End of the Circle Read online

  But in the meantime, what dark harvest have we reaped? The thought came like a sword cut, over and over.

  CHAPTER

  TWENTY-NINE

  “Peter Pan, huh?” I said to him. “Hope we packed plenty of pixie dust, Tink.”

  Louie Nichols, remark to General Vincent Grant, quoted in Nichols’s Tripping the Light Fantastic (fourth edition)

  In spite of himself, he was nearly nodding off when he felt his wife’s fingers dig into his arm. “Max! Look!”

  The fingers sank in with enough strength to make him wince; becoming a mother had not robbed Miriya of any of her Zentraedi sinew and vigor. Max was instantly wide awake, sitting up straight on the sleeping pad he and Miriya had thrown down on the bare deck to keep a vigil by their daughter.

  He saw what she meant at once: Aurora was blinking as if coming out of a dream, and the apparitions that were the SDF-3 children had vanished.

  Miriya was first to her daughter’s side, feeling her forehead with one hand, checking her pulse with the other. On the other deck levels, people were taking note of the change.

  Aurora put up with the fussing but insisted, “I’m all right, Mother. Father.” She put an arm around each of them and hugged.

  Max offered up a prayer of thanks. Aurora was so ethereal, so seemingly unsuited for hardship and strife—it broke his heart whenever he thought of her coming to harm.

  Jean Grant had arrived to gently nudge Miriya aside and run a diagnostic scanner over Aurora. Louie Nichols was there, too, practically jumping up and down, dying to ply Aurora with questions. Max laid a restraining arm on him. “Give her a minute, Doctor.”

  “Jean, I’m perfectly fine,” Aurora insisted gently, pushing the scanner away. “And we really haven’t any more time to waste.”

  “What happened to the children?” Louie burst out, unable to contain himself anymore. “Why’d they break contact?”

  “I’m still in fourth-level contact with them,” Aurora corrected. “But second-level, which you saw earlier, is somewhat draining. And it’s no longer necessary; I know our course now.”

  She stepped through the circle of people around her to a makeshift ramp that led toward the control area. Jean protested, “Wait, sugar; you need to rest a bit.”

  “There’s no time, Jean.” But before Aurora could set foot on the ramp, Max blocked her way. “Hold on a second, hon. You have to tell us what’s going on.”

  She smiled at him sweetly. A smile like a springtime sunrise, he thought; her shoulders felt so frail in his hands.

  “Well, I have to take control of the interfaces, to direct the Peter Pan on the last leg of the trip,” she told him. “Basically, we’re navigating through a—a mind continuum, you might say. As Marlene told you, it’s what the SDFers call newspace. Different from the physical universe and even from Doctor Nichols’s cyber-dimensions. So I have to take the helm to guide us.”

  Her face changed then, becoming sober, and Max felt her delicate hands close on his. “And there’s something else. Newspace reacts to what’s in us, our thoughts and emotions and experiences. It has no true form of its own, and so it draws from what it finds. The children say be very careful what we say and do and think.”

  “Yes,” someone agreed, and Max saw Marlene standing nearby. A somber, intent Scott Bernard hung back a step behind her. “We must all be careful now,” Marlene went on.

  “Mm-hm,” Aurora said, hair bobbing as she nodded her head. Then she drew his head down so that she could whisper in Max’s ear. “But especially you, Father.”

  * * *

  “And the Praxians don’t respond?” Exedore frowned.

  Cabell raised his hands hopelessly, then dropped them again. Before them, the big transignal communicator was silent. “The installation we left on New Praxis was working,” Cabell insisted. “The last message from Bela talked about disturbing dream aberrations, and our remote instruments indicated that Haydon IV was approaching the planet. As you can see, our link with the Amazons is now silent. The obvious conclusion is that Haydon is awake. I fear the worst.”

  “The Flowers,” Exedore rasped, running a hand through the bright disarray of his hair.

  Cabell inclined his head slowly. “The Flowers, of course. And after that, inevitably, the matrix.”

  They turned as one to look out the window of the lab at the immense rebuilt pyramid that was the Royal Hall, where the only Second Gen matrix—the “facsimile,” as Lang called it—had been stirred to fitful, difficult-to-control life.

