Webdancers (37 page)

Intentionally, Noah allowed the Eye of the Swarm and a small number of his followers to escape. Noah had always believed that every galactic race, even the supposedly most heinous, had redeeming qualities. The Mutatis had proven that, and he knew and loved one of the Parviis himself. She would be the mother of his child. Their baby would look like a Parvii, but would be a hybrid, not the same as the originals.

I am not about extermination
, he thought. Despite all of the changes in which he was immersed, Noah Watanabe remained true to his core values. A deep sensation of fatigue came over him from tapping into the raw primal power, but he fought to overcome it. From somewhere, a reservoir of strength, he summoned more energy.

Then, using his eyes like powerful searchlights to illuminate space, Noah scanned the vast expanse, questing. He sensed something else out there, more dangerous and destructive than HibAdus, Parviis, or even the crumbling galaxy.

Something he might not be able to stop.…

Chapter Seventy

Battles are never static. Even when they seem to be over, the tide can change.

—General Nirella del Velli

During the surprise Parvii attack, Tesh had fought for control of the flagship, trying to keep her own people from gaining entrance to the vessel. It was a battle within a battle, as the clustering humanoids tried to use neurotoxins to subdue the podship, and other ancient methods. Even with thousands of their tiny bodies all over
Webdancer
’s hull, they had faced a formidable task. Just one Parvii—Tesh—inside the sectoid chamber of the vessel could ward them all off, counteracting the toxins and keeping the Aopoddae creature under her sole control.

Then the equation had changed.

Woldn himself—the Eye of the Swarm—had joined the cluster on
Webdancer
. Tesh had sensed him out there, with his mind merging deeper into the others and dominating them more than ever. From his proximity and intense focus, powerful telepathic waves had slammed against Tesh’s sectoid chamber, like psychic battering rams. She’d fought back valiantly, but moment by moment she had been losing ground as the neurotoxins began to take effect on
Webdancer
and—soon thereafter—on her. Finally, the eager Parviis had streamed through openings they made in the flesh, like carpenter bees boring into soft wood.

Woldn and a handful of others had entered the inside the sectoid chamber with her, pushing her barely conscious form aside so that one of them could take over. Helpless to resist, she’d only been able to watch.

The Eye of the Swarm had kicked her. “Traitor!” he said. “We’ll show you what happens to traitors. But first, there is a battle to be won.”

He had become the new pilot himself, and guided
Webdancer
away to join other breakaway ships.

Suddenly, the sectoid chamber had glowed bright green, an unnatural condition that prevented Woldn from guiding the craft.
Webdancer
began to go in circles and loops, veering off into space.

“Let’s get out of here!” Woldn had exclaimed. “You too, Tesh.”

With that, he had swooped her up in a telepathic surge that flowed out and away from the ship and the battle.

“We’ve lost!” Woldn had said.

Unable to resist, Tesh had flown with the small group that left
Webdancer
—a few thousand individuals—bound for an unknown destination. She’d been caught up in their momentum, which suspended her independence. Curiously, Woldn was having difficulty sending telepathic commands to other Parviis in the swarms that had attacked other ships. Some of those Parviis followed Woldn’s small cluster, but others did not, and instead scattered into space in complete disarray.

Now as she flew on, Tesh absorbed psychic currents roiling from Woldn’s anger and determination to keep fighting back against all obstacles. Seeking to regain the old glories of his race, he would regroup. He would never give up. Everyone in the mini-swarm knew it, and Tesh felt considerable sympathy for them—and even for Woldn. She had never liked turning against her own people, but under the circumstances there had been no other choice. They had been wrong.

Tesh sensed increased anger focused on her—not only from the Parvii leader, but from the others linked to him. If Woldn permitted it, they could kill her. But he had something else in mind for her. What? She could not tell. Gradually, she was able to fall back to the rear of the group where it was a little more comfortable for her. But she could not pull away entirely, and swept forward with her unwanted companions.

