“Do you want anything to eat or drink?” Bayta put in suddenly. “I’m sorry; we should have offered that sooner.”
To my surprise, I realized that I was in fact ravenously hungry But this was far too interesting to interrupt even for food. “No, I’m okay,” I told her. “Please, continue.”
“Over the next sixty years the Spiders tried again and again to learn who and what this enemy was,” the Elder said. “They were able to get four other races interested in the problem, each taking a turn at solving it. All four ultimately fell, and it finally dawned on us that our actions were actually facilitating the invasions. The Modhri was also spreading out on his own, but we learned too late that these official investigation teams were probably the fastest and simplest route to high government levels.”
“And even after all this, you still had no idea where the attacks were coming from?” I asked.
“Actually, by then we had narrowed it to one of the worlds along the Grakla Spur,” he said. “Sistarrko was considered the most likely system.”
“So again, why didn’t you shut down the station?”
His eye-ridge tufts vibrated again. “We tried,” he said ruefully. “Citing economic reasons, we closed down the entire Spur. But the pressure from the other empires was enormous, and not only from those controlled by the Modhri. We didn’t dare take the chance that someone might become angry enough to storm the Tube itself, possibly destroying a section and thereby learning the secret of the Thread. So after a few weeks, we reopened the line.”
“And business returned to normal.”
“Except that now the Modhri knew who it was who’d been behind the various probes launched against him over the years.” The Elder shivered again. “And with that, the Spiders themselves became targets for conquest.”
I felt my throat tighten. Passengers, cargo, and mail, I remembered thinking rather resentfully back at Terra Station. If the Spiders were conquered, that ultimate hat trick would pass to the last-ditch weapon of an all-powerful tyranny. “I hope you’ve taken some precautions.”
“The very nature of the Spiders and their armor makes a normal Modhri attack impossible,” he assured me. “Still, with enough walkers in hand, other methods would become possible.” His eyes flicked to Bayta. “One of which you have already seen. I will admit that we began to wonder if there was still any hope for us, or whether we and the galaxy had instead begun the long dark path to defeat.
“And then, thirty years ago, you Humans burst upon the scene.”
He paused, his eyes again shifting to Bayta. “You were a wild race, full of confidence and energy and cleverness. The Shonkla-raa had either failed to notice you or else had decided your world had nothing worth stealing and had passed you by. But you were certainly a shock to the rest of us. Nothing quite like you had ever been seen in the galaxy, and I will admit that many of us were somewhat taken aback. But others saw you as perhaps our last, best hope for victory against the Modhri.”
I felt my throat tighten. “Are you saying there isn’t anyone else left?”
His eye-ridge tufts bristled. “At that point neither the Bellidos nor the Cimmaheem had shown signs of Modhran influence,” he said. “And we think the Filiaelians, at the far end of the galaxy, may yet be untouched. Their routine manipulation of their own genetic code provides a natural barrier to Modhran intrusion.”
Which was probably why Hermod had pointed me toward the Fillies in the first place. Watching a Spider agent go charging off to one of the last remaining bastions of independence would have pretty much guaranteed the Modhri’s attention.
“But you were the ones with the drive and the curiosity that gave you a unique edge,” the Elder continued. “We needed only to wait until you were acclimated to the cultures around you and ready to act.”
“And meanwhile, the Bellidos decided to take their own crack at the Modhri,” I said, remembering our conversations with Fayr aboard the Quadrail.
“And failed like all the others,” the Elder said grimly. “Still, it was their effort that finally solved the mystery of the thought-virus mechanism.”
“So when Fayr decided to try it on his own, he had the whole story available to him,” I said, nodding. “And as an extra bonus, you even provided him with a nice little diversion.”
The Elder ducked his head, the gesture looking very strange the way his neck was jointed. “For that I apologize,” he said. “But Fayr was in motion, and while we had no details of his plan or timetable, we nevertheless deemed his attempt had a good chance of success. We further judged that Humans were not yet ready to make a serious effort against the Modhri on their own. So we did what we could to help the Bellidos, while at the same time not jeopardizing the possibility of a future Human attack.”
“And it worked pretty well,” I had to admit. “I didn’t divert the Modhri quite the way you planned, but my presence at least muddied the water a little. And Fayr was good enough that none of it made much of a difference to his plan anyway.”
“Yes,” the Elder murmured. “Except that it seems his plan was only a partial success.”
“Unfortunately,” I said. “My guess is that once the Modhri figured out that you were the ones behind all these attacks, he decided he’d better pull up stakes and get out of town. He picked a new homeland and started shipping his coral there as fast as he could.”
“So that by the time Fayr destroyed the Modhran coral beds, enough of him had already made the transfer to begin again,” the Elder said heavily. “But now Bayta tells us you know where this new homeland is.”
“Yes, I do,” I said, folding my arms across my chest. “Now all you have to do is convince me that I should tell you.”
He stared, his eye-ridge tufts going suddenly rigid. “What do you mean?” he asked.
“I mean that from where I sit, you and the Modhri are looking way too much like fraternal twins,” I said evenly. “You both communicate telepathically, you both like to be in control”—I hesitated, but this was no time to worry about a little hypocrisy—“and you both play fast and loose with the truth when it suits you.”
I looked squarely at Bayta. “And you both invade people’s bodies.”
“It’s nothing like that,” she insisted. Unlike the Elder, her human face carried emotional cues I could read, and it was clear she was stunned by my abrupt refusal to spill my guts on cue. “The Modhri is a parasite, emotionally as well as physically, a creature who seeks to manipulate and control others for his own ends. I, on the other hand, am a true synthesis, with the Human and Chahwyn parts of me forming a genuine partnership.”
“And how much say did the Human half of you have in the arrangement of this partnership?”
A flicker of something crossed her face. “She was a foundling,” she said, her voice low. “A baby born aboard a Quadrail, then abandoned.”
I felt my skin crawling. That sort of thing wasn’t supposed to happen anymore, certainly not among the rich and powerful who could afford to travel among the stars. “Did you try to find her mother?”
“Yes, they found her,” Bayta said. She was trying hard to sound like she was just reciting facts, but I could hear the pain beneath the words. “But she didn’t want me. Or so she insisted.”
“We, on the other hand, had great need of her,” the Elder said. “We had the Spiders bring her here and… the two were melded.”
A shiver ran up my back. “At least the Modhri has the courtesy to wait until someone’s full-grown before taking over.”