Lonely Castles

by S. A. Tholin

  "What is what?"

  "Answer me, or the commander will have you collecting your teeth from the floor."

  The commander would do no such thing, and certainly not on Juneau's orders, but Ruotsi cowered.

  "I would answer you, but I don't understand. There's nothing wrong. The scans show normal brains."

  "Hardly. There's a distinct lack of grey matter around the hippocampus. And on the neurological scans, the anterior cingulate cortex shows unusually low levels of activity."

  "The major's right," Tallinn said, viewing the scans with interest. "The ACC has many functions. Error detection, decision making, awareness... It's impossible to say exactly how such low levels of activity would affect an individual, but I'd expect them to be prone to knee-jerk reactions, maybe even aggression. Impulsive, possibly with an impaired ability to focus. They'd be a bit of a barbarian, I suppose."

  "Barbarian." Ruotsi laughed. "God, you Primaterre really are full of yourselves. They're normal brains, with activity levels well within the normal range. Barbaric? No – human. And if you've never seen brains like that before, well, you ask yourself why that is."

  The conversation was taking an uncomfortable turn. Cassimer wanted to end it before it approached dangerous territory, but Juneau wouldn't let go now. A frown deepened the crease between her almond-shaped eyes.

  "You're saying all Kalevala have brains like this?"

  "No. I'm saying all humans have brains like this. All humans except for these seven dead Primaterre – and the one billion living Primaterre."

  "Are you saying we're not human?" Lucklaw sounded worried enough to make Tallinn smile.

  "It's not that big of a deal," she said, her voice soft and calming. "It's scientific fact that the practice of purity has a physical effect on the brain; the ACC in particular. It's like exercise for the mind. As weight-lifting helps build muscle, purity helps grow thicker layers of neurons. Pain tolerance and self-control; the ability to live in the moment – all of these things can be improved with contemplation and adherence to doctrine. Purity unlocks our potential."

  "Yes, but..." Juneau bit her lip. "If this is normal and Primaterre brains are the abnormal, that doesn't explain the locals from Cato. I examined some of them back at Miranda Station. Malnourished, sickly, but their brains looked fine. Their brains looked exactly like I expected them to – like Primaterre brains. How could that be? They certainly don't practice purity, and the kind of changes you're talking about, Tallinn, can only be achieved through sustained repetition. Regular adherence to doctrine wouldn't be enough. It'd take a monk, repeating a mantra over and over again, every day of his life. We know that Skald did that to the people of Cato. We know that it whispered to them every day, making them do its bidding. So that makes sense. It makes sense that their brains were affected like that. But ours... it's like something is..."

  She trailed off, giving Cassimer an uncertain look. Realisation sat at the tip of her tongue, he could tell. Like something is whispering to us. She was too clever not to see it, but the priming wouldn't let her say it. Even now, it would be whispering to her to let it go, to lose that thought and think of something nicer – something like the white veil enveloping her, the sweet blanket that told her that everything would be okay, so long as she stopped thinking.

  "Primaterre protects us all," Cassimer said, helping the priming along.

  Juneau smiled and let go of her scratching thoughts, her brow smoothing as she repeated his words back to him. It turned his stomach to see a woman so close to understanding forced back into ignorance. She deserved better, but it was Cassimer's job to keep his team safe.

  "Commander." Rearcross stood in the corridor. "Door's about to come down. RebEarth are breaching."

  "Primaterre protects us all," Ruotsi said, in a low, laughing voice. "Let's hope so."

  * * *

  The door fell to a sound like thunder. Smoky air rushed in, rippling the ankle-deep water.

  Cassimer hunkered behind their first line of defence, a barricade of washing machines and dryers dragged from the laundry room. Rearcross and Hopewell were with him, quiet and still but for Hopewell's impatiently tapping finger.

  Lucklaw and Tallinn had taken up position at the second line. That barricade was even sorrier, made up of turned-over gurneys and laundry baskets. Best case scenario, a RebEarther might trip over it and break a leg. But a sense of cover helped morale, even if the soldier's own suit of armour provided superior protection.

  "Are they coming in or what?" Hopewell whispered, peeking over the top of a washing machine.

  Nothing out there. Nothing on the sensors, either. Nothing stirred at all, but for a softness of ash and dust motes in the air.

