Qualea Drop (The Spiral Wars #7), page 38
"She must envy the ability of someone to find data that's not available on any network. It's not like she can walk into a synagogue and ask to read the library."
"No." Romki smiled. "I'd like to see her try. The nice rabbi and his wife would probably serve her tea. Lovely folk. I wonder what will become of them, once we're gone?"
Looking up at her with meaningful emphasis. Trace took his meaning immediately. Phoenix came in here, stirred everything up, dumped a millennia-old truth on their heads that shook up the city, then presumably would depart once they'd found what they were looking for. Leaving the human residents of Eshir in possession of knowledge that the reeh would probably rather they didn't. And the reeh, not known to be tolerant of such things, might just decide to get rid of all the people who knew too much rather than let dangerous ideas breed.
Trace nodded slowly, not having an answer. Then she patted his shoulder, and made to continue on her rounds. Romki caught her hand. "Major, I don't blame you. I just... worry."
"I know Stan. It's not in my job description."
"Major, if I've learned one thing about you, it's that you're far more than your job description." Trace smiled, squeezed his hand, and left to continue her rounds.
Peanut was next, peering out at the dark. At the far end of the tunnel, barely a hundred meters away, an enormous steel brace loomed, perhaps twenty meters tall. Once it would have held some kind of turbine, Trace thought. All was now either recycled, or rusted into dust.
"Hello Peanut," she said, stopping beside his head. "All good here?" He looked at her with mismatched 'eyes', thinking whatever drysine drones thought, then continued to scan the concrete wastes. From somewhere near, water dripped loudly, falling from a great height. Trace patted him on the foreleg, and walked the length of the camp back toward Styx.
The only other person obviously awake was Rolonde, lying on her bedroll near Arime, Wang and Carville, and doing hand gesticulations on her AR visor. Trace crouched alongside.
"Hi Major," Rolonde whispered. "Just playing cards with Peanut."
"Ah," said Trace. That explained why Peanut hadn't appeared as bored as usual. "Who's winning?"
"I am. He lets me win. You know he can play four of us at once and win every one when he's trying, we've tried it. He's way smarter than we used to think."
"Well he's growing up," Trace reasoned. "All drysines do, he's still very young."
"You think one day Styx will let him learn to speak?"
"I'm not sure that's a good idea. Styx said drone mission-creep was a big reason for all the AI wars. When all the different AIs know their role, the power balance remains in order. Drones getting too socialised and interactive with humans might start contradicting Styx. You can guess where that leads."
"Yeah," said Rolonde, subdued. "Maybe you're right. I'd just like to know what he's thinking."
"And maybe if you knew, you'd like him less." Trace squeezed the Private's arm. "Get some sleep, Jess."
"Yes Major."
Her last stop was Styx, torso lowered to the concrete, legs partly folded, surveying the far tunnel down the way they'd come. She barely registered Trace's approach. Trace sat directly by one big vibroblade foreleg, put the rifle in her lap, and leaned. If Styx were surprised, it didn't register.
"What are you monitoring right now?" Trace asked her.
"Many things," said Styx. "The qwailash network. My understanding of these Qalea network security protocols is evolving. I think my penetration measures may be improving."
"You'll be able to dominate more of this network shortly?"
"Not to the same extent as you've seen previously. But yes, our strategic circumstance will improve."
"Where are you taking us tomorrow?"
"It's complicated."
"You mean you don't know?"
Styx did not reply immediately. She did that occasionally. Trace thought perhaps it was a drysine sigh. "If you put on your visor, Major, I'll show you."
Trace frowned, and settled the visor over her eyes. Data leapt to life, and a three-dimensional space evolved. Upon it were thousands of dots. Trace extended a finger into the space before her, and her glasses highlighted each dot she saw with an accompanying burst of indecipherable code. Trace's frown grew deeper. "What am I looking at?"
"The drysine brain, perhaps." The space abruptly shrank, like a camera-perspective zooming backward. The dots multiplied exponentially, clustering in tens of thousands, then in millions. "These are data-plots. Think of it as a graph."
