Imperial Stars 3-The Crash of Empire

by Jerry Pournelle

  The uncertainty was a killer for me. I'd lost everything in the Collapse, and so had Janie. Only the birth of the Republic, and the plans to restore civilization, had given us the confidence to start new lives. Things could never be the same, but we believed they would get better again.

  Now it was 2024, we had our first grandchild, and what in hell could we expect next?

  I was halfway to the Concourse when I saw Washington. I hurried to catch up with him; he has a quick, marching walk which discourages company. "I've arranged a campground for the savages on the north slope of Signal Hill," he told me. "If they make trouble, we can contain them with one platoon."

  "And the Aliens?" I puffed.

  "We now have three platoons nearby, plus a mortar team and four aircraft. That's all we can spare."

  "How are things in the Neutral Zone?"

  "Tense, Mr. Secretary. My scouts report that all of the local warlords are mobilizing. They expect the Aliens to destroy us and allow them to move in."

  "Then they're in for a disappointment." Gwen Parsons joined us. "Colonel, could you slow down, please?"

  "Certainly, ma'am." He slowed and I caught my breath.

  "Thanks. We shouldn't let Weyler think we're in a hurry to see him."

  A good point, that. "Are you ready to slit his throat?" I asked.

  "That would backfire," the Colonel said. "Before Weyler left home, his shamans made a few convenient prophecies. If he dies here, even from natural causes, we'll take the blame."

  "And he'll become a martyr?" Gwen sighed in resignation. "Oh, well."

  The Colonel had given the savages a good place for a bivouac—good for us, that is. The ground was flat, with rises on all sides, and he had stationed a squad at each corner of a square. If the savages acted up, they'd die in the crossfire.

  I had to wonder if Weyler wanted that. I'll never know if the man was insane or sincere, but he gave every sign of believing his paganisms. If he died here, he might become the kind of symbol that could unite the other outlanders against us in war. We could handle them one at a time, but not en masse.

  The Colonel, Gwen, and I walked into Weyler's camp, under the eyes of our sentries. First and foremost, the camp stank. Sanitation was something Weyler's people had forgotten. They'd pitched a few lean-tos, to house their leader and his counselors. It looked like the dozen warriors who'd escorted them would sleep out in the open.

  Outlanders. They were all male, of course. They wore uncured animal hides and warpaint, but the thing that got my attention was their necklaces. Each one was made of human finger bones, taken from killed enemies, supposedly as a magical way of retaining the enemy's strength.

  Gwen seemed unmoved by that sight, or by the variety of knives, spears, and arrows the warriors carried. She glanced at all of them, then gave one a frankly female look that said you might not be too bad in the hay, if we got you cleaned up. Bless her for that; her look disconcerted them more than anything I could have said.

  Weyler crawled out of his lean-to and approached us. I was surprised to see how old he was—about sixty, I'd say. Few outlanders live beyond their late twenties; even in the Republic, where we have plenty of food and some medicines, sixty years is quite an age—I should know; I'm pushing it myself. He looked ascetic rather than scrawny, with whipcord muscles under the tan and dirt. His eyes gleamed as he paused to look at the force field. No doubt their arrival was a new factor in his plans, but not one that would upset them.

  He looked at us with contempt. "The weaklings of the New Renaissance. The people who would rebuild the old world and repeat its blunders. We have come to talk to your ruler."

  "She's busy judging a beauty pageant," Gwen said. "You're a bit late to enter, but we can hold a spot for you and your chorus line in next year's contest."

  The warriors shifted around uneasily. None of them looked old enough to remember chorus lines and beauty pageants, but they couldn't miss her mockery, and they weren't used to this treatment.

  Only Weyler maintained any dignity. "We will wait. We have far more time than you." He turned and looked at the force field bubble. "The Dark Gods have numbered your days." He looked to Washington and spoke before Gwen could respond. "And is the beloved hero ready to fight them again?"

  "I am," Washington said.

  Weyler smiled cynically. "Will it matter to you if you win or lose? No, let it pass." Abruptly he returned to his lean-to.

  We walked away, but I waited until we were out of earshot before speaking. "Were you trying to provoke him?" I asked Gwen.

  "No," she said. "The absurdity got to me. Weyler's a grown man! He taught college before the Collapse. Now he talks like he believes that 'Dark Gods' granola, and he acts as if he has generations of tradition behind his noble-savage act."

  "He might believe it," I said. "A lot of people cracked up during the Collapse."

  "Fine. How are we supposed to negotiate with a lunatic?"

  The Colonel chuckled. I'd always wondered what that would sound like, but the noise was much drier than I could have expected. "That was a common diplomatic problem even before the Collapse."

  Gwen looked annoyed. "If he's really nuts, then that's all the more reason to blow him away—discreetly, of course. The sooner we free his 'tribe' from him, the better."

  "We cannot simply liberate his people," the Colonel said, as we walked into his company base—a fancy name for a brace of tents, I'll admit. "If we try to bring them into the Republic, they will not cooperate."

