<<< There is risk to the star and to us.
But would we rather do nothing? >>>
Deeaab felt an ache of recognition. What the quarx-echo said, and the Delilah-echo quietly reinforced, was exactly what Deeaab had been closing in on. It might be the only way to help their friends. Perhaps it would even make up for the time, long past, when he had
not
been able to help other friends—when he had tried, and failed, to bring more of his kind out of the dying universe.
Daarooaack had begun circling more widely, exploring various dimensional layers. Finally she called:
“There is an opening into the star.”
Deeaab looked hard. Then he saw the channel: from the outside of the star down into its center, a channel where once the strange matter had flowed, but was now blocked upstream by the being called Ed. Many other channels were streaming into the star with strange matter. But there was slack in this channel, and Deeaab thought it just might be possible to take a large object down through it...
*
It was still damnably hard to tell what was happening outside the ship. The sentinel that had captured them had somehow folded itself into the Mindaru control station, but much of their view remained shrouded. Bandicut could see that
The Long View
was trapped in the upper atmosphere of
*
Nick
*
, but couldn’t see much more than that. He wondered if he should be planning another boarding party. Of course, they weren’t docked to the control station, and he didn’t have Napoleon to accompany him, but still...
Before he could get very far in that line of thought, Charli nudged for his attention and said that Charlene-echo needed to talk. Bandicut listened:
<<< Deep believes we may be able
to stop the Mindaru
and free you at the same time.
But we need your help. >>>
/I’m glad someone has an idea. What’s Deep have in mind?/
<<< It would be risky.
We need you to make contact.
Mind to mind. >>>
/With—?/
<<< The Mindaru AI. >>>
Bandicut barked a disbelieving laugh, which caused Antares and Li-Jared to look his way. /That thing is a killer!/
<<< Exactly. >>>
/When Ik came into contact with it, it took over his stones!/
<<< We are aware of the risk, yes.
But it is necessary for Deep’s plan.
And Charli can help protect you. >>>
Bandicut asked cautiously, /What’s the plan?/
Before Charlene-echo could respond, Charli said,
/// I think I see
what they have in mind.
We need to persuade the enemy
to do something...///
/Well, that’s just craz—I mean, the chance of being infected—my stones—and if I let that thing in my head, how do we know
I
won’t go crazy, or have a silence-fugue, or—/
/// Yes. Yes. All risks.
But we’ve learned a lot about the Mindaru,
and the stones will have a much better chance
of controlling the situation. ///
“John! What is it?” Antares asked.
Bandicut paused long enough to tell them what Deep was proposing. They were appalled, as he knew they would be, and they demanded to know more. He spoke to Charlene-echo. /You haven’t told me the plan yet./
<<< We want to throw the Mindaru,
and all of the dark matter with it,
out of the universe. >>>
/That sounds good. How?/
<<< We need you to convince it
to release the dark matter now,
and begin to collapse the star. >>>
Bandicut felt his mind freeze. /
Begin
to collapse—?/
<<< That’s right. :>>>
/That’ll give it what it wants. Kill the star, kill us!/
<<< Not if we’re successful.
We’re going to control the process.
John, this thing’s ready to blow.
We need to move fast.
Do you trust us? >>>
/Yes, but—can’t you tell me what you’re planning to do?/
<<< Not all of it. :>>>
/Why the hell—?/
<<< Because we’re asking you to make
direct contact with the Mindaru.
If it manages to see more in your mind
than you intend...>>>
Bandicut rasped a breath.
Hell’s bells!
/// John, we don’t have a lot of options,
and time’s getting short. ///
Bandicut thought furiously. If he trusted Charlene-echo and Deep and tried this insanely risky thing—and made even the slightest mistake—wouldn’t he likely just set off the hypernova, instead of stopping it?
/// It will happen anyway,
if you take no action. ///
Pressing his fingers to his eyes, he said to the others, “I’m doing what Deep wants! I can’t explain, but it’s the only way. And I have to do it
now.
”
Li-Jared yelped, Antares made a low, unhappy growling sound—and Copernicus said, “Captains, I have no better idea to offer. Jeaves?”
“None. If we trust Deep and Charlene-echo...”
A new seat suddenly appeared in front of the control console. Bandicut sat in it and placed his hands on a pair of contacts in the two armrests. He felt an immediate connection as the stones’ reproduction of a neurolink melted into place around him. “John!” he heard Antares call, but her voice faded into the background along with the rest of the bridge.
Bandicut shut his eyes again. /Promise you’ll keep me from flipping out and going into fugue?/
/// I will try. ///
That would have to be good enough. “Hold the fort down,” he said to the others. “Let’s go.”
