by Alex Lamb
‘Welcome, Captain Ludik,’ he said. ‘Apparently you have Will’s abilities now? You’re taking over as ro-captain?’
‘Correct,’ said Ann as she drifted through the lock. She felt sure, suddenly, that they’d never see Will again. Taking over the Ariel Two and leaving without him held a kind of horrible finality. ‘It’s not what I want,’ she said, ‘but there’s no time to grieve. Hold on, please.’
They took the docking pod down the hundred-kilometre drop to the primary habitat core. She tore away the safety limits on the pod and pasted everyone to the floor for the duration of the journey.
During the descent, Will’s shadow integrated her with the ship. As it came alive in the back of her mind she could feel the freshness of its repairs like fading bruises under her own skin. The mighty vessel’s antimatter reserves had been filled to bursting. They were ready.
Without her shadow there to mediate, accommodating a starship in her head would have been an intolerably alien sensation. Ann forced herself to accept it.
‘Everyone strap down,’ she told the crew as she reached the core. ‘Now!’ As soon as everyone clipped in, Ann punched them towards the swarm at full tilt. She kept a close eye on everyone’s vitals as she piled on the warp, trying not to kill anyone before she got there.
While she approached the swarm-carrier, it completed its packing assembly and began to increase spin. A dense cluster of Nems sat between the two discs, inside the skipping-rope fronds. They looked like a nest of waiting bees. She watched in despair as the weird aura of Nem-warp pasted itself over the plasma shell created by the spinning fibres.
‘Fire!’ she told her shadow. ‘Kill that thing!’
The Ariel Two fired every g-ray it had. But Ann already knew she was too late. The image of the spinning ship that reached her was still thirty seconds old by the time she came close enough to fire. The carrier winked out as if it had never been there, not even leaving a trail to follow.
Ann sagged in the captain’s couch, staring at the dead space that had once held the mutant swarm. Her mouth felt dry.
‘Captain Aquino, any guess on their exit vector?’ she said.
‘From the orientation of their warp-field, I’d say Tiwanaku,’ he said. ‘Almost certainly.’
That was a small mercy, at least. She’d have fewer drones to fight back in the home system, at least.
‘Everyone stay buckled,’ she said. ‘We’re headed for Earth and it’s going to be rough.’
19.3: WILL
At human scale again and struggling for virtual breath, Will stood on a sea of white nothingness and saw Rachel, his dead wife, walking towards him out of a wall of blinding fog. He knew immediately that it wasn’t her. The Transcended had borrowed her form again, just as they had years ago.
‘You,’ Will growled. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘Watching,’ she said. ‘As always.’
‘You did this, all this, didn’t you? You made this place.’
‘Of course.’ She smiled gently. ‘Who did you expect? Another galaxy-spanning civilisation?’
‘You killed me,’ he breathed.
‘Only after a fashion,’ said the Rachel-thing. ‘We’re still talking, aren’t we?’
‘But why?’ said Will.
He never thought he’d be able to truly hate something with Rachel’s face. Now he knew different.
‘We can’t have what you know leaking out,’ she said. ‘Snakepit shouldn’t know, not until much, much later.’
‘But why?’ said Will. ‘Why lie? Why build an entire world only to deceive it?’
‘To make what comes next easier,’ she said. ‘It’s better if those entities you call the Nems don’t know their own origin. It makes it easier for them to become humanity.’
Will squinted at her, uncomprehending. ‘Become us?’
‘That’s right. Why do you suppose they abandon operational complexity once they mirror a new species? It’s because they don’t need it any more. They become that which they encounter, with a few important adjustments, of course. Don’t tell me you didn’t notice.’
Will gawped. There had been clues to what was happening after all, just so subtle he hadn’t noticed them. The cells’ weird adaptations he’d seen in Pari’s base. The curious behaviour of the biosphere Ann had described. Even the curator’s own words. He’d seen all those hints and blanked them, dragged along by the tide of events.
