Toc238718023” class=“calibre9” id=“Toc238718023”>
While it was a certainty that in the course of its belligerent history and aggressive expansion the Empire of the AAnn had suffered shocks greater and more debilitating, surely none were more intimate than the one that rippled through the great hall called The Eye of the Nye on that fine third-season morning. A horrified Lord Eiipul IX edged away from Flinx, though he was all too aware that no matter what he did, in such close confines and subject to such intense scrutiny he did not have time or distance to edge far enough away. Halting in his retreat, eyes flashing, he drew himself up to his full height. He had cast in his lot with this softskin no matter what the creature did and no matter how outrageous its behavior.
Flinx’s straightforward strip accomplished its intended purpose. As he exposed himself he quickly drew the attention of every double-lidded eye within range of his naked, incontestably human form. It required barely a moment longer for his presence to become known to every one of the hundreds of notable nye circulating in the chamber, as his image was flashed to every individual’s personal information device.
Emerging from the resting pouch of the collapsing simsuit, Pip unfurled her brilliantly hued wings and took to the air of The Eye, relieved as always to be free of the confines of the simsuit. The presence below of hundreds of gesticulating, pointing, shouting AAnn disturbed her not in the least. As long as her master evinced no concern she was quite content, and the vast interior space of The Eye presented agreeable opportunities for soaring.
Though they were among the most honored and accomplished soldiers in the Imperial military, it still took the two tall AAnn flanking the Emperor more than a moment to draw their weapons. The idea that a human might suddenly appear unannounced in the midst of the Spiral at the center of The Eye was analogous to an AAnn abruptly materializing next to the President of the Commonwealth while he was enjoying breakfast with his family. As something that could not be imagined, the reality was difficult for even the most well trained to accept.
The impossibility went a long way toward explaining the absence of alarm. Since such a thing patently could not be, there had to be an alternative explanation. A clever prank of some kind, concocted by political allies to amuse the Emperor, or perhaps a test of a spectacularly convincing new projection device. Even those who found themselves standing close to the startling manifestation found themselves doubting its authenticity. In fact, of all those within striking distance of the revealed Flinx, only one exhibited any bona fide agitation. Lord Eiipul continued to stare at his guest in disbelief even as he struggled to decide what he could possibly do next.
Flinx saved him the trouble.
Naked, Flinx started toward the Emperor as Pip circled self-assuredly overhead. Rousing themselves, it occurred to both highly honored bodyguards that perhaps it might be a good idea to place themselves between the apparition and the Emperor, even if what they were confronting was nothing more than an ingenious projection. Coming to a halt, the projection proceeded to speak. Its clear, perfectly comprehensible speech only served to further underlie its unreality.
“My name is Flinx LLVVRXX. Though a softskin, I am a full member of the Tier of Ssaiinn. To my knowledge, I am the only human to have been so honored.” The Emperor Navvur W, he saw, was looking straight at him. The Imperial physique might be worn, but those dark blue eyes were not. They were penetrating. “I am not a holo, a tactile field, a simulation, or a mechanism. I am very real. I come to you without the knowledge of my government or my kind to share with you a danger that threatens all living beings, including every citizen of the Empire.” He gestured to his nearby and presently paralyzed host. “I would spare you this knowledge, but my friend insists it must be made known to all in order to ensure my safe departure from Blasusarr and the continuation of my search for a possible means of dealing with this threat.”
At this explanation a great many eyes turned as one to focus on Lord Eiipul, who was not at all thankful for the massed attention. Hissing began to rise around him and around the softskin, a swelling sizzle like the foreshadowing of a thousand geysers about to erupt. Raising one hand sharply, Navvur W gestured for third-degree silence. Immediately, the dangerously escalating outrage ceased. The increasingly irate and angry glares, Flinx noted, remained locked on him and his host. In addition to the two honor guards, others nearby had also drawn weapons.
“A mosst imaginative disscoursse,” the Emperor murmured into the ensuing silence. “But then, your kind iss known for itss flightss of imagination. It iss to be expected that one sso brazen would think large. A danger that threatenss all living beingss’? Truly, I would expect no modessty from one who hass accomplisshed what you have done.” His attention flicked briefly in the direction of Flinx’s host. “Albeit with an as yet to be determined modicum of outsside help.”
