A Covenant of Justice (46 page)

The Nexus responded in the voice of the Twelve. “Responsibility
is
not authority. You may claim only your share—and no more than that.”

d'Vashti pointed to the mountain in the sky. “That
is
my authority. Where
is
yours? You don't have thirteen TimeBinders here, do you? Where
is
Willowar?”

The Nexus didn't answer that. He frowned.

“Tell me it doesn't matter. Tell me that you have critical mass,” d'Vashti said. “I say it does matter. I demand that the TimeBinder of Willowar step forward and add his authority to this Gathering. Where
is
Willowar?”

And abruptly, the Nexus knew what d'Vashti wanted. He said, “If the TimeBinder of Willowar
is
present, let him step forward and join us. He will
be
welcome.”

d'Vashti smiled. He reached into his robe and pulled out a shimmering headband. “Thank you,” he said. “I will.” He lifted it to his head and lowered it carefully to his temples. Gasps of horror rippled across the arena.

The Kernel of the Phaestor authority staggered for a moment, but he held himself erect, letting the headband establish itself. Then, abruptly, he became another person. His face relaxed, became peaceful—and at the same time, shaded with emotion. He stared across the intervening space at the Nexus.

“Do you feel me now? Do you feel my strength? My power? Do you feel the authority of the Phaestor in your head? Go ahead, old man—create something for me. Create a new Regency. One even more powerful than before!”

The Nexus staggered as if two great armies fought a war within his head. He collapsed to the floor of the pedestal, struggled for a moment, clutching his head, clutching the constricting headband, as if trying to pull it off, then he uttered a great gasp of horror and shook as if possessed by a fit.

Around him, the TimeBinders also staggered. Nyota began wailing in pain. Three-Dollar sank to his knees. The others collapsed where they stood or clutched painfully at their skulls.

Only d'Vashti remained unaffected. “None of you can match the power available to a single well-trained Phaestor. You gave us
dreamtime
. We used it to master ourselves—and now I will use it to master all of you!”

Harry Mertz pulled himself laboriously to his feet. The connection to the TimeBinders had been broken. He spoke only for himself now. But he knew it would be enough. Somehow, he managed to get the words out. “Your authority exists only because we gave it to you. Now we revoke it. The stand we take here will outlive us. Already the word goes forth. The Regency
is
dissolved.”

“On the contrary,” said d'Vashti. “I
am
the new Nexus. The Regency will continue, stronger than ever—with myself as its ultimate leader. I now order this Gathering dissolved.” He flung his arms wide, as if in victory. Harry Mertz staggered as if struck. He sank to his knees. Several of the TimeBinders fell to the ground, gasping and clutching their heads or their chests.

“You see?” said d'Vashti. “You never had a chance. I've had you under my guns since the moment you started. Now—” He started to gesture.

Somehow Harry managed to get the words out, laboring to make himself heard. “You fool. You don't understand the power of the linkage—”

d'Vashti laughed. He completed the gesture.

Nothing happened.

And then . . . everyone in the arena looked up. A soft puff of light had flashed against the hull of
The Black Destructor
.

“What
was
that?” asked d'Vashti.

“Oh, shit—” said Gito.

“Uh—?” asked Sawyer.

“Somebody had a dirty thought.”

“Huh?” Finn didn't want to believe it either.

“Didn't you hear it? Something went
fwoop
!”

They looked back down the seemingly endless corridor. Something dark grew there. The channels of lights blinked and pulsated alarmingly.

“Goddammit,” said Finn. “I knew we couldn't trust the little bastard, but I didn't think he'd go off that quickly!”

The walls of the starship nearest the singularity began to wrinkle. The event-horizon of the pinpoint black hole now stood as a three meter sphere. It flickered like an uneasy ghost. Around it, the panels began pulling off the walls. They flung themselves through the air and tried to wrap themselves around the event horizon—then they just
vanished
into it. The bigger pieces folded themselves into crumpled balls and pulled themselves into the black hole with a dreadful crackling and crunching sound—flickers of radiation and static electricity began flashing across the surface of the sphere, and every object coming near it. St. Elmo's fire danced up and down the corridor.

