by S. H. Jucha
Initially, Alex had offered to meet with Gratuito’s governing body, only to be told by Tomas that the Independents had none. In return, Tomas had suggested a vid conference might serve the Admiral just as well.
But Alex had to admit that Lina’s suggestion had merit, despite how he felt about delivering recruiting speeches to strangers. So Alex had loaded his senior personnel and a few others into the Outward Bound and had ordered Squadron Leader Sheila Reynard to provide escort to the surface for their shuttle.
When the decision was made that Alex would make an in-person appeal to the Independents, Julien sent a flash to Libre’s only media group. It was a weighty message—the history of the Rêveur¸ the discovery of the New Terrans, their democratic society, Admiral Alexander Racine, the advent of war weapons, the capture of the first silver ship, and a message from Alex that he wished to address the Independents, in person.
The media group’s producer attempted to edit the lengthy message down but failed after several attempts. Everything had value, but then, what did he expect? A SADE had created the message. So that night, the producer set up his media comm repeater to broadcast the message to every SADE, ship controller, and groundside implant. His final message of the night was to request all three of his media people be at the shuttle terminal to cover the story. In his mind, the event rivaled the news of the silver ships themselves.
While Alex and company were in flight, Julien sent information on the planet’s history. Libre had been terraformed for nearly a century before its first inhabitants, the growing colony of Independents originally housed on Méridien, were transferred to the planet. When Julien detailed the planet’s gravity, a few percent less than Méridien, the Méridien crew turned off their grav-belts. Air quality, Julien told them, was good but a little light in oxygen, similar to higher elevations on New Terra.
Once on the ground, Captain Manet taxied the Outward Bound to a parallel apron, directed there by Julien.
Edouard relayed Julien’s message to the Admiral and the Dagger pilots, who followed him off the runway and onto the apron.
Alex’s entourage exited the shuttle into a pale blue-green sky and a large dim-red sun. A fresh, cool breeze, heavily laced with the scent of abundant flora, blew away the residual fumes of their craft.
Flight crew from the Outward Bound raced to the Daggers to join the Libran terminal crew, who were towing ladders behind service vehicles to release the pilots from their canopies. Alex and his people strode to meet Leader Stroheim, Ser Monti, and his daughter, Lina, waiting at the apron’s edge next to a terminal’s passenger transport.
Alex found the lighter gravity a pleasure, but it reminded him to speak to Terese later. He needed to know if their cell-gen injections would prevent the New Terrans from losing muscle mass and bone density on the Rêveur and on these lighter-g planets.
As the group crossed the apron, Alex could see the top of a platform above the safety berm. He hoped the sight of his Daggers and his New Terran crew would be a persuasive enough sales pitch for the successful recruitment of the Independents and that it wouldn’t depend on his oratory skills. “Mathematician, explorer, and ship owner,” Alex groused to himself. “My résumé doesn’t say anything about being a salesman.”
One hundred forty-nine kilometers up, Julien smiled to himself.
A good start, thought Alex. A live presentation to a few Librans would generate more impact, and these individuals could spread the word to others.
The comm was silent, but Alex was sure that Julien was laughing.
Julien’s reminder of Alex’s initial meeting with the Rêveur’s survivors brought those moments of charged emotions and mutual discovery back to him, and confidence fueled him. Alex renewed his step, and his entourage hurried to keep pace with him.
Tomas extended his hand to the Admiral as the New Terran reached him. “Welcome to Libre, Admiral. This is an exciting event for my people.”
Alex exchanged a brief greeting with Leader Stroheim and nodded to Lina, who smiled warmly at him. They followed Tomas across a stretch of field to a two-meter-high, grass-covered berm. As they crested the top, Alex heard gasps and shouts of surprise from the front of the huge audience. “I suppose I look much bigger in person than on vid,” Alex mumbled.
Renée took Alex’s arm and leaned into him. “You are more impressive in person,” she whispered.
Together, Alex and Renée ascended the platform, taking central positions, while fifteen Rêveur crew members positioned themselves across the platform and rearward of their Leaders. The crew looked resplendent in their dark-blue uniforms with gold Rêveur or Outward Bound patches on one shoulder cap, House Alexander patches on the other, and department insignias on shoulder bars. Gold stars decorated each side of the officers’ short stand-up collars.
There were no chairs on the platform, only a slender lectern. That suited Alex. He didn’t intend to take too long. As Tomas approached the lectern, a hover cam moved from its wide position to cover him. However, one drone stayed fixed on Alex, who looked briefly into the sensor and gave the audience a grave nod.
Tomas addressed his audience in a relaxed and comfortable manner, a leader who knew his people well. “You’ve had an opportunity to study the vids of our visitors distributed by Julien,” Tomas began. “I won’t bore you with repetition. You came here today to witness what we first saw two days ago … your fellow humans, New Terrans, a little larger than life.” Tomas paused as the audience politely laughed with him.
