The Shattered Sky

by Paul Lucas

  Gossamyr says I am being overly romantic and sentimental, wanting to preserve my own fantasy ideal of Myotan culture and not its reality, of wanting to trap our people into a bottle of time from which they can never change or grow. She says I should stop seeing our community in the abstract and deal with our people as, well, people. And, as such, they should be free to choose their own destiny no matter what well-meaning social scientists like myself may wish to happen otherwise.

  Spirits bless my wife, she’s right.

  But we also live on the opposite side of history from all those Native American cultures. We know their fate, both good and bad. And I can’t help feeling a terrible dread every time I think of all the thousands of humans who will flood the Tower by helistat in only a decade’s time, like settlers on wagon trains.

  --Armand Lerner, from Observations of a Stranger in a Strange Land, Outland Explorer magazine, Kylea Media, May 546

  * * *

  We arrived at the Laboratory an hour later, breathless, only to be shushed as soon as any of us opened our mouths to ask what was going on. Flier and several Myotan hunters stood in a small cluster off to the side, shifting about and looking nervous. They all seemed relieved to see their Shaman and her apprentice; apparently the situation smacked of too much magic for them to feel comfortable even with their human-made guns. Jacqueline was holding a camera on my husband, who was in the middle of the room apparently talking into air.

  “Go on,” he said. He turned briefly to acknowledge me and the other newcomers with a head nod, then turned back.

  I nearly jumped out of my fur when large, glowing block letters appeared in the air a few feet from Lerner, scrolling along just like I have seen the text in his computer-box do on numerous occasions. The letters formed a distinct message: WE DESIRE A FRACTAL DIMENSIONAL CONTROL INTERFACE LOCATED IN THE MAINTENANCE TUNNELS UNDER THE GRAVITIC RESONATOR CONSTRUCT YOU CURRENTLY OCCUPY.

  “A what?”

  There was a pause, as if who ever Lerner was talking to was either thinking or consulting someone. ITS APPEARRANCE WOULD BE SIMILAR TO A LARGE TRANSLUCENT CRYSTAL. IT WOULD APPEAR AS WHITE IN YOUR VISUAL SPECTRUM.”

  “The crystal I found!” I exclaimed to my husband.

  Lerner shot me a sour expression. Apparently I had just revealed something he would rather have left ambiguous.

  “What do you want with it?” Lerner asked.

  IT IS VITAL FOR OUR ONGOING INTERESTS. WE WILL OFFER AN EXCHANGE FOR THE CRYSTAL.

  “What kind of exchange?”

  WE MUST PAUSE IN COMMUNICATION TO CONFER AMONG OURSELVES.

  The letters froze for many seconds, and it became apparent that whoever we were talking to was not forthcoming with an immediate reply. I cautiously approached my husband. "What is all this?" I asked him with a hushed voice.

  His hand grasped mine, grateful for the contact. Apparently the situation had unnerved him more than he was willing to show otherwise. "A few hours ago we were preparing to go back down into the Underworld when these letters started appearing. At first we thought it was an automated thing, like that automated Matrix interface you found in the Underworld, but it became apparent that there was someone on the other end. It took quite a while for us to establish what was going on, and to fetch the people who should be here for what's apparently a first contact situation."

  "Holy crap," Louis said. "Someone other than us who knows how to use Builder tech? This is big."

  "Damn right," Jacqueline said with a huge grin. "Standing OEC discovery bonus for a friendly civilization with tech equal or better than the KN is a cool million credits. We just got rich again."

  "If they prove friendly," Lerner said. "And if they're an actual civilization and not some crazy old coot who just happened to come across a particularly user-friendly artifact somewhere."

  "There's more to this, though," Flier interjected. "Gossamyr, Windrider, these are the people who sent that signal that angered the Xique."

  "What?" Windrider said incredulously.

  "Wait a second," Lerner said. "We already discussed that with them. They meant that signal only as a beacon, to draw the KN to the Tower for negotiations. They didn't understand what it would do to the local wildlife."

  "So they say," Flier said with ice in his voice. "Or perhaps they did know, and simply did not care."

  "Such accusations is unlike you, Flier," I said.

  Our Chieftain curled his tool-fingers into a fist. "I have buried too many friends this past year, Gossamyr. Too many. In those darkest moments as we lay besieged by the Xique in the upper Tower, I believed that all our children might spend their last moments feeling only claws and terror. Never again."

  Windrider moved up and stroked her Mate's strong back comfortingly. To see Flier admit to such fear was as unprecedented as it was unnerving.

