Now the captain was gone, along with a quarter of the crew. Their mission had turned into a calamity for both Earthclan and the Five Galaxies. As for Streaker's hull- once so shiny, despite her age-it now lay coated by a mantle of material so black the abyssal waters seemed clear by comparison. A substance that drank photons and weighed the ship down.

Oh, the things we've put you through, dear thing. This was but the latest trial for their poor ship.

Once, bizarre fields stroked her in a galactic tide pool called the Shallow Cl.u.s.ter, where they "struck it rich" by happening upon a vast derelict fleet containing mysteries untouched for a thousand eons. In other words, where everything first started going wrong.

Savage beams rocked her at the Morgran nexus point, where a deadly surprise ambush, barely failed to snare Streaker and her unsuspecting crew.

Making repairs on poisonous Kithrup, they ducked out almost too late, escaping mobs of bickering warships only by disguising Streaker inside a hollowed-out Thennanin cruiser, making it to a transfer point, though at the cost of abandoning many friends.

Oakka, the green world, seemed an ideal goal after that-a sector headquarters for the Inst.i.tute of Navigation. Who was better qualified to take over custody of their data? As Gillian Baskin explained at the time, it was their duty as Galactic citizens to turn the problem over to the great inst.i.tutes-those august agencies whose impartial lords might take the awful burden away from Streaker's tired crew. It seemed logical enough-and nearly spelled their doom. Betrayal by agents of that "neutral" agency showed how far civilization had fallen in turmoil. Gillian's hunch saved the Earthling company-that and a daring cross-country raid by Emerson D'Anite, taking the conspirators' base from behind.

Again, Streaker emerged chastened and worse for wear.

There was refuge for a while in the Fractal System, that vast maze where ancient beings gave them shelter. But eventually that only led to more betrayal, more lost friends, and a flight taking them ever farther from home.

Finally, when further escape seemed impossible, Gillian found a clue in the Library unit they had captured on Kithrup. A syndrome called the "Sooner's Path." Following that hint, she plotted a dangerous road that might lead to safety, though it meant pa.s.sing through the licking flames of a giant star, bigger than Earth's...o...b..t, whose soot coated Streaker in layers almost too heavy to lift.

But she made it to Jijo.

This world looked lovely, from orbit. Too bad we had only that one glimpse, before plunging to an abyssal graveyard of ships.

Under sonar guidance by dolphin technicians, their improvised cutter attacked Streaker's hull. Water boiled into steam so violently that booming echoes filled this cave within a metal mountain. There were dangers to releasing so much energy in a confined s.p.a.ce. Separated gases might recombine explosively. Or it could make their sanctuary detectable from s.p.a.ce. Some suggested the risk was too great . . . that it would be better to abandon St reaker and instead try reactivating one of the ancient hulks surrounding them as a replacement.

There were teams investigating that possibility right now. But Gillian and Tsh't decided to try this instead, asking Suessi's crew to pull off one more resurrection.

The choice gladdened Hannes. He had poured too much into Streaker to give up now. There may be more of me in her battered sh.e.l.l than remains in this cyborg body.

Averting his sensors from the cutter's actinic glow, he mused on the mound of cast-off ships surrounding this makeshift cavern. They seemed to speak to him, if only in his imagination.

We, too, have stories, they said. Each of us was launched with pride, flown with hope, rebuilt many times with skill, venerated by those we protected from the sleeting desolation of s.p.a.ce, long before your own race began dreaming of the stars.

Suessi smiled. All that might have impressed him once- the idea of vessels millions of years old. But now he knew a truth about these ancient hulks.

You want old? he thought. I've seen old.

I've seen ships that make most stars seem young.

The cutter produced immense quant.i.ties of bubbles. It screeched, firing ionized bolts against the black layer, just centimeters away. But when they turned it off at last, the results of all that eager destructive force were disappointing.

