
Table of Contents
This novel is dedicated with praise and appreciation to Wayman Stanley, who taught me to pursue my dreams, regardless of the obstacles.
Acknowledgments
This novel would not have been possible without the dedicated assistance of a number of people, among them Bob Allen, Larry Payne, Kyri Freeman, Audra Bruno, Greg Byrne, and many others. A special thanks, as well, to Denise Fitzer, whose insights and red pen have helped shape this into the novel it is today.
In the warmth of the womb, She floated---wrapped in streaming currents that offered comfort, security, love. Communion. Delicate touches flickered across her body, caressing her arms, legs, throat, face. She sank into the thousand embraces, relishing the contact, yearning for it when it receded, but knowing from experience that it would always return.
She stretched out her senses, brushing against the immensity that was her God, her creator, her mother and father. And he responded. Sensing her desperate need, her God sent messages of hope, of love, and of comfort. But also a promise that struck like a threat---that She could not endure forever in the womb, that She must soon depart, and take up her destiny along with all of her siblings. She must go outside the womb.
She squirmed in the warm, fluid embrace, limbs tingling. The barriers of her world provided security. There was . . . something else outside the barrier. Something hard and cold. Something frightening. Something of which She wished no part.
To be separate, severed from the communion with her God and her world, frightened her. She trembled within the warm cocoon, retreating from the voice of her God.
Outside the walls of her cocoon, She felt a stirring, a gentle wash of exchanging fluids. Another womb, and within it a sibling. A companion, created for her, and only for her. A comfort-mate. He. A partner and link to the beauty that was the Home. He moved within another linked womb, and sent warm fluids that carried unique scents and impressions into She's domain. She drank deep of He's essence, and within the bond something grew.
"This is your mate," the God said, his voice soft and soothing. "A part of you, as you are a part of him. Together with your siblings, you will hold dominion over the world I have made for you."
She opened up to He and tasted him, wrapped herself around him, sank deeper and deeper into Communion with him. He was hesitant at first, perhaps frightened by the intensity of the promised union. He attempted to draw away, to maintain a separateness that was the antithesis of Communion. Pain wracked She, stabbed deep, wounding. But He, sensing the love that flowed from She, continued to stir. He stretched out, physically, emotionally, spiritually, and tasted of She. Joy flooded their link, an ambrosia that nourished.
Together they existed as a near-perfect union, a binding of spirits. She's soul cried out in ecstasy. They clung together, hungry for one another, their bond firming.
But a tremble swept through She's cocoon. Warm fluids sloshed and foamed. Ripples disturbed the delicate tranquility. She and He hesitated, drew apart, perceiving.
The God screamed, an agonizing throb that shook She's cocoon to its base. The tepid bath grew warmer, until it became painfully hot. She ached to scream but could find no voice. He recoiled, curling up around himself, walling himself away, though She reached again for him, desperate.
The God screamed again, and She felt a shiver travel through the fluid surrounding her. Waves of pain and fright crashed through the casing, the God in torment. She wanted to cry out, but could only shrivel up and hide, tucked down within the remotest corner of the casing.
Contagion washed through the God's body, consuming it, devouring it. Ancient, loving flesh decayed, falling in gobbets to the hard, cold world below. Invading parasites bored into the husk, chewing through muscle, and bone, tendon, and veins. The God's body trembled.
"Go, my children," the God said, voice tight with agony. "Go, while there is time. I will find you. I will bring you back to the Family."
She tried to call out to the God, tried to demand answers, to discover the ravaging pain that crawled through the God's body. The God reached for She with a thought, a whisper, a touch that spoke of love and pain. But a fresh deluge of torture stole black talons into the God's flesh, and tore it away, away.
She's embryonic sack ruptured. Warm, familiar fluids gushed through the tear, and She spilled out into the cold. Concussions of perception hammered into her as dormant senses awakened. She tumbled across the convulsing body of the God, reaching out desperately to cling to writhing tentacles. She awakened, birthing sights and sounds impossible to comprehend.
He's embryonic sack teetered, swaying in the clutch of a dangle of tentacles. Within it, She could see him, terrified, his hands drawn into claws as he ripped at the lining of his sack. His mouth opened. His eyes grew wide and round. His gaze found hers, pleading, yearning, desperate.
Pain stung She, and she turned from He. Things, tiny things, like short tentacles, only separate, gnawed at her lower limb with sharp little ridges of bone. A dozen of the creatures. A hundred. A thousand. She scrambled back across a great artery, climbing toward safety, and the terrible ravenous creatures pursued. Their fat bodies floated in the warm air, and a horrid buzzing sound issued from their mouths.
Something cracked far, far below, in the God's body. A massive chunk of the God's flesh ripped away, carrying a million squirming terrors with it as it fell toward the barren land below. Hundreds of She's siblings tumbled to their deaths. She ached for them. She heard the God's wordless scream.
She heard another scream and turned to watch as He's embryonic sack tore loose from its moorings. He scrambled within his sack, but could not free himself. The casing fell to the sloping floor of the God, rolled across flesh, and teetered on the ragged edge of a massive tear.
Below, a canyon yawned, jagged spears of rock looming large and sharp. Stones tore at the God's body, ripping into it. Blood and fluid spumed, a hot shower. Landskin lay in sparse patches across the barren rocks.
She heard more screams, hundreds of them. She looked, and high overhead were more embryonic sacks, trapping more of her brothers and sisters. The bloated, wiggling parasites swarmed over the sacks, boring into them, devouring the God's Children as they writhed in their casings.
He! She scrambled over a ruptured artery, sliding through the bloated bodies of the invading parasites. She reached out, tangling her hand within the cords that dangled from the top of He's sack. The God's body lurched as another spar of rock pierced it and tore away a great chunk of flesh. He's sack slid toward the opening. He swam to the top of the sack, scraping at the tough interior, unable to pierce it. His mouth opened in a soundless scream.
The cords slipped through She's fingers, and He's sack vanished, swallowed by clouds of dust, debris, and blood that showered down onto the land from the God's body. She screamed, reaching into the gap, desperate to join He.
The God's flesh lurched again, and She flew across the hollow.
The floor beneath her evaporated, and She fell, tumbling, toward the land far below. She screamed, crying out for He, desperate for him. But only the agonizing death-screams of the God's flesh answered her.
Rian held an unbroken glow-rod in his left hand, a sporelance in his right, and pressed his middle hand against the bole of a seeping tree to keep balanced. He considered cracking the thin, vegetable skin of the glow-rod and shedding its light on the shadowed gully. But the sun still perched, red and swollen, on the jagged rim of the defile, and the phosphorescent glow within the bulbous head of the rod would not last long. Best to conserve it. He felt the tree's sap begin to solidify around his wrist and wiggled his fingers to prevent the seep from gluing him to the tree. Through a gap in the dense screen of saw-edged leaves he could see down into the rain-washed gully to the mangled remains of the downed ool, spread for miles over the rough rock and the landskin. Rian took in the steaming heaps of torn, mottled flesh, thick with twitching tentacles, through the remaining pockets of sunlight. The ool's flesh, the color of decay, swam with boreworms; the buzzing annelids ravenously chewing, gnawing.
Here the ool had first fallen to earth, dragging its immense body across spears of rock, sloughing away flesh like the skin of a fruit. Mounds of what looked like chewed tissue dripped down the gully walls. Hapless bodies, twisted and torn in death, lay where they had fallen from the sky as the ool's belly ripped apart. The bodies, whom Rian recognized as Bhajong, lay lifeless in pools of their own blood and the ool's fluids.
The bulk of the ool lie beyond the rim of the gully, doubtless spread over miles and miles of terrain. Even now Rian's comrades would be swarming over the remains of the ool, coldly dispatching the Bhajong parasites that infested its bowels. The sounds of the boreworm swarms that had brought the airborne leviathan down to earth echoed through canyons and battered plinths of naked stone.
A stranger lay prone on the tumbled rocks. Different than the Bhajong, Rian's enemies, and seemingly whole. Rian blinked his eyes clear and stared, waiting for the stranger to move. When he did not, after a hundred heartbeats, Rian took a cautious step forward. He pushed aside the thorny branch, careful to keep the cutting leaves from his skin.
Beyond the leafy bower the hillside had crumbled, leaving only a narrow, twisting path strewn with boulders. Rian crept from boulder to boulder, avoiding writhing clumps of boreworms in their ravenous feast on the ool's flesh, and edged closer to the stranger. A trio of Bhajong corpses, clumped like fruit on a vine, sprawled in the shade of a pillar of crumbling stone. Others were spread across the hillside, a host of the dead. Rian smiled in satisfaction. These Bhajong would raid no more Gagash settlements, would never again descend through the ool's feeder tentacles and carry death and destruction to Rian's people.
The ool, crawling with boreworms, had loosed its bowels over the gully. The marks of its passage scored the land. And the stench of acid filled the air. The gully must have been directly in the path of its flight from the devouring boreworms released by the Gagash Enclave. Not a single leaf had survived its passage; even dying, the ool consumed the land below them. Raw wounds in the landskin leaked ichor. The boulders and the walls of unskinned rock bore the scars and abrasions of the ool's tentacle-spurs: long, deep gashes of exposed stone, boulders ripped up from the landskin and tossed, crumbling, against the ravine walls. Crumbling pillars of stone were festooned with the membraneous flesh of the ool's bladders. The explosion of those bladders when pierced by the stones had spread debris in a wide swath.
The stranger should not have been there. Could not be there. Not whole, not fleshed. Not at all. Naked, defenseless, the creature could not have lived through an ool-passage. By the Father, it was impossible.
Rian frowned, his browridge descending to shadow his deep-set eyes. He licked his lips, glancing toward the sky. He sniffed, smelling the corrosive spoor of the ool. But the spoor faded quickly, becoming nothing more than background scent. The twilight sky was unbroken, cerulean blue.
He drew closer, scuttling on hands and knees, careful not to shower pebbles and raw stone down into the gully. At a distance of no more than fifty feet he paused behind a boulder shaped vaguely like a spear. It thrust into the belly of the sky. He peered around the side of the boulder, staring at the stranger.
Two arms. Two legs. That alone was not terribly unusual. The creature's symmetry set him apart from the Gagash. He almost looked Bhajong. But the Bhajong were short and frail, pale of skin and hair. And they wore clothing, of a sort. This creature was tall, much taller than a Bhajong. He had dark red, almost blood-colored, hair. And he was nude.
Rian remained silent, listening to the sounds of the devastation. He heard only the wind, the flapping of bloodstained garments, and the buzzing hum of the hundreds of boreworm swarms. None of the Bhajong moved. If any of the raiders had survived, they were far from here.
For another hundred heartbeats Rian watched the stranger for signs of life. He could see the rhythmic rise and fall of the creature's hairless chest, the telltale twitching of long, tapered fingers on clean hands.
Firming his grips on his lance and glow-rod, Rian drew his dagger. He made a deliberate noise, sending a small avalanche of pebbles skittering down the landskin and onto the gully floor. He watched. The stranger did not move, made no sign that he had heard.
The sky continued to darken. He knew he should rendezvous with the others of his salvage party, communicate his discovery. But he cracked the glow-rod against the boulder instead. He shielded his eyes as the bulb on its end flared into brilliance. After a moment it faded to a quiet glow, and Rian looked at the stranger again. Still he did not move.
Rian rose from his crouch and approached the stranger. Standing over him, he could see other differences, differences that made him neither Gagash nor Bhajong. Differences that made the skin on the back of Rian's neck prickle, standing the spines on the back of his head on end.
The creature lay curled up like a newborn in the center of a gelid pool of purplish slime. His limbs flowed long, straight and unknotted. Beyond the thick shock of crimson hair, his body seemed almost waxy-smooth. His eyes beneath a high forehead were closed, long-lashed. He had narrow cheekbones and full lips, and a hairless chin, his white skin, sunned to a slight pink. Odd.
Rian knelt beside the stranger and reached out his hand. Possessed of a sudden loathing he snatched it back before contact.
"Blessings of the Father, what are you?" he whispered. He stretched out his hand again, determined.
The creature's eyelids snapped open, revealing eyes that mirrored the twilight sky. The pupils contracted, focusing on Rian.
Rian staggered back, scuttling away from the figure. He dropped the glow-rod onto the pebbled landskin and brought up his lance and dagger. The chemicals in the glow-rod bubbled within the thin vegetable skin, their light flaring in agitation. With his free hand he jerked another dagger from the belt around his thick waist.
The stranger uncurled and rose with fluid grace to his feet, standing straight, tall. His arms hung, relaxed, at his sides.
Rian bounced to his feet and faced the stranger. He kept the sporelance aimed at the center of the stranger's chest. A quick squeeze was all it would take to send a gout of spores into that soft body, assuming this creature's vulnerabilities lay in the same cavities.
The stranger cocked his head as if listening to an uncertain sound. Ignoring Rian and the poised lance, his gaze shot skyward, panning from side to side, searching. Expressionless, he lowered his eyes and raised one hand, staring at his palm.
Rian jabbed toward the creature. The stranger seemed oblivious to the action, continuing to stare at his palm. "You! What are you? Are you Bhajong?"
The stranger took note of the lance at last. He reached out and touched its acid-etched point, though lightly enough that the thin membrane did not burst and shower him with the deadly spores. Rian remained still, watching the creature's actions. He jerked his hand back from the lancepoint, staring in seeming fascination at the droplets of red that oozed from pierced skin.
"Hurts, doesn't it? Answer my questions, or by the Father, it'll hurt much worse," Rian said. He demonstrated his threat, jabbing toward the stranger's midriff. "Who are you? What are you?" He frowned. "Did you come from the ool?"
"H-hurts," the man muttered. He held his bloody fingertips toward Rian. "Hurts."
"So. You can talk?" Rian relaxed his stance. There was no threat in this man. "Where did you come from? How did you escape the ool? It just passed here. It should have gotten you."
The stranger said nothing. His hands dropped to his sides and he stared, expressionless, into the sky.
He's daft, thought Rian. Brain-dead. Either that, or moronic. Rian sighed, wondering what to do with the stranger. The most sensible course would be to kill him, here and now, and be done with it. He pulled back the sporelance, preparing for the deadly blow . . . and hesitated.
The stranger turned and stared into the sky, his eyes tracking the path that the ool had taken in its agonized descent from the skies. The stranger stared at the gobbets of ool-flesh that littered the valley, an almost wistful look on his face.
Where did this stranger come from? Was he some new breed of Bhajong? Some new threat? Rian did not feel comfortable making the determination. He was a fighter, a warrior, a man of action. But the Elders of the Enclave might have an interest in such an unusual specimen. They might be able to discover something crucial about him, worm from him some new plot of the Bhajong parasites.
The stranger jerked his head north, eyes widening. A moment later Rian heard the sound, slow, sonorous, rhythmic. A steady thrumming on his inner ear. The acrid stench of fear seeped from his skin.
"Ool! Come on. You're coming with me." He touched the man's flank with his lancepoint. The stranger jumped, turning to look him in the eye. Rian growled, baring his teeth. "Now. There's no time to waste. If you won't come, I'll spit you here and now and leave you for the ool to digest. The others will be waiting for me."
The man touched his side, smearing blood across pristine, pinkish skin.
Rian had begun to think he would have to make good on his threat when the stranger began walking toward the narrow, boulder-strewn path leading up from the gully. Keeping his spear poised inches from the man's back, Rian followed.
Back within the relative shelter of the seeping tree, Rian watched as the ool crested the ring of hills and moved slowly across the sky. Its massive body, nearly a mile long and half as wide, resembled nothing so much as a rotting tumor. Its mottled, humped flesh pulsed, breathed, and twitched; serpentlike tendrils crawled along its flanks. Immense bladders filled with buoyant gases lined its topside, expanding and contracting as the ool propelled itself across the sky. Its foretentacles trailed across hilltops and slid into the low valleys.
The landskin rippled in the suction from the feeder tentacles, and boulders cracked. A tree, ripped up from its roots by the suction, shot into a gaping tentacle. The dull thrumming sound intensified, becoming almost painful to hear. The mass of purplish-blue, tumorlike flesh pulsed and throbbed like some immense, distorted organ. Its gas bladders expanded and contracted, sucking in air, filtering it, and jetting it out behind, propelling the mass across the sky.
That people lived inside that grotesque creature was an abomination, a perversion of nature. But were the Bhajong truly people?
"Another?" Rian whispered. "Ool travel singly." He turned to the naked stranger. Rian had bound his hands together, and now the stranger sat staring at the thick rope wrapped around his wrists.
The ool floated closer, blotting out the newly risen quarter-moon, blanketing the stars. The sounds of its consuming rose in volume, a roar of shifting boulders and trees, wrenched up from the bones of the land. Waste, expelled from the sphincters at the ool's rear, showered in a hail of rubble and debris behind the mass. The land shook.
A foretentacle, nearly a hundred feet in diameter and more than a mile long, thrashed along the floor of the gully, sucking away at newly birthed boulders and exposed, ravaged roots of plucked trees. Others dragged deep furrows in the raw earth, cutting a miles-wide swath.
Close, thought Rian. Too close.
"Come!" he shouted over the rising tide of sound. "We're too close. We'll get sucked in."
The stranger stared at him with a look of incomprehension. Rian poked him in the calf with his lance. "To your feet. We've got to get out of here."
The stranger rose. He followed Rian from the seeping tree. One of the thorny branches slipped away from Rian's outthrust lance, slapping back into the stranger's chest. He grunted and collapsed to his rear in the shadowed bower, staring at the blood that seeped from a hundred punctures in his torso.
With a sigh, Rian turned and jerked the stranger to his feet, pulling him bodily through the screen of saw-edged leaves. Raising his lance crosswise, he kept most of the branches and leaves from them. Those few leaves that popped from their stems bounced harmlessly from Rian's tunic, but sliced into the stranger's skin.
Beyond the seeping tree, Rian led his captive along a game trail that climbed higher into the hills, toward the waypoint the salvage crew had established earlier. The glow-rod lit their way. The man followed along complacently enough, although Rian had to keep vigilant watch on where the stranger put his feet. Several times the creature slipped, fell, and opened new wounds on his naked body. By the time they reached the heights, bruises, welts, and cuts covered the stranger's skin.
He forced the stranger to his haunches beneath the sheltering overhang of an exposed boulder. Rian knelt beside him, his sporelance held ready across his knees, and waited for the ool to pass. He could not risk communication with his party as long as the creature remained in the area.
When the ool's thrumming finally faded away, Rian checked his prisoner once more, then crept from the shelter and stood on the heights, scanning the terrain for signs of his cadre. With another ool in the area, the crash site would become increasingly dangerous. Bhajong raiders would descend, scrambling over the remains like a horde of insects. Any Gagash caught in the area would be hard-pressed to escape. Standard protocol should send Rian's cadre scurrying for the heights and the relative safety of the Enclave beyond the high, ringing walls of rock. From there the Gagash could snipe at any marauding Bhajong that descended from the ool.
Rian frowned and turned to look at his captive. The creature sat unmoving in the niche, staring at his bound hands, an expression of curiosity scrawled on his bland features. What was he? The question had no easy answers here in the field. But perhaps the Elders could fathom his mystery.
Having decided, Rian knelt and used his sporelance to score the landskin surrounding the islands of rock. The caustic residue embedded in the blade forced the landskin to pull back, withdraw, exposing a patch of pebbly soil. Rian pulled a bundle of markers from his belt pouch and set them within the opening in the landskin. The boreworm spoor in the markers would keep the landskin at bay. Inside the ring of markers Rian left a coded message ordering his cadre back to the Enclave.
"Come," he said, standing and prodding at the stranger's thigh with the butt-end of the sporelance. He gestured toward the east, where the land spilled down into an area of fens and mist-shrouded bogs. "This way."
The stranger made no argument, standing and staring at Rian as if deprived of wits. Rian nudged him down the slope, toward the fens, and the Enclave.
As they climbed down into the valley the sounds died out, lost beneath the cries of birds and the buzzing hum of the boreworm swarms that shared the valley with the Enclave.
"Careful here," Rian said, wondering why he bothered. The stranger showed not the slightest comprehension. He picked their path carefully to avoid the boreworm entrenchments. "There are things almost as bad as ool here."
A drake coughed in the dense forest, close, hunting. The stranger jerked to a halt. He gazed into the tangled undergrowth.
"It's too far to trouble us. Besides, they're more bark than bite." He patted his lance and dagger, wishing he felt as confident as he sounded. Even armed with his sporelance, he would not want to encounter one of the massive drakes. Those mobile mounds of landskin were ready enemies. With his middle arm he pointed toward the east. "The Enclave's that way. We're not far." He stopped, and, frowning, noted the stranger's shifting attention.
The stranger raised his bound arms and looked at the center of his own chest as if wondering at their differences. For the first time an expression played across his features. A frown, mirroring Rian's own.
"Yes. We're different," Rian said. "You've never seen a Gagash before?"
The man continued staring, oblivious.
What must I look like to him? Symmetry was an alien concept among the Gagash, save for the Elders. Rian's own mutations were mild; his third arm, sprouting from the center of his chest and rippling with muscles, was the most obvious. He felt a moment of confusion, wondering why the hot tide of shame crept over him. He pushed aside the urge to hide his deformities, scowled beneath his heavy browridge, and snarled, baring sharp teeth.
"Get used to differences, creature. Where you're going, you will be the oddity." He tapped the man on his shins with the butt of his spear. "Come on. Get those feet moving. It's not far, but with night upon us, I'd rather be beneath ground."
Lady Dersi clung to a cluster of tertiary capillaries with one gloved hand while she moved into position to saw at the polyp with her knife. A slow movement of the ool shook the interior of the artery, and she almost lost her balance. She stepped over a fleshwave that rippled through the drained artery. She could feel Master Erekel's gaze burning into her back, and she blinked to clear her eyes of a sudden sweat.
"No. No no no! That's all wrong. Like this," Erekel said. He snatched the resin knife from Dersi's hand. He grabbed the polyp at its base, pulled until the flesh stretched taut, and quickly severed it from the arterial wall in one stroke. The severed stump snapped back into the wall, oozing a thick, viscous fluid that would seal the wound in moments. Erekel held up the writhing polyp. "See? Quick, or the arterial wall could be permanently damaged. Or, worse, the polyp membrane can develop a lesion, leaking acid. You don't want to get the acid on your skin."
Lady Dersi held up her hand, sheathed in a thick, elbow-length glove of jellied ool mucus. She glanced at Erekel, outlined by the phosphorescent glow of the arterial wall. The grizzled veteran's skin was deeply lined, his pale hair brittle as it fell to his shoulders. He blinked pale blue eyes in the face of her unspoken question. For a moment his eyes met hers, and Dersi could almost see a smile lurking beneath his harsh veneer. But then his gaze slid away, and his face reverted to its habitual scowl.
Erekel shook his head. "Yes, yes. Of course. The basal contrast neutralizes the acid, but that's beside the point." He scowled, reversed the resin knife, and used its pommel to jab in Dersi's direction. "That's the problem with you youngsters: always looking for the quick, easy way. Too much reliance on technology, I think. Whether or not the gloves neutralize the acid, you still should make an effort to do the job right. And if the acid lands on your flesh above the gloves? What then, little miss? It's burn straight through to the bone, that's what."
"Of course, Master Erekel," Dersi said, lowering her eyes in the wake of the old man's tirade. "I'll try harder."
Erekel's eyes softened. He looked away again. Finally, grunting, he thrust the knife back at Lady Dersi. She took it, sheathing it at her side beside the other tools of the harvesters' trade: the forceps, the sutures and antiseptic compounds, dozens of other implements, some metal, and a like number of chemicals. She fished out a shallow tub and screwed off its lid. Dipping her fingers into the thick gel within the tub, she scooped out a wad of odorless sealant. Erekel passed her the writhing polyp, and she spread the sealant across its dripping nether end, squeezing tight until the compound closed off the wound.
"Are you going to take all day with that one polyp, Dersi?" Erekel growled. She looked up to find him staring at her from some distance ahead along the arterial passage. He gave a tug on the tetherline. She jogged a few steps toward him to keep from stumbling to the spongy floor. "Get a move on."
She glanced down at the purplish, now-quiescent polyp and tucked it through the leather loop on her harness belt, alongside the half-dozen others they had harvested. Tugging her gloves tighter, she followed in Erekel's footsteps, careful to avoid the pools of welling fluid in the low places, between the ropy, squirming strands of new growth.
Erekel paused at an intersection and pulled out a detailed map of this area. Dersi, joining him, looked over his shoulder at the drawing in red and blue ink, tracing the arteries, veins, and capillaries of the mazelike interior of the ool. The functional corridors were picked out in blue, the active circulatory system in red. Ahead, along the blue line they followed, the passage opened up into one of the drained subhearts, the chambers empty and used primarily for the sifting of mineral deposits for useable material.
"Damn," Erekel said.
"What?"
He reached up and touched the arterial wall, pressing with enough force that the spongy flesh sucked at his hand. "There's supposed to be an emptied capillary here. The ool must have closed it off and begun repairs."
"Does that happen often?" She had heard of such things, of course, but had labored under the impression that it was a rare phenomenon. Certainly in the areas set aside for the comforts of the Lords, maintained by companies of workers, such things never occurred. She touched the arterial wall below where Erekel's hand lay. The flesh gave slightly, springing back when she removed her hand. Purplish ichor leaked out in a sheet, instantly hardening, thickening the wall.
He shook his head. "Not often. But it does happen." He dug into one of the numerous pouches that studded his work harness and pulled out a collapsible saw. Unfolding it, Erekel warned, "You'd best hold on to something. There's likely to be some localized disturbance."
Dersi nodded and pulled tethers from either hip of her harness, looping the hooks around hardened resin protuberances. She braced herself, bending slightly at the knees, and lowered her visor. Looking up, she found Erekel had likewise prepared.
Erekel touched the saw's point to the arterial wall and shoved, hard. The blade sank into the membrane. Thick, milky blood spurted, covering both of them. The corridor convulsed, vast musculature sending ripples along the emptied flesh. Dersi's feet flew out from beneath her and she hung for a moment, supported only by the taut tethers. She twisted, trying to gain her balance.
Erekel sawed at the raw flesh. It parted beneath the saw's blade, pulling away from the microscopic boreworm contagion embedded in the teeth of the saw. The torn membrane bubbled and frothed, and a flow of ool blood washed into their corridor. Polyps sprang out of the vessel wall near the wound, the knobbed heads weaving about, searching for the boreworm infestation.
"There," said Erekel, folding the saw and replacing it in his beltpouch. "New polyps, ready for harvesting. And we've reopened the corridor. Well? What are you waiting for? Get to harvesting them."
Dersi waited until the last of the tremors subsided. She stared down the newly reopened capillary, watching the ool blood ooze into sphincters and drain away. She detached her tethers and picked her tools, getting to work.
Several hours and two dozen freshly harvested polyps later, Dersi followed Erekel into the emptied heart chamber, climbing down the notched, hardened trunkline to the brittle floor. The surface crackled with her every step, breaking open with a gush of fluids, resetting in her wake. At the far end of the chamber, technicians raised mammoth filters from the bubbling pools of blood and moved them into position where another group of technicians, armed with long blades, scraped the dried, clinging material into vats. A third group of technicians worked the vats, separating out the usable minerals from the waste.
"Take these to processing," Erekel said, passing her his own load of weighty polyps. His face contorted with a begrudging smile. "You did satisfactorily, Lady Dersi. Not well, but that comes with practice, experience. In a few years you could be good."
"Thank you, Master Erekel," she said, feeling the heat of the blush creeping over her face. "Thank you very much. You have no idea how much that means, coming from you."
He waved the compliment aside and turned away from her. He walked toward the technicians, trading companionable banter, friendly insults.
Left with a double load of polyps, Dersi struggled beneath the weight and sought the main thoroughfare. A nearby tech pointed out the correct avenue, and Dersi lugged her burden toward a broad, high vein braced with the whole trunks of surface trees.
"Lady Dersi? Lady Dersi!"
Dersi turned at the sound of her name. A stoop-shouldered courier in the official brown coveralls of Veil Lords Service approached and bowed low. Rising, the thin-faced man frowned at her burden. "Lady Dersi!"
Dersi nodded. "I'm she. What is it?"
"Lady, your honored father sends for you," he said.
"Is something wrong?" She resisted the impulse to drop everything and run home. "What is it?"
He shook his head. "I don't know, Lady. I'm not privy to Veil Lord Huldru's motives, just his orders."
"Is he well, though?"
The courier nodded. "Oh, yes. Yes, of course, Lady. Lord Huldru is well."
"Inform my father I'll attend him shortly, then. As soon as I've dropped these off at processing."
The courier seemed uncomfortable. "Lady, I do believe Veil Lord Huldru's summons takes precedence."
"But, these were just harvested . . ."
He nodded in understanding. "I'll see to their disposition, Lady." He waved dismissively at the technicians swarming throughout the heart. "One of these can take them."
She hesitated for a moment, vacillating. Finally, well aware of the demands of duty and propriety, she sighed and unbuckled her harness, letting it fall to the tunnel floor. She took a moment to smooth out the wrinkles in her jumpsuit. "Where is the nearest throat? I'm not familiar with this area."
The courier pointed down the thoroughfare. "At the branching, take the left passage. There's a throat at the end of the corridor."
"Very well," she said. She glanced over her shoulder, spotting Erekel watching her. A frown crossed the man's face and he turned away as if anxious at having been caught staring at her. Dersi felt her face color again. She turned away from the courier and set off down the thoroughfare.
She passed a few technicians and workers on the way, and encountered a knot of folk at the intersection. Most of the pedestrians flowed along the main path. Dersi turned to the left and moved against the current of Bhajong. She ignored the buzz of conversation---much of it centered on her and her presence here among the working class---and kept her eyes focused forward. She allowed the sounds of the ool to mask the speech of the pedestrians, finding solace in the steady, pulsing thrum of the massive creature's circulatory system, the periodic, subsonic hiss of its bellows. She found herself smiling.
The passage narrowed before Dersi emerged onto a landing protruding out into a wide, vertical shaft that stretched away into darkness. Warm air rose from the depths, smelling of acid and digestion. Down there were the areas of the ool where no Bhajong trespassed, the working flesh of the ool, a mystery. Cilia sprouted from the shaftwalls, flowing with the air currents like a purplish-red carpet of surface grass. A metal stake driven into the tissue of the shaft indicated the throat designation and the landing number.
Dersi ran her hand across the cilia, depressing the tickling fibers. A rumbling sound issued from below her, a bubbling hiss. The walls of the shaft below her landing twisted closed as muscles contracted. She stepped out onto the newly formed mound of flesh and stretched out her arms, trailing her fingers through the cilia.
The gag reflex of the ool throat contracted the musculature surrounding the shaft in an ascending wave that carried Dersi aloft. She kept her hands out at her sides, brushing across the cilia, as she counted the landings she passed, noting the markings on metal poles driven into the tissue. As her landing approached, she withdrew her hands, allowing the cilia to sink into quiescence. The contractions ceased, and Dersi stepped out onto shaped flesh, finding herself in a broad, well-lit tunnel.
A pair of guardsmen armed with acidrods---the products of polyps such as she had been harvesting only a short time ago, Dersi thought with momentary pride---stood at attention on the landing. They saluted her formally, kneeling, as she stepped from the gorgemound. She bid them rise.
"Must you do that every time I pass, Captain Lhedri? Aterin?" She smiled as she rebuked them.
"Protocol, Lady Dersi," Lhedri replied. He winked at her. "Most Lords stand firm by it."
"I'm not most Lords, Captain," she said. "And I'm not overly fond of ceremony."
"Wish all the Lords thought that way," Aterin said.
She sighed, wanting to spend a few minutes talking with them, anything to delay her conversation with her father. But duty and obligation called. She promised to send a servant with refreshments and took her leave of the guardsmen.
She continued deeper into the intricate passages. Here there were few pedestrians, mostly servants who bowed or knelt as she passed. She spoke to each, knowing their faces, if not their names.
"Lady Dersi!" came a strong, masculine voice from a side capillary.
Dersi turned to see Lord Meloni approaching and suppressed a scowl. He wore a shallow grin on his pinched face. His thin lips curled up in a leering smile, and his eyes roamed the landscape of her body. She felt a shiver of revulsion as his gaze lingered on her breasts. Only through an effort of will could she stop herself from crossing her arms over her chest.
"Slumming with the commoners again, Lady Dersi?" Meloni asked. His strong fingers pinched a fold of her jumpsuit. He wiped his hand on his own ornate robes. "Really, I don't know why Lord Huldru allows it."
Dersi kept a pleasant smile pasted on her face. "I believe my father sees the wisdom in my understanding the routine maintenance of the ool, Lord Meloni."
His smile faltered, and he bowed at the waist. Even bent over, his gaze climbed from her calves, along her thighs, and onward to her bust. "Of course. The Veil Lord Huldru's wisdom is without equal."
"If you'll excuse me, Lord Meloni. My father has called for me."
He straightened and his smile broadened. His flat, depthless eyes locked on hers. "Of course, my lady. I await your favorable response."
Dersi frowned, wondering at his meaning, and watched as he walked away along the corridor. He seemed . . . smug. Self-satisfied. It sent another shiver up her spine.
Dersi pushed the unpleasant thoughts of Meloni away and continued on her way, passing another set of acidrod-armed guardsmen and exchanging pleasantries. She entered the section of the habitable mass of the ool that had been set aside for the Veil Lords. Here more guardsmen clogged the passages and chambers. In a vast hollow space with walls riddled by fat, pulsing veins and arteries, Dersi knelt before a resinous column that rose from the floor and stretched toward the ceiling far above. Thousands of thin tentacles writhed about the column. Fat globules of milky fluid dripped down from gaping orifices that ringed its apex, coating its surface, keeping it moist.
Eyes winked open in the column, and a slit of a mouth parted, spurting discolored fluids that dripped down to the floor.
"Daughter." The voice echoed, filling the chamber, reverberating. The fat veins and arteries pulsed quicker, in cadence. The massive chamber that was Veil Lord Huldru's body shivered in recognition of her. Fine, dripping laceries emerged from the ceiling and caressed her face. "Dersi."
"Father, you summoned me?" Dersi asked, her head bowed.
"Careful here," Rian said, taking the stranger's arm and guiding him around the seething pool of liquid. In the yellowish light of the glow-rod the liquid appeared sickly, unhealthy. The light also drew the boreworms to the surface. Their knobby heads emerged from the water, twisting around, seeking sustenance. "If you fall in there, that's it. There won't be enough left of you to put in a sack."
Despite Rian's urging, the stranger stopped and squatted beside the pool, staring at the writhing worms. He stretched out a hand over the water. The worms stretched toward the human flesh. Rian thought he saw the stranger smile.
"Don't do that. You'll just agitate them, maybe make them swarm. You wouldn't want that," said Rian. He tapped the stranger's shoulder with his sporelance.
Without a word the stranger arose and fell in line, following Rian as he wove a meandering path through pools and trenches filled with boreworms. The drake barked again, closer, and the stranger jerked, glancing behind.
"Don't worry about that. The drake won't come in here, and we're almost there, anyway." He paused, staring at the man, and tapped his lower lip. He fished into his beltpouch, pulling out a long, thick strand of leather. "Come here. Close your eyes and turn around. I should have done this sooner."
The man did as Rian bade him, seeming unconcerned. Rian wrapped the leather strip around the man's head, blocking his vision. "Now, I'm going to walk alongside you, steering you. You've got to follow my every step without hesitation. It's dangerous here, treacherous. The path's uncertain, and sometimes the pools and trenches expand or contract, changing the path entirely. I've got to concentrate on the way, so I can't spare much attention to you.
"I'd like to get you to the Enclave, but you're not worth my life. If you put me in any jeopardy, I'll throw you into the boreworm pools myself. Understood?" He did not wait for a reply, assuming none would be forthcoming.
Midway through the boreworm pools he heard it again: the unmistakable sound of an approaching ool. A shudder ran through him, but he did not hurry. Hurrying here would spell disaster. Besides, the boreworm pools would keep the ool at bay. They were the Enclave's first line of defense against the Bhajong.
By the time he reached the interior margin of the pools, he could hear the ool's approach clearly. The normal forest sounds utterly ceased. Even the drake's barking call stilled. Looking back, Rian could see the pools seething, the worms beginning to swarm. He jerked the blindfold from the stranger's eyes. Rian hesitated, then sliced the cord binding the stranger's hands. The creature would be less trouble that way.
"Now, we'd better hurry. I'm as eager to be caught in a boreworm swarm as I am to be sucked up by an ool." He sheathed his dagger and held the glow-rod in his middle arm, grabbing hold of the stranger's hand with his left. He pulled him along, breaking into a ragged trot.
They moved through dense forest, the moon and stars blocked by the thick canopy overhead. The hissing buzz of swarming boreworms masked the sounds of their progress, rising to a distracting level that hurt Rian's ears. Ahead, he could see the obelisk of metal that thrust up from the landskin like an immense thorn. The marker and doorway to the Enclave.
He swatted at an airborne worm, smashing it to the landskin. It writhed there, seeking his flesh. He stepped on it with his heavy-soled boots. Guts squished out with a noxious stench. More worms buzzed around, borne aloft by the frenzied chemical reaction in their pale bodies, fattened with expanding gases.
Swarm!
He dropped his sporelance, ignored the stranger, and ran his two free hands over the surface of the obelisk, searching for the trigger. Boreworms landed on his shoulder, digging with razored teeth through the thick leather of his harness, seeking flesh. Others alighted in his spiny hair, along his bare arms, and began chewing their way into him. He grit his teeth, ignoring the pain, and continued his search.
By the Father's Voice! Where was it? Panic robbed him of his memory. He had entered and exited this obelisk his entire life, knew it as he knew the dimensions and décor of his own quarters. But now, in this moment of tension, he could not find the key. He pounded his fist against the smooth metal.
He heard a thin, mewling sound from behind him and glanced over his shoulder. Boreworms covered the stranger. Covered! What skin he could see through the squirming mass of mottled, pale worm-flesh was streaked with bright red blood.
"Open, damn you!" he shouted, beating on the obelisk. "Open!"
And suddenly he beat on thin air, as the doorway opened, and he tumbled inside. Bathed in artificial light, he stared at the twisting fat worms that sprouted from his arms like massive hairs. He flung himself toward the near wall, seizing a long cylinder and directing the spray nozzle on his flesh. Oily foam washed out, bathing him, blanketing the worms. Killing them.
He dashed out into the night, finding the stranger prone, motionless, buried under the boreworms. He doused him with anellidicidal foam, dropped the canister, and seized the stranger beneath his arms. The swarm slammed into him as he dragged the man into the obelisk. He hit the button on the wall that sealed the pillar. The door slammed shut, crushing scores of worms. A hundred others in the tiny room bit into him, chewing.
Rian stumbled toward the other canister in a rack on the wall. He screamed as he felt worms burrowing through leather, skin, crunching bone, slurping blood, devouring organs. He collapsed into the rack, tore a canister free and sprawled out on the metal floor. He pressed the trigger, and suffocating, saving foam washed out, expanding. Keeping the trigger depressed, the foam buried them both, Rian and the stranger.
And then the stranger screamed, once, and grasping black tentacles seized him, pulling him down, down . . .
Memories flooded through him. Memories of warmth. Fluid motion. Tickling caresses.
Currents washed over him, and he swam lazily through them. He touched borders, boundaries, pliant, elastic membranes.
He wiggled digits on the end of longer stalks that grew out from his central trunk. Fingers. Arms. Yes. Fingers, on hands, attached to arms. And arms linked to shoulders, torso, legs, feet, toes. Head, on top. And loins. Oh, yes, loins. Penis, scrotum, testes. Maleness.
He.
Yes, he.
His fingers quested over his body, touching his face. There were features there, sensory organs, he knew, which, in other environments, would serve to feed him input, input for processing and interpreting that environment. Eyes, for vision. Ears for hearing, nose for smelling, tongue for tasting, and skin for touching.
Below, from chest and stomach, knotted cords stretched away from his body. He followed the cords, finding that they disappeared into the membrane overhead. Experimenting, he pinched one of the cords and immediately felt a peculiar sensation in his body. An unpleasant sensation. He released the cord, and the discomfort faded away.
Something emerged from the membrane wall and touched him with countless tiny pressures. Like fingers, only smaller. And moving all across his skin, his flesh, from toes to fingertips. The pressures vanished.
He felt cold seeping into him through the cords. Unpleasant. He tried to move away, but the cords followed him, the cold deepened. He squirmed, hugging his legs to his chest.
Other memories, then. Vague. There and gone before he could grasp them, hold them. He felt a painful absence, as if a part of him, a vital part, had been severed. But he could not remember what, or how. Only . . . He was incomplete.
He floated.
And awakened.
He rose to his bare feet and looked around the cold room. Its surfaces were covered with thick, white, airy stuff. The three-armed thing lay limp on the floor. Red fluid leaked from the breaks in its outer covering.
Skin. Wounds. Blood.
Blood leaked from the wounds in its skin.
He raised his fore appendages---arms---and stared at them. Holes, wounds, spotted his skin. Forty-two wounds, all small, circular, deep. And his . . . skin was covered with the red fluid, blood.
Unpleasant sensations localized in his head and ears, occupying his attention for a moment. He staggered, his legs wobbling. That was not a pleasant sensation. He felt more comfortable when he sank to his knees, into the fluffy stuff. He moved over to the three-armed thing on the floor.
Still, rubbery things on the floor caught his gaze. He picked one up. It flopped across his skin.
Dead.
Dead. It was dead. Ceased. Life functions arrested.
His legs wobbled again. He fell to the cold floor, which was much more comfortable.
Dying.
He frowned. No. That was not acceptable. He looked at the dead thing in his hand. If this was dead, he could not be dead. Dead was unacceptable.
He felt a sudden heat in the center of his chest, radiating outward. It sank into his arms, fingers, legs, toes. The heat rose and washed over his face, covered his chest. And then it receded.
When he looked at his arms the wounds had vanished. Only the . . . blood remained. It flaked off when he touched it with a . . . fingernail, falling into the white fluff.
The three-armed thing was dying, too. That was unacceptable. The three-armed thing had brought him here, had brought him into this cold place, away from the rubbery things that lay dead all around them. Dead was not a good thing for the three-armed thing.
"Hurts," he said, remembering. "Hurts." He touched the three-armed thing, and the heat surged, leaped from his body to that of the three-armed thing. He watched as circular wounds sphinctered shut, the skin rebuilt. He spent a moment scraping blood from the three-armed thing with his fingernail, waiting for it to begin life functions again.
"Dersi." The voice boomed from the wet slit in the column, echoing throughout the chamber. "Where have you been? I called for you hours ago. And why are you wearing those disgusting workclothes?"
"I'm sorry, Father," Dersi said. She raised her eyes and shuddered at the sight of him. His Bhajong body was long gone---replaced only by this sickening pillar of oozing ool-flesh. His mouth was split open, a slit in the base of the column, and dripped fluid in a pool at his base. Cilia, sensory organs, squirmed along his entire length, tasting the air, breathing intangible scents, extracting perception from the environment in manners Dersi could not hope to match. Where was her father? Where was Lord Huldru? Gone. Replaced by this . . . thing. This horrible, abominable thing.
Still, she forced a smile. "Father, it was wonderful! I went down into the core with Master Erekel. He showed me---"
"Silence!" boomed her father's voice.
Dersi shrank back, put her palms to her ears. The ringing pain of his voice sent rippling waves through her body. Her muscles ached, her bones throbbed. She stared at her father, watching as his mouth worked, yawning open and snapping shut, dripping globules of mucus that plopped to the floor. Orifices sphinctered open, sucking down the fluid.
"You've soiled your hands with the work of common laborers? You've stained your mind with their impure thoughts?" Thousands of tentacles draping from the ceiling shook with a wet, slithery sound.
"I . . . I thought . . . I wanted to see what they do," Dersi said, stumbling on her words.
Her father's ring of eyes bulged from their wet sockets. Dripping vertical slits opened, sucking in air with a vibratory hiss. "They consume. They propagate. They proliferate. They suck from the bounty of the ool like parasites, giving nothing in return."
"But I thought . . . The polyps. The boreworms."
"Enough! I didn't call you here to discuss such things. You will not sully yourself again. You have duties, responsibilities."
She felt the heat of anger climb her face. "Then why have you called me here, Father?"
"Lord Meloni has sought my approval for your union. I've given it."
"What? Father! I despise the man! How could you?" She rose and stamped her foot on the floor of polished resin. Cracks snaked out from the impact of her foot. "I won't do it!"
"You'll do as you're told, Dersi!" her father roared, his voice shaking the chamber. The fat veins and arteries shuddered, gorged. Tiny fissures ripped through the cavern wall, spewing hot fluids. "Meloni is of superb genetic stock. Your children will be strong, hastening the day of our ascendance."
"Children? No," she said softly. She glared at the ring of eyes on the column. His eyes stared back, oozing, swimming with all the power of a Veil Lord. Beneath that gaze she withered, her knees shaking, her flesh quivering. She fell to her knees on the hard, warm floor. She hung her head, pressed her skin to the slick, smooth surface of polished resin. "Father, please?"
"You are too young to know what is best for you, or for our people. When you have veiled, perhaps you will inherit a measure of wisdom to temper your fire."
Lady Dersi shuddered. Being veiled marked the achievement of a Bhajong's highest ambition. But the thought of it sat like a festering, seething cancer in Dersi's stomach. A lifetime of immobility, rendered nothing more than a massive, immobile expanse of flesh, a pulsating womb filled with churning life, growing new generations . . . It was more than Dersi could take.
No! No, she would not let it happen, not to her.
"I've coddled you, Dersi, allowed you your freedom, allowed you to ignore your responsibilities to the greater cause, long after you should have been veiled. For years your older siblings have communed, and I've left you to your own devices." His voice rumbled from the column, falling on Dersi like hammer blows. She gasped, shaking. "Perhaps I've been too lenient, too forbearing. I've spoiled you."
"Father, no," she whined. "No, please."
The floor shifted beneath her, bulged. A jagged crack speared through the resin, crackling. Warm, oozing flesh rose in a blunt knob, touched her cheek. "The communion is . . . indescribable, darling. Indescribable. To feel the ool, all of it, to control it, to become it. Do not fear veiling."
She shrank from the knob of flesh, mewling. She wiped the slimy residue from her cheek. Mucus dripped from her palm to the floor, drunk by a thousand tiny, sucking pores. "No," she whispered.
The appendage sank into the floor. Thick ooze bubbled up from the crack in the resin, congealed, and hardened into a rigid, brittle surface. "The council meets tomorrow," her father boomed. "There you will receive Meloni's seed. And thereafter you will both be veiled."
"No," she whispered. "No."
"It's for the best, darling," he said, as close to a whisper as his contorted vocal organs could manage. "For you. For all of us."
Dersi coughed up the feeding tube. It slid from her throat, dripping, and retracted into the ceiling. She lay back on the couch molded from the floor of her chamber, watching as her handmaiden, Savhari, bustled about the sitting room. The light-tumors on the ceiling flooded the room with a soft, violet aura.
Savhari hummed as she worked, a beaming smile on her face. She rummaged through the bureau inset into one wall, seeking a formal gown for the morrow.
"I've a bath prepared for you, Lady," Savhari said, holding up a long, flared gown flowing with creamy lace at the bodice and hem. She clucked, smoothing wrinkles in the material. "This one should do, I think."
Dersi said nothing. She stared at the woman, envying her her freedom, her commonality. This one would never face veiling. She would live out her life in the calm security of the ool, protected from the hated Gagash but never forced to endure the interminable bonding that was veiling. She would grow old, and die, joining with the ool only in the rendering vats far beneath the habitable section of the ool.
"What do you think, Lady?" asked Savhari. The young servant woman smiled, and her features shone beautiful and fresh. Soft. Her eyes, narrow and delicately contoured, seemed alight.
"Whatever you think best, Savhari," Dersi said with an absent wave. She turned away from her handmaiden and rested her chin in her palm.
"What's the matter, Lady?" asked Savhari. "You should be joyous. And proud. I am."
You're not the one to be encased in ool-resin, bonded to the organism, and irreversibly melded into its flesh, Dersi thought. But she said nothing. Savhari would not understand. None of them would; none of them could comprehend the utter horror Dersi felt in her bones. They would never face veiling.
Savhari smiled. "It's the shock, of course. You could not have expected it so quickly, after so long. To finally be reunited with your family! Ah, I envy you, Lady. You must be so proud and excited!"
She lay the chosen gown across the bed and touched Dersi on the arm. "Come, Lady. Your bath will grow cold."
Dersi allowed herself to be led through a short vessel and into a broad, low-ceilinged room festooned with light-tumors. Savhari caressed one of the pulsating boils and it sprang alight. Linked by kinked veins, the other tumors followed in sequence. In the center of the floor a tub rose from the crusted floor. Fat, pulsing arteries coiled about the tub, leeching warmth into the water.
Dersi shrugged out of her jumpsuit, letting the garment fall to the floor. Naked, she climbed over the edge of the tub and slid down into the tickling cilia that lined it. Agitated by the contact, the cilia squirmed, brushing across her flesh, releasing chemicals into the water that scoured her clean.
She leaned back against the wall of the tub, her hair flowing out across the surface of the water in a thin film. She breathed in the steam, the subtle scents of digestion, the soothing pheromones. She ignored Savhari's presence, and eventually the servant withdrew.
Here she could think, could consider her life and what awaited her tomorrow. The end of her life as she had known it, and the beginning of another. An immortal life.
One by one she had seen her older siblings, dozens of them, veiled, bonded to the ool. Each had gone willingly, eagerly, desperately. Smiling. Laughing as the floor cracked beneath their feet, the ooze seeping up to seal them in place. Holding their arms over their heads in ecstasy as the long, loopy tendrils of mucus dripped down from the ceiling, splashing on their faces, seeping into their skin. Gurgling as the ooze filled their lungs, stealing away the need to breathe. Then sleeping, going dormant. Awakening days later, their veils hardened, their new sensory organs sprouting from apex and nadir of their truncated bodies. Other senses, taste and scent, sacrificed. Their roots sunk deep into the flesh of the ool, bonded. For life.
Their communion comprised the mind of the ool, of all the ool. The communion of the Veil Lords gave the ool direction and sentience.
She still spoke with her closest sister on occasion. Merisi had changed. Dersi could hardly recall the laughing, vivacious girl her sister had been. Merisi, who had stolen into the nursery with her on a whim, a dare, and who had actually touched the swelling, throbbing wombs of their other sisters. Merisi was now reared up like a pillar in a Veil Lord chamber, immobile. Her laughter had died. Merisi had died, and something else had taken her place.
Dersi knew her doubts troubled the other Lordlings. They could not understand her, would not, she thought. They avoided conversations with her. She often turned to find their eyes on her, their lips curled up in distaste.
All but Meloni, who had marked her as his own.
She hissed in frustration. Meloni. He had made his desires plain. From earliest childhood he had dogged her footsteps, trailed her, stalked her. He had kept any others who might have been interested in Dersi from approaching.
And now he had won. Somehow, while she dallied below with the commoners, he had swayed her father. He had claimed her as his own.
And there was nothing she could do to prevent it.
Darkness vanished and She awakened. Awareness dawned as She gathered sensory input.
Sight. Blue skies warmed by staining orange, a curve of blazing yellow cresting the horizon, peaking through marching symmetrical lines. Trees---topped by clumps of vibrant green, tangled branches sprouting new life.
Sound. A curious absence, tempered by shrill cries of . . . birds. Rough grating of stone on stone. Soothing comfort of running water, so like the tides of earlier existence.
Touch. Sharpness underfoot. Stones---scattered across living, breathing, heaving landskin.
Scent. Loss, absence. Unfamiliar fragrances, sharp and clean. Foreign.
Taste. Acrid tang. Bitterness. Salt.
Her other senses refused to awaken, a deprivation that pained She.
She watched the sun rise over the horizon, watched it born into a fiery haze.
Images trickled into memories. Soft caresses, fluid movement, close comfort. Communion, linkage, companionship, home.
Sensation climbed through her skin, a trembling---shiver, cold---that tickled her scalp beneath red, red hair. Nakedness. She looked down at her body, noting the physical attributes, noting the smooth, unlined skin of damaged pink. Secondary sexual organs---breasts---rose from her chest, capped with nozzles for feeding her young. Below, a smooth expanse of stomach, trailing toward the joining of legs, an inverted triangle of cilia-like hair. Fingers explored, touching moist heat, an opening. Primary sexual organs, the promise of reproduction, a nurturing womb.
Female. Maternity. She.
She.
She stared at her surroundings, wondering. She stood in a pool of purplish fluid on the floor of a wide valley. Hills ringed the valley, blanketed with landskin, topped by trees that touched the sky. The sun warmed her skin. Sounds fell on her with unforgiving pressure. Scents from the trees and flowers tickled her nose. The landskin knew her, touched her with delicately raised tendrils.
She was alone, and that was wrong. She ran her hands down her stomach, touching her vagina, caressing the shell of flesh that held her womb. She yearned for the God, for the community, for her siblings.
She yearned for He.
He. She must find He. He must be near.
She turned, looking at the land around her. Looking for He.
She threw wide her senses. But with only the five, paltry sensory organs, she found no answers. Her God was silent.
She must find He.
Approaching Planetfall (In Transit)
Captain Rafael Santiago rubbed at the ache in his shoulder and stared at the ceiling of his office aboard Ship. A recent pain, he had yet to adjust to its presence, though it was to be expected. Even with the advances in geriatric science, age imposed its limitations on every man, the strong as well as the weak. Santiago had never been weak. But this new pain, a gnawing ache that spasmed whenever he raised his arm from his side, served as a constant reminder that, with the passage of time, the strong become the weak.
He shook his head, unable to fathom how he could have lived so long, done so much, and yet be betrayed in the end by his own failing body. It seemed . . . unfair, somehow.
Santiago snorted. Who ever declared that life had to be fair?
He pushed aside the pain, sealed it away behind a barrier of will, and turned to the latest crew reports Ship's Psych Officer Singh had sent over ShipsNet. He leaned back in his well-worn office chair and pivoted the plasma screen so that he could read the data more easily. The lines of information blurred, doubled, and Santiago suppressed a curse. He queued magnification, and the words swelled so that he could see them. Another trait of his body's decay.
Lt. Keevers had begun to show definitive signs of the onset of clinical depression. Unusual, but not unheard of during such a long voyage. Santiago agreed with Singh's assessment, and scheduled Keevers for reprogramming. A non-com, Gant, had assaulted an officer in the rec room. Santiago ordered him placed in stasis for the duration of the journey to their remote destination. The list went on, and on, seemingly without end.
The routine of commanding a SeedShip had long since worn Santiago's patience to a fine edge. Military personnel he could handle. They obeyed the chain of command, or they took their punishment. But with the civilian contingent aboard Ship, Santiago found he had to master an entirely new subset of skills---a skillset that struck him as being inconsistent and certainly not in the best interests of the mission. How did one deal with engineers and scientists who not only could not understand the need for strict protocol and order, but actively flaunted it? Without recourse to the brig, or stasis, Santiago had found himself forced to utilize the services of Ship's psych officer more and more often. And he distrusted Singh. Intensely.
As if summoned by Santiago's thoughts of him, Singh announced his presence outside of Rafael's office with the chime. Santiago stared at Singh's face on the display, unable to suppress his frown of distaste. Singh would make note of it in that analytical mind of his, draw conclusions, make notations in his files, and watch. He always watched. Those beady little black eyes of his seemed to catch everything.
Santiago sighed and gave Singh entrance. The little man looked awkward in his military togs, but he did keep an immaculate uniform. Creases in all the right places. Insignia properly displayed. Buckles and buttons polished to a mirror sheen. Maddening.
"Captain Santiago," Singh said, saluting.
"At ease, Singh." Santiago waved the psych officer to a chair opposite his desk. The little man settled into it with an effete fold of his legs, his hands---manicured to perfection---folded in his lap. "What is it?"
"I see you have studied the latest crew reports," Singh said, his voice crisp, certain, honed to a razor perfection of intonation and pronunciation.
Santiago nodded. "Nothing out of the ordinary."
"Respectfully, I must disagree, Captain," Singh said. He kept his gaze locked to Santiago's. Challenge? Or forthrightness?
"How so?"
"We near the end of a very long voyage. There are definite signs that the encapsulation is having an adverse effect on the crew and the civilian contingent of the Ship, Captain. There is an escalation of tension and anxiety that, I believe, will eventually show itself in the performance ratios."
"As you said, we're nearing the end of the journey. A month, two, at the most, and we'll be orbital. Once we achieve planetfall, I'd anticipate the situation to work itself out."
"Perhaps," Singh said. He sounded doubtful.
"If it will make you feel more comfortable, order an increase in pharms for the crew. I'll sign the order."
"Thank you, Captain. I do think that would be in our best interests."
"Was there anything else, Singh?"
Singh paused, considering. One thin, tapered hand touched his lips, an offhand gesture Santiago had come to loathe during the six years they had served together aboard the SeedShip. From experience Santiago knew Singh had something else on his mind, something he hesitated to broach. He was in no mood to listen to more of the man's prattle.
"Your pardon, Captain, but you do seem to be under an enormous amount of stress yourself," Singh said before Santiago could dismiss him. "Is there, perhaps, something you wish to discuss with me in my capacity as Ship's psych officer?"
"Me?" Santiago snorted. He forced a laugh, though humor did not reach his expression. "Certainly not, Singh. If I'm under stress, it goes with the territory. You worry about the crew's brains, not mine. I can handle myself."
Singh rose, saluted. "As you wish, Captain. If there should be anything else, I shall be in my office."
Santiago returned the salute and waved him away. The door hissed shut behind the offensive little man, and Rafael breathed a sigh of relief. His gaze caught the display panel, still queued to Singh's analysis. He shunted the file away to join the countless others he had endured during the past six years---countless reports detailing crew and civilian psychological problems and situations. None alarming in and of themselves. Nothing that could not be handled by the swift administration of punishment.
Santiago stood and walked over to the viewscreen. He queued it up, displaying the vastness of space through which the SeedShip sped. A million stars spread across the heavens, the incomprehensible expanse of the cosmos swollen with potential, with opportunity. Always before, the sight had calmed him, and offered him hope and inspiration. Not today. Not with mission-waypoint rapidly approaching. Today he was left only with doubts and anxieties, unresolved during the long, long voyage from home.
The Hegemony had tied his hands in dealing with the civilians. The engineers, scientists, and technical personnel would form the backbone of the new colony. They would supervise the Hatchlings as they acclimatized to their new environment. And the Hegemony wanted them loyal, obedient. Any behavior that could jeopardize their allegiance to the Hegemony was strictly forbidden.
Santiago wished---not for the first time---that the Hegemony could have seen the wisdom of establishing a colony under military rule. With only the crew to worry about on this voyage, it could have gone much smoother. Without the constant bickering of the scientists and engineers unattached to Service, Santiago could have the new colony up and running, peopled by Hatchlings programmed for loyalty to the Hegemony, in short order.
But the political undercurrents back home in the Terran Hegemony had prevented that. Many felt that the technology that allowed for the freezing of gene-spliced zygotes and the compilation of memories, skills, abilities, and personalities into downloads had been too new, too untested. They wanted guidance for the Hatchlings. They wanted control. They wanted a happy, contented population.
The stupidity of politicians never ceased to amaze Santiago.
Still, he was a military man, born and bred for Service. Loyal to the Service. He would do as he was ordered.
ShipsNet chimed, announcing an incoming call. Santiago turned from the viewscreen and moved to his desk. He toggled reception, and Biological Sciences Officer Alberto Rodriguez swam into view. Santiago smiled. "Officer Rodriguez, what can I do for you?"
"Captain, the telemetry we've been getting from the last of the drone-probes has continued to decay. We're getting nothing but static now. But it appears we're approaching extreme range for the sensors, and I was hoping . . ."
Santiago nodded. Here was the lone voice of reason and common sense among the scientists, a man Rafael could respect. He did his duty without shirking, without complaint, offered suggestions, not demands. And he was attached to Service. "Certainly. I'll send an order over to Sensors allowing you access."
"Thank you, Captain," Rodriguez said. He saluted.
Santiago returned the salute and ended the conversation. He wished all of the scientists could be as open-minded and reasonable as Rodriguez.
Rian opened his eyes. A surprise in and of itself, considering the recent memories that came crashing in on him with the return of consciousness. More surprising still, there was no pain. Despite the memories of the boreworms tunneling into his flesh and bone, he felt whole.
He raised his arms and stared at his new skin. Although he noticed flakes of dried blood, his skin was mostly clean. He looked up at the stranger, standing in the anellidicidal foam between Rian and the door. The man gave no indication that he was aware of Rian's awakening.
"What happened?" asked Rian. His voice echoed in the small chamber.
The stranger turned to him and raised his hands, palms outward. "Hurts," he said, and lowered his arms to his sides. "Hurts."
Rian nodded. "I remember. Yes. Hurts. Hurts a lot."
"Hurts," said the man, echoing Rian's nod. A very human gesture.
Rian climbed to his feet and felt the rubbery corpses of the boreworms all around him. He shivered in distaste. The foam concealed most of the bloated bodies, but those he could spot were fat with consumed blood and flesh. Their tangled bodies lay in drying pools of blood.
"Dead," the stranger said, pointing at the worms.
"Yes, dead," Rian agreed. He climbed to his feet and shuffled through the foam. His middle arm automatically checked his gear. He regretted the loss of his sporelance, left outside with the boreworm swarm. But he was not about to go out there and fetch it.
Outside, even through the thick metal of the obelisk, he could hear the sound of the ool's passage, the bleating, high-pitched scream of the beast as the boreworm swarm gnawed into its outer husk. He shuddered.
Why has there been so much ool activity? Were the Bhajong planning a major offensive?
Rian crossed to a wall covered in intricate glyphs and symbols and touched a precise series. With a sharp click a hidden drawer slid from the wall, revealing a numerical touchkey pad. He punched in his access code.
Hidden machinery whirred and clanked. A portion of the floor recessed, sloping downward to merge with a stairway. Artificial light sank into the depths of the earth, lost within the darkness.
"Come," said Rian, gesturing to the stranger. "Stay close to me. Even here there are defenses. They'll take you as quickly as the boreworms or the ool."
The stranger said nothing, but walked across the small room to stand, waiting. Rian frowned at his closeness. Heat rose from the man's body, and an unknown, acrid scent.
Mentally shrugging, Rian led the way down the ramp onto the stairway. Pressure plates triggered the ramp's closure. It rose ponderously, banging into place with a metallic boom. Thick clamps shot across the narrow stairwell, slamming into recesses on the opposite wall, locking the doorway.
With the stranger following on his heels, Rian began his descent.
At the bottom of the stairway they stepped onto a narrow landing where their passage was blocked by an immense door of aged metal. In a corner, recessed in the shadows, a small mirrored scope turned toward them, and Rian knew they were being watched. Several long, tense moments passed, moments that forced Rian to examine his choices in bringing the stranger to this place.
But what else should he have done? Left the stranger out in the wilderness? Killed him? He shook his head, discounting the idea. The Elders would surely want to study the creature, the anomaly. If not, he could be killed as easily inside the Enclave as outside it.
He glanced back at the stranger, who stood immobile, staring at the massive metal door.
The door hissed as its pneumatics triggered. It slid to one side and recessed into the wall. Beyond stood a wide, unadorned room of gleaming metal occupied by a pair of Gagash guardsmen armed with sporelances. One of the guards gestured them inside. He had only one arm, which sprouted from the center of his heavily pelted chest, and ridges of horn protruding from his jawline. The other, a shambling mound of rolled flesh on trunklike legs, held his sporelance ready, trained on the stranger.
