“Are you so sure of that?” I asked.
The prosecutor’s expression twisted with fury and he started to speak but then the Machine took an active role in the proceedings for the first time.
“Let the human speak,” it intoned in deep, resonant waves of sound that swept down the length of the chamber like waves crashing on a beach. “I would hear his account.”
I smiled at this. Finally.
“O great Machine,” I began, “I know not how I came to be here, but I know that any honest and fair being who defends the law and fights against chaos—as I understand that you do—will understand my recent actions and support them.” I then sketched for him in very brief terms the series of events that began with my father’s murder. I paid special attention to explaining the role Istari had played in helping me.
When I had finished, with my last words still ringing off the stone and metal walls and then fading, the courtroom fell silent. The ball of light floating at the far end of the chamber continued to pulse, but as I had spoken its color had oscillated from red through orange and now it radiated a bright yellow. The prosecutor eyed me now in a different manner than before, with less anger and more puzzlement. Then he shifted his gaze to that pulsing light. We all waited.
“Human, your story matches the evidence brought before me,” the rumbling voice from the light said at last, “and I detect sincerity and honesty in your voice and in your vital signs.”
The prosecutor scowled and looked as if he wanted to leap over the railing and strangle me before his master could say more.
“However,” the voice went on, “your admitted association with the outlaw Istari, whom you have labeled Renegade, and your participation in his schemes, incriminates you by association.”
“But—”
The prosecutor’s expression changed instantly into one of relish and glee. “Sentence him, master!”
“I am willing,” the Machine said after a pause, “to suspend your sentence and grant you temporary release if you will continue in the mission you have already begun—if you will track down and destroy the remaining members of the Cabal.”
“Such was my intention before I was brought here,” I replied, “but—what of Istari?”
“The one called Istari has already been found guilty by this court and will be executed.”
“No,” I called out. “No—I can’t do the job without him. It would be impossible.”
“He is a criminal, tried and convicted many times over in absentia by this court.”
“He works against the Cabal now,” I told them, “and without him I have no chance whatsoever of succeeding.”
Even as I spoke passionately in my companion’s defense, a tiny voice in the back of my head raised the question once again: Had I honestly come to trust Istari? Did I believe all—or any—of what he had said to me? If such great power awaited the Cabal in the form of this ‘wave’ approaching us, might he merely wish to destroy his old associates in order to have it all for himself? I had no answers to these questions. But I knew I spoke the truth when I said that without him there was nothing I could do.
“It is impossible,” the voice of the Machine stated flatly.
I looked around the courtroom, thinking fast. “What about all these Hands?” I asked. “You have so many at your disposal. They are great warriors, yes? They once enforced justice across the entire galaxy. Send some of them with us. Just a few. Surely they would be enough to guarantee Istari’s good behavior at least through the completion of the mission—and they could be of great assistance to us in bringing justice to the Cabal.”
“It is impossible,” the Machine repeated.
“Why?” I was leaning against the railing, almost shouting now. “If justice is your aim—and if you wish this Cabal to be brought down—then surely dispatching a few of your Hands to assist—”
The prosecutor rushed up to me and the answer that came booming out at me came from both his own lips and the glowing sphere of light at precisely the same time. “IT. IS. IMPOSSIBLE.”
I staggered back from the sheer force of this rejection. It nearly bowled me over. Recovering quickly, I leaned out once more, addressing both the Machine and his assembly. “Then I question your claims to be the great keeper of the peace and enforcer of law and order. No—I don’t question those claims. I reject them outright.”
“How dare you?” the prosecutor bellowed. He stalked towards me, fists bunched. “How dare you make a mockery of this—”
“This is a mockery!” I shouted back at him. “If you refuse to help, you forfeit the moral authority to judge me or anyone else!” I was jabbing one finger at him and realized with a start that it was no longer impeded by the weight of the chains. The manacles were gone, as if they had never been, though their marks remained on my wrists. Placing my hands on the railing, I leapt over it and confronted the prosecutor directly. I drew back a fist, preparing to punch him.
