The Tau Ceti Diversion

by Chris McMahon

  His mind swept around him, insubstantial tendrils whipping and surging with his dreaming mind. Rhythms brought into his conscious mind through genetic manipulation and chance. His nervous system, somehow, had expanded beyond his body. And he was connecting …

  The walls were alive. A vast living dome of thickly interwoven branches lit with primitive torches. A pungent, oily smoke filled the expanse with an aromatic odor. Hundreds of the beings were behind him, arranged in a circle. They were silent, their heads bowed.

  He focused on the shaman, on penetrating the mind behind those huge, glowing eyes.

  His heart raced.

  In his heightened awareness, the realization came with the shock of a blow to the head, emerging like a bullet from the depths of his subconscious where the knowledge had already coalesced.

  He knew those eyes. The eyes of the watcher outside the Starburst. The twin orbs of malice that he had first seen during the fugue in the biodome. The hate-filled hunter that had haunted him before the surge of radiation that had killed thirty-three men and women and crippled their starship. He was sure of it. But if this being was real, did that mean the shaman had some hand in causing that damage to the Starburst? Or the death of Evelle? He had managed to contain his grief and his anger at the tragedy by rationalizing it; telling himself it had been an act of God. The thought that this being attacked them … No. It was not possible. How could this primitive shaman direct such an intense burst of EM radiation? And why target them? It did not fit. But nothing about this world seemed to make sense. The dark side should be frozen. Lifeless.

  He pushed through those eyes.

  It was fire in his mind. Power. Flooding him. Light and motion. A swarm of tiny blue and white flames surrounded him. Some were buried deep, some linked together, others seeming to float on the surface of his consciousness.

  But one sped into his right eye, expanding with blinding pain.

  He was suspended in space, filled with power and purpose.

  This was a memory, but not his. The shaman’s.

  Before him, a vast device. A superstructure that would dwarf every station in the Earth system. Huge curved beams enclosed an ovoid space, the materials of construction virtually transparent, visible only through reflection.

  The light — blinding. A yellow sun — filling nearby space. The device — in orbit. Slowly, he drew closer to the massive bulk. Within it a core of darkness, the size of a small moon. Waves of energy radiated, then were absorbed across a shimmering field that stretched between the supports of the ovoid superstructure. The dark core constantly spinning, trying to shift its position, but held confined.

  Closer still.

  His mind was filled with a confusion of colors, geometrical shapes and readings — a flood of information he did not understand.

  The complex visual tapestry shattered in a blast of outrage. He was abruptly thrust out of the alien’s mind.

  The shaman’s eyes were beacons of fury. Around the alien’s head was a maelstrom of dancing, swirling lights. Intuitively, Karic realized he was seeing a depiction of the alien’s mind, as interpreted by his own overdriven brain. A new, hot light grew amid that cognitive aurora, then shot toward him.

  Defiler! I am Utar of the Imbirri! I suffer no such outrages.

  Karic fell into a depth of swirling color. His last thought before he surrendered to unconsciousness was that he had not only read the shaman’s mind, he had just communicated with him telepathically.

  If only Lein could see him now.

  ***

  Utar trembled with fury as he watched the human collapse. He gripped the scepter with all his strength, turning it on the intruder. His thick thumb hovered over the stud.

  “No, Utar. This is not the time for killing,” said the Awakener from his dais.

  With a supreme effort of will, Utar took his finger away from the activating stud. Torn with frustration, he spun to face the Awakener. “I am the Deepwatch. It is my responsibility to protect us. You must understand the danger to the Imbirri! These intruders must all die.”

  Ten seasons ago, Utar had seen the greatest danger yet to their way of life. In Farsleep he could travel paths he alone knew. While his body remained in a comatose state, his mind could travel time and space. It was during such a journey that he came to know them, these humans. Then again, he had risked the longest Farsleep yet to sow the seeds of their destruction. Had left their craft crippled — and the humans who remained helpless to avoid their own deaths — or so he thought. He had risen dangerously weak from that last, long Farsleep; his stores of fat depleted, his body drained, and his mind haunted by the scenes of destruction he had wrought. But for all that, he was satisfied. Yet … yet barely seventeen sleep cycles had passed before he saw his worst fears confirmed.

