The Swarm

by Orson Scott Card

  A certain officer in the International Fleet is also getting this information. I trust that you’ll be wise and act in the best interest of the human race, passing it along to Papa Hegemon and the press. Vico tells me you are not the selfish, egotistical person you were before, and because I trust my dear cousin, I will give you the benefit of the doubt. Please prove him right.

  Edimar

  Lem was having lunch with a few dignitaries from Earth and Luna when his wrist pad chimed and alerted him of a message. Lem discreetly tapped it to silence it, but the chime left him uneasy. He had set the device to alert him only when a handful of people tried to reach him, and only when their message was of grave importance. And yet Lem couldn’t get up and excuse himself. The men and women around the table were all VIPs—ambassadors, cabinet members, trade secretaries. It would be most discourteous for him to leave the conversation when so much of it was directed at him.

  Norja Ramdakan had spent months arranging the event, which included a tour of two Juke manufacturing facilities and lunch at the company’s private gourmet restaurant. Proposed legislation from the office of the Hegemony would greatly increase taxes and tariffs, and the people at the table had the power and influence to either make the legislation go away or lessen the proposed tax hikes.

  “You’re the son of the Hegemon,” said the French ambassador. “I would think you have more sway over your father than we do.”

  The comment was said partly in jest and earned a few polite chuckles around the table.

  Lem smiled good-naturedly. “My father is a very practical man, Madam Ambassador. As much as I wish he would give weight to everything I say, I assure you that’s not the case. In fact, my father is so concerned about even the appearance of nepotism that we here at Juke Limited have to work ten times as hard as other defense contractors to win any bids. Isn’t that right, Norja?”

  Norja laughed from his seat at the opposite end of the table. “The old man gives us hell.”

  More polite laughter from the group.

  “Even a cursory examination of how the Hegemony has allocated its funding over the last three years will substantiate that claim,” said Lem. “Juke Limited has its share of contracts, true. But those are contracts we’ve earned. We were clearly the contender in the bidding process with the best capabilities to get the job done as thoroughly and as quickly as possible. However, if a competitor even approaches our capabilities and shows any degree of promise, my father will inevitably award the contract to them. We have lost many contracts we should have won all because my father seeks to grow other businesses and spark innovation throughout the world. And he is correct to do so. As much as it kills my finance department, he and the other members of the Hegemony are right to diversify IF clients and encourage economic growth everywhere.”

  Lem smiled at the ambassador. “In other words, my father doesn’t really care what I think, Madam Ambassador. His primary interest is the safety of the citizens of Earth, not the financial stability of his son’s company.”

  “A company that used to be his,” said the ambassador.

  “Used to be, yes,” said Lem. “My father has fully divested himself of this corporation now, and those of you who know him well know I speak the truth.”

  There were a few subtle nods around the table.

  “But I think the Hegemony is mistaken with these proposed taxes and tariffs,” said Lem. “They will generate revenue for the Hegemony and thus the IF, no question, but they will also cripple innovation and discourage the free flow of ideas. Many of you may think that our interest here is purely selfish, but the companies that will be hurt the most by this are the midsized businesses that are struggling to get footing in this industry. It is a great irony to me. My father has worked tirelessly to foster growth among these companies, and now the Hegemony is making it even more difficult for them by imposing these new taxes. This is an age-old argument, ladies and gentlemen. The Hegemony has the revenue it needs. It merely has to cut frivolous spending.”

  “And is any of that frivolous spending going to Juke Limited?” asked Daijina, a trade secretary from the African Union. “Are you willing to concede contracts should they be deemed superfluous? I agree that the Hegemony has invested quite a bit in dead-end projects. We’ve lost hundreds of millions of credits in junk tech that goes nowhere. Maybe billions. And a lot of that money has gone into this company. I could cite examples.”

  There was a moment of awkwardness, but Lem smiled it off. “We could all cite examples, Madam Secretary. I could probably cite more than you. And I will be the first to admit that some of the innovations that we’ve developed here at Juke Limited have failed to measure up to their full potential. Fortunately for us, these challenging projects constitute only a small minority of Juke’s total output for the International Fleet. In fact, Juke Limited has the best track record in the business. But you’re right. Sometimes the final result falls short of IF expectations. Part of that is due to the mad accelerated pace that we must operate in. The enemy is approaching. We don’t have the luxury of time. It has been a frantic scramble for everyone. And when time is short and expectations are high, mistakes will inevitably be made.

