Crucible of Time

by Jeffrey A. Carver

  ***

  This was all taking far too long to suit Ruall. The images and explanations from Jeaves, the incredulity of the Uduon that a Karellian device could be producing effects with such repercussions, the declaration by Li-Jared that the shield had to come down: It was all devouring time. And time before meeting the Mindaru was fast dwindling. Li-Jared might have believed what he had told the Karellians—that they could be returned to the planet before fighting broke out—but Ruall did not. No, whatever was going to happen would happen soon.

  The Mindaru object was tracking inward, no question—and there, now, it was making a course change, turning toward the source of time-distortion. What would it do when it got here? Attack? Transmit observations to other Mindaru? Infiltrate and take control? All were possible, dangerously possible.

  Ruall instructed Copernicus to prepare an intercept course. “Be ready to execute if I say so.” They would have to break away abruptly from their orbit, carrying the Karellian leaders with them. This could disrupt the ongoing diplomatic process—something Ruall would have preferred to avoid. But she couldn’t put off dealing with the Mindaru while waiting for that to come to fruition. Li-Jared and the others were talking heatedly. “Where is Dark now?” Ruall asked Copernicus.

  “She is shadowing the Mindaru, and has made several close passes,” the robot answered. “She says this one is a more difficult problem than others she has met. It probably is not the same one we encountered in the starstream, but it may have been coming along behind it. It does not seem to have taken solid form yet. Dark is not certain she can stop it on her own.”

  It was time, Ruall thought, to take a look for herself. She told Copernicus she would be gone for a few minutes. She called Bria to her, from the interstices of four-space, where the gokat had been studying the new guests. Help me look for an intruder.

  With the gokat, she spun out of local three-space, extending all of her senses into the flower-space of the nearest four alternate dimensions. The ghostly universe now revealed billowing folds of space-time, some glowing brightly even across considerable distance. She could see, far off, the thin, gleaming thread of the starstream, stretching endlessly toward the galactic center. Closer were the squirming energy fields of the nebulas and belts that surrounded Karellia. Lots of complexity there; could be useful to know. Closer still was the pale luminosity of the temporal field, suffused with energy pulled directly from the radiation belts—and a nearly invisible outward ripple of temporal distortion, caught in a freakish n-space resonance with the distant space-time distortions of the starstream.

  While Ruall took all this in, Bria saw first what they had come looking for. With a yelp, the gokat darted close to Ruall and then tugged at their shared view, narrowing it down into diamond space—and bringing into sharp relief the curving path of the incoming Mindaru, speeding toward them, and extending sparkling tendrils into various levels of n-space. Dark was right; it looked more like a patch of unfocused space than a solid object. This was going to be a tough one to catch and kill.

  And it was coming on fast.

  ***

  Li-Jared was reaching the end of his patience, what with Quin and Koro angry over his revealing the secret of the shield to the Uduon, and the Uduon angry that the shield enabled Karellia to continue waging an unjust war against Uduon, and Bandicut stating as delicately as he could that the shield had to come down, one way or the other. “Things have changed,” Li-Jared said, repeating what had become a kind of mantra.

  “Perhaps so,” Quin said, “but that shield may also be the best thing we have to protect us from these Mindaru.”

  At that moment, Ruall, who had been quietly absent for a few minutes, rotated back into view—which startled all of the guests into silence. “Prepare, everyone, for high-speed maneuvering, and possibly for a fight,” she said without preamble. “The Mindaru object is approaching much more rapidly than we’d expected, and we are going to intercept it.”

  Koro was furious, practically tearing at his garments. “So you are going into battle with all of us aboard? What about your promise to take us back to the surface before anything happened?”

  “We did not promise,” Ruall clanged. “That was our intent, if possible. Unfortunately, it is not.”

  “Perhaps you should make it possible,” Koro countered.

  Ruall rang loudly and waited a moment for the echo to die away. “Perhaps we should fail to intercept the Mindaru, and leave your world defenseless?”

  Koro bristled. “We have ships, and they are armed. Will you help me get in touch with them?”

