"Believe me, cr!!akk cr!!akk, I was eager to do so, but my Eighth suggested that I remain in the background for at least a little while. In order to give you time to recover from your long journeying and"-she gestured in Clarity"s direction-"to mate."
Flinx had the grace to blush. "Remind me to have a word about semantics with a certain elderly thranx."
Sylzenzuzex continued. "Once these and other issues had been satisfactorily dealt with, the intention was to surprise you with an unantic.i.p.ated appearance on my part, chlakkt chlakkt. I waited for my Eighth to announce a time. Alas, he is old and older, and I think my eagerness to see you again kept slipping his mind. Tiring of his continued unresponsiveness, I chose to set aside his plan and decided on my own initiative to reunite with you today.
"I went to your hotel intending to do this, only to discover that you were away. Oddly, the attendant gave the impression I was expected. My initial reaction to this was that my Eighth had finally told you of my presence on Nur without so informing me. Though somewhat confused, I took the information splinter you had left behind for a "friend." When I perused the contents, it provided me with your intended destination. Nothing more." She gestured second-degree regret. "Had I known of the circ.u.mstances, I would have brought half a dozen police skimmers with me."
So that was what had happened. Nodding to himself as much as to Syl, Flinx remembered leaving the memory splinter "for a friend." When she had identified herself as such, the clerk had pa.s.sed to her the coordinates that had been intended for Bran and Tru. With their full attention occupied by the Order, they had been unable to get to the hotel earlier to check up on him and retrieve the splinter. Not that the mix-up on the hotel clerk"s part had worked out badly in the end.
But-after waiting so long at Truzenzuzex"s behest, why had Syl finally decided to go to the hotel to make contact with him today? today?
When he asked, she gestured second-degree bafflement. "I could not say, Flinx. As I told you, I was tired of waiting for my Eighth to settle on a date for a reunion. All I can tell you is that today the time felt right."
Standing nearby, Clarity reflected on their close escape as she continued to caress Sc.r.a.p. The youthful minidrag was finally winding down from the excitement of being freed and reunited with his master and his mother. She shook her head knowingly.
"You don"t see it, do you, Flinx? You project your emotions even when you don"t know you"re projecting. Maybe you were broadcasting your anxiety all over the place and Syl picked it up, and that"s what led her to try and make contact with you today."
He considered the theory. "If that"s the case, then why didn"t Tru or Bran react?"
Clarity smiled tightly. "Maybe they were too far away. Maybe having to deal with the Order"s attempts on their own lives overrode their sensitivity to anything you might have been sending out. Maybe you have a deeper emotional relationship with this thranx." She eyed the impa.s.sive Sylzenzuzex. "Maybe it was just a fortuitous coincidence. Such things do happen, you know. Are you asking me me to try and explain you to you?" When he failed to reply she added, "If you weren"t such a wonderful human being and I wasn"t so acutely in love with you, I think I"d be scared to death of Philip Lynx." to try and explain you to you?" When he failed to reply she added, "If you weren"t such a wonderful human being and I wasn"t so acutely in love with you, I think I"d be scared to death of Philip Lynx."
He met her gaze somberly. "You know what, Clarity? Sometimes I"m scared to death of me, too."
While her command of terranglo was very good, Sylzenzuzex found this exchange inordinately puzzling. "Though I understand your words and there is nothing the matter with my hearing, I have the feeling that I"m missing something. Just as there were times when I thought I was missing something, Flinx, when you conversed with the natives on Ulru-Ujurr so many years ago." She sounded wistful. "I wonder how their tunnel digging is progressing."
Flinx had to smile at the remembrance. "A few millennia yet to go, I should imagine."
""Ulru-Ujurr"?" Clarity moved over to join them. ""Tunnel digging"?" She looked up at Flinx. "Maybe you could fill me in on what you two are reminiscing about?"
"Maybe so," Sylzenzuzex agreed, underscoring the comment with whistling thranx laughter.
More old memories came flooding back to Flinx. As was usual with his remembrances, not all of them were pleasant. "Syl and I have some history together," he told the curious Clarity. "I suppose I better explain."
"That would be helpful." She did not add that, given the obvious depth of feeling that existed between him and a female with whom he had evidently shared a great deal prior to meeting her, it was also helpful that Sylzenzuzex belonged to an entirely different species.