The devastation expanded. The radiation increased, growing brighter every second. A great wind began sucking into the flickering sphere. The ship's atmosphere poured into the artificially widened singularity, pulling pieces of debris and scraps of material along with it. A stanchion crumpled and broke with a great creak and clang of metal. A section of corridor collapsed.

At the far end of the passage, Shariba-Jen said calmly, “We have less than ten minutes.” He pointed. “The docking ports lie that way.”

The mountain shook then. The great ship shuddered with an impact that knocked Sawyer sideways into Finn and both of them to the floor. Gito grabbed a stanchion. Even holding Juda-Linda, Jen compensated and held his balance. Alarms began going off. Loud clanging noises, raspy saw-toothed buzzers, klaxons, bells, chimes, and crisp metallic voices announcing, “We have a breach of integrity in the lower keel.”

All the air-tight doors on
The Black Destructor
began slamming shut, one after the other. They knew it wouldn't help. The pinpoint hole had become a sucking maw with an incredibly intense gravitational pull. It would pull the entire starship into it, inexorably. The monster ate. The vessel crunched and crashed and continued collapsing loudly into it.

Sawyer and Finn came up against a sealed door. Sawyer kicked it and slammed it with his hand, instantly regretting his anger.

Jen said, “Up there—we'll have to use the manual accesses.” He pointed toward a metal ladder. Finn went up it first, popping the hatch into the main escape corridor. Immediately, he turned around and pulled Sawyer up after him. Jen handed up Juda-Linda, and Gito followed.

Panicked crewmembers came running from all directions, racing toward their emergency stations. Sawyer wanted to warn them that they should abandon ship, but he knew he didn't dare. They ran past him, ignoring the strangers in the passage. The corridors had begun to shake now, as if the ship had caught itself in a state of perpetual earthquake.

Jen scooped up Juda-Linda and began leading the way again, straight toward the aft docking bays. But as they charged around the last corner, they came colliding up against—Lady Zillabar and her guardians, just coming in from the opposite way!

For a moment, all of them stared at each other in a horrified tableau.

“You?!” Zillabar said to Sawyer and Finn Markham.

“You?!” They said in reply.

And then—without even thinking, they fired. Gito shot the first Dragon Guard right between the eyes, Jen tossed the still-unconscious Juda-Linda to the rear and used the reaction from that gesture to plunge his arm right into the chest of the closest Dragon. He activated his industrial laser-finger and burnt out the creature's heart. Finn shot the third Dragon in the balls, then sliced his beam upward to stab out the creature's eyes. Sawyer hit the fourth one with a stun-grenade, then kicked sideways to disable the Vampire youth who led the party. They had the advantage of surprise and readiness. The Dragons toppled like dominoes.

Finn turned to check behind—and saw Zillabar going for one of the Dragon's guns. He leapt after her, grabbing her arm and pulling her back. He let her have it with a roundhouse punch.

Coming up quickly to cover him, Sawyer said, “That ain't no way to treat a lady.”

Finn grimaced. “She ain't no lady. Come on, let's go.” Finn bent down and scooped up Zillabar, tossing the woman over his shoulder. He headed for the nearest shuttle. Shariba-Jen had already grabbed Juda-Linda, and Gito had popped the door.

“Huh?” Sawyer stared. “Why—?”

For some reason, Finn felt he had to answer in the Old Tongue. “Because,” he said. “
Life is sacred. Everywhere
.”

Around them, the great structure of the Armageddon-class warship creaked alarmingly. It sounded like a slow-motion avalanche, a death-rattle, a metallic cry of despair. The scream of the metal frame went on and on and on, as it bent and cracked and poured itself into a three-meter hole. Sparks and explosions echoed somewhere in the distance. They heard screams and panic.

As Finn climbed down the tunnel, Zillabar pounded on his shoulders. “Put me down, you stinking son of a human!”

“Nope. I insist on rescuing you!”

“To make me a slave again? An act of ridicule? Never!”

“No. I just want to prove you
wrong
.”

“I'd rather
die
!”

