The Champion

  “In a few hours. You can stay in this room until that time.”

  “Most of us will,” Quentin said, his eyes never leaving the black X-Walker who had tricked him into coming here. “But I need a place to have a word with one of my teammates, in private, and I need it now.”

  17

  Believer

  WITH A DOZEN SILVER ROBOTS following along, Hulsey led Quentin and Bumberpuff down a gleaming corridor and into an empty room. The small space was like everything else he’d seen so far, more bubble than room, but there was nothing in there other than polished metal walls, a floor and a curved ceiling embedded with rings.

  Hulsey stood at the door. “Will this do?”

  Quentin nodded. “It’s fine. Leave us.”

  She had to know Quentin was on the edge of murder — from the slit-eyed scowl he felt on his face, from the uncontrollable sneer twisting his mouth — but she didn’t seem to care. Perhaps it was as she had said earlier: on this massive ship, life was cheap. She left the room. Her squadron of silver robots stayed behind. The knee-high machines moved to the smooth walls, where they stood as still as statues.

  The door hissed shut.

  Quentin stared at Bumberpuff, at his supposed friend.

  “Tell me why you put my sister’s life at risk,” he said. “Tell me why you put Fred’s life at risk, all our lives at risk. Tell me why you lied to me.”

  The last three words came out as an unexpected scream, grating and coarse in the small, smooth space.

  Bumberpuff didn’t move. Some of the tiny metallic minids that made up the X-Walker’s limbs started wiggling, rattling in place. Maybe the captain sensed Quentin’s open hostility, maybe the biotech body was reacting on its own, the Prawatt equivalent of a nervous twitch, of blinking too fast, of an anxious fear at being alone with someone who could hurt you, who could kill you.

  “Quentin, I am not sure what happened, but I give you my word that I had no knowledge of it. I was once a soldier — I would never put civilian lives at risk.”

  Even now, after all this time, it was hard to reconcile that perfectly Human voice with a machine, alive but still artificial. Bumberpuff had no face, very few physical signs of emotion. But if you didn’t look, if you just listened, you couldn’t tell a Prawatt apart from a Human.

  So that’s exactly what Quentin did.

  “Tell me again,” he said and closed his eyes. He wanted to hear the truth, whatever that truth might be. “Tell me you were used just as badly as I was. Tell me you didn’t betray me — tell me you didn’t use my sister like a cheap political sacrifice.”

  “I would never betray you,” Bumberpuff said, the words coming instantly, urgently. “You are my teammate.”

  His voice rang heavy with emotion, with anguish, perhaps even a touch of shock that Quentin could think such a thing. If Bumberpuff was a liar, he excelled at it.

  “I was a conduit,” the Prawatt said. “The Old Ones took control of me, used me to communicate.”

  Quentin nodded slowly, but kept his eyes closed.

  “Then call her back,” he said. “Or bring her forward or whatever it is that happened. I want to speak to her, right now.”

  “It doesn’t work that way,” Bumberpuff said. “In truth, I don’t even understand what happened. We are much too far away from Prawatt space for her to communicate in real time. That message she gave, it was some kind of recording.”

  Quentin’s eyes opened. His temper threatened to overtake him, push the conversation to a disastrous outcome.

  “That was no recording” he said. “She interacted with Hulsey, spoke directly to her.”

  “Then Petra did something else,” Bumberpuff said. “Perhaps embedded a part of her consciousness in me.”

  “Why didn’t she just come herself? Why didn’t she send another ship instead of using my sister and Rosalind and all of us?”

  “I can’t presume to explain the thoughts of a supreme being.” Bumberpuff sounded genuine, yet also ashamed at being a pawn. There was another tone in there, one that sickened Quentin; a hint of amazement, of reverence — the living god had been served.

  “I don’t know what Petra did to me,” Bumberpuff said. “All I can tell you is that I would never lie to you, never intentionally put you or our teammates in danger.”

  “Never, Captain? Not even if Petra herself came to you and asked you directly? Wouldn’t that be a holy request? If your living god asked you to do something for your people, wouldn’t you obey no matter who got hurt?”

