He sat letting the cold seep away and watched the plume of spray towering nearby. Glassy-smooth water shot by into empty space. Trees and bushes bobbed in the slick, brown surface—and then lurched into oblivion.
He walked through the roaring and watched the great white column crash down with dazed fascination. The water had such a quixotic spirit, going from placid muddy flow to harsh, beautiful froth in the space of a heartbeat. He wondered if in some sense it was truly alive, as much entitled to the sovereignty owed to all life as were the plants and small creatures and humanity.
Then something pricked at his weak, collapsed sensorium. He started, suddenly afraid that the Cybers had caught up to him already.
But no—it was a faint voice. A gathering call on Bishop comm.
It fell silent but he had gotten a fix. He followed it for a while toward a range of slumped, ruined hills. The jagged stones of shattered strata seemed to snatch at his boots. He stumbled and nearly fell.
—This way,—Shibo sent.
He could not use his searching sensorium for fear that Cybers would detect him—if they hadn’t already.
—Dad!—Toby’s quick spike was enough to give him a fresh directional.
He ran down a crumpled hill into the seeming shelter of a thick forest. The same umbrella trees stood stately and serene in the faint promise of dawn. Beneath them he felt safer, cloaked in the remnants of life in this battered place.
His power reserves ebbed. He slumped against a tree. The woods were silent and brooding, and then without transition Shibo was walking steadily toward him and the weight of the night lifted away, insubstantial.
“You… you…” He could not shape any words that expressed what he felt. Then Toby was there and it was like his return to camp before, the Family enclosing him in an unspoken clasp.
He simply let go, sinking to the ground. Time meant nothing. The world was immediate, without past or future. Every tree and bristly bush attained a sharp, stark clarity. Faces loomed, split by immense grins. Crisp light poured through them all, illuminating everything with an even, eternal glow. A mouthful of water drenched his throat in pure coolness. The snap and bite of rations burst in his mouth like explosions of unendurable pleasure. His muscles sang with release. The brush of Shibo’s hand, Toby’s arm about his neck—these framed each moment, lending a halo of incandescent immediacy.
He had no idea how long he spent like that, but the moment came when the ordinary world snapped back solidly.
“On your feet,” Jocelyn called. She stood among the scattered party of Bishops, looking tired, her jaw set stiffly. “I located His Supremacy. They’re headed down, followin’ that ridgeline up there.”
“What about Cybers?” Toby asked.
“We’ll deal with ’em better if we got the Tribe with us,” Jocelyn said.
“Besen can’t make good time,” Toby insisted.
Besen leaned against a tree. Her eyes were hollow and her face was drawn.
Jocelyn nodded. “We’ll take turns helpin’ with the wounded.”
“Not good for ’em,” Toby said. “Wear ’em out.”
“We got no choice.”
“Howcome we should hook up again with those son-bitches?” Toby demanded.
“’Cause when the Cybers run us down, I want help.”
There was no good answer to that. Killeen was proud of the way Toby had stood up for Besen but he knew Jocelyn had to keep them moving.
Nobody said anything as they got up and wearily made ready to march. There was no time for the Family to gather and count the dead or to mourn them. Desperation hung in the dry silence.
Killeen discovered that his feet were sore. His boots had kept their water seal intact but his leggings were still damp from the night. It was a simple fact of life in the field that such a discovery quickly banishes whatever joy or pain the previous day brought. Every fresh pain demands its own audience. Every joint protested. As he got up Killeen swore he could hear himself creak.
He helped Toby reset the bandage around the boy’s hand. They said little. Toby spent all his time caring for Besen, who was dazed and weak. The boy seemed far more energetic and focused than he had been before.
Killeen moved down the line cajoling a few Bishops who were simply staring into space. There were always those who could not forget the losses of one battle and carried them into the next. Years on the run had taught Killeen that people would put aside emotional weight when action came first. Their resilience was surprising, even noble. But if they had time to brood, or if someone belabored them about it, they could crack completely. He chided a few onto their feet and got them started. It helped him forget how many faces he did not see in the marching column and never would again.
Everyone was low on power now. Some had a little more and they started out strongly, taking long strides and getting out in front. Killeen smiled at that. It was stupid to waste your reserves when you were still fresh. Jocelyn barked at this vanguard and made them take flank and point positions.
Sunrise sent yellow blades cutting through the upper cloud decks. Killeen thought of all the activity above the misty overcast—the huge warrens abuilding, the cosmic ring orbiting as it waited to be used again, the Skysower that churned on, planting its seeds. For what? All these immense structures seemed without human implication, as natural and inevitable as the weather—and equally beyond human hope of changing.
The Family line straggled out along the slopes as they worked up into the hills. Cermo had taken a tech hit in the waist; no bodily wound, and he could still walk. He fussed with his equipment and got most of his upper shocks working again. Then he went up and down the line, joshing and giving sympathy and pulling together Family elements that seemed most discouraged. Jocelyn did the same toward the front of the column.
Killeen watched all this with approval, curiously calm. Up ahead lay the Tribe and the supply train. Behind came the Cybers. If they were to survive this day the Family would have to be swift and lucky.
Having turned the matter over in his mind for a while, he put it aside. There was nothing more to do but enjoy what was probably his last glimpse of morning. He walked with his arm across Shibo’s shoulders, resting on her exoskeleton. It was charging from her solar panels and helped her up the steepening slope. Its catlike purr seemed to waft on the warming air. The slow, lazy sound floated through his mind. It was a long while before he realized it was not sound at all.
A dry cool weight rested in the space just behind the nape of his neck. That was the way it felt when he had just taken on a new Aspect—a lumpy wedge tugging at the back of his brain. But this was stronger, as though air had twisted and condensed into a hanging dark syrup. Traceries of half-sensed ideas flapped through the ball of blotchy air. Killeen labored up the gravelly slopes, keeping march speed with the others, saying nothing, his attention sucked toward the presence that seemed to hover like buttery heat. He felt his arms and legs moving as though in thick oil. His lungs contained a patient, gurgling fluid. Air tasted like metallic blood.
“It’s here,” he whispered.
Shibo looked at him quizzically. He stumbled, caught himself.
The massive, deliberate movements were unmistakable. It was the Cyber who had captured him. And it was behind them.
No wonder the Cybers had stuck to them so well, he thought. They undoubtedly had a tracer of some kind planted on him. Nothing complex, just a transponder which could reflect a keyed signal. It could be no thicker than a thumbnail.
At the next rest break Killeen inspected his equipment. It would have been put somewhere he was unlikely to see it….
In only a few moments he found the small circle stuck to the inside of his left upper shocks. But it was cracked and pitted, probably from the spills he had taken. When he tried some sounding signals it failed to respond.