  "They're trying to unsettle us," Rearcross said.

  "More like trying to bore us to death."

  "Lieutenant," Cassimer warned. "Perception and clarity."

  "And patience," Rearcross muttered, earning himself an elbow in the side from Hopewell.

  Ten minutes passed, and Cassimer saw nothing but the gaping door. It was his world, his focus, a starless universe demanding all of his attention.

  Thirty minutes passed, and his thoughts began to drift. He checked in with Kiruna and Daneborg to keep his attention on the job. Daneborg watched from a rooftop as his partner shadowed a RebEarth patrol through the residential complex, but the glimpses and overheard snippets of conversation revealed nothing of relevance.

  An hour passed, and when Hopewell sighed deeply enough to fog up her visor, Cassimer knew that if he didn't give the team something else to focus on, they might lose their edge entirely.

  "I received another message from the demon," he said over the team channel. "A threat. It may attempt to contact the rest of you, too. If so, report it immediately."

  "It shouldn't have my details, should it?" Rearcross asked nervously. "Only the Cato team's info was leaked, right?"

  "Yeah, but it shouldn't know we're on Velloa, either," Lucklaw said. "Can't take anything for granted."

  "Leaked." Hopewell scoffed. "More like handed over on a silver platter. Thanks, Station Chief Amager. I just love having my personal details shared with demons. Now all of RebEarth will know too, no doubt. I don't really mind if they know who's shooting them, but the idea of the Shipwrecker going through my vacation photos is a bit much."

  "What sort of threat did it send you, Commander?" Juneau's curiosity had apparently returned, slightly too soon for Cassimer's liking.

  "Personal," he said, adding: "Private."

  "Has it got you worried?"

  "Mind how you speak to the commander," Hopewell said.

  "Mind how you speak to a superior officer," Juneau replied, but Hopewell just sniffed dismissively, turning her attention to Cassimer.

  "Do you suppose the houseplant sent Rhys and Florey messages too, Commander? I mean, it probably doesn't really know who's here."

  "Bastion will have informed them of the possibility. I believe Amager extended an offer of a private security team to Florey and his family." Extended. Yes, after Cassimer had twisted his arm.

  "Oh, Florey turned that down."

  "Inadvisable."

  "I tried telling him that, but will he listen?" Hopewell shook her head. "He and his family live in this Earth Provides compound. It's a real nice place, with real nice people, but they do seem to have the idea that what Earth provides is mostly guns and ammunition. Armed to the teeth, the lot of them, and sweet as sugar. Still, they do like their privacy."

  "Bunch of nutters, if you ask me," Rearcross said.

  "Nobody did, so how about you shut up? Nothing crazy about living in harmony with nature. Nothing crazy about living off the land," said Hopewell, who definitely did believe that Earth Providers were a bunch of nutters and had repeatedly told Florey exactly that.

  "Nothing crazy about churning out kids and living in mud huts?"

  "They're called eco-houses," Hopewell said, but her defensiveness faltered, and she laughed. "Perfectly nice i
f you hate hot water and air conditioning. Stars, don't even get me started on the toilets . You should see the–"

  Bright light flared at the open door, and then Kivik's voice, amplified by a speaker system, boomed down the corridor.

  "A shuttle just set down on the facility's landing pads. A fast little thing, and not so complicated that your pilot wouldn't be able to work it, even considering his severe blood loss. It's yours if you want it, safe passage guaranteed. All we want is a sample of the Kalevala primer. You can keep the scientists and the research too. One single sample, Cassimer. Your superiors wouldn't even know it was missing."

  "You want it, come and get it."

  "I would, but while I am a man of my word, I suspect you're not. No offence, but you do have a bit of a reputation. Your name's as good as a curse in some parts of the galaxy. I've no doubt you'd destroy that data the second we come in."

  "Coward." The insult was more for the benefit of his men than to provoke Kivik – and it worked, he could see Hopewell smile – but perhaps it would hit the mark. The Shipwrecker had made his name from inside ships, behind layers of force fields and super strong hulls. Space was his domain, but the earth was Cassimer's.

  "Better a successful coward than a dead hero, I say, though I know you wouldn't agree. Neither did Scarsdale, but if we could ask him now, I reckon he might have changed his mind."

