“Doctor,” said the AI, whose name was Jerry, “you haven’t specified a destination.”

“We don’t have one yet,” she said. “Stay southwest. Toward Mount Hope.”

She had come to the realization that Sheyel wasn’t going to want to give the Valiant back.

Had she an ethical responsibility to urge its return? To insist? Probably. But somewhere down deep she was pleased that he’d gotten away with it. And she didn’t really want to see it returned to Tripley. What right had he to a treasure of this magnitude? He’d walked into it by accident, and had never understood its significance.

“We have arrived, Doctor,” Jerry said. “Have you further instructions?”

She couldn’t see anything down there. Even Remorse was lost in gloom. “Circle,” she said. “Stay at six hundred meters. Keep just offshore. We’re looking for a landed flyer.”

“I will tell you if I detect one.”

The aircraft moved deliberately around the perimeter of the lake. Kim watched for a light, but saw no break in the darkness. After a while Jerry reported they had done a complete sweep. “There is no other aircraft in the vicinity,” it said, “either aloft or on the ground.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes. Do you wish to expand the search?”

“No.” Sheyel wasn’t here yet, but he would arrive before the night was over. “There’s some open space in the town. Set down there. But keep the door closed.” Not that she had any illusions that a locked door would be sufficient to keep out unwelcome critters. But it would make her feel a little safer.

She put a hand on the microwave oven, then made another effort to raise Sheyel, but once again she got only the recording.

Kim was reasonably certain she knew what he planned on doing with the Valiant: it was going to serve as a lure, to summon the phantom, the thing that had been left over from the Mount Hope incident. Sheyel Tolliver wanted to make first contact. He believed as she had that the creature could be reasoned with. One had only to draw it into conversation.

Deadly naivete.

The flyer eased down between ruined buildings. The sky was clear and the stars ran on forever.

She turned off the lights but left the engine running.

24

The ruined buildings cast long shadows in the moonlight. A cool, sharp wind whipped in off the lake. It howled through the abandoned town and shook the flyer. Kim was embarrassed sitting locked in the cabin like a frightened child. Eventually she opened up and climbed down onto the ground. But she stayed alert.

Somewhat before midnight Jerry broke into her thoughts: “Aircraft approaching.”

A blip appeared on the screen. Inbound from the southwest. From the general direction of Terminal Island.

She was back in the cabin. “Can we talk to them?”

“Wait one.”

Kim felt behind her for the duplicate Valiant, brought it up front and set it on the seat beside her.

“Channel is open, Dr. Brandywine.”

“Sheyel,” she said, “is that you?”

“Kim.” He sounded genuinely surprised. And delighted. “Where are you?”

“I’m embarrassed for you,” she said. “You took the man’s starship.”

A long pause. Then: “Yes, I did.”

“And what are you planning to do with it?”

“I am going to talk to its pilot. If possible. I’d be pleased if you joined me. Where are you?”

“On the ground. In town.”

“There’s a strip of open beach to the east. I’m going to set down there.”

She saw his lights approaching. “It’s not possible, Sheyel. What you want to do.”

He sounded surprised. And disappointed. “Why not?”

“Whatever the local goblin is, it’s not someone you can talk to.”

“How do you know?”

“I know. Take my word for it. It’s some sort of disembodied AI. Designed to perform specific functions, as best I can judge. Maybe it’s a kind of automatic pilot. But it won’t do negotiations.”

“Let’s not jump to conclusions, Kim.” The other flyer had begun to descend. “Everything points to the fact that it’s intelligent.”

“The thing’s deranged, Sheyel. And it’s dangerous.”

“It’s lost and alone. It’s been stranded here for almost three decades. You have to start by understanding that.”

“Sheyel—”

“You want to say hello to the unknown, there’s no way it can be anything but dangerous. I accept that possibility. Still, I’ve never heard of a malevolent AI.”

“I have.”

“You’re letting your imagination take over, Kim.”

“No, goddammit. I know what I’m talking about. Let it go, at least until—”

“I think you’re running scared, Kim. I’m disappointed in you. But after what you’ve been through, I can understand—”

“Don’t be stupid, Sheyel. This may be the thing that killed Emily and Yoshi. Look, let’s take the night to talk about it. Go up to Eagle Point. Hear me out. If you still want to do this tomorrow, then okay, I’m with you.”

She watched the lights of his flyer disappear below the trees. “Kim, do you know for sure of anyone it has attacked?”

“No. But—”

“There you are then. We’re going to make history tonight, you and I. Are you with me?”

“Sheyel—”

“Do you know what I have on board?”

“Yes,” she said. “I know.”

“No, I don’t think you do. You think I have a replica of the celestial.”

“No. You have the ship itself.”

“Oh.” She heard the respect in his voice. “Well done, Kimberly. Well done indeed. How long have you known?”

She was tempted to lie, to tell him she’d realized, as he undoubtedly had, from the moment she found out there were identical ships on the mural and in Tripley’s office. “I’ve known for a while,” she said. “You didn’t tell me the whole truth, did you?”

“You mean about my conversation with Yoshi? Yes, that’s so. I did hedge a bit. She told me they’d brought back a ship. But she wouldn’t answer any questions. Told me I’d have all the details soon enough.”

“What did you think? That they’d hidden it in the outer system somewhere?”

“To be honest, Kim, I didn’t know what to think. I suspected maybe they’d brought back something completely different from what we’d expect. And I wasn’t sure they hadn’t hidden it in the lake. It’s why I came here so often.” She heard his engine shut off and his door open. “Now, I have to get set up. Come join me if you want.”

“I wish you wouldn’t do this, Sheyel.” She ordered her flyer to lift off, to find the other vehicle and land beside it. It left the ground and followed the shoreline east.

Sheyel’s aircraft was down on Cabry’s Beach, where she and Solly had landed. “Careful,” Kim pointlessly cautioned her own vehicle. There wasn’t much room left. And then to Sheyel: “We don’t know what this thing might be able to do if it gets access to the microship.”

“It won’t go anywhere with this.” He was out of the flyer, dragging a packing case down from the cargo compartment.

“Why not?” Her aircraft settled into weeds and high grass, and she popped open the door and jumped out.

“Because I’ve scanned it. It has an antimatter power source. But there’s no fuel. No antimatter.”

“Oh.”

“So now we know what blew the face off Mount Hope, right?”

“I guess we do.”

He pulled a collapsible table from the flyer, locked its legs in place, and set it on the sand at the water’s edge. He pushed on it to make sure it was stable.