  Not only had he failed to destroy all the humans, the survivors had violated the sanctity of the planet Cru. Five of them were on the planet. Utar could feel the feeble pulse of their mortality, and sense the danger they represented.

  The thirty-eight First were silent. Expectant. They were the most senior of the Imbirri — brought to consciousness by the Awakener and Utar at the very dawn of time — yet their thousands of years of life had not prepared them for this scene: the abhorrent sight of the alien intruder, or the conflict its appearance had provoked between their two leaders.

  Reth and Ember, the two reds who held the human, looked at Utar then the Awakener. As Utar’s acolytes, they owed allegiance to him. Yet all of the Imbirri, including Deepwatch Utar, were ultimately bound to the Awakener’s will.

  The Awakener shifted his great bulk forward on his throne and favored Utar with an indulgent smile. “How long have we presided together over the Imbirri, Utar?” His voice was soft and sweet with melody.

  Utar lowered the scepter. “Almost nine thousand seasons.”

  Otla, the most senior of Utar’s seven acolytes, stepped forward respectfully from the ranks of the First, the vibrant green of his crown and shoulders shining with reflected torchlight. “It is the 8771st season of redwings, Awakener.” Otla had always had a head for numbers, and never failed to note the time of the annual Redwing Swarm — when the fat grubs that infested the lush forests near the crystal mountains hatched into vibrant red-winged butterflies. The acolyte bowed and rejoined the First.

  Green Patch gently touched Otla on the shoulder as he took his place. Although a gold, and an avid player of the Pod Game, Green Patch was named for the odd splash of emerald on his forehead, like the mark of hand stained with bright green sap. Green Patch and Otla often sang together and shared their choicest foods. The bond was a gentler, softer echo of that between Utar and the Awakener.

  Utar ground his teeth together in frustration. In the last few centuries the Awakener’s vast and powerful mind had turned in on itself, becoming lost in a blurred sea of memories and emotion. How could he make him see the immediacy of the threat?

  Utar regarded the pitiful human, now given in to his weakness. The alien shared some of the inherent powers that made Utar a Deepwatch — senses that extended beyond his physical form, allowing both mental communication and a vision of future potentials. Utar sensed that the human recognized Utar from his Farsleep travels. He cared not. Better he should know his executioner.

  “Awakener,” said Utar in a level voice. “The influence of these humans must be eliminated before it is too late. “

  The Awakener was silent. Worse, he seemed to be drifting back into dream.

  Utar’s lips compressed into a grim line. “Awakener, hear me! They must be destroyed, as are the forbidden ones. If they live only days more, the Imbirri are in great danger.”

  The Awakener smiled and shifted his great bulk, his dark eyes meeting Utar’s with loving benevolence. He turned and looked around at the assembled Imbirri. The First were silent, waiting for the wisdom of their leader.

  Utar also turned to watch them, his eyes narrowed. Only thirty-eight First remained. Once there had been forty-six. Over thos
e thousands of seasons, some had succumbed to the Changes despite his best efforts and regular doses of the Elixir, which prevented them. They had … were becoming abominations. Transforming to twisted creatures with no place in the forest. All had been destroyed by his own hand before they could emerge as horrors that would bring terror to the peaceful Imbirri. He remembered all the missing faces, and their silent voices, now absent from the harmonies. Even now, the nipples on either side of his bulky torso grew moist with sadness at the memories. Yet sacrifices had to be made. It was their blissful, changeless existence that he was protecting.

  The First stood in lines, ranked in the order of their awakening. Here, as for the Imbirri as a whole, the greens like Otla dominated. The golds — like Utar himself — were rarer, perhaps one-tenth of the population. There were others too, smaller groups like the purples and reds. All Imbirri were marked with various colors across their bodies, but it was the predominant color on the crown of their heads that distinguished them. The Awakener himself had been an undiluted green — a rarity — before his color began to fade.

