by B. V. Larson
“Do you really think you can get enough workers?” asked Nolan. “It’ll take tens of thousands just to refurbish sixteen sidespace drive systems and their associated controls.”
“Never fear, Doctor,” Zaxby replied. “I will get you your workers.”
***
“Half a million? Out of the question,” Premier Vuxana said when Zaxby shuttled to Freenix Base and gained a private audience with her. “I already conveyed the best ten thousand of our technicians to War Male Straker’s fleet. Our workforce is in the middle of constructing new habitats. My sisters and I have already spawned another million young, who are even now being educated and trained for their roles in society. These will provide more labor, but they also need living space, and our tanks and pools are already overcrowded and unpleasant.”
Zaxby had to fight against his biological imperatives to unquestioningly submit his will to his matriarch. Males and females were in charge, and neuters followed without argument. This was the way of things in Ruxin society.
Only, Zaxby had lived among humans for too long. He found it within himself to argue. “My Premier, you’re not wrong, but consider this: My simulations have shown the Liberation shall reach a high-water mark, and then recede, unless some other factor changes the trend lines. War Male Straker believes Indomitable will give him, and therefore us, an irresistible weapon. Is it truly impossible to divert the workers? Or merely inconvenient?”
Vuxana took time to think, popping a snail into her well-formed mouth. Zaxby was entranced by her chewing motions and found himself becoming sexually aroused. Unfortunately, there was no male nearby to complete the tryst, and so his arousal turned to frustration, perversely fueling his ability to dispute.
“I understand your argument, Zaxby, but I must constantly weigh the long-term needs of our people here with the short-term possibilities of this human Liberation. We Ruxins here can get by without the rest of the galaxy, as long as we remain hidden. With two centuries of sustained growth, our progeny might burst forth and seize our homeworld again, and be strong enough to establish a place for our species in this spiral arm.”
“Your words are filled with wisdom, Premier Vuxana,” Zaxby began in a diplomatic tone, “but every day our homeworld suffers under the cruel tyranny of the Mutuality. I myself bear the scars of torture and degradation. My fifth tentacle has only recently grown back. How many of our people must be so treated, and over how many years? Is not a great reward worth a gamble?”
Vuxana paused in her languid consumption of snails. The mollusk in her grip writhed, as if it knew its life was about to end. Zaxby felt kin to the helpless creature, as if his own existence hung by a thread. At his age, if the hope of the Liberation died, he might as well die with it, for it appeared that despite his many contributions he would never be allowed to genderize, never pass his exceptional genes to offspring.
That would, of course, be a tragedy, as he knew himself to be a superior specimen. But life, as the humans liked to say, was seldom fair.
“I have an alternative,” Vuxana said after an unusually long time of apparent contemplation. “I’ve been recently informed of a repository of technology that may serve your Liberator’s agenda.”
“Recently informed?” Zaxby took note of a slight anomaly in one of Vuxana’s auditory orifices. “You’re wearing a comlink.”
“Of course. I am young, beautiful, and inexperienced. Thus, some think me foolish and empty-headed. My mother, the former Premier, still guides me…and apparently has kept some things from me, until now.” Vuxana scowled for a moment, and then brightened. “I will deal with that issue later. Let us be briefed.”
Vuxana heaved her attractive bulk from her cup-chair and led Zaxby out of the private chamber through a disguised back entrance. Beyond it waited Freenix, former Premier.
“Mother, you will take us to this technological repository and provide us with complete information.”
“Of course, daughter.” Freenix shambled down a corridor pleasantly awash in rich, recycled seawater. Earthan mollusks crawled here and there, eating algae and making themselves available for easy consumption.
Zaxby mused on the benefits of wealth and power as he surreptitiously retrieved one and popped it into his mouth. The juicy crunch of its shell and body clouded his senses with pleasure. Yes, he could get used to this kind of life in his dotage, if only he could convince Freenix he’d earned the ease of retirement and the right to breed.
