Look to Windward

~ You’re fine. No obvious physical signs. You sure you’re all right?

~ Perfectly.

~ And we’re still Go status?

~ Yes, we’re still Go.

The silver-skinned avatar turned to look at him. “You’re sure you won’t be bored seeing a factory, Major?”

“Not one producing starships, not at all. Though you must be running out of places to distract me with,” he said.

“Well, it’s a big Orbital.”

“There’s one place I would like to see.”

“Where’s that?”

“Your place. The Hub.”

The avatar smiled. “Why, certainly.”

Flight

“Are we nearly there yet?

“Uncertain. That which the creature said. It meant?”

“Never mind that! Are we there yet?”

“This is hard to know with certitude. To return to that which the creature said. Is its meaning yet known to you?”

“Yes! Well, sort of! Please, can we go any faster?”

“Not really. We proceed as fast as is possible given the circumstances and therefore I thought our time might be employed by the telling of that which you understand from the creature’s sayings. What would you then say was the import of such?”

“It doesn’t matter! Well, it does, but! Just. Oh. Hurry! Faster! Go faster!”

They were inside the dirigible behemothaur Sansemin, Uagen Zlepe, 974 Praf and three of the raptor scouts. They were squeezing their way down a sinuous, undulating tube whose warm, slime-slick walls pulsed alarmingly every few moments. The air moving past them from ahead stank of rotting meat. Uagen fought the urge to gag. They could not go back to the outside the way they had come; it had been blocked off by some sort of rupture which had trapped and suffocated two of the raptor scouts who’d gone ahead of them.

Instead they had—after the creature had said what it had to Uagen and after an agonisingly long and absurdly relaxed discussion amongst the raptor scouts and 974 Praf—taken another route out of the interrogatory chamber. This route initially led deeper and further into the quivering body of the dying behemothaur.

Two of the three raptor scouts insisted on going ahead in case of trouble, but they were squeezing their way through the convolutions of the twisting passage with some difficulty and Uagen was convinced that he could have gone quicker by himself.

The passage was deeply ribbed underfoot, making it hard to walk without supporting oneself on the wet and quivering walls. Uagen wished he’d brought gloves. His partial IR sense could make out little detail here because everything seemed to be the same temperature, reducing all he could see to a nightmarish monochrome of shadows upon shadows; it was, Uagen thought, worse than being blind.

The raptor scout in the lead came to a fork in the passage and stopped, apparently thinking.

There was a sudden concussive thud from all around them, then a pulse of fetid air swirled over them from behind, momentarily overcoming the flow of air from ahead and producing a still greater stench that very nearly made Uagen throw up.

He heard himself yelp. “What was that?”

“This is unknown,” the Interpreter 974 Praf told him. The head wind resumed. The leading raptor scout chose the lower left-hand passage and shouldered its wings down the narrow cleft. “That way,” 974 Praf said helpfully.

I’m going to die, Uagen thought, quite clearly and almost calmly. I’m going to die stuck inside this rotting, bloating, incinerating ten-million-year-old alien airship, a thousand light years from another human being and with information that might save lives and make me a hero.

Life is so unfair!

The creature on the wall in the interrogatory chamber had lived just long enough to tell him something which also might kill him, of course, if it was true, and even if he did get out of here. From what it had said, the knowledge he now possessed made him a target for people who wouldn’t think twice about killing him or anybody else.

“You’re Culture?” he said to the long, five-limbed thing hanging on the wall in the chamber.

“Yes,” it said, trying to keep its head up as it talked to him. “Agent. Special Circumstances.”

Uagen felt himself go gulp again. He’d heard of SC. He’d dreamt about being a Special Circumstances agent when he’d been a child. Dammit, he’d dreamt about being one when he’d been a young adult. He’d never really imagined he’d meet a real one. “Oh,” he said, feeling infinitely foolish even as he said, “How do you do.”

“You?” the creature said.

“What? Oh! Umm. Scholar. Uagen Zlepe. Scholar. Pleased to. Well. Probably not. Umm. I just. Well.” He was fingering the necklace again. It must sound like he was twittering. “Doesn’t matter. Can we get you down from there? This whole place, well, thing, is—”

“Ha. No. Don’t think so,” the creature said, and might even have been trying to smile. It made a gesture with its head like a backward nod, then grimaced with pain. “Hate to tell you. Only me holding this together, such as it is. Through this link.” It shook its head. “Listen, Uagen. You have to get out.”

“Yes?” At least that was good news. The chamber floor wobbled underfoot as another rumbling detonation shook the puppet-like shapes of the dead and dying attached to the wall. One of the raptor scouts jerked its wings out to steady itself and knocked 974 Praf over. She made a clicking noise with her beak and glared at the offending beast.

“You have communicator?” the creature asked him. “Signal outside the airsphere?”

“No. Nothing.”

The creature grimaced again. “Fuck. Then have to… get away from Oskendari. To ship, habitat; anywhere. Somewhere you can contact Culture, understand?”

“Yes. Why? To say what?”

“Plot. Not a joke, Uagen, not a drill. Plot. Serious fucking plot. Think it’s to destroy… Orbital.”

“What?”

“Orbital. Full Orbital, called Masaq’. Heard of?”

“Yes! It’s famous!”

“They want to destroy it. Chelgrian faction. Chelgrian being sent. Don’t know name. Doesn’t matter. On his way, or will be soon. Don’t know when. Attack happens. You. Get out. Get away. Tell Culture.” The creature suddenly stiffened and bowed out from the wall of the chamber, its eyes closing. A tremendous shudder whipped through the cavity, tearing a couple of the dead bodies from the chamber’s walls to send them falling limply to the quaking floor. Uagen and two of the raptor scouts were thrown onto their backs. Uagen struggled back to his feet.

The creature on the wall was staring at him. “Uagen. Tell SC, or Contact. My name is Gidin Sumethyre. Sumethyre, got that?”

“Got it. Gidin Sumethyre. Umm. That all?”

“Enough. Now get away. Masaq’ Orbital. Chelgrian. Gidin Sumethyre. That’s all. Out now. I’ll try and hold this…” The creature’s head dropped slowly to rest on its chest. Another titanic convulsion shook the chamber.

“That which the creature has just said,” 974 Praf began, sounding puzzled.

Uagen stooped and picked the Interpreter up by her dry, leathery wings. “Get out!” he screeched into her