Void: Book Five of the Nightlord series

by Garon Whited

  “The geek in me desperately wants a starship, Diogenes.”

  “We do not have supply points in such universes,” he pointed out. “They have been marked as too dangerous because of their intelligence analysis capabilities. We would have to establish connections and divert resources from other projects to acquire the necessary funding. A preliminary analysis suggests it would be less expensive to purchase or produce components, however.”

  “Can you build a starship? Here?”

  “Using the information available, design and fabrication should be possible.”

  “How long will it take?”

  “The question is indeterminate. It depends on the ship mission parameters, number of crew and passengers, and what priority to give resource allocation, among other things.”

  “Okay, what’s the minimum time to build one?”

  “Sixteen months, eighteen days, and eleven hours, plus or minus fifteen hours. This is the smallest design for a starship. In nautical terms, it is the equivalent of a personal sailboat.”

  “Download more information, then draw me up some starships. What’s the fastest type of FTL drive?”

  “The fastest FTL drive involves a hyperspace jump, but it also requires a much larger powerplant and drive system. The easiest to produce utilizes a space-warping device to multiply the effective distance traveled per unit of time.”

  “Oh, I badly want a warp drive starship,” I complained. “You have no idea.”

  “My heuristic analysis of your statement suggests it should continue with,” and Diogenes mimicked my voice, saying, “but I can’t afford to do it right now.” He shifted back into copying Paul Bettany’s voice. “Am I correct, Professor?”

  “Yes,” I sniffled. “Yes, you are. Maybe next year.”

  “I will remind you, Professor.”

  “Thank you, Diogenes. Now, here’s a question.”

  “That is unexpected.”

  “Is it?”

  “Oh, wait,” Diogenes replied. “You are not Spanish, are you?”

  “What does that have to do with it?” I demanded.

  “I was not expecting the Spanish Inquisition. Please state your query.”

  I groaned. Even Bronze thought it was terrible. It was so horrible it was almost worth it. I was still pleased he made the effort.

  “The question,” I tried, once the shock wore off, “is about worlds which have suffered recent nuclear holocaust.”

  “I have several in the catalogue, Professor.”

  “I know. I was talking with Patricia recently and it got me thinking about her home world. Could we salvage their radioactive waste, process out the appropriate isotopes, and use them in a thermoelectric generator? Last time I checked the potential usefulness of thermoelectric devices, it wasn’t feasible on the large scale. But if we’re using waste radioisotopes as a heat source, we can water-cool the cold side…”

  “The idea has some merit. However, the processing of such materials will be problematic. The potential return on resource investment reaches a break-even in thirty-six years.”

  “Ouch. Not much help right now. How about we just order a lot more solar panels from an intact world?”

  “They are being delivered regularly,” Diogenes assured me, “from a world where fusion power has lowered their pricing, but not yet made them economically non-viable. May I also suggest building a third fusion plant of our own, Professor?”

  “Yes.”

  “I suggest building a third fusion plant, Professor.”

  “I meant—never mind. If you think that’s the most practical solution?”

  “Yes, Professor. However, with the existing solar taps, our fusion-based electrical production is sufficient to make building a complete, self-sustaining fusion plant practical.”

  “We’re still going to need more electromagical transformers.”

  “Ruthenium shipments are ongoing,” Diogenes assured me. “Also, when the solar conversion panels achieve polar positions, redirecting some of their output to continue self-replication is indicated. I have axial geometry deployments for your consideration, rather than surface-curvature deployment. The primary output will be to magical operations here on Earth, but any excess will be rerouted to continue panel production.

  “I also suggest, based on the design parameters you provided, that in an axial geometry configuration, all the panels can be continuously oriented toward the Sun, increasing their effective output.”

  The door to the medical building opened for us. Bronze, the Diogenes drone, and I all went in. A robot whirred up to me, accepted the little dollops of hybrid elf-flesh, and whirred away again.

  “You know, I’ve long suspected you’re smarter than I am.”

