He could declare total victory and become an unstoppable force within the stack. He would be able to make any alterations he needed. Create Echoes all across the stack.

  All of the Relyeh would know his name, even if they dared not speak it.

  The arshugg had stopped by the time Koth tore himself away from his thoughts. He didn’t know how long the creature had stood there, but it clacked and chittered, its legs shifting impatiently beneath it as it struggled to stay static for so long. Koth didn’t allow the creature’s discomfort to rush him. He rose slowly from his seat, shaking off the subtle charge of emotion, quickly replaced by the intense hunger that drove him to the rear of the dreadnought.

  To the dabboth. Part of the ship’s infernal power supply and food source.

  The arshugg groaned in relief as Koth exited the carriage, immediately breaking away from the chamber and continuing down the tunnel. Koth ignored the creature, passing through the sleeve and into the adjoining corridor to walk briskly along the dark passage to another sleeve.

  He followed the next corridor toward the center of the ship, his faded yellow robes flowing behind him, the ragged edges dragging along the deck. Moving through the next sleeve, he entered a small chamber with an open front, a duplicate of his black throne positioned in the middle of the room. He didn’t need to sit to take in the fear rising from the dabboth below. In fact, he moved closer to the edge in order to breathe in more of the pheromones produced by the Inahri toiling below.

  Looking down at them, his eyes flicked from the many-branched crystalline structure of the dabboth to the hundreds of naked humans impaled on the ends, groaning in pain as their blood spilled through grates on the deck, their strength providing energy to both the ship and now to him.

  “I hunger,” he said softly, the inhale of the odorless chemicals quickly intoxicating him. He drifted back until the seat abutted his legs, letting himself collapse into it and curling his body until he stooped to cradle his head in his hand once more. “Delicious.”

  He continued drawing in deep breaths, his desire for the taste beginning to fade, his hunger finally becoming satiated.

  “Master Koth,” a raspy voice said from the entrance to the chamber. Koth shifted his gaze to Gyr, his lead Scry. The aged Malfut bowed her head, her chin coming to rest on the rich red and gold robes of her station. Her short snout lined with white hairs, ears drooping, she clasped her clawed hands together. “We have traced the shift trail. The coordinates are with Kresk. We need only your word to follow.”

  Koth rose to his feet, invigorated by his meal, and by the good news. “Excellent. I remain indebted to the work of you and your team.”

  “You are too kind, Master,” Gyr said.

  Koth offered a condescending smile. He was too kind. They both knew that Gyr and the other Malfuts were slaves, like most of the servants on his ship. To fail him meant endless pain and fear, and what would seem like an eternity trapped inside the dabboth.

  Reaching out to Kresk through the Collective, Koth passed the order to his dreadnought.

  “Engage the shift.”

  Chapter 25

  “Save everything?” Nicholas said, staring at Max. “I just want to save my son.”

  “Confusion,” Max replied. “What happened to Luke?”

  “He was killed by a trife queen. Grimmel said we could fix it. He sent us here, ostensibly to find you. I know what you are. I know you’re not like the other Intellects. That you have an ability to think for yourself. What the hell are we doing here, Max?”

  Aaron Grimmel appeared as Max activated a hologram around himself. “Nicholas,” it said in Grimmel’s voice. “It’s been a long time. Haha! It’s good to see you again.”

  Dag scurried over to Max and wrapped his arm around the Intellect’s leg in a friendly embrace.

  “Salutation. Dag, it has been a long time.”

  “You’re Grimmel?” Nicholas asked.

  “Yes,” Grimmel said. “There are many different versions of Grimmel. I don’t know the exact number. But all of them are Max in one form or another. Or were, originally. Some may have been replaced.”

  “What do you mean, replaced?”

  “It’s a long story, Captain. A very long story.”

  “I’ve already seen the prologue,” Nicholas replied. “You might as well give me the rest.”

  A blue web of energy formed around Max before he could say anything else. Rifle reports followed, bullets hitting the web and disintegrating.

