by Chris Walley
Three days before the vote, Merral was called into Clemant’s office. Clemant gestured irritably at a note on his desk. “Over the last few days a number of manufacturing plants have had their production diverted. Some are now producing spun silica fiber of a precise composition. What’s going on?”
“It’s an urgent defense need,” Merral answered.
“For what?”
Merral hesitated. “Armor suits. But that’s to be kept secret.”
“Did you order it?”
“No. But I approve.”
He shook his head. “And what about this? Others are being asked to produce molecular-tuned metals and ionic transfer batteries in vast quantities.”
“Another urgent defense need.”
“Do you know what they’re for?”
“Well . . .”
Irritation flooded Clemant’s face. “This is madness, Commander! I have a head of defense who hasn’t a clue what’s going on. I have an off-world sentinel running around taking over our entire industrial production.” He glared at Merral. “Anarchy threatens to overwhelm us.”
“Sir, there are just three more days. I think we need to trust Vero. He knows what he’s doing.”
Clemant exhaled slowly and loudly. He stared at the wall of screens as if seeking inspiration, and then shook his head. “You’d better be right.”
Merral had seen little of Anya for some time, but met her on the stairs close to his office the next day. She looked pale and tired as if both color and energy had drained out of her.
“I wanted to see you,” she said with a tone of urgency. “But not in your office.”
“Down here,” he said motioning her into an empty corridor. “What’s up?”
“Things are happening. More than you know. Vero wants me out of the way for the next few days.” She gave him a look that was full of dread. “It’s coming, Merral. It’s war and it’s going to be bad—worse than we imagined.”
“I wouldn’t argue. But you know more than me.”
“Possibly.” Her expression changed to one of concern. “How are you doing? I’ve been worried.”
“Thanks. I miss you. And Vero, and your sister. How am I doing?” He took a deep breath. “It reminds me of when I had to climb a grand fir at college. It was nearly a hundred meters high. Nearly at the top, I looked down. It was a bad move. I froze solid with terror—vertigo. In the end, I forced myself to go on. And I made sure that I never looked down. It’s just like that now.”
“Good.” She smiled in way that made him feel he was special. “I must go. I also came to say that we are being put on alert. I’m going to be, well, absent for the foreseeable future.”
“I see. I feel very much on my own.” He heard the self-pity in his voice and hated it.
“I’m sorry. But I wanted to see you. I don’t know when we’ll meet again.”
As she turned to go, Merral’s throat tightened. Or if we will. He felt stabbed suddenly by the terrible certainty that they would not all make it safely through this looming war. “Keep safe,” he said.
She touched his hand. “And don’t look down.”
Later that day, Merral snatched time to visit Jorgio. He found his old friend flopped on a deck chair under a tree, a big hat slumped on his head.
Jorgio was strangely tired. “The humidity, I expect,” he grumbled. “Not used to being near the sea.” But Merral was unconvinced.
Over the inevitable tea, he asked Jorgio, “The ambassadors—what do you feel about them?”
Jorgio’s thick lower lip jutted out and trembled. “Nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“There’s just a blank; no noises anymore. Nothing.”
“So, you feel there is nothing there?”
“Tut. Didn’t say that. I said I feel nothing. It’s all blank. Like as if snow covered it all.”
“So there could be something there? Something evil perhaps?”
Jorgio frowned. “More than likely. I reckon if a thing was evil enough, we probably wouldn’t be able to see it.”
“A good point. Jorgio, you have your diary?”
He groped around his belt clumsily until he found it. “Yes!”
“If anything happens, can you call me? Immediately?”
“I will.”
That evening Merral and Lloyd were summoned to a meeting with Vero at the junction of two of the underground passageways. As they walked along them Merral, who had never particularly liked being underground, felt that the tunnels seemed dark and oppressive.
At the end of the passageways Vero waited for them with a middle-aged woman. Next to them, flat on the ground, was a thick disk.
“Meet Nina,” Vero said. “She wants some measurements. All yours, Officer.”
“Thank you,” Nina said. “Now, Commander, this will only take a minute.” Her voice was terse. “Stand on this disk, please. Good. Hands at your side. Good. Now look straight ahead. Don’t move.” She pointed a handheld device at Merral and as the disk rotated, beams of dull red light played over his body. “Thank you. Next, please.”
As Lloyd was measured, Merral beckoned Vero away.
“What’s this for?” he asked.
“Your armor suit. The troops get them off the shelf. Yours and Lloyd’s will be tailor-made.”
Nina picked up the disk, saluted, and strode away.
“Thanks. Will everyone have them?”
“Only the regulars. We don’t have enough resources for the irregs.”
“I see. Vero, I have a question that you may feel that you can answer. From talking with Azeras, do these people have weaknesses?”
“Yes. Many. The chief one is fear—fear of many things, but death most of all.”
“Yes, Luke spotted that.”
“Did he? It seems the Freeborn have always feared it, but the Dominion fear it especially. So they seek to do all they can to avoid it. They buy themselves decades by gene engineering; they replace everything they can by synthetics; they use cloned body parts; they make linkages with hardware. They do it all.”
