Survival (45 page)

Mac folded her hands on her lap and studied how the fingers laced together. Ten fingers, not six, twelve, or twenty-one.
How wide a gulf in comprehension did those numbers represent?
“You told Emily this, didn't you.” It wasn't a question. It couldn't be, not when it answered too many. Why the sub-teach disguised as personal logs . . . why the logs cued to Mac's password . . . why Emily Mamani chose to work with her and salmon instead of studying manatees . . .

Why they'd become friends
.

Mac watched her knuckles turn white.

As much as the Ministry and Nikolai Trojanowski had taken advantage of events to get Mac here, where no Human had been, Emily Mamani and her “allies” had wanted her here even more, and planned for years to achieve it.

“It's time you told me everything, Brymn,” Mac said in a tone that expected complete and total compliance. “Starting with where you met Emily. And how.”

It had been a classic Emily pickup: transit station, spots a likely guy waiting and looking bored, asks directions to somewhere very close by, a place that turns out to be a cozy bar with Emily's favorite music filling the dance floor. A playful night ensues. Mac found it eerie, hearing about something—someone—so familiar through the interpretation of a stranger.

Oh, there was a modification or two. Brymn had already been in a cozy bar, waiting for a skim ride out to an archaeological dig on Renold 20. He'd been pleasantly surprised to be approached by a Human of culture and education, even more surprised when she'd asked directions to the same dig. Another scholar, he'd thought. A common interest.

Interest?
With a sour taste in her mouth, Mac thought of Emily falling asleep in her office. Exhaustion? More likely the boredom of hours pretending to read what she'd already read.

Their first meeting had taken place two years
before
Emily applied to Norcoast.

Brymn, used to being alone, had been easy to charm. He'd seen it as a mutual regard and growing friendship. Mac, hearing the steps Emily took to win his confidence, gain access to his work, saw it as something else.

Premeditation
.

Emily had chosen Brymn as her target—a Dhryn crazy enough to work on his own, far from his kind. Mac wondered if any Dhryn would have done, but it didn't matter. Here was one ripe for the taking.

Not that Mac let her thoughts interrupt Brymn's recital. She let him keep talking, taking sips from her water bottle, eventually pulling up her knees so she could watch him over the top of that barrier. He needed no encouragement to continue; a natural storyteller who must rarely have an audience. Emily's rapt attention must have been intoxicating.

Brymn and Emily made plans to meet in a few months and work together. She would help Brymn with his work and teach him English so he could directly access the material of those Human researchers who didn't publish in Instella. Meanwhile she was building a dictionary of Dhryn and wished to test terms and grammar on him.

His work.
Mac knew it from her readings, but it was clearer described this way, filled with the fervor academic writing leached away. The Dhryn was hunting through the past of space-faring species, looking for evidence of the so-called Moment—the date of the destruction of the worlds within the Chasm. His hypothesis? That there had been transects connecting these worlds, and these had failed during the same catastrophe, stranding species where they hadn't evolved.

No one doubted there had been transects—or the technology to develop them—before. The discovery by the Sinzi proved at least the beginnings had been around for over three thousand standard years. But had such a network existed within the Chasm and beyond? Could all of those transects have failed at a single point in time? If so, was that the cause of the disaster that had befallen all of those worlds?

Even “Chasm Ghouls—They Exist and Speak to Me” devoted less than a footnote to the idea. Despite his years of searching, Brymn had yet to find a single shred of evidence.

That didn't mean he was wrong,
Mac thought.

Her project
. Emily had been coy, but eventually Brymn had convinced her—
hah!
—to admit they shared a related goal. She hoped to prove the existence of the Survivors, an entire species rumored to have escaped the Chasm. Legend painted the Survivors with everything from advanced technology to a godlike beauty no matter your physical preference. Emily's expectations were simpler. If such existed, they might be able to explain the mystery of the Chasm once and for all.

Were the Survivors the Ro? Had Emily found them, or they her? Regardless, Mac had a question of her own.
Had they escaped the annihilation of life on those hundreds of worlds—or been its cause?

Perhaps Emily would have chosen to work with manatees and travel to the Dhryn home system herself—
they might never have met
—but for a single consequence of teaching Brymn English. Among the obscure publications in that language, he discovered a series by that curiosity to Dhryn, a biologist. Not any biologist, but one working on how species survived catastrophic events. He expressed the desire to meet this scientist.

It took Mac a moment to realize he was talking about her work.
About her.

She could only imagine what had gone through Emily's mind then. Why was the Dhryn interested in an obscure salmon researcher's work? Was this a problem, or an opportunity?

Brymn went on, blithely unaware of the impact of his retelling of events on his audience, liberally adding mentions of the weather at each dig and other non-essentials. Mac lowered her chin to one knee, her arms wrapped again around her legs, but this time to hold herself in, not to stretch.

Not surprisingly to anyone who knew her, Emily had chosen to consider Brymn's interest an opportunity. She confessed to being a biologist and more. She claimed to be already working with the esteemed Dr. Connor. What a happy coincidence! Brymn had been delighted, especially when Emily promised to forward any new work from Dr. Connor directly to him, so he could keep up with her—their—findings.

