In Timeweb, Brian Herbert creates a universe of wondrous possibilities that is populated by sentient spaceships, shapwshifters, intriguing robots, and miniature aliens with mysterious powers. Humanity has become a mercantile society that has spread throughout the galaxy, ruled by wealthy merchant princes who live in decadent splendor—entirely unaware of another realm just beneath the fabric of the universe.
When galactic ecologist Noah Watanabe discovers the cause of a strange, cosmic disintegration, he embarks on an epic journey to restore the ancient balance to the crumbling galaxy. Noah must work with warring, alien races to unlock the secrets to a vast celestial puzzle.
The Web and the Stars—The web is unraveling, threatening to plunge the universe into oblivion.
Galactic ecologist Noah Watanabe is struggling to hold the cosmic filigree together, while the evil shapeshifter race of Mutatis threatens to use a doomsday weapon against humanity. Noah has his own paranormal ability to journey into the depths of the universe, but he has made enemies of his own, including a third powerful force determined to destroy humans and Mutatis alike.
Web Dancers—The conclusion to Brian Herbert’s epic Timeweb trilogy. As the human race and the sinister shape-shifting Mutatis continue their epic war, the connecting filigree of Timeweb strands that hold the universe together, begins to unravel. Sentient podships travel the strands of the web, but the cosmos itself is disintegrating.
Galactic ecologist Noah Watanabe, possessed of special powers, is the one person who has a chance of saving all races. He is immortal, and faced with the crisis to the universe, he is also evolving, changing both mentally and physically . . . but into what? Noah is swept on a tidal wave of destiny and knows there is no turning back.
Books 1–3 of the Timeweb Chronicles
Brian Herbert
Smashwords edition
Copyright 2011 DreamStar Inc.
WordFire Press
Timeweb Copyright © 2006 by DreamStar, Inc.
First publication 2006 in conjunction with Tekno Books and Ed Gorman
The Web and the Stars Copyright © 2007 by DreamStar, Inc.
First publication in 2007 in conjunction with Tekno Books and Ed Gorman
Web Dancers Copyright © 2008 by DreamStar, Inc.
First publication in 2007 in conjunction with Tekno Books and Ed Gorman
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the express written permission of the copyright holder, except where permitted by law. This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously.
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Books 1 of the Timeweb Chronicles
Brian Herbert
Dedication
Of all the books I have written, I owe the most to Jan for this one. You are the love of my life and my daily inspiration. Thank you for being so understanding while I spend much of my life in my study, taking fantastic journeys through space and time. You are a blessing beyond words.
Chapter One
We are but one of many galaxies, wheels moving the cart of the universe.
—Ancient Tulyan Legend
He stood profiled against the blood-red sunset as bulbous ships took off, a swarm of mechanical insects transporting contaminated materials to dump zones. It had been another long day. Normally the muscular, freckled man liked the buzz of activity in the air, the sense that he was restoring a planet that had been severely damaged by the industrial operations of the merchant princes. At the moment, however, he had something else on his mind, a surprising turn of events.
Noah Watanabe glanced again at a brief telebeam message, a black-on-white holo letter that floated in the air beside him. He had been estranged from his father, Prince Saito Watanabe, for so long that he had never expected to hear from the old tycoon again. Touching a signet ring on his right hand, Noah closed the message. In a wisp of smoke, it disappeared into the ring.
Brushing a hand through his reddish, curly hair, Noah considered the unexpected offer of a meeting between them. His initial thought had been to send a scathing response, or to simply ignore his father altogether. But other possibilities occurred to him.
In the din of aircraft, soil-processing machines, and the shouts of workers, he became aware of an oval-shaped hoverjet landing nearby, raising a cloud of dust. Moments later, the craft settled to the ground, and an underbelly hatch swung open, followed by a ramp that slid to the ground. Men wearing the green-and-brown uniforms of the Guardians—his ecological recovery force—hurried down the ramp, dragging with them a disheveled young woman, a prisoner. A trickle of blood ran down the side of her face. Her eyes were feral, and she kicked at her captors, without much success.
“Caught her trying to rig explosives to our biggest skyminer,” one of the Guardians said, a rotund man with a purple birthmark on one cheek and chestnut hair combed straight back. In his early forties, Subi Danvar was Noah’s trusted but sometimes outspoken adjutant. “She and two men—we killed both of them—stole one of our fast recon ships and locked onto the miner. They were about to set the whole rig off when we caught them and defused the charges.”
“Who sent you?” Noah demanded, stepping close and looking down at her.
