They boarded a shuttle and strapped themselves in beside Tallyn. The doors sealed and it floated up, then switched to repellers at a safe height. It ascended swiftly, the inertial compensators removing all sensation of acceleration. The weaker anti-gravity was used first, because otherwise the powerful repellers would punch holes in the ground with their invisible 'foot'.
They left the atmosphere, the pearly sphere of Atlan shrinking beneath them. The massive spiral galaxy that lighted the night sky shone like diamond dust strewn across black velvet, millions of suns so brilliant the nights were always bright, even when none of the five moons were visible.
Aboard the Vengeance, it hardly seemed possible that four years had passed. They disembarked in the same smooth room and followed Tallyn along moss carpeted corridors to the lift, which shot up to the bridge. Tallyn indicated that they should sit in two empty chairs, and tense silence filled the gloomy room as the crew awaited their orders. Tallyn faced his lieutenant as Marcon approached and saluted.
"Everything ready to go, Marcon?"
"Yes, sir."
"Good, let's get on with it then."
Breaking orbit and entering the transfer Net were achieved with little fanfare. If not for Marcon reeling off the list of procedures, and a brief glimpse of Atlan's receding globe, Rayne would hardly have known anything unusual had occurred. The screen went blank, and Tallyn turned to her with a smile.
"It's so mundane, isn't it? Space travel is almost boring."
She eyed him. "You read my mind."
"Of course I did. You still haven't learnt to guard your thoughts."
"That's rude, and I wasn't trying to."
"When in the company of so many, it would be wise."
She glanced around the bridge. "They're all…?"
"Telepaths? Yes." He looked at Marcon, who smiled. "Marcon finds your disappointment most amusing."
"If you can all read each other's minds, why do you bother talking?"
"We try to guard our private thoughts, so speaking telepathically requires just as much effort as talking. If we all left our minds open, our most intimate thoughts would become public knowledge."
"I see." She lowered her gaze, embarrassed. "Perhaps you should teach us how to do it properly."
"Well, Rawn doesn't really have to worry about it. His thoughts are pretty murky, since his telepathy is so weak. He can hear the equivalent of a mental shout, but he broadcasts almost nothing."
"Why didn't Mindra teach me?"
Tallyn's slight smile broadened. "Mindy's a busy little cat. She didn't have time. She only agreed because of who you are – might be. She likes dealing with VIPs. She did what I couldn't, but I can teach you the rest."
Rayne nodded, uncomfortable amongst so many people who could read her mind. On Atlan, they had seldom ventured into crowds of strangers, except at the bar, where the number of aliens made mind reading almost impossible, she had discovered. The library was often pretty empty, and the reading rooms had neural dampeners. Tallyn's friends had all been polite and ignored her open mind, it appeared, and crowds always made mind reading difficult. Although the crew were busy, it seemed to her newly awakened awareness that they all listened to her thoughts.
They went to a recreation area, where they ordered drinks and sat around a table. For the next five hours, Tallyn instructed her on the art of shielding her thoughts, while Rawn listened and asked questions. Tallyn rarely had so much time to devote to his guests, so he took this opportunity to teach her. She was making progress when Tallyn received a message from Marcon and took them back to the bridge. They arrived as the main screen activated and a dull, cloud-shrouded globe appeared on it. Rayne swallowed hard, a lump blocking her throat.
"That's not Earth."
"I'm afraid it is," Tallyn murmured.
"It can't be."
"It is."
She blinked and looked at Rawn, whose expression was drawn, his eyes bright. "I knew this was a bad idea."
Rayne forced herself to look at the screen again as Tallyn moved away into the gloom. It looked like a dirty Venus, perhaps after a violent dust storm, if Venus had such things. The blanket of clouds swirled various shades of brown and yellow into a soup of striated, venomous colours. A glance would tell anyone this planet was poisonous, and unfit to support life.
