by T. R. Harris
“No, I am not.”
“But how…how will you leave the Void?”
“That is of my concern. I will take the Klin fleet with me. Your responsibility, Pleab Coric, will be the array and the security of your homeworld. In the future, your forces will play a very important role in the conquest of the galaxy. Are you willing to accept this responsibility?”
There it was, the confirmation Coric had been hoping for.
“Yes, my Lord. The Olypon have devoted all our means and measure to your return. We are at your service.”
“Very good. Now, let us proceed with the briefing. I am anxious to learn what you have done with my galaxy while I was gone.”
One tiny starship, glued to the face of a mountain-size asteroid, was impossible to spot unless one knew what they were looking for. The Olypon patrols racing along the edge of the Dysion Shield were traveling too fast to detect the weak energy signature bleeding from the Mustang Sally. The team relaxed, while grimly assessing their situation.
They didn’t have the means to communicate through the turmoil of the nebula, so warning the galaxy that Kracion was here was not possible. Some of the ship’s critical early-warning systems were offline, and a manual transit of the Shield was out of the question. They had food and water for about a week, seeing that the small muleship now had a passenger list of ten. Comms within the Void were possible, and the team was able to monitor local chatter. What they heard wasn’t encouraging. The Olypon were moving forces to the Volseen Corridor, essentially blocking off any access to the Dysion, in or out. Adam knew they were doing this to give them time to rebuild the array. If that happened, then Kracion could move more Klin ships over, even if they had to come in 22-minute-long increments. Kracion would consolidate his forces, hidden from the prying eyes of the galaxy.
At least he hoped there were prying eyes. So far no one seemed anxious to jump on the major-new-threat-to-the-galaxy bandwagon. Fortunately, this delay could give Arieel and Sherri time to get to Formil where they might have more success convincing the Expansion of the risk. Of course, this was assuming Arieel could maintain her status within the Formilian power structure.
Even if that was so, Adam and his team couldn’t stay here. Eventually they would have to make a supply run, and the only planet with what they needed was Olypon itself. That wouldn’t be the smartest move they could make.
On the bright side, they were alive, relatively safe…but depressed as hell.
119
The line looked more like a snake than a course.
“No offense, Kaylor, but you’re crazy.”
“It is not I who charted the path through the Core,” the blue-skinned alien said in his defense. “This is what we found in the Klin archives. Adam requested we search for a quicker route from the Juddle Nebula to Formil, and that is what we have done. Unfortunately, it leads through the Core.”
“I know that,” Sherri Valentine said. “That’s not what I’m getting at. It’s crazy to expect me to be able to follow such a course, and especially within the most dangerous part of the galaxy.”
“That is why it is so convoluted,” Jym squeaked. The two aliens were on the huge bridge of the Colony Ship, speaking with Sherri and Arieel over a video CW link. “There are numerous obstacles along the way.”
“You’re making my case for me.”
“I do not understand.”
Sherri shook her head. Arieel was seated next to her on the bridge of the Davion. “Are you a proficient enough pilot for such a transit?” the voluptuous alien asked.
Sherri didn’t take offense; she was thinking the same thing. “And that’s another point. I’ve never been the primary pilot during any of our adventures. I always let the guys drive.”
“We will maintain communications throughout,” Kaylor assured her. “We will help guide you.”
“Well, we ain’t going to set any land-speed records along the way, that’s for sure.”
“Of course not,” Jym said. “You will be in space.”
Sherri was still shaking her head. “So, when do we start?”
“You are nine light-years out from the first turn. I would prepare yourselves now. Arieel will have to monitor the threat board for any unexpected obstacles. The date on these records suggest that they are relatively recent—about ten years old. Yet this is the Core; there are constant changes taking place.”
“Okay, let’s do this thing. We have to get Arieel to Formil as soon as possible. We have no time to waste.”
“Yet if our haste results in her death—”
Kaylor jabbed Jym in the ribs.
“You will make it,” the Belsonian said, glaring at his small bear-like associate. “A pilot’s confidence is often his—or her—greatest asset.”
“Thanks, Kaylor. Let’s get this over with.”
Kaylor checked his screens. “Once in the channel, transit time should be nine hours before you are beyond the most-dangerous region. Rest if you can before you start your run. It will become intense very soon.”
Among other things, the Klin had been master navigators. They also sought the most secret and obscure routes to protect them from their numerous enemies within the Milky Way. The course through the Core was one of them.
Sherri tried to reassure herself. The Klin would not risk their lives on something that wasn’t safe. There had been far too few of them for that to happen. So, everything would be fine.
The first evidence she got that that may not be so was when she and Arieel crossed the imaginary boundary that all standard charts called ‘restricted territory.’ A few light-years farther along, they began to see why.
The space around the Core was swarming with stars, many more than could be found in even the densest nebula or globular cluster. They came in all shapes and colors, creating a veritable maze of gravity channels and waves which played havoc with the drive system of the Davion. Star drives worked best when free of outside influences, like stellar masses and planets. But there was no escaping the hundreds of stars filling the space before them.
