"Main comp is infected?" Hadeishi tried to swallow, but his throat was dust dry. "That's impossible."
The bulky engineer grunted in agreement. "Main comp is fine, the computational cores are fine, archive and ready memory is all fine. But…" He tapped the panel accusingly, voice grating harshly. "The display pane interfaces, the comm nodes and the transmission linkages between the millions of subsystems on this barge are all wrecked by this kind of baka infiltrator. We're isolating systems, reflashing them and stitching them back into the network, but it's going to take a long time."
"Hours? Days?" Hadeishi stared around the Engineering deck with a cold gaze. His eyes lingered on three z-suited corpses tied down to the deck behind one of the work panels. "How bad have casualties been?"
Isoroku glanced over, then shook his head. "Damage control teams are still sorting through the wreckage – somehow we lost the entire area around your suite, the officer's mess and the forward galley – Yoyontzin reports everything up there is just twisted metal. All the hallways are clogged with wreckage."
"Again?" Hadeishi stared at the engineer in confusion. He was starting to feel numb. "From the laser impacts? Did we lose hull integrity forward of bulkhead nine?"
"No," Isoroku said, shrugging. "Some kind of secondary explosion. Nearly severed the data mains to the front quarter of the ship, but the conduit armor held – which does us no good, since every comp panel on the ship is useless." He made a spitting motion towards the evil face.
"Do we have replacement interface panels in stores?"
Isoroku bit the inside of his lip, thinking. "If they're not trashed by battle damage…"
"Isolate the sublight drive system, and rig a control panel just for the engines. Don't connect it to anything else. Will that let us regain maneuvering control?"
The engineer nodded. "We've been trying to clear the primary combat control backbone, but -"
"One little problem at a time," Hadeishi coughed, starting to drift away. Blood was leaking out of his mouth and making tiny crimson bubbles inside his face-plate. "How long until we have pervasive comm in the ship?"
Isoroku stared at the Chu-sa in horror. He seized the nearest crewman. "The captain needs medical attention right now. Get a work cart, get him on it and get him to medical! Someone, what's the status of the medical bay? Do they have air pressure?"
Crewmen scattered in all directions, including one who began chattering into the hardwired comm. Another brought Hadeishi back to the ring of comp panels. The Chu-sa batted feebly at the helping hands. "I'm fine, just have some splinters loose in my rib-cage. Someone has to relay telemetry from the outside to whoever is driving with this panel, so…" He paused, trying to clear his throat. "Are any of the bridge crew alive? Anyone with a pilot's cert?"
"I don't know." Isoroku felt panic start to churn in his stomach. "How bad is the orbit?"
"Not good," Hadeishi wheezed, clenching his teeth together. His medband was shrilling alarms inside his suit. He clenched his arms across his chest protectively. "Ah…! I seem to have exceeded some kind ofthreshold. You must stabilize our orbit quickly. Then you'll have time to fix everything else.
"Find a clean comp and panel, load fresh soft and get them into the hands of someone who knows how to steer. They'll need Navplot, which means guidance sensors have to be working." He smiled, face obscured by the drift of crimson. "Only tiny problems, Thai-i, taken one at a time. Small movements, my friend, small deliberate movements."
Hadeishi's medband tripped the last of its alert levels and flushed his system with knockmeout and a cellular stabilizer. The Chu-sa's eyes rolled up and his head fell loosely forward against the faceplate of his suit.
Isoroku cursed silently, then the work-cart was being wrangled into the work station and he and two of the Engineering deck crew were strapping the captain onto the cart, trying to be as gentle and as quick as possible.
Near Rural Highway Two-Fifteen> The Town of Chumene, Southeast of Takshila
A high-pitched wailing sound pierced the air, setting the hairs on the back of Gretchen's neck erect. The clatter of leathery hands on stiff-surfaced drums followed and then the tramping beat of hundreds of feet stamping on dusty ground. Malakar and Anderssen stepped out of the darkness at the edge of the village, faces lit by the hot glow of hundreds of torches and two enormous bonfires. The deep basso groan of bladder-horns joined the riot of sound. The gardener lifted her long snout, searching the furtive, twisting light for the proper street.
Gretchen watched the natives dancing with growing interest. A ring of elderly Jehanan – fairly dripping with flower petals, paper streamers and jangling charms – moved back, clearing the center of the street. Now they crouched at the edge of the light, long feet rising and falling in a steady, marching beat. A round dozen musicians were ensconced under a cloth awning festooned with statuettes and figurines and mandalas of flowers. One of the brittle-scales held a long, metal instrument in withered hands. The firelight gleamed on silver strings and an ivory-yellow claw began to pluck, sending a plaintive, echoing sound winging up into the dark sky above.
All else fell silent, leaving the trembling notes alone on the dusty stage.
Then, at the edge of the light, the villagers parted silently, bowing and snuffling in the dirt, and the slim figure of an adolescent Jehanan female appeared, wreathed in veils of pale gold and green. She darted out, fine-boned feet quick on the ground, the clink and clash of precious copper bangles marking counterpoint to the humming drone of the stringed instrument. The girl danced sideways, bending and stretching, miming – Anderssen realized, watching the movements – someone plucking flower buds.
"This is Avaya, twilight's maidenhead," Malakar whispered, "and she is dancing in the fields of the coming sun, collecting the opened buds of the sacred Nem as they lie cool, still unturned by the touch of the Lord of Light."
Avaya spun past, wholly concentrated upon the unseen, and Gretchen caught a rustle of feet in grass and the smell of a dewy hillside, pregnant with pollen and perfume. The girl danced on, the single instrument slowly, subtly, joined by the hissing wail of the bladder-horns and hooting flutes. So too brightened the illumination in the dusty circle and Anderssen blinked, startled and delighted to see the waiting crowd, still hidden by the gossamer barrier between shadow and light, raising many paper lamps on long poles to hang over the street.
A horn rang out, a cold, clear note. The girl stumbled, spilled her invisible basket of petals and raised her head in alarm, long back curving gracefully to the east. A deep-voiced drum began to beat, the tripping sound of a hasty heart, of blood quickened by danger. Avaya dashed here and there, snatching up petals from the ground.
So perfect were the girl's movements that Gretchen clutched Malakar's bony, scaled shoulder for support. In the flickering, dim light, surrounded by such rich noise, by so many swaying Jehanan, she began to see – darting, indistinct, gleam-ingly real – the petals on the ground, the rustling stands of green plants, golden leaves, waxy flowers half-open to the sky. Such an overpowering aroma washed over her she felt faint. Rich, dark earth; the dew on a thousand flowers; a cool, cold sky shining deep blue-black overhead. A steady emerald brightness rising on the horizon.
"See, now the king is coming. Her time grows short…"
Malakar's voice broke Anderssen from the waking dream. Another corridor opened in the crowd and a forest of torches clustered there, held aloft in scaled hands. Even now, with so many lights, she could not see the faces of the celebrants. They were dim and indistinct, bound by shadow, but the lamps and sputtering, resin-drenched brands burned very bright.