Ascendancies Read Online Free PDF Page A

“You’ve made your first mistake, Doctor. There are no places of our own here. It was the same mistake the Mechanist agents made, the same one that almost killed me as well. There is no concept of privacy or property here. This is the Nest. If you seize any part of it for yourself—to store equipment, to sleep in, whatever—then you become an intruder, an enemy. The two Mechanists—a man and a woman—tried to secure an empty chamber for their computer lab. Warriors broke down their door and devoured them. Scavengers ate their equipment, glass, metal, and all.”
    Afriel smiled coldly. “It must have cost them a fortune to ship all that material here.”
    Mirny shrugged. “They’re wealthier than we are. Their machines, their mining. They meant to kill me, I think. Surreptitiously, so the warriors wouldn’t be upset by a show of violence. They had a computer that was learning the language of the springtails faster than I could.”
    â€œBut you survived,” Afriel pointed out. “And your tapes and reports—especially the early ones, when you still had most of your equipment—were of tremendous interest. The Council is behind you all the way. You’ve become quite a celebrity in the Rings, during your absence.”
    â€œYes, I expected as much,” she said.
    Afriel was nonplused. “If I found any deficiency in them,” he said carefully, “it was in my own field, alien linguistics.” He waved vaguely at the two symbiotes who accompanied her. “I assume you’ve made great progress in communicating with the symbiotes, since they seem to do all the talking for the Nest.”
    She looked at him with an unreadable expression and shrugged. “There are at least fifteen different kinds of symbiotes here. Those that accompany me are called the springtails, and they speak only for themselves. They are savages, Doctor, who received attention from the Investors only because they can still talk. They were a spacefaring race once, but they’ve forgotten it. They discovered the Nest and they were absorbed, they became parasites.” She tapped one of them on the head. “I tamed these two because I learned to steal and beg food better than they can. They stay with me now and protect me from the larger ones. They are jealous, you know. They have only been with the Nest for perhaps ten thousand years and are still uncertain of their position. They still think, and wonder sometimes. After ten thousand years there is still a little of that left to them.”
    â€œSavages,” Afriel said. “I can well believe that. One of them bit me while I was still aboard the starship. He left a lot to be desired as an ambassador.”
    â€œYes, I warned him you were coming,” said Mirny. “He didn’t much like the idea, but I was able to bribe him with food… I hope he didn’t hurt you badly.”
    â€œA scratch,” Afriel said. “I assume there’s no chance of infection.”
    â€œI doubt it very much. Unless you brought your own bacteria with you.”
    â€œHardly likely,” Afriel said, offended. “I have no bacteria. And I wouldn’t have brought microorganisms to an alien culture anyway.”
    Mirny looked away. “I thought you might have some of the special genetically altered ones…I think we can go now. The springtail will have spread your scent by mouth-touching in the subsidiary chamber, ahead of us. It will be spread throughout the Nest in a few hours. Once it reaches the Queen, it will spread very quickly.”
    She jammed her feet against the hard shell of one of the young springtails and launched herself down the hall. Afriel followed her. The air was warm and he was beginning to sweat under his elaborate clothing, but his antiseptic sweat was odorless.
    They exited into a vast chamber dug from the living rock. It was arched and oblong, eighty meters long and about