by Terry Mixon
If the scale of the map was accurate, the aliens had been able to sense the entirety of the flip point network inside the Milky Way. Just the idea of something like that boggled her mind. Humanity had never explored more than a fraction of the area around Terra. Even the Singularity sat just outside the space that the Empire had grown into.
At its height, the Terran Empire had encompassed tens of thousands of systems. Even if you said that the Singularity was the same size—which hadn’t been true back then—the entirety of human-explored space would probably be less than fifty thousand systems.
The Milky Way held one hundred and fifty billion stars, minimum. That meant that all of human-explored space was half of one ten-thousandth of a percent of the total volume of stars. A decimal point with four zeros and then a five. As a percent. And that was being conservative.
With this new map, they could apparently reach any location they wanted to, but that didn’t mean they knew where in the system these flip points were located. Based on the color coding and the length of the flip point lines on the map, it was possible to make some guesses about where the flip points themselves would be, but they were just guessing.
Multiflip points occupied the same general volume of space inside a system as regular flip points. Far flip points occurred in the outermost area of a system.
There were also a few ultra-far flip points that sat quite a distance beyond that. Reaching one of those would take a period measured in days or weeks.
That still might be worthwhile, because while far flip points could reach out to a thousand light-years, those ultra-far flip points—though very rare—would be able to cross ten times that distance, averaging ten thousand light-years.
Fiona had studied the map and found something that Carl hadn’t noticed, as well. There was some kind of flip point marked at the center of the Milky Way. It orbited the supermassive black hole there. Several lines were running away from it, but they faded to nothing and seemed to have no exit point displayed.
The AI had speculated that these super flip points might lead to other galaxies, and she could even speculate which ones. Travel on that scale was humbling. And somewhat terrifying.
Kelsey hoped that they found this supposed far flip point. It was exciting to think that they were within striking range to end this fight against the AIs forever.
Of course, with the Clans waging war on the Rebel Empire, what would kicking the legs out from underneath the AIs do? If they stopped fighting, the entirety of the Old Empire would quickly be absorbed by the Clans.
Those people were just about as xenophobic as one could imagine. They didn’t trust anyone outside of their own culture, and she wasn’t certain they trusted themselves all that much. Simply based on what they’d learned from the descendants of Clan Dauntless, the Clans were warlike and extremely aggressive. Paranoia didn’t seem to cover the lengths they were willing to go to protect their culture.
Dominance by them would be several steps down for the citizens of the Rebel Empire. The AIs—while they controlled everything—didn’t make their iron fist obvious to the general population.
That wouldn’t be the case if the Clans seized control. They’d destroy every bit of military infrastructure and compel obedience through brute force. She’d already seen that in the sections of the Rebel Empire that she’d been present in when the Clans invaded.
And then there was the Singularity.
They were the puppet masters pulling strings inside the Clans. Even though the Clans didn’t trust the Singularity, Kelsey had no doubt that the people who’d managed to corrupt the AIs in the first place would have some means to eventually take control of all of human-occupied space.
Yet what choice did she and her friends really have? The AIs were in the process of concocting a deadly plague to eradicate all human life on Terra. How long would it be before they’d spread that poison everywhere and exterminated mankind? Or until it escaped their control, with the results being the same?
All of their options were bad, yet change was coming. The New Terran Empire wasn’t strong enough to stave off any of the looming disasters.
She supposed it was better to have the machines destroyed, because the New Terran Empire could fight the Clans and the Singularity. The unrelenting machines were the worst option of all, and they had to die.
All Kelsey needed to do was figure out how to make that happen in spite of the overprotective brother staring over her shoulder.
13
Talbot covered the approaching thing with his pistol. It stopped about ten meters away and seemed to be bobbing gently in place as its legs articulated, raising and lowering its body almost like a lizard, making itself seem bigger. It seemed to be considering him.
Now that his light was fully upon it, Talbot could see that it was artificial. The thing’s carapace looked to be made of some kind of hard, synthetic material and was a dark-brown shade that blended well in the gloom. It was utterly silent.
He supposed it could be a robot designed to serve the aliens. That might mean that it wouldn’t attack unless he did something to provoke it. Or it could be a security device that meant to truss him up like a Thanksgiving turkey.
The two of them stood there, considering one another, for almost thirty seconds before Talbot decided that it wasn’t going to come after him. He slowly put his pistol back in its holster to see what the artificial construct did.
It just sat there, slowly bobbing to a tune only it could hear.
Somewhat reassured, Talbot walked to the side to see what the thing did. It turned to continue facing him but took no further action.
He didn’t want to let it get between him and the door leading out of this building, but he also wanted to know what else was inside the building. What was the purpose of this place? If this robot was still functioning, was it possible that he could find water?
