The Chaos Chronicles

by Jeffrey A. Carver

  She saw him tumbling through the blackness and dived toward him, shouting, /THIS WAY OUT, JOHN BANDICUT! THIS WAY OUT!/

  *

  He cartwheeled free among the glittering spines of the icecore, through a vast snowflake. He was out of the inner core of the boojum-lair; but he was disoriented, dizzy, didn't know where to go from here. Who was with him? Shadow-people? Boojum? Voices reverberated everywhere, bewilderingly. He thought one was Charlie's, but then it was gone, swept away. And then he felt the searching presence of Antares, and he caught onto it in gratitude and desperation.

  /This way out! This way!/ she cried.

  He fled on her voice, and soon heard another.

  /Hraaah! John Bandicut, is it the boojum?/

  Almost out . . .

  /Bwang-g-g! Something is chasing you! Flee!/

  And the shadow-people whooping and whreeeking: /. . . the boojum! . . . insane! . . . controls the icecore . . . all through it . . . must be destroyed . . . must be destroyed . . ./

  /Yes! Yes!/ Bandicut cried, swooping and turning as he regained his own equilibrium. He still wasn't sure where he was, but he knew the shadow-people had created a path for him this far, and Antares had shown him the way. /How can we destroy it? How can we get it out of the ice caverns?/

  /Wheee! Wheeekeeek! . . . must destroy the ice caverns . . . it is the only way . . ./

  Destroy the ice caverns?

  /No! We must not!/ cried Ik.

  Bandicut could not catch his breath. Destroy the ice caverns? Lose everything they had come here for? Lose a chance to find the Shipworld masters, and maybe a way home? Surely there was some other way! He could only peer around silently as he spun outward through the maze, glimpsing with heartsick disbelief the sparkling windows of information that would all be lost.

  /Wheeep-wh'reeeep! . . . must destroy the core quickly . . . before it escapes . . ./

  He turned and saw darting light and shadow—the flickering presence of the boojum. It was not after him now, but after a way out. It knew it was in danger and was trying to flee. The shadow-people were right; if they didn't destroy the boojum now, they might not have another chance. They had to destroy the ice caverns.

  In this strange inner world, the shadow-people looked like darting bats and finger-shadows. He couldn't tell where they had come from. They seemed to be pouring out of some sort of n-space channel, but everything he could see was transmogrified by the phase-space shifts that both the shadow-people and the boojum had invoked. The shadow-people were swarming around the periphery of the icecore, demolishing connections to the outside with explosions of ice and snowflake. The enraged boojum flew in slashing orbits through the splintering core, opening virtual pockets then darting back again, finding no way out. It wailed, its voice running up and down the frequency scale.

  >> Must not . . . not . . . not . . . not . . . not . . . >>

  /Whreeek! . . . must destroy! . . ./

  Bandicut was at the edge now, trying to stay out of the way. /Hroom, tell us how to help!/ he cried. The foreman-shadow didn't answer, but he felt another shift in the virtual medium, and saw a shadow outstretched before him, a shadow in his own shape, but elongated. He reached out instinctively to join it; he contracted into it, then back toward his own physical center, reclaiming the control he had given up to the icecore, to the boojum.

  A huge bat fluttered close to him in the icelink.

  /Wh'rooom'm'm. Hruuu-eeeee! . . . your stones . . . pull free of the icecore . . . quickly . . . Whreeek! . . . quickly, John Bandicut . . ./

  He focused his thoughts dizzily inward, drawing himself out of the icelink connection. It was like pulling loose from a shower of exploding electrical connections, as the world of the icecore was stripped from him. He gasped a breath of real air, blinking his eyes, straining to peer out through the physically solid, icy snowflake that enveloped him. It was difficult to breathe, impossible to move.

  Whreeuuk! ". . . stay still . . ."

  Shadow-people, not images now but the real thing, swarmed nearby. The prison of ice crystals glowed like strands of molten glass and shattered. He gasped for breath, staggering backward. Beside him, his friends stood stunned amid splintered ruins of ice.

  "Hroom—!"

  Whreeek-k-k-k! ". . . stay . . . focus your stones . . ."

