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  She was, however, the only one to poke the scientist she was supposed to help in the midriff, shoo him from her field station, then attempt to drown the man sent by the Secretary General to assist them both.

  Not the most auspicious start to their relationship.

  Resisting a quite remarkable level of guilt, Mac began to read.

  Mac tapped the com. “Dr. Connor to Pod Three, please.” While she waited, she frowned at Emily, who’d settled on her outfit of choice with unusual alacrity and was now resplendent in a black evening jumpsuit that oozed sophistication and personal style. She’d given up on the sling and wrapped the cast in matching fabric. At the moment, the other biologist was holding out a similar garment in red, a gleam in her eye. Over my dead body, Mac mouthed at her.

  “Pod Three.”

  No mistaking that voice. “Tie? What are you doing on coms?”

  “Oh, it’s you. Hi, Mac. Yeah. Everyone else has headed for the gallery to get a good seat—I pulled short straw, having met our guest. Should be quite the affair. Why aren’t you down there yourself?”

  Emily shook the red jumpsuit suggestively; Mac stuck out her tongue. So much for her hope to arrange a private meeting with—and apology to—both Brymn and Mr. Trojanowski before supper. “We’ll be there shortly,” she said. “I wanted to check that everything was on schedule.” Emily rolled her eyes.

  “On schedule?” Tie’s laugh was a bark worthy of a sea lion. “No problem. It’s been the Pied Piper and his rats around here. Last I saw, that Dhryn was walking through Admin, collecting people as he went. Cooks will have to hustle to be ready, that’s my guess.”

  Disrupting everyone else’s research, Mac thought, changing her mind about the apology as she closed the connection. “Let’s go.”

  “Dressed like—that. You can’t be serious. Now that we know it’s for supper—”

  “Supper?” Mac raised both eyebrows. “Em, it’s Pizza Tuesday.”

  Emily appeared to struggle with the concept, then spat out something frustrated in Quechan. “You’re meeting with a scientist of another species and a representative of the Ministry of Extra-Sol Human Affairs! What kind of impression will you make in those?”

  Mac brushed nonexistent dust from her borrowed coveralls. “No worse than I’ve made already. You impress them. I want to get this over with so we can get back to work.”

  The rejected jumpsuit sailed across the room to drape itself over the couch. “So you’ve made up your mind about this so-called threat to humanity.” Emily’s voice was studiously neutral. She’d read the reports after Mac and had had nothing—yet—to say.

  Not knowing what to do with the pieces of the secret envelope, Mac had slipped them over the refolded mem-sheet, intending to save all three. To her astonishment, the two halves had immediately mended themselves into an unblemished whole, once more winking with her name. The envelope now seemed to burn a hole in Mac’s hip pocket. “What threat?” she asked. Mac walked over to the window wall and stood peering out through the droplets, then refocused on them. With a finger, she traced imaginary patterns between drops picked at random, touching each as she recited the list from memory. “A group of climbers disappears from a mountain on Thitus Prime. A cruise barge on Regellus drifts ashore, empty. Balloonists never land on N’not’k. An eco-patrol vanishes from a forest in Ascendis. A harvesting crew isn’t seen again on Ven Twenty-Nine—”

  “Don’t forget the Dhryn.”

  “Ah.” Mac left her finger on one particularly large drop. “The Dhryn misplace an entire field trip’s worth of students on their Cryssin colony.” She let her hand fall to her side and faced Emily. “Don’t get me wrong, Em. I sympathize with everyone involved. These are all tragedies. But nothing from the Secretary General explains why a handful of missing person reports put Brymn in my quarters and our population survey on hold.”

  “There’s more missing than these people. Information on our Nikolai, for one.”

  Mac blinked. “What information?”

  “Exactly. There isn’t anything in the message about either Brymn or Trojanowski. Why?” Emily lowered her voice. “Or was it there—and someone tampered with it?”

