Ammonite Planets (Omnibus): Ammonite Galaxy #1-3 (47 page)

“Did Nomus suddenly ignite? Or perhaps Almagest turned white?”

“You’ll turn white in a minute, Six, if you keep on talking like that!” Diva’s eyes flashed.

“I know: Lumina swallowed up Kwaide. And Xiantha overtook Valhai.”

Diva looked at him pityingly. “You are a very silly person,” she told him.

He seemed pleased. “I do my best.”

“Bah! There’s no point talking to you when you are like this.” She got up and stalked out. Six looked at her disappearing figure, and grinned to himself. He had never thought he would live to see the day.

VION AND GRACE had managed to avoid each other for days, but now that Six was on the mend, and Grace was visiting him often, it was inevitable that they would meet. Grace found herself lingering before going around corners, checking out the distance for the familiar figure. She didn’t know whether she was trying to avoid him or see him. The whole thing made very little sense.

“Hello Grace!” The voice, when it came, made her jump. He had clearly been following her along the passage, and had decided to catch her up.

“Vion!” She put a hand to her heart, in an instinctive movement to keep it still. “H-how are you?”

“I am fine. Which is more than I can say for you.” He put a steadying hand on her shoulder. “Are you all right?”

“You just startled me!” she explained.

“Rumour has it that you were killed on the explosion in the orbital platform, and for a moment there, you looked as if it were true!”

“No. I am still alive.” She thought for a moment. “I think.”

“I can see you are. Want to talk about what happened on the space station? I gather you were rescued at the last minute by Arcan.”

Grace flushed. She couldn’t tell him the truth: he was still in contact with Sell, and they couldn’t allow the truth to be known.

“Yes, I was very lucky.”

“You must have been. Who did they send from Sell to carry out the operation?”

“I … err … well, if you have to know, Xenon.”

Vion went still for a second, and then his jaw set. “
Xenon
? Your
brother
? Your own brother ordered your execution? Oh, Grace, I am sorry.”

“He probably had little choice,” she said, shifting her weight from one foot to the other.

“He had every choice. I have always disliked him. Now I know why.” He shook his head. “Sellites killing Sellites. This is a bad day for Valhai.”

“I ruined the 256
^th
skyrise. He can’t forgive that.”

“Even so, you are still his sister. I can’t begin to imagine how that has made you feel.”

Just as well he didn’t know that she had planned the whole operation around the assumption that her brother would do just that! He might change his opinion of her.

“I am fine.”

“I believe families should stick together,” he fumed.

“Yes, I … I … remember.”

There was a long pause. Then Vion spoke again, reluctantly. “About that … matter. Perhaps I owe you … that is … you may have wondered why …”

“You don’t owe me any explanations. I understand.”

He looked relieved. “You do?”

“Of course I do. You have an unbreakable duty to your house.”

“You do understand. I cannot be the cause of the downfall of my own house.”

“That would put you in the same situation I am in now. You would be hunted down in all the system, and your family expelled to Cesis. I couldn’t want that. I respect you for your decision.”

Vion looked away. “Last year, there was a moment when I came to join you on the 21
^st
floor … I was ready to make sacrifices then. But Cimma was wounded and things changed. I was reminded of my responsibilities. I am sorry. There was nothing else I could do.”

“I know. Don’t worry about it.”

“I know it makes me sound … weak, I suppose. But it has cost me more than you could possibly know. You wouldn’t have … you wouldn’t want …”

“I wouldn’t want to have been the cause of another house being expelled from Valhai. You are right there,” she said, with feeling.

“Then you forgive me?” he asked.

“There is nothing to forgive you for. Just one of those things.” She smiled politely up at him, glad that he had no idea of the turmoil of her thoughts. Some deeply hidden demon inside her was screaming that he hadn’t cared enough. But that was so unfair. She suppressed it firmly and suddenly realized that Vion looked very unhappy. She held up her hands towards him.

He raised his own hands and they touched fingers sadly. Grace waited for the spark that had passed between them before, but there was nothing. His fingers felt warm and pleasant to the touch, but nothing more. She bent her head, to blink away the tears that had filled them. Life was so sad sometimes.

“I … I wish things had been different, Vion.”

“So do I, Grace.” He looked into her face for a few long moments, and then removed his hands from hers. “Goodbye.”

“Goodbye Vion.”

They walked slowly away from each other, neither aware of their surroundings.

GRACE AND DIVA were sitting keeping Six company. Six was just congratulating Grace on her idea to keep the space station in Kwaidian hands, when there was a flash of silver behind her head, and a small chirping noise.

Grace saw that Six was staring past her head with his mouth open.

“What?” she said. “Don’t tell me I have one of those awful spiders on me!” She began to pat frantically at the back of her head and her shoulders. “Eugh! Get it off me! Diva! Do something!”

