Quan replied, "The time between Wars of Wars has been as short as fifty-seven years and as long as eight thousand four hundred twenty-two years."
Frig asked a question. "Are there ever any species that are not of the selected feeder species that come to power? And, how are they dealt with?"
Quan was silent as he searched his memories. "Interloper species are met with an immediate purge. As are those who grow powerful within a feeder or trimming galaxy. Only selected feeder species are allowed to grow strong."
Frig spoke. "Sir, under these rules, the cloned Humans should have been eliminated. I can only guess that because they hid themselves away instead of fighting, they are still alive today."
I replied, "The part that worries me is that the species we are now up against are the baddest of the bad. We have no idea if they are going to have five weeks to get settled into wherever they are or five years, before they are attacked, I mean."
I turned back to Quan. "Is there a grace period when a species is dropped into the War of Wars? A time when they are not allowed to be attacked?"
Quan replied, "Each participant is allowed to study the selected galaxy for a period of approximately twenty-eight days. When the study period is over, all participants submit a selected location for their species to begin. The participants deploy their species at the same time. Occasionally, two such species are located in close proximity to each other and immediately begin their fight."
I looked at Frig. "So, it’s been almost a dozen days since Ashley and the others were taken. That means we have at least sixteen more before the fighting might actually start. By the time we arrive, they may have been going at it for two months!"
Frig shook his head. "I fear it is possibly worse than that, Sir. We are not going to the War of Wars galaxy. We are on our way to the Duke’s galaxy. The galaxy selected for their final battle may be months’ or years’ worth of jumps away from the Tadpole, Sir."
I scowled. "Thanks for the ray of sunshine, Frig."
I turned back to Quan. "Tell us about the Duke’s complex. How is he able to transfer billions of people at once?"
Quan’s processors purred away at the questions. "The framework of the complex is constructed of an ore that is similar to that used on the Grids. It offers a needed rigidity during construction. The complex also makes use of the sodium skin technology that was discovered by the Humans. The complex remains hidden from all who would travel near it.
"Each species is tagged early in their development with a DNA bio-marker that emits an extremely low power signal that is unique to that individual. Scanning wormholes are opened throughout the galaxy in question, and the bio-marker signals for that species are continuously tracked. At any instant in time, the complex knows the exact location of every marked being.
"At the time of the transfer, a wormhole is opened for each individual, and each is then swept through. Within the complex, a holding facility is used to process each individual so that memories of the location of their origin, as well as of all battles fought once their species reached space, are suppressed. After such suppression is complete, the members of the species are deposited on a station, or stations, such as the one your species named the Grid."
Frig spoke. "Quan, this complex—from where does it derive its power?"
Quan eventually replied, "The complex makes use of the fusion power of a brown dwarf star. While that level of fusion is minuscule as compared to a standard fusing star, it is sufficient to power the needs of the complex. The star is encapsulated within the complex, yielding sufficient energy to power as many wormholes as are required. Typically, a species has under five billion members, although, some have been as high as nine billion."
Frig shook his head. "Sir, a brown dwarf? The power that could be drawn from that would be near-infinite when compared to power levels that we have achieved to date. Imagine a million cesium reactors, and then imagine something much more powerful than that."
Frig asked another question. "How long has this complex been in operation? And are there others, or have there previously been other such complexes?"
Quan replied, "The complex was constructed and became operational 963,287 years ago. Each participant has a nearly identical complex under their control."
I held my hand up towards Frig as I asked another question. "What can you tell us about yourself and the other participants?"
Five minutes of silence soon turned to ten.
Frig spoke. "Sir, that may have been too generalized of a question. Quan’s processors are running at full. I suspect this particular answer may take some time. You may want to find something to occupy your time for a while."
Frig turned back to his holo-display. "Perhaps you are in need of some sleep, Sir. We have a long journey yet in front of us. This may be a good opportunity for you to catch up with a good rest."
