Prophets

Of the last two, Brody came from Bulawayo in the Trianguli Union, and Tsoravitch came from Jokul in the Sirius Economic Community. Two planets fifty light-years apart; both close to forty light-years from Acheron. Mosasa had cast an extremely wide net, one that made the concentrated effort on Bakunin seem designed to catch the Caliphate’s attention.

Which was probably the point . . .

Mallory didn’t like to think of what would happen when the Caliphate moved toward these outlying colonies. The Vatican had no fleet, as such, but should the Bishop of Rome speak to some secular rulers, Mallory suspected that the Caliphate’s move wouldn’t be uncontested.

The only thing preventing him from seizing the tach-comm and sending a desperate message back home was the fact he knew that the Caliphate was closely observed. Their moves would be known by other assets soon after they made a decision. It wasn’t worth blowing his cover before he had gathered information at the source.

The source of what, that was the question. And the science team was as unenlightening on the point of this expedition as Mosasa had been.

Tsoravitch had just made a point about Mosasa’s less than edifying briefings. She leaned back in a corner of the common room, sipping a container of what passed for coffee on the Eclipse, and shook her head at Brody. “If he didn’t give you any more information, why’d you agree to come along on this bizarre little field trip?”

Brody sat facing away from Mallory, so he couldn’t see the doctor’s expression from his spot on the couch in the opposite corner of the common room, though the tone of voice Brody used was almost wistful. “I really could care less about Mosasa’s ‘anomaly.’ But I’ve been in a teaching chair at Sokoto University for nearly twenty years standard. I study culture, and I haven’t stepped foot outside the Trianguli Union since I finished my graduate work. Now I get the chance to see colonies that have been isolated from the rest of human space for at least a century? I jumped at the chance.”

“Amen to that.” Pak raised his glass in a toast to the others.

“Same reason?” Tsoravitch asked.

Pak nodded. “A hundred years isn’t a huge time for linguistic drift, even if they are isolated. But if these colonies were founded during the collapse of the Confederacy, with a substantial mix of languages, there could be a whole class of new Creole to study. The first person to write a paper on these outliers could make a career.” He looked over at Tsoravitch. “What about you?”

“You know any other chance I’d get to work with an AI?”

There was a long pause at the table. Brody broke the silence with a nervous chuckle. “She’s got you there, Leon.”

“You still there, Bill?” Pak called out.

“I am listening,” Bill’s voice came from a comm unit in the middle of the table. The synthetic voice was male, deep, and had a slight Windsor accent. Though the voice was completely naturalistic, it was so lacking in affect that Mallory would have preferred something that sounded like a computer.

He wondered if Bill picked it out himself, though Paralians perceived sound so differently Mallory doubted that Bill would be able to easily interpret the characteristics that made human voices unique.

“Well, what about you?” Pak said. “Are you anticipating some new branch of physics or mathematics?”

“No, I am not.”

“Why’d you agree to join Mosasa’s little expedition?” Pak asked.

“I wish to go where I have not.”

“You’re a tourist?” Pak asked.

“Mr. Mosasa provided me the means to leave the Ocean.”

Pak looked at Brody, smiling. “He is a tourist. Bill, we’ll have to get some holos of you that you can tach to the folks back home.”

“I do not understand what you mean.”

“Don’t mind him,” Brody said. “He’s just—”