And All The Stars A Grave.

by Greg Curtis

  “That’s no cruiser!” The words were simply torn out of him as he stared in shock at the behemoth settling down behind his ship. The size of a city block, it was larger than any cruiser he’d ever seen. Much larger. In space he knew, there was no scale to judge the ship against so perhaps he might have had his dimensions wrong, but still this monster had to be far larger than any mere cruiser.

  Seeing it there on a world, set against the backdrop of the horizon and hills, tucked in nicely behind the Sparrow, he could take in the ship’s true magnitude, and it was awesome. It wasn’t just larger than a city block, it could probably hold an entire city of people inside. This was no puny Force cruiser such as had ever been seen in human space enforcing the thousands of strictures placed upon them. This ship had to be a full sized battle wagon, with probably the best part of two or three thousand officers - make that soldiers - and from the looks of the weapons ports, enough fire power to level all of the Earth’s fleets in seconds. Though of course they wouldn’t do that. He hoped.

  The Interstellar Community might not particularly like the Earth or her inhabitants, but they did allow her to continue to explore the region - within their strictly defined limits of course - and even to continue running their two small colonies, thus far. And the Force, whatever the opinions of the Community it served, would always obey the law. That after all was its reason for being.

  Yet even as he gaped in shock at the massive size of the battleship landing as lightly as a butterfly behind the Sparrow, he realised one more thing that worried him. That as much as he’d hurried, he was still late. The ship would be down before he arrived. Well before.

  Surely they had been ordering him around even as they’d begun their landing procedures? But using that as an excuse wouldn’t help him. And the bug couldn’t go any faster than fifty. It had a built in speed limiter for safety reasons. Not that it was unstable, it was just that the treads’ incredible traction coupled with the massive braking system, meant it could actually stop so fast it might theoretically break the driver’s neck before the stasis fields could react. The engines, although unbelievably powerful for any articulated ground explorer, were powered down during acceleration for the same reason.

  When he was still a klick from the Sparrow, he finally knew that the battleship was down, if only from the fact that it had stopped moving. There had been no sign of anything other than its antigrav drive operating as it had landed, no gusts of wind and dust from the thrusters, no noise from rockets, not even a heat haze from cooling engines. It spoke volumes about the technological advantages the Interstellar Community’s great races had over the smaller races like the humans, who had arrived belatedly on the scene. Antigrav systems so advanced they didn’t need ancillary drives to stabilise them. Something the Earth’s scientists could only dream of. Nor did it have wings, not even the stubby retractable types the Sparrow used as stabilisers. Despite having all the aeronautic grace of a brick, it could fly smoothly through the atmosphere without them.

  Its size was even larger than he’d first realised. And it just kept getting larger as he approached. According to the radar it was at least five hundred metres behind the Sparrow and his house, yet it dwarfed them both, like a skyscraper behind a couple of small mud huts. The ship had to be at least thirty stories high and over a klick long. Well over. And while that might be nothing special for the Force, it was larger than even the biggest space stations the Earth had built. Undoubtedly with engines and weapons to match.

  All coming to see him. Why?

  Once more he wondered desperately what exactly it was he was supposed to have done and came up with nothing. What could possibly warrant this sort of attention? Mass murder perhaps. Stealing the crown jewels, assuming the Interstellar Community had some. Yet he’d done nothing since being here, other than dig for ancient artefacts. On a site that not only was well within the sector of space permitted for human exploration, but which also had been specifically permitted for him to dig on.

  Whatever else he understood about it though, he understood one thing. It meant trouble.

  ****************

  The steel meeting room - in reality just a ground vehicle docking bay that had descended from the vast ship - was an oppressive place to have a meeting. Or maybe it was just the meeting that was oppressive. It had actually been fascinating driving up to the ship to see this impossibly large steel elevator descending from the bottom of the ship, and then to drive on to it. It had been even more fascinating to drive in and see another dozen ground and ground effects vehicles already parked inside it, all of them huge advances over anything his people had. The bug was completely outclassed by them.

  Then though, had come the meeting, and as he’d emerged from the bug to be greeted by a crewman and directed over to the others for formal introductions, his interest in the rest of the vehicles had disappeared. It had been time to be formal and remember his manners as he greeted them all in turn. But all his lessons in diplomacy had been of little use, as no sooner had the introductions been made, then Dr Helos, a scientist of all things, had started in to him with a list of accusations and charges. He hadn’t stopped since, and Daryl strongly suspected he wasn’t going to. It was his place apparently, simply to stand there and listen.

  “Twenty three separate infractions of the code! Did you set out to break some sort of record human, or is this just continuing poor judgement on your part?” Helos was at his most sarcastic, and also his most happy Daryl guessed. His people thrived on argument. Especially if they won, and they nearly always won. They made sure of it. He held his tongue knowing that he would be expected to bow and scrape to the Force by Earth University as well as the Force itself, and he had endured similar tongue lashings before. Even by Alers, though they were far from his favourite of the great races.

