Visitor (Foreigner, Band 17) - Hardcover

Cherryh, C. J.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0756409101 ISBN 13: 9780756409104

Verlag: DAW, 2016

Inhaltsangabe

The seventeenth novel in Cherryh’s Foreigner space opera series, a groundbreaking tale of first contact and its consequences…

The human and atevi inhabitants of Alpha Station, orbiting the world of the atevi, have picked up a signal from an alien kyo ship telling them that the ship is inbound toward Alpha. Five thousand of the inhabitants of Alpha are human refugees from the now derelict Reunion Station. They have seen this scenario before, when a single kyo ship swooped into the Reunion system and, without a word, melted a major section of Reunion Station with a single pass. These refugees, who were rescued through the combined efforts of an allied group of humans and atevi and brought to safety at Alpha, are now desperate with fear.

Bren Cameron—brilliant human emissary of Tabini-aiji, the powerful atevi political leader on the mainland below, and also the appointee of the human president of the island nation of Mospheira—is the obvious choice of representative to be sent up to deal with both the panicked refugees and the incoming alien ship.

As a member of the spacefaring delegation who rescued the refugees, Bren has talked to kyo before—and even won their trust by saving one of their kind from a Reunioner prison. Because of his remarkable diplomatic and linguistic abilities, Bren managed to communicate with that grateful kyo individual on a limited basis, and he has evidence that that same kyo is on the ship heading to defenseless Alpha Station.

But no one can predict what an alien race might do, or what their motivations could be.

And Bren Cameron, the only human ever to be accepted into atevi society, is now the one individual with a hope of successfully interacting with the crew of the incoming ship. But Bren knows it will take putting himself in the hands of the kyo.

Can Bren count on the gratitude of one individual alien to save his life and the lives of thousands on Alpha Station?

Über diesen Titel

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

C. J. Cherryh planned to write since the age of ten. When she was older, she learned to use a typewriter while triple-majoring in Classics, Latin, and Greek. With more than seventy books to her credit, and the winner of three Hugo Awards, she is one of the most prolific and highly respected authors in the science fiction field. Cherryh was recently named a Damon Knight Memorial Grand Master by the Science Fiction Writers of America. She lives in Washington state. She can be found at cherryh.com.

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CHAPTER ONE

The lift slowed and shifted sideways. The indicator above the doors showed their approach to the change-point, the cross-over, where the human side of the station met the atevi side and did face-to-face business. A schematic to the right of the door showed a second lift, outbound from the docking bay, destined for the same stop.

That lift bore a very welcome envoy from the Earth below.

On the Earth of the atevi—humans did not predominate. But on the station—it was supposed to be a treaty-set balance.

It had gotten out of balance. And that was only one problem he needed to solve in the near future. The very near future.

Bren Cameron kept a precautionary grip on the safety bar—not being a citizen of the station, not being familiar with the route, he remained wary of surprises from the lift system. He wore court dress for the occasion, as a lord of the atevi aishi-di’tat, which he was. Not that the arriving party would care. But the occasion called for dignity. Respect. For him that meant brocade and lace.

Around him, his atevi bodyguards, black-skinned and golden-eyed, towered a head taller, armed and watchful. Wherever he went, they went, black-uniformed, constantly in contact with atevi authority, who could amplify their small force considerably on short notice.

Banichi and Jago, Tano and Algini—that team of four was the heart of his own household. Two more of the Assassins’ Guild attended him on this occasion, one man from the aiji-dowager, who was in charge of the mission; and one from Lord Geigi’s bodyguard, as a guide through station systems and a personal gesture of support from Geigi, who had been on duty shift after shift as atevi stationmaster in Central—control of which was supposed to rotate between human and atevi every two shifts, and pass politely between the two authorities.

That rotation had happened like clockwork for years . . . until—God, what was it? Five? Six?—days ago, when outside events hurtled the world toward a meeting they didn’t want under the best of circumstances. The alien and extremely dangerous kyo had arrived insystem and were now heading toward the inner solar system, presumably for a visit.

Presumably being the operative word. The kyo were already at war. Not with them, but with someone, and it was a concern—on two fronts. They hoped it was actually the kyo visiting them and not the unknown Someone. And they had aboard the station five thousand survivors from the other human station—Reunion—which had run afoul of what was indisputably a kyo attack. The kyo had had second thoughts afterward. They had allowed the evacuation of the survivors and promised peace.

