Volya cleared her throat from the door. “Sir, the guards are here with the Inquisitor.”
“Excellent. Bring her in.”
“Sir, this is a bad idea. I don’t like it.”
“Noted. Bring her in.”
Volya’s upper lip curled into a snarl, but she spun and disappeared back through the door. He spent the brief interlude preparing himself for a meeting he had never expected might happen. A reunion he had never dreamed might transpire.
Volya led the entourage into the room. Behind her two guards held the woman by the upper arms, though her hands were also restrained. Two more guards trained weapons on her from two meters distance.
“Guards, keep the prisoner well away from the Sator.”
His gaze settled upon the woman as a wave of genuine sentiment swept over him with far more power than he’d expected. “She’s not going to try to hurt me. Are you, Nyx?”
“No, sir. I give you my word.”
“Remove her restraints and leave us.”
“Sir!”
“Follow my orders, Volya.”
The guards glanced uncertainly between him and Volya, and not until she nodded minutely did they comply with his instructions. He’d deal with the borderline insubordination later, if it mattered later; now he watched them until they retreated through the door, Volya last, and it closed behind them.
Only once they were alone did he bestow a warm smile on his guest. “Welcome, my dear. I did not expect your visit, but I am most glad for it.”
Nyx took a step forward and dropped to one knee, head bowed. “Forgive me for all I’ve done to impede your work, sir. I did not see. I did not understand.”
Warmth spread through his chest, tinged as always with sorrow. “You were always forgiven. Please, stand. No one bows here, least of all you.”
Her shoulders rose and fell in a heavy breath before she stood, her eyes following her body to rise and meet his. “Thank you. I pledge myself to your service.”
“There’s no need for any of this nonsense—not any longer. The days of fealty are coming to an end.” He paused, finding himself fighting the powerful urge to reach out and stroke her cheek. “You look so like your mother.”
“What? I don’t…have a mother.”
“You do not remember her, of course. The memories and the consciousness which held them have been stripped away and reconstructed so many times over the millennia to serve Renato’s purposes, there can be nothing left of them. Yet you still look like your mother. I suspect he intentionally kept you so, though whether he did it as a remembrance or a trophy, I cannot say.”
She blinked several times as she worked to absorb the information. “I don’t understand. Are you…my true father?”
“I believe the correct term is ‘grandfather.’ Your mother was my daughter, and I treasured her so very much. You see, I’m not merely the leader of the anarch resistance. Once, a dreadfully long time ago, I was Corradeo Praesidis.”
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“The diati—the Primor’s diati—showed me a vision, a memory of what he did, of how he tried to kill you then stole your power, your name and your authority. I’ve been trying to find you ever since it revealed the truth to me.”
“That is…heartening. I’m glad you succeeded.” He frowned, noticing an absence where there should be presence. “But the diati? You no longer possess it?”
“No. I asked the Human…I’m sorry, I don’t even know his name. I asked him to take it. The taint of the Primor’s transgressions was too great, and I did not want his treacheries poisoning me further.”
“It was your choice to make, and a brave one. But realize that his sins are not your sins.”
“Perhaps not. Still, I bear plenty of my own, and I will not be so easily rid of them.” Her expression grew troubled. “May I ask what happened to your daughter—to my mother?”
“Are you sure you want to know? It is not a happy story.”
“How could it be? But I am an Inquisitor, bred to seek the truth in all things. Yes, I want to know.”
The warmth in his chest gave way to the sorrow. “As you wish. Soon after taking power, Renato—the Primor, my son—erased her regenesis records then killed her. He did so for his own protection, as she would have instantly recognized that he was not me. It pains me to tell you this, but you are correct—you deserve the truth. He killed you as well. He erased your memories during regenesis and brought you back, but he did her no such courtesy. I fear it gave him perverse pleasure to have the daughter of his murdered sister serve him unawares.”
Her face blanched, and he reached out and took her hand. It trembled in his, and he wanted nothing more in all the worlds than to soothe this pain, so ancient and faded for him but fresh and raw for her.
“Again, I am sorry. But it is all distant history, so long in the past as to hardly have existed at all. Despite everything that has happened, you and I are alive, and now we are together. We will have all the time in the cosmos to get to know one another anew in the coming days, but you came here for a specific purpose, one I’m told carries some urgency. What do you know?”
43
TARACH
ANARCH POST DELTA
* * *
MIA RUSHED BACK TO POST DELTA from her abrupt summons to Satus, trusting that Miriam would have gathered everyone they needed by the time she arrived. The meeting with Nisi and the Inquisitor, whom Mia found unnerving despite the absence of her power, had been uncharacteristically bereft of semantic flourishes and grandiose declarations, but it had still come too late and taken too long.
She quickened her step yet again. So much time had already been lost as the information passed from one person to another to another.
Less than a minute later she reached the conference room. People were milling about—a hurried scan of the room confirmed Caleb was not among them—but Miriam immediately turned her attention to Mia. “Ms. Requelme, please fill us in.”
