“I don’t know. I don’t like him. He’s a terrorist who blows up stations with innocent people in them—” she winced sheepishly “—and no, you don’t need to point out how blowing up buildings is now a trigger for me, and a hypocritical one at that. I’m working through it. He’s insolent bordering on obnoxious and in no way whatsoever trustworthy. But at the same time….”
“You believe he hates the Directorate and will do almost anything to see it brought down.”
“Yeah. I do.”
“So do I. I’ve had to work alongside a lot of unsavory people over the years. Mr. asi-Idoni won’t be the worst—” Caleb cut himself off with a grimace.
“What is it?”
“Talk about triggers. I’m excusing his murder of innocents because I believe his cause is a just one. It’s one tiny step away from agreeing with what my father did at the start of the First Crux War.” He shook his head. “Shades of gray…I swear they’ll be my undoing.”
“No.” Her brow furrowed in contemplation. “I think…shades of gray are hard and messy, and they deprive us of explicit rules to steer our decisions. But—this was something I pondered on while you and Mom were on Earth kicking Winslow the Elder’s ass—what if black-and-white rules and absolutes lead to the rise of people like the Winslows? What if ultimately they lead to a society like the one the Anadens have imposed on Amaranthe?”
The image of a man in a window consumed by flames haunted her, now and often, but it helped to believe her transgression had in the end been a lesser evil which helped stop a greater one. The palliative would be cheating if it didn’t feel true.
“If it’s easy, you’re doing it wrong.” He sighed. “Another Samuelism. He was wrong about a lot of things, but…he was right about a lot of them, too. So, hard way it is?”
She made a face suitable to convey her distaste for what was unfortunately the correct answer.
His hand came to her jaw as he leaned in and kissed her gently; she immediately deepened the kiss.
They’d made their first overt move today, and it had been stressful and intense, not to mention dangerous. She felt exhausted, though it was mainly the adrenaline bottoming out and would pass once she got her hands on an energy drink. Mostly she wanted nothing more than to stay right here, on this bed. In his arms. Eventually, wearing fewer items of clothing. Maybe some soft jazz on the speakers for added ambiance.
But while Valkyrie and Mesme both kept a watch on their guest upstairs, they still didn’t want to leave him out of their sight for too long. So after reveling in Caleb’s touch for another breath, she pulled back to meet his gaze.
The tiny crimson flecks in his irises didn’t bother her; they merely added yet greater expressiveness to already striking vibrance. “Shall we?”
“First, let’s talk strategy. He doesn’t even begin to trust me. He doesn’t trust you either, but he’s less afraid of you.” Caleb smiled teasingly. “His mistake, right? But if he’s to be convinced to help, I think you’re going to have to be the one to do it.”
“Have you seen my motivational speeches? They tend to end with strings of curses and melodramatic exits.”
He laughed. “I have. They’re spectacular.”
“Spectacularly disastrous.” She rolled her eyes to emphasize the point but climbed off the bed. “Okay, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.”
The Anaden was peering into the kitchen sink, two cabinets open and multiple containers on the counter beside him, when they returned upstairs.
Caleb cleared his throat, and Eren glanced over at them wearing a scowl. “I can’t figure out how anything works. This is ridiculous.”
She regarded him suspiciously. “Are you hungry?”
“Not really. I just got bored. Well…maybe a little hungry. But I’m more afraid to find out what you people eat.”
“That’s funny. We heard Idonis were naturally adventurous thrill-seekers. How scary can a taste of unfamiliar food be?”
The scowl deepened, but he abandoned his study of the sink. “I make it a habit to be as un-Idoni as possible. Except for the adventurous, thrill-seeking part. Fine. How does one prepare your supposed food?”
Caleb moved to the counter and nudged him out of the way. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll whip us up some manicotti. Alex, why don’t you open a bottle of wine? I think everyone could benefit from relaxing a bit.”