"Blessings of the Father, Rian. You're late. The others returned hours ago," the one-armed man said. He eyed the stranger, frowning. "What is this?"
"Blessings of the Father, Zhaed. You look well," Rian said. He was pleasantly surprised to discover the others of his cadre already returned to the Enclave. "And . . . Jey, isn't it?" he asked, addressing the other.
"That's right," Jey rumbled. "I'm surprised you remember."
Rian smiled. "I try to remember everyone. Works sometimes. And other times doesn't."
"I'm not exactly forgettable," Jey said, his flesh jiggling as he chuckled.
Zhaed pointed to Rian's silent companion. "Who is this? Why have you brought a Bhajong here?"
Rian shook his head. "He's no Bhajong."
"What is he, then?" Jey pressed. "He's not Gagash, certainly." His voice rumbled from deep within his massive form, emerging as if through a hollow tube.
Rian shrugged. "I don't know, really. I found him in a gully a few miles from here, in the ool-wake."
The two stepped back from the stranger. "The ool-wake?" Zhaed echoed. Jey jerked on his sporelance, staring at the stranger.
"He doesn't say much," Jey said.
"I don't think he can," Rian answered. "He hasn't said much of anything since I found him."
Jey shambled forward and reached out to touch the stranger. Rian's silent companion stared at Jey, a blank look on his face. He did not move as Jey's short, stubby fingers traced across his cheek, his shoulders. Then the stranger raised his hand and touched Jey's arm, running his fingertips along the mottled, jiggling flesh. Jey shuddered and stepped back, slapping down the stranger's hand.
"Hurts," the stranger said. He turned his hand over and stared at it.
"That's one of his few words," Rian said, smirking.
"What are you going to do with him?" Zhaed asked.
"Me? Nothing. Turn him over to the Elders, and Father, I suppose. Let them make of him what they will."
Zhaed grunted, shrugging. "You bring a lot of strangeness back with you, Rian. Not only an oddity, but the ool. We haven't had an ool cross over the valley in decades, but recently there's been three in two days."
"Three?"
Zhaed nodded, jerking his horned chin toward the periscope mounted on one wall. "The first the night before last---the one we downed. The second came during your passage of the boreworm pools. And another swept in just after you pulled this . . . thing into the obelisk. The boreworms have driven those off now. Though I worried we'd have to break out the heavy weapons."
Rian frowned. Two more ool? So close on the heels of the one the boreworms had downed. Decidedly odd, that. He could not remember similar circumstances. And the heavy weapons had not been used in so long he wondered if they still functioned.
"Truthfully, we worried we'd be cleaning your remains out of the obelisk in the morning," Zhaed said. "How did you survive? You were both covered with boreworms." He eyed the circular holes in Rian's leather harness, the dried, flaking blood that covered his exposed skin.
"I don't really know," Rian answered truthfully. "The foam helped. It killed the worms, at least. As for the rest---" He shrugged.
Zhaed frowned. The expression tightened his jaw muscles, standing his ridges on end, flaring them out into a series of needle-sharp spikes.
"I've got to see the Elders," Rian said. He avoided eye contact with the guards. He had the same questions they did. "When is your shift over? Perhaps we can take dinner together."
Zhaed shook his head. "I've married, Rian. No more nights in the cups for me, I'm afraid."
"A horrible, beastly woman," Jey said. "With a foul temper. And quick with kitchen utensils."
Zhaed snorted, waving the joke aside. "Jey's just jealous. She's a fine woman, and she keeps the bed warm."
Rian chuckled and slapped Zhaed on his upper arm. "Congratulations, Zhaed. And good luck," he said, with a wink toward Jey.
The guardsmen ushered Rian and his silent companion to the vacuum-sealed door that led from the guardroom into the cavernous warren of the Enclave. Zhaed punched buttons on the touchkey pad to the right of the door and it hissed with released air before swinging open on well-oiled hinges.
Zhaed scrawled a hasty note on a scrap of dried landskin parchment and passed it to Rian. "When your business is concluded, come by our house. I'll see you decently fed, at least. Jazrin's a wonderful cook."
"She is that," Jey agreed, patting his considerable stomach.
"I'll try, I promise. If time allows I'd like that. It's been too long since I've had a home-cooked meal. Trail rations and landskin grow tiresome."
Rian took the stranger's elbow and led him into the narrow corridor cut into the bedrock. The door banged shut behind them. Exhaust fans mounted above it sighed, vacuum-sealing the door once more. Rian glanced at his companion. The man just stood there, face slack, staring with unblinking eyes straight down the corridor.
Rian sighed. "Come on," he said. He set off down the long corridor toward the heart of the Enclave, the stranger in tow.
Worked by the Gagash for an eternity, the hub of the Enclave was a mammoth cavern more than a mile in diameter. In the center of the cavern floor yawned a pit that seethed with volcanic activity. Core-fires cast deep, red shadows across the intricate latticework of girders, beams, and heavy pipes that squatted over the pit like a nesting spider. Smoke roiled in billowing clouds from a dozen refineries situated around the pit's perimeter, and hundreds of Gagash scurried about the infrastructure like industrious insects.
The walls of the cavern rose in gigantic steps, each riddled with passages, chambers, and halls, the dwellings of the Gagash. Networks of pipes, venting gouts of hissing steam, sank into the bowels of the cavern. The level of noise was deafening.
Rian and the stranger emerged onto a busy avenue halfway up one of the walls. Passing Gagash stared at the stranger and hurried along. Conversation died around them. Even the few pedestrians Rian knew gave them a wide berth, avoiding eye contact and hurrying along.
He guided the stranger toward one of the angled lifts and boarded. The other passengers stared, moving to the corners of the caged platform. Rian ignored them, though he felt their hostility, and the spines on his head stood on end. He could smell their fear, their loathing, like rancid waste oozing from their pores.
The stranger's mouth hung open, his eyes wide. His gaze swept across the boiling tide of Gagash in seeming fascination. Gagash turned away from him, though a few bristled, their muscles tensing.
The breakman, who had a second vestigial head protruding from his shoulder blades, watched them with sneers on his faces. He jerked down the brake lever in the center of the platform while the eyes in the partial head stared at them. From the throat embedded in the man's back came a warbling moan.
Steam billowed from the pipes that fed the small engine mounted on top of the cage. Gears tumbled into motion, and the lift surged. It dropped rapidly at an angle toward the lower levels of the city.
Exiting the lift on a lower floor, Rian led the stranger toward the yawing mouth of a large hall. Hump-backed sentries bearing sporelances blocked their entry. Rian explained himself again and flashed his credentials to the guards. Reluctantly, eyeing the stranger with open hostility, the sentries stood aside and allowed them passage. Rian led the stranger deeper into the Enclave, toward the Elders' chambers.
Images built up slowly in He's mind: words, concepts, abstracts. He absorbed the flow of information, unconcerned with its source, and held on to the knowledge, storing it.
He was not whole. He knew that now. Something was missing. Something vital. Something essential. He should know more; he needed to know more.
He watched the men---?---the three-armed man thing took him among, wondering at their diversity. No two were exactly the same. None seemed like him.
Mutation.
The word came, and its meaning, and he stored it for later use. For now, he opened his senses---wondering what was missing, what vital piece of him was absent, and why---and absorbed input. He sensed black smoke that smelled of heat and tasted of fire. Red shadows that danced and sounded like silence. Drops of liquid leaking from tiny pinprick holes in these creatures' skins, carrying chemical triggers---pheromones---that stank of fear and alarm and curiosity.
The three-armed man's designation, his name, was Rian . . . Did he not need a name? All of these creatures seemed to have them, as if such things defined them, made them real. Without a name, was he any less real? He should have a name, a designation. To make him real, to give him solidity, definition.
He recalled, almost recalled, a name . . . But no. The memory evaporated, gone as he reached for it, leaving only a painful absence in its place.
Rian spoke to him, and He understood most of what Rian said. He stored words away, building language. That was another word that came to him . . . language. Rian wanted something. Wanted something from him---an action? A response? But he was not ready. His data was incomplete.
Rian spoke again, and He listened, but the concepts were unclear, and he stored the words away for later. Confusion.
These men---Gagash---were different.
The confusion grew. There was too much to see, too much to hear, too much to process. He could not control the intake. He pulled awareness back from his ears and nose and tongue, limiting his perspective. The raw data continued to stream in, but he shoved it back and away. He would open the knowledge conveyed later. Perhaps then he could understand it.
Something was missing. Something that kept him from being whole.
Rian took him to a big piece of shining rock---metal, processed ore from below the landskin---that ended the tunnel. Two creatures, men, stood there and spoke with Rian. Rian spoke back, but He could not understand the words, not yet.
The metal plate opened, and Rian took him into another room, a cube, with twelve wrinkled men inside. They stared at him, and He stared back.
He needed a name.
A sound awakened Dersi. She sat up, the cilia falling away from her skin and writhing as they receded into the surface of the bed. The usual momentary disorientation faded quickly away as she focused, waiting for the sound to repeat itself. It did not.
Dream fragments of soothing, warm liquid currents shattered and fell away from her mind like broken chitin.
She leaned toward the mound alongside her bed, hand outstretched to caress the light-tumor there.
"Don't," came a voice, low and whispery.
Her hand froze, and she jerked her head toward the voice. In the darkness she could see nothing. She swallowed, pulling her legs up toward her chest. Her hands clenched in the spongy surface of the bed. Cilia squirmed away from the aggressive touch.
"Who are you?" she demanded.
"A friend," came the response from the darkness.
Dersi focused on the sound of the voice. It seemed familiar, but she could not identify the speaker. Her vision sharpened, drinking in the ambient, residual light in the room. A dull hump of deeper darkness stood near her, at the end of her bed. A man-shaped outline.
"A friend?"
"If you would have me for one," came the gruff response.
"A friend wouldn't crouch in the darkness of my bedchamber. A friend wouldn't interrupt my sleep, uninvited." She edged closer to the mound at the side of her bed. She slid her hand across the bed toward the light-tumor. A hidden recess in the mound held an acidbulb. If she could reach it . . .
"Don't. Don't call the light." She heard shifting movement, uncertain steps in the darkness.
"Why? If you're a friend, you've no need to hide in the darkness."
"Yes, I know. But it remains unclear if you'll have me for your friend, Lady Dersi."
"What are you talking about?" she asked.
"I know you're to receive Meloni's seed tomorrow at council," the masculine voice said. He was older, with the rough edge of cells on the verge of atrophy. "I know you're to be veiled soon after."
"Yes," she said, hesitant. Erekel? Yes. She was certain of it. "What of it?"
"We don't think you want that," he said.
"We?" She slid her hand toward the concealed drawer. "You said, 'we.' "
"Yes, I did," came the reply. "Please don't, Lady Dersi. I'm sure you have a weapon of some sort near you. Don't force me to do something I'd rather not do."
She jerked her hand away. "What do you mean?"
The shadowy head shook. "I don't have much time, Dersi. They'll know you've awakened soon, and send someone to investigate."
"Who?"
"The Veil Lords. I can't say more than that now. It's too dangerous to me, to us." He paused, and she sensed he wanted to say more. She kept silent, and he continued. "You haven't answered me. Do you want to be veiled?"
"Of course. It's my duty, my responsibility. My honor."
"I think you lie. There is no need to fear the truth with me. I'm not an agent of your father's, or the council. I have only your best interests in mind. Yours, and the best interests of our people."
"What are you talking about?"
"I've got to go now. If you truly want the veiling, you won't see me again. And don't try to follow me. I wouldn't want you to get hurt.
"But if you feel as I suspect you do . . . Then, Lady Dersi, find a means of separating yourself from your escort tomorrow. On the way to council. We'll find you. We'll keep you safe. You need not face the veiling."
"I don't understand," she said, moving toward the shadowed man. He retreated quickly. Her door opened, and in the light that spilled into her room from the corridor outside, she saw a figure clothed in billowing garments. The man pulled a hood over his face. "Wait!"
But the man ignored her, darting away.
She sat back on her bed, watching as the door sphinctered shut once more, blotting out the light. She frowned, knowing she had seen, in the brief flare of the man's shirt as he swept from her room, features that confirmed her suspicion. Master Erekel, the harvester, slipped away.
Dersi found sleep elusive. Her thoughts tumbled, incoherent.
She rose from her bed. The cilia, which had begun their silent, dream-weaving caress in the wake of Erekel's departure, jerked back. Dersi caressed the light-tumor and used the violet glow to rummage through her wardrobe. Shrugging into a loose-fitting robe and comfortable shoes, she left her chambers.
The winding corridors of the ool thrummed with the rhythmic, sonorous sounds of home. The steady thump of blood streaming through the massive arteries lining the hall waged a losing battle against her turbulent thoughts.
At an intersection of main vessels she turned to the right and trod the spongy flesh of the ool until she came to a pulsing sphincter. Lacelike ribbons of flesh hung in curtains before the door, twitching at her approach. She allowed the ribbons to brush across her skin, felt the tiny stings of their recognition. In a few moments the sphincter irised open, and Dersi stepped into a Veil Lord's chamber.
"Merisi," she called. "Are you awake?"
"You know we don't sleep, Dersi," her sister replied. The column in the center of the room pulsed. A ring of eyes opened above the slit-like mouth. "And you announced your presence. Actually, I've been expecting you."
"You have?" Dersi walked across the hardened resin toward her sister.
Merisi chuckled in the Veil Lord fashion, thousands of dripping tentacles that spanned the ceiling writhing together in a wet, slurping sound. "You are to be veiled tomorrow. I anticipated you might come to see me. We were always the closest of our father's children."
Merisi broke open a crack in the chamber floor and raised a mound of warm flesh. Dersi sat on the mound, crossing her legs and staring up at her sister. So different. So inhuman.
"I can imagine how you feel, Dersi."
"Can you?"
The Veil Lord laughter erupted again. "I too had doubts before my veiling."
"You did? I didn't know."
"Of course. What sane person would not?"
Dersi kept silent. She had seen the joy, the rapture, that contorted her other siblings' faces as the mucus covered them, entombed them.
"But there is nothing to fear, Dersi. Nothing. Communion is . . . indescribable."
"Father said much the same thing," Dersi said.
"It is. Joyous, Dersi. To be bonded, a part of a vast whole. The sense of community, of union, is like nothing else. All our wonderings as children did not approach the truth."
"You have no regrets? You don't miss anything?"
"What would I miss?"
"Walking?" Dersi could not keep the sarcasm from her voice. "Talking, like a person. Touching, with fingers and hands rather than a mass of tentacles."
Merisi laughed long. "Walking? Why would I wish to walk when I am everywhere, experiencing everything? Where would I go? And talking---I communicate on more levels than you can imagine. Human speech is a poor medium, limited as communion is not. Touching?" A thousand thin tentacles snaked out of the ceiling and floor, flooding over Dersi, who resisted the impulse to cry out. The knobbed heads touched her, caressed her, wound through her robe and her hair, touching even her secret places. "How can ten fingers and a limited expanse of skin compare to this?"
Abruptly Merisi withdrew her touch, tentacles retracting. Dersi pulled her robe shut, looked everywhere, at anything, but the column that housed Merisi's mind.
"The completeness is without parallel in your limited experience. Your sensations cannot compare." The Veil Lord paused. "Look," she said, and the floor split apart at Dersi's feet, ripping with the squealing protest of torn flesh. A thousand arteries snapped, spilling blood and other fluids down into the crevice. Below, Merisi continued, broadening, flaring out into a mammoth, opaque sack scrawled with throbbing veins. Inside the sack Dersi could see movement. Something touched the taut membrane, a five-fingered hand.
"Even now I grow heavy with child. Soon, I will birth my children. A few, hopefully, will ascend to become Veil Lords. What human experience can compare to this?"
Dersi shook her head. She knew she should be impressed, awed. Envious, perhaps. But she was not. Disgust crawled up from the pit of her stomach, a revulsion so powerful she had to swallow to prevent herself from vomiting.
"Go, Dersi," Merisi said, closing the rent in her body. "Go and sleep. You have a big day tomorrow, the most wonderful you'll ever experience. I'm so happy to have you joining us, Sister. I can't wait to commune with you, to share with you all the pleasures and passions of the Veil Lords."
Dersi rose and touched the dangling tentacles that Merisi dropped to caress her in fond farewell. She forced herself to smile, to pretend. She bid her sister pleasant dreams---did the Veil Lords dream? No one had ever told her---and left Merisi's chamber. As the door sphinctered shut she ran down the corridor. She did not have the strength to hold in her horror. She burst into tears.
Rian entered the Elders' workroom with the stranger in tow. One of the guardsmen, a massive hulk whose twisted spine forced him to walk while leaning on the knuckles of one hand, kept a sporelance trained on the stranger's back. The room was square, with walls and floor of worked stone inlaid with shining metal. The ceiling breathed rhythmically. Landskin had been allowed access, and now it nippled in the center of the room, directly over a workbench crowded with implements of metal, glass, and living tissue. Huge, steam-belching pipes rose from the floor at the far end of the room and pierced the landskin ceiling. A network of smaller pipes and tubes crisscrossed the other walls. A ring of artificial light circled the chamber, halting the landskin's encroachment.
The Elders, the prime intercessors with the Father in the Enclave, clustered around the huge workspace. They looked up at Rian's entrance. In the flickering lights of a hundred display screens, the Elders' faces were deeply seamed, like cracks in hard stone. Their eyes seemed flat and cold. They wore smocks that concealed their bodies to their jawlines, and surgical gloves of glistening landskin film.
Puzzled expressions washed over them at the sight of the stranger in Rian's wake.
"What is this?" One of the Elders, Pallas, approached. He stared at the mute stranger, his lipless slit of a mouth drawn taut. Long, tapered fingers, sheathed in landskin film gloves, stroked the patches of scales that smothered his chin. His nose crinkled as he sniffed and then turned his attention back to Rian. "Where did you find it?"
The stranger stood with his arms lax at his sides, staring into space. A bit of drool trickled from his lips, tracing a thin path down his chin.
Other Elders came close, crowding around the stranger, poking at him. The stranger roused from his dreamstate to stare at those who touched him, though he made no effort to stop them. He raised his hand, palm up, and stared at it, closing his fingers one by one until he stared at a clenched fist. Then he opened his hand once more.
Elder Pallas studied the stranger, a small frown on his face.
"I don't know who . . . what he is, Elder. I found him senseless in the middle of ool-waste. I thought to kill him, but . . ." He related the circumstances behind his discovery of the stranger. Pallas's eyes widened at Rian's tale, and he watched the stranger with renewed appreciation.
"You did well not to kill him, Rian. Very well." He turned to the stranger, stepping close. The guardsman shifted his sporelance closer to the naked stranger's back. "Who are you?"
"He doesn't really talk," Rian said.
"Hmm. Doesn't, or can't? There's a vast difference, you know." The Elder touched the smooth expanse of the stranger's chest with a fingertip. "Fascinating. Elasticity in the exterior dermis. Porous, indicating the presence of sweat glands." He ran his fingers up into the stranger's red hair, tugged at the roots. "Firmly affixed in the transdermal layer. Odd pigmentation. A recessive trait?"
Pallas lowered his hand, tracing along the base of the stranger's skull. "Smooth, rounded skull, with shallow basal flanges, indicative of well-developed frontal and rear orbital lobes." He circled the stranger, who attempted to turn with him. Pallas frowned in consideration. "Wait like this, fellow. For just a moment."
The stranger's lips twitched and slowly curled downward in a close approximation of Pallas's frown. Rian sniffed at the reaction.
Pallas circled the stranger and ran a palm down his spine to his pelvis. "Slight curvature, within symmetrical norm, to the spine. Well-developed discs. Wide hips. The musculature of the back seems complimentary to the skeletal structure. Lower legs straight, unmarked by osteodegeneration." He walked back around to the front of the stranger and snorted. "No visible sign of mutation. What are you, my friend? Surely you can't be what you seem."
"What does he seem?" Rian asked.
Pallas ignored the question, ignored Rian. He addressed his comments to the other Elders, all of whom crowded close. "No characteristics indicative of Bhajong heritage, either. Pigmentation in excess of Bhajong statistical norm. The body mass is exceptional, as well."
Rian felt himself pushed back by the press of the Elders' bodies. He edged toward the entrance. The guardsman heaved himself erect, towering over the others, and glared at the stranger.
Pallas demanded a scalpel and used it to scrape at the stranger's palm, soft enough so as to not draw blood. The stranger only stared at him, continuing to ball his hand into a fist. Pallas wound his way through the gathered Elders with the scalpel. Rian followed at the edge of the crowd, watching the Elder. The nipple of landskin hanging down from the ceiling seemed to throb as Pallas approached, the scalpel held out before him. With his other hand Pallas seized the nipple and pulled it closer to the table, stretching it taut. Thin needles sprang out of the puckers in the landskin. As Pallas held the scalpel beneath the bulge, one of the puckers in the knob yawned open, and dozens of wormlike tongues slithered out, flickering across the blade.
Rian shivered. No matter how many times he saw the Elders at work with the landskin, he could not prevent the unsettling of his stomach. The things they had done with it, the changes they had wrought . . .
"Fascinating!" Pallas said. Several of the other elders echoed the sentiment.
The terminus of the nipple swelled into a translucent globe, pulsing with spiderwebbed veins. Within, something dark twisted, coiled. One of the other Elders used a scalpel to pierce the thin membrane. Thick fluid spurted out, and a squirming mass spilled into a tray placed beneath the sphere. The landskin snapped back toward the ceiling, gushing fluid that began to harden.
"Fascinating," Pallas repeated, absorbed in studying the squirming mass. "Have you ever seen such a reaction? Almost recognition, I'd say. Or antagonism. It's difficult to tell."
"What is it?" Rian asked, hovering at the edge of the Elders.
"What? Eh? Oh, you. You may go now. Don't go far. Hold yourself ready to meet with us again. There may well be further questions for you. And you'll want to see medical. I'll transmit the order to your duty officer." He turned away again, absorbed by the mystery before him. "This is remarkable."
Thoroughly dismissed, Rian turned away and headed for the door. He glanced over his shoulder, seeing the stranger standing mute and motionless. He frowned, feeling that there was something he was missing, something important.
He realized he was still standing beside the door when the other sentry coughed under his breath. Rian shook his head and ducked out of the Elders' workroom.
After leaving his contact information with the sentry, in the event the Elders decided they needed him sooner rather than later, Rian walked back down the wide corridor. He ducked beneath a billowing cloud of steam that jetted from a pipe mounted on the wall. Other pipes lay along the floor, close to the walls, studded with valves and gauges and wheels, carrying power to all parts of the Enclave.
Emerging into the central cavern, Rian headed toward his quarters, knowing he should report to the duty officer and debrief his cadre. And there was the matter of his lost sporelance. Hopefully it could be recovered from above. But boreworms in the frenzy of a swarm could consume just about anything.
He sighed, knowing disciplinary action was likely.
Hours later, after a debasing interview with the duty officer, Rian lay on a cold metal table, staring at the light panel mounted on the ceiling. The low hum of the artificial light grated on his nerves, set his teeth grinding. Instruments embedded in the walls moved slowly up and down his body, accompanied by a slight tickling that sank all the way through to his bones. Needles and probes riddled his body, making movement impossible; the slightest shifting on the cold metal brought stabs of pain as bits of metal gouged his flesh. The landskin tendrils attached to the base of his skull throbbed.
"There is some scar tissue accumulation where you said the boreworms attacked you." His head held immobile by a strand of landskin, Rian could just make out the figure of the technician leaning over a hump of pulsing landskin, his eyes pressed to a lenslike bubble. "The scarring would, however, appear to be quite old."
"You're calling me a liar? I was there. I felt them. I saw them. I . . . I don't know what happened. The anellidicidal foam killed most of them, but even as it did, I knew I had no hope of surviving. I could feel the boreworms in me."
"I doubt that. There is no trace of poison in your system. And there's no evident tissue trauma." The technician stood, gesturing with his three-fingered hand toward the bubble-lens. "You're in perfect health, considering. Certainly there is evidence of wounding, but wounding long since healed. Calcium deposits in your right femur, indicative of previous breakage. Several bone-spurns along your ribs. Slight depression in the base of your skull. Other than that, there's nothing wrong with you."
"That's impossible," Rian muttered under his breath.
Immediately following his debriefing with the duty officer he had been sent to medical. The holes in his tunic and the stains covering it and his skin were enough to convince the duty officer that something had happened, even if he did express some disbelief in Rian's description of his wounds. But Rian had to admit, at least to himself, that aside from a slight soreness in his muscles, he felt fine. He could find no trace of bores in his skin, not even the slight puckers that had dotted his flesh just hours before.
"I'm clearing you for duty," the technician said. He stepped up to the table and touched a panel set into its base. The probes hissed as they withdrew from Rian's skin and sank back into the wall. At a stroke of the technician's hand the landskin straps trembled, then, retracting, slithered away. The man smiled, his thin lips revealing the solid ridge of bone that served as his teeth. He took up a memo board and scrawled a few lines on the screen with a light pen. "Light duty, just to be on the safe side, though I don't see anything that would hamper your ability to carry out your assignments. Take this to your duty officer. I'll also be sending a copy to the Elders."
Rian swung his legs to the floor and stood, wincing in anticipated pain. There was none. He accepted the memo board the technician thrust at him and left the examination room.
In the hallway outside, chill with a draft from the gratings mounted high on the walls, Rian moved through the hospital wing of the Enclave. He stepped to one side as a Profound shuffled past. The . . . man's? . . . eyes were shrouded with massive folds of skin rife with tumorous growths. His jaw hung slack to his chest, huge tusks curling up from his lower gums to touch the skin of his cheekbones. One shoulder hunched forward, swollen with twisted musculature that dwarfed the rest of him. The other thrust backwards, with three too many joints and a hand the size of Rian's head. The Profound's right leg was a titanic mass of flesh oozing with sores; he thrust his left leg forward and dragged the right behind him, leaving a slimy trail behind him on the polished metal floor.
Behind the Profound came his caretakers, two kind-faced Gagash who followed his every move with their eyes. Traffic in the hallway flowed smoothly past the trio without pause. Rian could not help wondering at the Profound's presence here in the upper levels of the Enclave, though the guilt accompanying the thought gave him pause. The lower levels of the Enclave swarmed with Profounds, but their presence above was a rarity.
He exited the hospital complex and rode a lift upward. Klaxons sounded in the distance, signaling the beginning of another shift. From the central core, huge puffs of gray smoke spewed toward the cavern's ceiling. The clank of machinery, the buzz of a thousand conversations, the hiss of steam and the crackle of flames rose in a miasmic cacophony, singing of comfort, of home. Rian smiled, watching the industry of the Gagash, and thought to himself, we will reclaim what's ours.
Approaching Planetfall
Thud.
Alberto Rodriguez jerked at his workstation, his eyes widening at the unexpected sound. The pool of watery light in which he sat seemed to fall from some unexplainable place above him. Around him his equipment cast oblong shadows over the ceramic surface of the table. The mass spectrometer hissed as its smooth planes suddenly wrenched. The fluoroscope's shielding hood wobbled, becoming hinged jaws that clamped shut with a bang. And the collider . . . Rodriguez shivered and pushed back from the collider.
Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall!
Thudthudthud.
"No. Father, no." Rodriguez felt the darkness closing in. Something moved, something vast and slithery. Something that moved with a dry, rasping scrape. "No. Father!"
Skeletal fingers reached for him. A chill breeze touched the back of his neck. The stench of carrion leaked out of the cloying darkness.
Rodriguez shivered, his gaze darting around, programmed to penetrate the darkness, but desperate not to.
Pride ends in humiliation, humility brings honor.
Rodriguez squealed. The ceramic surface beneath his palms was cold, slick. Thick with some sticky substance. A coppery scent. Blood. He jerked his hands away, raised them in the watery light and stared at the dripping crimson.
Thudthudthud-THUD.
Sweat bathed him.
Flaunt the Lord's Word, will you? Alberto, my son, you are surely damned! The Lord hates pride and arrogance, evil behavior and perverse speech.
"It's not evil! It's . . . it's science! The pursuit of knowledge. Surely God---"
The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.
Something crept closer within the darkness, something powerful, oppressive, certain. Rodriguez trembled. He tossed over his chair, which twitched and melted away, forming a pair of hooded vipers that hissed at him, spitting poison. Where the venom touched his skin it smoked, burning holes deep into his flesh. Rodriguez screamed and huddled beneath the table, his arms wrapped around his knees. He rocked back and forth, screaming.
Listen, my son, to your father's instruction and do not forsake your mother's teaching. They will be a garland to grace your head and a chain to adorn your neck.
"No! That's you! That's you! It's never been me! Never! I don't have your calling!"
My son, if sinners entice you, do not give in to them. If they say, 'Come along with us; let's lie in wait for someone's blood, let's waylay some harmless soul; let's swallow them alive, like the grave, and whole, like those who go down to the pit . . .' my son, do not go along with them, do not set foot on their paths; for their feet rush into sin . . .
He could feel it, the almost-touch, the hated, feared, loved hand, heavy and firm upon him. He shook, paralyzed, unable to cease his rocking. Pressure, like a great weight, pressed down on his chest.
THUDTHUDTHUD-thudthudthud-THUD.
What you call knowledge, the Lord calls SIN!
"NO!" Rodriguez sprang up from his crouch and sank into the darkness . . .
. . . And awakened, bathed in sweat, a scream bitten back by his tight-clenched lips. His hand shot out, passing over the light-sensor. Brilliant, glaring white light spilled from the panels overhead, casting his sleeping alcove in harsh relief. His feet lay tangled in the silvery thermal blanket. Kicking it aside, Alberto swung his feet to the cold metal floor. His hands clutched at his head, at hair drenched with sweat. His heart beat furiously in his chest, like a kettledrum of distant Terra.
"No." He swallowed, his throat raw, dry. "No. It's a dream. Just a dream."
The same dream, with the same theme. One of two. Pride and lust, the duo that struck him deep. He shook his head to clear it and glared at the pristine, unadorned white walls. Only the display screen, with its recessed photon keypad, relieved the monotony. The message light blinked slowly.
"Time."
Oh-four-hundred, twenty-eight hours. The soft voice of Ship trickled from speakers hidden in the walls.
A message, at this hour? He rose and crossed to the display, triggering the playback. Lt. Marissa Flaherty's face winked into view on the plasma display. The time record indicated the message had come through only moments before. Perhaps it was what had awakened him from . . . from the nightmare.
Even in the dead of the night Marissa's face kept its beauty. Her soft auburn hair curled seductively around the high collar of her regulation uniform. She licked her lips, staring into the recorder, and he felt her gaze upon him, even through the time lag.
He shivered. Yes. It was good the nightmare, his father's voice, had not concentrated on the perils of lust.
"Sir, there's an anomaly. I . . . I'm not sure what it is. I think you should see this, sir." Her voice held confusion, concern. It sent a shiver of pleasure through him. He licked his lips and rubbed a hand over his face. The room's sensors, registering him awake, had adjusted the ambient room temperature, evaporating the sweat from his skin and collecting it for recycling. In the closed environment of Ship, nothing could be allowed to go to waste.
The message concluded, the screen again went blank, the blinking light falling into quiescence.
A quarter-hour later, Biological Sciences Officer Alberto Rodriguez exited the lift and entered the BS primary lab, abustle even at this hour. With so much analogous information to process, a wealth of alien material to study and catalogue, Biological Sciences was never left vacant. And, as its chief, Rodriguez was seldom given a full-night's sleep.
An inconvenience of his position.
The fear of the Lord is the beginning . . .
No! Stop it! More and more often the waking dream-voice intruded, despite the null capsules Rodriguez popped like candy. He knew he should make an appointment to visit with Dr. Singh, Ship's psych officer, but . . . his mind was a Pandora's box he was not wont to open fully to the light of scrutiny. Service offered few avenues for psychological treatment. The space-crazed were often put into the void of cryo, many never to be awakened. On such a mission as this . . . who could argue with the choices made in the interests of safeguarding the larger scheme of things?
Lt. Flaherty---Marissa---looked up from the 'scope at his entrance. Her hand rose to brush back a strand of auburn hair that had come loose from its tight coiffure and dangled tantalizingly across her high cheekbone. No smile. Only concern, puzzlement, the anticipation of input from a superior.
"Commander, thank you for coming down." Her voice was neutral, consumed with the science of her calling. "I don't know what to make of this, sir. I wouldn't have called during your sleep period, but . . ."
He waved aside the characteristic platitude and offered up what he hoped was a dazzling smile. She seemed unaffected, returning a shallow curve of her full, perfectly shaped lips. Stuffing disappointment deep, he said, "I wasn't sleeping, Lieutenant. What is it?"
"I was analyzing the latest samples brought up by planetary recon. The landskin is . . ."
"Landskin?"
She blushed, dropping her eyes and gesturing toward the plastic tray on her workstation. The powerful lenses of the 'scope hovered over the tray, casting a brilliant beam upon the sample within it. A grayish-pink swatch of twitching biomass lay in a pool of liquid. Striated and honeycombed with pockets of clear jelly, the biomass seemed somehow much more complex than its simple cellular structure allowed.
"It's what I've been calling the biomass, sir. Pardon my presumption, I---"
"No, no. It fits. I like it. There's no reason it can't serve as the common name for the material." He leaned over the tray and prodded at the biomass with a light-probe. It reacted to the contact, constricting around the probe before springing back to its flat state. "Landskin. For a living mass covering most of the habitable surface area of this world, it seems apropos. Explain your puzzlement."
Marissa sank onto the ergonomic chair before the tray. The position put the curve of her neck tantalizingly close to Rodriguez's face. He breathed in the unique scent of her body, closing his eyes for a moment and savoring it. She picked up another probe and touched the biomass. The back of her hand brushed his wrist, and he suppressed a shiver of excitement.
"These wells along the outer perimeter, sir. Alveoli? They are not a feature common to the other virgin samples. In fact, they weren't common to this sample, either, until a few hours ago."
He frowned, focusing on the biomass, the landskin. "You're certain?"
She nodded. "They emerged after the most recent battery of tests, spontaneously."
"Cancerous?"
She shook her head, a delicious spill of auburn hair escaping to cascade down the nape of her neck. "Not at all. I'm uncertain of their function, but they do seem to have sprung up as a reaction to the experiments. I've tested it, of course. Over there are other samples, now bearing similar structures. None of which displayed such features beforehand."
"Remarkable. Your surmise?"
"It's reacting. Evolving."
"Evolving? That's a great stretch, Lieutenant."
"I know, sir. But I've tested it repeatedly, including a genetic composition analysis. The landskin before the tests and that after are different. Profoundly different."
"That's impossible," Rodriguez muttered. He rose and walked to the other samples, spread across the wide surface of a workstation. Each bore the telltale features, ringing the exposed area where the landskin had been cut from the surface of the world.
"There's more, sir."
"More?" He returned to Marissa's side. A muted part of him still drank in the sight, scent, and electric feel of her, but most of him had grown quiescent, absorbed by the biological puzzle before him.
"Yes." She swiveled in her chair and toggled a switch. Above them, a display lit up with an abstract representation of the electrical currents within the landskin sample. "Watch this." Marissa took a pipette and siphoned a few CCs of amber fluid from a beaker marked with a chemical tag; he recognized the sequence as human urine. She tapped out a few drops of the urine onto the surface of the landskin. Rodriguez followed her motions, watching the reaction of the landskin. It seemed to drink in the urine, a boil-like blister rising on its surface and soon shrinking.
"Look at the display," she told him.
Rodriguez watched as electrical activity sprang up within the biomass, traveling outward from the area of the urine deposit. "It's processing! Those sine waves! They're close to cognitive spikes!"
"I thought so, too. But we know there's no intellect at work here. There are no cells specialized enough to serve as neural processors, no central nervous system of any kind."
"Not as we recognize them," Rodriguez agreed. "Still . . . It's gone. The electrical spikes have dissipated."
"Look into the tray. See the fluid at the outer rim? That's the urine. Over here, in this beaker, is a previous sample of the discharge. I've run the usual battery of tests, of course. It's urine---mine, to be precise---but it's not. It's been altered. There are additional genetic tags within the dreg-cells embedded in the urine."
"Genetic alteration? Impossible! Let me see your data." Rodriguez seized the printouts Marissa held up and scanned them with increasing agitation. Mutation, alteration of such a nature was a physical impossibility without profound procreative acceleration. And so quickly! Yet the empirical data was incontrovertible. The numbers stared him in the face and he could not contest them. "Remarkable. Have you sampled other tissues? Dermis? Brain tissue? Reproductive?"
She drew back from him, smiling slightly in the face of his obvious excitement. "Dreg-cells are readily available, as are dermis and a few others. I wasn't keen on extracting brain tissue, or reproductive cells. At least not from myself. And I need your approval for extraction from the cannery."
The cannery? Rodriguez knew the less scientifically minded members of the crew sometimes referred to the vast banks of frozen human zygotes by the term, but he was surprised to hear it coming from her. One of the chief attractions he held for her lay between her ears.
"You have it. More, I'll work with you. There are dozens, hundreds, of tests. This is remarkable. Remarkable!"
Marissa smiled, and he felt an urge to engulf her.
She raised her head and sniffed at the sputtering breeze, localizing the sensory input. Olfactory sensation. Unpleasantness. Decay. Rot. Pain. Fear. A ridge of naked stone rose from the landskin, bearing the markers of old depredations: deep scars in the crumpled rockface.
Aural sensation came next: shrill cries of avian lifeforms, groaning rumble of tumbling stone. Buzzing hiss of something . . . something dangerous.
Pulling her feet from the landskin's recognition, She walked toward the naked ridge. Trees stood in her path. She brushed against one of them. Sharp leaves sliced her skin, drawing fluids that dripped down her arms and stomach, pooling at her feet, where the landskin drank.
She stepped back from the trees. Warmth arose in her chest, suffused her torso, limbs, head. Breakages in her skin sealed, locking precious fluids inside. This was a thing She could do, that all of her God's children could do.
She walked around the trees. Something dark, brown, and many-legged leaped from naked rock to naked rock. It gathered its rear legs and sprang with an uncoiling of taut muscles. Missed. Scrambled against the unyielding surface of rough stone. Fell onto the landskin, dazed. Its stillness called to the landskin, which sent questing tendrils. Spurs bit into brown skin, drilled inside. The creature awakened, squealing. Stilled. Its body rippled, swelling. Tendrils retracted. Reborn, the creature scuttled away across the landskin.
She watched it move away, what had been alien, foreign, was now familiar.
A portion of the ridge had crumbled away. She climbed sharp, broken rocks, cutting her feet and hands. Warmth flowed outward, healing her breakages. She left blood, patterns of herself, behind on the rocks.
The sun sank toward the horizon as she reached the top of the ridge. She rose, questing for He, desperate. Her body shook for him, cried out in agony.
Visual input, limited---deficiency---revealed a deep valley beyond, thick with landskin that had begun a bulge in its center. Now, a seething swarm of annelids worked at consuming a massive humped organism crushed against the spears of naked rock. Tentacles stretched from one end of the valley to the other, twitching with crumbling, tossed stone, ravaged by other annelid swarms. Huge, filmy bladders rose and fell, rose . . . and fell.
Dying.
The ool, the womb where She had spent almost her entire existence. Mother.
Visual input: motion. She focused on bipedal movement. Grouped bipeds worked at a tentacle-mouth, dragging other, still, bipeds out onto the heaving landskin. Rows and rows of motionless bipeds already lay on the landskin. Parasites. Leeches on the bounty of the Mother. These were the creatures her God had created her and her kind to replace.
She could smell fear. Fear from the bipeds, borne on the stuttering breeze.
Ache. The scents pained her.
Daughter.
The voice came to her through the medium of the landskin. The touch was ecstasy, joy. Reunion promised. She opened herself, spreading her arms wide, waiting. Images danced in her mind, a flood of perception, a deluge of cresting thought. She experienced. She learned. She drank deep and long.
Do not fear. I am coming for you. I will bring you back into the family. Find your mate. Wait, and I will find you.
Promise of reunion.
In the valley below, her mother lay dying, while parasites scurried about, abandoning her collapsing flesh.
Find him, my daughter. Find him. Pain. Longing. Separation.
He was not here. He was elsewhere.
Reunion. The vast mind faded. Aid comes.
She fled from the valley.
Dersi turned into the corridor leading to her suite and stopped. A troop of guardsmen, Captain Lhedri among them, emerged from her chambers. They dragged Savhari behind them. They shoved Dersi's servant to the vessel floor. Another man stalked out into the corridor, hands balled into fists at his sides. Pinch-faced and broad-shouldered, there was no mistaking Meloni.
Dersi caught her breath and ducked back into the cross-vessel. Leaning against the artery wall, she released her pent breath. She shivered and felt her heart slamming into her ribs.
"Where is she?" Dersi heard Meloni demand. "Where is Lady Dersi?"
"Lord, I don't know," Savhari said. "I swear. I thought she was in her bed, sleeping. She was when I went to bed."
"Search the corridors," Meloni ordered the guardsmen. "I'll take word to Veil Lord Huldru. When she's found, don't hurt her, or you'll regret it."
A dozen guardsmen barked acknowledgement. Dersi heard the butts of their acidrods strike the spongy floor. Their footsteps approached.
Dersi pulled free from the arterial wall and sprinted down the corridor. Behind her, she heard the guards getting closer. But she felt certain she had not been seen. She gulped air like water.
Glancing around, Dersi noticed a capillary that veered away to her right, sloping downward. Without thinking, she dove into it, sliding face first through pooled fluid. Sticky blood clung to her face and arms, soaking through her gown. As the tube entered a sharp curve she crashed into a buttress of built-up plaque. Shards rained down, tiny slivers that nibbled at her skin. She stifled a gasp of pain.
"What was that?" she heard from above. Lhedri's voice. The sound reverberated through the capillary. She dragged herself down, down, deeper into the shrinking vessel. Broken fragments of plaque, like brittle daggers, raked through her soft robe, scoring her skin.
Before her, the capillary continued to shrink, growing tighter. Its walls pressed against her shoulders now. The hardened walls scraped at her skin through her robe. Her breath came ragged and hot, tasting of bile and blood. The darkness spawned unseen horrors that grabbed at her feet.
Behind her, she heard the voices again. She wedged herself forward until she could turn her head and look. A light danced in the distance now, shining on the encrusted walls.
"Something came this way," she heard Lhedri whisper. Scattered tinkling sounds came to her as someone shifted the broken chunks of plaque. The light panned across dripping pools on the capillary floor, and bruises and abrasions on the walls.
"It can't be her," another man said. "She wouldn't go down there. Why should she?"
"I don't know," Lhedri answered. "But if she did . . ."
"You're right," the other said. He sighed. "Dersi! Lady Dersi! Are you there? Are you well? Do you need help?"
Dersi's heart slammed against her ribs. She squirmed forward, away from the voices.
"There! I heard something. I know I did," Lhedri said.
"I heard it, too."
Dersi squeezed forward, surging against the constriction of the vessel. She stretched out her arms, clawing at the vessel wall. Her toes dug into the spongy flesh, thrusting her onward.
"I can't go any further, or I'll get stuck," Lhedri said, closer now.
She tried to turn and look behind, but the vessel walls clung close to her skin. Her shoulders had wedged tight. She could not move, could not crawl forward, nor retreat. She wiggled, threw her slight weight from side to side. She dug her fingers deep into the spongy flesh, clawing out chunks of dripping tissue. She tried to draw up her legs, create a bulge, a space, within the vessel. But the thick flesh absorbed her most powerful efforts without effect.
She squeezed her eyes tight against the tears that threatened to spill.
"Lady Dersi?" Lhedri called. "Is that you?"
"What do you see?" the other asked.
"Something's in here. I can't tell what. It's too dark, and there's a curve in the vessel. But it's something foreign."
"Is it her?"
"Lady Dersi! If it's you, please answer me. Are you hurt?" She could hear the panic in his voice, the concern. She almost answered him. She could trust him, certainly. But not to defy the will of the Veil Lords.
Vibrations, miniscule twitches of the ool's nervous system, shook the capillary. Fluid welled up in the gouges Dersi had torn in the floor of the vessel. It began to congeal, sucking at her fingers. The gaping holes overflowed. Ichor pooled beneath Dersi's chin. She felt the numbing, cool constriction of hardening liquid. She gasped air and she dug at the walls of the capillary.
"It must not be her. Whatever it is, it's lodged tight," Lhedri said after a moment.
"Come on. If it's not her the ool will take care of it sooner or later."
"Yes, you're right. The others have probably found her by now anyway. No doubt she was just wandering, too excited to sleep."
"Meloni didn't seem to think so."
"I wouldn't call what Meloni does thinking," Lhedri said, his voice thick and acidic.
The other man chuckled. "Talk like that'll get you rendered."
"Only if one of the Lordlings overhears."
Dersi heard the shuffling sounds of their slow withdrawal. They grunted and slid through the tight capillary, reversing themselves.
"No," she whispered. The ichor pool around her chin deepened. Trickles of liquid seeped into her mouth, flooded beneath her tongue. She could not move her hands, could not shake free her head. Hardening ichor crawled up her cheeks. She felt its numbing cold seeping around her shoulders, her torso, her legs. She could not feel her feet.
"Did you hear something?" Lhedri asked.
"No. Did you?"
"H-help," Dersi coughed. She spit gelatinous ichor from her mouth. Long, trailing strands of fluid dripped down from the roof of the vessel, spilling onto her face. It covered one eye, locking it shut. She blinked the other rapidly to keep it clear.
"Help me!" she screamed. Drool filled with chunks of congealed ool tissue spilled from her mouth, running down her chin.
"Lady Dersi!" Lhedri said.
"It is her!"
"Lady Dersi, are you injured?"
She heard them creeping toward her through the vessel once more. And then ooze flowed over her ears and she heard only the pounding of the blood in her head, screaming her panic.
Veil Lord Huldru opened himself to his expanded senses. Perceptions flowed inward, pulled from a thousand different receptors. He felt the tread of Bhajong feet on his skin, felt the whispery touches of their feeble hands on countless cilia. He heard their conversations, their moans of pleasure or pain. They cried out in the rendering vats as digestion ate away at their flesh. They crooned as he and those linked in communion sent them sweet, passionate, clouded dreams. He smelled them, smelled the putrid stink of their sweat as it dripped to his flesh. He scented their waste as it fouled his skin. He watched them copulate, spawning more parasites to continue the infestation. He watched them laugh and love and work, culling rot from his body. He tasted them with a thousand, million tongues.
And he experienced them in a hundred other ways, drank them with senses undreamed of by paltry human minds.
Other Veil Lords drank of his perceptions and fed him theirs. The communion was complete. He knew what they knew. They thought as he thought. He was aware of everything.
He experienced Meloni as the lordling approached, knew his fear, his lusts, his supple pleasures. His failure.
He opened his maw and allowed Meloni entrance. He raised lubricated lids in his trunk, watching the human walk with caution across Huldru's brittle skin. Meloni stepped over pumping arteries and knelt before Huldru, head bowed, awed by the majesty of the Veil Lord.
"Where is she?"
Meloni shook his head. "We've not yet found her, Veil Lord. She was not in her chambers. I've taken her maid for winnowing. I'll find her. She cannot have gone far. She's likely wandering the corridors, anxious."
Huldru rattled his sensory tentacles in agitation. He focused on the communion. Can any of you sense her?
A hundred voices answered immediately. No. She is not sensed.
She came to see me. Merisi. I consoled her. We shared.
Yes. As did I. She hesitated, replied Huldru.
"She has fled, Meloni. You will find her. Find her, or your own veiling will be refused."
Meloni shuddered, and Huldru felt the Bhajong's flaring panic.
"I will find her, Veil Lord. She can't stay hidden for long."
Intensity arose within the communion. A million sensory tentacles rattled and shook. A hundred Veil Lords communed at once.
What is it? Huldru communed once more, drinking perception.
The ool. It moves against our wishes. Dozens of Veil Lords echoed the statement.
Impossible!
It does! It does! I cannot control it!
I sense agitation, alarm. Long pause. Thought!
Impossible!
Huldru threw wide his senses, encompassing the outer skin of the ool. He felt the tug of the winds, the brush of the rains. The ool shot across the sky, its feeding tentacles retracted for greater speed. From the horizon, other ool approached, converging.
Huldru touched the ool's primitive mind-cluster, probing. He was quickly shoved aside, cast into a sensory storm that drowned him. The other Veil Lords cried out, communing.
My children! The powerful thought pounded into Huldru, a scream borne of a mind far more vast than even that of a Veil Lord. And then . . . communion died.
Rian slept and, sleeping, dreamed. He dreamed the old dream of the steady, hateful companion. He tried to force himself awake, but could not. As always, he began to wonder which was the dream world and which was reality. Was reality an endless service to a hopeless, thankless cause, a continual striving for that which all but the oldest and most foolish realized would never be attained? No amount of industry or unity of purpose, no matter how rigorously enforced by the Father's intercessors, could bring about the impossible. Myths did not become reality. Legends had no power to become tangible. To think, to believe, otherwise was simple folly.
Or could this be reality, this the true shape of things, this innocence, the naive world he had inhabited before awakening to the brutalities of existence, of life? He wished it so, prayed it so, even as he knew it was not. He sank himself fully into the dream, longing and loathing and wishing never to awaken, or to awaken now, and have done with the tantalizing, cruel dream forever.
He held his mother's hand, the sharp talons of her fingers always gentle on his skin, ticklish where they breezed across his palm or his wrist. Never had that hand struck him in anger, though he had seen her roused twice before. Backed by the tightly packed muscles of her shoulders and upper arms, her clawed hands could crush a man, pummel through the toughest armor.
He held her hand now, rubbed his face across her rough, abrasive skin, and felt the love bleeding through and into him. She cupped him in her lap, the bony plate that sheathed her bosom warm and hard and smelling only of her. He closed his eyes, sinking into her, sinking into the dream.
No! he begged. Please, end here. Let it end here, now.
But the dream swept him onward, unstoppable in its cruelty.
Bliss was an illusion. His mother died, victim of her own accelerated, uncontrollable bone-growth. In the end, bone shrouded her entire body. The surgeons' efforts to cull back the growths extended her life, by days, weeks, or months. In the end the growth came too quickly, and she died in her sleep, suffocated as the bone extended inward, crushed by its immense weight. Rian found her silent and cold on her bed, and wept unashamedly by her side until the keepers came to take him away to the orphanage.
Rian.
The orphanage had spelled the end of his illusions, all of them. An end to the innocence of childhood, and an awakening to the reality of the brutal, monstrous world in which he lived.
Rian.
The dream shattered, and Rian jerked upright, banging his head on the bunk above. His roommate, Blaen, mumbled in his sleep. Blaen rolled over, the joints of the bunk protesting with a faint squeal. Rian cursed under his breath and rubbed his head, feeling a rising lump.
"Rian." The voice was hardly more than a whisper, almost lost in the sounds of Blaen's renewed snoring. With mere slits for nostrils and a distorted palate, snoring was an unavoidable part of Blaen's sleeping.
Faint light from the corridor outside their room spilled into the darkness through the open door, falling like a bar across Rian's covered legs. Something moved outside their room, something stealthy, furtive. Gray shadows mingled in the bar of light.
"Rian." Quiet, soft.
Blaen's snoring rose in volume. Rian swung his legs out of bed and drew on his tunic, which he had tossed at the foot of the bunk. His belt he wrapped around his waist, touching each of the sheathed daggers, taking comfort in their cold weight. He slipped his feet into his unlaced boots.
"Rian. Come."
The soft voice pulled him. He crept toward the door, hearing small feet pattering away on the floor tiles. A dark blotch ducked around a corner as he jerked open the door and jumped out into the hall. The wall panels buzzed, and the faint scent of antiseptic cleaners rose from the shining floors. The quiet sounds of retreating footsteps disturbed the silence.
"Hello? Who's there?"
"Rian, come." It came from around the bend in the corridor, low and whispery. A small hand emerged, beckoning.
"Who are you? What do you want?" Rian rushed toward the intersection. Childlike laugher echoed, followed by the slap of naked feet on the metal floor. Rian's boots pounded, leaving scuffmarks on the well-manicured metal tiles. A dark shape, low to the floor and quick, vanished around another corner, less than a hundred feet ahead of him. The laughter followed after it.
Something about the shape . . . Something familiar. Rian picked up his pace, running now, and entered a high-ceilinged concourse with broad stairs both ascending and descending. A few pedestrians milled around, conversing in low tones. They stared at Rian as he entered, puzzled expressions on their faces. A few, noting his weapons belt and the touch of his hand on his daggers' hilts, put hands to their own weapons.
"Did you see someone? Did someone just run through here?" he demanded, approaching a slope-shouldered man who dragged a flat-bladed tail behind him. The man shrugged, backing away a pace from Rian.
"Are you all right?" a woman asked, her voice a rattling hiss. She put out a tentacle to steady Rian, who shook it off and took a step back.
"I'm fine. There was . . . There was someone. I woke up, and there was someone." He shook his head, frowning. What had he heard? What had he seen?
The tentacled woman smiled, an odd parting of split lips. "It must have been a dream, then."
He shook his head. "No. Not a dream. There was . . . a little girl? A dwarf? Something. At my doorway, calling me."
She shrugged, her tentacles rippling like snakes with the motion of her shoulders. She eyed him strangely and moved away, whispering to her companion.
"Rian, this way." The soft voice slid through the commotion unimpeded, snatching at his attention. He jerked toward the descending stairway, saw a dark blotch disappear downward. Rian wasted no time, shoving through the crowd toward the stairs. A few voices rose in alarm or anger at his rough progress. He ignored them, quickening his pace and leaping down the stairs to the first landing. The steps switched back, and again he caught a tentative, tantalizing glimpse of a dark shape below him, moving rapidly.
He followed. The lure stayed just beyond his view, allowing only fleeting glimpses, as he wound down at least a dozen flights of steps toward the depths of the Enclave. Rian found himself in a branching of ways when he reached a little-used level with hallways of smooth, aged metal and light panels that flickered and hummed. The dim corridors stalked off in four different directions. Again the childlike laughter came to him, mocking.
"You're getting waaarrrmmm-er, Rian. This way, hurry, hurry. Don't be late!"
"Who are you! What do you want!" Rian stopped where he was, glaring into the corridors ahead. The lights flickered, casting distorted shadows. What was he doing? Chasing shadows? He growled deep in his throat and drew one of his daggers.
The lights behind him flickered and winked out, casting him in darkness. Ahead, down the path from which the taunting voice had come, the wall panels flared into brilliance, washing the gleaming corridor with harsh light. He could see a hundred yards or so down the hall where it ended at a huge pressure door. The wheel in its center turned slowly as he watched, squealing from long disuse. Trapped air hissed as the door cracked open and swung inward on rusted hinges. Inky darkness welled up beyond the door.
"This way, Rian. Come to me." The laughter swelled, coming from all around him, out of the darkness. Softer sounds intruded, furtive movement, naked flesh on cold metal. Something clicked close to him. He turned, seeing blackness, sensing nothing. The ventilation system sighed, and warm air washed over him.
He shivered, certain that he was not alone in the darkness. His own fear rose, sharp and rank, like spoiling meat, through his pores. Swallowing, he hefted daggers in his other hands, taking small comfort in the feel of the landskin-wrapped hilts.
Something dry and rasping moved across the floor behind him, and Rian leaped forward, running toward the closest patch of light. The wall panels faded to darkness. He pressed onward, herded by the extinguishing lights, pushed by the furtive sounds within the darkness that always seemed too close for his comfort. A slight twitter emerged from the darkness, a chuckle that held nothing of mirth. Feral, lustful. He hurried onward, racing toward the open doorway at the end of the corridor, desperate to stay within the light.
The mocking laughter echoed down the hallway, coming now from directly behind him. The door at the end of the hall trembled, and slowly, ponderously, began to close. Its ancient hinges squealed. A dim light kindled in the darkness beyond the portal, a beacon. Rian, panting now, rushed toward the door. His heavy boots slammed into the metal floor, booming.
"Run, Rian, run!" Maniacal cackles reverberated through the corridor. The door swung faster, leaving only a small opening. The lights winked out and darkness closed in on him. The dry, rasping voice surrounded him.
He reached the door as the last of the lights died. His fingers shot into the narrow gap, shoving inward as his shoulder crashed into the thick metal. He felt the impact on his spine. The door groaned open, and Rian tumbled into the room, rolling across the floor and slamming into a solid, circular table.
With a final mocking twitter from the darkness beyond, the door slammed shut. The inner wheel spun as if worked by an invisible hand, and Rian heard stout locks engage. He scuttled back against the structure behind him, facing outward, his daggers held before him. He scanned the chamber by the dim, central light mounted on the ceiling.
Circular and crammed with gleaming metal structures, the room was thick with the scent of antiseptics, and something else. Ozone? Something that reminded him of the smell of impending lightning. Odd instruments, like those in the medical wing of the Enclave, hung from the ceiling, dipping down to nearly touch a series of raised, semicircular structures that rose from the floor.
Silence reigned in the chamber. He could hear his blood surging. His pulse raced. Gone was even the harsh, mocking laughter, the taunting voice. Only the dull, monotonous hum of machinery at work and the tinkling of hundreds of muted bells broke the utter quiet.
Rian slid to his feet and stared at his surroundings. The semicircular structures appeared to be workstations, similar to those used by the Elders. He recognized several of the devices hanging from the ceiling, having seen them numerous times in use. Others seemed oddly alien, and he could not guess their purpose.
Along one wall were thousands of tiny drawers, each bearing a label in an unknown language, as well as a curious diagram of lines and geometric shapes. Mounted on another wall was row upon row of tiny, diamond-shaped crystals. In the center of the room, beneath a cluster of overhanging instruments, rested an oblong table with a depression in its center, and transparent walls that rose to form an almost tubelike casing. Display screens littered the tables and walls; Rian could not count the number of input keypads sprinkled across any available surface.
He wondered if the Elders knew of this place. It seemed . . . hollow? As if it had not been used in a long, long time. None of the display screens were active. The keypads sat unlit. Though Rian could hear the hum of power supplying the equipment, it had the feel of dormancy.
"Come into my parlor," said the voice from all around him. Rian started, turning about in a tight circle, his eyes widening.
"Who . . . Who are you?" Rian demanded of the unseen speaker. He kept his daggers thrust out before him as he spun in place. "What do you want?"
The ventilators high on the walls hissed, and a discolored gas plumed into the chamber. "I have need of you, Rian. Desperate need. You present me with an opportunity. The opportunity to end this, for once and for all."
Rian moved to the center of the room as the plumes of gas fell toward the floor. He caught a faint, sweet scent. "What? What do you want? Who are you?"
Laughter. "Who am I? Why, I'm Father, Rian. Now. Sleep. My need is great, and you can help me."
Rian coughed. The gas expanded, covering the entire space. Rian rushed to the door and tried in vain to turn the wheel. It would not budge. He held his breath, but the gas, falling on his skin, tingled. His flesh went numb. His lungs burned, desperate for air.
"Why?" Rian whispered, his voice cracking as the fumes engulfed him.
"The vagaries of fate, it would seem, have conspired to make you unique, Rian. My old foe risks much in a desperate gambit, and I cannot allow him to succeed."
"Fate?"
"It was you who found the stranger, Rian. You who touched him, and were touched in return. You carry his contagion, his pestilence. I would return the favor."
"No. I don't understand!"
"Sleep, Rian. When the time is right, you'll know what to do."
His eyes burned. He could not hold his breath any longer. Holding his sleeve to his nose and mouth, he expelled his breath and sucked air through the weave of his tunic. The gas, permeating everything, flooded his lungs. His vision tunneled.
He fell, his knees buckling. The metal floor felt cool and hard beneath his face.
"When the time is right . . ."
"Roll her over." The voice echoed, coming as if from a vast distance. Dersi felt herself turned onto her side. Something pulled at her lips, prying them back. Her jaw popped and groaned as her teeth were forced apart. Fingers, tasting of resin and chemicals, probed her mouth, forced back her tongue, tickled the back of her throat. She heaved. Vomit surged up from her stomach in a thick stream filled with chunks of congealed ool fluids. The fingers probed her mouth again, clearing away chunky slime.
"Ouch! Damn. She bit me," the voice said.
She felt bone between her teeth.
"Dammit, Dersi, let go!"
Dersi could not open her eyes. But she did relax her jaw. The probing fingers slid free.
"Disgusting," another voice muttered. "It's on my shoes."
"It'll wash off," the first voice said. Dersi thought she should know that voice. Its raspy grumbling seemed familiar. She could not place it. "Get her over to the bed and cover her up."
She felt herself lifted, too weak to complain, her muscles limp and unresponsive. Strong hands lay her down on a smooth, hard surface.
"Help me clear this gunk from her face," the familiar voice said. Recognition edged closer. Fingers gouged the hardening ooze covering her face. It cracked. Jagged, brittle chunks broke away. Cool air filtered across her sweat-bathed face. She tried to force open her eyes but could not. "Here. Let me scrape that away."
Gentle fingertips swiped her eyes, wiping away sticky goo.
"Try to open them now," the gentle voice said.
Her lids felt leaden, but she forced them open. Violent light blinded her. She snapped her lids shut again. A moment later she tried again, opening them just a crack. Backlit by the glow of light-tumors bulging from the walls, a hazy figure swam into view.
"Erekel?" A heaving cough shook her, and bits of ool tissue spewed from her mouth. She choked, gasped. Erekel knelt beside her, thumping her on the back. Fluid boiled up from her throat, sloshing out onto the hard metal surface on which she lay.
"It's me, Dersi," Erekel said. "Don't worry, you're safe."
"Safe?" Her coughing fit subsided, and she looked into his rheumy eyes. He smiled at her.
"For now." He glanced over his shoulder. Dersi's gaze followed. A number of men hovered nearby, in the shadows cast by the light-tumors. Beyond them, an encrusted capillary yawned open, leading into darkness.
"Where am I? What happened? I remember . . ."
"Hush, now. You're safe here." He brought a flask of formed, hardened resin to her lips. She scented water and drank deep. Water drizzled from her lips and spilled down her chin.
She shook her head and sat up. Looking around, she noted that she sat on a surface of wooden planks built over a glazed hump of resin. The ceiling of the small chamber bore thick scars, poorly healed. Erekel, noting her gaze, nodded.
"Sensory tentacles for the Veil Lords. We've taken care of them. We're alone. Unobserved."
"How?"
"We kept watch on you, ever since I came to your room last night."
She nodded, her suspicions about her mysterious visitor confirmed.
"When you left Veil Lord Merisi's chamber we followed and saw Lord Meloni with your handmaiden. We also saw you run and knew you'd decided."
She shook her head. "I had decided nothing. I was scared."
"You had a right to be. Regardless, I tried to reach you before you dove into the capillary, but you moved too quickly. And then the guards followed you down. I worried that they would pull you out. We waited, watched. We were prepared to act. But then they both climbed out, obviously shaken, and took off down the artery in search of help.
"We know the back passages better than anyone, save perhaps the Veil Lords---and even from them we have our hiding places. We tunneled through the ool-flesh to retrieve you. It was almost too late. It had begun to ingest you."
Dersi shuddered and clutched herself. "Why? Why did you come for me?"
"I told you we'd prevent your veiling if we could."
"Yes. But why, Erekel?"
One of the other men came forward, leaned down, and whispered something in Erekel's ear, something Dersi could not overhear. He nodded and waved the man off.
"I'm afraid that will have to wait, Dersi. There is much you need to know, but matters come to a boil now, and I don't have the leisure to tell you. I will eventually. I promise. Trust me."
She stared at him. Trust him? But what had he done to inspire such trust?
She knew the answer and felt a pang of shame for the asking. Without Erekel, she would have been absorbed into the ool by now. She owed him her trust. She nodded.
"Come. I know you're weak, but this place isn't safe any longer. Something strange is happening. The Veil Lords have gone dormant, and the ool moves on its own."
