ask, therefore, that when the matter of the enemy is resolved you will see fit to return with me to Essai, to discuss the matter of Maii’s custodianship with the Agora, and that I might be allowed to serve formally as her bodyguard until then.”
He bowed again, and stepped back a pace.
For a moment, Roche didn’t quite know what to say. It looked like he was handing her a simple way to put the problem aside for the time being, but she couldn’t help but wonder if there was more to it.
make it to Essai. But if the chance does arise, I might take it. I suppose I should at least see what the Agora has to offer. Maybe they really do have my best interests at heart.>
Roche could accept that.
<1 know you wouldn’t, Morgan. And I’m glad that you would be coming with me—if you agree, of course. I’d feel uncomfortable facing them alone.>
Vri shifted his feet. Roche snapped out of the mental conversation.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I was just talking to Maii about it. We think the compromise is fair, so I’ll agree to meet the Agora when the time is right. Until then, you can travel with us and help keep Maii safe. After all, that is something we are
both
concerned about.”
The Surin soldier bowed a third time, this time more formally. “Thank you,” he said. “I believed that this was the decision you would reach. You have not disappointed me.”
He turned and strode heavily out of the room. Roche smiled as he went.
You have not disappointed me.
That was probably as close to a compliment as she would ever get from him.
said Maii.
<1 guess it shouldn’t be a surprise that High Humans have access to epsense as well as everything else.>
Roche felt the reave withdraw slightly, and she tilted the bed back. Under the cocoon, she wriggled the fingers of her left hand and felt them clench. Whatever the autosurgeon had done to her in the last few hours, it had left her feeling almost Human again. Almost.
“How much longer now, Uri?”
“Three hours or so, Morgan.”
“Can I at least have my other hand back now? I can feel it moving under this thing, so I know it’s working.”
“I’ll check.” Kajic conversed silently with the autosurgeon, then said: “On the condition that you don’t exert yourself, it will allow free movement to be restored to that limb.”
Even before he had finished speaking, the cocoon slid back down her left side, retracting like a fluid to reveal her left shoulder, arm and upper chest. She appeared to be wrapped in close- sticking bandages made from a white, tissue-thin material she didn’t recognize. Through it, she could make out the healing red wounds through which her implants had been removed. Her left palm and wrist were still stiff.
At some point, she would have to be refitted. Like Haid, she had grown accustomed to working intimately with machines.
Too
intimately at times—an issue she still hoped to take up with the Crescend, one day. When the war eased enough for her to take some time off—the sooner the better—she would commit herself to the care of the medical center again and get the upgrade she had once hoped to obtain from COE Intelligence.
Exactly when that would be, she didn’t know. First she had to get back in touch with the council and work out strategies for the coming war; they also had to find out if her talent could be replicated, naturally or otherwise. That was assuming, of course, that the
Phlegethon
survived its assault by the fleets of enemy-infected nations. Then there was working out what to do about Sol System itself: did the enemy actually have a reason for gathering here, or was it safe to go back home? If the latter, could the council coordinate the battle across the galaxy as a whole, or would its efforts need to be restricted to those areas considered the most important to save? And how would the governments of the Far Reaches—often overlooked by core-based interests, and the source of an ages-old resentment—react to that decision?
The future was full of uncertainties, as the Crescend had promised it would be if she chose this particular path. Roche didn’t regret her decision, but she did wish it could have been otherwise.
Your role is played out,
the Crescend had said.
As far as she could tell, her job was only just beginning.
20
IND Ana Vereine
955.2.16
0290
“Morgan?”
She snapped out of her thoughts. “What is it, Uri?”
“I’m picking up a ship on an approach vector,” he said. “Its configuration matches that of the Hum ship we impersonated to rescue you.”
“Is it hailing us?”
“No.”
“And we’re still camouflaged?”
“Yes.”
“Then how does it know who we are?”
