'Nothing! Edeard said breathlessly. An explosion of pure joy inside his head threatened to overwhelm him. 'Everything! I did it! I'm here. It's real. You're real. And you're all alive.
Dinlay let out an exasperated sigh. 'What is the matter with you? He squinted into his boot. 'Ah ha! His third hand scraped out the remains of a utog beetle. He gave Macsen a suspicious glance.
'Edeard? Topar asked cautiously.
'It's fine, Edeard held up a hand in reassurance, then laughed. He was feeling giddy now. The world was whirling round unsteadily. He sat down hard. 'No, wait. He held up his hands, fingers out to count. 'The ambush is in two days' time. Er… then another day and a half to ride back. Ladydamnit, if I start now I might not make it. I've got to go further back.
Dinlay shoved his foot into the boot and walked over. 'Bad dream?
Edeard grinned. 'The worst there has ever been.
'Ah. Would you like some tea? You've still got some of those linen packets left, Dinlay added hopefully.
'No. Edeard stood up fast. Before Dinlay knew what was happening, Edeard kissed him.
'Fuck the Lady, Dinlay exclaimed, juddering back out of reach.
Edeard laughed delightedly. 'I can't stay. I'm sorry. But by the Lady it is so good to see you all alive again. And the girls, our wives. Macsen, you're going to be a father. I promise. I swear on the Lady herself.
'What in Honious did you drink last night? Macsen demanded.
'I drank… I drank everything there is to drink.
'I think you'd better sit down, Topar said levelly.
'No time, Edeard said, enjoying how manic he must be appearing to the others. 'Well, actually, that's not true. He giggled. 'Do you remember the first day on the road. His fingers clicked urgently. 'We stopped and made camp just outside that farm. Oh, where was it?
'Stibbington, Dinlay grunted.
'That's right. That's the place, and it's in time. Plenty of time. Barely a day's gallop back from there. Macsen, do you remember, you were so saddle sore you claimed you couldn't walk.
'I remember.
'Yeah, me too. Edeard reached for the moment—
Justine: Year Four
Dreaming still. Mellow images of her true love. His scent. His laughter. His pleasure. Those two days kept stretching out and out—
Justine sat up in the medical chamber and glanced round the Silverbird's cabin. Everything was exactly the same as when she went in to suspension. No alarms sounding this time. They'd reached the star system, and the starship's log reported a thoroughly uneventful voyage. The Silverbird was already decelerating.
She swung her legs out, wincing at the stiffness in her limbs. Neck muscles were knotted and tight. What she needed was a good massage. Maybe at the Hulluba resort on Fasal Island. Yes, she could certainly picture herself lying on a bed on the spa veranda, overlooking the white beaches and absurdly clear turquoise water. The spa had some very handsome masseur, talented fit young men who knew how to kneed her muscles and tendons into complete submission. Very handsome. And the drinks they served in long glasses full of crushed ice, with exotic fruits — delicious. Hot blue-white star a pinprick of intense light atop the indigo sky. Handsome and eager.
Lordie, this is what dreaming about those two days does to me. Hulluba was a thousand years ago.
Justine sighed in regret and her third hand pulled a robe out of the replicator module. The culinary unit produced a big glass of carrot juice with vitamin supplements. It brought a grimace to her face as she dutifully swallowed it all down.
Maybe there'll be some beaches on a planet here somewhere.
She sat on the floor and started stretching exercises. Already she was looking forward to a very hot shower with powerful jets, a forcefully applied heat that would rid her neck of those abysmal kinks.
'What have we got outside? she asked the smartcore.
The star appeared in her exovision. Justine frowned. 'I know this. It was the star system which was projected on to the ceiling of the Orchard Palace's Upper Council chamber. A copper star that shone warmly at the centre of an accretion disc. Comets with moon-sized nuclei prowled the outer edges of the disc in high-inclination orbits, their tails streaming out for millions of kilometres, fluorescing a glorious scarlet. But what she was seeing outside now was older, the accretion disc had thinned out from the time of Edeard's tenure. Nine distinct bands had formed within it, each one shepherded by dense curlicues of asteroids as proto-planets started to congeal. The tails of the fireball comets were smaller, less volatile than before. Long braids of white vapour corrupted their once-pure scarlet efflux.
