Queasiness formed in her stomach, and it wasn’t just from the weightlessness. [[Kira here: Do you think we can stop the Corrupted now?]]
The Jelly’s tentacles flushed with a deep purple. [[Itari here: You and the rest of your co-forms? No. Nor do we believe the Wranaui can. Not alone. These Corrupted are stronger and more virulent than those of the Sundering. We must fight them together if we are to have any hope of success. Know this, Idealis: to stop the Corrupted, every cell in their bodies must be obliterated or else they will grow anew. That is why we sought the Staff of Blue. It had the power to command the Idealis and more besides. With it, we could have broken the Corrupted. Without it, we are weak and vulnerable.]]
“What’s wrong?” Hawes murmured. “You’ve gone all green about the gills.”
“The nightmares…” Kira started to say, and then paused, tasting acid. Right then, she didn’t want to reveal her part in creating the Maw to the lieutenant or to the UMC at large. It would come out eventually, but she couldn’t see how the truth would make any difference to the League’s response. They needed to kill the nightmares. What else mattered? “The nightmares come from the Vanished,” she said, and translated the rest of Itari’s words.
The lieutenant scratched at his neck. “Well that’s not good.”
“Nope.”
“Don’t count out the UMC,” he said with false confidence. “We’re damn good at killing things, and we’ve got some real geniuses back home figuring out new ways of dealing out death. We’re not out of the fight by a long shot.”
“I hope you’re right,” said Kira.
He fiddled with a UMC logo patch on his sleeve. “What I don’t understand is, why are we seeing nightmares now? They’ve been around for a while, yeah? So what triggered them? You finding the xeno?”
She shrugged, uncomfortable. “The Jelly didn’t say.” Technically it was true.
“Has to be,” the lieutenant muttered. “Doesn’t make sense otherwise. Signal goes out, then…” His expression shifted. “Say, how did Tschetter’s Jellies know to show up at Adra when they did? Were they keeping an eye on the system, in case anyone found the xeno?”
[[No,]] Itari said in response. [[That would have attracted attention we did not want. When the reliquary was breached, lowsound farscent was released, and after it reached us, we sent our ship, the Tserro, to investigate.]]
Kira said, “Should I get some details on who exactly this we is?”
Hawes nodded. “Good idea. Let’s find out who we might be forming an alliance with.”
[[Kira here: The ones you serve, the ones who want to form a … shoal … with our leaders, do they have a name?]]
Nearscent of confirmation. [[Itari here: The Knot of Minds.]]
From the Soft Blade came an image of tentacles gripping and intertwining, and with that a sense of close trust. And Kira understood that a knot was a form of group bonding among the Jellies, one that signified a joint—and unbreakable—cause.
Itari was still talking: [[The Knot was formed to protect the secret of Shoal Leader Nmarhl.]]
A thrill of recognition passed through her at the name. She remembered Nmarhl from one of the memories the Soft Blade had shown her when she was investigating the computer system on the Jelly ship, back at 61 Cygni. And she again recalled the unusual fondness the xeno seemed to have for the shoal leader. [[Kira here: And what was that secret?]]
[[Itari here: The location of the Idealis, which Nmarhl hid at the end of the Sundering.]]
Kira had so many questions, she didn’t know what to ask first. [[Kira here: Why did Nmarhl hide the Idealis?]]
[[Itari here: Because the shoal leader failed in its attempt to seize control of the Arms. And because hiding the Idealis was the only way to protect it and to protect us from further Corruption. If this Idealis had been in use, the Sundering could easily have been the end of the Wranaui.]]
Kira took a moment to process that and to translate for Hawes.
“You remember this shoal leader?” the lieutenant asked.
She nodded, keeping her eyes on Itari. “A bit. It was definitely joined with the Soft Blade at some point.”
Hawes motioned for her to look at him. “Let me get this straight. The Knot of Minds tried to stage a coup back during the Sundering—whenever that was—and now they’re trying to do the same again?”
When he put it that way, it didn’t sound so good. “That’s what it looks like,” Kira said.
“So what was their justification back then, and what’s their justification now?”
The Jelly’s response was swift: [[Itari here: Our reason was and is the same: we believe there is a better current to follow. The one we are caught in now can only lead to the death of Wranaui everywhere, in this ripple and others.]]
[[Kira here: Then, if you succeed in replacing your leadership, is there one among the Knot of Minds who will scent for the Wranaui?]]
The Jelly was slow to answer. [[Itari here: That will depend on those whose patterns survive. Mdethn may, perhaps, be fitted to the task. Lphet, also, but the other Arms would dislike answering to one who followed the heresy of the Tfeir. Either way, it would be difficult for any of the Wranaui to replace the great and mighty Ctein.]]
At that name, and at that phrase, a line of ice poured down Kira’s spine. Flashes of images from her dreams filled her head: a vast bulk rooted amid the Abyssal Conclave; a huge, scheming presence that saturated the water with its pungency. [[Kira here: Is Ctein a name or a title?]]
[[Itari here: I do not understand.]]
[[Kira here: Are all your leaders called Ctein, or is it the name of just one?]]
[[Itari here: There is but one Ctein.]]
“It can’t be,” she murmured, fear prickling the back of her neck. [[Kira here: How old is Ctein?]] She had to stop herself from adding the phrase “the great and mighty.”
[[Itari here: The wise and ancient Ctein has guided the Arms since the last cycles of the Sundering.]]
[[Kira here: How many cycles around your sun has that been?]]
[[Itari here: The number would mean nothing to you, but Nmarhl placed the Idealis within its keeping place when your kind were first venturing off your homeworld, if that gives you an idea.]]
She did the math in her head. Over two and a half centuries. [[Kira here: And Ctein has ruled the waters for all that time?]]
[[Itari here: And longer.]]
[[Kira here: All in the same form?]]
[[Itari here: Yes.]]
[[Kira here: How long do Wranaui live?]]
[[Itari here: That depends on when we are killed.]]
[[Kira here: What if … you aren’t killed? How long would it take you to die from old age?]]
Nearscent of understanding. [[Itari here: Age does not kill us, two-form. Always we can revert to our hatchling form and grow anew.]]
[[Kira here: Your hatchling form…?]] Several more questions only left her more confused about the Jelly life cycle. There were eggs, hatchlings, pods, rooted forms, mobile forms, forms that didn’t seem to be sentient, and—as Itari seemed to indicate—a host of forms adapted to specific tasks or environments. The unique nature of the Jellies’ biology sparked Kira’s professional curiosity, and she found herself shifting back into her role of xenobiologist. It just didn’t make sense. Complex life cycles were nothing new. Plenty of examples existed on Earth and Eidolon. But Kira couldn’t figure out how all the parts and pieces Itari was mentioning were supposed to fit together. Every time she thought she had a handle on it, the Jelly would mention something new. As a puzzle, it was frustrating and exhilarating.