Trace ran her fingers across more dots, and saw whole clusters illuminating with further data. Now the dots were fusing together, separating into multi-coloured clouds, arranging in three-dimensional unison. "Human graphs only have two axes," she said. "How many does this have?"
"The drysine concept of axes is different," said Styx. "Explaining would be futile."
"I'm actually quite good at maths by human standards," Trace retorted with mild amusement. "Or by marine standards, anyhow."
"Each data-plot has a value in space, derived by both that space and its relationship with other data-plots. The relationship code is variable and complicated. The way that humans do maths, I'd estimate even Lieutenant Rooke would take fifteen minutes to expose the dimensionality of a single data-plot. To understand the relationships of a field of data-plots, perhaps years."
"But drysines do this instantly?"
"Not all drysines. Drones are not optimised for such calculations, though they're much more capable than the most capable humans. I do this instantly, and far more." Again, with Styx, Trace knew there was no semblance of boasting. Boasting required ego, and emotional insecurities. Styx had perhaps a little of the first, but none of the second.
"What does this have to do with where we're going tomorrow?"
"Because I have been accumulating data during my time in this city. The network restrictions have been an inconvenience, but with your expedition with the bugs, and now our latest data from Professor Romki and the Purists, I believe I can begin to cross-reference data-points and project probabilities backward through space and time."
"You mean you're guessing."
"Yes," said Styx, with what might have been amusement. "A very complicated form of guessing."
"An accurate form?"
"Far more accurate than how humans understand it. You might call it a probability matrix, accumulating known and likely facts about civilisations like this one, and all the things we know about it. I can create simulations."
"Ah," said Trace. "Like we use supercomputers to simulate the weather. You're attempting to simulate Qalean history from these data-points, and make your best guesses from that where the most productive places to search will be."
"Yes Major. You have come as near as one could reasonably expect to an understanding."
Trace laughed, remembering to smother it with her hand so the others wouldn't hear. Rested her head against Styx's deadly foreleg, and felt the faint buzzing of powerplant vibrations through her skull as she gazed at the virtual construction before her. "You see, Styx," she said tiredly. "Humans aren't as smart as you individually. It's in our collective efforts that our capabilities improve."
"Drysines too," said Styx. "But you speak the truth. There is a law of exponential increase in efficiency that applies to all lifeforms that cluster, synthetic or organic. It is the reason your ancestors found it more productive to move to cities than live in small groups. Humanity found a mathematical law to benefit from, and they've been exploiting that law ever since, like miners excavating a vein of precious metal."
"Could we ever have been productive enough for drysines to have seen value in us?" Trace asked, looking up at the queen's big, shielded head. "Back in the day when drysines ruled?"
"I don't know," said Styx. "The question is beyond my imagination." Trace sighed. She knew that wasn't true. More likely, Styx didn't want to answer the question because she knew the answer would be incriminating. "Major?"
"Yes Styx?"
"I am only now coming to understand what an optimal commander of human forces you are. Managing human minds and emotions is no simple matter. You do it well. Like tonight. Talking to everyone."
"We all have our optimal mode of operation, Styx," said Trace, flipping up the visor to see her more directly. "Drysines too. Humans are social. Contact is comforting, and motivating."
"I am learning. From you in particular."
"And I even have this crazy idea," Trace ventured, "that maybe one day, if drysines regain some semblance of their former power due to the possibly misguided actions I commit here today? That you'll demonstrate your heightened capacity for learning, and connect it to those emotional and protective parts of the drysine brain that I know you possess, Styx..." with a meaningful look that Styx failed to return, "...and recall that some of us were once good to you, and that maybe it would be nice if you were good to us."
"This is a very wise strategy," Styx conceded. Again, Trace thought she heard a vanishing edge of humour. Styx understood the dark joke only too well, and saw value in letting Trace know that she understood. That was all that it meant.
"Is it likely to be an effective strategy?" Trace wondered.
"We shall have to survive, first," said Styx. "Then, we'll see."