Frig was right; I had not slept since Ashley had been swept away by the Duke. I set my sleep timer for twelve hours and made my way back to the bunk room. As I stretched out on my bed, I had a feeling of comfort come over me that I had not felt in a long time. This was my bunk. It was a safe place where I had spent thousands of nights resting. After a single blink of my eyes, I was fast asleep.
After waking from my sleep, I stepped out into the
Swift
’s hold. Frig was seated on the bench near Quan, pulling at a newly constructed BGS suit.
I spoke. "Wow, you were able to modify a suit for your physiology?"
Frig nodded. "Yes, there were a number of changes that had to be made; the bio-gel, the filtering, and nutrition packs all had to be reworked. I was checking the size and the placement of the suit’s pockets, pouches, and panels. I believe it is ready to be filled with the bio-gel."
I replied, "So, I should make every effort to not refill my gel from the tether attached to your chair?"
Frig shook his head as he laughed. "I would not believe that to be safe, Sir. Your liver and kidneys may not be able to properly process the nutrients that would be absorbed by your skin."
I picked up the nutrition pack before Frig placed it on his belt. "One thing I don’t understand, though."
Frig looked up. "And what is that, Sir?"
I laughed as I spoke. "How did you get all those insects crammed into this food pack!"
Frig sighed. "Really, Sir? Is that your best attempt at humor this morning?"
I replied with a grin, "It is!"
Frig grabbed the pack from my hand. "Then I would suggest you get to work on something else, Sir. Your attempt at humor was a feeble one."
I smiled. "Oh, I don’t know, Frig. From what I can see, half of the audience on this vessel absolutely loved it!"
Frig stood and walked to his chair. "Can you hand me the tether, Sir? It is time to fill the suit."
Seconds later, the warm gel began to flow. I was amused by the expressions coming from Frig’s face as he experienced his first fill.
When the process was complete, he looked up at his smiling partner. "What?"
I replied, "How’s it feel?"
Frig squirmed for several seconds before answering. "It is a bit unusual, Sir. I will admit to that."
I laughed. "Well, say goodbye to eating and pooping, my friend. Of everyone I know, I would say you will be the happiest with not having to waste your time on those daily mundane tasks."
Frig replied, "Yes, I suppose I will be."
Several seconds later, Quan began to answer my prior question. "I will begin with my history. I was created by a species who called themselves the Fellen. The Fellen were explorers. Quantums—that would be the name given to us—were valuable experimental tools for use by the scientists of the Fellen. I was of the newest and most intelligent model. While we were on an expedition, an explosion occurred on our ship. The cause remains unknown to me.
"I was thrown into space, with my lower half taking tremendous damage. The remainder of the ship then fell out of orbit around the planet we were exploring and burned up in the atmosphere. I was later collected by a salvage vessel and taken to a port within another species’ realm. As I had stated to you before, I was able to mobilize myself and escape from the salvagers.
"I wandered the crowded city for months, unsure of what to do other than to catalog data, when I was befriended by an elderly man who recognized my advanced cybernetics. For many months, Chulla Degur worked on my mobility circuits before he began to obsess over my intellectual abilities. In an attempt to better understand my programming, Chulla disabled my inhibitor circuit. I killed him the following day."
I began to raise my hand to ask another question, but Frig gestured for me to remain silent.
Quan continued, "Without the inhibitor, I experienced fear, aggression, loathing, and many other feelings that I had not been programmed to handle. I was soon running a criminal enterprise on this planet, which eventually led to my having full control of all of her citizens.
"As a physical being, I had needs. One of those needs was the changing out of my power cell. After one such change, I discovered that an unscrupulous subordinate had cloned my core three times over. The cores were spirited away by others, who would attempt to control them for their own purposes. It was those three cores who were eventually given bodies, after which they went out to form empires of their own.
"Over thousands of years, many battles were fought between the four of us before an accord was reached. We would each go our separate ways, taking whole galaxies under our control, but never interfering with each other. We each constructed spectacular empires and took advantage of monumental technological discoveries that the respective species of our empires were making. After tens of thousands of years, however, those achievements were not enough.
