And I was the closest of all the elders, and so of course the task fell to me to go and seek enlightenment from the gods.
***
The Executive
My mentor died believing that this venture was the worst mistake the company ever made. She lost her faith, in the end. Not me: by then I was already looking to the stars. I knew that all the money we had poured into this place, that had made our stock sink and our backers recoil, it was all an investment. Looking forward, that’s the key. For a long time, the human race was only concerned with today. I’m proud to be part of a venture that looked to tomorrow. And now tomorrow’s here. I’ve been in office here on what we’re calling New Greenland for nine years, and at last we’re in the black. The minerals that we’re taking out of this place have paid off all the decades of construction work, all the frontier hardship that made this colony possible.
Yes: colony. Not just a mining station, no. We’ve made this a home away from home. There were plenty of people who said it couldn’t be done, especially on this godforsaken place. But here we are, under the banner of Interglobal Corporat SA: the first ever extrasolar human colony.
The first of many. They’re breaking ground on another five worlds. We paved the way for that. It’s not a corporate legacy that will do much for the share price, but I’m proud of it anyway. Our small steps have made that giant leap possible.
All those worlds, and all of them ours, the stars our destination and all that. We’ve become the inheritors of the cosmos at last. And yet, the sole inheritors, it seems. Worlds and worlds, but none of them living, until we come to them. Makes me think about the early days here, the first geology teams getting spooked by all the seismological activity here, all the little quakes. But that turned out to be no more than geology and meteorology: out there the storm winds can shove the ice and snow and loose rock about like you wouldn’t believe.
***
I hurry to meet my appointment with destiny. The gods should not be kept waiting, after all.
Where I pass, others come to greet me. Everyone knows the mission I am on – perhaps the most important single task that any one of us has ever set out upon. They speak to me through the earth, sending messages of support, or asking that I pass words to the gods: requests, prayers, pleas. Who knows what blessings we may receive, when we have given them due honour? I tell them that we cannot make demands of the gods, of beings who have the power to destroy us with a thought. Even as I speak, the gods visit us over and over, little pinpoints of destruction patterning the surface of the world, a killing heat enough to reduce any caught in it to dust and vapour.
Do you realize that you may die, I am asked. Yes, I tell them. Of course: I take the risk gladly. And if I do perish, then there will be another, who will try some other way to appease these potent deities. How much worse not to try? How could we ignore the opportunity this visitation presents? In all the long ages of our histories, gods have never graced us with their physical presence. It must mean something.
My own thought is that it means we have finally become – become what the gods have always wanted us to be. Now we are fit to crouch before them. Now we are fit to be recognized as more than the earth that we have come from.
***
The Tyrant
On these certainties I base my life: that I am lord of all I survey, and that I pledge it to Earth. I had three men executed today, who tried to break the shell of that certainty. They had pamphlets spreading the lies of the Independence Movement, and they had been passing them about the civilian staff. Now they are dead: I cast them out beyond the walls. Let them lie there until the ice storms scour them featureless and abrade them away.
Latest communiques from Centropa and Pascal 3 give grave reports of the fighting, but how am I supposed to react to them? The news is stale long before it reaches me, try to cheat relativity as we might. I can only hold out here, a faithful son of Earth. There will be no suggestion of New Greenland breaking away. But then this is still the least congenial of the colonies. No liquid water, no sunlight, no terraforming. Nothing but a vast mineral wealth that everyone else can only look to enviously. But we were the first. We’re a symbol of mankind’s reach into space. For that reason, if no other, I must be hard on potential revolutionaries and mutineers. But I don’t need to be that hard. They can look out of the window and see what independence would get them. And they can see just exactly what it got the last men who tried to peddle that filth on my watch.
Still, I’ve had to double the sentries and put in a curfew. I’m confident of my own men, but all these civilians – the scientists and miners and base staff – they’re all bleeding hearts and politicals. They talk about the tyranny of centralized government of the colonies. They talk about taxes and human rights. They don’t understand. We need to hold it all together. One human state, over however many planets. And those who threaten that unity – and strength is only found in unity – must be punished, even if they think they have the very best of intentions.
There is a delegation coming to see me soon, of hand-wringing liberals and bleating fifth columnist scientists. They want me to let them out into the cold so they can conduct some study they say is of great import. They want to go examine the crystalline matrices of the great ice hills that are everywhere here, forming and reforming under the constant barrage of the winds. They say the complex internal structures have curious properties, including amplifying the ambient wind into earth tremors such as constantly bedevil our instruments. They say they cannot study these things within the base because even a slight change of temperature causes these intricate structures to degrade. I do not believe them. I know that they are politicals. They want to find somewhere I cannot see or hear, so they can conspire. I will meet with them by these windows, that look out on those three pamphleteers – you can see their expressions very plainly, the ones that froze on their faces when they were thrown out there alive. You want to go outside? I’ll say to those lefties. You’re welcome to go out on exactly the same terms as those men, no others. The Empire of Earth shall endure for a thousand years. It shall endure forever.
