by Tim Waggoner
“I’ll be damned. It worked.” Kyoto pulled her hand away from the weapons controls.
“Did they believe your cover story?” Mudo asked.
“Of course,” Memory said, sounding offended that Mudo could even conceive of such a question, let alone give voice to it. “I told them that I discovered the wreckage of an ancient spacecraft on an asteroid in realspace that was emitting bursts of hyperetheric radiation with an energy signature unlike any the Manti had ever encountered before. I hinted that I believed it might be the by-product of an entirely new hyperdrive design far more powerful than anything currently known. Though of course, since I am only a humble Lander, I couldn’t possibly tell for certain. There—happy now, Gerhard?”
“Ecstatic,” Mudo said.
“And that’s really enough to get us direct passage to the Prime Mother?” Kyoto asked. “It all seems too easy.”
“The Prime Mother is always concerned about new technologies, especially if they have anything to do with hyperspace. And since the Prana are confined to the Daimonion, the Prime Mother is the only truly thinking being in the Weave. There is no one else to go to but her.” Memory paused. “And as far as being easy, it won’t be. There’s no great trick to fooling a witless pair of Sentinels. From here on out, it really starts to get dangerous.”
“Starts to, eh?” Hastimukah’s laughter had a hysterical edge to it. “It must be nice to be an artificial intelligence at times.”
“Don’t let those carefully modulated vocal tones fool you,” Mudo said. “Deep down inside her mainframe, she’s just as scared as the rest of us. Artificial or not, no one wants to die.”
Kyoto had a difficult time imagining Memory as being afraid. After all, with her ability to make backup copies of herself—like the dormant Memory Junior in Kyoto’s G-7—the AI was virtually immortal.
“Plot a course for the Prime Mother, Memory,” Kyoto said.
“I’m surprised the sentries aren’t going to escort us to ensure we don’t stray from our designated path,” Hastimukah said.
“There is no need for an escort. The Sentries believe we are Manti, and no Manti would ever do anything other that what it was told. It’s unthinkable.”
Kyoto wondered if Memory had become Manti enough for the same to apply to her.
The course came up on the holoscreen. Kyoto eased the joystick forward, and the Janus joined the streams of Manti flying toward the Weave. As they descended, Kyoto examined the coordinates more closely.
“I don’t know if I’m reading this right, Memory, but it looks like you have us setting down a good distance from the Prime Mother.”
“You’re absolutely right, Mei. That’s the closest we can land without giving ourselves away. No Manti, not even the Prana, are permitted to approach the Prime Mother in flight. The Manti consider that a sign of disrespect; the Prime Mother must always be approached on foot.”
“Just what we need,” Kyoto muttered. “A Bugger with a queen-size ego.”
“It’s understandable,” Mudo said. “Since flying Manti never attack on the ground, flying in the presence of the Prime Mother would be viewed as an aggressive action.”
“Sounds logical,” Kyoto said. But she couldn’t help feeling paranoid. If Memory intended to betray them, setting down away from the Prime Mother—where the symphysis couldn’t be used against her—would be a good way to do it. Especially if the Manti wanted to avoid blasting the Janus and wasting the crew’s biomaterial.
She wished there were some way she could share her concerns with Mudo and Hastimukah, but with Memory ever present and always listening, that was impossible. And there was no way she could deactivate Memory long enough to have a private conversation with the others without arousing the AI’s suspicions. There was nothing Kyoto could do but land the Janus at the coordinates Memory had given her and stay alert for trouble.
Kyoto made sure to match the speed and trajectory of the other Manti, especially the Landers. If their masquerade was to work, they had to play their role to the hilt. Even so, she half-expected the Manti around them to see through their charade any instant and bombard the ship with energy blasts. But the Buggers paid absolutely no attention to the Janus. Either they sensed the Manti energy signature the ship was giving off, or they couldn’t conceive of the Sentries allowing anything other than Manti past them. Kyoto didn’t care which it was, as long as it worked.
