Ascending

by James Alan Gardner

  With Royal Hemlock, however, no admiral succeeded in gaining an upper hand. Indeed, the new crew had a handful of people from each high admiral’s camp, making the ship totally unsuitable for covert villainies: whatever secret scheme one admiral might attempt, all the other lackeys would immediately report to their own masters. Royal Hemlock became useless for Corrupt Intrigues…so the council assigned the ship to Lieutenant-Admiral Festina Ramos. If nothing else, all those spies would keep watch on my friend’s activities.

  “So we are surrounded by sinister infiltrators?” I whispered, peeking surreptitiously at the mooks behind us.

  “Absolutely,” Festina said. Turning to the mooks’ leader, she asked, “Sergeant, whose payroll are you on?”

  “Admiral Wang, ma’am.” The sergeant favored her with a quick salute.

  Festina smiled and glanced back to me. “He gives a different name every time. It’s become a little joke between us.” She turned back to the mook-man. “A good way to put me at my ease, right, Sergeant? Makes it simpler to stab me in the back later on.”

  “Whatever you say, Admiral.” The mook saluted again.

  The Lassitude Of Traitors

  A door opened ahead of us; Festina waved us inside. “Conference room,” she said. “We have a lot to discuss.” As our group and the mooks filed past her, she called to no one in particular, “Ship-soul, attend. Captain Kapoor, please.”

  A moment later, a man’s voice sounded from the ceiling. “Yes, Admiral?”

  “Are you free to join us in the conference room?” Festina asked.

  “If there’s an enemy ship nearby, I’d prefer to stay on the bridge.”

  “Very well, Captain…but please listen in, and offer your opinion whenever you like.”

  “Thank you, Admiral. Do you want the meeting secured?”

  Festina thought for a moment, then answered, “No. If we keep our talk too hush-hush, we’ll have all the spies on board trying to find out what’s happening…which means they’ll ignore their real jobs.” She sighed and glanced at the rest of us. “I swear, sometimes I want to grab the intercom and announce, ‘Attention all spies, the secret meeting in Conference Room C will be broadcast on Circuit Five.’ Or record every word I say and sell video-chips: proceeds to go to the fleet’s Memorial Fund. Maybe that’d stop our secret snoops from hacking the ship’s computers with peek-and-pry viruses. One of these days, someone’s going to make a programming error while trying to crack our security and it’ll crash some vital system.”

  Uclod snorted. “Conducting everything in the open won’t prevent that, missy. If I were a spy and everything you did was fully public, I’d be convinced you were hiding something really juicy. I’d tear the place apart looking for it.”

  “You’d do that,” my friend said, “but that’s because Unorrs have a genuine work ethic. I doubt if the Hemlock’s spies are that keen—almost no one in our pampered Technocracy has a sense of enterprise these days. Certainly not the toadies who spy for high admirals.”

  “Hmmph,” I said. “It sounds like your spies have Tired Brains.”

  Festina cocked her head and looked at me with her garishly green eyes. “Speaking of Tired Brains…” She stared at me keenly for several moments without finishing her sentence. I stared back, attempting to look as Un-Tired as possible. Finally my friend shrugged and said, “Let’s talk.”

  7 Since I had seen her last, Festina had apparently risen from lowly Explorer to lofty Admiral—but she assured me this did not mean she was evil like Alexander York, because her admiralship was more a legal fiction than an actual Rank Of Power.

  12

  WHEREIN I GATHER CRUCIAL INFORMATION

  Ticking Bombs

  The conference room had chairs that swiveled. This was most excellent indeed—if you sat with your knees tucked up to your chest, you could keep spinning round until you got dizzy. Even better, one whole wall of the room was a great panel showing a blizzard of stars; the panel pretended to be a window, but Festina said it was actually a computer simulation. Either way, when you spun on your chair, you saw stars whizzing past like white streaks…which just goes to show Science is not totally bad, if it can make highly advanced chairs for Personal Amusement.