“STOP,” called the Machine and the prosecutor, again speaking as one. “Stop,” the prosecutor said again, this time alone. He retreated from me, his expression morphing very rapidly now from righteous fury to surprise to what almost looked like fear. He dropped to one knee before me, his head in his hands, and moaned.
Utterly confused now, I looked around at the courtroom—and was dealt yet another shock.
The room itself was fading from view. The ranks of black-clad giants had already vanished and the pulsing light that represented the presence of the Machine had now dwindled to a tiny firefly speck. Then everything went away—everything except myself and the prosecutor.
Then he looked up at me and screamed, and I woke up.
+ + +
I came awake suddenly and sat up. I occupied a cold gray slab of a table in a small, domelike structure. I wore the same golden armor I’d had on since we’d left the palace. The chains were still gone and there were now no marks on my arms whatsoever from them. Some sort of mechanical arms were positioned on either side of the space where my head had lain.
I looked around quickly and saw two more slabs. Tall figures lay on each, and both of them were moving, awakening. One I recognized as the prosecutor from the courtroom—something I now realized had been a sort of imposed dream; a virtual reality experience, played out entirely within my head. Instead of being big, muscular and powerful and wearing a gleaming red and blue metallic suit, though, he was thin—emaciated, almost—and wore the tattered remains of what once might have been such a uniform.
On the other slab lay Istari. He sat up and looked over at me, then at the prosecutor. Then he saw the golden sword where it rested against the wall nearby.
In a flash he was up, off the slab, and grasping the sword. He leapt over my table to the space between it and the giant, and the sword flashed out.
“Wait,” I called to him, starting to understand a bit more. “Don’t hurt him!”
The sword tip halted just millimeters before the neck of the prosecutor even as he sought to rise.
The emaciated giant halted his motions, looked wide-eyed at my alien companion and then at me.
“How—how did you—?”
“It was all in our heads, wasn’t it?” I asked him. “It was all a trick.”
“Not a trick, no,” he said, blinking rapidly and shaking his big head. “It was merely all I have left.”
Istari frowned at this and glanced at me. I held up a hand. “What do you mean?” I asked.
He sighed heavily. “I truly am a Hand of the Machine,” he intoned. “Possibly the last one.”
I glanced at Istari to gauge his reaction.
“I did not know even one remained,” he said.
The giant nodded. “Only me, as far as I can tell. I am called Aucari.”
“And the Machine?” I asked.
He shook his head. “I have heard nothing from the Machine in ages. I fear him destroyed forever. What you saw inside the simulation was my representation of what the Machine was like, during his glory
days.” He gestured around the inside of the dome, and I saw that it was unkempt, untidy, dirty. “But those days are long gone now.” He shook his head tiredly and then gestured toward himself. “My equipment has kept me alive this long, but with no new bodies into which to download my personality and my knowledge, I have had to make do with this poor frail thing.” He groaned. “My time is nearly done,” he said, “and then the galaxy will be without the last of its defenders.”
“Such a tragedy,” Istari said, his voice dripping sarcasm.
I gave him a reproving look but he ignored it.
“These Hands have been nothing but tyrants for ages,” Istari said. “I don’t regret helping my former associates undermine them and their Machine.”
The giant—Aucari—gave Istari a dirty look but said nothing. Gone was the bravado of the trial. He seemed utterly defeated now. Despite everything, I felt bad for the guy.
Istari must have sensed that, too. He stepped back, moving the sword tip away so that Aucari could move into a more comfortable seated position on the slab. Then he looked at me. “You did well,” he said. “You continue to surprise me with the depths of your resourcefulness.”
I snorted. “I thought you were dead, and that I was about to join you.”
Then more of the memories from the trial came back to me and I looked at my companion sidelong. “Did he speak the truth?” I asked. “Are the Immortals truly attempting to harness some energy wave—and to destroy the galaxy in the process?”
