Unfaithful Covenant

by Michael Anderle

Lanara scoffed. “I don’t think those Core assholes getting themselves turned into monsters counts as controlling the ship. Even if the team had never gotten involved, that situation wouldn’t have ended with the Core in control of the vessel. The Hunters would have blown up a couple of planets, right?”

  Janessa winced. “A couple of planets?”

  Jia sighed. “I’m not worried about Hunters, but Wei’s right. We can’t make assumptions about what we’ll encounter when we arrive. It’s unlikely the insurrectionists won, but given we know the Core is supplying them Elites and likely other equipment, the rebellion might still be ongoing.”

  “Which is why we should jump in far from New Samarkand,” Erik concluded. “Just in case, at least a couple of days. If we fiddle around with half-jumps and trying to find newsfeeds in another system, it’ll end up taking more time, so we’ll go directly. But for all we know, this is a trap by the Core to grab the jumpship, and we can’t let it be taken no matter what. Jumping right next to the planet is too great a risk.”

  “Are we considering potential self-destruction?” Lanara asked, her face lighting up with interest.

  “Whoa.” Raphael shook his head. “Can we dial down the blowing up the ship part? It’s not like I paid for it, but that drive represents a lot of taxpayer money and scientific effort.”

  “We need options.” Erik nodded at Emma. “We need her with us planet-side, which means you’ll have to rely on the basic AI on that ship.”

  Emma lifted her hand and summoned a small hologram of the Bifröst. “Jumping without me is impossible because of minute adjustments that must be made during the process, but it’d be easy enough to program in an automatic flight program that will allow the ship to disengage at Raphael’s discretion that I could override without being docked, but still relatively close.”

  Erik nodded. “Fine. It’s not perfect, but it’ll do for now. If we have trouble, we’ll figure something out. As it stands, I figure we jump in near one of the uninhabited planets without any satellites and fly the Argo in even if it adds a couple of days. I don’t think the tradeoff between instant arrival and the risk to the jumpship is worth it, but the Bifröst should be fine away from the major travel routes.”

  “I agree,” Jia replied. “Whatever else is happening on that planet, we know the Core is involved, which means we’ll need to be extra cautious. That’s assuming this isn’t an elaborate trap on their part. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  Malcolm leaned forward. “Say the rebels have won, and they’re holding the colony hostage. What’s the plan then? It’s one thing to land on a planet in the middle of a rebellion where at least you have the Army and militia to back you up, but it’s another to land in hostile territory.”

  “We’ll play it by ear.” Erik grinned. “If necessary, we’ll shoot our way in.”

  Malcolm sighed. “I was afraid you’d say that.”

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  October 12, 2230, Gliese 581, En Route to New Samarkand, Aboard the Argo

  Jia sat in the cockpit, resting comfortably in the pilot’s chair while scanning the sensors for anything out of the ordinary—not that she expected to encounter anything. They’d disconnected from the jumpship and were a couple days out from New Samarkand. Currently, they were closing on one of the uninhabited outer planets. Janessa and Wei remained on the jumpship to help Raphael. Malcolm was in his cabin getting some rest, while Lanara continued her eternal quest to achieve engineering perfection.

  Although they were on their way to a world in crisis for a dangerous mission, Jia was relaxed, convinced the trip there would be uneventful. She kept going back to the long-range sensor data. It might be limited in scope and not real-time, but it did confirm there was at least moderate ship traffic around the HTPs and New Samarkand. She doubted she would see much in either direction if the planet was a captured world under siege.

  As she looked at the sensor displays, it was hard not to be struck by the emptiness of space. In the inner Solar System or a core system like Alpha Centauri, there were so many ships, satellites, and stations that sensors readouts of anything passing for a populated part of a system were rarely truly empty. They might be millions of kilometers away, but their light and emissions marked them in the darkness for the keen artificial eyes of humanity’s machines. Now, closer to the frontier, she could appreciate what it meant to be restricted to one planet with a small handful of ships.

