Heaven's Reach (35 page)

In fact, those milling about the Plotting Room watched
two
views of the Fractal World, depicted on giant screens—both of them totally different, and both officially “true.”

Speaking as a Jijo savage—one who got his impressions of spaceflight by reading Earthling books from the pre-Contact Twenty-Second Century—I found things rather confusing. For instance, many of those texts assumed Faster-Than-Light travel was impossible. Or else, in space-romance yarns, authors simply took FTL for granted. Either way, you could deal with events in a simple way. They happened when they happened. Every cause was followed by its effects, and that was that.

But the screen to my left showed time going backward!

My autoscribe explained it to me, and I hope I get this right. It seems that each microsecond, as
Streaker
flickered back into normal space from C Level, photons would strike the ship's aft-facing telescope, providing an image of the huge “criswell structure” that got smaller and dimmer as we fled. The pictures grew
older
, too, as we outraced successive waves of light. By the contorted logic of Einstein, we were going back in time.

I stared, fascinated, as the massive habitat seemed to get healthier before my eyes. Damaged zones reknitted. The awful wound grew back together. And glittering sparks told of myriad converging refugee ships, apparently coming home.

The spectacle provoked each of my friends differently.

Huck laughed aloud. Ur-ronn snuffled sadly, and Pincer-Tip kept repeating “gosh-osh-osh!”

I could not fault any of them for their reactions. The sequence was at once both poignantly lamentable and hilariously absurd.

Over to the right, Sara and Gillian watched a different set of images, caught by hyperwave each time we flickered
into
C Level. Here my impression was of queasy simultaneousness. This screen seemed to tell what was happening right now, back at the Fractal World. Time
apparently moved forward, depicting the aftermath of our violent escape.

The effects flowing from each cause.

Of course things are really much more complicated. That picture kept wavering, for instance, like a draft version of some story whose author still wasn't sure yet what to commit to paper.

Sara explained it to me this way—

“Photons haul slow truths, Alvin, while speedy hyperwaves carry
probabilities.
”

So this image represented just the most
likely
scenario unfolding behind us. However slim, there remained a chance it wasn't true. Things might not be happening this way.

By God, Ifni, and the Egg, I still pray for that slim chance.

What we saw, through rippling static, was a harsh tale of rapid deterioration.

More than a single great laceration now maimed the great sphere. Its frail skin peeled and curled away from several newly slashed wounds. These fresh cracks spread, branching rapidly as we watched, each one spilling raw sunlight the color of urrish blood.

Hundreds of exterior spikes had already broken loose, tumbling end over end as more towering fragments toppled toward space with each passing moment. I could only guess how much worse things were
inside
the great shell. By now, had a million Jijo-sized windows shattered, exposing forests, steppes, and oceans to raw vacuum?

The hyperwave scene updated in fits and starts, sometimes appearing to backtrack or revise a former glimpse. From one moment to the next, some feature of devastation that had been
here
suddenly shifted over
there.
No single detail seemed fixed or firmly determined. But the trend remained the same.

I felt claws dig into my back as little Huphu and the tytlal, Mudfoot, clambered onto opposite shoulders, rubbing against me, beckoning a song to ward off the sour mood. Partly from numb shock, I responded with my family's version of the Dirge for Unremarked Passing
—an umble so ancient that it probably predates hoonish Uplift, going back to before our brains could grasp the full potential of despair.

Roused by that low resonance, Dr. Baskin turned and glanced at my vibrating throat sac. I am told that starfaring humans do not like hoons very much, but Sara Koolhan whispered in her ear and Gillian nodded approvingly.

Clearly, she understood.

A few duras later, after I finished, the little spinning Niss hologram popped into place, hovering in midair nearby.

“Kaa reports that we are about ten minutes away from t-point insertion.”

Dr. Baskin nodded.

“Are there any changes in our entourage?”

Her digital aide seemed to give a casual, unconcerned twist.