Under that unblinking Imperial gaze, Lord Eiipul seemed to shrink in upon himself.
Fearlessly approaching Flinx, the Emperor stepped between his anxious bodyguards. Murmurs of concern rose from the inner circle of advisers and nobles. A second time the Emperor gestured, and for a second time the center of The Eye was still.
“Can none of you ssee that the creature iss more than weaponless?” Navvur W looked back at Flinx. “Truly, ssoftsskin, what iss your purposse in coming to a place where none of your kind have sstood before? Iss it to kill me?” Stressed hisses rose from the assembled. The Emperor ignored them.
“I am no assassin.” Flinx stared down at the unruffled reptilian figure standing curiously before him. “I spoke the truth.” As he raised an arm to gesture, several dozen weapons drew down on his torso.
The Emperor irritably motioned them off. “Crissandd. If it wanted to kill me, the attempt would have been made sseveral time-partss ago. The time for murder hass already passed.” Muzzles and other lethal focal points were lowered. Navvur W turned back to the visitor.
“You will leave thiss chamber alive, but not thiss building. You know that, do you not? Bravery iss no guarantee of ssurvival. But before you die, quesstionss will be assked—and ansswered.” He started to turn away. “Thiss hass been a more interessting diverssion than mosst. Now it iss a matter for the Ssecurity Sservicess. I have a full sschedule today and I have already wassted too much time on thiss fasscinating but otherwisse irrelevant alien intrussion.”
As well as the two bodyguards, other armed AAnn started to surge forward. By simply springing toward Flinx, Lord Eiipul caused the closing crowd to pause. He knew the hiatus would not last and that he had to speak fast.
“Venerable Navvur! I am Lord Eiipul IX. It iss true I have abetted thiss intruding ssoftsskin. Know that he sspeakss the truth when he ssayss that he did not wissh to come here. He doess not wissh to sshare the reality of the danger to which he referss unless he iss given no choice. He sspeakss truly when he ssayss that I inssissted on it.” Turning a slow circle, his tail clearing the space behind him, Eiipul addressed himself to the tense assembly.
“Many of you know me. I am no wild thinker prone to flightss of fancy or mental aberrationss. Wild as it iss, I have come to believe thiss ssoftsskin’ss tale.” Throwing an arm skyward, he made an unmistakably powerful gesture indicative of first-degree peril. “There iss a danger out there, beyond the Empire, beyond the edge of thiss galaxy, that possess a threat to all living thingss. It cannot be sstopped by warsshipss. It cannot be sstopped by any conventional meanss.” He indicated the silent figure of Flinx.
“Thiss ssoftsskin ssayss that he iss a key to the only possibility of countering thiss threat.”
“Not only a ssoftsskin prophet, but a mad one!” someone in the crowd shouted. Hissing laughter followed the remark.
“No prophet,” Flinx responded quietly. “A little different from others of my kind, yes, but no prophet. Believe me, no one in the galaxy wishes it were otherwise more than myself.”
“He doess not look very much like a ssavior,” another onlooker commented. “To me, he lookss like meat.”
Pausing, the Emperor turned back. “Very much sso. Lord Eiipul, by your actionss today you have already forfeited your possition, your sstatuss, and the previoussly highly regarded hisstory of your formerly noble family. I do, however, believe you when you ssay that you are not addled. What could possibly have possessed you to do thiss thing on behalf of a ssingle intruding ssoftsskin?”
Breathing hard, Eiipul confronted the Imperial presence. “Becausse, venerable Navvur, he sshowed it to me.”
The Emperor gestured second-degree bemusement. “He sshowed you a threat to the entire galaxy? Tell me, Lord Eiipul, where iss thiss threat, that he could reveal it to you? Outsside the city, perhapss? Ssomewhere on the Quassquin Plain?”
Flinx stepped forward before his host could reply. “The threat comes from behind a region known as the Great Emptiness, an area of sky blocked by an immense gravitational lens that is impenetrable to the usual array of astronomical instruments.”
