Part 36 (1/2)

”You don't get it.” She took a deep breath. ”The idea of becoming a mother is all I can deal with right now.”

”Dora.” Zical took her hand between hers. ”I'll help you all that I can. But please tell me you feel up to the task of motherhood. Or do you fear that responsibility too?”

”I'm not afraid.'' At her words, the tension in his shoulders eased. And she already wanted this child with a fierceness that made her breath catch. ”It's just that I didn't picture my life taking this path.”

”Neither did I. When I was a boy, I thought I'd grow up on Rystan. I never dreamed I'd have enough to eat or that I'd pilot a stars.h.i.+p or that I'd father a child with a woman who was born as a machine. I never dreamed that my foolish exploration on Mount Shachauri could threaten life in the galaxy or that it would be our destiny to try and stop the Zin. We can't always choose out fates.”

”I know that.” She squeezed his hand and then released it. ”Give me time to adjust.”

He released a sigh of exasperation. ”I'd rather we raise our child together, but if you aren't up to the task,”-his tone softened to gentle, fuzzy, sensitive-”I will raise and love the baby alone.”

At his ender words, she wanted to cuddle in his arms and let out a sob. Already she was too attached to the life growing in her womb to ever hand the baby over to him to raise after it was born. But it wasn't fair to take comfort from him when she couldn't promise him a future together. So she held back. Held back the tears of frustration that with all her intellect and all her planning and all her great knowledge of science, she'd forgotten the basic biological fact that when women and men copulated, they made babies.

She'd thought of having a child in the abstract. Much like she'd thought of someday having a husband. It was for time in the distant future. She certainly hadn't expected to tie herself down with such responsibilities during her first year of being human. And yet she couldn't help the eagerness and excitement and love from spiraling. What would their child look like? What kind of personality would it have? Boy or girl?

220.

She didn't care. She simply prayed that it would be born healthy and strong. And she wondered if she could be a good mother when she'd had none of her own to learn from by example.

After they returned to Mystique, Miri and Shaloma and Tessa would help her. As would Etru and Kahn. But of their family, only Tessa would understand her reluctance to marry Zical. And if she never married, likely only Tessa would remain nonjudgmental. But Dora couldn't make her decision based on how others would judge her. Whatever she decided, her baby would be loved.

Chapter twenty-one.

Zical avoided Dora for the next two days in hypers.p.a.ce. Although she often dwelled on her impending motherhood, she also worried about her future as well as Zical's. Since what Kirek needed most to recover from his ordeal was rest, he spent most of his tune sleeping, and it gave her too much time to think. Mostly, she fixated about the future of success of their meeting with the Sentinel.

After their escape from Kwadii, Ranth had run a selfdiagnostic program. He'd discovered that while he'd hidden in the vault, the hyperdrive had been tampered with, slowing their progress. Dora knew Zical had questioned the newcomers on board, Avanti and Deckar, but she could think of no motive for them to attempt to slow the mission. They were spending all their time developing their psi to operate their Federation suits. She figured it more likely that when the Kwadii had put the dampeners on their systems, and Ranth couldn't protect the system while hidden in the vault, the dampeners had somehow adversely affected the hyperdrive.

Although repairs had been undertaken, Ranth estimated it would now require an entire extra week to reach the galaxy's rim, where they hoped to find a way to contact the Sentinel, then reprogram the ancient machine to return to guard the galaxy. The scientists were already discussing theoretical issues on how to locate the Sentinel.

However, now that they were so much closer to the rim, Dora wanted to attempt to gather more information. During the journey her psi had strengthened, and Ranth and she worked more smoothly together than ever before. Their reach into s.p.a.ce was far greater, their ability to infiltrate distant star systems more manageable, and they'd broadened their communications networks to gather information.

And she hoped that since the Sentinel was now closer to the Milky Way Galaxy, she might contact the machine directly. The knowledge she could gain would be invaluable, and the task would also give her relief from thinking about Zical, his marriage proposal, and the baby growing inside her. Much more comfortable in the world of logic and statistics and program a.n.a.lysis than in dealing with her personal problems, she tapped into Ranth, hoping that with the hyperdrive repairs completed, he could give her his full power.

