Branegate Read online

  “So now you’ll conjure up an aircraft for us,” said Trae, getting into the spirit of the moment.

  Petyr stood up, and Trae with him. “No, just hold out your arms, and follow me.”

  Petyr held his arms out from his sides at shoulder height, and Trae did the same. There was an awkward pause, Trae feeling silly, then Petyr rose slowly from the ground, straight up, and Trae, without thinking, was following, and the ground was rushing away beneath him. The rolling hills and fields of flowers extended to each horizon and became a patch of purple as the sky turned to dark, dark blue, then black. The purple patch shrank to a dot, then vanished on the surface of a ball colored in swirls of blue, green and tan and then the ball was a point in a field of black as they rushed higher and higher. Points of blue light appeared in the blackness and then fuzzy wisps in red and green, rushing past them. Trae was exhilarated yet frightened at the same time. All an illusion, he thought. A dream-state, and none of it is really happening.

  Petyr seemed to sense his mood. “Relax!” he shouted clearly in the blackness of space. “You’ve had flying dreams before. Anyone with imagination has had them. Come on, faster. We have a long way to go!”

  Stars and nebulae raced by, and ahead the density of stars was increasing, a great ovoid cloud of stars. Lanes of dark dust were like spider web and there was an intensely bright spot in the center of the cloud. They were no longer rising, but descending, and the bright spot grew quickly. Stars and luminous gas flowed past them like mist, and suddenly they were in a clear space and ahead not one, but four points of bright light, close together, and positioned as if on the corners of a square.

  Getting closer, Trae saw swirls of stars and dusty gas in tight spirals around each bright point, and in the center of the square another light appeared, glowing green. Petyr pointed at it, looking back at Trae. “The local gate; you can just barely see it now.”

  The thing was indeed green, an oval shape, pulsing in intensity at a regular rate. Wisps of dust and gas laced its edges, feelers extended to the array of bright points surrounding it.

  They slowed and came to a stop in front of the thing. Petyr moved up alongside Trae, put an arm around his shoulders. Trae felt nothing, and Petyr made a grand gesture towards the object in front of them.

  “This is where we came from,” he said dramatically.

  Trae looked at shimmering green, then Petyr. “What?”

  “It’s a gate, a portal to our universe, son, the universe our people came here from. What the priests call The Immortals didn’t originate in this universe, but came through this gate from another one. Your great grandfather came through here, and never had a life outside the ship he was traveling on, even though he lived nearly a dozen normal lifetimes before he chose to end it.”

  “I don’t understand,” said Trae. “We’re not human?”

  “Must be. We can breed with the normal lifetime folks. Nobody knows when the first gates were formed, but the one you’re looking at came from your great grandfather’s generation once they’d learned to tap vacuum energy.

  Trae frowned at him.

  “Sorry. It’s all part of your education, and it comes soon. The family fortune depends on our knowledge of vacuum-state energy and how to manipulate it. The power is unlimited. Any energy, any mass you want, you can have it. You know what black holes are?”

  “Yes.”

  “There’s a really big one on the other side of the gate, in our home universe. It has a mass of a billion stars. Spacetime is highly stressed and we’ve engineered worm-holes into it, spacetime tunnels so small they penetrate through what’s called a brane. It’s a boundary between the two universes. Once on this side, four more black holes are arranged to stabilize the exit.” Petyr pointed to the four bright points of light nearby. “Black holes evaporate slowly, but the system is dynamic; we have to continually funnel vacuum energy in to keep things stable. Even the spatial arrangement has to be changed, and it’s no small chore to move black holes around.”

  Trae was staring at him, a slight grin on his face.

  “What is it?”

  Trae smiled. “I think my own imagination is running wild. I’m somehow making it all up in this dream I’m having.”

  Petyr nodded. “I can understand that. Not a dream, son. You’re in my mind right now, seeing what I remember, and we’re talking as sure as if we’re standing next to each other. Our connection is outside of spacetime. Here’s something else for you to disbelieve, but I was there to see it when it happened, and it happens every day we’re alive.”

