Cygnus 5- The Complete Trilogy

by Alex Oliver

  "I want you to organize the civilians into hundreds. Each hundred to have a designated representative to whom their people can direct questions and concerns. The representatives can come talk to me weekly or something."

  Carrow laughed nervously and smoothed back his lanky oak-colored hair. "You're talking about setting up a government? Where everyone gets their say?"

  She'd seen the transcripts of his paper from his trial. Democracy, egalitarianism, free speech and thought, he was a dangerous idealist, but she liked that. "Yes, I am. For now, they're going to report to me, but I want it robust enough that if I let everyone down and I need to be removed, you can carry on without me. Give me a year, then the people can vote me out if necessary. Think you can do that?"

  He swallowed, and then he seemed to unfurl, standing even taller like a sunflower in summer. "I've dreamed of the chance to try."

  "Good. Okay, get on it."

  The mood in the hall was shifting, she could see it in the lowering shoulders, in the heads coming up. Eyes were opening wide and fixing on her, mouths firming or even beginning to smile.

  Like the Frowards when Bryant had locked them in the mess, they were beginning to believe they could trust her to know what to do. That was a wave she knew how to catch.

  "Who looks after the animals?"

  Several men raised their hands, slowly, some of them shamefaced. She guessed that some of them had been neglecting their charges recently and made a note to look into that in future. Not today, though. This was distinctly a time for mercy.

  "Halter the animals and take them out into the alien biosphere. Animals are usually pretty savvy about what they can eat and what they can't. See if they can browse on anything native, and catch up with any maintenance there you may have neglected over the past couple of weeks."

  "The rest of you, Mboge here will organize into plant collecting teams. Anything that looks like a seed, nut, berry or tuber, pick a sample, bring it back here for testing. If we can't start growing Earth crops for months, lets see if there are native substitutes."

  Bryant was going to be kept busy, tasting everything and decreeing it poisonous or not, but she guessed that trying different kinds of foods would not be among the worst things he had to do. The thought of him always made her smile. She hoped he was doing okay with Nakano Nori and their potential new home. Should she should announce her intention to leave this place, abandon the fields the colonists had broken with back-breaking labor in favor of going underground? No. Not yet. Perhaps they should find out if they could survive without the fields first.

  But a bit of hope wouldn't hurt. "The people from the wrecker are currently working to repair my ship. It should be operational within a month. With the Froward, and with the Charity, we can - if necessary - go buy supplies."

  "How?" Carrow asked, looking delighted at his own nerve. "We have nothing to trade with. If we had, we would have eaten it already."

  So, her people or not, she was not quite at the stage that she felt comfortable telling them Bryant claimed they were sitting on a fortune in antiquities. "My family and my crew's families are getting paid death benefits. I feel sure we can divert some of that towards keeping us alive."

  A clamor as they saw an easy answer. She held up her hand before they could get started on demanding it. "I want to avoid that if we can, because the moment the Kingdom gets wind that we're not helplessly killing and eating each other down here, they're going to want to either take the place back or make sure we are.

  I'm sorry to have to say this of my former employers, but while we might not be cost effective to recover as a failing colony, they'll find the money somehow to crush us if they know we're succeeding. They'll see that as defiance, and defiance is a threat. We need to be in a more viable place before we can let it be known that we're still here."

  They didn't like that, but she ticked it off, her penultimate point made. One last chance to seal the deal. She smiled.

  "But speaking of families.... This is a new start for all of us, and in my eyes none of you are criminals any more. As of today, you are free civilians of Cygnus Five. Once we have the colony self-supporting, you are welcome to ask your families to come join you here. Let's make this such a good place to live that you can't keep the girls away."

  That caused such an uproar she had to tell two of the imps to clang upright and shoot pillars of flame straight up into the air above them to quiet them down again.

  "When that happens? Anyone molests or hassles or pressures those girls..."

  "You'll tear their brains out," her friendly heckler finished for her. She gave him a careful inspection. He looked harmless enough.

  "I'll get my doctor to turn them into one," she said mildly. In fact the first was more likely, but the second seemed to worry them more. A moment's uncomfortable silence fell, and she ticked off her last box and wiped the sweat from the palm of her hand on her black trousers.

  "Right. There will be a united service in the parade square oh twenty-five hundred hours when we will consecrate this new venture of ours. Until then, you know what to do. Let's find out if this planet will support us. Good luck."

  ~

  "This is astonishing!" Nakano Nori had barely stood still since they came down into the alien city, striding in and out of the council offices where Bryant had set up base, picking up ornaments and putting them back down again, trailing his fingers in the channels of water and up the interlocking net of fibers that formed the roofs of the buildings. Bryant had to agree. Since he had cracked the language barrier the place was coming open to him like an unlocked box. Now he had fired up the generators hidden deep beneath them, plugged into the planet's molten core, and he was waking everything up.

  "Can you read that?" Nori gestured at the transparent floor and the swathes of golden scratchy letters that pooled and swam beneath it.

  "Yes."

