by Ben Jeapes
*
Shivaji’s computer centre was behind the flight deck. Peter looked about him and reluctantly conceded that it beat his cubicle inside the centrifuge ring back on Ark Royal.
“Clear the room,” Ranjitsinhji said. He still hadn’t shown the slightest change in tone: his voice was that of someone to whom being disobeyed had simply never occurred. If he was the assistant, Peter hoped he would never, ever meet Krishnamurthy himself. “No, Ms Lahiri, you can stay. Mr Kirton, Ms Lahiri is your counterpart on Shivaji.”
Lahiri was his senior: her stripes said Commander, the same as Gilmore. “How do you do,” she said with a smile. “Please call me Muna.”
“Later, Ms Lahiri,” said Ranjitsinhji. “Mr Kirton, I understand you developed a translator program named Polyglot and that the sole copy is now on board Ark Royal.”
Peter groaned silently.
“Yes,” he said, “but-”
“No buts, please.” Ranjitsinhji held up a hand as if to ward the buts off. “I am too busy for that. Mr Kirton, we will avail you of all the necessary facilities on board this ship in order that you may retrieve Polyglot from Ark Royal’s memory. After that you will be given your freedom.”
Peter shook his head. “No, sir, I-”
“You see, the Rusties make a great thing about personal choice,” Ranjitsinhji said as if the interruption hadn’t happened. “You have declared your voluntary allegiance to our country and that will be a great coup for us: the software genius who developed Polyglot, a citizen of the Confederation! A six foot, fair skinned, blond, blue eyed citizen of the Confederation is admittedly rare, but we try to be open-minded. However, if you refuse to hand over Polyglot to your new rulers, they might think something is amiss. So, we need Polyglot.”
“My contract says that any software I develop while working for the Royal Space Fleet belongs to the Fleet,” Peter said.
“Don’t do it, Pete,” Julia said.
“The airlock is always waiting,” Ranjitsinhji pointed out.
“All right,” Peter muttered.
“Excellent. Ms Lahiri, let me know when it’s done.” Ranjitsinhji left and the others remained, looking at each other.
“I’ll need my aide,” Peter said.
Major Rajan had both their aides clipped to his belt. “Which is yours?”
“That one.”
Rajan handed it over. “The orbital net’s still up?” Peter said.
“Of course,” said Lahiri, not really surprising him. Shivaji’s automatic systems relied on the orbital net just as much as the other ships: Peter wouldn’t have put wrecking it past the lunatic in charge of this operation but maybe Surit Amijee, Shivaji’s captain, had had a word in his ear.
“My aide needs to talk to your comms system,” he said.
“I’ll do that.” Lahiri entered the required protocols manually. “Ready.”
“Right.” Peter entered a password into his aide and called up a display of codes. He, too, began entering them manually.
“Why don’t you just get your aide to transmit them?” Lahiri said at once.
“Give me some credit,” Peter said. “It won’t accept anything but manual entry. Security.”
“Try it anyway.”
Peter shrugged and did as he told.
“The host system is refusing to accept the codes,” said the aide. “Manual entry required.”
Peter cocked an eyebrow at Lahiri, who smiled. “Forgive me for insulting your intelligence. Carry on.”
“We’re in,” Peter said.
“There is a captain’s override in existence forbidding data to leave Ark Royal,” said the aide.
“Override, code beta apollo,” Peter said.
“Complying. The captain’s override has been overridden.”
Peter carried on entering the codes.
“Wait,” said Lahiri. Peter paused, his hands above the keys, and out of the corner of his eye he saw Rajan tensing. “Now you’re in, why not just tell your aide to get Polyglot?”
“Because,” Peter said, as if speaking to a small child, “I’ve made it a bit more secure than that. Manual entry, remember?”
“Try it anyway,” she said again.
Peter shrugged and changed to voice mode. “Retrieve Polyglot, copy to unit, password “berlitz”.”
“Unable to comply. Retrieval of that program requires manual entry of security codes.”
