Mission to Minerva

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

Garuth's mind raced frantically through what Hunt had been trying to say. Converge, expand bubble, suppress… Obviously it was referring to the Shapieron's M-wave gear. But how did that apply to their present situation?

He looked back at the image of the Shapieron, surrounded by Broghuilio's five craft.

The others around him were picking up on it too. Moments before Hunt called, they had been stunned by an announcement from ZORAC that the probe thought to be absent had suddenly commenced transmitting. It had been out there all along! The passage through the spacetime storm had caused havoc with its on-board system programming. Possessing only lightweight processing capacity compared to something like ZORAC or the kinds of system carried in the Jevlenese ships, it had taken until now to repair the damage.

"He was trying to tell us something," Duncan said. "Vic's word games again."

Garuth looked back at the Shapieron, standing there empty apart from the Jevlenese, with nothing else in the vicinity.

"He talked about expansion," Chien said. "When a detached onboard generator is powered up, it creates a vastly expanded bubble."

"And its convergence core zone," Shilohin mused. "That must be what he meant."

"The raft!" Chien exclaimed suddenly. "The Thuriens' first experiments with the onboard bubble generator. Before we realized that the bubble has to be collapsed after stabilization. The Shapieron can do the same thing."

Shilohin saw at once what Chien meant. "Garuth, can I handle this? Vic sounded pressed down there."

"Go ahead."

"ZORAC," Shilohin called.

"Ma'am?"

"Reference the early Thurien experiments on convergence containment and wave stabilization. Specifically, the rafts built to test onboard bubble creation. When the local bubble is not balanced via an umbilical connection to the Gate projectors, an expanded convergence zone results. Are we in agreement so far?"

"I'm with you."

"With the Shapieron's onboard generator driven at maximum, what kind of size would the bubble extend to?"

"I don't have access to VISAR's data right now. Impossible to say."

"Hundreds of feet? Thousands? A few miles, maybe?"

"Possibly… I think I see your reasoning."

"Not mine. Vic Hunt's."

"That figures."

Shilohin hesitated. Glancing at Garuth but still addressing ZORAC, she said, "Synchronization of the collapse would have to be external. It couldn't be coordinated within the convergence zone."

"I could create a direct switch from the lander into the control circuit to collapse the bubble," ZORAC replied. "But the ship's functional integrity might be compromised. It would require authorization by the Commander."

It took Garuth a few seconds to follow what they were talking about. But if they didn't try, Minerva would be at Broghuilo's mercy. The mission would have failed. If they tried and succeeded, and as a result the Shapieron became no longer functional, they would be unable to get home. But it was already looking very much as if they weren't going to be able to get home anyway. The alternative they stood to face was becoming part of a world dominated by Broghuilio. Garuth met Shilohin's eyes. Once again, he had to make an agonizing decision, but with no real choice.

"I authorize it," he confirmed.

"Reconfiguring generator net for maximum power," ZORAC responded. "Commencing bubble inflation now."

Broghuilio stood with his entourage on the Command Deck of the Shapieron and surveyed his new domain. In terms of style and engineering it was admittedly primitive in some ways, with its reliance on voice and screens-not even avco to afford permanent visual and audio sensory integration, let alone the full-neural capability of something like VISAR or JEVEX. But in a different way it had its own kind of splendor. Without direct neural interaction, and featuring less automatic system integration than Thurien designs, the older architecture used greater numbers of screens and operators, making the vista more grand and imposing. The supervisory dais with its positions for commander, deputy, and engineering chief looked out at the main displays over the bays of operator stations and instrument panels in the grand manner of thrones. Very fitting. It would suit Broghuilio well. In his mind's eye he could already picture the extension that would be added for the targeting and fire-control sections when the armaments from his own ships were installed. The whole vessel had obviously been refitted recently throughout, and he had established from its controlling AI that the power generation and drive systems were fully refurbished and charged. He would be unchallengeable effectively indefinitely in this. Even in its former condition, the ship had been good for over twenty years-and at the end of that, still up to attempting a voyage from Sol to Gistar. Yes, Broghuilio decided, this would suit him very well indeed.

"You see," he said, turning to Estordu and the others. "We have been here for a time measured only in days, and we are established. Our situation has already improved dramatically from the poor relations that the Lambian prince would have us be. As a revolutionary, he is an amateur. Did not I, the true revolutionary, promise you that one day we would settle the reckoning for that insult? It seems the day may come sooner than I anticipated."