Sherri had the course plugged into the nav computer and the ship was doing an admirable job of following it. Or at least it had been. Now the warping of space became so chaotic that the readings became suspect. Traditional means of surveying the curvature of space were useless.
“Do I have to take manual control?” Sherri asked Kaylor through the CW link.
The alien’s image wavered. “I did not hear your question.”
“The autopilot is going wacky,” she said. “I may have to take manual control pretty soon.”
“That would not be advised.”
“What else can I—”
The screen turned to static. Sherri checked the link time. It had only been seven minutes.
“Wormhole communications only last until the fabric of space shifts to a new pattern,” Arieel stated. “Around the Core, the fabric is ever-shifting.”
“That’s just great,” Sherri said, exasperated.
“I do not see where that is a benefit,” the Formilian said, confused.
“It’s not.”
Sherri studied the nav chart. They were still on course, but from the vibration of the generators she could tell the engines were fighting a strong pull to their right. It was obvious why. The outer rim of the event horizon for the supermassive blackhole at the center of the galaxy was only twenty light-years away. Even at this distance, there was a steady, brilliant glow in that direction.
The other curious feature of the space they were moving through was that the objects on their screens were moving at incredible speeds. As she and Arieel watched, star-size objects would actually shift several degrees. That would take speeds approaching one-half light. Dozens of stellar furnaces were nearing their last stage, soon to whip around the event horizon of the supermassive black hole, slowly spiraling in. Sherri was in awe of the fact that something the size of a star could be sucked into a dark void, lost forever in an impossibly large abyss. She ju
st hoped the Davion didn’t join them.
“Is that object within our course?” Arieel asked, pointing at an energy signature on the screen.
“It certainly looks like it,’ Sherri replied. She didn’t have to guess. The white line of their course dissected the object.
“What is it?” Arieel asked. “It does not have the signature of a star.”
She was right. The energy readings showed a curved flare to the north with another, thinner line to the southwest. To Sherri it looked like radar pictures of a disorganized hurricane eyewall. The fact that it formed a broken circle made her blood run cold.
Could this be a black hole directly in their path?
Sherri disengaged the autopilot and the ship immediately surged to the right.
“What are you doing?” Arieel yelled.
“That’s a black hole up there, and if we don’t get away soon, we’ll be caught in its grip. The little Davion won’t be able to pull away.”
“Yet now we are headed for the glow.”
“Give me a minute; this thing is really fighting me.”
The Klin KFV could be controlled by either a flight stick or by computer input. Sherri now had the stick between her legs struggling to pull it to the left. The ship straightened out, but now it was back on the original course…toward the smaller blackhole.
She pulled harder, but the stick wouldn’t cooperate.
“Shall I assist?” asked Arieel as she moved closer.
“That would help, but let’s not break the damn thing.”
Even with Arieel’s strength added, it was a losing battle. They couldn’t get the Davion turned to the left enough to get away from both blackholes.
“This isn’t working,” Sherri said. “Let me try one more thing. Give me the stick.”
Arieel backed away.
Sherri let the stick wander to the right. The ship followed. Then she gunned the engines, deepening the well ahead of them. They had been moving along at barely a quarter of max speed, picking their way carefully through the minefield of stars and debris. Now they raced forward.
“How is this helping?” Arieel asked. “All it is doing is hastening our demise.”
“What can I say; I’m impatient.”
Arieel’s face was still covered with shock when the Davion zipped by the invisible event horizon of the small blackhole, evident only as a gravity signature on the screens. The pull from the supermassive blackhole lessened, overcome by the much closer influence of the singularity on their left. Then Sherri shifted course, more to port.
The stick accommodated, feeling looser than before, using the gravity of the smaller blackhole to whip them along their arched path through space. Sherri maintained the strength of their gravity-well, adding it’s influence to the gravitational assist the Davion was getting from the singularity now behind them and off the port rear quarter.
The drag on the ship decreased as the blackhole fell away in the distance, allowing Sherri to steer farther to the left, lining back up on the original course line. They had passed the midpoint to the galaxy, now heading essentially downhill from here.
Sherri reengaged the autopilot and pushed back from her console.
“How about doing us a favor, Arieel? Go below and fix us a couple of the strongest intoxicants you can conjure up. I feel like having a stiff one.”
Arieel smiled. “I assume you are speaking of a beverage.”
“For now, but no promises when we get to Formil. Your men are unbelievably hot.”
“They are attractive as well.”
120
Adam was called to the bridge by Monty Pitts three days into their stay within the Dysion Shield. The ship was on rations, but that wouldn’t last long. Sooner or later they would have to do something.
“What’s up, master chief?”
“Increased activity along the Shield wall.”
Adam tensed. “Looking for us?”
