He’s not really a brutal captain, as the breed goes,” Captain Bates said, trying to reassure Melireenya. “I think Mikaaye picked that up from him. And he’s right, you know. A Linyaari could have a very good influence on that lot, especially the kids.”
The Balakiire, the Neizayir, and the tanker had arrived on MOO days before the Mana. The Balakiire had remained, hearing that the Mana’s crew had an important message it preferred to deliver in person to members of the Balakiire’s crew. The tankers, with Linyaari crews, were already on Vhiliinyar, off-loading the LoiLoiKuans.
“But he endangered the families of his crewmen!” Kharii protested. She and Neeva both were fiercely protective of Melireenya’s maternal feelings and rather miffed that the Mana’s crew had not relayed their message earlier and in more detail. Khorii knew they would have sent a search party after the pirate ship, but what would unarmed Linyaari have been able to do against such ruffians?
“I have a feeling Coco was monitoring them all the time,” Captain Bates replied. “They could not have been in any real danger. In fact, when Nisa intimated to me that I knew what Coco does to widows and children, what I really knew was that he’d be showing up soon. My mother and I were once a widow and child at his mercy, and although he was hardly the soul of altruism, and in many ways, pardon me, a total bastard, I survived the experience with fewer traumas than experienced by the average child slave my age. Besides, if he hadn’t had them under surveillance, he wouldn’t have known where they were on the Blanca, or more important to him, where we were when we went to save them. He probably didn’t expect them to leave the shuttle, and being on the planet’s surface would have been enough to lure us.”
Melireenya, somewhat to Khorii’s surprise, nodded. Her eyes warmed, and she smiled, “I have a brave youngling, worthy of his lineage. He will do well. Your clan cannot change his Linyaari nature, nor his gallant spirit in speaking up to spare Khorii and Ariin for the needs of their families and the humans coping with this new phase of the—I suppose we must think of it as an invasion now, rather than an epidemic? It is entirely probable that my son will change those around him for the better, which is good. The humans will need the strengths and skills of all the survivors if they are to fend off this new threat.”
She held out her arms, and first Khorii, then more hesitantly Ariin, embraced her.
“Now then, young ones, come. The Balakiire has the honor of transporting you to the quarantine area, where you will surely be reunited with your beloved parents, and Elviiz may be healed by his father.”
Khorii and Ariin had very little time to spend bonding, or even commiserating with Elviiz. The girls spent most of the trip to Vhiliinyar making a detailed report of their findings on Becker’s asteroid and the development of the alien beings. Captain Bates was making a similar report to Uncle Hafiz and Grandsire Rafik. With so little of the Federation force remaining, the Linyaari healers and House Harakamian had assumed many of its administrative functions.
The journey from MOO to Vhiliinyar by ship was a short one, and instead of landing in Kubiilikhan and taking a shuttle, the Balakiire took them straight to the edge of the quarantine meadows. The Ancestors, so like Ariin’s beloved Others, formed a protective ring between the newcomers and their family. In the center of the area sat the Condor, looking as dilapidated and unspaceworthy as ever.
Mother, Father, Uncle Joh, Maak, and RK were lined up to meet them, tension in every line of their bodies.
The girls, Elviiz, and the entire crew of the Balakiire disembarked. It was midday, the sky was a gorgeous periwinkle blue, the grasses lush and waving in a sweetly scented breeze. Beyond the meadow, the sea shone, and from the air the passengers of the Balakiire had seen the tankers on the shoreline along with other equipment necessary for the transfer.
A large delegation of sii-Linyaari frothed the water just offshore, waiting for their sea’s newest tenants. Already many other Linyaari lined the shore to watch and welcome the newcomers.
Ariin saw her sister staring in that direction. “What’s the matter with you, Khorii? You haven’t seen our parents since before I did. Pay attention!”
“I’m afraid of what I’ll see. What if they’re not cured? What if the plague is still there? Could you bear it? Won’t you hate me for seeing it? I—”
“Do not be so negative and silly. The plague has disappeared and mutated everywhere else we’ve looked. It won’t have lasted any longer here, not on Vhiliinyar, with all of this wholesomeness and healing energy surrounding it.”
Khorii grabbed her twin’s hand as they stepped away from the hatch, toward the ring of Ancestors. Everyone was waving. Khorii and Ariin took two steps forward. Sending everything she saw to her twin, Khorii narrowed her focus and looked first at Maak. Her android uncle looked exactly the same as he had the last time she saw him except—no blue dots surrounded him. She felt almost faint with relief. Elviiz could be treated and returned to his old self. He would be so happy. Captain Becker and RK were also surrounded by nothing but periwinkle sky and fragrant delicious grasses. No blue dots.
Ariin squeezed her hand and forced her to look at Father and Mother, who stood with their arms around each other.
The sunlight sparkled almost prettily on the halo of blue dots surrounding them. Ariin dropped Khorii’s hand. “No! It can’t be. It’s your imagination. The plague is gone!”
But she knew as well as Khorii that it was not.
