“It is a new drone. A child. We teach it, and it learns quickly.”
“A child! You built… on Phoenix?” Trace nodded. “Then you have a queen?” The translator chose the same word, from his tongue to hers. Given the parrens’ feudal nature, Trace was not surprised.
“Yes,” Trace confirmed. There was no avoiding it now. More lies, when confronted with this, would stretch credulity to breaking. “The queen said that parren in her time called her Halgolam.” And she took some pleasure in seeing the unflappable Aristan rocked again, dazed and staring as though from a blow to the head.
“Halgolam!” he murmured, and the translator did not bother with the word. “Halgolam! The destroyer, the bringer of light and renewal!”
“Do your people have any recollection of a drysine queen going by that name?” Trace pressed. A cable whipped and twanged as the kid grabbed it to change course, then ran headlong into Kumar. He grabbed the marine’s suit with multiple steel legs, then almost playfully sprang away in the opposite direction, sending Kumar flying into another cable.
“He gotcha Bird!” Arime taunted as Kumar recovered, swearing.
“No,” Aristan answered. “It is not in my memory, at least. Perhaps in the great histories we have clues. Would that you had told me earlier.” With an accusing stare.
“Well I’m telling you now,” said Trace. “We call her Styx, after an old goddess of Earth.”
“And what brings about this cooperation? What possible bonds could exist between humans and one of the Destined?” Past the translator, Trace thought she could hear a faintly peevish tone. Jealousy?
“The deepynines are not dead,” said Trace. “The great enemies of the drysines are alive, and working with the alo. We think that their great technology lies behind the rapid alo rise. We fear that human Fleet, in choosing to fight the Triumvirate War, was simply assisting in an alo-deepynine plan to systematically remove one enemy of the deepynines after another. The tavalai were always the greatest fighters against the return of the machines, and so they were first. The truest reason why Phoenix is now an enemy of the human Fleet is that we fear that Fleet has been fighting the wrong opponent, these past hundred and sixty years.”
It took Aristan a good thirty seconds to process that, staring down at the ongoing games below. “And why does your queen seek Drakhil’s diary?” he asked finally.
“It leads to the location of a far greater treasure. The means to rebuild her race.”
“And you would help her in this?” Breathlessly.
“If the deepynines are as numerous and powerful as we fear,” Trace reasoned, “we may not have a choice.”
“My people have long prophesied of the coming war,” said Aristan. “A war that will shake the foundations of the Spiral. It seems that you, Phoenix, may be its harbinger.”
The kid lost control of one of his handheld thrusters, which went careening out of control into a corner to shouts of ‘ware!’, then rebounded with a loud clank. The kid jetted over with his remaining thruster, and found Private Jess Rolonde working on her suit calibrations on this side of a cargo net. With a scrabble of tightly coordinated legs, he snared the drifting thruster, pushed off a wall bracket, then grabbed the cargo net rim and offered her the thruster with his smaller forelegs.
“Just get the fuck away from me!” Rolonde shouted, pushing off her suit to grab the cargo net further away, an edge of panic in her voice. “Bird, tell your damn pet to stay the fuck away!”
The drone hesitated, head darting, looking confused. Its forelegs withdrew the thruster. “Come on Jess,” Kumar retorted, “he just wants to play! Be a sport and play with him!”
“He doesn’t want to play,” Kono corrected from across the hold. “He’s just following programming to explore and interact with everyone. He doesn’t know Jess as well and he’s trying to fill in the gap, that’s all.”
“Well it’s not going to happen!” Rolonde declared. “Go away!”
The drone pushed off the edge of the cargo net, gave a burst of thrust… then caught a steel cable, and half-spun, clinging and looking back, still uncertain. Arime gave Trace a look, and Trace could almost see his incredulous amusement, despite the visor hiding his face. That the kid was not a puppy was too obvious to need pointing out. His responses were fast, precise and intent, and even while playing a game, his focus was entirely on the game’s object, and the successful completion of a goal. His confusion now was entirely an attempt to calculate strange human responses, and to place an organic’s emotions and body language into some kind of machine-comprehensible framework. And yet, damned if the big steel monster didn’t look just a little upset, at the rejection of his offer to play.