It was a long story replete with details that Flinx decided not to elaborate on until he had a lot more time in which to do so. It was enough that Clarity learned how, in the ongoing search to unravel the secrets of his parentage, he and Sylzenzuzex had found themselves thrown together on the edicted world of Ulru-Ujurr, that they had struck up an enduring friendship with its extraordinary natives in the course of doing battle with unscrupulous exploiters and a distant relative of his, and that upon surviving numerous potentially fatal encounters they had subsequently gone their separate ways.
"It"s all part and parcel of my long, strange, jagged journey," he concluded. As he put a hand on the shoulder that was not occupied by the minidrag Sc.r.a.p, the sounds of arriving skimmers drifted in to them from outside. "A journey that"s led me to some answers, to more questions, to a lot of knowledge and maybe a tiny bit of wisdom, to a partial understanding of the monstrous thing that"s approaching our galaxy, and most importantly of all-to you." Leaning forward, he lightly kissed her upturned lips.
She was smiling when he pulled back. "If that "tiny bit of wisdom" involves knowing how to properly conclude an explanation, I find I"d have to agree." Pulling his head down toward her, she kissed him again; harder this time.
Sylzenzuzex looked on with the combination of tolerance and quiet amus.e.m.e.nt her kind reserved for much of what pa.s.sed for intimate social interaction among their bipedal mammalian allies. As far as the average thranx was concerned this involved the exchange, in varying amounts according to the particular activity involved, of far too much in the way of bodily fluids. A delicate brush of antennae, a truhand caress, struck her as a far more sensible and civilized way to achieve a similarly intimate result.
It was all a matter of contradictory cultures, she knew. No doubt it had much to do with physiology as well. When pressed together, soft and flexible human flesh tended to meld, whereas performing the same action with part of a chitinous exoskeleton only resulted in potentially disfiguring blemishes and sc.r.a.pes. Then there was the whole business of ovipositors versus ... and ... well ...
The time available for such captivating speculation vanished as a team of alert and armed Church Security personnel arrived on the run. Identifying herself, she detailed the reasons behind her emergency call-in and explained what needed to be done. As a full padre, her authority to do so and to direct that the members of the Order be placed in custody was not questioned. That could very well come later, but it was not a concern of the newly arrived security personnel. Instructed to ignore the sometimes pa.s.sionate protestations of those being detained, they rounded up the recovering members of the Order with a proficiency and single-mindedness that was a credit to the Church.
As he watched his nemeses being led away, Flinx knew that in a couple of days, at least a few members of the Order were likely to be released. Formal grievances might then be lodged. But by the time the Nurian judicial system fully engaged with that of the local Church hierarchy and consequent summonses could be issued, he and his friends would be aboard the Teacher Teacher, far out in s.p.a.ce-plus on a vector for deep into the Blight, safe from both the homicidal machinations of the minions of the Order of Null and the tentacles of meddlesome Commonwealth bureaucracy.
At least, he hoped so.
Flanked by two burly Church operatives, the portly speaker was being hustled toward the hallway that led to the villa"s entrance. Now fully recovered from the bewildering effects of Flinx"s emotive projection, he was visibly less happy than he had been when lying on the floor immersed in its influence.
"This isn"t over!" Twisting in the grasp of his escort, he turned to shout back at Flinx. "There are more of us than you know, more than you can imagine! Others of the Order will find you. The Purity will arrive unhindered and the cleansings will be done! But first, you and those around you will be ... !"
"Quiet!" It was the Elder, roaring with surprising strength as he was ushered out ahead of the speaker. "You idiot!" the old man added for good measure. Thus chastened, the speaker lapsed into a petulant silence. It was the Elder, roaring with surprising strength as he was ushered out ahead of the speaker. "You idiot!" the old man added for good measure. Thus chastened, the speaker lapsed into a petulant silence.
Clarity clung to Flinx, the two minidrags flicking pointed tongue-tips at each other from the shoulders of their respective masters, and watched as the rest of the trussed acolytes were led out.
"I know we"ll be gone before they"re released from detention, Flinx, but they still scare me."
He shrugged, doing his best to make light of her concern. "Extremists are always frightening, Clarity." He offered a rea.s.suring smile. "With luck, though, we"ll never see any of them ever again. It"s a big Commonwealth." He turned to Sylzenzuzex. "Do you have to go with the security team, Syl? To make your report?"
Gesturing a negative, she skittered up alongside him. "I"ll file it via my communit. What do you want to do now?" Thoughtfully, she leaned slightly to her right to make eye contact with the woman who was holding on to his left arm. "Both of you."