Translucent data displays overlaid the astronomy image. Justine's secondary thought routines sampled the information, compiling summaries, and her focus immediately shifted to a tiny white crescent that circled the tenuous rim of the disc. 'No way! It was an H-congruent planet.
The Silverbird was still seven AUs out from the star. It gave her plenty of time to observe the planet as they approached. In the real universe outside the Void it wouldn't exist. Even if the accretion disc had produced an amalgamation of rock and minerals that built up to planet-size there wouldn't have been time for life to evolve. The Silverbird's spectral analysis filters identified water and chlorophyll, along with a lot of nitrogen in the atmosphere. Wherever the world had come from, it had oceans and recognisable plant-life covering the landmasses.
One AU out. It was small for a H-congruent planet; Mars-size. The atmosphere was thick, at the surface it would be a standard pressure. Temperature was typical. A magnetic field warped solar wind into characteristic Van Allen belts around it. There were no electromagnetic emissions. But she kept checking for that the whole way in.
An implausible world in an impossible place. Only in the Void. She knew full well the amount of mass energy the boundary had consumed during that short dreadful expansion phase was enough to create a thousand solar systems, let alone one small planet. I shouldn't be surprised at anything here. Edeard only scratched the surface of the Void's potential, as Living Dream keep emphasising.
Ten million kilometres out, and the Silverbird was decelerating at five gees, shedding the last of the colossal velocity that had carried her across three lightyears. Five gees was the best it could reliably maintain. The glitches were back with a vengeance. Sensor degradation was acute on some of the higher-function scans. But simple optical lenses were showing continents and ice caps. Whorl patterns in the clouds were becoming apparent. She saw one hurricane that was somehow splitting in two as it hit the coast, its leading edge separating as if a knife was cutting it. A very big knife. The phenomena triggered some uncertainty deep in her subconscious — an ancient memory that struggled to resolve. What cuts a storm in half?
Then she had more to worry about as cabin gravity started to fluctuate. Secondary systems were dropping out as fluctuations beset the power network. Back-up supplies didn't always compensate properly. She ordered the cabin to return to a neutral status, retracting everything except for her acceleration couch. At least her biononics remained fully functional. She activated her integral force field as the Silverbird flew across the remaining million kilometres. Ahead of her, the planet's upper atmosphere sparked constantly with contrails as meteorites from the fringe of the accretion disc impacted on the ionosphere. The Silverbird's force fields reported a build up of micro-particle strikes. Dust density outside was thickening rapidly.
Justine went and put her armour suit on.
Ingrav efficiency was twenty per cent down, and becoming erratic. Justine had already abandoned any idea of breaking into orbit. They were going to have to head for a direct landing. Hopefully the regrav drives would kick in once they were inside the planet's gravity field. Judging by the way the rest of the systems were behaving she wasn't placing any bets.
A thousand kilometres above the ionosphere and the smart-core began shutting down peripheral routines in order to concentrate on core functions. The ship curved round the bulk of the planet. Regra
v was becoming active — just. They would make it down okay. Probably.
That was when the three gigantic rocky cones sticking up through the atmosphere slipped into view. Silverbird was heading straight for them, trajectory projections giving their landing site just beyond.
Shock set in as she focused the cameras on the astonishingly familiar profile of the three volcanoes. 'You have got to be fucking kidding me, she said out loud.
The Silverbird was approaching near-perfect replicas of Far Away's Grand Triad at mach thirty. She fought to quash her surprise. It can happen. Here in the Void, it can happen.
Terminating a voyage three lightyears long at the exact point corresponding to her hyperglider landing twelve hundred years ago was not random chance. It was purpose.
The dream. Oh my God, the dream.
Which left a possibility that was almost too much to contemplate.
No. That cannot happen.