“I don’t think so. They’re doing a methodical survey of the nebula. I think they’re looking for weak points.”
“That would make sense. I’m sure Kracion doesn’t intend to take his fleet through the center of the nebula. He’s planning on doing what the Humans did; cut a hole through it. But where, and how?”
“From what you say of this Aris creature, the how is pretty much decided. He’s smart enough to already have a way. The where is still a question.”
Monty put a survey of the Shield on the screen in front of him. There was a blue dot to the left. “This is where we are. The Klin—and only the Klin—are over here.” He pointed to the right. The plot map wasn’t really a survey, but more of a suggestion. There were huge swaths of yellow, signifying unknown regions or areas where data was now out of date. This covered eighty percent of the screen.
“Is that the place? Can you tell?”
“The Juddle Nebula was created from a series of supernovas, a chain reaction in fact,” the master chief began. “It spread out over a vast area before gravitational forces began to draw it back in. At one point the star Kryils came into being and cleaned out the nebula around it, creating the Void. It’s still influencing the region, making the Void smaller. As it does, it affects the inner wall of the Shield more than the outer portion. This makes the barrier wider and thinner in sections. This looks like one of them. This could be their way out.”
“We should get over there. That could be our way out as well.”
“I’d wait until we see what they’re going to use to open the hole. If it’s large enough to move a fleet through, I don’t think we want to be anywhere near it, especially not within the Shield.”
Adam smiled. “Good point, chief.”
“But there is a lot of activity. What’s going to happen will be soon.”
“This means Kracion isn’t waiting for the array to be rebuilt. He’s going out looking for the Aris space station on his own, not waiting for the rest of his fleet. This could be to our advantage. I’ll wake up the others. This is the best news we’ve had in a while. Thanks for bringing it to my attention.”
The breakout came a day later.
All twenty-one of the Klin ships showed up at the barrier, with one larger signature located within a shield of flanking vessels. That had to be where Kracion was located. Where else would a god-like being ride but in the biggest and the best. Adam watched the image feeling impotent, knowing that Lila and Panur were aboard the ship. But with Kracion heading out with only this small force, the galaxy still had a chance. The Aris madman was still mortal. One well-placed shot would put an end to this whole thing. After which they would scour the wreckage for the mutants.
Of course, Adam couldn’t do the job alone. He needed a little help from his friends.
Kracion had the mutants sequestered in a room off the bridge with a camera on them and the image transfer to his command chair. The pair of odd creatures was too much of a distraction for the Klin bridge crew for them to be kept in the same room as he.
He surveyed the multiple screens before him. A circular phalanx of Klin ships was lined up facing the distant wall of the nebula, it’s gases alive with swirls of brilliant colors. On his command, they would launch a series of hundreds of remote-controlled gravity probes into the Shield. They would activate miniature gravity-wells, sucking in volumes of debris. Then more would be launched, one wave after another, until they burst out on the other side of the barrier. Then it would be Kracion’s turn to move forward.
Now he gave the order to launch the gravity probes. There was no time to waste.
He’d spent several hours listening to the excitable, yet nervous, Olypon leader give his recital on the Milky Way galaxy. That was a term the Humans associated with the home galaxy, one of thousands of such named references. It was now the common nomenclature accepted by a thin majority of races, content in having a neutral name for something they all shared.
Then he set to work absorbing computer data relating to the history and technological base of the galaxy. This wa
s a huge amount of information, containing not only data on a handful of worlds, but on thousands.
Kracion was in awe of it all, thinking how in such a short time he had been the catalyst for all that had taken place over the past four thousand years. Without his influence, the Alliance of the Klin would still be a fledgling grouping of civilizations, one of many, yet none reaching galactic scale in the time allotted. His intention had been to speed up the interaction of the races, a circumstance that would hasten the creation of the Apex Being. It worked. Now the galaxy was a mixture of thousands of species, many aware of the others and associating across the star lanes. Without Kracion, the Milky Way would be only a vague shadow of what it was today, with tens of thousands of years still to go before reaching maturity.
Yet the data he was accumulating was limited to the speed of the primitive computers in use. He could absorb the information much faster than it could be disseminated. Therefore, his study was not complete when time came for him to leave the confines of the Dysion Void and begin his quest for Solis, the artificial world of the Aris.
Although he’d been out of his encasement chamber much longer than this in the past, there were far too many unknowns in this galaxy to make him feel secure. His pride prevented him from considering these unknowns as threats, but that was what they were as long as he remained in his current state. In the past—both distant and recent—he had not feared death as much as he did now. It was simply his destiny. He would do his job and then return to his chamber, to be awaken in another hundred thousand, or even a million years beyond. He had lived for billions of years, yet in tiny increments. Whether the experiments of the Privileged could produce the results as expected was a question he seldom pondered. If they did or didn’t it would have very little impact on him. His kind had not been included in the first round of immortality should the time come. They would be rewarded only later, if there was any immortality left to be spread around.