  For an instant, Mac seriously considered the notion. Then she laughed. “You, my dear Dr. Mamani, have read far too many books of the wrong sort. It isn’t there, because it isn’t necessary. Brymn will enlighten us tonight on his credentials and, hopefully, why he’s here at all. As for our ‘field operative’?” Mac paused, then shook her head. “To land this choice assignment, he’s either offended the wrong people or is lousy at his job. Or both. In any event, there’s no reason to believe we’ll be stuck with them long enough for their backgrounds to matter.”

  Emily’s long fingers played with the oversized emerald of her necklace, a family heirloom she never bothered to lock away, confident no one would believe she’d wear something so rare and expensive at Base. Mac had to concede her logic, even though she couldn’t help occasionally translating the bauble’s worth into an upgrade to the docking pads.

  She knew the signs. “I take it you disagree, Em.”

  “You did take note of the locations and dates,” Emily said in an odd voice. “The disappearances do not appear random.”

  “It’s not like you to jump to conclusions from so small a sample—”

  “It’s not like you to put your own convenience ahead of the data.”

  “My—” Mac closed her mouth over the protest and stared at Emily. Rain drummed on the ceiling and walls like so many impatient fingers. “Is that what I’m doing?” she asked finally.

  Emily raised one eyebrow and waited.

  “Damn.”

  “We each have our failings at times. We won’t mention your fashion sense, sí?”

  Mac pulled out the envelope and waved it in the air. “Just show me what I missed.”

  “I can tell you. All of the locations are along the Naralax Transect.” Perhaps sensing Mac’s confusion, Emily shook her head, then drew a line in the air between them. “You never travel, do you? There are thousands of transects maintained by the Interspecies Union—”

  “No-space corridors,” Mac said dryly. “A.k.a. instant travel between connected solar systems. I may not gallivant like some, but I do know a bit about what’s outside the atmosphere. So where does this Naralax Transect go?”

  “Your ignorance is astounding.”

  Mac raised one brow. “I prefer to think of it as selective. So—are you going to tell me if there’s anything special about the Naralax or continue to berate my choice of sciences?”

  Emily shook her head in resignation. “Special? Depends on your definition. Home, for some. A dozen Human colonies. A few hundred non-Human systems, including our friend Brymn’s. A record, of sorts. Our most distant trading partner, Thitus Prime, is reached via the Naralax. Beyond Thitus, the Naralax extends—oh—a few systems more.” Emily’s light tone gave no warning. “One famous. The Hift System. The rest, infamous.”

  “The Chasm.” As she uttered the words, Mac felt the hairs lifting on the back of her neck.

  “Ah, she does know something. Yes, the Naralax is the only transect that extends into the Chasm. There’s a special destination for you, if you’re a prospector, archaeologist, or tourist with a taste for the macabre.”

  Oh, she knew about the Chasm. Every biologist, every religious order—probably every being who learned of it—worried over its very existence at some point in their lives. “There’s nothing in the Chasm,” Mac said. Except for system after system containing life-capable planets, all completely without life.

  Oh, it had been there once. It had—disappeared—three thousand years ago. That much, and only that, they knew.

  She shook off a chill. Stuff of fables. “Don’t tell me,” Mac continued, raising her voice into a falsetto. “Chasm Ghouls have kidnapped all these beings and are on their way to Earth next. We’re the only ones who can save the day.” Before Emily could do more than begin to look offen
ded, Mac relented. “That was uncalled for—”

  “That’s for sure—”

  “I am grateful for any insights you have, Em. Frankly, if it were up to me alone, I’d stuff this message down your Nikolai’s throat and let him look after our guest.”

  “Thus causing an interspecies’ incident before supper?” Emily said, the corners of her lips curving up. “One would think you enjoyed notoriety. The vidbots would be here before dessert.” Her smile faded. “Mac. The locations and dates matter because they occur as if whomever or whatever was behind the disappearances is traveling the Naralax from Thitus Prime toward Human-dominated space. The affected Dhryn colony is only systems away from our outermost settlement. If this pattern continues, the next beings to disappear may well be Human. I’d say that’s valid reason for the Ministry and us to take this seriously.”

