by Neal Jones
"Kiran, Kiran...relax. You're not a prisoner here, and this isn't an interrogation." Kravis smiled, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning back. "Gods, you look so much like him."
"Like who?"
"My brother, Kiirs. You recognize that name, don't you?"
"Yes." Kiran stared at his uncle, surprised. "He was my father."
"Do you know what he looked like?"
Garrett nodded, taking another drink from his cup. "My mother recorded a Hiver-sim. She had to smuggle it out of Mykahrian space with her when the mission was over. It was only a few minutes long. I played it a lot when I was little."
"You know about that mission thirty years ago? The viral outbreak and the team of specialists from the Federation that was called in to assist us?"
Garrett nodded again, feeling better already. Kravis was right about the nutrient drink. He took another long draught and then sat up, balancing the mug on his knee. "That's about all I know. She never talked about it much, and she never liked to talk about my father. Is that what this is about? Are you the one who ordered the Xaric to kidnap me?"
"No. I'm sorry about that. There's a lot of bad blood and sour history between the Xaric and the Mykahrians. Unfortunately, there was no other way for us to get you into Mykahr space. How are you feeling?"
"Better. I'd like to eat some real food. Who's 'us'?"
Kravis rose. "It's a long story, and I can explain it to while we eat. We have a small galley here, but you might not like it if you're not used to Mykahrian food."
Kiran nodded, following Kravis out of the cargo hold. "Anything is better than ration packs."
Commodore Gabriel withdrew the steaming mug of coffee from the wall dispenser and sat behind his desk. He had two hours until the end of his shift, and he'd taken care of most of the giant pile in his in-box, as well as the correspondence from Admiral Hazen and Vice Admiral Wu at ISD. Captain Barnes was due on Exxar-One within the hour, and the commodore wasn't looking forward to meeting him again. The last time he had been here, he had come to retrieve the Jha'Drok spy that station security had uncovered in the aftermath of the bombing of one of the churches on the promenade. Barnes' demeanor reeked of barely concealed condescension and suspicion for everyone around him, especially anyone who wasn't in an EarthCorps uniform. The commodore could only imagine what Barnes would have to say about this incident, and he cast another glance at the chronometer readout in the upper corner of his terminal screen. With his luck, Barnes' shuttle would be delayed, and he would give no thought about interrupting Gabriel's off-duty time that evening with a lengthy meeting that would be just shy of an outright interrogation.
The door chime interrupted the commodore's thoughts, and he stood, smoothing the front of his uniform. The captain's shuttle had apparently arrived on schedule after all. "Come in."
The door parted, and Gabriel blinked, startled. "Doctor Garrett?"
"I'm sorry to bother you, commodore. Is this a bad time?"
"No, not at all. Please come in." He motioned to one of the chairs in front of his desk. "May I get you something to drink?"
"Tea would be nice. Chamomile. Hot."
As Marc brought up the menu on the food dispenser, he asked, "I'm surprised to see you so soon. It's only been three days since our conversation, and –"
"– and you assumed I was on Earth."
"Well, yes." He smiled, handing her the cup and saucer.
The doctor took a sip before setting them on the edge of the desk. "I was attending a conference not far from here, and I was able to get a ticket on a last minute transport. I was actually considering paying my son a surprise visit next week, but –" she raised her hands as if to say Now here we are.
Gabriel nodded, sitting back as he sipped his coffee. "I apologize again, doctor. Admiral Hazen has informed me that not only is ISD involved, but someone in the Federation Security department has also initiated a dialogue with the Xaric government. So far, the Xaric have been uncooperative."
"Yes, I expect so. When I was on my mission in Mykahr space thirty years ago, I heard many things about the Xaric. They are almost as xenophobic as the Mykahrians, and apparently as violent and barbaric as the Khazar."
Gabriel set his coffee aside and leaned forward, folding his hands on his desktop. "About that mission, what can you tell me that's not in the general library database? I thought that by now much of that would have been declassified, but apparently not."
