by Ginger Booth
“Like herding dust bunnies,” Cope predicted in an undervoice.
They exited into the dome to meet and greet the assembled local dignitaries.
13
“Your delegation could ride on Prosper and Thrive,” Ben noted for the record, standing on Sanctuary’s great domed sports fields of yellow fake grass. They didn’t grow much here. “Takes less fuel.” And I’d have a prayer of keeping everyone organized.
“No, no!” Mayor Tharsis insisted jovially, the head ‘Martian’ in pink. “We have our own starships! We are the Colony Corps, after all!”
Ben smiled wanly. The Sanks’ parents and grandparents were the Colony Corps. The present generation was only recently recovered from being puppets to their own AI. But he understood their need to market themselves. They were a tough sell.
Tharsis continued, “May I present the leader of our delegation, Olympia Zhao!”
Oh, hell. She’s ancient! Ben figured the elderly Martian was another village elder, like Petunia Ling of the Loonies.
“Olympia’s mother was the great Captain Catherine Zhao of the Concordia, who bore the Cantons settlers to their world,” Tharsis continued. Ben nodded respect to the old woman. “Your captain will be Sanjay Mare.”
This worthy wore the navy blue of the Loonies. Ben would have loved to pause and chat, but Tharsis plowed on to another woman in pink. “Marga Becker is our educational psychologist, and volleyball champion! And Dieter Brainerd, a technician.”
Annoyed by the mismatched level of detail, Ben smiled warmly to the volleyball player and the tech. “Hello! I’d like to introduce a few new people as well. But first, I wish to make clear that this is a quick stop. We leave in three days.” They did call ahead and warn them, by ansible. Hugo Silva traveled with them specifically for coordinating logistics.
“Oh, no, that’s quite impossible!” elderly Zhao stated flatly.
Ben ignored her and addressed Captain Mare. “Is your ship flight-worthy? Fuel ready? Let’s arrange a readiness walk-through tomorrow morning with you and Mr. Brainerd.”
The Sank captain shrugged agreement. Ben didn’t care whether the teacher and the fossil were packed to go. More worrisome was Dieter Brainerd’s surly glower at Hugo Silva. Apparently the two Gannies didn’t like each other. Tough. A ship’s engineer was critical, in Ben’s opinion. But he had enough technical talent along to compensate, plus experience with Denali’s Nanomage, an identical ship design to Cupid.
Ben pressed on. “Hugo and Bron Silva are eager to update you on their adventures on Mahina and Denali, and the Pono rings.”
Hugo encouraged, “My son and his friend Nico Copeland would like to present regarding Mahina’s creches.” He pointed out the kids.
“Abel and Jules Greer you already know,” Ben forged on.
“We’ll be delighted to talk trade with you!” Jules pounced. “I’ll be setting up by the spaceport here with samples from Mahina, Denali, and our shipboard gardens.”
Abel added, “We encourage everyone to drop by and taste new foods and talk trade.” Both of them beamed in a friendly way.
Cope stepped forward himself to shake Tharsis’ hand. “We’ll need to talk again about ships. New opportunities arise. No worries. I think you’ll like this.”
Tharsis looked concerned, but before he could follow up, Aurora barged in and introduced herself. “I’d like to talk with your people about teaming up. Because my planet Denali would like to colonize Sylvan.”
The mayors were taken aback. “Oh! You’re ready to begin terraforming in the near term?”
“Terraform?” Aurora looked horrified. “Why would you terraform such a beautiful, vibrant planet? That’s genocide –!”
“Aurora.” Ben tugged her away for Sass and Clay to step forward next.
“If you want to terraform a world, start with this one!” Aurora shot back over her shoulder. “It’s dead already!”
Ben whispered to Bron and Nico. “Just get started with the inflatables. They’ll like that. Aurora, not the time.”
The teens got busy with their air canisters, blowing up their ride-in balls to demonstrate.
Aurora hissed, “There is no right time for genocide, Ben Acosta!”
Fortunately, Sass smoothly stepped in on the introductions. “You remember my chief engineer Remi Roy from Sagamore, and our head of science mission, Eli Rasmussen. And this is Kassidy Yang, publicizing our travels.”