  "How? I mean, I've been trying to crack it for months. Of course we had limited amounts of data to work with - the wrecker's software was mostly maths for targeting, and maths is easy once you know what base you're working with - six, by the way. But if I'd have been able to control the wrecker's repair drones like you? Well, it wouldn't have been McKillip in charge, that's for sure."

  "Mm," Bryant answered. He'd found what looked like an official record of the city's actions and was skimming it, half concentrating on the dry entries that made very little sense even when translated, half dwelling endlessly on the thought of marriage.

  It wasn't something he'd ever associated with himself. An antiquated concept he couldn't wrap his head around. She wanted him to promise never to sleep with anyone else and always to be there for her no matter what? What kind of contract terms were those? You'd have to be mad to sign up for something so risky. People didn't stay the same from year to year, signing away your whole life seemed insane.

  And yet the thought that she'd be prepared to consider pledging that to him if he asked? Well, he didn't know what to do about that huge a vote of confidence. He didn't deserve it. That kind of trust would be a shackle heavier than anything that had ever been put on his back before.

  "So what I'm asking," Nori bent over the section of the floor that was showing schematics - three further cities within a couple of days journey. A network of similar spaceship accelerators all over the world, "Is... How come you're not in charge? You just do what that woman tells you? Why?"

  Bryant sat up. The floor-level computers, while convenient for woodlice who carried all their limbs and sensors on their underside, were not ideally suited to humans, and the crawling was undignified.

  "She's better than I am at knowing what to do," he said warily. He wasn't sure he liked the tone of Nori's questions. Belatedly, he checked to make sure his nanites were still thoroughly saturating the man's system and shivered to find that half of them were putting out failure warnings.

  Nori had a sophisticated immune response of his own, and Bryant recognized it with a shock of familiarity and some nostalgia.
Anong Metharom's work. She was one of the people he had corresponded with regularly in his past life. Good. Not quite as good as him, but damn good nevertheless.

  His surviving bots were mutating to counteract Nori's defenses, and if the man didn't try to physically attack him at this very moment he would soon once again lose the ability. But right now, there was a small possibility that if he tried to knock Bryant out he would succeed.

  Better to stop him from trying then. Bryant fell back on good old fashioned persuasion. "Aurora is trained to lead. She's been in command of huge ships with thousands of people on them, and I heard that time in the Horsehead nebula she was temporarily ranked commodore - that means she had a whole fleet to look after. Me, I'm a surgeon and a designer of bots. I don't want to have to be dealing with people. As long as I've got everything I want, I don't care what other people do. You know? You want to struggle with who to delegate to dig out the latrines? Or would you rather be here doing this?"

  "What are we doing here anyway?"

  Bryant got to his feet and gestured for Nori to follow him to the door. From there he could offer up the whole city on the palm of his hand. The overhead lights shone brighter now, and the various buildings hummed with life. "I'm seeing if we want all this to be ours. And you're here... Well, I guess because Aurora thinks it should be made clear that whatever riches we find on this planet, it's going to be shared with you."

  "Is she mad?"

  Nori had seemed like such a nice guy at first, but Bryant was finding himself continuously cooling down towards him. Maybe Nori had only seemed nice because Bryant had been expecting someone like McKillip.

  "She's honest, and she's trying to do what's best for you."

  Nori chuckled, "Man, you are whipped."

  That was kind of true. But to be honest, Bryant found he liked it that way, so it was hardly a problem.

  "Well," he said, "From my point of view, it's a bit awkward to be using technology designed for a different body shape, but otherwise I think we'd be mad not to move in here. There's power and water set up." He drifted back inside and put a foot down in the centre of a map of the city, "These big baths are warming by a degree every fifteen minutes, so we've got heated public baths. We've got private dwellings with computers in them. We've got waste and sewerage disposal, roads, lights. It's all under rock that keeps out a sensor signal, and best of all..."

  Best of all was a building arranged like a theater around a guttered operating table. He hadn't been able to believe it when he'd seen it, but it seemed the Lice had done their own genetic manipulation. They'd done it out in public, displayed, like an art form or a spiritual practice. When he'd seen the records, felt the hushed atmosphere of that place where lives were transformed, he'd known he'd come home.

  This could be his. This city, this surgery, it could all be his. No going to live as a fugitive and a criminal on Snow City, always dealing with the kind of underworld scum who wanted to upgrade their fucktoys and bodyguards into more and more grotesque forms, until the people who wore them could no longer stand themselves. Aurora had learned to appreciate what he did, what he tried to do, and here - if the Kingdom would let him alone - he could be respected again.

  "Best of all, it's ours. You know?" He waved that all encompassing hand again, conscious that this time it symbolically contained the entire world. "This is our chance to start a whole new society, better than what any of us came from."

  "With her in charge?"

  It was embarrassing, what he felt about that. He'd always thought he was such an individualist, someone who would always go his own way, always prefer his freedom over any other alternative. But well, Aurora had him three-quarters convinced that for the day to day things of life, like surviving on a newly colonized planet, she knew best. And it was surprisingly relaxing, even comforting, that he could trust her to deal with all of that.

  Maybe he could trust her with the rest of his life? He couldn't currently think of anyone else he would rather sleep with. Maybe... maybe she'd be enough. She'd have both her forms. Switching between them might be enough excitement to counteract the inevitable boredom of knowing someone too well.

