Comfortable with each other. Not alone. Reassurance.
I dreamed this as if I were a third person standing in the temple’s doorway: with a view of the arboretum outside as well as Kaisho and me inside. No one else was part of this. Just the statues of heroes, plus a levitating Kaisho and Youn Suu. Did it mean something that I saw the scene from the threshold between the temple and the outer world beyond? The boundary between the sacred and mundane?
"It means whatever fits," said Kaisho. She and the duplicate Youn Suu turned, rotating in air until both could look at me. "None of it’s really predetermined. At least we hope not. We throw a lot of things your way, but only you decide what to use."
I asked, "Who’s ‘we’?"
The Youn Suu in front of me smiled. "You want to know who’s pulling the strings? Irrelevant. The important thing is what you do once your strings are cut loose. I’ll have to remember to teach you that."
"You’re going to teach me?" I said. "You are me."
"No. Look at yourself."
I did. My hands weren’t my familiar dark brown, but a much lighter shade that showed multiple scrapes and scratches. My clothes were Unity nanomesh, but not colored in motley Mutan camouflage; just a solid sheen of black stretching down to the white boots of a Technocracy tightsuit.
Festina had taken the black nanomesh. Her tightsuit was white and her hands, gouged and nicked in her trip through the bush, were exactly like the ones on the end of my arms.
"You’re having her dream," the other Youn Suu said. "She can’t have it herself — she’s awake."
"Besides" — Kaisho chuckled-"Festina would hate receiving messages in dreams. Such a rationalist! If she dreamed two plus two equaled four, she’d automatically mistrust it. You, on the other hand, will pay attention. Oneiromantic prophecies are in your blood. Literally."
"You mean my veins are full of Balrog spores?"
"Shush," Kaisho told me. "There’s one universal rule of prophecy, recognized by every thread of human culture: you don’t get to ask clarifying questions. You just listen and suck it up."
"Then," Youn Suu added, "if you’ve got a milligram of sense, you interpret the message like an intelligent mensch, rather than some self-centered oaf who’s never learned the concept of ‘double meaning.’ "
"I know how prophecies work," I said. "The wise benefit, while fools work their own destruction."
The second Youn Suu turned to Kaisho. "Pompous little bint, aren’t I?"
"She’s quoting," Kaisho replied.
"I knew that." The other Youn Suu turned back to me. "Are you ready to hear the message?"
I nodded.
"Okay," the Youn Suu said. "Give her the message, Kaisho."
Kaisho frowned. "I thought you had the message."
"How can I have the message?" my double said. "I’m just Youn Suu. I have no words of wisdom, and I certainly don’t know anything about the future."
"Well, I don’t have a message either," Kaisho said. "I’ve been the Balrog’s meat pasty for decades, but do the blasted spores tell me anything? Not bloody likely. I get sent on errands all over the galaxy, and most of the time I don’t have the slightest hint what I’m supposed to do." She glanced at me. "Get used to faking it, sister. Our mossy master loves us dearly, but he never spells things out."
"So we go to all this trouble," the other Youn Suu muttered, "for an honest-to-goodness dream visitation, and we don’t have anything to say?" She looked down on me from her place above the fountain. "This is a great steaming mound of embarrassment, isn’t it?"
"I get the message," I said.
"You do?"
"I do. But did you have to lay it on so thickly? I’m just Youn Suu. I have no words of wisdom, and I certainly don’t know anything about the future. Spare me the gushing humility."
Youn Suu gave me a dubious look. "That’s the message you think we’re sending? Some crap about having faith in yourself? Sweetheart, if tripe like that was all we had to offer, we’d send you a goddamned greeting card."
"You’ve stopped talking like me," I said. "I don’t swear, and I don’t use words like ‘sweetheart.’ "
"How about words like ‘fucking smart-ass’?" My own face glowered at me, then turned to Kaisho. "Come on, moss-breath, we’re done here."
Kaisho gave me a piercing stare. "Are we done? Do you know what you have to teach Festina?"
"How would I know that?" I said. "I’m just Youn Suu. I have no words of wisdom. I certainly don’t know anything about the future."
The thing that looked like me made a growling sound in its throat. "Buddhists! You can have them, spore-head. They’re all yours. Give me a hot-looking glass chick with legs and an attitude, and I’ll make the galaxy my bitch!"
The Youn Suu look-alike winked out of existence. Kaisho looked apologetic. "Sorry. He can never resist putting on a show."
"Who was he?" I asked.
"A friend of the Balrog’s."
"Some great and powerful alien?"
"Of course," Kaisho said. "He and the Balrog are working together on a project. Along with a good many others in the League."
"What are they all up to?"
Kaisho smiled. "You’ll figure it out. When you do, tell Festina. It’s time she knew."
"No hints?"
"Sure, here’s a hint. Become enlightened. Then you’ll know everything."
"How do I become enlightened?"
Kaisho shrugged. "It’s easy. Just wake up."
I woke up. Dream over. And despite the lack of direct information, I felt I’d learned a lot.
I’d learned that when I reached out to the Balrog — when I needed the solace of contact — the Balrog was ready to answer.
Oblique, frustrating answers… but enough to assure me I wouldn’t live my life in numb solitary confinement.
I rode peacefully on the flooded Grindstone. The rain had stopped. Above me, the sky was full of stars.
An hour before dawn, I reached the lake created by the Stage Two station’s dam. The current was slower but still perceptible; muddy water poured thick as cream over the dam, taking with it leaves and other debris floating on the lake’s surface. I could easily swim against the pull. Taking my time, conserving my strength, I stroked toward the station.
My skin had not turned to moss; that hadn’t been necessary. When the nanomesh uniform sensed my body temperature dropping to unacceptable levels, it had puffed itself up: from a skintight sheath to a thick layer of fabric filled with air bubbles. It held my body heat like foam insulation, even stretching itself to cover my hands and most of my head — just the face left bare so I could see and breathe. I offered my thanks to the Unity’s foresight, giving their survey teams all-weather clothes.
The outfit reminded me of a cold-water diving suit I’d worn during scuba training at the Academy… except that the Unity uniform was still colored in multihued camouflage patterns matching the local foliage. I attracted much interest from plant-eating fish who thought I might be a tasty mat of ferns floating on the surface. My slow swimming kept them from coming too close (even mid-Triassic fish were smart enough to know that plants didn’t do the breaststroke) but I accumulated a crowd of followers who wistfully hoped I might prove to be food.
Onshore, Festina and the diplomats continued toward the station. Their journey wasn’t as easy as mine; walking through semi-jungle gets tiring. At least they had adequate light for traveling — Festina carried a number of spare glow-tubes. The Bumbler also helped. It could scan ahead for trouble, letting them pick better routes and reducing the need for backtracking. Still, they hadn’t had a pleasant time. Ubatu was injured and weakened from blood loss. Li was in decent physical shape for a civilian, but came nowhere near matching Festina’s level of endurance. He whined… demanded frequent rest breaks… didn’t push himself to keep up.