He looked back at me, then away. He didn’t answer.
“It is true,” the giant murmured, his head down. “A god told me.”
“A god?”
“Solonis,” he said. “He visited me, not long ago.” He looked up, met my eyes momentarily. “He’s a god. A god who travels in time.” At my expression of skepticism, he hunched over again, mumbling. “He wanted to warn me. To warn the Machine. He didn’t realize the Machine was no longer active in this time.” He made a sound that could have been a laugh or a sob, or both. “So I recreated the Machine, as best I could, within that simulation. Along with the legion of Hands.” He made a choking sound. “I fear now it was all for nothing.”
Solonis. That rang a bell. I thought about it a moment and it came to me: it was the name of one of the soldiers in the household guard—one we’d left behind with the others in the pocket universe, to keep them safe, after the evacuation from Victoria. I didn’t know the man—not well—but he scarcely seemed to match the description Aucari had given.
“A god who travels in time,” Istari repeated. He looked at me. “I think our friend here is too far gone for us to rely on anything he says.”
I couldn’t argue. The big gray being sat hunched over, not looking at either of us. He seemed somehow... broken. I ignored his nonsensical words and turned my attention to my companion.
“But is he telling the truth?” I asked.
Istari looked at me, pursed his lips, appeared to be considering a variety of responses, and then simply nodded. “Yes. I hadn’t wanted to burden you with the additional weight of our mission, but there it is. That is why they must be stopped—beyond your simple quest for revenge or your desire to protect your Seven Worlds.”
I looked at him still closer, and I went ahead and asked him the main thing that bothered me now, just to see what he would say. “And if we defeat them,” I went on, “did you plan to try to deflect this wave, or to allow it to strike so you could take that power all for yourself?
Now he looked back at me and offered that same wry, evil smile. “You think I would turn down the opportunity to gain such power?” he asked.
I felt my pulse quicken. He still held the sword and my pistol lay at the far end of the slab I’d occupied. I knew I had no chance in a direct physical confrontation with him. The giant would be of little help; he seemed near death now.
But then he shook his head and laughed. “Oh, my dear Gaius,” he said. “You continue to wrong me.”
“What?”
“I have told you that my fate is sealed; that my destiny is a closed loop. Nothing you or I or anyone else does can change that.” His smile was no longer the evil thing it had been moments earlier. “I will never have that power, much as a part of me wishes it could be so. That, my friend, is not the destiny that awaits me.”
I took this in and tried to accept it. I needed him. I needed our alliance to endure, at least a bit longer. I wanted to trust him, though every part of me screamed that I should not. Blast it—I liked the guy. I didn’t want him to be the villain of the piece in the end.
“I do wish you had looked into Orondi’s Well when you had the chance,” he added. “It would have made everything so much simpler.” He paused as though considering those words, then, “In some ways, at least.”
I waved this off. I was sick of metaphysics, tired of what might be and what was destined to be. I wanted to act.
“Where are my soldiers?” I asked him, suddenly realizing their absence. “And how did we all come to be here?”
Aucari explained that he had caught us unawares with a concussion bomb as we passed through an area he regularly patrolled. He had dragged our unconscious selves to his headquarters. My troops were held in an adjoining building, safe and sound, pending the outcome of the trial. We walked outside and waited while he freed and rearmed them. They were a bit disoriented and angry at first but I managed to settle and refocus them as quickly as possible.
“Let’s get moving,” I said when we’d all been reunited. “This little side excursion has cost us precious time—and now I know that a lot more rides on our actions than just the fate of the Seven Worlds of Man.” I smiled at Istari. “You said it yourself— four down, four to go.”
The giant explained that we were currently on a moon of a gas giant far out beyond human space—but in a place where the layers of reality were thin enough that Istari could easily find a Path and guide us almost anywhere. That pretty much went over my head but Istari seemed happy enough to hear it.
