than a silhouette, but something about her shape and posture seemed familiar to Silence. He lurched forward a step, a mad, impossible hope bursting suddenly in his heart.
'Frost… ?'
'No,' said the figure, turning around in the chair to face him. 'It's just me. Daddy.'
The hope in Silence's heart crashed and died, but was replaced almost immediately by a different kind of warmth. He holstered his disrupter and smiled at his daughter. 'Hello, Diana. How the hell did you get in here? I didn't even know you were on board ship.'
'No one does,' said Diana Vertue. 'Let's keep it that way. No one must know I was ever here. I have enemies these days, more powerful and dangerous than I ever expected.'
'Oh, hell,' said Silence. 'Who have you killed now?'
'Nothing like that,' said Diana. 'I could cope with something like that.'
'Hold everything,' said Silence. 'How did you get on board this ship? No matter what excuse you used, security should still have alerted me.'
Diana smiled briefly. 'A girl has to have some secrets, Daddy. Let's just say no one sees me anymore if I don't want to be seen. Not even your ship's esper or security devices. Now, do sit down, the pair of you. I hate being loomed over.'
Silence and Carrion looked at each other, shrugged simultaneously, and looked around for somewhere to sit. There was only one other chair, so Silence sat in it. He was the Captain, after all. Carrion sat on the bed. They both looked expectantly at Diana.
'I've been working on something new,' she said carefully. 'Investigating the true nature of the Mater Mundi. And I've been digging up all kinds of interesting things. The one thing I'm sure of is that she isn't what everyone thinks she is. She's also somewhat mad at me for poking my nose into areas she feels are none of my business. In fact, she warned me off personally. I think she would have killed me if she could.'
Carrion looked at her interestedly. 'You stood off the Mater Mundi? I'm impressed.'
'Maybe you should back off, Diana,' said Silence. 'What's so important about knowing the Mater Mundi's true nature that's worth getting killed over?'
'I don't know,' said Diana. 'That's exactly my point. What could be so terrible about her, so shocking, that she's willing to kill to keep it hidden?'
Silence shrugged impatiently. 'There's no point in asking me. I've never had any interest in esper affairs. What do you want from me, Diana? We're leaving for the Darkvoid in just under six hours.'
'That's why I had to catch you before you left. I'm becoming increasingly interested in the nature of esp itself. How it does what it does. You two are both unique individuals. The Captain because he passed partway through the Madness Maze and emerged changed. And Carrion, because before he went to Unseeli, he showed no trace at all of esper abilities. No one in his family was ever an esper, for as far back as I can trace, and the genetic assay in his old medical files bears that out. So, Carrion, how did you become the esper paragon you are today?'
'The aliens changed me,' said Carrion. 'The Ashrai. It was necessary if I was to survive alone on their world and join them in their war against Humanity. So they remade me. And no, I don't know how. I have no memory of it.'
'They would have had to make alterations on the genetic level,' said Diana, frowning. 'Pretty sophisticated stuff for a species with no discernible technology.'
'That's a very human attitude,' said Carrion. 'Tech isn't everything.'
Diana studied him silently for a long moment. 'You're never alone, are you, Carrion? They're always with you. The ghosts. The Ashrai.'
Carrion leaned forward. 'You can see them?'
'Almost. I sang with them once on Unseeli, remember? My mind joined with theirs, though only briefly. That link is still there. I can feel them, a potential hanging around you, like the pressure on the air before a storm. Why do they stay, Carrion? Why do they stay with you?'
'I'm the last Ashrai. All that's left of what they were. They want revenge. For what was done to them. To the trees. To their world.'
'Revenge?' said Diana. 'That's a very human attitude, isn't it?'
'Yes,' said Carrion. 'Regrettably, they have learned by example.'
'We're very alike, you and I,' said Diana. 'Changed and altered by powers greater than ourselves, for reasons we don't fully understand. What were you supposed to be. Carrion? Their champion? Their defender? Their avenger? Be very careful, Carrion; you might not be what you think you are. You fought Humanity for them once. Would you destroy Humanity for them now, for revenge?'
'They wouldn't ask me to do that,' said Carrion.
'How do you know?' said Diana, and Carrion had no answer to give her.
'Why are you here, Diana?' said Silence after the quiet had dragged on long enough to become uncomfortable. 'After what you said to us at Parliament…'
'Needs must when the Devil vomits on your shoes,' said Diana. 'The Mater Mundi wants me dead. So I need help, powerful allies to watch my back and lend their power to me.'
'So you came to your father,' said Silence. 'Of course, Diana. That's what fathers are for.'
'No, Daddy,' said Diana. 'Not you. The Maze gave you power, but you're still learning how to use it.'
'So you want my help?' said Carrion. 'Very well. My abilities are at your disposal.'
'Don't flatter yourself,' said Diana. 'I need the Ashrai. Their inhuman strength. Like I said, the link's still there. God knows I've tried to exorcise them. I don't want anyone in my head but me. But if they're there, maybe I can use them. So tell me, Carrion, would they come if I called? If I needed them?'
'I don't know,' said Carrion. 'They don't talk to me anymore. But they have always intervened when I needed them.'
'Not exactly the answer I was hoping for,' said Diana. 'But… let's see if it's true.'
Her face changed suddenly. Dark shadows appeared beneath her eyes, and the skin of her face stretched taut across the bones. Her thin lips stretched into a merciless, humorless smile. She seemed suddenly larger than she was, and her eyes were unnaturally bright. Psionic power sparked and crackled on the air around her, and her presence leapt out to fill the cabin. Diana was gone, submerged in the malevolent aberration that was Jenny Psycho. Silence's hand went automatically to his gun and then fell away. Even if he could bring himself to use it on his own daughter, he doubted it would be any use against something like Jenny Psycho.
She stood up and glared at Carrion, shadows gathering around her, and he was quickly on his feet facing her, his power lance held out between them. Jenny Psycho seized the lance with her mind, ripped it out of his hands, and threw it the length of the cabin. Carrion cried out in shock, as though one of his limbs had been torn away. His body rose slowly into the air and then slammed back against the steel cabin wall, held there crucified by Jenny Psycho's will. Silence tried to rise from his chair and found he couldn't, held in place by his daughter's implacable thoughts.
And then the Ashrai came.
They filled the cabin like a boiling cloud, dead but not gone, with gargoyle faces and huge clawed hands. The cabin seemed to expand in all directions, becoming vast and cavernous to accommodate the massive forms of the Ashrai. Silence cried out at the sight of them. They were awful and magnificent, terrible in their anger, and they burned so very brightly. Jenny Psycho, blazing like a star, smiled at them and addressed them in perfectly reasonable tones.
'Hi, guys. Good to see you again. It's been a while. Sorry for disturbing your rest, but I really could use your help. There's something out there called the Mater Mundi, and it might just be more powerful than you are. And I don't think it's willing to accept any competition. So, if I need your help against it, will you come when I call?'
There was a burst of song in reply, music complex and emotional almost beyond bearing, sung by angels with barbed wings and haloes of flies. And then the Ashrai were gone, and the cabin was just a cabin again. Carrion slid down the wall and settled comfortably on the bed again. His lance sped across the air and back into his hands. Silence found he could move again. Jenny Psycho flickered out like a snuffed candle, and was just Diana Vertue again. She stretched slowly and sat down on her chair. There was a sense of calm in the cabin, of pressure released, of a storm passed.
'What the hell was the point of all that?' said Silence.
'Jenny's a bit of a bitch, but she gets things done,' said Diana, entirely unruffled by his tone. 'And I had a