  Flier continued. "I understand that this may be important to the humans of the KN, Lerner. But make sure that nothing discussed here endanger our people again."

  My husband nodded solemnly.

  "So who are these guys?" Louis asked.

  "Jacqueline and I think they may be the Others."

  "No shit."

  "You've mentioned them before," I said, remembering the conversation Windrider and I had about them years ago on the Tower ledge. "But most humans who have talked about them have always been vague."

  Lerner nodded. "That's probably because no one really knows much about them. There's not enough hard evidence for the KN to even officially acknowledge their existence. They're pretty much conjecture based on a lot of rumors and stories explorers have brought back."

  "Until now," Louis said.

  "But we don't know if the people we're talking to here are those Others."

  Flier nodded. "But who are these Others supposed to be?"

  Lerner shrugged. "Its hard to say. There have been rumors of another group or faction or whatever active in the Outlands ever since the KN began exploring after the Underworld expedition. Some Outland peoples have reported coming into contact with other groups like ours, but couldn't have been from the Known Nations. Of someone telling certain select groups to oppose KN explorers, or even attack them. Of mysterious entities or such creating Weirds and Dead Zones like the one in the Tower here for unknown reasons. Stuff like that.

  "Many people see something sinister in what they don't understand. But even if these are the same people responsible for all that, there's no real evidence that they have malicious intentions."

  "And there's no evidence that they're saints, either," Louis interjected. "Let's play this cautiously no matter what the truth may be."

  Everyone nodded in agreement at that as the words suddenly returned floating in the air, causing half of us present to jump in surprise.

  WE WILL AGREE TO AN EXCHANGE OF KNOWLEDGE FOR THE FRACTAL DIMENSIONAL INTERFACE. WE ARE WILLING TO GIVE YOU LIMITED WORKING KNOWLEDGE OF A NUMBER OF SPHERE SYSTEMS AND CONTRUCTS THAT YOU CURRENTLY DO NOT UNDERSTAND.

  “Why limited?” Lerner asked.

  Again, a long pause. GIVING YOUR CIVILIZATION FULL KNOWLEDGE OF MAJOR SPHERE SYSTEMS WOULD NOT BE NOT DESIRABLE.

  Lerner thought about that for a moment, but decided not to press the issue. “All right. Just for the sake of argument let’s say my people might be interested. What would we have to do for this limited knowledge?”

  PLACE THE FRACTAL DIMENSIONAL INTERFACE IN THE TELEPORT NODE, AND ACTIVATE THE NODE.

  “What good would that do? The teleport node system is screwed up from the Cataclysm. It randomizes almost every destination.”

  INCORRECT. THE TELEPORTATION SYSTEM USES A TRANSFINITE DIMENSIONAL COORDINATE SYSTEM YOUR CIVILIZATION HAS NOT YET DISCOVERED. THE DESTINATIONS ONLY SEEM RANDOMIZED BECAUSE YOUR SCIENTISTS HAVE NOT YET CONCEIVED OF THE MATHEMATICAL PRINCIPLES UNDER WHICH THE SYSTEM OPERATES.

  The humans goggled at the words for a few heartbeats, not daring to breath. Even I understood that those few sentences alone, if true, was the most anyone had ever learned
about the workings of the teleport nodes since they were first discovered.

  "We are so rich," Jacqueline whispered happily.

  LONG AGO THE TELEPORT NODE UNDER THE GRAVITIC RESONATOR CONSTRUCT YOU CURRENTLY OCCUPY WAS LOCKED TO ONE DESTINATION. PLACE THE FRACTAL DIMENSIONAL INTERFACE IN THE NODE CHAMBER AND ACTIVATE THE NODE.

  “Why don’t you just come and pick it up yourself?”

  TRAVEL TO YOUR COORDINATES IS NOT DESIRABLE.

  “Why not?”

  A dozen heartbeats of silence.

  THAT ANSWER IS NOT AMONG THE KNOWLEDGE WE WISH TO EXCHANGE WITH YOU.

  “Um, all right, then. Exactly what knowledge do you wish to exchange with us?”

  They started with generalities at first, promising us more specifics once they had the crystal in the Node. They revealed that metallic UTSite is created in part by manipulating the field range of the strong nuclear force. That the gravity generators the humans’ve seen at the rim of the Shard use collapsed super-dense matter accelerating at just fractions below lightspeed to generate their effects. They promised to teach the humans the principles of gravity wave communication.

