by Dan Worth
‘You think they could help us unlock that terminal?’ said Katherine.
‘It’s worth a try. There’s a whole shipload of technicians and scientists up there. One of them must surely know a thing or two about breaking into secure systems. How about you, Steven?’
‘Never my speciality, sorry,’ replied Steven apologetically. ‘But I wouldn’t be too sure if they can help you straight away. Hacking an alien computer? You’d need intimate knowledge of the programming language, surely? It could mean months of trying.’
‘Perhaps. I’d still like to give them the opportunity to look at what we’ve found down here though. This chamber and also those things that we found in the corridor need an expert scientific eye cast over them before we make our report.’
‘We need to be careful,’ said Steven. ‘If I’m any judge of my superiors they’ll try to acquire this technology and use it for military purposes. Just think about it: that nanotech alone could advance our spacecraft and weapons by thousands of years, virtually overnight. We should be careful who we tell about this. Remember where in space we are: if word got out about this, both the Commonwealth and the K’Soth might come charging in here to snatch what we’ve found. Tensions are running high enough as it is.’
‘Well it’s too late now isn’t it?’ said Katherine. ‘The crew of the Darwin already know.’
‘True,’ said Steven. ‘But Spiers doesn’t strike me as the sort to go yelling from the rooftops about something unless he knows exactly what he’s dealing with. He is a scientist first and foremost after all. I think we’re safe, for now.’
‘Actually my first concern was how to explain all this to the Dendratha,’ said Rekkid. ‘I can imagine they won’t be too pleased if we point out that their entire religion is based upon this alien installation being here.’
‘Well, do you think you could be a little more tactful than usual Rekkid?’ said Katherine. ‘This could really upset them if we handle it wrongly. If we want to continue to work on this site we need to maintain good relations with the monks.’
Rekkid smiled. ‘Yes, alright Katherine,’ he replied. ‘I promise to reign in my bad manners. Come on, we should get back to the surface.’
And so leaving the ranks of machines in the great chamber they made their way back up the dark curving corridor, past the wrecked alien forms and the huge doors until they reached the rope winch that led back up into the temple.
Katherine stopped to listen. ‘Can you hear them?’ she said.
‘What?’ Rekkid asked, reaching for the rope.
‘The machines, they’re still running. They haven’t turned themselves off, I wonder why?’
‘Who knows? Perhaps they only switch off after a certain period.’
‘Perhaps. It was the strangest feeling though. All the time we were in that room… I felt like we were being watched.’
‘You think that one of the Dendratha snuck down here after us?’ enquired Steven. ‘I didn’t see a thing.’
‘No, no it was like the room itself was watching us. It sounds ridiculous I know.’
‘No it doesn’t,’ said Steven. ‘It’s just a natural reaction, an animal instinct if you will. You're in a strange place full of shadows and then you find a room that springs to life when you walk in. It could make anyone paranoid. I myself was a little unsettled I admit.’
There was the sound of movement above them. Looking up they saw a cluster of Dendratha faces peering down at them. One by one the three of them were hauled up out of the pit into the torch-lit tomb. Ekrino and Kukadis came forward to greet them.
‘So,’ said Ekrino with barely concealed excitement. ‘What did you find down there? You were gone ever such a long time.’
‘Your Grace,’ said Rekkid cautiously. ‘It might be better if we discussed this in private before we proceed any further. Master Kukadis, how goes the excavation of this chamber?’
‘Very well, actually. We think we’ve positively identified four of the priests, judging by the artefacts they are carrying. We’re confident we should have the names of three more very soon.’
‘Excellent. Well, if you’d care to join us? Your Grace, would you lead the way please?’
They held the meeting in Ekrino’s own cell, a spartan, candle-lit room in the bowels of the temple that became rather cramped with the five of them huddled around the priest’s writing desk.
‘So,’ said Ekrino. ‘Tell me, what did you find? Why the secrecy?’
‘Your Grace,’ began Rekkid, mentally choosing his words with care. ‘Can I begin by saying that it is my understanding that there is a common belief amongst your people that this temple is built upon a sacred cave that is inhabited by your god.’
‘Yes, that’s true. Though some believe the cave to be more of a metaphor, anyway I digress.’
‘Well, we did find an extensive set of underground chambers down there. Sacred or not, they appear to be artificial.’
‘Artificial? Who do think made them?’ said Kukadis. ‘I hope this isn’t more of your troublemaking Professor.’
‘It isn’t, I assure you. You can go and look for yourself if you like,’ said Rekkid, doing his utmost to remain diplomatic. ‘We don’t know who made them originally. What is clear however is that others have gained entry to the chamber at some time in its history. Members of my race it would seem, others too, though their identity remains a mystery, even though we found some remains.’
‘Remains?’ Kukadis asked. ‘What do they look like?’
‘Well, the two we found were like great armoured beasts. They were silver in colour and…’
‘Demons!’ Kukadis exclaimed. ‘You found slain demons down there!?’
‘I uh... can I finish? They were constructed using what we call nanotechnology and they were fitted with a variety of advanced weapons.’
