"Don't be bitter, Shadow."
It was the first time since entering Current Control that she had used his first name, but he rejected the implied intimacy.
"More than nine thousand people died out there," he said, his voice low. "If one of our subs did it ..."
"Blame will have to be placed squarely," she said. "There can be no doubts, no questions ..."
"No question that Islanders did it," he said.
"Don't play games with me, Shadow. We both know there are many Mermen who will look upon the destruction of Guemes as a benefit to all Pandora."
Panille glanced around Current Control, taking in the intent backs of his people, the way they concentrated on their work while appearing not to listen to this charged conversation. They heard, though. It dismayed him that even here would be some who agreed with the sentiment Ale had just exposed. What had been up to now just late-night scuttlebutt, cafe chatter and idle stories took on a new dimension. He felt this realization as an unwanted maturation, like the death of a parent. Cruel reality no longer could be ignored. It startled him to recognize that he had entertained dream fancies about the essential good will underlying human interactions ... until just moments ago. The awakening angered him.
"I'm going to find out personally who did that," he said.
"Let's pray it was a horrible accident," she said.
"You don't believe that and neither do I." He sent his gaze across the awful testimony of those flickering screens. "It was a big sub - one of our S-twenties or larger. Did it dive deep and escape under the scattering layer?"
"There's nothing definite in the sonde report."
"That's what it did, then."
"Shadow, don't make trouble for yourself," Ale said. "I'm speaking as a friend. Keep your suspicions to yourself ... no rumor-spreading outside this room."
"This is going to be very bad for business," he said. "I understand your concern."
She stiffened and her voice took on a coldly clipped quality. "I must go and get ready to receive the survivors. I will discuss this with you later." She turned on one heel and left.
The hatch sealed with a soft hiss behind him and Panille was left with the memory-image of her angry back and the sweet scent of her body.
Of course she had to go, he thought. Ale was a medic and every available medic would be called up in this emergency. But she was more than a medic. Politics! Why did every political crisis have the stink of merchants hovering around it?
Consciousness is the Species-God's gift to the individual. Conscience is the Individual-God's gift to the species. In conscience you find the structure, the form of consciousness, the beauty.
"She dreams me," Duque said. His voice came strongly from the shadows at the edge of the great organic tub that he shared with Vata.
A watcher ran to summon the C/P.
Indeed, Vata had begun to dream. They were specific dreams, part her own memories, part other memories she inherited from the kelp. Avata memories. These latter included human memories acquired through the kelp's hylighter vector, and other human memories gained he knew not how ... but there was death and pain involved. There were even Ship memories, and these were strangest of all. None of this had entered a human awareness in quite this way for generations.
Ship! Duque thought.
Ship moved through the void like a needle through wrinkled fabric - in at one place, out far away, and all in a blink. Ship once had created a paradise planet and planted humans on its surface, demanding:
"You must decide how you will WorShip me!"
Ship had brought humans to Pandora, which was not a paradise, but a planet almost entirely seas, and those waters moved by the unruly cycles of two suns. A physical impossibility, had Ship not done it. All this Duque saw in the flashing jerks of Vata's dreams.
"Why did Ship bring its humans to me?" Avata had asked.
Neither humans nor Ship answered. And now Ship was gone but humans remained. And the new kelp, that was Avata, now had nothing but a toehold in the sea and its dreams filled Duque's awareness.
Vata dreamed endlessly.
Duque experienced her dreams as vision-plays reproduced upon his senses. He knew their source. What Vata did to him had its own peculiar flavor, always identifiable, never to be denied.
She dreamed a woman called Waela and another called Hali Ekel. The Hali dream disturbed Duque. He felt the reality of it as though his own flesh walked those paths and felt those pains. It was Ship moving him through time and other dimensions to watch a naked man nailed to a crosspiece. Duque knew it was Hali Ekel who saw this thing but he could not separate himself from her experience. Why did some of the spectators spit on him and some weep?
The naked man raised his head and called out: "Father forgive them."
Duque felt it as a curse. To forgive such a thing was worse than demanding revenge. To be forgiven such an act - that could only be more terrible than a curse.
The C/P arrived in the Vata room. Even her bulky robes and long strides couldn't disguise the fine curves of her slim hips and ample breasts. Her body was doubly distracting because she was C/P, and because she was imprisoned inside that Guemian face. She knelt above Duque and the room immediately went silent except for the gurgle of the life-support systems.
"Duque," the C/P said, "what occurs?"
"It is real," Duque said. His voice came out strained and troubled. "It happened."
"What happened, Duque?" she asked.
Duque sensed a voice far away, much farther away than the Hali Ekel dream. He felt Hali's distress, he felt the ancient flesh she wore for Ship's excursion to that hill of terrible crosses; he felt Hali's puzzlement.
Why were they doing this thing? Why did Ship want me to see this?
Duque felt both questions as his own. He had no answers.
The C/P repeated her demand: "What happened, Duque?"
The faraway voice was an insect buzzing in his ear. He wanted to slap it.
"Ship," he said.
A gasp arose from the watchers, but the C/P did not move.
"Is Ship returning?" the C/P asked.
The question enraged Duque. He wanted to concentrate on the Hali Ekel dream. If only they would leave him alone, he felt he might find answers to his questions.
The C/P raised her voice: "Is Ship returning, Duque? You must answer!"
"Ship is everywhere!" Duque shouted.
His shout extinguished the Hali Ekel dream completely.
Duque felt anguish. He had been so close! Just a few more seconds ... the answers might have come.