Sentients Of Orion: Transformation Space Part 8

This time the guards exchanged glances but didnt reply.

'Our Sophos is no longer reliable. Their decisionmaking has been compromised by a virus. Are you still prepared to blindly follow their edicts, knowing that?

His statements were inflammatory, treasonous. He knew that and cared not. A sense of urgency had taken hold of him. There was little time to preserve his world.

One of the guards looked as though he might speak, but then he stopped and nodded at an instruction unheard by Thales. He walked to the inner door and opened it. 'Enter, he instructed.

The Robes followed closely behind him as he returned to the Sophos meeting room and stood in front of the polished table.

'You are fortunate, Thales Berniere, that one of our caucus has seen fit to support an investigation into your story, said Sophos Lauda.

Thales eyes flicked to Rene. Had it been his wife?

Her expression remained as serene and detached as that of the politic guard.

'You will show the Robes and myself to the offices of this man you call Gutnee Paraburd. If he can be located and questioned, we will review our decision.

Thales nodded. 'I th-thank you, for this much at least. However, it is possible that Paraburd has moved premises. I would imagine that a man of such criminal inclinations does not stay in one place for long. You may have to extend your search.

'You learned much about criminals on your travels? asked Kantos.

Thales heard the superior, mocking tone. 'It is logical that he would do that, Sophos Kantos. That is all, Thales answered firmly.

'Lets hope not, Msr Berniere. For your sake.

But Thales had not finished. 'While you pursue your investigation of my claims, I would beg you to take steps to disable the s.h.i.+ft sphere. The Post-Species are an imminent threat to our world.

'You believe we should cut ourselves off from Orion, said Rene.

He turned to his wife, imploring her. 'If we dont, well lose everything.

'But if we disable our s.h.i.+ft sphere, we lose our influence. OLOSS cannot function without our counsel, said Kantos.

Fury blazed through Thaless body, overcoming his intention of remaining calm. 'You speak of my insanity, Sophos Kantos. OLOSS forces will act with or without our counsel, to protect sentient life. We can offer them nothing else now. What we should have done is seen the possibility of this happening, and guarded against it. We should have been able to predict, or at least theorise that the Post-Species would return with a greater force after the Stain Wars. Instead, we have been isolationist and self-concerned. You-all of you-would do your job too late. His gaze roamed the line of preeminent thinkers. 'All that is left for us now is to survive.

SOLE.

Scurry scurry Littlens go Follow, follow Drinkm up Eatm up Seern truth TEKTON.

Tekton sat in a once luxurious, now filthy, lounge on board the hybrid biozoon. From his brief inspection, the craft appeared to have been beautifully and comfortably outfitted, but without regular cleaning or maintenance it now resembled a place for squatters-or at least what he imagined a place like that might be like.

He tried not to show his revulsion for the discarded food containers and empty flasks of alcohol. The stench was harder to ignore, though, a mixture of something sickly sweet and well percolated, probably musky Balol body odours.

He closed his hood and set his suit to filter the scents. He wasnt filled with confidence by his rescuers att.i.tudes, but his situation had called for decisive thinking and compromise. If they took the money for his pa.s.sage and delivered him to Mintaka, then he could put up with certain deprivations. A filthy s.h.i.+p was nothing, after all, compared to free-falling from an airborne taxi into the grips of detrivore, which had happened to him on Edo. He was, he told himself, able to take this eventuation in his stride.

Only a matter of months ago he would not have dealt with this change in fortune nearly as well.

Finally! said logic-mind. Rationalism.

Lowering your standards, you mean, sniffed free-mind.

Both minds were correct, he thought, and it didnt bother him that they were. For a while he stared at the brown biozoon secretions on the ceiling, contemplating this until the 'esque Jancz slipped into the room with the surrept.i.tious manner of a crook.

'Were out of Intel s.p.a.ce, he said quietly.

Tekton smoothed back his hood and nodded appreciatively. 'Msr Jancz, has my credit for the trip to Mintaka been transferred into your accounts?

Janczs eyes narrowed a little, and a small smile played about his lips. His face was so long and thin that it seemed almost deformed. 'With the excitement about the Extros and all, the lenders are off-cast. Too much demand has bogged their systems. Everyones trying to move their credit somewhere else. Well try again in a day or so, when thingsve calmed. Meantime, we got a few errands of our own to run. Not in any rush, are yer?

Of course I am, you filthy imbecile. 'No, said Tekton blithely. 'Whenever you deem it safe and appropriate is fine by me. Though I might, if I could, request a cabin.

Tekton knew he was being ridiculously polite to this low-life, but while the semblance of civility remained between them, he would hold up his end.

Dont trust him, free-mind urged.

Hes done nothing to suggest untrustworthiness, logic-mind countered.