“Maybe it doesn’t,” Kajic said. “Maybe its similarity to the other ship is only a coincidence. We may have just blundered into Hum territory.”
“And you believe that?”
“Not for a moment,” he said.
She vacillated briefly. “Okay, broadcast an anonymous query for ID. Ask Cane and Ameidio to be on the bridge, if they aren’t already there. And give me that screen again. I want to see what’s going on.”
Her bed turned back to the holographic display. In it, she saw the relatively empty space around the
Ana Vereine
, plus the colorful overviews of the system. The approaching ship appeared as a red triangle, swooping closer along a gently curving trajectory.
“I have broadcast the query,” said Kajic. “If they’re going to reply, the earliest we’d hear is in a minute or two.”
Roche rubbed her chin with the fingers of her newly healed left hand. “If we had to fight, how long could we last?”
“Without the Box? Not long at all,” he said. “I’d prefer to avoid conflict entirely.”
“I agree, but if we
don’t
have a choice, I’d like to know what our options are.”
“It depends if they have independent fighters or not. Against more than three or four, I will be hard-pressed to maintain much of a defense.”
“A minute?”
“Maybe two,” he said. “At most.”
“They may not even use fighters,” Roche mused. “Depends what they want, I guess.”
“True.” Kajic’s voice was cautious. “No response as yet.”
“How long until they’re within combat range?”
“One hour.”
“Give them ten minutes to respond, then put us on alert. At fifteen we’ll broadcast a warning. If we still haven’t heard back by thirty minutes, we’ll assume they’re hostile and change course.
If
they follow, we’ll take further evasive action. And if
that
doesn’t deter them...” She shrugged. “Then we fight, I guess.”
She watched the screen. The ship didn’t seem to be changing course of its own accord, no matter how much she might wish it would.
“Where’s Vri?” she asked.
“Back in his fighter. I’ve advised him of the situation. He’s battle-ready, should we require him.”
“And Maii?”
“Perhaps you’d better head to the bridge too.” Not that it made a great deal of difference where the reave actually was, Roche reminded herself; just as long as their minds were in contact. Still, she felt better knowing where the girl was. “Is everyone else on deck?”
“Cane has arrived,” said Kajic, “but Haid is—”
“Right here,” said the ex-mercenary as the doors hissed open. He was dressed in a mirror-finished Dato combat suit and trailing another that echoed his movements perfectly. “I figured you’d probably prefer being where the action was.”
Roche smiled. “You figured right.”
Returning the smile, he tapped a series of codes into the autosurgeon’s manual console. It protested with a series of alarms and warnings, but capitulated under the weight of Haid’s overrides. The cocoon enclosing Roche’s half-healed body clicked, then hissed, then began to recede back into the bed.
Roche looked down in amazement as the rest of her body appeared, blotched red in places and wrapped in white like a barely formed chrysalis. Various sensors and drips retracted into the bed like worms diving away from sunlight. Her legs still felt numb. She moved one tentatively. It responded, but she wasn’t confident of its holding her weight.
“Are you sure this will be okay?” she asked.
“Uri assures me you’ll manage well enough, once you’re in the suit.”
“But I don’t have any implants.”
“We’ve thought of that. What the suit can’t work out, I’ll do for you.” Haid swung her legs off the bed, then manually walked the spare armor into position with its back facing her. The ceramic shell split and cracked open at the touch of a pressure pad. Its interior was black and moist-looking.
She couldn’t stand on her own. A twinge of pain shot up her left side as soon as she tried to take her full weight. Haid instructed the suit to go down on its knees; then he picked her up and put her inside. The suit’s padding cradled her, allowing her to rest as though she were sitting, with the merest twitch of her legs magnified to become steps.
She paced the room, enjoying the newly found freedom of movement. Control was limited to a primitive electrode net draped across her shoulders. Luckily the autosurgeon’s repairs of her damaged nervous system had progressed far enough for the device to work. It was years since she had trained to use one, and manual control wasn’t an option.
