The Father Unbound

by Frank Kennedy

  Together, they began a great crusade. They did know peace in their time. Hadeed saw all of it, felt his blood flowing through Ahmed, and that of Ahmed flowing through Hadeed.

  A blink, and Hadeed returned to his cell, his hands still gripped to The Father’s shoulders. Tears blurred his vision, and he shook violently.

  “We were created for war,” The Father said. “But you and I can find peace,” Ilya said.

  Hadeed fell to his knees and wept uncontrollably. Ilya promised to return tomorrow.

  * * *

  The Hephaestus Command-in-Control teemed with activity, more than usual. The fallout from the civil war’s grand finale and resulting armistice swamped the orbital fleet’s military headquarters as if the battle was still raging. The UG oversaw cleanup operations, search-and-destroy missions to capture wanted renegades such as jihadeen, redeployment of mine security battalions, resettlement of Hiebim who had spent years protected by peacekeepers or fleeing from occupied territory, and humanitarian drops on liberated but devastated communities. A cacophony of voices mixed with CVids throughout the multi-level control hub. At his perch atop it all, Admiral Aldo Cabrise found the organized chaos to be satisfying.

  He studied three watery holo-panels from his private station and impressed his gene-stamp on the countless documents – mostly Sanctum requests – processing through his personal directory. He did not see Maj. Olivia Hand approach.

  “Admiral, please pardon the interruption,” she said. “I have been conducting an investigation, and I believe you should see this.”

  “Investigation?” Cabrise said as he swiveled about. “Major, where might you find time?”

  “Actually, sir, this rose out of a request you made before we left Messalina.” She double-tapped one of the admiral’s CVs and produced a text-heavy schematic. At the upper left, however, appeared a face Cabrise recognized at once. “Sir Ephraim Hollander,” she said. “You asked me to inform you when he next visited the fleet. I checked with customs, and he is neither in the fleet nor on the planet. However, he has passed through customs twice since your last encounter nine years ago.”

  Cabrise glanced over the details and turned to the major with a scowl. “To the point, Major. What am I not seeing?”

  “Admiral, he has made three visits to Hiebimini in the twenty-eight years since retiring as regent. You were already familiar with his arrival nine hours after the attacks of 100.5311. However, he returned two years ago, entered customs through the Maria Doria, and took an uplift to Messalina, where he stayed for three hours. Upon returning to the carrier, he booked passage out of the system. We could attempt to backtrack his movements in the capital; but with all the chaos, we would need weeks. The most recent visit is what I find more remarkable. Admiral, look at the date. 19.5320. One day after the Rashadii incident.”

  Cabrise tapped a finger against his lips. “Major, you have piqued my interest. Ah, Mr. Hollander, what are you playing at? Theories, Major?”

  “None at present, but these cannot be coincidences.”

  “You think? He arrives immediately after the largest single massacre of Chancellors in history, and later he shows up after a massacre that, had it been averted, could have brought peace. I see he remained aboard the Doria for nineteen days.”

  “Yes, Admiral. He booked passage the day after the Messengers declared the armistice document a forgery and vowed to destroy the Patriots.”

  Cabrise sighed. “Major, I do not like puzzles. They are a distraction and above else, they give me a headache. I did not earn my way into the Admiralty to be plagued by these concerns. This man poses a significant threat. I do not know how, but I intend for you to find out. Transmit a secure package to Central and request a current dossier on Hollander.”

  “Yes, sir. Best chance for turnaround is twenty days, assuming they take quick action.”

  “Yes, Major, I’m well aware of the protocol. In the meantime, I find the lack of his presence disturbing given what has transpired in the past week. Ask all Carriers to perform a full genetic diagnostic of customs for the past thirty days.”

  “Yes, sir. We should have results by morning, but what are we looking for?”

  Cabrise rolled his eyes. “Whatever should not be there.”

  * * *

  Ephraim did not need to monitor stream transmissions from Hiebimini to know the time had come. He adjusted the flight controls aboard the quarry ship ITV Leggett and prepared to depart the system’s asteroid belt. He plotted a course toward the planet and told the onboard computer to take control. The Leggett would reach her destination in seventeen hours. He was confident the ship and its mundane work had gone largely unnoticed against the backdrop of the climactic weeks of the Hiebim war.

