The Celaran Probe (Parker Interstellar Travels Book 7)

by Michael McCloskey

  Marcant nodded. “That’s not going too far. It’s an apt word.”

  “Do you work with a Trilisk? One of your friends, maybe?”

  He smiled a creepy smile. At first Cilreth thought he was going to confirm her guess and do something awful.

  “No. I believe in them, though. Some don’t.”

  I guess Marcant just has a creepy smile.

  “You said you don’t oppose Shiny’s takeover. Why not?”

  “He seems to be a wise, benevolent dictator. And I don’t mean that facetiously.”

  “Seems to be. Why?”

  “He gave us our freedoms back. The only crimes left are crimes with victims, where someone is hurt, enslaved, or their property is stolen. His government doesn’t even take taxes. It stands on its own.”

  “And?”

  “He removed all forms of super citizenry, except himself. There are no Terran police officers, no judges, no diplomats or lawmakers. Every citizen of Earth stands equal now. He’s our leader, and he employs agents, millions of them, but they’re machines, not Terrans. They’re free of corruption, petty jealousy, ego, everything that always turns our own super citizens against us in tyranny.”

  “You don’t fear that control?”

  “No. As he said, actions speak louder than words. He could have exterminated us all by now. He could have forced us to do whatever awful things he wanted. But he didn’t do any of that. He lets us live our lives, and so I do trust him. That trust grows every day.”

  “You’re not free to look at his computer systems, though, are you? So you don’t know what he’s up to.”

  Marcant shrugged. “They’re his. I don’t let anyone look at my systems either, if I can help it.”

  Cilreth felt frustration. How could she explain that Shiny did all those things simply because it was in his best interest at the moment? Or did it matter why he did what he did? Were only the results important?

  Shiny can change his mind at any moment and if he does, we might all be in trouble.

  “Discuss the possibility that you don’t want to oppose Shiny because he’s got mind control.”

  Marcant raised his eyebrows.

  “Well, before he ever arrived, I disliked the world government. It’s documented. So he did not cause me to hate his predecessors,” Marcant began. “If he had mind control, I might forgive him for doing things I would not normally like. So. He took control of the Space Force. Let’s suppose I should be angry about that, but I’m not, because he has mind control.”

  Cilreth nodded. “Yes. Why should we hand the reins of our military over to an alien? You should be set on opposing him at all costs.”

  “So I should choose the old tyrants over Shiny because he’s an alien?”

  “Yes. Terrans should run Terra, right? Not an alien.”

  “The Terrans who ran Earth were greedy, evil bastards.”

  “Those were Trilisks.”

  Marcant raised an eyebrow. “Were they all? Really? I’ve only heard rumors. Shiny hasn’t told us much along those lines. If it’s all true, doesn’t he deserve credit for ousting them and freeing us from their yoke?” Marcant sat forward. “Please, I feel the need to reverse this a moment. Tell me why I should hate him. And I have a feeling you know him much better than I do.”

  Cilreth let Marcant turn the tables, because she wanted him to know about Shiny.

  “Shiny is interested in Shiny. Period. He befriended the PIT team, then betrayed it. If it became advantageous to throw all mankind into incinerators tomorrow, I think he might do it.”

  “But surely advanced civilizations know that cooperation is superior to competition.”

  “As long as resources are plentiful and goals are shared, it is. Those circumstances don’t always hold.”

  “Well, Shiny has all the resources he needs. He has the whole solar system. As far as goals, well, he hasn’t shared any with us, he lets us pursue our own goals. But with him in control, our goals can’t threaten his. So he seems a stable leader, for now.”

  “For now. That’s key. And don’t forget that time and attention are resources too, in his mind. He could turn against us even if he has plenty of metal, oxygen, all kinds of materials. If we’re slowing him down, distracting him from a goal, I fear that might be enough to make him flip.”

  “Do you really wonder about the mind control? Or did you just want insight into my thinking?”

  “You were caught hacking Vovokan computers. Seems to me like you might be opposing him.”