‘They’ll mimic your race, feed on it and then improve upon it,’ said the Transcended. ‘That’s hard for them to do effectively if they’re aware they’ve been manufactured to achieve that end. They must believe in themselves, just as you do. They need a vision, even if it’s a false one.’
The import of her words seeped into Will’s mind in slow, ugly stages.
‘You knew we’d release the Nems,’ he said. ‘You were counting on it.’
‘Of course,’ she said with a laugh. ‘In our experience, an intelligent species never ignores a free weapon for long, even with prior warnings. It’s a game-theoretic imperative we find it useful to exploit.’
Will shrank inside. The Transcended had arranged all this.
‘You knew we’d come here. You knew Earth would be at risk.’
‘Yes, but please don’t grant us powers of prediction we don’t have. This process never pans out the same way from species to species. And your outcome has been particularly surprising. We’ve never seen a messenger-agent such as yourself arrive so late in the game, or push so hard once they were involved. Your appearance at the last moment astonished us, as did the choices you made. The human capacity to surprise delights us, and proves the correctness of our choice.
‘In the grand scheme, though, the order of events matters little. As you know, we vet for appropriate species using the suntap and employ messenger-agents to encourage compliance in those edge cases where intervention appears worthwhile. You did a terrific job of that, by the way. Humanity has been far more predictable since your involvement. Then, if a species survives vetting, we allow it to reach what you might call a gingerbread world. The gingerbread world then neutralises any messenger-agents if they haven’t been disassembled already. So you can console yourself with the knowledge that your dismantling was inevitable, at least. You were never going to leave. Gingerbread worlds are very welcoming, you see. Their standards for integration are, you might say, rather loose.’
Will felt a surge of embarrassment. The curator had handed him power on the basis of a handful of files. He’d thought himself so clever. It had never occurred to him that she might not have a choice.
‘And every gingerbread world produces cuckoos. Inevitably, they are released,’ said the Transcended. ‘A species’ own capacity for constructive self-modification which we filter for at level one becomes a tool for the cuckoos to utilise at level two. Of course, only cuckoo-compatible species are allowed to get this far.’
‘Cuckoos,’ said Will stupidly.
He’d spent every day since the war believing in the Transcended. Believing in hope and straining his life to further that ideal of development and peace. Was this what all that striving had been for? To release some plague of usurpers to feed on the human race?
‘Why?’ he croaked. ‘If you wanted us dead, why not wipe us out the way you did the Fecund?’
‘Because we don’t want you dead,’ she said, her eyes bright. ‘We want you for something wonderful.’
Will lashed out at her. His fist connected only with air.
The Rachel-thing cocked her head. ‘You’ve become a destabilising influence, Will Monet,’ she said. ‘You should be very proud of that. It’s rare. You’ve produced patterns of behaviour we’ve never seen before. And our memories are long, believe me. So rather than taking you out of play, we’re leaving you in the game, after a fashion. That’s a risk, of course, but there’s evidence it’s worth
it. So you’ll be staying here and integrating with the planet as she desires. We’ll take the blocks out to enable that. She’ll be delighted, I assure you.’
Will stared at her, his mind tripping over the ramifications of her words. Godhood, or some sick parody of it, wasn’t optional, apparently.
‘Never,’ said Will. ‘I’d rather die.’
‘We’ll be making some modifications to your mind, of course,’ she said, ‘so as to minimise the damage you can cause, and to ensure that you’re suitably aligned. I’m very sorry, but you’ll have to be conscious during that process. We need to read your cognitive feedback, you see. That’ll hurt, but don’t worry, by the end you won’t care.’
‘Do you think you can scare me?’ Will shouted. ‘I’ve had my mind taken apart before. I’ve been tortured to the edge of sanity. There is nothing you can throw at me that I haven’t already beaten. Do you understand? Nothing!’