Sneering, the woman said, “I don’t do anything for free. What will you give me if I answer your questions?”
“You’re a mercenary, aren’t you?”
“You haven’t paid for my answer yet.”
“Talk and we’ll let you live,” Subi snarled. “That’s our offer.” With a round belly and a puffy face he looked soft, but in reality he had the strength of three men.
Having never mistreated prisoners, Noah scowled at his adjutant, who should know better. The man was bluffing, but was doing so without Noah’s authorization.
“Maybe the princes sent her,” another Guardian suggested, a large man who held the woman’s arms and danced away whenever she tried to kick him.
“Do you think it was your own father, Master Noah?” Danvar asked.
“I’m not sure,” Noah said, recalling the telebeam message. Remarkably, old Prince Saito had offered an apology for their failed relationship, and had expressed the hope that they might be close again. But warning signals went off in Noah’s mind; this could be a trick, even from his own father.
Noah and his Guardians had to be on constant alert against sabotage. In the past year, attacks had come from his business competitors and from enemies of the powerful Watanabe family, people who didn’t believe the stories about the estrangement between the business mogul and his son, and thought they must be working together in some clandestine way.
“Take her away for interrogation,” Noah said, with a dismissive gesture toward the young woman. “And treat her well, with respect.”
The woman looked at him in astonishment. “No torture?”
“Of course not. We don’t do things that way.”
“I am very pleased to hear that.” With a sudden movement, the woman writhed free of her captors and lunged toward Noah, brandishing a long dagger that she seemed to have produced from thin air. She moved with surprising speed.
Displaying athletic grace, Noah sidestepped the thrust and grabbed her weapon hand. But in his grip, her hand seemed to melt away, and the dagger, too.
“Mutati!” Danvar shouted.
It was a shapeshifter. For centuries Mutatis like this one had warred against the Merchant Prince Alliance. In a matter of seconds, her entire body metamorphosed into a long, serpentine form. She coiled, and struck out at Noah with deadly fangs.
But he whirled to one side and rolled away. His men fired a volley of ion-pistol shots at the creature, bursts of energy that flashed and sparkled in the air. Purple blood oozed from the Mutati, and the wounded creature began to change form again, this time to a startlingly large and ferocious beast with sharp barbs all over its body and face. But it only half metamorphosed, with its rear—more injured than the rest of the body—still a writhing snake. Using its front legs to propel itself forward, the monstrosity lunged at the Guardians, but they kept firing, and the Mutati finally fell, spurting gouts of blood.
On his feet, Noah drew his own sidearm and pointed it. Holding his fire, he took a step backward, watching the Mutati in fascination. His men stopped shooting.
Once more, the creature shapeshifted on its front, and the barbs on the face dissolved into torn and jagged flesh. A tiger-like beast began to take form, with desperate, wild eyes. But when it was only half formed, it abruptly shuddered and twitched, and then stopped moving entirely.
“Are you all right?” Subi Danvar asked, running to Noah’s side.
“I’m not hurt. Doesn’t look like any of you are, either.”
“My fault, sir. I thought sure our prisoner was Human, but the red blood on the side of her face was obviously faked, something she wiped on her skin.”
“They used a new trick on us,” Noah said, “but that’s no excuse. From now on, stick all the prisoners in the finger to see if they bleed purple. It’s the one thing about their bodies they can’t change.”
“I’ll check them myself,” Danvar said, referring to half a dozen men and women saboteurs that they had captured here on the planet Jaggem in recent weeks.
“Guess this lets my father off the hook,” Noah said, staring at the motionless blotch of purple flesh on the ground.
One of the men used a knife to dig a small white object out of the body. “Implanted allergy protector,” he said, holding it up. Mutatis were strongly allergic to Humans, so the shapeshifters often wore medical devices that encased the cells of their bodies in a prophylactic film.
After a worried, guilt-ridden nod toward his superior, Danvar departed with his men.
Shaking his head as he watched them go, Noah realized that he should have taken precautions earlier to prevent Mutati incursions. Especially here, on a planet that could have future significance to the Merchant Prince Alliance as a military outpost, by virtue of its strategic location. With all the planets that he had restored so far, Noah had never experienced even a hint of trouble from the shapeshifters, and for years he had relied on local police security operations to detect them if they ever tried to get through. The possibility of Mutati incursions had been in the back of his mind all that time, but from now on he needed to move such concerns to the forefront. He would have Subi Danvar work up new security measures in coordination with the MPA.
