Webdancers

by Brian Herbert

  With their increased assets, the Liberators had a new mission: Use the podships to transport Tulyan teams all over the galaxy, so that they could perform the infrastructure repairs on an emergency basis, staving off the damage that was occurring to the fabric of the universe.…

  * * * * *

  But before leaving, Tulyan hunting crews needed to round up all of the podships that had drifted around inside the Parvii Fold, away from the moorage basin. Acey Zelk, always anxious to pilot the arcane vessels, had been permitted to join one of the crews. Already they had found more ships than the one hundred thousand Tulyan pilots they had brought with them, so the Liberators would need to send some of their original fleet back to their starcloud to pick up thousands of more pilots. The exact number was unclear, because they kept finding more podships, in hidden places.

  “A nice problem to have,” Doge Anton had said that morning, when he and the others began to realize the enormity of the prize they had captured from the Parviis.

  Through the web, Eshaz had sent a message back to the Tulyan Starcloud, notifying the Council of the logistical challenge. They made arrangements to send four hundred podships from the original Liberator fleet back to the starcloud, to get thousands of more Tulyans. They needed enough pilots to transport the rest of the huge fleet of recovered vessels, and none of the new ships could be moved yet.

  This was because the Tulyan pilots and web maintenance crews needed time to familiarize themselves with the new podships, and to practice operations with them. Since time immemorial, there had always been a methodical breaking-in process in which the various personalities and talents—Tulyan and Aopoddae—were sorted out and meshed properly. If this was not done correctly, the ancient legends held that there could be extremely adverse results, even disasters in which podships rebelled and caused destructive havoc. Thus, it was worth taking the extra time to ensure safety, and—to the extent possible—to enhance predictability.

  In addition, the Liberators were setting up defenses, securing the galactic fold militarily to prevent Parviis from returning and regaining multiswarm strength there. General Nirella had set up a guard post near the tiny bolt hole where the Parviis had disappeared, and made plans to leave a guard force of one hundred podships and military personnel in other key areas of the fold, including the entranceway to the Asteroid Funnel.…

  * * * * *

  Continuing the inspection tour on a prearranged route, Tesh caused Webdancer to hover over the bolt hole. Using a magnaviewer aboard the flagship, Noah saw the barely-perceptible opening through which the Parviis had escaped. Inside the hole, he saw something move, and identified it as a solitary Parvii. A sentry, Noah surmised.

  Noah set the viewer aside, and said, “We must guard this area well.”

  “Where there’s one hole, there may be others,” Eshaz said.

  Both of them knew Tulyan teams were looking, but so far nothing had turned up.

  Once more the podship nudged up against the membrane, this time near the bolt hole. Inside the passenger compartment, Noah touched the skin of the vessel, but unlike the experience of Eshaz, Noah did not link with Tesh. The skin trembled, as if in fear of Noah. Then it calmed, and abruptly his vision shifted, flooding his consciousness with a wash of gray-green. Presently it focused, and one star seemed to twinkle in the broad field of view, but for only a moment before turning the blackest black.

  With his mind, Noah Watanabe—this most unusual of all men—peered into Timeweb and absorbed the entire vast enclosure of his own galaxy, including the decaying infrastructure and this remote, intricately folded section of membrane that had once protected the Parviis.

  The opening through which they had fled was a tiny point of blackness in the midst of the gray-green membrane. With his inner eye, Noah peered through the hole into another galaxy, and saw distant, twinkling star systems, nebulas, and belts of undefined, streaking color.

  He then experienced an even more peculiar sensation, and felt his consciousness shifting, spinning, making him dizzy. Presently he regained his internal balance, and found that his mind was now inside the alternate galaxy, experiencing it paranormally. From this new vantage point, he saw the small Parvii swarm near the other side of the bolt hole.

  They’re in the undergalaxy, he thought, feeling both a rush of excitement and deep trepidation.