Diva, though, was shaking her head and pointing behind Grace. Slowly she turned round.

In front of her was a metallic globe about the size of an eye. Set into the silvery orb was a tiny transparent plate, through which she could see what looked like a camera lens. The globe was hovering above the table, at a level with her head.

“EEK!” She gave a jump backwards, crashing into Six’s bed and falling on top of him.

“Do you have to do that, Grace?” Six complained. “I don’t see how I am ever going to get better if you go throwing yourself on top of my wounded shoulder at the first sign of anything out of the ordinary.”

“What in Sacras is that?” Grace extricated herself, still gazing at the mysterious object floating in the centre of the room. She put her head on one side to examine it from another perspective, and the silver orb tipped over, imitating her. She twisted her head to the other side, and the orb again mimicked her.

“H-hello?” She tried.

The object gave another faint chirrup of sound and then spoke, in a whirring, mechanical voice.

“Hell-o-o!”

“Don’t do that Six,” said Diva. “It isn’t funny.”

“I didn’t say anything!”

Diva stood up and approached the sphere like a Tattula cat stalking a prize. She walked right around it, and the sphere turned as she did so, following her with its eye. Then she passed a hand below and above the orb, with no result. It continued to gaze at her.

“What are you?” she demanded.

“I am a long distance video camera equipped with two-way communication,” it whirred.

“What are you doing here? Did the Elders send you?” Diva unsheathed her ornate dagger and looked threatening. “Did they?”

The thing’s camera lens rested for a moment on the blade, and then it made a chirruping sound that sounded suspiciously like a laugh. “I am made of a metal alloy which can withstand re-entry into any atmosphere,” it said. “Your knife is not going to intimidate me.”

Diva stiffened. “I asked you a question, tin pot,” she said through her teeth, “and you would do well to answer it!”

Grace touched her on the shoulder to stop her from saying anything else. “My name is Grace,” she said. “Pleased to meet you.”

“You don’t look pleased. Your eyes do not crinkle.”

“My eyes only ‘crinkle’ when I am looking full into the sun.”

“That is terrible. How do you find friends?”

Grace stared at the object. She seemed to have lost her way somehow. “Are you alive?” she asked it finally.

“No,” it replied. “And yes.”

“That clarifies everything. Thank you
so
much,” said Six.

“How long have you been here?” asked Grace.

“I arrived six of your days ago.”

“And where are you from?”

“I am not really from anywhere, but I was made by the Dessites.”

“If you were made, then you are not alive,” said Six.

The thing whirred, a little crossly, it seemed to Diva. She knew just how it felt. Six had that effect on her too.

“The video camera is not alive,” it said. “But I am.”

“And you are …?”

“I am an envoy of the Dessites, and I have to meet the being that was able to move the orbital platform above Kwaide. The Sellite girl here was involved.” It hummed a little and moved to hover next to Grace. “She must therefore know the entity that was able to move the space station instantaneously. I need you to take me to it.”

“I can call him here,” and Grace made to sign on the thin band of orthogel which surrounded her wrist.

“No!” The tiny sphere chirped worriedly. “No! That would not be … auspicious. First contact must be made with due ceremony. All possible deference will be shown when approaching a grade 2b life-form for the first time. It is in the mandates.”

“What grade are we?” Six demanded.

“You are all 3b.”

“3b! Is that all?”

“Transient life-forms with mediocre intelligence. Quite sure. 3b.”

“Mediocre intelligence yourself, you sheet-plated piece of future obsolescence,” Six retorted. “You had better watch out I don’t use you for target practice!”

“3b is quite a high rating,” the globe told him. “It is highly unusual to find more than one 3b species per system.”

“What do we have to do to get an upgrade?”

There were a series of small clicks. “You could only upgrade in your present form to a 3a. Type 2a species are like the Dessites – able to utilize quantum non-locality. Type 2b species are able to utilize quantum decoherence. And of course, type 1 species are incorporeal. We have not met any of those yet, but it is postulated that the final stage of existence, the most superior, will be incorporeal.”

Six was unwilling to let the subject drop. “And just what do 3a’s have that we don’t?”

A thin membrane covered the globe’s eye as it began to recite by rote: “A type 3a may be differentiated from a type 3b by the obvious use of all parts of the brain, these to include what you would call initial telepathic abilities, the rudiments of telekinesis and some other adaptations to quantum qualities.”

“I use all my brain!”

Diva gave a snort. “Not so as anybody would notice.” Six glared at her.

The machine gave a little buzz which sounded like an apologetic cough. “My observations lead me to conclude that there is at least a quarter of your brain which is not in use at this moment of time. I’m sorry, my analysis is quite final. You are all firmly and irrevocably type 3b.”