The neurolink was alive with energy and activity. He sensed Copernicus and Jeaves nearby, and the translator-stones hovering watchfully over his shoulder. The ship’s systems were right there in front of him, and he could sense the Mindaru entity trolling at the outer edges of the network, testing its defenses. The protocols Copernicus and Jeaves had set up were allowing it to probe, within limits. They were keeping it out of sensitive areas, and keeping Bandicut hidden. But that last was about to change.
*Are you ready?*
As he gazed out at the shadowy presence of the Mindaru, he felt himself suddenly falling...his neurolink presence falling, down into a place where he could see and hear much more—and where
he
could be seen.
*
Frustration was not something the Starburster Mindbody felt as a discrete sensation. But the captive’s intelligence system was proving difficult to break into, forcing the Mindbody to enlist more probes, more energetically. The captive had shrewd defenses.
Something was happening, and the Mindaru entity needed to find out what that was. Following the path of greatest probability, the entity narrowed the focus of its probe onto the one bio node that seemed most open to contact. Here, it thought, it might learn what this thing was planning, what sort of meddling with the mission. Images were starting to form, behind a haze of static...
*
He felt the pulsing of multiple streams of thought: the AI’s and the other robots’; Charli’s, the quarx-echo’s, and his own. And the scratchy, rasping nails of the Mindaru trying to claw its way in. He prayed he could stand up against it. Mostly, he thought it was beyond his control; it was between the stones and the Mindaru. He tried to still his fear.
/// John, keep your mind closed to it for everything
except what we tell you, all right? ///
He had no time to answer, because something banged open in his mind. It felt a little like the door to silence-fugue—except there was a presence behind it.
/Stones? Charli? Are you on top of this? Because I’m—/
Without warning, he found himself in another space, a place where the thoughts of the Mindaru buzzed like angry hornets. For a moment he felt pinned there; then something yanked him away. Now he was in a darkened space, a portal. The way to the Mindaru control center? He shivered as a thread of malicious thought reached out toward him...
—
There was a flash, a discontinuity, just like in the old neurolink before his accident back on Triton. Suddenly he was standing in an old barn, or a tractor-shed. The shed was empty, but in its doorway a shadow loomed. It was the combine, towering, grinding forward toward him. Was it going to finish the job it had failed to do in the field? A scream rose in his throat...
—
Another neurolink discontinuity. He floated along complex pathways, all angles and sloping contours. Was this a landscape of his own mind, or of the alien control center? Was it the landscape on which they would meet? He felt the presence of the unseen opposing intelligence, like a dangerous animal circling around him. It was alien and cold, aloof, frightening—like the combine, about to thresh him into oblivion. /Stones? Charli?/
*We are here.*
Here, but distant. He felt currents of movement around him, more than one thing stalking. Faint scratching sounds. It was more like...
rats scurrying in the woodwork.
Charli called from a distance:
/// It’s surrounding you.
It’s trying to filet your mind open.
Don’t let it. ///
Jesus!
/Thanks, I’ll remember that!/ He was shaking now, as the scratching sounds intensified.
Rats.
Were they actually AI probes gathering around him, preparing to strike, to suck his mind dry? Was it about to learn everything it wanted to know about Earth, and Shipworld?
*Probes are indeed approaching. We will protect you as we can. But we too must learn.*
Yeah. So what are we going to do here?
—
Silence-fugue was on him in a heartbeat, forcing him to fight for his sanity. He teetered on the edge...
Rat-things crawling over me. Nipping at my hair, squealing. Panic rising, voices screeching in my mind. Try to flee! Can’t move!
Not rats, more like huge vampire mosquitoes, trying to suck away his memories. The Mindaru.
Swat them away!
His thoughts and memories?
Don’t let it see anything it shouldn’t see...
The landscape of his thoughts was like a million popping flashbulbs, each illuminating for a split second a different piece of memory. He couldn’t control it—something else had control—he could only watch in horror as myriad pieces of himself seemed to detach and be revealed in a spotlight. But some were revealed more than others; some were drowned out by too much light, or hidden by the fog of chaos. The stones?
—
The field, the combine bearing down on him, thunderheads roiling overhead. The black dog barking frantically. He stumbled and fell, right in the path of the machine...
—
Sputtering images, a galaxy at war. Armadas dispatched to the distant reaches of space, leaving the safety of the galactic core to seek out infested worlds and neutralize them. Stars exploding, sterilizing their surroundings, seeding the galaxy with heavy metals. A treasure: elements to be gathered one day into planets and asteroids, and harvested millions of years later by other machine armadas.