 
Spackman

The Comet Riders

The Comet Riders

By

Anne Spackman

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2014 by Anne Spackman

All Rights Reserved.

Cover art by Boris Rasin

#

Whatever is done from love always occurs beyond good and evil.

—Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil

* * * * *

"Absolute power corrupts absolutely." —Lord Acton

# Foreword

Where did the evil begin? An evil that would bring the end of an entire civilization and destroy the lives of billions...

I was there when the boy entered the world. I was there when he took his first halted breaths. I was there when his hair grew into a soft, feathery down over his head, there a half-year later when he toddled over with his first few, staggered steps. I watched him as one does in a trance, unable for the longest time to bear to recognize this lovely child for the inhuman monster he would become.

He was Ilikan Marankeil, the man who would become the evil eternal Emperor of our world. And it was my destiny to destroy him. These things had long been foretold.

Then why ever did I spare his life, when I had the chance to kill him?
Chapter One

"The night before take-off—I hope he's not going to overdo it." Riorn Lier whistled, looking at his co-captain and friend, Ohnri Chiyenn, who was standing halfway across the room with a drink in his hand, chatting to a lovely young woman. Lier then shook his head as a slow smile involuntarily spread over the corners of his mouth.

"I'll have another urbin spirit with a berry spritz," Lier made a quick order while debating if he should go on over and bother Chiyenn. He downed it in mere seconds, irresponsibly, he still thought, castigating himself. He knew he shouldn't be drinking, but it was the only thing keeping his nerves in check. They were going to be in outer space tomorrow.

Riorn Lier was a giant figure in society, a captain of the planet Seynorynael's planetwide Astronomical Exploration Group. His face was by now synonymous with the entire AEG itself. Lier had been successfully memorialized in the minds of millions before the explorers' mission was even to take off, memorialized through parade after parade, endless fanfare, holo-newscasting and images displayed worldwide on every available public forum display.

The renowned captain Lier could have chosen to spend his last free evening before the launch among the political elite of the capital city of Ariyal-synai, in conference with the leading scientific minds of the century, or even on a last amorous foray, but Lier wasn't looking for any empty adulation.

The leisure center in Ariyal-synai's Cultural Center bustled with more than its usual number of patrons; Lier had already overheard several "philosophical" conversations about the upcoming explorer mission just standing in the entrance.

Most of the people passing him took no notice of him, not recognizing him or thinking that there was no way it could actually be the man himself; a few others, mostly young cadets in the AEG, had stopped to stare at him with a look of hero-worship and awe.

Perceiving their intent, Lier had signed an autograph for them and let them hurry away to boast of their good fortune to their troop of spacetraining comrades.

"Damn, it's hot in here," he checked his collar a minute later and ordered a third drink.

Lier felt as though he were walking through a dream already, as though he and the entire world were but characters in a play, yet he was the only person conscious of it. And, as soon as he had understood this, his capacity for forming the appropriate responses and taking the necessary actions had failed him. Or, maybe it was the spirits already affecting him.

Lier wasn't afraid of much in this life—except perhaps not being able to keep his crew's morale high in the near future—but that didn't mean he hadn't noticed that the world of activity surrounding him had become as surreal as weightlessness and as unpredictable as the weather. He couldn't describe his state of mind or feelings to anyone—anyone but the young co-captain who was in the same position as him. Lier wasn't afraid of launching—he had gone on several near space missions—but why did it seem this time as though the entire planet joining in celebration were naively and thoughtlessly carousing and dancing over his funeral? He couldn't explain why this was what he felt.

"I need to get my perspective back before tomorrow," he thought, wanting to shake himself out of this.

He stopped to survey the wide stretch of patrons from the dim security of the bar—as usual the Cultural Center was full of scientists, politicians, and space fleet specialists gathered during their off-hours, but that was normal, since the building's position adjacent to the Council building, AEG Scientific Center, and Central Astroport made it the ideal hang-out for several different walks of life. Chiyenn was now shifting about on a stool by the far end of the drink counter, near a group of technicians who were going up on Lier's ship, the Seishinna, and on the Velastria tomorrow.

Lier spared a thought for the Velastria's captain, Nilery, who had been detained in detox that evening because of a glitch in the inoculation facility two days before.

Now that is definitely not the way to have to spend the last evening before take-off, Lier reflected.

Riorn Lier headed across the center, turning a few heads sitting at the nearby tables as he made his way over to Chiyenn, a pale-skinned, white-haired youth with coal-colored eyes, dressed in the forest green, scarlet, indigo, and black uniform that marked him as a navigator.

"I am still coming to your rescue," Lier laughed to himself.

Chiyenn smiled as he looked up; Lier suppressed an urge to interrupt for a few moments, at least until he was within earshot. Then finally, he made his way over to Chiyenn.

"Let's go for a shot of oten spirits with a shiyarr-inn twist in it," Chiyenn told the man behind the counter.

"So? What is it this time?" Lier repeated, as Chiyenn took the drink from the bartender.

"Nothing." Chiyenn muttered into his glass.

"Thinking about the launch?" Lier asked, taking a seat by Chiyenn, who seemed to be stooped over his drink; Lier knew he had to stop him now, before Chiyenn overdid it and had to have the alcohol removed from his system back in the medical center. Maybe they were both too nervous this mission. But they would only have a short night to sleep off the effects of the alcohol.

"I am thinking about the launch, yes." Chiyenn looked up, as though just becoming aware of Lier's intrusion. Suddenly, Lier was surprised to see that Chiyenn was completely sober. Perhaps Chiyenn hadn't been downing as much as his present alacrity with his shiyar-inn fizz suggested.

"We'll be picking up the last of the crew at the Nanshe Moon outpost this time tomorrow." Lier said. He glanced sidelong at Chiyenn, who was pulling himself upright to respond.

"I just can't help wondering if there is anyone out there. It's a tremendous responsibility—to prove whether or not life exists outside this planet." Chiyenn sighed, wondering if Lier would understand his fears and doubts, for the man seemed so confident and unafraid.

"Come on, Chiyenn," Lier's laugh was deep, unfettered, "you're the one who believes there is life outside Seynorynael. Your friends who do the research at AEG are behind you in this, but if you lose your faith now, you'll lose your resolve."

"Well, I am still curious, even if I feel less certain tonight. We did receive transmissions, and we do have reason from stellar analysis to believe that some sentient species is sending the transmissions to us." Chiyenn began to nod, and then stopped; a crease formed between his brows.

"But that isn't necessary, is it? Someday it will be important for us—for our race, to create a living colony outside our solar system, and if we can find another world—"

"I know I know. I agree. Everyone knows Valeria will explode someday, but that won't be for at least the next 45,000 years. We won't see it happen, so cheer up," he added. Valeria was the star Seynorynael revolved around.

"Lier, why do you choose to go? Despite your rank, what keeps you doing it?"

"Because it's our next step, I suppose. Do we have to wait until the need arises to escape our planet merely to face the challenge?"

"The challenge."

"In this case it's the challenge of extending space travel to visit other star systems, but it could be anything. If you ask me, to shun the challenge and the purpose of humankind, our will to achieve what is possible, is unthinkable. When humanity ceases to challenge itself, it might as well surrender to extinction."

"Your reason for believing that?"

"Unexpected danger is waiting for us, as a race and as individuals." Lier replied. "If we aren't prepared to face challenges and to survive them, humanity will die out when a truly unexpected danger does finally strike."

"Rather an uplifting thought."

"I wasn't trying to be positive or negative. Merely honest."

"So, you see this mission as a step towards—what?"

"Like you said, Chiyenn, the independence of humankind from the environment. We have to grow up and leave our home world someday, don't we? We need to see what's out there first, and take our steps gradually, facing one challenge at a time."

"I agree."

"You might as well know that I have been afraid today, more than I was on past missions, but I believe in what I stand for, in what we are all doing and risking our lives to achieve. Conquering the unknown dangers of space will devise the biggest test, and—well, it seems appropriate, when you consider that the greatest challenge to our people's survival might come to our planet from the stars."

"An asteroid? A hostile alien nation bent on conquering us or making a meal of us—"

"The unknown, Chiyenn. Any unknown."

Lier downed the rest of his drink; they sat thinking, listening to the noise of the leisure center.

"We'll be gone such a long time." Chiyenn commented.

"Yes."

"I keep thinking about what Physics Specialist Kan told us," Chiyenn looked down into his drink and watched the contents swirl as he made a circular motion with the glass.

"Time Dilation will take affect on us—umm, no one we know will be here when we return, or else they will be very old. However many years pass on board our ship, many more will pass on Seynorynael in our absence, because of the relativistic rate of our ship, which travels near light-speed."

"It will be difficult to begin again when we return. But jook at all the people in here—I've never seen such a ruckus before." Lier made a gesture to include the unusual crowds in the leisure center. A lot of people who had traveled to the capital city Ariyal-synai to watch the launch of the new starship had joined the revelers who lived in the city.

"Yeah, I guess the entire city is starting the celebrations early. I hear the communications center will broadcast the launch across the planet." Chiyenn followed Lier's gaze around the room, noticing the crowds for the first time.

"So they tell me." Lier sighed. "By the way, have you seen the new uniform that the Leader's council has insisted I wear during the launch?" Lier shook his head.

Chiyenn grinned. "Yes. I liked it."

"Something wrong with the one I'm wearing?"

"No, no. But you have to admit, it has seen better days..."

"I suppose." Lier admitted. "But, well, it belonged to my father." Lier said, fingering his collar-button. "He was wearing it when he survived the explosion on the third moon of planet Kumei."

"I know, I know—he was the only survivor when the space fleet transport arrived at the base—he was clinging to life in a shuttle air lock. Your good luck charm, is it?" Chiyenn laughed, then noticed Lier's distraction. His gaze had been drawn across the room. "Lier?" he asked tentatively.

"Look at that girl over there," Lier said appreciatively.

"Where?" Chiyenn looked in the direction of Lier's glance, and searched through the crowds of people. Across the room by the food distribution unit sat a young woman in a black uniform, most likely one of city regulators off patrol duty.

Despite the rugged uniform, the clumsy standard-issue lasergun in the wide leather bolster on her hip and the reputation the regulators had in the center of being a group of intractable, wise-ass mavericks, the woman seemed refined, distant, unapproachable—and she was the only one in the room completely unaffected by the pervasive air of madness induced by the upcoming launch.

Leave it to Lier to pick out the most attractive woman in the room, Chiyenn thought, but this time Lier had outdone himself. The woman had an odd beauty, and she seemed a trifle sad... He wanted to go over to the washroom in the corner just past her so he could see what she was doing.

He decided to stay where he was.

"I just realized something." Lier said slowly, unsettled.

"What?"

"I am actually rather glad half of the crew this time is female."

For the first time in months, Chiyenn's laughter was real.
Chapter Two

"Captain Lier, I wish you and your crew the best of luck and success on your mission." Leader Maklian stood on the platform just before the starship shuttle's launch, blinking with sincerity, his face solemn and noble as he could render it, his proud eyes shining for all the holo-photographers to record for posterity.

Maklian's face was puffy, as though he had just woken up, and his watery eyes had an appearance of melancholy that survived his mood changes. Maklian had been leader for more years than Lier was alive; presumably, the stout, ineffectual figure had been a hellion agitator in days gone by, back when he was voted the next leader. Maklian had been expected to step down from the office after his stint of ten years, but had kept on for an additional fourteen, and now his health was failing, if not his shrewd mind.

"Why, thank, you, Leader Maklian, and on behalf of all my crew, I accept your kind wishes. We look forward to meeting you all again on our safe return." Lier said, warmly. Lier, however, was no fool, either. Lier smiled at Maklian throughout the speech, knowing what a bastard the man really was.

All of the members of the odd assembly gathered at the Ariyal-synai astroport to witness the launch stilled to listen to the words of the mission leader on this monumental occasion, but Lier begrudged the silence after the shouts and noise that had filled the air since sunrise. What did they expect him to say that he hadn't already said? How many times did he have to repeat the same trite propaganda before the mission would be launched?

Now the council representatives, politicians, scientists, and spectators had all turned their attention to him; Lier was very aware that he had to say what was expected, no matter what he honestly felt. Would it have been fair to share his fears with the world when it so desperately wanted something wonderful to believe in?

"On the behalf of my crew, I thank you as well, my fellow Seynorynaelians, for giving us this send-off." Lier said, as loudly as he could in a strong, clear voice, making the necessary eye contact with several people, putting as much stone-solid integrity into his gaze as he slowly scanned left-right over the crowd.

"In gratitude, I can only say that we will endeavor to live up to the faith you have put in us." The crowds began to cheer wildly as he finished his extemporaneous speech. Lier had the impression that anything he said would have been given an ovation.

Some of the other leaders took over; after a while, Lier heard the noise and not the words. This was all just window-dressing.

Wouldn't they all forget the launch by the next tenday? Wouldn't this singular event be swallowed by oblivion, that long mediocrity of human lives, while he and his crew were facing the dangers of space alone?

A moment later, the engines of their spaceship Seishinna test flared, signaling that the rest of the crew should begin boarding. Lier stood, looking noble and heroic, waving like a fool, he was sure.  
"We live for these moments, don't we?" Lier heard one of the mission subordinates saying to another, above the noise of the crowd. "When we can stand on top of the world and take our bows."

Lier looked out on the crowd and wished he could feel the same.

"Well, sir, still taking it all in stride?" Chiyenn said as they left the platform, the tumultuous cries of the spectators drowning out the sound of the engines. Even when the air lock door descended, they could still hear the dim echo of the noise outside. Chiyenn waved through the small viewport, enticing a frenzy of noise outside that sounded throughout the ship.

Lier had no intention of disabusing him of his heroic assumption and ruining the moment.

* * * * *

"Such a lonely, empty view," Lier said to himself, staring out the observation window of the darkened bridge of the Seishinna nearly a year after the launch.

He couldn't describe his feelings to anyone who hadn't been in space before—the strange frustration that assaulted him like severe claustrophobia or like agoraphobia, but it wasn't quite that, either—the frustration he felt was that everything stretched away forever and forever, and no matter how far the confining ship went, they never seemed to be going anywhere.

Why was it so disconcerting that the maps of the universe, or the infinitesimally small section of it that had been determined by Seynorynaelian scientists, had no definite direction, no reference point he could fathom? What was north and what was south? Space travel was like being on the sea, where only the positions of the stars indicated the direction and location of the ship.

What if someday Seynorynaelian scientists developed a ship that could feasibly warp to another part of the universe, or pass through a theoretical "hole" in space-time—what if then, the crew emerged into a region of space that was unrecognizable even by the surrounding stars, and could never again find their way home?

He was glad he wasn't a part of such an expedition, but that gave him small comfort.

Suddenly, Chiyenn arrived early to his shift, carrying a cup of shiyar-inn juice; Lier realized after a moment that Chiyenn had yet to notice his presence.

"Couldn't sleep?" Lier said, surprising Chiyenn, who started and barely avoided spilling his juice.

"You're up early, Captain," Chiyenn commented, recovering his nerves. Chiyenn headed over to a seat and looked out the forward viewport where Lier was staring at the distant yellowish-white star system that was reputedly their final destination.

"I wonder where Captain Nilery is at this moment," Chiyenn said thoughtfully.

"I imagine he's almost reached the other star system by now. The Velastria was scheduled to launch only two days after us." Lier shrugged.

"Think they've reached their destination?" Chiyenn wondered.

Lier understood Chiyenn's comment, but had no answer for him.

More than fifty years ago, their planet Seynorynael had been bombarded with unusual radio waves from a nearby star system, and it had taken more than forty years to process the transmissions into something coherent. What made the processing more difficult was that interstellar interference had also distorted the radio transmissions, but not unexpectedly. Seynorynael and its sister systems were located near the active center of the Great Cluster galaxy. And, though the transmissions had finally been processed, no one had yet been able to resolve any visuals from the transmitted waves; moreover, the speech—or language—used in the transmissions was still only gibberish to the Seynorynaelian population.

Some thought the transmissions only an elaborate hoax, but the random fluctuations in the frequency had convinced many scientists that it was at least a form of artificially created communication, even if others still maintained that its origins were not absolute proof of an extraterrestrial civilization that had developed less than a light-year away.

Three years after the controversy began, Seynorynael began to receive radio wave communication from another source, another yellow-white star half a light year from their planet. Within that year, Leader Maklian's council government had begun to put together an unprecedented exploration mission to visit the two planets. At the same time, scientists on Seynorynael had begun to attempt contact with the alien worlds, sending messages using well-known mathematical constants, but after forty years of transmissions, there had not been a coherent reply.

Towards the end of the starship Seishinna's construction, there had been speculation in the scientific community as to the authenticity of the signals and whether or not the explorers would find anything at the end of their long journey. But despite the reservations of a certain faction of scientists in Ariyal-synai and Melacre, the explorer spaceships Seishinna and Velastria had been finished.

After making contact on the closer planet, Lier's orders were to follow the Velastria to the other star system, located only a quarter of a light year from the first system, before returning to Seynorynael.

But all of Lier's doubts about the "success" of the mission—whatever that word meant—had been swept away several tendays after the ship cleared the space surrounding the black hole Kai-rek just beyond Valeria's system. At long last, Chiyenn had miraculously resolved a visual communication among the weaker signals they had received.

The transmission was brief, an image of a humanoid man standing on a barren surface under a dome, speaking in the same unintelligible speech of the other transmissions. The image of the humanoid was enough to send shockwaves throughout the ship.

The man in the transmission had appeared as human as the Seynorynaelians themselves, though with strikingly different pigmentation. His hair was dark. His eyes were a clear amethyst, his skin a translucent white—this made Lier question whether or not Chiyenn had resolved the image accurately. Seynorynaelians had pale grey skin.

Since it had taken so long to prove that there was an extraterrestrial source behind the transmissions, Chiyenn wondered if Captain Nilery might also discover a sentient species living in the second star system.

"Why haven't they responded to our transmission?" Lier wondered aloud, instead of answering Chiyenn's question. The Captain was not given to pointless speculation, but he couldn't understand why their attempts at communication had failed. The transmissions had been sent to a solid audience after all, that much they now knew.

"Perhaps the transmissions from Seynorynael never made it past the black hole Kai-rek." Chiyenn suggested.

"Doubtful."

"Or else they can't figure out what we're saying to them. And if they aren't paying much attention to our radio waves, they may not have noticed that we're even out here. We've only picked up communications from them for fifty-two years.

"You really think that?"

"Who knows?" Chiyenn shrugged. "Or perhaps their communications network isn't as advanced as we think."

Lier nodded, digesting this. "So, you're saying they may not be able to pick up signals from outer space, or process what they do receive?" he exhaled loudly. "Somehow I doubt that, too."

Chiyenn just shook his head.

"I suppose we'll find out soon enough." He said.

Lier kept calm, but his mind agitated his thoughts. Because he was certain that the visual communication had originated on a moon of the inhabited planet, implying that their civilization had a highly advanced level of technology, he wasn't sure why the planet's inhabitants hadn't responded to their signals.

What kind of people turned a blind eye to the signals of an alien race?!!

Perhaps a world that already knew about the existence of other races in the galaxy...

Lier decided speculation was not going to help his state of mind.

But he couldn't stop thinking about it.

* * * * *

Three days later, Seishinna dropped her speed, hurtling towards the circle of seven planets that surrounded the yellow-white star.

"Radio transmission source confirmed from second planet in the system," Specialist Maika announced.

"Are we in visual range?" Lier asked, moving forward in his chair.

"Yes, displaying magnified image in holo-monitor," the woman responded.

A small, mostly white planet with great swaths of blue ocean under the swirling cloud cover appeared in the monitor, the white terrain underneath dotted by patches of deep green and the crystal blue cracks of rivers.

"Magnifying source of radio waves," Maika continued, bringing up an image of a small city with an assortment of pure white and rich brown buildings oddly-shaped.

"It looks like they took simple organic shapes and replicated them," Chiyenn commented. "Better wind resistance?" he suggested off-handedly.

Suddenly the visual transmission was blocked by a drifting cloud.

"Shall we try to contact them, sir?" Maika suggested.

"What are you reading from the moon?" Lier asked Specialist Mandasse.

"Nothing—no sign of life. Maybe the visual we received came from the surface?" he arched an eyebrow.

"Hmmm. All right, let's send a message—"

"I'm afraid they've beat us to it, sir," Maika interrupted.

* * * * *

At least one thing is certain— the visuals did come from these people, Lier thought as the face of a woman appeared in the holo-monitor. Like the man they had seen in the visual wave communication, she was a humanoid, similar to Seynorynaelians but with slightly larger and more angular ears, but still flat against her head. Her bright amethyst eyes were slightly larger, and her lips a rich burgundy-red color.

Chiyenn had not erred in his image reception calculations. The woman's skin was milk-white, and her hair was black. The woman began to address them in the same language that had now become frustratingly familiar though it remained as indecipherable as ever. Her words had the euphonious quality of subtle music.

His attention was drawn, however, to the gesture the woman made with an emerald green-clad arm, and the image panned to the right, showing part of the city that they had seen in the holo-monitor. A smile appeared on the woman's face as she lifted her chin. Her manner gave Lier the impression that this was the inhabitants' gesture of welcome, that this woman had been selected to make their invitation.

Lier tried to maintain his sense of caution, despite the woman's invitation and outwardly good intentions. He wondered what Seynorynaelians would have done if another race had come to Seynorynael first—how the Seynorynaelians would have reacted to an alien intrusion—as his own crew had now come to a planet they would one day discover was called Kayria. Then he stopped, considering this. I'm assuming Chiyenn's tales are wrong, he thought, and that there were no comet riders, no supposedly alien ancestors of the Seynorynaelians.

Of course the comet riders hadn't existed, he told himself. Not until now—his own crew were the first real explorers to another star system.

The image ended, and silence reigned.

"All right, prepare to land near the city," Lier finally said. They had come here with a mission, and they might as well start now.

* * * * *

As the Seishinna's main shuttle descended through the quick rush of thin, vaporous clouds, the planet's landscape appeared below. The city they had seen in the broadcasted transmissions was located in the middle of wide, rolling green plains and rugged hills, some covered by short dark green vegetation, others near a vast stretch of water only open white sand plains dotted by small plants. In the distance, they could see vast expanses of white-capped mountains and verdant foothills, the predominant feature of the surrounding landscape.

Lier found himself speechless as he absorbed the sight of the planet, nothing like the familiar terrain of Seynorynael with its pale green and silvery lyra trees, emerald shiyar-inn trees and its indigo flower fields. This world was a collage of deep greens in the fields and trees with swatches of purple, rose, blue, peach, yellow, and white; yet it had a unique beauty to it. He wondered if perhaps Seynorynael might have developed more like this world, if Valeria had not been a bluish-white star.

The captain's shuttle from Seishinna landed on the plains outside the city and waited for the alien emissaries.

* * * * *

The reception the aliens gave their visitors intrigued Chiyenn. The aliens arrived within minutes of the Seishinna's landing. A large crowd of them had ridden in strange spear-shaped silver transports and fearlessly disembarked on the field, but Chiyenn observed several weapons among a troop of guards several paces behind the others.

Lier waited in the shuttle, watching from the windows until it seemed safe to disembark.

He couldn't help but be struck by the odd movement of the natives—they moved easily, jauntily, with speed and even grace. The natives were mostly lean, with long, beautiful, pronounced muscles, as though they were a race that either naturally had strong musculature or who valued exercise that kept the muscles strong; and, it seemed from a distance they might have had shorter limbs than Seynorynaelians, but Lier couldn't be sure. Yet that would have made sense, he told himself, since their planet's gravity was slightly stronger than that on Seynorynael; moving around hadn't been much of a problem for him, but some of his crew with poor cardiovascular endurance were having difficult moving around the cabin as quickly, without tiring themselves out in their frenzy to take quick measurements of things like surface composition and air pressure.

The only thing that kept striking Lier with a sense of the miraculous was the fact that the natives were anything like Seynorynaelians at all. Or were they?

When the air lock opened for Lier, Chiyenn, and a few of the crew to disembark, Lier decided on impulse to take a chance on the atmosphere their scanners had reported as breathable and removed his helmet.

The inhabitants facing the crew appeared to recognize him, as though only confirming what they already knew.

So, they had received—and processed—the recent messages from Seynorynael, Lier judged by their expressions. Why was it that he could read their expressions, he wondered? Shouldn't these natives exhibit behaviors and emotions in a way entirely unknown to him?

Wasn't it true that nearly fifty Seynorynaelian years ago, the natives had developed their own form of radio wave technology? Yes, they must have then tuned into the stars that they knew they were not alone.

At the same time, neither race was able to communicate in the other's language. Lier could only assume his last transmission had reached them. With enough of a reason to suppose this was the case, he was determined to discover why the inhabitants hadn't ever responded.

He didn't care that his announcement of intended cooperation and peace was as unintelligible to the native population as their speech was to him. He reasoned that if they hadn't made signs of hostility yet, they were likely every bit as curious about him and his crew as he was about them. Nevertheless, Lier had advised his crew to pack weapons in case of an attack, weapons they had stashed in their spacesuits, as much as he hoped violence wasn't going to be an issue.

With that hope, he tried to make his body language convey his peaceful intentions; he used every gesture of friendliness the retainers had briefed him in the years preparing for this mission.

His efforts seemed to work.

The natives were gesturing for them to board their shuttles.

Lier decided to oblige.

The Seishinna crew followed the natives' invitations to return to their city. A moment later, the transport lifted off the ground in a similar manner to Seynorynaelian airships. As they sped along, the wind was fresh and smelled of wildflowers—

"How is it that the wildflowers of this world at all smell like the ones on Seynorynael?" Lier wondered out loud.

"How is it that any flowering plants exist here like the ones we know so well," Chiyenn said. "Our species of Seynorynaelian flowers presumably followed an entirely different path of evolution, right?"

"Who knows how, yet." Said Lier in return. "I am incredulous that we have made contact with a race that shares our form, and that the plants and animals of this world thus far seem not unfamiliar to us. This is something I would have thought was scientifically impossible—if I weren't seeing it with my own eyes!"

Lier would have objected even more to the reality of the scientific implausibility set before him if he had not been so overwhelmed by the weather, the fabulous, gentle breath of cool wind that tossed over the bright fields of grass in the sun-kissed land—how it all reminded the Seynorynaelian crew of the precious days of the short warm season on their own world!

Then, several moments later, Lier turned towards their hosts at random, his eyes following an odd, greenish-yellow bird circling high on a far-off tree; instead, he recognized the woman in the transmissions sitting in the transport, having removed a helmet that lay useless in her lap—

It was the woman from the transmissions! Yes, and she, she had been the one who invited them on the transport!

Lier felt a strange sensation of excitement rising through him, making it difficult to sit still; he tried to suppress the unbecoming feeling and made a slow movement to get Chiyenn's attention again. With difficulty, Chiyenn clambered towards him, stooped and grasping for a hold to keep his balance on the fast-moving ship.

He pointed; Chiyenn looked to the far side of the transport, his eyes widening.

The woman was clad in a flattering dark green body suit, with a loose white short-sleeved overshirt. Most of the inhabitants had been wearing the same or black or brown variations of her attire.

Chiyenn sat down beside Lier as the shuttle abruptly descended to the transport lanes outlying the approaching city, with its high, silver, grey, and dark brown buildings.

"What do you suppose this place is called?" Chiyenn wondered aloud, drawing a curious look from the unknown female passenger, who by now had noticed them casting glances her way.

Lier shrugged, but the woman turned a keen eye on them.

She tapped a panel on the exterior of her handrest and mouthed several words. They heard the sound of her voice from their own seats as clearly as if she had been sitting next to them.

"Noritek," she said, gesturing to the city as though she had somehow perceived their question. Then she made a globe with her hands and swept her hands away, drawing their eyes to the mountains and territories beyond the city. Last she pointed to herself, and then to the man who was operating their transport, and finally she drew her hands together and clasped them, lacing her five-digit fingers tightly.

"Kayria," she said.

Chapter Three

Lier's mission guideline had allowed for the crew to remain one Seynorynaelian year on the planet, but for some unexplainable reason, he had not expected to remain that long. At least, he had not anticipated that a year could stretch so long, as every day seemed to bring new revelations, cultural and scientific discoveries of soaring magnitude.

At first the language barrier made communication with the Kayrian people difficult, and progress did not extend much beyond simple identification vocabulary. The nuances of Kayrian culture and beliefs remained a mystery, but Lier and his crew tried to document everything they witnessed.

At the same time, the Kayrians were able to clear up one misunderstanding right away. When Chiyenn showed the Kayrian woman Mica-luadei, who appeared to be some kind of important figure in their society, the recorded image of the first visual the Seynorynaelians had received, she had nodded, nodded like she perceived his question. Later, she contrived a meeting, in order to show them the construction plans of their first satellite and the ship that had brought that man to their moon and schematics of the atmospheric interference that scattered visual signals from the planet.

"Of course," Chiyenn's eyes were lit with a bright spark of comprehension; the Kayrian woman just smiled and nodded at them, tolerating this unintelligible gibberish. Lier suppressed a desire to laugh, and tried to suppress his own sense of wonderment that Kayrians smiled to show their amusement just like Seynorynaelians, when wild animals might have interpreted a smile as a threatening grimace. Yes, every biological and social coincidence Lier encountered forced him to experience a disquieting sense of wonder. Yet Lier was in no way disappointed that this was the reality he found, merely intrigued by it.

As it turned out, the Kayrians had sent the signals by laser beam to a newly launched space satellite, which had broadcast signals by radio dish into space. When the Kayrians received an answering signal a few years later, they had begun to create a space vessel to launch them to their moon while others worked on processing the transmissions from Seynorynael. They had gone to the extent of sending someone to their moon to try to install a receiver and transmitter, to try to learn more about their alien neighbors.

Lier found himself more and more impressed by the Kayrians' ingenuity. He tried to emphasize that sentiment in his reports.

The Kayrians gave his crew a permanent living dwelling in the city the first evening of their arrival, prepared much the same as Seynorynaelian homes, with greenery, low lounge chairs, and sleeper panels.

That was how Lier and the others knew— the Kayrians had known the Seishinna was coming, and they had already prepared for the cultural meeting.

Of course, this made scientific sense, though Lier hadn't thought about it beforehand; the blueshift in the Seishinna's last transmission this year had alerted the Kayrians that some celestial object was approaching the Kayrian system, and the transmissions ruled out any other possibility other than that the object was in fact an alien vessel. So the Kayrians were not as ignorant of Seynorynaelian knowledge as the crew were regarding Kayrians; the Kayrians had been analyzing what they observed for some time. Since the Kayrians had been receiving video transmissions from Seynorynaelian airspace for years, it hadn't been difficult to attempt to recreate a facsimile of the Seynorynaelian domestic settings they had observed for the convenience of their visitors.

Lier found it odd that the Kayrians hadn't invented food facilitator units; to his mind, the entire field of Kayrian science was a strange mixture of the highly advanced alongside the anachronistic. Kayrians had developed highly refined building materials, and yet the use of curved, aerodynamic shapes in their buildings struck Lier as odd.

However, after the first wind storm, a roaring, destructive thunder that proved as violent as those outside the weather-safe ring on Seynorynael, Lier began to appreciate the dwellings, and the wind-resistant function of the architecture.

He had already noted the Kayrians' extraordinary perception ability.

Chiyenn already had plans to bring back some technological devices from among of the Kayrians' greatest inventions. Lier was more impressed by the Kayrian temperament and thought the Kayrians handled stress well. They tackled problems with an approach certain of success, and usually, uncannily, always seemed to find the answers they sought.

Lier derived great amusement taking his new Kayrian friends out on the alarmingly fast Seynorynaelian shuttles.

Some of Captain Lier's Seynorynaelian crew also grew to like and admire the Kayrians they met, particularly the children of Mica-luadei, whom Lier understood to be some kind of spiritual leader. After a year passed on Kayria, about half of a Seynorynaelian year, her children had learned to speak rudimentary Seynorynaelian, and it was through them that the Seynorynaelians at last began to see the Kayrian culture.

The open candor of Kayrians surprised the Seynorynaelians. A few of the others who had remained on the ship until the mid-year after their arrival came to dislike their hosts because the Kayrian children would tell them anything they thought, without thinking that anyone might be offended.

The Kayrians believed in a divinity different from the Seynorynaelian Great One, the creator of all, who was known by many names across Seynorynael. The Kayrians believed in a spirit that moved through all living things, and that some of a person's energy remained where they had lived after death until it was called to another world by the Great Spirit. Their beliefs called for them to treat themselves and others honestly, or the Great Spirit might not allow them to join it in its journey. For if they could not face the truth no matter how unpleasant it may be, how could they ever expect to make the longest and most testing journey?

Despite all this, the Kayrians showed a great sympathy to those who found their way difficult to follow, and many of the Kayrian children amused the explorers with made-up tales. Mica-luadei had explained that there were also people in the Kayrian provinces who followed different religious beliefs, though their racial characteristics as Lier called them seemed much the same.

Other Kayrian sub-cultures spoke different Kayrian languages, ate different foods, and had different cultural practices, arts, and architectures. And though Lier saw no difference between their physical appearances in the pictures he observed, Mica-luadei assured him that some other Kayrians had darker eyes or lighter hair. Lier wondered if the Kayrians then saw all gray-skinned Seynorynaelians as similar to each other; but, he decided he didn't really want to know the answer to that.

During their mission, most of Lier's crew had begun to learn Kayrian, and had been invited to stay on the planet and continue their learning. Lier's mission guideline promoted this; Leader Maklian and his council had hoped that if an alien race were to be contacted, a mutual understanding of each other should be encouraged as soon as possible to prevent any possible outbreak of interplanetary war. Lier strongly hoped that war never happened, but he made mental notes about Kayrian weaknesses in case of a future exigency.

Shortly before the departure, Mica-luadei asked through her son if she might join the returning crew to visit Seynorynael.

Lier thought about that. Should she come back with them?

Apparently, Mica-luadei was willing to put her life in their hands.

Lier respected that. After a day or two of consideration, he decided to give her a large quarters on the Seishinna and then invited as many Kayrian scientists as were willing to come with the crew to study Seynorynael. He didn't want Mica-luadei to think that she was in any danger going to Seynorynael alone, or that Kayrian hospitality had gone unappreciated.

At the same time, Lier warned the scientists that the Seishinna would first have to go on to meet the Velastria. The Velastria had traveled to the planet in the neighboring star system, and the crews were to rendezvous before the ships returned home.

Chiyenn was adamant in explaining to them the danger in approaching the unknown planet—but after a brief moment weighing their alternatives, the Kayrians accepted.

Lier decided their decision took guts; and creator above! He admired their trust.

"Come in, Velastria," Specialist Maika Deria said, sending a short range communication to the starship under Nilery's command, now only three hundred thousand units away in orbit around the planet called Tulor.

Lier and the others waited, shifting around in the silence of the bridge.

Nilery's third long range message had updated the crew of the Seishinna on the events that had occurred since Velastria's launch from Seynorynael; apparently, the maverick mission leader Nilery had arrived on the fourth planet of a white-yellow star system, a place called Htuulorh by its humanoid population, a name which Nilery rendered "Tulor".

As for the Tulorians, it seemed that they were nothing like the Seynorynaelians or the Kayrians Lier had come to know.

At long last the Seishinna finally approached the rendezvous location just outside the planetary orbit. Lier tapped his fingers against the side of his chair, and on impulse decided again to re-play the last message in the holo-monitor. He hated the silent waiting.

After some time, a recorded message came through from Captain Nilery.

"To Captain Lier of the Seishinna." Captain Nilery said in the holo-sphere, drawing the eyes of several Kayrian passengers on the bridge; Lier sat down heavily in his command chair as the bridge communicator waited for him to continue the message. Of course, it had taken some time for the message to reach Seishinna through space; it was simply not possible to have a two-way conversation over such distances, so, as in days of old, the captains of space fleets sent dispatches to each other, and tried to sum up all of their questions and comments before recording them.

"Observation report on the planet Tulor." The message said; Nilery could only have made it less than an hour ago, likely before he even received Lier's message requesting an update of information.

"As you know, the Velastria arrived in Tulorian airspace 1.13 years after our departure; it has now been 1.3 Seynorynaelian years since that time. The Tulorians have at last decided to disarm their defense missiles after intense negotiations. We have remained in orbit for some time to keep any hostilities from escalating, sending down but a few emissary shuttles for our scheduled meetings.

"Our visuals depict a society of large productive cities worldwide. There are numerous manned satellites in orbit around the planet which we have already visited by invitation. Analyst Hider seems to think that their technological advancements have all been within the last twenty years, dating at the point in time when Seynorynael began to receive the transmissions from the planet.

"Linguist Meron, who had taken what little of the language we guessed from the visual communications we received after passing Kai-rek to form our salutation, has been hard at work piecing more information together.

"We continue to try to persuade them as best we can of our peaceful intentions. We tapped into their communications system and sent a broadcast worldwide within the first tenday of our arrival, but the Tulorians have forbidden future broadcasts.

"In the last year, we have made but little progress in persuading the Tulorians of our peaceful intentions, but the disarmament of the missiles shows progress. In the past two months, we have been entertaining a delegation of Tulorian scientists on board the Velastria in order to promote these peace talks.

"The decision to allow them to investigate us with an armed guard proved to play a positive role in breaking down their hostilities." Nilery said, his voice betraying a hint of satisfaction. "The scientists have remained on board since that time, observing our way of life, in particular paying attention to our scientific advancements. From what little we understand, we have sufficient evidence to believe that the Tulorians had no idea of their proximity to Seynorynael, and did not expect our arrival.

"Many of the transmissions from Seynorynael have been distorted by the gravitational forces of the black hole Kai-rek, though I hear that a small group of scientists on Tulor were beginning to suspect that some of the radio transmissions they had received might be of alien origin, yet they could not resolve the signals into any kind of comprehensible format.

"When the scientists boarded Velastria, we also had an opportunity to observe Tulorian culture and behavior. Between you and me, they seem to me to be an extraordinarily practical race—every Tulorian I have encountered possesses a great fascination with tools and how to use them and a penchant to create new devices.

"But in their enthusiasm for creating possible time-saving innovations, they have created an array of useless trinkets as well. Indeed, many Tulorian inventions appear to serve no other purpose than to provide pleasure or to serve as a topic of conversation, or to function as a catalyst for further creative endeavors. Some of the crew, however, have taken a peculiar fondness for Tulorian cuisine, in particular the region of Biliri. And yes, we can digest their food fully.

"When we finally presented Seynorynael's proposal to the Tulorian government to join a kind of 'planetary federation', the Tulorians held a planetary conference and agreed to consider the proposal. Then when the scientists' reports of our culture were spread across the planet, the Tulorian people seemed intrigued by the possibility of studying our innovations.

"I think they are inclined to join us," Nilery said thoughtfully, "but the government would first like to send some ambassadors to Seynorynael before reaching a final decision, and so we agreed to take them with us. In exchange, we were persuaded to allow some crew members to remain on Tulor. I think the Tulorians would like to believe our intentions are good, but they seemed more secure with the arrangement once half of our crew had been relocated to the Tulorian capital.

"I myself spent a month in the capital city among the ambassadors, preparing them in Seynorynaelian customs. The experience has left me with an odd impression of the Tulorian character, I'm afraid. Already I have noticed that the Tulorian rooms have been refitted with adaptations of our own food facilitators that their scientists studied on our ship. Most of our science is too far ahead of their understanding so far, but as you know the food facilitators are relatively simple to produce.

"Still, the entire experience strikes me as a demonstration of how easily the Tulorians will accept unusual ideas, but their adaptability has allowed them to advance from a civilization that did not have aerospace transport twenty years ago to one that has already sent satellites into orbit.

"But I think you will be more surprised by the Tulorian zeal for life, and their equal dedication to enjoying what they have worked hard to create. I think of you every time I visit one of their cultural recreation centers, and I am strongly considering suggesting our people recreate them when I return to Seynorynael.

"The one thing I hadn't anticipated, Lier," Nilery paused, "is that the Tulorians were at war with each other until the very arrival of the Velastria. I have to admit, I was surprised to learn of this, a year later! And nearly three years by the Tulorian calendar."

Lier suppressed an exclamation of complete and utter surprise, afraid profanity would ensue; for the sake of composure, he maintained an unsteady silence; he kept his mouth shut.

"I'm still trying to ascertain all of the details regarding this planetary war; it seems to have been primarily an air war, rather than a land conflict. I still don't know; perhaps the Tulorians have only let us see what they want us to see. There has been rapid change on the surface since our arrival, so it may already be too late to root out the evidence of what truly happened prior to our landing.

"This is my last transmission before the rendezvous. I report that some of the Tulorians have insisted on accompanying your vessel's crew when the Seishinna arrives; it seems imprudent to me to deny them, but you will have to make your decision when you arrive. Since we received your transmission about Kayria, the Tulorian people have been eager to meet with them and your crew.

"I will send a shuttle to bring you to Velastria where our meeting will take place. Then we can begin to discuss how best to assimilate our alien companions.

"Before I sign off I want to request that you ask if any of your Kayrians would be willing to exchange their quarters for one on the Velastria. The Tulorians have expressed an interest in meeting with a few of them. You have implied that your Kayrian companions may be reluctant to accept such an offer, but since my Velastria is a much smaller ship than the Seishinna, I confess I would be relieved to relinquish some of my Tulorian passengers in exchange. Their delegation is much larger than we anticipated.

"One other interesting anecdote—several of my crew who lived on the planet returned with Tulorian female companions; I hadn't anticipated it, but there is a possibility that we will never return to Seynorynael, and there is nothing in the mission guideline against bringing back aliens on board; as you know, the guideline encourages us to accept delegations—"

Lier jumped out of his chair.

"And of course, I myself thought that any kind of physical relationship with these aliens was absolutely impossible. But Medical Specialist Koralev, who was among the returning crew, informed me that the Tulorian biological systems are not incompatible with ours—"

"Good God." Lier said, somewhat horrified.

"Of course," Nilery's report went on, "I was more shocked to discover that some of my crew had actually gone through a Tulorian attachment ceremony, but the greatest surprise came only a few tendays ago when we discovered that one of my female crew members is carrying—a half-Tulorian child. Medical Specialist Koralev has termed the embryonic male 'a half-race child'.

"This information has virtually single-handedly erased the last of the Tulorian reservations to an alliance with us, but the scientific community of both worlds has been thrown into an alarming frenzy that will only be calmed when we determine how this miracle was possible—yes, miracle is how I see it. Perhaps I am a fool, but I can't help wondering if we are not related to these Tulorians somehow—and... I find myself wondering if perhaps... the Comet Riders of our past existed, after all, eh?

"This is Captain Nilery, signing off."

It was some time before Lier was calm enough to sit down again.

"I called you here, Medical Specialist Koralev, because I wanted you to explain your findings to Captain Lier. Captain Lier has just arrived on board Velastria from the Seishinna." Captain Nilery said, tight-lipped, glancing at the slight-boned young medical specialist and his steady, even eyes. Nilery was a round-faced, stout man with great jaws, a sturdy, big-boned frame, and broad shoulders. Nilery moved aside to let Lier and Koralev clasp hands in greeting; hard-soled boots made sharp clicking sounds against the smooth metallic floor.

What an odd gesture, Nilery thought, regarding them. The Tulorians hadn't understood the gesture at first, but to tell the truth, he never had, either. Near Nilery's home in the Kilkoran province, the gesture was infrequently used, but it was standard in Ariyal-synai.

"Pleased to meet you, sir," Koralev said to Lier. Koralev wondered why Lier seemed so anxious; from all he knew of the legendary Lier, third in line of a family of famous space explorers, Lier wasn't unsettled easily.

"So, Koralev," Lier said. "I hear you've been investigating the half-race child incident."

"Yes," Koralev agreed; they moved towards a conference table, Nilery leading, and sat down to discuss the matter.

"And?" Lier asked.

""As to my findings—they do not completely clear up the matter of the Tahlburey child." Koralev admitted, a crease forming between his brows. He seemed a man to whom life held no surprises. That, or else he no longer found that anything could surprise him after the recent discovery of the half-race child incident. "However," he continued, "when I began my genetic experimentation on the foetal fluids and individual chromosomes of the genetic contributors, I discovered something in the chromosome combination."

"Yes? What, exactly?" Lier asked.

"Well, it seems that individual Seynorynaelian chromosomes will create copies of themselves in order to combine with Tulorian humanoid DNA."

Lier was very quiet. Koralev paused to gauge a response, then continued. "I don't know why, and the odds of our two races being close enough in form to reproduce was unheard of until the Tulorian inter-attachments. I can only conclude that this supports a hypothesis that the conditions in which life evolves do not determine the end product as much as we thought—that is, life can evolve along a similar path even when given slightly different starting conditions."

"Interesting," Lier said. "You mean to say in order for life to evolve at all, it may require a certain range of environmental conditions, and those conditions will give rise to species that are similar enough to interbreed." Lier seemed uncomfortable with the idea.

"Something like that." Koralev agreed. "Life may have infinite choices in evolution, but the viable routes on worlds similar to ours in atmospheric composition and pressure, gravity, and light intensity may produce humanoid creatures similar to our own race. Though it may not always be so, and though other forms may have been tried and failed, the humanoid form may well be a highly successful and thus favored end product in evolution."

"Yes, I see," Lier nodded thoughtfully. "Though I can't agree, and I think that there is something further at work here."

"Hard to believe, Lier?" Nilery laughed.

Lier nodded. "Are you sure Seynorynaelian chromosomes are as adaptable as you claim—that they can lose some of the set twenty-five chromosomes in combination?"

Nilery glanced at Lier as though he read some hidden agenda behind Lier's question.

"I'm absolutely certain." Koralev replied directly. "I've repeated the experiments with fifteen other Seynorynaelian genetic sources."

"Good," Lier sighed. "Then you can discuss your case with our medical expert."

"Specialist Thelatesse?" Koralev asked. "Why?"

"Because." Lier exhaled loudly, pushing back his chair. "She's found that some of our chromosomes can be lost in combination with the Kayrian chromosomes."

"How do they know for certain it is possible?" Nilery turned a sharp eye on Lier.

"Because Chiyenn's Kayrian partner is going to have a child."

* * * * *

"Captain Lier, I want ask—is Federation giving Tulor ship—so we come home from visiting?" Lier stopped in his paces across the bridge to consider the new Tulorian mother's question—the Federation she spoke of didn't exist yet, but the Tulorians had been led to believe it was already an eventuality.

Lier knew all of the Tulorians were thinking about how they would get home if neither the Seishinna nor Velastria returned to Tulor. Nilery had told the Tulorians about the Seynorynaelian space fleet, but he had also divulged that there were few ships outfitted for long-term durations of travel; thus far only the Seishinna, Velastria, and Kaleena were capable of travel outside the Seynorynaelian solar system. The council had been working on augmenting the number of spaceships for the proposed journeys to other nearby planetary systems, but it would be years before more ships were completed; Nilery hated divulging the information to the Tulorians but considered it necessary. Yet the Seynorynaelian public itself had known nothing of the tentative plans of Maklian's council to form a Federation with the inhabitants of any aliens they discovered, if against all odds, such a thing was possible.

Lier's instincts told him that the Federation was already in its inchoate stages, and he had lived to see it happen.

"Yes, Tombtasheh, I believe we will give you a ship to return home." Lier said steadily, eyeing Communicator Pelksen and his wife who had come to visit him on the bridge. He regarded them with a benevolent air; Lier was self-consciously aware of his responsibility everywhere on board the Seishinna except his own quarters. "There will soon be a great number of ships making journeys between our worlds, I imagine." He added, in slow, carefully articulated words so that she could understand.

She seemed to understand enough. Lier watched the Tulorian woman sitting beside Pelksen, gratitude shining in her amber eyes. He tried not to stare at the tan arms that held her new daughter.

Lier didn't like children himself; he found them annoying from their early infancy to childhood, and after they became mobile, they proved reckless and destructive as well as annoying. At the same time, he felt a strange sense of wonder regarding Tombtasheh's child, as though it brought home the miraculous, tenuous, and fragile nature of humankind as nothing ever had before.

The baby girl's skin was not exactly a pale tan, because of the lighter cast to it. Her eyes were a blue like Seynorynaelians, but wider, and her ears curved slightly differently than Lier's.

"She's cutting teeth, eh, Tombtasheh?" he said, wincing, as the baby began to cry.

The sixteenth half-race child had been born less than half-way through the return journey to Seynorynael, more than three years after the Seishinna's launch. This was the sixth birth on the Seishinna.

Lier tried hard not to worry about Chiyenn.

Shortly after their arrival on Kayria, an epidemic had hit the city, crippling half of the Seynorynaelian crew, who had no years-long built up resistance to Kayrian disease. Chiyenn had been one of the worst afflicted, and had been isolated in a critical area to recuperate; by the time he recovered, he had already fallen head over heels for his attendant doctor, a young widowed Kayrian woman. Chiyenn asked her to come back with him to Seishinna; she agreed, despite the risks of traveling to Seynorynael.

The truth was that none of the Seishinna crew knew for certain that they would definitely make it back to Seynorynael, if something suddenly went wrong with the ship's biosystems, or if something unexpected happened in the space near them on their return journey. Space travel was in its infant stages and a long way from being routine and safe.

Thelatesse had already determined that Kayrian and Seynorynaelian body structures were not incompatible, Lier knew, and though the Kayrian woman Chiyenn had fallen in love with agreed to return to Seynorynael with him, Lier himself still found the idea of becoming attached to an alien significantly less appealing than his friend. Still, Lier was willing to approve for Chiyenn's sake and permitted Chiyenn's new wife to join the crew.

Lier tried not to think of himself as prejudiced, but at first he had considered the inter-racial attachments only slightly above bestiality; it was only after the discovery that half-race children were genetically possible that he changed his mind about this.

Lier had never presumed to understand the universe; he spent little time contemplating bizarre coincidences or arguing pointlessly. He just wished someone would figure out why this interracial pairing was all possible before they landed on Seynorynael.

Chiyenn, his youthful friend and confidant, this toe-stepping serious young man with a tendency to overdo everything, was already attached and had a little boy rambling about the ship! It was hardly to be believed! Yet Chiyenn was a father, father to an adventurous, wide-eyed boy named "Lier" after the captain of Seishinna, his godfather.

Lier didn't like children in general, but he made an exception of his godson. Later, he was forced to admit that the children had done the crew the biggest service of all.