“Kid!” Trace called, and the drone cocked his insectoid head at the voice, then swung with rapid grace to consider her. “Come here and meet our new team member!”
The drone briefly bunched and wriggled its limbs on the cable, then pushed off, a graceful unfurl to full extension, heading straight for her. To his credit, Aristan moved only forward, grasping the cargo claw to present himself directly. The drone arrived with a clatter of steel feet and scratching claws, then spread-eagled legs wide between two cargo claws, having just span-enough to do that.
“Kid, this is Aristan,” said Trace. “He is parren. He is a very important person among his people. He will play an important role in our mission.” The kid leaned from side to side, his head moving rapidly to complete a full scan of the new person. Aristan tentatively extended a hand, but the kid ignored it — his sensors did not require physical contact, and he lacked the emotional context to desire it.
“I greet you,” said Aristan, and his translator caught only a little of the awe in his actual voice. “Child of the Destined Ones. Do you speak?”
The kid did the little hesitation and head-tilt he did when processing something new. Probably the language, Trace thought. “Styx was unclear if he would ever speak,” she said. “He certainly comprehends, though again, it’s unclear exactly how much knowledge Styx pre-programmed into his brain. His memory files are full, so he has no need of experience. But his actual brain, the main processor, can only access all of that memory when it’s fully developed. So far, he’s halfway there.”
“After how long?”
“Since we left Ponnai. A little before.”
“Incredible,” Aristan murmured. Trace could only agree. “What is his part in this mission?”
“The vault has graviton capacitors. They generate artificial gravity to one hundred Gs, a defensive measure. We can’t deactivate it, and we can’t survive it. But he can.”
“The vault is heavily defended. Will he fight?”
“We have modular weaponry for him,” Trace agreed. “We’re going to introduce him to that very, very carefully. Look, he’s going to get bored shortly, he understands us well but he finds conversation dull. If you’d like to get to know him better, play with him — he needs play to learn coordination and stimulate brain growth, like organic children. Privates Arime and Kumar will show you the rules.”
“Yes,” Aristan agreed, with more enthusiasm than she’d have imagined from such a dour figure being offered a game.
“Kid,” Trace told the drone. “Aristan will play with you. Be careful with him, he has no armour to wear. Understand?” The drone turned and sprang away with such speed that Aristan flinched a little. “We’d say he has bad manners,” Trace explained with amusement, “but when you think of what need a machine society has for manners, you realise that’s inevitable.”
Aristan gathered himself, placed his feet to the cargo claw, and gracefully sprang after the drone. Trace did the same, but headed across the hold, for the edge of the cargo net where Rolonde was working. “Jess?” she said, as the armour suit swayed along with the net. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine Major,” said Rolonde through gritted teeth, working in a sleeveless shirt, blonde hair knotted at the back.
Trace could have demanded that the Private n
ot tell her such obvious lies. But it was well understood among marines that there were varying degrees of ‘fine’. If you knew the code, you could usually figure out which one applied. Trace pointed out to the drone, now playing a new game of manoeuvre with the unsurprisingly nimble parren. “We’re doing a mission with him,” she said. “Either you get used to it, or I’ll take you off.”
Rolonde stared at her in alarm. And took a deep breath. “Look, I’m fine… I just…”
“Can’t function with the kid around,” Trace completed for her. Rolonde looked helpless. “I understand that trauma isn’t reasonable. I understand I can’t just talk you out of it. But look at him. He’s no threat to us. Styx wants this mission to succeed even more badly than we do, and she knows any threat from the kid toward us will see him destroyed, so she’d never allow it in his programming.”
“Bird and Irfy wouldn’t shoot him anyway,” Rolonde muttered. “They’d hesitate, they think he’s a pet.”