And for that, he must return a hero. Otherwise, he would have given up his dreams and settled here, to regale the many adolescents with stories of the world outside the hidden nebula.
Deep in the palace, they arrived at a nondescript but well-secured door. Freenix input a complex fractal code into the locking device, and it opened with a pop and a sigh.
“This area is hermetically sealed,” observed Zaxby. “Is it for biological containment?”
“Among other things,” said Freenix. “It is one of many lines of defense against what resides here ever escaping. Now, my daughter must decide whether a dangerously useful tool should now be activated—and possibly released.”
They passed through a second hermetic door into a large vault. Inside, an ancient neuter stood to greet them. “Welcome to the Repository, Premier, Old One. Is this young fellow to be granted access?”
“Young fellow?” Zaxby laughed. “I am nearly two hundred.”
“Oh, to be in my two-hundreds again,” sighed the neuter. “Such energy, such joy in life I had back then. Now, after three-hundred and twelve years, my only purpose is to guard these treasures against the day of their use.”
“I believe such a day has come, Joxbor,” Freenix said.
“I shall decide that, Mother,” Vuxana said firmly.
“Of course, daughter,” Freenix said without any hint of real deference. “Joxbor, brief our new Premier on the Mindspark Device.”
“By your leave.” Joxbor moved slowly over to a display in front of a bank of sixty-four large, heavy, individually locked drawers. The holoplate lit with a picture of a three-dimensional geometric construct, the schematic of a machine. “The Mindspark Device is a quantum-activated mechanism of exosapient origin. It was salvaged from a vessel we found here in the nebula sixty-three years ago.”
“A vessel?” Zaxby said excitedly. “What sort of vessel? Is it still out there? Have you recovered it and exploited it? Have—”
Joxbor interrupted with the kind of glare and tone only an elderly pedagogue can generate. “Do keep silent while your elders are speaking, youngster. Were you in my class, you’d earn a good thrashing each day, with no doubt.”
“Joxbor,” Freenix said gently. “The briefing? Stay on topic, please.”
“Of course, my dear.”
“And Zaxby,” she added, “you’re to remain silent until the briefing has ended.”
Zaxby waved his assent, though technically the old Premier had no power to order him to do anything.
Joxbor’s familiar form of address made Zaxby look more closely and notice the telltale stretch marks of sexual reversion. Apparently, the ancient Ruxin had once been gendered, and had chosen—or had been ordered—to change back to neuter. This explained his advanced age, as those who remained male or female seldom lived so long. It also explained his status; Joxbor had likely been one of Freenix’s lovers.
Joxbor continued his briefing in a tired voice. “As I was saying before being so rudely interrupted, the Mindspark Device is salvaged alien technology. It invaded the computer of the singleship that found it, though not quickly enough to prevent the pilot from communicating this circumstance with base control. This pilot also had the presence of mind to manually destroy the ship’s drives, allowing enough time to scramble a response team to quarantine the vessel from all other contact. Eventually, the Device was excised.”
Vuxana gestured impatiently. “So you have this Device, locked away here?”
“Of course.”
“You said it conne
cted with the singleship computer. Did it employ malware?” asked Zaxby.
“I understood you were to be silent?” said Joxbor.
Zaxby subsided with ill grace.
Joxbor continued, “However, the answer to your question is yes…and no. The Device appears to be an invasive quantum semi-organism utilizing multiphasic, multidimensional modes in order to control complex nonorganic systems and reorganize them according to its programming and dictates.”
“I am no technician, Ancient One,” said Vuxana. “My talents lie in governance and politics, not machinery. Explain this Mindspark Device using terms of fewer than one hundred syllables.”
“Of course, Premier. My apologies. You distract me so with your overwhelming beauty, I wish I was again male.”
Vuxana huffed, but then she glowed with heightened chromatophoria. Zaxby, forced to hold his tongue, mused on the similarities between human and Ruxin females, especially those of prime breeding years. This caused him to drift for a moment into a fantasy composed of himself-as-male, Vuxana, and an unnamed and unimportant neuter to complete the triad.
