Rebirth

by Philip R Benge

Chapter Eleven

  The Morning of March 1st

  The Starship Freedom

  Tracy Goddard had finally finished working on a very tricky piece of software, and the city computer could now look upon the new colonists of Genesis as part of the people that it must protect. It also saw the Defender as a spacecraft whose sole duty was to protect the original people of the planet. George Masters Miles Finch four seat light aircraft also came under this definition, as it flitted above the woodlands of Genesis with Caroline and Morgana plotting the positions of each new native village on a map provided by the city computer. Morgana was George Masters` wife, and she simply loved flying in the Miles Finch, way up above the countryside; never had she enjoyed herself so much.

  George Masters had been brought to Orion with Tyler Burrows in a time storm, and since that day George had become a new man, enjoying the rebirth that Orion had given him. He had been the planet`s only pilot flying its only plane, but he had finally been able to teach Tyler to fly it as well, it made sense George said to have two pilots in case one got ill. For the last four weeks, he had been flying the two women about the countryside of the planet Genesis, while they searched for the native villages. Each village would have to be visited sometime, as the civilising of the savage natives of Genesis began in earnest.

  Tracy was still not certain whether the computer had fallen under the spell of Tyler Burrows, as so many people had done, including Tracy, or whether it was using Tyler for reasons that had not yet become known. However, what choice did they have? They had to accept the conditions proposed by the computer and so bring peace and prosperity to the people of Genesis. The only other option was for a fleet of starships to come from Earth, to blitz the ruined city, unfortunately the space fleet of Earth was already stretched, and to get one starship here on the edge of the galaxy would be a miracle. The last one to come their way had been the Defiant, but that was now busy fighting space pirates on the other side of the galaxy. No Tyler had no choice but to accede to the computer`s demands, which on the face of them were quite noble ones anyway. Caroline was of the opinion that the all-powerful computer had in fact fallen under the spell of one Tyler Burrows, and asking him for his help and agreeing that Tracy could play about with its software proved that it had.

  Tyler had been on Orion for the past two weeks attending to other things, but now he had returned on the Defender to keep to his side of the bargain with the computer, and ensure that the development of the planet`s original population progressed. He was met by Peter Collinson in the tracked vehicle; Peter had now been seconded by Tyler to help Charles Bragg in this task, and he had already contacted two of the native settlements located by the two women.

  "Hello Tyler, good to see you back, I hope that all is well, both on Persephone and Orion?"

  "Things are fine on both planets." Paul Divine answered for Tyler. "In fact things could not be better; Alice has decided to move to Orion. She will help Brian Goddard who has a lot of work in the pipeline, and he could do with a little help. Her replacement will be on the Constellation when it returns with the farm animals in two months` time."

  "He has been a happy little soul ever since Alice told him the good news." Tyler said.

  "Even the colonists on Persephone are happy for us, even if it does mean that they will be losing Alice." Paul Divine said.

  "Of course they are Paul, the people living on the new colony worlds are good people on the whole, and their religion is partly what makes this so. This much religion may be a bit hard to cope with, for someone who not only is not a member of the Church, but also holds a much different view about god and suchlike to the people of Persephone. There are far worse places to live Paul, such as back on Earth where nine billion people are crammed into those old cities."

  Peter Collinson didn`t join in the conversation because as a follower of the religion he couldn`t understand why Paul Divine should not want to live with the colonists on Persephone, but he decided to hold his tongue on the matter, he had learned a lot from Tyler Burrows during the short time that he had known him.

  The ruined city computer then contacted Tyler through the Defender`s communications system, and it asked him to come to the city urgently. As the Defender was not due to go anywhere yet Tyler flew to the city in it. After landing in the field some two miles from the city, he took a second tracked vehicle that he had brought along for use by Charles and Peter, and he used it to travel to the building where the computer was sited, he thought he knew why he had been summoned. It was because of the pummelling the Defender`s Phasers had put the city`s defences through, that and the extreme age of the city, the buildings had all been badly shaken and were now near to collapse. The computer greeted him as he entered the large room where it was sited, and then got down to business.