  Li-Jared broke in. “Those ships are confined to low orbit, and they are slow. Can they maneuver in n-space? Can they chase something that can likely move faster than light?”

  Koro’s expression darkened; he looked grim, the vertical almond shapes of his eyes narrowed to slits. “You show remarkably little loyalty to your homeworld, Li-Jared.”

  Li-Jared suppressed a surge of fury. “I am trying to protect my homeworld. From a stupid war, and from a threat it will not comprehend.”

  Quin had been quiet, but now she spoke. “You might be right, Li-Jared. But we do have weapons, and you should not dismiss them out of hand. Can we not join forces against this thing?”

  “Of course,” Li-Jared agreed. He took a breath to calm himself. “But keep your ships where they are, as backup. We can open a channel to them right now. Talk to them. Tell them what’s happening. Tell them that we are making the primary intercept, and they should be ready to act if we fail. Tell them to expect further orders from you—but if they don’t hear from you, they should be prepared to fight to the death against this thing.”

  As Quin visibly took all this in, Bandicut added, “And tell them to protect their intelligence systems—and shut them down at once at the slightest indication of attempted intrusion.”

  “Right,” said Li-Jared. “Especially that. Come on over here. Jeaves will help you make contact. Right, Jeaves?”

  “Making contact now,” said the robot.

  “Then we choose to stay aboard,” Quin said. She gestured to Koro to handle the communication.

  Ruall made a ringing sound of approval. “You will be far safer here than on any of your ships.”

  “But one thing,” Quin said in a low voice, “I still believe our temporal screen may provide good protection for the planet.”

  Ruall spun her blank disk face once and said, “Perhaps we should put it to the test. If your guess is correct, we will update our plans. But—” She paused, apparently to make sure she had their full attention. “To test, we will have to let the object get much closer to your planet than I would like, before we intercept. That is an additional risk. Do you accept the risk?”

  Ocellet Quin looked startled. It took her a few moments to absorb Ruall’s words and decide. It was perhaps a more difficult decision than she had expected. What do I trust? she was clearly thinking. Our own technology, or the word of these aliens? “Yes,” she said at last. “We have to know. We will try our shield first.”

  Chapter 9

  Testing the Shield

  THE STEELY TINTANGLE glided back and forth at the front of the viewspace. “Copernicus, enhance the view of the Mindaru, and the Karellian time-shield.”

  The time-displacement field became visible as a bubble wall in space, some distance farther out from the planet than The Long View. Well beyond that, the Mindaru arrowed inward, closing the distance rapidly. “Commander Koro, have you concluded your communications activities? We may have to break off contact without warning if the Mindaru body gets close. Tell your people to expect that.”

  Koro acknowledged, straightening up from the comm panel.

  Bandicut watched the Mindaru maneuver, a splinter of light in the viewspace. Copernicus had added enhancements to the view, but visually it was still difficult to make out. It seemed both there and not-there at the same time, like a ghost in the image. Still, Copernicus had its position pinpointed from the full sca
n data. It had now closed the distance to roughly the same as between Earth and its Moon. It was rapidly approaching the time-displacement bubble. The Long View would remain just on the inside of the bubble, to observe. If the Mindaru was stopped or repelled, they would have to decide whether to take the time to drop off Quin and Koro, and perhaps the Uduon under their care, before they set off in pursuit. But if the Mindaru penetrated the field, they would have to assume it posed an imminent threat and go after it. No one had yet seen the Mindaru in a planetary encounter, so they didn’t know what to expect; but in past encounters, the Mindaru had been lightning fast in penetrating intelligence networks. More than likely it would attempt first to take control of a station or spacecraft.

  “Coppy,” Bandicut said, “is Dark still in the area? Can we expect help?”

  “She is keeping her distance, trying not to alarm the target. Right now she is skirting the Heart of Fire, where she’ll be less noticeable.”

  Bandicut grunted. He would have preferred her closer.