  Important events will take place tomorrow, the Jewels told him. Everything will change.

  Ephraim had consulted them frequently since he made first contact. They had reached out through the confines of the planet-killer and shown him secrets beyond even what Frederic had revealed two years earlier. He listened to their lyrical recitation of the “Final Accord” and thought it the most beautiful he ever heard.

  “Ilya has also heard our song,” the Jewels told him. “He is at peace. Be happy for him.”

  “I will be,” Ephraim said.

  For two years, he consumed his waking hours in pursuit of the Jewels’ vision. He ventured to Hiebimini and found the source of the twelve windows of sunlight exactly where he expected, in a place he once visited before he became regent. He stood where the perfectly balanced light fell and could almost hear the whispers of what was to come. Final truth, they said. Listen and you will hear final truth.

  Now, with nothing to do until the ship reached its destination, Ephraim found his blue glasses. They used to mean so much. Yet he ignored the glasses after the Jewels came into his life. Somehow, his ancestors seemed trivial, even pointless. Still, he owed them an explanation – one friend, at the least. Ephraim looked into the blue glasses and said, “Come to me.”

  He walked into an orgy awash in bottomless draughts of liquor, animalistic sex, and psychedelic drugs. The ballroom was velvet as far as he could see, a room he could not imagine from any period in Earth history. Furniture was sparse; most tables or chairs were flung to their sides or splintered as if shattered against the walls. Ephraim’s ancestors thrust their naked bodies against each other, doused themselves in liquor, and licked lines of yellow powder on the checkerboard floor. No matter what their activity, each ancestor laughed in hysterics.

  Frederic Ericsson, who was burying himself in a woman who died half his age, looked up from the floor and smiled when he saw Ephraim.

  “Welcome to the end, my friend,” he shouted. “Getting what we can while we last.”

  Ephraim did not move. His blood boiled.

  * * *

  Crowds jostled through the streets of Messalina in greater numbers than ever before, yet with none of the vibrancy for which the city was known. Anger, grief, and delayed shock moved them mechanically toward their destinations. They plastered photos of the missing along chipped walls; some openly grieved their war dead with makeshift memorials; others shouted like barkers offering to rent rooms to the incoming flood of refugees. Patriot officers patrolled the streets but made little effort to pursue vandals or thieves. The officers did not know who their friends were: They received the praises of those who had most feared the Messengers and the scorn of those who believed peacekeepers would do a better job managing the city. The UG had pulled out following the armistice, allowing the Patriots to assume control and make this the only city where Hiebim militias could bear weapons. The uneasy mood was perfect for a former small-time thief who later became a jihadeen warrior. He faced no obstacles stealing food and medical supplies and returning them to the hovel he occupied with two other jihadeen survivors.

  Dihala Nanji provided both his companions with water then lifted the sleeves of his liege. He slowly removed Baqqari Adair’s bandages and studied her horrib
ly burned left arm. The flesh had fallen away when she was struck by a plasma burst during the orbital bombardment. Nanji applied a clear salve and new bandages. He praised Adair for her courage; he knew she must have been in agonizing pain.

  Adair, who along with her companions had discarded their jihadeen dress before sneaking into the city, wore a conservative white arbiya scarf and the robes she stole from a woman of the Patriot-dominated Hussein clan. That woman, like the owner of this hovel, had died with a spelling blade through her heart. Adair drank all her water and sighed.

  “Tell me, Nanji,” she said. “What did you learn?”

  “It is happening tomorrow. They are taking Honor to the Hall of Sun. He will be condemned and publicly executed.”

  “They are moving quickly,” said Adair, who spent four days hiding in the blue hills before finding a nighttime route into the capital. “They want him dead while the people are still enraged. They don’t want him to have a trial because he will speak a truth they don’t want to hear. We will not let this happen, Nanji.” She turned to the only other surviving jihadeen. “Sayed, come here.” They joined hands, Adair able to use only her right.

