The Alpha Choice

by M. D. Hall

  ‘You are certain this will neutralise Black?’

  ‘I am.’

  Garnoth nodded his approval. ‘You will proceed immediately with your two meetings. Keep me appraised of all developments,’ and with that, the image of the Agency head was gone.

  That last reassurance was now coming back to haunt her. Despite all she had done. The man and his artefact had got through to the cadre. Garnoth would wonder whether she had done enough to render Black ineffective. Had Black known about this man, even then? She began to question her actions. Should I have sidestepped Wye, and dealt with the President directly? Was I too clever for my own good?

  Her self recrimination was brought to a sudden halt as they were all called back into the room.

  Δ

  Following his new companion’s line of sight, Jon found Tala looking directly at him. Her face gave nothing away, and was all the more unnerving for that.

  Hugo looked around the crowd, seconds later sighing. ‘He's not here.’

  Jon scanned the corridor himself, but was unable to see what Hugo was driving at.

  ‘Gerry Wye,’ Hugo added, ‘he's still inside with the President.’

  ‘Why’s that a problem?’ asked Jon, bemused.

  Hugo’s response was to indicate, with a sideways move of his head, that the two of them should move off to a point where they could not be overheard. Jon took the hint, and it was only when they were far enough away not to be heard, but not so far as to arouse suspicion, that they continued their discussion in lowered voices.

  ‘I don’t know, but given that she doesn’t look too concerned,’ Hugo looked over to the seraphic Tala, ‘and Wye isn't to be trusted, it tells me that he’s somehow bound up in what they’re doing.’

  ‘You forget, Hugo, he’s only one and there are another four in there, she can't have got to all of them.’

  ‘That possibility is too frightening to consider,’ Hugo replied, shaking his head. ‘Because the President is here on the spot, he has the most influence, and take it from one who knows, he’s very persuasive. If Gerry’s got to him, the President will ensure the rest will fall in line,’ he breathed out sharply through his nose and looked hard at Jon. ‘We've got to accept that we’re likely to fail, so what’s the backup plan the Custodians gave you?’

  Jon stared blankly back.

  After a pause that seemed to last longer than the three or so seconds it actually took, Hugo spoke. ‘So we’re on our own.’ Jon could almost hear the man think. ‘You're the only one who can use the Artefact, right?’

  ‘As far as I know yes, at least around here.’

  Hugo wished that Liz was with him to sort through all the possible options, but that was a forlorn hope, and so came up with the only option available to them. ‘When we get back inside, make straight for the Artefact. Everyone will be too interested in hearing what the President has to say, to bother with you…’

  ‘What about his security people, won't they stop me?’ Jon interrupted.

  ‘We've already seen how the Artefact protects you. Provided you have it, I don’t think you’ll have a problem.’

  ‘You don’t think!’ Jon whispered.

  ‘Do you have a better plan?’

  After the briefest of moments Jon answered. ‘No, but I've no idea what to do with it, once I have it.’

  ‘If - and it’s a big if - I'm right, the same defence mechanism will kick in as before.’ Hugo answered.

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘Once the agreement is signed, the Te will attack us. I think the Artefact will protect you and I'm hoping the rest of us will be caught in that umbrella…’ he looked at the doubtful face of Jon and added. ‘I know it’s not much, but it’s all we've got.’

  A few more minutes elapsed before the doors opened, Gerry Wye stepped out of the room and whispered into the ear of the nearest Secret Service woman.

  Soon afterwards, the crowd made its way back into the room.

  Ω

  The Tellurians were about to fail, and Gorn had run out of options. He was about to transmit the kill order to the Avatar, when all power on the bridge failed.

  Darl was furious. ’What’s happened XO?’