"No, it's not, and that doesn't surprise me. I myself am still under contract with Federation Central Intelligence not to discuss any aspect of that mission that I was involved in." She paused, smiling mischievously, and then continued, "However, between you and me, commodore, I see no reason not to fill you in on a few details. After all, I have very good reason to believe that my son's kidnapping is related to that mission somehow, and I'm sure that whomever has been sent here by ISD will tell you the same thing."
"Good. I appreciate your candor, doctor. Let's start with the fact that it was a viral outbreak, correct?"
"That's right. The exact nomenclature of the virus is GXB-42849. It took almost six months of research for us to isolate it, and the doctor I was assigned to work with was Kiirs Roanok." She hesitated. "He's Kiran's father."
"I see," Gabriel nodded.
"I didn't learn that I was pregnant until two weeks after the mission was over and I was back on Earth." She glanced away, smiling sadly to herself. "It was a bittersweet surprise."
Gabriel nodded again, not sure what to say, but, before either of them could speak, the door chime warbled. "Come in."
Captain Barnes entered, glancing at Doctor Garrett before addressing Gabriel. "Commodore. Nice to see you again."
"Likewise," Gabriel replied glibly, rising and motioning to the chair next to Amelia's. "Coffee? Tea?"
"No thanks." Barnes seated himself and began typing on his compad. "This won't take long. You are Doctor Amelia Garrett, I presume?"
"Yes. You must Captain Barnes, the representative from ISD."
"Correct. May I also assume that you have just arrived here yourself?"
Amelia nodded, sipping her tea. "Yes. I was just about to explain to Commodore Gabriel some of the details of the mission I was assigned to thirty years ago; the one that involved an outbreak of the virus GXB on a Mykahrian colony."
"Good. I have been granted temporary security clearance from FCI to discuss that mission as well, and so have you, commodore. But only you. No one else on your command staff is authorized, and, because of that, I will be taking over the investigation of Lieutenant Commander Garrett's kidnapping."
"I'll let Commander Navarr know as soon as we're done here." Gabriel settled himself in his chair once more, reaching for his mug.
"Good. Doctor Garrett, please continue."
Amelia nodded, exchanging a glance with Gabriel. "As I was saying, I was selected to join a team of operatives and other specialists who were responding to a plea from the Mykahrian government for medical aid. One of their farming colonies was suffering from a very deadly outbreak of unknown origin. Apparently it had been raging for some time before their government finally relented to requesting for outside help."
* * *
Kravis was right. The galley was smaller than the cargo hold they had just left, and he steered Kiran to one of three tables that were arranged along one side of the room. Running the length of the opposite wall was a long counter, with a stove and other cooking devices behind it. A tall, slim Mykahrian woman was busy dishing up something that looked like vegetable stew, but it's brown and black color made it look unappetizing.
"Negara!" Kravis greeted her, sidling up to the counter. "Give us two bowls."
"Is that him?" she asked, thrusting her chin in Kiran's direction.
"Yeah. That's Kiran." He motioned him over. "Kiran, this is Negara."
"Nice to meet you."
"You as well." She smiled, looking him and up and down. "Here." She slid a steaming bowl across the counter
. "This will put some color back into your cheeks."
"What is it?"
Negara grinned. "Go on. You'll like it." She handed a bowl to Kravis.
The two men sat, and Kiran took a hesitant taste. The broth was thick and creamy, with a pleasant root flavor to it. The chunks of meat were also seasoned well, and reminded Kiran of the chicken his uncle back in Australia barbecued on those summer nights when Kiran and his cousins would camp out on the beach.
"It's good, isn't it?" Kravis asked, scooping up his own helping.
Kiran nodded, swallowing, and glanced around the small cabin. The only other person in the room was Negara, and she had her back to them, stirring the pot on the stove. "What kind of ship is this? Where are we exactly?"
"We're in the unclaimed territory between the Xaric and the Mykahrian empires. It'll be about two days before we're in Mykahrian space."
"Two days??"