Little Nildriyan had begun to speak his first words just after the Seishinna made its rendezvous with the Velastria. Now, more than three Seynorynaelian years later, the child was fluent in Kayrian, Tulorian, and Seynorynaelian. Through him, little Lier, and the others, many of the miscommunications between the Kayrians, Tulorians, and Seynorynaelians were beginning to disappear. No doubt it wouldn't be long before the children able to speak at least two languages from infancy would establish the real linguistic groundwork necessary for precise communication between the races.

Little Lier had already taught his namesake how to sing—badly—several children's songs from Kayria.

Lier looked at Tombtasheh again, and thought about little Lier, this time fondly. The little spitfire was always making visits on the bridge with his mother, and insisted on sitting on his "uncle's" lap in the captain's chair.

Only one thought gave him cause for concern. Lier thought about how long it had taken for him to overcome his own instinctive, natural prejudices against the Kayrians and the Tulorians, even after years entirely isolated among them; he was satisfied that his prejudices were all gone.

And that was why he began to worry. What would the consequences of his mission be years from now, long after his own death?

What would Kayrian history make of him—ally or enemy?

The woman known as Selerael stood among the crowds as the Seishinna landed in Ariyal-synai in the middle of a worldwide celebration unequaled since its launch. She watched, just a person in the crowd, as Lier and Chiyenn disembarked onto the airfield with their crew, and with the first of the Kayrian and Tulorian delegates ever to set foot on Seynorynaelian soil—at least as far as Leader Bandary knew, and he was the one making the announcements.

Would he be surprised to know that he himself was already part-Kayrian? Granted a small percentage, but part Kayrian nonetheless. Wouldn't Lier be surprised to know that he was as well, and that his navigator Chiyenn was even more so?

She recalled the day that Syleraestia had crashed at the edge of Firien, thousands of years ago in almost a haze, as though to recall it clearly would be too painful. She had journeyed into the past—to the past of the planet Seynorynael where her mother Alessia had been born. Selerael had been on Seynorynael in its early history when the climactic-induced dark age kept the planet in a cultural dark age for more than two thousand years; it was still recovering now, but that hurdle had been passed, for now, and Seynorynael had begun its slow climb back towards civilization. Yet she remembered the sensation of the air, back on the day of the crash when she had met the colonizer of Enor—the people who had seeded the universe with life cultures...

And now she was here, standing on a bare astroport field, standing against the cold winter day, freezing with a half of a million other Seynorynaelians angling to get a better view of their heroes.

Selerael, a shapeshifting being who was also an immortal, stood in the disguise of an elderly man, wearing an outlandish tear-shaped stone about his neck, surveying the hedonistic spectacle with a cold, attentive eye.

The years since her son Adam's death had not been easy.

The more Selerael knew and learned, the more she was tortured by all of her knowledge rather than comforted, as though each conflicting belief in the world waged war on the battlefield of her mind, and it was only growing worse. She was continually reminded of what had happened to her mother's mentor, the genius scientist Fynals Hinev, in the far-distant future—how Hinev, left alone among the ordinary population, had developed a multiple personality disorder that had brought him to the brink of insanity and driven him to search for a means of suicide with as much passion as he had searched for the key to immortality.

She understood Hinev now. He had gained immortality, and bestowed that gift to others—to his pupil, Alessia.

Now Selerael understood through living how lonely, how desperate Hinev must have become, how supremely tortured he must have been. For she had waited many long years on this beautiful planet already, and her wait was only just beginning.

She had been sent into the past by Hinev's mission for those who would defy the emperor—and kill him before he could establish the Empire.

She wanted to fight her despair. She had grown overwhelmed by using her telepathic power—the mind-raping power of telepathy—as Hinev had, and to risk mindlinks was always dangerous—she even feared them, despite knowing that a tremendous destiny lay in store for her, for she could never be sure in her own mind what and who she was, and how successful she might be if she allowed a momentary weakness to stay her hand or to sway it. She was so tired of "seeing" memories and thoughts that did not originate in her own mind.

She tried as hard as she could to find causes worthy enough to occupy her time until the day in the future that the emperor would be born. Yet she was so restive that no tranquillity could bestow peace of mind, and no promise of momentary happiness or contentment had the power to keep her interest for long; she only knew how to do what she had to do—to destroy the eternal Emperor Marankeil—and that to stop would have been impossible.

The worst part was the waiting.
Chapter Four

Jerekkil knew she was coming long before he heard her.

He crouched without a sound, slowly drawing further into a shoal in the riverbank, his body pressing into a thick carpet of spongy leaves, macerated by the wet bog beneath. After a moment, he dared to breathe, inhaling the thick, woody scent of the bank.

"Jerekkil, time to come back inside," Malina called, drawing close to him now.

Jerekkil tried to keep quiet. Malina was unconsciously heading towards him.

In desperation, Jerekkil's eyes darted across the waters of the moss-banked, river-fed pond as though searching for something to aid his cause of escape; he alighted upon a stone balanced precariously on a high acclivity overlooking the water and stared hard at it.

The wind picked up, making a melody through the reeds and high grasses on the far bank. The gentle sound was interrupted as a large stone plopped decisively into the still pond below.

Malina turned her head at the sound, scanned the area. Suddenly a smile lit up her face.

"Oh no, Jerekkil, it won't work. Now I know you're here." She called, not even bothering to dissemble her trump card.

She knew Jerekkil was a proto-telepath. Young though he was, Jerekkil had the fleeting power to move matter, to catch a thought in the air, to sense the moods and feelings of others. He had to be nearby. Did he think she would be fooled into believing that he was walking on the other side of the bank?

Still, she walked past him, heading towards the eastward path, scrutinizing the trees with sharp eyes.

Had his mother really overlooked him? Jerekkil wondered, as guilt began to grow in his young heart.

He hesitated until he couldn't bear it any more.

"Here I am," he called, jumping from the near bank. Malina stopped far ahead on the main path and retreated, wearing a face that tried hard not to smile. "You knew!" Jerekkil said, gauging her expression, his own face suddenly crest-fallen.

Malina nodded. "How many times have I told you not to play those tricks, Jerekkil?" she asked.

Jerekkil sighed. "It was just a stone."

"And next time it will be something bigger, and you won't have the power to stop it. You might do something you'll regret," she added furtively.

Jerrekkil's eyes stared at her, not comprehending.

"Let's get back to the house before the sun sets, okay? And you need to take a bath, young man," she told him, but her words were wooden. She was looking at her son and seeing herself when she was young. She would have adored him regardless of that.

What made it so difficult for those born in Firien to leave the settlement? And why did those who left inevitably return to visit this place time and again, this wild land north of the weather-safe ring? But would Firien hold Jerekkil, this adventurous son of hers? Would these rambles by the lake be enough to contain him? For she felt nothing would content him; Jerekkil's heart was wild, and he would have to go many places in the world, she thought.

They picked their way over the forest path and headed back towards their dwelling, which faced north northwest, located on a bend in the lake just past the eastern shore, near the water but settled further away, among the lyra trees that spread in a wide band away from the lake. Most of Lake Firien continued to the East of them, but in the small bends in the shoreline to the north of Firien City, the small ancient community thrived.

Their community had grown smaller than it had once been, and newcomers still came to it from the city at times to replace those who departed and never returned, but the people of north Firien never rejected the new arrivals, even though they knew their ways were slowly dying. Part of that was to live by the code that all humans were brothers and sisters, a code that outsiders derisively ridiculed for its quality of foolish idealism.

"Your grandmother is here for a visit, Jerekkil," she told him as they trekked along; Jerekkil was stamping on tree roots as he made his way down the path half a pace ahead. He stopped and turned around; she laughed, laughed at his bright eyes shining through the dirt on his face. Her wild son, her one natural son—Malina had given life to him herself, rather than having him grown for her by ectogenesis in an artificial life chamber. Jerekkil was the product of natural genetic selection; she sometimes wondered if that was why he was so bold.

He hadn't been tailored by the geneticists to eliminate or augment certain traits, a practice common for more than two thousand years, since the time when Seynorynael had discovered Berracha(y)i and its strange but humanoid population. Berrachai, as it was pronounced by most Seynorynaelians, could not produce viable mixed-race offspring until they had undergone much genetic alteration—assuming they wanted to do so, and half-race children of this kind were rare.

Some people might have said Jerekkil would not have the advantages of the many children who had been genetically tailored. Now nearly half of all "births" were artificial, even south in Firien City. In Ariyalsynai this year, Malina heard, the number had reached an unprecedented sixty-four percent.

But Malina knew that her son was in no way inferior; she was convinced that supposed purification of traits in the artificial tailoring actually reduced unknown combinations of traits in the gene pool, that by attempting enhancement of intelligence and other desired characteristics, the geneticists were actually weakening the race over time, perhaps making the entire race prone to the same diseases and weaknesses.

Jerekkil, this wild son who disappeared so often into the sylvan land whenever he got the chance, was recklessly independent, intractable, but at the same time highly sensitive. His balance was good, his hearing acute, his coordination excellent, but to what purpose? Jerekkil could read the skies for signs of weather change, read the winds for the taste of inclement weather, and he knew the name and use of every plant out here in Firien. What kind of talents were these to the world?

Malina knew Jerekkil needed to be trained for his future, and for that she was going to have to sever his attachment to the land.

She shook her head forcefully and tried to concentrate on something else.

"Allia?" Jerekkil asked; Malina nodded.

Jerekkil suddenly turned and tore down the path, heading for the dwelling, followed by his mother's laughter.

He was sitting at Allia's feet ten minutes later when Malina returned, letting the heavy weight of the back door close softly.

Allia now lived with Malina's brother just outside Lake Firien in order to be nearer to the medical facilities in Firien City; Malina knew her mother had caught the old-age wasting sickness, caused by the intense radiation of Valeria, even though it seemed the lively woman would never quite give in to the disease's crippling effect. Bone strengthening procedures and muscle and organ replacements had done little to stall the progress of the baleful disease. Malina struggled to accept the reality that Allia had come to visit for perhaps the last time, but she remembered to find her smile and to wear it when she gazed into the living area with its bucolic furnishings and bare, wood-planked walls—and she remembered, how she remembered, the days of her youth in this house. Her father had already passed on, and her brother Colim had left Firien for the city.

"It was a long trip coming up," Khustav whispered behind her, giving her a start. She turned around, her heart racing, breathing heavily. "I told your brother we'd contact him if it seems like she's going to pass on—"

"I know," Malina replied.

Khustav sighed, then turned to watch his son who was thoroughly engrossed in Allia's story.

Khustav Hinev paused a moment to reflect upon his fortune in life; had he ever thought to live in a land so rich with life and color and air so achingly sweet that a man could drink it for the rest of his life and still never be satisfied? All those years ago, he had left Ariyalsynai on a whim and come to visit the Firien province with his yearly vacation allotment. The cottages at the south end of Lake Firien, renowned by tourists, had been entirely full as usual with the elite fleeing the capital for the undomed beaches; Khustav could only afford to stay a day in Firien City and trek to the seaside—until a bright-eyed stranger on the street advised him that the area north of the changewinds was even lovelier than the south and nearly unknown to tourists, even in the warm season.

Still skeptical, Khustav had tentatively booked a tenday in a local cottage in the north and made the hour-long journey northward in a small, rural transport; but oh, could he have known the wondering turns of auspicious fate?

He was only sorry he could never have thanked the stranger; northern Firien was the most beautiful landscape he had ever seen, and he had spent several tendays there, using up his next vacation allotment as well, for he had met the young Malina and her family that warm season, fishing out on the waters with her cheerful, bombastic father Vilner, a man with a hearty laugh, full-fleshed cheeks and stout strength, her quiet, observant, fiery-tempered brother Colim, and the garrulous Allia. After a pleasant day, they had generously invited him to stay with them at this dwelling. Khustav left his rented cottage when he could stay no longer and paid a modest rent for the two of the upstairs rooms. After three tendays, he had quit his employment as a civil servant in Ariyalsynai and taken up a post in the local trader's supply house outside Firien, where Malina worked in quality control statistics.

When he and Malina were attached, Khustav had adopted her family as his own, and more often than not, Khustav sat on the sofa when Allia came to visit, as entranced by the tales of the former glory of the Firien settlement as his young son, tales of the comet riders Khustav had thought didn't really exist back in his cosmopolitan life in Ariyalsynai, tales he had never heard presented with such detail and accuracy.

"Grandmother, are the legends true?" Jerekkil always asked after an evening of storytelling. Allia would smile and say that some people believed it to be so. It was as much as she would admit to believing them herself in her daughter and son-in-law's company.

Allia knew that Malina didn't believe in the ancient stories, that she considered them tales augmented by the imagination of the downtrodden dwellers of rustic Firien, who merely wanted to believe that they had once had a glorious past, in order not to be disappointed by the depressed economy of the present.

Malina didn't want her son to know what a painful reality it was to learn that the tales weren't true, for Malina herself had left Firien before Khustav came, left to roam the wide world as far away as the Kilkoran Sea, and had returned to Firien knowing that the world outside the settlement thought nothing of the people who lived there. Nothing of value had ever come from Firien, and nothing ever would.

Malina knew Jerekkil believed in the stories; she only allowed herself to tolerate this spinning of nonsense because she knew Allia had been told she had less than a year to live.

Khustav wandered into the room as Allia told a story about the founding of the northern colony; Malina followed, and Allia's quick eyes flicked to acknowledge the presence of her new audience.

"Are the comet rider's descendants really the proto-telepaths?" Jerekkil asked at the end of Allia's tale as he squirmed into a better position on the rug; his feet seemed to have fallen asleep.

The proto-telepaths live at Firien alone because it was here that the colonizers came...

Malina gave a start; her eyes darted to her husband, who sat, unperturbed, on the sofa, watching Allia. Allia had spoken to Malina with her mind.

"What's a—colonizer?" Jerekkil asked, looking up at Allia.

Malina felt an involuntary shiver run down her spine. Jerekkil had also heard Allia.

Allia looked across at her daughter.

Yes, Malina, as much as you deny it, you are a proto-telepath. Like me. Like your grandfather.

"I don't know," Allia answered. "But they are mentioned in the family record."

"What are you talking about, Jerekkil?" Khustav asked, in his deep voice and direct manner.

The boy turned to his father with a bright, intelligent gaze. "Allia was saying that the people here are proto-telepaths because of the colonizers."

Khustav laughed and mussed the top of his son's hair; his heart swelled with an appreciative fondness of his son's enthusiasm.

"Can I see the family record?" Jerekkil asked. He waited, wondering—the moment was everything to him, though he hadn't even known about the record for more than a moment of his long life—at least, he considered it long. Every time a person asked him his age, he tallied up the years with a sense of pride, thinking how very wise he had gotten to be, even though his elders didn't appreciate it.

"We don't have one—" Malina began to say, but Allia's eyes sparkled mischievously, and she reached over to her belongings, rummaged around in them, and pulled out a coiled-up, crystalline fiber parchment. After a moment, she made a gesture to invite young Jerekkil onto her lap. Malina made signs of protest, but Allia took no notice of Jerekkil's dirty clothes and feet as he clambered onto her smooth white garment.

Jerekkil sat coiled up on Allia's lap for a long time, and they began to read the record together; Khustav seemed to recall something significant and got up, heading off on a more important errand outside; Malina just sat on a wooden panel, feeling a sense of her own disillusionment washing through her.

"And here you are at the bottom of it all," Allia smiled at Jerekkil after a while; she pointed down the long, unfurling, ancient scrap of indestructible chordent material upon which their distant ancestor had begun to record his family history. "And you must record your children upon this—my father told me it is the original, though many copies have been made. But the original always remains at our ancestral dwelling in Firien, so I will give it to you today to keep for your children."

"Did the same ancestor who built our original home begin the family record?" Jerekkil asked.

"Yes, he did." Allia replied. "And it was he who was said to have been a leader on the journey of the comet riders. Here is his name at the top, with the name of his wife. If you can believe this document, he lived many years even before they came here."

"Adam and Fahlia. What was the family name?" Jerekkil asked, confused.

"Dheemeettriehv." Allia said, pointing.

"I can't read those letters," Jerekkil said, his nose wrinkling in concentration.

"I think it's time for sleep now, Jerekkil," Malina interrupted, throwing her mother a look that said she had filled her grandson's head of nonsense enough for one evening. Jerekkil reluctantly obliged, first kissing Allia good-night before he left.

"What is it?" Malina demanded a moment later; Allia's watery eyes seemed profoundly sad.

"Dear, you haven't given up believing in the stories, as much as you fool yourself." She said, shaking her head. She didn't want to have to force Malina to believe, but she knew that she still had a powerful sway over her daughter, almost as great as the influence of Khustav, and she would do all she could to use that primal influence, an influence which no amount of passing time could subdue. "And you mustn't underestimate Jerekkil. He may be just a child now, but he already knows his own mind. And he will one day learn to use his talents—"

"That's what I'm afraid of, mother. What if he—"

"Malina, you have to forget what happened."

"I thought I could. But mother, ever since Jerekkil started showing signs of—reading thoughts, moving things, I haven't been able to get that afternoon out of my mind. I wasn't able to see that transport coming around the bend, mother, and.. it should—it should have hit me, but instead those three tourists died—"

"Malina," Allia said very softly. "I'm going to admit something to you."

"What?"

"You weren't the only one who caused the transport to veer off the path. I think, rather, you had nothing to do with it."

Malina shot up, then stood paralyzed. "But—you never had the telekinetic power—"

"I moved it," Allia said, shaking her head, then faced her with a hollow, worn-out expression. "That was the one time I was able to do it. I moved that transport because I couldn't bear to let my child die."

"Why didn't you say this before?" Malina demanded.

"You didn't believe in the power, Malina. And after all of these years, I didn't know you could hear my thoughts until a few moments ago. You heard what I told you this time, that you are a proto-telepath. After so long, at last I know you heard me this time."

"Mother, I thought I was the one who had killed them, all of these years."

Allia was quiet.

"I didn't think you understood, Malina." Allia said after a moment; her face seemed to have compressed inward, as though Malina's words had hit her like a hammer. "You were so young when it happened." Allia protested in a dull monotone, turning away. "But now, I see—I never knew you blamed yourself. I thought only I had tortured my conscience since it happened."

"You were able to kill those three just so that I could survive?" Malina demanded, her throat dry.

"No," Allia shook her head. "I never intended for anyone to be hurt, but I never had time to consider the consequences. You don't understand Malina, but when we are tested, it seems as though something involuntary takes control of us, suspends our free will and makes our choice but one option. All we know is that we must survive, and that we will pay any price to protect our loved ones. I am paying, Malina—not only through my guilt, but I am dying, dying a hundred years before my time. You don't understand, do you? I was young when I had you and Colim, young when your father died, but my father was more than three hundred years old when he found my mother and brought her here."

Malina's mouth dropped open.

"You never knew, Malina, I know. You refused to believe the family record because you didn't want to believe you had any proto-telepathic power, I see that now. But don't make the same mistake that my father made."

"Mistake?" Malina echoed.

"My father denied that he and I were proto-telepaths, and so he refused to train me to control my latent ability. When you fell in the path just as that transport came into view, I didn't have the ability to control my own power, Malina. I saved you without even thinking, involuntarily, as it were, and though I cannot be sorry that you lived, I do regret that I was the instrument of three other deaths. I've done my best to atone for those deaths in whatever small way I could, but I am at last paying for my sins."

Malina found she couldn't cry. She felt a horrid pang in her heart, but she was too numb for any tears.

"Please promise me one thing," Allia said.

"What?"

"Don't make Jerekkil live the way I did. Teach him to control his abilities. Give him the power to make his own choices in this life."

The silence between them stretched for several moments.

"All right, mother. I will."

Allia died within the tenday.

Chapter Five

The Kayrian man Ettrekh Meilacu-ra paused at the top of the stairs, gripped by a hesitation he had never known before. Why was he so suddenly afraid? How was it possible for fear to enter the heart of a man who knew what he wanted and had made a decision to do something about it?

If only he could have seen himself, standing there, his bare feet staggered over two steps, mid-stride, he would have said that the man was meditating upon something that had been mistakenly left upstairs.

He knew what he wanted, and he was afraid of getting it.

He wanted to see his home just one time before he died. And he wanted his daughter to know the planet they had all come from.

Kayria.

But did he really want to know what had happened to Kayria since he had left it? He felt the pangs of reminiscences he didn't invite, memories of his family, the intrigue and bustle of those who knew him intimately, never forgot his vices, and stubbornly kept their impressions of the boy unchanged in their minds even when he became a man; his thoughts drifted to recollections of his world, lingering over good and bad memories alike, fond thoughts of people who had passed on even in his childhood, and of friends and by-gone days of boyhood, wanderings over the wild moors of Noritek, and games adventuring in the glades by the ancient ruins of a primitive's dwelling.

He thought of his younger self, dreaming of the future he thought to find and to make, never expecting what life had to hold for him. He thought of it all now with such fond devotion, though the boy he had been had left Kayria, thinking to find something far greater out there in the unknown.

Ettrekh had grown comfortable and familiar with this Seynorynael, learned to function so very easily in its society, grown Seynorynaelian in his political leanings, begun to take the middle line in his actions, and misunderstood the uncompromising, irrational tendencies of the young Seynorynaelians he encountered almost daily in his work in the city of Falyndae.

Could it be, though. that Kayria still owned his soul? he wondered in reverent contemplation.

He had been pondering his death of late; he was satisfied that he would die here on Seynorynael with his Seynorynaelian-born wife, but a realization had struck him as he contemplated his actions to date: he did not want to die before he saw Kayria again.

And what of his daughter Undina? How could he live knowing that his child would never understand his soul? His wife—for some reason, the fact that Ilina hadn't been to Kayria never disturbed him; he had fallen in love with her for herself, and his love didn't hinge upon a common or disparate background but upon their common interests and thoughts.

Yet their daughter Undina was so young that Ettrekh didn't really know her, at least not what kind of woman she would one day grow to be; he couldn't say why it concerned him that Undina, who was a physical continuation of him, a part of him that would live ever after on Seynorynael, would never understand him, her father, because she didn't understand Kayria.

Ettrekh trusted Undina to make her own judgments—she was a clever girl, which made his heart so fondly proud—but she could only base those judgments on what she had experienced, and he knew her experience was scant. She had been born on Seynorynael, and she had never left the planet. For all the transmissions she could see, for all the electro-pad files she might read, she would never truly understand him, or herself, until she set her raw child's feet upon her native soil.

Ettrekh trotted down the stair.

He knew what he would do.

He could hear sounds coming from the central living area, where Ilina and her mother were teaching Undina Kayrian tradition, the uy-lana contest of concentration and strength. Ilina smiled at him when he entered, then turned again to her daughter to keep from losing. When the match was over, Ilina had won by the closest of margins, to the amusement of Ilina's mother, Gilwsa Nelana-mi, a middle-aged Kayrian woman with a small, frail body like a bird's but a feisty glow about her that defied everyone indiscriminately.

"Oh ho, Ilina-li. She's going to get you soon, that one." The older woman laughed; Ettrekh found it odd that though Gilwsa had never been to Kayria, her words had all of the qualities of the rich, euphonious stream of words of the Kayrian speech, not merely its language.

"But she'll never beat you, eh, Gilwsa?" Ettrekh said, glad that at least Gilwsa hadn't forgotten all Kayrian traditions, even if she had given her daughter a Seynorynaelian name.

"All this contesting has given me an appetite. I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm going to go find something to eat." Ilina said, clambering to her feet.

Undina stood quietly and followed her mother and father into the food preparation room; Gilwsa sat back in her chair, as though content to rest.

Kayrian children were taught from early on in life to fend for themselves when it came to simple tasks such as eating and taking care of personal belongings and needs. But in other areas, Kayrian parents took an almost dominating interest in their children's upbringing, as far as Seynorynaelians were concerned. Kayrians were highly rational people. Seynorynaelians were of the misguided belief that Kayrians seldom showed any emotion; in fact, this was a conclusion based on misunderstanding.

Ettrekh liked to think that Kayrians possessed a noble character and acted for the best. What was usually true and more reliable was that they often acted without hesitation; Kayrians were given to long contemplation before taking action, and in many cases, it was virtually impossible to change their minds once they had made them up.

Seynorynaelians suffered from the general prejudice that Kayrians possessed unfailing good sense; Kayrians themselves were far less certain of that assertion but as the image it projected of their race was positive, they generally refrained from disabusing the false impressions of their Seynorynaelian allies. It was a small enough advantage to be considered equal to Seynorynaelians with regard to reasoning abilities, because many of the prejudices against Kayrians were unfounded and degrading.

Ilina found a fresh urbin root and began scraping away at it to remove the dirty peeling, while Ettrekh stuffed some mian leaves into a pot to cook with a little bit of shredded koltri. Undina loped over to the food unit with a brazen gait and withdrew some cooked hikhu eggs which she brought back to the table carefully balanced in stacks up to her nose.

The Seynorynaelian meal facilitator remained in its corner, but the Kayrian families rarely relied upon them. Urbin roots, native to Kayria, had become a part of Seynorynaelian cuisine, and dishes made with them could be produced in the facilitators, but the Kayrians enjoyed the activity of food preparation, because it kept the family working together.

The four of them were all that remained of the extended Kayrian family. Ilina's father, Ertu Nelana-mi had died of premature old age radiation disease, and Ettrekh's parents still lived on Kayria. Ilina had only one brother who had disappeared years before, Viker; they seldom spoke of him. Why Viker had left suddenly remained a mystery to everyone, even though Undina was convinced she was the only one who didn't know the reason. Gilwsa occasionally mentioned that Viker had never been content on Seynorynael. But where else in the five planets might he have gone? Undina wondered secretly.

She thought of Viker often.

Undina's mother had lived all of her life on Seynorynael. Gilwsa's side of the family had been among the earliest immigrants nearly five thousand years before and had in many ways grown more like Seynorynaelians than Kayrians, though they had kept a few traditions. Gilwsa's husband Kilimay's family had lived on Seynorynael more than three thousand years, but they had moved across the Sea to Kilkor. Kilimay had joined Gilwsa in her home in Kerrai, and it was there that their daughter Ilina had met Ettrekh nine years ago.

After the Kayrian expansion, Kerrai had grown to be the largest northern city between Lake Firien and Ariyalsynai, located only a few hundred land units northwest of the great capital city, nestled in the foothills of the mountains that separated the rolling, vibrant green southern hills from the northern wild lands. Kerrai, a beautiful steep, multi-tiered city attracted Kayrians for some reason.

Ettrekh and Ilina had later decided that the city had grown too crowded to raise Undina there. Ettrekh's descriptions of Kayrian settlements led them to the nearby northern town of Falyndae, a picturesque domed village contained in a mountain valley.

Ettrekh Meilacu-ra had never intended to remain on Seynorynael.

Ettrekh had decided to travel and see the Federation's five planets himself, and after a brief stay on Tulor, he secured passage to Seynorynael. After landing in Ariyalsynai, he had traveled east to get a taste of undiluted Seynorynaelian culture. But when he heard of the large percentage of Kayrians living in the city of Kerrai and the claims that they had recreated a Kayrian city, his curiosity drew him there. He was catching a transport to the historic center when he ran into Ilina's family. Ilina still laughed at how her father had decided then and there to welcome the Kayrian native and give him the grand tour.

But if Kerrai had not been what he expected, a city still predominantly Seynorynaelian in population, architecture, and culture, it had held one of the greatest treasures in the conglomeration of five planets as far as he was concerned, one Ettrekh was never going to let go: Ilina Nelana-mi, a girl who could climb a tree better than he could, who loved to argue over politics and philosophy, and whose temperament and "ideas" were as unpredictable as the weather. He had been only a tenday from leaving the planet when he met her.

He had never left.

"Ilina, I want to visit Kayria. And I want to take Undina with me." He said as they were eating.

Ilina set down her drink; she stared at it a moment, as though extraordinarily fascinated by it for no apparent reason. She looked up at him; her eyes were strained.

"It is time she sees her home world." He went on.

"She..." Ilina exhaled shortly. "Has lived her entire life on Seynorynael, Ettrekh—"

"I'm talking about Kayria."

"What can it matter if she sees Kayria? It doesn't mean anything to her."

"I know, and that's precisely my point."

"I understand why you want to—"

"I don't think you can, Ilina. You were born here."

She stopped, visibly considered his words. "Perhaps I don't then. But—"

"Undina's eight by Seynorynaelian years, twelve by Kayrian years, old enough to make such a journey that will last her all of her life. If I don't take her there now, I think it will be too late for her to ever really know Kayria."

Ilina failed to see the significance of that.

"Children see the world differently, Ilina, don't you remember? Don't you remember how observant you were when the world was new to you? Don't you remember how every powerful, unique experience had the power to make a strong and lasting impression—"

"Yes, I do."

"I want her to be Kayrian—Kayrian in spirit. She'll always be Seynorynaelian, I know, because she was born and raised here, but to at least understand and feel what her people were—"

"Because I never got that chance." She smiled at him, a tight little smile.

"It isn't your fault your illness keeps you from traveling. I'm not trying to be condescending about my Kayrian roots—"

Undina giggled. The urbin roots made a popular dish her father was known for.

"I know." Ilina said soberly, not hearing her.

"And I'm not pitying you, either, Ilina."

"You'd better not."

"Seynorynael is a wonderful place to grow up, as long as there are other Kayrian descendants around."

"I thought so. But that's why you never asked before—because of me."

"I thought I could be happy just living here, living for the future, but—"

"I understand. I suppose I even expected this would happen. I'm not angry—I'm relieved."

"Relieved?" He didn't understand.

"All of this time, I knew I was holding you and Undina back. I knew you weren't saying anything about wanting to go home and see your family because of me, even though you clearly wanted to go back. Even though—I always knew you would have to go back someday."

"Not forever. Just one last visit."

"Forever? Honestly, it makes me sad when you talk like that," she said. "But I understand. I want you to know that I do. And of course," she said, averting her eyes. "I'll miss you terribly, you and Undina, but I'll survive; for your sake, I'll manage, somehow. How many years will you be gone?" Her voice was stoical.

"A year in space each way, but several more if you factor in time dilation—"

"What's going on in here?" Gilwsa suddenly interrupted, having entered the food preparation room. She had taken a bowl down and come up behind Ilina before the couple noticed her. Undina's eyes only fell upon her grandmother briefly. At the moment, she was far too interested in her parents' discussion, her bright eyes shifting between them. "Isn't it early to be taking a long journey? The warm season has begun, and you'll miss it," Gilwsa commented, taking a seat. "Ilina won't be able to see Undina grow into a woman, and what about her education—"

"She can receive an outstanding quality of education on one of the Seynorynaelian spaceships with the councilors' children." Ettrekh explained. "And she'll learn so much from seeing another planet, lessons no other experience can teach—"

"What good will it be when she returns here?" Gilwsa asked calmly. "She'll only have more to sacrifice—events and family she misses here, and then those she leaves behind on Kayria." Gilwsa sounded vaguely irritated, but not at Ettrekh.

"Grandmother, I've always wanted to see the land where we came from," Undina's small voice was heard for the first time. She kept glancing at her father; she knew he was brilliant, more brilliant than she ever hoped to be, but she felt he never noticed how hard she was trying to live up to the standard of his intellect. Of course, she knew he didn't know everything, but everything he said she measured with consideration; she let what he said affect her deeply, more than he ever suspected.

"Yes, dear, but you don't understand—"

"Yes, I do." Undina said firmly. "And I don't care what leaving means. If it means going somewhere where I'm not an outsider anymore, I don't care what I have to sacrifice here. I want to know where I came from. Who I am—more than anything you can give me. More than anything Seynorynael can give me."

Undina Meilacu-ra had been born on Seynorynael, but by the time she was conscious of herself, she already knew she wasn't quite the same as the other children she played with in training; her mother said she pointed in wonder the first time she saw a Seynorynaelian on the street, but she didn't remember that. She remembered staring at them, and numbly wondering what they were and why they looked the way they did. It occurred to her some time later that they were looking at her the same way and staring back at her. Some time later than that, she learned that the world she was living in valued these pale gray faces, not the familiar white features of her Kayrian family. The fact continued to strike her with its ability to surprise and stun her; she grasped at comprehension, the way a child wonders why his first burn has the power to hurt him.

Her mind revolted against the unfairness of it; her sense of the injustice dulled and flared from time to time, but for the most part, she grew accustomed to the Seynorynaelians almost as soon as she remembered being alive and aware, and after a time, she was even able to forget her own appearance when she interacted with them; staring at herself in reflective glass was a daily ritual that made her wonder; she scrutinized every inch of her face like a stranger.

But the first time she really understood that she was different in soul as well as in body was when she started talking about the familiar comforts of home: family meals, expressions the family used that were not actually Seynorynaelian but Kayrian, though she little understood the difference then, and the religious and cultural beliefs she had long since accepted as truth that were universally known.

Her Seynorynaelian peers did more than misunderstand her references; they regarded her as though she were a fool or an idiot, and treated her as though she were of no value and significance to the world; she was a non-entity, and they ignored her.

She didn't let them get away with it. She did what she wanted, played, eventually broke past the ridiculous taboos imposed upon her by never letting them see that she had been affected by them.

Yet from that day on, she had never again taken anything on faith.

Could she handle all of the strange and irrational traditions of the world? She thought she could handle anything by sheer determination and force of will, with integrity in her heart—she thought she could combat prejudice with truth.

The worst was yet to come.

She had accepted the fact that the characters in all of the holo-dramas were Seynorynaelian, that the characters she read about and that the important figures of Federation history were primarily Seynorynaelian. She decided to value them, these fantastic heroes, independent of their race's assessment of her and her culture; she could admire anyone with the same kind of fortitude and determination she knew she possessed, and she thought herself benevolent to be so open-minded about her conclusions.

She reveled in the deeds of heroes, reveled in honor, in justice, in beating the bad guy at his own game, in upholding truth and defending the meek—oh yes, she believed in it all. These heroes of faraway and yesteryear—they were her idols; she felt that they were kindred spirits, familiar to her, that in some way, they would equally admire her if they could only know her heart the way she knew she believed in the principles they stood for.

Then, on a miserable, bleak day, miserable and bleak in her recollection though it had been in the middle of the warm season—she uncovered a horrible truth, a secret conspiracy that had been operating against her since her birth.

She could never be a hero; she was an alien girl. And Seynorynael was really a patriarchal society.

"I wish I were a boy," she often thought from then on, not because she envied what they were—she was perfectly happy with her own physical body—but because they were like some older sibling who could have what he wanted, while she had to make do with what leftovers she was given. She didn't see why she couldn't have the same thing.

Undina was too young to know that her keen intelligence and ambition would offend men and make her unfeminine; she hadn't grown into the subservient role society had waiting for her as a female; she didn't even believe such genderized limitations existed yet. She only knew that she craved knowledge and adored logic, and she was very conscious of how bright and observant she was; because of this, she considered herself blessed and was unduly grateful and patient with those around her, without ever being condescending; she considered it the duty of the intellectually gifted to be aware that the gift of intelligence was a gift of serendipity, and she could just as easily have been born with average reasoning abilities.

She was horrified to discover that there would be those who would doubt that she was even intelligent, for the simple reason that she had been born female. She was equally annoyed that the Berrachaiyans, who complained about Seynorynaelian prejudice against them were every bit as prejudiced against her because she was female, which she couldn't have been blamed for any more than they could have been blamed for not being born Seynorynaelian.

That was when Undina decided to retreat into science, into the pure and reasoning world of fact, where she could be secure in her conclusions, and where incidentally, she could even manage to find work with as little interaction with others as possible.

She was only half-grown up when she made this decision. At the same time, she was jealous of and still fascinated by heroes. Could she be an explorer?

It wasn't until years later that she would wonder why general prejudice dictated that women were born to submit, to submit to men, and to submit to their unhappy lot of child-bearing and the even duller reality of child-rearing. She had no romantic notions that she would enjoy child-rearing.

Why should a bold spirit be forced to submit to anything? Was not the true power in humanity, all humanity, the power of choice and the power of free will? Was not the true value of humanity and other intelligent races of the Federation to be found in their intellect, which distinguished humanity and the intelligent races from base animals?

The poor girl didn't know that it didn't matter what she thought, that she was so wholly dedicated to impartiality between the sexes, that she disliked women's superiority complexes as much as she disliked male chauvinism. It didn't matter that she believed in the value and potential of the living being, not the man or the woman, not the alien or the native, but the being itself, its intellect and character. It didn't matter because the world was not going to accept her belief, and it wasn't going to change.

Undina could have been frustrated by the errors of society, but she chose to try to put it out of her mind. To let it destroy her would be being affected by it, and she refused to concede to anything she did not believe.

Thus she was acutely conscious of prejudice and injustice by the time she was half-grown because she was both Kayrian and female; she was acutely aware of the fact that this was the worst kind of predicament to be in and be living on Seynorynael.

Yes, she thought, she had always wanted to go to Kayria.

She wanted to know if Kayria was different, to test her ideals of egalitarian Kayrian traditions before she allowed herself to cling to them as though they were an aegis against Seynorynaelian injustice.

She wasn't afraid of learning the truth.

"And on Tulor there is a giant, paper-thin plant that grows in patches on the surface of the water. That's how the Emerald Sea on Tulor received its name, more than twenty-five thousand years ago."

The Seynorynaelian storyteller on board the shuttle Neliyan looked around at the rapt expressions on the faces of the children seated in a circle around him and felt a self-conscious smile work its way to his lips. Why couldn't they see that after all of these years telling stories to the young that he still felt as though he were a fake, that he wasn't qualified to do it or to do the tales justice? Yet he loved this, and he loved the stories; and to pass them on to the young made his old heart feel its youth again.

His name was Giacan, and he was the Seynorynaelian ambassador to Tulor's record-keeper, but nothing gave him a greater excitement than this, lighting the spark of imagination in the eyes of the young children. He was aware that they would forget him, but for a few fond recollections of a few of the older ones in years to come, aware that they only barely knew him for these short months as "the storyteller", a name that spread anticipation, and that the phrase "the storyteller is starting" set swift young feet racing down the shuttle corridors for the traditional gathering place before the c-level observation window.

"The ikulor plants cover the entire surface of the water for thousands of miles." He continued with a subtle pacing in his words, at the same time gesturing in the air. "It is said that the sea creatures that live in the murky depths of the Emerald Sea glow, for the ikulor plants block the light from Bilac, Tulor's yellow-white star, just like a blanket of snow covering the ground. The Tulorians ate the ikulor plant for many years, until they realized that the enzymes in these plants could be purified to make potent medicines to heal the sick."

"How did the people get sick if it was medicine, Giacan?" one of the children asked. Giacan laughed.

"The Tulorians scientists had discovered that it could be made into medicine, but they weren't the ones who needed it so badly. The ikulor was discovered to cure a terrible illness on Gildbatur."

"How, Giacan?" a little Tulorian boy asked.

"When—" one of the Seynorynaelian children began.

Giacan laughed again, waving a hand.

"Nearly three hundred years ago, the explorers who had found the planet Gildbatur returned to our Federation with word of a great planetary war. There had been an epidemic of disease affecting the injured, and one of the Tulorian ships was asked to contribute whatever it could to help, so that the Gildbaturans would know that they could trust the Federation.

"The ikulor was administered experimentally, with little hope of it having much effect, but to everyone's surprise, it had a powerful effect on the Gildbaturan life systems. And it turned out that the medicine had a more powerful effect as a medicine there than anywhere in the Federation. So, when a new crew left the Federation for Gildbatur, they took with them great quantities of the Tulorian medicine. Then, shortly after the second explorer crew arrived, the Gildbaturans ceased their conflict to join the Federation."

"What do the Gilatoor-mans look like, Giacan?" One of the younger children asked.

Giacan involuntarily cracked a smile.

"Well, they are more like us than the Berrachai."

"I saw a Berrachai once," one of the children interrupted. "They have great big chests and make a rasping sound when they breathe."

"Yes, child, because their own atmosphere is so thin. Seynorynaelians who have lived there for generations have begun to develop a greater chest cavity, and find it difficult to readjust to life on our world if they return. Many of them like to live in the Kilkoran mountain regions now, where the air pressure is lowest and they can breathe."

"They go to Kilkor because the great mountains to the north of Ariyalsynai are dangerous?" one of the older children suggested. Giacan nodded.

"Yes. Now, there is a Gildbaturan ambassador aboard our ship. You will recognize him if you see him. Gildbaturans have yellow skin and green eyes, and are slightly shorter and more heavily muscled than we Seynorynaelians."

"They didn't want to join the Federation at first, though, did they Giacan?" another older boy asked.

"No, they didn't, Ilsat. When we visited Gildbatur, our explorers found it useful that our ships had been outfitted with defensive weapons after the explorer Nilery's report on Tulorian conflicts. The Gildbaturans' society had not even developed any form of engine, but because of their war-based culture, their struggle over grazing territories and for control of cities, at first they would only think of joining us to gain an advantage over their enemies—and out of fear of our weaponry."

"But there aren't many differences between us any more, are there? The Gildbaturans today seem glad to be a part of the Federation." A gaunt-cheeked girl called Liera said.

"Yes, well, over time, they have adopted much of our culture and adjusted to the peace of the Federation. They have even established an institute of higher learning there, I hear, where Gildbaturan children study the scientific foundations of our mechanized android units, transport shuttles, and spaceship technology."

"And they don't fight any more—not like the Berrachai," Liera insisted.

"Yes, it's true." Giacan nodded. "The wars on Gildbatur have diminished to only isolated violent incidents, much less than those fought by our ancient brother civilization on Berrachai. Now, the Berrachai conflict was so deeply entrenched in their cultural identity that it took many years to negotiate peace between the territories, and to prevent the great civil riots that often killed millions of Berrachai. In the last period of civil upheaval, four hundred Seynorynaelians lost their lives, and the Council had to move to take action against the Berrachai to prevent the disaster from happening again..."

Suddenly steps sounded behind the assembly gathered on the observation deck.

"Undina, there you are. I've been looking everywhere for you." Ettrekh Meilacu-ra moved to the edge of the circle where Undina was sitting, her knees pulled up, arms folded on them. She stood quietly and followed him away so as not to disturb the storyteller. She had been listening to the comments of some of the younger children with a secret amusement.

"So, listening to stories? I thought stories were nonsense."

"These aren't stories," Undina disagreed. "They're—histories, scientific histories."

Ettrekh laughed. "All right, Undina."

"It's really interesting, father," she whispered knowingly, "Giacan's been to all of the five planets except Berrachai. He's been telling us about the planets. Did you know that the Kal-teci-la mountains of Kayria are the highest in the five planets except for Mount Vicak on Seynorynael?"

Ettrekh shook his head. "No. Speaking of which, you're supposed to be going to the education center."

"That's boring! The instructors don't know half as much as Giacan."

"Boring or not, you still need a real education."

She nodded absently, quashing emotion. There wasn't any purpose in arguing, she knew—she reasoned. She believed complete scientific understanding could and would prevail over useless emotions and sentimentality, and she was looking forward to a better world where reasoning and scientific calculations governed the motions of human beings rather than emotions; she even felt certain she would help to make it that way, that she would see such a future, and she lived partially in it already, by forcing the present she perceived to conform to her future vision. "Okay. At least if I go, I'll get to see purple Cespria birds."

Ettrekh's expression then was disapproving. "Undina, I don't think you should be hanging around the specimen display while you're there. Those creatures are wild. They're dangerous. To tell you the truth, I'm surprised they would have brought them on board."

"Don't worry, father." Undina said seriously. "Eilkorn says they're in the containment hold. He says they're being taken back to Gildbatur now that the preservation law protects them."

"That may be—"

"You don't have to get close to them, father. You can observe them through the silica screen."

"They'll study you as much as you study them."

"I know. They're probably thinking about what they could do to me if they could get out of the hold," she added.

Ettrekh just started at his daughter like a stranger.

"Father, I didn't know that the Kayrian capital was once located north of the Kal-teci-la mountains," Undina said, her nose buried in a printvolume she had received from new third level instructor. After nearly a year of travel, the shuttle was finally scheduled to land on Kayria within the tenday.

Undina listened to the constant sound in the background, a barely perceptible whine of a local heat generator; they were sitting by the observation window, with hundreds of people milling about.

There was no moment in which Undina was not acutely conscious of the scientific significance of her surroundings, of the miraculous and thrilling power of the innovations that had made her present journey, yes and even her life, possible. She dwelled on the concepts of space travel and physics, of time dilation and energy production, then let her mind drift in history, taking her imagination to the first explorer ships Seishinna and Velastria that had first made this long voyage so long ago. She often wondered if anyone else in the boisterous crowd ever pondered the amazing wonder of space travel, or if they were more worried about what the ship menu would be offering that day.

"The Kayrian capital?" Ettrekh echoed, thinking back to his early education. "Yes, that sounds right. Ialeia. Then Gir-deg-dir erupted, and the tremor that split the mountains. In the aftermath, the ancient capital Ialeia was swallowed by the sea. Few people survived, and some say that is why Kayrians do not build large cities." Ettrekh made his way over from the living area of their small apartment on board the shuttle. "May I see?" he asked, and Undina showed him the printvolume, etched in a volume of opaque, hair-thin rubbery sheets. The lifelike holo-picture depicted what the ancient city was supposed to have looked like in its glory.

"I suppose this printvolume is right—it did take Kayrian civilization a long time to recover. Sometimes the smaller size of our cities has restricted us or limited our growth in other areas—gathering resources and allowing more specialization in technology and industry. Though," he added, "we were almost as advanced as Seynorynaelians when they arrived—but we saw limiting the size of our population centers as the best solution to prevent another disaster, no matter what else it might cost us. Kayrians weren't willing to risk the lives of their future generations by over-building one area again."

"Father—did you know that the Berrachai eat a dish made of lymphis bark?" Undina asked, reaching out for the other printvolume in front of her. "And that when the Tulorians found an acid in the bark that could neutralize cini poison that they almost went to war over whether or not the Berrachai were going to share any of it with the rest of the five planets?"

"No," Ettrekh smiled, shaking his head. How many questions could a young girl ask? "What happened?"

"Seynorynael came in and negotiated a peace in the end." Undina answered softly, and he could see her reluctant admiration. She did not want her father to think that she preferred Seynorynael over Kayria.

"Ilsat has been to Tulor and Berrachai." She said, referring to one of her classmates, Ettrekh guessed. "His father trained as an explorer on Seynorynael many years ago and took his family with him when he was posted, but they are returning to Kayria now. I wish we could travel on one of the explorer ships. They're so much faster."

"And more dangerous." Ettrekh said emphatically.

"Ilsat says soon the Council of Five Planets will be sending the explorers further than the comet belt around Berrachai. He says there are rumors that the Federation has devised another mission to explore new territories."

"Undina," Ettrekh laughed. "Those stories are just rumors."

"Jerekkil, remember to contact us when you arrive in Kerrai." Khustav Hinev said soberly to his son; Jerekkil nodded. Khustav was proud of him, to be making his own way in the world, proud and eager to see his son make something of himself. He wasn't sure he liked the idea of Jerekkil's training to be an explorer, which was such a difficult course that the odds were against any man passing successfully, but at the same time, he wanted to have faith in his son. He had a feeling he was going to worry about it a lot. "Do you know which transport will take you to Ariyalsynai?"

"Murveg told me that if I wait in the cross section, the shuttle will divide and go on to Ariyalsynai." Jerekkil said, keeping still so that his mother could kiss him good-bye. Why did his parents have such a hold on him? he often wondered. He loved them, but he felt that restlessness that strikes at a young man as he begins to become a man, and he felt drawn out into the world; he was eager to meet its challenges.

He saw his mother's anguished expression and reached up to embrace her again, struck by the thought that he would not see her beloved face for two years, and that this was likely to be the image that stayed with him. When she let go, his father Khustav curtly moved to hug his young son, in the restrained manner of a father trying to pass on luck and a blessing of strength and courage to the son leaving home for the first time.

He is a part of me. Khustav thought. Can he handle such a rough life? Have I done enough to prepare him?

"If you need anything, you can contact my family in Ariyalsynai." Khustav said. "Your grandfather is hoping to see you on the Festival of the Return."

Jerekkil nodded, the bustle and noise of Firien City's busy transport center filling in the family's silence. He felt his feet sinking into the ground to hold him while his head felt drawn away towards the sound, the meaningless roar that he couldn't wait to sort into sense as he passed by and listened to and learned from all the people filtering past.

A moment later, the transport arrived with its swift whine, the sound of perfection applied to the mundane world; this was the best of all the lines that ran across the planet—perhaps even the galaxy, he thought in wonder.

Jerekkil had but a moment to board, and a quick departure would be easier than this lingering good-bye. Picking up his few belongings, he waved and tore off towards the transport gangway.

Chapter Six

Undina conducted an investigation into her father's secrets and discovered that her grandparents still lived in the city Irek-ar, about three days by open-air transport from the main cultural center of Noritek, where the shuttle Neliyan had landed. Why was it like trying to crack a yelechi egg to find out anything from him? All her work, and but the barest trickle of information leaked out; oh, she was sure her father knew a world of things he wasn't telling her.

She also knew that when she wanted him to do something very badly, he sometimes would, especially something that was for the general enjoyment of one and all. Undina asked her father if they could leave the dining facility early to join the throngs seated on the Neliyan's observation deck in hopes of glimpsing the landing. They headed through the crowds towards the lucky find of an unattended, small window with a half-view.

In minutes, the distant blue-white planet Kayria appeared from a sea of endless dark space and grew wide before them, until it was a comforting stretch of solid substance, delicately poised in the air, until the shuttle abruptly plunged through the cloud cover into a white world of rugged grey mountains, white sand deserts, and glorious fields of deep green vegetation.

An infinite-seeming curve of blue ocean also surrounded one side of the land mass in full afternoon sunlight where the shuttle was scheduled to land. After such a long journey in space, Undina was especially glad that they had not approached when the capital was in the dark side of night. The daylight beckoned them to this place; the night would have seemed as comfortless as space.

The sunshine was almost cloyingly-sweet when they disembarked.

Most of the passengers lingered in the astroport to wait for other connecting transports, but the diplomats, representatives from Seynorynael, and goods traders on negotiation assignments for the new Federation exchange were planning to remain in Noritek. Undina stood by the small load hauler that held their few belongings as her father negotiated an open-air transport to take them across the plains and hills to Irek-ar.

Undina had a vague sense that she should have been afraid, because she didn't know anything about where she was, and the activities of everyone around her were veiled in mystery as though in mist; their complete indifference to their own surroundings, their unknown purposes, entranced her. She had the sense that she should be afraid, examined that thought, and shrugged.