Yet this was Mother Earth, the world that had once had an entire self-supporting ecology matured over millions of years. The horror of it made her want to turn away and remember the glowing blue jewel within a fragile envelope of pure air, patterned with fleecy white clouds. The reality was a lifeless, hostile lump of rock cloaked in a poisonous atmosphere, a product of man's ingenuity. Its ugliness made her want to know more.
She glanced at Tallyn. "All I can see is clouds."
"We've launched a probe. You'll be able to see the surface soon."
A few minutes later, the screen's picture changed, and a wall of brownish mist replaced Earth's dirty corpse.
"The probe is descending through the clouds." He glanced at one of Marcon's holographic displays. "The temperature is one hundred and thirty degrees."
In the Atlantean system for measuring temperature, zero was freezing point and one hundred degrees was boiling point at sea level, which meant Earth's atmosphere was akin to a furnace. The probe fell below the clouds, and the screen showed an alien landscape of ravaged, barren desert shrouded in a haze of dust. Huge chasms snaked across it, vomiting lava in an endless bubbling ooze. The clouds reflected the lurid glow, creating a garish scene.
Seas of cooling lava filled valleys, and steam and smoke rose to thicken the clouds. The probe followed the contours of a savage land, finding a ruined city. A sprawling mass of twisted, rusting metal came into view; the remains of the Eiffel Tower. A solitary, broken statue raised an arm above the jumbled rocks like a drowning man begging to be rescued from this eerie, desolate place.
"What happened to the buildings?" Rayne asked in a horrified whisper.
Tallyn replied, "Seismic activity has levelled just about everything. The pyramids have survived, and the sphinx. Parts of the Great Wall of China are standing, but everything else is gone."
The probe flew through huge, alien canyons. "That's the sea bed; there's not much left of it. Most of the water is now in the clouds."
A crewman interjected, "Temperature two hundred and ten degrees."
"All gone," Rayne murmured. "All those millions of people. An entire civilisation wiped out." She turned away as a drunkenly leaning Big Ben came into view, unable to watch anymore, and sank into a chair. Rawn continued to stare at the screen, which had reverted to the picture of a distant Earth.
Tallyn winced, as if he had sampled her unguarded thoughts. "Okay, Marcon, switch it off. Run all the usual tests." He glanced around in surprise as Marcon announced, "Our long-range proximity repellers are reacting to an approaching mass, sir."
"What is it?"
"Its density indicates it's a ship."
"Can we focus a viewer on it?"
Marcon touched a crystal on his console, and an empty star field filled the screen. He touched more crystals, and the stars swelled, but remained enigmatic.
Tallyn demanded, "Are you sure the repellers reacted?"
"Yes, sir. They still are."
Rayne gazed at the screen, the excitement a welcome distraction. A star vanished near the centre of it, then another. She jumped up, pointing. "There is something there, look!"
Tallyn nodded as another star vanished. "I see it. Marcon?"
"Activating the laser pulse sensory array." He touched more crystals, studying a hologram that scrolled up before him. "We're getting a very mushy reading, sir, but it seems to be coming closer. The pulses are not being reflected, but absorbed. Time lapse indicates it's still quite distant, three light seconds. Initiating broad laser sweep."
One of the other officers looked up with a worried expression. "It appears to be enormous, sir."
"Elaborate," Tallyn said, frowning.<
br />
"At least five times the size of Vengeance. Maybe bigger."
Tallyn swung around. "Battle stations. Red alert."
Distant alarms sounded, and the bridge doors slid shut with an ominous hiss, cutting off the howling.
Tallyn turned to Marcon. "Try to contact it."
"Yes sir."
A few tense seconds passed, the Marcon said, "No response to laser link, trying radio… nothing. Microwave… nothing."
Tallyn glared at the screen. "All right, initiate Net link, power up energy conduits and shell."
Marcon's hands flew over the crystals before him. Vengeance lurched, making Tallyn stagger and grip a console. He frowned at his luckless lieutenant, who spoke calmly.
"Attractors, sir. Our orbit has been broken."