"Because of the security nets surrounding our borders, we have to travel at sublight to avoid detection. The patrol ships regularly scan for stardrive signatures and these older ships don't have adequate cloaking shields."
"So how are we going to get across the border undetected?"
"Oh don't worry. Getting through the security nets is fairly easy as long as we time it right – and we find a good weak spot. As for this ship, we're a courier vessel. Right now we're hauling chemical supplies for a mining colony on Callistar – that's one of homeworld's moons. It's the biggest one, actually. But that's not our final destination. The current outbreak is on Dakthar – one of the outer colonies of the home system."
Kiran looked up, pausing in mid-chew. "Current outbreak?"
Kravis nodded gravely. "This one is worse than the one thirty years ago. It's the reason we were forced to bring you here."
"By 'we', you mean the Mykahrians?"
"No. We call ourselves –"
" – the Anli'Sar." Doctor Garrett took another sip of her tea and then set it aside. "They're a resistance group, an underground movement that has been around for the last century or so – at least that's what Kiirs told me. I didn't know he was one of them until almost three months after we had arrived on Callistar."
"Is that when your relationship became personal?" Captain Barnes interrupted.
"Yes. Doctor Roanok was the head of the research team, and, as far as I know, he was the only one who was a member of the Anli'Sar."
"I'm sorry," Gabriel interrupted, "but I need some clarification here. The Mykahrian government is a dictatorship, correct? Their current president is Thrale?"
"If you're thinking of Malkris Thrale, no," Barnes replied. "He died some years ago. His son, Sarvok, is now in power, and yes, he is a dictator. The correct title is Dakr'o. He's the fourth generation of the Thrale bloodline to take that office, and he wields absolute control. There once was a governing body, something along the lines of an elected senate, but even then the Mykahrian people were extremely xenophobic. That was about three hundred years ago, right before Artok Thrale came to power and assassinated the entire senate. Sarvok is his great-great-grandson, and he's taken even stronger measures against the Anli'Sar than his father or grandfather ever did."
"What kind of 'stronger measures'?" Amelia asked, looking alarmed.
"Random arrests, extreme physical and mental torture, public executions, mass murders..." Barnes gave a slight shrug. "The whole empire is run as a massive police state. Thrale's army – it's called the Tarkalys Ulno'n – is in absolute control, and all citizens are taught from birth to give their allegiance and their devotion to the state."
"I see," the doctor replied, reaching for her tea.
"You should have known that from your brief visit there thirty years ago," Barnes continued. "Didn't Roanok tell you about all of it?"
"Yes, he told me quite a bit. Some of us also had access to the public news feeds."
"Then you know how grave this situation is. If Commander Garrett has indeed been captured by the Anli'Sar, he is in great danger."
"I think what Doctor Garrett is looking for," Gabriel interjected, "is some kind of reassurance from you, captain, that this matter is being handled with the utmost urgency and full attention of all necessary departments of state."
"I'm sure it is," Barnes countered with mild exasperation. "Didn't I say that when I came in?"
"Yes, you did," Amelia replied. "The commodore is right. I was hoping for a little bit more reassurance from you about the specifics of what is being done to get Kiran safely home again."
"I'm sorry, I don't have those details. I know only what I was told before I arrived here. I was also instructed to debrief you regarding any details you remember from your mission thirty years ago, specifically regarding the Anli'Sar."
"So it has been confirmed that the Anli'Sar are responsible for this?" Gabriel asked.
"I was never told that in so many words, but that was the implication." Barnes turned to Amelia. "I apologize for seeming insensitive, doctor, but the sooner we get this over with, the sooner I can give my report to my commanding officer. The more information that FCI has to work with, the greater the chance of securing your son's release."
"And what if it isn't the Anli'Sar, captain? Let's assume, for the sake of argument, that my son has been kidnapped by the Mykahrian government. What reason would Dakr'o Thrale order this abduction?"
