Heaven's Reach (71 page)

D
ESPITE OCCASIONAL GAPS, A DISTANT VOICE
came through clearly, resonating in his mind.

“…  there are further matters to discuss … precautions you should take, for comfort during transition … the new coating will protect you as backlash … throws you to a hyperlevel well beyond those commonly used by starfaring races.”

Working together with Ling and other members of the Mother Consortium, he had labored hard to achieve this—sifting through the incredible complexity of the Transcendent Mesh for something simple enough for mere organic life-forms to understand. After all their efforts, this was the best result so far. An explanation, in plain
Anglic, of what the great ones hoped to accomplish from all the recent violence and turmoil.

Apparently, they would take advantage of rare cosmic conditions to launch specially modified ships, sending messenger-envoys hurtling on one-way voyages across the immense gulf separating clusters of galaxies.

“By adding wolflings to the mixture, we may … prevent the failures that plagued past efforts … when we tried to … cross the vast flat deserts between our galactic nexus and the myriad spiral heavens we see floating past, tantalizingly out of reach.…”

Lark felt growing agitation in the surrounding watery medium, where he and Ling floated amid a jostling throng of symbiotic organisms. “Mother” was clearly both excited and worried by this news. He knew this, in part, because his own fretful thoughts helped shape the overall mood.

Ling's presence made itself known. Turning around, he saw her swim toward him through the living murk, reaching out to clasp his hand. At the instant of contact, he felt her mind stroking his own, bringing dire news.

Can you feel it? The master rings have decided to assail and destroy
Streaker,
no matter what the repercussions!

Lark blinked in surprise. Putting out his own mental feelers to probe the data network of starship
Polkjhy
, he tapped the Jophur command frequencies and soon confirmed the worst.

The priest-stack and the new captain-leader were in complete accord. With stark decisiveness, they had sent
Polkjhy
careening on a new, deadly course. Attacking, heedless of the consequences.

What can they hope to accomplish? Interfering with the Transcendents will only invite those mighty ones to swat this ship—and all of us aboard—out of the sky like annoying insects!

Ling nodded, and Lark saw that he had just answered his own question. From the Jophur leaders' point of view, this offered a last chance to wipe out the hybrid oxy-hydro superorganism that had taken over most of their ship. Apparently, the Jophur would rather go out in a blaze of glory than surrender.

The suicidal decision saddened Lark. If only they would simply wait for the supernova! He had a hankering to watch the run-up to that gaudy event. To feel the first hyperdense flux of neutrinos sleet through his body, heralding a crackling dawn. One that would illumine night on myriad worlds.

Of course, Mother wasn't about to take this lying down. With approval of every sapient member, the community launched an immediate, all-out assault against the remaining vital strongholds held by unconverted Jophur. Soon Lark began sensing the fractious fury of combat, as both sides flung deadly bolts along stained corridors, further melting
Polkjhy
's already tortured walls. Lark's nerve endings responded, turning each injury or death into a pang, physically painful. Personally intense.

Mother is about to break into the engine compartment
, Ling noted.
But we may not be able to cut power in time to save the Earthlings … or to prevent angering the Transcendents.

Indeed, resistance was bitter as ring stacks and robots stubbornly held their ground against the costly assault. But Zang globules and other members of the Mother Consortium kept up the pressure, storming Jophur defenses with spendthrift courage.

We'd better go help
, Lark thought, and Ling nodded. They both had a sense of how drained Mother's reserves were. This was no time to hang back.

And yet, even as they made ready to join the fray, something restrained both of them. A resistance that stopped Lark in his tracks.

Not a
command
, as such. More like a consensus decision—a general feeling among other components of the symbiosis. An agreement that the two humans should not be risked right now.

They would better serve the whole with their intelligence and knowledge, by probing through the Mesh, trying once more to communicate.

With some reluctance, Lark accepted the wisdom of this. Together with Ling, he went back to work, reopening the channels they had discovered before.

“It occurs to us that one final test might be called for … verifying your mettle.

“One more trial … before our universe changes.”

Lark exhaled a sigh that formed bubble trails in the frothy medium.

So. The Transcendents were still tinkering, trying to optimize their experiment till the very last moment. Or else the “gods” were amusing themselves at the expense of those poor Earthlings. Either way, they weren't about to defend
Streaker
with omnipotent power. Instead, they would let
Polkjhy
attack, evaluating the results.

There wasn't much time left for exploration. With one part of his mind, Lark tracked the great mass-infall of collapsing debris.