Dersi frowned but accepted the hand he offered her. She arose on shaking legs. Only Erekel's comforting solidity kept her from falling face down onto the hard, brittle floor. He rested her weight on his shoulder and gestured to the handful of guards. They fanned out and drew weapons: saws and probes and even an acidrod.
"Where are we going?"
"Somewhere safer. There are deeper places, places even the Veil Lords have forgotten about."
One of the guards motioned to them to wait. He switched his bonesaw to his left hand and drew out a short rod carved of bone. A thin needle sprang from the hollow end.
"What's that?" Dersi asked.
Erekel grinned. "Something of my own design. It delivers concentrated boreworm toxin on impact. Very effective against the sensory tentacles."
"Where did you get the boreworms?"
"The ool's always flying over Gagash settlements, stirring a swarm. Some of the worms inevitably get through the ool's outer husk, burrowing deep into flesh. I've harvested a few here and there."
"But why?"
"That ties into some of the things we need to discuss later. Now, hush."
Dersi stared at him. How dare he speak to a Lady so? But she wasn't exactly a Lady any longer, was she? She had made a decision, conscious or unconscious. An irrevocable decision.
The guard armed with the poker crept into the capillary, disappearing into the darkness. Erekel cracked a desiccated light-tumor against the resin. It hissed, shedding a weak glow. After a few minutes, Erekel led Dersi forward. The other Bhajong followed with weapons drawn.
She heard the hissing before she saw its cause. Bubbling, churning, the sound reminded her of the acidic bite of breached polyps. They curved around a massive bone protuberance, and Dersi gasped as an eerie green glow washed out of the walls ahead of them.
He edged them toward the other side of the capillary. "Careful here." They passed the green glow, and Dersi saw a seething wound in the vessel wall, the distended remains of sensory tentacles dangling toward the floor. Newborn polyps writhed at the edges of the wound, spurting acid on the ravaged flesh.
Erekel tugged her past the lesion. "That's the effect of the boreworm toxin. Remember what I taught you. Don't let the acid touch you."
Dersi nodded, dumbstruck.
The capillary shrank, and Erekel led Dersi into an artery that sloped sharply downward. He sidestepped down the incline, planting his spike-soled shoes firmly into ool-flesh. Dersi followed, trying to emulate him. The hard resin was slick. Dersi slipped and fell. Erekel caught her by the back of her nightrobe and dragged her to her feet. Holding on to her, he led them down, down into the depths of the ool. The guards trailed them, silent.
"What is this place?" Dersi stared, slack-jawed, at the immense chamber. She stood on a narrow tongue of old ool-flesh, thick-glazed with resin. Beyond and below her the mammoth chamber stretched into darkness. Above, monstrous bones protruded from the ceiling, hung with tattered ribbons of decaying flesh. Like gargantuan ribs, metal beams rose from the floor on one side of the chamber, spanned the ceiling, and sank into the flesh on the other side. A pool of water sat, bubbling, in the center of the chamber. Spars of metal poked up through the liquid, covered with dozens of colored blinking lights.
Beside her, Erekel shrugged. "An old stomach, I think. I don't know what it is now, really. It's old. I think, perhaps, this is an ancient ool. Maybe the oldest. This place has been long forgotten.
"Below there are big machines that buzz and hum and spit out smoke and steam. Like nothing I've ever seen. But the Veil Lords have no eyes here, and the ool doesn't seem to realize this area even exists anymore. It's our haven."
"Our?"
"Come on, I'll take you down, and we can talk."
The path downward consisted of a narrow, bisected artery carved with deep grooves---steps. Puzzled, Dersi studied the small details of the chamber as they descended. Everywhere the marks of Bhajong industry and alteration reared up within the ool-flesh. Landings on the stairway were too precise, too angular, too flat, unmarked with the characteristic bulge of sunken veins and hernias. Planar surfaces jutted out from the walls of the cavern as well, their functions indeterminate, but strange. Long strands stretched between the landings, strands she had assumed were nerve trunks or neural clusters. On closer study they had the look of artificiality. She reached up and touched one and found it hard, elastic.
"What are these?"
"I don't know. They run between those little metal boxes inset in the ool-flesh. They're all over this place, but they're not part of the ool."
"Artificial?"
"They would have to be. Like the machines down below."
"Machines? Like the Gagash use?"
He shook his head. "I don't think so. I don't know. I've never been in a raiding party, so I'm not familiar with Gagash machinery. But this looks old. Very old. Strange."
Dersi frowned and stared at the odd machines. She knew the Gagash utilized artificial machines, thwarting the natural laws. Their dependence on such perverse things made them weak, and would, in the end, lead to their downfall.
Erekel took her hand and led her onward. The stairway deposited them on a solid ring surrounding the central pool. From this vantage Dersi could see the mammoth pillars rising from the swirling waters. The lights dotting the structures blinked slowly in a distinct pattern, indicative of purpose. Soft whirring sounds came from the pillars.
Dersi studied the pillars as Erekel led her around the pool. She wondered what foul purpose they could serve, what perversion of the natural order they attempted to circumvent. Ahead, another structure protruded from the metal-ribbed walls of the cavity. A rectangular aperture pierced the vertical plane, opening into a room flooded with harsh, glaring light. Erekel steered Dersi through the gap, and she found herself in a cubic area bathed with light from a ring of luminous panels inset in the walls. Tables and benches sat offset to one side of the room.
Several dozen Bhajong perched on the benches. They rose at Erekel's entrance and stared at Dersi.
"Erekel, what have you done? You've brought one of them here!" The speaker rose from the table and glared at Dersi. A thin, ropy man whose pale skin seemed stretched taut across his cheekbones, he held a bladed metal rod in one hand. He gestured with the weapon toward Dersi. "You've doomed us all."
Erekel shook his head. "Sit down, Baedere. You're acting like a fool. She's one of us."
Baedere glared. "She's a Lady." He frowned at Dersi, and she felt herself withering beneath his gaze. An uncomfortable feeling, one to which she was wholly unaccustomed. She shoved the feeling away and drew herself up, freezing her gaze.
Erekel shook his head. "No. She only thinks she's a Lady."
Dersi jerked her attention to Erekel. The harvester smiled thinly at her.
"Dersi is not a Lady at all."
"Mom? Mom? Mother!" Rian tugged on her arm. It would not move. The bone had swept up from her breast, flowing thick, encasing her shoulders, her throat, most of her face. Tiny spurs and knots erupted from the bone, still growing beneath his palm, but slower, sluggish. "Mother?"
With a massive effort she turned her gnarled, warped head. Bone cracked like breaking twigs, crumbled into a coarse powder that fell onto the worn fabric of her blanket. He knelt at her bedside, fighting back tears. One eye was covered with bone. The other cracked open with startling clarity. Her body failed her, but her mind remained sharp, reflected in the bright tears that spilled from the corner of her eye to drip down her hard cheek and onto her pillow. The tiny pinprick holes in the bone covering her nose wheezed as she struggled to draw breath. She could not talk. Her mouth had long since sealed. Only a thin straw of metal thrust between plates of bone allowed her to suck up the thin broth that kept her alive.
"The surgeon's coming, Mom. He's coming. He'll cut it back again, just like last time. You'll see." A tear spilled from his eye and traced a thin track through the grime covering his face. He wiped his cheek with the back of his hand, forced a smile to his rebellious lips. "You'll see."
Her eye closed, squeezing out more tears. The hard plates that sheathed her fingers ground together as she forced her hand to clasp his. He felt powdered bone as it trickled between his fingers. Sticky blood followed, flowing into his palm.
He waited for the surgeon, waited. Always before they had come. As the instrument panel mounted above her bed slowed in its relentless pinging, quiet alarms sounded. Alarms that should summon the surgeons, with their saws and knives and medicines.
Her breath rattled through the straw, spittle dripping from its end to fall on the hospital sheet.
Flicker
Rian jerked, his gaze sweeping around, drinking in strange, unfamiliar surroundings. Man-shaped figures clothed from head to toe in white moved about the room, their faces concealed behind masks, eyes shielded by thick goggles. Their hands, tightly sheathed in gloves, moved with sluggish care across globes of glass from which wires and tubes spidered. One figure began walking toward Rian, forcing him to step back. The figure turned to look at him through bug-eyed goggles.
"Doctor, is something wrong?" The voice came across muffled, altered by the mask. Rian saw that the figure carried a shallow glass tray. In the precise center of the tray was a clear strip, grasped by metal clamps and marked with tiny black beads. Noting Rian's gaze, the figure glanced down at the tray, then back up. "Isn't this the download you wanted?"
"What?" Rian touched his head and discovered he wore a light mesh mask over the lower half of his face. His fingers crawled upward, finding thick, transparent goggles. What was this? Where was he? Confusion flooded over him. He did not understand . . .
Or did he? Knowledge tickled at the edge of his consciousness. This was . . . This was . . .
"Doctor? Isn't this the right coding?"
"I . . ."
This is too soon. Go now. Father's voice echoed in Rian's mind.
Flicker
Rian jerked awake. Sitting up, he cracked his head against the top bunk. Blaen stirred, grumbling in his sleep. The bunk creaked beneath his weight.
Only the tiny light mounted near the floor disturbed the darkness. Rian felt his pulse laboring; his breath came in gasping heaves. What was that? Where? He should remember. There was something decidedly familiar about the white room, about the white-garbed figures and their work. About the strip of black-dotted material in the tray. Doctor, he had been called, and it had not seemed utterly alien.
Haze crept in from the corners of his mind, thick and cloying. He battered at it, struggling for retention. He must remember! He must! But the haze wrapped around him, stuffing his head full of white fluff, and he could only grasp in futility at memories that churned away from him, away from the light of his consciousness. Mental fingers swiped at retreating knowledge, and fell short. Memories withered.
Rian shook his head, raising his middle hand to rub at his temples. Something . . . Something should have been there to prevent him from touching skin. Some obstruction. What? He could not recall.
Other memories flooded forward, pushing those he pursued aside like a raging wave of violence. The chamber, the drawers, the crystals! The eerie, mocking, nonsensical voice. The laughter. The gas! Choking, burning, numbing.
He climbed down from the bed and crouched near the light, staring at his skin. Unblemished. His exploring fingertips felt no residue of the gas, no greasiness, no thin film. Just night-sweat, from the dream. The dream. Was there something there?
The duty chime floated out of the speakers set in the walls. Blaen, as was his wont, grumbled, but sprang out of bed, landing heavily on the floor. He stretched his arms over his head, his bones popping, and released gas. He scratched his scaled belly and looked down at Rian. A smile curled his lips.
"Comfortable, Rian?" His laugh emerged as a rattling hiss. "None of my business, of course, but I've heard that beds were made for just that sort of thing. You should try it some time."
"Funny." Rian climbed to his feet. "Thought I heard something down there. Vermin."
"Don't tell the galleycrew." Blaen laughed again. He moved to the bureau and threw on his duty togs, buckling a wide, black leather belt around his waist. Sitting on Rian's bunk, he pulled on his boots and laced them up, grinning. "What're you waiting for? Don't you have administrative punishment today?"
"Oh. Yes. Of course." Rian realized he was wearing his uniform tunic.
"You sleep in that? And your boots, too? You're a glutton for punishment, Rian." Blaen stood and headed for the door. "Don't be late."
Late. Come to me . . . Rian frowned. "What did you say?"
Come to me . . .
Blaen looked at him queerly. "Late. Don't be. The duty officers hate it. Things'll go worse for you if you're late."
With that Blaen ducked through the door and was gone, leaving Rian staring after him. The hissing of the air ventilators sent a shiver down his spine.
The summons came in the middle of his administrative punishment, while he was busy scrubbing the expansive floors of the muster square, hating each black and white checked panel. His fingers ached from grasping the course-bristled brush, and his eyes burned from the caustic vapors that rose from the wash bucket. He was happy to put aside brush and bucket and follow the aide from the muster square. The duty officer's eyes bored holes in his back as he left, and Rian suppressed a smile at his good fortune.
Good fortune? A summons from the Elders was seldom that. Particularly not under these circumstances.
He followed the aide through the twisting corridors of the Enclave, ignoring the looks of the other Gagash they passed. His hands smoothed the wrinkles in his uniform.
The aide led Rian toward the workroom where he had left the stranger the day before, then past it, farther down the steam-choked hallway. Rian frowned, wondering at the change. Every time he had interviewed with the Elders it had been in that workroom. He had never seen them anywhere else. Something important was up.
Planetfall
Santiago watched the display as the SeedShip descended through the outer atmosphere toward the planet's surface below. Vast and primal, the world that stretched out beneath could not have been less Earth-like if it had been specifically engineered to be so. From horizon to horizon it was desolate, raw. Rivers laced through the rugged terrain, and mountains rubbed low and smooth by high winds marched in ragtag fashion across the broadest of the planet's continents.
Landskin. Santiago queued magnification, filtering out the interference of the landing engines so that he could focus on the ubiquitous mat that covered most of the surface area of the planet. Landskin---the sci-types down in BS called it. Its properties still had not been thoroughly investigated, despite the months spent collating and analyzing the data relayed up from the advance team on-surface. A simple cell structure, Rodriguez claimed, but displaying properties that argued for a systemic interaction on a much broader scale.
Santiago did not pretend to understand what it all meant. He had interviewed Rodriguez extensively before giving his approval to final approach and planetfall. Now he played back the conversation in his mind, looking for holes that would explain the uneasy feeling twisting in his gut as he stared at the convoluted surface of the planet.
"Landskin," he muttered, and scowled. He had gone down to BS, of course, at the insistence of Rodriguez. The chief of BS had been quite excited about his discoveries and had all but begged Santiago to come and observe the peculiar biomass.
Disgusting, Santiago had thought as he stared at the twitching, palm-sized bit of tissue. It did, indeed, somewhat resemble skin. Grayish, with a pink interior broken up into smaller chambers, the thing seemed almost to breathe within its plastic dish.
"The planet's ecosystem is incredible, Captain. Simple, yet complex. It---"
"I don't care about that, Rodriguez. Tell me, does it pose a threat to mission integrity? This . . . stuff, this landskin---is it dangerous? Poisonous? That's all I care about."
Rodriguez stopped, his mouth hanging open, and stared at Santiago as if utterly astounded that he did not share the burning scientific curiosity running rampant through Biological Sciences. He blinked. "Well, no. No, sir. Not that we have been able to ascertain."
"But you're not certain."
Rodriguez smiled. "We've run every test we can think of, Captain, and have seen no adverse side effects from proximity to the landskin. But there are few absolutes in science."
Santiago snorted. Few absolutes? Perhaps that was the principal failing of science, then. His own world dealt with little other than absolutes. Efficient or not. Within the threat threshold, or not. Dead, or not. You could not half-kill someone. Either your enemy died, or he remained a viable threat. End of story.
"Give me the straight and narrow, then, Rodriguez. What is the recommendation of Biological Sciences? Is planetfall a viable option at this point?"
Rodriguez frowned. "Well, of course. Yes, Captain. I see no reason we shouldn't proceed immediately. I'm most anxious, in fact, to get planetside, myself. This presents a marvelous opportunity for the advancement of xenobiological study. It---"
Santiago stopped him with a dismissive wave of his hand. "No need to go into particulars. Log your recommendation into ShipsNet. I'll have Nav compute final approach and decide on the appropriate timing for planetfall. I'll keep BS posted on progress."
He had turned away from Rodriguez then, returning to the endless parade of statistics and parameters that scrolled across his display. Dismissed, Rodriguez saluted and left, the door hissing shut behind him.
Now, with planetfall in full progress and the bulging arc of this strange world growing closer and closer, Santiago wondered at the wisdom of this course of action. The sheer distance of this remote world from the core worlds of the Terran Hegemony made communication with his superiors a haphazard, sporadic affair. Even leap-frogging through the relay-pods Ship had deployed on its outward trajectory messages could take months to travel from point to point, making conversation impossible and all but the most general of instructions from home meaningless.
Still, decisiveness was a virtue the Hegemony drilled into Service officers with a totalitarian approach. Indecisive leaders seldom passed muster. And only through sheer luck or the machinations of the body politic did a poor commander receive a commission. Santiago had few political connections. He stood on the merits of his Service record alone.
In the month since his interview with Rodriguez, while Nav chose a landing site for the SeedShip, Santiago had ordered his own brand of tests run on the landskin. He found that the stuff burned readily enough, though it emitted a noxious odor when exposed to the wash of a flamer. Once burned away, it attempted to re-advance, to re-cover the barren, rocky soil beneath. Simple barriers of plastic or plasteel did little to halt its advance. The landskin moved around such obstructions, beneath them, over them, or, in some cases, through them, building pressure at the weakest point and wiggling through like a snake through mud. Even plasteel could not endure the inexorable pressures exerted by the landskin for long.
The biomass resisted the veritable cornucopia of fungicides, pesticides, herbicides and other poisons borne as cargo aboard Ship. None seemed to have any effect. A few ingenious marines had tried mixing up bastardizations of the chemicals. There were few promising results and more than a few injuries to marines as a result.
Santiago moved to his grav-chair and queued communications. A burst of static arose, then faded. Sergeant MacCullum's face, shadowed by the helmet of his power armor, winked onto the display.
"Captain, sir?"
"Status, Sergeant?" Santiago focused on the swath of the planet's surface he could see to the side of Mac's face. Curls of smoke rose from the ground, where shriveled piles of ash lay scattered amid clusters of boulders.
Mac smiled. "Decon of the landing site's almost completed, sir."
"And the barriers?"
Mac shifted his position, and Santiago could tell he moved toward the perimeter of the burned area. "The current seems to be doing the trick, sir. The shit---pardon the expression, sir---doesn't seem to like it. It's not approaching, though it is building up a . . . a wall, or something, just outside the perimeter. Quivering, like it wants to come in, but can't."
"Queue your outside read so I can see," Santiago said.
"Yes, sir."
A moment later Mac's face disappeared. Static flooded across the display, then was quickly replaced by a wider, panoramic view of the proposed landing site. A circular area two kilometers in diameter had been burned free of the ubiquitous landskin, which now lay in smoking heaps, awaiting removal by one of the tractored rovers that had been carted planetside. At the circle's perimeter Mac and his crew had erected a low wire fence. Hooked up to the power reservoirs of the XV, the fence ran with a steady, mild electrical current. Crude, but apparently effective. The landskin massed outside the fence, but seemed reluctant to approach it.
"Very good, Sergeant." Santiago glanced down at his display, watching Mac's bio-stats scroll across the bottom of the screen. Nothing unusual. Mac seemed in perfect health. "And you and your men haven't experienced any adverse effects? No sickness? Nothing?"
"Zero, sir. Everything seems fine here planetside. This stuff's disgusting, but it seems to be harmless. And if we can keep it outside a perimeter, I don't think it'll give the colonists any problem."
Santiago nodded, saluted, and ended the communication. They would have to devise a more permanent and efficient system once Ship went planetside, of course, but the electric current seemed to be adequate for their short-term needs.
ShipsNet chimed. Santiago toggled comm. "Yes?"
"Captain, we've entered final approach."
"Very good, Ensign. Carry on."
Santiago sank back in his grav-chair. Closing his eyes, he could feel the living pulse of the SeedShip beneath him, a massive, throbbing entity, the culmination of mankind's evolutionary achievements. Two thousand crew, scientists, engineers, techs and soldiers. A million as-yet-unrealized colonists, frozen in their banks and banks of zygotes, awaiting quick growth and downloading.
He felt the joggling hitch as Ship pierced the final veil of the planet's atmosphere and descended toward the surface of the alien world.
"What are you talking about, Erekel?" He had taken Dersi's arm in one of his hands when they entered the meeting place, and now she jerked herself away and scowled at him.
"Dersi, give me a moment and I'll explain."
"Explain? What's there to explain? You're insane."
He shook his head. "It's true, Dersi. You are not a Lady."
"What is she, then?" Baedere demanded.
"Yes. What am I then?" She crossed her arms and stepped away from him. She could feel the others' eyes on her, sense their anxiety. She did not care. She glared at Erekel, daring him to keep silent. "Well?"
Erekel paused. His rheumy eyes focused on Dersi. "An enigma."
"An enigma."
He nodded. "Yes. An enigma."
Dersi threw up her hands. "Oh. Well. That explains everything, of course. Thank you for that intricate explanation, Erekel. All of my fears and doubts have been allayed. Very poignant. Very succinct."
"Now you're being difficult."
"Difficult? I'm being difficult?"
"Hysterical."
She clenched her teeth, balled her hands into fists. Her breath hissed between her tight lips. "Master Erekel, you've told me nothing. Nothing. If I'm being difficult, you'll excuse me. During the last day I've found out I was to be married to a man I loathe, forced into bondage with the ool, and turned into a massive, immobile womb for the purpose of procreating a new generation. I've fled from my would-be husband and become trapped in a capillary while the ool's resins made a damned good attempt at ingesting me.
"No!" she snapped, holding up her hand. "I'm not through, and you will stand there and listen to everything I've got to say, Erekel, or I swear to you I'll claw your eyes out myself."
Erekel's mouth snapped closed and he stepped back from her rage. She pressed on.
"Then along you come, pulling me out of the capillary, and I thank you for that. I'm grateful, incredibly grateful." Dersi paused, closing her eyes for a moment. She sighed. "You drag me through the depths of the ool to some forgotten cavity where I'm confronted not only by outright hostility from your compatriots"---and she paused to spear individual men with her gaze, men who turned away from her fire---"but by your assertion that I'm not a Lady. That I'm an . . . enigma."
"That's true," he said.
Dersi choked down her rage, breathing deep. "What, Master Erekel, does that mean? And if you give me some pat, evasive, dissembling answer . . . I meant my earlier promise. I will pluck out your eyes, or at least give it a damned good try. Don't play games with me."
The gathered Bhajong kept silent. They stared at Erekel, awaiting his response. Baedere shuffled his feet and shifted slightly toward Dersi. Dersi folded her arms and shut her mouth, willing Erekel to answer.
"I . . . uh . . . well." Erekel swallowed. He refused to meet Dersi's gaze, instead looking from face to face of the men seated at the tables.
"Out with it, man," snapped Baedere.
Dersi glanced at Baedere, frowning. "Yes. Speak out, Erekel."
"Perhaps," he said, and licked his lips. "Perhaps enigma was a poor choice of words."
"Oh? Then by all means, Master Erekel, find the right words." Dersi did not take her gaze from his lined face.
He licked his lips again. "You aren't Veil Lord Huldru's daughter, Dersi."
"What? Of course I am. He's my father, the father of all my siblings."
"Yes. He's the father of your siblings, of course. At least I assume so---I can't speak for that. But he's not your father, Dersi."
"How can you say that? I think I know my own father."
He smiled. "Actually, you're right. You do know your own father. But not in the manner you think."
"You're babbling. Get to the point and stop wasting my time."
He shook his head. "Huldru isn't your father, Dersi." He raised his face and locked his gaze to hers. "I am."
"Find her!" Lord Meloni lashed out, cracking the back of his hand across Captain Lhedri's face. The man staggered and put his hand to his lips. Blood trickled from the corners of Lhedri's mouth.
"Yes, Lord Meloni," Lhedri said, nodding. "We're trying. Someone must have helped her. She couldn't have gotten out of the capillary on her own. We found hardened casings molded to the shape of her body in the vessel. The shell bore the marks of sharp edges."
Meloni spun on his heel and stalked across Veil Lord Huldru's chamber. The Veil Lord lay dormant, tentacles dangling, listless, barely twitching. Only the steady thump of blood pumping through the veins in the walls and floor indicated that Huldru still lived. And each of the other Veil Lords had gone equally silent. Meloni walked over to Huldru's glistening trunk, reached out, and touched the sticky ooze that dripped down from its apex.
"Find them as well, Lhedri. Find them all, and bring them to me. Dead or alive, I don't care." He turned and faced the guard, his pinched features twisted in rage. "But if Lady Dersi has so much as a scratch from the efforts of your guards, you'll answer to me, personally. Do I make myself clear, Lhedri?"
Lhedri nodded. "Of course, Lord Meloni. No harm will come to her at our hands."
"Leave me now. Report back to me before morning with your progress. It would be well for you if you bring Lady Dersi to me at that time."
"I will, Lord Meloni." Lhedri saluted, kneeling.
Meloni turned away again, staring up at Veil Lord Huldru's dormant trunk. He did not hear Lhedri leave. In the wake of Huldru's unresponsive state, the sphincter that opened into his chamber lay in ruins, hacked open for better access.
His stomach growled, demanding attention. But with the Veil Lords comatose the feeding tubes had retracted into the walls of the ool. Sleep, too, had become impossible, plagued by wild, dissonate dreams. Without the dream-cilia to induce pleasant slumber, hungry, angry, restless Bhajong crowded the main arteries. Tempers flared. Fights broke out. A few men even died.
Meloni, acting on his own initiative and so far unchallenged by the other Lords, had stepped in to quell the disturbances and establish order. Offenders were taken for rendering, which alleviated a portion of the chaos, but not all. Meloni had stationed guards bearing acidrods at key intersections. All throats had been sealed off to traffic, restricting movement between levels.
He shook his head, attempting to dispel the spiraling thoughts of doom, and drank in the sight of the Veil Lord.
Such beauty. Such power. He ran his hands along Huldru's trunk, marveling at the sheer perfection of the form, a form Meloni had longed to assume for as long as he could remember. And now this. On the eve of his veiling his betrothed vanished, the Veil Lords had gone dormant, and the ool moved of its own volition.
Blind to the outside world without the enhanced perceptions of the Veil Lords, the Bhajong had become little more than captives of the insensate ool.
"You're my father?" Dersi laughed, doubling over and holding onto her knees. Tears spilled from her eyes, dripping to the hard, cold floor. She heard the other Bhajong snickering as well.
Erekel snorted. "You're being difficult again, Dersi."
Dersi chuckled and held up her hand. She wiped tears from her eyes and stood straight.
"Perhaps this is something we should talk about in private."
"You should have thought about that before you mentioned it, Erekel," Baedere said.
"Really, Dersi, I think we should go somewhere and talk about it."
"No. No. You've opened the vein, you've got to let the blood flow now, Master Erekel." Dersi waved her arms at the gathered men. She cracked a smile. "Come on, tell us all."
"You're being childish now," Erekel said.
"Well, now, Father, how else should I be? Tell me: How did this amazing paternity come to be?"
Erekel scowled, facing her, refusing to look at the other men. "How many breeders have borne children for Veil Lord Huldru?"
Dersi shrugged. "I have no idea. At least five, six. Probably more."
"And your own mother---how many children did she bear for him?"
Again, Dersi shrugged. "A dozen, perhaps two. I stopped counting them after the first four."
"And how many siblings were born in your clutch?"
Dersi frowned. "I was alone."
"That's unusual, isn't it?" He did not wait for her response. "Most are birthed in clutches of four or more, aren't they? I'm certain I've heard that somewhere."
"Now you're the one being difficult. What are you getting at, Erekel. I'm well aware that my birth was somewhat . . . odd."
"And it never occurred to you why? Did you ever wonder why you were the only spawn of that clutch?"
"It happens. Mother said I'd ingested my siblings."
"Yes. That sounds like Jherai."
"You knew my mother?" Dersi's frown deepened. Veil Lord Jherai had died years before in a boreworm infestation. Her chamber was now sealed, reclaimed by the ool and flooded with tissue and vessels, blood and resin. Dersi refused to visit the sealed sphincter, refused most days to think of her mother.
"It would make it exceedingly difficult to father you if I hadn't known her, Dersi." He nodded, and Dersi thought she saw the glistening of unshed tears in his eyes. "Yes. I knew her. I knew her before Veil Lord Huldru chose her as his newest bride, his latest conquest. I knew her when she was mobile, before she was veiled."
"You knew my mother," Dersi repeated.
"Jherai and I were to be wed, Dersi. At least until Huldru caught her scent and had her brought to him, gave her his seed, and had her veiled."
"What are you saying, Erekel?" Baedere demanded. Dersi glanced at the man, whose presence she had forgotten, and gestured sharply at him. He fell silent, stepping back from Dersi and Erekel.
"You see why I wanted to have this conversation with you in private, Dersi?" Erekel took a hesitant step forward, his hand outstretched. Dersi backed away, staring at the age-spotted hand.
"Stay away from me."
"Jherai was already pregnant, with you, when she was veiled. The seed Huldru implanted in her did not---could not---take root. She must have known. I hope she knew. I must believe she knew." He sighed. "Otherwise, why would she have kept it a secret from Huldru all these years?"
"But . . . But he knows me!"
Erekel shrugged. "You've enough genetic tags in you to designate you as Jherai's daughter."
"But not his!"
"We're all very closely related, Dersi. There is very little differentiation between us, when you think about it. Give or take a protein here and there, we're essentially the same."
Dersi shook her head. Dizziness overwhelmed her, and she fell to the hard, cold floor. Baedere rushed to help her sit up. Someone passed him a cup of water and he pressed it to Dersi's lips. She sipped at the cool water. Erekel's words pounded in her head, reverberating with hammer force. The water tasted like acid on her tongue.
She felt Baedere pull away, and other, gentler hands on her shoulders. The contact felt like fire through the thin material of her sleeping gown. She looked up into the aged, lined face of Master Erekel. Master Erekel, who claimed to be her father.
The aide ushered Rian along a tight corridor choked with hissing pipes and banks of machinery that clanked and chugged, belching plumes of acrid steam. The man seemed unbothered by the hot gases that caught up his wispy hair, fanning it out around his head. His lurching step continued, unfaltering, through an iris that spiraled open to reveal a vaulted chamber with walls of gleaming metal.
The smell hit Rian first. Rancid, like souring landskin and pungent spices. Powerful enough to make Rian's eyes water. And beneath the overpowering stench of the landskin were other, more subtle smells: oil and acid, smoke and waste.
Rian gagged, covering his mouth and nose, squeezing his eyes shut against the stinging miasma. Only then did he become aware of the sounds. Bubbling liquid, clanking machinery, hissing steam, the low thrumming of vast bellows. And voices. Voices raised in excited conversation.
He felt the gentle pressure of the aide's hand on his shoulder. He squinted, taking in the room.
In the floor, a ring of wide pits filled with pulsing landskin surrounded dozens of transparent tubes. From the heaving mass of landskin in the pits, fat tentacles snaked across the floor and joined with the bases of the tubes, throbbing like devouring serpents. Bubbling greenish fluid, laced with thousands of landskin filaments, filled each tube.
Rian jerked to a halt, staring. His mouth hung open.
"Rian! Good. Good. Come here."
Rian turned to see Elder Pallas approaching. The smocked Elder wound his way between the tall cylinders, stepping over fat, writhing tentacles of landskin where they lay on the polished metal floor. Pallas held a syringe in one gloved hand, and waved Rian closer. Beyond him, Rian could see other Elders milling about the cylinders, staring into their green-hued depths.
Rian ignored Pallas. He turned back to stare at the transparent tubes. Grotesque figures hung suspended, listlessly floating in the green fluid. Twisted and distorted beyond even the worst Profound Rian had seen, the vaguely human creatures were wrapped within cocoons of landskin filaments. Tendrils pierced their skin, penetrated their mouths, nostrils, eyes, and ears---every aperture was filled with a pumping, twitching mass of tentacles. Beneath them, from the floor of the cylinders, rose machines to grasp the ankles of the prisoners, braces to hold them steady, and needles to pierce them.
"By the Father! What is this?" Rian whispered, stepping back, toward the iris.
The aide stepped behind him, blocking the exit. Rian jerked away, eyes widening in shock. He turned to face Pallas, who frowned with impatience, and gestured for Rian to approach.
"Come, come. What's this? Come here, Rian." Pallas stepped beyond the ring of landskin pits and came closer. He held out his hand, gestured. Rian felt the aide's hand on his upper arm, less gentle this time. The man shoved him forward.
"What is this?" Rian repeated, staring at the tubes. In the nearest, a figure with a mass of long, flat, suckered tentacles trailing away below its waist twitched. Its torso rose smooth and unblemished, well muscled, while from its humped shoulders sprouted arms covered with bony knobs. On a thin stalk sat an elongated head, eyeless and ringed with a multitude of round, sharp-toothed maws.
Pallas followed his gaze, frowning. He waved absently. "That? Oh. I don't know its designation. A specimen. A subject. They're all subjects."
Rian looked into other tubes at similar horrors. Here a woman's perfect form was riddled with massive, leaking lesions from which sprouted tiny, fully formed arms, like those of infants, though tipped with razor claws. Her jaw was locked in agony, the muscles in her throat stretched taut. Her mouth gaped open, stuffed with a heaving wad of tendrils that choked back her screams. But her eyes . . . Her eyes, clear and obviously filled with intelligence, begged him, pleaded with him to end her suffering.
Pallas took Rian's arm, tugging him toward the ring of containers. Dumbstruck, Rian did not resist. He felt the presence of the aide at his back, but could not take his eyes from the horrors of these pathetic captives, their lives rendered useless by walls of glass.
"There is something you must see. Fascinating. Truly fascinating. We owe you a great debt of gratitude, Rian."
"What do you mean?" Rian forced back the rising of his gorge and turned to the Elder, keeping his eyes away from the tragic figures. He swallowed. "I don't understand."
"This way, my boy," Pallas said, urging him between a pair of landskin pits. The musk of the landskin rose in palpable waves from the pit. Its veined mass shivered and seemed to draw back from the pair of men. Rian stepped over the thick tentacles on the floor, loathe to let the things touch him.
They passed through a gap between the containers. Rian kept his eyes turned away from the pleading eyes of their occupants, and entered a cleared space in the center of the ring. Here were clusters of work benches and machines of the Elders' calling. A central pool gave access to the landskin, which heaved and swelled, breathing. A dozen Elders worked in concert around a table crowded with instruments and flasks, beakers and machines. They looked up as Pallas led Rian into the circle.
Pallas ignored the others, dragging Rian toward a tube on the far side of the ring. "Here."
Rian stared at Pallas. He shook his head. "I . . ."
"Don't be foolish. Look, Rian. You've brought us a truly incredible gift, a gift that bodes well to propel our efforts years ahead of schedule. This is incredible."
Rian did not want to look, but could not help himself. He felt compelled to raise his eyes.
And there hung the stranger, suspended by filaments of landskin within the pale green fluid of a transparent cylinder. Clamps held his arms and legs splayed wide, and needles pierced his body along his arms, legs, and torso. His eyes, which had been closed, now opened. His gaze swept downward, focusing on Rian. Emotion and understanding flickered there momentarily, then faded away. The muscles of his throat constricted, and he seemed to gag on the thick tube that entered his mouth.
"Truly remarkable. An entirely new species, neither Bhajong nor Gagash, but seeming to be a bit of both. There's enough commonality to call him kin, we think. But also, and perhaps more fascinating, there is something of the landskin in him as well. The genetic matrices haven't been completed yet, but he promises to yield an unmatched quantity of information. Information which may well bring our quest to fruition." The Elder stepped away from Rian and laid a hand on the glass of the container. He stared up into the stranger's eyes, which snapped shut. A flood of bubbles rising from the floor of the container masked the stranger's face for a moment. Pallas sighed and turned back to Rian. "The goal is within reach, Rian. I can smell it. I can taste it! Think! Within a generation or more we could have enough knowledge to cull the mutenagens from our genetic code altogether. We can go back! We can go back to the way we were before."
Rian stepped back from the light of passion in Pallas's eyes.
"There's more," said Pallas, still facing the stranger. He nodded. "Much more. Despite his hybrid nature, he seems closer, much closer, to humanity than any of the other subjects we've isolated. Oh, each has some small portion of the untainted genome, no doubt. We've isolated bits here and there, but never enough to formulate the entire code. We only take small, agonizingly slow, steps forward, seeming to shuffle through a morass of dead ends and petering trails. Here, at last, is something to work with, something to strive for.
"He's immune to the mutating effects of the landskin. Can you imagine that? Totally immune. We've subjected him to almost continuous bombardment with the landskin contagion, and it has no effect on him. His genetic makeup remains stable, unchanged. If that potential can be isolated and duplicated . . ."
Rian began to understand Pallas's excitement. Could this . . . this creature really mean that much? Could he be the key to the Gagash return to humanity, true humanity? Even the potential, the possibility, of such a gigantic leap forward awed Rian. He stared up at the stranger with new comprehension.
Rian jumped as he felt a sting on his upper arm. He jerked back and turned around. One of the other Elders stood behind him, syringe in hand, an unreadable expression in his eyes. Others crowded close, and the aide now stood with a stunrod in his misshapen hands, the pod-end focused on Rian's chest.
Pallas strode back into Rian's view, his hands clasped behind his back and a broad smile on his face. "Something's happened to you, too, Rian. Something . . . wonderful. We don't know yet whether it was your contact with the anomaly or some other vector, but there have been changes within you. The blood tests and your medical exam have yielded incredible evidence. Evidence of dramatic, fundamental differences. This must be studied, analyzed. Paired with what's been gathered, and remains to be gathered, from the anomaly, you could speed resolution."
"What?" Rian backed away, stumbling. His legs wobbled under his own weight, suddenly weak and leaden. A slow cold crept along his shoulder, spreading icy tendrils through his torso. "What have you . . . what? What have you . . . done . . . to me?"
"A sedative only, I assure you," Pallas said. He nodded, and several of the Elders came forward and laid hands on Rian. The aide stood nearby, weapon trained on Rian's chest. "It will wear off in time. But we couldn't have you damaging yourself, not when you represent such hope, such promise."
"Damage?" His mind swirled. Motes of odd-colored lights danced before his eyes. His tongue felt thick. "What . . . I . . . don't feel so . . . good."
Rian watched Pallas's head swell to fill the room. His eyes blazed, fire dripping to sizzle on the floor. He spoke, but his words ran together, like thick soup, tasting of screams and children's laughter. Rian's legs folded. The hands on him burned, like ice and slime. His head lolled to one side, and drool drizzled from his mouth.
Enigma, they called him, and it seemed as good a designation as anything. He, he had called himself. It seemed familiar. He. It seemed . . . right.
Awakening had begun, had trickled in raising awareness and understanding. These creatures that had seized him, these men, these Gagash, they did not know what they did. They subjected him to the influx of the landskin, flooded his cell with the raw juices of life. He welcomed it, embraced the landskin and its spoor. It began the fulfilling. It was not complete; there was still much that remained clouded, hidden from him.
Since Rian had left him with . . . these others, He had experienced. He experienced pain, as they took him and immersed him in a strange, buoyant fluid, a fluid that sizzled on his skin, raising welts that did not fade until the warmth came from the center of his chest and spread outward.
He experienced what the awakening soon told him was fear. Fear---as sharp bits of metal slid from the floor of the tube and sank into his skin, piercing muscle, spreading outward to wrap hot wires around his bones.
He experienced confusion, as a flood of sensations crept outward from the bits of metal, overwhelming his senses, rendering him unable to form coherent thought. That, too, had faded with the coming warmth, leaving only the thin residue of panic.
But then, with the touch of the landskin on his figure, came an easing. Tentative recognition. Like spreading petals of a rare flower, the first trickles of knowledge came sinking through him. Memories. Long memories. His own, before waking with the three-armed man, Rian, looming over him, and others, memories long forgotten by anyone. Memories not his own. Memories that came at him in a quickening rush, threatening to overwhelm him, threatening to render him impotent.
In the end, he forced them away, forced them to subside, taking only a little at a time.
Language returned. But something was blocking his throat, a thick tube, and he could not use the knowledge, could not reason with them.
As it has always been. The memory-voice spoke softly, but with a certainty based on lifetimes, eons. They would not listen. They would not hear. Sadness. Great, tragic sadness rode the memory-voice like a heavy yoke. A deluge of memories pressed on his barriers, desperate to return to him.
Bitterness awakened, stoked to a high, consuming flame. Hatred. He turned new eyes on those who tormented him, had always tormented him. Him and his predecessors, his kith and kindred. Feeding on his rage, the landskin tendrils throbbed, writhed, creating eddies and small whirlpools in the green fluid.
The humans did not recognize his hatred. They poked and prodded at him, sliced pieces of him away, suffused him with foreign liquids and forced vile substances down his throat through the thick tube. The chemicals boiled his blood or froze it with crystals of ice. The heat in the center of his chest, his link, reacted, neutralizing his wounds. Healing him.
Still the humans continued. They flooded his system with distillations of the landskin, and wondered that he absorbed it harmlessly, never dreaming that he drank it in as sustenance. Communion beckoned, calling to him, but he could not. Could not. Not now. He must focus.
Focus. Danger loomed. He must escape these creatures, these hated invaders, these abominations. He squirmed, and the landskin fibers loosened, obedient. But the metal clamps remained tight on his body. He could not force them.
Danger. Alarm shot through his system, carried on waves of flooding pheromones through the fibers. Danger. Hurt. Flee.
He could not flee. Compelled by the sizzle of panic, he struggled harder against his bonds, to no avail. With rising fear he looked up, through the glass that held him, and watched as the Pallas-thing came toward him, leading another. Rian. Rian.
Danger. Hurt. Flee.
Rian? He stared at the Rian-thing, and became aware of something . . . something. Some new threat. Something that had not been there before. Something dire. Something dreadful.
Rian had been altered. Something, a deadly something, rode now within Rian, dormant, but waiting.
Kill. Kill. Destroy.
Rian came closer, looking up at him through the glass. He drew back and closed his eyes, unable to face that baleful, horrible abomination.
+
Chapter 17
"Are you hungry?" Erekel asked Dersi. He held her, steadying her.
She dropped her gaze, shaking her head. "No. No. Tired."
"Come," he said. "I'll take you somewhere you can rest. We . . . We can talk more when you've slept."
Dersi allowed Erekel to guide her to her feet. The other Bhajong whispered among themselves. She ignored them, refused even to look at them. Erekel supported her wavering footsteps.
"Get out of the way, Baedere," Erekel said.
"All of our questions haven't been answered yet, Erekel."
"They will be. Trust me."
Baedere chuckled. "Trust you? You've asked that a lot today, haven't you?"
"I'm asking it again, of you."
"Very well, Erekel. Go. Find her a place to rest. Then come back here. We've a lot to discuss."
Erekel grunted and led Dersi to the back of the metal room. She could feel the eyes of the other men on her back. Their whispers began again, and she caught some of their words. Still they questioned her presence among them, and cast doubts on Erekel.
She could not argue with them or their feelings.
"Come on, Dersi," Erekel said gently. He reached up and touched a depression in the smooth metal of the wall. With a click and the sound of running water, a portion of the featureless metal slid down into the floor, revealing a doorway. A metal corridor stretched away into darkness.
With Erekel's first footstep in the corridor, bands of light flickered on, illuminating a short stretch of the hallway. Dersi blinked, but could not begin to fathom this new revelation. She had seen too much, experienced too much, to wonder.
"This place is incredible, isn't it? I don't think this is of Gagash construction," Erekel said. His voice echoed down the corridor. More lights, farther along the passage, flickered on, while those behind them extinguished. "There seem to be sensory capabilities here that turn the lights off and on. As well as other things."
Dersi shook her head. "What?"
"I said there are other things this place does. Lots of things."
She put her hand to the side of her head. Her skull pounded.
"I'll keep quiet. Here. This room's empty." Erekel stopped and touched the corridor wall. Another doorway appeared, opening into darkness. A band of lights flickered on, illuminating a square, metal-walled chamber. A low shelf was positioned on one wall and several cylinders bulged from another. A complex array of transparent tubes and rods hung from the ceiling.
"That's a bed," Erekel said, pointing to the low shelf. He half-carried her to the bed and lay her down. The smooth, cold metal surface warmed at the touch of her skin, becoming strangely soothing. Like liquid, the surface welcomed her body. It welled up, pillowing beneath her head. She gasped and tried to sit up. Erekel's calming hand on her shoulder prevented her. "Relax. It takes some getting used to, but there's no harm in it."
Dersi eyed the flowing surface of the bed. Her hands grasped at the hard, planar edges. "What is this?"
Erekel shrugged. "I don't know, really. But it's harmless."
"How do you know?"
"I've slept there many times. This is my room, when I'm here."
"Your room?" Again she tried to sit up. This time Erekel did not prevent her. The surface of the bed became harder beneath her, offering firm support. The warmth continued to radiate from it.
Again he shrugged. "I've claimed it. There are literally hundreds of rooms in this place. I don't know if any of us have ever even fully explored it."
"What is this place?"
Erekel smiled. "You've already asked me that, and I've told you I'm not sure. I have my theories, but nothing for certain."
"Theories?"
He held up a hand. "Rest first, Dersi. We can talk later. Now, I think it's best you get some sleep. If I'm not mistaken, you didn't exactly sleep last night."
She shook her head. Shuddered. "No. No, I didn't."
He rose from the bedside and crossed to the doorway. Pointing toward a shallow depression on the interior wall he said, "If you want to leave this room, just push your hand into this niche. The door will open. I'll be outside in the hallway, waiting."
She nodded, staring around the room.
"If you lay down for a few moments the lights will dim. Sit up and they'll brighten."
Again, she nodded. She focused on the contraption of rods and tubes in the center of the ceiling. She wondered at their purpose.
Erekel paused at the door, just outside the room, and stared at her. "If you need anything, I'll be right outside." He dropped his gaze, licking his lips. "Are you alright, Dersi?"
"Go away, Erekel," she said. "Just go away and leave me alone."
He nodded and touched the wall outside the room. The door slid up from the floor.
Dersi rose from the bed and watched as fluid ripples traveled across the metal surface. A moment later she reached down and touched it---cool and hard once more. She frowned. The need for sleep pressed down on her, but she would not lie on that alien surface. She tugged the tatters of her sleeping gown tight around her body and lay down on the floor. Within moments she fell into a deep, dreamless slumber.
She's physical form grew weary, limbs becoming heavier and heavier as night approached once again.
The cold, pale lunar mass rose on the horizon, striped by the thrusting trunks of once-alien trees. She climbed a steep slope, avoiding more of the sharp-leafed vegetation. Naked stone protruded from the landskin, bathed by the soft caress of the wind stirring through the hills.
The landskin resisted her steps, calling out to her with touch, with scent. Joy-pheromones rose with each footstep, clouding her nostrils. Shivering tendrils tickled the soles of She's feet, twined about her calves, tasting. She pulled her feet away from the eager touch, the loving embrace. There was no time for the ecstasy of the landskin. There was time only for He.
At the top of the rise She stood and looked down into a narrow, high-walled valley washed with silver lunar light. The landskin had grown thick as it climbed the walls of naked stone, before its weight dragged it down into the deep crevices of the valley floor. It pooled. It thickened. It bulged, creating a fat knobbed globe atop a thinning stalk.
She felt joy. The promise of new life flooded her with comfort and certainty. The infant ool sang, calling out to her.
The knobbed head atop its stalk trembled. It shook, straining against the bonds of the landskin. Flesh expanded at the rear of the knob, filling with buoyant gases.
The chaining stalk stretched, strained.
She felt muscles in her facial structure tug, becoming taut. Her lips peeled away from the hard, calcified ridges in her mouth. She sat, feeling the comforting touch of the landskin drinking her essence, tasting her, feeling her, knowing her. She entered a vast communion, and watched. Watched as the infant ool broke free and sailed into the moonlit night.
Dersi awakened to a light, hesitant touch on her shoulder. She jerked back, cracking her head against something hard and cold. A scream died in her throat as she saw Erekel kneeling on the floor, a shocked expression on his face. He held a cup in one hand.
"Dersi, I---"
"What! What are you doing?" She pulled the flaps of her sleeping gown tighter about her body. Behind her, the bed warmed, melting heat into her skin.
"It's been nearly twelve hours, Dersi. I thought you might be thirsty, hungry." He stood and offered her his hand. She stared at him. "Come on. I won't bite."
"I'm not so sure about that." Still, she accepted his hand and climbed to her feet. He frowned at the unused bed, but said nothing about it. Instead, he handed her the cup.
"What is it?" she asked, swirling the milky-white liquid.
"From what I've been able to tell, some sort of nutrient drink. Proteins, sugars, vitamins and minerals. It doesn't taste too bad."
"From what you've been able to tell?" She passed the cup back to him. "No, thank you. I am thirsty and hungry, but not that much. Just tell me where I can find the nearest feeding tube."
He shook his head. "Not here. You'd have to leave this place." He held the cup out to her again. "It's this or nothing, I'm afraid."
Hesitant, she took the cup and stared at the liquid. She was hungry. Her stomach growled. Her throat felt packed with dry grit. Sniffing the cup, she found the odor acceptable.
"It won't hurt you, Dersi. Actually, I've grown rather fond of it. It's different than ool-milk, but not offensive in the least."
Dersi tipped the cup and touched her tongue to the liquid. Sweet. Thick. Much thicker than ool-milk. She took a mouthful and swished it around her mouth. It tingled as she swallowed, flowing down her dry throat like a healing balm. Prickles climbed her arms and legs, spreading outward from her stomach.
"Where does this come from?"
"From one of the machines in this place," Erekel said. He gestured at the room around them and walked toward the cylinders protruding from the wall. "These seem to process it, though I can't say where it gets the raw material to make the drink."
"You've drunk this?"
"Often."
She steeled herself and gulped down the rest of the liquid. It rested heavily in her stomach.
"It's time we talked, Dersi."
Handing him back the cup, she nodded. "Yes. I think so."
At that moment Dersi heard hurried footsteps outside the room. She and Erekel turned. A moment later Baedere rushed to the doorway. He leaned against the frame, breathing heavily.
"Baedere! What is it?" Erekel demanded.
"Guards. Well-armed. Bearing acidrods."
"Where?" Erekel seized Baedere by the shoulders and shook him. "How many?"
"Coming down the stairway. At least two dozen." The Bhajong shook himself free and speared Dersi with his gaze. "It's her fault! She led them right to us."
"Stop being a fool, man!" Erekel snapped.
"How else do you explain it?"
"I don't know, but that's not important right now. Where are the others?"
"Fleeing. Taking the side passages out of here."
"Good." Erekel turned to Dersi. "We've got to get out of here, too, Dersi. Come."
"You're not bringing her with us, Erekel," Baedere said. He blocked the door. "Leave her here. She's what they've come for."
Erekel shook his head. "No. I'll not leave her in their hands. Go, if you must, Baedere. We'll make our own way."
"You're a fool, old man. A damned fool." He shook his head. "I hope to see you again.
"Lady Dersi," he continued, "if anything happens to Master Erekel, you'll pay for it."
"Get out of here, Baedere," Erekel urged. "Before it's too late."
Baedere turned back toward the common room and ran. His footfalls echoed down the hall. In the wake of his departure Erekel grabbed Dersi's hand and pulled her into the hallway. "Come on."
"Where?"
"There are places in this complex they'll never find," Erekel said. "Places few of us have ever been."
"Safe places?"
"I don't know. Safer than here, certainly."
"But I---"
A harsh crackling sound tore the still air of the hallway, and a man---Baedere---screamed. Dersi looked toward the common room, seeing Baedere reeling back into the corridor. Shadowy figures moved into the doorway. An acidrod barked with a crackling hiss. Baedere's head exploded in a bright spray of blood and brains.
More screams echoed through the hallway, the gurgling of dying men. The invaders raised their weapons, pointing them toward Dersi and Erekel. Voices called out, ordering them to halt.
"Come on. This way," said Erekel, tugging on her arm. "There's another way out of here."
Erekel shoved Dersi ahead of him and they ran. Dersi risked a glance behind them, seeing their pursuers closing the distance between them. One of the shadowy figures raised an acidrod and fired. Instinctively, Dersi dove to one side, pulling Erekel with her.
The acidslug smacked into the opposite wall and burst. Bubbling acid spread its acrid stench through the corridor. Dersi coughed as Erekel jerked her forward. He pulled her toward an intersection that flared into brilliance. More acidslugs slammed into the walls.
"This way. I think," said Erekel.
"Stop, damn you! Stop! That's her. That's Lady Dersi," a rasping voice cried from behind them. "We need her unharmed."
Erekel and Dersi ducked around the corner and ran onward, their footsteps echoing on the metal floor. Dersi's lungs burned, her breath coming in ragged spasms.
"Damn!" Erekel said.
Dersi peered over Erekel's shoulder. Ahead of them, no more than thirty feet away, the corridor ended in a blank metal wall.
Rian heard voices in his soft, private darkness.
"What's happening to him?"
"I don't know. Something. We'll know more once we get the test results."
"The preliminary data suggested nothing like this. There's more than we suspected. Something else is happening that's not easily explained. Another agency seems to be at work in him. On him."
"Another agency?"
A sigh, disgusted confusion. A voice that was almost recognizable, even through the sound of crashing waves that pounded on his ears. He struggled to define the voice, but could not. "We've isolated the primary infiltration. It seems to be viral in nature. Closely linked to the genetic composition of the anomaly. Certainly, it has its origins with our special guest. But there is another contagion at work in him, on a cellular level. We can't pinpoint what it's doing to him yet, but it's something."
"There's no rejection? His system isn't fighting it? I see no indication of fever."
"No. It seems to be assimilating quite nicely. White cell count slightly elevated, but not to the extent that would indicate systemic rejection."
Pallas? Elder Pallas? But . . . Rian tried to open his eyes and found that he could not. Slight pressure on his lids told him his eyes were covered. Panicked, he tried to reach up and pull away the obstructions. But he could not move his arms.
"Is he conscious?"
"He shouldn't be. But there is significant electrical activity in his brain." Yes! Pallas!
"Will he recover?"
"The pupa should keep him stable while we study him. Providing whatever's at work on him doesn't begin to cause damage."
"Can he hear us?"
"I doubt it. The fluid should provide a dampening effect, for one thing. And then there are the monitors. I doubt he can hear much, if anything."
"What's this?"
"Hmm. I don't know. A spike in his brainwaves. He's waking up?"
"Like this? Could he survive full wakefulness?"
"I'm not certain. But it would do our research little good. I'll put him back under."
"How long will that ta---"
Floating.
"Rian. Rian, can you hear me?"
Rian twitched, the voice throbbing in his ears, floating beneath the sound of gently pumping liquid. He moved, twisting his body. Warm, thick gel muted his motions, resisted him. He tried to open his mouth, gagged on a fat, throbbing tube in his throat. His hands, free now, rose through thick, viscous jelly and touched a mask covering the lower half of his face. Gnarled, ropy tentacles of landskin stretched away from cups suctioned to his eyes.
"Relax, Rian. You're in a pupal cylinder. Nod your head if you can hear me."
There were currents in the gel, streamers of hot and cold, numbing. His skin tingled.
Rian's hand climbed the tentacles rising from his eyes until they merged with a thick, pliant membrane. He could feel veins throbbing in the membrane wall. Beyond the membrane, the cool, smooth feel of glass. He wrapped his hands around the base of the tentacles, tugging.
"Don't do that! You'll jeopardize everything!"
Rian tugged harder, feeling his skin stretch taut. Sharp, stinging pain flared through his face.
"Rian! Don't, or I'll have to sedate you again. If I do, I won't bring you fully awake again."
Rian dropped his hands. They flowed slowly through the jelly to his sides. More tendrils sprouted in vertical rows from his crotch to his armpits. He felt a peculiar lassitude, knew he should care, should be alarmed, should want to remember. But he did not.
"There. I've given you a mild sedative. Should keep your stress minimal."
Minimal. The darkness pressed in on him. The darkness, and the weird weightless feel of suspension. He gagged on the throat tube, trying to force it from between his lips.
"No. Don't try to talk. Just listen."
Rian managed to nod.
"Good." The voice---Pallas, some small part of his mind informed him---paused. Rian could hear other sounds over the pupal tide: grating machinery, electric humming, other voices, raised in animated discussion. "Listen closely, Rian. Listen very closely."
Again, he nodded.
"The pupal cylinder should keep you alive, healthy and unharmed, for quite some time. It is not our intent to torture you, Rian. I regret the manner in which we took you. All of us do."
Rian remembered the syringe which had been jabbed into his arm from behind. The scene replayed itself in his mind. He felt a surge of rage, but kept it inside, knowing he could do nothing.
"In time, once we've gathered all the information available, you'll be freed, of course. Until then, it's vital that you remain as still as possible, as calm as possible. Anxiety could skew the test results. We could keep you sedated, but . . ."
Rian felt something moving on the back of his neck. Thin digits, like fingers, kneaded the skin covering his spine, at the base of his skull. He jerked. Fought by the restraining jelly, he moved his hands upward, clawing up his own torso.
"No! Don't do it, Rian. That's why we can't keep you asleep any longer. There's . . . there's something happening to you. Something we can't explain. Not yet. On a cellular level. As best we can tell, you've been exposed to some foreign material, a virus, if you will, or multiple viruses, which have infiltrated just about every system in your body: your organs, your soft tissues, your muscles, bones, tendons. It's interacting with all of your systems in ways that, quite frankly, we don't understand. It's quite remarkable."
Remarkable? Rian ignored Pallas's warning and dug through the jelly to his skull. He touched something, something soft, squishy. Fine tendrils arose from the thing to greet his questing hand, licking through the gel like a hundred thin tongues. Rian felt an electric tingle in his fingertips. A warning?
He panicked. His fingers dug at the mass, ripping into his own flesh. The tentacles reacted violently, slashing at his hands.
"Rian, don't! We don't know enough! Not yet!"
Rian ignored Pallas, digging, digging.
"Dammit! He's not listening. We have no choice. Sedate him again."
"Are you certain, Pallas?"
"Yes, damn you! Do it. Do it!"
Cold crept through the umbilicals in his sides, sinking into his body, drifting through his blood. His fingers became blunt sausages, feeble. His hands sank through the jelly. The voices faded, faded . . .
"Rian? I know you can hear me." Pallas's voice, again.
Rian, remembering betrayal, did not respond.
"Rian, I didn't want to have to put you under, and I can't do it again. You wouldn't survive the sedation."
He tried to raise his arms to pry the thing from his neck, but found his arms restrained, bound close to his sides.
"I'm sorry about that, Rian. But we had no choice. It's for your own good. Our good. Trust me."
Rian bucked within the jelly, struggling to tear free his arms. But whatever bound him remained tight, refused to give. He relaxed, accepting futility.
"I need to talk to you. But I need to be certain you're listening. Can you listen, Rian? If so, nod your head."
Rian nodded.
"Good. Now. You need to know that there have been changes since we last spoke. The viruses---we've isolated at least two separate organisms---have entirely infiltrated your body. How, or why, we don't know yet. But, and this is important, Rian: They do not seem to be harming you. On the contrary, they seem to be doing something . . . quite remarkable. Extraordinary, I must say."
A long pause, during which Rian marshaled his strength for another try at his bonds.
"We're primarily interested at this point in the second of the two viruses. The first, we've identified as having come from the anomaly, doubtless during your contact with him, perhaps through an exchange of blood or other fluids. But the other . . . Ah, that remains a mystery. We've not encountered its like.
"This virus seems to be strengthening your immune system, Rian. And not only that, it seems to be stabilizing your genetic matrix. In short, it's making you immune to the landskin contagion."
A part of Rian understood what he was being told. The rational part. The part detached from his present circumstances. That was a very small part. The rest of him struggled quietly, subtly, against the bonds.
"This is the breakthrough we've been dreaming of, Rian. Can you understand? You are the breakthrough we've sought for generations. You represent the future, our past, the salvation of humankind, Rian. You, and this virus. We've done it! We've beaten it, Rian! Can you understand the impact this will have?"
The bonds held him tight. Rian lost patience. He slung himself about within the jelly. His feet impacted the membrane wall, bulged it outward.
"No! Stop that, Rian. Stop that, or you'll leave me little choice but to sedate you again. I don't want to do that. None of us want to do that. I don't think you'd survive going under again.
"But if you persist in this, you'll leave me little choice." Short pause. "We can get the information we need from you whether or not you're alive, Rian."
Rian stilled. He hung in the gelid bath, feeling its currents against his skin.
"That's better. That's much better. Now. You must understand, Rian. Please. We don't . . . We don't like this. Not at all. But we have no choice. Surely you see. Surely you realize that for the good of us all, for the good of our species, we must keep you. We must explore, experiment. We've got to find the missing pieces of this puzzle."
Rian screamed, thrashing, gagging on the throat-tube. He strained against his bonds, but to no avail.
After Planetfall, APF 0001
"You forget yourself, Commander Rodriguez!" Captain Santiago's face drew down into a scowl, and his wrinkled fists bunched on the surface of his lap-board. The results of Alberto's exhaustive research, paired with Lt. Marissa Flaherty's, were displayed plainly on the screen.
They were undeniable to any who would open their eyes and realize the truth.
"My apologies, Captain. I spoke out of anxiety, I assure you." How could he have said such a thing? A man's pride brings him low, but a man of lowly spirit gains honor. What? Rodriguez berated himself, wondering at the choice of words that had suddenly, without conscious thought, tumbled from his mouth when the captain had expressed his doubts.
"I was unaware you were such an adherent of the Church, Commander." He frowned, and Rodriguez could almost hear his thoughts. He wondered if he would be forced to visit the psych officer. Fanatics were justifiably excluded from Service; their instability had been proven time and again as unsuitable for life beyond Mother Terra. Something about the vastness of space clashed with their undeniable yet consciously suppressed belief in their own importance in the universal scheme of things.
Rodriguez shook his head. "I'm not, Captain Santiago, I assure you, a product of my . . . dysfunctional upbringing. I've cleared Psych at each nexus." He paused, considering. Santiago still stared at him, uncertain. The captain opened his mouth, and Rodriguez jumped to a decision. "My father was a bishop of the Church of Universal Truth. Mother removed me from his custody under the Dogma Protocols, and I underwent the standard series of deprogrammings and evaluations. I've checked out fit for duty time and time again, Captain."
"I'm puzzled at the exclusion of this from your records, Commander. Most puzzled." He tapped out of Rodriguez's research and called up the personnel records, spanning through until Rodriguez saw his own Service holo displayed on the screen. "There's nothing here at all."
Deprogrammings and reprogrammings were universally erased from master files, absent the express need of the good of the Hegemony. Santiago should know that as well as he. But Rodriguez shook his head, becoming increasingly agitated as he sat here, useless, in the captain's study, while all of creation lay awaiting him in the BS lab. "Respectfully, Captain, that's irrelevant. You're missing the point. My research---"
"---is what's irrelevant, Commander. I suggest you begin rethinking your conclusions. Surely you don't believe that this . . . this landskin should take precedence over our mission, over the expansion of the Hegemony? Your own reports indicate there is no danger in it. We've seen no adverse effects from it. And it burns away readily to make room for our expansion. I see no reason to forestall the thawing and downloading."
"But it's intelligent, Captain! I know it!"
"Intelligent?" The captain snorted, turning off his display. "Commander, we've seen no such indication. It---"
"It reacts to stimuli. And, there is a definite pattern within its reactions. The flyers, the drakes---"
"Drakes? You mean, as in dragons? Rodriguez, I do believe you've lost your mind. Perhaps a visit with the PO would---"
"No!" Rodriguez stood, glaring down at the captain. "You refuse to see, you foolish old man. You look out upon a beautifully intricate, yet simple, ecosystem, a system in perfect harmony, and you see an unresponsive world ripe for exploitation and rape. Don't you see? They're all related! The flyers, the drakes, the landskin. All of it! The landskin is a vast solar collector, drawing energy from this world's sun, processing it in a manner similar to, but much more efficiently than, the photosynthesis of our own Terra. The flyers eat the landskin, which expands through the medium of the drakes. Death adds to the equation, feeding the loop. It's perpetual procreation, Captain, untainted by the complexity that makes life on all other worlds we've encountered so chaotic, so unpredictable.