Behind her, Tesh sensed something coming fast. Before she could turn to look, it swept her up and absorbed her.

Webdancer
!

The vessel had come of its own volition, taking Anton, Nirella, and others with it. Tesh found herself inside the sectoid chamber, and within moments she was piloting the ship back to join the rest of the victorious Liberator fleet.

* * * * *

But the elation did not last long.

The moment
Webdancer
pulled back to join the other podships, Eshaz flew near and asked for an emergency meeting. His request was granted, and the two podships nudged against each other and opened their hatches, so that Eshaz and two other Tulyans could enter.

Through her connection to the podship, Tesh listened as the Tulyans strode heavily through the corridors of
Webdancer
and entered Doge Anton’s office. Tesh heard the voices of Anton and Nirella as they greeted them.

“Dire news,” Eshaz said. “We must depart for the starcloud immediately!”

“Another enemy,” one of the other Tulyans murmured. “Another enemy.”

Alarmed, Tesh left the sectoid chamber and hurried down the corridor in her tiny natural form, moving in a blur of speed along the walls. Then, so small that no one noticed her, she slipped through an opening beneath the door of Anton’s office and entered. It took her only a matter of seconds to get there, and she slipped inside. Then, scurrying up an interior corner like an insect, she became motionless, like the proverbial fly on the wall, eavesdropping.

The biggest Tulyan of the three, Eshaz, shifted uneasily on his feet. “Noah summoned us to the cocoon, and asked us to timesee. He’s been sensing a great danger, and wanted us to help him figure out what is happening.”

“I’ve heard of timeseeing?” Nirella said. “You’re saying it actually works?”

“We don’t talk about it much, but yes. It’s an ability a few Tulyans have to see aspects of the future,” Eshaz said. “We three are among the few capable of this, and I regret to inform you that we have no time to celebrate. A great and terrible thing approaches. We must leave immediately for the starcloud. It is safer there.”

“But what is it?” Nirella asked. “We’re victorious here. All of our enemies are vanquished.”

“All that you know about. We cannot say what is coming, only that it brings darkness with it, and the probable end of all that we know.”

“Darkness for all time,” the third Tulyan said.

“The end of the galaxy?” Anton said. “The decay can’t be stopped?”

“Something more,” Eshaz said. “We can’t determine what. Only that we must hurry.”

“I’m not going to question your judgment,” Anton said. “Or Noah’s. Nirella, notify the fleet we are departing for the Tulyan Starcloud. Without delay.”

She saluted and got on the comlink to set it up.

The Tulyans hurried away, and Tesh sped back to her sectoid chamber. Only a few minutes later, Noah Watanabe transported his cocoon,
Webdancer
, and most of the Andromeda division of the fleet back to the starcloud via the visualization method he had used previously—a method that he surmised must use the ultimate of galactic shortcuts. It was not quite instantaneous, but was close to it.

Then, in a matter of seconds, he sped back to the battlefield and signaled that he would escort the rest of the fleet—around sixty percent of the ships—to the starcloud via other podways, staying with them for the protective firepower he could offer. But, he worried, even that might not be enough.

Feeling great fatigue from tapping into the primal energy source, and with the continuing demands on his energy, Noah hoped he could find the strength to continue. Intermittently, he went through moments where he didn’t think he could. Then, he would feel bursts of energy that gave him just enough to keep going.

Now his cocoon and thousands of smaller podships split space in flashes of green light, in a frantic rush to escape an enemy that they could not see. For defensive purposes Noah remained at the rear of the pack, and through the Aopoddae linkages he transmitted details to the other podships about the best route for them to take.

As Noah zipped through space behind the others, he pressed his face against the wall of the cocoon’s sectoid chamber, peering in all directions through his many eyes in the hull, scanning, searching. Podflesh oozed around him in the chamber, a shallow pool of it.

