"So you knew Cliff Hawk was creating a rogue?" Quamodian leaned forward to search the Reefer's lax and bloodless face.
'Two rogues, Quamodian. The first got away." He grinned with a spasm of pain. "Looks like the other one did too!"
"I see," whispered Andy Quam, staring up at the angry aurora. "The first one entered our sun. Now it's rogue too!"
The Reefer shrugged.
Clothilde Kwai Kwich cried, "Monitor Quamodian! This must be reported at once. Since our citizens are not in contact with Almalik, we must return immediately to Wisdom Creek and report via the transflex station there."
"It's been reported already," said Andy Quam.
"Impossible! How could it be? We just found out ..."
"By Rufe's parents. They knew about it, didn't they?" The boy nodded, looking pleased and excited. "And they've gone to Nuevo York to pass the word along."
The Reefer scratched his ribs cautiously, winced and groaned. "So that's about it, right? Now bow about taking me in to Wisdom Creek?"
"Not just yet," said Andy Quam, deadly quiet. "One more question. What about Molly Zaldivar?"
'That witless little thing! She ruined Cliff Hawk. In love with her, he was; she tried to stop him, and messed everything up."
He gasped and leaned forward, clutching his chest. "But I don't know where she is now, Quamodian," he moaned. "Please! Isn't that enough? Won't you take me in before this thing kills me?"
On the way to Wisdom Creek Andy Quam used the flyer's circuits to contact the control dome for priorities. "Thirty-minute delay on all messages, Monitor Quamodian," said the dome. "I will inform you when your circuits can be cleared."
Grim-lipped, Andy Quam ordered the flyer to the Star-church. Now that he knew what was wrong with the sun his responsibility was at an end. Almalik would cope with the problem—somehow—or Almalik would fail; Quamodian didn't care. At that moment the only thing on his mind was Molly Zaldivar, stolen into space by the rogue and doomed to early death by the lethal rays of the old power source in the cavern. As for the Reefer, Quamodian didn't care in the slightest whether he lived or died.
Yet there was a sort of grandeur in what happened at the Starchurch. They were greeted by the new robot inspector, his egg-shaped black body bobbing with excitement at the presence of so many illustrious visitors. Even though this was not a Starday, a circle of the saved were kneeling on that wide floor beneath the imaged suns of Almalik, and Quamodian and Monitor Clothilde Kwai Kwich led the procession that brought the limping, sullen figure of the Reefer to the Visitants. Behind him the carnivorous citizen, the green spiral citizen and the cloud brought up the rear.
The kneeling worshippers chanted their praises of Almalik. Then Juan Zaldivar stood up to ask the Reefer the statutory question—if he understood the nature of symbiotic life; if he had chosen of his own free will to acceptthe fusorian symbiotes in his body, blood, brain and bone; if he understood that this choice was made forever.
To each question, the Reefer croaked, "I do."
He knelt, and the inhabited saved ones knelt with him, their golden brands glowing in the gloom. They chanted again, then- voices rolling solemnly against the mighty dome that held the thirteen suns of Almalik.
The Reefer gasped a sudden protesting cry.
He rose half to his feet, turned with a sudden look of wild alarm, then pitched forward on his damaged arm.
Quamodian heard a sharp, hissing crackle. Fine golden sparks were dancing up from the glowing marks on the bodies and faces of the saved ones, floating delicately toward the prone body of the Reefer. They flew together, gathering into a tiny cloud of golden fire that hovered over him.
The yellow fireball sank hissing into his skin.
An arm of it darted around his body, touched his cheek, retreated to rejoin the rest. The air was suddenly heavy with the sweet reek of the Visitants.
The Reefer's moans subsided.
Then the chanting ended. He stirred, opened his eyes, stood up easily and came to shake Andeas Quamodian's hand.
"Thanks, friend," his great voice boomed. A serene and gentle smile had fallen over his scarred ferocious face. The star of the Visitants now glowed faintly above his ragged beard. "All my pain is gone."
Juan Zaldivar came to take his hand. "You are saved now. You'll feel no pain again," he said solemnly.