The Silverbird hit the atmosphere. Tenuous air molecules screamed as it hurtled downwards, soaring round the side of the tallest volcano with its flat summit and dead twin calderas. Churning superheated air blazed in the starship's wake. Regrav units applied what force they could muster.
Acceleration pushed Justine down into the couch. Her chest was compressed as her weight quadrupled. Biononics reinforced her body, enabling her to breathe normally. The regrav wouldn't alter the starship's vector. Her landing point was predetermined.
Ordained?
The Silverbird plunged down through a light cirrus layer, its speed dropping to subsonic. The volcano's mid-slopes were beneath her, rocky crags and cliffs strewn with patches of lichen and moss, streaked with snow. Then she was flying over the volcano's upper meadows, undulating grassland that formed a wide verdant belt just above the treeline. Icy waterfalls tumbled down rocky outcrops, birthing a lacework of silver streams.
Another mind impinged on the starship's gaiafield. The person's thoughts curious and enthusiastic.
'Oh no. No no no. He can't be here. You can't do this to me.
A long glade opened up in the forest below. Silverbird descended fast. Its landing struts bulged out of the fuselage. Justine gritted her teeth. The bump wasn't too bad. The cabin shook and a crunching sound tremored through the superstructure. Gravity fell below a standard one gee. Some of the ship status icons turned amber briefly, then flicked back to green. Whole sections faded to neutral as the drive units ceased to operate. The starship wasn't going to be flying anywhere soon.
But she was down, and intact. That was something.
The mind was still there; waiting with a hint of impatience. She was sensing its emotional state directly through farsight rather than via her gaiamotes. Presumably then, he could sense her thoughts.
Justine took her time removing her armour suit. After all, she didn't want to frighten him and it would look fearsome to anyone unfamiliar with Greater Commonwealth technology. She unwound an emergency rope ladder from the airlock, not trusting the gravity manipulation function to lower her down. When she started down she realized the beige one-piece she'd put on was remarkably similar to the leathery grey-blue flightsuit she'd worn in the hyperglider. Only the helmet was missing.
'Didn't get that right, did you? she mocked the Void.
The rope ladder swung about alarmingly as she neared the bottom, Its pendulum motion sending her swaying over the grassy ground. She jumped the last two rungs.
Gravity was low, just like Far Away. The scent of pine trees was strong in the humid air. Her farsight swept out, producing a mildly disorientating effect. Then she began to interpret the foggy shapes, correlating them to what her eyes could see. Besides, her biononic field scan function was working unimpaired, providing solid interpretations of the surrounding landscape.
He was standing ten yards away, waiting courteously for her to notice him. Justine turned round very slowly, still half believing she'd open her eyes to see the Silverbird's cabin around her as she rose from suspension. But no, it was real. He was real.
Justine smiled, too numb for any emotion to triumph. 'Hello, Kazimir, she said.
His face was perfect, healthy dark skin and shining white teeth in lips that could smile so wide; rich black hair tied back with a red band. As were the clothes, a leather waistcoat open to show off a nicely muscled torso, and his McFoster clan's emerald and copper check kilt. He even carried the correct small backpack.
'You know me? he asked.
The voice was right, too. But then it should be, he was her creation after all. Her smile shifted from welcome to sympathy. 'I'm aware of who you think you are. That's my fault.
He frowned. 'Are you all right? Your craft came down fast…
Finally, she laughed. That concern was so Kazimir. 'A little shaken up, that's all. My name is Justine, by the way.
'I'm pleased to meet you, Justine. Is that really a spaceship?
'It really is.
* * * * *
Justine couldn't be cruel, that was the hardest part. She couldn't just tell him to go away, or ignore him. That would have been so much easier for her. But he was a seventeen year old human being with feelings; just like everyone else he never asked to be born—no matter the strange nature of his birth. He deserved to be treated with consideration and respect.
Curiously, he had no clear recollections of where he came from.
They sat beside a stream that gurgled along the side of the clearing. Both weary of the other, yet he was powerfully attracted to her, and not just physically, she could sense that.
