by Nick Webb
“Aye, aye, admiral. Its been an honor. Commencing Oppenheimer maneuver one.”
“Godspeed, Chieko,” said Admiral Oppenheimer. “And thank you.”
He kept shooting, not wanting to watch. But the flash in the corner of his eye made him look. The Stennis disappeared, and the next moment the Swarm ship it was burning towards convulsed in an explosion as the rear third of it disappeared in a cloud of debris, fire, and slag.
“Dad? What’s your status? How much we got left?” He glanced at the timer. They’d been in hell for nearly twenty minutes. They had ten minutes left until the red line. When they were supposed to be back on the Independence and q-jump the hell out of there.
“Five minutes. Almost done.”
Zivic was calm. That was what surprised him. It was a maelstrom of weapons fire and ships and explosions and hundreds of ships darting in and out, weaving and dodging and flanking, all while falling towards the ever approaching event horizon. But he was completely at peace, focused on the task at hand. He supposed that was his friend’s doing.
But he noticed two other things. First, he noticed the flow of time, and the differential in its flow between where they were and where they’d just come from above Earth. He even noticed the time flow differential between the highest part of the battle with the lowest—fighting closest to the event horizon looming ever larger below like a perfectly black disk.
Second, the proto-ligature was strengthening, and he was starting to feel, almost individually, all the crew members of the fleet. Over two hundred thousand, all around him. And the Skiohra, both External and Internal. And, to his surprise, many of the Dolmasi. And one other person.
Someone outside the proto-ligature. And yet somehow a part of it, in an almost belligerent, hostile sense.
“Oh my god,” he murmured.
“What?” said Ace.
“It’s Huntsman. I can feel him.”
A pause. Ace replied. “So can I. And he’s got something up his sleeve.”
Oh shit.
Chapter Seventy-One
Bridge
ISS Defiance
Black hole
Penumbra System
The battle was progressing surprisingly well, Proctor thought. She hadn’t expected so many ships in their fleet to survive this long. But between the q-jump idea that Krull had had—patching each ship’s q-jump engine into a dedicated core on the Independence running Qwerty’s predictive algorithm which allowed them to jump away from a Swarm beam at the last second—and the impressive coordination they’d managed between the three fleets, they’d suffered only losses of less than twenty percent.
Three fleets. It was really four. The Valarisi were the grease between the three races. The common denominator. The force that coordinated, soothed, and gave confidence. She felt it in her own mind as her new friend added its helping voice or influence at certain times. Friend. She called it her friend. That’s what the Swarm used to say.
But this was different. Much, much different. When choice is missing, words take on a whole new meaning. Friend becomes slave. Family becomes empire.
“We just might make it, Tim. Which means you’ll owe me a beer.”
“We never made a bet, Shelby,” he replied, glumly.
“Lighten up, Tim. It was a joke.”
The Defiance was stealthed, and in the mass confusion of the battle, she was confident the Swarm simply had no time to even notice the little invisible gnat flying around, pricking them here and there, running interference for certain shuttle that were facing stiff resistance.
“Shelby, do you remember your promise?” he said.
She didn’t reply, choosing instead to focus on the tactical display before her, firing at targets as they presented themselves. “Ensign Riisa, hard to port. Help out the ISS Resolute.”
“Shelby?”
“And when exactly would you like me to kill you, Tim? Hm? Before the battle’s over? After? During the victory parade for all to see?”
“That wasn’t my question. I asked if you remembered it.”
“I do. But I’m not—”
“Listen. Something has happened.” His voice was grave.
She finally looked up at him. His face was white. “Tim. What is it?”
“Shelby, he’s here,” said Granger from his seat at the comm station. “Huntsman.”
The pit in her stomach returned. “What does that mean?”
“I’m … I’m not sure. I don’t know what he has planned. But he wouldn’t have shown up here without one.”
