A faint signal returned. "Interrogative yours."
"Torchloves, mission abort. Mission abort. Estimated target beyond spread range. Return to base. Return to base."
"Hawkwatch, Torchlove one. Stet. Returning to base."
Gerswin scanned the indicators, altered course again fractionally. The Caroljoy would skim by Marduk before lifting above the ecliptic for the long trip back to Aswan.
"Three until drop," the console informed him.
The pilot left his ostensibly obsolete scout on course until the three lights winked red in quick succession, then green.
"Torps away. Launch path is clear and green through reentry"
"Hawkwatch, Torch two. Target discharged missiles on reentry course for Basepath."
"Torchlove two, interrogative interception."
"Hawkwatch, that is negative."
"Understand negative."
"That's affirmative. Negative on intercept. Missile reentry curve will commence prior to intercept."
"Torchlove two, hold data. Say again. Hold data for analysis."
"Hawkwatch, stet. Holding data for analysis. Returning base this time."
Gerswin debated releasing full screens to return normal gravity to the Caroljoy, but decided to hang on for another few minutes. It would be just like the Impies to have a few jokers planted around the system.
He altered course again, well within the general departure corridor, but enough to confuse a DRI tracker using the launch curves for the torps as its data base.
His screens blanked again.
"Distance and weapon?" he asked the AI.
"Three triple em cluster at point one emkay."
Nothing like proving yourself correct on the. spot. He checked the screens, but they seemed to have held under what had been an extremely close miss.
"Impact near previous course line?"
"Impact less than point zero one from previous track."
Gerswin decided to leave the screens up longer than lie had decided a few moments earlier.
"Hawkwatch, this is Turtlestrike. Target evaded DRI line, on high exit course Hawk system."
"Stet, Turtlestrike. Interrogative status."
"Status is red five from EMP backblast."
Gerswin translated. Turtlestrike, whatever craft that represented, had also been too close to the detonation and would be down for at least five stans, long after the Caroljoy had made the first of the return jumps toward Aswan.
Gerswin left the screens up, though he dropped acceleration to allow a gee drop to three gees, until he was within minutes of the jump point. Then, and only then, did he return to normal operations for the jump. The switch from three-gee acceleration to near weightlessness nearly cost him the pearapple he had eaten before he had entered the system.
He swallowed hard, gulping back the bitter taste of regurgitated fruit, and plowed through the prejump checks.
While the modified message torps carried enough of the spores and seeds to transform Marduk back into a livable planet, given several thousand, or more, years, the Imperial Interstellar Survey Service would still have Marduk as a source of supply for its toxic warheads for several dozen centuries, hopefully longer than the Empire would be around to use them.
He shook his head and touched the jump stud.
The stars winked out; the blackness swam through the Caroljoy; and, after a short infinity, another set of stars dropped into place as the scout resettled in real spacetime twenty systems from Marduk.
XXXIX
The Overlords of Time have called upon the Underlords of Order under the Edict of the West Wing of Chronology.
Listen . . .
Can you hear the whispers of the old papers rustling in the stacks where they were placed by the servators to ensure that the records would be complete?
Can you understand the mumbled words of the languages so old that their alphabets have been lost, so antique that outside of the library no record exists of them or of those who spoke such soft sibilants?
Do you wonder who filled the library, for it was neither repository nor refuge by design, but Hall of Destruction, built for the Ancients by the Gods of Nihil?
Do you stand in awe of the Black Gates that no tool can scratch, that not even the Empire could understand, and that the Commonality quietly refuses to see?
Hush . . .
In the silence that falls with the west mountain shadows, you may hear a set of footsteps, if you are in the right corridor, catch a glimpse of the captain.
The captain, you ask? That figment of imagination? That illusory paragon of legend? That satyric sire of our long afternoon? That man whom sages deny?
Hush . . .
Three steps, each lighter than the last, a silvered black tunic, and hawk-burned eyes—did you see? Did you dare to see?
Ahhh . . .
You turned your head, away from the sole chance you had to see the captain as he was. For he was, and is, and will be, as we were, are, and will be.
The Shrine? That time-clouded prison? For now, it holds his body, his thoughts, but not his soul. Not his soul.
His soul is here, along the corridors designed to resist the fires of Hades, where you may see him if you are lucky, when twilight falls from the mountains across the Black Gates. His soul belongs not just to the gentle, nor to the green, nor to the ladies, but to the past, to the storms, and the spouts.
