Visitor

  There was one concept Prakuyo had tried to emphasize.

  That association could not be broken.

  But what, exactly, did that mean? That things that had met would—what? Be doomed to go on meeting? That the outcome would always be the same? That this association could not be broken. Or that their several species could never undo the contact—which had, at their parting, never been resolved.

  The concept worked on a planetary surface where oceans and mountain ranges shaped the contacts one was bound to make, but space was not that way.

  Unless one counted that star systems, which developed in clusters and strings, as Jase had explained in some detail once—with empty spots and dust like mountain ranges and oceans. Starships didn’t jump into empty space. They jumped to the next safe and adequate point of mass, and set up bases—stations—at stars with useful resources.

  The fact remained that Prakuyo had been determined to characterize their small group, which included three distinct species, male and female, young and old . . . with that term association. A group that sat around watching vids and eating teacakes. And laughing.

  Where did one start, with that? Might its meaning to the kyo be something far more simple? Those who had met, could not unmeet? Perhaps it had an even broader scope: what was done couldn’t be undone—

  Kandana—major domo—opened the office door, entered quietly with a little bow. “Has the paidhi an answer for the dowager’s staff?”

  Do or do not. He had to decide. Now.

  He had to stay focused, bottom line. Half of him was beyond curious whether the dowager herself had any insights urgent and helpful on the issues raised in that transcript, but he suspected she had not. He suspected that Irene and staff problems with the guests was the matter of the dowager’s interest; and the body so wanted simply to plead exhaustion and sleep late for one, just one night’s—

  Running steps sounded in the hall, crossing from the foyer.

  Running, in an atevi household, never heralded good news.

  Kandana frowned and opened the door again—admitted Asicho, who bowed deeply.

  “Nandi. Nand’ Gin says—one cannot understand entirely—please call immediately. One wished her to delay but she hung up. She named the kyo. One does not know the detail.”

  A tick upward in heartbeat. “Thank you, nadi, nadiin. I shall manage.” Asicho was not the most fluent of his staff where it came to dealing with humans, Gin had a little Ragi, if only on certain topics, but the message came through. Asicho bowed and left, Kandana followed, closing the door silently behind him.

  The adrenaline surge stayed.

  Bren swung his chair about, punched two presets on the desk console, one the video display, first of which tracked the kyo position and clocked the routine ping of their mirrored message.

  The message wasn’t due yet. The position showed nothing changed, not rate of approach, not direction.

  Second preset was active Central, whichever Central was active, but preset number eight was one he’d established this afternoon, attached to Gin’s personal com.

  “Gin, Bren here. What’s going on? Has something changed?”

  He glanced at the clock: a little more than two hours before handoff to the atevi. Gin was not scheduled to be in Central at this hour. She had already had a long day, getting both shifts online and communicating with Ogun.

  “We’ve got an off schedule transmission,” Gin said. “May be a graphic. Phoenix senior tech consulted me, making the same guess as I made. They’re looking it over now. Should have an answer any minute. Are you at a console?”

  “My office, yes. I am.” Thank God he was dealing, for the first time since his arrival, with a calm, resourceful, and helpful Mospheiran director. He had a mental image of the techs, the room. Gin was likely there at the moment, working in concert with Phoenix techs on a routine she’d helped work out in the first place—translating kyo graphics with good success on black and white transmission. Color had not, at last viewing, been quite as satisfactory.

  “No verbal message?”

  “No. Stand by. I’ll window what I’m getting.”

  He saw a blank display pop up in the corner—he hadn’t used the system in a year, and he faltered a bit, toggling over to half-screen display.

  He saw tiny black lines. Saw the little bar that was the place-marker rip across and across and across.

  It was going fast. Blank space did that.

  White dot. Central of the line.

  Calibrating? he wondered.

  The white dot became longer, and longer with successive passes.

  Became a long white bar growing line by line. Then began a thicker white bar under it. That developed downward as a thick white vertical.

  Then a black dot appeared centered on the white.

  Line after line, and both the relative length and proportion of the thin line and the white vertical, now developing a black arc—that touched off a supposition. A hope.

  Another white dot appeared, off to the side, in the black. In a few more passes two images were developing simultaneously, and the black arc on the white vertical became a black circle.

  He guessed, over time, what the white vertical might be. What that second object, at a fair distance—might be. He waited, not willing to prejudice Gin or the techs.

  “I’m thinking that’s the mast,” Gin said finally. “That’s the docking mast. And I think that other shape is Phoenix. They’ve shortened the actual interval between the two by a third. They’re deliberately including the ship as part of the question. Either-or.”

  “I agree.”

  “They understand the station architecture, do you think, that being the docking port? God knows they had ample chance to observe it at Reunion.”

  “Prakuyo made an entry at Reunion, but I think it was through the hole they made.”

  “Deja vu.”

  “I hope not. They watched Phoenix lock onto Reunion. Probably they watched your shuttle dock this morning. At Reunion, the two ships locked to transfer Prakuyo. I’m thinking this is a query. There’s two choices in this frame. Phoenix. Or the station mast. I think we send them the one we want them to use.”