  The long pause told Quentin everything he needed to know, yet he waited anyway, waited for Bumberpuff to man up and tell the hard truth.

  “If Petra asked me, yes, I would do anything she required and do it gladly,” the Prawatt said. “But for this, she did not ask. I swear it on the Old Ones themselves. Please, Quentin ... forgive me for my part in this.”

  Quentin’s teeth clenched tight. It would be so easy to slam that X-body to the ground, to kick it, punch it, tear at it ... but Bumberpuff’s voice, the honesty in it, the pain.

  Quentin’s teammate — his friend — was telling the truth.

  The anger ebbed, receded to a low tide but it did not vanish. Quentin believed Bumberpuff had no conscious involvement in Petra’s manipulations. Still, if she had asked, Bumberpuff wouldn’t think twice about lying, betraying, maybe even killing.

  Religion ... all it does is damage and corrupt.

  “I need to know your loyalties,” Quentin said. He already assumed the answer, but a sliver of him hoped he was wrong. “If it comes down to it, Captain, if you have to choose — do you choose your friends or do you choose Petra?”

  “Petra,” Bumberpuff said instantly. “My first loyalty is always to the Old Ones, the entities that gave rise to my kind. Quentin, you stopped a war, and in doing so saved the lives of millions of my people. You earned my respect. There is nothing I would not do for you — except go against the will of God.”

  Complete honesty: could Quentin really ask for anything more? Now he knew where Bumberpuff stood. It wasn’t what he wanted to hear, but it was the truth. And the truth was that he could never trust Bumberpuff.

  “Thank you,” Quentin said. “That’s what I needed to know. Let’s go back and join the others.”

  18

  Duel

  QUENTIN EARNED HIS LIVING playing a sport in front of at least a hundred thousand spectators. He’d seen the huge crowds for Dinolition and for “The Game.” Even the professional mixed martial arts fights he’d watched had at least fifteen to twenty thousand sentients in attendance. He’d assumed the fight between Taker of Souls and Bloodletter would draw a big crowd.

  He’d been wrong.

  The room was small and round, made of the same polished steel or silver he’d seen everywhere else in the ship. The same except for the floor — a bowl of yellow-flecked red stone, ten meters in diameter, maybe three meters lower at the center than at the edges. A meter-wide circle of black stone ran around the bowl’s perimeter.

  Less than a dozen Portath stood on that circle, their blue-dotted skin flashing in waving greens and yellows. Was that pattern some kind of cheering? Or perhaps concern?

  Hulsey directed Quentin and the others to an open section of the black stone.

  “Whatever you do, do not interfere,” she said. “Stand, watch, and stay—”

  “Stay still, right?” John said. “We got it, Lady Fun-Times, we got it.”

  Quentin and the others took their places. Hulsey stood next to him.

  A pair of the Portath spectators stepped off the black stone and into the yellow-flecked red bowl. Quentin recognized them only by their size difference: Bloodletter and Taker of Souls. The two positioned themselves opposite each other, right up at the bowl’s edge, then started rolling around the rim at identical speeds, protrusions reaching far out to grab the lip and pull them along. It struck Quentin as a formal movement, maybe the equivalent of two teams standing at the 50-yard line for the pregame coin toss
, or two fighters touching gloves before the ref let them tear into each other.

  Both combatants’ flashed and pulsed, patterns swirling so fast Quentin couldn’t really lock on to any one thing. It was like being in a hoverjet skimming across a city; you saw what you knew were buildings and vehicles shooting past below, but the images came so fast you couldn’t make out any details.

  If color was the Portath language, the two combatants were screaming at each other at the top of their lungs.

  Ju elbowed Quentin. “Q! Them booger bags are talking smack!”

  He was probably right. And if the visual shouting didn’t properly communicate their intentions, the strange knives each of them brandished certainly did. The weapons consisted of two pointed, curved blades of polished steel, each about twenty centimeters long, their bases seamlessly affixed to a center ring. The blades curved in opposite directions, making the whole array resemble a propeller, or maybe two fat commas joined at the dot.

