Stellaris: People of the Stars

by Robert E. Hampson

  “I’m going to burn up!” Alvar shouted a moment later. “It’s too hot!”

  “Alvar, try a sip of water,” Cin replied. She knew that the bouncer’s skin temperature was normal, its internal temperature nominal—the “heat” was Alvar’s fear. She waited, hoping he would follow her orders. “Alvar, drink. The water’s cool.”

  A moment later, she saw that he had sipped.

  “It’s too hot, I’m burning up!”

  “Do you want recovery?” Cin said. “Do you want me to bring you back?”

  “It’s all red outside! Glowing! There are flames! I can see flames!” Cin checked her readouts and brought up visuals from inside the bouncer.

  “There are no flames, Alvar,” Cin told him calmly. “What you’re seeing is normal for your altitude and speed. You are in the green, textbook.”

  “I’m dying, I’m dying!” Alvar wailed. Readouts showed his heart rate climbing alarmingly.

  “I’m going to pull you out, Alvar,” Cin said.

  “No! No, if you do that, I’ll die!” the man’s voice roared in her headphones.

  “You’re completely safe,” Cin said. She readied the abort sequence but held off for a moment.

  “No, I’m burning up! And if I go back, I’ll die! I know it!” He roared. His voice lowered. Pleading. “They’ll kill me, don’t you see?”

  Cin hit the abort. On the all-call channel she reported, “Systems malfunction on Alvar’s bouncer, recovery initiated.”

  “NO, NO, NO!” Alvar cried on their private frequency.

  “I said it was a systems malfunction,” Cin assured him. “Not your fault.”

  “No! Let me go!” Alvar cried. “I can handle it!”

  An alarm wailed suddenly in the shuttle’s cabin. Manual override! Valrise warned even as the shuttle’s com announced, “Manual override on bouncer Alvar, manual override.”

  “Alvar, reengage the controls,” Cin said. She checked her readouts. “You’re going off course.”

  No response.

  “Alvar! Alvar, you must let the computer take control—you’re off course!” Cin said even as Lewrys’ telemetry indicated that Alvar had engaged his thrusters…in the wrong direction.

  “Warning, systems anomaly, temperature variance increasing,” the autonomous telemetry for Alvar’s bouncer reported.

  “Initiate emergency recovery,” Cin ordered. She knew better—the first thing she had trained the Arwonese to do was to disengage the automatic systems in case of emergency. While Alvar had been operating under manual control, he had to purposely cut the circuit to disengage the automatics.

  “Systems off-line,” the bouncer’s system reported. Alvar had clearly retained that much knowledge in his panic. “Hull breach imminent.”

  “Alvar, you’ve got to change your course!” Cin shouted. “You’re burning up!”

  “It’s beautiful!” Alvar’s voice came back. “It’s so beautiful!”

  “Contact lost,” Lewrys’ tracking systems announced. “Debris detected.”

  Alvar’s bouncer disintegrated, Valrise reported. Cin immediately checked on Coklon: He was still on profile.

  “Coklon, report,” Cin said.

  “Everything is nominal,” the Arwonese man replied laconically. “It’s beautiful down here!”

  “What happened to Alvar?” Mira shouted loud enough to be heard through Cin’s headphones.

  Valrise? Cin asked through her link.

  The bouncer disintegrated, Valrise replied. We shall record it as a malfunction.

  Cin pulled off her headphones and said to Mira, “Something went wrong with his bouncer.”

  “Wrong? What happened?”

  “He didn’t make it,” Cin told her.

  * * *

  Captain Merriwether handled the discussion. “We are too close to change our delivery method,” he told His Holiness. “We can abort the transfer.”

  “And if you do?”

  “We will return when we can,” Captain Merriwether said. “Probably in three years or so.”

  “This is your fault, Captain,” His Holiness replied sternly. “You have admitted that there are other ways to deliver cargo and affect trade.”

  “Not as efficient, therefore more costly,” Captain Merriwether said. “We’ve found that this is the best for long-term trade.”

  “Perhaps we don’t want your long-term trade,” His Holiness replied.

