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"There . . ." There. . .there. . . there. . . His own words echoed inside his
skull and ears, and his eyes watered. He closed them and felt as though he
were twirling upside down. He opened his eyes, and knives of light stabbed
through them..
Silently, slowly, he refocused his attention on the approach course to the
outer Farhkan station. The briefing profile had cautioned against going inside
the orbit of the sixth planet. At least the outer orbit station showed on the
screens, almost like an energy beacon, and he aimed the Paquawrat toward that
beacon.
Then he leaned back in the couch and tried not to see anything, nor to hear
anything. Nor to think-not about the images of Soldiers of the Lord, nor an
archbishop whose fault had been to be in the wrong place with the wrong name,
nor Quentar who'd thought the only safe Revenant was a dead one, nor James
who'd saved his neck more than once with his knowledge and never asked for
acknowledgment, nor Ulteena, who'd taught him the value of anticipation and
never asked. . . .
The accumulators hiccuped, and the hiccup jolted down his spine. Both feet
twitched, and his boots thumped the cockpit floor.
He sighed, and his, breath sounded like a hurricane whistling through his
body. He tried to tamp down his sensitivity, but nothing happened. His breath
still rumbled and whistled, and his feet twitched.
Slowly, he studied the system readouts. He had another two hours of torture
before he reached the outer Farhkan station.
The time passed slowly, the red haze swelling and ebbing, his feet
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occasionally twitching, and each sound slashing at him. With his eyes open,
the cockpit light as low as he dared leave it, his eyes burned. If he closed
them, he seemed to whirl in space.
Periodically, he checked the ship, his position, and his progress. How much
translation error he'd piled up he had no idea, because Farhkan systems didn't
provide human-style comparators. He supposed the Farhkans could tell him.
Finally, after almost two hours, he straightened and transmitted. "Farhka
Station one, this is Coalition ship Paquawrat, code name Holy Roller." Trystin
took another deep breath. "Request approach clearance and lock assignment."
"Human ship, this is Farhka. Reason for your porting ' is what?"
"Request assistance. . . Coalition ship Paquawrat, code name Holy Roller,
requesting refueling and assistance."
"Have you a patron? Please state the name of your patron."
Patron? What the hell was a patron? Patron. . . patron ... patron...
Trystin closed his eyes and wished he had not as the cockpit seemed to whirl
around him. Patron?
Ghere! He'd said "patron" twice, emphasizing it. Trystin opened his eyes and
said the name slowly. "Rhule Ghere. Dr. Rhule Ghere."
A hissing sound carried through him, a sound with knife edges. Then there was
silence. Trystin began to decelerate, calculating his own approach. Five
minutes passed . . . then ten. "Human pilot, please state your name. Please
state your name."
"Trystin Desoll. Trystin Desoll. Major, Coalition Service."
Another hissing rushed through him, knife-edged, and he stepped up the
deceleration. His feet twitched, and his jaw developed a tic.
He slowed the ship more, noting the two Farhkan craft that bracketed him,
unable to do more than watch, half wondering if even the return flight profile
had been a setup to ensure he never got back. Escaped assassins were
embarrassments, he suspected, again, too late.
"Human pilot Desoll, you are cleared to dock. Follow the energy beacon. Follow
the visual green light. Follow the long audio signal on your emergency
frequency."
"Thank you, Farhka. I have the green light. . . ." Trystin winced as the
sounds overpowered him, and he waited for them to pass. "I have the beacon."
Edging the ship up to the small lock was agony. Even the signals from the
magnetic holdtights slammed through his implant as they locked the ship to the
Farhkan station's hull.
Holding on to the edge of the couch, then bracing himself on the bulkhead, he
shuffled toward the lock. His fingers trembled, and his arms shivered as he
opened the lock.
In the locking port stood four Farhkans. Two trained some sort of heavy
weapons on Trystin.
Trystin stepped from the ship, and the heavier gravity clawed at him. He
tottered there for a moment, the strange clean and musky smell of Farhkans
around him, the strange weapons they did not need pointed at him, when he
could scarcely even walk. He wavered for only a long moment before the
darkness reached out of his brain and smote him down.
71
"Without a deity the universe is uncertain. But, once the deistic faiths have
been analyzed, they provide no greater certainty, nor is there any verified
evidence that deities per se have improved humanity or its institutions.
Certainly, improvements have occurred, but those improvements have been
accomplished in purely human fashion. These accomplishments have proved that
people can bring greater certainty, greater goodness, greater understanding
into the universe, and, while they may have been inspired by faith, those good
people have done so without the physical help of a deity.
"Thus, it can be argued that the invention of a deity only serves as a pretext
for human beings to believe in a set of values beyond those rooted merely in
self. Yet, most societies in history have chastised those individuals who have
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attempted to acknowledge publicly that need for a set of values beyond those
rooted merely in the individual's needs, or that a 'mere' human being could
consider and develop such values. Thus, great truths have always been
presented in the guise of divinely inspired guidance.
"Yet theologies exist which claim that men and women will be as gods, or equal
with god, upon their physical death, and they have proved immensely popular
and successful, despite the inherent contradiction. How, logically, can death
transfigure a man or woman into a being that much superior to the one who [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]