“The genebank. That was their target, and they got it. The bomb. CI told me before he passed out.”
Genebank? Bomb? Several minutes ago there had been a tremor. Wow... “Okay, Constable, thank you. Now we’d appreciate if you’d return to your duties; we’re very busy here.”
“Uh, yes. Of course. Take care of them, doc.”
Madani turned to the Lieutenant, who was in much worse shape than Konami. She had four gunshot wounds: two in the abdomen, and one each in her shoulder and arm, rapidly being cleaned and dressed by MedTechs. Five minutes into the brain-scan, which thankfully revealed no sign of hypoxia after Mattoso’s heart had briefly stopped, Constable Goodluck returned, barging through the hatch breathing heavily.
“They’re — the traitors — almost here. We need to move to the next reserve point!”
MedTechs and doctors looked around the medical bay in confusion, finally settling all eyes on Madani.
She gritted her teeth. “We’re not going anywhere. We took an oath and we’re staying with our patients.” She met the eyes of her own department, staring hard at any who looked like they might prefer to flee.
“But—”
“Our duty is with the wounded. Anyone who leaves will answer to me after this is all done.”
Goodluck looked at her, shook his head, and then turned around with weapons drawn.
“Ilsa...”
Oh my god! It was Konami — he reached out to Madani, and she pulled along the little guycable that stretched across the Medical bay to take his hand.
“Rana — take over nine! Cy, what is it?”
“Goodluck... said they’re almost here?”
“Don’t worry, Cy.” She covered his hands with hers. “Everything will be alright.”
“No, listen... we have to announce it. Loud. To everyone.”
“Announce what?”
“The genebank. Here, my wearable...” Konami fumbled weakly at his pockets, and Madani helped him find it. “Need to tell Ngayabo... the genebank is dead. All dead — no more genes.”
“Dead? I don’t understand...”
Konami gestured weakly. “On announce mode — bypassed normal security... should go everywhere in the Fortress.” His voice was so quiet she had to put her ear next to his mouth and moments later he was silent again, his wearable floating away from his hand.
Gunshots turned her head. “Everyone take cover!” shouted Goodluck. MedTechs and doctors alike scrambled to find something to hide behind.
“The patients too!” shouted Madani.
Behind a cluster of beds, huddling the patients down with them, Konami’s wearable drifted by. What the hell did he say?
More shots rang out from the passageway outside Medical, and Goodluck returned fire with a shout.
Goddamn Ngayabo for starting all this... Madani reached for the wearable, flipping on a projection onto the back of a prone patient. It was already in the announce mode on the Fortress circuit, with Konami’s chief inspector override. “Ngayabo, listen to me!” She was shocked by how loud it was — so loud that even Goodluck paused, mid-shout. She swallowed her surprise and continued. “The genebank is dead. Dead and gone, every one of them. It’s all gone, Ngayabo. Stop this. Stop the killing. The genebank is gone forever.”
CHAPTER 81
After dreams of chaos and violence, Konami woke up to silence. Silence, a bright light that made him shut his eyes, and a tremendous ache, from his chest down to his feet. He tried to speak, but all that came out was a croak. He opened his eyes again — Madani was staring down at him with a grin.
“Welcome back, Cy.”
“Water…” he managed to groan. She squirted something into his mouth, a little sweeter than water.
“Before you ask, she’s okay. Mattoso. Stable and medicated for pain.”
“Where am I?”
Still in Fortress Medical, apparently. She explained that they had a bit more space to work with, but were still relying on the 21st century gear they had cobbled together.
“Fortress? What about—” He coughed painfully.
“Don’t worry, Cy. Just relax. The fighting is over. We won.”
We won... The thought comforted him as he settled back into unconsciousness.
“He’s awake, Mayor.”
“Cy? Can you hear me?” It was Harry. Konami was in a private room, it appeared — perhaps one of the Fortress’s supply closets. Mayor Akunle drifted in front of him, with Madani stretched out above. “We thought you’d want to hear what’s happening.”
