Trial by Fire - eARC (89 page)

“You are present, the-Riordan-called-Caine?”

Caine rose—and felt quite stupid. He was still alone, so for whom was he standing?

“I am.”

“And you are alone?”

“As you requested. May I ask to whom I am speaking?”

“My full name is cumbersome for your tongue and quite long. Perhaps you would consent to call me Yiithrii-ah-aash.”

I will if I can.
“I am pleased to meet you, Yiithrii-ah-aash.” Caine had the sensation of his tongue being poised to stumble over the downhill slalom of syllables, was surprised to get to the end of the word without major disaster. “While I doubt I could pronounce it just yet, I would be happy to learn your full name and what it means.”

“This is most gracious and we appreciate it. However, we would defer this to some other time, if this is acceptable.”

I had good enough manners to try; he has good enough manners to let me off the hook. We’re off to a good start.
“Of course, Yiithrii-ah-aash. I would appreciate knowing your title, however.”

“It translates quite imperfectly into your language, the-Riordan-called-Caine, and it is not so much a title as a denotation of present function. One term for it would be ‘facilitator’; another might be ‘liaison-symbiote.’ I do not know your language well enough to determine which more accurately reflects my role in this meeting.”

“You seem to know our language quite well—” And then Caine realized that the voice was not a machine equivalent. “Yiithrii-ah-aash, you are speaking to me without the benefit of a Dornaani translator?”

“This is correct.”

“How did you—?”

“The-Riordan-called-Caine, we, too, are a species renowned for our curiosity, so it is with regret that I must decline to answer your questions. I am under fairly restrictive time constraints. Suffice it to say that it was my honor to be selected to become fully familiar with the speciate self-reference materials that you presented at the Convocation.”

Good grief, that would mean
—“You became familiar with
all
those materials?”

“This is so.”

“That was a great deal of work, Yiithrii-ah-aah.”

“It was a great honor and illumination. We Slaasriithi regret to have given you such limited information in return, and it is for this reason—among others—that this meeting was deemed advisable as soon as it was practicable.”

“I’m sorry. I do not understand.”

“My apologies. I will elucidate. It was our desire to communicate directly with you at the Convocation. However, in the months preceding that gathering, envoys from the Arat Kur arrived at one of the contact points along our shared border, urgently requesting dialog with our representatives. Their intent, plainly put, was that we should help them deny human admission to the Accord.”

Son of a
—“But how could they do so without revealing details of our race, without violating the privacy stipulations of the Accord?”

“Your bafflement reprises our own. However, in telling us about humanity, the Arat Kur demonstrated that they had a far greater awareness of the ancient history and inhabitants of this region of space than we did. Based on their reaction to your candidacy for membership in the Accord, humanity seemed to be the epicenter of their species’ fears. When we refused to commit to an
a priori
rejection of your candidacy, we discovered that their fears of you quickly became fears of us.”

“Because you had indirectly supported us?”

“That, too, but subsequent information prompted us to reconsider the possible causes of the Arat Kur’s diminished congeniality.”

The end of the sentence dangled like a baited hook. “And what new causes came to light, Yiithrii-ah-aash?”

“There are several, but most share a common root. It is conjectured that, in some time past, your race and mine were, if not allied, then at least affined.”

Caine smiled at the archaic usage.

Yiithrii-ah-aash’s voice skimmed and glided in an oddly liquid fashion over the English phonemes and idioms. “As Convocation approached, we projected that any ready exchanges between us, or strong support for your candidacy, could make the Arat Kur—intemperate.”

Caine understood. “Because if they interpreted your friendship toward us as a prelude to alliance, they’d preemptively move to a war footing, escalating what might have been a salvageable situation.”

“Yes, this was our thinking. We regret and apologize for its profound flaws.”

“You couldn’t have known that they had already prepared themselves for war,” Caine pointed out.

“Embarrassingly, we did not even consider it a possibility. It was too uncharacteristically precipitous and aggressive for their species.”