  Stones? Bandicut clamped his eyes shut to focus, then suddenly hesitated, remembering the echo of Charlie's voice in the icelink. Was there really something of the quarx in there? There was no way to know, and too late to find out. One more thing lost. He trembled, focusing on the reality of the boojum's frantic efforts to escape into the icelines, to speed away to hide elsewhere. /Translator-stones,/ he whispered, /if you can do what the shadow-people ask—/

  *Ready.*

  He swallowed. "Ik! Li-Jared!" His friends were staggering toward him.

  "What has happened?" Ik cried. "I could not see until the shadow-people came. The boojum—?"

  "It's all through the icecore! This is its lair!" Bandicut shouted. "The shadow-people are isolating it." His heart was pounding. "We must destroy the caverns to destroy the boojum!"

  Ik's eyes flickered in anguish. "But the information! Is there no way—?"

  "I couldn't—I'm sorry! No choice, no time—"

  "I saw it," hissed Li-Jared. "It nearly killed you. And I heard—Antares?"

  "Yes," Bandicut said hoarsely, glancing up, around, for Antares. He couldn't see her. But he was grateful for her presence. "Yes. Will you help me, Li-Jared? Ik? Will you use your stones with me?"

  "But the icelines for a continent converge here! What of all that they control?"

  "I know!" Bandicut whispered. "But it's going to escape. Do we trust Hroom?"

  "Hraah!" Ik's eyes flashed. "Then let us—"

  Bwang. "—kill that accursed thing once and for all!"

  Bandicut felt his wrists beginning to burn. "Hroom!" he cried. "We're ready!"

  Wheeeek-k-k-k! A flurry of shadow-people stormed over his head and around the cavern, trailing an exploding line of ice crystals. For an instant, Bandicut thought perhaps the shadow-people were going to do it all themselves, and not need the stones. And then the starfire blazed from his left wrist . . .

  *

  The caverns were a crystal palace, of diamond surfaces and rippling fire; and around the rim were concentric waves of darkness; and in the middle, frenetic bursts of light shooting through interconnecting spines. In the midst of it all, erupting from three standing figures and bouncing crazily among the faceted crystals, was a squirming ring of emerald fire. The cavern looked like an enormous geode exploding with laser light.

  Antares watched in astonishment, clinging to the rock face, as the narrow ledge she was standing on began to shake. She had pulled back from her shallow contact with the icecore as soon as she'd seen the others exit, amid cries for the icecore's destruction. Having glimpsed the boojum at work here, she was not about to argue.

  Bits of ice were crumbling everywhere. The spindles that had held her arms and neck were turning to powder. She turned to scramble back up onto the higher ledge where the norg was waiting. She found a metal arm extended to assist her. "Are you unharmed?" Copernicus asked urgently.

  "Yes, yes!"

  "John Bandicut? Is he unharmed?"

  She crouched on the wider surface. "I think so. But they're trying—dear sun and moon—to destroy the caverns!" As she leaned forward to peer over the ledge, she saw shadows swarming, and spikes of orange light flashing up from the heart of the cavern, striking at crevices over her head. Were they going to bring the ceiling down? "I think we'd better move away from here."

  She felt a sudden burning in her knowing-stones.

  *We are needed.*

  /What do you mean? What for?/

  *At once.*

  A wave of heat swept through her. She knelt, clutching the robot's arm. "Copernicus, hold on to me," she whispered. She peered back down into the maelstrom of light. /All right,/ she said, raising her head.
/>
  From her throat, a beam of light shot out and ringed the upper cavern with a crackling hiss. From below, she imagined she heard a wail of despair.

  *

  The shadow-people carved ever-widening channels of n-space darkness, flickering with momentary glints of gold. The madly flashing presence of the boojum was rebounding furiously through the chaotic activity. Bandicut's and the others' translator-stones had been joined by another beam of light from a rock-ledge up near the ceiling.

  Something very strange was happening in the icecore itself. Amid the pulsing light, the boojum's presence was becoming visible, without quite taking physical shape: a writhing shadow in the center of the icecore, hazed with an aura of desperation and anger. It seemed to know it was dying, dying as the power of the stones and the shadow-people destroyed its home. It was helplessly enraged, and was ravaging the stored information all around it in a futile act of destruction. It was all going to be lost anyway—the connections across the breadth of Shipworld, the vast vaults of knowledge, and whatever chance the company might have had to realize their goals.

