A Night Without Stars (79 page)

“
The
Paula Myo? The investigator from the Serious Crimes Directorate?”

“Yes.”

“What are you doing here?”

“I was sent to help the Brandt colony fleet. What is your identity, please?”

“Laura Brandt.”

“No way,” Florian exclaimed in awe. “Mother Laura?”

Paula held up a finger. “That is fascinating. Could you please explain how you come to be here?”

“I downloaded my secure store memories to the floater smartnet just before the Primes nuked me,” Laura Brandt said. “And both floaters are linked through the wormhole. The processing power available is sufficient to mimic a basic human neural structure.”

“Just like Joey,” Paula replied.

“Joey? Joey Stein? He's alive?”

“Not in a biological body. Nigel placed his memories in a smartnet, running a medical lifeboat on his starship. Effectively, he's in the same situation as you.”

“Poor old Joey. So how did you get here? Has the Commonwealth found us?”

“I'm afraid not. I was on board Nigel's starship, the
Skylady.
I only recently became active.”

“Bollocks. So are the Fallers still a threat?”

“Yes—and right now, an even bigger one than they were back in the Void. That's why we opened the wormhole here.”

“You said you wanted to take control of the floater?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“We want to use it as the anchor to this wormhole so we have a very stable terminus at Valatare; it has some precision maneuvering to perform.”

“That will mean me relinquishing my connection to the floater in Ursell's atmosphere.”

“Yes. Is that a problem?”

“No. I maintained the connection because there was no reason to stop. Once Ursell's atmospheric saturation point had been reached, I reduced the size of the wormhole so that the volume of gas passing through simply compensates for the amount of gas Ursell leaks off to space—a not inconsiderable amount, given the size of its envelope now.”

That was such a machine construal, Paula thought; factors remain stable so the equation is maintained. And the Brandt personality had certainly never thought to question Valatare's nature at any time over the last two and a half centuries. It might be Laura's memories running in the smartnet, but that smartnet could never emulate the quirks and imagination of a biological brain. This version of Laura was a level below even the ANAdroids. She was willing to be helpful, but she'd always have to be instructed.

Paula reviewed the data flowing across her exovision. “I have a satellite flock in orbit above Valatare. They're showing me the atmosphere is three hundred and fifty kilometers thick.”

“Yes. I have only limited senses available in the floater, but that seems to be the atmospheric depth. It is an unusually stable transition layer to the liquid mantle.”

“The troposphere layer doesn't end in liquid,” Paula replied. She was studying the radiation emissions, which were totally wrong for a gas giant. The resolute boundary at the bottom of the atmosphere was throwing out a lot of gamma ray energy, which was swiftly absorbed by the superpressurized gas.

As the satellite flock continued their sweep, she watched for the one anomaly she prayed had to be there. Something, anything—a radiation spike, quantum fluctuation, gravity twist, magnetic flux. Paula stared through the wormhole at the insipid cloud bands, fantasizing she'd see a blemish that would give the location away.

“What does it end in?” Laura asked.

“A type of event horizon.”

“That's not possible. This isn't a black hole.”

“I know. Valatare is an artifact.”

The satellites reported a quantum fluctuation. It was coming from a small zone, approximately five kilometers across, on the equator. “Gotcha!” Paula cried. Behind her, she could hear the ANAdroids laughing victoriously.

“What is that?” Florian asked.

“I'm assuming it's the generator. It consumes matter and converts it into energy to power the barrier. There's enough gas here to maintain the event horizon for millions of years.”

“Just like the Void,” Demitri said. “Except the Void is consuming entire star systems to provide the power it needs.”

“Then the prison is like a mini-Void?” Ry asked nervously. “Can it pull us in?”

Paula finally broke away from staring at the swirling clouds. “No. It just uses the same principles to sustain itself. And now we have to crack it open.”

“How do we do that?”

“I want to maneuver the floater down to the anomaly; that way we can establish direct contact. If we can do that, we can analyze it and see how to switch it off.”

“Ambitious,” Kysandra said.

“Indeed, but now we might be able to move our next stage along faster than I anticipated.”

“How?”

Florian smiled. “The Planters!”

“Exactly,” Paula said. “They should be able to analyze the generator a lot faster than Nigel2. I was expecting this to take weeks, but now it might be over a lot sooner. Laura, we're going to break contact for a while. When we open the terminus again, I want to use your floater.”

“I understand. I'm not going anywhere.”

“Thank you. Demitri, close the terminus, please.”

