Exodus to the Stars

by Andreas Brandhorst

  Survival. That was the name of the basic concept. The "Star Seekers," as these people called themselves, referred back to the Lemurians' Konos trauma. Never again, they urged, must humanity be put in danger of extermination. Never again. But humanity was much too vulnerable as long as it remained on a single planet, actually on just a single continent of that planet since vast expanses of Lemur lay under snow and ice. Humanity must leave the place of its birth—as quickly as possible—reach other worlds, and settle on them.

  On the worlds of other suns.

  To the stars ...

  "The planets of our solar system are not enough," said the man in black on the podium. His voice sounded a little strange, as though distorted, which combined with the speaker's charisma gave it an almost hypnotic effect. "They are too close. We must go further out into space if we are to survive. Much further ... "

  Survival. The Lemurians must survive. Everything else was secondary to that goal.

  Deshan looked back and forth between the man on the podium and the vidscreens. He listened to the voice, and tried to imagine the face behind the ceremonial mask. Especially Meritworthy warriors had formerly worn such masks.

  The twelfth Hero Vehraáto ... Deshan knew the legend, of course. In Year 1 dha-Tamar, Vehraáto had come from the sun like a being of light, saved humanity from ferociously raging beasts, gathered followers around himself, and went back to the light after announcing that he would return to Lemur when it faced its greatest peril. As a Chronicler, Deshan knew that legends were filled with metaphors and reflected the influences of their era. Deshan doubted that the man was in fact the twelfth Hero, and he had to be given credit for one thing: he did not introduce himself as "Vehraáto," but merely called himself "Herald."

  "If we remain on Lemur," the man on the podium said, his voice sounding very serious, "we are doomed to destruction. Life is swarming out there in space, and someday we will be visited by beings that are even worse than the Konos."

  The man in black paused in order to give his words added emphasis. It was silent in the amphitheater, so silent that Deshan's own breathing seemed loud to him.

  "When they come to kill us all, we must have reached the stars, or else there will be no human beings left. To survive, we must act now. The official space program of the Great Solidarity is not enough, because with it our progress is too slow. It is necessary to augment the program with additional projects, and for that we need your support. Become a Star Seeker yourself. Help us! Together we will find a way to the stars. Together we will build ships in which thousands can set out for new worlds. Together we will make the human race grow so that it can never be destroyed!"

  The man in black withdrew and other people explained the Star Seekers' first concrete projects. Deshan continued to listen but did not pay attention to the technical details. Again he concentrated on the mood and sensed something like collective determination, undoubtedly positive energy. Survival.

  Later, when they were sitting in the electricar and driving through the night towards Marroar, Deshan asked thoughtfully, "How many of them are there?"

  "Over 10,000 already, or so I've heard," replied Mira, who sat once more at the controls. "It was more impressive than I expected. I actually just wanted to listen to the Hero to add the relevant chapter to my dissertation, but now I believe that massive changes are in store for Lemurian society."

  "A kind of a race to the stars?"

  "A race for survival. The Hero is very clever in the way he plays on our old trauma and directs the collective will to survive in a new direction. He's constantly gaining new supporters, and as a result the movement's influence grows."

  "I don't think he's the returned Twelfth Hero."

  "Neither do I," Mira said. "But he plays the role very convincingly. And he doesn't claim to be the Hero, either. Someone or other once expressed the idea out loud, and since them he's borne the description like a title."

  "A charlatan?" Deshan speculated. "Someone who's taking advantage of his listeners' good faith?"

  "You're a Chronicler. Make inquiries if you like. But I don't think you'll find anything sinister. I consider the Hero ... the man in the mask to be someone who is genuinely concerned about the survival of humanity and that's why he wants to take us to the stars. The Star Seekers' influence will grow. Our society will change and perhaps even a whole new era is about to dawn."

  Deshan looked out at the edge of Marroar, at the many lights of the city.

  "What if he's right?" he asked.

  "Right about what?"

  "About the menace that threatens us from space? About the ... dangerous beings that could attack us someday?"

  "He's adding a future trauma to the trauma of our past. But this is the present, Deshan. We live here and now."

  At home in his workroom, Deshan wrote a report about the Star Seekers' mass meeting at the Hedros Memorial and sent it over the DataNet to the media center of Marroar. His Merit account would be credited with two additional bonus points. Before he joined Mira to put the children to bed, he looked out the window at the stars and wondered if there really were beings up there that were even worse than the Konos and if they would someday come to Lemur to destroy the human race.

  16

  Denetree

  Denetree watched in horror as the curtain of energy crawled across the room and reached the Akonian Echkal cer Lethir. The glow glided over the first officer of the LAS-TOOR without burning him as Denetree had feared. It reached the two other Akonians, then Sharita Coho, and crept towards Denetree and Solina Tormas. Everything within the young Lemurian urged her to flee, but the unknown something—a force field—still held her paralyzed.

