The Holy Land: Fanatical Earthling planet assassins are spreading chaos through the galaxy. Is there any nice way to stop them?

by Robert Zubrin

  Tiranus tuned on his heel and stalked off. As Aurora watched him go, a tear formed in the corner of her eye. “I can’t believe it,” she sniffled. “It’s been just ten years since the war,and now they’re saying the same horrible things all overagain.”

  Danatus put a soft hand on her shoulder. “Don’t worry, Aurrie. Most people don’t think that way. You’ll find you have a lot of friends here.”

  The priestess turned her teary face towards the young officer with an expression that pleaded forreassurance. So he added, “I promise.”

  Aurora regarded the three CNN reporters, who were now disappearing down the long corridor that led out from the landing bay. “We’re being placed under guard, while those assassins are being given the free run of theship.” She shook her head.

  “They’re reporters,” Danatus said. “They need to be able to move freely to get their story.”

  “Aren’t you at least going to search their boxes?”

  “We can’t. We don’t search other reporters, and they are suspicious, so searching them would be suspicion profiling. That would be illegal.”

  Aurora shook her head again. “May Minerva awake you,” she said.

  Danatus smiled. “Thanks for the kind thought. Come on, Aurora, let me show you to your rooms.”

  The flagship was astonishing. Its corridors were the size of avenues, each side of which were decorated with exotic trees, iridescent sculptures, and glorious beds of fragrant alien flowers. The ceilings were illuminated with a vague blue light and so high that they seemed like a natural sky. Crowds of royal blue-clothed Weegee men and women moved around chatting or shopping, or sat in open-air bistros sipping drinks or playing board games. In several places the corridors opened into fair-sized plazas in which choruses sang and skate dancers danced. If Hamilton hadn’t known he was inside a warship he would have thought he was outdoors in the center of a very unusual but quite pleasant town on a delightful planet. Apparently the Princess knew how to travel in style.

  “I apologize for the rather crude appearance of everything in this part of the ship,” Danatus commented. “This area is for the low-ranked enlisted men. But we’ll be in officer country soon enough and things will become a lotnicer.”

  Indeed they did. As they moved forward into shipboard zones reserved for personnel of ever higher grade, the streets became wider, the trees taller, the flowers more luxuriant, statues more impressive, and the furnishings in every way more elegant. Finally they entered an enormous boulevard lined with transparent glowing crystal palaces that emanated wonderful fragrances and beautiful soaring music.

  Aurora telepathed Hamilton a comment. “Yikes,” she thought. Aurora asked Danatus. “So, is this where the Princess lives?” Danatus smiled. “No, these are the junior officer’s quarters.” The priestess’s eyes went wide. “Junior officers in these? On your

  father’s ship…” Danatus interrupted her. “Aurrie, really.My father’s ship was an old- style light battlecruiser, optimized for speed and firepower. This is an Imperial Flagship. We need to keep up appearances.” He stopped in front of one of the smaller palaces. “Ah,” he said. “Here are your quarters. I’m sorry ifit’s a bit shabby. I tried to get you better, but this was all I could arrange.”

  Aurora eyed the magnificent structure in awe. “That’s OK,” she said. “We’ll manage.”

  Danatus gave her a friendly slap on the back. “That’s the spirit, Aurrie, you were always ready to rough it. But if you do need anything, there will be a Space Marine detail in the outer foyer who will be available to help you. Now go inside and get some rest. I’ll be by at 0900 tomorrow morning to take you to the inquest, which will take place in the secondary administrative disciplineshack,” he indicated a fabulous building some distance down the boulevard, “starting at 1000 hours sharp.”

  A moment later, he was gone. Aurora stood staring at their crystal palace for some time.

  Finally she turned to Hamilton. “Yikes,” she said aloud.

  “Yikes,” he said in agreement.

  Then they started climbing the 100-meter-long staircase that led to the palace door.