"And there is direction here, I tell you! Intellect. Cognition. Vast on a scale we can't begin to understand, and crude, by our standards. But intellect. Think what we can learn! Think of the wonders that await us if we move slowly, with care for this precious environment. The sheer magnitude of the---"
"Compose yourself, Commander!" Santiago rose, grimacing at the pain in his knees. He touched the plasma screen, which rippled in reaction. "Send a security detail to my study. Commander Rodriguez is to be confined to quarters until further notice. Have the PO attend me in Records."
"Yes, Captain," came the response.
Rodriguez recoiled. "Psych officer? No. I . . . No!"
"Restrain yourself, Alberto. Don't force me to put you in cryo. It would appear your reprogramming was ineffective. In deference to your long record of exemplary service, I'm willing to forget this little insubordination, provided you check out with Psych. If reprogramming is warranted . . ."
"You're making a mistake, Captain. A grave mistake."
"That's enough, Alberto! Enough. Don't force my hand."
Rodriguez lapsed into silence, defeated. He hung his head. An interview with the PO spelled the end of his career, despite Santiago's assurances to the contrary. Any reprogramming sufficient to alleviate the captain's concerns would certainly bring collateral damage to his higher cognitive functions. Memory loss. Lapses in coherent thought. He would be fit for nothing but manual labor until he could be retrained. A process requiring years. Years which he did not have.
His discoveries! His precious, amazing discoveries!
A world-mind. A true world-mind, spanning the entirety of this planet, moving with a slow deliberation, unrecognizable by the means at their disposal. Only sensed, on some alternate level of consciousness.
Communication. There was communication. He knew it! This vast intelligence tried, and repeatedly failed, due primarily to the shortcomings of the human mind, which could envision no mode of communication other than its own. But the ebb and flow of the landskin, its curious ability to alter genetic material to which it was exposed, offered another form of sentience altogether.
Already Rodriguez could see the effects of the world-mind's efforts. He had theories, theories that needed further exploration. Pheromones. Particulate matter, like viruses, that compelled a host's mutation along designated lines.
The security detail arrived, their entrance hailed by the tonal signal echoing from the speakers hidden in the walls. The two men in military uniform, sidearms holstered but fingers touching the cold metal butts of their weapons, stepped up and saluted the captain.
"Commander Rodriguez is to be confined to quarters. Restricted access to only myself and those I designate. Deposit him, then send the duty officer to me in Records. Keep this quiet, soldiers."
"What are you doing, Captain?" Rodriguez was on the verge of panicking. To have come so close!
"Rodriguez, there are things you must understand. Even someone from your particular branch of Service should understand the need for security and order in circumstances such as these. We're on an alien world, Alberto. Need I remind you of that? We face unknown challenges in the execution of our sworn duty. Biological Sciences is along on this foray to serve the ends of our mission parameters, no more. These things you speak of . . . They pose an imminent danger, jeopardizing Ship security and mission integrity."
"No. No, please, Captain."
Santiago shook his white-haired head. "I'm sorry, Rodriguez. But until I feel our mission has not been compromised by your . . . fanaticism, Biological Sciences will come under direct supervision of Security. All research activities will be channeled through me, requiring my direct approval. Anything not directly pertaining to furthering the security of this mission will be immediately terminated."
"You can't do this, Captain!"
"You're wrong, Rodriguez. I can do this. I have done this. Take him away. If he persists in this untoward behavior, sedate him."
"Mar--- Lt. Flaherty! What. . . . How are you able to comm with me?"
"Keep it down, please, Commander. I presume there are sentries outside your door as well as mine?"
He nodded, regarding her face on the screen. Dark circles hung beneath her eyes, and her hair had a tousled look not usual. She glanced surreptitiously over her shoulder, biting her lip. "Have you heard? Have your guards told you?"
"Told me? What?" His guards had been particularly uncommunicative. When addressed, they would respond only as protocol dictated, giving him nothing. For the past three weeks he had languished in his room, occupied only by reviewing in his head the details of his research. An entire world to explore, a consciousness with which to establish rapport, and he was locked in this chamber, unable even to access his research materials.
And the nightmares. At times he could no longer be certain whether he was awake or asleep. His father's voice came to him with startling regularity now. He could not control it. The null capsules the PO had prescribed, a great deal more powerful than those he had prescribed for himself, had ceased to have any effect. And the sessions with the man had proved useless beyond belief. No doubt he was slated for cryo as soon as the captain consented to the order. Upload and erasure would soon follow.
"Captain Santiago's had a seizure. A stroke. Partial paralysis of his entire right side. Speech all but impossible. The prognosis is for partial recovery, but he's been designated unfit for duty by the medical staff."
"What? How do you know?"
"I've got a friend in Comp. He patched through to me this morning. It's him allowing me access to you now."
Rodriguez felt a sting of rage at her mentioning of a male friend. Had he imagined the emphasis on friend? What more was he to her?
Let us behave decently, as in the daytime, not in orgies and drunkenness, not in sexual immorality and debauchery, not in dissension and jealousy. Rather, clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ, and do not think about how to gratify the desires of the sinful nature.
"Shut up!" Rodriguez shouted.
"What?" Marissa drew back from the screen, her face wearing an expression of utter shock.
Rodriguez shook his head. What had he said? "Nothing. I was . . . thinking of something else, Lieutenant. Forgive me."
"Commander, are you . . . okay? You seem . . . frazzled." She frowned, concerned.
When had he last looked in a mirror? Or even stepped into the sonic cleanser? His hair hung lank and oily across his forehead, and he could feel the thick stubble on his chin. When had he stopped taking the facial depilatories? He sniffed, realizing he stank.
"I . . . I'm trapped in here, Lieutenant. I've got to get out."
She seemed unsure, pausing. She licked her lips. "That's why I'm contacting you. With the captain incapacitated . . . Luther's assumed command of the mission, but it's a fractured command, at best. There are those who . . . those who share our views, Commander."
"Who?"
"Most of BS, of course. Others. A few soldiers, in fact. My . . . friend coordinates communication, keeps us secure from detection. Something's boiling beneath the surface. We have friends we never knew we had."
"We."
She nodded. "We need you, Commander. We've tapped into the long-range sensors. Something approaches. A flyer. A big one. Its configuration is different from the others. More sensory tentacles. We believe it's the alpha-prime."
"The alpha-prime," Rodriguez whispered, his voice trailing off in awe. "Get me out of here, Marissa."
She smiled. "We're working on it, Commander. With the disarray ongoing, it shouldn't be long. Listen, Commander, I don't know how long this channel is secure. I'll contact you again as soon as I'm able."
Rodriguez waved her away noncommittally, his mind already turning toward the momentous things brooding on the horizon. The alpha-prime!
Rodriguez keyed the holographic display clock rather than the auditory alarm. It was time.
A moment later he heard muffled voices through the door panel. A shout of alarm trickled through, then the unmistakable whine of small-arms fire. More shouts. The impact of beam weapons on the interior hull of Ship, an agonizing, grating sound. Then silence.
Good. They had neutralized the guards before the alarm went off. The sensory implants within the guards' bodies, the bio-statistic relays, would trigger the klaxons in moments, but there was a small window of time. A very small window.
The door hissed open, disabled at the keypad outside. A soldier stepped forward, outfitted in full battlegear. The muzzle of his pistol smoked. The stench of death filled the corridor. Behind the soldier came Marissa, her hair bound in a loose ponytail, a smudge of grime across the bridge of her nose. She carried a plasma carbine in the crook of her arm as if she were born to it.
"Commander!" She came forward, reaching out. Then, with a slight smile of rue, she withdrew her hand. Rodriguez felt its absence like a wound. "We don't have much time. Their relays will trigger the alarm in moments."
Rodriguez glanced down at the pair of dead soldiers. Both had fist-sized holes in their chests, where thin curls of smoke carried the stink of charred flesh. He felt no bitterness toward them, only regret. They were lost to the cause, the beautiful cause. The cause hatched over the past days, while Rodriguez languished, alone, in his prison.
Be always mindful of the sin of pride, my son. The voice sounded curiously pleased now, and Rodriguez felt a sense of gratification. The specter of his father had been mollified, placated by the grand plan that would see the works of the Lord glorified.
The soldier gestured down the hallway, and Rodriguez and Marissa set off. Their compromised guardian tagged along behind them, watchful at the intersections, his gun held ready. Rodriguez felt comforted by his presence. The first of my seraphim. The first of many.
"The XV?" Rodriguez asked as they moved through the spiraling corridors of Ship.
Marissa nodded. "The others are waiting for us in the hangar. The other shuttles have been disabled. When we launch, they won't be able to pursue us."
"The guns?"
She smiled. "Our XV's launch is keyed to a dormant program in the primary computer interface. As we clear the hangar doors, the program will initiate, locking down their systems. Simultaneously, a second program will crash the coolant subroutine, effectively disabling the core. They won't be pursuing, and they won't be able to fire on us."
And with the core disabled, Ship could not hope to leave the planet's atmosphere. Captain Santiago and his lackeys would be stranded on this beautiful, alien world, forced to accommodate to its demands. Or die. Rodriguez smiled. Everything was working out perfectly.
"The cargo?" he asked.
Marissa drew up short at an intersection, and the klaxons sounded. The loud warbling galvanized the soldiers milling about the halls. They seized their weapons and moved to duty stations, barking out queries over their in-Ship comm units. Their guardian soldier pulled them back behind a bulkhead. They pressed against the cool ceramic wall, holding their breaths as soldiers pounded past them.
When the last of the soldiers had passed, Rodriguez grasped Marissa's shoulder. "The cargo!" he demanded.
She winced and pulled free. "Aboard. Most of it."
"Most?"
Marissa ignored him, moving into the hall and heading down a slope toward the hangar deck. Her fingers caressed the barrel of her plasma rifle. Rodriguez shuddered.
"Most. It couldn't be helped. Eight thousand zygotes and a like number of download-packs. To move more would have brought too much suspicion. It should be enough."
She was right, of course. Eight thousand. More than enough for his purposes, when combined with the breeding stock Santiago and his crew represented. With Santiago's faction and a gene pool of zygotes eight thousand strong, chosen on Terra for their perfection, Genesis could begin anew. The download-packs, of course, would be discarded. Carrying the composite personalities, intellects, and skillsets deemed most likely to thrive in a hostile alien environment, they would have no place in the new garden.
The new Eden.
In the transparent tube, He floated. A thousand delicate landskin tendrils caressed him. Renewed, revitalized by the influx of nutrients fed to him through the landskin, He flexed the muscles of his arms and legs, reveling in the fresh power flowing through his body. Gone were the toxins of the man-things. Gone were the hundreds of small wounds, the anxieties, the fears. The metal instruments, the clamps and bonds, had cracked beneath the constant, worming pressure of landskin tendrils. When the time was right, they would burst.
He had watched as the men took Rian and deposited him in another tube nearby. Rian hung limp in the empty tube as the others attached metal clamps to his arms and legs. The men seized the landskin in their cruel hands, stretched it taut, creating tentacles, which they attached to Rian's skin. The landskin recoiled, loathe to touch Rian. He could feel its revulsion through the surface communion. But the men persisted and succeeded at last in attaching the tentacles.
Other men had come in, then, and used coiled hoses to pour the green fluid into Rian's tube. It rose to his ankles, his thighs, his waist, and still the man did not move. It covered his torso as other men climbed around the rim of the tube, inserting a sharp-ended tube of shiny black stuff between Rian's lips, down his throat. A hinged arm tipped with round cups descended from the ceiling. The man-thing called Pallas attached this to Rian's eyes. The fluid rose, covering Rian's chest, touching his chin. And then it swallowed him, and the men retreated, back to their tables and instruments, with obvious excitement.
Now He stared through the green bath in his own tube at Rian. The man called Pallas spoke to Rian, but He could not hear his words. Rian twitched, struggled. Anger and panic rode him like a heavy yoke.
He closed his eyes and opened himself to communion, remembering, learning. Communion broached hidden reservoirs of memory and dreams. Memories that stretched far back, before awareness, before sentience. Before the coming of Man. Memories of oneness, of completion and perfection. Memories that did not include Man, neither Gagash nor Bhajong, as they termed themselves.
Memories pushed forward, demanding recognition. He sensed with a hundred million organs the bright flare, the trailing arc, as the twinkling star descended. He tasted with a billion tongues the poisonous taint of noxious smoke and burning landskin as the star, surrounded by a coruscating, shimmering veil, settled slowly into a deep-rivered valley. He heard a roar greater than the heaving bellows of the ool with countless aural receptors. And he felt the tread of alien life on his skin.
Later, much later, he sensed their destruction of his perfection. The bipeds emerged from the belly of the fallen star to crawl about on the landskin, pierced living flesh with implements of metal and other foreign materials, dug deep into the solid bedrock and tapped the molten core of the world. Pillars of smoke climbed into the pristine cerulean skies, vast smudges that seemed to be tears in the fabric of the world. Artificial structures sprang up, erected in a blink, forever altering landscapes that had stood inviolate since the Beginning.
The memories included overwhelming patience, a learning of these invaders from the great Beyond. Attempts at communion failed. Those bipeds touched by the landskin became diseased, unclean. Memories of fire, consuming, pushing back his skin, away from their shining spheres and angular structures. Constant fires against the needful, constant encroachment of the landskin, the undeniable influx of life to cover barren lifelessness prevented, denied. Pain. Pain beyond bearing.
And still patience. A new thing, learning. Growth in a different manner, an expansion of consciousness, a disease brought by those from the Beyond. Recognition. Cognition. Awareness. Facility.
Still, the memories insisted, communion had been sought. And still it was denied. Revoked.
Ool came, trailing communion tentacles from feeding tubes, seeking by this last, greatest effort to establish contact. Fires, spit from coiled cylinders into the blue skies, enveloped ool, burned them, rendered them lifeless ash. A diminishing. A loss. Loss of communion, of completion, of perfection. Pain.
One came, different than the other bipeds, desiring contact, communication. He was welcomed. He came, seeking, and the world cried out with joy, believing this to be but the first tentative reach. This one experienced, communed, and was changed, altered. The others, those brought with him, refused to change, could not, and communion failed.
And still others sat in their shining spheres and structures, refusing, destroying.
He shook, trembling. He forced the memories away, away. Away.
But another door opened, reawakened during communion. The other side. The other perspective. Human. In a flash of insight, He realized that he possessed their memories as well, the pooled memories of these invaders from the stars.
Not Gagash. Not Bhajong. Not different. The same.
Those memories tore at him, and he could not face them. He shuttered them away and locked the recesses of his mind against the sudden influx.
Time---another gift of the Humans---passed, though He remained consciously oblivious of its passage. He opened his eyes and stared at Rian, the avatar of all that was hated, the focus of his rage. The other humans stood around He's prison, pouring over their notes, prodding at bits of his stolen tissue, manipulating the landskin in a hundred different, obscene ways. He could hear their voices. He watched them manipulate their machines, machines that poked him with needles and saws, stealing his tissue bit by bit for their tests.
The man called Pallas approached Rian, holding up a vial filled with pink, frothing liquid. Rian jerked, turning his body away. While He communed, the men had removed the cups from Rian's eyes.
"This is incredible, Rian. Incredible. The . . . anomaly you brought with you. It's fascinating."
Rian kept himself turned away. The other humans poked at He. He ignored them, watching Rian, fearing Rian.
He shifted. The clamps holding his legs cracked, bits breaking off to float down through the jelly. Soon. Soon.
"If I have the tube removed from your throat will you speak with me?" Pallas asked Rian.
Rian turned slowly in the clutching jelly. Pallas stepped back.
He moved his hands, touching the fine strands of landskin that filled his prison. He stroked them with his fingertips, caressed them, commanded them. They throbbed, answering his call.
"But you must, Rian," Pallas said. "We must know more of it. You must have left something out. Something that might not have seemed important, but is. Something seemingly trivial? This . . . enigma, this anomaly . . . it seems so close to human, close enough to have all the genetic markers common to our species. And yet more, so much more. There are tags I've seen only in the landskin, and others unique to the ool. Other markers suggest kinship with the drakes. The entity seems an amalgam of them all. Incredible."
Rian kept silent.
Pallas sighed. "You don't understand."
More. He commanded, demanded. The landskin shoved its way into the tube, expanding, straining against the tight confines. It flooded upward, enveloping He in a loose cocoon. Fine strands shot out from the walls of the cocoon, seizing the remains of the clamps on He's wrists and ankles. The tendrils squeezed, heaved, and tore loose the bonds. Pressure built, though He remained insulated within the cocoon.
Through the landskin sheath He heard the shattering of his prison. The mass of landskin crashed to the floor, carrying He along with it. It flowed away from him like water. He stood, free within a ring of men.
Rian's eyes snapped open as something crashed nearby. He heaved himself back against the far wall of his prison as the stranger's tube exploded, flooding the room with writhing, convulsing landskin. A central globe of landskin bubbled and frothed on the floor, pulsing like some great bellows.
Elders scrambled away from the globe, knocking over chairs in their haste. A spill of instruments danced across the hard metal floor. Glass shattered.
"What the . . ." Pallas turned his back on Rian, staring across the laboratory.
The bulge throbbed, cracks lacing, widening across its surface. Elders cried out as the landskin burst like a gigantic blister, spewing ichor and slime in a wide arc. Something rose from the ragged wound. A pale figure, dripping with ooze.
Rian jerked in his restraints, recognizing the stranger. His bonds held him fast.
The stranger surveyed the room in an instant, his gaze roving across the Elders pushing away from him, before traveling onward. Rian saw recognition and something else---fear?---in the stranger's eyes when that gaze fell on him.
The stranger leaped forward. Pallas scrambled out of the way, screaming. A braver Elder tried to interpose himself. Without pause the stranger seized the man's throat and jerked downward. He tossed the corpse aside. It crumpled to the floor, its head dangling at a bizarre angle.
The other Elders scattered. They bolted for the iris. One of the Elders paused long enough to slam his fist down on a switch. Klaxons rang out, and bright red warning lights flared into brilliance.
Rian struggled against his bonds, throwing his weight from side to side. He strained his arms, kicked out with his legs. He chewed on the tube in his mouth, gagging.
The stranger reached Rian's tube and raised his fists over his head. His eyes blazed with a strange light, and his mouth was drawn up into a fierce snarl. He slammed his doubled fists into the wall of Rian's prison, the impact rattling the tube on its base. Cracks shot through the glass, and fluid spewed out. Again the stranger pounded on the glass. And again. Chunks of glass broke away, falling to the floor.
The stranger reached into the shattered tube, his hands burrowing through the draining jelly to seize the tight knot of tentacles that bound Rian to the top of the tube. He grit his teeth and heaved. His banded muscles bulged. With the sound of tearing flesh, the tentacles ripped free. A flood of hot liquids washed out, bathing the stranger.
Rian fell to the floor. The stranger jerked on the tethers, heaving Rian through the ragged hole in the glass. Jags like daggers tore through Rian's skin, drawing blood. Rian squirmed, kicked out at the stranger's reaching hands. His bare foot smashed into outstretched fingers, snapping bones. The stranger took no notice. He tightened his grip on the mass of intertwined tentacles and jerked Rian toward one of the landskin pools.
Rian struggled, but the bonds held him tight. He coughed on the throat tube, frantically trying to force it from his mouth. He felt a rising surge from his stomach.
Guards poured into the room, armed with sporelances. The stranger ran toward the landskin pool, dragging Rian across the glass-littered floor, as the guards leveled their weapons. The stranger ignored them, leaping down into the central pit.
Rian's eyes widened as he saw a tremendous swelling rise from the pit, a great bulb of landskin that pitched and heaved and swayed. A hole opened in the bulb, and the stranger sank into it. Flowing like water, the landskin enveloped the stranger, swallowing him.
Sporelances barked, spewing wads of poisonous spores into the landskin. It shivered, but wrapped its folds tighter about the stranger. With a tremendous, heaving jolt, the landskin bulge sank into the pit, bearing the stranger down. Rian, caught by the attached tentacles, felt himself drawn into the pit, crashing into the landskin. It shot out hundreds of tendrils, wrapping around him in a bubble.
"No!" he heard someone scream as the landskin began to close. He saw a guard throw down his sporelance and leap. The guard's hands clasped around Rian's ankle. He hung on, and more guardsmen joined him, hands clawing at Rian's flesh.
"No! Don't let it take him!" Pallas screamed.
More guards poured into the room. Their lances riddled the landskin with poisonous spores. Gaping, dripping wounds appeared in the snaking landskin tentacles. Flesh sizzled and popped, bubbling with virulent toxins. Other guards grabbed at Rian, pulling him upward, back into the chamber of horrors.
Crackling, wounded shreds of landskin shot up from the pit, coiling into blunt knobs. The knobbed tentacles lashed out, smashing in skulls, breaking ribs, crushing limbs. Guards fell away, only to be replaced by others who pawed at Rian as he was drawn inexorably down into the pit.
With a final, sharp jerk, Rian sank into the hole, and the landskin swallowed him.
"You've led us to a dead end!"
Erekel spared her a withering glance. "I know. I can see that."
Acidslugs burst on the walls to either side of them, punctuating his words. Dersi ducked, avoiding the small, spreading clouds of corrosive gas. Erekel gasped and jerked his hand away from the wall as metal bubbled, liquefied.
"Hold your fire!" a figure at the far end of the hallway demanded. "Hold your damned fire!"
"What'll we do?" Dersi asked.
"I don't know. I must've taken a wrong turn somehow."
"I thought you knew this place."
"I told you, this place is vast. No one knows all of it."
A figure detached itself from the group at the end of the corridor and strode toward them. His shoulders squared, the man carried an acidrod, which he leveled at Erekel and Dersi. As he came closer and the lights triggered on the walls, Dersi recognized him.
"Lhedri! What are you doing here?" She felt confused. "Why are you doing this, Lhedri?"
"Lady Dersi, Lord Meloni sent me to safeguard your return. I trust you're well. These malcontents haven't harmed you?" He came forward, eyeing Erekel warily. He trained his acidrod on the center of Erekel's chest.
"Malcontents?"
Lhedri shrugged. "Rebels. Rabble. Call them what you will. Have they harmed you?"
"Stay back, Lhedri," Dersi said. She raised her hand, palm outward, commanding.
Lhedri smiled. "Lady Dersi, I can see that you're confused. It must be all the stress. You're safe now, I assure you. Come away from this man. Lord Meloni awaits you."
"No."
"No?"
"You heard her," Erekel said, puffing out his chest.
"You would be wise to keep silent, traitor," Lhedri said. "If you've harmed the Lady Dersi it will go worse for you. The rendering vats will seem like paradise."
"Stay away from me, Lhedri. I'm asking you, as a friend. Or, if that was false, I command you, as my father's daughter." She pushed aside the nagging memory of Erekel's assertion. Claiming him as father would certainly weaken her position.
"My apologies, Lady. But with the dormancy of the Veil Lords, Lord Meloni has taken command."
"Dormant? The Veil Lords?" She remembered Erekel saying something about that, but had not found the time to question him further.
"Come, Lady Dersi. We can discuss this on the way back to Lord Meloni. He will acquaint you with other things you need to know. I promise you, no harm will come to you. You have my word."
"I'm not going anywhere with you, Lhedri. Especially not back to that bowel-waste, Meloni."
Lhedri sighed and signaled to his men. They tromped forward along the corridor, acidrods held at the ready. "For reasons I can't comprehend, you seem to care for this old fool, Lady Dersi. That being the case, I assume you would be loath to see him harmed, or dead." He glanced at his guardsmen. "Kill him."
"What? No, wait! Stop!" Dersi cried. She moved in front of Erekel, putting her body before the acidrods.
Lhedri shook his head. "Lady Dersi, you put me in an untenable situation."
"Leave me here, Lhedri."
"I can't do that, Lady Dersi."
"Tell Meloni you couldn't find me."
"I'm afraid that won't work."
"Then it would seem we are at an impasse."
"It would seem that way, yes." Lhedri gestured, and four of his men peeled away. They ran back down the hallway.
"Where are they going?" Dersi asked.
Lhedri ignored her. Catching Erekel's eye, he said, "A dozen or more of your compatriots are down, dead or wounded. We saw more. I've just sent men to hunt those others down and kill them. If you value their lives, you'll step away from Lady Dersi and give her into our custody."
Dersi felt Erekel twitch, heard the gasp of alarm from his lips. He grasped her upper arm, squeezing, and she put her other hand on his. Dersi felt tears well up in her eyes for the lives lost, and the further losses still to come. The weight of her responsibility in those deaths weighed heavily on her shoulders. She shifted, pulling away from Erekel.
"Dersi, don't," Erekel whispered.
She shook her head. "I've got to. I . . . I can't let them die for me."
"They won't find them. They're gone by now."
"You don't know that," Dersi said. "Please, let me go."
"You don't know what you're doing!"
"Yes. Yes, I do." She hung her head as her fingers worked against his, prying his grasp away from her arm. She raised her eyes and seized Lhedri with her gaze. "Order your men to stand down, Lhedri. I'll come with you. There's no need for further killing."
Lhedri snorted. He barked out an order, and the four men halted at the intersection, their acidrods at rest. "A wise, compassionate decision, my lady. Already you display the wisdom of a Veil Lord."
"Shut up, Lhedri," Dersi spat. She pulled away from Erekel. "Allow this man to pass unhindered."
"By all means," Lhedri said. He gestured, and his men parted, clearing an avenue for Erekel to escape.
"Dersi, I can't . . ."
"Go. Just go. Don't make this be in vain." Dersi refused to meet his imploring gaze. She squeezed her eyes tight against the fear and loathing.
Erekel shuffled his feet, eyeing Dersi, Lhedri, and the other guards. Finally, he touched her shoulder, let his fingers trail along her arm and drop to his side. "Dersi . . ."
"Go."
Erekel shook his head and turned away from her. Lhedri stepped forward, laying hands on her arm, squeezing. He pulled her farther from Erekel. "Take him," Lhedri ordered. The guards sprang forward, seizing Erekel. One raised the butt of his acidrod and slammed it down on the dome of the old man's head. Erekel dropped to the metal floor, senseless, drooling.
"No! Lhedri, no!"
"Bring him. Lord Meloni will want to speak to him personally. You others fan out. Find the others and kill them. Kill them all."
"You promised!" Dersi screamed. She balled up her fist and struck Lhedri in the mouth. He recoiled, but did not lose his grip on her arm.
Lhedri jerked her around and pinned her arms at her sides, holding her from behind. She could smell the blood flecking his lips as he leaned in close to her and snarled in her ear. "He is a rebel. A traitor. They all are. There is no mercy for them, no leniency. Only death. I have my orders."
"I swear I'll kill you, Lhedri," Dersi said, her voice soft, hissing. She struggled against him, but he was too powerful. He pulled her arm behind her and levered it up toward her shoulder blades. She felt the stabbing pain in her shoulder.
"Be quiet. Be still. Don't force me to truss you. I do not want to hurt you, Lady Dersi. Not you, of all the Lords."
Dersi watched as Erekel was hauled up, his hands bound behind his back. A swelling purple bruise marred his wrinkled features, just above his left eye. In the center of the bruise a gash leaked blood into his eye. He shook his head, groggy.
"Erekel," Dersi whispered, straining against Lhedri.
The old man's head swiveled on its thin neck. Squinting, spilling blood down his cheek, he focused on her. "I'm alright, Dersi."
"I'm sorry, Erekel," she whispered. "I'm so sorry."
He shook his head. "Don't. I'm alright." He smiled, the gesture transforming into a wince of pain. "I've been in worse situations."
"Disgusting," Lhedri said. He jerked Dersi away, down the corridor. "Remember your station, Lady. Your emotions betray your status as a Lady."
"Don't talk to me of my station, Lhedri. Don't you dare."
He said nothing, pulling her along. They reached the intersection and moved toward the common room at the end of the corridor. Behind her, dragged along by two guardsmen, Erekel struggled to free himself. Dersi heard one of the men cuff Erekel, cursing.
Ahead of them one of the vanguard cried out. The harsh retort of an acidrod pierced the air, and the man reeled, crashing into the wall as his torso exploded in a spray of blood and acid. Dersi could hear angry curses and barked orders from the common room.
"What?" Lhedri tensed, pulling slightly away from Dersi.
Dersi struck. She leaned quickly forward, then snapped her head back. The back of her head cracked into Lhedri's face. Bone shattered. She felt a hot spray on the nape of her neck. Lhedri's hands came up to his face. Dersi ducked, pulling away from him.
A group of rebels charged down on them. Acidrods coughed up their wads of corrosives, a dozen slugs slamming into another man, melting his flesh from his bones. A bloody skeleton dripping organs collapsed to the floor. Other rebels came on, brandishing crude weapons, blades and daggers and saws, clubs and hammers. Lhedri's men knelt and raised the acidrods to their shoulders, firing into the mob.
The hiss and stench of the pitched battle stunned Dersi. She scrambled away from Lhedri's grasping hands. Lowering her shoulder, she slammed into one of the guardsmen restraining Erekel. The guard recoiled, stumbling into the wall. Erekel cracked his elbow into the other man's face, then pulled himself free. The guard Dersi had battered raised his acidrod. He trained its nozzle on Erekel. Dersi smashed her fist into his face. The acidrod barked, spewing its slug into the wall above Erekel's head. Erekel grabbed her hand and pulled her to him. She fell into his arms, overbalancing both of them. They tumbled to the blood-drenched floor in a heap as acidslugs crashed into the walls. The air itself stank of corrosives, and Dersi could feel her skin blistering, the pain gnawing at her.
"Come on," Erekel said, dragging her to her feet.
"Lady Dersi!"
Dersi turned and watched as Lhedri fought his way through the melee. He used his acidrod as a club in the tight quarters. Rebels hacked at Lhedri's guardsmen with crude, effective weapons. The guards fell back and struggled to gain room to use their superior arms. Dersi watched a guard die, his head crushed beneath the weight of a metal rod in the hands of a huge man in harvester's garb. Another guard drove the nozzle of his acidrod into the big man's face. He fired point-blank. The harvester's head vanished in a bright, repulsive spray.
Erekel pulled her back the way they had come. They reached the intersection as acidslugs plastered the walls around them. Dersi shot a glance back, seeing Lhedri coming for them, shouting over his shoulder for his men to stop firing on Lady Dersi. His own acidrod dripped blood from its butt, his arms coated with gore to the elbows.
"Here," Erekel cried, leading Dersi along a side passage that sloped sharply downward. Lights flickered on in advance of their progress, illuminating plain, unadorned walls of uniform metal.
"Where are we going?" Dersi's breath came ragged, rasping up from her throat alongside the burning taste of bile. Her legs throbbed. She could hear Lhedri behind them, gaining quickly. And then she stumbled, tripping over her own feet. She sprawled out, bouncing on the floor, and rolled into Erekel. Together they tumbled down the incline, limbs tangled, crashing again and again to the unyielding floor. Dersi's chin smashed down, jarring her teeth. She squeezed shut her eyes and screamed. Erekel echoed her cries.
At the bottom of the incline they bounced into a blank wall and rebounded. Dizzy, bruised, nauseous, Dersi tried to rise to her hands and knees but could not summon the power. She heard the huffing of Lhedri's breath from farther up the slope, his rasping voice cursing and crying out to her.
Erekel untangled himself from her scissored legs, rising on wobbling knees. He dripped blood from his mouth and the egg-sized knot on his forehead, and he groaned in pain. Still he struggled, crawling to the far wall as Lhedri halted on the slope and raised his acidrod to his shoulder.
"Erekel!" Dersi cried. An acidslug whizzed through the air, slamming into the wall mere inches from Erekel's outstretched hand. The harvester screamed as his flesh boiled, but he reached up, up, straining to touch the shallow depression in the wall.
Dersi heard the hissing thump of the acidrod firing again as Erekel's hand slid into the depression. Behind the crackling of the acidslug hurtling toward Erekel came a dull, mechanical clanking, as a door at the foot of the incline began to rise from the floor. Slowly. Too slowly.
Dersi screamed, defied her bone-weariness, and flung herself toward Erekel, straight into the path of the speeding acidslug.
She sped across the landscape, unaware of the razor-sharp leaves that sliced into her bare flesh, cutting her to the bone. As she broke through a line of trees, the inner warmth at her core rose up, sealing her wounds, leaving blood to dry in the cool evening air. In the distance communion beckoned---one of the creatures the aliens called drakes---but she ignored it, single-minded in her determination to reach He, driven by the undeniable call to join him, to commune with him and become one.
She passed through valleys and climbed ridges, forded streams and penetrated deep into clinging, cutting forests of once-alien trees, pulled like a lodestone toward the west, always the west, doubling back on ground she had already covered. Compelled by need.
Since dawn She had run, and her body began to fail, to falter. But the need drove her onward, ever onward. She stumbled and fell, tearing the skin from her face and forearms on sharp stones that protruded from the cushioning landskin. Her footsteps filled with blood as she rose and ran once more, and the landskin drank.
She must rest. But She could not. The need. The terrible, awesome, incredible need. The hunger and thirst of it pulled her onward.
Inside, she could feel the quickening as her body, responding to the closeness, began its preparations. Ovulation. She must find He quickly.
At dawn She had awakened to the screaming joy of the landskin communion. The joy that proclaimed that He had been found, that He was awake, and aware, and unfolding with knowledge and memory. At last He remembered, and communed. And the landskin cried out to her, kindling a beacon that pulled her.
She could taste him on the landskin with each faltering step, scent him in the pheromones expelled in her wake.
He was near.
She felt his wounds, but knew that he would recover, had begun recovery, and sought after something within the hated confines of the aliens' subterranean womb. Something dangerous. Something dire. The thought of his peril galvanized her to greater speed, allowed her to ignore the fatigue that permeated every cell of her body.
She knew pain, pain greater than a physical wound. He had not unfolded all the knowledge, was unaware of her, of his purpose, of their promised union. Unaware that She sought. He did not seek her. His knowledge remained incomplete.
But she would expand his consciousness, rid him of the taint of the aliens.
Procreate.
She ran down the steep side of a ravine and across sharp stones, cutting her feet, to kneel in the shadows of an oblong boulder. Her hand reached out, touching the rocky spot where, only days before, he had lain unconscious, unaware, unawake. Dried purplish crust, the residue of his crèche sack, lay thick on the landskin, coating the stones.
She glanced toward the north, toward the single wall of rock and clinging alien vegetation that had separated them from one another, unaware. No more than a morning's slow walk. So short a distance, yet days had passed, and more time would pass before their reunion.
Farther to the north, in a valley churning with parasitic aliens, the mother ool of them both lay dying, in the last throes of agonizing pain. She could still taste her, could recognize her pain.
She mourned.
Now, with his spoor close on the landskin, She could follow He's path with ease. She climbed the rocky slope, pausing in the shade of a razor-leafed tree that still tasted of him. Here the demands of her body caught up with her, and when she turned away to continue her pursuit She found she could not move her feet. She sank to the landskin, breathing heavily, unable to focus.
Cilia caressed her, sank into her skin, fed her. Unnoticed wounds warmed with renewal, closed. Depleted tissues swelled with newborn strength. Impatient, She tried to pull away. The landskin refused to let her go, clinging, suffusing her with power and communion.
She sent out a cry for him through the landskin, a summons.
And dire certainty came flooding into her in return, a sense of dread, of menace. She felt his fear, his nearly overwhelming panic, and an electric tingle traveled through her. The threat was real, and growing.
Come, she silently called. Come, quickly!
I am coming to reclaim you, daughter, came her God's reply, borne through the medium of the landskin. And in a flickering vision she saw them, saw them through the billions of sensory organs of the landskin: the ool, dozens of them, flocking toward her, churning the clouds into broken mists in their passage.
Rian stumbled within the bubble as a tremor swept through the landskin. He fell to his side and rolled. The tentacles, rising up from his sides and disappearing into a sphinctered opening above, wound around his body, stretched taut. His chin slammed into the tough, fibrous flesh. His teeth clamped down around the tube in his throat. He felt something snap inside and tasted a hot gush of blood. Swallowing, he chewed on the tube.
Wondering at the disturbance in the landskin, he managed to wiggle to his knees, his back pressed against the wall of the bubble. A shiver passed through the landskin at the touch of his naked skin. He smelled the acrid stench of burning flesh and turned to see a fizzing, oozing wound in the landskin.
His bubble pitched, rolling, keeping the wounded area away from him. Rian lost his footing again and fell. One of the tentacles, stretched taut, snapped and fell across his naked chest. He pressed his back against the landskin. Again the bubble trembled, shuddered, and he felt oozing liquid well up beneath him, hot and stinging.
Rising to his feet once more, Rian strained against the tendrils that rose through the apex of his bubble. Balancing against the undeniable sensation of movement, he turned in place, slowly winding the tentacles around his body, stretching them tighter and tighter. His breathing became labored as his ribs pressed down on his lungs.
When he could wind himself no more, he strained against the taut tentacles, backing into the landskin wall. He pressed against the shivering flesh. Held there, while his bubble lurched and the landskin foamed. Held there, while the bubble rotated, shifting his feet to keep his balance, straining against the pull of his alien umbilicals.
The bubble pitched, flipping over. Rian fell, eyes widening, trying to twist his body around so that he would not land on his face. The tentacles jerked him up short of the landskin floor, stretched, and screeched in protest. One by one they snapped, whipping around like lashes, scoring his flesh, drawing fresh blood. As the last of them broke Rian crashed down to the curving floor, landing on his shoulder and the side of his face. The tube in his mouth cracked. Sharp, brittle shards stabbed into his cheeks and gums. He gagged on the nether end, as it slid down his throat, and lodged there.
Frantic, he heaved, tried to cough. He chewed on the shattered prosthesis, his teeth biting through crackling outer husk and into rancid, gooey tissues within. His tongue worked at the mouthpiece, pushing it from between his teeth. He gagged, hunched over, strangling on foreign tissue and his own bile and blood.
Around him the bubble continued to heave, and Rian was tossed about like a doll, banging into the sides of the sphere, smearing the walls with blood.
At last his teeth cracked through the remnants of the tube, piercing the thick strand of muscle that held it all together. Jerking his head from side to side he forced the tube from his mouth. He vomited, and the rest of the construction spewed from his throat, bathing him in digestive juices.
Shivering, crying, Rian lay on the wildly pitching landskin, unable to summon the strength to do more. He managed to roll to his stomach. His forehead pressed against the oozing, ruined flesh of the landskin.
Dimly he became aware that the sensation of movement had stopped, though he could not then decide the importance of that. Spent, he lay panting, moaning just to hear the sound of his own voice, and wept.
Curled up within the landskin bubble, He drank in the communion, learning, consciousness expanding as wave after wave of memory, dream, pounded into him, flooding him. He fought against the deluge, but could not contain it.
Know this, son. The voice echoed through the landskin, coming from all around him, powerful, undeniable. A voice he should know, a power he should recognize. He almost touched it, almost grasped it. But the knowledge slid away, just beyond his reach. Know this.
He shrank in upon himself, arms wrapped around his head, tears leaking from his eyes as the memories came, the hateful memories.
The memories of the others, the outsiders, the humans. All of their memories, their thoughts, their dreams. They came to him in a flood, the blessed, cursed release of knowledge that flowed to him through the landskin. And He knew. He knew. Those hateful, infesting aliens, who had come down from the stars to pervert the perfection of the Family---He knew the minds of all of them who had died and been absorbed upon this, his world.
He twitched in the throes of dream/memory, fighting to emerge. The flood of images continued, unabated. Thousands of individuals, separated by hundreds of years, all distinct, all unique, diverse. All of their memories were his. All, for this was the beauty of the Family, that knowledge, memory, thought---these things were not lost from generation to generation, but continued, carried over, protected.
He drowned in the racial memories of the humans, awash in their pains and progresses, their failures and achievements. From the dimmest ancestral visions: swinging through trees on prehensile tails, gathering insects from overturned logs; developing the first of the crude tools---sticks thrust into gigantic conical termite mounds---that would gain their species ascendance and dominance on their homeworld; creating fire; roaming great plains; settling, building structures that would expand into mammoth cities, crawling with their kind. Later: the first tentative steps spaceward, pitiful launches of little more than habitable bombs. Failures, successes. The first footfall on a surface other than their own overdeveloped world. Thousands of developments, thousands of breakthroughs, each hurtling them farther and farther from their point of origin. The founding of their Hegemony, and its expansion.
He fought to awaken, terrified by the flickering images that he could recall as vividly as his own first waking, crude thoughts. He was them. All of them. He lived their lives, experienced their triumphs and failures, their loves and hatreds, their cruelties and their grandiose, prophetic dreams. So many, separate, driven. A horde of disconnected, yet unified memories.
The nightmares plagued him, the loneliness these creatures felt. Apart from the Family, kept apart by their own selfishness and greed. Oh, communion with the Family had been offered them. Communion. But they had refused, all but the least part of them. More, they opposed the Family, sought to thwart it, to destroy its perfection and beauty. Ill content to join in the blessed communion, these hateful creatures from another world had refused the generous, awesome gift of communion, and refused it still.
They were imperfect. Alien. Hostile. Enemies.
This creature, this Rian . . . He felt hot hatred boiling in his gut, an inferno of rage.
Rian must die! He must kill Rian!
A voice thundered through the landskin, rattling it. A Voice. He jerked awake, shaking, cowering. The voice. The undeniable, unyielding voice. No! Bring him. Bring him to me.
And the final barrier to He's memories shattered, splintered into a million bits. Knowledge flooded in, knowledge of his origins. Knowledge of his God. His master.
I come, the God said. I come to bring you back into the embrace of the Family. This Rian. You will bring him to me. For I have determined that Rian is a weapon of my enemy, a weapon I must understand. Bring him to me.
Your will be done, my God, He communed through the landskin. Your will be done.
He felt the sudden slack in the tethers by which he held Rian. The cilia lining his sphere hissed. He reached out, accepting the penetration of the needle-headed strands, opening himself to communion. Awareness flooded him, a vast flood of perception. He felt the surging approach of dozens of ool, the peculiar lassitude of countless drakes drawn into quiescence by the approaching dawn, the endless caress of the wind across his limitless skin. Below, in the bunkers of the Gagash, the parasites poked and prodded at the landskin, introducing poisonous cells, cousins of the abomination. And---
She.
He jerked away from the cilia, twitching. The muscles throughout his body spasmed, responding to impossible, illogical stimuli. Stimuli that he recognized, on a primitive level, had been there all along, submerged, battered into a corner of his mind by the deluge of awakening memories. Now . . . Now he could no longer block away the urgent need.
She.
Every nerve in his body screamed fire, twisting tendrils that climbed from his genitalia, irrepressible demands on his being, his body, his mind. Heart pounding, blood streaming, pounding in his ears, his limbs rigid, unresponsive to his mental commands. His breath came hot and heaving, ragged gasps that he felt in his toes.
She.
No. I come, and I will succor both of you. Do this. Bring me the creature, Rian. Bring him to me. The God's voice reverberated through the landskin, powerful, insistent.
But He, gripped by primal urges, could not hear the voice of his God.
He seized a fold of the landskin with both hands. Screaming, he ripped it apart. With a ragged sound of tortured flesh the landskin parted. Plasma gushed out over him, a wash of hot, slick liquid. The cilia went wild, lashing at him, thrashing, whipping at his naked skin. He felt nothing. He reached into the raw, open wound in the landskin and seized chunks of flesh, ripping them away and tossing them behind him into the sphere. He burrowed through the landskin, ignoring the cries, the entreaties, the ravaged pain that shot through communion.
Reacting, agonized, the landskin retreated. A tunnel opened up before him, climbing upward. Tentacles shot from the walls, seizing him, wrapping around arms, legs, torso. They shoved him upward, carrying him aloft as if through some gigantic throat. Frenzied, prey to primordial instincts, he fought against the restraints. He was powerless against the landskin, held immobile as it surged up through the cracks in the land.
Mate.
The landskin attempted communion, but He could not. It begged, cajoled, strove to awaken his kinship. But He felt only the undeniable surge of procreative energy rising from deep within, flooding through his bloodstream, awakening nerves long dormant, causing his skin to tingle, his muscles to throb. Against such primal instincts, cognition could not prevail.
He rose through the landskin. Ahead, the landskin parted, allowing a glimpse of blue skies.
He could sense her.
Female. She.
Lhedri cursed as Dersi flung herself in front of the rebel, Erekel. He heard her scream. The gap between the ceiling and the rising wall shrank. Erekel screamed Dersi's name in panic, his voice raw, ragged, as the door closed with a resounding crash.
Panic seized Lhedri. Had the slug hit Lady Dersi?
He rushed down the incline to the blank wall at its end. With the butt of his acidrod he beat on the metal. But the wall resisted his efforts without a scratch. Breathing heavily, Lhedri brought his acidrod to his shoulder, stepped back, and sent slug after slug into the wall. Acidslugs ruptured, spilling hissing, sizzling wads of corrosives across the metal face. Acid devoured the metal, eating deep, sending runnels of bubbling fluid dripping to the floor.
At last his acidrod was depleted, and still the door stood, partially melted but strong. He threw the acidrod down in disgust.
"Dersi! Lady Dersi!" he called. His voice echoed through the corridor.
Behind him footsteps betrayed the approach of Lhedri's guards.
"Captain Lhedri!" One of the guards, a man with a bulbous nose and thick eyebrows above deep-set, pale eyes, stepped forward and saluted with precision. His acidrod still smoked, a delicate plume of greenish smoke rising from its nozzle.
"Report, Cadrin!" Lhedri snapped.
"We've routed them, sir. A few escaped, but not many."
"How many?"
Cadrin shrugged. "No more than a handful, at most. I've detached parties to hunt them down. We'll get them all."
Lhedri nodded and turned away, staring at the acid-scarred wall. "Lady Dersi and Master Erekel disappeared behind this wall. We've got to get through it."
"Your acidrod doesn't seem to have had much effect," Cadrin said.
"No. It didn't. Still, there must be a way through. Fan out and search this area. Look for a trigger or a latch." Lhedri took an acidrod from one of the other men and checked its load. Six acidslugs remained.
If Lady Dersi were hurt . . .
Lhedri cursed. How could he have known she would react with such . . . stupidity? There really was no other term for her actions. What hold could Erekel have on Dersi, that she would so selflessly throw herself into the path of certain death to save him?
He shook his head. That argument would win him no mercy from Lord Meloni. If the wall came down and Lhedri faced the gruesome scene of Lady Dersi's acid-ravaged body, how could he return to Lord Meloni? More, how could he live with himself? His heart caught in his throat at the mere thought of such a thing. Dersi was . . . He pushed the unwanted thought away. Whatever else she might be, Dersi was a Lordling, daughter of the Veil Lord Huldru. While he . . . he was a mere soldier, a servant.
"Captain Lhedri! I think I've found it," one of the guards called from near the back wall face.
Lhedri hurried over and stared at the shallow depression inset at shoulder height in the wall. Glaringly obvious compared to the plainness of the rest of the corridor, the depression seemed sized to fit a hand. Thinking back, Lhedri recalled he had seen other, similar depressions in the walls of this alien installation, marking hundreds of places other rebels could still be hiding.
What was this place?
He pushed aside the young guard who had found the depression and, facing the acid-scarred wall, slowly pushed his hand into the niche. An almost imperceptible tingling rose beneath his palm. He jerked back his hand.
He heard a muted rumbling coming from walls, ceiling, and floor.
"I want Lady Dersi alive. Unharmed." If she was not already dead. But Lhedri turned from that very real possibility, refusing even to consider it.
She could not be dead. Could not!
"Dersi, no!" Erekel ignored the boiling pain of his arm and threw himself at Dersi's hurtling form. His shoulder crashed into the small of her back, sending her spinning into the rising wall. He heard the crack of her impact and her cry. His arm flaring in agony, Erekel crumpled to the floor as the acidslug whizzed scant inches overhead and slammed into the far wall. It burst in a shower of rancid green, consuming smoke.
"Dersi!" Lhedri's voice eked through the narrow gap as the wall rose. Erekel flinched as acidslugs slammed again and again into the other side of the blank metal.
The wall met the ceiling with a dull click.
Erekel crawled over to Dersi, who lay motionless on the cold floor. He reached out, biting back a cry of pain as his bubbling skin stretched taut, cracking open, leaking blood. He cradled the limb awkwardly, afraid to touch it. Tears streamed from the corners of his eyes and a low whine escaped his lips.
The small room lurched. Erekel braced himself against the sensation of rapid downward movement. A low hum leeched through the walls. The floor vibrated.
Dersi groaned and rolled over on her side. Her hand rose and touched her jaw. "What did you do to me?"
Erekel managed to grin through the pain. He nodded toward the far wall, where dripping acid ate ravenously through the blank metal. "Saved . . . your life. That was meant for . . . me. Not . . . not you, Dersi."
"I couldn't . . . couldn't let you die for me," she whispered. She drew her knees up and leaned against the wall, brushing a strand of her pale hair from her face.
"Very noble. Not terribly smart. But thanks," Erekel said. He hissed as a fresh wave of pain picked at the edges of his consciousness. His stomach roiled.
"You're hurt." Dersi crawled over to Erekel and reached out for his arm. He held it out for her, almost afraid to look at it, knowing what he would find. The skin had peeled back, eaten away by the corrosive juices, exposing banded muscle. Blood and pus oozed from the hand-sized wound, dripping onto the floor. "That looks . . ."
"Hurts. But I think . . . the acid's lost . . . its potency." The flesh and blood no longer boiled, and now fresh, untainted blood welled up from deep within the wound.
Dersi took the hem of her sleeping gown and tore away a long strip of soft cloth. She wrapped the strip loosely around the raw wound. "It should be washed, but this will have to do for now."
"Tha---" Pain and exhaustion caught up with Erekel, and he slumped over, unconscious.
Dersi caught Erekel as he fell. His body was slight, almost weightless. She lay him down, positioning him so that his wounded arm lay across his chest. Then she extricated herself from him, rose, and glanced around the small room. Other than the slight depression in one wall and the scars in the walls from the acidslugs, the room was featureless, a plain metal box.
It moved, she was certain of it. Slight tremors rose up from the floor through the soles of her feet. The walls, too, vibrated. What was this place? She touched the wall that had slid up from the floor and felt a dull thump from its other side. A few moments later another thump traveled through her fingertips.
She could not stay in here forever. Erekel, for one thing, needed attention. The acid wound would require much more than just loose bandages. At the very least it needed to be washed free of the residual toxins. And neither of them carried water or food. If this were an ool tunnel sustenance would be no problem. She could stroke a feeding tube from any wall. But here, in this place . . .
Dersi rubbed her jaw, wincing at the tender spot where she had crashed into the rising wall. She stared down at Erekel. Even in his sleep the wound troubled him. He clenched his jaw whenever the slightest movement jostled his arm. A slight groan escaped his thin lips.
Without pause, she stepped over Erekel and slid her hand into the depression in the wall, feeling a subtle shifting. The vibrations throbbing through the room slowed, then stopped.
Hidden machinery clanked and rumbled as the door slid down into the floor. The revealed corridor stretched straight ahead, disappearing into darkness. Lights blinked, flickered, and slowly settled into a harsh white glare along the ceiling. In the glow she could see the corridor ended in another blank wall no more than a hundred paces distant.
Careful not to touch his wounded arm, Dersi dragged Erekel into the corridor, afraid that if she left him alone the room would seal him away again. He groaned as she lay him down against one wall. The heat rising from his forehead indicated an encroaching fever.
"Hold on, Erekel," Dersi whispered. She rose and walked down the corridor, her footsteps echoing in the tight confines. Behind the walls she could hear a dull whirring buzz, another alien sound among so many she had experienced in the last few hours. She shivered and tugged the remains of her gown tighter about her shoulders.
As expected, there was a slight depression on the right-hand wall at the end of the corridor. Taking a deep breath, she slid her hand into it, then stepped back, crouching, ready for whatever might be beyond.
The door slid down into the floor, and Dersi gasped in wonder.
Lord Meloni paced Veil Lord Huldru's chamber, his hands laced behind his back, his gaze trailing across the dormant sensory tentacles and organs. Lhedri was past his deadline. Well past. Meloni refused to think what that could mean, allowing the slow, burning anger to build into a pyre.
At the sound of hesitant footsteps on the resinous floor, Meloni turned toward the shattered doorway. A guard saluted, kneeling, and Meloni felt a thrill of pleasure at the unfamiliar gesture of subservience. When he veiled, such abject humility would be commonplace. But now it made him smile.
The idea that smiling would be beyond him when he veiled flitted through his mind, but he ruthlessly crushed the rebellious impulse. A small price to pay, regardless. Trivial, even.
"Yes? What is it?" Meloni demanded, coming back to himself.
"Lord Meloni, the throats . . ."
"Yes? The throats, what?"
"They . . . they're not working."
"Which ones? Send a carver team to see to it."
"It . . . It's all of them, Lord Meloni. All the throats. None of them work."
"None of them?"
The guard nodded. Meloni, frowning, noticed for the first time that the man's eyes were wide, his mouth a tight line.
"That's impossible," Meloni said.
The guard opened his mouth to reply but snapped it shut as a tremendous shudder swept through the Veil Lord's chamber. Meloni staggered to his knees as the floor heaved beneath his feet. The dangling tentacles shivered with the motion. The ool itself seemed to shake, to tremble. The guard fell back, crashing into a wall.
"What's happening!" Meloni was wide-eyed with fear as he climbed to his feet. A ripple surged up through the floor, shattering resin into tiny, piercing shards. Like a wave of flesh, the ripple traveled across the chamber. Veil Lord Huldru's base cracked, partially torn from its moorings. Purplish black fluids spurted from writhing roots. Chunks of Huldru's hardened body broke free, tumbling into the widening chasm at his base.
Meloni, borne on the wave of rolling flesh, grabbed at cracks in the floor, at dangling tentacles, at hissing, pumping organs. Nothing could stop the surge as it heaved him into the air. He crashed down, instinctively rolling, and smashed into the wall.
As suddenly as it had begun, the tumult died. Silence, stillness, descended like a curtain, and Meloni lay on the broken resin listening to the sound of his own heart beating. Nearby the guardsman who had brought him word of the throats' failure lay broken, bent double, folded like laundry. Plumbed from the depths of the ool, enzymatic fluid welled up around the corpse. The guard's flesh sloughed from his bones as the fluid consumed him.
Meloni staggered to his feet, calling for his guards. No one responded. He ran from Huldru's chamber, tripping over the broken floor of the main artery. In the distance he could hear screams of terror and pain. Unsure where he was going, Meloni ran onward.
He passed another Veil Lord's chamber---Veil Lord Merisi's?---and glanced inside. Stunned, he stumbled into a wall, his eyes widening, his jaw dropping. A massive crack split the floor of Veil Lord Merisi's chamber, a crack from which rose the heaving, translucent sack of her womb. As Meloni watched, the sack ruptured, flooding the chamber with thick, viscous ooze. Darker objects, vaguely man-shaped, tumbled from the deflating sack, squirming, writhing in the jelly. One of the figures rose on ill-shaped forelimbs and opened its maw. Hundreds of lashing strands emerged between rows of needlelike teeth. A single round orb opened in the center of the creature's forehead.
Meloni backed away, his feet leaden. His knees knocked against one another, and a burning sensation crept up from his gut as bile rose into his throat.
Another creature climbed up on stalklike hind legs, rising until its long, serpentine neck nearly touched Merisi's dangling sensory tentacles. Its neck fanned in a mammoth hood, and its jaws split wide, belching out fat white tentacles that seemed to sniff at the air. More and more of the creatures crawled from the slimy bath of the sack, each horribly different. Yet each bore some unmistakable residue of Bhajong heritage.
Where Bhajong children should have crawled weakly forth, monsters emerged, twisted, distorted perversions of nature that cried and screeched and mewed, hungering. They turned toward him, and Meloni could see the ravenous hunger in their eyes, the feral power in their twisted forms.
What horror could have so perverted Merisi's children?
Screaming, Meloni ran, unaware of his surroundings, seized by a panic he could not resist.
He found himself in the council chamber, an immense drained heart with rings of formed benches surrounding a central podium. Here nearly a hundred Bhajong were gathered, and they rushed to greet him, crying out questions, demands, seeking answers. Their voices rose to an indecipherable cacophony, and Meloni had to beat their hands away from him. He forced his way through the sea of grasping, tugging Bhajong toward the podium.
"What's happening, Lord Meloni?"
"My son! My daughter! Where are they?"
"What was that tremor?"
The questions slammed into him, and he had no answers. He reached the podium and raised his hands, demanding silence. The crowd pressed close, all eyes on Meloni.
"Wait!" Meloni cried. "Wait!"
Someone at the outer edge of the gathered Bhajong screamed. Other voices rose in cries of alarm. Men, women, and children pressed toward the podium, away from the doors.
Through the doors came a horde of misshapen creatures, their horrid voices grunting, wailing. They pressed toward the Bhajong.
APF 0002
Santiago had heard the whispers, the doubts. He chose to ignore them, knowing that strong, confident leadership was necessary, not tantrumic displays of his power. Still, it galled him that these men and women he had led across the Hegemony and beyond the borders of known space, to this alien world, would doubt him now.
But in the wake of the Exodus, as some were now calling Rodriguez's rebellion and flight from Ship, there was precious little remaining to them beyond doubt. Doubt and fear and a keen sense of aloneness in the universe. Severed from the Hegemony by the traitorous acts of a man Santiago had trusted, Ship's crew needed guidance. They needed leadership. They needed an authoritarian hand, if they were ever to recoup their losses and regain a toehold on this barren world.
He had not wanted command, not again. His last stroke had depleted his strength and rendered him feeble. Only through the rigorous barrage of drugs and physical therapy had he been able to regain some small portion of his old stamina, his old, reliable constitution. He knew he was a shadow of his old self now. A pale, withered shadow.
But strength did not reside in the body alone. There was strength of character. Strength of will. Strength of the mind. Santiago could say without undue vanity that he remained among the strongest of the crew.
He pushed himself to his feet in his office. The trembling began almost at once in his knees, his ankles. And then pain. Shooting pain that traveled through his shins and up into his knees, lodged there, twisting, spiteful, before voyaging onward to torture his hips and lower back. The pain was insistent, inevitable, unbanishable by even the strongest of drugs. Santiago had determined to bear the pain. It would not become his master, nor he its slave. He would triumph over it, despite the costs.
Standing to spite the pain, he queued ShipsNet, accessing Ship's systems. His gaze roamed the long list of statistics, assessments, and requests from Damage Control. He had no need to read the reports; he knew each detail, each damning, threatening item in the long catalogue of offline systems. The core was dead, irreplaceable. And with it the null shield that had become the permanent barrier to the encroachments of the landskin. They had reverted to the use of electrified fences, crude things strung up along the perimeter and powered by the secondary power generators that continued to function. But for how long? How long before even those meager reserves gave out, leaving them powerless, defenseless against the pervading advance of that disgusting biomass?
He shook his head. Not long. The techs worked day and night, attempting to devise an alternate means of powering Ship and her environs. But the Hegemony---perhaps lacking foresight---had assumed the core would power the newborn colony until more permanent means could be devised for supplying the necessary energy on-surface. The core could easily have met the needs of a colony numbering just over a million.
More worrisome, still, was the loss of the communications array. Damaged beyond repair. A new one would have to be constructed, if the remaining techs and scientists could locate the data-composite that contained the knowledge of how to do so.
The list went on. And on.
"Damn you, Rodriguez!" Santiago said, his tongue oily and foul as it tripped over the man's name. "I trusted you, thought you were different than the rest. And this . . . This is how you repay me."
Eighty-eight Servicemen and -women had been killed in the Exodus. Rodriguez's scheme had been exceptionally well planned. Thirty soldiers killed in the backwash as the commandeered XV launched from Ship, their bodies incinerated beyond recognition. Twenty-eight more blown to bits in the explosions that had rifled through Ship, destroying system after crucial system, rendering Ship a shadowed husk of its former efficiency. Twelve died of injuries sustained in minor accidents---the explosions had weakened bulkheads, torn through retaining walls, and devastated a medical wing. Fifteen killed in firefights with the rebellious soldiers who had gone over to Rodriguez's side. Three buried beneath tons of rubble, beyond any hope of recovering their bodies.
Santiago had seen action before. He had seen death before. Death and destruction, and the potential for both, went hand in glove with Hegemony Service. He had stormed the bastions of resistance fighters, men being vaporized by pulse weapons at either side of him, challenging the threat of instant death and emerging victorious. He had commanded warships in the heat of interstellar combat, driven to heights of anxiety and thrill by the whine of the big guns and the percussive thrumming of missile launch. He had ordered planetary bombardments, watched from the bridge as hellbore missiles impacted the blue-green worlds sitting below him and exploded, demolishing strongholds and cities alike.
He knew death. It was an old companion to him. A hated, familiar idol that claimed hero and coward alike, at whim. It held no mysteries for him.
But this . . . this was different. This was a betrayal. A crime. A sin. Murder, on a scale that would have earned Rodriguez an agonizing death within the bounds of the Hegemony.
ShipsNet chimed, dispelling Santiago's bleak foray into the realm of accusation and recrimination. He queued comm, and his secretary's grime-smudged face winked onto his display.
"Captain, the crew is assembled," she said, her voice tight, clipped. A good soldier. Standing by her duty, despite the morass of confusion that enveloped Ship.
"Very good, Ensign. Have the assembly called to order and I'll be down presently."
"Will you be needing assistance, sir?" She said it matter-of-factly, without criticism. Good material.
"No. I can manage on my own, Ensign."
"Very well, sir," she said, and disconnected.
Santiago stretched, groaning at the pain but refusing to give in to it, and gathered the materials he would need for the briefing. Before he left his office he cast a last glance at the viewscreen mounted on the outer wall. It displayed the arc of the planet immediately surrounding ShipSite, desolate and empty, covered with the pervading landskin.
Somewhere out there was Rodriguez.
"Soon. Soon, Rodriguez. I'll come for you. I'll come for you, and nothing will stop me." He turned from the viewscreen and strode with certain, measured steps toward the door.
Santiago stepped out onto the makeshift stage that had been erected in the only mess hall that remained in operating condition. Before him gathered the soldiers remaining in his command. They fell quiet, the bedlam of individual conversations trailing into silence, and watched him, waiting.
"I didn't expect to ever be addressing you all again. Certainly not under these circumstances." Santiago stared into their eyes, his gaze locking on them, one after another. He noted several of the men and women exchange significant glances. One man touched his female companion's hand, held it tight. She whispered something in his ear. He frowned, shook his head.
"We are faced with a situation as grave as any I've ever encountered. Indeed, as grave, or graver, than any faced in the history of the Hegemony. I've never been one to believe ignorance of circumstances serves any real advantage, neither in war, nor in peace. That being the case, I'm going to lay it out for you, so that you all know what we face, and will face, as our time on this world drags on."
Santiago paused, letting his words sink into them. He saw fear slowly spread upon their faces. But also determination and anger. Good. Anger he could use.
"Yesterday morning a group of dissidents led an armed revolt inside Ship. With tragic loss of life, they secured the release of Commander Alberto Rodriguez and a number of his compatriots, men and women I had ordered confined to quarters until the situation here on this world stabilized. From what we have been able to piece together, Rodriguez and his rebels were able to seize control of one of Ship's hangars and commandeer an XV. With a cargo consisting of various small arms, powered armor, durable goods and electronics, foodstuffs, and potable water, the dissidents achieved separation, despite the valiant efforts of a number of our security personnel.
"We're estimating approximately two hundred twelve dissidents departed with Rodriguez, including most of the scientific staff and a number of compromised security personnel." Santiago paused, putting his hand to his head as a fresh wave of pain spasmed up his legs. He pushed it aside, refusing to acknowledge it. These valiant men and women who had followed him across half the galaxy, deserved better. "In addition, a great deal of medical and scientific equipment was stolen, other pieces destroyed, seemingly out of spite. Most alarming, both the core and the communications array have been destroyed. We cannot communicate with the Hegemony. We're on our own here.
