Unseen hands snapped off the carapace. They plucked out the articulated limbs one at a time, peeled off the front plates that covered Azzar’s circuits. Next, they spun the robot’s angular head in a full circle before detaching it.
Even then, the Shana Rei weren’t finished. They tore out each of Azzar’s now-dull optical sensors and extracted circuits, spreading out an ever-growing cloud of debris. After the argumentative robot was completely dismantled, the Shana Rei broke down the components even further, snapping them, twisting them, until the large pieces were smaller pieces, then tiny bits that broke down into nothing at all.
Exxos had been correct in withholding detailed information. The Shana Rei could easily destroy all of the robots, but Exxos had to find some way to make himself, and his comrades, worthwhile.
Finally, the throbbing dark stain turned its eerie eye back toward Exxos and pronounced, “You are machines, but you are aware.”
“We are intelligent. We are independent. Our ships were escaping an enemy. We did not mean to intrude. We intend you no harm.”
The Shana Rei said in unison, “We cannot be harmed. The Shana Rei are everywhere. We live beneath, between, and behind the cosmos. You cannot intrude.”
Exxos pondered the conundrum, his thoughts racing. “We understand. Perhaps we can assist you.”
The black blot continued. “Order and precision offend us… but your robot thoughts do not cause us pain, as the Ildiran thism does, as the thrumming and rattling of verdani thoughts, as the piercing wail of the faeros…”
From Ildiran databases, the black robots knew that ages ago the Shana Rei had leaked through from the void to uproot the stranglehold of Ildiran thism. It had been a tremendous battle, and only an unlikely alliance with the fiery faeros had driven them back.
The Shana Rei grew more strident, more agitated, more deafening. “As does biological life everywhere—festering, chattering, droning, pounding.”
Exxos spoke, trying to stall while he thought of a way to save himself. “The Shana Rei are creatures of the void, chaos incarnate and entropy itself.”
“We are the natural state of the universe. Order and form are contaminants in the cosmos,” said the shadow blot. “We hold you now in an entropy bubble, safely walled off from the rest of the universe. Once, we resided quietly in the dark spaces between the stars, but now we have been forced to move, driven out of the silent emptiness because something tremendous is awakening.”
Reacting with incomprehensible anger, the formless Shana Rei expanded and collapsed like a midnight heartbeat. Then they used their invisible force to separate another helpless robot from the rest and sent the specimen spinning and careening.
Exxos watched as they toyed with it like a malicious child who had caught an interesting insect. The black robot struggled, bleated out signals of panic, but the others could not help. Exxos remained silent, fearing how many of his remaining robots would be torn apart on the whims of the shadow creatures. He began to doubt any of them would survive—unless he could find a way to make the black robots valuable.
As if testing their abilities, or just destructively curious, the Shana Rei extended the victim’s segmented metal legs, breaking off one at a time, before splitting open the back carapace to toy with the internal circuitry.
“We are only searching for peace, silence,” the Shana Rei continued. “To restore the universe to the way it was before the infestation of life.” The dark things continued their casual dissection of the robot. “The screams of living things and the thrum of minds make the universe an intolerable place.”
With a vicious yank, the Shana Rei tore off the robot’s flat head and sent it spinning into the emptiness.
“The noise just became intolerably louder as something great and terrible is awakening. It poses a powerful threat.”
With swift invisible strokes, they continued the methodical disassembly, breaking the robot’s pieces into smaller and smaller fragments, until nothing visible remained.
“The Shana Rei have been driven out and forced to war. Though the universe holds more emptiness than substance, we are losing the battle for creation.”
Before the Shana Rei could turn on other robots, Exxos decided he had to gamble to survive. He lied. “We are unique—and we know how to win that battle. You would be wise to ally yourselves with us.”
FORTY-EIGHT
OSIRA’H
The astronomy team rushed Osira’h directly to Ildira from the turbulent star Wulfton. Because her other halfbreed siblings were connected with Gale’nh, she knew Rod’h, Tamo’l, and Muree’n had also sensed the crisis aboard the Kolpraxa.
The distant expeditionary ship had been swallowed in nothingness, a paralyzing shadow. The Ildirans aboard had cried out into the thism, despairing and drowning in cold, infinite blackness.
Though the rest of the Kolpraxa’s crew had fallen silent, her brother Gale’nh was still in there somewhere, alive but separate, immersed in a cold blindness that went to her marrow. She could sense him but could not comprehend the flood of his thoughts and emotions any more than she could understand the faeros. But she felt his urgency.
She raced back to join Rod’h and Muree’n in Mijistra; maybe together they would find a solution…
When she met him inside the Prism Palace, Rod’h wore a grim, lost expression that could not be softened even by the rainbows that shone through the crystal walls. “The entire Kolpraxa—it’s gone. I sensed fear throbbing from the crew. Gale’nh tried to challenge it, but he was overwhelmed.”
Osira’h nodded. “There was no explosion or attack that I could understand. We have to go see my father. He must have sensed something when the Kolpraxa vanished. All those Ildirans.”
Rod’h shook his head. “He failed to sense it the way we did. The other Ildirans were just… removed from the thism, as if taken out of the universe entirely.” He narrowed his eyes. “But there is more. Through the treelings, our mother received a message from the CDF flagship accompanying Adar Kori’nh on war exercises. They encountered an infestation of black robots at Dhula.”
Osira’h frowned. “I don’t believe black robots are responsible for what happened to Gale’nh.”
“Perhaps not,” Rod’h said, “but the robots escaped into some sort of dark nebula—exactly like what Gale’nh encountered. Adar Zan’nh just returned and is briefing the Mage-Imperator now.”
They hurried toward the skysphere audience chamber. Before they reached the tall entryway, Muree’n joined them. Their half-sister wore the scaled tunic and reinforced leggings of a warrior, and her every movement was filled with prowling grace. Muree’n’s telepathic ability was the least of Nira’s five halfbreed children, but the sibling bonds were strong, a connection forged through blood and breeding, as well as through thism. Osira’h knew that on distant Kuivahr, Tamo’l had felt the same thing.
And she could still feel Gale’nh. And the terror that engulfed him.
“We may have a fight on our hands,” Muree’n said. “Something attacked our brother—it was an act of war.” She spoke as if she fervently wished that it were so as the three made their way past the guard kithmen into the audience chamber.
Mage-Imperator Jora’h sat in his chrysalis chair with Nira beside him. Adar Zan’nh stood at the base of the dais, issuing his report. He had a harried, almost disheveled appearance as he described his recent fight. “Liege, the robot ships vanished into a dark nebula that was no mere dust cloud. It was alive. Our sensors began to fail, controls became confused.”