Netherspace

by Andrew Lane

  The Gliese traded the netherspace drives for human beings.

  Only for human beings.

  The humans in question could be close to death due to old age or a terminal disease, or they could be in perfect health. It didn’t matter. Eleven people for the family-sized drive, nineteen for the economy model and thirty-seven for the big boy. No one knew whether the prime numbers were significant or what happened to the humans who were exchanged. They were taken off-planet and in thirty years none had returned. However, the Gliese never took any human rations, so it did not look good. One rumour said humans and Gliese could eat the same food, but as no one had ever seen a Gliese eat, or had any idea how they did so, the rumour was obviously of the comfort-those-left-behind variety.

  There was no shortage of volunteers. For those from the more extreme city states it was an alternative to the death penalty. For the terminally ill, the possibility of a cure. For others either an adventure or the opportunity to convert the heathen. And the families of those who went were well rewarded by GalDiv which, in theory, oversaw all transactions. In practice trades were also made in secret, hence the free spacers and the North Sea launch that had led to the male executive muttering resentfully under his breath.

  It’s a shit situation, Kara told herself, but what’s the choice? People are spread out in this little corner of the galaxy. Netherspace drives keep us together. That was the official version. One day she might believe it. Meanwhile, everyone – immigrants, SUT staff, explorers – all went Up together.

  Sometimes a netherspace drive stopped working and the space vehicle snapped out of netherspace to find itself marooned, adrift in the cosmos. The Gliese always showed up with a spare. How did they know? There was only one problem: the call-out fee. One human, alive and kicking. Pay that and a new drive would be installed. Refuse and you died out there. Most SUTs carried a man or woman who’d been very well paid to be the call-out fee. Some “fees” had made over a hundred trips packaged up in medically induced comas, others had been taken on their first journey. As with everything else alien-related there was no pattern, no rhyme or reason. Nor any explanation for the few SUTs that had simply vanished without trace.

  It’s not trade, Kara thought fiercely, it’s slavery; it’s… Her thoughts were interrupted by an announcement from the pilot. It seemed that the majority of passengers owned diamond-rated credit cards. Therefore the flight had been given special clearance and would be landing early. Cheers broke out. Some passengers stood laughing and waved their cards, including the man next to Kara. How satisfying that her job allowed her to kill people like him.

  Political parties had faded away years ago. If they hadn’t, Kara thought, I’d have been an independent anarchist.

  * * *

  “I don’t like aliens,” she said, staring down at a Berlin spread out like a vast jigsaw puzzle, so many areas showing green or gleaming silver in the sunshine. The office was vast, with a tropical hardwood desk, two sofas facing across a polished slab of granite and various easy chairs. It could have featured in a design magazine.

  “Not a problem,” Anson Greenaway said. “Liking them would be a disadvantage.”

  She turned towards him. Even behind a desk Greenaway wore his authority like a senior soldier who’d known real combat. He wore his very expensive suit as if it was put on at the last minute, without thought. His hands were strong, the nails cut short, no hint of a manicure. Not the usual kind of senior bureaucrat, or a man who matched the carefully designed office. She suspected he was ex-special forces, from one of the American city states. Her intuition said to go carefully. “It’s not going to happen,” Kara said. “Whatever it is.”

  “The Contract Bureau assigned you to EarthCent. And they assigned you to us.”

  She remembered what Control had said. Or rather, what he hadn’t said. “Except the Bureau has no idea why.”

  He nodded. “That’s how it stays. This is purely GalDiv business.”

  Kara knew the argument was lost. GalDiv controlled eighty per cent of all human–alien interactions. Galactic Division was more powerful than its nominal parent Earth Central, like a child controlling the family fortune while the parents were still alive. “Why not tap me up direct? Why bother going through EarthCent and the Bureau?”

  “Why does the Contract Bureau exist? Humour me.”

  There was something about his voice. Attractive but also challenging. “Corporations and individuals will always kill for profit,” she said, trying not to sound like a manual. “We do it for them. Helps keep everything under control, stops criminal mafias getting involved. Reminds people that there is an authority out there, one with teeth.” He smiled at this, but not with his eyes.