  “Serial murders. Mysterious disappearances. They happen all the time,” Mac protested, stuffing the message back in her pocket. “We’re talking thousands of worlds. Trillions of beings. Standards of morality that vary from incomprehensible to those that would make an alpha shark swim deep and fast. Let alone species like the Ehztif and Setihak . . . Sethilak . . . or however you say the damn name—you know, the ones who eat one another given half a chance and a dark alley. With all that, what makes these few incidents so significant?”

  “Your first question for our dinner guests, I presume,” Emily said, gesturing to the door. Then her slim hand turned palm up, stopping Mac before she could take a step. “The hair. At least the hair. Please, Mac.”

  “You’ve got to be kid—”

  “Think of it as camouflage.”

  “You’re going to be a pest about this, aren’t you?”

  “I’m right and you know it.” Before Mac could move out of reach, Emily had grabbed her braid’s end and tugged smartly. Hair, still damp enough to smell faintly of soap, cascaded over Mac’s shoulder and threatened to cover one eye. “There,” Emily pronounced with satisfaction.

  Mac shook her head to settle the mass down the center of her back, shoving the strand over her left eye behind her ear. “Happy now?”

  Emily’s wolfish smile wouldn’t have looked out of place on one of the Haida totems that still startled visitors to the shore. “I will be.”

  - Portent -

  THE FIRST drop plunged into the fine sand, coalescing grains into a tiny, glistening ball, green against the dusky red of the dune. The ball slipped downslope very slightly, drawing a shallow line behind.

  More drops fell, more balls formed, more lines clawed at the massive upcurve of the dune.

  More. Drops struck already dampened balls, shattering them into smaller, darker portions that spread the green tint, the lie of life, across the sand.

  Each impact sent its vibration coursing through the dune, the sum of all the drops a siren call to those who spread sensory hairs and waited for opportunity.

  Serrated claws pushed through the sand, their owners as eager to sip from the rare cloudburst as they were to hunt others with the same intention. Slender whiskers trembled in search of imminent danger as other, barely larger creatures were drawn into the evening air. Writhing nodes of worms collected beneath what should have been the moisture they needed to reproduce.

  It was not.

  More drops fell, dissolving claw tip and whisker, searing away fur and flesh, melting everything they touched or that touched them into more balls of sand.

  As the balls slipped downslope, the mouths were waiting.

  4

  ENCOUNTER AND ENLISTMENT

  THE GALLERY was on the main level of Pod

  Three, located there by practicality, since Three was the only residence pod in operation year-round. There were smaller cafeterias within the other residential pods, where students and staff could make their own meals. Most came here, saying they preferred the convenience and camaraderie of eating together. As a former student herself, Mac knew it had more to do with having someone else wash dishes.

  The gallery was large enough to accommodate everyone on Base, but Mac had never seen this many filled tables on a late summer afternoon. Was no one but Tie working? Hopefully no ongoing experiments—besides hers and Emily’s—were being ruined by neglect.

  Not that she blamed the excited crowd. Most students had been here since spring thaw and novelty was a treasure. Their “guest” was the former, if not necessarily the latter.

  He was sitting at the head table already—or rather beside it. Someone had done some quick work to modify a second table for the Dhryn so it sloped at an angle parallel to the alien’s normal posture. Holes had been cut in the tabletop to support a variety of bowls and other utensils. The table leaned in the other direction as well, there being only enough room on the raised dais that held the head table for one end of it. Mac hoped the Dhryn could manage. The head table was supposedly for the research leaders, but was usually commandeered by whichever students got there first. The dais’ elevation gave those sitting there the best view of the wallscreen during hockey games and other events.

  No students up there now, Mac noted, wending her way through a maze of chairs, bags, and long, and some quite hairy, legs. She nodded and smiled in greeting, but didn’t stop to chat with anyone, reasonably sure Emily would prod her in the back to get to where she was expected. Mac would have happily sat with the students, but there were two empty places beside the Dhryn.