The Weave grew larger on the holoscreen as they approached, and the individual strands which had seemed so thin and fine from a distance now appeared as wide as one of Europa’s multilane causeways. There would be more than enough room to land the Janus.
When they’d descended to within a kilometer of the strand, Kyoto activated landing thrusters. The strandway was far from deserted, however. Manti of all castes scuttled across its surface, heading in both directions. Flying Manti such as Landers, Yellow Jackets, and the rest crawled slowly along the strandway, appearing to confirm Memory’s explanation about her choice of landing zone. Ground Manti were mixed in among the fliers—small two-legged Infectors and lumbering spiderlike Widows.
“Memory, we’re going to need a clear space to set down, and we’ll need it soon,” Kyoto said.
“No need for concern, Mei. Just watch.”
As the Janus closed to within meters of the strandway, without missing a step, the Manti altered their courses to open a space for the ship to land. Seconds later, the Janus had touched down on the Manti Weave.
Kyoto grinned. “A thought just occurred to me.”
“What?” Mudo asked.
“For the first time since the Manti attacked Earth, humans are invading their world.”
Mudo grinned back. “Not only is turnabout fair play, it’s also extremely satisfying.” But though the scientist sounded fine, his skin was pale and his eyes bloodshot.
“Are you going to be able to hold onto the symphysis long enough to complete our mission?” she asked.
“I’ll have to, won’t I?” Mudo said grimly.
Kyoto looked at him a moment longer, the nodded. She powered down the Janus’s engines, then released her seat restraints and stood.
“Time to suit up, gentlemen. We’ve got a delivery to make.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-SIX
“I feel like a gnort walking among a pride of starving vomisa,” Hastimukah said.
“I don’t know the animals you’re talking about,” Kyoto said, “but I get the analogy.”
The three of them were encased in vacc suits, but though they were protected from the airless void of hyperspace, they all knew the suits would be no better defense than tissue paper should one of the Manti see through their ruse and attack.
“I’m beginning to wish Memory hadn’t used her nanoparticles to adapt our helmets’ faceplates so we can see in hyperspace,” Mudo said. “I could do without the sight of all this… traffic.”
Mudo sounded like a man who was deeply terrified and fighting desperately not to let his fear get the better of him. Kyoto understood; she was rather terrified herself. Though the three of them had each fought the Manti in one fashion or another, rarely had they gotten so physically close to their alien foe, and never to so damn many. Dozens upon dozens of Buggers surrounded them, some moving faster, some slower, but while some sense kept the Manti from colliding with one another, they often came within a meter or less of the three companions. The psychological pressure of being in the midst of the enemy was quickly taking its toll on the three of them. At least they didn’t have to maintain comlink silence. Memory had assured them that the Manti wouldn’t be able to pick up their com signals, and since there was no atmosphere to transmit sound, they could talk all they wanted.
Beyond being surrounded by Manti, walking on the strandway was an eerie experience for other reasons. The sky—if that was the right word for it— was a murky gray, with the inky black of a mass shadow looming far in the distance. The Weave generated enough gravity to keep them from floating off into hyp
erspace, and with the extra help of their grav boots, they could walk almost normally. The spongy substance of the Weave gave slightly beneath their feet with each step, and Kyoto couldn’t keep from thinking about what they were walking on. The strandway, like the rest of the Weave, was made from the biomaterial of the Manti’s victims. How many individuals from how many different species had they stepped on since they’d landed? And if they were discovered, would they too be reduced to construction material for countless generations of Manti to crawl over?
Just then an Infector stomped up to them and put down its clawfoot close to Mudo’s boot, nearly stepping on it.
Panicked, the scientist reached for the blaster at his side, and Kyoto grabbed his hand before he could draw the weapon. Infectors were nasty little Buggers. During a battle, they would be towed into attack position by flying Manti like Landers. Once in place, they began to spew corrosive chemicals that could eat through just about anything. The last thing they needed right now was for Mudo to take a shot at the clumsy Infector and alert it to their presence.
