by Ian Douglas
It happens.
As for General Nanodynamics, I think they’re going to have all the shiny new xenotech data they can handle, beginning anytime now.
The question is whether we’re going to have time to do anything with it before the next crisis.
You see, the Treaty of Bloodstar provides for an exchange—Qesh technological data for the right to exploit Gliese 581 IV. It seems my guess was right; the Salvationist leaders want the Qesh there.
That revelation alone beggars belief. The Jackers were slaughtering those rebel prisoners outside Salvation, slaughtering them in the most horrible fashion imaginable, and yet the Council of Elders has formally invited the Qesh in to “restore order.” The gods preserve us from religious fanatics. The bastards were still sniping at our Marines on the planet before we finally withdrew.
The Qesh, if we can believe them, are busily Qeshiforming Bloodworld, and when they’re done, they will leave a single clan behind to complete the domestication of their human property while the rest move on. Where will they go? They haven’t told us. Not Sirius, probably; they’ve told us they already control another node of the EG out at Spica, a B-class double giant only about 120 light years from Gliese 581. In fact, they claimed they’d arrived at Gamma Ophiuchi from Spica, where they apparently had a major base of some sort, 130 light years from Gamma Oph.
But what if they decide to acquire more property rights in our interstellar backyard? What if they find Earth? We’ve checked. All references to Sol and to Sol’s location have indeed been deleted from the Bloodworld networks, but there’s still the possibility, even the likelihood, that their technology is good enough to tease the whispers of our civilization out of the hiss and crackle of background noise.
The Galaxy was already a dark and scary place; it’s just become a bit darker, a bit scarier, and just a bit lonelier.
I’m sure General Nanodynamics and the other xenodata-miner corps will make good use of whatever information the Jackers care to share with us. Maybe we’ll even use it to figure out how to manufacture true antigravity, or figure out how to switch off the new Ice Age and turn all of Earth into a semitropical paradise.
But I wonder if it will be worth it.
I and the whole of Marine Recon 7 are clan sib-daughters of the Qesh, now, yeah, but just how much will that buy us if they come knocking at Earth’s doorstep, maybe with a near-c impactor?
Thanks to the Treaty of Bloodstar, our xenosophontology and x-bio people have a lot more to work with as well. I was wondering what the third Jacker sex looked like; turns out the big septopods are the females, the smaller octopods are “nurturers,” a translation of the Qesh term for the nannies who take care of the babies after they’re born, and the males are . . . well, I’ve seen one, now. They’re glistening, wet, and black, about three centimeters long and look like a terrestrial leech with eight clawed appendages. They’re parasites living inside the female’s reproductive tract—completely mindless, almost completely brainless, and the babies eat them when they’re expelled at parturition.
Charming. The xenosoph teams are going to be working on what that might mean for Qesh social structure and worldview for a long time to come.
“Huh? What?”
I realized Dubois had asked me a question. I’d been staring down at the slow-growing disk of Earth, lost in thought.
“I said, are you still putting in for the Black Wizards?”
“Oh . . . yeah.” I shrugged. “It hasn’t been too bad.”
Some of the Marines had kidded me about my zombie status, and a few had seemed distant or scornful. Most of them, though, just called me Doc.
The thing is, when I’d talked to Lieutenant Baumgartner on board the Consolation, I’d forgotten that I was due for reassignment anyway. My deployment with 1st Battalion, 1st MarDiv had been temporary and provisional, pending my winning my upgrade to FMF. So I’d gone ahead and filled in my dream sheet, requesting assignment to the Black Wizards, Marine Deep Recon 7. I admit that a large part of that revolved around the fact that Joy was Marine 1/1, 1st MarDiv—and right now I was very interested in keeping in touch with her.
Of course, my interests didn’t count for a whole hell of a lot. Now it was up to the gods of Division Personnel and MarDeepSpaRecGru to grant or refuse my prayers.
“If I were you, Carlyle,” Garner told me, “I’d be putting in for xeno-res. Maybe a contact-study team with the Hymies.”
There’d been a lot of scuttlebutt lately about the Hymies, as they were commonly known—the enormous abyssal life forms eight kilometers and more across, living in the lightless depths of Niffelheim-e’s world ocean. The evidence suggested that they were intelligent, though we still didn’t understand the nature of that intelligence, the form it took, its worldview or cultural mapping. The xeno-research groups were excited about the new contact, though I suspected that the Commonwealth’s real interest had more to do with establishing a base inside the Gliese system where they could keep an eye on our new neighbors. We have an embassy ship orbiting Bloodworld now, but if the Jackers decide to do something nasty to Earth, that’ll be the first to go. Maybe they’ll spot the preparations first out at Niffelheim, though, and send a courier with a warning.
