Evolution

by Saunders, Craig

  Cetee, who now had the right type of bioweapon implanted in her right arm for insurgency had to learn how to use it properly. Its structure was based on the edomain sheaths, natural weapons of a fearsome creature which was hunted for the base materials used to create the blade in her own arm. The blade – curved like a claw – retracted on impulse, in much the same way as Kyle’s genogun stood down. Although for the thief it was essential to be able to use the blade without adrenal glands having to wake up first. The blade also dripped venom, and was lethal with just a scratch.

  In order to use the blade Cetee’s genetic make up was also altered. She still has complications after the process, but when she was ready she would be able to use the blade at will. The weapon was not massively powerful, but suited to subtle work, such as that of a thief.

  Cetee asked Kyle what he was smirking at when they finished playing with the sinblade for the day.

  “It’s not very powerful is it?” he said.

  “No, you’re right, it’s not. Your genogun is immensely powerful, you must be very proud.”

  “I am,” said Kyle, puffing his chest out. “Mine’s bigger than yours.”

  Cetee patted him condescendingly on his bare arm. “That’s nice for you tribeboy. Never be the guy with the most powerful gun, Kyle.”

  “Not my philosophy.”

  “But it is mine. You know why?”

  “No, go on, why?”

  “The bigger the gun, the more people aim for you.”

  *

  The sallow faced man made one call after they had left.

  Three weeks out of time passed without a thought for the Ecentrists. They waited patiently, and then after one call they found the trio, or quintet, depending upon your view of sentience.

  *

  Chapter 

  Kyle, Cetee and Orpal left their Stowaway ship long behind for the next piece of emitter.

  On route Kyle tried the ancapilar solution, feeding the Lu nutrients and pushed the eyes into the il y’ap interface. He tried the frin spectrum but the blasted eyes still refused to say ‘boo’. No matter what he attempted, the eyes refused to talk to him. Lore stated that the eyes of the Lu could be used for soothsaying, back on Guron, but the eyes steadfastly refused to play. After much consternation Kyle gave up with them. In his room he threw the remainder of the ancapilar solution and all his tools into the trash compactor. Fine, he thought to himself, if they won’t behave, I won’t talk to them either. Kyle looked at them where they sagged against his shelf, his only trophy on board. As a trophy they were fine indeed. And a trophy they would stay.

  The journey took long enough. It took exactly two days to get from the Harckand feeder ship to the sybaritic ship of the Hedonals, based in sector 8965_¬re tarmand.

  The frustration was palpable, but then there was Cetee to help him over the worst of it. Kyle was eager to get out and so was Cetee. The freedom of the hunt, the thrill of thievery. Both were ready to test themselves against the Enlightened. The Ecentrist were nowhere in sight.

  Orpal called them to the comroom. They had arrived.

  The ship loomed before them, clearly visible from each room’s holowindow. Kyle left the eyes and his gun in the room and emerged dressed for pleasure. He wore trousers and a light silken shirt, and also a look of awe. The ship was a glorious sight to behold. It lacked the impact of a Cablas, but then Kyle wasn’t very well travelled. The sight of the ship had stunned him into silence. Apart from the look of shock on his face, Kyle was very nicely turned out. The trousers and the shirt he wore flowed seamlessly together. As he hit the compan to shut his door behind him (the room he left behind was a tip, but Orpal hadn’t looked into the room since the first night Kyle and Cetee had had sex. It was something, like most squishy things, that Orpal just could not bear to watch. Cetee still refused to sleep with Kyle, insisting there was only one man in the galaxy she would even consider sleeping with, and Kyle wasn’t him), Cetee emerged from her cabin, next door to his. She looked stunning. She was dressed in a flowing silk dress that obviously was pulled on over her head. She was showing just enough cleavage for Kyle to wonder at and her green freckled shoulders stood out against the white straps of her dress. Kyle would have drooled but his enforced time with female company and Orpal to talk to had given him slightly better manners than he had started out with.

  He gawped instead.

  “Where did you get that dress from?” he said. “You look fabulous.”

  Cetee almost blushed. “I replicated it. And thank you.”

  Her right hand looked normal, so Kyle asked.

  “Is it working?”

