Salvation Lost
Page 50
“Hiding in the dark,” he said ruefully. “Del’s going to hate that when you wake him up.”
“The Neána option isn’t the endgame,” she said softly. “Not even close.”
Over a thousand cocoons had already been brought over from the Olyix Welcome ship. Their corrupted flesh had mechanical umbilicals plugging them into the toroid’s new systems, keeping them alive until the interstellar habitats were built.
“Do you think we can bring them back?” Xante said. “I mean, turn them back into humans, with bodies again?”
“Saints, yes. We’ve been able to do that since before we lost Earth. Lim Tianyu perfected the procedure for human biology in her London clinic.” Yirella smiled bleakly. “One of my ancestors was the first to be reversed.”
“Uh, I didn’t think we had ancestors. You know, not actual family.”
“They let me check my genealogy back on Juloss as part of my therapy. It was supposed to help give me a sense of belonging—which it did, a bit, I guess. Some of my DNA comes from Bik’s descendants.”
“Bik?”
“Yeah. He was Lim Tianyu’s first patient. It was part of a deal with his brother.” She shivered as she recalled the files she’d accessed. “Some people make incredible sacrifices for their family.”
“Still do.”
“Right. So we can give everyone their bodies back.”
“Yes. Happy ending, I guess.”
Yirella spotted Tilliana along one of the rows, with most of the squad standing beside her. As they walked toward them, she did her best not to stare at the cocoons. She’d accessed so many recordings of them from back during the original Olyix invasion that she was completely familiar with the shape, a bulbous barrel of flesh with a distended head protruding at the top. The file records were nice and clinical, valuable information. In real life, the cocoons were ruined people, too real. She wanted to be sick, and to run.
Xante was wrong, I’m not up to this.
Tilliana had obviously been crying. So had Janc and Falar and Uret, while the rest of the men looked as despondent as they had at Rello’s wake.
“What is it?” she asked Tilliana.
Her friend gave Xante a guilty glance. “I shouldn’t have called you here.”
“Well, too late now,” Yirella replied brittlely.
Tilliana ducked her head. That was when Yirella realized no one else was making eye contact. “What?” she demanded.
“We’re running DNA sequences on all the cocoons as they’re brought over from the Olyix ship,” Tilliana said. “The gentens identified a match for hir sequence this morning.”
Yirella didn’t breathe as she turned to look at the cocoon they were all gathered around. The bloated face had no ears; skin had sealed over the eye sockets and nostrils, while the mouth had locked open. And yet…those tiny features that did remain hit Yirella with brutal force. Features she could never forget. “Oh, Saints, no,” she whispered.
It was Alexandre, their year tutor from the Immerle estate back on Juloss. The only parent any of them had ever really known. The one who had made her rehabilitation hir personal crusade. Alexandre, who had left on the last generation ship so sie could live out the rest of hir life in quiet retirement on whatever fresh world they settled.
Yirella sank to her knees in front of the cocoon. “We’ll find them,” she promised fiercely. “We know where the enclave is now, and when we get inside we’re going to kill every Olyix in this galaxy.”
THE END
of Salvation Lost
The conclusion of the Salvation Sequence will be told in The Saints of Salvation.
2204
YURI ALSTER Connexion security chief
CALLUM HEPBURN Utopials senior trouble-shooter
ALIK MONDAY FBI senior special detective
KANDARA MARTINEZ dark ops mercenary
JESSIKA Neána metahuman
SOĆKO Neána metahuman
LOI Yuri’s aide
ELDLUND Callum’s aide
AINSLEY BALDUNIO ZANGARI founder of Connexion and its CEO
AINSLEY ZANGARI III CEO, Connexion TranSol division
EMILJA JURICH Utopials leader
GWENDOLINE SEYMORE-QING-ZANGARI Connexion finance director
HORATIO SEYMORE Social Services agency advisor
CRINA Connexion security bodyguard
KOHEI YAMADA Connexion security, London chief
ANNE GROELL Connexion security, New York chief
DAVID JOHNSTON supreme commander, Alpha Defense
SOUTHWARK LEGION
PIOTR AUCOIN leader
LARS WALLIN muscle
ADNAN nethead
GARETH BRABIN nethead
OLLIE HESLOP planner
TRONDE AUCOIN printer
LOLO MAUDE Ollie’s lover
CLAUDETTE BEAUMANT Legion scam target
JADE URCHALL lieutenant in London crime family
MORGAN CREW
DELLIAN squad leader
YIRELLA Vayan designer
TILLIANA tactician
ELLICI tactician
FALAR squad member
JANC squad member
URET squad member
RELLO squad member
XANTE squad member
MALLOT squad member
OVAN squad leader
TOMAR squad member
FINTOX Neána metavayan
KENELM captain of the Morgan
WIM bridge officer
1901…Guglielmo Marconi transmits radio message across the Atlantic Ocean.