  “Do we still serve one man?” They nodded with enthusiasm. “Good. Then tomorrow, we will come for him. We will find our way into the Hall of Sun and save Honor.”

  “There will be many guards,” Nanji said. “If we cannot defeat them?”

  “Then we and Honor will become martyrs. We will die with dignity.”

  They did not let go of each other as they plotted their rescue mission.

  * * *

  Ilya and Cho made love for the final time. It wasn’t the beautiful setting they might have imagined, but this unkempt and confining hotel room in Messalina’s disreputable green-light district was the only thing they could find in the mad scramble following the end of the war. Ilya had refused to trade on his Chancellor heritage for better accommodations; he didn’t need the unwanted attention anyway. Chancellors could take one look and determine he was one of the reviled lot who had “gone native,” and they would not have hesitated to kill him if they knew what he planned to do the following day. In many ways, this humble room usually occupied by rural ethnic tourists or nomadic traders proved a perfect place to say farewell.

  They threw the sheets off the bed and wrapped themselves in each other, a pair of alabaster sculptures intertwined. They were gentle, for they wanted only to feel each other’s skin, to make permanent in their memory every contour, every muscle, every joint. They needed to know all this had been real, from the day they met in a room full of candles to the moment their hearts joined to the first cry of their newborn daughter. Even as the journey neared its end, and they knew they would have to say good-bye, Ilya and Cho did not compromise their passion. They refused to do so even on this, their final night. Ilya considered himself blessed to have a stubborn wife, otherwise Cho might have heard his pleas and not followed him to the planet.

  They loved each other with thoughts of nothing else until at last a CVid on the bed stand flared to life, and an avatar with a smile appeared.

  “Mr. Horne, this is your ten-minute warning. Transport will be arriving shortly.”

  They pulled apart. Cho started to speak, but Ilya kissed her then placed a finger over her lips. He shook his head. She understood. They continued to kiss as they rose from the bed. They separated and dressed in silence. The bustle of the busy street just outside their window and the cries of nightlife broke the quiet. Cho placed their few possessions into a small carry case just as someone knocked at the door, which Ilya opened.

  “The rideabout is here, sir,” a teenage Hiebim said. “We need to leave quickly if we’re going to make the uplift.”

  Ilya nodded. He had contracted with the young man to be a guide when they entered the city two days ago. He asked the guide if he was certain his passenger would be safe. The Hiebim looked both ways before revealing a plasma pistol under his robe. Ilya told the guide to wait then closed the door. He knew Cho could take care of herself – she had been a survivor on Indo Prime years before he came along – but he did not want to put his daughter’s mother at risk. He looked inside his consciousness and found The Father staring back.

  “Will she make it home?” He asked. “Yes,” The Father responded. “And your daughter will become a beautiful, happy young woman.”

  Cho joined him at the door and ran her hand through his cascading hair.

  “No tears,” she said. “You make me too happy to cry.”

  “I had nothing before you,” he said. “All the rainbows at Ularu aren’t enough for what you’ve done for me. You saved me, Cho Suu-Kwan.”

  “I love you, Ilya Hollander.”

  The tears came. “The next time you kiss May-La, tell her it’s from her daddy. Please?”

  Cho opened the door, her own eyes watering. “Every kiss will be from her daddy.”

  Their parting kiss was short and tender. Their eyes could not let go as easily.

  * * *

  Ephraim had no patience for Frederic’s explanation about the shocking debauchery continuing to play out in the velvet room. Ephraim had waited in an antechamber almost two hours before Frederic, having just zipped up his pants and tossed on a shirt, came to talk. Frederic brought a freshly-lit cigar and a bottle of bourbon with him. They were not alone in the antechamber, as naked women of various historical eras and not always of great physical endowments paraded past on their way to the velvet orgy.

  “So, this is what it all comes down to?” Ephraim asked. “Dignified men and women say goodbye to life in the most debased manner possible. Yes?”

  “Come now, Ephraim. None of us are immune to the simplest desires. And with very little time left to play …”

  “You strip yourselves of whatever self-esteem you might have had all these centuries?”

