The Lion in Paradise

by Brindle, Nathan C.

  "Elon Musk. Is this Yael?"

  "Yes! Elon, I've been in contact with my mother and sisters, don't ask how, it takes too long to explain. We can put Phobos back together and lift it back into orbit, but we need to make sure you and Aunt Mei know in advance, so you can get the word out about things being moved around without any obvious reason. We're going to put the shell back together first, then fill it back up with the rocks and junk from inside, and then gently raise it back into its original orbit."

  Elon chuckled. "Wow. I knew you and your mother and sisters were special. I didn't realize you were that special. Are you sure about this?"

  "As sure as we can be, and we know if we don't try, there's nothing else to do for it."

  "Well. Time is of the essence, so I will call General Lai and pass the word. I imagine we will need about ten minutes, so can you hold off that long?"

  "We'll do what we have to do."

  "'All the king's horses and all the king's men.'" Elon chuckled again. "I'll leave you to it. Thanks, Yael, and thank your mother and sisters, too. Praying for this to work."

  "We are, too. Keep your fingers crossed."

  "Toes, too. Musk out."

  Yael clicked the comm off and set it aside. "Okay, Mom, I'm ready to give this a try. But Elon says it will take ten minutes to get the word to Aunt Mei and then out to the spacers."

  That's okay. In the meantime, you can start looking at the shell and seeing how it goes back together.

  "I'll do that."

  She stood and looked up. After a moment or two of that, she realized she'd just end up with a crick in her neck if she kept doing that, so she lay down on the bed with a pillow supporting her head and looked up again. "Much better," she murmured.

  Her mother was right; she could "see" the broken moon quite well no matter which direction her head was turned. So she gave up worrying about that, and simply "looked" through her Mesh sense. As she got more and more used to it, she realized she could ignore the "grid" and simply sense the Mesh like a flow of material. It because quickly evident that thicker, heavier sections "looked" different from thinner, lighter ones.

  Turning her attention, at last, to the "shell" of Phobos, she noticed neither of the two halves were spinning in relation to each other. That, at least, was a godsend; whatever had pierced the shell and left it in two halves had not imparted any particular motion to the moon, though it had slowed it down in its orbit, resulting in the loss of over 1,200 kilometers of altitude so far.

  "Imagine the two halves back together the way they were," she said, absently. "Oh! Has it been ten minutes?" She opened her eyes and picked up her comm from the small nightstand. The clock app said it had been, and there was also a text from Elon, and another from Mei, both saying warnings had been sent out and they were waiting to see what happened next.

  "Mom, the warnings are live. I'm going to start."

  Very well, Yael. We are watching and will try to help as much as we can from this distance.

  Yael closed her eyes again, and concentrated.

  The two halves, thin as they were from a planetary standpoint, were horrifically massive. She understood the difference between mass and weight, of course – weight being dependent on gravity, and what determines how fast something falls; and mass being a measure of how much that thing will hurt when it hits you, no matter what it weighs.

  More or less.

  At any rate, she had to pull the two halves back together very gently, or they might fracture into even more pieces, making the job impossible. Inertia was not her friend, and inertia was what mass was all about. Any velocity she imparted to the shell in microgravity was going to be quite difficult to reverse. "All right," she said, mostly to herself – but it helped focus her to say it out loud – "I want to very, very slowly start fitting the two halves together. I will move the smaller piece back to join up with the larger piece. I am imagining that happening at a speed of no more than a foot per second. Begin."

  Nothing seemed to happen for a few minutes; there was just enough velocity, a few centimeters per minute, drawing the two drifting pieces of regolith apart. Overcoming even that tiny amount of inertia with that much mass was daunting. Yael felt an actual, physical strain on her whole body, which seemed to her to be crazy, since she wasn't out there physically pushing on anything.

  "Wow, this is hard," she grunted, breathing deeply, trying to make sure she got enough oxygen.

  It is a huge mass, and you are still learning. But you are doing well; the mass is slowing and will soon enough be pulling back together. We will monitor and make sure you know when the two halves are at rest, relative to one another.

