Timeweb Trilogy Omnibus (3 page)

An expert in the application of the laser, Sajak intentionally left small segments of the victim’s flesh only lightly secured, thus providing apparent escape opportunities. Every few seconds, the Mutati would shapeshift and try to squirm through one of the “openings,” but each time the General would quickly close it up, while leaving another space free.

It was all a game, and the Doge noted a cruel smile twitching at the edges of Sajak’s scarred mouth. After each escape attempt, the officer adjusted controls on the nerve induction rack as punishment, to intensify the pain.

Looking puffy and red-faced, the victim coughed and sneezed, and emitted the foul odor of Mutati fear. In order to intensify the suffering, General Sajak had removed the creature’s implanted allergy protector.

The agonized, high-pitched shrieks of the Mutati gave the Doge a warm, toasty feeling because he hated the shapeshifters so much and always had. From a young age he, like billions of people, had learned to loathe the arch enemies of humanity. He looked forward to these sessions as much as Sajak did, the way children looked forward to sugary treats.

On the wall behind Lorenzo hung a stylized painting of the Madonna holding technological devices. A composite artwork, it depicted a synthesis of the leading religious and scientific disciplines of humankind … tenets that dated back to the origins of Human life on Earth eons ago, and to the subsequent migrations to Timian One, Siriki, Canopa, and other planets.

The ruler of all Humans, the stocky, wrinkled Doge Lorenzo was the ninety-fourth person to occupy the Palazzo Magnifico and sit upon the legendary Aquastar Throne. He held strong theoscientific beliefs himself, and employed them to keep his citizens in line. The officially sanctioned text of the Merchant Prince Alliance was the Scienscroll, whose origins lay in the murky, legendary past. An electronic copy lay open in front of the Doge, and he read a passage from it aloud while the Mutati screamed in agony. A wager box also sat on the table, a black mechanism that the three noblemen used to keep track of their bets concerning how long the victim would survive. Lorenzo loved games of chance.

This notorious prison was linked to the Palazzo Magnifico by a covered walking bridge over a narrow waterway, a man-made tributary of the Royal Canal that ran through the heart of Elysoo, the capital city. Named after a mythical economist of millennia past who led the first corporate migrations from Earth, Elysoo became the most beautiful of all cities created by the affluent princes, one of the Wonders of the Galaxy. Even Mutatis (those foolish but brave ones who ventured here in disguise) said so; everyone admired the magnificent municipal designs, and especially the intricate dancing lights on the canals and the illuminated, lambent waterfalls that made the metropolis such a magical wonderland at night.

To prevent the features of his beloved city from being duplicated elsewhere, the doges always blinded the architects and engineers after they had completed their work. But the biggest threat to the Merchant Prince Alliance was not the theft of urban designs, or even of industrial secrets. It came from the Mutati Kingdom. Lorenzo wanted to annihilate the entire race of shapeshifters and make them suffer as much physical pain and humiliation as possible in the process. In his view they were the lowest form of life imaginable, the biological dregs of creation. He could not understand why the Supreme Being had contrived such organisms, unless it was to test Humans, to see how they would respond to such a dreadful enemy. The Mutatis were not just a military threat; they were a supreme challenge to all that any decent person held sacred.…

This hapless torture victim (captured in a space skirmish between Humans and Mutatis) was still trying to metamorphose his flesh in order to escape, but Sajak handled him deftly with the strong green threads of high-intensity light. As the Mutati assumed different physiques, the laser threads still held onto him, tightening their grip on his cellular structure and causing him to howl in agony and frustration. Exhausted, he reverted to his original fat, fleshy form.

With a sardonic laugh, the General turned up the pain amplification mechanism to its maximum setting, causing the Mutati to squirm even more frantically. The creature reached the highest note of a blood-curdling scream, and then babbled everything he knew about the military operations of his people. In a cracking voice, he said he was a mid-level officer, a sevencap who had been the adjutant for one of their top admirals.