“Convocation was beyond anyone’s power to salvage,” Caine said with a shrug. “However, I have since learned that your ships were commerce-raiding all along the Arat Kur border during the war, keeping more than a third of the Wholenest’s military assets tied up in fear of a large-scale incursion.”

“That is so.”

“Well, that was an immense help, and my leaders wish to express their immense appreciation for it. With this war behind us, we can initiate the kinds of cultural exchange I’m sure both our peoples would welcome.”

“This is a most interesting proposition, and one which we must discuss at some later date. However, our time now grows short. Perhaps it would be wise for us to conclude this dialog with a brief meeting.”

Or maybe not. I’ve faced enough anxieties, real and imagined, for one year, thank you.
But Caine said, “Yes. I would like that.”

The green light above the airlock’s iris valve flashed three times and went out. The portal opened with a breathy squeal and Caine stepped forward, glad for the speed with which this was happening, that his mind had less than one second to spin within the maelstrom of primal fears that he had come to associate with first contacts.
What will they look like? What will they smell like? Will I lose my composure, run gibbering into a corner because what I have seen is something that humans should never have seen, should never have encountered? Will I unwittingly insult them? Will I fail my race by seeming stupid, inept, rude, too aggressive, too passive, too silent, too loquacious? In short, how can you control the encounter and win the day, when the rules of the game change every time you play it?

However, Caine stopped in mid-stride—because there had been no way to be ready for what he saw. Because he did feel like running into a corner, gibbering, the universe tilting and making less sense with every passing second.

Yiithrii’ah’aash walked through the doorway with precisely the same rolling gait as the natives Caine had met on Delta Pavonis Three. The familiar smallish and tightly furred head of that species—shaped more like a brazil nut than an almond—rode smoothly atop the equally familiar and improbably long ostrich neck. The body was closely furred and wasp-waisted. The long gibbon’s-arms swung easily alongside the oddly flanged hips and dog-jointed legs. Prehensile finger-tentacles extended in some form of greeting and the knee-length bifurcated tail was shorter than those Caine had seen on Delta Pavonis Three. However, a few purposeful coiling and flexing motions indicated that it was still a functional appendage.

The Slaasriithi was not a Slaasriithi. It was a Pavonian. Or Pavonians were Slaasriithi. Caine wished he could close his eyes until the pointless debate in his head subsided. Whoever, or whatever they were, they were the same species. He opened his eyes—
damn, I guess I
did
close them
—and discovered that Yiiithrii-ah-aash was holding something out to him. Caine, reached out to receive it. A small, recently harvested branch with small green leaves. It was subtly fragrant, familiar—

It’s an olive branch. Where did they get this? And is this a sign of peace? Or—
and Caine could not tell whether his next insight was profound or paranoid—
are you telling me you know many of our secrets, including my code name? Are you telling me you know the tale of how, when Odysseus finally came home to his own family and his own life, he returned to a bedroom which was built around an olive tree: a sign of life, hope, fruitfulness, closure?
Caine couldn’t decide whether, in receiving this branch, he was being encouraged to see himself as coming full circle, his wanderings and wonderings at an end, or whether he was being pitched headlong into another odyssey of mysteries and risks. He looked from the leaves back to Yiithrii-ah-aash, and was surprised to find three irregularly shaped eyes staring at him from either slanted facet of the edge-on, furry brazil-nut that was his head.

Caine swallowed. “I know you. I mean, we—your people and I. We have met before.”
How erudite.

“Ah, you refer to your experiences on Delta Pavonis Three.”

Okay, so I guess everyone knows about
that
“secret,” now.
“Er—yes.”

Yiithrii’ah’aash’s tendril-fingers spread straight and flat to either side. The gesture of negation was so clear that Caine almost expected him to shake his head as well. “That was not us.”

Caine simply stared at the contrary evidence before his eyes.

Yiithrii’ah’aash’s tendrils unfolded into a slow-motion writhe of baby snakes. “Allow me to clarify. As Neanderthal is to you, what you met on Delta Pavonis Three is to us. We cherish it and call it ours, but it is not
us.
”

“But it communicated with me, and knew about—things.”
Such as, which star we come from.

