This is a fan translation of Dark Skies (Тёмныенебеса) by Mikhail Akhmanov, currently only available in Russian and, because of the author's passing in 2019, unlikely to ever be published in English. This is the fourth book in a six-book series called Arrivals from the Dark (Пришедшие из мрака), which also has a six-book spin-off series called Trevelyan's Mission (Миссия Тревельяна).
I claim no rights to the contents herein.
Chapter 9
Assistant Adviser Patta
"I am listening, Patta. Speak!" Zong-ap-sidura Baharan, the head of the advising mission, bent his legs and lowered himself onto a heated seat but did not offer Patta to sit. This was a sign of displeasure.
"A group of six craft flew over a portion of the landmass for…" Patta said a measure of distance equivalent to two and a half thousand kilometers. "There were other groups, sent by Subyaroka. They were studying the territory on both sides of the equator and proceeded farther, to the ocean coast. At least six hundred craft in total, both transport and combat vehicles."
"Six hundred and thirty-four, half of Rikkaraniji's air force," Baharan clarified. "My other assistants have made the calculations, and there is no need to speak of it. I know that the progenitor gave the order to find where the Paired Creatures were hiding, but the landmass is big, and his pilots have yet to find anything. Tell me what you have seen yourself."
"I have seen a Hossi-moa ground vehicle," Patta said. "The Splinters wanted to destroy it, but the vehicle was maneuvering skillfully and managed to hide in the mountains. In this area." He inserted a claw into a device's slot, and a rocky maze appeared before them, with gorges and a multitude of sharp peaks. "The pilots were flying low over the rocks, and two of the craft crashed. The vehicle was heading for the seacoast, but I am certain that the Hossi-moa changed his route. He did not want us to find his hiding place."
"Is that all? All you can tell me?" Patta was silent, and the adviser, sticking out his tongue in irritation, licked his scaly cheeks. Then he said, "My Zong-tii need to be here, in Ho, and control the actions of the Splinters. It is not our task to chase Paired Creatures with their clan, but you have visited settlement ruins and flew over the continent many times. The Thought Giver sees that you are lucky, you survived, and Tihava's claws will not rip off my scales. But!" He once again stuck out his tongue and pulled it back in. "But, by accepting this risk, I wish to find out something useful. Something that my other observers, the ones who remain in Ho, cannot notice. And what do you tell me?" His tongue again shot out of his maw. "You say you saw a Hossi-moa machine. You say it could not be destroyed. You saw two combat craft were lost. Why do I need to know that? I need conclusions."
"I do not have them yet, Zong-ap-sidura," Patta said. "When I do, you will be the first to know."
Baharan slashed his claws through the air, "Perhaps Tihava was wrong. He claimed that you were smart and could see the useful in the strange, but I think that your spot is bigger than your mind. Or are you hiding it from me?"
This was a hint that Patta did not wish to share information with an elder member of his clan. A hint and a threat: here, far from the other elders, Baharan was the master of life and death of his Zong-tii.
Patta started making the gestures of respect, then scratched his shoulder and let a drop of his blood fall to the floor.
"The Thought Giver sees! The honorable Zong-ap-sidura must not be angry. If one does not understand the whole, how can one speak of the half? Or even of the quarter? One cannot say, so one should keep quiet! So said Tihava, my mentor."
The adviser suddenly calmed down and, clasping his upper limbs on his belly, spoke, "Tihava is close to our progenitor. He will become a Big-Elder, will receive a long name, and will live far longer than you or me. He has authority, and I obeyed his wish to send you to the Cold World. I took you with me." This thought was over, and Baharan paused to let what he had said reach Patta. Then he continued his speech, "A scale has two sides, and the one closest to the body is hidden [A Dromi saying with a deeper meaning than human expressions like 'a double-edged sword' or 'a coin has two sides'. A more precise meaning could be 'a coin has two sides, one obvious and one secret.]. What is outside? Within each warrior clan, there are advisers from the ruling tribes, and that is right: the clans fight the Hossi-moa, but only we know what was, what is, and what shall be ['What was, what is, and what shall be' is an expression equivalent to Dromi terms for 'history', 'sociology', and 'politics', respectively.]. Advisers have also been sent to the Splinter clans. I, you, and the other Zong-tii have been sent to this clan, to Rikkaraniji's tribe. The Splinters are not needed in this war, and they will have to stay where they've been sent. Rikkaraniji knows this, and so do Korroningata and the rest of their progenitors. Our task is for them to sit here as intimidation for the Hossi-moa and to not try to leave these worlds. That is what is outside. But what is inside? Do you know that?"
"As well as you, Zong-ap-sidura. So far, our warrior clans have yet to capture any Hossi-moa planets, except for these three, taken by the Splinters. Here, we can study the Paired Creatures to find their vulnerable point."
"These words are for Rikkaraniji," Baharan muttered. "For a Patriarch of the Splinters, so that he does not sharpen his claws on our backs too frequently. You, Patta, know the secret nature of our mission. The missions Tihava had given us."
