by John Shirley
“Ah, there you are, Minister,” Excellent said silkily, with an It is past time gesture, but conveyed in a genial fashion. “You have consulted with the ship’s captain?”
“I have, Great and Sacred Hierarch,” R’Noh replied, genuflecting. “The ship is still being charged and victualed, but he anticipates readiness within this daily cycle.”
“But—” Here Excellent turned his deceptively mild gaze upon Mken. “Is our Prophet of Inner Conviction in readiness?”
“I cannot be truly ready, O Hierarch, for a task I have little confidence in. I request consultation with the full triumvirate of Hierarchs, so that I may be of assistance in selecting another candidate for the expedition, if, indeed, the triumvirate approves—”
Excellent Redolence sat up straight, his long neck recoiling like a snake about to strike. “Mken ‘Scre’ah’ben!” The use of Mken’s original name was intended to put “The Prophet of Inner Conviction” in his place. “Do I understand that you are accusing a Hierarch of the Sacred Search of breaching Council protocol?”
R’Noh made a pleased sniggering sound at this scolding.
Mken kept his temper in check. “I imply nothing of the kind, O Hierarch. I am suggesting that the purpose of this journey is beneath us—and is not necessary. It is past time for a review of the need for a Roll of Celibates. Instead of a mad and risky expedition, let us scrutinize—”
Excellent slammed a fist onto the arm of his antigravity throne—accidentally triggering a spray of random holographic images and making his chair revolve once in the air.
Mken wanted to laugh, but given the situation, thought it unwise. “They are, after all, San’Shyuum, worthy of respect as our people, even though—”
Pretending the throne-spin hadn’t happened, though even R’Noh had to suppress another snigger at the sight, Excellent Redolence jabbed an accusing finger at Mken and demanded, “Have you forgotten that these so-called Stoics have appropriated our homeworld, Janjur Qom—stolen it from the holy martyrs? It is an act of liberation, not abduction, to acquire females from them! And the Purifying Vision of the Holy Path, the Luminary associated with it—these alone should justify the attempt!”
“If perhaps we could involve the other Hierarchs—”
Excellent made a quick, snappish gesture that was rarely used, meaning Go silent or die silent. “I will hear no more of this political casuistry! The triumvirate has agreed that I am to oversee a restoration of new breeding stock! The method was not specified—therefore, I shall specify it myself!”
Excellent seemed to realize that he was exposing himself—that the raging tyrant who was the real Excellent Redolence preferred the appearance of a somber, witty San’Shyuum of subtle wisdom. He settled back in his throne and absently stroked the fur on one of his wattles. “You have unsettled me. I will brook no more insubordination. Here are my terms, ‘Prophet of Inner Conviction.’ ” Mockery dripped from his tone as he used the title. “You may take your choice. You will suffer a severe, thorough, and perhaps not entirely unbiased inquiry into your exclusion from the Roll of Celibates—an exclusion that I believe to be fraudulently arranged—and you will suffer the legal consequences . . . or you will lead this expedition to Janjur Qom.”
“With all due respect, Great Hierarch, I am scarcely a military commander.”
“I beg to differ. You were in action on the Planet of Blue and Red, and in other places during the war. We have no one else available here with such experience. You oversaw purges and the appropriation of resources.”
“That was long ago.”
“Silence! Enough of this—make your choice!”
Mken took a long, deep breath. Then he bowed to the inevitable—as he bowed to Excellent Redolence. “I will lead the expedition suffused with an eagerness to serve you, Great Hierarch.”
“Good. Go and prepare for departure as quickly as you can. Breathe not a word of this to anyone. Then report to launch bay thirty-three. Your staff has already been chosen for you. Including the Elites . . . my Sangheili . . . I am sending along with you . . .”
“Respectfully, Excellent Redolence, I will need to make a plan. Survey the state of the homeworld, choose the precise—”
“Once more you drag your heels! The survey is based on sound surveillance intelligence. The plan was made through specific modeling. It has all been completed. You are free, however, to refine it as you go. Now, leave my sight and prepare for departure.”
