We were back to our starting point almost before I knew it. The lifelines linking our virtual selves to reality reappeared, extruding from our mirror images like glowing fiber optics, arcing toward infinity.
My relief at knowing our bodies were still alive and out there came and went like a smile as I remembered the final test of my own initiation into cyberspace.
(This is the worst part,) I thought, forcing Miya’s still-expanding wonder to downsize and center on us. I’d done everything I’d had to do the first time I’d worked c-space with Deadeye … and then I’d nearly lost it all when I tried to break the interface and resurface. (What we become in here isn’t us, no matter how real it seems. We have to let all this go. But it’ll still feel like we’re committing suicide. Do you trust me—?)
(Trust me …) she echoed, even though I felt her aching, not with fear but with regret; felt her yearning to explore more of the cascading dream landscape she’d only glimpsed on our journey.
(Hold on,) I thought gently. (Stay with me—) The first time I’d done this I’d only gotten through it because my terror of being left alone in here, abandoned by Deadeye, had been worse than my fear of death. I’d been scared shitless through the whole ordeal; nothing like Miya’s response. But then, I hadn’t been with Miya, and she hadn’t been with me. It was as if she’d been born to do this. I wondered whether all Hydrans would react the same.
I felt her mind bleed into my own as pure energy consumed us, as our bodies merged, radiant, as our last coherent thoughts dissolved … as we held each other for the last time in a kiss before dying.…
* * *
I opened my eyes to the data kiosk’s lightplay, the shadowed alcove, my finger still fused to the access. I drew my hand away, surprised to find that I hadn’t become part of the machine. There was no feeling up half the length of my arm. I shook it out, felt sensation come back in an excruciating rush that made me wish it had stayed numb. My body wanted to slide down the kiosk to the ground and not get up again.
Miya’s movements were clumsy, her nervous system still making the transition back to the physical, like mine was. But as she looked at me and realized where we were, what we’d done—that we were still alive—euphoria filled her. (I want to go back. I want it again—) She put her arms around me and kissed me the way I’d kissed her when we’d first gone inside. The kiss went on and on between us, as if cyberspace was an erotic drug; until I began to think what had happened the other night in my hotel room was going to happen again, right here in the middle of the street.
Daeh and Remu appeared in my line of sight, gaping at us. Daeh swore out loud. “They’re coming!” he shouted. “What are you doing? They’re coming!”
Miya stiffened. (Humans—?)
“CorpSec?” I said, my words tangling in her thoughts. But we didn’t need to ask. Miya held me closer and teleported us away.
TWENTY-ONE
WE WERE BACK with Naoh and the others. Daeh and Remu followed us by seconds.
Naoh was waiting for us as we appeared. As she saw us she froze. I didn’t understand why until I realized that we were still holding each other, still only a few breaths away from a kiss, our bodies, our faces, betraying our hunger for each other even here, now, in the middle of a war zone.
I let go of Miya. She let go of me, her face flushing.
(We sent the message, Naoh—) Miya’s senses were still so heightened that I could feel every nerve ending in her body. I wondered whether I was the only one or whether everyone in the room could feel our every finger and toe, our beating hearts. (Naoh, we entered the Humans’ comm web.… It was like the dreams of the an lirr. The starport is aware! We can go back—)
I reached out, pulled my hand back uncertainly, wanting to stop her before she told the others too much. She’d kept her psi link open to me; kept her promise. But she still trusted these people too much, way more than I did.
The others looked up as the images registered, their weary, grief-stricken faces coming alive. As comprehension and then hope began to show in their eyes, it was even hard for me not to believe she’d made the right choice.
I crossed the room to where Joby was sitting, his small face empty, like he was barely aware of what was going on around him. The other Satoh might watch over him while Miya was away, but they weren’t doing more than they had to, to help him. Or maybe they simply didn’t know how.
“Joby,” I said softly. I crouched down, holding out my arms to him: doing it because I hoped that would distract Miya before she said too much, doing it because I couldn’t stand the emptiness in his eyes.
