The Naked God - Faith

mathematical symbols, and pictographics, they produced a spectrum of pure emotional tones. None of it provoked any kind of discernible answer.

The crystal slowed again, drifting over the headland group. There were over sixty humans camping out together now; Stephanie’s initial group had been joined by a steady stream of deserters from Ekelund’s army. They’d broken away over the past week, sometimes in groups, sometimes individually; all of them rejecting her authority and growing intolerance. The word they brought from the old town wasn’t good. Martial law was strictly enforced, turning the whole place into a virtual prison. At the moment, her efforts were focused on recovering as many rifles as possible from the ruins and mounds of loose soil. Apparently she still hadn’t abandoned her plan to rid the island of serjeants and disloyal possessed.

Stephanie stood looking up at the twinkling crystal as it traced a meandering course overhead. Cochrane was still lumbering along thirty metres behind. His annoyed cries carried faintly through the air. “Any reply yet?” she asked.

“None,” the serjeant told them.

People had risen to their feet, gawping at the tiny point of light. It seemed oblivious to all of them. Stephanie concentrated on the folds of iridescent shadow which her mind’s senses were revealing. Human and serjeant minds glowed within it, easily recognizable; the crystal existed as a sharply defined teardrop-filigree of sapphire. It was almost like a computer graphic, a total contrast to everything else she could perceive this way. As it grew closer its composition jumped up to perfect clarity; in a dimension-defying twist the inner threads of sapphire were longer than its diameter.

She’d stopped being amazed by wonders since Ketton left Mortonridge. Now she was simply curious.

“That can’t be natural,” she insisted.

Sinon spoke for the mini-consensus of serjeants. “We concur. Its behaviour and structure is indicative of a high-order entity.”

“I can’t make out any kind of thoughts.”

“Not like ours. That is inevitable. It seems well adjusted to this realm. Commonality would therefore be unlikely.”

“You think it’s a native?”

“If not an actual aboriginal, then something equivalent to their AI. It does seem to be self-determining, a good indicator of independence.”

“Or good programming,” Moyo said. “Our reconnaissance drones would have this much awareness.”

“Another possibility,” Sinon agreed.

“None of that matters,” Stephanie said. “It proves there’s some kind of sentience here. We have to make contact and ask for help.”

“That’s if they understand the concept,” Franklin said.

This speculation is irrelevant,choma said. What it is does not matter, what it is capable of does. Communication has to be established.

It will not respond to any of our attempts,sinon said. If it does not sense affinity or atmospheric compression then we have little chance of initiating contact.

Mimic it,choma said. the mini-consensus queried him.

It can obviously sense us,he explained. Therefore we must demonstrate we are equally aware of it. Once it knows this, it will logically begin seeking communication channels. The surest demonstration possible is to use our energistic power to assemble a simulacrum.

They focused their minds on a stone lying at Sinon’s feet, fourteen thousand serjeants conceiving it as a small clear diamond with a flame of cold light burning bright at its centre. It rose into the air, shedding crumbs of mud as it went.

The original crystal swerved round and approached the illusion, orbiting it slowly. In response, the serjeants moved their crystal in a similar motion, the two of them describing an elaborate spiral over Sinon’s head.

That attracted its attention,choma said confidently.

Cochrane arrived, panting heavily. “Hey, Tinks, slow down, babe.” He rested his hands on his upper thighs, glancing up with a crooked expression. “What’s going on here, man? Is she breeding?”

“We are attempting to open communications,” Sinon said.

“Yeah?” Cochrane reached up, his hand open. “Easy, dude.”

“Don’t—” Sinon and Stephanie said it simultaneously.

Cochrane’s hand closed round Tinkerbell. And kept closing. His fingers and palm elongated as though the air had become a distorting mirror. They were drawn down into the crystal. He squawked in panicked astonishment as his wrist stretched out fluidly and began to follow his hand into the interior. “Ho shiiiiit— ” His body was abruptly tugged along, feet leaving the ground.

Stephanie exerted her energistic power, trying to pull him back. Insisting he return. She felt the serjeants adding their ability to hers. None of them could attach their desperate thoughts to the wailing hippie. His body’s physical mass had become elusive, it was like trying to grip on a rope of water.

The frantic yelling cut off as his head was sucked within the crystal’s boundary. The torso and legs followed quickly.

“Cochrane!” Franklin yelled.

A pair of gold-rimmed sunglasses with purple lenses fell to the ground.

Stephanie couldn’t even sense the hippie’s thoughts any more. She waited numbly to see who would be devoured next. It was only a couple of metres from her.

The crystal sparkled with red and gold light for a moment, then reverted to pure white. It shot off at high velocity across the rumpled mudlands towards the town.

“It killed him,” she grunted in horror.

“Ate him,” Rana said.

Alternatively, it took a sample,sinon said to his fellow serjeants. The shocked humans probably wouldn’t want to hear quite such a clinical analysis.

It didn’t select Cochrane,choma said. He selected it. Or more likely, it was a simple defence mechanism.

I hope not. That would imply we have come to a hostile environment. I would prefer to consider it a sampling process.

The method of capture was extraordinary,choma said. Is it some kind of crystalline neutronium, perhaps? Nothing else could suck him in like that.

We don’t even know if gravity or solid matter exist in this realm,sinon said. Besides, there was no energy emission. If his mass was being compressed by gravity, we would all have been obliterated by the radiation burst.

Then let us hope it was a sampling method. Yes.sinon conveyed a slight uncertainty with his thought. Shame it was Cochrane.

It could have been Ekelund.

Sinon watched the crystal slicing freely across the land. It had become a cometary streak. That may yet happen.

Annette Ekelund had established her new headquarters on top of the steep mound which used to be Ketton’s town hall. Rectangular sections of various buildings had been salvaged from the ruins all around and propped up against each other; energistic power modified them into heavy canvas tents printed with green and black jungle camouflage. Three of them contained the last remaining stocks of food. One served as an armoury and makeshift engineering shop where Milne and his team worked repairing the rifles which had been dug from the wet soil. The last, sitting right on the brow, was Annette’s personal quarters and command post. She had the netting rolled up at both ends, giving her a good view out across the island’s blotchy grey-brown land right to the scabrous edges. Maps and clipboards were strewn cross the trestle table in the centre. Coloured pencils had marked out the army’s defensive fortifications around Ketton, along with possible lines of attack based on scout reports of the terrain outside. Serjeant positions and estimated strengths were all indicated.

The information had taken days to compile. Right now Annette was paying it no heed; she was glaring at