Chaos Cipher
by
Denver Harrington
Chaos Cipher
Copyright © Denver Harrington
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means including photocopying, recording, or information storage and retrieval without permission in writing from the author.
ISBN-13: 978-151732-555-8
ISBN-10: 1-517-32555-2
Cover art by Denver Harrington
Special thanks to:
Steve Dawber
Damien Hendry
Bob Kettle
André Fairweather
Claire Bassi
Joe Heaton
Pawel Burza
Andy Maiden
Laura Taylor
Sylwia Moskal
Give feedback on the book at:
Denverharrington.com
[email protected]
[email protected]
Twitter: @DenverHarring
First Edition
Printed in the U.S.A
Thank you to my good friend James, whose interest in science fiction has had a great influence on me and contributed to this story and its characters. A warm thank you for the encouragement and support of my friends and family, this book is dedicated to them, and especially to Sysh, whose love and patience apparently knows no limits.
Flapping butterfly
Rising from her chrysalis
Stirring hurricanes.
PART ONE
RESTITUTION EREBUS
-1-
Rynal planted a seed not long after his daughter was born. He pushed the dull kernel into the ground down on the exo-planet Amora and cupped the earth around it, blessing its wellbeing with a hopeful prayer. He savoured the moment, a symbolism of new life, then wondered how big the tree would grow to be by the time his daughter was his age. Providing the terraforming stations remain operative over the next century, that tree should be as big as the redwood pines he’d heard of in the Amazon wastelands on Earth. Nature knows how to plan for the future; of that he was sure. Intrinsically the process of life seeds and slumbers and dies and springs, each new life blooming from the remains of the last, offered over into continuity. But the Earthers do not dream. They do not plan. They do not care. Earthers call themselves Titans of the Atominii world - such doleful ignorance brings out a great disdain within his otherwise acutely scientific mind that Rynal disappointingly found himself more often than not trying to temper, since wasting his cognitive capacity to dwell on Earthers unless necessary was far too burdensome. But recently, the subject was becoming more and more difficult to avoid since there were rumours of ships coming in and out of this system, mysterious starnavis docking at the Kyklos station. His home.
He stood from the ground and turned slowly as if to absorb the panorama of the humid world before him. Amora was a place of calcareous skies, vast dark oceans and rocky terrain webbed only by the scarce vines of fungi. His breath fogged in the breathing mask. Nitrogen and methane were rich in the atmosphere, but there wasn’t yet much oxygen here, and what atmosphere there was itched at Rynal’s ears. Holding his gaze skyward he heard the soft footsteps of old Osmond tread closer and stop.
‘Not much longer now, Osmond,’ Rynal said without turning. His voice caught in the cusp of his mask, slightly muffled and transmitting into Osmond’s earpiece. ‘One day in our life time, all this will be habitable at last.’
‘I have a message from Malla,’ Osmond digressed, arms held behind his hips. Rynal turned to see his trusty uncle. Like most Olympians he was tall, wiry and mutated by the cruel genomes of their Earther past, the genetic human, a proud society’s answer to a rapidly changing environment. Osmond’s fangs flashed as he spoke from behind his mask, his lower incisors notably larger than his higher, pushing his lip up into an intimidating and misleading scowl. Without a doubt he looked unapproachable, but Osmond was a warm and loyal soul.
‘The Kyklos order has granted her permission to come and visit you. She’s arriving here on The Cereno,’ he divulged. ‘Your daughter I believe is with her too. As is your brother, Raven.’
Rynal tired of watching the black oceans crash and spray and turned his attention to the distant atmospheric processing plant, a huge cross-frame pollution station, pumping gasses, heating up the cold and stark world with variously measured pollutants.
‘Family reunion,’ Rynal smiled genially, his fangs jutting just below the lips, radiant green eyes like emerald jewels shifted with joy at the thought of seeing them again. Rynal had a queue of hair upon his head that hung in a long black tail to his hip, shaven at the sides. Upon his forehead he had antennae almost eight inches from his skull protruding like fish-bones, a mutation that merged technology and biology. His antennae felt the subtle vibrations of everything, allowing him to tap into frequencies locked out to most sentient beings. Transqualian abilities like his were rare, but not unique among some transhuman cultures. Working on the Amorian atmospheric processor gave his transqualian reach a long hiatus, there was little to tap into here, no radio signals, no neurophase frequencies, only the light of the Suntau which he could sometimes hear with a little practice. The work itself, however, had given him little repose and other than to witness his daughter’s birth he had rarely ventured back to the Kyklos station. It was his ambition to make a world better than the Atominii, better than the Earthers, to imagine a place of quality, to inspire those who do not dream. Such a place demanded strong order, regulation, and a tightly nipped utopia. It must be perfect - to lead by example.