Undina had never before traveled in an open-air transport; she looked forward to it blindly, with her imaginative ability in full force, but she still wasn't sure what the reality of it would prove to be. All of the shuttles and transports on Seynorynael had protective screening against the radiation, the inside atmospheric temperature carefully controlled; to ride in those transports was like being any old where—within a protective city dome with little to view, and almost as bad as being in a space shuttle—no, that was the worst, because it was so confining and could be scouted and mapped in a span of three days; space shuttles were definitely the worst because they were so stable that they seemed always unmoving, getting nowhere as the stars slowly crept by.

Undina stared skyward at the sun, the white-yellow sun of Kayria, so large and luminous, but just for a moment lest it damaged her eyes—she was at no moment unconscious of the scientific repercussions of her actions. The sky seemed so pale by Seynorynaelian standards, a washed-out blue, but at least she could stay here and stare at it for as long as she wanted! Oh, and it stretched on so, comforting in its all-surrounding scope.

They ventured onto the fifty-passenger air-car, a silver transport with no roof; Undina suffered a moment of impatience until it filled up, then lifted off and shot away across the northern plains with formidable speed.

The view! The wind! Undina gulped raw air greedily, felt the wind pulling her hair and casting it about in force, until she was obliged to search for something to tie it with. She could concentrate on the strange specimens of tree and shrub, flower, and stone far ahead, following them with her eyes until they were close, dead even, and then lost far behind them. The mountains shifted their faces as more rolled into view; the forests undulated, dipping left and right into the open green meadows, dotted by white and cornflower blue flowers.

Her father was explaining that they would be getting off at Nai-ra-nai in a day. From there, they would take another transport northwest over the hills to Silseinat and then another on to Irek-ar; she tried hard to listen and to stop exulting in undignified worship of the land.

"We're passing through the agricultural fields," Ettrekh pointed, and Undina looked around at the beginnings of the domed greenhouses and open fields of urbin roots far ahead, which had been part of the patchwork she had seen from the air as the shuttle Neliyan landed.

She watched the city loom closer, with its smooth-shaped, wind-resistant buildings; the shuttle abruptly turned to bypass it. Undina slouched back, as disappointed as though she had been taunted by an unkept promise. The city rolled by, too far away for details to be noted.

"My family lives just southeast of the Kal-teci-la mountains," Ettrekh commented, once the city of Noritek and the great expanse of fields was out of sight behind them.

"Really?" Undina asked, alert again. "Then we won't be very far from where the ancient capital lies on the bottom of the sea." She reached to the back of a chair in front of her for the printvolume she had been reading earlier, but it fell down under the seat, rushing away behind them.

"Is this yours?" One of the passengers behind them stood and addressed them in perfect Kayrian, an older man with a slight smile that turned up the corners of his mouth; she observed once again that this was a common expression adults presented her with; of course, she acknowledged that it made her feel special and appreciated, even if for her youthful appearance alone, a reason that held no particular value to her—she would rather adults grant her a modicum of respect than to patronize her. At the same, time, her heart was struck by a pang at the older man's sentiment; she couldn't doubt that this moment of human contact pleased him for some reason, that it held an odd value to him.

In one hand he held out the fallen printvolume to them, its rubbery pages still open. Undina nodded gratefully and accepted the printvolume, "Wonders of the Federation of Five Planets." She was about to thank him for stopping it from sliding to the rear of the transport, but she was suddenly struck mute, even as her lips parted to form words—

in Seynorynaelian.

"Thank you very much," Ettrekh offered for her, and for the first time Undina noticed a slight Seynorynaelian in her father's accent. She understood Kayrian, yes—but could she sound anywhere as genuine as either of them when she spoke it? Did this strange language really belong to her?

Undina tried to forget her unhappiness and let her eye stray ahead to the horizon, where large white clouds filled the blue sky, and a dark, flat storm cloud had fused with the distant hills.

"Is it too bright for you?" Ettrekh asked, and Undina realized she was squinting. But it wasn't that she had been overwhelmed by the bright day on Kayria. She was used to the intensity of Seynorynael's star, Valeria. She had been squinting to see better, but of course the effort did no good in producing more illumination.

Her father laughed. "You'll get used to it here, Undina," he said, and settled back onto the seat.

After several hours, the transport began to near the storm cloud. Undina looked up from her printvolume at the sound of thunder, wearing a discerning expression; she processed the data her eyes received—yes, the storm was going to hit soon.

After a moment, a sudden mechanical whine startled her and she felt something behind the transport move—in the ensuing seconds, a clear dome of chordent material rose on either side of the shuttle and from the rear, coming together to protect the passengers from the threat of a rainstorm.

She realized that she was disappointed with a sense of wonder. Could it be—could it be that she had wanted to feel the rain?

She already knew she enjoyed the sound—perhaps because of the lulling effect it had on the senses of the many races of human being. At the same time, she was also aware that she felt an instinctual fear of environmental forces rising in her, a fear she rationalized had been ingrained from living on Seynorynael. There, the rain was often light and pleasant, but this only lulled the population with a long period of calm—for one of those hints of distant thunder was surely to bring unending torrents of rain and lightening every year, rain with the power to level an undomed city and the power to destroy even a domed city every hundred years or so. And more often than not, the darkening skies of Seynorynael brought great blankets of snow, snow that plagued the lands outside the dome with death and famine; on Seynorynael, rain was a rarity of the warm season.

The downpour began with scattered drops making a clicking sound on the overhead covering. Undina wondered about the density of the droplets, and if the sound had a repetitive pattern that could be analyzed. The transport passed into a grey rain cloud, an encompassing mist that darkened the interior until the automatic lighting to the side of Undina's chair came on, brightening her seat with enough light to read.

The scattered symphony of raindrops intensified and coalesced into an even clattering. She stopped trying to count the gaps between the loudest groupings. She was satisfied that the downpour was not as heavy as the strong rains Undina had heard ravaged Tulor, and found that this realization was not unpleasant.

She slept easily, knowing exactly what she was going to do and content that she could achieve it. She had a purpose and a goal—she was going to conquer the mysteries of this planet and make it her own.

"You're right, father, the Kal-teci-la mountains are as beautiful as the Mirakaya near Falyndae," Undina observed, shivering as a cool zephyr from the mountains swept over them. Why did the skin pucker up so, she thought, thinking of the reason technically—yes, she knew about follicles and nerve endings, but that wasn't what she wanted to know. Why was it that Kayrians, Seynorynaelians, and Tulorians shivered, while the Berrachai didn't? And why was it that their bodies had developed this particular mechanism and temperature sensitivity as opposed to something else?

She put the question aside—if there was no answer to be found, what was the point in wondering right now? The third day of their journey was nearly over, and ahead they could see the city of Irek-ar and its brown and white dwellings. The sight of it captured her eager eyes and wouldn't let go of them.

"Thirty thousand Kayrians used to live here, but it looks like it has grown some since my youth." Ettrekh said as his daughter stared in open wonder out the side of the transport. He was glad he had arranged to get the side seats for them in Silseinat. Undina was capable of expressions that entertained him to the core, he thought fondly. There had been a time, not so very long ago, when he knew he had been capable of making them himself.

"Does anyone know we're coming?" Undina asked, turning curious eyes to him at last.

"Yes. I contacted my family by holo-video before I went to look for the shuttle."

"Why did you leave, father?" Undina wondered; she watched his face study her just for a second, but it didn't register the urgency of her question—perhaps because she always asked questions she just had to know the answers to with such urgency? But couldn't he see how much it mattered this time? Couldn't he reason that she had always wanted to know this secret most of all? For this was the unknown mystery upon which her very existence hinged. The impossibility of her father and mother meeting had he never left Kayria—she couldn't even begin to contemplate the odds, the impossibility of her own life. This mystery filled her with a sense of the miraculous, and she hated that—she hated the power it had over her and needed to find a plausible, reasonable truth she could understand and accept.

Her father kept silent. There it was again—this conspiracy of silence! She hated it. Did he think she wasn't capable of understanding his reasons if he told her? Why was it that adults always neglected to explain the most crucial, interesting things about their lives? Why, why were there so many secrets?

She decided to read her printvolume again; there, mysteries were revealed indiscriminately.

"I've only been gone fourteen years as far as I measure time, but on Kayria, forty three years have gone by." Ettrekh seemed to say this to himself, an hour or so later.

Undina turned to him, with a blank expression of horror.

"That's terrible."

"Not all things in this world are good, Undina, and every choice we make means sacrificing the alternative." He said, and then the silence reigned again.

Ettrekh and Undina tarried in leaving the transport when it arrived in the central station; the crowd was thick, and they were in no hurry. A moment after Undina had lifted her belongings from the load carrier, a large group of Kayrians approached them.

Undina watched the effect these people had on her father. He seemed very still, but all-intent upon their visages and their words; she recognized the familiarity of his eyes and made a deduction.

The man and woman in front were her grandparents. They were strangers to her, as strange as the unknown history that linked her father so forcefully to them; yes, she could see that they had a hold over him, over his action and entire outlook of life, deeper than she would ever know.

Could it be that nature didn't command all of a person's development? she wondered, her eyes hardening in concentration. Could it be that something of them, something non-biological, non-genetic, had been perpetuated in her father without her even knowing it? She looked at them with a sense of jealousy for only a moment, a jealousy that they truly knew him better than her, that they knew him better than he would ever allow her to know him.

They were kind to her, spoke kindly to her, made her feel welcome, softened her heart to love them as much as she loved her father, for they revealed themselves to be something akin to him, her father whom she adored.

But she noticed that secrets surrounded them, too, secrets they kept from her with eyes incapable of understanding how much it mattered to her to know them.

It was a long time before she realized that this sharp realization was a feeling, not an observation, and that feeling was painful; sadness had found her and touched her while she was so decidedly looking the other way.

"Is this my little brother Belliadh?" She heard her father ask so easily after several moments, and she saw a middle-aged Kayrian man standing behind the elder couple, a man smiling like a boy once again, in awe of the older brother that had gone away.

"This is Undina," Ettrekh said, looking around for his daughter, who had moved to the side, lost in all of the conversations going on at once.

"Hello, I'm glad to meet everyone," she said, putting her words together in Kayrian before she spoke.

They ignored her informality and paid kind words and attentions to her which she heard from a distance. She felt very awkward, and for all their superficial invitations and welcomes, she felt as though they wouldn't ever really talk to her, especially the elder couple. Didn't they know that their kindness was appreciated, but it wasn't what she wanted? She wanted so desperately to know them.

Perhaps they would eventually see that, she thought.

She was preoccupied by the odd exchanges going on between father, mother, and son; there was an expression of pain in their eyes that they couldn't hide, and expression of acute love and yearning, mixed with a grain of judgment and anger.

He hadn't ever come back from the short journey he was to make, leaving so many things unresolved, so many things unclear. Undina forgot her own irritation and wished with all her might that she could smooth over the tension between them, this aching melancholy that washed through the air like an invisible vapor.

"I remember how I cried the day you left that you had not taken me with you, Ettrekh." Murilsa, Ettrekh's sister was saying.

Undina's mind wandered. She listened absently, until her father mentioned her mother.

"This is my wife, Ilina," Ettrekh lifted a holo-transmitter with a recorded message of greeting to her husband's family. Murilsa took the device and watched the message, then passed it along. They noted the woman, looked hard at Undina.

Someone got the idea that it was time to head back, and they moved along. Undina was glad they had stopped staring at her.

"Where's father?" Undina asked the next morning, descending the stair to the meal unit room.

A dark cloud descended upon the room; her father was conspicuously absent.

"He went to the interment field." Her grandmother, Duvilsa, said.

"What?" Undina said, a slow creeping cold falling on her.

"He went to visit Umi-umi and Almager."

When her father returned, she sensed a shroud of melancholy and guilt around him; he found her eyes and smiled, a bittersweet smile she would have given her soul to understand.

"Why didn't you invite the others to come?" Undina asked the next morning as she followed her father away from the dwelling and up onto the mountain path. Her father had woken her before sunrise to go on a sudden expedition, and the yellow sun, now burnt orange, had just begun to rise over the horizon, tingeing the land with rosy beams.

"I wanted you to see the mountains first with me. I used to go off on my own and climb to the peaks over there—we won't go that far, and the foothills here aren't very steep, but I wanted it to be quiet so you could enjoy your first glimpse of the mountains and the view of the valleys from the summit."

Why did this excursion seem so important to him? she wondered. He had prepared for it with a religious air, an air that suggested he knew every small detail involved in the ritual. And he was inviting her to learn it now.

Still, he never verbally explained anything. No one seemed capable of explaining anything to her. Perhaps they thought she would understand from the scanty clues she stumbled across? But she couldn't! She wanted to hold on to her frustration at the silence, but even though she didn't understand the ritual, she was nevertheless struck by the power of this ritual in governing her father, her intractable, brilliant father. She had just learned that he was as much affected by the power of tradition as anyone.

And though she wanted to feel angry at the fact that she had been neglected in an explanation, she felt humble that her father wanted to share this tradition with her more than anyone, even those he had known for so long, his family.

At the same time, she wondered—why was there a veil of mystery and silence around everything?

Undina only nodded, and the two of them set off. They spoke little, and gradually the chirps of early morning birds were swallowed by the rushing wind. They climbed their way to the top and over several foothills before they came to the closest mountain, moving until the sun was directly in the sky overhead. Undina stopped on the mountain side, leaning into the mountain with her feet balanced on two flat rocks that poked up through the short green vegetation and took out her water bag.

They stopped by a stream and spent an hour fishing for piarlk.

After the long walk, Undina surveyed the growing pile with interest.

"It's good to be hungry," she said, with enthusiasm. Her father agreed. They packed up the fish and set to hike a little farther.

"Just a few more steps and we'll reach a ledge where we can stop and eat," her father called from above. "We'll head back after we climb to the top of this mountain."

Undina followed him up to the ledge and sat down under the shade of a small Ku-mie tree, relieved to rest her aching feet. Her father pulled out the assortment of foods he had packed in his sack, then cleaned and spit the piarlk fish, and started a fire. The fish was wonderfully hot; there were neri cakes and various Kayrian fruits that had always been a rare luxury on Seynorynael to follow it, stacks of taigh filled with jer-ba paste.

After the meal, Undina stood to look over the mountain side at the city in the valley far below. The white mountains covered in short, dark green vegetation and bright purple and white flowers gave way to bright sand plains and dark green fields far beyond the city. Closer to them was the small cluster of buildings arranged around the transport highways, now hairline thin.

In between the city and the mountain were the small valleys of the foothills, the clear blue tarns and scattered Ku-mie trees that protected the Kayrian creatures. As her eyes wandered over the lake far below on their left, Undina was sure she caught a glimpse of a tirani run from the water's edge back to its burrow in the underbrush of a copse of Ku-mie.

"It's breathtaking," Undina said, shielding her eyes from the glinting sun that had reappeared from behind a large white cloud. "But it doesn't look as though very many people ever come up here," she added. She loved it, but at the same time she thought the land seemed forlorn.

Ettrekh joined her on the ledge, offering her a draught of cool water.

"Perhaps not in recent years. You're probably right—or the tirani wouldn't have returned," Ettrekh said. Undina looked at him a moment before returning to the view and sighed appreciatively.

"I'd like to stay here forever—"

"I said the same, once."

Undina turned to him, but his eyes were a mystery.

"Come on." Ettrekh smiled. "Let's see if we can reach the peaks before we have to return home. But if you want to see them, we'll have to go on now. We shouldn't chance being caught outside after sunset."

"Is it dangerous?" Undina asked, apparently delighted by the possibility.

Ettrekh suppressed a laugh. "Only in a manner of speaking. The land is safe enough for humanoids, but Mweilade wants the family together for the evening meal."

Was this, her father, obeying orders not his own?

Wonders never ceased.

Undina helped prepare a dish her mother had taught her to make, a spicy urbin root stew with duga and horeca, two popular Kayrian vegetables. As she watched her grandmother and cousins come over to scrutinize her work curiously, she smiled; in spite of herself, she really liked her cousins. They were vibrant and funny, and creator above, there were so many of them! Had she ever spent time in play? She couldn't seem to remember.

On their way back from the mountains, her father had taken her through the town to collect his brother, sister, and their families from their work stations at the distribution center, medical station, and young Ettrekh II from the local training center. He had contacted them on his holo-communicator as they neared the city and made plans to return to the dwelling together.

Most of the city's inhabitants were out and about collecting fresh produce after work hours in the city market, and as they wove their way through the crowds, Undina was again struck by how strange it was to see mostly Kayrians around her. Only one Seynorynaelian and a few Tulorians appeared here and there among the throngs of people looking for their provisions. There were more automated robotic units than aliens, she noticed.

Undina had lived on Seynorynael her entire life, and she had grown used to seeing Seynorynaelians so much that their faces were normal to her. On Seynorynael, Undina had often forgot that she was a Kayrian when playing with her friends. Even on the ship Neliyan, there had been more Seynorynaelian children than other children from the Federation's five planets.

But it was on Neliyan that she had begun to realize how the Seynorynaelians saw her, away from the open-minded part Kayrian population of Falyndae.

As a Kayrian humanoid she was different from them, but some of the Seynorynaelians on Neliyan had treated her as sub-human, looking at her like she was disgusting or avoiding looking in her eyes at all. She hadn't told her father how her classmates had teased her desire to become an explorer and see all of the mountains in the Federation, the Emerald Sea on Tulor, and the violet interstellar nebulae visible from Berrachai.

Some of the boys who had never been around Kayrians before had grabbed her hair to see what it felt like. They had wondered how Seynorynaelian Kayrians could speak their language without the three voice-boxes and then insulted her speech. Only a few of her fellow students had defended her.

She couldn't remember having such a marvelous, unfettered time in all her life; it seemed Mweilade's house was the focal point of the entire planet, and it symbolized everything that was good about the world. She drank the air like happiness distilled, unafraid of it clouding her thoughts.

Undina carried her contribution to the table, but a stray finger made her dart aside.

"Get your hands away from that, Nolandner," she threw him a look of reproach, but her cousin only shrugged.

"I wouldn't do anything, Undina, now would I?" he laughed and gave her a wink.

"You will begin to take Undina with you to training soon I hope, Nerai," his father Belliadh reminded the boy as the two of them approached the table. "No doubt her father will keep her out of training for a while, but I expect she must continue her studies as well."

"Of course," Nerai said.

Chapter Seven

Undina sat remembering her cousin, Nerai, as she looked out the observation window of the Seljir, a large passenger spaceship she and Ettrekh had booked passage on out of Noritek for their homeward journey.

Five years after their arrival on Kayria, they had finally managed to procure a transport. Ettrekh had intended to leave long before, but there had been a small interior civil revolt and blockade between the planet Tulor and one of its space colonies, which had diverted most of the Seynorynaelian space vessels to Tulor and the surrounding area. The few remaining transport ships were booked solid and reserved for the social elite until the blockade ended.

By the time they boarded Seljir, Undina was a grown woman. Had she wanted to leave Kayria? She was still asking herself that question. Gilwsa's words of so long ago came back to haunt her—yes, leaving Kayria would be leaving family behind here forever, but to stay would be the same.

She couldn't leave her mother behind forever, so she chose to leave Kayria and go back to Seynorynael with her father.

At the same time, she wished she could stay with Nerai! They had become like brother and sister in the last few years. She felt she could tell him anything, and he had never kept a secret from her.

She knew all about her father's elder brother who had died; she knew all about the spilt in the family over Ettrekh's decision to leave—

She understood at last her father's anguish over leaving, then and now.

But they were simple people, she and her father, simple in that they couldn't afford to bring the entire family of either side from one world to another, and too many years were lost to time dilation in space travel to and fro.

Nerai, her best friend, her schoolmate, her co-conspirator and companion, was lost to her forever.

That was why she went looking on board Seljir—she wasn't sure what she was looking for yet, but she would know what it was when she found it.

She remembered passing by the advanced inculcation center on the Seljir when she heard voices discussing Tulorian politics in a wide, open forum under a shade of hydroponically grown Ku-mie trees; she was immediately drawn to the voices and lingered around the park until the debaters discovered her presence.

Three young men sat on the gnarled roots of a keln tree, too far away for much of their words to be heard, until she dared to stroll by, whereupon they stood and moved away a little: one, a stout young Tulorian man with huge amber eyes and hair, the other a slim Seynorynaelian several years senior to her by the looks of it, and the last an attractive Kayrian youth with cloudy purple eyes and a countenance suggesting general displeasure with the world and all he surveyed.

Their secrecy wounded her; she found all of a sudden that she wanted to be included upon whatever they discussed.

They ignored her. She moved past them and pretended to sit under a shady ku-mie tree, halfway between them and a group of elderly Kayrian women discussing traditional herbal remedies for stomach pain; they began once more to talk, in a subdued, wary manner, until finally some time later they began their argument with renewed energy, forgetting in the heat of their argument that she was even there.

They left a few hours later, unaware of her.

She returned the next day, this time bringing a printvolume; the trio were there again, exuberantly discussing science and technology's effect upon political evolution. The bombastic Tulorian, Irnda, seemed to be doing most of the arguing.

After several days, the trio actively noticed her; at least, the Kayrian, Gynda, noticed her, arriving one afternoon expecting to find his friends, alighting instead upon the girl sitting alone under a ku-mie tree.

"Who are you, anyway?" he asked.

"Me?"

"You're here all the time. Don't you have someplace else to be?"

"I like it here." She said, surprised to learn that he had noticed her all along, when she was reading; none of the trio had ever seemed to notice her at all.

"Why? There's nothing here but plants."

"Then why do you come here?"

"Me? Oh, Irnda, Jondi, and I are old friends. We trained in Noritek together."

"That's odd. You're not from the same worlds."

"Not really. We come from political families." He shrugged.

"Oh, I see," she said, realizing that he was a politician's son, probably an elitist. His friends were probably the same, children of diplomats. She felt suddenly very humble.

"Anyway, what do you do, besides hanging around here?"

She wanted to say that she was a scientist, but she hadn't ever received any official training apart from her training in rural Irek-ar; years of torturous independent study hadn't made her officially qualified for anything.

"My father brought us here to visit Kayria. He's a weather circulation analytical technician on Seynorynael." After she said it, she considered that perhaps her father wouldn't be able to pick up his job where he had left off. "What do you do?"

"Nothing much," he shrugged. "I'm going to Seynorynael by invitation for some big celebration. I imagine I'll take my father's place as Kayrian ambassador to Seynorynael someday."

She tried not to act impressed.

"What do you talk about?" she asked.

"Politics, mostly. Also technology, scientific innovations, new theories. Sometimes ancient logic, if Jondi leads the discussion first."

"Sounds interesting."

"So, do you want to sit with us?"

"Me?"

"It's obvious you're eavesdropping anyway." He said.

"Would the others mind?"

"Not for a while, they won't." He shrugged. "And it might be interesting to have you around." The flat tone of his voice suggested otherwise. Yet she was excited; this was her chance at last to be a part of the predominantly male discussions, a part of their dynamic discussions dictated by logic, reasoning, science.

"What's she doing here, Gynda?" Irnda wondered when he arrived later.

"She's—what's your name?"

"Undina."

"Undina wants to listen to our discussions." Gynda explained. "Is that okay with you?"

"As long as she can stay awake." Irnda laughed.

After that afternoon it became a daily ritual for her to meet the group under the tall ku-mie tree, for she had nothing much to do, having finished her training years, and with her father working on one of the artificial weather circulators for the ships' technicians; she hung around this secret fraternity in wonder, not realizing at first that it wasn't formed for the glory of reason and logic to prevail; it was about maleness and comraderie, and they kept her an outsider, a spectator prevailed upon only to settle disputes. She was to be excluded from the discussions on the grounds that she was female; the premise of a society for superior logic was but a rationalization on their part to achieve her exclusion—what was she but an uneducated, simple girl in her plain Kayrian clothes?

Gradually, she joined the discussions, anyway. At first they seemed completely taken aback by this, perhaps challenged; after several months had gone by, Irnda argued with her with as much forceful zeal as he had argued with his companions. They argued over philosophy, science, religion, interpretation of history; on the subject of politics alone, she acceded to their superiority, though she understood some of it intuitively from her experience living on Seynorynael.

After a while, she became aware of a peculiar distraction in Gynda's eyes; they seemed to follow her more often than necessity called for. Irnda in kind began to grow agitated. Undina began to deduce the truth as she saw it, that to some extent the three better enjoyed their own company, because to have her around made Gynda and Jondi less able to reason and prey to their male instinct which was distracted by her, while she was better able to keep her senses intact. Did they resent her for this? she wondered. Did they resent their own desires and blame her as the cause of them?

But they didn't know her yet, despite the discussions, or what she felt her purpose in life was.

Undina wanted to deny instinct and train it out of the human being. Perhaps, she thought, that was why she had sought out their company, not merely to fill the void left in her affections by the loss of her cousin Nerai. She reasoned that, with the triumph of science over prejudice and myth (and she assumed that science had already triumphed), the necessity of training a man to retain his animalistic nature had been rendered secondary to the increasing development of his logical side.

The humanoid should subvert his animal nature in favor of logic and reasoning; if desire were a necessary leftover trait in evolutionary development, every man should at least learn to train his mind to ignore it when necessary, and learn to keep desire within its proper environmental bounds.

Undina didn't think that she had put herself between these proper bounds, subject to their desire. She felt that their intimate circle was exempt from all society's rules and from the rituals of courtship as it congregated in the name of scientific appreciation.

At the same time, she began to notice Gynda more and more, because he clearly noticed her. He was always so silent, so mysterious, so irritable, and his looks sharp and disdainful. In his confident negativity, he seemed to know an awful lot more than she—or at least, to have put his knowledge to good use through experience.

She thought perhaps that, had he been raised under different circumstances, they might have been more alike, and she imaged a similarity in them and used this principle as a basis for her actions in her dealings with him.

In time, Gynda began to arrive earlier than usual, and they would often discuss their own topics for hours before the others arrived; he seemed attentive to her words, and spoke but a little until she was obliged to fill the silence with words; but in manner and gesture, he conveyed a growing concern and appreciation of her. He asked where she lived on Seynorynael and seemed satisfied that Falyndae wasn't far from Ariyalsynai; he asked about her family and told her that the Nelana-mi family had once been famous and that a branch of it was still known in Noritek.

After several months of their private discussions, he began to make unconcealed, loving gestures towards her—first taking her hand when he could, then more boldly caressing her arms, which made her pale and get nervous; then finally, as they strolled around the trees, he gave her a kiss. He kissed her several more times, on several different occasions, and they began to arrange meetings on other parts of the ship: at the observation deck, in the lounge, inside the recreation center, where people swam, walked, and played games.

In time, she was convinced that he loved her; that was what persuaded her to love him.

Undina had always believed that if there were no understanding between a man and a woman, they could never be truly close; for some reason, she imagined that they understood one another. She craved and adored that understanding which they shared, as she adored him. His name was constantly in her mind, like a sacred word.

Oh, she was sure they understood and loved each other, but was that only what he let her imagine? She didn't wonder about that until later.

He met her that day at the grove, told her that the others had been called away. He took her to the park, talked to her, confessed that he adored her, promised to show her all of his family holo-pictures and show her about himself. She followed him gladly. Then, in his quarters, all alone, he told her he needed and wanted her; he told her how valuable she was, how beautiful, how much he respected her.

She was easy prey.

It started out as a simple argument, she thought. She thought he was teasing her only. She never imagined that he meant what he said.

They had met each other a few times in his quarters. That afternoon, Jondi and Irnda had noticed the change in attitude in Gynda and Undina, and Irnda had begun a heated argument, ending in an anathaema that Undina wasn't to be a part of the group anymore. She had defended herself and her integrity; Irnda listened for a while before uttering a stream of profanity at her and stalking off.

She couldn't shake the injury he had done her; she supposed that was why she kept mentioning how much it hurt her that Irnda could say what he had, after knowing her so long.

"I'm really beginning to wonder about Irnda. Maybe he's jealous of me—"

"Do all women like to wallow in their feelings?" Gynda asked suddenly, lying beside her. "He probably thought you were just being pushy or critical. Overly emotional."

She resisted the urge to argue otherwise. She—overly emotional?? He was just teasing her, as he always did; she was sure this was his way of showing that he cared.

"So you think it's better to be unfeeling than emotional?"

"Yeah." He said. "Just look at Jondi—he's as unfeeling as you can get, and happier than all of us."

"Oh, so you think the hard, self-controlled, quiet man doesn't feel? Well, I do." She said.

"Really?" He didn't believe her.

"He feels a satisfying sense of his own nobility because he knows his behavior is praise-worthy. Our expression of emotion may be different, but men and women are no different in their capacity of feeling emotion."

"Spoken like a woman." He said. "Men and women are different for a reason. That's the way it's supposed to be. You can't change that."

"I didn't say—" He put a finger over her lips to shush her, then reclaimed it.

"Listen, don't let Irnda bother you. He was just irritated that you were in the way for so long. He doesn't understand how much you want to be there."

"I'm getting the feeling that men don't like what they don't understand." She protested.

"Because we don't value you, unless we are considering our own pleasure?"

"Hey!" She threw a pillow at him, not caring for his jest.

"You know that has a lot to do with it." He admitted, after a short pause. "That's biology. Men are free to move around biologically—just look at the pajes. The females nurse the young—"

"There are no more pajes in the wild." She informed him; this was her area of expertise. "They became extinct. They're grown ectogenetical—"

"You're missing the point, Undina!" he said angrily.

"I don't see that there is a great similarity between people and pajes."

"I'm talking about the overall principles."

"I don't want to have children, though."

"A sensible decision. But you can't deny the role that your gender has developed for over eons."

"Didn't you have a mother as well as a father?" She asked.

"What are you talking about?"

She sighed.

"Honestly, I'm beginning to think you'll never be able to handle the mundanity of your destined life," he laughed.

"Why should I spend my time only doing mundane things?" she asked.

"Everyone has to, in the end."

"That's a defeatist statement."

"It's a rational statement."

"It isn't. Reason dictates that there may be more than one feasible solution to any problem." She insisted. "It's just your solution, your reason. You don't want to try if you can't win. You think nothing will get better, that we'll never progress enough to eliminate the necessity of the mundane, so you don't try. You say you suppose you'll take over from your father, but you don't even know. But look at what trying accomplishes—the Seynorynaelians have already made food distribution units, self-sanitizing chambers—"

"You just don't want to be stuck doing trivial things your whole life." He laughed. "It's almost sweet, how much you want to make a difference to the world."

"What's wrong with that?"

"Undina, Undina, why do you have to have everyone love you?"

"What?! I don't—"

"You do."

"I just want one man to love me."

He stared at her, stared hard at her, as though his life depended on it. Why?

"So. Why don't you tell me who this man is that you want?"

She didn't know to be afraid of the question.

"I want to want him more than anything or anyone in the world," she said. "I—think I have to love and need him, more than anything the world could offer me, or at least I'd have to feel that way." She smiled at him, as radiant as a sunrise.

"You value yourself too highly." He declared.

"That's harsh!" She exclaimed.

"You want a man to adore you."

"No," She shook her head violently. "I guess—I don't know, but that doesn't seem so terrible if I adore him as well."

"Can't you see what kind of pressure that is?" Gynda laughed. "To adore someone lasts only so long. Besides, love doesn't last. Just enjoy the moment now of what we have as man and woman."

"Don't you see though, that, there has to be something more?" She returned.

"What are you going on about?"

"It makes me angry that women are treated as second-class citizens, even in this advanced society, by some men. Some think it's charming if we have a brain, or seem to, and even then you're not quite sure we do."

"Not true, though since time began there have been men who look down on women, but that is the minority."

"You may have a point." Undina admitted. "But how can there be any meaningful real love if you don't like a person for what they're about?"

"You, my dear, are a loose woman. And who said I ever loved you?" He said suddenly and to hurt her.

She was stunned.

She sat up, stepped back a moment, and for the first time since she knew him, she began to see him clearly. She began to see that he was a man who lived for the moment, and the moment only, and that was all there was—and because he did this all the time, he had no understanding of ambition and purpose, and he couldn't understand her; there was no blame in that. The greatest fault with their relationship had been in his willful deception; perhaps she had imagined too much of his character, but she saw this as the lesser crime, whereas he had known what she imagined of him, and yet he had let her believe it without ever correcting her.

Then she realized something else. "I see. The first submission is the sweetest. You like to win and to enjoy. Understood."

"What?"

"I said—"

"What makes you think you're special?" He hurled, his ice-edged smile penetrating her heart. "You're just like a hundred other stupid women who think they know everything. You think you can keep me or any other man happy? Men don't stay because we're different from you biologically. We need our freedom. We only stay when we get tired of playing around."

She laughed hard. "Women love freedom, too."

"But you'd smother a man to death."

"Would I? " She stopped. "Why would I do to another exactly what I most fear happening to myself?"

"I can't abide a woman who thinks she knows everything."

"I can't abide a man who casts me crumbs of love and then waits for me to come begging for more; and yet they say women are a tease."

"You fight too hard for a feeling that isn't worth your effort. Why are you so stubborn, Undina? Or—are you stupid?"

"I guess—it looks like you've won. I will not be called names by you, however."

"Apology given. You value yourself too highly."

"Actually, I am content enough with my faults that I don't chide myself daily for them, and what I can achieve I try, but I'm under no false delusions that my existence matters to the world at large."

"You probably thought it did."

She wouldn't show how his words stung her.

He moved away abruptly, coldly, glared at her.

"You're useless to me now." He said.

"What?" The word fell from her mouth.

"I feel sorry for you, Undina." He said. "You're not the girl I thought you were. You may be young, but somehow you've already become a hardened husk of a woman that is too bitter."

He didn't know how that comment would haunt her to the end of her days.

She got up quickly and grabbed her things, and left for the last time, looking for a peace she couldn't find, and would never know again, not even in the utter solitude of her quarters.

But long afterward, as she lay there with her heart, like annealed glass, fragmented into shards that continued to do damage, she wished she had never known this feeling, or found that the world was no longer the beloved place she had known, that it perhaps never had been.

In that moment, she wished she could be a child again. And she knew she would go to her death yearning for the beauty of those days.

In the next few tendays, Undina tried very hard to mend her spirits for her father's sake and raised them with effort, while underneath she allowed herself time to fill in the void. The Seljir was large, and she saw no more of Irnda, Jondi, and Gynda. Instead, she kept company with her father, his friend Limalda, and Limalda's son Sochon whenever her father wasn't working.

After a month, it became clear that Sochon was in love with her, and had spoken to his father and Ettrekh about it. Ettrekh treated the affair as though Sochon and Undina were already meant to be attached and would gratify all universal expectations in no time at all.

"I don't love him." Undina told Ettrekh, when he started going into the particulars of Sochon's appeal.

"You'll change your mind." Ettrekh said, mistaking her objection for groundless fear.

"How often do I do that?" She said, "I don't want any part of Sochon. Or any man, Kayrian or otherwise."

"Oh, Undina, I thought you'd finally grown up," Ettrekh said, shaking his head. She wished he hadn't looked so disappointed.

"What?"

"I mean—you're awfully unnatural, Undina."

"Why?"

"Because you aren't interested in men."

"I like them. I am interested in them, I just am not looking for a man right now."

"Undina, you don't have forever. Sochon really seems to care for you—"

"I don't care. Or—actually, he's the one who doesn't really care. He has this idea that I'd be happy raising children in Kerrai and whistle joyously every time he comes through the door."

"You are being awful, my child. Sochon is a worthy man with a kind heart. What has put you in this foul temperament?

Undina looked down. Didn't her father see Sochon was the type of man who would never understand her? He was a sweet enough person, but it would be wasting his time and hers if she didn't return his feelings of love.

"Why don't you just give it a chance?"

"Because I will never love him. I am wasting both of our time if I even try."

"Undina—"

"Think what you want, father. I'll never get attached. I'll never let any man keep me from being free."

"Undina don't be ridiculous—"

"That's the way I see it. Don't tell me I haven't got a right—"

"Don't take that tone of voice with me," he warned. "I'm not the enemy, but I am your father, and you'd better remember that."

She sighed; he didn't know that to her, all men had become the enemy except him.

"Undina," her father said, "most women who think as you do live lonely lives."

"Then let it be that way."
Chapter Eight

"How do you put this thing in reverse?" Farakai shouted to the other explorer trainees in the room. He was a gaunt-faced man with a jocose disposition and long hair cut so low across his eyes that it moved when he blinked. He wasn't exactly certain what had led him where he was, but he had made a profound discovery for his age.

He was seriously afraid of going into outer space. An odd thing for a man training to be an explorer.

Ten of the explorer trainees were gathered for the first time in an actual shuttle outside Ariyalsynai, on the uninhabited plains where their practice could do no damage.

Yikes, be careful, Farakai cringed as they sped towards a large tree on the plain.

"You don't reverse it," a young man interrupted, one of the youngest trainees selected when the group was formed only a tenday ago, drawing the attention of the ten explorer trainees and their silent shuttle officer. The man was quick-looking but built sturdily enough, with eyes that seemed disinterested no matter what he looked at. "You can't reverse a class kx-1000 shuttle. You have to make a wide circle to turn around."

"Okay, I'll give it a try," Farakai said, and turned the shuttle a hard left, jostling the passengers as he veered around, avoiding the tree ahead.

"Now ease up on the acceleration." The young man continued. Once Farakai had slowed the shuttle to a safe speed, he turned around slightly.

That commanding officer sure is a silent one. What is he going to do—wait until we run into a mountain before he helps us? Farakai thought, annoyed.

"How do you know so much about the shuttles?" Farakai asked the young trainee, relinquishing control to Chenka, their officer, a stout figure with a disposition like a skittish durveg.

"They're actually very easy to understand compared to the explorer ships," the young man laughed easily. Farakai decided he liked him instinctively. "I used to study the shuttles and starships while I was at one of the education centers in Ariyalsynai, but I've never actually flown one."

"Jerekkil Hinev—how about giving it a try," the officer Chenka interrupted with an impatient, overly authoritative air. "Farakai here wasn't listening to the proper procedures earlier. Now let's see if our youngest trainee can apply his printvolume learning to what he is doing now," he said, with an intent on mischief.

Jerekkil headed to the pilot seat and sat down, casually glancing around at his instruments. He engaged the engines, turned the shuttle towards a long unobstructed bit of the field, and sped up to five hundred units per hour, lifting the shuttle into the air and off the ground. It was not the smoothest take-off Farakai had experienced, but Jerekkil had done it.

"Well what do you know?" Farakai said, staring in wonder.

An hour later, the trainees left the shuttle at the outside dome and boarded a transport to take them back into Ariyalsynai.

"You did pretty well, Jerekkil," Farakai said after he had caught up to the young man. The group had been let off in the dormitory with the other trainees. The seventy explorer candidates selected just a tenday ago had been subdivided differently every day so far, but they would cross paths regularly over the next two years. Farakai recognized some of the others from yesterday's range weapons operation seminar.

"Well, I had an advantage over the rest of you. But I admit, I wasn't as calm as I seemed," Jerekkil said.

"Well, you had me fooled," whistled Farakai.

Jerekkil shrugged.

"I couldn't believe you risked a take-off on the first day." Farakai said. "I heard the ground controls are different from the air controls."

"There are more than a hundred more air controls." Jerekkil explained. "But I only used the basic ten—actually, it was just luck that I saw a wide enough place to land without running into anything. Say, Farakai—do you know what we have planned for tomorrow?"

"They haven't told us. But we have two choices left, if experiences from past years can be trusted. It's either the drop from the air into the sea, or the two day survival course."

"They like to weed out any reluctant trainees, don't they?" Jerekkil shook his head.

"Well, they only train explorers every five years." Farakai said. "I just missed the deadline last time. I was still at my education center, and I had to wait four years."

"What have you been doing?" Jerekkil asked, genuinely curious. He himself had been lucky. His year had finished the education course less than two tendays ago, just in time for the training selections.

"Well, I took a position as a council aide in order to improve my abilities in public relations, politics—the explorers are peace-makers, after all, aren't they? There hasn't been an expedition since the trip to Mirius. The last civilization to be discovered was Gildbatur. I figure the odds aren't that great for us to be involved in anything but keeping the peace between the Federation planets."

"What about the great explorer mission they've been talking about all over the center?" Jerekkil wondered.

"I hear that's still several years off. But who knows?"

"Father, have you forgotten something?" Undina asked as Ettrekh returned from the communications room and joined his daughter on the shuttle's observation deck. The journey from Kayria was almost over, and the shuttle had passed within a radio range for short transmission communication from Seynorynael. In a few days, they would be home.

"No..."

"What's wrong?"

"I don't understand it. I sent the communication yesterday. Even if it took five hours for them to receive the message, we ought to have received their reply by now," Ettrekh shook his head.

"I thought you left to try short range communication. You can wait and talk to them every few minutes," Undina said.

"None of the communicators were free. I guess everyone's anxious to talk to their families. But we'll hear from them soon, don't worry."

"Maybe they've gone out—but then our robotic house unit would have sent the message to them on their personal frequencies—"

"Tilen and Narenka—they won't be the same, Undina you know that."

"Of course I know—"

"Seeing and knowing things are two different things, Undina."

"... message for Ettrekh Meilacu-ra. Tune into frequency 121..." a mechanized robotic unit moving around the room, poking its computer head into couples and families seated around the observation deck began to approach them.

"I'm Ettrekh Meilacu-ra," her father said, and the robot sped towards them frenetically.

"Tune into frequency 121—message from Ilina Nelana-mi from Firien province." It repeated, only pleased when Ettrekh nodded and tapped his wrist communication device.

"Firien province?" Undina echoed as the robot sped away. Undina leaned over her father's arm to get a better look at the video communication that had appeared on her father's wrist imager.

"Dear Ettrekh, I received your message at last this morning." Ilina began. "I'm sorry that you had to wait for a reply, but it took the robotic operators a while to reroute the signal to our new home from the Kerrai province where we once lived. Oh, Ettrekh, there is so much to tell you. Right now, mother and I are living with Viker and his family! Shortly after the Kayrian relocation was passed, we were told that our people could no longer remain within a thousand units of the capital. Mother wanted to move to Kilkor to be with her brother's family, until we heard news from Viker.

"When my brother left home he wandered for several years before he came to live in Firien City. He met a half-Kayrian woman there, and they were attached around the time that you and I were attached. They had a son, Delac-ast Ertu Nelana-mi, born the year after Undina, though I suppose now he will be a man older than she.

"Ettrekh, when you return you will have to take a shuttle west to Firien City's astroport. From there, Viker has promised that he will collect you. I am working in the medical center until the end of the next tenday and cannot get away to meet you when you arrive, but the minutes will pass as hours before I can see you.

"I love you my dearest. Undina, I love you. And I can't wait to see you both."

The starship shuttle arrived at Ariyalsynai in the early morning before dawn. Ettrekh and Undina joined the heavy traffic of the bustling astroport and a multitude of travelers from the five planets, all bound for different destinations, on life's journeys or a mere commuter transport to Mezera, the closest city to the south.

The medium-altitude transport shuttle to Firien City was small but relatively empty. They were estimated to arrive within two hours after take-off, and Undina was glad they hadn't taken a low-altitude shuttle like the ones prevalent on Kayria. A trip over ground would have taken most of the day.

"All passengers, prepare for landing. We are arriving in Firien City," a robotic voice sounded overhead, drawing Undina's attention from her printvolume to the observation window. The shuttle's observation room was only large enough for about a hundred passengers, not at all what she was used to. On board the starship shuttles, there had been several different observation decks, all large enough to accommodate a thousand passengers, with a clear domed canopy that allowed them a view of nothing but the distorted, elongated lights of stars rushing past.

Undina would have cried, if her nature permitted her.

What had happened to the Undina who belonged here? She had been lost somewhere on Kayria. Why couldn't she regain herself? Why did her memory keep torturing her with images of the Neliyan, and of Gynda?

The sight made her a child again. Memories stirred in the back of her mind; she hadn't looked there, in to those memories, in years.

How was it possible to feel such an ache and still live with it?

She hadn't realized how much she hungered for the view of a planetary landscape. When she looked up, she caught her breath, as though she stood humble before a miracle. She saw a wide, rolling sea, a deep blue, and just below, the tall white buildings of the small city growing larger as the shuttle descended.

The image was so beautiful, so perfect—

Too perfect. This was a world that didn't welcome her kind.

But she had been born to this world. Even though her mind told her that she was not a part of it, she could at last accept that she had been born and belonged here.

Jerekkil wasn't sure how long he could stay at Lake Firien.

Khustav and Malina didn't ask questions. The fact that he was home was enough; but they didn't try to keep him from his own business.

Jerekkil had told no one that the explorers might be called away at any time, but he suspected his parents knew. Just two tendays had passed since he finished his explorer training. Jerekkil was excited to be home, and his friend Farakai had promised to visit before the end of the warm season.

"I've got to take a look at this place you've always bragged about. From the stories you tell, no place can be half as amazing as that Lake Firien of yours." Farakai had said on the final day of training. "But my wife may not like the idea—she wants to go to Kilkor to see the springs of elan-anai."

Jerekkil laughed and said he'd be expecting Farakai and his wife to show up at the door any time.

The first tenday back at home Jerekkil had spent relaxing after the years of constant training. He went swimming in the lake, took walks by the shore, went fishing, and wandered deep in the lyra forest.

The truth was, he had begun to have agitated feelings of late, a deep yearning in his heart to find a stable feminine companion; even Farakai was attached! At the same time, he desperately wanted to see the many places in the Federation to which he had never seen. And there was always Firien, this place that kept him coming back no matter how far he would go.

Jerekkil decided to go to Firien City early that morning, perhaps in part to escape the quiet of the family dwelling in the remote village on the north shore, but he left on the pretense of collecting some fresh provisions for the evening meal.

"I'm just going out for a bit," he told his mother in the doorway.

Jerekkil headed down one of the pedestrian streets in the open market when a young woman stepped into his view from around the corner of a building, her face and features in profile as she spoke to an obscured person on her left. She and her friend completed the turn around the corner and nearly bumped into a frozen Jerekkil.

Her long, straight, shining dark hair moved around her as she stopped, concern drawing little worry lines on her face, but he had not heard her words. Jerekkil looked around him and realized that he had collided with her friend, a tall Kayrian man of medium build. The girl looked down, from him to Jerekkil, and asked if they had been harmed. Jerekkil shook his head, still confused as the other man started to come to his feet. The fall hadn't paralyzed Jerekkil. It was the pair of amethyst eyes before him, the heart-shaped face of the Kayrian woman that held his arm and helped him to stand.

Her eyes were concerned, but not soft.

It had taken Jerekkil a moment to register that she was Kayrian despite the obvious fact that her midnight black hair shone with silver glints in the Seynorynaelian sunshine.

"You okay?" She asked, peering at him. What was that look? He wondered briefly.

He stepped back, but as usual maintained composure.

It was defiance. He saw it clearly, saw it as clearly as if her emotions were written there, which to him, they were. He felt no guilt in having read her feelings; he was an empath.

Why the defiance? Ah, yes—she was Kayrian, and she had no way of knowing that he wasn't going to kick her and her companion or blame them for his own carelessness in falling.

He wished she would stop looking at him that way. She was far too beautiful for such an expression to be borne. He stared at her soft feathery eyebrows to avoid the glare; once he noticed them, he was ever after aware of them. Her eyebrows were beautiful, so beautiful. He wanted to touch them.

"Sorry I knocked into you," Jerekkil extended a generous hand to see if the Kayrian man needed anything; he was brushing the dust from his uniform.

Undina eyed him skeptically.

"You're not hurt?" she asked, just to be sure.

"No, no," Jerekkil said. "But what about your friend? I hit him pretty hard. Do you need me to call a medical android?"

"No," the Kayrian said, now eyeing Jerekkil; a crease of confusion and latent hostility appeared between his brows.

Jerekkil decided to be blunt.

"I'm Jerekkil Hinev," he said, extending a hand to them in greeting.

"Undina Meilacu-ra," Undina replied, confused. "This is my cousin, Delac-ast," she added, slightly flustered.

"Your—cousin?" Jerekkil echoed, certain that he hadn't been able to hide his positive assessment of that.

Delac-ast cast him a mild expression of warning.

"Do you live in Firien City?" Jerekkil asked, putting aside his own errand to the provisions center.

"No, that is yes, my family is now living here. But we came from Falyndae—and I guess you could tell that we came from Kayria before that—" Undina stuttered. Why was this man talking to them?

"I've been to Kerrai," Jerekkil nodded, analyzing the odd accent of Undina. Some of her words sounded so Kayrian, others as Seynorynaelian as he pronounced them. The combination didn't add up—new immigrants couldn't imitate Seynorynaelian speech and the complexities of the three small voice-boxes, but only native Kayrians spoke with so strong an accent.

"Really?" Delac-ast said.

Jerekkil nodded. "I passed through Kerrai each year while I was in training in Ariyalsynai. But since I became an explorer last year, they've put me on leave until I am called."

"You're—an explorer?" Undina's face seemed to pale, if that were possible.

Delac-ast betrayed a tight smile.

Jerekkil looked further, winced.

This Undina would have done anything but trade her soul to be an explorer. This conclusion kept Jerekkil studiously silent a moment, as he regarded her.

Undina seemed to bristle in agitation under his scrutiny, as though she weren't sure why he had undertaken it, and she felt certain his conclusion was going to be negative. She seemed suddenly conscious of her simple clothing, while he was wearing the liquid black uniform of the scientific force also shared by the explorer candidates.

"We should be going." She pronounced, half-way directed towards Delac-ast, half-way in defiance of Jerekkil. "My father wanted us to be home before late afternoon—my cousin's family is leaving for a trip to the South tomorrow." She added.

"The South?" Jerekkil hoped she would elaborate.

She didn't. "It was nice meeting, you, Jerekkil," she added, politely. Her ability to maintain her dignity and also remain polite struck him with a strange sensation of wonder. Meanwhile, Undina had turned and was leaving.

Suddenly, she stopped at the sudden weight of his hand on her forearm and turned back around.

"We'll meet again, Undina Meilacu-ra." He told her.

"Locate: Meilacu-ra," Jerekkil spoke into the robotic terminal near the communications center in Firien City. He had continued down the pedestrian center until he reached the communications building. From there, he planned to get on a shuttle to the shuttle change outside the city. From the shuttle crossroads he could take a shuttle to his home north of the city, in the ancient rural community of Firien.