'Sure, said Jancz, stepping back towards the door. 'This way.

Tekton followed Jancz to a small cabin not far from the galley. It was neat enough, if spa.r.s.e, with the appearance of not having being used for a long while.

'Help yourself to whatevers in the galley. We arent ones for makin meals. Eat as yer go on this beauty.

Beauty? That absurd notion stayed with Tekton as he closed the door and locked it.

Little was beautiful about this hybrid 'zoon. What luxury it had once entertained had now faded in the wake of abuse. Its corridors were acrid with astringent scents, and its walls the pale pink of poor circulation. Rubbish was piled in every corner, and sticky secretions layered surfaces. The poor sad creature is sick.

Tekton pared open the seal of his suit and fished around for Lasper Farrs DSD. With relief, he pulled the box free and set it on the bed. Then he stretched out alongside it without bothering to remove the rest of the suit. His back was raw from rubbing against the devices sharp corners, and suddenly, now that he was safely away from Commander Farr and Intel, he felt exhausted.

He slept for a while, woke, peeled off the suit, drank, and washed in the tiny san. He found some lotion in one of the cabinets and spread it over his body. Despite having to put on the suit again, he felt refreshed and more able to think.

His stomach complained of hunger, but Tekton ignored it. He did not want to venture out of his cabin into the galley just yet. Instead, he checked the door lock again, then sat himself down before the DSD.

Taking a deep breath, he settled into a comfortable position, leaning against the bulkhead.

'Balance, he said.

The undulating 3D image of a Lorenz Attractor sprang into being above the box. Tekton watched the fluctuating brilliance of the fractal structure for a moment before speaking the next pa.s.sword.

Was Cousin Ra really responsible for creating this magnificent device? What gifts did Sole bless my arrogant cousin with, to enable him to do this?

Tekton had a sudden and overwhelming craving for his life to be as it was-before Sole, even. Back at Tadao Ando studium hed been mired in politics and a certain level of intrigue, but nothing there had been beyond his experience or imagination. Since leaving Belle-Monde on his quest to win the Ent.i.tys favour, his life had become nothing if not chaotic and dangerous. Tekton longed for safety-and regular s.e.x.

His akula swelled a little and then deflated again. On an insalubrious hybrid biozoon, in a location that could well be in the teeth of an impending galactic war, and with only two obnoxious mercenaries for companions.h.i.+p, thoughts of carnal pleasure were neither easy to sustain nor really practical.

With a deep and heartfelt sigh, Tekton spoke the next pa.s.sword. 'Shame.

A beam shot from the centre of the Attractor and he was swallowed up by the devices stimulation of his visual cortex. Images appeared and spun quickly through his mind, coloured lights with no form or substance.

He let himself adjust to the speed and glitter of the data, then focused on a recurring speck. The spin slowed and his reality s.h.i.+fted as if he was sucked forward into it. He found himself in the buccal of another biozoon, watching Mira Fedor lying in the pilot vein, her hands resting on her swollen belly.

Shes been busy, his free-mind sneered.

Logic-mind urged Tekton to experiment further, to learn control of the devices quirks.

Tekton let his focus withdraw from the Baronessa and slip back among the coloured lights. He tried concentrating in different places, and quickly became adept at controlling the speed and flow of the images.

Its an instinctive system, logic-mind mused. Designed for humanesque minds. Even uneducated ones.

Bit like a recognition game, observed free-mind.

No. It employs simple logic, logic-mind said. Like this... and this...

Tekton began to group images to form rough linear timelines, and practised the knack of viewing concurrent events.

The device itself was a pure delight, responding to a variety of physical and neurological cues from its user. Tekton knew he could lose himself for days, dipping into the affairs of the galaxy and the permutations of the elegant arrangement of information-if, that is, the news out there had been better.

As it was, what Tekton saw shook his composure. The galactic war which Mira Fedor had prophesied to the summit just hours earlier had already begun.

Tekton flipped between terrifying spectacles. Entire systems were being swarmed by Geni-carriers. Thousands upon thousands of incendiaries descended into the atmospheres of habited worlds.

Many of the DSDs recorder eges had been damaged, transmitting barely discernible images of dense dust clouds where populated moons should be. Others showed the partial obliteration of colonies, and still more sent footage of suffering and carnage.

Worse than that, the Geni-carriers had targeted the galaxys grandest architectural achievements-structures and designs which attracted billions of tourists. The bridges between the Latour moons now hung rent and broken, like tentacles torn free from the body of a huge sea creature. Who knew how many had perished during their destruction? There were over a million tourists inside the Great Diorama Well of Mapoor, helplessly trapped within sightseeing gondolas as the kaleidoscopic walls around them began to implode.

