Fear the Future (The Fear Saga Book 3)

by Stephen Moss

  “You make a point that has been made many times before, Shtat my friend, and I hope you won’t mind if I counter with a cold reply. I’m sorry to have to do this, but where was this sentiment when, for example, you liquefied the Bydint contingent’s assets?”

  Shtat groaned, and Marta smiled with genuine amusement.

  “It is not as if they had left me much choice,” said Shtat, in reply. “God knows I tried to reason with them.”

  Marta nodded in measured agreement. Shtat had indeed tried to reason with them, but his reasoning had been: I have better political contacts than you, and have stolen your major hauling contracts by low-balling your bids, so ‘merge’ with me or face ruin. They had chosen ruin, ending in some spectacular suicides, and even Shtat had been forced to admit it had been brave to continue to resist … stupid, but brave.

  “When you bargained with them,” said Marta, trying to be gentle now, “did you really think they would give in to your terms?”

  “I bargained with them in good faith,” said Shtat with conviction, but then ended dejectedly, “… but no. I had always suspected they would resist to the end.”

  As they reached the very tip of the ship’s bow, Shtat grasped one of the forestays and stepped up onto the bucking bowsprit with aplomb. He walked forward a few steps with the surefootedness of a man who has spent his life at sea, and indeed he had. Marta let the man stare out at the horizon for a moment and gather his thoughts.

  The conversation was not their first on the topic, and it would not be their last, but they were becoming more frequent. They had picked Shtat for a reason. He supported the war, but more out of a businessman’s pragmatism than the cold ambition that drove the likes of the Lamat, or the simple economic survivalism that drove the Mantilatchi and Eltoloman.

  Marta had no such appetite for conquest, quite the opposite, and these conversations made her feel soiled and dirty. She was convincing a man who was trying to be better than he was to stay on the wrong side of the war, because they needed him there. Her fellow conspirators and her needed a front man, one who could stand up to the full scrutiny of their so-called allies and not break, either literally or virtually, and give away the truth.

  The Nomadi were not here to support the war. Or at least the majority of them weren’t, anyway. There were some who were here for profit, and profit alone, and they would have to be dealt with when the time came. But Marta and her partners had not been able to risk putting one of them in charge in case they used the power it gave them to root out the conspiracy in their midst, one they must suspect was there, if only halfheartedly.

  No, Shtat it had needed to be, and though he suffered now, Marta reconciled herself to her duty by thinking that if the man really had doubts about their mission, then how pleased was he going to be when he found out he had in fact been the puppet of a bunch of traitors. Well, traitors or heroes, depending on who got to write it down afterward.

  She smiled wryly at Shtat’s back, then shook her head and mounted the long bowsprit to walk out to join him. The ship was huge, not unlike humanity’s great sailing frigates of the golden era of sail on Earth, its long graceful lines carved out by generations of sea-going evolution, its shape formed by the flow of the waves along thousands of hulls long since lost, either to rot or to the very seas they sought to master.

  She carried no guns, though, either in this virtual form or in her real incarnation back on Mobiliei. And her real form was encased in shielding that could withstand a hurricane comfortably, and had the ability, should its skipper order it, to slide its masts down level with her deck and seal herself, either to dive beneath the waves or lift herself bodily out of the water, hurricane or no, and travel either to land or directly into space with impressive, if inefficient, thrusters.

  Marta’s own flagship had been capable of no less, and indeed it had not been an uncommon sight to see the anomaly of two or three great flagships of the Nomadi high fleets docked, often with masts ceremonially held high, at one of the hubs in orbit around Mobiliei, an extravagance that was a favorite of the gossip-shares.

  “The bowsprit, my favorite place to stand as a child,” shouted Marta into the full wind.

  Shtat glanced back as Marta approached, “Yes, mine too. No better place to feel the ocean beneath you.”

  “No, no better place,” agreed Marta. Then, speaking to Shtat’s back once more, she went on, “You know, I am sure there are others who share your doubts, Shtat, both at home and even here, in the actual Armada.”

  Shtat turned to face Marta, and she noticed as the virtual environment that was, after all, an expression of his own mind, slowed almost to a stop.

  They locked eyes and Marta finished, sternly now, “But what it comes down to, my friend, is that such considerations are moot now. You know that, Shtat. We are seven years out from our destination. That’s all. Once we enter the binary cluster we will be within theoretical range of the Interstellar Subspace Tweeter at our destination. If it has finished its lunar conversion, which we hope it will have, then we will be able to receive signal directly from the advanced team.”

  Shtat took a deep breath, bracing himself as Marta finished, “This is not the time for doubts, it is the time for resolve. For resolve and preparation. We have come all this way, now it is time to see this through.”

  Shtat nodded, returning Marta’s rigid stare with as stern a matching one as he could muster. Then they both nodded once more, their free arms shaking in unison to signal their agreement, and so they turned to walk back along the bowsprit to the deck proper, the wind and waves returning to their natural volume and motion as they did so.