  “For a fee, we are willing to announce your presence to other traders,” Captain Merriwether returned calmly.

  “For a fee,” His Holiness sneered. Someone off camera spoke in urgent tones but Captain Merriwether did not hear what was said. The expression of His Holiness altered. “How often are your bouncers destroyed like this? Surely you lose a lot of your own crew in such accidents?”

  “We experience a mechanical difficulty about once every one hundred thousand flight hours,” Captain Merriwether said. He nodded toward the camera. “You have that information in your initial contact packet and signed the contract acknowledging the possibility.”

  “One of our men died, Captain,” His Holiness snapped back. “We now wonder whether your contract has any merit.”

  “That is your decision, Your Holiness,” Captain Merriwether replied calmly. “If you wish us to deliver cargo, we must continue the training immediately.”

  “And what if we leave the operation solely to your crew?”

  “Then we will abort the transfer,” Captain Merriwether said. “If it is of any aid, you may contact your remaining personnel. They have assured me that they understand the risks and are willing to continue their training.”

  “All of them?” His Holiness asked.

  “All of them.”

  His Holiness mulled on that. After a moment, he nodded. “I should like to speak with them in private. If they agree, I will approve.”

  “Very well,” Captain Merriwether said.

  * * *

  “Now, as we all know, we suffered a loss but we have agreed to continue this mission,” the Calmt Prime said as she looked over the Arwonese bouncers. “We have been training in simulators since the accident; today we are back in real ships.” She nodded toward Cin. “Cin will accompany us on our bounces while the Valrise will provide additional support.” She paused and glanced at Mira and Sikar, who gave her reassuring nods. Then she looked to the men.

  “Let’s get to it, time’s wasting!” Coklon declared.

  “I shall go first,” the Calmt declared. The others gave her shocked looks. “It is my right and my duty.”

  Cin said nothing, gesturing for the Calmt to enter her bouncer. Cin triple-checked the bouncer’s systems: As expected, all were perfect. She checked her own unit—built for her and to her specifications. Her bouncer was named Terra, after mankind’s homeworld. Cin had promised herself that, one day, she would bounce on the homeworld itself and the craft’s name reflected that promise.

  The two undocked from Lewrys and commenced their deorbit burn.

  The Calmt is requesting a private channel, Valrise informed Cin.

  Fine, Cin replied, toggling a connection. “You wish to speak in private?”

  “I do,” the Calmt said. “I have been thinking—”

  “We could abort, if you wish,” Cin said.

  “Not that,” the Calmt said. “I have been thinking about Alvar.”

  “We have determined the cause of the error, and I can assure you that your bouncer is operating nominally,” Cin told her.

  “Of course,” the Calmt replied in a smug tone. “I am convinced that the error has been corrected. Alvar is not at the controls.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “He caused the accident, didn’t he?” the Calmt said. When Cin didn’t immediately reply, she continued, “He panicked and cut out the fail-safes.”

  “What makes you say this?”

  “There is something you don’t know about our world,” the Calmt said.

  “There are many things I d
on’t know about your world,” Cin replied.

  “Alvar panicked, didn’t he?”

  “Valrise reported a systems malfunction,” Cin temporized.

  “We suffered a major famine and our people are starving,” the Calmt said. “Those who were selected for the bouncers were expected to succeed. We need your trade if we are to survive. His Holiness made it quite clear that anyone who did not learn to use your bouncers was ‘a mouth wasting food’—his own words. So when Alvar panicked, he knew that he would die. One way or another.”

  “Why did you not say there was a famine?” Cin said. “Valrise is committed to humanitarian aid.”

  “It is a very select famine,” the Calmt replied. “Those His Holiness considers unworthy are those that starve.”

  “Are your people among them?”

  “My people are most of them,” the Calmt said. “We are the ones most recently ‘assimilated into the Greater Whole.’ Are you familiar with the concept of a ‘scorched earth policy’?”

  I am, Valrise said to Cin, relaying relevant images. Cin fought an urge to vomit.

