Fiction Vortex - May 2014

  "You are the next Gobind Prasad?"

  Lina wilted under the Thrumm's inquiry.

  "The ship is irreparable." Tuvad glanced at the wreckage. "We have no way off planet."

  "And the samples?" she asked.

  "The aft section is completely destroyed." Tuvad's cilia flowed in arcs of sadness, although Lina couldn't tell whether it was for the ship or the tissue samples.

  Her vision blurred as she blinked back tears. She took a deep breath, the chill air tickling her lungs. She needed to see his body.

  "Can you lead us back to Prasad's lab?" Lina asked the Thrumm.

  "You are incapable of matching my overland speed."

  "Can you move more slowly?"

  "No."

  Lina's legs trembled, a hollow growing in the pit of her stomach. Her father would've known what to do. The great Gobind Prasad — scientist, diplomat, and adventurer — the man who had been involved in more first-contact situations than any member of any race. He was a legend. His daughter though, she couldn't even beg help from an alien who had just saved her life.

  Lina took a few calming breaths, she was just coming at this the wrong way. "Could you carry us?"

  "Yes." The Thrumm dropped to the ground, almost crushing Captain Tuvad. Lina helped drag Blue-Green-Green-Red onto the crablike alien's rough dorsal shell. The Fostern's limbs would grow back in a few weeks, but for now Blue could only manage a slow crawl.

  The Thrumm scuttled sideways, moving fast enough to blow Lina's hair back from her face. The rocky plain sped by, a floor of dark red pumice dotted by patches of purple scrub. Here and there, like pools of liquid silver, worm colonies flowed across the landscape, devouring all in their path. Lina squinted at one of the shining masses. Could they really be sentient?

  Her father's laboratory came into view — a ramshackle collection of pre-fab drop pods, their skeletal ferro-plastic walls warped and blackened by flames. It could've been any one of a million modular research units, but Lina knew it well. Although the scenery had changed from world to world, the lab was still the closest thing she had to a home, at least until she was old enough for boarding school,

  "What happened?" Lina rubbed stinging eyes as the wind shifted to blow the caustic smoke in their direction.

  "There was a fire." The Thrumm's mechanical voice held no hint of sarcasm.

  "I know, but why?"

  "Doctor Prasad ignited flammable chemicals in an attempt to forestall being devoured. He was unsuccessful."

  "Is it safe?" she asked.

  "The flames and worms are gone."