  For a frozen instant, Bandicut felt a hopeless, numbing empathy for the boojum. Whatever it was, whatever its origins, it was suffering in its final moments of desolation.

  The instant of clarity and near-understanding passed with a whisper of regret. A large array of faceted crystals exploded in a blaze of light. Bandicut stumbled into his companions as they fell back.

  He caught his balance and crouched against the light. The fire from his translator-stones had gone out, but whatever they had begun in the icecore was building toward a critical reaction.

  Whrreeek-k-k! ". . . must flee now . . . flee! . . ."

  "This way!" Ik cried, striking out for the wall they had descended into this place.

  "Bandie! Hurry!" cried Li-Jared.

  "Coming!" he rasped, stumbling after the Karellian. The ice formations were beginning to vibrate with a dissonant hum, like a crystal glass singing. He peered up the shivering wall, which Ik had quickly scaled with his rope. Li-Jared went right behind, and Bandicut grabbed the rope and began hauling himself up last. The rope twinged and began contracting, and he simply hung on as it pulled him up. Ik caught his arm and helped him over the top.

  "Hurry!" Ik cried, coiling his rope with blurring speed.

  Which way? Bandicut wondered, but the robot was in front of him squawking, "Follow me! Follow me!"

  "Napoleon!" Bandicut was in front now, and he led the way after Napoleon, running on the uneven surface. Glittering ice dust rose in clouds as the crystalline formations crumbled. Crack-k-k! An icy stalactite crashed down in front of him. He gasped to a halt, shaken by the near miss. The rubble of the stalactite blocked the path, cutting him off from Napoleon.

  "Left!" Li-Jared led the way through a detour, and they rejoined Napoleon and ran together toward the exit.

  *

  When the fire from Antares' knowing-stone cut off, the entire cavern was singing and quivering, and on the verge of exploding. Shadow-people were darting in incomprehensible patterns, and crying out to Bandicut and the others to flee. They were all running now, toward the end of the chamber to her right. She could still see them, but they would soon disappear beneath the overhanging ledge.

  "Copernicus!" she shouted. "Let's get out of here! Can we go the same way they're going?"

  Tap tap tap! "I'm in contact with Napoleon. Let us try, Lady Antares. Let us try!"

  The norg's wheels spun and caught, and they raced along the rock ledge as fast as they could move.

  *

  They were almost out when the icecore blew. It caught them from behind, not with a physical concussion, but a rippling wave of spatial distortion. Tumbling in an agonizingly slow spiral, Bandicut glimpsed a rainbow flicker as the shadow-people's n-space channels converged on the icecore. Then his heart stopped. A horrifying eruption of blackness—the boojum—leaped in desperation into the breach, fleeing straight toward him. He felt its fury, its hatred and despair roiling outward like a silent explosion. He was helpless in its path; he could not move . . . could not breathe . . .

  Suddenly the boojum jumped again, over his head, boiling upward and out, seeking escape.

  Then the implosion caught it and funneled it backward, back into the blaze of diamond and the expanding circles of prismatic light. Swallowing the shadow, the icecore collapsed to a fist-sized black hole, then vanished with a thundering BOOOOM.

  Chapter 26

  Decision at the Portal

  SILENCE.

  For perhaps two dozen heartbeats, Bandicut could see nothing except darkness and expanding circles of light. It was achingly reminiscent of the departure of his ship from Triton. Threading space, the quarx had called it, and he never had understood exactly what that meant.

  Something rustled in his thoughts, like a figure stirring from the ashes in an old holoflick.

  /// Just what the mokin' fokin' fr'deekin' hell's

  going on here? ///

  murmured a voice he'd thought he would never hear again.

  Bandicut froze, trying to regain his senses—or maybe his wits. He felt an icy grit around his hands. Ice dust and snow. What had he just heard? /Charlie? Is that you?/ he whispered. /Charlie?/

  /// I'm not sure, frankly.

  But I can tell you one thing:

  I have one hell of a headache.

  You mind telling me what just happened? ///

  Bandicut swallowed in the darkness, thinking, the voice is different. It has the language and the vocabulary. But it's not the same Charlie. Damn. Damn. He took a slow breath. It's still a Charlie, he thought. /We just killed the boojum, I think. And the ice caverns with it. The icecore. Do you have any idea what I'm talking about?/

  /// Not really.