“He has told all he knows,” General Sajak announced triumphantly, as the victim slumped on the rack, bleeding purple fluid from his ears and giving off fitful gasps. The small officer stood over him, smiling.…

One of the noblemen sitting in judgment with Lorenzo was the chisel-featured Jacopo Nehr, inventor of the “nehrcom,” the instantaneous, cross-galactic communication system. Fabulously wealthy, he also manufactured efficient, low-cost robots in leased facilities on the Hibbil Cluster Worlds, and engaged in precious gem mining and distribution.

The other noble at the Judgment Table was Saito Watanabe of CorpOne, a tall, obese man with jowls that hung loosely on each side of his face. He and Nehr, both born commoners, had been promoted by the Doge to “Princes of the Realm,” in honor of their business successes. Now their companies were affiliated with the all-pervasive Doge Corporation, which received a share of all merchant prince profits.

Prince Saito did not like these sessions, but attended them out of necessity, in order to maintain the favorable economic position of his own business empire. When the interrogation of a prisoner became most intense, he tried to tune it out discreetly and think of other matters. At the moment, he was remembering back a decade, to a time when his estranged son Noah had been in his late twenties and had worked for him. Once they had been close, though it had developed into a strained relationship, filled with disagreements over environmental issues.

He wondered if the young man had been right after all.

Sadness filled the Prince as he recalled their emotion-charged final argument. As the details came back, he felt tears forming in his eyes. With sudden resolve, he fought the emotion and pushed it deep inside, where it would not be noticed by his companions.

Only hours ago, Prince Saito had sent his son a letter suggesting a meeting. A telebeam response had arrived moments before this interrogation session, as indicated by a change in the color of Saito’s signet ring, from ruby to emerald. He had not been able to look at it yet.

At long last the victim issued a horrendous, shuddering scream and died. As he did so, the wager box metamorphosed from black to gold, and cast a bright beam of light on the face of the victorious contestant. It was Lorenzo the Magnificent, as usual. He loved to win, and set the machines to make certain that he always did.

Presently, the Doge and Nehr went out the door, bantering back and forth over the results of the bet, while Saito remained at the table. Men in black hoods swung a hoist mechanism over the corpse of the prisoner. They grunted with exertion as they moved the heavy body onto a sling.

Prince Watanabe took a deep breath, anticipating a negative response from his proud, willful son. To activate the telebeam projector, he touched the stone of the signet ring. The mechanism identified him from DNA in the oil of his skin and flashed a black-on-white message in front of his eyes, floating in the air.

He read it, and allowed a tear of joy to fall down his cheek. Given a fresh opportunity, he would listen to his son this time, would do everything humanly possible to bring them back together again.

Chapter Three

There is a legend that the Creator of the Galaxy can alter his appearance, like a Mutati.

—From a Mutati children’s story

Paradij, the fabled Mutati homeworld.…

High atop his glittering Citadel overlooking the capital city, the Zultan Abal Meshdi stood on a clearglax floor inside a slowly spinning gyrodome. An immense terramutati who could take on many appearances, he now looked like a golden-maned lionoid in flowing robes and jewels, clinging with the suction of his bare feet to the moist, revolving surface.

Around the majestic leader spun two other compartments, visible to him through thick, clear plates. One contained waterborne Mutati variations that swam gracefully … while the other enclosure was filled with genetic variations that flew about at hummingbird speed.

These were the three types of Mutatis—terramutatis, hydromutatis, and aeromutatis—functioning on the ground, in the water, and in the air. Within their own environments, the variations could shapeshift, becoming a panoply of exotic creatures.

From the gyrodome, Meshdi saw Royal Chancellor Aton Turba in the room outside, pacing back and forth as he awaited the instructions of his superior. A mass of flesh with a small head and centipede legs, Turba had been in this shape for less than a day.

If a Mutati remained in one form too long, his sensitive cellular structure locked into place, so that he could no longer metamorphose. Normally it was safe to maintain one appearance for weeks, but Turba changed himself on a much more frequent basis, fearful that if he didn’t he might slip into cellular rigidity. And, despite the chancellor’s fluid appearance he remained instantly recognizable to the Zultan, who possessed a rare gift. Meshdi was one of the few Mutatis who could look at another, no matter his appearance, and see beyond the surface to an intricate combination of aural hues and electrical charges that were unique to the individual.