Miya glanced at us. I felt her thoughts reach out and weave into his mind, ordering and augmenting his senses. The next second she was standing beside me, taking Joby into her own arms.
As I looked up Naoh was watching the three of us together, the way she’d watched the two of us before. I looked away as our eyes met. So did she.
All at once the other Satoh turned like one person, looking toward the empty center of the room. My eyes followed them like an afterthought. Three more figures were standing there, so suddenly that I wasn’t sure whether everyone else had turned to look at them before they arrived or after.
The first of the new arrivals was Hanjen. The second was one of the Satoh. They supported the third one between them: Grandmother. Her clothing was torn and bloody; her face was a mass of bruises.
I’d crossed the room on foot before anyone else had even reacted. It was like they’d been paralyzed by the sight of her, or stunned by her pain. I shoved the stranger aside and helped Hanjen move her to where we could ease her down onto a makeshift bed of piled rugs.
Miya was beside me suddenly, with Joby still in her arms. I took him from her as she offered Grandmother a cup of water she’d conjured from somewhere. She helped Grandmother drink, gently wiped blood from the oyasin’s face and hands.
Wherever Grandmother’s flesh showed through her ruined clothing, the skin was bruised or broken. I even thought I saw burns. I looked away, sickened, before I had to be sure.
“Stay back!” Miya said fiercely as the others began to come closer. They backed off. Helpless rage bled from her thoughts into mine, staining my vision crimson; but she never looked away from Grandmother, not flinching from the damage as she did what she could to ease it.
I felt her mind shift into a nonverbal mode I could barely access. She passed her hands over Grandmother’s body as if they held a medical scanner. Her concentration flickered, her face contorted with pain as she paused over the worst of the injuries.
I felt her do something then with her psi that I had no words to describe. It was healing of a kind I’d never seen, so that I wasn’t even sure whether she was trying to mend torn tissue or only ease the pain. All I was sure of was the pain it cost Miya for each bit of the oyasin’s pain she took away. I kept my mind open, letting as much of the pain pass through her into me as she’d allow. Joby whimpered, as if no one had enough control to protect him completely. I held him closer, biting my lip.
The others gathered around us, watching. I felt their eyes glance off me, again and again; but whatever their thoughts were, they kept them hidden.
“What happened?” Naoh demanded, looking at Hanjen.
He shook his head, his face gray, like he was sharing Grandmother’s pain along with us. “She appeared, in my home. They did this, to an oyasin—!” His voice shook.
“Did she escape from them?” Naoh asked.
“I doubt it,” I said, remembering what they’d done to me. “They must have let her go.” I leaned forward beside her. “Grandmother,” I said softly. “Why did they do this to you? Did they tell you?”
She nodded, struggling to raise her head; Miya held her, supporting her. Miya’s presence in my mind cut off suddenly, leaving me alone in silence. I sucked in a breath, caught by surprise. Miya glanced at me as she wiped her face on her sleeve, wiping away sweat or tears. The look told me the oyasin was taking all her strength, all the he
aling support she had now. And then her eyes were back on Grandmother.
“Oyasin,” I murmured. “Did they send you back with a message? Why did they send you back like this?”
“Bian!” Miya said querulously, like I was acting too Human.
But Grandmother lifted her hand, a barely visible motion. “No.… Bian is right. It is important.…” Her eyes were a deeper green than I remembered, without a veil to conceal them. She shook her head slightly. “Ah, Bian. I told you that you shouldn’t come.…”
But I wasn’t hurt. I froze, realizing that it wasn’t over yet. My throat constricted as I whispered, “I had to. You know I had to.”
She nodded slightly, her eyes filled with depths of sorrow. “The one who hates us all.…”
“Borosage?” I asked.
She nodded again. “He said that I must tell you this: He has taken so many of our people. They will be freed only…”
“If we give back the boy?” Naoh finished it, her voice poisoned with hatred.