  The palace interior was appropriately palatial, complete with numerous frescos, mosaics, gardens, sculptures, and other works of art. In the center of the main ballroom was an array of musical fountains spewing glowing multi-colored water in changing patterns depicting splendid visionary landscapes in the air. On a pedestal stage surveying the fountain were crystal statues of three beautiful goddesses. One had an owl perched on her shoulder; this Hamilton recognized as Minerva. The remaining two were strange, but as one carried a double-headed ax and the other a staff with two coiled snakes, Hamilton surmised readily enough that they must represent Hera and Aphrodite.

  Aurora frowned when she saw the triune altar, and turned away from it, surveying the ballroom, as if looking for something. Her eyes lit upon two circular pads about fifteen feet in diameter which were covered with satiny sheets. Quickly she ran and pulled the covers off of one of the pads, and threw them over the statues of Hera and Aphrodite. Then she knelt down in front of the statue of Minerva and spent several minutes in quiet prayer.

  Finally she stood up and faced the Ranger. “Hamilton, come here,” she said. “I need to make a sacrifice to cleanse this altar.”

  Alarmed, Hamilton backed away. “Hold on, Aurora. Your religion is your business, but I have no intention of being anyone’s sacrifice.”

  Aurora laughed. “Hamilton, you are so silly. I’m not going to kill you. I just need a few drops of your blood to offer to the Goddess as an apology for the sacrilege that has been done to her here. Now stop acting like a frightened child and come here so we can get the job done.”

  Hamilton stepped forward gingerly. He offered his left hand. “Can you take what you need from there?”

  Aurora smiled and took his left in hers. “Yes, certainly.” Then mov- ing swiftly, she removed her owl pendant from her neck and slashed it across his left wrist causing it to bleed copiously. Hamilton tried to snatch his arm back, but found he couldn’t move at all. Then Aurora held his arm so that his blood fell at the feet of Minerva. She looked at the statue and intoned.“Oh, great goddess Minerva, please accept this sacrifice and forgive the insult that has been given to thee in this place. Know that we, who are here now,worship thee and only thee.” Then she slashed the owl in the opposite direction acrossHamilton’s wrist and the wound healed as if it had never been there at all. She released Hamilton’s hand and he found he could move again.

  “There,” she said. “Now was that so bad?”

  Hamilton rubbed his wrist.“I guess it wasOK.” He regarded the statue. “Aurora, you told the Goddess that ‘we’ worship only her. You know that I don’t follow your religion.”

  Aurora shrugged. “Obviously. But Minerva is only interested in the thoughts of rational minds.”

  “So I don’t count.”

  “I’m afraid not. But you know, if you would really like to become human, my offer still stands. Just let me into your inner mind with permission to rearrange things, and I’ll fix you up. It would take a lot of work, since many of your psychotic complexes are rather deeply dug in, but if you really cooperate I think that in a few months you could be debugged and then reprogrammed to be nearly as human as any Minervan male. I’ll do it at no charge. How about it?”

  “No way.”

  “Phooey.” Aurora sighed. “Oh well, I suppose it is unrealistic of me to expect a subrational being to comprehend its own mental inadequacy. But I like you anyway. It’s just too bad that…”

  “Sorry.”

  Aurora dropped the subject and surveyed the ballroom. “Well, Hamilton,” she said. “We’ve got a lot of time to kill. Can you play chachostrat?” She pointed to a table with an inset quad nine squares long and seven squares wide, with two rows of playing pieces on each side.

  “Is it like chess?” Hamilton asked. Hamilton was an expert chess player. He eyed the pieces with interest. Perhaps thi
s was a game where he could show himself a match for Aurora.

  They sat down at the table and Aurora explained the rules. As she did so, Hamilton could not help observing how the game mirrored Minervan and Weegee concepts of religion and society.

  The rules were as follows. Each side had two rows of pieces. In the front row were the smaller pieces, similar to pawns in chess, but with each one representing a different specialty of space marine. These male pieces all had limited moves. In the second row were larger pieces denoted by figurines representing one Empress, two princesses, two countesses, and two priestesses. These all had more powerful moves. The male pieces were all limited in another way; the pieces they attacked were simply killed, and thus removed permanently from the board. The female pieces, on the other hand, did not kill, they captured, and the prisoners they took were then returned to the board on any vacant square as partisans of their new possessor. In the center of the board stood the Goddess, immobile but all-powerful. If a priestess could be moved next to her, the person who made the move could ask her to change the shape of the board, with various specified shape changes possible depending upon the square of approach or other circumstances. The idea of the game was to capture the opposing Empress. This could only be done with a female piece, as killing such a royal personage with a space marine was considered to be quite beyond the pale.