The control dome had been in touch with Almalik. But there were difficulties. Quamodian blazed, "What difficulties? I must communicate with Almalik at once—go there as soon as possible!"
"Regret," sang the control dome sweetly. "It is a matter of priorities."
"That's what I demand, emergency priority!"
"But Monitor Quamodian," sang the control dome, "when you arrived yesterday you stated the emergency was here."
"It was here. Now I have new facts! I expect a most serious danger to the suns of Almalik!"
Clothilde Kwai Kwich whispered, "Andy, may I speak to him? Perhaps he will listen—" But Quamodian froze her with a glare. She subsided without comment. She had become a softer, more feminine person since the visit to the cave, the discovery that Andy Quam's fears were not groundless.
"State these facts," the monitor rapped out melodiously.
"They are already available to Almalik," said Quamodian. "They exist in the mind of a man called the Reefer who has just received the Visitants. I wish to be on hand among the stars of Almalik, to assist with the interpretation and use of this new information."
He did not add his more urgent private reason; it would have been of no use, since it was not the sort of thing that would influence the control dome's transcience patterns. But he clung to a wild, despairing hope that Molly Zaldivar might appear with her captor, somewhere about the multiple suns of Almalik. If she did, Quamodian wanted to be there.
"Moment," sang the monitor dome. Andy Quam shifted uneasily in the seat of the flyer.
Clothilde Kwai Kwich frowned thoughtfully. "We have priorities," she stated, as if to no one.
"What about it?" Quam demanded.
"Nothing, Andy. Except that the rest of us can go to Almalik at once and plead your cause."
"Agree," chanted the chorus of the grass-green spirals. "Impatient. Urgent. Suggest no delay."
And the cloud citizen sighed, "There exist great forces deployed against Almalik. It is necessary to prepare immediately."
Quamodian said stubbornly, "Do what you like. I am going anyway."
Clothilde looked at him doubtfully, but said nothing. She was saved the need to, anyway; the control dome spoke in all their ears, through the little communicator plugs:
"Monitor Quamodian, your request is denied, Senior Monitor Kwai Kwich, your priorities, and those of your party, are withdrawn. There can be no travel to that destination now."
The news struck them all with consternation. The green spirals whirled furiously in their interlocking orbits, their collective thoughts a babel of whispered fear and excitement, just below the threshold of comprehensibility for the others. The predator citizen whined mournfully and edged closer to the boy, Rufe, who stared wide-eyed at Andy Quam. The pinkly glowing cloud citizen whispered somber predictions about the disasters that lay ahead, and Clothilde Kwai Kwich's hand crept out, unnoticed, to lake the hand of Andy Quam.
"Why?" he demanded furiously. "We are monitors! We cannot be denied priority rights!"
"All priorities are withdrawn," said the control dome somberly. "Our headquarters report anomalous astronomical phenomena among the planets and multiple suns of Almalik. Robot inspector, please clarify."
Unnoticed, the black egg-shaped form of the robot had drifted across the square toward them. Its oval sensor was cool and bright and blank. Its high voice hummed: "That is correct, Monitor Quamodian. The outer planet of Almalik Thirteen has suddenly stopped in its orbit. It is moving on a collision course toward its primary at many times the normal acceleration of gravity."
Quamodian's eyes narrowed. His mind whirled with chaotic flashes of forebodin
g. Molly was there! He was certain of it now, and certain that he must get to her. "Not surprising!" he barked, surprising himself. "That is precisely what I hoped to prevent! I must get there at once to limit the damage, avoid it if I still can."
"Impossible, Monitor Quamodian," the robot whirred. "The collision of the anomalous planet with Almalik Thirteen is expected to occur within a few hours. All transflex facilities are in use for the evacuation of the threatened planets. Even so, they are inadequate. Only a fraction of the population can be saved. Under these circumstances, no incoming travel is permitted."
Clothilde Kwai Kwich gasped. The predator citizen lifted his snout and emitted a long, mourning howl.
Quamodian stammered, "But—but I must go there! To help! It is still possible to do something ..."
The robot did not respond. Its bright black case hung motionless.
Rule whispered fearfully, "Preacher, what's the matter? Is it dead?"