  Oddly, Noah could not see very far in this realm, and he wondered if his own anxiety had something to do with that. In his own galaxy, he had learned to overcome physical fear, for he was as close to immortal in that realm as any person could be. But in the undergalaxy, he sensed the rules of physics and laws of nature were entirely different. Nothing was as it seemed there, and he curbed his own curiosity, didn’t really want to venture further. Everything he had been through in his own galaxy was more than enough for him, and he couldn’t afford to lose focus, couldn’t afford to leave his duties and spin off into the unknown.

  But Noah also sensed very strongly that something in the undergalaxy was causing the decline of Timeweb, or at least contributing to it. He could not escape considering the ramifications of this second galaxy. His entire concept of galactic ecology had potentially been broadened by a great deal, and beyond that the implications were exponential. A universe of them.

  Seeing the vastly diminished Parvii swarm hovering by the bolt hole, Noah had mixed feelings—an urge to destroy them and feelings of pity. Tesh was one of that devilish breed, and he thought he might even love her, and that he might do virtually anything for her if he ever managed to fulfill the galactic duties that seemed to have been thrust upon him by fate.

  I am not a god or a messiah.

  He did not want to even consider such possibilities. It could only cause harm to his focus, to his intentions. He felt an innate sense of rightness about the course he had followed with his life thus far, about the choices he had made. But he hesitated to believe that he might be anything more than an enhanced form of a human being. Eshaz, in his zeal to heal Noah, had pressed his wounded flesh against the infrastructure of Timeweb, but the strange and powerful nutrients of the infrastructure could never alter certain basic truths.

  I was born of a Human mother and father. There is nothing miraculous or particularly heroic about that.

  Despite all he told himself, and his sense that he was highly ethical, part of Noah wanted to eliminate this Parvii swarm violently, leaving Tesh Kori as the only survivor of her demented race. In the undergalaxy, the troubled Noah stirred his mind, and felt a cosmic storm forming. Was he causing it? He felt uncertainty about this. But then, as if caught in a great wind, he saw the Parvii swarm buffeted, so that they flitted about in confusion and fear. Some scattered into the distance, and did not return.

  The swarm grew even smaller, and Noah felt pity for the terrified creatures.

  Wondering what had just occurred, he struggled to extract himself from the peculiar visions. Finally he succeeded in withdrawing, and returned to his physical self, in the passenger compartment of Webdancer.

  Conflicting emotions raged in his mind, giving him an intense headache.

  Eshaz looked at him with concern in his large eyes. “You saw something, didn’t you?” the Tulyan asked.

  Noah nodded, but for several moments found himself unable to organize his thoughts or form them into words.

  Chapter Eight

  Noah worries incessantly about his genetic linkage to Francella Watanabe, and her severe mental health issues. But there is an ancillary problem, something he has not discussed with me, and which I have not had the courage to bring up: Is not Doge Anton genetically linked to Francella as well, and might there be psychological repercussions because of that?

  —Tesh Kori, private notes

  Thousands of additional Tulyan pilots had arrived from the starcloud, and were being meshed with the podships like alien marital partners, using the ancient techniques to ensure the maximum efficiency of the Tulyan-Aopoddae linkages. Now, counting the original nine hundred pods
hips that the Liberator fleet had brought to the galactic fold, Doge Anton had a force of more than one hundred twenty-two thousand podships. As had earlier occurred with the original fleet, as the new pilot-ship matchings were completed, the sentient podships took on the reptilian faces of their pilots, and opened up gun ports on the sides of their hulls.

  The process was going well. Only two hundred and fourteen podships remained to be synchronized by the Tulyans, plus a few more out in the reaches of the fold that needed to be brought in.

  Noah, Anton, and Eshaz stood at a viewing window inside a modular headquarters structure that General Nirella’s military technicians had constructed. Held in place by space anchors, it was positioned exactly where the Palace of Woldn used to be, which was considered the most central—and most commanding—position in the entire fold.

  The three leaders stood with a number of dignitaries who had been brought in after the victory here over the Parviis, including two members of the Council of Elders and a number of merchant princes. They watched while teams of Tulyan podship handlers worked in the airless vacuum with the remaining, unsynchronized Aopoddae.

