Of course Ro-kenn could climb aboard a robot and simply fly off. But till either Kunn’s aircraft or the star-ship arrived, there was only wilderness to flee to. No shelter beyond this glade filled with inconvenient questions.

A shout rose up from the cluster of urs and men over to the left. The huddle broke, revealing a beaming Lester Cambel, burdened by several large-format volumes as he hurried forward. “I think we found it!” he announced, kneeling with several assistants beside one of the spheroidal knobs that ran along the tangled mass of cable. While an aide pried at the box, Lester explained.

“Naturally, none of us has the slightest idea how this device works, but Galactic tech is so refined and simplified, after a billion years, that most machines are supposed to be pretty easy to use. After all, if humans could pilot a creaky, fifth-hand starship all the way to Jijo, the things must be darn near idiot-proof!”

The self-deprecating jest drew laughter from both sides of the crowd. Pressing close to watch, the throng left no easy or dignified avenue for Ro-kenn or his servants to escape.

“In this case,” Cambel continued, “we assume the gadget was meant to go off when all the pilgrims were in place near the Egg, at our most impressionable, perhaps as we finished the invocation. A good guess would be either a timer or some remote control trigger, possibly a radio signal.”

An aide succeeded in getting the cover off, with an audible pop. “Now let’s see if we can find something like the standard manual override switch they show on page fifteen-twelve,” Lester said, crouching closer, consulting one of the open volumes.

Ro-kenn stared at the book, filled with crisp diagrams, as if he had just seen something deadly creep out of his own bedsheets. Lark noticed that Ling was looking at him once again. This time, her expression seemed to say, What have you been hiding from me?

Although she lacked a rewq, Lark figured a wry smile would convey his reply.

You assume too much, my dear. It blinded you, preventing you from asking sound questions. It also made you patronizing, when we might have been friends.

All right, maybe that was too complex to transmit by facial expression alone. Perhaps what his smirk actually said was — Such nerve! You accuse me of hiding things?

“I protest!” interjected the male sky-human, Rann, towering over all but the hoon and a few traeki as he stepped forward. “You have no right to meddle with the property of others!”

Phwhoon-dau crooned softly, “Hr-r — then you avow ownership of this invasive thing, placed without permission in our most sacred site?”

Rann blinked. Clearly he hated the present weakness of the aliens’ position, having to fence words with savages. Confused, the tall sky-human turned to Ro-kenn for guidance. While they conferred, heads close together, Lester Cambel continued.

“The purpose of this contraption was what had us stymied for a while. Fortunately, I’d already been doing some research on Galactic technologies, so the texts were somewhat familiar. Finally, I found it listed under psi emitters!”

“Here’s the switch, sir,” an aide declared. “Ready when you are.”

Lester Cambel stood up, raising both hands.

“People! This is a first and final warning. We’ve no idea what we’re about to set off. I assume nothing fatal, since our guests aren’t flying out of here at top speed.

However, since we’ve no time for careful experiments, I advise you to at least step back. The cautious among you may retreat some greater distance, perhaps twice the diameter of the Egg. I’ll count down from ten.”

Uthen wanted to stay and watch, Lark thought. But I made him go hide those library disk-things we found.

Did I actually do him a favor?

Cambel drew a deep breath.

“Ten!”

“Nine!”

“Eight!”

Lark had never seen a g’Kek outrace an urs before. But as the crowd dissolved, some of the Six showed surprising haste to depart. Others remained, tethered by curiosity.

Courage is one trait that binds any true union, he thought with some pride.

“Seven!”

“Six!”

Now Ro-kenn himself glided forward. “I avow ownership of this device, which—”

“Five!”

“Four!”

Ro-kenn hurried, speaking louder to be heard past the tumult. “—which consists merely of instrumentation, innocently emplaced—”

“Three!”

“Two!”

Faster, in frantic tones. “—to study patterns cast by your revered and sacred—”

“One!”

“Now!”

Some humans instinctively brought their hands up to their ears, crouching and squinting as if to protect their eyes against an expected flash. Urs pressed arms over pouches. g’Keks drew in their eyes, while qheuens and traeki squat-hugged the ground. Rewq cringed, fleeing the intense emotions pouring from their hosts. Whatever a “psi emitter” might be, everyone was about to find out.

Lark tried to ignore instinct, taking his cue instead from Ling. Her response to the countdown seemed a queer mix of anger and curiosity. She clasped both hands together, turning to meet his eyes at the very moment Cambel’s aide stroked a hidden switch.

Asx

Confusion brims our central core, oozing through the joint-seals that bind us/we/i/me, seeping bewilderment down our outer curves, like sap from a wounded tree.

This voice, this rhythmic recitation, can it be what we know it not to be?

The Egg’s patternings have stroked us so many ways. This ruction has familiar elements, like the Sacred One’s way of singing…

Yet — there is also a metallic tang, simplistic, lacking the Egg’s sonorous pitch and timbre.

One sub-cadence draws us toward it, clattering like a hasty quintet of claws, pulling our attention, as if down a dark underground funnel.

Suddenly, i/we coalesce, submerging into strange existence as a unified being. One encased in a hard shell.

Pentagonal resentment surges. This “me” is filled with rage.

How dare they tell me I am free!

What unnatural law is this Code of the Commons? This rule that “liberates” my kind from the sweet discipline we once knew, imposed by our gracious queens?

We who are blue — we who are red — surely we yearn to serve, deep in our throbbing bile nodes! To work and fight selflessly, assisting gray dynastic ambitions! Was that not our way among the stars, and before?

The native way of all qheuens?

Who dared bring an end to those fine days, forcing alien notions of liberty into carapaces too stiff for a deadly drug called freedom?

Humans dared impose these thoughts, breaking up the union of our well-ordered hives! Theirs is the fault, the shell-bound debt to pay.

And pay they shall!

After that, there will be other scores to settle…

i/we writhe, experiencing what it feels like to crouch and run on five strong legs. Legs meant for service. Not to a mere nest, crouched behind some puny dam, or to some vast abstraction like the Commons, but to grand gray matrons, noble, gorgeous, and strong.

Why does this vivid perception flood through our dazzled core?

It must be the Rothen artifice — their psi-device — part of their scheme to influence each race of the Six. Tricking us into doing their will.

Quivers of surprise shake our/my rings. Even after so many years of friendship, i/we had never realized — the qheuen point of view is so weird!

Yet no weirder than the next sensation that comes barging into our shared consciousness.

The feel of galloping hooves.

A hot breath of the dry steppes.