  “I’m simply curious. Alien computers—me and my friends are fascinated.”

  “Then take this job. You’ll learn a lot, more than you could ever learn here.”

  “You know enough about me now? The offer is serious?”

  “The offer is serious. Tell me though, are you afraid to take physical risks? Do you have combat skills, incarnate or virtual? Will you travel to other worlds?”

  “I can fence,” Marcant said. “Not world class, I’m afraid. I’ve spent my fair share of time living in VRs swinging swords. I do a great Elric... you know, because I’m pale?”

  “And skinny.”

  “Well, yes...”

  “And modern arms?”

  “Well, they aim and shoot themselves, don’t they? Modern arms means assault robots,” Marcant said.

  “Fair enough. I’ll recommend you for the team.”

  Marcant nodded. “Excellent. I can’t wait to meet my new boss.”

  Chapter 23

  The team had started to return to the New Iridar. Everyone had obeyed her summons within the ten hours she had given them to arrive. She had left Marcant out of this meeting, even though he had agreed to join the PIT team. Telisa met Imanol as he came on board. Imanol spoke before she could ask a question.

  “Shiny caught me. He took the sphere,” he admitted.

  Telisa sighed. “It’s not your fault. Shiny knew I had the cloaking device. He may have anticipated it. What did you find?”

  “There’s a new facility on that island. But I don’t know if the AI is still there.”

  “I assume he has it. A new facility suggests it might still be there.”

  “There are the Trilisk tunnels. Maybe he built a research facility to study those. Do you think he uses the AIs for mind control?” Imanol said.

  “It’s still not clear. We’ll all talk about it.”

  Imanol nodded. “The meeting is soon. I’ll clean up quickly.”

  As Imanol walked away, Telisa considered his report. It seemed like Shiny was ahead at every turn. Telisa sent a message to Cilreth.

  “Cilreth. Imanol has been in Shiny’s back yard. Keep an eye on him and let me know if anything unusual happens.”

  “Got it.”

  Telisa worried about Shiny, Magnus, the new ship, the Space Force ambassador, Marcant, and her current team all in the few minutes before the meeting. By the time she walked into the mess area, she was ready for any distraction.

  Telisa saw everyone there, crammed into tiny seats or standing in the corners.

  “I’ve met with Shiny and the Space Force. I don’t have an answer about Magnus. What I do have to tell you is that we’re getting a better ship. Much more room for everyone.”

  “How?” asked Cilreth.

  “Shiny supplied, just like this one. It will be adapted to Terrans. It’s not one of his big ships like the Clacker, but a step up nonetheless.”

  Cilreth rolled her eyes. “Another ship to clean.”

  “Are you talking about the sand or the software?” Imanol sniped. Telisa ignored it.

  “We have an ally in the Space Force. It just so happens, he has a battlecruiser. So he’ll be coming with us.”

  No one knew what to say. Cilreth tried first.

  “Why are they coming?”

  “They want to send an ambassador to the Celarans, if there are any left. Also, Shiny has told the Space Force about the Destroyers, and equipped the Earth fleet to fight them. At least, to some degree. Sin
ce there seems to be a conflict going on between Celarans and Destroyers, maybe we can help.”

  “Is this battlecruiser going to be more powerful than our ship?” Caden asked.

  Telisa raised an eyebrow. “Well, ours is Vovokan. So I think it’s at least faster and better defended. I suppose the battlecruiser might outgun us, though.”

  “What’s the name of the Captain? And the ship?”

  “Admiral Sager of the Midway.”

  While everyone digested that, Telisa dropped another bomb.

  “We also have a new team member coming. You’ll find out more about him later. I didn’t invite him to this meeting, given its nature.”

  Telisa sat on one of the tables, then continued. “I want to hear from all of you first. Who wants to report their findings about Earth’s change of heart?”

  Everyone traded looks until Siobhan spoke. “I’ll go.”

  Telisa watched Siobhan as she gathered herself.

  “Earth is nuts. We’re famous. Shiny is loved or at least tolerated everywhere. Caden is like a superhero. I’m widely known as the evil woman who ‘took him off the market’.”

