by J. N. Chaney
“Welcome to your new and temporary home, Thorn,” Bertilak said. “I hope you find it to your liking?”
Thorn walked in and looked around.
Compared to any quarters he’d ever had with the ON, this was positively palatial.
He had an enormous sprawl of space, containing one of the largest beds he’d ever seen. Cushions were heaped and piled about, and there was a huge wardrobe, into which the entire contents of his bag would easily disappear. And there were actual wall hangings, tapestries of heavy, brocaded cloth decked out with soothing, abstract designs. The air held a faint smell of spices unknown to Thorn’s ON palate.
“This is—” Thorn began, turning another circle. “Well, I’m stunned.”
“Is that approval? Because if not, there are two other—”
“No, no! This is—yeah, it’s fine, Bertilak. More than fine, in fact.”
“Excellent. Well, I will leave you to get settled in. When you are ready, please join me on the bridge. Simply follow this corridor all the way forward.” The big alien started to turn away.
“Bertilak?”
He stopped and turned back with a questioning look.
“Why do you have this compartment?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, you’ve been pretty clear that you fly alone. You’ve also said that you are, as far as you know, the only member of your race,” Thorn said, dropping his bag on the bed with a thump. “But you’ve got this compartment all decked out for habitation, and seemingly with furniture scaled to, ah, your particular needs. And you say you’ve got two more compartments like this?”
“Just because I tend to fly alone doesn’t mean I don’t want others aboard my ship,” Bertilak replied. “Sometimes I carry passengers. And sometimes I have Orbital Navy Lieutenants temporarily become my indentured crew. Like now.”
Thorn scowled and started to react, but Bertilak just laughed and raised a hand.
“I am joking, of course. Well, not about the paying passengers part. Having quarters such as these available means that I can carry passengers on very short notice.”
Thorn nodded. “Okay, I guess that makes sense. Well, I’m going to get settled in. I’ll come to the bridge shortly.”
Bertilak nodded and left.
Thorn just stared at the door after it closed.
Paying passengers? Maybe.
But as Thorn looked around the room, he couldn’t help noticing that it looked entirely unlived-in. Everything from the bedding to the cushions looked absolutely new—not a wrinkle or even a hint of a stain. There was a museum-like air to everything in the room, making Thorn feel like an interloper rather than a guest. Or unwilling crew.
Of course, that didn’t mean much. Maybe Bertilak was just a fastidious housekeeper. But it was another one of those little things that nagged at Thorn, joining the growing list of things that just seemed odd about this whole situation. It was, he thought, like being able to see all the individual pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, but not the picture it was supposed to assemble.
The thought energized Thorn. Okay, here he was, whether he liked it or not. He might as well make the best of it. That would start with finding out who Bertilak was and what really made him tick, and that would begin at the heart of the ship. The bridge. Thorn knew you could fake a stateroom, but as to the heart of a starship, there was no avoiding the functionality and use of engineering.
It was time to see what Bertilak flew and how he flew it.
Thorn stopped in the entrance to the bridge and looked around, once again brought up short by the scenery.
It was nothing like the bridge of the Hecate or any other warship he’d been on. Those were busy, purposeful, and full of tech—consoles, screens, repeaters, all of the miscellaneous stuff required to monitor and control something as complex as a big ship and all of its systems. This, on the other hand, was—
Not like that at all.
Bertilak sat in a chair—not even a crash couch, but what literally looked like a simple chair—before a single console, facing a large viewscreen. A second chair sat to his right.
And that was it.
Bertilak turned. “Ah, my friend, welcome to our bridge. Please, come in, make yourself comfortable. We’re about to get underway, and you’ll need to secure yourself for our initial transit. I’m certain this is a process you’ve done time and again, despite your unusual abilities?”