“Please continue,” Vuxana said.
Joxbor folded his tentacles. “In simplistic terms, this is a computer with a quantum nano-informetric component. Do you follow me so far?”
Vuxana frowned. “No. Be clearer, or there shall be consequences.”
Joxbor’s movements became careful, as if manipulating fragile eggs, and he tapped the controls to illustrate his words. “If given access to power, the Device can generate nanite tendrils via quantum probability methods. We surmise it can connect to any energy source and any computer, no matter how constructed. It will invade electronic systems and reorganize them.”
“So this Mindspark Device invaded and reorganized the singleship computer—to what end? Was it malignant?”
“It did not appear so. However, the singleship’s systems were of limited complexity.”
Vuxana moved forward to crowd Joxbor, clearly becoming impatient. “What exactly did it do? Tell me now, or I shall find someone who can.”
Joxbor didn’t back up, instead he opportunistically reached out and caressed one of Vuxana’s gorgeous tentacles as if petting an animal. “It first self-repaired and optimized all ship systems. The pilot reported efficiency increases ranging from 23 percent to over 5000 percent.”
“That seems innocuous,” said Vuxana, moving back and rubbing with disdain at the spot where Joxbor had touched her. “In fact, that seems a useful technology.”
“Yes, but then it began exhibiting signs of… volition.”
Vuxana’s eyes widened. “Volition? It began to…”
“…do things, using the ship systems it controlled,” said Joxbor. “It fired thrusters in an attempt to approach the quarantine ships. This was prevented, but then it attempted to communicate with the systems of other ships via datalink. Although this was easily defeated by encryption, it later began to speak, though at the level of a larva, parroting what it heard.”
“It was gaining in sophistication… perhaps even becoming self-aware?”
“Apparently.”
“Did it do anything inimical? Even anything untoward?” asked Vuxana.
Joxbor’s tone turned reproachful. “No, Premier. In fact, it seemed innocent and friendly, like any child. It pained me to see it shut down.”
“Yet it was shut down, and it now resides in this vault.”
“That was not my decision.” Joxbor rotated his eyes toward Freenix.
Vuxana turned to gaze upon the former Premier. “Of course not. Mother, why was this intelligence locked away rather than allowed to grow? It might have become a powerful ally.”
“Or it might have gone insane, like all other advanced machine intelligences before it,” Freenix replied. “Later, when we have hundreds of habitats rather than only a few, there might be time to bring it to life and study it.”
Zaxby watched as Vuxana’s supple young mind made explicit connections. “Yet now you reveal this to me…to us, as an alternative to supplying Indomitable with sufficient labor? You suggest we install this Device on a battleship of vast potential power and allow it to grow? This seems like a far greater risk than before, when it inhabited a mere singleship.”
Freenix’s body language expressed a combination of disdain and weariness. “I present it to you as an option to solve the problem of Zaxby’s battleship and secure the freedom of our homeworld. I only suggest you purge Indomitable’s systems of all information relating to the significance of this nebula, and that you activate the Mindspark Device well away from here. If it goes rampaging among the human systems, what do I care? In fact, that might also achieve our desired result.”
Vuxana pointed accusingly with a tentacle. “And if it devastated Ruxin?”
Freenix replied, “If War Male Straker liberates Ruxin and yet his Liberation movement fails, do you really think Mutuality will allow our species to recover? You see how they are. You’ve studied their history. At best, they will bombard Ruxin back to the stone age. At worst, it will be a genocide—except for the remnant here in the nebula. But you’re the Premier now, my daughter. You must decide.”
Vuxana kept one eye on her mother, one on the old guardian of the vault, and turned two upon Zaxby. “You have lived among humans for many years. What do you counsel?”
