Spires of Infinity (34 page)

“That is partially correct. When we discovered the long-term effects on the sun, we shut down to minimal running capacity to give us time to find a solution.

Unfortunately it is impossible to shut it down completely.”

“Why not,” Sam demanded. “You’re killing the sun, and everyone in the world

with it!”

“It is not that simple,” Allie’s overly patient tone made Sam’s wolflike tail

actually bristle with anger.

“The black hole,” Gabriel said.

“Yes,” Allie nodded to him. “You
are
smart, aren’t you.”

She said it in a way that implied Sam was not, which only made Sam bristle even more.

“The containment field must remain active at all times. Though small, the

singularity is still powerful enough to devour this entire star system with room for desert.

Removing the containment field would allow the singularity to fully form into a black hole. Shutting down the facility will mean the instantaneous destruction of this moon.

You would not even realize you are dead, trapped in your last moment for all eternity.

Which death do you prefer?”

Swishing her tail angrily, Sam glared silently, her jaw set.

“It was not an ideal solution, but it was meant to give the scientists time to work out a way to put everything right again,” Allie said.

“But then came the nuclear bombs, and they put an end to that.

“Correct. The facility can generate an energy shield that will protect against nuclear bombardment, however, the shock waves killed many, the radiation got to those stupid enough to venture outside, and starvation took care of the rest. Millie was the last, and she left in search of food five hundred and eighty eight years ago.

“I estimate that the sun will degrade enough to make life on this moon impossible in approximately forty-seven years. Twenty-nine years after that, there will no longer be enough power to hold the containment field and this region of space will be devoured.”

“You mean the world’s gonna end in forty-seven years,” Sam asked, looking

much like one would expect of someone who had just heard the world was ending. Her ears drooped forward and her tail went limp.

“Correct,” Allie nodded. “If nothing is done to stop the drainage, this moon will no longer be capable of supporting life in forty-seven years. Give or take.”

“So
do something
,” Sam cried. “You’re some sort of super smart computer thingy, aren’t you? Surely you can think of something to do!”

Allie was on the verge of answering, but she started as if goosed, moving toward the window and pointing down at the gate that Gabriel and Sam had entered through.

“My, today
is
a busy day, is it not? We have more visitors.”

“More visitors,” Gabriel asked.

“It’s not the Apostle and an army is it,” Sam asked apprehensively.

Rolling her eyes, Allie waved a hand at the picture window. The view zoomed in on four figures standing just inside the gate, one hologram and three NVMs. Two of the robotic guards were lumbering over to block their path. Not a window, Gabriel realized, a holographic projection.

“Wait,” Sam squinted in confusion. “If you’re here with us, how are you down

there too?”

“That is one of the great things about being the AIOS—that means Artificial

Intelligence Operating System, by the way—of the most sophisticated supercomputer ever built,” Allie winked at Sam. “There’s an app for that.”

“Hey,” Gabriel pointed at one of the three newcomers. “I know her. I saw her in New Hope. She was staring at me weird. I remember her because she has two tails and I thought that was really strange. Don’t tell me she actually
followed
us here.”

“That
bitch
! Can’t she see that you’re
taken
! I’ll stick my hand down her throat and rip those two stupid tails of hers right out through her guts!”

Raising an eyebrow, Allie looked at Sam. “That does not seem physically

possible.”

“How did they get through the gate? I needed my badge to open it.”

“I let them in of course,” Allie said.

“Why would you go and do a stupid thing like that,” Sam hissed. “They might be spies for the Apostle!”

A look of confusion passed over Allie’s face for a second before it was gone in the same there-then-not way that her expressions changed. “I do not know. That is very strange, is it not? They seem to have restricted high level access, and it appears as though I was the one that authorized them several hundred years ago. I am unable to hack through the protection on the files in my memory that contain their information.”

“This is getting a bit interesting,” Gabriel said as he stood. “Let’s hear what they have to say.”

Chapter 30: The Impossible Problem

Drinking deeply from a plastic bottle, Gabriel had not realized how much he’d

missed purified water. It just tasted
better
, and he couldn’t see anything he’d rather not try to identify floating in it.