  “Yes, Ephraim. If the truth must be known, yes. We could choose to sit idly as the final wave crashes over us. We might be keen on ourselves for such dignified courage, but what image are we left to protect? The great Chancellor supremacy? The illusion of the false deity we bestowed upon ourselves in honor of our so-called immortality? No, Ephraim. We chose to go out the way any mortal man or woman would if given unlimited choice. We chose to be happy. We even talked about it. And for once, we actually agreed with the Eglantines.”

  Ephraim could not get past his indignation. “Why? Did the Eglantines suggest true happiness is only found when we tap into the primal urges of our most primitive genes?”

  “Something to that effect. Release of all inhibitions. Man without inhibitions is …”

  “Dangerous. Barbaric. Sub-human. Yes?”

  Frederic lost his good cheer and drank straight from the bottle. “Please, Ephraim. We can’t end like this. Not our friendship. Besides, I have a gift for you. Remember, I told you about it when you were at Finnion’s Universe, but I …”

  “Ten hours, Frederic. That’s all you have. This is how you will spend it?”

  “Hmmph. Listen to me, Ephraim. I have a surprise – the one I promised you two years ago. Since you are still among the living, and the link will soon be gone, you will not have another chance to see him.”

  Ephraim tensed. “See whom?”

  “Who else?” Frederic swigged again. “The man who made you what you are today.” Frederic looked past Ephraim toward a door at the end of the antechamber and grinned. “Go on. He’s been waiting a long time for this. So have you.”

  Ephraim did not trust his old friend, but he could not help moving toward the door.

  * * *

  Hadeed did not ask where his jailers were taking him nor did he offer the slightest resistance. In truth, he was well-rested, his stomach was full, and his mind was at peace. The miracle bestowed in his cell a day ago opened a vista upon humankind he never could have conceived. Armed with this knowledge, he ate a full dinner and was prepared for a resolution to his life’s work, even if it meant he stared into the face of an executioner.
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  He walked through a subterranean corridor flanked by four guards armed with blast rifles. His hands were bound by chains. He felt almost young again, his beard having been shaved away before a jailer brought him what passed for breakfast. The guards did not speak but were not afraid to look him in the eye, and Hadeed never responded with a defiant or threatening glare. He did not care if they had fought for the Patriots or took payoffs from the Chancellors.

  At last, the corridor intersected with another, at the center of which an elevated platform awaited six inches off the ground. A brilliant white haze descended from a matching round hole in the ceiling. Hadeed thought he heard the echoes of many voices. The guards directed him onto the platform, where they joined him. Seconds later, the platform lifted, and the guards took defensive positions, extending their rifles forward. Soon, the haze became a thick cloud. The voices grew with intensity as Hadeed and the guards passed through the ceiling and emerged in the Hall of Sun. A mix of gasps, hisses, and cries of anger stirred the crowd until at last the platform leveled off.

  Hadeed adjusted his eyes. He and the guards were draped in brilliant light; consequently, the spectators were a blur. Still, Hadeed knew thousands of Hiebim focused upon him. Yet their mood mattered little to Hadeed. He looked above and around the great domed structure and saw giant glass portals, each circular and projecting a beam of focused sunlight upon the spot where he stood. He turned and counted.

  Twelve. Just as he always knew there would be. Twelve eyes. The light of truth. He did not see Ignatius Horne right away, but he felt his counsel’s presence. Hadeed was ready. He had come to the end of the path.

  THIRTY FIVE

  THE PRISON

  A VOICE OVER A SPEAKEr outlined the charges against Hadeed, the penalty for each being death. It said the tribunal would issue a judgment after “public words,” the speeches given by representatives of the prosecution and the defense. Hadeed saw such speeches at the Asra regional tribunal when he was a boy. The defendant stood before the public and listened to condemnation from a local citizen followed by words of support by someone of similar status. The words had little if any bearing on the verdict, for evidence had already been evaluated by the judges. Hadeed vowed to endure whatever shame the prosecution would foist upon him.