  Six legged centaurs, with hides of leather and patchy fur, they were a mean spirited people in his opinion. Arrogant, though the polite term was probably self-confident, physically imposing thanks to their size, and always willing to look down their surprisingly long, horse like noses at others, they annoyed him. This particular specimen, Helos, was simply a normal member of his people, though sadly someone had given him some sort of authority over him.

  Somehow though, the tone of his accuser, even through the translator unit in his ear, was raising the hairs on his back. The six legged centaur might be happy arguing, and even more so at winning, but Daryl was sure he was taking some extra pleasure at rubbing his lowly human nose in it. Like some sadistic schoolteacher enjoying the rush of power as he berated his poor student.

  “Seven illegal modifications to your ship maser, none of which were notified to either your own Government or to the Force. Two further modifications to your drive unit, again not notified.”

  “But I did notify them when they were made in Earth dock and they were approved. In any case this is an Earth Fleet vessel, and I don’t own it, so I can’t be held responsible. Also, they’re not weapons. Not really. Your engineers can tell you that. In space the maser would be far less effective than it was before I had it modified. It’s just a borer, its purpose simply to help the ship dig tunnels on this world. And the two mods to the drive were patch jobs when the ship ran into an interstellar dust cloud on the way here.” Inside though, even as defended himself as politely and ably as he could, he was wondering why he had to, especially to this particular Aler. He wore no uniform, in fact he appeared to have no rank at all, and surely had no power of arrest. But no one else seemed to be interrupting him, and the other Force officers seemed quite happy to let him carry on. In fact they seemed to be enjoying it.

  “And where are the records?” The Aler tapped two of his six feet, and Daryl knew he was caught in the alien’s trap. Of course he had no records. They were back on Earth with the spaceport authority who’d done the work, as Helos undoubtedly knew. Instead he said nothing, knowing there was nothing he could say that he hadn’t already said a hundred times to the ship’s crew. They weren’
t interested in listening.

  “I thought so. No records means no evidence. Therefore the modifications are both illegal and unreported. That’s up to five standard years on each count.” Thirty-five years on an alien penal colony, for nothing. Daryl gulped, - quietly, while noting that the Aler sounded more than slightly pleased with himself even through the dry tones of the translator. And he still wasn’t finished. Actually he was barely getting started.

  “And then there are the fourteen illegal flight offences. Did you somehow forget that you’re supposed to acknowledge every communication from each beacon you pass? Or did you choose to ignore it, hoping that perhaps the beacons would miss you? Allowing you perhaps to slip out of your species’ predetermined spatial zone?”

  “The ship responds automatically to any and all beacons that we pass, as it’s programmed to, and the log shows it missed none. The course never varied.”

  “And so now you’re blaming the ship for your failures human. Surely you are familiar with the code. It has after all, been translated into your primitive language. Rule 247, clause 93, section two. ‘The pilot of all vessels upon receiving a communication from a locator beacon must respond within twenty three standard minutes, with a verbal advice of the name of the ship, its point of origin, destination, speed and position coordinates. Yet this you have not done.”

  “The ship gave all that information automatically each and every time.”

  “Yes it did. But the code calls for you to do it, not the ship’s computer. Or is that too difficult for you to understand human?” The accusation shocked Daryl, not least because it was true. It was something he like every other human pilot had debated long and hard. On the one hand to expect the pilot to do that was unreasonable on a small vessel, especially when the ship might pass a beacon at any point, perhaps waking up the pilot three or four times a night and leading to tiredness and the inevitable mistakes. On the other hand they didn’t want to be caught out by the technicalities of the law. But in the end they’d been advised by the D’lorian Ambassadors, that a computer simulation of the pilot’s voice, provided it gave all the required information was good enough. It was exactly what all the other races did.

  “And do your own pilots notify in person? Or the thousands of other one man ships cruising through Community space?” He shouldn’t have said it Daryl knew, the words just seemed to slip out of his mouth by themselves. But the Aler’s superior attitude and bitterly unfair charges were finally wearing him down, and Daryl was just beginning to get angry. Stupid! He kicked himself mentally. But he still knew that the others hadn’t obeyed the letter of the law either. No pilots did even when they had sufficient crew to man a twenty-four hour roster. Computers were more reliable.

  “Or do they too choose to leave the task to the more reliable computer?”

  “Do not change the subject human.” Helos crossed his middle legs and fixed him directly with a stare from his three black eyes, a sign of frustration and anger soon to follow. “It is you who’s under question here.”