One truly hoped that understanding had held up.

And with news that the kyo were inbound, the Mospheiran-born stationmaster, Mikas Tillington, had gone berserk, locked down the Reunioner sections of the human side of the station, and refused to release control of Central to atevi on their regular rotation. Mikas Tillington had put himself in sole control. Mikas Tillington had determined he was not going to turn decision-making over to his atevi allies, not with this emergency bearing down on them, and he had emphatically refused to trust the Reunioners, who had come in as outsiders and a problem to his organized station operations, even to be free to walk the station corridors.

The Reunioners hadn’t been treated well by Tillington’s administration, and they were now panicked out of all reason.

Well, Tillington could lock the Reunioners into their sections, but not even he had dared lock the atevi shuttle out of dock. And that atevi shuttle had brought up not only Bren Cameron, human translator for Tabini-aiji, head of the atevi government, but also Tabini’s grandmother the aiji-dowager, and the aiji’s nine-year-old son, with staff and security, who brought the certain word that atevi intended to be in charge of contact with the kyo—and determined that they also would be in charge of the station, given the meltdown of the human-side stationmaster.

Once aboard, Bren, armed with a mandate from the Mospheiran president and the support of two of the four Phoenix captains, had walked into Central, ousted Tillington and shifted control to the atevi control center.

Tillington having refused to negotiate at that point, Bren had locked Tillington in his own apartment under house arrest and set the atevi-side stationmaster, Lord Geigi, on watch and watch with his crew, all this pending the arrival of the shuttle bearing Tillington’s replacement.

Also in custody, now, given a rapidly worsening situation in the locked sections, was the self-appointed leader of the Reunioners, one Louis Baynes Braddock, the former Reunion stationmaster, currently the primary troublemaker among the refugees. Braddock was Pilots’ Guild, which in the distant past had run the ship. He claimed authority, he had ruled Reunion for over a decade, and, with Reunion lost, he had delusions of taking command here—a command that might never have gained followers, had it not been for Tillington’s hate campaign against the Reunioners.

With the kyo approaching and the Reunioners in a state of panic, Braddock had made his move—and landed likewise under arrest.

It was not a good time for a civil war.

And with the four Phoenix captains themselves split two and two—two having backed Tillington and two vehemently opposed—it was time for the two powers of Earth to step in and inform the authorities in space what they intended to do about that rapidly approaching ship.

Two powers controlled the planet: the aishidi’tat and its leader Tabini-aiji, who owned all but one of the shuttles that kept the station going, and the President of the island of Mospheira, where humans had found refuge from the original quarrel that had split colonists from ship-folk—and where they had lived and built for two hundred years, below a dead and moth-balled station in orbit, never expecting Phoenix would return.

Never expecting Phoenix would have created another human station in another species’ claimed territory.

Certainly never expecting that a ship from that species would be coming in on Phoenix’s trail with a purpose yet to be determined.

Tabini-aiji had sent Bren Cameron up to deal with the impending visitors by whatever means he found necessary. Necessity thus far had included the forceful removal of Tillington from Central, and the arrest of Braddock and his followers.

The President of Mospheira was also moving fast. He had quickly launched Mospheira’s only shuttle and sent a replacement for Tillington, a unilateral appointment, with no reference to the Mospheiran legislature.

A good thing, in Bren’s opinion. He needed help, someone to take the reins of the human-side operation, Mospheiran and Reunioner, because the Phoenix captains weren’t in a position to do it, the atevi authority shouldn’t do it, and he had his hands full with what was coming in on them from outside the solar system.

The current time was first-shift, a fact completely irrelevant to Bren’s sleep-deprived body. The crisis of the moment had determined his schedule ever since he’d come aboard. He was currently operating on three hours of sleep. He’d had tea and toast for a breakfast, issued a few housekeeping orders, cleared small details left from yesterday, slipped into a good coat, and set out, desperately relieved to know that the shuttle was here, and to know that Tillington and his...

Details zur Ausgabe

• Verlag: DAW
• Erscheinungsdatum: 2016
• Sprache: Englisch
• ISBN 10: 0756409101
• ISBN 13: 9780756409104
• Einband: Gebundene Ausgabe
• Anzahl der Seiten: 384
• Kontakt zum Hersteller: DAW; https://www.aeuln.top/; ; Kl?nenfeldstr. 22; Muttenz; 4132; Schweiz
• Verantwortliche Person: Nicht verfügbar