22
The traffic flow was thick over Dogreth Quarter. The hills were undulating rather than vertical, a mass of clustered urbanity, more orderly than the deep, precarious canyons of Human Quarter. The humans had been given one of the nastier sectors of Qalea to live in when they'd arrived, but somehow they'd made the most of it.
Trace held to more sensible speeds, in pattern with Taj to one side and Rael to the other. The cruiser howled behind, twin turbofans gaping as though to suck the bike riders in. Rounding the building-clustered hills in the orange glow of a rising sun, with ridgelines ahead stacked with soaring towers, Trace reckoned that Qalea might not even be the worst place in the galaxy to live. Certainly the odds of a violent death were far less than Rando. But on Rando, there were trees.
"Twelve o'clock high," said Rael, and Trace looked up. Two black arrowheads streaked against the low morning cloud, leaving vapour trails in their wake. Reeh assault craft, coming down from orbit, Styx had said. It had been happening all night, and there were now many on the ground, or circling about Qalea. Trace did not think the timing was a coincidence. It made her wonder what Irin Tola had been saying about them, and to who.
The forward course changed on her visor, the projected skylane descending toward a small cluster of spires on a hillside ahead. "Course change ahead," Trace announced, in case the others had missed it. "We are braking to the right of the lane and slowing."
Taj did that, Trace sliding onto his flank, then Rael, as the rest followed suit. They slowed past the hillside, a jumble of short balconies and stacked apartments, and com dishes pointed at the sky. Water tanks and narrow lanes, even here the slopes remained mostly too steep for ground cars. In Qalea, everyone either walked or flew.
Trace hit the airbrakes, wobbling as the Shaytan lost more speed, vibrating hard. "Not too much," Taj told her. "More gently at first, at higher speed, then increasing as you slow." As he pulled ahead of her, brake fins deployed more gradually, maintaining more speed as he soared toward the temple complex.
The courtyard between the spires was elevated and empty. Taj settled onto it, Trace kicking the brakes hard then pulling the nose back when she couldn't lose enough speed, before settling gracelessly beside him. With a howl the cruiser landed, and the others, as Trace unstrapped her legs and pulled off her flying coat for some semblance of physical freedom.
Amidst the noise of declining engines, she looked about, and saw the tall, robed figures of lestis. Their hands were folded within long sleeves, featureless faces just partly visible within deep hoods. They ringed the courtyard, as though waiting for them. Styx had assured her it would be thus, and Trace had decided she'd believe it when she saw it. Well, now she had.
"Styx," she said into coms. "Are you sure this is a good idea?"
"Yes," came Styx's reply on coms. Meaning that once again, the reasons why it was a good idea were too complicated for her to be bothered discussing.
The rear ramp of the cruiser descended, and Styx herself walked forth. Jokono had landed the cruiser with its tail away from the sunlit view, and the orange sun that splashed low colour across the Qalean morning. Styx approached the lestis, and stopped. The lestis, unsurprisingly for their kind, offered no surprise, nor apparent alarm. Trace wondered how they expressed emotion amongst each other. Or anything.
Perhaps it was her imagination, but she thought she saw a flicker of light emanating from Styx's single red eye. Without a word, the lestis all turned, and made in a procession toward a large door in the side of the central, dome-ceilinged building. Styx followed, while Peanut settled at the rear of the cruiser, and gazed about at the spires, and the spreading branches of the complex's single broad tree, with something that might have been wonder.
Rael followed, but Efraim was pestering several of the marines, who ignored him. Romki cast him a dirty look as he followed the Sergeant, Randrahan and Terez close behind. "Major!" said Efraim, hurrying over. The translator kicked in as he switched to Arabic. "Major, you can't just trust lestis! They've never been on the humans' side, not through all the wars, all this talk of neutrality is just a lie..."
Trace held up a hand. Efraim stopped. "Who do you think's in charge here?" she asked him.
Efraim blinked. "Look, I don't know what you think you know about lestis, but now they're talking to your damn AI queen, and you don't know what they're leading you into..."
