“Don’t hold your breath.” Matshi shot off another sequence of lasers and torpedoes—in vain.
“Eight hundred kilometers, seven hundred kilometers …,” Suthsi continued to count softly.
Desperate to avoid listening to the countdown to our looming demise, I watched as Benedict’s craft stopped at the edge of the portal. A thin cloud smoothly seeped out of the planet and soon blanketed the entire sphere. The Somalderis, Nephil Stratum!
Our holo showed that, within seconds, her color transformed from its downy white to a luminescent golden yellow as she channeled solar energy and cosmic rays to Benedict’s planet-ship for the voyage.
“Three hundred kilometers, two hundred kilometers to impact …,” Suthsi intoned.
“Prepare for impact,” Matshi yelled.
We took our Catascope 101 APPs (Avoidance Preparation Procedures) and implemented them immediately. There was little chance we could survive a fusion bomb, but—
The flash of light was blinding and our ship rocked violently. All our screens went blank for a few moments. Fortunately, the shock waves from the bomb must have dissipated in the vacuum of space before impacting our ship, and the rocking eased quickly, under Eikhus’ expert nav control. We were all, to our immense relief, alive and uninjured. But when the screen displays flickered on again, we saw that Benedict’s planet-ship had disappeared! The starfield we’d been viewing was now deserted—with no sign of Nephil Stratum, HD5924, or of the portal, anymore.
“What happened?” I asked, shaken.
Eikhus shook his head. “I don’t have a clue …”
Matshi was subdued. “We should be the ones who … vanished.”
“Detritus near the portal?” pressed Spud anxiously. Remnants from Benedict’s ship might give us an indication of their fate.
“I’m checking,” Eikhus responded, his fingers moving from holo to holo. In a few minutes, he shook his head. “Nothing.”
“Did they transition … or explode?” Suthsi asked quietly.
Eikhus sighed as he continued to search his holos. “I don’t know,” the Kharybdian responded. “One way or another, they’re gone.”
* * *
Setsei had finished a Geryon sweep of our ship, and, to our relief, found no significant external or internal damage. Eikhus followed with a scan of our perimeter, and identified scattered fragments of the detonated fusion bomb—the bomb that should’ve scattered us into fragments. Further checks on our vessel, however, showed we didn’t even have a tiny scratch.
“Hello!”
We all turned to look at Spud, who was diligently focused on his holo screen.
“There is a comm module among the local bomb debris,” he explained. “I shall tractor it in.”
“Could be a trap,” Matshi warned, pulling out his stun gun. “Guns at the ready,” he commanded in true Zygint form.
As we Ergaled our stun guns and aimed them at the expected M-fan site of the comm module, Spud scanned the small silver sphere and then Ergaled it on board and up to the bridge. The module was a bit larger than standard Zygan models, about the size of a Terran watermelon, and was covered with lettering that resembled the writing we had seen on the comm equipment on Benedict’s ship. From M82 or 81?
Setsei cautiously approached it, his Geryon ready, and ran a Geryon scan as we held our breaths. The Ytran finally nodded, and said with little confidence, “Activate.”
Our fingers on our triggers, we watched the module emit a low-pitched buzz and then a holo, which rapidly coalesced into the shape of a hulky, furry Ursan.
“Agriarctos!” I cried. “Where are you?”
The Ursan looked around and smiled. “That’s classified. Glad to see you all made it.”
“We almost didn’t,” I chided.
Spud snorted. “You fixed the bomb so it would explode just before it hit us.”
“Sorry about that,” Agriarctos shrugged. “I had to cut it close so Benedict would think he actually blew up your ship. I couldn’t be sure that otherwise he wouldn’t try again.”
“Thanks,” I added, puzzled. “Mind if I ask why were you trying to save us?”
“That’s classified,” the Ursan repeated with a grin.
“I believe I know why,” Spud put up his hand. “Setsei, Geryon the holo, please.”
Setsei strode over and ran his Geryon over the image from head to toe.
I stood with my mouth agape. As Setsei ran his weapon over the Ursan’s holo image, the long snout of Agriarctos morphed for a brief moment into a very familiar face. Ward Burton! Wart!