  Their motion was instantaneous, and away from the yawning, green chasm Petyr called a portal. They rushed in towards one of the bright points of light surrounding it. Details were suddenly there. It was not a single point of light, but a tight vortex of stars, dust and gas, an intense glow at its center. They moved in even closer, and chaos surrounded them, and ahead was a dark spot, then a speck of black near it that seemed to be their target. The speck resolved itself into a sphere, not black but dark brown, connected to a monstrous funnel-shaped thing spewing forth something that blurred the space before it far into the distance.

  They drew close. The thing was not small; it was easily the size of a planet, and Petyr sensed Trae’s wonderment.

  “It’s the size of a typical gas giant, around twenty standard-terra masses. It’s a ship, Trae. Has a crew of fifty people, and it’s only one of ten ships that police the gate and make the necessary adjustments to keep it stable. When I saw it I was a small boy, and it was pushing on that black hole ahead of us, a minor correction, by the looks of it. With a major push the space around us would be so blurred you wouldn’t be able to see the ship. It doesn’t actually push on the black hole; it produces a localized distortion in spacetime with bursts of vacuum state energy, and the mass sort of rolls along with the distortion. The required power, of course, is incredible. Ninety-eight percent of the ship is field generator to suck up vacuum state energy and redirect it. Impressed?”

  “Still hard to believe,” said Trae, “but I’m seeing it.”

  “The technology came from our universe, not this one, son. Your world is even larger than you see here. And there are four gates in this galaxy, not one, all of them near the core center. Even with a vacuum field drive it’s typically a fifty-year trip to any of the planetary systems we’ve occupied here. We’re working on that. You’ll be working on it, too. The travel time has to be shortened for reasons I’ll explain to you. The family fortune is also involved, but mainly we need to be able to respond quickly to whatever comes through the gate, and right now we can’t do that.”

  “Are we in some kind of danger?” asked Trae.

  “We could be. Our people have enemies other than the Emperor of Gan, people more powerful than him. I left Gan for a reason. My mission is yet to be accomplished. As we speak I’m on a ship nearing the gate you see before you. Within a year I’ll pass through that gate and return to our home universe. There’s a political crisis, a bad one, and I’m considered to be the leader of our people in this universe we’ve migrated to. Some would have it otherwise. They might already have sent agents through the gate to terminate me. That means you could also be in danger. Your mother is with me, and you’re the only family member left in this universe. I’ll tell you where to go and what to do, and the knowledge you have to have will be fed to you in an unconscious state. The problem you left Gan for is about to be solved. You’ll be leaving the local system, and beyond it only a few of our own people will know you’re my son. You’ll be in charge of the empire I’ve built there, Trae, even though you’re so young. You’ll know what to do, and I’ll be in constant touch. Other Immortals might contact you from a distance. Be wary of such contacts. Do not let such people know where you are or what you’re doing, and right now you’re wide open to them. You’ll have to learn to mask yourself, and I’ll show you how. Oh, this is enough for now. You’re stunned; you’re not getting all of this.”

  “I hear you,�
�� said Trae, but his mind was whirling.

  “Another time. I have less than a year to do all of this. I’m going to let you sleep a deeper sleep so I can start feeding you data on our companies. The tech stuff can come later. Time to go back, and—oh, oh, your mother is here.”

  The universe was suddenly black, gate, black holes, the great ship and swirling gases all disappearing, and then Trae was back again on a bench looking out on rolling hills and fields of flowers beneath an azure sky. Petyr was sitting across from him, looking sheepish. “I thought she’d be content to just watch this time. Sorry, dear, I wasn’t thinking of you.”

  Petyr disappeared in a blink, and a cool wind brushed Trae’s face. The light seemed to dim, and when Trae looked up he saw the sky was darker than before, a hint of purple mixed in with the blue. The fields of flowers were still there, but more mixed now, not just lavender, but splotches of deep red, white, and there were more trees with purple tops.