  The entire Liberator fleet had been delayed while Tulyan experts synchronized and stabilized the vast fleet, necessary to ensure that there would be no rebellion in the Aopoddae ranks, and that every one of the sentient ships was working in concert with the pilots. This involved subtle methods of synchronicity and mutual respect, ways that had been known to the Tulyans since time immemorial, and by which they ensured the integrity of the immense fleet.

  “It has been very difficult to integrate so many ships,” Eshaz said, “but we’re almost there. Long ago, the Parviis did something similar, using their own methods. We’re replacing their bonds with our own, then checking and rechecking.”

  “And those are the most difficult of the bunch,” Anton said, pointing out at the podships that were still being worked.

  “Precisely. We’ve separated them from the others, and are performing final tests on the others as we speak. Keep in mind, too, that this is not a process of breaking or taming the podships. Rather, we must harmonize with them.”

  “Just as Humans and other races need to do in nature,” Noah said.

  “Well put, my good friend,” Eshaz said. He touched Noah’s left arm affectionately before pulling away. Then, looking at Doge Anton, the Tulyan added, “If final tests go as anticipated, the rest of the fleet should be able to depart for the starcloud in two days.”

  “And the recalcitrants?” Anton asked, gesturing again at the podships outside.

  “They can be left behind for more work. Eventually, they will be integrated with the others. These just have more difficult Parvii bonds to overcome.”

  Anton tapped on the window plax. “Can they be merged with the guard force of one hundred armed vessels that we’re leaving?”

  “Some, perhaps. We’ll see.”

  Outside, Noah saw three additional podships being brought into the mooring basin, including one piloted by Acey Zelk. In the only way that a Human could do this, the teenager stood on top of the vessel. He wore a life support suit, and was secured to the beast by an ornate harness. He used thorn-vines to guide the creature. The suit and harness enable him to travel at high speeds, as fast as the podship could go. The young man was grinning as he came in atop the hull, and he waved toward the viewing window.

  Noah and Eshaz waved back.

  But Noah withdrew his hand quickly. He wore a long-sleeve shirt, and the extension of his left arm had revealed something that had been troubling him for several days … a rough area of gray-and-black skin that ran from the forearm to the shoulder and down across his torso, like a mineral vein.

  He had not wanted to see a doctor about the condition, suspecting that it was far beyond anything a medical practitioner could understand. Much of his own paranormal abilities undoubtedly stemmed from the time that Eshaz had healed him of a serious head injury by connecting him to a torn fragment of Timeweb. Afterward Noah’s own sister, Francella, had attempted to kill him by the most brutal of methods, by hacking him to pieces. Through some miracle, he had survived the dismemberment attempt, growing back all of his severed body parts like an exotic lizard.

  The doctors had been dumbfounded.

  Even after all that, Noah’s demented, dying sister had injected him with a dermex of her own tainted, contaminated blood. Since then, Noah had been increasingly concerned, but had not wanted to consult with anyone about it, not even Eshaz. Whatever was happening to his body would happen, and Noah sensed—very strongly—that neither he nor anyone else could do anything about it.

  The night before, while sleeping in accommodations that had been provided for him in the headquarters building, he’d experienced an odd dream about Francella in which she had chased him across the Parvii Fold. It had seemed so real, but had been utterly impossible, since Francella had died after injecting herself with an immortality elixir—a substance that turned against her and made her age rapidly. It was with that tainted blood that she had injected Noah, just before dying herself prematurely. His relationship with her had been a real nightmare. No matter how many good things Noah had tried to do for her during his lifetime, nothing had worked and she had never appreciated any of it. To the end she had remained bitter toward him, irrationally blaming him for her troubles and trying to kill him.

  Now Noah saw Eshaz watching him closely, as the Tulyan sometimes did.

  Then Noah remembered Eshaz touching his affected arm a few minutes ago. With their truthing touch ability, Tulyans could read thoughts if they desired to do so. But Noah had been wearing the long-sleeve shirt, and Eshaz hadn’t felt the skin directly. Noah had always assumed that direct skin contact was necessary, but what if that wasn’t the case? What if Tulyan mental probes could penetrate the fabric?

