The Saints of Salvation

by Peter F. Hamilton

  I paused from my endless task, supervising the containers with their myriad humans, and extended my reach farther into the wonderful union with the onemind. It was urgently reviewing its hangar memory. That ship took off from Salt Lake City, and there was an intense human attack there. Memories were incomplete, inadequate, with too many gaps. We were stupid. No: It was. Forgiving.

  Now we pay for our compassion, for treating the humans with love and respect. Meanwhile, their antimatter-powered radio devices broadcast our position to the whole galaxy. There is nothing we can do about that now. The closest ships are over two hours away.

  I don’t understand the reason for the broadcast. The Sol system is fifty thousand light-years away. They cannot be calling for help. This is a setback for us, not a defeat. Our gallant Resolution ships will return to the humans’ pitiful homeworld and settled planets within thirty years. All remaining humans will be liberated from their wasted lives so we may carry them to embrace the glory of the God at the End of Time. There will be no “rescue” for those we already hold.

  So…why? Why this? Why expend this effort, surely every resource they possess, just to bring those radio transmitters here? Humans will never receive their broadcast. Ah. They won’t…

  I opened myself fully to the onemind. “It is the Neána,” I declared. “They are behind this.”

  “Your reason for deciding this?” the onemind asks benignly.

  “That broadcast is extremely unlikely to be detected by any human group that eludes our kindness. However, we know the Neána are spread wide across this galaxy in their treacherous nests. They listen as we do for transmissions from newly emerging species. They will know what that signal means, where it is originating.”

  “Not just the Neána,” the onemind contemplates in an unguarded moment.

  Deep memories from the arkship neuralstrata. We see the Katos—red blemishes traversing the elegant starscape, the destruction they inflicted upon us when they divined our true honorable mission. Worse, we felt the demise of valiant oneminds as our welcome ships were shattered and burned by the Angelis war fleet. The sadness of loss that lingers in every Olyix mind to this day.

  “We should be able to find out the true intent behind this broadcast,” I said. “The humans must still be on board. They can be questioned.”

  “The subverted transport ship was destroyed. No neurovirus distortion could forge that; verification was external. I have now purged the contamination from myself and confirmed total integrity. The remaining ships from that hangar are gone, flying into the star. Their trajectories are being monitored. There is no illusion anymore. The humans perished with their ship.”

  “Suicide in humans that dedicated to their mission is unlikely. I know. I understand humans very well.”

  “Your knowledge of human psychology is acknowledged. You shared it with me, and now I utilize your own routines in my analysis. There is nowhere further they can hide within my structure. Quint and sub-sect server organisms have searched the hangar for any continuing signs of human activity. There are none. They are dead.”

  The onemind is shitting on me from a truly great height. It doesn’t fucking listen. “They are not.”

  “Your reluctance to accept my authority is troubling.”

  “I am simply offering likely possibilities. If humans were on board that ship, they will have attempted to survive.”

  “And, alternatively, if the ship was governed by a G8Turing? If there was a metahuman Neána on board? No. The regrettable incident is now closed. Rejoice; we are about to enter the enclave.”

  “I rejoice. Will the gateway’s onemind watch for approaching hostile alien ships?”

  “Of course. It is already determined that the gateway star system’s watcher sensors will be refurbished. New short-range sensors will be built in to enhance our observation of near-space. Now recommence your duty. Our situation has returned to normal.”

  But it hasn’t. That arrogant motherfucker will get us all killed. Those alien vermin are still on board, skulking about somewhere. And I am going to find them. I am going to prove the onemind wrong. I’ll enjoy rubbing its smug face in that. Who knows, the Olyix fullmind might even reward me with elevation to a onemind—not in a Resolution ship, but a full arkship like I deserve. Wouldn’t that be something?

  MORGAN

  FINALSTRIKE MISSION, YEAR TWELVE

  Dellian and Yirella, along with the rest of the fleet crews, had spent twelve years in the toroid-shaped domain. Twelve years while the history faction remodeled the thirty fleet ships. They also increased the neutron star’s defenses, adding concentric layers of sensors and portals out to three light-years, ready for any ships coming from the Olyix sensor station, sixty-seven light-years away. Within the domain, those events played out across a total of six days. Immanueel had reversed the speed that time flowed from the accelerated rate that had matured the biosphere into ancient delightful parkland to the same slowtime that was used by the Olyix enclave.

  Dellian had to admit, that was a whole lot better than getting dunked in a suspension tank again. “So do you think they can timeshift the fleet when we’re inside the wormhole?” he asked.

  On the last day before they left for the enclave star, he and Yirella were walking through one of the domain’s forests. It was something they’d done every day of the hiatus, enjoying an epoch that was probably the closest they’d ever get to old Earth’s environment. Bizarrely, it seemed more natural than Juloss ever had. He’d decided that was down to age, which possessed a reassurance all of its own. Some trees in the forest were giants, hundreds of years old. So they’d explore the not quite overgrown paths and climb some of the stately trees and finish up with a swim in one of the big rock pools.