  “We can do either.” Calculations, metal and plastics and adaptation. Gin’s department. She’d been part of the operation when they’d linked ship to ship with the kyo the first time. “It’s your decision which.”

  The transmission was, over all, good news. The query about two docking modes removed one terrible possibility from the table—but immediately mandated he make decisions which had their own consequences. Offering a meeting aboard their own ship, using Phoenix as a base, would be comfortable for the kyo, and certainly secure. Offering the station was a more open, liberal gesture on their own part, though scarier and less comfortable for the kyo—who were born to a slightly greater gravity and whose version of room lighting was closer to dusk. But Prakuyo an Tep, at least, knew what the conditions would be.

  If only they were dealing with him. Her. Whatever Prakuyo was.

  The door opened. His aishid arrived quietly and lined the wall, aware that something significant was going on, probably listening all the while, and he was glad of their steadying presence. “The kyo seem to be proposing to dock,” he said to them in Ragi, and reporting it made it more real. “Station or ship, seems to be their question. One inclines to prefer the station.”

  Solemn, silent nods from those whose advice he most trusted. Acceptance, just acceptance. Anything he chose, they’d go with.

  “My bodyguard has come in,” he said to Gin, in Mosphei’. “They’re aware. I’m inclining toward requesting the kyo to come into the station. It gives us a base not dependent on ship command. And if the kyo are here to observe who we are, then offering the station seems more welcoming—given the situation that developed at Reunion.”

  “I’d
agree,” Gin said. “It’s to be an atevi operation, top to bottom, once they come aboard, am I right? Having ship politics interfering in this, even in minor details, would not be helpful, and I am definitely not proposing my section of the station for the honor.”

  “Agreed. Our answer needs to be a graphic of just the mast. I think they’ll ask more details as they get closer, technicals I can’t give. I can translate them. But I can’t come up with them.”

  “I can,” Gin said. “And Jase can. I’ll talk with ops, prepare them a suggested procedure. In graphics.”

  “I’ll let you get to work,” he said.

  “I’ll handle it. I’ll stay on in Central until it’s done and received. If that takes some of Lord Geigi’s shift, we’ll stay and do it. I trust that’s all right, if you’ll explain it to Lord Geigi. We’ll send everything past you.”

  “At any hour. I’ll advise Geigi to wake me if anything comes in.”

  “That’ll be a good idea.”

  “Gin.”

  “Yes.”

  “Thank you.” Fervently. He could only imagine managing this with Tillington in charge and Ogun hanging over Tillington’s shoulder. “Thank you, Gin.”

  “No problem,” Gin said, and there wouldn’t be. He believed it so far as anybody on the station could assure him of anything.

  He shut down, working his hands, which had gone cold, sorting his mind into Ragi. “The kyo have queried,” he said to his aishid, “about docking, and we have invited them to come in at the mast. I have made the decision without querying ship command, but one has already made it clear to them that the choices in this matter are all atevi choices. One wishes to advise the dowager that this has happened, however I now fear I must decline her invitation for breakfast. I have to rest.”

  “Indeed,” Banichi said. “You should. We should, Bren-ji.”

  It was the first time he could recall Banichi calling halt.

  He nodded slowly.

  “One gratefully accepts your advice, ’Nichi-ji. Bindanda has been trying to provide us a proper meal and you have more than deserved rest and a good breakfast tomorrow. Let the Guild Observers and the dowager’s guard deal with what comes. As soon as I approve Gin’s message, which should be in the next few moments, we shall sit and take a little tea, and then we shall all of us rest.”

  • • •

  Even with the best intentions, however, there was no escape from the problems, and the time was short. The question now, if they were to have the kyo on the station, was where to put the kyo that would be both comfortable and secure, in all senses.

  “I shall make a list of the kyo needs and ask Haiji,” Algini said, on the second round of tea. Haiji was Geigi’s Guild senior. “The gravity aboard the kyo ship was slightly greater, therefore they should be comfortable enough in that regard. One understands there are heated storage areas on another level within reasonable proximity of this section’s lift system, which, once converted, could provide not only comfort, but security for the visitors, and ease of access for the aiji-dowager. One believes Haiji will suggest those—the chart shows large spaces, having all useful connections, and with lift access—freight lift, but one believes a simple reprogramming of the system controls what cars stop. Haiji might have that information.”

  Leave it to his aishid to know more about the passages and parts of the space station than he had ever needed to ask: the Guild made a point of knowing the layout and resources of any place in which they operated, as soon as possible, and to whatever extent they could.

  “Do so,” Bren said. “Excellent notion.” And in one suggestion, that was a problem packed off, perhaps, to a good resolution. Haiji knew or knew where to obtain what they needed, and if Haiji did not, that information was surely something Geigi could find, and Geigi could move work crews required to make the necessary changes. Geigi had always said it was an hour’s work to move a noncritical wall.

