Anvil Of Stars Part 10

Still, the moms insisted-and Theodore agreed-confronting a technologically superior adversary was not necessarily folly. Killing Captain Cook.

The tactics of dealing with superiority were largely those of silence and attrition, like an infected flea creeping into a human's clothes to spread plague. The makers and the doers could act as bacilli.

But repeatedly, Martin was reminded by Theodore's writings that any comparisons they made-even the comparison of killing Cook-were faulty.

It was possible the superior adversary could nullify or escape any of their weapons.

Martin closed his eyes and tried to subdue his frustration, his conflict. There would never never be enough information. And he-Martin-would never be sufficiently prepared... be enough information. And he-Martin-would never be sufficiently prepared...

The Dawn Treader Dawn Treader used every method at its disposal to slow over the long days of s.p.a.ce, and to conserve its fuel, girding for battle. used every method at its disposal to slow over the long days of s.p.a.ce, and to conserve its fuel, girding for battle.

Martin led the children outside the s.h.i.+p again, and this time, he felt they were prepared. He had set up a particularly nasty adversary-one suggested by Theodore years before.

Martin stayed within the s.h.i.+p, directing the efforts of this adversary with two others-Harpal Timechaser and Stephanie Wing Feather.

Outside, forty of the children flew their craft around the Dawn Treader, Dawn Treader, preparing for entry into a simulated system configured very much like Wormwood. preparing for entry into a simulated system configured very much like Wormwood.

The five unknown ma.s.ses around the yellow star were hidden defense stations, in Martin's plan; and Theodore's adversaries, pure machine intelligences that had long since replaced their biological creators, were in command.

Martin watched the scenario play itself out.

Planets met their end in compressed time, surfaces molten slag, and most of the children survived. Hare, Hare, portrayed by the still-intact portrayed by the still-intact Dawn Treader, Dawn Treader, came through with minimal damage. came through with minimal damage.

The farthest-scattered craft came in fifteen minutes after the simulation's end.

Stephanie licked her index finger, stuck it up to an imaginary breeze, swayed her arm toward Martin, and smiled. Confidence was returning.

The children gathered in the first homeball's cafeteria and a.n.a.lyzed their performances, Martin and Hans overseeing. The self-criticism flowed steadily, without hurt feelings, and Martin felt a knitting of the teams that had gone out on drill.

Afterward, they ate dinner, then listened to music performed by Joe Flatworm and Kees North Sea: raucous, lively folk music from the Ukraine and Tennessee, barely slowed by the extra weight.

Their bodies had grown stronger, stockier. No need to ask if the moms were responsible.

The performance lasted less than half an hour; they rested after, Martin in Theresa's quarters, in the heavy darkness, watching the ceiling, mind pa.s.sing over the day's events.

He slept peacefully, without dreams.

Two days until coasting resumed; five days from pa.s.sage through the pre-birth material.

Martin exercised in the second neck, climbing along the ladder fields instead of letting them haul him up or down. He had climbed almost the entire distance from the second homeball to the third, enjoying the exertion, almost used to the heaviness, when he heard the screaming, thin and far away, sliced into ghastly echoes by the shapes in the worms.p.a.ce.

Theresa was in the third homeball, above him, doing private practice in a bombs.h.i.+p. She quickly descended on a field, pausing beside him where he hung, and listened, frowning. "Did you hear that?" she asked.

He nodded, hoping it was nothing. It did not sound like nothing. nothing. It sounded horrible, even more horrible when distorted, and they were used to the distortions of voices in the necks. It sounded horrible, even more horrible when distorted, and they were used to the distortions of voices in the necks.

Nothing for seconds. Then, a barely audible keening, voices of concern, two or three people trying to comfort.

They descended quickly, ladders dropping them to the second homeball.

In the main corridor, they found Rosa Sequoia weeping, surrounded by five others, two Wendys and three Lost Boys. Her broad, strong face wet with tears, Rosa could not catch her breath, and she could not speak beyond a few gasped words.

"We didn't see anything," Min Giao Monsoon said, patting her on the shoulder. "There is nothing in the halls!"

"What's wrong?" Martin asked.

"Rosa saw something," Kees North Sea said, narrow face nervous, eyes s.h.i.+fting. "She's scared out of her wits."