Thorn crossed to the extra seat and sat down. He saw now that there was a little bit more to the ship’s bridge—two consoles were mounted on the rear bulkhead, sporting displays that looked to be depicting nothing but abstract shapes, some spinning, some morphing and flowing languidly from one configuration to another. It might have been useful information—but not to Thorn, who found the assembly to be somewhere between an art installation and a fever dream. Nothing was static, and nothing was easily discernible as hardware.
Tanner’s voice cut in. “Bertilak, this is the Hecate. We’re ready to get underway. Have you got Stellers all squared away?”
“He’s sitting right beside me,” Bertilak replied, glancing at Thorn. “He looks excited to be on the cusp of this remarkable journey we’re about to share, truly.”
Tanner’s reply was dry as a bone. “I’ll just bet he does. Stellers, you try to restrain your enthusiasm.”
“I’ll do my best, sir.”
“Alright, we’re thirty seconds from lighting up the Alcubierre drive,” Tanner said. “Safe travels.”
“And to you, Captain,” Bertilak replied, irrepressible good humor in every syllable.
Thorn watched the Hecate. She hung in space, now a few hundred klicks off, an imposing presence against the starscape.
And then she was gone.
Thorn had literally blinked and missed it. Not that there was much to see when a ship lit its Alcubierre drive. Some people claimed they caught the briefest flash of either dazzling blue or deep crimson from Doppler-shifted particles, depending on whether the ship’s trajectory was toward or away from the observer. Thorn didn’t buy it. For him, a ship just always seemed to wink out of existence.
“Well then, Thorn,” Bertilak said. “With the Hecate gone, I see no reason to hang about this little bit of space, as glorious as it might be.”
“Glorious?”
Bertilak beamed his supernova grin. “Of course. All space is glorious, simply because it exists. As a virtually unlimited resource, open space is one of the true miracles of our universe.” Bertilak wasn’t just enormous, green, and loud. He appeared, to Thorn’s chagrin, to have a poetic streak as well.
“Okay, I’ll take your word for it,” Thorn said, hoping that there wouldn’t be any long diatribes about the wonder of it all.
“So, in the meantime—” Bertilak began, then he stopped and his grin faded. “Thorn, my friend, you look so unhappy. Do you miss your ship so much already?”
“What? Oh no, that’s not it. I just realized I need to know something about your ship that it never even occurred to me to ask about.”
“And what’s that?”
Thorn looked earnestly, almost desperately, at Bertilak. “Please tell me it has a toilet.”
17
The High Shaman watched as the last of the Caucus entered the vast Hall of Assembly. Iridescent bursts of bioluminescence punctuated the gloom beneath the great dome. Most of the flashes and flickers were ones of curiosity or puzzlement, likely because of the sudden and emphatic nature of the summons they’d received. More than a few were tinged with alarm, though. The last time the Caucus had been assembled so hastily, it had been to announce the destruction of Kuvor by a vicious sneak attack by the vile humans.
Good, the High Shaman thought. Let them fret for a time. It would make them more receptive to the measures he was planning to put to the Caucus. Fear was an excellent motivator, after all.
The last of the Caucus took their places, and the High Shaman moved to a place over the precise center of the dais that soared up from t
he Hall’s floor. Around him, in a complete circle, ranked galleries stepped progressively upward, giving the interior the shape of an inverted cone. The center of the dais—and the official center of the Nyctus Star Empire—was the place known as the Focus, marked by a simple and rather unremarkable piece of rock—the Truth Stone. Custom held that any who occupied the Focus must tell the truth and be assumed to be telling the truth by all present. To speak from anywhere else on the dais was to signal potential duplicity—which could, in some cases, be very useful.
But not today. The High Shaman waited for the full attention of all 412 Delegates, ensuring he floated directly above the Truth Stone as he did.
Silence.
“I speak the truth,” the High Shaman said, his voice carried by cunningly designed acoustics through the water, to be heard by every Delegate as though they stood right next to him.
“You speak the truth,” came the massed reply.