Noah’s thoughts returned to the communication he had just received from his crusty, septuagenarian father. How odd to hear from him after all this time, after all the bad feelings and bitterness between the two of them. Their last encounter—more than fifteen years ago—had been a shouting match that had become physical when the prince struck his son in the face with a closed fist. The blow from the big man had been considerable, and Noah had reeled backward in surprise and shock. Out of a sense of honor, the younger man had not even considered striking back, not even for a moment. As a result of the altercation, he had not expected to ever see his father again, except on newsreels that documented the businessman’s comings and goings.
Now he watched Danvar’s hoverjet take off and thread its way through the crowded airspace, flying toward the Guardians’ base of operations on a nearby plateau. The sky was deep purple, almost a foreboding Mutati shade, and Jaggem’s small, silvery moon was just rising above a distant escarpment. He wished his father was here to see how successful he had become in his own right.
Noah had not needed any inheritance from Prince Saito. The younger Watanabe had become wealthy beyond anything he could ever hope to spend, from the ecological recovery operations he conducted on numerous planets around the Merchant Prince Alliance. Before embarking on that career, Noah had considered becoming the industrialist that his father wanted him to be.
But, after long consideration, Noah had come up with a better line of work, one that did not conflict with his own strongly held environmental beliefs. His ambitious, conniving sister Francella was more suited to following in their father’s footsteps anyway, so by default Noah gave her what she wanted, his own spot as the heir apparent of the family’s huge commercial operations, spanning countless star systems.
After making his momentous, life-changing decision, Noah had proceeded to carve out a business niche of his own, bringing efficiency to what had previously been a fledgling, loosely run industry. His timing had been exquisite, and now he ran the largest ecological recovery operation in the galaxy, with skilled teams working on blighted worlds, restoring them to habitability after their resources had been stripped by merchant prince industrialists.
It was a career path in which Noah restored many of the planets that his own father’s operations had nearly destroyed. But he had not selected this particular business just to irritate the old man—at least not consciously. Noah had only done what he thought was right, and as a Watanabe he felt he had an obligation to make up for the environmental wrongs committed by his family.
In memory, he reread his father’s short telebeam message. Then he activated his ring and transmitted a polite but reserved response, agreeing to the meeting.
Chapter Two
Lorenzo the Magnificent . . . Should he be described as Machiavellian, or as a Renaissance man? Perhaps he is both: a leader who will do anything necessary to advance the business and scientific ideas that he holds dear.
—Succession: a Concise History of the Doges, one of the underground press books
Of all the worlds in the Merchant Prince Alliance, none came close to rivaling the elegant capital world of Timian One, a domain of fabulous palazzos, villas, and country estates, with ambassadors and nobles coming and going on important business. The planet was guarded from space attack by orbital military platforms and by extensive installations on the surface.
And yet, in all of this opulence and grandeur, there existed on the homeworld of humankind a high and sprawling prison known as the Gaol of Brimrock, filled with bloodstained walls and floors, musty rooms, and filthy corridors . . . a structure that reeked of bodily decay and the most excruciating, horrendous deaths. At any hour of the day and night, victims could be heard screaming as they were tortured and killed.
In the largest chamber of the gaol, a vaulted room with barbed straps hanging from the ceiling and hideous machines arrayed along the walls, the aged but still-spry Doge Lorenzo del Velli sat at the Judgment Table between a pair of princes. At one time the Doge had been a classically handsome man with a prominent chin, strong nose, and dark, penetrating eyes, but now the skin sagged on his cheeks and under his chin, and his gaze had lost its luster. The leathery face was etched with the concerns of high command and the depravities of endless nocturnal liaisons. He rarely ever smiled, and when he did, it had a steely edge to it. Lorenzo and his companions wore cloaks, brocaded surcoats, silkine shirts with dagged collars, and golden medallions. Their liripipe hats, in the varying colors of their noble houses, rested on the table in front of them.
The trio of noblemen watched dispassionately as their top military officer used a nerve induction rack to torture a flesh-fat Mutati. The air around the rack sparked and flashed with green light, from the strong threads of a jade laser held by the inflictor, a delicate little man in a baggy red uniform with gold braids and an oversized officer’s cap. Supreme General Mah Sajak, despite his high rank, enjoyed coming here on occasion to perform tasks that were normally reserved for men in black hoods.
The high-intensity device, a golden staff that shot threads of green fire from the tip, had been manufactured by the Hibbil race, specialists in computers and high-performance machines. The electronic wand inhibited the movements of the Mutati, and was used in lieu of physical cords or other restraints.