One soul, one man, one barrier that separated the Gods of Nihil from the green of the new Old Earth, and you have missed the chance to see.
There never was a captain, you say?
Are there none so blind as will not see? None so deaf as will
not hear? None so alive as will not live?
Speak not of Faith! Faith is but a belief in what cannot be known, and the captain was, is, and will be. Knowing and known—the captain, keeper of the Black Gates . . .
Mysteries of the Archives
Kyedra L. deKerwin
New Denv, Old Earth
5231 N.E.C.
XL
THE CONTROLS MOVED easily under his lingers, even though Gerswin had not used the flitter in more than a year. All indicators were green, and the preflight check had been clear.
Perhaps he was being overcautious. Even after setting down the Caroljoy on his own secluded property on Mara, theoretically a hunting preserve not directly traceable to Gerswin and the foundation or to his identity as Patron L. Sergio Enver and the local subsidiary, Enver Limited, which had taken over the commercial culturing and production of the biological sponges that could remove and decompose nearly any organic toxic, he was skeptical. Skeptical about the workings of a sealed flitter in a hidden bunker.
On top of the skepticism, he had doubts about the wisdom of continuing to build biotech enterprises and continuing to collect ever-increasing income, income he was having more and more difficulty investing and handling.
"So why do you keep at it?"
He wasn't sure he knew the answers to his own questions, outside of the fact that Old Earth wasn't ready for his return, outside of the fact that stopping would require some serious thoughts and selfevaluation. He pushed that away.
The contracts with New Glascow had represented a nice boost to his personal holdings, besides leading to the first steps in turning that smelter/manufacturing planet into someplace liveable—not that the New Glascow Company knew that would be the end result of using Enver products. All they knew was that if they dumped the spores into waste piles they got total organic breakdowns and heavy metals on the bottom of a settling pond. In short, some water, some oxygen, carbon paste, free hydrogen, and a gooey mess worth its weight in metal for easy refining and recycling.
Someday, Gerswin suspected, when the air began to clear and fish began to appear in all the streams, they'd discover the overall picture. In the meantime, with a modest take from the enterprises created from the application of grant research, all properly licensed, of course, Gerswin, under close to a dozen names, was able to fin
ance his own operations with but a token tap on the foundation budget, while pouring additional contributions into OERF.
He hoped that his efforts to keep separate from the foundation would limit the Imperial scrutiny, or delay it somewhat.
As far as Enver, Limited, went, he was Patron L. Sergio Enver, who preferred play to work, but who occasionally visited the facilities and didn't complain too much if his senior executives voted themselves expensive bonuses—provided production and sales continued to increase and provided they kept their eyes open for new biological technology opportunities.
Already, on Mara and other nearby systems, half a dozen other competitors were using information stolen from Enver.
Gerswin smiled as he thought of it. If they knew how easy he had tried to make such theft! You could offer knowledge on a silver platter, and no one would take it. Once you made money with it, suddenly people would cut throats for it.
He cocked his head as he listened to the whine of the turbines. Despite its inactivity, the flitter handled well, and the engine indicators were normal.
Sooner or later, he knew, the Empire would come calling, and he would have to leave precipitously. Perhaps that was why he avoided worrying about continuing, preferring to leave that decision up to the Empire. The coward's way out . . .
He tapped the signal for the homer as the flitter neared the local Enver headquarters. While he did not announce his visits in detail, he did not want to catch his loyal employees totally by surprise. Usually he sent a message torp indicating the general time of his next inspection.
Here, on the main continent, the sun had dropped behind the western hills, and the twilight had fled for solid night.
Gerswin dropped the flitter into a sloping descent toward the rooftop pad reserved for the patron on Enver, Limited. The homer signal remained green on the screen.
As the flitter slowed, he closed his eyes and triggered the flash strobes, searing the roof with a blaze of light. In the following instant, he cut all exterior lights, and the flitter settled onto the hard-surfaced building.
Releasing the canopy of the old-fashioned combat model flitter, Gerswin dropped to the roof on the right side, the side of the fuselage that had no handholds or extended footbars.
With his own unhampered night vision, he could see the watchman rubbing his eyes. But beyond the control bubble . . . was there another figure?
The pilot flattened behind the right stub skid, bringing his stunner to bear.
Two figures with long rods that suspiciously resembled projectile rifles were sighting on the flitter. Their quick reaction to the blinding glare he had flooded the landing pad with meant that they wore night glasses to protect their vision. Night glasses on the roof meant some level of government. Competitors would have used poison, long-range sniping, or some other less violent or more stealthy method.