Each side was engaged in their own share of staring. Despite all the time Alex had spent with his visually stunning Méridiens, they had been the exception, the lesser number of crew. Here, he faced a sea of the beautifully designed people.
The drone operator had initially focused on Alex. But the media producer had spotted something to amplify the story, and she urged her operator for new images. One drone briefly framed Mickey and Pia before closing in on their clasped hands, Pia’s slender one disappearing inside of Mickey’s massive one. A second drone focused on Alex and Renée. While the Co-Leaders weren’t holding hands, there was no space left between their shoulders.
When Tomas finished his introduction, the audience acknowledged his words with whistles and clapping, which surprised the Méridiens on the platform. It was not an expected response from their people. Apparently the Independents were more comfortable expressing themselves. In this regard, they were more akin to New Terrans than Méridiens.
Alex paid particular attention to the audience’s enthusiastic and overt response to their charismatic leader, and he noted Tomas mentioned Julien by name, not as the Rêveur’s SADE. As Alex was introduced by Tomas, he stepped forward and shook the Leader’s hand, laying his other hand on Tomas’s shoulder in a comradely gesture. If he must, Alex decided, he would play the political game as best he could. He sought to maintain the image of President McMorris in his mind, but for some inexplicable reason, it kept morphing into the face of the despicable Assemblyman Downing.
Holding the sides of the lectern, Alex let his eyes wander over the mass of people. He found their expectant faces unsettling, so he shifted his focus to the audience’s front rows, which were primarily composed of young women dressed in Méridien fashion but not the subtle, blended colors Alex was accustomed to seeing. Theirs were vibrant colors and
patterns that seemed to proclaim liberation from Méridien society. However, as was usual for Méridien women, the clothes and wraps were anything but modest. Alex gave them his best smile, and they responded with smiles, waves, and a few pursed lips. Alex heard Renée’s chuckle in his implant.
Alex turned his head back to Renée and gave her a wink, similar to the one she had first sent him in the meal room, but slower and full of intent.
Renée felt the warmth start in her toes and spread up to her face.
“When Independents were first described to me,” Alex began in Con-Fed without preamble, projecting his voice out over the crowd and forcing the vid drones’ amplifiers to modulate the audio gain, “as people who couldn’t follow the rules … as people who spoke out against their society’s order … as individuals who just had to speak their minds …” Alex heard the grumblings that he had hoped to elicit, and he paused for dramatic effect. “I said to myself: ‘So what’s the problem? Isn’t that how people are supposed to act?’”
The enormous crowd broke into applause, and shouts of support echoed across the grass meadow. Over the continuing cheers, Alex shouted, “In fact, the individuals described sounded a lot like my people. New Terrans value independence. We speak our minds and we encourage our children to speak their minds.” He couldn’t continue over the deafening noise of the crowd. They weren’t only cheering; they were jumping up and down, waving arms and articles of clothing, scarves, shirts, and even some wraps. It took time for the clamor to begin to die down.
Finally, Alex held his hands out wide to reassert control, the gesture enlarging his frame even more, which elicited a few appreciative whistles from the front rows. “You’ve heard our story. The humans behind me, Méridiens and New Terrans, fight to defend all humans. We won’t allow these silver ships to destroy mankind. You know our words aren’t empty. You’ve seen the vids of the captured silver ship, and your good leaders have witnessed this in person.” As Alex indicated them, Eric, Tomas, and Lina each raised an arm in acknowledgement and nodded to the crowd. A vid drone hovered in front of them.
“We understand that you’re building city-ships, what you call ‘colony ships,’ to escape Libre when the aliens come your way, and we’ve no wish to interfere with your work. In fact, if we can aid you, we will be pleased to do so.” The crowd began cheering again, and Alex waited patiently for the noise to subside, pleased with the audience’s reaction to his words.
“Most importantly,” Alex continued, “we need your help. We’re in need of material and people. You have fabrication plants that are fallow and people who are idle while others work on the city-ships. We must produce more fighters, like those you saw land on your runway, and the weapons they employ. This will require your assistance mining ores, processing alloys, manufacturing the parts, and assembling the fighters and weapons. In addition, we must convert a freighter to carry the fighters. All of these processes require the assistance of your trained workers. With these fighters, we can take the attack to the silver ships before they leave Bellamonde.” Alex had built to a crescendo, his voice getting louder and louder, and he had ended his exhortation with his hands in the air, as if he was cheering a New Terran aero-ball team.