Everyone knew almost as quickly as they did. Their parents did.
“Khorii, by now you have more experience than we do with this disease,” their father said. “Why do you suppose we remain infected when everyone else can be cured?”
It wasn’t just a family conversation. Practically the entire planet was reading the images and words passing among them. Wanting to weep or scream or rant as much as Ariin did, Khorii instead methodically explained what had happened on Becker’s asteroid and what she thought it meant. “I believe that you are not so much infected as infested at this point,” she told them. “Because you and everyone around you survived, the organisms that mutated into your strain of the disease did not further progress into the next phase of their development. It had no dead organic tissue from which to morph into its inorganic-matter-absorbing form, so it’s simply stayed the same with you. Perhaps—perhaps it will die of its own accord, without being able to change.”
“Or maybe not,” Father said glumly. “Maybe somehow or other we keep it thriving because we are Linyaari. Perhaps that is why Joh and Maak and RK have become free of contamination, yet we are still carriers.”
Mother said, “There has to be a way to beat it. Once Maak has all the data—perhaps he’ll find even more clues when he works at restoring Elviiz’s inorganic modifications—he may help us formulate a cure. Or perhaps one of our own scientists, having studied the disease and its aftermath, will be able to cure us. You girls have both done your best, and we’re very proud of you.”
“But I miss you,” Khorii said.
“And I want so badly to be with you,” Ariin said.
They could see Mother’s smile from where they stood. “We are Linyaari, children, and we will always be close no matter what. While we cannot physically touch without endangering you and others, we’ve asked that pavilions be erected for you and for Elviiz. Maak will bring the instruments, tools, and materials he needs to work with Elviiz out there. We can talk as often as we want. Meanwhile, we will have some time together.”
But under Mother’s soothing words, Khorii and Ariin were both aware that the description of the new forms that the alien invasion were assuming had alarmed and disturbed their parents. Time seemed to be eternal on this pleasant plain, with the sun sparkling on the distant sea and the grass just waiting to be grazed; but elsewhere, in Corazon and on Rushima, time was running out.
They felt the same consciousness among the other Linyaari who had been to the human worlds trying to help and returned thinking they’d cured a plague, only to learn it had become something even more sinister.
Still, it was almost like home for Khorii as she and Ariin settled into their tent and helped Elviiz and Maak with theirs. Uncle Joh chose to remain aboard the Condor and near Mother and Father. He had evidently gained true immunity after his acute attack of the disease, cure from the symptoms, and prolonged contact with the strain Mother and Father carried. Maak had already begun work on a vaccine from his blood, but so far they’d had no one to try it on. RK was also plague-free and chased poor Khiindi around the field as if he were a mouse until Khiindi, no doubt hardened by his own spacefaring experiences, turned on his sire and began chasing him instead.
When the sun went down, all concerned were very tired and much sadder than they expected to be.
Long after they should have been asleep, Ariin lay on her back, her thoughts racing. Though she was trying to shield her thoughts, Khiindi had picked up on her agitation and was pacing with clicking claws back and forth on the floor of the tent, over Khorii’s body and back and forth again before walking over Ariin again.
Finally, Khorii sat up, flinging her blanket aside. “What?” she demanded of her sister.
Ariin turned to her with a troubled expression. “Something,” she said. “Look, can I trust you? Do you trust me?”
“You have to ask that after all we’ve been through? We’re twin sisters, of course you can trust me! And yes, I trust you, too.”
“I have a sort of a secret. I didn’t mean to keep it as a secret—everyone should know about it, but they seem to have forgotten, what with everything else that’s happening.”
“Please stop being so mysterious. And Khiindi Kaat, will you please stop that!” she said, forgetting that she did not normally try to thought-talk to her cat. To her surprise, though, he did stop, and came to crouch on top of her, glaring at Ariin.
Ariin glared back, but said, “The thing is, everyone thinks we may be running out of time but that is not true. I have plenty of time, right here.” She pulled a metallic object from her pocket and clasped it on her wrist. Khiindi made a sound that was half growl and half plaintive mew. Ariin smirked at him. “And here’s something else. I’ve been thinking and thinking about the way that alien thing moved in the bay of the Blanca. There was something familiar about its shifting, and I think some people where I lived before I came here may know something about it.”
Khiindi gave a startled meow and hopped off Khorii to bat at Ariin’s wrist. She caught him by the scruff of the neck and clutched him in her arms. “Khiindi knows, too. Where I was happened a long time before now, back before our people were created.”
“You’re talking in riddles!” Khorii complained.
“Maybe so. But we could go there and find out what we need to know and be back without anyone ever knowing we had gone. We could find the answer to everything, how to get rid of the aliens and save the humans, how to cure Mother and Father.” She squeezed Khiindi and placed a kiss that was strangely unaffectionate on the top of his head. “What do you say?”
Khorii didn’t have to think about it long. “When shall we leave?” she asked.
Ariin smiled. “Soon.”
“How soon is soon?” Khoril asked.
“Soon enough,” Ariin replied enigmatically.