“Assikk,” the Emperor murmured. “It iss invissible to telesscopess, to deep-sspace ssenssorss, to magnifying insstrumentation of all kindss—but, asstonisshingly, not to you.” He glanced disdainfully at the anxious Eiipul. “And evidently, not to certain sselected oness.”
“I can show it to you, too,” Flinx responded without hesitation. “That is, not show, exactly. It’s far too big to show, or to try and comprehend visually. What I can offer is more in the nature of a shared experiencing. I didn’t lie to Lord Eiipul about it and I won’t lie to you. The sharing can be dangerous. Not every sentient can handle the experience.”
For a second time, Navvur W gestured amusement. “You will forgive me if I decline your generouss offer, ssoftsskin. There iss only one of me and I wass not raissed up to thiss ssupreme possition to wasste irreplaceable time ssharing ‘experiencess’ with crazed ssoftsskins, however bold they may be. I have little enough time each day in which to disscuss important experiencess with my own advisserss.” He started to turn away again, his tail barely in motion.
“I am ssure, however, that ranking memberss of the Ssecurity Sservicess will find your ramblingss entertaining—at leasst for a little while. They will, I fear, be far more interessted in how you as a repressentative of your sspeciess ssucceeded in arriving ssafely here on Blasussarr without attracting their attention than in any of your entertaining but less ssenssible ramblingss. I will mysself be interessted in the ressultss of thosse engagementss. I ssusspect your revelationss may ressult in damage to more than a few careerss.” With a soft hiss, he turned back to his resting post.
“Remove the creature. Keep me apprissed of any worthwhile findingss that may ressult from itss interrogation. Lord Eiipul I will deal with later. He iss desserving of a little time to get hiss family affairss in order.”
Swallowed up as bodyguards and a handful of close retainers and advisers closed in around him, the Emperor disappeared. Soldiers and nobles immediately pressed forward to contain Flinx and his increasingly panicky host. Weapons were raised and aimed in Pip’s direction. Uncertain which of the numerous targets below to deal with first, she flew higher and waited for some kind of indication from her master as to how she should respond.
Flinx found himself reflecting sadly that there was no time. Never enough time to do anything the way he preferred to do it. It didn’t seem to matter which sentient he was trying to connect with: a member of his own kind, thranx, AAnn, representatives of other species. Individual minds were always so impatient, individual bodies unable to wait.
A plethora of clawed hands reached for him. He knew he had one chance. It was not the first time in his life he had only had one chance. On that proverbial one chance had frequently hinged his hopes of accomplishing wildly different things.
Facing the place where the Emperor had been surrounded by his protectors, Flinx closed his eyes and focused. Like it or not, the casually dismissive leader of the Empire was going to see what Flinx had seen, experience what he had experienced. Flinx concentrated as hard as he ever had, intent on transporting the mind of that one supremely powerful representative of AAnn-kind along with him on the difficult and dangerous mental journey he had made so many times before. He felt himself slipping, slipping, away from his surroundings, away from the noise and the eyes and the reaching alien hands. It was happening again. Even there in The Eye of the Nye it was happening. He anticipated it, he foresaw it, he expected it.
What he did not expect was taking along all of them….
So many stars, brilliant and blinding. So many nebulae, vast and diffuse. Above all, so much space, stark and infinite and so very, very black.
No nestling greenness accompanied his outward reaching this time. The profound and reassuring deep warmth was also absent, as was the coldly calculating presence of a certain incredibly ancient weapon. He no longer needed their help. Having several times previously been boosted outward, he could now cast his inner self to that terrible, distant place without external assistance. Knowing where and what it was that he sought, he flung his awake-asleep consciousness toward it.
Each time he suffered to make the contact it became more familiar, the process of state-of-mind journeying more clear-cut. Each time it changed him a little, not only physically but mentally. An unavoidable corollary of his unique mind and extraordinary nervous system, he was certain. The Meliorares who had made him would no doubt have been pleased. He wished he could have met them all, known them all. So he could have killed them all. He wished, as he had on many occasions, that he had never been born. Of course, if that had been the case then it was likely that his mother would not have been paid. For her services.