  Kirion, like Gorn, was completely at a loss to explain the outage. Darl was just about to speak when the power was restored, but before Gorn had an opportunity to proceed with his order, he received one of his own. ‘Gorn, find the cause of that malfunction and share your console with the XO so he can double check your findings.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Gorn replied. This effectively put paid to any chance he had of issuing the kill instruction to the Avatar. Kirion would be aware of anything beyond the norm, why didn't I give it the autonomy to act if I was blocked? Part of him was angry for being so shortsighted, a bigger part of him was relieved.

  Δ

  As Hugo and Jon got to the doors, two muscular Secret Service men appeared either side of them and gently, but firmly, moved the two off to one side. They were kept there until everyone had entered and taken up their previous positions, at which point they were escorted into the room and brought to a stop well short of the table and, more importantly, the Artefact.

  Jon's heart sank. Their last ditch plan had just evaporated. The ancient device might as well have been back at Stonehenge.

  Once the murmuring crowd had quietened to an expectant silence, the President spoke.

  He addressed the crowd, but looked at Hugo. ‘I have conferred with my fellow leaders,’ as if to confirm this statement, each of the images gave a slight nod of the head. The spokesman for the cadre continued, with what Hugo took to be genuine sadness in his eyes. ‘I am sorry it has come to this. A trusted friend has sought to make capital out of this momentous event. We owe our lives to our new friends,’ at this point the President dropped the pretence of addressing all present, and spoke directly to Hugo. ‘You were the most powerful man on the planet, and would have remained so but,’ he glanced at Gerry Wye, before returning his attention to Hugo, ‘you weren’t content with that. Instead, you come to us with this,’ he gestured, towards the Artefact, ‘toy, and an unbelievable story to make us all afraid…afraid enough to swallow your fabrication. Well, you seriously underestimated us, as I underestimated you.’

  Hugo looked at Gerry and wondered what he could have said to the President, to make him believe this nonsense. While there was a look of dark triumphalism in Gerry Wye’s face, there was no such overt expression in the face of Tala. She remained calm and without expression of any kind. He had been completely outmanoeuvred by Gerry and Tala, and was now expected to respond to the President, but how could he deny something he knew nothing about? He could only shake his head.

  With no reply, or explanation forthcoming, the President stood up straight and turned to look at the clock behind the press corps before saying. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, I apologise for keeping you waiting. You came here to witness the execution of an agreement to record, possibly the most historic moment in our evolution, certainly the most promising. Not since our ancestors discovered fire, has there been such a leap forward for mankind. No doubt the writers of history will record that the signature was six minutes late,’ he smiled. ‘I hope it’s not all I’m remembered for.’

  Nervous, sporadic laughter travelled around the room.

  Not everyone was as comfortable with the signing as they were before the entrance of Hugo Black and Jonathon Tyler. Why, more than a few wondered, didn't the President put off the signing just for a day, to see if this Artefact is all Tyler has said it is? If the Te are our friends, they wouldn't object.

  Hugo had recovered from his bewilderment, and looked again at Wye and Tala. He now understood everything. The Te’an had it covered all along. She smiled at him, secure in the knowledge that she had won. Gerry Wye made no attempt to avoid his gaze. Indeed, his look portrayed his thoughts as surely as if he had voiced them.

  At that moment Hugo realised he had underestimated Wye. He always knew the man held the deluded belief he w
as a patriot. In his twisted view of reality, the thought that one man, Hugo Black, could hold his nation to ransom was anathema to him. What did it matter if Hugo never gave him cause to think this? The power Hugo possessed, the power that frightened Wye, had gone. Hugo was no longer a threat, and that was all that mattered to the man whose actions were about to propel the human race into oblivion.

  Hugo shook his head without knowing he did it. ‘You stupid, vain fool,’ he said quietly to Wye, knowing the man could not possibly hear him, ‘you have no idea what you've unleashed.’

  Without any great fanfare to mark the moment, the two representatives, one of Earth and the other of Te’ath placed their hands on the electronic pad before them.

  The signing was complete. Applause resounded through the room from all but Hugo, Jon and the Secret Service personnel. The three view screens showed genuinely happy premiers, each secure in the knowledge that the whole world, but more particularly their own nations, would benefit enormously from the alliance.