  Lina jumped down from the Thrumm's back and started for the lab. She shouldn't have been surprised it would end like this. It was always her father's way — too little, too late, even in death.

  ~~~~~

  "TAGCAT?" Tuvad played his handbeam across the scorched minivid display. They'd spent almost an hour picking over the laboratory and found nothing but this single phrase.

  "That's definitely his handwriting," Lina said.

  "Truly? I thought perhaps the worms might have written it," Tuvad said. The N'ktheed had been peevish since Lina informed him that the Sapient Coalition would almost certainly not replace his ship.

  "There's nothing salvageable here." Tuvad turned away, tentacles crunching over broken glass.

  "There's no body." She looked up at the Thrumm, who peered in through one of the many holes in the laboratory.

  "The worms ate all of him."

  "How do you know?"

  "I watched."

  "You didn't help?"

  "There was nothing I could do."

  Lina bit back an angry response, turning back to the lab rather than let the Thrumm see her flustered. She prodded a broken specimen jar with her foot, and it rolled to reveal the body of a tiny silver worm. She tightened the ray of her handbeam and squatted for a better look.

  The worm was about six centimeters long, its seamless quicksilver body oozing digestive acid from the anterior opening. Other specimens lay about the cluttered lab in various stages of dissection.

  Lina frowned. Why was her father cutting them open if he thought they were intelligent? Apart from the cryptic words on the display, nothing remained to hint at his research.

  Tuvad ducked back in the room. "There are sealed crates in one of the storerooms."

  Lina nodded, curiosity taking a back seat to survival. The hardened crates were blackened, but otherwise unharmed. With the Thrumm's help, they extracted them from the ruined dome and cracked open the pressure seals.

  One of the crates contained survival and medical gear, no doubt intended for field research. The others held a jumble of strange equipment.

  "I don't suppose you know what all this is for?" Lina glanced at the Thrumm.

  "Doctor Prasad did not explain the purpose of these particular components."

  Something tugged at Lina's pant leg. She looked down to see Blue-Green-Green-Red. The Fostern's skin rippled in patterns of ochre and taupe.

  "Slow down, I can't understand you." Lina squinted at the shifting colors, but although she caught the Fostern's general tone of excitement, Blue's words were too fast to follow. She turned back to the Thrumm, and pointed at the metal box on its side. "Can I borrow that?"

  "I will not prevent you."

  Lina reached up to activate the translator's visual sensors.

  "...on Fortean 248. Over a million units decanted before Conclave investigators shut down the operation, but he was practically a nation in his own right by then. So there really wasn't much they could do but recognize him as Prime Minister." The words flowed from the translator in a quick stream.

  Tuvad writhed with surprise. "I always considered my companion a creature of few words."

  Lina sniffed. "It was probably the translator. Those cheaper models only transmit the gist of the message. Blue, could you start over, slower?" The translator's video transmitter flashed in a kaleidoscope of winking lights and colors.

  "Of course. What you see here is a disassembled cloning facility, although the birthing crèches appear too small to create members of any known race. Perhaps the Doctor intended it for organ replacement. Black market parts are worth—"

  Lina held up a hand. "I doubt my father was setting up a clone farm."

  Tuvad touched her shoulder. "Why? Pashtun is far from normal shipping lanes — the perfect place to set up an operation. It would explain the request for genetic samples from Coalition member races. After all, does his research not require funding?"

  "After the Thrumm breakthrough, he had to practically turn grants away." Lina drew back from the Captain's tentacle. In his letter to the Advisory Committee, her father had called the worms the discovery of the century. She'd told herself that was why she'd volunteered to carry the samples, not because she wanted to show him how much she'd accomplished without his help.

  "Perhaps he wished to clone the worms?" Blue asked.

  "What would that accomplish?" Lina looked at each of the aliens in turn.

  "It doesn't matter what he was doing." Tuvad interlaced his manipulator tentacles. "We should focus on getting rescued."

  Lina turned to the N'ktheed. "When I don't contact the council, they'll send a ship to investigate. We'll be rescued in a few days, a week at most."

  "If we're not eaten." The Captain went back to rifling through the scattered parts.

  Lina swallowed, hands at her sides. All her life she'd been trapped in the shadow of a man she hardly knew. Even the other Council members whispered that she'd earned her position by virtue of her father, when in reality, his exploits had dogged her every step of the way.

  "We should continue his research." Lina's declaration surprised even her.

  "What research?" Tuvad gestured at the lab. "All I see are ruins."

  "You and Blue can get the lab working again, I can collect what data remains, and the Thrumm, well, I'm sure it can help, somehow."

  "Gobind Prasad couldn't prove the worms' sentience. Wha
t do you think we'll be able to do?"

  There it was. No matter how high she climbed, he was always waiting.

  "He's not a real doctor," Lina said.

  "What?"

  "The title is honorary — my father never finished his degree. I, on the other hand, have two."

  "Congratulations." Tuvad went back to rooting through the debris.

  Lina swallowed the urge to scream. Tuvad and Blue were the only trained engineers on the planet, and she wouldn't get their help by throwing a fit.

  "The Coalition will pay for information on the worms," she said after a few calming breaths.

  A few of the Captain's sense cilia swiveled in her direction. "Are you speaking as a representative of the Scientific Advisory Council?"

  Lina paused. The lab was compromised and the subject of study extremely dangerous. Protocols were clear: They should remain at the crash site and await rescue, not risk their lives pursuing a line of inquiry that had already left one researcher dead. She was overstepping her authority, risking her position, perhaps even her credentials, and for what — to prove her worth to a man who hadn't cared about her even when he was alive? Why did she want this so much?

  Lina spread her hands wide, fingers straight and rigid, mimicking the N'ktheed position of honorable intent. "Yes, I speak on behalf of the Council."

  "We have little to lose, Captain." The translator spoke for Blue-Green-Green-Red.

  "Except our lives," Tuvad said.

  "If the worms want us dead, there's not much we can do to stop them," Lina said.

  Tuvad drooped. "So be it. Blue and I will assist you in continuing Prasad's research, for an equal share of the profits."

  "Done." Lina intertwined her fingers with Tuvad's cilia. "You can assemble the cloning apparatus while I see what I can learn from our new friend." She hooked a thumb at the silent Thrumm.

  "Do you think it'll want a share?" Tuvad leaned close. Lina tried not to pull away as his manipulator tentacles caressed her hands and face. Physical contact was important for the N'ktheed.

  "Its own race doesn't even consider it a person. I don’t think we have to worry about it wanting a cut."