"What did you see?" Theresa asked, moving in closer to Rosa. Rosa kneeled in a tighter crouch, large frame forming a round obstruction in the corridor.

"Rosa, stop it," Martin said, an edge in his voice. "Please get yourself together." She had piloted a s.h.i.+p outside and performed well in exercises; he had thought she was coming around. Now he was irritated, and then ashamed of his irritation. Doesn't she know she makes this more difficult for us? Doesn't she know she makes this more difficult for us?

But that was truly beside the point, and he buried his resentment at her weakness. He knelt beside her, touching her wet cheek.

"No!" she shouted, starting up, falling back painfully on one arm. She looked so clumsy, so pitiably overwrought, that Martin's anger surged almost too quickly to be hidden. "You didn't see anything," she said. "You won't believe me...But I saw!"

"What did you see?" Martin asked, teeth tight together. did you see?" Martin asked, teeth tight together.

Resonant, almost silky, Rosa's voice carried down the hall to other children gathering, ten, then twenty, coming from both directions. "Something large and dark. It wasn't a mom."

Martin looked up, shoulders and neck tensing, less at Rosa's proclamation than at an intuition something was going to go very wrong, and he could not stop it.

"I've never seen anything like it," she said.

"Did it do anything?" Theresa asked. Martin winced inwardly at her implicit affirmation that there had been something.

"It stared at me...I think. I couldn't see any eyes. It left marks."

"Where?"

Rosa got to her feet, wiped her eyes with the palms of her hands, swung her shoulders back and stood tall. She apologized in a barely audible voice. "I was in the C wing, coming down for my team exercise...The lights were down. I don't know why."

"Lights are always down in C wing," Martin said. "n.o.body has quarters there."

"That's the way I come here," Rosa said, glancing at him resentfully. She avoids the place where she saw Theresa and I making love. She avoids the place where she saw Theresa and I making love. "It was in the dark, just...being there, sitting or standing, I don't know. I've never seen anything like it." "It was in the dark, just...being there, sitting or standing, I don't know. I've never seen anything like it."

"Show us," Martin said. He turned to the children gathered on both sides and said, "I'll handle this."

"We'd like to help," Anna Gray Wolf said, face eager-something different attracting her, attracting all of them. She stared owlishly at Rosa.

"It's okay," Martin said. "Theresa and I will take care of it." In case they doubt the masculine touch is sufficient. In case they doubt the masculine touch is sufficient.

The children dispersed, and Martin took Rosa's elbow.

"You don't think I saw it?" Rosa asked as she led them along the hall to the empty C wing.

"I don't know what you saw," Martin said. Then, trying for a joke, "Maybe you saw a mom without makeup."

Rosa looked at him resentfully, sadly, then straightened and pointed to the area of the hall where she had seen the shape. Martin ordered the hall to brighten-wondering why Rosa had not already done the same.

He examined the walls. Never dirty, never dusty, the surfaces within the s.h.i.+p of the Law cleaned themselves; it was taken for granted by the children. The walls showed no marks.

"I saw scuffs when I came through here," Rosa raid.

"It was dark," Martin said.

Quietly, desperately, Rosa began to weep again.

"You could have turned the lights on and seen whatever it was," he said.

"We don't disbelieve you," Theresa said, holding Rosa's shoulder firmly, ma.s.saging it with her fingers. "But why didn't you turn the lights on?"

"I was afraid! I didn't want to see it, whatever it was...I didn't want it it to see me." to see me."

"How big was it?" Martin asked. Dangerous, dangerous. Dangerous, dangerous.

"It filled this part of the hall," Rosa said, stretching her arms to the ceiling. The hall was two meters wide, marked with blue circles where quarters might be chosen and doors made by the s.h.i.+p on request.

The entire s.h.i.+p had completely adapted itself to deceleration. The circles that had once marked doors in the ceiling and floor had been absorbed by the s.h.i.+p; only circles on the "walls" remained. Perhaps Rosa had misinterpreted some function of the s.h.i.+p, or seen something n.o.body else had witnessed.

He tried to express that diplomatically. "The s.h.i.+p usually cleans up or changes when we're not watching; maybe it accidentally allowed you to see something."

"It wasn't part of the s.h.i.+p...I don't think it was," Rosa said. She had lost her tone of hysteria. Her face appeared calmer now, puzzled, and she seemed willing to cooperate, to help them solve the mystery.