"Processing... " the terminal responded. "Location: eighty-third precinct, third by fifth transport lane, the Naya building, apartment 917. Ettrekh Meilacu-ra presently at dwelling. Undina Meilacu-ra—moving on transport shuttle route 23, passing the central fountains..." the robot threatened to continue updating Undina's progress, so Jerekkil cut it off with a thank you and walked away, clutching a printsheet, an involuntary smile lighting up his face.

Jerekkil thought about Undina as he walked towards her dwelling the next morning, where he planned to wait outside the door and coordinate a "chance" meeting. He had thought of her throughout the previous afternoon, and had woken early.

Jerekkil couldn't say why, but he felt a power connecting them; he had felt it from the moment he saw her turn her head; then she looked at him as though she didn't want to let him into her reality of the world. He wanted her to welcome him into her reality more than anything. Yet he was terrified of her rejection, more than he cared to admit.

He liked her—the way she thought. He liked her face, but more than that, her attitude and way of looking at the world. He thought of all the times he had held back from women for a while, held back out of regard for them; he knew he had to hold himself back this time and was afraid to drive her off, but—he couldn't stop the fantasies that had already begun to possess his thoughts, fantasies of her.

She was Kayrian, but they were similar to his race.

And Jerekkil was an empath. He could "see" the rudimentary feelings of others. He could sense emotions, thoughts—he tried never to let anyone know about it; people always thought he was immensely fortunate to avoid two-faced friendships, and his friends envied his ability to converse so freely and knowledgeably with women, yet it had seemed he was incapable of registering any real feeling for any one of them. Mostly because he had never met anyone who shared his views or hopes in life.

He waited outside the building, until at last Undina appeared.

"Undina, could you see if your mother needs some help at the medical center after you go to the market?" Ettrekh's message played in the holo-monitor.

Undina's father had gone with her cousin's family early that morning to the south. The Nelana-mi family of her Uncle Viker had been thinking of relocating to one of the larger cities inside the weather-safe ring ever since the virus epidemic broke out in Firien City the year before. But Ettrekh had accompanied them to try to get his wife a portable medical unit from the research center in Hilari.

The virus had swept the planet two years after Ettrekh and Undina left for their long journey to Kayria. The Kayrian population on Seynorynael had been affected more than any other. Though several communities near Ariyalsynai no longer welcomed other races, the Seynornyaelians had never appealed to the council to remove the ancient settlers from Kayria until the virus hit. Shortly after the virus began to spread, the council affected what was known as "The Kayrian Relocation", asking all pure Kayrians to leave the cities near Ariyalsynai to protect the great city from the ravages of the epidemic.

Gilwsa had fallen prey to the virus shortly after the family moved to Firien City, and Ilina had taken the position in the medical center to keep an eye on her mother. Gilwsa had been slowly recovering, but the precious portable medical units were in short supply, and Ilina had felt it best to leave her in the hospital's care, rather than to try to bring her mother home.

In the end, the virus had been less severe than expected. Fewer than ten percent of its sufferers had perished so far, and Ariyalsynai had recently rescinded "The Kayrian Relocation" decree, promising not to pass it again. But most of those who had moved to other cities decided not to return to their original homes.

Even though Firien City was only just inside the weather-safe ring, Ilina had found her brother Viker again, and had grown to love the city and its surroundings. When Viker talked of moving south, Ilina began to feel distraught and plunged into her work at the medical center. She didn't want to leave, but Viker was all she had left. That was—until nine days ago, when her husband and daughter suddenly returned from Kayria, in answer to her prayers.

If things worked out, Ettrekh's surprise gift to his Ilina on her last day at the medical center would allow her to bring Gilwsa home.

Undina tried to think about what she was going to get at the market. She was still agitated from yesterday, from the brashness of the Seynorynaelian man who presumed that after five minutes, he could talk to her so intimately. She had a feeling she knew what he had meant—but she tried not to think about it.

Undina took the transport shuttle to the market and began to wander among the stalls, looking for something special to buy for the evening meal, but found herself thinking about taking a trip to the Lake instead. In all of the days since the arrival in Firien City, she hadn't yet gone to get a closer look at the water she had seen from high above the astroport.

"Where do people go to enjoy the Lake?" She asked one of the street vendors, a robotic device that appeared startled and perplexed by her question. Before it could answer, she heard a man's confidently direct, musical voice and felt someone standing behind her.

"The south shore is the most crowded." He said.

She turned.

"Not you again!" she sighed.

"Hello to you, too," he rejoined.

"What are you doing here?"

"You wanted to know where to go to enjoy the lake, didn't you?"

"I presume you know something about it?"

He smiled. "I do indeed. You see I'm from this area originally."

"All right, then. So, you were saying something about the south shore?"

"That's right. It's too crowded. Your best bet is to go north."

"North?" she repeated, skeptical.

"The south in general extends from the far southern curve of Lake Firien to the area north of Firien City. People know about the area, and it's renowned for its tourism and fantastic beaches, so it's always crowded. And of course, the south is within the weather-safe ring. But you don't need to worry about that in the warm season, so you should go north. Not many people can be bothered to travel north, but it's worth it."

"It is?" she still sounded unconvinced.

He nodded. "A few miles north of here the white sands end and the rocky shores of the north begin. They call that place the 'changewinds' because the winds are in opposition there. The east wind brings the sand from the other side of Firien, and the territory of the west, south, and northern winds begins just north of it. Often the winds collide, bringing great storms to the area. Firien City is usually safe because no one lives near the changewinds, and no one usually bothers to go north of it. There, if you go, you'll find the prettiest bit of land you ever found anywhere on this world."

Undina stared at him, her eyes working over the information.

"The white sands are the most popular," Jerekkil repeated, "but some of us prefer the north shores—rocky in some places, sandy in others. There's an infinite variety of little beaches, and the lyra forest! Prettier than any of the mixed acreage around here. The forest is even more ancient, too, so it's a lot more open, not so dense and murky as you'd imagine from what they have down here. Of course, there isn't any of the tourism and there are no trader's posts there, and no sweet cakes being sold on the street, no trash, no noise, no overpriced accommodations, either—"

"All right, all right—I'm sold on it, Jerekkil." Undina laughed.

They looked at each other and said nothing; she had remembered his name and used it without any regard to propriety.

"If you'd like, I could take you to the white sands and we could catch a transport north." He offered after a moment. "Since the warm season began, the transport shuttles will be running there every minute."

Undina looked at the fruit stall. Her expression was cold.

"Undina, don't look at me like that," he said. She turned to him, her expression subtly hostile.

"And you're so sure you know what it means?"

"I can't convince you I'm not trying to seduce you, can I?"

She whirled on him. "How—how could you just say that?" She looked around as though someone might have heard him. Did he have to talk so loudly?! Goodness, how embarrassing.

She may have felt he should be contrite, but he laughed.

"I'm right, aren't I?"

"You annoying—"

"Do you want to go?"

"Not if you don't let me finish my sentences! Anyway, I have to visit the medical center later," she said, shaking her head. "My mother works at the medical center, and I said I would meet her today."

"It won't take us long to get there." He shrugged. "We'll just go to the white sands, and I'll show you the floating docks where the ilaias lounge in the afternoon. You can be back in the hour, if you want."

"Who are you?" she stared at him, aghast. None of this made any rational, logical sense!

"Come on, we'll have some fun." He took her hand and ushered her towards the transport, taking supreme amusement in all of her defensive protests.

"All right," Undina acceded, pulling her arm free from his grasp.
Chapter Nine

The warm season was ending; Firien City was preparing for the cold. The last of the kiri birds had flown away to the south. Now only the lonely call of a ceiras bird that had been left behind echoed over the pebbled but sandy beach where Undina and Jerekkil walked in bare feet, just north of the changewinds; their sand-crusted shoes lay far away, back a land unit or so, perched on a high rock.

It was beautiful up on the north shore.

Undina heard the ceiras bird call, completely amazed that the entire warm season had passed, and she was still spending her days with this stranger Jerekkil Hinev, who was now not really a stranger anymore.

They had spent many wonderful days together this warm season so far.

Today, they climbed over a giant boulder in the path; she seemed more tolerant that he wanted to help her to climb, and she secretly didn't mind his touching her at all.

He held her hand to hold on to her and steady her down the jagged edge. She leaped to the ground and swung him in a circle with the force of her jump. He felt as though he couldn't let her go; he had discovered something and was happy to help her. When they had been in the city together, other, Kayrian men had looked at him with hostile intent—Undina was with a Kayrian girl, and they didn't like him being with her. All of this just made Jerekkil feel more angry at them, and more protective of her. He realized that other people would disapprove of their relationship, but he didn't care what they thought, though it did bring him feelings of discomfort and distress.

Undina seemed naively unaware of this, or else she, too, didn't let it bother her; she let go of his with a laugh and ventured ahead of him, unafraid. Was she so determined to be away from him so fast? It was annoying, but he forgave her.

Jerekkil watched her swinging her arms as she danced about the shore, looking for new discoveries in the sand, for whatever caught her excited eye; he knew that her intensity and spirit were important to her—she loved the nature around her, as she was a spiritual person who was grateful for the world her god had made. No one could say she was the least bit naive in either her faith or her action; she had an integrity that endured against the callous reality of the world.

He felt utterly disconsolate and gloomy all of a sudden that she didn't understand his feelings and so wouldn't understand him.

"Undina, what do you want in a man?" He wondered out loud.

"What?" The question rattled her nerves, he could see.

"Just a question." He tried to be nonchalant. "I'm curious."

"Why?"

"You don't seem to like men very much. It took you three tendays to stop glaring at me. Or at least, if you like men, you seem very much to distrust us all."

"Oh, well." She broke an involuntary smile.

"Are you afraid of feeling what you feel—"

"Desire?" She said. "Do I think desire is dirty?"

"Yes." He admitted.

"No. Desire is a part of love, if you love, when you love."

"So what are you afraid of?"

"Who says I'm afraid of anything?" She threw back; he realized he'd said something wrong.

"Okay. I mean, what is it that bothers you about men? Why give us such hostile glares?"

She looked at him. "You don't want to know."

"I do. Tell me."

"I suppose I was injured by a man whom I thought I loved. And I don't want to force anyone to care about me or listen to what I feel ever again. I don't want to let anyone in—or be judged or hurt for what I am."

"But you aren't forcing me to do anything. I want to know more about you, about what you love, serious. Do you think you'd have to sacrifice your own goals or something?"

"Do I also fear just being incidental someday?" she added.

"Something like that." He agreed, for argument's sake only.

She thought about that, idly making sweeps into the moist sand with her toes. "I don't know. I used to resent things that I no longer really do. But I can't help my reactions. I still mistrust men in general, because they can hurt me. I guess, though, they can only hurt me if I care first. Maybe I shouldn't be afraid ever again."

He took this information as a revelation. It made sense though, as far as what he had sensed about her.

"What do you mean?" He asked, hoping to draw more out of her.

"I guess I was afraid, Jerekkil," she said. "But everybody gets scared sometimes—mostly that they won't be appreciated or understood. But really, if people hurt each other, then they should not care about someone who can hurt them. The only problem is, if you did love someone, you have already gone too far, let them in so to speak—and then it is too late. What they say to you matters, and it can do its damage if it's not what you want to hear."

"You talk about science most of the time—maybe no man ever thought you believed in love or had strong feelings about anything unscientific."

"I—I think like a scientist does, but that is because I like truth. I feel more as I get older that emotions are the key to who we are, something I didn't believe when I was young. But I definitely want my life to have meaning, and life in general, the lives of those around me as well. Or at least to be a good life, a life well lived. Full of good things and actions."

He laughed at her, a laugh of affection. "You're getting your feet dirty."

"Take a look at yours," she said, with a mischievous glare.

"So," he said, as they walked along, "you think there has to be meaning in a relationship. Not just desire, but—you do feel desire?"

"Of course," she sighed impatiently. "I can't very well be alive and not feel it. But I control it as much as I can. I don't like impersonal desire."

"Impersonal desire?"

"You know what I'm saying. I don't like it even when I feel it myself. I suppose I'm a fool, but I want a man to love me—not just a female body who looks pretty or is sweet. And I want to love him—as I love myself, not as a soulless body in the world devised to bring me pleasure."

"Not like this delicious little sweet cake." He motioned to the picnic basket.

"Not like that fabulous little sweet cake you know I love."

"But as I was saying, I'm me—not someone else. Not a billion other women that have come and gone. I'm me. I'd hate to think he didn't know who I am."

"So what do you want?"

"You think I'm being high and mighty," she said quietly, as though it pained her. "I—I hate the feeling I get when I see myself in other people's eyes. "Jerekkil," she ventured. "What do you want?"

"Me?" He laughed, paused. Couldn't she read the answer in the way he was looking at her?

She couldn't.

"It's simple, really. I guess—I guess I want a woman I truly know—and like, and enjoy." He said. "I can't imagine anything sweeter."

"Are you being honest with me? You mean it?"

"Well, I think so." He said. He wanted to laugh at her, laugh with adoration, but he knew she would have taken his laughter for derision. He picked up a stone and cast it out on the water as hard as he could, listening to the hard impact against the water in satisfaction. "Come here."

She obliged, surprising them both.

"I can do that, too," she proclaimed, trying to downplay the fact that she had come when he asked, now rolling up her sleeves. She kept trying and trying until her stone reached as far as his had, but by that point, she was breathing hard, and a stray black hair had fallen across her forehead.

He watched her exertion, and came to the same conclusion he had guessed long ago; she lived by the principles of reason and logic, but she was as untamable and stubborn a creature in her soul as any he had met before.

And now—he loved her.

He knew she was of a different race, but it didn't matter. Her spirit had captivated him.

He made a decision right then and there, whether or not she liked it. He wasn't going to give up for anything in the world.

"What did you think about Kayrian agricultural methods?" He asked suddenly. "I was studying some of what your people did to improve life here on Seynorynael and for the Federation." Her eyes alighted as though she was happy to forget this talk of love and she went into a commentary on crop-rotation with urbin roots, with all the enthusiasm of a child. They discussed the matter a while, first idly casting stones into the water and then wading knee-high in it, but he was remembering how he had showed her, a city girl, how to skip the stones and how to read the waves for signs of a coming storm.

Jerekkil was the one who had been trained to explore, but had never left Seynorynael; she was the one who had never been admitted into the elite science center, despite her obvious intellectual ability. He felt a pang in his heart that the world was unfair, a pang such as he hadn't known since childhood, but then it was gone.

Jerekkil believed that it was up to any man to change the world in whatever way he could, if he saw that the world could benefit by it. He believed that, but he also believed that a man naturally tried to preserve what he loved best in the world; perhaps this was for selfish reasons, but he was glad someone had long ago thought to preserve Lake Firien so that he could be here to see it, and here sharing it with her.

He was so excited, he almost didn't notice his explorer communicator slip from the basket and into the water at their feet. It sank to the bottom, lost to the lake.

"Oh no!" he shouted in surprise.

He knew he couldn't contact the other explorers without it, that they couldn't contact him—that if he didn't save it from the water soon, it was going to short-circuit.

"Oh, gosh, Jerekkil!" she cried, then started reaching her arm down in to the knee-deep water to see where it had landed. They searched for a moment, but the communicator was lost.

Jerekkil was growing more and more desperate.

She tried to calm him, not knowing that the reason he was upset was because he was going to have to get the communicator back—by any means necessary.

He stood. There was a light in his eyes, a bare flickering there. She stared at him with a look of uncertainty. Why did he suddenly seem so different? The hair on her arms stood on end. She wasn't afraid. The waves continued to make their sonorous sound around them, there under the bright glare of the sun.

She heard a noise in the water, as something popped up from it before them; she expected to see a fish jumping, or a nurlemch bobbing about.

The communicator appeared on the surface, buoyed in the water, then seemed almost to leap into Jerekkil's outstretched hand.

"How did you do that?" Undina asked, her eyes flaring wide as though she had just witnessed a miracle. He tried to remember that this was a girl who didn't believe in unscientific things, in miracles. She stepped back a little; he kept calm.

"What did you see?"

"That's—that's—"

"Impossible?"

She nodded numbly.

"I'm—a proto-telepath."

"A what?"

"A proto-telepath."

"You're saying you can read my mind?" she said, horrified, as though this was the worst kind of invasion possible. She clambered away heavily in the waters, trying to flee, but he caught her arm.

"No," he said, forcing her to look at him. Couldn't she see this wasn't something dreadful? This was a part of him—he just had to make her understand and accept it. "Well, maybe—" he amended. "I can occasionally read thoughts, but I can't control it, and so far, I've only been able to do that three times in all my life. But I can sense your emotions, your surface concerns."

"You're not serious."

"I am." He let go of her arm; she could do as she pleased. She stayed there, standing in the water.

"What do you mean by 'proto-telepath'?"

"I don't actually know. It's a Firien expression. There are several of us there, some more powerful than others."

"What else..." she croaked, hoarse, then swallowed.

"Can I do? I also see visions—once or twice a year at best, and sometimes they come true, and sometimes I have no way of knowing what they are—and sometimes, I can influence direction of something already in motion, like a stone, or a man."

"When?"

"Whenever I feel a powerful impulse or emotion, such as fear—"

"Or love?"

"I don't know about that." He returned, aware for the first time that he couldn't stop smiling.

"But rational thought has nothing to do with it," she said, analyzing what she had heard. "You can't control it rationally."

"I can," he nodded. "My mother taught me how to control it, a long time ago. I can influence things that are already in motion that way, and move small objects. I can read your emotions, but I can't control the visions, and I can't read your mind whenever I want. The impulses I can't control or predict rationally are the most powerful. When something happens and I react instinctively, my proto-telepathic power is so much stronger."

"So." She said.

"What?"

"You aren't afraid of your emotions?" She laughed. "And I—I'm too terrified to love anyone."

He wasn't surprised by her statement.

"I used to believe you were." He said. "But not anymore."

"Why?"

"I can already see what you feel for me."

"I'll be able to see the Nanshe post, too." He said, going on and on about the upcoming explorer mission.

Yes, she thought, Jerekkil was bit of a dreamer. Could she love this man?

Apparently.

"Jerekkil, does it bother you that I'm an alien? Be honest." She interrupted.

"What?" He appeared stunned, then laughed. "No. But those of us who live at Firien think differently from other Seynorynaelians, I told you. You saw that when you met my family, didn't you?"

"I suppose."

"Remember the legends of the comet riders?"

"Yes."

"My grandmother Allia claimed that even the comet riders came from different places. But they became one people. I always thought that it was supposed to be that way, that we became a Federation to learn from each other and trade for what we needed. I was shocked to see that it wasn't a common belief when I lived in Ariyalsynai and that most of us think we should exploit the planets we draw into the Federation for raw goods and resources.

"But does it bother me that you are an alien? I should think it bothered you more that my people forcibly relocated the Kayrians who have always called this planet their home." He looked at her. "Anyway, would I have asked you to marry me if it bothered me?"

"You know attachments don't mean anything."

"They do," he countered. "It means some other guy isn't going to presume your heart isn't taken, or that he can have anything else."

"But I wouldn't belong to you. You wouldn't belong to me—"

"We do belong to each other, body and soul."

"But, Jerekkil, if we ever had children—they'd be abominations in the eyes of this world! You know how most people think. Half-race children are an abomination."

"Undina—"

"Doomed to rejection from both sides of the parentage and forever uncertain of who they are and where they rightfully belong..."

"We'd love them, though, wouldn't we? Isn't that enough?"

"Jerekkil, I want you to meet my family," she said; he had already begun to read her silences, to know when her mind was hard at work weighing a decision, even when her face gave away nothing.

"All right," he acceded. "I was beginning to wonder if you would let me—"

"I told them, but I don't think they understand yet. I don't even know if they ever will."

Even taking the nearest transport, the couple did not arrive in Firien City until almost sunset. Undina led the way into her family's apartment, while Jerekkil remained behind at the door. He heard Kayrian voices and began to translate—thank goodness for the hard years of language and diplomacy training, he thought. Creator above, though, was he ready? Why did it seem as though this moment was always going to be somewhere in the far distant future?

The moment was now, though, and he was more than a little bit nervous.

They were asking Undina why she had left the door open and what she had been doing.

"Father, I'd like you to meet Jerekkil," Undina said.

Jerekkil took a step in the door and offered a smile to the tall, proud Kayrian man standing just beyond.

"Hello," Ettrekh, Undina's father, said woodenly, running a critical eye from head to toe over Jerekkil. Jerekkil could have stepped back, but he stepped forward instead.

"So," Ettrekh said. He glared at the young man, this smiling creature with no superficial sense, a gray-faced man with big bright eyes agleam with amorous thoughts of his daughter. Ettrekh was annoyed. He knew his daughter better than this silly-faced child!

Why was Undina listening to him, this stranger, this Jerekkil with his sanctimonious Seynorynaelian name, when she had always listened to her father before better than anyone? Would she depend on this youth, could she trust and depend upon him, as surely as she had relied upon her father? Would this youth love her so unconditionally? Would his love never fail her?

Ettrekh's thoughts raced; he tried hard not to glare at Jerekkil, but he was sure some of his innate hostility came across.

"Where will you live?" Ettrekh asked calmly, as calmly as his self-control allowed. Less than three days after his daughter had suddenly made the announcement that wonder of wonders, she was going to be attached—to a Seynorynaelian! The family had been suffering from an acute state of shock since that afternoon. It had taken Ettrekh all of those three days to practice being hospitable towards the man.

"There's an empty dwelling on the north shore, just a few minutes away from my family." Jerekkil returned affably.

"Why can't you live here?" The woman who matched a description of Undina's grandmother, Gilwsa, asked from her seat by the portable medical unit.

Ettrekh half-turned, clearly surprised by the woman's sudden animation.

"I'm glad to hear that you're doing better," Jerekkil offered. "Undina says you're as tough as old leather."

Gilwsa laughed hard, in a way that suggested she found this comment to her liking.

Ettrekh turned back to Jerekkil, in that moment finding himself liking the young man's attitude more than he cared to admit. He was painfully aware of Jerekkil's training; if Jerekkil became an explorer—Ettrekh knew that when he returned from his mission, Undina would have aged many more years than he.

He suddenly realized Jerekkil had made the comment in Kayrian.

"Who wasn't going to get attached?" Ettrekh asked Undina after Jerekkil left.

Undina refused to be abashed by the comment.

"I wasn't going to get attached because I thought it was impossible to find someone like Jerekkil. I thought such a man didn't exist." She said. Ettrekh shrugged, sighed, and departed the room.

"What kind of man?" Gilwsa pursued.

"A man who loves and respects me as a person, for the person I am." Undina returned.

"What about all of those ideas you had, girl?" Gilwsa demanded. "That science philosophy notion you'd talk yourself dry about with all your friends—you were going to fight for a place in the science center in Firien City."

"And I've been retreating from the world instead, is that it?" Undina laughed, a laugh that betrayed she didn't care anymore. "You're right. But I didn't know when I had those lofty dreams that the world as it is now isn't somewhere I want to be. Our society isn't living up to what it could be—"

"Undina, you know I don't understand when you talk philosophically." Gilwsa reminded her.

"What I mean, grandmother, is that the reality of the world, what exists, what is fact, is misrepresented by the prejudices of the people in it, people who live by their own little made-up realities and force the rest of us to believe in them." She shrugged. "The animals don't make judgments about one person versus another. The sun shines on us all, doesn't it? We all have to die, don't we? We all live, have feelings and reasoning ability, whether we're stupid or smart, beautiful or ugly. Well, Jerekkil comes from a place where the people understand that. He understands that—"

She broke off, paused. "And that is where I want to live and whom I want to live with. Firien is where I think I will belong."

"Then what kind of impact are you going to make on the world?" Gilwsa demanded. "How are you going to make the world better?"

"With my decision as a given?" Undina meditated a moment. "Well, I suppose—Any way I can, grandmother. Any way I can. But, I'm not sure anymore. I will admit that."

"I have a good idea for us to celebrate the warm season," Jerekkil said, self-consciously aware of his own voice; he knew he sounded noncommittal. They were sitting under a small lyra tree outside their dwelling. He was reading a manual on Tulorian customs; she was working on putting down an idea of a scientific principle she had been devising for almost a year.

"Oh?" she said absently.

"We'll go into the city and collect your family for a picnic." He said, satisfied when she put aside her light-pen and directed her attention entirely at him. "Gilwsa keeps complaining that no one takes her anywhere anymore, and if I remember, your mother said that she wasn't going in to help in the medical center for three more days."

"Now?" Undina protested; he refused to hear it.

"Yes, now. We'll surprise them and take them down to the white sands shore for a day. We can meet your father at the Kayrian cultural center on the way."

"It's amazing how well you two get along these days."

"He doesn't have a seminar planned for today, does he?"

"Not that I know of."

"So, let's go. No grumbling about what you were doing."

"All right, but we'll have to hurry. If we wait too long, grandmother will have mother taking her to the market—she keeps insisting she hasn't fully recovered."

"That crafty woman! She's been as strong as you or I for more than a year."

"It's only because she hates to go alone," Undina said, dead-pan; they both knew what an actress Gilwsa was.

Jerekkil was still packing the picnic provisions when his personal frequency monitor activated.

The sound chirped mindlessly, over and over.

Jerekkil stopped dead in his tracks, his heart launching into his throat.

Undina stared up at him.

Everything else had been forgotten.

It wasn't likely to be a sudden training seminar this time. The explorer candidates were as ready for the Tulorian mission as they ever hoped to be.

Jerekkil said nothing. He reached out to her and sank down on the ground under the tree. There they held on to each other a few moments longer, until the twilight descended and the stars rose.

And then he left.
As flies to wanton boys, are we to th' gods,

They kill us for their sport.

—Shakespeare, King Lear (IV, i)

Chapter Ten

Jerekkil decided to take a transport just south of the bucolic dwelling where he and Undina had made a home and walked on foot the rest of the way; as in time long gone by, he picked his way through the wide, rough pathways of upturned roots and stones, shaded under the high, vaulted arch of the canopy of lyra branches. As he turned into the path before the dwelling, a young boy sitting under a tree looked up at him with a startled expression.

The boy's hair was slightly darker than usual, with a bright glint but soft as bird feathers, his deep blue eyes almost violet, and slightly almond-shaped. The boy appeared less of a mixed race child than most, his Seynorynaelian heritage physically dominant in his pale gray skin.

Jerekkil felt his heart constricting in his chest. Creator above—a child like that could only be his and Undina's.

The little boy jumped up, then cast a suspicious glance towards Jerekkil.

"Mother, there's a strange man!" the little boy called, standing, and tore back to the dwelling.

Jerekkil guessed that he was midway between his birth year and the end of childhood, born shortly after Jerekkil and the other explorers left for the region of space around Tulor where a small planetary colony was being created on a moon of the Tulorian system's fifth planet. "There's a strange man, outside, mother. Come quickly!"

Undina hurried from the house, and stopped just outside the door, her eyes frozen with disbelief, then relief.

She looked at Jerekkil, her unchanged husband, now younger than she was.

Jerekkil's eyes were pained for a moment; he waited, not knowing what she thought—

Then he looked further.

He headed towards her with a faint smile, a smile that was glad to be home, and glad that she held no ill will over his long absence.

The boy stood by, confused, as Undina embraced the stranger. After a moment, she turned to let Jerekkil take a look at the boy.

"Jerekkil," she said, pleased that Jerekkil's face was aglow in wonderment as he beheld his unknown son. "This is your son, Fynals."

The boy turned a suspicious glance at the stranger; after a moment, his eyes showed bewilderment, then, gradually, dawning comprehension. Then, as the child made a connection which the suspicion clouding his eyes had kept him from acknowledging—Fynals remembered the holo-picture in the living area, the picture of his father.

Fynals' strong-set, clenched jaw tried to hold back the tears.

He failed, and rushed into his fathers outspread arms.

"My boy," Jerekkil said, holding him close. As Jerekkil held the child, he felt a primal bond with him, an instant, unconditional love for him. And after a moment, he sensed that there was something else which bound them, which would help to fill in the empty years he had missed of Fynals' life.

Fynals Hinev was also a proto-telepath.

Fynals Hinev had been to Firien City to visit his Kayrian relatives enough times as a boy to know that the settlement in northern Firien where he lived was considered the backwater of society and the ends of Seynorynael.

Fynals Hinev didn't much care about that. Public opinion didn't concern him/ Hinev had long ago decided that most people didn't know about anything and could hardly feel half of what they said and so their judgments were worthless to him. He wasn't trying to be critical, just accept what he thought was true. And he wouldn't admit that he cared about what they thought.

He was a half-race child in a world that considered such children an abomination, a world that did all it could to discourage such interracial children. And he had been born with an uncanny ability to feel emotions and sense thoughts; he knew exactly what they were all thinking of him, all the people he met that feigned tolerance and secretly despised him.

He could see their hate for him.

What was it like to be Kayrian, all Kayrian? he frequently wondered. Or to be all Seynorynaelian?—to feel this sense of belonging that everyone around him felt, without seeing the world he lived in through an outsider's lens? What was it like to truly belong to one thing, to be secure in your identity? Fynals wondered. To know what place you had in the world, and to feel whole and happy?

I am Fynals Hinev, he told himself, but who is that? What am I, but a half-race man?

He was also a proto-telepath, and he knew what people thought of him, how little they esteemed his worth.

Was it any wonder that for so many years he was content in Firien, where he sensed the essence of all that had lived and died there and a venerability of the eternal elements? God and the wild animals in Firien did not judge him.

Fynals Hinev, like his father Jerekkil, had haunted the forests of Firien as a boy. He had a wild streak in his heart. His thin, sinewy, dexterous hands had been fashioned to climb trees and scramble over high, marshy banks; his movements, swift like a shadow, seldom disturbed the life of the forest which the young child observed with eyes keen and mindful.

Hinev played games in the turbid waters of low standing pools after the rains, and slept on the soft ferny, mossy undergrowth in a grove near a running, stony brook; he swam through Lake Firien, finding scleropods on the bottom of the sea, whenever Undina wasn't looking to tell him to come back to the shore. Hinev's bare feet were always dirty, plastered with sand, muddy, or wet.

Fynals Hinev was fascinated by the waves, the powerful and changing tides, the changing positions of the ethereal orb Nanshe and the fiery Ishkur that hung so tantalizingly close in the sparkling tapestry of the violet-blue heavens. He thought about the lyra, the fine-threaded veins of its leaves, and examined them next to the back of his own hand. He studied the land like his own body, came to know its every aspect and function, and loved it as himself.

Hinev romped through the snows that dominated three of the four seasons. He sometimes held his breath in the haunting silence of the edge of the forest at dawn, when the sun Valeria filtered through the skeletons of the sher-inn and sedwi trees onto the unchanging lyra. The silver-gold leaves, blanketed in snow and ice, seemed exquisitely fashioned all of ice; they sparkled rainbow colors in the shaded light under the canopy, while the bare limbs of the sher-inn trees glistened pale and thin in the direct light of the sun. Hinev's boots sank through the snows; he tore through high drifts in glorious delight and collapsed in triumph onto the banks until the cold chilled and dampened his hair through; his mother claimed it was a miracle he hadn't died of hypothermia.

In the heart of the coldest season, Hinev watched from the window, yearning to go out into the land, even as the temperature north of the weather-safe ring dropped to a lethal cold. His lips cracked in the cold, his hands chapped, his nostrils froze inside; returning to the warmth, his fingers pricked with pain as his nerves came back to life and the blood surged back into his extremities.

There were days when the energy shipments never arrived, and the people of Firien were obliged to ration what they had and try to aid those in dire need; in desperation, Hinev and his mother often gathered the dead sher-inn branches and made bonfires like the primitives that once inhabited the land, aeons ago.

Hinev came to adore the smell of the ripening sher-inn wafting on the breeze as the warm season approached, the smell of the last days of the warm season, when the bite of the coming cold stung the air and stung his nose; he knew the scents of nature, the individual scents of each animal, of the trees and shrubs and plants; he knew the land with such intimacy, and the land knew him, as if both of them had been fashioned for each other.

Fynals Hinev was a child of nature, but his fascination for the science that invisibly governed the wild led him through the gateways into the world of science and discovery; there, he found his mother to be his guide, his leader, his source of wisdom. And as much as he loved the land, it was to his mother and their dwelling that he returned at the end of the day.

Hinev adored his mother. Most of the women he met on the street on visits to the provisions center, by chance, or on trips to Firien City, even who would be kind to a young boy born of two worlds, were foolish and prattling—though he was not trying to be mean in thinking this of them—but they were not at all like his mother, Undina.

Undina was almost always silent.

Hinev and his mother shared a special bond. In the early days, it was she who had introduced him to the land and made him aware of it; it was Undina who had taken Fynals by the pathways and taught him their secrets, immersed him in the waters under the bright sun and taught him to swim, she who had taken him rock-climbing, hiking up to their favorite spot on the weather-beaten top of the neighboring hills to the east, where the vaporous mists drifted low across the distant peaks, and fishing in the small mountain rivers and in Lake Firien itself.

And then Undina had stopped. She retreated into the dwelling as he grew older and bold; she armed him with wisdom but gave him his freedom. He had then gone out all on his own.

Hinev returned to Undina for answers, answers she never kept from him when he asked for help or knowledge; she told him all she knew, shared all the secrets of her heart and mind; Hinev was sensitive to the power of her mind, and he knew, knew with his empathic soul, that he had been cast of the same mold, and of the same mind as her. But there was something more, something from his father—the very talent he had to sense the feelings of others, though he did not know it.

Hinev adored his mother, for she was the central figure of his life. And though he was lonely without her, he was happy to be alone.

Hinev worried about his mother, though, because she was alone. As years passed, he came to know that she had no peace of mind, because she loved and resented her husband, the father Fynals had never known, and so Fynals had little peace of mind. He felt as though he had to be there for Undina—he felt he had to be strong and responsible and no problem to her; he felt he should be there to love her, take care of her, to fix things if anything went wrong. To be the solid rock she could lean on that his father should have been.

Fynals only thought of Jerekkil as an illusion. He listened in rapture to stories of his father's exploration mission, stories from his grandmother Malina about her son Jerekkil as a youth; Fynals had long since made his father into a hero, a phantom hero, and often this heroic image did much to draw him from the depths of his racial shame, to raise his heart, and restore his pride. His father was an explorer, even if Fynals was a poor half-race child from Firien.

Now, Fynals sat in awe of a figure seemingly come to life from a holo-frame.

Jerekkil Hinev was here, in the flesh!

"You named him 'dreamer'," Jerekkil laughed, taking a seat in the food preparation room. He knew Undina was anxious to hear about his mission, a trip that had taken only a few months on the new advanced explorer starship. But Undina had not seen him in many years. Jerekkil felt the awkward silence in the room as Fynals gazed at him curiously.

It's so good to be here again, he thought, looking at Undina. As though she had read the expression in Jerekkil's eyes, Undina laughed and smiled at him. Watching his mother's reaction closely, young Fynals sat down next to Jerekkil and began to inspect his black explorer's uniform.

"Fynals was born during a snow storm in the height of the cold season the year after you left," Undina said. "Malina tried to get me to the medical center, but the transport couldn't get through, so Fynals was born here. Does Malina know you're home yet?" Undina asked, suddenly changing the subject, and Jerekkil noticed young Fynals' eyes light up with excitement at the possibility that Malina would be visiting.

"No. The transport arrived in Ariyalsynai, but I took an express shuttle directly to Firien City. How has my mother been since I left?" Jerekkil hesitated.

"She's doing well. She comes to visit quite often. She spends a lot of time with Fynals, telling him stories and taking him into the city to visit the learning center. My mother was jealous until she got to keep Fynals for a couple of tendays. She had the entire family come over from Kilkor to see him. I hadn't seen my great uncle since before I went to Kayria—he tried to convince me that Fynals looks Kayrian—can you believe that?"

"Is he related to Gilwsa?" Jerekkil laughed, sharing a joke Fynals didn't understand, but it seemed their laughter was strained.

Fynals listened to his father's stories of outfitting the new colony and exploring the outer planets to set up supply routes, fascinated by his father's descriptions of the great violet colored nebulae, the asteroid fields between Tulor and its colony Pior, and the giant outer planets of the Tulorian system. Fynals wanted to hear about the explorer's starship and about the other explorers, but most of all, he wanted to know about the specimens that the ship had collected on their brief stop on Tulor.

Undina was relieved. Undina's concern that Fynals would not accept his father had vanished by the second day of his return. Jerekkil had suggested that they go swimming together during the morning meal, and the two of them set off together for the water's edge. After they had tired of swimming, Fynals was delighted to discover that his father could skip stones across the water, but Jerekkil knew he had much more to teach him, and now he was home for good.

That evening, Fynals went outside after star's rise.

He was too young to really understand the importance of the reunion, that his mother and father were still catching up, and Undina had been explaining all that had happened during Jerekkil's absence. Fynals understood the necessity of reunions, but it didn't have the impact on his young mind that it would had he been older.

Fynals Hinev could have been jealous of his father's place in his mother's heart, but he wasn't; Fynals wasn't jealous because he was aware of his father's right to Undina first, and if he had harbored a slight injury at being replaced by his father in her affections, he also wanted to be beloved by this hero, this man he knew and sensed so clearly.

Fynals Hinev was like his mother in mind and in many ways, but he and his father shared the bond of proto-telepathy; while Fynals knew his mother, she did not know him as well, and that had wrenched his heart with frustration that he couldn't always make her see what he knew, felt, and understood, except in subdued words. He was frustrated when she said she just couldn't ever be like him, a proto-telepath. However, Hinev understood his father Jerekkil instinctively, and he knew that Jerekkil could understand him the same way. Thus their bond was a deep bond of understanding, uninfluenced by time.

"Is it true that the council is planning a long exploration mission?" His father was sure to know, and Fynals was curious. There had been rumors everywhere when Malina started to take him to the learning center.

"Yes—but they haven't completed the starship. I don't think the mission will be launched for several years." Fynals only nodded, and Jerekkil turned again to hear about his parents' trip to Ariyalsynai with Fynals and Undina.

Later that night, Fynals Hinev sat under his favorite lyra tree, gazing up at the starry sky, and then he made a decision.

"I'm going to visit the Federation planets someday," he told the kelacs that made soft humming sounds in the night. "I'm going to follow my mother and father's journeys to the stars. But I'm going to be an explorer on that mission. I'm going to go further than any Seynorynaelian ever dreamed." He sat and thought a moment about his mother whom he adored. "But if I leave, who will be here when I return?" Fynals wondered, growing distressed.

He didn't want to come back here, back to his home, if his mother weren't going to be there waiting for him. At the same time, the idea of following his father out to the stars wouldn't clear from his thoughts.

"I don't want Fynals to go away for training," Fynals overheard his father saying as he returned to the house.

"But he's already six years old—nine by Kayrian years, and I don't want him to suffer the way I did—"

"But you and I can teach him here," Jerekkil insisted. "I can teach him what I learned in explorer training, so he won't waste his time with the beginning training years. If I know you, my dear, you've already been giving him a solid foundation for his learning, and this way—I'll have more time to spend with him. I've already missed so much of his childhood," Jerekkil said with a regretful sigh.

Fynals banged the door loudly as though he had just come in to the dwelling.

"Ah, Fynals, you're back," Jerekkil smiled at him. Then unexpectedly, Fynals ran to his father and hugged him tightly, as though the gesture alone could keep Jerekkil home forever.

Fynals wasn't satisfied with a few stories; he wanted to hear everything about Jerekkil's training days in Ariyalsynai, everything about his trip to Gildbatur down to the finest detail. But Jerekkil spoke as though he had all the time in the world to tell the boy; didn't his father know that Fynals was impatient to know it all now?

Jerekkil laughed at him, looking into Fynals' anguished face with a keen eye, and decided to spend an evening of story-telling; his own memories cast him back to the days when he sat coiled upon Allia's lap, hanging upon her words.

After a while, though, Jerekkil's enthusiasm dulled to a sensitive candor; Fynals listened, but he seemed to have sensed more than he wanted to know.

"You talk about exploration as though there is something to be lost, not gained," Fynals said slowly, constructing a sentence without much forethought.

Jerekkil nodded. "I do. Alone in space, it's the fears that surround you, not the excitement. Fears of suffocation, of the great unending unknown... fears of life," he added, with an odd laugh.

"I don't want to think about those things." Fynals protested.

Jerekkil stared at him so intensely that Fynals found he couldn't look away. The expression in his eyes seemed to be looking completely past him, as though he were trying to burn a hole into his son's memory, as though he already knew to what ruin the boy's naive enthusiasm might lead.

"Remember, Fynals—remember what I'm telling you." Jerekkil said very quietly. "For these are the hardships an explorer must endure."

"Now, Fynals—show me what factors are essential to the enzymes that are necessary for muscle contraction—I want to see a diagram of the energy cycles and their roles in the muscle tissues," Jerekkil said, and went away to get them something hot to drink.

The sun was rising through the silica window that morning, halfway through the third cold season since Jerekkil's return.

"Looks like it's going to be warmer today," Jerekkil said.

"What did you say?" Undina asked.

"It's warming up today. Maybe we can go outside for a while. Or go fishing." Jerekkil said, coming back. "Fynals has been working so hard since the cold weather began, but I think there's more for him to learn about—"

"Oh, no, don't criticize me." Undina laughed. "I'm not the one who's been gone so long."

"But Undina, you never taught the kid how to have fun!" He said, grabbing her by the arm again as though she were a child, then ushered her outside.

"Wait—" she screamed. "I'm not dressed." ]

Jerekkil's smile was fierce, and she relented.

"I was thinking about taking you and Fynals out today," Jerekkil suggested, several days later; he had begun to make these adventuresome excursions out of doors something of an unpredictable habit; frequent enough that Undina no longer grew surprised but timely enough that Jerekkil's ideas always maintained an air of spontaneity.

"To the learning center?"

"No," Jerekkil shook his head playfully, enticing her to guess again.

"Not the market again," she said tentatively.

"No," Jerekkil smiled.

"Then—I give up. Where?"

"We're all going on a picnic," Jerekkil said simply.

"You're not serious—it's freezing out there," Undina protested.

"Then dress warmly." Jerekkil laughed. "But the weather report for today predicts a rise above freezing. It may get cold again tomorrow, so we're going to enjoy the day outside."

"You are without a doubt absolutely unpredictable."

"You like that."

"I adore that."

Without a word of explanation, Jerekkil took them to the shuttle station heading south. They arrived at the southern white beaches of Lake Firien, near a popular coastal town frequented by visitors from Ariyalsynai during the warm seasons. But there were only a few other people outside and about when the family arrived.

"I'm hungry. What kind of food do we have?" Hinev asked after a while.

"Taigh rolls."

Hinev winced. "Last time they were dry." He said, but he took one anyway and ate it. It wasn't dry this time.

Since it was too cold to swim in the water, Fynals went away along the shore after their afternoon meal, looking for things that had been washed up on the beach. Undina and Jerekkil didn't sit very long before the blanket they had brought began to let in some of the cold, and they stood, deciding to follow young Fynals down the beach and keep an eye on him.

"His Tulorian is getting better—but then he's had a lot of exposure to Kayrian and I think his mind better accepts new words and language because of that," Jerekkil was saying when the device on his wrist frequency receiver activated, interrupting the sonorous sound of the waves.

Undina remembered that sound—how she remembered it!

She felt the blood drain from her face as Jerekkil brought his wrist to his lips hesitantly and tapped the reception device.

"Message to second-chief explorer Jerekkil Hinev: message received from the express starship Deltor from the council representative on Gildbatur. Pro-independence group instigated a small insurrection on Gildbatur. Orders for all explorers to return there to quell the protesters. Diplomacy requested in dealing with insurrectionists—orders to persuade hostiles to visit Seynorynael to remind them of benefits gained by the Federation alliance."

"Fynals," Undina called after a moment of stunned silence. Several feet away, Fynals was prodding a dead water fowl with a short piece of driftwood, oblivious to the rest of the world. "Don't touch that!" She cried, her voice betraying an unaccustomed note of panic.

Fynals looked up; his sensitive child's eyes scanned the two of them, took in the vague meaning of his sensations. He swallowed back tears.

He knew what was happening.

His father was leaving again!

The world was sinking beneath him.

It only took a moment for reality to change forever.

Hinev was watching a video report of the wildlife of the Kilkoran province when the holo-monitor lit up with a sudden transmission from the news center. An image of the communications tower in Ariyalsynai appeared, then the face of one of the young communications operators in the middle of the communications center.

"Explorer starship Ishkur has exploded in Seynorynaelian airspace due to unknown causes. The ship was heading to Gildbatur to alleviate the persistent crises there. Reports from the moon bases on Nanshe report that all aboard the space cruiser have been lost."

Fynals heard a startled intake of breath at the door to the living area and turned around. Undina stood there, her eyes wide in horror. Fynals ran to her and buried his head in her chest, feeling his own tears burning his eyes. Then he realized that he had to be her comfort, as she had always supported him.

He looked up into her vacant expression, expecting her to weep or shout her grief.

"Fynals, you know what this means, don't you?" she asked a moment later. He shook his head, but he was vaguely unsettled.

"Your father is dead."

He felt a slow, dawning sense of horror and panic descending on him.

Dead...

Hinev struggled to grasp what that meant.

The first thing that hit him was that his father wasn't coming back.

He tore away from the dwelling. He ran outside, collapsing under the small lyra tree, his favorite place, where he had been the day his father returned. He gazed up into the disinterested constancy of the star-filled sky and had to look away. A light wind whispered in the lyra trees around him, articulating his grief as the forest mourned with him.

And inside the dwelling, Undina sat alone.

Alone as she had once wanted to be, before she knew better.

Chapter Eleven

"Hey, Hinev, any word yet on the Federation council's decision?" Midrior entered the dormitory where Hinev was studying for the entrance examination into Ariyalsynai's most elite biochemistry program.

"What?" Hinev looked up at his roommate. "Oh—not yet."

"Well, I have some news," Midrior said, but Hinev wasn't paying much attention. "Will you stop that?" He exclaimed, irritated. "I've never met anyone more likely to pass that exam than you, Hinev." Midrior laughed, remembering the day less than a year ago when Hinev had first arrived in Ariyalsynai for training.

For a youth entering formal education so late in his childhood, Hinev had more than made up for lost time, if he had in fact suffered from the lack of training. Within a tenday Hinev was placed among the top year science students, and it was then that he had been transferred to a room with Midrior.

Hinev had an answer for everything, but Midrior usually had to wrangle the answers out of him. Only the second day they knew each other, Hinev had interrupted an argument between a Kayrian student and one of Midrior's friends. It seemed Hinev wasn't only a half-race child; perfect Kayrian flowed from his lips! Midrior was determined to puzzle the man out; what confused Midrior more was how Hinev spoke Tulorian and Gildbaturan so well. Only Hinev's Berrachai(y)i sounded weak, but no Seynorynaelian Midrior knew could imitate that language very well, and Hinev's wasn't any worse than their instructor's.

And this Hinev hadn't ever received formal training before this year? Midrior often wondered.

Midrior had done some investigating a few tendays ago when Hinev took some interest in the postings calling for candidates into the explorer entrance exam; for the first time in the history of the space exploration programs, the council had made acquiring scientifically-trained candidates their top priority. Rumor had it that this was because the mission was going to far surpass the previous ones in its range, that the next explorer mission was going to discover other worlds beyond the five-star ring, the last planet of which had been discovered years and years ago, before the Tulorian-Berachai War.

Out of curiosity, Midrior went to the records building and began to research the past explorer missions to see what his friend was getting so worked up about, and made a jarring discovery.

Almost two years ago, the explorer starship Ishkur had exploded on its way to Gildbatur. Midrior was about to continue when one of the crew's names popped out of the printvolume and caught his attention. The second chief of the mission had been a certain Jerekkil Hinev. Intrigued, Midrior had gone to investigate his personal history, but there wasn't much about him on file, except that he came from Lake Firien.

The place where Fynals Hinev was from.

Midrior's curiosity won out over tact, and he asked Hinev if he knew about Jerekkil; of course, Hinev had said. Jerekkil was his father.

Ever since Hinev's confession, Midrior had been determined to see his friend Hinev achieve his goal to become a biochemist with genetics studies and one day train with the explorers; he had to admit, he liked the idea of being friends with an explorer's son, and perhaps a future explorer. He liked the idea that they would all go on to do great things. And he did not like to see his efforts go unappreciated.

"I don't want to just pass." Hinev said. "Remember, I'm trying to get into the top program—"

"I said I have some news," Midrior repeated. "It's about the progress of the explorer starship." Midrior added. Hinev looked up.

"You didn't," Hinev laughed. Midrior couldn't figure out how Hinev knew, but he nodded.

"I went to see Mindier for you."

"And?"

"He found out all about the new mission." Midrior said. "Seems he went to his father's building and asked around. By the way, did you know they've named the new prototype?"

"No." Hinev said, growing intrigued.

"It's called the Sesylendae." Midrior said, with an air of triumph. "Rumor has it that the centipede gate capable engine is still on hold, though. It just isn't working. But Mindier says one of the scientists in his father's unit is developing a new engine, something called—

"A tachiyon engine." Hinev finished.

"Hey, how did you know?" Midrior laughed. "Anyway, Midrior says it's capable of an even greater relativistic rate than the other prototypes."

"Time outside the ship would pass more swiftly then," Hinev commented.

"Minutes pass on board, hundreds of years pass at home." Midrior gestured in the air dismissively. "Honestly, I can't understand why anyone would want to become an explorer—no offense, Hinev." Midrior sighed, shaking his head. "But if the council doesn't ever decide on the proposed course, it won't matter what the starship engineers do."

"No, it won't." Hinev agreed absently, glancing back to his work.

"What's that you're doing?" Midrior asked, peering over at the work etched on a half dozen printvolume sheets strewn across the study panel; half of them were really outdated, Midrior noticed. Hinev leaned back in his chair noncommittally and shrugged.

"Just something that's going to get me into the best science training program there is." Hinev said.

"How do you figure that?" Midrior asked, his eyes skeptical. "If you don't know someone to get you in, you either have to put your faith in luck or score higher than anyone else ever did on their test, and even then, even for you, Hinev, I mean, I know you deserve it—"

"It isn't about deserving," Hinev said very quietly. "Deserving people don't always get a chance to do what they want in life. Life doesn't hold a reward for the deserving, even if it should."

"I don't understand you, Hinev." Midrior laughed.

"I have to get into that program," Hinev said. "For someone I know who never got the chance."

Hinev saw Midrior less and less, until at last their friendship drifted into the past.