“We are followed by a crowd of diverse vessels,”
the machine voice replied.
“Some are robotic, a majority house oxygen-breathing refugees, bearing safe-passage emblems of the Retired Order of Life.

“Of course, all of them are keeping a wary distance from the Jophur battleship.”

The Niss paused for a moment or two, before continuing.

“Are you absolutely sure you want us to set course for Tanith?”

The tall woman shrugged.

“I'm still open to other suggestions. It seems we've tried everything else, and that includes hiding in the most obscure corner of the universe … no offense, Alvin.”

“None taken,” I replied, since her depiction of Jijo was doubtless true. “What is Tanith?”

The Niss Machine answered.

“It is a planet, where there exists a sector headquarters of the Library Institute. The one nearest Earth. To this site Captain Creideiki would have taken our discoveries in the first place, if we had not fallen into a cascade of violence and treachery. Lacking other options
,
Dr. Baskin believes we must now fall back on that original plan.”

“But didn't you already try surrendering to the Institutes? At that place called Wakka—”

“Oakka. Indeed, two years ago we evaded pursuit by merciless battle fleets in order to make that attempt. But the madness sweeping our civilization preceded us there too. Sworn monks of the monastic, bureaucratic brotherhoods abjured their oaths of neutrality, choosing instead to revert to older loyalties. Motivated in part by ancient grudges—or else the huge bounties offered for
Streaker'
s capture by various fanatical alliances—they attempted to seize the Earthship for their blood and clan relations.”

“So the Institutes couldn't be trusted then. What's different this time?”

Dr. Baskin pointed to a smaller display screen.

“
That
is what's different, Alvin.”

It showed the Jophur battleship—the central fact of our lives now. The huge oblate warship clung to us like a bad smell, following closely ever since their earlier assault failed to disable
Streaker.
Even with Kaa at the helm, the dolphin crew thought it infeasible to lose them. You'd have better luck shaking off your shadow on a sunny day.

“Our orders are clear. Under no circumstances can we let one faction snatch our data for themselves.”

“So instead we shall go charging straight into one of the busiest ports of Galaxy Two?”

The Niss sounded doubtful, if not outright snide. But Dr. Baskin showed no sign of reacting to its tone.

“Isn't that our best chance? To head for a crowded place, with lots of traffic and possibly ships big enough to balance that imposing cruiser out there? Besides, there
is
a possibility that Oakka was an exception. An aberration. Maybe officials at Tanith will remember their oaths.”

The Niss expressed doubt with an impolite sound.

“There is a slim chance of that. Or possibly sheer surprise might prompt action by the cautious majority of
Galactic clans, who have so far kept static, frozen by indecision.”

“That's been our dream all along. And it could happen, if enough synthians and pargi and their allies have ships in the area. Why wouldn't they intercede, in support of tradition and the law?”

“Your optimism is among your greatest charms, Dr. Baskin—to imagine that the moderates can be swayed to make any sort of decision quickly, when commitment may expose them to mortal danger. By now it is quite clear to everyone that a Time of Changes is at hand. They are pondering issues of racial survival Justice for wolflings will not take high priority.

“Far more likely, your abrupt appearance will provoke free-for-all combat above Tanith, making Kithrup seem like a mere skirmish. I assume you realize the armadas who are currently besieging Terra lie just two jumps away from Tanith? In less than a standard day they would likely converge
—”

“Abating the siege of Earth? That sounds worthwhile.”

The Niss hologram tightened its clustered, spinning lines.

“We are dancing around the main problem, Dr. Baskin. Our destination is moot. The Jophur will not allow us to reach Tanith. Of that you can be sure.”

Sara Koolhan spoke up for the first time.

“Can they stop us? They tried once, and failed.”

“Alas, Sage Koolhan, our apparent invulnerability cannot last. The Jophur were taken by surprise, but by now they are surely scanning their onboard database, delving for the flaw in our wondrous armor.”