  "As you can see for yourself, the city is now beginning to collapse around me; this building too doesn`t have a lot of time left. If I am to survive for much longer, you will have to take me aboard the Defender, otherwise all the knowledge that the builders of this city stored within me will soon be lost forever."

  "All right computer, I will have the Defender take you to the planet of Orion where Brian Goddard can reassemble you in the old science building; it is powered by a fusion reactor so you will have a decent power supply, and it is protected by a defence shield. The reactor will provide power to you for some time before we will have to refuel it. You can then think about some new projects. You might consider giving Brian some of the information that you possess in your vast memories, providing that you think our society can safely handle it without destroying itself." Tyler said by way of agreeing to the computer`s request.

  "That will be satisfactory; in return, and a little late, I will tell you of the gift that I mentioned when we first met. There is a crashed Heliot spacecraft not far from this city; it came through the same space storm that you did. However, instead of crashing on the planet of Orion it bounced of the planet`s atmosphere whereupon it was hit by a large asteroid, its computer system and life support, amongst other important parts of the starship, were damaged. The crew were not able to repair much of the ship before reaching this planet, but they had repaired enough of it to allow them to land. The survivors were killed by the natives when they left their ship in search of drinking water, they were all half dead by then and could offer little resistance. The ship is fully repaired now, I had my own repair robots board it and repair its computer system, and when they had finished their task the ship`s own self-repair systems took over and began to repair the rest of the ship. The ship is in the large hanger like building on the edge of this city, I moved it there as soon as its computer system was fully repaired."

  Tyler Burrows was stunned, and it took him a moment to take in all that the computer had told him. There were many questions to answer; finally, he was down to just the last few queries.

  "The starship will have Heliot symbols on all of its equipment, plus the computer will be in the Heliot language. We have already worked out the meanings behind most of their symbols, we did this when we installed the Heliot technology into the Defender, but a translation for all of the others would be handy." Tyler said, just a little churlishly.

  "I have already altered the computers of the ship to work only in the English language, and I have already anticipated your request by translating the symbols and have sent the translation of each of the symbols used on the Heliot ship to the ship`s computer, you will be able to access them when you go aboard her."

  Tyler had never searched all the other buildings of the city, because the few they had looked into were just bare shells and were in a dangerous state of collapse. There seemed no point in braving the dangerous buildings for no reason, so he and the others had left them alone.

  "Thank you, I will go and look at it immediately after I have told Brian Goddard of the arrangements that we have agreed to regarding your new home. Tell me why didn`t you fire on the Heliot ship when it approached?"

  "I could see th
at it was badly damaged, and that most of its crew were already dead or dying. Why I allowed it to land here I could never work out, but maybe it was what your friends call the fates, the same spiritual thing that seems to have taken control of your own life Tyler Burrows. Tyler now contacted Brian on the short wave radio.

  "Brian where are you I need to talk to you urgently?" He asked.

  "I am right behind you Tyler, I have been doing a little work concerned with our city computer, and how are you by the way?"

  Tyler turned around, and after greeting his friend he quickly told him about his agreement to move the computer to a safer location. On being told Brian was delighted, it meant that he would have the all-powerful computer for his plaything and said so.

  "Tyler, the amount of knowledge that may well be inside of its memory banks could revolutionise our science." Brian said, hardly able to contain himself.

  "Be careful that you don`t revolutionise the science of Earth before Earth is mentally capable of handling it all." Tyler warned him.

  "Tyler you have so little trust in anyone, except for your friends that is, and anyway I still remember the time experiments back on Orion, and so you have nothing to worry about." Brian replied.

  "I know that Brian, but do you blame me for being just a little concerned about the rest of mankind?" Tyler asked his friend.

  "Maybe not, for mankind is weak and politicians are even weaker."