The Infinity Link

by Jeffrey A. Carver

  Kadin hesitated. "It might be," he said.

  Jonders growled. "You don't know."

  "Well," Kadin admitted. "Even Mozy-Earth, if she could talk, couldn't say why Mozy-ship—"

  "You don't know," Jonders insisted.

  "I have had no corresponding contact with Kadin-ship, for all the reasons we've discussed."

  "Admit it. You don't know."

  "No," Kadin said.

  "Thank you. That's all I wanted to hear."

  * * *

  The page was urgent: "Bill Jonders to the operations center, immediately."

  Mozy was already positioned as he reached his console. He grabbed his helmet and quickly entered the link, and felt for Mozy's touch. What he found was a dull, angry presence that brushed him aside as it zeroed straight in upon Mozy-Earth.

  Mozy came to, stuttering. "I—I—I—" She jerked convulsively. With a visible effort, she held herself still. "Listen—are you listening? Computer failing—failing—"

  Marshall was there; Hathorne was just crossing the floor. "Mozy, did you raise ship?" Marshall demanded. "Where are you now?"

  She blinked slowly. "N-n-n—"

  "What, Mozy? Try again. Did you raise ship?"

  "No—response—drive—landing jets."

  "What do you mean, no response?" Jonders wasn't sure if that had been Marshall or Hathorne. Both looked agitated.

  "No response to—control." She appeared to be having trouble breathing. Thrudore, keeping a careful watch on her vital signs, was preparing a hypodermic.

  "Can you be more specific?" It was Marshall this time. "Did you attempt separation? What about the probe?"

  Mozy stared at him with a froglike expression, eyes wide, her larynx bobbing. Her breath was an asthmatic rasp. "Probe—not responding. Propulsion—not responding. All functions impaired—or dead. This will be my—last transmission." She bent forward and coughed violently.

  Marshall shot a glance at Jonders and gestured: Can't you do something? Jonders warped his focus into the link. He felt a very great blackness—and a wall, invisible in the absence of light, flat and smooth and utterly impenetrable, excluding him. Through the wall, dimly, he heard a disturbance. The voices of the two Mozys, struggling for expression? He listened, probed with his fingers, searched for a way inside; but the wall was stone, unbreachable.

  He focused through his eyes.

  "Explain yourself, Mozy," Marshall was saying.

  The only answer was the expression on Mozelle's face, reflecting her triumph and her despair. Waves of emotion filled her eyes and ebbed out again: sadness, rage, futility. Peace. She turned her head up slightly, and peered at Marshall.

  "What do you mean, last transmission?" Marshall repeated. "Mozy, we've got to get you separated from that asteroid."

  She shook her head, shook it even as she spoke, her voice hoarse with strain. "Last transmission. Ending—" She cleared her throat. "End—of mission. Soon."

  Hathorne's voice snapped out angrily: "We'll tell you when the mission is over!"

  In the sudden quiet, she laughed—a single, convulsive bark. "Don't waste my time!" she hissed. She sucked in a ragged breath, and gasped it out again. The tension in her body slackened. "I called to make a final report," she whispered. "Here it is. All maneuvering systems unresponsive. Kadin, dead. Mother Program, dead. Soon I will be . . . dead." She paused, and the room was utterly silent. Thrudore ceased fussing at her patient's side, and stared at her.

  Jonders probed the mists in the link, desperately searching for a way to reach her. He located a region of shadow, a possible opening. (Mozy?) He extended a tentative hand—and a bolt of electricity snapped through him, hurling him away. Stunned, he looked at Mozy through his eyes, through a haze; she was scowling, gasping for breath, her chest heaving unnaturally.

  Jonders swallowed an impulse to cry out. Thrudore was already in motion, readying another injection, tuning the tau-field. Mozy blinked. Her eyes were round and red and dry, her breath sandpaper.

  "Dr. Thrudore, what's happening?" Marshall demanded. "Mozy, talk to us!"

  (Talk, Mozy!) Jonders cried into the link.

  Seconds slid by.

  "Dammit, answer us!" Hathorne roared.

  Mozy blinked again, and scanned the room with jerky eye movements. Her gaze locked with Jonders's for a terrifying moment, utterly unreadable. Her eyes closed, breaking the gaze. "I—" She stopped and swallowed. "You—will receive—a telemetry dump. Everything—all data on—" She swallowed again.

  "All data on—" Marshall said. "Mozy!"

  "Talenki," she gasped. "And now—good-bye—"

  "Damn it!" Marshall shouted. "No!"

  Mozy shuddered, and her eyelids fluttered, and her eyes rolled back, and remained horribly open, only bloodshot whites showing. (WAIT!) Jonders bellowed into the link, but he had already felt the wrench of separation, Mozy from Mozy, and his voice was swept away by a shriek of pain that reverberated across the emptiness of space, that echoed, ringing terrifyingly, and only after an eternity of seconds dissipated to silence. He felt himself paralyzed, every muscle twisting in horror, something clenching his throat, choking off his windpipe. He struggled furiously for breath, and finally whispered into the link, (Mozy—don't go!) And in reply, there was a hum of feedback, and the whispering hiss of the cosmos, tachyon static. The link was empty, the circle broken.

