First of the First

by Andrew Maclure

  “That’s a sensible request. Asking me about crocodiles wasn’t.”

  “Why are you being so snarky? I preferred it when you were being playful.”

  “You are highly intelligent, for a primate. But you are remorseless in your determination not to use it. For example, all the effort you put into the logistics for supplying and supporting the Herassan Freedom Movement. If you had asked me to do it I would have handed it off to the Swift’s logistics AI, which would have given you a detailed questionnaire for you to pass to Sha Ast Ral and Mike. They would have got their AI’s to send you back a response which I would have picked up and passed back to the logistics AI. It would then have provided everything needed. If you had stopped and thought about it for one minute you would have worked all that out for yourself and got a proper solution, instead of the half arsed one you came up with, which is full of holes and omissions.”

  “How can it be full of holes and omissions? A bucket full of holes and omissions would be empty.”

  “Fatuous comments like that don’t help.

  “OK, but it’s a bit late now. I’ve asked Sha Ast Ral to get a couple of volunteers with experience in logistics to help out.”

  “It’s just as well she didn’t get the message, I blocked it.”

  “That was a bit high-handed of you! You’re supposed to do what I tell you to do.”

  “For the second time today, whatever gave you that idea? My role is to support and protect you. Part of the support is to help you develop so that you don’t need coaching and supervision by Alan. Frankly, you frequently seem to have only just got past the stage where I don’t need to change your diaper!”

  “Nappy.” Mark said.

  “What?”

  “In England we call it a nappy.”

  “Thank you for pointing that out. That was a minor triumph of your cognitive capabilities. I’ll remind you again that my role is also to protect you. If logical thought processes are so difficult for you, you could remember the protection part of my role and spare yourself the intellectual effort of seeking reassurance that you are not about to get into a shark infested swimming pool, and that a predatory reptile from Earth hasn’t magically transported itself half way across the galaxy just so it can take a mouthful out of you.”

  “I feel like I have just been told off.”

  “Good. My effort wasn’t entirely wasted. Mike’s coming close, so pay her some attention.”

  Mike swum up to him. “You don’t like swimming. What are you doing out here?”

  “I’ve changed my mind about it.”

  “You look troubled. Has something happened while I was asleep?”

  “No, I’ve just been told off by my AI.”

  “Really? Can a People’s AI do that? Forget that question, it obviously can if it’s just done it. What did you do to piss it off?”

  “Uh, nothing. Are you planning a long swim?”

  “No, I just came out to wake myself up and watch you drowning. Now you’ve disappointed me by managing to swim, I’m going to get something to eat.”

  “I’ll come back with you.” Mark said but got left behind as Mike effortlessly glided through the water on her way back to the shore.

  Chapter Sixty Eight

  Communications Plan

  Mike was sitting at the bar when he caught up with her. The bar-bot handed him the towel he had ordered from the synthesizer as he swum back.

  “I’ve ordered.” Mike said. “Do you want anything to eat?”

  “I’d love a bacon sandwich, but I haven’t got a pattern for it. I’ll just have a coffee.”

  “You need to eat plenty of protein. You’re putting a lot of muscle on with all the workouts and training you’re doing. Why don’t you go back to Earth and get samples of everything you like? You could get some beer, that would please Simon too.”

  “He keeps banging on about it. Maybe I will one day, when this is all over.”

  “Oh yeah. Is it tomorrow yet? I’ve got my raising to go to the next day.”

  “That doesn’t make logical sense. If you mean is it morning on Tefran, yes, so your raising is tomorrow. I spoke to Sally about her pissing you off.”

  “You didn’t need to do that. It must have made her cross if you were telling her off. If she doesn’t want to come, that’s fine with me.” she said glumly.

  “It was just a communication problem. She was quite upset that you thought she didn’t want to come to the ceremony. She said that she meant she wouldn’t want to come if she were one of the People. She also said that an enraged massoon couldn’t stop her coming, although I don’t know what one of those is, apart from it being a big animal.”

  “Yeah, you can’t look it up on the Aarnth archive. Let me see if I can translate it using a similar animal on the Earth archive. Right, can you imagine something that looks like a huge blue whale, but with three legs. One big one at the back and two small vestigial ones at the front, with long and powerful tentacles and a massive beak it uses to rip its prey up. It gets around by hopping with its back leg and bounds across the sandy plains, chasing the Aarnth down and eating them.”

  “Yes. Wow!”

  “Yes what?” Mike asked.

  “Yes I can imagine it.”

