Timeweb Trilogy Omnibus (44 page)

Through the porthole, he saw the Doge’s red gunships again, firing at the escaping vessel, tearing through the hull just as Subi was increasing the acceleration. Only moments away from freedom.

In the void between the spacecraft, Noah saw the path of enemy projectiles as they sped toward him. As yet, nothing had hit Noah or any of his companions.

For a long, lingering moment, Noah awaited the inevitable, knowing there was no escape from that fate, or the one that held him tightly now. Silence encased him, the eerie stillness of impending death.

The grid-plane was not going fast enough!

The projectiles drew closer. They were right outside the porthole now, only a fraction of a second from impact. He flinched, then felt searing pain. He tried to scream, but in the vault of darkness he had no voice.

Chapter Sixty-Five

Visual observation is not the same as confirmation.

—Sulu Granby, Philosopher of Old Mars

Resembling a small, bronze-scaled dragon, Eshaz knelt beside the comatose form of Noah, who lay on the carpeted deck of the grid-plane, with a blanket over him and a pillow beneath his head. His Human friend had not been doing well; the vital signs had declined precipitously to a dangerous level. In addition, the Tulyan’s own bodily aches and pains had been worsening of late—the apparent link with the decline in Timeweb—but he tried not to think about all those things.

Instead, he gazed off into the distance, seeing through the walls of the grid-plane and the damaged, stranded podship that encompassed it and floated in space. Debris from the planetary explosion bobbed near them like flotsam on the sea, great chunks of rock and turf. But none of that inhibited his vision in the least. He saw through it all, to the other side.

With slitted gray eyes, Eshaz peered far into the galaxy, as if through a child’s looking glass. But this was no juvenile activity. Nothing ever had been for him, since he had always taken his responsibilities seriously. His ancient ability permitted him to gaze far across the galaxy, to stars and planets and his own starcloud, floating like an oasis in a vast wasteland, most of which was entirely devoid of life.

Home.

Whenever he peered into the galaxy, he always liked to start out this way, making certain the sacred Tulyan homeland was still intact, that the Council Chamber was lit, and everything was all right. Considering the tenuous state of the galaxy, this was not always a certainty. There were no distance or time factors diminishing the sighting. He was peering into the present, not the past. Like using a super zoom lens that spanned the curvatures, folds, and distances of time and space.

A tear of relief ran down the bronze, scaly skin of his face. The legendary Tulyan Starcloud floated serenely in space, looking no different from this distant vantage than it had long ago. He knew, because he had lived for nearly a million standard years.

The visual confirmation gave him great comfort, but on this occasion he took only a moment to look in that direction, because of a pressing matter that required his attention. Sadly, there were so many of them nowadays, an acceleration of bad events.

Refocusing, he saw a tiny Parvii woman exploring the hidden passageways and chambers of the stranded podship that contained his grid-plane. As was the case with all Tulyans, Eshaz’s ability to see Parviis in this paranormal manner was limited: for unknown reasons, he and his comrades could not see their tiny enemies in swarms, but occasionally they could see individuals, especially when the individual was far from the center of a swarm.

With a start, Eshaz recognized the Parvii woman.

Tesh!

He’d thought something was strange about her, but had been unable to determine what. Though he knew Parviis could alter their size, he hadn’t suspected her of being one of them. But he had no time for personal reproach. Something was far more important than that, or than the control of a single sentient pod.

Eshaz, like all Tulyans, could see Timeweb, the exceedingly strong, hidden strands that connected an entire galaxy. He saw that this podship was hung up on one of the strands, and that it had been propelled into that position by the explosion on Plevin Four. What caused such a catastrophe? He had no idea.

He spotted a tiny rip in the web adjacent to the podship—a defect just starting to form in the fabric of space. It was an early stage timehole, barely discernible by his trained eye, and not visible to other galactic races at all. If left unchecked, it would grow in severity, eventually reaching a dangerous advanced stage, when it was visible to Humans and other races. The most severe timeholes, if they occurred in proximity to planets, could rip portions of earth and rock away, sucking them into bottomless holes in the cosmos.