  He blinked, his eyes fogged; there was a commotion around Mozy-Earth, Thrudore shouting for equipment. Somebody had a respirator mask over Mozy's face. His hands were clawing at his helmet as though to tear it off and rush to her aid; then he slammed his fist down on the console and thrust himself instead deeper into the link. If he could find her, warp the link inward to her, reach out with a lifeline. . ..

  (Mozy,) he cried softly, (we're still with you, still here,) and if he was not crying real tears from his eyes, then they were spilling in a flood into the link. His inner voice shook with emotion.

  Turbulence. Static. Was anyone still there?

  (Bill, come out,) a very small voice was saying. (The link's broken. Do you hear me, Bill?)

  (Mozy?) he whispered, ignoring the insistent voice of operations control, and probing deeper still; and what he heard was silence, but behind the silence, something like the memory of Mozy's voice, weeping, a mutter of pain, the tiny sigh of a last breath, perhaps real, perhaps only imagined. And if imagined, or if real, following the last whisper of the last breath, he felt a new and calmer silence, and sensed a passing movement, like a stirring of air on a sultry summer day. (Mozy . . .?)

  There was only the silence.

  When the link darkened and he recalled himself with a shudder into his own body, his hands were shaking so, he could hardly remove his linkup helmet. When he was free of the entangling cables, he rose from his chair and slowly approached Mozy, now surrounded by medics.

  It was minutes before anyone spoke to him, and then he felt a hand at his elbow, pulling him aside, and it was Thrudore, and she was calling his name. He blinked, jerked himself upright. "What? Diana?"

  Her eyes were intense and sorrowful. "I'm sorry, Bill," was all she said.

  * * *

  The sunlight streaming in through his office window chilled more than it warmed. He thought of life streaming upward along that sunbeam, streaming into space. Into nothingness. Two lives, entwined in life and in death. Their wail echoed in his mind, refusing to die.

  He was supposed to be upstairs in debriefing now.

  He thought, If only . . .

  If only what? If only she hadn't died? If only the mission hadn't failed? If only Hoshi hadn't transmitted her, and if only he'd noticed the warning signs before it had all happened?

  He stepped to the window, pressing his fingertips to the glass. The sun was sinking toward the mountains, the afternoon shadows lengthening on the meadow slopes. He was going to have to tell Kadin, of course—Kadin-Earth, who was now the only Kadin left. Almost, it was a more daunting prospect than informing Mozy's family,
the latter an official responsibility, thankfully not his. He wondered how they would tell the story, what concealment they would devise.

  Outside his office, there was the sound of a sudden commotion, and Lusela arguing, insisting to someone that he couldn't go in. "I have to! Now!" shouted a familiar voice, and then there were chairs scraping on the floor—and then the door burst open, slamming back against its stop.

  Hoshi strode into the office, Lusela following in a state of agitation. Jonders peered at them both, and then waved Lusela out. She shrugged and pulled the door closed.

  His eyes . . . don't stare, you've been away from him for what seems like a year. "Hoshi," Jonders said rather stupidly. "This isn't really the time—"

  "I have to tell you something," Hoshi insisted stolidly. "I have to tell you now. Then you can do what you want with me. Just please listen."

  Dear God, Jonders thought wearily. "What, Hoshi? What is it?"

  "You have to believe," Hoshi said. "You have to believe I didn't mean it to happen. I only just realized. I thought—" His eyes were wet with tears. "I didn't know."

  "Didn't know what?" Jonders said carefully, trying desperately to focus his thoughts. This was insane. How could Hoshi have heard already?

  Hoshi stood very still, rocking on the balls of his feet. "They're going to die," he said, very softly. "In the computer. It can't handle them together. You have to do something, I don't know what, but if you don't, they're going to die." His eyes were closed, now, but tears were leaking from his eyelids. "You don't have much time."

  For a few seconds, Jonders could not speak. He had never in his life felt such weariness. He tried to speak, and failed, and swallowed, and when at last he found his voice, he managed to say, "Sit down, Hoshi. Sit down."

  "There's no time," Hoshi insisted.

  "I know," Jonders said. "No time at all. Sit. Hoshi. Please."

  PART SIX

  HOMEWARD AND BEYOND

  Prelude

  The wind growled and the snow dashed and swirled around Four-Pod's snout. The Song danced in his brain; but it could not raise his spirits.

  He moved at a plod, slowly putting distance between himself and the caves. What was he going to tell his people? How could he say that the Philosophers had rejected their riddle-offerings—probably because he, Four-Pod, had angered them with his insistent questions about the Song?

  It was beyond his understanding. How could the Philosophers fail to hear it? They said because it was unknown to them, it was clearly of the devil.

  His heart told him that could not be true—not unless his mind and his heart had utterly betrayed him.

  Was he the only one in the world to hear the Song? If so, then he might as well die in the Snow Plain, for never again would he live in peace. He, Four-Pod, simple traveler and bearer of riddles—was it possible that he knew something beyond the wisdom of the Philosophers?