As we walked out of the dome and rejoined my confused but now relieved soldiers, Aucari nodded to us. “Go with the blessings of the Machine,” he said, “and find victory.”
“The Machine can go to hell,” Istari said.
The mists gathered, and my companion led us into them once more. I told myself it was purely my imagination that they seemed tainted now with the lingering scent of brimstone.
ELEVEN
It was not in fact hell but a sort of alien heaven into which we stepped, as it turned out.
We fourteen—the twelve remaining soldiers from the palace on Victoria, plus Istari and myself—pressed on along the Paths, with my alien companion leading the way, the sword held out before him as if it were some sort of cosmic tracking device or divining rod that told him the direction to travel. Occasionally he would halt our procession, then step away from us and swing the blade back and forth a few times, powerfully, through the space before him. Once this was accomplished, he would lead us on again—and the terrain over which we passed would take on some new form, from rolling grassy hills to desert flats to craggy mountains. I assumed this meant he was cutting a new and unseen Path through the layers of reality among which we walked. But I was not entirely certain.
In truth, it mattered not whether any of us understood it. All that mattered was that we reached the proper destination at the end. And, as it turned out, we did.
We had been marching for some time up a steep incline, with the familiar waves of fog forming on either side and above us, swirling about. Forked lightning traced its way along the perimeter. Our world contracted, became nothing but the immediate view before and behind us. The ground was soft and damp and the smell of richly turned earth nearly overwhelmed us.
At last we leveled off from the climb and marched through grass that stood ankle deep. Within a very few steps the grass had lengthened to knee height and beyond, presenting us with a legitimate obstacle to further progress. We pressed on, Ista
ri now using the sword like a traditional blade, hacking away at the now-man-high grass and carving us a way through.
Then the grass abruptly vanished and we found ourselves in a darkened forest. Branches of alien trees pressed in from all around. Istari was clearly growing tired from all the work he was having to do, cutting an actual, physical path as well as a metaphysical Path. But he would not allow anyone else to touch the sword—not even me.
Then, abruptly, he stopped, and the rest of us came up short behind him. He turned and motioned us back a few steps, then grasped the hilt of the golden weapon with both hands and swung it around hard, like an axe. Instead of the forest rending aside, the air itself seemed to split open and fall away, leaving behind a shimmering oval that hovered there, facing us, like a doorway into another world.
Which is precisely what it was.
Furiously he motioned the troops through as he stood off to one side. When I made to follow, he stuck out a hand and held me back. “Wait,” he said.
“What? But—the men—?”
He held me back for one more second, then, “Now,” he said, and together we leapt through the portal.
The soldiers were scattered about, guns out and ready, but no one fought them or shot at them. They looked to us as we appeared through the doorway in reality Istari had cut for us. For his part, he brandished the sword, ready to do battle with any comers. I had my own pistol in hand, but my attention was focused mostly on taking in the strange environment we had just entered.
“Where are they?” Istari demanded of anyone that might be listening. “Where could they have gone?”
Clearly he had expected someone to be waiting here when the soldiers emerged, and it dawned on me relatively quickly that he had expected some portion of them to be dead now, having secured for us a beachhead. Instead everyone was still alive, no gunplay had ensued, and the quarry he’d expected to catch by surprise was not where it was supposed to be.
This all passed through my mind in a mere instant, even as I was looking around and taking in our new and drastically different environment. We were inside an enormous hollow sphere, probably a couple hundred meters across, its curving walls all of gleaming silver metal. The dome of the ceiling loomed high above us and the bowl-like bottom was lost in darkness below. I could see these two directions because I and the others stood upon a ring that circled the equator of the spherical space. A walkway—the one we’d run out onto—led to it from an actual, physical doorway behind us. We had bypassed that doorway by coming here to this spot directly, via the Paths. The ring on which we stood, which seemed to my eyes to hover in space with no visible supports, formed a walkway that circled all the way around the perimeter, and was itself never wider that twenty meters.
Baranak: Storming the Gates (The Above Book 2) Page 18