It wouldn’t be much warning, but even a little would be better than no warning at all.
“Maybe,” I told Chief Garner. “But I was kind of hoping for something warmer.”
“Well, you discovered the critters. I’m sure the research boys and girls would be glad to have you on the team.” He shrugged. “Hell, after opening the door with the Qesh, you can probably write your own ticket, anywhere you want to go. Maybe even the Xenoscience Bureau at Bethesda!”
So . . . where did I want to go?
Not Earth. I was going to spend my leave there with relatives, but no. Not Earth.
I was Fleet Marine Force now.
My place was with the fleet—with the Marines.
Star Corpsman Timeline
2069: Discovery of pseudobacterial mats beneath Martian permafrost.
2072: Collapse of the North Atlantic Conveyor. Beginning of the New Ice Age.
2095: Cayambe Space Elevator enters service.
2098: Terran Commonwealth established. Glaciers form across northern hemisphere.
2100: Neo-Luddite revolution against nanotech and genetic engineering.
2105: Alpha Centauri Expedition. Success of Plottel-Alcubierre Drive.
2109: Chiron [Alpha Centauri A IV] colony established.
2115: Terran Commonwealth takes over Cayambe Space Elevator.
2117: Sirius Expedition. Discovery of Encyclopedia Galactica.
2120: Jovian Expedition. Discovery of Europan Medusae.
2131: First AI transcriptions of Encyclopedia Galactica.
2140: White Seraphim Incident on Chiron.
2143: Human Endeavor expedition to Gliese 581.
2146: Establisment of base at Conomara Chaos, in Europa.
2149: Founding of General Nanodynamics.
2150: Contact with the Durga, at Delta Aquarii.
2181: Salvation Colony established on Bloodstar’s World by CCS Outward Venture.
2186: First contact with Qesh by Zeng He at Gamma Ophiuchi, 84 light years from Earth.
2194: Contact Protocol—location of Earth kept secret.
2198: Establishment of Cernunnos, at Psi Serpentis IV.
2204: Hippocrates Expedition. Contact with X’ghr.
2212: Development of cybertelemeric engineering.
2241: Elliott Carlyle joins the Navy.
2245: Bloodstar Rebellion.
2246: Second Battle of Bloodstar. Treaty of Bloodstar.
Star Corpsman Glossary
apneustic center: portion of the brain, located in the pons, that stimulates breathing.
atrioventricular node: also AV node. Co
llection of cells at the upper end of the right ventricle of the heart, which can take over pacemaker duties from the SA node if it is suppressed.
atriums, left and right: the two smaller, upper chambers of the heart that receive blood from elsewhere—from the body for the right atrium, the lungs for the left. When they contract, they force the blood down into the heart’s ventricles.
Bainbridge reflex: automatic response to a sudden drop in blood pressure within the atria, slowing the heart rate.
BP: blood pressure.
bradycardia: from Greek for “slow heart.” A heartbeat considerably slower than normal.
BVE: blood Volume Expander. A fluid such as saline, Ringer’s Lactate, or human blood plasma, used to prevent circulatory collapse in the event of severe blood loss.
C1 through C7: designations for the seven cervical vertebrae in the neck, located between the skull and the thoracic vertebrae.
carotid arteries: major arteries, one on either side of the neck, delivering blood to the head.
cc: cubic centimeter. A standard unit of volume used in medicine.
cingulate cortex: portion of the brain’s limbic system that, among many other things, processes the neural input from the body we register as pain.
diastole: the second number of a blood pressure reading, measuring the lowest pressure against the arterial walls, in millimeters of mercury, between each contraction.
DRG: dorsal respiratory group. Column of nerve fibers within the medulla oblongata that initiate breathing.
fibula: long bone in the lower leg, more slender than and next to the tibia.
hippocampus: portion of the brain’s limbic system that, among many other things, helps process acute pain.
humerus: long bone in the arm, between shoulder and elbow.
intercostal nerves: from Greek for “among the ribs.” Nerves arising from the thoracic spinal nerves and running through the thoracic pleura and abdominal peritoneum.
medulla oblongata: in common usage, the medulla. Portion of the brain, the lower half of the brainstem, between the spinal cord and higher portions of the brain that controls, among other things, heart rate, blood pressure, breathing, and various involuntary or autonomic functions.
mesothelium: a thin membrane lining several body cavities, including the thoracic cavity.