  Time to prove that, it seemed. They needed a floor plan. A sketch, at least, of what the kyo needed. Atevi furnishings were large enough, at least the larger items. Geigi’s operation could move it or produce it, for that matter, in very short order. It might not be wood, but wood, fabric, stone . . . it could look like anything Geigi’s artisans wanted it to.

  “The kyo will perhaps wish to refuel,” Banichi said.

  “They might, and we shall offer it, but in point of fact, we have no idea what their ships use for fuel, or their efficiency. Phoenix could not carry sufficient for a round trip, Reunion to Alpha, but that does not mean the kyo ship has the same limitation.”

  It did, however, raise a good question. If the kyo ship did come in needing supply—that suggested either malevolent intent to take it or peaceful confidence that they would get it, each of which answers posed certain other questions.

  He shut that thought down. Fast. The kyo wanted to come aboard. They wanted to talk. Concentrate on that. Solve that problem properly and most others would resolve themselves.

  “We do not know how many visitors to expect,” Jago said.

  “We do not. They’ve given no indication, yet, how many or for how long. We shall just have to manage as we discover the situation. Still, I doubt that they would be seeking a long stay, unless their dealings at Reunion have made them fugitives from their own authorities, which one hopes not to be the case. I do not expect more than a few individuals ever to leave their ship. On the other hand, they may insist we come aboard.”

  “Either way, we shall be ready,” Jago said, and Bren felt another vertebra relax. Another concern successfully delegated. His aishid, Gin, Geigi . . . all the functional details were in hands in which he had utmost confidence.

  There remained one individual and one concern he had put off—and now, with preparations starting, she did need to be informed.

  Not a full meal. Not a discussion of human problems.

  Arrangements. Actual preparations for her joining him, actively working with the kyo.

  That trumped any politics going on in Geigi’s guest quarters.

  “Tell the aiji-dowager’s staff, nadiin-ji, that one would take great comfort in a cup of tea tomorrow mid-morning, if convenient. I shall have a report to give her, by then.”

  “Such an invitation will come,” Jago said. “We are assured the paidhi will have access at any request.”

  12

  It was after a late breakfast in his own apartment, with one of Bindanda’s most comforting concoctions of eggs and toast under his ribs, that Bren put on one of his good coats and slipped quietly—well, quietly for a man with four bodyguards—across the hall, where the dowager’s staff showed him immediately to the vacant sitting room, providing him a chair and a cup of tea, advising him that the dowager would join him momentarily.

  He had, he found on waking from a relatively sound sleep, one troubling question about his atevi allies in the upcoming meeting with the kyo, and that worry centered not around the dowager, but on the involvement of the young gentleman, and most particularly—on the young gentleman’s division of attention between his young associates and the business at hand.

  Specifically—and potentially delicate—there was suddenly a girl involved, in what sense a human was completely uncertain. There had been a threat to the young gentleman’s entire circle of associates of similar age.

  And there had been, Narani had informed him on inquiry, more than one instance of Irene or Irene and Cajeiri visiting Lord Geigi’s premises to settle some distress from Bjorn’s household. The young gentleman had been delegated to solve the guests’ problems, which apparently continued. Andressen-nadi wanted communications. He wanted to contact his company, which, for whatever reason, had not contacted him. And communication on the Mospheiran side of the wall was one thing Mr. Andressen definitely would not get.

  People had devotedly kept troubles away from him for a number of hours. They still were doin
g it. He didn’t doubt the dowager’s wisdom in asking Cajeiri to rein in his guests, and Irene helping Cajeiri was a reasonable arrangement. But Irene would soon be left to cope on her own, since Irene would definitively not be going down with them to the area they were setting up.

  He didn’t doubt the young gentleman’s usefulness when he was truly focused. Cajeiri was every inch Tabini’s son, at home in the court and in the affairs of nations. Cajeiri understood the give and take of diplomacy, having had the canniest set of teachers the world had to offer, and he had dealt with a scary lot of experiences that no nine-year-old, human or atevi, ought ever to have met. He could be uncannily practical and observant.

  Excepting the distraction of his young associates, one of whom was female and without parental supervision.

  He hadn’t wanted to think about the Reunioners.

  But with Narani’s report—that concern was back in the middle of things.

  No one knew better than Ilisidi what was currently at stake, both for her grandson and the future of the world, yet she had allowed this potential distraction to linger in her residence. There had to be a reason.

  And Andressen, meanwhile, wanted to talk to a Mospheiran company.

  A wonder any of the Reunioners were mentally stable, given what they’d endured over the last decade and more; and God knew the whole operation would have been in far worse shape if Irene hadn’t been the brave, clear-headed kid she was.

  Irene was also the fragile one, the one whose adults had all failed her. Of all the kids—this girl had turned up resident in the dowager’s apartment, with, apparently, the dowager’s blessing.

  The dowager didn’t make emotional decisions.

  Well, not ordinarily.

  At least not the soft-hearted sort.

  So was there an atevi reason for the distraction, a reason lodged somewhere in the dowager’s known biases . . . her protectiveness of her great-grandson, for instance?