The route he took involved some shortcuts between sectors, and they passed through regions where web conditions were barely adequate. Tulyan repair teams had already worked on some of these podways, and for the areas where breaks still existed, he went around. In a little over two hours, the group emerged from space just outside the Tulyan Starcloud, and made their way into the protective mists.

Just before entering the mindlink field himself, Noah paused briefly and scanned conditions in the galaxy, seeing far across space with his multiple eyes on the hull of the cocoon … eyes that enabled him to view the vast filigree of Timeweb and the farthest reaches of space. As he focused to do this, the cocoon glowed brilliant green, casting light far across the galaxy and even illuminating the distant Kandor Sector he had just left.

He detected a disturbing bulge there, in the paranormal fabric of the galaxy. Abruptly, strands of the galactic infrastructure ripped away, creating what looked like an immense timehole, covering the entire galactic sector. Around the galaxy he saw other bulges, and additional huge holes appeared. One of them sucked up Woldn and the remnants of his attack force, then closed again, like a fantastic cosmic mouth. Another took the entire Adurian homeworld to an unknown place … and he didn’t think it would ever return.

Then, where the Kandor Sector used to be, huge, dark shapes poured out of the hole and scrambled around on the podways, on multiple legs that scampered along the strands of Timeweb. Even with the illumination Noah cast on them, he could not distinguish details of their bodies—only that they were large, amorphous creatures that moved very quickly.

Viscerally, he knew this was the additional danger he had foreseen, but he had no idea what it was.

Chapter Seventy-One

Time spins its own web.

—Ancient Tulyan saying

Inside the ethereal mists of the starcloud, Noah communicated with the Council of Elders, this time using one of the comlink channels of the Liberators. Then, after making arrangements directly with First Elder Kre’n, he guided his cocoon to the immense inverted dome of the Council Chamber, which floated over Tulé, the largest Tulyan planet. The cocoon and the chamber were of equivalent sizes, but of very different configurations—and Noah’s was much more the organic of the two structures. He commanded the amalgamated Aopoddae to link to a docking station on the chamber.

By prior agreement, Noah strode out of the cocoon and made his way into a tunnel linking the structures. There, he boarded a small, automated motocart that had been sent for him, which carried him rapidly into the central meeting chamber.

The entire Council awaited him, sitting at their high, curved bench. Noah would have preferred to remain inside the cocoon, but the Tulyan leaders had insisted otherwise. Worried about still being able to control the primal weapon, Noah had nonetheless acceded to their demand, subject to the availability of the motocart to get him back in the event of an emergency.

Although some of the Elders had seen him in his present podman appearance, the entire Council had not. He exchanged greetings quickly with the Elders, tried not to let their probing, inquisitive stares bother him. He saw Doge Anton, General Nirella, and Subi Danvar standing nearby, and nodded to them.

Again, Noah was weaker away from EcoStation, but this time it was much more serious than the previous occasions when he had left. He felt drained, a condition of deep fatigue that he had begun to notice after using the primal weapon. He had recovered only slightly since then. The weariness had reached deep into his cells and mind, making him feel as if he could sleep for a week, or longer. He didn’t dare. He had to go on, had to keep finding the strength to go on.

As he stood before the high bench, Noah focused on the fact that the Elders were looking down at him closely, and some of them were whispering to each other. Troubled, he had a feeling he should get back to the cocoon as soon as possible, for the restorative energy it imparted to him.

“We have formed a military plan with the Liberator fleet commanders,” Kre’n said, “and it is necessary for us to merge you into it—with your newfound powers.”

“Though we aren’t quite sure how to do that,” Anton said.

Noah nodded, pursed his lips in thought. He felt exhaustion seeping over him.

“I think we all need a certain amount of autonomy,” Kre’n said. “We have our communication channels and our differing capabilities. Here in the starcloud, we Tulyans will maintain our mindlink as a defensive force, while your Liberator ships can be more offensive in nature, still keeping some vessels back to aid us here. As for you, Noah Watanabe, you can serve both purposes.”