Finn stopped, very annoyed. “All right,” he said. “Have it your own way.” He dumped her disgustedly to her feet, left her there, jumped through the shuttleboat door and slammed the hatch in her face.

“What about the Lady?” Sawyer asked.

“She changed her mind.”

“Just as well. She never did get along with the rest of us.”

Shariba-Jen sat at the controls of the shuttleboat, swearing furiously. “The damn thing won't start. The pod bay doors won't open. And the ion-drive modules keep going pocketa-pocketa instead of rrrrm-rrrrm.”

“Kick it!” Gito hollered. “That always works for me.”

The great vessel began to crumple. Sparks and explosions flickered along its hull.

Far below, on the disk of the Forum, the crowd watched in horror as the silent horror unfolded. Shuttleboats dropped away from the vessel, one after the other; bright sparks of light rushing toward safe harbor.

Even d'Vashti stared—stunned into speechlessness.

The great vessel slowly imploded, collapsing inward around the singularity at its heart. The last few escape pods fell away from it. The great ship sucked inward in a sudden final rush—and finally vanished in a blaze of brilliant blue light.

And then . . . a great cheer went up all across the flat disk of the Forum. Whoops and shrieks of joy. Whistles and catcalls of hysteria. Delirium and delight. A celebration of emotional release. Cries of victory resonated and echoed. People grabbed each other, tears streaming from their eyes; they pounded each other on the back. They hugged. They kissed. They held each other close, turning around and around. They opened their arms and their hands and united their hearts.

The Dragons shifted among themselves, uncertain and wary. They looked as if they thought they should take action, but they held themselves back. They had no experience with this kind of situation.

And then . . . the Nexus stood up again in the center of the arena and looked across the intervening space at Kernel Sleestak d'Vashti. “You are fighting the TimeBand, d'Vashti. It works only when you submerge your identity in the sea of memory. You cannot impress your will on six thousand years of history, hoping to reshape it with a single hunger. It doesn't work that way. You must relax and let us in. Swim in the sea of community. Relax. Surrender to the community of minds and become one with the rest of us. Let your mind be part of ours—that's the way. Now, you can see the larger vision and realize that this small tiny hunger of yours, this dreadful lust for power and authority serves no one, not even you. We welcome your strength in the new vision. You have much to give us. But you must surrender to the inevitable now so that we can all end the dreadful killing together. The choice
is
yours, Kernel Sleestak d'Vashti. How say you?”

d'Vashti recoiled. He staggered backward. “No!” he screamed. “No! I will not
be
beaten.” He gestured and the Dragons instantly unslung their weapons and pointed them all at the Nexus. “Do you think you are stronger than this?”

“Listen to the TimeBand, d'Vashti. Listen—! This is your last chance.”

d'Vashti nodded mockingly. “Yes, I thought so. You have brave words and no weapons. Now, I'll teach you the dead man's victory.”

“Ahh,” the Nexus smiled. “So be it.” He bowed in a curiously inviting gesture. “If that is your choice, then go for it. This will
be
an interesting death.” The Nexus held up the caduceus he carried so all could see it. He held it aloft like a shield of virtue.

For just the barest instant, a flicker of doubt flashed across d'Vashti's face. Then he shook it away and lashed out in anger. “You get to have an interesting death. I get to
be
right.” He gestured to the Dragons above, giving the order to fire.

The needle beams struck then. They bounced off the Nexus like water splashing off a wall. The beams splattered outward in all directions. They leapt out across the arena, directly back to the Dragon Guards, striking one after the other, igniting them instantly ablaze. The Dragons' screams cut off sharply as each one flared brightly and exploded into nothingness. One after the other, they disintegrated, shriveling into shadows of ash that whipped away quickly in the breeze.

d'Vashti stared in horror. His gaze circled the upper rim of the arena and them came slowly back to the center where the Nexus still held the caduceus high. It gleamed and dazzled. Intelligent energy crackled off of it, sparking and fizzing.

“See what you have created!” The Nexus roared at him. “Your own hatred comes back to you amplified by the TimeBands, aimed by our memories, enlarged by our wisdom, expanded by our vision of what
is
possible. Your own mind focuses the energy, because you are wearing a TimeBand too!”