  “That’s a crock,” he said. “The Bureau might prevent business rivalries escalating into all-out war. Except not one business application for an assassination has ever been approved.”

  Kara could only stare at him.

  “Private applications? The same. Never happened.”

  “Crap! I’d know!”

  “All you know, Kara Jones, is the Bureau gave you a home and pays you very well.”

  “My last assignment—”

  “Pharmaceutical executives. You were told they planned a consortium and that the application was from rival companies. Not true.”

  “Then what the fuck…?”

  “The matter concerned a new, highly addictive drug resulting from an unofficial alien trade off-world. Worth billions but not good for Earth or the colonies. Free spacers were also involved. We couldn’t let it happen. The corporations wouldn’t listen to us. They said it was all lies. They’re listening now.” He smiled slightly. “The living ones. Nice operation, by the way.”

  Once again she could only stare at him.

  “Figured it out, right? The Bureau does our dirty work. You actually work for GalDiv. You always have.”

  She looked out of the window, needing time to think. Every one of her contracts could have had an alien involvement. There again, so did most of Earth business, one way or another. Even so. Damn it, Greenaway was making sense! Time to assert herself.

  Kara walked across the rare-wood-tiled floor and sat in a chair facing the desk. “You owe me an explanation.”

  “I owe you dick,” he said calmly. “But you are here for a briefing. Let’s start with Sergeant Kara Jones.” He looked directly at her. “Age thirty-two. Trained as a sniper with the English Federation Army, London City division. Was one of the best. Resigned three years ago and joined the Bureau. No family. Bisexual. Mild drug use. Enjoys free-climbing, diving and high-altitude parachuting. Doesn’t read much but likes music, especially from the late nineties, and old movies.”

  “That it?” She was genuinely scornful. “You got me here because I’m good at my job, screw both girls and boys, keep fit and have an interest in the past? I know a hundred people like that.”

  “We know several thousand.”

  She stared impassively at him as what felt like a small but angry vulture began tearing at her gut, from the inside. Greenaway glanced down at the desktop, where Kara assumed that a hidden display was showing her emotional state. “You have a natural talent we can use. Not the obvious one, either.”

  “So you say.”

  “Four years ago, on an English Federation Army classified operation codenamed Forest Clearing—”

  “I know what it was called, but that’s a top-secret codename. You shouldn’t even know it.” Weak but she had to say something.

  He didn’t rise to the bait. “You stalked the Gliese for a month.”

  Somehow she held herself together. “Three weeks and two days.”

  “There was a riot. People demonstrating against aliens. That’s when you killed the Gliese. Then you quit the army.”

  Kara looked away. She wanted to tell the truth but that would mean uncovering memories that had been nailed shut four years ago.

  “What happened, Kara? What happened between you and the Gliese? What mad
e you quit the job you loved?”

  She could walk out – but where would she go? The Bureau wouldn’t have her and as a freelance unofficial assassin she could count her remaining years on the joints of one finger. “I heard it die,” she said quietly. “In my head.”

  Greenaway pressed a button and a drawer slid out of the desk towards Kara. “Joss-stick?” he asked. “Or would you prefer Medellín City coffee? Maybe a Northwest Fed Pinot Noir?”

  She’d bet it was her favourite joss, too. “Water’s fine.”

  Another drawer opened towards her. “Cairngorm Sparkle okay? There’s fresh cut lime.” He relaxed back in his chair as if they were two friends discussing old times.

  She took out a small bottle and glass, both chilled. Poured. Added a slice of lime. If GalDiv had gone to this much trouble they must want her very much. “I know the natural spring this comes from,” she said. “I’ve climbed there.” But he’d already know that.

  TWENTY DAYS EARLIER

  There was no more killing. The surviving one hundred and forty-eight Pilgrims – adults and children – plus the three SUT staff, who kept to themselves, were herded onto the Cancri space vehicle. Tatia’s robe was now mostly a dirty grey.

