Polity Agent

‘Then what?’

‘We found no sentient life at all in a further twelve solar systems we surveyed. But we did find stations and ships crammed with Jain substructures; worlds where destructive battles had been fought, some of them radioactive, some showing no sign that they were once living other than by the massive weapons in orbit that had burned them down to the magma. All the Jain tech there was somnolent. Its seeds were spread through space—awaiting the right kind of sentient touch that would awake them to the fertile earth of a new civilization.’

‘Very poetic’

Chaline grimaced. ‘You had to be there.’

‘So then you decided to set up the First Stage runcible?’

‘Not then, exactly. While we were surveying we picked up a U-space signature. A Maker ship appeared, just discernible at the core of a mass of substructure—it looked like a dandelion clock. It attacked immediately, suicidally. We took it out with a CTD. I don’t know what he heard, but Lucifer was briefly in contact with whatever was on that ship. He said it was time for us to go home, that other similar entities were closing in on us—the Maker versions of your friend Skellor. Lucifer also informed us that these entities would be able to track us through a standard U-space jump, and therefore we should escape via runcible. Graham and myself were a little dubious about this—they didn’t have runcible technology and we weren’t about to make a gift of it to them by leaving a first stage runcible behind.’

‘It perhaps means nothing,’ said Cormac, ‘but what was your impression of Lucifer’s attitude at that point?’

‘Well… he seemed almost guilty. But he could have been using emulation programs in the Golem’s base format program. We supposed the guilt, whether real or emulated, was what Lucifer considered a suitable response to the danger he’d put us in.’

‘Are you sure of that?’

Chaline frowned at him. ‘As sure as I can be. Why are you digging at this?’

‘Never mind. You set up the runcible.’

‘We did—after Lucifer demonstrated a knowledge of runcible technology he could only have acquired in the Polity. It was he who suggested a time-inconsistent runcible. We thought he didn’t understand how dangerous that could be. But he understood perfectly. His people were dead, wiped out by a technology that spreads like a virus, and he wanted to innoculate that particular area of space.’ She stared at Cormac, waiting for some comment or question. When none was forthcoming she continued, ‘We chose a barren and untouched moon circling a gas giant—the only planet in orbit of a nearby white dwarf. Other suns lay under a light year away and we were near to the centre of the Maker realm. We landed the Victoria—a difficult enough task in itself. I set up the runcible and we cannibalized the ship’s U-space engine for the parts to make that runcible time inconsistent. Lucifer provided some esoteric tech to enable us to fine tune things and boost the power from the fusion reactors we dismounted. We were running alignment tests when—’

‘One moment,’ Cormac interrupted, ‘you need an AI to run a runcible. I’d have thought that requirement even more critical in this situation.’

‘Yes… obviously we’d brought a runcible AI, in stasis, along with us.’

‘It sacrificed itself to get you back here?’

Chaline stared off to one side for a moment, then turned back to Cormac. ‘Yes, it did. You see, it could have escaped through its own runcible, but that would mean that runcible shutting down before the one on Celedon, which in turn would mean the energy of the time-inconsistent link coming this way rather than going that way. We could not have escaped it, nor would something in the region of a hundred billion other human beings.’

On hearing that Cormac kept his mouth closed—the figure was worthy of a respectful silence.

Chaline continued, ‘We initiated the runcible AI before agreeing to Lucifer’s scheme, and it instantly concurred. Just one of those Jain nodes is hideously dangerous, as you know. Here was a chance to turn trillions of them to ash.’

‘What came through the runcible after you?’

‘As I was saying: we were running the alignment tests when another of those Maker ships appeared. I put together the information package and sent it through to Celedon and, to us, at our end, full connection was instantly accepted. Things would have been mighty shitty for us then if it had been rejected.’

‘You chose Celedon because of its remoteness?’

‘Exactly. And we meanwhile knew, or rather Graham knew, hostile protocol Starfire would be instituted. We thought we’d have time to get all our stuff together, but things U-jumped down into the base we’d built.’ Chaline winced.

‘Things?’