  "Wait a minute," Louis interjected. "How do we know that you're telling the truth about all of this?"

  Lerner scowled at his friend's undiplomatic question, but the Others replied anyway. WE HAVE ANTICIPATED THAT YOU MAY NEED PROOF OF THE VERACITY OF OUR CLAIMS TO KNOWLEDGE AND OF OUR INTENTIONS TO UPHOLD OUR END OF THE AGREEMENT. WE ARE WILLING TO OFFER TWO BENEFICIAL DEMONSTRATIONS.

  "You have something specific in mind?"

  BEHIND YOU AT THE FAR END OF THE ROOM YOU OCCUPY ARE BIOLOGICAL AUGMENTATION CHAMBERS. We all turned to regard the large cylindrical tanks against the far wall, the ones attached to large banks of machinery and seemed to grow right out of the floor. Even Dumas hadn't guessed at their purpose to date.

  THE CHAMBERS ARE DESIGNED TO MODIFY AND REPAIR LIVING ORGANISMS. THE SUBJECT IS SURROUNDED AND PERMEATED WITH A HIGH-MINERAL NUTRIENT BATH THAT THE NANOTECH MATRIX WITHIN CAN USE AS RAW MATERIALS FOR ALTERING AND RESTORING VARIOUS BIOLOGICAL TISSUES. THE CHAMBERS CAN BE USED FOR A WIDE VARIETY OF PURPOSES, INCLUDING ACCELERATING CELL GROWTH AND ALTERING DNA.

  My husband's brows furrowed. "I don't understand."

  WE HAVE BEEN MONITORING ALL ACTIVITY AND CONVERSATIONS WITHIN THIS CHAMBER SINCE IT WAS FIRST DISCOVERED BY ITS RESIDENTS SEVERAL WEEKS AGO. WE ARE AWARE OF AN IMMATURE MYOTAN MALE WHO IS SUFFERING BIOLOGICAL CASCADE FAILURES DUE TO INJURIES. WE CAN DIRECT YOU IN THE USE OF THE BIOLOGICAL AUGMENTATION CHAMBERS TO RESTORE HIM TO FULL FUNCTIONALITY.

  "You can do that?" I asked, incredulous. Not our spirit-callings nor the humans' science had helped Brightwind come out of his coma. Brightwind's condition had been steadily worsening, and all of us had begun to fear for the worse. "If you can truly do that we would be truly grate..."

  "What's the second demonstration you mentioned?" Lerner asked, cutting off my expression of gratitude. Reckless words in a bargaining negotiation like this, apparently.

  WE ARE AWARE OF THE CONVERSATION BETWEEN YOU AND YOUR BIOLOGICALLY-INCOMPATIBLE GENETIC EXCHANGE PARTNER AFTER YOUR SEXUAL ACTIVITY WITHIN.

  Lerner's voice stuttered, his silly human custom of taking exception to any talk of sex, but my mind was already leaping ahead to what the Others were proposing. Spirits, they couldn't be!

  WE CAN GUIDE YOUR TECHNICIANS IN THE USE OF THE BIOLOGICAL AUGMENTATION CHAMBERS PRESENT AT YOUR LOCATION AND HELP YOU AND YOUR BIOLOGICALLY-INCOMPTABILE GENETIC EXCHANGE PARTNER CONCEIVE OFFSPRING.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  The legend of Galen's Lover is one of the most popular stories in Known Nation's history, and with good reason. It was one of those rare instances where love, honor, and courage proved to be more than just storybook fantasies.

  Lyssa the Fox, heir and first-born daughter to Thorena the Jackal, had passed away after pushing the fledgling Borelean Empire her mother had founded to legendary size and power. She had left three potential heirs--Petra, Iyaku, and Diana, who by their mother's decree were expected to duel each other to the death in a remote wilderness for the throne.

  But Lyssa had also had a son, Galen, who by all accounts had a gentle scholar's soul, and as a male, was forbidden in the old Borelean warrior-female society to engage in violence except defensively. Galen at the time of his mother's death had fallen deeply in love with a mysterious stranger.

  The exact identity of Galen's lover to this day remains murky. Who this person was, what gender he or she was, and even this person's exact species has remained a matter of speculation for centuries. It is only known that he/she/it was from outside Borelean society, and his mother had hated the match and had Galen's lover imprisoned and sentenced to death.

  But Lyssa had died before the sentence could be carried out. As all his sisters also disapproved of his choice of beloveds, Galen knew he had only until the new empress was crowned before his beloved was executed. In desperation, knowing he was no match for any of his warrior sisters and defying all Borelean tradition, he joined the succession duel as a last-ditch effort to save the person he cared for most in the world.