"Yet that's not the worst of it. You all know we lost a number of vital personnel, including Captain Luther, who assumed command in the wake of my recent . . . difficulties. Casualties are estimated at eighty-eight dead, two hundred thirty-one seriously injured. Primarily due to a hidden virus program that launched with the XV's departure. This virus rendered the fusion core of Ship inoperable." He sighed. "It's not repairable. And without it, the null shield has failed. We cannot stop the encroachment of the biomass, nor defend ourselves with sufficient force should another attack of the . . . drakes, as Rodriguez called them . . . come against us again. Our heavy weapons are disabled. Again, they are not repairable.
"We are operating on reserve battery power alone. At present usage, estimates on reliable power range from twelve to twenty-four standard hours. After that, only essential functions can be maintained."
A great wave of disquiet traveled through the room. Voices raised in alarm. The babble of conversations swelled, becoming an amorphous, roiling cacophony. Santiago's head began to pound.
"Mechanics is working on rigging substitute power sources---windmills and solar collectors. In addition, we've managed to tap a geothermal node beneath Ship and should be able to convert enough power to keep vital systems active. But the null shield is gone. The heavy weapons are gone. Nothing, short of another fusion core, can power them effectively."
Santiago stepped away from the podium. He strode forward, standing on the edge of the stage, and seemed to spear them all with his intense gaze. "You all know me. This mission was mine, before . . . before my stroke. I voluntarily stepped down and allowed others to assume command. Well, that's changed. In the wake of the significant loss of life and the critical loss of talent and technology, I'm assuming command once more. Effective immediately, this facility is under martial law. You, as the remaining military personnel 'board Ship, are my enforcing arm. You will report directly to Gunnery Sergeant MacCallum, who will coordinate everything through me."
Santiago gestured toward the door at the far end of the stage, the door through which he had emerged earlier. He heard the unmistakable whir and thrum of powered battle armor, and out of the shadows came a massive figure. The overhead lights cast sparkles across the gleaming plasteel plates of MacCallum's armored figure. Huge black coils snaked across his shoulders, and on an articulated arm swung the cruel cylinder of a flamer. The visor of MacCallum's helmet was recessed, revealing his rugged, no-nonsense features.
Mac cleared his throat, the sound amplified by the armor's internal speakers. "The captain's spoken about what the techies are doing to resolve the power situation. That's fine. That's good. That's not my area, however. I'm a fighter, a warrior. It's what I do best. And it's what I'm going to be concentrating on. We're not going to sit idly by and wait for this planet to assault us. And we're not going to sit on our collective asses while that loony Rodriguez makes off with equipment and personnel that are vital to our survival. No.
"What we're going to do, soldiers, is what we're paid to do. Make war, pure and simple. We're going after Rodriguez and his crew. And when we're done with them, we're going to tame this planet for the Hegemony."
Rian struggled to his knees, then climbed to his feet, a task made all the more difficult by the restraints still encircling his torso and the heave and pitch of the rolling landskin. Glancing down, he noticed hairline fractures snaking across the chitinous outer shell of the tentacles. He strained, testing the breaks. Chunks of the outer shell flaked away, falling with muffled patters to the mottled, festering landskin. The taut fibers beneath the chitin stretched. Stretched, but refused to give. They snapped back elastically when he relaxed.
Sighing, Rian breathed deep, gathering his strength. There might have been a bit of slack around his middle arm, enough to possibly allow him to slide it free. That done, extricating himself from the bonds would be simple. Sweat dripped down his forehead, trickling into his eyes. The close air of his little pocket was hot and moist, pumped through countless layers of landskin from the surface to this deep, closed-off place. He shook his head, sprinkling droplets of perspiration. Bile and rancid, acidic tastes stained his tongue, and he spit to clear his palate. His throat hurt where the shattering tube had sliced into its lining.
His spittle sizzled on the landskin, thin curls of smoke rising. His bubble shivered, and the landskin pulled back, attempting to draw away from Rian's saliva. Rian stared at it, puzzled by the bizarre reaction.
He relaxed for a moment, calming himself, working in miniscule increments to gain slack in the tentacles. Heaving, straining, Rian felt the bonds stretch once more, giving a little. He shrugged his middle arm, working it upwards, tearing layers of skin from his forearm. The oozing blood seemed to help; his arm slid slowly upward. A moment later he jerked it free. He collapsed to his knees. Beneath him, the landskin rolled, shifting, flowing as if to escape contact with his skin.
In a short time Rian succeeded in freeing himself. He tossed the loose tentacles away and squatted, resting. He coughed up a great wad of blood and mucus and spit. The landskin shivered as the spittle struck it, agitation traveling outward in expanding rings of disturbed flesh.
Curious.
Exhaustion and consuming pain in his throat forced him to his hands and knees. As he hunched over and gagged on thick clots of blood caught in his throat, he realized that the pain had begun to fade. Warmth spread out from the center of his chest, flooding his limbs with tingling heat. The warmth brought a feeling of comfort, of renewed strength. Of power.
He sat back on the landskin, feeling it flow beneath his buttocks, pulling away.
Now that he was free, he took a moment to rethink his situation, admitting to himself that things had gotten worse, despite his certainty while in the pupal tube that he had reached the nadir of his existence. He sat trapped in a tight sphere of landskin, without any sense of direction, breathing stagnant air and tasting his own blood, the only light the pervading phosphorescent glow of the landskin itself.
Where was the stranger?
The creature had seized him, flaring hatred and . . . and fear? Something had been in its eyes, blazing forth like lightnings. Remembering it, Rian shuddered. The power of the thing was astonishing. It had tossed him about as if he weighed less than nothing, dragging him here, into the very fabric of the landskin.
They had traveled through it, Rian knew this. The sensation of movement was unmistakable, though direction was undecipherable. Up? Down? Certainly they could not have gone deeper. The landskin blanketed the world, true, but not to such thickness. Rian knew that the landskin the Elders used in their experiments had been lured deep into the Enclave.
"Where am I?"
The landskin walls remained silent, throbbing. Its musky scent bathed Rian. He coughed up a wad of phlegm and spat.
The landskin reacted. It heaved, rippling away from the spittle. A narrow corridor stretched away, pinching to a close a few yards deep. The walls around him shivered, twitched. Pores gaped open in the flesh, belching out fine tufts of sinuous tendrils.
Rian stared at the narrow aperture. Delicate plumes of stinking smoke curled up from the landskin. Its edges blackened. Startled, he rose and moved toward the pinched tunnel.
Slowly, Rian smiled. He searched among the ruins of the throat tube, kicking aside smaller, useless fragments. There. An almost perfect piece with a jagged, almost serrated edge, the chitin wrapped tight around a central core of fibrous muscle. Hefting the makeshift weapon, Rian turned back to the narrow tunnel, the gap in the landskin beckoning.
Rian coughed and spat into the narrow cleft, watching as the landskin retreated further, opening the way a bit more. He stepped into the gap, following the oozing tunnel. The landskin closed behind him, sealing him in.
In more of a tube now than the sphere that had kept him captive, Rian paused to rest, leaning against the squirming landskin. By a great deal of trial and error Rian had determined that he could cause the landskin to retreat at a slight upward slope by spitting high on the heaving walls. The landskin flowed away, continuing to open the way before him.
A slow-going, painstaking process, and Rian still had no idea where he was, in which direction he traveled, or even how far he had come. Periodically the landskin's retreat flowed around a rocky outcropping or abutment. When such segments of rock presented hand-or toeholds, Rian scaled the wall. Taking his makeshift knife in his teeth, Rian climbed, and the massive wall of flesh flowed away, erupting with twitching, writhing tendrils that shook at him ineffectually.
He yearned for sleep, but dared not give in to the desire. The fear that the landskin would close over him, absorb him, kept him moving, always upward. The landskin could only be so thick. When he tired he paused, keeping close watch on the pulsing walls. Neither hunger nor thirst were a problem; the shard of chitin proved effective in slicing dripping slivers of tough, fibrous flesh from the landskin.
Never terribly palatable, the landskin tasted odd. Its usual pungent, almost rancid flavor seemed dulled, muted. And it sat in his belly like a lead weight, making him sluggish. His fingertips and toes tingled and his stomach seemed to churn. For a while after swallowing the flesh he felt dizzy, and squatted while a wave of nausea passed through him. It faded, leaving in its wake a curious palsy in his limbs. He forced himself to breathe deep until the trembling passed.
He swallowed and turned in a tight circle, watching the walls of his fleshy prison. How long would it be before the landskin contracted, crushing him? He put one palm flat against the wall. A thousand tickling filaments emerged from the landskin, tasting him, then jerked back as if pained. There. Did it tremble? Was that the slightest contraction within the wall? Stretching out his right arm, he touched the other wall and stood there, waiting. Within a few moments he felt it; pressure on his palms forced his arms inward. No more than an inch or two, but that was no comfort.
His progress was too slow. As if sensing his purpose, his determination to escape, the landskin threatened to smash him to a bloody pulp.
He fought panic, knowing it would do him no good. Sweat beaded on his forehead and dripped down into his eyes. He swiped it away with the back of his middle hand. The walls moved a bit closer, a barely perceptible shift. His tongue was a dry lump in his mouth.
Calm. He must be calm.
Rian raised the makeshift knife and stared at its broken edge. It had proven capable of cutting into the landskin. But how long would its integrity last if he were forced to use it to hack his way through to the surface---however far that might be?
As the walls moved another fraction of an inch closer together, he dropped his hands, turned, and plunged the knife into the landskin. The flesh pulled back slightly, then collapsed, clutching at the crude blade. Rian sawed at the fibrous tissue, his hand covered with ooze to the elbow. With his other hands he pulled at the edges of the narrow gash, widening it. The landskin tore raggedly, the thin filaments twisting through it like veins popping, snapping, spurting warm juices. He ignored the slick liquid, tearing at the gap. Bathed in slime, Rian wormed his way into the tear. Though his tongue was fat and dry in his mouth, he worked up enough saliva to spray the walls, causing them to twitch and draw slightly back.
He thrust the knife into the tough flesh above his head. His toes dug into gashes filled with writhing tendrils and he levered himself higher. Reaching upward, he tore chunks of landskin away, digging with torn nails at the flesh of the world. Tiny, needle-tipped threads erupted from swollen pores, stabbing at his exposed flesh. Coated with blood and slime, Rian gritted his teeth and did his best to ignore the hundred thousand small pains, concentrating on tearing through the landskin, striving for the surface.
Below him, his hacked path squeezed shut, strings of flesh lashing out across the gap and drawing closed the wound. A bulge of stinking fluid welled up beneath him, burning the bare skin of his foot.
Rian seized flaccid, dangling arteries within the landskin and used them to drag himself up through the tightening gash. The walls pressed close, and now other, fatter, tentacles bulged outward, striking him. Others twined around his torso, and he spent as much time hacking these grasping appendages from him with the knife as he did cutting his way upward. A great gush of hot fluid spurted from a severed vein overhead, showering him. He gagged and spat out a mouthful of biting liquid.
The collapsing flesh closed on his left foot, clamping down with brutal solidity. Crying out, Rian tugged on his foot. Sucking ooze clung, resisting his efforts. A dozen vinelike tentacles emerged from the landskin wall and wrapped around his leg from ankle to crotch. With tears of panic and agony Rian stabbed at the tentacles, which vomited up purplish, caustic juices. His knife caught on a loop of tentacle and was ripped from his hand. The tendril coiled, crushing the shard and dragging it away.
Rian stared at his now empty hand. He blinked away slime. Unbidden tears sprang from his eyes and dripped down his cheeks.
The walls pressed closer, squeezing against his ribs, his shoulders, his pelvis. He screamed as he felt his bones grinding together.
Flailing, his hands grasped at chunks of landskin. His fingers dug through tough, warm flesh, burrowing like thick worms through gooey tissue as the inexorable pressure built on his ribs. His breath came short and gasping, wheezing from his lungs.
"Please," he gasped. A flood of vile liquid washed down his throat. The landskin bulged overhead, and a thick tube of oozing flesh slammed into his mouth, flowing past his teeth. It gushed over his tongue and caught in his throat. Thin streamers of landskin surged down toward his stomach. Thrashing, Rian clamped his teeth down on the slimy mass, moving his jaw back and forth, cutting.
The landskin heaved. Rian felt like his head was being torn from his shoulders as the tentacle jerked from his mouth, whipping up and rearing like some vast, hooded serpent. In the dim glow of the pustules dotting the landskin Rian saw the ravaged surface of the tentacle; it boiled, its outer skin bubbling as huge blisters arose and burst, spilling a thick white mucus.
Something---some vestigial remains of the landskin---squirmed in his belly. Intense pain flared through him, pain that caused his body to convulse. He clamped his teeth shut, straining against the undeniable urge to vomit. The landskin squeezed.
Vomit spewed from his throat in a thick stream, a tremendous surge of burning fluid and hunks of ill-digested landskin. Choking, Rian twisted in the grips of the vise-like landskin, knowing he was dying, knowing he could do precious little to save himself.
He heard the splash as his risen gorge struck the landskin, felt the heated backwash cover his face. He closed his eyes against the burn.
A sudden, excruciating contraction rippled through the landskin and Rian knew he heard ribs snap. He choked down a scream.
The tentacles holding him snapped back, dropping him to the pinched floor of his crevice. Around him his own vomit dripped along torn landskin, smoking, sizzling. The stench of burning flesh choked him.
Dizzy, he tried to climb to his feet, but stumbled on the uneven surface and pitched, face first, into the landskin wall. His stomach heaved, and he vomited again. Hot bile splashed his face.
The landskin surged, rippling away from the pool of waste. A thick tentacle lashed out, wrapping around Rian's waist. It jerked him from his feet. Above, the landskin poured away like running water, opening a widening corridor straight up. Rian rose through clouds of smoke that stank of burning tissue, borne by the squeezing tentacle. Drool, thick with his own digestive juices, dripped from his chin, spattering on the outer skin of the tentacle and eating into the fibrous tissues.
Blinding light struck him from above. Twisting within the undeniable grasp of the tentacle he squinted against the glare. Bright blue, dotted with puffy white, and directly overhead a blazing ball of yellow-orange.
Outside!
He had time to wonder for only a moment before the tentacle whipped forward and released him. Shot from the bowels of the landskin like spores from a sporelance, Rian windmilled in midair as the ground receded. He flew ten feet into the air, bathed in sunlight, caressed by a stiff breeze from the north that smelled of the boreworm fens.
The ground rushed up to receive him. Rian braced for the impact, trying to twist his legs to break his fall.
His right foot slammed into the landskin, quickly followed by his left. He tumbled, his shoulder smashing into an upthrust stone as he rolled down a steep slope. At the bottom of the slope he crashed into a low ridge and lay still, as the landskin retreated beneath him, leaving him on barren, cold stone.
The sound struck Dersi first as the door hissed down into the floor: a raging, turbulent cacophony, the glaring crackle of lightning, the moaning of vast winds rising like a thousand haunting souls crying out in desperation, in loneliness. And below it all, barely heard, the steady thrumming of powerful machinery at work, clanging, grinding, heaving. She put her hands to her ears and took a step backward.
The chamber beyond the doorway beckoned to her. It towered. Dersi stepped through the opening, mouth agape, and stood on a railed platform protruding out into empty space. An arch of shimmering metal covered with blinking, twinkling lights stood in the center of the platform. Dersi avoided the arch, stepping around it and toward the railing. Across from her position, a hundred feet or more away, a matching platform jutted out from the opposite wall. A thin, swaying catwalk connected the two platforms. Above, rose the metal-walled shaft, disappearing fifty feet overhead into a thick, churning fog that shimmered with a silvery light. Far, far below, the vast black eye of a raging maelstrom confronted her. Howling winds pulled at her garments as if to seize her and drag her down, down into its violent heart. Sudden vertigo nearly overwhelmed her, and she gripped the cold metal tubes of the railing with white knuckled hands. The sounds paled in comparison.
Within the black eye of the storm, a depthless obsidian orb drank in the ambient light, consuming it like some ravenous beast. The thin braces that shot out from the sides of the sphere and into the gray winds seemed incapable of resisting the power of the storm, yet they held, vibrating. Jagged bolts of lightning danced along the struts, lanced into the turbulent clouds, and shot upwards, crackling against the metal walls. Dersi's hands tingled on the metal railing, and the hair at the nape of her neck rose.
Dersi pushed away from the railing and backed toward the doorway. The metal grating beneath her feet trembled, crackling with numbing energies. Her joints ached. Her teeth rattled in her gums. A queer nausea bubbled up within her.
Her eyes on the shaft beyond the railing, she stumbled and reached out to gain her balance. Her hand brushed against the cold metal of the arch.
Harsh crimson light washed over her, blazing from panels set in the walls. The churning fog overhead took on the eerie taint of shed blood. A glaring, bone-jarring siren sounded, echoing in the turbulent shaft.
"Warning! Unauthorized entry in Primary Interface. Please state authorization code to access Interface Core."
Dersi jerked her hand away from the arch. She pressed her back against the railing, feeling the queasy tingling lash through her skin, sink into her bones. Eyeing the arch warily, she edged toward the open doorway.
"Warning! Unauthorized entry. Please step into Interface Arch and state authorization code."
The voice came from all around her, echoing out of the bloodred mist above, rising from the turbulent maelstrom below. Cold, dispassionate, the words tumbled over her with clipped precision, without inflection, penetrating even the titanic rumblings of the storm. It sent a tremor of fear rippling through Dersi's core.
"Security protocol initialized. Please stand by."
Dersi watched in horror as the door slid up from the floor. She flung herself toward the rising partition, her fingers hooking over its edge. It rose, carrying her upward. Her bare feet scrambled on the slick metal, seeking purchase. She threw her arm over the edge, dragging herself upward. The massive door continued its smooth rise, the distance between it and the ceiling shrinking. Her right foot slipped and her chin slammed into the metal, jarring her teeth, biting her tongue.
"Step away from containment door. Please stand in Interface Arch."
Dersi screamed and heaved herself higher. She threw her left leg upward, her toes tickling along the edge of the door before falling back down. Blinking away stinging sweat, she pulled, her arms straining, her fingers vainly attempting to dig into the hard metal. She slung her leg up again, catching her heel on the upper edge of the door, and dragged herself up. The ceiling touched her back, undeniable solidity.
Expelling her pent breath, attempting to make herself as small as possible, Dersi rolled over the edge of the door. She fell toward the hard, cold metal floor on the other side. The door slammed shut, the booming sound ringing through the narrow corridor. The edge of her frayed wrap caught in the door, jerked her to a jarring stop. The cloth ripped. Dersi tumbled free, slamming into the floor.
"Standby for security detail. Security protocol engaged."
Dersi's mouth dripped blood and her shoulder flared in agony. Her breath wheezed from her lungs, thick with discharge. Every inch of her body screamed in pain. She rolled to her stomach and stared down the corridor, toward the lift. But the hallway ended in the smooth, blank metal of a closed door.
She closed her eyes tight, willing herself not to cry. Frustration battered at her emotional defenses, threatening to spill the pent-up tears. She had no time to wallow in self-pity, could not give in to the strength-sapping emotion.
"Elevator disabled. Security detail to Primary Interface access. Repeat: security detail to Primary Interface access. Unauthorized access."
"Shut up," Dersi whispered. She pushed herself to her hands and knees and looked toward Erekel. Her eyes widened. She jerked around, gasping, and scanned the blank expanse of the corridor.
Erekel was gone.
Lhedri paced the small room, his fingers playing along the knobbed shaft of his appropriated acidrod. His men, as if sensing their leader's agitation, stayed well back from him, pressed against the vibrating walls. They glanced at one another with anxious expressions on their faces. A few swallowed repeatedly. One man scratched continuously at the stubble on the side of his face.
Lhedri tried to ignore them. He reached out and touched one of the smooth walls. Beneath his hand the wall throbbed. Every few seconds there was a subtle thump. The sensation of movement was undeniable.
Cadrin cleared his throat. "What is this, Captain?"
"A lift, I think. Like a throat. Only mechanical."
"A throat . . ." Cadrin glanced at the floor and shifted his feet. "We're going down."
Lhedri nodded. "I think so. I think these thumps I'm feeling through the walls are different levels of this place."
"How will we know when to stop it? And how do we stop it?"
"I . . ." Lhedri bit his lip. A good question, the first. If each thumping indicated the passage of another floor, how were they to know when Lady Dersi and her abductor had exited? He had ten men with him. Judging by the thumps, they had descended more than twenty levels. Assuming each had an access point, they could spend forever searching this complex before locating the fugitives. And that assumed Lady Dersi and Master Erekel had holed up rather than continuing to flee.
"Captain?" Cadrin raised one eyebrow.
This search had turned futile. "Take us back up, Cadrin."
"Of course, Captain. How?"
Lhedri stared at him. How? How. Lhedri pushed soldiers aside and approached the shallow niche in the wall. He had done nothing other than press his hand into the niche to start the lift. There were no buttons, switches, knobs, or latches. Just the niche, sized to fit a flattened palm. The tingling that had risen from the cold metal had started the lift moving.
Would the same procedure stop it and send it back up again?
He reached out to put his hand in the niche, hesitating and licking his dry, cracking lips.
"Unauthorized access in Primary Interface. Security protocol engaged. Security personnel to Primary Interface access. Repeat: Primary Interface breach. Security detail to Primary Interface access."
The voice emerged from the walls all around them. Lhedri jerked back his hand and brought the acidrod up to ready position. He stared at the walls, trying to locate the source. Around him, the soldiers did likewise. They moved away from the walls, gathering in a tight knot, facing outward.
"Who is that!" Lhedri demanded. "Show yourself!"
The voice had been curiously flat, emotionless. Sourceless.
"Security detail to Primary Interface access. Unauthorized access in progress."
"Captain?" Cadrin pressed close, staring at the blank walls around them.
"I don't know, Cadrin." Lhedri studied the walls, seeing nothing. "It seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same time."
"Orders?"
Lhedri shook his head slightly and reached toward the niche once more. No voice came from the walls. He bit his lip and slid his palm toward the depression.
"Security protocol engaged. Elevator lockdown in progress. Security detail enter override code for restoration. Security detail to Primary Interface access."
Before Lhedri could put his hand into the niche, the lift abruptly slowed, then stopped. The vibrations in the walls ceased. Metal clanged behind the walls.
"What . . ." Cadrin looked to his commander for answers Lhedri did not have.
On the edge of panic, Lhedri slid his hand into the niche, stiffening against the expected tingle in his palm. It did not come. He felt only cool, smooth metal. Frowning, he removed his hand and inserted it once more. And again. Still, the small room did not react. No thrumming vibrations, no sensation of movement.
"Captain? What are we going to do?"
Lhedri shook his head. "Let me think, Cadrin. Let me think." He leaned his acidrod against the wall and pinched the bridge of his nose, closing his eyes. He could hear the shuffling of feet, a few throats being cleared. One man whispered something to another, too low for Lhedri to overhear.
For the first time in his service to the Veil Lords, Lhedri had no idea what to do.
Dersi climbed to her feet and approached the spot where she had left Erekel. Splatters of blood and acid residue still coated the floor where he had lain, unconscious. But there was no sign of the man. Kneeling, she ran her hands along the walls and floor in the immediate area, seeking something, anything, to explain his disappearance.
"Erekel!" Dersi's voice cracked as she cried out to the harvester. Reverberating echoes washed over her, amplified by the corridor.
"Security detail en route. Remain calm. Aggression will be met with non-lethal countermeasures."
Countermeasures? Dersi frowned. What was this? She turned in a tight circle, trying to watch in every direction.
"Who are you?"
"Remain calm. You will not be harmed."
Remain calm? Dersi suppressed a bitter laugh. Calm?
As she watched, a portion of the side wall receded, then slid to one side, moving without a sound. Muted, purplish light spilled into the corridor. A thick shadow fell over Dersi. She took an involuntary step back, away from the opening, as a figure stepped through the doorway.
Tall, lean, and strikingly beautiful, the woman's thick auburn hair fell over her bare shoulders, cupping the swell of her naked breasts. She stood with her arms at her sides, staring at Dersi without visible expression. There was a stiffness to her, a disconcerting rigidity that caused Dersi to shiver and back farther away. A quick glance over her shoulder told her the lift was still sealed. She swallowed, tasting blood.
"The security detail, I assume?"
"Your presence here is unauthorized." The woman's voice lacked tonality, pitch, meter. It spilled from full, red lips within a face that did not move. No twitch of cheek muscles, no blinking of eyelids. Her pupils were wide black pools.
"Where is Erekel?" Dersi drew herself up, straightening her shoulders and glaring at the woman in her best approximation of authority. She kept her own voice firm.
"Come with me," the woman said in her dead voice.
"Where?"
"Come with me." The woman reached out. Dersi ducked, but the woman's movements were too quick. Her hand latched onto Dersi's shoulder and squeezed. Dersi cried out as the woman's grip tightened. She dropped to her knees, her hands clawing at the woman's. She might as well have been prying at the metal walls. "Come with me."
The woman pulled Dersi to her feet and spun her around, pushing her toward the newly revealed hallway. The vise-like grip on her shoulder compelled Dersi; she could not fight through the pain of that incredible pressure.
As she stepped into the new corridor she glanced down, seeing a thick, ropy tentacle on the floor. It throbbed, its dark striations bulging, thick ooze dripping from pustules that riddled its surface. Dersi followed the tentacle, discovering that it merged with the woman's back, piercing her body between her shoulder blades.
"This way," the woman said, shoving Dersi forward.
There was no thought, only instinct. Stimulus, and reaction. He surged up through the landskin, driven, compelled, by the furious hormonal barrage that screamed up from his core. Emerging through a rift in the landskin that left him bathed in sticky, hot fluids, He screamed in primal lust, panning about the landscape, seeking, seeking.
She.
He panted, his body heaving with urges he could not deny. His God called out for him, demanding, insistent. He ignored the call, unable to focus on it. The landskin around him whipped about in a fury, seeking to draw his attention. High, high overhead, ool converged, sailing across the cerulean blue skies in a desperate net to reclaim him. He ignored them. A river raced nearby, trilling out its thirst-quenching song. He ignored it all.
Only She. She.
He was reborn, reawakened. He knew his purpose, his design.
He quested with senses that had lain dormant, but had now awakened. He tasted the perversion of the Gagash settlement, their Enclave, where it sat in the bogs over the line of hills. He filtered the desecration away, focusing his senses deeper, wider, broader. She. She. Only She.
There. There, beyond the hills, away from the treacherous domain of Man. He caught her scent, her unique essence, borne on wind and the pheromone wave that crested with the inhale and exhale of the landskin. There.
He ran, sensed her running as well. Towards him. Towards reunion. Communion.
The landskin sought to bring his God's voice to him. He broke through the encrustations of communication, burrowing through the deluge of commandments. The landskin petered away as he ran up the hill. Sharp stones sliced into his feet, tearing flesh to ribbons. He ran. His blood bathing the rocks, slicking the moist soil. He ran. The wind brushed his face, hot and tangy, moist with the promise of She.
Atop the hill. Down, down into a valley choked with alien trees that hissed and crackled in the breeze. A river, thick and sluggish, gurgling over slick stones. Tangled roots, like landskin tentacles, clutched at his feet, almost seeming to have will, volition. His feet bore him onward, onward.
She.
And then he saw her. She came. She came, She came, She came. Through the river, through the woods. Her moist promise beckoned, called, demanded. Scent and sight and hearing and a hundred other senses screamed out at him.
He rushed toward her. Gone was his weariness. Gone his pain. Gone all thought. Save her. Save She. His body demanded, and he yielded to its summons. His flesh ached for her. Ached for She.
She met him, and there were no words, no utterances, save for the gutteral cries of their unified needs. Flesh met flesh, parting, merging. There with the breeze sighing, beneath the hot, burning sun and the lowing hum of the ool in flight overhead, they found one another.
He fell into her, and She into him. Flesh slicked, twined. Limbs sprawled. Thrust and thrust and thrust, a delicate resistance soon overcome, pierced, ruptured. Pain, mingled with the ultimate pleasure, fulfillment.
The voice of the God called out, then yielded, showering down blessings.
He did not care. He could hear nothing, nothing but the pounding of the blood in his ears, nothing but the slip-slide of limbs entwined, the slurp of sweat-soaked flesh sliding, sliding across and through and over and under. Hot, wet mouths met, parted, met again. Slap of flesh. Blood drawn. Blood savored.
Quickening.
Breaching of barriers, piercing of veils. Mind flooded mind, the pinnacle of union. Communion. Purpose combined, reached, exceeded. Instinct merged with instinct, union beyond thought, beyond endurance, beyond belief.
Then . . . Then . . .
Their bodies trembled, deplete. Each sensing each. Each becoming each. Communion, vast and true.
He touched She, touched her face, her throat, her swollen, pulsing nipples. She moaned, feral. He's hand trailed to her womb. There, beneath his trembling palm, life stirred, its movement leeching through flesh. A twitch. A stirring. Dawning awareness.
She's mind touched He's, basking in the union. The union that had given life.
They slept, and the life, the offspring, grew.
APF 0002-0008
After Planetfall, 0002
Ship's Psych Officer Singh sat on the edge of his chair, facing Captain Santiago across the broad, pristine surface of the desk. He folded his hands in his lap, relaxed, and attempted to avoid analyzing the reactions of the captain. An impossibility, given Singh's training and indoctrination. He could see the lines of anxiety cutting across Santiago's face like lash marks, deep and telling. Here was a man with the weight of the colony on his shoulders. Indeed, the weight of all of human civilization, as far as they were concerned. A troubled man, robbed of the ability to be decisive. The pressures would have broken another man long since. Santiago endured.
Did he do more than endure? Could he?
"I think, perhaps, we should invite Master Sergeant MacCallum into our discussion." Santiago queued comm and summoned the master sergeant. MacCallum's voice, harsh and guttural, responded quickly. He would report immediately.
"I concur, Captain." Singh sat back to wait, watching the captain's face as Santiago studied the data Singh had provided. The captain frowned, pursed his lips.
Within a few moments, Santiago's secretary announced the arrival of Master Sergeant MacCallum. Santiago granted access, and MacCallum stepped into the office. He saluted, glanced at Singh, and awaited Santiago's pleasure.
"Sit, sit, Mac."
MacCallum sat rigid in the chair, his back rod-straight, his gaze focused forward. A slight frown rode his lips.
"Singh here has some . . . interesting news, Mac," Santiago said at length.
"Oh?" MacCallum shot Singh a look, arched his brow. "What's that?"
Singh crossed his legs and clasped his large, thin-fingered hands around one knee. His smile melted into a slight frown, and he stared over MacCallum's head, focusing on a point on the wall. "Interesting. Interesting, indeed."
Santiago snorted. He reached out and picked up a ceramic mug, sipped at it.
"Tell me, Sergeant MacCallum, have you noticed an . . . increase in the, ah, dalliances of your crewmen?"
"Dalliances? What?"
Singh smiled and shook his head. "Sexual expression, let us say."
"Sexual expression? Fucking, you mean?"
"Mac!" Santiago snapped, but he lightened the reprimand with a grin. Since MacCallum's ascent to second-in-command, he seemed to enjoy a certain latitude in conversing with the captain. Singh had noticed them in private, speaking without regard to rank, only skill and expertise.
"Well, in the common vernacular, I suppose that would be one way to put it." Singh unlaced his hands and lay them in his lap, one perfectly situated atop the other.
"I've noticed a few more . . . dalliances, yes. It's natural, I think. Especially in the wake of Rodriguez's actions. I mean, he's effectively marooned us here, with no hope of rescue, and the men are facing the very real threat of death on a daily basis. The women, too. Seems natural to me."
"Yes. Yes. Of course. A perfectly rational reaction to the stressful situation in which we find ourselves. I agree. At least, to a degree. A common reaction, I think. In moderation. Usually the pattern would not be so . . . exaggerated, however."
"Exaggerated."
Singh nodded. He reached toward a brief on Santiago's desk, picked it up, and held it before him. "My own data, gathered both through direct observation and interviews with those who have sought me---and there has been a marked increase in the hours I am logging in session, since the . . . recent unpleasantness---leads me toward a different conclusion. The amount of sexual expression has far exceeded what might have been expected under even these severe circumstances."
"So? The crew's a bit randy. What's the problem?" Mac looked to Santiago for concurrence, but found the captain's face hard, stony. MacCallum frowned.
"It goes beyond that, Mac. What Singh's report suggests is that there's something else at work here. A biological agent. Some sort of aphrodisiac."
"Aphrodisiac? You're serious."
Singh nodded. "Oh, yes. Most assuredly. It is almost incontrovertible. Given the empirical evidence there can be no other conclusion safely drawn. Documented accounts of similar situations resulted in no such prolonged and extreme increase in sexual tension and expression."
"But there was nothing in any of the Biological Sciences rep---"
"Biological Sciences, until the Exodus, was the exclusive province of Commander Rodriguez. And since he left, I've had what remains of BS concentrating on other things. Keeping us alive, for instance."
MacCallum shook his head. "But what? I mean, if you're correct, Singh, how's it getting into us?"
"Oh, any number of agencies, I believe. Spores. The water. The landskin. We eat it, remember? Pheromones."
"What do we do about it?" MacCallum turned to Santiago.
Santiago took another sip from his mug. "What can we do? And do we need to? Do we even want to do anything about it? Think for a moment, Mac. Outside of the environment and our own limited resources, what is the biggest threat we face to the success of this mission? The broader mission, mind you. The colonization."
MacCallum frowned, deep in thought. "Our numbers make us vulnerable. Too few people to do what needs doing. It's why we've begun the thawing and quick-growth process with the zygotes."
"And there, since that bastard Rodriguez's actions left us with precious few zygotes and downloads, we face the problem of having to recycle the downloads, possibly creating problems we can't begin to foresee. But with natural children . . ."
"There would be no such problem." MacCallum shot his gaze between the other two men. "Still, it's slow."
"Singh has a few theories regarding that, as well. It seems there's some chance we could use the rapid growth machines to speed the development of the children along. Coupled with limited, skillset-based downloads . . ."
Singh spoke up. "It would mean, of course, eliminating the contraceptive regimen."
"Easily done," MacCallum said. He paused. "But there are many fewer women in the crew than men."
"Ah, but think of the cannery, Mac. Up until now we've primarily been thawing and fast-growing the males to augment our labor force." Santiago smiled and took another sip. "If we hatch exclusively females for a time . . . Why, we don't even need to waste downloads on them, other than rudimentary skills and cognitive abilities. They would essentially be walking wombs."
Walking wombs. MacCallum leaned back in the formed plastic chair, his gaze wandering from Santiago to Singh, and back again.
Walking wombs. The idea disturbed Singh, but it did offer promise. Promise of population increase, with few of the risks and incidental challenges of fast-growing the zygotes and infusing them with duplicate personalities. It raised the very real possibility of survival. And not just survival but, perhaps, the chance to thrive, to reach back into the stars, soon. The chance to return home, to the Hegemony, leave this hellish place behind them.
Slowly, a smile bloomed on MacCallum's face, echoing the grin on Santiago's lips.
Singh felt conflicted. The idea was his own, certainly. And it did offer a slim ray of hope.
But the ethics. The morality. Could these crucial aspects of the human psyche be ignored? At what peril?
But . . . Home.
APF, 0008
Singh stood in the shadows of a bulkhead and watched as Master Sergeant MacCallum, his hands clasped behind his back, stared through the thick glass into the Hatchery. A student of human behavior and a master of observation, Singh could read the distaste in the lines of the sergeant's shoulders, the furrow of his brow, the subtle down turn of his thin lips. A simple man on the surface, Sergeant MacCallum hid layers and layers of conflict and complexity beneath a thin veneer. An excellent case study. Singh only wished that MacCallum would seek out the services of the PO more often. His file, locked within the secured node of ShipsNet, accessible only by Singh, himself, was meager.
Singh shifted his gaze to the activity beyond the glass wall, looking into the Hatchery. Four of the white-coated technicians shifted from workstation to workstation, carrying the zygote-bearing trays with a tenderness and care reserved for the infinitely fragile. And so they were.
One wall of the Hatchery was packed with little drawers, each labeled with a host of information, including a bar-coded gene sequence and a plasma chip that described physiological parameters for the contained cell-mass. Opposite, sealed beneath a sheet of resilient, insulating plastic, rose the banks of downloads, tiny crystals packed with information. Between these two poles were the gestation tubes, the quick-growth vats, and the linkups.
"Fascinating, is it not?" Singh said as he approached.
Mac jerked, his hands dropping, one palm coming to rest by instinct on the cold butt of his holstered weapon. He seemed to relax as Singh touched one well-groomed hand to the glass.
"What?"
"Fascinating. I must admit the hard science is beyond me. Genetics was never my strong suit, though I did delve into the subject during my residency. But I felt a different calling." He smiled. "A higher calling, I have always believed."
Mac grunted, noncommittal. Singh turned back, watching the technicians---Hatchlings, themselves---depositing another zygote into the vats. Another technician, using forceps with edges of sterile monofilaments, slid the download chip into the recessed tray at the base of the vat.
"Another breeder?" Singh carefully kept the emotion from his voice. Certainly not even pride, pride at having suggested the course they had followed for years now. It would not be appropriate.
But he had had no choice. Had he? Always honest with himself, Singh could not help but admit that the program had been a grave error. A calculated risk, he had called it. But, in reality, it had been one man's vanity, playing at being a god. His vanity. His sin.
Mac nodded. "The others have begun showing signs of the contagion. Two had to be put down yesterday."
"Two more. A pity. I had hoped we would enjoy a bit longer period of viability from them."
"They'd both borne a kid or two. They'd served their purpose. Their personas can be recycled, and the techs tell me they can throw their codes into a soup and come up with something entirely new. No big loss."
"Such a disregard for life." Singh kept his eyes glued to the scene beyond the glass, refusing to look at Mac, though he studied the master sergeant surreptitiously.
Mac bristled. His hand squeezed the butt of his pistol.
"It's all in how you look at it, Singh. You call the breeders alive? They don't have the intellect of my bootstraps. They react on a purely instinctive level---hell, half of them can't even speak. They serve a purpose. Life? That's not what I'd call it. No more than I'd call my gun alive. It's a tool. They're tools. It's as simple as that."
Singh shook his head, expelled breath in a hiss between his teeth. "I regret this course of action. I regret this grand scheme. What has it brought us? Has it brought us any closer to securing ourselves on this world?"
Mac dropped his eyes, not responding.
No. It had not. There were more of them now, of course. More workers, more laborers, more technicians. More soldiers. But . . . something was wrong. Something was decidedly wrong. Within weeks of being fast-grown, Hatchlings exposed to the atmosphere of this alien planet began . . . changing. They became warped, physically, mentally, and emotionally. Less than human. Nothing had served to forestall the changes, not even the most powerful of stabilizing drugs. Only closeting the breeders within the sterile environment of the skeletal remains of Ship kept them viable long enough to give birth.
Singh continued. "How many originals remain, Master Sergeant? A hundred? Eighty?"
"You should know. You've got files on all of us, don't you?"
"Of course. But, to be honest with you, I have stopped following the numbers. The story they tell has become too tragic, too dire. I do know that more than two-thirds of our population came from the Hatchery. And all of these seem much more susceptible to the contagion. Natural births have fallen dramatically---what were there? Three last year? It will be only a matter of time before we die out, leaving only these Hatchlings in our wake. These Hatchlings, which do not share our immunity to whatever plague this planet has inflicted upon us. What will become of us then, Master Sergeant?"
Mac clenched his jaw, said nothing. He spun on his heel and stalked from the Hatchery, heading, no doubt, for the armory. Singh was familiar with the master sergeant's moods. He needed to kill something, anything. Singh made a mental note, promising himself to enter the thoughts into MacCallum's file, then turned back to watch the technicians at work.
This is not right.
Rian stared around him, taking in the pristine, white walls, the bright cases rising from the shining, polished floor. A tube hung from the ceiling, all of glass like those in the Elder's laboratory, but without the greenish fluid. Instead, crystalline liquid held a figure suspended, streamers of bubbles gushing up from a ring around the base of the tube. The figure was motionless, its eyes closed. It seemed somehow . . . unfinished, as if its growth had been arrested.
He moved closer, reaching out a hand to touch the glass.
And stopped, staring at his hand. Thick, pliant material covered his hand to the wrist, swallowed by the tight-fitting cuff of a white sleeve. He looked down, staring at the coat that swathed his perfect, symmetrical body.
Symmetrical.
He touched the center of his chest through the tough material, feeling for the arm that should have been there, but was not. No nub, no scar tissue. Nothing.
There was something covering his face, distorting his vision. He moved his hands over a transparent shield, a peculiar headgear that surrounded his head like a bubble.
"Doctor?"
Rian spun. The voice came from behind him. Another white-smocked figure stood there, a tray in its hands. On the tray was a shallow dish containing a black and white strip no longer than Rian's finger.
"Doctor, is something wrong?" Through the clear barrier of the face shield Rian could see concern in the clear, pale eyes of the man who addressed him. Clean skin, unblemished.
"Wrong?"
The figure nodded. "Yes. Is something wrong? Is the specimen not acceptable?"
Rian backed away from the man and his tray, filled with a sense of dread, a sense of rising danger. His back touched the smooth glass of the hanging tube.
"Doctor Singh?" The man pivoted his upper body and placed the tray on a nearby table. "Should I call someone? Are you ill?"
"Ill?"
"Leave us, technician." The new voice came, cold and alien, from the white walls all around. Rian spun in place, eyes darting toward the shadowed niches near the ceiling, seeking the speaker.
The man nodded. "Yes, Father." Without another word, the man stepped toward a glass panel in one wall. The panel slid aside with a hiss and closed again after the man had left the room.
"Is there a problem, Singh?"
"Singh? Who are you? Where are you? Show yourself!"
"Your behavior is decidedly odd, Singh. Has the therapy at last begun to fail?"
"Therapy? No! Where are you!" Rian reached out and picked up the tray, slinging the shallow dish to the floor, where it shattered. The black and white strip slid across the smooth tiles. Rian held the tray up like a shield, a weapon. He backed toward the wall, pressing against it, facing out into the room.
"That was foolish, Singh. The sample will have been contaminated. It will be unusable. We shall have to begin again."
"What are you talking about? Show yourself!"
No. This is too soon. Awaken, Rian. Awaken. All in its proper time. The voice echoed out of darkness, swam up from Rian's subconscious. Authoritative. Foreign. Undeniable.
Rian woke on cool stone, in darkness washed by a sprinkling of stars and the quarter-moon perched on the western horizon. He blinked, unsure for a moment of his whereabouts, before the memories came tumbling back like a landslide. Shivering, he drew his naked legs up to his chest and stared out into the night, listening to the hissing sounds of the landskin breathing. Beyond his sight, a drake barked, its deep, sonorous voice echoed moments later by an answering cry.
He sat on pebbled stone, a barren stretch of naked bedrock unblemished by the landskin. Behind him rose a low ridge, its rough surface abrasive against his back. Knots and bruises covered his body where he had crashed into the short wall when the landskin had so forcibly ejected him. He rubbed his forehead, felt a tender spot the size of his thumb.
Flickers of a dream came to him: white walls, a glass case, an eerie, cold voice. He shook his head, trying to clear it of the unwanted images. His pulse raced, his breathing came in quick, shallow gasps.
Be patient. Be calm. All is proceeding according to plan.
The voice spoke softly into his mind, overriding his fears, stilling him. Some small part of him rebelled. A soothing crept outward from his center, choking the rebellion, quaffing it.
The rasping hiss of the landskin's slow, steady encroachment warned him of its nearness; it could be beaten, pressed back, but without constant vigilance it would return, always return. Only the high places, the vertical cliff faces and precarious plateaus, unreachable by the drakes, remained unskinned for long.
The drakes barked again, closer. Summoned by the landskin, called by its reluctance to approach Rian, the drakes lumbered through the night. He could hear their crashing progress through the trees beyond this bowl-shaped valley.
Boulders loomed up around him like long, jagged teeth. None was high enough to keep him away from even the smallest of drakes. He needed to find higher ground, a place the drakes could not reach.
He rose and felt around on the ground, coming up with a smooth, flat stone about the size of his hand. Crossing to a flat-topped boulder, he set down his stone and took up another, rounder one. A few sharp blows created a rough edge on the flat stone. Its edge drew blood when he ran his fingertip across the jagged serration.
Armed with this makeshift axe blade, Rian paused to listen for the drakes. There. Closer. Trees cracked beneath their gargantuan weight, snapped off midtrunk, falling with the rattling hiss of crashing leaves. The drakes lowed, warbling voices rising as they approached. Need bled through those voices, yearning toward expansion.
He climbed over the low wall and set out across a narrow gap in the landskin. At his approach the landskin seemed to shrink in on itself, retracting, baring stone in its determination to avoid his touch. The terrain sloped upward, climbing toward a high hillock whose upper third lay barren. Naked, jutting rocks and tumbled boulders formed a natural stairway to the hillock's top. Though each step brought fresh pain in every muscle in his body, Rian hastened toward the jagged rocks.
Taking the crude axe in his middle hand, Rian scaled the hillock. Sharp stones cut his feet and scored his hands. He left blood in his wake, painted on the rocks in a rich slather. The sparse landskin disappeared altogether as he climbed higher. When he reached the top he found a space no bigger than his own body, a rough spur of exposed rock upon which he balanced. Forty feet above the valley floor, he watched and listened, awaiting the coming of the drakes.
As if driven by intellect, they came, one from the north, the other from the east. They broke through a ring of razor-leafed trees lining a ridge that encircled the valley. Huge old trunks came crashing down beneath the ponderous weight of the creatures, clattering on the landskin like loose skeletons.
Rian watched them, saw them pause and raise ridged heads on long, serpentine necks. They lifted their snouts into the air, scenting. By the huffing sounds they emitted from the countless openings in their veiny skins, he knew they sensed his presence. They hesitated and became agitated, stomping on the landskin with their forelimbs of hardened resin. Their massive, flat tails slammed into the ground, a vast drumlike sound echoing in the night. The one that paused on the eastern verge rose on its hind legs, exposing a pale-white belly crawling with cilia. Its triangular head split, disgorging a mass of crimson sensory tentacles that looked like tongues of flame. Rian knew that the touch of those organs released a burning, consuming corrosive capable of stripping a man to his bones in seconds.
He drew his legs up and squatted on his spur of stone, settling in for a long night.
Trumpeting, the drakes approached one another, their ponderous movements shaking the ground. Pebbles rained down from Rian's perch, pattering across the raw stone below. They met in the center of the valley, a mere hundred yards from Rian, and their long necks twined. Wads of sensory tentacles emerged from their mouths, tangling. Then, almost regretfully, they parted, and the smaller of the two lumbered closer to Rian's roost. Its mouth gaped open, tentacles tasting the air in Rian's direction.
The drake tromped closer, raising itself on its hind legs. Ungainly in this posture, it teetered forward, its forelegs smashing down against the stone outcropping. Rian clutched the crumbling edges of his perch, maintaining his balance against the violent tremors that shook the stone. Though even fully extended the drake could not hope to reach him, Rian drew back from the edge. Scarlet sensory tentacles tickled the rock wall some ten feet below his position.
The other drake withdrew, its footsteps reverberating through the valley, shaking Rian's perch.
Rian stared down into the hundreds of eyes scattered across the flesh of the closest drake. Pallid orbs, the eyes caught the thin moonlight, reflecting it back as eerie gleams in the darkness. He could smell the pungent odor of its body, the rank stench of its corrosive, dripping saliva.
Gathering a handful of loose pebbles, Rian began tossing them at the drake below. Stones bounced harmlessly from its tough hide, causing its eyes to blink closed, then reopen. Tentacles snatched at the stones, drawing them into the creature's maw.
"Go away," Rian said, raining pebbles down on the drake.
As if understanding him, or realizing it had no chance of reaching him, the drake slid down the pillar of stone and turned with lumbering strides. It trudged across the barren stone to a point near the edge of the landskin and sank to its belly. Grumbling, it lowered its long neck to the cool stone, rested its head on the jagged upthrust of a boulder.
Rian leaned on one elbow, watching the drake's metamorphosis. Its legs splayed out at its sides and flattened, collapsing even as its massive trunk seemed to implode. Loose flesh flowed outward, spurting across the barren stone like miniature rivers of landskin. Its head and neck melted, dripping over the boulder and leaving it covered with landskin that pulsed and throbbed. In a few short minutes the drake disappeared, returned to that which had birthed it, expanding the reach of the landskin. A few residual blisters burst, spraying spores that landed deep into the region of stone and grew, becoming hard clusters of new growth, seeds for the next offensive.
After waiting an hour or more for the encroachment to consolidate its hold on the land, Rian rose and searched the dark horizon for signs of other drakes. Another bellowed in the distance, but it was too far away to pose much of a threat. Rian climbed down the stone pillar, scraping his knees and elbows on the sharp rocks. Landskin now crouched in mottled rills around the base of his hillock, spongy beneath his feet as he reached ground level. It trembled as his flesh touched it, flowing, abrasive on his skin.
While atop the hillock he had spotted the dim glow of the Enclave beacon in the distance, and he made for this now, climbing landskin hills crested with thick stands of trees. Here he used his crude axe blade to hack a sturdy limb from one of the trees. Quick, certain strokes of the flat of the blade shaved the bark from the limb, and he whittled a long, tapered point at one end.
Equipped with his new spear Rian descended the line of hills into a crescent-shaped valley choked with a rich, dark canopy of trees. Flyers flitted among the moonglare-silvered leaves, blazing with scintillating colors ignited by the moonlight. A cascade tumbled from a rift in the canyon wall a hundred yards to the north. It crashed into a wide pool on the valley floor and sent a plume of mist high into the sky. Through the interlocking branches, Rian caught an occasional glance of the silvery river that wound through the ravine and disappeared around a curvature in the vaulted walls. A riotous miasma of scents rose from the valley, the perfume of a thousand flowers, and beneath it all the pungent aroma of the landskin.
Rian recognized the valley. Following the river would take him into the boreworm fens surrounding the Enclave, a journey that would carry him on into the morning. There he could . . .
Could what?
He paused beneath the razor-leafed trees, listening to their susurrus in a cool wind tasting of water. Events had unfolded so rapidly, one atop another, that he had had no opportunity to consider his next move. Return to the Enclave? But what would happen there? Though they had expressed regret at their actions, the Elders of the Enclave had imprisoned him, experimented on him.
He ran hands across his naked flesh. The lumps beneath his arms remained tender to the touch, certain signs of the Elders' violations. And though his throat no longer throbbed in pain, he could still taste the vile tube that had penetrated him. He spat on the landskin. It sizzled, rippling away from his spittle.
He remembered the needles, the forceps. The penetrating, sawing blades, stealing gobbets of his flesh. He shivered.
Would his reception on returning to the Enclave be any different? He shook his head, answering himself. When the Elders learned of his return---and certainly such knowledge would be conveyed immediately---they would react no differently. He would again be kept, held. Experimented upon. Sacrificed for the greater good of the Gagash, for the dream of returning to their origins, their humanity.
But . . .
Rian moved over to a rounded boulder and sat down, leaning his makeshift spear against the oozing bole of a tree. He watched a flyer buzz past, darting from flower to flower in an intricate dance, and saw much of himself in the creature. It never stayed for long on the delicate petals of the blooms, wary of the nectar oozing from the stamen that sought to trap it.
At his feet the landskin retreated.
He brought up his middle hand and stared at it in the filtered moonlight. A part of him since birth, he found it impossible to imagine life without the appendage. He had seen pictures of their ancestors, the people they had been in the long, long distant past. How would it feel to have only two arms, two hands, ten fingers? Hair rather than the rigid spines that covered the dome of his head? Symmetry itself seemed an alien concept. Rian could not imagine being so symmetrical, was not even certain if he desired such a profound change.
But could he make that decision for all Gagash?
He sighed, holding his head in his three hands.
The bellowing of a drake from nearby and the crashing destruction of trees raised him to his feet. Still uncertain of his destination, but knowing he could not be caught here, defenseless against the encroachments of the drakes, Rian set off toward the rich silver ribbon of the river on the valley floor.
He slaked his thirst at the river and paused to rest once more before pressing onward, following the winding course of the waterway. Here the trek was easier, for the landskin thinned as it approached the running water, and pebbles poked up through its sparse coverage. The cool water soothed his feet and calves. Moonlight bathed his shoulders, broken only by the occasional branch that thrust out across the water.
He heard the ool before he saw it, the world-shaking thrumming of its dangling tentacles sending ripples through the bedrock, the landskin throbbing in time to the monstrous sound. Stopping in the shallows of the river, he stared behind him, watching as the gigantic, tumorous mass crested the canyon wall, eclipsing the moon and rolling its great shadow over the river. The massive feeder tentacle dragged along the top of the escarpment before falling over its edge to slam onto the valley floor. The riverbed shook, and Rian fell to his knees, thrusting his hands into the silt at the river bottom to keep from falling on his face. The crackling rip of trees torn up by the roots and sucked into the fleshy blot in the sky masked the sound of the river's tumbling.
Wasting no time, Rian gained his feet and sprinted along the riverbed. The ool devoured the moon, its vast bulk blotting out the stars as it swept toward the Enclave. Risking a glance over his shoulder, Rian saw another ool approaching, trailing the first. And another.
He had to get out of the valley. He scrambled up the steep slope of the ravine, dodging slashing limbs and razor-edged leaves. Behind him the ground churned; the landskin rippled as it rushed ahead of the ool in a massive wave that toppled trees and spat plumes of river water high into the sky. Flyers darted past Rian toward the rim of the valley.
The first ool crested the far rim of the ravine and sank toward the fens on the other side, its tremendous gas bladders deflating with a rush of hot, moist air that stank of putrescence as it washed over Rian. He clawed at the roots of trees in the face of the heaving wind, feeling his body lifted from the ground, rendered weightless. Leaves slashed at his face and arms, but Rian snapped his eyes shut and clung to the roots, ignoring the biting pain of a hundred cuts.
The harsh, buzzing hum of a boreworm swarm rose from the fens, audible even over the destruction of the ool.
The hot wind died, cut off by the interposing rim of the escarpment. Rian collapsed to the tangle of roots, banging his forehead on a hard knot. He dragged himself toward a hollow at the base of a giant tree. The tangled roots fought him. The landskin beneath him heaved.
Two hundred yards away a feeder tentacle trailed through the river, ripping trees crouched at the banks of the waterway up by their roots and tossing them skyward. Rian looked directly overhead at the underside of the nearest ool. Thousands of twitching purple tentacles hugged close to the lumpy flesh, surrounding a gaping hole in the mottled flesh. From this hole lightning flickered, trickling down toward the earth like caustic tongues. The earth exploded at the touch of the bolts. Great clouds of dust and rock and shattered trees rose in twisting funnels that danced along beneath the ool.
Rian crouched lower, attempting to dig deeper into the stinging, cutting ropes of the tree's roots. He felt the tug of howling winds, the sizzling crackle of lightning, the pulsating thunder of the ool's bellows, its destructive rampage. He wrapped the roots tighter about his body and squeezed his eyes shut.
"Hello, Rian." A firm hand seized his left shoulder. He snapped his eyes open and gazed up into the face of the stranger.
Prodded from behind, Dersi stumbled into the dimly lit corridor. She lost her balance and tripped over the throbbing tentacle, which jerked at the touch of her skin, slithering with a wet slurp across the ridged metal floor. Dersi scuttled back from the looping coils and pressed against the right-hand wall. Thick, clotting ooze bubbled from gaping orifices pocking the metal to coat her shoulders. The unmistakable, heady scent of a Veil Lord struck her, pungent and suffocating, powerful.
Here?
Dersi swallowed panic and turned to stare at the walls. From ceiling to floor the metal dripped with resin. Oblong boxes scattered with blinking, muted lights thrust out from between hard chitinous ribs in the walls. Hundreds of flailing tendrils flared from sphincters that opened and closed like mammoth nostrils. As Dersi rose to her knees a long, articulated metal rod dropped from the ceiling and oriented on her. With a wet hiss, the globed end of the rod parted, revealing a crimson orb. In the center of the orb a circular patch of darkness expanded with a whirring buzz.
Like an eye.
Dersi stared up at the hovering sphere, waiting for something to happen. Out of the corner of her eye she could see the naked woman standing, motionless, her gaze fixed on the crimson orb. The sound of the woman's umbilicus as it slid across the floor sent shivers down Dersi's spine.
"Get up," the woman said in her monotone voice.
Dersi, staring at the crimson eye, ignored her.
"Who is this?"
Dersi jerked, looking around for the source of the new voice. It seemed to come from all around, leaking from the dripping walls themselves.
"I do not know," the woman answered.
"Bring her to me."
"That was my intent."
"She intrigues me. I can taste her."
The woman nodded her head, once, and stepped toward Dersi as the articulated rod retreated. From the ceiling, a wave of dripping metal swelled into a pulsing mound and split open to swallow the red eye. Ripples passed through the ceiling as the slash sealed itself.
The woman's umbilicus heaved, a portion rising from the floor like some gargantuan worm, and flopped forward. It retreated ahead of them, sliding over the metal floor with a wet slurping sound, and disappeared around a corner choked with shivering tentacles.
"Who are you?"
Dersi winced as the woman seized her. Long fingernails dug into her shoulder. She tried in vain to pull away, but the woman's grip was unbreakable.
The woman said nothing for a moment. Dersi looked over her shoulder at her. For the first time an expression flickered on her face. She frowned, bit her lip. Her free hand rose to touch her auburn hair, pulling free a single curl and wrapping it around her finger. Then, as if noticing what she was doing, the woman jerked her hand away. The curl snapped back into place. "M . . . Marissa," the woman said, a strange hitch in her voice.
"Where is Erekel?"
"Be silent. Proceed." Marissa squeezed tighter, and Dersi gasped in pain, her knees buckling. She put out a hand to catch herself.
"You're hurting me!" Dersi jerked to her feet and twisted. Marissa's fingers dug into Dersi's shoulder, sending spasms of agony through her body. Ignoring the pain, Dersi balled up her fist and smashed Marissa in the face. The crunching impact rocked Marissa's head back amid a fine spray of blood.
Marissa stumbled, dragging Dersi with her.
"Let go!"
Marissa righted herself and shot out her other arm, clamping her hand around Dersi's throat. Effortlessly, she raised her arm, heaving Dersi into the air. Gasping for air, Dersi kicked out, slamming her bare feet into Marissa's thighs and torso. Marissa shook her, tightening her grip around Dersi's throat.
"That was foolish. Cease this. Your struggles are pitiful."
Dersi gagged, feeling faint. She clawed at the fingers around her throat.
"You will come with me. As I understand your . . . physiology . . . maintaining this level of pressure against your airway will soon render you unconscious. It makes no difference, to him or to me, whether you come conscious or unconscious. The choice is yours. Cease this struggle and I will release your throat."
Eyes bulging, lungs burning as if filled with acid, Dersi forced herself to be still. She fought to draw breath and failed.
"Very well." Marissa lowered her to the floor. She released her grip, and Dersi collapsed in a heap. Precious air filled her lungs in a searing, gulping flood.
"Where . . . Where are you . . . taking me?" Blinking away tears, Dersi looked up at Marissa.
"He's waiting for you," Marissa answered, and she reached down and jerked Dersi to her feet. "Come."
Who? But the stony look on Marissa's face promised she would answer no questions. Dersi moved ahead of the nude woman, flinching as Marissa's hand came down on her shoulder and squeezed. More gently this time, but still painful.
As they traveled the narrow corridors, Dersi noted more and more of the strange, oblong boxes protruding from the walls, each covered with twinkling, multihued lights. Twice more the ceiling parted and the eyelike constructions dropped down, following their progress. Each time the bloodred orbs focused on her Dersi felt as if she had been stripped bare, her mind peeled away, layer by layer, exposed.
The corridor debauched into an oblong room choked with writhing tentacles and strange machinery. Massive gears turned overhead, spinning interlocked wheels and driving metal rods into cylinders that wheezed and clanked, belching steam. Hundreds of articulated rods thrust from the ceiling, the floor, the walls, all orienting on Dersi, their bloodred orbs darkening, contracting, swelling with interior blackness. A huge vein transversed the chamber. It pulsed and leaked translucent ooze in long streamers. Dozens of smaller vessels fed into the larger, each swollen.
Marissa's umbilicus wound across the cracked and pitted floor, looping around the hard, planar surfaces of bizarre machinery. It rose to pierce the side of the vein.
In the streaked shadows a dais rose from the floor, on it a construction of crystalline spheres and rods and black, coiled tubes. Darker shadows crouched at the foot of the machine, a black, distorted hump that expanded and contracted, as if breathing.
"Alberto, I've brought her," Marissa said, speaking into the clamor of the room.
"Dersi!"
Dersi darted her gaze to the familiar voice on her left. Erekel entered the chamber from the opposite side, escorted by a woman in all respects Marissa's twin. He tried to move toward Dersi, but his escort jerked him back, driving him to his knees. He gasped, his fingers prying at the woman's grip on the back of his neck.
"Erekel!" Dersi strained against Marissa's hold. The woman clamped down on Dersi's shoulder, her grip unbreakable.
"Release them." The voice reverberated through the huge chamber, shaking the tentacles, rattling the churning machines. Instantly Marissa removed her hand and stepped back toward the wall. Simultaneously, the other woman released Erekel. Dozens of thin filaments spat from the walls and swarmed the women, wrapped around their bodies in tight cocoons. The chitin-covered metal walls rippled, opening gaps into which the cocoons retreated. Ooze flowed from pores high on the wall, dripping over the openings, sealing them, hardening.
Erekel rushed up to Dersi and knelt at her side. He took her in his arms, holding her close. Dersi mewed weakly, gasped in pain. Erekel drew back, holding her at arm's length. "Dersi?"
She shook her head. "I'm alright. Just sore."
"What happened to you? After the lift . . ."
"You were so hurt, Erekel. I . . . I had to look for something, anything, to help you."
He shook his head and raised his arm before her. She stared at the unblemished pink skin, reached out, and touched it with a fingertip. No wound, no scar. Nothing. "She did it. The woman. I awakened in a corridor with her staring down at me, her hands roaming over my body. I called out for you, but you didn't answer. I resisted her, tried to, when she picked me up. I might as well have been fighting the whole ool."
"Me too." Dersi stared over Erekel's shoulder at the bizarre trappings in the room. "What is this place?"
He shook his head, his gaze sweeping across the room. "I don't know. It . . . it's incredible. These machines . . ."
"Welcome, my children!" The powerful voice shook the chamber. Erekel seized Dersi's hand and drew her close. On the dais, the heaving black hump stirred, seeming to grow before their eyes.
"Erekel?"
"I don't know, Dersi."
A figure rose and descended from the dais, cloaked by shadows. Long strands like puppet's strings climbed from its form toward the ceiling, merging with the throbbing veins that crisscrossed the vault. As the figure approached them and Dersi and Erekel backed farther away, the machinery continued to pound, hiss, and clank. Lights of a thousand hues blinked on and off from a hundred surfaces. The red-orbed mechanical arms swiveled, training on the Bhajong.
Coming toward them, the figure moved into a band of light, revealing itself. Erekel's hand tightened on Dersi's.
Man-shaped, half of the creature's body seemed composed of metal, metal that whined and screamed in protest as it approached. But metal and machinery merged flawlessly with oozing, leaking organic tissue. It left wells of slime in its footsteps. From every portion of its body rose tentacles and cords, organic and artificial, that disappeared into the tangle overhead. One of its eyes protruded on a gleaming metal stalk, whirring as it regarded them. The other eye leaked a pallid discharge that dripped down its brittle flesh. Its mouth crawled with writhing cilia.
