But they were alone, and Oonak seemed very calm as he navigated the cave system, occasionally following a dark passage deeper underground and then following another passage that curved back up. While he did this, Zahn said nothing. He trusted Oonak’s sense of direction.
When they finally slowed down, they were in a massive cavern that was just below the ice. Zahn could tell because light filtered through a section of the ice above, giving him a clear idea of the cavern’s size.
Near the far wall, he could see a large ring-shaped machine between two columns set atop a rocky pedestal. The whole structure looked ancient.
As they landed on the cavern floor, Zahn braced for a thud, but none came. Navika had alighted upon the rock just as a bird would alight upon a stem: with perfect grace.
“Smooth landing.”
“You can thank Navika for that. I give him commands, but Navika is the one who puts the real finesse on the flight.”
“So there’s a kind of symbiosis between you two, isn’t there?”
“In a way, and right now Navika indicates that the air outside is quite cold but still breathable. Come with me.”
Oonak led him back out to the central room.
“Be careful. Water will solidify quickly out there.”
“You mean it’s below freezing?”
“Oh, yes. You will need these. They are warm and repel water, as well.” As Oonak said this, he handed Zahn a thick silver jacket, long silver pants, and boots, all of which were similar to the uniform that he was wearing.
“Oh, thank you.”
“You are the one who deserves thanks. You were not obliged to assist me, yet you did.”
When the door opened, the temperature of the air shocked Zahn’s exposed face, causing him to pull his hood tighter, and as they headed toward the ancient gate, he was again struck by the size of the cavern. He wondered how many cave systems were yet to be discovered on Avani and if any of them might be hospitable to life.
And then, the immensity of the gate dawned on him.
Despite its apparent age, it was perfectly preserved. The main feature of the gate was a huge upright ring made of a strange metallic stone. To either side of the ring were two control panels that curved outward, and all of it was atop a large stone pedestal.
Zahn walked up to one of the control panels, and found it to be unlike any technology he’d ever seen before. The panel was covered in strange markings and circular grooves that had been etched into the stone. He moved his hand over the panel, and found it chilling to his exposed fingertips.
He tried touching a prominent ring shape in the upper left corner of the panel, but nothing happened. No matter what he did, the controls didn’t respond. Oonak walked up behind him, holding a device that reminded him of his father’s reading pad.
“We have deduced that these are some of the symbols that this machine uses to signify numerical digits.”
On the pad were bizarre, curving symbols that seemed vaguely familiar to Zahn, and he studied the controls again.
“Oon, could these numbers be some kind of address system? I mean, if the gate network is made up of a series of gates all around the galaxy, wouldn’t it need something to identify them?”
“Indeed, you are as clever as we had hoped. That is exactly what we believe the numbers are used for. I would have told you before, but I wanted to get your unbiased opinion first.”
“So how do we activate the gate?”
“Although I removed all of the ice from the gate controls when I first discovered them, my attempts have thus far proven unsuccessful, as you know. We were hoping that if you used the gate’s controls, it would recognize you as an Avanian.”
For a while, Zahn continued to play with the controls, but nothing he did had any effect. Frustrated, he kicked the side of the control panel, hurting his foot in the process.
“I can’t believe this. We’ve come this far and nothing works. I don’t know what else to do here, Oonak.”
“Do not fear, Zahn. A solution will present itself. One moment, I will be right back.”
As he waited, Zahn allowed his back to slide down the side of a nearby column, eventually sitting on the smooth floor of the cavern. Despite the jacket that Oonak had given him, he was starting to feel cold, as well.
To get his mind off of this seemingly unsolvable problem, Zahn examined the floor of the cavern, and as he did this he felt something wet drip onto his hand. He looked up and observed a thick patch of ice high above him near the center of the room. Enough light was filtering through the ice that he might have been able to examine the greyish floor of the cavern even without Navika’s illumination.
On a whim, he decided to take out the knife his grandfather had given him as a child and tried to chip off some of the column. He wondered if this column might be connected to the gate in some way and pressed the blade into the stone harder. In the process, he slipped and cut one of his fingers.
Zahn leapt up and yelled in frustration as blood oozed out.
“Ah! This is stupid. I can’t believe we’re stuck after coming all this way.” Zahn sucked his cut to get some bits of sand out.
“Navika said he heard you yell out,” Oonak said as he ran over. “What happened?”
“I cut myself. Do you have anything? What do spacefarers do when they bleed?”
“Navika has something. One moment.” Oonak ran back toward the ship.
While he waited, Zahn decided to try his hand at the controls again. Perhaps they’d just needed time to warm up. When he got back up to the controls, he gazed at them as though he were in a staring match with a great villain.
“If I were a civilization smart enough to build a machine that creates holes in the fabric of spacetime, what button would I expect people to push?”
Again, he noticed the ring shape in the upper left corner of the panel, and in a mixture of desperation and stubbornness, he pressed the button again.
This time, it worked.
