Her father was a lens kithman who devoted his mind to philosophical pursuits and the study of the Lightsource. Had the Shana Rei been able to crack through the barrier and infect her via that higher plane? Or, was Tamo’l just weaker than the others?
With a gasp, she realized that she had unconsciously called up more records of the Onthos plague, had even flagged where the samples were stored on Pergamus. She hadn’t even known she was doing it, and during that fugue she had unwittingly begun to plan how she might acquire some of those specimens.
Tamo’l deleted all her work and shut down her systems, helpless and terrified. “Leave me!” she shouted. “I will not help you.”
The shadows within seemed to be laughing.
Unexpectedly, the mocking, looming presence recoiled inside her mind, and she felt a fundamental change. The lurking shadows were like a chill poison within her, but this change was something bright, new, and aware—and it intimidated the Shana Rei. She felt a loud presence tearing its way into the universe like a child desperate to be born. It was not part of the thism, not connected to the link she shared with her siblings … it was something different.
Tamo’l reached out, eager to embrace the new titanic presence, seeing it as a hope for rescue. But that other great sentience now sensed the taint of the Shana Rei inside her, and she suddenly became as deeply afraid of this mind as she was of the shadows. She was caught between the two immense forces, unable to escape. Still, she held on and cried out until the awakening presence noticed her and responded.
And it was agony!
CHAPTER
78
JESS TAMBLYN
At Academ, the comet was restless and uneasy. The wental energy that permeated its ices flared with a brightening new glow, as if it had received an infusion of fresh fuel. The Roamer students were anxious, and even Jess grew increasingly concerned about what was happening to the elementals that had been been quiescent for so long.
Their energy had once been an integral part of him, when he and the wentals had soared across the Spiral Arm, fighting the hydrogues and the faeros. The water elementals had sung through him and Cesca, liberating them, making them more than human. He felt his skin tingle now.
He didn’t believe the wentals would harm Academ, but not everyone could trust such powerful and exotic beings.
A nervous Arden Iswander came to see Jess and Cesca, escorted into the school admin offices by KA. The young man looked so much like his industrialist father. “I volunteered to come speak with you,” Arden said. “The students are worried. That glow seeps into everything. What does it mean? What if there are side effects?”
“The wentals have always been benevolent,” Cesca said, trying to reassure him. “I have no reason to believe they would cause us any harm. After they helped the human race survive the Elemental War, some of them went dormant here.”
Arden nodded slowly, clearly unconvinced. “Mostly dormant, but something is obviously triggering them. And wentals have been deadly in the past—you’re both aware of that more than anyone else. When they were inside you, your touch was enough to kill people. What if the wentals are losing control again?” He raised his hands to indicate the glowing ice walls.
Jess knew that Arden Iswander had been standing up for himself and fighting back against bullies, even when other Roamer students blamed him for his father’s mistakes. Arden seemed to be a born leader, and now he was speaking for other uneasy students.
“I wish I had a better answer for you,” Jess said. “The truth is that neither Cesca nor I can understand exactly what’s happening with the wentals inside the comet.”
The ubiquitous glow in the ice shimmered, but the wentals had not communicated directly. Jess wasn’t even sure whether the elementals still knew how to communicate, if they remembered the fragility of human life.
When Cesca touched the wall, some of the ice melted, but her fingertips seemed to be wet with nothing more than water. “Sometimes we hear words and grasp clear concepts, but at other times it’s just a sense of excitement or unease.”
“You can see with your own eyes how much the comet is changing,” Arden said.
“Yes, it’s changing,” Jess replied. “And considering the destruction caused by the Shana Rei, we may need the wentals as allies.”
“Even after what they did to you?” Arden asked.
“And what they did for us.” Cesca’s voice grew stern.
The boy was far too young to remember the awful attacks of the hydrogues and faeros, so he could not understand the cost that Jess and Cesca had been willing to pay. At the time, the human race had been caught in a galactic clash against vastly superior foes. The wentals had helped humanity survive.