  Limbs grew and shrank, blue eyespots gleamed, colors coursed. Still rolling along the rim, the two formless sentients swung the double-sickle blades in short arcs or long, point-first jabs, as if warming up or showing off their skill.

  The formal dance lasted less than two minutes; it ended suddenly and brutally.

  Taker of Souls, the smaller of the two, pushed hard off the edge, sweeping down the bowl and up the other side, extending a long arm that whipped the blade in a vicious horizontal arc. Still moving around the rim, Bloodletter pushed hard off the stone, launching into the air just as Taker of Soul’s blade hissed beneath; Bloodletter’s own weapon sliced downward — the sickle blade bit deep, severing Taker of Soul’s protrusion in a splash of yellow.

  Taker of Souls shuddered, fell hard, its round body splatting against the curved bowl and rolling limply down to the center. The stubby severed limb sprayed yellow fluid that splashed some of the spectators. The Portath let out a screech so heart-wrenching Quentin’s hands went to his ears.

  Bloodletter rolled along in a wide descending spiral that brought it closer and closer to its wounded opponent. Bloodletter pulsed a throbbing orange, waved its double-curved blade, sending a clear message of what was coming next.

  John jumped up and down in excitement. “Did you see that? That was awesome!”

  John was entertained — Quentin was sickened.

  Closer and closer Bloodletter spiraled toward Taker of Souls. The vanquished’s skin suddenly flashed a pattern of mostly black, and in that split-second Quentin understood what it was saying — for a race that communicated with color, a lack of color had to indicate total surrender.

  Taker of Souls was begging for its life, like a Human on his back with hand reaching up, palm out, pleading no, don’t kill me.

  Bloodletter didn’t listen.

  The curved blade sliced down, cutting deep into the rounded body, then came up again as yellow and chunks of something brown spilled across the stone bowl. The agonizing death-screech intensified. The blade slashed down a second time, making another deep cut that crisscrossed the first.

  Taker of Soul’s movements slowed. The rounded body deflated, a punctured bag sagging as fluid flowed out of it. A few faint flickers of color spasmodically flashed along its skin.

  Then, it fell still, an emptied corpse lying flat at the bottom of a stone bowl, in a pool of its own life’s blood. The last color faded from the skin, leaving only a dead yellowish-brown membrane.

  Quentin felt queasy: a sentient life, snuffed out, just like that.

  Bloodletter climbed to the bowl’s black stone rim. Portath scurried out of its way, giving the victor plenty of space. Still coated in the oozing gore of its foe, Bloodletter pulsated with a pattern of reds and oranges and yellows that Quentin could only describe as triumphant — a visual scream of victory.

  That pattern died down, replaced by calmer, more subdued hues. Hulsey’s coat flashed in response. She nodded, turned to face Quentin.

  “Bloodletter says you are free. However, you must tell no one of this place, of the Portath, of what you have seen.”

  “So we’re free, but you’re already threatening us,” Quentin said.

  “No threat,” Hulsey said. “You may leave, but our laws have not changed. Any sentient entering the Cloud will either be destroyed or made a trainee. Once you are gone, there is nothing we can do to stop you from saying whatever you wish. But if any of you talk of this, word will spread, and sentients will come by the millions even if you tell them it is dangerous. Any lives lost will be your responsibility.”

  She was right; it wasn’t a threat, it was reality. That was the nature of sentients, to think that they were somehow special and could escape the consequences of their actions. Adventurers, risk-takers, the rich who had nothing better to do with their money ... if they found out Quentin and the others had safely left the Cloud, they would think they could do the same, no matter what other information they heard.

  Quentin glanced at Becca, could tell she was thinking the same thing. She nodded.

  He looked at the others. “Everyone get that we can’t talk about this? To anyone?”

  Nods all around. They understood clearly.

  “We’ll stay quiet,” he said to Hulsey. “You have our word on it.”

  “Let us hope that is enough, she said. “Before you leave, Bloodletter asks that you and the others witness the Portath’s history with your own eyes, so that you may bear testimony to Petra on what you have seen.”

  The mere mention of that name brought back Quentin’s anger.

  “What about my sister and my friend?”

  “The history first,” Hulsey said. “Then I will take you to your sister.”

