Charles Sheffield - Transcendence

But at that point theory had little role to play in what they had to do next. That would be decided by facts, and certain facts were undeniable. Day was approaching — the first hint of light was already in the sky. They dared not remain on the surface of Genizee, at least not close to the shoreline, once the sun rose and the Zardalu became active. And the most important fact of all: there was a ship just a few hundred yards away. How it got there, or who was on it, was of much less importance than its existence.

“We can all compare theories — once we’re safe in space.” Rebka peered around him. He could at last distinguish rock outcrops from lightening sky. In a few minutes he and Louis Nenda would be able to walk or run without killing themselves. But by that time he wanted to be close to the ship. “I know it will be rough going across the rocks, but we have to try it even while it’s still dark. I want Atvar H’sial and Kallik to guide Nenda and me. Tell us where to put our feet — set them down for us if you have to. Remember, we have to be as quiet as we can, so don’t take us through any patches of rubble, or places where we might knock stones loose. But we have to get to where the moss and mud begins before it’s really light.”

The predawn wind was dying, and the sound of waves on the shore had vanished. Hans Rebka moved through an absolute silence, where every tiny clink of a pebble sounded like thunder and a dislodged handful of earth was like an avalanche. He had to remind himself that human ears, at least, would not detect him more than a few feet away.

And finally they were at a point where the amount of noise they made did not matter. The gray-green moss lay level before them, soft and fuzzy against the brightening sky. All that remained was a dash across it to the ship, a couple of hundred yards away.

Rebka turned to the Hymenopt, who, even with one injured leg, was four times as fast as any human. “Kallik, when you reach the hatch, you go right in, leave it open, and ready the ship for takeoff. Don’t get into a discussion or an argument with anyone on board — we’ll have time for that later. By the time I’m there, I want us ready to lift. All right?” The Hymenopt nodded. “Then go .”

Kallik was a dark moving streak against the flat mossy surface, her legs an invisible blur. Atvar H’sial, surprisingly fast for her bulk, was not far behind. The Cecropian covered the ground in a series of long, gliding leaps that took her smoothly up to and inside the hatch. Louis Nenda was third, his stocky body capable of real speed over short distances. Rebka was catching up with him on the final forty meters, but Nenda was through the hatch a couple of yards ahead.

Rebka jumped after him, turned as his foot skidded across the threshold, and slammed the hatch closed. “All in,” he shouted. “Kallik, take us up.”

He swung around to see what was happening. It had occurred to him, in the final seconds of the dash across the moss, that there was one real possibility that he had refused to consider because it had final and fatal implications. What if the Indulgence had somehow been captured by the Zardalu, and they were waiting inside?

Breathe again. There were no signs of Zardalu — the cabin was empty except for the four new arrivals. “Kallik, bring us to a hover at three hundred meters. I want to look for Zardalu.”

But the little Hymenopt was pointing at the control display where multiple lights were flashing. “Emergency signal, Captain Rebka. Not for this ship.”

Rebka was across to the console in a couple of steps, scanning the panel. “It’s the Erebus ! In synchronous orbit. Take us right up there, Kallik. Graves should have stayed outside the singularities. What sort of trouble is he in now?”

The hover command was aborted and the rapid ascent began. All eyes were on the display of the dark bulk of the Erebus , orbiting high above them. No one took any notice of the downward scope. No one saw the dwarfed image of Darya Lang, capering and screaming on the sunlit surface far below.

Darya was learning the hard way. There was no way of knowing just how much discomfort and fatigue a person could stand, until she had no choice.

The irritating little black bugs that crawled into her eyes, nose, and ears were nothing. Limbs that cried out with fatigue were nothing. Hunger and thirst were nothing. All that mattered was the disappearance of the Indulgence , the only escape from the surface of Genizee.

As the sun rose higher she sat down on a flat stone, filled with despair that changed little by little to annoyance and then at last to rage. Someone — someone of her own party , not a Zardalu — had stolen the ship, just a couple of minutes before she and Tally were ready to board it. Now they were hopelessly stranded.

Who could have done it? And finally, with that thought, Darya’s head cleared. The answer was obvious: the survivors, whoever they were, of the first group that had flown down to the surface of Genizee. They had arrived on the seedship, but it had not been there when they wanted to leave. With that gone, they must have seen the Indulgence as their only way off the surface. But if that was so, once they realized that they had left people behind on Genizee, surely they would return. Hans Rebka would come for her. So would Louis Nenda. She was absolutely sure of it.

The problem — and it was a big one — was to be alive and free when that return took place. And one way that would certainly not work was to remain on the surface. When she peeked over the sheltering line of vegetation between her and the shore she could see the water bubbling with activity. Now and then a great blue head would break the surface. The Zardalu might not like the rocky, broken terrain where she and Tally were hiding as much as they liked the sea and shoreline, but by now they would have realized that the escaped prisoners had taken to the air ducts. It would surely not be more than another hour or two before a systematic examination of the surface vents began.

She rubbed flies from the corners of her eyes and crawled across to where E.C. Tally was sitting in front of a little bush bearing fat yellow leaves.

“E.C., we have to go back. Back into the ducts.”

“Indeed? We went to considerable trouble to remove ourselves from them.”

“The ship will come back for us” — she told herself she believed that, she had to believe it — “but we can’t survive on the surface while we wait.”

“I am inclined to disagree. May I speak?” Tally raised a bunch of the yellow leaves, each bloated at its extremity to a half-inch wrinkled sphere. “These are not good in taste to a human palate, but they will sustain life. They are high in water content, and they have some food value.”

“They might be poisonous.”

“But they are not — I already consumed a number.” A considerable number, now that Darya’s attention had been drawn to it. While she had been sitting and thinking, two or three bushes in the little depression had been denuded of foliage and berries.

“And although I am an embodied computer,” Tally went on, “and not a true human, the immune system and toxin reactions of this body are no different from yours. I have suffered no adverse effects, and I am sure you will also feel none.”

Logic told Darya that Tally could be quite wrong. He had direct control over elements of his immune system, where she did not, and the body used for his incorporation had been carefully chosen to have as few allergic reactions as possible. But while her mind was telling her that, her hands were grabbing for a branch of the bush and plucking off berries.