  “What if we simply surrender it to Haydon?” Exedore mulled.

  Cabell answered, “It may come to that in the end, but I would see our subsequent chances of survival as very slim.”

  And by “our” he meant every single living thing in the universe and possibly, knowing Cabell, its inanimate material as well.

  “We could create another matrix,” Exedore said.

  Cabell put into words what they both knew. “Yes, but that would take time, perhaps months, and Haydon will not endure such a wait. No, He means to supercharge the matrix with the Flowers from New Praxis and start at long last on His final journey.”

  There was a rapping at the open door: Lantas, Cabell’s new student and research assistant since her return aboard the ship comandeered by Dana Sterling and the 15th ATACs. She was the last surviving member of a Scientist triumvirate, a bright and energetic young woman, her hair a mass of pink ringlets. She had adopted a protective, almost proprietary attitude toward Cabell and Exedore, making them the missing members of a new triumvirate.

  Now, though, Lantas looked young and frightened. She said, “The captains of the Local Group are here.”

  They trooped into the room—Karbarran and Spherisian, Garudan and Perytonian. Strange to see them striding along together, when in the near past there had been so much friction among them.

  The captains drew to a halt before the three. Hodel, the burly Karbarran, spoke for them; the flotilla was mostly Karbarran, after all. “We have had word of Haydon’s approach. Tirol has given us reason to hate it over the centuries, but in the Sentinels War, you here became our allies. More to the point, we think your researches into using the matrix to halt the shrinkage of the cosmos are our only hope of survival. We therefore cannot surrender the matrix to Haydon, no matter what.

  “Tracialle will lead the fleet into battle. Your Tiresian techs have agreed to man the Valivarre.” His main regret was that the powerful Ark Angel had, after delivering the scientists to Tirol, departed for return to Earth; it would have added tremendously to the flotilla’s firepower.

  Exedore had heard something about the Tiresians’ crewing Valivarre for battle. With all the Zentraedi gone save only himself, the ship had to be refitted for use by Micronians, of course. But how surprising that the clones, after centuries of docility, should leap to defend their planet and the matrix with all the stoic determination of Zentraedi in a suicide charge. It was a time of horrors but, truly, a time of wonders as well.

  “I tell you again that I doubt you have any chance of victory,” Cabell was saying. “But I know that won’t dissuade you. What, then, do you wish of us?”

  A Perytonian, Purg, spoke up, tossing his needle-sharp horns as he did. “Tell us of the Awareness, the seat of its consciousness, where its vulnerabilities lie. It is weak now; if we destroy it, Haydon will be unable to wage war.”

  Cabell was shaking his head measuredly. “Firstly, the planet has gone through such radical mechamorphosis that there is no telling where the Awareness is now. Nor is there any reliable way of detecting it.

  “But more importantly, destroying the Awareness will not guarantee that Haydon is powerless; far from it. I implore you all to hold back. Exedore and I are trying to develop some kind of defense to keep the artificial planet at bay.”

  What he did not tell them was that if worse came to worst, he and the micronized Zentraedi meant to destroy the matrix utterly. The residents of the Local Group looked to it as their only
hope of salvation.

  Captain Prah, the Spherisian, answered. Her ship, the Quartzstar, was the newest, smallest, and most beautiful of all the Local Group vessels. Spheris was perhaps the least warlike of the allies, and so Cabell hoped for some word of moderation from her.

  But she said in a voice that had a high crystal ring to it, “We cannot risk Haydon’s gaining the ultimate power of the matrix, nor can we gamble the lives of Tirol’s people. Therefore, unless this weapon of yours is forthcoming, the flotilla will advance and engage Haydon IV as soon as it appears in this system.”

  “I am Zentraedi,” Exedore said, hands clasped behind his back. “I understand your feelings. Nonetheless, I beg you to reconsider.”

  The captains’ silence was as emphatic as any spoken refusal.

  “Go, then,” Cabell told the captains. “Exedore and I will see if Protoculture has any secrets left to teach us.”