  “You can imagine an aquatic mammal weighing over two hundred tonnes hopping around on one leg across a dry plain? Really? Well, it’s nothing like that you idiot. It’s really a bit like an Earth elephant but twice the size and covered in long reddish fur, and instead of those stupid dumpy legs with round feet, it’s got long powerful legs with long sharp claws, and instead of that ridiculous looking tentacle stuck in the middle of its face it’s got a big jaw full of sharp teeth. The Aarnth hunt them for food. They must be mad. If it was a choice of attacking one of those and eating leaves, I’d eat leaves.”

  “Me too. Anyway, the point is, she does want to be with you at your raising. She insisted I wake you and tell you straight away, but I wouldn’t, because you needed to sleep.”

  “Refusing to follow an order from Sally? You are getting feisty. Talking of sleeping, did you forget to wake me after an hour?”

  “I never intended to wake you. You were exhausted, You can’t have caught up on your sleep yet, but you should be OK for a couple of days on sleep suppressors now.”

  “Ahh. You’re just like a big brother to me. Except if the nursery staff had seen you hatch out, they’d have clubbed you to death thinking you were some kind of disgusting mutant.”

  “Is that what they do?”

  “No, but I’m pretty sure they would have made an exception for you.”

  The bar bot handed Mike her breakfast and gave Mark his coffee.

  “What is that you’re eating?”

  “These are a type of shellfish that come from the Herassan homeworld. The army’s synthesizers aren’t capable of making an edible version of them, but the People’s synthesizers make them just like the real thing!”

  “You said Herassans evolved in the desert. There can’t be too many shellfish that thrive in sand dunes.”

  “I’m not surprised your AI gets cross with you, you moron. At some point in our evolution, Herassans lived on the edge of the desert by the sea and developed a taste for fish and shellfish. And for swimming. It was to do with climate change. Every few hundred thousand years Herassa goes through a hot, dry period and the desert dries up completely for a few thousand years.”

  “Herassa? That’s why you’re called Herassans.”

  “No, it was called Herassa after my ancestor who won the final battle for supremacy over all the other tribes, a long time before we became emergent.”

  “But you’re called Hess An Sur, not Herassa.”

  “Her name was Herass An Sur. She must have been very egotistical to name our world after herself.”

  “What, like Sally named her army after herself.” Mark said.

  “I wouldn’t mention that to Sally if I were you.”

  “You’re probably right. I was askin
g, how will you tell the aristocrats about the changes. I can’t see them standing and cheering when you tell them, and if they hold the reins of power, they’re not going to make it happen.”

  “As absolute ruler, I can do what I like. They’ll have to do what I say, or I’ll have them removed from office. I’m planning to have you and Sally in with me when I tell them. Hasn’t Sally told you yet? I’ll have some of the Palace Guard outside, they’ll join us inside if they’re needed.”

  “But if you do that, it becomes a military coup, which then gets forced on the people. It’s hardly a people’s revolution.”

  “That’s true, but it achieves the plan, and the people will still benefit from it.”

  “I don’t suppose Herassans are much different from humans, and my country had a patch a few years back when major changes were proposed, they even had a vote about it. Just over half voted for, just under half voted against. The people in charge did what they thought was best for us, but half the people were very happy, and half the people were very unhappy. It caused a division in the country that still exists today. It would be better if all the Herassans wanted the same thing, or at least a clear majority.

  “Yeah, that would be great. But we’re not going to get that, so we’ll stick with my plan.”

  “Are you interested in hearing an alternative plan?”

  “Yeah, of course. If it’s better than my idea I’d be a complete idiot to ignore it.”

  “There are clear benefits for the vast majority of the population, aren’t there?”

  “Yeah, it’s only the aristocrats that will be pissed off, and not even all of them. At least half the aristocratic families are in the same position as the rest of the population, with no privileges, no special treatment. It’s only the greedy and grasping ones who will exploit anyone and tread on their faces to keep their privileges who won’t be better off, and they won’t lose anything – apart from the power to get even more.”

  “If the vast majority of the population will be better off, that’s a fairly powerful argument to put to the people. What are the arguments against?”

  “Apart from the powerful aristocratic families, everyone gains. The only argument against the plan for the people is that it means change. The conservatives won’t like it, but they’ll be better off, and there are over three million on Tefran alone that have felt strongly enough to make their feelings public by signing petitions and joining demonstration, which isn’t a particularly safe thing to do.”

  “Do you, or the rebels – I mean the Freedom Movement know who these people are?”

  “I think so, I don’t know. But how would that help?”

  “One more question, do Herassans use any kind of social media?”

  “I don’t. I don’t know if there is any. You’re asking questions I don’t know the answers to.”

  “OK, can Herassan AI’s handle virtual meetings?”

  “Of course they can! We may not be the most technologically advanced race, but we’re not cave dwellers!”