“You’re a very cautious man, Lieutenant,” said Lahiri. “I think I like you.”
*
On board Ark Royal, Gilmore and Nichol looked glumly at the display over Peter’s desk on the flight deck. Five minutes earlier it had come to life and now it was buzzing happily away to itself. Data was being taken from the ship and they couldn’t do a thing about it.
*
On Shivaji, Julia watched the display with equal anguish as it showed data entering the ship’s banks. AIs checked it for viruses and bombs and pronounced it clean. Lahiri straightened up from the desk with a satisfied smile.
“Well done,” she said. Peter stared stonily into the distance. “Confirm safe receipt of Polyglot program.”
“Polyglot program has been received,” said the system. “Checksum shows 100% viability.”
“Transfer to my aide. Give both password-” She entered the password manually. “Major Rajan, give these two a room. I’ll be on the flight deck with Mr Ranjitsinhji.”
The stateroom had twin beds, a view in the floor that showed a sequence of the Roving and space and the Roving again as the ship revolved, a food dispenser and a guard the other side of door. Julia also suspected it was crawling with electronic bugs.
“You’re quiet,” she said.
“Yes,” he said glumly. He pulled a stylus out of his pocket and looked around for something to write on. He settled on the palm of his hand. Going to die, he wrote. Then, under that, probably.
She stared at it. “Why?”
“Because of what I just did,” he said. His palm was full and he tried to write left handed on the other. It didn’t work and he took her hand instead. Polyglot won’t work. Made it only work on AR.
“Won’t wo-” she exclaimed out loud, before remembering. “Er ... you didn’t have to, Pete.”
“Yes I did. No choice. I wasn’t going to take chances with your life.”
Julia looked at her palm, then up at him. She held it up for him to see and raised her eyebrows. “Very kind of you, Pete. Very kind.”
He lay down on one of the beds with his hands behind his head and shut his eyes. “Now it’s out of the way, I hope they don’t need you as a hostage. If they’re angry about anything, they’ll take it out on me. I hope.”
He didn’t say anything else. His breathing slowed down and he was either asleep or praying. Julia looked at him, aghast. What world was this boy living in? Of course they’d take it out on her. And then on him anyway. Maybe he wasn’t worried about dying, he had his faith to comfort him, but-
Thank you, Peter Kirton, for including me in it as well. Thank you very much.
*
“Your Royal Highness!” Krishnamurthy stood up from behind his desk and came forward, hand outstretched, face beaming. “Do come in!”
Prince James walked slowly forward, seething and aware of the NVN man behind him. Krishnamurthy was interviewing each of the delegates in turn: finally, at almost 23:00, it was his turn.
“I apologise for this inconvenience,” said Krishnamurthy. “I am sure you understand that, given the insights I have received into First Breed nature ... well, what choice did I have?”
Insights! James thought with contempt, thinking of all the carefully laid plans that this creature had just comprehensively buggered up for him. Though now wasn’t the time for arguing. Gunshots, James had recently discovered, were loud. Being shot at was terrifying. James had decided that only a fool went to war.
“I’m amazed you haven’t started shooting hostages yet,” he said.
“At the moment, I do
ubt any of you would surrender your chances of ruling a world for a handful of human lives. No, we won’t shoot hostages yet: we will leave that as, say, a reserve option.”
“What do you want?” James said.
“Please, take a seat.” Krishnamurthy sat down behind the desk again and James stayed standing; never a tall man, he still towered over the Indian. Krishnamurthy looked up and his eyes glinted. “I said, sit.”
A chair banged into the back of James’s legs and a powerful NVN hand pressed down on his shoulder. He sat.
“That is better. Your Royal Highness, I once offered you the chance to join my alliance. In all sincerity and friendship, I offer you that chance again.”
“I don’t think so.”
“Your friends have decided it is the wisest course,” Krishnamurthy said with a smile. As the delegates were being shown into Krishnamurthy’s office one by one and kept incommunicado afterwards, James couldn’t know if that was true.