The cavern flooded with light as the gate burst to life. Zahn was so shocked that he felt as though his eyes were going to pop out of his head. Each of the number symbols now glowed a ghostly white, and the circular grooves that he noticed before revealed themselves to be a row of glowing circles that filled the lower half of the control panel. Perhaps most exciting of all, the gate lit up in a bright white ring, and everything became covered in faint geometric patterns.
Zahn was so stunned that he just stood there for a while to bask in the moment, watching the colors on the gate as they gradually pulsed in brightness. When Oonak walked up a few seconds later, Zahn felt that he was just as surprised, yet he expressed it in a much quieter way.
“How did you do it?”
“I don’t know. I just—I hit the button again.”
“How curious… yet whatever you did was effective. Excellent work, Zahn!” Oonak smiled so largely that even his eyes seemed to smile.
“Now the question is, how do we tell it where we want to go?”
“Patience. Let me tend to that cut first.”
When Zahn showed Oonak his cut, he sprayed a strange bubbling gel onto it which stopped the bleeding and then melted away. “This will prevent infection and accelerate healing speed.”
After Zahn thanked Oonak, he examined the controls again, soon realizing that the row of glowing circles were probably planets. There were the right amount, and some were glowing green while most were a dim red. After a few moments, he noticed that there were pointed ray shapes carved dimly into the stone behind some of the planet symbols.
“Oon, what do you think the ray shapes mean?”
“Uncertain, but I would hypothesize that there are three main types of gates: those that allow you to jump from world to world, those that allow you to jump between a world and the vacuum of space, and those that jump from vacuum to vacuum. Perhaps this ray shape symbolizes a path to your star.”
Zahn touched the ray shape, and it lit up, haloing the green circle in a golden
starburst. The sound of the gate also became deeper, and at the end of the row of circles, a new circle lit up. This new circle was golden and much larger. Beside it was a small ring, and Zahn noticed that a hexagon now pulsed in a blue light farther up on the control panel.
“Oon, I’m beginning to think this gate was designed to be relatively simple to operate, and I’m pretty sure that I just linked this gate to another gate in orbit around Avani’s star. When I push that hexagon, I think a vortex will appear.”
“I was wrong before. You are more than clever. Proceed.”
Without hesitation, Zahn pressed the glowing hexagon, and the low hum of the gate became a roar. After a few seconds, a point of bright light appeared in the center of the ring, and then all of the space in the middle of the ring spiraled in on itself, as if reality itself were an ocean going down a drain. Photons spun into the vortex at odd angles, and the sight was unlike anything Zahn had ever imagined.
“You know, I’ve simulated wormholes in the observatory’s computers before, but I never realized how…” Zahn paused. “I never realized how otherworldly it might look.”
“Thanks to you, now we know. Are you certain that the destination is set?”
“As sure as I’ll ever be.”
Oonak walked over to the controls and observed them, and Zahn glanced back over to the majestic starship, suddenly realizing that his role in Oonak’s quest might be over now. Would Oonak still need him now that the gate was active? What about his own quest to discover the true fate of his mother?
“Oon, now that I’ve activated this gate, do you still need my help?” Zahn said as the gate roared louder. “I must admit I was hoping to see Avani from orbit, but I just want to check before I get my hopes up. Or does my adventure end here?”
As Oonak turned toward him, a faint smile was on his lips.
“Far from it, Zahn. The next gate appears to be within your star system, so I still require your assistance in the next step of my journey—of our journey, I should say. At least, if you agree to it. I must warn you that this journey will only become more dangerous as we head farther from your home. The space between planets is not always as empty as it appears, and this galaxy is more wild than you could imagine. I have extensive experience in navigating the Ocean of Space, and I will do everything in my power to keep us unharmed. However, please realize that by continuing onward, you risk your life in the dangers of wild space, and there are no guarantees that you will ever return home.”
Zahn thought about this for a few moments.
“I understand,” he said. “My choice has not changed. I want to continue. I trust you, Oonak, and as you said, I am the most logical choice.”
“Indeed, you are. Come, let us see what Unity has in store for us on the other side of that gate.”
Back in the ship, Zahn decided to plant his feet firmly on the floor this time, despite the fact that, if he ignored the seat beside him, it almost appeared as though he were levitating above the cavern floor.
As he captured a few photos, he found himself wondering how long the gate would remain active after they’d used it.
Did the gate have a mechanism to close the opening after a certain period of time? I wonder if Oonak knows.
Zahn looked over, but Oonak seemed focused on analyzing the vortex. He seemed almost hypnotized.
“Oon, are you okay?”
“Apologies. Navika is relaying a great amount of data to my mind. This vortex is quite extraordinary, Zahn. It seems light, as well as matter, is able to filter though the vortex aperture. It is quite faint, but Navika is perceiving some stars on the other side. Are you ready?”
“Yes, do it.”
“I’m going to approach slowly. I do not know all of the effects of going through such a gate, or if it is entirely stable.”
“What’s the worse that could happen?”
“Well, we could be turned inside out.”
