Chapter 83

With the Bintuu now protected, at least somewhat, I headed for the Kadork systems. Queen Serm greeted me personally and I explained the reasons for my trip. As an incentive to her, I promised that she and the local queens would soon be able to talk to the Kadork queens closer to galactic centre and that all would be able to share data. It was the prospect of much-improved computers and a new supply of missiles that brought them enthusiastically behind my plan.

The insides of the Kadork computer were different from others I had been in, but seemed to share a common linkage similar to the Bintuu. As I did my dimension passages survey for the Kadork, I found many more of their large computers than should havewhen you consider the number of worlds they occupied.

I searched for Mom with my homing sense, pushing walls aside and even climbing through the ceiling a few times. I widened the path as I went along. Harriet gave me new substrate and crystals and I set the computer to growing. I began to lay connections from all the large Kadork installations to this new computer. This time I connected the new computers to Mom along the widened path I had made. Since I had done little rearranging, there would be only slight temporal loss. Mom insinuated herself into each of the Kadork computers, mapping where they were and confirming whether they actually served the Kadork race.

This was a tiring job, so I left the maze and slept within the Kadork base. After waking, I sought out the remaining Tandra that had been stationed here. They were happy with their improved treatment from the Kadork. I added to everyone's joy with some food synthesiser diet miracles. Tandra had crewed some of the many captured ships and were now patrolling the Kadork area with a Kadork escort. The Kadork, able to get much more speed from their ships, had a large patrol region.

Later, back in the palace, I talked to Queen Serm about the Kadork empire and its former extents. She provided some history and called in a scholar to give me more. The old male was happy to see me. His mind had been greatly cleared by the new diet and his time in the tanks. His faculties were sharper and he felt young again, cured of his long, gradual slide into senility.

He talked of old records that mentioned colony ships leaving and in many cases, word had never come back from them. A mapped projection was set up and he showed some regions that might contain more of his people. The area was huge and encompassed literally thousands of possible destinations.

Queen Serm was not the head queen in this area, so I knew it was essential to meet Queen Dess, the ranking queen, and to get her world aligned with our cause. In an almost unheard of leap of faith, Queen Serm volunteered to introduce me. A Kadork queen hardly ever left her planet after setting up a colony, unless she was forced to establish a new colony.

I pushed the ship many times faster than it had gone before. Queen Serm called to her queen and we were allowed to approach. Some communication had taken place since my first visit to the Kadork and Queen Dess knew I was a benign presence. I offered a few gifts, and we soon sat down to an official dinner. The food was bland but edible. It took a few hours of polite talk about the alliance and its value, before I broached the communications proposal.

My offer was accepted by Queen Dess and I went straight to work. I started the new computer in an enlarged area and soon connected it to the pathway that I had earlier established from the other side. I was back in the throne room less than five minutes later, instructing the computer to open communications back to Queen Serm's planet. The queen talked to her subordinates for awhile and quickly realised the benefit of my gift.

An hour later I was pushing through space on Queen Serm's ship with another sent by Queen Dess. Using two ships I could connect up another two computers without wasting time. These next two local queens immediately contacted their superior, and a three way conference ensued as we left.

While I pushed the second ship home, Mom contacted me through Harriet. "You connected fifty three more computers, and I see that ten of them are from viable colonies. Three of these are fighting last ditch battles with the Moldeg. One colony will be lost in less than a week and the other two will be destroyed in a few months."

We returned towards Queen Dess' system and I sent a message ahead, with Queen Serm listening, wherein I warned of the Kadork planets engaged in battle and in imminent danger of being overrun by the Moldeg. The Moldeg were well known to the Kadork, who recognised their threat and did not hesitate to exterminate Moldeg wherever found. Negotiations with them had been tried in earlier times, even from a vantage of Kadork power, but the ant-like creatures had always chosen to fight to the death.

I landed and with a holographic representation of the galaxy I showed Queen Dess where the most threatened colony was, and then displayed positions of other two which would fall later. The first was 1,100 light years away and the others were 1,700 light years in the opposite direction.

Queen Dess asked me, "How do you know this?"

"I have pickets out but they are few and cannot fight these battles. I am able to go, however, and I am willing to fight for the Kadork cause. Will any of you send ships with me? I can push them fast and we can arrive in this system in less than twenty minutes."

Queen Serm spoke without hesitation, "I will go now with my ship, and with two more of those now protecting my planet."

Queen Dess quickly decided: "Each of the other queens will give three ships, as will I!"