Wart must have been coming us from far away, as Setsei’s Geryon couldn’t maintain the change, and the holo image soon reverted back to its furry Ursan form. No wonder Agriarctos had been able to act as Spud so perfectly when we’d partnered on Benedict’s quest. He’d spent a great deal of time with us over the past year at Earth Core and gotten to know us well.
“Very clever, Spud,” the Ursan nodded. “Let’s keep it our little secret, okay? The walls at Central have ears, and they’re not all on His Highness’ head.”
I walked over and faced Agriarctos/Wart. “Are you coming back with us?”
He shook his head. “Not right now. Not right away. But you kids don’t need me anymore either. Earth’ll do fine in your hands.”
I sighed and nodded, my voice cracking. “Well, I sure needed you, and thank you, again.”
Wart as Agriarctos saluted with a bulky hand and waved as his holo started to dissolve. I’m not sure if it was an artifact of the communication, but, for a moment, I thought I saw the flash of a gold ring on the pseudo-Ursan’s finger.
I felt my right hand rise up and return the wave until Agriarctos’s image had completely disappeared.
Chapter 24
Apantisis
Mikkin, Zyga—present day
Debriefs at Zygint Central had taken hours. I think we had all sat with three quarters of the senior admin by the time we were done. Thank heavens for time loops, or I would’ve finished an old lady of, say, twenty-five.
Just as I was finally ready to leave for my much awaited return home, Juan came up to me and asked me to follow him. My heart stopped when I saw he was leading me down the hall once again to the Omega Archon’s suite.
Juan paused outside of His Highness’ door and gestured for me to go in. I gave him an insincere smile and stolidly entered the room, taking my usual seat on the edge of the uncomfortable contemporary sofa.
A door on the other side of the room whisked open and the Omega Archon entered, this time dressed in a polo shirt and khaki pants. I stood up and resisted the urge to ask him if I was interrupting his golf game. He took a chair opposite my seat and waved for me to sit back down. Then, smiling, he observed me for a few moments. In complete silence. I was getting more nervous by the minute. Say something, will you?
“Do you believe that the end justifies the means?” he finally asked.
Was that a trick question? “Uh …,” I stammered.
“It’s not a trick question. Just answer.”
“Sometimes,” I said hesitantly.
His eyes narrowed for a moment, then he smiled once again. “So do I—sometimes.”
My eyes widened. That was an admission I didn’t expect. “Is that why you didn’t go after Benedict?”
“That was your job,” the Omega Archon pointed out.
“Well, he’s out of your way,” I stammered. “And he might be dead.”
“That was not the outcome I’d hoped for,” he responded ambiguously. After a short pause, he folded his hands together and gazed intently at me. “But that is not why you are here. Your list of violations is extensive. First, unauthorized entry into the RAM—”
“Wait a minute!” I protested. “I never went into the RAM! She did. And she”—I choked—“died.”
I felt myself being scanned once again. His Highness bestowed me with a trace of a smile. “I will accept your point. And your means.
But, remember, Rush, as a principle, legal and ethical are not always the same.
“Look,” I countered, “’the end’ in this situation was saving the lives of my friends. For me, that was an ethical choice.”
His smile broadened, only to disappear when I asked my next question. “She yelled something to me just before she died. ‘Find out about Stacy!’ Who’s Stacy?”
The Omega Archon studied me with a sad expression and said gently, “There are many branes, some accessible to you, and some not. Her brane is not accessible.” Or did he mean ‘brain’?
“You’re not going to give me an answer?”
“I have.” He remained impassive.
I sighed. “Well then, I guess we’re done here.”
“Not quite.” My stomach turned. “Even without RAM entry, you still have quite the long list of violations,” he continued as he started enumerating the sequence of policy numbers I’d run afoul of to my numbed ears.
It was clear I wasn’t going to get out of here scot-free. I flashed for a moment, with a pang of regret, on Nephil Stratum. Despite her subsequent treachery, I would always be grateful that she had sent me to T’fal for training. Ka’vyr had helped me survive Gary’s torture. Perhaps it would also keep me from suffering through the Omega Archon’s flames.