“Be at ease. Understanding will come when you visit us.”

“When I what?”

Yiithrii’ah’aash looked at him. Caine felt the small hairs on his spine stand in response to the eerie familiarity of the purring sound that Yiithrii’ah’aash made deep in his chest. “Was I not clear? I said that you shall understand all when you visit us. For you shall visit us, the-Riordan-called-Caine. And soon. Very soon.”

“Is that an invitation, a request, or a prophecy?”

Yiithrii’ah’aash just stared.

And purred more loudly.

Epilogue

Custodian shift vessel
Olsloov
, twenty AU above the ecliptic of Sigma Draconis

The voice of Vruthvur, Senior Coordinator of the Custodians, burbled through the humid, comforting darkness of the ship’s most private Communitarium. “Alnduul, members of this council have expressed some concern in regard to your management of the assistance we provided the humans in the recent war. More than one observer feels that your success owes as much to luck as it does to logic and methodical planning.”

Alnduul settled deeper into his couch. “I must remind you of the rules of contact and engagement imposed upon us Custodians at the start of this operation. Until the war commenced, we were prohibited from making direct contact with anyone but Downing, once Corcoran’s decease was confirmed. This severely limited our ability to influence or even be aware of, human strategic decisions.”

“Do you feel we should have made more open contact, exerted more direct control?”

“These two variables are quite different. More open contact? Yes—but with the Earth Confederation as a whole. Conversely, exertion of more direct control was not a practicable option and, if detected, would have played into the Ktor hands.”

Vruthvur’s voice remained patient, serene. “Why so?”

“Because if the humans had learned that we were manipulating their governments from within, they would have rejected us as allies. Sooner or later, they would have aligned themselves with the Ktor. Moreover, I am of the opinion that more direct control would have hindered rather than helped the humans’ prosecution of the war. Long before hostilities commenced, Corcoran’s strategy of losing the first battles in order to later be in a position to win the war was well underway.”

The Coordinator’s voice was slow. “I do not understand what you mean by this phrase, nor how Corcoran’s strategy impacted our planning.”

“Venerable Vruthvur, as you may recall, Nolan Corcoran came to our attention during incident 2083B—the ‘impending asteroid collision’ crisis that the humans refer to as the doomsday rock.”

“I do recall this.”

“Then you may also recall that, by the time he had come to our attention, and we were able to situate proximal surveillance and security assets, that he had already begun to set plans in motion for humanity’s accelerated move toward the stars.”

“My recollection is unimpaired, Alnduul. What do you adduce based on this preamble?”

“We presume to guide events, Vruthvur. But Corcoran moved too decisively, and was too strong a mind, for that customary approach to be practicable. He crafted a set of subtle, interlocking plans without any input—active or passive, direct or indirect—from us. And it is well that we were too late to succumb to the temptation of attempting such influence. It would have ruined his extraordinarily bold and insightful plans.”

“So you imply that Corcoran—and through him, the humans—were truly in charge of the situation?”

“I do not imply this. I state it unequivocally.”

A new voice intruded: Menrelm, whose pointed inquiries often produced more irritation than enlightenment. “How can this be? The humans had not yet even attained interstellar capability at that point.”

“True, but after the asteroid crisis, some of their leaders now had evidence of its attainability, because they had discovered the impending collision had been engineered by interstellar intruders. Corcoran’s consequent strategic deductions were not merely inspired, but proleptic. He reasoned that if Earth had already been the target of an attack, it would be again. He further reasoned that once a proper First Contact occurred, a second attack on Earth would follow soon after, since a new target is best attacked when it is small, weak, or disoriented. He further conjectured—correctly—that Earth, having been watched, would face opponents who would not merely have technological advantages. They would also enjoy advance intelligence on humankind, its capabilities, forces, deployments.”

“He could hardly conclude otherwise,” Menrelm commented, “given what he found on the asteroid.”