“You won’t hear me arguing.” Wine was an even better choice than an energy drink. She grabbed a bottle of sangiovese and three glasses then motioned their guest to the table.
He sat down cautiously. “What is it?”
“Alcohol. Spirits.” She searched for an applicable Communis term; as part of Mesme’s crash course on Amaranthe, her eVi had learned Communis, but knowing the language wasn’t the same as living the language. “It’s similar to….merum tsipouro.”
“Oh. In that case.” He grabbed one of the glasses and tipped it toward her.
She didn’t like him. Though the cybernetic veins running through his skin were far less overt than those of the assailant on Seneca, they still gave him a cold, harsh appearance. Alien, no matter what genetics they shared.
But as appointed persuader-in-chief she had a job to do, so she donned a pleasant visage and filled his glass, filled theirs and settled in her chair. “Valkyrie, how far are we from the location our guest provided?”
‘We will arrive at the Ursa Major I Arx in approximately two and a half hours.’
“Thank you.” Her eyes flitted toward the Kat hovering at the front of the cabin then across the table to the Anaden. “Mesme, why don’t you go check on your ship. You can meet us later.”
You wish for me to depart now? Why do you ask this?
“Because of all the evolved life forms on this ship that Eren asi-Idoni doesn’t trust, I believe he trusts you the least. I want him to hear what I have to say with as open a mind as possible, and he can’t do so while you’re making him twitch like a marionette on juiced strings.”
Eren shrugged over the rim of his glass, and with the visual equivalent of a sigh Mesme spun up and departed.
“You’re insane. In three hundred years of a life filled with debauchery, appalling excess, rebellion against a merciless, all-powerful regime and a record-setting number of suicide stunts, you are the two most insane individuals I have ever met.”
Eren refilled his drink, crossed his arms over his chest while still holding the wine, and leaned back to regard them with defiant eyes in an open challenge to prove him wrong.
Caleb chuckled wryly. “This isn’t the first time we’ve been called insane. But the fact we’re alive, here and sitting across from you should tell you something.”
“Not much. What in Hades’ five rivers do you want with details on Machim vessel construction, layouts, weaponry, defenses, movements and operational chains of command? There are two of you. Or possibly four. I doubt this little ship could so much as dent a single Machim warship, so what do you care what fifteen million of them are doing?”
Fifteen million…Alex squelched a shudder. “We never said we were alone.”
“Are you now saying you’re not alone?”
She hid her pursed lips behind her glass. She sucked at subterfuge and the cloak-and-dagger routine…. “You could call us an advance scouting party. The important thing is we can use the intel. We will use the intel. We’ll use it to challenge the Directorate on a level and in a way it has never faced. With this information, we can bring it to its knees.”
She had no idea if they—humans, her mother, the AEGIS fleet, the Prevos—stood any genuine chance of doing such a thing. But having seen a few tiny glimpses of this universe’s iniquities, she damn well intended to make sure they tried.
Perhaps her conviction showed in her expression and tone, because Eren’s defiant posture softened. “I can’t get it for you. It’s beyond my skills, my access, my everything.”
Caleb didn’t dispute his assertion. “Can one of your comrades?”
“Another anarch? Someone higher up and more influential than me, you mean?”
Caleb lifted his shoulders in answer.
“I don’t see how. If we were capable of pulling off heists of such grandeur, we would already be doing them. We have several Machims in the organization, but by definition they’re no longer connected to the Machim integral, as it’s impossible to be both and function. And accessing the kind of data you’re talking about is impossible without either being connected to the integral or having access to…Directorate-level files….”
“What is it, Eren? What came to mind?” Valkyrie had once told her that calling people by their first name made them feel more comfortable in unfamiliar surroundings. She figured what the hell, it couldn’t hurt. Unless it could?
She appealed to Caleb for help, but he merely winked at her. It must be encouragement, right?
“Nothing. Almost certainly nothing. An anarch acquaintance of mine once claimed an agent had successfully broken into a Galactic Divisional Machim Hub. But they were caught inside and suicided rather than be tortured and give up anarch secrets.”
