“Yes! Do it.”
“Working.”
Kelric continued to float, trying to exercise his legs. After a while he asked, “Has anything happened?”
“I am thirty-four percent finished with the process.”
“Can you talk while you work?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know about that palace speech?”
“I know about many palace speeches.”
“The one playing on the ship when we left.”
“I do not have this recording.”
“Oh.” Kelric’s fingers were growing tired from hanging on the chair. “Can you put me back in the pilot’s seat?”
“Certainly.” A robot arm extended from a bulkhead, folded its multijointed hand around his body, and set him back in the seat. Then it hovered above him like an orderly checking its patient.
With no warning, Kelric’s arm shot up and knocked aside the robot arm. His right leg jerked. Then his left foot slammed into the control console. For all the force of its strike, he felt nothing.
“Uh, Shuttle Four,” he said. “What are you doing?”
“Try moving your legs,” it suggested.
He gave it a try. His left leg rose into the air with the eerily smooth ease of hydraulic-controlled motion.
“Hey!” Kelric grinned. “How long will this last?”
“It should serve until your recovery is done.”
Relief washed over him. “Then I’ll recover?”
“To an extent.”
His ebullience ebbed. “What extent?”
“That remains to be seen. If you exercise, it will strengthen your muscles and coordination. However, it is imperative you report to a biomech repair facility as soon as possible.”
Dryly Kelric said, “I know.” He gave a martial-arts punch at the air and was gratified to see his arm move with enhanced speed. When he punched the chair, it left a dent that only his enhanced strength could have made. He tried a kick next, with good results. He couldn’t actually feel his legs move; it was more like hauling around sacks of grain. But it worked.
“Do you know how long my repairs will take?” he asked.
“I’m not sure,” the shuttle said. “Just after takeoff, one hundred percent of your body was paralyzed for several seconds. It almost killed you. You were also one hundred percent blind. The paralysis is about seventy-five percent now. Without your enhanced optics, you would have about twenty-five percent vision.”
Good Lord. “I had no idea it was that serious.”
“Leaving an Aristo cylinder is not easy.”
He wondered what Tarquine thought about his escape. She was probably furious. Would she miss him? Probably. He had cost her fourteen million credits. Would he miss her? It unsettled him to admit it wasn’t only the aphrodisiacs in his body that made him think of her.
“Do you want my analysis regarding the Third Lock?” Shuttle Four inquired.
“You have an analysis?” This ought to prove interesting.
“Yes. You should go undercover. The Lock is at Sphinx Sector Rim Base. Several Aristos are stationed there. Pick one that is away and have yourself delivered to his or her residence as a provider. That will leave you some freedom to act. I can create a false set of documents for the transfer.”
Kelric grimaced. The last thing he wanted was to go among Aristos again. But if a chance existed to deactivate the Lock, he had to consider it. The shuttle’s plan made sense. After his recent experiences, he had an idea how to build such a cover. Aristos expected certain behavior from providers. As long as he acted “normal” in their presence, he could do a lot behind the scenes. It helped that the platinum shortage had hit Sphinx Sector so hard. To offset their platinum losses, Sphinx Aristos were stockpiling other resources. Like providers. So his appearance was unlikely to raise eyebrows.
Even if he made it into the SSRB, he faced two major hurdles: reaching the Lock from within the complex and escaping afterward. Providers had no reason to visit the Lock or travel alone. His first escape had taken the Aristos by surprise. It wouldn’t happen again. If he tried this and anything went wrong, he would end up as a provider for life.
Kelric hated the whole idea. He wanted to go home. But he had it within his ability to stop an interstellar war, one the Traders would probably win. No one wanted to restart hostilities. However, as long as the Traders thought they could triumph, using their captured Lock and Key, they would try. If he turned off the Lock, he would restore the balance of power and protect trillions of people.
“Nothing like a little stress,” he said.
“My structure is under no stress,” the shuttle informed him.
Kelric gave a wan smile. “Not you. Me.” He exhaled. “We have plans to make.”
“Plans?”
“To infiltrate the SSRB.”
“I can add you to the inventory of a supply ship,” it suggested. “I can also deliver you to that ship. I estimate a probability of four to thirty-two percent that you can then succeed with your stated goals.”
“That’s low.”
“It goes up if you limit your goals.”
“What do you suggest I leave out?”
“Escape will be the most difficult.”
Kelric spoke dryly. “Any other ideas?”
“No. I have an observation, however.”
“Yes?”
“You have an advantage no Eubian can claim.”
“And what might that be?”
“You are a Rhon psion. That might increase your chances.”
“Well, yes.” Kelric froze. “What makes you think I’m Rhon?” Asking the question now, after he acknowledged its truth, was like closing the gate after the livestock had left the farm. Damn truth serums. He needed them out of his body.
“I learned it when you put your mind into mine,” the EI said.
He wondered what else it knew. The security failure on the cylinder ship had exposed it to many EIs. “Do you know if ESComm has penetrated the Lock’s security?”
“Unknown. Eldrin Valdoria refuses to cooperate.”
He sat up straighter. “Eldrin is at the SSRB?”