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.
Abal Meshdi chuckled, and thought, The Humans believe they are such masters of technology, but we have a surprise for them.
Chapter Four
Timeweb ensnares the past, the present, and the future. As each moment becomes the past, it folds into the web and seems to disappear without actually doing so. Simultaneously, in a great cosmic balance, the future opens up for us . . . little by little.
—Tulyan Imprint
Seated in the back of a maglev limousine, the man gazed out a tinted window as the car hummed along a mountain track, snaking downhill. Through morning vistas that opened between sun-dappled trees, Noah Watanabe saw immense factories and office complexes below in the Valley of the Princes, facilities that were operated by the titans of industry who controlled the multi-planet Human Empire. For a few seconds, he barely made out the high-walled perimeter of his father’s CorpOne compound, with its radically-shaped structures, an imaginative variety of geometric and artistic combinations.
On the opposite side of the valley, Rainbow City—the largest industrial metropolis on Canopa—clung to a shimmering, iridescent cliff. Workers occupied homes on the lower levels of the community, while the villas of wealthy noblemen studded the top like a crown of jewels. For decades Prince Saito had owned one of those palatial residences, and Noah recalled some happy times growing up there . . . but only a few. There had been too many family problems.
It was early summer now, with the canopa pines and exotic grasses of the valley still bright green, having gorged themselves with moisture in anticipation of the coming dry months. Noah viewed it as a survival mechanism, and thought that plants were just as intelligent as other life forms, but in different ways. This and other controversial beliefs frequently put him at odds with the wealthy industrialists of the Merchant Prince Alliance, including his own father.
Noah wore a velvis surcoat and a high-collar shirt with a gold chain around the neck. His muscles bulged under the fabric. He was accompanied by six men dressed in the green-and-brown uniforms of the Guardians, his force of environmental activists who were known as “eco-warriors.” The men were armed with high-caliber puissant rifles, as well as sidearms and an arsenal of stun-weapons, poisons, and plax-explosives. They sat silently, staring outside in all directions, ever on the alert for danger. Ahead of the black car and behind it on the maglev track—as arranged by Prince Saito—were nine other identical vehicles, thus preventing potential aggressors from targeting Noah too easily. An air escort of CorpOne attack hellees flew overhead, and the entire area around him had been scanned by infrared and other devices.
Enemies could still defeat any of these systems. Technology was that way; you could never be certain what your adversary knew, or what he had developed to use against you in the eternal dance of offensive and defensive advancements. People wishing to do Noah harm might still be lurking in the woods or in the air, but he believed in fate; if something was meant to get him, it would.
This was how he felt about the upcoming meeting with his father, which he had not expected to occur. Upon receiving the message from the old man, Noah had experienced a visceral sensation that a greater power was at work, drawing them together. Perhaps the two of them, who had disagreed so vehemently about industrial and environmental issues in the past, might find some common ground after all. Noah had always held onto a thread of hope that this might happen, but had taken no steps in that direction, until he replied to his father’s recent message.
Noah’s strong belief in fate did not mean that he just sat around and waited for things to occur. Far from it. The penultimate activist among activists, he was an assertive leader who constantly pushed events, implementing large-scale transformations on the worlds of the Human-controlled Merchant Prince Alliance.
In the process, Noah had become fabulously wealthy in his own right, so he cared nothing of rumors reaching him that he had been disowned by his father; he really only cared about the loss of a relationship with Prince Saito . . . the riches of emotion, knowledge, and experience that they were not sharing with each other. Maybe that was about to change.
The procession of maglev vehicles reached the valley floor, where the single track widened into ten, with a variety of conveyances whirring along on them . . . luxury cars, truck-trailer rigs, and buses filled with workers. Presently Noah and his entourage passed through a security beam at an ornate gate, and entered the CorpOne compound. A pair of diamonix elephants with red-jeweled eyes stood on either side of a grassy planting area just inside the entry. Ahead, Noah could see the main building. He knew it well, from having worked there with his father at one time, before their blowup.
A marvel of engineering and aesthetic design, Prince Saito Watanabe’s office headquarters was an inverted pyramid, with the point down. As if by magic, the large structure balanced perfectly in that precarious position, while the foundation—a broad platform that included gardens, flagstones, and ornamental fountains—spun slowly beneath it. But Noah Watanabe (with his scientific knowledge and curiosity) knew how it worked; the structure was held in place by a slender core-pillar of pharium, the strongest metal in the galaxy. Elaborate geomagnetics were involved as well, and as a last recourse, a backup system would shoot stabilizing outriggers into receptacles if the tilt meters indicated trouble.