It was frustrating to him. Wherever he went in the galaxy he fixed these web defects, or thought he did, but frequently another one appeared only a short distance away. He had hoped that these ominous signs of galactic disintegration would reverse and either heal themselves or stop appearing, but that had not been the case at all.

This one, while small, was in a bad location, out in the middle of space by a vital, structural fold in the galaxy, where it could easily enlarge and cause serious havoc in an entire sector.

But he wasn’t thinking so much about that. He had another thought in mind. Still kneeling by Noah, but not looking at him, he placed a scaly hand over the man’s forehead, and felt the life ebbing away.

I must move quickly
.

On impulse, Eshaz was about to attempt something he should not do without approval from the Council of Elders. But Noah Watanabe was a rare person, one who behaved more like a Tulyan than a Human. He truly cared about the environment, and for more than just one planet. Noah saw—or
sensed
—an interconnectedness spanning the galaxy, and galaxies linked with other galaxies.

But is he the one spoken of in our legends?

So many important questions, and so little time. Eshaz only knew one thing for certain, a visceral sense that saving Noah was far more important than trying to gain control of this podship, or even repairing the rip in Timeweb.

Using his free hand, the Tulyan reached overhead, and onlookers were startled to see him and Noah flicker in and out of view. Unknown to them, Eshaz had his scaly hand pressed against a torn spot on the web just above him.

With a shudder, he felt energy flowing from the rift, coursing through his body into Noah Watanabe.…

Chapter Sixty-Six

How do we measure the accomplishments of our lives? By this do we measure our happiness, or our despair.

—Anton Glavine
, Reflections

The crew of the
Avelo
, following one of Captain Yuell’s rare and prized treasure maps, made several passes around Wuxx Reef, in a blue binary star system. The yellowing parchment, which he had spread open on the bridge of the ship, described fully laden merchant prince schooners that were missing in that sector, but without precise information on the exact location of the wrecks.

In only a few hours, the adventurers struck pay dirt, locating a spice schooner that had crashed into a cave within the floating rock formation, so that it was not visible from the outside. They only found it by sending a scouting party into the cave in a speedplane, with the red-sashed captain at the controls.

The wreck contained a cargo of exotic Old Earth spices, in sealed, largely undamaged containers. Captain Yuell, with a wide-ranging knowledge of commodities and values, said that he would investigate before selling the salvaged goods, since some of the spices might be irreplaceable, now that Earth was destroyed.

“This cargo might even be needed by scientists to regenerate seeds,” he theorized as Acey, Dux, and other crewmen loaded bags, chests, and barrels into the
Avelo
. “In fact, even without knowing what we can get for the haul, I’m going to award all of you a bonus. We’re overdue for a celebration.”

When the loading was completed, he patted Acey on the back, and added, “You and your cousin have done fine work for our little enterprise, and now you’ll learn how we let our hair down.” Ever since helping with the repair of the hydion engine, Acey had become one of his favorites, almost like a son.…

The following day, Captain Yuell took his treasure ship crew to the dusty planet of Adurian for a celebration. As the men strutted into a dimly-lit saloon they wore their finest clothes, with eye patches, bandanas, baggy trousers, and gleaming knives at their waists. Captain Yuell and the little Hibbil Mac Golden wore ceremonial swords.

“Stick with me, lads,” the captain said to Acey and Dux, “and I’ll teach you how to have a good time.”

Most of the patrons in the crowded tavern were Adurians, looking like humanoids with small, antlike heads and bulbous, oversized eyes. But there were a handful of other races as well, chubby Kichis, tall Vandurians, and bearded Ordians. As the treasure crew entered, conversation halted, but resumed soon afterward when the visitors glared around.

“They don’t want trouble with us,” Mac Golden said, keeping his hand near his sword.

A curvaceous Jimlat woman, with a pretty but blockish face, smiled at Dux, causing the young man to blush.

“You like that one?” Yuell asked.

“Uh, I have a girlfriend waiting for me at home,” Dux said, lying.

“Well, this is where we keep ourselves tuned up in the love department,” Yuell said, with a wide grin. “Don’t want to get rusty on these long voyages.” He and the men laughed.

