Roger Allen - The Shattered Sphere

“And that would be?”

Larry held his hands out, palms toward Tyrone, a small, cautionary gesture. “There’s a lot we don’t know,” he said. “A lot. But we’ve got all the data on the Adversary—plus a lot of what Lucian fed to me directly that I haven’t worked out all the way yet. But if the Adversary were going to move on the Multisystem, the Earth-Sphere system, it would head for the wormhole that it sensed in the first place. And if it sensed the arrival of Earth in the Multisystem, then it would be the wormhole Earth came through that it would have detected. And if the Charonians knew their cover was blown anyway, and if they knew which hole the Adversary was going to come through, maybe they’d decide to set up some kind of forward defense on the other side of the hole.”

“That’s a lot of ifs and maybes.”

“I know. I know. But I think it hangs together. And if it’s right, then the Charonians are getting ready to defend against an attack. And if the first line of defense fails—”

“Then the Charonians throw Earth at the Adversary,” Vespasian said. “I still can’t quite believe that. How could someone throw a planet ?”

Larry smiled thinly. “How could someone steal a planet?”

Vespasian nodded. There wasn’t much of an answer to that.

“I don’t know if I’m right,” Larry said. “But I might be. I might be. And if I am, then we have to get word to Earth.”

“How?”

“Somehow,” Larry snapped. “Somehow fast. Before Earth isn’t there anymore. And I have an idea how.”

Sianna Colette moaned, shifted in her sleep, and then woke up, her eyelids fluttering open most unwillingly. She tried to prop herself up on her elbows, but even that effort was too much. She slumped back onto the bed, and suddenly realized that she was in a bed, and not a coffin-shaped tin can.

She rubbed her eyes, realizing in the process just how stiff and sore her arms were. On the second try, she managed to prop her herself on her elbows, and from there to sit full up in bed.

She seemed to be in some sort of hospital room or infirmary, clean enough if a bit chaotic in the decorating department. The walls were covered with graffiti, most of it cryptic—and occasionally rather cheerfully obscene—get-well messages for past occupants of her bed. The furnishings were all rather tatty and run-down looking, but warm and safe and bright for all of that.

Wally was sitting at the foot of the bed, looking a bit thinner and paler, and dressed in an odd-looking outfit that seemed to be a cross between overalls and a bathrobe. He was staring at the screen of a datapack, and hadn’t noticed her waking up.

“Wally?” she asked—or at least tried to ask. It came out sounding more like a grunt than a word, and Sianna found herself taken by a fit of coughing. Wally got up suddenly, got her a glass of water from the side table, and gave it to her, putting a hand on her back to support her. She took a big gulp of it, and grimaced just a trifle at the taste. Now she knew they were definitely on NaPurHab. Only a habitat would recycle water that many times.

“Wally,” she said again, and this time her voice worked. “We made it.”

Wally nodded and smiled, but there was something sad, something worried behind the smile. “Yes,” he said. “We made it. They got you out of your permod about sixteen hours ago.”

“My God! That long. I don’t remember anything at all about the second half of the permod flight. Have I been unconscious that whole time?”

Wally shrugged. “I suppose,” he said. “The doc says it looks like you were running a pretty high fever for a while there.”

Sianna lay back down onto the pillow, and Wally let her down easy before sliding his hand out. “So,” she asked, trying to keep her voice calm and casual. “Have I missed anything?”

“One of our most cherished illusions is that we always have a choice, that there are always options. We seem to feel there is something unnatural about the inevitable. We like choices, even if they are meaningless. Most people are more willing to accept an unpleasant reality once they are convinced that there is an alternative—even if that alternative is nothing more or less than death.”

Ursula Gruberdid not like the ideas he was getting. They were dangerous, grandiose—and yet, they smacked of surrender, somehow.

The Lone World monitors were coming into their own, pulling down all sorts of data, and were listening in on nearly every command the Lone World sent to the Ghoul Modules controlling the Moonpoint Ring. By now the data teams were confident they had correctly interpreted all the basic commands.

And they were at least fairly certain they could duplicate at least a few of them.

Well, maybe that was the way they would have to go. She was not sure she saw any other way out.

If “out” was the right word to use, all things considered. Ursula checked the time and sighed. Time for her call to NaPurHab, a chore she did not look forward to. She did not like dealing with those people. In a better world, she would not have to do so.

Of course, in a better world, aliens would not have kidnapped the Earth, either.

Sianna Colette, still in her hospital overalls, slipped into the back of the MainBrainMeet Room. Wally was there, listening to the call from Earth with rapt attention. Sianna felt she ought to be in on the conference, even if she was too much in shock to pay much attention. After all the effort made to get her here, she felt something close to honor-bound to attend.

But effort expended was the least of it. Sakalov had died . Died to no purpose whatsoever, pummeled to death by an intelligent rock.

And there was something else she could not help realizing: they were stranded here, she and Wally. NaPurHab was supposed to be a way station for them, a place to wait until the Terra Nova came and collected them. But that was not going to happen anytime soon. Not with a sky full of COREs and SCOREs making everyone’s life interesting. Maybe it would never happen.

But Dr. Sakalov. Would he still be alive, now, if she hadn’t run into Wally that morning a few days and a hundred years ago? If she and Wally had not guessed at the nature of the Charonian command center and inspired Bernhardt to send them off to take a look at it? As best she could see, the only concrete result of that guess was Sakalov’s death.

But no. At least try to listen. Ursula Gruber was on the screen, giving Eyeball an update. Gruber. Strange that the first thing Wally did upon arrival here was to phone in to her .

“Half of the SCOREs are heading through the revived Moonpoint Wormhole,” Gruber was saying. “The other half are taking up positions around the hole. They are going into a layered spherical envelopment outside the perimeter of the Moonpoint Ring.”

“And we be insideward too,” Eyeballer Maximus muttered, too low for the mikes to pick it up. “Not likeworthy.” Sianna had yet to make sense of the Purps in general, and Eyeball in particular. Eyeball was a smart, tough, clear-thinking woman. She could talk normally if she wanted to. Except, most times, she didn’t. Sianna had met her when she breezed through Sianna’s docshop room—in order to ask Wally something. Wally seemed to be fitting in awfully well around here.