Quamodian shook his head, staring. The robot's plasma sensor flickered, darkened, went out. Three thick black effector whips slid out of its body shell and dangled limply below it, brushing the dusty pavement of the square.
"Robot Inspector?" Quamodian called querulously. Beside him the girl whispered, "There's something terribly wrong! It's out of communication entirely."
But abruptly the effectors snapped back into the case. The sensor glowed again.
"We have received a further instruction from headquarters," it hummed. "The information states that a powerful rogue invader has destroyed the native intellects in two of the suns of Almalik. The invader has established its own transcience patterns in these suns, and it is now attacking the planets of Almalik Thirteen."
Quamodian caught a sudden, rasping breath.
"Cal Cygnus!" he demanded.
"Sacred Almalik, spokesman star of Cygnus, is calling here," the robot's high whine interrupted him. "Your transflex travel priority has been approved. You and your party may depart from the Wisdom Creek transflex station at once."
Chapter 25
Light-millennia away, the rogue's consciousness grew and sharpened in the heat of a cosmic fury. The huge sentience of stripped electrons and plasma soliloquized to itself like a stellar Hamlet:
My seas boil dry ... my magma bleeds from glowing wounds ... my core itself is shattered by those savage plasma spears . , . still I hurl myself toward the great white sun ahead ...
The inner planets of the sun spread wider in their orbits as it approached. They began flashing backward past it; it was hours only now until they, and all the space about, would be dissolved in the blazing debris of the sun the rogue was about to destroy. And still the sun did not resist.
Swelling vast ahead of the rogue, it lay serenely white, beautiful and quiet, undisturbed by the rogue's attack.
By now the rogue was ancient and mature—in its own terms at least; it had existed and learned through billions of cycles of its picosecond reflexes. It had learned a full complement of "emotions," or at any rate of those polarizing tropisms which did for it what the glandular byproducts called emotions did for human beings. It had learned anger, and the calm pride of the target sun called forth anger in the rogue:
If it would only recognize me! If it would only admit causing the sun of Earth to strike at me! If it would offer some apology for deceiving me, for its contempt of me— then perhaps I could yet stop my blow ...
But it ignored him.
The rogue was not entirely ignored. Though the great white star blazed on passionlessly, benevolently, still the rogue found itself the target for great forces from elsewhere. Another sun of Almalik had joined the attack upon it The blue companion of the golden giant stabbed at it with a twisting shaft of plasma, a monstrous snake of glowing ions and transcience energy, which pierced to the rogue's heart, withdrew and jabbed again.
An agony of meta-pain jolted the rogue to its innermost plasma swirl; but it was not destroyed. It gathered its forces and sought for a weapon to hurl back the thrust of the blue star.
And it found one. Passing by the great fifth planet of the unresisting white sun, the rogue reached out with its plasma arms to snatch a string of moons. It gathered them to itself, fused their shattered mass into its own body, linked their electrons into its transcience patterns. With its new mass it strengthened its defenses.
And secure in its new strength, it drew more strength from the attacking stars themselves. It sucked their transcience energies, through the blue bolts and the golden ones, tightened its transflection fields and hurled its new mass always faster toward the maddening white star that glowed on, contemptuous of all the rogue could do.
And that phase of the battle ended.
Though the rogue had never struck back at the twin attacking giants, they were beaten.
Their plasma coils had exhausted even their giant strength. The coils withdrew, collapsed, disintegrated. The blue giant shrank and dimmed; its golden companion swelled and reddened.
And then they were both dead. Their fusion fires still blazed on—but mindlessly now; the intellects that had animated them were drained empty.
Sentience had fled from them. Anger and fear and purpose had gone. The blue star swelled again, the golden companion shrank back to normal size; they had become merely globes of reacting nuclear gas, normal atomic engines no longer controlled by any transcience intellect.
It was a clear victory tor the rogue—but its major enemy, the bright white star in its path, was still the same.
It was not defeated. If it was even threatened, it gave no sign.
The rogue felt its vast quiet mind watching, alert but strangely unafraid. It was anomalous, the rogue considered, that the target star did not request mercy, or a discussion of terms. Anomalous—and somehow disturbing.
