The Dreaming Void (79 page)

“You had twenty years to discover the bugs he planted. That you failed is unforgivable.”

“Don't try to play the blame game with me. This is your foul-up, and I will make that very clear to Ilanthe.”

Marius turned on a heel and walked back to the airlock chamber's entrance. His dark toga suit adjusted itself around him, once more giving off a narrow black shimmer that concealed his feet. He glided with serpentine poise down the corridor toward the airlock chamber that contained his own starship.

His u-shadow opened a secure link to the Cat's ship.

“It's so nice to be popular again,” she said.

“We have a problem. I want you to find Troblum. Eliminate that shit from this universe. In fact, I want him erased from all of history.”

“That sounds personal, Marius, dear. Always a bad thing. Messes with your judgment.”

“He's heading for Sholapur. In five days' time he will meet with an ANA representative there and explain what we have been doing. His ship has some kind of advanced stealth ability we didn't know about.”

“Gave you the slip, huh?”

“I'm sure you'll be more capable of rectifying our mistake.”

“What do you want me to do about Aaron? He's still down on the planet's surface.”

“Is there any sign of Inigo?”

“Darling, the sensors can barely make out continents. I've no idea what's going on down there.”

“Do as you see fit.”

“I thought this was all critical to your plans.”

“If Troblum exposes us to ANA, there will be no plans; there probably won't be an Advancer Faction anymore.”

“The strong always survive. That's evolution.”

“Paula Myo is the representative ANA is sending to collect Troblum.”

“Oh, Marius, you're too kind to me. Really.”

It should have been tempting. He was alone in a small starship with three amazingly fit men who probably would have been honored to got to bed with him. Oscar had been delighted when Tomansio had introduced his team. Liatris McPeierl was his lieutenant, a lot quieter than Tomansio, with a broad mouth that could flash a smile that was wickedly attractive. He would handle the technical aspects of the mission, Tomansio had said, including their armaments. Gazing at the pile of big cases on the regrav sled that followed Liatris about, Oscar had his first moment of doubt; he did not want to resort to violence, though he was realistic enough to know that it wasn't his decision. Cheriton McOnna had been brought in to help because of his experience with the gaiafield; there was nothing about confluence nest operations that he didn't know, Tomansio had claimed. Oscar was slightly surprised by Cheriton's characteristics. They were almost Higher: He had altered his ears to simple circle craters, his nose was wide and flat, and his eyes were sparkling purple globes like multifaceted insect lenses. His bald skull had two low ridges reaching back from his eyebrows over his cranium to merge together at the nape of his neck.

“Multimacrocellular enrichment,” he explained. “And a hell of a lot of customized gaiamotes.” To prove it, he spun out a vision of some concert. For a moment Oscar was transported to a natural amphitheater, lost in a sea of people under a wild starry sky. On the stage far away, a pianist performed by himself, his soulful tune making Oscar sway in sympathy.

“Wow.” Oscar blinked, taking a half step back as the vision cleared. He'd almost been about to sing along; the song was familiar somehow—just not quite right.

“I composed it in your honor,” Cheriton said. “I remember you told Wilson Kime you liked old movies.”

Now Oscar remembered. “That's right. ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow,' yeah?” He took care to reduce his gaiamotes' reception level. Cheriton had produced a very strong emission. It made Oscar wonder if the gaiafield actually could be used in a harmful way.

“Yes.”

The last member of the team was Beckia McKratz, whose gaiafield giveaway made it very clear that she would like to bed him. She was equal to Anja in the beauty stakes, minus all the neurotic hang-ups. Oscar wasn't interested, not even on that first morning when he had stumbled out of his tiny sleep cabin to find all four of them in the main lounge stripped to the waist and performing some strenuous ni-tng exercise. They moved in perfect synchronization, arms and legs rising gracefully to stick out in odd directions, limbs flexing, eyes closed, breathing deeply. From their gaiafield emanations, their minds seemed to be hibernating.

Aliens teleported into human bodies, carefully examining what they could do.

It was all very different from Oscar's wake-up routine, which normally involved a lot of coffee and accessing the most trashy unisphere gossip shows he could find. That was the whole nonattraction problem. All that devotion to perfection and strength did not seem to leave them much time to be actually human. It was a big turnoff.

So he crept around the edge of the lounge to the culinary unit, snagged a large cup of coffee and a plate of buttered croissants, and sat quietly in a corner munching away as he watched the strange slow-motion ballet.

They came to rest position and took one last breath in unison before opening their eyes and smiling.

“Good morning, Oscar,” Tomansio said.

Oscar slurped down some more coffee. That morning routine also included no conversation until his third cup. The culinary unit was suddenly busy churning out plates with large portions of bacon and eggs with toast.

“Something wrong?” Liatris asked.

Oscar realized he was staring at the man as he ate. “Sorry. I assumed you'd all be vegetarians.”

They all exchanged an amused glance. “Why?”

“When we were flying the Carbon Goose across Half Way, I remember the Cat kicking up a big fuss about the onboard food. She refused to eat anything produced and processed on a Big15 planet.” His companions' amusement evaporated. To Oscar it was as though he had been transformed into some kind of guru, steeped in wisdom.

“You did talk to her, then?” Beckia asked.

