by Jim Rudnick
The admiral nodded. “That’s a big 10-4, Captain. Handle them and then come back for more. See Kelsey too for billeting quarters here on the landing port base. You’ll be assigned a flyer of your own—careful though as they handle differently. We work here from oh nine hundred hours through to nineteen hundred hours—trying to get the job done. You can request through Kelsey anything you need. Oh—budget is not a problem at all anymore, it seems … just to get the damn four towers finished off and our Confederacy Council occupancy permits issued. In four months, Captain—that’s all I’ve got for now,” he said and sighed as he nodded his goodbyes and reached for one of those chiming tablets to his side.
Moments later, Tanner and Kelsey worked out his quarters, and Tanner received his paperwork for the flyer and IDs for his PDA so that he’d be networked into the academy communications systems.
“So, what’s the scuttlebutt on when we do get the permits, Lieutenant?”
The Faraway alien cocked his head to one side—something Tanner noted his tail did at exactly the same time, which might be good to know in future—and half-smiled.
“Sir, local wagering has it at seven months at a minimum. Just saying, Sir,” he said and smiled a bit.
Tanner nodded and smiled back as he picked up the folders and tablets to leave. “’Bout where I’d put it—but let’s see what we can do, shall we?” and he turned to leave the administration building and find his way over to the officer’s residence to get his quarters squared away. Next would be the flyer yard to find his wheels—or wings—maybe and get over to the towers to see what he could see.
CHAPTER THREE
In the inner chamber of her apartment, the Master Adept sat waiting. She had been doing just that now for over an hour, and she was experienced enough to know that some things could not be rushed. She often looked at the far wall, wishing she could see the lands around the Issian walled city. Out there, she knew, life was hard, and yet she knew what she would see if a window was there.
Seared plains and small foothills rimmed the city, and beyond them lay more of the same for as far as the eye could see. In fact, here on the southern hemisphere, on the largest continent on Eons, those hills ran more than four thousand miles running east to west mostly but occasionally creating canyons and even smaller buttes and mesas. For the most part, no one lived from here to the western sea; Dessau was the farthest city on the continent, and it lay among those hills too.
Scrub brush coated the hills but not a tree could be seen. The soil was so pitifully poor that such hardy vegetation could not grow. Some of the brush was brown, and still more was that parched orange rust color that came from scorched weather patterns that plagued the planet. For almost three generations, the ground had been able to support less and less vegetation, and crops had long since died. No matter what kind of fertilizers had been developed, the land could not grow enough food to support the people of Eons.
She knew Eons had not always been a desolate wasteland. Records going back ten centuries showed this had once been a fertile continent with abundant farms, prosperous cities, and a thriving agricultural commerce system..
For the last three centuries, the radiation from the blue sun over Eons had gradually changed the land. As the droughts increased, the soil and the economy dried up. Scientists predicted the young giant blue star would eventually find balance and agriculture would thrive again. Until then, the people of Eons were left to find other means to support themselves and their planet.
Having the academy here meant much for the Issians. It would change everything, more than most knew, for the Issians and their struggling economy.
She paused in her thinking as the first tremor of another mind entered her own consciousness, and she quickly let the falling feeling arise within her. Moments later, she was surrounded by others—not in person, but in the Issian mind grouping, which meant they could all see each other’s minds and conference that way. This was the Issian Inner Council—the group that governed Eons.
She nodded to each but turned right away to the twins who had been invited to the mind group today.
“Zara and Ella, so good of you to join us, and while niceties are yes, nice, we all want to know what you’ve learned,” she said in a hurry, trying to get to the point immediately.
Zara spoke up for the twins; she was the one who always took a leadership position, and while it was known that both twins were about equal in Issian potentials, Zara spoke for both. A woman of forty years of age, she and her identical twin, Ella, had been members of the most innermost group of Issians who helped to govern Eons—and their abilities too.
She was pretty in a sense, mature, with the hint of gray now in her hair. Like most Issians, she dressed in all black. Her top, leggings, and even her boots were black. She pushed back the edge of her hood so it lay out of the way on her shoulders, and her mind spoke up with a small degree of regret in her voice.
“Master and all here, I am afraid that we have little real news—but rumors do abound up on Aporia. While what we can report is factual, as I said, there are other items that we cannot as yet confirm,” she said.
She looked at the few faces that were in the circle around her and shrugged.
“What we know is that Kendal Steyn is still working against us. She has been somewhat, um, successful in her recruitment of others to her cause—twins, of course. Her own twin, Mariam, is still being held in confinement in our MedWards and suffers as always. I will not go into what we—Ella and I—think caused that breakdown, but you all know how we feel. With Kendal actively working on the building of her own group of protesters, we think that this will become an issue that we will have to deal with soon. Deal with—we think—in a very formidable way,” she said and then leaned back.
All present sat on that for a moment, and then all eyes turned to the Master Adept.