"Are we linked to the Net?"
"Yes."
"Charge the repellers."
A crewman's hands danced across his console, and Marcon watched his readouts with a frown. "There's no effect."
"Still no reply?" Tallyn glanced at his second-in-command, who shook his head.
"None."
The huge ship blotted out all the stars on the screen, filling it with a featureless blackness. The crewman who monitored the distance between the ships was down to thousands of kilometres now, the proximity becoming dangerous. Several officers showed symptoms of stress, their brows sheened with nervous sweat and their eyes wide. Tallyn and Marcon remained calm, their expressions set in rigid lines.
Tallyn said, "Fire energy weapons."
An officer touched a crystal, and a point of golden brilliance that rivalled the sun appeared on the screen, winking out as the black ship absorbed it.
"No hit, sir." Marcon stared at his hologram in disbelief.
"Impossible. We couldn't miss at this range."
"We didn't miss. It had no effect."
Tallyn's brows knitted. "Fire the anti-matter cannon."
The officer touched another crystal, and a distant boom shivered through the ship. The blackness on the screen remained unaffected.
"No effect, sir," Marcon stated with chilling calm.
"By the Olban," breathed Tallyn. "What is that?"
"I am the Guardian."
The voice came from all around them, as if the air itself had spoken. Tallyn swung around, his eyes snapping about the bridge, seeking an enemy.
"Who are you? What do you want?"
"I am the Guardian."
Tallyn stared at the black screen. "Why do you hold us? We have no quarrel with you."
"I have come to greet the Golden Child."
Everyone swung to stare at Rayne, who gaped at the screen, stunned. Tallyn muttered, "I knew it."
Rayne glanced at Rawn, who met her eyes with a look of mingled awe and disbelief. She wanted to run, but the door was closed, and she turned back to the screen, trying to ignore the crew's stares. Embarrassed by the sudden attention, she cleared her throat. "How do you know I'm the Golden Child?"
"I am your guide, Golden Child. Do not fear, your destiny will be revealed to you in due course."
She swallowed hard, wishing she could vanish like Mindra.
Tallyn frowned at the great ship. "What must she do?"
"That will be revealed only to her."
He nodded. "Why have you chosen to greet the Golden Child here, now?"
"I came to the place of her birth to await her, knowing she would return."
"You didn't know where she was?"
"I knew."
"Is the time of the prophecy approaching?"
"As it has been for millennia."
Tallyn snorted. "Why do you call yourself the Guardian?"
"I am the Guardian of my people, entrusted to keep them safe until they awaken. This place was one of their creations. More than that, you have no need to know."
"This place? What do you mean?"
A semi-transparent image of a blue planet appeared in the middle of the control room, making many of the crew jump up in consternation.
"A projection, sir," Marcon said. The planet rotated, its glowing blue seas patterned with snowy clouds within the clear bubble of its atmosphere.
"That's Earth," Rawn muttered.
Tallyn looked disbelieving.
"Ignorance and greed have destroyed it, just as they destroy everything they touch." The voice sounded sad, and the image of Earth vanished.
"How did you create it?" Tallyn demanded.
"My people did, not I. Such order does not easily come from chaos. My people created many habitable planets."
Rayne dragged her reeling mind from the morass of shock, the questions that hammered at her brain demanding answers. "If your people created it, can you save it?"
"There is nothing left to save. It has reverted to its former state, and my people are no longer here."
"Where are they?"
"In a safe place."
"Would that be Quadrant Forty-Four, by any chance?"
"Farewell, Golden Child, until we meet again."
The blackness vanished, and stars shone on the screen again. Rayne sank into a chair as her knees gave way. The crew stared at their readouts, their hands skipping over the lighted crystals that covered the consoles like jewels.
"We've been released, sir," a crewman announced.
"No sign of anything nearby, not even on the long-range repellers. I never saw anything move so fast," Marcon sounded amazed.
Tallyn's expression was inscrutable. "Send a message to Atlan. And try to identify that ship. Analyse the recordings of the voice. I want to know who or what that was, and where it came from."