Like ancient Earth cowboys after a cattle drive, the crew drank heavily and gambled in the smoky main room. More Jimlat women emerged from back rooms, and mingled with the men. Even Acey had one on his lap, but Dux, being more shy, kept his distance. For a while, Dux even tried to avoid gambling, since he and Acey had already lost so much. But after a couple of “high-du” drink injections, he joined his friends in a card game.

By the time Dux slipped into one of the high-backed chairs, the game was getting boisterous, with the participants shouting at each other, and not always good-naturedly. As Mac Golden explained in his squeaky little voice, this was Endo, the favorite pastime of the hairless, homopod Adurians—a fast moving competition in which electronic cards changed their faces and numbers in the blink of an eye, reducing or increasing their values.

Each player had an electronic screen on the table in front of him, with cards flashing across the surface. If certain card combinations showed up, the player had to press a button quickly to select it, or lose the hand. Acey had the best luck with the cards that came up, and the quickest reactions of anyone at the table. No one, not even Dux , could even come close.

“Time to quit!” Captain Yuell exclaimed finally, as he rose to his feet. “We better get Acey out of here before he ruins the whole Adurian economy.”

But just as he said this, Dux got his own winning hand on the screen, and he pressed the button. The screen locked in place, showing the faces of six Adurian women, side by side, each of them wearing matching sunbonnets. The word “WINNER” appeared on his screen in Galeng.

“Hey, look at this!” one of the treasure hunters exclaimed. “We’ve got another big winner here!”

But before Dux could celebrate, the faces on his screen changed, to pictures of Acey Zelk and Dux Hannah at the center, along with four blank faces, two on each side.

“What the.…” Unable to comprehend what he was seeing, Dux leaned close to the screen, and blinked his eyes in disbelief. The blank cards changed, to four uniformed men wearing hats marked “POLICE.”

Dux’s companions all said they had the same screens.

“Let’s get outta here,” Captain Yuell said, leading the way to the exit.

Just then, the front door of the saloon burst open, and white-uniformed Adurian police officers swarmed in. Yuell and Golden charged into their midst with swords drawn, scattering the officers with the aggressive attack. The rest of the treasure ship crew waded in behind them, swinging chairs, clubs, bottles, and anything else they could get their hands on. Acey got on top of the bar and leaped down on two officers, smashing both of them to the floor hard. This knocked one unconscious, and Acey head-butted the other one into a similar state, then jumped over the motionless Adurians and attacked others.

Dux did what he could himself, but he wasn’t the fighter the others were. An Adurian officer hit him in the side of the face with a stun club, sending him reeling and tumbling back under a table. Dux tried to sit up, but felt a little dizzy. Nonetheless, he climbed out and hurtled himself against the police, swinging his fists and screaming obscenities at them.

The police officers had apparently expected their numerical superiority to be enough to take the motley treasure ship crew into custody, but soon discovered how wrong they were. The Adurians tried to draw their pistols from holsters, but only one of them pulled a gun free, and he didn’t get an opportunity to use it, because Mac Golden severed his arm at the elbow with a swish of his sword. The injured Adurian ran from the saloon into the street, screaming and spurting gouts of blood. Other officers ran after him in terror, and most of those remaining in the saloon were on the floor, either unconscious or dead.

Just as Dux was fighting another, having punched him in the face, he heard someone shout, “Duck, Dux!”

Without delaying to consider why, Dux did as he was told. A fraction of a second later Captain Yuell fired one of the officers’ own guns, a thunderous blast that blew the alien’s head off only inches away from a startled Dux.

The captain then led a retreat. They made it to a shuttle and lifted off just before the shuttleport filled with police vehicles. As they rocketed upward, Dux saw police aircraft arrive and circle the landing field below.

“I didn’t see any other shuttles down there,” Mac Golden said, as he wiped his bloody sword on a cloth. “It’ll take ‘em awhile to mount a pursuit, and by then we should be long gone.”

“But they can still catch us at the pod station,” Acey said, “while we’re waiting for a podship.”