  Jia had always understood intellectually how something like space piracy could occur, but now, in the vastness of the mostly empty Gliese 581 system, she could understand that help might be days away under the best of circumstances if you dared travel anywhere but the most common flight paths. Ships were remarkably self-sufficient, and an antisocial criminal crew with patience could accomplish a lot.

  She tried to shake the negative thoughts out of her mind. Possibilities were just that, not realities.

  Erik sat behind her, his feet up and resting on the back of the copilot’s chair. He was watching a recorded sphere ball match from months ago on a data window projected on the ceiling. He tapped his PNIU and paused the feed. “I recognize that look.”

  Jia tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear and refocused her attention on her readouts. “What look?”

  “You’re overthinking something. I love your mind, but sometimes it sabotages you.” Erik dropped his feet and sat up. “I don’t care if the Core’s helping the rebels. They haven’t taken that planet yet. If they were that good, half the frontier would have fallen already. We’re not going to have to fight our way down. I’m sure we’ll have plenty of annoying shit on the planet, but not before then.”

  Jia nodded. “I know.” She gestured at a display to her far left that showed small bright spheres arranged in different locations around the system. “And there’s too much traffic back and forth to suggest we’re going into a fallen world. It’d be nice if we were on a normal flight path, so we had a better chance of connecting to the OmniNet, but that’s what comes with being this far out. Would you believe I was actually feeling pretty calm about everything up until a couple of minutes ago?”

  “I’d like to see you on one of the newest colonies.” Erik grinned. “You’d go nuts. You’re so used to having everything at your fingertips. Being there on the frontier, with the bare essentials and all the big core world news and entertainment being months away…I don’t think you could handle it.”

  “I could handle it,” Jia insisted. “After a period of adjustment. Besides, it’s unnatural in a way.”

  “Unnatural? Getting back to basics?”

  “Humanity’s great advantage over other species on our planet is our toolmaking capability. But I’d argue we’re more natural on our home planet surrounded by everything we’ve built than sitting under a dome on some planet that’ll require centuries before you can step outside without a breather.” Jia shook her head. “I understand why we’ve spread out, but I can’t always say it’s a good idea. Imagine if we were just in the Solar System. The idea of rebellions would be laughable at this point.” She sighed. “And I get it that if we hadn’t expanded, some of the races might have expanded more toward us. Redundancy and the preservation of species and all that.”

  “And just seeing new things.” Erik stared at her. “I thought you wanted to travel. Now it sounds like you want to hide in a tower in Neo SoCal.”

  Jia nodded. “I do want to travel, but I don’t want to live on a colony. Exploration isn’t the same thing as settlement.” She smirked over her shoulder. “And I’ve spent plenty of time on ships now. I can survive without instant access to the entire net. I survived when we were flying the Rabbit, and that wasn’t the most spacious, modern ship.”

  “I know.” Erik dismissed his data window with a tap. “But you don’t understand why someone would choose to live in a place like New Samarkand, not really. Or hell, Molino.”

  “That’s true.” Jia shook her head. “For all the talk about transportation, that’s
a small percentage of the colonists. Hard to get a good colony going only with screwups. Good money means opportunity, but that leaves a lot of people willing to leave the comfort of Earth to go live out on the frontier, scratching out a bare existence in a dangerous environment. I know what people say, but that doesn’t make it any less strange.”

  “Some people want the challenge,” Erik offered. “Or just want to be away from it all, including billions of people. They’re the opposite of you.”

  Jia scoffed. “There’s plenty of empty space on Earth. If the Core can stick Tin Man and yaoguai factories in beautiful, empty parts of the wilderness, non-homicidal maniacs could find a place to live without a single person around.”

  Erik rubbed his chin. “Yeah, they could, but it’s always there—that knowledge that billions of people are sharing the same rock as you. That they could come crowding in on you any day. It’s nice to know there are weeks or months between you and the teeming billions. It can be relaxing in its own way.”