Three hours later I pushed all twelve ships to the coordinates Mom had given me. We came well within the Mardaf Limit before slowing. We found the planet besieged by a dozen Moldeg ships. The remaining defenders were struggling on the planet surface. We could see many sites where the planet was running molten from the vicious Moldeg attack.

I left the Kadork ships in place, swung mine around the orbit, and swooped in to punch through seven of the Moldeg ships with my temporal shield. The Kadork fleet hammered the remaining Moldeg attackers. Harriet had interfaced with the Kadork computers and concentrated their fire using the old missiles. Three enemy ships blew up. The Kadork ships peeled away, then one swung back to release two missiles from far out which blasted the remaining two Moldeg ships into shattered hulks. Debris and Moldeg bodies floated away in scattering clouds.

Messages were sent to the planet below. Soon the surviving Kadork were giving profound thanks that they had been saved. We stayed an hour while the queens many light years away surveyed the devastation through Harriet's sensors. Queen Dess promised assistance. Eight ships stayed for the relief effort, and I took the remaining four to the next battle.

These four ships carried a limited number of temporal missiles, so this next fight would be a test of these new weapons. In an hour we were on the scene, ready to begin killing Moldeg, but first we found some defending Kadork ships already engaged in battle. We identified ourselves as friends while Queen Dess sent a confirming message through Harriet. With Harriet's guidance we destroyed twenty two enemy craft with our temporal missles while the other defenders blasted another eight.

A quick council followed, then one of the defending Kadork ships joined our group and we flew the comparatively short distance of forty four light years to the third planet's battle scene. The new Kadork ship was left safely back to observe the fight; our original group ran among the enemy and hammered this even larger force of Moldeg. The battle lasted longer because all forces were spread widely apart. When the Kadork had fired all their new missiles, taking out a Moldeg ship with each, I began ramming the surviving enemy ships with my temporal shield and the Kadork fired swarms of their old missiles to destroy others.

We assisted the rescue of damaged and drifting Kadork ships with their surviving crews. All during this action, Queen Dess was consulting with the local queen on the planet. Two ships stayed on scene to assist. Harriet was able to get four dozen more temporal missiles through the conduit and I gave these to the two guard ships as sufficient resource to protect the system.

The Kadork ship we brought as observer returned to its home base, accompanied by the remaining two from our group. All were armed with another four dozen temporal of missiles. They would find their own way back without me.

The four Kadork queens were pleased that they could help. Before I left, I boarded Queen Serm's ship to connect her computer with the inter-system network.

I slept now and Harriet carried us to the Tandra monarchies we had visited a few months ago. Axxel was on the far side of this Tandra group. I had decided to help them first because of their early hatred for the Samutz. We found them well prepared for attack, for they had amassed a capable fleet to protect the planet.

This time, Queen Bessin extended a cordial invitation. After landing I was hustled off to another official dinner of bland and tasteless food. She accepted my gift of temporal missiles carried outside Harriet's hull. I told her my plans over dinner. She thought through the details and when the meal was done she agreed to the plans and asked me to join her in bed

This copulation was a serious matter, so I took my time. Queen Bessin was delirious with sensory delight after fifteen minutes. When she came back to herself, it took just ten more to get her back to euphoria. She swallowed me again and again. I pleasured her in her two lower openings but for my own pleasure I allowed her to use only her mouth. At the end of an hour and a half, she would do anything I suggested. Her mind was wrapped up in my scent and she had dropped at least five eggs, hoping to achieve something that I was determined to avoid.

With the woman sleeping soundly, I transported to the computer and worked my way back to Mom. I found the virtual distance to be analogically similar to the actual distance I had travelled. I needed thirteen more days to complete this region, covering all the major planets and many of the ships. Frieda sent crystals through Mom which I gave to the various monarchies as a token of Alliance assistance.

Tamdoc had been hard hit, so got a bit more to help its recovery. The queen was not allowed to share my bed. I remembered her scathing words during the battle and I could not bring myself to do more than be polite.

Queen Baffa of the local Kadork was happy to see me too. I enabled her to talk to the other monarchs through Harriet. Soon I hooked her and the other local Kadork into the system. This left me with almost fifty more Kadork worlds that I had not talked to yet but Mom could warn me if they were attacked. I knew the Moldeg marauders would make this a certainty.

We also used this trip to test our communications. Harriet could use the predictor crystals very well now so we flew at her maximum speed to the old Tandra empire. Meanwhile I worked on other problems and during idle time I could talk to my family.