  While I spun, Festina revealed how Royal Hemlock came to be in this region of space. Apparently, it was due to Uclod’s great-great-uncle, an elderly person named Oh-God. Like all Unorrs, Uncle Oh-God was a terrible criminal—one who happened to specialize in an offense called smuggling. (I did not quite understand why smuggling was such an odious crime, nor why humans gave it the cozy name “smuggling,” which sounds like a pleasant bed game, not a felony at all; but my head was reeling in circles, so that is my excuse for not following the logic.)

  This Oh-God had not always been a professional lawbreaker—in younger days, he belonged to the Technocracy’s Explorer Corps, though he was not human.8 Ex-Explorer Oh-God still kept in touch with his friends from the corps…which is why he contacted Festina when he heard the Unorrs intended to release Admiral York’s secret files. He had warned Festina that trouble was brewing—there was no telling what the High Council might do to prevent the full truth from coming out. Therefore, Oh-God advised Festina to protect herself.

  As soon as my friend received Oh-God’s message, she realized the Admiralty would try to erase all signs of what had happened on Melaquin. Accordingly, she raced for my planet to preserve what evidence she could. Festina did not know that four navy ships had several hours headstart on her; nor had Oh-God mentioned that his great-grandnephew Uclod had set out for Melaquin even earlier. Therefore, Festina hastened through The Void, thinking she had a chance of reaching Oarville first…and she would have flown all the way to my planet, if her ship had not detected the brief transmission I made before the Shaddill jammed our communications. Since it was not far off her intended route, she ordered her crew to check the source of the signal. That is how my Faithful Sidekick found me in the infinite depths of space; and I was only a tiny bit angered she had not been searching for me, and had never visited Melaquin in the years since I supposedly died.

  “But the planet was off-limits,” Festina protested—as if that were sufficient excuse for not coming to weep on my grave. “I’d forced the Admiralty to agree no one would ever land on Melaquin again: not the council, not me, not anyone associated with the Technocracy. It was the best way to keep the League of Peoples happy. That’s why nobody had cleaned up the evidence before; the top admirals didn’t want to risk upsetting the League. Now, of course, with their asses on the line, the council will do anything to stay out of jail…which means they’re like rabid dogs, biting anyone who gets in the way.”

  “Including us?” Uclod asked.

  “You, me, and their own dear mothers…not to mention,” Festina raised her voice slightly, “anyone who’s managed to hack into the ship’s internal intercoms to eavesdrop on this meeting.”

  “You think we are being spied upon?” I whispered.

  “On this damned ship, it’s a certainty. The ship-soul computers are constantly listening…which means other ears could be listening too.”

  Uclod snorted. “Hell of a security system you got if any Tom, Dick, or Harry can hack into your hardware.”

  Festina glared at him. “The fleet’s computer security is nigh well unbeatable against outsiders; the problems only come from insider spies. The spies work for admirals, and admirals all have backdoor access codes that circumvent our regular safeguards.” Her fierce expression melted to a rueful smile. “Basically, this meeting is shielded against everyone except the bastards who are most likely to eavesdrop on us. And if anybody is eavesdropping,” she said, raising her voice again, “you now know too much for the High Council’s comfort. If I happened to be a spy, I’d think long and hard about my own personal safety. If, for example, I received a secret order like, ‘Sabotage Royal Hemlock,’ I’d wonder what would happen if I obeyed. Suppose I disabled the Hemlock so it could be captured by the council
. Would the Admiralty really reward me for devotion to duty? Or would I end up with everyone else on a thousand-year sleep-ship to Andromeda?”

  She let the question hang in the air. Finally, it was the mook sergeant who broke the silence. “The admiral realizes,” he said, “how unlikely it is that every spy on board will accept your reasoning?”

  “Certainly,” Festina told him. “There’ll always be idiots who dream of big payoffs, even when they know they’re working for treacherous bastards. But I’m hoping there’ll also be sensible people to stop them. People who’d rather not fall off the map, thank you very much, and who’ll blow the whistle to me or the captain.”