  ~~~~~

  "You are the next Gobind Prasad?"

  Lina was getting tired of that question. The Thrumm seemed unable to recognize her as a discrete individual. She recalled that Thrumm religion only acknowledged a fixed number of identities. Reincarnation was a concept Lina knew well, but the Thrumm claimed to be able to transfer memories and personalities from individual to individual. While the idea fascinated her in theory, it was proving quite frustrating in practice.

  Lina had spent hours grilling the hulking alien for information about Prasad and his research, but every time she seemed to be making progress, her line of inquiry ended in the same monotone response.

  "You are the next Gobind Prasad?" The Thrumm's mantra overwhelmed Lina's thoughts like vedic chant.

  She threw up her hands. "Yes, I'm the next Gobind Prasad!"

  "Welcome back, Doctor Prasad. I see you are now gendered female." The Thrumm rocked back and forth in approximation of a nod, a gesture it must have learned from Lina's father.

  "That’s me. Female." She bobbed her head back at the Thrumm. "Now, tell me about my research."

  "You already know about your research. You are Gobind Prasad."

  Lina slapped the ground in frustration. She was tempted to give the interrogation up for a lost cause, but there had to be something. She just needed to ask different questions.

  "Okay, what are your thoughts on my research?"

  "Your hypothesis is correct."

  "And what made you think that?"

  "The field of statues."

  "The field of statues?" Lina blinked. "Of course. How could I forget? We should go there ... again."

  The Thrumm dropped to the ground. After a moment's surprise, Lina clambered onto its back, and they were off.

  "We're going to investigate something!" Lina called as she sped past Tuvad and Blue. The Captain shouted back, but his words were lost in the wind of the Thrumm's passing.

  The worms were everywhere. Colonies of varying sizes surged across the landscape, pausing only to attack one another. Lina halted the Thrumm so she could observe one of the battles from a safe distance.

  The first colony disgorged twenty wriggling worms, which crawled over to the second colony, where they were promptly devoured. Then, the second colony launched a similar assault. This continued for almost an hour. Sometimes sorties would occur at the same time, but the two small parties of worms never attacked each other, always crawling for the central mass.

  It seemed a strange way to wage war. The worms didn't appear to be struggling over resources, and had no apparent territory. Was it some form of ritualized combat?

  The sun dipped below the horizon as the Thrumm continued over the increasingly treacherous terrain. It scaled almost vertical cliffs with ease, skittering up and over boulders that Lina would have needed a grav-belt to navigate. She was grateful for the darkness, as it saved her from seeing just how high they were. Without the fear and adrenaline, Lina was lulled by the Thrumm's gently rocking gate. She looped her harness around one of the alien's spiky protrusions and dozed.

  The sun was low in the sky when Lina woke. They were dangling below a sweeping overhang, one of the Thrumm's massive claws wedged into a fissure in the rock. She crawled to the edge of its shell and peered down.

  The valley swarmed with worms. Colonies flowed in and around vast columns of perforated stone hundreds of meters tall like termites in a monolithic hive. On the plains Lina had witnessed combats between two and even three colonies, but the battles below contained hundreds. She swallowed, suddenly not sure if she wanted to communicate with the worms.