  The energy curtain touched Denetree, and she felt a tingle, like a momentary itching. The feeling vanished at once and with it the glowing. A moment later Denetree could move again, and she instinctively took a step back.

  Again the voice resounded.

  "Examination complete. Permission to enter granted. Authority status: Unlimited."

  The door in the opposite wall slid open.

  Sharita's right hand remained near her handbeamer in its magnetic holster as she walked through the door into a long corridor. Echkal cer Lethir followed right behind her—a new little hint of the rivalry between the Terran and the Akonian Ma-Techten. The others were a little slower and Denetree saw Solina produce a small device and glance at its readouts.

  The corridor's floor, ceiling, and walls seemed to consist of dark gray metal. Dim light gleamed from illuminating strips halfway up the walls. Not all of them functioned; some were dark. Denetree wondered if that was a sign that this base's technical systems no longer operated flawlessly.

  Sharita switched on her com unit. "Crawler One crew, please come in."

  She waited, but there was no reply.

  The Akonian historian stepped to Sharita's side. "An absorption field," she said, and pointed to the indicators on her device. "Com signals only reach a few meters."

  "Lovely," Sharita commented. "So we have to do a little legwork. Shall we get going?"

  "Where?" Lethir asked.

  Sharita pointed ahead of them. "As far as I can tell, there's only one direction we can go, unless you want to go back to the surface."

  The corridor curved in a wide arc towards the right, so they could not see its end. Some sections of it lay half in darkness because no light at all came from the illuminating strips any longer. Denetree noticed spots on the walls, perhaps hints of corrosion. They reinforced the overall impression that this base was very, very old.

  The face of Solina the historian showed fascinated interest as she looked around, constantly taking readings with her instruments. "This base could be even older than the one on Mentack Nutai," she said.

  "I'd like to point out once more that this is undoubtedly an ancient Akonian installation," Echkal cer Lethir said emphatically. "Therefore it belongs to my people."

  Sharita sighed. "Nobody wants to take anything away from you. We'r
e here to find out what happened to Catchpole and the others. And to Icho Tolot."

  "Considering the absorption field," Solina said, "it's almost a miracle that were able to detect stray teleporter energy pulses."

  They passed several doors that could not be opened. The doors even remained locked when Lethir operated the controls next to them.

  "I wonder what kind of test we passed," Denetree said thoughtfully.

  Sharita stopped and looked at her. "Good question." She thought for a moment and raised her voice. "What examination took place?"

  "I have confirmed that you belong to the race of the Builders," a disembodied voice replied.

  Echkal cer Lethir opened his mouth to say something but Sharita threw him a warning look.

  "Of ... course," Sharita replied. "Are there any other persons in this base who belong to the race of the Builders?"

  "Two other groups have been examined. One consists of alien lifeforms that are marked for elimination. The second group refused to allow the aliens accompanying it to be eliminated."

  Sharita and the others exchanged questioning, puzzled glances. Denetree listened to the voice, which sounded artificial and like neither a man nor a woman. And yet there was a strange individuality to it, something living.

  "Yu'lhan and Tru'lhan," Sharita said in a low voice. "And Grresko." She took a deep breath. "We have unlimited authority status, do we not?"

  "Correct."

  "The first group is not to be eliminated. I repeat: do not eliminate the first group. And take us to the second."

  Silence reigned in the corridor for some moments.

  "That is ... unusual," the voice finally responded.

  "Why?"

  "Security has priority. Only the Builders may have access. All alien lifeforms must be eliminated because they could be aiding the Enemy."

  "The enemy?"

  Silence.

  "You have verified that we are of the race of the Builders," Sharita said cautiously.

  "Correct."

  "Are Builders authorized to give you orders?"

  "Yes."

  "Then I hereby give you these orders. Do not eliminate the first group and take us to the second. Do not initiate any offensive measures of any kind in either case."

  Again a silence that lasted several seconds followed. "I ... acknowledge."

  Somewhere further along in the corridor, on the other side of the curve that limited visibility to about twenty meters, there was a humming and a buzzing, accompanied by a rhythmic clicking. Denetree saw something monstrous stalking towards them: a metal being with numerous arms and legs in tangled bunches. Lights shone in the central oval, like red and violet eyes. The robot, more than two meters tall, paused in front of Sharita, and Denetree saw that the legs, arms, and even the central body consisted of segments that could be lengthened, shortened, and retracted.

  "Follow me," the metal being rasped, and again Denetree understood the words only because her Translator unit immediately interpreted them for her.

  The robot wobbled back in the direction from which it had come, and Sharita and the others followed it. After several dozen meters along an especially brightly lit section of the corridor, it turned to one of the doors and touched it with a tentacle-like arm. The door slid to the side with a muffled humming. Behind it was a wider corridor that gently sloped downwards. Its walls were not just gray metal but also had windows in them that gave views of other areas of the station as the party went past: semi-dark, ghostly machinery halls in which the shadows and forms of servomechanisms moved; rooms with large containers whose purpose remained mysterious; others outfitted with surprisingly familiar-looking furniture, with cabinets, tables, and chairs. Rooms that seemed to be waiting only for their inhabitants to return. But there was no sign of a living being anywhere. There were only machines here. And a voice that Denetree suspected belonged to the station's central computer. A neutral voice, but even so, Denetree thought she had heard a peculiar conflict within it.