  "Okay." It was all Yael had the air for.

  You don't have to speak out loud, you know.

  I didn't know, thought Yael, gratefully. Thanks. Easier. But not telepathy?

  No, you still subvocalize when you think in words, unless you're trained not to do so. That vibrates the Mesh and we can "hear" it.

  How long is this going to take?

  She could "hear" her mother chuckling. Got a mani-pedi scheduled, hon?

  No! She rolled her eyes. I started in on this with no real idea how far apart the pieces were. Even though I can see them, I'm not getting a good read on distance.

  Sorry. Ariela sounded contrite. That really wasn't fair. They drifted about a hundred feet apart before you grabbed them and started slowing them down. And at the current rate of slowing, they should be at relative rest in another two or three minutes, then they'll start getting closer to one another again. Which one of you is the math whiz? How long is this operation going to take? The last two sentences were directed at her other daughters.

  Raven's the math whiz, came from Delaney. But it's simple enough to ask a holotab. Tab, given current inputs, how soon will Yael have to reverse the acceleration?

  There was a short pause.

  It says if you can manage to get it moving at a foot per second, you'll have to do turnover, well, slowdown, after 50 seconds, but that doesn't take into account how long it will take to accelerate one of the masses to that speed, and it has no data on your acceleration rate. I take it you're working with the smaller piece.

  Yes, because it doesn't have the base sticking through it.

  Let's see how long it takes to get up to speed.

  Are there any Corps members on Mars? she heard Delaney say.

  Possibly, but no time to summon them, and they probably wouldn't be able to help her anyway, replied Ariela. Most of the Corps are barely able to perform the usual Mesh parlor tricks, still, after all these years.

  Who are the Corps? wondered Yael, absently. Not the Marines?

  No, sighed Ariela, they're a group of people we're working up to learn Mesh manipulation. Most of them are civilians who have been able to see the Mesh for years and had no idea what they were looking at, and had no idea how to manipulate it. But as yet, nobody can do it as well as the six of us. Not even close.

  Turnover! came from Delaney.

  Yael gasped, then started pushing the smaller piece the other way to brake it.

  They're definitely closing at speed, but slowing down, reported Delaney. Doin' good, sis!

  Thanks, thought Yael, desperately, trying to decelerate the piece evenly. Can you guys give me a hand and make sure the damn things fit up?

  We're working on it. That may be what's making it harder for you. Sorry.

  It's coming to a stop, I think.

  Almost perfect. Almost there . . . give it another nudge inward.

  Good?

  Good! I think I heard it go "thunk."

  Okay . . . and you guys can clean up the rubble that goes inside?

  Already on it, hon, came from her mother. Then we need to lift it back into its orbit.

  I'm calculating how to do that, thought Yael, busy with her holotab. It's just a ballistics problem.

  Listen to her, came from Yehudit, with a mental giggle. "Just" a ballistics problem.

  Yael ignore
d her, concentrating. "Okay," she said to herself, "need to lift the moon about 1,500 klicks. With an initial motion . . . and just enough force . . . make an arc back up to the original orbit, but with just enough force to get it to slip back in with zero off-orbit velocity and right at orbital speed . . . where's that ballistics calculator Grumpaw gave me . . . okay . . . got it."

  You talk to yourself a lot? teased Devorah. We're ready.

  Initiating lift. Yael took a deep breath, closed her eyes, and started pushing.

  It's still falling.

  It's going to dip a little bit more and then curve back up. Stop pestering me.

  Enough, girls, came from Ariela. You're doing fine, Yael.

  Need . . . help . . . lifting . . .

  The four on Earth put their backs into it along with Yael. Tell us when to stop, came from Ariela.

  It just bottomed out and is on the way up, reported Yael. Give it another few seconds, then I can probably handle it myself.

  Wow, said Yehudit. Did you see that huge warp going outsystem from Clarke?

  I think that was your grandfather, going to get Raven, replied Ariela.

  At Devlin's? That's a six-day trip, one way, at Warp 5, came from Delaney.

