The Abyss Beyond Dreams Read Free Page B

The high-res image behind her was taken from a sensor mounted on the forward section of the starship, where the ultradrive unit and force-field generators
were clustered. The bottom fifth of the image showed the curving carbotanium hull with its thick layer of grubby grey thermal foam. At the top of the hologram was a small blue-white crescent,
similar to any of the H-congruous worlds in the Commonwealth – though its night side lacked any city lights. And between the hull and the planet was the strangest nebula Laura could have
imagined. As she stared, she saw it had some kind of solid core, a long ovoid shape. It wasn’t truly solid, she realized, but actually comprised of sheets of some crystalline substance warped
into an extraordinary Calabi-Yau manifold geometry. The shimmering surfaces were alive with weird multicoloured patterns that flowed like liquid – or maybe it was the structure itself that
was unstable. She couldn’t tell, for flowing around it was some kind of haze, also moving in strange confluences. ‘Serious bollocks,’ she grunted.
    ‘It’s a kind of spaceborne life,’ Cornelius said. ‘Three of them rendezvoused with us not long after we were pulled into the Void. They’re sentient. You can use
your telepathy to converse with them, though it’s like talking to a savant. Their thought processes aren’t quite like ours. But they can fly through this space. Or at least manipulate
it somehow. They offered to lead us to worlds inside the Void where we could live.
Ventura
,
Vanguard
,
Violet
and
Valley
followed two Skylords.
Vermillion
is following this one, along with
Viscount
and
Verdant
. We decided that splitting the starships gives us a better chance of finding a viable H-congruous
planet.’
    ‘With respect,’ Laura said, ‘why are we following any of them to a planet at all? Surely we should be doing everything we can to find the way out? All of us are on board for
one reason: to found a new civilization outside this galaxy. Granted, the inside of the Void is utterly fascinating, and the Raiel would give their right bollock to be here, but you cannot make
that decision for us.’
    Cornelius’s expression was weary. ‘We’re trying to find an H-congruous planet, because the alternative is death. Have you noticed your biononic function?’
    ‘Yes. It’s very poor.’
    ‘Same for any chunk of technology on board. What passes for spacetime in here is corroding our systems a percentage point at a time. The first thing to fail was the ultradrive, presumably
because it’s the most sophisticated system on board. But for the last year there have been fluctuations in the direct-mass converters, which were growing more severe. I couldn’t risk
leaving them on line. We’re using fusion reactors to power the ingrav drive units now.’
    ‘What?’ she asked in shock. ‘You mean we’ve been travelling slower than light all this time?’
    ‘Point nine lightspeed since we arrived, nearly six years ago now,’ Cornelius confirmed bitterly. ‘Thankfully the suspension chambers have remained functional, or we would have
had a real disaster on our hands.’
    Laura’s first reaction was,
Why didn’t you get me out of suspension back then? I could have helped.
But that was probably what everyone on board would think. And from what
she understood of their situation, the captain had done pretty well under the circumstances. Besides, her specialist field of molecular physics probably wouldn’t be that helpful in analysing
a different space-time structure.
    She was drawn to the bright crescent ahead. ‘Is it H-congruous?’
    ‘We think so, yes.’
    ‘Is that why you tank yanked me? To help with a survey?’
    ‘No. We’re six million kilometres out and decelerating hard. We’ll reach orbit in another two days. Heaven alone knows how we’ll cope with landing, but we’ll tackle
that when it happens. No, you’re here because our sensors found something at the planet’s Lagrange