Parallax Red and then to Earth, you and your followers will have what, ten years, perhaps fifteen on the outside, of life?”
The old man drew his robe about him. “Accept your fate with dignity. If you’re truly my son, you will do so.”
Sindri whirled away from the shaft, stamping noisily down the steps at the side of the dais. “I don’t surrender as easily as you, Pop. If you are truly my father, neither would you.”
He returned to where they stood, declaring, “Show-and-tell time is over. By now, you should have some understanding of the tragedy I’m trying to avert. Can any of you offer suggestions?”
He spoke in such a way as if he expected no response. To Kane and Grant’s surprise, Brigid said mildly, “If the countermeasures you’ve already undertaken don’t bear fruit, you’ve no choice but to go quietly into the night of extinction.”
Sindri peered up at her, head cocked at a quizzical angle. “Indeed, Miss Brigid. What are those counter-measures I’ve already undertaken?”
Grant and Kane knew Brigid was fast, but even they were taken aback by how swiftly she shot out her left arm. Her fist impacted with a meaty smack on the point of Sindri’s chin, sending him reeling backward. His walking stick clattered to the floor, tangling in his feet and causing him to fall unceremoniously on his back.
The three trolls voiced hooting cries of anger and shock, and they pelted forward, their eyes fastened on Brigid.
Two of them just managed to see Kane’s right fist and Grant’s left boot driving at them. Arms flailing, spurting blood from a nose and a lip, the pair slammed into each other.
The third troll flew over his companions in a steel-springed bound, somersaulting between Grant and Kane and landing feetflrst against the small of Brigid’s back. Flinging out her arms, she staggered forward. She would have fallen atop Sindri had he not rolled frantically to one side. As she dropped to her hands and knees, the troll alighted just behind her, small fists raised over the exposed nape of her neck.
Kane went for him, but Sindri bellowed, “Enough!”
The troll immediately dropped his hands to his sides and stepped quickly over to Sindri. Kane kept coming, stopping only when Sindri snatched up his cane and held it before him like a sword. “Enough, I said!”
Turning toward Brigid, he put a hand on her arm and helped her up. Wincing, she fingered her back.
“Why did you strike me, Miss Brigid?” His voice was filled with anger, but full of reproach, too.
She glared at him. “You learned I have an eidetic memory. Did you think I forgot what I saw, or wrote it off as a dream?”
Sindri swallowed hard. Perplexed, Kane asked, “What did you see, Baptiste?”
In a voice quaking with barely controlled fury and disgust, Brigid answered, “That filthy gnome did more than interrogate us while we were unconscious. He experimented on us, violated us. I woke up just long enough to see what he was doing.”
“I have the right,” Sindri stated firmly. “Any life-form has the right to surviveby any means necessary.”
“What are you talking about?” demanded Grant.
Brigid ran unsteady fingers through her hair. “Ste-rility and infertility. There’s absolutely no point to leaving Mars if those conditions can’t be reversed.”
Without looking at him, Brigid stated, “Kane, I saw you hooked up to a machine. It was milking you of sperm. Grant probably got the same treatment.”
Kane instantly became aware of his sore genitals again.
“And with me,” Brigid continued in a rush, “Sindri took a personal hand. He inserted something into me. All done against our wills, just like the ancestors of the transadapts he pretends to weep for.”
No one moved or spoke for a long moment. The only sound was the deep bass hum. The trolls Kane and Grant had incapacitated stirred, climbing slowly erect. One of them groaned and broke the frozen tableau.
Grant took a threatening step toward Sindri, face an expressionless ebony mask, but his dark eyes held a homicidal glitter.
“Don’t be foolish,” Sindri said. “Killing me will avail you nothing. You don’t know the location of the mat trans, so you can’t return to Parallax Red .”