“No,” Hanjen said, interrupting for the first time. “That is no longer enough. He wants all of the Satoh to surrender … or the ones they took will not be released, and there will be more reprisals.”
“Son of a bitch,” I muttered in Standard. Everyone looked at me. I wished I hadn’t reminded them or myself again that I was half Human.
“And is that why you came here, Hanjen?” Naoh demanded. “Have you brought drugs and binders to make us surrender?” The others around her stirred restlessly, frowning.
Hanjen frowned too. “You know it isn’t. My mind is open to you: see it, feel it. I am no friend of the Humans. I will never forgive what they did today! Even if you were not—” He broke off.
I felt the sudden pang of Miya’s shame. My mind filled with blurry memories of Hanjen, of all he’d meant to her, to Naoh, once; of all they’d once meant to him.
“But I will never forgive you, either, Naoh,” Hanjen whispered. His fists knotted at his sides as he looked around the room. “Any of you. I only came here because the oyasin asked it. I am taking her to the hospital now. I hope all of you will pray that our ‘superior’ minds and inferior medical technology can save her from what the Humans have done to her.” For the first time, the word “Humans” sounded like a curse from his lips. “You claimed all along that you wanted to help our people: I leave it up to you whether you surrender to the Humans or bring even more suffering and grief down on us all.” He kneeled down beside Grandmother.
Let me help you— I almost said it out loud, before I realized that there was nothing at all I could do. The same impulse filled Miya’s mind; I wasn’t even sure whose idea it had been first. But then she remembered Joby—that his safety depended on her. She glanced at the other Satoh in the room, all of them her friends, her comrades. This time she looked at them like they were strangers.
She looked back at Grandmother lying in Hanjen’s arms. Grandmother’s body spasmed suddenly, and Hanjen paled. A wave of sickening grief crested over Miya’s defenses and rolled through me. Joby began to wail. And then all at once the perfect clarity of Grandmother’s vision touched us all—even me—one last time, in a blessing and an absolution. And then she was gone.
Her body lay in Hanjen’s arms, the green eyes staring like she’d been caught in a moment of awe. A raw noise of grief filled his throat. His arms constricted, holding her close. He rocked her lifeless body slowly, making no sound now, but with a look on his face that I felt to my bones. Everyone around me wore the same look of devastation, even Naoh. Miya sank to her knees beside him, clinging to his leg. Her choking sobs shook my body.
I reached out to close Grandmother’s eyes, touching her as gently as my unsteady hand could manage, with her sightless gaze looking through me at something beyond. No one moved to stop me. No one moved at all.
I took my hand away as Hanjen got to his feet. He lifted the oyasin’s broken body as easily as if it weighed nothing, now that her soul had left it. “Never,” he repeated, his stare including us all. “I will never forgive you.” (Never—) Holding Grandmother in his arms, he gathered in his thoughts like torn netting and teleported.
The sigh of air as he disappeared was like the sorrow of the breathing universe. Naoh stared at the emptiness where they’d been seconds before. Her face was as desolate as Death’s.
The others were asking questions now, out loud and silently; my ears heard them. Miya’s mind registered them as she struggled to pull her thoughts back together.
“What will we do?”
(The oyasin, she’s—)
“No, we can’t.…”
“The Humans, it’s all the Humans’ fault!”
(What will we do now—?)
Death. Death all around me.… I held on to Miya, barely aware that she was holding on to me now, only aware of death, emptiness.…
Naoh’s gaze settled on Joby, cradled between us, still sobbing.
Miya looked up suddenly. The anguish inside her spiraled out of control as the holocaust of Naoh’s need for justice/vengeance blistered our senses. All the minds around us went up like tinder; I felt their emotions burn through each other’s defenses until they were all one mind, and it was blind to reason.
