Transvergence (43 page)

Quintus Bloom was continuing, pulling Darya's attention back to the stage.

"We have completed the data reduction phase. Now comes, if you will, an
analysis
phase. Finally we will perform the
synthesis
phase."

The hologram display blinked off, and Bloom moved a little closer to the center of the stage.

"Twelve hundred and seventy-eight Builder artifacts, scattered around the spiral arm. Every one mysterious, every one ancient, and every one different.

"Let me begin by asking a question that I suspect has been asked many times before: Can we discover, in all the great variety of artifacts, any properties that seem common to all? What features do they share? They are of wildly different sizes. Their functions range from the totally comprehensible, like the Umbilical transit system between Opal and Quake in the Mandel system, to the wholly baffling and almost
intangible
, like the free-space entity known as Lens. They appear to be totally different. But are they?

"I suggest that their striking common property is
space-time manipulation
. The Builder artifacts came into existence millions of years ago, but the Builders themselves must possess an ability to work with the structure of space-time—or of space and time—as easily and flexibly as we mould clay or plastics. With that ability comes something else, something that I will discuss in a little while."

Something else
. It was a deliberate tease, inviting the audience to work out for themselves what Bloom was going to say. Darya herself had wondered many times at the apparent ease with which the Builders fabricated space-time anomalies, from the simple Winch of the Umbilical to the monstrous puzzle of the Torvil Anfract. Did Quintus Bloom believe that he had something new to say, when so many others had thought about the problem for so long? Did he even realize that the Anfract
was
a Builder construct? Behind the casual marshalling of facts and the easy audience command, Darya sensed a massive arrogance.

"Now I want to ask a rather different question. Within the past year, we have seen what appears to be an unprecedented number of
changes
to the artifacts. It is fair to ask, is this real, or is it merely something of our own imagining? Are we perhaps guilty of
temporal chauvinism
, believing that our own time is uniquely important, as all generations tend to think that their time is of unique importance?

"We can answer that question, thanks to the work of one of your own researchers, here at the Institute. Professor Darya Lang did the statistical analysis that shows the recent artifact changes to be unlike any recorded earlier."

Darya felt the shock, and a rush of blood to her face at hearing her own name when she least expected it. Professor Merada was leaning forward and saying something to Quintus Bloom. White teeth flashed, and the beaky nose turned to point in Darya's direction.

"Professor Merada informs me that Darya Lang is herself in the audience today, after being away from the Institute for a long period. I feel honored, and I hope that we will have a chance to meet after this seminar ends.

"But let me continue. We have available the statistical evidence that recent events involving the artifacts are in fact unique. But it is well known that statistics are not an
explanation
of anything. We have to ask and answer the question—
why
? Why has there been a spate of changes in the artifacts, unique in our history of them? Professor Lang's important work, with all due respect, does not answer that question."

The knife, sliding in hidden behind the compliment. "With all due respect" meant "with no respect at all." Darya held her face expressionless, while people in the audience turned to look at her. Bloom went on, ignoring the reaction.

"What is unique about our own time, sufficient to cause a basic change in Builder artifacts—in
all
Builder artifacts? Why did the new artifact, which I described yesterday and called Labyrinth, come into existence?"

A
new
artifact? But every one was at least three million years old! Bloom must mean there was a
newly-discovered
artifact. Even that was hard to believe. Darya had scoured every record in the spiral arm. She wanted to interrupt, to make Bloom stop and repeat whatever it was he had said the previous day. But she could not do it, and he was sweeping on:

"I want to suggest an answer, and also to make a prediction. The changes are occurring
because the artifacts have at last achieved their intended purpose
.

"And what is that intended purpose? It is to shape the development of the spiral arm, so that it follows a certain path into the future. Now we can ask, how is it possible that the Builders
knew
what shape the future might take?