“Yes, ma’am. The Primors apparently kept a current backup of the data required for their regenesis at their Prótos Agora stronghold. There isn’t an actual regenesis lab there, but in the wake of the Primors’ demise a number of their elassons are working to find a way to access this data and transfer it to other labs. According to the Inquisitor, we have days at most, and possibly as little as a single day, before the data is transferred and the process of each Primor’s regenesis begins.”
The only outward reaction Miriam displayed was to briefly pinch the bridge of her nose. Mia knew the woman was under tremendous pressure and had been for an uninterrupted string of many hours now, but Miriam lifted her chin resolutely, having absorbed this new complication. “I trust this Inquisitor knows where the Prótos Agora is located?”
“It’s a hybrid starship-space station, not unlike Post Satus. It orbits the Milky Way galactic core in a tight orbit—so close to the core that the structure requires triple layers of the strongest shielding the Anadens possess to prevent its bombardment by a variety of deadly cosmic forces. She claims not to have the precise details of its orbital trajectory or how to find it at a particular time, however.”
Bastian scoffed. “What good is she, then?”
“I can find it.”
Everyone, including Mia, turned to Alex, who was holding her Reor slab out on an open palm. “I’ll take the Siyane as close as I can get to the core, then I’ll open a wormhole and follow the strings until they lead to the Prótos Agora. I’ll scan the data that’s stored inside until I find what must be there: orbital calculation algorithms and specs on defenses. But I should go now.”
Miriam frowned. “Go—but please take precautions. Be safe.”
“I’ll be in touch as soon as I learn something.”
Mia watched Alex head toward the door. “I don’t have any more information to share right now. Unless I’m needed here, Alex, can I walk partway to the Siyane with you?”
Alex shrugged noncommittally. Miriam n
odded, giving Mia permission to leave. She quickly followed Alex out the door and fell in beside her. “Caleb wasn’t in the meeting.”
“He’s not comfortable being in a confined space close to so many people. He’s got the power under control, but he’s still afraid he might hurt someone.”
“I haven’t seen him at all since what happened at Solum. Is he okay?”
Alex shook her head slowly; it made for an odd contrast to her rapid pace. “No, he is not. He blames himself for Solum’s destruction and for every single one of the lives lost there. Mia, I’ve never seen him like this. He’s trapped in this dark place, and I don’t know how to help him. I’ve tried everything, but he’s just…destroyed. I think he’s decided that Malcolm was right about him after all.”
“What? But Malcolm doesn’t even think so ill of him now.”
“I know. But it doesn’t seem to matter. He believes it.” Alex stopped at a junction of three elevated walkways. “I need to hurry. We all have to focus on finishing this damnable war right now. But thank you for asking about him. I’d tell you not to worry, but the truth is, you probably should worry. When this is over, I may need to ask for your help in getting through to him.”
“Of course. Anything.”
Alex gave her a weak smile and rushed off.
SIYANE
By the time she reached the Siyane, Valkyrie had worked out the sliding scale of how close they could get to the galactic core versus for how long. A small detail remained unanswered to complicate matters: they didn’t know how long they needed.
‘No settlements or structures, other than small, autonomous scientific instruments, exist within 1.7 kiloparsecs of the central black hole’s event horizon. I believe that if we position ourselves inside this 1.7 kiloparsec perimeter, we will be able to eliminate extraneous data streams with little difficulty and identify streams leading to the Prótos Agora in a reasonable amount of time.’
“True, but we also need to read the data, or at least record it.”
‘I’ve honed the process of copying and recording such data over the last several days, significantly improving speed and efficiency.’
“I bet. All right.” Alex considered the map in her mind. “Let’s pick the least active region…Sector 51. From there, we’ll advance to 1.6 kiloparsecs distance from the big ground zero. We’ll investigate for two minutes then evaluate whether we need to move. But hold one sec.”
She looked around the empty cabin in growing concern. She hadn’t wanted to leave Caleb alone while she went to the meeting, but he’d insisted he’d be fine. Now he was gone.
Where are you?
The next second Caleb materialized beside her. “Here.” He promptly sat down in his cockpit chair. “Don’t say I don’t have to go with you. This is dangerous under any definition. The astronomical forces at work so close to the core could render the ship or Valkyrie inoperable for any of a hundred different reasons, in which case I’ll need to teleport us out of there.”
“That’s a…very persuasive argument.” Her eyes narrowed. “Wait a minute. How do you even know what we’re planning to do?”
“Your father sent me a message after you left the meeting.”
She didn’t really know what to think about that. “Well, okay then. Since you’re here, you can do the piloting—or monitoring of Valkyrie’s piloting. I’m going to be a bit preoccupied.”
“Happy to.” He offered her a poor facsimile of a smile and activated his HUD.
She wanted so badly to comfort him, to ease his mind and remove some small portion of his burden. But she was running out of things to say, and thus far none of what she said seemed to help. He said they helped, but he was lying.