  The First watched the Awakener in hushed expectation. Unlike Utar, they saw the same leader they had always known. Their trust, their love, was undiminished. None of them saw the changes in the Awakener that Utar saw. Not surprising, since none of them had the deep relationship with their leader that the Deepwatch had. He and the Awakener were the first of the changeless Imbirri. The first to share their voices in the verdant innocence of Cru’s ancient forests.

  “In truth, you are all my children,” said the Awakener. “But you, Utar, you were the first of the First. I rose you up, here beneath the branches of the Tree. So long ago … long ago. Yet you remember, do you not, my friend?”

  Those memories were vivid to Utar. The Tree had been young then, open below its high canopy. Over long eons they and the First had lovingly pruned and woven its branches together to form a great, living dome, its only entrance an arch of living boughs cunningly concealed by overlapping branches. A sacred space of fellowship and union. Endless seasons filled with love and joy, marred only by the violations of the few among them.

  The Awakener smiled at Utar.

  They regarded each other for a long moment. Utar’s heart lifted at the sight of that big, familiar face, the powerful glowing eyes. He felt the first note of a melody swelling in his chest, and drew in a sharp breath. A flush of heat ran to the nipples down the sides of his torso, and he longed for an intimacy between them that was impossible with the First here. He fought to clear his mind, to escape the welling emotion, but the Awakener’s presence was overpowering.

  “It is as I taught you,” said the Awakener. His huge chest rose with an indrawn breath and his voice wrapped the silent First in tones as deep as forest shadow. “The Elixir is the breath of life! Without life, there is no love, and love is eternal.”

  The Awakener rose from his primitive seat of boughs and the First fell to the ground, faces raised in adoration.

  The Awakener looked at the First, his face filled with delight.

  “You serve me well. Yes. Well,” he said, sweeping his gaze across the prostrate First.

  “But you, my friend,” he said, returning his gaze to Utar. “You are the greatest of my servants.”

  The Awakener stepped down off the dais, walking to the Deepwatch, taking Utar’s hands in a soft grip of friendship. The tips of Utar’s nipples grew hot at the contact.

  “Utar. You were beside me to share the beginning of time. You know the joy of life — unending life. Why should any existence, even that of these strange beings, be ended?”

  Utar stepped away from the touch of the Awakener, his emotions in turmoil. Never would the Awakener understand the peril in which the Imbirri lay. Time was endless on Cru, unmarked and unchecked by the hands of fate. His friend and master, the Awakener, had become lost within his teachings, having sheltered too long beneath the warmth and strength of years. He was trapped by his visions, as surely as the Tree encircled them.

  Utar bowed his head, defeated, and raised the scepter high, surrendering his authority to his master.

  The Awakener took the scepter. He untied the skins and decorations that covered it, letting them drop to the ground. He held up the naked, gleaming cylinder and turned to the First.

  “Go my children! Go forth and raise others as you have been raised high!”

  Utar straightened, his eyes solemn. It had been more than a thousand years since the last of the Imbirri were raised to sentience. The Awakener was lost, sadly, within the immensities that gave them birth; yet Utar could still not defy him. “What of the human?”

  The Awakener looked at the alien and laughed. “Place him in the punishment pit until I decide.”

  Utar bowed, then gave curt orders to Otla and Munch — the latter, a short, plump purple who was another of his senior acolytes, and who had earned his name from a long-standing habit of noisy eating.

  As he watched his followers drag the human to the punishment pit, Utar trembled with a desire for the being’s destruction. He could wait. He would bide his time until the vile beings that had violated Cru made their presence felt in more insidious ways. He would wait until the cancer of destruction within them rose and smote the Imbirri as he knew it would. Then the Awakener’s consciousness would fully return to the present. A great reckoning will follow, even if I must die to bring it down upon them.

  The Imbirri will be preserved.

  CHAPTER 9

  The minutes passed in agonizing slowness.