“No. He is on the planet Glory.”
“Oh.” It had been too much to hope for. Kelric hated to think of his brother as an ESComm prisoner.
“Shall I prepare documents for your transfer?” the EI asked.
“We have to solve some problems first,” Kelric said. “My body is full of truth serums. It’s not enough to make me reveal data protected by neural blocks, but if someone asks what I’m doing, I’ll probably tell them too much. The drugs that suppress aggression hamper my ability to defend myself. And the aphrodisiacs are a distraction.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“You’re sure you can’t turn those off without losing the medicine cycles?”
“Cycles do exist that would provide only medical therapy,” the shuttle said. “Unfortunately, I have neither the knowledge nor time to implement them.”
“Can you turn off every cycle in my body?”
“Yes. However, then you would no longer benefit from their healing effects.”
“Would that affect the repair of my paralysis?”
“Now, yes. Eventually I will have done all I can for the paralysis. After that, your recovery will be a matter of exercise.” The EI paused. “However, in caring for your health and preparing your body for the regeneration or transplant of new organs, it would be in your best interest to continue the drug therapy.”
Kelric considered his options. “Let’s do this. Stay on course to Sphinx Sector. When you’ve done all you can for my paralysis, take me to the SSRB, get me into a supply ship inventory, and turn off-all the drug cycles. Can you do that?”
“I will do my best,” Shuttle Four said.
17
Sphinx Sector Rim
The SSRB glittered in space like a cluster of jeweled necklaces linked with sparkling chains. As the supply ship drew nearer, the base
took on a less benign aspect, resolving into ponderous habitats bristling with antennae, support structures, and weapons ports. Far from any star, the complex created its own system of orbiting bodies.
Kelric floated at the porthole in the cargo bay where the crew had “stored” him. His delivery from Shuttle Four had gone without remark by the taskmaker crew here. The orders to take a provider to a Sphinx Sector Aristo had apparently surprised no one.
He had helped Shuttle Four to prepare his false ID. Without his aid, the EI couldn’t have convinced anyone. It had no capacity for intrigue. He had it list him as a natural-born Eubian provider. That way, everyone would assume Aristos had bred him to behave like a provider. The invoice described him as an anonymous gift to the wife of an Admiral Kaliga. He would have preferred a solitary Aristo, but the shuttle had too little data on the personnel at the SSRB. At least with Kaliga, they knew enough to be reasonably certain they could schedule Kelric’s arrival when neither the admiral nor his wife was home.
Here on the supply ship, the crew outfitted a cargo bay for him, with a waste unit and mesh hammock. The small ship didn’t rotate, so he spent his time floating around the bay, doing free-fall exercises. The verdict on his paralysis had been a little better than expected. He could move without hydraulics. In gravity, he walked with a dragging gait, his limp so pronounced he often stumbled. With the hydraulics, though, he now had enough control to make his motions appear normal rather than unnaturally smooth.
When he interacted with people, he used hydraulics. By himself, he exercised without them as much as possible, prodding his muscles and nervous system to recover. In the day it took for the ship to reach the SSRB and go though security, he noticed a slight improvement—nothing dramatic, but still a positive sign.
They docked at a space wheel that served as a maintenance and residential habitat. He had hoped the supply ship might be lax with security, but they gave him their full attention. The cargo master escorted him through decon with the rest of the small crew.
No one spoke to Kelric. They avoided his gaze. Only the captain acknowledged his presence, with an appraising stare that made the hairs on Kelric’s neck stand up. The captain’s ruby eyes marked him as the son of an Aristo and a provider. Psion genes were recessive and Aristo genes dominant, so such children showed Aristo traits and usually found themselves on top of the taskmaker hierarchies.
A spoke elevator took them from the wheel’s hub out to its rim. When they reached the terminal at the end of the spoke, an ESComm lieutenant met them. He escorted Kelric to a magcar and put him in the back, then took his place in the front.
As they rode along the magrail, Kelric gazed out the circular window at the residential village. It existed inside the rim of the wheel, which was shaped like a gigantic tire. The tire’s outer edge served as the ground and its inner edge made a “roof” far overhead. The magrail ran along the ground like a slender stripe around the tire’s circumference. In the distance, far ahead of the car, ground and roof both curved upward.
Landscaped parks dotted with flowers surrounded them. Rivers meandered past velvety lawns. The parks stretched on either side of the magrail for the width of the rim, several hundred meters, then sloped up into terraced hills on either side. Droop-willows shaded airy houses on the terraces. He found it hard to believe this was in the heart of a military complex. It never ceased to boggle him that Aristos created such beauty.
They soon turned off the main rail and climbed into the terraced slopes. The car stopped in a grove of willows. Lacy branches shaded a house made from rose and ivory woods that must have cost a fortune on a habitat, where organic growth was carefully monitored.
The lieutenant ushered Kelric inside. The house was a graceful sculpture of airy halls and open skylights, with sliding screens for walls. All the rooms, halls, and windows were curved or else had seven sides. Breezes moved freely through the building. Kelric suspected it never rained.