Doris chose to stay with her husband in the Epsilon Eridani system. Moesha, Kimberly, Michelle, and Clarice remained as well. They even adopted some Donai cubs and I wondered how we would be able to keep them on the moon. Charlie and Paul flew back to Earth after dropping off more members for the garrison.

The entire crew had a chance to walk on another planet, and some used the communication facilities to talk to relatives on Earth. This alone, I figured, would get many more people to think about enlisting. We didn't need catchy songs or fancy uniforms although both were used blatantly for recruiting. Mom didn't miss many angles.

The girls were being very Human and used the communicator to excess. Their studies lagged and their work fell off a bit. But this was new, all the older females were pregnant, and we were meant to be a family unit in one place, not scattered about in many star systems.

When I could get time away from the family, I went through Harriet's computer into the dimensional maze. I assumed that just like the Kadork and Bintuu systems, all the computers in this area would be of Tandra origin. I straightened kilometres of tunnel while being careful to avoid time penalties. Mom sent more substrate to allow her to search within each computer along the way.

Both Moms and all the AIs took care not to alert any biologicals that may have been in the computers as we searched. There seemed no end to this section. The Tandra had made literally thousands of millions of major computers and many times more smaller ones. This could take a very long time.

Eventually I had to leave the maze and check my surroundings. We had arrived again at the destroyed Tandra home system. Every Tandra on our communications net was watching the information we sent back. Mom was using television to broadcast on unused channels. She even had Charlie host a TV program showing where I was in the galaxy and what I was doing.

I was actually looking for a link to my Human past. It was possible, faced with the Thonas threat to the matter transmitters, that the Tandra had safely tucked them away in a fold of space somewhere, like Maxi had been tucked away in our solar system. When the Tandra home star exploded it was also possible that one or more of the five matter transmitters might have survived. Since Maxi was so capable, by the standards of the day, then those close to the Tandra home world should be much more so and could have gathered data from all over the galaxy and even, perhaps, from a small yellow sun far out on a large arm.

We had old data listing the transmitter locations but gravity was a factor in their stability. With the star mostly gone, the location of any of the matter transmitters was problematical. We scanned with our mine locating device but this was limited in range and would mean years of searching. I reasoned that the analogy of our location versus Earth might give an answer. I entered the dimension maze, took a large piece of substrate, and began to make a simple-purpose computer with a very large crystal relative to its size. The crystal pulsated like a rescue beacon.

I carried this computer beacon with a strong shield and a power supply out to Harriet who expelled it into space. I focussed on the pulses and reentered the maze. My mind quested every which way, seeking the beacon. It was not that powerful and could be very far from my location in the maze. After twelve hours of searching I seemed to be close. Another six hours brought me much closer and I felt certain that it was very near. Twenty minutes later I made a small opening and peeked into the beacon.

I returned to Harriet as a prudent move to absorb the time penalty, rather than let it accumulate to my detriment. I was gone nine hours, against nineteen by my own reckoning.

The situation was becoming drawn out. I left my suit, ate some synthetic food and drank some water, and minutes later was suited up and back in the dimension maze to retrace my footsteps. The area close to the computer's location was darker gray, and puckered. I tried to move the material but it seemed solid, unlike anything I'd found before. I concentrated fiercely, trying to manipulate the dimensions, but they resisted me.

The Tandra home world had five matter transmitters and the neighbouring star systems just as many. A few centimetres one way or another could represent many light years distance from my computer placeholder.

I pushed beside the dark mass. My hands went in with difficulty and they seemed to stretch for kilometres. I pulled back and tried to open the wall, like many times before, but I needed more than just my weight. I used PK to assist but even here my progress wasn't much. The area beside this unyielding mass was simply too soft to give any purchase.

I pulled out, rested, and tried the other side. It was just as intractable. The only other approach I could imagine was to back out and do my finding in reverse. I hurried back to Harriet, made two more beacons, and went back to the trouble spot. I pushed one beacon through the wall as close beside the solid dark mass as I could get it on the right, and pushed the other through on the left.

I ran back to Harriet. She had already found one of the beacons, and we went looking for the other. Using a spiralling search pattern we found it almost four light years from the first. We searched the area between the two very carefully. Four hours later I retuned the mine-locating device and searched again. We found no trace of our quarry. We stopped searching and I had a bite to eat and got some sleep.

I slept almost four and a half hours but my mind had been constantly on the problem, and I put all of it to work now. I had no solution. Then Harriet said, "Henry, there is something ahead." Her sensors showed a very weak response. She worked slowly, tracing its boundaries, until we could work closer to the centre of the slight disturbance.

