The Eternal Enemy by Michael Berlyn Page A

conscious genetic engineering, they had mutated toward light-speech for aesthetic reasons. Most Habers he’d seen on Gandji had had the latent capability to talk, though none really liked using it. And whenever Markos communicated strictly through his eyes, he felt he missed about fifty percent of the informational content while getting about seventy-five percent of the emotional content of the message.
    He was sure there wouldn’t be any cheering crowds waiting there for them. Even if they had somehow been informed of the ship’s arrival time, he couldn’t see these creatures piling out of houses (or whatever they lived in) to crowd the streets in excitement. They weren’t returning home after having won a war—they were imported talent, a cross between saviors and mercenaries. Cheers? Not very likely.
    Now all he had to worry about was whether Aurianta was populated by Habers or by Hydrans.
    If it were Hydran, he had a very good idea as to the kind of reception they would receive.

9
    Without a viewscreen Markos had no idea what Aurianta looked like. He sat beside the Old One, squirming in his seat, anxious to get outside and see the planet. If he had been aboard the Paladin , he would have already known what awaited them. It would have been easy to see through the logarithmic magnification of the viewscreens. But the Wedge , as Markos had named it, had no screens that produced coherent visual pictures. As they landed, the thin, transparent screens before them had lit up supplying landing information to the Haber, but swirling colors through a grid made little sense to Markos.
    He was burning to leave the ship, to see where the Old One had brought him and the children. Most of his fears over finding the planet overrun by Hydrans were put to rest; the Old One would know by now if Hydrans were out there.
    â€œWell, Old One, it looks like we’ve made it,” Markos said, smiling inside, bubbling with excitement, eagerness, and anticipation.
    The Old One showed a weak, watery, noncommital red.
    â€œYou’re not glad to be back, then?” Markos asked.
    â€œI, I no longer belong.”
    â€œWhat? That’s not true, and you know it,” Markos said. “I’m the one who doesn’t belong—not you. I don’t even have the slightest idea what it’s like out there, or what they’ll think of me, or how they’ll treat me. I’m not even sure they know themselves.
    â€œYou’re the Haber—not me. You’re returning home with the solution you were sent out to find. Doesn’t that mean anything? Don’t you think your brothers will be grateful?”
    â€œYes,” the Haber said. But the red he generated through his eyes was weak, as though he weren’t really convinced himself. “They, they will be grateful, but that does not change the important things. I, I am still taboo.”
    â€œNot to me, you’re not. Listen to me, Old One. We may not have another opportunity to talk like this for a long time. If you want to spend the rest of your life in mourning, meditating down to zero energy and death, then you go right ahead. But if you do, you’ll be failing yourself and your people. You and your brothers have taught me a lot about change. But let me teach you something: Your way of life is to accept and deal with change as best you can, right?”
    The Old One showed a solid red. “It is time for us, us to go. We, we can leave the ship now.”
    â€œWait a minute. Whatever’s out there can wait.”
    The Old One showed red again.
    â€œIf you were on Aurianta and you ate something in your final cycle, then I could understand. But we’re at war, and war forces us to change our attitudes. War makes us take a harder look at what we are, where we’ve been, and where we’re going.
    â€œTake a hard look at yourself. You’re the closest thing to a friend I have. I need your help. You can’t