He started to speak, but his mouth was too dry. A water bag was already in his hand, he found, and he squeezed it into his mouth. “What?”
“With Ngayabo and the traitors.”
Of course — could it all be over? He told them to get on with it, and the mayor explained that just minutes after Madani’s announcement, the attackers stopped advancing. Within a half-hour, they were withdrawing altogether, and within an hour they were all out of the Fortress. “It was the genebank. You saved us, Cy. You and Mattoso.” Fighting had ended two days prior, with several hundred casualties. “But it would have been all of us if it hadn’t been for you and Mattoso.” And in the aftermath, Wilson Paramis was found dead. Officially, in the fighting, but the mayor said that he had killed himself, leaving an unencrypted wearable with blueprints and proof that the supposed Earth return vessels were mockups.
Konami’s mouth opened in surprise.
“And that’s not all. He had a recording, I don’t know how, of Ngayabo speaking about her plans. You were right, it turned out. There was no return possible. Ngayabo planned to kill everyone onboard. It even showed that your predecessor – the last Constabulary head – had been killed via fake suicide by the conspirators.”
In any other circumstances but these, Konami wouldn’t have been able to believe it. Paramis had tested positive for phenelzine. The mayor didn’t have an answer for that, but suggested that he may not have intended to finish the journey in the first place. “In any case, we released everything we found immediately. Inside and outside the Fortress. We hacked into the shipwide circuits and put on Ngayabo’s words, on repeat. We said we had recovered it from a dead traitor.”
The mayor continued to explain. There was no response for another hour, and then scouts reported sounds of fighting – a mutiny within the mutiny. Heh – traitors to the treasonous. A few hours later a group came out with a white flag, and Ngayabo tied up and gagged. “There were another few pockets of holdouts, but the vast majority surrendered right then.”
For the rest, the mayor explained that they were retaking the ship, space by space. Any remaining holdouts could be dealt with systematically.
Ngayabo was under guard and not speaking, not to anyone at all, while most of the other conspirators were cooperating from their hastily rigged jail cells. Apparently most of them didn’t even know Ngayabo’s ultimate plans. They thought we were all going back to Earth. Most were happy to cooperate after that.
“In fact, based on the data in Paramis’s wearable, even the traitors weren’t supposed to live. Ngayabo planned to kill everyone. Every single one of us, and every single one of her conspirators. Maybe a few of them knew it, knew they were gonna die, and fought on anyway. She was gonna kill twenty thousand people—”
“—and use the genebanks for the New Humanity.” Konami shook his head in amazement. “That’s what I figured out, Harry. Kiro — DCI Gregorian — he had said that we weren’t the future. That even the kids onboard weren’t the future. He knew what the future was — the genebanks. Ngayabo was going to kill off humanity and start fresh. A generation of babies in artificial wombs, raised by Bots, and one old, genocidal fanatic. A truly New Humanity, with no influence whatsoever from old Earth.” He shuddered.
“So that’s it, Cy. We’re resting and healing, repairing, and retaking the ship. But it’s over. Konrote’s getting his guys together to start fixing the Cans’ rotation.”
“And the traitors?”
>
“I’ve talked to the captain. There will be trials, for any that won’t plead guilty. Most of them have been begging to confess. A handful tried to kill themselves, in addition to those that turned on each other.”
Trials. Konami couldn’t help but think back to his own trial, though they didn’t call it that. As if Harry could read his mind, he looked away at Konami’s glance.
“I’ll leave you to rest, Cy. Everyone is grateful — the Doctor can tell you that they’ve been turning away visitors all day. Thank you, Cy. To you and Mattoso.”
When he left, Konami tested his muscles. There was pain in his legs and pelvis, but it was manageable. He reached out to Madani and pulled her in for a kiss. For the first time, he saw tears in her eyes.
“I was so worried, Cy. When Goodluck brought you in.”
“It’s over now. Thank you — for saving me.”
“Thank you, Cy. For saving Aotea.”
He asked after Bea, who was next door.
“How about Kostya?” He felt guilty, absurdly, that he hadn’t visited his dog in weeks.
