Changing Vision (3 page)

Paul Cameron, despite his tendency to dress conservatively and stay out of the limelight, was not a Human easily missed, a useful characteristic as I relied on his dark, perennially rumpled hair as a marker to guide me through the mass of taller and shorter beings, all intent on wishing me the best. There was something about the graceful way he carried himself, the way his gray eyes fixed with intensity on anything of interest—as they did once he spotted me. He smiled easily, and usually sincerely, so the falseness of that expression on his face this time was fair warning.

“We have a problem,” Paul confirmed quietly, my ears well-tuned to his low voice despite the babble as I drew near. I spared an instant to wonder if he meant our tradition of an open bar when entertaining clients and staff, noticing more than a few individuals hanging around the entryway who were definitely not on my original invitation list. The more the merrier, I believe had been the Human expression Meony-ro had used when taking that responsibility from me at what, I now admitted, had been a weak moment.

More than uninvited guests
, I realized almost at once, reading my friend’s face with the ease of long practice. His smiles for the well-wishers on every side didn’t warm the somber look in his gray eyes, eyes that met and held mine with a clear message.

The kind of trouble we had to handle on our own.

I pressed my cup of well-nursed spurl into the nearest willing appendage. “Excuse us,” I said to no one in particular, forcing my sensitive ears up and open in a relaxed gesture despite the almost painful decibel level in the lobby. “Always business. I keep telling the Human: if it’s not on a collision course for the bank, it can wait.” There was the expected round of chuckles and amused grunts. Paul was widely considered the serious half of our business, despite the respect given to my expertise in evaluating merchandise and predicting trends.
All true.

Cue and excuse given, Paul didn’t waste any time heading back out the doors, not bothering to check I was behind.
In a hurry, then
, I thought uneasily, following as quickly as politeness and the width of my present feet allowed. Fortunately, no one seemed to care that the hosts, and so the erstwhile reasons for the party, were leaving—something I supposed could also be attributed to Meony-ro’s expanded guest list and our largesse behind the bar. I shunted the appropriate memo to a part of my private memory I would access tomorrow.

Paul led the way around the rear of the squat utilitarian building housing the offices of Cameron & Ki Exports at the edge of the Minas’ shipcity. The shipcity itself made up more than two thirds of the area of Fishertown, a reasonable proportion, since almost everyone in Fishertown worked at the shipcity or provided some service to the spacers and their ships, from freighter fleets such as the Largas’ to smaller independents. Ours wasn’t the best location—we hadn’t paid premium price or tax for one of the newly glamorous areas of extra conveniences. Paul had agreed it would arouse suspicion to live beyond our obvious means. Over time, Cameron & Ki Exports had come to turn a decent profit, albeit not a huge one. It was our inclination. And it was safer.

Although
, I sighed to myself, considering the stark, practical ugliness of the colonial-era architecture looming ahead,
it would have been nice to dip into the vast store of credits and other currency I’d inherited as last of my Web and at least plant an imported shrub or two.
Minas XII’s charming climate, at its best, encouraged a mind-numbing variety of low-to-the-ground bushes and flowers that burrowed into the soil to meet their pollinators.

“In here,” the Human said unnecessarily as he waved his right hand before the lock pad of the warehouse side door, our private entrance. “I’ve put him in the customs-pending vault.”

“Put who? And why in the vault?”

“Not here,” was his cryptic and most-unhelpful reply, considering we were the only beings currently not inside
enjoying the party, the sounds of which still came quite clearly to my ears. Paul tended to err on the side of caution.
He was beginning
, I thought dourly,
to sound more like Ersh every decade.

We entered the warehouse without turning on the interior lights, a move that seemed more in keeping with potential burglars than owners. Who or what had Paul put in the vault?
What
, I hoped for its sake, since, as storage, the claustrophobic box was far more suitable for a few cases of brandy than anything living and aware.

Paul closed and locked the door behind us, only then activating a hand light. I stood perfectly still until he passed me a second light—the night vision of this form being so poor as to be a joke on several planets and a source of quite real danger on most, if only in terms of collisions with various objects.

“This couldn’t wait?” I asked impatiently, although I went after him as he strode to the back corner of the vast, and to me invisible, room. I focused queasily on the dim oval of light aimed in front of my feet, determined not to cycle simply to best him at this trekking about in the perilous dark.

