Second Veil

by Wilson, David

  "They probably don't even know we exist," Zins said. "It has been so long since The Protectors acknowledged this planet that it seems likely we are as much a legend to them at this point as they are to us."

  "Or," Cyril said, his voice soft, but carrying, "they are still protecting us. If they have not reached out to us, perhaps it is so that their communications could not be intercepted. If we are forgotten, it buys us time."

  "Time for what?" Cumby said.

  "To prove ourselves worthy," Zins said without hesitation. "To find ways to defend ourselves, and to survive, without the help of protectors looking out for us. To reach out and know our enemies, prepare for them, and do our best."

  "And if that best isn't good enough?" Councilor Illana cut in, "what then?"

  "Then nothing," Zins replied with a shrug. "We are apparently getting closer to encountering whoever did this," he waved at the case on the table, "whether we prepare or not. I'm thinking they aren't the talking kind. We can ready ourselves for the day they finally find us, or we can ignore it and go on and hope our children have to deal with it, but none of it will change the danger. It is entirely up to us."

  Cumby glanced around the room.

  "In a very real way, what Maester Zins has said is true. This is the room where decisions are made. We are the men, and women, who will decide what road we take into the future. If we are destroyed, it will be at least in part because we ourselves have failed. I see no real way to protect ourselves, and I'm not optimistic about our chances if we are discovered…but neither am I willing to roll over and let our world be consumed by some distant darkness we don't understand."

  Euphrankes had pulled a small book from a pocket of his protective suit. He leaned in close over the table and studied the artifact carefully. Then, with careful strokes, he copied down the letters from the metal plate.

  Lockhe d - that was all he could make out. There was more in the middle, but he thought if they encountered anyone who was familiar with such characters along the way, they could show it to them. It might mean something, it might not. It might make them friends, or enemies. There was no way to know whether they would first encounter the creators of whatever had been destroyed, or the destroyers. There was no way, even, to know which side – ultimately – had been in the right.

  “I’m trying to figure out what could destroy something so completely,” Aria said, frowning. “I mean, I know there must be weapons out there far beyond anything we’ve seen, but…”

  “It’s the veils,” Zins said. “We have limited weapons technology, but it isn’t because we couldn’t create something much more destructive. Think of the mag drives we’ve just finished, directed on the surface of a building, or a ship, not for the purpose of propelling an airship, but to pull it apart magnetically.”

  “You have thought about such things?” Euphrankes asked, turning to his old friend in shock.

  “Since the moment I believed you could really propel us up and beyond the veils, yes.” Zins replied. “How can you not? If we get out there and find whoever destroyed that,” he pointed at the table, “we’d better be prepared in case they have similar plans for us, don’t you think? Otherwise, what is the point in going at all?”

  They were all silent for a few moments, and then Cumby spoke.

  “I believe Maester Zins is correct. You are going to have to bend some of the brilliance you have available to you toward defenses, and weapons. You can’t go blindly out there and hope that the universe is a wonderful place. Judging from how things can go wrong in a closed environment like Urv, I think we can guess how they might go on a grander scale.”

  “We’ve already got plans,” Zins said softly. “We haven’t shown you yet, Frankes…and I’m sorry for that, but we knew you’d be opposed, and we didn’t want to leave this work all for the last moment.”

  Euphrankes reached out then and ran a hand over the jagged edge of the fragment of machinery on the table. He glanced up at Zins.

  “You are right, I am opposed, but I am also not a fool. Everything you and the High Councilor have said is true. I ask only that we spend more time on defensive systems…Imperium is a powerful shield, and that same magnetic field you envision as an offensive weapon could create an interesting shield, with some modifications.”

  Zins smiled.

  “Of course …we’ll show you what we have on the return trip, and we can make plans for incorporating it into the Tangent’s design.”

  “How close are you?” Cyril asked curiously. “How soon might you attempt to pass the veil?”

  “We can be ready in a matter of a couple of weeks,” Euphrankes said. “The construction for the patches and portable airlocks is nearly automated. We have split our crews among those who wish to join us on the Tangent, and those who want to remain behind and man the compound, helping as they can to reopen the roads and pilot the airships between cities. We need only a few more for the journey.”

  “I wish that I could go,” Cyril said wistfully. “I wish that I could see these wonderful machines you are building and pass the veils. I wish that I could join you on a journey that may, in the end, bring you face to face with The Protectors, or those like them. All my life I’ve been worshipping them. Now, just on the verge of realizing that they are not omnipotent protectors, but very possibly men not so unlike myself, I find that knowing is suddenly very important.

  “Do we have a method of communication designed?” he asked. “How will we know what you find, or discover? How far will you go before you return?”

  Euphrankes grinned.

  “Slyphie figured out the communications. She has had some considerable success bouncing signals off of objects beyond the veil – very distant objects – using yet another application of mag theory. This planet is – as you know – riddled with veins and pockets of metal. It is possible, using rods pounded deep into the surface of the planet, to use that metal as an antenna of sorts. We’ve been working on a receiver. So far, all it’s picked up is noise…scattered bursts of radiation from beyond the veil. With the transmitter we have designed, however, we should be able to beam signals directly back to that receiver from very great distances.

