"That is its nature, Jack. We were aware that such creatures existed, but not aware that they existed on what you call the honkers' planet. Perhaps it is an import. Such a creature, acting in conjunction with the Imago, is a strategic masterstroke. It makes the Imago infinitely more dangerous to the empire."
So the honker had indeed known what he was doing! Except that they were shortly due to be blown up. "How much time till destruction, Candy?" he asked, morbidly interested.
"Thirty-six minutes."
"Destruction?" Tappy asked.
"We have encountered a— a special situation," Jack told her. "I'll explain it in a bit. This is Garth Gaol, whom we may consider to be a friend." He hoped. "Just relax."
Tappy did so, ministered to by Candy.
He returned to the Gaol. "Garth, can you tell us how to save the Imago and ourselves? I mean, without killing the host of the Imago?"
"Ordinarily I could do so, Jack, but at present I am distracted by the process of conversion. I am also losing my capability to think and act with precision and force, because of the increasing constraints placed upon me by empathy with those who would suffer the consequences of such action."
This, too, was interesting. "You mean the Gaol dominate the galaxy because they lack empathy? Because they don't care about the suffering of those they subjugate?"
The Gaol did not answer, but it wasn't necessary. Of course it was true! It was true historically on Earth, too. Power was grasped by those who had least sensitivity to the harm they did to others. This was probably the root of the saying "Nice guys finish last." Empathy might not be the same as conscience, but the effects could be similar.
Something else registered. "Candy, didn't you say that the Imago was supposed to be separated from this city thirty minutes before destruction? So that the host of the Imago would not be destroyed?"
"Yes, Jack."
"So that thing's not just an enclosure. It's a spaceship!"
"That is true, Jack. It is the isolation ship for the Imago's host."
"Will it hold more than just the coffin? I mean, other people?"
"Yes, Jack."
"How much more? I mean, could we hitch a ride in it?"
"It is capable of supporting the lives of three sentient beings as represented here."
"Three?" Jack was taken aback. He had in mind rescuing all four of them: Tappy, himself, Garth Gaol, and Candy. Because if they all piled into that ship and took off, the watching Gaol station would not see anything amiss. It was supposed to separate. To establish the Imago's utter isolation. Then the city could explode on schedule, and it would be assumed that everyone was dead except Tappy. It was a way out!
"Damn!" he said. "Someone's going to have to be left behind."
"Why, Jack?"
"Because there are four of us!" he snapped. "Only three can escape in that ship."
"But only three of us are alive. Jack. You may leave me behind."
She was not alive! Of course! That did reduce it to three. "But by the same token, you can come along," he said. "You won't be using any air or water or food, and we need you to take care of Tappy. I mean, the host for the Imago."
"This is true. Jack."
"Well, then, let's do it! How much time do we have until separation?"
"Two minutes, Jack."
And here he had been wasting time on details while their deadline was overhauling them! Naturally the emotionless AI had not been screaming warning. "Get us all on board that ship now!"
"The Gaol must authorize that."
"Garth, you must authorize it!"
The Gaol whistled. Candy went into action at blurring speed. She lifted Tappy out of her coffin and re-snapped the fastenings. Then she touched a button somewhere, and the bars blocking Jack disappeared. He ran to the ship, and the Gaol rolled beside him. Tappy was now standing in the ship, seeming to have suffered no debilitation from her brief session in the coffin. There were not even any marks on her; however the life-support devices attached, they did not seem to have punctured her skin.
"Close it up!" Jack cried. "Get this crate into the air!"
Candy paused. "The life-support container is already closed, Jack. I do not understand the remainder of your directive."
He definitely had to watch that vernacular! "I mean the ship! Do what you have to do to get this ship safely sealed and separated on schedule!"
Candy resumed her blurring motion. The panels closed, and internal light came on. It seemed like closing a wooden crate from the inside, but it was a metallic spaceship.
"Separation," Candy announced.
Jack looked around. "Shouldn't we get into acceleration couches or something?"
"Why, Jack?"
Oh. Inertialess drive, of course. They had crossed the galaxy without any feeling of acceleration; why should this little ship be different? "Then can we look out a portal? To see where we're going?"
"Why, Jack?"
"I'm primitive, remember? I just feel easier, and I think Tappy would feel easier, if we could see outside."
"Of course, Jack," Candy said in the manner of one humoring a child.
The opaque panels became transparent. They could now see out in every direction. In fact, the whole ship was transparent. It was as if everything were made of glass, including the motor, assuming it had one. Then Jack realized with a start that the four of them were transparent, too, and almost invisible against the backdrop of the central core of the ship. Once again galactic science had surprised him. "Thank you," he said inadequately.
He took Tappy's hand and led her to the curving wall. They looked out. There was the city, already drifting away below them. From this vantage it looked like a giant globe. He had thought of it as a blinking dome, back on the honkers' planet. Perhaps half of it had been under the ground.
"The host must eat," Candy said. "The preservation unit is no longer sustaining her."
"The food's all the same, isn't it?" Jack asked. "I mean, nutritionally, regardless what it looks, tastes, and feels like? So bring us candy bars."
"This is a confection in my present image?" Candy asked, perplexed.
Jack laughed. "Close, but no cigar."
"I do not understand."
Even Tappy smiled then. Jack explained about candy bars. Soon an approximation was produced. It looked a bit like something left behind by a sick dog, and tasted somewhat like oysters steeped in chocolate, and it squished suggestively as they bit into it, but it would do.
Tappy nudged him. "Let's find a bed," she murmured.
"Yes, so you can rest," he agreed. "In the normal manner, without being sealed in a box."
"So we can make love." She smiled. "In the normal manner, without being rushed. We are the only human beings here."
There were those five years of sexual relations again, implanted in her memory. What was he going to do? He didn't dare tell her the truth, because that might not only hurt her feelings deeply, it might cause the Imago to retreat, if that was possible. Would Garth Gaol then revert to his nonempathy state, and do what was best for the empire? It couldn't be risked.
He hated lying, or even evading the truth, with Tappy. But he knew he shouldn't do what she so innocently wished. She now thought of herself as twenty, which was old enough, but she remained thirteen. Which was the greater evil? The lie, or more statutory rape?
The worst of it was that he did feel the stirring of desire. His emotional state was in flux, somewhere between fancy and love, and her new ability to see and talk increased his feeling for her. So did his heightened empathy. It now seemed natural to follow through with sexual expression. But he knew it was not.
He had to stall. "You've been through so much, Tappy. The— the egg hatched, and it drew substance from you, which you have to restore. Then you were confined in the Gaol's box. We feared it was for life, but with the help of the hatchling we managed to change Garth Gaol's mind. You've been in and out of something like suspended animation. You need to rest, and recover your equilibrium."