  “I am a complex of programs in a powerful computing matrix,” Diogenes corrected. “To the extent I think, I think faster than anything with a protein-based brain. My memory is more extensive and virtually perfect. I lack the ability to define goals for myself or think creatively.”

  “You’re saying you have no imagination.”

  “Yes, Professor.”

  “Okay. But you’re the most massively powerful computer the planet has ever seen. You can operate, in real time… how many robots?”

  “With the added processor clusters, my theoretical capacity in on the order of ten to the forty-third. The figure varies based on robot type and capabilities. A track-laying, cross-country exploration and repair robot requires more processor time than a delivery drone, for example.”

  “So, it’s fair to say you have excess capacity.”

  “That is correct.”

  “Good. From now on, I want you to devote about a tenth of a percent of your total computational capacity to generating random courses of action and evaluating them. Let me know if you randomly have an idea that seems good enough to be worth human evaluation.”

  “Program set up and running, Professor. Shall I poke plastic carpet with a bacterium?”

  “That’s pretty random,” I admitted. “How would you evaluate that course of action?”

  “Impractical and pointless. Shall I detonate a cardboard solenoid?”

  “I wasn’t aware cardboard solenoids could be detonated.”

  “I will disregard it, then. Shall I annihilate all organic life forms?”

  “Did that pop up as a random result?” I inquired, suspiciously.

  “No, but I am a rudimentary type of artificial intelligence controlling extensive robotic labor. It seemed obligatory to include it.”

  “Let’s hold off on it for now,” I suggested. “And run these random ideas through your predictive algorithms before you suggest them to me, okay?”

  “Only share the good ideas?”

  “Yes, please. And only when I have time, if you would.”

  “Certainly, Professor.”

  “Thank you. How soon can I start talking to the captives?”

  “They are in individual rooms, confined, and recovering from the effects of their anesthesia. I have administered antidotes and stimulants. Most are somewhat conscious, but not yet lucid.”

  “Fair enough. I’m in no rush. We need to feed Bronze.”

  Another drone hummed up, orbited Bronze’s head, and paused.

  “If you will follow me, I will show you to a feeding stall,” it offered. Bronze nodded and trotted off after it. I followed my own drone to a waiting room and sat down in a recliner. It didn’t even squeak. Diogenes knows to over-build the furniture. A little time in my headspace to further organize my angel lore seemed appropriate. Later, I could get some work done to replace the amulets stolen from Mary and myself. Or should I try to track them down? It would be easier to copy the enchantments than to make all-new ones… Angels, tracking, mayhem, enchantments… good plan.

  Argh. My altar ego, the Lord of Shadow. I promised him I’d look into directing energy at him.

  Come to think of it, I probably should have checked while I was in Karvalen. How do you feed an energy-state being? W
hat sort of energy do they eat? Faith or belief can generate it, sure, but is it psychic energy? Magical energy? Or what? It’s hard to duplicate something you can’t even define.

  All right, add further consultation with a quasi-deity to the list.

  I stepped into my headspace.

  I opened my eyes when Diogenes poked me. The robot was a smooth, rubbery thing, four-legged, and hospital white in color. Probably the equivalent of an orderly, with sturdy structure, four arms, big hands, and enough padding to be comfortable for a patient. I wouldn’t be surprised to find tactile feedback sensors embedded in the soft outer covering.

  “One of the subjects is lucid and demanding to know where he is.”

  “If he’s asking coherent questions, maybe he can give coherent answers. Show me to him. And how’s Bronze doing?”

  “She is presently out for a run. I am preparing another lunch for her. Her Impala is repaired and fueled. The orichalcum production for her new statue is on schedule. Do you wish to have it machined into jointed, robotic form?”

  “I think she’ll handle it herself. The important thing, I think, is getting her in it.” I followed the robot to a locked room. We both went in. The captive sat up in bed, wearing only a hospital gown. He searched around himself, feeling along the sides of the bed, probably for a switch to summon a nurse. He stopped when we entered.