"Welcome, my children," the creature repeated. Its voice fell from that horror of a mouth and, simultaneously, seemed to resonate from the walls all around them. "I've tasted you. You are my progeny, but I do not know you."
Nearly choking, Erekel stepped forward. "I'm a harvester . . . Erekel."
"Harvester." The figure paused, staring off into space, before orienting on Dersi. "And you? Are you, too, a harvester?"
Dersi opened her mouth to confirm the assertion, but her tongue refused to obey. Her jaw moved up and down, but she could not utter the lie. The wet slurping sound of the tentacles overhead, the ominous clangor of the machines, the hissing whir of the mechanical eyes . . .
"No. No, you are not a harvester. You are a Lord. I can taste it. And yet . . . And yet you carry his blood within you, as well. Curious."
"Dersi," she managed to say, a faint whisper.
"Dersi. Your markers are familiar. Interesting matrices. Much potential. A throwback of some sort, I suppose. Should have thought of that myself."
"I don't understand," Dersi said. She moved closer to Erekel, drawing strength from his warmth.
The figure raised one arm, the gesture accompanied by a bedlam of noise from the tentacles attached to it. "Come. We will speak."
"Who are you?" Erekel squeezed Dersi's hand.
"Biological Sciences Officer Alberto Rodriguez." The way the creature spoke, it sounded almost like a question. "Yes. That's correct. But I haven't used that name in generations. You may call me God."
APF 0018
"Come." Captain Rafael Santiago set aside the cup of lukewarm water---wishing it were coffee, wishing that Ship's stores still held the precious beans, or that the plants had demonstrated more tenacity in taking root in this foreign soil---and peaked his hands in front of his face. His chin rested on his outthrust thumbs, and he could feel the stubble there.
The door to his office slid open and his aide stepped inside, executing an imperfect salute. Santiago watched the aide cross the polished ceramic tile floor, noting the hitch in the young man's step. The contagion, it must be. Though the aide wore a crisp uniform that covered him from ankle to throat, Santiago could almost see the festering sores that must cover his flesh. Festering sores, or worse. Some of these newer Hatchlings had developed . . . abnormalities that made sores seem like a godsend.
Santiago repressed a shudder, remembering others he had seen, others with huge, tumorous growths sprouting from their limbs, bones twisted, sending out spurs barely wrapped in taut flesh. One woman, only recently put down, had hidden a complete, diminutive arm that had grown from her pelvis. Another man, one who had escaped through the porous perimeter and into the wildlands surrounding the Enclave, had developed a ring of blisters along the base of his neck. The blisters burst, revealing red-rimmed eyes that leaked a foul liquid.
"Captain, the reports you requested." The aide handed Santiago a datapad. Santiago felt a shiver crawl along his spine as his fingers brushed against the Hatchling's. He knew it was not communicable, knew he could not catch the contagion. None of the Founders could, or their natural offspring. Only the Hatchlings, and their clones.
Still. He surreptitiously wiped his fingers on his pants leg.
"Will there be anything else, sir?" The aide shifted from one foot to another.
Santiago looked at the man, so young, physiologically as well as chronologically. Yet so old, measured against the span he could be allowed to live. Most Hatchlings could expect five, perhaps six years of life after awakening. Before the contagion took hold, and spread, and . . . changed them.
"How long have you been awake, Simon?"
Simon refused to meet his eyes. He stared at the floor. "Four years, three months, two days, sir."
"Does it hurt?" He did not know why he asked. He never had before, of any of them. Not in the eighteen years they had been marooned on this disgusting planet. Perhaps it was nostalgia. Simon looked a bit like his namesake, the son Santiago had buried so very many years before, long before launching himself into space aboard Ship.
Natural, considering. In a weird way, this Simon was his son, too. If stolen cells altered and combined with some other, anonymous, donor could be called a son.
"Some. A little. Some days are worse than others." The admission obviously pained Simon, though he could hardly do anything else. Programmed for truth, they were unable to deceive, either by intent or omission. A lesson learned in the early days.
"And today?"
Simon raised his head and smiled, and another part of Santiago died. So like Simon. So like his son. Dead. Dead, dead, dead. "Today is worse than most."
"See medical. Get them to give you something. My authorization."
Simon nodded. "Thank you, Captain. Thank you. Is there anything else you need?"
"No. Go on, Simon. See the doctors. Get something. Then rest. I'll retire soon, myself."
"Should I send your nurse then, sir?" Solicitous.
"Yes. But have her prepare my room first, if you don't mind."
"As you will, sir," Simon said, withdrawing. The door slid closed, creaking on its age-worn tracks, leaving Santiago alone with his thoughts.
He stared at the closed door. He could hear Simon gathering his things to leave the reception area. The man was so precise, so economical in his movements. Physical perfection. Or at least he would have been, should have been. If not for the contagion.
Santiago pushed back from his desk, the wheels of his sled sliding with a whisper across the smooth, polished tiles. He stared down at his legs, rendered useless by the last stroke and now shriveled. He could picture his legs beneath the thin fabric of his uniform, like sticks painted with age-spotted, wrinkled skin.
As he heard the sound of his nurse entering his office suite he picked up the datapad from his desk and wheeled himself toward the door. It opened before he had crossed the office, and Diane stepped around behind him, taking the handles of his sled.
"Your room is ready, Captain. Should I have your favorite dinner sent up?" Diane's voice was low and soothing, soft.
He turned his head and looked up at her. Beautiful, with her dark hair pulled back and gathered by a copper clasp and her eyes wide, bright, and clear, Diane smiled down at him. "Oh, are the processors working again? Yes. A nice filet mignon would be nice. Overstuffed baked potato, too."
"Pureed, or would you like to try to suck it whole through the straw?" She kept a straight face, wheeling him through the reception area and into the wide, white corridor toward his quarters. "Tell you what, I'll get them to use an extra flavor cube for you."
"You're too kind," he said with a sigh.
"The least I can do for our fearless leader."
He chuckled. "Fearless leader? Diane, if I were twenty years younger . . ."
"You'd still be old enough to be my grandfather."
"Fifty, then. Fifty years younger."
"Seriously, how are you feeling, Captain? You didn't overdo it today, did you?" She laid a soft, warm hand on his shoulder, squeezing gently.
He reached up and patted her hand. "I'm not dead yet, Diane. There's a lot of life left in these old bones."
There has to be. There has to be.
Later, having dined on a thick landskin soup---sucked through a straw, no less---Santiago sat in bed reviewing the day's reports. Simon's latest findings lay in his lap, the screen glowing blue in the darkness of his austere quarters.
More than usual, he found it difficult to concentrate. His mind wandered, drifting over the accumulated flotsam of his ninety-plus years. Without doubt, the past twenty years on the surface of this alien world occupied the lion's share of his memories. But there were other times, other memories. Before. Though the turmoil of this harsh existence pressed on him daily, nothing could rob him of his earlier, better memories. In retrospect, all his achievements in Service, his rapid advancement, his first command, his distinguishments, the accolades that had rained down on him like a spring shower---they meant nothing. When he was gone, they would be forgotten. Doubtless they already had been forgotten in Hegemony space, save perhaps in the annals of the military.
Here, planetside, it would be no different.
No. That was untrue. It would be horribly, tragically different. He would still be forgotten, would fade from the memories of whatever pitiful remnant of humanity survived on this disgusting world. But his legacy would remain, if any survived. A legacy of pain and failure, genocide and enslavement. His was the hand that had wrought this perversion of humanity, had given the orders that set the techs on their campaign of recombinant DNA and cloning, downloading and alteration, orientation and indoctrination. Generations of Hatchlings had been born, grown, educated, and put to work under his direction. And they had died, by his orders. Been killed, to be more precise. Again, at his orders.
What could he have done differently?
Let them---us---die with dignity. All of us. To the last man.
For the millionth time the thought flickered through his consciousness, a nagging certainty that yearned to be born.
On his death, it would all fall apart. He knew it, knew it in his heart, his soul. All of this, this travesty of human existence, would come tumbling down. It would vanish beneath the oppressive weight of the landskin, as the eerie stuff grew to reclaim its own.
And what of humanity? Sooner or later the Hatchlings would rise and throw off the oppression of the Founders. They would revolt. And poisoned by the contagion, who knew what would arise if they were left unchecked, allowed to breed?
"Rodriguez," Santiago whispered. He wondered what had happened to the rebel. They had given up searching for him and his followers long, long ago, when Mac died, dissolved down to his boots by the caustic agents vomited up by the drakes. In all these years, two decades, Rodriguez had been silent. Dead, most likely, a victim of his own delusions.
"You're getting old, ancient, Rafael," he told himself. "Old. I feel it."
He leaned back, tossing the datapad to the night table and crossing his arms beneath his head. The ceiling gave no answers, only conjured up the other memories, the better ones. He forced the tragedy of his mistakes down where they could continue to fester, eating at his soul.
"Simon," he said, picturing his son in the discolorations on the ceiling. He remembered the downy soft hair, the way it fell into his eyes as the boy ran through the green, green grass of the parklands. The sounds of his child's laugher echoed in Santiago's quarters, summoned from a deep reservoir of pain and pride. Santiago could still feel Simon, feel his butter-soft skin, as the boy tumbled into his arms. The mingled scents of grass and wind, little-boy sweat, and the shampoo Diane used to wash his hair rose in a tantalizing, poignant cloud.
How often had he held the boy? How often had he spared the time from his call to duty to hold him, comfort him, tell him how proud he was to have such a fine, fine boy for his son? Not often enough. Never often enough.
Simon should have been the legacy he left behind, his own personal immortality. Such a good, bright boy. So strong. So rambunctious.
Dead. Forty years and more before Santiago had signed on for this foolish, doomed mission. Killed, with Diane, his mother, in a stupid, tragic accident. Killed, while Santiago journeyed between the stars.
Tears dripped down Santiago's cheeks, spilling onto his pillow.
"How long?" Santiago hung his head, the words reverberating in his mind like Klaxons.
"Six months, perhaps. With diligent care." The med-tech laced his fingers together and leaned close. Programmed for a sympathetic bedside manner, the tech laid a smooth, young hand on Santiago's shoulder. "Strict bedrest. No stress."
"There's nothing that can be done? No drugs? No surgery?"
The tech shook his head. "I'm sorry. Your body could not handle the strain of even the most minor surgery, and the drugs have lost their efficacy. There's nothing else."
Santiago nodded. "I understand. Thank you. Will you call my nurse, please? And . . . give me a moment, will you?"
"Yes, sir," the tech said, rising smoothly, easily, on long, young legs. He left the room, left Santiago alone with the news of his coming demise. No. Too clinical a word. Death. Left Santiago alone with his coming death.
He wasn't sure how he felt about it. He wondered . . .
"Oh, hell," he said, spinning his sled about and wheeling toward the door. It slid open, and Diane was there. Diane, with her too-sympathetic expression and her beautiful eyes. Eyes like his Diane's. He could not face those eyes, not now.
"Call Singh. Have him meet me in my office."
"Office? But the doctor said . . ."
"I don't care what the doctor said. Have Singh meet me in my office. Tell him I don't want to wait on his leisure. Whatever he's doing, tell him to drop it, and attend me."
She hesitated. "Y-yes, sir." She reached for the handles on the back of his sled.
"Leave off of that! Fetch Singh. Now!"
She blanched, retreating a step, then another. A hurt expression crossed her face. "Yes, sir."
He left the med-wing under his own power, wheeling through a waiting room packed with degenerating Hatchlings, feeling their eyes on him. A certainty of the dark thoughts behind their eyes came to him, the undoubted knowledge that they relished this, had waited for it. Their time would come, soon.
"Not yet, damn you," he shouted, sending his sled rolling into the hall. "Not fucking yet."
"What you are speaking of is highly irregular. I am not certain such a thing is possible." Singh's normally neutral expression had vanished in the wake of Santiago's announcement. His eyes widened. His mouth turned down into a deep grimace.
"Nonsense," Santiago barked. "We've done it---or something so damned close to it as to be indistinguishable---a hundred thousand times. Why not? Surely you see that there is no clear alternative."
"I am unsure. This . . . this is very irregular, Captain. Theoretically possible, yes. But wise? There can be no guarantee."
"Again, I can see no alternative." He reached out and took one of Singh's hands between his. "Let me pose you a question, Singh. What will happen if I die? Now. With things the way they are? With the Hatchlings outnumbering us twelve to one. How long will they be content to be bred like chattel, to be stuffed with personalities and egos not their own? How long before they rebel and slaughter all of you?"
Singh pulled away, shook his head. "I . . ." He sighed. "Not long. From what I have been able to observe of their collective psyche, there is a deep-rooted, instinctual urge to truly live, unfettered."
"Live. In what form, what fashion, Singh? Each generation of Hatchlings we breed quickens sooner, alters sooner. Changes sooner. And the mutations grow more profound as year sweeps into year. What will the shape of mankind be in a dozen years? Fifty? A hundred? Would we even recognize ourselves? Especially without the stabilizing effect of the Founders around to keep at least one strain pure. Chaos."
Singh continued to shake his head. "But what you are proposing. This . . . this is so . . . so irrevocable. So profound."
"Do you think I like the idea, Singh? Do you think I relish the idea of immortality melded into a machine, bonded into a computer system, rendered little more than an active download? Is this how you think I envisioned my existence as a boy, staring up at the sky, the stars?"
"No. No. Of course not." He turned his back, watching through the window in the door as Simon went about his duties. A tumor had appeared on the young Hatchling's forehead in the last weeks, a tumor filled with bone that swelled his head to twice its normal size. Singh shivered.
"Yes. I see you've realized what I realized long ago. I can't download into a Hatchling. The damage could well extend into my own psyche." He spread his hands. "There is no choice."
Singh sighed. "I shall investigate the possibilities. There are a few techs who remain loyal to us who, perhaps, could accomplish this deed. And deep within the bowels of the Enclave there are systems that remain undamaged. The computer core could easily house a . . . a ghost."
Santiago smiled. "A ghost? There's a certain irony in that, isn't there."
"Indeed." The psych officer shook his head again. "I shall see what I can do."
"Make it quick, Singh. There is not much time. Not much time at all."
"You!" The howling wind of the ool's passage ripped the word from Rian's throat and cast it out, raw and feeble. Rian jerked back from the stranger. His right hand curled around the haft of his makeshift spear.
The stranger smiled. He seized Rian's throat and dragged him from the root-lined bower, out into the storm of noise and debris. He ignored the pummeling hail of torn earth and the rattle of stones that pelted his smooth skin. Strong fingers dug into Rian's flesh, choking, constricting.
Rian threw himself on the stranger. The man fell back, stumbling over a tangle of snapped roots. The stranger's confident smile evaporated as Rian's fist crashed into the side of his face. Rian felt the satisfying crunch of breaking bone. Blood spurted. The stranger lost his grip on Rian; his head rocked back. Grasping the stranger's arm, Rian twisted. The stranger went to his knees. Rian slammed his knee into the stranger's chin. Whirling the spear about, he thrust for the stranger's chest.
A hand whipped in from Rian's right, slapping aside the spear. Its sharpened end tore through the stranger's hand and ripped an oozing hole in the landskin beneath. The stranger cried out and clutched the spear with his other hand. Rian threw himself back as another figure flew at him, snarling. He clung to the spear, and the stranger screamed as the wood tore through his flesh. Rian raised his middle arm, blocking a descending blow. The impact numbed his arm.
A woman, as perfectly formed as the stranger, leaped at him. Her fist smashed into the side of his head, a jarring blow that dropped him to his knees. His vision clouded and he fell back on his haunches. Another blow crashed into the bridge of his nose, snapping back his head. He fell, cracking his head on a tight knot of roots. In his hand, the shaft of his spear shattered. A heavy weight landed on his chest. His middle arm shot up, his hand seeking, finding soft flesh and digging at it. Blinking his eyes to clear the pain-haze, Rian blocked another hail of blows, feeling each impact like a knife thrust in his arms. His hand wrapped around a soft throat. The woman growled, her teeth bared, long streamers of drool dangling from her peeled-back lips.
Rian heaved, thrust his greater weight against her pinning legs. She toppled, and he slammed his left elbow into her chin, rocking her head back. She grunted. Twisting around, Rian palmed her face and slammed her head into the roots of the tree. He whipped the broken haft of the spear around, stabbing it into her midsection. She screamed as a great gout of blood spurted up from the wound. Rian jerked upward on the spear, ripping flesh.
"No!" Rian heard. He turned his head, flinching at the just-seen shape careening toward his face. The fist grazed his chin. Slick with the woman's blood, Rian's spear shard slipped from his hand. He tumbled away from the woman, who lay groaning, curled into a tight ball. The stranger howled in rage and flung himself on Rian.
Rian raised his knee, crashing it into the stranger's crotch. The stranger hunched over, and Rian grabbed the side of his head with his right and left hands, pounding his middle fist into the stranger's face. And again. Blood sprayed, painting Rian's arm to the elbow.
The stranger's bloodshot eyes narrowed. His hands seized Rian's throat, squeezing. Rian pounded him, fists smashing into the stranger. His middle hand clawed at the vicelike grip on his throat. He fought for leverage, twisted his body, rolling over on top of the stranger. He slid his middle hand up, gouging his thumb into one of the stranger's eyes. Blood squirted, gushing out of ruptured flesh. An eyeball popped beneath his thumbnail, squirting liquid like a miniature geyser.
Do not resist. It is all according to plan. Rian ignored the insistent voice in his head.
A tremendous blow on the back of his head knocked him away. A knotted, powerful arm encircled his throat, jerking him away from the stranger's grip. Rian tried to twist, striking behind him with his fists, pounding into soft flesh that sheathed an inner core of hard, banded muscle. As the stranger staggered to his feet, hand clasped to his bleeding face, the woman dragged Rian back, keeping him from gaining his feet.
She tripped over an upthrust root, spilling them both to the landskin. Tendrils slashed out of the heaving flesh, twining about Rian's calves, constricting, holding him. He kicked out, but the tentacles tightened, winding like fat serpents around his knees, his thighs. Others spun out, wrapping around his right forearm. The woman jerked up on Rian's head. His spine, wrenched, crackled in protest. Sharp needles of pain wracked him.
The stranger, blood streaking his face and mottling his shoulders, lurched toward them. He kicked out, slamming his heel into Rian's stomach. Though Rian tensed, he felt the blow in his back. He gagged, squeezing his eyes shut. The woman kept the inexorable pressure on his throat. Waves of blackness closed in, a wash of numbness that threatened to steal his consciousness.
"Ease up. Do not kill him," the stranger said. "But keep him still."
Rian forced open his eyes, squinting up at the looming face of the stranger. One mangled, distended eyeball hung down on the stranger's cheek, slowly leaking yellowish fluid. The other was swollen, crimson with the stain of a thousand burst blood vessels. He flexed his injured hand, sending sprinkles of blood dripping to the landskin.
The landskin flowed over Rian like a tight blanket, molding to the contours of his body.
Don't resist. Don't struggle. Be still, and wait. I am with you. It is all according to plan. Rian ignored the strange, alien voice in his head, fighting with all of his strength against the constricting bonds of landskin.
The stranger knelt beside him, wincing. He shook his head, and the eyeball on its twitching strings swung back and forth like a pendulum. Frowning, the stranger reached up and took the eyeball. With his other hand he forced open the oozing socket and shoved his eyeball back into place. He closed his eyes, breathing deeply.
Rian watched in fascination as the cuts and lacerations on the stranger's face knitted seamlessly, leaving only drying tracks of blood. A moment later the stranger opened his eyes. The mangled orb gleamed wetly in the fitful moonlight, cocked slightly to one side. The stranger tapped at the outer orbit, positioning the eyeball so that it stared down at Rian.
"Ease up a bit more. He's going to lose consciousness."
In response, the arm at his throat slackened, allowing him to draw hoarse, gasping breaths into his tortured lungs. A soft spray of tangled red hair fell across Rian's face. He jerked his head from side to side and blew at the offending strands.
"What do you want?"
The stranger smiled. "You, Rian. You."
Rian shook his head. "Why?"
The stranger's smile broadened. "God calls you. You will answer his summons."
"Kill him," the woman said. She released Rian's throat, leaving him in the embrace of the landskin, and circled him. She lay her hand on the stranger's shoulder, kneading the taut muscles beneath his skin. "God can retrieve the information from his corpse as easily as from a live thing."
The stranger shook his head. "I don't think so. Can't you feel it? Even through the touch of the landskin I can learn nothing of him. And the landskin is loath to embrace him. Something is wrong. Something has changed."
"It doesn't matter. Their existence is numbered in days, if not hours."
"What are you talking about?" Rian demanded.
In response the stranger lifted his arm, pointing toward the sky, where Rian could see dozens of ool floating across the valley. Their bulks cast distorted shadows on the landskin. The sound of the ools' passage had faded as they moved farther along the valley floor, heading for the ravine wall and the fens beyond. Now Rian could clearly hear the raucous, buzzing hum of swarms of boreworms, could see against the luminous tapestry of the night the creeping clouds of worms swollen with buoyant gases.
"Your precious Enclave will fall, Rian. We have awakened, and we will take back what was ours. We will cure this world of your parasitic infestation."
"What are you?" He stared at the two of them, so alike, so utterly alien. The clean lines of their limbs, the very symmetry of their smooth bodies, rendered them monstrous. But the alien gleam in their eyes struck him to his core. He shivered. The landskin, reacting, squeezed tighter.
The stranger raised his arm, extending it for Rian to see. "Once, you were like this, Rian. Close, at least. A faint shadow of what I am. Your kind. Your species. Before you came here, when you remained where you belonged. Out there. Beyond the skies, traveling in your metal ships between the stars. Bringing your pestilence to a thousand worlds.
"You do not know your own history, Rian. You've forgotten it all. For so long have you breathed beneath our sun, for so long have you eaten of our flesh and drunk of our lifesblood, that you have lost all memory of your origins. Pitiful. A species with such poor cognitive abilities should never have gained the power you've accumulated.
"But we owe you a great debt, too, Rian. It was your individuality, your illogical adherence to hierarchy and struggle, that awakened us. You've partaken of us, Rian. But no more than we've partaken of you. Before you came this was a paradise, in the vernacular of your ancestors, an Eden. Look what you've made it. Look what you've made of yourselves in your vanity and your belligerence, your self-righteous superiority. You thought to change this world as you've changed countless others. You thought to remake it in the image of the thousand others upon which your vile, parasitic species crawls, sucking the life from them.
"But not this one, Rian. Never this one."
Rian struggled against the landskin, trying vainly to move his arms and legs. He could not. It clung too tight, flowing against his skin like abrasive stone.
The stranger leaned closer, his breath hissing in Rian's face. "We are the future, Rian. She and I. We are the future of this world. And, in time, we will be the future of others. All of them. Until, at last, the stars will cry out in unison, communion, one vast, all-encompassing species, at peace."
He leaned closer still, until his blood-flecked lips touched the lobe of Rian's left ear. "You are obsolete. An abomination even in the eyes of your ancestors."
Rian snarled and spit at the stranger. The reaction surprised him with its violence.
The stranger screamed, his hands clawing at the droplets of spittle on his face, tearing great gashes in his skin. Between his clawed fingers Rian could see the stranger's face bubbling, hissing, smoke rising from it in noxious pink streamers. The stranger reeled, falling to his back and writhing in obvious pain. His legs kicked out, slamming into the landskin, which bucked in sympathy. The woman rushed to the stranger, letting out a high-pitched wail. She seized him, clutched him like a newborn to her mother's breast, while he thrashed wildly on the ground.
Still the landskin clung to Rian. He could not move.
When the stranger rose, half of his face had sloughed away, a dripping, ruined mass of pustule-ridden tissue. His lips were gone, revealing white teeth stained with blood thrusting up from oozing gums. His voice, when he spoke, slurred from his mouth. "That hurtsss. That hurtsss a great deal."
He approached, staying out of range of Rian's spittle. In his hand he carried the broken shard of the spear, twisting the short rod through his long, tapered fingers. "Ssso will thiss!" he cried. He reversed the spear shaft and slammed it down through the landskin and into Rian's belly.
"God?" The unfamiliar word felt strange in Dersi's mouth. She shook her head, not understanding its meaning, and saw Erekel shrug.
The right side of God's face twitched, his lips curving upward in a grotesque approximation of a smile. Cilia wriggled from between his tight lips, questing across his cheek, sliding into his dark nostril. "A concept all but abandoned in the universe of my birth. Simply put, God is the creator, the progenitor, the catalyst behind all that is nature. The supreme being. Me."
Dersi stared at the foul creature, unable to decipher his claim. "Like a Veil Lord?"
God laughed, a harsh sound, like the scraping of raw stones in the ool's gullet. Dersi shivered and drew back from him. "The Veil Lords are but pale imitations of me, Dersi. My creations, as are you all. They are failures, one and all. My first attempt at bonding humanity to the perfection that is the world-mind. Imperfect creations of a perfect, supreme being."
God gestured with his metallic arm, motioning them toward the far end of the oblong chamber. There, in the deep shadows of clamorous machines and throbbing ool organs, a sphincter twisted open, revealing a long, torturous hallway beyond. Deep recesses lined the resin-encrusted walls, lit from behind by glowing light-tumors of a soft greenish hue. Vague shapes reared up within those recesses, cast in masking shadows.
He led them into the hallway. His trailing umbilicals moved through the flesh of the ceiling, merging with the tissue and following inside an undulating wave. Dersi trembled and pulled back against Erekel's guidance.
"What are you doing?"
"I don't want to go in there, Erekel. This is . . . this is wrong. Something's not right."
He snorted. "Do you see an alternative? I've no doubt that if we refuse to go with him, God will bring the women back. I'm not anxious to tangle with them again. Are you?"
She shook her head, still hesitant. But Erekel tugged on her arm, just a few steps behind the grotesque figure, forcing her to stumble forward. Ooze dripped from the opened sphincter onto her shoulders and trickled down between her breasts. She shivered and bit her lip.
"This way. There is a more comfortable room down here. You're both hungry, thirsty. I'll have refreshments constituted." God kept his back to them, moving down the corridor in a miasma of sound. In his wake the scent of pungent spices, rich and sharp, washed over Dersi. She gagged.
Erekel pointed into one of the niches, nudging Dersi's attention that way. Within the recess a creature which at one time might have been human sat in a resin-encrusted chair of worked metal. Rods and wires sank into the man's distorted, enlarged head. His mouth was open, held so by little clawed arms that emerged from the walls of his recess. A bundle of dripping tubes clogged the orifice. Other wires, other tubes, wound around his head, masking his eyes and ears. His entire body glistened with hardened, wavery resin, forever sealing him to the thronelike chair. Behind him, on the back wall of the recess, a bank of blinking lights flickered on and off with no discernable pattern.
Dersi drew back, looking into another of the recesses. Each bore its own perpetual captive, silent forever.
"What are these . . . things?" Dersi whispered softly, for Erekel's ears.
"I don't---"
"Other failures, other attempts at union which went awry. My crewmen and compatriots, consumed by the same dream which drove me. Their bodies, their minds, their wills---they were not strong enough. Now they are storehouses of knowledge, of genetics, traits ripe for the harvesting." God's mechanical eye rose and turned back toward them, though his face remained fixed toward the front. "That one is Ensign Lisa Douglas, from Xenogenetics. Useful, but flawed. As were they all."
"Are . . . Are they dead?" Dersi managed to ask. She stayed in the center of the corridor, keeping as much space as possible between her and the recessed creatures.
"They can never die. Like me, they are immortal. But they are unaware. At this point they are simply . . . farms, if you will. Cultures for the harvesting of genetic material." He paused, mechanical finger to his cilia-dripping lips, and frowned. "Come, it's only a little farther, and you can both rest."
Dersi shrank into Erekel as they passed a woman forever posed with her arms stretched above her head, her fingers drawn like claws, as if to fight, to scratch and tear, at some horrifying menace. Translucent tubes capped her full breasts, extracting white fluid, milk or collostrum, with a wet slurp. Between legs held permanently open by digging clamps, other tubes pierced the woman's vagina, organic tubes that moved lazily, undulating.
A sphincter at the end of the hallway twisted open, and God led them into an oval room with metal walls. Crystalline screens covered the far wall from floor to ceiling, coruscating with a kaleidoscope of colors. Before the wall of twisting designs rose a mammoth throne of gleaming metal. Directly above the throne a sphere covered with transparent tubes and claw-mouthed hoses dropped from the ceiling. God strode to the chair and seated himself. Needles emerged from the right arm of the chair and pierced his flesh, while from the other arm hissing clamps latched onto his metal appendage. The sphere of jutting crystal rods lowered, twin bars descending and sliding into the base of his skull. He sighed in seeming pleasure, his mouth gaping open and the cilia within it disgorging.
"Sit," God said, raising the fingers of his right hand. Dersi started as machinery grated in the wall. A portion of the wall slid into the ceiling, and a low chair emerged from the darkness, clicking into place behind her. An identical chair slid into place beside Erekel. "Sit. Refreshments are on their way."
"God," Dersi said, licking her lips. She paused and glanced at Erekel. "God, what is this . . . this place? It . . . it's so alien."
He laughed. "You unwittingly mimic the very words of your ancestors, Dersi. They, too, once looked upon a new and fascinating world, wondering at their place in it, wondering at its reality, its immutable laws and the consequences of breaking those laws."
"I don't understand," Dersi said.
"Neither do I," Erekel echoed.
"Will you sit? It is not often that my children find me. I rather welcome the novelty. The simulacrums have become such tedious companions, and my other children have not yet emerged from the womb." He gestured, and the chairs slid closer to Dersi and Erekel. Dersi, with a wary glance at her companion, lowered herself cautiously to the edge of the chair. Expecting the chill touch of metal, the rising warmth surprised her. She kept her hands in her lap, away from the chair's armrests. Erekel likewise sat perched on the edge of his seat, looking as if at any moment he might bolt from it.
At that moment the sphincter through which they had entered spun open, and a pair of the nude, identical women stepped into the room. They carried trays burdened with clear flasks containing a white liquid, as well as platters piled with squares of some brownish material. An unusual scent rose from the trays, like nothing Dersi had encountered before.
God gestured with his fingers once more, and a low, broad table emerged from the floor in front of Dersi and Erekel. "Marissa, put down the trays and leave us."
"Yes, Alberto," the two said with one voice. Dersi eyed the squares as the women set down their burdens, turned, and departed the way they had come.
"It is quite beneficial, catered to the needs of your physiology."
"What is it?" Erekel asked, touching one of the squares with a fingertip.
"Nutrient cake. Proteins, carbohydrates, a blend of vitamins and minerals in a fiber base. It's soft enough for you to chew, though you should be careful, given your dental deterioration. An unexpected side effect of total dependence on the ool for sustenance, I'm afraid. It's not filet mignon, but it's palatable, nutritious."
Erekel picked up one of the squares and sniffed it, while Dersi watched him. He licked his lips, then glanced at God. Finally, he took a tentative nibble at one corner of the cake. His face slid through several emotions: anxiety, revulsion, curiosity, and, finally, pleasant surprise. He swallowed, took another bite.
"A vast improvement over ool plasma, I take it?" God smiled his eerie smile.
"It's good. Unusual," Erekel told Dersi. He nodded toward the platter, then frowned, turning his head and sticking his finger into his mouth to scrape something from his teeth. "It sticks."
"Try it, Dersi," God said with a sickening smile.
Hesitant, Dersi forced herself to take one of the brown cakes. She stared at it, noted its tackiness on her fingertips and its subtle aroma, like strange spices. Wincing, Dersi took a tiny bite, finding the cake spongy, like lung tissue, and with a taste that defied description. Unusual, peculiar. Not unpleasant, however.
"What is this place, God?" Erekel asked. He gestured at the room around them, but clearly meant the entirety of the complex nestled within the ool, hidden.
"And what do you want with us?" Dersi said.
God laughed. "Very direct, Dersi. You remind me of Santiago." He smacked his half-lips, the cilia spilling out like fat worms. "Hmmm. Yes. There is a certain similarity in the matrices. I thought I'd culled him entirely from my genepool, but it would appear not. That might work in my favor."
"What do you mean? What are you talking about?"
"It's unimportant," God said, raising his mechanical arm in a vague gesture. He sighed, an almost human affectation. "You asked about this place. A logical question. The answer, I'm afraid, is not quite so succinct and logical. Originally, this was to be our interface, our communications node with the ool, with the landskin, with the planet itself."
"Our?" Dersi leaned forward in her chair.
"We. Us. Humans. We're aliens, Dersi, foreign to this planet. Invaders from another, lost, world."
Dersi burst out in laughter.
"Your disbelief is understandable. I've taken great pains to ensure it, in fact."
"We're from another world?" Dersi said, snickering. The horrendous caricature of a man across from her took on a comedic cast, its horror fading in the light of revealed madness. "And just how did we accomplish that?" She raised her arms and flapped them at her sides. "Did we used to have wings, then? What happened to them?"
"Of a sort, yes," God said. "Though not in a manner you could understand. Look around you, Dersi. See the things in just this room alone. The screen behind me, the communications equipment overhead, the computer terminals jutting from the walls. The walls themselves, in fact. Where have you seen such artifacts before?
"I'll answer for you: nowhere. Oh, there are similarities between this technology and those perversions of the Gagash. Similar, but not identical. This is not a technology I've allowed to proliferate. It's unnecessary to my children, a burden carted across the stars in an effort to transform, to terraform, an unwilling host planet in the image of our abandoned homeworld. It's a crutch humanity leaned on for far too long, instruments of environmental rather than personal change, a means to refocus the world to meet our limited view of what it is, what it should be, rather than awakening to the realization that it is humanity that should change, humanity that must change. Or be changed."
Dersi edged back in her seat. She glanced at Erekel to see if he was as astonished by God's insanity as she. Shock rippled through her; Erekel slumped over in his chair, his eyes closed, his mouth gaping, his chest rising and falling rhythmically. Tiny creatures crawled across his skin, multilegged and illuminated from within, spinning filaments as delicate as threads over his flesh.
"Erekel!" Dersi cried. She tried to rise and go to him, only to discover that she could not. The metal of the chair liquefied, drinking her in. Oozing tendrils spewed from the wall behind her, seizing her arms. One wrapped around her throat, another her forehead, and dragged her back against the chill metal of her chair.
"There is no cause for alarm," God told her. "Erekel is unharmed, just asleep, while I harvest what sequences from him I can use. I promise you, he's feeling no pain. In fact, I'll send him pleasant dreams."
"What are you doing? Why are you doing this?" Dersi grit her teeth and pulled against the tight restraints, her efforts futile.
"Don't worry, Dersi. You are about to fulfill your purpose, and you should feel proud, proud of your contribution to my Eden."
"No! Let me go!"
"So like Santiago and his lackeys." He shook his grotesque head. "They would not listen to me, would not see the sheer majesty, the beauty of this completely interdependent ecosystem, a system unlike any we'd ever encountered. I cannot blame them. They were always men and women of action, not understanding the nuances and secrets that could be discovered through observation, interaction of a more peaceful nature. No. They would not---perhaps even could not---see that this beautiful world, this Garden of Eden, had evolved a sentience beyond human comprehension, that it was---is---in effect, one organism, one living, breathing, reacting, cognizant creature.
"It welcomed us as we came down from the stars, Dersi. Can you imagine? Though our engines scorched its body for kilometers in every direction at our landing zone, the world-mind welcomed the strays from another world, sought to communicate with us, to learn from us, and to teach us.
"But men like Santiago could not understand the entreaties. We argued with them---myself, Marissa Flaherty, a few others. We argued, pleaded with them to pause, to listen, to strive to understand. But, crippled by the vagaries of fate, Santiago forbore our advice, and launched an assault on the planet. He broke the seal on the massive terraformers, released alien, Terran life-forms upon this pristine world, perverting it, wounding it in ways we could not possibly understand. He hunted ool from the skies, Dersi, burned them as they floated and released peace pheromones onto the wind currents."
Dersi panted. The bonds around her chest and arms, her head and legs, held her firmly, but gently. She could not move. She could only stare at the horrifying apparition of God, there before her on his throne. She screamed, her throat raw.
"We acted, a few of us. We had to, don't you see? They were killing it, killing the very planet that had welcomed us with open arms, prepared to accept us into a brotherhood such as has never before been witnessed. Imagine! Two species, from worlds light-years apart, intertwined as one! It is miraculous.
"Santiago did not see it that way. Nor did the security forces, the marines and troopers." He sighed, shaking his head. His voice lost its angry edge, sinking into sadness, regret. "In the end there really was no choice. I knew we could communicate with the world-mind, given time. We could still realize my dreams. But only if the others were rendered powerless to harm us and our host. In the end, only my way could pave the road to true communion."
The rods sunk into the base of his skull retracted, rising into the complex array overhead. Clamps and tendrils withdrew, and God stood. He walked toward Dersi, his organic arm extended. His fingertips, warm and wet, touched her cheek.
"Alas, Marissa and the others were not strong enough. We built well, or thought we did. The interface was thought to be perfect, and we held our collective breath in anticipation as we all opened ourselves to communion with the greatest, most vast mind we had ever encountered."
He shook his head and turned away from her, staring at the immense crystalline screen on the opposite wall. At a gesture the screen wavered, and images sprang into clarity upon it. Men and women, dressed in bizarre clothing that covered them from ankle to throat, stepped into niches cut into cold, metal walls and seated themselves in chairs dancing with lights and crawling with lifeless cords and tubes. More than a hundred sat and caught their breath, and waited as spiked helmets dropped down over their heads, concealing their faces above their mouths. A stream of intermingled voices rose from the images, the words indistinct, unintelligible, but burdened with keen excitement. The excitement changed to panic, the anxious voices to screams of horror and pain. The men and women writhed in their gleaming chairs, struggled against the bonds that held them. One woman broke her arms free and raised them toward the ceiling of her recess, even as mucus oozed down to coat her in a glistening second skin. Her cries abruptly ceased.
Dersi stared in horror as more and more of the people on the screen were overwhelmed by dripping ooze, their cries forever stilled, their bodies locked into permanent stasis. Until, finally, one voice, alone, cried out, a voice vaguely familiar. The other images winked out one by one on the screen, and the central picture swelled to encompass all of the immense rectangular crystal. A lone man, whose cries trickled off, his rigid limbs relaxing, now let his mouth open in wonder rather than agony and fear.
"Yes. That is me. Of all my compatriots, I alone survived intact our first successful interface with the immensity that is the world-mind. And with that interface . . . Ah, Dersi! You cannot begin to imagine. Even the Veil Lords, closer to the world-mind than any unveiled, cannot begin to imagine the scale of the sentience I touched. And, touching, absorbed. And in turn was absorbed.
"I am the world-mind, Dersi. I am the ool, all ool." He touched the dangling cords that rose toward the ceiling. "I am connected to this ool, and it, in turn, is connected to all the others. I am the drakes. And I am the landskin. All of it. A precious gift, the most precious in all the universe."
"You're insane!" Dersi spat.
He turned back to her, smiling. "Perhaps. From your frame of reference it doubtless would appear so. But your scope is limited, Dersi. Your perceptions are crude, unevolved, pitiful. Do not lament, Dersi. The fault is not yours, but mine. For too long have I kept you Bhajong ignorant of your true purpose in my Eden. I had such high hopes for you, for all of you. But . . . But you've failed. Utterly. Now . . . Now my other children are nearing completion, nearing birth. You have become superfluous."
He paused, licking his lips with a thousand tongues. "But . . . Perhaps . . . You, Dersi. You're different. I can feel it. Genetic throwback, perhaps? Or an anomaly cast adrift in this sea of genetic flotsam? Could you appreciate the gift?
"This is not a gift I am content to enjoy alone, Dersi. I am not content to dwell with this immensity alone among all my birth-species. This garden must be shared, cultivated, brought to fruition. The world-mind once offered such a divine relationship to complete strangers and only a few of us accepted. I have made it my crusade to bring this garden to all, to welcome the rest of my brethren, their children, into this communion.
"The Veil Lords were a failure. Power hungry and delusional, borne of impure gene codes, they could grasp only a tenth of what the world-mind had to offer." He strode to the wall near Erekel and stroked the tangled ridges of resin there with his organic arm. Cilia burst from the wall, caressing his hand. "But, finally, with their unwitting aid and the fruits of their distended wombs, I have succeeded. I have given life to the first of the new breed, Dersi. The first to enjoy the unique, complimentary heritages of both their human ancestry, and the gift of the world-mind."
He gestured, and the screen flared to life once more, revealing an immense, vaulted chamber. From floor to ceiling and all around were translucent cases, sacks, and within each, a human form. Pale, red-haired, perfect.
"My new children. I am on the cusp of transforming the world. You are nearly perfect, Dersi. Against my understanding, you are as close to me as I could ever dream of achieving. You will be the next, the first of our kind after me, to achieve complete union with the world-mind." He gestured to the screen. "And these will serve us."
The chamber shook, a rill of rippling flesh spasming across the walls. Dangling tentacles twitched, and God jerked back from her, his face contorted in pain. An eerie keening wail arose from his horrid mouth, a cry that shook the room. Dersi squeezed her eyes shut, balled her hands into fists, and strained against her bonds. But they held.
God winced, a tightening of his organic tissues. He wheeled away from Dersi and sat in his throne. "We've crossed into the realm of the Enclave. Soon, it will be time to reclaim my lost children, my Adam and Eve, loosed from the bowels of this Heaven before their time."
Dersi screamed as the metal walls of the room bulged inward, pressed by an incalculable weight of ool-flesh. Metal buckled, wall panels collapsing into the chamber. The machinery overhead whined, steam belching from hairline cracks, stinking fluids spurting from veins and arteries and cold metal tubes. The screen behind God shattered.
APF 0168
Sundar Singh felt a tingle of fear in the pit of his stomach. With the stoic calm he had cultivated for most of his two-hundred-plus years, he kept the emotion from his face. He stared at his hands, twisting the wedding band, the symbol of love long lost, around and around on his finger.
"I've said something to alarm you." The voice throbbed with power, rich and full. Confident. Singh could hear the smile behind those words, the genuine enjoyment Eric took in inspiring such fear. Though Singh did not look at the Hatchling, he could hear the subtle creaking of the formed plastic chair as the monster shifted position. Despite a career spent delving into the secrets of the most secretive of men and women, Singh could not help but shift backward, away, in response. He did not want Eric too close.
Singh licked his lips. "No. No, of course not. Go on. Please." It took all of his self-control, all of his training, to utter the words. He wanted nothing so much as to jerk back, perhaps run, and summon the sentries. This beast should be put down. Now. Immediately.
Eric laughed, a hearty sound, deep like his voice. "You amuse me, Singh. Greatly. Tell me: Do you believe you can mask your fear from me? Perhaps such a thing is possible among your kind, but not with me. Never with me." Eric leaned forward, reaching out a hand ripe with calluses and huge, purple boils, and touched Singh's long, tapered fingers. One nailed finger touched the wedding band. "I can smell your fear. I can taste your panic."
Singh marshaled every shred of reserve he possessed and pulled his hand away gently, slowly. It would not do, he knew with certainty, to acknowledge this power Eric had over him. Not openly. If he did not speak it, did not acknowledge it, it could not be certain. Even for Eric. Even if he could smell such an intangible thing as fear.
Eric laughed again, and Singh looked up at the Hatchling. Not a large man, he was nonetheless plump with power, suffused with it. His seamless, smooth face, still round in the cheeks with the youth of his artificial birth, gave him the look of a simpleton, a moron. But his eyes, bright and round and piercing, revealed the depths of cruel intellect wadded up within that cherubic face. His eyes blazed, sinking into Singh's skin like hooked needles, pulling bits and pieces away like gobbets of flesh. Singh avoided staring into those eyes, knowing their power.
"I can imagine your thoughts, you know. Right now, you're wondering if you shouldn't call security. Perhaps you think to put me down now?" Eric laced his fingers together behind his head. "Do it, if it will make you happy."
"I was thinking no such thing." He licked his lips, hating the nervousness he knew shone through his façade. "We were speaking of . . . of . . ."
"Lost your train of thought?" Eric laughed. "You're slipping. It must be your age catching up with you. What are you now, a hundred? More?"
"I . . . We are not speaking of me, Eric. We---"
"But why not? Time and again we've met and you've listened to me talk, ever since I was hatched. And yet, during all that time, five years now, I've learned nothing of you that I haven't ferreted out on my own initiative."
"Wha . . . What do you mean?" Was that panic leaking through his voice? No. Impossible. It could not be.
Quick as a striking snake, Eric's hand lashed out, seizing Singh's left hand. He turned it over, palm up, and pulled Singh closer. "You wear this ring, doctor. This simple golden band. I'm familiar with the concept and the symbolism. But I've seen nothing of a spouse. Tell me, Singh: Where is your wife?"
"This is highly irregular, Eric. I . . . I think we should, perhaps, continue this another time. When you are more calm."
"But don't you know?" Eric released his hand and leaned back. He stared at the ceiling. "It's been five years now. I'm at term. Soon the call will come, and they'll dispatch me. We have so little time left to discuss such things. Don't you think we should get these weighty problems off our minds while we have the chance?"
"I have other appointments---"
"Other death interviews, you mean. Yes. I'm familiar with your schedule. Vanessa and John and Benjamin, to round out your day, isn't it? All crèche mates of mine."
"I did not know---"
Eric waved nonchalantly, still staring at the ceiling. "Of course not. Why should you? After all, we're just workers, aren't we? Drones. Animals. I imagine livestock on your homeworld were culled from the herd with equal dispassion."
"That's not how it is, Eric."
"Isn't it?" He lowered his eyes and stared at Singh, who felt an acid churning in his gut. "Isn't it?"
Singh withered under that gaze. A part of him leeched outward, slurped up by the powerful Hatchling like thin soup. He could see the hunger in Eric's eyes, the ravenous need. He trembled, needing this interview to end. Needing to press the comm button and summon help.
Eric had to die. Now. Before . . .
Abruptly, Eric stood. "I'll leave you now, and return to my . . . pen. The killers can find me there. With my kind. All of my kind."
"What . . . what do you mean?"
Eric only smiled. "It should not take me any longer than twenty minutes to reach my pen. I'll be waiting."
Without another word Eric left him. Singh released a pent breath he had not known he held. The exhalation deflated him, left him powerless, wobbly. His chin fell on his chest, and his hands trembled. On his age-shrunken fingers the gold wedding band hung loose.
Eric was not the problem. Not in and of himself. He was a symptom. A symptom of a disease of the Founders' making. He represented all the ills of the present system, the degeneration of the Hatchlings and their discontent. Eric could be neutralized, eliminated. But would that solve the problem, cure the disease? There would always be another Eric. Always. Until the Hatchlings succeeded in destroying the remnants of the Founders, and proceeded according to their own destiny.
Old. I am so old. No one should live this long. Not like this. Not in this place, on this world. Singh shook his head, feeling every one of his years dropping onto him like sharp, heavy stones.
With a heaving sigh Singh rose and rounded his desk. He collapsed in the thick, soft chair and pulled open the drawer. The bottle gleamed in the artificial light of the office. Without conscious thought he picked it up, stared at it, turned it around and around in his wrinkled hands.
Life. The essence of longevity, distilled from the lives of countless Hatchlings, neatly packaged in a thick suspension.
Not eternal life, but close. Enough in this one bottle to keep him alive for decades more.
"Santiago," he whispered. No. Father. Another of Father's creations, perhaps his most marvelous. Certainly his most insidious.
Armed with the composite knowledge of all Hegemony science, knowledge carried in the vast computer core of Ship, Santiago had become . . . had become . . . Something else. Less than human, and more. Not quite a sentient program, but more. A monster. A tyrant.
A secret tyrant, but a tyrant, nonetheless.
Since being uploaded into the computer core decades before, Santiago had undergone vast changes, changes beyond even those most wildly anticipated. Now, like some vile spider, Santiago, Father, brooded within the web of the Enclave's computer system, spinning his snares of lies and deceits, tugging the lifestrings of them all. Directing them. Guiding them, whether they wished to be guided or not.
And only Singh---and a handful of volitionless drones---knew of him. The technicians had been the first to go, quietly disappearing into the vast warren of passageways that had once been the body of Ship. Singh had inquired of them, sought them out, when he noted their absence. No one could provide him answers. Santiago had made them disappear. Father had.
Then, gradually, others who knew of the captain's transformation had died. Again, quietly. Peacefully. But dead, nonetheless. Until only Singh remained. Singh, who was yet too valuable for Santiago to vanish.
Father/Santiago controlled everything, determined everything. Secretly.
But he could not cure the disease of the Founders' making.
"Eric has become a problem." Singh sat at his desk in his quarters, watching the flickering pattern of colors on the display screen that had come to define Santiago.
"No longer. He has been neutralized." The synthesizer gave Santiago's voice a cold sound, like polar ice. "Don't worry, Singh. The situation is well in hand."
"How?"
"That is unimportant. What is important is that with the tissue samples I retrieved from his body I was able to identify the specific gene patterns that allowed his unchecked aggression to override the passivity programming. It'll be simple to cull that specific sequence from the gene pool of the Hatchlings and redirect it into the Founders."
Singh shivered.
Santiago's sensory capabilities were impressive, unmatched by anything human. "It repulses you, doesn't it, Singh? I can sense your trembling. I can hear your heartbeat quickening. You didn't take your medicine today, did you?"
Something rose up within Singh. He shook his head. "I will not. I am done with it, Captain. With all of it. Kill me if you wish, but I will no longer participate in these gruesome experiments."
"Pathetic. And very hypocritical. You think to wash your hands of the blood and guilt? Impossible. You are covered in guilt. You've bathed in it daily, since planetfall. You are as guilty of this . . . situation as me. Your culpability is no less than mine."
Singh shriveled in on himself. The crushing weight of his own responsibility nearly brought him to tears. They would not have been the first he had shed.
"Your guilt is misplaced, erroneous. And unnecessary. Foolish. What we do here is necessary to the continuance of our species. We are fighting a war of survival, Singh, a war we cannot hope to win without resorting to the use of the weapons of the enemy. As the planet changes us, so must we change ourselves, if only to keep the scales balanced.
"Look around you next time you stalk the halls. How many Founders do you see? How many of our own children still roam the Enclave? Few. Few. And daily fewer." The cold voice paused, the flickering lights on the screen contracting and expanding, contracting and expanding. "They kill them, did you know? The Hatchlings. They kill the Founders' children, when they can find them."
"No."
"Oh, yes. I stop it when I can. But they are persistent. Hopefully, with what I've extracted from Eric, I'll be able to put a stop to that sort of behavior. If we are to survive as a species some small segment of the population must remain as free of mutation as we can make it. Random mutation, that is."
Singh shook his head. How many Hatchlings had been birthed, grown, tested, and harvested, all for the purpose of isolating gene sequences that could work to the improvement of the root stock of the Founders? How many lives had been artificially created only for slaughter? Countless. Countless.
"If we are to wage war on a planet, we must be prepared. We must be armed and armored against its incursions, against its insidious attacks. We must create and maintain a healthy pool of resistant individuals, capable of carrying on the crusade. We must safeguard them, improve them, and prepare to marshal them for the war we must wage."
"Why?" The word was almost a sob as Singh hung his head and wrapped his arms around it. "Why?"
"To reclaim the stars. To reclaim our heritage. You cannot dream of the wealth of growth our species has undergone throughout its history. Since I've bonded with the computer I have expanded, grown. I understand so much more now than I ever did before. We are a glorious species, Singh. Glorious. Unmatched. To lose such a heritage, such a birthright . . . It would be tragedy beyond understanding. A crime against nature. I cannot let that happen.
"One day, whether it be next year or a hundred thousand years from now, we will achieve dominance over this world. We will rise above it, become its masters. On that day, we will begin to move forward again, to reclaim the stars that were ours."
Singh shook his head, tears spilling from his eyes. At what price? What will we have become by then?
Rian squeezed his eyes shut and screamed. The stranger twisted the broken spear shaft, digging it deeper into Rian's stomach.
Something was thrust between his wide-opened lips, slamming against the back of his jaw. His eyes popped open, seeing the feral, grinning visage of the woman leaning over him. She pressed the other piece of the spear shaft into his mouth. He gagged on the stick as she held it tight. Out of the corner of his eye he could see tendrils of landskin rise and wrap around the protruding ends of the shaft, locking it in place.
"You won't be spewing your poison again, Rian," the stranger said. He slid the length of wood from Rian's stomach and tossed it aside. With a smile on his ruined face he stood, offering his hand to the female. She came forward, leaning on his hard, knotted body. Already the wound in her stomach had vanished, leaving only a staining carpet of dried blood. The stranger's face had begun to knit together as well, though deep, raw fissures still leaked slowly. He smelled of rot.
"You should kill him," the woman said, and Rian oriented on her. She stood beside the stranger, one arm on his shoulder, the other cupped around her midsection. "His attack nearly destroyed the offspring. It was damaged, but I have repaired it."
The stranger looked at her, frowning as his lip reknit, flesh flowing in thin threads. Filaments of flesh crept up from his shoulder, forming needled heads, and sank into her hand where she touched him. "It remains viable."
She nodded. "Within the viable range for this flesh."
The stranger turned to stare into the sky over the valley below. "Come, God calls. The Genesis nears fruition. Soon our brothers and sisters will begin to awaken." He raised one hand over the landskin sheath that held Rian immobile.
The landskin shivered, its abrasive inner surface churning against Rian's skin. He could feel it creeping into the wound in his stomach, could feel its hideous burn. It trembled, ballooning upward on a thick stalk, Rian's cocoon at its head, raised some four feet from the hillside.
"There is pain," the woman said with a wince.
"Yes. His touch poisons the landskin. You feel it as well. This is the taint that God fears. It is a threat to God's plan. Like all their threats---all the Terran flora and fauna they have unleashed on our world---this one will be nullified."
"It should be killed."
"God does not will it so," the stranger said. "There is a purpose for this one. Follow."
Be patient, Rian. Do not struggle. All will be made well in time. The voice echoed out of the dim recesses of Rian's mind, soothing, undeniable. Rian felt himself falling into a languorous stupor.
The stranger set off down the hillside, hand in hand with the woman. Rian's landskin cocoon shook, then flowed downhill after them, trailing by a yard or two. Rian struggled against the stupor that gripped him, trying to break free, but the weight of warm flesh held him tight.
Ahead, at the base of the slope, a vast shadow in the dawn light masked the terrain, revealing only black swaths of spindly trees and scattered boulders. Farther within the dark shadow, the ribbonlike river gleamed darkly. Overhead hovered the titanic body of the largest ool Rian had ever seen. Its humped, bulbous body dwarfed the valley. Lightning danced beneath the ool, flicking across the landscape, sending huge plumes of dust and debris churning into the air. Massive feeder tentacles lay quiet among shattered trees. One such tentacle, larger by far than the others, rested between two upthrust boulders, its mouth yawning wide, revealing a puckered redness. Dozens of figures, seen through a withering curtain of flickering lightning and rendered tiny by distance and perspective, swarmed around the tentacle mouth.
Able to move only his eyes, Rian could see little else; the ool blotted out the sky. But the sounds of ool-passage swelled as the landskin wave carried him downslope behind the two strange creatures, and the passage-wake of dozens of the monstrous creatures lay all about the valley. Even now he could hear the harsh buzzing of countless boreworm swarms in the distance.
They drew near the ool, entering its shadow, and Rian could smell the heavy scent of ozone as lightning crashed down before them. Tensing, he could feel the spines of his head standing on end, charged with electricity. A tremendous bolt slashed down from above, flickering across landskin, boulders, and trees alike, raising an explosion that sent clouds of debris pluming into the sky.
Insanity! Surely the stranger could not mean to lead them into that firestorm!
The stranger paused just outside the ring of sizzling fire and raised his hand. As if in answer to an unvoiced command the lightning storm parted, rolling back to either side, opening an avenue through to the massive feeder tentacle and its attendant creatures. The stranger and his mate strode through a landscape warped and twisted by the lightning storm, and Rian's landskin cocoon trailed behind them.
As they neared the tentacle-mouth Rian could discern more of the nature of the creatures around it. Distorted, mangled, they seemed almost Gagash, though much more monstrous. Like Gagash, no two were alike, comprised of mixtures of mismatched torsos and limbs, bestial heads and tails. No few were winged, beating wobbling flights around the base of the tentacle. Others had burrowed down into the landskin, into the crust of the world, itself, only their upper quarter visible. One creature, seemingly no more than a sphere of mottled, spined flesh, rolled toward Rian and the strangers. As it approached, Rian could see hundreds of pale eyes scattered over its surface and a sucker-lined maw ringed with grasping tendrils. It paused within a few yards of the strangers, raising itself on spindly stalks and orienting its eyes on them. Its maw gasped open and closed, its breath hissing through its tentacles, causing them to vibrate. A thin warbling emerged.
"God awaits," the thing said in a mewling voice.
The landskin at the feet of the creatures bulged. It split open with a sound like tearing cloth, and a sharp-snouted head emerged, followed by broad, spiked shoulders and spadelike hands. The snout opened, revealing row upon row of needle-sharp teeth and a tongue tipped with a cluster of a dozen eyes. "God awaits," this creature said, its voice but a whisper.
Others approached, until a horde of misshapen, distorted creatures crowded close. Some reached out tentacles, claws, pinchers, or rigid, thorny appendages to touch Rian in his landskin sheath. All intoned, "God awaits."
Rian shivered in his warm, pulsating blanket. So alien. So bizarre.
The stranger waved his arm, a sharp gesture, and the monstrosities scattered. "They are mindless drones. Workers. Even in Paradise, there is need for such. Perhaps such a fate awaits you, Rian." He smiled and patted the landskin covering Rian's belly. The slight pressure sent new waves of agony through Rian's midsection, and the landskin sheath bulged as if hungering for the stranger's touch.
The woman led the way toward the open mouth of the tentacle. Rian's gaze tracked the massive feeder, following it up, up toward the throbbing bulges of the ool. He jerked within his cocoon, eyes widening as he looked upon a scene from a nightmare. In the center of the ool, ringed by long, dangling tentacles, was a huge hole from which a bright light shone. The lightning crawled from this hole, snaking along the underside of the ool, before lashing down at the ground. In the center of the hole, visible through the shimmering haze of the lightning storm, a mammoth sphere of shining metal hung, spinning in place. Rings of crackling energy rippled outward from the orb, crashing into the metal latticework that formed the interior walls of the hole.
With the swarm of monstrosities parting before them, Rian's captors marched toward the gaping maw of the feeder tentacle. A putrid stench wafted from it, smelling strongly of rot and decay and acidic juices. Closer, Rian observed that the tentacle, thirty yards in diameter, heaved and contracted, as if breathing. Squirming cilia disgorged from ulcers and reached for the stranger and his woman, caressing them, tickling along their nude, sweat-glistening bodies. They raised their arms and allowed the thin tendrils to play over their skins, broad smiles on their faces.
"Come," said the stranger, shrugging away the cilia. The squirming mass withdrew and returned into the walls of the feeder. "It is time to return home. God calls. I can feel his impatience."
The stranger squatted at the base of Rian's cocoon and caressed the landskin. Abruptly Rian felt a sense of weightlessness, and his sheath dropped into the waiting arms of the stranger, who, grunting, stood. Rian was cradled in his arms, still held immobile by the pressing constriction of the landskin.
The stranger smiled down at him. "God is expecting us, Rian. He's most anxious to meet you."
Rian struggled, but could not move. Carried by the stranger, trailed by the woman, Rian entered the moist heat of the feeder. He gagged on the close, disgusting air, biting down on the stick in his mouth. Globes of flesh that protruded from the walls glowed softly, shedding enough light for Rian to drink in his surroundings. The walls breathed, plumes of rancid-tasting air shooting from moist sphincters in the flesh. Thick veins, pulsing, ran in a convoluted pattern throughout the tunnel, and from the ceiling hung tattered scraps of flesh like lace. The woman stepped forward and raised her arms, brushing aside the flesh-lace.
After traveling for a hundred yards or so through the dense tunnel they came to a hump in the tentacle. Once they climbed over this they arrived at a flattened section. Above them the tentacle stretched away toward the ool, more than a thousand yards overhead. Here the cilia emerged from the walls of flesh in waves, caressing the strangers. The stranger dropped Rian to the floor of the tentacle. Rian felt a powerful shifting in the flesh of the ool, a heaving that shook the tentacle and rattled his teeth against the stick in his mouth.
The walls of the tentacle contracted, forming a hump in the center as they squeezed tight. Rian felt the unmistakable sensation of upward movement, borne aloft by the rising knot of flesh. Like a gargantuan throat, the feeder shot them upward smoothly, toward the ool awaiting them above.
Yes! At last, I have found him! The voice throbbed with excitement, satisfaction. But it left Rian cold.
Dersi strained against her bonds, screaming, as putrid liquid splashed down from burst vessels overhead, bathing her in caustic warmth. Her skin burned. The hiss of belching steam masked God's words, but Dersi saw him raise his arms toward the twisted ceiling. Crystalline rods shot downward, plunging into flesh and metal skin. Dripping tendrils danced, their severed ends spurting fluid in a fine, heavy mist. The walls groaned, bits of metal snapping, spinning through the air to crash against bizarre machinery.
There! Did her arm move, even a fraction of an inch? She bit her lip, feeling sweat trickling down her forehead, dripping into her eyes, burning. The stench of smoke and bile and vomit and a thousand other odors clung to her nostrils. She gagged. Pushing down her revulsion, she blocked out the terrible sound of the buckling walls, squeezed shut her eyes against the image of God on his throne, the crystal shafts buried in his chest, his mouth gaping wide, writhing with a million squirming cilia, gushing pale fluids.
Her forearm bulged, trembled. Whatever power held her tight to the chair resisted her efforts, made them desperate, futile.
And then the room stilled. Like a gigantic exhalation, the walls retracted. Bulges of oozing flesh retreated back within shrinking tears in the metal walls. Massive pipes overhead crinkled, snapping shut the rents from which the steam billowed. Loose tentacles slammed into the walls, burrowing their dripping ends through metal, into ool-flesh.
Dersi's efforts died as she watched God rise from his throne, the spears of shining crystal throbbing, stained with his lifesblood where they emerged from his torso. He shivered, his eyes pinched shut, and his mouth slowly closed. A few cilia remained trapped between his taut lips, squirming, tasting. He slurped them in, opened his eyes, and grinned at Dersi.
"Pardon the interruption, Dersi. I was . . . distracted. It is quite . . . unnerving when the boreworm swarms infest the ool. But the situation is under control now. Yes. The situation is quite fine." His smile broadened, and he gestured absently behind him with his mechanical arm. The broken shards of the screen, scattered about the floor, liquefied. Like slithering worms, the silvery fragments gathered together, forming a solid ball at the base of the wall. Spears of silver lanced upward, spreading, drawing the rest of the mass up to coat the wall. Recreated, the great screen pulsed once, then quieted.
As God approached her, he left a trail of mixed fluids: black, crimson, and yellow, leaking from oozing puckers covering his body. Dersi took her gaze from him, watching over his knobby shoulder as the screen flickered, flickered, and a panoramic image winked into view. Outside. She was no soldier. She was a Lord. She had never seen the outside world except through the tinted, hazy film of the ool's membranous outer husk. Here, on the screen, the outside world was immense, clear. Vast. From edge to edge of the screen it stretched, encompassing all, a rich, deep blue pierced by the faintest of golden glimmers in the distance. In the background rose the irregular humps of hills, and between two of them a slender arc, the edge of a golden ball, hung suspended, blazing.
Dersi's jaw hung open as she stared at the image. So beautiful. So . . . alien. All that vast, open space, no convenient veins to hold, to steady; no warm embracing walls to comfort, to offer the cushioning solidity that sang of security, of . . . of home.
This was the world where the Gagash lived, this endless horizon, this incredible vista of vulnerability.