“Well, they reported back on what they’d accomplished after they underwent your ‘regenesis’ procedure, didn’t they?” It had taken some work on Mesme’s part to convince her of the legitimacy of this notable Amaranthean technology. The proposition that the Anadens had achieved practical immortality…she was still skeptical. Cloning, she’d give them—but complete consciousness transfer? Soul transfer?
Eren shook his head with a solemnity not displayed before now, and she put aside her musings on the nature of life and death. “No. The agent wasn’t Anaden. He was Novoloume.”
They’d spent weeks receiving the worst info dump imaginable from Mesme, both before and after they’d traversed the master portal to Amaranthe. History, species, customs, tech, security procedures and endlessly so on. She’d had no hope of remembering it all, so it was a damn good thing Valkyrie was around to catalogue it.
Any help for me?
The Novoloume are a humanoid Accepted Species considered by most to be extraordinarily beautiful, elegant and refined. Their role is diplomacy, public affairs and other formalized social interactions. In close proximity, they secrete pheromones that most mammals find highly sexually arousing.
Oh, good lord. You can insulate me from the effect, can’t you?
I can. I cannot, however, do the same for Caleb.
She smiled to herself, as the mood wasn’t suited to public smiling. I think he’ll manage. He has skills.
For instance, he was currently giving Eren a positively earnest look. “To die to protect one’s allies is a very honorable act—one of the most honorable there is. The anarchs are serious about their cause, then?”
Eren leveled an impressively steely stare at Caleb in return. “You’re asking me if my Zeus-be-damned attitude betrays an abundance of conviction or masks it?”
Caleb idly raised an eyebrow. But he seemed impressed, even if he didn’t want to be.
“I suspect whatever my answer were to be, it wouldn’t convince you. So you’ll simply have to judge for yourself.” Eren tipped up his glass and emptied it. “Thank you. This drink of yours is surprisingly satisfying. I will delve into what, if anything, can be done to get you closer to your insane request—after I complete the mission I’m presently on.”
Eren produced a small slab from a hidden pocket in his pants and rolled it around in his palm. “While I enjoy a great deal of freedom in how I go about my business, I also have an obligation to my superiors and my comrades, something I…” he studied Caleb “…suspect you understand.”
Caleb threw his hands in the air, but it was a mild gesture. Of course he did understand. “All we’re asking for is good-faith assistance. I’d say ‘we’re not asking you to die for us,’ but it doesn’t sound as if that’s a good measure of your commitment.”
Eren laughed lightly. Somewhere in the passing of the evening, the Anaden had relaxed around Caleb. God, her husband did have a way with people. Aliens, too.
“Not so long as the anarch posts remain safely hidden from the Directorate—” Panic flared in Eren’s expression. “Which I really shouldn’t be talking about. What’s in this ‘wine’?”
“Truth serum.”
Caleb maintained a flawless poker face, but the distress on Eren’s grew so severe Alex hurriedly intervened. “He’s kidding. It’s not any likelier to induce truth-telling than any other alcohol.” She motioned to the slab in his hand. “Is that your mission?”
“It contains the information I need to complete my mission…and you don’t know what this is, do you?”
She shook her head.
“How in the name of sanity do you not know what a Reor slab is…never mind, I don’t care. It’s encrypted data storage.”
She fixated on the slab, admiring its subtle beauty while the quantum processes behind her irises analyzed it. It was a solid, translucent onyx mineral, but thousands of fibers rich jade in color ran through its interior in ordered rows at right angles to one another. The proportions of the object were a precise four by nine by twenty-five millimeters.
They are the squares of the first three Fibonacci primes.
True, but don’t get excited—three numbers aren’t much of a pattern.
They are when the filaments’ relationship to one another follow it as well.
Okay, now you have my attention.
“Can I hold it?”