The intergalactic abyss, Bran Tse-Mallory would have told him, was a poor place for a pity party. Whimper if you want, but save civilization first. Not because it’s your duty, not because you’ll be a hero, but because it’s the right thing to do. In the abrogation of rightness only anarchy wins.
Blackness and stars he sensed rather than saw—and a presence. No, Flinx corrected himself. A multiplicity of presences. Navvur W, Emperor of all the AAnn, was there, just as Flinx had intended. So too was the small, affectionate, familiar mind-shape of Pip. What he had not intended and could not entirely account for was the presence of dozens of other nonhuman species. In projecting powerfully enough to drag the essence of the Emperor along with him, he had inadvertently also brought along a hundred of Navvur’s closest advisers. Each time he used his Talent, he reflected bemusedly, it strengthened a little more. He could only hope it would not strengthen to the point of killing him.
The scene in The Eye, he mused, must be one of complete chaos. He could only hope that no one would panic and shoot down his physical body. Should that happen, his inner self might be lost forever in the frightful nether regions of interstellar space.
No time to ruminate on that now. His thoughts and those he had brought with him had been projected elsewhere. To the edge of the galaxy and beyond. Distance was not a state of mind: mind was a state of distance. At least it was to the intentionally garbled and cunningly reassembled DNA of Philip Lynx.
Dragging the minds of the Emperor and his advisers along with him, Flinx felt his thought-self burst through the space occupied by the obstructing gravitational lens. Explosive stars and radiant nebulae vanished. They had been swallowed up, consumed, obliterated by something so immense it could only be described as a series of dark equations. Where previously the gloom had been pierced by points and swaths of light, now there was only darkness. An utter absence of luminosity.
But not of presence.
As on previous occasions a thin tendril of hesitant perception reached out to scarcely skim the outermost reaches of the onrushing Evil. The feeblest touch, the slightest contact, was all that was necessary to convey the colossal malignancy of the force that was rushing toward the galaxy—and, he sensed, continuing to accelerate. Flinx knew it, recognized it, was far more familiar with it than he had ever wanted to become.
The incalculable foulness was new to the quintessence of the Emperor Navvur W, however. Equally, it was something never experienced and not imaginable by the essences of his hundred advisers. Among them all only one diminutive spark of consciousness proved able to cope with the assault on the senses. Flinx recognized the thought-self of Lord Eiipul. Along with everyone else who had been standing adjacent to the Emperor when Flinx had projected, he too had been wrenched outward by the force of the human’s metaphysical dislocation.
In consequence of barely perceiving the outermost edge of the onrushing Evil that lay behind the Great Emptiness, a host of silent, terrified screams momentarily filled a minuscule portion of the endless extragalactic desolation. Like saplings caught in a hurricane, individual specks of sanity began to fragment and splinter. It would do no good to confirm his thesis to a congregation of the hopelessly insane, Flinx realized. He began to pull away, to recoil. Away from a supraphysical malignancy too vast to be comprehended, too excessively loathsome to be understood.
Cognizance fled from that place of interstellar horror, the diversity of confused and confined nonhuman minds drawn and shepherded away by one that was more than human. Fled and retreated back to a region of welcoming warm stars, of planets swarming with life, of respiration and intimation and meditation. A hundred and two minds withdrew all the way back to just one of those star systems, to a single world as blissfully unknowing as all the others of the unspeakable fate awaiting it. Back to one moderately spacious chamber inside one building within the boundaries of one city. Not all of them, alas, returned whole.
It was a risk a reluctant Flinx had been forced to take.
Opening his eyes, he stopped swaying and once more took stock of his surroundings. His physical self was intact. He had not been shot. As near as he could determine, he had not been touched. The slight weight on his left shoulder was that of an Alaspinian minidrag. Glancing down, he saw that Pip was exhausted but otherwise unchanged by the experience they had just shared. Turning his attention to the milling throng of larger, more sentient reptilian shapes that surrounded him, he found himself confronting a far greater range of consequences.