  “The admiral is an optimist,” Sergeant Mook said, though he was smiling behind his visor.

  “The admiral likes people to know where their best interests lie,” Festina replied. “She also likes taking every possible precaution. For example, Sergeant, I would never tell you your job, but do we really need this huge contingent to guard unarmed civilians? Aren’t there better places your people could be?”

  The sergeant’s eyes flickered. “Does the admiral vouch for these guests being trustworthy?”

  Festina looked at us a moment—Uclod, Lajoolie, Nimbus, and me—then laughed out loud. “Of course not. All four are ticking bombs, for Christ’s sake. But compared to some members of the crew, these folks are absolute saints. Why not leave a few of your guards here, and send the rest to…oh, wherever you think a not-too-smart spy might stir up mischief.”

  The sergeant said nothing for a count of three, then nodded. “The admiral’s suggestion is well taken.” He tapped a button on his wrist, then began speaking rapidly—which is to say his lips moved at high speed, though I could not hear a sound coming out of his helmet. I assume his words were transmitted privately to the troops around him…because in a few seconds, all but two of the mooks saluted and clattered out of the room. As for the sergeant himself, he and the two remaining Security persons took up a position in front of the door: all three of them in exactly the same stance, hands folded below their waists, feet slightly spread apart.

  “Lovely,” Festina said, turning back to the rest of us. “Now let’s get caught up, shall we? What’s been going on?”

  When I told her my story, she screamed.

  The Gawker

  Festina did not scream loudly, nor in one continuous howl…but at key points in my tale, she yelped or winced or muttered most engaging profanities. She was not at all happy about the Shaddill hovering over Melaquin; she became all growls when I told how they shot us with a sinister unconsciousness beam; she was eyes-wide astonished when I described flying into the sun with no ill effects; but her most violent reaction came at the end, when Uclod rudely took it upon himself to fill in the “gaps” of my narrative.

  I had chosen not to provide overmany details about my so-called death and the four years thereafter—if Festina learned I had lain in one place for month after month, she might mistakenly think my brain was becoming Tired. Furthermore, I omitted all mention of the Pollisand, including the description I got from the woman in the tower. Unfortunately, I had already told Uclod what the woman said; therefore, he cheekily thrust himself forward to reveal that information to my friend. This caused Festina to splutter with oaths most vile.

  “A big white thing like a headless animal?” she asked.

  “That’s what we were told,” Uclod answered. “Right, Oar?”

  “Yes,” said I, most reluctantly. “Is this creature known to you, Festina?”

  One of the mooks by the door laughed under his breath. The sergeant glared at him. So did Festina. Without taking her eyes off the mook, my friend said, “He’s known, all right.”

  “Who is he?” Uclod asked.

  Festina did not answer right away; instead, she pressed a button on the conference table’s surface. A section of table in front of her rolled open to reveal a vidscreen and keypad. She tapped on the keys a moment, then turned to face the false window that had been showing all those pleasant stars.

  The window had changed. Now it displayed a picture of a beast I recognized all too well—a headless white rhinoceros with eyes down his throat. “That,” Festina said, “is an alien who calls himself the Pollisand. Possibly the most frightening creature in the entire galaxy.”

  Cleverly feigning ignorance, I said, “This Pollisand is a wicked villain?”

  “No. Not in the usual sense. But if the Pollisand is in the area, consider me officially terrified.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he’s a gawker. A disaster junkie. Someone who loves showing up at a certain kind of catastrophe.”

  Festina pressed more keys. The picture screen shifted to a different view of the Pollisand: this time standing inside a poorly lit room filled with machinery. In front of him sat a human woman wearing a baggy green outfit of the type called overalls. She was not looking at the Pollisand, but he was definitely looking at her.

  “This,” said Festina, “shows the Pollisand’s first appearance in human space. The year 2108 on the planet Meecks, in the control room of the Debba colony’s fusion reactor. Surveillance cameras recorded this headless white alien materializing behind the command console at the very moment a technician finished entering a manual override on a safety mechanism that was supposedly malfunctioning.”