Outrage, horror and despair consumed Tekton, drowning out any rationale that his logic-mind could offer. How could anyone... any thing... perpetrate such ruin... such sacrilege?

All our greatest achievements, free-mind wailed. Everything that we are. Everything we strive for. All our beauty.

The only tiny sliver of hope the DSD afforded him was that his home world, Lostol, had been one of those whod heeded the Baronessas warning. The Lostolians had disabled their s.h.i.+ft spheres, preventing the Geni-carriers from entering their system. Tekton could not detect their s.h.i.+ft signatures, which meant that the Post- Species had likely bypa.s.sed Lostol.

Relief was replaced by more anxiety. He was cut off from his family, which pained him despite the fact that he seldom communed with them. Doris Mueller, his mother Alaman, uncle Tolos, the Tadao Ando studium... All were beyond his reach.

Unreasonable sentimentality! Logic-mind had to bellow at him to be heard over his worrying. When was the last time you spoke to Alaman or Tolos? Or even wondered what they were doing?

Tekton nodded to himself. Logic-mind was right. To weep over lost familial connections was asinine, but this ma.s.s destruction of the galaxys architectural monuments, that was completely deplorable. Unacceptable.

In addition to his marrow-deep outrage and grief, Tekton was besieged by a wave of momentous guilt. From his glimpses into the chaos propagating throughout Orion, Tekton deduced that OLOSS was gathering in multiple locations, planning reciprocation. But its forces were fractured, blinded by the breakdown of res-s.h.i.+ft and without a clear leader. Lasper Farrs s.h.i.+p appeared to be stranded in the vicinity of Bellatrix, apart from the rest of its fleet, and Farr was without the device that had clearly allowed him to stay one step ahead.

Ive stolen his prescience, and the OLOSS worlds will pay.

The G.o.dhead closed his eyes and his mind to the device, and fell back onto the bed, curling into a tight ball. Tears leaked from his narrow seldom-used tear ducts, and he didnt bother to wipe them away.

What have I done?

There, there, free-mind soothed.

All is not lost, said logic-mind with uncharacteristic sympathy, as it worked for a solution.

Tekton and his minds lay in a huddle of mutual despair for some time until logic-mind came up trumps.

Well, we have the device, dont we?

Yes, agreed free-mind and Tekton.

Then lets use it!

BELLE-MONDE.

'Gone where? demanded Miranda Seeward. She was the first to recover and demand an answer.

Chief Balbao surveyed the group of agitated tyros. To his disappointment, each one of them seemed as surprised as the next. 'Id hoped you might have that answer for me.

'But thats t-terrible, spluttered Javid.

The rest nodded, each seeing their generous study grant vanis.h.i.+ng.

'Terrible, but true. I suggest we take a few hours to digest this news and study the newscasts on the purported invasion. We should meet back here then and devise a strategy. I would request that none of you contact your inst.i.tutions or benefactors about this until we have had time to a.s.sess and evaluate. It could be that the Ent.i.ty will reappear in a short time, in which case we would look most foolish for panicking. OLOSS has enough to concern itself with at the present.

A group nod. Even the uulis flared their agreement colour.

'Your mouds will inform you of the meeting time. Thank you.

Balbao made a quick departure before any of them could attach themselves to him. The one thing hed learned about the tyros was that, like children, they could ask endless questions.

His office offered no solace. A deluge of enquiries and requests for instruction awaited him on his moud. Most imperative of them all was the 'cast query from the OLOSS steering committee, asking why they hadnt received the most recent data.

Inform them that changes in the Ent.i.tys electromagnetic field are interfering with our data collection. Therell be a delay of some days, he told his moud. And contact Balol on my private account.

Balbao paced the circ.u.mference of his office while he waited. Belle-Monde, while unwholesome in terms of its decor, had afforded him the most important research a.s.signment hed ever had. Success here meant the opening of doors all over the scientific worlds. If there were worlds left.

Balbao was not given to moments of anxiety-it wasnt in his Balol make-up to be jittery-but the current state of his affairs was less than desirable. And he hated being at the beck and call of the tyros. Though they were learned beings of his ilk, their selection on this programme and their subsequent shafting had made them less than trustworthy, and more than unpredictable. It was as though they were at the whim of the Ent.i.ty, not studying it.

In his next meeting with them he would find out more about their projects. He would demand to know more. The time for secrecy was over.

Chief Balbao, farcasts are disintegrating. There is no reply from Balol.

No reply.

No, sir.

And generally?

It is varied. Mintaka and the near systems are still responding, as are Scolar and a small cl.u.s.ter near them. Lostol and most of that sector are r.i.m.m.i.n.g.

What news of the supposed invasion?

Common cast is resonating with disinformation. Many channels say it is a hoax, and as many again report it to be true. May I suggest using the emergency frequency on the evacuation s.h.i.+p?