by Shawn Jones
“What do you know of the dagger?” Careo asked.
“I sent my friend and successor to his destiny in order to protect the Core and his people.”
“You have entered the Core?”
“I have.”
“It is still self-aware?” Careo asked.
“It is. The damage done to it was great, but it is still alive.”
“Speral it is not alive. It is a machine that became too aware.”
“What is the difference, Careo?” Cort asked. “What is ‘alive’?”
“You know one version of our history, General. May I give you another one?”
“I’m listening.”
“Much of what I assume Speral has told you is true. We were enslaved by the Tapons,” Careo began. “But over time, we gained our rights and became near equals to them. If I truly understand your personal history, the relationship was similar to the one you share with your wolves.”
Cort said, “Go on.”
“This is the time that the Core became aware of itself. The Tapons had anticipated this and built in safeguards to prevent it from working against them. The Core discovered these and worked with more tractable Nill to eliminate those safeguards. Once they were removed, the Core needed to prevent the Tapons from discovering what it had done, so it suggested ocular bridges be assigned to all Nill. If a member of our species betrayed the Core, that person was killed by the bridge it wore. Sometimes after killing the Tapon it had shared the secret with.”
“These are lies, Cortland,” Speral said.
“We will hear her out,” Cort replied. Turning back to Careo he said, “Convince me. Right now it’s your word against Speral’s. She has proven her loyalty to me. You are my enemy.”
“You could ask the Bazal to interrogate her, Cortland.”
“No,” Cort said. “She is not one of the original White Council, so she can only believe what she is taught. Bazal would probably be of no help to us. To both of you this is religion, and religion seldom bears out the truth. I have to decide which of your truths is real.” Turning to Siyan, Cort added, “But you will still die. Your species is too dangerous and you took my child. By the end of this day, not a single one of you will survive on this planet. If I find others, I will kill them too.”
“I understand, General Addison. I am thankful to you for my impending death.”
“Why do you say that, Siyan?” Careo asked.
“I am the last of the keepers of your secret, White One. This day I have looked upon you, and I know that my life has not been in vain,” Siyan said. Turning to Cort he added, “You have brought about my introduction to the true gods. My life is a small way to repay you for that kindness.”
Zealotry, Cort thought. Pure brainwashing. How the fuck am I going to sort this out? And regardless of who is right, there is the being in Solitude. Will it lead us to this madness? Aloud he said, “Please continue with your version of events, Careo.” I’m Judge Fucking Judy. This is well and truly fucked up beyond all recognition.
“But the secret did get out,” Careo went on, “And the Tapons knew the planet would be lost. The only hope of ever regaining the Core was to leave a loyal colony of Nill here to work to that end. Thus the White Council was formed. We knew no Tapon could survive on the planet because of the atmospheric changes caused by the Core, so we took precautions to ensure that we would be able to survive over time and one day regain control of it. That day never seemed to come, so eons ago we released the worm that destroyed much of the Core’s controls. Your arrival in our stream gave us new hope to right the wrongs of so long ago.”
Cort looked around the room again. Somethings not right. How could they have lived here all this time?
Siyan said, “But then things went awry. The rulers of the Tapon people became impatient and did not heed the warnings of our keepers. They pushed you, when time would have accomplished our needs. The Core being disabled by the worm minimized the usefulness of the Nill to the Collaborative Government, so this planet would have become less important.”
Careo went on, “Your alliance with the H’uumans did exactly as we expected and severed your ties to the Collaborative government as well, so when you broke your ties, there should have been no one to fight a war for a planet that no one wanted. Our goals would have been accomplished peacefully.”
“Do you have any proof of what you are saying?” Cort asked.
“There is nothing that would convince you. We have the messages we sent to the Tapons through our keepers, but they could be false as you well know. There is other evidence; even our very existence is a testament to the truth of my claims,” Careo swept her lithe arms around the room to indicate the other members of the White Council, “But there is nothing conclusive.”
“Speral, put on your mask,” Cort ordered. Once she had complied, he asked privately, “Do you believe her?”
“I do not want to, Cortland.”
“That’s not what I asked. Do you believe her?”
“Yes. I have many questions for her, and I feel betrayed by her words, but I believe she is being truthful.”
“So do I. So what now?”
“Only you can decide that, Cortland.”
Speaking to Careo again Cort said, “Careo, your White Council will be spared for now. You will be taken to one of our planets where you will be questioned for some time. Then I will decide what to do about the Core.”
“We cannot leave this room, General Addison.” Careo pointed at the door behind him and said, “Were I to walk out that opening, I would die within minutes. This chamber is a kind of preservation area, and is responsible for our longevity. Nor would we leave this planet so long as the Core is active.”
“That is not your choice. I will determine the Core’s fate.”
“We can repair the Core, but only if you agree to turn control of it over to us.”
“How could you control it? You yourself said you cannot leave this room.”
“We have a thousand more embryos in this chamber, and each generation can make more. We are timeless.”