The Infector hesitated, as if it sensed something was wrong. Memory’s nanoparticles had done more than help them see in the Weave. They were generating Manti energy signatures so that they could walk unnoticed among the Buggers. But now Kyoto feared the nanotech wasn’t working.
Finally, the Infector picked up its big foot and stomped off.
“It’s okay, Gerhard,” Kyoto said softly. “You can let go of the blaster now. The Infector is gone.”
Mudo turned to look at her, his hand still gripping the weapon. “I believe that’s the first time you’ve ever called me by my first name.”
Kyoto gently pried Mudo’s fingers from his blaster. “This doesn’t seem like a time to stand on formalities. Besides, it got your attention, didn’t it?”
Mudo smiled. “I suppose it did.” He looked at Kyoto for a moment, and she thought she saw something in his eyes that she’d never seen before, as if he were feeling something new, or at least something he’d never allowed himself to show before.
“I’m all right now… Mei. Let’s keep going.”
Mudo turned away, and Kyoto had the sense it was as much to break eye contact as it was to continue with their mission. Maybe more.
She didn’t know what to think or feel about this latest development—if it even could be called that—so she decided to ignore it for the time being. Besides, there was an excellent chance they would all be dead very soon, and then she wouldn’t have to deal with it.
That’s it, Kyoto, she told herself. Keep looking on the bright side.
“Our vacc suits came with handblasters as standard issue,” she said. “But to be honest, they’re little more than ferroceramic security blankets here. Even on their highest setting, they won’t do much more than irritate a Manti.”
“So what you’re saying is, we should keep our hands off them,” Hastimukah said.
“No,” she answered, though that was of course exactly what she meant. “Just don’t reach for them unless you really need them.”
“Point taken,” Mudo said.
They continued on in silence after that, walking shoulder to shoulder to combine their energy signatures and make themselves appear to be a larger Manti. After twenty more minutes of travel, the Prime Mother’s tower finally came into view.
Even from this distance, the structure was huge. Kyoto had seen a similar tower on Earth during the war against the last swarm. That tower had been the Manti’s base in Sol’s system, and it had been destroyed when she and Memory crashed the moon into Earth. But this tower was two, maybe three times larger. As they drew closer, they could see that its base was an olive green mound with a round central opening. Green supports curved outward from the central tower and back down over the mound, looking like segmented insect legs. The tower itself stretched upward to a tapering point, more insect legs flaring out and curving upward like the branches of some gigantic, nightmarish tree. Glowing lines of greenish energy radiated from the tower’s base and through the strandway, hundreds of them, though they grew more faint the farther away from the tower they reached, until they faded altogether.
Kyoto remembered what Memory had told them about how the Manti brought information to the Prime Mother. “Their information is chemically encoded, and once they reach the Weave, they will touch a strand, and the chemicals will be transformed into energy and then transmitted to the Prime Mother.”
Kyoto realized that the lines of energy she was looking at were the communication streams passing to and from the Prime Mother. They probably became more concentrated the closer they came to the tower, which was why the lines of energy were visible here and nowhere else. So not only were she and the others walking on recycled biomaterial, but also on thousands, maybe millions of com signals.
There was something about this last thought that bothered Kyoto, something important, but she wasn’t sure what.
When they were within half a kilometer of the tower, Kyoto stopped and turned to Mudo and Hastimukah. “How are you holding up?” she asked the scientist, careful to avoid using his name.
“Adequately.”
Mudo’s face told a different story, though. His skin was chalk white, and sweat streamed off his forehead. Kyoto checked his vacc suit’s external readout and saw that all systems were functioning properly. Mudo’s condition had nothing to do with suit failure, but then she hadn’t thought it had.
“You look terrible,” she said.
Mudo started to laugh, but then he grimaced in agony, swayed, and started to fall over. Kyoto and Hastimukah each grabbed hold of one of the scientist’s arms to steady him.
