by Colin Kapp
“Marshal Jym,” she turned to Wildheit, “how can we use the mines?”
“How long does it take to get them into space?” he asked Kasdeya.
“They’re gas propelled to run clear of the vessel. Say about a minute to spread a radial pattern to the diameter those ships have been ranging.”
“So the problem’s one of reaching a point of emergence a minute before the Chaos predictions say we will. Can that be done, Roamer?”
“I can read where the patterns will fall and tell Kasdeya how to anticipate them. But in order to satisfy the Chaos equation we shall have to remain in that position for the full minute.”
“Why is that?”
“Because in order for there to have been a Chaos pattern in the first place, we will have to be present at that time. If we don’t satisfy that part of the equation, the Chaos pattern will be located over our actual point of emergence rather than the one we wish to simulate.”
“This discussion is way over my head,” said Wildheit. “But we’ll give it a try.”
Kasdeya shook his head. “Too much of a risk. If that crazy chicken’s wrong and we attempt to sit out there for a full minute, we’re surely dead.”
“How can I be wrong, you idiot?” Although her voice remained level, Wildheit noted the merest flicker of anger cross her brow. He was suddenly undecided as to whether this was a juvenile reaction or whether Kasdeya had touched some more dangerous strata underneath. He feared the latter, and took the initiative himself.
“Jequn, arm the mines. Let me know when they’re ready. Kasdeya, take your timing from Roamer. Roamer, as soon as Jequn’s ready, find us the minute we need.”
“Why so suddenly positive, Marshal?” Kasdeya was critical.
“What’s the use of a catalyst if it doesn’t influence the reaction. We’re in no position to fight fire with fire, so we’re going to try fighting Chaos with Chaos.”
When the banks of stars returned to view on Roamer’s command, the great ships were absent from the scene. Obedient to his instructions, Jequn fired a pattern of space-mines, and for a brief instant they could actually see the trails of evaporating vapor leap away from the ship as the deadly weapons dispersed themselves in space. In the hiatus that followed, nobody spoke. The tension increased perceptibly with the passing of the seconds. Then the critical minute was over—and nothing whatever happened.
The anticlimax brought an angry reaction from Kasdeya.
“Told you the chicken was mad! Now we don’t know when the hell they’ll jump on us next.”
“Or was it due to the cowardice that made you time-jump an extra space ahead?” Roamer asked calmly.
“What!” Kasdeya attempted to cuff Roamer with the back of his hand. But the blow did not reach her. With incredible speed, she intercepted the swing and twisted his arm somehow back upon itself. Kasdeya’s agonized cry, however, lost its impact with the arrival of the battleships and their immediate and most spectacular destruction. Each massive ship blazed into a miniature nova so bright that the polarizers in the flight-bridge dome blanked everything else from view in striving to cut off the fierce and critical burst of radiation.
Literally two full minutes elapsed before the dome permitted the stars to come back into view, and then the scene was of a space filled with large balls of incandescent metal that still gave birth to occasional bursts of sparkling fire. Of the great, dark, persecuting ships, these were the only remains.
“Let’s get out of here!”
Asbeel had taken Kasdeya’s place at the controls. The latter, white-faced and grim, was nursing a brutally-strained shoulder and confronting an incredibly calm Roamer.
“You hell-bitch! What did you have to do that for?”
“Did you think I’d stand and let you strike me? Remember, I can read your intention before you even make the decision. Next time you or anyone tries the like of that, I’ll kill them.”
“You’ll do what? You skinny chicken!” Kasdeya was unable to believe his ears. He nearly choked with incredulity. “Don’t you know my reputation?” He started to raise his other arm in a threatening gesture, then found himself looking down the muzzle of one of Wildheit’s projectors.
“Break it up, you two! With a whole hostile universe outside, don’t you think we’ve enemies enough? I don’t blame you for what happened, Roamer. But it’d be useful to have a few allies left when we actually start taking on the Ra. Better get that arm fixed, Kasdeya. Jequn, help him.”
“Are you giving orders on my ship, Marshal?” Kasdeya asked belligerently.
“Not through choice, believe me. But if we don’t restore some unity among ourselves, we’re lost.”
“What makes you think you’re able to take control?”
“Let’s put it this way. Roamer and I have taken more Ra ships out of space in a few hours than have you in seventy centuries. Is that a fair assumption?”
“Yes, but …”
“And left to your own devices, you might achieve another seven thousand years of running before natural death catches up with you. But I can’t afford that sort of time. It was your proposition that we join forces. Well, I accept—but I make the decisions and I give the orders until the job’s done. After that you can make your own way to hell at any velocity you choose.”
Kasdeya gave a sour grimace, but his shoulder was plainly giving him great pain, and he was in no mood for further argument.
“Very well, Marshal. We’ll try it your way. But keep this crazy chicken out of my route. Else I’ll show her a few aspects of personal violence she’ll not be able to anticipate.”
Out of the corners of his eyes, Wildheit saw Roamer tense for a spring like a wild tigress. Then just as she began to move she suddenly stopped and froze to statuesque immobility as she read his intention to use the shock pellet in his projector to stop her. She turned and looked at him with eyes full of subdued rage.
