by T S Hottle
Laral looked like a trapped meezu. He bowed his head.
“General,” said Kai, “this is an audio-only recording. Please signify that this is your offer with a yes or a no.”
“Yes.”
The answer made Kai giddy, particularly because Laral looked nauseated saying it. “And your terms offered were as follows: We acquire for you a city near the second planet’s northern pole to secure its manufacturing capacity. We agree to give you ten percent of our harvests as payment for your support.” Kai struggled not to sound like he was gloating with his next statement. “And once my new worlds are officially secured, you agree to take possession of Essenar as compensation.”
“Have you not considered selling Tishla’s indenture contract?” asked Laral.
“I did. And I reject that option. Therefore, I offer you an entire world, one you have the resources to mine that I do not have. Are we agreed, General?”
Laral stared down at the plate of hot food just placed before him. “I could not change your mind.”
“General, Tishla’s indenture ends in one more revolution. In the interest of producing a child, I may extend it. If she successfully conceives, she will become my wife and be elevated to High Born. If she fails, her talents and her brilliance assure that she will always have a place with me as a Free Woman. Therefore, I must reluctantly offer you Essenar instead.”
“Sentimental cub,” Laral muttered under his breath. “Very well. Governor Lattus Kai, I humbly beg you to accept the terms we have just outlined. Upon securing the two rogue colonies brought to our attention by the Tianese Marq, I, Laral Jorl, your servant, will accept possession of Essenar.”
Kai had one more item to add before asking for Palak’s assent as witness. “Then upon confirmation of possession in Confab, General, Essenar will become yours. Palak, please give your name and make a statement of witness to this deal.”
Palak’s eyes shifted between Kai and Laral. His look told Kai he wanted to be anywhere but the Governor’s private dining room. “I, Orial Palak, Captain of the Governor’s Palace Guard on Essenar, member of the Warrior Caste, and son of Orial Rufeed, do hereby attest that this recording was made freely by both parties and the terms were attested to. On my life, I swear this to be true.”
“House,” said Kai, “end recording. Congratulations, General Laral. You just purchased a mudhole.” He grabbed a piece of meat and chewed off an end. “Subject to Confab, of course.”
THREE: Hanar
“They had a hypergate,” said the captain of the vessel, an older woman named Berraa. “But the lead ships destroyed it. We’re working on the orbital station now.”
Tishla caught Kai’s eye and shook her head. She would not discuss what it was that bothered her in front of Berraa or her crew, but Kai knew it would be bad. “And on the surface?”
“By taking out the hypergate, we’ve cut off their communication with the other Tianese worlds,” said Berraa. “Once the orbital station is destroyed, the surface will be ours for the taking.”
Kai watched as the blue-green sphere grew on the wall-sized screen. It looked much like the world where Kai and Tishla had been raised. He turned to her. “How’s it feel knowing you’ll be queen here?”
“More like princess consort, Sire.”
The word “Sire” drew dirty looks from various crewmembers. Kai only smiled. Turning back to Berraa, he said, “Have you and your crew staked their claims yet?”
“We prefer to wait until…” Berraa stopped when the wall screen flared white. On the surface, a tiny sun erupted along the coast of the continent where Marq’s rogue colony lay. “Sire, that’s the main settlement.”
“Captain,” a crewmember shouted, “laser fusion device has detonated in the colony’s main settlement.”
“I did not authorize the use of fusion weapons,” said Kai. “I did not know we had any. Captain, contact the lead cruiser. Ask them if General Laral author-“
“This is General Laral,” said a familiar voice over the command center speakers. “Governor Kai, did you procure a fusion device I did not know about?”
“I was about to ask you the same thing,” said Kai. “I was prepared to give the order to seize that settlement.”
Tishla walked over to Kai and whispered, “Ask him about Marq.”
“General,” said Kai, “did our friend mention anything about fusion weapons? I thought these rogue colonies weren’t supposed to have them.”
“We had no intelligence to indicate any were here,” said Laral, “but whether by accident or design, this colony’s last defensive capabilities were just vaporized.”
“Begin the invasion,” said Kai. “Let’s seize the land while the survivors are confused.” He motioned to have the signal cut. To Berraa, he said, “If that’s laser fusion, that means the blast site won’t be hot when the fireball dissipates. As soon as it clears, I want to visit the site.”
“Sire,” said Berraa, “there will be nothing but death and ruin there.”
“If the Governor wishes to see death and ruin,” said Tishla, “then take him to see it.”
Berraa met Kai’s gaze with a look that said, She’s no concubine, is she?
Kai gave her a look back that brooked no discussion on the matter.
***
The incursion capsules plowed into the earth as the ships provided by Laral fired them at the remaining farms. As predicted, the conscripted troops found a small population of confused colonists. Laral’s battle wagons, powered by oil-fueled engines that made a tremendous racket, chased them off their farms, the heat weapons mounted on the backs of the wagons exterminating a vast number of them.
Kai had no interest in any of it. It was a fairly new colony with only one large settlement. A day after the invasion, he stood in the charred remains. Rain had come through overnight and brought most of the fallout back to the ground. In some ways, Kai was disappointed. He had, after all, wanted to trade a rainy world for a drier one. However, some rain had to fall, or this planet would not have tempted Tianese renegades to violate their Compact.
