Infinity's Shore

Advance description

Leaves the unwary stunned by

Serendipity!

Yeah, Kaa agreed, staring at a vaulted chamber that would have been impressive even on Earth, filled with crisscrossing timbers and sparkling lights. Alvin’s account did the place injustice, never conveying the complex unity of all the whirling, spinning parts — for even at a glance one could tell that an underlying rhythm controlled it all. Each ripple and turn was linked to an elegant, ever-changing whole.

The scene was splendid, and ultimately baffling. Dim figures could be glimpsed moving about the scaffolding, making adjustments — several small, scurrying shapes and at least one bipedal silhouette that looked tentatively human. But Kaa could not even judge scale properly because most of the machine lay in deep shadows. Moreover, holovision had been designed to benefit creatures with two forward-facing eyes. A panel equipped with sono-parallax emitters would have better suited dolphins.

Even the normally wry Hannes Suessi was struck silent by this florid, twinkling palace of motion.

Finally, Ur-ronn cut in.

“I see Uriel! She is second fron the right, in that group standing near the chinfanzee.”

Several four-footed urs nervously watched the machine whirl, next to a chimp with a sketchpad. Random light pulses dappled their flanks, resembling fauns in a forest, but Kaa could tell that gray-snouted Uriel must be older than the rest. As they watched, the chimp showed the smith an array of abstract curves, commenting on the results with hand signs instead of words.

“How we gonna do this, Streaker?” Kaa asked. “Just barge in and start t-talking?”

Until lately, it had seemed best for all concerned that Streaker keep her troubles separate. But now events made a meeting seem inevitable — even imperative.

“Let’s listen before announcing ourselves,” Gillian Baskin instructed. “I’d rather conditions were more private.”

In other words, she preferred to contact Uriel, not a whole crowd. Kaa sent the robot creeping forward. But before any urrish words became audible, another speaker interrupted from Streaker’s end.

“Allow me this indulgence,” fluted the refined voice of the Niss Machine. “Kaa, will you again focus the main camera on Uriel’s contraption? I wish to pursue a conjecture.”

When Gillian did not object, Kaa had the probe look at the expanse of scaffolding a second time.

“Note the stretch of sand below,” the Niss urged. “Neat piles accumulate wherever light falls most frequently. These piles correlate with the drawings the chimpanzee just showed Uriel.…”

Kaa’s attention jerked away, caught by a slap of Peepoe’s tail.

“Someone’s ccoming. Peripheral scanner says approaching life signs are Jophur!”

Despite objections from the Niss, Kaa made the probe swivel around. There, framed in the doorway, they saw a silhouette Streaker’s crew had come to loathe — like a tapered cone of greasy doughnuts.

Gillian Baskin broke in. “Calm down, everyone.… I’m sure it’s just a traeki.”

“Of course it is,” confirmed Ur-ronn. “That stack is Tyug.”

Kaa recalled. This was the “chief alchemist” of Mount Guenn Forge. Uriel’s master of chemical synthesis. Kaa brushed reassuringly against Peepoe, and felt her relax a bit. According to Alvin’s journal, traeki were docile beings quite unlike their starfaring cousins.

So he was caught completely off guard when Tyug turned a row of jewel-like sensor patches upward, toward the tiny spy probe. Thoughtful curls of orange vapor steamed from its central vent. Then the topmost ring bulged outward…

… and abruptly spewed a jet of flying objects, swarming angrily toward the camera eye! Kaa and the others had time for a brief glimpse of insects—or some local equivalent — creating a confusing buzz of light and sound with their compound eyes and fast-beating wings. A horde of blurry creatures converged, surrounding Kaa’s lenses and pickups.

Moments later, all that reached his console was a smear of dizzying static.

Gillian

AMAGNIFIED IMAGE FLOATED ABOVE THE CONFERENCE table — depicting a small creature, frozen in flight, whose wings were a rainbow-streaked haze, painful to the eye. By contrast, the Niss Machine’s compact mesh of spiral lines seemed drab and abstruse. A strain of pique filled its voice.

“Might any of you local children be able to identify this bothersome thing for us?”

The words were polite enough, though Gillian winced at its insolent manner.

Fortunately, Alvin Hphwayuo showed no awareness of being patronized. The young hoon sat near his friends, throbbing his throat sac in the subsonic range for both noor beasts, one lounging on each broad shoulder. To the machine’s sardonic question, Alvin nodded amiably, a human gesture that seemed completely unaffected.

“Hrm. That’s easy enough. It is a privacy wasp.”

“Gene-altered toys of the Vuyur,” lisped Ur-ronn. “A well-known nuisance.”