  The Mindaru slowed as it approached the outer boundary of the time-field. For several minutes, it seemed to hover impossibly, as though studying the situation. Then it skated along the field boundary like a bug skimming the surface of a pond, drifting one way and another. Then . . . in a sudden movement, it slipped through the field, as easily as through the wall of a soap bubble. Ocellet Quin hissed in dismay, and Koro muttered in a low voice. The Mindaru had appeared not to disturb the bubble in any way—and also suffered no visible dislocation in time or space as it passed. It hovered again, just inside the time-shield. Analyzing, perhaps?

  Ruall said nothing, watching.

  To everyone’s surprise, the Mindaru reversed direction and slipped back out through the bubble.

  Bandicut frowned. Should he be alarmed or relieved? Was it preparing to send a report? Clearly it had decoded the temporal screen with no difficulty. “What do you think, Ruall?”

  Before the Tintangle could answer, the Mindaru reversed course again—back through the time-shield, and toward the planet. Now Ruall spoke. “They may be examining the shield and looking for a way to use it to their advantage.”

  Koro protested. “It didn’t stop them—I grant that—but how could they use it themselves?”

  “They are capable of many unexpected things,” Ruall answered.

  Li-Jared rubbed his hands together furiously. “They may be distracted and more vulnerable while they do that. Shouldn’t we attack?”

  Ruall’s head spun once. “Indeed. Copernicus—”

  But Jeaves interrupted. “We’re seeing a lot of transmission activity.”

  “Sending to other Mindaru?” Bandicut asked.

  “Maybe. But I think more likely attempting to hack into the Karellian network. Possibly into the time-field control system itself.”

  Quin leapt to her feet, gesturing into the viewing space. “We can’t allow that! Can we stop them?”

  “Not from here,” said Jeaves.

  Quin jerked around to address Jeaves. “Can we send a warning to our people?”

  “No,” clanged Ruall. “No communication!”

  “Why not?” demanded Koro.

  “Because if we transmit, we open ourselves to hacking attack. Your people were warned once; that will have to do. Copernicus, power up weapons and prepare for course change.”

  “Intercept?”

  “Close approach. Three quantum shock pulses, as we pass.”

  The ship hummed, and the stars in the viewing space began to move up and to the right. Copernicus remarked, “Quantum pulses were ineffective in the starstream.”

  “I hope to lure them back out through the shield in pursuit, if we can. Use two-thirds speed, and be ready for full, when I say.”

  “Aye-aye. Toward the Heart of Fire?”

  “Region of maximum magnetic flux.”

  “Aye.”

  ***

  Three blooms of light bracketed the Mindaru, as The Long View hurtled past, firing. The enemy changed course to pursue, just as Ruall had predicted. They had gotten its attention.

  “Are you drawing them away from the planet?” Quin asked.

  “Partly,” Ruall said. “Copernicus, give us the magnetic map of the region between us and Heart of Fire. As soon as we’re through the shield, take us to full power.”

  The viewspace changed at once, showing bright magnetic lines that looped down from the Heart of Fire still in the distance, to caress the planet and its surrounding space. At intervals there were eruptions: impressive cascades of lines falling in great downbursts onto and tangling with Karellia’s own magnetic field lines, more closely wrapped around the globe. These natural downbursts reminded Bandicut of eruptions from the surface of a sun. “There are huge amounts of energy flowing along those magnetic lines,” Ruall said. “I want to use that energy against the Mindaru. If we can lose ourselves in the interference of the clouds, and then double back using a downburst for cover, the Mindaru might never see us coming.”

  “Like flying out of the sun in a dogfight,” Copernicus said.

  “I don’t know what dogs are or how they fight, but here’s what I’m planning.” Ruall spun in place. “If we can use our weapons to rupture the magnetic lines, we might be able to release the energy and dump it onto the Mindaru. If that doesn’t destroy it outright, the electromagnetic pulse might at least disable it. Can Dark help us focus the energy release?”

  Copernicus answered, “It will take a comm burst to ask. Approved?”

  Ruall gonged in annoyance, but agreed.

  The enemy, right now, was gaining on them as they approached the shield bubble from the inside. Coppy had slowed a bit to prepare for the transition.

  “Crossing the temporal threshold in three, two, one . . .”