  Out in the fields of flowers someone was standing. She wore a long, white dress, sleeveless, and was waving to him. Even at this distance he could see her hair was blond. He waved back, stood up and went to her through the flowers, feeling his feet pushing aside their stalks, their scent enveloping him. And when he drew near he saw her face, and recognized it.

  “Anton,” she said, and held out her arms to him.

  He felt a compulsion to embrace her, but held back and saw tears well up in her eyes. “My name is Trae,” he said.

  She came up to him, sliding her arms around his neck and pressing her cheek to his. He felt pressure, but no warmth. “I know it is, but you’ll always be Anton to me. And now you’re becoming a man.”

  She took a step back and grasped his arms. “I think you favor your father a bit, but that nose is mine.” She smiled. “I’ve missed you so much. I hope someday you’ll understand why we had to leave you. I feel so badly about it, but I have to be with your father, especially now, and you have to carry on for us in the place we really want to be.”

  “Petyr—Father—he said something about a crisis in your home universe,” said Trae. “Right now I’m trying to digest and believe what I’ve heard. I might be making this all up in my own head.”

  “You’ll accept it all in time, dear,” she said, then reached down and took his hand in hers. “Walk with me, now, and tell me all about your life on Gan.”

  There was no real sense of time. They strolled together, shoulders touching, and Trae’s story was a steady stream without conscious voice, a detailed data dump of the experiences of sixteen years in the caverns. When he was finished, the woman he supposed was his true mother pursed her lips in a sad smile.

  “No girlfriends? No romantic attachments yet?”

  “My friends were few, and there were no girls. The Church doesn’t encourage it for people my age.”

  “Ah, The Church,” she said, and sighed. “That was becoming a problem even before we left Gan.”

  “It advocates belief in The Source, brought to us by The Immortals,” said Trae reverently.

  She squeezed his hand. “We had nothing to do with the founding of The Church. Your father preached democracy and equal opportunity for everyone during his mission. He wanted all people to recognize and use the natural powers within themselves to make their lives better, and to stop depending on the grace of rulers who only stole from them. The concept of ‘The Source’ was invented by a few ambitious men who obtained power by making up a new religion, and sad to say they were successful.”

  The sky suddenly darkened. Trae looked up and saw that a dense cloud had covered up the sun, but even as he watched, the cloud slid away and the sky was bright again.

  “Sorry,” she said, “but the subject of The Church makes me angry. We objected to it from the start, but the instigators only tried to pacify us by making us out as some kind of superbeings. What nonsense. If there is a God, we’re certainly not it. It’s our technology that allows us to do what we do, and that’s a product of our own brains and hard work. Nothing has ever been given to us through worship or prayer to the so-called ‘Source.’”

  Trae was struck mute, and looked down at the ground. They walked in silence a few steps, and then she squeezed his hand again.

  “I know I’ve offended you, but it had to be said. There will be more to your education than technical matters. Try not to hate me for it.”

  Still stunned, Trae said nothing. A few more steps and she stopped, grasped his arms and turned him around to face her.

  “Trae, look at me.”

  He did so, his eyes moving slowly upwards to meet hers.

  “I’m your mother, and I love you with all my heart, but I have very little time before I leave my only child in another universe, at least for a while. Your father and I are going back to a bad situation, and the only reason I’m even with him is because of the political influence of my family. I have to be there. You have to be here. You have to take charge of our affairs here, and be ready to react to any negative consequences in our political maneuverings. Billions of lives could be at stake, and I don’t want your judgement being clouded by religious teachings you’ve learned as a child. Your father can stuff you full of technical and business information, but your use of it must be realistic and practical and free of religious dogma that doesn’t apply to the vast majority of people in all universes. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

  She shook him for emphasis, and tears welled in her eyes.

  “I don’t see how my belief in ‘The Source’ can hurt anything I do in everyday life. How can faith, trust and love hurt anything?” said Trae.

