• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

He’d ordered the shapers who now oversaw the aquarium’s operation to stop feeding the fish humans or their remains. While the spectacle had been one that was amusing—as always, watching creatures deny the centrality of pain was amusing—Shedao had sensed a reduction in the nobility of the predators. Presenting them captives diminished these great hunters who could take much tougher prey in the wild. To deliver to them anything they could not recognize as prey they usually caught for themselves was to mock them.

Shedao Shai smiled as best he could. The shapers and priests, the intendants and many of the workers—these were all classes of Yuuzhan Vong society who had become lazy. The warriors were the true hunters. They were the Yuuzhan Vong who clung most closely to the truth of the universe. And yet, he was willing to admit to himself, not all of them were faithful to that concept. Deign Lian had shied from it, and Shedao suspected that even a night in the Embrace would bring him little enlightenment.

Elegos held himself erect as he entered the chamber. He moved fluidly, not giving in to the pain in his body. Shedao Shai could see that he hurt. The motion of his arms was restricted. He limped almost imperceptibly as if a hipbone ground in its socket with each step. Still, he does not deny the pain, but comes to embrace it. He is learning well.

Shedao Shai turned from the fish and nodded to him. “You have worked hard today and yet accomplished nothing.”

The Caamasi smiled slowly as if even the muscles of his face produced pain. “On the contrary, I understand even more your belief that pain is the only constant. My rational mind wishes to reject this idea, but can only do so if I disassociate myself with the reality of my physical self.”

“You realize that is folly. Why?”

The Caamasi’s shoulders slumped slightly. “Philosophers debate whether or not we are creatures of elemental material, or if we somehow have an ethereal nature to us—something that is more than our body and its functioning. Proof of that is impossible to find, so we are left having to accept that, perhaps, we are nothing more than creatures of meat, bone, and blood. If so, we are born in pain and die in pain and know pain throughout. To deny this is to express a belief in the unprovable, which is a fraud we perpetrate upon ourselves. You do not allow yourself to be deceived in this manner.”

Shedao Shai nodded solemnly. “You understand things better than many of my own people. And yet, you do not fully accept this to be true.”

“You have told me you believe in gods. Are they not extracorporeal creatures? Does not their existence suggest that you may have a spiritual component to your existence?”

“No more so than the ability of these fish to breathe water should suggest you, too, somewhere, somehow, have the capacity to do so.” Shedao Shai shrugged. “The gods are the gods. They are aspects of pain and of the universe. We can join their fellowship if we are true to reality.”

Elegos’s head came up. “When all you are is pain you transcend your physical form?”

“Yes.”

“Then it would seem there is more I need to endure since I have not transcended yet.”

“You are fatigued, and I shall let you go rest, soon.” The Yuuzhan Vong leader tapped talons against the transparisteel aquarium. “Deign Lian brought me news of events in our holdings. It seems your assessment that the New Republic would withdraw their probes in light of the failure at Garqi was incorrect. The same ship appeared at Sernpidal to see what we were doing there.”

“Did it find out?”

Shedao Shai refrained from granting Elegos a smile. Yes, play our little game. Don’t ask me what we are doing at Sernpidal, merely inquire if that information is no longer proprietary. “It could be they did. Our forces were misdeployed and did not stop them. They scouted the system and withdrew. There is, of course, a chance that they will fail to correctly analyze the data they collected.”

The Caamasi cocked his head to the side. “You do not believe that.”

“No. The leader who placed his ship where he did is