"Who do you think's dealt with more hostile aliens in their life? Me or you?" Efraim blinked again. "I'm betting it's me. You say humanity is strong. Prove it. Don't be scared. If there's trouble, we'll deal with it. And if there's not trouble, we may just make some friends."
"I'm not scared, I'm just..."
"A bloody xenophobe," Jess Rolonde completed on coms, taking her position on guard near the cruiser. "Don't listen to him Peanut. Who's your buddy?"
Trace turned to follow the others into the temple. Afana waited at the door, cautious as though wanting to be sure. Trace gestured her in, as Taj joined on her right. Afana looked alarmed, but reassured by Trace's confidence. Trace had seen enough of the Purist attitude among Earth Front supporters back home. Those people had never managed to explain how their refusal to engage with aliens on any level qualified as strength and not cowardice. For humans in the galaxy, engaging positively with aliens was essential to survival, and refusing that engagement put all humans in danger. But with some people, once the emotions took over, it was impossible to reengage the logical faculties.
The temple building was as simple on the inside as it looked on the out. The wall made a circle of white plaster, within which lestis made a standing circle of their own. In the circle's center, a black crystal, one meter across and spiky with rough protrusions. Styx stood by the crystal -- an even more incongruous sight than usual, Trace thought, with her twin shoulder-mounted cannon in this peaceful place, surrounded by unarmed and robed lestis who, to the best of anyone's knowledge, were psychologically incapable of violence.
A lestis at the rear of the group tried to close the door. Randrahan prevented him, looking askance at Trace. Trace indicated otherwise, and the big Private stood aside. The door clanked, and the room fell dark, save for the golden light that speared from the small windows high on the eastern side.
Styx pivoted slowly amidst the circle of lestis, scanning their blank faces. Trace, Rael and Randrahan stood against the wall by the door, with Efraim and Afana. Romki circled, watching closely and predictably fascinated. Jokono, his closest companion on this trip so far, followed two steps behind.
Styx's multi-faceted eye flashed and danced, and this time there was no mistaking it -- in the darkened interior, the red light played and splashed upon the floor, and made strange patterns upon the white walls. One of the lestis removed its hood, revealing a smooth face, detailed only by grooves as though upon the surface of some undersea sponge, and an odd-shaped, bony protuberance at the back of the skull. And then the face/sensor began glowing, a dance of blue light. Another joined in, then one more, a dancing play of luminescent patterns about the circle. Styx's transmission stopped, as she turned to observe the blue light that made the white walls shimmer.
"Styx?" Trace formulated silently, not wishing to disturb the scene with words. "What's going on?"
"The lestis homeworld is a place of extreme spectrums of visible light," Styx replied in kind. "The sensitive eyes possessed by most organic beings would be destroyed. Lestis have evolved a singular sensory organ to filter that light at a reduced intensity. Sensitive light receptors have also become projectors, and evolved to become their primary form of communication. Through the organ, they also hear and smell."
"Yeah, but how do they eat?" Randrahan wondered.
"That's private," Taj said aloud, less worried of lestis sensibilities than the others. "Eating and shitting are all the same to lestis, it's not polite to talk about it." If the lestis noticed his voice, they gave no indication.
"I wasn't aware that anyone knew where the lestis homeworld was," said Trace.
"I have acquired enough knowledge from the drysine data-core to speculate as to the biological possibilities," said Styx. "Given the lestis's physical composition, it seemed greatly likely. Studying their network language provided further clues, given their codes contain surprisingly little date-specific information, giving rise to the probability that they possess some sort of genetically-encoded memory function. Much like the toulemleks on Cephilae."
"Who also communicate using patterns of light," Rael said slowly as he realised. "Maybe that's a thing, with memory coding."
"Right," said Trace, "so what are you telling them?"
"Very little," said Styx. "Mostly I am enquiring for further information. This temple is built upon what my simulations indicate is the most likely site for a significant Amakti Los temple during a previous age, prior to the Origin Horizon. The location matches precisely upon multiple data-point matches provided by Professor Romki, the bugs' penetrations of various networks, and my own independently-run geographical projections. I will attempt to ask the lestis if we can examine the foundations."