  “But that doesn’t mean we should keep paying for them. What good is it to raise taxes and tariffs if we’re still wasting so much of our current spending? Norja, what’s the name of that silly device they just launched at Gungsu?” Lem snapped his finger as if trying to remember.

  “The gravity disruptor,” said Norja.

  Lem smiled. “Yes, the gravity disruptor. Here’s a device that cost the IF several hundred million credits, and it won’t even work against the Formic hulls. That, ladies and gentlemen, is not wise spending. That is throwing away the hard-earned income of the citizens of Earth and Luna. And who will pay for this mistake? Gungsu? No, all the other corporations who must now shoulder a heavy tax to make up for the expense.”

  Lem’s wrist pad chimed again, and this time everyone’s eyes went to the device. Lem couldn’t ignore now. “Ladies and gentlemen, you will excuse me for a moment, but that sound means that this message can’t wait.”

  He rose from the table and ignored the dirty look Norja was giving him. They had just gotten to the part they had rehearsed about Gungsu and the gravity disruptor, and Lem was walking out. Norja would give him an earful for that.

  He stepped into the kitchen and checked the message. To his astonishment it was from his father. The message read, “I’ve just learned that all seven remaining Parallax satellites have been destroyed at the same time. We have not yet made an announcement, but I wanted you to know. Dark days ahead, son. Stay safe.”

  Lem stared at the words, his mind suddenly flooding with questions.

  He tried calling his father but of course there was no answer. Father would be in emergency meetings with the IF. There would be chaos at CentCom.

  When had it happened, Lem wondered? Did Father learn about this through his ansible? Was this happening now? Had this just occurred?

  The Hegemony had not yet made an announcement. That was smart. They were wise to be cautious. If all seven satellites were down, it meant Earth was completely blind. And not only that, but it meant that the Formics’ reach already extended to every corner of the solar system. Many of the Parallax sats were positioned on the far side of the system, in the opposite direction of the Formic approach. And yet Formic probes had already reached them without detection. It meant all the arguments against Edimar’s theories had gone up smoke. Naysayers had claimed that the Formics could not possibly have infiltrated the Asteroid Belt without our knowledge. And yet here was incontrovertible proof that the Formics could go wherever they pleased, from one end of the solar system to the next.

  And then there was the orchestration of it all, taking the satellites out all at once. That was no coincidence. That suggested intelligence, planning, strategic thinking. It meant the Formics were very well informed. They knew precisely where the satellites were located and how t
o avoid detection en route.

  No, it meant more than that. Because the Formic probes that had carried out this coordinated strike must have left the motherships years ago. They must have set out long before now with an understanding of the satellites’ orbits. They had to know not only how many satellites there were, but also where the satellites would be located at the exact time of attack. They had to have mapped out the future positions of their targets and set their course accordingly.

  It also meant that the Formics understood that the satellites had value, even if they might not fully understand what that value was.

  But then why take out the first satellite separately? Why destroy Copernicus alone? As a test? To gauge our firepower? To see how we would respond? To see how safe it would be to take out the others? That would explain why the ship that had destroyed Copernicus had put up no resistance when the IF fighters arrived. Its mission was to destroy Copernicus and then to allow itself to be destroyed.

  Did the Formics know what Copernicus was? Did they know we used them for observation, or did the Formics think them potential weapons? Threats to remove before the fighting began?

  And that’s what this was obviously. This was a preliminary measure. The Formics were readying the system for a full invasion.

  Lem suddenly felt sick. As if a protective bubble that had given him some degree of comfort had suddenly popped, revealing a monster right in front of him.

  He put on a calm face and stepped back into the restaurant. There was a lull in the conversation at the table, and Lem smiled and said, “Everyone, you will forgive me, but I need to borrow my chief financial officer for a moment.”