Flinx considered. Though few preparations were required before he could leave New Riviera, some could not be avoided. The Teacher"s Teacher"s AI could handle most of the necessary procedures. A couple of days were all it would take. Meanwhile ... AI could handle most of the necessary procedures. A couple of days were all it would take. Meanwhile ...
"Why don"t we have that reunion?" Reaching out with his right hand, he swept his palm across the middle of her antennae, bending them forward.
As they snapped back, Sylzenzuzex reflected that a male thranx who had done such a thing uninvited would have risked a swift strike to the b-thorax. Coming from a human, however, the gesture carried no such social baggage.
With a female on each arm, Flinx followed the last of the security team out of the villa.
Sylzenzuzex"s Church-registered skimmer was far faster than Flinx"s rented vehicle, so he instructed his skimmer to return to its base station on autopilot while he and Clarity joined the padre in returning to Sphene. For Flinx it was one of those rare journeys when he did not have to constantly monitor his course or destination, much less keep a lookout for private, government, or alien forces seeking his capture or death. He used the atypical opportunity to enjoy the views of the tranquil Nurian countryside with his companions.
Later, while Flinx lingered near the rear of the craft, entertaining Pip and Sc.r.a.p, Clarity wandered forward to take the seat alongside their driver. While Sylzenzuzex straddled the familiar thranx bench, Clarity availed herself of a standard human-conforming chair. It felt strange to be snakeless. Though she missed the familiar weight on her shoulder, she understood her pet"s desire to spend as much time as possible with his often absent parent.
"You could not have timed your arrival much better," she murmured in symbospeech by way of opening conversation.
Since the skimmer, once programmed, more or less flew itself, Sylzenzuzex was able to turn her attention away from the height-adjustable console and to her pa.s.senger.
"So it seems to have been." A foothand gestured toward the back of the craft. "From the time we first met, it struck me that there existed a more than casual bond between us."
"I can empathize with that. Because Flinx and I are also deeply bonded."
What am I saying? Clarity found herself thinking. Was she jealous? Because Flinx had known and bonded with Sylzenzuzex before he had known her? That was absurd! Their timely rescuer was a Clarity found herself thinking. Was she jealous? Because Flinx had known and bonded with Sylzenzuzex before he had known her? That was absurd! Their timely rescuer was a thranx thranx. Clarity knew she should be feeling nothing but grat.i.tude. Or was female jealousy something capable of crossing species?
You, she told herself quietly, are being a world-cla.s.s fool. Rectify it are being a world-cla.s.s fool. Rectify it.
"I haven"t had a chance to actually thank you. For saving us."
A thranx could not blush, but the padre made the equivalent gesture. "Flinx saved my life. I suspect he would have survived this time even in my absence."
"How can you know that?"
Antennae fluttered gracefully. "Because according to my esteemed Eighth, he always does. For example, despite the many difficulties and concerns that are unique to him, the many curious challenges and dangers and personal troubles he has endured, he still somehow managed to find the time to find you."
Now Clarity not only felt like a prize fool, she was ashamed.
"He"s been out of my life more than he"s been in it." She looked toward the rear of the skimmer. A brilliantly hued minidrag on each shoulder, Flinx was staring out the transparent canopy, enjoying the view as the skimmer entered Sphene proper. Despite his height, his appearance and manner were still boyish. One got that impression whenever one was around him, she knew. Provided you didn"t look too deeply into his eyes.
"I"m sure he hopes that will change." Click-whistling to the console, Sylzenzuzex made a minor course adjustment. The skimmer obediently turned slightly to starboard.
"We both do." Clarity came to a decision without even realizing she had been debating the issue. "I know you two go back a long way, and I know you must have a lot to talk about. If you"d rather converse in private ..."
The thranx looked over at her. "Wouldn"t a private conversation automatically include Flinx"s prospective mate as well as him? Or are your prenuptial standards so very different?"
"No," Clarity murmured in reply. "No, I guess not." With that cla.s.sically cogent observation by Flinx"s old friend, the last vestiges of incongruous resentment on Clarity"s part vanished completely.
The sprawling extended-stay residence had been designed and built to accommodate, insofar as it was physically and socially viable, visitors to New Riviera from as many worlds as possible. Mindful of traditional thranx tastes, some of the facility was located belowground. It was in a s.p.a.cious habitat on the third subterranean level that they reunited with Tse-Mallory and Truzenzuzex.