Rynal had within his fist the soil scooped from the ground. He opened his palm and let the grains slip into the wind. Finer granules still caught around the material of his suit’s sleeve, and he watched the rest race away. He wanted to be kind to this world. He wanted it better than their last, a chance to be better with each other than they had been to one another on the Kyklos station. Although, that had been fairly well, each had still found reason to accuse or scrutinise the other for some unfounded reason. He wanted none of that here, though Malla would tell him often, conflict is the nature of things, an evolutionary state. Life was already well on the way to finding ground, they were merely speeding up the process from millennia to mere decades, via chemical and biological conditioning. There was no more room to dream where it could be done for you, that’s what Rynal had learned of the Earther Atominii cities. They say dreams are made real in the digital realm of the quasilands where Earthers plug in and lose themselves to unthinkable pleasures and pains. It would be different this time, he thought. Here, things would be right. Leadership was necessary throughout the deep space journey, throughout the dangerous voyage, but on Amora, all would be equal. We would all find place.
A fiery overcast of light shone as The Cereno passed overhead, roaring engines tearing through the valley. Rynal and Osmond watched the ship adjust for descent. The Cereno was a bulky starnavis, with a rounded turtle-shell hull and a tail fin spiked with communication arrays and solar panels. The four sturdy roll thrusters at the front and rear extended out wide and aimed their lilac flames earth wise, torching the rock into billows of dust. Gently the huge carrier touched down.
‘Osmond,’ Rynal said, making pace toward The Cereno with his long coat flagging in the forged zephyrs of the carrier’s engines. ‘Send our other starnavis back home and come with me. We’ll take The Cereno.’
‘Already done,’ he decided.
*
Once the loading bay platform was sealed Rynal let his mask hang at his belt as he and Osmond made their way through the main ramp and storage deck. He was about to reach for the cargo hold door to by-pass his way to the bridge when Osmond grabbed his wrist.
‘Not that way,’ he
said. ‘It’s temporarily closed off.’
Rynal took a moment to stare at the quarantined door and asked ‘Why?’
‘Special shipment,’ Osmond informed. ‘The Cereno’s stacked with an Obsiduranium catalyst.’
Rynal looked alarmed.
‘It’s safe,’ old Osmond assured, ‘there’s no power source for it. Just an input, nothing wired.’
‘Still, think you should be bringing black alloy down here on a planet?’
‘Nobody knows we have it.’
‘How much?’ he asked, still puzzled and beginning his assumptions, ‘enough to cause a radiation hazard in the cargo hold, right? What’s that, half a ton?’
Osmond shook his head and told him it was closer to two.
‘Osmond, where did it come from?’
‘The Sacred Star Acolytes,’ Osmond explained. ‘Our Naval forces division picked it up from an asteroid system. We believe it was stolen but never recovered. Somebody tried to hide it in the asteroid field.’
‘Why did you bring it here?’
‘I didn’t,’ Osmond insisted. ‘It was retrieved by a scout team. We kept it aboard The Cereno because of the engines. She’s a big starnavis, but she can make a fast run.’
‘How did the scout team find that stuff? We’re nowhere near the asteroid fields.’
‘They were having…dreams.’
Osmond didn’t want to insinuate anything. Ever since Rynal’s daughter had been born people were experiencing strong senses of what was loosely referred to as Déjà Vu or visions. Some were sensing things that had not yet happened before they eventually did. Others were hearing voices. For the Sacred Star Acolytes it had been the hidden catalyst, haunting them, its very position as clear as crystal on the start charts in their dreams.
‘Dreams?’ Rynal quizzed.
‘It could be the Elixir,’ old Osmond shrugged unconvincingly. ‘Perhaps it’s finally talking to us…’
‘Who else knows about this?’
And Rynal suddenly became aware of a new presence in the ship’s hallway as Malla slowly walked down one of the travel ramps that curved around either side of the cargo door.
‘For the moment,’ she said confidently. ‘Just a small number of us.’
She was wearing a neat padded hair cap. Her space suit was a thick black material, neatly shaping out her body with criss-cross patterns, shielding plates and segmented colour sections lined with zipping seams. Two thick air filter pipes extended from her abdomen and fed behind her into an oxygen pack. Her collar was a thick bronze ring that ran atop of her shoulders with several adjustments, able to house a protective space helmet. A sanguine smile spread across her lips as she faced her slightly shorter husband. Her eyes aglow like rubies dazzling in the light, she took his hands and their foreheads touched.
Rynal shut his eyes, feeling the waves of silent passion pass back and forth between them and she touched his cheek with the back of her glove.
‘Your daughter is waiting to see you in the main cabin.’ She said.
‘Malla,’ Rynal tried again. ‘That catalyst…’
‘The catalyst offers us security,’ she said. ‘We need it now more than ever.’
‘That’s right,’ old Osmond then asserted with his hands formally behind his hips. ‘Rynal, the Sacred Star Acolytes saw this thing for a reason. The Chronomancer child wanted us to find it…’
‘You don’t know that.’ Rynal said.
‘Yes, I do.’ Osmond continued. ‘It’s no coincidence. Just last month there was an Earther here…a Titan.’
‘A Titan?’ Rynal repeated. ‘What did they want?’
