The Timeweb Chronicles: Timeweb Trilogy Omnibus (20 page)

Chapter Forty

A secret is never meant to be kept. It is always trying to break out of the box confining it.

—Graffiti, Gaol of Brimrock

The shuttle trip down to the surface of the Mutati homeworld would take longer than his entire cross-space journey to the Paradij pod station, covering millions of parsecs. This seemed incongruous to Giovanni Nehr, but it was the reality nonetheless. Hyper-fast podships were one of the greatest mysteries in the universe, but he had another one with him, in the heavy parcel he carried under his arm.

Boarding the shuttle, he was confronted by two Mutati guards, their large, pulpy bodies draped in black uniforms. They ran the yellow beam of a scanner over his body and the package, to make certain he wasn’t carrying anything dangerous.

During the procedure, Gio smiled confidently. In reality, he
was
carrying something explosive—but not in the usual sense of the word. Speaking to them in common Galeng, he provided his name and demanded to see the Zultan Abal Meshdi himself.

Surprised, the guards laughed, a peculiar squeaky sound. “Our Zultan?” one of them said. “Don’t you know he hunts down your kind and tortures them?”

“Tell him I am Giovanni Nehr, brother of Jacopo Nehr, inventor of the nehrcom. You are familiar with that device?”

The guards looked at him stupidly.

“Just tell him I’m a very important person,” Gio added.

“Our scanner shows you are carrying rocks,” the shorter of the guards said. “Are they pretty stones?”

“Oh yes, pretty stones for your Zultan. He will like them.”

The taller guard reached out and was about to touch the parcel, when he started to sneeze and sniffle. His companion’s eyes began to water, and he coughed.

In proximity to the Human, both guards were becoming uncomfortable, not having bothered to wear implanted allergy protectors near their own homeworld. Their small fleshy faces reddened and they stepped back, taking seats on the shuttle as far away from Gio as possible. There were no other passengers.

“What sort of a fool are you?” the taller of the guards asked, eyeing him with contempt. His large eyes had become purple-veined and watery.

“A
Human
fool,” his companion answered. He sniffled and laughed, then sneezed.

After the shuttle landed, four guards replaced the initial pair. Staying as far away from Giovanni as possible, they took him by groundjet to the imposing Citadel.

After a careful security screening and a check of his identity documents, the visitor was escorted through a long portico and then into a maze of interior corridors and lifts that took them to one of the upper levels of the Citadel. The parcel was carried by a guard, who put gloves on before touching it. As Gio’s escort of Mutati men sniffled, sneezed, and wiped tears from their eyes, they spoke to him in Galeng.

“Are you brave or just crazy?” one asked.

“Perhaps both,” came the reply.

“You are fortunate that the Zultan has consented to see you. As the brother of the nehrcom inventor, you are an important person in the Merchant Prince Alliance.”

“Ah, so you know what a nehrcom is?” Gio asked.

“I’ve heard of it,” the guard said, although he did not elaborate.

Ahead of them, two immense doors carved with space battle scenes swung open, revealing a glittering audience hall beyond. An immense Mutati in a jeweled golden robe sat in the center, on a high throne. Curiously, he had some sort of a blue bubble attached to his forehead, a device with internal workings that bathed his face in spinning circles of multicolored light.

Gio took a deep breath, for this had to be the Zultan Abal Meshdi himself. As Gio approached, the Mutati removed the bubble device and handed it to an attendant. With a scowl on his face, the Zultan stared down silently at his visitor as if observing every detail, absorbing information without words.

The hall was nearly empty, except for a few attendants around the perimeter. Gio noticed a hairless alien standing off to one side as well, and judged him to be an Adurian, a race that was said to be allied with the Mutatis. This one wore a black suit and a white cape, and he had a number of colorful caste markings on his face and forearms.

“Greetings, bold Human,” the Zultan said. “You have a gift for me? I like gifts.”

The guards halted Gio at the base of the throne. He felt very small in this immense chamber, like a tiny child in the midst of the oversized Mutatis and furnishings.

Looking up, he bowed and said, “Your Eminence, I bring a gift for all of your people, not just for you personally.”

“What?” He looked displeased. “Not for me personally, you say?”

“Of course, you don’t have to share it if you don’t want to,” Gio added hastily. He glanced sidelong at the parcel held by one of the guards.

“What sort of strange offering do you bring?” Meshdi demanded.

“Unlike anything you have ever seen. It will enable your great kingdom to compete with the Merchant Prince Alliance.”

From his quivering, pulsating mound of fat, the Zultan sneezed and then responded huffily. “What makes you think we wish to
compete
with our inferiors?” Surveying the fearless Human, he added, “Nonetheless, what is your gift? If it is a good one, I will be pleased.”

