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.Finally she nodded to Kallik to move to an image sequence drawn from a different wall.The now-familiar first scenes came into view.Blue supergiant marker stars, no colonized worlds.The orange sparks of the Zardalu came, and at last went.Humans appeared in a lurid red, Cecropians in yellow.They existed side by side, spreading outward for a long, long time, until a clade of glittering cyan appeared from close to the inner edge of the spiral arm.Darya stared at the location, and could think of no species at all in that part of the spiral arm.Human exploration vessels had been there, but had found nothing.She glanced at the supergiant markers.The scene was far in the future.The cyan clade worlds grew until they met humans.Cyan then at once began to disappear.Humans were taking over the worlds of the new clade, as glowing red swallowed up cyan.That went on until the new color had vanished completely.And then, as though a process had been started that could not be stopped, red began to consume yellow.The Cecropian worlds dwindled in number, not steadily but in sudden spasms of contraction.The clade shrank back toward the original home world of the Cecropians.A final spark of yellow gleamed there, until it was replaced at last by a gleam of red.Humans, and humans alone, ruled the spiral arm.The millennia rolled on, the supergiant marker stars crept like tiny blue snails across the face of the galaxy.Finally, red points began to flicker out of existence.Not in a systematic pattern this time, but randomly, one by one.A handful, widely scattered across the spiral arm, hung on as dots of ruddy light.At last they began to vanish.Darya was finally staring at a spiral arm where again only the marker stars could be seen."Excuse me if I interrupt your thoughts, but do you wish to see the next sequence?" Kallik was standing by her side.Darya had no idea how long she had been waiting there.She shook her head.Since her findings made no sense, additional data were more likely to confuse than to clarify.Darya realized how tired she was.How long since she had slept? How long since they had entered Labyrinth, how long since they arrived in this chamber? She couldn't even guess.Still there was no sign of J'merlia.She and Kallik should have gone searching long since.The fascination of the polyglyphs had held her.The worst of it was, she wouldn't be able to sleep now no matter how she tried.And it was not because of worry over J'merlia.Darya knew her own weaknesses.She might close her eyes, but the image sequences were going to keep running, running, running, visible to an inner eye that could not be closed.They would remain until something in her brain over which she had no control permitted them to vanish.Then she would rest."Kallik, do you mind if I talk to you?" Hymenopts, unlike mere humans, never seemed to become weary."I'd like to share some thoughts, think out loud at you.""I would be honored.""Did you watch all three sequences with me?""Yes, indeed.""But you didn't see Quintus Bloom's presentation, when he was on Sentinel Gate?""That was not my good fortune.""Pity.Did you, by any chance, examine the recording of the presentation in Bloom's data files on the Myosotis?"It occurred to Darya that for someone who had asked to share her thoughts, she was doing rather poorly.So far everything had been a question.But Kallik did not object."I examined the records on the Myosotis, and I found them fascinating.""Good.So you saw what Bloom says he found in Labyrinth, and we've both seen what we found here.""Some of what we found here.With respect, three image sequences remain to be displayed.""That's all right.We'll get to them.We need to think, frame a hypothesis, then use the other image sequences to test it.""That is a procedure fully consistent with the scientific method.""Let's try to keep it that way.First, Bloom's image sequence.It was consistent with our past, and what we know of the past of the other clades.It showed a future with all clades present, and it showed a spiral arm full of colonized worlds.Now for a question: Was that the only image sequence that Bloom found?""We lack the data to provide an answer." Kallik stared all around her with her rings of eyes."However, we do know that Quintus Bloom came to a hexagonal chamber like this one, even if it was in a different interior.""Which is very probable.But you mean, he must have wondered what was on the other five walls, wherever he was? I agree.He seems a thorough research worker.He must have examined all six walls.But now let's talk about what we found.Three different histories of spiral arm colonization.The past in two of them was plausible, but in every case the far future was different.Agreed?""Certainly.Different from each other, and also different from what Quintus Bloom reported.""Good.Now I've got my own ideas, so I don't want to lead you on this.What do you see as the single biggest difference between what Bloom reported, and what we have been finding?"Kallik's exoskeleton did not permit her to frown, but her perplexity showed in the delay before she responded."With respect, I see two major differences."That remark was not one that Darya had been expecting."Two differences?""Yes indeed.First, we find that the spiral arm in the far future is empty.There are no populated and colonized worlds.Quintus Bloom found the opposite, an arm where some clade occupied every world.""That's the difference that hit me.So what's the other one?""The image sequence displayed by Quintus Bloom showed Builder artifacts.The sequences that we have seen so far offer no evidence of such artifacts.In fact, they show no sign whatsoever of the existence of the Builders, now or in the past [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]