  As before, Bandicut felt a momentary queasiness, and everything blinked out and back on. “Through the shield,” he heard Copernicus say. And Ruall answered with, “Rapid separation, now.”

  They widened the gap quickly, as The Long View sped up and the Mindaru, in turn, slowed to pass through the field after them. Coppy kicked in some tight spatial threading, and they streaked away from the planet. Soon they entered the inner boundary of the Heart of Fire, high above the shield bubble and even higher above the planet.

  Bandicut glanced at their guests to see how they were handling the change. Quin and Koro looked disoriented, and perhaps shocked to realize that they were inside the Heart of Fire and still alive. Akura and Sheeawn were eyeing the viewspace worriedly. Probably they were as scared as the rest of them of the coming confrontation with the Mindaru; but as for flying in the Heart of Fire, they were old hands.

  ***

  Ruall illuminated a point on the mapping of the energy flux. “This seems a good place to rupture the magnetic containment. Concur?”

  Copernicus and Jeaves conferred with Ruall and concurred. “We can be in position in twelve minutes, if we slice across some turbulence,” Copernicus said. “Thirty-two, if we follow the safer course.”

  Bong. “The faster the better,” Li-Jared said, and Bandicut agreed. They knew all too well how quickly the Mindaru could crack a network. If they in The Long View waited too long to make their move, the Mindaru might already have seized control of the temporal shield. What if they found a way to tune it to bring even more Mindaru up the timestream?

  “Fast, then,” said Ruall. “Let us do this.”

  It seemed to Bandicut that Ruall rubbed her two paddle-hands together in anticipation. Sparks snapped between the two surfaces.

  ***

  Copernicus called out, “The enemy is turning back toward the planet!”

  That’s not the plan, Bandicut thought. “You mean they’ve stopped chasing us?”

  “Apparently,” Jeaves said, “they’ve decided the shield is bigger game. Especially if the Heart of Fire is interfering with their attempt to hack in.”

  Ruall spun and conferred with Copernicus. But Koro strode forward, looking every inch the
commander, and demanded, “Are you turning back? We need to go after it.”

  The view forward showed The Long View continuing to speed in a continuous arc through the clouds. Ruall answered with a chilly reverberation in her voice. “Our strategy remains unchanged. Everyone be seated now. Are you ready, Copernicus?”

  “Ready.”

  “Can we still hit them before they reach the shield?”

  “It will be close.”

  ***

  “Nearing the mark,” Copernicus reported.

  “Hold tight, everyone!” Ruall ordered. “Sharp maneuvering ahead.” Outside, the Heart of Fire energy clouds billowed and fell away behind them. Copernicus adjusted the view, bringing into focus a breathtaking loop of fiery gases. “That’s our primary target,” Ruall said. “My aim is to release all that energy onto the enemy. Copernicus, are weapons charged?”

  “They are.”

  Ruall floated to the center of the viewspace and announced, as though dictating into a log, and maybe she was, “We are about to commence hostile action against the Mindaru. Copernicus will control the targeting on the magnetic lines and the firing.” She swung closer to the robot. “Copernicus, fire at your discretion.”

  Two seconds later, a flash scored the viewspace, and a powerful snap! echoed through the deck. The clouds erupted with shards of light that shocked the backs of Bandicut’s eyeballs. Before Bandicut could figure out what he was seeing, Copernicus redrew the viewspace to show them. The quantum implosion had twisted the magnetic lines of flux from the clouds and then snapped them, releasing a tremendous burst of energy directly into the path of the Mindaru.

  “New course!” Ruall clanged. But Copernicus already had them in motion, flying right on the tail of that energy burst.

  ***

  To Bandicut, it seemed they were riding a roller coaster of light. The magnetic lines squirmed through the space above the planet, and bunched and shot downward in front of them. The four guests on the bridge looked terrified, and he didn’t blame them.

  He had his eye not on the Mindaru, visible only as an icon in the viewspace, but on Dark—now visible as a fleck of black speeding in a corkscrew pattern through the luminous clouds. Dark was shepherding the enormous gout of energy they had just released.