The noise of the crowd thundered across the field like a wall of sound striking those on the platform. It had no comparison to the sedate greetings of Alex’s first encounter with Méridiens, but under the circumstances, it was what he and his people needed. As the commotion died down, he noticed that the audience had begun to crowd forward, as if getting closer to him would make his words more real to them. The front row was now leaning on the edge of the platform, waving, cheering, and smiling up at him.
When the audience quieted, Alex said, “Your city-ships represent a safe opportunity to flee the menace of the silver ships. But someday, wherever you go, the silver ships will come for you … if not for you, then your children or their children. To ensure your descendants can live without fear of this menace, we need to stop them now. And to do that, I need some of you to fight alongside my people. You may wonder what the risk will be for those who join us. I will tell you this. Some of you or perhaps all of you will die if you fight with us. But, here today, I ask this of you anyway … for your families, for your people, for all humans.”
Once again, the crowd erupted into cheers. Alex had expected his request to subdue them, the prospect of death almost certain if they joined his people. He was reminded that these people, Independents, were the outlaws of Méridien society.
Tomas joined Alex at the lectern and placed a hand on Alex’s shoulder as he addressed the audience. “These are humans unlike any we’ve seen.” The crowd laughed along with Tomas and Alex at the joke. “But I speak of their will, their spirit. I believe if anyone might produce a means of saving our people, it’ll be this group of individuals. We have a choice to make. Do we help them in their fight or abandon them in their quest to save mankind?”
And to the relief of those on the platform, the huge crowd broke into a unified chant of, “Fight! Fight! Fight!”
-6-
As the crowd chanted, Tatia signaled Alex,
Alex extended his invitation to the audience while his crew exited the platform to take up stations alongside the fighters and armed shuttle.
Counting on the crowd’s enthusiasm, Alex and Tatia had hoped for a few hundred of the curious. They didn’t expect the entire audience to stride over the berm at the Admiral’s invitation. But both of them had underestimated the enticement they had offered the Librans, who would have an opportunity to see and touch the weapons that had defeated a silver ship—a ghost that had haunted their nightmares for sixty-one years, ever since the destruction of the first colony, Cetus, in the Hellébore system.
The Librans were intrigued by the display but politely maintained their distance. That was until they discovered that Senior Captain Bonnard, Squadron Leader Sheila Reynard, and Lieutenant Robert Dorian had flown the Daggers that captured the silver ship. Then the crowd pressed forward to lay their hands on the pilots and honor them as they asked for details of the capture.
Andrea, familiar with the Méridien ritual of storytelling that the Librans desired, raised her hands overhead, and the entire audience, surrounding all the ships, quieted. Implants were set to record; comms from those nearest Andrea relayed signals to those behind so that all might share in the Captain’s story. Then, as Andrea had done once before, she told the story of the encounter, the loss of Jase, the defeat of the silver ship, and the joyful recovery of Robert. When she finished, there were no crossed arms and bowed heads to greet her story, but clapping and shouting. The Rêveur’s officers were touched about the arms and shoulders or kissed on cheeks. They were grinning for so long and hard that their face muscles began to hurt.
Renée and Pia were surrounded by young Méridien men and women, who, having witnessed their close
pairing with the New Terrans, were asking much more personal questions. Pia was happy to share, while Renée chose to deflect the questions to Pia.
Tomas Monti saw the present circumstances as an opportunity to acquire inside information on Alex and his people. He sought out the fiery red-head, Terese, who had intrigued him. Tomas was especially curious as to the extent that New Terrans had adopted Méridien technology. When Tomas found Terese, the Librans politely stepped aside to clear space for their Leader. Tomas extended a polite bow to Terese and asked for a moment of her time.
“The New Terrans have only had their implants for a short while, Ser. Have they all adopted them as proficiently as the Admiral?” Tomas asked Terese, which caused him to become the focus of her laughter. Immediately, Tomas’s implant received a recording. It was a hectic mix of comm requests for various items. It took Tomas a few moments to realize that he was observing two groups of people, each searching one another’s implants for information, assembling clues, and hurrying to assemble the answer to a puzzle. When one side was successful, the vid ended. He played the recording again for himself.
Terese waited patiently for Tomas to finish perusing of one of her favorite implant games. She had been team captain, and they had won that evening, but barely. Terese had expected to shock Ser Monti with the chaotic nature of the New Terran-Méridien implant games, but instead, with her link still open to him, she discovered Tomas was replaying the vid, a smile on his face. His reaction caused Terese to pause and take a fresh look at Ser Tomas, and a little smile began to form on her own lips.
When Tomas was able to focus again, Terese said, “Soon after the New Terran crew received their implants, Commander Tachenko came to me and expressed her dissatisfaction with our Méridien teaching regimen. The New Terrans had only a short time to adopt the implant’s basic applications before we would leave their world to return home. So the Commander and I designed a simple game to help the New Terrans adopt their implant controls.”