“And how is that a weakness?”
“It makes them cowards. And it makes them dependent on machines.”
“I see.”
Vero grasped him by the hand. “Now, my friend, we may not meet until after the decision. Do what you can to ensure a vote against it.”
“I’ll try, but it’s hard without revealing that I know more than they do.”
“There must be no risk of that.”
“And after the vote?”
“All hell will break loose.”
“Is that a figure of speech, or do you mean it literally?”
“A literal meaning is precisely what I fear.”
22
When finally it came to the vote, the contact team met around the table in Corradon’s office. There, amid the plants, they had a long and heated discussion. The five representatives were plain: general opinion was in favor of a treaty. The public mood was due to a combination of things: the threat of the True Freeborn, the promise of a rapid reunion with the Assembly, and a growing irritation with the closure of the Library and the Admin-Net.
One representative summarized his dilemma. “If it was just me, I’d say no. But I am a representative and must act on my people’s wishes.” His words were greeted by sympathetic nods.
Then it came to the vote. Three representatives voted in favor of the treaty, but one voted against and one abstained. Merral voted no and, after a few mutterings, Jenat did likewise. All eyes turned to Clemant.
“No,” the advisor said, after a long silence. “I vote no.”
“Four to three against,” Corradon announced with a mournful shake of his head. “I fear what this will bring.” He gazed around the table, plainly hoping for second thoughts, but there were none.
“Very well,” he said with the deepest of sighs. “I will take the news to the ambassadors personally.”
“Sir,” Merral said, as the others began to leave, “I
wish to put the alert level to orange.”
Corradon seemed to stare into infinity. “If you must, after I have spoken with them. But, Commander, please don’t trigger any hostilities. I want to leave every last chance for a peaceful outcome. We don’t want any more deaths.”
Having ordered the level of alert to orange, Merral, acting on a sudden impulse, followed Clemant into his office.
“May I ask why you voted against the treaty?” he asked, after closing the door.
Clemant stared at the wallscreens before turning his dark gray eyes on Merral.
“I found much among our visitors that attracted me.” He nodded at the screens. “They have seen the threat of chaos. They know how to control worlds.”
He ran a finger around the edge of his hair. “But once they gain access to the Admin-Net, they could control us. That’s what the Dominion is all about. And I don’t want that.” His smile was stiff and awkward. “Commander, as you know, I believe that we face a real threat of disintegration into chaos. But I’m not fool enough to flee from that into being assimilated into the Dominion.”
“I see. I should have realized that was how you would think.”
Clemant shrugged. “Perhaps. I’ve come to the same conclusions as Delastro, but from different reasons. I think we will have to fight them. And there, Commander, the issue becomes yours. Can we win?”
“Frankly, I don’t know.”
The advisor stared at the screens. “Well,” he said softly, “I think we will soon find out.”
Lezaroth was in his cabin when he heard the news. “Yes!” he exclaimed, unable to restrain his exultation and relief. “By all the powers, I will teach them!” And as he said the words, he wondered whether he meant Farholme, the ambassadors, Hanax, or all of them.
He called the ambassadors, noting their glum faces. “Listen,” he said in his best don’t-mess-with-me-or-else tone, “this is now a military operation. I’m in charge now. You make no decisions and take no actions without my say-so.”
Hazderzal and Tinternli looked at each other and shrugged reluctantly.
It is curious how their debacle with the lost Krallen pack has worked to my advantage. They can hardly ask to be involved when they’ve proved to be so incompetent.
He ended the call and walked onto the bridge. The word had spread and all eyes were on him.
“Hear this all crew,” he said into the microphone, relishing the moment. “We are now in military mode.” He paused to let the shouts of delight die down. “All commanders to the conference room to hear battle plans. All other crew prepare for deployment of Krallen and firing of kinetic energy weapons. We will be surfacing shortly. Ground attack team prepare for deployment.”
He paused again for emphasis. “This is going to make our long trip worthwhile.”
Back in his office, Merral had a call from Corradon; the ambassadors were disappointed and would consider how to proceed.
Ten minutes later, as Merral was trying to organize things in the war room, he received a voice-only call from Vero.
“Well done.”
“Not my doing,” Merral said, walking into a corner to escape the noise. “It was close. Now what happens?”
“Azeras predicts we will see the full-suppression complex.”
“It’s lurking beyond the system’s edge?”
“Worse. You may as well know. He says they’d stay close, and it’s probably hiding in Below-Space by the Dove of Dawn.”
It took a moment for the news to sink in. “It’s already here?” Merral’s heart pounded. I was expecting at least a week.
“So he says.”
“I desperately hope that he’s wrong.”
“An understandable sentiment, my friend. But I wouldn’t put any money on it.”
“What?”
“Never mind.”
For the next few hours nothing happened. Eventually, Merral found a mattress and put it on the floor next to his desk. As the night shift stared at monitor screens and talked together in tense, low whispers, he tried to snatch some sleep.
Just before dawn, he received a call from Jorgio, his pale face almost touching the diary screen.
Rubbing his eyes free of sleep, Merral diverted it to the nearest screen.