At a signal from the Zultan, the guard stepped up to the throne, and handed him the parcel.

Meshdi examined the package, turning it over and over without opening it. “The scanner report says that there are rocks inside,” he said, with a sly expression. “I think you have rocks in your head, too.”

The Adurian, having moved closer for a better view, snickered.

“I have not brought you common rocks, Your Eminence.” Gio motioned. “Please, open your gift.”

Beaming like a fat child, the Zultan tore off the plaxene wrapping, then lifted the lid of a box inside. A wash of green light startled him, and he almost dropped everything.

The guards clicked their weapons, but Meshdi waved them off.

“Jewels?” he exclaimed, looking at them with his eyes wide. “These glitter in ways I have never seen before.” He selected one of the small green gems and held it up to the light. A peculiar fascination filled his face.

“You hold in your hand a great military secret,” Gio said, “the secret of the nehrcom transceiver, sometimes referred to as the Nehr Cannon.”

With a perplexed expression, the Mutati asked, “Instantaneous communication across space? This is the secret?”

“It is.”

He looked confused, but his dark eyes glinted with pleasure. “But how does it work?” He put the gem back in the box, picked up another.

Having penetrated his brother’s computer system to learn the secret of the cross-space transmission device, Gio began to spew forth information, telling how to cut the rare stones and align them for perfect transmission, holding nothing back. He knew it was foolhardy to do this, and perhaps even suicidal, but he didn’t care. After working closely with his brother, and seeing the decadence and debauchery of the merchant princes, Gio had decided it was only a matter of time before the determined Mutatis defeated them, and he wanted to be on the winning side. Even if he never saw that day and these shapeshifters put him to death, he would go to his grave knowing he had knocked the arrogant Jacopo Nehr off his pedestal.

The transmitter wasn’t really a cannon at all, Gio announced. The term “Nehr Cannon” was merely selected to confuse and misdirect the curious. He even told the Zultan how to mine for the deep-shaft piezoelectric emeralds, and that they could be found on a number of planets around the galaxy, including some that had no military defenses. He provided a list.

Finally, Giovanni Nehr fell silent.

“Is that all you know?” the Zultan inquired.

“It is, Majesty.”

“Then of what use are you to me anymore?”

“I assumed you would be grateful.” Feeling a surge of unexpected panic, he added a lie: “Besides, my expertise will still be needed to perfect your own galactic communication system, to work out any problems that you are bound to encounter.”

“But if you betrayed your own people—including your own brother—we cannot trust you, either. Your disloyalty marks you as dangerous and unreliable. If what you have said is true—and we recorded all of it—we have scientists capable of replicating the nehrcom transceiver and dealing with problems. We don’t need you.”

“But I brought you a gift! You should be grateful!”

“You said yourself that it was not for me personally, that it was for my people. Thus, you committed a social gaffe, an unforgivable faux pas in our culture.” His large eyes narrowed. “You should have researched more carefully.”

With a cruel smile, Abal Meshdi motioned for the guards to take the sputtering, suddenly terrified man away. “Foolish Human, you will not live long enough to learn how to bargain.”

* * * * *

Under tight security, Gio was taken to a prison moon orbiting the planet Dij. He recognized the name the moment he heard it. This was one of the worlds stripped of all resources and abandoned by the Merchant Prince Alliance.

He did not know, however, that on the surface of Dij, under the direction of Hari’Adab Meshdi—the Emir and eldest son of the Zultan—planet-busting Demolio torpedoes were being constructed.

Chapter Forty-One

Disaster—and salvation—usually come from unexpected sources.

—Data Banks, sentient machine repository

A polyglax bubble stood in the middle of a circle of standing noblemen, all dressed in jerkins, capes, and liripipe hats. Inside the clear enclosure—a combat rink—a pair of crimson eagles fluttered and ripped at each other with beaks and talons, powerful birds shrieking and tearing each other to shreds, spattering blood on the bubble’s interior. Their wings had been cropped, so that they could not fly.

“Kill him!” one of the men shouted, his voice hardly rising above the noise of the birds.

“Rip his heart out!” another shouted.

As the birds gouged each other, making feathers fly, spectators threw merchant prince liras and platinum coins in a wide dish on top of the bubble, making bets and raising them or dropping out of the game, depending on the progress of their feathered champions.

Lorenzo del Velli had placed a wager on the larger bird, but it was losing to its smaller, faster, competitor. The Doge was not pleased, but still was not yet ready to give up. With a scowl, he threw more money on the pile. It was late evening, and he was in the illuminated courtyard of his Palazzo Magnifico, with young members of his royal court. Around them, most of the lights in the palace were out.