A dry scale for you, but not for me, Patta thought. My mentor has given me a completely different task.
Aloud he said, "We must find something useful among the human Hossi-moa. Something that would be useful to the Clans."
Baharan's tongue darted in his half-open mouth. It was an indication of excitement.
"Yes, exactly! New technology, new devices, new materials! That which we no longer get from the Secretive Ones… Perhaps to master the secret of the terrible Hossi-moa weapon and antimatter production! But we miscalculated." Excitement left the adviser, and his voice became barely audible. "We miscalculated, Patta. There are only primitive machines on these fringe worlds, and their inhabitants are a simple human Hossi-moa worker clan…"
Patta made a gesture of negation.
"No, Zong-ap-sidura, you misunderstood my mentor Tihava and the will of our progenitor. New devices and new weapons would be a good thing, but that is not what is important."
"What is it then? You were Tihava's student, and you are close to him, so explain," Baharan said with displeasure and swiped his claws at the air. His reaction was relatively calm; in any other clan, a Zong-tii, who had decided to lecture his elder, would not have lived a moment longer. But the ruling tribes had their own ways. Humans would call them more democratic.
"My task is to study the psychology of the human Hossi-moa, to understand the reasons for their actions, to figure out the organization structure of their tribes and the subordination in their clans between their elders and juniors, that which gives them stability and strength. We, Tihava thinks, could borrow something… not machines and not even the secrets of their weapons, but some element of their hierarchy. We are good imitators… You yourself said, honored elder, that there are Hossi-moa, whose behavior cannot be explained by logic, our logic. But each race has its own logic, and we need to figure it out in order to discard the harmful and take the useful, that which suits us."
"Take something from the Hossi-moa… not machines, not technology, but something from their ideas… that which was, is, and shall be… That is a new thought," the adviser said musingly, scratching his chest and watching dry scales fall down. The thought was indeed new, but Baharan had a much more sophisticated mind than the Splinter progenitor and his descendants. The Thought Giver had not been very generous with them.
"There are many differences between our races," Baharan said finally. "Different physiology, different ways of thinking, and different goals… We cannot even speak with them, as their vocal apparatus is too dissimilar from ours… I am not sure the Paired Creatures have any ideas useful to us. But, since Tihava has decided it, I will not hinder your studies. If you die, the fault will be yours, not mine!" Having finished this thought, he switched to the next one, "Today, you flew over the continent and, as was said, saw a Hossi-moa vehicle. I will ask again, what have these observations told you?"
"Nothing, Zong-ap-sidura. Far less than visiting the ruins, where I was nearly killed but was spared. That event is a subject for deeper thought, but, today, I have not learned anything new. The Hossi-moa who controlled the vehicle fought stubbornly… But we already know that the Paired Creatures value life far greater than we do."
The adviser made a gesture of agreement, "That is so. You may continue your work, Patta, but I want you to be respectful to Rikkaraniji and his Sisura-zong, this Subyaroka. Of course, we must watch them and direct their actions, but do not forget that they are older than us."
"Their spots have lost their color [The spots on the long-lived Dromi, who are past the age of reproductive activity, fade, indicating infirmity. The phrase 'his spot has lost its color' is equivalent to a human expression 'old fart'.], but I will do my best not to notice that," Patta said and headed for the exit.
He left the adviser's living area, furnished with low seats, shelves by the walls, which substituted as tables for the Dromi, and equipment for recording and communication. Five Sinn-ko servants, who were awaiting Baharan's orders, parted before him, making gestures of respect. Ignoring them, Patta headed for the stairs. From a human viewpoint, they seemed strange, with steps that were too wide, tilted, and horseshoe-shaped. But for the Dromi, with their knees that bent backwards, such stairs were more convenient.
Having descended, Patta stopped in a passage, near a transparent wall that faced the future spaceport. The adviser group was located in two three-story towers: one was taken up by Baharan and his servants, while his Zong-tii assistants lived in the other. The towers were connected by a passage on the second level, and, from this gallery, Patta could see the plain, where thousands of prisoners were swarming, the force field emitters, the already-completed openings of the launch silos, and tower-like structures, the largest of which was the Patriarch's abode.
He was pleased. He'd managed to obtain permission to continue his work, while saying nothing to Baharan of his true mission. He could, as before, go to the ruined cities, fly over the continent with the Splinters, risk, hope, and wait. Wait for an opportunity. His certainty that it would come had grown. The Hossi-moa who had spared him… Maybe there were others like him… maybe they would understand him and say what they needed… maybe he would be able to help them, to aim their strike…
His biggest worry was the problem of communication. Tihava had said that, on the planets of the Secretive Ones, where the mercenaries and the Twice-Splinters both lived, they communicated using the Lo'ona Aeo language. Apparently, their sounds could be produced by humans, Dromi, and Haptors, which was not surprising, since all three, each in their own time, had served the Secretive Ones and understood what their employers said. But Tihava hadn't known their language, and he could not put that which he did not know into the heads of his students. So the mentor suggested they acted as the situation demanded: either avoid contacting the humans, or use a xilot-tlan, a memory crystal, with simple images instead of speech or gestures, which would be incomprehensible to them. After meeting that strange Hossi-moa, Patta had prepared a recording and now carried it with him, keeping it hidden under a shoulder strap. But would the Paired Creatures understand him? Would they want to understand?
