The B’tari craft without warning slipped back into normal space. Its scanner told him the ship was within sub-light range. Yet when Torbin asked for a visual, it told him: ‘Cannot resolve an image.’
‘How can that be?’ he asked simply.
‘Extreme gravitational lensing,’ it offered.
‘But it’s not a singularity.’
‘In a sense it is, in as much as it possesses a paradoxical state of infinite gravitational force.’
‘Explain how that can be then.’ If you’re so clever.
‘Unable to.’
‘So the B’tari computer has been stumped.’ At least he would allow himself a moment of satisfaction.
‘The object that used to be the ship is now a paradoxical phenomena.’ It seemed to be justifying its lack of insight.
‘Then is it still the ship? – never mind, just get me there as quickly as possible.’
The B’tari ship persisted in warning him of the dangers of approaching the vessel. But now Torbin felt it was simply too late to turn back. There was nothing to turn back for; even if he was going to die on this mission (for that’s what it had become) he would die for a noble cause, perhaps as their astronomer Zorandi Entola had done.
The AI insisted they approach the last few thousand kilometres at a constantly reducing speed, the gravimetric readings were now off the scale.
After another hour of frustratingly slow progress, they reached what should have been the ship. The AI told him, ‘I must inform you that it is not advisable to enter into its local space.’
‘Thank you for your concern. Now tell me how to activate that special suit.’
By rights, if what used to be the ship was behaving like a typical quantum singularity then at this close range – a few kilometres away – they should be pulled into oblivion. But this was something else, something strangely self-contained. A time dilational phenomenon as a layer around an opposing force. It appeared as a gap in space, a blackness surrounded by the lensing effect so typical of a black hole. In these conditions there was no chance of linking it up with the B’tari vessel.
The suit, being of B’tari design, was considerably more sophisticated than anything he knew of. Firstly, it moulded exactly to his shape; its HUD overlay was giving him a bewildering array of information. But sensing his lack of comprehension it told him in English every precautionary measure it was taking to counter the ship’s mysterious effects, as its thrusters were edging him nearer. There was a peculiar translucent white shimmering around him, like a morphogenic aura; this must be some kind of deflector field. It made him wonder if they had prepared this technology specifically for this encounter. He opted to reassure himself that that was the case.
Even at only a few metres away the ship was still a black void in space. His suit obligingly had created a grid around the vessel, but he couldn’t see the outline for the hatch. He was manoeuvring around it now, and as he got even nearer the grid pattern became more detailed, until finally a highlighted rectangle emerged amid the complexity of lines. The suit’s AI persisted in its warnings of severe gravimetric distortions with increasingly opaque orange waveform graphics, emanating from the dark vector of the ship.
‘But you can protect me, right?’ he demanded of it.
‘This suit will intensify the counter field but cannot guarantee your safety if you continue on this course.’
‘Fine. I’ll take my chances.’ But there was an uneasy feeling as he looked around at the stars. He was sure they had changed.
Unsurprisingly the hatch did not respond to any manual attempts at opening. So, with a relish that somewhat offset his apprehension, he pulled out what he knew to be a cutting laser (he tested it on a dividing bulkhead during the journey) and set it working against the seal.
He was so engrossed in trying to cut through the hatch, he mentally dismissed a warning appearing in his HUD. Unidentified object emerged through spacial portal, was its basic interpretation – a to-late-to-do-fuck-all-about-it analysis of the situation in any case. Torbin knew, though. He just knew. He felt foolish, a naïve child, being drawn into their trap like the proverbial fly to sticky paper.
The object had an arachnoid quality. Its two upper limbs twitched before his face (still nominally protected by the suit) as if sketching the outline of his features. It seemed to be studying him. Torbin tried communicating, he put out an all-channel comm. ‘I need to know the location of Zorandi Entola.’ He couldn’t stop his voice wavering, it would surely know of his fear.
Instead of answering, a tendril extruded towards him, telescopically, to an almost invisibly fine point. It seemed to have penetrated through the seal of his helmet. Torbin wasn’t sure if the thing had already paralysed him or if it was merely his fear, as the wire moved upwards. He could feel the tip questing about for some easy entry point, settling finally on the area just below his left eye. It pierced his flesh quickly enough that he didn’t feel any appreciable pain – just like a syringe. A cold numbing sensation followed, then he felt drowsy. But the relief of unconsciousness did not come. Instead, he was seeing events from his past. Memories of his recent work, his diaries, and the people he had met. Then the Elusivers: imperious and omnipotent to his younger self, but not without benevolence, showing him what was intended to represent the sum total of human experience. First the joy of love, of sex. And for a time there was nothing else that mattered. It was everything. The less tangible pleasures also: a oneness with life itself; nothing more than the carefree enjoyment of a summer garden, a scented breeze, and music so sublime it seemed to transcend any human art-form. Simple serenity. An innocence free from bitter memories. Then the beautiful melancholy of a cliff-faced beach just after an October sunset; as if this is how life should conclude. The Elusivers had shown him things only ever before hinted at – always tantalisingly beyond his grasp.
Except on some intuitive level he became aware that none of it was real; more like a dream or artificial reality.
But then there was the suffering … oh, the suffering; maybe that was like real life – him vicariously the war victim with a limb blown off, the disorientation and tear-inducing pain. And yet still room for the fear of what might follow. Even now, preternaturally vivid like a PTSD memory.
Finally, when he had resolved in his mind that he wanted to die – that he wanted to feel nothing ever again – the memory faded. She was there, the suffering banished once more to its hidden recess. Raiya was talking to him: kindly and understandingly – and more than just as a psychiatrist. Then, as it all became more real again, the one he had missed more than any: Emelda. In a movie-like switch of scene they were making love. But just when he began to believe this was truly real, she started fading – her touch, her scent until there was nothing.
Blackness.
***