“And because we need this mission to succeed so badly,” Trace continued, “I can only have functional people on the trip. I’d like to be supportive of you on this, but I can’t. Right now, he’s not optional. You are.”
“I’m a good marine!” Rolonde retorted.
“One of the best,” Trace agreed. “I picked you for Command Squad myself. I love you Jess, but if you’re going to screw up this mission, and this squad, then you’re out. Figure out a way to work with the kid. That’s an order. Non-compliance will see you left behind. Got it?” Rolonde looked at her boots. And nodded shortly. “Good. Don’t leave me one short, Jess. I need you on my flank.”
18
Erik strode into the main corridor of the Tsubarata’s human quarter. The power was still off, but temporary generators loaned by helpful tavalai engineering staff now whined and throbbed on the floor, rigged into walls with the panels removed. The connections weren’t perfect, but they lit half the corridor lights, and gave the marines on door guard enough power to open and close the door without resorting to the hand winch.
Those marines now searched a small, female tavalai by hand as she stood on the edge of human territory with her arms in the air. Erik stopped before her, and did not need to be experienced with tavalai to decipher a look of great displeasure upon her face. Both marines were male, and Erik did not particularly care if female tavalai had sensitivities about being searched by men. Behind the woman, her State Department guards, no doubt armed beneath those civvie clothes as humans were not allowed to be. Behind them, and the cordon line established for the purpose, a small crowd of observers of various species, many of them media, gathered for a look down this open length of hall.
The marines cleared the woman, with a nod to Erik. Two more marines stared warily at the crowd, not trusting the assurances that only ‘safe’ tavalai had weapons. The woman walked to Erik, hand extended in the manner of one who thought she knew human customs well.
“Captain,” she said without need of a translator, “I am Jelidanatagani. We did not have the opportunity to meet in person, on Stoya.”
“Ah,” said Erik, accepting a perfunctory handshake. So this was Jeli, whom Trace and Dale had reported having no pleasure from meeting. She must have trailed them back to Kantovan System. “I’ve heard of you. What can I do for you?”
“A word, if you please. A private word.” With a glance at the watchers, over her shoulder.
Erik nodded, and walked back down the hall, allowing Jeli to walk at his side. His marine escort accompanied, not so patronising of their Captain to think that a small, female ambassador would be a threat to him, but wary of others. They’d explored the human quarter for other ways in and out, and while they hadn’t found any yet, the Phoenix engineers were confident some would exist. All agreed that there was no way in hell that State Department had left the human quarter alone for a thousand years, having all the means, motive and opportunity to get inside and look around any time they liked. And if they could get in and spy, they could get in and assassinate too, knowing the area far better than the newly arrived crew of Phoenix.
Erik arrived at the first door to a main office, and gestured Jeli inside. It was the lobby they’d first entered yesterday, desk lights now activated as the ceiling lights remained dark, and a small, portable coffee machine on the secretary’s desk. Crew had been seeing to necessities, then.
“Some coffee, Ambassador?” Erik suggested. “You’re familiar with it?”
“I will decline, thank you,” she said, repressing a grimace. Tavalai liked their flavours light and subtle, and coffee was not that. Captain Pram had liked Phoenix’s herbal tea, but could barely stomach a mouthful of coffee. Jeli probably thought he was trying to poison her.
Erik leaned against the desk, and left Jeli to stand in the middle of the floor. There were no chairs, and he wouldn’t have offered one anyway. “Captain,” she said, as prim and proper as any gruff-voiced, squat-shouldered tavalai could manage. “We know of your plot.”
Erik’s heart skipped a beat, but he kept it from his face. He’d been through this before, on Heuron. That time, Supreme Commander Chankow really had known his game, and the consequences had nearly been catastrophic. He hadn’t let anything slip that time, and he wouldn’t now. “Plot?” he said mildly.
“Your conspiracy,” said Jeli, with cold triumph. “With certain rogue elements of our fleet.”