Kassidy gave a hundred-watt smile and kissed Tharsis smack on the lips. “The people of Mahina love you already! And when they see my latest footage – you wait! When your settlers come join us, Mahina will welcome you with open arms!”
The third mayor, the Ganny Inge Lumpkin, traced her lip to warn Tharsis about the purple lipstick smear. Sanks didn’t wear makeup. They didn’t wear anything except their color-coded pressure suits and workout outfits.
Abel butted in again. “The boys are demonstrating a game we picked up on our trip to Denali. These can be used inside the dome. But they’re also self-contained, limited air supplies. For children to play outside and learn about hypoxia.”
Marga Becker, the shrink, asked doubtfully, “Wasn’t Denali the dangerous planet?”
“Yes!” The customer was always right, to Abel. “That’s why it’s so critical for children to learn courage and limits from a young age.” He beamed at her.
“You should teach them to stay safe indoors!” said the educational psychologist. “And wear proper breath masks!”
Ben, Cope, Abel, and Jules – the parents who broke in the first wave of settler creche teachers in Schuyler – grimaced at Becker. Aurora looked even less friendly.
Hide indoors? What, for the rest of their lives?
Zan and Wilder, along as security escort, took a running start and kicked Bron and Nico sailing down the field, heads and torsos safely inside the giant balls, their stubby little calves and boot socks sticking out. Sanctuary had 0.9 g gravity plates down in the city, but the field didn’t reach up here. The boys bounced beautifully at 0.7 g.
The mayors and envoys stood transfixed by the new sports game. Sanks were big on sports.
Jules prompted, “Abel, do you think we could spare just a few of those balls at our trade stand?”
“Well, we didn’t bring many,” Abel cautioned. “Intended for an icebreaker on Cantons. They were instant hit on Mahina, though.”
With the pushy Martians distracted, Ben set his appointment with Cupid’s captain. Hugo Silva tried to engage Marga Becker about that crucial issue of creche care and education on Mahina. But she kept her eyes on the ball game.
Ben suspected it was a bad sign that Hugo and the Ganny technician, Cupid’s excuse for an engineer, only traded a wary nod. Only eleven hundred Gannies lived here, few of them technical. The two knew each other, and Hugo’s absence hadn’t made them fonder. The two female envoys appeared to treat the two men, captain and tech, as inferior beings.
But the lead envoy, Olympia Zhao, seemed more knowledgeable about Cantons than the database. She confided to Ben, Clay, and Hugo that she studied European history tirelessly as a child. She said this was her way of remaining close to her mother so impossibly far away. Similar to Ling of the Loonies, Zhao left Mars at age 7. She parted from the famous Captain Zhao (Ben never heard of her) even younger, aged 5. They didn’t meet again til Olympia was 18.
Ben’s eye drifted kindly to Cope as she gushed. This is why. Sass proved to Cope and Teke that there was no hope for humanity except to band together again to build the technical skills for truly advanced but humanized environments. The Diaspora needed to be reversed. And with the old warp drives, human lives just weren’t long enough to make two-way trips. You performed a miracle, Cope. In the hustle and bustle, Ben needed reminding just how momentous it was, what Spaceways was doing.
Olympia never did truly bond with her mother. As with most colonies, family ties never really formed. How could they?
“Now, we don’t know how this compares with wha
t they truly did on Cantons,” Olympia shared now to her rapt audience. “But the plan was for each European country to have their own enclave. The settler quotas were alloted by population back on Earth. Not every country, mind you. Europe had many countries.”
Clay chuckled in understanding. Ben studied a few European countries in college, and promptly forgot all about them. They’re gone. He smiled politely.
“Rather than a dome on the ground, each planned a walled city-state, with a dome over the top. Inside, they wanted to capture the distinctive architecture of their home countries. With luck, the agriculture too. High-speed rail lines connect the cities. And then someday, when terraforming was complete, voila! They would spread out from their city-states across the countryside!”
Hugo confirmed, “This is consistent with what we saw during our aerial survey. The city walls are awfully thick.”
“Why?” Clay inquired.