‘Call them what you will Professor. But those are demons slain by Maran’s angels! It must be the Cave of Maran, it must! Truly this is a holy day!’
‘Did Maran show himself to you?’ asked Ekrino.
‘No he didn’t.’ replied Rekkid. ‘But we found a large chamber at the end that activated itself when we stepped inside.’
‘Lined with stone tablets of Maran’s knowledge?’
‘Yes, I suppose you could call them that.’
‘Astounding!’
‘Though I have to say, they actually looked more like solid state processing devices of some kind.’
Ekrino brushed this detail aside. ‘Professor, Doctor. I cannot thank you enough!’ he seemed to be actually weeping with happiness. ‘You have brought great joy to us with this discovery. Truly, your names shall be remembered and entered into the history of our order. Come Kukadis, we must hold prayers at once!’ Ekrino seemed suddenly far more sprightly. He hustled Kukadis out of the door and left the trio sitting dumbfounded in his cell.
‘Well,’ said Rekkid smugly. ‘I think I handled that rather well don’t you?’
‘Yeah,’ replied Steven with a note of sarcasm. ‘You’ll do fine until they find out that their sacred cave is an underground collection of alien computers, or whatever.’
‘Oh, let them believe what they like,’ said Rekkid. ‘They’ll still think it’s the Cave of Maran no matter what, I’ll bet.’ His comm. started to chime. He picked it up and held it to his ear. ‘Rekkid here.’
Spiers and his crew were scrutinising the tiny dot they saw begin to move away from the Fulan A ring. Quickchild was on the move and so far it was failing to respond to any of their communication attempts.
‘Professor? It’s Captain Spiers here. You’ll be pleased to know that your spacecraft is finally showing signs of life. We are tracking the vessel now, but it won’t talk to us.’
‘Are there any signs of damage?’ Rekkid enquired anxiously.
‘No, no physical damage that we can tell from the outside, but internally, who knows. However we are detecting transmissions between Quickchild and the ring he was docked to. My guess is that it’s
still interfacing with the device’s systems.’
‘Is it possible that it’s under the ring’s control?’
‘It’s possible I suppose. But like I say, we can’t tell at this point.’ Spiers paused in his conversation whilst he peered at the data projected in front of him. ‘Professor, Quickchild has just engaged his jump drives. We’re locking onto his warp wave now… looks like he’s heading for the other ring.’
Varish knew what he must do. He was filled with joy and a sense of purpose as he looped around Maranos in hyperspace and sped towards Fulan B. He had to get back, he had to find his people and more importantly, find her again. The real Irlani, not just a simulation dredged out of the corners of his mind. He must wake the other Bajenteri stored within the other ring and within the device itself, find out where and when the others had fled to. Now he knew who he was, he couldn’t remain here alone could he? He couldn’t remain alone without her.
He terminated his jump and angled himself through the corona of the B star, docking carefully with the other super dense bracelet that hung impossibly above the surface. He reached out with his mind and unlocked the encryption key that held the entity trapped within, he felt Ichthasa, the being within respond gratefully at her release from an aeons old prison. Varish and Tyrunin both greeted her and began a flurry of communication.
Spiers’ crew were becoming even more intrigued by the strange events they were witnessing. Spiers relayed what they were seeing to Rekkid, who by now had seated himself and the others around his computer and could now see for himself.
‘Professor, it looks like both rings are now communicating with one another, as well as Quickchild. We are detecting signals across a number of wavelengths that we can’t decipher. It seems that it has managed to activate the systems on board the B ring… wait it’s moving again.’ Everyone watched as Quickchild twisted out of view, there was a moment whilst the Darwin tracked his signature through hyperspace, before he re-appeared again above Maranos. The Darwin’s cameras zoomed in on the tiny silver ovoid as it floated above the equator, the planet behind it providing a convex sandy background scattered with sparse clouds. There was the faint smudge of the city below.
‘Professor, it’s right above you now. I don’t know what it plans to do but…’
‘Hello Rekkid, Katherine, Steven. This is Quickchild,’ came the disembodied voice from Rekkid’s computer. ‘I apologise for my absence, however I believe I have found the answers to all the questions concerning my identity and my origins.’
‘Quickchild,’ Rekkid began. ‘What…?’
Varish cut him off. ‘Rekkid, the first thing I will tell you is that my name is not Quickchild. It is Varish, a name which I had forgotten for many thousands of centuries, but which the other of my kind that resides within the A ring, known as Tyrunin, has re-taught me… along with many other things. Things you may find hard to believe but which you are, coincidentally, involved in.’
‘What are you talking about? Where…?’
‘It is my understanding from speaking to the others of my kind within the rings that you have made some attempt to re-activate the device within the planet.’
‘You mean the chamber that we just discovered?’
‘Yes. You found that the systems within were encrypted did you not?’
‘Yes, we had hoped that the crew of the Darwin might be able help, but with you back…’
‘Then return there at once and I will show you everything.’