Well, thought Erik. That didn’t sound good. But it wasn’t over yet. He recalled what his mother had always said when she felt herself accused unfairly. He made his expression as bored and bland as possible. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Please Captain,” the Ambassador snorted. “Do you think I don’t know how much some portions of our own Fleet dislike State Department? This has been a long battle for control of tavalai military force, and I assure you, Phoenix is a very recent comer to this struggle. Once upon a time, the most democratic nations of Earth believed that the military should always be commanded by civilians. That is State Department’s position too, and has been for millennia. Our Fleet, naturally, feels otherwise.”
“Can’t imagine why,” Erik said drily.
“And those old nations of Earth,” Jeli retorted, “would be quite horrified to see the military dictatorship that human government had descended to.”
“Yes, well those nations are all dead, aren’t they?” said Erik. “And we have State Department’s policies to thank in large part for that.” He hadn’t meant it to come out with such venom. But being in this place was having that effect upon more crew than just him. State Department had backed the krim, made them powerful, then failed to anticipate the consequences for Earth. Realising their mistake, they’d tried to correct by enforcing a peace that would have amounted to continued human slavery beneath their krim masters, and even joined the krim in fighting humans to enforce it. That had also failed, and in giving up in disgust, State Department had all but given krim the green light to kill what had been, at the time, the only planet upon which humans lived and thrived, and everyone upon it.
Standing here in this room, that had once been occupied by a woman whose only purpose for being here was to save her husband and two girls from the horrors of krim occupation, Erik knew that it was not just the halls and doors that shivered with the ghosts of the dead. Earth may have died, but the great tavalai institution whose blunders had so greatly contributed to its death remained, and now stood before him, still so certain in its own righteousness, and having learned nothing at all from history. Suddenly this entire mission was about far more than just a heist, for most of the Phoenix crew. It was payback.
“Captain,” Jeli said coldly, “this plan to destabilise the political balance between Fleet and State Department with your very high profile Parliament speech will not succeed. We know that you discussed it with Admiral Janik at Stoya. We have some reason to suspect that he wrote the speech for you. We know what it contains. I warn you — should you give it, there will be grave consequences f
or Phoenix, and for Family Debogande. You cannot defend them all, one in particular. Please think of her.”
Lisbeth, she meant. Erik smiled grimly. “Your English seems pretty solid,” he told her. “How good are your obscenities?”
Jeli frowned. “I beg your pardon?”
Erik leaned forward, and spoke slowly to avoid confusion. “Fuck off,” he told her.
“The good news is that she doesn’t have a clue,” Erik told the room as he entered the main human quarter assembly room. It had seating for perhaps a hundred, all the senior staff in what would have been a total of several thousand, at full strength. The seats were arranged in a semi-circular amphitheatre before a huge full-wall window that gave a view out onto the rocky planetoid about which the two main Tsubarata habitation rims were spun. The planetoid zoomed by fast ‘above’ the window, its craggy surface broken with shipping docks and hangar clusters. Several kilometres distant, the second habitation rim spun in the opposite direction. And rotating now past the view came the vast, curving planetside of Konik, butterscotch yellow beneath a bright blue horizon.
“What’s the bad news?” asked Romki from the Ambassador’s big chair before the podium desk. He, Hiro and several of Phoenix’s best computer engineers rigged the podium with sophisticated gear, some of it wireless, others cabled in directly, trying to get a feed from thousand-year-old systems that they’d powered up as best they could.
“The bad news,” said Erik, trotting down amphitheatre steps, “is that she’s getting desperate. She thinks it’s a purely political move, and she’s worried about the repercussions.”
“Of course she thinks it’s a political move,” said Romki, staring at his holograph display on the air-screen and his glasses both. “She’s a political operator, she can’t think any other way. Coming here was quite clever like that — it’s the ultimate political move. It’s got them all looking the wrong way.”
Kantovan Vault (The Spiral Wars Book 3) Page 28
