Hearing, smell, touch, memory.
Joanne Nicole tasted the degree of her powers as the hours passed in the dark compartment. If you can hear the fold of a single layer of cloth; if you can smell the difference between an empty room and one containing another being; if you have placed in your mind the position of everything with more accuracy than one who can see those things with light, who has the superior power in a dark room?
There was a sound in the compartment, and Joanne Nicole knew the answer. Her ears flooded her mind with data as her right hand grasped the hilt of her blade. She heard a hand brush the wall and try twice to make the wall switch illuminate the compartment. Then cloth-clad footsteps walked the compartment’s deck.
Cloth-clad footsteps. An atmospheric suit. There was no sound of the door opening!
There was a hiss, a sizzle, the smell of ozone filling the compartment, a wash of heat speeding over her head. The footsteps moved toward the sleeping platform as the smells of burned cloth filled the air.
"Ehhh?"
There were more sounds of hands moving through the scorched and ashed bedclothes.
Nicole moved silently to her left, around the bed platform, until she sensed the near presence of another being. She gently placed her left hand around the being’s suited right leg and, with her right hand, placed the point of her blade against the leg’s covering.
"Put down your weapon, or I will open you to the atmosphere."
There was a frozen moment, then Nicole felt the heat of molten steel lace through her right shoulder. As her mind dimmed from the pain, she shoved the blade with her right hand into the creature’s leg.
There was a scream, a blade of energy moving through her shoulder, a whiff of ammonia. then blackness.
EIGHTEEN
"What are the goals? What are the intended goals? Whose goals are served by the event? Whose goals are intended to be served by the event?
"The more of the truths you acquire that you need to satisfy these questions, the closer you will be toward understanding the situations that arise between creatures. And understanding the event is but a particle away from controlling its nature and effects."
The upper right quadrant of her body was numb. Her mind was filled with the scarlet vision of blood as bright heat washed her face.
Tora Soam spoke over her. "Natueh, the lights. The heat left her face "Tora Soam?"
"Yes."
"Who was it? The one who tried to kill me?
"Emmmm." An uncomfortable silence. "We do not know. As soon as I understood what you were going to do. I had your duty guard removed and another squad of guards prepared to apprehend whoever tried to enter your quarters. They saw no one entering or leaving."
Nicole frowned. "It was wearing an atmospheric suit. I punctured it. Whoever it was should have been dead in my quarters."
"There was no one."
Nicole let her memories pick at the problem. "Entrance was not made through the corridor. There is at least one other entrance. The body must have been removed in the same manner." She reached out a hand and grabbed at the air until she felt Tora Soam’s arm. "Ovjetah, when I punctured the suit, I smelled ammonia."
"Emmmm." Tora Soam remained silent for a moment. "Nicole, only one of the members of the Ninth Quadrant observation team would use an atmosphere containing a significant amount of ammonia. Darlass Ita of the planet Aus."
Nicole shook her head. "No. That makes no sense. Timan Nisak designed and built the orbiter. It had to be a Timan."
"Joanne Nicole, everyone on the orbiter knows that you are sightless. The one who tried to kill you could have been either Timan, human, or Drac, wearing a suit, attempting to convince you that the person was from Aus. Perhaps your assailant did not intend to kill you. The purpose of the visit might have been to cast suspicion on the Timans."
"Or a Timan trying to make it look as though someone else was trying to frame the Timans." Nicole shook her head. "Tora Soam, who else is in this compartment?"
Another voice spoke. "I am Natueh Gi, Chirn Jetah of the ship Cueh."
She turned toward Tora Soam. "Where are Ambassador Rafiki and Jetah Indeva?"
"At first they were both difficult about appearing here without assistants. However, both of them should be aboard by now with their guards."
Nicole nodded. "We must all meet in the screen room." She turned her head toward Natueh Gi. "Can I get up?"
"No. You should rest. Your body has suffered greatly."
She frowned at the Chirn Jetah, then felt with her left hand. Her right arm and shoulder were covered with a smooth plastic cast.
"I think I have saved the limb."
Nicole let her head fall back to the bed. "Natueh Gi, I must be moved to the screen room."
"You should rest."
The Ovjetah grunted. "Move her. She knows what must be done."
She spoke as the bed-table began moving. "Ovjetah?"
"Yes, Joanne Nicole?"
"Is the screen room tied into the Talman Kovah’s computers, and the USE’s commercial computers?"
"The information from the Talman Kovah is available, but Ambassador Rafiki will not allow the connection to the USE central system."
Nicole nodded once and remained impassive as the bedtable moved down the corridor.
Hurry. Natueh Gi. There is a nightmare to discuss.
Her mind swam, and an image came to her of Storm Mountain and Ted Makai, months before the attack, in the officer’s club…
"Talk to me about Amadeen, Ted."
"Are you one of those who are attracted by the grotesque?"
"I want to understand." Ted Makai moved in his chair, finished his drink, then ordered another. He remained silent.
"Ted, Carver doesn’t talk about Amadeen. Neither do Speidel or Ghadi. No one who served there does."
"Joanne, have you ever had a deathly frightening dream?"
"Yes."
"Have you ever tried to put such a dream into words to tell to another?"
"Yes, I have."
"And has anyone who heard those words ever understood the terror of your dream?"
Nightmares… l would wake in the dark, the end of a scream still on my lips; shaking, the perspiration soaking my hair and bedclothes. As a child. my mother would hug me and smile as I tried to tell her about my experience; years later. Mallik would half-listen to my hysterical tumble of words, then laugh…
"No. They couldn’t understand… they were not there in the same dream."
Makai had nodded. "Now, buy me another drink…"
The moving table turned a corner and Nicole sensed herself enter a larger compartment; the ship’s screen room. The table stopped, and the Chirn Jetah pressed a button, raising the upper end, allowing Nicole to face the others in the room.
And now I have to tell them the nightmare that I saw.