Regeneration (Czerneda) (30 page)

“Polar bears,” Mac said finally. “How’s that work?”

The man beside her gave a low chuckle. “Until pack ice, she helps with the grizzly census. Populations overlap near here.”

“Handy.” Mac pulled her knees up so she could wrap them in the blanket too, trying not to be envious. Here he was, in an area as remote and isolated as humanly possible in the modern world, and he’d found a fellow biologist to share his life.

As for sharing anything, that remained part of a future Mac wasn’t interested in contemplating. Not now.

“What’s it like?” Sebastian asked unexpectedly. “Out there.”

She considered the question. “Like here,” she answered after a moment. “You watch your step. And everywhere else becomes—smaller.”

He fell silent, as if she’d said enough.

Mac counted shooting stars for a while, then watched a pair of tiny lights trace out the river below.
Probably the ferry making its night run.
She followed the lights until they disappeared around the next sharp bend.

She looked up in time to see a luminescent sheet of green unfurl across the sky. With a gasp, Mac threw off the blanket and started to rise to her feet. She sank down again as pink joined the display, then purples. “Mouse,” she lied, her teeth chattering with more than the chill. Ashamed, she fumbled to rewrap herself.

“Admit it, Mac. You’re cold.” He sounded amused. “That’ll teach you to live in the tropics and lose your conditioning.”

Before she could protest she’d done nothing of the sort, Sebastian slipped down to the step she was on and gathered her up, blanket and all, so she could lean back against his shoulder and still see the stars.

Mac let herself relax into his so-Human warmth.

“Dr. Connor.”

The strange whisper woke her, but she froze, eyes shut, wondering why her name was the only sound she heard.
Why weren’t the dogs barking?

“Dr. Connor. We don’t have much time.” The voice became distant, as if speaking to someone else. “Why isn’t she waking up? Is there something wrong with—”

She recognized that impatient snap, even muffled.
Hollans?

Mac opened her eyes, finding herself nose to nose with a hulking silhouette.

“Good,” she heard Hollans say. “Would you come with me, Dr. Connor?” The silhouette moved back.

As she sat up, the arm that had been around her fell away.

“Sebas—?” Mac lost the word, her mouth too dry.
What had Hollans done?
She moved her tongue around, found some moisture. “Sebastian!”

She reached out and found him. He was lying beside her on the steps, body flaccid, head back. Mac gave him a gentle prod but he didn’t stir, snoring quietly. She glared at the silhouette and didn’t bother to whisper. “What did you do to him?”

“Your friend will be fine.” A hand appeared in her way, and Mac resisted the urge to slap it aside as she climbed to her feet on her own.

She felt normal. A little cramped and with a sore hip, but nothing that couldn’t be explained by falling asleep on a cold rustic staircase.
Except she hadn’t fallen asleep.

No sign of dawn yet. A faint red glow illuminated the ground between their feet.
An invitation.
“This way, please, Dr. Connor.”

“I’m certainly not leaving him like this.”

“Someone will watch. Please, Dr. Connor.”

Hard to argue with someone insistently polite.
Giving in, Mac tarried to roll up her blanket and wedge it under Sebastian’s head and shoulders, taking in as much of her dark surroundings as she could. No sign of Mudge or Schrant. Hollans must have come for her.

Using the light to find the stony path, then to avoid larger stones once they’d left it, Hollans led Mac past too-quiet doghouses to the looming bulk of a waiting lev. Its door opened, the interior dimmed so she didn’t have to squint to see there was no one waiting inside.

“You set this up,” she accused, once they’d climbed in and taken seats.

“The delay?” He nodded and pulled off the goggles he’d worn. “Resume normal lighting.” The increase was gradual, easy on her eyes. “Would you like a drink, Dr. Connor?”

Kid gloves were never a good sign,
Mac decided, now more worried by this midnight meeting than irritated. “Sebastian didn’t know,” she said.

It wasn’t a question, but he answered anyway. “We didn’t need to involve anyone else. We can always find you, Dr. Connor.”

At the reminder, she involuntarily rubbed her right arm, though the mark from the implant needle had faded months ago. Its result would outlast her bones.
Not a comfort.
“I’ll take coffee, black,” she said. “What’s this about, Hollans? Why the secrecy?”

“Tea.” He regarded her levelly. “Dr. Connor, we’ve had our differences. I’m aware you don’t like me much.”

“I wasn’t aware I had to,” she countered, then flashed a humorless grin. “You don’t like me either. I’m too—”
what was the latest?
“—blunt.”

“That part I like.” His smile was barely warmer than hers. “If you’re going to be wrong, you’ll do it in the open. Saves all sorts of excuses and investigations.”

Mac shot to her feet. “Is that why we’re here?” she demanded hotly. “I wasn’t wrong to bring my people into this, Hollans, and I’ll defend that to—”

“Sit down. Please. You don’t have to defend anything, Dr. Connor. Thank you.” This to the black-armored agent, anonymous behind his or her visor, who arrived from the front of the lev with a steaming mug in each gloved hand. Mac took hers absently and nodded her thanks, eyes on Hollans. She sat and put the mug on the arm of her chair to cool.

Hollans waited until the agent had closed the door. “And thank you,” he told her.

Mac narrowed her eyes, now more than worried.

Bernd Hollans, the Ministry’s top official in matters of the Dhryn and Myrokynay, which meant representing all humanity in the current fight for survival, sat quietly, sipping tea, and let her study him.

A trim, tidy man, Hollans wore his usual suit, as if he’d come straight from a meeting at Earthgov or, more likely, the IU Consulate. He’d added a darker-than-usual shirt, with no cravat at its throat, and, she blinked, very sensible hiking boots.
Prepared, but in a hurry.

