Sunborn (31 page)

    Bandicut’s stomach took a sudden lurch. He’d just assumed it could be flown remotely. He hadn’t thought about someone actually having to get aboard and fly the thing. There was only one person who was even remotely qualified.

    Antares grabbed his arm and yanked him to face her. “John!” she said fiercely. “You aren’t thinking—?” She tilted her head, eyes alight with fire. “This scout won’t be coming back, will it?”

   
Bandicut’s voice felt thick. “I don’t know. I guess it’s not very likely—but maybe not impossible.”

    Copernicus rolled into view. When had he come onto the bridge? “Milord, I will go. It might be possible for me to communicate with Napoleon, through one of our alternate comm systems.”

    “That could work,” Napoleon said, stepping up behind his fellow robot. “It would be a risky mission for my friend. But he is stout and courageous, and it would be an honor for both of us to serve you in this way.”

    Bandicut felt a rush of contradictory emotions. Copernicus might indeed be a good candidate. And logically, it made far more sense than
his
going. And yet...

    “We’re—”
bwang
“—running out of time,” Li-Jared said. “Either he flies or I do. You’re needed to fly
The Long View,
 Bandie.”

    “As your servant, I would be honored,” Copernicus said.

    Bandicut drew a sharp breath, fists knotted. “All right, Coppy,” he murmured. “Get down to the scout. We’ll work on a plan while you get ready. Call us when you’re there.” Smacking the robot firmly on the metal nose, he quickly turned back to the control panel.

   
/// John, you’re bottling off some strong emotions.

   
Do you want me to—? ///

   
/Shut up? Yes. I don’t have time for emotions.../

*

   
Listening to the discussion, Delilah felt a shock of responsibility. Strange aliens or not, her actions had gotten them into this. Perhaps her actions should get them out.

   
Perhaps we’ll die, regardless; but perhaps if we do we should die learning; learn what this thing is that sends its roots down into the many-dimensional layers; learn its thoughts; learn if it is the ancient killer; learn why it hates so...

   
Learning was good; learning was why they had come. And defeat might not be the only outcome.

    The Mindaru might yield up its secrets.

   
But I must act now; act at once; they can manage this ship without me if necessary...

*

   
“Copernicus, are you almost there?” Bandicut called, glancing into the display window at the lower left, where Jeaves had provided a view of the scout hangar.

    “Almost, my captain,” came the robot’s reply.

    In the display, Bandicut saw the scout suddenly glow yellow, and begin to vibrate. “Jeaves? What’s happening?”

    Jeaves was motionless for a moment. Then: “Delilah has taken the controls of the scout. She is launching...”

    “Captain, I cannot gain entrance to the hangar,” Copernicus called.

    The glowing scout was now floating in the center of the hangar bay. It began to move. It passed through the far wall of the hangar and vanished. “Scout is away,” Jeaves reported tonelessly, and changed the monitor window to show the scout accelerating away from the ship. It looked like a luminous oval, spinning off into space.

    Bandicut started to protest, but the sound died in his throat. Delilah was flying the scout. Was that bad? “Um, don’t we need her here to help fly
this
 ship?” he asked softly.

    “We can manage,” Jeaves said. “Delilah left this message...” A ringing chime sound filled the bridge for a few seconds, then faded. “She says she caused this detour, and she feels she should get us out of it. Besides, she has the best chance of any of us to gain useful information, and maybe even make it back.”

    Bandicut and the others stared at each other in astonishment. Copernicus squawked on the intercom, asking for instructions. “Well...” Bandicut said, then called to Copernicus, “you can go next time, Coppy.”

    “But—”

    “Come back to the bridge.”

    “My friends,” Jeaves said, “what direction do we want Delilah to fly in?”

    “Her judgment is as good as ours, probably,” Bandicut said. “It’s not like we know.” Even as he said it, he felt a query, across the divide bridged by the quarx:

     <<< May we go ahead and create the time bubble? >>>

   
/Yes, I think so./

    In the display, the dwindling image of the scout shimmered, blossomed slightly, then scooted with unexpected speed across the gridlines.

    “So,” Jeaves said. “Now we look for an opening, and hope Dark gets in here quickly enough to pull us out.”

    “Mm,” Li-Jared said noncommittally. “That
was
 our only auxiliary craft, yes?”

    “Yes,” answered the robot.

    For a few moments, they stood looking at each other in silence. Then Jeaves said softly, “Well—it’s not as if we could have gotten home in the thing anyway.”

Chapter 20

The Mindbody

   
The chords of space rang insistently with overtones that suggested the presence of parasitic, biological lifeforms. One of the objects had become a blurred presence, neither quite here nor quite there, squirming in and out of the temporal present. That in itself was an oddity. The nature of the parasites was unknown, and therefore so was their purpose. The potential for trouble was clear, however. The Mindaru Mindbody presumed a high probability of interference. It was good that the web had pulled them in.
   
Not in quite a long time had the Mindbody encountered any biological lifeform, much less anything so odd. The closest was the life infesting the star-fires, which was not exactly biological. It might be useful to study this new form, or mixture of forms, to gain information against future encounters. The potential benefit needed to be weighed against the more conservative approach of destroying or encapsulating the specimens at once, before they could become a problem.

    Nanoseconds passed, as the Mindbody pondered. Finally it decided: it would neutralize the intruders, yes, but first it would gather information.

    It would begin by drawing them closer. It would peer inside. And it would learn just what it was that dared come near.

*

   
Antares had sensed the presence of Delilah on the dwindling scout craft, but the presence had blurred and vanished, behind the temporal bubble. So much for her hopes of monitoring Delilah’s progress that way.

    “It appears,” Jeaves said, “that Delilah and the scout have attracted attention. The scout is turning toward the center object. That might be intentional on Delilah’s part.”