Noah’s car hummed up to the edge of the slowly revolving platform and locked into position at the edge of an exotic rose garden. He gazed up at the improbable building above him as it rotated with the platform, and considered the practical benefits of such a design. As the headquarters spun, it gave off electronic pulses that absorbed and processed important data. The system could identify known agitators from all galactic races, profile criminal types, and make highly sophisticated statistical predictions.
Noah wondered what his father wanted; their emotion-charged enmity had lasted for a decade and a half. In memory, he went over the conciliatory message he had received from the old patriarch, reviewing every detail that had been in the telebeam. His father was a precise man, who said exactly what he intended every time he communicated in any form, but Noah suspected hidden meanings:
In the past we have not understood one another as a father and son should. I blame myself almost entirely, and you not at all. It is my duty to bridge our differences.
The electronic transmittal had gone on to suggest a time and a place for a meeting. Now, as Noah watched a white-uniformed escort secretary march primly toward the hover-limousine, he recollected his own written response:
Father: I appreciate your sentiments, and look forward to meeting with you as you have specified
* * * * *
From her office inside the inverted pyramid, Francella Watanabe stared in rage and disbelief at a closed-circuit screen that showed the escort secretary leading Noah and his entourage through a wide corridor. At various points along the route, Francella—as Corporate Security Chief—could activate detonations by remote control and kill the entire party. The thought was tempting, but she had something even more devastating in mind.
With a heavy sigh, she activated a copy of the telebeam messages her father and Noah had exchanged, and continued to seethe over them, as she had done since seeing them for the first time three days before. To the very depths of her soul she loathed her twin brother, resenting the preferential treatment he had always received at her expense. Before the big disagreement between Noah and his father over environmental issues, the young man had been the heir apparent, the favored one. In those days Noah had even dressed like his father, in a cloak, brocaded surcoat and liripipe hat, while she was expected to remain in the shadows and say very little. She was, after all, only a female in an interplanetary society run by men, for the benefit of men.
Now her bête noire had entered the building only a few floors down. She wished their father had consulted her about such an important matter, for she might have used her considerable wiles to steer him away from making the invitation. Recently, though, the old man had seemed distant and had been making excuses to avoid or delay the appointments she had requested with him.
He would regret that soon, because Francella had set in motion a new and climactic plan . . . one that would take both her father and brother out of the picture, while allowing her to obtain everything she so richly deserved.
A two-pronged attack.
She wished it didn’t have to be this way, and her conscience had been giving her some trouble over it. But she had been driven to do this, with no other choice. Events . . . and people . . . were conspiring against her, and she needed to strike fast, in order to protect her position.
Hearing familiar noises behind her, she felt her pulse quicken. Francella flipped off the telebeam and turned to see her aged father opening the door and lurching into the room in his stiff-jointed way, tapping the hardwood floor with one of his ornate walking sticks. He had arrived only the day before from Timian One, where he had been attending to his duties on the Council of Forty, a powerful clique of noblemen who ruled with the Doge.
Prince Saito Watanabe had a large collection of fancy canes, many of them carved in the images of animals. This one, of canopa white teak, had a bull elephant head carved on top of the handle and the end of an elephant snout at the bottom.
All around the CorpOne complex, as well as in his lavish homes and vehicles, the obese old man had representations of the grand, extinct beasts. Images of the pachyderms were on wall hangings, pillow cases, and statuary; even articles of furniture were carved in their likeness. In addition, Prince Watanabe had commissioned paleontology expeditions to Earth and other far planets where the creatures used to roam . . . scientific ventures that brought back remains of elephants for genetic testing.
“You requested an urgent conference with me,” the industrialist said to her, in a coarse tone. “I grant you five minutes, before my appointment with Noah.”
“Five minutes?” She felt her face flush, and noticed her father looking at her closely with his intense, dark eyes.
“My schedule is very tight,” he said.
“Too tight for your own daughter?”
“I’m sorry if it appears that way, but I have been planning for this important rendezvous with Noah, going over what I will say to him.”
“Are you certain it is wise to do this now?” she asked, already knowing his answer.
Saito Watanabe studied his statuesque, redheaded daughter, who wore a white lace dress with gold brocade, and a high, star-shaped headdress. For an additional fashion statement, she had shaved off her eyebrows and hair at the front of her head, creating a high forehead.