  “Why did you not contact us directly?”

  “We could not; we had no transmitters,” the Calmt replied. “I was elected among my people to join the Greater Whole, to renounce my kind in the hope that I might protect them from within.” She added bitterly. “In that, I failed.”

  “So why do you continue to work with His Holiness?”

  “Who says I am?” the Calmt replied.

  Cin checked her readouts and waited. The Calmt said, “Coming up on bounce in five minutes.”

  “Watch it, it’ll be beautiful,” Cin said almost automatically. She’d been watching the outside of her bouncer lighten and had noted the first pink rays of atmospheric heating color the nose of her ship. Unlike the Calmt, Cin wore nothing when she dove. Her body was encased in an air-replacement fluid; it filled her lungs, allowing her to perform higher-gee maneuvers than the normal bouncers could. Like all the bouncers, her ship’s hull was transparent, unlike those for the Arwonese. Her instrument panel was also transparent, marked only by the small specks of the highly integrated circuits which comprised her computer controls. Cin’s craft had a slightly lower thermal insulation, allowing her to feel the temperature rise as her bouncer sliced through the atmosphere. She—and all the other bouncers in the crew—liked the notion of being able to “feel” the air around them.

  They bounced. Minutes later they impacted the target cargo vessel and reversed course.

  “Amazing!” the Calmt declared as they returned to the red depths of the atmosphere. “Absolutely amazing!”

  * * *

  Cin met the Calmt as she emerged from her bouncer. Cin had already donned a shipsuit to avoid offending the Arwonese woman.

  “Your skin is glowing,” the Calmt declared, raising a hand to her own face. “Is mine like that?”

  “No,” Cin said. “When I bounce, I wear no clothing.”

  “Isn’t that dangerous?”

  “My bouncer is all I need to wear,” Cin said. “I like to feel the heat of the air on my skin.”

  The Calmt shook her head in wonder. “I don’t think that is too strange for my tastes.” She waved the topic aside. “How are the others doing?”

  “They are within tolerance,” Cin replied, having checked in with Valrise.

  “I’m sure His Holiness will be pleased,” the Calmt observed tartly. “Will we be able to proceed, then, with the transfer?”

  “We have to make up for lost training time but I believe, with no further difficulties, it will be possible.”

  “And the remotes will help,” the Calmt said.

  “Training with the remotes will become the first priority,” Cin said. “The remote bouncers are always the primary form of momentum exchange.”

  “The human bouncers are just for fun,” the Calmt guessed.

  “Not just for fun,” Cin corrected. “However it is true that we work best in managing the remotes.”

  “Why couldn’t the ship do it herself?”

  “It is a question of proximity,” Cin said. “Valrise will not be close enough to provide immediate responses.”

  “But isn’t this all rather predetermined?” the Calmt asked. “I mean, isn’t it just a matter of physics?”

  “Almost,” Cin replied. “Atmospheric turbulence means that not even the most advanced calculations will be completely predictive. There is an element of chance that must be managed.” Cin added, “And sometimes the masses of the cargo containers are not as accurate as desired. We know how to handle that.”

  “And will we learn to manage that?”

  “Mostly that will be up to the crew bouncers,” Cin said. She caught the Calmt’s look and added, “As you get more experienced, we will bring you more closely into the operation.”

  “You mean, the next time you come back.”

  * * *

  Cin still had misgivings about the proficiency of the Arwonese bouncers.

  “There is something going on,” Cin informed Valrise. “I see too many strange looks passing between them, particularly the women.”

  Their performance is above average, Valrise replied. And we must make the trade, particularly after losing one of their own.

  Cin frowned but nodded in troubled agreement. The integrity of the ship was at stake.

  Keep an eye on things; let me know if anything untoward occurs, Valrise added.

  “And you do the same,” Cin replied.

  They are planning several low-level launches, setting up the GPS system we recommended, Valrise reported. Beyond that, their space efforts are limited strictly to the cargo exchange.

  “We’ll know one way or another the next five hours,” Cin said aloud, glancing at the automated countdown timer.