  Ariela chuckled. Your grandfather has a new trick up his sleeve. Says he can do it in a couple of hours, tops. Without rotating. He must have decided to try it out; it's only been tested on drones, so far.

  If he'd tried that with anything bigger than the Bandersnatch, we'd be putting the planets back in their orbits, observed Delaney. That was some deep warp he was pulling.

  I think I have enough way on Phobos that it will climb until it hits its original orbit, then it will be fine, maybe with just a couple of tweaks, said Yael. Can someone else check that? Because I'm starving. And I need a shower.

  She heard clapping from her sisters and her mother, and she grinned, hugely.

  Yael, honey, said her mother, ya done good. I love you. We all love you. We'll handle it from here. Get a shower, some food, and get some rest. We'll see you soon; but in the meantime, you’re a star in our book.

  Love you guys, too. See you soon.

  Yael leaned back onto her pillow, still grinning.

  And seconds later, she was asleep.

  Chapter 10

  The Generals

  "We've got a bunchaton of things to do, and a very limited time in which to do them," said Wolff, pulling up a holoscreen. Von Barronov and Harbinger looked at the list and the attached holos. Both shuddered a bit.

  "First of all," Wolff continued, "the one that hit the Hancock Center is going to have to be handled by Beam and his boys. I don't see us dropping Rods on that one, and it seems pretty content to hang out inside that shell of Mesh it's got draped around it, at least for the time being."

  "Concur," nodded von Barronov.

  "Beam," said Wolff.

  "I'm here," said Beam, from behind them. "I heard. We'll handle it. It is being handled now. Ari and the girls are loosening the Mesh and bringing it to the surface, then we will take it out and drop it into the Sun before the being cracks it open."

  "Good. Thank you."

  "I take it the Mesh heaved underneath it when the ball barreled in, and that's why the building fell over instead of collapsed," said von Barronov. "Like a Scotsman tossing the caber. Lousy distance, though."

  "It's a reasonable theory until we can run back and watch what happened. Now," said Wolff, moving on, "the one that hit Phobos just whizzed on past after it blew through and disrupted the planet's shell, and is probably in a solar orbit. We could go after it, based on what we know about its orbital dynamics, and catch it, but what we really need is at least a frigate and some boosted Rods to crack it open and destroy the, hmm, occupant. Beam, can they survive in a vacuum?"

  "Our analysis of the one you killed suggests not, but they would be a while dying, during which time they would still pose a threat to anything close to them."

  "I've got it," said von Barronov, snapping his fingers. "Remember how we discussed dragging the one in Iraq out of phase with us, then contracting the field and leaving it there?"

  "Yeah?" grunted Wolff.

  "That's not how to go about it. Remember how you also suggested using a singularity to dispose of the dark matter?"

  "Uh-huh."

  "We can create singularities with the drive and use that. Just drop the whole damn ball into the Abyss. Garbage collection finished."

  "Hmm." Wolff thought about it. "Project a drive singularity into its near neighborhood and just suck it through to antimatterland?" He turned to Beam. "Would that work? I know you said 'probably' before, but the direction that thing was headed would make a trip to Jupiter too long, and I don't want to get anywhere near the Sun if I can help it."

  Beam was silent for about three seconds.

  "Well?"

  "Patience. These calculations take time, even for me. I believe that would be a reasonable alternative to a hot gravity well. As you say, once it exits through the white hole into the Abyss, in whatever form it would still be in by that time, whatever posi-matter is left will simply detonate as soon as it touches anything in the antimatter universe."

  "Okay."

  Harbinger, who'd sat, mouth agape, during the entire conversation (not being read in, he didn't have a clue about most of what they were talking about – or from where Beam had suddenly appeared), tentatively raised a hand. "General?"

  "Colonel," said Wolff, nodding at him. "Question? And yeah, you're not read in, roll with it, we'll unfuck that later."

  "Thank you, sir. My question is, have you noticed these anomalies are striking areas near your granddaughters?"

