Anvil of Stars

“They’re desperately afraid,” Erin said. She had changed in the past few days; intense green eyes duller, hair matted, face more slack. It takes life out of all of us. “But they’re so enormously powerful…” she added.

Ariel cocked an eyebrow. “A few savages invade your house. There might be thousands of them outside, in the dark. They’re smart, and they’ve seen what your technology is like… They’re making new weapons. Would you be afraid?” she asked.

“They could squash us like bugs,” Erin said, curling her lip.

“Then why bother convincing us? Why not squash us now?”

“Maybe they value us. Maybe they’ve renounced their past so totally—”

“They had nothing to do with the past!”

Martin closed his eyes. “Please, that’s enough,” he said. He turned to the mom. “We have to resolve some things. We need advice from you.”

“Advice about what?”

“What to do,” Martin said, simply enough. “I’m snowed. I can’t see anything clearly now. Can you?”

“I ask again, what sort of advice are you seeking?”

“Are all these creatures innocent, or guilty?” Martin asked.

“They say they were created by the Killers. We can’t confirm or deny this,” the mom answered. Martin’s stomach contracted again; he had not eaten since speaking with Hans.

“You wonder if the Killers are still here,” the mom said, “and whether there is a way to seek them out, and punish only them.”

“Right.”

“We have no more information than you,” the mom said.

Eye on Sky listened quietly, and when the conversation halted, interjected, “Snake mother and ships’ minds agree. The evidence for presence of Killers is lacking.”

“They could have changed themselves… even destroyed their memories, their histories, to escape punishment,” Martin said.

“That is possible,” the mom agreed.

“Do you think it’s probable?”

“I can’t answer that.”

“But if we make the wrong decision, and kill… them, all of them, or some of them, we’re criminal, aren’t we? Won’t we violate the Law?”

“The Law is simple,” the mom said. “Interpretation is not so simple.”

“ ‘Destruction of all intelligences responsible for or associated with the manufacture of self-replicating and destructive devices,’ ” Martin quoted.

“That is the Law,” the mom said. It floated in the dark cabin, projected data glittering in reflection on its coppery surface.

“ ‘For I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children,’ ” Erin quoted.

“ ‘The cord is part of the braid,’ ” Eye on Sky quoted in turn, “ ‘and suffers the shame of the braid.’ ”

Martin’s frown deepened. “Does the Law demand vengeance on succeeding generations?” he asked.

“I do not interpret the Law,” the mom said. “That is your responsibility.”

Martin held up his hand to stop Ariel and Erin from saying more. Ariel frowned and drew up her knees, touching them to her crossed arms like a little girl exiled to a corner. Erin tilted her head to one side, lost.

“Why haven’t we been attacked?” he asked the mom. “They have the means… They could have destroyed us when we first arrived.”

“Your thoughts may be as informed as those of the ships’ minds,” the mom said. “However, some possible explanations occur to the ships’ minds. The inhabitants of these planets may be supremely confident they can destroy us, so they toy with us, wishing to learn as much as they can. They may try to capture and control us to learn more about the potential threat. The Killers may no longer be in residence. The beings we have encountered may be waiting for the first signs of our aggression. They may in fact abhor destructive behavior, and take extreme risks to avoid harming our ship. Though this possibility seems remote, the power displayed may be a bluff. There are other hypotheses, but they decline in usefulness.”

“They could have weapons they haven’t even revealed.”

“That seems likely,” the mom said.

“They must be planning something,” Martin said.

The mom did not contradict him.

Hans and Martin spoke in private on the noach. Thirteen hours had passed since the end of noach blackout. “I’ve held a council here,” Hans said. “We’ve gone through most of the information you passed along. I thought we’d get you folks in the loop.”

“You’ll have to talk with Eye on Sky, too,” Martin said.

“The Brothers will make their decision separately,” Hans said.

“We haven’t divided our crews yet,” Martin said.

“Have you made up your mind?”

Martin hadn’t slept, hadn’t eaten much. He blinked rapidly, eyes pink with strain, unable to shake a particular image from the thousands he had viewed: harvesters collecting young after hatching in the oceans of Sleep, Leviathan at dusk flaming red through a bank of crustal fissure smoke. Strange and serene and beautiful, just part of the richness, part of the flavor.

“Yes,” Martin said.

“And?”

“If the Killers are gone, I don’t think the Law applies. And if they’re still here, to get to them, we’d have to kill a thousand times more people than lived on Earth. It doesn’t make sense. We can’t risk it.”

“That’s part of a very good armor,” Hans said, eyes heavy lidded, fingers working in rhythm on his knee.

“I know,” Martin said.

“We’ve come a long way and lost our own good people.”

Martin did not dignify that reminder with a reply.

“And you think we should move on.”

“I think we should wait for more evidence. Two ships could orbit Leviathan at safe distance, hidden, the crews in cold sleep—”

“Until our fuel is gone and we become a death ship,” Hans said.

“We wouldn’t have to wait very long.”

“We wouldn’t?” Hans asked. “How long is very long, centuries, thousands of years? What kind of evidence would satisfy you? They’ll never show themselves. I can’t afford to be so careful. I’m Pan. I’m sworn to enact the Law.”

“At what cost?” Martin asked.

“What did Earth pay?” Hans asked in return.

“And the Brothers—?”

“I think they’ll decide with you. They’ve been remarkably weak partners, am I right?”

“I—”

“When you met the staircase god, the Brother just crumpled. Kind of sums them up.”

“We have to understand their differences.”

Hans smiled thinly and rubbed his scalp with straight fingers. “We’re here, the evidence is here, the Law is clear. We’re making the necessary weapons. Marty, if we don’t do it now, it will never get done. If we’re wrong, the moms will stop us.”

“I don’t think they will stop us,” Martin said.

“Why in hell not? They’re upholding the Law, too.”

“Hans, they don’t judge. They give us the tools. They don’t make decisions.”

“Then we’re really no better than the Killers, are we? Just more puffed up.”

Martin avoided that argument. “Can we do it without Shrike? he asked. “We’d have