They referred to the gleaming mantle now blanketing
Streaker
's hull. As an ignorant Jijoan, I couldn't tell what made the coating so special, though I vividly recall the anxious time when swarms of machine entities sealed it around us—dark figures struggling enigmatically over our fate, without bothering to seek consent from a shipload of wolflings and sooners.

The final disputants were two sets of giant repair robots, those at the stern trying to harvest carbon from
Streaker
's hull for raw materials, and the other team
busy transforming the star soot into a layer that shimmered like the glassy Spectral Flow.

Lightning seemed to pass between the groups.
Meme-directive impulses
, the Niss identified those flickering bursts, advising us not to watch, lest our brains become somehow infected. In a matter of duras, the contest ended without any machines being physically harmed. But one group must have abruptly had its “mind changed.”

Abruptly united in purpose, both sets of robots fell to work, completing
Streaker
's transformation just in time, before the first disintegrator ray struck.

“Who says there has to be a flaw?” Dr. Baskin asked. “We seem to be unharmable, at least by long-range beams.”

She sounded confident, but I remember how shocked Gillian, Sara, Tsh't, and the others had seemed, to survive an instant after the attack began. Only the crippled engineer, Emerson d'Anite, grunted and nodded, as if he had expected something like this all along.

“There are no perfect defenses,”
countered the Niss.
“Every variety of weapon has been logged and archived by the Great Library. If a technique seems surprising or miraculous, it could be because it was abandoned long ago for very good reasons. Once the Jophur find those reasons, our new shield will surely turn from an advantage into a liability.”

The humans and dolphins clearly disliked this logic. I can't say I cared for it myself. But how could anyone refute it? Even we sooners know one of the basic truisms of life in the Five Galaxies—

If something isn't in the Library, it is almost certainly impossible.

Still, I'll never forget that time, just after the big construction robots finished their task and jetted away, leaving this battered ship shining in space, as uttergloss as any jewel.

Streaker
turned to flee through the great hole in the Fractal World, and suddenly great spears of destructive light bathed her from several directions at once! Alarms
blared and each ray of focused energy seemed to shove us outward with titanic force.

But we did not burn. Instead, a strange noise surrounded us, like the groaning of some deep-sea leviathan. Huck pulled in all her eyes. Pincer withdrew all five legs, and Ur-ronn coiled her long neck, letting out a low urrish howl.

All the instruments went crazy … and yet we did not burn!

Soon most of the crew agreed with the initial assessment of Hannes Suessi, who decreed that the disintegrator beams must be
faked.

A showy demonstration, they must be meant to frighten off our enemies and let us escape. No other answer seemed to explain our survival!

That is, until the Jophur pounced on us a short time later, and
their
searing rays also vanished with the same mysterious groan.

Then we knew.

Someone had done us a favor … and we didn't even know who to thank. Or whether the blessing cloaked more misfortune, still to come.

A voice called over the intercom.

“Transfer point insertion approaching in
 … 
thirty ssseconds.”

Those in the Plotting Room turned to watch the forward viewer, looking ahead toward a tangled web of darkness—first in a series that would carry us far beyond Galaxy Four to distant realms my friends and I had barely heard of in legend and tales about gods. But my hoonish digestion was already anticipating the coming nausea. I remember thinking how much better it would suit me to be aboard my father's dross ship, pulling halyards and umbling with the happy crew, with Jijo's warm wind in my face and salt spray singing on the sails.

Back at the hyperwave display, I found another person less interested in where we were going than the place we were leaving behind. Emerson, the crippled engineer, who wore a rewq over his eyes and greeted
me with a lopsided human smile. I answered by flapping my throat sac.

Blurry and wavering, the image of the Fractal World glimmered like an egg the size of a solar system, on the verge of spilling forth something young, hot, and fierce. Red sunlight shot through holes and crevices, while cruel sparks told of explosions vast enough to rock the entire structure, sending ripples crisscrossing the tormented sphere.