Extremis (90 page)

The biggest human received a message from a newly arrived—and much battered—armored figure, who gasped out something fast and desperate. The large human turned to Jennifer. “Honey, we don’t have a lot of time left. The Baldi—the Arduans will be here in less than a minute. They’ve overrun Jon Wismer’s rear guard. He’s dead, Jennifer.”

Ankaht felt Jennifer slip away, as though someone had struck deep into her body with a long, cold weapon. This—Jon—had been someone for whom she had felt a great, gentle fondness, much as a sister would for a brother. “Jennifer, yes, you are right in all this. But to stop this killing—to make Jon’s death the last. How does taking us hostage help achieve that?”

“Because”—and Jennifer turned her suddenly sunken eyes back upon Ankaht, who saw for the first time just how quickly a changed emotional state could make a human look haggard and unhealthy—“because, Ankaht, now that we’ve taken you hostage, we are surrendering to you.” Jennifer nodded. The big human stepped back from his covered position at the doorway. He called his twelve remaining soldiers from their posts, gathering them to him. Standing before Ankaht, they all cast their weapons to the ground.

Behind Ankaht, Tefnut ha sheri actually cried out in surprise. It was a strangled sound, and Jennifer looked concerned for a moment, but Ankaht calmed her as she asked, “You came here—fought through all our defenses, died by the hundreds—just to take us hostage, and then surrender to us?”

Jennifer nodded again. “What else would make you—all of you—believe how strongly we want to talk to you, to make peace? Here we stand, at last able to cripple your people at their darkest, weakest hour—and you are powerless to prevent it.”

Ankaht imitated—stiffly—Jennifer’s nod. “And at that same moment, you choose instead to capitulate. You hold us in your hands, able to do us great injury, but instead you let us go—and more, you put your fates in our ‘hands.’ ” Ankaht felt tears of wonder and hope streaming down her face and did not care: she was proud to wear them. She turned and opened her
selnarm
so all could receive her statement—and challenge. “Can any of you doubt the power and truth of this gesture? Can any of you harbor any suspicion that humans are not persons, are not furnished with souls as great as those within the Children of Illudor? Can even
you
still doubt it?” she finished, aiming the question at Lentsul, who, at the head of a dozen Enforcers and several blisters, rushed into the room, weapons leveled at the humans.

* * *

Lentsul, who had sensed some of the exchange, wondered if the eldest sleeper had, in fact, been permanently addled by her many centuries in cryogenic sleep. “Elder,” he sent quickly, “this could be a trap, a ruse. These are clever creatures—”

“Good Lentsul, I do not recognize your
narmata
at this moment. It is changed—flooded with fury, with hurt. You are not thinking clearly.”

“No, Elder. It is you who is not thinking clearly. Even if these dozen humans mean to surrender, the rest of their forces are still fighting. Hundreds are headed this way. To this very chamber. Do you think
they
will surrender?”

The human subject Peitchkov had evidently understood much of what he had sent. “Surrender. They. Will. At. Signal. From. Us.”

Lentsul ignored her. “That signal is probably a way for this advance team to confirm that their attack’s primary target—the Council—is all here. I suspect they will fire one of their HVMs at these coordinates as soon as she is allowed to transmit the sig—”

“Lentsul—”

He was resolved not to succumb to Ankaht’s masterful philosophizing and speculation; not now. So he countered with logic. “This human female has come to surrender? Very well, what are her terms?”

“Lentsul, she has imposed no terms—”

The human subject Peitchkov sent as well as said, “One requirement only. That we talk. If we surrender to you. You must talk with us.”

Lentsul quickly concurred. “That is acceptable. Now, order all your approaching forces to lay down their arms.”

Ankaht was pleased, amazed. “And will you, too, agree to this, Lentsul?”

Lentsul waved his weapon in impatience. “Of course, of course.” There wasn’t much time left. In forty seconds, the lead elements of the main human force would arrive. That left just about enough time to make sure that the main attack force got the surrender signal and could be disarmed by his own forces. Then, when they were defenseless, Lentsul could arrange for the safe and efficient euthanization of each and every one of the savage—

“Lentsul.” He heard his name spoken, and heard it—flat and featureless—through the
selnarm
link furnished by the vocoder. Tefnut ha sheri had brought it over to Jennifer, who was looking straight at him.