She paused, and added, “You are in possession of great power and responsibility, Noah. Surely you are the Savior spoken of in our legends, the one who will deliver us from death.”

This subject had come up before, and Noah had tried not to believe it. Now he was no longer so certain, and chose not to comment on it. But no matter what they called him—or what his destiny might be—he was not certain if he had the capability to stop whatever creatures were tearing the galaxy apart with new timeholes, bigger than any he’d ever seen before, or had ever heard of. The decay of the galaxy—at least the rapid acceleration of the process—had not been from any natural, internal laws of decay. An outside force was involved.

Fighting back his fatigue, Noah looked up at Kre’n and said, “I told you what I saw—all the new timeholes, and huge, dark shapes pouring out of the one in the Kandor Sector. Creatures of some kind. You said you know what they are?”

Kre’n nodded her scaly, reptilian head. Then she narrowed her slitted eyes, and said, “What I am going to tell you has never been revealed to non-Tulyans, not by us or by any of our predecessors. It is one of the things we routinely confirm among our people with the truthing touch, constantly verifying that the information has not gotten out. The terrible secret has become ingrained in our race, but now it is appropriate for you and the others present to know what we are all up against.”

Noah trembled in anticipation.

“The creatures are Web Spinners,” Kre’n said, following a moment’s hesitation. “We have Tulyan observers in deep space, and they have confirmed this. The danger is severe.”

When Noah looked at the ancient leader with a blank expression, she said solemnly, “In the first days of the universe, the Sublime Creator formed galaxies on top of galaxies, folding in around each other in cosmic embraces. Our beneficial deity lives in the overgalaxy, a wondrous realm of time-and-space consciousness that is on a higher plane than any other.”

“Like heaven.”

“Somewhat.”

“How many galaxies are there?”

“This is not known, and perhaps can never be known by us.” She gazed at Noah for a lingering moment, then said, “Long ago, after the explosion of an incomprehensibly large star, galaxies were formed from the flaming embers, creating suns, planets, and other cosmic bodies. From the earliest days, the Sublime Creator wanted to organize the galaxies and keep their differing qualities separate, so he sought builders for the huge project. He was the grand visionary that generated the universe, but for certain detailed tasks he delegated much of the work.”

She smiled sadly. “An early form of management, you might say. He already had the galaxies, but to make each of them an entirely separate enclosure he needed a strong fabric for the separations. This he accomplished with work crews involving various life forms that he created. The scale is beyond our comprehension, as are the details. But for us it all boils down to this galaxy, and how it was set up. Our galaxy received special consideration, giving it beauty that is second only to the ethereal realm of the Sublime Creator. This explains the loveliness of our nebulas and star systems, and particularly of Timeweb—our cosmic filigree whose intricacies are unmatched by any other galaxy. This paranormal webbing was generated by specialized creatures on a rather large scale—though on the scale of the universe it might not seem that way.”

“And that’s where the Web Spinners come in,” Noah said.

“Precisely. Like huge spiders, the Web Spinners extruded the strands of our galactic web, after consuming the fibers of deep-shaft, piezoelectric emeralds. So that the races could travel on this glorious infrastructure, the Sublime Creator formed the Aopoddae podships, a race of sentient spacecraft capable of transporting other races across the galaxy in a matter of moments. Our galaxy is indeed a wondrous creation, containing countless life forms that are supposed to work in harmony with one another. There are even infinitesimally small nanocreatures that live inside the webbing. Another race entirely. They are secret beings … except to us.

“Since it is spun from ingested emerald fibers, Timeweb glows faintly green. The same glow is also found in the sectoid chambers of podships, making it possible for ship pilots to communicate with each other across vast distances via the galactic web that the chambers are in direct contact with. The nehrcom transmission system of the merchant princes also uses these piezoelectric emeralds in a slightly different fashion, aligning the stones so that they bounce signals off the web.”

“And my cocoon can glow, like a green sun in space.”