"We began to fight among ourselves over the most trivial of things. Emperor Belon then approached each of us with the idea of the War of Wars. A controllable number of galaxies were selected and divided among us. The complexes were then constructed so that we each might participate in the War of Wars on an equal basis. The locations of the complexes were kept secret so that we each might exist without the fear of being killed by the others."
I turned to Frig. "So, they got bored, and we are here as the result. We have got to find the Duke’s complex. If we find that, we find our people, we shut down the complex, and then we kill off the Duke."
Frig replied, "The others are clones of the Duke. Who is to say that they will not take over his assets, or possibly reconstruct another Duke? I believe we will have to remove all four participants if we want to ensure our freedom."
I nodded as I sighed. "You are right. This is an all-or-nothing scenario. If we find the complex, we find the war. If we find the war, we could possibly capture the other androids by doing exactly what we did with the Duke. Capture them and drag them through the wormhole in a deep freeze. The question is, how are we going to find the Duke’s complex? If it’s covered in the sodium skin, we don’t have a way of detecting that."
Frig replied, "Quan may not know the location of the complex directly. He may, however, know of its surroundings. We may be able to deduce the location of the complex by evaluating other memories."
I nodded. "Hmm. So, what you are saying is, you think that if we find out his other memories place the complex near a nebula, or a particular type of star, we can narrow down the locations? You win a cookie for that one, my friend!"
Frig looked over at me. "A cookie?"
I smiled. "It’s an expression; it means 'nice going.'"
Frig spoke. "After a dozen years, I would have thought that I had heard almost every Human expression. I shall have my cookie now, Sir. Pay up."
For a moment, I had a blank stare. "It’s an expression. There is no actual cookie!"
Frig shook his head. "That is a terrible example of an expression of affirmation, Sir. It has only left me with the desire for a cookie."
I slapped my food pack. "There are no more cookies, Frig. Although, I kind of have a hunger for one now too. A big Duranganut butter cookie would sure hit the spot."
Frig pointed towards Quan. "Can we continue our questioning of Quan, Sir?"
I replied, "We can. Quan. What is the largest astronomical object that is near the complex?"
Quan answered, "The Supernova remnant W233 is ten light-years from the complex."
I nodded my head. "Now we are talking! OK, Quan. What is the next-largest astronomical object in the area surrounding the complex, and what is its distance from the complex?"
Quan replied, "The small globular cluster Retica is located thirty-six light-years from the complex."
Frig spoke. "Sir?"
I held up my hand. "Hang on, I’m on a roll! Quan, what is the third-largest astronomical object that is closest to the complex?"
I turned and smiled. "I’ll have your answer in no time, Frig."
Frig replied, "Quan. Drawing a straight line from the supernova through the complex, what is the closest star located along that line on either side of the supernova and the object? Please provide type and luminosity. Repeat this process for the globular cluster that was referenced."
As Quan thought, I spoke. "Oh, you had to go and show me up with your fancy search parameters, didn’t you."
Frig nodded. "Sir, I am impressed that you so quickly derived my intentions. With the data Quan will provide, we may be able to pinpoint the complex."
I replied, "Well, your approach does make a lot more sense than what I was going for. I was thinking that if we identified enough of these objects, we would find it. Your approach will definitely get us there quicker, if Quan has the data."
Frig tilted his head. "You aren’t going to reward me with another fictitious cookie, are you, Sir?"
I laughed. "OK, enough with the cookies. I still want one!"
Quan answered with the information Frig was looking for. As we continued to jump closer to the Tadpole galaxy, the data Frig had entered began to identify globular clusters and supernova remnants. We soon had our mark.
Frig spoke. "I have the target star locked in. It is a good candidate to have had a brown dwarf in orbit around it."
I turned back towards Quan’s core. "Quan, what can you tell us about gaining access to the complex?"
Quan replied, "The complex cannot be accessed from outside. The sodium skin on the exterior can only be turned off from within."
I continued, "Using our wormhole generator, can we jump to a point inside the brown dwarf?"