1945…First nuclear explosion (above ground).
1963…Limited Test Ban Treaty signed, prohibiting atmospheric nuclear bomb tests.
2002…Neána cluster, near 31 Aquilae, detects electromagnetic pulse(s) from atomic bomb explosions on Earth.
2005…Neána launch sublight mission to Earth.
2041…First commercial laser fusion plant opens in Texas.
2045…First commercial food printers introduced.
2047…The US Defense Advanced Research Project Agency reveals artificial atomic bonding generator—the so-called force field.
2049…US Congress passes act to create Homeland Shield Department, charged with building force fields around every city.
2050…China forms Red Army’s City Protection Regiment, begins construction of Beijing shield.
2050…Saudi kingdom installs mass food-print factories. Twenty percent of the kingdom’s remaining crude oil allocated for food printing.
2050…Russia starts National People’s Defense Force; its shield generator project starts with Moscow.
2052…European Federation creates UDA (Urban Defense Agency)—builds force fields over major European cities.
2062…November: Kellan Rindstrom demonstrates quantum spatial entanglement (QSE) at CERN.
2063…January: Ainsley Baldunio Zangari founds Connexion.
2063…April: Connexion twins portal doors between Los Angeles and New York, charges ten dollars to go between cities.
2063…Global stock market crash, car companies lose up to ninety percent of their share value. Shipping, rail, and airline stocks fall. Aerospace stocks rally as space entrepreneur companies announce ambitious asteroid development plans.
2063…November: Space-X flies a QSE portal into LEO on a Falcon-10, providing open orbit access. Commencement of large-scale commercial space development.
2066…Astro-X Corporation’s mission to Vesta. Establishment of Vesta colony.
2066…Connexion Corp merges with emergent European, Japanese, and Australian public transit portal companies to form conglomerate. Major cities now portal networked. Noncommercial vehicle use declining rapidly.
2066–2073…Thirty-nine national and commercial colony/development missions to asteroids (the Second California Rush—so called because of the number of American tech company CEOs involved). Large number of World Court injunctions filed by developing nations and left-wing groups against exploitation of exo-resources by for-profit companies.
2067…Globally, thirty cities now protected by shields, two hundred more under construction. Start of decline of conventional military forces. Phased air force and navy Reduction Treaty signed at UN by majority of governments. Armies reconfigured as counter-insurgency paramilitary regiments—numbers cut substantially.
2068…Seven corporations established at Vesta. Astro-X completes its Libertyville habitat colony. Houses 3,000 people.
2069…First solar powerwell portal dropped into sun by China National Sunpower Corporation. Five-kilometer-long magnetohydrodynamics chambers built at Vesta, positioned on large asteroids, outside Neptune orbit.
2070…Armstrong resort dome assembled on Moon. Similar resorts under construction on Mars, Ganymede, and Titan.
2071…All major cities on Earth linked by Connexion stations—except North Korea.
2071…UN treaty forbidding nonequitable exo-resource exploitation. Any asteroid or planetary minerals mined for use by commercial companies must be equally distributed among all nations on Earth. US, China, and Russia refuse to sign. European Federation awards treaty Principal Acknowledgment status; starts to draw up its own nonexploitation regulations, where “excess profits” of asteroid development companies will be channeled into Federation foreign aid agencies. Commercial asteroid development companies reregister in non-signatory countries.
2075…Seventeen self-sustaining habitats built in asteroid belt. Construction of Newholm starts at Vesta (by Libertyville)—fifty kilometers long, fifteen kilometers in diameter. Takes three years to form, two years to complete biosphere.
2075…Fifty-five percent of Earth’s energy now comes from solar powerwells. Decommissioning of nuclear power stations begins, radioactive material flung into trans-Neptune space via portals.
2076…Increasing number of asteroid developments become self-sustaining and Earth-exclusionary. Start of habitat independence movement.
2077…Interstellar-X launches first starship, Orion, propelled by QSE portal solar plasma rocket. Destination Alpha Centauri. Achieves .72 light speed.
2078…March: Global tax agreement signed by all governments on Earth, abolishing tax havens.
2078…August: Nine space habitats declare themselves low-tax societies.
2078…November: First Progressive Conclave gathers at Nuzima habitat; fifteen billionaires sign Utopial pact to bring post-scarcity civilization to humanity. Each launches asteroid colony expansion, with an economy based on AI-managed self-replication industrial base.