Suspicious, he aimed his gun directly at her unarmored head. “Signal your forces to disarm. Now.”

“I will signal them to wait for two minutes, if you lift your jamming.” She nodded to the largest human. Lentsul calculated the probability that this was part of an elaborate ruse, decided it was unlikely, and sent the override command to the electronic-warfare control center. The large human next to subject Peitchkov immediately sent a quick signal; Lentsul pulsed the jamming to reassert. The human looked up in annoyance.

But subject Peitchkov was unperturbed. Instead, she folded her hands—immense armored gauntlets—calmly.

“Lentsul, I do not know you. But I feel—through Ankaht, and others—that you are a protector of your people. That you protect them with your wits, more than your strength.”

Lentsul kept his weapon aimed directly at the human’s head.

“So I know you are too smart to miss the opportunity this puts before you. You would be foolish not to realize that once we lay down our weapons, you could quite easily turn the tables on us. You could disarm and slaughter us all, thereby eliminating the Resistance and saving the Council. No doubt you would be a hero.”

Lentsul wondered if he should shoot subject Peitchkov now: she had guessed too much of his intent. But he felt Ankaht’s razor-edged attention on his every move.

The human continued her jabbering. “But before you think too well of such a plan, think through all of its consequences. If it turns out that we do indeed relent—that all our forces lay down their arms—then no Arduan can deny that we acted in good faith. All of the Children of Illudor would be compelled to admit that we spent our lives—the only ones we live before being swallowed up by
xenzhet-narmat’ai
—to make clear a single point: how badly we, and this war, could hurt you. And yet, having proven and brought that threat to your very doorstep, and with our
skeerba
at your throat, we nonetheless stayed our hands. And why? To prove that we want to speak with you, not kill you. And now you have given your word to do no less.

“If, however, it turns out that you have lied and intend to slaughter us all as soon as we lay down our arms, then I ask you to contemplate the aftermath of such a betrayal, even if you believe us animals. In short, I ask you to think on this:

“When the sun sets on this day, will you—and the millions of Arduans who shall inherit the consequences of your actions—truly be able to go to your mirrors, and with all three eyes seeking truth—”

Ill’sblood! Where did she learn that saying?

“—will you be able to tell your reflection: ‘I am the sentient one, the good one, the righteous one. But the creatures who refrained from destroying our leaders—and who relented because we promised them fair parley under a flag of truce—they are but animals.’ For if, at the end of such a day, you can still see yourselves as just and sentient, and us as evil and bestial, then there probably never could be peace between us.

“So if this is the plan to which you are committed—to betray us, and your own honor as well—then enjoy the dubious gains of that treachery for the short time you have left. For when the rest of humanity comes—and as sure as the sun rises each day, they will come—you will wish you had simply remained to die when Sekahmant went nova. For the fury of that destruction will seem mild compared to the vengeance our brothers and sisters will bring down upon you. And it will not be fierce and unremitting because you killed us, but because you
betrayed
us.”

Lentsul answered; the vocoder produced his sneer with distressing faithfulness. “That is a rather warlike note upon which to end your appeal for peace, Jennifer Peitchkov.”

She shook her head. “But I am not done. Do not be afraid.” She wedged open her suit’s right greave and turned a recessed dial. Then she reached up under and behind her left armpit and pressed a small control stud. With a hiss and a set of rapid clacks, the immense protective suit seemed to sag on her. She reached across her body, undid a side hinge—and both her breastplate and faulds fell away, carrying the rest of the upper armor with them.

With only the immense greaves and boots on, her body looked almost tragically thin and weak. But she shuffled forward until she was within a meter of Lentsul. At which point, she got down on her knees. “In our species, this is the posture we adopt when asking something from a master, from a person before whom we may show no pride. I am, however, a proud woman of a proud people, so bear that in mind when I tell you why I kneel: not for myself, or our warriors, or yours—but for all our children, all our young. And for all those who will never be born if their parents are consumed by this war-day, and the bloody months and years that would surely follow. In the name of those unborn children, and for their lives, I beg—abjectly beg—that you
genuinely
consider our humble request to parley. Lentsul, Ankaht, all who hear my plea, believe this if you believe nothing else: as a mother, my love for those unborn innocents is greater than my pride. If you, too, are sentient creatures, can you feel any less? Can you, in good conscience, ignore such an appeal?”