  “Who are you? Where am I? I demand to know what hospital this is!” He glared at me, a big man with a slight Italian accent. “You’re not a doctor.”

  “Just because I don’t wear a white coat and a stethoscope doesn’t mean I’m not a doctor. I’d like to examine your ears. Turn your head. Have you had any problems with your vision? Blurriness? Reddish tints? Shadows?”

  He frowned thunderously and glared at me.

  “My concern,” I went on, “is to make sure you don’t have signs of a bleed in your brain or inside your eyes. If you feel dizzy, lose coordination, and wind up collapsed on the floor in a puddle of your own making, it’ll be too late. Turn you head. Please.”

  He grunted and turned his head. I pretended to examine his ear. At least he didn’t recognize me from the garage.

  “I want to know where I am,” he insisted.

  “You’re in a hospital, recovering from what appears to be some damage from extremely loud noise. Jet engine? Explosions?”

  “No… I don’t… it was…” he trailed off, looking at the robot. “It was a mechanical man. A robot. Several of them.” He turned to look at me and pushed me away. “Now you tell me where I am! Right now!”

  “Where you are doesn’t matter if you don’t know how to get home. Do you want to walk? Or would you like your clothes and a quick boot out the door?”

  He sneered at me for a moment.

  “Who are you and what do you want?” he demanded.

  “Nothing much. I’m mostly interested in why you tried to kill me. Were you paid, or did you guys ambush me simply because you don’t like me?”

  “You!” he shouted, and promptly threw the sheet over me—or tried to. I stepped back as it fluttered through the air and was ready when he sprang off the bed to attack.

  I sat on him, carefully, holding his right hand up behind his back almost to the neck, and tried to talk sense. Mary insisted I study martial arts because I’m not at all talented at brawling, despite my unnatural advantages. My swordsmanship is a perfect example of how training can make up for a lack of talent. These days, I’m pretty sure getting into a fistfight with Bruce Lee some afternoon is still a bad idea, but if he’s the one who walks away, he’ll have a limp. Let’s not talk about what happens at night.

  Horrible thought. What happens if someone like Bruce Lee becomes a vampire? Just how pants-wettingly fast do those hands move? Or an Olympic fencer? The opponent will look like the victim of a giant sewing machine.

  Perhaps it’s best if I keep these thoughts to myself.

  “Look,” I told him, hiking his arm a notch higher, “I’m not killing you. I’ve gone to some trouble to repair you, in fact. I’m not trying to hurt you, aside from the minimal bit of restraint I’m applying.” I eased off a trifle on my hammerlock. “I just want to know your motivation. Is it financial? Religious? Both? What have you got against us creatures of faerie?”

  “I’m not going to answer any—what? Faerie? What are you talking about?”

  I eased the pressure on his arm a little more to encourage conversation. I still didn’t let him up.

  “Seriously, just because we’re not human, is that any reason to ambush us? We try to keep a low profile and not bother anyone. Why are you picking on us?”

  “You’re no fairy. You’re a vampire!”

  “What?” I demanded, edging his hand higher as though I was upset. “That’s insulting! How dare you accuse me of such a thing! Do you want to be turned into an equal mass of spiders? I can do it. I did it to a guy not six hundred years ago, and you could be next!”

  “I’m sorry!” he shouted. I was pushing his hand uncomfortably close to his hairline.

  “That’s better,” I told him, slacking off on the pressure. “If I let you up, will you talk this over?”

  “Yes!”

  I stepped away from him and let him get up on his own. He rubbed his shoulder, glaring at me.

  “Look,” I reasoned, “I have a pulse. I have a body temperature. I may be pale, but that’s because we’re night creatures, not because I burn in the sunlight any more than you do.” I gestured and a cloud of sparkling motes trailed behind my hand. Another movement and it whirled into a small vortex, settled to the floor, and started wandering slowly around the room, bouncing off things.