  An altogether pleasant experience, until today. With the time flow normalized so they could access the outside universe directly again, Ainsley’s android had come to visit them.

  “The corpus guys know their shit,” the white android said. “If everything goes to plan, we’re actually going to be at the enclave in a few weeks—our time. Can you believe that?”

  “No,” Dellian said flatly.

  “Easily,” Yirella said, and gave him the look.

  “Oh, come on, Dellian,” Ainsley said. “Don’t tell me you aren’t interested to see the weapons upgrades they’ve been working on. Damn, if they’ve built you a combat suit like Yanki from Prefect Space III, I’ll stuff this android in one and join you storming the Salvation of Life myself. They were awesome.”

  “Okay. I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Prefect Space III was a game matrix when I was…Well, when I just had an ordinary human body. It came out back in about 2100, I think. My memories didn’t magically improve when I finally expanded into the Factory ship; all I remembered then is all I’m ever going to remember. Mind you, I do have perfect access to all those memories now.”

  “So were you dying?” Yirella asked.

  “Hell, no. I’d had plenty of full cellular rebuilds by then. My body was in good shape. Our rejuvenation techniques on the exodus habitats were pretty good. The early ones back in Sol not so much. My neurons got screwed over at the start. Nothing big time, but enough to change me. I had a couple of flaky centuries back then, let me tell you.”

  Dellian gave the white figure a surprised glance. “You mean your original body—the actual you—is still alive somewhere?”

  The android’s face managed a thoughtful frown. “I don’t remember. There’s a memory of me on a bed in some fancy clinic; Emilja was there, some of my family—Gwendoline, for sure. Then I reactivated in the ship. But, two of me? Fuck no, that would just be weird. I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have done it. There’s only me, and this is it—the genuine Ainsley Zangari, accept no substitute. My core identity is running in an exact copy of my original neural structure, but most of my thinking takes
place in quantum arrays; that’s what gives me speed and ability in a fight.”

  Dellian grinned. “And that’s the non-weird part?”

  “Hey, grab what the universe has to offer, kid.”

  “So your body’s dead? I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be. It lived for thousands of years, and not in some Goddamn domain-time cheat. I lived them all for real. And I can do it again.”

  “Wait. What?”

  “See, this way my personality is frozen, locked into what it was the instant my body passed. The ship’s neural core doesn’t have the kind of randomness that biological brains are subject to. I’m unchanging. So, when all this is over—and assuming I survive—I have a choice. I can carry on as the ship, or I can clone myself a new body and transfer my mind back into it. I’ll be me again, exactly the same as before.”

  Dellian risked a glance at Yirella, knowing what he’d see: a face devoid of expression—except maybe a slight crinkling around her flat nose. It didn’t matter; he knew exactly what she was thinking. What about your soul?

  “Continuity seems to be a theme here,” she said, “on quite a few levels. Did you know about this group of ultra-Utopials Emilja put together?”

  “Kind of. I knew she and some level one Utopials had formed a political group, a loyalist movement. Again, the memories aren’t too firm. I know Emilja and I were concerned by the lack of success in the exodus habitats. When we fled from Sol, we believed we’d be laying siege to the enclave within a thousand years. Well, that never happened. By the time we put the Factory together we knew we had to change the whole aspect of the exodus. Our technology had plateaued, but it was good enough to allow humans to adopt the Neána approach to surviving the Olyix. I never knew who she’d recruited, but we agreed on a program of soft influence with long-range objectives. We’d keep our civilization going, but slowly change the goal, turning the generation ships away from planetary life. Gotta admit, though, I wasn’t expecting it to be quite so soft and slow. People like your Kenelm…sie could’ve been a bit more proactive.”

  “That’s not the impression of you that I got at Vayan,” Yirella said. “You were focused on attacking the enclave, not fighting a protective campaign to keep the Olyix away from this part of the galaxy.”

  The android’s plain face managed to approximate a pensive expression. “Yeah, well. I might not be able to change my mind, but I’m not a Turing with preset operational targets. All I ever wanted, from the day the Salvation of Life turned up at Sol, was to nuke those Olyix bastards into oblivion. This was my greatest chance.”

  “Did the Factory know that when they installed you in a ship?”

  “Emilja did. It doesn’t matter. There are plenty of other Factory ships in these parts that can dump a shitload of grief on the Olyix if they start sniffing around.”

  “How many ships?” Dellian asked.

  “Dunno. That’s strategic information. But we know now that there are more than just me; that Signal from the Lolo Maude is proof of that. Lucky coincidence, huh?”

  “What? That the other Factory ship beat the Olyix?”

  “No.” The android faced Yirella, his face unnervingly blank. “That you’d decelerated mid-flight. Those fleet ships weren’t built on a government contract, you know.”

  Dellian started to open his mouth—

  “Every component built by the lowest bidder,” Ainsley told him. “That’s how they used to build space rockets, back in the day. Made riding them kinda interesting. You just sat on top of a pillar of fire and fury wondering which part would fail first.”