“Not much. It was almost as if she was bored with us. And I still don't get why you idolize her the way you do.”

“We're realistic about her,” Cheriton said. “But she accomplished so much.”

“She killed a lot of people.”

“As did you, Oscar,” Tomansio chided.

“Not deliberately. Not for enjoyment.”

“The whole Starflyer War happened because humanity was weak. Our strength had been sapped away by centuries of liberalism. Not anymore. The External worlds have the self-belief to strike out for themselves against the Central worlds. That's thanks to Far Away's leadership by example. And the Knights Guardian are the political force behind Far Away. Politicians don't ignore strength anymore. It is celebrated on hundreds of worlds in a myriad of forms.”

That was the trouble with history, Oscar thought: Once the distance had grown long enough, any event could be seen favorably. The true horror faded with time, and ignorance replaced it. “I lived through those times. The Commonwealth was strong enough to prevail. Without the strength we showed then, you wouldn't be alive today to complain about us and debate what might have been.”

“We don't want to offend you, Oscar.”

Oscar downed the last of his coffee and told the culinary unit to produce more. “So sensibilities aren't a weakness, then?”

Liatris laughed. “No. Respect and civility are high points of civilization. As much as personal independence and kindness. Strength comes in many guises, including laying down your life to give the human race its chance to survive. If the Knights Guardians have one regret, it is that your name is not as famous and revered as the others from your era.”

“Holy crap,” Oscar muttered, and collected his coffee. He knew his face was red.
My era!
“All right,” he said as he sank back onto the chair that the lounge extruded for him. “I can see we're going to have fun times debating history and politics for the rest of the mission. In the meantime, we do have a very clear objective. My plan is quite a simple one, and I'd like some input from you as we shake it down into something workable. You guys are the experts in this field and this
era.
So for what it's worth, there are several ANA factions extremely keen to find this poor old Second Dreamer, not to mention Living Dream, which has a very clear-cut agenda for him. Between them they have colossal resources which we can't hope to equal, so what I propose is that we jump on their bandwagon and let them do the hard work. We should position ourselves to snatch him as soon as they locate him.”

“I like it,” Tomansio said. “The simpler it is, the better.”

“Which just leaves us with mere details,” Oscar said. “Everyone seems to think the Second Dreamer is on Viotia. We'll be there in another seven hours.”

“Impressive flight time,” Cheriton said drily. “I've never been in an ultradrive ship before.”

Oscar ignored the jibe. Tomansio had never asked who was employing Oscar, but the ship was a huge giveaway. “Tomansio, how do we go about infiltrating the Living Dream operation there?”

“Direct insertion. We'll hack their smartcore's personnel files and assign Cheriton to the search operation. He's savvy enough to pass as a dream master, right?”

“No problem,” Cheriton said. He sighed. “Reprofiling for me, then.” He ran a hand along one of his skull ridges.

“I'll make you look almost human,” Beckia assured him.

Cheriton blew her a kiss. “Living Dream has been altering confluence nests all across the General Commonwealth to try and get a fix on his location,” he said. “It must be costing them a fortune, which is a good indicator of how desperate they are. It's not a terribly accurate method, but once they narrow it down to a single nest, they'll know the district at least.”

“How does that help?” Beckia asked. “A nest's gaiafield can cover a big area. If it's in a city, it can include millions.”

“If it were me, I'd surround the area with specialist nests and dream masters and try and triangulate the dream's origin.”

“So we can be in the general area just like them,” Oscar said. “Then it's all a matter of speed.”

“The factions will be running similar snatch operations,” Tomansio said. “We'll be up against their agents as well as Living Dream.”

Oscar picked up on how enthused the Knights Guardian were by that prospect. “The faction agents will have biononic weapon enrichments, won't they?”

“I hope so,” Tomansio said.

“You can match that?” Oscar asked nervously.

“Only one way to find out.”

It was a gentle valley carpeted by long dark grass that rippled in giant waves as the breeze from the mountains gusted down. There was a house nestled in a shallow dip in the ground, a lovely old place whose walls were all crumbling stone quarried out of the nearby hills. An overhanging thatch roof gave it a delightful unity with nature. Its interior was a technology completely at odds with its outward appearance, with replicators providing him with any physical requirement. T-sphere interstices provided his family with an interesting internal topology and any extra space they might want.

He stood facing it, holding his bamboo staff vertically in front of him, torso bare to the air and legs clad in simple black cotton dirukku pants. He was shutting down biononic field functions; attuning his perception to sight, sound, and sensation alone, feeling his surroundings. Nesting cobra: the foundation of self. He moved into sharp eagle and then twisted fast, assuming jumping cheetah. A breath. Opponent moving behind. Bring the bamboo down and sweep: the tiger's claw. Spin jump as a coiled dragon. One arm bent into Spartan shield. Lunge: striking angel. Drop the staff and pull both curving daggers from their sheaths. Bend at the knees into woken phoenix.

A vibration in the air. Heavy feet crushing tender stalks of grass. He raised his head to see a line of black armored figures marching toward him. Long flames billowed from vents in their helmets as they roared their battle call. His breathing quickened as he tightened his grip on the daggers. The smell of charred meat rolled across the grassland. Aaron gagged on the terrible stench. Coughing violently, he sat up on the couch in the ground crawler's cabin.