by T. R. Harris
“Yes, Master. I will begin immediately setting up the scenario.”
“And Morlon?” The cold intensity in the voice of the Grand Master made Morlon freeze. “There have been far too many miscalculations with the Humans. And now you are lighting the path for them to our most important facility. I only hope you take the proper precautions, because if you fail, I will not be able to protect you from the consequences.”
Morlon stared back at his leader. He wasn’t afraid, only insulted that his skills were being questioned. “I understand, Master. But if I fail, my fate will be deserved.”
“Remember that, Morlon…if that time ever comes.”
Chapter 11
“It does not go in that way!” Jym exclaimed. “The ports face to the side and connect with these attachments.”
Copernicus shook his head. “You don’t know what these ports are for, so how can you know?”
“It makes sense. These are transmission lines. They must be connected to a reference device.”
“I really wish the two of you would stop arguing,” Adam said. Jym and Copernicus were stuck in an opening under the nav console trying to install the computer they’d gotten from Kies. It barely fit under the station, and the connectors had to be cut and replaced to mate with those of the Najmah Fayd. Adam knew both of his friends were wrong; neither knew what the connections did until they were hooked up, which was turning out to be into an agonizingly long process.
“With all your mutant genius, we could really use some help,” Copernicus barked.
The barrage of mutant-this and mutant-that had been non-stop since the Najmah Fayd jumped into space after leaving Bancc-Bin. They hopped six light-years away, and since then had been cruising along on standard gravity drive. Sherri was at the comm station doing her best to bring in local broadcasts, searching for any word about their escape or the region-wide search underway for the trans-dimensional starship. As was always the case, acquiring the advanced technology of the Najmah Fayd had taken precedence over the capture of the crew, and somewhere in the vastness of space, hundreds of enemy ships were on the hunt.
Adam had scanned the data manuals for the nav system aboard the ship, learning all the intricate details of how it worked. His mutant abilities helped, and now he had superior recall of the details. That’s why he was just about to take over the install process, rather than let Jym and Copernicus continued to screw things up.
“Jym’s right, Coop,” he said. “The unit follows a logical in-out configuration. But, Jym, the ports on that side are for the input, not the output. Flip it around. Try that and see if it lights up.”
“But that….” Jym studied the three-foot-square box. “Oh, I see. Yes, let us try that, Copernicus.”
“You mean he’s right?”
“Possibly,” Jym scowled. “He will be even more insufferable than before if this works.”
A moment later, the lights on the module flashed on and the screen embedded above the nav console came to life.
“See,” Adam said with pride.
“You scare me, Cain,” Copernicus said, no humor in voice.
Adam slapped him on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, Coop, I scare myself sometimes too.”
Jym and Copernicus extricated themselves from under the console, with Jym slipping into the main seat to begin working his magic. Jym had been raised in spaceships, having accompanied his mechanic birth-father on his assignments, beginning at seven years of age—in Fulquin years. He took to the intricacies of starship systems with uncanny skill, and his small size allowed him to move within the tight confines with ease. Now his stubby, fur-covered fingers danced over the input board, searching data files for the information he needed. Within seconds he was able to bring up a schematic of the major star systems for this section of the Andromeda galaxy.
“There it is—Nuor,” he announced proudly. All the crew gathered around. Jym punched a few more buttons and a distance measurement appeared on the screen: five thousand six light-years from their present location. Within an area of competing gravity sources, the Najmah Fayd was restricted to TD jumps of about six hundred light-years at a time. With recharge times, they could be there in less than a day.
And then what?
Adam leaned back against the command chair. “Anything about the location of the transit points for the LP stations?”
“Not on here,” Jym said. “That is not something I would assume to be public knowledge.”
Riyad cleared his throat. “Adam, you once proposed to wring the information out of some high-ranking Nuorean,” he pointed out. “Is that still an option? Please say it’s still an option.”
Adam laughed. “That’s always an option, if not for information, then for sport. A guy has to have his hobbies.”
“There’s a lot of broadcast chatter,” Sherri said. “It’s a jumble, but we may be able to pick up something.”
“Again, I do not believe they would be speaking publicly about this subject,” Jym reiterated.
Kaylor raised a hand for attention. “The transit zones we are looking for are old and well-established, and as pointed out before, stationary. The LP-6 transit zones keep changing, as the Nuorean switch the landing points in our galaxy. But the others are more like roadways to distant stations that must be serviced on a continual basis. And with no apparent enemies in their galaxy, the Nuoreans would see no need to keep these locations secret.”
Jym grunted. He hated to be contradicted, even by his oldest friend.
“Sherri, have the comm record all the chatter,” Adam ordered. “Then set up an algorithm to search for any references to LP stations, transit points, zones—or whatever they call them. Hopefully something will show up.”
Sherri stared at him with her wide, blue eyes. “And exactly how do I do that? I’m not a computer expert, but I assume you are…now.”
Jym placed a furry hand on Sherri’s arm. “It is not that difficult, really. I will assist you.”
Adam smiled back at Sherri. “See, even Jym can do it.”