  They were confined in a large hold with water tanks and a bewildering variety of fresh edible roots and plants from Earth. There were eleven large empty barrels, which everyone assumed were meant for human waste. So the Cancri understood human biology – at least, enough to keep humans alive. But there was no knowing for how long. Some of the survivors claimed, a little hysterically, that they were being kept for food. Others that it was all a GalDiv plot to get more sideslip-field generator engines. A few wiser heads repeated one of the arguments in favour of alien–human trade: the aliens were advanced enough to take what they wanted, including live humans. But that didn’t mean that aliens valued humans. Therefore the most logical explanation was kidnapping by a rogue Cancri group, possibly for ransom. In the end the Pilgrims lapsed into sullen resignation tinged with fear. If they did talk it was to blame Juan – and to a lesser extent Tatia – for everything.

  Tatia’s response was that if Juan had been at fault then he’d paid the price.

  But so had many others, came the reply, and what had they ever done other than adore the gods who’d given humanity so much?

  She said maybe the Cancri weren’t real gods, not like the Gliese or the Eridani, or that the Pilgrims had offended them.

  “But if they’re gods,” someone said, “why can’t they make us understand them?” Strange how quickly a strong belief, an obsession, could dissolve like a sandcastle against the tide.

  As time wore on, the hold began to fill with the stench of human sweat and waste. Tatia spent the time interacting with her AI. She’d discovered it had a store of her favourite vids and music. She listened and watched with her face to the wall. If the Pilgrims even suspected she had an AI they’d probably lynch her.

  * * *

  Operation Forest Clearing. It sounded so innocuous, so ordinary. That, of course, was the point of codewords. Operation Alien Assassination was too on-the-nose; Operation Pointless Experiment more so.

  Kara remembered it as if it had been yesterday. She always would, and sitting there in Greenaway’s office she could smell the pine needles and the slight tang of wood smoke in the air. “Follow the Gliese,” she had been ordered. “Don’t let it become aware of you; same goes for its GalDiv guards. Look for patterns in its behaviour. Imagine you’re stalking an enemy; you have to discover what makes it tick.” It was the loosest military briefing she’d ever known, and she might even have refused – it was a volunteer job – if it had not been for the very senior and well-respected general who’d personally asked her to come on board.

  It wasn’t difficult to remain undercover at first, she was just one of a small crowd the Gliese attracted wherever they went, even after forty years. And she had an arsenal of remote cyberdrones disguised as insects, birds, bats and beetles. By the end of the second day she could recognise “her” alien by its mouth flaps, even when it was with other Gliese. On the third day she was told to be particularly observant, but not why. “Her” Gliese behaved exactly the same way as before. Then she was instructed to observe it closely at a specific time.

  “Did you figure out why?” Greenaway asked.

  “They had to be probing the Gliese with electronics, maybe various gases or chemicals from someone in the crowd, to see if it reacted. There was a rumour the Gliese are telepathic. Maybe something happened at its SUT, an explosion, whatever, and they wanted to see if my Gliese responded.”

  Greenaway tried to hide a smile at the expression “my Gliese”. “Why you, when they had access to all manner of experts?”

  “I asked myself the same thing,” she said. “I came up with a couple of reasons. One, they wanted to keep it secret because Gliese were hands-off for everyone except GalDiv. Two, snipers have a talent that gets trained up to the max. We observe, we get under the target’s skin because that’s the only way to succeed and stay alive. No one ever admits it, but snipers go a lot on intuition, gut instinct.” She realised how chatty she’d become, wondered if he’d used a truth-tell on her.

  “You’re right,” Greenaway said. “The English Federation Army was going rogue… at least, a small faction was. Couple of generals and their staff were concerned about the threat the Gliese could pose. Some were secret Human Primuses. They tried X-rays, neutron beams, radar; you name it, the Gliese got it. Nothing. Nada. Their skin diffuses all forms of energy. In fact, we’re not even sure if that is their skin. Some think it’s an environmental suit.”