Just as Oonak said this, the bright point at the center of the gate grew, and as Navika was pulled into the vortex, a loud rushing sound filled the cavern.
“What’s happening?!” Zahn shouted over the noise, but before either of them had time to react, they were engulfed by the swirling maelstrom.
For a few fractions of a second, it appeared as though Navika was completely twisted around as they passed into the vortex and entered a realm whose rules were quite different from ordinary space. And just moments after the ship had disappeared into the vortex, the point of light that had been in the center of the gate blinked out of existence, and the controls went dark.
Once again, the cavern seemed lifeless, and the only trace that was left by their presence was as subtle as a single twig on a forest floor.
CHAPTER 11
THE UNIVERSAL SONG
For what seemed like only an instant, Navika and everyone inside hurtled through a corridor made of pure light. Beyond the corridor, Zahn thought he could see dozens of other corridors great distances away, like spider webs spun from the light of a trillion suns, and then Oonak and Zahn saw a flash that overwhelmed them.
Once their eyes adjusted, they found themselves staring at a huge star just ahead of them. The star was so bright that Navika reduced the transparency of the walls to avoid harming their eyes. The sight was truly incredible, and Zahn soon recognized it as Kuvela, the star that Avani called home.
“Aren’t you concerned about how close we are?”
“I was, but Navika is indicating that we are currently in a stable orbit around the star and are in no danger of falling into its gravity.”
“That’s a relief.”
Zahn continued to look out onto the star. Now that he was so close, it nearly filled his field of view, and he was thankful that Navika graciously filtered the image so that he could see the seething waves of hydrogen and helium below without hurting his eyes. With traces of disbelief, he watched a solar flare slowly arc across the star and then plunge back into the rippling surface. As an observer, he always thought it was ironic that something appearing so hellish from up close provided Avani with the energy that made life possible.
“So chaotic, yet so beautiful,” Zahn said. “And the vortex corridor. That was the purest light I’ve ever seen. Did you see the network of other corridors?”
“Indeed, I did, and Navika is continuing to analyze the data that we gathered. From what we saw, there may be many gate corridors in this part of the galaxy, and now we shall use this next gate to continue.”
“What gate?”
“Look above you.”
Zahn looked up and was surprised to see a ring shape far above him. He’d never noticed it before because they seemed to be in the exact center of the huge ring. Yet, as he watched, he realized that this wasn’t quite accurate, either. They were moving forward, beyond the ring, at some speed. However, the ring was so large that it was difficult to judge how fast they were going.
“Whoa.”
“I suspect that we exited through this gate, and that we can use it to continue onward, as well.” Oonak paused. “Excellent. Navika has just located what appears to be a control panel on the ring, similar to what we found on Avani’s South Pole. We are heading there now.”
The sensation of flying through space in a partly transparent ship was even more unsettling than flying over the ocean. Without feeling anything, he saw the edge of the ring grow closer and closer.
Zahn looked down and instantly wished he hadn’t. The floor was still transparent, and now, instead of seeming to stand on thin air, he appeared to be standing on nothing at all. Below his feet was a vast array of tens of thousands of stars, and he decided to sit cross-legged on the bench once more.
When they reached the edge of the ring, Zahn noticed another control panel with a row of glowing circles, and by now he was certain that the circles symbolized planets since there were the same amount of them as there were planets in the Kuvela system. Even Rodhas, the most distant planet, was indicated as a dim red orb. Most of the planets we
re.
Since the first gate indicated Avani as a green orb, Zahn guessed that the dim red color meant there were no gates on most of the worlds, and this disappointed him. As an observer, he would have loved to visit Rodhas in person.
In stark contrast to this, Avani’s green indicator was outlined in a warm starburst shape with golden threads coming off of the starburst. These threads connected to a golden band of light that led far above him and around the entire gate, creating a faint golden ring.
Just above the planet symbols, he noticed a white point of light and smaller points above it. Zahn guessed this symbolized his sun, Kuvela-Dipa, in relation to nearby stars.
“This control panel is quite similar to the one on Avani,” Oonak said. “It would appear that we can indeed use this gate to travel beyond your star. Do you see the strange markings below the panel? Those are the same ancient numbers that the first gate used. If my understanding of the number system is correct, we are currently at gate 3.3.2, 71.11.23, 000.”
“Three zeroes at the end. What could that mean?” Zahn said.
“I hypothesize that we are at a gate which serves as the center node for many other gates, and I suspect the way these addresses work will become more clear as we see more of them. Once we understand the addressing system, we can plot a direct path to the Confederation Council.”
“So what do we do now, Oon? We can’t touch the control panel. It’s out there in a vacuum, and I just realized I haven’t seen any space suits in this ship at all.”
“We take the next logical step, Zahn. We listen, and then we knock.” Oonak looked ahead. “Navika, scan for any energy signatures radiating off of the control panel itself and theorize about possible methods of communication.”
A voice surrounded them, coming from everywhere.
“No signals are being emitted from the control panel itself,” Navika said.
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