She chuckled. “Last I heard, few hours ago, all the pets were bouncing off the walls with the VetBots. XO says they remain there until Spinup. But we can visit.”
Konami started to extricate himself from his various medical connections. “Bea. I wanna see her. Get this IV out of me.”
“I don’t know if you’re—”
Konami couldn’t help it and laughed uproariously. It hurt and felt great at the same time. “Ilsa, I’m going. I’m going to see Bea. Get it out or I’m pulling it out.”
Surprise turned to amusement on her face, and she complied.
Mattoso was intubated and hooked up to half a dozen devices – she looked straight out of one of those ancient medical drama vids. He wondered how difficult it would be to move her to the much more modern facilities of the Infirmary, once it was operational. A familiar face — Teacher Pat Carmona, if Konami remembered correctly — hovered over her, along with a youthful Doctor. When Carmona saw Konami, a range of emotions ran over the Teacher’s face. After just a moment, they pulled over and embraced him gently.
“Thank you, Chief Inspector. Thank you for saving her.”
“How is she?” Looking into Pat’s face, Konami realized the teacher was absolutely exhausted.
“Better. She’s woken up a few times, but she’s weak. She smiled when I told her that we won. Now she’s resting.”
“Looks like you need to rest, Teacher.”
As if in confirmation, a wide yawn took hold of Carmona.
Madani suggested the teacher retire to the hammock next door, assuring him that they’d be woken if there was any change in Mattoso’s condition.
After Carmona left, Madani ordered the other doctor to rest.
Konami let out a long, deep breath. It felt like he had been holding it for an eternity. He settled into a comfortable position beside Mattoso, taking her hand in his left, and putting his right arm around Madani.
Head resting on the doctor’s shoulder, for the first time in months Konami felt an absence of worry.
He had never felt anything better.
EPILOGUE
AOTEA TODAY: SPECIAL EDITION
SPINUP PARTY A GREAT SUCCESS!
Yesterday, forty days after the Battle of Fortress Deep, as many Aoteans have come to call it, we felt our own bodyweight for the first time in 15 weeks. Grateful Aoteans were reunited with their pets, including this writer’s own beloved cat, Barry. Much work remains to be done, but the saddest tasks — the funerals for the fallen — are complete. We will never stop mourning our lost loved ones and loyal shipmates, but they have all finally been consigned to the reclamatorium. Despite the destruction of the first facility, a new genebank is being established, and their biological heritage may yet live again.
The trials continue for those few that refrained from pleading guilty, including their ringleader, Mara Ngayabo. As always, AOTEA TODAY will provide continuous and to-the-minute coverage of all legal proceedings. We can all hope that most of the conspirators, so far sentenced to labor and house arrest for the next twenty cycles or more, can eventually regain the trust of the rest of us.As for the remainder, perhaps there’s no hope for mutual trust, but they still might contribute to our journey in small ways, and they should be given every opportunity to do so.
The damage to Aotea, not only to our ship and crew, but to the psyche of those of us remaining, is devastating . Perhaps even more so, now that we’ve had the chance to reflect on the events of the past few months. But while we must mourn, we must also refrain from despairing. On the contrary, we should feel free. Free to chart our own path, and free to create our own society, should we choose to do so, recognizing the privilege it is to be alive to continue this journey. And continue we must, whether back home or on to a new destination, not only to honor the memory of the fallen, but to restore a sense of hope to ourselves and our children.
In happier news, all restrictions on media from the Charter for a New Humanity Beyond Earth have been declared null and void by Captain Horovitz and Mayor Akunle, per their emergency powers. This writer just so happened to have a large store of Earth system media, including many entertainment vids and games, and they have been provided to Acting Data Systems Chief Wren to upload into Aotea’s network library. All Aoteans are encouraged to see what they’ve been missing!
