Timothy Zahn - Manta's Gift

"Whew!" he said, breathing hard as the two of them coasted to a stop in the buffeting winds. "I haven't had a swim like that in dayherds. Nice to know I can still do it. How about you? You okay?"

"I'm a little winded," Manta admitted, feeling nervous and awkward and fearful as he faced the other. "My fins are probably going to hurt in the sunlight."

"Hopefully not as much as those new friends of yours are going to hurt," Pranlo said, his voice sounding rather grimly satisfied. Maybe he was feeling awkward, too. "I was trying to catch that Nurturer's eye with my tails as I went past. Don't know if I got her or not."

"You definitely got Gryntaro square in the lungs," Manta said, trying hard to pretend this was just a casual conversation between two friends. "I tried that trick on a couple of Vuuka once. Works pretty good."

"Wish I could have seen their expressions," Pranlo said, moving in for a closer look at Manta's left ear. "He didn't get you, did he?"

"No, you were just in time," Manta assured him, wishing he could read the other's face. There seemed to be more background light here than he remembered from a typical Centerline sundark, but it wasn't nearly enough for him to figure out what Pranlo might be thinking.

Odd that he hadn't noticed the brighter sundarks before during this trip. But then, the way Gryntaro had pushed them, he was usually fast asleep by this time of sundark.

"Yeah, it looks fine," Pranlo confirmed, drifting back again. "Good thing, too. I'd hate to have followed you all this way and then wound up being a couple of pulses too late. Drusni would never have let me hear the end of it."

Manta's heart twisted painfully inside him. Drusni. "Is she... I mean...?"

"She's fine," Pranlo said. "She was still weak when I left, but the Nurturers assured me she was out of danger. She's probably mostly healed by now."

"At least physically," Manta murmured. "Pranlo... I..."

"It's all right," Pranlo said softly. "Drusni told me what happened."

Manta winced. "All of it?"

"All of it," the other said. "Like I said, it's all right."

Manta turned away from him. Even in the dim light, he couldn't stand to look his friend in the eye.

"It's not all right," he said, the words hurting his throats. "What I did was... I can't even find the right words for it."

He flipped his tails restlessly. "I've been thinking about it ever since it happened," he went on, wondering if Pranlo was understanding any of this. "All my life, anything bad that happened to me was never my fault. At least, not as far as I was concerned. It was always someone else's fault, or even the whole universe's fault. Never mine."

"But this one wasn't your fault," Pranlo pointed out.

"Ironic, isn't it?" Manta said, grimacing. "For once in my life, I really didn't have anything to do with it; and so, of course, this is the one I feel worse about than all the rest of my screw-ups put together."

He sighed. "And this is the one I can't ever make right."

"Not to mention the one you were going to be punished for," Pranlo pointed out.

Manta shivered, thinking about what had almost happened to him.

What still would happen if they ever caught up with him again.

Pranlo was apparently thinking the same thing. "We'll have to be careful, of course," he said.

"They'll be on the watch for us as soon as those two get back to Centerline and whistle up the alarm."

"They'll be watching for me, anyway," Manta said. "With luck, you went by too fast for them to be able to identify you."

"Probably," Pranlo said dryly. "But if they catch us together, they shouldn't have any trouble figuring it out."

"We'll just have to make sure they don't, then," Manta said, suddenly making up his mind. "Do you want me to leave now? Or should I wait until sunlight in case we get jumped by predators—"

"Whoa, whoa," Pranlo interrupted. "Wait a pulse. What's this leaving stuff? We're going back to Centerline together, aren't we?"

"We most certainly are not," Manta said firmly. "Like you said, if they catch you with me, you've had it. Besides, I've been exiled. I can't go back."

Pranlo flipped his tails in contempt. "To the Deep with that," he said, just as firmly. "Hey, swimming circles around authority is one of the things you and I do best, remember? We can keep you hidden, even in Centerline. Besides, Drusni wants to see you, and I sure don't want to bring her way out here."

Manta's heart twisted a little more. "Drusni doesn't want to see me," he said. "Not after what I..."

"She knows what you did," Pranlo reminded him. "She also knows something you seem to have forgotten: that it was her idea in the first place. And that it saved the lives of a whole bunch of children."

"Yeah, right," Manta said bitterly. "And all it cost was her dignity, her self-esteem, and her child.

Yeah, that was sure worth it."

"She knew the risks at the time," Pranlo said quietly. "And she was ready to pay whatever it cost."

"But her own baby?"

"We had two other children swimming in that herd, you know," Pranlo said tartly. "A Midling and a Youth. They might have been grabbed on that machine's next pass."

"So she did it for her children?" Manta asked.

"Partly," Pranlo said. "And partly to help the children who'd already been caught."

He flipped his tails. "But the biggest reason she did it was for you."

Manta felt his muscles tense. "For me?"

"You were as much a captive of the humans as the children were," Pranlo said. "She knew that. I really think that for that alone she would have paid the price, even if there hadn't been any children involved. She was willing to do whatever it took to set you free."

"No," Manta said, tails twitching in agitation. "That can't be."

"Okay, fine," Pranlo said calmly. "So which one of us are you calling a liar? Her, or me?"

Manta clenched his jaws. "I'm not calling anyone a liar," he said. "I'm suggesting you're bending the truth to be kind. Trying to make me think that she doesn't... that she doesn't hate me."

"Hate you?" Pranlo gave a little snort. "Listen, you big striped idiot. Who do you think sent me out here to keep an eye on you in the first place? My mother?"

Manta swiveled around to stare at him, not daring to believe it. "You mean she really doesn't...?"

"We're friends, Manta," Pranlo said quietly. "All three of us. Always have been; always will be. It'll take a lot more than getting caught up in some Pakra-scorned human scheme to change that."

Manta swallowed hard. "The Three Musketta, huh?"

"Exactly." Pranlo yawned. "And right now, at least one of the Musketta needs to get some sleep.

How about you?"

"Definitely," Manta said. "One last question, though. How did you manage that trick where you came up from underneath Gryntaro to ram him in the lungs?"

"What do you mean, how did I manage it?" Pranlo said, suddenly sounding very sleepy. "I just swam underneath him, then stretched my buoyancy sacs. It seemed like the direction he would least expect an attack from."

"Yes, but how did you do it?" Manta persisted. "We're Breeders, and Breeders aren't supposed to be able to get below Level Four."

Pranlo yawned. "Kind of a mystery, isn't it? I saw what they were going to do, figured out what I had to do to stop them, and then just swam my little fins off doing it. I guess I was just inspired."

Manta made a face. "Willing to do whatever it took to set me free?"

"Something like that," Pranlo said. "Like one bond-mate, like the other, as the saying goes. Or maybe there's something about Drusni that just sort of rubs off on everyone she meets."

"Yes," Manta murmured. "There certainly is."

"Still, you know me," Pranlo added; and in the darkness, Manta could imagine him grinning.