“What do you suggest, Arden?” Jess asked.
The young man lifted his chin. “For the time being, as a precaution, the students should move back to Newstation. At least until this settles.” Arden lowered his voice. “I think it’s a reasonable suggestion.”
Jess and Cesca had always hoped to have children of their own, but exposure to the wentals had irrevocably altered their biology, and they were never able to build the family they wanted. Instead, they had established Academ so they could always be around Roamer children, to guide them and teach them.
Jess trusted the wentals, but he also felt protective of the children. The clan members had given these boys and girls into their care, and he and Cesca had to protect them. He looked at Arden and nodded. “I understand your worries. Cesca and I will stay here, but anyone who wishes to transfer from Academ to Newstation is welcome to do so. Although we’re convinced the wentals won’t harm us, we shouldn’t take any risks.”
“I’ll tell the rest,” Arden said. “Some students want to go right away, but I’ll stay here. Others will, too, if you really think it’s safe.”
The covered walls began to crackle, and fresh light streamed through the unmasked ices. The lambent light suddenly became intense, searing. Cesca cried out, and Jess felt his heart leap. It was as if the water elementals had just let out an exuberant flash of communication that sparked through.
A profound change out in the universe had just made them stir, and the water elementals were building their energy and signaling … to something. Jess had not felt a sensation like this before.
Around them, the whole Academ comet began to shine like a newly lit star. Shouts of alarm came from students and faculty in the corridors. The intercom system crackled with static and frantic questions.
“You’re right, Arden,” Jess said to the suddenly uneasy young man. “We should send the students away. The wentals are preparing for something.”
CHAPTER
79
EXXOS
The black robots were reeling from the panicked reaction of the Shana Rei. Eternity’s Mind? The creatures of darkness could not coherently describe what exactly they feared.
Inexplicably, several of the marrauding shadow clouds in interstellar space began to collapse, crushed by some outside force, and the Shana Rei could not prevent it. Across the Spiral Arm, as the ominous force achieved a sort of consciousness, the black nebulas were converted into cold basic matter, reversing the flow of chaos.
The trapped Shana Rei wailed into the void, expressing far more agony than they had ever shown over the pain of sentient thought.
Although Exxos was pleased to witness their suffering—as far as he was concerned, the creatures of darkness deserved every modicum of misery they endured—the idea of a force awesome enough to terrify the Shana Rei was unsettling to the black robots as well. He and his myriad counterparts could not defend against something like that, could not prepare, nor could they flee.
The huge fleet of resurrected robot ships accelerated through the roiling shadow cloud, separating themselves from the chaotic nebula as swiftly as they could. While the robots watched from an increasing distance, the enormous Shana Rei cylinders crumbled, their obsidian surfaces spiderwebbed with cracks.
Frant
ic inkblot creatures manifested around the robot ships, appearing and disappearing at random, their voices jibbering. “The dark matter is coalescing!”
“Eternity’s Mind drives it!”
The black shapes stretched and distorted, their central eyes blazed as if in terror, then the eyes flickered and grew red.
Exxos savored their panic, but it was also dangerous. Robot warships raced beyond the envelope of the shadow cloud, which had emerged in space near a bloater cluster, and the nuclei of the drifting nodules flashed and sparkled, as if activating in response to the proximity.
The bloaters?
Exxos remembered when the Shana Rei had first threatened the Iswander industrial operations. It should have been a devastating massacre, but when the shadows saw that the human workers were draining and killing bloaters, they simply withdrew without attacking, leaving the industrial operations intact. Exxos and his robots had wanted to annihilate the Iswander outpost, but the Shana Rei refused. It had been a capricious and inexplicable decision.
Now, new shadow clouds emerged into realspace at random points, without any sort of strategy. The Shana Rei simply wanted to fill the cosmos with their smothering darkness, but this time, some force pushed back against the nebula.
The bloaters?
