Michael Hudson - Thieves of Light

With a rush, Jarvis's mental logjam began breaking up. " From Earth," he sputtered. "A stupid thing-why would you say-of course you're from Earth! There's nowhere else to be from-"

His voice trailed off as a great bulk moved into the doorway, blocking the light streaming through. Moving on two legs stout enough to have belonged to century-old birch trees, the inhuman figure stepped through the opening.

Jarvis gaped. In size and appearance both, it was a monster, all teeth and scarred scaly skin and huge oval eyes. With its head thrust forward like a lizard, Jarvis could see the beginning of a line of rounded spines starting at its nape and continuing down its back. A thick muscular tail lashed back and forth slowly, the tip brushing the floor of the chamber with a sound like a straw broom on concrete.

What it was, where it could be from-these were unfathomable mysteries. But the thing that puzzled Jarvis even more was that the beast was wearing what could only be called fatigues, sleeves rolled up to the elbow, legs tucked into thick-soled black boots. On the beast's right shoulder was some sort of insignia in electric blue and gold; strapped to its right calf was a brown-handled throwing knife in a scabbard.

"As you're starting to realize, there are many subjects on which you're not fully educated," Parcival said with a sympathetic smile. "Christopher Jarvis, may I introduce Nar-lex-ko-li-hon, Sergeant of the Ninth Platoon of the Guardians of Light-and a true Photon Warrior."

Jarvis stared at the alien, then at Parcival, then back at the alien. "I don't believe any of this," he said. "I was in the Photon Center, playing a match-"

"This isn't play, Bhodi Li," Li-hon said. "The Photon-"

"You speak English!"

"You hear English," Li-hon corrected.

This time Jarvis saw that the alien's stiff lips and dancing tongue moved like in a badly synchronized movie. Whatever sounds it really was making, he could not hear. If it's making any sounds at all "I'm not buying it," Jarvis said, shaking his head. "That's a costume, and this is some kind of trick. I don't know what you did to me in the Center, but it's not enough to make me think that anything like you can be real."

"Where do you think you are, Chris?" Parcival asked before Li-hon could respond.

"I don't know," Jarvis said, throwing his hands in the air. "Somewhere in the Center. A back room somewhere."

"Would you like to go out through the door with me and see where you are?"

A little tremor of doubt ran through Jarvis. "Yeah. Yeah, I'd like that just fine," he said nevertheless.

"Li-hon?" Parcival said as though asking permission.

"This is not the customary procedure."

"He has to know, or we'll get nowhere. I warned you about that."

"Very well," the creature agreed. "I will meet you in the chart room after."

"Done. Come with me, Chris," Parcival said, turning and leading the way.

Outside the chamber, Jarvis found himself following the boy down a wide corridor that reminded him of the tunnel in his high school between the boiler and utility rooms. Brightly colored tubes and conduits masked much of the ceiling. Some were transparent, with a viscous blue-green liquid bubbling through them. Some had side branches that came down the walls to what looked like high-tech fuse boxes with five-by-five grids of glowing lights.

But even though he could connect what he was to things he knew, nothing he saw really looked familiar. "Are we in the basement?" he asked hopefully.

"No," Parcival said, stopping at what seemed to be a blank spot in the right wall. He touched his hand to a diamond-shaped panel, and the wall opened up into another doorway. Glancing back first to see that Jarvis was with him, Parcival stepped through.

"I want to know how you do that," Jarvis said, dogging the boy's heels. Then he stopped short, and his mouth went dry. The cylindrical room they had entered had a window-a wide slab of glass that divided the far wall in half.

Except it couldn't be glass, because the view out the window was of the Earth.

It was the Earth as he had never seen it, from hundreds of miles up: land and sea and cloud all gliding by beneath him like a NASA film come to life. Parallel streamers of clouds like white furrows cut across the sky, echoed by shadows on the multihued brown landscape. The light-colored shallows and sand bars showed up clearly against the darker ocean depths.

"This is nuts," Jarvis muttered.

"I hope you understand now-"

"I'm on a spaceship? In orbit?"

"Yes-a scoutship belonging to the Photon Alliance," Parcival said. "You were brought here from the Photon Center by a spacetime transporter link."

"But things like this aren't real!" Jarvis protested.

"You're being dense," Parcival said impatiently. "Look around you. Look out there. Don't you believe what you see? Would you rather believe you're crazy? Or that we're tricksters?"

"But what's it all about?"

"Sergeant Li-hon is waiting to tell you-if you're ready to listen."

Jarvis looked away from Parcival and down on the Earth. It was all ocean underneath them now except for a string of three islands, each ringed by its own pale green atoll and capped by tiny white cloud puffs.

It was real. It could be nothing but. And if it was real, then he was where Parcival said he was, and-hard as it was to accept-Li-hon was what he seemed to be.

"I guess I'm ready to listen."

Parcival smiled and clapped Jarvis on the shoulder familiarly. "I knew you'd be okay. Come on, then. Li-hon is waiting."

"Just a minute. If this is all what it seems, what are you doing here? What's your relationship to the big lizard? Are you a prisoner or something? A toady?"

Parcival laughed unexpectedly, and only then did Jarvis realize his pun. "I'm a Photon Warrior," the youth said. "Sergeant Li-hon is my commander."

" You're a Photon Warrior?"

"Yes."

Jarvis shook his head. "Nothing personal, but there must not be much to getting in, then."

Parcival's expression darkened. "It's lucky for you that it's me you said that to," he said tersely. "If you'd said it to nine out of ten Warriors, they'd have used the floor or the nearest bulkhead to wipe the smirk off your face. If you were lucky, by the time they'd satisfied their honor, you'd only have a few broken bones. Me, I'm not that sensitive to ignorant comments. If somebody's dumb enough to think that just because I'm smaller than them I couldn't possibly be a danger to them, that's fine-it gives me that much more edge if I ever have to kill them."

Jarvis stared. "You mean it, don't you?"

"Every word. Now come on-the sergeant's waiting."

Parcival led Jarvis to a six-sided compartment full of unfathomable electronics consoles. The one object Jarvis recognized by its function was the small hexagonal table at which the alien sat.

"Is he ready?" Li-hon asked Parcival.

"I think so," the boy said, settling onto an open stool on the nearest side of the table.

That left Jarvis the only one standing. He looked from Parcival to Li-hon questioningly.

"Sit down, Bhodi Li," the sergeant said in answer to the look. He waited a moment until Jarvis had complied, then went on: "Bhodi Li, as we sit here talking, there is fighting on seventeen worlds between the Guardians of Light and the forces of the Arrian Alliance. It is a struggle that threatens all civilized worlds, including your own Earth."

"Do you mean that there's seventeen planets out there with life on them? Seventeen different kinds of life?"

"For the most part, the fighting has been confined to uninhabited worlds. In fact, it may be said that those worlds are what the fighting's about. But if the Arrians gain the advantage there, no one doubts that they will carry the fight to the home worlds of Light. And there are many more than seventeen home worlds. There are, in fact, ninety."