“Ameidio, you’re a genius!”
“Realize that I’m only doing this out of self-interest,” he said lightly. “Trying to coordinate things with you stuck down here would have been just too damned awkward. So, if you will...”
He indicated the door.
She didn’t move. “Since when are you giving the orders around here?”
Again, he smiled. “It’s good to have you back, Morgan.”
Together they clanked heavily from the room and headed for the bridge.
* * *
The ship’s complement was complete by the time they arrived. As the ten-minute deadline came and went, a siren echoed through the ship, announcing full alert.
“What was that for?” asked Haid, assuming his position by Cane at the weapons board.
“Don’t forget our passenger,” Kajic chided him. “Alta’s still down below.”
Roche settled into the spot where Kajic’s second-in-command had once sat. “Any change in the situation?”
“The ship is proceeding as per its expected course, decelerating with a constant delta-v. It has neither responded to my hail nor issued one of its own.”
“Does it look like it’s going to attack?”
“Apart from heading our way, it doesn’t seem to be doing anything at all.”
“Maii?”
She turned. “Any thoughts, Cane?”
“If what we suspect is true,” he said, “then I think we can expect at least one of my siblings to be aboard this ship. And they will be much more difficult to deceive than the Disciples who captured you.”
“Do you think they’d respond if we hailed them in your command language?”
“They might, but that would only confirm their suspicions that we are the people they seek,” he said. “We may yet be able to bluff our way out of this, though.”
“I’d just like to know how they found us,” said Haid. “Something’s not right about all of this. I can feel it.”
“I agree.” Roche looked at the main screen, glad to have access to its greater area and clarity. The one in the medical center had been barely adequate. “Any idea where this ship came from, Uri?”
“It appears to have altered its course from this orbit here.” A red ellipse circled the sun. “How long it followed that orbit, however, I can’t tell.”
The orbit didn’t seem to intersect any hot-spots or suspicious-looking regions.
“The Disciples must have contacted them somehow,” said Roche. “They must have traced our course.”
“Sounds reasonable,” said Cane.
“So what do we do?” asked Haid.
“We wait them out,” said Roche. “They might be bluffing. If they intended to destroy us, they would’ve come in faster or slow-jumped right on top of us. They must want something else.” She studied the creeping dot on the screen. “How long now, Uri?”
“Forty minutes until we change course.”
“That gives us a little breathing space, anyway. In the meantime, I want to get in touch with the council, if we can. Uri, is that drone still following us?”
“Yes.”
“Good. Send a tightbeam message requesting a conference with whoever’s in charge at the moment. Tell them I have something they need to know.”
“I’ll try.” Kajic’s hologram faded into static.
“Why are we wasting our time talking to them?” Haid asked. “How many times do they have to knock us back before you take the hint, Morgan?”
“They still need us,” she said, adding: “And unfortunately we still need them. Besides, unless they’ve found someone else who can locate the enemy like I can, I’m pretty sure they’ll be prepared to talk.”
“Yes,” said Haid, “but will they listen?”
She didn’t have long to wait. Barely five minutes passed before Kajic announced the receipt of a reply from the council.
“That was fast,” she said. “Do we have a live feed?”
“Connecting as we speak. The signal is heavily encrypted and therefore low on detail but at least delay-free.”
“Put it through.”
A window opened on the main screen, revealing a grainy black-and-white image.
“Well, if it isn’t Morgan Roche,” said Salton Trezise. “How nice of you to get in touch. Rumor had it you were dead.”
“As much as I’d love to exchange pleasantries with you, Trezise, I don’t have the time. I need to speak with Murnane.”
“He’s no longer on the council, I’m afraid.” Trezise’s expression was smug. “Both he and Nemeth have been censured, along with their Exotic friends. The council doesn’t take kindly—”
She cut him short. “So who’s in charge?”
“Me, for the time being.” He smiled broadly.
