The Impossible Future: Complete set

by Frank Kennedy

  Of most importance to Michael and the Solomon equity movement, Entilles hosted private conferences between the prefecture’s most powerful descendancies and Presidiums. In a world without centralized government, this was how they negotiated many of the most crucial economic and political decisions. And that, at a time of Chancellor civil war, made the Entilles a target.

  Michael understood his role and precisely what to watch for, but worried double duty would throw off his comedic timing. He’d be nervous enough circling the stage surrounded by hundreds of people he despised, decked out in their most bejeweled finery. But having to put eyes on his target without giving himself away – that was another matter.

  As he counted the final minutes on the substage beneath the audience, Michael reached for his flask. He filled it before leaving home, knowing full well he’d polish it off before night’s end. This was a new brand, more juiced than the variety making the rounds on the Pacific Riviera. He savored each sip and hid the flask. Two minutes before showtime, he sniffed a sweet jolt of poltash weed and scanned the prep room, where performers cavorted. He jumped off the substage and approached a Solomon soprano who’d later sing opera classics while hovering above the audience.

  “Nice pipe,” he said, pointing to the four-inch blue cylinder from which the woman was smoking. “Left mine back at my landing. Care if I take a hit?”

  She offered a wry smile, suggesting the hope of something joyful in return. “Of course, Michael. Finish it if you have time.”

  He grabbed the pipe. “You know me?”

  “Sweetie, every Solomon in the NAC knows who you are. You’re doing good work out there.”

  As he inhaled from the pipe and filled his lungs with poltash, Michael tingled. Shit. How much does she know?

  “Keep them laughing, Michael. They will look in the mirror someday, sweetie, thanks to Solomons like you.”

  As smoke poured out his nose, he returned her pipe.

  “Have you seen my act?”

  Her smile dampened. “Once. That was enough. But it’s OK. I know what you’re trying to do. It’s very courageous.”

  “More like a license to steal their damn money.”

  She laughed. “As if they would ever miss it.” The substage glowed, signaling thirty seconds. “Slay them, Michael.”

  He didn’t ask her name and figured he never would. Opera – on stage or hovering – offered no appeal. She cut a stunning figure, only a few years older, but even the possibility of a late-night union at her place did not stir him. Michael had one love, one desire, and she was millions of kilometers from Earth.

  As the round stage rose beneath Michael, the ceiling pixelated and disappeared above him. He wasn’t nervous about the reception – most of his audiences reacted with quiet skepticism until they heard the punch lines. Rather, he dreaded performing in the round, which was the universal theatrical preference of Chancellors.

  Michael hated the notion that no matter which way he turned, there were always people behind him. Two years ago, he took a pair of bullets in the back at Lake Vernon, Alabama, and should have died. Sam took a laser pulse through her spine at Hamilton Park in Philadelphia Redux and should have died. From time to time, the nightmares of both horrors tore him from a fitful sleep.

  “If you’re gonna shoot a man,” he told Rikard a year ago, “look in his goddamn eyes first and know what you’re ending.”

  “It’s a reasonable code,” Rikard said as they studied the layout of a mercenary’s landing. “Just don’t expect everyone else to hold the same standard as you.”

  “Tell me about it. I grew up in a world of double standards.”

  Michael kept to his code two hours later when he shot his first target working deep-ops for Rikard’s team.

  It wasn’t hard to justify. The Presidium paying them to take out the assassins expressed sympathy for Solomon equity and pushed hard to prosecute anyone who collaborated in developing the immortals and the Jewel hybrids. The mercs came from a descendancy of hardliners and belonged to the same affiliation hired to kill Michael and Sam in Rear Admiral Augustus Perrone’s purge. When Michael stood over the body, he felt none of the remorse that tortured him after killing Christian Bidwell. This felt right. Necessary.

  “This is what it takes now,” he told Rikard after they fled the scene. “I been half a heartbeat from death so often, reckon it’s my turn to spin the wheel on some of these mo-fos. Get my speed?”

