she followed the source of illumination to an unobstructed viewing port, where she peered outside and saw a world of pale yellow dawn.
yee commented dryly.
“beats being dead, i guess.”
Rety agreed. “I guess.” Then she shrugged.
“At least we’ll see, one way or t’other.”
Gillian
I FOUND A LIBRARY REFERENCE. THEY ARE CALLED capture boxes,” the Niss explained. “This weapon offers a clever solution to the Jophur dilemma.”
“How do you figure?” Gillian asked.
“We thought we had them in an awkward situation, where they must come close and inspect every decoy in order to find us. A cumbersome, time-consuming process.
“But this way, the Jophur need only get near enough to dispatch special missiles. They can then move on, dragging a string of captives behind them.”
“Won’t all that additional mass slow them down?” asked Kaa, the pilot.
“Yes, and that works in our favor. Alas, not enough to make up for the advantage this technique gives them.”
Gillian shook her head. “Too bad we didn’t know about this in time to incorporate it in our plans.”
The Niss answered with a defensive tone. “Great clans can access weaponry files spanning a billion years of Galactic history.”
Silence reigned on the bridge, until Sara Koolhan spoke, her voice transposed by the amplifying faceplate of her helmet.
“What happens if we get caught by a missile?”
“It creates a field related to the toporgic cage your Six Races found enveloping the Rothen ship. Of course that one was meters thick, and missiles cannot carry that much pseudo-material. The chief effect of a capture box is to suppress digital cognizance.”
Sara looked confused, so Gillian explained.
“Digital computers are detectable at a distance, and can be suppressed by field-effect technologies. A principal reason why organic life-forms dominate the Five Galaxies, instead of machines.
“Unfortunately, this means our decoys can be disabled easily, by enclosing them in a thin shell of warped spacetime.”
“Indeed, it seems an ideal weapon to use against resurrected starships lacking crews. The Jophur may be malign and limited in many ways, but they do not lack for skill or reasoning power.”
Sara nodded. “You mean the method won’t work as well against Streaker?”
“Exactly,” Gillian said. “We’ll prepare our computers to stand a temporary shutdown without inconvenience —”
“Speak for yourself,” the Niss muttered.
“As soon as the capture box surrounds us, organic crew members can use simple tools to dissolve it from the inside. Estimated period of shutdown, Niss?”
The hologram whirled.
“I wish we had better data from the expedition the sooners sent to the Rothen vessel. They reported major quantum effects from a toporgic layer meters thick.
“But the Jophur missiles will cast thin bubbles. If prepared, crews should burst us free in mere minutes.”
A happy sigh escaped Kaa and several dolphins. But then the Niss Machine went on.
“Unfortunately, when we pop the bubble, it will alert the Jophur which captured vessel contains living prey. After that, our restored freedom will be brief indeed.”
Dwer
THE STUFF FELT STRANGE. IT SEEMED TO REPEL HIS hand slightly, until he got within a couple of centimeters.
Then it pulled. Neither effect was overwhelming. He could yank his hand back fairly easily.
He could not quite place why it was eerily familiar.
Dwer walked all the way around his circular cage, stopping on occasion to bend down and examine the starscape beyond. He recognized most of the constellations, except for one patch that had always been invisible from the Slope. So that’s what the southern sky is like. Undimmed by dust or atmosphere, the entire Dandelion Cluster lay before him, a vast unwinking spectacle. It would be even more fantastic without the filmy golden barrier in the way.
Thank Ifni for that harrier, he reminded himself. There is no air out there.
In one direction lay a tremendously bright star he did not recognize at first.
Then he knew … it was the sun, much diminished, and getting smaller all the time.
In the opposite direction lay Izmunuti’s fierce eye. The red glare grew more pronounced, until he began to make out an actual disk. Yet he realized it must still be farther away than the sun. Izmunuti was said to be a giant among stars.
In time he noticed other objects. Not stars or nebulae, but gleaming dots. At first they all seemed rather distant. But over the course of a midura, they drew ever closer, rounded shapes that revealed themselves more by their glimmering rims, occulting the constellations, than for any brightness they themselves put out.
One of them — a rippled sphere on the side toward Izmunuti — had to be a starship. It loomed larger with each passing dura. Soon he recognized it as the behemoth that had twice crossed the sky over the Poison Plain, shaking his hapless balloon with each passage.
When Dwer crossed his prison to peer through the membrane on the other side, he saw a line of yellowish globes, even closer than the starship. Their color made him realize, They’re other captives, like me.
Pressing close to the barrier, a tingle coursed his scalp and spine. He felt similarities to when the Danik robot sent its fields through his body, changing his nervous system in permanent, still-uncertain ways.
Well, I was unusual even before that. For instance, no one else I know ever talked to a mulc spider.…
Dwer yanked his head back, recalling at last what this stuff reminded him of. The fluid used by the mad old spider of the mountains — One-of-a-Kind — to seal its victims away, storing its treasured collections against the ravages of time. Months back, a coating of that stuff had nearly smothered him, until he escaped the spider’s trap.
A strange sensation came over Dwer. An odd idea.
I could talk to spiders, not just in the mountains, but the one in the swamp, too.
I wonder if that means …
Once again, he put his hand against the golden material, pushing through the initial resistance, pressing his fingertips ahead. The resistance was springy. The material seemed adamant.
But Dwer let his mind slide into the same mode of thinking that used to open him to communion with mulc beings. Always before, he had felt that the spider was the one doing most of the work, but now he realized, It’s my own talent. My own gift. And by the Holy Egg, I think I can—
Something gave way. Resistance against his fingertips suddenly vanished and they slipped through, as if penetrating some greasy fluid.
Abrupt cold struck the exposed hand, plus a feeling as if a thousand vampire ants were trying to drink his uncovered veins through straws. Dwer jerked back his arm and it popped out, the fingers red and numb, but mostly undamaged. The membrane flowed back instantly, never leaving an opening to space.
Lucky me, he thought.
When Dwer next checked, the starship had grown to mammoth size. A great bull beast, bearing down on him rapidly, with a hunter’s complacent confidence.
I’m a fish on a line. It’s reeling me in!
On the other side, the captive globes bobbed almost touching, like toy balloons gathered along an invisible