Government involvement also meant that the pair wore conductive stun armor and helmets.
Gerswin estimated the distance from the flitter skid to the low wall from behind which the two agents waited. Slightly more than thirty meters.
He had to act, and quickly!
In seconds, they would start looking for the pilot, one Gerswin, and, on finding him, calmly riddle his position with whatever projectiles they were carrying—fragmentation, straight shells, or gas.
Thirty meters was too far for the stunner, even without their armor to consider, and certainly too far for the throwing knives.
Gerswin settled on the watchman, who had to be an accomplice, tacitly or otherwise.
A weak distraction, but better than none.
The watch bubble was fifteen meters away, on an indirect line between him and the agents.
Thrumm!
The first stunner bolt flared on the bubble, the second through the open door. It staggered the watchman.
Gerswin sprinted.
He made it halfway to the pair before the taller of the two agents, catching the motion from the corner of his eye, whirled.
Gerswin pumped his mad rush an instant longer, then dived low and rolled to the left, zigging forward, and coming up with the knife.
Scrtttt.
Clunk.
The other agent brought her weapon around, hampered by its length, even as the taller one went down, his weapon echoing on the roof.
Whuppp.
Before she could get the barrel toward Gerswin, he knocked it from her hands and swept her feet from underneath her.
The woman tried to bring her legs into play, but he twisted and dropped his full weight onto his right knee, which slammed into the side of her neck. The dull crack and instant limpness of her body signaled her death.
Gerswin followed her down, dropping behind the ledge that had not been sufficient shelter for the agents, and reached for the projectile rifle.
Strummm!
The frequency of the stun bolt—heavy-duty military model—confirmed his earlier impression of the watchman.
Still flat, he glanced at the first agent, wearing a full marauder-issue camouflage armor and matching helmet, twitching with the knife through his chest, though each shudder was slower and the time between each longer.
Gerswin edged along the walkway, head below the coping level, until he could retrieve the knife. Before he could pull the knife out, the man shuddered a last time and was still.
As the man in business gray checked the long weapon, he discovered it was configured for frag rounds. He squirmed another meter toward the watch bubble, keeping his body well below the wall.
A quick look, and he squeezed off one round.
Crummppp.
He squirmed farther, and tried another.
Crummppp.
There was no answering fire.
Several meters farther, nearly at the corner, he darted another look, then slowly peered once more.
The watchman was sprawled halfway through the open bubble port, and the darkness spread across his shoulders was not sweat.
Now what?
He could leave, if he left immediately, before the reinforcing troops discovered that the wrong man had survived. But then he wouldn't know what was behind it all.
Besides, if the Impies had really known what was happening, they would not have pulled such a weak operation. So it hadn't been organized by the Imperial government.
A good Imperial records check would have resulted in a direct assault or investigation of the foundation itself, either with more finesse or with overwhelming force.
He would have shrugged as he moved toward the watch bubble and the lift house behind it, but he saw the glimmer of light.
"Once again."
He took a deep breath and charged the portal, managing to cross the ten meters and drop into the darkness behind the side of the portal as the two replacement guards walked out. The portal closed before they were even fully aware that something might be wrong.
The right-hand guard turned toward Gerswin, something in his hand.
Crummpp!
The shot turned the marauder uniform into scraps of flesh and cloth.
Before the second guard could turn, Gerswin reversed the weapon and brought the stock into his diaphragm even as he knocked aside the guard's weapon hand.
Leaving both the dead guard and the unconscious one where they lay, Gerswin scrabbled around to the back side of the lift shaft, looking for the concealed access port he knew was hidden there.
His fingers traced the outline, and he backed away. A snap kick, and the plate fragmented, as designed.
He reached down and punched the three studs in one of the preset combinations and, without waiting, scrambled back to the front of the lift where the remaining living guard was dragging himself toward his weapon.
Gerswin kicked it away, pulled the stunner from his pouch, and fired.
Thrummppp!
At that range, even the guard's armor offered little protection. His knees and legs buckled him into an untidy heap.
Keeping one eye on the lift po
rtal, Gerswin picked up the body of the unconscious guard and carried it to the flitter, quickly locking the now disarmed man into the cargo bay.
His return flight was likely to be very quick, followed by an even quicker departure on the Caroljoy.
Before he made that flight, he needed to claim whatever he could from the latest of the ongoing work and see if he could determine what exactly had occurred.
3.The Endless Twilight Page 18