The Web and the Stars Read online

  But it was only short-lived relief. Calmly and precisely, Francella severed his other leg, even as the first one was beginning to grow back. She must be deaf to his screams.

  A mad, fascinated gleam filled her eyes. With shaking hands, she tossed his appendages in a medical waste bin.

  “I’m no longer waiting for the ‘experts’ to perform their ‘tests’ on you, dear brother. I’m taking charge of your case.” She cut across his middle body, only going halfway through and digging the hot light—at some lower setting—around on his interior organs. All intentional, he presumed, to maximize his suffering. Belly pain. Spurting blood. Noah didn’t know if he could keep staunching the injuries.

  Through his excruciating, almost otherworldly pain, Noah heard the guard calling for his sister, and knocking on the door. “Is everything all right in there, Ms. Watanabe?”

  “Yes, you idiot. Now go away!”

  The man said something Noah couldn’t understand, then grew quiet. He was probably going to get Bichette.

  Noah howled in agony and cursed her.

  With blood spraying all over her, Francella cut off the new legs before they completed their regeneration process, then hurriedly amputated both of his muscular arms.

  “Let’s see how immortal you really are!” Francella shouted. “If I destroy all of your body tissue, how will you regenerate? Will you get smaller and smaller, with less cellular material to use for repairs?”

  “How dare you use me as a guinea pig? I’m your brother! We’re fraternal twins!”

  “You’re like a lizard,” Francella said, her eyes frenzied, “growing parts back. Is that what you’ve become, a slimy little lizard?”

  Noah bellowed at her defiantly. “You bitch! I’m ashamed we’re in the same family!”

  She smiled, and he fell silent. The blood flowing from his wounds—where the arms and legs had been sliced away, and the stomach had been cut open—stopped, and skin began to grow back.

  Then Francella hacked away at his head and the rest of his body, cutting and recutting the moment she saw anything growing back. Noah’s consciousness ebbed, and he felt himself drifting out into the cosmos, on a stream of blood that stretched across the continuum of time and space.…

  * * * * *

  The research scientists knocked the door down, and tried to calm her, until she threatened them with the instrument. She was drenched in blood. They backed away.

  While Bichette and his associates watched in dismay, Francella continued to hack her brother into smaller and smaller pieces. Finally, she paused, breathing hard. None of the parts were moving anymore. Nothing appeared to be growing back.

  She fell to her knees, screaming and sobbing. Someone took the laserblade out of her hand.

  Dismayed, she realized that she had acted out of anger and frustration, and she hoped she had not killed him, but only because he was needed for the ongoing experiments. Could Noah still regrow parts, and if so, in what form? Bizarre thoughts flashed through her brain. Would multiple copies of Noah develop, one around each of the severed pieces?

  * * * * *

  As she watched, Bichette and the others conferred, then piled the body parts together in a gory heap.

  But Noah was—against all odds—still alive, extending mental and physical tendrils into the alternate dimension of Timeweb, probing, receiving mass and nutrients from the cosmic organism that supported his remarkable body. He felt the powerful presence as it filled and restored his bodily functions.

  Yet in his unbearable, unrelenting pain, Noah would have preferred death, the long sleep that eluded him.

  * * * * *

  Far across the galaxy, Tesh and her companions on board the podship proceeded through one dwarf star system after another in the back regions of the Hibbil Sector. The Parvii, the Tulyan, and the two Humans on the vessel did not actually have daytime or evening, not by the standards of their lifetime experiences, and there were no bright suns in this region. But they did know when they were fatigued, and based upon that they reached what Eshaz called a “diurnal arrangement,” under which the wristchron Acey wore became their ship’s clock.

  Under this arrangement they agreed upon a time to rest, in preparation for the hunt that would begin the following “day”.…

  When the agreed-upon time for sleep arrived, Tesh left the sectoid chamber and sealed it, after giving the sentient vessel the command to float in space within a specified area. Now, with the lights low in the passenger compartment, she and the others lay in recumbent chairs, sleeping.