“Yes—that goes for you, too, Roamer.” Wildheit was uncompromising. “Uneasy bedfellows we may be, but I have one overriding priority, and that’s to beat the damn Chaos Weapon. Don’t think I’m going to let anything or anyone stand in the way.” He turned to Asbeel. “Now, is there any way of establishing radio contact with Terra?”
“Not a hope. There’s no way of getting any interactive phenomena through the trans-continuum junction unless you’ve access to something like the Chaos Weapon which can stress the continuum itself. The only way we could achieve radio contact is to go back into the new universe. Is it that important?”
“Well, Saraya organized this little nest of catalysts, so I presume he knew how he intended it should be used. The trouble is, he forgot to tell us. By no stretch of imagination can we take on a whole universe by simple force of arms. Therefore it’d be interesting to find out just what Saraya had in mind.”
ELEVEN
“MARSHAL, I am in communion with Talloth. Marshal Hover wishes to speak with you. But first, Talloth and I have something to say.”
Wildheit dragged himself awake and switched on the light in the small cabin in which he had found vacant bunkspace. His action of checking his chronometer had less to do with a desire to know the time than with preparing his mind for an unusual precedent—a communication from the symbiotic gods undertaken of their own volition.
“What’s on your minds, Coul?”
“The things which you are preparing to do frighten even us gods.”
“I wasn’t consciously preparing to do anything. But please continue.”
“We have been through such a cataclysmic period before. Many of us did not emerge from the trial. When continua collide, even dimensions buckle and warp. Many of us were lost in the strange storms that occur in domains even we cannot understand.”
“You’re describing cosmologies many orders above my comprehension. What do you want of me?”
“It’s more a question of what you expect of us. You are my faithful and loving host in this dimension. In return I strive occasionally to save you from
the consequences of your own mortal stupidity. But the situation you are entering has elements of scale beyond any possibility of our intervention. We dare not follow where you intend to tread.”
“In other words, when the going gets really rough, I’m on my own?”
“A correct interpretation. The human short and singular life-style breeds a casual disregard for death which cannot be shared by those both potentially immortal and having composite identity. By way of compensation, you shall have special privileges until I take off. For a short period you may call on me without mortal need.”
“Thanks for the offer. When do you go?”
“I shall stay until the last second. When you find me no longer at your shoulder you will know the final catastrophe is imminent. Now if you breathe carefully, I will relay the pedestrian thoughts of Marshal Hover.”
“Jym! Thank heavens you’re still alive.” Hover’s voice broke out of Wildheit’s mouth. “I’ve had the very dickens of a time trying to persuade Talloth to make communion. He insisted that you were in no danger that generated a special reason.”
“Objectively, that’s probably true at the moment. How’re your legs coming along, Cass?”
“They’re the greatest since synthetic onion. Yesterday I ran a mile in four-and-a-half minutes. I reckon to get my time under four by the end of the month.”
“Great to know you can joke about it. Have they set a date for the fitting?”
“Oh my God!”
“What’s the matter now?”
“Jym, how long do you estimate since the last time we spoke?”
“I was in a lifecraft just clear of Mayo, before we got picked up. I’d reckon about thirty hours.”
“Then mark this carefully, Jym boy. That conversation took place nearer twenty months ago, not thirty hours.”
“Then you really do have the legs?”
“Fitted and functioning. And I’ve the corns to prove it. So what the devil happened to you?”
“I think I can guess. I got involved with some characters who have a rather casual approach to the velocity of light. I assume some of their maneuvers involve measurable time-dilation.”
“In these days of subspace travel? Where are you now?”
“I don’t think you’re going to believe this, Cass.”
“Try me!”
“I’m in a completely different universe, with a kid who can read Chaos off the top of her head, a symbiotic god who just handed in his resignation, and five characters who were practicing sociology around two thousand B.C.”
“You’re right—I don’t believe you. Except …”
“Except what?”
“Except that Saraya’s standing next to me nodding agreement to everything you say.”
“He should be in agreement. He set me up for this gig. Ask him what the program is from here out.”
Wildheit was interrupted by a loud and urgent knocking on the cabin door.
“Hold a minute, Cass. Sounds as if we’ve an emergency here.”
Gadreel was outside. There was perspiration on his brow.
“Marshal, the Ra are massing. Many thousands of ships have hit space. Kasdeya wants you to see.”
“I’ll be there directly,” said Wildheit, closing the door again. “Cass, tell Saraya the Ra invasion is beginning.”
“Will do! He says damn and blast, and that’s the one move he hoped they wouldn’t make at this time. Once through the trans-continuum junction they can manufacture their own disasters—and then amplify them with the Chaos Weapon. Does that make sense, Jym?”
“Very much so.”
“Therefore, it’s absolutely vital you put the Chaos Weapon out of action once and for all. Can you do that?”
“I haven’t a clue, but I can try.”
“Saraya says trying’s not enough. It’s imperative you succeed.”
“If it’s humanly possible, we’ll do it.”