***
I am within sight of the gods when the Worm rises from the depths and attacks. This one is vast, a beast fit for a time of legends, when all things were greater and grander. The presence of the gods kills Worms as easily as it kills us, and so the beasts are driven from their usual haunts. This is how it came to cross my path. Half-melted by the heat of the gods’ regard, driven mad with pain, it lashes out at anything nearby. I am nearby.
I feel its wordless complaint through the ground, and prepare myself for battle. Of course there must be a guardian to be passed, to reach the gods. It is only to be expected.
The great beast erupts out of the ground in a thunderous blur of motion and strikes at me. I meet it, strong despite my age. We battle, move and countermove follow swiftly, one on another, and I wonder if the gods can see me fighting. I wonder if they will receive me as a victor triumphant, when I stand over the Worm’s carcass.
The beast has its jaws on me, the touch of them converting the mass of my body into its own, attacking the unique patterns of my substance and overwriting them, making more of the Worm. For a moment I know terrible pain and fear, but only for a moment. My doubts pass in a split instant, too swift for the gods to mark and judge. I slough off the corrupted sections of my body, and I have sidestepped the Worm’s charge. I have my own grip locked about it, attacking in turn, breaking down the stuff of the beast until it is nothing more than ice.
When I have slain it: when the detritus that remains has no more trace of life or structure in it, I raise my substance up towards the gods, but they are still waiting for me. Of course they will not come to me. I continue my swift progress to meet them.
***
The Rebuilder
They say that things on Centropa got so bad, in the last battle of the last war, that this place is no longer the most inhospitable place
still inhabited by humans. Looking out into the storms, I find that hard to believe.
This was the last place to fall, certainly. The tyranny of Earth is over. The rule of that tiny cabal of men and women and their broods, lifespans stretched to unnatural lengths, lasted for generation after generation, as they ruthlessly subjected a whole galaxy to servitude so that they could live in luxury. Or that is what the history books will say, when we write them.
Long after Earth fell, New Greenland held out. This, mankind’s first colony, become the final holdout of the tyrants. A lot of people said we should let them have it: let it be their prison.
But we took it, in the end. The last of the Great Men shot himself in this very chamber, after erasing as much of the computer system as he could, after opening the doors of the base onto the shrieking cold outside – killing far more of his own servants than of our soldiers.
Now the base is secured, against wicked men and against the elements, and we must pick up the pieces. In the end, we did not retake this place out of a sense of justice. We retook it because New Greenland has been the engine room of Empire. A hundred mining stations have carved out the ground here and winched their bounties up the elevators into orbit, and from that wealth came our star-spanning civilization. Now that civilization lies battered by war, and those who lost have done their best to wreck everything that was built here.
So it falls to me and my comrades to return this planet to the fold, and to restore what we can of the fabled mining complex that once jump-started an era.
I have told Earth and the other colonies that we will need their help for that. I have said that they must invest, for all the repairs and rebuilding. Each one has told me that they have nothing to spare. It is not just the war. We had expanded and expanded, taking everything we wanted from the galaxy. Now we are running out of habitable worlds, and of resources on those worlds we already have. The best of the mining here is done. That is the terrible secret the dictators did not want us to know. To gouge more bounty out of New Greenland we must delve deeper, spend more and more to harvest less and less. But we persevere. Human spirit can conquer all things, in the end. We will rise again, but this time in justice and siblinghood. This is our galaxy; we are its destiny.
***
What will they say to me? They must be watching even now, as I approach. I have felt the first of the heat that they bring with them. I close the distance cautiously: I must get as close as I can, but not so close that the radiance of the gods destroys me. Confronting the divine will be a painful experience, but I am strong. I will survive.
The voices of the other elders come to me in support; the voices of all my people. I see for myself now the great shadow of the gods’ mountain, reaching towards the sky, dwindling and dwindling and yet seeming to have no apex. I have never known awe until now. I am not worthy. I will have to suffice, though. There is no other.
What will I say to them? I cannot ask why they have destroyed so many of us: they are the gods, and not to be interrogated thus. I must instead ask them the great questions – why are we here? What is the meaning of it all? What purpose have we, in the great world? Such weighty concerns are worth pain; are worth my death, even, if only I can send the answers back to those who wait.
I have made good time. I am almost there. The gods must surely be smiling to see me.
***
The Engineer
We lost Section 2 today. The heating system suffered a catastrophic corruption failure – the mechanisms can be repaired, we think, but we’re going to need to rebuild the computer architecture from the ground up. Nobody was in there at the time – there had been enough signs that it was all going to go wrong. So why not fix it before it went down, you ask? Have you seen the list, the list of things that need fixing? I have to prioritise; we all do. Sometimes we get it wrong.