He had made it into the elite scientific program with a revolutionary idea, a new idea that was still dividing scientific camps all over the Federation; an idea that had made this unknown youth Fynals Hinev somewhat of a celebrity in the past three years.

Who was this Hinev, to have come up with such an idea before even completing his specialist training? Many asked, and once society had perpetuated and circulated enough myths about him, myths growing in each re-telling, the elite of Ariyalsynai discussing him were already half-given to accede his genius before they had even taken a look at his metaphysical ideas.

Hinev knew the truth of the matter. Undina had taught him all she knew, all she ever thought, and she had first shown him her "science of individualism" before he even had a chance to believe that her philosophy was not truth. In the years after his father's death, Hinev had inherited the works of his mother and expounded the philosophy where she had left the last arguments unfinished. During early training, he spent his few free moments compiling it thoroughly into a lengthy document, which he presented to the special considerations committee, where petitioners to the science training program could present any outstanding achievements they had done for consideration in the hopes of being admitted on the merit of their outside work.

Most of all, Hinev had submitted it because he knew there was a chance his voice would be heard; he had done it for Undina. Hinev knew that her only hope of making an impact on the world had always rested in the hands of her son, and he was determined not to fail her. She had wanted him to do something that would change the world for the better because she couldn't.

He felt none of the victory for himself, except that it pleased him to see that the beliefs that he and Undina shared now belonged to the world to accept or denounce—but for the world to hear.

When Hinev first arrived at the center, he had wondered which of these people would become real people to him and not just faces, objects passing by, not just people who wanted to get to know him for his sudden fame; then he ran into an old acquaintance from his early training, Mindier.

Some time later, Hinev ran into another young man by chance in one of the laboratories, and they began an argument, discussing cell anatomy at first, then everything possible either one could think of as the argument escalated into a three hour debate that spanned the entire terrain of the training center, as they followed each other about their immediate errands. The stranger became a genuine friend Hinev would keep for life, a man by the name of Arion Kudenka.

In Hinev's second year in training, Hinev met Cernik, who brought his friend Niflan into their circle; they formed a discussion group completed by Mindier, a group bound by such close friendship, that the other trainees came to regard these five young men as an indomitable, inseparable force whose clear voices reigned supreme over the outside forum.

The only problem for the group was the name-calling of passers-by.

Standing out in the open forum, Hinev was a target for random commentary—insults—delivered by trainees wandering into the large communal forum from all over the neighboring centers, ignorant trainees and youths from common centers passing by on the transport lanes, anyone who noticed the half-race man standing there out in the open.

"Half-race bastard!" Was the most common of these hurled insults. Seldom did the offenders draw near enough to show their own faces, unless they passed in a group of more than four; the animus of these large groups often threatened to descend into a brawl between sides: them and the circle of five.

Hinev and his friends were almost drawn into a brawl when some of the offensive passers-by threatened Hinev and Kudenka brandishing fists in the air as they passed. It was all Hinev could do to keep Kudenka from jumping on them for their crude speech and raised fists.

Insults were usually flung into the air out of nowhere, days, even tendays apart, never expected, always directed at the half-race Hinev who seldom led the discussions in the forum. Kudenka often stopped talking after a particularly nasty comment was flung their way; Niflan, Cernik, and Mindier all stilled as well before resuming in their debates, whether political, philosophical, or scientific. All were stunned by the defamatory remarks that plagued the half-race genius they had come to know as their brother, and they took the insults he received to heart. Hinev alone seemed unemotional, unaffected, as though he never registered anything.

Hinev was used to jeering. He had been half-race all his life, and had grown entirely used to being insulted for it.

Lopri, one of the unknown culprits of the verbal attacks, had begun to haunt the forum of late with his friends, a group of elite children with narrow-minded opinions, and who were, quite frankly, spoiled and rude. Yet for some reason, the elite had mostly accepted Hinev and admired him, in conformity with society's rather inflated image of him, after he had come up with his revolutionary ideas. Only Lopri despised Fynals Hinev, this man who was an intellectual genius.

Lopri hated intellectuals. Lopri was not overly bright, but he was wealthy. Lopri hated having to answer questions blindly, wringing his unhappy mind for answers he could not know; he had gone into aesthetic training, which had the misfortune of being situated next to the elite scientific building. Lopri had prejudices against aliens, as well as the poor of his own race. Of course, it wasn't his fault that he hadn't the intellect Hinev had, but he had become bitter and wanted to hurt the man.

Yet Lopri had an image to maintain, that he was a deserved member of the elite: high-minded, refined, reasonable. The maintenance of this image was his major occupation, and it took all of his effort to cultivate an educated air.

Lopri especially hated this Hinev, this inferior-born man who walked around as though he didn't notice all of the attention around him! Shouldn't he at least have the sensitivity to appreciate the attentions? Why did he deserve them, a low-born half-race man? Lopri despised Hinev, because Hinev was nothing while he, Lopri, had been born into an established family, and yet it was Hinev everyone important followed with their eyes.

Lopri had got through but a page of Hinev's "science of individualism" before he became overwhelmed by the words; oh how he hated the man!

Yet he would never show his hatred in front of anyone and risk exposure and censure; he was always careful in his choice of negative comments, restricting them to defamatory remarks about Hinev's half-race heritage, which were socially acceptable.

Lopri even tried on occasion to be nice to Hinev and his group, that elite-born scientist Mindier, Kudenka, whom Lopri hated because the man was a natural leader, also a brilliant scientist by all accounts, energetic, enthusiastic, and noble-hearted, Cernik, the boisterous young astro-chemist, and of course Niflan, the outsider, who had switched from general science to aeronomy and astro-navigation against his family's wishes.

"Just what is this science of individualism of yours, then, Hinev?" Lopri threw at Hinev from across the courtyard, the open forum with fountains, gardens, and trees. Hinev was excusing himself from his circle of friends; several of the others stopped and glanced at Lopri. Hinev wore an expression Lopri was sure had to be complacent; Hinev never seemed to show any emotion, damn him!

Lopri shrugged and smiled.

"It's rather complicated." Hinev said. Lopri battled with maintaining his smile. How could this Hinev humiliate him in front of everyone with that kind of a remark?

"Just give me the basic suppositions, then."

"Well, the science of individualism as the main force guiding human nature is in part the idea that the individual will always act for his own interest, and that he will act for the good of others if that general good promotes his own interest."

"That's the basic premise, Hinev," Kudenka said, with a half-smile; Hinev noticed the crowds suddenly gathering around him, ears turned his way. Was he going to explain his philosophy in layman's terms, here in the courtyard? they wondered.

"Yes, but there's more," Hinev said, trying not to look about or to let the swelling crowd affect his thinking.

There were shouts of encouragement swarming round. Hinev seemed to hesitate, then finally gave in. Kudenka's eyes held an expression that considered Hinev's impending triumph a foregone conclusion; Kudenka was waiting, ready to listen, knowing he would enjoy the way Hinev was going to put Lopri in his place. Lopri was such a mean-spirited man that Kudenka thought he deserved this, especially after all he had done to injure Hinev and him.

"The science of individualism is primarily based on rational thought as we know it." Hinev explained, his voice clear and unfettered but for a breeze that dared to whisper behind him. "The principles of the science of individualism maintain that an individual has as much right as a majority to influence the environment, as long as his motive is for the welfare of others and thereby for the welfare of himself; his motives must not be to promote events which will lead to either his own ruin or the ruin of others, which cannot be rational.

"Promoting Individualism is about individual reasoning and the superiority, not merely the validity, of the rational mind over tradition, hearsay, and opinion. Individualism is based on understanding the reality of the human mind, as we perceive empirical truth, and it is determined by biological fact. The science of individualism establishes that the rights of the individual are as valid as the general interest of society, and recognizes the productive potential of all living beings, and the right to develop that potential. What this means is that any person has the right to do as he must, as long as his action doesn't impede the rights of another or cause the willful ruin of others, directly or indirectly.

"So in essence, it is a basis for right and just behavior, of one individual for himself, and for society as individuals.

"According to individualism, a person's individual morality is as valid as the morality of his society, even if his morality is independent of the society he comes from. The one principle is that any individual is as valid as any group, that he constitutes his own faction of one. Individualism also establishes that all races and sexes have equal rights, without denying that all individuals do not always share equal abilities.

"Individualism denies that justice necessitates the division of society into any class hierarchy, since this does not promote social equality of opportunity which is independent of factual biological inequality. We are not born equal, but should not be grouped by our inequalities. Individualism denies the deification or idolization of any public figure, since to be an individual one is only accountable to one's own value system.

"But individualism doesn't deny the right of a society to dictate law, since law is supposedly for the general good and the good of the individual; it merely advocates an individual's free choice whether or not to decide if that law has moral validity and is to be obeyed.

"As for morality, individualism dictates that moral judgments cannot be based on virtue that is illogical and contrary to the principles of survival, or to biological fact.

"Moreover, any sexual act for the promotion of the survival of the species cannot be immoral, except an act of sexual force which negates individual rights, though individualism doesn't deny the right of any person to decide the emotional preconditions which must be necessary for the act to have value to both parties; that is to say, a person's individual morality is both valid and instrumental to the survival of the species. But it is a singularly individual choice and cannot be determined by society as a whole.

"Also, we believe that as an instrument of maintaining the survival of any race, emotions, whether considered good or not, are integral to the survival of the race; emotions are a necessary part of individual reasoning, free will, and an individual's biological make-up, which is biochemical but erroneously proclaimed to be but a combination of 'instinct', 'nature', or 'character'. Instinct, nature, and character comprise the essence of individualism because they are biologically created states of mind; they are the instruments of individual reasoning and are not independent of rational thought. Emotion and logic are thus interdependent.

"Individualism recognizes the principle that no male or female is an absolute example of his sex or his sex's behavior, which means that a female can be and is often masculine, and a man can be and is often effeminate, and that this is not an observation for which it is necessary to make any moral or character judgment, because no particular race or sex must be categorized by general prejudice, which denies the existence of the exceptions of the individual.

"Individualism does not condone the false perpetuation of broadly categorizeable gender roles which deny the rights and individual, unique nature of every person's reasoning intellect; individualism purports that gender roles approved by a large society, which has been prejudiced by tradition, are not valid. Nor can these gender categories be found to be valid because they do not recognize the biological fact that no two organisms even of a particular race and sex are identical or can be found to share identical traits.

"Individualism dictates that gender roles are basic in their function of perpetuating the survival of the species; that is, there happens to be an X and a Y which interact for the sake of natural selection, and a sexual act between them is necessary to perpetuate the species. General characteristics of gender are merely facets of that gender's direct ability to promote the survival of offspring; thus mothers can choose to protect their children by the rational choice of instinct to keep the genetic material alive, and males can also choose to protect the mother and child to keep their own genetic material alive.

"Individualism dictates that reasoning is an ability independent of race or sex, and reasoning varies in capacity in each individual independent of race or sex. Individualism also recognizes the utility of intuition in a given circumstance when pure reasoning cannot expose the answer before an expedient decision must be made; individualism supposes that intuition will be found to have a measurable and analyzable source in the human brain and that no action or feeling any man is capable of is unique to that particular individual, though his particular reasoning and intellect are unique and valid as an individual alone, unlike any other—"

"Stop!" Lopri said, covering his ears, then suddenly pretended as though he were parodying himself in order to hide his disdain of the man.

"You asked for an explanation." Hinev shrugged, preparing to turn away, his synopsis unfinished.

"Don't take it the wrong way." Lopri said quickly, posturing with intellectual poses. "I found your idea interesting, but give me time to process everything you've said."

"Of course."

"So, what is your take on creativity, then?" Lopri demanded, looking serious.

"Creativity is at the root of the soul." Hinev nodded.

"And?" Said Lopri.

"The science of individualism promotes freedom of expression—anything for the betterment of the self in all branches of study and action—well, any creative activity that promotes a feeling of individual self-worth, that doesn't contradict the other principles—"

"Forget the science of individualism for a moment." Lopri shook his head. "What about you? What do you think?"

"Me?" Hinev laughed. All eyes turned to him as though the answer to the meaning of life were forthcoming. "I'm still trying to figure out what some of the strange modern Tulorian murals in the art gallery are all about. Frankly, I can't see much value in them, and if a squiggle of violet color is supposed to represent our suffering, perhaps I need a corrective eye procedure. But I despise myself when I find myself being negative or too critical of others, so I'd rather not say more."

The entire crowd laughed, all except Lopri. This Hinev wasn't conceited, despite his intellect. He was just living on his own terms.

"You make one great mistake, Hinev." Lopri said, as the laughter died out.

"What's that?"

Kudenka swung his eyes to Lopri, sensing hostility. But did Hinev suspect what Lopri might really feel? He often wondered.

"Assuming that all the races are equal." Lopri said.

"They are."

Some of the others snickered, mostly those in the elite on Lopri's side.

"They aren't." Lopri rejoined. "Don't feed me your idealistic nonsense. Biologically speaking, Seynorynaelians are superior to other races—fact; pure, simple, not subject to debate."

"I say it is."

"You can't prove otherwise."

"What would it take to do that?" Hinev demanded, superficially calm.

"You couldn't. The inferior races haven't followed the same path of evolution as we have. Your Kayrian species is nowhere near as venerable; your other races haven't been tempered by the same severe forces of environment."

"Explain to me why Kayrian and Seynorynaelian can combine genetically—"

"I won't go into 'The Great Debate' with you, Hinev." Lopri said, mostly because he didn't know it well enough; his present argument he had learned from his elitist family before he was old enough to enter training. "Seynorynaelian DNA genes are superior to those of the other humanoid races, and combine because the Seynorynaelian race is adaptable and the most fit to survive—"

"I see it's pointless arguing with you." Hinev said quietly.

"Because I'm right?"

"Because you've forsaken the pursuit of knowledge for the security of your own prejudices."

When was the last time I enjoyed anything? Hinev wondered idly, heading back from an interview in Kilkor where he had been invited to defend his philosophy, "the science of individualism" before a group of venerable scientists and philosophers.

Hinev was tired, and not exactly a happy man.

He was tired of all the discussions, tired of the training sessions, at least for that moment. Everyone had down moments. Hinev was tired of defending his mother's Kayrian race as well as his beliefs, so damned tired of Seynorynaelians seeing him as an outsider, when he had been born on this world, raised here, and was half-Seynorynaelian himself!

The attendant on the shuttle had glared at him when he sat in the honored seat reserved for him near the front left side of the shuttle; after a short investigation of his passenger sheet, he had gone over to whisper with the other attendants on call, and every so often the entire lot of them cast glances back his way. They were polite to him on the surface, a bit sincerely surprised, but Hinev saw past it all, felt their underlying hostility. Sometimes he wished he could know exactly what they were thinking instead of feeling what they felt—no, that wasn't it. He wished he could enter their thoughts and tell them what he thought of their judgment; more than anything, it suddenly occurred to him that he wished he could force them to see what exactly it was like to feel the same kind of hostility—

And then he sighed at himself. That kind of thought, and its imaginary behavior, was not rational at all. And it wasn't right. For so long he had tried to deny this tool, this "weapon" he had of being able to guide movements and to know what others thought of him; he had kept so unemotional on the surface, with no expression, because to let them know what he was feeling was to betray his own vulnerabilities, and he had little enough to defend himself as it was.

Hinev was glad when the shuttle landed, relieved to be back in Ariyalsynai. He was almost done with his training in biochemistry with sub-specialization in genetics; in fact, he had but a few tendays to go until he received his official specialization. He, Kudenka, Cernik, Mindier, and Niflan would be finished at once, and they were all going to try for the new explorer mission; the final official call for explorer candidates to train had come that year, and the last exams were to fall at the end of the warm season.

Niflan said it was Hinev that had mentioned the idea that they all try for the programs together, but Hinev knew it had been Kudenka who first spoke of the idea aloud, back at the end of their second year. They had all been pouring over the necessary testing this last year, testing each other in advance; it was common knowledge among the center if not within the general population that Hinev's father, Jerekkil Hinev, had been an explorer.

Hinev tried to remember all that his father had told him about the selection process, and the five of them set their minds on making it into the program together.

Hinev caught a local transport and headed back to the science center, where he found Cernik in the forum; Cernik was going to meet Niflan. Hinev accompanied him to the nearby philosophical sciences building. Cernik was talking about some kind of field competition; they headed down a long white corridor towards the main hall until they caught the echoed words approaching them.

"...I don't think we have a choice about thinking." A female voice was saying. "If we are capable of thinking, we will; even a retarded mind will think—is it not impossible to survive if we do not think? We cease thinking only when we are dead, and even if a man should wish not to think and choose suicide, he cannot eradicate his final thoughts before death..."

Hinev stopped, shushed Cernik to silence. Cernik gave him a skeptical, confused look.

"Of course, if one is talking about reason, man can only think according to his ability." The woman continued. "He cannot choose not to reason, but his reasoning may be flawed. He can choose to try to use his intellect as little as possible, but necessity will impel him to think automatically with his own logic, faulted or not. No, there is no choice with regard to thought; any living being must think in order to be alive. Choice has nothing to do with it; for even to choose not to think is a thought and end result of a process, and try to implement such a plan, impossible as it is, would be to consciously think about not thinking..."

"What is it, Hinev? That's just Reneja in there, talking philosophy again—"

"Reneja?" Hinev turned to him with a questioning gaze.

"Sure, Niflan's old friend."

"Man is a creature of free will," Reneja went on, "but he is never entirely free of preconditions beyond his choosing. To assume that all he is, and that the course of his life, is entirely a result of his own choices is ludicrous. If that were true, we would all be beautiful and unflawed, and we could do entirely as we pleased, even given that we would have to accept the consequences. Did a man choose the circumstances of his birth? No. Is this not proof that from the beginning, a man's life is limited by forces beyond his control?"

Hinev went inside the door and found a seat near the back. There was a group of about seven or eight people clustered about the speaker, Niflan among them. At Hinev's intrusion, the woman's eyes flicked towards him imperceptibly; she looked away deliberately.

Hinev found himself distracted by her appearance, and couldn't hear her words. Her face was lovely, but not exquisite; her hair was incredibly pale by Seynorynaelian standards, without being some off-world color, but her bright dark eyes were soft as a wind-smoothed pond.

She seemed suddenly to avoid looking at him as she made her next argument. Hinev hadn't even the ability at that moment to wonder why.

"If a man's pursuit of happiness interferes with the pursuit of happiness of his fellow, his achievement of self-worth and self-satisfaction is a vice, not a virtue, for his selfishness has not merely established his own happiness but effectively destroyed the happiness and self-worth of another." She cast a nervous glance at him, as though she thought he would be critical of her. Then he realized that she was expanding upon concepts explained by his science of individualism. "To be proud of such an achievement at the expense of others is immoral—"

"But surely the study of science is exempt from your argument." One of the others argued. "The study of science is based entirely on reasoning, experimentation, and knowledge, not on pursuit of happiness—"

"And we make the mistake of assuming that all scientists are reasoning, untainted by motive or agenda, so to speak." She rejoined. "Remember, though, that a scientist is human, and polluted by human ambition and ego as much as the politician down the street."

"But—"

"Geradis won't ever accede—" Niflan said. "The only problem with science as I see it is, it's always making possible things most of us aren't ready for," he laughed deeply, clearly trying to mitigate the heat of the argument going on between Geradis and Reneja.

"So, stick to navigating cargo ships, Niflan," Geradis threw out, dead-pan, but it was equally clear that he wasn't serious.

Reneja had stopped, grown silent. Her eye had strayed towards Hinev. The others followed it and turned.

"We'll see you tomorrow, then—" Some of the others were making parting words; the group filtered out the door, leaving Niflan, Reneja, and another man sitting in a circle by a podium.

Reneja stepped down from the podium, trying not to be flustered.

"Hey, Niflan, you ready?"

"You're Niflan's friend, right?" Hinev asked, looking at Reneja.

"You could say so. I'm Reneja." She said, looking blankly at him.

"You made a few very interesting points." Hinev said appreciatively. "Sorry we interrupted. I'm—"

"Fynals Hinev, I know." Reneja said, paling slightly, self-consciously aware that she had blurted her words, and that they were staring at her. Had they noticed how she blurted those words? Hinev seemed so serene, but there was a slight hint of amusement sparkling in his eyes. She tried not to look him directly in the eye. "So, so where are you going?" She turned to Niflan.

"We're practicing to be explorer candidates," Cernik explained. "All of us. Me, Cernik, Kudenka, Hinev, Mindier—"

"Explorer candidates?" Reneja echoed.

"Sure, you should try, too." Hinev suggested; Cernik looked askance at him, with a hint of humor.

"Me?" Reneja was startled.

"Why not?" Hinev asked.

"Well, it's just that I never gave much thought to it."

"Are you afraid?" Niflan asked, with a hearty laugh.

Reneja's eyes narrowed. "No."

Her expression, the small, defiant crease between her brows, caught Hinev's attention. Then, she smiled. The smile made her eyes glorious.

"If you can get in, Niflan," she laughed, "I can get in."

And she did.

Chapter Twelve

After the first year of explorer training, more than two-thirds of the original successful candidates asked to quit or were forced to leave. The circle of six—along with Reneja—helped each other train to pass the cuts and stayed on to the second and third year.

After that first year, Kudenka, Niflan, and Hinev acknowledged that each harbored feelings for Reneja; but they were determined that whomever Reneja chose among them, it shouldn't sunder their friendship. Even Niflan agreed to their self-imposed ruling, while all along he knew that Reneja didn't care for him in any amorous way; his congenial disposition allowed him to overlook his own disappointment, even though it cut him to the core that he had known and loved Reneja for years without her reciprocation.

It became clear in no short time that Reneja was hopelessly enamored with Hinev, and the two other contenders for her affections stepped back, with few hard feelings; Hinev sensed that each was willing to concede defeat but involuntarily maintained their own regard for Reneja, which time did little to cure.

Reneja and Hinev began to spend so much time together that the original group of five was temporarily sundered. Kudenka launched himself into additional study as a means of distraction and ended up somewhat of an authority on the mission guideline; Niflan and Cernik fell into their own discussions, sometimes with Mindier, who made new friends among the other candidates and drifted a while away from the old alliance.

Then, in the third and final year, the final cut from their candidate crew was made to augment the last candidate group. All of them—Kudenka, Hinev, Niflan, Mindier, Reneja, and Cernik—had passed.

They were now officially explorers.

In the celebration that followed, the circle of six rekindled their strong affection for each other; they congratulated each other and prepared for the coming voyage.

The greatest surprise came within the following tenday: Kudenka had been selected as the mission leader, rather than any of the experienced regulators or space shuttle pilots of previous missions; the present mission called for a person of scientific training and leadership ability by its very nature, and Kudenka was an astrophysicist.

Their mission was to make the first attempt at centipede gate travel, widening micro-tears in the fabric of space-time and using them to "warp" across space.

The six explorers were afraid, one and all, but they were going. They would learn what secrets lay beyond the closest stars, secrets kept for all eternity by the universe.

The Sesylendae, the new explorer ship, had been completed, and had been loaded some two seasons prior to the last cut.

The circle of six visited the new ship together; Sesylendae's new captain, this leader of the explorers thereafter to be called "Kudenka's explorers" looked upon the ship with a sober eye; since his appointment, Kudenka seemed to have aged considerably.

Hinev knew, knew instinctively that Kudenka would never let them down. Kudenka was a man more worthy to lead the others than any, a man that had nothing else to distract him, who would let nothing but the welfare of them all distract him upon their mission. Reneja and Hinev danced on the boarding deck, making promises to the wind about their future; Mindier cut in, and Reneja ended up dizzy after a few minutes, collapsing with gusto onto the railing. Everything seemed so bright and promising.

Hinev should have remembered that reality can change in a moment.

"I never wanted children before I began to contemplate having them with you." Hinev said, lying next to Reneja that evening, his heart full of an undefined feeling he wouldn't name.

"Oh really? And how many do you want?"

"How many? That's entirely up to you."

"Oh, so you want natural children—not grown by ectogenesis."

"As long as they're your children, then I do." He said, turning towards her and playing with a strand of her hair. "But again, it's your choice."

"What if I don't want any?"

"You do." He laughed.

"How do you know that?"

"You're far too creative not to want children. And I suspect you'd like to be involved in that creation as much as possible."

"You're right. I was grown by ectogenesis, you know." She said; he stared at her. She hadn't mentioned this before, not that it was important to him either way. Most people had been born by ectogenesis. "And I know exactly what that feels like." She went on. "Call it irrational, but I feel as though my mother couldn't love me because I wasn't born of her body."

"What about your father?"

"He thinks I'm sexless because of it." She shrugged. "That I'm not a man or woman, that I haven't got any irrational tendencies because I was born free of a human female body. It's as though I am mechanical, in a figurative sense."

"And he raised you that way, as well. Not like a man or woman, merely a member of the species."

"Yes. I think the only way I'd ever really feel like a woman, really understand what it means, is to have my own child. At the same time, I don't feel like other women should have to feel the same way. I hate being critical of others. But," she smiled at him, "if you hadn't given me a choice, then I would have sworn high and low never to do it, even though I love you."

He laughed at her. "That's what I love about you."

"What?"

"The fact that I can respect you without even trying."

He held her close that night, thinking that any world which held Reneja would be enough for him; at the same time, he had been wondering again—what about Undina?

How could he leave her forever?

The rest of them had already made their good-byes; Reneja seemed unconcerned that she was to be parted from her family forever, that in the years of their journey near light-speed, a thousand or more years could pass on Seynorynael.

And there was a possibility that they would never be able to come home.

It wasn't until that moment that the full horror of this thought hit him.

If they ever returned from their mission, the world they returned to wouldn't be the one they knew.

And that meant that they wouldn't ever really come back.

"Where's mother?" Hinev asked before Ettrekh had even patched in the visual. He had received Ettrekh's message earlier that day while on tour of Sesylendae, a message that said he was to contact Ettrekh in Firien as soon as he returned.

His grandfather's image appeared; Ettrekh's hair had gone grey, and there were crow's-feet etched by his eyes.

"Hinev, I... don't know how to tell you this." Ettrekh's face was crestfallen. And immediately Hinev knew something was wrong.

I should have come home during the last break, he thought. "What is it?" He asked evenly.

"Hinev, since you last came home, the viral epidemic has returned to our area. Undina is in the medical center—"

"Viral epidemic?" Hinev echoed, the words hitting him in the gut.

"You haven't heard? They don't know how it started, and they haven't been able to find a cure yet. I'm afraid she won't survive, Hinev."

"She?" Hinev repeated weakly.

"Your mother. Our Undina." Hinev digested these words, and was silent for a long time.

"I'll be home in a few tendays," he insisted suddenly, refusing to believe that Undina could die before he could get there to remedy the situation. He had been away almost nine years. Before the explorer mission was launched, he would be given clearance for a visit for three tendays; he had planned, thought, dreamed somehow of convincing her to come on board Sesylendae in secret, then struggled with his conscience about these thoughts.

Ettrekh shook his head firmly, as if to say that Hinev would be too late.

"I'll get one of the stasis capsules for her." Hinev thought suddenly, his desperate thoughts shifting. The stasis capsules, a new experiment in suspended animation chambers thus far only rumored to exist, had supposedly been developed for the upcoming explorer mission; Ettrekh and Hinev were both aware that Hinev's words had been a statement of desperation; only Hinev suspected that the rumors regarding the capsules were true.

"It will keep her alive until I can find a cure for her illness—and I will." Hinev said, thinking desperately that if there was a way to save Undina, he would travel to the ends of Seynorynael to find that cure. He just hoped he wasn't called away on his mission before he could find it.

Ettrekh nodded, absently, but he regarded his grandson with a sense of wonder, mostly because there was nothing Hinev hadn't achieved thus far that he had set his mind to and because Hinev's name was famous throughout the world. If anyone could get the stasis capsule—if it existed—Hinev would be the one to do it.

Ettrekh was already so proud of him; Hinev was to be the first great explorer mission's biological and genetics expert, and its second medical technician.

"Can you get one, can you really?" Ettrekh asked again. The new stasis capsules were rumored to be imperfect, but if they existed, they were more valuable than anything on the planet. Only a council representative could have access to them, or anything else as valuable—a council representative or one of the new explorer scientists.

The capsule alone could buy Undina more time. Ettrekh knew that he wouldn't be alive when Hinev returned, that it would be many years before Hinev could revive his beloved mother and that the chances of her survival diminished across the years.

But hope was something.

Hinev tore away from the room, lost in a haze. He ceased to pay attention to his surroundings; he was wandering alone in the city, aimlessly. Firien, where was Firien? Where was his mother? Undina couldn't die! She would go unwillingly, unless he was there! He felt as though he'd been dropped onto a dreary, dark field, a poor mad thing with no sense of direction and no sense to figure out where he should be.

He wanted to know—to believe—that Undina was alive, that she would remain alive. He loved her so, and would miss her too much. How could he return to the security of their dwelling in Firien, his home no matter where in the universe he went, without knowing Undina would be there?

She was only a humble Kayrian woman, but he loved her so much, he couldn't bear the thought of her death

In that moment, Hinev came face to face with himself, and he knew that he was angry at the necessity of human frailty. He knew that time was precious, but why must men die so young?

And where did time go, once it was passed? Where had the golden moments gone, the ones he had spent with Undina? Why did he have memory of things that were no more? If Undina never woke up into the world again, yes, even if her body still lived, if her thoughts were never there with him again, he knew she would be lost to him.

Hinev supposed others had felt this way, since life began.

For a moment, Hinev wanted to be with Undina, to share her fate. He wanted to will the life back into her. Most of all, he felt very afraid.

Then, nothingness. What was this nothingness? Despite what he had said, he felt he couldn't do anything anymore; the energy driving him had simply left his body.

He wandered a long time, perhaps days, alone in the city, lost to all. He felt no purpose anymore, felt nothing but the nothingness sweeping around him and closing him in? he wondered. So that wherever he went, the nothingness still followed...

What was the point to life, to it all?

Did he believe in anything anymore? he asked himself. Did he want? Feel? No, not anything but the nothingness.

Then, as he sat on a dark street, lying exposed to the wind, a voice inside him told him that if he gave in to this hope of disappearing, he would rot, alive or dead. He would rot here, and the nothingness would win.

But why go on? he asked. Why?

It was his own voice that answered.

Because of love, there was a reason to live. To keep Undina alive in him, in his memory.

"Creator above, I was beginning to worry about you! We thought you had disappeared! Hinev? What is it?" Reneja asked, spying Hinev sitting alone in the dining hall, but Hinev's mind was far away. She continued to stand, glancing down at him.

"I'm sorry, Reneja," he said, looking up a moment later. "I wanted to be alone for a while."

"Something happened," she stated the question. She had known Hinev almost three years, long enough for her to understand when something was bothering him, even though he seemed undisturbed by most calamities.

From what she knew of his life, however, she had never before been surprised by his ability to deal with difficult situations, though life had offered him little to depend upon. And that fact alarmed her. She knew this was something he couldn't shake off.

"I heard some news—about my mother," he offered. "It seems she's fallen prey to the viral epidemic that is sweeping the provinces."

Reneja reached an arm around him in an attempt to be some comfort. Reneja knew that the disease he was talking about was fatal.

"I've decided to put her in a stasis capsule. I don't care how I have to get it—but I can't let my mother die," Hinev said. Reneja knew he was demanding a solution that was next to impossible, demanding it of himself, as though he expected nothing less and would torment himself for any failure. Her heart wrenched.

Then, she had an idea. A terrifying idea, something that she knew she could do for him, even if it meant breaking all of the rules to do it.

"Hinev, I can get one," she whispered.

Hinev turned to her with an expression of shock, the first time she had ever seen him wearing it.

She smiled.

"My father created them." She shrugged, laughing at his expression.

"But I should have known—"

"What?" She laughed. "How could you, when I only found out last tenday?!"

For the first time since he had heard the news about his mother, Hinev remembered where he had put his smile.

Sesylendae pulled up from the runway outside Ariyalsynai and shot skyward, breaking through the clouds at an amazing speed, the jarring forces balanced by stabilizers. But until they reached open space, Hinev felt the hum under his feet as he stood in his laboratory.

Undina was safe, he thought. Safe in the stasis capsule. She would be there when he returned, and until that time he was going to scour the galaxy to find a cure for her.

His search would take many years.

Hinev had been checking all of the creatures on board, taking care of them, which had been his allotted duty for the moments of the launch.

Once the tachiyon engine engaged, the ship would speed up very slowly for the lifeforms aboard to adjust to the speed, and finally be vaulted away at a speed that made the take-off look like an evening stroll. And as soon as the ship cleared Tulorian airspace, it would be heading on a course to take it near several hundred systems in The Great Cluster.

After they had reached the first unexplored planet, the ship's crew had orders to test the centipede gate engine. If successful, the centipede gate they enlarged would be a permanent link to the one that had been positioned just outside Kai-rek, an ancient black hole near the Seynorynaelian system.

A few hours after the take-off Hinev left his experiment to search for Reneja at the Observation Window. He laughed as he headed to the Observation Deck, remembering how she had talked of watching the outside world throughout take-off so as not to miss a moment of Seynorynael's glory. She had never before been on a space voyage—nor had he—and she was going to record it for posterity on one of Niflan's favorite holo-stilling devices. Their posterity, he thought. They had already planned a long life together.

The launch of Sesylendae had been horrific. Something had gone wrong in the engine; even Hinev had felt it in his secure position in the interior. One of the spaceship technicians had cleared it up after a few minutes, but the horrific sound like the sky cracking open had sent the animals all over the containment room bleating and cawing; Hinev hardly had any time to panic, trying to keep them calm. He was glad, though, that he wasn't with the others.

Anyone who showed signs of flight disorder—of which there were various symptoms—would be sent back to the ground by shuttle. But of course, they had all been prepared for the take-off, Hinev thought; yet the take-off had been far rougher than all anticipation, and for a moment when they reached orbit, all power had gone out for half a minute.

Hinev was glad they were past the worst of it as he wandered around the Observation Area, searching the crowd that lounged on the deck, enjoying their first glimpse of the nearby Sumar cluster. Several hours had passed since the launch; Reneja was nowhere to be found, and Hinev assumed she had gone to her quarters. He decided to wait for her on the deck. She would come looking for him sooner or later, he knew.

Hinev was sitting alone by the window when Niflan found him. Niflan's face was very pale as he headed towards Hinev; Hinev's senses drew back in horror.

Something was wrong. Very wrong.

Niflan found he couldn't look his friend in the eye, but he knew that someone had to break the news to Hinev.

"Hinev."

Hinev was silent as though he hadn't heard.

"Hinev. I'm afraid I have to tell you, Hinev. You see, Reneja and Cernik—" Niflan stopped, swallowing a lump in his throat; his throat was scratchy and raw, but he kept his composure out here for the world.

Hinev's face held a look of profound horror, Niflan thought, looking at him now. It was in the eyes, Hinev's eyes. Niflan had the feeling that Hinev already knew what he was going to say. "They couldn't handle take-off. They were restrained, but—"

Hinev's eyes glazed over. "They had to be sent back." He said evenly, breaking the news to himself before Niflan could.

"Yes." Niflan nodded, the beloved faces of Reneja and Cernik in his mind, but he heard the sound of their voices most clearly. He would never forget the sound of those voices.

"We put them into one of the shuttles to rendezvous with the Nanshe outpost." Niflan said. "They will await transferal back to Seynorynael there. I'm sorry, Hinev," Niflan added solemnly. "I—know how much you loved her."

It was as if Reneja had died, because Hinev knew he would never see her alive again.

Chapter Thirteen

Selerael was present at the child's birth. She was there in the shadows, as she had been long before the child's mother and father ever met each other.

How fate had backfired upon her! she thought.

She had never known who his mother would be, or his father. She had blindly followed all those born under the name Marankeil, haunted them almost to the point of their mental ruin, though she thought they had never known. What could she do to them? She hadn't tried to interfere thus far, until Vaelan Marankeil. There was something about him—perhaps that he looked so much like the Emperor Marankeil in the memories she held of him, memories inherited by her mother, Alessia.

Selerael tried to prevent his attachment, tried to dissuade him, but to no avail.

That was when she discovered that she was powerless.

She tried again.

Marankeil and Iola Efaren were attached, and they had a child.

She was there when the boy entered the world, took his first halted breath and cried with a melancholy of being forced into the world. She was there when his hair grew into a soft feathery down over his head, there when his tiny wondrous eyes first took notice of his surroundings. She was there a half-year later when he toddled forth on his first few staggered steps in utter wonderment. She watched him as one does in a trance, unable for the longest time to bear to recognize this lovely child for the monster she knew he would become.

Then, one day, she struggled against the trance.

She knew what she had to do! What she had waited to do! What she had sworn to do all those years ago among her own mother and son on the bridge of Sesylendae, and she would not hesitate—

She moved towards the boy, swifter than a shadow. She was behind him. She needed no weapon to kill him. If she chose, she could but raise her hand, and direct the power of Hinev's serum into a stream of blue-hot fire, an incineration beam that would terminate the life of the baby Ilikan Marankeil.

Or she could merely crush him, smother him to death in her vice-like arms.

She decided to kill him with the purest fire, yes, in order to save the lives of the countless trillions that would suffer and die by the hand of the Seynorynaelian Empire, on the order of the cruel and evil Emperor Marankeil.

She tried to creep near, tried to raise her arm.

Suddenly, she was the one who cried out, as Space began constricting around her, threatening to cut off breath, heedless of her power. The constricting space seized her arms and squeezed against the skin, threatening to implode her, but the power of her immortal body fought, held it at bay, kept her trapped there in a state of suspended time and animation. She was conscious of the arrhythmic beats of her pulse, beating rapidly—

And then she heard the whispers, felt the animus of these baleful, chilling whispers, voices like the wind in her mind. This was a warning, a primeval warning and for the first time in all of her life, she felt a creeping fear—a fear of the nothingness—

Space and Time themselves were stopping her—yes, they were forbidding her from destroying this child!

The enormity of this, the unfairness of this, when she had been their creature, had waited these many long years for her own purpose to come to an end, overwhelmed her. She felt as though she would collapse in weeping, but she was too distraught, horrified, and wounded by this pain to even shed a tear.

Her own mind began racing back across her memories, searching for a right answer, for a new tactic as to what she could do.

She felt so unbearably helpless.

Then—was the murder necessary? Could she not stop Marankeil some other way? Could she prevent his ever becoming mechanized, from turning into his monstrous self?

No, she didn't know him well enough. Not unless she tried to enter his mind and force him to stop—

The powers told her she couldn't do that. They would crush her back to oblivion if she tried. But wasn't she the One? The One destined to restore balance? Perhaps even she was not exempt from following the laws of Nature, the principles of science.

She could, though, learn about the child.

Then she remembered Hinev. Knowing what had happened to Hinev, what would happen to Hinev, who would one day lose his own identity in the thousands of invading memories he had absorbed telepathically, she was abruptly afraid to read Marankeil's mind too deeply and have his thoughts poison her beyond redemption; at the same time, she was then able to contact her own conscience, the conscience she had tried to put aside for what she had to do.

She knew she could not judge what she did not know or understand.

Knowing that, she made it her purpose to learn everything about him.

And she was going to use that knowledge to change his fate.

When she made that decision in her mind, she found that Time and Space had released her invisible bonds; when she made up her mind not to kill Marankeil in cold blood, she found she could step towards him, draw near—

Near enough to change his destiny.

The heavy white doors slowly swung inward on hinges the color of deep purple flowers, the color of Seynorynaelian blood. A boy with a mass of curls appeared under the wide, arching frame of a tall city dwelling and adjusted the bottom of a grass-stained shirt that had once been both white and clean. Behind him, the row of houses that had been sandwiched together seemed to be looking down on him with a disapproving eye, casting their tenebrous shadow before him and over the steep steps as far as possible, onto the small patch of flat, vivid green grass that separated the dwellings from the thoroughfare ahead.

He turned on them and towards the road.

"Ha hooo! What a lovely day!" Rilien Kilaen Ornenkai threw triumphant words to the wind as he jumped over the last step. With an emancipated air, he headed to the street, arrived at the corner, and sat before the transport entryway. No sooner had he sat down than his mind began meditating on enthusiastic possibilities of what lay in store for him that day.

"What am I going to do today?" he wondered.

He had no doubt that he was going to find adventure, or that it would find him. He had so many expectations. Some thrilling, some apprehensive, but expectations nonetheless and altogether positive. He had no idea what he would find, but he was eager to discover it. At the same time, the future seemed so far away to him, so bright and full of promise, and he liked it that way, far ahead of him, though he did not know it. He liked to keep the dreams safely ahead of him, so that he had something to inspire him to acts of heroism.

Riliya Ornenkai was happy, young, and free that day.

His imagination left no doubt in his young, certain mind that he was going to taste all life had to offer, and that he was going to achieve whatever he attempted; was he not a heroic soul? He couldn't understand that the world was indifferently cruel, carelessly disorganized, uninspired, unmoved, and content with profitable mediocrity. He was indifferent to the real world and only knew the brightness of the dream of it. All he knew was that he had great hopes, and he hoped, the determination to see those hopes fulfilled.

Riliya Ornenkai looked up at the dome and wondered if he could really see beyond the artificial light to the real sky above the dome.

The entire city of Ariyalsynai and much of the surrounding landscape had been covered with a great dome that kept unregulated weather from interfering with the city's growth, though the clear blue sky high above showed no sign of it.

Riliya waited a minute for a transport to arrive. Like the dome, the clear transport tunnels seemed invisible, and the transports appeared to ride suspended in mid-air. But the twisting, interconnecting tunnels were tightly packed in the city streets. Some arched over the lower buildings at the remote edges of Ariyalsynai, far away from the high white ornately decorated buildings of the city center that rose like spires into the sky, up to the peak of the dome that covered the city. Only special air-cars were permitted to travel above the transport tunnels, the air-cars of the politicians and prominent families that lived in the city center.

Riliya hopped onto the transport that had stopped to collect him. One of the prefects in charge winked at him, but Riliya wrinkled his brows in confusion; why did adults always condescend to children as though children had no minds of their own? He tried to smile back.

He settled himself in a seat as the high-speed transport took off. A minute passed as the transport reached a multiple intersection. Riliya had sat in the seats marked "Gelyfaeon Park". At the intersection, the long chain of transport sections broke off, three continuing on in the same direction towards the heart of the city, another turning to a neighboring sector, but Riliya's section turned into yet another transport tunnel, a long clear tube that led to the local park for his sector of Ariyalsynai.

The transport left Riliya at the edge of Gelyfaeon Park, a small alcove of lonely green trees and scattered flowers among the shining white and silver city. Riliya stopped to observe the great blooms of blue and violet miri flowers that filled the air with their fresh sweet scent. He couldn't help but admire them, poking stubbornly through the bare patches of grass. No one had planted them but the flowers had sprung up on their own in the dark black soil, perhaps from seeds that had lain dormant through the construction or from those that had drifted in when the dome archways opened to let in transports from the astroports and space stations.

Riliya left them alone and headed to his favorite spot, a tree root under a sprawling sher-inn tree where he liked to sit and invent stories of ancient heroes. He sometimes imagined he was a comet rider hero that had arrived on Seynorynael from the stars. He was a hero who had lived free in the open land before there had been cities, before the regulation codes had been devised. Like any hero, he could choose his own future and live anywhere he desired.

Sometimes he imagined he was an ancient leader of a great mass of people. Sometimes he imagined his people were being attacked by evil aliens and that he was the hero who had saved them before and would again. He was the one who was going to fight the alien leader one on one and defeat him. He was going to win he wasn't sure what as his reward and then fight the other alien leaders who would of course challenge him time after time, and he'd beat them all.

Riliya seldom imagined winning a fair noblelady, but when he did, she would of course be proud of him and grateful that he had saved her life. She would try to kiss him, but he would wipe it off and humbly accept her gratitude. Sometimes he played games with stick figures and assembled armies in the dirt under the sher-inn tree; a twig sufficed for his noblelady, and he leaned her against the tree so she could watch, and so he could occasionally reassure her he would save her life and curse the villain for trying to kidnap her.

He got caught up in his fantasies; he couldn't wait to finish the battle he'd been waging yesterday.

Someone else was sitting under the tree. His tree.

"Who are you?" Riliya said loudly, startling the scrappy young boy with dirty knees and scratched-up legs who had begun to doze in the shade. The boy blinked and rubbed his eyes, turning to the side to get a look at the interloper that had disturbed him. Then Riliya noticed the purple flower the other boy held tightly in his hand.

Riliya's eyes flared in anger. He had no reason to resent the boy's being in his favorite place, except that he cherished the spot as his own, but seeing the light purple flower gave him an excuse to get angry. Ornenkai's mother hated it when people pulled up the flowers, and he took this action as a personal attack against her.

"No one should take the flowers from the ground." Riliya hurled accusingly. "There won't be any left for others to enjoy."

Instead of gratifying Riliya with an apology, the smaller boy suddenly broke a welcoming smile.

"Is this your spot?" he asked, but Riliya remained silent. "I knew that someone had been here—the root has been worn down—it's very smooth. Really nice to sit on."

Riliya kept his frown, but he was beginning to relent in his anger at the stranger's approval and keen eye. The strange, limber boy moved aside a little, inviting Riliya to sit beside him. Riliya didn't move—the boy had still taken the flower after all, even if he did appreciate Riliya's favorite spot in the park.

"Sorry about the flower." As the boy turned to gaze down on the blossom in his hand, his earnest smile faded, his friendly voice now subdued. "I had to take it—my mother can't come here anymore—so I was going to bring it to her. But now I wish I hadn't. I think maybe the flower will have wilted by the time I give it to her, and it will remind her—"

The boy stopped, as though stubbornly holding back tears, just staring at it.

Riliya sat next to him, his hesitation forgotten.

"What's wrong with her?" he asked curiously. The strange boy seemed subdued.

"She got the old age radiation disease early."

"The man who lives by us died of the old age mutation, too." Riliya said, scratching in the dirt with a twig. "Father said it was the radiation that made him old—he used to live to the south, where the radiation is worse—"

"Mother has always lived in Ariyalsynai. And she doesn't even look old."

"I'm sorry I shouted at you about the flower." Riliya said regretfully. "I suppose one flower won't hurt. But you'd better take it home to her before it dies."

"It's already dead." The boy said stonily.

"May I go with you to give it to her?" Riliya asked, trying to efface the sad expression on the boy's face.

"All right." The boy said reluctantly and stood, wiping off his pants. He was a bit shorter than Ornenkai, unusually lissome and quick for a child. His eyes were a brilliant cobalt, and his hair was fair, but a shade that would one day likely turn dark.

As it turned out, the boy's home wasn't very far from Riliya's, located in the same sector. The boys climbed to the fourth floor of the house and tiptoed into a darkened room, where a woman lay sleeping quietly. The boy signaled that they should leave, but the woman stirred.

"Ilika—is that you?" she asked, breathing with difficulty.

"Yes, mother." He said, almost apologetically, as though he was sorry to have woken her, since to wake her forced her back into the reality of her pain. "I brought a friend I met in the park today."

"I'm Riliya. Riliya Ornenkai." Riliya stuttered, trying not to be unsettled by the woman's weak condition.

"Ornenkai?" the woman repeated, a fine crease gathering between her eyes. "Oh, yes," she sighed, remembering, as though simple answers brought some measure of relief to her in her present condition. "I met your father once in the building where I used to work—" her voice drifted off; she stared off into space.

"Is your father a scientist, too?" Ilika turned to Riliya.

"Yes," Riliya admitted, abashed. "He's the head of the biochemistry division in the Solaer Three Building."

"Mother was a top research scientist in the genetics division—" Ilika began, but his voice abruptly stopped. Riliya saw the expression on his face and knew what had disturbed him. Although he regretted it, he had begun speaking of his mother's life and activities in the past tense.

Sensing her son's anguish, Ilika's mother strained to move into an upright position, leaning her back against the wall, and reached an arm out to draw in her son. She pushed away the long light bangs that grazed his eyelashes and kissed him lightly on the forehead.

"Don't worry about me, Ilika," she crooned in a stronger voice. "I'm feeling better. You and Riliya can go and play while I get something for our afternoon meal." She said, pushing aside the bed covering and dropping her feet carefully to the floor to hide her pain from her son. "What's that, Ilika?" She motioned to the flower still clutched tightly in Ilika's small, dirty hand.

"Nothing." Ilika said, quickly hiding his hands behind his back.

I hope Ilika isn't angry about yesterday, Riliya Ornenkai thought as he headed to Gelyfaeon Park, the boys' usual meeting place for more than a year. When he was preparing to leave the previous morning, his father had caught him and set him to his studies all afternoon.

As Riliya approached the meeting place, he saw an older boy with a surly expression talking to Ilikan Marankeil and then push his friend against the tree, laughing as he walked away.

"Who was he?" Riliya tried to look at Ilika's bleeding shoulder but Ilika shrugged off his attention and struggled to his feet, squinting where a fragment of tree bark had fallen into his left eye.

"It's nobody."

"What did that bully say to you?" Riliya asked, and Ilika sighed.

"He said my father is an unfeeling deloch, that he knows my mother is going to die and never comes home, that he spends all of his time in his lab to stay away from us. He said my mother probably deserves to die and that I should go with her."

"How does he know you?" Riliya asked, confused.

"He lives on the same housing strip that we do. His father works for mine in the computer mechanics division."

"He's probably jealous of your father. My father says yours is the most brilliant computer programming architect in Ariyalsynai."

"No—it isn't jealousy." Ilika countered. "He spoke the truth. My father doesn't care if my mother lives or dies—he's a cold creature. He only cares about one thing and that is his own grand project—no one in the council would promote him to the central city division to work on real starships because they know he's the meanest deloch that ever came out of the Northern snows..."

"You know that isn't true—"

"What would you know about it? If he does care, he isn't around to show it. When he is at home, he never says anything to us."

"Maybe he doesn't know what to say to you." Riliya suggested.

"Look, I don't want to talk about him anymore. How about we try to make it to the border lands? We still have enough time to go today if we hurry and get on a transport."

"I'm sorry about yesterday." Riliya remembered their plans. "My father was late leaving for the division and stopped me. He set me such a long list of assignments that I wasn't finished until after second moonrise."

Ilika smiled. "It's okay. I made up a game while you were gone. I pretended I was a comet rider on the first ship that arrived on the planet, and that you were on the second ship that got lost. While I was waiting for you to get here, I ate my sher-inn fruit and planted the seeds to create a future food supply, in case the natural resources on the planet couldn't sustain me..."

"I thought we were both supposed to be on the same ship."

"I had to think of some reason to explain why you weren't here." Ilika insisted.

