There was a brief pause, then Jorge heard a response through his headset: the same language, apparently spoken by a
hjadd
. It lasted for a minute or so, then Manny made a brief reply before looking at McAlister again. “Just as I suspected . . . we won’t be docking at our own sphere but somewhere else. It seems that the High Council has chosen a different site for our meeting.”
Jorge and McAlister exchanged a worried look. “Is this good or bad?” Jorge asked.
“I couldn’t tell you because I don’t know. There is one bit of good news, though. Given the fact that we’ll be here for so short a time, the Council has allowed us to forgo the usual decontamination procedure, provided that we have our own air supply.”
“Not a problem.” As a precaution, the Navy had furnished the expedition with five airpacks. Previous experience with the
hjadd
had shown humans the wisdom of being prepared to cope with the aliens’ native atmosphere, with its lower pressure and higher nitrogen content. “But that still doesn’t tell us where we should . . .”
“I was coming to that.” Manny tapped McAlister on the shoulder, and apparently didn’t notice that the pilot flinched at his touch. “Interface the nav system with the comlink, then return to autopilot. The local traffic network will guide us to whatever berth the Council wants us to use. Once we’ve arrived, you may resume manual control and commence docking maneuvers as usual.”
“‘As usual,’ he says.” McAlister reached forward to enter a new command into the comp’s keypad. “I should’ve never volunteered for this damned mission.”
Talus qua’spah
steadily grew in size until it filled the cockpit windows
for as far as the eye could see. As Manny said, the
Mercator
was on full autopilot, guided in by the traffic-control net. As the shuttle reached the colony’s periphery, its reaction-control thrusters fired on their own accord, putting the spacecraft on a new course that swung it along a shallow arc above the vast construct.
Dozens of habitats moved beneath them, with thousands of lights gleaming within their portholes. Every now and then, they caught a fleeting glimpse of an alien figure, as if a member of one extraterrestrial race or another had paused for a moment to watch the approach of the tiny craft. Along the thick cables that linked
Talus qua’spah
together, Jorge spotted small, lozenge-shaped cars moving at breakneck speed within transparent tubes: obviously a rapid-transit system, providing access from one hab to another.
Talus qua’spah
was called a house, but in fact it was a city, one larger than any ever built by humankind.
The
Mercator
began to lose altitude, gradually dropping to a couple of hundred feet above the colony, until it headed directly toward a geodesic sphere five hundred feet in diameter. As the shuttle approached the hab, a rectangular hatch opened just above its equator; light spilled out, revealing what appeared to be a small hangar. The thrusters fired again, this time to brake the shuttle, then the
Mercator
slipped into the bay.
As soon as the shuttle was past the doors, Jorge felt weight return; apparently their craft had just entered a local gravity field. At that moment, the master alarm rang, signaling that that the autopilot had been disengaged. Caught by surprise, McAlister swore under his breath; he grabbed the yoke and pulled back on it, firing the thrusters one last time to complete the braking maneuver. He reached up to snap a row of toggles; a bump from beneath their feet as the landing gear was lowered, then the pilot slowly brought the craft down. A hard thump as the
Mercator
made its touchdown, and the pilot let out his breath.
“They might have warned us,” he said to no one in particular, as his hands moved across the console, shutting down the engine and thrusters. That done, he craned his neck to peer aft through the cockpit windows. “All right, they’ve closed the door. Let’s see if it’s okay to leave.”
Jorge was already ahead of him. Gazing at the environmental control panel to his left, he studied the readout for the outside atmosphere. The gauge slowly rose, indicating that the hangar was being repressurized. “Coyote-normal,” he said at last. “Same for gravity. Looks like they’re expecting us.” He looked back at Manny. “We may not need those airpacks after all.”
“Wear them anyway. This is only the hangar, after all. We’ll be going . . . well, somewhere else.” The Savant leaned forward to activate the wireless again. Once more, he said a few words in the
hjadd
language. This time, though, there was no response, only an expectant silence. “I believe that means they’re waiting for us. Shall we?”