  What would a long term relationship like that be like anyway? He'd never tried. He didn't know if he was capable of it.

  But they did say that practice made perfect. Maybe even sex improved when you'd got a partner who knew exactly what you liked. Most virtuoso musicians stuck to one instrument so they could get fully to grips with its intricacies and challenges. Instead of being a brief diversion, it could be a project.

  Fucking scary though, that kind of commitment.

  He felt like he had everything he'd ever wanted being offered up to him on a platter, and he was scared to take a bite in case it disappointed, because if it did, he'd have to eat it anyway, and forever. It sucked, hard, when life handed you no escape clause, and it was unfair, unreasonable of Aurora to insist on what she wanted, instead of compromising somehow in favor of him.

  But that thought gave him a qualm. No. What did he expect? She'd tried the route of trusting to love and it had destroyed her life. How could he expect her to do it again with him, when even he didn't know if he was capable of that kind of fidelity? She'd been taken advantage of once, and she was not going to let it happen again.

  Fucking Keene. He was really starting to dislike that man.

  "Well..." Nori surveyed the empty city. He fortunately did not look as though he was about to go on a rampage, though his face was closed and smooth, hiding his thoughts. Bryant's bots picked up a muted sense of exhilaration from him, as if he was far more impressed than he was letting show. Which was frankly reassuring, because anyone who could react to this with disinterest had the imagination of an earthworm. "I guess it is pretty neat. But it's not going to do us any good without food. Starve here or starve back at the compound, it's not going to make a lot of difference."

  The floor made a glassy chime and a strip of monitors turned purple as Bryant's scroll through the city's past reached the final record. Bryant drifted over there, soft footed and curious as a cat.

  "Yeah," he agreed, looking down. "Planetary winter's coming. I think we're going to need to take some of this stuff, sell it in Snow City and set up a trade pipeline to bring in food." He felt less enthusiastic about the prospect than he might have been only a day ago.

  "I'd like to be considered to go," Nori offered, giving Bryant a harmless, winsome smile he instinctively distrusted.

  I bet you would, Bryant thought. And I bet if we put you in charge of a hold full of priceless antiquities and a spaceship, we would never see you again. It wasn't a large leap of imagination to guess Nori's plan - it had been his own, after all.

  "I know several people in Snow City. I could get the best deals."

  "We'll let Aurora decide who goes, if anyone."

  A flash of anger like a red pulse through Nori's bots, but his mild, helpful face didn't change at all. Scared, Bryant almost stripped the energy for another wave of bots out of the thin layer of fat he had left, but he held off. He didn't want to do that if food was scarce and Nori was controlling himself, but he mentally marked the man down as someone to watch in future nevertheless.

  "So what does it say?" Nori asked, nodding at the strip of purple crystal. Distracted, as was no doubt the point, Bryant looked down and read, and his feeling that this was all far too good to be true filled him with an obscure sense of triumph as he understood what he was seeing.

  "Fuck!"

  "What?"

  "Didn't you wonder where they went? The creatures who built this? Why they built their spaceship launchers and just left their whole planet behind?"

  Nori frowned, "Alien reasons, I guess. I don't see why we have to assume their reasons would make sense to us."

  "Very philosophical," Bryant mocked, as he hunkered down to get closer to the text, make sure he hadn't read it wrong. The text was accompanied by pictures of Lice that looked like his imps, being simplified, made smaller, stup
ider, simpler. The engineers that worked on them chewing off their own antennae in horror at what they'd done.

  "But this says that some of them wanted to stay so much that they deliberately had themselves devolved. They gave up their sentience so they could stay. They crawled back into the lakes from which they'd come, accepting that they had to be transformed into animals to escape the Destroyer."

  "Destroyer?"

  "Shit," Bryant looked out on the city with a new anguish. These people had wanted to stay here so much that they were willing to stop being people for it. He couldn't imagine even conceiving that idea, let alone going through with it.

  "Some of them just couldn't bring themselves to do it, and they left from the mass drivers in spaceships, looking for a galaxy where the Destroyer wouldn't come. They knew they couldn't stay, not one of them, or they would wake it up and destroy the galaxy. So they had to go to escape for themselves, but also to protect their devolved brothers and the children that had once been kin."

  And then humans had come instead and taken it all for their own the way humans did, and the least he could do in return would be to cherish it as much as they did.

  "Bryant!" Nori insisted, "What destroyer?"

  The guy was missing the point. Which was this planet was sacred ground, and if Bryant was going to pick all of this technology up from where they'd left it lying, he would do so with reverence. “Just some god, I guess,” he said, not too worried about that part. It wasn't a great deal more ridiculous than what Aurora believed. “But think of it, devolving yourself, forgetting self-awareness and humanity.”

  The boy on his table, who'd wanted gills. He'd wanted something of the same sort – to be able to go down into the depths and leave the complexities of human life behind. “Why would you want that?”

  “Sounds simpler,” Nori shrugged. “Less chance of being fucked over. Are we done here then? We're going to have to keep a base at the launcher anyway, so I'm keen to get back.”