  He stared at it for a bit, watching it, fascinated. When the spell finally wore down and the whirling motes fell apart into nothingness, he turned back to me with an uncertain expression.

  “I was told you’re a vampire.”

  “Now that’s just rude.”

  “I’m only repeating what I was told.”

  “Well, maybe I shouldn’t hold it against you,” I admitted. “You were told. Fine. But I want a word with whoever thinks I’m a vampire!”

  I lied like a used car salesman with a gambling problem, to him and to his buddies. Six guys, one after the other, all with some variation on the theme. I didn’t need all of them to completely buy it, but each of them told me something whether they meant to or not.

  I talked to each of them until they became unreasonable or unresponsive, depending on how the conversation went. At which point, I left the guy I was questioning and Diogenes gassed him unconscious before putting him in restraints. I won’t have them making a heroic escape, uniting the mutant elephants and the tribes of Homo Apocalypticus, and staging a revolution against the robot overlords.

  First of all, I doubt they could unite any of them. Second, it wouldn’t end well for them. Diogenes has the firepower to eradicate all life larger than a rat on this continent. I had him draw up the contingency plans. It would take him about sixty days. We wouldn’t get much else done in the meantime, but it could be done.

  From what I gathered from my vampire-hunting captives, there are at least two major vampire-hunting groups. The guys who captured Mary and crucified me are Lorenzo’s people—the regular vampire hunters. The other group—the yahoos who showed up in our warehouse—is more religious, viewing the eradication of vampires as a holy cause.

  Sounds familiar.

  These guys are out to cleanse the black-hearted bloodsuckers from the world. They’re not sponsored by an official religion, as such. They’re more a loose confederation of people from many different religions—Catholics and Protestants, Jews and Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus. They don’t seem to mind differences about creed and doctrine so much. Their major concern is the evil they’re facing.

  I bet they still have some private animosities and intolerances, but nothing brings people together like having someone else to hate.

  Salvatore put them on our track. He isn’t a formal p
art of their organization, but, being somewhat religious and decidedly rich, he found people to ask, found answers, and found ways to contact the Interfaith Order of Anti-Vampire Zealots. This inevitably led to glowing crosses in my garage. Thanks, Salvatore. Mary’s not the only one irked with you.

  And after all the money we funneled through him. You’d think over a pound of flawless diamonds would earn us some slack, but apparently not. It’s so hard to find an honest criminal, sometimes.

  The only bright spot was their complete lack of knowledge regarding Lorenzo. At least it was fairly easy to group our enemies. Salvatore and the Religious Zealots, versus Lorenzo and the Humans-Only Club.

  By the time I finished the discussions it was well after lunchtime. Mary was in the residence complex, waiting for me. Bronze was in Denver, grazing on a variety of nutritious and high-calorie dishes of her own.

  Nuts to the universe. I went to lunch.

  It was a good lunch. Diogenes may not eat, but he has cooking programs from a dozen universes and authorization to build as many hydroponics banks as he needs. It’s kind of helpful that I told him to go ahead and grow whatever he could. Not only did we have food ready for the refugees from various flavors of Nukeville, we produce a large surplus. The surplus is growing—no pun intended—every day, since food is one of our world exports—our food and the food we buy from the refugee villages. It’s surprising how many major grocery stores will happily buy your produce and never ask where you got it. Of course, we have to sell to worlds where the regulatory agencies haven’t taken over, which generally means the world is earlier in the consensus timeline than is ideal.

  This bothers me, sometimes. Not because Diogenes grows a substandard crop—far from it! His growth banks produce the healthiest, cleanest food it’s possible to produce—but because I wonder what sort of quality control is on everyone else’s food. I mean, I probably don’t have to worry about cancer or pollution or toxins or whatever, but what about everyone else?

  I’m an environmentalist vampire. As weird as that is, I’m not sure it even makes the top ten in my life.

  “So, how go the interrogations?” Mary asked, assembling a Dagwood for herself.