The lieutenant took him to a heptagonal room with no furniture, just piles of white rugs and pillows in rose hues. The ivory wall screens were so thin that sunlight diffused through them. In terse Highton, the lieutenant gave orders: remain here, make no noise, disturb no one. Then he left.
Alone, Kelric went to the far wall and pushed aside the screen. It opened onto a garden with well-tended flower beds and lawns. A gazebo sat prettily under the willows.
I am a right angle, he thought. Then he left the house.
Kelric stood on a bridge that crossed a stream in the public parks. Flowering vines curled around the rail under his hands and draped the sides of the graceful arch. The parks basked in manufactured sunshine from overhead panels. If this habitat was like others he knew, at night the light panels would slide back, uncovering dichromesh windows that let starlight sift into the parks.
Well-dressed taskmakers strolled in the gardens, relaxed on benches, or gathered under trees. A young couple with a baby settled on a lawn and spread out a picnic. It looked idyllic. Only the collars and guards these people wore gave hint of the truth, that they were slaves.
He saw no Aristos. It didn’t surprise him, given that only a few thousand existed. These taskmakers were high in the slave hierarchies and had some authority themselves. They would never risk losing their favored lives to disobedience. With one word from their Aristo owner, that happy couple could lose their child, each other, everything they valued. If they behaved, they kept their idyll. No wonder the Trader empire thrived. Aristos had everything they needed: wealth, power, military might, resources, and a trillion-strong populace they bred, pampered, indoctrinated, bribed, drugged, brainwashed, punished, and genetically tinkered into subservience.
In his exploration of the parks, he had come across only one other provider. She kept her eyes downcast, much as he had during his escape from Tarquine’s ship, trying to become invisible. She sought a different sort of escape, a retreat into her mind. It was her refuge.
She had no mental defenses. Her high Kyle rating and open mind made it easy to absorb a general sense of her thoughts. She was on an errand for her owner and would meet him later for his pleasure. She had no hope of freedom. Kelric didn’t think she even understood the idea. The three providers on Tarquine’s ship had been the same. His inability to help them made him grit his teeth until his jaw ached.
His escape had been unique. Tarquine’s security had done its job, judging his behavior out of bounds and notifying the Minister. Her long separation from her pager had helped him, due to the strange broadcast, which he still didn’t understand. Even that wouldn’t have made a difference if he had been less than Rhon. In fact, being Rhon would have done no good without his also having the background to hack secured EIs. And he had been desperate. Willing to die. He probably would have died if not for the medical cycles in his body. Those were possible only because his internal reactor supplied energy for reactions. Anything less than those factors combined and his escape would have failed.
It couldn’t be repeated. Nor could he shove his mind into an EI again and survive. Besides, Shuttle Four had shut down the cycles in his body before it transferred him to the supply ship.
Now what? He had to make his move soon: it wouldn’t take long for someone to discover he was Minister Iquar’s slave. Somehow he had to leave this habitat and go to the Third Lock, a space station in its own right. His best bet to find transportation was at the hub of his wheel, where most ships docked. To reach it, he had to pass the elevator’s warning system. If he did anything out of bounds, it would notify his new owner, Xirene Kaliga.
The light panels were dimming overhead, turning a rosy sunset hue. According to the lieutenant, Xirene and her husband were due back this evening. He either had to escape now or return to the house. The station’s monitors had left notification of his arrival at the house and would have recorded his stroll through the parks, so his owners could find him right away if he didn’t return.
He wanted to leave. Now. But he knew too little about the habitat.
If he bided his time and used his judgment, his chance of success increased—to a point. Too long here, and he would be discovered. Also, if he went back to the house he would have to spend the night with his new owner. Gods only knew what she would want from him. But if he let his aversion to Aristos force his hand, his haste might ruin his chances.
Kelric made his decision.
He was dozing in a pile of cushions when the apparition showed up in his room. Like all Aristos, she had classic features. Rubies studded the shimmering hair pulled up on her head. She had a youthful face, almost a child really, with round cheeks and a small nose. The translucent drapes of her white robe revealed enough to suggest a figure more voluptuous than normal for a Highton.
She stopped in the doorway, hands planted on either side of the frame, and cried, “Oh, surely this couldn’t be!” Clasping her hands in front of her curvaceous bosom, she moaned, “I knew it. I knew it! Oh, how could I have come to this?”
Still groggy from sleep, Kelric sat up and pushed the curls out of his eyes. It was dark outside, but a lamp in one corner shed muted radiance over the room.
He felt her mind. She created that same mental abyss as a grown Aristo. With her, though, it was chaotic. He had heard Aristos didn’t transcend until puberty, but he had never met one this young before. Her mind searched for his with an unformed quality rather than an adult’s honed instincts. It shifted and flowed, never giving him anything definite to defend against. If in Tarquine he had seen the end of transcendence, in this girl he saw its emergence.
Aside from her attributes as an Aristo, though, she had some other rather odd personality traits.
“I can’t believe it,” she exclaimed, throwing her hands wide. “Why? Why? What have I ever done to deserve this?”
“Is something wrong?” he asked.
She glowered at him. “How can you act so normal when my world is ending?”