His face gave her no clues.
No surprise.
From their first meeting, she’d thought his features well-suited his line of work: smooth enough to appear vigorous and friendly when he smiled, wrinkled enough to crease into imposing responsibility when he frowned. His eyes were the blue of old ice and missed nothing at all.

He’d been Nikolai Trojanowski’s boss once before, and was again. What Mac had seen of that relationship didn’t imply mutual liking either, but it held respect.

“You didn’t come here to thank me for having common sense,” she concluded out loud. Then, thinking over where they were, the way Hollans had drugged or otherwise incapacitated both dogs and people to approach her, the lack of guards, Mac nodded to herself, suddenly chilled. “No one else knows you’re here, either. What’s going on?” She heard the anxious edge to her voice and deliberately lightened it. “Don’t tell me you want to come, too. We’re crowded already and we haven’t even left for Myriam.”

He didn’t bother smiling. “You aren’t going to Myriam, Dr. Connor. Not the planet, anyway.”

“I’m not?” Mac reached for her coffee, then decided against it.
Still too hot.
“Where am I going?” she asked numbly.

“Let me explain the situation, first. Like every species connected by the Naralax, we sent scout ships into the Dhryn System. Haven, not Myriam,” he clarified.

Hot or not.
She took the mug and a cautious sip. “I take it they found something.”

“Several hundred somethings. Ships, empty and drifting. Freighters, transports, you name it. Some sending out automated distress calls—with Dhryn colony idents. We speculate—what is it?” This as Mac nodded.

“The Vessel,” she recalled. “When I asked about the colonies, he said they were without Progenitors. That they were lost.”

“Seems they found their way home. Looks as though they slipped through the gate in the initial chaos, then settled in a distant orbit to wait.”

“No one saw them?” she protested.

“We’re talking about spatial distances, not a puddle, Dr. Connor. Do you know how long it takes to sweep even a portion of a solar system for something the size of a Progenitor ship? Forget something a thousandth its size. The surprise isn’t that they could hide—it’s that we found them at all. The initial discovery was made by the Ar, also surprising—” at her blank look, he skipped what he was going to say. “The Trisulians in the system,” his voice became flat, “initially did their utmost to contain the discovery, but the crew of the Ar ship was Human. They raised a fuss, our ships spread it, and details of the find were sent to the IU.”

Mac realized she still held the hot mug and put it down, concentrating on keeping her hand and voice steady. “The Dhryn?”

“We don’t know.” She raised an eyebrow at this and he gave a tiny shrug. “I’m told the ships are nonfunctioning: some damaged, most with their doors open to space. Only three have been found so far intact and powered, but there’s been no response from those to any signals. We’ll know more when they’re boarded. Which hasn’t happened yet.”

“Why?” She frowned. “What are they waiting for?”

“Reasonable caution, Dr. Connor. Some of the species in the recovery effort believe Dhryn sheathing can interfere with their scanners.” He hesitated. “And there have been certain—jurisdictional—issues.”

“Idiots.” Mac snorted and picked up her mug again. “Let me guess,” she told Hollans over its rim. “None of them wants the other to go first. Can they really believe we’ve time for this nonsense?”

“Some delays are useful,” Hollans commented, the corner of his mouth twitching as if she’d amused him. “This ‘nonsense’ gave our Sinzi-ra time to consult with the IU inner council. As a result, the three intact ships—left that way—are being towed to the gates as we speak. To be brought to Myriam. And you, Dr. Connor.”

Mac’s mug dropped from her hands, tumbling to the floor. She lunged to retrieve it but missed. The arc of hot dark liquid ended on Hollans’ sensible boots.

Bet he’s glad he wore them.
She made vague shooing gestures at the spill and looked in vain for something to wipe it.

“Leave it, Dr. Connor.”

She’d been doing so well, too.
“Sorry ’bout that,” she muttered, sitting up.

“More coffee?”

“You’ve got to be kidding,” Mac blurted.

Hollans’ lips quirked again. “No coffee, then.”

“It’s bad enough you people have me working with archaeologists on a desert planet,” she protested loudly, ignoring his comment. “I’m not a bloody starship engineer! I study—” Mac stopped there.

“Salmon,” Hollans obliged, the quirk fading to something noncommittal. “We’ve engineers en route to Myriam, Dr. Connor. You know why we want you on those ships.”

She glared.

He waited.

Games, even now.
“To translate,” she snapped.

“To translate,” he repeated, giving a smug nod as if she’d pleased him by her startling grasp of essentials. “Until we can produce a full adult Dhryn lexicon, suited to Human sub-teach, we must make do with what we have. Or rather who. You, Dr. Connor.”

She should have taken that second coffee,
Mac thought grimly.
And aimed higher.

“Earth orbit to the Naralax gate is a six-day trip,” Hollans continued, as if unaware—or more likely unimpressed—by her simmering anger. “You’ll be taking something a little faster and more discreet than your originally scheduled transport. I believe you’re familiar with the
Annapolis Joy?
Her captain remembers you.”

The ship’s name was misleading. The
Annapolis Joy
was one of the Ministry of Extra-Sol Human Affairs’ less-than-diplomatic dreadnaughts, bristling with armaments normally used to intimidate would-be smugglers before they entered or left orbit. She had had been among those to engage the Ro at Haven.

And the
Joy
had brought Mac home from Myriam.

“He probably remembers the screaming,” Mac said under her breath. She’d missed the instant, there on the cold sand, when they’d hurriedly removed most of what remained of her arm to stop the continuing digestion of her flesh. She’d made up for it by regaining consciousness on the way to orbit.

Fortunately, the
Annapolis Joy
had the sort of medical facility that specialized in battlefield trauma, right to replacement parts. Though she hadn’t made a friend of the ship’s surgeon.
He should have asked before preparing skin she didn’t want.