  They followed the robot and approached another large window on the left side of the corridor. When Sharita reached it, she stopped abruptly and Denetree saw her eyes go wide.

  "That's a Halutian ship!" Sharita exclaimed.

  Along with the others, Denetree looked into a large room, more brightly lit than the dark machinery halls. There stood a black, globe-shaped starship with a flattened bottom and a diameter of about a hundred meters. A crowd of robots of a variety of configurations had opened up the ship at one place and had begun to remove things from it.

  Sharita turned to the machine being that had led them here.

  "I have new orders," she said. "Take us to Icho Tolot ... to the being that was on board that ship."

  The multi-limbed robot stalked closer, and the lights on its central body flashed. "It is a ship of the Enemy, and an Enemy was on board."

  "Take us to him!"

  The robot's humming changed. "This command cannot be executed. It violates security priorities."

  "I hereby invoke my unlimited authority status and repeat my order: take us to the being that was on the ship."

  This time, not only the humming changed, but the robot itself. Several legs disappeared into the central body while hump-like bulges formed with openings in which light flickered. The machine being rose—an antigrav field, Denetree suspected—and encased itself in a bubble of energy.

  "Status reevaluated," it said. "Authority null. You are collaborators with the Enemy. Security detention will be implemented."

  "You are wrong," Sharita insisted. "We ... "

  Two beams of energy shot past her—the two Akonians, whose names Denetree did not know, were suddenly holding small weapons in their hands and firing at the robot. The protective bubble lit up where the beams struck it, but the destructive energy did not reach the mechanical being within.

  A stream of pale light emerged from one of the bulges and struck one of the two Akonians, who collapsed and lay numbed on the corridor floor.

  Swearing loudly, Sharita threw herself to one side, whipped out her handbeamer, and fired. Echkal cer Lethir and Solina Tormas also drew weapons that Denetree had not seen before, and she suddenly realized that she was the only one standing there with empty hands.

  Red flashes shot from Sharita's beamer, punched through the robot's protective bubble, and ate their way into the central body. The machine being rose all the way up to the corridor's ceiling, tipped to one side, and ... exploded.

  There was a deafening crack, and the explosion's shockwave knocked Denetree off her feet. Fortunately, that saved her from being struck by the glowing shards of debris that hurtled through the corridor like bullets.

  "Here come two more!" Lethir shouted.

  Numbed, Denetree raised her head and saw two additional machine beings floating through an opening that had formed in the right wall. From them as well came the beams of pale light, and one touched the Akonian first officer. Lethir groaned and fell to the floor.

  And suddenly a shrill screaming echoed through the wide corridor, a demonic howling that cut right into Denetree's marrow. Without consciously thinking, she leaped up and ran, faster than she had ever run before in her life, away from the menacing robots, most of all away from the screeching that threatened to drive her insane. Fear lashed her on and a desire to escape the gradually diminishing howling.

  As she came around the bend of the curving corridor, she suddenly saw a flying robot in front of her. It was different than the machine beings Denetree had seen up to now. Again she reacted without thinking, leaping through a dark opening in the nearby wall. Beyond, it went steeply downwards, and the young Lemurian lost her balance, sliding and falling through darkness. She tried in vain to grab on to something, but her hands touched only smooth metal—and then nothing at all.

  Denetree felt nothing more beneath her or next to her, and fell through pitch blackness. The screaming repeated itself, though not as loudly as before. She realized that she was the one screaming, and she snapp
ed her mouth shut, falling through horrible, empty silence. She could impact at any moment, and the speed at which she fell had surely increased to the point that she would break every bone in her body.

  Then she noticed that the air was passing only slowly by her. And far beneath her, in the blackness that swallowed up every shape and outline, the first vague gray indicated the presence of light.

  Time passed and the gray increased. Denetree began to hope again.

  Finally the light of functioning illuminating strips pushed back some of the darkness and Denetree saw that she was floating down through a long shaft that led deeper into the asteroid. An antigrav field prevented a fatal plunge. In the walls around her appeared the dark openings of corridors and passageways, but Denetree did not know how to change the direction of her movement to reach them. She extended her arms and legs, attempting it with swimming motions, but without success.

  About ten minutes later, the bottom of the shaft appeared below Denetree, and she floated down towards it, still securely supported by the antigrav field. As she again felt solid ground beneath her feet, she breathed a sigh of relief and looked upwards—the shaft disappeared above her in the darkness beyond the illuminating strips.

  After some momentary hesitation, she activated her spacesuit's com unit. "Sharita?" she said hopefully. "Sharita?"

  No answer.

  She turned to the only corridor that was accessible from the bottom of the shaft—a few illuminating strips made portions of it stand out from the darkness.