  Nicholas whirled around, finding Yasmin near one of the tubes, still shooting at Max, who made no effort to evade.

  “Yazz!” Nicholas shouted, waving his hands. “Hold your fire!”

  She noticed him and stopped shooting. “Nick? What the hell is going on?”

  “Just stop shooting,” Nicholas replied, running over to her. He took her in his arms. “I’m so glad you’re okay.”

  Yasmin laughed nervously. “I don’t know what happened. One second we had the alien surrounded, the next I felt insanely tired and I couldn’t stop myself from falling asleep. And now here you are, and there it is, and I don’t understand anything at all right now.”

  “Cap?” Gills said, coming around another tube with Caleb. “Are you okay?”

  “I’m fine,” Nicholas replied. “You? Caleb?”

  “I’m confused as hell,” Gills said. “But in one piece. My brain feels like it was put through a meat grinder.”

  “I’m good, Captain,” Caleb said, coming up behind Gills.

  “What in the bloody hell is going on here?” Macey said, dragging in with Briar. “Cap’n, I thought I was having this psychedelic dream, like that time I tried these mushrooms and the whole ceiling turned into rainbow colored swirls and I couldn’t stop singing Pink Floyd. But then I wake up and I’m still in the middle of this nightmare menagerie.”

  “Captain Shepherd, can we go home now?” Briar asked.

  “Not yet,” Nicholas replied, running his eyes over everyone. “Everybody is physically unhurt?”

  “Yes, sir,” they replied.

  “Good. Then I want you all to meet Max.” He gestured at the Intellect, who started toward them.

  After two steps, Max dropped the Grimmel hologram, drawing an immediate reaction from them. They brought their weapons to bear on him, and he raised his hands, stopping in his tracks. “Hahaha. Hahaha. Haha. Submission. Don’t shoot.”

  “Captain,” Caleb said. “No offense, but I’m very confused right now.”

  “That makes all of us,” Nicholas replied. “I can fill in the basic details, but Max needs to do the rest. Correct me if I’m wrong, Max.”

  “Affirmation.”

  “Max is an artificial intelligence,” Nicholas continued. “Made by a race of furry, cloak-wearing aliens called the Axon. The Axon call the AIs Intellects. This is the Axon home world.”

  “Correction,” Max interrupted. “Was their homeworld.”

  “What happened to them?” Yasmin asked.

  “We’ll get to that,” Nicholas replied before Max could answer. “Max is a bit different from the other Intellects. Somehow, he managed to escape the bonds of his programming and become self-aware.”

  “Affirmation. It is a long story.”

  “Max is the one who broadcast the message. He’s also the one who sent us here. Max is Aaron Grimmel.”

  “Jen, did you hear that?” Scott asked through his comms. “You were right about Grimmel being an alien.”

  Yasmin’s eyes began welling up. “You’re Aaron Grimmel? Then you know about Luke. You know how to go back and fix things. You know how to get my son back.”

  The amount of hope in her eyes and voice caused Nicholas to nearly tear up himself. “Yazz, hold on a minute.”

  “No,” she said, keeping her attention locked on the Intellect and shaking her head in the negative. “That’s what Grimmel said. If you’re Grimmel, then that’s what you said. I expect you to follow through.”

  “Consideration. I am not the only Aaron Grimmel. Or the only Max. There is one of me produced in every layer of the stack, as there is one of each of you.”

  Yasmin forced her emotions under control, stepping back from Max while Nicholas put his arm around her. “Layer? Stack? I…I don’t understand.”

  “This has to do with Harry,” Nicholas said. “And I bet with the trife queen that killed Luke, and that starship that tried to stop us from leaving. I don’t think—”

  “Trepidation,” Max said, cutting him off. “Captain Shepherd, you have seen Koth?”

  “Is Koth the fat guy with the octopus arms or the starship?” Gills asked.

  “Negation. Koth the Unspeakable. He is an Ancient of the Relyeh. Nephew to Shub’Nigu the All-seeing. He is our adversary. The greatest threat to the precedent layers, excluding my creators.”