The Zultan’s gyrodome made a faint squealing noise specially tuned to give pleasure to him, and he smelled the sweetness of santhems, tiny airflowers that glowed faintly mauve in the moist, humid air … a barely visible field of color.

Abal Meshdi inhaled deeply, absorbing millions of the scented flowerets. A sensation of deep relaxation permeated his entire body, and he sighed with pleasure.

A wonderful gift from his Adurian allies far across the galaxy, the gyrodome spun faster and faster, raising the pitch of its whine, heightening his pleasure to one of the highest levels he had ever experienced. Everything became a blur around him. The mechanism sent the Zultan into a trance in which all of the problems, decisions, and challenges of his position were aligned, and he could consider them in detail.

Foremost in his mind: the continued Human threat. Each day he considered what to do with the ones that were captured, assigning the trickle that came in from various sectors of the galaxy to hard labor or execution through horrific, screaming deaths. He enjoyed watching them die, since they suffered so much. Like his counterparts on Timian One, he knew how to heighten the pain of his enemies.

He also worried what to do with his own son, Hari’Adab, who seemed overly independent, almost rebellious at times. It especially troubled him that Hari had expressed opposition to him privately about the “Demolio” program, a top secret, highly ambitious military weapon that the Mutatis had under development. The Zultan, with no patience for naysayers, had thus far been unable to change the young Mutati’s mind, but had obtained his sacred promise to keep his feelings to himself. And, in an effort to provide Hari with administrative experience for the maturation of his thinking processes, he had assigned him as Emir of another planet, Dij. For some time, however, Hari had not been submitting the required reports to his father. As a result, the Zultan would need to apply stern discipline.

Gradually the dome slowed, and Abal Meshdi stood upright. The water and air creatures around him had grown quiet, and the Zultan’s head was clear and calm. By the time he emerged from the dome, he had made a decision about his arch enemies. The matter of his errant son would have to wait.

Aton Turba bowed, then stood submissively with his three hands clasped in front of his round belly.

Above all, the Zultan hated Humans. It was an enmity that went back for millennia, to disputes among the distant ancestors of both races. He didn’t remember what started it all, but had an exacting memory of the events that had occurred during his own lifetime. There had been a number of military skirmishes, and in most of them Humans had prevailed. Because of limitations on space travel, however—with faster-than-light speed only achieved by mysterious, sentient podships that operated on their own schedules—neither side had been able to mount a large-scale attack on the other.

According to Mutati mythology, the galaxy was once pristine, before Humans defiled it tens of thousands of years ago. The Mutatis knew this from an oral tradition that went back to a time before Humans existed, when there were only a handful of galactic races.

The Zultan scowled at his chancellor and announced, “The gyrodome has just shown me exactly how to use the new weapon my researchers are developing.”

Turba looked perplexed, for he had not been told anything about this. But he knew better than to ask questions of his superior. As always, the information would flow in due course, and the chancellor would be required to remember every detail.

“When the device is perfected I will institute a new policy,” the Zultan announced in a pompous voice, “and trillions of Humans will be exterminated, like hordes of insects.”

Abal Meshdi went on to explain the terrible new doomsday weapon to Turba, and told the astounded chancellor that he would need to tend more carefully to the affairs of the Citadel in the near future, since the Zultan would be occupied with other, more far-reaching, matters.…

* * * * *

Within days, an elite corps of “outriders” was selected and trained … Mutatis who were looking for opportunities to attack their enemies with the most frightful weapon of annihilation in the history of galactic warfare.

Overseeing the operation from his busy War Room in the capital city of Jadeen, the Zultan gazed out on banks of data processors that projected space-simulation images of the merchant prince worlds … and of planets farther out, at the fringe of the enemy realm. A tiny spaceship, represented by a larger-than-scale point of orange light, flew toward one of the outer worlds.