Peter Hamilton - The Evolutionary Void

“Hey, fuck you, too,” the first winged Silfen groused.

“I apologize for my friend,” said the other. “I’m Bradley Johansson, and this is Clouddancer; the Silfen have named him a human friend.”

“Uh-” was all Araminta could manage.

“Yeah, pleasure to meet you, too, girlie,” Clouddancer said.

“Uh,” she said again, then: “Bradley Johansson is a human name.”

“Yes, I used to be. Some time ago now.”

“Used to be …?”

He opened his circular mouth, and a slender tongue vibrated in the middle as he produced a nearly human chuckle. “Long story. As a human I was named a Silfen Friend.”

“Oh.” Then some memory registered, associated with Mr. Drixel’s awful school history class. “I’ve heard of Bradley Johansson. You were in the Starflyer War. You saved us all.”

“Oh, brother,” Clouddancer grumbled. “Thank you, Friend’s daughter. He’ll be insufferable for a decade now.”

“I played my part,” Bradley Johansson said modestly. His tail tip performed a lively flick.

Araminta sat up on the cushioning and folded her legs. With a happy certainty she knew she was about to get answers. A lot of answers. “What did you call me?” she asked.

“He’s referring to your illustrious ancestor,” Bradley Johansson said.

“Mellanie?” It could have been imagination, but she was sure the singing outside rose in reverence for the name.

“That’s the one, all right,” Clouddancer said.

“I never met her.”

“Some people are fortunate, others are not. That’s existence for you.”

“Is she a Silfen now?”

“Good question; depends how you define identity.”

“That sounds very … existential.”

“Face it, girlie, we’re the lords of existentialism. Shit, we invented the concept back while your DNA was still trying to break free from mollusks.”

“Ignore him,” Bradley Johansson said. “He’s always like that.”

“Why am I here?”

“You want the existential answer to that?” Clouddancer asked.

“Carry on ignoring him,” Bradley Johansson said. “You’re here because, to be blunt, this is your party.”

Araminta turned to look at the gap in the tent fabric, watching the ceaseless colorful motion outside as the Silfen danced and sang beside the loch. “My party? Why mine?”

“We celebrate you. We want to meet you, to feel you, to know you, the daughter of our friend. That is what the Silfen are, absorbers.”

“Am I really worth celebrating?”

“That will become apparent only with time.”

“You’re talking about the Void.”

“I’m afraid so.”

“Why me? Why do I connect with a Skylord?”

“You have our communion; you know that.”

“I do now. That’s because of Mellanie, isn’t it?”

“You are our friend’s daughter, yes, and because of that you are also our friend.”

“Magic is passed through the female side of the family,” Araminta murmured.

“Load of bullshit,” Clouddancer said. “Our inheritance isn’t sexist; that’s strictly your myth. Mellanie’s children acclimatized to their mother’s communion in the womb, and they in turn pass the communion to their children.”

Araminta risked a sly smile at Bradley Johansson. “If that’s how it works, the men won’t be able to pass it on.”

“Male children inherit the ability,” Clouddancer said. He sounded belligerent.

“From females.”

Clouddancer’s wet tongue vibrated at the center of his mouth. “The point is, girlie, you’ve got it.”

She closed her eyes, trying to follow the sequence. “And so do Skylords.”

“They have some kind of similar ability,” Bradley Johansson said. “The Motherholme has occasionally sensed thoughts from within the Void.”

“Why doesn’t the Motherholme ask the Void to stop expanding?”

“Don’t think it hasn’t been tried.” The tip of Bradley Johansson’s tail dipped in disappointment. “Ten million years of openness and congeniality gets you precisely nowhere with the Void. We can’t connect to the nucleus. Or maybe it just doesn’t want to listen. Even we didn’t know for sure what was in there until Edeard shared his life with Inigo.”

“You can dream his life as well?”

“We’ve dreamed it,” Clouddancer said, managing to push a lot of disgust into the admission. “Our communion is what your gaiafield is based on, after all.”

“That was Ozzie,” Araminta said, pleased she wasn’t totally ignorant.

“Yeah, only Ozzie would treat a friendship like that.”

“Like what?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Bradley Johansson told her. “The point is that the galaxy has a great many communion-style regions or effects or whatever. They’re all slightly different, but they can interact when the circumstances are right. Which is like once in a green supernova.”

“So you’re like some kind of conduit between me and the Skylord?”

“It’s a little more complex than that. You connect because within the communion you have similarity.”

“Similarity? With a Skylord?”

“Consider your mental state after your separation. You were lost, lonely, desperate for purpose.”

“Yes, thank you, I get the idea,” she said testily.

“The Skylord also searches; that is its purpose. The souls it used to guide to the Heart have all gone, so now it and its kindred await new souls. Their quest ranges from their physical flight within the Void to awareness of mental states. Somehow, the two of you bridged the abyss between your universe and its.”

“Is this how humans got in originally?”

“Who knows? Before Justine, nobody had actually seen the Void open up. It didn’t for the Raiel armada; they forced their way through. But humans were never the first it accepted. Occasionally we have felt other species flourish briefly within. Always, the Void has consumed them.”

“So it has to be aware of the outside universe?” she pondered.

“In some fashion it must be. This is philosophical speculation rather than substantiation. We don’t think it recognizes physical reality, not outside. Perhaps it considers the universe beyond its boundary nothing but a spawning ground for mind, rationality, which is what the nucleus absorbs as the boundary absorbs mass.”

“Edeard and the people of Makkathran say that the Void was created by Firstlives.”

“Yeah,” Clouddancer growled. “Such a thing cannot be natural.”

“So where are they now?”

“Nobody knows. Though you, our friend’s daughter, may be the one who finds out.”

“I don’t know what to do,” she admitted. “Not really. There’s someone who might be able to help, one of ANA’s agents. He’s already helped me once: Oscar Monroe.”

Bradley Johansson sat in front of her, his tongue quivering fast at the center of his mouth cavity. “I know Oscar. I fought with him in the Starflyer War. He is a good man. Trust him. Find him, though your path will not be easy after this.”

“I know. But I’ve made my mind up. I won’t lead Living Dream through the boundary, no matter what.”

“That is the choice we knew you would make, daughter of our friend. Such worthiness is why we came here to know you.”

“Tell her the rest,” Clouddancer said gruffly.

Araminta gave him an alarmed glance. “What? What else is there?”

“There is something out there, something new that emerged into our universe as ANA fell to treachery,” Bradley Johansson said. “Something much worse than Living Dream. It is waiting for you.”

“What?”

“Its full nature remains veiled, for we can sense it only faintly. But what we glimpsed was greatly troubling. Humans have a dark side, as do most living sentients, and this thing, this embodiment of intent, has come directly out of that darkness. It is an evil thing; this we do know.”