Jacqueline Lichtenberg [Dushau Trilogy 03] Outreach

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felt no compunction in candidly probing into them, as if there could be no
such thing as a private or personal matter.
Jindigar had never felt anything like it. Nor had he ever dreamed he could
react to such an intrusion with amused calm. Since I consider myself dead
already, very little can threaten me. It was an odd sort of freedom. His Oliat
had not completed its mission, and so he would not permit it to be stolen from
him. But he did not resist with his ordinary stridency, telegraphing to his
opponent that he was indeed seriously threatened and therefore half beaten
already. I never knew how much I feared death.
It was another deep-Renewal insight and had no place in the affairs of a
Center.
But something of it communicated to the hivebinders. Their probing went from
demanding to respectful. Then they withdrew, leaving behind a poignant sorrow
over the Oliat's dreadful affliction and a reverence for their nobility in the
face of such a fate.
The hivebinders climbed onto the whule, sitting erect with their hand limbs
clasped before them, here and there a leg draped over the side to keep the
bowl-shaped sounding chamber from rocking. They buzzed with a mindtune
offering sympathy and hope, apologizing for misunderstanding why they had
come, and promising to help the strangers overcome their insensitivity to the
vitalizing of the fullsong.
In response to the hive-mind's insight a new group of hive-binders appeared at
the door. They had glints of bright red and orange in their carapaces. With
scarcely a pause they rushed eagerly into the room, projecting their mindsong
before them, targeting now on the Oliat, rather than on any of the members of
their own hive. Their glee at the hive-mind's having finally lifted the harsh
and unreasonable discipline restraining their fullsong infused it with a new
vigor.
Jindigar seized the links to his Receptor and Protector and wove u tighter
defense against the intrusive signal. But the proximity of the singers
intensified the song. It beat through his filter.
//Brace yourselves!// warned Llistyien in tandem with Darllanyu.
Understanding didn't help. The alien rhythm beat through them in
ever-increasing waves as the little beings poured all their frustration into
it.
Jindigar frantically ran through a desensitizing procedure he'd never had a
chance to teach his Oliat. He wrapped them in a cocoon spun of their own
linkages, a tangle worse than he'd built to filter the hallucinations. As fast
as he worked, the fullsong eroded his efforts, seeping into their nerves,
hitting reflexes that triggered vital glands deadened by the drug.
The Dushau felt sick, but Krinata, unprotected by drugs and unable to benefit
from Jindigar's complex cocoon of linkages because her brain couldn't handle
the data flow, could not resist the song. She turned toward Cyrus.
Muttering deliriously, her mate fought free of the blanket he was wrapped in.
Driven by her human response to the forces of Renewal, she drifted to her
mate's side and bent to tuck the blanket around him. Before Jindigar knew what
she intended, she blotted Cyrus's damp forehead with one corner, seeking with
all her heart to ease his suffering and heal him.
//Jindigar // warned Trinarvil, trembling with a sudden need to support
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Krinata's effort through Oliat function.
Krinata's intent in her action, to affect the outcome of an illness, was
perilously close to a kind of symbolic Inversion of the Oliat. But, lost in
the grip of the fullsong, she had all but forgotten that the Oliat was
balanced and working and that she could draw the rest of them after her.
With a sudden, determined effort Jindigar snapped them all to attention.
//Krinata, we must warn Threntisn of the hive-heart's function. Then we've got
to get out of here.//
Krinata glanced at Trinarvil, then at the hivebinders, and the fog cleared
from her eyes. Shuddering a little, she tore herself from Cyrus and with more
than one backward glance went to the lab door. Just as she arrived the door
opened, revealing Threntisn holding a loaded injector. "I've got it," he
announced in Cassrian, then searched for Chinchee, puzzled when the Herald
wasn't visible.
Al Threntisn s first words the fullsong cut off on a note of bewilderment. All
around the room, tangled piles of Natives, twined together in mutual
enjoyment, ceased their activities, stunned b the sudden interruption. In one
far corner Chinchee struggled up among u group of his own species, his
harnesses and wishes of rank discarded, his white skin smudged with the dirt
from the floor. Threntisn recognized him, anyway, and called out, "Tell them I
am ready now to show them why they must leave this ship to us."
Jindigar could hardly believe that the Historian was oblivious to what had
been going on in this room. But Threntisn wasn't in Renewal. And he was intent
on the miracle he was about to demonstrate. He cut straight across to the
treatment room and administered the dose to Cyrus while Chinchee
self-consciously attempted to recoup his dignity.
Satisfied with Cyrus's condition, Threntisn turned, saying, us if expecting
Chinchee to be standing right behind him, "Tell the Rustlemother here that it
will take a while before she sees a change, but " Surprised that neither
Chinchee nor the Rustlemother was looking over his shoulder, the Historian cut
off. He looked down to find many hivebinders gathered in the doorway,
observing his every move, reporting to the hivemind. His gaze lilted,
searching for the Rustlemother, who was slumped by her fire, apparently
asleep.
am he watched, the elderly female toppled to the floor, the platelets that
made up her skin rustling audibly and the myriad accoutrements of her office
clattering against the floor as she fell
Two warriors and several of the white-skinned craftsmen dashed to her side [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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