“Welcome to this special session of the Caucus. I realize that many of you greeted the news of its convening with apprehension, but I make no apology for that. Once more, we face a dire and insidious threat from the humans.”
Crimson waves of anger swept in ripples across the ranks of Delegates, and there was a rising tide of murmuration, punctuated by anger and fear. The High Shaman waited for it to subside—then waited a moment longer, letting the weight of his pause rest on the collective presence of those gathered. He wanted the Caucus to continue their worrying just a little bit more. He knew there would be speculation about what had happened, especially with the horror of Kuvor still fresh in their minds. An experienced leader, he knew to never waste a good crisis. The newness of their racial anger would be a tool like no other, and the High Shaman intended to exploit every hyperbolic moment of the Nyctus rage—for his own use, of course.
He was a politician. Not a saint.
The High Shaman went on when he had exhausted the moment. “I realize that many of you expect the worst. We do not, however, face another atrocity such as the humans perpetrated at Kuvor. We have something potentially even more dire, even more of a threat to the Star Empire, to confront.”
There was another series of ripples, more vigorous and long-lasting. The High Shaman again let it play out. The more unsettled and fearful the Delegates, the better, and their mindset was ripe for the picking.
“Several cycles ago,” the High Shaman continued, “we lost contact with Tāmtu. At first, we were not concerned. Tāmtu is far enough away from the Focus that delays in communications are not uncommon. However, it soon became clear that this was no simple lag. Instead, it seemed that Tāmtu had simply stopped communicating with us. Of course, at that point, we feared the worst.”
Another wave of apprehension swept through. Again, the High Shaman let it run its course, but this time, he flashed his own colors of understanding. Too much threat could overwhelm the crowd and make them ignore the reward. That was an error he would not make.
“Accordingly, a ship was dispatched to determine what was happening. It disappeared. So did a second ship, and then a squadron of warships. All simply ceased communicating, just as Tāmtu itself had.”
“More human treachery!” a Delegate shouted, provoking a chorus of responses.
The High Shaman took careful note of them all. He still wasn’t sure how many of the Delegates had chosen to align themselves with the pacifist movement known as the Reconciliation, which advocated for peace with the humans. It unsettled him to note that there seemed to be more speaking out against the exclamation of human treachery than the last time the Caucus had convened. That meant the Reconciliation may be gaining ground. The High Shaman briefly turned his attention to his Chief Advisor, who flashed back a quick acknowledgement. The actions and reactions of each of the Delegates would be noted, and later analyzed, to determine how much effort must be invested in dissipating this growing pressure to cease hostilities with the humans and enter into dialogue.
It wasn’t a problem—yet. The purpose of the Caucus was to provide a forum for the people’s representatives to speak freely, without the usual restrictions of caste. But too much willingness to adopt a more peaceful stance with the humans risked undermining everything the High Shaman and his own circle had been working toward. It might soon prove to be necessary to introduce stronger measures and begin using words such as disloyalty, or even treason.
“It is, indeed, human action that has isolated Tāmtu from the rest of the Star Empire. But the planet has not been destroyed, or even attacked, at least in a conventional sense. As near as we can tell, all of the Nyctus there are perfectly fine. They are simply changed.”
“Changed in what way?” a Delegate called out.
“Yes, spare us your dramatics, High Shaman, and speak the truth demanded by the Stone!”
The High Shaman recognized the second speaker, of course. Satu, a Delegate from the planet Areru, was an outspoken critic of the war effort and one of the rallying figures for the Reconciliation. Unfortunately, she was also powerful, having built a formidable network of allies and like-minded supporters. Soon, he would have to do something about her.
“They are changed,” the High Shaman said. “By the young human female known as Morgan.”
There was a moment of silence as the Caucus took this in. Bioluminescent shock and confusion flickered through the Hall. Satu finally broke the eerie stillness.