Pandemonium reigned in the great chamber of The Eye of the Nye. To his right, the Emperor Navvur W was struggling to stand upright. In this he was aided by a frightened bevy of newly arrived technicians. Grim-faced medical personnel worked their way through the shocked, confused crowd, attending to the unconscious, the gibbering, the sobbing, and those whose thought-selves had returned only in part. Close to the naked human, a dazed but otherwise coherent Lord Eiipul stood staring fixedly in the direction of the Emperor.
“The venerable Navvur appearss to have ssurvived the encounter,” Flinx’s host commented coolly. Sharp eyes turned to study the bewildered crowd. “Not sso all of my dissbelieving brethren.”
Observing the newly arrived medical forces at work, Flinx could only concur. “I meant to convey only the Emperor with me. Sometimes—no, make that many times—I don’t know what my Talent is going to do or how it’s going to react to the demands I place on it.” His mouth tightened. “I’ve damaged some of those here. I’ve damaged people before. I never mean to. Unless they’re trying to hurt me, and even then I try to minimize the effects.”
Lord Eiipul turned sharply on the softskin. “‘Minimize the effectss’? What ‘effectss’? The effectss of what? Can you do more than jusst sshare thiss dreadful and dangeroussly enlightening experience, Flinx LLVVRXX? Iss there more to you and your capabilitiess than you have told?”
Turning quickly away, Flinx started toward where Navvur W was showing signs of rapid recovery. “Hadn’t we better be sure we stay close to the Emperor lest some of his destabilized and more assertive bodyguards decide to resolve matters on their own initiative?” Keen to further change the subject, he indicated some of the less speedy-to-recover nobles receiving medical attention. “Assuming we’re not killed, won’t you benefit from the unintended damage that the experience has inflicted on some of your rivals?”
Distracted by the notion, Eiipul scrutinized the surrounding circle of badly battered AAnn nobility, then looked back up at the human. “Truly you comprehend our cusstomss in wayss I would never have thought possible for a ssoftsskin.”
Flinx shrugged, aware that the meaning behind the shoulder-lifting gesture might be lost on his host. “Since I feel comfortable everywhere and at home nowhere, I’ve had to learn to empathize with every species’ customs.”
It was not the response Eiipul had been expecting. He felt an unexpected and entirely deviant surge of sympathy for the human. “I ssensse that you are obliged to deal not only with demonic forcess on the outsskirtss of the galaxy but alsso within yoursself.”
Flinx started to nod, remembered to gesture second-degree concurrence. “There are times when I don’t know which troubles me more.” He resumed advancing toward the rapidly improving Emperor.
By the time the two of them had approached to within speaking distance of Navvur, the ruler of all the AAnn had recovered to the point where he took note of their presence. Bodyguards, this time with weapons drawn, moved to intercept the noble and the softskin. Unmistakably shaken by the experience he had just undergone but with his innate perspicacity unimpaired, Navvur W gestured his sentinels aside.
Stopping just out of arm and tail reach, Flinx stared placidly back at the Emperor of all the AAnn. As it often did at the most inopportune moments, his inborn sarcasm chose that moment to reassert itself. “Tssant, venerable Navvur. Did you find my ramblings entertaining?”
To his credit, the Emperor ignored the gibe. As he had stated earlier, he had little time to waste. “What jusst happened here, and how did you do it?”
Flinx sighed. “I did what I promised I would do. I showed you the threat of which I spoke. That’s all I can do. How I did so doesn’t matter. What matters is your response. Are you going to believe me or are you going to kill me?” He paused only a moment. “It really doesn’t matter, because in the long run if I’m not allowed the opportunity to try and find a way of stopping what’s coming, everyone and everything is going to die anyway.”
“You sspeak too much of death,” Navvur hissed softly in reply. “Sspeak to me of life.”
“Let me go. Let me rendezvous with my ship.”
The Emperor hesitated. “You will return to the Commonwealth, sspeak of your experiencess here, and tell them we are weak.”
Flinx gestured first-degree demurral. “I will return, yes, but only to pursue a defense against what you just experienced. I have little interest whatsoever in the unending historical squabbles that divide the Empire and the Commonwealth.”