  Daryl knew he’d probably gone far beyond the point where a smart person would leave off. And more importantly he’d gone far beyond where his people would have allowed him to when dealing with the Force. The last thing any of them could afford was trouble with the Interstellar Community. More trouble that was. Humanity already knew they’d obviously done something wrong, somewhere or somewhen, or else that they were simply something that the Community disapproved of, strongly. Hence humanity’s unfair treatment at its hands. And at the hands of its Interstellar Force. But they couldn’t defend themselves against prejudice or charges they weren’t told of, assuming they had actually been charged with something. Nor could they fight their way out. Not against a collective of hundreds if not thousands of alien races all acting as one and with technology centuries ahead of their own. It was unfair but the only way out of their predicament they assumed, was to obey every single command that the Community gave them, as best they could, and in time pray that they would be accepted into it. One day.

  “This is useless. The human is not interested in helping us, and in any case it is too simple to understand our work. We should just leave it here.” The little Regularan, who until then had seemed almost pleasant, mainly because he’d said nothing at all, suddenly broke in and showed his own disagreeable bias. That coupled with his scaly green skin and lizard like appearance, gave Daryl the uncomfortable feeling that Dr. Li would prefer to have him for dinner then as a helper. The rather intimidating dentition in its mouth added to that worry. He’d seen a few of them before among Force patrols, and always thought them rather unassuming quiet types. This one clearly wasn’t. Nevertheless its attitude was in his favour as well as its timely interruption.

  “With respect Sir, I agree.” But Daryl immediately realised that he must have said something wrong even in agreeing with him, as he watched the little Regularan’s green scaled face wrinkle up like a prune. He might not be able to read many alien facial expressions - of those species that actually had faces - but he was certain this wasn’t a good one.

  “I don’t like you human. Your species is unworthy of my time. But don’t think you can manipulate me because of it.” The Regularan wheezed at him, its voice breaking up badly even through the translator, which probably meant he was also angry. How could he have upset two aliens in one meeting? Daryl knew that that would not go down well with his supervisors when they found out.

  “But I wasn’t trying -”

  “I don’t think you could be of any use to us.” He cut him off without a thought. “You are too primitive. Your people have barely mastered space flight, your knowledge is extremely limited, and you want to help us solve the greatest riddle of space. The Ancients.”

  Which was the complete opposite of the truth. Daryl would much rather have stayed with his dig on Navid Two. Certainly the rewards might not have been as great, but then neither would the price. And living on a ship for months or years, crewed by the great races as they were known, was as far from pleasant as anything he could imagine. Every single one of them seemed to regard humanity the same way they would a particularly unpleasant cockroach that had landed in their food. Assuming they didn’t like cockroaches. But he had to be polite. Besides, the mention of the Ancients had caught his attention. They wanted his help in researching the Ancients? That was surely every archaeologist’s dream. Except for the people he’d have to share it with of course.

  “With respect Sir, I was not using you, merely agreeing. I also do not see what help I could give your scientists. And I would rather stay here as well. Besides I’ve already been out here for nearly ten months. I’m due to return home shortly and then take some shore leave. At least a couple of months of it as required by both Earth Fleet and Force regulations. Then I’ve got to start writing up my findings, another six months worth of work.”

  “Which is not what you will be doing.” The captain broke in once more, clearly not liking where the conversation was going. Myrans were not only blunt, they were incredibly logical and persistent. They had decided he was coming with them, wherever that might be. They had surely already arranged it with his superiors, and the United Earth Government. And when they’d realised he might not want to go, they had carefully begun framing him, ensuring his cooperation with the threat of many long years on a penal planet. Probably more than he would survive.

  Their people seemed to operate on ‘the end justifies the means’ principal, and so they made certain that every possible loose thread was plucked long before they ever made their presentation. They knew they had all the cards in their hands, and they’d made sure that he knew it too, so it seemed pointless to them for him to resist. Actually they probably found it aggravating. But then he found their methods infuriating, not that he would dare tell them that.

  “You will -” The captain was unexpectedly cut off in mid-sentence by Helos.

  “You will be joining us as we seek out the Ancients. Or you will be spending the rest of
your life in one of the worst places you can imagine. I suggest you choose wisely human.” But Helos had overstepped himself. He’d not only angered him with his threats, he’d upset the captain as well, breaking in on him when he was speaking. The Myran’s bald head swivelled to face the Aler, and while Daryl might not know much about alien facial expressions he guessed that the captain was angry. But then so was he. Partly as a snub, he ignored the Aler and turned to face the captain.

  “Captain, I seem to recall somewhere in the code that a pilot accused of so many serious offences is entitled to a trial of the full Force court. One where the accused gets a legal advisor and plenty of time to organise a defence, and no doubt obtain copies of the records in question. And I can obtain all of those records. Likewise such a trial makes binding decisions on all the Community. And I do believe that all citizens would benefit from hearing the decision of the court that all responses to beacons must be in person. That computer representation is not acceptable.” Unspoken in which was the understanding that any such decision would be greeted by widespread anger, as pilots of every race told the Force where to go. They might possibly have him on a technical breach, but it was going to cost them more than they could surely afford to use it, if he had any choice in the matter.