  Cetee’s face took on a faraway look. The blade snicked out from her skin, puckered against the blade. Her eyes came back into focus and the blade disappeared. “Yes,” she said, “it’s working just fine.”

  “Well then, said Kyle, minding his manners and putting his elbow out for Cetee to take. “Shall we?”

  *

  Apart from their sexual liberation, the Enlightened had a flexible governmental system, a complex set of moral obligations underpinning everything, and a common set of goals. They were flexible and their constitution allowed for changes – eg in times of plenty they were allowed to expand and grow, in times of little they collapse in on themselves, like the sun cacti of Faerisan, which grow, blossom in the fire plains, and then hide themselves and bide their time in times of fire.

  In times of plenty the Enlightened expanded. This was such a time.

  In this, the third age of enlightenment (each new age precipitated by some new discovery on the origins of the species, in turn shedding light on the species path from here on out), the Enlightened were growing.

  The Lore could no more hold them back than take up arms. The war was going badly for the Lore. The Enlightened encroached on all known Lore space and the Lore’s collapse was faster than anything the Ecentrists could have hoped for.

  The Enlightened weren’t all about war, however, and the sybaritic ships of the Hedonals, a sect of the Enlightened, were a sight to behold; the case in point. The Hedonals were the Enlightened’s most, well, enlightend of sects. No entity as large as the conglomeration of nations that made the Enlightened could survive without sectioning off portions of itself.

  The Hedonals had no beliefs as such. They just enjoyed themselves. They shared their ships with the Eudemonists, who exercised the furthest extremes of the hedonals beliefs. The hedonals were forever sighing happily. The Eudemonists, a sub-sect, punished themselves with their relentless dogma. They believed their actions should bring only pleasure, and were forever flagellating themselves for failure to enjoy to the full some aspect of life or another.

  They held the next piece of the emitter, which Orpal, Cetee and Kyle were now hunting. Unfortunately, the only way to get the piece was to visit the sybaritic ships, which meant travelling unarmed except for Cetee’s sinblade, and the added pressure of having to enjoy oneself while on a mission, as Kyle believed, from God.

  Before he left, unarmed, Kyle prayed. He prayed for luck and forgiveness for the sins he was about to commit. His soul cleansed, he and Cetee left Orpal behind and entered the Hedonal’s ship.

  *

  Unlike Cablas, the sybaritic ships had no guestgreeters. Instead, they used a simple system of signs, which pointed the way, interactively, for each pleasure seeker new to the game.

  Kyle found the system to his liking. At the first sign they came to Kyle interogated a compan until he found what he wanted – the third piece of the emitter. According to the compan the third part was on display in the fourth quadrant of the giant ship.

  The ship, designed by Hitte Jepalpa, Kurlion’s most famous son, stretched into the distance far further than even the Lu could see. Each quadrant was devoted to some pleasurable pastime or other, and each was magnificent in its all-encompassing splendour. The ship had no halls and streets as such, but was comprised of large plains, further divided into squares, where diversions of any kind could be p
racticed. The ships reminded Kyle of the Faer San sector of his homeworld Guron – it was the closest thing he had experienced. Even then, with the glow districts of the seedier parts of Faer San, nothing compared to the relentless hedonism of the Enlightened at play.

  As far as Kyle could tell, there was nothing unpleasurable aboard the ship. He was amazed the Eudemonists were allowed aboard the ship, what with their pessimistic gloomism. He could not imagine how anyone could fail to take pleasure from the ship. Orpal had warned them to steer clear of the Eudemonists. The sight of them whipping themselves on the streets, to amused looks from the pleasure-seekers, was enough to convince Kyle that it was sound advice.

  He and Cetee, arm in arm, looking like a royal couple on display, took the pathway to the fourth quadrant and left Orpal behind in the docking area.

  As they walked they marvelled at the sights and sounds. There was a brothel, for denizens and visitors of both sexes, a sports complex for other physical activities, a pot house for smokers and drinkers, lush gardens and a whole quadrant dedicated to nature in all it’s splendour, pools for frolicking, even a gambling den with gambling on everything from death to life (although only in simulators – death was forbidden and anyone dying while on a trip to the ship was forcibly expelled to expire some place else). There was more, but it could take weeks for the couple to explore it all.