  “We’ll need someone to monitor that signal, Cyril,” he said softly. “Do you suppose you could find room in The Chamber of Stars for it? I can think of no more appropriate place…”

  Cyril’s eyes grew bright.

  “Of course!” he said at once. “I will send priests with you to help bring it to Urv and install it!”

  “We’ll keep a second receiver at The Outpost as backup,” Euphrankes said. “We haven’t figured out a way yet that you can send signals back to the Tangent, but you will be able to receive regular reports on our progress, and on any discoveries we make.”

  “And I will continue to study the artifact, and the pumps,” Cyril said. “We will work with your engineers – perhaps we’ll discover a means of sending back a signal on our own. Be certain you install a receiver on board the Tangent, as well as just a transmitter.”

  “Done,” Euphrankes said.

  “I think we’d better get back to The Outpost,” Zins said. “Seeing this artifact again, and wondering, has me on edge.”

  “Agreed,” Euphrankes said.

  “Thank you for coming so quickly,” Cumby said. “I will feel better knowing The Temple has a means of following your progress. I have to admit, if I didn’t have so many years under my belt, I’d be tempted to tag along myself. I’ve spent a very long time cooped up in this place.”

  “It’s not just the veils that are opening up,” Zins said. “The roads will be clear soon, and I’m thinking it’s been far too long since representatives of The Council reached out to the remote cities in person.”

  “Perhaps you are right,” Cumby said. “The travel would certainly do my spirits good.”

  “Then we will see you soon,” Euphrankes said. “Maybe you can make the trip to The Outpost to see us off on our journey.”

  “I
t would be an honor,” Cumby said.

  “Then,” Euphrankes said, shaking the old man’s hand for the second time in less than a month, “we will see you there.”

  The group broke up then. Cyril carefully closed the case and carried it out of the chamber. Euphrankes, Zins, and Aria returned to the air towers, and High Councilor Cumby – with an escort of his guards – trailed along to watch them depart.

  As the Vector pulled away from the air dock and floated into the distance, he spoke quietly to himself.

  “Hurry, Euphrankes. Get out there, and find them. I would very much like to live to see it.”

  Chapter Twenty

  “We’ve made contact,” Aria called out.

  She sat on the far side of the Tangent’s bridge from Euphrankes, a microphone in one hand and a polished brass headset, the earpieces manufactured to attach to the leather-covered helmet of her protective suit, perched on her head. The cable it was attached to had twin plugs that snaked into the single cable leading to the earpiece and attached at the other end to a pair of radios. One radio was hooked into the standard radio frequency that linked the cities – spotty, but better since they’d raised the antennas to place them between the veils. Signals transmitted better in the thinner atmosphere, and they were able to bounce around the curved surface of the planet by using the reflective qualities of the Second Veil.

  The other cable plugged into the new gear. They’d been working with it furiously, trying to get it operational before launch.

  “The Temple reads you, then?” Euphrankes asked.

  “Loud and clear,” she beamed. “Now I’m going to test the receiver on this end.”

  “It should work fine here,” Euphrankes said. “The question is, shooting through the Second Veil, how far can they send a signal – when will we lose them?”

  Aria nodded absently. She flipped a large toggle switch, adjusted the cables and spoke into the microphone again. She sat, intent on whatever she heard through the headset, and Euphrankes watched her for a reaction. At first she frowned, and he feared they weren’t going to get a response. Then Aria smiled, and Euprhankes couldn’t help the grin that spread across his own face.

  “It’s good,” she said. “I don’t know if it will work past the veils, but we have a clear connection on the new equipment.”

  “Let’s keep regular reports, twice daily, from here out,” Euphrankes said. “That way we get a good chance to let the equipment burn in, and to check for bugs. We won’t have much time to adjust it once we’re gone. We need a solid connection from the start, and we have to maintain it. I assume our own transmissions to Urv will get through, but there’s nothing like knowing for certain – and the only way to know is to get a response.”

  “Slyphie has added another bit to it,” Aria said. She indicated a red light on the side of the receiver. “Watch this.”

  She spoke into the microphone again. This time she smiled more quickly as the response came directly back. As she did, the red light blinked three times, and then grew steady again.

  “What does it mean?” Euphrankes asked.

  “It means we received a response,” Aria said. “It will detect a signal much too small for actual voice translation, but will tell us that Urv has acknowledged our transmission. As long as we see that light blink, we know we got through. There are codes as well. If it goes off and stays off for a moment, it means our transmission was received but garbled. If it starts beeping constantly, they have received nothing in more than a day and are asking us to please respond with a status.”

  “That’s wonderful,” Euphrankes said.

  He turned back to the console before him. They’d run a thousand simulations, and the mag drive appeared as if it would function as they expected it to. It didn’t change the risk, or the fact that an entire crew of men and women would be trusting him with their lives as they launched into the unknown. He wished there was a more real-world way to test it, but he’d done all that he could.

  “We will be ready in two, maybe three days,” he said.