The black cloud roiled and swirled as if helpless, folding back into itself and collapsing at near-relativistic speeds. All that dark matter grew denser and denser, pulled in by its own gravity and pressed inward by some outside repulsive force. In an astonishingly short time, the huge shadow cloud collapsed, its matter increasing in density until a dull glow appeared at its center. Pressing, crushing, condensing—nuclear reactions finally reached a critical point, so that as the nebula continued to fall in toward its center of mass, a proto-star at its core sparked and ignited.
Watching the shadow cloud collapse while the helpless Shana Rei retreated in chaotic terror was appalling to Exxos—because he didn’t understand what was driving this catastrophe. It seemed as if the fabric of the universe itself was fighting back, awakened and antagonized.
Abandoning the remnants of their shadow cloud, the Shana Rei fled back into the void to escape the searing pain of the newborn star.
Witnessing such a cosmic disaster made Exxos feel insignificant again. From the mind-ripping outcries of the creatures of darkness, he knew that the same thing was happening at other emerging shadow clouds across the Spiral Arm.
CHAPTER
80
SHAREEN FITZKELLUM
Kotto lay in a vegetative state in the sickbay of Fireheart Station, calm, peaceful.
For two days, the best Roamer physicians ran tests and scans while Howard and Shareen hovered nearby. The teens tried not to get in the way, realizing they couldn’t help … but it soon became apparent that the doctors couldn’t help either.
Hoping for some insight, Howard and Shareen had reviewed Kotto’s logs, his cryptic comments and outbursts, speaking to something else out there. And then the final surge that he had invited in, oblivious to what it might do to him. At the time, Kotto’s behavior had confused the two compies, and when Shareen watched his final seconds, her heart ached and tears filled her eyes.
The great scientist’s brain patterns were completely blank, as if his mind and soul had simply departed, taking along all the magnificent, overwhelming knowledge of the universe that he had supposedly experienced.
After two unresponsive days with no change at all, Kotto Okiah—the greatest Roamer scientist who ever lived—simply passed from life. He stopped breathing and his heart stopped beating, but his genius mind had departed days earlier.
* * *
Shareen felt helpless. “If Kotto died to receive all that knowledge, I wish he’d been able to share some of it with us.” She slumped into a chair.
Howard continued to review the logs of Kotto’s voyage, scanning through the days of readings, much of which was useless null data. While Kotto was alive, they had focused on the last part of the expedition, when he encountered what he called Eternity’s Mind.
Now they concentrated on the other vital discovery Kotto and the survey craft had made. Anger growing within Shareen lifted the heavy shrouds of grief. “Kotto would have wanted us to learn something from this debacle—something we can use.”
She played back the early images of the voyage through the void, when the survey craft had slipped past quiet and crowded black hex cylinders, a gathering of the Shana Rei. She hung on the words Kotto uttered. He thought he had found their secret lair.
“He wanted to bring this to General Keah,” Shareen said. “To let the CDF know that they might be able to take the Shana Rei by surprise.”
They both looked at the ominous images of the dormant shadow cylinders folded inside the void. The huge black hexagons seemed lethargic, unaware … like sleeping predators.
Shareen’s lips curved in a determined smile. “We need to go to the terrarium dome, have the green priests send a message that there’s a back door at Fireheart, a way to get to the shadows where they will least expect it.”
“General Keah is going to love that,” Howard said.
She and Howard knew how the shadow clouds appeared in realspace to wreak havoc. This void, though, was inside the walls of their fortress, behind any defenses they might have. And that suggested a remarkable opportunity.
“In fact,” Shareen said, “this might even be Kotto’s greatest discovery.”
CHAPTER
81
GENERAL NALANI KEAH
The Confederation Defense Forces had, in the end, done little to defend the Confederation. For all their bluster and armaments, their sun bombs, their laser cannons, they had completely failed against the Shana Rei threat.