Mken made a gesture of obeisance and turned away. Drifting his chair past R’Noh, he heard Excellent remark with a sneer, “R’Noh, refresh my memory. Didn’t this very ‘Prophet of Inner Conviction’ once denounce you as a capricious fool when you suggested a mission to obtain females from the Stoics?”
“Why, yes, yes he did, Great Hierarch!”
“Is it not an exquisite irony that now he must lead such a mission himself?”
“Oh, I agree,” chuckled R’Noh, as Mken directed his chair through the doorway. “I find that quite exquisite!”
“Mken,” said the Hierarch from behind him. “Remember that no one is to know about this mission . . . except those who must accompany you.”
Mken paused, half turned. “Very well, Great Hierarch. But—when we return? Surely, then we must . . .”
“Yes, yes, once it is complete and you have returned, success in hand—then we will announce it. Success will protect the mission from expected criticism. Now, you go and see that it is a success!”
Mken gestured Joyful obedience. He went slowly from the room, to preserve as much dignity as remained to him . . . precious little.
After leaving the hall, he paused in an observation bubble, directing his chair to a window that looked out on the smeared purple of a nebula. To go out there and return to Janjur Qom . . . He’d dreamed of going there all his life. But under these circumstances . . . no.
The Stoics were not without their own military resources. What were the chances he would return alive from such a mission?
It seemed to him the chances were feeble.
And the likelihood was that he would die there, away from his beloved mate, never seeing his child. This was utter madness.
CHAPTER 5
* * *
High Charity
850 BCE
The Age of Reconciliation
On the blood of my father, on the blood of my sons, with each beat of each heart within my breast I swear to uphold the Covenant.”
Under the direction of the San’Shyuum known as R’Noh, a Sangheili ranger known as Vil ‘Kthamee recited the oath with the other Sangheili, before setting foot on the corvette Vengeful Vitality, the vessel that would take them to Janjur Qom under the command of the Prophet of Inner Conviction. Vil always found the oath thrilling, but later, if he thought about it too much, he felt uncomfortable; he tasted a bitterness. The Covenant was relatively new, the Writ of Union was crafted not so long ago. And within memory the Sangheili had fought the San’Shyuum. How many of his bloodline, his egg brothers, had died under the blistering, murderous blasts of the Dreadnought?
And yet he served these same San’Shyuum.
Surrender? It was not surrender—the dishonor of such a thing the Sangheili could not imagine; no, it was alliance—and it was the saving of Sanghelios.
Still, here was that bitter taste within his mandibles, when he thought of the fallen dead. Could they but speak, would they denounce the Sangheili as living without nobility?
Now there was a crueler irony: Vil lived on a great chunk of what had once been Janjur Qom. It was the homeworld of the San’Shyuum, the homeworld of those who had wiped out so many Sangheili. The great mass of stone and soil, about two mountains worth, taken up by the Dreadnought when it arose from Janjur Qom, had been removed from the keyship and formed into an asteroid; it was to be the foundation of the true pedestal of High Charity. And already there were warrens dug into it, sealed off subterranean fortresslike structures, airtight and almost self-sufficient, where lived Sang
heili serving as guards, protectors of the San’Shyuum.
There were six trained Sangheili warriors, and their commander Trok ‘Tanghil, filing into the corvette on the launch deck. Just before he stepped into the air lock Vil’s gaze took in the sweeping, curved lines of the iridescent stealth corvette; it was in two linked tiers, its middle swollen like a Sangheili slitherer just after the creature had swallowed a hopping slug alive—as if something large was not yet digested in its belly. Like with all Covenant ships, loosely based on an obscure selection of Forerunner designs, there was something organic about the lines of the ship; it emulated the rippling forms found in nature.