‘He wanted to speak with some of our leaders. He offered the Sacred Star Acolytes pardon from Earth providing we sell them this very star system. It seems they’re interesting in the appropriation of our new planet.’
‘We said no,’ Malla re-joined, her red eyes beautiful and resolute. ‘Naturally.’
‘But that doesn’t change the fact,’ said old Osmond, stepping forward, ‘that our enemy knows where we are and they have targeted our system for another use, probably for Obsiduranium mining.’
‘How much time do we have?’ Rynal asked.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Osmond. ‘We have a deterrent. They can’t bully us into handing over this star system. With a catalyst in our possession the Atominii won’t dare touch us.’
‘And the Elixir?’ asked Rynal. ‘Do they know?’
‘I doubt anyone outside of Kyklos knows of the Elixir.’ Malla stated.
*
Where the Kyklos station circled above the peridot planet Amora, with the Suntau star suspended above the northern axis, Rynal’s civilization had cultivated upon the circular station a realm of well governed and coordinated peace. They had their own dreams for the young planet Amora. Rynal imagined they shared his vision of building a civilisation worthy of being called civilised, an extension of autarkic holacracy they had realised together on the Kyklos station. It wasn’t perfect, but it was peaceful. Like many Olympians it was Rynal’s wish to have just such a world on Earth, but he had lost hope for that dream long ago. And he had hopes for his daughter as she lay quietly in his arms. Just a few months old the sleeping baby had already made a huge impact on those who had looked upon her eyes. They believed it was she who was changing their outlook. They believed she was a Chronomancer. Rynal largely ignored the claim. He’d never believed in such nonsense. After all, nobody can see the future. It simply is not set.
He watched her, wrapped in the warm thermal quilt that was silver on the outside. Rynal was steady as The Cereno lifted. He gently approached one of the porthole windows to watch the land shrink away below the cumulus. The rock and sea faded beneath the thick atmosphere made denser by the huge stations still pumping pollutants into the sky. He turned as his tall and laconic brother, Raven stalked into the galley.
‘I had rather wondered,’ he began, uttering from the shadows, ‘if thine errand to the terraforming station would be all but brief.’ Two small chartreuse rings shone back where Raven’s eyes were.
‘Why?’ Rynal whispered gently. ‘Are you missing a sparring partner, Raven?’
‘Ney,’ Raven respectfully confessed. ‘Only thy kin.’
Raven stepped further into the light. He looked much like Rynal, only his hair was longer, thicker and in strands that hung past even his hair cap and his green eyes and fangs were the only visible mutation to him.
‘I’ve missed you too, my kin.’ Rynal smiled. ‘And when we’re home we can head to the recreational district and hammer back a few.’
‘Nothing would please me further.’ Raven said, bowing his head. ‘But hear my words brother. These arms,’ he said, lifting his arms up with fists tight, ‘forged as they are from years of training, have not the will to carry thee again home from our intemperate remissions.’
Rynal laughed. ‘Like the last time?’
‘Though I never tire of the competition,’ Raven winked.
Rynal turned his nose down to the child to see if she had woken.
‘Thou hast better be ready, brother,’ Raven said in a low voice. ‘The Cereno has not the means of a gravmex. Canst thou yet sense the lack of gravity? We will be in orbit soon.’
Rynal returned to the cradle and rested the sleeping baby within. Robotic polymer arms adjusted to guide the infant down on the soft cocoon of fleshy white materials and Rynal moved over to a ladder to head for the bridge. Raven slouched over the galley’s table and watched him leave.
*
Osmond observed The Cereno’s functions as the autopilot command took them out of Amora’s stratosphere. From here they could see the Kyklos ring station, a large wheeling habitat kilometres in size. An elegant structure, the Kyklos wheeled and sparkled where the mirrors winked back from the spherical axis, a large docking harbour for deep space starnavis. Lights cruised back and forth on the spokes as elevators serviced the ringular centrifuge. As he watched, Rynal winced at a glimpse of the Suntau
star as it flashed through one of The Cereno’s portholes and he steadied himself on a solenoid footpath. Malla swam through the low gravity to join him and he helped her down onto the path. She was smiling as her boots secured. The micro-gravity never failed to amuse Malla and it always sent waves through her stomach and chest.
‘Coming up on the Kyklos,’ old Osmond said.
‘I’m looking forward,’ Malla told Rynal.
‘To what?’ he asked.
‘Getting back,’ she said. ‘Having you home, away from those atmosphere stations on Amora.’
‘Well one day we’ll be calling Amora our home if all goes well.’
Suddenly the power cut and The Cereno’s bridge fell into a dark silence. Osmond held up his hands, confused, ready to admit he’d touched something he shouldn’t have. Spots of light moved around the bridge, beaming in from the windows as they cruised through the Suntau’s light.
‘Osmond?’ Rynal’s voice uttered.
‘I-I don’t know…’ he stuttered.
And then a brilliant light cast through the windows causing Malla to scream and turn away. The transparent material quickly reacted, becoming opaque enough to dampen the radiation, discerning a huge fireball silently bloating ahead through space.
Chaos Cipher Page 1