  "Colonel, they're savages," Gwen said. "Look at Weyler's men. If we gave them half a chance, they'd join us in half a second."

  Washington shook his head. "My agents have tried to get them to defect. It hasn't worked because they're no longer 'nothing but savages.' Weyler has very carefully, and very thoroughly, indoctrinated his people with a new set of beliefs."

  Gwen made a noise of disgust. "They believe that simpleminded trash about Dark Gods and magic?"

  "They do," Washington said. "The mind that thought it up is anything but simple. He, Weyler, has created a mythology in which science is magic—a very weak magic. The Dark Gods destroyed the old civilization by appearing in the guise of a super-scientific race from the stars, and destroying us with stronger magic."

  I shook my head. I didn't doubt the Colonel—understanding the outlanders was a big part of his job—but that was hard to swallow. "Colonel, a lot of Weyler's people were born long before the Collapse. How can they swallow that mulch? They know what science is."

  "Do they know?" he asked. "Did they ever know?"

  Another good point. Hell, even before the Collapse a lot of people thought of science as a kind of magic. I had no cause to act surprised if Weyler's savages were more open about it.

  "There is another point," Washington said. "Weyler uses ritual to condition his people into the viewpoint of savages. He encourages slavery and vendettas to counteract the ideals of civilization. Human sacrifice is a prime example—when a victim is killed, the participants must either feel guilt over a murder, or see the act as a legitimate, even moral deed."

  "So to live with their consciences, they have to become savages," I said. Gwen made a small noise; she shared my disgust.

  "Indeed." Looking oddly unsettled, the Colonel excused himself and went into his tent. Gwen and I left the camp, heading back to the Concourse. "You met the Colonel in '97," Gwen said. "How well do you know him?"

  "How well does anyone know him?" I asked. "He went to West Point, and he fought in Central America for a year—he was wounded and spent some time in Walter Reed. He's one of the Founders. Beyond that, I don't even know his first name. He keeps to himself. Why do you ask?"

  "Remember what Weyler said back there? About whether it would matter if the Colonel won or lost to the Aliens? What in hell did that mean?"

  "You've got me," I said. "I suppose he was just trying to confuse the issue." Gwen nodded ruefully, said goodbye and went her own way.

  I'm a better politician tha
n she is; she hadn't realized I was lying. I know Washington a little better than anyone else; I know his secret. An Alien zapped him during the Battle of Chicago.

  The Battle, in which we threw the Aliens back into space, was as lopsided as the devil. On our side, we had a scratch regiment from the Eighty-second Airborne Division, supported by National Guard tanks and artillery, and reservists such as myself. The Aliens had their landing craft, their force-shield and anti-meteor weapon— and one zapper.

  The force field deflected most of our small-weapons fire, while the meteor ray vaporized our bombs and shells as they came in. The shield had effectively unlimited power, and once we ran out of bombs and shells, our soldiers had to go in on foot, pitting M-16s against a zapper. No wonder most of them mutinied.

  The zapper is a gentle weapon, which works by stimulating the pleasure center of a brain—any brain, Alien, human, or animal. On the one hand, as one of the Aliens explained, their race considered it barbaric to kill or injure other life-forms, no matter how primitive. On the other hand, a blast of pure pleasure can immobilize an attacker as effectively as death; no one can function during the ultimate orgasm. On the other hand (the Aliens have three), they had no idea that humans could become addicted to the zapper.

  Everyone learned about that quickly. The zapper left its victims unconscious, to awake with the memory of ecstasy corroding their souls. All that the victims could think about was repeating the experience. Most chasers died of thirst, because drinking water distracted them from the pursuit of the Aliens.

  The Colonel wasn't immune to its effects. At the climax of the Battle I saw him walk toward the Alien lander, when everyone else was either running or hiding. I was hiding behind a pile of concrete, and hoping that the zapper couldn't work through it. It was all I could do to peek over the rubble, and see the Colonel fall in convulsions as he was zapped.

  I saw him get up and stagger toward the Alien with the zapper. I know he was hit again; I heard the zapper's burring noise, and I felt the pleasant sensation of its backlash. Before the monster could fire a third time, he was on top of it. The Colonel grabbed the Alien and slammed it against the pavement, killing it and wrecking the zapper. We'll never know how the other Aliens felt about that; they bugged out then. We saw Scented Vine's drive flame pushing it out of Earth orbit that night.

  Maybe Washington's ability to withstand the zapper isn't surprising. His will power is fierce; he held his unit together throughout the Collapse. Lesser men did the same thing, and went on to become petty warlords; the Colonel turned his force into a servant of the Republic and civilization.

  Did the experience change the Colonel? I couldn't say. Even before the Battle I had found this mythic-warrior reserve impenetrable. One thing was certain: I couldn't mention any of this to Gwen. Aside from being an intolerable breach of the Colonel's privacy, it would demoralize her, and everyone else, to learn that our national hero was a victim of the zapper.

  It didn't do anything for my morale to know that—or to realize that Weyler knew it.