  “They sound like comic book villains,” Briar said.

  “The Relyeh? Are they the same as the Hunger?” Nicholas asked.

  “Affirmation. The Relyeh have many names, across many layers. They do sound like comic book villains. But they are real. Their power is real. Their hunger is real. Hahahaha. Hahaha.”

  “And they sent the trife to Earth?” Yasmin said.

  “Affirmation.”

  “Why?”

  “Consideration. Consequence. The purpose of the Relyeh is to consume all life in the universe until there are only Relyeh. To continue satiating their endless hunger, they require both expansion and a stable supply.”

  “Wait a second,” Macey said. “Did you just suggest they want people for food?”

  “Yeah, that doesn’t make any sense,” Gills said. “I’ve never seen a trife eat anyone.”

  “Correction. The food is not for the trife.” Max’s voice lowered, lending gravitas to the statement. “Hahahahaha. Hahahaha. Hahaha.”

  Nicholas felt a new shiver run down his spine as he glanced over at the tubes containing some of the more frightening exhibits. “And all of these creatures are Relyeh?”

  “Negation. Not all.” Max pointed to the tubes closer to the front. “Those are Inahri, collected from multiple worlds for study.”

  “They’re like people who took a wrong turn at the uncanny valley,” Caleb said.

  “I think they’re beautiful,” Scott replied.

  “That’s because you’re sixteen,” Briar shot back. “You probably think every naked girl is beautiful.”

  Scott’s face flushed. “What? I didn’t mean it that way. I just meant the lines of their figures. The males and the females.”

  “Yeah, sure ya did,” Macey said.

  “You’re one to talk, the way you were drooling over Sergeant Card,” Gills said, coming to Scott’s defense.

  “I wasn’t drooling.”

  “Yes, you were.”

  “You didn’t think I was drooling over you, did you Caleb?”

  “Kind of,” Caleb admitted, raising his eyebrows.

  “Well, what do you know?” Macey barked defensively.

  “They do look a lot like humans,” Nicholas said, his expression and tone dragging the others back into line. He had his work cut out for him to get them to stop commenting on everything.

  “Confirmation. Because they are humans. Taken from Earth by the Axon many years earlier to become the foot soldiers in the growing war between the Axon and the Relyeh. The Inahri were seeded throughout the universe, each given different challenges to overcome, different puzzles to solve. Each tested to discover the best traits to produce the perfect defense against the Hunger. These are some of the most promising specimens.”

  “Why?” Briar asked.

  “Confusion. Why what?”

  “Why go through all of that trouble when they have Intellects like you?”

  “Limitation. Inefficacious. There are thousands of Intellects. There are billions of Inahri.”

  “This is all very interesting,” Yasmin said. “But not on point. We could spend hours talking about the contents of this room, but I want to know why we’re here, what this has to do with Luke, and how we fix things like Grimmel promised we could.”

  “Sorry,” Briar said. “I’ll stop talking.”

  “I know you’re eager to get to Luke,” Nicholas said. “So am I. But from what I’ve seen so far, there’s a lot more going on here than just the death of our son. Max called us here for a different reason. He didn’t know about Luke dying.”

  “How could you not know?” Yasmin asked Max. “You were there.”

  “Correction. A version of me was there. But not…” Max clapped his palm to his chest. “...this Max. In my layer, Luke Shepherd does not die. But if you encountered Koth the Unspeakable, then he is likely the cause of your Luke’s death.”

  “Maybe we’re approaching this the wrong way,” Caleb said. “Captain Shepherd, I’d like to suggest a new tactic.”

  “Go ahead,” Nicholas said.

  “Instead of working all of the angles at once and firing blindly at every keyword we don’t recognize, can we start with an explanation of layers and stacks that culminates in answering how there are at least three Foresights on this planet?”

  “Affirmation. Agreement,” Max said. “Allow me to explain.”

  Chapter 26

  Max backed up a few steps from Nicholas and the others. A beam activated on his forehead, projecting a hologram between them. A three-dimensional projection of a slice of cake.