Mac's head lifted, nostrils widening like those of a startled doe searching for a hidden predator. She couldn't help but remember her joy at finding Dr. Mamani's application on her 'screen, how she'd rushed to complete the year's budget in order to clear funds to bring the highly reputed scientist to Norcoast, even how they'd all pitched in to give the place a quick cleaning, in case appearances would make a difference.

Brymn remained oblivious, words flooding out of him now to tell her how anxiously he'd waited to receive each transmission, how honored he'd been to hold raw data and see her analysis taking shape, how enthralled by each leap to a new experiment . . . then, finally, the opportunity of a lifetime. The Interspecies Union had quietly alerted the authorities of member species along the Naralax Transect to what it called “a mysterious threat,” asking for investigators with knowledge of the Chasm to cooperate. When the Progenitors searched for such a Dhryn, there was only one choice: Brymn.

And Brymn chose to work with Humans, so he could finally meet . . .

“You, Mackenzie Winifred Elizabeth Wright Connor!” he finished, holding four arms toward her. “Despite all that has happened, meeting you has been the most joyous and significant moment in my life. For this reason, I had the name of Emily Mamani Sarmiento recorded within the vault of my Progenitors, in gratitude for having made our meeting possible.” When Mac didn't immediately reply, the Dhryn wrapped his arms around his middle and looked worried. “Are you not pleased we met?”

“I could wish for better circumstances,” she said honestly. “But not a better companion,” this with a depth of emotion that surprised her.
She was,
Mac scolded herself,
anthropomorphizing
.

Still, his sudden smile implied the Dhryn could understand and reciprocate what was, to Mac, a Human feeling. “We are
lamisah,
Mac, and friends. As is Emily. Do not let yourself worry. I am sure she will be able to explain what happened on the way station. She will be well—we will find her.”

Perilous thing, friendship
. Mac rubbed her chin on her knee, debating which of Brymn's illusions to shatter first. “I don't believe Emily needs our help, Brymn.”

“What? How can you, her friend, say this?” Outrage, in a Dhryn, appeared to involve standing, lowering the torso angle, and arm waving. Brymn did all three before blurting out: “She was taken by violence from her sleep! I saw the reports, the images. There was fluid over the walls—her fluid! The Ro—” His limbs trembled. “The Ro—”

“Oh, I believe they took her,” Mac agreed miserably, hugging her legs. “But the signs of a struggle can be faked. Humans can lose a fair amount of fluid—blood—without permanent damage. Broken furniture?” She nodded at the pile in one corner, where she'd collected the remnants of her assault on the door. “Nothing easier.”

“But why make it look—? I don't understand.”

“I don't have answers, Brymn. For what good a guess will do? Emily knew I'd never willingly leave Earth. For some reason, she—and others—wanted me to do just that. Badly enough to fake her own kidnapping. Badly enough that the dictionary she built with your help was to make a sub-teach of your language—for me. Badly enough that they made it seem impossible for me to be safe anywhere but here. In the Dhryn home system.”

“A Human working with the Ro? Impossible!”

Mac raised a brow. “I'm working with a Dhryn.”

“Even if it could be—why? With apologies, Mac, you make no sense. Why would they do all this to force you here, the one place you're safe from them?”

“That's the question, isn't it?” Mac tucked her chin back on her knee.

Brymn sat in front of her, one three-fingered hand covering hers. “What if you're wrong about Emily?”

“Then I'll owe her a beer. More likely ten,” Mac promised. “But there's too much at stake, Brymn, for us to ignore the evidence. Emily wasn't working with me before you told her of your interest in my research. She lied to you. Emily knew you—she'd prepared the sub-teach in your language before arriving at Base this year, before the Union knew there was an emergency. She lied to me.”

“She must have had good reason.”

The alien's staunch defense of Emily—
so like her own, to Nik and to herself
—wasn't making this any easier. “At this point,” Mac decided, “I don't care about her reasons. We need to be careful. Why am I here? Why does it suit Emily, and perhaps the Ro, to have me on Haven? Something's going on, Brymn.”

He took his hand away. “We must not trouble the Progenitors with this—supposition, Mac. They would not react well. Not well at all.”

Mac studied Brymn's face, seeing the fear there. Reluctantly, she nodded. “When it comes to Dhryn, I must rely on your judgment.”

As he nodded, seeming more relaxed, Mac caught her reflection wavering within figure eight pupils, surrounded by gold. What did he see, when he looked at her? What did he think, feel? How could she begin to fathom what had no connection to her flesh?

How could she know if
he
lied?

18

 

 

 

M
AC HAD HAD her preconceptions of other worlds. They'd all be Earths, of a sort, perhaps with different shapes to their treetops or unusual birds in their skies. She'd even imagined some sort of alien marketplace, filled with otherworldly scents and sounds. But there would be treetops, birds, and skies.