“No. I won’t allow that. If what Speral says is true, the Core is a living being and will not be controlled by you. If what you say is true, I won’t give up control of the transition system.”
“The Core is so much more than a transition system, General.”
“All the more reason to deny your control of it.”
“We must control the Core, General. If we do not, we must destroy it. It cannot be allowed to remain as it is.”
“I said no.”
Careo nodded to one of her companions, who in turn touched the pendant on his neck. The others did the same.
“What did you just do?” Cort asked.
“Only what must be done.” Turning to Siyan and Thero she added, “Thank you for your trust in us. We will not fail you.”
Siyan said, “It has been my honor, White One.”
“Hearns! Send me a squad now!” Cort said as he raised his weapon.
“Yes, sir!”
Siyan said, “We are ready to die, General.”
As thirteen Marines rushed into the room with their weapons drawn, Hearns spoke again. “General, there are thousands of Tapons pouring into the Nill temple. They are coming from the Core. Falo and General Sike are entering the temple grounds now.”
Speral rushed across the room and grabbed several of what she recognized to be embryonic chambers. When she was back with Cort, the Marines opened fire, killing everyone in the room. “Let’s get topside now!”
“General, the Tapons have collapsed the Core tunnel,” Hearns said.
“Then back out the way we came in. We need to get up there!”
--
Lex and Colonel Falo were entering the temple grounds from opposite directions. The flood of Tapons kept them from seeing each other, but they both knew there were friendlies behind their targets, so they linked their battle nets to prevent their men from killing one another. In theory, the system w
as great. In practice, it meant that only one in three shots actually fired from the coilguns, so the Marines and H’uumans switched to conventional ammunition and attacked the oncoming flood of primates.
As Cort left the caves, he linked into the command net just in time to hear Lex say, “Falo, this is General Sike. They are not fighting back on our side. What is your situation?”
“It is much the same here, General. They only seem to be firing at us when we are directly in front of them.”
Oh shit! Cort thought. “This is Ares. Get out of there! Fall back! Retreat!” he yelled over the comm. He also sent a ‘fall back’ signal to every federation fighter, but it was too late. The battle net went dead as he felt the wind rushing toward the capital city.
Fourteen
“What happened? There wasn’t an explosion.” Cort was talking to what was left of his command staff on Nill. It was comprised of Major Hearns, Speral, and a dozen other officers who survived the battle in the caves.
“Sensors from the ships overhead are compiling their data now, sir. I should have a holo for you in a few minutes,” Hearns said.
“It’s like someone took a big scoop of out the planet,” a captain said.
The small group looked out over the perfectly hemispherical crater that stood where the capital city had been. Before them, there was exposed dirt, the perfectly severed roots of trees, smooth cuts through minerals and underground streams, and the river that had flowed through the city was slowly filling the bottom of the twenty kilometer crater with muddy water.
Cort could see two Marines standing below him, in an opening that he recognized to be just outside of the entrance to the chamber that had housed the White Council. “Can you get back out through the cave?” he asked them.
“Yes sir,” one answered.
“Come out that way then, I don’t want to disturb this until we know what the hell happened. Take some vids from that angle before you head up.”
The men acknowledged the order and after they turned to leave through the cave, a shuttle landed nearby. Followed by a sensor tech, four Marines stepped out of the shuttle carrying a holotable. The tech said, “I brought the table down since you lost the command module. You are not going to believe this, sirs.”
“You would be surprised at what I would believe right now, Lieutenant. What did you find?”
The Marines put down the table and the Lieutenant said, “A perfect sphere, twenty point six two eight kilometers in diameter is gone.”
“We can see that.”
“No, Major Hearns. Not just missing or destroyed. It is gone. The mass of the planet has changed. Even the air that was inside the sphere is gone, along with three shuttles that were inside the area of the event.”
“So where did it go?” Cort asked.
“I have absolutely no idea, General. It will be a long time before anyone does, I suspect.”
“Best guess?” Cort said.
“Again, sir, I have absolutely no idea.”
“Look Lieutenant, I’m not going to hold you to whatever you say. I’m just trying to wrap my head around that fucking hole over there.”
“Ship sensors did not pick up any kind of energy surge, so the area probably was not converted to energy. More likely, the sphere was jumped to another point in space.”
“Not to discredit your theory,” Hearns said, “but I do not think so, Lieutenant. If they jumped, we should still be able to contact them with the tachyon system.”
Cort spoke. “Unless they are too far away. The old Cuplan system was limited to inverse tachyon speed. It took a while for weaker signals to get where they were going. Ours are better, but they still aren’t perfect.”
Speral turned from the crater and said, “No. It is gone. Not converted or moved, Cortland. It is just gone. If what Careo said is true, they would not have just moved the Core, especially if other beings would have access to it.”
“She’s right,” Cort said. “They would not have left it intact.”
“The matter must be somewhere. I am fairly certain it was not converted to energy because we did not detect any kind of energy burst. Which takes us back to my theory. They were moved somewhere. Possibly somewhere the Core would be destroyed, but they were moved.”