“So,” he finally concluded, “your sentence is one year.”
One year?! One year in Hell! I gasped, “This is the thanks-”
The Omega Archon rose up and I instantly regretted my outburst—until I observed he was smiling, his eyes actually twinkling as he headed for his door.
“You will pretend that justice is served. And I will pretend that you do not know ka’vyr.”
* * *
The Ifestian technique was extremely effective. Rather than the overwhelming agony I had experienced during my previous penalties, I was able, using my ka’vyr skills, to emotionally pull myself out of the flames of Hell and the time loop, and see myself actually sitting comfortably on the sofa, watching the minutes ticking by on the suite’s clock.
Though I was relieved on the one hand that I had learned how to escape Hell, I was also frustrated that His Highness had clearly avoided answering my questions. There was still much I didn’t know—and didn’t know how to learn. For a few moments, I actually felt like my brother John, who had always raged when his questions went unanswered. If my dream in Benedict’s cell held a grain of truth, maybe John had chosen to travel to another dimension because he’d been desperate for answers, too, and our dimension, our brane, seemed to have few or none. Because “nothing” wasn’t an acceptable answer. Not for him, and not for me.
My time-out finished quickly. The hour passed before I knew it and the door of my suite opened to release me to the hallway with a soft chime. I looked at the door from which the Omega Archon had entered on the opposite side of the room, and promised myself that one day I would walk out of this room through that other door. The door to the answers. To what was beyond.
Energized, I made my way over to Zygint Central Comm, where I found Spud fixated on a holo montage.
“It worked,” I said happily. “The ka’vyr.”
When he didn’t respond, I started massaging his stiff shoulders, whispering, “Okay. Something’s on your mind.”
He didn’t look at me. “Brilliant deduction.”
“What up?”
“I have gone over and over it. I cannot find any ripple in the timeline. Earth history remains unchanged.” He ran his fingers over the holo, and the scene before us changed to reveal a somewhat older, fully-bearded Yeshua preaching to a large crowd along a mountainside.
“That’s good.” I paused. “Isn’t it …?”
“Perhaps. But, knowing what we now know, I don’t understand how, or why …” Spud paused, turned around, and faced me. “Feel like a ride?”
“If it’s looking for answers, always. Let’s go,” I smiled.
* * *
Phoenicia—two thousand years ago
I wasn’t surprised to see us M-fan outside Sidon. Spud had chosen our contact metrics from data on one of the holos he’d been scanning. Our calendar read 3779. It was in fact only a few relative months after our last visit, Phoenician time.
We landed invisibly in the desert, Ergaled into our familiar costumes as Akbar and Danel, and micro’ed our ship into the folds of our robes, before setting out for the hike to the Phoenician burg. Look out, Sidon, the boys are back in town.
Autumn in Phoenicia was definitely more pleasant than summer. The temperature was a comfortable eighty-two degrees, though I know Spud still would’ve preferred a climate in the high fifties. Nevertheless, we found our steps were a lot more energetic, and we even jogged for a few stretches on the path towards the city.
Lost in the rhythm of my pace, I had run ahead of Spud without noticing. I stopped and saw him far behind me, standing outside the temple where we had met the old Keeper on our first trip. What was it called? Es-man … Esh-Eshmoun. Spud waited for me to trot back and then led me through the gate to the entrance.
Right after Spud knocked, the Keeper opened the door and greeted us with a smile. “Welcome, Akbar and Danel,” he said in Phoenician. “How come you to cross our path again?”
“Inductive reasoning,” responded Spud. In the Queen’s English, to my shock.
The Keeper’s eyes twinkled and he let out a warm chuckle. I looked at Spud, flabbergasted.
“Well done … Akbar,” the Keeper replied, echoing Spud’s Eton-bred accent. He opened the door more widely and waved us into a cool stone foyer inside the temple. “Please, enter.”
“He is here,” Spud said, his tone having the hint of a question.
The Keeper nodded. “Yeshua,” he called out in Aramaic, “would you come to greet our guests for a moment, please.”
The young Yeshua we remembered, looking healthy and fit, appeared from a room beyond, holding a scroll in his hands. My jaw dropped. Over the young man’s shoulders was draped what looked like a ram’s pelt whose fluffy down shone with shimmering streaks of gold.