"Well I'm here now. You only thought I had been delayed, but really I was going to check on our water supply." Riliya held out two flasks of sher-inn juice he had brought in his satchel with the noon meal provisions.

"Why do we live inside the dome?" Ilika pondered as the two boys wandered through the border lands forest just outside the dome encasing Ariyalsynai and its outlying territories. The two of them had stopped at the northern edge of the wooded area to eat their provisions, a few nirii rolls and some dried fruit.

The high snow-capped mountains to the north obscured the northern territories and the regions beyond, outside the weather-safe ring. Ilika's gaze had fallen on the white peaks shrouded in pale blue-grey mist, a light sheath of moisture that reflected brilliant blue and violet hues of broken light.

"I would live out here if I could," Riliya mused. "In the wild lands. I've never left Ariyalsynai before, but I think I would like to see the Eastern Plateau, the Great Sea and the Kir Islands, the Kilkoran territories, the southern cities... I would live free in the world, but I'd have to see it all before I decided where I would want to live."

Ilika said nothing for a long time, his brows crinkled in troublesome thoughts. Riliya had noticed that he often had that expression when he thought of his own home, and of his mother's weakening condition.

"Riliya, what do you think happens when a person dies?" Ilika asked. It was the first time he had openly spoken of his mother's death. Riliya swallowed, suddenly uncomfortable, but he could not let Ilika see his reaction. He had to be there to cheer him up. But Riliya himself didn't like to think about it. He had never been faced with the death of anyone he knew, and Ilika's mother had gotten him to think about his own mortality for the first time. She was too young to have been afflicted with the old age mutation disease.

"I don't think anyone knows for certain, Ilika—but I don't like to think about it. We don't have to worry about it now—we're only children."

"But children grow up. And what makes you think anyone is safe? Even children die—we could be killed in a transport tunnel accident here in Ariyalsynai. And you always hear about children in the northern territories who freeze to death, caught outside unaware when the first yearly snowfall hits."

"You may be right, Ilika, but what can we do about it?" Riliya asked impatiently, wanting to change the subject.

Ilika quietly nodded understanding. Riliya was as afraid as he was about dying, but chose to ignore the subject. Still, he decided it was best to leave his friend alone. Then he remembered their game before the noon meal. They had been pretending to be explorers on the most recent mission, beyond the Federation's five worlds.

"Scout—have you any news to report?" Picking up on Ilika's game, Riliya shook his head.

"No advanced life form readings. Suggest we take a few samples of vegetation and head back to the ship, captain." He pulled a few wild flowers from the base near the ground to preserve their roots. "I'm going to take these back to the park." Riliya added in his own voice.

"There are plenty of them out here," Ilika agreed.

"Wouldn't it be great if we were one of Kudenka's crew?" Riliya asked, misty-eyed. "I'd love to be like them, meet them, even—"

"Idiot." Ilika said roughly. "It'll take thousands of years for them to return, remember?"

"I know that," Riliya said defensively.

"So, you won't be around to see it." Ilika shrugged.

Riliya was struck by the fact that he hadn't really understood that he'd be dead by the time they got back and would never know what had happened to them. He didn't want to face that.

Meanwhile, Ilika stood very still, saying nothing. Riliya caught the frozen expression on Ilika's face—half-afraid, half-alert. He put a hand on Ilika's arm; Ilika reacted with a gasp, exhaling the breath he had been holding and jumped, still standing in his place, still looking over at the dark light under the trees.

They heard a soft, scratching sound in the undergrowth beyond.

"What was that?" Ilika said tensely.

"You heard something out there?" Riliya drew beside him and scrutinized the area ahead. "Hey, Ilika—what is it? What's wrong with you?"

"Nothing," Ilika said, relaxing a bit.

"I don't believe you. Hey—what are you looking at now?" He turned to look at where Ilika's gaze had wandered, this time off to the left. "I don't get it. There's nothing there," he said, looking at a dark glade far off. "Hey, Ilika—you're really scared."

"No, I'm not." Ilika said slowly.

"What are you looking at then?"

"There."

"The glade?"

"Yes."

"Why??"

Ilika kept staring at it. "Because of the shadow that was there. It moved behind the trees suddenly when we turned to head back. It thought I didn't see, but I know it's there, watching me."

"What are you talking about?"

"I feel this shadow has been following me my whole life," Ilika explained.

"A shadow?"

"You think I'm crazy,"

"I never said that."

"But you were thinking it."

"No, I wasn't. I just don't understand what you mean."

"Forget it. You wouldn't understand."

"What kind of a shadow?" Riliya persisted. Ilika stopped.

"I don't know, Riliya. I really don't know. But—for some reason, I feel it following me sometimes wherever I go, and I can't help but think—I mean, I feel it harboring ill will towards me. It's as though I've done something to offend it, even though I can't imagine what that might be. You probably think this sounds crazy—"

"No, just weird. But if you want me to go see what it is—"

"No, Riliya, that's okay. There's nothing you can do to drive it away. Let's just go back home. It'll be a while before it follows me again."

"So why are they tearing everything down?" Iera Uffyeld-Ornenkai asked.

"Why?" her husband, Elkan Ornenkai repeated. "Because the government needs the room, that's why. But that's not what I wanted to talk about."

"What then?"  
"Well, you know I was trying to switch departments when we move house."

"Yes?"

Elkan took a deep breath. "I'm happy to say that the Science Cuncil has offered me a top position in the new regional Science Building."

"Well, that's excellent. How long before you can transfer?"

Elkan shrugged. "I'm not sure yet. But that isn't the best news. With my new position, I get to spend every Vahden of the tenday in the Central Federation Science Building near the Council Headquarters. They have group seminars to monitor the progress of their top divisions—I'll be given clearance to examine Kayrian and Tulorian creatures in the preservation parks. For some reason, the geneticists haven't produced a successful ectogenic clone yet."

"I thought cloning was banned by the Council." Iera Uffyeld-Ornenkai raised an eyebrow as she served herself some utasha from the large blue container on the table.

Riliya hadn't been listening to the conversation until his father mentioned that he had been moved to another location. Without seeming to pay much attention, he began listening carefully to their discussion, feeling somehow as though an important decision with regard to his future had already been made.

Ornenkai's little sister, Aia, began listening too, her eyes wide, but she seldom made a sound throughout dinner and chewed her food laboriously slowly; she was a reed-thin, sickly child about a year younger than Riliya, but with an angelic face and delicate, graceful arms. Their older brother, also Elkan Ornenkai, was several years older than them and had moved away for training before Riliya was born; the family seldom spoke of him, and Riliya often wondered if it were because his brother had done something wrong. Riliya couldn't help but wonder now if they were going to move his brother's things or leave them here.

"It is for humans," Elkan Ornenkai passed the blue container to Aia. "But there aren't many Kayrian or Tulorian specimens. Anyway, if you want it, the council has offered you a position in the Botanical division. Oh, I meant to tell you that I ran into your father on the tour of the Council Headquarters yesterday."

"Don't tell me, he's still angry that you took his beloved child away to the outer sectors."

Elkan laughed. "No, I think he's forgiven me for that. He says he's glad we have the sense to move back where we belong and give up that crazy dream of living the simple life—"

"We aren't exactly living in the Celestian provinces."

"I know—but he still doesn't realize we just wanted to make it on our own."

"The poor old dear. He wouldn't say it, but when I saw him at mother's memorial, he seemed so alone, as though he really needed us back in his life."

"Well, your leave of absence is almost over. He's got to understand that you'll be going back to research, that you won't have time to play nursemaid to him. Speaking of your mother, I can't understand why she gave it all up—why she left Astro-engineering for the life of a diplomat's partner."

"My aunt's partner gave up his medical career to accompany her to Kayria when she became representative." Iera shrugged.

"Yes, but your mother played a pivotal role in launching our last exploratory mission. What a waste of talent. Didn't you say that she helped design the Sesylendae?"

"Yes, she did." Iera's voice held a tinge of regret. "As a child, I did feel sorry that she had given up her career for father's. I don't remember much of the early years, except the day she took me to watch the explorers' launch. But I knew she had been involved in some kind of monumental undertaking. I guess that was part of the reason I was so determined to follow her path and not live up to Father's expectations that I would take his seat on the Council."

Riliya almost fell off of his seat. His mother had seen the explorers' launch? It was too much for him to believe. Why hadn't she said anything about it before? He had heard of the Sesylendae, Kudenka's explorers' ship, and had often imagined its voyage to the stars with a romantic's vision. The news that his own grandmother had helped design the starship shocked him. Why did his parents always keep the most interesting details of their lives from him? Riliya had only met his grandfather once, when he was too young to remember. He had no idea that his grandfather had a seat on the Council.

"I guess most of the sector will be temporarily relocated to the inner sectors until the reconstruction is finished." Elkan continued.

"What's going on, father?" Riliya interrupted. Elkan faced him with an impatient smile that didn't appreciate interruptions.

"The council has decided to rebuild the outer sectors, Riliya." His father glanced at him. "They're going to tear down the lower level housing and build up to the dome. They've been worrying about overcrowding and housing shortages, and to prevent future difficulties, they're going to move all of us in the shorter, older buildings in the outer sectors towards the city interior. We've been transferred to a community living center in one of the outermost city towers."

"One of the city towers?" Riliya had an image of the shining white buildings of the elite hierarchy, near the city center.

"Yes. We'll have a lot more space, and as I told your mother, she and I are going to be promoted to the regional Science Building."

"What about all of the people living out here?" What about the parks? Riliya thought.

"Most of them will be transferred to temporary housing in the towers, until the lower towers are finished. They'll be tearing out all of the transport tunnels and replacing them with the interconnections. The entire city will be linked, and transportation traffic will decrease. The council is planning to raise the standard of living for everyone in the city."

"But I like the city the way it is. Our house may not be big, but it's beautiful. The towers are nice, but I like the lower buildings. The carvings and murals in them are so interesting! And the lower buildings don't block out the view of the mountains." Riliya said, upset by this news.

"Don't worry, Riliya. You'll be able to see the mountains from the new quarters. But the lower buildings are old—they've been here for thousands of years. They were built strong and to last, but they've outgrown their efficiency. And once we've settled into our new home, you'll be able to focus more on your studies and less on boyish outings and stories. Maybe I'll take you in to the labs so you can learn what the life of a scientist is all about."

"They aren't stories father, they're legends." Riliya ignored him. "The comet riders were real people."

"Son, those are stories—childish fantasy."

"Not everyone thinks so." Riliya lifted his chin defiantly. "Some people believe in the ancient lore. They say they are the stories of our origins passed down before our ancestors wrote down their own history."

"He's right, Elkan." Iera interrupted. "Some of the scientists believe the ancient legends. They say life couldn't have evolved here the way it did without some alien pregenitor."

"Perhaps," Elkan conceded, "but I can't help but object to their terminology. 'Comet Riders' indeed. If our ancestors came here came on a ship, where is it?"

"Some say the ruins at Lake Firien are the remains of their ship." Iera commented.

"Yes, I know." Elkan said, irritated. "But how could so many people have arrived here on a single ship? It's ridiculous. Anything technologically advanced enough to hold so many people—and to have landed safely enough that they actually survived—should still be around."

"I suppose," Iera said, to ease the tension.

"Anyway," Elkan said, "we'll never solve the issue of where our ancestors came from, but who knows everything about the past but the people who lived it? We have to think of who we are and where we are going. And this family is going to move in less than two tendays, so I suggest one little boy stop dreaming nonsense and start thinking about packing up his things."

Riliya slung his mother's holoframe which held an image of the sea coast across his back to carry it from the hauler by the elevation device to their new apartment.

"Riliya, go down and collect the last of the load carriers from the transport," he heard his father call from the adjoining room, where Elkan and Iera Ornenkai were unloading their personal effects.

The Ornenkai family had few things to move in the end, since their new accommodations had built in sleep panels, a food dispenser unit, videocoms in every room, chronometers, self-cleaning features, a table and bench unit that slid out from the wall for meals.

They had packed their own raised seat panels for the lounge area, a large, open, unfurnished space in the center of the apartment. But other than the few heavy pieces, they had only brought their decorations and personal belongings from their former dwelling.

For the past tenday that Riliya had been confined to the dwelling to prepare for the move, he had spent much of his time daydreaming of the day when Kudenka's explorers would return, wondering how the planet would have changed by then. Riliya knew that with the time dilation effects of near light-speed travel, they would return many years into the future, a future he himself would never live to see. He thought jealously of the generations that would follow his, that might not be as interested as he was in the return of an ancient group of explorers.

Ilika would feel the same way. He had wanted to tell Ilika that his very own mother had been present at the launch of the first major galactic explorer mission, but he had not seen Ilika in several tendays. The older boy had stopped coming to their meeting place, and after a few days, Riliya had stopped expecting him.

Riliya didn't believe Ilika had forgotten him. Something else must have come up to keep Ilika from coming. And now it was Riliya who would not be able to make it to their meeting place, if Ilika ever returned to it.

Riliya called to the moving hauler to follow him, and the mechanized load carrier unit began to trail him to the elevation device when Riliya heard a familiar voice coming from the transport shuttle tube disembarkation panel. He stopped and turned around to look. The hauler suddenly collided into his heels, drawing out a reflexive shout from the young boy, but Riliya was too preoccupied to be distracted by the pain.

His own family had traveled ten minutes on the underground tube transport to the tower, since the upper level transport tubes had been temporarily shut down to reconnect them with the new proposed lower towers. The lowermost unloading area, illuminated only by the artificial glare of fluorescent lighting, had been closed off from the world above, but Riliya was pleased to discover the panoramic view from his room's observation panel. The clear transport tunnels and tubes didn't obstruct the sight of the mountains, but Riliya was soon disappointed to discover that a new construction would soon put a lower tower between him and the view he now enjoyed.

Riliya peered down the transport tunnel where dozens of families were unloading their belongings. Then near the end of the tube he spied his friend Ilika, towing a satchel on the ground behind him. Riliya told his own hauler to stay and rushed through the crowds towards his friend. Ilika looked up at the sound of an approaching stranger, but only half-smiled when he saw Riliya.

"I didn't know you were moving here!" Riliya exclaimed. "When I tried to find out where you were, even the public position locators couldn't find you!"

"Why didn't you send a message then?" Ilika said in a surly tone.

Riliya shrugged. "I was afraid my father would check my frequency channel to see what I'd been doing, so I was waiting until I had an opportunity to contact you on the public channels."

"Public channels?"

"They provide them for nothing here in the towers, you know," he explained.

"Father had grandfather arrange our accommodations." Ilika whispered cautiously, but his father was already out of earshot. "We had to move because they're tearing down our sector housing. Grandfather has a seat on the Council—and father wanted to live closer to his new position. He's been transferred to the regional Science building."

"What about your mother?" Riliya asked without thinking. Ilika looked away as though he had been slapped, his jaw clenched and his eyes squeezed shut to contain his emotion.

"She isn't coming with us," Ilika finally managed. Riliya blinked uncomprehending, and then realized what his friend had meant. Suddenly he knew why Ilika had not come to their meeting place in the last few tendays.

"She's dead," Ilika said; his bright cobalt eyes were in tears.

Chapter Fourteen

Riliya and Ilika often played in Ilika's apartment several floors down from the Ornenkai family apartment. Several tendays before Riliya had suggested that the two of them look for a new park to make their regular meeting place. Before the move, they had been to nearly every park in Ariyalsynai, but there were a few they had never seen that they had once talked of visiting.

The central botanical gardens were now closer than they had ever been, which would allow them to stay longer than they had before. But since the move, Ilika seemed content to remain indoors, and the two had fallen into a habit of visiting each other without leaving the tower.

Riliya had begun to notice the change in his friend since their separation, beginning with the second day after they had arrived. Riliya brought a bouquet of flowers identical to the one that Ilika had picked for his mother nearly a year before. He had gone to great trouble finding them that morning, returning late in the afternoon. Ilika hardly glanced at them as he took them from Riliya's outstretched hand.

"What's wrong?" Riliya had asked.

"I don't want them." Ilika said, giving them back to Riliya with a decisive gesture. Riliya couldn't hide his confusion; Ilika's hard expression softened. "Thank you of course, Riliya," he quickly added, "but I can't accept them. I want nothing near me that reminds me of death."

"But aren't they beautiful?" Riliya was looking at them.

"For now," Ilika said, shaking his head. "But tomorrow? The beauty fades too quickly. The container is a better gift, but I don't need it, either." Riliya put the flowers aside.

"I'll take them back later then."

"So, what does your father actually do?" Riliya wondered; it was getting late, and Vaelan Marankeil hadn't appeared.

"Oh, he's begun to work on improving the Federation starship computers and improving their memory storage and cognitive capabilities," Ilika answered. "He's also currently involved in a project to expand the computers' parallel mode and increase the range of interconnections between the electromagnetic synapses in the mechanized artificial intelligence units that coordinate some of the functions on unmanned probes."

Riliya's eyes widened at Ilika's explanation.

"He may have found a better way to integrate them with their laser-optic and crystalloid computer components." Ilika said, as though he were also an authority on the matter. "Father created the project and presented it to the council before we moved." Ilika added. "He's the one who created the nano-implants that the medical centers use to regulate the brain functions of people with supposedly irreversible brain damage."

"Oh."

They played a while, when the door abruptly sounded; Vaelan Marankeil was returning early from his lab in the Regional science building at Riloriyen. Ilika stiffened; he stopped, mid-sentence and his eyes became darting and nervous.

"You still sitting there, Ilika?" Vaelan directed at his son, in a sharp sardonic tone as he dropped his things in the entryway.

"Lazy, good-for-nothing..." Vaelan muttered under his breath as he came inside.

Ilika's face hardened. Ornenkai knew his friend was not lazy, and was highly motivated. He felt angry inside at the insult.

"Oh, ho, there Riliya." Vaelan said, approaching. "You're looking awfully well."

Riliya processed the tone and wasn't sure if the comment had been intended to be friendly or secretly censorious.

"Thank you." He said, simply.

"Maybe you can get my boy to start paying attention to his future. I'm sure your father has a plan for you. I'll bet he understands the value of hard work."

"Yes, sir," Riliya said.

"Good." Vaelan nodded. "You'll be good competition for Ilika then. Competition never hurt a friendship. You pay close attention to your friend there, Ilika, if you ever want to amount to anything." Vaelan paused. "Stop giving me that surly look, boy, or you can go live somewhere else."

Ilika said nothing. Vaelan finally turned away to head into his private workroom on the other side of the apartment. He was going away to spend his evening, as he spent his morning, trying to perfect his grand project.

"Marankeil, sir—" Riliya tried to defend his friend, but Ilika laid a gentle hand on his arm, quieting him until Vaelan Marankeil turned away.

"I know what you want to say, Riliya, but don't bother," Ilika's voice was small, sincere, and his eyes were bright and soft with feeling. "You can't do anything for him; ambition has already eaten his soul."

One morning several tendays later, Ilika had escaped his apartment shortly after his father left for the laboratory. His father had set him several questions to answer, but he had quickly finished them and hurried down to find Riliya. The two of them had spent the day playing games, pretending to be comet riders that had just crashed on the planet and had to build a new civilization.

"Well, Ilika, it's nice to see that you haven't been confined to your apartment," Iera said.

"Riliya, we're going to have to meet late tomorrow if we want to see each other." Ilika whispered as Iera headed to the meal distribution area and set in a program for the evening meal in the food dispenser unit. Meanwhile, Aia watched them, moon-eyed.

"Why?" Riliya asked.

"Father's taking me tomorrow to see the laboratory. It's time I started to learn about how the computers and mechanized units function, not just how to operate them, he says—"

"But you already work on all that."

"He doesn't know that." Ilika shrugged. "It's been nearly a year since I went with him to the laboratories, and since formal training is coming up, he says it's time he picks up his lessons again with me."

Ilika stayed with them for dinner; Ornenkai never appeared, having been delayed by data recording at his center.

"Mother, have you ever heard of the ruins at Lake Firien?" Riliya asked.

"I've seen some of the analyses on the scraps and the skeletal remains of an ancient ship they found there." Iera replied.

"You have?" Riliya repeated.

Iera nodded. "Some people think they aren't real but some elaborate hoax, but I don't think so. Anyway, why do you ask?"

"We've been playing comet riders today." Riliya answered.

"Oh," a light smile played around the corners of her mouth. "Well, I don't know about the legends, but a ship would have to be as large as the skeleton at Lake Firien if it were going to bring an entire civilization to our world. The only problem with that theory is that none of the ship itself has survived. If it were destroyed on impact, we would have more fragments of the exterior hull than have been discovered—and several million tons of scrap from the interior structure."

"Maybe someone stripped it for parts," Ilika suggested.

"Well, all I know is that in the event that the entire ship was blown apart, there shouldn't have been such perfect preservation of the interior skeleton." Iera said. "Most of the chemical analysts think the skeleton was built by somebody who wanted everyone to believe the ancient legends."

"Who would want to do that?" Ilika asked.

"The council thinks one of the strange people who live at Lake Firien could have built the ruins to establish themselves as keepers of the ancients' knowledge. The representative from Firien is always objecting to the council's proposals. The council thinks they are trying to gain favor with the people and increase the power of the Firien province."

"But don't a lot of people already believe in the comet rider legend?"

"Yes, most people do." Iera nodded. "But don't tell your father I said that. Riliya. Even some of our evolutionary and geological scientists agree that life should not have evolved as quickly on Seynorynael as it seems to have. Our star Valeria is too young. But most of them think that the story that the two waves of comet riders, those who arrived early in civilization and their brothers that followed later, are evidence that our people must have come in many small ships, perhaps escape vessels fleeing the natural disaster of our original home world."

"I wonder what made them leave." Ilika said.

"I don't know." Iera said. "In truth I think vanity keeps a lot of people from believing that we haven't actually advanced so quickly on our own merit. People would rather not believe that they have fallen from the greatness of some ancient ancestors, beings who were capable of traveling across space in one great ship."

"Do you think that the ruins at Firien could be the Havens of legend?" Ilika asked.

"I don't know, Ilika." Iera laughed. "I think the Havens are only a myth people have created. But if they did exist, the ruins at Firien may hold some answers we have yet to find. But if a person really wanted to know more about the Havens, they would do better starting in the lore records in the Firien province. Some of our technicians have been there, but a lot of the ancient records haven't been translated. Those that have been translated have already contributed a lot to our understanding of the ancient comet riders. I think that is the reason a lot of scientists believe in the legends, even if they don't agree about the ruins at Lake Firien."

"How far away is Lake Firien?" Ilika asked.

"It's too far a journey for young boys to make in one day." Iera answered. "Firien lies to the northwest, beyond the weather-safe ring. If you go to the archives at the cultural center, you can find a map and all of the translated records of the comet riders."

"Let's go the day after tomorrow," Riliya suggested when Iera got up to get something to drink, drawing a distracted Ilika from his thoughts.

"Of course," Ilika said. "Iera, why does Ornenkai hate it when we talk about the comet riders?"

Iera smiled at the dark-headed boy with his wreath of feathered hair falling into his eyes; she resisted the urge to mother him and sweep his hair back.

"You'll understand someday if you ever have children." She said, in that peculiar mysterious manner of grown-ups who enjoyed their secrets.

"I'm never going to have children." Riliya laughed. "Why would anyone want to have to take care of somebody else?"

Iera shrugged. "You know, your brother is going to have a child with his new wife." She said.

Riliya's mouth dropped open.

"Elkan?"

"He'll be visiting in a few tendays." She said, excited, but she said nothing about her own fears for her son. The younger Elkan Ornenkai had never realized his father's dreams for him, and she knew there was going to be a lot of tension between them. At the same time, she was worried about Riliya.

She knew Elkan had put all his hopes on his second child, and she was afraid Riliya would one day figure that out.

"Why do you let that Marankeil boy influence you, Riliya?" Elkan Ornenkai sighed. "He's a competitive, domineering little brat, and you've got better things to do with your time than to associate with him. Besides, I thought you would enjoy coming in with your mother and I to the laboratories for a change."

"He isn't." Riliya said quietly, aware that defiance was dangerous, but he didn't care.

"You don't know as much about people as I do."

"But father, I told Ilika I'd meet him tomorrow in the archives building. We've been working on learning the ancient language together."

"What useless knowledge," Ornenkai said, drawing a look of reproach from his wife.

"Look son, isn't it about time that you begin to apply yourself to some serious studies? Now that we are living in the towers, you have the opportunity to go to the Central Scientific Academy for your education. They won't accept you without some rudimentary training, but you waste all of your time with that friend of yours. If you spent half of the energy you do memorizing lore to embellish your fantasies, you'd have mastered more by now."

Riliya bit his lip and turned away. His father didn't understand. He couldn't abandon Ilika now. They were best friends. Riliya knew that Ilika threatened adults' comfortable superiority because he wasn't willing to give in to anyone or anything. Though older than Riliya, Ilika was the same size, and Elkan Ornenkai had made the mistake of underestimating the boy's character. But while Elkan Ornenkai found the boy intractable and restive, the younger Ornenkai admired Ilika's intellect and strength of will.

Riliya had long since learned the futility of confrontations with his father. He was never allowed to win, even with a rational argument, but the hope that a reasonable argument might one day work kept him thinking them up. Nevertheless, the best alternative to arguing for the present was to avoid defeat and save his dignity. Riliya returned to his sleep chamber and began to pack his satchel for his trip to the archives building. His father would have to drag him out of the apartment if he expected his son to join him! Riliya decided.

In the other room, Iera Ornenkai took up the battle for her son, as though she recognized many of the same characteristics in her husband and son that the other two refused to see and wanted to make peace between them. Though Elkan often appeared to be inflexible, she knew there were chinks in his armor.

"Elkan, you know how important ancient language and lore have become to Riliya."

"Yes, but so what?"

"You should listen to his ideas—he's as thorough in his research as you are when he talks about climate and science shaping our history."

"Maybe... " he sighed. "I know what I should do, but that isn't what happens. I don't mean to be so hard on him, but I know how difficult it is to succeed in Ariyalsynai, especially if I allow him to neglect his proper training. He's just a boy. How can he know what's good for him? And don't you see his potential when he talks about his hypotheses? I know he's afraid to share them with me, but I've heard him talking about it. Riliya's an intelligent boy. He needs to be challenged.

"He may not have genius for mechanics," Ornenkai amended himself, "but he can foresee problems. He's so analytical. He just doesn't realize that his gift would be best employed in a scientific field of study. Lore is very interesting to a young boy, but it lacks creativity. History is static."

"It's good for the imagination."

"Yes, but it doesn't change, Iera, and it can't provide the same kind of satisfaction to a curious mind as scientific endeavors."

"Elkan, Riliya's still a child." Iera sighed. "What harm can it be to let him dream a while longer of his comet riders? The real world you love will have him too soon, and he'll be consigned to the fate you have chosen for him because you'd have him succeed before he's happy."

"Iera—"

"Elkan, have you forgotten why we left for the outer sectors?"

"That was different." Elkan Ornenkai shrugged. "Your father wanted us to take up his diplomatic position, for you to succeed him on the Council—"

"Then why does Riliya have to choose our profession?"

"I'm not forcing him to, Iera, but I tell you, I see something in him. He's got a future ahead of him. His friendship with that Marankeil boy has got him dreaming about legends, but even when he's thinking up those ridiculous stories, he considers the effects of climate and technology rather than let his imagination run wild. He doesn't know that he could be a great scientist, if he applied his talents to it—"

"Because you value scientific study more than anything, but you can't see that it takes the same aptitude to decipher lore and learn the language of the ancients—"

"I'd be willing to allow him a career in evolutionary science, Iera. Many evolutionists have been involved in the investigation at Lake Firien, as well as chemical analysts."

"And I suppose Riliya's stargazing might come in useful if he chooses to become a astrochemist or astrophysicist, even if he had to leave us and go to the observatory on Nanshe?"

"Well—yes." Ornenkai admitted. "But I would of course leave those choices up to Riliya."

"Would you?"

"I only want the best for him. We've both seen life in the outer sectors."

"So?"

"Is it wrong to want more for Riliya? I merely want to give him the opportunity to make a choice. If after he's trained at the science academy, really put an effort into it, and he still prefers this lore nonsense to a respectable field—then... then I won't stop him from doing what he wants."

"I have your promise, Elkan?"

"Yes."

"All right." She sighed. "I won't object. But if you're going to send him away to your boyhood training center, at least wait until the cold season is over."

"Listen, Riliya," said Ilika. "It says here that the second wave of comet riders fell by a sea far to the west."

"Lake Firien?" Riliya looked across at Ilika from his view-search screen.

"There isn't anything about it." Ilika shrugged.

"Look what I've found, Ilika." Riliya said after a moment. "Here are some pieces of writing that were found in Ariyalsynai, written in the comet rider's strange language. The records say they may have been diaries of some kind, just the simple entries of ordinary citizens, or correspondences..."

Ilika headed over to read over Riliya's shoulder. The two of them had spent several tendays in the archives building, reading legends and looking through the few records that dated back ten thousand years. The building was nearly empty, but the two boys could not access the information at home without a record of their search being imprinted on their family computer grid.

"It says 'great leader... emerged' then there are a lot of words in another syllabary that aren't translated. It goes on scattered with a few more words that were identified. 'the destiny of our people' is repeated again—it looks like our word for destiny is the same as theirs. 'led by the one... new realm...' That's it. Sorry I called you. I guess it isn't very important. None of it makes sense—there's too much missing information."

Riliya looked up at Ilika, but the older boy had a far-off expression on his face.

"My mother said we inherited our beliefs of destiny from the comet riders," Ilika finally said.

"History is destiny?" Riliya laughed, repeating the first line of a well-known legend. "What do you suppose that means, Ilika?" Riliya asked. The two often posed the question to each other as part of a ritual, and usually the same answers were given, stock phrases they had learned in early childhood about the chain of being.

"Of course," Ilika said suddenly, as though answering a question he had posed to himself.

"If only someone could translate the missing comet riders' alphabets," Riliya sighed. "The ones the computer codes couldn't break."

"We have to find more records somewhere—so that we can find the repeating patterns and try to do it ourselves." Ilika said and stood. Riliya looked up at the chronometer and silently cursed. Elkan Ornenkai would be home soon and wondering where his son had gone.

Riliya looked at his friend. He wondered if Ilika cared as much about the lore as he did.

"Ilika, let's look for the Havens." He said, but almost lost his nerve when his friend turned a glassy-eyed stare upon him. He couldn't tell if Ilika were for or against the idea.

"Well of course we will, Riliya. We'll find the Havens. Then the secrets of our ancestors will be—ours." Ilika hopped from the archives dais to the ground level, where the crystalloid computer registered Ilika's presence with a reedy "good-bye".

"Ilika, are you going to remember me when we have to separate for training?"

Ilika stopped and glared at him as though this were the most foolish question in all the world.

"Of course!" He said. "I'll never forget you, Rilien Ornenkai."

"My little sister has a crush on you," Riliya said, thinking how Aia's eyes followed Ilika whenever he came to eat dinner with them.

"Does she?" Ilika only laughed.

"So, so why is it you don't have other friends?"

"I suppose I refuse to like people who dislike me for my temperament and then refuse to alter their opinions of me, even after I try to do everything I can think of to please them. You, Ornenkai, you weren't like everyone else."

"I yelled at you when I first saw you."

"Maybe. But you were there when I most needed a friend. A person doesn't forget that, Riliya."

"Ilika, you should try to make other friends. Forget that bully Hilemi. And forget what your father says when you go away."

"I wish I could, Riliya, but I can't." Ilika said, with a dark, hunted look in his eyes. "I remember everything they have done to me in detail, and I can't forget it. I just can't."

Before Riliya returned to his apartment that evening, Ilika persuaded him to stop by his apartment to show him something secret he had been working on since Vaelan Marankeil had taken his son to the science building.

"It's a little project I've been developing on my own," Ilika said, gesturing towards a blank viewscreen hooked into a wall computer by a large mass of wires. "First you have to put that neural helmet on. Then think of a memory—picture somewhere you've been." Riliya picked up the neural helmet and imagined his favorite spot in Gelyfaeon Park. Then he turned and looked at the viewscreen. The image appeared in the holo-field.

"That's nothing." Riliya said.

"Nothing?" Ilika said angrily, his deep blue eyes glowering at Riliya as he snatched the helmet away.

"They can project images from human memory at the holo-center—" Riliya answered, then suddenly stopped. The image in the holo-field had changed without being given a stimulus. The field was suddenly filled with blue and violet flowers. "Ilika, how did that happen?" Riliya asked tentatively, and Ilika smiled, forgetting his anger when he recognized Riliya's appropriate show of awe.

"The computer took your memories and built on them on its own. Every time someone adds to its memory bank, he leaves some of his own thoughts behind. But the computer doesn't just remember your memories. It can take on your dreams up until the present point in your memory bank, and then it will act on its own, as a separate entity. If you leave it alone, it will go back to the picture it likes of the sea coast. Only now it may also like to imagine some trees or those flying creatures you like..."

"How did you do that?" Riliya asked, incredulous.

"Father leaves me alone in the labs every morning. For a while, I just looked around, but about a year ago I started to pay attention. But I've been working on all kinds of computers as long as I can remember..."

"I usually hate computers, but I have to say that it's nice to see that a machine can learn what it likes."

"Why do you hate computers?" Ilika asked.

"Well not just computers—I hate machinery. It just sits there, unable to think on its own, so it's boring to me, unless I can use it to learn or play games. But even the games we can play with it are kind of boring after a while to me. And most of all, sitting staring at a computer isn't anything to a mountain view when you've scaled a range on your own—"

"You wouldn't understand, Riliya." Ilika shook his head and turned away. Machinery never disappears. Machines don't wither and die like the flowers you cherish.

Chapter Fifteen

Ilikan Marankeil wasn't paying much attention to the weather.

He left the dome of Ariyalsynai in the morning, early, before the sun had risen, wearing nothing but a thin shirt, pants, and broken-in boots, and headed into the wild lands looking for a place where he wouldn't have to deal with anyone shouting over the inefficacy of economical sanctions against Tulor as he trekked past students loitering around the gardens of the Lunei Science Center.

Specialization training was over for the tenday, and Marankeil wanted away from it all. The transports ran all night; he caught one that was completely empty and almost slept through the gate outside the dome, where the connecting train continued on to Kerrai.

Dark grey skies held off the dawn outside the dome, low dismal clouds which hung over the bare skeletons of the trees of the rural land beyond; a light mist lingered in the morning air. He found he liked the chill, and the grey skies. It was like walking into the murkier realms of human consciousness; the weather incited his mind towards philosophical reflection, but damn it—he was freezing!

What was it about the mist that fascinated him? He wondered. He seemed to like it against all reason.

If he thought about it, he would have realized that in his mind, the mist separated reality from the realm of dreams; he ascribed a supernatural power to an environmental phenomenon that his reasoning assured him was entirely natural and causal.

In the mists, the segments of time seemed to run together, as though he could step over the present and back into the past, or into the future. What ludicracy was this? He would never have admitted this feeling to anyone. Perhaps he felt this way because the mists obscured the dome entirely; he was lost in the primitive foothills of the wild lands, seemingly alone.

There were no mists within the environmentally controlled dome of Ariyalsynai. There was no rain. Had people once thought the rain superfluous? Didn't they miss it? Sunshine filtered down from the outside world and was often augmented by reflective mirrors; wind circulated within the dome by a mechanical process. The closest thing to rain had been the regimented showers of the gardens and arboretums; when he was young, Marankeil had found himself waiting for them, standing under the trees in the arboretums staring skyward, like a heathen waiting to embrace his religion.

Glorious sun-kissed days of the warm season—was it so surprising that he loved them as well? For did not all of humanity enjoy the warmth, the light, the beauty—the independence that the heat allowed the adventurous man? Yes, he did; yet there was at no moment a time when he was not aware that baleful radioactive light was killing them all, that this empyreal light had ushered in the old-age radiation disease. Later, he learned that the radiation permeated the mist, that the mist was no protection against the radiation, but this seemed hardly to matter; the prejudices he had formed in his youth still had an impact on his attitude and behavior.

That morning, however, he was trying not to think about the weather and just live in the moment without excessive contemplation.

He started walking, walking aimlessly into the trees, crunching over the white rime on the bare ground, fallen twigs, and scattered grasses. The sun had passed overhead when he returned towards the dome, set back to civilization by hunger pangs. He passed within a hundred paces of the station when he stopped, conscious of some presence near him.

He was aware of the shadow of the trees cast before him; he couldn't stop staring at the shadow on the ground. Was it moving?

He turned around sharply.

Someone had ducked behind a tree. He hadn't seen the person, but the sound hit his senses and was duly processed.

"Who's there?" He demanded, his voice turning hoarse. He cleared his throat, gazing about in curiosity for signs of footprints. Few people ever came outside the dome...

He knew it was the shadow. After so long, it had found him again.

But he wasn't a child anymore, a poor creature afraid of the dark.

It was time to confront his nemesis.

"Show yourself," he demanded in a voice that was strong, ice-edged.

He waited, his eyes narrowing critically, squinting in the sylvan gloom as though this would help him to see better.

After a moment, he heard a crunching sound.

A woman dressed in a lilac-colored coat the shade of wild sherin flowers darted her head and shoulders from around the sheltering tree; with an abashed smile, she stepped over a clot of dried twigs in her way, scratching up her exposed calves as she hurdled a bush and stood in the open path, hurriedly straightening her attire.

The sight of her, almost ridiculous in her fretting, prompted a smile that welled from deep in his senses. He almost recanted his firm belief that all women were actresses, watching her. What woman would try to act so ridiculous?

He took several easy strides towards her to check out the scratches.

"Really, I'm fine," she protested, raising a defensive hand as he came towards her. He ignored her, squatted down to take a look at her leg, brazenly reached a hand down to examine it.

It was remarkably well-formed, but there weren't any scratches on it.

"Didn't you cut yourself?" He asked, scratching his own lip in confusion.

"No," she said. "But the coat tore. I'll just have the android units at the Lunei Center sew it for me."

"The Lunei Center? That's where I'm training—"

He stood up, facing her, stopped.

The woman was lovely—quite pretty, but he had seen prettier ones in his life, yet there was something particularly enchanting about the shade of her eyes.

"I'm looking for vegetation samples," she lied quickly. "Someone forgot to leave the keln leaves we collected in the hydration unit and they're husks now."

"You're a scientist?" He asked. "I mean—a botanist in specialization training?"

"A biologist, actually. I should be heading back now—"

"But you haven't gathered your specimens." Marankeil observed. "I have all day, so how about I help you?"

"That really won't be necessary—"

"Well, then, I'll just take a turn and follow you this time."

"Excuse me?"

"You were following me."

"I wasn't. I was looking—"

"Shouldn't you have gone south if you wanted any keln leaf specimens that the frost hasn't hit?"

"Well..."

"You know, I think I've seen your face around the center before." He commented, scrutinizing her. "Nor are you dressed properly for a foray."

"That's all a matter of taste—"

"You were following me," he declared.

She hesitated, the look in her eyes like a trapped animal; he was surprised though, that there was no betrayal of accompanying fear there. There was a mark of steel in her eyes, beneath the soft, sea blue pools.

"Yes, I was following you," she admitted finally.

"Well, you found me." He said, scratching his neck, blinking disinterestedly for all the world, but his eye kept straying to her neckline. "So, are you going to tell me what you want, or do I have to guess?"

She appeared flustered a moment, as though she hadn't ever anticipated such a confrontation.

"I wanted to get to know you."

Now he was interested.

"You did?"

"I wanted to see if all I had heard about you was true—to see what I could do to—to—"

"To what? You've got to stop stuttering and just say it."

"I can't—"

He stopped; she was shivering. "You're cold," he pronounced. "Let me... I left my coat," he snapped his fingers in irritation. "Well, why don't we just hurry back to the transport, since we're both obviously going back to the same place now that your game is up—"

"It wasn't a game," she insisted, with a dark, serious tone most women could never pull off effectively.

He liked her better already.

She made no protest, though, as he took her arm to lead her; then, just as they neared the transport, she cast a glance back over her shoulder. He watched with a keen eye.

"What are you looking at?" He asked.

"Nothing," she replied, shaking her head. "Just a shadow that... seems to follow me from a distance."

His hand on her arm abruptly tightened as they stepped towards the dome.

"Well, you have the advantage." Marankeil said, once they were sitting on the transport.

"What?"

"You know who I am, and I haven't got a clue who you are."

"Elera," she answered. "Elera Erlenkov."

"Well, Elera, do you mind explaining how you know me?"

"I work in the building one over from yours. I see you around from time to time."

He digested her answer.

"Whatever made you decide to study biology?"

"What's wrong with it?"

"Hey, don't be defensive. I just wondered."

"Well, maybe I study it because animal motives are so much easier to comprehend than those of human beings. Isn't that why you're into artificial intelligence? You don't get along well with people, do you?"

"I won't take that comment as an insult, but I rather thought we were getting on marvelously."

"I mean you don't get along with most people. Not many people spend their morning tramping around in frost—"

"No, not many, but you did." He pointed out.

"I had my reasons."

"Don't we all? But if you don't tell me what your reasons were, I'll have to assume that you followed me because of something as meaningless as an infatuation—"

"I wanted to know if you were the one who created the prototype on The Memory Project."

His expression worked into a blank stare.

"How did you know about that?" He demanded.

"I heard a rumor that someone at our center had created the computer who could project memories and electronic thoughts to other computers, and so I did some investigating—"

"No one knows about that," he said, looking at her. "What kind of person—" He shook his head. "You aren't what I thought at all."

"What did you take me for?"

"No, actually, I didn't think you were foolish," he amended himself. "But I could see that you were trying hard to project that image."

"And if I was?"

"It's too late. You've exposed yourself to me," he said. "Some people protect themselves by shielding their true natures, but you've made a blunder—"

"I didn't intend—"

"Don't even think of apologizing for being intelligent and having purpose or ambition. But don't even think of denying any of it. I won't let you, because frankly, I couldn't be more pleased. Yet I understand the necessity of the play; you have every right to shield yourself from the mindless creatures who would exploit or denounce you."

"You're very critical of people."

"Yes."

"Are you always so severe? Not everyone deserves censure; the students at the center—"

"Are a mixed bag, just as society is a mixed bag."

"Maybe. But everyone has potential—" She stopped herself; his expression was stony, revealing nothing, but she seemed to be looking past him. "You don't believe me. But you did once."

The way he stared at her almost betrayed a hint of his surprise.

"Yes," he said after a time. "Before I grew up, I always attributed more character and competence to people than they deserved." Marankeil's mouth formed the barest hint of a smile, but a smile entirely ironic and in no way amused. "I attributed order and purpose to the world, not knowing that the world is tediously monotonous and functions by simplicities and half-hearted efforts. Not to be mean unnecessarily to anyone, but it is true."

She said nothing for a while; the train whisked along, suspended by electromagnetic power, with but the faintest sound of winds buffeting it. Outside, the white towers of the inner city ring loomed; they were approaching their stop.

"When I was young," she said, "I used to fall asleep on these things. My friend was always talking about philosophy, but I thought I didn't have time for it. I tried not to dwell on human nature. Now I find myself fascinated by it."

"When I was young, I wanted to save the world," he said suddenly. "Silly, huh? Don't laugh," he warned. "Well, I did. I wanted to save people from their worst selves. I wanted people to be remembered and honored. I wanted to protect them, to inspire them, to draw out their best—"

"Why? For what purpose?"

"To make the world better. But then I realied that people in general don't care enough about what could be better."

"No more," she interrupted. "I don't want to hear another word against people in general. I'm one of those 'people in general'."

"I wasn't including you, though, in my criticism."

"Well, thank you for your generosity, but—"

"You think I'm hard-hearted. Would it interest you to know that I went to the wild lands because my childhood friend and I used to roam the foothills, dreaming of adventure, and that I was suffering a momentary attack of sentimentality?"

"Yes, yes," she hurried him along, inexplicably uncomfortable.

"I suppose there are moments in childhood too perfect to be forgotten, and too painful to be remembered. Moments when I wanted to suspend time forever," Marankeil said, with a self-conscious, hollow laugh.

"You did?" she returned, struck by the horror that she had once also wished for the same thing.

"The train's stopping at Lunei now," he said after a moment. "I'll walk you back to your building—"

"No, I think I'd better go back myself."

She hurried off the transport, before his words could stop her.

Did she actually believe that he gave his opinions so freely to just anyone?

She was different, he could sense that well enough, and he wanted to confide what most mattered to her.

How, then, could she think that she had passed out of his life? That he would let her pass out of his life, when she worked but a short stroll from the artificial intelligence center?

Marankeil made it a habit of dropping by her work when he had the time, sometimes daily for a few minutes, sometimes once a tenday, and then he refused to leave until several hours later, when she insisted on going home for the day, without letting him accompany her. He tried to reach her by comnet on occasion, but when it became clear she didn't respond to anything short of personal appearances, he stopped bothering and made the spontaneous visits exclusively.

Most of the time she was busy doing something when he found her in her lab, and he just started conversation, unless her lab group was still there, but she tended to work the longest hours; she always responded to the argument he presented, whatever it was, no matter how she seemed to fight against arguing with him every single time.

Thus far, their relationship was unusual in that neither of them acknowledged that it even existed.

Despite the fact that Elera made no attempt to return the casual attentions Marankeil gave her, to even agree to any excursion with him outside her lab, he had the impression that she was struggling against her composure not to respond to him, and that at some point, she would capitulate to what he felt was a positive inclination she secretly harbored towards him.

"My director is going to come back any minute, and I'm supposed to be finished with this." She said one afternoon, gesturing to the data entry.

"So?" He said, scratching his chin.

"Stop being so unreasonable," she pleaded.

"Me?" He bristled at the word. "I'm not the one who refuses to accept a simple offer to so much as go for a walk together. Are you afraid of being seen consorting with me? Unreasonable—ha! I'm not the one who stubbornly ignores her own judgments and gut feelings. You're still treating me as an enemy—"

"I have my reasons."

"Explain them."

"You wouldn't understand."

"You never try to make yourself understood."

"I don't have to respond to that."

"Now you're being petty. Perhaps you aren't what I thought you were. Perhaps you are as fickle and intractable as any woman can be at her worst—"

"I'm not, and that's insulting."

"Just because you've indicated you're as intelligent as me doesn't make it true. You haven't proved this to me rationally," Marankeil said, with a sly tone. He waited a moment.

She rose to the argument, but ah, how she kept calm! She was angry—he could see he had made her angry. That thought delighted him/

"I may or may not be. Because I do not wish to flaunt my intellectual principles doesn't mean I do not possess intellectual and reasoning abilities equal to yours. I don't know the answer, however, but you certainly are sure of yourself."

He laughed at her. This was his favorite game, a game he had devised of testing her character. She passed his standard, yet again.

"You never disappoint me." He said. "So—"

"What do you want?" She said, only her eyes defensive. Would they ever stop being defensive?

"I think you know what a compromise entails."

"A compromise?"

"I'll stop pursuing you, if you agree to meet me half-way."

"What exactly does that mean?"

"Well, I adore talking to you, but I hate standing for hours on end, so from now on, I want you to meet me from time to time—in a public place, of course. Anywhere you want."

"Why are you being so persistent?" She wondered, with a strange, lost expression.

"Because," he returned, "I have never respected a woman before you, or cared so much about her. And that makes me rather pleased."

The cold season descended upon the Ariyalsynai dome in full force, darkening the skies to the point that the artificial illumination beacons switched on. Marankeil found his work drawing him away from his meetings with Elera for several tendays; then, finally, one afternoon, he ran into her coming out of the biological building on his way across the open forum towards the student's residential building.

Marankeil's expression betrayed a momentary glimmer of having forgotten her importance to his life; one chance meeting was enough to rekindle his enthusiasm in seeing her, and perhaps to augment his pleasure.

"Ah, Elera!" he called to her, and she approached.

They soon sat by the open forum on the ground under a tree, filling in those necessary details of work and progress; after a moment, he came to the conclusion that she still wasn't quite able to let her guard down around him.

"Sometimes, I would like to know what other people are thinking," he said suddenly, staring at her.

She stopped mid-sentence in her story about the humanroid project.

"What if you didn't like what you found?" Her voice held a tremulous quality he wasn't accustomed to hearing from her, and he grew irritated.

"What do you know about it, my dear?" he laughed mockingly.

She got up to leave.

He pulled her back down, not viciously, not violently. It wasn't difficult; she didn't really want to go.

"Sorry," he offered.

"You don't like it when I get angry at you." She observed.

"On the contrary," he said, "I don't mind your anger. The only thing I don't like about you is when you undermine your own value by venting unnecessary fears to me."

"Shouldn't I leave when you insult me, though? I honestly shouldn't let you get away with it."

"Perhaps you shouldn't, but I use that as a defensive tactic, not an offensive one," he said.

"Anyway, I have been angry at you because of the way you think and behave at times. You can't save me from my secret wishes and desires! Besides, Elera, you can't go around saving others without losing something of yourself, or perhaps forgetting who you are. You are not here to rescue the lives of others! You have a single purpose that is far better than pretensions to selfless, self-sacrificing nobility—"

"Oh?"

"To be true to yourself and your own wants and needs. You have to live for yourself, before you can live for everyone else, or your benevolent intentions are meaningless. How can anyone trust you to help them if you will not even help yourself? You should care most about yourself!"

"I do know myself. And I know what I need to do." She said, her voice hard all of a sudden, and derisive of him.

He smiled. "Good. "

She watched him, suddenly shrugging off an ambivalent sensation. "'O, most imperfect light of human reason'," she intoned, "'that mak'st us so unhappy to foresee what we can least prevent. Pursue thy wishes, and glory in them; there's in shame no comfort, but to be past all bounds and sense of shame.'"

"I like that."

"I thought you would. But I can't take credit for coming up with it—"

"Where did it come from—"

"An ancient writer I once read," she said quickly to avoid discussing it, "but anyway, how do you know so much about what I need, about what is best for me?" she asked, returning to what he had said.

"I don't," he admitted. "I just substituted your needs for mine according to my own philosophy."

"You seem to have high ambitions, for a man who won't admit to anyone that he was responsible for The Memory Project."

"Perhaps. But it is those of us who hide in shadows who crave more than anything to be at the center of it all."

They were watching a couple walking by a few days later while sitting under the same tree; minutes later, the couple were shamelessly kissing in the middle of the golden grass field, heedless to passers-by.

"That Pesden is a fool." Marankeil observed.

"How do you know?"

"Men sense these things about each other."