“As I’ve said before, I don’t think we have anything to offer you,” he said.
“Your support will suffice. Oh, and I am glad to say that your brilliant software expert Mr Kirton has chosen to become a citizen of our nation.”
“I’m sure he wasn’t in the least coerced.”
“I give you my word, he was in no danger at all. Now, you saw my message to Iron Run? Of course you did. So, you see, it is important to me that my consolidation be legitimate in the eyes of the First Breed. The First Breed don’t recognise the rights or wrongs of conquest; they just look at the fait accompli. In their eyes, once your ships have come under my control, they will be mine. Once I have the allegiance of a nation’s leader, that nation will be mine. There are two ways in which this can happen: your willing acquiescence, or your execution and replacement by one of my people. It is all the same to the Rusties, and it is your choice.”
“You realise you’ve effectively declared war on half of Earth?” A statement so blindingly obvious that James was ashamed to make it but he needed time to think. He was powerless; all he could do was hope the ships in orbit put up a good fight.
His heart sank lower at the thought. If Ark Royal were to be able to rely on the protection of its allies, surely it needed to be able to make its own contribution ... and that whinging idiot Gilmore had gone and locked up Plantagenet, who only happened to have the software for the ship’s weaponry in his ROM.
“And what is half of Earth going to do to me,” Krishnamurthy said, “when I will have control of the Roving and use of the First Breed’s space fleet? I advise you, Windsor, to join me.” For once, there was no pretence of a smile on his face. “Well?”
*
The door opened and Muna Lahiri stood there, arms folded, with an armed guard was behind her.
“Very clever,” she said to Peter. “Very clever.” She looked at Julia. “Your friend redesigned Polyglot so that it won’t work outside Ark Royal’s own net. All it comes out with is gibberish.” Back to Peter. “Excellency Krishnamurthy is not someone to cross. He will be angry and I expect he will order your execution. Why did you do it?”
Julia felt everything lower than her ribs turning to water. “When?” she whispered, her mind skirting around the question of whether the ‘your’ in ‘your execution’ had been singular or plural. It was a treacherous thought.
Lahiri ignored her. “Why did you do it?” she repeated. It was dawning on Julia that Lahiri could have been a friend. She didn’t want them dead either.
Peter just closed his eyes again. “Because,” he said, and that was all the answer Lahiri was to get.
*
Shortly after 23:00, they lost the World Administration.
The voice of the fleet commodore, U Thant’s captain, came over on general band. “This is U Thant to all Earth ships. We have been unable to make contact with our delegate below so are taking matters into our own hands. We do not believe the WA should take sides in this dispute and we hereby declare our complete neutrality. U Thant is leaving orbit of this world altogether and establishing its own orbit around the sun at a distance of eight light minutes. Please note that we are well able to defend ourselves. Message ends.”
U Thant leaving orbit was like someone trying to make a dignified exit from a room, betraying their nervousness by hurrying just a bit too much. The WA ship used its fusion engines to make a quick getaway, which was safe but still broke normal space conventions so close to a planet.
“There they go,” said Nichol. The radar showed U Thant’s blip moving off at speed. “So much for them.”
“Thank you, Mr Nichol,” Gilmore said, more sharply than he had intended. U Thant’s departure meant one less obstacle for the enemy, bringing a possible attack closer. What would a space battle be like? How should he prepare? The only precedent was what common sense and his imagination could provide. He was always wary of common sense – if it really was common, he thought, everyone would have it – but his imagination could usually be relied upon. “Still the ring, Mr Nichol. Arm Wild, is your suit still on board?”
“It is,” Arm Wild said.
“Then both of you suit up. We’re going to empty the ship. Plug yourselves into the air supply – we may be breathing canned for a while.”
Whatever was going to happen to Ark Royal, they would be ready for it.
- 19 -
21-22 May 2149
Two of the crew were trapped upstairs in orbit and two more were God knew where, and the rest of the crew was sitting with her in the Dome.