  Over and over, during the headlong days of the Flower harvest, her hand went to her sidearm and she drew a breath to summon those guardswomen who were still faithful to her, to go out and stop the collection, prevent the delivery to orbit, or die trying.,

  But each time, Bela’s hand unwillingly released the gun’s grip. To do that would mean fighting and killing her Sisters and make her worse than Haydon, worse than an Invid. What was to happen now was beyond her power to control.

  In time the cargo ship lifted off, climbing to orbit on its antiproton-power trail. It was gone for more than ten hours, off-loading its Flower cargo and taking aboard the promised modules. When it made planetfall again, it seemed as though every childless woman on the planet was waiting to greet it, to help in assembling the modules.

  Haydon and Her works remained an enigma; the modules, once activated, shifted position and assembled themselves, the Amazons not daring to interfere or try to probe the secrets of Her devices.

  Still Bela sat in her aerie, glaring down the central boulevard of Zanshar. Dawn rose on a plaza from which the cloning facility had vanished, replaced by a Whaashi. A lottery was being held in the open square for a fair and orderly allocation of access to the place of miracles.

  When the first woman entered the Whaashi, Bela rose from her place and went to her palace’s command center. There she watched on a projecbeam screen as Haydon IV got under way again.

  She expected to see a planet restored to high-sheen, flawless max-function, but it was not so. It looked as if there had been some repairs, and certainly the artificial world was maneuvering powerfully and quickly, but signs of damage were still to be seen.

  Then Haydon IV was gone, superluminal. Bela commanded her techs to make yet another attempt to establish contact with Tirol despite the interference that had been frustrating them thus far.

  Curse the Shapings!

  With Aurora’s hand on the tiller—or rather, her mind guiding the Peter Pan through a modified “thinking cap” (she refused to have anything to do with Louie’s cyber-sockets, and Max and Miriya would not have permitted it, anyway)—the sphere ship emerged into newspace.

  It was as if an encasing bubble had popped; all around them were stars and nebulas, and nearby the Super Dimensional Fortress swung in orbit over a world swathed in the white clouds indicative of a living planet.

  “We took longer to get here than the SDF-3,” she explained, “because our drive is so different, and so was our route through Ranaath’s Star.” Dr. Penn, Louie, and the rest did not get to find out why, because Lisa Hunter’s face appeared on the main projecbeam imager and her voice rang from the speakers.

  “Attention, unknown vessel. Attention—Aurora! Vince! Max, Miriya—lord, it’s good to see you all!”

  A lot of people on the Peter Pan were trying to talk at the same time, Aurora being a notable exception. Vince silenced them with one stern command. “At ease!”

  Lisa went on. “The children said you were coming. Vince, I have to warn you: There’s no guarantee you won’t be stranded here, too, unless you get out of newspace now, this moment.”

  Louie Nichols had crowded up next to Vince, recognizing Lisa from old newscasts, tapes, and having seen her once in person during the SDF-3 launch ceremonies. “I think we’ve got a handle on that, Admiral.”

  Vince frowned at Louie but tolerated the intrusion. “Lisa, d’ you have maneuvering power?”

  “Barely, Vince.”

  “No problem. If you’ll hold your present orbit, I’ll match up with you.” Harry Penn was studying his instruments and giving Vince a can-do nod.

  “Very good. I’ll convene an emergency conference. We can begin transferring personnel to your ship right away.”

  Vince drew a deep breath but decided not to contradict her quite so publicly. It might cause serious morale problems—maybe even a breakdown in discipline—to announce that nobody was going anywhere for a while.

  The main delay in docking ships was necessitated by Peter Pan’s techs having to fit external securing gear on the outer hull. But two hours later the mated air locks opened, and despite the strain of the crisis, there was a reunion that made the bulkheads rattle.

  Lisa had left Forsythe in command of the bridge. She waited on the SDF-3’s side of the lock, since it was roomier. Vince stepped through from Peter Pan, they saluted each other, and then he swept her up in a laughing hug. Rick did not bother with salutes, throwing his arms around Jean and bussing her soundly.

  Restraint and order broke down, with more hugging, joy, and laughter than any of them could recall in a long time. Vince was in no position to object, since he no sooner released Lisa than he was confronted by his son. Bowie held out a hand shyly. “Hello, Dad.”