  The Aliens came out of their lander that afternoon. They wore suits identical to those of Scented Vine's crew. The garments were said to be puncture-proof, which would prevent the spread of any micro-organisms in either direction. They had a mirror-like anti-laser coating that made it difficult to look at them. Three of them stood inside the haze of the force field, while one moved downhill toward the Concourse and the Forum. Soldiers and outlanders watched it silently, while the Colonel, Gwen, and I went out to speak to it.

  I was there more through curiosity than necessity. The Colonel could assess their military potentials better than I could, and the only real plan the government had was to stall for time. Still, I was interested in the things.

  Come, let us be honest. I wanted to see how Colonel Washington reacted. If he was hooked on the zapper, I wanted to know now.

  The Alien recognized us as a delegation. It stopped in front of us and touched its translator plate. "I wish to visit your leader." The machine sounded as emotionless as the Colonel.

  "She's taking the day off," Gwen said.

  "My business with her is most urgent."

  Gwen shrugged. "If she thought she had urgent business with you, she'd have shown up for work today."

  "I wish to discuss the affair of the Scented Vine. I am convinced your leader finds this important."

  I glanced at the Colonel. His face looked as blank as the Alien's gold visor. He'd noticed the zapper in its holster, along with other devices on the Alien's waistband, but it didn't hold his attention. At least, that's the way it seemed to me.

  "Our leader has other things on her mind," Gwen said. "If you want to make an appointment, I think she can work you into her schedule sometime next week."

  There was a long pause, and I wondered what was going on inside that helmet. "I will agree to an appointment," the Alien said at last.

  "Fine. Speaker Ryan will see you Monday at noon."

  "That is acceptable." The Alien spun around and went back to its lander. It walked gracefully, I'll admit; the three legs and three arms moved with a dancelike rhythm.

  "Interesting," the Colonel said, as we walked back downhill. "It seemed almost desperate to see the Speaker."

  " 'Almost,' nothing," I said. "I'd say it was desperate. Not to mention diplomatic."

  "It wasn't diplomatic," Gwen said. "Patient, maybe. Stinking Weed's crew never accepted any sort of a delay, remember? That thing tolerated an unavoidable delay, nothing more. I wonder why?"

  "It is not here to help us," Washington said. "If it was here to help undo the damage of their last visit, it would have said so."

  "So they want something from us," I concluded. As conclusions went, that stank. What did we have that could interest the Aliens? Judging by the looks on their faces, Gwen and the Colonel were as much in the dark as I was.

  "I see that the Dark God confounded you," Weyler said. He'd crept up behind us, as quiet as a cat but less welcome.

  "Not at all," Gwen said. "It just made an appointment to see Speaker Ryan next week. You should do the same thing, Weyler, although I doubt she'll invite you to lunch."

  His eyes glinted angrily. "So it confounded you after all."

  "It almost sold us the Brooklyn Bridge," Gwen said cheerfully. "Weyler, why don't you walk up to one of those ugly bastards and tell it about your 'Dark Gods' silliness? Or get some of your clowns to pray to them—up close, where they can smell you?"

  "The Dark Gods are not mocked!" he said, and stalked away.

  Washington's eyes followed him. "I'd better speak to my men," he said. "They have orders to watch him at all times."

  "Don't be too hard on them," Gwen said. "Weyler lives like an animal. He knows how to slither around."

  "And my men are supposed to know how to follow him." The Colonel left.

  I looked Gwen over as we walked down the Concourse. "Gwen, have you got something personal against Weyler?"

  "You mean, why am I acting this way?" She shook her head. "Tad, I lost my husband and children to raiders. Maybe I wouldn't hate Weyler so much if he was just a savage, but he's deliberately working to tear apart what's left of civilization. He's no better than the Aliens."

  "Is that any reason to bait him?" I asked. "Or them? If you can't be hypocritical enough—"

  "I could," she said, and frowned thoughtfully. "But I won't. Treating them seriously is a mistake; it gives them credibility. I think we would have been all right if we'd laughed at those walking milk stools in '97. Don't ask me why we didn't. Well, we both have work waiting for us. Catch you later."

  She left me alone with my thoughts. Gwen might provoke either the Aliens or Weyler into doing something dangerous, but politically she was making the right move. If the Republic survived both the Aliens and Weyler's plans, she'd come up smelling like a rose. If we collapsed, well, nothing would matter any more.

  I went back to my office. Between Zone Twenty-nine and my War Department work, I had plenty to
do. Mobilization was on my mind; if we were going to have a war, I wanted it done as efficiently as possible. There were reports of more incidents in the Neutral Zone; bands of raiders were probing everywhere, no doubt at Weyler's behest. They couldn't hurt us, but they tied down a considerable fraction of the Army.

  One thing became obvious: mobilization was going to delay the Mesabi project. For the past twenty-seven years, all of our metals have come from salvage. Old cars, old plumbing, old wiring—there was plenty of scrap left after the Collapse, and so far it had met our needs. However, our industry was growing exponentially now, and we needed other sources. That meant reopening the iron mines in the Mesabi ranges, in upper Minnesota. Almost worked out in the last century, they still held enough ore to last us for decades.