She wasn’t sure what to do. There were only seven minutes left until red line. They were almost there. Just a few more shuttles needed to complete their mission, and they were done. Could she track him down? Shoot him out of the sky?
“But I asked you that to remind you. If it comes down to needing to kill Huntsman, and it ends up being a suicide mission, well, I call dibs.” He finally flashed her a grin and a wink, just like old times.
“Oh god, Tim I hope it doesn’t come down to that. We’re almost done. If we just—”
And then the world went white, disappearing in a flash.
Chapter Seventy-Two
She woke up, but everything was wrong. Everything was white. Almost blindingly white. But she didn’t have to squint.
“Oh for the love. If this is heaven, what a stereotypical letdown.” She’d been on her back, so she rolled over and slowly pushed herself to her feet. “Let me guess. God shows up. Tells me I’ve got a choice. Go with him, or go back and finish my mission, eventually going down in a blaze of glory for good this time.” She spun around, her arms wide. “Am I right? What the hell is this?”
“My god, you’ve become cynical in your old age, Shelby,” said a familiar voice.
She spun around to face him. “Tim? So you’re here too? Are we still on the bridge? Are we asleep, and somehow sharing the same dream through the proto-ligature?”
“Shelby, I’m not Tim. You are lying on the bridge of the Defiance, but I am not Tim. He’s lying on the bridge of the Defiance, too.”
“Oh. So … not god either?”
He chuckled. “A little. But not really. I’ve been alive for almost as long. I’ve seen the creations of countless solar systems, and their deaths. The rise and fall of great civilizations. I’ve seen horrors, and heroism, and sacrifice, enough to last a million lifetimes. I’ve seen evolution in action. And I’ve influenced it here and there, with breathtaking results in sentient races. So, in a sense, yes. I am god. Sort of.”
“I’m confused.” She studied his face. Tim Granger was smiling broadly. He looked very, very similar to the man she’d just left moments ago. But … slightly different. It was the mood, more than the appearance. This Tim was confident. Happy. Almost … artificially so. “Are you Tim, or not?”
“I am not. I told you. I am an imprint of Tim. A representation of him. Essentially, I’m AI. He worked on me for millions of years. Perfecting me. Currently, I’m housed in several racks of hardware deep underneath the crust of Tal Rishi.”
“Oh.”
“But I’m Tim, in the sense that I have all his memories. All his likes and passions and flaws and intentions and plans.”
She perked up. “Oh,” she repeated. “Then … what’s the plan? You planned for this battle for billions of years, right? Are we … doing it how you planned?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. You see, the real Tim, that you have now, is human. With a finite, tiny brain. There were only so many memories we could cram in there without overwhelming his new body. And, frankly, he remembers a lot less than we had planned. Oh well. He’s still Tim. But something he did not remember was the plan. Because, and you’re not going to believe me at first, but there was never a plan. There was nothing for him to remember.”
“Oh,” she repeated a third time. “That’s … disheartening. And now Huntsman is here, and he’s messing everything up. We’re about to lose, aren’t we? When can I wake up?”
; “Soon. Only a second or two has actually passed. Don’t worry about that. But I’ve brought you here, through the proto-ligature the Valarisi are building, to tell you why there was no plan. And what that means for you.”
She held her arms out to her sides. “I’m all ears, Tim.”
“Shortly after I arrived in the Swarm’s universe, I became intimately connected to them. And that did not change when I escaped back into our universe, albeit at not quite the right time. They followed me here, quite early, in fact. The universe is a big place, Shelby, and neither they nor I had any idea where Earth was. Or rather, where it would be. But where I looked, the Swarm followed. I … inadvertently caused the destruction of several spacefaring races that way.”
“They followed you. And they could read your mind?”
“After a fashion, yes. They could read some intentions. Feelings. But they’re damn smart, and able to put two and two together. So I knew that I could never, ever make a plan to save humanity, because then they would know, and undermine it.”