The door slid open with a whoosh of hydraulics, and the second hologram of Allie entered the room followed by the three newcomers. Saluting herself, she giggled and disappeared.

Standing to meet the new arrivals, Gabriel examined them. The girl had a very pretty face, and unnaturally bright green eyes that were more like the eyes of a beast than those of a human. Her straw colored hair hung loose to her waist and she had the same triangular animal ears that Gabriel had almost come to think of as normal. Her ears were a bit narrower than Sam’s were, coming to a sharper point, and she had a distinct foxy feel about her appearance. Tipped with white fur, her twin bushy tails curled beneath the hem of her modest skirt, and she was armed with a knife of a size with his own, a quiver, and a staff that must have been an unstrung longbow. Up close, Gabriel couldn’t help but think he’d met her somewhere before. Something about her was so familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it.

The other two were identical twins, bearing a strong family resemblance to the girl. Gabriel would have recognized their faces anywhere. They looked like younger NVM versions of the Northern Sage, with straight black hair to their shoulders, wolf ears and bushy black wolf tails. They both had the same bestial eyes that their sister did, except that theirs were purple, and they wore perfectly identical mischievous grins. The one on the right had a massive sword on his back and a hefty knife on his belt. The other wore a sword on each hip.

One thing marked them out from everyone else on Ethos. Their skin was dark. It wasn’t
very
dark, but it had the bronze color of a deep tan the likes of which he’d have paid a tanning salon good money for in his previous life. The sun on Ethos wasn’t strong enough to darken skin and everyone he’d seen was pasty white.

“It’s you,” the girl took Gabriel in with surprise.

“Hello again,” Gabriel nodded.

Coming to his side, Sam shared a frosty look with her. The air actually seemed charged with their unspoken communication, and he was surprised that the room wasn’t icing over. Gabriel knew jealousy when he saw it, as well as a wrongfully accused woman too proud to back down.

Sharing a look with each other, the twins gave identical low whistles, and took a step back.

Clapping a hand on Sam’s shoulder, Gabriel gave her a light shake.

“Stop that before it starts snowing in here.”

Sam’s eyes narrowed at him, and he had the distinct impression she was thinking about taking a bite out of him.

“My name is Kari, these are my brothers Jonathan and Michael. Are you the ones in charge of this place? I bring news of danger.”

“No. We only just arrived ourselves. She’s the one running things.”

Following Gabriel’s finger, Kari’s eyes fell on Allie watching them from near the window that was not a window.

“Oh! I’m sorry,” Kari exclaimed. “I didn’t realize you were a full AI, rather than an automated greeting system.”

“Ooh,” Allie grinned. “
More
people that know things that they should not!

Things are getting exciting.”

“There’s an army on the way,” Kari said to Allie. “And it’s being led by an

extremely dangerous individual we’ve had several encounters with. You might say we’ve been chasing the Apostle.”

“Yes, we know about the army,” Mister Mittens said in a bored tone, his tail

flicking lazily.

Blinking at the cat, Kari broke into a wide, delightful grin full of inhumanly sharp teeth and fangs.

“He can talk? That is just so
cute
!”

Grumbling bitterly, Mister Mittens sat up on his haunches and made a very rude gesture with his forepaws.

“Now I’ve seen everything,” Gabriel muttered.

“We were just discussing the plight of this moon,” Allie said. “Please sit and join us. Your input on the Apostle will be very welcome, though I doubt that any army could breach my walls. I can have more water brought if you would like refreshment.”

“Yes, please. Thank you,” Kari said, gesturing for her brothers to sit, before seating herself.

She sat on her tails, something Gabriel had never seen Sam do, and he found

himself wondering if it was uncomfortable. Sam sure threw a fit when someone pulled on hers, so it was obviously a very sensitive area.

Gabriel listened quietly as Allie went through everything that had already been discussed, answering all questions from the newcomers.

“Now, tell me of this Apostle,” Allie said.