  I was watching for a little while.

  But I can't say it made much sense. ///

  Bandicut didn't answer. He wasn't sure it made much sense to him, either. He rubbed his eyes. The expanding circles of light were slowly fading, but the darkness too was fading into a grayish light. He sensed the movements of Ik and Li-Jared nearby.

  /// I do seem to recall something about a boojum. ///

  Bandicut chuckled desolately, trying not to cry for all they'd just lost. For the Charlie he'd lost. /Yeah. Something about a boojum. I'm glad you remember that much. Usually when you're reborn, you don't have much of a memory./

  /// Yeah? ///

  The quarx seemed to shrug in indifference, but an instant later his thoughts flickered into Bandicut's, probing.

  Bandicut closed his eyes, allowing the quarx to relive its death in the boojum-trap. He felt a powerful upwelling of grief. It was his own grief, for the old Charlie; and he wasn't sure he was ready yet for a new one, a different one. He trembled, remembering the echoes of Charlie that he had heard in the icecore, and he wondered if they were really fragments of his old friend, or perhaps the shudderings of the new Charlie beginning to wake up. /When the boojum killed you, I thought this time it was for good. I really thought it had crushed everything that was left of you./

  He felt circles turning and closing in the quarx's thoughts as fragments of memory came together into a dim recollection of death.

  /// Well . . .

  we n-dimensional fractal-beings are

  pretty tough to kill. ///

  Bandicut exhaled. /I'm glad./

  /// Seemed to me it was some sort of

  n-space disturbance that woke me up.

  Was that—? ///

  /Us destroying the boojum? Yeah—and along with it just about everything we wanted to know. Including, maybe, how to go home./ He sensed puzzlement in Charlie's thoughts at the word "home," and wondered if the quarx was puzzling over memories of his own home, or Bandicut's.

  He sighed, and peered around. There was finally enough light to see by. He was sitting in a powdery snowdrift, and so were Ik and Li-Jared. They were all looking around in a daze. He realized, as he struggled to his feet, that he still ha
d his backpack strapped to his shoulders. Napoleon was nearby, extricating himself from a deep snowbank. And the cavern that they had not quite gotten out of was filled with swirling, phosphorescent fairy dust—which seemed to be the sole source of light at the moment. The intricate ice structures were completely gone. Bandicut blinked, imagining all the knowledge that had just turned to dust.

  Whreeek! Tree branches with dark, fluttering leaves flew around him and the others. ". . . danger passed . . . believe boojum destroyed . . . searching for traces . . ."

  Bandicut breathed a suddering sigh of relief. It was Ik who spoke first. "Urrr, Hroom-m-m. Thank you for coming when you did." The Hraachee'an gazed sadly around the wreckage. "I regret this loss very much. But you—we—did what was necessary, I suppose." Ik muttered a rumbling sigh.

  Whrruuuu. ". . . unfortunate loss . . . disruption of information and control . . . recovery will be difficult . . . prolonged . . ."

  Bandicut cleared his throat. "I think what Ik meant was, he was sorry for the loss of what we were seeking."

  "Indeed. We are back where we started," Li-Jared pronounced. His eyes flickered as he surveyed the ruins of the ice caverns.

  Hroom fluttered in response. The foreman-shadow's movements were difficult to follow with the eye, against all that sparkling snow dust. ". . . are aware . . . deeply sorry . . . had hoped to help, bringing you all here together . . . had not known the boojum . . ."

  "I suppose no one did—" Ik began.

  A cry interrupted his words. "John Bandicut!"

  Bandicut peered around, squinting.

  "Up here!" It was a female voice.

  "There, John!" Ik pointed.

  He finally spotted Antares. The Thespi female was on a path zigzagging down from a ledge way up near the ceiling. Copernicus was behind her. "Antares? Coppy?" His voice cracked with emotion.

  /// Who are they? ///

  /Friends,/ he whispered. He shrugged off his backpack and ran to meet them. Once they reached the cavern floor, Copernicus sped past Antares, tapping wildly. He shuddered to a halt beside Bandicut, and Bandicut knelt and touched his metal skin in wonderment and joy. "Coppy?" he murmured. "Coppy! Are you all right? Jesus, we were worried about you!"