  Tala shook the hand of the President and smiled. She then walked around to the other side of the desk where she removed, from her jacket a disc similar to that shown to Hugo Black in his office, so many years earlier.

  Hugo looked at the President, the man he had trusted to make the right decision…

  Δ Ω

  Most people in the signing room had never seen a disk like the one Tala produced after the ‘signing’. In fact, it was so small many still did not see it. Addressing all present, she announced. ‘Behold, your planet!’ She threw the disc into the space in front of her, where it stopped in midair. Closing her eyes, a holographic image appeared above the disc showing what was taking place above the Earth. At first the scene was an inky blackness then, slowly from the left of the hologram, appeared a segment of an enormous crescent, growing larger as it advanced further into the blackness. This was the Earth as seen by the Te, and it was the camera or whatever recording device they were using, not the planet that was moving. Within a couple of minutes the movement ceased.

  Even though Jon had seen the Sun from Jane’s observation room, this was still very impressive. As with a myriad of other pictures he had seen in magazines and on television, the Earth was predominantly blue, with large white areas of cloud and irregular green and brown segments. What was different to anything he had previously seen, was the sense of being there, it was as though he was floating in space, above his planetary home. He lost any sense of being in the room, or part of a group. Everything faded away until there was only him, the Earth and the vast blackness of space. His feelings were not only of awe, as he looked out towards the almost limitless expanse of space, but also of comfort, to know that the breathtakingly beautiful planet below was his home.

  He had no idea how long he had been ‘lost,’ when the image appeared to recede and became, once more, a hologram. Diminishing to passive observer, he ceased to be part of what he saw. Certain this effect was intentional, he looked around and could tell his experience was not unique. Immediately, his attention was drawn back to the floating hologram. Three yellow flashes appeared, against the blackness - exiting weft space had been honed over the last three thousand years - and when they were gone, three ships floated in their place. He had no way of determining their size, as they were totally without markings of any kind. They were elliptical in shape and seemed to have no windows, turrets or protuberances of any kind, they were completely smooth. Just as the Earth reflected the light of the Sun, they shone with a yellow gold lustre.

  Of course, Hugo had seen the like before, when he was shown a recording of Te’ath by Tala and Beron. He knew that if they were of a similar size to the ship he saw landing, they would be over three kilometres long, and dwarf any structure on Earth.

  Tala opened her eyes, looked towards the President and smiled. Her smile denoted genuine pleasure. The President returned the smile and bowed his head slightly, to acknowledge the gesture.

  The Te’an representative, who had laboured for so long to arrive at this moment spoke, not only to those in the room, but the entire, watching planet. ‘These ships will seal our alliance…’ she paused long enough to look around the room, meeting the eyes of each person, in turn, saving the cadre for last. Returning to the President, she held his gaze longer than any of the others, and if anyone had cared to look at him they would have seen a flash of uncertainty flicker across his face, before she added, ‘…and your fate.’

  Tala, once again closed her eyes, and when she opened them the image within the hologram had changed. Floating in front of her was the image of the man Hugo had last seen when the President pleaded for Te’an assistance, the same balding, thickset man. His name was not known to any there, save Tala, it was Garnoth.

  The image spoke. ‘You have done well Tala. Be ready to receive final instructions from Commander Darl.’

  Garnoth looked directly to the President. ‘You really ought to have listened to your injured friend,’ he indicated to Jon, and smiled. ‘He was quite right. Now that you are a member of our alliance you are subject to our absolute dominion,’ the infuriating smile remained. ‘I appreciate how melodramatic that must sound, but it seems to be the appropriate expression to cover the situation in which you now find yourselves,’ he stopped, taking in the confused looks of those assembled and sighed, as though forced to realise his audience were not quite as quick on the uptake as he had hoped. ‘Let me explain. Because of a code of conduct forced upon us by others, we were unable to directly invade your planet, it is not permitted. There is, however, a way around the code, which necessitates infiltration of a society by subterfuge. What the drafters of the code failed to appreciate, for all their sophistication and power, was that if a civilisation such as yours, of its own free will, joined with us for mutual protection, all decisions concerning safety and well-being reside with us. We are entitled to interpret these concepts subjectively. Particularly, where your continued well-being conflicts with our own. The consequence, unfortunately for you, is the destruction of all Tellurian life on this planet and for the avoidance of doubt, by Tellurian we mean you.’