Filling the sky, leaving shadows like dense stains on the hills, were dozens of ool, their dangling feeders churning through the humped, broken land.
"Behold, Dersi!" He turned to face the screen, raising his arms and gesturing broadly. "Watch! Watch as I remake the world in the image of my dreams. This is my sixth day, and I need no seventh to know that it is good."
The clutch of ool swept through a deep ravine, a valley packed close with tall, spindly trees and split by a ribbon of silver water. Where they passed, obliteration reigned. Beyond the valley, over a jagged wall of naked rock, lay a sunken place, a swirling maze of dark ponds and tangled rivers, crooked trees and waving grass. And boreworm swarms. Thousands of them, a vast network of darker blots against the sky, aloft, thrusting into the mottled bulges of ool bodies. In response, the ool opened their nether sphincters, showering the land below with a deluge of caustic waste. Trees crackled, sizzling, and melted into slag. Water boiled. Rock ran like liquid.
"What . . . what's happening?"
God turned back to her, smiling. "I'm destroying Santiago's scions, Dersi. They are . . . obsolete, and troublesome."
"San . . . Santiago?"
"The Gagash. Those pitiful ground-dwellers, with their fruitless quest to return to mundane humanity. They cannot comprehend the gifts of this world. They refuse to accept the beneficence of the world-mind. Of me. I am just, Dersi. But I have grown wroth, impatient. I have tried to show them the errors of their ways, have tried to wrap them in my loving arms, embrace them, bring them into my flock. I have waited for them to return to me."
His eyes grew hard: The mechanical orb contracted; the oozing sore of his other socket squeezed tight, dripping with yellowish fluid that trickled down his cheek. "But they bear the taint of Santiago and his ilk. He opposes me through them. They are fallen. They seek to thwart my designs, flaunt the will of the world-mind. Now I shall harvest them. Now I shall---what?"
God jerked, his mechanical half shuddering. His eye on its articulated shaft spun about, facing the warped doorway. Seeming to forget Dersi, he stalked across the room, the machinery overhead following on a track recessed in the ceiling.
"Security alert! Security alert! Containment breach. Repeat: containment breach. Security detail to elevator twelve."
Captain Lhedri swore and swiped the back of his hand across his sweat-soaked forehead. In his other hand the acidrod slowly cooled, its slugs spent. He held onto the rod as a weapon of last resort. With its length, it gave him greater reach than the sword at his belt, and its heavier base could serve as a cudgel in his capable hands.
"How many more slugs do you have, Cadrin?"
Beside him, his lieutenant checked the shaft of his weapon. "Two."
"I'm empty." Lhedri leaned against the cool metal of the walls and took stock of their situation. Of the dozen men who had crowded into the mechanical throat with him, five still breathed. Around them the others lay in puddles of spreading blood, tangled with the corpses of eight naked, bestial women. At Lhedri's feet, Bhunto's glazed-over eyes stared up at him from his severed head. Pushing down his gorge, Lhedri prodded the head on its side, removing himself from its flat gaze.
"We've thirteen slugs between us, Captain," Cadrin said. He passed Lhedri another acidrod, its shaft slightly warped and covered with blood. "Here. This has four slugs remaining. Sannin won't be needing it."
"Thirteen." Lhedri stared down the corridor. The lifeless tentacles connected to the female corpses oozed liquid on the metal floor. They disappeared in the darkness of the hallway, a short distance from where Lhedri and his men rested. "That won't be enough if more of these women come for us. We used too many slugs in destroying the door."
Cadrin, beside him, shrugged. "It couldn't be helped. Besides, we still have hand weapons."
Lhedri wanted to argue that swords and knives would do little good against the monstrously powerful women-things. He did not. He could see the others looking to him for leadership, for guidance. Any display of uncertainty would ruin what chances they had of getting out of this place and back to Lord Meloni. And of finding---and rescuing---Lady Dersi.
"Gather the men, Cadrin. Waiting here's not going to get us out of this."
Cadrin barked out orders and the men groaned, raising themselves from the floor, dripping with sweat and blood. There were no wounds between them other than minor scratches. The bestial women had been determined in their attacks, and quick. Those they had reached with their long-fingered hands lay dead, their bones broken and their flesh torn.
A few minutes later Lhedri led them along the corridor, keeping well away from the tangle of umbilicals on the floor. Ahead, the light panels on the walls flared into brilliance, illuminating their way. The corridor curved toward the left.
A subtle click and a low whining sound preceded a brilliant scarlet beam that lanced down from the ceiling, striking a man just behind Lhedri in the forehead. The rear of the man's head exploded in a spray of blood and brains, and he dropped without a sound. Lhedri jerked. Cadrin seized his shoulder and pulled him back, beyond the curvature of the wall.
"What was that?" Cadrin asked. Lhedri stared down at the corpse of another of his men. The man's expression was staid; he had died without warning. A perfectly circular hole the size of Lhedri's thumb pierced his forehead. The back of his head, pressed against the metal floor, smoked; his white hair fanned out like a halo in the spreading pool of his own blood.
"Take his weapon," Lhedri ordered. He felt his heart hammering against his ribs. His mouth was parched, his tongue thick.
Lhedri leaned his acidrod against the wall and drew his dagger. He tossed it into the corridor, beyond the curvature. The whining sound erupted again, and the brilliant beam speared out, striking the knife. The blade melted into a running pool of silvery metal.
"We're trapped," Cadrin said.
Lhedri spared him a withering look, but said nothing. He glanced behind them at the ruin of the door to the lift. Acid fumes still rose from the slurred metal. A dead end on one hand and an unknown killer on the other. They were trapped in a fifty-foot-long section of corridor swimming with gore.
Lord Meloni reacted without thinking. Seeing a guardsman with an acidrod dangling from his lax fingers, Meloni snatched the weapon, reversed it, and expelled a slug at the first of the monsters. The slug slammed into the serpentine creature's torso, erupting, opening a ragged, smoking hole the size of a fist in the scaled, tentacled flesh. The creature screamed as the acid ate into its insides. Its spindly legs buckled and it collapsed, screeching.
Others pressed forward, but now guardsmen raised their weapons to their shoulders and fired on the monsters. The unarmed pressed back, away from the crush of hideous creatures, screaming, crying, wordlessly moaning.
A creature wobbled forward on legs running with open sores and reached into the crowd. It seized a woman in its misshapen claws, raised her high over its tentacled head, and ripped her in half. Blood washed over the creature in a red shower, and it tossed the halves of the woman's body away.
More monsters poured into the council chamber, wading into the panicked crowd. Pressed back by the Bhajong tide, Meloni slipped and fell to one knee, losing his grip on the acidrod. It clattered away beneath the pummeling feet of the Bhajong. A knee slammed into Meloni's face, and he felt his lip split. He tasted blood as he scrambled to his feet and fought through the tightly packed bodies toward the rear of the room.
The scent of blood and acid hung heavy in the air, making his eyes water and his nostrils burn. He felt something touch his shoulder and ducked, throwing himself to one side. Glancing over his shoulder he saw a multijointed arm tipped with a four-foot blade of serrated bone rip through a woman's abdomen and emerge from the small of her back. She was lifted up and dashed against the ceiling. Blood rained down on the crowd.
A child screamed near him, and Meloni turned to see a many-legged creature with a ring of arms dripping orange fluid twist a woman in half. One of its arms shot downward, seizing the screaming child from the dead breast of its mother. The little girl stared in wide-eyed horror at the gaping, sucker-lined maw of the creature as it raised her by her ankles and began lowering her into its mouth.
"No!" Meloni screamed. He saw a bloody blade on the floor, pinned beneath the severed legs of a man, and snatched up the sword. He threw himself on the creature, his sword hacking down into the thick arm. The creature jerked, losing its grip on the child. She fell into the screaming throng, and the creature turned its attention to Meloni. Its arms lashed out, wrapping around Meloni's midsection. He slashed with his sword, feeling the biting sting of corrosives eating through his clothing and into his flesh. Again and again he hacked at the arms, until the blade bit on hard bone and stuck. The creature hissed and dropped him. He lost the sword and landed on his shoulder, momentarily stunned.
"Lord Meloni!" a guardsman screamed, pumping acidslugs into the threatening creature. It reeled back, its flesh sloughing off in great, bubbling waves, revealing bloody bones. Meloni rose to shaky feet and pushed toward the guard.
A horrendous cracking sound erupted, and the floor beneath his feet shook. Stumbling to one knee, he put out his hand to steady himself. Fine, jagged cracks laced through the resinous floor, and ooze bubbled up from below. He jerked his hand back, dragging long streamers of viscous fluid. His knee sank into the floor, and he struggled to rise.
Screams rose to a crescendo in the council hall as the Bhajong surged back from the spreading lacery of cracks in the floor. Fluid spumed into the air, falling on startled, panicked faces. Cries of agony and alarm tumbled from half a hundred mouths as feet and calves sank into the floor, hard chunks of resin breaking apart, revealing pulsating, glistening bulges of ool musculature. A thousand fine filaments shot up from churning pools of ichor, wrapping around ankles and calves, pulling.
Meloni pulled back from the sucking liquid and tentacles. Behind him, he could sense the monsters, hovering in a containing ring about the Bhajong, moaning, screeching, caterwauling. As he sank to his knees in the sucking goo, sharp cracks pierced the ceiling, releasing a flood of liquid. The shower fell over him, coating his body, sticky and hot. Around him he could see the other Bhajong similarly covered, swimming through a pool of expanding ooze.
Movement constricted, Meloni fought to free himself, hearing the brittle cracks of breaking resin as the liquid began to solidify around him, encasing him. He screamed, and a wash of hot fluid poured into his mouth, silencing him. More fluid bathed his eyes, locking him away into darkness.
APF 0361
Magda Kellahar cursed and slammed the datapad onto the desk in front of her. Beakers and other glassware rattled, and a tech had to snatch a vial in midair before it shattered on the floor. Magda ignored the exasperated expression on his face.
Tired. So tired. She rubbed at her eyes, trying to worm away the ache behind them, the ache that came more and more frequently as the years pressed in upon her.
I have no time!
The tech placed the vial gently back into its cradle. "Doctor Kellahar? Are you all right?" He raised a hand as if to touch her, thought better of it, and dropped it to his side.
"All right? All right?" She glared at him. Stupid child!
He stepped back from her. The other researchers in the laboratory stopped their inane chatter. Magda could feel their eyes upon her.
They did not know. They did not know.
She sighed, shaking her head. It was not their fault. It was not the tech's fault. How could they know?
"I'm fine," she said at last. "Just tired." She sank onto a lab stool. It creaked beneath even her slight weight. "So tired."
Doctor John Everette approached, touching her shoulder. "Go home, Magda. You work yourself like a drone, and you're not exactly a teenager, you know."
Magda glanced up at Everette, noted the concern in his eyes, and felt every one of her seventy-odd years pile in upon her. Her shoulders sank. She shook her head. He did not understand. He could not. She sighed.
"What is it, Magda?" Everette waved the tech away and knelt beside Magda, taking her old, wrinkled hands in his own young, strong ones. She noted the telltale ring of tiny scales circling his wrists, sign that the contagion had begun to work its curse upon him. Another sign of failure.
"The newts," she said at last, forcing her other, greater worries aside for the moment.
"The newts?"
She nodded and gestured toward her datapad. "The newts we released last month."
He picked up her datapad and scanned its display. "The vectors. But this is impossible. They should have . . ."
"They didn't. Like the others, like the ferns and the cockroaches and the bumblebees before them, they succumbed. Quickly. Not even thirty days before complete assimilation. We've failed. Again."
Everette shook his head, staring at the display. She knew what he saw, could see the realization of utter failure that had become so commonplace spreading across his features like a black wave. Time and time again they had genetically engineered life-forms to be immune, or at least resistant, to the landskin contagion. Time and time again they had failed. Within weeks, sometimes days, the life-forms had been perverted and altered by the contagion, something other than what they were. Genetic alteration on a cellular level, a physiological change that defied all of their efforts to curtail or prevent it.
They could not halt the contagion, much less wage war upon it.
Everette sighed and replaced the datapad. He forced a smile. "Well, at least there are the worms."
Magda waved absently. "The worms. They thrive, beyond our expectations. But they've been changed, too, far beyond their architecture. It was pure accident and . . . providence, I suppose . . . that created those monstrosities. They're as dangerous to us as to the landskin."
He shifted his feet, falling into awkward silence.
She rubbed at her eyes, wishing her headache away. "Don't mind me, John. I'm old and tired. And sick of all this . . . failure. Just ignore me."
"You should go to medical, Magda," he said.
"I will. Help me up. My knees ache so fiercely I don't think I could move my ass off of this stool by myself."
He chuckled and pulled her up, then motioned to one of the nearby techs. "See Doctor Kellahar to the infirmary, please."
"I'm all right, John," she protested.
He shook his head. "No. Magda, no. Go to the infirmary."
Magda grimaced as she swung her legs around and put her bare feet on the cold ceramic floor. Her toes curled in protest at the chill touch. She pulled the open-backed gown tighter about her body and brushed a lank strand of iron-gray hair behind her ear. Her fingers lingered on the strands, remembering them deep, luxurious, and the brown of chestnuts, like those seen in the holo-vids of vanished Terra. So many years, and so much experience.
An orderly whisked through the door, responding to the chime Magda knew had sounded at the first touch of her feet on the floor of the isolation room. The lower half of his face was a white void beneath the filter mask he wore. He paused in the doorway, made a quick notation on his datapad, then stepped toward Magda.
"Feeling better, Doctor Kellahar?" the orderly asked.
Magda scowled. "There's not much time. Call the team together. This body's had it."
The orderly's brows pinched together and he glanced at his datapad. "Your vitals read within statistical norm. Are you certain?"
Magda waved impatiently. "Go. Now. I've been through this enough times in one form or another to recognize the signs."
A slight ping sounded from the monitor mounted on one wall of the pristine isolation room. A geometric pattern of lines and angles fluctuated on the screen, and a voice emerged from the hidden speakers. "I concur. Initiating vessel preparation. See to it, orderly."
"Yes, Father," the orderly said, nodding in the direction of the monitor. He saluted, fist on breast, and turned to leave the room. In the wake of his passage the door slid closed, an almost silent hiss of escaping air, effectively sealing the room off from the remainder of the Enclave.
Magda stared across the small white room toward the monitor, wondering if she had the strength to cross that slight distance and interface directly with Father. With a sigh she realized she did not. She sank back, leaning against the cold ceramic of the table, and waited. Breaths wheezed from her lungs, wet and bubbling.
"The degeneration comes quicker each time, Singh." The voice that emerged from the speakers held nothing of humanity, no warmth, no tone, no inflection. Flat. Sterile.
Another voice, Singh's, distinct yet as cold as the first, emerged from the speakers. "It is to be expected. With each passing generation, even the Founders begin to suffer from the effects of the contagion. My latest data indicates this generation maintains a genetic purity matrix of point-nine-nine-nine-four, compared to the previous generation's point-nine-nine-nine-eight. It's accelerating. The next vessel is the closest to statistical norm, but she rates out at only point-nine-nine-nine-seven."
"Father?" Magda forced back tears.
"Yes, Magda?" Santiago answered.
"I don't want to die, Father." Foolish, and she knew it. Foolish. She could not help herself. Age crept relentlessly over her, weighing her down, robbing her of strength and will. Her bones ached. Her flesh felt as dry and brittle as parchment. With age came fear, though she warred against it with cold, hard logic. At such times, with flesh-death approaching closer with each passing moment, logic held no sway over her.
A cold, electronic sound issued from the speakers. Santiago laughed. "You cannot die, Magda. You are not alive, not real. You're being foolish."
"It is a very real psychological expression, Captain," Singh said. "After a human lifespan augmented by the rejuvies, even an Avatar can become attached to the life they have known. In a very real sense, she is as human as what remains of the Founders. More so, given her genetic purity."
"A moot point, Singh. Reclamation of Magda is essential to the formulation of the next Avatar."
A burst of electronic static, Singh's closest approximation to a human sigh, floated from the speakers.
"I . . . I understand, Father," Magda said. She brushed away a tear from the corner of her eye. The Avatar brought up Magda's hand and stared at the thin skin stretched taut over swollen bones. Veins and arteries could clearly be seen through the near translucent skin, except where darker splotches marred it. For so long had she dwelt in this usurped flesh, that she had come to think of it as her own. "I look forward to rejoining you."
"No, you don't. None of you ever do. But that's of no matter. Your purpose is done, Magda. Your knowledge will be added to the whole, broadening my understanding through the direct interaction and human perception you've experienced over the past seventy years."
Magda nodded. She knew she was not the first Avatar. There had been dozens before her, each usurping a vessel of flesh and moving among the growing Enclave, gaining experience, leeching knowledge and input from the Gagash surrounding them, then returning to Father, expanding his consciousness in ways electronic monitors and sensors could not.
Magda's time was done. Another Avatar awaited, a blank slate that would enter the world of the Enclave without the accumulated wisdom and knowledge of Father, only a driving need to learn, to grow, to experience. It kept Father new. Fresh. It allowed him to insinuate himself into the growing society, guide it without direct intervention, keep its collective feet on the path he had determined would eventually return them to their heritage.
"The new vessel is prepared," Singh said. "The persona of the vessel has been subverted."
The Avatar started, her hands clenching on the bedsheet. She had forgotten.
No. She had not forgotten. She had consciously repressed the knowledge, as it was too painful to acknowledge. Conscious awareness of Magda's subsumed persona, buried deep within the recesses of this body's brain, forced into a role of subservience to the needs of the Avatar, languishing for decades as a mental and emotional prepubescent, was too painful to give heed. She wondered if the other Avatars before her had thought the same.
More, what would Magda experience in the too-brief period of time between the Avatar's uploading into Father and her body's death? How would a child of seven adapt to the sudden realization of her geriatric state? The idea of it---falling gently asleep as little more than a toddler, then awakening in a body grown old, wrinkled, aching---brought fresh tears to the Avatar's stolen eyes. Mercifully, Magda's flesh could not long sustain its life. The child-persona's period of suffering would be brief.
"Rest, Magda," Santiago said. "Your body is very old, and frail. It would not do to have it die before the Avatar can be uploaded. Makes things messy."
Magda wept, but could not disobey. She climbed back up onto the bed, feeling every ache in her bones, each sharp pain in her joints. Her skin hurt. A dull cold twisted in her stomach, and she felt her heart lurching to keep up its tempo.
Needles emerged from the cold surface of the bed and pierced the flesh of her neck. Warm fluid rushed through her bloodstream, carrying lassitude. Her eyes grew heavy. She could not keep them open. A tear dropped from the corner of her eye and trickled across her wrinkled cheek, falling onto the bedsheet.
A low whine escaped her lips as memories began to slide from her mind. She grasped at them, frantic, but could not hold onto them. Mother, father---not hers, Magda's---faded away, lost to the blackness. Her first kiss. The only child she carried to term. The feel of her husband's weak grip on her hand as he died. Watching her grandson born. She swiped at the memories, desperate to hold onto them.
They were hers. Hers! Experienced in a stolen body---Magda's---but the memories were hers alone.
In the one, intense moment before the last shred of her consciousness faded, she sensed another persona, a delicate, frightened persona, bubbling up from the depths of their shared mind. She reached for the other, wanting to comfort her, needing to hold her.
She failed.
God turned back to Dersi. "The situation seems well in hand." He smiled, spilling squirming cilia from his mouth. Drool dangled in long, yellow streamers from his lips. At his gesture the floor near Dersi's chair split open, and a hump of ool-flesh rose. It flattened, spreading, forming a plane with a shallow depression. God sat, his tethers hissing and clanking to accommodate the movement, and the hump of flesh molded itself to his form. He leaned forward, crossing his arms on his knees, and favored Dersi with a broader smile.
"Let us continue our conversation, shall we? Now. Where were we? Ah, yes. Santiago."
"Why are you holding me? Let me go!"
He shook his head. "Dersi, my child, my beloved child. Don't you see? I cannot let you take this most profound of evolutionary steps on your own initiative. I've tried free will, and it doesn't work! The Gagash were given free reign to seek me, to return to my embrace, and they chose to strive against me, against the ultimate fate I ordained. Your own Bhajong were given the greatest of gifts: the gift of communion with me, with the world-mind. Your leaders turned it into an elitist privilege, excluding those who are of my family. This cannot be allowed. The time for such freedoms is past, my child. For the Gagash. For the Bhajong. For you."
"No! Let me go!"
"Don't worry, my dear. It will only hurt for a brief---very brief---period, and then you will join me in such a wonderful communion. The communion of your Veil Lords pales in comparison, I assure you. You will be first, my primal angel. My messiah. I shall place you at my right hand, my dearest."
He raised his metal arm, and overhead machinery clanked and clamored. Deep amber lights flickered on in hidden recesses, illuminating a cylinder of gleaming metal trailing dozens of coiled black cords that slid along the ceiling on wheeled tracks. The construction came to a halt directly above Dersi, who stared up into its hollow center. Within, beams of light crisscrossed the cylinder, while slender needles circled its rim.
"What is that!"
"Don't worry, Dersi," God said. "I told you it will only hurt for a brief time. In the end, it will all be worth it."
Other equipment slid out of the ceiling, dropping down to bracket Dersi's head. Clamps emerged to grasp her scalp. She screamed, trying to pull away, but tiny claws seized her, held her immobile. From the floor came oozing tentacles, wrapping around her throat, pulling her head back. Others looped over her chin; hard, needlelike tips wormed between her taut lips and clenched teeth, forcing her mouth open. The rancid taste of bile squirted into her mouth and she gagged.
A thick, blunt-tipped tentacle slid out of the tangle of machinery overhead. Hanging just before her wide-open eyes, the blunt head split, disgorging a metal-sheathed rod that entered her mouth. Something cold and slimy, with the feel of a thousand crawling legs, crept down her throat.
Dersi tried to scream, but gagged, her breath coming hot and uncontrolled. The metal cylinder overhead lowered, the ringing needles piercing Dersi's forehead, scraping bone.
"I apologize, but evolution does require wakefulness," God said. He reached out his organic hand and touched her cheek. "I promise it will soon be over. In time the memory will fade altogether, and you will be unable to recall the pain, only the overwhelming joy of what's to come."
Dersi struggled. But, held by the grasping chair, the tentacles, and the bizarre equipment, she could do nothing. The cylinder overhead began---slowly at first, then quickening---to rotate. The needles sliced cleanly through the skin of her forehead, scoring the bone beneath.
Unable to scream, unable to move, Dersi sought the solace of retreating into her own mind.
"I'm sorry, Dersi. But I can't allow that," God said. His metal fingers caressed her cheek. A thin tube dropped from above, a bead of liquid at its end. The drop fell into her eye, coating her lashes. A hot flush sizzled through her body, and her mind sharpened, her senses instantly focused on the pain.
The cylinder rotated faster, faster. Thin curls of smoke rose from her forehead. Blood dripped into her eyes, down her cheeks, her throat. The stench of burning bone clogged her nostrils.
Another arm descended from the mass of machinery. Clutched in fingerlike pinchers was a squirming, multilegged worm.
"The vector," God supplied, his voice soft, passionate. "Merged with the cerebral cortex, it opens . . . wonders, Dersi. Wonders beyond belief."
Dersi could only scream silently, watching as the vector neared her, hearing the terrible sound of the bonesaw, smelling the acrid stench of charred flesh and bone, feeling the indescribable agony of her tortured body.
"What do we do, Captain?" Cadrin leaned close, whispering. He cast a significant look over his shoulder at the remaining four soldiers. Following his gaze, Lhedri watched as the men whispered among themselves, their hands white-knuckled on their acidrods. Their eyes were wide, wild, their lips pressed tight together.
"Did you get a good look at that thing?"
Cadrin shook his head. "It happened too fast. Something popped out of the ceiling, then Rhoud was down, dead. Then I grabbed you and jerked you out of there."
"I saw it. A long stalk with a box on its end and a red sphere. I think I can hit it."
"What?" Cadrin grabbed Lhedri's arm and pulled him a little farther from the others. "Captain, your pardon. But that's insane. You saw how quick it made rendering out of Rhoud. You'd be dead before you could squeeze off a slug. Then where would we be?"
"You have a better suggestion? The mechanical throat isn't working and we can't stay here forever. Sooner or later more of those monster women will come, and we have only thirteen slugs left to us, Cadrin. What happens when those are exhausted? Swords? You saw what they did to the men in hand-to-hand combat."
"You think more will come?"
"Something's controlling them, Cadrin. You heard the voice in the air. Something directs them, knows we're here, and doesn't like it. It's only a matter of time." He shook off Cadrin's hand and crept toward the curvature of the wall. Listening, he could hear the clinking whir of the mechanical arm in the hallway. He turned his gaze to Rhoud's corpse, sprawled with arms and legs akimbo in the center of the corridor. A thin curl of smoke still rose from the hole in his forehead.
Lhedri retreated and pulled Cadrin aside. "You're a good shot, aren't you, Cadrin?"
Cadrin nodded, frowning. "I don't think I'm going to like this."
Lhedri grinned. "Trust me, Cadrin. I think this will work."
Cadrin groaned, but followed Lhedri as his captain led the way back down the corridor toward the piles of the dead.
A few minutes later, after much heated debate away from the ears of the other men, Cadrin and Lhedri returned to the waypoint, dragging the limp corpse of one of the women along with them. The trailing end of her severed umbilicus oozed, leaving a wide, slick path behind her. They grunted at the effort, for her slight size belied her considerable weight.
"Captain?" The soldiers stood, leaning their acidrods against the wall, and stared at them.
"You're sure about this, Captain?" Cadrin asked as they dropped the corpse near the curve in the corridor. He swiped the back of his hand across his forehead and flung sweat to the floor.
Lhedri smiled grimly. "No. But it stands to reason. From the looks of the thing, it's been there all along. There being no other exits from this corridor besides the lift, the women had to have come from that direction. I think the arm-thing will recognize its mistress."
"Enough to stake your life on it?"
"Enough to stake my life on your aim, Cadrin. Help me lift her up. I think once I get my arms beneath her shoulders I can keep her up."
The other soldiers crowded close as Cadrin helped Lhedri heft the corpse to its feet. The severed root of her umbilicus continued to ooze, a thick fluid heavy with gobbets of flesh. Lhedri slid his hands into her armpits, staggering beneath her weight and grunting. "Damn, she's heavy!"
"Can you move?" Cadrin asked.
Experimentally, Lhedri shuffled forward, pushing the woman ahead of him, keeping his head low and centered between her shoulder blades. The ragged trunk of her tentacle leaked onto his tunic. His legs trembled with the effort of keeping his balance. His arms shook. "Get behind me!" he said, gasping.
With Cadrin trailing close behind, Lhedri staggered along the hallway. Twice he slipped in Rhoud's pooled blood, nearly losing his footing and crashing to the floor. But Cadrin stepped forward, supporting the dead woman's weight while Lhedri regained his balance. Careful of his footsteps, Lhedri pushed forward. Cadrin came close on his heels, crouching, his acidrod held in white-knuckled hands.
"Ready?"
Cadrin swore under his breath. "No. But let's get on with it."
As he pushed the dead woman out before him Lhedri heard the mechanical whir of the arm in the ceiling. He cringed, feeling his scalp prickle. He realized his eyes were squeezed tight and forced them open. The woman's head flopped to one side, and a lock of her auburn hair fell across Lhedri's face, tickling his nose. He resisted the impulse to sneeze.
"Can you see it?" Lhedri said, between wheezing breaths.
"No. But I can hear it. It's tracking our movement. I can feel it watching us."
"It hasn't done anything yet. Ease around to one side and see if you can get a look at it. I'll distract it."
"I hope you know what you're doing."
Lhedri did not answer, pushing forward. He could hear the thing's movement, overhead and perhaps a dozen yards farther along the hallway. Pressing his forehead against the dead woman's back, he could feel his warm sweat on her cold skin.
"I see it. It's pointed directly toward you, toward her. Wait. It's . . . damn!" Lhedri heard quick movement behind him, and a brilliant red beam lanced down over the woman's shoulder, narrowly missing Lhedri's head. The crackling beam raised blisters on Lhedri's forehead, and he bit down on his lip to keep from crying out.
"Cadrin? Cadrin!"
"I'm fine. It missed me, barely. I'm not certain this is going to work. The thing moves fast."
"It has to work. I don't think I can back up now."
"Hold on, I have an idea." Cadrin shouted back at the four soldiers behind them. A moment later one of the men answered.
Lhedri ignored them, concentrating on his feet and on the ominous sound of the mechanical arm overhead. Sweat trickled down his face. His arms and legs screamed in protest, the deadweight of the woman dragging on him. He locked his knees.
"Cadrin, if you're going to do something, do it soon. I don't know how much longer I can hold her."
"A moment," Cadrin answered, and Lhedri could hear him shifting forward. "Be still."
It happened quickly. A sword, tossed by one of the soldiers, clattered in the hallway behind them. The mechanical arm screeched, whirring, and the brilliant crimson beam lanced out. Cadrin, in the moment it took for the guardian to reorient itself, stood, acidrod training on the arm. The weapon thumped. An acidslug struck the mechanical guardian. It shattered, bursting in a hissing spray of acid. Sparks laced the hallway, and an explosion slammed Lhedri backward through the air. He crashed to the metal floor, rolling as the smoking corpse of the woman crashed down beside him.
Lhedri lay stunned for a moment, groaning.
"Captain?"
He focused on the voice, finding Cadrin kneeling at his side. His lieutenant's strong hands gripped his shoulders, gently shaking. Blinking his eyes, Lhedri slid across the floor and leaned his back against the wall. He glanced around, noting the smoking, dripping arm hanging from the ceiling, sparks dancing from its ragged end. The woman's corpse lay nearby, its abdomen torn asunder, entrails bubbling up from the jagged cavity, smoking. The flesh of her face had been stripped away, revealing a charred skull banded with gleaming metal strips.
"Are you all right?" Cadrin asked.
"Just give me a minute. I'll be fine."
A scream ripped through the corridor, coming from beyond the mammoth metal doors at its end.
Cadrin pulled Lhedri to his feet. The other men remaining in Lhedri's command approached. One of them reached out a booted toe to shove at the limp body of the dead woman. Another man stepped up to the crackling arm hanging from the ceiling, careful to avoid the sparks that leaped from its end. Near his foot lay a tangle of wires and twisted metal, smoking and running with acidic residue.
Lhedri pushed Cadrin away and surged toward the massive doors at the end of the corridor. "That scream! That's Lady Dersi!"
"Wait, Captain!" Cadrin ran after him, snatching up his acidrod from where he had dropped it. Another of the men carried Lhedri's acidrod slung over his shoulder. They followed close behind Cadrin.
Lhedri reached the doors and ran his hands over the smooth metal, trying to work his fingers between them. Cadrin seized his shoulder and turned him around.
"Captain, we don't know what's in there!"
"Lady Dersi's in there, Cadrin. Let me go."
"At least let us get ready. Set the men into a containment ring, ready to lay down a covering fire. I'll open the doors. You get behind the lines."
The doors slid open at their backs, and another of the monstrous women reached out, seizing Lhedri by the back of his neck. He felt the power of her grip, the inexorable pressure on his spine as she tried to draw him close. Her mouth opened, revealing blunt teeth, a feral snarl on her lips. Only Cadrin's grip on his shoulder gave her pause. Cadrin tugged on Lhedri's arm even as the captain screamed in pain.
Behind the woman came others of her kind, leaping into the ranks of Lhedri's men. One man was dropped instantly, his face crushed by a pounding fist that drove his teeth through to the back of his skull. Another man fired his acidrod, destroying a woman's midsection. She reeled back, consumed by acid that ate away at her insides. She slumped over, soundless.
Lhedri twisted, ducking, using his weight to pull the woman's hands downward. Cadrin stepped in, bringing up his acidrod and placing its fluted nozzle directly into the woman's mouth. He fired, and her head evaporated. Droplets landed on Cadrin's arms, sizzling. A gout of acid washed over a woman behind the first, dissolving her arm down to its metal-wrapped bone.
Another Bhajong fell as a woman reached out and seized his arm. Her foot came up, placed on the small of his back. She wrenched backward with her hands and shoved downward with her foot. His arm tore free of his body and he screamed in agony before shock claimed him.
Cadrin snatched up another acidrod and passed it to Lhedri. Too close to use it as other than a cudgel, Lhedri smashed its butt-end into a woman's stomach. She did not flinch. Her hand lashed out, jerking the weapon from his fingers, and tossing it aside. Disarmed, Lhedri pushed back, his hand fumbling at his side for the hilt of his sword. The woman came on, hands outstretched to crush him.
"Captain!" Lhedri heard Cadrin's voice over the terrible chaos of the battle. Out of the corner of his eye he could see that only he and Cadrin survived. The others lay, broken and twisted, tangled with the bodies of four of the women. Three of the monsters remained alive. Cadrin was pressed by one of them who wielded a Bhajong arm as a club as she beat at Cadrin's defense. He used his acidrod as a staff, fending off her blows, retreating down the hallway toward Lhedri.
Lhedri slashed with his sword at the woman's grasping hands, slicing off several of her fingers, which pattered to the metal floor. She took no notice, battering aside his sword as he thrust for her face. His arm went numb to the shoulder with the force of her blow. He fell to his haunches, skittering back from her advance.
She pounced, and Lhedri rolled aside. Seeing an opportunity, he lashed out with his sword, cutting clean through the fat tentacle, near where it connected to her back. The woman spasmed and collapsed without a sound.
"The tentacles, Cadrin!" Lhedri called, avoiding the wild swing of another of the women. He risked a glance at his companion, seeing Cadrin in desperate straits. The other remaining woman had forced him to his knees, his back to the wall, and pummeled away at the acidrod he held crosswise in front of him. The barrel of the weapon bent, its skin fracturing beneath the onslaught.
The woman pressing Lhedri lashed out, catching him a glancing blow on his shoulder. The power of the blow sent him spinning. He crashed into the wall and almost dropped his sword. Instinctively, he ducked, and the woman's fist pounded into the wall where his head had been. The thick metal of the wall crumpled, her fist driven a foot or more into it. She tugged, but could not free her arm.
Lhedri dashed forward, ducking a roundhouse swing by the woman. He slashed downward, severing her umbilicus. The woman collapsed. Her face slammed into the wall. Her trapped fist prevented her from slumping to the floor.
"Cadrin!" Lhedri said, stepping forward to hack at the last woman's umbilicus where it lay squirming on the floor. His sword bit deep, but did not sever the cord. The woman screeched, the first sound he had heard any of them make, and half-turned, momentarily ignoring Cadrin. Her eyes focused on Lhedri and she staggered toward him, her hands clenched into fists.
Cadrin brought up his warped acidrod, placed it against the flesh of the woman's back, and fired. The acidslug tore into her body, bulging the flesh of her midsection as if she were swollen with child. From the central bulge, deep red lines laced out, tracing across her torso. She jerked, her fingers forming claws, her mouth gaping open. The red lines opened deep cracks in her flesh, and her bowels spilled out in a steaming, acid-washed heap at her feet. She crumpled and lay still in a spreading pool of her own juices.
Lhedri rushed to Cadrin. The man lay back. The ruin of his acidrod lay across his acid-splashed thighs. His arms were covered with smoking wounds, and one ended in a ragged stump, flash-burned and oozing. The flesh on one side of his face and one of his shoulders had sloughed away, revealing pink-tinged bone. His lips moved feebly.
Lhedri knelt at Cadrin's side, careful of the still-caustic acid coating his body. "Cadrin, I . . ."
Cadrin shook his head, a movement that caused new agony to blossom on his face. "No. Get . . . get her . . . Captain. I'm done."
"No, Cadrin. There's still a chance."
Cadrin smiled through melting lips. His eyes went blank, and his mouth gaped open. Lhedri could hear the sizzle as the acid ate through flesh and into bone. Cadrin was dead.
Lhedri scrambled among the dead for acidrods, taking the two not ruined and still holding slugs. Two rods, six slugs. He sheathed his sword and chose the best of the rods, slinging the other across his back.
The single female scream had not been repeated. Dersi, he was certain of it.
Armed as best as he could manage, Lhedri passed through the massive doors and into a semicircular room with a narrow catwalk around its rim. A metal-lattice stairway gave access to it, and Lhedri crossed to this without taking much note of the bizarre machinery that choked the room. Dozens of tangled umbilicals, the remains of those attached to the women, rose from the center of the room to pierce a heaving globe of ool-flesh above. The thick scent of mingled ozone and smoke and ool-blood clogged his nostrils.
The catwalk rang with his footsteps as he circled the room toward the single exit. It stood open, and beyond it he could see glistening convolutions of resin and ool-flesh intermingled with gleaming metal. Sounds echoed through the passageway: slithering tentacles and the whirring clangor of belching machinery.
How had he heard Dersi's scream over such a din? He shook his head, uncaring, and pressed onward.
Taking a firmer grip on his acidrod, he crept into the corridor, following it a short distance until it ended in a sphincter that refused to open at his touch. The lacery hung before it twitched in agitation, a sound like the ringing of chimes, threatening to bring more of the women.
Lhedri could not stop. More and more he was certain the scream had been Lady Dersi's. And from the sound of it, he felt not only her fear, but her disgust and revulsion, emotions Lhedri could, in the aftermath of his own encounters here in this nightmarish place, understand quite well.
Unbidden doubts attempted to squirm into his thinking, a desire, almost a need, to forget Lady Dersi and seek his way out of this torturous place. He had entered the rebel complex with more than forty guardsmen under his command, and had descended in the mechanical throat with twelve of them under his guidance. Of those, not one survived. And they had died horribly, torn limb from limb or wrenched into twisted shapes barely recognizable as Bhajong.
But where could he go? He was trapped in this complex of horrors. He could only hope to find Lady Dersi and her companion, the rebel Erekel. The old man had moved with seeming self-assurance in seeking these metallic bowels. Certainly he knew how to escape them.
Besides, he could not desert Lady Dersi in this horrid place. Not Dersi.
Banishing doubts from his mind, he leaned the acidrod against the squirming wall of the corridor and drew his sword. He pressed the sharp point against the nexus of the sphincter, working the blade into the resilient flesh of the ool. It resisted him, and he twisted the sword, straining to bite deep into it. It trembled, and the lacery behind him shivered in agitation, crying out in alarm. He sawed desperately at the flesh, worming the sword deeper into the sphincter. Fluids drizzled down the resinous surface, coating his blade and bathing his hand and wrist. A narrow gap opened in the flesh. Breathing deeply, knowing he gambled with his life and that of Lady Dersi's, he saw no alternative, and shoved his foot through the hole. He released his sword and wiggled deeper, pressing upward with his hands on the slick flesh, pushing downward with his booted foot. Sticky fluids washing over him, Lhedri wiggled his head through the crevice and peered into the room beyond.
He gasped, his eyes widening. Feeling behind him, through the sphincter, he took up the acidrod he had left leaning against the wall and dragged it through. He pulled himself the remaining way through the access and drew his sword after him.
He stood upon another catwalk, this one ringing a vast spherical room, easily a hundred feet in diameter. Its walls were composed of row upon row, from distant floor to equally distant ceiling, of transparent, cylindrical tubes. Massive wads of tentacles rose from each case, rising to intersect in a tangled ball in the center of the chamber. Here other tendrils dangled, reaching out to caress the facings of the tubes with suckered tips. A dripping eye the size of a man hung on a knotted cord from the central tangle, swiveling to orient on Lhedri as he entered.
Tendrils slithered from the walls, snaking toward Lhedri, who dropped to his knees. The tentacles crashed together over his head, and he heard the sound of ringing metal. Glancing upward, he saw that each of the writhing arms was tipped with a four-foot-long sliver of sharpened metal. He rolled away as other tendrils slashed down at him. His acidrod slipped from his fingers, clattering on the metal grating, and caught on the narrow lip encircling the catwalk. A sword-tipped appendage speared down, smashing the weapon to splinters. A weird, warbling cry erupted from beaked mouths that emerged from the tangled ball.
Lhedri rose to his feet and ran along the catwalk, while all around him the chamber erupted into a fury of sound and motion. Lining the walls, sealed away in their transparent cases, he could see perfectly symmetrical beings, their bodies long and shapely, their faces uniform in some semblance of sleep. Male and female, each had the same shock of bright red hair, almost the color of blood. He dodged bladed tentacles, ducking and rolling, leaping over knots of them when they thrust across his path. A blade sliced along his shoulders, digging deep into his skin. He felt the hot flush of blood drip down his back.
Ahead and behind hot air gushed from the walls. He ran through clouds of steam as the cases lining the catwalk cracked open. He heard muttering sounds, words, undecipherable in his panic. Smooth-limbed bodies began stepping from the cases.
Lhedri saw a landing ahead, and a broad metal door. He dashed through clouds of fog and grasping hands, dodging the clumsy blows that rained down on him from the cases. As if fearing to hit the red-haired beings, the sword-tentacles retreated. They rose, hovering overhead, tracking his movement, but did not lash out.
A red-haired man stepped directly into Lhedri's path. Unable to stop himself, Lhedri lowered his shoulder and crashed into the man, knocking him asprawl. Fingers grasped at his clothing, but Lhedri slammed his elbow down into the beautiful man's face and crawled away. Another figure, a woman, clutched at his arm. Lhedri jerked away, reaching for the door. He could see another of the shallow depressions on the wall beside it. Frantic, he crashed into the door and slid his hand into the niche. The door clicked, jerked, and began to sink into the floor.
He could feel the creatures closing in on him. Diving through the door, he rolled, spun to his feet, and whipped the other acidrod from his back, firing blindly behind him. He heard a satisfying outcry as the slug sizzled through the air and disappeared into the wafting fog.
Lhedri leaped to his feet and bolted along a short hallway that ended in another sphincter. Two slugs. Not daring to stop, knowing the creatures would be hard on his heels, he raised the acidrod to his midsection and fired at the sphincter even as he pounded down the corridor. The hissing slug crashed into the sphincter, and it shuddered. Acid gnawed through ool-flesh. The portal flew open, and Lhedri leaped through it.
One slug left.
He turned back, ready to defend himself against pursuit. But the sphincter slammed shut with a wet slurp, sealing him in.
Lhedri spun again, facing into the room, his acidrod ready . . . and gasped in horror.
Lhedri took a step back from the horrifying figure that rose at his entrance. Metal and flesh merged in the creature, an unbelievable hybrid of dripping, oozing limbs and gleaming metal. From its body rose dozens of cords and tentacles, joining overhead in a tangle, attached to shuddering, clanking machinery. Its mouth opened, spilling a mass of squirming cilia.
"Who dares intrude upon me?" the figure demanded, its voice sending tremors through the room. Overhead, tentacles shivered, and the complex machinery shuddered, belching steam.
Lhedri stepped back again. Fear sizzled through him, unrestrained, a mortal terror that left him trembling. His knees felt weak, his fingers twitched on the acidrod. The voice, the terrible, forceful voice. It struck him to his core.
"Bow down to me, child! Bow down before your God!"
Lhedri could not think. His mind raced, images tumbling over one another in a chaotic swirl. Without thought, he began to sink to his knees. Waves of force spilled from the towering figure, washing over Lhedri, robbing him of will, of resistance.
"Yes, bow before me, child. You are in the presence of your God. I hold your life in my hands. Serve me, and the blessings will be manifold. Defy me, and your end will be beyond compare."
Lhedri fell to his knees. His hand relaxed, and the acidrod tumbled from his slack fingers to clatter to the floor. He felt his eyelids becoming heavy. The air he drew into his lungs felt dense. It tasted of smoke and acid. Sluggish, he put one hand to the floor to gain his balance.
Something, some small sound, stirred at the edge of his consciousness. Something he should know. Something he should remember. Something . . .
"Bow down. Prostrate yourself before your God."
He lowered his head, felt the cool metal of the floor against his lips.
"Sleep. Dream. Be at peace. I welcome you into the fold. Sleep."
His eyes closed, heavy beyond belief.
The sound came again, a shrill gurgle. His body sank deeper into relaxation.
"Sleep."
The command could not be denied. His shoulders slumped forward. His face pressed fully against the cold metal floor. Dreams hovered at the edge of his mind, visions of family, of community, of safety and warmth. Companionship. Love. He opened the doorways of his mind to the dreams.
The gurgling sound, unmistakable in its panic, fell on his sleep-pressed ears. Something. . . . What was it? Something . . .
His arms fell to his side, brushing against the acidrod where it lay next to him. It clattered, bringing clarity. He opened bleary eyes, staring into the gleaming surface of the floor. His will seemed not his own, oppressed by a power he could not understand.
"Now, Dersi, shall we continue?" Lhedri heard the creature say, its voice light, pleased.
Dersi? Lady Dersi? Lhedri shifted, canting his head to one side, and saw the horrid creature approach a warped chair, a raised lump of ool-flesh and metal. He saw through heavy eyes a cylinder situated directly above the chair, saw it dancing with flickering inner lights, saw it revolving, spinning. Smoke arose from its terminus, and a misty cloud of deep red, unmistakably blood. He smelled the harsh stench of burning flesh, the coppery tang of blood, and other, subtle things he could not identify.
The gurgling sound came again, and a slight movement drew his eye. There, along the back of the lumpy chair, a few strands of long, pale hair trailed across metal and flesh.
"Not much longer, Dersi, and then you will join me."
Lady Dersi!
Lhedri rose to trembling knees and felt around him with his hand, keeping his eyes trained on the disgusting hybrid. His fingertips brushed the shaft of his acidrod and he drew it to him. It scraped across the floor.
The creature turned at the sound.
Lhedri brought up the acidrod and fired in one smooth motion.
The hybrid of metal and tissue screamed, a sound that shook the room.
The mound of flesh carried Rian and the strangers upward until it deposited them within a broad chamber festooned with shivering tentacles. The stranger shoved Rian to one side of the mound, then picked him up and stepped over a lip of throbbing tissue. The woman followed. Carried over the shoulder of the stranger, Rian could see the hump shrink, the flesh recede back into the walls of the feeder. The scent of acid was strong here, rising from several pools of liquid sprinkled around the room.
Dark-skinned creatures crept around in the shadows of the chamber, skittering on short, crooked limbs. Others, spiderlike, scuttled up the walls, seizing dangling tendrils in their pinchered mouths and dragging them down into the pools of liquid. The tendrils then began to drink, siphoning the liquid up into the throbbing flesh of the ool. A hulking creature with short, stubby legs shambled toward one of the pools and knelt. A ridged tube slid from the center of its eyeless, globular head and entered the pool. With a disgusting slurping sound it sucked at the bubbling, hissing liquid. Its stomach swelled, and still it sucked. The skin of its belly stretched taut, becoming translucent, the veins embedded in the flesh standing out in sharp relief.
The stranger dropped Rian to the floor. It cracked beneath his weight. Reaching up, the stranger grasped a thick tentacle hanging from the ceiling. After wrapping the tendril around the landskin cocoon, the stranger stepped back and stroked the bulging tentacle. It retracted, dragging Rian across the floor and up, until he was hanging head down, suspended several feet above the floor.
Rian struggled, but still could gain no slack in his sheath.
"The landskin will not release you. And even if it did, what would you do? Where would you go?"
Rian glared at the stranger, willing him to death.
The stranger smiled as if reading his mind, mocking. His face had completely healed, fresh, pink skin replacing the withered ruin left by Rian's spittle. The woman at his side reached up and laid her palm upon the stranger's cheek. She smiled, displaying clean, white teeth.
"Come," the stranger said, and turned his back on Rian. With the woman at his side he crossed the room, heading toward a circular opening ringed by knobs of hard, porous flesh that jetted purplish gases. The tendril by which Rian was suspended shivered and slid along through the flesh of the chamber in the wake of the two strangers.
The tubular passageway wound through striated tissue, rising and sinking over encrusted projections. Other passages, most smaller in diameter, intersected the one along which they traveled, and strange creatures crawled or slithered through them, bent on tasks Rian could not discern. The stranger and his woman ignored Rian, other than to periodically nudge his cocoon to one side when massive, hunchbacked creatures slogged past, eyeless and unheeding of their presence.
They entered a confluence of passageways, an oblong chamber from which dozens of tunnels sank into the moist darkness. Here a series of misshapen pillars rose from the floor. Knobs and lumps dotted the surface of the pillars, which seemed composed of a glistening, translucent material. Passing close to one of the spars, Rian could see a reaching hand within, fingers bent in a supplicating gesture. Farther on, a face, beautiful in a strange sort of way, framed by wisps of pale hair, swam beneath the translucent crust. Eyes wide in terror, mouth forever frozen in a silent scream, the face begged surcease which would never come. Other faces loomed up within the encasing material, all agonized, all ridden by never-ending terror.
Bhajong, Rian knew, though he had seen but a few in his life. Those few had been armed and armored, raiding parties who had descended the feeder tubes to savage outlying Gagash communities. In death the Bhajong held no such beauty as these. The dead were cold, their faces cruel in rictor, drawn into feral snarls, their eyes beady and hard.
Tiny creatures, like insects but composed of metal and flesh, scuttled over the frozen figures, boring into the translucent stone, gnawing at the bodies of the Bhajong. Emerging, the insectoids spun fibers from their nether ends toward the ceiling and crawled aloft. They disappeared into the shadows.
At the far end of the chamber they entered another tube, this one sinking gradually until it deposited them in a hallway of metal. Rian looked around in amazement, startled by the sight of so much metal, here within the bowels of the ool. Though coated by intrusions of ool-flesh, the hallway gleamed, lit by artificial lights mounted on the walls. Twenty yards farther along the passage, an iris of ool-flesh rose up to block the way.
A thunderous voice screamed from beyond the iris. The corridor shook, chunks of ool-flesh breaking free of the walls and tumbling to the floor. Metal buckled, heaving like some monstrous serpent, pitching the strangers from their feet. They cried out, tossed like pebbles along the hallway. Rian's tether snapped, and he crashed to the floor. Around him, the landskin sheath seethed, streamers of flesh whipping about madly. Its inner surface bubbled, crackled, and Rian felt sudden play in his prison. He wormed one arm free. The stick fell from his mouth, and he sucked in great gulps of air.
The iris shot open, revealing a world of nightmares.
Alberto! I'm here!
Lhedri fired his last acidslug. The sizzling wad of destruction hissed across the room and slammed into the revolving cylinder. It exploded in a shower of sparks, sending jagged lightning arcing through the chamber. The hybrid called God reeled back, its arms bracing its head as it unleashed a scream that rattled the walls.
Other machines exploded overhead, and Lhedri dodged a falling tentacle that crashed to the floor and twitched, leaking. God slammed into a bank of hissing machinery.
Beyond God, a sphincter shot open.
Lhedri gained his feet and stumbled toward Dersi. Another Bhajong, Erekel, sat motionless, as still as death, in a chair next to hers. Lhedri slid in a pool of fluid and crashed into Dersi's chair. He reached out for her, but his hands froze, inches from contact with her skin. Her face was bathed in blood, and a huge flap of skin had been removed from her head, revealing deep-scored bone. Tentacles and clamps littered her body, and a thick tube ran from an articulated arm overhead and down into her throat.
"Lady Dersi!"
He was too late.
Rian rolled within his restraining sack, barking up against one wildly pitching wall. He seized the loosened lip of the landskin and pulled another arm free. Keeping his eyes trained on the stranger and his woman, both of whom lay clutching at their heads some yards away, Rian ripped at the landskin, feeling it tear between his hands. His other arm popped free. He dragged himself free of the sucking mass and staggered to his feet, thrusting out his arms to keep his balance.
The stranger, his face a mask of pain, climbed to his feet. He reached for Rian.
Rian retreated. Behind him, the iris began to squeeze shut. Without thinking, Rian dove through the aperture headfirst. He felt its closure nip his toes, and then he rolled, crashing into something hard and cold.
He reached out a hand to draw himself up and felt the warmth of another hand. At his touch the alien fingers spasmed, and the hand seized his wrist.
Rian jerked his hand away and scrambled to his feet. Thick smoke, glowing with the angry orange and scarlet of concealed flames, revealed a vague, manlike shape looming before him. Sounds crashed in upon him: the ringing crash of metal, a wet slurping, belching steam and the crackle of flames. And a scream, pounding on his ears, hurting, powerful enough to rattle the walls. Something touched him from behind, a wet, slithering thing concealed by clouds of smoke. He jerked away from the touch, waving his arms to clear away the acrid, stinging billows.
A wheezing clank came from his right and he spun in that direction. A dripping arm shot out of the fog. He ducked, and the arm sent eddies of smoke curling over his head. A tentacle on the floor wrapped around his ankle, sending him sprawling. Others snaked out of the floor, seizing his arms.
A massive, hideous figure loomed out of the smoke, a creature of nightmares, an amalgam of metal and flesh, writhing with tendrils and cords. A red-orbed mechanical eye oriented on him, and a mouth dripping with cilia turned up at its corners. Metal fingers seized his throat, ripping him from the bonds of the tentacles. He was swept into the air, his feet dangling, kicking futilely at the metal-sheathed torso of the creature.
"Ah, my guest has arrived at last," said a voice oozing with hatred.
Yes! The voice in Rian's head screamed in triumph.
Something touched Lhedri's hand. Instinctively, he snatched at it, felt fingers, a wrist. He turned, fanning the smoke out of his way, and raised the acidrod like a staff. The hand jerked away, and an ill-seen figure tumbled away into the swirling smoke.
Machinery crashed down around him, sending up showers of sparks. Lightning danced within the billowing clouds of smoke. He coughed, his lungs seared by raging heat, poisoned by burning fluids.
A soft sound, a groaning gag, came from nearby.
Lady Dersi!
Lhedri felt his way through the choking clouds. His questing fingers found an arm, swathed in ool-resin, and he traced it up to a shoulder, a throat, a face. He snatched away tentacles and clamps, unheeding the damage he might cause, knowing that if he did not get her away from here now, it did not matter how badly he injured her. What little life remained in her after her ordeal would be snuffed out.
He pried away a series of tiny claws ringing her mouth. The tube down her throat presented greater difficulty. He had no idea how deep it went, what parts of her it had invaded. He pulled gently, breathing a great sigh of relief as it slid without a hitch from her mouth.
"Ah, my guest has arrived at last." Lhedri heard the uncanny voice of God, echoing through the smoke. He could not tell how close the creature was.
Dersi coughed, spewing hot fluids across his hand. Lhedri leaned close, holding her. She coughed, gagged, and tried to say something. Over the sounds of the flames and the crashing machinery he could not hear her. He leaned closer, her lips to his ear.
"Erekel," she whispered.
Lhedri tried to raise her from her chair. Ool-resin kept her locked in place. His fingers dug at the brittle, resilient resin. It cracked, large chunks breaking away.
He heard someone gag in the chaos of flame and smoke and crashing machinery.
With a final heave, Lhedri freed Lady Dersi. She collapsed in his arms, sending him sprawling to the floor. Her soft weight pressed down on him. Blood and strange liquid bubbled from her lips, bathing his shoulders.
Rian squirmed, his hands working at the titanic strength of the claw at his throat. With his middle arm he lashed out, pounding his fist again and again into the face of the monstrous creature that held him. The creature laughed, a harsh sound, metallic and bubbling at once.
Rian! Be still!
"The pestilence you represent cannot be allowed to spread, Gagash!" the creature said.
Needle-tipped tendrils sank into Rian's skull, slicing through skin and bone like paper. Waves of agony washed over him, and he felt the strength fade from his limbs. He fell limp in the creature's grip.
Yes!
A flood of sensation crashed through him. Images speared his mind, flashing pictures he could not connect. Then memories rose from the depths, swimming like boreworms through curtains of darkness. In scant moments, his mind was laid bare to the creature, all his secrets revealed.
The creature laughed. "Ah, Santiago. You live! I can feel your touch behind all of this. But your pitiful machinations will not save you. I know all your secrets and have made them mine!"
Not all of them, you gloating monstrosity!
Rian tried to struggle, tried to marshal enough will to want to resist. He could not. The metallic claw at his throat choked the life from him, and he could do nothing.
The voice in his mind fell silent, leaving him in the clutches of the monstrosity, helpless and alone.
Someone coughed near Lhedri. "Dersi! Dersi!" The voice was harsh, rasping.
"Erekel," Dersi said, coughing up blood. "Help him."
"We have no time! This place is coming down around our ears, and God is here, somewhere. We must escape while we can!" Lhedri dragged her limp form to his shoulder. He dropped the spent acidrod and drew his sword with his free hand.
"No," she said. Her arm shifted, a slight movement that left her breathless. "Please."
Lhedri growled but shifted Dersi on his shoulder and waded through the smoke to the other chair. Here he found Erekel trussed up with squirming tentacles and hardened resin. He broke away the resin and Erekel surged up from the chair.
"You!" The old man grabbed a fistful of Lhedri's tunic.
Lhedri slapped his hand away. "If you value your life or that of Lady Dersi, we have no time for this. How do we get out of here?"
Erekel coughed. He shook his head. "I don't know. I came through a sphincter somewhere. I can't see through all this smoke. What's happened? Dersi?"
"Later," Lhedri said. "She's hurt. I don't know how badly. Get us out of here, Erekel. I don't care how, but anywhere is better than this."
A huge piece of machinery crashed down, shaking the chamber and shooting flames toward the ceiling. Lhedri stepped back from the intense heat, shielding his face with his arm. "Now would be a good time, Erekel."
"I . . . I think it's this way," the old man said, tugging on Lhedri's arm and leading him through the smoke. Around them veins pulsed and throbbed, and sensory tentacles whipped about like lashes. The harsh grind of machinery swelled around them, accentuated by the consuming roar of flames. Heat washed over them, blinding in its intensity.
A massive pipe tore loose from the ceiling, raining debris down on them. Lhedri jerked Dersi from his shoulder, crouching low over her, shielding her with his own body. Jagged bits of metal pummeled him. Erekel crouched low to the wall, and Lhedri heard him screaming wordlessly.
Rian felt himself slipping away, felt the life sluggishly leeched from his body. The metal hand drew him close. He could smell the fetid breath of the creature even over the acrid bite of the smoke. "Know this, scion of Santiago: You have been used, and you didn't even know it. Used by a creature as alien to you as I. You've been used, and you've been discarded. But by your own betraying memories you reveal that Santiago's scheme went awry. You've failed. Santiago's failed."
Santiago? Delirious with pain and sniffing at the rancid spoor of death, Rian had no idea what the creature meant. He waited for death, welcoming it.
The creature stiffened. Its grip on his throat slackened. "Dersi," it whispered. "No!"
A tremendous rending sound came from overhead, and Rian caught sight of a mammoth pipe swinging down from the ceiling, its jagged edges belching steam. Rian's captor looked up just as the serrated rim swung low. It smashed into the side of the creature's head, tossing him from his feet as if he were made of paper.
Rian found himself flying through the air. Instinctively, he tensed. He crashed into a wall, his breath whooshing from his lungs as something snapped inside. The hard metal floor rose up to smash him in the face. He flopped over on his side, his hand encountering a cloth-wrapped leg. "Help me," he said, his voice inaudible to his own ears.
"Wait!" Erekel snapped, crawling over to seize the man's hand. He felt a pulse, steady but there. "He's still alive."
"So? Let's get out of here." Lhedri tugged the old man's shoulder. He coughed on smoke, squeezed his eyes shut against the sting. Something came, pounding through the smoke, shoving aside machinery that crashed against walls. He knew what it was. "God's coming. Come on!"
"He can help us!" Erekel said.
"He's almost dead. We don't have time."
"Bring him," Dersi whispered. "Bring him."
Lhedri snarled. "Here! Take her. I'll get him." He passed Dersi to the old man, leaned down, and pulled on the outthrust arm of the downed man. "Damn! He's a monster!"
"Gagash," Erekel said. He wrapped Dersi in his arms and staggered to his feet. "Come on. Bring him. He can help."
Lhedri spat in distaste and hauled one of the Gagash's three arms over his shoulder. He sagged beneath the weight, shifting his sword to his free hand. For a moment he caught himself thinking that three arms might not be such a bad thing.
"Dersi!" God's voice boomed out of the chaos. "You cannot escape me!"
"Where's the damned sphincter?" Lhedri felt the approach of the monster, knew they did not have much time.
"Here!" Erekel said, and he led the way through the churning smoke. They dodged falling debris and writhing tentacles that sought to impede them. Lhedri slipped and slammed his knee on the floor. The flare of pain loosed a cry from his lips. He rose and pressed on, straining beneath the weight of the unconscious Gagash. His skin itched at the close contact. The Gagash's skin was abrasive. Lhedri forced down a rising wave of nausea.
"You will not escape!" God screamed, his voice shaking the chamber anew. More debris fell from the ceiling, glass shattering, metal clanging, ool-tissue falling with wet slurping sounds.
"The sphincter! It's shut."
Lhedri dropped the Gagash to the floor. He leaped forward, slashing at the sphincter with his sword. The blade bit deep. Juices spurted, but the iris held. Cursing, he hacked at the tough flesh again. It twitched, a spasm traveling through it in a rippling wave.
"He's coming," Erekel said. His voice trembled.
Lhedri ignored him, continuing to batter at the sphincter. He had opened a hairline crack in the flesh, a crack that oozed thick ool-blood. It pooled at the foot of the door. Another blow and the crack widened. He kicked at the portal, and bits of resin flaked off, clattering to the floor. "I've got it! Come on. Get Lady Dersi through. I'll see if I can hold him off, grant you some time."
"Containment! Fire control systems activate!" God roared.
Erekel surged forward, given strength through panic, his face a mask of terror. He slung Dersi over his shoulder and dove, headfirst, through the narrow gap Lhedri had opened. A shard of resin scraped along his thigh, drawing blood. The old man cried out in pain. His arm snaked back through the opening, grabbing the Gagash's shoulder. Lhedri leaned down to aid Erekel, heaving on the Gagash's considerable weight and shoving him through the crack. Resin shards cracked and broke, digging deep into the tough, leathery skin of the man's body.
"Pitiful child!"
Lhedri turned, forgetting about Erekel, forgetting about the Gagash, entrusting Lady Dersi's safety to his unwanted companions. God loomed up out of the smoke, towering, his mechanical eye blazing, glowing shafts of crystal embedded in his flesh. Behind him, machines dropped from the ceiling, thick white gas jetting from nozzles mounted on their ends. Where the white gas spewed, flames died and smoke dissipated.
"Captain Lhedri!" Erekel called from beyond the sphincter.
"Go. Keep her safe, Erekel. Go." Lhedri firmed his grip on his sword and prepared to buy them time. He leaped forward, slashing at the gigantic figure of God.
Memories exploded. The raging firestorm of images swept Rian away, a dizzying rush of impressions, sights, sounds, and tastes.
Flicker
He crouched beneath the cool, overhanging ferns, his sparse pelt damp with the morning dew. His mate, trembling behind him, picked through his fur, seeking lice and mites, forgetting for the moment their peril. With a shaking paw he parted the velvety fronds and watched as the massive carnivore padded along the path to the waterhole. Sight, rather than scent, served as his prime sense.
His mate found a tick embedded in his flank. Her fingers were thick and clumsy, better suited to climbing than such delicate work. She leaned forward, parting the course hairs of his fur, and nibbled at his skin with her sharp teeth. He felt the slight pull as she removed a parasite. His ears, yet keen, heard the small pop as she bit down on the bulbous tick and chewed.
The great cat paused, one padded, taloned forepaw frozen halfway to the soft loam, and cocked its tuft-eared head. Rian stilled, not daring to breathe. The feline groused, a wet rumble deep in its throat, and scented the air. The sluggish, thick breeze blew toward Rian where he crouched, concealing his scent from the carnivore.
At last satisfied, the beast continued on its way toward the watering hole. Rian tugged at his mate's large, protruding ear and scampered along the forest floor. She trailed him, and they sought the security of the high terraces.