He shrugged. “Sure. You can’t get to the data, and there are billions more where this one came from.”
She accepted it from him, balanced it on her palm and ran a fingertip over the surface. It felt chilled and as perfectly smooth as its dimensions were precise. “Are they all the same shape?”
“The same proportions, yes. Any other shape and the data degrades—something to do with how the data’s stored.”
It’s extradimensional, isn’t it, Valkyrie? That’s how the encryption occurs?
Likely so, but I am unable to fully analyze the mechanism at work. We have seen functioning six-dimensional devices. I believe this object delves into more.
She narrowed her focus to a small section of the interweaving filaments, searching for the patterns folding in on themselves….
A hum, so faint she wasn’t positive it was real, pulsated against her palm—or in her head.
Am I imagining this, Valkyrie?
No. It is likely the quantum-level oscillation of the quanta storing the data, no matter the form they take.
Which would, it seemed, be something she could sense. The surreal quality of her life these days still occasionally took her by surprise.
The jade filaments began to shift their color in ripples across the spectrum.
Eren reached for the slab. “What did you do? It only changes colors when it’s encoding data.”
“Nothing. I just touched it.” She reluctantly handed it back to him. “Thank you.”
Caleb was regarding her intently, but she ignored his inquiring gaze. She’d explain later—or explain how she couldn’t explain it. “Where does the material come from?”
Eren scrutinized the slab closely as the filaments returned to a stable jade, then slipped it back in his pocket. “Originally, some planet out in the Tyche galaxy. They grow it in labs now.”
“ ‘They’?”
“The Directorate, of course. Reor production is one of the few truly multi-Dynasty enterprises. None of them can accomplish it alone, and the material’s too important not to mass produce.”
A corner of Caleb’s mouth quirked upward as he redirected his attention to their guest. He lifted his glass to his lips. “What is your mission?”
Eren snorted. “Sorry, no. I do appreciate the timely save and the ride, and this has all been most lovely. The food was a fair bit odd, but the wine’s exquisite. Nevertheless, we are neither cohorts nor comrades, and we are certainly not friends. The anarch resistance survives on secrecy. It exists every da
y a single security breach away from annihilation, and I will not be the one to commit that breach.”
PART II:
SINGULARITY SHADOW
“It is difficult to say what is impossible, for the dream of yesterday is the hope of today and the reality of tomorrow.”
— Dr. Robert H. Goddard
AURORA
YEAR 2323 AD
7
SPACE, NORTH-CENTRAL QUADRANT
ARCADIA STELLAR SYSTEM
* * *
THE MONSTROUS TWO-HEADED DINOSAUR dropped dead to the desert floor with a thundering wallop that shook the ground beneath Bob’s feet.
Beside him, the lavender-skinned young woman gasped in relief and swooned into his arms. “You saved me from the monster, stranger. What mystical weapon do you wield to fell the mighty beast so swiftly?”
He glanced at his Daemon before holstering it. “It’s not important—what’s important is that you’re safe now.”
She gazed up at him, wide, innocent lavender eyes matching the color palette of her skin. “I must repay you for this kindness. It is our custom to do so.” She took a step back. “I know nothing of your ways, stranger, but allow me to give you pleasure as best I can.” Her hands went to the hem of her skimpy, sleeveless leather top and began lifting it up—
‘Alert: I am detecting a signal 0.8 megameters distant at N 23° -8° z W. It appears to be a disabled and adrift vessel.’
He held up a finger as the material reached the tantalizing curve of her sumptuous breasts. “Hold on one second, would you?”
Bob Patera paused the illusoire with a groan and yanked the interface off his neck. “Dammit, Barbie. You barged in on purpose!”
‘They say anticipation of the event is often better than the event itself.’
“No one says that. No one ever says that.” He stumbled out of the bed, located a somewhat clean shirt on the floor and pulled it over his head. “Now, what? Why are we picking up anything on scans? We’re supposed to be zipping toward Arcadia in a warp bubble.”
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