The most probable explanation for the current King and his extended family was that he had discovered some form of longevity but denied it to all but his immediate kin, and that this same serum, process or surgical technique had also stalled his kin’s maturation. This had occurred with some of the earlier anti-geriatric medications used by humans. Specifically there had been a nanotech process—similar to the nanofactories used by reifications—which had read the DNA of its host, then perpetually worked to repair any subsequent damage to that DNA. The disadvantage here was that if the DNA was already damaged before this reading process, the nanomachines would maintain that damage. This meant that someone suffering from cancer would then always have cancer, for any attempt at correction at a genetic level would be defeated by the nanobots. It also meant that if someone took such treatment while a child, he or she would then remain forever a child.
The armour was near impenetrable: a thick layer of exotic metal sandwiching alternate layers of a superconductor and some other reflective exotic metal. The Warden tried low-level radar and microwave scans, but once the AI upped the intensity of those, the Prador clearly sensed them, because it turned to face the nearby satellite eye and projected microwave and radio white noise. But there remained another possibility.
The Warden slowly began altering the position of the nearest satellite eye, to bring it away from the armoured Prador but down into the same level of the ionosphere. Further around the planet, it dropped another eye to the same level.
‘Prador do not participate in diplomacy,’ Vrost replied. ‘This must be settled quickly.’
Shit, thought the Warden.
‘Now,’ Vrost continued, ‘that I have obliged you, I would prefer it if you made no further attempt to scan Father’s second-children.’
One strange piece of information there: the Warden had assumed, by the size of this armoured Prador, that it must be a first-child. The AI then initiated the X-ray scan from his further eye, while using the closer eye as a receiver. The fusion detonation came a microsecond after, converting the armoured second-child into a glowing ball of gas. The flash knocked out the reception on most nearby satellite eyes.
‘I repeat,’ said Vrost, ‘attempt no scans.’
Either suicide or remote detonation initiated by Vrost, the Warden realized. ‘My apologies, that scan was initiated before your warning.’
The AI was betting on the Prador not comprehending exactly how fast an AI could react. For a moment Vrost gave no reply, and the Warden studied the X-ray picture he had obtained. It was not very clear, but certainly showed that the armour had not conformed to the shape of the being it contained. That looked nothing like any Prador second-child.
‘The ocean ship survived the wave caused by my first strike,’ said Vrost. ‘Another strike would only be four hundred kilometres closer and, impacting on a spaceship near the surface, I have just calculated that its detonation would not cause so large a wave.’
The Warden found himself all out of bluffs. Either Vrost believed the AI could use U-space weapons or he did not. There was nothing more the AI could do, and Vrost, it seemed, did not believe him. The coil-gun fired again.
Tracking the missile down through the atmosphere, the AI made its own calculations and realized that the Prador captain might just be right, so long as no weapons or fusion reactors detonated aboard Vrell’s ship. Then something unexpected happened, and the AI observed the projectile become a streak of incandescent gas.
‘It would seem that Vrell’s shipboard weapons are perfectly functional,’ the Warden remarked.
After a long delay, Vrost replied, ‘Yes, so it would appear.’
Something cataclysmic had certainly occurred here in the sea. The giant whelk recognized the signs by something buried deep in her memory. She recollected, long in the past, grey sulphurous fountains spewing from sea-floor vents around which gathered strange green prill and enormous pale clams. Near her, magma had wormed up from the deep ocean floor with a sound like something huge tearing apart. Hints of its inner glow showed through the immediate crust it acquired on contact with the sea water, and it hardened into stone pillars that then toppled one after another. All this had been a curiosity to nearby whelks, until one of them had ventured close enough to grab one of the clams. That rash individual was caught in a stray current of water which, but for the pressure, would have been steam. It died with one long-drawn-out squeal, before floating upwards inflated by its own cooking gases. The rest of the whelks fled.
Here, around her now, drifted the remnants of parboiled leeches, cooked-red segments of glister and hinged-open prill carapaces. Down below she observed the skeleton of a heirodont and felt a surge of gladness — as she well knew, such monsters did not die easily, so what had caused this ablation of its flesh must have been strong indeed. Now all that was left of that drastic event was unusual warm-water currents cutting through the devastation. But the ocean was gradually returning to normal and, like herself, its denizens were venturing into this area to feed on the organic detritus.
First came the turbul, crunching open both shell and carapace to get at the broiled meat inside. Then came shoals of boxies, swarming like silver bees as they picked through this cornucopia in the water and juggled clean any pieces of shell the turbul dropped. Glisters remained distant, keeping well clear of the whelk herself, but prill she had to perpetually slap away. A heirodont, half the size of the one she had beheaded, cruised into view then turned towards her. She prepared her garrotte and waited, as the thing circled twice, clacking its mandibles. Holding the line out towards it, drawn taut between two tentacles, she sculled round to stay facing it. Then it attacked.
Her line cut into the slope of its head as it drove her rapidly back up through the water, then along the surface, kicking up spray from the heaving ocean. Its mandibles kept groping only a small distance from her body. When it eventually slowed, she relaxed the line’s tension, sculled neatly round beside the creature’s head and looped the line around its neck. It was easier with this smaller attacker than the previous occasion, and the line did not snag on any vertebrae this time. A second heirodont arrived just in time to see the whelk pushing off from the thrashing body of her attacker while its head spiralled down towards the bottom, trailing ichor as grey as any spume from a volcanic vent. As the second heirodont quickly turned away, she felt joy not so much because of this victory but because the attacker had propelled her to this particular area of ocean. For, sticking out her corkscrew tongue, she savoured a familiar taste in the water.
The ship.
16
Molly Carp:
no one really knows how this creature obtained the first half of its name, though the second part is quite obvious, since the creature’s body resembles that of a Terran fish called a carp. However, there the resemblance ends. It propels itself through the sea by gripping the bottom with three rows of flat tentacles growing from its belly. Fossil evidence indicates that these are a further evolution of barbels. Molly carp are solitary and territorial creatures, usually making the shallows around a single atoll their domain. They can grow up to five metres long in the body, with tentacles extending down fifteen metres. Hoopers claim that once every three hundred years they all simultaneously leave their individual territories so as to mate in Nort Sea. This has yet to be witnessed by any Polity observer, but if it is the case, then they seem to have adapted well to viral longevity. Rumour and legend abound regarding these creatures: they rescue drowning Hoopers, sometimes follow ships for hundreds of kilometres, and like magpies will steal anything shiny they can lay their tentacles on. It is claimed that one Captain Alber even trained a molly carp to tow his ship. This Captain has never been found, so no confirmation can be made. All Polity observers have witnessed are molly carp haunting island waters, where they are voracious predators of glisters and prill, occasionally venturing down deeper to unearth amberclams —