He liked to associate with people much younger than he was. They gave him energy, almost making him forget what an old man he was becoming. Even with all of his wealth—no prince had more money—he could not slow the advances of age. Time was like a thief, and a sneaky one at that, taking what rightfully belonged to him when he was unaware, moment by moment.

And unknown to him, another time thief lurked in the shadows behind shrubbery, looking on.…

* * * * *

In all of the realm of the merchant princes, there was perhaps no more loyal robot than Jimu. This had something to do with his original programming, since all MPA robots were programmed to be loyal to their Human creators. But it had even more to do with his sentient character, which he had developed on his own, through devotion and hard work.

As a robot, Jimu had been maltreated by Humans for decades. They had always overworked him and kept him going with whatever parts they could lay their hands on, no matter how that decreased his operating abilities. His Human masters could have installed new program modules in him, or the latest grappling arms, but had not bothered to do so. They just kept cobbling him together while awaiting new automaton models, always intending to replace him. But Jimu fooled them.

By the force of his personality, his dogged determination and will to survive, he had basically maintained himself, locating or rebuilding his own parts, all the while remaining cheerful and making himself useful. In his machine unit he had risen to the rank of a noncommissioned officer—a duty sergeant—but still people spoke constantly of getting rid of him in favor of a newer, more efficient model.

Several times Jimu had felt the end was near, especially during the Battle of Irriga years ago, when his undercarriage was shot out from under him. Thinking he was useless, soldiers dumped his mangled metal body in a pile of scraps and forgot about him. But he still had his upper body and backup battery pack, and managed to pull himself around until he found another machine with the parts he needed. Within hours, he put himself back together and reported for duty.

That created quite a stir in the ranks of Humans, and the soldiers took him on as a mascot, symbolizing the fighting spirit of their unit. They promoted him to Captain of Machines—a rank that put him in charge of six thousand other robots. For a while, Jimu felt basically invulnerable, as the soldiers maintained him passably well, even knocking out some of his dents and polishing him up. But personalities changed around him as his military friends moved on to other assignments, and one day Jimu again felt forgotten, and had to fend for himself with new troops, who didn’t know his personal story or care about him.

But he hadn’t blamed them for that. Humans were Humans and machines were only machines, even with the enhancement of sentient programming. Machines would not exist at all if not for the inventive, godlike spark of the Human minds that designed and built them in the first place.

Of all living Humans, Jimu felt that the Doge Lorenzo most deserved his loyalty and dedication, since that nobleman was the titular head of the revered Humans, the prince who was so admired by his peers that they elevated him to the highest station in the galaxy.

So it was that Jimu and his force of twenty fighting robots, having come all the way from the Inn of the White Sun to serve the Doge, found themselves watching the eagles fight, or more precisely, watching over Lorenzo to make certain he was safe.

Several days ago, Jimu had marched up to one of the palazzo guard stations and stated his business to the Red Beret soldier on duty there. “I’m here to warn the Doge that people intend to harm him,” Jimu had said.

The soldier had taken one look at him, with his dented, scraped body and glowing yellow eyes, and he cut loose with a belly laugh. Then, looking closely at the rest of the patched-up robots who had accompanied Jimu, he laughed even more.

Jimu had not taken offense, for he’d seen Humans like this before, the shallow types who made judgments based upon appearances. It was one of the biggest weaknesses of human nature, their inability to avoid superficiality, but he forgave them for it.

“The Doge is in great danger,” Jimu said.

“And I suppose you’re here to protect him?”

“If necessary, yes.”

More guards came over, weapons at the ready. They stood around, smirking, laughing, and hurling insults at the visitor. “You and your pals look like zombie robots,” one said. “Who dug you up?”

“Zombiebots,” another said. And they laughed uproariously.

Jimu didn’t respond to any of those insults, for they had nothing to do with his mission. He and his companions concealed their own weaponry within compartments on their metal bodies, and he knew he could easily overwhelm these fools and enter the palazzo. But that would only cause more Red Berets to come, and a wild battle would ensue. No, that would never do.

“I can see you do not understand,” Jimu finally said. “There is nothing more for me to do here.” With that, he turned and departed, and took his odd little squadron with him.

But the following morning, Jimu and his robots got into the palazzo anyway. Having put the royal home under observation, he knew that household robots ran errands, getting food and other supplies. In an alley behind one of the markets, Jimu had cornered one of the robots and then interfaced with it, programming it to open a servant’s door later that night.