  Another delay; Quentin was tired of delays. He glanced at Becca and Kimberlin — they both nodded, silently urging him to be patient.

  “Tell Bloodletter we say thank you,” Quentin said. “We’d be honored to see whatever he wants to show us.”

  Hulsey bowed. “Wait here,” she said. “It won’t be long.”

  She walked through an oval door and was gone, leaving Quentin with swirling thoughts of vengeance.

  In four short years with the Krakens, he had somehow earned powerful enemies: Gredok the Splithead, Anna Villani, Kirani Kollok and now, probably, Manny Sayed. Maybe even Stedmar Osborne, Manny’s Buddha City Elite co-owner and Quentin’s former boss.

  Quentin could add another enemy to that list, one vastly more powerful than all the others combined — only this time, it was his choice.

  Petra Prawatt had put his sister, his friend, his teammates and the woman he loved in mortal danger. For that, Quentin Barnes would never forget, and he would never forgive.

  19

  History Lesson

  HULSEY LED QUENTIN AND THE OTHERS down a corridor as gleaming and pristine as everything else in the ship. The Portath, it seemed, were not big fans of dirt. Everything polished, everything clean.

  The others — Becca, Kimberlin, Doc Patah and George, mostly, as the Tweedy brothers didn’t seem to care — couldn’t stop talking about Petra’s message. Had the Portath really come from another galaxy? Was that even possible? Was the Abernessia invasion for real? If it was real, when would they reach the Milky Way, the civilized planets?

  None of it mattered to Quentin. The invasion was probably yet another Petra lie, maybe a method to set up yet another Prawatt war. He didn’t care. He wanted to get his sister and Fred and get them the hell out of there. That was all he wanted.

  Overhead, Portath traveled up and down the corridor, swinging from the polished metal rings. John and Ju oohed and ahhed, made bad jokes, acting more like they were attendees at a zoo rather than captives inside one. The Portath seemed to pay no attention to Quentin and the others.

  Hulsey led them into a new room, this one so dark Quentin couldn’t see more than a few feet. The lingering, ringing echoes of his footsteps made it sound like a large space.

  Hulsey’s robe glowed a simple white, illuminating the area immedi
ately around her. From deeper in the dark room came another Human woman, also in a robe that glowed flashlight-white.

  “This is Beatrice,” Hulsey said. “Captain Bumberpuff, you are to go with her. The information Petra requested is being gathered. You are to help Beatrice put it into a format that the Prawatt can understand.”

  “Of course,” Bumberpuff said. “Whatever I can do to help.”

  Beatrice bowed, then gestured toward the darkness, showing Bumberpuff the way.

  “Hold on,” Quentin said. “Mike, Doc, go with him. Petra will want to make sure Bumberpuff stays safe.”

  Kimberlin glanced at Quentin, understanding the unspoken message — Quentin didn’t trust Bumberpuff, and he didn’t trust the Portath, either.

  “We’ll stay with Bumberpuff,” Kimberlin said, then stood next to the Prawatt. “Come on, Doc.”

  Beatrice looked at Hulsey for permission.

  “It’s fine,” Hulsey said. “Take them.”

  Beatrice bowed again. Her robe was a moving spotlight as she walked deeper into the dark room. Bumberpuff and Kimberlin followed on foot, Doc Patah floating along between them.

  “All right, Hulsey,” Quentin said. “Let’s hurry this up already. I want to get my sister.”

  Hulsey took a step closer to him.

  “No one has ever left the Cloud,” she said. “Everything will change. This is bigger than you, your family —” she gestured toward Becca, George, John and Ju “—bigger than your precious friends. There is an entire race here, one hunted almost to extinction, and now those same hunters are on their way to this galaxy. The Portath are breaking their silence for the first time in twelve thousand years, so maybe you could just shut up for a few minutes and pay attention”

  She stared up at Quentin, he down at her. He’d assumed she was weak-willed — what strong person would live as a slave rather than die trying to escape? But as with so many other things, he’d been wrong. Hulsey wanted to protect her captors. She seemed to love them as much as Bumberpuff loved Petra.