After formally greeting his young and suitably deferential female relative, the esteemed Eint walked over to Flinx. Having to bend low to clear the ceiling when he walked, Flinx had taken a seat on a floor cushion of a type designed to provide visiting humans with some degree of anterior comfort.
"My boy, you invite trouble," the thranx muttered, "the way a distillation of pheromones attracts the s.e.xually vigorous."
"With consequences that are significantly less gratifying." Tse-Mallory was seated cross-legged on the other side of the room.
"It"s not by choice or by design, as you both well know," Flinx responded glumly.
"No, no, of course not. You are just unlucky," the Eint observed with characteristic sarcasm. Turning to face the watching Clarity, he executed a bow whose grace belied the absence of a flexible backbone.
"I am very relieved to see that you suffered no harm, my dear. Bran and I blame ourselves for not keeping closer watch over you. Especially since Flinx"s return."
She smiled and shrugged it off. "Even the most attentive of nurses can"t keep watch every minute of every day. Forget about it. I"m fine, Sc.r.a.p"s fine, and Flinx is fine."
"And we will be more fine," Flinx added, "once we"re safely off New Riviera and in s.p.a.ce-plus."
Sylzenzuzex gestured agreement coupled with understanding. "I"ve insured that those who abducted Clarity and desired to kill Flinx have been removed from contact with them and with society for at least a couple of days." The sardonicism in her voice reminded Flinx immediately of her older Eighth-relative Truzenzuzex. "My report insists that their detention is vital to the continued public health."
"Clarity and I being the public," Flinx concluded with satisfaction.
Tse-Mallory eyed him from where he sat. The old man was nearly as tall as Flinx and much heavier of build. Even with his legs crossed in front of him, his closely cropped white hair nearly sc.r.a.ped the slightly concave ceiling.
"Flinx, while you were gone on the Teacher Teacher, Tru and I were kept busy not only looking after your enchanting lady but monitoring the progress of that evil that threatens to devour all. As it draws nearer the galaxy our contacts in both Commonwealth and Church Science Central have been able to track its direction and progress to a degree that is as increasingly despairing as it is increasingly precise."
"It continues to speed up," a somber Flinx guessed.
Tse-Mallory nodded grimly. "According to the latest report we"ve received, last month the leading edge of the darkness made contact with the very minor star cl.u.s.ter known as MC-3048b. Hardly worthy of the designation "cl.u.s.ter," the grouping in question contained eight stars in four single and two double systems." He paused for emphasis. "All but one of the binary systems has since disappeared."
A new voice interrupted, the bemused clicking of Sylzenzuzex. "Would it be too much, venerable Eighth, to ask what you are all talking about?"
"Yes, csillkk csillkk, it would," Truzenzuzex told her brusquely. "All will be explained in due course." She went silent as he turned back to his lifelong companion. "Continue please, Bran."
Tse-Mallory nodded briskly. "The light of half a dozen suns-gone, just like that. No plasma flare-up, no ensuing nova, no punctuating outburst of X-rays or gamma radiation. Nothing. One by one these stars have simply vanished. Swallowed up, as an immeasurable quant.i.ty of additional matter has been, by what Flinx has so eloquently yet simply described to us as the Great Evil."
Truzenzuzex leaned impatiently toward the tall young human in their midst. Having known him for a long time, the Eint knew he could ask him anything he wished, directly and without precondition or preamble.
"What more can you say of the threat, Flinx? Have you perceived it recently? What news can you impart, what hope can you deliver?"
"Very little of either of those, I"m afraid," he mumbled unhappily.
Seated next to him Clarity reached over, took his right hand in hers, and squeezed gently. It was such a simple, uncomplicated gesture. What it communicated silently was exactly what he had missed more than anything else during his nearly two years of journeying. Human warmth. Openness. Unquestioning love.
Truzenzuzex did not take Flinx"s hand, but he could gesture first-degree sympathy and understanding. "Expecting little, I am neither surprised nor disappointed by your response. At our end, nothing has changed for us or for those few others who know the secret. Despite much pondering and theorizing by minds better than Bran"s and mine, the ma.s.sive disguised weapons platform of the extinct Tar-Aiym that you encountered and interacted with still presents the only means and method any of us consider worth pursuing as a possible defense against the overwhelming extragalactic threat that approaches."
Tse-Mallory nodded agreement. "Not only is nothing humanx-derived perceived as even remotely capable of affecting something so vast as the Great Evil, we cannot even envision or imagine anything capable of doing so."
