The Dragon Never Sleeps

— 31 —

Turtle had been given quarters reserved for visiting dignitaries, the best living arrangements he had known since the Dire Radiant. A prison cell without bars. Only prisoners mad enough to attack their jailers would need restraint aboard VII Gemina. The Guardship was aware of every sentient corpuscle moving through its metal and plastic veins.

He had the freedom of the ship, with the exception of the Core. What harm could he do?

He was caught more surely than any fly in a spider's snare.

Amber Soul had been installed in the cabin next to his, where her pain was monitored remorselessly. Initially Turtle went nowhere else. He refused to pretend to be anything but a prisoner of the ancient enemy.

Midnight had quarters beyond Amber Soul's but seldom saw them. She spent her time with Hanaver Strate. Turtle felt no rancor. She had to be what she had been created to be.

He was sad, pitying Midnight her pain and Amber Soul her needless agony.

Maybe one of Amber Soul's own kind could penetrate her barriers. To Turtle it was as proof as a Guardship's screens.

Frustration at his helplessness translated into a restlessness he assuaged, eventually, by wandering. But he did so far from the habitats of living crew, out in remote reaches near the rider bays, the nests of pursuit and interceptor fighters, and the Hellspinner pits. There were places out there that offered direct views of naked starspace.

He suspected thousands of Guardship crew never saw space except as a telerelay. A screen had boundaries. A screen never portrayed more than a small, flat section of reality. These humans did not like to admit that they were of no consequence in the eye of the universe.

He found a dead Hellspinner pit. Gemina permitted him access. From the O Bubble on the Readying Room he had a view of as much universe as his mind could encompass. He could lie on the Twist Master's couch and subside into seductive, freckled darkness where there were no yesterdays, no tomorrows, no worries or fears.

He could get as morbidly philosophical as he liked.

WarAvocat found him the third time he visited the pit. Of course, Gemina would report. Amazing, though, that the man would come out and invest time visiting.

WarAvocat took the console seat, stared out at the void. VII Gemina was off the Web, doing Turtle knew not what. He could see a small moon, a station, the moving sparks of local traffic.

It looked as though he had nothing to say. When he did speak, it was only a confirmation of what Turtle read from his stance. "It's restful out here. When I look back, I feel nostalgic only about my time as a Twist Master. Out here you're alone with yourself. Sometimes you end up facing yourself and what you might be."

He grinned, apparently without calculation. "Nothing like popping off a 'spinner and having a Lock Runner slide through and you have to twist a new one and get him before he gets you."

Turtle countered, "Nothing like banging through knowing you have to spot the pit and take it before the Twist Master gets you and your team. Are you really that old?"

"WarCrew sleep a lot. Did you pilot a Lock Runner?"

"I invented the tactic." Successful Lock Runners had deposited commandos on the skins of Guardships. Guardship soldiers had been no match for Ku warriors.

"It wouldn't work now."

"There are no more Ku. No other species has the reflexes. WarAvocat, where are the children?"

"The what?"

"Your children. Your little ones. I've been aboard three Guardships. When we took XVI Cyreniaca, briefly, before it blew. XXII Scythica, before WarCrew drove us out. And now VII Gemina. I have yet to see children."

WarAvocat puzzled it out. "We're our own replacements. Everyone aboard has been here since VII Gemina was commissioned."

"But... I know WarCrew age only on duty. But the others look like they live uninterrupted lives."

"They do—till they get elected or Deified. Most crew just die, then a recorded and edited version gets impressed on a young clone."

Turtle did not comprehend the rationale. "They live their lives over and over?"

"As the jokes goes, over and over till they get it right."

Turtle shook his head. It made no sense. He had studied these people all his life. They were predictable but incomprehensible.

"It works for VII Gemina, Kez Maefele. Other Guardships evolved other directions. They've gotten strange."

Strange. "They say nothing ever changes. They blame you. You are wonderful devils. But I have lived every minute of several thousand years. The entire universe has gone strange. You may not have noticed."

"Why wouldn't we notice?"

"You do not look outside as long as Outside does not fracture the rules you enforce. Canon has changed, WarAvocat. I mark the watershed when the rage for tier cities swept Canon. Before that there were few nonhumans in Canon space, except along the Rims and on the Closed Treaty and Reserved worlds. Artifacts were rare. Like me, they were created for noble purposes. Now they are everywhere, nonpareil toys, to be played with, abused, and discarded. Humans' worlds were choked with people. The Web was acrawl with ships. Trade was brisk Outside. Where have the trillions gone, WarAvocat? There are thousands more worlds now. But they should be filled. They are not. Few are more populous than that pesthole where you found me. Why? Your normals are not breeding.

"These days those held in deepest contempt are the glue binding what is left. Humans own Canon, but nonhumans and artifacts keep it going."

WarAvocat ruminated. "Is there a point?"

"Not if you don't see it already."

"Are you saying this long die-off is our fault?"

"I have no opinion. I am an observer. But others watch. Maybe they see with greater acuity. They are more free than I to roam."

"Food for thought, Kez Maefele."

"I will pass you hearsay, WarAvocat. There are races Outside with ambitions toward Canon space. They perceive a vacuum. But one force holds them at bay."

"Us?" WarAvocat smiled. " ‘What cannot be achieved by strength must be gained by stealth.'"

Turtle grunted. "You have studied me closely."

"You accomplished more with less than anyone before or since. Your tactics set the tone for every incursion and rebellion since." WarAvocat chuckled. "As long as they pursue tactics that almost worked instead of looking for what will work, I ought to be pleased."

"Is there a way?"

"There must be. There always is." WarAvocat mused, "I wonder if anybody considers what would happen if we got knocked off. Seems obvious that whoever did the job would be somebody nastier than us."

"I don't expect that aspect garners much thought." WarAvocat was right. Who defeated the Guardships would replace the Guardships, almost certainly with a grander tyranny.

He stared outside, unseeing, wondering if greed and cruelty and brutality were as much absolutes of life as entropy was an absolute of the physical universe. Did the climb out of the slime write programmes no mind could overcome?