There was an old saying in the marines. You could survive three minutes without air, three days without water, and three weeks without food. That certainly wouldn’t be a pleasant experience, and he wouldn’t be very mobile after a couple of weeks on starvation rations, but since he could breathe, that meant that his first priority had to be finding water.
The robot watched him move around the other side of the room and only advanced when he started walking away. Perhaps it was waiting for him to give it an order.
Good luck with that. Not only was he the wrong species, but he couldn’t do anything without a common language.
After exploring a couple of rooms, Talbot decided that the building was a domicile. There was a place where it looked like something could sleep, though it wasn’t a bed. It was more like a series of soft cushions placed on the floor.
There was no way that those had survived millions of years. Something had to be refreshing the contents of this building, even though it seemed like there was no one living here. The building—much like the robot—seemed to be waiting to be of use again.
One of the rooms in the back of the building might’ve once been used for food preparation, and he was pleasantly surprised to find a large appliance that seemed to have swirling water in a bowl that was about half a meter across.
Of course, it might not really be water. Some forms of acid looked like water. Thankfully, his implants were capable of parsing things through his sense of smell and telling him details about their composition.
He turned that function on and took a sniff at a safe distance. There was a lot of odor in the room, much of it incomprehensible, chemically speaking. Still, it was safe to come closer to the liquid.
Step by step, testing as he went, he eventually found himself with his nose half a dozen centimeters above the surface of the liquid. Still nothing. It seemed like water. If it was anything else, it would be outgassing something that he could pick up. He was going to have to take a chance.
Talbot dipped the tip of his pinky finger into the liquid and pulled it rapidly back out. He felt nothing other than wetness. That was a g
ood sign.
He touched the tip of his finger to the end of his tongue. Just like his nose, his enhanced taste buds were more than capable of parsing the chemical composition of anything he put in his mouth. In this case, the liquid was distilled water, so it was perfectly safe to drink.
Now all he needed was something to carry it in.
He found cabinets low to the floor that held various implements that might be used for cooking. Nothing that had a securable lid, though. At least he could use some of them for cups. And as long as he was able to return to this building, he could drink his fill.
It was utterly amazing to him that what seemed to be a long-vanished species had left something operational like this so long after they’d died out. Or gone wherever they’d gone.
Carl had said that their original flip point map was seventy-plus million years old. Nothing the Terran Empire built would last even a fraction of that.
The robot was still watching him. It didn’t seem inclined to intervene in what he was doing, but Talbot wanted to test a theory.
He left one of the containers sitting on top of a low-slung cabinet and then walked to the other side of the room. The robot didn’t move.
Talbot stepped back out into the short hallway that led toward the front of the house. He waited a minute and then stepped back into the room. The errant container was no longer in sight. The robot had put it back away.
That confirmed that the device was probably meant for housekeeping or serving the residents.
He resumed searching what he thought of as the kitchen and found himself standing at a device that he couldn’t figure out. Like the rest of the cabinets in the room, it had to serve a purpose, but there wasn’t anything inside it. The interior seemed to only go back about half the depth of the cabinet, but there was no way to access what was beyond that.
Talbot closed the door and ran his hand across the front of it and was shocked when it became semitranslucent and showed a series of alien icons. He’d thought it was metal, but he’d been wrong.
The runes he was looking at were grouped into clusters. He didn’t know what they meant but was willing to experiment. He reached out and touched one.
The display vanished. Curious, he tried to open the door to the cabinet, but it wouldn’t move.
Twenty seconds later, he’d already turned away and was looking at something else when a soft chime sounded from the cabinet, pulling his attention back to it.
Talbot tried the door again, and it opened. Only this time, the cabinet wasn’t empty. There was what looked like bread on a small platter, covered with what seemed to be chopped pieces of meat in some kind of sauce. It had steam rising off of it.
Had this thing just made food out of nothing? Or maybe out of something in the back half of the cabinet?
Would it be safe to try something like this after all the time that might have passed? Even if it was safe, would it be poisonous to humans?
Only one way to find out.
He repeated the process of smelling it like he had before, and his nose was able to give him a lot of chemical data about what he was looking at. Nothing set off immediate red flags about it being poisonous, though he could say nothing about its taste.
Talbot touched the tip of his pinky finger to the sauce and then put the smallest amount that he could on the end of his tongue, prepared to spit it out at a moment’s notice.
It was actually palatable. Better yet, while it had things that his body probably couldn’t absorb, it wasn’t toxic. He repeated the process with the meat and the bread and found that while the meat was definitely not to his taste—it seemed like a weird kind of seafood—it would give him calories that he could use.
The bread was actually pretty good.
The entire time he’d been experimenting, the robot had been watching him. That was kind of creepy, but this meant he could survive on this planet for a while if he had to.
And considering that the odds of Carl finding him were so low, he might spend the rest of his days here alone. He really hoped that that wasn’t the case, because his new robot sidekick was a very poor substitute for his wife and friends.