“No, Es. Sorry about the party. But you’ll see.”

“A few lights would help that,” I muttered under my breath.

As it turned out, I didn’t need them. My ears involuntarily pricked up and swung forward in response to an almost subvocal moan from somewhere ahead. There were vibrations to the edges of the sound, as though air had passed through a thin layer of moisture. “Paul?” I whispered anxiously. “Who—”

“I don’t know his name,” my friend said in a heavy voice. “I just know he needs help.”

We must have been closer to our destination than my impoverished vision informed me, for suddenly a light came on overhead and, after blinking painfully for a moment, I could see Paul standing in the doorway to the vault itself. He must have left it open: kindness for its occupant and a sensible safety measure, given the regularity with which its
cumbersome time lock forgot the date and required the efforts of a locksmith to open during reasonable working hours.

I stepped past him, then halted in the doorway, the fingers of my left hand seeking the comfort of Paul’s shoulder in a movement foreign to this form, yet so part of my inner nature by now, I rarely noticed the discrepancy. “I had to bring him to you,” Paul said as if in apology. “No one else could help.”

The Ganthor male lay facing the door, eyes closed into barely perceptible slits, his snout hanging half over the side of the ramshackle cot Paul must have pulled here from the staff room. He was naked, bearing none of the belts or bandoliers usually seen on Ganthor traveling offworld. By the way his thick bristled skin hung in rolls, gathering like so much fabric over each joint of leg and arm, he hadn’t eaten properly in weeks. But it was the huge oozing burn stretching from throat to abdomen that should have killed him by now, despite the fact that it showed signs of decent emergency care. Blasterfire, and at close range.
A mercenary.

No need to ask why Paul hadn’t taken the poor being to a hospital. On a Fringe world such as Minas XII, settled by refugees from conflicts fought largely by paid soldiers, there would be little or no sympathy. In fact, there was a high likelihood merely bringing this being here would land us on the wrong side of the authorities, such as they were, explaining Paul’s caution. But there was a larger issue.

“Where is his Herd?” I asked very quietly. The Ganthor looked unconscious, and from what I could see, didn’t have one of the implanted devices to allow him to vocalize in comspeak, the trade tongue of the Commonwealth and Fringe. The glistening streaks of drying mucus coating his snout and nostrils were signs that, awake, he must have continued desperate attempts to pick up the scent of others of his kind, an expenditure of moisture his damaged body could ill afford.

Paul’s voice was strained—I could hear the helpless anger in it. “No one knows—or will admit it. There must have been action in one of the closed zones. He was transferred
through two Inhaven freighters I could trace before ending up on one of ours, the
Largas Loyal.
Her Captain said all they were told was that this was a crash survivor needing to go to the nearest facility. He contacted me on approach, and I met the ship.”

“None of them wanted his corpse on their ship’s manifest,” I said, unable to stop the feather of a growl under my words. Even the otherwise easygoing Lishcyn form could be outraged by such behavior toward an injured being. “I’m amazed he survived this long.” Amazed, but not surprised: the herd instinct of the Ganthor was incredibly powerful. Somehow, this dying soldier’s desperate need to reach his Herd—not to die alone—must have kept him breathing. It was an innate heroism Ganthor mercenaries all too often paid for as dearly as this.

“There are no Ganthor on Minas XII,” I said sadly. “I’d know.” In fact, almost anyone would. Hiding the presence of a Ganthor Herd, especially one intent on celebrating a victory or commiserating a defeat, was virtually impossible. Not only were they large and noisy, they tended to break things. Other people’s things. To be fair, this tendency was not particularly deliberate, merely a consequence of certain aspects of their hardwiring.

As if he could understand, and perhaps he could, the soldier roused.

Roused was too strong a word. The eyes remained almost shut—probably he didn’t have the energy, or will, to try and break the dried crust gluing his lids closed. But one hand shifted listlessly, toes uncurling so their percussive surfaces contacted one another. It wasn’t a word. It was only a sound, like a heart breaking.