"His Excellency spoke truly," one of the party said.

"Luring the Shapieron here to be dealt with away from the Thuriens was an act of brilliance!" another effused. "The mark of a true genius."

Even Broghuilio blinked at that one. It hadn't quite been that way. But it was fine by him, if that was what they wanted to believe.

The captain of Broghuilio's flagship, who had also come aboard for the tour, looked up from speaking via compad with his second-in-command. "We are still receiving requests from General Wylott and from the Lambians to reconnect, Excellency," he advised.

"We will talk to Minerva when we have completed our inspection," Broghuilio replied. Nobody was going to be telling him what to do very soon now, and for a long time to come. They might as well get used to it.

"The Shapieron would give us a fast and regular connection to Earth," Estordu remarked. "A warmer climate; richer and more diverse habitats. Suitable for the exclusive refuge of a ruling elite, perhaps? Surroundings conducive to an appropriate lifestyle. A small population of serving classes…"

Broghuilio looked at him in surprise. Even the scientist was thinking positively for once. "A proposition with merit," he pronounced. "We will give it full consideration in due course."

Broghuilio strode forward to stand in the aisle of primary control stations immediately below the supervisory dais. "ZORAC." He was getting to know the system better by now.

"Acknowledging."

Broghuilio hadn't quite summoned up the nerve to direct it to address him as Excellency yet. The loss of face if it were to find some grounds for refusing in front of his followers would be intolerable. He would tackle the matter when he was more sure of himself.

"Are the plans and blueprints of the ship available as I requested?"

"They can be viewed in the holo-display tanks of the Navigation section, forward to your right and up the blue steps."

Broghuilio moved along the aisle and stopped to survey his realm from this new perspective. "You know, ZORAC, you have no choice but to learn to get along. You have to cooperate while we hold your previous associates. And I have to preserve them as long as I need your cooperation. We both have the basis for a deal."

"I understand."

And, of course, there was always the possibility that in time it might come to evolve new loyalties. Broghuilio turned and climbed the steps up to the dais itself. From this elevation, the panorama looked even more spectacular. He imagined it all lit and alive, the stations manned, the panels and screens active. And his to command.

"Bring up the main displays," he ordered. "I want outside views all around the ship."

One by one the large screens facing the dais came to life to show the five Jevlenese vessels against a slowly moving carpet of stars. The brilliant cloud-streaked disk of Minerva stood in the background on one, and a part of the Moon off on an edge in another. A holo image below and in front of the dais showed a three-dimensional representation of the Shapieron with the screens indicated around it in their correct orientations and directions.

In the center behind Broghuilio, the commander's chair and console faced out over it all. Broghuilio turned and regarded it. He straightened his shoulders, puffed up his chest, and approached his future seat slowly, almost with reverence. This was a solemn and symbolic moment. His followers watched silently from below.

And then Broghuilio stopped abruptly.

Another Broghuilio had appeared out of nowhere, already sitting in the Commander's chair. The expression of rapture that had been on his face lasted for an instant, then switched to one as bewildered as that on the face of the Broghuilio who was standing stupefied, gaping at him. The Broghuilio sitting recovered first. "Who the hell are you?" he demanded.

"I could ask you the same thing," Broghuilio standing shot back. The questions were reflex. It was obvious to both who the other was. What was far from obvious was a sensible question to try and make sense of it.

"What are you doing dressed like that, in my ship?"

"Your ship? What do you mean? This is-" Broghuilio standing faltered as Broghilio sitting vanished in front of his eyes.

"Who the hell are you?"

He turned dazedly. Another Broghuilio was halfway up the steps to the dais. At the same time, consternation was breaking out among the rest of the group below as two Estordu's recoiled from each other as if they had like charges, while the flagship captain disappeared from one place to reappear in another. The whole area below the dais dissolved into a mйlange of figures popping in and out of existence randomly. On one of the screens, the image of a Jevlenese ship disappeared, leaving just an empty starfield.

And suddenly Broghuilio was back on the bridge in his flagship, looking at screens showing surroundings of the terrain on Luna. General Wylott was there somehow. In the background, Estordu was jabbering something unintelligible. Another Broghuilio came onto the bridge, stopped dead, and gaped.

"What's happening?" Broghuilio from the Shapieron demanded. "How did we get here? And who the hell are you?"