  “I wanted to give the neutron star civilization as much time as possible to develop before we arrived,” Yirella said. “Decelerating from relativistic speed, then accelerating back up again, added years to our flight here. A non-critical unit failure was a harmless way to achieve that.”

  Dellian clenched his jaw. Saints! I should have worked that one out. He didn’t dare look at Yirella.

  “Got to love the irony,” Ainsley said. “As soon as they cracked exotic matter manipulation, the corpus humans literally had as many centuries as they wanted to take.”

  Yirella shrugged. “Hindsight.”

  “But we’re here now,” Dellian said.

  “And so are the Olyix,” Ainsley said cheerfully.

  “Immanueel has detected them?”

  “Yep. Eleven Resolution ships, two hundred and eighty AUs out and closing; they’re down to point two light speed. And they’re all carrying a wormhole terminus. There will be more Resolution ships backed up inside the wormholes, too.”

  “They got here fast,” Yirella said.

  “We’re sixty-seven light-years from the sensor station,” Ainsley said. “They knew we’d come here as soon as we kicked their asses at Vayan. It’s the culmination of the whole Strike plan, and the Olyix know that better than everyone by now.”

  “I have to question how many human societies would actually do that when they pick up a Signal, or pulled the enclave location from a onemind,” Yirella mused. “I mean, if your closest neutron star is a hundred and fifty light-years away…why bother? Leave it to someone else. You probably wouldn’t get there in time anyway.”

  “Irrelevant,” Ainsley said. “The corpus humans are going to strike in another twenty-three minutes.”

  “They’re already out there?” Dellian asked in surprise.

  “Oh, yeah.” Ainsley produced a disconcerting grin. “They used portals to send ships through behind the Olyix. Now they’re accelerating at about a hundred gees to catch them while the Resolution ships are decelerating.”

  “And they’re stealthed?”

  “Let’s just say they’re quite hard to detect. We don’t know the absolute capabilities of the Resolution ships, but Immanueel is quietly hopeful.”

  “You destroyed all the Resolution ships at Vayan,” Dellian said. “I’m sure the corpus humans can do the same here.”

  “No question about it, kid. It’s just how fast they can kill them. Think of this as a big trial of the corpus armada’s capabilities before we get serious and go visit the enclave.”

  “But the sensor station is going to know they’ve suffered a momentous defeat,” Yirella said. “Once the wormhole generators are destroyed, the wormholes will collapse. All eleven wormholes collapsing together will tell the Olyix that humans have developed something formidable out here—especially after Vayan and whatever Lolo Maude did to the Olyix at the other Signal star.”

  “Bring it on,” Ainsley said.

  “I want to actually watch what happens,” Dellian said. In a way I can understand—but he didn’t say that out loud.

  “Popcorn’s ready and waiting at the congress hall,” Ainsley said.

  Dellian used his databud to request a portal. Within seconds, one dropped down onto the path and expanded.

  They walked through it into the hall. Immanueel’s strikingly lofty body was already there, along with a good number of fleet humans who’d accessed the news. The wooden chairs had gone, leaving everyone to stand as they watched a big tactical display that was projected into the air before the central column. Today the prismatic light inside the crystal was noticeably subdued as the corpus humans concentrated on the approaching Resolution ships.

  Dellian and Yirella made their way over to Immanueel.

  “How’s it going?” Yirella asked.

  “No deviation in the Resolution ships’ trajectory,” they replied. “We believe they haven’t detected our forces, yet.”

  Dellian studied the big display. The graphics were easy enough: a clump of eleven scarlet icons with violet course vectors crawling toward the glittering emerald dataclump that was the neutron star. Behind them, arrow-shaped formations of violet attack cruisers were racing after the Resolution ships. It took a moment for him to grasp the scale; the eleven Resolution sh
ips were occupying a bubble of space more than an AU in diameter. The cruisers were already traveling at point four light speed, and accelerating hard.

  “What are you going to attack them with?” he asked.

  “First barrage will be simple kinetics,” Immanueel said. “The cruisers can fire them at relativistic velocity. There will be no plasma exhaust or gravity wave emission for the Resolution ships to distinguish. Once they become aware of our assault, we’ll switch to active weapons. That should come between ten to a hundred milliseconds after detection.”

  Dellian’s instinct was to make an incredulous grunt.

  “We need to be fast,” Immanueel said. “Given enough time, the Resolution ships can simply close the wormholes around themselves and fly back down them to the sensor station, or wherever the other end is. That, if you remember your history, is what Alpha Defense forced the Salvation of Life to do above Earth, once the Avenging Heretic was safely on board.”

  “Yeah. But…how long do you think they’ll need?”

  “We are working on one to one-point-five seconds. As they approach the neutron star, they will be very alert for our response. That would include an immediate escape trigger. It’s what we would do.”

  He couldn’t even imagine how many factors the corpus humans were incorporating into their attack scenario. “You don’t really need us at all, do you,” he said quietly.

  “This is just basic orbital mechanics,” Immanueel said. “Simple math. The enclave will be a lot more complicated.”

  “Huh.”

  “If you do not wish to join us on FinalStrike, we will understand.”