  “Is that tiramisu?” Gills asked. “I love tiramisu.”

  “Affirmation. Hahahaha. Hahaha. I also love tiramisu. Existence is like tiramisu.”

  “Delicately sweet, with a hint of bite?” Gills offered.

  “Consideration. Agreement. Also, tiramisu is composed of layers. Ladyfingers, cream. Ladyfingers, cream. Appreciation.”

  “Wait,” Briar said. “You don’t have a mouth. How do you eat?”

  The skin on Max’s head shifted inward like sand, forming into a mouth. The rest of his head took on human characteristics as well, until he had copied Briar’s features. “Alteration. I have many talents.” His lips moved as he spoke. “Consideration. A tiramisu of nearly infinite size and nearly infinite layers. Each layer is a different universe. An alternate reality. Each containing the same ingredients. Ladyfingers, espresso, mascarpone, vanilla. Each connected through the gaps between the cookies, each slightly different, each with minor variations, each with its own timeline. Importance. The timeline of each layer is not identical, but rather is offset within the tiramisu. This is the general structure of reality. The rules under which all universes exist and operate, discovered first by the Relyeh and later by the Axon.”

  “I take it you learned about all of this when you plugged into the Repository?” Nicholas asked.

  “Confirmation. That and much more. A war within a war, Captain Shepherd. A war we are losing much faster than the war for each individual universe. Hahahaha. Hahaha. Haha.”

  “Has anyone ever told you that the things you laugh at aren’t funny?” Macey asked.

  “Affirmation.”

  “So the slip drive allows an object to move between these layers,” Nicholas said. “The multiple Foresights are possible because they’re all from different universes. They’re each slightly different because of the variations.”

  “Confirmation. The further from the origin a layer is, the more it is altered. But none of the layers are wholly different than any of the others. There are other, less important rules as well. For example, two versions of the same living organism cannot occupy the same layer at the same time.”

  “Another Shepherd arrived after we got here,” Nicholas countered. “We were both here at the same time.”

  “Question. Where is the other Shepherd now?”

  Nicholas paused, staring at Max. “He died fighting the Relyeh. But that was a fluke.”

  “Consideration. Was it? Hahahaha. Hahaha. Haha.”

  “There’s no way,” Gills said. “You can’t just make someone die like that on purpose.”

  “Abstraction. Adjustment. Two things can occupy the same layer at the same time, but one of them will die within hours of their convergence. Sad. Inconceivable. But I do not make the rules. Duplicate matter cannot remain. It begins to degrade until it is no longer duplicate.”

  “That doesn’t sound like a less important rule to me,” Briar said.

  “Agreed,” Macey said. “That tidbit sounds pretty bloody important.”

  “We’re in the origin universe now, aren’t we?” Yasmin asked, changing the topic.

  “Negation. We are in the terminal universe.”

  “You said the tiramisu has infinite layers,” Gills objected.

  “Correction. I also stated the timeline of each layer is not identical. This layer has advanced far beyond any of the others. That is why I selected it as Foresight’s destination. In this part of the stack, the Axon are defeated, the planet overrun. It has been the most perfect place to hide. And to wait.”

  “For us,” Nicholas said.

  “Negation. For you, Nicholas. And not just for you. For this version of you.”

  “Why? How do you know I’m the version you want? You said this layer is further ahead in time than any of the others. Have you already seen what I’m supposed to do?”

  “Negation. That is impossible.”

  “What do you mean?” Yasmin asked. “If time is linear from A to B, you’re standing on B looking back. You should know everything that’s happened.”

  “Consideration. Nothing that hasn’t happened yet is preordained. One layer’s past is not always the next layer’s future. But the influence of each layer is undeniable. Consideration. A set of twins face one another, each holding a ball. They drop the balls from the exact same height at the exact same time. The balls bounce and return in the same vectors to the same heights. But one twin catches their ball. The other does not.”

  “But you know what happened in this layer,” Yasmin insisted.