The blackened rubble still smoldered despite the rain. While Kai and Tishla did not need radiation suits, Captain Berraa insisted they take breathing gear just the same. Even the previous night’s rain could not have purged all the soot and dust from the air.
“Did we do this?” asked Tishla, her voice slightly muffled behind the breathing mask. “I thought Ninth Charter forbade the use of such weapons against civilians.”
“Our civilians,” said Kai. “These were aliens illegally squatting on this planet.”
“Kai? Can I ask you something?”
“What’s that?”
“If that other world has an entire city on it, complete with factories, how can it be a rogue colony?”
“Maybe the Compact doesn’t know it exists.”
“Marq does. And he’s Tianese.”
Kai wandered into an intersection blasted flat by the fusion weapon. Ahead, with all the buildings knocked over, he could see that the center of town had become a sheet of blackened glass. His foot hit something as he walked through the intersection. Looking down, he could see it was a Tianese skull. It could just as easily have been one of Kai’s own people.
The resemblance made him shake.
***
The colony transports, large saucer like craft with sophisticated antigrav lifters, soon arrived at Hanar, the name given to the colony now under Gelt occupation. Kai’s troops and Berraa’s crew were given first choice for land claims. Kai himself took only enough to put together a crude capital, the one the Tianese had built now a black wound on the coastline.
Kai chose Palak to administer the planet for him. “You’re a better man than most High Borns in the Warrior Caste. And you know the Realm is just giving us more criminals for transportation.”
“Have to start somewhere, Sire,” said Palak. “We interrogated one of the survivors. We can’t eat their grain, but it’s close enough to ours that we kno
w it will grow here, too.” He reached into his pocket and produced a familiar-looking root. “And apparently, these things grow like weeds here. Famine is not going to be a problem for you.”
“Or you,” said Kai. “Play your cards right, and you can call yourself ‘Governor’ here soon enough.”
Palak bowed his head. “Thank you, Sire.”
Kai looked past Palak at where a shuttle had landed in the distance. A Tianese man strode down the ramp with Laral. “Our friend is back.”
Palak turned to see Marq approach with Laral a few steps behind, following him like a lost pet. “I do not trust that man. And his companion is a monster.”
“Who’s the monster? Laral? Or Marq?”
Palak turned back to Kai. “You know? I think they’re interchangeable.”
***
The prisoner squirmed in his bindings. At least Kai thought it was a he. These Tianese kept their genitals elsewhere, and neither Kai nor his interrogation team felt like looking for them.
“Has anyone extrapolated their language yet?” Kai asked the lead interrogator, a grizzled old enlistee from the Warrior Caste who clearly didn’t care much for Kai or Laral. Never mind that he served both at the moment. His name was Rork, and Kai never did learn if that was his family or personal name.
“It took some time,” said Rork. “Most of what he said translates as ‘Please don’t kill me. Let me go.’ Have you considered asking the General’s little alien friend? He’s of the same species.”
“He only speaks the Mother Tongue in our presence. Anyway, I don’t trust that man. As alien as they are, I trust our friend here more. Pity we’ll have to kill him.”
“Do we not do that to our own renegades?”
The similarities between primate species overwhelmed the differences. Kai could recognize fear on the alien’s face. He had seen Zaras, truly the most ape-like of the known sentient primates, bare their teeth and knew whether they were smiling or threatening. Laputans, for all their bluster, cried easily. The Qorori, those pale nocturnal beings with six fingers instead of the usual five, had a reputation for the most sensual expressions of ecstasy among all the known primate races. Something else unsettled Kai. Like these hairless apes called the Tianese, the Qorori kept their genitals elsewhere. Actually, Kai realized his own people were the odd ones. Being born into this skin, however, instead of the paler, darker-haired Tianese, made the rest of the primate universe utterly alien to him.
“Can you translate for me and make it sound reasonable?”
Rork smiled, revealing several missing teeth. Most had been taken out in combat, and a man like Rork would leave the gaps as trophies. “I’ve done this before. Once I pick up a few words and speak them back at him, he gets really talkative. I probably know half their idioms now, at least the common ones.”
“Translate for me.” To the alien, he said, “I am Kai, Governor of this world. One of your people tells me you are squatting on this planet.”
Rork translated for the alien. The alien responded back in a language that sounded like gargling. Through Rork, he said, “We are here legally. This world is a Compact world, chartered by Metis.”
“Who is Metis?”
“Metis is a…” Rork struggled with the word the alien used. “He calls it a ‘kunstichewentasorty.’ The word does not extrapolate well.”
“So it’s a group?” said Kai. “Like Juno?”
“I know of no Juno,” the alien said via Rork. “Metis is the homeworld of most of the settlers here.”
“But not yours.”
“I am from Belsham.”
Kai turned to Rork. “We are recording this. Right? So far, we know only of Tian and Etrusca in this Compact. And Juno is a commercial entity.”
“If that little alien is to be believed.”