  “Even if it means saving the lives of Chancellors who wish you’d never crossed the fold?”

  He laughed. “Ain’t nothing more satisfying than having a Chancellor in your debt. That’s the whole purpose of deep-ops, right? Build allies? Hold leverage when the war ends?”

  All of which was enough motivation for Michael. Later, when Rikard invited him into a permanent role, Michael didn’t hesitate. Knowing full well the decision meant more bodies on the deck, he threw back a shot of jubriska and said, “I’m in.”

  He never told Sam how far he’d gone as a soldier in the Chancellors’ civil war. Maybe when it’s over, he convinced himself.

  Now, as he arrived at eye level with the Entilles audience, Michael heard the announcer introduce him as “the man who brings a special proto-African charm to the Collectorate.”

  He whispered under his breath, “The fuck?”

  Shaking off his frustration, Michael spoke over the smattering of applause and went for the opening every mediocre standup comic delivered on first-Earth TV.

  “Hello, Boston Prefecture! How we all doin’ tonight?”

  He gave them a second to produce the predictable non-response. “Yeah, yeah. I feel you. It’s Boston, right? Number one in everybody’s hearts for fifteen hundred years, give or take. Am I right, people?” Steady applause. “Fifteen hundred years. Can you imagine?” He pointed to a silver-haired Chancellor near the front. “This fella can. He laid the first stone.”

  That was the gut punch he needed. As the audience erupted into howls, Michael dived into his routine. By the end of ten minutes, he successfully compared the Chancellory to the Third Reich and the Admiralty of the Guard to James Bond movie villains. They didn’t understand the analogies, so Michael never knew if they laughed at the punchlines or the way he flailed while delivering them.

  “But seriously, there was this guy back in my neck of the universe called Goebbels. Worked for that Hitler asshole I mentioned before. Let me tell you, this Goebbels was a piece of work. You’d love him. He said if you tell a lie often enough and loud enough, it becomes the truth. Now ain’t that the truth, people?”

  He slayed, fulfilling the opera singer’s encouraging words.

  All the while, Michael’s eyes segmented the audience, looking for his assigned target. He circumnavigated the stage-level tier first, then moved upward with methodical precision. Advance intel said Finnegan Moss always sat near the stage. Michael had studied the face for hours and grew nervous when he didn’t make contact right away. Moss was supposed to be here: Dinner with three women in the Onyx Presidium – none of them his wife – and then private talks with a rep from the Juniper Presidium afterward. That’s when the attack would happen. The intel was rock-solid.

  Michael wondered whether someone got to him before Moss reached Entilles, although the possibility seemed slim. Like most powerful Chancellors, Moss carried a phalanx of security – a combination of pay-rolled Solomons and freelance mercenaries. No security apparatus – or weaponry of any form – was allowed inside the theater, creating an oasis from the violence. However, security teams blanketed the external promenade and the corridors linking private landings. The deep-ops team needed a genetic lock on Moss to set up a cordon around him once he left the theater.

  They needed Michael.

  Nineteen minutes into his twenty-five-minute set, Michael found Moss out of place in the third tier. He wasn’t laughing as hard at the jokes as his female companions.

  Now came the hard part. Time for Michael to get close. He had six minutes to
plant a bleeder on Finnegan Moss, or that man likely wouldn’t survive the night.

  Michael couldn’t guarantee his own survival, either.

  3

  Unification Guard headquarters

  Vasily Intersystem Transit Station

  S AM AND MICHAEL TALKED ABOUT HAVING children, but the conversations went nowhere. They cheated death enough to understand the folly of long-range plans in an unstable universe. They also weren’t ready to defy the law banning Chancellor-Solomon offspring. They broached the topic only when others pointed out Sam’s genetic loophole: She might bear children free of the Chancellory’s tragic fate because brontinium extract never poisoned her blood.

  Michael, who was an only child, admitted he wanted kids someday. Months ago, as they walked the Pacific beach at the Pynn outpost, he reminisced about first Earth.