'I am on my groundwalk, he told her when she asked where he'd come from.
'To prove you can survive out here by yourself, she said, recalling this very same conversation from so long ago. 'Once you return to your clan you can become a fully fledged warrior and fight the Starflyer.
'You know of the Starflyer?
'Kazimir, I know this must be hard to believe, but the Commonwealth defeated the Starflyer a very long time ago. You're not who you think you are.
He grinned delightedly. 'Then who am I?
'You are a dream I had. This place makes you real.
His face produced a thrilled expression while his mind registered a brisk amusement. 'What are you saying, that I have died and this place is the Dreaming Heavens?
'Oh my God! Justine stared at him in complete astonishment. 'I'd forgotten that part of the Guardians' ideology. Well, consciously, anyway.
'So are you my spirit guide? You are what I imagine an angel would look like.
'You called me that before, she said quietly.
'I did what?
'You used to call me your angel.
'Back when we were alive? His mind was starting to show uncertainty — a joke wearing thin.
Justine cursed her stupid old biological body for its crippling emotional weakness. 'You are alive. Again. It's complicated.
'You thought I was dead?
I watched you die. 'Tell me where you were before you started your groundwalk? Who your friends are? What did you spend last year doing? In fact, what were you doing this time yesterday?
'I… His thoughts churned desperately. 'It is difficult. I don't remember much. No wait, Bruce! Bruce is my friend.
'Kazimir, I'm sorry. Bruce was the one who killed you.
He recoiled. 'This is the Dreaming Heavens!
'I suppose in a manner of speaking, yes it is.
'Bruce would never kill me.
'He was captured by the Starflyer, who turned him against the Guardians of Selfhood. He became their agent.
'Not Bruce.
'Not the Bruce who was your friend, the Starflyer destroyed that part of him. Kazimir, you don't have any memories of your past because I don't know it, not as fully as I should do, not the details. We didn't spend enough time together to talk of such things in depth. The time we did have was too precious. I always regretted that, I'm so sorry. She looked away, trying to get her emotions under control. This is so painful. I don't have to put myself through thi
s. I should just walk away. Then she glanced at him, seeing the hurt and confusion on his face, and she knew she couldn't do that to him, not her Kazimir, not even a shadow of him.
He reached out tentatively, fingers touching her shoulder, as if he was the one who should be offering comfort. 'We were… together?
'Yes, Kazimir. We were lovers.
A wide smile split his youthful face, and the universe wasn't so bad after all.
'I'm doing this really badly, she confessed. 'I wish I could be gentler to you.
'So I am what you dream of?
'Yes.
His smile was triumphant now. 'I am glad you dream of me. I am glad I am here for you.
Oh no. We're not going down that wad. It's not… right. 'I'm glad you're here, too; but I have a duty to perform.
Kazimir nodded seriously. 'What duty?
She pulled a face. 'Save the galaxy.
'How?
'Don't know, actually. Where we are, this place, it's wrong. I have to get to… whoever's in charge, try and convince them to stop their expansion. I'm sorry if that doesn't make much sense.
Kazimir's gaze turned to the Silverbird; there was a flash of longing in his mind. 'Will we fly there in your spaceship?
The first drops of rain began to fall out of the darkening sky as the stormhead found its way round the volcano. 'I'd like to, but I need to figure out how to make it fly again. And I don't know where the nucleus is or how to get there.
'Oh. His disappointment was tangible, shining through a weakly shielded mind.
Justine grinned. 'Would you like to look inside?
'Yes please!
He shot up the rope ladder with ease. But then, Justine recalled, Kazimir had always been very agile. That would account for why her own heart was racing as she clambered up after him. The airlock was small with the two of them in it. She told the smartcore to open the inner door, and led the way up the narrow companionway into the cabin.
Kazimir tried to be polite as he stared round the circular compartment, but he clearly wasn't adept at shielding his thoughts. Fortunately, she recalled several techniques Edeard had employed in Inigo's dreams.
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