In the ensuing silence Truzenzuzex proceeded to voice what he and Tse-Mallory had so far been reluctant to ask. "Are Bran and I correct in a.s.suming from the time and manner of your return to Nur that you have been unable to reestablish contact with the greatly sought-after artifact in question?"
The philosoph"s a.s.sumption relieved Flinx of having to confirm what was plainly an antic.i.p.ated disappointment. "I"m afraid so. But," he added quickly to forestall their deepening disillusionment, "it"s not like I spent all these past months looking for it, either."
Tse-Mallory"s gaze narrowed. "Then what have you been doing-boy."
Flinx flinched, but otherwise accepted the scold without comment. From a commonsensical standpoint Tse-Mallory was entirely correct in voicing the censure. Flinx would have been the last one in the room to claim that during the past year or so he had behaved in a wholly rational manner.
"I needed-I had to find out some things." He looked for support to Clarity, to whom he had already confessed the reasons behind his wandering. "About myself, about intelligence in general, about worthiness."
"Dear me," Truzenzuzex murmured, "and is it now safe to believe that with the fate of the galaxy and all sentience at stake you have finally managed to satisfy your personal requirements?"
"I think so." Flinx was too abashed to respond directly to the philosoph"s sarcasm. Though in the past months he had dealt efficiently with murderous humans and belligerent AAnn, with hostile environments and would-be a.s.sa.s.sins, in the presence of the two senior scientists who had been his mentors since his early youth he felt like little more than a wayward child.
"You "think" so, kijaa!kt?" kijaa!kt?" Truzenzuzex harrumphed. "To think that the fate of everything should rest on the shoulders of one so young, self-centered, and unstable!" Truzenzuzex harrumphed. "To think that the fate of everything should rest on the shoulders of one so young, self-centered, and unstable!"
Clarity had heard all she could stand. Locking her arm in Flinx"s and leaning protectively against him she glared at the philosoph, unintimidated by either his considerable accomplishments or fearsome reputation.
"That"s enough! What about everything Flinx has gone through on behalf of this lunatic quest you sent him on? What about the recurring headaches that sometimes nearly kill him? He doesn"t know what a normal life is and he hasn"t had any peace since he was a child-and even then he sometimes had to steal just to eat." Her gaze swung back and forth between the two scientists. "You"re both famous, successful, honored representatives of your respective species. You have the freedom to go wherever you want, when you want." As Sc.r.a.p adjusted his position on her shoulder she pressed close against the man beside her.
"Everyone wants something from Flinx: private individuals, companies, the great families, government agencies. Or else they want to kill him. Or dissect him." She looked up at the young man who had already lived several lifetimes. "All he wants is to be left alone-and maybe to be happy, just simply happy happy, for a little while before he dies. You can"t, any of you, imagine the pressures he is under every moment of every day."
Peering down at Clarity, Flinx swallowed hard. He had been right to come back here. He was not so sure he had been right ever to leave.
For a while it was quiet in the underground room. When Truzenzuzex finally spoke again his symbospeech was shorn of the usual abrasive clicks. But his words were underscored with as much resolve as ever.
"It"s not that Bran and I don"t feel for our young friend, Clarity-bearer, or that we fail to understand and sympathize with his challenging physical and mental condition. But the threat we face is far, far greater than any individual or any individual concerns. Everything-everything including personal happiness-must perforce be sacrificed in the attempt, however futile it may seem, to deal with this oncoming danger. Otherwise we abrogate our responsibility as sentient beings, to civilization and to the generations yet to come." Downy antennae dipped in her direction.
"Do you think that I am "happy" having to devote to this peril what little time remains to me? Considerably less time, may I point out, than remains to you or to Flinx. Do you think I do not ponder what may become of my own scattered progeny if it is not overcome?" Glistening compound eyes regarded each of them in turn. "We are all of us here among the few who are even aware of the monstrousness that is sweeping toward our home, our Commonwealth. And among that few, we know that we have only one realistic possibility of confronting it. Without Flinx"s intimate involvement, we have not even that." His golden gaze eyed her unblinkingly.
"In light of all that, my dear, I am afraid that individual concerns, no matter how poignant or involving or intense, must necessarily be set aside."
This time the ensuing silence lasted even longer than the one that had preceded it. For a change it was Flinx who spoke up first.
"Uh, actually, I have an idea."
Tse-Mallory took a deep breath, exhaled slowly and deliberately.