  “When I was little, Pops took us on these trips to Starkville.” He laughed. “My aunts and uncles were pumping out kids like rabbits. It was crazy, but I had some wicked times with my cousins. So, yeah, I wouldn’t mind having a gaggle of mini-Coopers.”

  He took Sam in his arms and came in for a long kiss. “Right now, I reckon we need to settle for loving each other. This shit is about to get real again, and there’s gonna be a serious damn body count. I promise, Sam. We come out the other side, I’m gonna marry you. We’ll have a mess of little dumbasses, then we’ll grow old together and start yelling at kids to stay off the grass.”

  It was one of Sam’s most beautiful memories. His humor untouched, his tenderness unvarnished, his courage undaunted. All of this as he fought battles forced upon him, bulked up to become a warrior in training, and spent every spare minute playing catch-up on his second-Earth education.

  The notion of kids rushed over Sam when she learned the age of the survivors she was about to interview.

  “Fraternal twins,” Maj. Cyril Lancaster told her. “Age thirteen. Lived with their parents on Ark Carrier Newton above G’hladi colony. Were on route to Earth on the STS Kilmurry after leaving Newton because of harassment and death threats. The family was outspoken that the UG should stand down starting with the next generation.”

  Patricia nodded. “They were lucky to escape at all. Chancellors above G’hladi are known for being hardliners.”

  “Their parents?” Sam asked.

  The major shrugged. “No idea. They were registered in the manifest, but they were not among the dead. Six others are also missing. Two adults, four children. Possibly vented into space.”

  “Something’s not right, Major. We were told there were four survivors. Our last report said …”

  “Girls, ages ten and eleven. Died a few hours ago. Their stasis pods were damaged, causing irreparable neurological collapse. Even the best facilities on Earth wouldn’t have saved them.”

  Sam understood Chancellory medicine well – she would have died on the table two standard years ago if not for their marvels.

  “Those poor kids. Have they said what happened to the ship?”

  “Not as such. The Kilmurry was out of communication for eleven days. We know this from Fulcrum transit beacons. And given their request, we assume they spent time in the throes of your dear friend James Bouchet. Beyond that, Miss Pynn, we have no more than we ever do after these attacks.”

  She ignored the “dear friend” snark and focused on a new challenge. Sam never played well with younger children – for years, she preferred the company of older, more dangerous kids.

  Her worries escalated when she rounded a bend and stared into a glass-encased conference room with a round table, at which sat a boy and a girl moving their fingers hurriedly through holographic games. Their recreation did not elicit smiles; Sam thought they appeared robotic. They were smaller than typical for their age, but Sam wasn’t surprised given their family’s aversion to the Guard.

  “Brayllen and Rosalyn Helmut,” the major said. “The boy is unpredictable. Anxious. We’ve had to sedate him twice. The girl is composed but very cautious in her choice of words. Every time she appears ready to divulge critical details, she backs off. Insists she will talk only to Samantha Pynn.”

  She sought the advice of her aide and mentor. “Thoughts?”

  Pat winced. “Sam, did your mother ever calm you when you were frightened?”

  “The night she was killed. We were preparing for an enemy assault on our home. She got me through the toughest patch.”

  “Good. Hear her voice. Match her tone. Comforting but firm. Yes? These two have been waiting on you for days. Let their reaction guide your words.”

  Sam asked the major, “Will you be in there?”

  “No. They’ve had their fill of me. Your Chief is correct. They could use a maternal presence.”

  Sam was eighteen by the Collectorate standard calendar but now felt much older; Michael would appreciate the irony. With a final boost of encouragement from Pat, she steeled herself and headed where she expected to hear nothing good.

  The twins, both auburn-haired, paid her no mind at first, although the boy sneaked a darting glance in between gaming maneuvers. Sam positioned herself across the table and waited for them to snap out of their hypnotic gestures. The girl reacted first, setting her hands on her lap without wiping the holocube. She tilted her head slyly as if daring her visitor to speak first. Did she assume Sam was another Guard inquisitor? If the girl was playing chicken, she won.

