David Brin - Heaven's Reach

I guess I know where that puts me.

The dark human male joined Dr. Baskin before the twin screens, sharing a glance with her that must have communicated more than words.

“You can feel it too, Emerson?” she said in a low voice. “Something is different. I’m getting a real creepy feeling.”

The mute man rubbed his scarred head, then abruptly grinned and started whistling a catchy melody. I did not recognize the tune. But it made her laugh.

“Yeah. Life is full of changes, all right. And we might as well be optimistic. Perhaps the Old Ones have grown up a bit since we’ve been away.” Her mirthless smile made that seem unlikely. “Or maybe something else distracted them enough to forget all about little us.”

I yearned to follow up on that — to step forward and press her for explanations. But somehow it felt improper to interrupt their poignant mood. So I kept my peace and watched nearby as the harvester robots circled ahead and vanished beyond the limb of the Fractal World.

A little while later, a worried voice spoke over the intercom. It was Olelo, the ship’s detection officer, calling from the bridge.

“For some time we’ve been picking up substantially higher systemwide gas and particulate signaturesss,” the dolphin reported. “Now we’re seeing reflections from larger grain sizes, just ahead, plus entrained ionic flows characteristic of sssolar wind.”

Dr. Baskin looked puzzled.

“Reflections? Reflecting what? Starlight?”

There was a brief pause.

“No ma’am. Spectral profiles match direct illumination by a nearby class M8 dwarf.”

This time, Emerson d’Anite and I shared a baffled look. Neither of us understood a word — he due to his injury, and me because of my savage birth. But the information must have meant plenty to the other human.

“Direct … but that can only mean …” Her eyes widened in a combination of fear and realization. “Oh dear sweet—”

She was cut off by a sudden alarm blare. Across the Plotting Room, all conversation stopped. The image on the main screen zoomed forward, concentrating directly ahead of Streaker’s path, to the limb of the great sphere that was now rotating into view.

Huck spread all her eyestalks and uttered a hushed oath.

“Ifni!”

Neo-dolphins rocked their walkers in nervous agitation. Ur-ronn clattered her hooves and Pincer-Tip kept repeating—“Gosh-osh-osh-osh-osh!”

I had no comment, but reflexively began umbling to calm the nervous beings around me. As usual, I was probably the last one to comprehend what lay before my ogling gaze.

An indentation, interrupting the curved-serrated contour of the sphere.

A wide streamer of faint reddish light, wafting toward the stars.

A scattering of myriad soft glints and twinkling points, like embers blowing from a burning house.

Our Jijoan sage, Sara Koolhan, stepped forward.

“The sphere … it’s ruptured!”

Olelo’s anxious voice reported again from the bridge.

“Confirmed … We’ve got-t a breach in the criswell structure! It’sss a … a big hole, at least an astron or two acrosss. Can’t tell yet-t, but I think.…”

There was another long pause. No one spoke a word or dared even breathe while we waited.

“Yes, it’s verified,” Olelo resumed. “The collapse is continuing as we ssspeak.

“Whatever happened to this place … it’s still going on.”

A PANORAMA OF DEATH HAD HER RIVETED.

“I will grant you one thing,” remarked the voice from the spinning hologram. “Wherever you Terrans travel in the universe, you do tend to leave a mark.”

She had no reply for the Niss Machine. Gillian hoped if she kept silent it would go away.

But the tornado of whirling lines moved closer instead. Sidling by her left ear, it spoke her native tongue in soft, natural tones.

“Two million centuries.

“That is how long the Library says this particular structure existed, calmly orbiting the galaxy, a refuge of peace.

“Then, one day, some wolflings came by for a brief visit.”

Gillian slashed, but her hand swept through the hologram without resistance. The abstract pattern kept spinning. Its mesh of fine lines cast ghost-flickers across her face. Of course the damned Niss was right. Streaker carried a jinx, bringing ruin everywhere it went. Only here, the consequent misfortune surpassed any scale she could grasp with heart or mind.

Instruments highlighted grim symptoms of devastation as, escorted by the huge Zang globule-vessel, Streaker entered a ragged gap in the tremendous fractal shell, bathed in reddish sunlight that was escaping confinement for the first time in aeons. A storm of atoms and particles blew out through the same hole, so dense that at one point the word “vacuum” lost pertinence. A noticeable pressure appeared on instruments, faintly resisting the Earthship’s progress.

There was larger debris. Chunks that Kaa moved nimbly to avoid. Some were great wedges, revealing hexagonal, comblike rooms the size of asteroids. Tumbling outward, each evaporating clump wore shimmering tails of dust and ions. Thousands of these artificial comets lit up the broad aperture … a cavity so wide that Earth would take a month in its orbit to cross it.

“Albeit reluctantly, Dr. Baskin,” the Niss concluded, “I admit I am impressed. Congratulations.”

Nearby, a throng of walker-equipped neo-dolphins jostled among the passengers. The Plotting Room grew crowded as off-duty personnel came to gawk at the spectacle. But a gap surrounded Gillian, like a moat none dared cross, except the sardonic Tymbrimi machine-mind. No one exulted. This place had caused the crew great pain, but the havoc was too immense, too overwhelming for gloating.

Nor would it be fair. Just a few factions of Old Ones had been responsible for the betrayal that sent Streaker fleeing almost a year ago, while some other blocs actually helped the Earthship get away. Anyway, should hundreds of billions die because of the greed of a few?

Don’t get carried away, she thought. There’s no proof this disaster has anything to do with us. It could be something completely unrelated.

But that seemed unlikely. Sheer coincidence beggared any other explanation.

She recalled how their previous visit ended — with a final backward glimpse during Streaker’s narrow getaway.

We saw violence erupting behind us, even as someone opened up a door, letting us make a break for the transfer point. I saw a couple of nearby fractal branches get damaged, and some windows broken, while sects clashed over Emerson’s little scoutship, seizing and preventing him from following us.

Gillian’s friend paid dearly for his brave rearguard action, suffering unimaginably cruel torture and abuse before somehow, mysteriously, being transported to Jijo right after Streaker. The speechless former engineer was never able to explain.

Amid the guilt of abandoning him, and our hurry fleeing this place, who would have guessed the Old Ones would keep on fighting after we escaped! Why? What purpose could an apocalypse serve, after we took our cursed cargo away?

But a horrible tribulation must have followed. Ahead lay ample testimony. Plasma streamers and red-tinged dust plumes … along with countless long black shadows trailing from bits of dissolving rubble, some larger than a moon, but all of them as frail as snowflakes.

She pondered the ultimate cause — the treasures Streaker carried, like Herbie, the ancient cadaver that had taken over her study, like Poe’s raven, or Banquo’s ghost. Prizes lusted after by fanatical powers hoping to seize and monopolize their secrets, winning some advantage in a Time of Changes.

It was imperative to prevent that. The Terragens Council had made their orders clear — first to Creideiki and later to Gillian when she assumed command. Streaker’s discoveries must be shared openly, according to ancient Galactic custom, or not at all. Mighty races and alliances might violate that basic rule and think they could get away with it. But frail Earthclan dared not show even a hint of partiality.