Hidden Empire - Kevin J. Anderson [220]
Frederick felt defeated. "Emissary, your words have already been heard by millions. An account of this meeting will spread to the other worlds of the Terran Hanseatic League as well as the Ildiran Empire."
"Then my mission is complete." The hydrogue sank back into his thickening opal clouds. His liquid-crystal humanoid form became fluid again, dispersing.
One of the royal guards touched a transmitter pickup to his ear, listened to a report, and quickly took a step closer to the throne. "Sire! The main warglobe has just withdrawn from Earth orbit."
Frederick couldn't believe what he had heard. "Then how will the emissary get back to his mothership?"
The green priest suddenly jerked his head up, looking away from his tall treeling, as if he'd been burned. "Sire, Chairman Wenceslas expresses extreme concern. He advises your highest level of caution."
OX spoke, his words overlapping the green priest's. "The emissary does not expect to return."
The King backed away from the hovering containment sphere, stumbling up a step to the throne. The sphere's curved walls were opaque now, and he could no longer see the liquid crystal form of the hydrogue emissary.
"Evacuate the Throne Hall!" he said. "Get everyone to safety! I want—"
Thin cracks appeared along the outer skin of the environment sphere, a pattern of lines that had been laid down within the thick diamond walls. A series of apparent circular hatches were surrounded by a jagged starburst of stress-fractures, cracking, splitting...
The hydrogue emissary blew open the armored seals of his containment vessel, unleashing an atmosphere dense enough to crush hydrogen gas into metallic form, to rearrange carbon into diamond. The sudden, complete release of pressure sent a shock wave through the Throne Hall.
A hammer of overpressure obliterated the opulent room, demolished the ornate stained-glass windows, pulverized the hapless spectators. The explosion crushed the Whisper Palace throne and hurled the Teacher compy OX into a stone wall.
The blast wave turned Old King Frederick—the man who had ruled the Terran Hanseatic League for forty-eight years—into boneless jelly. And forever changed the course of history.
100 MARGARET COLICOS
After weeks of combing through the cliffside Klikiss city, Margaret and Louis Colicos finally made their breakthrough.
DD diligently strung lights throughout the tunnels. The Friendly compy wired up illumination systems and installed a small power generator to provide heat and air exchange inside the inner chambers.
Now that the initial archaeological excitement was over, Arcas frequently remained back in camp, tending the now-thriving treelings. He spent hours summarizing the Klikiss discoveries for the benefit of the worldforest and anyone else who could tap into it.
The three Klikiss robots often wandered off without reporting their whereabouts. One early morning, Louis pointed out what he thought were faint changes in the first set of ancient ruins, scuffed caterpillarlike foot treads and subtly rearranged equipment. From this, he surmised that the black robots must have returned to the abandoned buildings, looking for hints and trying to reassess their past.
"I guess I'd do the same if I had complete amnesia, dear," Louis had said. "Exploring one of your old cities, who knows what tiny thing might trigger a revelation? Maybe they're getting closer to a memory flash."
Margaret agreed, though she remained disturbed. "I wish they weren't so secretive about it. We certainly aren't hiding anything from them."
She had stored copies of their tangible images and reports. Detail-oriented as usual, Margaret kept files back in her tent and stashed a duplicate datawafer inside the ghost city. The brutal flash flood that had swept through the canyon demonstrated how even a seemingly secure location could suffer catastrophic damage.
While Louis was tinkering with the incomprehensible machinery inside the stone-window chamber,