  Thus while novel in many respects, the game was chesslike enough, and Hamilton happily accepted Aurora’s challenge. In their first game, however, she crushed him in less than twenty moves. No matter, Hamilton thought, that was just his first try whereas Aurora had undoubtedly played the game for years. He asked for a rematch, and Aurora accepted, delaying only to get some raffa for them to sip during their second encounter. In this game she soundly beat Hamilton again, although it took her some twenty-five moves to do it. They got up to get a snack. “Well Hamilton,” Aurora said as they wandered among the huge buffet of bizarre delicacies offered to them in thepalace’s main banquet hall, “you seem to have some aptitude for chachostrat. I tell you what. Let me give you some odds and we’ll see if we can have an even match.”

  Carrying their snacks back with them, they resumed their seats at the chachostrat table.

  Aurora took two of her space marines, changed their color from purple to orange and placed them on Hamilton’s side of the board. “Here,” she said. “You can have two of my marines. That gives you nine in all against my five. Let’s see if that will even thingsup.”

  Itdidn’t. Within thirty movesHamilton’s forces were totally smashed and he had to resign.

  “OK,” Aurora said. “Perhaps we need to increase the odds. Take two more of my marines.”

  Now Hamilton had eleven marines—almost two solid rows—against Aurora’s three, who were barely enough to form a limited redoubt in front of her Empress. Surely if he played methodically he could box her in and win.

  Moving carefully to make sure that no pieces were left unprotected, Hamilton advanced his marines up row by row. Everything seemed to be going according to plan. But then Aurora removed her bootlets and stockings, and started to slowly rub her shapely girlish feet together. The action was distracting. Hamilton made a mistake and lost a marine. Then he made another error and his position was penetrated. A few moves later he found himself routed.

  Aurora smiled. “I think we shall have to give you maximum odds. Take all of my marines.”

  Hamilton set his mouth in a grim line. He realized now that she was trying to humiliate him by beating him while offering great odds. Yet he couldn’t refuse the challenge; to do so would be to admit defeat in advance. She was willing to play dirty—it was obvious to Hamilton now that her bit with her feet was a willful ploy to destroy his concentration. But he had two full rows of marines against her none, and was wise to her tricks. He would teach her a lesson.

  The game began in similar fashion to the previous one, with Hamilton slowly advancing his phalanx. Aurora played with her feet, but the Ranger managed to keep his eyes mostly averted, and only made one mistake, losing a marine which, under the circumstances, he could afford. But then Aurora started combing her hair and humming to herself in the most enchanting way.This was hard to ignore, and Hamilton’s concen- tration began to falter, causing him to lose two more marines. Aurora took her prisoners and dropped them into the central area to exchange them in a bloodbath which left the area around the Goddess temporarily unguarded. Hamilton had one move to save himself but, distracted by Aurora’s siren act, he failed to see the danger. Taking advantage of the situation, Aurora moved up her Priestess and had the Goddess reverse the squares onHamilton’s side of the board. This threw his formation of Marines uselessly to his rear and exposed his Empress front and center, under direct attack by Aurora’s mobile feminine forces, which had been preconcen- trated for the occasion. Two moves later it was all over.

  Hamilton wasnot one for whining, but he couldn’t help thinking that Aurora had not played fair. Combing her hair to break his concentration was over-the-top. That was enough for the priestess.

  “So, it’s my fault that you can’t control your own thought processes? I wouldn’t have had any problem with you combing your hair.”

  “Aurora, really, you knowit’s not thesame.”

  Aurora said, “Hamilton instead of blaming others for your failures, why don’t you look at yourself?”

