interesting and entertaining at first. He was the man who deciphered what the transmat was! But his intense presence began to bother me. Maybe I was prejudiced by his very violent background and the warning Admiral Demba gave us."
Khalanov never answered her question as to the current activities of Setek-Ren. She didn't want to question him further, considering the change of his expression that mention of Setek-Ren caused. Perhaps his summons of her to assist him in some work would lead to relief of his now serious mood. "What will we be doing today, sir?"
"Traveling." Khalanov started to empty his pockets onto his desk.
"Do we need pressure suits?" It was one possible reason he would need to empty his pockets.
"Possibly, but we'll begin without them." The last pocket he emptied contained a cryptikon. He kept it in his hand. "Follow me. We need more room to operate."
Her heart sped up; she did not have the combat augment to calm it. She had experienced the cryptikon in person only once, when Khalanov demonstrated it for the engineering staff. It had scared her! Anyone who had a solid knowledge of physics and mechanics, beyond relying on an in-body expert system, had his faith in both science and religion shaken when in the presence of a cryptikon.
They walked to the largely vacant deck where the wreckages of barbarian Fleet jumpships occupied one bay. Khalanov selected the largest vacant bay.
"I need a witness or a companion for this experiment," Khalanov said. "How brave do you feel today?"
"You insult my warrior ancestors with that question!" Wingren complained. "But not me. I'll only say that I won't disappoint you, as long as you are with me."
"If we survive this, would you consider having dinner with me?" he asked.
"Only if you let me cook!" Wingren felt braver than she ever thought possible. This admiral had asked her for a date! This handsome Earthian admiral. A man she liked very much. She strained to contain her excitement. When he activated the cryptikon, those thoughts and feelings fled, replaced by a different kind of excitement.
Khalanov gestured to indicate the dark gold control interface with its violet wells of distant reality, glimpses across unknown spans of the universe. "I've begun to think of this as a telephone directory," he said, "the ancient kind with paper pages. The field of funnels is but the top page in an infinitely thick telephone book. We are presented with a small selection of possible contacts based on some criteria I can't guess. I can sense that a large percentage of connections are possible but there must be factors that disqualify me from opening every connection. I've found only five connections I can make, all of them on this first page of the directory."
"Most of the images seem static and rather abstract," Wingren said, "even though they have a disturbingly vital presence. A few have movement and I can guess they are produced by the cryptikons we know about. The former class of connections are those you can't access."
"Exactly. Except for one. When any of the cryptikons activate, that one static image is always displayed on the first page of the telephone book. I receive an impression of distance when I touch the image wells. I can tell the Essiin Museum cryptikon is much farther away than the other cryptikons on the ship. Most of those which don't allow connection are farther away than the museum. I haven't sampled very many of the telephone book entries, but the one we are going to investigate is truly far away. Disturbingly distant."
"Should we record what we see?" Wingren asked.
"I was about to suggest that," Khalanov replied. "Yes. We both should."
Khalanov selected a violet well containing an image of endless corridors. Lines and angles and planes of pale gray instantly replaced half of the engineering bay, the pure geometry appearing starkly real for all its lack of compelling features.
"It looks like passageways," Wingren said, "but there's no scale to judge the size, no details to even determine which way is up."
"Let me position myself into the image. Perhaps that will yield another perspective."
"Not without me, sir!" She boldly grabbed his hand.
They stepped into the image together. To steady themselves in the frightening unreality, they put their arms around each other's waist. The lines and planes converged at infinity in all directions away from the engineering bay. The admiral reached with his free hand to try to touch some part of the image. His finger contacted a surface, an unseen source of light flashed, and they were blinded. Wingren was embarrassed to let a stifled shriek escape her mouth.
"Can you see anything?" Khalanov asked. "I think my eyes are still functional but I'm not sure. I can still see in-body data and control structures but that bypasses the retina."
"Same here," Wingren replied.