Elise almost collapsed with relief when the stone door vanished and Carl came crawling out. Unable to restrain herself, she swept the young man into a hug as soon as he stood. “I’m so glad to see you. I was afraid you weren’t going to come back.”
“You can’t get rid of me that easily,” he said with a grin. “I think the chamber transported me to a lower level of the facility. I didn’t look around because I didn’t want to chance getting stuck there. Thus far, you’re the only person that’s been able to find these doors, and I didn’t want to take the risk.
“Talbot didn’t go into this one. I scanned for his DNA, and the only genetic material inside the chamber came from me. If he found something like this, it wasn’t this specific chamber. There may be others. Why don’t we walk around the circumference of the larger chamber and see what else we can find?”
Elise started walking. She looked back toward the rune leading into the chamber that Carl had visited. The door had once again closed, but she could see the rune until she was about ten meters away, and then it vanished.
She stopped. “The rune disappeared. Walk back and touch it again. I know you can’t see it, and neither can I, but I want to see if it works when I’m not involved.”
Carl brought out one of his instruments, walked back, and scanned the wall. He stepped a little bit to the side, reached up, and touched it. The door opened again.
“It looks like it doesn’t require your intervention, but I didn’t see anything. Maybe scanning the wall will show me some of Talbot’s DNA.”
They continued walking around the room, and she found another rune. Interestingly, it was exactly the same as the rune they’d just left behind. They opened the door underneath it and revealed another chamber just like the one Carl had gone into.
Without going in, Carl scanned it with his instrumentation and shook his head. “No DNA. Let’s keep walking around and see exactly how many of these we find.”
They didn’t get a full count before they hit pay dirt. Based on the spacing, Elise thought that there were probably twelve of these smaller chambers, because they’d found eight of them and had gone two-thirds of the way around the larger chamber.
That number made sense too. There were one hundred and forty-four runes in each chamber, a function of twelve. So why not twelve chambers in total?
When they found Talbot’s DNA, it was inside a chamber but not on the rune to open it. How had he gotten inside?
“It looks like he touched one of the interior runes,” Carl said. “It’s glowing, so I guess the runes that don’t are somehow disabled. Or maybe they’re restricted in a way that we haven’t figured out how to unlock. That almost certainly means that Talbot went to a different section of the facility, and I can go find him.”
“We can go find him,” Elise said firmly. “I want to see what’s on the other side of one of these. It may end up that we have to explore all of them to find another way out.”
“We can’t leave everyone here with no way out.”
“They don’t have a way out now. I can’t activate an exit, so I’m putting my foot down. Just accept it.”
He sighed and nodded.
The two of them crawled into the chamber, and Elise was surprised when Olivia crawled in after them. “I’m going too.”
With a shrug, Carl reached up and touched the rune that had Talbot’s DNA.
The growing light made Elise cover her eyes. “Is this normal?”
“It happened last time too. It only lasts about fifteen seconds, and then the door opens to a new place. This has to be some type of matter transportation system.”
Elise felt no discontinuity. With the rings, she hadn’t felt anything like that either, but that was literally stepping through an event horizon to another location. This had to be different, because it moved them from one location to ano
ther without them going through an opening linking them together.
As soon as the light vanished, she opened her eyes and blinked away the aftereffects. The door was gone, and she knew immediately that she wasn’t looking into another area of the facility. There were stars in the open sky.
“You’ve found a way out!” she said.
“Yeah,” Carl said. “Only we’re not where we started, based on the number of stars up there. Unless I’m gravely mistaken, we’re significantly closer to the galactic core than we started. We’ve traveled tens of thousands of light-years, and we’re on a different planet.”
Elise tried to wrap her head around that and then decided that it didn’t matter. She focused on her implants and called Talbot. Since everyone had the updated implant coms now, she could reach him if he was within ten kilometers, and the signal wasn’t blocked.
Hey, buddy. Elise here. Are you looking for a ride home?
Moments later, she was elated when his response came in. If you’re at the chamber on the hillside, don’t come out! The door goes away. Stay inside the chamber.
Ignoring his advice, Elise grinned and crawled out of the chamber. Above it, she saw a glowing rune. That meant that she could open it again if needed.
To test the theory, she gestured for the other two to stay inside and touched the rune. The door reappeared, sealing them inside. She touched it, and the door opened again.
Elise gestured for all of them to come out and returned her attention to communicating with Talbot.
We’ve figured out how to activate the doorway and get back home. Where are you?
Look down the hill.
Elise stepped over to the edge of the outcropping, noting an arrow made of loose stones that pointed toward a path, and gasped when she saw the alien city spread out below them. At one of the closer buildings, she saw a figure waving and knew that it must be Talbot.
We’re coming down, she said. Stay right there.