  With Noah staring back at him, Eshaz lowered his gaze.

  In privacy that evening, Noah examined his arm closely, and an unavoidable thought occurred to him. The affected area that he’d been trying to hide reminded him of podship skin.

  Chapter Nine

  Great historical events can be illusory to their participants, and to the historians who write about them afterward. Even with the passage of time and the seasoning of history, the truth can still be elusive.

  —Sister Janiko, one of the “veiled historians” of Lost Earth

  After reading a holo-report that floated above his desktop, Pimyt paused and looked up. “This looks good,” he said to the dignitary sitting across from him, an insectoid man in a white-and-gold suit.

  Ambassador VV Uncel did not respond. He stared at a small handheld screen.

  “VV?”

  “Eh?” The Adurian’s voice squeaked. “Oh, sorry, my roommate gave me a list of things he wants me to do. Household tasks.”

  “Ah yes, what Humans call the ‘honey-do’ list.”

  “Yes. He’s quite demanding.”

  Even though Uncel and his male roommate were in what the Adurians called an ‘affectionate relationship,’ Pimyt knew it was not sexually intimate. It couldn’t possibly be, because the androgynous Adurians, renowned for their laboratory breeding methods, even relied upon them entirely for the propagation of their own race.

  “Now what were you saying?” the Ambassador asked.

  “Just that the report looks good. The results are exactly as I expected.”

  “As we expected,” Ambassador VV Uncel said. Like all of his race, he was entirely hairless, a mixture of mammalian and insectoid features with a small head and large bulbous eyes. His skin was a bright patchwork of multicolored caste markings, symbolizing high social status.

  “Don’t take that tone with me. The minute I learned about Human military operations on Canopa, I found out their purpose, and I knew instantly they would fail against Parvii telepathic weapons. That was all in my initial report to the Coalition, predating anything you wrote.”

  The Ambassador raised his chin haughtily. “Your report would
not have gone anywhere if I hadn’t concurred with your guess.”

  “What do you mean, guess?” Pimyt felt his face flush hot, and considered hurling something at the irritating diplomat. For a moment, he scanned the objects on his desk, a glax paperweight that could kill him, a paper spike that could do the same, or put out an eye.…

  The Hibbil’s gaze settled on a book that was heavy enough to cause pain if hurled accurately, but wouldn’t do lasting physical harm. He’d never taken such action before, though, and knew he shouldn’t even consider it. Too much was at stake.

  Taking a deep breath, Pimyt continued. “In my position as the Royal Attaché to Doge Lorenzo del Velli, I gained extensive military experience. I was personally responsible for moving MPA troops and equipment around, taking steps to weaken merchant prince military capabilities while maximizing our own. I was also on the team that came up with the idea of inserting sabotaged computer chips into the firing mechanisms of merchant prince space cannons, ion guns, and energy detonators. The weapons will seem to operate perfectly, until our warships come into range and are identified—which automatically shuts the weapons down. What a delightful image: totally defenseless Humans, ready to be slaughtered.”

  The elegant insectoid smiled. “You are so like your Human friends, aren’t you? Always exaggerating your contribution, trying to take personal credit for everything. We Adurians are not that way, and understand the need to share credit, to work as a team. You know quite well that I had similar devices installed surreptitiously on the biggest Mutati warships, but I’m not bragging about it.”

  Pimyt grabbed the book. Perhaps if he threw it just right it would strike the Ambassador hard enough in the head to knock him out for a few minutes. Yes, he could do it quickly, without warning. Then he could.… The Hibbil salivated, but he set the violent thought aside, and the book.

  “Let’s stop bickering,” Pimyt said. “We agree the Humans have gone on a fool’s mission against the Parviis, and soon we’ll learn the scale of it.” He pointed to the holo-screen, which displayed a report sent back by HibAdu observers who had positioned lab-pods out on the podways to watch for enemy activity. “The Humans have big problems tying them down at the Parvii Fold, so much that they even had to send hundreds of ships back to the Tulyan Starcloud for reinforcements.”