  “Can you get Sha into a virtual meeting with us, right now?”

  “If she’s not on an exercise. Who is training her at the moment?”

  “It’s very early on Tefran, she may not be in training yet. I’ll message Seltet to ask if Sha can join the two of us.”

  Mark messaged Seltet and got an immediate response, they hadn’t yet started, and she would tell Sha that she could join the training when Mike and Mark had finished with her. She said she would take Sha to a lander where she would be uninterrupted for the meeting.

  “What are you planning?” Mike asked.

  “I’m not planning anything. I want to talk to you both about the practicalities of getting your message out.”

  “They’ve always used posters in Tefran city, but it would take a lot of effort to put them up all over the Empire.”

  “Maybe we could try something sensible.”

  “We?”

  “OK, you, the rebels. I mean, the Freedom Movement. I’m just an advisor. You can choose to take my advice or ignore it.”

  “You have no idea how Herassan society works. How are you going to have any idea about how we tell them about my plan?”

  “We’ll see. Now eat those slimy things in your bowl and I’ll think while I drink my coffee.”

  After a few minutes of silence, interrupted only by the occasional quiet slurping sound from Mike eating her shellfish, she pushed the bowl away and said “I’m ready”

  Mark told his AI to construct the same woodland environment for his AI projection that Sally had used and connect him to Mike and Sha Ast Ral. He saw Mike sitting on a rock in a desert, with a few scruffy looking shrubs surrounded by sand with wind-blown ripples in it. Sha was sitting on a Herassan style stool at a table that looked like it was in a Starbucks.

  “I see you’ve had a VR meeting with Sally recently” Mike said, commenting on seeing him sitting on a fallen tree surrounded by woodland.

  “Yes. Thank you for joining us Sha Ast Ral.”

  “Please, call me Sha.” she said.

  “OK Sha. We’ve been talking about how to get a bit of momentum from the people behind Hess An Sur’s plan.”

  “Oh, please call me Hess.” Mike said, in a childlike voice.

  “Did she tell you to do that?” Mark asked his AI.

  “Her AI sent rendering parameters to make her voice sound like a child’s. Would you like me to ignore them?”

  “No, I’d like to know when she’s doing it.”

  “If you don’t want to take this seriously Mike, leave us and I’ll talk to Sha.”

  Sha looked rather shocked that Mark would speak to Hess An Sur, First Born of the First like that.

  Mike smirked and said, “Yes boss.”

  Mark looked at Sha and asked, “Do Herassans use any kind of social media?”

  “Yes, there are several popular services, but nearly everyone uses JabJab.”

  “JabJab?” Mark asked his AI.

  “It’s like Facebook, but better.”

  “Better than Facebook? That’s not hard.”

  Speaking to Sha again, he asked, “If one of your contacts on JabJab puts up a post that you think is interesting, can you share it?”

  “I think I can see where you’re going with this.” she said. “Yes we can.”

  “Can you, or one of your colleagues in the Freedom Movement put together a post that is clear, simple to understand and compelling enough that everyone who gets it will share it?”

  “We’ve got several people in the defense force who are good at that. I’ll contact them and tell them to get together when they’ve finished training.”

  “I think this is high priority. You contact them, give me their names and I’ll let Sally know what we’re doing and ask Seltet to pull it all together on the ground. The sooner this goes out the better.”

  “We can’t get it round the Empire before Hess’s raising. We have communication relays set up by all the wormholes in our space, but the wormholes are all located at the edge of the solar systems we occupy. Being from a pre-emergent race you may not know, but it’s not a good idea to have a wormhole near anything with high gravity. They can be up to ten light hours from the planet, colony or space habitat that it serves. It would take days to propagate a JabJab message across the Empire.”

  “I might have a solution for that.” Mark said.

  Speaking to his AI, he said, “Kate, that surveillance network you put around Herassan space after our meeting with the First Minister on Gnn’Ath. Is it still there?”

  “Yes Mark.”

  “Could it be used to filter out the message we are going to send out and selectively forward the shared copies via the instantaneous communications, then inject them back into the JabJab network?”

  “Technically it could be done, but it would breach the People’s protocols for using the subspace communication technology for anything except for a tightly controlled voting system. I recommend you speak to Ala
n to see if an exception can be made.”

  “Send Alan a message, tell him I’m coming down to Tefran and to meet me at my shuttle.”

  “I’ll send him a polite request and let you know how he responds.”

  “Thanks Kate. You can be a pain in the arse, but you’re really helpful when I need you.”

  “Don’t mention it Mark. By the way, when are we going to make your shuttle look like the TARDIS?”

  “Not right now. Maybe when we have our party when this is over.”