The week before, we nearly lost life support to a nasty little glitch in the override system. Just a little self-replicating piece of code that somehow arose, some dog-end of program that ended up with just the right ones and zeros to copy and recopy itself, and go undetected by the scans. It consumed half the safety protocols before someone spotted it – and somehow it had got copied into the backups as well. It was almost game over right then, except someone cobbled together a work-around. There’s a lot of that going on.
We’ve lost two more of the drilling rigs, as well, and naturally they’re shouting about that, off-planet. I tell them they can come down here themselves if they want, but until they do, we’re going to spend our time on the things that keep us alive, first and foremost.
Nobody’s talking about the elevator. I remember, my dad used to say, “they built to last in those days.” Turns out that wasn’t quite true, dad. And that’s proving rather more stubborn, as repair jobs go, so we’re relying on the shuttles to get supplies in, and product out. Except that means waiting for those all-too-elusive gaps in the weather to get a flight window.
And we keep working. We don’t keep working out of any great pride in our craft or loyalty to our paymasters. We keep working because it’s that or this place falls apart around our ears.
***
I feel the heat against my outer layers: they peel and flay slowly in it. I cannot advance further without permanent harm. And I will suffer that harm, if it brings my people closer to the gods, but first let me take my stand before them and greet them. Who knows, this may be enough.
Their mountain stands before me, and it is as strange and unnatural as anything I could have imagined. Its footprint on the earth reverberates like voices, but the voices say nothing, merely roar and growl as though there are captive monsters within. Much of it is darker than rocks: the heat keeps it pristine against the stuff of our world. Some parts are dusted with snow, their unearthly symmetries broken into jagged edges. These parts seem to radiate less of that terrible invisible fire. They are almost approachable.
The gods have visited many parts of my world with the terrible radiance of their presence, but my people tell me that now, as if sensing my approach, they have concentrated themselves at this one point. Surely that is an omen.
I feel a tremor within my innermost structures at the daring of what I am about to attempt. A whole world of my people waits for me to address the gods and unlock their wisdom. After this, everything will be different. What can we hope for? That there will be no death, that heat will not melt us, nor time break us down. Surely all things are within the power of the gods.
I draw my form up with all the dignity I can muster, ignoring the now-constant pain that is a mere shadow of the divine fires.
I speak: “Gree-“
***
The Survivor
Listen to me. I know you can hear me. I’m still here. I’m still broadcasting. I don’t believe you’ve gone. It’s been three months since the shuttle should have come. Please, I’m running out. I’m running out of it all. I’ve shut down and shut down and shut down until there’s just this one room that still has heat and light and air and please, please tell me you can hear me. Please tell me you’re coming for me. I’m the last one here. You can’t have left me behind. I don’t care how bad things are. I don’t care if you’ve got problems. I’m on New Greenland and it’s a lie just like the first one. It was never green. It’s a joke they made, and now the joke is killing me. How can it end up like this? We had a space empire! We had a space empire that lasted for centuries. And here’s where it started. How can it just fall apart? Someone answer me, for God’s sake. I’m still here. I’m still here! Everything’s breaking down, there’s no parts, there’s no food, there’s no fuel. Please, before the lights go out, please come and get me. I’m still on new Greenland! You left me behind! Please!
***
“-tings!” I call, but even as I speak, the mountain is collapsing, falling in upon itself, its substance corroding away, abrading in the wind. I watch, astounded, as the last embers of the gods are snuffed away in an instant, the
killing heat gone, and abruptly the last remnants of all that they were are engulfed in the white land, buried and hidden away, gone as if they were never there.
We will never know whether I made some error, failed some test. How did we displease the gods, that they removed their presence from amongst us so suddenly and inexplicably, so soon after they appeared? All my life I will think back on that moment: what could I have done differently, to make them stay?
We will never solve this paradox. The gods will pass from memory to story. Future generations will not believe. Crouching there, I find it had to believe as well. All I feel is a great sadness. For a brief time, something strange and rare came into our lives. Now we are alone once more, and the only change is that we understand how alone we are.
Island Visit
by Nathan Hystad
6:32 PM, Saturday, June 21st, 2014
Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig. The words kept repeating in Isaac’s head until he could do nothing but dig the ground in front of him. He looked behind him and saw Bryla digging as well; dozens of small holes were started within a twenty foot radius. Her hands were bleeding from the rough wooden shovel they had stolen from one of the now vacant homes. He tried to give her a small smile but it came out more like a helpless grimace. He felt something wet and looked to see his own hands bleeding. What is happening to us? What do they want? Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig. The words cut off his own thoughts and he got back to it.
Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig Dig
9:23 AM, Saturday, June 21st, 2014
The ferry docked in the island's harbour and its four passengers stood on the edge waiting to be let off.
“Welcome to Bowen Island. It'll be a quiet one today since everyone is in the city for the parade. The ferry will be back every hour on the half hour,” the lone ferry employee said.
Aliens - The Truth is Coming (Book of Aliens 1) Page 4