  Mara checked her chrono and — for the thousandth time — searched the sky for the position of the sun. It was a hard habit to break, even for a space-rat who had spent less than a decade on-planet.

  Fuck this.

  She started pacing again, seeking an outlet for her nervous energy. The XR32 felt heavy, inert, in her hand, but she would not sheath it.

  She studied the lakeshore and the jungle, alert for any movement that would indicate a threat.

  The dull throbbing behind her eyes had developed into an intense headache, sharp edges of pain working at her temples and neck.

  The pod’s systems were still laboriously running through the diagnostic, Ibri checking hardware manually with the limited tools he had. Fatigue weighed down on her, and her body craved darkness and sleep. Her concern for Karic and the rest of the crew had grown steadily, fed by the silence and the frustration, until it was overpowering.

  Mara made for the pod, hardly pausing as she straddled the hatch and entered the cramped cabin. Ibri ignored her, his attention focused on a circuit board that he was investigating with a small probe, wires trailing across the floor to a meter.

  “Ibri.”

  When Ibri did not respond Mara snatched the circuit board from his grasp and tossed it out of the pod, watching with satisfaction as it sailed through the air and speared into the grass.

  Ibri glared at Mara in mute anger.

  “It’s been more than two hours. This is taking too long. We have to get a message to Janzen and Andrai. These aliens are dangerous. They and the lander could be in danger.”

  Ibri snorted in contempt. “We can’t walk to the lander with the aliens out there. We’ve got to get this pod operational. Fly it to base camp.”

  Mara shook with rage. “We have to get back to the base camp now — with or without the pod. We have its position. We could reach it in less than half an hour. They are just on the other side of that ridge, damn it!”

  “Safer to fly the pod,” said Ibri obstinately.

  Mara was afraid of the jungle, and of the aliens. They were big, intelligent and equipped with weapons, but Janzen and Andrai had to be warned. She and Ibri had to attempt the walk. She now realized how optimistic Ibri’s initial estimate was. The pod could be inert for up to a day, depending on how badly the software had been affected; and during that time more lives could be lost. Together, they would have a good chance in the jungle. Alone, she could perish quickly if threatened or injured.<
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  “Finish up, Ibri. We are walking to the lander. We will put the damaged transmitter inside the pod.”

  Ibri turned away and continued working.

  “Did you hear me? I just gave you an order.”

  Ibri simply looked at her.

  She should not have shouted. The pain in her head was bringing tears to her eyes.

  “You are coming with me, Ibri. Now.”

  “I’m not going anywhere, Commander. Janzen can handle things at the lander until we are finished.”

  “Janzen …” But I left Andrai in charge.

  Mara met Ibri’s eyes, sudden comprehension banishing her headache in a flood of adrenalin. Ibri had never stopped supporting Janzen. And the longer Janzen was left alone with Andrai, the more chance he would have to manipulate events. God! Here she was, obsessed with the aliens, when it was Janzen she should have been worrying about. She knew Ibri would never attempt the walk, not when he had a reason to keep her here — and give Janzen more time to sway Andrai.

  Mara was suddenly aware of the weight of the XR32 in her hand. She briefly considered threatening Ibri, but put aside the idea as untenable. Ibri was just arrogant enough to call her bluff — and she knew she would never deliver on the threat. She sheathed the weapon.

  “Still Janzen’s lapdog, hey Ibri?”

  She had the satisfaction of watching sudden doubt bloom in his dark, surly eyes. She had hit the mark. He turned quickly away from her and busied himself at the panel beneath the console.

  “Secure the pod. Take no chances. I am walking to the lander. Fly it over to base camp when you are done.”

  “Sure.”

  She slammed the hatch with every ounce of her strength and stood there fuming. This was turning into a nightmare.

  Mara walked to the edge of the jungle without a backward glance.

  Up close the vegetation towered above her, cutting off any view of the ridge that hid the lander. From the lakeshore, it had seemed so simple. The lander was close by — less than four kilometers. She had seen it land.