“I’m reading it as well,” Holloway reported. “Gravitational distortions, directly ahead. They match the patterns we experienced when we passed through the wormhole. Commander, there’s a way out of here!”
“Full acceleration,” Winter ordered. “Override all safety systems and give it everything you’ve got!”
“Way ahead of you, skipper,” Sabatini replied. “Come on, old girl, one last push, one last push.” Space ahead was visibly distorted in a way it had not been before, the starlight seeming to stretch into infinity as they raced towards the mouth of the wormhole, the debris now finally falling back, as though, impossibly, the strange portal was selective about what it was choosing to accept, opting to transport Xenophon across the light-years while leaving everything else behind.
“Second wave of detonations on the planet!” Holloway reported. “Another four thousand and change, same yield. There’s not going to be a single life-form left on that world in a matter of minutes. Total destruction.”
“That’s why we came,” Morgan said. “Though I admit, I didn’t expect to have even the faintest chance of getting out of this system in one piece.”
“We’re not there yet,” Winter warned.
“Five seconds to impact. About the same to the threshold,” Sabatini said. “Closing on target now. Hold on, everyone!”
“God, I hope this is better than last time,” Holloway said.
“The alternative would be considerably worse, Spaceman,” Winter said. He watched as the viewscreen blurred, Xenophon diving into the mouth of the beast, and waited for the same nightmare that they had experienced before, the same horror. It never came. The ship slid through, nimbly and neatly, racing out into the cold depths of space, the stars shifting out of position. The sirens continued to wail as the bridge crew worked, shutting down the emergency systems one after another, until at last, silence reigned.
“We’re through,” Sabatini said.
“Where are we?” Morgan asked.
Holloway shook his head, then said, “We’ve moved approximately two and a half light-years, sir, but we haven’t emerged at a star. Not even a rogue planet. We’re just in the middle of nowhere. No stellar bodies for at least a light-year in any direction.”
“Anything on sensors, anything at all?”
“Bringing short-range sensors on-line now, sir. Wait one.”
“I can’t quite believe it,” Morgan said. “We did it. We did it!”
“Don’t jinx it,” Winter replied, “but it does look very much like it. Singh, see if you can contact Earth. We should be in range of a beacon from here. Try and find out what’s happening back there. I have a feeling that we can trust whatever they decided to tell us now.”
“On it, sir,” the technician replied.
“No damage to ship systems,” Bianchi said. “All nominal. No casualties reported, aside from the shuttle crew.”
“Christ, it’s impossible!” Holloway yelled. “The shuttle! It’s resting a thousand miles from us, intact. There isn’t even any scoring from the heat shield, nothing it all.”
“We’re being hailed,” Singh said. “Shuttle is requesting permission to land. Both Technical Officer Mendoza and Specialist Volkov aboard, all well.”
Taking a deep breath, Winter sat back in his chair, nodded, and said, “Get them home, on the double. Then connect me through to the ship.”
“Aye, sir,” he replied, a smile spreading across his face. “Getting the first tactical updates now from the Fleet. All hell is breaking loose back home. Looks like a few thousand top people just dropped down dead at their desks. We’re short most of the Cabinet, the bulk of the Admiralty…”
“Call Interstellar News. It seems strange to think that we’re going to be passing our report via press release, but that’s probably the fastest way to make sure everyone knows what happened out here,” Bianchi suggested.
“Do it, Singh.”
“Aye, sir. And you’re on to the ship.”
“All hands, attention. This is the Commander. I’ll keep this simple. We did it. The Tyrants are gone, Earth is saved. I hope they’re planning the biggest victory celebration in history back home. We’ve damned well earned it.” He paused, then said, “The war’s over. We won.”
Epilogue
Mendoza sat in the observation room, looking out at the distant stars, her eyes fixed with such rapt attention to the magnificent view that she barely registered Winter’s entrance as the officer moved to stand behind her, sharing the spectacle.
“Interested in the latest news from back home?” he asked.
“Do we have a President yet?”
He smiled, and replied, “Three, technically, but it looks like we’re going to settle down to one within the day. There’s going to be an election, I’m told, at some point in the near future. At least we’re not going to have a civil war. Only four people dead throughout the colonies, by the way. I guess the Tyrants never managed to infiltrate, just as you thought.”
“We were just another tool for them,” she replied. “Have you had a chance to read my report?”
“Out live, on the seven o’clock news. You’re a heroine, for the record.”
“Not what I had in mind.”
“Me either,” he said. “Everyone’s prevaricating. There are a lot of very nervous people back home. The idea that there might be another version of the Tyrants flying around the stars…”
“It’s a possibility Guardian had considered,” she replied. “There are, shall we say, safeguards against any harm befalling humanity. Volkov and myself. We’re both going to have to go along on the expedition. And if Earth doesn’t send one, the colonies will. We still have enough ships to do it.”
“I think it’ll happen,” Winter said. “Better the devil you know, and the other minor concern is what Guardian might do if we don’t.”
