The Sea is Full of Stars

South Zone

Around much of the southern hemisphere, they gathered up their staffs and runners and went to the centers of their hexes, the movers and shakers, the foreign and defense chiefs, often the political chiefs and their top aides. All else was being coordinated from back in their home capitals, using the Well Gate to get messages and requests for consultations and data back to them as things proceeded.

Both sets of Kalindans were there with the others, notably Mellik, who turned out to be a psychologist working for Interior, basically keeping an eye on them, as well as the Premier, Magnosik; Corrivit the Defense Minister; and Chaskrit, Foreign Minister. All the high officials were there with two aides, making for a larger delegation than was specified. They didn’t care, nor did most of the other races, it appeared. They brought whoever they wanted and stuffed them in someplace.

There was room, of course. Not everybody showed up, including, thankfully, anyone from Chalidang, although with some cheek, there was a small Cromlin delegation. These somewhat colorful lobsterlike creatures had not been directly involved as yet in any conflict, but it turned out that the number three in the delegation was in fact a reprocessed one himself, and had been physically, and remained mentally, Josich the Emperor Hadun’s half brother.

Nakitti thought it was a damned weird conference anyway. More critters than you could imagine, and no auditorium for more than a hundred people who all breathed the same stuff. Basically, it was done on monitors beamed to the reception rooms of the embassies, so there wasn’t a lot of interaction except in the corridors and going to and from the Zone Gate. There was a constant stream of creatures, some not very friendly, in a two-way parade.

For a semitech hex, the Ochoan Embassy was plush and high tech. Even a lot of the nontech hexes enjoyed the luxuries of technological comfort here, which often spoiled those posted here for going back home. For instance, there was a system for ordering or obtaining whatever food and drink you liked; no need to send home. Bring your favorite delicacies, have them zapped by the computerized stations, and within minutes it became part of the database. Then, anytime you wanted it, you just ordered it and there it was, perfectly synthesized and delivered to a food station near you. Better than home, really, because you knew this hadn’t been anywhere else, and thus contained only pure food. Wines? Give the machine a sample, and it would deliver bottles or jars as required. There was little this system couldn’t handle except volume; it wasn’t designed for mobs of people per embassy, and the more orders that came in at once, the slower the system became. For that reason, some of the hall traffic was simply going home for dinner; others were bringing catering, some of which, on the way to being eaten, tried to eat other creatures going by.

Nakitti had no trouble figuring all this out; once you recognized a food that was the equivalent of something you knew, it wasn’t that hard to manage. This explained why she was gaining weight even though her bill pouch was nearly empty, and why some of the things she’d been eating were rather strange to the other Ochoans. It was disappointing to discover that some old favorites were now repulsive to her tastes, but rich, dark chocolate and candy-coated fruit and insects were just fine and went down in incredible quantities.

Although of a royal household, she still was, as usual, the lowest social rank there, so few of the nobles would speak to her directly, or when they did, it was in the tone reserved for the lower classes. But she did have the run of the Ambassador’s suite, currently turned over to her Baron’s use, and by observation had memorized what you keyed in on the entry pads to achieve voice access to the centralized computer database. Hell, as Tann Nakitt, she’d cracked far worse than this one, since this was a utilitarian common access system not designed to keep people out.

What was it they’d said? Your true nature came out even after the Well reprocessed you. Yeah, she thought, look at Josich.

Hmm… Yeah, let’s really look at Josich!

The computer screen read off the basics of Chalidang, its technology—which was of a surprisingly high level for an underwater hex with a history of absolute monarchy—and its basic history, which consisted of warlords knocking off each other, sometimes knocking off or being knocked off by their own kids, while a solid and highly efficient computerized civil service kept it all going no matter who was in charge. They’d also waged war before, sometimes on neighboring hexes, sometimes a bit farther afield, but always with limited objectives. They essentially considered all the nearby hexes to be their pantries and supply closets, and they went to them when they wanted or needed something.

Also interesting was that the Chalidangers could not exist for more than very brief periods in air; water had to go through those armored gill cavities or they had real trouble. Of course, even for a bunch of squid-faces, they had pressurized vehicles that provided oxygenated water and allowed them to move on land when necessary; aquariums of a sort, with armor and guns. Wouldn’t mean much in a high-tech environment where laser and beam weapons could burn holes through that and leak you all over the beach, though, so how did they work in semi- and nontech hexes? They seemed to have some way of doing it. Maybe they used some of those many tentacles in some kind of gear arrangement to keep it going, or—springs! Giant wind-up pressure suits? It was laughable, but the more she stared at a photo of one, taken apparently from a great distance and blown up, the more she was certain that, indeed, that was exactly the case. Wild, at least until the thing wound down. They surely had that covered, though. Never underestimate the ability of a sentient race to figure out how to kill things even under the most hostile of conditions.

Looking over the Chalidangers, though, something kept nagging at her…

Damned, if they didn’t look and act one hell of a lot like the Hadun! The tentacles, the eyes, those were different, but the basics were the same.

Nakitti accessed the entry recording of the Hadun clan, such as it was. They came in much like she had, but on the underwater side, salt and all. She couldn’t follow their language, of course, but they apparently arrived in the Hadun e-suits they’d been wearing when they got zapped here. They used fairly standard frequencies, and because of the problems involved in broadcasting some of the high frequencies, tended to automatic shift translation to Realm Commercial even between two of the same race. A bit of a volume adjustment and frequency sweep of the recording, and Nakitti was listening to the conversation, or some of it, in a tongue she could understand. It was laced with untrans-latables that were in Hadun alone, and it was partial, but it was still educational.

“… Brothers! Are you all all right? ” That was Josich himself!

The others checked in uncertainly.

“… wasn’t what… planned but… will do. We… hoped for more… get processed. Our… same blood… Quickly brief… Attend Us! We… the Well… Will… touch… Be of great courage!… Be gods! No word… Act shocked, confused…”

There was more, but it was even more broken up. What caught her eye was something that apparently nobody else had picked up on. Maybe nobody else had tried to find out what was being said here, or nobody cared or understood. Surely she couldn’t have been the only one to have seen it.

Josich the Emperor Hadun had used the term “the Well.” There was also that business about getting processed, and acting shocked and confused. There was absolutely no mistaking the sense of this.

Josich had known precisely where he’d landed, and the system as well.

How? This was a one-way trip. Josich couldn’t possibly know about the Well World, the idea of reprocessing, any of it. Could he?

And yet…

The implication was also that the brothers didn’t know. It was almost as if Josich had been here before, somehow, and gotten out. No, that wasn’t quite right. These were his half brothers, which meant they were born to at least the same father or mother as he had been. He was, however, the oldest, which is how he was first in line for the throne back then.

If Josich hadn’t been here, he’d certainly known about it from someone who had. Someone who’d gone into great detail. It didn’t make sense, but there it was. Somehow, not only had he known about this place, he’d known how to get himself reprocessed as something very close to the Hadun, perhaps a distant relative of the common source of the race, and he had managed to do it without triggering the Well’s legendary defenses. Clearly he hadn’t intended to be caught and panicked into the place, and there was the implication that he had planned on an even more controlled entry, but he’d coped just fine.

Not bad for a wormface, Nakitti thought. Not bad for anybody. In fact, if Josich wasn’t such a totally evil son of a bitch, you might say that this kind of genius almost deserved to run the place and regard everybody else as bugs.

By the time the Baron returned from the preliminary meetings on the conference, Nakitti had a lot to tell him, and although it was recounted in an almost admiring tone, it was anything but the best of news.