  The Song intertwined itself with his thoughts and gently sustained him as his foreclaws bit the ice, as he pulled himself across the trackless ice.

  Even now, the Song was as clear in his mind as a sparkling flake of snow at the precise moment of freezing; as melodious as the shifting suck of slush beneath one's weight when glacier turned to delicious melt; as harmonious as the keen of storm-bringing winds. Of the devil, indeed! Such beauty could not be of the devil!

  He paused to consider the terrain. Bearing right would take him higher, into unfamiliar cave lands—more treacherous in footing, but closer to the sky. Something there beckoned him. Did he hear an almost inaudible murmur coming from that direction? The wind, only the wind over the hills. Bearing left would carry him into the wilds of the Snow Plain, where the elements, unblocked, would scour him raw. Straight ahead was the shortest route home, where duty called him to report of his journey.

  But . . . if his vow was to return with truths, could there not be truths lurking in one's own mind and soul—to be discovered by listening, exploring, responding to need, and trusting. If such truths emerged, shouldn't they, too, be brought to his people, despite the words of the Philosophers?

  There was a terrible yearning grown strong in him which he could not identify, and he longed only to share it, to know that he was not alone.

  The wind howled, urging him to decide. Something in the foothills, calling him? Suppose it was one of the mysterious Ones-Who-Thought, the wisest of the wise, who could answer questions he had not even thought to ask? Or suppose it was a predator, a False Hope, lurking death? Suppose. Suppose. Fulfillment or peril? Decide. The journey must be made. He bobbed his head, smelling the breezes. He blew his six nostrils clear, and took an intoxicatingly deep breath of methane into each lung. He began to move even before he knew his decision. One step following another, across the ice and snow.

  Climbing. Slowly climbing into the foothills.

  Was he dreaming, or did the Song murmur in triumph as he began his ascent?

  * * *

  In the cold and stony darkness, there were changes.

  If something akin to doubt had existed, it could do so no longer. The ghostly call pulsed through the colony as clearly as the light of the brightest star, filtering through the frigid crystal lattices.

  Confusion was not a concept that the colony was aware of; but confusion existed, in the disorders that flickered through the memory points, in the slow shifting of atoms, in the alteration of the lattice and the growth of complexity. A quality very much like self-awareness had appeared, responding to the ghostly presence. Without it, the changes might have taken another million years.

  Something like impatience was becoming manifest within that clarifying awareness. The disquiet became steadily sharper.

  * * *

  The sun's inner currents moved ceaselessly. Never since the time of creation had they stopped their furious movement—twisting in ever-changing patterns, responding to shifts in the flux and the field.

  For generations past counting had the rarified out-regions been thought barren, except perhaps for the mindless filamentary drifters. Few capable of thought ventured there, where the near-vacuum could suck the life out of the unwary. In all of memory, few had gone there.

  But that was before the voices. The voices from above, from the misty vales at the edges of nowhere.

  Not from the deeps within, where the bright fusion fires warmed and caressed, and where life was conceived. Nor from beyond the outer fringes, where there was nothing—a slow, silent wasting of existence, inconceivable cold and darkness, nothing.

  From the misty regions, the voices came; and so, to the misty regions the explorers must go, to find the voices' source.

  * * *

  To the gods grumbling, thundering in the heart of the sun, the voices were but a flitter, a droning of a bee.

  * * *

  To Luu-rooee, the ocean was blue and empty, and bright with sunlight, and there had come no answers, only a steadily greater yearning. Sliding silently beneath the waves, he turned downward with powerful strokes of his tail, propelled himself downward into the gloom and denseness, where cool hands caressed his flanks and sounds echoed like man-steel. Downward, trailing a thin line of bubbles. Downward, to listen.

  Drifting. Cool. Barren water taste. Awareness blurring. Time passing into no time.

  A flutter in the thoughts.

  Luu-rooee blinked to attention. There was a presence. Odd. Euphoric. Disturbing. It reminded him of the voice, and yet was not of the voice. A presence very, very far away, touching him. It was not the godwhale. And yet . . .

  The godwhale was coming closer. He felt that.

  When the time came to renew his lungs, Luu-rooee rocketed toward the distant sky, a smile creasing his soul.

  Chapter 47

  Voices . . .

  . . .sounds echoing that were not voices . . .

  . . .blackness and light, and shattering colors . . .

  Unquestionably there were others present; but that was illogical. Where could they have come from? There should be no o
ne present. There should be nothing at all.

  A feeling of disquiet grew. And bewilderment. Voices echoed round and round, but made no sense. There were sounds like plucked strings of glass, and the music of water rippling and flowing, as if through an enormous basin of stone or crystal . . . .

  * * *

  Starlight flashed, splintering dazzling sunlight. Every nerve was shot through with pain, and the only awareness was of fear fear fear fear fear . . . naked exposure to blinding radiation and vacuum . . . nowhere to hide. Was this a test of fire, or had something gone terribly wrong?