  The rest of the seats were already taken by Mac’s fellow lead scientists: Lee Fyock, Martin Svehla, Kammie Noyo, Jirair Grebbian. The order in which they sat had nothing to do with relative seniority. Mac’s and Kammie’s work was year-round, which was why they split the administrative duties for Norcoast. The rest arrived each spring with their own teams of scientists, techs, and students, cluttering up available space and demanding more than their share of equipment. Once the resulting waves stopped crashing about, everyone slipped into research mode. The only command structure, as such, lay between the students and their supervisors and, by early summer, that typically degenerated, leaving only a group of individuals focused on their work.

  There was, however, an unspoken acknowledgment that lovestruck Lee could sit beside Emily—who tolerated his attention because he lent her books—and Jirair, who tended to wander absently from any meal halfway through, always had an end seat. The other researchers would be either sitting with their students, in the field, or in a few cases, taking their meals in their lab. There were always some who remained blissfully oblivious to anything outside their work.

  Mac glanced around the room. Trojanowski was conspicuously absent. She nodded to her bright-eyed colleagues as she took the seat closest to the Dhryn’s table. No doubt they were brimming with curiosity. Mac paused to admire the cutlery, not having seen this many pointy objects on display in the gallery since Jirair’s students had built a ceiling-high castle from sea urchin husks and left the remains to fumigate the entire pod. Emily sat beside her.

  The room, which had been buzzing with voices and the tinkle of utensils as students experimented with theirs, fell silent.

  “Welcome, Mackenzie Winifred Elizabeth Wright Connor!” The Dhryn’s deep boom shook the windows. “Welcome, Emily Mamani Sarmiento!”

  Definitely infrasounds under there, Mac told herself, now obliged to look directly at her guest for the first time since poking him in the whatever.

  The Dhryn had reapplied his makeup, adding sequins along his ear ridges. The bands of silk wrapping his torso were now bright crimson, a color that went rather well with the Dhryn’s mottled blue skin. There were gilded bobbles hanging from those bands showing above the sloped tabletop. Dressed for the occasion. As were, Mac registered belatedly, everyone else who possibly could be. Even the students were in their civvies, looking en masse like a riotous garden of floral shirts punctuated by the inevitable black T-shirts. No coveralls in sight.

  Mac could feel Emily’s I told you so. She sat a little straighter, taking what comfort she could in being
clean. At least her hair wasn’t trying escape its usual asymmetrical lump at the back of her head. Despite her cast, Emily had managed to pull the mass upward into a tight French braid, leaving only the length down Mac’s back free to cause trouble. While it felt as though something with little claws and attitude was sitting on the top of her head, even Mac had to admit she looked more dignified than usual. Maybe she should wear it like this for her next meeting with Mudge, which now seemed by far the simpler half of her life.

  “It is we who welcome you, Honorable Delegate,” Mac responded, unsure if she was supposed to use his name in public, since even the Secretary General hadn’t used it in the message. As she sought frantically for anything else to say, well aware the entire room was listening, she found herself transfixed by the alien’s gold-irised eyes. They seemed to hold a great sadness, despite the polite smile the Dhryn wore.

  Could the disappearances of the Dhryn on Cryssin have involved individuals close to Brymn? His family, perhaps? Mac hadn’t the slightest idea what a Dhryn family unit might be, but she trusted her instincts. Whatever reason brought Brymn to her, she decided, it was something personal. “We will help you,” she promised quietly, “if we can.”

  Brymn’s lips formed a small, closed circle. A bead of glistening yellow moisture trembled at the opening of one large nostril. Even as Mac hoped this was an indication of a positive emotional response and not a virus, the Dhryn flung his uppermost arm around her shoulders. “I knew I was right to come here. Slimienth om glathu ra! Thank you, Mackenzie Winifred Elizabeth Wright Connor! Thank you, all!” Brymn’s voice vibrated the glasses on the table.

  With each “thank you,” the arm squeezed tighter. Forget bruising. Mac began to seriously worry if her bones could take the pressure. She managed a little squeak of protest which the Dhryn fortunately understood. Or he was about to let her go anyway. She was, Mac decided, saved from damage either way.