  Siobhan shifted in her seat and continued.

  “So of course I looked into how fast it happened. It took only about a month. First, everyone assumed the worst. Slowly, reports came in that most of the Space Force had survived intact, where everyone had assumed they had been vaporized in space. Shiny’s communication blackout lifted, and suddenly everyone realized most of the people were fine. Then the prisoners of Skyhold came out talking about Trilisks. The Space Force backed up the story. The citizens learned about Shiny and no one knew what to think. Many were preparing for a war of resistance, despite the good news.”

  “Has Shiny addressed the citizens directly?” asked Imanol.

  “Sure. At this point, he made The Shiny Address.”

  “What!?”

  “He announced himself to all of Earth. Look it up,” Siobhan said.

  Imanol went off retina to investigate. Telisa scanned some clips of it herself. It had happened shortly after the PIT team left on their mission. The most famous piece was:

  You see me now as an alien overlord and you are unhappy about it. I understand that. I will prove to you all that you are better off with me in control. I ask the people of Earth to judge me by my actions, not my words.

  “This is what he said?” Imanol asked.

  “Yes.”

  “It’s not normal Shiny-speak,” Telisa pointed out.

  “I assume he had it smoothed out to normal sounding Terran, given the occasion. Then he started taking action. More action than anyone thought possible. More action than the world government had taken in all the years of its existence.”

  “Well what did he do first?” Imanol asked.

  “Removed all VR quotas. Well, that’s the big thing from the start that everyone remembers,” Siobhan said.

  “How does it work with unlimited VR quota? Why does anyone ever come out?” Imanol asked.

  “Well you need to come out once a week just to do some basic body maintenance, you know? Shiny hasn’t gotten all the bugs worked out yet. You still need to get up, walk around some, take a toning pill and some vitamin balancers. Something too about being conscious for a few minutes every week to keep your muscles connected to your brain. I can’t remember exactly. But Shiny made that easy, too!”

  “How?”

  “He improved the incarnate activities available,” Jason said. “There are a bunch of incarnate parties and special events going on all the time. It’s a blast to actually get out once a week and see your friends, you know, face to face. Everyone takes that time to eat some real food and share stories about their virtual adventures.”

  “It’s our natural evolution,” Cilreth said. “That’s how it went on Vovok, too, you know. It’s inevitable for virtual reality to eventually supersede reality.”

  Supersede, ha, Telisa thought.

  “Well, who goes in and fixes things when stuff goes all conductive purple?” Imanol asked.

  “Shiny fixes it. I mean, not personally, but you know. Vovokan stuff fixes anything that breaks.”

  “Of course he does,” Imanol said. “With everyone off in imaginary worlds, he’s free to do whatever he wants. Less people watching him, questioning him.”

  “Maybe true,” Siobhan said. “But he’s not making anyone do it. Core World citizens just love it. Reality is too dangerous and boring for them.”

  “Because they don’t do anything meaningful,” Caden mumbled.

  “Says the Blood Glades champ?” Imanol said.

  “Next time we’re in a fight and I save your ass—”

  “On topic, please,” Telisa said. “What next?”

  “Well everyone talked about him for weeks. They wanted to know more about him. They gathered information and rumors and circulated it all to death, until everyone decided they loved him. Then they went back to their entertainments.”

  Siobhan’s flow of information stopped. She looked at Telisa, who decided Siobhan was done.

  “Caden?” Telisa prompted.

  “I talked with my parents and many others, rather than relying on the network,” Jason said. “Siobhan and I decided we would each take a different approach for more varied results.”

  Telisa nodded.

  “Earth loves Shiny because he’s been a good to Earth,” Caden said.

  “Because of his actions?” Cilreth asked.

  “That’s just it. He actually did what everyone wanted.”

  “He can’t have made everyone happy. You know how that goes,” Cilreth said.

  “Well, that’s true, but he went further than anyone else ever got,” Caden said. “He took a long list of demands from citizens and organizations and implemented them.”

