Every indicator, every test, every probe had confirmed that the Wheel was utterly dead, that every Charonian in the Solar System, from the greatest to the smallest, had died when Larry sent out the death order.
But clearly, somehow, some part of the Wheel had survived. Somehow its corpse was still capable of action, of movement.
But why did it choose now to move?
And then he knew. He knew. And negotiating his way down a pitch-black tunnel to safety was suddenly trivial, meaningless. A door, a way out, was suddenly open. But the dangers of the past had returned, infinitely more deadly than the teeth of a tyrannosaur. He had to get to a comm center. He had to get word to the Ring of Charon, to Sondra Berghoff.
His mind was racing, his heart pounding with excitement as he thought it through. It meant danger, yes, that was clear. But it might mean hope, as well.
The second pulsequake knocked him off his feet, but that was of no consequence. He waited it out, clinging to the floor of the bucking, twisting Wheelway as best he could. When it stopped, he got up and moved on.
It did not make sense. Wolf Bernhardt stared at the screen, as if he could will the data to be logical and coherent. The SCORE had going through the wormhole. What was it all about?
He looked toward Joanne Beadle, her eyes still locked on the display screen. “Very well,” he said, in as brusque a tone as he could. “It has gone into the hole. So, where does that wormhole lead? Back to the Solar System?”
“I don’t think so, sir. If our theories about what happened are right, the Ring can never be returned. The tuning adjustment mechanism has got to be huge and complex—and there’s just no way it survived in any sort of reparable state.”
“Then what are you saying?” Bernhardt asked.
Beadle licked her lips nervously and looked up at Director Bernhardt. “I’m saying that’s a detuned hole out there.”
“Detuned? So it goes nowhere? That SCORE just sent itself off into oblivion?”
“No sir. I’m not an expert, but as I understand it, a detuned wormhole drops back to a, ah—I suppose you’d call it a default mode. Every transit pair of black holes has its own natural resonances. Leave them alone and they will revert to that tuning.”
“So why couldn’t the Ghoul Modules tune this one?”
“The parts of the Moonpoint Ring that could do it are one big fused lump. Nothing can budge the Moonpoint Ring away from its default tuning, ever again.”
“And you’re sure that the default is not the same as that of the ring in the Solar System?”
“Couldn’t be. The whole point of the Moonpoint Ring is to serve as a tuning system to force the black hole off its default tuning. Besides, don’t forget the people back in the Solar System closed their end of the hole as well.”
“If that is so, then where does that damn SCORE think it’s going?”
Joanne shook her head. “I don’t think anyone is that good a guesser, sir.”
The full staff was on the bridge, everyone hushed, quiet, tense. Not that there was much point to having anyone at all on the bridge just now. The ship was days away from being able to do much of anything besides watch.
The Terra Nova was moving toward NaPurHab at a crawl, well below the relative velocity that would attract the interest of the COREs that still circled the Earth—at least according to the Earthside theorists and their simulations. Dianne smiled to herself, but there was no pleasure in the expression. Sakalov. Sakalov had been one of those theorists—and had died for the crime of guessing wrong. Perhaps there was some justice in the theory spinners putting themselves on the line, but sometimes the price of justice was too high.
Besides, there was no justice if Sakalov died for being wrong. All the theories were wrong. No one had predicted the SCOREs heading into the singularity. So what the hell else had they got wrong?
“Talk to me, Gerald. What the hell is going on?” Dianne asked. “I thought the SCOREs were supposed to land on Earth and breed.”
“Be thankful we were wrong,” Gerald said. “But we may have other problems.”
“What do you mean—”
“SCORE X002 coming up on closest approach,” Lieutenant DePanna announced. She was the detection officer for the watch, and Dianne was glad to have her. DePanna knew how to interpret what she saw.
Dianne watched on the screen, ready to see this one follow the other into the wormhole.
“Closest approach in five, four, three, two, one—peripoint.” DePanna checked her boards. “X002 is not, repeat not, on a course into the wormhole. It is moving at a tangent to a wormhole intercept course. It is coming about. X002 has ceased maneuvering. Course projections running now. We show X002 now in a circular polar orbit of wormhole, radius 2,231 kilometers.”
“Now what the hell does that mean?” Dianne demanded.
“No idea, ma’am,” DePanna said in a smooth, steady voice. “Stand by. Something more.” She checked her instruments and looked up in surprise. “SCORE X002 radars cut off,” she said.
“But the COREs never cut their radar,” Gerald objected. “Yes sir,” DePanna said. “That’s what I thought too—” Something on her displays caught DePanna’s attention, and she started adjusting her detectors. “—and we were both right. Radars still active, but redirected. I am running backscatter and beam-leakage analysis. Stand by. Ah, Captain, as best I can tell, SCORE X002’s radar is now directed in a tight beam, focused on the singularity.”
“Oh, come on!” Dianne said, baffled and infuriated. “This is ridiculous. Why aim it at the wormhole? They can’t tell where it is?”
“I don’t know, ma’am. But that’s what it’s doing. X003 coming toward closer approach.”
“And what the hell is this one going to do?” Dianne demanded. “A song-and-dance routine?”
Gerald MacDougal rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “No song and dance,” he said, “but if we consider that the primary function of a CORE is to detect and destroy spaceborne objects that threaten something the Charonians value, maybe we get toward an answer.”
“What do you mean?” Dianne asked.
“I mean if we assume the SCOREs are behaving rationally, and further assume that their behavior programming is based on the COREs, that suggests that these SCOREs are getting into position to strike at something. Then if we consider what positions they are taking—”
“X003 has entered the wormhole. X004 is taking up an equatorial orbit.”
“My God,” Dianne said. “Half of them taking up parking orbits on this side of the hole, and the other half going through it. They’re trying to stop something from coming through the hole. First line of defense on the other side, and the second line here on this side.”
“Yes,” Gerald agreed. “They’re watching for something they expect will come through it.”
“But why not just slam the wormhole shut?” DePanna asked.
“Because they can’t,” Dianne said. “Whoever is on the other side is able to force the wormhole open. What other answer could there be?”
“None that I can see,” Gerald replied. “I’ve been thinking on this a lot. The Charonians are getting ready to fight something, even though we don’t know what. Much of the evidence points toward their fighting something stronger than they are. It’s hard to imagine that, I know, but there’s more evidence of it right out there.”