Jorge unfastened his seat harness, then climbed over the center console and followed Manny into the passenger cabin. The others had already unbuckled their own harnesses; Inez had risen from her seat, but Greg and Vargas remained where they were, staring out the portholes at the hangar. “Don’t see anything else out there,” Greg said, looking up at Jorge as he entered. “You’d think there’d be other ships.”
Jorge shrugged. Just then, that was the least of his concerns. “Manny says we might need the airpacks,” he said to Inez, then another thought occurred to him. “Weapons, too?” he asked, turning to the Savant. “Or would that be considered an insult?”
“More than an insult,” Manny replied. “Weapons of any kind are prohibited on
Talus qua’spah
. Fortunately, we’ll be here for so short a time that no one will ask to inspect our ship and its cargo. Otherwise, we could expect to have them impounded.”
Jorge had expected as much. “All right, then . . . no guns.” Inez nodded, then walked aft to the cargo nets and found the equipment case containing the airpacks. He turned to Greg and Vargas. “I don’t know how long this will take, but until we get back, you’re to stay put. No wandering around, no exploring . . .”
“Aw, c’mon, Lieutenant.” Sergio looked at him askance. “Can’t we just get out and stretch our legs? We’ve been cooped up in here for eleven hours now.”
“That shouldn’t be a problem,” Manny said before Jorge could respond. “Just make sure that you don’t leave the hangar . . . and under no circumstances should you reveal any weapons.”
Greg nodded, and once again he and Jorge gave each other a knowing glance. The sergeant was to keep an eye on Vargas. And perhaps McAlister, too, for that matter; Jorge wasn’t sure how much he trusted their pilot.
By then, Inez had removed the airpacks from their case. She handed one to Jorge, and they took a couple of minutes to put them on: a small pack, about the size and shape of a knapsack, that they each carried on their backs with a small harness. Once activated, the packs would filter oxygen and nitrogen from the ambient atmosphere and turn them into breathable air. Two elastic tubes led to a half-face air-mask, which was also fitted with a mike and amplifier; a pair of goggles went with it. Inez and Jorge pushed the goggles up on their foreheads and let the masks dangle beneath their chins.
Once they were ready, Jorge knelt to undog the belly hatch. A faint hiss of escaping pressure, then the hatch opened. He lowered the ladder, then stood up. “Ladies and Savants first,” he said, making a polite gesture.
“No.” Manny shook his head. “As expedition leader, you’re expected to be the first to exit your craft.”
Something in the way Manny said this caused Jorge to pause at the hatch. “You think we’re being watched?”
“From the moment we came through the starbridge. And believe me, Lieutenant . . . the Council, and particularly the
hjadd
, take great stock in even the most casual of actions.” He looked at the others. “Remember that when you get out to stretch your legs.”
Jorge swallowed, but there was no point in arguing. Bending forward again, he climbed down the ladder, with Inez and Manny just behind him. Ready or not, they were about to enter the House of the Talus.
They had just emerged from the shuttle when a circular door within
the hangar’s far wall opened like a sphincter. A robot came through, or at least that was what Jorge assumed it to be; spherical, about the size and shape of a spacecraft oxygen tank, it scuttled forward upon four multijointed legs resembling those of a spider. The machine moved toward them so quickly that both he and Inez instinctively stepped back. Manny remained where he was, though, and waited until it stopped in front of them.
“Greetings,” he said, hands at his sides. “I am Manuel Castro, diplomatic liaison to the Talus from the Coyote Federation. With me are Jorge Montero and Inez Sanchez, both of the Coyote Federation Corps of Exploration.”
As he spoke, a slender arm detached itself from the sphere’s base and extended toward them. At its end was a pair of lenses that rapidly telescoped and retracted as the arm twitched back and forth, inspecting each of the three visitors in turn. At the same time, a panel near the top of the sphere opened, allowing something that looked disturbingly like a gun barrel to protrude. If it was, indeed, a weapon of some sort, then it was aimed straight at them.
Manny had barely finished when the machine responded in a high-pitched chitter that sounded somewhat like that of a grasshoarder. Whatever its language was, it clearly wasn’t
hjadd
. Manny listened for a moment. “Yes, we’re here to see the High Council regarding a matter of some urgency.” Another outburst. “We’ve been invited, yes,” Manny continued. More chittering. “I assure you that we’re unarmed, and that my friends will abide by the protocols. Now, please, escort us to the meeting place.”
