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One more thing needed to be verified before they departed. Broghuilio and his
Jevlenese were thought to have appeared at Minerva at around the time that the
Lambian-Cerian rift was developing. Whether the Jevlenese had actually caused
it was unknown. But even if not, the warlike disposition and ambitions of
conquest that Broghilio had displayed on Minerva suggested that they would
have been involved in escalating tensions to the eventual outbreak of war.
Since the Shapieron was witnessing the termination of that war, it had
obviously arrived at a point in time that lay after the arrival of the
Jevlenese. Exactly how long after, nobody could say. The Thurien interrogators
at the time had asked no questions about Jevlenese, for Jevlenese didn't yet
exist, while the Lunarian survivors had said nothing about any mysterious
aliens showing up at some point in the past. And that was hardly surprising.
For if events had indeed followed the course that was surmised, it meant that
one side was being aided by an alien intrusion whose existence could only have
united the general Lunarian population in opposition had they known about it.
Hence, Broghuilio and his cohort, and whatever Lunarian element had thrown its
lot in with them, would have every reason to conceal the fact of the new
allies' origins which the fully human form of the Jevlenese would have
facilitated greatly.
From the fragments of Lunarian records available at the time of the original
"Charlie" investigations, it had been guessed that the Jevlenese arrived at
Minerva a century or two before the war. The more recent researches that
Duncan and Sandy had helped with now put it at far less. The Lambian leader at
the time the war escalated to destroying the planet was a dictator called
Xerasky. He had come to power upon the death of his predecessor Zargon, which
few at the time doubted Xerasky had engineered. Zargon had been a former
military general of the last of the Lambian kings, Freskel-Gar. Zargon was an
unknown who came rapidly to the fore in initiating and commanding an advanced
militarization program. He later ousted Freskel-Gar and proclaimed a
dictatorship, taking charge himself. The suggestion that Zargon might have
been Broghuilio was obvious, but it was still speculation. Zargon had appeared
abruptly somewhere around twenty years before Minerva's destruction.
When the Jevlenese ships exited from the turmoil of spacetime that had
tunneled them from another universe, they had been followed by the probe whose
last transmitted image of Minerva had gotten back before the tunnel closed.
Hunt, Danchekker, Garuth, and others aboard the Shapieron now had been present
when that image came in. The probe was from the Shapieron, which had been
pursuing the Jevlenese. Fifty thousand years later, orbiting on the edge of
the Solar System and carrying still functional h-band equipment, it would
relay the first signals that opened up contact between modern Earth and
Thurien. If it had arrived at Minerva twenty years previously with the
Jevlenese, that probe should be out there somewhere now. This was the one
final thing to check.
ZORAC used the ship's communications gear to scan a circle around the
ecliptic, sending out the appropriate call codes. And sure enough the probe
returned an acknowledgment and fix from a position not too far from Minerva it
would have fifty thousand years to find its way out to the edge of the Solar
System. It meant that, yes, Broghuilio and the Jevlenese had arrived. But they
were already a part of Minerva's past. The Shapieron needed to move farther
upstream against the flow of events.
"That's all we need to know," Eesyan told Garuth. "There's no more for us to
do here."
Garuth brought the Shapieron back to the vicinity of the primary beacon. A
call via the beacon when the ship had powered down from main drive
reestablished contact with Thurien.
"Lock on to ship's compensator confirmed," the supervisor's voice advised.
"Suppressor compensation positive. Stabilizing the bubble. . . . You're set to
come home."
"You guys don't seem very talkative," Caldwell commented, back on the circuit.
Silence hung heavily for a second or two.
"I guess there's not really a lot you can say, Gregg," Hunt answered finally.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
The voice of Top Sergeant Nooth yelling at the newest squad of recruits,
accompanied by the rhythmic thud of boots crashing in unison, came from
outside the barrack hut window.
"Hup-two-three-four. Hup-two-three-four. What's the matter, Frenitzow?
Frightened of pulling a muscle? Worry about it when you've got some. Pick
those feet up. Hup-two-three-four . . ." The sounds faded in the direction of
the parade square, giving way to the intermittent rat-tat-tat of small arms
from the firing range.
Lieutenant Klesimur Bosoros stretched back on his bunk and set aside the
magazine with the article on biological writings of the Giants that he had
been reading. At least, he was still known as Kles. That much of his life
hadn't changed. Just about everything else had, in ways that he would never
have thought possible. He didn't get much time to think about his former
interests these days, although when he was alone on night sentry duties he
would still pick out the Giants' Star and remember his boyhood dreams. The
situation between Lambia and Cerios had deteriorated to the point where actual
conflict had broken out between them under different pretexts on a number of
occasions. Only a matter of years ago, such things had been all but
unthinkable. Now, so the sociologists said, they were recognized as an
inevitable consequence of societies becoming more complex and developing ideas
they were not prepared to compromise. So the world was busily learning and
improving its new arts to defend them.
Kles's unit had been fortunate enough not to be involved in any of the
fighting so far, and some of the barrack-room psychologists and political
experts assured them all confidently that they wouldn't be, because the fit of
insanity would soon be over. The Cerian president, Harzin, had issued an
appeal to the Lambians, calling for Minerva to come to its senses before it
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