  It was clear they'd created the stone pillars, dissolving the mountain away to produce a work of monumental architecture that dwarfed any on old Earth.

  Lina's first thought was that the columns were part of a massive dwelling, but the worms did not appear to actually live in the pillars, and there was no indication that they were bringing anything in or out of the valley. Why create giant structures if not as homes or storehouses? The Thrumm had called this place the Field of Statues.

  Then it made sense. Those weren't buildings, they were art.

  Lina grinned. The worms had culture, which meant they were intelligent. Now she just needed to find a way to talk to them without getting eaten.

  "Thrumm, would you please take me back to camp?"

  "Yes, Doctor Prasad."

  In the daylight Lina could see every crevasse, every boulder, every sheer drop. She tried looking up at the sky, but found herself searching for the contrails of descending skip-landers.

  Lina screwed her eyes shut and tried to concentrate, but try as she might, her thoughts kept returning to her father. Was she doing this to prove herself better than him, to show she could succeed where he'd failed? That wasn't it — she'd surpassed him in other ways, was recognized by her peers for discoveries just as important. The fame? Docudramas and serialized action vids had never interested her. Again, it just didn't feel right.

  If the worms were intelligent, she couldn’t just let someone else pick up where her father left off. The Council would assign some other field agent to the research, that and censure Lina for numerous breaches of protocol. And yet, she didn't want to back away.

  This was hers — he owed her that much, at least.

  She thought back to the specimens in her father's lab. The worms had no obvious eyes or ears, and only a very limited neural network. From what Lina remembered, their insides were mostly digestive tract. Perhaps they communicated by touch? Other races like the N'ktheed used tactile exchanges as communication. She ran through the information in her head, trying to fit the disparate pieces together: the miniature cloning machine, the statues, the words on the minivid display.

  "Tag cat." It was nonsense, just like everything else on Pashtun. The wor
ms made no sense. The colonies themselves seemed to act with one mind, but she hadn't seen any interaction between separate swarms outside of them attacking and devouring one another.

  She was coming at this the wrong way. Her father was dissecting the worms. Maybe he did want to clone them. She'd need to gather new specimens.

  Lina sighed. Tuvad wasn't going to like this.

  ~~~~~

  "Get if off me! Get it kreeeeee!" The Captain slipped into his native tongue, panicked screeches almost deafening as Lina's tongs closed around the writhing worm.

  "Hold still!" She dropped the worm into the specimen tube, narrowly avoiding its squirt of digestive bile. "Okay, we've got enough. Blue, hit the flamer!"

  Lina crossed her fingers as the cannibalized maneuvering thruster cycled up to a low burn. Blue had assured her it would work, but, then again, Blue had also assured her that landing on Pashtun would be easy. The colony was less than ten meters away, boiling toward them like a spring flood. The Thrumm hefted the engine's heavy exhaust port and pointed it in the direction of the worms. The thruster coughed and spat a puff of smoke.

  "Don't hit them!"

  The engine jerked, red-orange wash spewing from the exhaust port. The wave of heat snatched the air from Lina's lungs. She stumbled backwards as the Thrumm played the flames across the swarm's path. The colony rolled back into itself, worms flashing with reflected firelight. It was almost beautiful.

  "We must leave!" Tuvad plucked at her arm, and the two of them staggered away. Specimen jars tinkled on Lina's web-belt as the worms inside twisted and thrashed. They climbed a low rise to look back at the conflagration. There was a loud pop as the engine stuttered and died. The Thrumm flung the smoking wreckage aside and retreated across the blackened foliage, heavy legs pumping to keep ahead of the roiling carpet of worms. It crested the ridge, and stopped.

  Lina reached up, feeling the soft suction of Blue's tube feet as she was pulled onto the Thrumm's back.

  "Let us hope we learn much from these specimens, because our actions could not have left a very good impression." Tuvad pulled himself up after her. His waving cilia were smudged with ash and soot. Lina doubted her face was any cleaner. She hoped the Captain was right — it would be devastating if the worms' first message was a declaration of war.