"Yes, sir."
Marcon touched crystals, and other consoles lighted with his messages, their operators responding by touching other crystals or sensor pads. The alarm was cancelled and the bridge doors opened, allowing several new men to enter and take up unoccupied stations. The bridge became a hive of activity as crew members in other parts of the ship demanded orders through the consoles, and the officers replied. Marcon sat before five holographic readouts, scanning the displays.
Tallyn went over to an empty station at the back of the bridge, where a curved console deflected traffic. Rayne and Rawn followed, curious. He sat in the contoured chair and ran his hands over the crystals. Scorning the holograms, he directed the recorded image onto the screen, which lighted with the empty blackness of the strange ship's image. Tallyn tried to enhance the picture, but the scene remained black.
"How can a ship be so black it doesn't even reflect the stars?" he asked. "Why did the energy weapons have no effect, or the anti-matter cannon?"
Rawn stepped up to stand behind Tallyn's chair. "If he's Rayne's guide, maybe he has a super advanced ship."
"Yes, but who, or what, is he?"
"I don't think it matters."
"It's gone!" Rayne pointed at the screen, where the stars had reappeared. Tallyn's fingers darted over the console, crystals lighting in their wake. The black image reappeared, and he stared at it, as did Rayne and Rawn. This time he had slowed down the replay, and a haze of gold covered the blackness for an instant, then the stars returned.
"That's impossible," Tallyn muttered.
"What?" Rawn asked.
"It's a Net ship! It used the transfer Net."
Rawn glanced at Rayne. "So?"
"It went into the Net." Tallyn turned to face them. "It used an energy shell and went into the Net. That's impossible. It went into the energy dimension. Nothing that big could go into the energy dimension and survive. The shell it would have to generate would be monstrous."
"But it did it."
"Yes. Which means its technology is far more advanced than ours. By the Olban. That ship has instantaneous travel."
Tallyn stared at the screen for several minutes, apparently deep in unpleasant thoughts, then replayed the recording again before turning to Rayne. He studied her with disconcerting intensity, making her uncomfortable until he ran a hand over his hair and forced a strained smile.
"So, you are the Golden Child. I was right."
She glanced at Rawn. "I don't find it a very appealing prospect, somehow. I'd rather be nobody, given a choice."
Tallyn sighed. "I understand. Your being special is what saved you, but such things cut both ways. There's always a price to pay for being different. And Rawn, although he's not the Golden Child, was also saved because of you, so you shouldn't curse it too much."
"So what happens next? Am I put out as bait, like a sacrifice to a dragon?"
"No, nothing like that. Fate will take its course, that's all."
Chapter Nine
Tallyn traversed the long, pillared hall to the council's chamber, his footsteps echoing. The council building was intended to intimidate, but Tallyn had been here many times, and its grandeur had lost its effect. He hated meetings with the council, which demanded detailed explanations and endless reports. The novelty of discussing his work with such august persons had worn off when he had become aware of their weaknesses.
A quartet of Draycon guards waited outside the doors, dressed in blood-red uniforms and horned helmets that concealed their features. He frowned, wishing his audience did not coincide with the Draycons' visit, for he had a particular disliking for the much-despised race. The council often did this to impress such visitors with its busy schedule and important meetings, when, in truth, it had little to occupy its time, and its members spent most of it bickering amongst themselves. Atlan's efficient civil service made the council all but obsolete, yet the grizzled oldsters who comprised it refused to allow a modern government to replace them. This, Tallyn reflected, was one of the disadvantages of Atlanteans' lengthy lifespans; it slowed down progress.
The guards stood aside for him, and he stopped just inside the doorway. Two people addressed Vargon, their backs to the doors. After a few minutes, Vargon looked up and signalled Tallyn to approach. As he did so, the aliens turned to face him. Hiding the shock of recognition behind a bland mask, he inclined his head and spoke the required words of greeting.
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