“I understand. But … you’re here.”
“I am. I couldn’t make a plan. But I could make tools for you to use. I could set the conditions such that, when this moment happened, the odds would be, ever so slightly, be pushed in your favor from the hopeless position you would have been in otherwise.”
She finally understood, and closed her eyes to process. The Granger moons. The Ligature being destroyed, which would have never happened without the Dolmasi being slowly driven mad through Tim’s influence aboard the mystery ship. And with the Ligature destroyed, the path was made clear for the Valarisi to return without the risk of the Swarm immediately corrupting them.
He continued. “I created entire races, you know. The Findiri were the first. Absolutely savage warriors. Relentless. Proud. With an incomparable drive to survive. I figured a race like that would certainly be able to stand against the Swarm. But instead, they hid. Dodging the Swarm. They survived, all right, but not in the way I expected. And now I’ve loosed a violent, bloodthirsty race upon your local group of galaxies. My second attempt was made as a response to the Findiri. I made them to both counter the Findiri, and also, when combined with the Findiri’s might, lead to victory over the Swarm, before they ever discovered where Earth was. They’re subtle. Clever. Ruthless. Highly intelligent. They can read minds, Shelby. They are not strong by any appearance, but in a way they are more deadly than the Findiri.”
“Why are you telling me these things? How does this help me against the Swarm? How can I use this to beat them?”
He shrugged. “You can’t. I’m just assuming you’ll win today, and I think you’ll want to know all this eventually, for when you face them.” He paused. “However, there is one thing you can learn from my failure with them. I created the two races as compliments to each other. I intended for one to compensate for the other’s weakness, and that together, united, they could defeat the Swarm. You see, Shelby, in all my billions of years in the Swarm’s own universe, learning their history and savagery, I never once found a situation where they conquered two races at once. And not because they weren’t willing to, it’s just that, believe it or not, they never got the opportunity to. Tribalism is a fact of evolutionary existence in just about every universe. It’s an unfortunate reality. But this is where you come in. And my efforts to guide the final evolutionary steps of the Skiohra, and the Dolmasi. And yes, the Valarisi. It was my intention that, when the time was ripe, the four races would unite as one against the Swarm, and vanquish them forever. Completely and utterly.”
The whiteness surrounding them was fading. It was as if storm clouds rolled in the distance, and dark fog boiled all around her.
“Wait. Tim. What’s happening now? What’s Huntsman doing?”
“Beware, Shelby. Huntsman is the Swarm. The human manifestation of the Swarm. The Adanasi, if you remember your terminology from the Concordat of Seven. He means to wrest control of the proto-ligature from its rightful owners, and use it to corrupt all of you and bring you under his sway. Beware, Shelby. He’s powerful. Because he has the full force of the Swarm behind his mental focus. They’re channeling all of it, all the rage, all the hatred for you, their lust for revenge, through him. He’s dangerous. And, if I were to bet you a beer, I’d say odds are you’re most likely going to fail.”
“Well thanks for the vote of confidence.” But her words had an edge to them. She was scared. They’d come so far, and they still would probably lose. And die.
“I said the odds are that you fail. But, Shelby Proctor, in all the years I’ve known you, I’ve learned that the odds often don’t reflect reality when you get involved. Through fate, and even more through your sheer intelligence and grit, you’ve managed to bend the odds more times than I can count.”
“Fate? Is there such a thing?”
“Ask Carla.”
The darkness was thickening all around them. The mention of her dead little sister pierced her deep. “And was I fated to win? Or lose?”
He smiled. And as he smiled he started to fade. “It hasn’t decided yet.”
And then he was gone.
And so was she.
Chapter Seventy-Three
Bridge
ISS Defiance
Black hole
Penumbra System
When she came to, everything was chaos.
Ships were flying blind. Some Dolmasi had even started firing on several IDF ships, and they in turn had started to retaliate. A wave of … something … washed over her. Revulsion and rage. It reminded her of her experience over Bolivar, when they’d first encountered Tim’s mystery ship. What they called the Golgothic ship.