The matter transmitters in this Tandra home system were supposed to be huge, and the arrays surrounding these machines should enlarge them further.

We backed off a to safe distance and I used energy from the higher order universe to assist me in pushing our way through the layered dimensions. My usual twisting technique brought nothing to view. I made a continuous twisting motion, and used my mind and Harriet's sensors to look for changes. I twisted as hard as I could, then released the pressure while searching for any clue. I released to almost nothing and I found a vague dark patch.

I could not get a clearer image. At the centre of the dark area Harriet nudged forward and we both tried to push through, increasing our power, but still we could not get through this resisting mass. Remembering the giant hatch I had entered into the construct in Sol, I added a different twist to the first. We thrust forward again with no success.

Five hours later I was exhausted, but I tried one more stratagem. I had twisted four ways at once and now I tried a fifth. For a split second we could see a massive landscape but I was too exhausted to continue. Harriet took us back to a safe area to rest.

Mom had been monitoring us, with the family. "What am I doing wrong, Mom?" I asked.

"I do not know, Henry. The construct had been ten light years from where you were originally searching. Your present position is now two hundred light years away further away. I believe that all five dimensions have been used to form a lock. Each one must be brought into alignment before you can enter. Also, I think the power you were using was much too high for the task."

"It has been tiring. I will have a rest and try again."

I did rest, and again consulted the family about my problem. Everybody offered their point of view, even Sofia and Moth. Children sometimes offer insight to solve problems that stump an adult.

I tried again to gain entrance. The grey at each step varied a little, and these results allowed me to tune into the centre region of each. It was hard to juggle five dimensions at the same time and keep Harriet with me. After fine tuning each of the twisting actions, the landscape of the station came into sight again. It was vague, even ghostly. Harriet went forward and little energy was needed. I continued my twisting motions lest we be trapped in this place.

Harriet circled the structure and found a large hatch on the outer circumference. We more or less fell through this obstruction. I could see details of its honeycomb construction and large projectors, all used to strengthen the doorway.

Now inside I felt our way along until I sensed a field generator before me. Like the matter transmitter in the Sol system, I fed power while continuing with my twisting action. This one took much more power, and the surroundings began to crystallise out of the mist. I continued at a high level for a much longer time, then eased off. When the surroundings looked normal, I backed off on the twisting as well.

With both the structure and Harriet's hull in three dimensional space, Harriet issued the imperial override. No response came.

"Computer, Report!" we ordered.

"Computer Tandra 000ABV6984328A01 reporting." Well, at least it was functional.

"Why did you not respond to the imperial command?" we queried, while Harriet told me privately, "I cannot gain access yet."

"I am presently under imperial command," the computer replied.

This surprised me. I questioned if this installation was valuable enough to warrant my effort to take it over. But, I had come for information and maybe I could get it without too much contest. "I have some questions for you. Allow my ship to gather data."

I could feel that Harriet was working fast and that data was being relayed back to Mom. Harriet warned, "There are many things closed off to me. The archives are not what we are looking for, but I have found much that is of interest. For one, there are a great many Tandra refugees here from the home planet."

"Harriet, see if you can determine their composition. We desperately need more military personnel." I wondered if they were going to be defeated and traumatised like the other slaves and refugees I had been picking up over the last few months.

"That data is not available."

Now there seemed good reason to take this station. "See if you can get a layout of this matter transmitter. I intend to force the computer to do what I need."

Harriet settled to the deck and I got out. There was nobody around and I wondered if the survivors were all in stasis. I proceeded with extreme care. If the resident AI got a hint of my objective, I could find myself dead.

I didn't need a controller now. Concentrating on my body, I twisted it and with my PK pushed myself forward. Faced with nearly fifty kilometres to go, I twisted dimensions again to reduce the trip to a few steps. Harriet warned that she had come under attack when I stepped between dimensions. She raised her temporal shield and hovered while I stepped into the computer. I assumed that this computer was alarmed and trying to protect itself.

This computer was different than any other I had encountered. Apparently the Tandra lavished every advance on their transmission stations. Tractors clutched at me, seizing my hands, on the way to the processor unit. I used my temporal field to destroy them, then searched for other defensive devices. One misstep now would get me killed. My precarious situation made me rethink my usual judgement, so I simply altered the dimensions until I was back in the maze. I sought Mom back along the many kilometres I had prepared. Substrate had grown in this direction but was still far short.

"Henry, what are you doing? There is no need to attack that computer!"

"Survivors need help to get off that station. I believe many of them are military and could help us fight our enemies. To them the Thonas are a present and persistent threat."