"To answer that question, I return to my earlier point. The Builders, we know, had a mastery over space and time that is far beyond us. It is far beyond us,
literally
, because the Builders are not from the distant past, an ancient race who built their artifacts and then somehow vanished. They are from the
future
, the far future, where they built the artifacts and
returned them to the past
. The Builders are beings from the future, who have mastered time travel. Let me say that again, in other words, because it is so important. The Builders did
not
vanish from the spiral arm at some time in the past. They were never in the arm in the past—that is why we find no trace of them there. They are in the future.

"And which beings are they? Given their interest in human affairs, and the way that they have shaped human affairs, there is only one plausible answer: the Builders are
us
—our own distant descendants.
We
are, or will be, the Builders.

"And so, my overall prediction: the Builder artifacts have achieved their main purpose, steering us along the desired path of spiral arm development. Since that primary purpose is fulfilled, the Builder artifacts will continue to change, and even to disappear from existence. They will return whence they came—to the future."

The lecture hall was in an uproar. Only Merada, who had known what was coming, remained calm. Quintus Bloom was standing at the front of the stage, gesturing at Darya.

"I wonder, Professor Lang." His voice carried over the hubbub. "I wonder if you have any comments. I would appreciate your opinion."

But Darya's mind was spinning. She could not give her opinion. Not because Bloom's suggestion that the Builders were time travelers from humanity's own future was unthinkable.

No. Because Darya had considered that possibility
herself
, long ago—and rejected it, for reasons too subtle to present off the cuff, and in public. She shook her head at Quintus Bloom, turned and began to push her way back toward the entrance. She had to think. If there really was a new artifact, as he had suggested, she had to find out all there was to know about it; then she had to re-evaluate everything she had ever thought and done in her whole blessed career.

"So that was it. The talk by Quintus Bloom left Darya fit to burst. Anyone could tell that by looking at her. After she'd had a session or two with Bloom she took off. Left Sentinel Gate."

Hans Rebka stopped speaking. He showed no signs of starting again.

Louis Nenda, who had been offering pheromonal simultaneous translation for the benefit of Atvar H'sial, glared at him. The transition had been abrupt, from detailed description to a sudden two sentence cut-off. It was certainly not a logical end point.

"Are you saying that's
it
? That's all you're going to say about what happened, and where and why she went?"

Rebka shrugged. "I've told you all I know."

"And you
let
her go, just like that. Didn't try to talk her out of it, or stop her, or go with her?"

"I didn't."

"He is lying, Louis." The pheromonal message from Atvar H'sial came quickly. It was not necessary.

"Damn right he's lying. But why?" Out loud he said, "Were you in on the sessions she had with Quintus Bloom?"

Rebka shrugged. "I sat in on the seminar, until it was clear to me that I wasn't going to understand more than three words." He looked Nenda straight in the eye. "I don't know what they said to each other."

Nenda stared right back. "I believe you." He added to Atvar H'sial, "In a pig's eye. I can lie with a straight face as well as anybody. What now, At?"

"We have something of a problem, Louis. I do not wish to reveal to him that Bloom's prediction, of changing and vanishing artifacts, appears to be coming true."

Hans Rebka snapped his fingers. "Oh, there was one other thing that will interest you, Nenda. Soon after we arrived at Sentinel Gate, J'merlia and Kallik rolled up at the institute."

As a distraction, it was first-rate. Nenda went pop-eyed. "Kallik is here now? And J'merlia? Why didn't you tell us that before?"

"Because they aren't here now. Darya took them with her."

"She can't do that! They don't belong to her. They belong to me and Atvar H'sial."

"Not any more. They have the rights of free beings."

"Nuts. I have their slave cubes, right here." Nenda began to fumble at his tight head-to-toe clothing, which proved almost as hard to get into as it was uncomfortable.

"Louis, what is going on?" The exchange between Nenda and Rebka had been too fast for Atvar H'sial to receive a pheromonal translation.

"J'merlia and Kallik. Been here—and gone. With Darya Lang."

"My J'merlia!"