“Thank you, Zara, your abilities to provide us with evidence of this group is much appreciated. We, too, believe that if they get bigger and if they then decide to go public with their twisted reasonings, we will have to do something. One more thing—any visitors at the MedWards for her twin?”
Zara shook her head. “Not a single one for the past four months, Master. We have an inside source there and monitor same,” she said.
The Master Adept nodded. “So, for all here to consider, at the next mind grouping, we will need to discuss various methods to handle same. Remember, the protesters plan to gather converts, then publicize their beliefs to try to get us to stop our so far very successful Twin Selection program. We cannot allow that to happen. I want your own ideas on same at the next grouping …” she said, and as she did the circle of other Adepts around her disappeared.
The Inner Council mind grouping was over.
She rose and left the inner chamber—what she often called her office, as if she needed one—and returned to the living area of her quarters in the tower that rose over the walled city.
Outside, she could still see the ruins of a farm just a few miles away, the barn leaning sickly and the farmhouse without a roof. Past that, the previously orderly corrals and paddock fences held a rail or two, but for the most part, they looked like they had been left to deteriorate for years. She knew the view a hundred miles or a thousand miles down the valley would be the same—long forsaken farms and buildings and the detritus of a once flourishing farming community ... and that could be seen mile after mile.
We do what we do when it comes to twins, as we need to.
The ability to change a birth was one that only Issians with the most prolific of abilities could do.
Science said that monozygotic twins were formed after a blastocyst essentially collapsed, splitting the progenitor cells—those that contain the body's fundamental genetic material—in half, leaving the same genetic material divided in two on opposite sides of the embryo. And identical twins were formed.
But Issians had learned they could control the creation of twins by simply using their highly skilled minds
to make the progenitor cells split into two, creating two embryos where there had been only one.
Of course, it only worked on females—male embryos resisted this kind of tampering remotely, and it always ended the embryo’s life.
Females only. And seldom, but enough to help keep the Issians as adept as could be.
After all, the Master herself had once been a twin, as had all of the Inner Council …
#####
His flyer was blue, and it was the just a bit lighter than the blue of the background shield in the RIM Navy icon of the dagger. It had two seats, with both having access to the center-mounted trackball controls. Could carry, Tanner thought, at least a couple hundred pounds of cargo in the rear bay, but today it was just him.
ID in—check. The flyer’s AI flashed up a verified user notice on the dashboard display.
Power on—check. As Tanner hit the start button, the thrusters him mounted on each side behind him were up and running fine.
Belts on—check. He buckled his seatbelt and ensured it was secure.
Time to go, and he slowly used the trackball to lift off—up and up and then yaw to port—and then his thumb hit the throttles, and the flyer surged ahead.
Got some pep, he thought and grinned. Wonder what this woulda been like with a load of Scotch on …
Ahead, he could see the foothills, and he made his way toward them in a straight line.
No control towers and no flight plans either.
Eons was still a seat of your pants type of aeronautical system, he realized, and that meant that biggest and fastest usually ruled.
His gaze went down to the river below as he followed it upstream for a few miles until the canyon walls began to build around it. As those walls grew taller and taller, the four towers of the new academy came into view. They stood out, no doubt about that, for all to see. He knew that the administration tower, where he’d find his office, was in Tower Number Four, so he made his way there first.
Circling the tower, from top to bottom, he could see some still unfinished floors, some windows missing, a few welders perched what he’d call perilously on the scaffoldings, and yes, two floors just boarded up completely.
At ground level, he leveled off and took the flyer in for his first landing.
“Went well,” he said to himself, as the flyer AI helped a bit, and he came to a stop only a hundred feet from the huge doorways and ramp up into the tower. He opened up the flyer canopy and hopped out—to be met right away by a Provost guard with a Merkel on his shoulder.
“Sir, ID, please,” the guard asked, and Tanner nodded and beamed over the required docs from his wrist PDA.
The guard looked down at the display on his chest and nodded.
“Welcome, Captain Scott. Your offices, if that’s where you’re headed, are up on floor twenty-three. Right beside Rear Admiral Higgins’ offices—you’ve no staff I think as yet though, Sir.” The guard whirled around and went back to the small shack that was nearer the main doors.
Going to be pretty impressive when she’s done, Tanner thought. There were enormous thirty-foot doorways with wood trim that was made from that wood from Anulet he’d so admired during the Duke’s hunting party, but he couldn’t remember the name of the wood. “Still, wonderful grain and colors,” he said, as he walked in the now open double front doors.
Inside was a complete mess. Half-opened cartons of furniture were being manhandled onto dollies for inside deployment. Rows and rows of cases of pre-packed items—he had no idea what lay within— were being hand-bombed by what looked like students deeper within the lobby. Tech pieces, raw wires, ports, terminals, and monitors were all stacked up and waiting to go up in the elevators.
Elevators. He could see four of in the lobby, but three were sealed off with yellow tape and were not being used hence the holdup for all inward-bound goods and equipment.
He smiled to himself, went over to a man who appeared to be a senior tech, and interrupted him.
“Hi … can you tell me, please, why three of the elevators are not being used today?” Tanner said.