Already the white dwarf surged and boiled as the cloud's inner fringes struck its surface at high velocity. Concentric waves of actinic blue fire crisscrossed the ancient, tormented surface, spouting gaudy flares of plasma back toward space, hinting at far greater fireworks to come.

Meanwhile, uncoded insults hurled from
Polkjhy
's bridge, taunting
Streaker
's crew as their hull was turned into a betraying antenna, forced to siphon heat from other folded layers of space.

At that point a familiar voice joined in.

It was Lark's old friend, the traeki from Jijo who had once been
Asx
, then
Ewasx
, and now was a wise, multicomponent being, simply called “X.”

I have finally made full contact with the Earthship's computer
, the hybrid creature announced.

Congratulations
, Lark replied.
Have you transmitted the information you wanted to send?

With a sense of waxy satisfaction, X confirmed it was done. Everything that had been learned about Jophur master rings was now copied into
Streaker
's onboard storage system, including the knack for growing red toruses—the kind that had proved so potent against egocentric dominance.

And yet, what good would the information do? Even if
Streaker
survived the present attack,
and
the coming stellar explosion, the Transcendents would only hurl it away from the Five Galaxies, riding a cosmic tidal wave, careening toward starscapes where no Jophur ever lived.

X showed no sign of recognizing any inconsistency.

You might be interested in something else I have learned. There is a passenger aboard the Earthship. Someone now counted among its honored leaders. A human person, familiar to us both.

Lark sensed anguished irony behind the words. Bending his will toward the indicated path, he finally gained access to
Streaker
's housekeeping files and discovered the datum X referred to.

Sara!

A spasm rocked him, from sheer surprise. Eddies tugged Lark's body, while Ling grasped his right arm, to help him get over the shock.

What is my sister doing out here … so far from Jijo? How did she wind up in such a mess!

The blow was made worse when Mother came up with an estimate of heating rates aboard
Streaker.
At this pace, the influx would reach critical levels in less than half a midura.

Soon after that, all the water aboard the dolphin-crewed ship would start to boil.

Emerson

T
HE ALARM SEEMED TO TAKE EVERYONE IN
Streaker
's control center by surprise.

The others had been so intent and worried about the engorged, enraged star—and about mysterious actions of the nearby needle-gateway—that they seemed to forget about danger from mundane enemies.

But he had not.

Emerson knew better. He had dealt with Jophur before and understood their tenacity—a single-mindedness that had been grafted into their race by careless Uplift consorts, who had failed to grasp the basic value of moderation. When the assault came, he was ready.

Lacking speech or literacy, Emerson could not read the flashing monitor screens or figure out the exact nature of their weapon. Details did not matter. He understood that it somehow had to do with making
Streaker hot.
Already the walls and floor plates were emanating uncomfortable warmth. Large amounts of energy poured in, even though the small sun was still not ready to explode.

Sara reached for his hand, and he felt guilty putting her off with a mere loving squeeze, before dashing away. But Emerson figured that a chance of saving her life was worth more than staying by her side and roasting together.

Running down a torrid hallway, he kept shouting, in hopes that the automatic intercoms would pass on his simple message.

“Suessi!… Karkaett!… Now, now, now!”

Would they come? So much labor had gone into making his idea a reality, applying a two-hundred-year-old
technology to new problems in survival. And yet, he worried. They might have simply been humoring him, working together as a way to stay busy till the end.…

Clambering through a maintenance tube, Emerson hurried till he reached the small chamber where his last, triumphant encounter with the Old Ones had taken place—and breathed relief when he saw that Hannes and a couple of dolphin engineers were already there, gathered around the big laser. They babbled to each other in the sweet dialect of engineering. Emerson could no longer parse the quick, efficient meanings, but their speech sounded like music, nevertheless.

The graceful lyrics of competence.

Hannes turned his mirrorlike dome to ask Emerson a question. One that was simple enough for his frail remaining language centers to grasp.

“Yes!” He nodded vigorously. “Do … it!”

Hannes pushed a switch and the laser abruptly bucked in its mounting brackets—hissing and straining like some great beast, snorting as it sprang into action.

Emerson shifted position in order to sight along the massive barrel, curious to see where massive amounts of energy were now pouring.

He saw nothing but stars.

Sure enough, a nearby view screen showed a red dot, representing the Jophur vessel
Polkjhy
, approaching
Streaker
's other side.

Of course he had been lucky with the Old Ones. It would have taken extreme luck for this enemy to be within reach. Anyway, a battleship's defenses might deflect even such a potent beam.