Divergence

CHAPTER 17

When Louis Nenda and Atvar H’sial went scurrying into the darkness, Birdie Kelly was not at all sorry to see the back of them. Graves might want to arrest the pair, but the Karelian human Nenda had always struck Birdie as crude and violent, and the silent, winged Cecropian gave him the creeps.

Good riddance to both. Birdie pushed Julius Graves off him, struggled to his feet, and looked around.

Things were a mess. He was not sure where to begin.

Graves was winded and gasping for breath, but otherwise he seemed all right. Birdie ignored him. Kallik was unconscious, lying on the floor halfway to the center of the room, and Birdie could do nothing for her.

The body of E. C. Tally, a little closer, was in the worst shape. It lay motionless, with the cable trailing from the bleeding head and ending in a bare plug a few feet from where Birdie stood. There was nothing to be done for Tally, either, because his body was deep in the Lotus field.

Birdie looked for J’merlia. The Lo’tfian was lying on the curved floor, just inside the pattern of concentric rings, and he was still holding E. C. Tally’s disconnected brain firmly in two of his forelimbs. If he had been knocked out, too, or affected by the Lotus field…

But as Birdie watched, J’merlia began to move, crawling out toward the perimeter of the outer circle. Birdie took the loose end of the neural connect cable and went around to meet him.

“Where is Atvar H’sial?” J’merlia asked as soon as he crossed the boundary of the yellow ring.

“Ran for it. With Louis Nenda. We’ll worry about them later. Here.” Birdie held out the connector. “Turn Tally’s brain around this way, and let’s see if we can plug him in again.”

The connection was supposed to be handled delicately, but it had been yanked free with great force. Now the neural bundles refused to mesh easily into position. The plug slipped out of the socket when it was released. Birdie knew nothing about the care and maintenance of embodied computers, but he said a prayer, placed the connector into position again, and pushed — this time a lot harder.

Down on the curved bowl of the floor, the body of E. C. Tally jerked and spasmed. There was a grunt and a whoosh of lungs violently expelling air.

“Tally!” J’merlia called. “Can you hear me?”

The battered figure with its bloody head was on hands and knees, struggling to stand up. It failed on half a dozen tries, supporting itself on its bruised forearms each time it fell forward. At last the body stayed upright.

“I hee-ar… poo-erly.” The speech was garbled. “It is diffigult… to speag. Some of my gonnegtor interfaces were des-troyed when they were pulled out. Others are… degraded. I am seeging to gompensate. Do not worry, I was designed with high-cirguit redundancy. I am… improving. I will be all right. I will be fine.”

Birdie was not so sure. As Tally said those last words, he had fallen flat on his face again.

“Take it slowly, E.C. We have plenty of time.”

“Brr-err,” E.C. Tally replied. “Grarr-erff.” But he was making progress. He was standing again, shaky but upright. As Birdie and J’merlia watched, he took two tentative steps — in exactly the wrong direction.

“No. E.C.!” Birdie shouted. “Wrong way. Come toward the outside. You’re heading for the middle of the room.”

“I am well… aware of that.” The head turned slowly, to look back at them. The voice was reproving. “Since it will be necessary at some point to retrieve the Hymenopt Gallig, surely it is more efficient to do so now, and thereby egonomize on both time and motion.”

E. C. Tally was improving all right, Birdie thought — if a return to his usual wrongheadedness could be considered an improvement. But he carefully paid out neural cable while Tally limped forward until he reached Kallik. Blood streamed from the open skull as Tally bent down and laboriously cradled the little Hymenopt in his arms.

“We are goming out now. Prepare to restore me… to the granial gavity, as soon as I reach you. Sensory inputs via the gonnegt gable are degenerating. Please geep talging, so that I gan sense your diregtion. I gan no longer see.”

“This way — this way — this way—” J’merlia called, but he did not wait. When Tally was still inside the yellow ring the Lo’tfian rushed forward, took part of Kallik’s weight, and led the way back to Birdie Kelly. As Kallik was released, E. C. Tally groaned and sank to the floor beside her.

“Quickly.” Julius Graves had finally recovered his wind enough to be helpful. He was removing the bandage from Tally’s skull. “Steven says that there will be permanent damage if an impaired neural connector is used for more than a minute or two. We are close to that limit already.”

As the bandage came off Birdie turned the cranium on its hinged flap. “All right, E.C., here we go. We’ll have you back online in a few seconds.

“Now!” he said to J’merlia, who stood ready. The connector came free of the disembodied brain, at the same moment as Birdie pulled the cable out of the hindbrain socket. Tally’s body slumped against Birdie. The blue eyes closed.

Julius Graves took the short connecting spiral of the computer’s hindbrain connection and set it carefully into its usual position. There was a brief spasm of Tally’s limbs, but before anyone had time to worry the eyes had flickered open.