He looked at the plain behind the force screens, at the field, where the Hossi-moa were laboring, and thought that the language of force and the gestures of threat were far more comprehensible than words of peace. By continually taking over new star systems, the Dromi had approached the human sector, and their current enemies realized that they were being threatened or, at least, that the Dromi were trying to push them out of the border area of space. They had sent fleets to all the vectors, where they were expecting the expansion of the Clans, and the Dromi had also understood that their enemies would defend themselves. What was currently happening at the landing silos was also an example of a wordless contract: either you dug the ground, crushed stone, carried soil to the seashore, or you would be vaporized where you stood. Prisoners were not being beaten or punished by depriving them of food or water; concepts like "torture" or "hunger" were unknown to the Dromi, for they did not fit into their rational world. Logic protested against it: one who was weak from hunger, sick, beaten, or maimed was a poor worker, and so, all methods of coercion were useless. Those who made a mistake were simply destroyed.
Knowing something of humanoids and humans in particular, as well as his own race's history, Patta was not overly surprised at that and did not consider killing to be cruel. Humans obeyed their elders with far less enthusiasm than the Dromi; among the latter, obedience to a member of a higher caste was a genetic characteristic, at least at Hallaha and Sinn-ko stages. For that reason, juniors did not need to be forced with a stick, or a whip, or any other way, and coercion, so widespread among humanoids, was only a theoretical concept for the Dromi. The problem with young ones was their great numbers, which was why death was seen as a method of necessary culling. They were killed without anger but also without mercy; only one in ten Hallaha could hope to get a name, and only one in thirty Sinn-ko lived to the time when a spot appeared on his belly. The lives of the Named-Ones were consumed by work and wars with the other races; as for the Hallaha, they killed one another, died from a lack of food, or were destroyed by their elders. It was the process of natural selection, the cleansing of the gene pool; only the strongest, the smartest, and the toughest lived to the age of procreation.
But everything had turned out to be different for humans, as well as the other humanoids. Patta knew that the procedures to select the best, the most worthy ones to continue their bloodline were extremely complex among them, and that even the worst ones could have offspring under certain conditions. Without a doubt, this was determined by their method of reproduction, and nothing could be borrowed there: what had been given by nature could not be changed. That disobedience to authority, the ability to resist the strength and power of their elders, which boiled down to the concept of personal freedom, was, according to Tihava, a powerful developmental impetus. Was this factor the one that was so necessary for Dromi progress?.. And had the Twice-Splinters been able to obtain this strange characteristic?..
Patta knew it was possible, based on his own experiences. The genetic obedience to the Patriarchs and the Big-Elders, who stood above all in the hierarchy of the Clans, had been transformed in him into the loyalty to a single being, his mentor Tihava. He, who had been chosen back when he was only a Sinn-ko, was now almost free; he had studied for many years, but he'd gained not only knowledge; he had been freed from the idea that any elder could control his life and his fate. How had his mentor managed that?.. How had he done that?.. Even now, having approached the mature Zong-ap-sidura age, Patta could not have answered that question. But what he really wanted to ask his mentor was not his secret methods, but something else, which was, perhaps, an even greater mystery: Tihava had freed him, but who had freed Tihava?..
He recalled his teacher's words of an outside impetus. If a race had no power to change something, an external influence was necessary — that was what Tihava had said. A global shock, a disaster, or a lost war were required, and that risk needed to be accepted, for the victors would be able to lead them on a new path or simply destroy them. But those stuck at a dead-end had no choice, so a disaster was unavoidable… But was that disaster the only external influence? Could Tihava himself be an outside impetus, not as destructive as war and less noticeable? And if so, where had he come from?
At times, Patta thought he knew the answer. Humanoids of various races were similar in appearance, and a Kni'lina could pass himself off as a human, and a human could appear as a Haptor. But a Dromi was always a Dromi! From where could a Dromi sage, free from the power of the elders, capable of freeing others, able to alter their minds, have come into the empire of the Clans?.. Only from the planets of the Lo'ona Aeo, Patta thought. He knew of the forbidden, of the Lifestyle-Changers, for he was one of them. He wanted all the Dromi to become like him. Which was why the war needed to be lost.
A piercing scream came from the field, where the construction was taking place; it looked like one of the Hossi-moa had dropped a heavy rock on his foot. Not a worker any more, Patta decided. Apparently, the Zong-tii, assigned to oversee the prisoners, came to the same conclusion: on his order, three Named Ones raised their emitters, blue discharges flashed, and the wind scattered the resulting pile of ash.
