And then another moment. Then another. “Bayta?” I murmured. “What’s going on?”
“They’re not coming,” she murmured back.
I stared at her. The Chahwyn had a crucial role to play in this whole grand scheme. If they were suddenly backing out, we were finished. “This is no time for any of us to lose our nerve,” I murmured back, taking Bayta’s arm and moving us a few steps away from the others. “We need them.”
“I know,” Bayta said. “But once they’ve made up their minds … I’m sorry, Frank. I warned you. They’ve made up their minds, and there’s nothing I can do.”
I looked over at the four defenders, standing motionless behind the Melding. “I want to talk to them,” I told Bayta. “Now.”
She shook her head. “The defenders won’t take you there.”
“Then you do it,” I said. “You can control these trains. We get back on the tender, and we head to Viccai.”
I felt her arm stiffen in my hand. “Frank, I can’t do that.”
“You did once,” I reminded her. “And the stakes are a hell of a lot bigger now than they were then.”
“I know,” she said. “But they’re not going to change their minds.”
I looked over at Rebekah and Terese. During the past few days, beginning after the failed Shonkla-raa attack, I’d noticed a subtle change in their relationship. The two girls were still friends, but the sight of Rebekah frozen in the Shonkla-raa’s mental grip had apparently awakened some deep maternal instincts in Terese that even the baby she was carrying hadn’t succeeded in doing.
And the dagger-edged look Terese was giving me right now said that whatever the problem was, I’d better find a way to fix it. “You say they aren’t going to change their minds,” I said. “Is that a fact or an opinion?”
Bayta sighed. “A fact.”
“Good,” I said. “Because the only way you can know that for sure is if you’re in communication with them right now. So where are they?”
She hesitated. “There’s a tender a little ways down the Tube,” she said. “One of the Elders is there.”
I looked past Terese and Rebekah. This station was much smaller than most, with the atmosphere barrier that defined the edge no more than half a kilometer away.
And now that I was looking, I could see the faint reflection from the globes of a group of Spiders waiting motionlessly just inside the barrier. More defenders? Or were they just the relay that was allowing Bayta’s telepathy to stretch down the Tube to the Chahwyn hiding down there?
Either way, unless there was a line of Spiders strung out all the way to Viccai, Bayta’s telepathic limit meant the Elders’ tender couldn’t be all that far away. “Fine,” I told her. “If you won’t drive me, I’ll walk.”
Bayta twitched with surprise. “What?”
“If they won’t come to me, I’ll have to go to them,” I said, letting go of her arm. “Let me get the big oxygen tank from the tender and rig up a harness for it.”
“Wait a minute,” Bayta said, grabbing my arm as I started to walk away. “This is crazy. You don’t even know how far away they are.”
“They can’t be very far, or you wouldn’t be able to communicate with them,” I reminded her, trying to pull her hand off my arm. “Don’t worry, I’ll be all right.”
But for once, my assurances weren’t enough. Neither was my strength. Bayta held on grimly, her fingers tightening against my attempts to pry them free. “No,” she said, her voice starting to tremble. “Frank, this is suicide.”
I frowned at her, the unexpected word echoing through my mind. Reckless, maybe. Useless, probably. Stupid, almost certainly.
But suicide? How on Earth could a short walk down the Tube be suicide? As long as I kept an eye on the oxygen tank’s gauge, I would know when to turn around and head back.
Unless there was something else about to go down out there. Something that would be best handled in the dark loneliness of an empty Tube. Something that Bayta either knew or else strongly suspected.
I looked at the cluster of Spiders by the atmosphere barrier, Riijkhan’s words echoing through my mind. Had he been right? Had the Chahwyn decided they no longer needed me? The only way that could happen was if they’d found someone or something that could take my place.
Or if for some reason I’d suddenly become a liability instead of an asset.
“You’re right,” I said, turning back to Bayta. “So just in case I don’t return, I guess I’d better make sure Morse and the Modhri know everything about my plan.” I looked her squarely in the eye. “And about everything else.” Firmly but gently, I pulled her grip from my arm and beckoned to Morse.
“Wait,” Bayta said.
I waited as her eyes became unfocused, and I counted out ten heartbeats before she finished her silent communication. “The Elder will see you,” she said with a sigh. “The defender will take you to him.”
Out of the corner of my eye I saw one of the defenders detach himself from the Melding and head toward us. “I’d prefer you take me,” I said.
Bayta shook her head, a short, choppy movement. “He won’t let me,” she said. “Only you and the defender.”
The dark loneliness of an empty Tube … “Okay,” I said. “Whatever.”
Morse came up to us. “What’s the trouble?” he asked.
“No trouble,” I said. “The Chahwyn want to talk to me. Probably just a glitch or two that need ironing out.”
His eyes flicked to Bayta, back to me. “Sounds good,” he said. “I’ll go with you.”
“I don’t think you’re invited,” I said.
“I don’t think I care,” he countered. “If we’re going to be allies, we have to trust each other.”
“You can trust me,” I said.
“You, yes,” he said pointedly. “But so far, only you.” He looked back at Bayta. “Make sure they know that,” he said gruffly. “The Modhri and I trust Frank Compton. No one else.”
“They know,” Bayta said quietly.
“He’s also the best excuse for a strategist that we’ve got.” Morse’s eyes flicked to the approaching defender, then back to me. “And whatever strategy you’re working now, good luck with it.”
“Thanks.” I gave Bayta the most encouraging smile I could, then turned to the defender. “Let’s get to it,” I said, gesturing him to the tender.
The typical cruising speed for a Quadrail was roughly a hundred kilometers per hour relative to the Tube, which translated to a light-year per minute relative to the universe at large. Usually tenders could pull a slightly better speed even than that.
On this trip, though, the defender telepathically operating the controls didn’t seem in any hurry to build up speed. We rolled along the track toward the end of the station at an almost leisurely pace, no faster than the average Olympic distance runner would do. We angled up the slope and through the atmosphere barrier into the main Tube, at which point we slowed to little more than a fast walk.
It was quickly clear why we weren’t bothering to pick up speed. Less than thirty seconds after leaving the station, we rolled to a stop. “They are waiting,” the defender said, lifting one of his metallic legs and gesturing toward the door.
“Do I at least get an oxygen mask?” I asked, eyeing the door dubiously. Centuries of Quadrail travel and the slow but constant leakage through the atmosphere barriers of a thousand stations had left enough pressure throughout the entire Tube system to protect me against the more serious physiological effects of decompression. But there wasn’t nearly enough air out there for actual breathing.
I was still contemplating the unpleasant possibilities when the door opened, bringing with it a gust of slightly stale air. I stepped outside and found myself in a siding, one of the small service areas the Spiders had stashed at various places off the main Tube. Behind my tender—or in front of it, depending on how you looked at it—was another tender, this one with two defenders flanking the door. I walked over to it, veering a little ways outward so that I could see behind it, mostly out of idle curiosity as to whether there might be more defenders hanging around back there.