He heard the displeasure in her voice, saw it etched on her face . . . and wondered what had gone wrong with the relationship between her and Noah. For years Saito had not failed to notice the raw hatred between them, the destructive sparks and flames that flared whenever they were together.
“I will see your brother alone,” he said to her. “It is best for the two of you to remain apart.”
“Daddy, Noah hates us. Don’t you realize that?”
With deep sadness, the heavyset man looked away. He felt his eyes misting over, and didn’t say what had been in his heart for a long time, a primogenitary hope that Noah would take over for him.
A son should follow in his father’s footsteps, the Prince thought. It is the natural order of things.
But Noah had been defiant and headstrong. So much so that the Prince had not expected him to accept the invitation. But he had.
What is Noah thinking? What are his wishes, his dreams?
“It is time,” the Prince announced to his daughter. And he ordered her out of his office, hardly noticing the fiery glare she shot back at him.
* * * * *
The reception room where Noah had been told to wait was on the fourth level of the upside-down pyramid, with a wide picture window that looked out on the gardens and fountains below. Since each floor was larger than the one below it, he saw an overhang outside the window, and knew that each floor all the way to the top was like this as well, in a dizzying arrangement of inverted tiers.
He was pondering the upcoming session with his enigmatic father, and only half noticed a number of CorpOne security police in silver uniforms gathering on a flagstone area outside. Over their heads, blue-and-silver CorpOne banners fluttered, each bearing the stylized designs of elephants.
Suddenly he heard the violent pop-pop of gunfire. The private police took cover behind plants, benches, and fountains, and drew their weapons. But many of them were not quick enough, and they fell under the onslaught.
Stunned, Noah saw a squadron of green-and-brown uniformed soldiers running onto the flagstones, carrying shiny blue puissant rifles, setting up a ferocious volley of high-intensity fire that drove the defenders for cover. Many died in the onslaught.
The uniforms looked like those of Noah’s own Guardians! But they couldn’t possibly be his people. He had not ordered this! Oblivious to any danger, he pressed his face against the window glax. He didn’t recognize any of the individuals. Who were they and why were they doing this?
Noah’s thoughts went wild. He couldn’t imagine what was occurring. Now the attackers were hurling explosives that detonated and shook the building.
Furious and confused, Noah hurried into the corridor, where he met his entourage of six Guardians, all with their weapons drawn. “Follow me!” he shouted. And he led them back the way they had come in.
* * * * *
Only moments before, Saito Watanabe had been standing at a window of his large office, considering what he would say to his son. It had been a long time since the two of them had spoken at all, so it would be an extremely awkward situation. Lifting a tall glass to his lips the old man took a long drink of sakeli, a syrupy liqueur, and admitted to himself that he was afraid the meeting would not go well. A tiny remark could set off yet another argument, so he would be careful about what he said . . . and try not to take offense too easily.
We need to get to know one another again.
His dark gaze flickered around the room and settled on a scroll attached to the wall. It was his Document of Patronage from Doge Lorenzo, the legal instrument attesting to the fact that Saito had been elevated to the status of a nobleman, even though he had not been born to such a station. Saito’s entire corporate empire rested upon that piece of inscribed tigerhorse skin, and upon the ancient political system that supported it.
My son should receive this some day.
Like other merchant princes, Saito believed that a strong son could carry on the family traditions in ways that a daughter could never do. Francella had been trying to fill that role, but something had been missing. The Prince knew it, and she must as well.
Canopa, one of the wealthiest Human-ruled worlds, was dominated by CorpOne, the mega-company owned by Prince Saito Watanabe. Under grant from Doge del Velli, the Prince owned industrial facilities on more than a hundred moons and planets, including distant Polée, a mineral-rich but sparsely populated world that generated immense profits. With a wide range of operations, Watanabe was especially proud of his medical laboratories, which had developed remarkable products to extend and improve the quality of life through “cellteck”—advanced cellular technology.
In recent years, Noah had become wealthy in his own right as Master of the Guardians, demonstrating considerable business acumen. The young man’s operations were on nowhere near the scale of the Prince’s, but nonetheless they showed great ability. In sharp contrast, Francella had never done anything on her own. She just whiled away her time as an officer of the firm, without showing any creative spark of her own.
An eruption of gunfire brought the old man out of his thoughts. As if in a bad dream, he stared in shock at the outbreak of violence and pandemonium outside. Guardian forces were attacking CorpOne! He could not believe that his own son would commit such an atrocity against him, no matter the differences they’d had in the past. They were the same blood, the same heredity, and the Prince had sought a reconciliation with him. Was there no honor in Noah, no familial loyalty?
