Shira said softly, "All our science is based on the search for simple rules underlying complex phenomena. Simple algorithms can be shown to generate complexities, from the turbulent flow in a glass of water to the spiral structure of the Galaxy itself."
"You see the idea," Flood said. "There's a lot of nonsense in there, but also a lot of treasure to be dug out. It's as if you have a tank full of every possible combination of words in Earthish. Most of it is dross. But in there to be discovered are the finest works of human literature—even those not written yet."
"And similarly, I suppose," Stillich said, "scientific understanding not yet acquired."
"Well, yes. But Shira has always been more ambitious than that, haven't you, Empress?"
Shira said, "Human consciousness is likewise the product of simple algorithms with particularly complicated outcomes. And similarly, any mind imaginable—human, post-human or alien—must be there to be discovered, in the pool, in metamathematical stasis."
Flood grimaced. "The Friends of Wigner were prepared to destroy Jupiter to send a message to the Ultimate Observer. Now this lunatic believes she can find the Observer in a tank of light."
"Show some respect," Stillich said sharply.
"But whether or not she ever achieved her goal, she is in danger of unleashing much greater threats on humanity. For some of the minds in there are not content with stasis, with waiting to be discovered. Look at this." He summoned up a Virtual of his own. "We've been tracking this for years. Decades. We have our spies, in Sol system. Look at this. It's a neutrino scan we made from the Freestar just hours ago."
It took Stillich a moment to work out that he was looking at a cross-section of the Earth, deep below the granite raft of Manhattan, and the imperial bunker. And down there, swimming in the mantle, was a shape, perhaps organic, perhaps artificial, a winged shape like a stingray, like a sycamore seed.
"It isn't fully formed," Flood said grimly. "Not fully operational. But it soon will be."
Kale asked, "What is it?"
"In the Friends' accounts of their dark future, there are hints of a race even more threatening to mankind than the occupiers of Earth from whom they fled. A race called—" His pronunciation was uncertain: “Chee-lee, Zee-lee. They, or their potentialities, are lurking in the logic pool. And they are trying to break out."
"How?" Kale snapped. "By constructing this ship, deep in the Earth? How are they doing that?."
"We have no idea," Flood said. "Our only concern was to stop it, before this ship bursts from the Earth like a bird from its egg. I mean, this is a threat so potent it is trying to strike at us out of nothing more than a statement of the logical possibility of its own existence! If this thing had got out of the mantle, I don't imagine our four light years' separation would have saved Alpha system. Now do you see why it was necessary to wage this war? It wasn't just for our freedom from Shira's political domination. It was to free all mankind of this terrible threat—for Shira, your Empress from the future, was endangering all of us."
Stillich looked at the Admiral's grim face.
"Decision time," said Kale.
"Yes, sir. My view? It's not worth risking Earth to save this project of the Empress's—"
"The Project is worth any price," Shira murmured. "Even that."
Kale turned to her. "Ma'am—we have no time. We must accept his terms. We can discuss the details of your abdication later—the legitimisation of an interim government ... " He turned to Flood. "You have won, star-farmer."
Flood picked up the nanotechnological box, and dropped it in the logic pool. It sank with barely a ripple, and then seemed to dissolve. Flood watched the pool, as the writhing metamathematical bifurcations withered, and the pale light began to die. "It is done."
Stillich said urgently, "And call off your relativistic attack dog."
Flood smiled. "Done."
"None of this is real," Shira murmured. She rolled back into the shadows.
Kale faced Flood. "You will pay for all you have done."
Flood gazed at him, his eyes full of regret. "Oh, I have paid, soldier. Believe me, I have paid."
And then the bunker shuddered, and a wave like a tide pulsed through Stillich's gut.
Kale staggered. "What was that?"
When Stillich had recovered, Shira was gone.
S-Day plus 11
Asteroid Belt
Earth was so close now that Densel Bel could see it, an image magnified and heavily corrected for relativistic distortions, suspended over his head—he could see it in real time, a blue marble, achingly beautiful, and yet scarred by war. But he could never touch it. The vast pulse of kinetic energy that had been injected into this ship by years of GUTdrive acceleration separated him from his home world just as much as if he had been stranded in another universe.
Only subjective minutes remained before his life ended, and Earth died with him.
Once more Flood appeared before him. "It's over," he said, smiling.
"What is?"
"The war. Shira is abdicating—we are free. Now you must destroy the Fist Two."
"Me? Why me?"
"This was your purpose, Densel Bel. You are my failsafe. I needed somebody on board who I knew would terminate the mission, even at the cost of his own life. And that's you, a man loyal both to Earth, where you were born, and Footprint, where you have your family. You have the authority. Just say aloud, 'let it end'. The AI will do the rest. Goodbye, Densel Bel. I hope you feel the sacrifice you are making is worth it."
"Flood. Wait—"
"Yes?"
"Would you have done it? Would you have let the Fist strike the Earth?"
"Oh, yes. To stop what Shira was doing—believe me, there was no choice. Good luck, Densel Be!." He broke up into a cloud of pixels and disappeared.
Densel Bel looked up at the blue Earth, and thought of Su-su and Fay. "let it end."
Light flared, an instant of intense white pain—
S-Day plus 7 months
Earthport
The flitter rose from Earth like a stone thrown from a blue bowl. The little cylindrical craft tumbled slowly as it climbed, sparkling.
Peering out from the rising flitter, Stillich had to admit that the Freestar, which he had come to inspect on behalf of the Navy, looked spectacular, with the newly constructed wormhole Interface, a bright blue tetrahedron with milky-gold faces, slung beneath its angular spine. When Flood and his crew returned to Alpha system in a couple of months, they would take the grudging good wishes of Earth's interim government with them, and the business end of a new wormhole, which would link the worlds of Alpha and Sol forever.
"Or until the next political crisis," Flood said dryly.
"There is that."
"Look—here comes another shipment of green muck from Titan."
It was a cargo pellet slung from Titan that had crossed the system unpowered, and now made an entry into Earth's atmosphere, cutting a bright contrail across the blue sky. This crude shipment method was an interim emergency measure, until the great space elevators were hung in the sky once more.
"Not 'green muck'," Stillich said. "Algal concentrate."
Flood pulled a face. "Next time you visit Footprint, be my guest at dinner."
"That might be some time away," Stillich said gently.
They both knew that was likely to be true. Too many had died, on Earth and elsewhere, for the populations of Sol system to forgive their colonial cousins for the war, whatever the retrospective justification in terms of Shira's murky crimes.