Just inside, floating blithely from left to right, on some engineering mission, was a Huragok, a being that defied the contrast between machine and biological organism. The thing—they could not be called a species, not having evolved—had been artificially created, it was said, by the Forerunners themselves, who built them up with nanocellular intricacy to be repair and enhance mechanisms, to act as maintenance engineers for the devices known now as sacred relics. A Huragok’s snaking head could seem slightly reminiscent of the San’Shyuum, to Vil anyway, but the Engineer organisms had three eyelike sensory nodes on either side of their heads. A large cluster of translucent pink and purple gas sacs—some for elevation, some for propulsion, some for chemical supply—humped over the creature’s head; two probing, feathery anterior tentacles whipped forward. Each tentacle tip articulated into cilia, microscopically fine at the ends, for working within electroenergetic interfaces and other gear; from its underskirt below rippled four other work tentacles. The docile creatures seemed to desire nothing but food and work—and they’d made no resistance when tamed by the San’Shyuum.
The Huragok seemed to be coming along on the expedition—and Vil had worked with the creature before, more than once. He recognized it by the particular mottling of its air sacs. This Huragok was known as Floats Near Ceiling. It communicated with configurations of its tentacles and could read some hand signs and certain holographic insignia. The Huragok being part of the crew was good, as Floats Near Ceiling was efficient and Vil always found its presence to be curiously comforting. Perhaps they were soothing because the Huragok had no agenda but effecting repair, maintenance, following directions, and the like—the creatures were almost eerily trustworthy.
After stepping from the air lock into the ship, Vil saw the San’Shyuum leader known as Inner Conviction, the Prophet seated broodingly in his antigrav chair at the foot of the ramp leading up to the bridge of the corvette; an armed Steward behind him watched the Sangheili narrowly. R’Noh, the Minister of Anticipatory Security, wasn’t coming on the voyage, but there were several other San’Shyuum on the stealth corvette: the captain, called Vervum, the communications officer, S’Prog, and a gunner named Mleer. But the vessel was outfitted for clandestine activities, not significant space battles, and it occurred to Vil that he and the other Sangheili outnumbered these San’Shyuum, who, after all, were of little use in a pitched hand-to-hand fight.
Flickering through Vil’s mind came an unbidden daydream—he imagined he and his fellow Sangheili taking the ship, slaughtering the San’Shyuum, making their way in the corvette back to Sanghelios, settling in secret in some remote part of the world, or perhaps on one of the moons.
Instantly Vil was ashamed of himself. How could he even imagine such a thing? He had spoken an oath—many oaths, a taut and binding knot of vows—all to uphold the Covenant. He had bound his soul to the Covenant through those pledges. How could he even imagine rebelling?
I must reform my thinking—or turn myself in.
He must have no more treasonous fancies.
Vil carried his satchel and directed-energy rifle into the crew’s quarters, stowing his gear under a bed, wondering if, after all, he would die on the alien soil of Janjur Qom. That they had some sort of assignment there was whispered in the barracks. They would be briefed when they reached orbit around their destination. But what it was, and why the ship was going alone to a world known to be seething with hostile apostates, was not known to any but the San’Shyuum.
The Refuge: An Uncharted Forerunner Shield World
850 BCE
The Age of Reconciliation
Tersa had to return to the hall of crystal columns to get his scancam. He’d forgotten it in his hurry to rush off to the midday meal. The food was mostly the local and quite edible vegetable matter and some artificial meat—the latter from the protein fabricator they had brought with them from Sanghelios. The protein mash was unappealing, but Tersa was young and his appetite was strong. There was an assortment of small fauna wandering the shield world—certain Sangheili had been tasked to use analyzers and discover if they were safe to eat. The Sangheili had high hopes of fresh meat, and soon.
Tersa needed the scancam in the next room slated for evaluation; it hadn’t been of much use in the crystal columns chamber, the great transparent pillars, though clearly vibrating with energy, remaining stubbornly resistant to scan or analysis. Enduring Bias would have to be called to identify them, Sooln had said.
And there was Enduring Bias now, up ahead, floating between two columns. It must be here to confirm the use of the room. The shield planet was immense, and it was now well known that Enduring Bias had lost some of its memory.
Oddly enough, it seemed to be emanating an image of the Refuge, the shield world itself, seen from space. And muttering to itself in an unrecognizable language as it did so.