  Lewrys and Marys—both named after revered and long-dead crew members—were prepped for launch.

  Cin was aboard Lewrys, ferrying the downside crew—mostly the Arwonese—to their destination. Goroba had the rest of the bouncers with him on Marys. Cin had no concerns about the crew bouncers, so she’d suggested that she ride with the Arwonese. Valrise had agreed.

  With Emery as pilot, the shuttle was cramped with the eleven trainees and the two crew. Its racks carried a full complement of crewed and remote bouncers—forty in all.

  Fortunately, they didn’t have far to go. Arwon was now a large ball filling their port side almost completely.

  “Once again, tell me the drill,” Cin said to the collected Arwonese bouncers.

  “We drop anti-orbit, hit our cargo, bounce back, and hit the inbound cargo,” Coklon said with a grin. “Repeat and continue until sufficient momentum is exchanged, then rendezvous back here.”

  “Where Valrise will place an orbiting station which will include a reentry vehicle,” the Calmt finished, glancing at her two fellow women. Cin’s brows creased as she caught their looks: It was that same disturbing look she’d seen before.

  “Arwon I,” Coklon said in agreement. “The Blessing has already been bestowed by His Holiness.”

  Cin kept her face blank. She’d had little time to learn more about the politics of Arwon but what she had learned—through her training and in conversations with other crew—was enough to make her wary of religious oligarchies.

  Coklon snapped his fingers in an expression of the ease of the task facing them.

  “Prepare your bouncers,” Cin said. To Emery she said, “Deploy the remotes at your discretion.”

  “I’ll deploy ’em when you launch,” Emery replied with a chuckle. He and Cin had once been lovers; they still worked with the easy comradery of two people who had shared thinking.

  “Just don’t be late!” Cin teased. She moved down the corridor to the hatch and her bouncer. Out of sight of the Arwonese, she gladly shucked her shipsuit before wriggling through the hatchway and onto her craft.

  “Sealing,” Cin reported, activating the controls. Her bouncer, Terra, responded eagerly, like some ancient st
eed awaiting her commands. Cin closed her eyes, engaged the atmospheric controls and waited as the cool, slightly damp gas rose from the reservoirs on board the Lewrys to cover her completely. She took the breath that she always hated as the gas rose to the level of her lips. It rose over her head quickly and Cin forced herself to inhale it. For a moment she fought panic as her lungs instinctively tried to expel it. The gas condensed slowly around and inside her, turning to a body-temperature liquid that encased her protectively within Terra’s super-tech transparent hull.

  “Life support,” Cin said.

  Life support one hundred five percent, Terra responded through Cin’s link. The bouncer was considered operational with life support as low as ninety percent, but Valrise insisted that there be a margin for error in all normal operations. With bouncers, normal was a rare condition, Valrise had once explained to Cin, alluding to the general crew belief that anyone who would expose themselves to a hard atmosphere in extreme conditions was very much outside the norm. Crazy.

  Cin completed the rest of her systems checks and turned her attention to the earthers preparing beside her.

  She was not surprised to learn that all the women had chosen to leave their shipsuits behind. What did surprise her was that Coklon and Batric had also “gone native.” For herself, Cin couldn’t imagine bouncing in something as constricting as a suit. The gel-liquid that surrounded her operated with less friction than a suit, making her movements just that much quicker and efficient. Early in her training—and anytime she was training worlders—she had to wear a shipsuit through a bounce; no matter how transpired, she never liked it.

  “All systems nominal, we are coming up on insertion,” Emery reported just as Cin had come to the same conclusion.

  “Call, Calmt,” Cin said. She was letting the Calmt call the orders.

  “Valrise, Valrise, this is LEO bounce team, request insertion,” the Calmt said with the clipped precision of a well-trained professional.

  “LEO bounce team, I copy and confirm that you are ready for insertion,” Valrise replied over the regular comms.

  “They’re good,” Cin said, emphasizing only that she thought the team was ready.

  “LEO team, you are cleared for insertion,” Valrise said on the comms. “Wait one, I have a transmission from downside.”