"That-t's all we removed?" Karkaett asked, incredulously, staring at a small patch of eroded carbon. "It'll take years to cut it all away, at-t this rate!"

The engineer's mate, Chuchki, so bulky she nearly burst from her exo-suit, commented in awed Trinary.

Mysteries cl.u.s.ter Frantic, in Ifni's shadow-^ Where did the energy go! *

Suessi wished he still had a head to shake, or shoulders to shrug. He made do instead by emitting a warbling sigh into the black water, like a beached pilot whale.

Not by Ifni's name, But her creative employer- *I wish to G.o.d I.knew. *

Gillian IT ISN'T EASY FOR A HUMAN BEING TO PRETEND she's an alien.

Especially if the alien is a Thennanin.

Shrouds of deceitful color surrounded Gillian, putting ersatz flesh around the lie, providing her with an appearance of leathery skin and a squat bipedal stance. On her head, a simulated crest rippled and flexed each time she nodded. Anyone standing more than two meters away would see a st.u.r.dy male warrior with armored derma and medallions from a hundred stellar campaigns-not a slim blond woman with fatigue-lined eyes, a physician forced by circ.u.mstances to command a little ship at war.

The disguise was pretty good by now. It ought to be. She had been perfecting it for well over a year.

"Gr-phmph pit.i.th," Gillian murmured.

When she first started pulling these charades, the Niss Machine used to translate her Anglic questions into Thennanin. But now Gillian figured she was probably as fluent in that Galactic dialect as any human alive. Probably even Tom.

It still sounds weird though. Kind of like a toddler making disgusting fart imitations for the fun of it.

At times, the hardest part was struggling not to break out laughing. That would not do, of course. Thennanin weren't noted for their sense of humor.

She continued the ritual greeting.

"Fhishmishingul parfful, mph!"

Chill haze pervaded the dim chamber, emanating from a sunken area where a beige-colored cube squatted, creating its own wan illumination. Gillian could not help thinking of it as a magical box-a receptacle folded in many dimensions, containing far more than any vessel its size should rightfully hold.

She stood at a lipless balcony, masked to resemble the former owners of the box, awaiting a reply. The barredspiral symbol on its face seemed slippery to the eye, as if the emblem were slyly looking back at her with a soul far older than her own.

"Toftorph-ph parffuL Fhishfingtumpti parfffui"

The voice was deeply resonant. If she had been a real Thennanin, those undertones would have stroked her ridge crest, provoking respectful attentiveness. Back home, the Branch Library of Earth spoke like a kindly human grandmother, infinitely experienced, patient, and wise.

"I am prepared to witness," murmured a b.u.t.ton in her ear, rendering the machine's words in Anglic. "Then I will be available for consultation."

That was the perpetual trade-off. Gillian could not simply demand information from the archive. She had to give as well.

Normally, that would pose no problem. Any Library unit a.s.signed to a major ship of s.p.a.ce was provided camera views of the control room and the vessel's exterior, in order to keep a WOM record for posterity. In return, the archive offered rapid access to wisdom spanning almost two billion years of civilization, condensed from planet scale archives of the Library Inst.i.tute of the Civilization of Five Galaxies.

Only there's a rub, Gillian thought.

Streaker was not a "major ship of s.p.a.ce." Her own WOM units were solid, cheap, unresponsive-the only kind that impoverished Earth could afford. This lavish cube was a far greater treasure, salvaged on Kithrup from a mighty war cruiser of a rich starfaring clan.

She wanted the cube to continue thinking it was on that cruiser, serving a Thennanin admiral. Hence this disguise.

"Your direct watcher pickups are still disabled," she explained, using the same dialect. "However, I have brought more recent images, taken by portable recording devices. Please accept-and-receive this data now."

She signaled the Niss Machine, her clever robotic a.s.sistant in the next room. At once there appeared next to the cube a series of vivid scenes. Pictures of the suboceanic trench that local Jijoans called the "Midden"-carefully edited to leave out certain things.