  “If the jump drive ever gets mass-produced, that ends,” Jia commented.

  Erik shook his head. “Nope. People will just go out farther. I’m sure someone will negotiate a right-of-passage treaty, and we’ll string colonies all the way across the galaxy.”

  Jia took a moment to check her instruments. Normally, she didn’t need to pay so much attention, but Emma was distracted by her efforts to examine and modify potential code for the jumpship’s AI. Given how much Emma complained about limited access to the ship, neither Jia nor Erik wanted to deny her the opportunity, even if there was only so much work she could do while flying away from it. From what the AI had said, she had downloaded the necessary data onto Argo’s systems for modification after taking the time to initiate modifications in between her navigational duties.

  “Billions, huh?” Jia smiled. “I alternate between missing the bustle of Neo SoCal and appreciating taking days away from it in the Argo. I guess it’s not so crazy to imagine why someone would leave something like that behind to live in a dome where they know every single colonist. It’s like growing up in an ancient village.”

  Erik stretched his arms above him with a huge yawn. “I think about Molino a lot.”

  “I’m sure you do. It’s understandable. I know you won’t get closure until we finish off the Core.”

  He shook his head. “I’m not talking about the massacre. I’m talking about why my unit was there.”

  “The Zitarks.” Jia frowned. “The invasion that never came. The galactic war that would change everything.”

  “Yeah, the invasion that never came. Everybody keeps assuming war’s still coming. Hell, a lot of the time I assume that, but that’s us projecting the way a human mind works onto inhuman creatures. I know some aliens are bastards, especially the Hunters, but I’m not as sure about the others. Not anymore.”

  Jia lifted her hands and bent her fingers like claws. “It’s not like the Zitarks aren’t an aggressive species. Even if the idea of war was pushed by the politicians, that doesn’t mean we won’t escape it. Rising powers butt heads. That’s the way it’s been on Earth since we started throwing up towns. It might be premature to apply the logic to other races, but it’s not unreasonable.”

  “You think so?” Erik nodded. “That was how I thought during most of my time in the Army, but I was a soldier. Everything was a military problem waiting to be solved. The more time I spend out of the military, the more I think about alternate solutions.”

  “Even though your standard solution involves bullets and grenades?”

  “Wanting alternate solutions doesn’t mean ignoring time-tested ones.”

  Jia looked away for a moment, her eyes half-closed in thought. “I suppose when I think about it, the UTC disproves that rising powers near each other must lead to war and destruction. It makes a mockery of the old ideas about a Thucydides Trap and an inevitable war between great powers. If a lot of the old theories were true, Earth would still be a bunch of separate nation-states, constantly fighting each other in bloody wars. We might still have a lot of problems to work out, but I don’t think anyone can seriously imagine the Earth ending up like New Samarkand, and if billions of humans with different beliefs and backgrounds can make it work, maybe…” She smiled. “You could be right. We could be projecting human hostility onto others. An alliance with aliens isn’t impossible to imagine. A shared government, potentially. It’s strange, but not impossible.”

  Erik grinned. “You think we’ll have a grand United Confederacy of Planets in the future? Zitarks and Leems in Parliament? That’s a bit much for me, even on my optimistic days.” He lifted his head and pursed his lips in imitation of a prissy, stuffy politician. “Member of Parliament Rrrrowrack wishes to take the floor and address the raw meat subsidy bill.”

  Jia laughed. “MP Rrrrowrack?”

  “I don’t know what Zitark names sound like. He’s a Zitark. His name won’t be Lee.” Erik shrugged. “Lots of growling and hissing in their language, right? So Rrrrowrack, and he’s hungry, so they want to make sure they’re getting raw meat. The real deal, not printed stuff.”

  “Okay.” Jia snickered. “The Chair recognizes MP Rrrrowrack’s right to the floor to speak on the raw meat subsidy bill.”