  They wanted to make the most of their trip, but Cetee had to get the piece of the emitter out first. Orpal, thanks to precautions brought on by the advent of war, had been unable to scout ahead and find a plan for the ship, so this trip was both reconnaissance and the job rolled into one.

  But Kyle would be damned if he didn’t enjoy himself first. Kyle, having never been to one of the Enlightened’s pleasure ships before, determined to have some fun. Cetee took on the role of guestgreeter for him, and took some measure of enjoyment from the look on Kyle’s face as he wandered the city streets. Kyle didn’t know where to start.

  Orpal, through the eargen, admitted that there was no rush to get the piece. There would only be a rush to get out once they obtained it.

  Strolling arm in arm along the fast moving pathways that the Enlightened favoured over the Tradition’s arterial paths (the Enlightened believed half the fun of anything was the journey to the destination. So while Cablas was dull and uninteresting along the way to any destination, the journey designed to take the least amount of time possible, the Enlightened’s pleasure ships dedicated whole regions to travel.). At any point they could have stepped off the travelator, but they had decided to first see what security was like around the piece.

  *

  They found the third piece of the emitter without much trouble. It was roughly situated in the centre of the Enlightened’s fourth quadrant. It was a beautiful thing to behold. While the other pieces had been all jutting angles and harsh geometry, the section the hedonal’s kept was a smooth profusion of holes. It was obviously designed as housing for other pieces and its appearance was in keeping with the purpose the ship. There was minimal security, although stealing the piece would no doubt bring down the Enlightened own security force, the merctiles, on the thief. Cetee didn’t think it would be a problem.

  While they were there anyway, Cetee and Kyle decided to enjoy themselves first.

  They split up.

  *

  The gambling here was of a higher class than that available on the feeder ship for Harckand. There was mud brag wrestling, but there was also gutwomp racing, hutch building and cards. Kyle rarely lost at gambling, so he didn’t really like it as a rule, but Cetee had told him the gutwomp racing was a blast. The gutwomps ate their way up a string of praetra. The first gutwomp to reach the apex of the gambling den (they would promptly fall back to the ground with a wet thushplop once they had eaten) was deigned the winner. It was a simple sport for a simple man.

  He put his money on a red coated gutwomp and sat back to enjoy the race.

  The gutwomp he bet on was champing to get away as soon as the board was laid. The starting pistol went bang and the gutwomps all started eating the long strings. When the gutwomp had eaten it all they would be at the top of the board and full up. It was far from cruel. Gutwomps loved to eat, and this way every participant got the best out of the deal. Plus, the amusing sounds of the finished gutwomps falling down was worth the price anyway.

  The red coated gutwomp was neck and neck with a blue coated one, and Kyle cheered with the rest of the punters. As they reached the top of the board Kyle turned away. Without looking he knew his would win.

  It was always the way for him with gambling. It was fun until the end. Just like the hunt, Kyle had always preferred the chase to the kill. It was, he supposed, why he had never become an assassin. It was too cold a sport for his liking, even though the kill was a part of his chosen profession. Back on Guron assassins had been plentiful, and killings among the ruling classes had been almost a sport in its own right, drawing gamblers to pick those rulers that they thought would lack longevity. Jithrail Pailor had been the longest lived prelate, and rumoured to have eyes in the back of his head. Kyle had put money on him once to outlive the other three candidates in the Guron elections, but had on that ocassion lost as the cold-blooded assassin’s blade had found its way into his candidate’s back before the campaign was even begun.

  No, the assassin’s life was not for Kyle. He would rather gamble his life in the sport of the hunt.

  He duly won on the gutwomp race. He had to admit, he had been sceptical about the delights of gutwomp racing, but the bloated splashes of the gutwomps falling down once they had finished had made the bet worth his while.

  After collecting his winnings Kyle went to a pot den, but only had one drink as there was business to be taken care of shortly. He took a few hours for himself and visited all manner of dens with his winnings, but didn’t partake in any of the delights on offer. This was a business trip, he told himself, and kept it in his pants.