She sighed quietly…time was short, and she needed to concentrate on what she could do. “Valkyrie, you know the drill. Depart Tarach-controlled space, move another twenty megameters, then fire up the Caeles Prism. We agree our initial destination is Milky Way galactic coordinates l 17° 45’ 42.14” b −29° 00’ 30.25”?”
‘We agree.’ The Siyane lifted smoothly off the elevated platform and ascended into the sky.
MILKY WAY GALACTIC CORE
SIYANE
The blinding light of the galactic core consumed the viewport, but Alex ignored it. She suspected she’d be back soon enough; maybe she could bask in the view the next time. Right now she stared down at the Reor slab.
Such a deceptively tiny object, holding the key to so much.
Caleb busied himself studying the ship’s vitals. “Are we doing all right, Valkyrie?”
‘As all things are relative, yes.’
“That’s encouraging, I guess.” Alex reclined her chair. “Open a small wormhole, and let’s hang out.”
A sea of brilliant strings of light engulfed her, and she immediately grimaced. “I thought you said this close, they were going to be simple to sift through.”
‘As all things—’
“Relative, yeah, yeah. I need…space. I need to back up. Not the ship—me. Keep the wormhole opening here.” She leapt up and made her way through the fog of light to the far end of the main cabin, where she turned around and braced against the counter.
Better. The strings now gained a measure of distance and trajectory before they were drowned out by the light of the core.
She slipped into sidespace, then sent her consciousness inside the wormhole.
The extradimensional environment was as chaotic here as the tangible one. She struggled to keep her bearings as upside and downside flipped over and over again. Inside outside, down the rabbit hole, dizziness threatening to send her physical body to the floor…she felt something steady her, holding her still as the chaos rushed past her. Concentrate on the strings. Ignore everything else and see only the strings.
She smiled, somewhere. Thank you, Valkyrie. Strings, strings, strings…this clump here is substantial. The wave bearing the coordinates is 174.6218530021186 MHz.
It leads to an Erevna research station in MW Sector 42.
She reversed course in her mind until she sensed the walls of the ship surround her. How about…. She focused on a different tangle…but the more she focused on it, the thicker and deeper the tangle extended. It was like standing amid a forest of luminescent neon string trees.
She chuckled, apparently audibly, because Caleb called to her from the cockpit. “Alex?”
“Sorry, it was just…imagery. I’ll tell you later.”
She symbolically brushed aside string after string until she was able to, again symbolically, close two fingers around a single string near the center of the forest. This one. Coordinates 17.44411229142213 GHz.
This leads to no registered location.
I’m going. She looked ‘up’ and sent the majority of her consciousness soaring along the length of the string.
Her path shifted with ever-greater speed as she neared the terminus; the source was careening around the core at unbelievable speed.
She reached the terminus nonetheless, because in sidespace she wasn’t bound by restrictions like speed.
An oval structure spun ahead of her, but it was so swathed in shields that its physical characteristics remained hidden from sight. She also wasn’t here to take visuals, so whatever. She dove for the interior—
—and collided with a solid diati barrier. “Ow!”
Caleb’s voice echoed farther away now, on the edge of her peripheral perception. “Alex? Are you okay?”
“Hmm. I am, but that would’ve hurt something fierce if I’d actually been there. The Prótos Agora has, among other defenses, a diati shell. But it’s not a problem. I don’t need to access the interior.”
Valkyrie, we can now see all the strings flowing from inside. Fill up your databanks. She glanced at the time. Per your parameters, you have four minutes.
There’s a safety margin built into the time limit.
Right….
While Valkyrie recorded exabytes of data, Alex mused. If the diati truly was pandimensional, so wa
s the Reor. There was no way through a diati barrier except with more diati, yet the Reor data passed through it unfettered. What did that mean? She found she was rather curious about the nature of this entity that was destroying her husband’s life. About the nature of the slab in her hand as well, but she had priorities.
She suspected it meant both life forms were old. Very old, and perhaps connected to the fundamental universe in ways they didn’t, couldn’t, and might not want to understand. This synced with Caleb’s latest vision—
Recording complete.
Ten seconds to spare. She closed her virtual eyes, willed herself straight back into her body, opened her real eyes, swayed against the kitchen counter and hurriedly steadied herself—then winced at Caleb’s concerned, oh-so-troubled visage. “Head rush. Get us out of here?”
“Gladly.”
While they retreated she walked-but-mostly-stumbled to the data center and began pulling the data out of Valkyrie’s storage banks. “This much data may take years to wade through, but right now all we need is the Prótos Agora systems information.”
‘Running sort and search algorithms.’
“You read my mind.”
‘As I do.’
When this crisis is resolved, I will burn many cycles contemplating how we can help him. I feel sorrow for him, and for you. I feel your sorrow for him, and I find I must take care to not create a feedback loop of endless sorrow.
You’re wonderful, Valkyrie. You’ve developed such a noble soul.
And in doing so discovered that souls can give rise to terrible distress.
She watched in her peripheral vision as Caleb guided the ship out of the wormhole into normal space and checked their position, then let his hands fall to his lap. He stared out the viewport. A vein pulsed beneath the skin of his temple. His jaw flexed.
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