Or was the holograph what it seemed? Tersa began to doubt it when the flying AI seemed to make the image explode. Then come back together. Then explode again . . .
Tersa wasn’t sure if he was authorized to talk to Enduring Bias. He was just a young Sangheili, and Enduring Bias was a living Forerunner relic, a holy thing, and only Sooln and Ussa and, perhaps, Ernicka the Scar-Maker spoke to it, as far as Tersa knew. But Tersa had the curiosity as well as the appetite of the young, and he couldn’t resist the chance, since no one else was around.
“Have you identified the use of this room?” Tersa asked, walking up.
“Oh!” Enduring Bias spun to face him, its three electric-blue lenses shining down at Tersa. “I was so absorbed in the external modeling, I didn’t notice you come in. I really must realign my peripheral analyzers. I have much work to do on myself. I have been having trouble with internalized visual modeling—I find projecting works better now.”
“What was that language you were speaking in?” Tersa asked.
“I have developed a habit here, in the course of millennia of conversing with myself as I work. I tend to use the language of the creators. Can I be of service to you?”
“Of service? To me?” Tersa was tempted. Perhaps he could ask Enduring Bias what the truth was about the Forerunners. Had it known them? Were they really gods? Supernatural creatures? If so, why did there seem to be a biological waste-disposal system here? Was there such a thing as sacred biological waste?
But a more pressing question came to mind. “Were you making pictures of this world blowing up, just now?”
“Yes and no.”
“Can that be an answer—yes and no?”
“You’ve never noticed that many things are a case of both affirmative and negative? In fact, primitive computer systems tend to develop using codes made up of yes and no, one and zero, one one one zero one one zero zero—and the very structure of the universe might be said to be a fluctuation between yes and no, if we consider quantum effects in particle presence, and the original impulse of—”
“But—what about the picture? Of the planet being destroyed?”
“As to that, your leader, Ussa ‘Xellus, requested of me to explore the feasibility of activating the Great Disassembler. Its processes may be regarded as a kind of explosion and then again, it is not a true explosion, but rather an orderly disassembling. However, there is inevitably an admixture of chaos.”
“The Disassembler. Does it relate to this room?”
“Y
ou make an admirable intuitive leap, possibly the result of background consciousness calculus. Yes! This room is indeed the energy generator and focuser for the process of disassembling. I was here making certain that the process could go forward if needed. I ran a model to check the energy output with my projections of full disassembly. Happily, utter disassembly of this world seems entirely possible!”
“That’s . . . good news. But—why would Ussa want that . . . that disassembly?”
“He has not informed me of his underlying purpose.”
“Won’t it kill us all if you just break it all apart in space?”
“Now, that is another question that’s, if not answered affirmative or negative, is answered best by . . . perhaps and perhaps not.”
“Oh. I see.” Tersa felt a chill in his mandibles and down his spine.
“I must prioritize now, and depart from your ever-so-agreeable companionship. Sooln has transmitted a summons to me. Good algorithms to you, young Sangheili!”
And Tersa watched with growing dread as Enduring Bias flew away, talking obscurely to itself as it went.
Covenant Vessel Vengeful Vitality
Near High Charity
850 BCE
The Age of Reconciliation
The Vengeful Vitality hummed with energies held barely in check as it prepared to generate a slipspace portal. Mken, the Prophet of Inner Conviction, could feel the chained power of the vessel vibrating under his chair as he approached the rear launch deck. He wished he could step off the chair, here, but it would confuse the Sangheili.
It was a curious thing—one could not feel much, when the mighty Dreadnought, unthinkably gigantic as it was, traveled through space. But the smaller the vessel, the more one felt, as if the smaller ships were more reactive to gravitational fields, radiation, and the minute particles flitting through the void. Mken found that he enjoyed the sensation—there was something romantic about it. It must be like being on the naval vessels, sailing the seas of Janjur Qom—back in the old days, when San’Shyuum were physically strong, and the ships were made of wood.
