And maybe find out whats happening up there, says Brawne Lamia, jerking her thumb toward the roof of the tent.
The baby, Rachel, is crying shrilly. Weintraub rocks her, holding her head in his broad hand. I agree, he says. If the Shrike wants to find us, it can find us on the ship as easily as out here. Well make sure that no one leaves. He touches Hoyts chest. As horrible as it sounds, the information the surgery gives us on how this parasite works could be priceless to the Web.
All right, says the Consul. He pulls the ancient comlog from his pack, lays his hand on the diskey, and whispers several phrases.
Is it coming? asks Martin Silenus.
Its confirmed the command. Well need to stow our gear for transfer. I told it to land just above the entrance to the valley.
Lamia is surprised to find that she has been weeping. She wipes her cheeks and smiles.
Whats funny? asks the Consul.
All this, she says, stabbing at her cheeks with the back other hand, and all I can think about is how nice itll be to have a shower.
A drink, says Silenus.
Shelter from the storm, says Weintraub. The baby is taking milk from a nursing pak.
Kassad leans forward, his head and shoulders outside the tent. He raises his weapon and clicks off the safety. Telltales, he says. Somethings moving just beyond the dune. The visor turns toward them, reflecting a pale and huddled group, the paler body of Lenar Hoyt.
Im going to check it out, he says. Wait here until the ship arrives.
Dont leave, says Silenus. Its like one of those fucking ancient horror holos where they go one by one to hey! The poet falls silent. The entrance to the tent is a triangle of light and noise. Fedmahn Kassad is gone.
The tent is beginning to collapse, stakes and wire anchors giving way as the sand shifts around them. Huddled together, shouting to be heard over the wind roar, the Consul and Lamia wrap Hoyts body in his cloak. Readouts on the medpak continue
of mud in the coating of sand on her cheeks.
The Consul shrugs. Gladstone overrode the original pip. Theres a message here from her. Do you want to hear it?
For a minute, no one answers. After their week of voyage, the thought of being in touch with someone outside their own group is so incongruous that it does not register at once; it was as if the world beyond the pilgrimage had ceased to exist except for the explosions in the night sky. Yes, Sol Weintraub says, lets hear it. A sudden lull in the storm makes the words seem very loud.
They gather around and crouch near the old comlog, setting Father Hoyt in the center of their circle. In the minute they have left him unattended, a small dune has begun to form itself around his body.
The telltales are all red now except tor the extreme-measures monitors glowing amber. Lamia sets another plasma cartridge in place and makes sure that the osmosis mask is secure on Hoyts mouth and nose, filtering pure oxygen in and keeping sand out. All right, she says.
The Consul triggers the diskey.
The message is a fatline squirt, recorded by the ship some ten minutes earlier. The air mists with the data columns and spherical-image colloid which characterizes comlogs dating back to the Hegira. The image of Gladstone shimmers, her face distorting bizarrely and then almost comically as millions of specks of windblown sand rip through the image.
Even at full volume, her voice is almost lost to the storm.
Im sorry, says the familiar image, but I cannot allow your spacecraft to approach the Tombs just yet. The temptation to leave would be too great, and the importance of your mission must override all other factors. Please understand that the fate of worlds may rest with you. Please be assured that my hopes and prayers are with you. Gladstone out.
The image folds into itself and fades away. The Consul, Weintraub, and Lamia continue to stare in silence. Martin Silenus stands, throws a handful of sand at the empty air where Gladstones face had been seconds earlier, and screams, Goddamn fatherfucking asshole politician moral paraplegic dipshit drag-queen bitch! He kicks sand in the air. The others shift their stares to him.
Well, that really helped, Brawne Lamia says softly.
Silenus waves his arms in disgust and walks away, still kicking at dunes.
Is there anything else? Weintraub asks the Consul.
No.
Brawne Lamia crosses her arms and frowns at the comlog. I forget how you said this thing works. How are you getting through the interference?
Tightbeam to a pocket comsat I seeded as we came down from the Yggdrasill, says the Consul.
Lamia nods. So when you reported in, you just sent brief messages to the ship, and it sent fatline squirts to Gladstone and your Ouster contacts.
Yes.
Can the ship take off without clearance? asks Weintraub. The older man is sitting, his knees raised and his arms draped on them in a classic posture of pure fatigue. His voice is also tired. Just override Gladstones prohibition?
No, says the Consul. When Gladstone said no, FORCE set a class-three containment field over the blast pit where we parked the ship.