Kai began to think Marq may not be Tianese after all. He may even be a Gray in disguise. The Grays were nasty little creatures, considered the most alien of alien primates, prone to terrorizing pre-spacefaring races for sport. The Warrior Caste, Kai knew, made sport of them in return. Maybe Marq was their way of getting even with both the Tianese and Kai’s people. “Juno claims they own this planet and gave it to us to develop.”
“Who are you?” said the alien, again translated by Rork.
“We are the Gelt.”
“I’ve never heard of you.”
“We barely know who you are.” Kai knelt next to the alien Quand said, “Tell me, do your people have slavery? Even indentured servitude?”
The alien’s expression went from frightened to angry. “We are not savages. The only slaves we have are convicted identity thieves and stowaways. And their terms are limited by our Declaration of Rights.”
“And what happens if one of your kind comes into possession of an alien slave, indentured or otherwise?”
“What else? They’d have to free the person.”
“And this is the law on all of your worlds?”
“On pain of expulsion from the Compact. We have had civil wars over it, sometimes between factions on the same kunstichewentasorty.”
“That’s a planet. Right?”
“Usually. Sometimes a whole star system. Three or four are merely continents.”
Planet would do for Kai’s purposes. “One more question. Did your people destroy your own main settlement?”
“We thought you did.”
“We did not.” Kai rose and said to Rork, “Find whatever you can in their food stores, give him and his family the best possible meal you can make from that. Make them comfortable.”
“Sire?”
“Have your cook lace the food with sleep potion. Tishla will give you the proper dosages. Make sure there’s enough to stop their hearts after they lose consciousness.”
Rork gave Kai a knowing smile. “General Laral will not like that.”
“General Laral will soon be Governor of Essenar. He can deal with whatever aliens he finds there however he sees fit. I am Governor of this world, and it is my decision.”
Rork gave Kai a formal salute, fists crossing his chest, bowing. Kai doubted he ever gave Laral that kind of respect.
“And Rork.”
“Yes?”
“Bring their bodies to my lander so we may burn them properly.”
“They’re not Gelt, Sire.”
“No. But I want their people to know we are not savages either. We will ceremonially burn them. Tishla will record the ritual and take it to the Tianese.”
“You think Laral is starting a war.”
“I think Marq is playing us against his own people for his own ends.”
***
Tishla could not understand it. Sent to a Tianese world so soon after they had slaughtered thousands of those creatures? It was the blast. Kai had been nervous since the blast. They still did not know who detonated the fusion device.
“Go with that alien to his homeworld,” said Kai. “Stay there until I call for you. You’ll know what to do when you get there.”
She hoped so. Leaving Kai behind at the mercy of Laral Jorl, the most devious man she had ever met, scared her. What would become of an unclaimed indentured in alien space?
Worse, he sent her to Metis via Ramcat. With Marq, no less. When Kai delivered her to the awaiting transport, Marq standing there with his stupid little smile waiting for her, she felt real fear, wondering if she would ever see Kai again. Now she found herself waiting for hypergate transit to this…
Metis?
What was Metis? Marq had told her it was named for an ancient Tianese goddess of wisdom. When Tishla pressed him for details, Marq added that the king of that particular tribe’s gods feared that Metis would bear a son who would overthrow him. So he swallowed her, only to end up giving birth to her daughter.
“Your people are sick,” she said when Marq finished the tale of Zeus, Metis, and Athena.
Marq laughed, and it sounded off now that Tishla could hear other Tianese around them. “You have to understand. The tribe that orig
inally created the Metis myth was a matriarchal society. Metis was their goddess. When the Sea Peoples…”
“The what?”
“A warrior tribe that overran that part of our homeworld before the historical record there truly began. Anyway, they were patriarchal and worshipped a thunder god named Zeus. When the cult of Metis would not die off, the conquering people made up a story that Zeus had married Metis. As the story goes, someone told Zeus that his son by Metis would overthrow him. So when Metis got pregnant, he tricked her into becoming tiny and swallowed her. Only she gave birth anyway, and a new goddess of wisdom, Athena, sprang from his head.”
Tishla wondered if the story lost something in translation. It sounded ridiculous and just a bit horrifying. “Who are you people? Do you solve all your wars with cannibalism?”
“It’s just a primitive myth.”
“That you named an entire planet after.”
“Baah-Zun. Isn’t that from your creation myth?”
That was all the quarrel she would have with him. When Kai ordered Tishla to accompany Marq to his homeworld, she knew not to argue. Though he would not explain why, she did not argue. Most of the time, she could push him as though she were the master and he the indentured. Still, if Kai asserted himself, Tishla submitted. That was the deal.
The trip started normally enough. She and Marq took one of Kai’s personal transports to Ramcat, a Laputan world. As the Realm and the Compact remained largely oblivious to one another’s existence, only on Ramcat could they move from one culture to the other without having to go through first contact protocols.
At least, that was the plan.
As the Laputan transport entered the wormhole that would carry them to Compact space, Tishla watched with pleasure as Marq became mildly ill from the distortion effects of the hypergate. She herself found the experience unpleasant, but she did not suffer the same problems dealing with the gates’ interdimensional oddities as others did, be they Gelt or alien.