But the rogue would not be deterred from its purpose. It plunged on to smash the white star and its haughty pride. It sought and found new fuel for its vengeance. Passing a cloud of asteroids, it swept them up and added them to its mass. It reached ahead to gather in the barren satellite of the fourth planet, and crushed and fused the new mass into its own as it sought to crush and fuse all the suns of Almalik.
Already in anticipation, it tasted the acrid joy of victory and destruction.
Thirteen suns would die or be driven to mindless burning. A hundred planets, and a thousand inhabited world-lets would be destroyed. A million billion living things would go up in white-hot plasma as the stars died , . .
And among them, thought the rogue with a bleak stab of pain, would be the trivial living blob of organized matter called Molly Zaldivar. .
I do not wish Molly Zaldivar to die. She must die. I will not save her. But I do not wish her to die, because I love her.
In its deadly plunge toward the white star it sent thin threads of plasma effectors ahead to seek her out. Its sensor filaments ranged the cubic miles of void, and found her at last, still on the sleeth, far ahead of the rogue and dropping toward the atmosphere of the third planet. The arm of the golden giant that had treed her from the rogue was gone now, with its master's death; but Molly Zaldivar still lived.
And felt the rogue's delicate tendril touch.
She looked up unerringly toward the point in space where his massed energies were driving the planet (town to its primary. "Monster?" she whispered.
The rogue was silent. It merely watched, and listened.
"Monster," she said, more confident now, "I know you're there, I don't mind."
She was silent for a moment, leaning forward over the sleek black skin of the sleeth, staring toward the cloudy world below. "You've done so much harm, monster," she sighed, "I wish—and yet you've tried to be good to me. Monster, I'm so sorry that you must make war on Almalik!"
The rogue did not answer. But it probed her interior spectrum of thoughts and energies, registered the dark shadow of sadness and, with it, a pale golden glow of—of what? Love? Fondness at least, the rogue considered.
It contracted its tendril to the
merest whisper, content only to observe her, while it considered. Its strength was so immeasurably greater than her own that it could lift her from the sleeth in an instant. The energies that had hurled planets about and slain stars could fold both her and the sleeth back into its own fused and glowing mass effortlessly, carrying them with it into the collision with the proud white star ahead.
But it did not.
It watched her carefully, but without interfering, as she darted, secure in the sleeth's shimmering transflection fields, into the ionized border layers of the third planet's atmosphere and dropped swiftly toward the cities on its surface.
The third planet was a blue-green world, and beautiful. It was a world of peaceful seas and friendly continents. Dazzling cities dwelt along its oceans and rivers, inhabited by all the many kinds of creatures that were companions of Almalik.
The rogue watched her drop into the towering spires of one of the cities. It was not yet too late; it could sweep her up even there, and bring her back in the effortless recoil of one of its plasma arms.
But it stayed its energies. It merely' watched, as it drove on toward the collision, now little more than an hour o(f, which would sear and melt this world, and destroy the organized mass of matter that was Molly Zaldivar.
Chapter 26
The flyer, with its organic passengers and trailed by the green spirals and the pink cloud citizen, fell endlessly through the transflection distances, and emerged into the exit port of Kaymar, crown city of the planet of Kaymar, central world of Almalik.
Clothilde Kwai Kwich's hand tightened hi consternation on Andy Quam's arm. Beside him the boy gasped. "Preacher! Looks like we've come to a bad place!"
The great central dome of the city seethed with citizens of all kinds. Many were human, in this central city of the worlds of Almalik; calm Terrestrials, bronzed giants from the reefs. But there were citizens in a myriad Shapes and in no shapes at all, liquid citizens and gaseous citizens, citizens that had no form of matter to clothe the bare energies that constituted their beings. The diaphragm of the transflex cube behind them was already contracting on a full load of refugees lucky enough to be on their way to some other world. The shouts, cries,, hissing whistles, electronic pulses and other signals of the countless thousands who had not yet been so lucky added up to a vast chorus of pleas for help. Twenty crystal citizens hung just before them, their razor-sharp edges of bright blue transparency flashing in the suns of Almalik. Quam dropped the flyer to the ramp, opened the door and led the way, ducking under the crystal citizens.
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