Their response was the equivalent of cosmic laughter. It resolved finally into a single, unmistakable “sentence”:
ON THE CONTRARY.
Our dance dissolved into confusion for a moment, then recovered.
We do not understand.
The aliens hesitated. Something like solicitude emanated from them, something like compassion.
WE CAN—WE MUST—EXPLAIN. BUT UNDERSTANDING WILL BE VERY STRESSFUL, COMPOSE YOURSELVES.
The component of our self that was Linda poured out a flood of maternal warmth, an envelope of calm; she had always been the best of us at prayer. Raoul now played only an om-like A-flat that was a warm, golden color. Tom’s driving will, Harry’s eternal strength, Norrey’s quiet acceptance, my own unfailing sense of humor, Linda’s infinite caring and Raoul’s dogged persistence all heterodyned to produce a kind of peace I had never known, a serene calm based on a sensation of completeness. All fear was gone, all doubt. This was meant to be.
This was meant to be, we danced. Let it be.
The echo was instantaneous, with a flavor of pleased, almost paternal approval.
NOW!
Their next sending was a relatively short dance, a relatively simple dance. We understood it at once, although it was utterly novel to us, grasped its fullest implications in a single frozen instant. The dance compressed every nanosecond of more than two billion years into a single concept, a single telepathic gestalt.
And that concept was really only the aliens’ name.
Terror smashed the Snowflake into six discrete shards. I was alone in my skull in empty space, with a thin film of plastic between me and my death, naked and terribly afraid. I clutched wildly for non-existent support. Before me, much too close before me, the aliens buzzed like bees. As I watched, they began to gather at the center, forming first a pinhole, then a knothole and then a porthole in the wall of Hell, a single shimmering red coal that raved with furious energy. Its brilliance dwarfed even the Sun; my hood began to polarize automatically.
The barely visible balloon that contained the molten nucleus began to weep red smoke, which spiraled gracefully out to form a kind of Ring. I knew it at once, what it was and what it was for, and I threw back my head and screamed, triggering all thrusters in blind escape reflex.
Five screams echoed mine.
I fainted.
IV
I was lying on my back with my knees raised, and I was much too heavy—almost twenty kilos. My ribs were struggling to inflate my chest. I had had a bad dream... .
The voices came from above like an old tube amp warming up, intermittent and distorted at first, resolving at last into a kind of clarity. They were near, but they had the trebleless, faraway characteristic of low pressure—and they too were finding the pseudogravity a strain.
“For the last time, tovarisch: speak to us. Why are your colleagues all catatonic? How do you continue to function? What in Lenin’s Name happened out there?”
“Let him be, Ludmilla. He cannot hear you.”
“I will have an answer!”
“Will you have him shot? If so, by whom? The man is a hero. If you continue to harass him, I will make full note of it, in our group report and in my own. Let him be.” Chen Ten Li’s voice was quite composed, exquisitely detached until that last blazing command. It startled me into opening my eyes, which I had been avoiding since I first became aware of the voices.
We were in the Limousine. All ten of us, four Space Commandsuits and six brightly colored Stardancers, a quorum of bowling pins strapped by twos into a vertical alley. Norrey and I were in the last or bottom row. We were obviously returning to Siegfried at full burn, making a good quarter gee. I turned my head at once to Norrey beside me. She seemed to be sleeping peacefully: the stars through the window behind her told me that we had already passed turnover and were decelerating.
I had been out a long time.
Somehow everything had gotten sorted out in my sleep. By definition, I guess: my subconscious had kept me under until I was ready to cope and no longer. A part of my mind boiled in turmoil, but I could encompass that part now and hold it in perspective. The majority of my mind was calm. Nearly all questions were answered now, and the fear dwindled to something that could be borne. I knew for certain that Norrey was all right, that all of us would be all right in time. Not direct knowledge; the telepathic bond was broken. But I knew my family. Our lives were irrevocably changed; into what, we knew not yet—but we would find out together.
At least two more crises would come in rapid succession now, and we would share these fortunes.
Immediate needs first.
“Harry,” I called out, “you did a good job. Let go now.”
He turned his big crewcut head and looked down past his headrest at me from two rows up. He smiled beatifically. “I almost lost his music box,” he said confidentially. “It got away from me when the weight came on.” At once he rolled his head up and was asleep, snoring deeply.
I smiled indulgently at myself. I should have expected it, should have known that it would be Harry, great-shouldered great-hearted Harry who would be the strongest of us all, Harry the construction engineer who would prove to have infinite load-bearing capacity. His shoulders had been equal to his heart’s need, and his breaking strain was still unknown. He would waken in an hour or so like a giant refreshed.
The diplomats had been yelping at me since I spoke to Harry; now I put my attention on them. “One at a time, please.”
By God, not one of the four would yield. Knowing it was foolish they all kept talking at once. They simply couldn’t help themselves.
“Shut up!” Bill’s voice blasted from the phone speaker, overriding the cacophony. They shut up and turned to look at his image. “Charlie,” he went on urgently, searching my face in his own screen, “are you still human?”
I knew what he was asking. Had the aliens somehow taken me over telepathically? Was I still my own master, or did an aggressive hive-mind live in my skull, working my switches and pulleys? We had discussed the possibility earnestly on the trip out, and I knew that if my answer didn’t convince him he would blast us out of space without hesitation. The least of his firepower would vaporize the Limousine instantly.
I grinned. “Only for the last two or three years, Bill. Before that I was semipure bastard.”
Later he would be relieved; he was busy. “Do I burn them?”
“Negative. Hold your fire! Bill, hear me good: If you shot them, and they ever found out about it, they might just take offense. I know you’ve got a Planet Cracker; forget it: from here they can turn out the Sun.”
He went pale, and the diplomats held shocked silence, turning with effort to gape at me. “We’re nearly home,” I went on firmly. “Conference in the exercise room as soon as we’re all recovered, call it a couple of hours from now. All hands. We’ll answer all your questions then—but until then you’ll just have to wait. We’ve had a hell of a shock; we need time to recover.” Norrey was beginning to stir beside me, and Linda was looking about clear-eyed; Tom was shaking his head with great care from side to side. “Now I’ve got my wife and a pregnant lady to worry about. Get us home and get us to our rooms and we’ll see you in two hours.”