“Defense!” Olympia pounced. “They developed a plan during the trip. Their philosophers decided –”
Ben’s brow puckered. He doubted a single ‘philosopher’ earned a living on Mahina.
“– Human beings are forever at war, in competition. So they planned for the city-states to return to Renaissance stylized combat. Isn’t that romantic?” She quivered with history-professor delight.
Not many history buffs on Mahina, either. In Ben’s high school, history amounted to applied English and science to applied math. Poldark High only boasted the two teachers and fifty students across four grades. The English teacher favored soporific literature over baffling history. Ben couldn’t relate to either.
Clay looked alarmed. “Stylized warfare? They thought this was a good idea?”
Olympia took a dainty sip from a waist flask. “Excuse me. So dry. They believed it was unavoidable. Therefore it should be channeled, civilized.”
Clay scoffed, “Stab each other with pointy sticks? Or only shoot until the first man dies?”
Olympia threw up her hands. “This is what we seek to find out! Mother left before the first walled city was sealed. I’m so excited! Only a few more days.” She quivered and sipped again.
Jules Greer put a hand on Ben’s shoulder to interrupt. Her forced smile told him plain as Pono that she was miffed. The couples owned a mansion together for years, on top of years in shipboard tight quarters. “We’re hosting dinner tonight on Prosper, Ben! Olympia, the envoys and mayors, at 17:00 hours. We’ll have you come early for drinks and a tour.”
How did that happen? They landed here about 16:00 Mahina time, after a 10:00 start. Ben chose to warp 5 hours out from landing. Local time, despite the recent sunrise, was about noon. Jet-lagged, they’d sit to this dinner around midnight. “And the, um, crew?”
“Corky will feed them on Thrive,” Jules explained, still smiling stiffly. “They invited us to dinner, you see. But Olympia, you must see Prosper! We’re to be neighbors in space!”
Ah. Ben did see. Sank cuisine was revolting. “Well, we have so much to do! If you’ll excuse us until this evening, Olympia!” He began gathering up his flock to take a nap before this evening’s snooze-fest.
He made a note to look up Renaissance ‘stylized warfare’ first though. The plan sounded really dumb. But Ben learned that much from history – no end to human stupid.
The captain was pleased with the first meet and greet. More teens joined Bron and Nico now bumbling around the yellow tufted field masquerading as soccer balls. Someday he should ask Sock for the official rules of this game. For the moment, the kids ran as fast as they could straight into each other, like human bumper cars. They knocked each other off their feet to bounce and roll away across the field, then came hurtling back for more.
14
Ben stepped into Cupid from the door airlock and gazed around an orderly hold. His eyes narrowed at the collection of Sank whimsical conveyances. “Haven’t seen that one before.” He pointed with the hand holding his p-suit helmet. The two-legged ride-on toy looked like that Earth bird famous for sticking its head in the sand.
“An electric emu!” Captain Sanjay Mare enthused, the Loonie of the Sanctuary group bound for Cantons. “Bipedal locomotion. Shame it doesn’t fly. I wish we had birds. So liberating, so free!”
Ben fought his lips to smile instead of grimace. “Lots of flying creatures on Denali. They’re a menace for a pilot.”
“Oh? Ah,” Mare allowed. As the second load cycled through the lock, he pointed out other key supplies in the tidy pile of cargo.
“I’d like you to grant command authority to myself and Captain Collier, over your ship AI,” Ben mentioned.
“Ah, that seems extreme,” Mare demurred. “I mean, in an emergency…”
Sass backed Ben up. “In an emergency it’s too late. There needs to be trust between captains, Sanjay.” She smiled warmly at him.
Ben nodded and drifted toward the med-bay, positioned in the same spot for the courier-class ships as the much bigger PO-3 he flew. He froze. Remi, strolling alongside him and Cope, backed away in shock. The tiny chamber featured one gurney and a 4-armed pole robot.
“Computer, disable med-bay robot,” Ben ordered.
Rather than the expected quibble about him not being authorized to give orders, the ship AI’s female voice replied mildly, “Robots are not under control of the ship AI.”
“What controls the robot?” Ben sharply demanded of Sanjay Mare.
“Well, Loki.” Sanjay pointed to an equipment bank near the emu parking.
