Dichronauts by Greg Egan

Author:Greg Egan
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3
Tags: Science Fiction
Published: 2017-03-20T23:00:00+00:00

PART FIVE

Chapter 14

Seth tipped his head back. A dozen orange-furred limbs were stretched out across the deck towards him, below three pairs of eyes in three not-quite-faces.

«Are you seeing this?» he asked Theo.

«I’m only seeing what you’re showing me, so it’s your eyes I’ll have to trust. There’s nothing for me to ping but the deck and the sky.»

«We’ve reached the southern hyperboloid,» Seth realised. This wasn’t one more flooded terrace; they’d left the slope behind.

«I’d say so.»

«Which is peopled by scampers in boats?»

«I don’t think they look much like scampers.»

«They look even less like Walkers.»

Theo said, «They might struggle to walk in Baharabad, but here they seem entirely ambulatory.»

Seth struggled to get past his astonishment. Whatever he called them, these people had saved his life, but Ada and her Sider were still out on the water somewhere – and with luck, Andrei and Nicholas too.

He said, «Yell at them in your own language and see if they respond.»

Theo didn’t ask why, and Seth didn’t need to be told when he’d done it: the Southites began shrieking and hooting, turning their faces to each other and then staring at Seth with a renewed intensity. If they could hear Theo, there was a good chance that they could also hear the newly wakened Sider, and they might well have been drawn to this part of the water by her bawling. Seth was immensely grateful that their eyes were as sharp as their hearing, but there was no reason for the novelty he presented to distract them from continuing their search for the source of the sound. Granted, if he looked half as bizarre to them as they did to him he had to expect a certain amount of attention, but he hoped that he’d only piqued their curiosity, not sated it.

«We need to let them know that they should keep looking,» he told Theo.

«How?»

Seth thought for a while. «Which direction is the Sider?»

«It’s hard to tell,» Theo grumbled. «I’m still wet, we’ve been moving around in the water, and I’m not used to ... any of this.»

Seth gazed at the three Southites, who gazed back, showing no sign of losing interest in their exotic catch and getting on with other tasks. «Roughly,» he pleaded.

«Speaking body-wise, halfway between backwards and down,» Theo replied.

Seth pointed his right arm in the direction Theo had specified. «Now imitate Ada’s—»

«Dahlia.»

«Dahlia?»

«Someone has to name her.»

«Imitate Dahlia, before they think I’m just stretching my arm out for no reason.»

Seth couldn’t hear anything, but he felt a strong enough vibration in his skull to be assured that Theo wasn’t holding back.

The Southites burbled, grunted and squeaked, glancing at each other and swaying on their long, low limbs. Seth didn’t presume to read their emotions, but the one thing they weren’t was indifferent.

He moved his arm back to his side, then repeated the whole act three more times. The Southites became ever more animated, but they remained fixated on Seth himself. Had they failed to understand his message, or did

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