“Not to Outworld. The hostages have taken over the key positions there. I never intended to ship you there, either.”
“But this unit won’t reach farther—” He paused. “You’re not going after the Andromedans we sent to the sunside mines!”
She shuddered. “No—they’d crucify me, literally!” She took his hand. “Skot of Kade, I need your opinion. My aura is supposed to be able, with the aid of special equipment, to overwhelm a hostage of one-quarter my own intensity. Do you think this is possible at a short distance as well as in close proximity?”
“I’m no transfer expert. But I don’t see why not. Transfer is essentially a long-distance mechanism, and the Andromedans did it all the way from their galaxy, a million light years away. But what relevance—”
“You see, I wouldn’t want to make a hostage of one of our own people, and damage her as the Andromedans did. But I wouldn’t have such scruples about an already existent hostage. That host has already been hurt, and the Andromedan deserves no better.”
Skot gaped. “Yael, you’re not thinking of—”
“I am Melody of Mintaka. No need to conceal it anymore. Skot, someone has to identify and deal with the hostages on the other ships. We can’t let those ships fall into enemy hands.”
“If I transfer to Outworld, maybe I can—”
“No! That would only give us away. I need you here. I’m going to transfer to some of the other ships, but I don’t want anyone else to know. My host, the real Yael of Dragon, will conceal my absence, but you will have to help her, because she knows no more about space than I do. If she makes a slip, your ingenuity will be needed.”
Skot shook his head. “Llume’s the only one who might catch on, and we don’t need to worry about—”
Melody put her hand on his arm, turning him about to face her. “I don’t want Llume to know. It could only distract her at a very inopportune time.”
Skot looked down. “Oh. Yes. Of course.” Then he looked into her eyes and she knew she had a conquest if she wanted it. “Just how dangerous is this mission?”
“No worse than my mission on this ship.”
“Thanks for the reassurance,” he said wryly. “You’re limping, bruised, and bloodshot, lucky to be alive. You look like a worn-out witch. And you say—”
Melody reached up to kiss him. “The physical violence has not affected my aura. This is the only transfer unit in the Fleet, so I will have to return in another host. Will you recognize me as a lovely Polarian?”
He had to smile. “No problem,” he said, letting her go after a slight hesitation. “I’ll know your aura. But we’ll need a code word when you come in by shuttle. I can handle that part of it; ship-to-shuttle is on a different beam, not part of the fleet net, and Llume won’t even know about it.”
“Lot of *,” Melody said, smiling.
He nodded. “Lot of * it is. If I don’t get that word, I’ll treat anything that comes in as a hostile craft. So you make sure you—”
“Don’t worry! I’ve seen how you shoot!”
Melody reviewed the transfer unit procedure with him, and they oriented on the nearest ship—another giant Disk of Polaris. Then she entered the unit.
“Oh, one thing,” Skot said before he activated the mechanism. “Is your host a nice person?”
“You’ll find out!” Melody said, laughing merrily.
11. Mating the Impact
*the other members of the council are becoming restive*
—I am aware of it they lack the patience or perspective—
*their position is comprehensible, dash we have a thoroughly worked-out plan of action, well implemented it requires only overt action at this stage, before too many individuals of the subject galaxy become aware of the hostages among them already our delay seems to be causing regression in segment etamin*
—you are very practical, * I suppose an explanation is in order—
*it would be appreciated*
—when I prayed to aposiopesis, I was granted a revelation, a small share of the nature of ultimate reality it is this: we are very like our sister galaxy—
*that hardly seems relevant*
—it is relevant, ast our leading spheres are very like theirs our / resembles their sword cultures, that the temple of tarot calls the suit of gas, of transformation both cultures employ laser weapons and have the thrust mentality—
*but our slashes roll, while their sword cultures such as the solarians employ frictive propulsion*
—rolling is frictive too but physique is of little significance it is the basic nature that matters our slashes cut enemies to pieces with their knife edges and lasers, and their solarian swords do the same it was that similarity of nature that caused the archcriminal flint of etamin to pervert our highest-kirlian agent, thereby blunting our first effort he was of sol, she of slash had we anticipated that affinity of types we should have modified our policy and prevailed then—
*perhaps so yet the other cultures do not*
—but they do, ast! our dash resembles their wands, even to the physical aspects of deriving from flying creatures, even to the social aspect of utilizing a companion-species beneficially, though I deem our £ superior to their humanoids our ast resemble their disks, quadpoint is like their cups with only the medium of rock exchanged for that of water our duocirc are like their auras being magnetically based—
*naturally all species fall into certain broad functional classifications this has long been known*
—the resemblances are too strong, too fundamental to be coincidence! they are in fact our brother species if we destroy them, how may we answer to aposiopesis? shall we not ourselves be destroyed?—
*yet our advancing civilization depends on this*
—that depends on how we define civilization progress based on the destruction of a kindred culture—
*I think it necessary for you to vacate your leadership the council will not accept your views*
—we must cease this attack against our neighbor we must seek accommodation instead together the galaxies can comprehend aposiopesis is this not clear?—
*I regret it is not*
She stepped guardedly out of the unit. If the hostages were alert, she could find herself in immediate difficulties.
Surprisingly, she was in a human body. And the ship seemed to be identical to the one she had just left. “Melody!” a voice cried. “Or is it—Yael?”
Melody did a doubletake. “Oh, no! It didn’t work!”
“You didn’t go?” Skot asked, looking relieved.
“Let me see. It doesn’t have to mean a malfunction. There has to be a suitable host at the other end. In this case, a female. If there were none aboard the ship, I should… bounce.”
“Oh. Yes, of course. That tells us something.”
“It does. If you have any communication with the Polaris, insist on talking with a female. You will know whether she’s a hostage or not.”
“Maybe we can check them all out that way.”
“No use. With almost four hundred hostages remaining in the fleet we know a good many ships are suspect, and we don’t want to alert them by checking. And it occurs to me there could be a number of female hostages whose auras are over one quarter intensity of mine, so I would not overwhelm them anyway. I have to get to those ships and eliminate the hostages directly. Otherwise the hostage ships won’t hesitate to blast the loyal ships out of space. That may have happened in one case already.” He nodded gravely.
They reoriented on a Cup of Spica, the Four of Cups. Skot activated the unit again. And Melody… Found herself in a battle for her life. It had not occurred to her that her potential host might resist. The transfer to Yael of Dragon had been so simple, but there was a deadly difference between a voluntary and an involuntary host. And that helped explain why the Andromedans destroyed the minds of their hosts: They had to, because the hosts resisted as long as they were able. She was in the body of a Spican Impact, a fin-propelled creature of the deep sea. Spicans were neuter or triple-sexed, depending on one’s viewpoint. There were three fixed physical types, but the sexual role of each was determined by the manner in which a trio came together. Any two could interact without sexual excitation, but the arrival of the third sex acted as a catalyst, and there was immediate and explosive mergeance. More correctly, implosive mergeance.