The tech raised his eyebrows. “Sir … Captain—sorry, yeah. Seems that these three are not allowed to be used as they’ve not been granted to do so by the RIM inspectors, Sir. You—like us—will learn to hate those guys too,” he said, as he tried to balance one more monitor on the dolly in front of him and then helped to push it into the long, long line for the only working elevator.
Tanner grinned.
He went over to the closest sealed off elevator, tore down the yellow tape, kicked aside the signage that said NOT IN SERVICE, and then pressed his hand against the wall plate. The door opened. He went in, turned, and then hit the button for the next floor up, which happened to be floor four. The doors closed. The elevator went up to the fourth floor and the doors opened. He took a half step outside to look around, got back into the elevator, and pressed the button marked LOBBY. The elevator returned to the lobby floor.
He left the elevator and said quite loudly for all to hear, “I am Captain Scott. I have just made all the elevators fully functional. Use them as you will.” He tore down the rest of the tape and kicked the signage out of his way.
All four elevators were now up and running.
“End of this one,” he said to himself, and he watched as the lengthy line grew much shorter as workmen and dollies dived for those new elevators now in use.
One down, but thousands still left, he knew, and he watched as the increase in functional elevators slowly began to chew down the traffic jam in the lobby.
He took the stairs, noting that cases had been left aside on some landing, but he got all the way up to the twenty-third floor and opened the door to same.
Here there was soft carpeting already laid, coved ceilings, and even art on the walls. Here, on what was the executive floor, he figured, everything was done, as this was where the academy administrators would be found. Registrars, CEOs, and principals, VIPs, deans, and other administrators would all be located here. Figures that it’s ship-shape, he thought, as he walked across the soft carpet and down the long central corridor.
At a few doors that were open, he stuck his head in—beautiful new office furniture and wall units were already installed, and book cases and more art were on the walls. Looks like admin is ready … wonder how the student areas are, he thought, but in his gut, he knew there’d be a real difference.
He found a door with a large temporary sign that read Rear Admiral Higgins, and he looked in at an empty room.
And beside it was another office with sign that read Captain Scott. He went into his office and grinned.
Plain concrete floor.
A simple short desk with a folding chair.
No network hookups, no computer terminals, no communications or monitors—not a thing to work with.
Just a room and a seat.
He shook his head. No wonder the admiral worked out of the administration wing over at the landing port.
So will I, Tanner thought, and he smiled at how little he intended to be in his office.
Here is where the rubber meets the road as they used to say, so here at the towers is where I’ll be.
He took the stairs down two at a time, and when he reached the lobby, he was met by the same senior tech he’d spoken to a half hour earlier.
“Sir, wanted to warn you—there’s a couple of Provost guards and one of those damn RIM Building Inspectors looking for you,” he said out of the corner of his mouth, and then he went back to slugging another big box in a pile of other boxes.
Tanner nodded, said, “Got it,” and then turned to leave the tower lobby.
As he walked outside, he saw the guards around his flyer, and his jaw got a certain clench as he walked up to them.
“Can I help you, Provost?” he said to the lieutenant who stood in his way. Behind him, three more Provost guards were between them and the flyer. Beside the lieutenant, but a step or two back, stood some kind of a bureaucrat with too
many folders and tablets in his hands.
“Sir, Provost Lieutenant Lismer. We have it on good report that you are the captain who is responsible for tearing down the elevator closed notices and signage and then letting workmen use same. Is that true, Captain—and a small note, Sir? That if that is true, then you may be charged with zoning infractions, Sir,” he finished off.
His jaw still set, Tanner looked at the lieutenant.
“Lieutenant, might I ask if you recognize this uniform—my uniform?”
“Sir, yes, Sir—it’s a Barony Navy captain’s uniform, Sir.”
“And Lieutenant, do you also know that the Barony is a Royal realm? One that is governed by our Baroness?”
The lieutenant nodded.
“And Lieutenant, are you also aware that as a Royal realm, we have our own laws and penalties for items that we determine are crimes?”
Again the lieutenant nodded, but a little slower.
“And are you aware, Lieutenant, that we also have beheadings in the Barony—that happen on the whim of our Baroness,” Tanner said flatly, his voice edged like a guillotine.
The lieutenant did not nod. He did not move, as he seemed to be processing what he’d just heard.
“And as the 2IC here on Eons for the new academy build—only the rear admiral can tell me what to do—I also have the ear of the Baroness. What would you like me to do when I find something that I can fix—fix it, or perhaps just pass along the culprits to my Baroness? Your choice, Lieutenant,” Tanner said with intensity.
The lieutenant started to half-turn to the bureaucrat but stopped when he saw the man had taken several steps backward. He turned back to face Tanner as he found himself alone.
“Sir, fix things, of course. Just like you did today, Sir. Job well done, Sir,” he said quickly, snapped a salute, said “With me,” and marched away followed by his other Provost guards.
Tanner, however, held out a hand to stop the bureaucrat.