“Ah.” Navvur looked pleased. “You guard firsst of all your own interesstss. How very like a nye. In that event, why sshould you care what happenss to anyone elsse, far less everyone elsse?”
Flinx looked away. “There are those I do care about. Friends. A certain member of my species of the other gender in particular. We will not be impacted by what is coming this way, but our grandchildren might be.”
The Emperor of the AAnn gestured first-degree comprehension underscored by second-degree bemusement. “Ssoftsskinss,” was all he hissed, as if that explained everything.
Lowering his gaze, Flinx did not blink as he focused on the slitted pupils of the venerated AAnn standing opposite. “Do you believe me? Do you believe what you experienced?”
Navvur turned to judge those around him. The usual spiral of eager supplicants and prattling advisers currently resembled a scene after a battle. Medical personnel were everywhere. After studying the sight for a long minute he turned back. Not to Flinx, but to the AAnn noble standing beside him.
“Lord Eiipul IX, you believed the expossition of thiss ssoftsskin from the beginning. How doess what we all jusst experienced differ from what you went through before?”
“It wass very much identical, essteemed Navvur. The only difference I am aware of iss that thiss time I had more company.”
The Emperor gestured absently to himself. “Confirmation of intergalactic horrorss unimaginable iss not ssomething to be wisshed for, but at the ssame time cannot be denied. Truth iss truth.” He turned back to the silently waiting Flinx. “By the ssand that sshelterss life, ssoftsskin, and againsst all logic, I find that I musst believe you.” His tone hardened, the hissed consonants emerging sharper and more biting than ever. “Woe unto you and your kind if thiss iss ultimately determined to be ssome ssort of clever diverssion from the verity of exisstence. You musst know that as ssoon as thiss ssession iss dissolved, a full account of everything that hass transspired will be passed on to the Imperial asstronomical council. The mosst advanced insstrumentss will be sset to ssearching that portion of the heavenss you have ssingled out for attention. What they find there may determine the fate of many, whosse collective future hass now become your ressponssibility.”
Flinx responded without hesitation. “Nothing would please me more, venerable Navvur, than for your scientists to deep-scan that section of the heavens and find nothing more than the most dull and boring extension of normality.”
“Krazzumk,” the Emperor grunted. “You threaten apocalypsse yet assk for little.”
For the second time that morning, Flinx shrugged diffidently. “I ask only to be allowed to go.”
Navvur considered. “I know what I experienced, I know what I felt, I know what I ssenssed in place of sseeing. What I do not know iss how one ssmall and inssignificant being ssuch as yoursself, remarkable though you may be, can possibly think you can ssuccessfully confront and combat a menace greater in extent than entire clussterss of sstarss.”
How much should he explain? Flinx found himself wondering. How much could he explain? “I hope …,” he began. “I hope to have—help.”
The Emperor let out an ascending hiss. “It would have to be help on a cossmic sscale to deal with ssuch a cossmic peril. My hope would be to die long before thiss phenomenon—if it iss as real as it appearss—reachess the outsskirtss of our galaxy.” Bright piercing eyes searched Flinx’s own. “You appear to me to ssuffer from a debilitating affliction common among your kind, Flinx LLVVRXX of the Ssaiinn. You are an incorrigible optimisst.”
“If I was not,” Flinx told him, “I suppose I would have given myself up for lost a long, long time ago.”
Was that a reptilian twinkle in the Emperor’s eye? “You ‘ssupposse’?”
“I said I was optimistic.” Reaching up, Flinx stroked the back of Pip’s neck.
“Mysself,” Navvur replied thoughtfully, “I find optimissm to be a mental sstate inconducive to ssurvival. That doess not mean it sshould not be encouraged. One thing iss ssurely rightful: if what you sshared jusst now with me and mine iss veritable, then as you ssay it truly will not matter if you live or die.” He made a gesture that pronounced first-degree judgment. “Accordingly, I have decided to let you li—”
He was interrupted by a screaming noble, hands and claws extended and teeth bared, who made a sudden leap straight for the human’s throat.