  Aria glanced over at him.

  “We are ready now,” she said. “We will soon have to quit putting it off and cut the lines.”

  Euphrankes looked as though he might argue, thought better of it, and chuckled. "You are right, of course. We have to make this a reality. It will no longer be enough to dream.”

  “Have you made the final selections for the crew?” she asked. “Zins was waiting on that so he could begin scheduling watch duty, and assign berths.”

  “It is nearly there,” Euphrankes said. “There are two slots still uncertain. It’s as hard to turn anyone away from this mission as it is to accept them, knowing the uncertainty of the outcome. The selfish part of me wants to just go myself, see if I survive, and come back, but that can’t happen. It’s a lot of responsibility.”

  “It’s not all yours,” Aria said. “You know that. They want to go…WE want to go, and it’s not a question any longer of should we – we need answers.”

  “I know, I know,” Euphrankes said. “It doesn’t make it any easier to sleep at night.”

  Aria laughed. “One of these days, you’ll drop dead of worrying about others.”

  "Great," Euphrankes said, finally smiling and letting out a chuckle. "Now I'll have to worry about dropping dead and letting everyone down."

  Aria shook her head and turned back to the radio sets. She chatted with Cyril in Urv for a few moments, setting up a schedule for regular broadcasts and responses. Euphrankes puttered about the bridge, checking and rechecking instruments and equipment that had already been gone over a hundred times. Everything was gleaming metal and shined to brilliance. There were familiar controls, and brand new ones that had never been tested.

  The maiden voyage, a between the veils flight to Urv, was scheduled for that evening. Euphrankes hadn't slept. He hadn't slept well in over a week, in fact. He kept thinking about the stars, and the vast, dark spaces surrounding them. He thought about the debris, and the type of destruction that could send such a thing hurtling through space to their doorstep.

  He glanced over at Aria again.

  "Their planet could have just exploded," he said. "There might not be a threat at all, other than a natural one. There may be nothing to find."

  She looked over at him and frowned.

  "You don't believe that. If you did, we wouldn't have spent the last week perfecting and testing weapons. We have never built a weapon in all the years of my life – not here, not in Urv. The idea that we may need them, and that our lack of knowledge in that area may be our greatest weakness is the one thing, of all those you worry about too much, that troubles me as well.

  "What kind of man – or being – destroys things like that? We squabble and banish one another, and we've even had skirmishes between cities. We've never had a conflict on any greater level, though. There has always been the knowledge behind it all that anything we do can affect the veils. Do you think it's possible that this is the gift The Protectors have given us?"

  "What do you mean?" Euphrankes asked.

  "We take nothing for granted. Our homes, our cities, our roads – the air that we breathe. Our laws, our ways, and our lives are built around preserving those things. We hold the preservation of life above all other things; it's ingrained in our culture. Maybe The Protectors have seen too many destructive peoples. Maybe this was a way of molding us into protectors. In a universe that may be filled with fighting on a large scale, we may be the calming factor."

  "It's a pleasant thought," Euphrankes mused. "The trouble is that – if it's true – then that means most other races won't share our concerns with preserving life. We may not get the opportunity to explain ourselves, or to influence anyone, before we're blown out of the sky to become strange debris on someone else's doorstep."

  They worked on in silence. It was two hours before launch, and the others had begun entering the airlock and slipping on board.

  "I have to go below," Euphrankes said
. "I have to choose the final two crewmembers, and there's no sense putting it off any longer."

  Aria nodded.

  "I'm going to find Slyphie and record the schedule that Cyril and I have established. We'll choose a small group to be responsible around the clock for the transmission, and for recording any messages from the surface."

  "I'll be bringing the main log with me when I return," Euphrankes said. "We'll keep that here on the bridge. All command level personnel will have access when on watch. I have the feeling it may be one of the most important and fascinating things written in the planet's history. I brought a lot of ink."

  Aria laughed.

  "Perhaps," she said, "I should schedule a daily recital of the entries over the radio? Cyril could record them and they'll know what's happening to us. Even if we get too far out of range for him to respond, we'll be able to leave a record."

  "That is a wonderful idea," Euphrankes said. "Imagine that. After all the trouble we've caused, and all the years of exile, there might be one of those fabulous, thick-spined books in The Chamber of Stars with our words in it."

  "I can see the title now," Aria laughed. "The Voyages of the Tangent: Captain Euphrankes Holymnn."

  "More like the adventures of the crew of the airship Tangent," Euphrankes said, "led by some guy who had no idea what he was doing."

  "Just so Myril doesn't break out of confinement to write a sequel titled ‘I told you so,’ I'm okay with that," Aria said.

  They both laughed.

  "I'll be back in an hour," Euphrankes said. "Get everyone ready for the launch. We'll meet in the main dining hall right before we leave. Don't know if I've got an inspirational speech in me, but I'll give it my best shot. I suspect there will be some sort of festivities for our arrival and sendoff in Urv as well. We're celebrities, you know. We might as well enjoy it while we can."

  "We'll be ready,” she said. Then, with a flip of her hair and a laugh, she added, "Skipper."