‘I’m not trying to scare you, Will,’ said the Transcended reasonably. ‘I’m just helping you get in the right frame of mind. We need a good imprint of your motivational architecture to inform the things we’ll eventually want to make out of you. Every gingerbread world needs strong weapons.’
Will reached uselessly for her face with hands bent into claws. The Rachel-thing receded back into the fog, leaving Will alone in pristine oblivion.
He twisted with all the mental force he could summon, desperately willing his way out of the vision, but he didn’t stand a chance, of course. The Transcended had always been with him. They’d never let go. Being free was never an option.
And then, in a bright moment of exquisite horror, the surgery began. Rachel’s face suddenly filled Will’s mind like an explosion and then was gone, along with all memory of what she’d looked like.
‘No!’ Will screamed.
Memories blossomed in his mind like fireworks. His half-son Mark came and went. Poor Amy, who he’d watched die. His friend Ira, grave but determined. Gustav, blood pooling in his mouth as his eyes implored Will to action. Each vision left a curious gap in its wake, like a tooth yanked from an open mouth.
‘No! No! No!’
Will’s years of political suffering, his long war days and finally his youth, all were snipped out a piece at a time. In the end Will still knew fear and rage, but had no one left to aim them at.
‘No …’ he said, and wondered what he meant.
‘There there,’ said the Transcended. ‘Time to sleep, Will Monet. Time to sleep.’
The snow-white simulation faded into nothingness, taking Will along with it.
19.4: MARK
Mark looked at the radiation profile on the wall display and knew there couldn’t be any doubt. A sick sense of injustice welled up inside him.
‘Our hands were just tied,’ he said. ‘We don’t get to go to Earth – we have to make our stand here and now.’
Citra regarded him blankly. ‘Why?’
‘Because of the target-size problem,’ said Ash grimly. ‘If we let the Nems take over this system, they’ll be that much smarter by the time they get to Earth. If the swarm wins here, they’ll gain an army of hosts and about a thousand IQ points.’
‘I’m not sure “swarm” is the right word,’ said Zoe. She was already frantically typing on the nearest surface. ‘Take a look at this.’ She posted a window to the wall-screen. ‘This is an interpolated image from our primary telescopic array.’
Six bright points hung against a backdrop of fuzzy darkness.
‘They look like starships,’ said Mark.
The Nems had brought a human-style fleet with them this time, not a swarm. With each passing second, the image resolution improved. The Nem craft all had the same curiously knobbled exterior. And they were diving in-system at almost a full light – a real achievement so close to a star.
‘They look like giant raspberries,’ said Citra.
‘They’re not all the same type,’ said Zoe. ‘I’m seeing two ship-forms. Three of them are round like our ships and three are elongated.’
‘I’ve never heard of these things,’ said Ash.
Mark rifled through Ash’s borrowed memories. ‘Me neither. They’re new.’
Fingers of dread stroked up his spine. The Nems had changed again.
‘We have to wake Sam,’ said Citra. ‘He’s been preparing for this moment. I listened while he organised defences for the whole system.’
Ash looked sour. ‘I’d rather not.’
‘Unfortunately, Citra’s right,’ said Mark. ‘We need all the information we can get.’
Zoe shot him a dry look. ‘Are you sure we’ll believe it when we get it?’
‘No, but that’s a chance we’ll have to take.’ He pushed off the wall, back towards the med-bay.
At first, the medical SAP refused to rouse Sam.
‘He requires extensive facial reconstruction,’ the room told them. ‘Surgery is ongoing.’
‘I don’t need him sitting up,’ Mark told the machine. ‘Isn’t he carrying a subvocal tap for heavy-gee dialogue? We can talk to him while he’s still in there.’
‘He also has a concussion with mild brain damage,’ the med-bay insisted. ‘His mental functions are still under repair and should not be utilised. I cannot recommend stimulation at this time.’
‘I don’t care,’ Mark snapped. ‘This is an emergency.’
The wall-screen on Sam’s cabinet swapped to a simulated display of his face. He groaned as the med-bay dumped stimulants into his blood.