  Vince took it and shook it, but Jean threw her arms around Bowie and kissed him over and over, laughing even though there were tears streaming from her eyes. Musica and Allegra watched from one side, fascinated. Then Jean embraced them.

  The two groups met and mingled in individual encounters that varied greatly. Dana managed to clutch both Sean and Marie to her and at the same time kiss a strangely blushing Angelo Dante, while Gnea looked on dubiously. Harry Penn embraced his daughter and spared a handclasp, albeit a cool one, for Jack Baker. Scott Bernard led Marlene over by the hand to meet Lang, who seemed subdued, even shy, out in public like that. Kazianna sat to one side, not wanting to trample anybody, but knelt to exchange kisses, like humans, with her old comrade-in-arms Miriya. Angie saw Dana’s face go blank and distant as she caught sight of Rem.

  Minutes went by before Miriya realized that Aurora was not anywhere to be seen. She mouthed the name to Max, and he shrugged helplessly while Rick Hunter pumped his hand and pounded him on the back. Then Miriya realized that there was a spreading pool of silence over by Peter Pan’s lock and another on the opposite side of the compartment. The crowd went silent by degrees, becoming aware that Aurora waited on one side, Roy and Drannin and the SDF-3 children on the other.

  Some had not seen the children’s glowing, otherworldly eyes before; there were murmurings and uneasy shiftings in the crowd. People instinctively made way until the children and Aurora were staring at each other over a gap of empty deck. Aurora and Roy moved at the same time, drawing close like kids in a pretend wedding.

  When they came together, they took each other’s hands, and a crackle of blue radiance startled the grown-ups. Aurora informed her parents, “The others and I must talk.”

  Roy led her over into the circle of lamp-eyed youngsters, and the group headed for the lock. Lisa wanted to haul them back, but Jean put a restraining hand on her arm. “We need to talk, too, Lisa.”

  With some difficulty, Lisa cut the core leadership people out of the herd and got them across the passageway to the conference compartment. Vince and his essential people came, too, while the rest of the celebrants repaired to a nearby rec hall to carry on with the reunion.

  “We’ve run some calculations,” Lisa began before everyone was seated. “I want to get all personnel evacuated in one hop if you have sufficient deck space. Even if
that means we’ll be sitting on each other and take only the clothes on our backs.”

  Rick had been watching the troubled look on Vince’s face and braced himself as the general spoke. “Lisa, I’m not sure we have any place to go back to. Whatever it is that happened when you were drawn here, it’s affecting the universe. Louie, maybe you’d better take over.”

  Louie rose, adjusting his black goggles, his grin coming and going in tics. He launched into a recap of what had happened, the SDFers interrupting with intermittent questions but for the most part listening.

  The transcendence of the Regess and her race, the appearance of Ark Angel in Earthspace, the search expedition for the SDF-3 and the battle at Ranaath’s Star—Louie recounted it all succinctly, although Lisa noticed that he described the strange psi-contact between the SDF-3’s children and Aurora in oddly neutral terms, apparently not wanting to offer much theory about that just yet.

  Lang watched Nichols, that Robotech up-and-comer. The scientist, having studied some of Louie’s brilliantly insightful work, became convinced nonetheless that Louie saw the solving of the mysteries of Protoculture not as a holy pursuit and the search for the Grail but rather as some immense and rather elite game.

  So: there was Rem the reborn template, and Nichols the secular adept, along with all the others—half-breeds, Wyrdlings, mind-savants, and the rest—gathered in one place at last. But none of them could occupy the place in the Shapings that Lang could.

  If only he had the strength to seize it.

  CHAPTER

  THIRTY

  In that happy-yet-sad reunion with the people from Peter Pan, I felt one special pang but kept it to myself

  It was clear how much Scott Bernard’s mixed feelings about Marlene had put him through, but in some ways I couldn’t help envying him. As much as I loved Rick and Roy, I couldn’t help thinking about other human DNA remains, in other wreckage—at Sara Base, on Mars. How would I feel if Karl Riber reappeared?

  At one point I discovered I’d been sitting there for five minutes, staring out the bridge viewpane, lost in that thought. And realizing newspace’s apparent affinity for our memories and emotions, I knew we really had to get out of there.