  Two brutal days of personal battle later, only a badly-wounded Galen and his sister Iyaku, the one he had always been closest to, remained. Iyaku bested him easily, but was so impressed by his courage and love that she spared him. Within three days Iyaku was crowned as Iyaku the Merciful, and Galen's lover was released into the gentle scholar's loving embrace. Galen and his lover left the Borelean Empire soon afterward with his sister's blessings, and forever disappeared from the historical record.

  Four hundred years later, the story has spawned a literal mountain of plays, novels, operas, essays, movies, video games, and more. But perhaps the greatest evidence of the story's resonance among the citizens of the Known Nations is that finding out what happened to Galen and his lover continually places among the ten most important exploration priorities in public opinion polls.

  --excerpted from A Lover of Galen's Lover, by Shala Ting, Technocracy of Lyra Free Press, Lyra, 538

  * * *

  "So what do you think, Windrider?" I shifted from one foot to the other nervously.

  She grumped, crumpling dried redberry root into a wooden mortar and grinding away. "You and Lerner already seem determined to go through with it. Why do you need my opinion?"

  "We both trust your wisdom. You know that." I dug an imaginary hole in the floor with my toe. "And you will be the child's grandmother, after all."

  "Only a grandmother of the heart."

  I shrugged. "That is the only kind that matters."

  She smiled thinly. "Perhaps you are learning after all, apprentice. But this business you speak of--it involves great risk for you."

  "Bearing a child is always a risk. This is simply a bit more complicated than most."

  "But if this works, the child will be almost completely conceived of by these Others' magic. Magic that neither we nor the humans understand."

  "But the Others cured Brightwind! He's awake and recovering because of them." We had been at the point where Brightwind's family had little choice but to trust the Others. It was either that, or hang their little boy's wings in the Hall of Remembrance within a few weeks at most.

  It had been a harrowing day for everybody. We all monitored the entire procedure closely from the time they immersed the youngster's body in the grayish liquid of the augmentation chamber tank and all through the six hours the youngster was within as Dumas and Louis followed the Others' instructions. The time passed agonizingly slow for us, but for Cloud and Brightwind’s parents the wait was pure torture. Trusting the youngest member of their family to unknowable aliens who, inadvertently or not, had caused immense suffering among our people.

  But the morning after Brightwind was removed from the tank, he woke bright-eyed and cheery, wondering what had happened. His mother and father wept openly, hugging him fiercely. By the time Windrider and I reached the chamber, Cloud had joined them, as they all held each
other as a family. Brightwind was simply bewildered by it all until I pried him loose and explained everything, his kin too choked up to make coherent sentences.

  Not everything was perfect, though. The membrane of his right wing was still missing. When asked, the Others said that they had only promised to restore Brightwind's "vital systems." Apparently they had not seen his wings as vital.

  We definitely ruled out these Others being Myotan.

  "Making you pregnant will be different from healing Brightwind," Windrider said. "They will not just be healing, but creating life, and using your body to do it. It sounds more than a little reckless and unnatural."

  "It will be a lot less involved than what they did with Brightwind. Besides, Dumas has been studying their methods for over a week, going over the machines in the Laboratory with all his care and knowledge. Plus he and Louis will monitor me the entire time. He believes that what they propose is with some risks, but doable. Even simple, given everything they had to do with Brightwind."

  Windrider stopped her grinding and sighed. "But the spiders do not fully understand the machine's magic."

  "Not entirely, not enough to, say, build his own. But Dumas understands its workings enough to carefully monitor what happens to me. Besides, he said I should be in it for only a few minutes at most."

  "And this...machine will combine your seed and Lerner's? Your child be born of your combined spirits?"

  "I hope so." What was to actually happen was that nanosurgery was to be performed on the egg waiting in my fallopian tube, combining the DNA in its nucleus with Lerner's from his donated sperm. I smiled briefly, inwardly. Even in this most unusual method of conception, the male still had it easy.

  According to Dumas, the DNA combination should work out to produce a healthy Myotan child. From the KN's own analysis from the blood tests they had taken over three years ago, most of our DNA originally came from humans; we were in large part simply human/bat hybrids. The process proposed by the Others would take the human portions of the Myotan DNA structure from Lerner, and the rest from me. Dumas even suggested that this might even be a good thing for the Myotan community at large, injecting fresh blood into our limited gene pool.