2079…China National Interstellar Administration launches starship Yang Liwei. Destination: Trappist 1. Achieves .82 light speed.
2081…All Earth’s energy supplied by solar powerwells. Connexion largest energy provider.
2082…Major national currencies now backed by kilowatt hours. Global de facto currency is wattdollar.
2082…Interstellar-X–led General Starflight Accord signed between all starfaring organizations (capable of building starships) and governments, ensuring open access to new stars and no duplicated star missions.
2082–2100…Twenty-five portal-rocket starships launched from Sol to nearby stars.
2083…Orion arrives at Alpha Centauri. Psychroplanet discovered 2.8 AU from star, named Zagreus. Too expensive/difficult to terraform. Eleven government missions transfer into Centauri system and establish asteroid manufacturing bases, along with eight independent asteroid companies. Construction of multiple portal starships at Centauri system begins.
2084…Last car factory on Earth (in China) shuts down. Connexion hub network serves ninety-two percent of human population, including space habitats.
2084–2085…Twenty-three starships launched from Centauri.
2085…Utopials launch starship Elysium.
2086…Alpha Centauri asteroid manufacturing stations abandoned. Small joint-venture solar rocket plasma monitoring station maintained in orbit around the star, providing drive plasma for the starships.
2096…Chinese starship Tranage arrives Tau Ceti, exoplanet discovered.
2099…Chinese begin terraforming of Tau Ceti exoplanet, named Mao.
2107…US starship Discovery arrives Eta Cassiopeiae. Exoplanet discovered.
2110…US begins terraforming Eta Cassiopeiae exoplanet, named New Washington.
2111…European Federation agrees to terraform exoplanet at 82 Eridani, named Liberty.
2112…Elysium arrives at Delta Pavonis. Terraform-potential planet discovered, named Akitha. Construction of habitat Nebesa and extensive orbital industrial facilities. Terraforming of Akitha begins.
2127…The Yang Liwei arrives at Trappist 1. China begins terraforming two Trappist exoplanets T-1e and T-1f, Tianjin and Hangzhou.
2134…New Washington terraforming stage two complete, open only to American settlers.
2144…Olyix arkship Salvation of Life detected 0.1 light-years from Earth as its antimatter drive is switched on for deceleration. Communication opened. Four-year deceleration to Earth-Sun Lagrange-3 point opposite side of sun from Earth.
2150…Earth population 23 billion; 7,462 space habitats completed, population 100 million.
2150…Olyix begin to trade their biotech with humans in exchange for electricity to generate antimatter, allowing them to continue their voyage to the end of the universe.
2153…Mao declared habitable. Farm settlers transfer from China, begin stage two planting—trees, grass, crops. Fish introduced into ocean.
2162…Neána mission reaches Earth.
2200…Eleven exoplanets now in stage two habitation. Large-scale migration from Earth. Twenty-seven further exoplanets undergoing stage one terraforming. No more being developed; fifty-three marked as having terraform potential. Portal starship missions ongoing, but reduced.
2204…Portal starship Kavli arrives in Beta Eridani system, eighty-nine light-years from Earth. Detects beacon signal from alien spaceship.
BY PETER F. HAMILTON
Great North Road
Manhattan in Reverse and Other Stories
Fallen Dragon
Misspent Youth
THE COMMONWEALTH SAGA
Pandora’s Star
Judas Unchained
THE VOID TRILOGY
The Dreaming Void
The Temporal Void
The Evolutionary Void
THE NIGHT’S DAWN TRILOGY
The Reality Dysfunction
The Neutronium Alchemist
The Naked God
NIGHT’S DAWN UNIVERSE
The Confederation Handbook
A Second Chance at Eden
THE GREG MANDEL TRILOGY
Mindstar Rising
A Quantum Murder
The Nano Flower
The Abyss Beyond Dreams
A Night Without Stars
THE QUEEN OF DREAMS TRILOGY
The Secret Throne
The Hunting of the Princes
A Voyage Through Air
THE SALVATION SEQUENCE
Salvation
Salvation Lost
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
PETER F. HAMILTON is the author of numerous novels, including The Abyss Beyond Dreams, Great North Road, The Evolutionary Void, The Temporal Void, The Dreaming Void, Judas Unchained, Pandora’s Star, Misspent Youth, Fallen Dragon, and the acclaimed epic Night’s Dawn trilogy (The Reality Dysfunction, The Neutronium Alchemist, and The Naked God). He lives with his family in England.
peterfhamilton.co.uk
Facebook.com/PeterFHami
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