  Festina rose from the table, strode to the display screen, and glared at the baggy green woman. “The techie was an utter numskull. She’d misdiagnosed the problem, botched the solution, disabled a warning alarm so no one would know she’d screwed up…then kept hot-dogging with moronic attempts to stop cascading system failures throughout the installation. Result? Total reactor meltdown. Not a big boom, but the entire power generation system got slagged. Considering the outside temperature was ninety degrees below zero, it looked like the colony would freeze to death in a matter of days.

  “And that’s when the Pollisand showed up.” Festina pointed to Mr. Headless Asshole on the display screen. “Right in the control room, at the precise moment meltdown became inevitable. He pranced up to the woman and began to ask questions. Why did you do that? Why didn’t you call for help? Why did you ignore the expert systems? Is there some disturbance in your personal life that’s rendered you mentally incompetent? It’s hard to feel sorry for a techie so stupid, but it must be rough getting badgered with questions right after you’ve doomed a hundred thousand people to become icicles.”

  “Did the colony die?” Lajoolie asked softly.

  “The colony did; the colonists didn’t. They sent out an SOS and got evacuated before they came down with terminal frostbite. Unlucky for them, they were picked up by a Cashling outreach crusade…which means nothing to you, Oar, but suffice it to say, the colonists became indentured servants for ten years to pay off the cost of their rescue. After a decade of grunt work and listening to Cashling sermons on Godly Greed, those people must have wished they’d frozen.”

  Uclod wore a large frown. “You’re sure the reactors melted because of that technician?”

  Festina nodded. “There was a thorough investigation. Why do you ask?”

  “Because it’s awful damned convenient this Pollisand just happened to be in the right place at the right time.”

  “Isn’t it though,” Festina agreed. “And since his first visit, he’s showed up in human space over and over again: always right after someone has made a disastrous mistake.”

  She moved back to the table and reached toward the keypad…then withdrew her hand. “I’ve got pictures of other Pollisand sightings, but they aren’t pretty. He’s particularly drawn to the Explorer Corps. Whenever someone has body parts bitten off, gets impaled on a poisonous plant thorn, or steps in something that explodes, there’s a chance the Pollisand will appear out of nowhere and ask, Why did you think that was safe? Why didn’t you walk around? What was going through your head…besides that big wooden spike?”

  Uclod snorted. “You’re sure he isn’t to blame for these so-calle
d accidents?”

  “No one’s sure of anything. But we’ve never found a shred of evidence that he sets up these scenarios himself. It’s always people going about their normal business, making their own catastrophic decisions.”

  “Could he not have a Sinister Ray,” I said, “that compels one to commit foolish deeds?”

  “Theories like that have been suggested,” Festina replied, “especially by the people caught acting like imbeciles. But investigations don’t bear it out; almost always, these folks have a history of similar stunts before the one that really cooks their goose. Coworkers are likely to say, It’s exactly the kind of stupidity we expect from that idiot…which begs the question why the idiot didn’t get fired long before, but incompetence is the norm in our beloved Technocracy.” She turned back toward the screen and scowled at the baggy-suited woman.

  “So if the Pollisand doesn’t cause these accidents,” Uclod said, “how can he tell they’ll happen? You think he can see the future? He knows someone’s going to mess up, and gets a kick out of calling you a dope?”

  “He doesn’t call people dopes,” Festina said. “I could play you recordings of his conversations with Explorers—Explorers who’ve just got themselves or their partners maimed through bonehead mistakes. Judging by the Pollisand’s tone of voice, he truly wants to know why they made such bad choices: like he’s trying to get some insight into the human decision-making process.”

  “You mean he can tell in advance when someone’s going to flip the wrong switch,” Uclod said, “but he has no idea why? What is he, some sort of time traveler? When he hears that someone screwed the pooch, he goes back into the past so he can find out the details?”

  “That’s one possible explanation,” Festina replied. “We’ve never got solid evidence of an alien practicing time travel…but the top echelons of the League do so many hard-to-believe things, why not that too?”