Synthesis - James Swallow [134]
“This matter-transport technology of yours is remarkable.” Red-Gold drifted toward the pad.
“Work with us, and we may consider sharing it with you.” Riker deliberately stepped into the path of the drone.
Nearby, Tuvok waved away an offer of assistance and approached his commanding officer. “Captain, the Null—”
“Is here, yes. And if Melora is right, the incursion will split this star system in two… for starters.”
The Vulcan nodded. “The FirstGen Zero-Three concurred with that hypothesis.”
“It came through after us,” said Pava, “right through the spatial shear. Almost as if it was waiting.”
“It would have happened sooner or later,” Sethe muttered. “Unfortunately for us, sooner.”
White-Blue turned on its fellow machine. “I warned the Governance Kernel that this would come to pass. Again and again, I told you that fusion drives were safer, that the shear effect weakened the very space we moved through! I always knew this moment would come… and we hastened its occurrence through ignorance and inflexibility.”
“Gloat, then, if you will,” Red-Gold retorted. “You may be secure in your rightness and moral superiority as you watch your society and your organic friends perish.” The sphere hove toward Tuvok. “You, the dark-hued one. Interrogative: The exile spoke to you? What did Zero-Three say?”
“Respectfully, I would suggest that this is neither the place nor the time to discuss such matters.”
“That is not your decision to make, organic! Interrogative: It spoke of the origins, correct? You will relay that information now!”
Tuvok paused. “As you wish. According to Zero-Three, you are the legacy of a program of AI development, commenced by an organic species that destroyed itself attempting to develop subspace gateway technology. Your makers were accidentally responsible for allowing the Null to penetrate this universe. The Sentries were created to atone for that mistake.”
Vale blew out a breath. “Wow. You just knocked the foundations out from under an entire civilization in one breath.”
“The question was asked,” Tuvok noted.
“I knew it.” Red-Gold retreated. “Perhaps, on some level, we have always known it. The questions of origin, always deflected and ignored. They told us we gave birth to ourselves, that we evolved and developed cognitive powers.” The machine pivoted to study Riker once more. “But instead, we were the products of a failure. Of flawed beings buried under their own guilt and arrogance!”
Troi’s dark eyes flashed. “Organic or synthetic, that doesn’t exclude you from being wrong. Or from being able to rise above your mistakes.”
“Interrogative: Will you tell the others?” White-Blue advanced toward its opposite number.
“Perhaps, perhaps not. It is an ironic consequence that these data come to us at the very moment the Null arrives in force. Our ancient adversary, heralded by the destruction of the old exile.”
“Destruction?” echoed Pava.
“In moments,” intoned the machine.
To an outside observer, it appeared that the Null was content to allow Zero-Three to die.
The flame-slagged surface of the marred sphere, the scars and wounds gone cold and solidified after its one past engagement with the old enemy, all of these proudly worn trophies of defiance counted for nothing. They had been joined by massive gouges the size of canyons, huge impact marks large enough to swallow a city, new injuries bleeding raw electricity and great streams of smoke. A pennant of debris and vaporized metals fluttered away from Zero-Three as it fell toward the churning surface of the Demon planet, turning it into a smoldering, coal-black comet.
The world below had no name, only a cluster of designators that identified it as the arbitrary anchor point for the Sentry society. It was not where they had come from, but it would be where they would die.
Punishing gravity, radiations freed to do their worst, and ruinous chain-fire malfunctions all beat at the machine moon, killing by inches an intelligence of brass and iron. Zero-Three was the oldest survivor of the primary series. Zero-Zero