“How is that possible? You assured us that she had died on the planet called Nebo! That was the whole purpose of the attack. You assured us that the wholesale extermination of the humans there was necessary to ensure her death. We brought the wrath of the humans back upon us, and now the population of Kuvor is dead. Now you tell us it was for nothing? All of those lives—”
“It is not that simple,” the High Shaman cut in. “There are still aspects of this we don’t understand. She was dead. We confirmed that by her sudden and complete absence in the Firmament.” The Firmament was where real lives could be seen, and felt, and counted. It was the living space of the Nyctus, a place where their psychic energy was as tangible as their flesh. To a race like the Nyctus, the Firmament was of equal importance to the ground they walked on—or swam over.
“And yet, you say she is somehow on Tāmtu, and has changed our people there,” Satu shot back. “What does that even mean, changed?”
Another chorus of shouts rang out, accompanied by strobing flashes of angry confusion. This time, the High Shaman didn’t wait for it to subside.
“Yes, she was dead. Now, she is not. Her presence in the Firmament is suddenly clear again. Moreover, the planet Nebo is once more intact and populated, as though we never destroyed it.”
“But how is that possible?” someone exclaimed, fear saturating every sound of their question.
“We believe we are seeing the hand of Stellers in this,” the High Shaman replied. “He has brought Nebo back, and, in the process, brought Morgan back as well.”
This time, the stunned silence was absolute. Finally, a single voice spoke.
“How could he contravene death?”
“We don’t know,” the High Shaman said. “We’re aware, of course, that Stellers is a profound threat. He was, after all, responsible for the destruction of Kuvor. But it would appear that his ability to move an entire fleet great distances represents only a part of his powers.”
“There!” Satu shouted, leaning over the balustrade lining the gallery where she had her place. “There is the reason that we must seek another way of dealing with the humans. In the face of such power—”
“Stellers is only one man,” another Delegate shouted, cutting Satu off. The High Shaman noted this with satisfaction. This speaker was a reliable ally. “He cannot be everywhere, or do everything.”
“Are you even sure about that?” Satu shot back. “And what if there are other humans with such powers? For that matter, why should we lend credence to anything you are saying here today?”
“The High Shaman occupies the Stone of T
ruth. Are you suggesting that he flouts what it represents?”
“Of course not. But there is a stark difference between lying and merely being wrong,” Satu replied, then turned back to the High Shaman. “And, so far, you have been wrong repeatedly. You said the war would be brief, that the humans would not stand for a protracted conflict. You said that the bombardment and destruction of human worlds such as Nebo would compel them to back down. You said that the trap prepared for the human fleet through our operative high in their command structure would convince them to sue for peace. None of those things have come to pass. Instead, our warriors fight and die, Kuvor is an irradiated ruin, our use of the Firmament against the humans has proven that they are as strong as us, and perhaps stronger. So again, High Shaman, why should we find you credible?”
The High Shaman had to resist a bioluminescent display of anger. “Whether you find me credible, Satu, is entirely up to you. And, yes, I admit that the course of the war has not progressed as I’d originally envisioned. However, the humans have a single point of failure, one that has become our priority to neutralize.”
“Stellers,” a Delegate said.
Agreement flashed across the Caucus, tinged with both anger and anxiety. The name Stellers had become evocative of untold and fearful power. It was, the High Shaman thought, a name with which to elicit a fear response in larvae.
“Yes,” he said. “Stellers. And, to the end of neutralizing him, we have several courses of action underway. The humans seek peace and cooperation from the Danzur. We have managed to leverage our operatives on their Ruling Council to deny such an agreement with the humans, unless they hand Stellers over to them, whereupon they will transfer him to us.”
“Do you really believe the humans will agree to that?” Satu asked. “Would we agree to hand over one of ours to them? If the roles were reversed and it was you, High Shaman, that the humans were demanding to be handed over, do you expect that we would do so?”
“If it was up to you, Satu, then I’m sure the answer to that question would be yes, without hesitation.”