"I don't know," Barnes sighed. "Believe it or not, I am merely a field agent for ISD. I don't actually work for FCI, my office is simply coordinating with them on this investigation. As soon as we received Commander Navarr's report regarding the Xaric, we moved forward with the assumption that the Anli'Sar hired Xaric mercenaries to kidnap your son. But you're right, this whole operation could have just as well been initiated by Thrale or someone in his army. But whomever is behind all of this, we still have a question of motive. Whether it was the Ulno'n, Dakr'o Thrale, or the Anli'Sar – we haven't found any cause yet for why any of them would want to kidnap Commander Garrett."
"Have any Mykahrians successfully defected in the last two or three centuries?" Gabriel asked. "Surely in a police state like that there's been one or two dozen citizens who have escaped."
"You would think so, but, to the best of my knowledge, no, there's never been a documented case of successful defection. But that doesn't mean that no one's tried. I was told a few days ago by someone in FCI that they have records of at least thirty-seven attempts over the last two hundred years of Mykahrian defection. Unfortunately, in every case, soldiers of the Ulno'n discovered the plans and terminated everyone involved."
"Yes," Amelia agreed. "Kiirs told me about one of those more recent attempts when we were working together. The reason that the Ulno'n are always able to thwart defection plans is because most of the Mykahrian population is on their homeworld. Population control is rigorously enforced. Couples are allowed only two children, and that's only if both parents are within the allowed age limits for procreation. The closest major colony is on Callistar. That was where the viral outbreak occurred thirty years ago. The other two colonies are on the other pair of habitable planets in the Mykahr system. I'd have to check a library to recall their names, but Kiirs told me they're both farming and industrial colonies, not very large, relatively small populations in fact. The Ulno'n established large bases on both of those planets before any citizens were allowed to relocate there. The Ulno'n Army is quite large, and they are always recruiting the best and brightest of the younger generations." The doctor glanced away, giving a slight shudder. "Labeling the Mykahrian Empire a police state is an understatement," she finished quietly.
The commodore glanced at Barnes and then cleared his throat. "Thank you, doctor. That does explain a lot. How bad was that epidemic thirty years ago?"
"I don't know the exact numbers," Kravis said, after a moment's hesitation. He pushed aside his empty bowl and stared at it, frowning. "All I remember Kiirs saying was that it decimated a third of Callistar's population." He looked up at Kiran. "Which means the final
body count was somewhere around two million."
"My gods," Garrett replied, stunned. He had been about to scoop up the last chunk of meat, but he paused, staring at the brown morsel. Something his mother had said years ago suddenly echoed back from the depths of his memory. "Population control," he murmured.
"What?"
Kiran looked up, realizing that he had spoken aloud. "Sorry. I was just remembering..." he trailed off, pulling the rest of the scene out of the dusty recesses of his memory. "I was working on my biology homework – sophomore year in high school, I think – and I had a question about viruses. I asked mom about it, and she got this strange look on her face. I think the question had something to do with replication, or maybe it was genetic engineering." He shook his head. "Whatever it was, she told me a little bit more about that mission she had been assigned to, and I think she got a little too caught up in her story, because she ended up going on and on about biological engineering and genetic manipulation. And then she ended with something like, 'That virus was probably another form of population control'. I asked her what she meant, because most of what she'd said before that made no sense at all – a lot of medical jargon – and then she looked at me, a little confused, like she'd forgotten what my original question was. When I prompted her, she got irritated, and told me to go finish my homework in my room."
Kravis nodded. "She was probably right. We believe that Malkris ordered the creation of a virus for that very reason, and then when it got out of control, he turned to the Federation for help."
"Why?" Kiran asked, swallowing the last bite of meat. "Aren't there any scientists or researchers who specialize in that sort of thing?"
"Of course. But, according to Kiirs, all their attempts at finding a cure failed. They tried for almost a year – every scientist and specialist in the empire was relocated and put on that project. None of them could find a cure, much less isolate the pathogen responsible. That's why the fatality count was so high. By the time Malkris petitioned the Federation, almost a million people had died. And, of course, it took at least six weeks before the Federation team finally arrived, and another six months before they isolated the virus and found a cure."