Normally this would not have been possible, since all of the Doge’s robots had built-in security measures that prevented tampering. After General Sajak shot Jimu, however, the servants who reactivated him accidentally tapped into a deep data transmission zip that had been installed by the Hibbils. This opened up programs to Jimu that he had not previously realized he had. Later, after Thinker had him overhauled, Jimu found that he functioned with new mental acuity, beyond any of the programs installed in ordinary robots. That superior knowledge had enabled him to easily bypass the security barriers of the Doge’s household robot.

Thus the entire squadron got in, and they set up clandestine positions around the palazzo.…

For days and nights afterward, without any break, Jimu and his squad concealed themselves carefully around the royal palazzo, their powerful puissant rifles at the ready, weapons that had been hidden inside their motley assortment of mechanical bodies.…

Now they stood on balconies and rooftops, looking down on the courtyard, at the boisterous activities of the Doge and his royal companions. The Humans were getting louder as they gambled and drank.

Suddenly, in the shadows below, Jimu saw a hunched-over man run between bushes, moving from the concealment of one to another. Then he saw three more hunched-over shapes, doing the same.

He sent an electronic signal to his companions, cocked his own rifle. Around him, he heard the faint buzzing of their activated weapons.

The robots fired in synchronization, lighting the shrubbery on fire with powerful blasts, making flares out of all of the bushes around the perimeter of the courtyard. Simultaneously, half of the robot force surged into the courtyard from the lower level.

Men shouted and scattered on the flagstones. The fighting eagles got loose, but with their cropped wings they could only fly a few feet off the ground before crashing into someone and flopping onto the courtyard. Blood and feathers filled the air.

In the melee, four hooded, black figures emerged from their hiding places and tried to flee, firing handguns at robots that pursued them. But the robots were not deterred, and knocked them onto the flagstones, then snapped restraint cables on them.

Jimu hurried down to the courtyard, which was illuminated by the crackling, burning bushes. The palace staff rushed forward to douse water on the flames, keeping them from catching the buildings on fire. Under Jimu’s watchful gaze, the robots removed hoods from the captives. He recognized one of them, and so did the noblemen gathering around.

“You!” Doge Lorenzo shouted. “General Sajak, why are you dressed like that?”

“Some things are best not delegated,” Sajak said, with a sneer. “I wanted to do this job myself.”

Dragging the small, slender man to his feet, Jimu said, “He intended to assassinate you.”

“Is that true?” Lorenzo asked.

The General smiled. His eyes burned with hatred.

Searching his data banks, Jimu said, “He doesn’t like your politics, Doge Lorenzo, and feels that only noble-born princes should hold high office—not entrepreneurs and inventors.”

Moments later, Lorenzo was surrounded by his special police, the Red Berets. They were heavily armed men in red uniforms and floppy caps.

“And where were you when I needed you?” the Doge asked, of the squad leader.

The uniformed man looked embarrassed.

“These robots saved my hide,” Lorenzo said, patting Jimu on his metal backside. “Maybe you should give them your uniforms.”

“I’m sorry, sir,” the squad leader said. “We didn’t expect any problems from your royal court, and General Sajak must have used his security clearance to get through. This was totally unexpected.”

“Then why were these robots on alert? Are they smarter than you?”

“I’m sorry, Doge Lorenzo. It won’t happen again.”

“With all due respect, Sire,” Jimu said, “Your household security could use considerable improvement.” He told how he had waylaid a household robot and reprogrammed it to allow him to gain access to the palazzo, and how he had originally learned of the assassination plot at the lava lake on one of the moons of Timian One. He provided as many names as he knew, including that of Prince Giancarlo Paggatini, the nobleman who organized the secret meetings of General Sajak and his conspirators.

“The way you got in here is very interesting,” Lorenzo said. “And quite disturbing. Fortunately for me, you’re not one of their agents.”

With a gesture at the Red Beret squad leader, the Doge barked, “Go! Get out of my sight, all of you! Take Sajak and his goons with you. The arrogant fool! He wanted to kill me himself. You are to interrogate them, and I mean
interrogate
. Find out everything. See who’s involved in the conspiracy. I want every name.”

“It will be done, sir.”

Like whipped daggs, the Red Berets left, handling the men in black roughly. Despite their shortcomings, Jimu knew that the special police were a fierce bunch, highly motivated and dedicated in their own way. An ancient law enforcement group, they had their own secret rituals, language, and symbols. If anyone could get the answers Lorenzo wanted, they could.

“Come with me, robots,” Lorenzo said. “I’m going to show you how to bet on an eagle fight.” With that, he put his arm around Jimu’s rounded shoulders, and led him back to the bubble enclosure. Fresh eagles were brought in, and the entertainment resumed.