Dark fury infused Saito Watanabe, the raw, unforgiving rage brought on by deception and betrayal. Somehow his son’s Guardians had disabled the building’s electronic-pulse security system to gain entry!
Why would Noah do this?
All hope for rapprochement between the two of them exploded. A gloomy darkness settled around the Prince. Prior to this, he had been reconsidering his entire business philosophy, wondering if his son’s environmental activist position might have some merit after all. Saito had wanted to suggest to Noah that perhaps CorpOne’s polluting factories might be dismantled or redesigned after all, no matter the cost.
Now they would never have that conversation.
The door of Watanabe’s office burst open, and his silver-uniformed security police rushed in. Their faces were red, their eyes wild. “This way, My Prince!” one of them shouted, a corporal.
The police formed a protective cocoon around the big man, and rushed him out into the corridor.
Chapter Five
The noble-born princes have too much time on their hands.
—Doge Lorenzo del Velli
General Mah Sajak stood impatiently while an Adurian slave put a clean red-and-gold uniform on him, replacing one that was covered with fresh purple blood stains. The General had been torturing a Mutati with an evisceration machine, and the prisoner of war had not died well.
The next time, Sajak would stand in a different position while supervising the interrogation and punishment process, to avoid being splattered with the filthy alien fluid. Sometimes when he got excited and stepped too close to a captive this sort of thing happened. It was all part of the job, he supposed, but he didn’t like it. A stickler for decorum, he wanted everything clean and tidy, both in both his profession and his personal life.
“Hurry up, hurry up,” Sajak admonished the slave, for the General was anxious to get back to Regimental HQ and take care of other business.
The captive Adurian was a male hairless homopod, a mixture of mammalian and insectoid features with a small head, bulbous eyes, and no bodily hair. His skin, a blotchy patchwork of faded colors, poked out around the wrinkled but clean rags he wore. He perspired profusely as he worked, and made the mistake of leaving spots of moisture on the General’s new uniform. Because of this, Sajak marked him for death, but would keep it a secret until a suitable replacement had been trained, and administered the necessary psychological testing.
This one should have received a perspiration test.
“Sorry, sir,” the Adurian said, as he noticed the sweat dripping from his own wide forehead onto the clothing. “Shall I get another jacket?”
“No time for that now,” Mah Sajak growled. “Do you really think I have time to wait for such things?”
“No, sir. It’s just that . . . “ The slave’s oversized eyes became even larger from fear, and he perspired even more, a torrent that ran from his brow down his face.
Grumbling to himself, Sajak left the nervous alien and stepped into the hot, silvery light of a security scanner that identified him and allowed him to pass through to a corridor. His body and uniform glowed faintly silver, and would until he reached the next security checkpoint.
A slideway transported him through a long series of corridors in the Gaol of Brimrock, past dismal cells, torture chambers, and body handling rooms. Unpleasant odors seeped into the hallways, mixed with sweet disinfectant sprays that never quite masked them. Other officers, guards, and civilians passed by, all glowing with metallic illumination that indicated which checkpoints they had been through. Here and there, through tiny windows, he caught glimpses of another world outside, the blue waters of the Grand Canal and the glittering buildings of the opulent city.
The officer barely noticed any of it, however, so engrossed was he in his own concerns, which were extremely important. Mah Sajak—in his oversized uniform and cap—took seriously his duties as Supreme General of the Merchant Prince Armed Forces. Eleven and a half years ago, he had dispatched a military fleet to attack the Mutati homeworld of Paradij, where the Zultan lived in his ostentatious citadel. That fleet should be arriving soon.
I’d like to hoist Meshdi’s fat carcass onto one of my interrogation machines, the General thought, and he considered the wide array of torture devices at his disposal—automatic, semi-mechanized, and manual. Each had a specific, deadly purpose, and worked to great effect on the Mutati race.
Beneath the small, bony-featured officer, the slideway squeaked as it flowed forward jerkily. He gripped a shimmering electronic handrail that moved alongside.
So much responsibility on his shoulders, and sometimes it weighed heavily on him. Especially now, with the climactic moment approaching. The “Grand Fleet” of MPA fighter-bombers was aboard a bundle of vacuum rockets that had been traveling through space at sub-light speed for all those years, moving inexorably toward the Mutati homeworld of Paradij. He expected complete military success, but there were always little nagging worries that kept him awake at night.
