Knight by Timothy Zahn

Author:Timothy Zahn
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Tom Doherty Associates

twelve

They found Ushkai in the exact same place where Nicole had last left him: standing in the long room lined by barred, twenty-foot-square cages that he’d told her had once been animal treatment areas.

Ushkai’s human-looking image remained motionless as Nicole and Kahkitah walked toward it. Nicole kept her eyes on it, wondering if she was going to have to wake up whatever section of the Fyrantha’s computer ran the thing.

Kahkitah, for his part, seemed fascinated by everything except the image. The Ghorf’s head and shoulders swung back and forth continuously as they walked, his eyes taking in everything, little bits of untranslated birdsong mutterings whistling through his gills.

“What is this place?” he asked at last as they approached the waiting hologram. “Is it a prison?”

“No, it was where they kept sick animals,” Nicole said. “The Fyrantha used to be a zoo.”

“Really?” Kahkitah asked. “Where are the animals now?”

“Probably dead,” Nicole said. “No, no—that’s not what I meant,” she added hastily as he gave off a horrified whistle. “I mean it was a long time ago. The animals would have died of old age.”

“Oh,” Kahkitah said, sounding only slightly less outraged. “Is that why all the arenas have such different landscapes?”

“I guess,” Nicole said. She hadn’t really thought about that aspect, but now that Kahkitah pointed it out it was obvious. Different areas to show off different types of animals. “Okay, now, Ushkai is just a hologram, so let me do the—”

“What is a hologram?”

“He’s just an image that the Fyrantha is projecting here,” Nicole said. “When he talks, it’s a part of the ship talking through him.”

“But the image is human,” Kahkitah objected. “If this is the Fyrantha speaking, why doesn’t it speak from a Wisp image?”

“I don’t know,” Nicole said, feeling a flash of frustration. They were facing possible death for Jeff and the others, with the enslavement or destruction of Earth to follow. This wasn’t something she wanted to talk about right now. “Probably so he wouldn’t freak me out. Let me do the talking, okay?”

“Of course.”

“Greetings, Protector,” Ushkai said as they came up to him. “How may I serve?”

“The Shipmasters are trying to get two of the human groups together to fight,” Nicole said. “I want to make it so that neither side can. On Earth animal doctors sometimes have to put the animals to sleep or keep them from moving. Are there any drugs aboard the Fyrantha that can do that?”

For a couple of seconds Ushkai didn’t move or speak. “Ushkai?” Nicole prompted.

“You wish to put them to sleep?”

Nicole pursed her lips. Actually, now that she thought about it, that wouldn’t really do the job. The Shipmasters would just wait until everyone woke up. “No, not to sleep,” she said. “Something that … I don’t know. Something that won’t let them fight.”

“Something that will prevent them from focusing on things around them, perhaps?” Kahkitah suggested.

“Right—something that’ll confuse them,” Nicole agreed. “Can’t focus, or can’t see straight. Maybe something that weakens their muscles?”

“There were once such drugs,” Ushkai said.

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