Ben glanced that way and took in Sass’s white face. Clay gripped her arms in support, so hard his fingers might leave bruises.
“Reconvene in my galley,” Ben barked. “Immediately. Sass, Clay, lead the way.” He was pleased to see Abel hustle them into the air-lock. Sass’s engineer Remi Roy hastily squeezed in too.
“The rest of the tour?” Sanjay attempted.
“We will discuss in my galley,” Ben stated flatly. “Command authority over your AI. Now, if you please, Captain Mare.”
“See here, Captain Acosta!” the Loonie objected.
Hugo Silva interceded. “Computer, grant Captain Ben Acosta command authority. Ben, identify yourself.”
Ben introduced himself to the AI as prompted. Once granted command authority, he added Cope, Remi, Abel, Clay, and Sass to the list of people Cupid should accept orders from. They also provided their voice-prints, most from inside the door airlock.
Mare demanded of Hugo, “How did you gain access to do that!”
Hugo gave him a withering glare. “Fighting for my life against robots.”
“I…didn’t know,” Sanjay allowed thoughtfully.
“Gentlemen, save discussion for my galley,” Ben insisted. “Electric emus. Is their gait better than the horses?”
“Emus are my favorite!” Sanjay enthused. “Though I like Loonie three-wheelers, too.”
The man mercifully took the hint and stuck to social topics on the way to Prosper’s galley. Jules supplied them with pitchers of water and glasses, then cleared the room before Ben’s second wave of people arrived.
From his seat, Abel clued him in. “Ben, Sass is checking that thing in your office.”
“Thank you. If you’ll excuse me a moment, I need to check that with her.” Ben paused with a hand on Clay’s shoulder. “Do you need to join us, Mr. Rocha?”
“I’m good,” Clay claimed, though his shoulder was rigid. The old space hands already wore the top halves of their p-suits dangling from their waist belts, clad above in T-shirts, a long-sleeved wheat color in Clay’s case. Ben opted for short sleeves in plain white.
“I’ve got him,” Abel noted from Clay’s side.
Ben hustled to his office. Once in the door, he immediately held out his arms, not at all sure his shocky old captain would accept a hug.
She flung herself into his chest and clung there gasping for breath as his arms enfolded her.
“I –” she attempted.
“Shh,” he crooned. “We’re agreed. Loki
doesn’t leave this star system.”
“Yes. Please! I’m sorry. I just –” She sobbed.
Ben’s frustration with her over the past few weeks flew out the airlock. He could only imagine what it was like to suddenly face that torture device, its beady ‘eyes’ alive with power and intention. One of those robots killed her brutally, not once, but over and over again, under direction from the pitiless AI Shiva.
Loki isn’t Shiva. But he’s close enough. In fact, Loki was 99.99% Shiva, so far as the captain-engineer could figure. Ben didn’t trust the remaining 0.01% as far as he could throw the rego thing. Which was nowhere. The overpowered AI controlled the asteroid belt as well as the human colony here on the planet. At least now Loki only controlled the mechanicals, not the colonists as puppets as well. We hope.
He thought fast as her sobs diminished. “I’ll tell them they need to remove the offensive robot. You should never have to see that again.”
“But it’s their med system!” Sass argued, voice cracking.
“Tough. You’ve still got the Yang-Yang system on Thrive, right? How would you feel about granting the Sanks our nanites for the duration?”
She pulled away. “Dot Markley was the one who knew the procedure.”
Ben plucked her a tissue to mop her face. “Kassidy can do that.” Yang-Yang youth-granting health-repairing nanites were customized to an individual’s biochemistry and genome. They could update automatically once a person was inducted into a controller’s system, but the first visit cost out the wazoo. However, Kassidy Yang was the second Yang in ‘Yang-Yang,’ and she lived aboard Thrive.
“Have you spoken to Loki yet?” Ben asked gently. This was one of the issues he was annoyed with her about. Both captains spoke to Loki on the way in. The AI was ‘Sanctuary Control’ among his other faces. He greeted them and granted permission to land. Then Loki started hassling Ben about why Sass wouldn’t talk to him, said she was too busy, yada-yada. “He asked whether his copy on Merchant ever got repaired.”