Zaxby was thoughtful before answering. “If you will not provide the workers I need, I’m willing to try this Device. There is danger, but our human allies and many of our fellow Ruxins are out there even as we speak, fighting and dying in hopes of liberating both species from tyranny.”
“Then let it be so,” said Vuxana. “Keeper, give Zaxby the Device and instruct him in its use.”
When her commands were executed, Zaxby eyed the Device curiously. He couldn’t help but wonder how this unexpected twist of events would play out.
Chapter 23
Starfish Nebula, Battleship Indomitable. Thirty days later.
Zaxby watched as the last of the forty-five thousand Ruxin technicians departed, packed to the gills aboard the local Ruxin transports. They were workers Vuxana had grudgingly allotted to the Indomitable refurbishment, a tenth of what he’d asked for. Five thousand others had stayed aboard as crew, barely enough to operate the battleship.
Yet the fifty thousand had labored mightily, and Vuxana had ordered a surprisingly generous supply of raw materials and manufactured parts to be delivered to Indomitable. With those, the team had first ensured all sixteen sidespace engines were in good working order, each with triple backup circuitry in case of localized failure.
After that, the crew refurbished the central spinal multi-weapon, a massive dual particle beam and railgun powerful enough to smash a fortress or crack a superdreadnought in one strike. Other systems had been given short shrift so that Indomitable could be used for its primary purpose: as a gargantuan mobile siege engine.
Vuxana had even provided a newly manufactured underspace engine. Though it was far too small to make Indomitable into an Archer, Zaxby figured he could find an appropriate ship in which to install it.
Zaxby had high hopes for the Mindspark Device, but Captain Zholin considered it his primary responsibility to deliver the battleship to Ruxin as Commodore Straker ordered, on time and as functional as he was able. That was why he allowed for only one sidespace transit to bring the modules to a position on the outer edge of the Ruxin stellar system, far beyond its most distant planet, well away from any defensive Mutuality forces.
Zholin’s other option—to transit to some intermediate point, reassemble Indomitable, install the Device, test its results, and then disassemble again for the final transit—seemed fraught with uncertainty. Far too many things could go wrong. This way, at least the ship would be there, and hopefully it would ensure the liberation of Ruxin.
Five days later, with five to spare, Indomitable’s pieces arrived at the Ruxin system.
As before, it took almost a day to assemble them. Slowly, careful
ly, each chunk a superdreadnought in size if not in function, the million-ton modules were guided together by a combination of thrusters and grabships and tugs, each making tiny adjustments.
First, each of eight pairs joined. Then the eight double pieces grappled and became four, and then two, the fore half and the aft. Finally, the two became one, like octagonal metal cans stacked atop one another. In celebration, Zholin ordered a half-day of rest for the weary beings inhabiting the metal monster.
Zaxby happily took advantage of the instruction, sleeping comfortably in his hydro-tank and dreaming of the lovely Vuxana. When he awoke, he suggested as complete a test of systems as possible.
Captain Zholin gathered all key personnel on Indomitable’s capacious bridge and ordered the system test to begin. Once finished, it was time to start the real trial: that of the Mindspark Device.
The ship’s control center could seat three hundred with ease. It was arranged as a bowl rather than the usual circle, with a flat octagon in the center accommodating the operational sections—Helm, Sensors, Communications and so on—and eight tilted decks around them containing staffs for the sixteen subsections. Gravplating allowed those on the angled decks to operate as if they were flat, but all personnel, displays and screens were visible to the ship’s captain and flag officer positions at the center.
Some screens were dark and the chairs were empty, for many of the battleship’s secondary and defensive weapons, auxiliary power systems, fleet comms, high-grade sensors—all the myriad machinery that should have made Indomitable a true battleship rather than a mere siege engine—were inoperative. Like a ghostly old factory standing too long empty, it seemed dismal, sad, dull and unlovely.
Zaxby carried the Device himself as he entered the arena-like space. It rested within a simple ceramic case, double-insulated. Whatever alien construct resided within, it had been denied power and connectivity.