"And my Kallik. I know what I said, At, but we better be ready for more than a day's stay. You and me got lots of work to do before we can leave Sentinel Gate."

Hans Rebka had told the truth about Darya's first encounter with Quintus Bloom, and what happened afterwards (even if it was not, for reasons that Hans preferred to keep to himself, the whole truth).

She had run from the lecture hall, so swamped with emotions that her mind refused to function. But ten minutes later she was pushing her way back in, barging past the same angry people as on her first entrance. Wrong or right, Quintus Bloom had not finished, and she had to hear the rest of it.

She knew there had to be more, if Quintus Bloom was to retain his plausibility with Professor Merada and the institute. Merada, whatever his faults, was scrupulously honest and painstakingly thorough.

Darya herself had long ago noted—and remarked on—the mastery of time and space exhibited in the Builder artifacts. It was easy to form a theory around the idea that the Builders had time travel. But theories were a dime a dozen. The partition that separated science and wishful thinking was
evidence:
observations and firm facts.

The odd thing was that Quintus Bloom
had
facts, more than Darya would have believed. As he spoke she became convinced. The artifact near Jerome's World, whether it was new or not, certainly existed. Bloom had visited Labyrinth, and found a way to penetrate its coiled and re-entrant geometry. He had taken recording equipment with him. At the key moment of his presentation, the darkened stage of the research institute filled with scenes of Labyrinth: the scan from all angles, and the bizarre interior where nothing remained still and nothing followed straight lines.

Quintus Bloom kept his comments to a minimum. He allowed the images to speak for themselves, until at last he said, "This is the innermost chamber of Labyrinth. The scenes that follow are taken directly from polyglyphs contained within that chamber. I have performed no editing, no adding to or subtracting from. I merely display what I found revealed on the chamber walls."

The scene at first was static, a fixed panorama of points forming a rough crescent. Every audience member knew it well. It was the local part of the spiral arm, complete with bright stars and diffuse clouds of dark or glowing gas. Builder artifacts were shown as minute flecks of vivid magenta. Nothing moved on the image, and the tension in the lecture hall grew steadily. When a green point flared suddenly into existence, there was a sigh from the whole audience.

"I suggest that you ignore that for the moment, and concentrate your attention
here
." Bloom indicated a region of the spiral arm far from the green point, which had now spread to become a close-set pattern. Soon an orange speck of light flickered into existence, to spread in its turn and swallow up the green.

"Now, if you please, watch closely where the cursor is set. A new point—now! And its location:
Earth
, the original home of the human clade." But Quintus Bloom had little need to speak. That source location was familiar to all.

So was the sequence that followed. One by one, other points brightened, moving out from Earth and Sol in a roughly spherical pattern. "Centauri, Barnard, Sirius, Epsilon Eridani, 61 Cygni, Procyon, Tau Ceti, Kapteyn, 70 Ophiuchi . . ." The names were spoken, not by Quintus Bloom but by the audience. It was little more than a whisper in the darkened hall, the ritual recital of the nearest stars that humans had explored at crawlspeed, before the discovery of the Bose Network.

The display continued: millennia of human exploration, shown in a couple of minutes. Bright sparks of a new color appeared, far off in the spiral arm. They too grew in numbers, until suddenly a thousand stars burst into light simultaneously.

"The discovery of the Bose Network, and the Bose Drive." Again, Bloom's comment was unnecessary. Everyone recognized the moment when humanity had exploded into the spiral arm at a rate limited only by the available ships and explorers, and human space had become linked with the sprawling worlds of the Cecropia Federation.

The dance of the lights continued. The orange points, which had winked out one by one, reappeared. But now the appearance of the spiral arm was no longer familiar. Myriads of stars glowed, in many colors. They extended across thousand of light-years, far beyond the boundaries of the Fourth Alliance, beyond the Cecropia Federation, past the farthest reaches of the Zardalu Communion. Suddenly everything was new, the familiar star maps swallowed up within a larger panorama.