We're playing a dangerous game, she thought, as flickering holosims showed huge mounds of ancient debris, discarded cities, and abandoned s.p.a.cecraft. The idea was to pretend that the Thennanin dreadnought Krondor's Fire was hiding for tactical reasons in this realm of dead machines . . . and to do this *without showing Streaker's own slender hull, or any sign of dolphins, or even revealing the specific name and locale of this planet.

If we make it home, or to a neutral Inst.i.tute base, we'll be legally bound to hand over this unit. Even under anonymous seal, it would be safest for it to know as little as we can get away with telling.

Anyway, the Library might not prove as cooperative to mere Earthlings. Better to keep it thinking it was dealing with its official lease-holders.

Ever since the disaster at Oakka, Gillian had made this her chief personal project, pulling off a hoax in order to pry data out of their prize. In many ways, the Library cube was more valuable than the relics Streaker had s.n.a.t.c.hed from the Shallow Cl.u.s.ter.

In fact, the subterfuge had worked better than expected. Some of the information won so far might prove critically useful to the Terragens Council.

a.s.suming we ever make it home again . . . Ever since Kithrup, when Streaker lost the best and brightest of her crew, that had always seemed a long shot, at best.

In one particular area of technology, twenty-second-century humans had already nearly equaled Galactic skill levels, even before contact.

Holographic imagery.

Special-effects wizards from Hollywood, Luanda, and Aristarchus were among the first to dive confidently into alien arts, undismayed by anything as trivial as a billionyear head start. Within mere decades Earthlings could say they had mastered a single narrow field as well as the best starfaring clans- Virtuosity at lying with pictures.

For thousands of years, when we weren't scratching for food we were telling each other fables. Prevaricating. Propagandizing. Casting illusions. Making movies.

Lacking science, our ancestors fell back on magic.

The persuasive telling of untruths.

Still it seemed a wonder to Gillian that her Thennanin disguise worked so well. Clearly the "intelligence" of this unit, while awesome, was of a completely different kind than hers, with its own limitations.

Or else maybe it simply doesn 't care.

From experience, Gillian knew the Library cube would accept almost anything as input, as long as the show consisted of credible scenes it had never witnessed before. So Jijo's abyss flashed before it-this time the panoramas came over fiber cable from the western sea, sent by Kaa's team of explorers, near the settled region called the Slope. Ancient buildings gaped-drowned, eyeless, and windowless-under the scrutiny of probing searchlight beams. If anything, this waste field was even greater than the one where Streaker took refuge. The acc.u.mulated ma.s.s of made-things collected by a planetary culture for a million years.

Finally, the cascade of images ceased.

There followed a brief pause while Gillian waited edgily. Then the beige box commented.

"The event stream remains disjointed from previous ones. Occurrences do not'take place in causal-temporal order related to inertial movements of this vessel. Is this effect a result of the aforementioned battle damage?"

Gillian had heard the same complaint-the very same words, in fact-ever since she began this ruse, shortly after Tom brought the'captured prize aboard Streaker . . . only days before he flew away to vanish from her life.

In response, she gave the same bluff as always.

"That is correct. Until repairs are completed, penalties for any discrepancies may be a.s.sessed to the Krondor's Fire mission account. Now please prepare for consultation."

This time there was no delay.

"Proceed with your request,"

Using a transmitter in her left hand, Gillian signaled to the Niss Machine, waiting in another room. The Tymbrimi spy ent.i.ty at once began sending data requisitions, a rush of flickering light that no organic being could hope to follow. Soon the info flow went bidirectional-a torrential response that forced Gillian to avert her eyes. Perhaps, amid that flood, there might be some data helpful to Streaker's crew, increasing their chances of survival.

Gillian's heart beat faster. This moment had its own dangers. If a starship happened to be scanning nearby-perhaps one of Streaker's pursuers...o...b..ard cognizance detectors might pick up a high level of digital activity in this area.