  "You reckon wrong." Scarsdale had cared only about his name, and here it was, spoken months after his death. It seemed the RebEarther had earned the legacy he'd wanted so badly.

  "God." Kivik sighed, the amplified sound rushing down the corridor. "Nothing puts me to sleep quite like speaking to the zealous. Isn't it tiring to be so uncompromising, Cassimer? Don't you ever want to bend, even a little? Come on, take the easy path for once in your life. We're civilised men, not beasts fighting for territory. Let's resolve this with words and honour, not horns and claws."

  "No," Cassimer said. Kivik was wrong; being uncompromising was not tiring. It was liberating. A path determined by principles was free from doubt and fear. Instead of worrying about what was right to do, he only had to consider how to do it right.

  "Not even for the girl in the picture? One word from me, and the Bright-Winged One will end her. One word, and he could do worse. There's no point torturing the prisoners we already have, but would it be so easy for you to sit in this basement while my men take turns with your girl?"

  Cassimer bit his anger down, trying to assuage it with logic. If Skald were in a position to take Joy, it would already have done so. And if it did, it would never give her to this RebEarth filth. "No deal."

  "Ouch; cold. I wonder what the girl would say. Perhaps she'd expect no less, given your reputation. But what about the rest of your men? What will they say to the Bright-Winged One's offer? And what of the Kalevala civilians?" Kivik raised his voice. "If we come in, the Kalevalans will become collateral damage. A shame, when we would have treated them more than fairly. Free to go home, or, if they so pleased, free to join us. Five million marks, the spirit has promised, to any Kalevala scientist willing to work for us. Five million. There's a lot a man could do with that sort of money. So much that I'll give you some time to consider just how much. In one hour, we'll talk again."

  * * *

  Lucklaw was the next to receive a message from the demon. Also a photo; this one of a woman standing on a ship's bridge. Blonde hair, worn in neat curls, grazed the collar of her grey uniform. The rank insignia of a Rampart admiral on her shoulders caught the light of a red supergiant star outside the ship's viewports.

  "My mother," Lucklaw said. "Well, that's not much of a threat."

  "What, you don't care about your mother?" Hopewell shot him a look.

  The team, bar Rearcross who'd elected to remain on guard duty, had gathered in the morgue to eat – Hopewell was passing ration bars around – and to keep an eye on the civilians. The simplest way to quash thoughts of mutiny was by showing them what they'd be up against.

  "Of course I do, but nobody cares more about Admiral Lucklaw than the admiral herself. If Skald wants to go after her, he'll have to deal with her twenty-four-seven security team. She calls them her bodyguards, but they look more like blood-thirsty thugs to me. Their identities all check out as squeaky-clean, which is a sure-fire tell that they're anything but. I'm pretty sure they do a lot more for my mother than just opening car doors. In any case, it'd be easier for Skald to get at us than her. I'm not worried."

  "It's pretty damn low to go after our families."

  "It is a demon, Hopewell," Tallinn said. "What do you expect?"

  "Yeah, I guess. Stars, Tallinn – could you maybe sit down for a second and have a ration bar with the rest of us? Your pacing is kind of driving me crazy."

  Tallinn sat, but declined the ration bar. "I'd rather not open my visor. Between the sewer water, the corpses and the civilians, Earth only knows what sort of diseases are floating around in here."

  "Oh, but you're happy for us to breathe the bacteria?" Hopewell shook her head. "Some medic you are. Very thoughtful."

  "Well, if you get sick, I'll sort you out. But if I get sick..." Tallinn grimaced. "I think I might actually be getting sick with stress. I can't stop thinking about Baltimore and the flight crew. They don't even have suits. They're out there, somewhere, breathing in the filth of this world. And their wounds! They're at risk of gangrene, blood poisoning... I don't even want to think about what their RebEarth captors might be carrying."

  "Pretty sure Baltimore would count himself lucky to live long enough to catch an infection."

  "Hopewell," Cassimer said, and she lowered her face in shame.

  "Apologies, Commander."

  "Don't apologise." Ruotsi stood at the back of the morgue, hunched and shackled to a water pipe. "We should all count ourselves lucky to survive to see another day. Our primer is still at a rough prototype stage. Why not just give it to them and be done with it? You said you came here to help, but we're going to die down here."