“Very good,” E. C. Tally said. “We suffered a loss of interface for only two-point-four seconds. All sensory and motor functions appear to be normal. Now, the closing of the cranial cavity is something that I prefer to do for myself. So if you do not mind—”

He reached up, pushed away Graves’s supporting hands, and grasped the open top of the skull. He turned it backward on its hinge. Birdie, standing behind him, had another quick view of a red network of blood vessels in the skull’s lining; then the cranium tilted to fit snugly over the protective membranes of Tally’s spherical brain. Tally exerted vertical pressure. There was a faint click. The skull was again a battered but seamless whole.

As E. C. Tally calmly reached up a forearm to wipe blood from his eyes, the other three could begin to attend to other worries. Birdie realized that Kallik was conscious and silently watching.

“Are you feeling all right?”

The Hymenopt shook her head. “Physically, I am functioning normally. But mentally, I am very confused. Confused as to how I came to be here, but even more as to how you came to be here. The last thing I remember was going down there.” She pointed toward the center of the chamber. “My master was at the center. Now he has vanished, and so has Atvar H’sial. Where are they?”

“Good question.” Birdie was automatically coiling up the neural cable. Old habits of neatness died hard. “J’merlia, can you bring Kallik up to date, while the rest of us decide where we go from here?”

He turned to Julius Graves. “I’m not in charge, never have been. But I want to find Professor Lang and Captain Rebka as much as you do, and help them if they need help. And I know you want to get your hands on Nenda and that Cecropian, and give ’em what’s due. But don’t you think it’s time we forgot all that and started acting rational? I mean, like getting out of here and going someplace where we know what’s happening to us.”

Listening to himself, Birdie was amazed at his own nerve. Here he was, a real nobody, telling a resentative of the central council what he ought to do. But Graves did not seem annoyed. The bald head was nodding slowly, and the radiation-scarred face wore a serious expression.

“Commissioner Kelly, I cannot argue with you. You, as well as J’merlia, Kallik, and E. C. Tally, have been drawn into a situation of great danger, for no better reason than my desire to bring Louis Nenda and Atvar H’sial to justice, and to satisfy my own curiosity. That is unfair, and it is also unreasonable. I intend to continue to explore Glister. I hope to find Nenda and H’sial, and also Hans Rebka and Darya Lang. But that is not your responsibility. As of this moment you are officially relieved. You, E. C. Tally, J’merlia, and Kallik are all free to return to the surface. Take the Summer Dreamboat, go back to Opal, and report. Leave the other ship for my use, and for the others if I can find and rescue them.”

It was a better answer than Birdie dreamed of getting. He stood to attention. “Yes, sir! Kallik, J’merlia. E.C.? All ready to go?”

But the embodied computer was shaking his head. “Go, Birdie Kelly, as soon as you are prepared. However, I cannot accompany you. I was sent to the Dobelle system with a mission: Find out what happened at Summertide, and learn why Captain Rebka and the others elected to remain there afterwards. Full answers have not been provided, and my query registers remain unfulfilled. I must go with Councilor Graves.”

Which left the two aliens. Even as Birdie turned to them, he suspected that he was going to be disappointed. Kallik was hopping up and down, emitting the chirps and whistles that told of high excitement.

“The masters are alive! The masters are alive! J’merlia says that they are conscious, and somewhere within Glister. Honored humans, please grant us permission to seek them and offer again our services.”

“You still want to go after those two crooks?” Birdie did not have much hope after that speech, but he tried. “Kallik, they deserted you and J’merlia and left you to die on Quake. They ran away from you here, when you were still stuck in the Lotus field with no idea when or how you’d get out. They don’t care what happens to you. You don’t owe them anything.”

“But they are the Masters! Our true and wonderful and only masters.” Kallik turned to Graves. “Revered Councilor, please grant us permission to accompany you. We will obey any orders that you choose to give us. Let Commissioner Kelly go home — but please do not send us with him to Opal. Let us remain with you and seek the masters.”

Hearing her, and looking at J’merlia and E. C. Tally, Birdie had his own moment of truth. They were all suggesting that he should try to fly — alone — through that blizzard of murderous Phages. Without Kallik to help as navigator, his survival chances were close to zero. And then if by some fluke he did not make it, he would have to fly all the way to Opal facing the bitter fact of his own lack of courage.

What a choice: a fool, or a coward. And the coward had a near-certain chance of being killed as he tried to fly away from Glister. Birdie might be safer here.

He sighed. “I was just joking. I’d rather find out what happened to the others. Lead on, Councilor. We’re all in this together.”

“Wonderful. I am glad you will stay. You are a great asset.” Graves gave him an admiring smile.

Birdie cringed. If there was one thing worse than being a coward, it was being mistaken for a hero.

Kallik’s lonely wandering through the interior of Glister before the others arrived was paying off. As she moved the Hymenopt had mapped out in her head a rough plan of many of the chambers and corridors. She already knew that the lower levels were high-gee environments, unsuitable for human or Cecropian habitation. And she was also fairly sure that there was no way they could reach the surface, other than the one she had created with the field inhibitor. To reach that, Nenda and Atvar H’sial would have to pass again through the chamber with the Lotus field. Since they had not done so, they must still be somewhere in the lower levels of Glister’s interior.