Ranth?

Linking.

Dora's mind merged with the processors, the hardware, her sensory array expanding until she could ”see” from thousands of s.h.i.+p's sensors, monitor hundreds of thousands of random communications, take in so many details that it flooded her brain.

To avoid mental burnout, she focused on keeping only the data she required, filtering 222.

out extraneous material. And she linked with Ranth, she lost her of smell, her sense of touch, becoming lost in a system of intricately woven code.

And the Ranth's and her psi, powered up, shooting them through hypers.p.a.ce, linking with machines from thousands, maybe millions, of other worlds. They ignored all data except that which pertained to legends of the Perceptive Ones, the Sentinel, and contacting and reprogramming the machines.

They found so little. On a planet called Haptarin was an outpost where the Perceptive Ones might have once spoken to the people on Mount Faragon. On Danjabo, she caught a reference to the Perceptive Ones in an ancient museum, noted a sculpture labelled The Sentinel, and collected odd bits of data that alone made no sense but perhaps when studied overtime might aid their quest.

Stretching their new powers, they flung their psi ever outward toward the rim, where the stars thinned and the galaxy succ.u.mbed to the vastness of empty s.p.a.ce between galaxies. Utter blackness, utter quiet coc.o.o.ned them.

Silence.

Darkness.

Emptiness.

Without Ranth's link, Dora would have been terrified of becoming lost in the immensity of nothingness. And still they stretched their psi out toward the Andromeda Galaxy. Pus.h.i.+ng. Seeking. And Dora's isolation increased as she let go of all sense of self. Hurtled through the great blackness until...

Ranth What is that? She noted a tendril of alien intelligence. An iota of a psi tickle.

I am Guranu.

The words came to her clearly, the ent.i.ty responding in pure thought. Guranu. A resting place for the Sentinels during their long journey.

The information excited and stunned. They'd a.s.sumed from the start of their mission that there was only one Sentinel. But Guranu had indicated there might be more.

Sentinels? There is more than one?

Guranu maintains contacts with thousands of Sentinels. Do you require aid?

We require communication and information, Dora requested, electrified by this contact, but worried that they couldn't maintain the link for long. The distances were simply too far, their powers weakening by the second. All along they'd thought that a single Sentinel, one machine, protected them from the Zin. To learn there were so many astounded her.

Then hope rose in her. Was it possible only one Sentinel had been recalled? And that the rest remained between the Milky Way and the Andromeda galaxies still standing watch as they had for eons?

Guranu can link you and the Sentinels. Stand by.

223.

Standing by, Dora agreed, wondering if their entire journey might have been for nothing. If Zical's presence at Mount Shachauri had only recalled one machine of thousands, they all might still be safe. And the crew could go home to Mystique if they could find another powersource. Dora would have liked nothing more than to speed them through hypers.p.a.ce to return to have her baby with her best friend at her side. To be cut off from Tessa had made Dora grow, but she missed Tessa and longed to talk to her. About Zical. About the baby. About what Dora should do next.

This is Sentinel 17592. Why do you seek communication?

Have all Sentinels been recalled? Dora asked.

Yes.

Oh, no. It was worse than she'd thought and her hopes that all was at it should be burned out as quickly as a falling meteor. If all the Sentinels had been recalled, their task was much more difficult. How would they find and contact them all? Somehow they'd have to find a way to turn all of them around-a seemingly impossible goal.

The recall order was an error, Dora communicated to the Sentinel. All of you must turn around.

The Sentinels do not listen to the enemy.

Enemy? The Sentinel thought they were the enemy? Then why had it given them the information they'd been recalled? Nothing made sense. Panic filled her. She tried to explain. We are not the enemy. We are on the same side. The Perceptive Ones created the Sentinel to protect us from the Zin.

You harbor an ally of the Zin. You are the enemy.

Dora sensed the machine's implacable will. Had the Sentinel's programming broken down, just like the Perceptive Ones' programming on Mount Shachauri? She sent a tendril down the link, hoping to infiltrate the system and discern the problem.