  So, Hamilton thought, all this was some kind oflesson. “OK,” he said. “What’s your point? That you are a better chacostrat player than I am? I concede it. Or is it that you are smarter than me? I concede that too. Sowhat?”

  Aurora smiled. “Hamilton, you weren’t just beaten at chacostrat, you were utterly and totally crushed. So what I am trying to get you to see is that your mind is completely inadequate.”

  “Oh, thanks Aurora, that makes me feel real good.”

  “You don’t need to feel good. You need tochange.”

  Hamilton scowled. “I tell you what, let’s just change the subject. Can we get the news here? I’d like to find out what’s happened since the fleet arrived.”

  Aurora nodded. “Good idea. I’m sure this place is equipped with an excellent holotheater. Now where are the controls?” She looked around, then said, “Oh there they are.”

  Apparently the controls were telepathic in nature, because even though Aurora did not touch anything, the ballroom suddenly became alive with holographic figures depicting the latest news events from Earth. First the ballroom was filled with images of Earthling assassin children having their hands blown off in New Minervapolis, with an accompanying breathless commentary by Kolta Bruna. Hamilton paid no attention to the reporter, as the scene of carnage itself commanded all his attention. Then on the far side of the ballroom he briefly saw what looked like images of Charlie and Susan trying to bind some of thechildren’s wounds, only to be driven off by Kennewickian toughs. This got him so mad that he actually started across the ballroom to try to intervene, before he realized that he was only watching images.

  Then the scene changed and he was on the Capitol Mall, in the midst of a mass rally of the Cosmic Christian Crusade. All around him were images of religious Christians pissing on effigies of the western arm of the Milky Way Galaxy, and chanting “Death to the Minervans! Death to the Empress! Death to the Weegees! Kill all pagans, kill, kill, kill!”

  An image of White House Chaplain Rev. John Meade raised double victory signs as he faced the crowd from a holographic grandstand on the mall side of the Capitol building. “Jesus is coming! Victory is near!” he intoned as the crowd applauded madly.“Let us join in a holy crusade to exterminate all pagans throughout the universe. With Christ on our side, we are invincible!” Cheers roared from the crowd.

  Hamilton turned away from the newscast in disgust. Mercifully, Aurora switched the holotheater off.

  This is insane, Hamilton thought. Don’t any of them realize what is about to happen? Why can’t they see how crazy they’re being?

  “Why can’t you?” Au
rora said.

  Chapter 15

  True to his word, Danatus arrived to escort them to the inquest at precisely 0900. Unlike the previous day, however, when the main boulevard of the junior officers’ quarters had been largely deserted, now the street was lined with spectators, and Aurora and Hamilton made their progress to the Secondary Administrative Discipline Shack under the scrutiny of hundreds of curious onlookers.

  The SAD Shack was a fabulous structure made of iridescent crystal, about three times larger in scale than the palace in which Aurora and Hamilton had spent the previous night. Instead of a ballroom, it had a main plaza in the center of which was a glowing shaft. Danatus led the two foreigners to the base of the shaft, which then opened to reveal a luxuriously-appointed elevator car. The three entered the elevator, and the entrance disappeared. Aurora felt a mild vibration but no acceleration. Then the entrance reappeared and they exited the elevator into a modest sized lobby which was filled with chatting Weegee military officers and priestesses.

  An elderly officer with lots of medals adorning his uniform approached the three. Aurora recognized the man as Phillipus, the Admiral who had been present in the holotransmission when the Princess had phoned her.

  Danatus saluted sharply. “Lieutenant Danatus, sir! Reporting as ordered with the Minervan witness and her specimen, sir!”

  The Admiral turned to Aurora. “Priestess third class Aurora, wel- come. Thank you for assisting us at this inquest.”

  Aurora held up her hand, three fingers outstretched but pointed Aurora held up her hand, three fingers outstretched but pointed degree angle. “I’m proud to be of assistance, Admiral.”

  Admiral Phillipus raised an eyebrow. “That’s an old style Navy salute. I appreciate the sentiments you are apparently trying to express by it, but you should know that it is reserved for Navy combat veterans.”