by Paul Lucas
“Well, if it is not getting weaker, then what?”
I turned to Cloud, Looking at him fully for the first time since he joined me. “It is healing.”
“That quickly? From over a dozen gunshot wounds? Impossible! That would take--”
“Magic,” I finished for him. “No one has seen him cast a spell, but suppose he does not need to. Suppose the nanites in his body automatically heal him instead of waiting for instructions to do so. Perhaps the Others are using the Tower as they did before, and are constantly broadcasting instructions to him through gravity-waves that neither we nor the humans can detect, and commanding the nanites to do so. Hm.”
“What?”
“But if they can instruct the nanites directly, why do they need him? Why not just instruct the nanites here to kill all of us in the Tower, then have the nanites carry the crystal to the Teleport Node for them? But they must have programmed the nanites within Sunset's body somehow, without us detecting what they were doing.”
Cloud blinked in confusion. I went on anyway, talking more to myself in any case.
"In the machine that helped to impregnate me were a reserve of nanites unconnected to the mainstream Matrix. The Others might have perverted them, programmed this transformation in advance, then hid them within Sunset as he developed. It is the only way. Louis and others have told me that nanites are usually not present in newborns; the Matrix must keep its distance in order to prevent any possible deformation in the development of a fetus. But the Other-programmed nanites could have hidden there, reproducing and growing in number as my son himself grew within me, safe from attack by their Mainstream brethren."
I gave a cold little laugh. "But once he was born they were quickly running out of time. The mainstream nanites were slowly working their way into him from all around him. They waited as long as they dared before the normal nanites began taking notice of the Weird inside my son."
I segued into silence, brooding. But it became clear that for some reason the Others couldn't control the mainstream nanites. If they could, all of this would be unnecessary. If they could operate the Tower's internal systems remotely, why couldn't they access the Matrix here as well? Surely they were smart enough for spells and magic, like myself or Louis or any other Mage on the Shard. What was so different about them that the most universal tool among the Shards would be denied them?
Louis had taught me the Matrix Analysis spell. I should cast it again, to see if the Others were using any spells within the Tower.
And if my theory about my son was correct... "I can use that spell to locate the Sunset!”
Cloud looking more confused than ever, but when he began to ask the inevitable questions I shushed him loudly. I shouldered the rifle and set about calling the spirits immediately.
As soon the spell was cast, I could sense a Weird-- my son?--twelve levels above us. And with a leap of intuition I suddenly knew exactly where it was going.
“Well?” Cloud asked, impatient.
“Its close to the Lab.”
“We go back to get the others, then,” he said. “Maybe we can head it off.” He grabbed my arm and pulled me back in the direction of Amethyst and the others.
“Let go!” I yelled, wrenching my arm away. I immediately set off for the nearest ramp leading up. “Do what you want. I’m going after that creature, here and now.”
“Gossamyr, wait!” Cloud said behind me, watching me get further and further away. “We have to get the others. The thing is too dangerous. You can’t just go alone. You can’t...Oh, dark spirits!”
Within another few heartbeats he had caught up to me again. We were silent the rest of the way.
* * *
As we slowly approached the entrance to the Lab, weapons drawn, Cloud finally spoke up again, this time in a harsh whisper. “How do you expect to kill it if it is healing magically as you say?”
“Even nanites have to have their limits. They still need raw materials to repair his tissues, and as far as I know the creature has not eaten since being hit by the sergeant's weapon. No one has reported stolen food or for that matter been attacked so the creature can eat. But there might be things in the Lab or in the Underworld that can help him.”
The chief hunter shook his head. “Why did you and Lerner ever trust these Others?”
I snapped my wings. “Did you not ever want something so bad that you would do anything for it, even fool yourself into thinking that the means justified the end result?” I looked at him and let a wicked smile play across my lips. “Like, say, shoot your rival for a female that you knew hated you?”
Cloud winced. “Cruel words do not fit you, Gossamyr.”
“Perhaps if I had been more ruthless about what I wanted in life instead of always compromising with others, things may have turned out differently. But no, I always felt so guilty about all the trouble I’ve caused that it seems all I have done these past few years is lick someone else’s fur to make up for it. With Flier and Windrider, with the elders, even with Lerner. Trying to be a good daughter, a good Mate, a good student, a good Myotan, even a good human, in a way, all the time. And look at the storm those winds have blown me into. Well, no more. When I join Lerner’s spirit--if he can ever find it in himself to forgive me--I will do so by doing what I know has to be done instead of doing what others expect of me.” I moved toward the door, weapon at the ready. “And I want you to know that what you think means nothing to me, Cloud. Stay out of my way, Chief Oaf.”
When we reached the Laboratory, I vaulted through the open doorway, weapon leveled, ready to blast away at anything that moved. But nothing stirred at my entrance. I carefully scanned with the entire room and found not a single living thing in the Lab.
Cloud entered behind me, subdued. “Where are the guards?” he said. We had left Stormcold and Wingdance here last I knew. “I do not like this.”