  “It’s skin. Believe me.”

  Greenaway sat up. “How so?”

  Because by the end of the second week Kara had begun to develop a connection with the Gliese.

  “You identified with it,” Greenaway said. “Like a hunter and a deer.”

  Kara was suddenly aware of a strange, spicy taste in her mouth – one that she’d first, hatefully experienced three years ago. She reached for her water, drank deeply. Truth was, she hadn’t just identified with the Gliese. She’d bonded with it. “It was more than that,” she said. “I knew the fucking thing. I knew its body. Skin.”

  “Why kill it?”

  “Once they’d evaluated it from a distance, and not got any reaction, they wanted to go further. They planned to stage a riot, separate the Gliese from its guards and kidnap the damn thing. I guessed they wanted it in a laboratory. They wanted to dissect it.”

  “Which worried you why?”

  “They were desperate. There was a lot invested in Forest Clearing. Fact is, they were out of their depth.”

  “You killed it to avoid a scandal?”

  Kara looked away. “No.”

  “You should see something.” The tendons and muscles in his throat worked as he sub-vocalised an instruction to his AI.

  The recording was projected in the centre of Greenaway’s office. The figures were knee-high, so it was easy to recognise the Gliese and its guards, surrounded by an angry throng. Well, paid to be angry, she remembered, with a few special forces soldiers also involved – including Sergeant Kara Jones. The sound was off but she remembered the cries and curses as the crowd surged, the warning shots fired by the alien’s guards. One final push separated them from the Gliese. Kara saw herself and three other soldiers in civilian clothes rush forward and began to move the Gliese towards a waiting jitney. Kara remembered how it had felt, as if there were no bones or muscles inside but only a mass of jelly and stringy fibres.

  “Computer enlarge life size, group alpha four. Play.”

  Strange, thought Kara. I’m feeling relaxed about this but I also want to cry. She watched herself, both hands under one of the Gliese’s arms, suddenly tense.

  “That was when you killed it,” Greenaway said.

  The tears came. She nodded.

  The Gliese seemed to collapse in on itself, arms falling to its side. A thick, black substan
ce oozed from its mouth. Anyone could see it was dead or dying. Kara could remember screaming: “It’s dead! Get the fuck out of here! Move!” She could remember the sudden spicy taste in her mouth and knew it was Gliese blood.

  The four soldiers piled into the vehicle, which sped off down a side street.

  “Computer off,” Greenaway said, and then as the figures blinked out, “I understand your superiors were pissed you didn’t bring back the body.”

  “My call.”

  “You used a thin blade. Equivalent to an ice-pick in the ear, like a mafia hitman in those old movies you love.”

  Kara nodded.

  “How did you know the spot?”

  She shook her head. “I just did. Intuition. I do know how to kill.”

  “Why?”

  She wiped her eyes with a plaspaper handkerchief. “It wasn’t dignified. What they planned.”

  “Do better.”

  “We’d bonded. Whatever they did to it they did to me.”

  “Okay,” Greenaway said, as if agreeing it was a nice day. “You heard the Gliese die?”

  “Felt. It was like… like… ice dissolving in warm water, nearest I can get. I had… all these impressions from before, except it wasn’t really what it felt or sensed, but my brain trying to understand—”

  “It was always going to fail,” Greenaway said, his manner now more businesslike and urgent. “Dissect a Gliese and all you find is a load of incomprehensible organs suspended with strands of organic webbing that may or may not be its nervous system in a mass of black jelly. Dissection only works if you can relate it to the human experience and Earth biology. You can figure out how the Gliese moves – but its hearing system? Its sight? We don’t know their wavelength range, if they see flat or in 3D or even 4D, whatever that might be. We couldn’t find its DNA, although maybe there’s something does the same job. We couldn’t identify its brain. Cellular structure? Gliese cells are like nothing we’ve seen before. There’s nothing we can relate to unless the Gliese tell us how they work. And that isn’t going to happen.”