It was almost midnight but no one was likely to sleep. All Hannah had in the way of entertainment was a pack of cards, but it was better than nothing. She looked around as Samad picked through the cards in his hand, mind not really on the game. Members of the crew of each ship were forming their own cliques; any conversation at all was in the form of self-conscious whispers.
Soldiers patrolled constantly. Krishnamurthy’s allies didn’t have a military presence but they were able to come and go as they pleased. They had the grace to look embarrassed and uncomfortable.
At long last a party of Rusties appeared and a murmur went around the Dome. The captives were perking up, sitting up straighter. Here came their salvation.
The lead Rustie addressed the nearest NVN sentry. “I am Spar Mild and I speak for Iron Run. I will converse with your superior.”
The sentry looked around nervously and an officer hurried up to rescue him. “Mr Krishnamurthy has been waiting for you, sir. If you will come this way-”
“I choose to speak here.”
Now the officer glanced around. “Sir, this place is a little public-”
“It is the First Breed way for conversations to be conducted in public. Your superior will attend us here.”
The officer swallowed. “If you will wait here, sirs,” he said, and left them alone with the sentry. The man shifted nervously as all attention in the Dome was turned on him.
Krishnamurthy turned up thirty seconds later, rubbing his hands. “My dear Spar Mild, I am delighted you could come. Please, let us not talk here-”
“Iron Run has received your message,” said Spar Mild, the first sapient being in a very long time to interrupt Krishnamurthy. “Your argument is interesting.”
“Do you accept the legitimacy of my action?”
“You are in error to think that we will alter the rules of the Convocation.”
Krishnamurthy’s smile didn’t waver. “But as I explained, I am now the leader of the humans on this planet. I have done nothing that will interfere with the smooth running of the Convocation tomorrow. Various nations from Earth will be represented, as specified in the rules.”
“You have not impressed us with your mastery over the other nations.”
“But I have their superiors down here, in my power, and that makes them mine,” Krishnamurthy said.
“You have captured the Seniors of the Earth nations, we cede that point, but the nations have not acquiesced.”
Krishnamurthy shrugg
ed. “Then we will remove the Seniors and install our own, according to your own custom, if that is what is required.” Now the attention of every human in the Dome was on him, boring into his back. He didn’t seem to notice or mind.
“There will be no innocent deaths,” said Spar Mild.
“There will be no innocent deaths,” Krishnamurthy agreed. “Seniors may be executed in accordance with First Breed custom and juniors are liable to our own laws, which are punishable by death if transgressed. Now-”
“We accept your leadership of the humans now on the surface of the Roving,” said Spar Mild. Krishnamurthy opened his mouth and drew himself up as if to argue, before actually realising what Spar Mild had said. Hannah heard it: so did every other human in the Dome, but no one could believe it. Had the Rustie really said that?
“This is a temporary measure,” Spar Mild added over the rising background murmur. “The humans here are under our protection and no harm will come to them. As we accept your leadership of them, we no longer hold their former leaders responsible for their well being: we hold you responsible, and reprisals will be made against your people if any harm comes to any of them. We are leaving soldiers of our own to ensure this.”
“You accept my leadership?” Krishnamurthy said.
“As a temporary measure,” Spar Mild repeated. “Its permanence will depend on the outcome of the affair in orbit.”
Krishnamurthy beamed. “I promise you a result very shortly,” he said.
*
“I think this is it, sir.”
Across the airless flight deck Nichol was hunched over his desk and staring at the displays. Gilmore abandoned the letter to Joel again and turned his attention to the monitor. Arm Wild, too, broke out of whatever internal meditation was occupying his thoughts to look.
There had already been a false alarm half an hour ago when a cluster of ships at the leading edge of the fleet stopped spinning, which Gilmore suspected would be the first stage of an attack. The ships were behind and just to the right of Pacifica, and for all he knew they might have made their own agreement with the new order.