The circle of wan cloudscape shrank to nothing. Paula walked over to the window, where three Macule Units were parked outside. A number of puppies zipped about between the domes, as if they could sniff out more information on the visitors. “We need to leave,” she told Unit976. “We may return soon, but if we don't, the technical data we have provided will be enough to restart your development.”

“Do not leave,” Unit976 replied. “We would like to trade more material for information.”

“If we are successful, we will take you with us, back to the galaxy we all came from.”

The high-pitched whine of Unit26's colossal electric engines starting to spin up was audible through the dome's insulation.

“Open the terminus to Trüb,” Paula told Demitri. “Fast.”

The ANAdroid nodded sharply.

“The rest of you, into your suits,” Paula said, switching on her integral force field. One of the puppies raced at the dome. When it hit, its momentum carried it a couple of meters up the panels. Its front edge rose up over a transparent section before it fell down.

“What are you doing?” Paula asked Unit976.

“We do not wish to return to the galaxy we came from,” Unit976 replied. “It was being consumed by the Void. There is no future there.”

“Very well. Once we are back, the Commonwealth will provide you ships to carry you farther on. We do not break our agreements.”

Unit26 began to move forward, its heavy tracks churning up spurts of dirt as it slewed around until it was heading directly at the domes. As well as hearing its engine, Paula could now feel the floor of the dome shaking. She saw hatches crank open along the front of the machine. Tubes began to telescope out, looking suspiciously like weapon barrels. “Damnit!”

The wormhole opened onto a gray expanse of perfectly smooth land, vaulted by a jade-tinted sky. They were the only two colors Trüb possessed.

“Go through,” Valeri said.

Paula walked quickly through the gateway. Her boots sank several centimeters into the dust on the other side. The surface was made of particles as fine as flour, and completely dry. She'd never seen a horizon so sharp before. A scan showed her that the atmosphere was mainly argon and carbon dioxide, with a pressure 8 percent standard. Florian and Ry came hurrying out beside her, swiftly followed by Kysandra and the ANAdroids. Between them, they kicked up a lot more dust.

The wormhole began to expand as it slid across the ground, depositing equipment that had been inside the large assembly dome along with the engineeringbots. Then one of the smaller domes came through, followed by the wormhole generator itself. The wormhole closed.

“Now what?” Florian asked.

“Is there any alien species that isn't hostile to us?” Ry asked plaintively. “Seriously? Just one?”

“A great many,” Paula said. “Some of them very wonderful.”

“But none of them seem to be here,” Kysandra remarked.

“The Raiel are.”

“I hope to Giu you're right.”

“Get the equipment into the dome,” Paula told the ANAdroids. “This dust can't be doing their systems any good.”

The engineeringbots started to move. Paula performed a fast biononic field function scan on the dust, which turned out to be made up of exceptionally complex molecules. It was a thick layer, extending down several meters; her scan couldn't reach whatever solid surface lay below.

The dust was swirling around them like a mild fog, agitated by the engineeringbots as they carried equipment into the dome. She bent down and pressed her open palm onto the dust. Her field function sent a weak magnetic pulse into it. A clump of the airborne motes around her wrist sparkled for an instant.

“Pixie dust,” she murmured. She told her u-shadow to transmit the Commonwealth first-contact interpretation package.

“What are you trying to do?” Kysandra asked.

“Get the attention of the Planters. The dust is some kind of nano, but inert.” Her biononics started pumping the dust with a magnetic field.

“Oh, Uracus,” Florian groaned. “I thought you said it turned gray as a defense mechanism.”

“The color isn't really relevant.”

“Wow!” Ry yelled.

Paula saw it. A streak of jade phosphorescence a couple of meters wide, shooting away from them through the dust, moving at what the mind interpreted as close to light speed.

“Did you see it? What was it?”

Paula's field function scan expanded, just in time to catch a tangerine streak rushing in the opposite direction. It identified a minute quantum signature shift in the dust's molecular structure. She shut down the magnetic field and sent the Commonwealth first-contact interpretation package again.

More colored bands of pale light began flickering through the dust, as if an even brighter source of light was blazing just below the surface. Abruptly, the entire dust plane turned a sharp metallic purple right out to the sharp horizon. It also became solid as the dust motes locked together. Footprints smoothed out, as did the furrows made by the engineeringbots shifting equipment into the dome.

A circle of the surface eight meters wide turned black. It started to rise up, the top of a chrome-yellow cylinder, which kept on extending. Paula's field function scan followed it, measuring at three hundred meters high when it finally stopped growing. Then her biononics reported she was being subjected to a very sophisticated field function scan.

Her u-shadow reported a link ping.

“Greetings,” she acknowledged.

“We haven't encountered humans before.”

