Heaven's Reach (75 page)

That was the main reason Harry agreed to this mission. It might seem odd to worry about events a hundred million years from now. But for some reason he identified with people in that distant era. Maybe his efforts would spare those folks some of the ignorant terror now sweeping Five Galaxies. Even if, by then, the “gods” were distant heirs of chimpanzees, and the Navigation Institute of that future age was staffed by descendants of today's lice. The kind infesting his fur right now, making him constantly yearn to scratch his—

“Captain Harms,”
said a whirling circular shape that appeared uncomfortably near his nose.
“I have news! Your goal should now lie in view. Congratulations! And may I add that it has been a real—”

Harry cut off observer mode holo with a curt head-shake. Hustling to a bank of windows, he peered past the ever-present E Space haze … and caught sight of a thin, sinuous glow, twisting across the countryside just ahead. “Well, something's going right, for a change,” he murmured.

While laying his instruments, he would find an appropriate site along the Path, put Kaa and the others in the corvette, and shove the little vessel into normal space—hopefully within reach of their destination. Harry might then have barely enough time to get back home to civilization before the whole place rocked and rolled.

Rety was adamant.

From the moment she got up—stumbling into the control chamber with a hand pressed to her head and the other stroking her little urrish “husband”—Rety made one fact abundantly clear.

She was not returning to Jijo with Dwer and the others.

“
You
may be homesick for filth an' a bunch of low-tech
barbarians, but if I never hear o' that place again, it'll be too soon! I'm going back with Harry.”

That was it. No gratitude for saving her life. No mention of her erstwhile religion, or inquiries about her late guru. Just a fierce determination that defied all opposition.

Even so young, she is formidable. I've met some humans with personalities this strong. All were world-shifters—for well or ill.

But most had one trait Rety lacked. They knew the pragmatic value of tact. Of course, she'd been raised by savages. In civilization, she might learn social skills, forge alliances, achieve aspirations, and possibly even be liked.

There was just one problem with her plan.

“I'll be honest, miss. There's a good chance I can get you all to the right quadrant of Galaxy Four. Maybe even the sector. But my own odds of survival after—”

Rety laughed. “Don't tell me odds! I ain't worried 'bout odds since I was gored by a gallaiter, and given up by my own tribe for dead. Yee an' I are gonna stick right by your furry side, if you don't mind. And even if you do.”

The others were no help. Kaa used a spectral analyzer to peer into the Path—filled with dark nebulae and glittering stellar clusters—searching for the telltale blush of a particular stormy star. Kiwei occupied herself staring at the plain of memes, apparently trying to impose her will again, causing more shapes to appear.

Dwer's sole response was a rolling of eyes. He had no aim to intervene in Rety's life again.

“Oh, all right.” Harry sighed. “Just promise you'll stay out of the way. And no whining about where you finally wind up!”

Rety nodded. “So long as it ain't Jijo.”

A buzzer announced the dropping of another instrument package along the curving Path. With luck, Wer'Q'quinn's devices would be positioned well before the biggest chaos wave of all. Then it would be a matter of dropping Kaa and the others off near a mapped t-point and wishing them luck.

He offered Kiwei a chance to withdraw.

“You don't have to enter Galaxy Four. After the links snap, there'll be no more travel between—”

She raised a meaty hand, chuckling. “Not more fairy tales about a permanent ‘rupture' please! Scout-Major, you've been misled. The Five Galaxies have always been—”

The station abruptly jolted to a halt. A shrill squeal made everyone turn as Kaa used his tail flukes to thump the pad of his walker.

“C-come!” the dolphin urged. “Come and see thisssss!”

Harry and Kiwei hurried to join him at a bank of windows. Kaa used his neural tap to create a pointer ray, aimed toward the glittering Path.

“There it isss!”
The pilot hissed clear, moist satisfaction. “I found it!”

Dwer asked—“Izmunuti?”

“Yesss! Just past that oblong cloud of ionized hydrogen. The spectral match is perfect. So are surrounding star formationssss.”

“Wow,” Dwer said. “I think I can even make out a familiar constellation or two. All twisted, of course.”

Kaa raised a sleek gray head, chattering happily. And though Harry's Trinary was rusty, he caught the gist.

Kiwei peered toward the vast sprawl of pinpoints.

“Then Jijo's sun …?”

“Is right th-there!” Kaa turned a dark eye toward Harry. “Major Harms, if you insert us here, how many paktaars would that leave us from—”

A sudden jab on the shoulder diverted Harry's attention. He swiveled to see Rety, holding her urrish companion in the crook of one arm. The little creature—her “husband”—craned its long neck, peering at the Path.

“Uh, Major Harms, could we ask you a question?”

“Not right now, Rety. We're making an important decision.”

She nodded. “I know. But yee just saw something you oughta look at.” She pointed along the sinuous tube, back the way they'd just come. “There's stuff goin' on in there.”

Harry straightened. “What do you mean?”