Hurriedly, they made their way back into the bowels of the temple and the chamber beneath it. As they stood once more in the great amphitheatre of machines, Varish located the long buried communications arrays that gave him access into the banks of computer systems. On great holographic displays that filled the space around the trio with images, he showed them everything: The great empire that the Bajenteri had built across the galaxy, its wonders and its achievements which had lasted for millennia before they were then swept away by the final catastrophic collapse and descent into anarchy. He showed them the Bajenteri building the great machine in the Fulan system - a gigantic wormhole portal. He showed them altering the position of Maranos so that it lay at the Lagrange point between the stars, whilst they demolished and plundered the other planets for materials, then their final desperate flight from this galaxy.
He showed them snatches of his own life, traumatised by war, brightened by his love for Irlani, but cut short by disease and transferred into the artificial matrix in which he finally resided. He showed them his final desperate battle against the enemies of the Bajenteri that had resulted in his defeat and his mind being lost amongst the stars for billions of years, only to be found at last by the Esacir and brought falteringly back to life.
He showed them too what happened in the Fulan system, information he had obtained from Icthasa and Tyrunin: That a million years ago the Arkari Empire had found the great device in the midst of their savage civil war and had used it to banish a full half of their population to a destination that had been wiped from the memories of the three entities that controlled it.
Furthermore, he showed them how the Arkari had forgotten about the device but then ten thousand years ago they had rediscovered it. They had re-awoken the three Bajenteri and re-activated the portal unwittingly opening a gateway to a dimension inhabited by savage creatures that swarmed through. Though many details of this had also been wiped and the portal finally sealed and locked, it was clear that the Arkari had only narrowly won the engagement and that the creatures in question bore a resemblance to the mechanoids that they had found in the subterranean passage.
Quickchild’s final image was of the device fully activated: a cruciform of light that sprang from the poles and equator of Maranos and which reached out to touch both stars. Katherine and Rekkid knew they had seen this before, in the recording buried within Captain Cortill’s log that showed the end that awaited the defeated Arkari. They were one and the same.
Varish’s narrative explained everything that they had been puzzling over for so long. That Cortill’s ship was the age that they had always claimed it was. What had finally happened to the defeated half of the ancient Arkari. Why the Dendratha believed that evil had arisen from the ground ten thousand years ago to be defeated by angels who resembled the Arkari. Why the Fulan system had formed in such an odd way, why Maranos was positioned so exactly between its two parent stars and why there were great structures buried within the planet and floating above the surfaces of the suns. They were all part of the machine - the great portal the Bajenteri had built billions of years ago to escape their persecution and whose complexity was such that three personalities, preserved and accelerated within artificial matrices, were required to operate it.
‘So you see,’ said Varish. ‘I am the last of my kind. I have no right and no reason to remain here. I must return to my people and take the three others in this system with me. I will transfer their personalities into my memory and leave functional AI copies behind to run the machines.’
‘But aren’t you worried?’ said Katherine. ‘You said that the Arkari re-activated the device and found something horrible inside, or on the other side or whatever. Doesn’t that bother you? Look at those things we found lying in the corridor. The Arkari were obviously desperate to stop them getting in here, and the Dendrathas’ own legends claim that they came from within the device. What if more of them should come through?’
‘It is a risk I am willing to take, Katherine. I know where I intend to terminate the wormhole. I doubt that my own people would have chosen a hazardous destination. I suspect the Arkari activated it randomly and by chance ended up unleashing some savage alien civilisation from who knows where or when.’
‘Varish,’ said Steven. ‘Are you sure that you know what you’re doing?’
‘Steven, I have never been surer of anything else in my, admittedly, long life. Please trust me. I have to get home, it has been so long,’ he said, a note of painful longing in his voice. ‘I have to do
this. Now watch.’
The screens now showed a panoramic view of the planet and the two stars from the Darwin’s cameras. Varish had linked the two systems via his own. As the assembled trio and crew of the science vessel watched he hacked into the final locked system inside the chamber. The screen of the ancient console came alive with a blur of characters and a cut away schematic of the planet sprang into existence above.
Maranos had been cored like an apple by the Bajenteri. The structures the Darwin had detected extended right into the centre of the planet. But instead of a molten core, the centre of the world was filled with machinery. Gigantic devices the size of small moons surrounded the cylindrical wormhole generator that stretched from pole to pole. Energy conduits stretched out to opposing points along the equator, each facing one of the rings floating above the twin suns. Rings which now began move.
As they watched, the rings began to spin with increasing speed, the distortions they caused whipping the stars’ coronas into titanic whirlpools of plasma. Bound by the energy fields the rings generated, they reached out across space towards the planet at the speed of light, the whirling maelstroms of particles carefully managed and goaded by Tyrunin and Icthasa to their destinations. Two Humans and one Arkari watched in amazement along with the crew of the Darwin as the vast brilliant cyclones of energy were spun from the stars toward the planet.
Around three quarters of an hour later, in the rocky plateaus near Bridgetown, and on the opposite side of the world, the ground began to split. Immense apertures, hundreds of metres across, opened up in the arid earth revealing huge mechanical maws that greedily swallowed the descending tornados of plasma that, guided by funnelling energy fields now plummeted down through the atmosphere and were fed to the mechanisms buried deep within the core. These transformed the raw energy of the stars into power for the great engines that now, after millennia, spun into life.