  Erik grinned. “Instead of debates, the Zitark MPs can eat people who piss them off. I can see it now. ‘Analysts question MP Rrrrowrack’s consumption of the opposition party candidate and consider the strategy bold and dangerous in an election year. Other pundits question the Leem MP’s mention of the Roswell Incident. Should the past be left alone?’”

  “A mixed-species Parliament would make politics more entertaining.” Jia smiled. “I barely pay any attention to politics. My family does, but to be honest, I think that is mostly so my parents can figure out who to donate to.” Her smile dimmed. “There’s a thin line between helping someone and attempting to bribe them.”

  “Your parents, especially your mom, might be pains in the ass, but they aren’t criminals.”

  “I know. I’m just saying, nothing’s ever about ideology for them. They see politics as purely transactional.” Jia tilted her head. “I think Mei’s changing, but my mother’s the same as she always was.”

  “They’re far from the only people who think that way.”

  Jia tapped a control panel off to the side to double-check the readouts from the last reactor diagnostic. “That was why I never cared about politics. It’s because I wanted to be purer, not locked into influence webs. I became a cop because I wanted to stand for something, and I wanted to be around people who stood for something. Now I’m next to you, and we’re taking on a corrupt conspiracy that infests our government and major corporations. It might sound arrogant, but I think we’re winning.”

  “Winning next to me isn’t a bad place to be,” Erik replied. “Don’t know if being next to me ends with a Zitark in Parliament.”

  Jia let out a happy sigh. “I don’t know either. There’s so much I thought I understood, but now I realize there’s far, far more I don’t. It makes it hard to predict the future. Knowing that Earth isn’t perfect has, overall, made me feel more hopeful. I know that sounds weird, but before, I always felt like I had to live up to this perfect ideal, and that stressed me out all the time. Now I know it doesn’t exist, so instead, I have a target I can aim at and encourage others to aim at. It feels…more achievable, more realistic.”

  “I didn’t have any grand goals or ambitions when I joined the Army,” Erik explained. He rested his head against the back of the chair and put his feet back up on the copilot’s chair in front of him. “I turned down promotions so I could stay in the field. It’s where I felt most comfortable, and I didn’t worry about changing the UTC or accomplishing anything but doing right by my soldiers. Then those bastards…” He sighed. “Well, you know the rest, and now they’re sitting on New Samarkand, probably screwing over both the rebels and the Army.”

  “I wish I knew their final plan.” Jia furrowed her brow. “If t
hey want power and influence, they already have it. The more we learn about them, the more trouble I have understanding. Hunter ships, the Elites, the yaoguai. What’s the end goal?”

  “Domination, I assume.” Erik gave her a weary lopsided smile. “It doesn’t matter how the tech changes. In the end, isn’t that what it always comes down to? Some rich asshole is angry because they think they should be even richer and be able to do whatever they want to anyone not as rich as them? If that rich asshole has an Army, then he gets to call himself a king and take even more shit. It’s not complicated. It’s the opposite. It’s the simplest story in the world, a tale as old as humanity.”

  Jia jabbed a data window with her pinkie. A holographic image of a large icy world appeared, marked by dark striations covering the surface. The planet might not be as amenable to terraforming as New Samarkand, but someday humanity would set up a colony there, just as they’d spread throughout their home system.

  Jia fired the attitude thrusters to adjust their course and take them closer to the planet. “Maybe far in the future, we’ll share systems with other races,” she mused. “Let different species settle different planets. It’s not like we need the colonies for space. It’ll be a long time before that’s an issue, even if every colonial city eventually becomes a metroplex, but for now, I think the planet in front of us is a good one to hide behind.”

  “There’s no way we can avoid detection,” Erik replied. “Eventually, we’re going to have to deal with the Fleet ships in orbit around the colony. They might not be able to do much to help the Army because of the domes, but they’re going to have a question or two for us.”

  “I know, but the less attention we draw, the better. Let’s pray Alina’s credentials are as good as we all hope.” Jia stared at the planet. “It’s pretty to look at, but I’d hate to have to land somewhere like that.”

  Chapter Thirty-Three