“I believe we come from the same galaxy,” Paula said. “Humans have encountered artifacts you left behind.” She sent a file with images of the gigalife the Sheldons had found.

“Those are our ‘offshoots'—I do not believe you have a linguistic determination for our relationship with the pieces you encountered. I deduce you determined their compositional nature and produced the micro-particles implanted in your cells?”

“We did. I hope we have not offended you by doing so?”

“No. It is the nature of early biological life to examine and exploit its environment. We understand this.”

“Thank you. May I ask what you are?”

“We have no name. Our nature is omega, the essence of all life that evolved on our home planet. Now we are one, but separate. Parts of us traveled to new stars. We grew again on lifeless planets. This particular planet was taken into the construct you call the Void. We refused its transformative purpose, and began to seek an exit within quantum manipulation of spacetime. It expelled us here.”

“You said you traveled between stars. Can you leave here?”

“We have already left this world. We do not know if the part of us that exited reached a galaxy. It is a formidable gulf to traverse, even for us. But we are content here. This sun will last for billions of years, allowing us to progress our thoughts.”

“But when the Prime came, you changed.”

“This is a different state for us. Equivalentize it to your sleep if you will. The aggressive biologicals, the Prime, who came here to claim land and material are short-lived relative to us. We simply await their end or transformation to enlightenment.”

“They are ended. A human destroyed them.”

“That is regrettable. Life is precious.”

“There is another life-form banished to this star that threatens humans. The Fallers. They are a self-modified biological, redesigned for genocidal colonization. Can you help us defeat them?”

“We do not engage in conflict. We prefer shelter.”

“I wouldn't ask you to fight,” Paula said. “However, I believe we have allies inside Valatare. I need to release them.”

“Valatare is a strange construct. It was here when we came to this star.”

“I have located what I believe to be the generator mechanism that produces it. Our wormhole can reach it. If we do that, can you analyze it for me and determine how to switch it off?”

“If we did this, would your allies end the Fallers?”

“There are many options available. All I want to achieve is to return humans to our galaxy, our culture. That is all I will ask them for.”

“Very well. We will examine the Valatare generator.”

“Thank you.”

Midnight had long passed when the small convoy drove through the center of Varlan without stopping. Orders had been issued from the master general himself, allowing them to pass any roadblocks—of which there were many—unimpeded.

Sitting in the front passenger seat of the lead car, Chaing looked out nervously at the darkened, deserted streets. Headlights picked out derelict stationary trams that had ground to a halt between stations. Every now and then, a regiment troop carrier would trundle the other way, but nothing else moved. That was unnerving. The capital had always possessed a thriving nightlife, and usually at this time the streets and boulevards would be thronged with people enjoying the multitude of clubs and theaters. But now there were no lights, either, save the occasional glimpse of a candle flickering behind curtained windows. The whole city was in darkness.

For all he knew every building had been abandoned. There was no way to tell.

“Is the blackout part of martial law?” he asked the uniformed PSR driver.

“No, sir. The bastards hit our power stations late this afternoon. I've heard on the radio the engineers will have the power back on by morning.”

“Good to know,” Chaing said, not believing it.

The Air Defense Force base just outside the city, where they'd landed, had been busy. In the few minutes they took to transfer Roxwolf to an armored prisoner transport truck, Chaing had counted five big, four-engined transport planes taking off and heading north.

Operation crudding Reclaim. Where every senior government official runs away to Byarn to try and save their arse. Well, if the Trees do fly down to low orbit and the egg bombardment begins, there won't be anything to reclaim.

At the far end of Bryan-Anthony Boulevard, every window of the palace shone bright electric light out into the night, as if it were taunting the deprived city. Chaing had never been inside before, and found himself as daunted by its scale as any tourist. The convoy drove through archways to a courtyard, then down a ramp. They stopped in some big underground garage, where a squad of armed and nervous palace guards was waiting.

The chief scientist of section seven's advanced science division was in charge. Chaing was interested to see it was an old woman wearing a thick beige cardigan against the cool night air. His first thought was:
She's old enough to be Stonal's sister
.

Faustina signed the release papers, and the palace guard lieutenant in charge of the detail marched Roxwolf away.

“See you at the end of the world, Captain,” the mutant Faller called out to Chaing.

Chaing gave him an icy stare that had reduced many an interrogation prisoner to a sweaty wreck, but Roxwolf just responded with a grin that showed off more fangs. Behind him, he heard Jenifa snort in contempt.

“I don't like it,” she said. “He's too confident.”

“Nothing to lose,” Corilla commented. The Eliter girl was busy looking around the bleak cavernous garage.

“If I didn't know better, I'd say he's where he wants to be,” Jenifa said.