Lentsul analyzed Jennifer’s words for obvious falsehoods or contradictions. They did not contain any, but their veracity could not be conclusively verified, either—and the future of his species might very well depend upon what he did next. Dispassionate analysis of the situation indicated that there was no justifiable reason to take any risks.

“Lentsul,” sent Ankaht. “Put down your weapon.”

“No, Eldest. We need assurances.”

The big human pulled off his helmet—revealing the face of Peitchkov’s mate. Hardly a surprise.

The vocoder reproduced the tone of the human’s voice as being strangely calm, even casual. “Look. I’m a soldier, not a diplomat. So let me break this down for you. This deal is as good as it gets. For either of us. If you don’t meet us halfway, what happens? You kill us all. But before we all die, we kill lots of you, including your most important leaders. And then what? Internal power struggles? Political problems in your fleet when its got its back against the wall? Yes, we know your Fleet is in trouble, because even our naked-eye telescopes tell us you’re getting this system ready for a siege. And think about this: do you think we used
all
our HVMs today? Do you think we deployed and risked
all
our best trained individuals?
All
our milspec gear? C’mon, think about it. If we got in here once…”

The implication hung in the air like a poised blade, like the razor’s edge of uncertainty upon which each one of them was now poised.

The subject Peitchkov reached out one slender hand for the gun Lentsul had aimed at her forehead. “Lentsul, please, let’s stop the killing.”

He looked down and saw her pleading eyes. In the same instant, he saw Heshfet’s haughty, wonderful profile towering above him. He heard subject Peitchkov’s words echoing in his conscience. He felt his hate for Heshfet’s murderers fill his
selnarm
. The war between the two emotions intensified, tremored down through the rigid cluster in which he clutched his machine-pistol, and shuddered out into the already-quivering tentacle that was wrapped tightly about the weapon’s trigger.

Which, if squeezed, would surely be the death of them all. But that was not of primary importance now. The lives in this room did not matter. Only the future of his race—the coming generations who would inherit the consequences of his next act—had any significance. And he, an
Ixturshaz
, had no choice but to act in accordance with his training, his caste. He made the calculations and discovered which course of action optimized the chances that Illudor’s Children would survive.

“What I do,” he sent clearly, gun steady, “I must do for the unborn Children of Illudor.”

His tentacles flexed restively, unwillingly, and then opened.

Lentsul’s gun fell to the floor.

TRNS
Li Han
, Allied Fleet, BR-02 Warp Nexus

Ian Trevayne stood motionless, hands wrapped in a tight knot behind his back. “I don’t trust them.”

“Neither do I,” Mags agreed hollowly.

The day had begun with twenty-two Baldy relay drones cycling through the warp point from Madras. Each one of them had been dutifully blasted to subatomic particles on the assumption that any Baldy attempt at communication must, perforce, simply be a new trick.

But when they sent nine through all at once, and a fragment of a message got transmitted, it was clear that there was a genuine intent to communicate.

But what should have ostensibly been a cause for some guarded optimism turned grim soon enough. The message had been: “must communicate about regrettable deeds.” “Regrettable deeds?” Trevayne had hardly known what to think. In a war where millions had died, infants had been executed, and whole towns annihilated, what new species of apocalypse or atrocity could constitute special mention as a particularly “regrettable deed”?

Mags had evidently been thinking the same thought. “I just hope they didn’t use biologicals on Bellerophon.”

Trevayne nodded tightly. That had been his fear, too. The one thing that might compel the Baldies to meet under a white flag was a runaway doomsday bug that they didn’t know how to turn off, or treat, due to their rudimentary understanding of human biology. Of course, they might need the same kind of help if they were trying to contend with the aftereffects of fallout, had the “regrettable deeds” been nuclear in nature.