‘What the fuck …’
His voice emerged as a digitised mess while the SAP selected a vocal interpolation program that would work. The simulated face blinked and looked around. The camera in the corner of the display went live.
‘Hello, Sam,’ said Mark.
‘Where am I? What’s happening?’
‘You’re in recovery.’
Dawning realisation crawled across the simulated face. Sam scowled.
‘Well, you got your ship back,’ said Sam. ‘Congratu-fucking-lations.’
‘Sam, the Nems are here,’ said Mark.
‘Of course they are, you stupid little shit. What did you think was going to happen? Did you imagine that bullshit prank at Nerroskovi was going to buy you time? The Nem carriers are made out of adapted drones, you idiot. Where did you imagine they came from? Kill one carrier and the others cluster and fuse to make a new one. Everything they do is made out of drones.’
Zoe’s eyes lit up. ‘Of course!’ she said. She sounded more fascinated than afraid.
‘We didn’t wake you so you could insult us,’ said Mark. ‘We need to know the state of Carter’s defences. We’d ask them but they’re not in a talking mood.’
‘Do you imagine that anything I can tell you will do the slightest bit of good at this point?’ said Sam. ‘Do yourself a favour and leave the system. It’s fucking over. You’ve doomed these people already. Let them die in peace.’
‘The defences!’ Ash shouted. His voice squeaked with rage and spittle flew from his mouth. ‘Tell us about the fucking defences or I swear you’ll come out of that box a cripple.’
‘There are two colony police gunboats about six AU out,’ said Sam, his voice dripping scorn. ‘They’ve got orders to release decoys in the event of a swarm to draw the Nems’ attention.
‘But the best ship in the system by far is the Gulliver. The colonists were going to equip it with some weapons, but you fucked that up, Mark, before they could even start. We were supposed to act as an escort for the evacuation ark. Most of the population were already aboard before you trashed my comms. I have no idea if they ever finished that process.’
‘Where’s the ark?’ said Mark.
‘At Carter’s primary moon.’
‘And how about the people in the Flag colonies? You were going to burn them from orbit, weren’
t you?’
‘Do you really think they deserve rescuing?’ Sam drawled. ‘You saw them up close.’
‘Of course they fucking deserve rescuing!’ Mark shouted. ‘They’re people!’
He struggled for calm. Every second he spent in Sam’s company came with a heavy emotional cost.
Zoe passed an image feed of the approaching Nem fleet to Sam’s visual field.
‘The Nems didn’t send a swarm this time,’ she said. ‘Their carrier brought these raspberry ships instead. Any idea what they’re for?’
The silence that followed spoke volumes.
‘You’re screwed in any case,’ said Sam at length. ‘You took out the orbital defence platform. That was your best tool for making a stand, or even just for target reduction. The Carter colonists have Nem-cloaking now. I made sure of that. They’ll just have to fire it up and hope. The Gulliver has one option and that’s to get the fuck out of here.’
‘Wrong,’ said Zoe.
An icon appeared in Mark’s sensorium. ‘I’m receiving a signal from those ships,’ he said.
He passed it to the nearest wall. A beautiful woman with decorative orange striping on her face appeared. The backdrop behind her was a field of shimmering blue like a summer sky.
‘Greetings!’ she said with a warm smile. She looked somehow familiar, in a friendly, approachable way. ‘We come in peace. We are the Photurian Collective and we offer an alliance with the human race. Please do not be alarmed by our arrival. We are here simply to engage in face-to-face dialogue with the people of the Carter System. We bring gifts: extended life, telepathy, social harmony and a host of biological and technological enhancements. We offer all of them freely in return for the chance to meet you and learn about your culture.’
Mark stared at the woman and almost wanted to believe the message. Maybe the Nems had grown up. Maybe after all the horror they’d brought, this was what they’d been trying to turn into.
‘Run,’ Sam breathed. His simulated face started to distort into fragments. ‘Run now!’