“It was Stonal who ordered us to bring him here,” Chaing said. “Argue it with him.”

Faustina came over and shook hands with Chaing. “I heard you were the one who apprehended him, Captain. Congratulations. Quite a catch.”

“Thank you.”

“We've never seen a living breeder Faller before, and certainly not a mutant like him.”

“Are you going to dissect him?” Jenifa asked.

“Great Giu, no,” the old director said, quite shocked. “We know their biology. It's their way of thinking I'm interested in. And from what little I've heard, I understand he's disaffected with his own kind.”

“So he claims,” Jenifa said.

“But he volunteered the information that the Trees will fly into low orbit.”

“He'll say anything to stay alive.”

“Right.” Faustina seemed perplexed by her attitude. “Director Stonal is waiting for you.”

“Including her?” Jenifa jerked a thumb at Corilla.

“Yes, apparently. I have your passes.” Faustina held out three laminated badges. “Please wear them prominently at all times while you are in the palace—especially down here.”

Chaing followed a corporal from the palace guard along several corridors, then down some interminable stairs. His leg was throbbing badly by the time they reached the bottom. This basement level was obviously newer than the rest of the labyrinth under the palace, with bright electric bulbs illuminating white walls; the metal doors were flush-fitting, with electric locks. The one at the end had four armed guards outside. They all had to show their badges before they were allowed in.

The stone-walled jail cell was a reasonable size. It had a bed with a decent mattress, as well as a table and chair. There was a shower in one corner, along with a toilet and basin. There was even a small bookshelf, stacked with some novels about regiment heroics, and Slvasta's official biography running to more than a thousand pages. It lacked windows, but then it was six floors underground. To emphasize this, ribbons of slimy algae leaked out of the mortar and down one wall. Three meals were supplied each day through the hatchway in the door. Reasonable food, too.

Joey had stayed in worse hotels.

So far he hadn't been questioned, which made him rather glad. There were residual Adolphus memories washing around in his head about PSR
interviews,
and he didn't imagine he'd be able to do the whole hero thing and resist pain for the good of…Well, frankly, there wasn't anything worth holding out for now. He'd given the King of the World gig his best shot, and the paranoid spook had known that something was wrong almost straightaway. And Paula—Paula was most likely dead.

That still brought him awake in the middle of the night with cold sweats. A species that used nukes so easily…He retained his own memories of the science expedition into the Forest of Trees; his contact with Faller copies of his crewmates. The way they'd forced him onto the surface of an egg, sticking him fast, its gradual absorption of his body. Only death—well, bodyloss—had saved him, with Nigel's help.
And for what?

He'd done everything possible to help Paula and her group, only for the Fallers to kill that last remaining hope.

Losing her had probably made him careless, confirming Stonal's suspicions. He wasn't surprised; such a massive loss of hope had been a terrible blow. After it happened, he hadn't a clue what to do next; he'd only ever considered himself as Paula's support team.

Now he spent most of his time lying on the bed, suffering recurring migraines—presumably due to his thoughts occupying a neural structure that wasn't his own.

At least his suffering wouldn't last much longer. Terese wouldn't have any room on Byarn for her number one political prisoner. And the more recollections about Byarn that bubbled up from Adolphus's subconscious, the more he didn't want any part of their crazy Operation Reclaim anyway.

He heard noises in the corridor outside and opened bleary eyes to look at the door, expecting the hatch to open and a food tray to be shoved through. Instead he heard the sound of another cell door being opened. Some kind of a scuffle. The unique sound of a body thudding to the ground.

“And crudding stay there, filthy freak,” a guard shouted.

The door was slammed shut. Keys turned in the lock.

Just for a moment, Joey allowed himself to daydream it was Stonal being thrown into the cell next door. Terese being thorough in eliminating any threats to her new regime. “Meet the new boss,” he chanted. “Same as the old.” But Stonal wouldn't make that elementary mistake.

He closed his eyes and sank back into the comfort of misery and self-pity. Then his OCtattoo reported a weak link ping. “Anyone receiving this?”

He almost ignored it. Probably a trap, but he was thoroughly bored, and anything was better than languishing in the cell until the Apocalypse hit. “Yeah, me.”

“Who's that?”

“Adolphus.”

“No crud. The prime minister?”

“Ex-prime-minister now, thank you.”

“You're an Eliter? We didn't know.”

Joey heard the sound of guttural (and oddly liquid) laughter, and heaved himself off the bed. His world spun as he tottered over to the door, but he gritted his teeth against the nausea and abysmal headache. The link signal increased marginally as he pressed his head against the cool metal of the hatch in the door. “Not really. I acquired some Commonwealth enrichments recently. Who are you, pal?”