During the flight to Theroc, Keah had dealt with her shock, grief, and anger. Locked in her ready-room for hours during the flight to the Confederation’s capital, she rehearsed her report, swearing to herself that she wouldn’t candy-coat the disaster. Later, sealed in her cabin on the Kutuzov, where no one could see her, she wondered how she could tell the King and Queen that she had failed. Her rehearsed lines simply faded away, and General Nalani Keah broke down.
But that was enough of that. No time for sniveling. Finally, drained, hardened, and with renewed resolve, she cleaned herself up, put on her best uniform, and went to speak to Peter and Estarra.
All the green priests and Theron defenders had rushed back from the Wild, and Keah’s green priest Nadd was finally able to share basic details with other planets through telink.
After all the challenges General Keah had confronted in her military career, facing the King and Queen on Theroc was the hardest thing she had ever done. She presented images of the complete rout her most powerful warships had suffered at Earth: billions dead, a significant portion of her fleet wiped out in a single battle.
Afterward, she added in a raw voice, “If I could find a way to dismantle those monsters down to their component atoms, I would do it with my bare hands.”
Peter rose from the throne, shaking. “The Shana Rei already tried to kill the worldforest with their nightshade, and it took all of our efforts—your ships, Solar Navy warliners, verdani treeships, and even the faeros—to drive them away. With only the CDF and a few faeros, Earth didn’t stand a chance.”
Keah lifted her chin, swallowed hard. “I will recall all our deployed ships and center them here. We have to protect Theroc at any cost.”
Already, the Kutuzov, the Okrun, and the last sixty battered warships orbited the planet, joining the gigantic verdani battleships that stood guard. The huge orbiting trees were intimidating, and the CDF Juggernauts and Mantas were nothing to sneeze at, but against a million bugbot attackers, they wouldn’t be nearly enough.
This was all she had, however, and Keah vowed to do her damnedest. She asked all of her personnel to think outside the box and suggest alternate solutions. In the past, no matter how she encouraged Admirals Handies and Harvard to come up with new ideas, they had
still fallen back on old methods … and they had died for it. At least Admiral Haroun had stepped up to the plate. Keah didn’t know what hope she could offer.
And then like a miracle, a new possibility fell right in her lap.
In the stunned silence after Keah finished her report, the green priests in the throne room suddenly stirred, touching the wall of the worldtree and receiving a telink message. “We have urgent news from Fireheart Station,” said Zaquel. “Kotto Okiah found a significant vulnerability of the Shana Rei.”
General Keah blinked and caught her breath. “Hell, I’d be happy with even a moderate vulnerability. Write down the reports—I need all the information.”
The green priests furiously transcribed the data coming through from Celli and Solimar, describing Kotto’s expedition into the void and how it killed him, but not before he discovered the secret hiding place of the shadows. If Kotto’s two lab assistants were correct, the CDF might be looking at a whole different playing field.
Many listeners didn’t grasp the significance of the discovery, but Keah burst out, “This gives us the opportunity to sneak up on the shadows from behind! A back door, right into their lair. They won’t expect it, and we can choose the right time.” She clenched her fists and let out a low, edgy chuckle. “We’ve always been at the mercy of when and where the Shana Rei decided to strike. It was defense instead of offense. But if the Big Ring accident made a secret entrance, then we can go there ourselves and strike.”
It felt strange to be filled with enthusiasm and hope, and Keah was going to make the most of it. “Your Majesties, if we keep fighting the Shana Rei and the bugbots the way we have been, we are bound to lose. There is no chance we can defeat them in a head-on military clash, on their terms.”
Peter nodded. “After seeing what happened at Earth, I have to agree.”
Keah continued to press. “Those things want to make every last one of us extinct. We have to try any possibility.” Then she offered a hard grin. Her dark outrage had been transformed into a ruthless determination. “I’ll bet Adar Zan’nh would be willing to send his best Solar Navy warliners to the operation. We’ll gather as many sun bombs as we can find from the other patrol ships in the CDF—this is where we need to use them. I’ll go to Fireheart Station by way of Ildira.” She took a step closer to the throne. “Just say the word, and we’ll take the war to the Shana Rei.”
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