  The reaction from the small crowd was one of complete disbelief. Some hoped it was part of an elaborate hoax, a rebuke for the appalling accusations made against the Te by the stranger with the injured arm. After a few minutes the incoherent mutterings of the crowd ceased.

  Throughout those minutes Garnoth was silent, and as the silence stretched on, any hopes the crowd may have harboured, faded. All the while, the smile of the harbinger remained, but his eyes reflected no warmth, no humanity.

  Hugo looked at Tala as the image pronounced sentence, and saw the merest hint of regret in her face, that doesn’t make any sense, he thought.

  The projection of Garnoth disappeared as swiftly as it had appeared, to be replaced by the image of a distinguished looking man with greying hair and aquiline features. Those in the gathering who still had their wits about them, guessed this was Darl. Speaking in a languid voice, he said. ‘Tala, you and Beron are to return immediately. It has been decided to proceed with the sterilisation of the planet sooner than originally planned. The timescale has been reduced from a month, to six days. We still believe that will be ample time to remove all we consider worth preserving. Your reports, and those of Beron were most impressive and have been thoroughly analysed. They have saved us weeks of valuable time.’

  He spoke with no apparent regard for the Tellurians in the chamber. ‘Only Tellurian life is to be extinguished, at least for the time being. Shock troops will be deployed to remove the articles of value and eradicate any remnants.’

  The impact of what had been said hit almost every Tellurian, although the effects differed: some began to sob, one fainted. Most, however, simply looked with expectation upon the face of the man they earnestly believed could, and would save them.

  During this time the President had taken on the look of a man thirty years older than his actual age of fifty-four. The look he gave Hugo as much as said.
‘What have I done?’

  The stark realisation that the President did not have the answer brought home the true horror of what was going to happen, hitting the little group as surely as if Te’an shock troops had actually entered the chamber.

  So it was, no one noticed Beron entering the room. Evidently, the guards outside the door had not proven a hindrance.

  Ω

  When the image of Tala had faded from view, Garnoth sighed and turned towards Darl. ‘You know the Tellurians will use force in an attempt to stop us,’ it was more a statement than a question, although Darl misread it when he replied. ‘I would be surprised if they did not, but you have no cause to fear the out…’

  ‘Fear the outcome!’ interrupted the spymaster. ‘Don’t be absurd Darl. We need them to attack us.’ The commander’s face began to redden, he was unaccustomed to being treated as a fool.

  Garnoth continued, seemingly oblivious to the discomfiture of the man opposite. ‘I am concerned at the loss of the ships we gave them. They are a valuable resource. Of course, they will have to be destroyed.’ In this statement there was a question, for while Garnoth knew as much about the firepower of Eclipse, as its commander, he dared to hope the military man’s combat experience might offer up the slimmest possibility the hybrid ships could be captured intact.

  On this occasion Darl understood exactly what was being asked. ‘Regrettably, the ships are too small for us to target areas that will simply immobilise them. Even the darts will not assist. The hybrid ships do have the ability to mount a sustained attack, causing severe damage to us, and so we cannot take the risk…’ the spymaster simply walked from the commander’s ready room. Darl felt compelled to look at the Avatar, but the machine regarded him with no hint of emotion whatever, before breaking eye contact and following its master. Unaccustomed to fear, Darl was nevertheless unnerved at the thought of the machine thoroughly scanning him, and determining with some accuracy what he was feeling. He was grateful it was unable to read his thoughts!