Weary as we are from the conflict, the ship is abuzz with talk of our future. The emergency powers of the captain and mayor will remain in effect while control and operation of the ship is reestablished, but this is not a long-term solution to govern ourselves. In light of this, AOTEA TODAY sought the opinion of Hamad Maltin, Senior Agricultural Scientist, and popularly considered one of the three Society for a New Humanity “Bigwigs” — the only one left. He declined to be interviewed, but provided the following statement:
“Aoteans, I am sorry. I am sorry for the rot at the root of the Society for a New Humanity, and I am sorry that I was blind to its true nature for so many years. It will be no consolation, but all I can say for myself is that this is not the Society that I joined as a young man in Jupiter system. The Society’s founder, Paola Rahmon, was absolutely correct about one thing — there is a violence intrinsic to the culture of Earth and Earth system. But she was wrong about another thing — separating from that culture obviously does not eliminate this influence. We brought it with us, no matter how strictly we tried to separate ourselves, and I am now convinced that this part of humanity can never be excised. But perhaps it can be tamped down, and redirected.
Aoteans have a new future, when cycles ago our future seemed so clear. The decision on how to proceed and govern ourselves, and even whether to continue on to Samwise or return to Earth system, must be a decision by all loyal Aoteans, though I plan to take no part. If it’s not thrown out entirely, the Charter for a New Humanity Beyond Earth should be thoroughly examined, and no clause or section should be safe from excision if Aoteans deem it unacceptable. On Earth and Mars they used to call such a meeting a Constitutional Convention — as disconcerting as it might seem to emulate a custom of our ancestors, we should recall that this practice produced the least violent societies in Earth’s bloody history. And we should keep in mind that the Charter did not keep us safe from the recent chaos.
As for myself, I am content to tend the Garden. All my energies will be devoted toward its repair and encouraging its growth, so that all of us and our children will forever have natural foods to eat and natural beauty to enjoy. No longer am I a ‘Bigwig’, or even a professor — my counsel should never be heeded as any more valuable than any other Aotean. For the remainder of our journey, whether it ends in Earth system or Samwise, I will merely be, if I can be permitted one last conceit, Aotea’s Gardener.”
LATE EDIT: AOTEA TODAY has been informed by the new Second Officer, Commander Mattoso, that the awards ceremony to honor the MOMbots has been postponed until tomorrow evening. Please see the attached ann
ouncement for details.
###
APPENDIX: Historical Timeline
2027: Comet P/2027 Saini discovered by amateur astronomer
2032: Path of Comet P/2027 Saini analyzed and determined to bear a significant risk of collision with Earth, comet renamed Shiva
2034: Shiva calculated to have ~50% chance of collision with Earth in 2055, damage estimated to be comparable to the Cretaceous-Paleogene impact event
2036: Treaty of Cooperation for the Future of Humanity (popularly called Co-Op Treaty) signed by nearly all nations, with two major goals: alter the path of Shiva to spare Earth, and execute a plan for humanity’s future in case the first goal fails. Major hostilities on Earth cease (with a small but vocal, and largely religious, opposition to the Co-Op Treaty)
2043: Operation Deflect team lands on Shiva and begins ejection of comet mass at high speeds
2043: First permanent facility, named Sanctuary, founded on Luna
2044-2050: Numerous small, free-floating habitats established in orbit around Earth or near-Earth orbit around the Sun, largely by the ultra-wealthy
2050: Advances made in life extension; average human lifespan ~90
2054: First permanent habitation founded on Mars
2055: Operation Deflect is successful; Shiva passes within 100 thousand miles of Earth
2055: CoOp Treaty signatories extend close ties, Union of Earth formed, commits to continuing colonization of the solar system
2060: Off-Earth population: ~2000 on Luna, ~500 on Mars, ~1500 on free-float habitats
2071: First permanent habitation founded on asteroid Ceres
2071-83: Numerous small permanent and semi-permanent habitations established on asteroids
2087: First permanent habitation founded on Mercury
2087-2094: Numerous organizations advocating independence from Earth control founded on Luna, Mars, and elsewhere
2100: Off-Earth population: ~10K on Luna, ~10K on Mars, ~500 on Mercury, ~10K elsewhere
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