That last statement didn’t go over very well with his little furry friend.
********
“We should not go much closer until we have a better idea where we are going,” Kaylor said over his shoulder to Adam sitting in the command chair. “Traffic is building. I suggest we remain hidden here until…well, until it is time not to stay hidden.”
“Good idea,” Adam said wryly.
The team had taken a leisurely tack on their way to Nuor, yet were frustrated at the lack of progress in identifying any of the elusive transit zones. Only Jym seemed pleased with the outcome; it would prove he’d been right all along. Now they were only four hundred light-years from the Nuorean homeworld, cloistered in a violent triple star system that looked ready to blow at any moment. They’d chosen the location because most of the other space traffic in the area was avoiding the system like the plague. Kaylor kept the trans-dimensional jump batteries charged and ready, with his finger never too far from the launch button—just in case the locals knew something he didn’t.
“All this electromagnetic interference isn’t helping with the comm chatter,” Sherri griped. “We’re closer to Nuor but only receiving about…. Wait!”
Her comm screen had just begun displaying streams of Nuorean writing. She slapped the console with her right hand. “Dammit Jym, did you set this thing to display notices in Nuorean?”
Jym scurried over to her. “I apologize. I did not set a preference. This must be a default, displaying in the native language.”
“That’s okay,” Adam said as he lifted out of his chair and went to Sherri’s station.
She looked up at him with utter disgust. “Don’t tell me you can read Nuorean now? This is getting ridiculous.”
Adam dismissed her sarcasm as just one more case of mutant-envy. For days now, most—make that all—of the crew had been experiencing the illness to one degree or another. He wished he could share the wealth, but he only had a limited
number of mutant brain cells…and he was keeping all those for himself.
“I tapped into the translation program a few days ago. Let me take a look.”
Station chairs were affixed to a sliding rail in the deck. Sherri pushed her chair to the side but didn’t surrender it to Adam. She would make him stand as he read the message.
Adam pursed his lips and furrowed his brow, while placing his right hand on his chin in ‘Thinker-like’ fashion. “Well, let’s see. Uh-huh, very good. Yes, definitely,” he mumbled as he read.
“You pompous ass,” Sherri grumbled.
“Now children, let’s not get personal.” He stood up straight to make his report. “Multiple references to LP transit zones, announcing some kind of anniversary celebration commemorating the date of the initial completion of LP-1.”
“Does it say where, and any mention of LP-5?” Riyad asked.
“It mentions LP-5, but no specific location. It seems this should be common knowledge to all who are interested.”
“Look! I have something on the nav board!” Jym yelled, prompting a wholesale shift in the crew across the bridge to where the tiny bear sat. Jym pointed. “See these faint red spots, they were not there before.”
Jym was indicating five slowly pulsating dots, all in a line and radiating out from Nuor. “These are transmission beacons, now activated. As I said, they had not been active before.”
“They turned them on to show their people where the celebrations will be held?” Kaylor asked.
“Or they turned them on to let us know where they are,” Copernicus suggested.
“It does seem a little coincidental,” Adam said. “The Nuoreans are master strategists. They probably figured out our endgame the moment we showed up in Andromeda.”
“Now they’re inviting us to take a run at LP-5,” Riyad said.
“Why would they do that?” Jym asked.
“Because they’ve been stymied at every attempt to find the Najmah Fayd, so why not set a trap and see who walks in?”
“They would do this only if they believe their plan will succeed,” Riyad added. “Otherwise they’re opening up the front door for us. They’re not that stupid, but they expect us to be.”
Adam studied the screen for a moment. The dots were in a line, but which one was LP-5? He considered how the build-out would have progressed. Once the smaller, hopscotch stations were built, they would be essentially shut down as new ones came online. The last one—the one servicing LP-6 and the link with the Milky Way—would be the second most-important station and the one getting the most standard traffic, tasked with keeping the midpoint generators maintained and the station manned. It would make sense from a long-range perspective that this last station would be the closest to the main population center and supply lines. He focused his attention on the dot closest to Nuor. It was actually within the system, placed between two of the ubiquitous gas giants nearly all systems had.
There was a conspicuous silence on the bridge, as everyone waited for Adam to speak. When he did, it was accompanied with a thin smile.
“If they’re going to roll out the red carpet, I say we don’t let them down.”
“It’s a trap, Adam,” Sherri said with sarcasm.
“Of course it is. But I say we accept their invitation, just not on their time schedule. The report said the celebration is to take place in four days. I suggest we hang out here for eight. Then when we don’t show up on time, they’ll start to doubt their plan. Security will relax as alternative strategies are worked up. Then we show up. Surprise!”
Sherri looked out the forward viewport. “That might work…if this damn system doesn’t blow itself apart within that time.”
“Don’t sweat it,” Adam said. “Kaylor, work up an alternative jump site, just in case we have to bolt from here.”
“Already plotted.”
“Good man—or I mean Belsonian.”
“I know what you meant.”
Chapter 12
The home star of the Nuorean system was called Or, and the native word for two—or a pair—was nu. Located on the second planet from Or, the homeworld of the race became known as Nuor—Second from Or.