  Suddenly Tesh sat up and cried out, “Noah! Oh my God!”

  Around her she heard the soft snoring of the teenagers, and the rumbling, deep snorts of Eshaz. Apparently the three of them had not heard her, but she sensed that something was wrong: Noah Watanabe was in terrible danger, and she could do nothing to help.

  In her inexplicable but certain grief she shouted his name, as if calling to him across the vastness of the galaxy. “Noah!”

  Somehow, her traveling companions continued in their slumber. She could not understand why, or why she felt as she did. Tesh remembered Noah’s freckled, handsome face, and his intelligent brown eyes.

  And she wondered if she would ever see him again.

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Each of us has a place of sweetness where we can go to soothe our troubled spirits. Sometimes it is a fellow Mutati or a physical location, but most often it is imaginary, and we are only able to escape there for fleeting moments.

  —War therapy session notes, Dij

  The Emir Hari’Adab had a different method of clearing his mind than that employed by his powerful father, the Zultan. Instead of connecting his brain to Adurian gyros, which had become something of a fad, Hari liked to glide around the star system on a solar sailer. Though he was a sizeable Mutati himself, he felt like a mote inside the craft, with its giant silvery wings glinting in the sun. It was so silent out here, and infinitely peaceful. Usually it made his troubles seem far away and inconsequential.

  But not today.

  He sailed along the ecliptic of the Dijian System, following the apparent path of their sun through the heavens. Only a few hours ago, he had been towed out here by a rocket plane, and then left to drift. But that was all for show, to avoid criticisms from sailing purists. Secretly, his solar sailer had backup rockets.

  Technically, he knew he wasn’t really solar sailing, at least not the way a true spacefaring aficionado would look at it. Periodically, his craft was aided by short, silent bursts of rocket power. In an officially sanctioned solar-sailer race, he would be disqualified for violating the rules, but for these private moments he liked the extra energy boosts, instead of having to wait and pick up speed gradually over the reaches of space, using the rapid-absorption solar panels on the craft.

  I feel like my brain needs that, he thought. A little extra oomph.

  At his command, the craft dipped and then soared under combined sail and rocket power, as he tried to improve how he felt. The unusual, custom-built craft had a variety of entertainment options. One of them, the on-board gravitonics system was off now, but if switched on could give him the sensation of being on an amusement park ride. He didn’t want that right at the moment, didn’t need a thrill. In fact, he realized now, he needed the complete opposite of that. He needed to slow down the sensations and mental processes that were causing him so much anxiety.

  Hearing a surge as the rockets kicked on, he shut them off, too. And just drifted. Looking through the overhead and side windows, he marveled at the glittering beauty of the outstretched wings, how they seemed to be reaching for a breath of cosmic wind from God-on-High, the way he was looking for the same thing now, heavenly inspiration.

  Hari believed in God, and was more devout than most Mutatis. But his personal beliefs fell far short of the religious fanaticism his father was spreading around the realm, causing increased hysteria in the people when they were most vulnerable, not helping them at all.

&
nbsp; On numerous occasions he had voiced his opinions to his father, always doing so respectfully and in private. Lately, Hari had been protesting the aggressive Demolio program, and he had always opposed the war against the Merchant Prince Alliance, favoring peaceful resolution instead.

  Repeatedly the Zultan had rebuffed him, suggesting to his son that he needed to “gyro” himself or other such nonsense. Hari didn’t think his father had ever been that intelligent. Oh, the elder Mutati was smart enough to keep from accidentally stepping off a ledge, but he didn’t have the degree of mental sophistication that was needed to lead a great people. He was more like a next-door neighbor, entertaining to be around, but not a real leader.

