Free Starship Fall by Eric Brown Page B

about something.” I took a sip of juice.
    She inclined her head. She employed human gestures tentatively, uncertainly, much as a stranger to the English language might use unfamiliar words.
    She said, “The other day I saw the future. Or rather I saw what might be the future, or rather possible futures. Who knows which future might happen in this reality?”
    She fell silent.
    “And?” I prompted.
    “And the difficulty is in knowing which future might happen. Our elders have a theory, perhaps you have heard of this theory? It is that all the futures we see when we smoke the bones will come to happen, in many different realities. Our elders say that we can make the future we want in our reality, through guiding events to the desired outcome, and by being virtuous and good.”
    I smiled. “Our scientists have a theory that there are a multiplicity of differing words, an infinity of realities,” I told her.
    She lifted a hand in an odd gesture, much as a puppet might perform the movement. “I saw three futures, David. Two were vague, while one was more… vivid. According to our elders, the more vivid the vision, the more likely it is to happen in our reality.”
    “That makes sense,” I murmured. I hesitated, then said, “And what were these visions?” I stopped myself, and made a performance of hitting my forehead with the palm of my hand. “Sorry. I forgot. You can’t talk about them, can you?”
    She smiled at my play-acting, appreciating the humour. “What I said the other day, about not being able to talk about them... I said that because Hawk was there.”
    I felt a sudden apprehension. “I don’t see...” I began, though I did see, dimly.
    She went on, “I can talk about what I saw, but I do not want to tell Hawk about what I saw. So, please, do not say anything to him. Do you promise?”
    “Of course,” I said. “What is it, Kee?”
    “I smoked the bones, David, and then I passed out. I experienced… oh, words cannot describe the wonderful feeling. It was bliss, it was… a word Hawk sometimes uses… eu- eu...”
    “Euphoric?” I suggested.
    She nodded. “Yes, euphoric. I was in a different place, and I was gloriously happy. And then the visions began.” She looked down at her hands, her fingers twisting.
    “What did you see?”
    She looked up, staring at me with massive eyes. She seemed frightened. “I saw Hawk. He was in the sacred cavern. You were there, and a tall woman with dark hair. I saw Hawk, standing beside the entrance to the chamber, and he was shouting at someone, and arguing...”
    She stopped there, shaking her head from side to side as if in disbelief.
    “What happened?” I prompted.
    “And then... then Hawk was attacked. I think he was stabbed. He fell, holding his chest.” She was crying now, hunched and weeping. She shook her head. “Then the vision changed. I saw myself alone, and weeping.”
    “Who attacked him?” I asked.
    She shook her head. “The image was vague. I could not make out his attacker...”
    I nodded, aware that my throat was dry. I told myself that what Kee had told me was no more than alien superstition, utter nonsense that had no rational bearing on how events in this world would play themselves out. I said, “And the other visions?”
    She lifted her shoulders in a quick shrug. “In the other visions I saw me and Hawk, on an alien world, walking hand in hand beside a silver sea… and another vision showed me in old age, with Hawk looking after me...”
    I gestured. “Well, there you are, then. Two of the three showed a happy outcome.”
    She screwed her pretty face into a mask of anguish. “But the first vision, the strongest vision, showed Hawk dying. This means... this means that this is more likely to happen, unless we work hard so that it will not.”
    I nodded, playing along with her. “And how do we do that?”
    She said, “You must tell our friends, Matt and Maddie, tell them what I saw, tell them that Hawk must never again