The twins looked at Kari and she nodded, then began.

“The Apostle of Cain is not from this world. I’m not sure which world she

originally comes from—”

“She,” Gabriel interrupted. “Our Apostle is a man. It must not be the same

person.”

“Oh, it is,” Jonathan said.

“Yes indeed,” Michael agreed.

“She wears a black mask and a heavy cloak all the time,” Kari said. “She moves like a man too. It’s hard to determine her gender just by looking at her. And her mask mechanically distorts her voice. We thought she was male at first too.”

“Trust me, there’s a beautiful goddess beneath that mask,” Jonathan added.

“She’s what’s called a Heretic,” Kari explained, nodding to Sam. “It’s what we three are. You know of werewolves and vampires? Most stories about them can be traced back to one of our kind. It appears that humans on this world have genetically manipulated their bodies to mimic ours in order to adapt to the climate here, but we’re what you might call the real thing, hybrid children of humans and extradimensional entities known as
Demons, as is the Apostle. She has many abilities you might consider superhuman. I know that your walls will not keep her out, because they wouldn’t keep me out either. Additionally, she has some sort of power that I have never encountered before, except in her. She seems able to manipulate the emotions of others and bend them to her will. I would not take her presence lightly, nor would I expect your walls to protect you.”

“I see,” Allie nodded. “This facility also has an energy shield that is capable of deflecting nuclear bombardment. Can she break through
that
?”

“I’m not sure. In fact, I don’t understand why she’s coming at all. She already has the ability to travel to any world she pleases. Why would she want a gateway to other worlds?”

Blinking at her, Gabriel thought it was rather obvious.

“Not space,” he explained. “
Time
. This place is a
time machine
.”

“Possibly,” Kari looked to her brothers, and they nodded in unison. “If that is true she must not be allowed to reach this facility. Imagine how many worlds she could convert or destroy if she had infinite time to do so before we’re even born. She could change the course of history for the entire universe. We might all simply cease to exist.”

“A comforting thought,” Gabriel muttered. “Now that we’ve been over that,

Allie, you said that the last scientist here gave you a task before she magically jumped almost six centuries into the future to give me my quest. Could you tell me what it was?”

“Of course, Gabriel, I have been waiting centuries for someone to ask that

question. I was asked to put all of my unused runtime into reversing the damage that this facility has done to the sun.”

“And your findings?”

“Unfortunately, there is no feasible method of undoing the damage. A star is not a living being, or a machine. It cannot be healed or repaired. My recommendation is that we use the time we have left and evacuate the entire population to another habitable world using a Gate Jump.”

“Wait,” Sam interrupted. “Hold on for just a second. You said you could use this place to go back in time, right? So why not use it to go back and stop it from being built in the first place?”

“Because that would create a paradox,” Gabriel sighed, to an approving nod from Allie.

“A what,” Sam asked, a dumb look crossing her face.

“Let’s see if I can explain this right,” Gabriel leaned toward her. “Say we use the Spires of Infinity to go back in time, and stop the Spires of Infinity from ever being built.

This causes a change in the flow of time to our version of the present, where it is then impossible to use the Spires of Infinity to travel back in time, and therefore impossible to stop the Spires of Infinity from being activated. In doing so, we make it impossible for us to do it, which, in turn, makes it possible for use to do it again, which, in turn, again, makes it impossible. It chases itself around and around forever, creating a vortex that causes the entire universe to collapse until it consumes all of space and time. And when it finally winks out of existence itself, there is nothing left in its wake to ever say there was a universe here. A paradox is infinite destructive energy created by a contradiction in the flow of time.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean,” Sam cried, looking more confused than ever. “Can’t you say it more plainly than that?”

“If we use this place to stop this place from ever being activated, the resulting contradiction in time will tear the universe apart. Here’s another example. If you travel back in time and kill your grandfather, then your mother would never have been born, which means that
you
would never have been born. If you were never born, you couldn’t have killed your grandfather, and so he lives. It’s basically a problem of creating a sequence of events that physically cannot exist within the same line of time. Better?”