"Was it metal, or something else?" Theresa asked.

"It was like a shadow. I didn't see any details. I don't know what it could have been. It seemed alive to me." Rosa folded her arms. Martin saw her as she had been when the journey started, five years ago, sixteen and not fully grown, slenderer, with a rugged attractiveness, now become a vulnerable burliness. He wondered again why the moms had chosen her. They had rejected so many others, many Martin had thought were good choices. She swallowed hard, looked, with her large black eyes, more and more lost. "Maybe it wasn't part of the s.h.i.+p. Maybe it doesn't belong here."

"Hold on," Theresa said sternly. Martin was grateful to her for taking a critical tone he dared not use. "We shouldn't jump to any conclusions."

"I saw it," Rosa said, stubbornly defensive.

"We're not questioning that," Theresa said, though Martin certainly thought they should, and she had. "We've all been under a strain lately, and..."

Rosa was turning inward again.

"I saw it. I think it might be important," she said.

"All right," Martin said. "But for now, until we know more, or somebody else sees it, I'd like to keep this quiet."

"Why?" Rosa asked, eyes narrowing. Martin saw more clearly the depth of her problem. She was not going to react well to his next request, but he saw no way around it.

"Please don't talk about it," he said.

Rosa tightened her lips, jaws clenched, eyes reduced to slits, face radiating defiance, but she did not say anything more. "Can I go?" she asked, as if she were a little girl requesting dismissal from cla.s.s.

"You can go," Martin said. Rosa walked on long, strong legs down the hall toward the central corridor, not looking back. Martin inhaled deeply, held it, watching her like a target, then exhaled when she was too far away to hear.

"Jesus."

"No, I don't think so," Theresa said. She grinned. Martin felt the walls again, as if there might be some mark remaining, some trace of Rosa's shadow.

"I don't think there actually was was anything," he said, trying to be extra reasonable, extra careful, even with Theresa. anything," he said, trying to be extra reasonable, extra careful, even with Theresa.

"Of course not," Theresa said.

"But we shouldn't be too too certain," he said without conviction. certain," he said without conviction.

"You think she's...let's not use the word hysterical," Theresa said. "That has the wrong s.e.xual connotations. Let's say stressed out. She's been working up to something. That's what you think? Don't be a hypocrite, Martin. Not with me."

Martin grimaced. "If I tell it like I think it is, we might both reach the wrong conclusions. If I say Rosa is losing it, well...there's evidence, but it's not a sure thing. Maybe she saw a trick of the light. Something we don't know about."

"Ask the War Mother," Theresa suggested.

That was an obvious first step. "Rosa should ask," he said. "It's her sighting. Let's make her responsible for it."

Theresa touched index finger on one hand to little finger on the other, bent it back until it was perpendicular to the joint, a gesture she sometimes made that fascinated Martin. "Good idea. Do you think she'll keep quiet?"

"She doesn't have many good friends."

"Poor Martin. On your watch, too."

"Maybe it's just a temporary aberration, and she'll pull out of it. Just to be safe-"

Theresa caught his meaning before he expressed it. "I'll have some Wendys keep watch on her."

Martin lowered his hands from the unmarked walls. "Right," he said.

"Maybe Ariel..." Theresa said. "She seems to be the only friend Rosa has."

"We're all friends," Martin said.

"You know what I mean. Don't be obtuse."

Theresa, as their time together lengthened, was becoming more and more critical, more and more judgmental, but in a gentle way, and Martin found that he liked it. He needed another voice now.

There were things he could not directly express, even to Theresa: a growing fear. Rosa expresses it her way. I almost wish I could be so direct. Rosa expresses it her way. I almost wish I could be so direct.

In the central glow of the schoolroom, the War Mother contemplated Martin's report. They were alone in the large chamber, Martin standing and the War Mother floating, both in a spot of bright light. The doors had closed. n.o.body else could hear them. Rosa had refused to go to the War Mother, had seemed insulted they would ask her to. And inevitably, word about her experience had spread.

"No such phenomenon has been noticed within the s.h.i.+p," the War Mother said.

"Rosa didn't see anything?"

"What she saw is not apparent to our sense," the War Mother said.

"Is it possible that we could see something aboard the s.h.i.+p, something with an objective reality, that you would not?"

"The possibility is remote."