Poseidon's Wake

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‘I hate to state the obvious,’ Eunice said, glaring at her wrists which had just been freed of the restraints, ‘but Kanu won’t have achieved much if the Risen still end up crushed to death under the re-entry loads.’

‘He’ll have gained the world,’ Goma said, ‘because when he had a choice, he did the human thing.’

‘You mean the futile thing.’

‘If you want to start passing as one of us, start thinking a little less analytically. Would you really have allowed the Risen to die?’

‘Dakota? In a heartbeat.’

‘And the others? We know there are more of them aboard.’

She met this with a non-answer of pursed lips. But it was enough for Goma to know that Eunice had her limits.

‘I’ve signalled Nasim,’ Vasin said, without much enthusiasm in her voice. ‘Told him to bring Travertine in on a fast rendezvous. We can’t do a thing for Kanu, but we have a transatmospheric lander on the main ship. If all else fails, we could send it down under autonomous control.’

Goma nodded — it was the right thing to do, but even if it did get anywhere near the surface, it would make no difference to Kanu’s chances. On the scale of a solar system, especially a compact one like this, Travertine was no faster than Mposi. It would still need several days to cross the system from its orbit around Orison.

But what else was a captain to do but give orders that contained the promise of hope?

‘Thank you, Gandhari. And thank you for letting Eunice out of those restraints.’

‘She isn’t forgiven — not until I work out what exactly she needs to be forgiven for — but I gain nothing by keeping her tied up. She’s clearly smart enough to use us whichever way she sees fit, and for now I’d rather we at least entertain the illusion of cooperation.’

‘You can forgive her when you’re ready,’ Ru said.

Eunice looked unfazed. ‘I don’t need anyone’s forgiveness. I did what needed to be done.’

‘What she did was brutal,’ Goma said. ‘No one’s disputing that. But she’s also right that it was the only thing that would help Kanu.’

‘And remind me how it helped Kanu, exactly?’ Ru said. ‘Because from where I’m sitting, they’re in just as much trouble as they ever were.’

‘He had the choice,’ Goma said. ‘That’s all that mattered. That the choice was his, finally, and he made the only one he could live with.’

‘She got to you,’ Ru said, shaking her head in disgust. ‘When you took that bath, in the well, she spread a little of her poison into you. Didn’t you, Eunice?’

‘Please,’ Grave said, interceding with raised hands. ‘Everybody — what is done is done. We can either carry our grievances forward and let them weigh us down, or allow them to blow away like dandelion seeds.’

‘Why should we listen to a word you have to say?’ Ru asked, without a flicker of anger or accusation. ‘You’re a believer, drowning in your own superstition. You’re the enemy of all that’s rational.’

‘I was also wronged. Each of you, in your way, was ready to see the worst in me. But I blame none of you for that, or for the differences of opinion you now share. The truth is that Eunice has a perspective none of us presently understands. She has been here before and she truly grasps the consequences. Until we attain her perspective, we cannot judge her. Nor can we blame ourselves if our sympathies do not always align. Ru — you have the right to feel aggrieved. You were also wronged, and in a terrible way. But Eunice acted on the facts available to her, and from her standpoint it was a perfectly rational decision. Something was hurting her friends, something in your blood. Ask yourself how quick you would have been to look beyond the obvious explanation — that you were a willing agent in the killing of the Risen?’ But Grave did not give her the luxury of dwelling on an answer. ‘Goma is right, and it has nothing to do with Eunice. She’s just seeing things clearly, as we all should. Kanu has done the only human thing possible, as any of us might have under the same circumstances. And if it took the Zanzibar translation to bring us to this moment, this chance of a final reconciliation between humans and the Risen, I think it will have been for the best.’

‘You people love your sacrifices,’ Ru said.

‘And you people love your certainties. None of us are enemies, Ru — at least, none of us needs to be.’ And he nodded at the blue transected disk of Poseidon, swelling larger in their sky by the minute. ‘Not in the face of that.’

CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

Nissa eased her bulky, suited form into the command position aboard the shuttle Noah, quickly familiarising herself with the layout of the instruments and control inputs: they were not too dissimilar from those aboard Fall of Night. Under normal circumstances, the shuttle would have gladly flown itself. But these particular circumstances were anything but normal, and the lander was all too willing to turn to human guidance.

‘The poor thing’s confused,’ Nissa said. ‘Like a dog being made to learn a new trick. It can’t find an acceptable entry solution and is wondering why it’s been placed in this position.’

‘You mean it knows we’re all going to die and it doesn’t want to be a co-conspirator?’ Kanu asked.

‘Think kindly of it,’ Swift said. ‘It’s a simple machine and it’s doing its best. Might I suggest a slightly steeper angle of attack — say, two additional degrees of nose-up elevation?’

‘Am I flying this or are you?’

‘My abject apologies. Under the circumstances, you are doing a most creditable job.’

But Nissa altered their approach angle anyway and consented to allow Swift to offer such advice as he deemed useful. The fact was, even Swift could not be expected to work miracles.

‘If it’s the last thing we do,’ Kanu said, ‘it would be a shame not to see one of the wheels up close. Can you find us an entry profile that gets us within visual range of a suitable wheel?’

‘Already done,’ Nissa said. ‘And it’s not just out of curiosity, either. Those wheels are the closest thing we’re going to find to dry land. I know this ship’s supposed to float but I’d sooner not stake my life on it.’

‘It’s a good plan,’ Kanu said.

But they both knew it was barely a plan at all. They would have no choice but to land in open water, for Noah had no means of setting down on the wheels even if there had been a suitable hard landing surface. For a few minutes they deliberated about attempting a controlled descent onto one of the floating biomasses, but all the evidence suggested that the living rafts were too tenuous to bear the lander’s weight, let alone absorb the shock of impact without rupturing. And then they would be back in water again, except this time choked in from all directions. Besides, none of the biomasses came within five thousand kilometres of any of the wheels.

With the lander still under thrust, Kanu made his way back from the command position to the Risen. They were in support hammocks identical to the ones on the larger ship. He braced a hand against the ceiling and leaned in to Dakota.

‘We’ll be hitting air in a few minutes. Nissa’s going to find us the smoothest way down, and we’ll try to hold our deceleration at a manageable level. I can’t promise it’ll be easy, though.’

‘Nor can we expect the impossible of you,’ Dakota said.

‘Of any of us. But before things get tough, we need to think ahead. You had years to plan this expedition. Is this ship well stocked with equipment?’

‘What do you have in mind?’

‘Whatever we need to survive on the surface. We’ll float, while we’re able. But you knew this was a waterworld, and that the wheels are the only solid surfaces. How were you hoping this would play out?’

‘A close visual inspection of the wheels. The analysis of the encoded patterns — the understanding of their context.’

‘From the air?’

‘Most certainly. Your ship could have coped with atmospheric insertion had our approach speed been low enough. What can be learned from the tiny parts of the wheels at the ocean’s surface?’

‘Right now I’m more concerned with not dying.’ He would have smiled at his own remark had the black toxin of the Terror not still been within him. The absence of hope, the absence of purpose, the inability to see a point to any act, the realisation of the supreme and total futility of existence — he could not begin to imagine how it would be possible to live with this hollow, howling void inside him, sucking the hope out of every moment.

And yet Nissa said there had to be a way. She was feeling it, too — so surely were the Tantors. And yet, as Nissa had pointed out, Chiku must eventually have come to an accommodation with the facts of the Terror. Life could go on — purpose found again. Presently Kanu saw no way through his present despair, but for Nissa’s sake he would trust her judgement — trust that there was a path, a way of living, that would make this bearable. That the void would close.

‘We can use one of the wheels as a safe haven,’ he continued. ‘Those inscriptions, the ones we saw from space — they’re deep, cut into the wheel like ledges. If we can get onto one of those ledges—’

‘Then what, Kanu?’ Dakota asked, with an edge of desperation.

‘Mposi isn’t far behind us. I’ve told Goma to turn around, but if there’s a shred of Akinya in her, I might as well have been whistling in the wind.’