The General had assured the Doge that all would go well. The renowned Mutati-killer, Admiral Nils Obidos, headed the task force, a man who had won two important military victories against the shapeshifters. He had selected more than twenty-four thousand of the finest men and women in the armed forces, including the top fighter-bomber pilots in the Merchant Prince Alliance. In addition, all ships had redundant mechanical systems and even a backup crew of the finest sentient robots from the Hibbil Cluster Worlds . . . intelligent machines that could operate the whole fleet without Human involvement, if necessary. In some respects the General considered them better than Humans; if he told them what to do, they did it, without delays, complaints, or questions.
Doge Lorenzo del Velli was so convinced of a huge victory that he had begun preparations for a gala celebration on Timian One, with the exact date to be announced. It was widely known that there would be a festival, but the Doge had not told anyone what the occasion was. Rumors spread like fire on oil. The best entertainers—Human and alien—would be brought in from all over the galaxy. Even Mutati captives would participate. Under the high security of a huge containment field, terramutatis, hydromutatis, and aeromutatis would perform shapeshifting acts in a golden amphitheater.
At Sajak’s thought command, he felt the tiny computer strapped to his wrist imprint his skin with a nubraille pattern, telling him what time it was at that moment. The device, containing a vast encyclopedia of information that he could access, required only that he think what he wanted to know, and the message would be received almost immediately. Now it was early evening, and in the zealousness of his interrogation he had neglected dinner.
During the first six years in which merchant prince fleet had been advancing toward the enemy, General Sajak had received coded nehrcom transmissions from the task force admiral informing him that the operation was progressing well. Nehrcoms (invented by Prince Jacopo Nehr) were audio-video signals transmitted across the galaxy at many times the speed of light . . . an instantaneous communication system in which messages were fired from solar system to solar system at precise angles of deflection, using amplified solar energy. Nehrcom Industries, with a monopoly on the system, had installed transceivers in key sectors of the galaxy—sealed units that would detonate if anyone tried to scan or open them, thus protecting the priceless technological secrets. But the inventor still worried about military and industrial espionage by military enemies and business competitors, and refused to install transceivers in locations he did not consider secure.
And, although the remarkable transceivers could transmit instantaneously across space, they only operated to and from land-based facilities . . . for reasons known only to the secretive Nehr. The General and his staff had discussed sending status reports via messengers on board podships . . . but it had been known from the beginning that this would be an unreliable, dangerous method. Podships operated on their own schedules, often following circuitous routes with numerous pod station stops—thus risking detection by Mutati operatives. The mission planners agreed that it would be better to transmit no messages at all than to take such chances.
So, during the more than five years that the fleet had been beyond nehrcom range, the General had heard nothing at all. His huge task force was taking the long way to the Mutati homeworld, approaching it from an unexpected, poorly patrolled direction. If the Grand Fleet encountered Mutati forces, they would only be small ones, easily crushed.
The arrogant Jacopo Nehr irritated Sajak, for more reasons than one. The self-serving inventor should be forced to share his technology with the Merchant Prince Armed Forces, so that military strategists could employ it more effectively. It might even be possible to improve the system, so that it was no longer dependent upon land-based installations.
The Supreme General sucked in a deep breath. That would be a tremendous advance. But Nehr would not give up the information easily. Attempts had been made—through friendly persuasion and otherwise—and all had failed.
Jacopo Nehr and Prince Saito Watanabe were often seated beside the Doge during torture sessions that the General conducted. For Sajak, this created an awkward situation. Born to a noble station, he secretly resented princely appointments such as the ones received by the two business tycoons, and would prefer a return to the old ways. While Sajak had done well personally through his own efforts, many of his relatives and noble friends had suffered setbacks—having been supplanted by the new breed of entrepreneurs and inventors that the Doge favored. Even worse than his father, Doge Paolantonio IV, who started all of this foolishness, the merchant prince sovereign was surrounding himself with scientists and industrialists, upsetting the old, proven ways of doing things.
Someday the General would do something about that. It was one of his vows, and he always did what he set out to do. From an early age he had been that way. The trick was to conceal his desires from persons more powerful than he, so that they could not prevent him from achieving his goals. Fortunately for him, that list was quite small now, and one day it might not exist at all. He didn’t mind taking orders from a commander in chief; but he had to respect the commands, and their source.
General Sajak stepped off the slideway and strolled through a short corridor, then paused at another security check point. This one scanned him with golden light and left him glowing that color when he left. He made his way down a short set of steps through a hallway where the lights were not functioning, and his own glow cast an eerie illumination on the walls. He took another slideway in a different direction.