  Only a few days now, thought Marta. Then they would be within range of the IST in orbit around Earth’s sun and they would know. They would know who had succeeded. If they received a signal then it meant the advanced party’s satellites were still in orbit, which could only mean that the primary plan of her colleagues had failed. She did not know what that plan was. No one knew the full scope of the plan except one among them, and Marta did not even know who it was, even though she had been one of the first to join the conspiracy.

  Such were the layers of security around their cadre, layers which she hoped would protect her as much as she hoped they would protect whoever lay at the center of the plan.

  All she knew was that if the satellites were still online, it would be bad. Terrible even, for it would mean that the only way to stop the Armada from wiping out the humans would be to try and destroy it, all of it, and she wondered if her fellow conspirators had the appetite for butchery on such scale, even if it was to stop a far greater genocide.

  In truth, she was far from sure if she had the ability to do that either.

  A million of her own kind, including her own life and those of many of her family and friends, in return for seven billion people who were, quite literally, completely alien to her. How many could say with confidence that they would do such a thing? As she thought of her co-conspirators, and herself, she could not be sure.

  No, they must hope that they receive nothing from the IST installing itself on Mars’s moon. Then her part in the plan would come into play.

  She smiled wryly.

  ‘Her part.’

  In the end, as far as she could tell, she was probably screwed either way.

  Interval D: Lost in Translation

  The simulation was rousing success, a feat even by the standards of the Prime Minds’ combined intellectual might. Alpha Centauri A shone down on them with a multifaceted beauty that beggared belief, both wonderful and disconcerting as it grew above them.

  For the sake of show, they were being shown the bodies of their stellar host on their approach, starting with an upcoming pass-through of the asteroid belt that lay at the outer reaches of its gravitational field. Some poetic license was being taken here, as they would deliberately not pass anywhere near the belt’s orbital plane to avoid straining their shield. For though the fusion fire that was their decelerating engines
also served to obliterate any interstellar debris in their path, they were hesitant to try it out with anything as large as some of the grander planetoids of the great belt.

  But reality aside, the banquet’s countless participants, both the auspicious and the proletariat, would be treated to a spectacular show as the star grew larger above them.

  “I think,” said Princess Lamati with a beaming smile, “that this is going wonderfully!”

  “I agree,” said Lord Mantil to her left, his legs crossed behind him, as he finished a large tankard of his favorite imported mash. “It is … stunning.”

  The appointed representatives were seated in a large circle at the center of twenty other circles, each laden with the most senior dignitaries and military leaders of each of the nine contingents that had agreed to combine their celebrations. No one missed the Hemmbar, they were famously, deliberately even, the worst company around, humorless to a point that they considered perfection.

  Princess Lamati, on the other hand, was in her element. She was seated with Quavoce on one side, the famous champion of the Mantilatchi, and one of the few people she might even consider as a match, and Shtat Palpatum on the other, a silly man, perhaps, but her sources told her that he had a soft spot for her, and she enjoyed playing with him.

  But for now her attention was squarely on Quavoce for three reasons. Firstly, because she was genuinely taken by how in awe he seemed with the banquet’s setting, but then also because she was studiously avoiding the eyes of To-Henton across the way, and finally because she knew it infuriated poor Shtat that she had her back to him.

  “You know, Quavoce,” she said, and he brought his gaze down from the star growing ever closer above them to meet hers, “you never cease to surprise me.”

  She smiled a little too coyly and he disguised his instant suspicion of her motives. It was no secret that back channel negotiations had begun before they even took off for a matching between their two houses. The matching wouldn’t be mutually exclusive, of course, indeed Quavoce was more likely to willingly copulate with To-Henton than he was Princess Lamati; they had even dabbled with each other on occasion.

  But the truth was Quavoce remained very skeptical about sharing either his bed or his house with the snake that was Princess Lamati, famously good though she was between the sheets.

  “I surprise you, Princess? How so? You don’t think they have truly outdone themselves with this environ?”

  She looked around appreciatively and nodded with genuine approval. “Of course I do, Quavoce. And I do wish you would call me Sar, as I have given you right to.” It was a high honor, if you cared for such things, but it carried with it implications Quavoce did not wish to encourage, so now it was his turn to feign coyness.

  “You honor me, Princess. More than I deserve.”

  She did not disguise her displeasure, but the moment was broken as they were subconsciously notified that they were approaching the asteroid belt, and thus the next course.

  All eyes went skyward, and the gathering became silent, both in the inner circles of high-ranking officials and the dizzying array of spectators that were arranged in greater circles around them, hundreds of thousands of virtual eyes looking toward the star above them as they raced across the borders of its realm.

  The asteroid belt swam out to meet them like they were descending on a distant coastline, its headlands and bays the seemingly infinite number and variety of asteroids, some spinning, some not, some with their own debris auras, but most starkly defined against the blackness.

  They formed a curve ahead that continued to broaden as they approached, widening and widening until it formed a horizon that extended to the limits of their vision to either side, and still it kept flying down to meet them, growing and growing, ever more detail resolving in the vast line of rock and ice until suddenly they were on it, among it, and in a blink they were through, the line now vanishing fast below them as the fleet continued on toward the star that was the focus of their celebration.