Flicker
He ran across the rolling tundra, the tall grasses whipping at his naked thighs. His arm ached from carrying the clay-lined log and its precious cargo: four slow-burning coals. The ragged, lice-ridden garment of crudely stitched monkey skin he wore around his torso flapped in the breeze of his passage. Behind him, loping in their off-kilter manner, knuckles occasionally scraping the ground, came his band. Males bearing sharpened sticks fanned out in a wedge behind him, their eyes trained on the waving grasses. The females, cubs and smaller young clutched to their pendulous breasts, moved in a pack at the center of the wedge.
Rian topped a rise and stopped, raising one callused paw to halt the band. The males halted where they were, scanning the terrain. Rian grunted at the nearest of the males, gesturing with his weak chin toward a line of scrub trees in the lowlands beyond the rise. The other male whuffed, alarm and curiosity intertwined, language in its infancy.
A rival band emerged from the line of trees, screaming, whooping. They capered about, palms slapping the gorse, clubs crashing into the twisted trunks of the trees. Rian's males rushed forward to the hilltop, brandishing their crude spears. They screamed at the other males, bolstering their own flagging courage.
They came together in a rush, and Rian died, his head bashed in by a knobbed club.
Flicker
Rian's hands trailed through the cold, wet clay. His feet pumped, up and down, on the pedals of the potter's wheel. A long, fluted neck emerged beneath his skilled fingers; the funerary urn for the chieftain's ashes took shape. Long used to such efforts---for had he not provided the burial urn for the chieftain's father and three brothers, slain in the Hittite raids of two summers past?---he let his hands work of their own accord. His mind focused on the glaze he would choose for the urn. Blue, to placate the spirits and draw them near as escorts to the Otherworld. The appropriate pictographs to delineate the chieftain's meager achievements gave him further pause. What achievements could a fuzz-cheeked boy have after only fifteen years of drawing breath and a mere month of leadership?
Flicker
Rian danced, her breasts heaving beneath the thin gauze, her hips swaying to the increasing tempo of the music. Frantic, impassioned, she raised long, thin arms over black-as-night tresses, the cymbals on her fingertips clashing together, beating counterpoint.
The Emir regarded her through smoky, long-lashed eyes. She found herself surreptitiously regarding the breadth of his shoulders and the hard angularity of his face. Not handsome, but powerful. At his word he could raise two thousand swords and half as many horses, a mighty warband, indeed. And if what she had heard was correct, his favorite wife had yet to give him an heir. Rian suppressed a smile, allowing her gaze to linger on the Emir's. There were potions that could ensure the favored wife would never conceive.
She danced, seducing the Emir. She would bear him many strong sons!
Flickerflickerflicker
Images piled one atop another, a flood of lives lived, experiences gained. He was a poet, a sailor, a thief, and a baron. A knight, sworn to William, called the Conqueror, executed for betraying his liege to the Saxon lords. A bishop, grown fat on the toil of others, his rectory in all respects a palace, all gilt and marble. A duchess, a scullery maid, a serving wench, a goodwife. A cobbler and a cooper, a writer of odes, an actor, and a barrister. Each acquisition of knowledge, each slightest step of human evolution, technology alien to his Gagash heritage, he experienced. He made discoveries, stole them, exploited them. He fought wars against evil, was evil, a victim and a victimizer. He feasted and starved; died old and abed, consumed by wasting diseases, and young and alone, pierced by swords, punctured by bullets, boiled in suits of steel by heated oil dumped through murderholes of castles he had been ordered to take.
Flicker
He leaped from a boxy, gleaming craft onto an alien, dusty landscape, and looked back upon Earth, small, blue-green, and glowing in the light of a newly risen sun. His boots sank into the thick dust of the moon, immortalizing the first tentative step of mankind into the vast beyond.
Flickerflickerflicker
He piloted shuttles and needlecraft, landers and freighters, spanning first the homesystem, Sol, then taking larger leaps outward. Cruisers exploded under his command, vaporizing crews of thousands. He pressed buttons that released planet-killer bombs, consuming the atmospheres of splinter worlds unwilling to swear fealty to the Hegemony, and he laughed.
Flicker
He awakened to the whole of human existence, his memories exploding with . . . with everything.
This new awareness dwarfed his own existence, made him smaller than a mote of dust. Racial memory, an expansion of consciousness that was the offering of this alien world, its attempt at communication, at union. The world, the landskin, the drakes, the ool---all part of a symbiosis that transcended consciousness. Through some power or ability, that symbiosis encompassed the whole of human history, the memories, dreams, and aspirations of the entire race. And this gift, this knowledge, was offered as surety. But to accept such a gift? The consequences, the utter and complete loss of humanity. . . . The price was too high.
He understood, finally, that the Bhajong and the Gagash were one people, one alien, ruthless, conquering people, born on another world and launched into the universe, their hierarchical and competitive natures creating a vast, parasitic, breathing organism that was the Hegemony. An empire spanning thousands of worlds, bleeding them dry, sucking the life from them as it sucked the life from all its citizens.
And this world was to have been the next conquest. Here his newfound knowledge failed. For in all the convoluted, bloodthirsty history of the Hegemony, it had never failed to ultimately devour what worlds it set its eyes upon. One ship should have been followed by another, and another, until a flotilla, an armada, of warships came. If the world had proven intractable, it should have been reduced to a smoking ember, floating barren and lifeless about its star.
But it had not happened. There was only the one Ship, peopled by more than a thousand citizens of the Hegemony and bearing in stasis the cellular potential of a million more, with composite personality downloads stored in vast computers. Terran fauna and flora had been carted across the vast void of space, to recreate Terra anew, as had been done so many times before.
Failure. The schism that had developed among the Ship's crew had torn them apart, broken them into rival factions, had set them against one another in a desperate bid for dominance planetside. Alberto Rodriguez, Biological Sciences officer, had led the Exodus, bent on establishing communication and interaction with the primitive, all-encompassing entity that was the landskin, that was the ool, that was the drakes---all of them. They had become the Bhajong, parasites within the great ool, manipulated in every manner by the despot, Alberto.
Santiago's faction sought dominance still and became the Gagash, warped by a forced dependence upon the landskin for nourishment, their gene pool hopelessly clouded by mutations as the world-mind sought to adjust them to its own ends.
Flicker
And understanding blossomed.
He experienced them all, all their lives. He was there when humankind first stepped foot on this alien world. And he was there when the traitor, Alberto Rodriguez, led his band of malcontents in their exodus, sabotaging Ship's systems in the process, marooning them all here, forever.
Outside of himself, he gasped, for all of human history here on this world unfolded to him, came to him in a rush, inspiring panic and awe, revulsion and disgust. Hatred.
Father. Santiago.
The Elders, serving no end but their own, harvesting attributes and abilities from the Gagash in order to recreate them within their own, insular people. A separate race entirely, in every sense that mattered, bred among themselves, kept pure, apart. The Gagash were their chattel, their livestock, bred not for food, but for genetic material to further the grand scheme that had driven them since the Founding.
They had no hope of recreating the lost humanity in the bulk of Gagash society. That had never been their aim. Instead, they worked beneath a cloak of secrecy, building themselves farther and farther apart from the rest of the Enclave, building themselves into superior beings capable of taking their insane war to the planet, itself. Building themselves with material, tissues and traits, stolen from those unfortunate enough to have attracted their attention. All in the deceitful name of reclaiming something long, long lost.
Santiago. Father. The voice in his head.
It is necessary, Rian. Necessary. You cannot know the sacrifices I have made, all of us have made. You cannot realize what has been lost on this foul world. The voice spoke with a keen urgency, a zealot's fervor.
No! I will not be used like this!
A vast, foreign sigh echoed through his mind. You have no choice.
The final, sealed door in his memory opened, revealing to Rian the invasion of his own body, his own mind. Since the night he had awakened, lured by the childlike figure that continually dashed away before he could reach it, he had carried this thing, this presence. Santiago. An alien infiltrator, growing increasingly dominant within Rian's mind.
Things had been done to him. Alterations. Augmentations. He was a carrier. A carrier of disease, of infection. A carrier of Santiago's hope.
For generations the Gagash had believed the Elders strove to return them to their lost humanity, impelled beyond reason to maintain a tenuous grip on a history they could not remember.
But it was all a lie. A hateful, horrible lie.
And now . . .
And now.
Awaken. We have work to do.
Rian's middle arm lay bent beneath his body. He rolled over, groaning, and his senses throbbed into wakefulness. Sounds crashed in on him: screaming and the roar of fire, crashing machinery and a deep, throbbing pulse from the ool-flesh surrounding him. Hands touched him, hesitant. Heat and moisture blanketed him. Blood filled his mouth and he spat on the sweat-stained metal floor. The rough skin of his face stung where someone had slapped him repeatedly.
"Can you get up?" The voice came from close to his ear. Rian turned and looked into the gray, watery eyes of a white-haired old man, his face wrinkled and pale. Bhajong.
Rian's middle hand snaked up, seizing the old man around the throat. "Get away. Get away from me!"
The elder choked, his eyes round and wide. His tongue lolled from his mouth. His feeble hands clawed at Rian's grip.
Rian slid to his feet, taking in his surroundings with a glance. A woman lay, unmoving, at his feet, blood drenching her face, staining her hair. Bits of crusted resin splotched her skin. The elder he held struggled, but could not hope to loosen Rian's hold.
Beyond them, through a crack in one of the living doors of this nightmarish place, came a clamor, and smoke roiled into the tight corridor in which he found himself. Movement beyond the crack was diluted, hazy with smoke and masked in the stench of burning flesh and smoldering machinery. Something moved there, but he could not say what.
The old man's face was turning a nice shade of pale blue. Rian relaxed his grip and shoved the man against the wall. Tentacles hanging against the wall slithered.
"What's going on here? Who are you?"
"P-please . . . Choking . . ."
Rian released him. The man crumpled to the floor and lay there, groaning, his hands at his throat. "Must . . . must get out . . . of here. God . . ."
"God." Rian jerked his gaze back to the crack in the portal.
Rodriguez. The enemy. Rian was unsure if the inner voice was his own . . . or someone else. Father. Santiago.
Something approached from the other side, something huge. A terrible voice screamed rage, and the walls of the corridor shook.
"God," Rian repeated.
"Help us," the old man managed to choke out. "Lady Dersi . . ."
"She looks dead. Sorry, old man. You're on your own." He turned from them, staring down the corridor toward a branching of ways in the distance.
Our fight has just begun, Rian. The plan unfolds, but you have much, much more to do. Though you have delivered Rodriguez's demise to him, he remains capable of thwarting me. Santiago's voice, this time. Smug. Self-assured, thinking himself undeniable.
"Please." The old man climbed to his knees.
Rian hesitated, and the portal exploded outward, flinging shards of hard resin like daggers. One splinter scraped along Rian's cheek, slicing it to the bone. He hunched over, avoiding the hail of blades, and felt the impact as something landed heavily at his feet. The steaming remains bore little resemblance to anything human, neither Bhajong nor Gagash.
"Lhedri," the old man said, his voice a whisper.
Smoke billowed into the corridor, and a dark figure moved through it, bellowing.
Rian hissed, then reached down and hauled the limp form of the woman to his chest. He held her there with his middle arm and dragged the old man to his feet. "Come on."
"What? What happened?"
"I remembered God," Rian said. Dragging the old man behind him, Rian pounded down the corridor, while at his back the massive form of God screamed in rage. And, inside of him, Santiago cried out for vengeance.
Erekel felt a shock travel along his arm as the three-armed man grabbed him and pulled him along. His arm went numb to the shoulder. Then spreading warmth flowed outward from the Gagash's grip, a burning sensation that seemed to travel through Erekel's bloodstream. He gasped, but plodded along behind him.
"Who . . . who are you?" Erekel asked between gasps for breath.
"Rian. You?" The Gagash did not even seem winded, despite the abuse he had obviously suffered. Erekel wiped a hand across his forehead, slinging sweat and droplets of blood---his or another's, he could not say---to the floor.
"Erekel." Behind them, no more than twenty yards back, God surged into the corridor. The walls rippled toward them, a wave of flesh thrashing with tentacles. Metal buckled, screeching, warping beneath a crushing weight of living muscle. "Let go of me. I can manage on my own."
Rian released him and pounded down the corridor. At the intersection he did not hesitate, but turned to his right.
"Where are you going?" A quick glance back showed God gaining on them, his massive form pushing at the tight confines of the hall.
"I don't know," Rian said. "Anywhere but here."
The burning sensation continued despite Rian releasing his arm. It swept through Erekel's chest, sinking into his legs, tingling his toes.
Then it faded, leaving renewal, refreshment. Weariness vanished from Erekel's limbs, and he followed Rian with a new lightness in his step.
God's voice boomed through the corridor. He laughed, a hollow, mirthless sound. "Where will you go, my little lambs? You are in my domain. Cease this flight. Come back and prostrate yourselves before me, and I will welcome you into my flock. I will shower blessings and gifts upon you, and exalt you."
Ahead of Rian the ceiling ripped, and a bulge of ool-flesh surged into the corridor. The mottled flesh throbbed, and running sores spat cilia that reached for the Gagash. He lowered his head, tucked Lady Dersi closer to his chest, and slammed into the narrow gap near the floor of the hallway. Cilia snapped at him, twining around his arms and throat, then jerked away as if pained. The mound of flesh heaved like some great slug and retreated. Erekel ran in Rian's wake. His skin crawled as his shoulders brushed at the writhing cilia.
God screamed behind them. His massive fists slammed into the walls, which shuddered at the impact. Joints groaned and beams twisted. "No! You will spread your contagion no further, Santiago-spawn!"
Rian ran on, and Erekel followed. They passed through an arch ringed with pustules and entered a broad hallway broken by niches along each wall. Within each niche sat shadowed figures, hundreds of tentacles attached to their bodies. Thick resin coated them, sealing their faces forever in expressions of horror and alarm.
God entered behind them, closer. Erekel risked a glance back and saw the creature stagger forward. He seemed to have grown, his head now brushing the ceiling ten feet overhead. His shoulders scraped the sides of the corridor, metal screeching along metal, ool-flesh merging and separating from the organic portions of the walls. He gestured with his organic arm, and a ripple traveled through the flesh-lined corridor.
"Rian, look out!"
Spines shot from the walls at their left, thick, sharp barbs dripping with acid. Rian and Erekel ducked, and the spines slammed into the opposite wall, plunging into flesh and metal alike. Erekel fell to his knees. Tentacles spurted from the floor, cracking through metal like fragile tissue and latching onto his legs with clinging suckers. They drew back, smoking, and whipped away from him.
What? What was happening?
"Come on!" Rian said. He jerked the Bhajong to his feet.
God roared, slamming his fists into the floor. The corridor shook. "Come, my little lambs! I grow tired of this sport. Humble yourselves before me, and I will yet honor you."
Erekel stumbled forward, watching in horror as waves of flesh pinched shut ahead. A rolling bulge of muscle came toward them, while from behind God pressed forward. A mere ten yards separated them. "Rian?"
The Gagash ignored him, moving toward the approaching pinch of flesh, his hands outstretched at his sides. His body glistened with sweat; the spines on the back of his head stood on end. He shoved forward. His hands clenched in the ool-flesh. The walls trembled, shook, and drew back from him. Flesh smoked, oozing with unhealthy-looking fluid. As if splashed with powerful acid, the organic walls continued to decay, bubbling and hissing, melting into runnels that pooled on the floor.
"What are you?" Erekel whispered.
Rian did not answer. The pinched flesh snapped away from him, rolling back as surely as it had rolled forward, and Rian pressed onward.
Erekel chanced a glance over his shoulder again. God closed on them. Erekel could almost feel the monster's hot, fetid breath on the back of his neck.
"Erekel, my child. Erekel, why do you forsake me?" God's voice dropped, becoming low, insinuating. "Erekel, don't turn your back on your God. Come and kneel at my feet, that I might give you my blessings."
Erekel felt a stirring in his body, a yearning to obey, to turn around and submit to the will of God. His steps faltered. He slowed. His feet became leaden, drawing sluggishly up from the floor. Dull pressure pulled at his eyelids, forcing them closed. Lassitude crept over him, stealing his will.
Rian seized his hand and jerked him forward. A hot surge gushed through his body, and the compulsion to obey vanished in a wave of disgust. The horror of the creature that pursued them came crashing down on him, and he quickened his pace.
God screamed, pounding at the walls of the corridor. Something snapped, a vast tearing sound. Erekel stumbled. He stared in horror as God jerked one of the still figures from its niche. Veins and tentacles popped, fountaining rancid liquid. He raised the petrified figure over his head and flung it toward them. Erekel struggled to his feet and hurried after Rian. The petrified corpse crashed into the wall and bounced away, clattering, chunks of flesh and solid resin breaking free like shattered glass.
The hallway dumped them into a broad passage of gleaming metal. One end, about thirty feet away, ended in a blank slab of metal. The other opened into a vast space where winds howled and waves of electricity crackled along the metal-lattice walls. A narrow catwalk jutted out from a broad landing and spanned the empty space. Thick, churning fog masked the vault's ceiling. Below, swirling in a chaos of ripping winds and sizzling bolts of lightning, a maelstrom tore at the walls. In its center hung a globe of depthless black obsidian.
"Here!" Rian drew up short at the edge of the catwalk. He snatched Erekel's arm and shoved him ahead. Again Erekel's skin burned at the contact. A spasm of nausea churned in his stomach. He closed his eyes for a moment, grasping at the railing of the catwalk. A limp weight was pressed against his chest. "Take her. I don't know who she is to you, but she seems important. By now she should be carrying the contagion, as well. The world-mind, Rodriguez, will have little power to alter her. Or you."
"What?" Erekel's hands pulled Dersi to him, cradling. Her skin was cold and damp.
Rian smiled, an expression that rendered his thoroughly Gagash features more Bhajong. He seemed kinder, more noble. Less a monster. "No time for that. Go. Find a way out of this place."
"What are you going to do?" He knew. He already knew.
Rian's smile broadened. "Go on, Erekel. Keep your woman safe."
"You can't. Lhedri tried. You saw what's left of him back there, steaming."
"I'm not Lhedri. Go on, Erekel." Rian turned his back and stepped toward the arched entrance. A vast shadow flowed over him, and Erekel heard the clanking slither of God's approach. Trembling, Erekel looked down into the mangled face of Lady Dersi. By the faint rise and fall of her breast he knew she lived. But her grip on life seemed so tenuous. He could not sacrifice that.
He turned his back on Rian and ran along the catwalk, the slight weight of Lady Dersi barely felt.
A tremendous shockwave rippled along the catwalk. Erekel fell. Lady Dersi spilled from his arms. Her limp form tumbled along the catwalk. She rolled against the low lip edging the walkway. Her arm hung over empty space and the churning maelstrom below. Lightning danced along the underside of the catwalk as if hungry for her flesh. The catwalk continued to shake.
Erekel scrambled, but could not seem to get to his feet on the pitching catwalk. He reached for Dersi's shoulder, his fingers brushing the delicate fabric of her torn robe. Another shockwave rolled along the catwalk, and her body teetered. Her limp weight shifted. A cloud of white, blood-stained hair fanned out, and her head rolled over the edge. Tremors in the metal nudged her torso closer, closer to the edge.
"Dersi! No!" Erekel crawled toward her, unable to gain his feet. He reached out. Another ripple shot through the catwalk, and Dersi's body tumbled over the low lip.
Rian did not have long to wait for Rodriguez. A bulge of ool-flesh, studded with lashing tentacles and dripping with gore from smoking gashes, plumed from the mouth of the corridor. It split like tearing cloth, spitting the monstrous creature Albert Rodriguez had become out upon the landing. Rodriguez towered. His metal hand slammed down into the landing and ripped upward. Like a huge worm, the floor beneath Rian's feet rolled.
Rian fell to his side. Caught by a wave of rolling metal grating, he tumbled toward the railing and the void beyond. He reached out. His fingers curled around a length of railing. He grunted as his falling weight jerked on the socket of his arm, straining taut muscles. His feet kicked out over empty space. Jags of lightning flickered beneath him, arcing high. The obsidian orb in the center of the maelstrom spun faster, as if hungering for Rian's death.
"You fool! What makes you believe you can oppose me? Foolish pride?! Pride ends in humiliation, while humility brings honor. Bow down to me, worm!" Rodriguez's voice rose. Its power shook the towering vault. Girders overhead groaned. Fat tentacles snaked out, wrapping around the railing and popping it from its moorings. Kicking, Rian felt himself hauled into the air. He clung to the warped metal railing.
Rian released the railing and fell toward the heaving platform. Clawed appendages fountained from the pulsating wall of flesh behind Rodriguez. They snatched at him. Rian twisted, avoiding the rending clack of a monstrous claw. Another snapped shut around his wrist, then jerked away as drawn blood gushed out and covered its chitinous surface. The chitin burned, hissing streamers of smoke rising from chaotic ruin. Rian landed on the balls of his feet, pitching to the side as the landing heaved. Another claw slashed toward his head. He ducked, rolling toward Rodriguez. Razor-edged, articulated arms thrust for him. Serrations dug into his torso, biting deep. He screamed as fibers blossomed along the hard chitin of the claws and whipped at his face, his chest, his arms and legs, leaving deep gashes.
Rodriguez's metal arm shot out, seizing Rian's face. Razor-edged fingers tore his flesh to the bone. "You've lost, worm! Your contagion ends here. Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall!"
Rodriguez gestured, and rods popped up from the landing, rising like serpents. The metal bands slapped at Rian, crashing into arms, legs, ribs. He felt bones snap beneath the terrible force of the blows, and his blood flowed freely, dripping through the gaps in the grating to fall into the maelstrom below. Desperate, Rian rolled closer to Rodriguez, reaching for the mottled, torturous creature. Rodriguez laughed, stepping back, and the metal whipcords slashed down at Rian. A rod struck him across the back of his head with unbelievable power. He sprawled on his face.
The metal rods shot out and wrapped around Rian's arms and legs. They heaved upward, jerking him taut, tearing the muscles from his bones. He screamed in agony.
Rodriguez smiled and looked at Rian. "No witticisms, pawn? No sarcastic rejoinders? I'm disappointed."
Rian kept his mouth shut, straining against the metal bonds.
Bear it. It's almost completed. Your task is almost completed. The voice soothed, demonstrating it still held vast power over him.
Rodriguez laughed, mocking. "Ah, no. This will not do. This will not do, at all." He waved his mechanical arm, and the rods twisted, contorting until Rian hung his head downward. "Much better. The way a traitor should be crucified.
"Time to die, Santiago-spawn. Regretfully, I've no time to make this long and painful. Pressing matters take priority, I'm afraid." Rodriguez stepped forward, raising his metal arm. The fingers pinched closed, merged, and formed a broad, needle-sharp harpoon. With a smile on his hybrid face, Rodriguez drove the spear into Rian's chest.
With the agonizing touch of Rodriguez's body, Rian's inner voice screamed in triumph. YES!
Erekel's fingers tickled across Dersi's shoulder. Fabric ripped. Her body rolled, tumbling into space. Her arm whipped past his face. Desperate, he grabbed at the flailing limb, his fingers scrambling for purchase. He caught her wrist, scuttling forward on his belly. The dead weight of her body swung downward. His arm scraped across the lip edging the catwalk. Flesh peeled back like the skin of a fruit, and slick blood splattered across the grating. His shoulder screamed in protest as Dersi jerked to a halt. Below her, the maelstrom churned. A scream born of agony ripped from his throat.
He felt his fingers slipping, slipping. Her cold skin was damp, slick. Crying out, Erekel wormed toward the edge of the catwalk. He reached out with his other hand for Dersi's arm. His fingers caught on a bit of her nightgown. It slid across her shoulder. Through the gaps in the grating he could see her blood-splattered face, expressionless, drool trickling from the corners of her mouth. He felt himself sliding toward the edge, drawn by her weight.
"No!" he screamed, straining. She slipped. Fresh agony ripped through his tortured shoulder as he struggled to firm his grip on her wrist. His other hand twisted around her nightgown, bunching to gain a grip. "Dersi, please! I don't . . . know how . . . long I can . . . hold you. Please!"
He slid another few inches across the grating. His head and shoulders now hung over the maelstrom. Desperately he dug the toes of his shoes through the gaps in the grating. The metal dug through his shoes and into his toes. He could feel blood pooling in his shoes. His arms trembled. Dersi's sweat-soaked skin slid inexorably through his fingers. His clasp on her wrist weakened, slipped.
Behind him Erekel could hear the sounds of Rian's clash with God. But he could spare no concern for them. He focused all of himself on the still, gently twisting form of Dersi, an arm's length below him, her toes pointed down toward the horrifying black ball in the center of the maelstrom. Churning winds whipped her gown like a banner, revealing bits of soft, creamy flesh. Her hair writhed like thousands of tiny worms, a white-and-red halo surrounding her face.
Her hand slipped through his, and she dropped another foot. His other hand, bunched in her nightgown, prevented her tumble through the void. The gown slid across damp, pale skin, and now Dersi lay below him, hanging by a tenuous scrap of torn cloth, her arms and legs dangling below her. Her still form rotated, and Erekel screamed again, in frustration and rage and no little pain.
A length of twisted railing lay humped on the catwalk near him, almost within reach of his outstretched leg. Squeezing shut his eyes as if to summon strength from some hidden reservoir, Erekel scraped his body along the catwalk, toward the twisted refuse. Every inch brought new pain, in his arms and along his stomach, as fresh wounds tore open on the ruined metal of the catwalk. He heard a sound, a terrible, undeniable sound, and stared down at the dangling girl below him. Cloth ripped, a jagged seam opening in the nightgown. Dersi's limp form dipped an inch or two closer to the maelstrom. He dug his hands in her gown, gathering more to him, moving her body closer.
A pole, jagged-edged and thrust from the twisted wreckage near him, slid across his stomach. He felt its ragged edge gouge into his stomach, digging a furrow through his skin. He clamped his teeth shut, choking back a scream that he knew would find him releasing Dersi. Dersi, his daughter. He slid farther into the wreckage, and the pole dug deeper into his stomach. Something burst within him. He tasted blood in his mouth.
He hooked a leg through a length of crooked railing, locking it in place in the hollow of his other knee. His position firmer, he ignored the agony in his gut and slid over the edge of the catwalk. His hair stood on end, lifted by the static charge of the dancing lightning. The catwalk pitched and rolled, and he nearly lost his grip on Dersi's shift. He scrambled for purchase, screaming again. Finally, his hands twisted in the cloth and he tugged on it, drawing Dersi nearer.
The gown ripped, a sound of infinite finality. Erekel could see the rip in the fabric, a spreading tear that snaked along the seams. How much longer? How much longer could the frail garment support her weight? Erekel closed his eyes and pulled, drawing her up hand over hand, bunching his fists in the cloth.
She moved. Her head, lolling to one side and hanging down with her hair fanning out below, shifted. Her lids fluttered. She gasped, a quick intake of startled breath.
"Dersi, no. Don't . . . move!" Erekel's voice filled with anguish and anxiety. The pipe embedded in his guts tore at his insides, and he felt a horrid weakness steal over his limbs. Please. Please, don't move.
She opened her eyes. They grew wide and round. Her lips drew back in terror. She twitched. The gown ripped. Erekel desperately hauled it in, heedless of the tearing of his entrails. She raised her head. Her hands jerked. Her eyes locked onto Erekel's.
"Erekel!"
"Hold still!"
She did not. Her hands shot up, clawing at his. She seized his arms, her legs kicking desperately in the void. Erekel felt himself slipping. The pressure on his legs, tangled in the wreckage, sent flares of new pain through him, warring with the agony of his guts. "No."
The catwalk pitched. The mass of wreckage shifted, groaning as it slid across the grating. Erekel felt himself shoved toward the void, his legs now hopelessly caught in the tangle. He hung over the maelstrom, looking down into its heart, Dersi dangling from his tenuous grip. Her eyes pleaded silently with Erekel, who could do nothing but hold on, hold on to her, hold on for his life, and for hers. The pipe in his gut slid free, and his blood gushed out, bathing him in rich scarlet.
"Erekel!" Desperation rang through her voice. She dangled well beyond the verge of panic. "Help. Help me!"
"C-climb. Climb, Dersi. I . . . can do . . . no more." He felt his grip on life fading, like water through a cupped hand. Blood bubbled from his lips and dripped down into the maelstrom. A few drops splattered on the spinning obsidian orb. It seemed to suck the droplets in and hunger for more.
Dersi reached up and grabbed Erekel's shoulders. Her lips drawn back in a snarl of panic, she climbed. Her nails dug into his skin, drawing blood. Blood pumped from his wound, showering the black orb. The breath gushed from his lungs. With his vision rapidly fading, he watched as Dersi climbed over his body. He felt the relief of her weight as she reached the tangled wreckage and climbed onto it. "Dersi," he said, breath coming with a wet hitch. He closed his eyes . . . and floated into darkness.
Rian should be dead. He knew that. The wounds, the terrible wounds. Too much blood lost. He opened blood-crusted eyes, blinked, and again. So much pain. His head pounded.
Knowledge.
Rian knew.
Yes. It is nearly finished, Rian. Nearly finished. So long have I waited, so long have I plotted. So many times have I tried to destroy him and failed. You have succeeded. You have given our species back its hope.
I am sorry, truly sorry. I don't understand.
I could not destroy what I could not approach. I could only dream, and plot. But you . . . You, Rian, with your taint of the landskin contagion, with your mutations and your exposure to a creation of Rodriguez's . . . you have gained me access. Access to destroy him and all his works.
Rian sensed humor, dark and full of self-loathing.
Ah, the irony of it all! To have spent centuries trying to destroy you all, to rid our line of your taint, only to have you, a descendant of a Hatchling, provide me with the means to triumph.
He felt a calming come over him, a white blanket of comfort. The pain eased, taken away, removed to some other place by the voice in his head. The voice he knew was, somehow, Santiago.
Rest well, Rian. You have done well. You've delivered the virus to Rodriguez. The rest will take care of itself. Rest.
He watched the blood dripping from his body and onto the landing. Most drizzled into the gaps in the grating, raining down into the maelstrom. A portion ran along the metal rods, trickling slowly toward the bulge of flesh that blocked the doorway. Enough? Coupled with that already shed and infiltrating, was it enough? Could it be enough?
It is enough.
I am sorry. I can do no more.
Rian smiled, a slow blossoming, the irony of his fate not lost on him. Possessed of the total of human experience and existence, it was an old, old story. Unenviable.
His blood: life, change.
He died uncertain, content.
Lhedri jerked awake, drawing his legs back and frantically seeking his sword with his blood-drenched hand. A quick glance around him showed the machine-chamber to be empty. Long, convoluted tentacles hung from the dark ceiling, spewing thick white foam over the raging fires, quenching them. Touching his face and finding it coated with the foam, he decided that was what had awakened him.
His fingers found his sword and he drew it to him. He crouched, watching the hovering tentacles, wondering if they would take note of him. They did not. They continued spewing their foam, heedless of his presence.
What? He shook his head, trying to remember what had happened to him. His body ached. Blood, his own and someone---something---else's, drenched every inch of him. Cuts and bruises riddled his body, the deepest a long gash in his abdomen that seeped yellowish fluid.
When he had charged God, intent on buying time for Erekel to get Lady Dersi away to safety, he had known he would die. He hoped only to stall the creature. He leaped toward the towering figure, thrusting with his sword for the conjoining of metal and flesh. God laughed at him. Laughed at him! And batted him aside as if he were nothing. He still felt the power of the blow along his left side. Bones ground against one another when he moved.
He had been dazed for only an instant, he thought. He had shaken his head, his vision swimming, and focused on the heaving back of God as the creature swelled up before the exit. Without thought, Lhedri had leaped toward the figure. His sword sank deep within flesh. Blood and disgusting fluid fountained. God screamed, a thunderous sound that shook the machine-chamber anew. Lhedri drew back to attack again.
Then other creatures materialized through the smoke, red-haired like the ones from the spherical room. Two of them, a male and a female, the latter obviously swollen with child. In the clouds of smoke they collided with him, sent him sprawling at God's feet. The fall saved his life. God's metallic arm swept through the space Lhedri had occupied only moments before, crushing the male redhead into pulp. Chunks of flesh and a hot wash of blood showered Lhedri. The female screamed, retreating into the smoke. God bellowed. He seized the ruined sphincter and ripped the hard, resinous planes of flesh from the doorway, tossing them aside.
Yes. That was what had happened. Climbing dizzily to his feet, Lhedri had not seen the huge chunk of sphincter flying toward him until it was too late. He ducked, too slowly. The edge of the plane caught him a grazing blow on the side of his head. He spun around and crashed into the wall, unconscious.
Now he touched his head. The swelling had receded, though touching the gash sent a wave of nausea through him, forcing him to his knees. How much time had passed?
Lady Dersi!
He staggered to his feet and headed for the mangled sphincter. Already new resin, secreted by the torn edges of the portal, had begun to solidify. No more than an hour, then.
Beyond the portal lay a steaming pile of ravaged flesh. Only by the presence of curled hands and shattered rib bones could it be identified as having been human. The flesh was pulverized, the skull smashed to crumbling bits. Erekel? Dersi? The Gagash? He felt a surge of panic and knelt beside the remains. He poked through the charred mass with the tip of his sword, seeking some sign, some identifying feature.
Nothing. Not even a scrap of clothing. Dersi had been clothed. Wouldn't something have survived?
He had to believe it, had to assume she still lived, still struggled to escape this horrid place. If he did not, if he chose to believe this steaming pile of refuse could be Dersi . . . He turned away from the possibility, rose, and firmed his grip on his sword.
The wake of God's passage was plain. Ragged tatters of ool-flesh hung like lace all around, and the flooring underfoot bore the scars of heavy footfalls and the scrape of metal. Splatters of blood dotted the hallway, which stretched ahead to an intersection choked with long, listless tentacles.
Lhedri paused before entering the confluence, listening. Aside from the heave of ool-flesh and the wet slither of tentacles sliding against one another, no sounds came to him. Evidence of God's passage trailed along the right-hand corridor. Lhedri followed, stepping warily. Overhead, the ool-flesh dripped, ragged and torn, seeming almost acid-burned. It stank of corruption. The few tentacles that lay across his path twitched as he approached and slithered away from him.
Frowning, he reached overhead, brushing his fingertips across the nub-ended tendrils that hung down from the ceiling. They shivered at his touch, retreating into gum-lined pustules. The ceiling rippled as the flesh retracted, drawing away from him.
What was happening? Touching the flesh with the tip of his sword brought no such reaction.
An overwhelming sensation of urgency gripped him, a certainty that Lady Dersi needed him. A hot flush traveled through him, a tingling in his limbs that left him anxious, brimming with contained energy. Sweat poured from his body, a drenching wetness that soaked through his clothing and pooled in his boots. He wiped a hand across his brow and flicked sweat onto the walls. The ool-flesh sizzled where the droplets struck it.
He passed through a section of hallway where the floor-plates had been ripped asunder. Yard-long spikes of hardened resin had slammed into the right-hand wall at about shoulder height. Farther along, a massive hump of ool-flesh had torn through the ceiling, flooding the corridor from wall to wall. But something, some caustic agent, had eaten a festering hole through the flesh. It hung now, lifeless and melting.
The trail turned again, entering a wider concourse studded with niches in which men and women sat encrusted with resin and tangled with tentacles and cords. One such alcove lay barren save for dangling, dripping tendrils. Lhedri pushed on, coming across the lifeless figure of a petrified woman, her face set in terror. She lay among crumbled pieces of resin, her arms and legs twisted beneath her body. Lhedri knelt and studied her.
He breathed a great sigh of relief. Not Dersi.
A tremor wracked the corridor, dropping Lhedri to his knees. His sword clattered away across the floor. He held onto the wall for support as wave after wave of turbulence shook the passageway. Finally he stumbled to his feet and pressed onward, his footing uncertain. He snatched up his sword where it lay against the wall.
Ripples passed through the ool-flesh festooning the walls. Thick arteries burst, gushing ichor that washed down the hall. Thick and sticky, it clung to his feet as he slogged through it. Tentacles broke free, writhing in fitful jerks. Everywhere the ool-flesh corrupted, began melting into thick slag. It bubbled, churned. Huge boils sprang from the flesh, swelling with fluid, laced with thin veins and capillaries. As Lhedri ran through the pitching corridor the boils exploded, showering him with rot.
The corridor he followed ended in a mound of rotting flesh, its stench overpowering. Lhedri fell to his knees, wracked with nausea, and vomited. The mound heaved, heaved, swelling from within. Geysers thick with chunks of flesh exploded from the mass, and it collapsed. A wave of corruption tossed Lhedri down the hallway, tumbling him end over end before he crashed against a metal bulwark.
His head swam, his vision dim. Propping himself up on his sword, he slogged through the ruin toward the corridor's end, fighting sickness. Lhedri heard a scream from around the corner.
A familiar scream.
"Lady Dersi!" he cried, pushing forward.
"Erekel! No! Erekel!" Dersi tugged on his bloody shirt. He hung, head downward, flaccid. A shower of blood fell onto the rotating sphere below. It hissed and spattered, sending up angry jags of lightning that licked along the underside of the twisted catwalk. Current flowed through the metal. Waves of dull pain shot through Dersi's hands, traveling the length of her body. Tears dripped from her eyes to splatter on the catwalk. "No."
The catwalk shifted. Dersi jerked upward as the mass of twisted railing grated across the gangway with a harsh metal shriek. Wide-eyed, she lost her grip on Erekel's shirt, the fabric tearing from spasming fingers. Erekel slipped, his slack body pitching downward. With a slow, agonizing groan, the pile slid toward the edge of the catwalk. A few loose pipes tumbled free. The howling winds of the maelstrom caught them, whipping them into walls with resounding clatters.
Held only by one mangled leg, Erekel's body rotated. Dersi stared down into his face, biting back a scream of pain, tears flowing freely. Wracking sobs now shook her body.
Again the pile of debris shifted, its weight bearing it forward. Clamps and bolts snapped with tight pings. Dersi fell backward, crashing onto the canted grating of the catwalk. A vast tearing sound screamed through the immense chamber. The pile of wreckage shifted again.
Dersi did not think. Her limbs trembled in fear and weakness, yet she edged closer, closer to the mangled remains of the railing. Closer still. Her hand stretched, reaching. Erekel's unconscious form twisted in the contorted metal, limp.
"No. Erekel, no," she whispered. She felt the stinging bite of tears welling up in her eyes, the horrible agony of her flesh torn asunder. Her head throbbed. Her body shook. She ignored the pain, ignored it all, shoved it aside. She hooked her feet in a mass of bent tubing and moved closer, closer.
Her fingers stretched out, briefly touching Erekel's foot, tickling along his ankle. Heat flared up from below, a scorching wind that rushed by her with the fury of wind through lung-tunnels. Hot. Dry. Smelling of burnt flesh and burnt air.
She could not reach him. She must reach him.
Dersi slid across the catwalk, her flesh gouged by jagged spurs of metal that peeled up from the grating like thorns. She gritted her teeth and tried to ignore the pain.
"Erekel! Erekel!" she called, her voice harsh and ravaged.
He hung there, listless, unresponsive.
Her fingers curled around the cuff of one pants leg, snagged in the material. She pulled, pulled. She felt the strain on her ankles as she put more and more of her weight on them. Metal dug into her feet, slicing them open.
"Erekel!" she screamed. A gout of flames plumed below, hissing along the walls. She closed her eyes against the terrible heat. "Father!"
She pulled on him, desperately tried to draw him higher. She was too weak, her strength depleted.
He groaned. His eyes opened. "Dersi," he said, as his gaze met hers. "No. Go. Go, Dersi."
"No, Father. No." She bit her lip as a thorn of metal pierced one of her feet, driven through it like a nail, and bit into the other. "Come on."
His eyes pleaded with her. Let me go. Let me go.
She squeezed her eyes shut, warding away the plea. "No! Damn you, Erekel! No!"
His fingers reached up, touched hers. Weak. Trembling. "Dersi, let me go. Let me go."
"No. Erekel---Father, I can't!"
His fingers played over hers, there on his ankle. Gentle. Blood-covered. Sticky. She looked into his face, saw him smile.
"Dersi, I . . . I am proud. So . . . proud," he said, and blood frothed from his lips.
"No. No! Father!"
He smiled. "Thank you . . . for that. Dersi. My daughter." His fingers lingered, lingered on hers, lovingly.
Tears spilled from her eyes, unquenched. "No." She felt herself weakening.
Erekel's fingers clenched atop her own, squeezed. And then he pried her fingers away, one by one, as Dersi screamed and cried.
"I love you . . . Dersi." He fell, and the wreckage, dragged by his weight, shifted. It slid forward and over the edge.
Dersi scrambled back, shrieking. As she struggled to her knees, the mangled railing snapped free and tumbled into the maelstrom. Erekel's limp form lazily spun amid the wreckage. One arm flapped as if Erekel bid her a final farewell.
Erekel.
Her father.
Through the gaps in the floor of the catwalk, Dersi watched the tangled mass spin through the air below, tumbling toward the maelstrom and its pulsing, spinning black heart. Metal crashed into the sphere. A tremendous discharge of lightning shot up. Jags of energy slammed into the underside of the catwalk. Metal exploded in gaping holes, sending long, misshapen spears outward in a deadly hail. Dersi, rocked back by the force of the explosion, tumbled along the catwalk toward the far end.
With a sound like the dull grumblings of one of the ool's stomachs, one of the sphere's support struts tore free. The spinning ball dropped, spitting fire and lightning. The other struts twisted, wrenching at their moorings. A wave of concussive force seized Dersi and lifted her into the air. She opened her mouth to scream, but found the air sucked from her lungs as a consuming ball of fire wrapped around the sphere. Below her, the catwalk buckled, its center rising like the heaving bulk of a massive worm.
"No!" The cry burst from the trembling figure of God, gripping the railing near the landing from which Dersi and Erekel had fled. Another figure emerged from the putrid mass of flesh at the entrance to the landing. The landing shook with the force of the explosion below. Fire rose to engulf it, a flood of roiling, devouring flame.
And then Dersi crashed back downward. She slammed into the far landing. Her body bounced, and she felt her ribs snap. Helpless in the flood of concussive force, Dersi spun across the grating. She felt a tremendous impact on the small of her back as she plowed into the interface arch on the landing. Oblivion engulfed her, and she fell into darkness.
Lhedri felt himself picked up as if by some mammoth, clenching hand and tossed through the air. He crashed into the wall above the wide entryway with enough force to spew the air from his lungs. Then he was falling, uncontrolled. His shoulder slammed into the landing. His sword skittered from his hand and caught on the low lip encircling the landing. He groaned, blinking his eyes to clear them, and stared down into a roiling mass of flame and lightning. His eyes widened. A consuming heat washed over him as the fireball swelled, approaching.
Lhedri rose and leaped back into the corridor, tucking and rolling through melting ool-flesh, its stink sending waves of revulsion through him. A wall of flame shot up behind him, a fountain that rose, crackling, from the depths of the massive chamber. He felt the blast baking his skin, blistering. Again his body was picked up and heaved through the air. Pain exploded in his side as he smashed into a wall, spun, and bounced down the hallway.
He lay in a pool of melting ool-flesh. It clung to him, its stench raising bile in his throat. Staring at the ceiling, he could not bring his mind into focus. He could hear nothing, just a vast blankness that told him he had been struck deaf. His fingers, exploring his head, found blood trickling from his ears.
Dazed, unsure of his whereabouts or his purpose, he rose to his feet. His hand on the wall supported his shaky legs. He stared at where his hand met the ool-flesh sheathing the wall. It drew back from his touch, receding like ripples in a pond, bubbling, while all around him the tissue hung in diseased-looking tatters. Pieces of blackened tissue plopped to the floor, boiled, and melted into a stinking pool of liquid.
His gaze wandered the length of the corridor. Everywhere the tissue blackened, shriveled, and finally melted, rotting. An incredible miasma of putrid odors hung like a pall in the air, the stench of death. He could not believe, could not believe, the extent of the devastation. Nor could he begin to understand its cause.
A tickling sensation spiraled outward from his chest, a coolness against the blistered heat of his skin. He looked down. His clothing had been burned from his body. With tentative fingers he touched his chest, unbelieving of the sight that met his eyes. Blistered skin bubbled, expanding, then sloughed off to fall at his feet. Beneath that putrid layer lay new, healthy skin, unblemished, unmarked. Pain receded as if it had never been there, leaving only its memory.
A moment later, as if plugs had been removed from his ears, his hearing flooded back. Sharp sounds, crashing metal and screams. The dull roar of flames. Crackling waves of energy. The hissing consumption of ool-flesh.
And God's voice, thundering.
Lady Dersi! With strangely rekindled vigor, Lhedri ran down the corridor and emerged onto the blackened landing, facing outward. Before him, mounted on smoldering rods of metal, hung a smoking skeleton. Tatters of flesh clung stubbornly to the bones, black and dripping. The head was thrown back, its mouth opened wide. Its three arms were wrapped in melted metal rods, spread wide. One hand, the middle, seemed to have escaped most of the ravages of the flames; the flesh was pocked with seeping blisters. The arm thrust out from the chest, the hand cupped as if it held something, something precious.
The Gagash.
Beyond the smoking corpse, a twisted catwalk spanned a vast open space. Howling winds whipped upward, a gale-force updraft that hurled debris toward the ceiling far above. Objects rained down, crashing into the landing and the catwalk, and tumbled toward the spinning maelstrom below, where they were caught up and shot forth again.
At the center of the catwalk, where it heaved upward like some immense worm, God sprawled, clinging to the railing with his mechanical arm. His metal half smoldered. Partially fused joints squealed in protest as he dragged the seared meat that was his organic half along the catwalk. Half his head had vanished, and a shrill, mechanical sound escaped his throat, rising over even the sounds of the maelstrom. His passage left a wide swath of oozing ruin on the catwalk's grating.
Lhedri followed God's red gaze, at first seeing nothing that would attract his attention. Then, on the opposite landing, shadowed within the leaning bulk of an archway that danced with inner lights, he saw a humped form, still. A wisp of pale white hair and a delicate curl of a soft arm betrayed her: Lady Dersi.
"Dersi!" His shout carried over even the cacophony of noise in the chamber, given strength through desperation.
God turned at the sound of Lhedri's voice, his mechanical eye blazing. His half-jaw gaped open, and a scream like the sound of clashing metal emerged. His clawed appendage slammed into the gangway, and he dragged his half-body forward, toward the opposite landing.
And Lady Dersi.
Lhedri did not think. He stepped around the crucified Gagash, toward the trembling walkway.
Suddenly the entire world seemed to heave. Momentarily weightless, Lhedri felt his feet leave the solid floor of the landing. He scrambled, reaching out for something, anything, to anchor him. His hand brushed something brittle and dry, and he latched onto it, squeezing. His fingers dug through a thin crust, sinking into a soft, warm wetness, and he held on. His feet flew up, up, until only his tremulous anchor held him, head down, keeping him from flying away.
His head barked against something, and he turned. The grinning, black-toothed skull of the Gagash stared back at him. He realized he held onto the middle forearm of the dead man, the musculature sliding loose, unattached to bone.
The sensation of weightlessness vanished, and Lhedri fell, jerking to a halt a few feet above the landing, hanging by his grip on the Gagash's outstretched arm. His eyes swelled wider as he stared down through the metal grating, down through the burning shell of a vast spherical object, down through the howling winds that spun debris about like toys. Down through a massive hole in the ool, toward the surface of the world, below. Close. Closer than he had ever seen. He could see individual leaves on the trees, stones on the hillsides, the silver ripple of water washing along a streambed. He could see the ool's feeder tentacles, corrupted, decaying, trailing across the landskin. And where the feeders dragged, they left in their wake corruption, consumption.
The ool fell, dropping gently, like a billowing sheet of lace, toward the world, and the landskin that had spawned it.
Lhedri hung from the Gagash's charred arm, staring down at the approaching ground. He blinked, disbelieving the impossible, the imponderable. A virulence ran through the ool, a virulence capable of sending it spiraling to the ground. A virulence that spread at the merest touch of the feeder tentacles, poisoning the landskin below.
"No! No!" The voice was cold, lifeless, utterly alien. Like sand scraping on metal, it rasped.
Dazed by the death of his world, Lhedri raised his eyes and looked at God, who clung to the catwalk, his own gaze locked onto the swelling fragment of the world below. "No. It can't be. No! You're killing it! You're killing it all. Santiago!"
Lhedri dropped to the landing. God turned, his eye whirring as it focused on Lhedri.
Dersi groaned, waking. Her head throbbed, her body ached. She felt something hard pressed against the small of her back, hard and cold and tingling. Warm stickiness bathed her face and torso, and the smell of coppery blood overrode even the powerful stench of burning flesh and ozone.
She opened eyes, thick with congealing blood, swiping at her lids with her numb fingers. Pressing her back to the hard surface behind her, she stared out over the turbulent maelstrom that boiled and hissed and crashed below her. A cry of panic caught in her throat, a choking wad of revulsion.
The thing that had been God crawled toward her, its body a ragged testament to the power of the storm. Flesh hung in tatters, and its metallic limbs squealed in protest with its every move. Its red-orbed eye oriented on her, and its mouth hung open, dripping with rotten cilia. Gnashing teeth the color of bone chewed on the cilia, and a croaking sound emerged from its throat. God struggled for words.
It came closer, closer, and Dersi could only stare in horror. Her limbs would not respond to her commands, remained frozen, intractable. A thin mewling sound escaped her taut lips.
God's voice, when it finally emerged from that brutalized, alien mouth, was cold, toneless. Mechanical. "Dersi, first of my seraphim. To me. To me. In you I can continue. In you I can rebuild, and take the fight to Santiago. He has not won yet. I won't allow it. Come to me."
A ravaging spasm of pain shot through her head, like a thousand biting insects burrowing through her brain. Her back arched, a tormented scream ripping from her throat. Something moved. Something awakened, something deep, twisted, and foreign. Something in her own mind.
"Come, my seraph. We've much to do. Come."
Something pressed against the inside of her head. Webs of pain spidered out from her forehead, sinking through her spine and into her limbs. Without conscious thought, Dersi found herself gaining her feet, stumbling across the landing, and lurching toward God on the catwalk, unheeding of its pitching roll, the tremors that ripped through it. She tried to grasp the twisted remnants of the railing to stop herself. But her arms refused to obey her, hanging limp at her sides. Her feet shuffled onward.
"Yes. Come to me. Come to me. Together we shall rebuild. We shall rebuild it all, and take our communion, together, to the stars."
No. No. No. Her body moved forward, now less than twenty paces from the mutilation that was God. She yearned to scream, ached to scream, to vent her frustration, rage, and fear. Her mouth remained tightly shut, her lips stretched taut, immobile.
Below, debris crashed into the sides of the shaft, sending up a torrent of sparks. Jags of lightning shot upward, trickling along the floor of the catwalk. Dersi jerked, spasming as the current swept through her body. God screamed, harsh and metallic. Another voice, distant but edging closer, familiar, erupted in an agonized wail.
A flood of heat boiled upward, borne aloft by winds that ripped chunks from the catwalk. Shards like knives tore at Dersi's naked skin, drawing blood. The catwalk pitched, and Dersi's body tumbled, sprawling out face downward on the metal grating. She could smell the stench of her own flesh burning but could not feel the pain.
Only the thing, the something, in her brain. Only that. Foreign. Hungering. Answering to God's call.
God shivered, sparks dancing along his contorted metal body. His trembling claws reached outward, digging gouges in the metal grating as he dragged himself toward her. Blackened cilia shriveled and dropped from his mouth. Bits of flesh sloughed free, melting into an oozing liquid. His jaw worked furiously, clamping his teeth open and shut, open and shut.
Ten feet. Ten feet away now, and God crawled closer. Closer.
The pain in her head consumed her, robbed her of thought.
Warmth flared from her chest, a burning fever that battered at the pain, at the cold, at the infestation.
"No! She is mine! Away. Away! She is mine, Santiago! Mine!"
Lhedri collapsed as the lightning bathed the catwalk. His body shook, his blood seeming to boil, to churn. He blacked out.
When he awakened, God was nearer Dersi, almost close enough to reach out his mangled arm and seize her. His body smoked, sparks cavorting along his limbs and the terrible exposed spars of his metal ribs. A spine of interlocked, spinning wheels and gears wove from side to side as he wormed his way closer and closer to Lady Dersi. His chilling voice had nothing Bhajong in it. Nothing.
"Yes. Yes. Mine. All mine. My resurrection. My salvation."
Dersi did not move. She lay like the dead, sprawled facedown on the catwalk, her arms and legs splayed wide. Her blood-drenched white hair fanned out in the howling winds, spreading like a whispering pink aura.
Lhedri struggled to his feet. He stumbled as the catwalk lurched again. A fountain of flames shot up from below, scouring the ceiling high overhead. Bits of flesh and charred metal fell in a heavy rain. Lhedri reeled back, covering his eyes as smoldering particles bounced along the catwalk, glowing, smoking.
His sword. Where was his sword?
Lost. Gone. Irretrievable. Lost.
"You have not won, Santiago!" God screamed in his terrible, awful voice. The shout rose over the cacophony, thundering, vibrating the walls. He laughed, thin and metallic. "I will not let you win!"
Lhedri pushed forward through the rain of debris. Embers landed on him, catching his clothing on fire. He beat at the flames with his naked hands and continued. From a pile of wreckage he pulled a long, bent pipe, its end jagged and dripping with some vile fluid. He caressed the pipe like a lover as he stumbled forward, toward Lady Dersi, toward God.
God reached Lady Dersi, pulling himself as upright as his mangled body would allow. He dragged her limp form into his cold lap, touched her face with his metal clawed appendage. His fingertips left thin runnels of blood behind on her battered face.
"Ah, my child. My beautiful, promising child. Come to me. Come. It is time. Though it is not what I had planned, still you will live again. We will live again. You are my resurrection, my salvation, my hope. Come. Awaken."
Closer now, and God still ignored him. The foul creature's touch spawned movement in the skin of Lady Dersi's forehead, a bulging of taut flesh, like an immense, throbbing boil. Thin blood, cloudy and pink, erupted from the center of the swelling, running down through the blackened flesh of her cheeks. From the lace of cracks emerged a gelatinous tendril, trembling.
"Yes, my child. Yes." God touched the tendril. He leaned down and pressed his lipless metal mouth to it, a cold kiss.
Fire billowed up from above, a wall of flame that obscured God and Dersi for a moment. Lhedri had to back away, hands before his face to keep away the blistering heat. Beneath them, the ground rushed upward, yearning to embrace the dying ool.
With a shower of sparks, the obsidian orb jerked free of its remaining struts, and shot down through the hole in the ool. The silver waters of the river reached out to swallow it. A geyser plumed skyward, hissing with steam.
"Dersi! Lady Dersi!" Lhedri could waste no more time. Screaming, he ran forward, somehow balancing on the dancing catwalk, hurtling the wall of flames, crashing through a curtain of belching steam. He did not allow himself to feel the agony, pushed it to a deep recess in his mind. It did not matter. Nothing mattered. Only Dersi. Lady Dersi.
His Dersi. His.
Beyond the twin walls, of flame and steam, God still crouched over the still form of Lady Dersi, the trembling, glistening worm that had emerged from her skull now pinched delicately between two of his fingers. With a sound of tearing metal, his head pivoted to face Lhedri.
"You! No! You'll ruin everything! Everything!"
Lhedri did not answer. He sprang forward, raising the jag-ended bar over his head and bringing it down. It smashed into the top of God's metal skull, ringing out in a peal like a bell. Lhedri's hands went numb, his arms. He fought to keep hold of the rod.
God rocked. A massive dimple marred the nearly spherical dome of his head. His eye hung askew, its end spinning and spinning. His jaw was canted to one side.
"Nnnno," God said, twitching. The spinning eye jerked, trying to focus on Lhedri. It stopped as it registered the ruin of the glistening worm, still clutched between two metal fingers, but now flattened. Jellied globs ran down those fingers. "N-nnoo!"
Lhedri raised leaden arms and brought the rod down again. God's head fell to one side. In his gaping maw Lhedri could see a series of madly spinning wheels and gears, jerking. Slowing.
God slumped, crashing to the catwalk. Dersi slid from his lap. His fingers trembled, ticking across the grating with an arrhythmic tempo.
"N-no. Y-you don't know . . . what y-you've done. My d-d-dream. My beautiful dream."
Lhedri swung the rod, cracking it into the side of God's head.
The wheels slowed, slowed. At some point God's eye had fallen away. Now only a thin, articulated arm creaked and groaned from the side of his head. Lhedri smashed the arm with his next blow.
A thin sound emerged from God's mouth. Cold. Laughter.
Again Lhedri pounded God's mangled head.
"Y-you c-c-can't-t-t w-w-win, Sa-san-tititi-ag-ag-o. I . . . I . . . I . . . am . . . every . . . everywhere. Everywhere. Y-you c-c-c-an't-t-t-t defeat . . . an entire w-w-world. I'll linger . . ."
With a snarl, Lhedri slammed the rod down again. And again. Anything to stop that mocking, foul voice.
God's wheels ceased. He lay silent, amid flame and steam, blood and dripping flesh, twisted metal and smoke. Lhedri, panting, wild-eyed, stared down at the ruin of metal and flesh, at the destruction he had caused. His strength left him, and he collapsed to his knees. His breaths came in choked gasps. The rod fell from his fingers and rolled over the edge of the catwalk, falling down, down into the maelstrom of flame and water, toward the river that approached, hungering.
God's mouth opened, and his voice rang out, once more, cold and sure. "Cursed am I above all the livestock and all the wild animals! I will crawl on my belly and I will eat dust all the days of my life. And there will be enmity between me and the woman, and between my offspring and hers; he will crush my head, and I will strike his heel." Something broke within that mangled metal skull, something shattered. "Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return."
God fell silent.
God was dead.
"Lhedri?" Dersi's voice was soft. "M-my father. Erekel . . ."
Lhedri said nothing, watching as the ground swelled below them, consumed by fires. "The world burns."
"No," Dersi whispered. "No. God's world burns. Ours . . . ours awaits."
Lhedri turned to Dersi and took her in his trembling arms. He held her tight, felt her weak breathing, her tremulous heartbeat against his chest, while the world rushed up to embrace them, and fires raged all around.
She called herself Eve. God would have liked that. The small part of her that was God approved.
She stood on a high bluff of rough, naked stone, staring out across the barren hollow where Men dwelt in their homes of wood and stone and, in some cases, metal and glass. They moved about on the surface without care now, confident. Dominant. Masters of all they surveyed.
Where once life had flourished, covering all with a dense blanket of landskin, now only pebbly dirt lay thick over bedrock. Dirt, and the frail, grasping plantlife that had lately begun to spread its taint.
Eve heard a sound behind her and turned to see Methushael climbing across the sharp stones of the path toward her. The youngest of her line, her grandson four times removed, Methushael trod the stones unflinching, unafraid of leaving behind his spoors, his flesh and blood. He would learn better, in time. They all had, all her children. Cain, and Enoch, and Irad, and Mehujael.
She smiled at her naming of them, this thing she had kept for herself. God would have been pleased that she drew on his knowledge, imparted to her, to give them their names. Each son and each daughter must be brought to her on their naming day, naked, exposed to the elements, so that she could judge for herself whether they carried the taint that had doomed them all.
The taint that had killed God. Santiago's taint. Rian's taint. The taint that had destroyed the beautiful dream, the Garden.
"Eve," Methushael said, too loudly. She frowned at him as he came up to her and looked down into the valley. "What are you doing?"
"Watching them." She took his shoulders and held him close, feeling the warmth that rose from his silky skin. "Once, this was all us. A part of us. Before they killed God."
"It will be again. Enoch says so." He squeezed her hand. "Enoch says that the landskin will spread again, proof against their poisons. That it will descend from the high places and climb from the low, until it once more covers the world. Then we will exterminate them."
She smiled indulgently. "Who do you think told Enoch that, young one?"
Methushael squeezed her hand tighter, and she sighed. She steered him away from the heights. "Come, they will see us and send out a hunting party."
"Enoch will kill them if they do," he said with all the confidence of the young.
"Of course he would," she agreed, unwilling to dispel his youthful illusions. In time he would learn better, would learn of the capabilities of Man, of his evil.
How? that small part that remained God inside her screamed. How could it have ended so?
Eve, following Methushael down the slope toward the chasm, remembered. She remembered God's death, and the ool spiraling down from the skies. All the ool, falling, rotting from the inside out, bits and pieces of melting flesh peeling away from chitinous skeletons to fall on the landskin, poisoning it in turn.
The virus ran rampant. She had heard the screams of all her kindred as they melted, consumed by the contagion unleashed by Santiago's vector, Rian. Rian, the Gagash she and her mate had brought into the body of the ool. In a very real fashion, she was culpable in God's death. Just as she was responsible for the deaths of nearly all of her own kind.
Few of the Bhajong had emerged alive from the ool that fell from the sky. Few enough that their unrecognized brethren, the Gagash, had fallen upon them and taken them prisoner. Dersi, who had brought God to ruin, lived. And Lhedri, who had delivered the killing blows.
Eve had fled, vanishing into the rotting landskin, seeking the dark, forbidding places Man would not go. She ran ahead of the contagion, desperate to outpace it, desperate to survive long enough to . . . long enough to . . .
She had crossed a deep, cold river, and the contagion slowed. Beyond the banks she ran on, while God awakened slowly inside her, carving out a place for himself. Not nearly large enough to accommodate all of him, all of his vastness. Enough for something to survive. Something of his determination, a bit of his knowledge.
She had communed with the landskin, communicated the desperation she felt like a wash of fire carving through her bowels, caressing the life that quickened within her womb. The life that would bring at least a portion of God back into the world. The landskin responded, huge boils rising from it, swelling, bursting with a shower of ichor. Drakes climbed forth, slurping at their own afterbirths, consuming more of the landskin and ballooning in size.
Accompanied by the drakes, She who would become Eve had fled, commanding the landskin ahead of them to part, that the drakes would not be infected with the contagion borne in Rian's blood. Together they sought the high places, where the contagion would be slowest to come. For days and days they traveled, putting hundreds of miles between them and the spreading disease, finding at last an isolated valley ringed by rough hills, a place free of the taint of Man. Here the drakes dissolved back into landskin, a terrible fragment of what had been. The only fragment.
She still heard the screams as drakes, ool, and landskin succumbed to the contagion. A world died. All but this small portion, this pitiful remnant.
Eve watched Methushael walking ahead of her. In him, and in the others of his generation, she had given hope back to the world. This expedition would tell the tale. This close to the habitations of Man, the contagion would be at its most virulent. Something about Eve, perhaps even her contact with the vector, Rian, made her immune to the disease, though none of her first generation children had been. If Methushael could not withstand its taint . . .
Ah, but if he could! If he could . . .
Within her, the small portion that was God railed, cursing Santiago, cursing the downfall of the Garden. Cursing that Santiago, the old enemy, had won.
Eve smiled, watching Methushael, waiting for him to die. Or to live.
about the author
Born in 1966 and an avid fantasy and science fiction reader since early childhood, Jeff Stanley is a graduate of the University of South Carolina, where he majored in English literature. He works and writes in Columbia, South Carolina, where he resides with his wife, Mari, and their two children, Hope and Will. Tainted Garden is his first published novel.
A Del Rey® Book
Published by The Ballantine Publishing Group Copyright © 2003 by Jeff Stanley
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by The Ballantine Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.
Del Rey is a registered trademark and the Del Rey colophon is a trademark of Random House, Inc.
Tainted Garden is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents either are a product of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously.
Cover design by Ezra Martin
eISBN 0-345-45910-5