  The newest incarnation of the Demolio program was a step off a ledge of another sort, and the Zultan was dragging his people down with him. To Hari, the use of laboratory-cloned podships was a violation of nature, a sacrilege against God-On-High himself. Thus far the Emir had only told his father he opposed aggressive military tactics, without framing his discontent in religious terms. To do so would risk a huge emotional outburst from the Zultan, who considered himself the sole arbiter of all important religious and political issues.

  The cutoff of podship travel had effectively confined Hari to the desolate Dijian star system, although he could take this sailer to the adjacent Paradij System if he so desired, a journey of a little over a month. For one reason or another he had avoided doing that. Most of all he didn’t relish the thought of a big confrontation with his father, whom Hari blamed for causing natural podships to go into hiding.

  Through it all, Hari had led the people of his solar system in a buildup of military defenses, causing them to rally around him. He considered himself patriotic, didn’t want Dij or any other Mutati planet overrun by foul-smelling Humans. But his father was going too far. The frenzied Zultan Abal Meshdi had orchestrated the Mutati people, bringing them to a dangerous fever pitch.

  The Zultan even forced Mutati children to sing military songs in school, and encouraged them to make gruesome drawings of dead Humans. Lost innocence. Another sacrilege.

  While Hari was doing the best possible job under trying circumstances, he felt a deep sadness in his heart, one that could not be remedied on this private sailing venture. With a scowl, he sent a telebeam message, ordering the rocket plane to come back and get him.

  * * * * *

  The following day, Hari’Adab and his girlfriend, Parais d’Olor, sat atop a rocky, barren cliff overlooking the sea, talking. It was a perch above their favorite stretch of private beach.

  For this occasion Parais had metamorphosed into a very large butterfly with rainbow designs on her wings. Periodically, as she considered their important topic of conversation, she fluttered off the cliff and floated around on sea breezes, before landing beside him and tucking her wings.

  Hari had never understood the long-standing enmity between his people and Humans, and wished that rational minds might prevail, heading off further bloodshed. But his father, always rabidly militaristic, had insanely destroyed four Human-ruled planets, and intended to wipe out all the rest of them as soon as he could get another delivery system perfected. It made no sense to the young Emir, and he felt himself shaking with rage and frustration.

  Gazing into Parais’ cerulean blue eyes, he imagined the children they might have one day, offspring that would be aeromutati like her, since female genes were dominant. So many shapeshifters … and Humans as well… had found mates in the time-honored ways of love, and just wanted to raise their families in security.

  But such dreams were only illusions, waiting to be shattered by the next episode of war.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Victory is invariably achieved through a series of carefully calculated steps.

  —Jimu of the Red Berets

  In recent weeks Thinker had been looking at Giovanni Nehr with increasing disdain, and even some suspicion. The man’s behavior seemed particularly odd after the debacle of his failed attempt to rescue Noah from Max One Prison. Cocky and outgoing before that, he had become introverted and secretive. He stopped going to the Brew Room for beers and barely interacted at all with the robots, even though he still wore the armor Thinker had given him back on Ignem.

  Even more troublesome, with Subi Danvar’s blessing Gio was spending an increasing amount of time away from the subterranean headquarters, supposedly because he needed to perform additional reconnaissance missions to find out where Noah really was. But Thinker had his doubts. Gio wasn’t very good at reconnaissance—he had failed to discover in advance that Noah wasn’t even at that particular prison.

  Still, Subi said he still believed in him, and Thinker thought this might be because the adjutant wanted to give him a chance to redeem himself. Humans were like that, always trying to give one another second chances. In his data banks the robot leader had countless examples of such generous behavior, countering the aggressive, even criminal actions of other members of the Human race.

  But Thinker wondered if Gio deserved a break like that, or it was a waste of time and resources. Of greater concern, was he actually going out on reconnaissance missions, or could he possibly be a spy? Was he providing updated information on Guardian forces to the enemy? It seemed entirely possible.