  "Well, not really. Yehudit was nowhere near Iraq, Yael was on Mars, not on Phobos, okay, maybe Devorah was near the one in Chicago, but we haven't heard anything from Raven, and Delaney didn't show up in Chicago until we did and so far as I know, there haven't been any of these anomalies related to either of them."

  "You should probably call them 'transports,'" said Beam, "because they appear to be exactly that; one-time use, minimal controls, minimal life support, and a rotation engine. How they managed to wrap those beasts so tightly inside something so small is truly a mystery; I'm still running calculations trying to decide if they are five-dimensional beings, or if some other quantum oddness is at work."

  "But why are they choosing areas near your granddaughters, or I suppose in Yehudit's case, near an area she spent a great deal of time in, many years back?" persisted Harbinger. "Stipulated, their aim sucks, which unfortunately doesn't make them any less dangerous. But how certain are you they aren't actually trying to take your granddaughters out?"

  "Well—" started Wolff.

  "The probability of that just went considerably higher," interrupted Beam. "Your granddaughter Raven just destroyed one which came within approximately 50 meters of the ship in which she is traveling. In warp, no less."

  "Destroyed it?" said Wolff, unfazed; he was getting used to Beam's unlikely interjections, he thought. "Destroyed it, how?"

  "Unclear. A great deal of power and gravitational energy was involved, which is how it came to my notice. A small space-time rift that pierced the Mesh and bottomed out in the Abyss. A gravitational 'funnel,' for lack of a better term. The creature is destroyed."

  "Is she all right?"

  "She fainted. She was working with a Space Force Marine who has apparently a limited view of the Mesh, who helped her gather the power she needed. His name is Rafe—"

  "Sorensen. Yes. A sergeant in Delaney's FTSA2, under First Lieutenant Pete Moore. His group had a mission on Devlin's Strike, so half of them were traveling undercover on the same liner as Raven. The other three and their medic are aboard a different liner." Wolff sighed. "Okay, you're right; that puts the probabilities of the five daughters being in the Darkness' sights pretty doggone high."

  "That rift," said von Barronov. "Is it going to need repair?"

  Beam shook his head. "It appears she was capa
ble of sufficient fine control that it simply collapsed and closed up again once the Darkness' transport fell through. I would not expect her to be able to do it again, soon, but eventually, perhaps within just a few hours, she will recover sufficiently to ward off another attack."

  "I wonder if they can all do that," mused Wolff.

  "I would not be surprised," replied Beam.

  Wolff looked at him. "You don't know?"

  "I do not. Their rapid development has been a series of surprises to me. Delightful surprises, to be sure, but I could only hope they would evince this sort of power this early in their lifespan." Beam looked at him. "Be aware, General Wolff, your daughter Ariela is just as firmly in the crosshairs of the Darkness as are her daughters."

  Wolff lifted an eyebrow. "So far, though, the only ones the Darkness do not seem to have targeted are, in fact, Ariela and Delaney."

  "Ariela may be hard for them to target," suggested von Barronov. "She's not from our timeline, perhaps she isn't as clearly resonant to them as her daughters, who are at least half from our timeline. Hmm, come to think of it, maybe that has something to do with their aim being so far off for all of them."

  Wolff shrugged. "Or they were deliberately aiming for places they knew they would want to investigate, or would have to respond to, under the assumption the transport passenger would take it from there. But what about Delaney, then?"

  "You got me there," admitted von Barronov.

  "Delaney is incredibly strong," said Beam. "Perhaps they simply don't wish to chance a meeting with her at this stage."

  "She's strong, sure, but not that strong," replied Harbinger, skeptically.

  Beam smiled. "I do not mean physically. Her power with the Mesh was freakishly high from the moment she first became aware of it. It has only increased in the intervening century and a half. But even before that, it was already manifesting in her. Surely you recall the mission to al-Saḥra', just before your trip to 2017 Chicago?"

  Harbinger's eyes widened. "Hmm. That could explain some things I never really understood about that mission. Among other things, a door I'm absolutely certain she did, but she swears on a stack of Bibles she didn't."