Julius Graves led the way, followed by the two aliens. Tally was next, still holding the reel of neural cable that Birdie had rewound. There might be no more Lotus fields in the interior — Kallik knew of none — but it was best to take precautions.

Birdie came last. The rear was no safer than anywhere else, but he wanted to be alone to think. He was still brooding over his decision to stay on Glister. He had blown it. It had occurred to him, too late, that he ought at least to have gone back to the surface and taken a look at what was going on there. For all he knew, the Phages had wandered away to seek other targets. He might have had a clear ride home. And even if they had not gone, he could have come back here and been no worse off than he was now.

They had been descending steadily, through a succession of corridors, sliding ramps, and chambers of all shapes and sizes. At this point Birdie was not sure he could find his own way back, but that did not matter too much because E. C. Tally would have every turn and twist recorded in his inorganic data banks.

Birdie bumped suddenly into the back of the embodied computer. Graves, in front of the others, had paused, and Birdie had not been paying attention.

The councilor turned. “Something is ahead.” His deep, hollow voice was reduced to a hoarse whisper. “There are peculiar sounds. You wait here. J’merlia and I will proceed. We will return in five minutes or less. If we do not, Commissioner Kelly will be in charge of all subsequent actions.”

He was gone before Birdie could object. All subsequent actions. He was being promoted from peon to president, with no idea what he ought to do. “How do I know when five minutes is up?” he asked E. C. Tally.

“I will keep you informed. My internal clock is accurate to the femtosecond.” Tally held up one grimy finger. “Since Councilor Graves’s final words to you it is exactly… forty-six seconds. Forty-seven. forty-eight. Forty-nine. Fifty.”

“Stop that, E.C. I can’t think when you keep on counting.”

“Indeed? How strange. I have no such trouble. I offer condolences for your restriction to serial processing.”

“Talking like that is just as bad. Keep quiet. Just tell me when it’s every minute.”

“Very well, Commissioner. But one minute has already passed.”

“So tell me when it’s two.” Birdie turned to Kallik. “You have better ears than we do. Did you hear any sounds from in front of us?”

Kallik paused to reflect. “Sounds, yes,” she said at last. “But nothing remotely human. Wheezing, and groaning. Like a venting Dowser.”

“Now come on, Kallik. There can’t possibly be a Dowser here — it would fill up the whole planetoid. Were there any words?”

“Possibly. Not in a language that I am able to comprehend. But J’merlia is a far better linguist than I am, perhaps you should ask him.”

“He’s not here — he’s with Graves.”

“When he returns.”

“But if he returns, I won’t need—”

“Two minutes,” Tally said loudly. “May I speak?”

“My God, E.C., what now? I told you to keep quiet. Oh, go on then, spit it out.”

“I am concerned by our immediate environment. As you may know, the functioning of my brain requires shielding from electromagnetic fields. As a result, the protective membranes contain sensitive field monitors. The corridor in which we are standing contains evidence of field inhibitors, and that evidence becomes stronger the farther that we go.”

“So what? Don’t you think we have more important things to worry about?”

“No. Assuming that the field inhibitors are functional, and that the interior structure of Glister relies upon the same methods as the surface for its stability, we would experience a significant change in environment were the field inhibitors to be turned on. As they could be, at any time.”

“Change of environment. What do you mean, a change of environment?”

“In simple terms, we would fall through the floor. After that, I cannot say. I have no information as to what lies below. But let me observe that the outer parts of Glister average fifty meters between successive interior layers. A fifty-meter drop in this high a gravity field would render everyone of our party inoperative, with the possible exception of Kallik.”

“Gawdy!” Birdie stepped sharply backward and stared down at his feet. “A fifty-meter fall? We’d all be mushed.”

Before he could say more there was a patter of multiple feet in the tunnel ahead of them. J’merlia came scuttling back.

“It is all right,” he said excitedly. “Councilor Graves says that it is safe to move forward to join him. He is in conversation with a being who dwells within Glister. It can converse in human speech — and it knows the present whereabouts of Atvar H’sial and Louis Nenda! It means us no harm, and we are in no danger. Please follow me.”

“Now hold on a minute. And you, too, Kallik.” Birdie grabbed the short fur on the back of the Hymenopt, restraining her — though if she had decided to go, nothing he or any human could have done would have stopped her. “You can tell us we’re safe, J’merlia, but that’s not what E.C. says — according to him, the tunnel floor could dissolve underneath us, any time. We’d all fall through and be killed. The farther we go the worse it gets. Can’t whoever it is wait just a bit, while we check if we’re safe?”

“I do not know.” J’merlia stood thinking for a moment, his narrow head cocked to one side.

“I suppose it can,” he said at last. “After all, it’s been waiting for six million years. Maybe a few minutes more won’t matter too much.”