“Fine! But Talloth’s getting the fidgets, so this communion is ended. Take care …”
Everyone was on the flight-bridge, including Roamer. All the screens were turned on, but even without them it was possible to distinguish the myriad points of light moving in a steadfast stream across the starry backdrop. Gadreel’s first estimate had been drastically low, for the thousands had become tens of thousands and hundreds of thousands; a unique and impressive strand of space-born migrants drifting like some golden insect swarm toward its promised lands.
The screens gave a closer and more sinister viewpoint. Intermixed with the relatively featureless ships, which Wildheit judged to be personnel transports, was a high proportion of obviously armed and extremely wicked-looking vessels that were undoubtedly sophisticated warcraft. These armed ships were also present in mass in protective phalanxes which rode escort at intervals alongside the fantastic convoy. The spearhead of the entire parade was a concentration of huge battleships similar to those which Kasdeya’s vessel had so narrowly escaped. In terms of the sheer number of overtly armed craft, the Federation Space Force was already matched, and there was no sign that the great stream of ships was anything but unending.
“Are they all going—the whole universe?” Wildheit asked, finding a slightly plaintive note creep into the back of his voice.
Kasdeya was grimly amused. “Preserve a sense of scale, Marshal. That’s the contribution from only about about five star systems. Mere pathfinders. There’s a hundred-thousand inhabited systems in this one galaxy alone, and at least a hundred-thousand-million galaxies in this universe. What you see is the thinnest edge of the thinnest possible wedge.”
“And they’re afraid of the Federation?”
“Those ships have no possibility of rearming or refueling, nor is any but a handful equipped to make the return journey back across the trans-continuum junction. Logistically, they’re at a complete disadvantage. The Federation ships can hit hard and run back to base for repair or supplies. The Ra have to carry with them every atom they require. They can count on no help at all until they’ve had the chance to establish industrial colonies capable of giving space-going support. That could take at least twenty years. So this first part of the fleet is a throw-away armada designed to establish a bridgehead, but no more.”
Wildheit returned to the screens, trying to reconcile the view of this armed and mighty force with Kasdeya’s description of it as a throw-away armada. He had to admit the difference in viewpoint was related to the sense of scale, but his own comprehension was daunted by the endless stream of golden ships whose origin appeared to be infinity.
“The Chaos Weapon—where is it?” he asked suddenly.
“It’s actually located somewhere in the trans-continuum junction itself. What’s on your mind, Marshal?”
“I want to put it out of action.”
“You’re as crazy as the chicken.”
“Why? Is it impossible to sabotage it?”
“Wait till you’ve seen it before you decide. I don’t think you appreciate its size. They drain whole stars into the furnace to fuel it, and use ten black holes each of two solar masses in a stabilized ring for the focusing. When it operates it distorts the value of pi over a radius of better than five light-years.”
“Even so, we have to try. If that fleet gets through to the new universe with the Chaos Weapon still operating, the Ra can win all the way down the line.”
“How do you figure that?”
“Can you imagine a more destructive combination than a suicide fleet with its effect multiplied by the Chaos Weapon? The potential of any attack can be magnified out of all proportion by linking it to the backlash of continuum distortion. Once through the trans-continuum junction they can manufacture their own disasters to order.”
“You make a very perceptive point, Marshal, which is surprising. Up to this time, your knowledge of Chaos has been superficial, to say the least.”
“I’m a late bloomer,” Wildheit said, unwilling to go into detail. “Is the attack on?”
“Ask the
crazy chicken. She appears to have a close grasp of the future.”
“Do I detect a grudging undercurrent of belief?”
“Marshal, I saw her stop when you only thought about using that projector on her. I’d swear you didn’t move a single muscle, yet she knew your intention. I’m easily persuaded about facts which aid survival.”
“Roamer?”
“The patterns erupt into more violence than there are words to describe it. The ultimate catastrophe is coming—but not yet. There’s time to attack the Chaos Weapon, and no great entropic change is located at that point. I think we should try.”
“I’ll go along with that,” said Kasdeya. “Penemue, run us a course plot for the trans-continuum junction. I want the marshal to see what he’s up against. I don’t myself see any way of tackling an object of that size, but perhaps Saraya’s catalysts can achieve something that logic can’t.”
“Where are we?” Wildheit asked, as the agonies of the fast flight died away.
“In the trans-continuum junction itself—a theoretical nowhere.” Penemue, on whose shoulders fell most of the mathematical chores, appeared to be the only one who felt qualified to answer the question. “At this point we are included in neither one universe nor the other. We’re in the junction which separates the two continua. It’s a domain unique in itself, being starless, massless, theoretically infinite, and with only a negative set of physical principles of its own. It’s boundaries are defined only by the velocity of light, yet it is neither tardyon nor tachyon space nor anything else that has a definition. It is nothing at all, in the most literal sense of the term.”
“Yet things can exist here?” Wildheit was fighting to comprehend Penemue’s concepts.
“Certainly. But don’t become confused by the apparent simplicity of that fact, Marshal. The mathematics of the continuum septum are quite horrendous. Basically, any artifact which exists in this domain is relative only where it is contained by itself. Simply, it is the hull containing this ship that enables the principles of ordinary physics to be maintained inside it. Outside that containment, no unifying physical principles apply.”