  The woman who called herself his mother released him. For a long moment they just stood there looking at each other. She wiped her eyes with a hand, finally, and said, “I guess you’ll have to learn as you go along, and that’s the hard way. I can only hope we all survive it. We’ll talk another time, because your father is aching to get back to you with all his technical data. But before I go, I need to know one thing: do you remember me at all, from when you were little—before your rebirth, I mean?”

  “I remember your face—in—dreams.” He told her about the dreams, the big bed, the ornately carved door in his room. The fire.

  “They locked us in, and the house burned down around us,” she said. “I don’t remember the end of it; they told me they found us together on your bed, all charred. I’d covered you with my own body, trying to protect you. At least I was spared a direct memory of it. It doesn’t haunt me so much that way.”

  Now tears were streaming down her face. She hugged him and buried her face in his shoulder. Trae stood there stiffly, not knowing what to do.

  “We’re reborn and hardly know each other, but you’re still my Anton and I love you,” she sobbed.

  “I know,” said Trae, and immediately felt stupid. There was more he should say, more he should feel, but couldn’t. The woman was a vague memory from a dream. He didn’t know her.

  A voice came out of the clear sky, saving him. “Tatjana darling—give him time. This is all a huge revelation. The poor lad is paralyzed by all of it, so let him rest a bit. Besides, there are other things he has to assimilate before he wakes.”

  She kissed his cheek, stepped back and sniffed once, then wiped her eyes again with her hand. She looked a bit angry as her eyes moved away from Trae’s. “Very well, but next time I’ll not give up so easily. Next time I’ll have him know his own mother, even if it means you have less time with him.”

  The woman nodded curtly to Trae, and her image faded to nothingness, as if she’d been a projection on a screen of air.

  “She’s going to be very angry with me,” said a voice behind Trae, “but it won’t be the first time.”

  Trae jerked around in surprise. Petyr was standing there, now dressed in a dark business suit, strange looking and out of place in a field of flowers. “A mother’s love for her only son extends across an eternity, Trae. Be good to her, as good as you can, until you get to know her again.
The two of you are all the family I really have in this universe. Now, however, it’s time to get down to business. I’m going to let you go into rem sleep for half an hour or so, then bring you up a bit and begin feeding you data. At the same time I’ll do a bit of downloading to update my records of your memories and experiences. Make sure your guardian, whose image I’m using without permission, does the same as soon as you wake up. Updates will be necessary every night from now on until I tell you otherwise. This is important, Trae. Don’t miss a single update. I can already hear your question about memory updates. Ask your guardian. His instructions are being supplemented as we speak. No more talk; time for you to sleep. I’ll return soon.”

  Trae opened his mouth to speak—and went away somewhere.

  If there were more dreams, and likely there were, he didn’t remember them. He awoke on his bed, staring up at a white ceiling. There was a faint buzzing sound. He turned his head, realized the buzzing was coming from an open briefcase on a table in one corner of the room. The table lamp was lit. On the bed next to his lay Petyr, on his back, breathing deeply, and the man’s eyes were moving beneath his eyelids. Trae watched him for several minutes, then lay back and tried to recall everything that had happened in his dream. It was all there, in detail, total clarity. Not like a dream at all.

  A sudden, rattling intake of breath, and Petyr woke up. He sat up and rubbed his eyes, looked over at Trae. “Get up. I have to test you again,” he commanded, and swung his legs off the bed. “Now.”

  Petyr went to the recording instruments in the briefcase and fiddled with them while Trae got up. “You said you were monitoring the effects of little machines in my body, but it’s more than that, isn’t it? You didn’t tell me the truth, Petyr.”

  “It was truth as far as it went. Sit down here. We need to do this quickly. No drugs this time.”

  Trae sat down in a chair by the table, and Petyr hooked him up in the usual way. “You’re scanning my memories up to this moment, even private things,” he said. The thought made him feel a bit angry, even violated.