She watched the ISS Lancet disappear in a fiery blast, slagged to broken debris by three Dolmasi ships flanking it.
Out of nowhere, the Benevolence plowed through the debris field, firing on Dolmasi and human alike.
Madness. Madness everywhere.
She could feel it in her own mind. She could hear it in his laugh.
Huntsman. Laughing. His voice carrying almost audibly over the din of madness washing over her from every one of the millions of living beings in the great raging battle. The whole thing still falling, careening, down towards the ever-growing black disk.
“Tim. What do we do?”
He frantically studied his console, poring over the data coming off their meta-space receivers. Something was assailing them through meta-space. Spikes of unbridled energy, unleashing torrent after torrent of violence upon the proto-ligature, and through it, upon them. Upon their minds. And not just their minds.
Upon their humanity.
It was tearing them apart. Driving them from each other. Even human from human, and not just race from race.
She reached deep, searching for her Valarisi companion. Are you there? she asked.
I am. I don’t know what to do either. We’re under attack by … something. We thought it was the Swarm, but it’s like they have a renewed vigor about them. It’s like they’re building their own Ligature, independent of ours, but … sharper? More dominating? You lack the words I can make you think to describe what is happening. Just minutes ago, they had no control over us. But now? We feel powerless to stop it. Just like before.
She closed her eyes and sat back in her chair, both from pure mental anguish and a sense of impending defeat and hopelessness.
“Shelby, I remember. A small piece, but I remember it clearly,” Granger was talking so low, she could barely hear him.
“Tim?”
“I remember pieces of the past few decades. I remember Huntsman. I watched him, from afar. He had a family. He’s a person too. Remember that. And use it. He’s human. He’s not Swarm. Not completely. He’s human. Use it.”
Her mouth was open, but she didn’t know what to say.
Shelby. He’s right. I don’t know how, but if you can distract him, for just a minute. Half a minute. We can reassert control and give us the space of time we need to escape.
He’s human. Remember that, Shelby. Your greatest enemy is human.
She tapped the broadband comm open. “This is Admiral Shelby Proctor. Patriarch Huntsman, do you read me? Please come in.”
After a few seconds, he responded. “Ready to beg?”
“Perhaps,” she said. “But first, let’s talk. Leader to leader. Adversary to adversary. Friend to friend.”
“I … what?” He sounded momentarily confused.
“We have a lot in common, you and I, Tobey. From what I gather, you never had children. Is that correct? I didn’t think agents within the Russian Confederation’s intelligence service were encouraged to start families.”
“I … no. No I didn’t. This is a very strange way to beg, admiral.”
She chuckled. “Oh, I’m begging, Tobey. I’m begging you to listen to me. I’m childless too. But I had a nephew. I lost him, once. He was dead. Scared me like nothing else ever has. Do you know what that’s like? Did any of your siblings ever have children?”
“No. They didn’t, admiral.” It sounded like he was spitting with anger. “They died in the war. A war that never would have happened if humanity had just joined the Family peacefully.”
“Ah. I see, Tobey. I’m so sorry. I’m sorry they died. Honestly, if I could go back, there’s a lot I would change. How I fought that war. I have regrets, Tobey. Lots of them.”
“Good. You’ll die with them.”
“I’m sorry, Tobey.”
He was silent.
“I’m sorry if my actions contributed to their deaths. I wish I could go back. Change what I did. So that they could live. So they would not have been taken from you so prematurely. I’m sorry.”
“It’s far, far too late for that, Proctor. And now you’re about to die because of it. I’m going to q-jump away in about a minute, and I’m going to take the Swarm ships with me, and you’ll be left here to your fate. An eternity falling into a quantum singularity from which you can’t return. Not this time, Granger—yes, I know you’re listening.”