  “Examples?”

  “There are several societies that lamented the extinction of most of Earth’s natural animal species. As you know, at the end we pretty much just took DNA samples and let everything slide. We all told ourselves we’ll recreate the wild again someday when we have the technology and resources. Well, that never really happened with the UN in charge. And of course, once the arms buildup started, we never looked back. Well, Shiny created dozens of huge islands out in the ocean and populated them with extinct species. He did such a good job of it, the ecosystems actually work. There are drones out there for people to interface with that don’t bother the animals at all. People can see the wildlife anytime they want.”

  “Well, there’s no way he could have accomplished everything on the list... is there?” Telisa asked.

  “You’re right, there’s a long tail of requests. Impossibly long. But he’s made his way so far down it, that 99.9% of the world’s population are totally satisfied. He met some esoteric demands. Some society wanted 100,000 of Earth’s top historic sites restored and maintained just as they had been in antiquity. I mean everything from Pompeii to the library at Alexandria, the Greek temples, Stonehenge, the list went on and on. Shiny didn’t restore the sites—but he created virtual realities containing the entire list. He incorporated some amazing research and technologies that have made the VR sites so authentic the society realized it’s better than anything they had asked for. He even inhabited the sites with artificial denizens that live out their lives in the way we believe they did in the past. Anyone can visit these virtual realities and they can even choose the time they want to visit and it’s all there, to a level of detail that astounds them.”

  “Sound familiar?” Cilreth said.

  “It makes me think of Trilisks living in alien bodies, hidden among the populace,” Telisa said.

  “Well, those people aren’t real, and—”

  “Yes. Still, that thought crossed my mind.”

  Jason looked hesitant, but Telisa could tell he wanted to say something.

  “What do you think, Jason?” Telisa asked.

  “I think we’ve been thinking too small,” Jason said. “Mind control is t
oo small. This is Trilisk technology we’re talking about. The prayers we used were just our primitive way with interacting with it. I think Shiny’s taken it to the next level.”

  “Explain,” Telisa said. He had her full attention.

  “I’ve noticed that more things are consistently happening that make people happy,” Jason said. “I think the AI uses resources to see what’s going on inside people’s heads, then engineers happiness from the outside.”

  “So I guess Caden wanted to be famous?” Imanol spat.

  “He wanted to be exonerated publicly,” Telisa said, before Siobhan and Caden could get bent out of shape.

  “But Siobhan is...” Caden stopped.

  “Yes?” Telisa prompted. “Are you happy with recent events, Siobhan?”

  Siobhan nodded. “Oddly, I am. No corporate assassins came for me, and I’m widely envied.”

  Cilreth found what she was looking for. And Marcant is getting what he wants. To study alien technology.

  Telisa made the next leap by thinking about what she wanted. Her breath caught.

  Then I might get Magnus back?

  She immediately clamped down on the rising hope and tried to keep it small. Jason was just theorizing. Telisa’s emotions were too flustered to speak about it with everyone, so she moved things on before anyone asked about her.

  “I no longer think Shiny is controlling everyone,” Telisa said.

  Imanol’s mouth opened but he could not say anything. Before he finally expressed his ridicule, Siobhan spoke up.

  “She’s right. It’s sad, but the Earthers just don’t care who’s in charge as long as they’re not bored. And Shiny caused a revolution in VR entertainment and increased everyone’s VR time half again. Between all the new automation and the Trilisk AIs, Earth has nothing to do but live their whole lives in VR. They’re happy, and as long as they’re happy, they don’t care who’s in charge out here in reality.”

  “But there were protests, underground resistance organizations—”

  “And they evaporated. The ones left are people who were in charge before just for the ego trip and now Shiny doesn’t need them. Only a tiny fraction of the population is gunning for a new world order. And they’re widely hated for it, because they sabotage the VR network and go into people’s homes to disconnect their life support. Those robots we called Shiny’s enforcers when we arrived are out protecting people in VR. They aren’t oppressing anyone except the saboteurs.”