"I could ask you the same question."

"What happened to the Ganymean ship?"

The other Broghuilio shook his head, obviously not comprehending. "What Ganymean ship?"

Fifty miles from the Shapieron, Garuth stood with the others in the surface lander, watching incredulously as the pattern of craft clustered in space fluctuated crazily. The five Jevlenese ships performed a dance of vanishing and reappearing, jumping from one spot to another. At one instant there would be six or seven, an instant later, just two or three. In a zone extending for an uncertain distance, the time lines from scores or more of realities in which they had happened to take up different positions were converging and becoming entangled. At the center, the Shapieron itself seemed to shift back and forth spasmodically. The channel from the lander's local control system was connected through to a simple circuit breaker that would deactivate the bubble that defined the expanded convergence zone. All Garuth needed was one specific combination. Below his chest in front of him, his hands opened and closed as he flexed his fingers unconsciously in anticipation.

The number of Jevlenese ships shrank to three, two… he tensed… then, suddenly, six. If none of the time lines impinging on the Shapieron included a Jevlenese ship, it followed that the Shapieron couldn't contain anyone who had been brought to it by one, and therefore it would have to be empty.

Then, just for a moment, the Shapieron stood on its own in space. Every one of the five Jevlenese craft and their various alternative versions were momentarily in some different reality.

"NOW!" Garuth called. An icon on a display changed to confirm the transmission. Would the signal get there fast enough?

On the screen, the image of the Shapieron steadied itself. Nothing else changed.

Everyone waited breathlessly. Nothing. Not a sign of any Jevlenese ship.

"I think you've done it, Garuth," Shilohin whispered.

"Magnificent," Chien complimented.

In the background, Duncan and Sandy quietly clasped hands and smiled at each other reassuringly.

Garuth swallowed disbelievingly. The picture replayed itself in his mind of the strutting oaf parading himself inside his ship. The memory came back of the humiliation he had been forced to accept. And a slow smile of satisfaction formed on his face. He felt like a starship commander again.

The lander closed with its regular port in the Shapieron's main docking bay. Garuth had waited a further fifteen minutes before returning. A systematic search of the ship confirmed that no trace of Broghuilio and the Jevlenese was to be found.

It was necessary to search the ship physically because another result that had been feared was also confirmed. During the wait, nothing further had been heard from ZORAC, and no response could be evoked from it either from the lander or upon entering the Shapieron. In the same way as had happened with the system in the probe, the riot of desynchronization had scrambled ZORAC's internal processes to the point where it ceased functioning coherently. But the network that formed ZORAC was far more complex than the probe's equipment, and the energy concentration at the core of the disruption induced by starship power was more intense than anything the probe had come through. After analyzing the logs and records, Shilohin's scientists announced that not enough was left running for the damage to be repaired. ZORAC was irrecoverable.

That was why ZORAC had requested authorization by the Commander before proceeding.

ZORAC had known.

Rodgar Jassilane, the Shapieron's engineering chief, restored the channel to the shuttle down in Melthis. The interface that ZORAC had created into the Agracon system was working. Garuth got ready to deliver the news as best he could without ZORAC available to translate. He asked Jassilane to prepare a replay of the event sequence as captured from the lander.

A Lambian was calling something about an armored column on the move toward the Agracon. Somewhere else, an infantry regiment had declared for the king. In the middle of it all, Hunt and the officer watching him stood to one side, seemingly forgotten. The atmosphere in the communications room was tense. Nothing more had been heard from the Jevlenese. But from the bits that Hunt could pick up, Freskel-Gar was having other problems. The regular forces and the nation appeared to be rallying to Perasmon. Although Freskel-Gar was visibly under strain, whether he would try to brazen it out using the prisoners as bargaining chips, or concede now and make things easier was unclear. It could go either way.

And then a voice that Hunt recognized as deep, Ganymean guttural articulating a mixture of Jevlenese and broken Lambian came through above the hubbub from the console where he had talked briefly with Garuth. "No. Not Prince or Lambian. Victor Hunt, talk with." ZORAC was evidently unavailable. Freskel-Gar moved across, followed by his aides. The voice came again from behind the group of figures. "Victor Hunt, only. Talk with Earth human. Was there before." Freskel-Gar looked back and nodded to the officer to bring Hunt over. As the company parted to let Hunt in, Hunt saw that a screen was connected into the circuit this time, showing Garuth. Freskel-Gar stopped him with a gesture as he was about to move through.

