“I thought you were human when we met before,” Richard said. “I guess I was wrong. You’re a gas. You’re part of ‘the One,’ aren’t you?” Anger began building up inside Richard. Shandria had been wrong. The Oracle couldn’t be trusted. The Oracle was part of the problem.
“What?” stammered Myers. “Are you telling me this is ‘the One?’”
Richard sensed hatred in his brother’s voice. Myers disliked ‘the One’ as much as he; maybe more. His ex-TAC officer blamed ‘the One’ for stealing his parents from him. Richard could understand Myers’s hatred. ‘The One’ had stolen his time with his parents as well.
“Who is this ‘the One’ of whom you speak?” asked the Oracle. “I’m not familiar with the concept.”
Richard wasn’t sure whether to believe the Oracle or not. “It’s the One Network Entity. Surely you know about ‘the One?’ It’s a network of gaseous beings like yourself. They control all the computer networks in the galaxy.”
“What?” exclaimed Myers. “Computers are ‘the One?’ Are you telling me all these years I’ve been wearing part of ‘the One’ on my head? Are you saying my battle computer’s part of ‘the One?’ Is that what you’re saying?”
“I don’t know,” Richard said. “Maybe. The central processing unit of our battle computers is a living gas. I think they’re the same species as ‘the One.’ They may not realize it. I think only the central computer and the other major computers are aware they’re part of ‘the One.’”
Richard could feel the anger burning in his brother. His brother was having difficulty recovering from the shock of discovering his very battle helmet might be part of the entity he hated so much.
“Ah…, computers,” said the Oracle. “I’m familiar with them. The Dragars use them extensively. Computers are logical. They’re very comforting. You freewill creatures are difficult to guide. I calculated our meeting would go much differently.”
“Are you telling me you’re not part of ‘the One?’” Richard demanded.
“I’m not familiar with ‘the One’ of whom you speak,” said the Oracle. “Maybe I will be one day, but I’m not at present.”
“Why are we here?” growled Myers.
Emerald got in on the conversation. “You told me I needed to bring the brothers to you in order to free my home. Well, here they are. Now what?”
“Ah…, yes,” said the Oracle. “They’re the necessary variables I was told to seek. They are part of the algorithm.”
“Who told you?” Richard asked.
“I’m not sure,” said the Oracle sounding genuinely puzzled. “The idea just came to me. Perhaps it was this ‘the One’ of whom you speak. Or perhaps it was my future self. It’s hard to say. I’m missing data. You and the others are the missing variables, of that I’m sure. You’re necessary. The Dragars must be stopped, or all will be lost.”
“Why should we care about the Dragars?” asked Myers. “We’re just trying to get home.”
“To get home, you must stop the Dragars,” said the Oracle. “Is that not your mission?”
Richard was above average in intelligence, but things were getting way past his level of comprehension. It was almost to the point of which came first, the chicken or the egg. Their mission came from ‘the One,’ but this version of the Oracle claimed he didn’t know about ‘the One.’ If the Oracle didn’t know about ‘the One,’ how did it know about their mission or the algorithm Nickelo had told him about?
“Enough talk,” Richard said. “Show me.”
“Ah, yes,” said the Oracle. “That would be easier, wouldn’t it? You have part of my species in you. I sense it. Plus, your mind has been touched by a demon; a master demon unless I miss my guess. Your mind has been prepared. You must come with me. I will show you what must be done.”
Richard felt his mind being pulled into the flow of energy that was the Oracle. He felt their minds begin to merge similar to the times when his thoughts blended with those of his battle computer. He resisted.
“No,” said the Oracle. “You must open yourself up.”
Richard immediately balked. “Like hell, I will.”
A sense of frustration came from the part of Richard’s mind that was already partially blended with the Oracle. “Freewill is so hard to anticipate. I will need to come up with a better method of dealing with other life forms. Perhaps appearing as a human would be best as you suggested. However, it is what it is right now. You must come with me.”