“See Diva, you are only a ‘b’. How does that feel, your mulchiness?”

“Yeah, like I am going to take much notice of a machine!”

Grace wanted to know more. “So does type 3 evolve into type 2 and so on?”

“No. They are completely separate evolutionary trails. It would be quite impossible for a type 3 to become a type 2.”

“And a type 2 to evolve into a type 1?”

“That is mere speculation, since nothing is currently known about type 1 species. Parameters undefined.”

“And if this is only a video camera, then who exactly are we talking to?”

“I am a traveler. I was grown during the journey. I am only a traveler.”

Six blew a sigh and closed his eyes. All this was giving him a headache. “Whatever.” He waved a tired hand. “So long as you weren’t sent by the Elders I don’t much care who you are.”

“Six!” Grace turned on him. “We must be speaking to an extra-system being! First contact!”

“Don’t much care if it’s the last, frankly,” muttered Six. “All that whirring is getting on my nerves.”

“Typical!” Diva shook her head in disgust. “Really, Six, you have the attention span of a five-year-old.”

“Excuse me! In bed recovering, remember? Hero at rest, ok? All this thinking is making me dizzy.”

“Doesn’t seem to take much …”

“… And in any case, it wants to talk to Grace, not to me. So why don’t you all waft off and leave me alone?”

“You do realize that we are talking of a being from a different galaxy, nomus?”

“Right now we are talking to the equivalent of an interscreen,” said Six. “And I’ve seen enough of those to last a lifetime. Take it over to Arcan – he’ll talk to it for days on end. Bore it silly, I should think.”

The tiny orb gave a hum of disagreement. “We are talking of a type 2b intelligent life-form,” it pointed out. “Nothing such a being could say could possibly be boring.”

“Shows how much you know!” retorted Six. “Once he gets going about microphysics there’s no stopping him!” He had an afterthought. “And by the way, he might not like being classified as a ‘b’ either! Just a word of warning, you know!”

Grace sighed and nodded towards the door. “Maybe we had better continue this outside,” she suggested. “Let Mr. Big Hero get some beauty sleep.”

“It’s not
me
who needs beauty sleep,” the Kwaidian retorted.

“Why you—”

“Shut the door on the way out!”

Diva and Grace found they were in complete agreement about what to do with Six once he had made a full recovery.

THREE DAYS LATER Grace was back on Valhai, accompanied by the little recording machine. She made her way slowly down the familiar metallic steps that traversed the rexelene block, and stepped down onto the surface of the planet.

The video camera was clearly very enthusiastic. It skittered around her, the lens of the camera recording the planet from all sides and angles.

“How did you get here so fast?” Grace asked it through her mask pack.

“We can travel at ninety percent the speed of light,” the machine told her. “So a journey which might take the Sellite ships months can be accomplished in days.”

“So now you – the person I am talking to, I mean – is up in orbit around Valhai?”

“That is correct. Of course the video camera is a new one – the previous one had to be left on Kwaide, since we have no way of recuperation.”

“I could have brought it with me, when Arcan transported me over!”

The orb gave a buzz. “It is forbidden to seek alliances with type 3 aliens.”

“Whatever. But won’t the Sellites detect you – in orbit above what they claim is their planet?”

“Look at the recording device.”

Dutifully Grace turned her gaze to the small globe. It flickered and then disappeared from view.

“How did you manage that?” Try as she could, she was unable to detect anything.

“It is fairly simple technology. Light waves from behind the globe are captured, fed around the machine along microtubes, and then transmitted towards you from the front of the machine. The result is that you no longer detect the camera.”

“Could I do that?” Grace thought of all the advantages of being able to disappear at will.

“If you had some sort of clothing equipped with the microtubes, you could.”

“But what about radar, and heat imaging, and other ways the Sells have of detection?”

“This process has been adapted to enable us to escape detection completely when we so desire.”

“Cool!”

“It can work at extremely high temperatures if necessary.”

Grace looked confused.

“—You said it was cool?”

“Ah. No … I meant that … it is interesting,” she finished lamely.

“And why don’t you come down here yourself to meet Arcan, instead of sending a machine?”

“That is impossible.”

Grace looked sideways at the machine. “Why?”

“That information is unavailable to type 3 aliens.”

Grace’s chin came up. “Yet I am good enough to show you how to meet Arcan?” she said.

“Certainly.”

“Hmm. I think there may be certain … err … details of our society which you have missed.”

“Unlikely, but do go ahead.”

“We don’t like being told we are not good enough to have access to certain information.” Grace stopped in her tracks, and tried to breathe calmly so as not to block the mask pack.

“But you are not evolved enough to have any further information.” The machine gave a sharp whirr.