“The greeting in their language,” the Keeper said to the youth, “is ‘hello’.”
Yeshua nodded, and, with some effort, repeated the word ‘hello’ to us both.
“Thank you, Yeshua,” the Keeper continued in Aramaic, “you may return to your studies.” As the youth disappeared, the old man turned to us and added, again in English, “He will be safe here until it is time.”
“Who are you?” I blurted out in my natural voice.
“Simply a Keeper, Shiloh. I watch over my world and repair that which is broken.”
I stumbled, mesmerized, “W-well, you certainly were ours.”
Spud nodded. “Our deus ex machina.”xxxiii
The old man smiled again. “Et machina est universa.”xxxiv
Spud grinned. “Veritas.”
I was a little slow on the uptake. Especially in Latin. A God out of … the Universe? “Y-you’re a god?”
“No, Shiloh, there are no gods. I am simply … a friend.”
The Keeper then extended a hand in the Phoenician gesture of friendship. His gold ring flashed in the sun again, and this time I was able to see the pattern on its face. A sunflower in full bloom.
We responded in kind, and then, waving, we walked off up the path once again, where, less than a month ago, we had trod with trepidation. Once out of sight, I turned to Spud, shaking my head.
“Who—or what—is he?”
Spud shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe,” he paused, and then added with a smile, “maybe he’s … a temporal vector shield.”
I jabbed him in the arm, and, laughing, he ran off sprinting towards our landing site. I gave good chase, and, as always, we arrived in a tie. Well, almost. He was a second or two ahead of me, as always. Except, when, as always, I was a second or two ahead of him. It gave us something other than opera to argue about during the trip home.
Chapter 25
Home
Hollywood—present day
The surfers had come back to my beach again, and the waves were really sick. I think that means good in surfer slang. I’d M-fanned back to Malibu for a few hours to check my messages, pack a few things, and close up the house until the end of hiatus. We got the word this morning: we’d been renewed and season two shooting was due to begin in late August. Our producer had left me a message that the Singularity Channel had ordered another thirteen episodes of Bulwark for next fall. If the ratings stayed up, there was even a chance they’d go with a full twenty-two for the season. Tara Guard and Larry Sioux would have another chance to defeat the dastardly villain Mordmort after all.
My agent had also called to let me know they’d finally cast the movie about the girl with disabilities—unfortunately, without me. Meryl Streep’s daughter got the job. Gosh, you’d think playing Tara Guard would have made me a shoo-in, IMHO. Seriously, my agent did offer me a Disney film instead, and said I’d only have to be the shaggy dog for the middle of the picture. I told him to send the script to Kris. I’m not turning into an animal. On the other hand, I do have a friend named Matshi who doesn’t mind doing that once in a while…
Matshi’s promised he’ll comm me when he returns from M81. He, Sarion, and Sarion’s mates decided to go for a joyride through non-Zygfed space for a few months. I figure it’ll be a while before they run out of new places to explore and things to do—and maybe they’ll tell me about some of their adventures when they come back.
Eikhus and the Nautilus made their way safely back to the Kharybdian Enclave after dropping Setsei and Suthsi off in Madai. The Ytrans have surprised us all by deciding to enroll in classes at Daralfanoon University where they plan to study cosmocriminology, and, yes, hone their fighting skills.
Eikhus himself has decided to channel his own fighting skills towards the battle against death. He has only one more year of nanobiotech training before he can begin an apprenticeship in anastasis, which he hopes to do at Nejinsen. Meanwhile, Nerea has asked Eikhus to officiate at her merging ceremony in June. Spud and I are looking forward to seeing her and her other two tributaries join currents to create little creeks or, as Sarion joked, pro-creek-ate.
And Spud? Well, he’s still playing those screeching operas during our routine duty patrols in our own Solar System. Though I’m happy to report that Spud’s transmitting an super-high note from an awful aria at an enormous, out-of-control Humboldt vessel yesterday caused the massive renegade ship to break up harmlessly in Earth’s atmosphere, before it could crash land and turn Europe into a giant impact crater.