"What does she see in him, then?"

"Who knows?"

"He's considerate."

"He's insincere."

"Maybe, but you can't deny the power of the illusion. Most people love what they think is a loving heart, not an indifferent one." She sighed. "There is no reward in this life for selfishness, unless solitude is something you can live with."

"Hmmm," he said, stroking his chin. "Well, you seem to like being by yourself most of the time." Marankeil commented.

"So tell me, and this is off the subject," he said suddenly, "is it possible to be moral and act morally—and let's assume the simplest understanding of the word here—if you're always by yourself, with no one else to benefit from your actions or there to judge your mistakes?"

"All of this philosophy again." She sighed.

"You know you love to argue with me." He laughed with a seductive smile.

"No wonder you're into artificial intelligence. You never stop arguing."

"Is it possible?" He repeated the question. "In other words, if no one knows you're being moral, and you're alone, and no one benefits—don't you see it doesn't matter to the universe how we behave?"

"Yes, it does matter." She said, disagreeing with him.

"How, in your humble opinion?"

"Because whatever we do in this reality, whether or not we estrange ourselves from each other—even by flying to another world to try to escape others or—even being shipwrecked there, alone—our actions influence the environment for the bad or for the good, which is what will endure for others to find. We have a choice in anything we do or don't do, including—"

"The environment has nothing to do with morality," Marankeil said with a dismissive laugh. "If there are no people in it except one. There is no society comprised of a single individual." He leaned back on the ground, growing indifferent. "And if there is no society, there is no morality necessary to govern anything—except the law of the fittest, the law of survival."

"But the environment is related to society," Elera said.

Marankeil looked up, almost against his will. "How?"

"We can't escape our connection to all things that have been or will ever be—but even if we choose not to live around or with anyone else, it is still possible to act morally, because what we do to the world around us will eventually affect others, even if we don't live to see the effect we have."

"Hmmm." He paused. "So by your account, even this tree seems imbued with a soul. You wouldn't like it if I hacked it to pieces." Marankeil made a swinging gesture with his arms towards the nearest sedwi tree.

"No, but what has that got to do with anything I said?"

"Maybe it doesn't," he shrugged, "but you seem to think that evil or goodness is our natures; whether or not we live in society, it makes no difference—you might as well say evil exists in us from the moment we're born and that society has nothing to do with it—it would amount to the same thing as your argument," he threw out, irritated.

She stared at him. "And you don't agree?"

"No, I don't," he shrugged again, then leaned back against the grass casually, folding his hands behind his head. "If evil does exist at all, it is not in the self but in the society that by and by robs us of our innocence."

She was silent.

After a moment, he looked up.

"I don't want to argue anymore with you—today," he said.

"Really?" She returned. "Then let's just stop."

"Tell me, who in the world deserves to live the most, in your opinion?" Marankeil asked Elera with an only half-serious laugh; the longest cold season had ended, and he had found her one afternoon, sprawled on the warm, sun-dry grass in a recreation field just outside the center where some of the students went to study.

The light seemed content to linger over her, he thought jealously; as he watched her, his other senses came alive, and he became aware of the scleropods chirping under the grasses, the soft whispers of the artificial wind as they were caught in the tangled bushes away on the verdant field. The wind caught the soft pink blossoms of the sedwi trees nearby; flower petals began to fall like pink snow upon the fields, carpeting the grass and the golden attorea flowers waving in the breeze.

Marankeil plucked a tall grass blade from the ground and started to caress Elera's bare calf with it.

"I don't think it's a matter of deserving but more of luck—you asked me this yesterday, remember? And I didn't much care for the subject then—"

"Okay, another philosophical question, then. If it were possible to have it, what would you do with absolute power?"

"I don't know." She answered, uncomfortably, turning towards him. He was sitting beside her, legs folded before him. "Is there a right answer to this question?"

He looked at her. "You would help people," he inferred.

"Maybe."

"Philanthropy doesn't exist, though. Anything you do to help people is for the reward it gives you in making you feel good about yourself."

"What if I had nothing to gain?"

"You feel good about doing good deeds. This bolsters your ego, so you do profit."

"But if I outlive the people whom I help or if I remember longer than they do—"

"You still feel good. You still profit."

"What if I knew I had a certain amount of time and nothing else to do, so I might as well do what I think will improve the quality of life of those around me—"

"No more of those 'what ifs'. Don't tell me you wouldn't be tempted to use absolute power for yourself, or for whatever you pleased, and not give a damn about what happened to anyone else." He said it to test her, expecting her to deny his statement.

"Oh no, I won't tell you that I wouldn't be tempted to do what I wanted to do." She said, agreeing with him. "I think it would be a struggle every day to do what I think is right, in order to live with myself. I think—I know I would fail sometimes, however hard I tried."

He stared at her, unable to believe that she had been so honest with herself and with him, unable to believe that she had given him the answer he had been searching for.

"Elera—you're afraid of power." He announced, after a moment's pause.

"Yes."

"Or rather, of misuse of power. Of your own power."

"Yes."

"You shouldn't be."

She sighed. "Look, I've got to go," she announced suddenly, clambering to her feet; a few grass blades clung to her shorts. He saw them but did not brush them off.

"Where?"

"I left some data back in my room. I have to retrieve it before I go back the lab."

"I'll come with you. Don't worry, I have no intention of attacking you, my pristine beauty," he added, as she shot him a skeptical glance.

He wasn't even sure why she agreed.

It turned out she lived in the far residential building on the fourth level. Her room was small, but the windows made it seem larger. There was a sleep panel still extended taking up most of the room, a small desk with electro-pads strewn across it, but almost no decoration, apart from a silver necklace with a tear-shaped, polished, lapis-colored stone set at its center lying on the desk; it seemed to have been recently reshaped by a lapidary.

"You don't believe in useless trinkets. You don't own much." He commented.

"Let's just say I live a nomadic lifestyle."

"Tell me, then—so when was the last time you lived for the moment?" he asked suddenly.

"I don't have time for this right now."

"I'm being serious."

She seemed unable to recall; a fine line formed between her fair brows as she considered the question. "Live—for the moment?"

He nodded. "And I don't mean act like an idiot who thinks living for the moment is doing whatever foolish thing he wants without worrying about the next day's consequences." He explained quickly, in case she mistook his sincerity for insipidity.

"Then tell me what you do mean." Elera said.

"Living for the moment means for once putting aside all of the things you tell yourself you have to do, and submitting to all that is good that inspires us as a people. Then you have to put yourself back, back to a time when you could just sit in the sun and feel the sun and nothing else. Climb a hill and just experience the climb rather than thinking about where you're going. Or listen to the rain, just listen, not thinking about getting wet, not thinking about how long it's going to take for your clothes to dry. If you're living for the moment, you shouldn't be thinking about that. You should be living the moment, and nothing else. And if tomorrow comes, there'll always be time to worry then."

She was stone silent.

"I thought so," he concluded after a moment, reading her expression.

"You thought what?"

"We're both the same." He declared. "We both wish we could live for the moment now, but we can't."

"You were a dreamer." She guessed, as though not liking her own conclusion.

"Perhaps briefly," he admitted. "Apparently you were, though, and more so than I."

"I despised duty." She corrected him. "And I had my ideals, the same as anyone. But when I was growing up, I didn't get much chance or time to dream. There was too much going on—"

"But you were a dreamer on some level, despite that. Dreamers have a hard time," he continued, "always looking to the future as a source of hope. Some of them can change, though, when life is difficult for them, into such hard men."

"I don't believe that. I think that dreams can't die as long as we live—or we die on the inside. Without our hopes and dreams, and we must fight to defend, keep, and nourish them, well then—we've got little to live for." She argued, leaning against the desk chair, suddenly animated. Her own zeal seemed to surprise her, but she continued. "To lose your dreams is difficult, though it happens so often. It can be destructive. Decency hinges upon love, hope, faith..."

"Interesing idea." Marankeil sighed. "All true, but a luxury nonetheless. The survival of the fittest is the law that governs the universe."

"You are the cynic, but perhaps I should say you are right. You don't believe in decency, do you, as something that important to the race?"

"I have a vague notion of what it means to other people." Marankeil amended her statement. "Decency or indecency—they're the same to me. I simply don't live by other people's rules, moral or legal. Besides, who decides what is decent?"

"Good point." Elera returned. "But I believe in good. And the power it wields for the greater good."

"You've reduced this argument to absolutes again—you're right, and I'm wrong, and the truth is simple." He sighed. "Who decides what is good?"

"Every man must decide for himself, and there is law that we set out as a society, that we decide as a group."

"That a few decide, to keep others down." He said.

"Look, I have to go." Elera said, having had enough.

"I also know that."

"What?"

"That you love to run away from me. But someday, you won't want to."

She left in a hurry, heedless of whether or not he stayed.

Marankeil was still there when Elera returned, several hours later.

"I thought you'd never get back. I'd almost concluded that you don't even sleep—"

"What are you doing here?" Elera demanded.

"You have a strange fascination with skipping stones and watercolors."

"Yes," she nodded. "I adore simple pleasures. The 'last refuge of the complex' so to speak."

"Wherever did you hear that?" He laughed; she knew by now that this laughter was not derisive, as much as it could be taken that way.

"Somewhere."

"What should I do to balance my life, would you say? I have no time for simple things, but I liked the idea of pleasures. Perhaps you could suggest an activity for me that is pleasant—"

"I'm all out of ideas," she said quickly.

"I do have one."

"You should go."

"Why?" He demanded.

"Because."

"You don't enjoy pleasure?" Marankeil said, looking hard at her.

"I haven't got time for this," she returned. "I'm busy."

"Busy busy shmizzy. You are evading what I want."

"I am busy," she returned.

"You are trying to get away from me. But, I think you should give in and love me, since I already love you."

"I can't—" she said, stepping back. He got up off the sleeping panel and headed towards her. "I never wanted— I was only hoping to change your fate..."

"What are you talking about?" He demanded. "Change things?"

She grew distraught; tears wouldn't come, but she staggered back, nervous and slightly dizzy.

He helped her to her panel, turned, and left the room.

But now he knew that she was hiding something from him, and he was going to find out exactly what that was.

Perhaps he wore a knowing smile across his face five days later when he found her lying in the field again, her favorite retreat of late. He refused to speak with her there, though, and uncharacteristically insisted on taking her to the small park beyond and its sheltering grove of tall sedwi trees for the sake of privacy; he had some very important news to divulge, by his own admission.

Why did she go so willingly? he wondered. Why, despite his superficially calm demeanor, did she seem so prepared for what he was going to say?

"Who are you, Elera?" He demanded finally, leaning casually against a stone fountain situated in the middle of the remote sedwi grove. "You weren't trained in Kilkor, like your report says. They've never heard of you there. I know. I checked it out."

"You think I'm a fraud?" She returned.

He leapt to his feet suddenly, reached forward and grabbed her arm. "You have more of a right to be here than anyone," he said, his voice strong. "The humanroid project would have failed without you. You are one of the most brilliant people I've ever known. That wasn't my question. I want to know who you really are."

"What does that matter?"

"It matters. Tell me."

"I don't like to be told what to do," she said, pulling away. "If you think I've lied to you—"

"I don't give a damn about what you tell anyone else, but I want the truth from you."

"You believe in truth so suddenly?"

He wanted to slap her, and he wanted to crush her in his arms. He wanted to kiss the sting from her face, to hold her now, and so much more. He loved her, loved her, hated her, loved her more.

Without her, he was alone, and he felt it acutely.

Marankeil wanted her to be with him for as long as he lived.

Meanwhile, she was staring at him with a profound horror in her eyes.

"What is it?" he demanded. "Why are you looking at me like that?"

When she didn't answer, he grabbed her by the arms again. He was conscious of the fact that he was acting against his deepest beliefs; he didn't believe in exerting physical force on anyone, at least he hadn't until now. He found the sensation ignited the animalism in his soul. He felt like crushing her in his arms—he found he couldn't think straight at all and fought to.

"Who are you?" He said.

She didn't answer.

"Tell me."

"I already did. Anyway, what right do you have to question me?"

"Because," he replied very quietly, "right now I want you more than anything I've ever wanted in all my life."

She just stared at him; he tried to crush her again with kisses. The more he tried, the more forceful they became.

After a moment, though, somehow, miraculously, she was able to free herself from his grasp.

Suddenly, he felt awkward, ludicrous, infuriated. He reached forward again to grab her with all the strength in his body, to force her to submit to his desire, for his life would be very nearly suspended in time until he could have her the way that he wanted—

But she was able to pull free. How?? The impossibility of it stunned him for a moment.

From a distance, at the entrance to the grove, she stopped, stood in defiance of his love, he was certain. Wasn't there a triumph in her eyes he had mistaken for defensiveness? She had obviously just toyed with him all along.

For the first time, he had no verbal repartée ready for the situation, and for the first time, he had no desire to say anything.

Shocked, Marankeil leaned far back in the fountain and let the forceful spray pound his body raw.

Chapter Sixteen

"Hey, Ornenkai, could you go to the computer terminal and ask it if there's anything in the memory bank about Kayrian macton cross-linkages?"

Ornenkai had just entered the laboratory when his lab partner Lerney threw out the request without even turning around. Lerney, a short, slight-framed biologist with an odd sense of humor and a penchant for practical jokes stood bent over the microscanner, and for once his tone of voice had been serious.

"Our tirani specimen is dying," Lerney added, letting a hint of disappointment enter his voice.

The two lab partners had raised the tirani clone since its birth ten months ago. A strange pigment discoloration on the soft fur under the creature's belly and a sudden listlessness had led the two researchers to investigate for signs of disease. Ornenkai had left the macroscopic analysis to Lerney, but Ornenkai had been putting his own expertise in biochemistry to use in trying to determine the cause of the strange rapid-aging disease that they had observed in their tirani in order to find a possible cure.

Lerney's conservative statement expressed the situation—the tirani was beyond all hope.

Ornenkai stopped in front of the computer terminal. He was rather tall and thin in a way that suggested he had just finished growing and needed time to fill out; his forearms were sinewy, and his hands large but dexterous. His curly hair had straightened out since childhood; despite the labcoat, the severity of his expression when he could muster it, he appeared almost angelic, like one of the cordan statues set around the botanical fountains.

Ornenkai's mouth quirked into a concentrated frown.

The tirani's disease and the sight of the computer terminal had suddenly recalled an image of Ilika Marankeil—an image eternally youthful in his recollection. He had not thought of his childhood friend Ilika in several years, not since the early days of his training, when his father sent him under protest to a center far from home, where he was to acquire a singularly excellent education.

He had acquired it, but at a cost.

When Ornenkai tried to contact Ilika, he learned that the young Marankeil had also been sent away to an advanced technological institute in Melacre, and after a while, the two had lost touch.

Where was Ilika now? Ornenkai couldn't help but wonder.

Now, he found himself paralyzed by the unexpected memories returning to him. The years in between had forced him to drown out the dreams he had cherished as a young boy. He had long since embraced pragmatism, and made reason his faith. A recollection of his former excitement in the days he and Ilika had gone off adventuring and then researching their comet rider heroes struck him with unexpected pain, but he convinced himself this sentimentality was pointless.

For a moment, he thought the recollection would pass, as though the older Ornenkai would disdain such fantasies.

A few minutes later, they were still there.

He was getting annoyed.

He grew increasingly irritated when they hadn't retreated ten minutes later. Once again he felt their hold on him, and he wondered randomly if he could still read the ancient language he had learned as a child.

"Hey Ornenkai, what's keeping you with that file?" Lerney called.

"Sorry..." Ornenkai offered, and set to work on retrieving the information. Keeping his thoughts focused on the tirani helped him to put Ilika out of his mind.

Several hours later, the two lab partners were finishing monitoring the tirani's life signs for the last time that evening before leaving the laboratory. In their absence, the computer analyzers, mechanized units in both android and humanroid forms, would continue to take care of the creature.

"So, where are you headed after the specialization ceremony?" Lerney asked.

"The Central Research Center," Ornenkai responded absently, still thinking about the tirani. With the disease in its final stages, it was unlikely to survive the last tenday of their training. He couldn't imagine coming in to find the little creature already dead. He had always thought they would give it back to the institute as a viable specimen where it would live out a full life.

"That's a remarkable position, but it isn't a Specialists' Center." Lerney continued.

"I know." Ornenkai admitted.

"You just surprised me, that's all. I guess I thought you would be going on to further research in your field. The Central Research Center welcomes specialists from all of the fields, I heard."

"That's true. The varied teams there combine for Federation research projects." Ornenkai explained.

"So that's why you studied under so many different field researchers. I thought you must just enjoy pain."

Ordinarily Ornenkai would have laughed at Lerney's last remark,

but he was suddenly distracted by the idea that the largest artificial intelligence section and starship computer development program had been established at the Central Research Center, within the buildings of the Scientific Center of Learning.

Several tendays after the specialization ceremony, Ornenkai stumbled on the disembarkation platform at the Central Research Center in Ariyalsynai; dear Ariyalsynai—the precipitous white towers were exactly as he remembered them.

"Do you want me to wait?" A mechanized voice sounded behind him, and Ornenkai looked down at the small android transport towing his things. He shook his head, and the transport moved ahead of him to take his things up to his new laboratory.

Several days passed before Ornenkai had gotten all of his belongings in order. The delay was partly due to the numerous meetings he had been asked to attend to begin a joint research project and partly because he spent too much time stopping to talk to strangers while wandering around familiarizing himself with the building.

About a tenday after he had arrived, Ornenkai was well into his analysis of tirani x-strand replication, but he had some work to do before going to the developmental project meeting scheduled that afternoon. He stepped from the elevation device into the dark corridor before his laboratory, wondering why so many of the staff scientists had been called to attend.

Only a few scientists were in the building this early in the morning, most of those that were having stayed since the previous evening. Many of their work necessitated that they keep unusual hours, and some of the experiments had to be checked around the clock. Every laboratory had a sleeper panel installed in case an experiment needed to be constantly monitored.

"Hello, Riliya." A low voice emerged from the shadows to his right. As Ornenkai peered into the dark, a young man stepped forward.

Ornenkai stared at the man for a moment before he recognized him. He was of average height, a little shorter than Ornenkai, with a build that suggested he was quick and strong.

"I'm sorry—"

"You don't remember me?"

"Ilika Marankeil?" Ornenkai asked tentatively, and the older man offered him a slow smile of approval. "Well, I'll be—what are you—so... so..."

Marankeil laughed.

"Shall I let you collect your thoughts? You haven't changed all that much—just an older version of the kid you were. I remember those days fondly."

"Yes."

"Well, I hear you have been included on the major research project meeting."

"Yes, but how—"

"Actually, that's the first time I knew you were here. I was reading over the attendance list and I saw your name."

"I didn't know you were here, either."

"I'm not surprised about that." Marankeil admitted. "This place is incredibly large, even for a research center. We've acquired sixteen thousand scientists in the last three tendays, and my division is on the other side of the building."

"Your division?" Ornenkai repeated numbly.

"Yes. I'm head of the new mnemonic technology department in the artificial intelligence center."

"Well, well. I'm impressed." Ornenkai whistled, and headed towards his laboratory. Marankeil followed him two steps behind.

"Actually, I was just talking to your director, and she told me that the Biochemistry Department did everything in their power to get you here."

"Well—"

"I didn't know you were involved in the successful tirani-piwyn combination cloning experiments." Marankeil said. "They didn't think it was possible to cross-breed such different species."

"Yes."

"Don't be modest now. I detest false modesty."

"Is that why you came—to discuss our collaboration on the new joint project?" Ornenkai asked casually as the two entered his lab and headed for the relaxation area to take a seat. Ornenkai stopped for a moment on the way to glance through a microscanner and record an entry in his data.

"No." Marankeil said absently. "I just wanted to see for myself how much you've changed. I don't suppose the new Ornenkai is at all interested in folklore and taking field trips?"

Ornenkai stiffened. He couldn't tell if Marankeil were sounding him out and had been derisive about it or if he were merely being pleasant. Marankeil's tone of voice had an unusual quality, a potential double meaning and darker intent hidden beneath the charm of his superficially innocuous manner.

"What about you, Marankeil? Haven't you given up your childhood dreams? Don't we all?" He asked suddenly. But Marankeil only laughed.

"Idle dreams, yes. I only have time now for what I can do to make myself happy. I've had a lot happen this year to make me re-think what I want in life."

During the project meeting, Marankeil suggested a joint venture between the artificial intelligence department and the biochemistry of systems and genetics division. Ornenkai was sure Marankeil the division director had orchestrated the collaboration in order to work with Ornenkai on developing the new mechanized unit androids he had proposed, androids with a parity to not only the human form but also its character.

Marankeil insisted that a knowledge of human systems was essential in creating the perfect human replica when several of the other division directors questioned the need for a biological division to be involved in the project, even though most scientists could fabricate an android using the present technology in artificial muscles, bones, organs, and computerized brains and neural systems. Ornenkai watched open-mouthed as his childhood friend convinced the older, established scientists to take his project seriously. By the end of the meeting, they were enthusiastically behind him.

Marankeil seemed to know everything there was to know about the humanroids.

Once the project had been passed, Marankeil enlisted Ornenkai as the chief geneticist and biochemist for his project team with the rest of the department working as their other projects allowed. However, after several tendays, it became clear that the driving force behind the project was Marankeil alone, and in fact it was he who had pioneered much of the technology for the project. The technicians of his division performed many of the tasks that he called for, but Marankeil had breathed the life into the project.

As the tendays passed, Ornenkai's fellow scientists in the biochemistry of genetics division fell further behind in the project, as the fundamental level of knowledge required to understand the innovations the team of Ornenkai and Marankeil had achieved was raised beyond their ability to make any great contributions. Ornenkai often delegated only the small tasks to them, as most of his colleagues were involved in other endeavors.

What Ornenkai didn't know was that Marankeil had already artificially augmented his own intelligence using nano-technology, by implanting computer memory into his own brain.

At the end of a long day, the two old friends had a moment to relax in Marankeil's lounge while their new artificial facial muscle went through a battery of tests.

"Why haven't you become attached?" Ornenkai asked absently, remembering the admiration in Lia Hilan's eyes when she looked at Marankeil; she had brought some parts over from her lab to the division director earlier.

Marankeil looked away suddenly, and though his returning expression appeared calm, Ornenkai had caught a glimmer of irritation in his boyhood friend.

"If I admit anything, I expect it to go no further than these walls."

"Of course." Ornenkai was intrigued.

"I was in love once, not too many years ago." Marankeil admitted. "I knew this woman for a year, before I became specialized. Before I met her, I used to want to have a woman who would rest beside me. So that if I woke in the dark, I might feel her comforting presence there, feel her soft arm lying over my chest. Then I would know that she needed me more than I her; that her gentle serenity, her repose, depended upon my strength.

"I thought I wanted her to be there with me in the day, to laugh with me, to understand when my heart wasn't whole. I wanted—well, pleasure, things, but not a companion. I always preferred the company of males in matters of the mind. Or I should say—usually. I do esteem our female scientists, to be sure, but I never sought out their company.

"But I will tell you, I did meet a woman who made me love everything about her—and especially her mind and spirit. But the one I had set my heart upon, and yes my desire, she the first who could have satisfied both for me—well, she was fickle creature and meant no word she ever spoke to me. Or if she did, well she left. Left without returning my love.

"I realized then that if I could subdue my male desire and cure it along with the pain, that at last I would be free of it all. Free to focus my desires on action. Ambition isn't enough to change the world. You have to subdue all other feelings, my friend, for ambition to have any real power. Anyway, enough about her. As you can see I am doing quite well without her. I am getting to do what I always wanted to do, and getting it done!"

"Perhaps you'll meet someone else." Ornenkai offered.

Marankeil seemed about to laugh, or to strike someone.

Ornenkai looked away, uncertain how to respond to Marankeil's sudden gravity. He didn't understand Marankeil's attitude.

"What about you?" Marankeil asked, with a strange tone. "Have you ever thought of securing a partner?"

Ornenkai shook his head. "Lerney says I'm too picky, but the right woman hasn't come along yet."

"Perhaps he's right, but then, perhaps the right woman hasn't found you."

"What is the purpose of this project?" Ornenkai decided to change the subject, remembering that Marankeil had gone to present a report to the Seynorynaelian Council that morning for permission to continue the project. "Has the council authorized another explorer mission, or will the new androids run the shuttles between the conglomeration of five planets?"

"No, the Council doesn't consider androids capable of heading a mission on their own. They are interested to see if androids can function as independent cognitive beings, but they don't see the potential..." Marankeil stopped.

"Then why did they approve the project?" Ornenkai persisted.

"The council doesn't particularly care about or understand science, Ornenkai. They keep the peace between the planets, and as you know, the scientific boom was only created to analyze the conglomeration of planets' biological and technological systems for political reasons. With that work nearing an end, there is a surplus in the field, but the Council won't discourage the field because our exploration expedition could return at any time."

"So then, at the moment, as long as we're working for the expansion of understanding, they don't really care what projects we involve ourselves in."

"To some degree." Marankeil nodded. "But the space shuttle engineers have requested some of our reports to aid the development of the ship guidance computers. If we can create a cognitive intelligence, they hope to utilize the design to protect the shuttles where the range of human pilots is limited."

"Wasn't that your former division?" Ornenkai asked.

"You've been checking up on me, I see. Yes, I was co-director in the spaceship computer program for a year."

"Why did you leave?" Ornenkai wondered.

"As I may have told you, I decided I only had time to make my dreams a reality. Working in computer development for spaceships was not bringing me closer to what I wanted to accomplish—I wasn't realizing the dreams I hoped for, and I had learned all that was of use to me. So, I asked for a transfer. The artificial intelligence unit here is a small department, and after a while, I pioneered a new mnemonic division. The central directors don't really know what to do with it yet, and so they haven't asked much of me—yet. But I'm afraid there aren't too many qualified technicians in my field. Even after acquiring new specialists last year, I'm still doing most of the detailed work myself."

Marankeil hadn't told anyone that he had had his own memory and intelligence augmented with nano-chip technology. It was illegal to do it—dangerous, and even most scientists in the field didn't know how to use nano-technology properly. Marankeil had found his father Vaelan before Vaelan passed away; it had been Vaelan's final gift to his son to implant his son's brain with nano-technology—all so he could pass on his secret research to his son.

"I wondered why you and I were the only ones involved in the actual development outside the theoretical planning of the independent constituents—the only ones actually creating the android from the raw blueprints." Ornenkai continued.

"You aren't even trained in my field, Ornenkai, and you're a greater help than any of my specialists. But that was why I wanted you for the project. With your knowledge of living systems, I thought you would be able to determine if there were any design flaws. I suspected the skills of a biologist might be essential to the success of my project. Studying human nature and technical skill isn't enough. Our android must come as close to a natural life form as possible. Right now the humanroid androids look more human than they actually are. I know. But I want ours to truly be more human, no matter what it appears to be. There aren't many ways of improving upon natural life systems."

"I agree with you there, but this kind of work is exhausting."

"Agreed."

"It looks like the analyzer is going to take a while on the tests—let's take a break. We've been working so hard these past few tendays, and I'm getting sick of this laboratory."

"Have you ever seen the botanical gardens?" Marankeil suggested.

Ornenkai laughed. After all of these years, he still had never been.

"One more question," Ornenkai said.

"Yes?"

"What was her name?"

"Elera." Marankeil answered, almost before Ornenkai finished asking.

"Who was this Elera?" Ornenkai wondered.

"She was nothing special," Marankeil said with level calm. At the same time, he saw a memory in his mind's eye, a memory of himself long ago. He saw himself speaking, whispering to her as she slept on the fields of grass and golden flowers.

You are everything to me. Oh, Elera, give me something to believe in! Let us cherish every moment together. We have so little time together, you know.

"But you said—" Ornenkai started to object, confused.

"She was nothing at all... nothing at all," Marankeil repeated tonelessly, then turned his face from Ornenkai and headed back towards the door. "I'll see you later," he offered easily. "I'm feeling a bit tired suddenly. We'll schedule our trip to the botanical gardens later, if you don't mind."

Ornenkai just nodded.

"Do you remember the trip we were planning to come here when we both moved into the new tower?" Marankeil asked as they finished their tour of the gardens the next day. He had taken a few steps off the path and headed towards one of the tall sher-inn trees nearby, one of the few native specimens in the botanical encyclopedia. He reached out an arm to ease himself onto the ground under the tree and leaned back against the trunk, his elbows behind his head, his knees pulled up.

"Yes. But then we began to visit the archives instead. And not long after that, I was sent away to training." Said Ornenkai.

"As was I." Remembered Marankeil. "But I have often thought of those days. Do you remember how we loved to pretend we were explorers or comet riders journeying to a new land? We made a vow to find the Havens one day, but I suppose you've forgotten all of the legends by now. Or have you kept any of the records we found in the archives all those years ago?"

"Strange that you should ask." Still standing, Ornenkai began to pace back and forth as he spoke; one of the female scientists strode by them, just then, obliging Ornenkai to pause. He followed her with his eyes, appreciative eyes that assayed the potential of her pleasant figure.

"You were saying?" Marankeil prompted, amused.

"Some time after we began our project, I went looking through my belongings." Ornenkai resumed after a moment, suddenly regaining his lost fervor. "I don't know why I kept them all—I was sure at the time that my father would find them and get rid of them, anyway, but—

"Mine would have."

"I've been reading through some of those old records on the comet riders. It's amazing how much you'll remember from childhood without even knowing the information is still there until you see or experience that something again. I had forgotten some of the legends, but I discovered that I do still remember the language and syllabary."

Marankeil sat up, suddenly animated, though Ornenkai thought he moved deliberately slowly so as to seem less excited. "I knew you still loved the legends." He declared. "I could always see it in you. No matter what happens later, you always remember what you once loved."

Ornenkai turned away. "I don't think that's the point. The pursuit of knowledge is of tangible value, whether in the realm of biology or cryptology. I don't understand why you keep bringing pointless philosophical judgments and all this talk of love into the argument."

Marankeil laughed.

"Science is more than biology, or chemistry, or astrophysics, or even engineering, isn't it, Ornenkai?"

"I said that."

"But you don't value all of it. You don't value philosophy, which is the science of the human mind."

Ornenkai sighed.

"Don't think to sigh at me," Marankeil said evenly. "It won't accomplish anything. I don't oblige people's petty contradictions, not even yours."

"Petty? You smug bastard," Ornenkai said, getting angry. "What kind of child do you take me for?"

"None at all," Marankeil said. "You're brilliant, so very brilliant; a genius even," Marankeil shrugged, noticing Ornenkai's expression softening, "but for all of your analytical skill, you lack emotional intelligence. I wonder if perhaps your brother inherited it all in your family."

"Emotional intelligence?" Ornenkai wondered, impartially, not registering the insult because emotional intelligence wasn't something he valued at that moment or felt pained to lack. He had no desire to be like his brother, either.

"Yes. An intelligence of the senses." Marankeil explained. "Oh, you have senses, sensibilities for the nature you love so and for the dreams that you live on, dreams that live somewhere in you estranged from your rational self, no matter how you deny it."

"What has that got to do with anything?"

"Nothing, really. I just found it amusing how much you love these legends, how they consume you with intensity, but you are still so young in spirit. You have yet to learn so much."

"Like I said, you smug bastard." Ornenkai said.

The left side of Marankeil's face quirked into a smile.

"So," Marankeil laughed. "Your intelligence keeps you from loving anyone; you can't love someone beneath you in intellect, maybe? Or not at all? But the truth is you don't really value anything but reasoning and pure knowledge. You shy from grasping intuition or recognizing subtleties, or looking for meaning where it doesn't spontaneously appear to your critical eye."

"I see nothing wrong with that. Love is just an emotion. What does it really matter? What are emotions really for, except that they make us behave like fools. We must not fall prey to them, but act according to our beliefs."

"I do. Still, Ornenkai, I think you do lack emotional intelligence. It may not be a bad thing. It is what it is."

"Some of what you say might be true," Ornenkai shrugged. "I don't much care for weak sentimentality, but I shouldn't confuse enthusiasm and a desire for excitement and the pursuit of knowledge with these 'dreams' as you put it. And what do you mean by emotional intelligence? Every man feels—yes, even I do—but he doesn't let his feelings blind him to reason. Feelings can't be allowed to blind us so that we don't do what we must for the sake of the greater good."

Marankeil laughed. "You have your opinions, still. And you may be right. Anyway, this talk of love has left a sour taste in my mouth. Let's forget about it."

"Easily." Ornenkai shrugged. "I was getting angry, anyway."

"So, you've really been trying to read the old syllabaries?" Marankeil asked.

Ornenkai nodded.

"Wonderful. You've just given me an idea."

"What?"

"After the project is finished, we can go looking for the Havens as we always meant to do."

"You're serious?"

"Perfectly."

"I don't know," Ornenkai finally said reluctantly. Marankeil had seen something he couldn't admit to himself, that he still loved the ancient lore. But would they find anything? he wondered. Or would such a search be in vain as his mind told him, a regression into childish fantasy? And whatever dreams the young Riliya had cherished, the present Ornenkai didn't know if he could risk the disappointment of failure. And even if it was an adventure, he would feel ridiculous, looking for mythical havens like a little boy!

If they went off in search of evidence of the comet riders, how would he find the time to maintain his position in the research center? Ornenkai wondered.

"Give me some time to think it over," Ornenkai added, thinking that there was some comfort in the routine of his life. Remembering his youth and his fantasies about finding the havens of the comet riders always depressed him. It inevitably reminded him that his own life was passing too quickly. It was much easier keeping his thoughts on the future, and not to dredge up the past and its faded dreams.

Several tendays later, Ornenkai entered Marankeil's laboratory, looking somewhat dispirited after another mandatory project meeting that Marankeil had been too busy to attend. Ordinarily Ornenkai's return would not have disturbed Marankeil, but something was different this time. Marankeil watched his friend expectantly as Ornenkai dropped the sample bag he was carrying on the floor.

"They're closing down the project," he finally managed.

"But it isn't finished." Marankeil protested, visibly shaken by the surprise. Ornenkai wondered for a moment at the odd look in his friend's eye and what it meant, but decided Marankeil was allowed any reaction to such ground-shaking news. He thought he recognized a bit of the expression Ilika had shown after his mother's death, like the look of a drowning man—a man determined to find something to cling to beyond all hope, who would allow nothing to distract him. Ornenkai turned away to avoid Marankeil's gaze.

"They say we've learned as much as possible." Ornenkai added. "What they mean is that they've already got as much information as they need to improve the starship guidance computers. They've assigned me to another, more urgent project. There's been another outbreak of Kayrian fever, only now it's affecting some Seynorynaelians of mixed descent." After standing a few moments longer, Ornenkai had gone to sit down heavily in a chair in the lounge across the room.

"But this isn't the end of our collaboration." Ornenkai added decisively over the sound of the test machine parts operating in the simulators. "Since I'm not the senior project chief, I'll only be doing some of the foundation work. If you have time, I thought we could make a journey to Lake Firien—at least we could begin to look there." Ornenkai tried to appear composed as he waited for Marankeil's reaction. He had decided in that moment that Marankeil needed something to lift his spirits, and he hoped that agreeing to their expedition would put him in a better mood.

But Marankeil turned around quickly, a hard expression on his face. "Once you agree to the search, you can't disappoint me, Ornenkai. If you're still willing to go, we'll keep looking until we find the Havens of legend."

Ornenkai found he couldn't say anything. He had committed himself to the venture lightly, but to his great surprise suddenly felt a burden lifting from his shoulders, a new freedom he had never known. He was filled with such an excitement that he didn't notice his friend's pensive silence.

The fifth trip to Lake Firien had been a failure, though enjoyable for the hikes alone. After half a year, Marankeil and Ornenkai had not located the Havens, but at least this time they had picked up some local tales about the comet riders neither of the two friends had ever heard before. They included incredible stories about the powers of the comet riders' Leader, who had disappeared shortly after the great expansion of Ariyal-synai, a figure often referred to as the Zariqua Enassa by the legend experts.

Very interesting, Marankeil had thought.

On the last day of their search, an archivist in Firien City had shown the two of them a surviving record from a personal diary about ten thousand years old, of a supposed ferai-lunei, one of the comet riders. But like so many others that had been found, the document was unreadable, written in a strange flowing script of unfamiliar letters, a combination of small swirls, curves, strokes, and dots. Marankeil supposed it to be some obscure dialect of the second wave of comet riders; the text had died out apparently almost immediately following their landing.

Ornenkai had asked the archivist if he knew what had happened to the second wave of comet riders' when they met the others already living on the planet, and if there were any truth to tales that they had contributed to the expansion of Ariyal-synai. To Ornenkai's irritation, the archivist wouldn't give them a clear answer. He had only shrugged, offering them the same explanation they had heard everywhere else, that the expansion of Ariyal-synai had been a result of some severe weather causing mass migration to the South.

The archivist told them he did not believe in the comet riders, per se. But he did believe that the Seynorynaelian race had come from the stars, only long before the tales originated. As for the so-called "second-wave" comet riders, he would concede they could have been an explorer group of the early civilization that had returned after a long mission, hence all the exaggerated tales prevalent upon their return about other galaxies and planets.

According to him, these returning explorers must have crashed the ancient starship, thus destroying what remained of the ancients' technology. In his opinion, there could have been only a few survivors, and half of the stories and supposed diaries that appeared after the crash must have been fabricated by a population caught up in romantic tales that had grown larger with each re-telling.

Marankeil had asked why an archivist of Lake Firien did not believe the tales, and the archivist had held up a finger, asking them to wait while he retrieved something from the preservation room.

"I'm not supposed to do this," he had said, bringing out a translucent blue, rectangular board, a thin plate that he had carried tucked under his arm. "I shouldn't have removed it from its preservation casing, but..." he trailed off, holding up the plate for them to see. As his hands moved to the side of the board, hidden words etched into the document lit up within the interior as though composed of small fires.

Ornenkai had copied the words of the document as the archivist explained.

"Now, we of Firien know this is a real document of the first-wave of comet riders, despite what the Federation scientists might say about it. Our scientists have tested the material and it's, well—let's just say all of the materials used by the second-wave of comet riders are nothing like it. They used holo-printsheets very similar to ours.

"You asked why I was skeptical about the second-wave comet riders? Now you know. You'll see a few documents with this lettering in Ariyalsynai if you look there. But this piece here is almost untranslatable. Unlike some of the others, there are only a few representatives of our modern alphabet shown on it, which is another reason why the Ariyalsynai experts deny its authenticity. But to me, it proves that we are descended from a great civilization from the past. Too bad the so-called second comet riders destroyed its lost secrets when they crashed their vessel," he added in an irritated tone.

"Why do you believe we're descended from the first comet riders?" Marankeil had persisted, ignoring the man's unfounded claims about the second wave of comet riders.

"Why?" the archivist had repeated as though the answer were obvious. Examining the plate again, he bit his lip, then met their curious expressions. "Aside from the fact that this board is over twenty thousand years old and hasn't decayed like some of the more recent documents, aside from the fact that we can't reproduce this material—I have no idea how they got those fire-letters in there." He had said, then left to return the board to its proper place among the archives. In his absence, the friends had left the building, and then left Firien.

Confused and disheartened by their discoveries, Marankeil and Ornenkai planned a different kind of expedition on the way back from Firien City.

"Look, don't think that I want to postpone the search, Marankeil," Ornenkai said, "but how about taking a break from our routine to simply enjoy the surroundings? Just like we used to when we went exploring outside Ariyalsynai. The warm season is passing, and we won't be able to travel north into the wild lands for another year. If you don't want to see the area any more—"

"All right, we'll take a short break. But since a lot of people journey to the wild lands near Kerasov in the warm season, I would rather stay clear of all of the northern towns. How about—here?" Marankeil said, pointing to a spot far north of the band of settlements. It held an unpopulated range of hills and mountains just south of a network of rivers that fed the Meraya River, one of many great waters that emptied into Lake Firien.

Ornenkai cast him a skeptical eye. The terrain of the territory he had indicated was too rugged for settlements and largely untraveled, except by herds of wild and potentially dangerous delochs and other predators. But he saw why Marankeil had made the suggestion. The territory was one of the least likely areas where a ship might have possibly landed. It seemed Marankeil was willing to put the search out of his mind and enjoy the outing.

For the past several days they had been hiking over hills shrouded by a thick fog of unusually damp air. Then a day before, the fog had finally given way to clearing skies, large white clouds, a fine early morning mist, and the crisp perfume of dew-touched flowers. The afternoon had warmed, and it had turned out to be a pleasant day, cooled by gentle breezes whispering in the tree branches.

They stopped in the small valleys below the tree line that separated the hills from each other, finding stony streams trickling down from the peaks and small cascading waterfalls that fed pools of crystal clear water. The ground was cold at night, but each day they found a dry area of undergrowth on which to rest. So far there had been no visible sign of the deloch herds and only a few old tracks of predatory animals near the large stream they had followed.

Then as they climbed higher into the rising mountains, the temperature began to fall. Ornenkai had been thinking about yileches, the water fowl that dominated the area. He had studied more of the well-known Kayrian and Tulorian creatures than those of his own planet, but he recognized one of the yileches before she scurried off to hide in the ferns. He knew only a few scientists who studied the elusive creatures of the northern territory, creatures that survived the long winters by remaining dormant in the frozen waters and secreting reviving enzymes at the beginning of the warm season in which they lived all of their waking lives, hunting, mating, and then preparing for the upcoming winter.

Without warning a glint of sunlight struck his eyes, and Ornenkai raised a hand to shield them, blinking furiously. He had been watching the stony path as he walked, only occasionally glancing further up the mountainside, but he looked up at once when he realized that the source of the light had been ahead.

But—wasn't the sun behind them?

They had almost reached the summit of a high mountain when Ornenkai stopped, Marankeil only a few steps behind him. They had seen nothing unusual as they looked ahead, as though they had been blinded by an illusion; now the sudden light blinded them, drawing them towards the source.

High in the rugged mountain, glints of sparkling metal had suddenly shone through exposed patches in the hillside; grown over by grassy turf, the metal object beneath stretched almost half of a mile. Nestled in the uneven faces of the neighboring peaks, the smooth, curved side of a manmade vessel had long lent its shape to the hillside before them, though fallen soil, trees, and grass had gradually buried it. How long the ship had been buried, though, none but the stones could relate.

Thus the secrets of Enor had been lost.

Marankeil and Ornenkai searched for several hours over the wide, precipitous hill for an opening into the ship that had crashed at an angle into the cliff side.

"Do you think this was the vessel of the first comet riders?" Ornenkai wondered aloud, staring up the acclivity. Why had they not seen it until they were almost upon it? He wondered to himself as he stared at the smooth blue alloys of the outer hull, now closer than he had ever imagined, reminiscent of the shape of the swirling script of the first comet riders. Ornenkai could hardly contain his excitement that they might have actually found the Havens. But Marankeil didn't answer him.

Now Ornenkai had to admit to himself that until that moment on the hill, he hadn't been exactly sure what they were looking for. But perhaps the legendary Havens was in fact a spaceship, perhaps the comet rider's ship itself, and not some mythical settlement or city. Ornenkai had never heard of any but the long scrutinized ruins at Lake Firien, the ruins so many tales called the remains of the ancient starship of his ancestors.

Meanwhile, Marankeil had moved ahead, climbing, his hands and feet finding the interstices in the face of the cliff. At last he gave a shout, and Ornenkai hurried to follow, looking ahead to a rift in the hull under the shadow of a large tree growing from a small ledge above. Perhaps it was not the entrance they had sought, but Marankeil's smile made it clear that it was going to do.

Marankeil disappeared into the rift. A loud noise echoed up to Ornenkai, the sound of feet landing heavily on some hard surface.

"Be careful," Marankeil called. "There's a fifteen foot drop." Ornenkai stooped over the sharp curling lip of metal and braced himself for a fall. He landed on a cold, slanted surface. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the dark interior, but Marankeil was waiting for him.

"I twisted my ankle a little. Are you all right?" Ornenkai felt a hand on his arm help him to his feet and nodded. Marankeil's face became visible in the dark. "We're lucky," he added, gesturing to the surface beneath them. "This area is an open space between the interior and exterior hull, but whatever made the rift in the outer hull also created this floor we're standing on. Can you see the small hole in the interior hull above? We'll have to climb up the wall to get to it. It's slippery and steep, but if you hoist me on your shoulders, I can reach the top and pull you up after me."

Ornenkai nodded involuntarily. They walked several meters ahead until they neared the interior hull. Once Marankeil had reached the second rift, he hooked his feet over the edge of the rift and reached out for Ornenkai's outstretched arms. The rift brought them out into the upper half of a wall in a human-sized corridor. Both of them jumped to the ground and collapsed on the floor, exhausted with the effort.

Suddenly the interior was illuminated.

Ornenkai blinked in amazement at the swirling design of blue alloys and mild blue lighting of two intersecting corridors. The mesmerizing walls gave the effect that the corridors were channels built under water. The patterns and atmosphere evoked by the soft lighting reminded Ornenkai of the ocean floor. Then they heard the soft sound of generators engaging.

"We should head into the innermost chambers," Marankeil suggested, his eyes already analyzing the corridor to their left.

At the end of the long corridor, past more than a dozen intersections and a hundred smaller doorways, they came into a large circular area with the same aquatic design as the corridor they had followed. On the floor several open man-sized metallic bottomed cylinders with tinted blue exteriors and swirling ornamental alloy designs had been arranged, spaced about three meters evenly apart, each on a raised dais. Ornenkai walked among the empty cylinders, peering curiously into them.

Marankeil had found a small alcove on the far end of the room. The sound of his footsteps drew Ornenkai's gaze from the cylinders. In the dim light, Ornenkai saw him sit behind an elevated platform on a kind of stool. Then he lifted a tinted rectangular piece of something that looked like blue silica. In his hands, the smooth, thin plate began to illuminate from within, igniting invisible words engraved in the very core of the plate.

Marankeil turned the piece sidelong for Ornenkai to get a better look as he entered the alcove. Lit panels covered the walls of the room that Ornenkai's instincts told him was some form of archives library. A few more plates lay on the platform as though someone had just put them aside. As Ornenkai got a better look at the platform, he saw that though it had appeared just a table from a distance, at close range he could see thousands of lit panels on its surface for any number of functions involved in data recording and retrieval.

Marankeil was already examining the words. Ornenkai sat next to him and gasped.

Though much was immediately indecipherable, like the plate the Firien archivist had held, a few of the triangular shapes and elliptical swirls immediately resolved into characters from their own Seynorynaelian alphabet. Many of them Ornenkai recognized from his childhood, when he and Marankeil had attempted to decipher some of the comet rider writings.

"That looks like the language of the first comet riders." Ornenkai commented, peering at one of the long inscriptions.

Like the plate still in Firien, these were the most rare symbols, found on only a few ancient writings. The lack of material had made it difficult for anyone to interpret them. Even Marankeil and Ornenkai had had far more success learning and deciphering the other syllabaries of the comet riders.

All the other documents we found—they must have been the words of comet riders that followed, Ornenkai realized. But it stands to reason, there would be fewer traces of the first comet riders left outside the Havens, if that's really what we've found.

"We were close, Riliya," Marankeil interrupted the silence, reverting to Ornenkai's childhood name. "Some of these have been written in the second comet riders' alphabet—so they must have been one people! This might be the missing evidence, the missing key we needed to figure out the earlier symbols. This one that was lying here looks like it might help. Look—if you apply the equivalents that we determined from the repeating patterns, you can find words in the ancient Firien dialect..." Ornenkai focused on the patterns and allowed his mind time to translate.

"Something about an immortal woman? That can't be right—"

"To destroy the Empire... " Marankeil continued. "'The future... destiny... destroy the loop... nothing..."

"It sounds like a history," Ornenkai commented. "Maybe it was the end of their civilization."

"It could have been a prediction," Marankeil said thoughtfully. "The tense of the verbs is unclear, and it does speak of destiny, of the future."

"About our future?" Ornenkai wondered aloud. "Our fate maybe?"

"Our fate," Marankeil echoed, suddenly distracted.

"But that bit about an Empire—that sounds like a historical reference. Creator above, though," Ornenkai continued, considering Marankeil's opinion, "I never heard about our ancestors coming from an Empire—so, so maybe it is a prediction... A dismal one, though, if there is to be nothing left."

"Wait a minute—it says something about a legacy that 'lives until the universe's end.'"

"Then you're right—it must be talking of the future," Ornenkai breathed, surprised, but Marankeil said nothing. "Do you think our ancestors were planning on creating an Empire when they came here?" he asked.

"I don't know, Ornenkai, but there's a map here lighting up at the bottom—a spiral galaxy and beside it a picture of a system with nine planets... "

"What? Where are you going?" Ornenkai asked as Marankeil began shuffling everything quickly, as though preparing to leave.

"We have to get these plates back to Ariyalsynai and give them a full analysis." Marankeil said, with a casual shrug.

"What about all of the other information that is stored here?" Ornenkai said.

"I already tried to see if the panels would respond to my touch when you were looking at the cylinders, but they don't. All I see is the plates that have been left out here."

Ornenkai picked up the other plate, but the words that appeared made little sense to him. Yet the postscript sent a shiver down his spine. The account had been a kind of personal diary, written in obscure characters, but it was signed in the ordinary ancient script of their ancestors, the name lost to time in the unknown letters, then the words "the Haven-master, last colonizer of Enor".

"You must swear, Ornenkai, by all that you cherish most, never to reveal to another living soul this place where we discovered the Enorian Havens. Anyone who finds out will destroy the place, you know that." Marankeil's unwavering eyes were fixed upon Ornenkai, and he felt as though the entire world waited listening for his answer, as though time had slowed and the very trees cried out in anguish as he uttered his oath, his words lost in the wind.

"I swear," Ornenkai said, feeling very awkward and boyish making the pact out here in the light, like so many of the pacts they had made as children. But Marankeil seemed altogether serious, and Ornenkai felt his friend's sincerity carry him along. "I'll never disclose the location of the Havens." He said, and immediately he regretted it.

"Nor will I," Marankeil spoke solemnly, looking back at the now distant hillside and its invisible secret.

The two had explored the open corridors in the Enorian Havens, but the sealed corridors and rooms would not let them pass. Only at the end of another long passage did doors open for them, but it was the air lock that led them to the outside world again, as though the Havens themselves had not welcomed them and were urgent to have them leave. The doors swished closed behind them with incredible speed but would not open again no matter how close they approached and how long they stood outside.