  *

  Cetee decided to take more highbrow amusements. She went to listen to Humdringals singing in the bathhouses, where the accoustics were rumoured to be the best, and have a massage at the same time.

  After three hours, their alloted time, Cetee and Kyle met in front of the piece. Its smooth exterior reflected the neon signs around them, giving it the appearance of a ball of rainbow.

  “Are you ready?” asked Cetee.

  “I’m ready. How about you?”

  “Did you have a nice time?” Cetee asked. Kyle gave her shoulder a little squeeze.

  “Yes I did. But I missed you. I could have had all the pleasure I wanted back on ship.”

  Cetee granted him with a smile. He was trying, at least. Over the course of the past three weeks she had to admit, he had grown on her. Just a little.

  “I misssed you too,” she lied. “Now, it’s time to take the piece. We’ll get it out and then get straight back to Orpal. If we take it no one will know it’s us, right? No one looks after the piece here.”

  “I’m with you. We take the piece then stroll back like nothing’s amiss. Right?”

  “Right.”

  The quadrant where the piece was housed was quiet. Few patrons of the sybaritic ships bothered looking at archeofacts. There were plenty more interesting diversions available.

  Looking around, Cetee decided no one was watching. It wouldn’t be long before the alarm brought the merctiles running, but hopefully before then they would be safely away on Orpal.

  “Let’s do it,” she said, and reached out a hand to take the third piece of the emitter.

  *

  In the deepest, stickiest, darkest reaches of space, Exel was trying to tell the universe how to behave. The universe had a tendency to be obstinate, though, and pretty much did want it wanted.

  They were discussing time, and as time was outside the universe’s remit, it was somewhat confused. Drunkeness could only help in so far as it removed the universe’s concept of confusion altogether.

  “Well, what i
f time is a particle?” Exel questioned. It stretched and cracked its back on an armchair made of stars. The universe’s living room was most comfortable, it found.

  “What if it isn’t?” replied the universe, pleased with its own powers of debate, which for the universe generally meant bludgeoning any other debator into submission with physics. “Imagine infinity. The dark in one circle, the light in the other, endlessly spinning, meeting, never to part, never to become one, and all the living things marooned on the edge”

  Exel squared its shoulders and prepared for a long haul. The universe passed Exel a jug of wamboo, favoured for its subversion of intellectual conversation, which both Exel and the universe definitely needed. It meant they could meet in the hazy middle ground of drunken logic, where nothing could ever be incontravertably true.

  “Unless of course you take the Heidensweisen principle on the logic of chaotic chance; making an uncertainty a practical certainty (i.e. the unlikelier a proposition is the higher the chance of a multi-directional event occurring in an indirect space/time flow, due to the laws of the serendipity). The sheer preponderance of possible paths dictates that there is a higher chance of convergence the further into time those paths travel, as space and time are bent and could be considered the same sides of opposite coins, twisting and never landing on one side.”

  “Shit,” said the universe. “That actually makes some sort of sense. Confirming my point. Which makes my point make more sense, as the chances of me saying something that made sense after three weeks of drinking wamboo are so remote as to make it a statistical impossibility, thus making it a practical certainty that no matter how tortuous logic becomes I cannot stop making sense.”

  “Grrrrrrrgh!” said the Exel and rolled up its sleeves and changed tack. “The idea of time travel (that is, time that travels) is dependant on the concept of infinite time as once all the problems are worked out and a means/mechanism/machine/modus for time transport is devised, the said machine should then exist for all time. If not then it can exist for no time as it depends on time to exist. Although, consider it another way, if someone calculates the level of improbability of such a machine, feeds this calculation into a computer connected to a nice cup of really hot tea and turns it on, the time machine is simply called into existence. Well, there is a problem with this. We can perceive only X, Y, Z, and T (where T is apparently a linear straight line). Whereas, the time travel means/mechanism/machine/modus would exist at Tx, Ty, Tz, X, Y, Z. we can not directly perceive of that machine, just the same as a two-dimensional being cannot directly perceive a three-dimensional object or contemplate what a third dimension might be like. The machine therefore must already exist. But that is dependant on time having been infinite and spherical in concept but never ending in reality. Wherever that comes into it.” Exel sighed and took a breath.