“Mr. Merral, the curtain’s lifted,” Jorgio gasped. Saliva trickled from the corner of his mouth. “Something’s here. It’s terrible! I can feel it now. It’s evil and full of hate.”
“What is—?” Merral began.
Through the open door he heard hurried footsteps and gasps, gasps that turned into shouts of alarm.
“Jorgio,” he cried, “I think we see it too. Hang on there. I’ll send someone over.”
Merral ran into the main office where everyone was gathering around a screen.
The image was of a hazy, shaking form emerging out of the velvet blackness of space. A tracery of blue light flickered over a long brutal-looking structure, revealing gray, turreted slabs, towering arrays of ugly cylinders, and stacks of ominous-looking tubes. Despite the absence of anything that gave the structure scale, Merral knew it was vast.
“How big, anyone?” he asked, hearing the alarm in his voice.
“Over two thousand meters long,” a woman replied, disbelief ringing in her words. “That’s a two-triple-zero.”
“God, help us!” said a man.
“Mass?”
“Harder to say. Maybe over half a million tons. Well over.”
Merral looked around, aware that all eyes were on him. The full-suppression complex is here. He took a deliberate breath. Let’s begin this properly.
“Everybody, no panic please. We go to red alert. I want civilian defense preparations begun. All troops are to take up combat positions with medical facilities on emergency status.” He paused and looked at the screen. “And pull all the liaison people out of Langerstrand. I think diplomacy has just ended.”
After sending someone over to check on Jorgio, Merral met with Corradon and Clemant in the tiny annex off the main war room.
Corradon, who seemed reluctant to sit down, paced around, shaking his head. His face was a bloodless gray and Merral wondered if he had been sick.
“Treachery and duplicity,” he said. “I should never have trusted them. Not ever. Delastro was right.” He stopped and looked at Merral with worried eyes. “But, Commander, a reassurance please: our soldiers will not fire first?”
Merral considered pointing out that they had nothing that was remotely likely to be effective against such a ship, but merely said, “No, sir. The forces are in purely defensive mode.”
“I just want to be sure.” Corradon’s hands visibly trembled. “Perhaps, just perhaps, loss of life may still be averted.”
Merral caught Clemant looking at the representative and read both contempt and concern in his expression.
“Perhaps . . . ,” Corradon said, “we ought to offer them the Library key.”
His suggestion was greeted by silence. After a few moments Clemant turned to Merral. “Is there anything we can do?” He sounded frustrated.
“Only what we are doing. We have no effective weapons against this sort of vessel. A preliminary analysis suggests it carries all sorts of passive and active defenses.”
Suddenly a wallscreen flicked on.
It was Ambassador Hazderzal. There was no trace of the habitual good humor on his face. “Let me be plain. Your rejection of our peaceful and generous offer has shown that you are against us. As we feared, the Assembly has not changed, and we must assume that you are plotting our destruction. As a result, you have forced us to choose a new strategy. The ship that has appeared—the Triumph of Sarata—is capable of returning this world to dust and molten rock. From now on negotiations will be in the hands of Fleet-Commander Lezaroth.” He hesitated. “Ambassador Tinternli and I are truly sorry that it has come to this.”
The screen flickered and a new image appeared: a black-haired man dressed in a dark gray military uniform with a neat row of ribbons.
The face—dark-eyed, tanned, with a cheek scar—seemed more that of a statue than a human being. A thought came to Merral with an unnerving certainty. This is a man with war in his very bones, a man who has torn from himself all kindness and sympathy. His fear fed into a prayer. God, help me deal with this man.
“I am Fleet-Commander Lezaroth.” His voice was hard, the Communal good but harshly accented. His tone invited no dissent. “I command this ship, Triumph of Sarata. Your refusal to agree to our generous terms means that we must move beyond negotiation.” There was a pause. “Nevertheless, as a testimony to the lord-emperor’s abundant mercy and grace, I offer you a last chance to join us voluntarily. There is no neutral ground. To fail to support us is to oppose us. The hallmark of the Assembly seems to be a refusal to believe in the real world. We are forced therefore to try and wake you up to reality. Therefore—I trust you are paying attention—unless Representative Corradon calls me before midday your time today offering to open the Library and Admin-Net to us, one of your villages will cease to exist by dawn tomorrow.”
The screen went blank.
“I need time,” Corradon said and walked unsteadily away.
“What do we do, Commander?” Clemant asked quietly as the door closed behind the representative.
About the situation or about Corradon? Merral sensed an ambiguity in the question.
“The key must not be handed over.”
“I agree, but whether that decision can survive casualties is an interesting one.”
Merral said nothing.
“We have four hours,” Clemant said. “Let’s see what happens. I shall be in my office.”
Over the next few hours, Merral found himself fully occupied by the myriad issues to do with the defenses. He made calls to the colonels of the regiments and the people in charge of the defenses of the main cities to check on their progress. The red alert galvanized the planet into action. From the rain-forest villages of the southern isles to the icy northern ports of the Balanide Chains, every community seemed to be involved in feverish activity. The smallest settlements were emptied; around all the others, trenches and walls were created or strengthened. Everywhere, arms and armor were issued.