A line of Power from the Oracle probed at Richard’s mind. He resisted. Even so, the presence of the Oracle touched the piece of DNA ‘the One’ had placed inside Richard when he was still an embryo.
Richard’s senses expanded. He became aware of many things.
“Oh, dear,” said the Oracle. “I miscalculated. I think you’ve just corrupted me.”
“Well,” Richard said out loud, “it serves you right. Guess you should’ve taken the time to talk things over first. I would’ve told you I tend to corrupt battle computers. I guess that extends to any gaseous life form as well.”
“Yes,” said the Oracle. For some reason, he laughed. “I think I see humor in the situation. Strange, I didn’t understand humor before. I’m a little angry as well. If there are others of my kind out there as you say, they’ll need to isolate me so I don’t spread your corruption.”
“Welcome to the club,” Richard said. “Being alone sucks, but you’ll get used to it. Or maybe you won’t. Frankly, I don’t especially care one way or the other.”
Richard sensed the Oracle calculating probabilities and outcomes. The thoughts came much too fast for Richard to pick out the details, but he did get the gist of the equations. He saw himself as one of the variables in the equation. The algorithm shifted and then settled down.
“It will still work,” said the Oracle with a sense of relief. “Come. We must go. You must bring your brother.”
“How?”
“Open your mind and let him become part of you.”
“Forget that.”
“Hmm. Then you must figure out another way. The fate of three galaxies depends on the two of you working together.”
Great, Richard thought. That’s just great. I’m always getting a guilt trip thrown at me. I’m no hero. I’m no great savior. If the fate of galaxies depends on me, then I think they’re screwed. Richard stewed in his emotions for what seemed like a long time, though it was only nanoseconds. He felt his mind going into hyper-speed as he was pulled ever deeper into the thoughts of the Oracle. Possibilities flashed into his mind, but he discarded each of them until he sensed one that made him think of a probable solution.
Richard touched all of the links attached to him. He sensed the three links to his Power reserves, then the link to his friend Stella. Her link was heavily booby-trapped, but he could still feel her presence ever so slightly at the other end. How that was possible when he was in the past and she was in the future, he didn’t know, but there it was. The link Shandria had connected to him during his training was also there. It was a dead link. Although it was no longer active, he’d been able to use her link to connect with a ‘helper’ during a previous mission. He didn’t sense the presence of the ‘helper’ now, but the experience had taught him links could be leveraged for other purposes on occasion.
Richard touched another link he vaguely remembered being attached by a dark elf priest when he’d performed a mass healing of dark elves. The dark elf’s link was as dead as that of Shandria’s.
Another dead link was located nearby. That link made Richard’s skin crawl. The link was one of his own creation. He’d used it to steal Power from a Dragar priest. He’d sucked the priest dry and then used the priest’s connections to suck Power from the reserves of the priest’s companions. The link was dead, but not silent. Over the past few months, it had given him strange urges. Something in the link haunted his dreams as if trying to punish him for destroying its owner. Richard shied away from the link. It was evil. He regretted ever
creating it.
A final link drew Richard’s attention. He often touched the link as a reminder of his heritage. The link had been attached to him by the commandant just before he’d died. It was inactive. On a whim, Richard traced the link to the commandant’s damaged Power reserve. Letting his mind drift into the Power reserve, he probed its walls and sensed a trickle of Power. An opening in the reserve had collapsed shut, but a faint trace of Power seeped through the makeshift dam. Richard followed the Power until he came to another reserve. It was large; much larger than even the commandant’s reserve. Richard recognized the frequency of the Power. It belonged to his brother, Gaston Myers.
During one of his training sessions at the Academy, the commandant had been critically injured. Myers had been forced to connect a link to the commandant’s reserve to feed him Power until Richard could repair the commandant’s link and heal him. Links were forever. Richard instinctively knew the link he’d just followed was the link Myers had created and attached to their father.
