'Ekiversh?'
"The Ekiversh are intelligent metazoa who have a fully-developed race-memory. They gave us some help in building the machine with which we intend to stop the Shifter. They have lived so long that their knowledge is very great. They are good-natured, friendly and, because of their structure and type, live on the only planet in the system which is not in some way torn by strife. The Thron could learn something from the Ekiversh but, in their arrogance, they would not deign to do so. We have not often visited them, for whenever we leave our city the wrath of the Thron is turned upon us. But we have made telepathic communication when certain favourable laws have applied, for short periods, in the system.'
'Can you point out their planet on my chart?'
'With pleasure.'
Naro Nuis accompanied them aboard their ship, looking around him with pleasure and curiosity.
'A bizarre craft,' he said.
'Not by our standards.' Renark produced the chart and the alien bent over it, studying the figures marked there. At last he pointed. 'There.'
'Thanks,' said Renark.
'Let's get started, shall we?' Asquiol drummed his fingers.
'The Thron will be awaiting you when you leave here,' Naro Nuis said. 'Are you sure you want to risk it?'
'What else could we do?' Renark was close to anger.
The alien turned away from him.
Asquiol shouted at Naro Nuis:
'Haven't you any idea what you will do if you stop the Shifter? You could strand us here with no means of saving our people - no means of going back, even if we did find the information we need. You can't begin your experiments yet!'
'We must.'
Renark put his hand on Asquiol's arm. 'We must get to Ekiversh as soon as possible and see what we can learn before the Shaarn succeed in stopping the Shifter in orbit.'
'Then I had better leave,' Naro Nuis said sadly.
With mixed emotions, Renark said goodbye to the alien, thanking him for his help but aware that this pleasant people were about to conduct an experiment which - if it was successful - would shatter his own hopes of learning enough from the Shifter to be able to return to his own universe and save humanity.
Renark sat in the control seat, tensed. Asquiol fidgeted in his own seat by the gunnery panel.
Suddenly the force-dome over the city flickered, flashed bright orange and boiled backwards, leaving a gap. Renark's finger smashed down on the firing switch. The ship trembled, screamed and lifted.
Then they were through the gap in the screen, whining up through the clouds towards the madness of the Shifter's space.
Thron ships spotted them instantly and came flashing in their direction.
Asquiol didn't wait for Renark's order this time. As they sped into deep space, he fired.
The Thron ships flickered 'away from the cold, searing stream of anti-neutrons which Asquiol, in his desperation, had dared again to employ, and which their instruments told them meant "instant disruption. Even so, some vessels were caught for an instant in the periphery of the deadly flow, and must have suffered for it. Anti-neutrons, possessing no electrical charge, could not be stopped by any energy screen.
Asquiol could almost see the Thron licking their wounds.
He had hoped that this first exchange would frighten the attackers badly enough to give Renark time to make a clean getaway. But the Thron had the advantage of being able to manoeuvre in Shifter space. Renark gritted his teeth as he piled on power and plunged into the billowy twistiness which this region presented to his mind. It was almost like piloting a boat through mad, storm-tossed seas.
But they were seas that intruded into the mind.
The Thron came after them, and Asquiol saw them somersault preparatory to firing. He hesitated, reluctant to use his weapon a second time. Then great slams of force hit them.
The ship skidded and bucked. 'Don't pussyfoot, Asquiol,' Renark roared uncharacteristically. 'Let them have it!'
Asquiol clung to the firming arm of the anti-neutron gun. Blindly, he turned up the density to maximum and sprayed space. Phantasmal green flares snowed, on the screen before him, where he scored hits.
Renark closed his eyes and concentrated hard on the piloting. The collapse of atomic structures on a large scale was not a pleasant experience for a space senser.
After that, the surviving Thron ships withdrew. There was silence in the cabin of Renark's ship for some time.
A few hours later Renark made a quick mental exploration. He found what he'd expected. The Shaarn had begun the first stages of the experiment. There was evidence of fierce fighting near the Thron planet, and somewhere sunward a sizeable installation was being set up.
He probed further. At present the Shaarn were unmolested, but not for long. A large fleet was assembled an hour's journey away, and would soon no doubt do much to impede the progress of the Shaarn's labours. In spite of the friendliness shown him by his hosts, Renark began to regret the Thron warships destroyed by Asquiol.
Soon, Renark felt he would be gaining a complete picture of the workings of the multiverse. There were other things he wished to know and he had a feeling that if he lived he would know them soon.
Once again they were experiencing the chaotic and bewildering currents of outer space. But this time there was little emotional reaction, for their self-confidence was strong.
But Renark still had to fight to keep the ship on course in the stormy, lawless and random flowings of time and space, skimming the ship over them like a stone over water, through myriad sterechronia, through a thousand million twists of the spatial flow, to come finally to Ekiversh…
SEVEN
Immediately they landed on the peaceful oxygen planet, tiny, polite threads of thought touched their minds, asked questions.
Responding to the delicacy of the impressions, Renark and Asquiol made it clear that they wished to contact the Ekiversh as the Shaarn had suggested. They remained in the spaceship, pleased to see the light green chlorophyll-bearing plants which were not unlike Earth's.
At last there appeared outside the ship what at first appeared to be a heaving mass of semi-transparent jelly. Disgusted, Renark was repelled by the sight and Asquiol said:
'The jelly-smellies. Remember I told you they were some sort of legend on Entropium? Metazoa - ugh!'
A voice in Asquiol's head said humbly: 'We are deeply sorry that our physical appearance should not appeal. Perhaps this will be a better form.'
Then the whole mass reared up and slowly transformed itself into the shape of a giant man - a giant man comprised of hundreds of gelatinous metazoa.
Renark could not decide which form was least unattractive, but he blocked the idea out of his mind and said instead:
'We have come to converse with you on matters of philosophy and practical importance to us and our race. May we leave our ship? It would be good to breathe real air again.'
But the metazoan giant replied regretfully: 'It would be unwise, for though we absorb oxygen as you do, the waste gases we exhale are unpleasing to your sense of smell.'
'The "jelly-smellies,"' Renark said to Asquiol. 'That explains their name.'
'We were informed that you are equipped with race-memory, that in effect you are immortal,' Renark thought tentatively at the glutinous giant.
'That is so. Our great experience, as you may know, was to have witnessed, in the early days of our race, the dance of a galaxy.'
'Forgive me, but I don't understand the implications of that,' Renark said. 'Could you perhaps explain what you mean?'
'It was believed,' said metazoa, 'that those whom we call the Doomed Folk had passed away in a distant galaxy in our original universe, and that galaxy - which had known great strife - was quiet again in readiness for the Great Turn which would be the beginning of a new cycle in its long life. We and other watchers in nearby galaxies saw it shift like a smoky monster, saw it curl and writhe and its suns and planets pour in ordered patterns around the Hub and out around the Rim, reforming their ranks in preparation.