  Without Gio’s knowledge, Thinker had been observing and psychoanalyzing him, and had determined that he had a pattern of currying favor with superiors in order to gain his own promotions and other favors. Gio had behaved that way with Thinker when the robot commanded him, and had done the same with both Noah and Subi. This was another unfortunate aspect of Human behavior, their tendency toward sycophancy.

  Thinker had serious doubts about whether Gio was serving the interests of Noah or the noble cause of the Guardians. His background as the brother of the top general in the Merchant Prince Alliance made him even more suspect. Supposedly the Nehr brothers had quarreled and no longer spoke to one another. But what if that was a lie, and Gio’s unexpected appearance at the Inn of the White Sun—where he volunteered to join the machine army—had been a clever ploy?

  These thoughts troubled the cerebral robot.

  * * * * *

  One afternoon Thinker was supervising the machine troops inside four large, connected caverns as they performed training exercises. He saw Subi Danvar enter the chamber and stand off to one side, where he watched the machines as they marched and simulated weapons fire, shooting silent beams of light at each other … the equivalent of blanks.

  Thinker clanked over to Subi and began to voice his concerns about Giovanni Nehr, who was supposedly out on a recon mission at that moment, but might be doing other things instead.

  The adjutant, after listening attentively, scowled. Then he said, “I don’t see it that way. Gio’s as dedicated as any of us.”

  “I’m not so sure. But there’s one sure way to find out. With your permission, I could read his thoughts.” Thinker brought a tentacle out of his body, and it hovered overhead. “My organic interface,” he said.

  “Put that damn thing away. I told you how I feel about downloading Human thoughts without permission. It’s not ethical.”

  “I believe the issue here is survival, not ethics. All’s fair in love and war?”

  “I won’t hear of it. You’re violating Human rights. It’s not the right thing to do, and Master Noah would never stand for it.”

  Thinker snaked the tentacle back into its compartment. “But what if I’m not wrong?” “You are wrong. Believe me, I know a lot more about people than you do.” Just then, Gio strode into the chamber and looked around. He appeared to be quite agitated, and was perspiring heavily. Joining his two superiors, he loosened his body armor and said, “I found a huge training camp for the Red Beret machine division, in the Valley of the Princes. They’ve converted industrial buildings to manufacturing robots, and have more fighting machines than we ever imagined, at least thirty thousand of them, and growing fast.” “That many?” Subi asked.

  “We can nev
er keep up with their production rate,” Gio said. “We have one advantage, though,” he added. “They don’t know where we are.”

  “Pray it stays that way,” Thinker snapped, displaying an uncharacteristic machine emotion. With a sudden movement, he clanked away, to tend to his own, much smaller army.

  * * * * *

  On the jewel-like planet Ignem, beneath the orbital ring containing the Inn of the White Sun, the remnants of a machine army had been performing repetitious troop exercises. Since the departures of Thinker and Jimu, they no longer had effective leadership, and had grown stagnant. They were not increasing their numbers, and only performed minimal repairs on themselves to keep what they had going.

  In particular they had lost the inspiration that had been provided by Thinker, the greatest computer brain among them.

  For some time now, the increasing malaise had irritated the feisty little robot, Ipsy, to the point where he had been challenging more robots to fights than ever, selecting among the largest and most heavily armed of the bunch. They were only too happy to accommodate him, and he usually lost. But the dented little guy kept coming back at them, and did gain some degree of respect in the ranks for his unflagging courage. But the officers had still refused to listen to his pleas for a more effective army, and would not make any improvements. Finally, the officers had ordered Ipsy to stay away from Ignem, and banished him to the orbital Inn.

  But even that had not slowed him down, as Ipsy turned his aggression toward reinvigorating the operations of the Inn of the White Sun. For months he had been traveling to alien worlds that were still accessible, where he’d been skillfully promoting the services of the facility. Possessing a font of new promotional ideas and a relentless, hard-working attitude, he was bringing in a good income for the machines, almost as high as it had been before the Human and Mutati empires were isolated from the rest of the galaxy.