“It’s not only Guardian you have to worry about,” she said. “You’ve got Volkov and I to contend with, as well.” She looked up at him, and added, “I was surprised as hell to wake up in the shuttle, drifting next to Xenophon. When Guardian offered us the chance to stay, I thought that was it, that I’d be spending the rest of my life in the network, however long that might be.”
“Do you think he changed his mind, or that it might have been some sort of test?”
“I thought of that, but I dismissed it. He didn’t need to trick us, and he didn’t need to test us. He knew that the Tyrants had to be destroyed, and had already done most of the work towards that end. That’s obvious enough. No, I thought about it some more, and I realized the truth of the matter.”
“And that is?”
“I never left. At least, a part of me didn’t. A part of me is still there. Maybe a copy of what was, but I’m not sure that makes any more sense than anything else I thought was real. I died, Commander. There was no way I could have lived through that re-entry. The shuttle was destroyed. Just because I didn’t personally experience it doesn’t mean that I don’t know that it happened.” She paused, smiled, then said, “You’re going to come up with some sort of technological trickery at this stage, some reason why I’m wrong, a reason why I could have survived. Some gimmick of Guardian.”
“We know it can manipulate wormholes at will. It doesn’t seem much of a stretch to suggest that he, it, created one underneath the shuttle and rested you neatly on the surface, and that it then transferred the shuttle to join Xenophon at the end. You said Guardian promised you that you had a choice.”
“And I also said that I made my choice, and that he had led me to believe that it was inevitable. We’re talking about a perfect AI. There’s no reason to suspect that it couldn’t create a copy of itself.”
“You’ve had a thorough medical examination. There’s no sign that you aren’t precisely who you appear to be, who you think you are. There’s no reason to suspect that everything is not precisely as it should be.”
“Is there?” she asked. “I’m far less certain than you are, Comma
nder, and I’m the one who has to live with this. Whatever that means.” She paused, then said, “It was paradise. That much I do know.”
“It doesn’t sound much like it from your report.”
“Doesn’t it? Perhaps I couldn’t describe it as I should. We’re talking about an environment that can be totally manipulated, Commander. Not the hellscape the Tyrants created. This was something infinitely different. A playground where an entire race could live in peace, where each individual added to the greater whole, rather than being subsumed by it. A place where you could live forever. Once your consciousness was linked in, it would be there forever, stored away.”
“It seems far more likely to me that the copy was returned in Guardian’s memory banks.” Winter paused, smiled, and added, “Or are you going to suggest that you are still there, and that for some reason you have chosen to live this life, rather than enjoy everything that your paradise might have to offer?”
“I suppose that’s every bit as possible.” She shook her head, and said, “I’ll never know. There’s no way to know.”
“A difference that makes no difference is no difference.”
“No, no, you don’t understand,” she replied. “I’m going to do everything in my power to find whatever remains of the Blessed and return them to their homeworld, but I’m not doing it for them, or even because I made an agreement with Guardian. If it was as simple as that, I’d go home.” She looked at him with mournful eyes, and said, “I want to go back, Commander. I want that more than anything in the world, but I somehow know that Guardian will not accept me until I have completed my mission.”
“You realize what this sounds like, I hope,” Winter replied, recoiling from the desperate Mendoza. “I ought to have you listed for a full psych evaluation. That might not be a bad idea when we get home.”
“It’s not just that I want to return to the network. That’s not all of it. I’m not complete. There’s something missing. I don’t know if there is such a thing as a soul, and I don’t know whether or not you can duplicated it, but I somehow feel, deep inside, that I left the most important part of myself behind when I returned to the shuttle. And I want to be whole again.”
Winter frowned, then said, “I can’t advise you what to do, and I can’t tell you what to think. All I can tell you is that you’ve got two choices. You can either spend the rest of your life wondering about what might have been, what might be, and trying to solve all of these unsolvable metaphysical questions, or you can spend the rest of your life actually living your life, savoring every moment, every memory, every instant. Maybe you’ll end up back with Guardian. Maybe you won’t. I’ve no idea. All I know is that it is an amazing universe out there, and we’re going to get to see a lot more of it than we ever thought possible.”
Reaching for a datapad, he continued, “You want to know the secrets of the universe? Right here I have the basic specifications for the wormhole drive. That gives us every system within a hundred light-years, no questions asked, no need for expensive beacons or hyperships. Who knows what we’re going to find out there? The remnants of the Blessed, other alien races, things we can’t even guess about. I only know one way to find out.” He passed her the datapad, and said, “Past or future? Dream or reality? You decide.”
“One day we’ll all have to make the same decision,” she said, looking at the blueprint on the screen. “We were heading that way before. Every engineer in human space will be working on it now. Sooner or later…”
“Then we’ll make our decision, knowing what happened to the Blessed, to the Tyrants,” Winter replied. “But it will be our decision. Not theirs. Even if it is our last.” He smiled, then added, “Someday. Not today. Today we have work to do.”
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