“I’ll cast another Matrix Analysis to find Sunset. Maybe he turned off somewhere, and they pursued.” I said. It was far more likely that Sunset had ambushed them then dragged them off somewhere to feed, but I said nothing.
I cast the spell. “I cannot detect it. It must be out of range.”
Cloud looked perplexed. “How can that be? You said the spell had a range of a human kilometer. From here that would cover the whole Tower. It could not have gotten out of range that fast.” His eyes widened. “Unless...”
He turned toward the small elevator that led to the Underworld. The blockades had been moved.
I moved toward the elevator entrance. The chief hunter sighed. “Well, I guess we have our work cut out for us.”
I spun toward him. “Not ‘we’, Cloud.” Before he had even a moment to react I quickly called a lightning spirit. Cloud’s body tensed painfully for a second as all the muscles in his body tightened, then slumped to the ground, stunned.
Then, while he was mentally defenseless, I cast a Sleep spell on him. He would be out for hours. I stripped him of his extra bullet clips. I would need them for what was to come.
I turned and entered the elevator. However, just before I activated the chamber, I regarded Cloud’s still form. Very remotely, buried deep down, a pang of guilt sparked and grew. Was Cloud really so awful? He had changed in the past few years, especially since Sunwing had died, a pain I could now very much identify with. He had done nothing but help me after he found me over Lerner's body. And he had stuck with me, trying to protect me, despite all the verbal abuse I had given him in the past few hours.
No! I had to concentrate on my objective. I had to free my youngster's spirit. Cloud did not matter.
But the Lab was awfully cold...
Sighing, I exited the elevator. I activated a heater and dragged Cloud in front of it, trying to make him as comfortable as I could.
I was such a fool, sometimes.
I hefted my rifle and headed back toward the elevator. As soon as the doors closed and I began to descend, I knew deep down that I would never see the Tower, my home, or any of my fr
iends again.
One last task, and my life would be over.
FORTY-FOUR
In every moment of every day, the world ends and is reborn anew.
--from Myotan oral traditions
* * *
The Underworld had changed since the last time I had visited, at least in the immediate vicinity of the elevator entrance. Great stacks of equipment from both the Niven's Folly and the more recent helistat that bore the marine to us lay spread everywhere, connected by ground wires that sprawled everywhere like tree roots. But most surprising were the shimmering webs that stretched everywhere between anchor points no more than an arm’s length wide.
Dumas. He had not exactly been forgotten in the ensuing crisis with the creature, but it was thought that since he was isolated down in the Underworld with his surveys and experiments he would be safe. No one had thought to come down here more than once to check on him.
I didn’t see the spider swarm or the creature anywhere. There was no movement or sound I could detect beyond the relatively small circle of light created by Dumas’ base camp.
I almost called out for the spider swarm, but thought better of it. The echoes were too pervasive and unpredictable down here. No sense letting the creature know where I was just yet.
The network of chambers under the Tower was vast, and there were many we had only briefly examined. Any one of them could have a hidden exit which could lead into the vaster Underworld beyond. I may never find the creature.
But no. The Others wanted the crystal. We had told them that we moved it from its original chamber, and they had assumed that it was somewhere in the Tower above. But the truth is we had hidden it down here, where the hiding spaces were so much vaster.
My eyes widened. Of course. I did not know where the creature was now, but I knew where it would head to once it had what it wanted. I just had to get there first.
I turned to go and was greeted with a large, fist-sized spider dangling from a web in front of my face. “Dumas!” I exclaimed.
His other element-bodies scuttled up along the floor and walls to join us. “Gossamyr,” the Swarm said. “What is going on? What I assume was the creature Louis warned me about came through the elevator just a little bit ago.”
I quickly filled the Spider Swarm in on all the pertinent details of the last few days. “Did he hurt you?” I asked.
“No. He growled at my element bodies if they happened to get too close, but otherwise left me alone. He must not consider me much of a threat.”
“That may be because the Others do not know much about your kind and could not program him accordingly. To him you may just be a bunch of spiders instead of an actual person”
Dumas’ element-bodies swarmed over each other in irritation. “It's unfortunate that I wasn't topside to help track the creature down before this. I could have helped. You humans always tend to think too individualistically, never give enough thought about the group as a whole.”
“I’m not human,” I told him.
“To me there is very little difference between your two sub-species. You look and act and think so much alike. After all what are the differences between, say, yourself and your husband compared to the differences between you and me?”
The look on my face at the mention of my husband must have been unmistakable, even to a herd of sentient spiders. “I am...sorry about the passing of your husband, Lerner. Did I err socially in mentioning him?”
I shook my head. “Never mind that. We have to find the monster.”
“He’s not far from here,” Dumas said. “I have one of my element-bodies watching him. He is rummaging through many chambers, looking for something.”
I nodded. “Okay. Directly confronting him now would be stupid. We’re going to have to lay a trap. We have to make sure he never threatens my people again. Come on.” I began stalking down the darkened corridor.
I heard the dozen-odd tarantulas scuttling along the metal floor behind me. “Where are we going?”
“The teleport node.”