The Nuoreans had advanced basically to the stage of the ancient Romans when the aliens arrived, yet a thousand years before, they had taken a different path to building the culture that would one day dominate a galaxy. The Nuoreans had developed a society where combat was the accepted means of advancement, as well as achieving wealth and possessions. Yet in those early days, nearly all challenges were to the death. That changed when the aliens arrived.
The Nuoreans received star-travel—along with most of their other advanced technology—like most other races: They got it from others. The Juireans took theirs from the Klin; Humans, from everyone else. In those ancient days, the Nuoreans didn’t have much to contribute to galactic society; however, the arrival of the aliens on Nuor changed the race dramatically.
They continued to hold their gladiator games, yet in light of their new-found place in the universe, the Nuoreans began to value their own kind more, at least enough to stop the wholesale slaughter in the arenas. They retained the tradition of combat to attain wealth and status, but they made these contests more ritualized rather than lethal. An injury of a significant degree was enough to call the match and declare a victor. This way the race maintained their fighting skills as their population grew.
When the inevitable wars began with their galactic neighbors, the Nuoreans had neither superior technology nor weapons. What they did have were superior gaming skills. These initial clashes—three thousand years ago—were hardly contests. Every move the aliens made, the Nuoreans were already one or two steps ahead. Soon, the natives of Nuor had expanded their reach across half the rim, with no alien species able to stand against them.
But still they felt the bloodlust for combat to the death.
Having conquered hundreds of worlds, the Nuoreans began staging contests against the most-worthy aliens. Fighting other Nuoreans was a predictable endeavor; they had all been trained in the same techniques, almost from birth, so the challenge was limited. With the aliens, however, it was a whole new game. They fought unconventionally and with enthusiasm, especially after the Nuoreans introduced the concept of immunity challenges. It became a matter of life or death for the aliens, with nothing in between, which only made them fight harder.
The Nuoreans reveled in this new opportunity to hone their skills and achieve fame. Yet the aliens had no possessions the Nuoreans wanted. So instead of wealth transfer, these contests ended with the awarding of immunity points, which could be used to shield native combatants from loss of their own wealth, at least to a degree, depending on the challenge factor of the opponent. This new system flourished, and at the height of Nuorean power and influence, over five million immunity challenges were fought every day on a variety of worlds.
It must also be noted that the Nuorean claim of having killed off all the advanced races in the Andromeda Galaxy was an exaggeration. A billion years before, the interior of the huge galaxy had suffered a collision with a smaller galaxy, turning that region into a living Hell for space travel. What species had been there were wiped out, and the deadly conditions made any new attempts for life to gain a foothold almost impossible.
The surviving species developed along the rim of the galaxy.
And not every race—advanced or not—became the target of the Nuorean’s alien games. In fact, over eighty percent of advanced life along the rim was considered not worthy of combat, while less than one percent were classified Jundac, and too dangerous to fight.
The Nuoreans focused only on the most-challenging races, and primarily the combat-aged males. Children, females and the aged were spared. Yet when most of the able-bodied males of a world are taken away to be killed, societies tend to suffer. In the early days, the Nuoreans didn’t care—there were still hundreds of worlds to draw from. But when the truly competitive races began to grow fewer in number, th
e Nuoreans began a program of population management. This worked to a point, yet the Nuoreans still longed for the halcyon days of near-unlimited immunity races and the subsequent contests. Immunity challenges allowed for more aggressive ambition among the Nuoreans and faster advancement up the ladder.
The Kac was their answer.
The Nuoreans discovered the means to travel between galaxies quite by accident. While experimenting with a dual-singularity space drive, the Cadre One scientists noticed how when the two blackholes interacted, they produced their most-prominent gravity effects along a straight line, rather than in a sphere. By building generators in pairs, the Nuoreans were able to create series of matching blackholes that would fight to join up, elongating the structure and confining their influence to what could be best described as gravity tunnels—hundreds, then thousands and finally millions of light-years long.
This breakthrough wasn’t for normal space travel, however, since the massive generators required had to be stationary to work properly. But the opportunity to enter a narrow gravity well at one end…and reappear thousands of light-years away at the other, was revolutionary.
The only drawback to the new technology was that it couldn’t be used near any competing gravity sources. This was the same as with traditional gravity drives. The theoretical top-end for a standard grav-drive could never be reached within a galaxy. Only in the great void between the star islands could truly impressive speeds be attained—and the true reach of the dual-singularity device realized.
For thousands of years, not only the Nuoreans, but most of the advanced races in Andromeda, had studied the Milky Way—the Kac in the Nuorean language. Here was a smaller galaxy, yet free of the convoluted mess that was the interior of their own. The players of Nuor could imagine the opportunity for more and challenging immunity contests in the Kac—if they could figure a way to get there.
Their new gravity technology—designated Launch Points, or LP’s—would give them that access. It would open up a new era in the history of the Nuoreans, while some even suggested moving their entire race to the Kac. That idea had never caught on, but plans to invade their neighboring galaxy were begun in earnest.