A pause, then the gun barrel disappeared, and the machine began to retreat, returning to the door from which it had appeared. “Come along,” Manny said quietly, not looking at Jorge and Inez. “My friend has agreed to take us there.”
“Some friend.” Jorge followed him, with Inez right behind. “A security ’bot, I take it?”
“Not exactly.” Manny kept his voice low. “You’re right about her job, but she isn’t a robot. She’s a
danui
. . . or at least that’s how she was born. Since then, though, she’s become their version of a Savant. The difference is, in her case, her brain was physically transplanted into a machine body, thereby allowing her to become a very efficient sentry.”
Inez stared at the
danui
cyborg. “Why?”
“Why not?” The buzz that signified Savant laughter. “The
danui
are naturally suspicious, and this particular one loves nothing more than interrogating new arrivals. Believe me, if I weren’t with you, you’d have been here for hours, arguing with her just for the sake of her amusement.”
The cyborg led them into a broad, steel-walled tunnel; the door behind them swirled shut as they walked down the corridor to an identical door. The sentry halted before it, her eyestalk twitching toward Manny. Once again, she voiced another demand. “I understand,” Manny replied, then he looked back at his companions. “My friend informs me this is both an airlock and also a sterilization area. Although we won’t have to undergo full-body decontamination, the Council does want to make sure that our clothes aren’t carrying any contagious microorganisms. So you’ll need to put on your masks and goggles once we go in.”
“Understood,” Jorge said. Manny responded to the
danui
in her own language, and a second later the door irised open, revealing a small, circular room. To Jorge’s surprise, the sentry didn’t follow them inside but remained in the corridor.
“She decided we’re harmless,” Inez said, as the door closed behind them.
“I had much the same impression, yes. Otherwise, she would’ve joined us.” Manny watched as she and Jorge donned their masks and goggles. “Just out of curiosity . . . the way you said that leads me to wonder if you picked up on her emotions.”
Inez didn’t respond for a moment. “In a manner of speaking,” she said at last, her voice distorted by the mask’s amplifier. “She might look like a ’bot, but her brain is organic. That was how I was able to pick up on her. It was . . . well, weird . . . to be able to sense an alien’s emotional state, but it was surprisingly human. Or humanlike, at least.”
“I see.” Manny was quiet for a few seconds. Panels within the ceiling turned red, and Jorge felt a subtle rise in temperature. He guessed that the room was being bathed in ultraviolet radiation. “But you can’t do that with me, of course.”
“No. Your intelligence is contained within a quantum comp, and so it’s inaccessible to me.”
“Interesting. I’d never thought of that.” Manny paused. “Still, I’d refrain from doing that during our meeting with the Council. Some of its members are empathic by nature, and I understand a few of them have some strong cultural taboos against uninvited sensing.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.” Looking at Jorge, she gave him a wink through her goggles. “I have plenty of practice in shutting out strong emotions of those around me.”
Jorge said nothing, but he was suddenly glad that the air mask hid his expression. How many times in the past had he entertained fantasies about her before he’d known that they were related? Again, he was uncomfortably reminded that she had been aware they were kin long before he was, and had been shutting out his feelings toward her.
A few seconds later he felt his ears pop from the lowered atmospheric pressure, then the ceiling resumed its former appearance. “We’re done,” Manny said. “Remember . . . the atmosphere we’re now in isn’t necessarily fatal, but you’ll pass out if you try to breathe it. So keep your mask on at . . . ah, here we go.”
Jorge turned to see two curved sections of the wall behind him split in half, sliding open to reveal a doorway that he hadn’t realized was there. On the other side of the door was a broad, elliptical chamber, its floor a smooth expanse of fine-veined black marble, its walls reflective black glass. The ceiling was a concave dome just a dozen feet above the floor, with indirect lighting from around its rim. No furniture of any sort, although there appeared to be a keyhole-shaped door on the opposite side of the room.