“You can’t go on like this!” Kyoto said. “The damn symphysis is killing you!”
“Nonsense,” Mudo muttered. He tried to shrug free of his companions, but he was too weak. “If we could rest a moment…”
“I’m sorry, but if we stop for too long, we’re bound to give ourselves away,” Kyoto said. “None of the Manti are slowing down, let alone stopping to rest.”
“Perhaps one of us could carry the symphysis the rest of the way,” Hastimukah suggested.
Mudo shook his head. “The Prana gave it to me. It’s my burden. Besides,” he said with a weak grin, “I have absolutely no idea how to pass it to someone else.”
“I guess you’ll just have to lean on us, then,” Kyoto said.
She and Hastimukah maintained their hold on Mudo’s arms, and then the three of them continued forward, more slowly than before. Kyoto worried that their slower pace might draw the Manti’s attention, for the Buggers were all crawling at the fastest speed of which they were capable. But if any of them noticed the trio’s slower pace, they gave no indication.
The three trudged on toward the entrance to the Manti tower. It rose forth from the middle of the strandway, but the Buggers all detoured around it. Evidently none was allowed to approach the Prime Mother without an invitation. Good thing Memory had secured one for them.
As they drew closer to the giant edifice, Kyoto saw that the entrance—which was nearly large enough for a Battleship to pass through—was flanked by a pair of shock towers, organic weapons capable of firing powerful energy projectiles. Kyoto had encountered them before, while battling the last swarm on Europa. The projectiles were slow moving, but they were capable of inflicting a lot of damage. Kyoto saw no sign of Manti guards, but then with the shock towers in place, there was no need for any. As they approached the entrance, Kyoto could see the crimson furnace that lay at the heart of each shock tower blaze and roil, and though her vacc suit’s environmental systems were designed to protect the wearer from temperature extremes, Kyoto nevertheless began sweating.
Over the open comlink channel, Kyoto could hear Mudo’s breathing become shallow and rapid, and she feared he was having a heart attack or stroke. But before she could voice her concerns, he gave a little wave as if to say, I’m fine.
The crimson energy of the shock towers seemed to flare more bright
ly as they began to make their way into the Manti dome, and for an instant Kyoto thought they had been detected by whatever sensory apparatus the shock towers possessed. She braced herself to be engulfed by a seething energy projectile, but the shock towers didn’t fire, and the trio moved through entrance without harm.
The interior of the Manti tower was a great hollow dome. Beneath their feet, the floor was covered with radiant lines of energy—the information the Manti were sending to their queen—so many lines that the dome glowed with an eerie green light. The inner walls were completely covered with smooth spheres that glistened in the sour green light. Thanks to Memory’s briefing, Kyoto knew what this place was: the Crèche, where the eggs the Prime Mother produced were taken to incubate until they were ready to hatch. Every centimeter of available wall surface was completely taken up by Bugger eggs. Some were small as a fist, hard and opaque, while others were swollen and distended, larger than a human head, surfaces stretched tight and thin. Small insectine forms were visible through the membranous outer layers of their eggs. The larva wriggled around, poked and probed at their spherical prisons, impatient to be born.
There were thousands of eggs—thousands upon thousands. Kyoto had never seen the inside of the Manti tower on Earth, but since it had been the Buggers’ main base in Sol’s system, she imagined it had looked much the same. Seeing these eggs wiped away whatever last traces of guilt she felt over helping Memory destroy the Earth.
But the eggs weren’t the only residents of the dome. Ivory-hued Buggers that looked something like giant fleas crawled over the eggs, tending to them, taking out a Manti larva when it hatched and bearing it away, devouring the empty egg casing, and bringing in a new egg to take the old one’s place. From what Memory had told them, these flealike nursemaids were called the Chula, and they served as the Prime Mother’s personal attendants. Indeed, they lived and worked in such close proximity to the Prime Mother that they were almost extensions of her, more like the fingers on the end of one’s hand than servants.
