"But -- you have to be able get the accessway working," Alvina protested. "You bond with machines -- you can fix anything!"
Macro stood up and dusted off his pants legs. "To a point," he replied. "Yes, I can get any mechanism working -- but only if there's something to get working to begin with. This one's totally shot. Fused into slag, probably by a pulse bomb in one of the previous wars. A few auxiliary systems are semi-functional -- enough let me "see" into the system and make the diagnosis. But there's a -- a hole in the heart of the machine. It's so melted together it can't be repaired, let alone restarted."
"Perhaps," ventured J'Onn J'Onzz, "if I dug through the rubble, cleared this accessway of yours with my super-strength--"
Macro was already shaking his head. "There is no physical accessway -- not in this place and time. From what I've determined I can only speculate that the fried mechanism was designed to bring one into sync with us from -- elsewhere. Backstage Peripheral itself, no doubt. If it were a simple tunnel, then yes, clearing it that way would work. But a simple tunnel could never have penetrated the portlock to begin with."
"Then--"
"It's over. Done. We can't get into Peripheral this way."
There was a considerable amount of argument back and forth before the others could be brought to accept Macro's assessment. But he had an answer to every quibble, every objection. The facts were as he had stated. The accessway was worthless. Nothing of the mechanism's original design was recoverable. Nothing for super-powers, for wisdom, for wishing, for mana, for magic, to get a grip on, or correct.
If there was a generally agreed-upon low point of the entire mission, this was it. To come so close....
Finally, D.J. Woohoo spoke what was in everyone's mind. "You're the leader, Sendulo. This is your ground. If there's any alternative, you're the one who has it. What do we do?"
Sendulo looked at her bleakly. "I see only two options," he said.
"I'll work on optimizing them," Alvina promised.
"One, while certain, doesn't do us any good," Sendulo stated. "The other, only a fool would attempt."
"Give it to us straight, Sen," Sigmund urged.
"We could wait for the Supers to blow out the portlock and follow them through to Peripheral," the Reaver chief continued. "That's the sure way, but it would be fatal for our cause. Our only hope of helping Cyd is to reach her now, while there's still a chance to help her prepare for what's coming. That would be too late -- for her, for us, and likely for our entire universe. Unless she managed to pull some rabbit out of her hat--"
"Possible, Father," Alvina pointed out. "Mom has before. That's why the universe still stands to begin with."
"Yes, but we can't count on it happening again. You don't remember all the wars, Alvina, but I do. It's gotten harder every time. Your mother's choices are not limitless, and the Supers have learned from their past failures. If we can't provide her with new possibilities, this could well be it."
"What's the second option?" Dabbler asked.
"Make for Panmunjon, bluff our way in somehow, and hoping someone's awake at the switch in Peripheral to yank us through."
"That's it?" cried Mary, incredulously.
"That's it. As I said, only a fool would try it. Everything would have to break just right, and anything could go wrong."
JigSaw turned at Sindy. "So it looks like it's the Frodo scenario for us after all, Sin," she quipped.
Sindy made a face, seeing nothing humorous about it.
"Working," Alvina said, in a distracted-sounding voice.
Mon Nov 10 22:49:26 2003
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