Her first instinct was to defend Murnane. Nemeth, she was sure, had been involved in all manner of underhand deals, but she doubted the older councilor had ever acted improperly. He had the change-resistant, inflexible air of someone who was not easily diverted from the straight and narrow.
But this wasn’t the time or the place to get involved with petty politics. There was too much else at stake right now.
“If you’re really in charge,” she said, “then there’s something you need to know.”
“I hope it involves the imminent arrival of reinforcements,” he said. “I’ve just been told that another fleet is jockeying for firing rights—”
“I’m sorry, Trezise, but there won’t be
any
reinforcements.” She didn’t like to say it. He looked genuinely harried under the self-satisfied exterior. “I’ve been in contact with the Crescend. You can forget about the High Caste. They’re not going to get involved.”
His face dropped. “Why not?”
She hesitated momentarily, not wanting to tell Trezise that the reason the Crescend wasn’t getting involved was because she had specifically asked him not to.
“Because it’s not their fight. Would we intervene in a squabble between two Low Caste tribes on a mud planet somewhere? That’s how this looks to them. Yes, one tribe might get wiped out, and things will certainly be messy for a while afterward, but that’s just the way it goes. It’s no big deal.”
“Tell
that
to the tribe being wiped out,” he said.
She was trying to defend the Crescend, but found it difficult to keep the bitterness out of her voice. “They will provide us with all the data they’ve collected over the years, but that’s all you can rely on.”
“Well, it’s something, I guess.” He looked thoughtful for a moment. “Tell me, how exactly did you get in contact with the Crescend?”
“I haven’t got time for explanations right now,” she said, certain the Crescend wouldn’t talk to Trezise even if she told him how. “I have a situation here I need to deal with. When things have settled down at both your end and mine, I’ll be in touch again to work out what to do next.”
“This situation—it wouldn’t have anything to do with the ring, would it?”
“No. Why?”
“The drone receiving your broadcast is on its outer fringes, and activity is rising in that area. I just thought there might be a connection.”
“Not that I’m aware of,” she said. She was about to close the line when she added on impulse: “Oh, and by the way, Trezise. I ran into one of our former colleagues the other day.”
“Really?”
Roche nodded. “Page De Bruyn.”
He raised both eyebrows. “What’s she doing here?”
“Not much anymore,” said Roche. “She’s dead.”
Something passed behind the man’s eyes, but otherwise he didn’t react. “That is unfortunate,” he said. “Did she happen to—?”
The screen went black.
Roche waited a moment, but the image didn’t return.
“Uri, what happened?”
There was no reply.
“Uri?”
Haid looked up from his station. “I’m getting a damage report from section gold-two.”
“Which is what?”
“Uri’s maintenance support and information management,” he said. “Seems a cable has malfunctioned.”
“What sort of cable?”
“One linking his higher functions to the rest of the ship, from what I can tell.”
“He’s cut off?”
“For the moment. Repair agents are moving in now.”
She forced herself to quell a twinge of alarm. “Good, because we’re going to need him soon to coordinate the course change.”
Haid was about to respond when the floor shook slightly and a low rumble passed through the bulkheads. The lights flickered.
Roche was instantly on her feet. “
Now
what’s going on?”
“I have red lights all through sections gold-one and gold-two,” Haid said, tapping frantically at his board. “Security is down across that level.” He looked over to Roche, the concern evident in his expression. “I think there’s been an explosion, Morgan.”
Roche met his gaze silently for a few seconds until she was able to ask the question: “What about Uri?”
“I can’t tell.”
She checked with the reave “Maii?”
Roche’s sense of alarm became one of rising dread. “I’m going down there.”
Haid also rose to his feet. “I’m coming with you.”
“If anything’s happened to him...” She hurried for the exit to the bridge. “You have the bridge, Cane.”
Haid followed with heavy, urgent footsteps. “It
can’t
be an attack,” he said. “Our disrupters haven’t registered the use of hyperspace weapons. There’s no way they could’ve got something in here without us knowing.”