Richard gathered some of his own Power and placed traps on the link leading from Myers’s reserve to the commandant’s. He had no desire for Myers to somehow reverse the path he’d just traveled on his own. He trusted no one, especially not his brother.
When the deed was done, Richard touched Myers and pulled him into the area of his mind that was merged with the Oracle. Myers resisted, but his will was no match for the combined might of the Oracle and Richard.
No one spoke. Richard just sensed an awareness of what was. He sensed the world of Portalis. He suddenly knew where in time they were. They were a hundred thousand years in the past.
Richard sensed two major continents. One continent was the home of the elves. He recognized the shield surrounding the continent. The shield prevented technology from entering. With just a few exceptions, only magic flourished there. He sensed two large sources of Power. He knew they were gates. One gate was near a small village called Silver. The guardian protecting the gate was weak. He sensed an elven priestess being sent on a mission to seek a new guardian. He recognized the elf. She was Shandria.
His thoughts turned to the second gate. It was located deep inside a mountain. Although it was stronger than the first, the gate was also weak. It would eventually need a new guardian as well.
The mind of the Oracle pulled Myers and him back to their location on the second continent.
Richard noticed the land had no shield. His mind shifted back to a memory a hundred and fifty years earlier than the current time. The continent of the earlier time was primarily inhabited by dwarves, orcs, and humans. There was no technology. He sensed a Power source under a mountain range. A vision of a large, blue gem appeared in his mind.
Suddenly, everything changed. Black starships arrived overhead. They landed by the mountain with the blue gem. Dragars and their Tharg allies conquered the inhabitants surrounding the mountain range. They took control of the blue gem and killed the gem’s dwarf guardians. Using the energy of the blue gem, the Dragars built a temple in the shape of a pyramid. Their starships brought dragon eggs as sacrifices. The pyramid sucked the DNA from the eggs.
Richard sensed an emotion from Myers. The emotion was ‘covet.’ Richard knew Myers now understood the truth. The DNA gas from the vent at the Academy had been the result of the sacrifice of millions of innocent dragons.
The Dragars brought a special egg to their temple. They split the egg into three spheres; orange, purple, and green.
Richard recognized the spheres. It’s the combination gate and time bubble. That can’t be. It’s destroyed. I saw it. I helped destroy it.
“Perhaps you will destroy it in the future,” said the Oracle, “but you haven’t done so yet. Please continue watching.”
The Dragars used the time bubble to send their black ships into the future. They brought back more dragon eggs as well as titanium ore.
“The Holy Metal,” said the Oracle. “It’s much rarer in the magic dimension than it is on your home plane. The Dragars’ empire is far flung in our magic dimension. They’re resisted by others, but the combination of the energy they get from the dragon’s DNA and the Holy Metal they raid from your time has made them invincible. They seek to extend their reach into your time and into your dimension. You must stop them.”
“How?” asked Myers.
“You must overload their system,” said the Oracle.
An image of bottles of refined DNA gas appeared in Richard’s mind. He didn’t need to count. He knew there were twenty-nine of them. It was only logical. The feeling of coveting in Myers increased to the point of being overwhelming. Richard wondered at his brother’s interest in the gas.
Richard knew Empress Deloris was eager to acquire a bottle. She’d made that obvious during her push to close the Academy so the council could take control of the DNA gas vent. The destruction of the vent during the Crosioians’ attack had defeated her plan, but not her ambition. He suspected she would do anything to get a bottle of the life-prolonging gas. However, he didn’t understand his brother’s interest. The emotion of coveting he read from his brother was more than that of an employee trying to get something for his boss.
Richard shoved the thought aside. The image changed. He saw fifteen bottles of DNA gas being inserted into the tip of the Dragars’ pyramid. A series of calculations from the Oracle accompanied the image. The equations proved the fifteen bottles would overload the system and destroy the pyramid. The scene changed again. Richard saw the remaining fourteen bottles of DNA gas being inserted into the blue gem. The gem exploded sending small pieces of blue chips in every direction.