But Jijo's ocean provided a lot of cover, as did the surrounding mountain of discarded starships. Anyway, the risk seemed worthwhile.

If only so much of the information offered by the cube weren't confusing! A lot of it was clearly meant for starfarers with far more experience and sophistication than the Streaker crew.

Worse, we're running out of interesting things to show the Library. Without fresh input, it might withdraw. Refuse to cooperate at all.

That was one reason she decided yesterday to let the four native kids come into this misty chamber and visit the archive. Since Alvin and his friends didn't yet know they were aboard an Earthling vessel, there wasn't much they could give away, and the effect on the Library unit might prove worthwhile.

Sure enough, the cube seemed bemused by the unique sight of an urs and hoon, standing amicably together. And the existence of a living g'Kek was enough, all by itself, to satisfy the archive's pa.s.sive curiosity. Soon afterward, it willingly unleashed a flood of requested information about the varied types of discarded s.p.a.ceships surrounding Streaker in this underwater trash heap, including parameters used by ancient Buyur control panels.

That was helpful. But we need more. A lot more.

I guess it won't be long until I'm forced to pay with real secrets, Gillian had some good ones she could use ... if she dared. In her office, just a few doors down, lay a mummified cadaver well over a billion years old.

Herbie.

To get hold of that relic-and the coordinates where it came from-most of the fanatic, pseudo-religious alliances in the Five Galaxies had been hunting Streaker since before Kithrup.

Pondering the chill beige cube, she thought- I'll bet if I showed you one glimpse of of' Herb, you 'd have a seizure and spill every datum you've got stored inside.

Funny thing is . . . nothing would make me happier in all the universe than if we'd never seen the d.a.m.ned thing.

As a girl, Gillian had dreamed of star travel, and someday doing bold, memorable things. Together, she and Tom had planned their careers-and marriage-with a single goal in mind. To put themselves at the very edge, standing between Earth and the enigmas of a dangerous cosmos.

Recalling that naive ambition, and how extravagantly it was fulfilled, Gillian very nearly laughed aloud. But with pressed lips she managed to keep the bitter, poignant irony bottled inside, without uttering a sound.

For the time being, she must maintain the dignified presence of a Thennanin admiral.

Thennanin did not appreciate irony. And they never Sooners ASX.

YOU MIGHT AS WELL GET USED TO IT, MY RINGS. The piercing sensations you feel are My fibrils of control, creeping down our shared inner core, bypa.s.sing the slow, old-fashioned, waxy trails, attaching and penetrating your many toroid bodies, bringing them into new order.

Now begins the lesson, when I teach you to be docile servants of something greater than yourselves. No longer a stack of ill-wed components, always quarreling, paralyzed with indecision. No more endless voting over what beliefs shall be held by a fragile, tentative ('.

That was the way of our crude ancestor stacks, meditating loose, confederated thoughts in the odor-rich marshes of Jophekka World. Overlooked by other star clans, we seemed unpromising material for uplift. But the great, sluglike Poa saw potential in our pensive precursors, and began upraising those unlikely mounds.

Alas, after a million years, the Poa grew frustrated with our languid traeki natures.

"Design new rings for our clients," they beseeched the clever Oailie, "to boost, guide, and drive them onward."

The Oailie did not fail, so great was their mastery of genetic arts.

WHAT WAS THEIR TRANSFORMING GIFT?.

New, ambitious rings.

Master rings.

LIKE ME.

Will they break their promise, once we've shared all we know?

Maybe they'll fake the answers. (How could we tell?) Or perhaps they'll let us talk to the cube all we want, because they figure the knowledge won't do us any good, since we're never going home again.

On the other hand, let's say it's all open and sincere. Say we do get a chance to pose questions to the Library unit, that storehouse of wisdom collected by a billion-year-old civilization.