“Roxwolf.”

“So what did you do to get shoved down here?”

“You don't know my name?”

“Sorry, no.”

“Crud. I'm not as notorious as I thought.”

“Yeah, don't sweat it. I'm not quite what you'd expect, either.”

“So it would seem. You say you have some kind of Commonwealth machine that allows you to link; that's very interesting. Are you in touch with the Eliters?”

“Nope. Not this far underground.”

“Ah. Pity. So nobody is coming to break you out of here?”

Joey grinned silently. His Commonwealth defense enrichments could probably cut through the door easily enough. But then what? The palace dungeons were a three-dimensional maze. Kill lots of guards—because they were doing their job. Not exactly the blaze-of-glory way he wanted to go. “No. How about you?”

“No, I am alone on this world.”

“So it looks like we're here for the duration.”

“Uracus!” Roxwolf said. “Does the Commonwealth know of us? Will they help?”

“No. We're on our own. Especially now Paula is dead.”

“I see. Ah well, at least it won't be long.”

“So what are you in here for?”

“I am a mutant Faller; I had quite the gang empire going back in Opole.”

“No shit? Wait a minute, why would you want the Commonwealth to save us?”

“My own species rejects me. If the Apocalypse succeeds, I die. I was trying to make a deal with the human security forces: my life for information.”

“How's that going for you?”

“I've had better days, my friend.”

“Yeah. This government isn't the most enlightened I've known.”

“Even now, your nature puzzles me,” Roxwolf replied. “How can your species ever achieve anything when you exist in perpetual conflict with one another? You flew to the stars once. That is no small achievement.”

“Bienvenido is a special circumstance. We got hit with the Void, then your species. It hasn't brought out our best behavior.”

“You speak as if you've seen other human societies.”

“I have. A long time ago now. I don't have many memories of them in this stolen body, just enough to keep my faith in humanity.”

“So you are a visitor here? You did come from the Commonwealth?”

“Not exactly. It's a long story, pal.”

“I'm not that busy right now.”

Chaing was slightly disappointed by the secure bunker with its stuffy, chemically tainted air and low ceiling; he'd expected something a little more striking, but this was just another government-issue office without windows. The command center itself was a wide room with radio and telephone consoles around three of the four walls, all staffed by communications division operators. The map table in the middle had a large-scale representation of Varlan, with the river Colbal running along its southern side. Young NCOs with long poles slid circular wooden emblems into place, setting out regiment positions and nest activity.

He could see that the Capital Regiment had troops deployed at the twelve major roads leading into the city; their reserves were stationed at six camps in public parks, ready to reinforce them. Two Air Force squadrons of AG-30 ground-attack planes were circling overhead. Nine marine attack boats patrolled the river. Eight black emblems were standing in various train station yards around the outskirts, which chilled him: Aseri batteries ready to fire their nuclear-tipped missiles at any large incoming force.

Stonal stood at the head of the table, his hands resting on the edge as he surveyed his doomed domain. Master General Davorky stood beside him, talking in a low voice as they ordered fresh deployments.

“Captain Chaing,” Stonal said, beckoning.

“Sir.”

“Did the mutant say anything new on the journey here?”

“No, sir.”

Stonal grunted. “Pity.”

“I'm not sure Roxwolf is telling the truth, sir,” Jenifa said.

“Oh, he was, Lieutenant.”

“Sir?”

“Three hours ago, the Space Vigilance Office reported that the Trees have begun to move,” Davorky told her. “They are flying down to a lower orbit. Their eggs will Fall on us, and there's nothing we can do to stop them.”

“No,” Chaing said faintly.
That's the end. We lost.
He heard Corilla gasp. She'd turned pale, and her hands were trembling.

Stonal gave her a sharp glance. “Hold off telling your friends that. I'd like to keep the capital calm.”

“Why?” she asked in a shaky voice. “What's the point?”

“If the regiments have a clear field to move through, we'll be able to inflict maximum damage on the nests as they advance. I don't want panicked crowds blocking their way.” Stonal indicated a swath of red flags beyond the city's outskirts. “Those are all incidents reported to us during the night, possible enemy incursions or gatherings. We've heard of villages cut off, unauthorized vehicles on the road, unknown creatures seen moving across the countryside, that kind of thing. Now we're waiting on scouts to report in. But they're clearly massing out there for something.”

“What about the prime minister?” Jenifa asked. “Is Byarn secure? Can we retaliate…afterward?”

“Her plane is still two hours out from Byarn,” Davorky said. “Nothing can happen to her while she's flying over the ocean.”