Ornenkai lingered on the hill, looking back longingly at the embodiment of his heritage, the last remnant of the ancient past that still kept so many secrets, but Marankeil had already hurried on ahead, eager to return to the city.

Chapter Seventeen

"Any luck?" Ornenkai asked, looking up again from his desk at Marankeil, who was still bent over one of the plates they had taken from the Havens. Some of what they had found was written in the earliest syllabary they had still not been able to decipher, but some of the records had obviously been written later in a hybrid of the ancient's language and ancient Seynorynaelian.

"You must have something," Ornenkai persisted when no answer came. "You've been working on just that one plate since we got here."

Marankeil put down his printsheet, finishing the last sentence.

"This plate must have been an old canon of our ancestors. It is a recording of a legend, a belief—I don't know, but it even sounds vaguely religious."

"What does it say?" Ornenkai asked, moving to an empty seat by Marankeil to get a look at his translation.

"I missed a few words here and there, but it appears to be referring to a theory of existence called the "cycle". I think that these people believed that their very existence was contained in an unbreakable cycle—I thought perhaps they meant their position in time and space, something like a world line—you know, the path our bodies trace in space and time from the moment we are born—but then a world line is jagged and uneven. And it would be impossible for anyone to move constantly from one place to another without ever returning to a place they had been, which they would have to do to exist on an unbreakable circle.

"Anyway, it talks about the cycle as being a circle and then it begins to refer to it as a sphere—something bound and contained, then something infinite. Doesn't make sense—but then I thought with the missing words, I could be reading it wrong."

"Perhaps the author was setting the conditions?" Ornenkai wondered.

"Maybe. Anyway—it calls the "cycle" unbreakable—there is no ending or beginning—they're one. But then it says the beginning is unclear.

"It talks about the direction of the circle as lines that curve on a sphere, leading anywhere. At the same time, each circle's "line" exists distinctively, sometimes overlapping or converging with another curve; yet each curve exists by itself and can only be itself. If it altered in its predestined course direction, it becomes by definition something else, and so itself only could it ever remain, for it was meant to be."

"That sounds like the notion that for each choice we make, the universe takes both of the two, but we only see and live the one."

"I agree. But listen—there's more. The legend contended that the cycle could not be broken, but the paradox that the ancients saw was the uncertainty the sphere implied. Here's where it ties back in to the nature and beliefs of existence. It says that no one has ever been given to know which path he travels or upon which plane of reality his life belongs." Marankeil picked up the printsheet and began to read it directly.

"'At a point of singularity, only one point alone has no circle. The "cycle" has no effect upon its existence. Its path unites the courses by an initial infinite choice of direction on the curve. Any person that could travel upon that point would belong to no circle, would be bound to no cycle, can be born and may die at any time.

"'Long have we of Enor waited for that One'—it looks like not even they had known when the 'One' would appear, when or even if the 'cycle' could be broken."

"Do you think that this legend has any meaning? It might be just a religious belief, as you said." Ornenkai took the printsheet from Marankeil's offering hand and held the rubbery, gelatinous sheet up to the light, carefully reading over the translated words. There were still some large gaps in the structure, enough missing to cast doubt on the adequacy of their assumptions.

"How could they know about the future?" Marankeil wondered aloud. "It sounds to me like a prediction. Perhaps there are infinite choices behind our every decision because of the amount of previous decisions that influence our history, but possibilities are also limited by the set of circumstances that we inherit."

"History is destiny," Ornenkai mused, reiterating a common expression. Then he stopped. Clearly Marankeil was thinking the same thing.

"The "cycle"—the legend of the ancients—could it be that—"

"We still believe it to be true." Ornenkai interrupted, finishing Marankeil's guess.

Marankeil stopped, contemplating, remembering something. We can't escape our connection to all things that have been or will ever be...

"And 'the beginning is unclear'—but what did that mean?" Ornenkai said, not noticing Marankeil's silence. "There has to be some point from which everything occurred. There must be a beginning. And everything ends with the end of the universe." He shook his head. "I'm more confused. I understand how history influences our individual destinies, but how can those destinies return to affect history if that is indeed what this "cycle" implies? How can the future affect the past?"

Change my fate... Marankeil turned away, but Ornenkai had gone into contemplation over the translation.

Is there one destined to live untouched by the bounds that mortal beings must endure? Marankeil wondered. One who will escape the cycle of death at the end of the universe and live for all time, present and future? Maybe if a living being could forsake his human form but keep his spirit, he would become the One who travels on the unbound point of singularity. Then all destinies, and the universe, would be his. For absolute power is impotent unless it is used to control others.

"I just heard about your technical team's breakthrough," Ornenkai said out of breath as he rushed into Marankeil's inner laboratory. Already six tendays had passed since they returned from the Enorian Havens, but Ornenkai had still been at the Research Center less than a year. Ornenkai stopped, suddenly intrigued by the large android unit lying on the ground, hooked up to the main computer by a million micro-filaments and almost completely covered by a tarpaulin. A small neural helmet lay on the ground; Ornenkai remembered the one he had seen in the young Ilika's apartment years before.

"How long have you been working on the development?" Ornenkai asked, his eyes drawn to the android arm, not yet covered by the artificial skin or alloys that would either make it a humanroid or a human-shaped mechanized unit. The exposed musculature of the arm, composed of electrostrictive polymer fibers, writhed and flexed.

"As long as I can remember, in one form or another," Marankeil responded absently, to Ornenkai's irritation. How could Marankeil discuss his own discovery with such indifference?

"May I try the device after the demonstration period is over?" Ornenkai asked tentatively. Marankeil looked up, an amused smile on his face.

"Of course. But I must make sure there are checks in place before the technology becomes dangerous."

"Dangerous?" Ornenkai repeated, his brow furrowed.

"Yes. Can't you see the potential abuses of the ability to program the human mind from a computer? We'll have people using the computers as methods of learning rather than study, but the information will not have to be processed by the mind, only accepted. That kind of thinking is far too linear, unquestioning, without the modulation of an individual's own beliefs."

"Surely no one would use it as a substitute for real learning."

"Why not, if it were possible? You are still so young, Ornenkai. There are those your age less talented than you still trying to clear their first level of training. Once they have reached adulthood, they will have to give up if they have not passed their exams and take a profession in manual operations where the machine operators cannot function. What kind of life is that? Don't you see that many of them would give anything to understand the greater achievements of science and culture in order to obtain better social standing?"

Ornenkai's eyes widened.

"Never fear, my intellectual giant. My invention can't really give them that—it can only allow them to recall the information as the computer does, utilizing their own latent memory storage abilities. It can be an aid to study, if only as a means of remembering raw information. It cannot replace the real philosophy of the mind and its cognitive abilities."

"What is this?" Ornenkai decided to change the subject, indicating the strange android in front of him. As far as Ornenkai could remember, Marankeil was still on project leave when he suddenly presented his ground-shaking innovation. No one had known what he had created since there weren't any progress checks while on project leave. It suddenly occurred to Ornenkai that it was likely then that Marankeil alone knew how the technology worked, his technicians only to a lesser degree. The project had been kept in the dark, and no other specialists had made inspections.

Such an innovation could give Marankeil plenary power over the entire scientific community... Ornenkai shuddered, but tried to shake off his concerns.

"This? This is my masterpiece, of course."

"What—no sense of humility, Marankeil?" Ornenkai laughed.

"What is humility?" Marankeil echoed, in equal kind. "A vanity that tries to raise one's true worth in the eyes of others by intriguing them first, so that they will seek the truth and note the subtle contradiction between what was claimed and what rather seems to be true; thus, one's worth is highlighted more than its real merit deserves."

"Okay, okay. I suppose you have a right to crow about it." Ornenkai conceded, not liking what Marankeil had said.

"Perhaps I'll explain it to you then when it is finished—if it works." Marankeil shrugged. "I've been developing it for years, but until recently, I had given up on achieving perfection—" Marankeil stopped short. "How about we go on a break? I'll explain some more of it to you."

Ornenkai nodded, losing interest in the strange-looking android. It was, after all, just a machine.

After all he had done, the most difficult task proved to be locating and secretly securing the suspended animation capsule from those left over from launching the first major galactic explorer mission. Now at last the device was his, and he could finally begin the greatest experiment of all, the last step of all.

Marankeil calmly activated the mechanized unit he had been preparing for many years, a creature he had created with a computerized mind capable of embodying a human mind, able to absorb not only the pieces of thought from a living being, but the entire entity. Now only the last transfer remained.

Marankeil looked down at the mechanized unit with satisfaction; if it failed, what would he lose? Yes, it was a gamble; if he failed, he would die then, lose a life presently not worth living, but he would die anyway in time. If he succeeded, immortality would be his.

He felt certain he would; the Enorian legends had so much as assured him so. Yes, he thought. Soon, his being and all of his memories would be extracted, replicated, and transferred into the mechanized unit, his conscious thought entering the machine and remaining there. His human shell he would be careful to preserve in case the machine failed—there was a possibility that it could be revived if he sensed that the mechanized forms were beginning to malfunction, but for that he might need a biological expert—Ornenkai.

Marankeil smiled complacently, confident that nothing could go wrong with the three replicas he had waiting already as back-ups. Then suddenly his face twisted in irritation, distracting him as he realized again that he was going to need Ornenkai, that he would have to convince his friend to join him.

But he wasn't worried. He had already gained what he needed from Ornenkai, when Ornenkai refused to see the truth... Perhaps Ornenkai didn't want to know. Now Marankeil had nothing to fear.

He also knew Ornenkai's weakness well enough to tempt him, to control him, better than Ornenkai knew it himself. Ornenkai was desperately afraid of death. Marankeil had sensed that when his own mother died. And Ornenkai believed in philanthropic values.

But he had to concentrate on the transfer now. If it worked, he would have all the time in the world to worry about Ornenkai.

"Marankeil, where are you?" Ornenkai called out into the empty laboratory. He looked up at the sound of the door opening to the inner laboratory. An incredibly advanced-looking mechanized unit moved into the room, looking at him as though it were waiting to be spoken to.

"Where's Marankeil?" Ornenkai addressed the machine android that moved fluidly without sound, and for once he found his attention distracted by the revelation that he had never seen such an exquisite android before. Marankeil's? he thought.

The machine let out a reedy, synthesized laugh that sounded nonetheless familiar. Could machines laugh? Ornenkai wondered.

No, Ornenkai, they can't. But I'm not just a machine. Ornenkai heard the words enter his mind unbidden, as though another entity had put them there.

How did I speak to you without using my voice? The machine went on. As a computerized entity I can receive the information of your brain waves—like telepathy, yes, except that I can only hear your surface thoughts. Then I can communicate back to you using your own frequency.

"What are you?" Ornenkai asked, amazed.

"Don't you recognize me, Riliya?" The synthesized voice asked. "It's me."

"Marankeil..." Ornenkai let the words die.

"Don't you see, Ornenkai? You could live forever in an eternal body."

Eternal? Ornenkai was suddenly conscious of his heartbeats. Eternal. He had no real concept of that word, of all that it meant.

What could a man do with eternity?

What would he discover if he became like Marankeil?

"You know that someday we'll discover a way to defend our bodies from the radiation disease, but it'll be too late for our generation." Marankeil continued; Ornenkai tried to ignore the reedy, artificial quality of the mechanized unit's voice, tried to forget the lyrical voice that had been Marankeil's and could never be again.

"You won't live to see that moment if you remain as you are." Marankeil continued. "Just imagine, you might never again feel pain."

"But I wouldn't feel anything. No pleasure either—" He formed a mental image of Lia Hilan. "I couldn't feel pleasure, could I?"

"This is better," Marankeil replied. "You can simulate perpetual pleasure."

"Well, what would I care if I couldn't see or hear—"

"You're just stalling. You know you could. You know I considered everything before I attempted the transfer. I told you, everything had to be perfect."

Perfect? Was there such a thing? Or wasn't perfection as elusive as immortality—

"Wouldn't you love to live free of death and disease as a human being in a body that cannot chemically interact with the environment?" It seemed Marankeil suddenly paused at the words. Ornenkai waited. So—what about the environment?

"I wouldn't want to give up my vision more than anything," Ornenkai said.

"I can see better than you, Riliya," Marankeil continued again, "and I can hear sounds you never imagined—the very air is full of sound, and even machines speak. The frequencies show me so much I did not know—and I feel the nature of electromagnetism—and it's glorious, Ornenkai..."

"How do you see?"

"I see as you do, except that I can also determine the heat levels of living objects. I can see in the absolute dark of the void chamber. But you would see how much better it will be if you would join me—"

"If you feel no pain, how do you sense touch—and pleasure?"

"Touch is not as sensitive to the unpleasant aspects of pain and pressure, but I can sense the imperfections in a smooth piece of silica—I can feel the texture of water, my fingers are more dexterous and agile and yet a thousand times stronger than human fingers—and pleasure can be simulated in my cerebral cortex whenever I desire it."

Perpetual pleasure? No pain?

"There must be a sacrifice," Ornenkai protested, still skeptical, feeling overwhelmed. Why didn't he choose an android more human in appearance, like one of the anthropoid humanroids? Ornenkai began to wonder, but cut off the thoughts to keep Marankeil from hearing them.

"We solved many of the problems together, Ornenkai. You helped me to understand the physical systems necessary to perfect my android form."

"The project?! How did you continue the project without anyone knowing?"

"The project only involved the parts that I could not solve on my own. I admit I was disappointed by its official discontinuation, but then I realized I had learned almost all that I needed. Thus the end of it was only a minor setback..."

"Why didn't you tell me what you were planning?"

"I couldn't, Riliya, until I was sure that the transfer would be a success. And I didn't want to alarm you with what I was planning to do. But now I'm offering you alone the chance to join me. Just think of it, Riliya. Together you and I can restore the faded glory of our people—we can create the great Empire the Enorians saw and bring prosperity to all the races if we wish..." Marankeil was unsure if his argument were winning Ornenkai over, and readjusted his line of pursuit.

"As a machine you can never be harmed, Riliya—my body runs on the energy of sun and wind and can take electricity from any nearby source—it will never fail you. I will teach you how to heal and maintain yourself if an internal system begins to fail, but there are back-up systems in the unit and even back-up units that I have created to replace this body when it begins to grow old.

"As a machine you can still eat food and burn the fuel as energy as humans do—you can even taste sweet sher-inn juice. Trust me, Riliya, you will see how much better your life will be." Marankeil could see that Ornenkai was wavering. "Come Ornenkai, my friend, I would not have invited you to join me if I hadn't wished the best for you." He added. "Join me and we will guide the evolution of our kind."

Ornenkai said more words in protest, instead regarding Marankeil thoughtfully. He didn't want to become a machine, but—

Helping humankind, yes, that was interesting. But that was not what swayed his final decision.

What Marankeil left unsaid—their speculations about the Enorians' eternal life—haunted him. Could it be possible to find that secret someday? And then—yes and then to live forever as a man? One thing was certain—there was much evidence in the animals of their planet that Seynorynaelian life had already evolved in reaction to the damaging effects of Valeria's radiation and potential that life might eventually evolve to the point where radiation could do no more harm to their race and to the planet's animals.

Marankeil's promise of immortality would at least buy him some time.

He was young and foolish enough to believe that a man might deserve it.

"But surely you wanted to help everyone, didn't you? The others want to know how you did it. They want to know how they can—"

"So what?" Marankeil said, with disinterest, as he sat in his residence out by a small, enclosed garden. Ornenkai had just arrived from a meeting at his science department.

"You don't want to help them," Ornenkai repeated, suddenly subdued by the truth he had never before accepted. Only a short time had passed since the transfer, and already Ornenkai saw a change in Marankeil.

"Ah, you finally understand."

"So why—why did you say—"

"I said what I could to get you to join me, knowing what you wanted to hear. And I omitted my intentions, because they had nothing to do with your decision."

"You—you're a monster." Ornenkai said suddenly, in shock, but he wasn't sure if he meant it. "You don't really care about anyone—but yourself."

"You're right. I don't care. I just don't care anymore about anyone, or about helping anyone who doesn't deserve it." Marankeil explained, his mellifluous voice low but steady; he was somewhat upset by the fact that he could no longer read Ornenkai's feelings directly in his eyes, but he himself had nothing to hide.

"You don't care?" Ornenkai still refused to comprehend him.

"The world is just bleak to me." Marankeil said; he would have to say more now, if Ornenkai was ever going to understand. He eyed him with a glittering, cold, mechanical eye. "Everywhere I look, I see things that are wrong, and I don't believe that anything can be changed for the better. Chaos is all I see. Yet the thing is, I don't care any more. I used to think: what if I do something about it? Every little bit everyone can do helps. I used to think I could come up with a miracle cure, something that would bring order to the world, or at least some sense to it. I was young and foolish then, and yes, I remember having a pure heart. I look on that person as an entirely different being now. Yet I remember him, though now he is a stranger to me."

Ornenkai stepped back, horrified by his friend's admission but unable to withdraw. He was suddenly very conscious of his non-human body.

"I remember him, didn't I say??" Marankeil continued. "Yes, back then I cared about people, every little thing about people. When they hurt. How they hurt. Why they hurt. And most of all, how to stop us all from feeling so much pain. Then I started to see that most people weren't worth the effort. They didn't want help. They didn't want me. They were going to do what they wanted without ever knowing anything about me or that I cared for them all. That hurt me, back then. I thought something was wrong with me, tried to change myself. Make myself so good at it all that no one could stop me from bettering the world. Slowly I stopped thinking about what I could do for them and more about how I could control them. They couldn't be trusted to do anything properly, even for themselves. So I decided I'd make the world what I wanted it to be. I'd make myself what I wanted most to be. And maybe I'll get there. I don't trust any one else to get me there, that's for certain—"

"But surely not me, not all of your old friends—" Ornenkai began to object.

"People are all flawed, including me," Marankeil countered. "They'll let you down if you give them a chance and let you down again if you forgive them. If you trust them, Ornenkai, then you're a fool."

Ornenkai didn't answer. Marankeil waited a moment, then continued.

"Then I went through this stage of feeling guilty that I'd given up on them." He admitted freely. "After a while I stopped feeling guilty. Can you imagine why?"

Ornenkai shook his mechanical head swiftly.

"Because I stopped believing that anything was stopping me from getting what I wanted. I saw that everyone was out there just trying to get what he could for himself. Enjoying himself whenever he wanted and as much as he wanted, living his life as though he were the only creature in existence and the rest of the world mere objects around him. He was doing all of these things and not paying any price for it. He was living completely free.

"I saw that having a conscience about little things wasn't doing me any good. I began to believe that a conscience was some kind of masochistic streak in humanity that keeps us from getting what we want because it's easy to give up and not put any effort into anything. It's easier to act the martyr and complain that life isn't fair than to blame ourselves for our failures. The thing is, life doesn't care enough about you specifically to be fair or unfair. It hasn't the ability to be anything but impartial because it isn't something ordered. I realized that life is really about survival. The hunter doesn't worry about whether or not he should attack his prey. I decided my senses were telling me this all along, but I only ignored them—"

Marankeil saw Ornenkai making vague signs of disagreement. Marankeil waved an arm in dismissal, his voice rising and hurrying along in a passion, but it was a cold, controlled passion.

"And I don't want to hear the argument that if you fancy yourself above moral law, if you contemplate and premeditate the nature of your decision to be immoral before you act immorally, that you've made a conscious acknowledgment of what you've done. I don't want to hear that you're thereby accountable to the moral law you claimed to be exempt from. I've heard it before, that a sinner or murderer must confess, is compelled to because he can't keep his sin hidden. I've heard that this is the conscience's admission that at heart the sinner himself wasn't really a predator, because he had to justify his action even to himself. He didn't believe he was a predator, after all.

"Well, first let me say that I don't care either about sin or confession; if I've done something, an act, a thought, I can admit it and feel no horror, or keep it to myself and feel no shame. You see, I have no qualms about either keeping or telling secrets. Nothing, not even conscience has power over me, simply by virtue of the fact that I am—that I was—and in my soul still am an animal and need to survive. That is all.

"Their argument has many other flaws as far as they pertain to me; perhaps to others as well, but how they pertain to me is all that I care about.

"For you see, I think that you truly have to believe that your mistake matters to any one else in order to feel obliged to justify yourself. I'm not justifying myself. I don't care what the truth is—don't mistake this for meaning that I deliberately try to lie or to "sin" as it were; on the contrary, what I'm saying is that I have no interest in making my own character appear good by showing a false truth, or adhering to a morality system I had nothing to do with creating, a morality code which I feel is an artificial concoction of the human intellect rather than the human animal. Therefore, I am the best judge of truth because I do not care for it one way or another, so I can give it better than any one.

"To the point, I am really beginning to wonder if truth exists. I wonder if anything is simple, if anyone is doing anything other than just surviving or deluding himself into believing that he is trying to please others.

"Life just keeps going. And I want to be a part of it for as long as possible. Because I wish to survive does not mean I have no sense of pleasure or pain. I am very much aware that I was an animal. I also have feelings. I fear I was once capable of love, though no longer. I once felt desire. Acute desire. I sated it when I could and welcomed its appearance again when it returned, but it no longer gives me the satisfaction it once did. Yet I still wish for companionship, or I would keep no friends, assuming it is in my power to keep them, friends I can tolerate. And you, Ornenkai—I would keep you always with me because you are the one being that reminds me why I became as I am." He hesitated, as though this comment had surprised even he himself. "You are the one other being I ever respected, apart from one other. For you, my friend, are the one being who ever stood a chance of stopping me from getting what I wanted, and I stopped you."

"So, I am a monster." Marankeil laughed at length; an hour had passed in silence.

Ornenkai looked over to him, coming out of a long moment of inner reflections.

"I don't know. I just said that—because I can't understand you yet. I—suppose I should try to before I judge you." Ornenkai heard the words after he said them, as though he hadn't thought much about what he was going to say.

"You think I have no morals?"

"Yes." No hesitation.

Marankeil laughed. "I know what you think 'morals' are; for years I've listened to other people's definitions of what these things are supposed to be. But if I exist, do I not have a right to my own beliefs about what they are to me?"

"I suppose," Ornenkai said after a moment. "Every individual has rights."

"That's beside the point."

"I am completely baffled." Ornenkai shook his head.

"Well, Ornenkai, what would you say if I said I believe we are born with certain moral tendencies? How then can we be denounced—even damned—for a nature that was given us and is beyond our control? And is a man to be held morally accountable when obsession robs him of free will?"

"I'm not saying we've ever done anything to be damned for," Ornenkai replied, evasively. "But we chose to become what we are of our own free will, so whatever we do with it, it's up to us. Any man who makes a mistake, no matter if he's become a machine or not, is at fault, and he'll have to deal with what ensues as a result."

"I won't believe your attributions of blame," Marankeil laughed. "Morality is abstract and moral perceptions are the vain sentiments espoused by a particular person. We have no control over what we are born, but we still each of us struggle against our natures, with our consciences, with our own morality, so we do have self-control. Yet this fear of blame should rationally have nothing to do with any of our actions. I believe in consequences—yes, but blame—this concept of sin—no."

Ornenkai stopped. Marankeil had already said he didn't believe in sin, but this concept continued to stun Ornenkai.

"There is a subtle difference." Marankeil said. "No—actually a great difference."

"I think that self-control is something which keeps all of us from plunging into sin or vices. And you, my friend, haven't got any self-control at all."

Marankeil laughed. "Yes, I do. What have I ever done to anyone?"

"But not everyone has it. That's why we have criminals."

"Show me a man who has never been capable of self-control and I guarantee his mind is either unfunctioning or unhealthy."

"You mean it doesn't function for lack or for excess of something entirely chemical and physical. A chemical imbalance in the brain or something."

"Biology again," Marankeil sighed. "But at least you seem to understand me."

"But if we can all control ourselves, how can there be Fate—and dammit—what about criminals? If there is no crime and moral punishment, why do criminals feel the need to confess, even when they know society will punish them? Isn't it true that we all have a moral conscience?"

"We may do, most of us, but not everyone shares the same morality, Ornenkai."

"What about the criminals?"

"Criminals—I suppose I know what you mean by that." Marankeil sighed. "Ornenkai, despite what you believe, a criminal—by your definition—can be happy, and an upright, virtuous man miserable. So tell me, is this justice as you see it?" Marankeil asked.

"But—" Ornenkai tried to protest.

"Don't try to feed me any nonsense about the virtuous being happy for the sake of the goodness they do and the criminal's conscience making him suffer for his guilt. The fact that this isn't always true proves that each man or woman possesses their own morality code and lives by it. Their morality was fated to them, yes, but their choice to live or not live by it—this is entirely their free choice and will."

"Morality has to involve society—"

"No, no—not as you think it does." Marankeil said. "Absolute reality dictates that the morality of a man's neighbors, who are human and therefore flawed and mortal themselves, has no real moral, non-social bearing upon him—let them judge!; he must decide his morality for himself. A morally strong man is a man who has identified his own morality and lives by it. Doesn't he have the right to his beliefs as much as any man? You do believe in equality and human rights, as you said, Ornenkai."

"Yes..." Ornenkai stopped. "So morality isn't something that can be taught, but born into you, as you claim. That can't be true, or else what good are teachers if not to teach us right from wrong?"

"Morality becomes automatic through habit, yes, Ornenkai, but those concepts of right and wrong are merely rules of a particular society."

"Then I have a question. If a man must believe and know he is sinning in order to sin, why must he not also know he is acting virtuously in order to be virtuous?"

"Ah, if virtue truly exists, Ornenkai, it functions like breathing—sometimes it will be unconscious and at other times conscious. But virtue and sin are entirely independent concepts."

"What if a man is born into a society without moral character?" Ornenkai wondered.

"You mean, as you persist in defining moral character?"

"Yes."

"Impossible. But no single law—and remember that laws are as unjust to the individual as they are just to the mindless majority—can force the man who was born incapable of your so-called proper moral action to adhere to proper moral action. You can't force him to obey the law, no matter what the consequences of his action might be, even if he should be detained in prison for his failings. Or else why do we detain so many criminals who never suffered privation or desperation?"

"Most of them have suffered, though. They have to be desperate to do what they do. But the ones you're talking about are immoral and deserve what they get."

"Because they broke someone else's law by abiding to their own morality code?" Marankeil said.

"I can't believe any morality code would condone their crimes." Ornenkai protested.  
"Then at least as a biologist, you should remember that above all, man is an animal. A selfish animal, which is why he will do what he must to survive. When a man wishes to survive, that is the only morality he knows."

Ornenkai said nothing for a long time.

"So, you don't believe in sin, but you do believe in Fate and free will?"

"Yes. I believe in Fate and predetermined conditions, but that doesn't mean I don't hold a man accountable for the choices he makes when more than one option is open to him, and both options are equally within possibility." Marankeil said. "Well—he simply will be held accountable, because of course he understands his society's rules, but I don't condemn him. The sad thing is that most men suffer from the inability to see that if they wish to abide by their own morality, they must change society or leave it. Which is good, or society couldn't function. Society needs people who are incapable of solitary action to follow others."

"You choose your words carefully, as though to avoid blame, which you say you don't care about. Marankeil, you have a strange set of opinions."

"According to whom?"

"Well—to the world."

"To you."

"To me."

"And what of it? I'm tired of outdated ideas that neglect the reality of the universe and the universal consequences of all actions in favor of petty social consequences. The many humans and aliens—we are all subject to environmental forces that are beyond our control, but we can also affect these forces, which no one seems to consider in their notions of social morality."

Ornenkai stopped, suddenly thinking about the Enorians. History is destiny—how much of what the vanished Enorians had done would continue to affect the entire universe and all of the life in it? Even when the explorers returned to a world perhaps influenced by Enor millions of years before recorded time?

"So, then, is it right to eradicate all that can ever be through our own vain pursuits?" He wondered, disconcerted, thinking about the tablets. "Or perhaps because of our vices?" Ornenkai asked, after a moment.

"Absolute right or wrong has nothing to do with it. You can't make blanket statements, my friend. There are consequences, but what gives us the right to judge them right or wrong for other people? We simply have to live with them, try to analyze what we see and predict what might happen. What is going to happen. Ah, but I do not wish to be dogmatic. Of course, I do not expect you to agree with me in this. This is my moral understanding, not necessarily yours."

"What you say is interesting," Ornenkai admitted but tried not to let it work on his thoughts. "Though I can't understand how a man would believe in Fate and also believe in free will and the capacity to make predictions based on observations."

"They are not contradictory." Marankeil insisted.

"For myself, I don't believe in Fate. It makes no rational sense. Entropy is increasing in the universe, that's all—"

"Moving all things towards a state of decay—chaos, break-downs—they're inevitable." Marankeil returned. "Isn't that Fate in a way?"

Ornenkai shook his head. "Not exactly."

"Then what about the Enorian legend?"

"You can't prove it," Ornenkai said numbly.

Some time later, perhaps even years later, it occurred to Ornenkai to wonder why Marankeil had deceived him, why he had even invited him to become a machineor mechanized unit He had gotten what he wanted—what did he need Ornenkai for?

"Why did you need me?" Ornenkai wondered. The two machines had been involved in a humanroid project for some time; Ornenkai functioned through the days, convinced that Marankeil's involvement in their newest project was not something philanthropic.

"Why did I need you, Ornenkai? You mean as opposed to someone else?"

"Yes. You could have chosen anyone—or no one."

"You're my friend." Marankeil said, seeming content with that simple answer.

"You can always make new ones." Ornenkai insisted. "You didn't have to grant me immortality."

"Unfortunately, I am still an animal in my soul, Ornenkai," Marankeil replied, with a gesture that passed for a sigh. "And no achievement ever meant anything to the human animal when there was not someone else there to witness it."

Ornenkai paused.

"Is that all?" he asked after a moment.

"Ornenkai, you are my friend, despite everything I believe, or perhaps because of what I believe. Our friendship reaches beyond time, to the days when we little perceived its existence, or its power. And I did what I did because I see your friendship with me is based on the loyalty which you believe exists and because you base your friendship upon the pursuit of your interest—you hope one day to understand me, and so you linger on, because I am the only one who never feared to tell you the truth of what I believed. My beliefs fascinate you, beliefs which now begin to temper your soul as they did mine."

Despite what Marankeil claimed, Ornenkai didn't believe him, not yet.

Chapter Eighteen

"I think, councilor, that you have overlooked my colleague's point," Ornenkai glanced over at Marankeil, or rather, the mechanized unit that now held Ilikan Marankeil's being. Ornenkai knew that this was exactly how he appeared to the councilors.

The metallic voice resonating from his lips had come as naturally as breathing to him; he no longer protested that this wasn't his, no longer regretted the loss of his natural speaking voice, especially not as he raised a powerful, shining silver fist and slammed it into the table.

Marankeil watched the apostate scientist Ornenkai. I feel sorry for you, Ornenkai, he thought, but was that his feeling—pity? The thought struck him that this was merely an established expression to pronounce judgment upon another's actions and call it sympathy. You are acting against your moral conscience, Ornenkai. Despite what you believe. You think this doesn't bother you, and it doesn't, not now. But it will someday, Ornenkai. It will someday.

"The question is not whether or not the council should present a proposal but how best to make it."

"The United Council of the Federation's five planets meets tomorrow." Nealan, a puffy-faced, sallow-cheeked man with a sharp mind and a noble attitude, announced, employing the voice of a seasoned orator. "Perhaps if Marankeil is so eager to have the Federation Council approve a security force for the protection of our territorial boundaries, then he can present the proposal himself."

"Perhaps I shall." Marankeil agreed pleasantly.

"I would not imagine you're going to succeed with the Federation council, either." Nealan said. "We Seynorynaelians still hold the majority of seats, and the Kayrians will agree with us. As yet, I see no threat to our Federation's security—the planets that have petitioned to join the Federation of Five Planets cannot harm us."

"I am Seynorynaelian." Marankeil said.

"Yes..." Nealan's eyes clouded with a queasy expression.

So, now what do you think? I told you they were mindless. Ornenkai heard Marankeil's thoughts come to him from across the room, though none other would have noticed their silent communication. The two mechanized units did not move, did not even turn heads as the conversation took place.

They think that if there is a present threat to our great Federation, then they will see it. Marankeil continued. Idiots. The civilizations our great explorer mission has begun to contact may be heading for our planet. If they decide not to join our Federation, what is to keep them from trying to conquer us?

I guess most Seynorynaelians still do not foresee that possibility. Ornenkai pondered the significance of Nealan's argument. We've never experienced intergalactic war. I think you are right— the Federation Council may be more receptive to your proposal. Ornenkai added. They at least know the importance of self-defense, but our people don't understand war, not the way the Berrachaiyans do. Ornenkai glanced around the table; he was getting tired of the Seynorynaelian council's resistance to its newest members.

A person who can't see the truth for himself and lacks the capacity to see it when others present it to him is an utterly useless human being, Marankeil returned.

There had been initial problems getting the scientific community and the people of Ariyalsynai to accept the two scientists for who they were—many people still thought the mechanized forms of Marankeil and Ornenkai merely androids.

But Marankeil's demonstration of their telepathic ability, his perception of his surroundings and independent responses convinced those who had known him that the advanced mechanized unit was indeed Ilikan Marankeil. The final irrevocable truth came after a brief investigation into Marankeil's project, but the mechanized creature permitted the scientific community to see only the details of his project that might convince them and not any of its most guarded secrets.

Marankeil's telepathic link to brainwave communication showed him the jealousy of many scientists from the Research Center and across the Federation who had come to observe the units. Despite his irritation at their insistence upon understanding the technology Marankeil had pioneered, he had not at first been very worried about their interference. They could do nothing to him.

When the rumors of two scientists' mechanized immortality had reached the planetwide population, the news disturbed many people, many of whom objected against the experiment because they did not want to be machine themselves and felt threatened by it, others objecting because they thought everyone might eventually abandon the human form for a machine.

But their fears served no purpose. Marankeil had no intention of letting anyone else follow him and Ornenkai, unless he wished it.

Ornenkai tried to answer the scientists' many questions as to why they had chosen androids that did not appear as natural humans but humanoid robotic forms instead. The technology existed for Marankeil to have created a humanroid out of his mechanized unit that would have born a more superficially human likeness and blended into society better.

The truth was that Marankeil had wanted them to know he had become a machine. Ornenkai had begun to believe that he even wanted others to fear him, that he had chosen an extraordinarily powerful, indestructible android body because it was more impressive and fearsome than even a humanroid.

Ornenkai had even begun to notice a change in Marankeil's attitude towards the scientific fields. Marankeil had achieved his greatest desire, and it seemed he thought he had every intention of abandoning the fields of scientific study. But at the same time, he began to act as though he feared others advancing beyond him, of improving upon his achievement in memory transfer. As the mnemonics division director, he began to reject any projects aimed at improving the robotics division, and even began to replace a few engineers with less competent ones.

Ornenkai saw the danger in Marankeil's new sentiments, but his objections were diminishing every day. True, as a scientist, he had always felt the urge to make new discoveries and push the boundaries, and in his heart, he still regretted the idea that Marankeil would attempt to arrest future progress in the field. But he hadn't really believed that Marankeil alone could do anything to stop it from growing, and he hadn't wanted to incite an unnecessary argument between them.

Another part of him had understood the real reason he could not willingly oppose his friend, and tried to persuade him that he should in fact confront Marankeil, but that part was slowly dying, lost to the new Ornenkai who was preoccupied with his own new abilities and too grateful to consider opposing the friend who had granted his wish for immortality.

For a long time, Ornenkai did not know that Marankeil had been considering resigning from his position as a division director at the Research Center in the year after the transferal. But shortly after, Marankeil learned that he had been named a life-term councilor by his grandfather. Before he died, Vaelir Marankeil had named his grandson to succeed him without ever discovering Marankeil's mechanization. The council's initial opposition to the appointment on the grounds that Marankeil could not claim a "life" term had been outweighed by the terms of the law.

A certain number of life-term seats had always been passed among families, created in early history to maintain a balance in the council and protect against sudden swings in policy forming. But Marankeil had no intention of maintaining the indifferent position now expected of the long-term regulators. When he accepted the position, he told Ornenkai that it was to change the direction of his life.

After an initial period of public hostility towards Marankeil's appointment, people began to accept the idea, especially as Marankeil's name appeared in the circulated reports of council activities in favor of many improvements to Seynorynaelian life. It seemed that though he had become a machine, he had not forgotten the common needs and desires of the people.

Ornenkai had continued his work until two years after the transferal, when he was informed that he had been appointed a councilor by the elected representatives of all the provinces. Marankeil's reputation as a public defender had grown to the point that his picture appeared on printsheets passed throughout the cities. Some would even go so far as to claim that he had become mechanized for the sake of the people and not for his own gain, that he had sacrificed his own humanity to improve the Seynorynaelian race.

Marankeil's popularity had given him a position to suggest electing his mechanized companion to the Council, but Ornenkai had been busy in the Research Center, and hadn't received news of the election until the final results came in. At Marankeil's insistence Ornenkai reluctantly resigned from the Research Center within the tenday to become a councilor and moved to an apartment near the Council Building.

However, Ornenkai's initial hesitation to leave the sciences had been quickly worn down by Marankeil's promises that they could change the government for the better, and he dismissed his secret fear that Marankeil had brought him into politics in order to keep tabs on him. After the first few meetings of the Council, Ornenkai was too grateful and excited that he had been included on policy forming discussions to regret abandoning his old life.

His new body had given him all the power and time he needed to sample all of the opportunities in life he had never contemplated as a mortal being. Ornenkai gradually convinced himself that becoming a councilor was the best thing he could have chosen. Now he could possibly change all of the policies he had never liked when he was powerless and replace them with better alternatives.

But it had been Marankeil's idea to create some kind of security force for the Federation boundaries.

Strange, Ornenkai thought, shielding his mind from Marankeil. Most Seynorynaelians do not anticipate conflicts arising as a result of Kudenka's explorers' mission. Perhaps Marankeil is right. Perhaps the world is made of fools.

Marankeil refused to be infuriated, and refused to be daunted, though the years passed, and still he couldn't gain the support he needed in the Federation Council to create some kind of security force; time and time again the representatives against the proposal defeated his supporters. Yet Marankeil knew, somehow he knew that he was slowly gaining ground.

I will find a way to undermine the council's power, Marankeil told himself each time. And then I will get rid of it. Who deserves to live forever? He wondered absently. Yes, my dear Elera, now I have the power to decide.

Ninety-eight years after Kudenka's explorer mission had been launched, a Seynorynaelian shuttle suddenly returned home, carrying delegates from a planet called Ephor.

Kudenka's explorers had landed on Ephor only twenty-seven tendays earlier according to the shuttle calendar, less than half a year since Sesylendae had been launched. But already the effects of time dilation in hyperspace had allowed a century of time to pass on Seynorynael.

One of the explorer crew, a man called Giddehns, had sacrificed his mission in order to return as an escort for the Ephors on board the shuttle and to bring important information about the Ephors to the council. In a private audience with the council, he warned them that although the Ephors had accepted the invitation to join the Federation Council, they were a fiercely independent race.

Though humanoid, the Ephors were tall and stocky, with dark grey leathery skin and grey eyes. The explorer Giddehns claimed that what he had seen of Ephoran culture made the Berrachai look like sweet little ileacs. So, Kudenka's explorers had decided one of their number should return with the Ephors aboard a Sesylendae shuttle to warn the Federation. Though the Ephors had only created ships capable of traveling to the edge of their red-star system, they were quick learners. In several thousand years before the mission returned, the Ephors could have gone to Seynorynael and attempted to conquer it.

The return of Giddehns could not have been more aptly timed for Marankeil's benefit. Within the year, Marankeil' voice dominated the Seynorynaelian council and the Federation council. Only a half-race Gildbaturan named Smilsid, the son of the Seynorynaelian Ambassador to Gildbatur and a native woman, continued to make trouble for Marankeil.

For Marankeil's new security force to pass the unanimous count, Marankeil decided that it was time to gain their permanent participation.

"I have an idea, Ornenkai," he told his friend one afternoon while Ornenkai was overseeing his latest cultural enhancement project.

"What?" Ornenkai turned to look at him, forgetting that he couldn't read the mechanized unit's face, then looked again to monitor the progress of the building.

"I am going to offer the transferal to Maerodach and Baladahn," he said calmly.

Ornenkai whipped around in shock.

"You can't be serious—" He stopped, considering Marankeil's motives. What could Marankeil stand to gain by it? It was clear that Marankeil enjoyed the control he had over others around him, but he also fed on the interaction between himself and his enemies, on the argument itself, and his ultimate victories. Why would he seek to immortalize his enemies? Could he enjoy the conflict that much?

No, of course it had to be that he saw it as a way to secure their loyalty. Maerodach and Baladahn were strong-willed opponents, and would be as useful if somehow won over to Marankeil's side. The transferal would score another triumph and solidify Marankeil's control of the Federation Council for generations to come.

"Don't forget, Ornenkai, the power my leadership has given you." Marankeil warned. "Don't forget the anger you felt when the Council approved the destruction of the parks. Soon you will have finished this Seynorynaelian 'Arboretum Museum' you are creating for the future generations—right next to the council building no less, where you can be close to it."

"Will they accept, do you think?" Ornenkai wondered, returning to the main issue.

"Yes, of that you can be sure. They think like Gildbaturans—always after a good fight, and once they no longer oppose me, they should see the potential in controlling a security force. But you missed a few meetings, my friend. Though I must admit you have given me an idea, one that seems paramount in light of the transferal of our new companions. I have decided to establish a Main Terminus in the council room."

"A Main Terminus?"

"Yes. We will transfer our minds into the main computers to preserve our knowledge and being, ensuring—a permanent computerized storage place if you will. You will have constant telepathic link between the two entities of your being, my friend—a stationary computer that will allow you to forever interact upon our council meetings if you wish, and our current mechanized form—a mobile unit that will allow us both to travel the planet freely and observe all we ever wished to see."

"A Main Terminus installation in the Council Building—I can transfer and store the memory from my mobile unit there in case something happens to it," Ornenkai suggested, drawing a laugh from Marankeil.

"How shall we form this new security force?" Baladahn enquired from the permanent storage aspect of his being before the rest of the council arrived for the meeting. "And how should we name it if we are to please the scientists of the Federation Science Building?"

"I don't care what it is called," Marankeil's computerized voice was irritated. "What matters is that I keep the scientists under tight control. When the explorers return—if they ever do—they must understand that our primary goal is to protect this planet from outside threats. Any future exploration missions will be devised by and under the control of our security force—our martial enforcers, so to speak. And the scientists will have no independent identity outside the body of our enforcers."

"A martial force? Like the armies of Ephor?" Maerodach suggested.

"Not quite," Ornenkai shook his head. You can't change the Seynorynaelian mind. We can't give this body a name influenced by alien culture and ideas. It must induce pleasant sentiments—a feeling of security, not hostility. "And if all of our future scientists are to be trained by it, in order to secure their cooperation, the people must believe that it has been formed to expand our scientific understanding—Seynorynaelians love to explore," Ornenkai added, trying to quell a memory of adventures from his own boyhood.

Marankeil sent Ornenkai a silent feeling of approval.

"Happy people do not contemplate terror." Marankeil said. "So—what do you suggest, Riliya?" He asked a moment later.

"If it is to be a martial scientific force—why not call it so?"

"Very well," Marankeil rasped amusedly. "The Martial Scientific Force is born."

It took years for Ornenkai to realize what Marankeil's greatest fear was.

Any person who has done something great is afraid that someone else will be able to do it as well, and Marankeil was no different in his paranoia. The thought occurred to him—where? What was he doing? He took no notice of his surroundings or whatever minor task he had been doing. This thought was all, and now that he had realized it, Ornenkai never forgot it.

His idea bore out in practice as well.

Over the coming years, Marankeil was able to alter the society into which he had been born, and Ornenkai was there on his right to help him.

Anything they could do to stem the tide of progress and maintain the society as it was, they did. They would do anything that kept Marankeil and Ornenkai in control.

Soon their influence over the fate of the future generations of humankind began even at birth. Marankeil wanted to make sure that genius died out on Seynorynael.

The expensive ectogenesis process had made multi-racial children possible by growing them outside a womb from the parent's genetic material; this process had been popular but by no means ubiquitous for many generations. But Marankeil encouraged its use over "primitive" natural birth and made ectogenesis available to the average Seynorynaelian for a nominal fee; he knew that had the process been entirely free, the people might have mistrusted its value. The people were assured that the fee was to prevent wanton abuse of the technology and that the enormous cost was in fact paid for by the munificence of the Elder Council; they were persuaded that they should take advantage of such generosity, and in time, the use of ectogensis was routine, as natural as breathing. Had there ever been a time when people bore children without it?

Marankeil and Ornenkai used the ectogenesis process for other purposes. They bred out intelligence on the pretext of the trait engendering impertinence, pride, unruly, or egoistic behavior, and they bred out socially aberrant traits. Genetic tailoring for physical beauty was favored and became an established norm, but it varied in success. Faces could be altered by the new technology, but Marankeil made it illegal to do so on political grounds, in order that the government could keep tabs on everyone in this age of civil chaos invading from the unstable off-worlds. Who wanted a criminal to escape notice and justice because he could alter his face?

Soon, using ectogenesis in order to have children was required by law—anyone giving natural birth in the Federation was forced to pay a fine that might take years to pay off; even the fathers of such children were rooted out by genetic testing and required to pay. Only the elite families—new and old—were permitted the dignity of bearing their own children if they so chose with their special exemptions, but few did. Marankeil had bought them with favors, and continued to do so. They stayed, they were utterly loyal to the council for all that it gave them, and never worried that Marankeil and Ornenkai composed the dominant force behind it—what did that matter, it the council was willing to be so generous? The elite were faithful to the council; for those who left their offices were no longer allowed the many luxuries they received.

Marankeil granted women the same rights and freedoms in society as men entirely; the idea was solidly ingrained in the social mind, not merely given lip service in law as it had been for eons. At the same time, elite women didn't always promote absolute equality when it didn't suit them, such as in the matter of being called up for mandatory military service, which all ordinary class women undertook along with men; many elite women felt it their duty to fulfill their military service, but a few did not and were given exemptions. Yet in every other aspect the elite women in society took their equal social status as a matter of course.

Exemptions from military service were possible because, more than any other faction of society, the elite hierarchy was governed by tradition. The elite hierarchy was beheld by one and all as being exempt from the general laws on the grounds of its venerability, exempt from most expectations within the public's consciousness if not strictly exempt in writing.

It took little time for the same laws Marankeil had founded as the basis of Seynorynaelian society to be applied to the worlds throughout the Federation; the council members of the off-worlds were no different from those on Seynorynael, who wished to earn Marankeil's mechanized immortality and would agree to nearly anything to obtain their everlasting reward.

Thus in only a few generations, the habits of the Federation society had become so entrenched that, after a while, if it were to be discovered by scientists that the ectogenesis labs were doing the races a disservice, it would hardly have mattered, for the mutations that allowed the race to improve upon itself over generations had been for the most part effectively stamped out.

For a world with such a long history of innovation, Seynorynael had become a world frozen in time.

Yet Marankeil and Ornenkai, the two oldest Elders, were considered to be innovators in the stability they had provided to all worlds of the Federation and for the comfortable standard of living they had extended to all.

Anyone who didn't agree with them just had to be crazy.
Dramatis Personae and places in The Comet Riders

Alessia Valeria Zadúmchov—Uh-LESS-ee-yuh Zuh-DOOM-chav—one of Hinev's explorers, daughter of the last Enorian Zariqua Enassa and Nerena Zadúmchov; the child taken by Marankeil to be Hinev's assistant

Ariyalsynai—Ar-ri-YAL-sinn-eye—"white mountain" or "star mountain"; the ancient capital of Seynorynael

Berrachai(y)i—Bair-uh-KAI-yi—an alien race

Elera Erlenkov—ELL-err-uh ER-lenn-kahv—a woman training at the Lunei Center; Ilikan Marankeil's companion

Enor—EE-nor—a legendary planet and civilization

Ettrekh Meilacu-ra—EE-trekh May-LAK-ku-RAH—a Kayrian man, father of Undina

Fynals Hinev—FY-nahlss HAI-nev—the greatest scientist of Seynorynael, son of Jerekkil Hinev and Undina Meilacu-ra; the scientist who created the elixir of immortality known as "Hinev's serum"; one of Kudenka's explorers

Ilikan Marankeil—ILL-li-kahn MAIR-enn-kee-il—man who one day becomes a mechanized Elder, then Emperor of the Seynorynaelian Empire

Jerekkil Hinev—JAIR-ik-keel HAI-nev—an explorer and proto-telepath raised in the region of Lake Firien; father of Fynals Hinev

Firien—a city and region on Seynorynael surrounding Lake Firien; north of the weather-safe ring

Kudenka—Koo-DEN-kuh—a scientist who leads Kudenka's explorers; friend of Hinev

Lake Firien—Lake FEAR-ee-enn—a province of Seynorynael; also a large body of water

lyra—LEER-uh—the beautiful, mysteriously undying trees of Seynorynael; a formerly abundant, seeded, but now fruitless tree that can no longer be replaced once destroyed

Ohnri Chiyenn—OWN-ree Kai-yenn—co-captain of the Seishinna and one of the early explorers of Seynorynael

Rilien Ornenkai—RILL-ee-yen OR-nen-kai, a biochemist; later a mechanized Elder and then Vice-Emperor of the Seynorynaelian Empire; finally, the computerized entity on board Syleraestia

Riorn Lier—Ree-orn Leer—explorer captain of the Seishinna

Seishinna—the ship of the earliest Seynorynaelian explorers

Selerael—Sel-AIR-ay-el (softer "s")—the daughter of Alessia and Eiron Vaikyure-Erlenkov, the one destined to end the Seynorynaelian Empire

Sesylendae—Ses-ILL-enn-day—starship of Kudenka's explorers

Seynorynael—Say-NOR-i-NAY-el; often Seh-nor-i-NAY-el—planet in the Great Cluster Galaxy

Selesta—Sel-ESS-tuh— the greatest explorer spaceship ever to be built by the Seynorynaelian Empire; once a ruin by Lake Firien, the vessel of the ferai-lunei, the comet riders.

Tulor—Too-LORR—second planet discovered by Seynorynael

Undina Meilacu-ra—Un-DEE-nuh May-LAK-ku-RAH—young Kayrian woman; mother of Fynals Hinev; creator of the "science of individualism"

Valeria—Vuh-LAIR-ee-uh—blue star of Seynorynael

Zariqua Enassa—ZAIR-ee-kuh or ZAR-ee-kuh Ee-NASS-suh—last colonizer of Enor; Alessia's father

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