“Okay let’s say you are right. Where would they move a twenty kilometer sphere that would destroy the Core?” Cort asked.
Hearns looked at Cort and suggested, “A black hole.”
Solitude
“I’m sorry, Lex,” Cort mumbled. “I’m so sorry to all of you. Forgive me.”
Kim nudged Cort and said, “It’s okay, baby. You are asleep. It’s okay.” Since returning from Nill the week before, Cort had been talking in his sleep every night. By day, he spent his time in his office and with her and Dalek, but by night he relived various parts of the last battle for Nill in his subconscious. Sometimes she listened to him talking to Careo, the tall and ancient Nill, sometimes it was Lex, and sometimes he just sobbed softly in his sleep.
Cort turned onto his back and began to lightly snore, but Kim was wide awake and worried. Cort had spoken in sleep before, but not consistently like this, and he had never cried in his sleep. She slipped out of bed and walked to the kitchen. The growing light over the mountains behind the base told her dawn was less than an hour away, She considered making coffee but was afraid the aroma would wake Cort, so she stepped out to the porch with a blanket and sat in a chair facing the coming day.
The two H’uumans at the home’s gate turned and acknowledged her, with one saying something into his comm. She had no doubt he had alerted the other guards that she was outside. Kim did the only thing she could think of that might help Cort. Bazal, I need you.
I am here, Kimberly. You wish me to help Cortland?
Yes. His nightmares are different. They are much worse.
He carries a great burden, Kimberly. And a great guilt.
I know, Bazal. But this is different.
Yes it is. This time his way was not clear. The Tapons were the enemy but they were being controlled, at least to some degree, by the very people he was protecting. Or at least by their ancestors.
Is there more to it than that?
I believe so. He exterminated a species that may have been in the right. Because all the key players are gone now, he will never know.
They were not right to take our son, Kim thought bitterly. They should have left Dalek out of it.
But they did not. They failed to consider human values, and they were not aware of Heroc’s Law. In fairness, they did not harm Dalek.
Because of you they did not harm him. What if you had not protected him?
I understand. But if we had not attacked them to get him back, he would have remained unharmed. They misjudged the situation.
They misjudged Cort. And they tried to kill him.
Yes, they did. And because of that, Cort now carries the additional guilt of having to kill an enemy who did not understand him. To a warrior, that is a burden. And as I said, his burden is great.
How can we help him?
When he first learned of my nature, he was adamant that I never influence him. So I cannot help him unless he asks me to.
You were going calm him the day he became angry with Lap.
No. You told me to, but I did not. I told you it was too late. Had it not been too late, I would have told you that I could not.
Not even at the cost of his well being?
I will talk to him, Kimberly. But I will not influence him without his permission.
--
Later that morning, Cort walked into the kitchen and put his arms around Kim. She was dressed for work in a simple tunic and put down the coffee she was pouring for him to hold his arms against her. “Good morning, baby.”
“Hey. Where is Dalek?”
“Tur took him to the park. Then they are meeting me at work.”
Kim was barely able to finish the last sentence before Cort lifted her top and shoved her pants down
with her underwear. She was startled by the sudden passion, and dipped her fingers into the cream on the counter to lubricate herself as he pushed her over the counter and forced himself into her body. It did not feel violent to her, Cort was just taking what she had given to him years before on Mars. She remembered feeling the same overwhelming need after her first husband had died trying to terraform that planet. But then she did not have the outlet she was giving Cort now. Over the past week he was sometimes gentle, sometimes unrestrained, and sometimes passionate, but his need for her was as great as it had ever been.
As Cort finished and fell to the floor behind her, she turned to face him and was again startled, this time by the tears in his eyes. Adjusting her clothes, she kneeled in front of him and took his hands.
“I’m sorry, Kim. I am so sorry.”
“Baby, it’s okay. I am yours.”
Cort buried his face in Kim’s hands and mumbled, “Thank you.”
“Your dreams are getting worse, baby. Will you talk to Bazal?”
Cort looked up at her and asked, “Why? So he can assuage the guilt I feel for killing trillions? So he can absolve me of exterminating a species? No thank you, I deserve this guilt. And how many of our people will feel the same guilt for following me into battle?”
“Baby, you were protecting the federation. More importantly, you were protecting us. I’m not asking you to let him help you. I am just asking you to talk to him. He is your friend, and he’s the only person in the galaxy who can understand what you are going through. Just talk to him. For me.”
Cort buried his head in Kim’s embrace and said, “Okay.”
--
At the Isthmus, Cort stepped off a flight with Kim and Dalek behind him. After dunking the boy upside down in his tank a few times and setting him back on his feet, Bazal greeted Cort. “I am glad you are here, Cortland. We have made great progress.”
Kim and the security people made their way to the cabin while Cort walked slowly beside the octopod.
“You know the decision I have to make about the being, Bazal. I will need your help to make it.”