I wrenched my mind free of the maddening input that poured through my psi link with Miya. (Joby!) I thought, shouting against the firestorm. Joby was all that mattered: protecting him, finding a way to get him to safety.…
“We will not surrender,” Naoh said, her voice dripping blood. “I would rather be dead! Let the rest of the Community decide for themselves whether they fight to live—or die for no reason.” There was no doubt anywhere in her mind, in any mind around us. “Miya, you have to show us now how to access the Humans’ computers.…”
Miya bent her head, her resolve softening like candle wax in the heat of their shared fury.
“Naoh,” I said desperately. “We’ve sent a message off-world. We’ll be getting help soon. We could leave town, hide out deep in the Homeland; or we could stall them some other way—lie, fake our own deaths, anything just to stay alive until then—”
“No Humans will ever negotiate for us, listen to us, or help us, even if everything you claim is true, Bian,” she said. Her voice was flat, without the rage I’d heard in it before, but her eyes hadn’t changed. “We are not afraid to die. They can’t break us with fear. But we would rather live, to lead our people’s rebirth.… And you’ve given us another Way, just as you promised. We will destroy the Humans with their own technology, before they can use it against us again.”
Something turned cold inside me. “Teaching you to interact with their datanet will take a lot of time, which we haven’t got—and a private port, which we haven’t got either, now that Hanjen’s cut us off. And I don’t see any other way—”
“You are the Way.” She pointed a linger at me. “I know you’re lying to us now, because you’re afraid to share your secrets—you can’t hide what Miya knows from me.”
I looked at Miya; she looked away helplessly.
“But even if it’s true that we can’t learn their technology and how to use it in time, even your lies prove you are the one who can help us survive until we can learn how. Only you are someone who can do it for us.”
“What?” I said, already sure that I wasn’t going to like the answer. “What do you mean?”
“Hurt them. Hurt them like they hurt you, us, all our people.… They tortured the oyasin and sent her to us to die, because they think we’re cowards! We have the boy. We’ll send him back to them the same way. Then they’ll know that they should fear us—”
“Naoh!” Miya said thickly, “you swore we wouldn’t hurt Joby!” Joby began to cry again, frightened by emotions neither one of them could control. She rocked him, hushing him, wiping away his tears.
“And we won’t.” Naoh looked at me. “Let Bian do it,” she said, like she was telling me to wipe his nose.
“Bian is one of us!” Miya said.
“Of
course he is.” Naoh shrugged. “But he can lie like a Human; he can even kill like a Human. He has killed and survived. He’s different. That’s why we found him. He can do this easily.”
“Easily?” I said, starting to tremble. “You think it was easy for me to kill somebody, even in self-defense? It cost me my Gift! I might as well have died. What the hell do you think I really am? If you even think I’d ever touch him—” I felt Miya inside my head, her psi manifesting in a way I didn’t understand; until suddenly I realized that she was trying to teleport—trying to focus Joby’s mind clearly enough to carry him with her and still find the strength to take me too. (Go!) I thought frantically. (Get him out. Just get him out—)
“Naoh,” I said, groping for any coherent thought, any distraction to give Miya the time she needed. “Hurting Joby won’t stop Tau. It only makes us like them. It means they’ve already destroyed us. The Humans see us as less than … than lirr.” The Human lexicon in my brain translated the word for “sentient being” as “Human.” “If we—” I felt the soft breath of air behind me that told me Miya and Joby were gone.
“Miya!” Naoh cried. Her face went white with fury. “You sent her away—?” she said to me, half a question, half a demand.
“No,” I said. “You did.” I held her gaze until at last she looked down.
She looked up at me again, finally, and I felt every green, long-pupiled eye in the room fixed on me, like all their minds held the same thought—and the thought was always hers. “You claim you still believe in our cause?”
I nodded, wondering what kind of choice she thought I had. Miya was gone, and I was helpless without her, lost in the wasteland that surrounded my mind.
“So you refuse to be a terrorist, like the Humans? But you said if the Human pacifist Gandhi had faced Tau, he would have been killed. Where does that leave us?” she demanded. “What is the answer?”
This time I looked down and shook my head.