micron: 1 millionth of 1 meter. A human red blood cell is about 5 microns across. A typical human hair is around 100 microns in thickness.
nananodyne: from “nano” and “anodyne.” A nanobot, about 1 micron across, programmed to reduce or eliminate pain. Slang: nanonarcs.
nanobots: nanotechnic robots—tiny machines, first hypothesized in the late twentieth century, that operate inside the human body, either under autonomous programming, or through teleoperation by a human or artificial intelligence. Typically, they range in size from 1 to about 20 microns, are powered by the heat of the body within which they operate, and can communicate with one another and with an outside operator by radio.
neuroreceptor: a neurotransmitter receptor—a membrane protein allowing a cell, particularly a neuron or a glial cell, to communicate chemically with its surroundings.
neurotransmitter: any of a number of chemicals that transmit signals from a neuron across a synapse to another neuron or some other target cell.
NMDA: N-methyl d-aspartate. A type of neuroreceptor in the brain associated with consciousness. Certain anesthetics, such as Ketamine, block these receptors, inducing dissociative anesthesia.
nociceptor: pain receptors; sensory receptors that send nerve signals to the spinal cord and brain where they are interpreted as pain.
pericardium: from Greek for “around the heart.” The thin, membranous layer of mesothelium surrounding the heart and the roots of the primary blood vessels.
periostoma: from Greek for “around the bone.” Sheath of nerve- and blood-vessel-rich tissue surrounding each bone.
phrenic nerve: from Greek for “mind.” Nerve that branches through the diaphragm, the mediastinal pleura, and the pericardium. It provides the only motor supply for the diaphragm.
pneumothorax: from Greek for “air in the chest.” Caused by a penetrative wound piercing the pleura, allowing air to enter the chest cavity. Also referred to as a “sucking chest wound.” It can lead to the collapse of one or both lungs.
RBCs: red blood cells. Natural, disk-shaped cells 5 microns across that transport oxygen and carbon dioxide through the circulatory system.
respirocyte, Freitas respirocyte: artificial blood cell, a spherical nanobot approximately 1 micron across and containing approximately 18 billion atoms, first proposed by Robert Freitas in the early 2000s. Respirocytes carry 236 times as much oxygen as human RBCs. If all of a human’s RBCs were replaced by respirocytes, that person could hold his breath underwater for hours, or sprint at top speed for fifteen minutes without taking a breath.
sinoatrial node: also SA node, collection of cells on the surface of the heart’s right atrium that serves as a pacemaker, causing all of the heart’s muscles to contract together.
systole: the first number of a blood pressure reading, a measure of the highest pressure on the arterial walls, in millimeters of mercury, during the heart’s contraction.
T1 through T12: designations for the twelve thoracic vertebrae in the spine, located between the cervical vertebrae (above) and the lumbar vertebrae (below).
thalamus: portion of the brain serving as a central switching station for incoming neural impulses.
thoracic cavity: space within the chest containing the heart, lungs, esophagus, and associated structures.
tibia: long bone in the lower leg that, together with the smaller fibula, runs between the knee and the ankle.
ventricles, left and right: the two larger, lower chambers of the heart, which receive blood from the atria. When they contract, they force blood out of the heart—into the lungs in the case of the right ventricle, and out into the body for the left.
VTA: ventral tegemental area. Portion of the midbrain responsible for triggering dopamine release during orgasm. Among other things, it is associated with motivation, addiction, and the emotions associated with love.
About the Author
IAN DOUGLAS, one of the many pseudonyms for writer William H. Keith, Jr., is the New York Times bestselling author of the popular military SF series The Heritage Trilogy, The Legacy Trilogy, The Inheritance Trilogy, and the ongoing Star Carrier series. A former naval corpsman, he lives in Pennsylvania.
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By Ian Douglas
Star Corpsman
BLOODSTAR
Star Carrier
EARTH STRIKE
CENTER OF GRAVITY
SINGULARITY
The Galactic Marines Saga
The Heritage Trilogy
SEMPER MARS
LUNA MARINE
EUROPA STRIKE
The Legacy Trilogy
STAR CORPS
BATTLESPACE
STAR MARINES
The Inheritance Trilogy
STAR STRIKE
GALACTIC CORPS
SEMPER HUMAN
Copyright
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Cover art by Fred Gambino
BLOODSTAR. Copyright © 2012 by William H. Keith, Jr. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be rep
roduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
Epub Edition PUB SEPTEMBER 2012 ISBN: 9780062197993
Print Edition ISBN: 9780061894763
FIRST EDITION
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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