“I mean in the last few duras there's been three or four really bright … There goes another one!” She winced as a sudden glare hit her eye. “Is that normal? Can stars get so shiny, all of a sudden? I figure you'd want to—”

“Observer mode!” Harry shouted. “Scan the Path for sudden stellar bursts. Are they E-Space illusions, or is something real happening in Galaxy Four?”

The hovering symbol whirled for only a moment.

“The outbursts have spectra and brightness profiles of unusually energetic, type SN1a supernova. Such explosions are known to affect the interfacial membrane that you call the Path.”

“I can see that!” Harry snapped. The mammoth tube's stable sinuosity had started to move. It shivered and heaved near each sudden point of aching brightness.

“Safety parameters deem it prudent to retreat now from the boundary.”

Kiwei protested. “But supernovas do not happen this way! Each is an isolated astrophysical event!”

“I don't like this,” Dwer added.

“Maybe we oughta do what the voice says,” Rety suggested. “Back off. Head for civilized space. Take shelter on some planet till all this blows ov—”

“Forget it-t!” Kaa squalled. “Harms, keep your promissss!”

Harry nodded. “Okay. Everone who's going to Jijo, move through the airlock to the corvette. We'll need a few duras—”

His sentence cut off as another little blue star abruptly flared—this time just to their left, almost adjacent to the boundary—expanding its effulgence a billionfold, filling the cabin with blinding glare.

Lightspeed was no impediment to the causality disruption that followed. Some kind of metric wave hammered the fleshy inner surface of the Path, making it buck and heave like a tortured snake. The perimeter warped into E Space, discoloring horribly as new bulges formed, flailing like agonized pseudopods. Several of these curled around the station, lashing spasmodically.

It seemed a rather personal way to be assailed by a supernova. But Harry had no time to dwell on ironies of scale. “Prepare for transition!” he croaked in a terrified voice.

All at once, the entire Path seemed to
shimmer
, and Harry knew that the estimates had been wrong.

The rupture is coming.

His passengers had just moments to grab some nearby object before the sidereal universe grabbed Harry's vessel with a horrid moan, yanking them all back into a realm of atoms.

Sol System

G
ILLIAN KNEW JUST TWO LIVING PILOTS WHO
might stand a chance of maneuvering swiftly through spacial conditions like these.

Keepiru, and Kaa. Both had started out three years ago with Creideiki's carefully picked crew.

Now, both were gone. Each to where he was needed most.

Each to where he belonged.

Fly true, Keepiru.
She cast the wish outward, past myriad random glimmering stars.
Wherever Tom and Creideiki decide to go, please guide them through to safe harbors.

As for Kaa, she had felt guilty since pulling him away from Jijo, where Peepoe needed him. According to Sara's calculations, the route back to Galaxy Four would be perilous, demanding all his skill, as well as a generous helping of his famous luck.

I know you'll make it, Kaa. May you swim with Peepoe soon, and remain Ifni's favorite all your life.

Conditions elsewhere weren't quite as bad as in Galaxy Four. Yet, the remainder of civilized space was raucous and high-strung. The Navigation Institute kept posting detours till it ran out of buoys, then stationed gallant volunteers along every known route, shouting themselves hoarse over subspace frequencies, diverting traffic to a few safe paths. Flotillas set out from countless planets on daring mercy missions, braving maelstroms to rescue lost ships and stranded crews.

It was Galactic Civilization at its best—the reason it would almost certainly survive this chaos, and possibly emerge stronger than ever. After things settled down, that is. In a few thousand years.

Meanwhile, the four remaining galaxies were a mess. While many clans and races dropped their petty squabbles to lend a hand, others took advantage of the disorder to loot, extort, or settle old grudges. Religious schisms spread like poisonous ripples, amplifying ancient animosities.

And where is
Streaker
heading, right now? Straight for the worst site of fanatical warfare, praying we get there before the fighting's over. Talk about jumping from the frying pan into the fire.

At least Gillian had no complaints about
Streaker
's rate of speed. Right now, she probably had the fastest ship in all of oxygen-breathing civilization.

Not to put down Akeakemai, but without Keepiru or
Kaa, this trip would have taken months, following the marked detours. We'd arrive at our destination only to find ashes.

So it's a good thing we had outside help.

That “help” embraced the Earthship's bristly cylinder like a second skin—a blanket of shimmering tendrils that reached out to stroke the varied metric textures of the cosmic continuum, sensing and choosing course, speed, and level of subspace in order to make the best possible headway. Undaunted by warning buoys and danger signs, the semisapient coating steered
Streaker
along routes that flamed and whirled with tempests of unresolved hypergeometry, making snap transitions that would tax Keepiru at his best.

The great Transcendents might hate leaving their comfortable Embrace of Tides, seldom venturing from their black-hole event horizons to meddle in the destiny of lesser races. But their
servants
certainly knew how to fly. Perhaps this special treatment balanced some of
Streaker
's awful luck during the last three years. But after narrowly escaping a supernova explosion, Gillian gave up tallying miracles—good, bad … and simply weird.