Quan replied, "Any attempt to open a wormhole within the complex will fail. The portal opened would instead be located within the active sodium skin."
I turned to Frig. "Well, so much for finding it. Even if we do, we can’t get in. Will there be any way to track where the wormholes he has open lead to?"
Frig pulled up a diagram on his holo-display. "In order to find the endpoint, we must have access to the initial opening so that a scan might be performed. I will be spending the next few hours studying the information on the sodium skin. You might attempt to ask Quan about the internal structure of the complex. If we do gain access, we will need to know where to go and how to get there."
I turned back to the table in front of me, where the core of the former Duke sat open and vulnerable. "It looks like it’s just you and me for a bit, Quan. Tell me what you can about the interior structure of the complex."
The android computer went silent for two hours as it compiled and correlated information on the subject. "The interior of the complex is made up of a shell surrounding the brown dwarf star that is approximately one kilometer in thickness. The inner wall as well as the outer wall is active sodium. Conduits join the two walls together and allow the full containment of the brown dwarf star.
"Gravity nodules, exposed on the interior wall, convert the extreme gravitational pull into a usable energy source. This energy powers the wormhole generation equipment that is located near the outer wall. Nodules on the outer wall allow the establishment of the wormholes without exposing the exterior of the complex.
"The control room is located on the highest point of the complex as defined by the Tadpole galaxy’s definition of
up
. If approached from my last known location in the Triangulum, the top of the galaxy would be that which is facing the Triangulum."
I spoke. "When was the complex last updated?"
Quan replied, "176,287 years ago. A single wormhole generator was replaced with an experimental model that was later decommissioned."
A chime sounded on Frig’s holo-display. I spoke. "What was that?"
Frig replied, "That, Sir, was an indicator telling me that a design for a cesium nanoreactor is now complete. I would suggest we have the replicator manufacture a power cell for test purposes."
I raised my eyebrows. "Well, yeah! Let’s get that thing up and running. My cells are all down to about 60 percent now. I’ll pop one out of my leg and drop it in."
Frig shook his head. "I am sorry, Sir. I cannot allow that without at least a minimum of testing. If we damage your leg, we may not be able to repair it out here."
I looked down at my legs and over at the replicator. "You can’t just drop the design template for one of these legs on the replicator and let it spit one out?"
Frig replied, "Each of your prosthetics has a custom fitting procedure that we do not have available to us. Those instructions are located on the computers back on Tresha."
I rocked back in my seat. "Aw, well, that’s just great. So, if one of these gets mangled, I’m out of using it until we return to Tresha? Who left the program there?"
Frig again shook his head. "There are no responsible parties on this ship, Don Grange. Neither of us thought to upload the data from the planet’s surface, which included all of the data on the prosthetics’ installation. I would suggest that we produce a single power cell and put it through a variety of external tests. I will have the replicator build a test jig that somewhat resembles a prosthetic leg in function. From that, we can determine if the power cell is safe for you to try."
An hour later, Frig was placing a nanoreactor power cell in my hand. A test jig was completed several minutes later, and I inserted the cell into the receptacle. Several dozen flashing lights told us that the leg was now active.
I looked at Frig. "So, what do I do with it now? How do I test this thing?"
Frig replied, "Put your helmet on, Sir. I have a simple program that you can run from your HUD to control it. Just put it through the paces of every move you can think of. Attempt to overload it if possible, but please try not to command any moves that will send it flopping out of control here inside the
Swift
. That could be very unfortunate for us."
I laughed. "OK, got it, no flopping!"
For the next hour, I pushed the test jig to its limits. The power cell had little difficulty providing the needs of every move I commanded. When the test had ended, Frig gave the go-ahead for an install. I removed the current cell and pushed the new nanoreactor into the receptacle. My leg restarted with a jerk.
I spoke. "Whoa, what was that? It never did that before."
Frig replied, "Perhaps the original power cell has a slow ramp-up time. This reactor would be online near-instantaneously. Stand, walk, and flex the leg. I will tap into its diagnostics to look over its performance metrics."