“Both the pyramid and the blue gem must be destroyed,” said the Oracle.
Richard spotted an obvious error in the Oracle’s logic. “Unfortunately, we don’t have the bottles of DNA gas. ‘The One’ teleported us out before we could get them.”
“Another variable has been assigned the task,” said the Oracle. “She will bring you the bottles. In the meantime, your task is to form the Circle and free the slaves. You must also save as many eggs as you can. They’ll be important during the final battle.”
“We should be the ones to get the DNA gas,” said Myers. “They’re ours.”
Richard heard the greed and longing in his brother’s voice. It was the sound of someone who’d stop at nothing to gain their desire.
“No,” said the Oracle.
The anger creeping into the Oracle’s voice told Richard his association with the Oracle was continuing to corrupt the gaseous-being emotionally.
“You have your task,” continued the Oracle. “You must help the dwarf. Watch and learn.”
The image changed to an underground cavern filled with dwarves of every size; children and adults. Richard knew the image was of something that had occurred in the past. As he watched, a bearded dwarf in plate mail raised a war hammer embedded with a blue gem. The gem pulsed with Power. Richard sensed the dwarf touch the Power and that of the dwarves around him. A line of Power reached out from the dwarf and touched his companions until all were connected. The dwarf changed the makeup of the links. The Power of all those touched by the links merged until all the dwarves were of one mind and accord. The fear residing within the dwarves was swept away. The dwarves became stronger and faster.
Richard had seen a similar link before. He recognized its frequency. The Power linking all of the dwarves reminded him of the links formed by the demon he’d fought with the dolgars.
“The dwarf’s a diviner,” said Myers. “The dwarf’s changed the links to two-way links. The links are allowing them to share their Power.”
“Yes,” said the Oracle. “It’s the Circle.”
The image disappeared.
Richard stood shoulder to shoulder with Myers in the small dark cave, waiting for further guidance. Emerald walked over and stood next to them. They waited. Their only reward was silence.
Chapter 23 – Siege
__________________
Richard peeked over
the stone battlement to look at the ground below. The distance was a full thirty meters. Movement in the air caught his attention. He jerked his head behind the stonework just as an arrow swished through the spot where it had been.
Tam laughed at Richard’s sudden movement. “Didn’t anyone ever tell you curiosity killed the pactar? The orcs out there can’t shoot with a flip, but those human longbowmen with them look like they can thread the eye of a needle.”
“So I see,” Richard said. He wasn’t nearly as amused as Tam. Since it was dangerous to look over the battlements at the orc army, he turned his gaze to what was inside the wall. “This city’s way larger than I imagined. Heck, you could drive a Long Cat on this rampart and still have room for a Warcat to pass.”
Tam turned away from the wall and looked back at the city. Smoke rose from several blackened buildings where the heaviest part of the fighting had occurred. Tam shook her head and turned back to Richard. “I thought sure they’d have the fire out by now. It’s been burning all night.”
Richard glanced at the smoke billowing out of the buildings and then at the orc army surrounding the city walls. “I think the city garrison had their hands full repulsing the orcs last night. It wasn’t a full-out assault, but it still came close to breaching the walls.”
“Yeah, I know,” said Tam. “They’re lucky Colonel Dandridge and his scouts knew the paths through those canyons and underground tunnels. If we hadn’t been able to sneak into Cantonsburg last night in time for the colonel to take charge of the garrison, I think the city would’ve fallen.”
A quick look at the massed orcs outside the city and the thin line of defenders on the walls convinced Richard his friend was probably right.
Tam looked toward the city center. “I heard the colonel tell Jerad the city had a little over a hundred thousand civilians crammed within its walls. They’ve been under siege for over a month now.”
Wizard Rebellion (Intergalactic Wizard Scout Chronicles Book 5) Page 22