  The crowd erupted into a roar that was shared and amplified in the virtual space, and was taken up by the arrayed generals, admirals, lords, and ladies, with the vigorous clapping of knees by the men and the hands of the women.

  As they passed into Alpha Centauri’s realm, the great platters of the next course in the banquet came floating down out of the vacuum above to rest among the gathered audience. For most it came in the form of individual plates laden with treats, either for their individual consumption or to share with their neighbors, if they were getting into the spirit of things.

  For the main tables it took the form of vast central platters that came to rest in the center of each circle, larger than the combined weight of the people for whose pleasure they had been created. Virtual food invited gluttony, even celebrated it, given its utter lack of consequence in either the short or long term, and so the platter was covered in a dizzying array of foods from all over Mobilius, and even some simulated treats from Earth, creations of olfactory and taste artists in anticipation of the new bounty to be found once they reached their destination.

  They could have no idea of what to really expect among Earth fauna, and indeed, biologically, most of it would be very foreign to their systems, sometimes intoxicatingly so, sometimes just plain toxic. But they would enjoy it virtually now, and once they had processed and analyzed the real thing, they would no doubt revel in it virtually then, while their real bodies were kept vital and healthy on a more appropriate diet.

  Sar Lamati reached forward first, ignoring deliberately any sense that the sitting Council Chair should kick proceedings off, and grabbed what might have been an approximation of a Rhinoceros horn, though its insides in this case were gelatinous, and, she discovered, sweet to the point of intemperance.

  “Oh my goodness!” she exclaimed aloud. “You must try this, it is divine. I am glanding Olfast now, and it really makes the aroma leap out at you!”

  Still chewing her first bite, she inhaled deeply from the upturned base of the horn and smiled, then handed it to Shtat, stroking his hand as he took it from her and allowing her pleasure at the taste to translate most suggestively into her gaze as their eyes met.

  He smiled a little more vigorously than he had intended and she laughed, not cruelly, or at least she didn’t think so, and turned back to Quavoce. He had pulled a long, broad green leaf from the elaborate centerpiece and was chewing on it. It was savory, but as he chewed on it, it released a bitterness that bordered on unpleasant, but stopped just short, and he quickly found that the density of the leaf’s grain combined with the bitterness to make it wonderfully saturating, and that as he chewed it more, it was releasing an underlying spice that was satisfying on a primal level.

  “How is your … leaf?” said Princess Lamati, patronizingly.

  He turned to her, smiled innocently, and replied, “Bitter, but one learns to appreciate it in time.”

  She laughed loudly, the layers of drugs in her system not allowing her to be insulted. She saw only banter, maybe even the kind of banter that made her even more appealing, and she was very proud of herself as she laughed off the subtle insult and reached out to break off a piece of his leaf for herself.

  He let her, and he thought about how charming she could be when she chose. He caught himself, and removed his rose-colored glasses by glanding Sober, noting once more the slippery slope his role placed him on. Oh well, he thought, he would relive the simulation later in the privacy of his own virtual home, and would appropriately amplify his enjoyment then, when he was in no danger of accidentally engaging in less than wise activity with the dangerously beautiful and beautifully dangerous Sar Lamati.

  - - -

  The banquet proceeded with great pomp and circumstance, and thankfully without incident. The hours passed by, slowed in the simulation to match the mood of the participants, the organizers having agreed to make the virtual banquet last for as long as the representatives, and to a lesser degree the gathered masses, were enjoying themselv
es.

  But the time must come, and eventually DefaLuta looked around at her fellow Council members and said, “If you all agree, my fellow representatives, I will allow the Prime Minds to take the simulation into the next phase roughly in tandem with the actual translation.”

  Anyone in the know had long since learned that the Prime Minds would fully devote themselves to the act of actual translation first, making sure it was synchronized perfectly across the fleet, to the nanosecond, before turning their attentions to processing the virtual translation for the nearly million strong multitude enjoying the simulation. But the delay would only need to be momentary, should the Council approve the next phase.

  “Must we!” said Princess Lamati, grasping Shtat’s hand. Shtat laughed giddily once more.

  DefaLuta smiled without malice. “Well no, we don’t have to, but having seen the plans, I truly believe we will all enjoy the next stage of the celebration even more than we have this one.”

  “Very well. Then let us go!” said the princess magnanimously, before releasing Shtat’s hand and leaning away from him to whisper in an aside to Quavoce, “As long as you promise to dance with your friend and ally from the Lamat Empire.”

  Quavoce smiled as noncommittally as he could, then turned to watch DefaLuta as the woman rose and raised her voice. The action amplified her, and sent her words rippling out across the gathered masses, a voice echoing over a crowd that extended for a mile in every direction.

  “Friends, allies, Mobiliei, we are at the edge of a great moment. We are the chosen few who have been given the honor of turning our world’s great race into a true interstellar power!”

  There was a roar that rumbled through the simulated cosmos, and was enthusiastically taken up once more by the Council members. Above the huge audience, the approaching star was getting visibly larger every moment now, a great ball of tumultuous flame, searing and leaping.