In the Heart of Darkness

The Rajput glanced at Great Lady Holi. The old woman, he was even more relieved to discover, seemed to have retreated into a trance. It was almost as if she were not there. Only a statue of her, unmoving, rigid.

Sati followed his glance, smiled faintly.

'She is not Great Lady Holi. Not really. Great Lady Holi is simply a vessel. The divine being who dwells in that vessel is named Link.'

'A goddess? Or a god?' asked Sanga. He was rather proud that his voice neither stammered nor had a trace of tremor.

'Neither,' replied Sati. 'Link has no sex, Rana Sanga. It is a pure being, a deva spirit sent by the gods. The new gods.' The young princess straightened her back. 'When Great Lady Holi dies, I will replace her as Link's vessel. I have trained for that sacred mission my entire life. Since I was but a babe.'

Watching her obvious pride in that announcement, Sanga felt a sudden pang. He did not find Sati attractive, as a man might find a woman. For all the comeliness of the young princess, hers was a type of aloof beauty which appealed to him not at all. His own wife was plump, plain-faced, and prematurely grey. She was also as warm as rich earth, and as playful as a kitten.

Still, he felt a pang. He could not imagine this princess ever tickling a husband in bed, mercilessly, as his own wife delighted in doing. But he could not help that pang, thinking of this young woman as-whatever Holi was. Something not human.

The inhuman thing in the room, he now learned, could read minds far better than any mortal.

'Do not feel sorrow at Sati's fate, Rana Sanga. Your sorrow is misplaced. It derives from nothing more than ignorance.'

He stared at Great La-at Link.

'You are privileged, Rana Sanga. You are the first human I have spoken to since I arrived in this world, other than Malwa.'

'Why?' he managed to ask.

'It is necessary. I did not expect Belisarius to be so capable. The historical record misled me.'

Sanga frowned. Curiosity overrode all fear.

'You knew of him?'

'Of course. In the world that was, he reconquered the Roman Empire for Justinian. Given the severe limits under which he was forced to operate, he may have been the greatest general ever produced by humanity. He was certainly one of them. The distinction, at that level of genius, is statistically meaningless.'

Sanga did not understand the word 'statistically,' but he grasped the essence of her-of Link's-statement.

'If you knew all that, why-'

'I am not a God. The Gods themselves-the new Gods, even, who are real-are not Gods. Not as you understand the term. Nothing in the universe can be a `God' as you understand the term. It is precluded by chaos theory and the uncertainty principle.'

The last sentence was pure gibberish, but, again, Sanga understood the sense of Link's statement. For a moment, his Hindu orthodoxy rose in rebellion, but Sanga drove it down. The moment was too important for religious fretting.

'Explain further. Please.'

'I could know of Belisarius, Before I arrived, only that which is recorded in history. That he is a great general, is a matter of record. That he is something greater, is not. I do not understand that unexpected capacity. No general could have done what he has done. No general could have manipulated all of Malwa so perfectly. And, certainly, no general could have reacted so instantly when I detected his duplicity.'

For a moment, Link paused, as if in thought.

Does such a being even 'think'? wondered Sanga.

'Either my data are incomplete, or other factors are at work. I must discover which. It is essential that you catch him, for that reason above all others.'

Awed, Sanga was; frightened, even. But he was still a Rajput. A Rajput king, he reminded himself.

'I cannot promise you that,' he stated harshly. 'And I will make no vow which I cannot keep.'

In the silence which followed, Sanga had time to wonder at his punishment. Would this- divinity-be satisfied with stripping him of his lands? Or would it demand his life?

The response, when it finally came, astonished him. From the divine being who secretly ruled Malwa, he had expected a Malwa reaction.

'Excellent. You are a treasure, Rana Sanga. It is possible that we erred, choosing Malwa over Rajput.In the end, reliability seemed more important than capability. From the long view of time.'

The last sentence was chilling. Sanga suddenly grasped-even if only vaguely-the immensity of that 'long view of time.' As gods might see it.

'Now, as a result, we must adapt. More of Rajputana's essence must be incorporated into the new world we are creating. More of that capability.'

Sanga was not entirely sure he found those words reassuring. For him, Rajputana's essence was not Rajput ability. It was the Rajput soul. Rajput honor.

Again, the divine being called Link seemed to read his mind perfectly.

'You do not understand, Rana Sanga. Malwa and Rajput are but moments. Stages in a process, nothing more. To you, they loom large and fixed. To the new Gods, they are as transient as mayflies.All that matters is the process.'

'What-process?' he croaked.

'The salvation of humanity from what it will become. From the horror of its self-created future. I was sent back in time to change that future. To change history.'

'I will show you that horror. I will guide you through the future. Through human damnation.Through final pollution.'

Sanga had time, just, to begin raising his hand in protest. His hand felt limply to his side.

Visions gripped him, like a python.

Chapter 19

Blinding flash. A sun arose below the sun. The city beneath that sun vanished. Its inhabitants were incinerated before they knew it.

The city's suburbs were not so fortunate. Charred, but not vaporized; its people screaming, their skins peeled from their bodies in an instant. Seconds later, the suburbs and its shrieking people were blown apart by a sweeping wall of wind.

'Shock wave. Overpressure.'

Sanga understood neither term. Nor the next:

'Seventy-megaton warhead. Excessive. Crude. The other side responded with MIRVS. Circular probability of error was so fine as to make up the difference.'

Another city. Obliterated, not by one giant sun, but by ten smaller ones. The difference, in the end, was nothing.

'The exchange continued for eight days. Within a month, half the world's life was gone. Within a year, all of it, above the level of bacteria. It was the first time humanity extinguished its own world. It would not be the last.'

The world, barren. A single vast desert, so bleak as to make the Thar seem an oasis. The seas, grey and empty. The sky, black with an overcast thicker than anything Sanga had ever seen, in the worst of monsoon season.

'Four times humanity destroyed the Earth. Twice by nuclear fire, once by kinetic bolides, once by disease.'