Darkness continued, until faint smudges of light became apparent within the total black. The wispy shapes floated everywhere, even below their feet. The shapes varied slightly but the size of them ranged from tiny to huge. Either their eyes continued to grow more sensitive or the luminance slowly increased, until Wingren finally understood what she saw.
"Galaxies!" Wingren declared. "Clusters of galaxies, rivers of galaxies!"
"Can't be!" Khalanov argued. "Our eyes can't gather enough light to see that far and that well. Not in so short a time."
"But that's what it looks like! We seem to be standing in one of the empty areas of the universe. Perhaps something is helping us see what should be invisible to us."
"We've lost contact with the Freedom," Khalanov noted. "This has not happened before. There was always a way to turn around and go back to the cryptikon. Also, there is no obvious presence of another cryptikon, the one that would be making the connection to send this data to us."
Wingren was not aware of this abnormality, and would have been more frightened, had not Khalanov sounded calm. Still, it worried her. Where had the view of the engineering repair bay gone, on whose deck they were surely still standing?
"Someone must be showing this to us, actively using their own cryptikon, and employing functions we do not know about," Khalanov speculated, speaking slowly. "Hello? Can anyone understand me? Is anyone listening? Let us see you."
A dim red light, too dim for a star, appeared behind them. It illuminated something that floated before the backdrop of the galaxies. Its reflective surface and unusual shape implied it was an artificial construction.
"Is this you?" Khalanov asked.
The double-sphered object rushed toward them, stopped, and slowly rotated, giving them a view of every area of its exterior. They could see no details or irregularities on its surface. It was a perfect geometric shape, as though modeled by computer in a holographic display: two spheres connected seamlessly to each end of a short shaft. A certain richness of color beneath the red illumination suggested the object was golden.
"There are no markings," Wingren commented. "How can we learn anything useful?"
The artifact swelled in size, as if coming closer. It filled their field of view until there was no longer a way to judge if it was still approaching them. Wingren could almost see her own face as a reflection in the surface of the artifact, and realized an instant before it happened that it was going to hit them!
There was no impact. Wingren blinked then saw only hazy light. She could not see Khalanov. She could feel Khalanov; they were still holding each other tightly. She found one of his hands and each of them reacted by gripping fingers and trying to reassure each other.
Wingren only realized she was holding her breath when they floated into a room and became visible to each other. She exhaled, turned to meet Khalanov's eyes, and they both turned to take in the details surrounding them.
Their feet came to stand - still bearing their normal weight - on a floor: this all but escaped Wingren's notice as her gaze danced among the pleasant objects and fixtures of the room. Someone lived here, someone who could be human! Those who lived here had sat in chairs made of wood and on a sofa covered with bright cushions. Someone had eaten at a simple wooden table that still held containers of condiments and napkins
. A few dirty dishes remained by the kitchen sink. Cupboards might still contain food and dishes. Doors might lead to bedrooms and bathrooms.
The window above the kitchen sink then drew their attention. They walked to it.
Except for the floor, neither of them had touched anything. Wingren and Khalanov looked at each other as they stood at the sink, then Khalanov reached across the sink and opened the old-fashioned venetian blind in the window.
They stared for a long time at the scene beyond the window. It wasn't that they wondered at how real it looked. It wasn't that the details were strange or alien. It was that it was like Earth, very much like Earth, except it was not Earth and at the same time it was supposed to be Earth.
"Grass, trees, swimming pool, mountains," Khalanov said. "Earth, but not Earth. It's not quite right."
"Like a memory of Earth," Wingren suggested.
"Exactly," Khalanov agreed. He closed the blinds. He turned and pointed to a glass door. Wingren took his hand and walked with him to the door. It slid open onto a screened porch and a view of another part of the yard. The air smelled of flowers and freshly-mowed grass but Wingren's attention was diverted by the bed.
"What?" Khalanov asked, as Wingren tugged him toward the bed. Then he saw it, too. "Blood!"
A thin mattress covered a wooden frame that might have been a kind of large lawn chair that was fully reclined. Fresh red liquid pooled