“Yes. Truly remarkable.”

“And dangerous in the wrong hands,” the towering Elder named Dabiggio added. Scowling more than usual, he sat on one side of her at the long bench.

“Fortunately, that is not the case,” Kre’n said, glancing at him and speaking in a scolding tone.

“You say the Web Spinners are spiders?” Noah asked.

“No, I said they are
like
spiders, with certain similarities—but significant differences as well. The creatures are immense in size, with remarkably strong exoskeletons that are not subject to the expansion limitations of planet-bound spiders, which would collapse if they were scaled up too much.”

“It should not be possible for them to be so large,” Noah said, “just as Timeweb should not be possible. Even though I know the vast web exists and that it links the entire galaxy, I am still amazed that something so intricate holds it all together, and that most of the races can’t even detect its existence.”

“Truly, Timeweb is a grand and marvelous concept,” Kre’n said, “but there have been problems. One has been apparent for some time now. The web is infinitely strong but fragile in many ways, and requires a great deal of work to maintain it. Initially, the Sublime Creator assigned Tulyans to perform this work, and gave us dominion over podships to get us around the galaxy. This system fell into disarray when another race grew in numbers and took control of the podships away from us.
Parviis
. The Sublime Creator didn’t actually create Parviis directly; they arose from the biotech laboratories of the Adurians, whom he did create himself.”

“And even though your race were cast out so ungraciously,” Noah said, “you continued to perform whatever maintenance and repair work you could, on a piecemeal basis. A noble undertaking, I must say.”

She looked dismal. “The Adurians caused a lot of trouble in ancient days, as they have in recent times. We have always been wary of them, as we have been of their surrogates, the Parviis.”

“Tesh Kori told me that Humans are an offshoot of Parviis.”

“That is true,” Kre’n said, “which serves to explain some of the problems humankind has caused. But that is another story, and you are not typical of the race.”

The comment made Noah think of Tesh (who also was atypical of her race), and of their unborn baby, which would be a hybrid of the Human and Parvii genetic lines.

Just then, Eshaz hurried into the chamber and addressed the Council. “Our deep-space observers report the Web Spinners are on the move,” he said. “Heading in this direction. They’re leaving a wake of destruction in their path—planetary systems, even the biggest, hottest suns wiped out and scattered into flaming embers. Nothing gets in their way. They just mow it down.”

“And their ETA?” Kre’n asked. She looked very concerned, but amazingly steady. Noah detected no panic there, nor on the faces of the other Elders. But in their long experience, this must be the worst of events.

“Eighteen minutes.”

Feeling his pulse quicken, Noah said, “I must return to the cocoon.”

“We can have you there in less than a minute,” Kre’n said. “But know this, valiant Human, before you go into battle: The Sublime Creator found the Web Spinners difficult to control, especially their leader, the Queen. Like the sentient races that are familiar to us, they were granted a form of free will. In their case, they had to be carefully and forcefully monitored while they built the Timeweb infrastructure—a process that took a very long time. When, at long last, they completed the vast construction project, the Sublime Creator confined them to the undergalaxy and sealed them there, so that they could not disturb him or the showcase of his marvelous creation—our own galaxy. Since then, the Queen of the Undergalaxy has ruled her stygian realm, and only that.”

“But we have an ancient prophecy,” said one of the other Elders, an elegant Tulyan man. “What the Web Spinners create they can also destroy.”

“So you’ve always known this was coming?” Noah asked.

“Our timeseers have long foretold these days,” Kre’n said, “and their visions have finally come upon us. Depending upon what happens next—and that we do not know—these are either the End of Days or a New Beginning.”

“And a battle plan?” Noah asked.

“Defend and attack. Against such an onrushing enemy, there can be no other plan.”

“I guess we’ll find out soon enough where I fit into all of this,” Noah said.

Kre’n nodded, and said softly, “Our blessings be upon you, Master Noah.”

Then everyone hurried to their battle stations.