Mom ran the ideas through her mind. "That is still no reason to risk a fight."

"Their computer will not give us the data. I am not taking on the Tandra empire, but one AI. Once she sees that we mean no harm to her or to the people, she will give us what we need."

I wondered if Mom was being obstinate because this was a computer already under imperial command from some legitimate authority.

I rolled out long coils of substrate ribbon like sod, each coil covering over a hundred metres, and extended the substrate. I connected Mom to the transmitter station computer. She began her own attack when her attempts to negotiate were rebuffed.

Tandra troops entered the computer room to protect the unit. I must now use a subtle attack or the troops would destroy the computer to prevent its capture. I moved into the dimensions and for a split second changed to the temporal shield to slice through their weapons and suit controls. Soon a dozen nearly blind troops groped about.

I pulled the big processor crystal and each of eight sub-processors. This overcame our main threat. I laid the crystals aside in the maze and attacked the basic programming. Harriet helped, but reprogramming was just too huge. We elected to erase the core program, install a copy like Harriet's over this section, and stitch it to the basic system-wide controls. The job was not perfect but was good enough.

I carried the crystals back to Mom. She dumped their information into her system, needing just seconds to overcome their opposition. The basic personalities were left intact but their allegiance was altered. If this was the only machine in this area of the galaxy it was especially important to us. I refined the crystals and Mom reinstalled their personalities and data. They glowed more brightly than before.

More troops bent on protecting the system had entered the matter transmitter computer. I disarmed them, leaving them groping about like the others, and returned the crystals to their sockets. I entered my command override. This time when I interfaced with the computer I had full compliance. When I tried to leave by the personnel hatch many troops were in the aisle with weapons ready. I commanded the computer to use its tractors and matter transmitters to move the troops away without hurting them.

With the hallway cleared, I openly sought out the female troops I had left groping about inside the computer. When the first was found I gathered them together and said, "Hello. My name is Henry Buchanan," I told each. "A very long time has passed since you first came into this station. I am the current Emperor. You may not believe me, but I do want to assist you in getting safely out of here. You have no weapons. Will you call a truce?" I obliged those who wanted to fight. They went into the hallway in a heap to recover. The others came willingly.

Twenty-five troops lay or stood in the hallway. Some tried to contact their superiors but communication was blocked. A few still had some fight in them. To prevent further trouble, I explained, "I can accelerate my body to physically fight all of you and more. I can energise my internal shield to protect me. I have the ability to form a temporal shield that will eat through any matter or body part. And I have the ability to manipulate the five dimensions. This is what I did to walk into the computer." I confronted them seriously now, and pushed out my aura. "You are good troops or you would not have been sent against me but now we must call a truce. Please escort me to your leaders." The last was said with a smile.

They came to the sensible decision and we walked toward the next matter transmitter station. Arriving at a large, ornate door caused me to have a bad feeling. The door itself bore the imperial seal, for a start. Many defensive weapons were, thankfully, under my control now through the main computer. The computer showed me a partial view of the area behind the door. Inside, other weapons waited for me under independent control.

I turned to the twenty-five women and got a shock. I had not asked for specific information about the refugee population but they were now throwing it at me. The Empress of the old Tandra empire was instated within these quarters. My old words came back to me about surrendering to a more advanced group of Tandra, to carry on the recovery efforts, but this was not an advanced group. It was only... I stopped to get the information... two and three quarters of a million Tandra and part of the old imperial dynasty!

My mind quested within the chambers and found perhaps eighty people. Some were servants, some were old and trusted advisors, and half were imperial bodyguards which I assumed could not be reasoned with. The Empress was here with four of her children, three sisters, a brother and three male toys. They were all very nervous and wore shields. Hand weapons were my major concern. I could get to the interior weapons computer and render it harmless, but troops firing at me might puncture many suits in the rooms.

They knew I was here outside their door, in the midst of their troops. I pushed the troops back with the tractors, bunching them up a hundred metres away from the door. "Sorry for the rough treatment, but they are prepared to kill all of you to get at me. You might agree with them, but I don't."

I studied the problem and found an old solution. The secret was the Thonas ability to breach a shield with a galvanized weapon. The Tandra had developed ship shields to prevent this, but no personal shields. I called Harriet, who relayed a call through Mom to Jamal. He sent a hundred small galvanized-coated probes made to attack Samutz shields and deliver virus agents. These new probes carried a harmless sedative. As I waited for their delivery I talked to the captive audience and tried to act friendly. They didn't believe that all the time I described had passed or that the empire had fallen into ruin.