"What did that Giant mean, 'Earth human'?" he muttered. "How can you be from Earth?"

"More to this than you could dream," Hunt replied. "Best for you to end now. Believe." It was pure bravado. Hunt had run out of everything else. Freskel-Gar interrogated him silently with a long, penetrating look, and then motioned for him to continue.

"Garuth," Hunt said, facing the screen.

"Vic. We win, as you guess. Watch how. You see now." Garuth's features were replaced by a view of the Shapieron riding in space, surrounded by Broghuilio's five craft. Garuth's comments continued as a voiceover. "See from lander, where we are. ZORAC expands bubble." The scene became chaotic as ships began vanishing, multiplying, shifting from place to place. Freskel-Gar took a pace forward to stand beside Hunt, peering in bemusement.

"I don't understand. What's happening?" he demanded. Even though it had been he who put the idea to Garuth, Hunt was too astounded himself at seeing it actually happening to be capable of saying anything.

Then the Shapieron was on its own; a voice shouted something in Ganymean; and nothing further changed… except that after a few seconds it became evident that the image had stopped juddering and was stable again. "Back in ship now," Garuth's voice informed. "Broghuilio, Jevlenese, all gone. For good. But Perasmon plane…" Garuth made hand motions in the air as he sought for words.

Freskel-Gar was looking pale and tight-faced. He seemed to have gotten the message. "Translator computer is down," Hunt told him. "Bring back other Giant here. Easier talk, yes?" Too numbed to argue, Freskel-Gar just nodded to the officer, who hurried away. Hunt made the best of his opportunity to pile things on.

"It's over, Highness. You saw. Five ships, many years ahead of all that Minerva has. But all gone." He snapped a finger and thumb in the air. "Like so. Was nothing. You can't win against Giants. Wylott knows. Perasmon lives. Harzin lives. So now you have all Minerva to fight, too. Not possible. Smart thing is end now. Best answer. I tried to tell before. Now obvious."

Frenua Showm was brought in. By means of signs and bits of Jevlenese, Hunt conveyed the situation. Showm gasped at the news, took a few seconds to absorb it and adjust, and then, radiating exhilaration, turned to Garuth on the screen. From bits of the exchange between the two Ganymeans, Hunt followed Garuth saying that ZORAC had been trying… something to do with the Cerians… but Garuth didn't know because ZORAC was… it sounded like "finished." Hunt broke in to tell Showm that the flight had been diverted and two leaders were fine. The remark about ZORAC was alarming, but he had no time to dwell on it. Showm passed the news to Garuth, and it was his turn to be incredulous. Some indecipherable Ganymean exclamations and expressions followed, and the two aliens began emitting snorting noises accompanied by peculiar shaking movements. Only Hunt out of all those in the room had seen a Ganymean laugh before. But there could be no mistaking it.

Neither Freskel-Gar nor any of his staff were making any attempt to interrupt now. The realization of the inevitable seemed to permeate the room, as voices died and one by one the figures all around ceased tasks they now realized were futile.

The final report came from a station on the far side of the central map table. Infantry and armor were taking up positions around the Agracon and had sealed off all access. The commander of the Prince's Own defending units inside was requesting orders. A column was also heading toward Dorjon. Total silence fell. All eyes were fixed on Freskel-Gar. He looked from Hunt, to Showm, to Garuth watching from the screen, and over the expressionless faces surrounding him. As Hunt had said, it was over.

"Tell him to stand down," Freskel-Gar said.

Outside in the anteroom, where she had been told to remain in case she was needed again, Laisha was still recovering from the shock. A few minutes before, the colonel who had taken the light-skinned man inside had hurried back out, disappeared, and then come back through with somebody he had evidently been sent to fetch. Or would some "being" have been more correct? Laisha's mind was still in a turmoil. Obviously something extraordinary was going on. Her biggest regret was that Kles couldn't have been here to see it too. The being that had accompanied the colonel back, followed by two armed Lambian guards, was darker in hue than any Minervan, with an elongated head, dressed in a yellow tunic with strange fastenings and accessories, and standing over seven feet tall. But there shouldn't have been one any closer than millions of years in the past, or light-years away-if they still existed at all. Laisha had seen a real, live, Giant!