  Sam broke the silence. “Hello, Rosalyn. Brayllen. Major Lancaster says you have something to tell me.”

  Brayllen gasped, pushing back his chair. “Are you Samantha?”

  Rosalyn whispered to her brother and insisted he stay seated.

  “Yes, Brayllen, my name is Samantha Pynn.”

  “Prove it,” Rosalyn said, dispersing the game and opening a new holocube. “Every Chancellor has a unique genetic stream stamp to prove identity. Toss yours to me.”

  Sam, who learned of the identifier many months after her amp was installed, fingered a cube and flicked over the data.

  “I have less than two years’ record,” she told Rosalyn. “I was born on a different Earth.”

  Tears overcame Brayllen as he leaped from his chair. “It is you. It’s exactly what he told us.”

  The boy ignored his sister’s pleas and rushed around the table, flinging his arms around Sam, his tears raining. She detected a combination of relief and terror as he sobbed into her bodysuit.

  “He said you would come, Samantha. He said you were a good person and you’d never let our parents die.”

  She bent down until square with his eyes, which he tried to wipe dry. “Who, Brayllen? Who said this?”

  He stammered, as if frightened to reply. “Brother James.”

  “Brother?”

  “That’s his name. He said he used to have two others, but he doesn’t need them now. He said you’d understand.”

  She did. “He has your parents?”

  A hand touched her shoulder before Brayllen answered. Rosalyn stood tall and glassy-eyed.

  “Yes,” the girl said. “And the parents of our best friends, too. We haven’t heard from Freida or Carmen. They were supposed to be with us, but the major won’t tell us anything.”

  Sam formed the picture. The two who died hours earlier must have been sent back as well, their parents also held hostage. She refused to drop the devastating news now.

  “This has been difficult for you.” She knew her words were empty. “I’m here now. Can you tell me what happened?”

  The twins stared at each other, as if deciding who went first. Sam grabbed each by the hand and insisted they sit on the floor with her.

  “Major Lancaster said you were carrying a message for me. Did Ja … did Brother James threaten to kill your parents if you didn’t deliver his message?”

  They nodded in unison, and Brayllen’s grip tightened.

  “He showed us what would happen if we didn’t follow his instructions,” the boy said. “He put his hand on one of our ship’s crew and set him on
fire. It was horrible. I remember him screaming so loud and then his body melted away.”

  “He called himself a god,” Rosalyn said. “I didn’t know what he meant. It was the first time I ever heard anyone say the word. Is a god supposed to be so evil?”

  “No,” Sam said, remembering how James incinerated a mercenary moments after they crossed the fold. “But he’s not a god. He’s a man, Rosalyn. He’s a man who’s playing games with your life and your parents’ lives. I promise I will do everything I can for them. What is the message he asked you to deliver?”

  The girl took a deep breath. “You can do it, sis,” Brayllen insisted. “You have a better memory than me.”

  Rosalyn nodded. “He told us to recite the message word for word. We had to memorize it and repeat it to him before he was satisfied.”

  “Go ahead, Rosalyn. Take your time.”

  “Samantha,” the girl began, “you have made a positive impact on Earth. I hope you have found comfort in sharing your life with Michael. The time is coming for you to leave everything behind. After finishing your business on Earth, you will join me on a more important mission. I will realign the Collectorate, and you will be at my side to map the future. You will do this willingly and without Michael. You owe a permanent debt to me and my race. People like you expected my kind to become your servant monsters. Instead, I have been your personal savior five times. When the war ends, you will stand with me, Samantha.”

  Sam would have collapsed if not already on the floor. Her mind struggled to process the message, let alone its sudden ending.

  “Is there anything else?” She muttered.

  “No,” Rosalyn said. “Brother James said once we delivered the message, we could answer questions about what happened to our ship.”