    Antares felt a shiver of fear for Delilah. She tried to extend her senses more widely, in hopes of gleaning something about their nemesis ahead, but she found nothing.

    Li-Jared, arms crossed, but looking as though he were about to spring into motion, studied the display. “Should we light our engines and make a run?”

    “Hrrm,” said Ik. “Is not the idea to stay quiet until Dark finds us, and hope she can pull us out? Do we have any reason to think we’re freer to move than before?”

   
We might not have much time,
 Antares thought. Delilah was falling inward fast. How long could she provide a diversion? Antares let her feelings search outward for signs of Deep and Dark. She sensed Deep nearby, tracking Delilah, but she couldn’t locate Dark.

    And then she did. She heard...it sounded like a
song,
somewhere in the distance. It reminded her strongly of something, though at first she couldn’t decide what. After a moment, it came to her. It was like the sound of
goythen
trees in the wind, in a valley far off—their closely spaced trunks vibrating like the strands of an enormous string instrument. The memory lifted her momentarily back to the Thespi woods where she’d grown into her youth, where the mother-who-bore-her said her last farewells and passed Antares on to the teacher-mother, a less gentle and maybe less strong woman...

   
“Can you hear anything? Antares, can you feel anything?”

    Antares started. What had triggered that sudden reverie? Ik was speaking to her. “Yes,” she murmured, angling her head slightly. “Yes, I hear Dark.
Feel
 Dark. It is moving this way. But—” she hesitated “—I can’t tell what it’s intending to do. Or even for certain if it’s located us.”

    “Hrrm,” Ik said, leaving Antares thoughtful and worried.

*

   
Bandicut had heard Antares’s words with half his attention. He was trying to cut through the static of confusion that Charli was experiencing with Charlene/Deep. /Anything?/

   
/// The time-fusion is making it difficult

   
I cannot quite tell what is happening. ///

   
/Keep trying./

   
/// Do you mind if I rotate out of

   
your dimensional plane for a few minutes? ///

   
/Uh—I don’t know. Is that okay to do?/

   
/// It may be uncomfortable. ///

   
An instant after the quarx spoke, Bandicut felt a flutter, and then a sudden, haunting emptiness in his heart and stomach. /Charli?/

    “The scout is actively maneuvering now, trying to change course,” Jeaves said, bringing him back.

    The small craft, visible only in a highly magnified display, was stretched out into a blur of light. It was swerving and maneuvering at high speed, too fast to follow; in fact, it was blurring around turns. It did not appear to be trying to escape, though; if anything, it was maneuvering to make a direct dive onto the central object.

    “It’s the time-shift,” Li-Jared said. “Delilah’s time is moving faster, so that’s why she can maneuver so fast. But
what
 is she trying to do?”

    “Kamikaze mission?” Bandicut said suddenly, heart sinking.

    “A what?” asked Antares.

    Bandicut stared at the blurred image, unable to pull his gaze away. “Old Earth expression. A suicide dive on a target. I think that’s what Delilah’s doing. Trying to buy us time, maybe.”

    “Oh,” Antares said, her voice dropping off.

    Bandicut felt an unexpected lump in his throat. /Charli? Can you hear me?
Charli?
/

*

   
Delilah found it strangely exhilarating to feel her own actions leap ahead far faster than the time-flow on the outside.
Temporary advantage; the field is beginning to adapt; it is changing more quickly than before. This could be to our advantage; may mean the adversary is paying more attention to me than to the ship; if so, this is good.

    One thing she could not do was pilot anywhere she wanted to. Certainly it was unlikely she could return to the ship. Therefore...

   
Don’t go straight; make it follow you. But dive at it before you’re through; pass it or glance off it or hammer it; try to make the jump over, you are not fractal for nothing; if you can get in, who knows what you can learn.

   
Was she about to commit suicide? She didn’t expect the scout ship to survive. She didn’t expect to survive herself, in her present form.

   
But I have no intention of dying...

*

   
Dark appeared at last, a faint shadow gliding across the field lines. It was not coming exactly
toward
 them. If anything, it was veering to pursue the scout craft now shooting in a blur toward the central object. Was Dark going to help the wrong ship?

    Antares sensed Bandicut gripping the control pedestal, wanting to reach out and change things. But he was as powerless as she was. Something had happened to Charli; Antares could sense no presence of the quarx, though she hadn’t sensed a death, either.

    Pushing that question out of her thoughts, she tried to focus on the distant scout. She could read nothing empathically, but the scout was now pulsing with rapid, strobelike bursts of energy. Was that something Delilah was doing on purpose? Or was the scout under attack? Antares strained to read...nothing.

    The pulses of energy blurred into a long brushstroke of white light. John Bandicut drew a loud breath. “Does anyone have any idea—?”

    Before he could finish his question, the image of the scout burst apart into a line of spattered droplets of light, spanning the spectrum from red to indigo. For an instant, Antares couldn’t breathe, because she suddenly felt the distant touch of Delilah—and then, as suddenly, she felt it no longer. She felt as though Deep had stopped time right here in this ship. What had she just felt?
Fear. Hope. Determination.

    In a single heartbeat, time unfroze. All of the droplets of light that were the scout sprang inward and vanished into the object at the center of the field lines. A faint spray of light blossomed back out of the center, then faded to darkness. There was no other sign of the scout, or of Delilah. No sense in her mind, no nothing.

    “Jeaves?” Bandicut said softly.

    The robot was silent for a moment. Then: “I am checking all sensor bands. But I find nothing. I am afraid the scout, and Delilah, are gone.”

    Antares gave an involuntary cry, and she and the others stared at each other in shock. Shock at Delilah’s sudden fate, and at the implications for them.