Anvil of Stars

not detract from our friendship, though I feel less free with him now, but he knows or intuits what there is between us, you and me, and that makes him wiser than I. He is a noble spirit. I realize your reluctance to break up a dyad that seems so stable, but you cannot take away from us what is most important. William and I are brothers, as I never had a brother. You cannot break that, and you cannot replace it.

I send you this, because I miss you even when I am on duty, and there is a short time here before I report to the mom.

I feel so naive but my love for you is more intense than any positive emotion I have felt until now, and I want you to know that.

He read the message through several times and winced at its awkwardness, its revelation. Even among the children Martin was reluctant to open himself so. He felt like a boy again, though at twenty-two he was one of the oldest on the Dawn Treader. Theresa was three years younger; William, a year younger.

“Send,” he said, and the message and Theresa’s name vanished, leaving William hanging alone. The name flickered. “I’m thinking,” Martin told the wand. Could he really remain involved with William, when he focused so much attention on Theresa?

Irony here. Throughout the voyage he had tried to keep above the play of emotions, to maintain his dignity, finally joining in a dyad with William because he could not resist the pressure to make some tie, and William seemed safest, and they did match.

Because of his aloofness, Martin had gained both respect and isolation; he had been voted sixth Pan of the Watch, an important position, and then (it seemed inevitable now, understanding the venery associated with position “and power) the Wendys had courted him, and he had dallied; that was expected. William did not object, in fact fantasized of what he would do when he became Pan.

Martin had lost his shield; and flirting with Theresa—initially innocent sex—had plunged him deep into what he had avoided for so long. It had to happen.

Still in him lingered fear of loving and losing, not just through separation, but through death. All of them had known the same losses—Earth itself, great Mother of all they knew and were; then separation from family and friends on the Ark.

They were more than children sent on a time-bent crusade; they were avenging angels, soldiers trained but not yet tested, given access to incredible power they did not completely understand. Eventually they would use that power if they were to fulfill their mission, and some of them would not survive.

As for William, Martin had nothing to say to him that he could not say better in person. “Fade,” he instructed. The name vanished. He raised his arms and crooked a finger and a thin ladder of green light crossed the periphery. He pointed his finger and the light flowed, broke up, and reformed, spanning one wheel of the schoolroom and intersecting the star sphere.

Martin poked his hands and feet into the plane and pushed himself ahead, drifted lazily around the sphere, viewing the stars from many angles. Folded his arms and drew up his long, thin legs to wait for the mom.

Martin had inherited his father’s physique and his father’s long, grim face; he also had his father’s sweetness of temper and sharpness of mind. But his almond eyes and his sensuous, full lips over protruding front teeth were his mother’s.

A mom entered from below and moved up silently beside him, a squat flattened cylinder about a meter tall, copper and tarnished brass, with a head-like bump but no features, no arms, and no legs.

“I am ready for your report,” the mom said. The mom’s voice was authoritative but not shrill or insistent. It never demanded, never ordered, merely instructed and guided. A mom always referred to itself in the first person, as did the ship’s mind on the rare occasions it was heard from. The children had no evidence, other than tone of voice, that ship and moms were any different.

“We’re doing okay,” Martin said. “The children all seem healthy, physically.” He looked away. “There’s some tension with four or five individuals who aren’t getting along with the rest. Rex Live Oak has troubles now and then. A few others. I’m keeping track and trying to work them back into the group. Rosa Sequoia’s the worst. She attends the meetings, does her drills, hangs around when we play games, but she has few friends now. She doesn’t even talk with the Wendys much.

“Exercises are going well. We’ve been simulating small-craft navigation in planetary space, orbits and evasive maneuvers, ship’s defense, shepherding makers and doers. I guess you know that.”

“Yes,” the mom said.

His neck grew stiff. Here it came. “I’d like to see some outside exercise. The real thing. I think we’re ready.”

This was the third time he had made such a suggestion in his six months as Pan. All the children were anxious to get outside the Dawn Treader in the craft they had been training to use. “Five and a half years is a long time. We’ve come a long way. We know it might take much longer, but… We’re impatient.”

“Understood,” the mom said. “Continue.”

“I suppose we’re growing up, more mature. There’s less upset… not as much squabbling about sexual stuff. Fewer arguments and noise. I talked about this last tenday.”

“These are all expected events.”

“Well, they’re still significant,” Martin said, irritated by the mom’s attitude, or non-attitude. “I’m trying to use this… calmness, whatever, to help us focus on the training. It’s working, a little, anyway. We’re doing better in the trials. But there’s still grumbling about how well informed we are. I’d like to suggest fuller participation. I’ve suggested that before.”

“Yes,” the mom said.

“That’s about it. Nothing spectacular.”

“I see no signs of major trouble. You are doing well.”

With a characteristic lack of the minutiae of social grace, the mom glided from the schoolroom along its own unseen ladder field.

Martin puffed his cheeks, blew out a breath, and turned to leave, then spotted Hakim Hadj in the doorway below.

Hakim moved aside for the mom’s passage and spread his ladder to where Martin waited by the star sphere.

“Hello, Pan Martin,” Hakim said. He climbed to within a couple of meters of Martin and assumed a floating lotus. “How are you today?”

“As usual,” Martin said. He bit his lower lip and gestured at the door with an unenthused hand. “The usual friendly brick wall.”

“Ah yes.” Leader of the search team, Hakim was shorter than Martin by seven or eight centimeters, with smooth brown skin, a thin sharp nose, and large confident eyes black as onyx. He spoke English with a strong hint of Oxford, where his father had gone to school.

To see Hakim blink was a wonder; his face conveyed centuries of equanimity in the midst of strife, his lips composed a genial and unjudging line. “I am glad to hear it.”

He had taught Martin Arabic a few years before, enough for him to read Arabic children’s books from the libraries, but the lingua franca of the Dawn Treader was English, as it had been aboard the Central Ark, Earth’s death having frozen the American moment in history.

“The search team may have a suspect,” Hakim said. “I would like to present the evidence to you, and then to the moms. If you do not agree, we will keep our thoughts from the moms until better evidence comes along.” Hakim was usually cautious and taciturn to a fault about the search team’s work.

Martin arranged himself in a less graceful lotus before him. “I just gave my tenday report…”

Hakim apologized. “We cannot be certain enough to render final judgment—but there is sufficient evidence that we believe the ship should send out remotes…” He caught himself, apologized again, and said, “But that is your decision, Martin.”

Martin said, “No offense taken, Hakim.”

“I am glad. We have found a stellar group of three stars less than a light-year from our present position. The spectra of the two contain a mix of trace radioactive elements and rare earths in proportions similar to those in the remains of the captured killer machines.”