  "It's not just about us, Ruotsi," said Southgate, shackled to the same pipe. His voice was hoarse and tired. "If the Primaterre get what they want, they will help all of Kalevala against the Gustavians. Five million marks might sound like a lot, but it's nothing at all compared to knowing that my children won't starve to death in bombed-out ruins."

  "They say they'll help us. That doesn't mean they will."

  "Our government made a deal with yours," Juneau said. "They will keep their end of the bargain. Would you honestly trust RebEarth to do the same? Do you really think they'd give you five million marks when they could just as easily shoot you?"

  "Kivik's word can be trusted. He means what he says and always honours agreements. We've never had any trouble with him befo–"

  "Ruotsi!" Southgate hissed, but too late. Before was a word that Cassimer would not let slip by unnoticed. Before was a word that might indeed see Ruotsi collecting his teeth off the floor.

  He stood, and in his shadow, both Southgate and Ruotsi shrank.

  * * *

  It didn't take long for Ruotsi, teeth intact, to spill the sordid tale.

  "The ships in orbit call themselves the Victual Brothers. Kivik captains the flagship of the fleet, the Stortebecker. They are RebEarth, yes, but part of the.. ah... mercantile branch."

  "Pirates," Hopewell said.

  "To some. To others, they are a vital trading partner or a lifeline. There are worlds that would die without the Victual Brothers. Insignificant worlds, deep space colonies, and factions under sanction by the Primaterre. Even the Black Nine, where no one but the Victual Brothers would dare to venture. They supply aid where no one else will. They save lives."

  "At the cost of lives," Cassimer said.

  "You think a starving man spends even a second wondering where the bread he's eating came from, or whether the miller's still alive? In this system, we are all officially enemies of RebEarth, every faction a signatory on the treaty that outlaws their organisation. We all know
that if we break that treaty, the Primaterre Protectorate would use it as an excuse to bring war to our worlds. But without the Victual Brothers, we would starve. Southgate's children would be dead already." Ruotsi shot his colleague a long look. "And so, by tacit agreement, we have allowed them safe harbour. Not our friends, not our allies, but sometimes useful partners. They're based near Campbell, about five days from here. Catrin Domanska, our procurement officer, would sometimes go there to trade for things difficult to find. She always got along fine with Kivik, always got us good deals. So when RebEarth first showed up here, we sent Domanska out to talk to them. We didn't think... we didn't know... what they did to her, nothing like that has ever happened before. Kivik was on first name terms with her; they were friendly, for God's sake, but the things they did to her..."

  "To make us disable the facility defences," Southgate filled in when Ruotsi's voice got too choked by tears to continue. "It worked. Domanska's husband shot our security officer on duty when he refused to help. He dropped the outer force field and ran out there to get her. Last I saw him, they were dumping his naked corpse into the sewers. So friendly. So trustworthy."

  "Shut up, Southgate. We don't know what really happened out there. Domanska could've done something, said the wrong thing. She always was quick with her tongue."

  "She's dead!" Southgate spat. "She's dead and you're trying to fucking blame her for her own murder. You're a god-damned–"

  "Enough," Cassimer said. "Ruotsi – two questions. One: what kind of trade did you do with Kivik?"

  "You know what kind, Commander," Juneau murmured, and yes, he did, but he wanted to hear the man say it.

  "We gave him pharmaceuticals. In exchange, he..." Ruotsi licked his lips. "Look, you must understand how important this research is to us. It's our last chance at survival; we needed to do whatever it took. We needed a look at functioning primers, and well, Primaterre citizens are hard to come by–"

  "Two," said Cassimer, who'd heard enough. "Who else trades with these Victual Brothers?

  "The list of who doesn't is shorter. You've built your walls too high, your empire too bright. Do you even know what it is like to deal with the Primaterre Protectorate from the outside? Trade agreements must be made in conjunction with accords to adhere to the doctrine of purity. You make worlds beg at your feet, forcing them to set aside their own values before you'll deign to so much as talk to them. You wield superiority like a weapon, and now you are surprised to see weapons aimed back at you? Oh, the Primaterre Protectorate is a fine empire, Commander, but empires fall – and the barbarians are at your gate."