* * *
“It’s locked on one location. The Others weren't lying about that,” Dumas said from inside the globe of the node. One of his element-bodies hung from the control-pad about my head-height just to the right of the doorway.
I shifted pensively from foot to foot, rifle tight in my hands and a dozen offensive spells on the tip of my mind. Dumas’ element bodies were spread wide, keeping a watch out for the creature, but that was no guarantee that it couldn’t find some way to surprise us. “Is that unusual for a Teleport Node?”
“Yes. The whole idea of the teleport network is that the user should be able to access any other node in the system, no matter its location. It wouldn’t be a very convenient form of transportation if each node only went one place, would it? You might have to cycle through thousands of transmissions before you finally ended up where you wanted to be.”
“But it’s more than that. Its been locked ever since we’ve discovered it. One thing KN xenotechs have learned is that the teleport connections between two points isn’t stable. The shifts appear random, but like the Others told Lerner, we may simply not have the math to understand what's happening. But once a shift occurs, it is almost impossible to access the old destination again. The shifts usually occur within minutes or sometime hours of each other. The two nodes in KN territory have only four destinations they can access semi-reliably, and those are not guaranteed from one day to the next. To find one such destination-lock so far from KN territory is very interesting. If only I can find out how long it’s been like this.”
“So it has been like this for longer than two days?”
“Yes.”
“Then the creature has not meddled with the node yet. Hm. Dumas, I have something important to ask of you.”
A number of his element bodies shifted position, the better to look at me. “Yes?”
“I am going to have to ask you to sacrifice one of your element-bodies.”
A heartbeat. Then: “Explain.”
“We cannot let the creature back up into the Tower. It cannot be allowed to hurt my people again. Do you understand? No one else gets hurt if we fail to kill it. We have to remove it from the Tower, permanently.”
The spider swarm said, “I think I see where you are going with this. We will ambush the creature as you said, and lure it into the node. I will have one of my element-bodies within, who will operate the controls as soon as the creature is inside. It will then be teleported away. Am I correct in assuming that's your strategy? Good, then I agree. It is a worthwhile sacrifice.”
"Are you sure? I mean, the element-body is part of you.”
The spiders scuttled about agitatedly. “As I said earlier, I am not human. Nor Myotan,” he added hastily. “Though I am well-trained and experienced in relating to humans, you must remember I am essentially a very different kind of consciousness from you. For me to even use the pronoun “I” is misleading, as would be the word “we.” I am something in between. Your language is inadequate to describe how “I” view “myself.” I am one being, but I am many minds.
“And perhaps much more than you, I understand that individuals mean nothing compared to the whole. If I had to sacrifice one of my element-bodies to save the other thirteen, I would do so without hesitation. Unlike a human or its kin, who balk at, say, cutting off a limb to save themselves. What matters a hand or foot compared to your very life? And yet that is how you and your kind thinks, even though it seems silly to spider swarms like me.”
“I am glad you think that way,” I said gravely. “Because you are not the only one who is going to make a sacrifice here.”
Dumas switched spiders at the Node controls; the new one was unusually large, with a large sack of webbing tied to its back. “I figured as much," he said. "You want to make sure the creature is dead, no matter what injuries you sustain, and no matter if you are in the node when it is activated.” Dumas paused for a second, thinking. “You are going to sacrif
ice yourself for the good of your community. Admirable.”
I grunted, unsure of how to react to being complimented by tarantulas. In the end I decided to let him think what he wanted. He did not need to know how selfish I was being at the moment.
My body, my heart, my very soul ached to join Lerner, wherever his spirit flew. Funny, just a few short months ago, I had begun to think of myself as a religious skeptic, an almost-agnostic. Now, I prayed fervently to the spirits on an almost hourly basis, begging them to look after my loved one and beg his forgiveness on my behalf.
There had to be an afterlife. There had to be some part of us that lives on after our mortal life is over. Otherwise, what would be the point of living at all? To be born, make babies, and die, to eventually fade from all memory, completely forgotten, as soon as your wings fade forever in the Hall of Remembrance?
My husband had to be out there somewhere, beyond life. And I would join him if I could, very soon.
But I had to do this one last task. I would follow after my son's spirit as it flies beyond the Shards.
As soon as that thought fully formed in my mind, all the horror, all the anger and rage, all the grief of the past two days washed out of me in a torrent. I unlocked teeth I did not know I had been clenching, and slowly, almost arduously, slumped my shoulders. A shiver of relief ran through me, from ear-tips to toes, as I truly exhaled for what seemed the first time in hours.
All my possible destinies, all my might-be futures, were now closed to me but one. Knowing what was to come was inevitable gave me a feeling of peace.
Dumas signaled that the creature was approaching. I stood in the doorway of the teleport globe, gun leveled and ready, spells already forming in my mind. It was useless to try and hide. Chances were he already smelled me, and his hearing was sensitive enough at this distance to hear my heartbeat.
As soon as it turned into view at the far end of the node chamber I saw it was carrying something cradled in one arm. The crystal. He had found it, after all. Now I was the only thing that stood between it and the fulfillment of its mission.