Paul turned to look at me, his hand reaching out and then dropping, utter anguish on his face. “Es, I’ve never asked this of you before—”

“No need to ask now, my friend,” I replied. When I’d first met Paul, he’d been an alien culture and language specialist—part of a Commonwealth First Contact Team. During our time together, he’d continued his exploration of other living intelligences with the same intense and compassionate
interest. Paul knew, as well as any being could who lived outside the imperative of the Herd, the only possible comfort of meaning to the dying Ganthor.

And he knew only I could offer it.

Without hesitation, I passed Paul my beaded bag and slipped out of the issa-silk burnoose I’d donned for the party. I walked over to where a long table bore a set of crates marked perishable. Opening one, I found, as I’d expected, the shipment of rootstocks ordered by Atty Fresk, a local florist and plant dealer.
Most of the order was probably for me
, I reassured myself with a twinge of guilt. My Lishcyn-self could provide more than enough mass, especially since my recent discovery of fudge, but I had to be able to return to this form as well. Foresight, I told Ersh in my thoughts, was something I’d learned the hard way. There had been a very uncomfortable ride home in Paul’s luggage the last time I hadn’t been prepared. So I selected the thickest, juiciest specimen, hoping it wasn’t an irreplaceable rarity—something I had no time to check anyway—and put it carefully aside.

I released the tight grip needed to maintain my form as the slightly rotund Lishcyn, feeling the warm pulse of energy released at the same time. Pausing less than a fraction of one of Paul’s heartbeats in web-form was enough for me to sense the throbbing of gravity beneath us, the overlapping music of electromagnetism drawn from atom and star. It was also enough to let me detect the byproducts of decay in the air: the Ganthor’s breath. I cycled into what I had to become.

As Ganthor, the stench of imminent death was almost more than I could bear. Worse was the overscent of abandonment. I rushed forward, ramming my snout roughly into the side of the soldier, using the bulk of my healthy body to shove at his with complete disregard for any physical pain. His eyes opened at the same time as fresh mucus bubbled joyously from his snout; it was stained pink with blood. My alarm and concern filled the air between us, broadcast without any need to will it so.
Herd-friend
, it sent.
Not alone
, it affirmed.

A rapid series of clicks, comprehensible words, as though he knew time was running out. *The Herd is dead. The Matriarch was betrayed. Abandoned on the battlefield. No Herd.* This last with a scent of pure despair that tore at my soul.

*Herd!!* I insisted, stamping one foot against the floor in emphasis. I wasn’t mature enough as a Ganthor to impress him as a Matriarch, the senior female and undisputed ruler of her Herd’s association of males, related and otherwise, and nonreproductive females, related or forcibly adopted. But I was here and all he had. *Join this Herd!!* I ordered him. *Join!!*

I drove my shoulder and thigh against his again, inadvertently collapsing the cot beneath us both and doubtless gaining a bruise or two in the process. His body was mostly gristle and bone. He gave way, admitting his subordinate role within our Herd of two with a scent of pure relief. There was a rush of belonging, of identification blurring and melding into one. I couldn’t get close enough to him.

“Es.” The sound meant nothing. I refused to open my eyes, clinging to a cooling comfort.

*Es!!* The clickspeak was muffled, delivered by the rapping of a knuckle on metal and punctuated by a stamp part of me knew better than to ignore. *He’s gone.*

I pulled myself away from what had been a member of my Herd, an effort agonizing beyond comprehension to a non-Ganthor, possible solely because I owed greater allegiance to the being standing anxiously to one side. Thankfully, Paul had known better than to try and touch me. Ganthor were foremost a physical species and my present form outmassed the Human’s by a significant and dangerous amount.

I cycled, shedding the excess mass as drops of moisture clinging to my fur. To the senses of this form, the Ganthor was simply dead, the passionate responses of Herd and need merely an echo in memory.

“Es. Are you all right?” Paul’s voice was soft and a bit anxious. When I looked over at him, I realized why.

My vision was predator-keen, and my eyes met Paul’s
down the length of an elegant, smoothly-shaved muzzle. Without meaning to, or wanting to, I’d cycled, not into the form I lived in on this world and in this place, but into the more comforting one of my birth. I didn’t need to dredge up memory to hear what Ersh would have said, doubtless something about my being Youngest and so prone to such emotional lapses in judgment.