Kuwale shouted in my ear, "Are you okay? I've got you now. Try to relax." Ve sounded distant; all I could manage was an indignant grunt. "A couple of minutes, and we should be safe. My lungs are affected, but I think that's passing." I stared up into the unfathomable sky, drowning in reverse.
Kuwale splashed water over my face. I was improving; at least I could tell that I was swallowing most of it. I coughed angrily. My teeth started chattering; the water was colder than I'd imagined. "Your friends are pathetic. One amateur burglar, caught out by a backup alarm. Cholera that gets confused by a melatonin patch. Toxins that wash off in seawater. Violet Mosala has nothing to fear."
Someone grabbed my foot and dragged me under.
I counted five figures in wetsuits and scuba gear; they were all clad in polymer from ankles to wrists, and all wore gloves and hoods as well.
The harvester emerged from the translucent distance, barely visible against the sunlit water, and I felt my first real shock of visceral fear. If they'd poisoned the tentacles—restored the natural gene to the engineered species—we were dead. I broke free long enough to turn and see the other three divers thrashing around Kuwale, trying to hold ver still.
One of my captors waved the device in front of me again. It was a regulator, attached to an air hose. I turned to stare at her; I could barely make out her expression through the faceplate, though Witness instantly recognized another target. The air hose led to a second tank on her back. I had no way of knowing what the tank contained—but if it was harmful, I was only minutes away from drowning anyway.
The diver's eyes seemed to say: It's
I looked around again. Kuwale's arms were tied behind vis back, and ve'd given in and accepted the unknown gas. I was still weak from the toxin, and short of breath. I had no chance of escaping.
I let them bind my hands together, then I opened my mouth and bit hard on the regulator tube. I sucked in air gratefully, reeling between panic and relief. If they'd wanted us dead, they would have run a fishing knife through our ribs by now—but I still wasn't ready for the alternative.
The harvester approached, and the divers swam forward to meet it, dragging us along. I wanted to shield my face with my hands, but I couldn't. The medusa s knot of transparent tentacles opened up around us, writhing like the pathological topologies of pre-space, like the vacuum come to life.
Then the net closed tight.
21
The harvester's toxins were enervating, but not painful. If anything, they made the ride more bearable: relaxing muscles tensed in revulsion and claustrophobia, dulling the sense of being eaten alive. The creature was probably just a commercial species, not the privately engineered weapon I'd imagined. Belatedly, I started recording; my eyes stung from the salt, but closing them gave me vertigo. I could see Kuwale and the divers guarding ver, blurred as if through frosted glass. Pacified by the toxins, cocooned in translucent jelly, we moved through the bright water.
I pictured us being winched into the air and dropped unceremoniously onto the deck, like the catch I'd seen disgorged earlier. Instead, someone relaxed the harvester with a hormonal wand while we were still in the water, and the divers hauled us up over the side, climbing rope ladders. On deck, Witness matched three more faces. No one spoke to us, and I was still too spaced-out to compose an intelligent question. The woman who'd offered me the regulator bound my feet together, then tied my hands, already joined, to Kuwale's, linking us back-to-back. Another of the divers took away our notepads, wrapped a length of (non-living) fishing net around us—threading it under our arms—then hooked it to the winch and lowered us into an empty hold. When they closed the hatch, we were in total darkness.
I felt my biochemical stupor lifting; the odor of decaying seaweed seemed to help. I waited for Kuwale to volunteer an assessment of our situation; after several minutes of silence, I said, "You know all their faces; they know all your communications codes. Now tell me who's winning the intelligence war."
Ve shifted irritably. "I'll tell you this much: I don't think they'll harm us. They're moderates; they just want us out of the way."
"While they do what?"
"Kill Mosala."
My head swam from the stench; the smelling-salts effect had outlived its usefulness and gone into reverse. "If moderates want to kill Mosala, what do the extremists have in mind?"
Kuwale didn't answer.