  Norja placed his napkin on the table, chuckled, and stood. “You see? This is the mad, accelerated pace Lem was referring to. We can’t even pause for a good meal. Excuse me.”

  He followed Lem out, but the serene look on his face vanished the instant they were alone in the corridor. “I’m assuming this is a life-or-death situation, Lem, because I can’t imagine anything more important than the conversation we’re having in there.”

  “It was a message from my father.”

  Norja’s expression changed immediately. He was suddenly on edge, which bothered Lem. It meant even Norja was surprised Father had sent Lem a message.

  Lem read him the text.

  Norja said nothing for a moment and began to pace.

  “They destroyed the satellites all at once, Norja. They’re organized. Their reach extends across the whole damn system.”

  “It’s worse than that,” said Norja. “This means we can’t track any of the asteroids.”

  Lem hadn’t thought of that. But of course that was the biggest concern. If the Formics had indeed confiscated thousands of asteroids and intended to push them somewhere in the system, how would we know if they were moving and where they were going without Parallax?

  “Our only available method of observation now is the ships already in space,” said Norja. “And that’s not enough. That’s not even close. How many ships are there in space? Roughly?”

  Lem shrugged. “Between corporates, free miners, and the IF? I don’t know. Two fifty? And that’s probably high.”

  “How are two hundred and fifty ships going to track three thousand asteroids?” said Norja. “Impossible.”

  “We don’t know that it’s three thousand,” said Lem. “That’s just how many Edimar says there might be.”

  “The free-miner girl has been right every time about everything else. I’m not betting on her being wrong now.” He shook his head. “Two hundred and fifty ships. That’s nothing, Lem. And probably a quarter of those are clumped together anyway. At depots, stations, being serviced, getting supplies. Or heading in that direction. It’s not like we have them all spread out over the system evenly with their Eyes trained on certain objects. We don’t even know which asteroids we should be looking at. That’s what Parallax was for. If an asteroid deviated from its orbit, Parallax would alert us, and we’d know the Formics were moving it. Now, we don’t even have that. It’s like Earth is standing in a firing range with a blindfold on.”

  “We have to attack their big warships,” said Lem.

  Norja looked at him like he had lost his senses. “The warships? We might have an army of Formic-controlled asteroids in our midst, and you want to go on a suicide mission to the warships? Each of those warships is as big as the Formic scout ship from the first war. Maybe bigger.”

  “Then what would you suggest, Norja? You just said we can’t track every asteroid in the system and that we don’t know which ones we should monitor. The warships we know about. We are one hundred percent certain they exist and they are out there. That is a target we can confront.”

  “Leave the ecliptic?” said Norja. “Expose ourselves?”

  “It’s space, Norja. The instant we leave Earth’s gravity well we’re exposed anyway. We won’t have an asteroid to retreat to, but since the Formics have probably seized the asteroid anyway, I don’t see that it makes much difference.”

  “This isn’t a time for humor, Lem.”

  “Who’s joking? Those warships are the only targets we can definitively identify. Is there a supreme Formic ruler? A Hive Queen? And if there is, isn’t that where she would be hidden and protected?”

  “They’re coming at us from both sides,” said Norja. “If we go after the warships, we would have to divide our fleet into two forces, and it’s already paper thin to begin with.”

  “We can’t continue to sit here and maintain a passive defense,” said Lem. “We have to act. We strike them before they’re prepared. They came building their fleet, right? They’ve been dismantling this massive mothership and building these warships, right? Well, maybe they’re not finished. Maybe they’re parked up there above and below the ecliptic, building their fleet as we speak, getting ready, sharpening their knives. If we strike before they’re ready, we might have a chance.”

  “And what if these warships have indestructible hulls? We don’t have a weapon for that yet. You’re talking about striking them before they’re ready, but we’re not ready either.”

  “Where is Benyawe with the NanoCloud?” Lem asked.

  Norja shrugged. “They’ve been prepping for a presentation with the Hegemony, Lem. They’ve been modifying a prototype. We haven’t mass-produced anything. We’re not ready to take this into combat. We’re a year or two away from that. And even when we have mass-produced them, we still need to know the intricacies of these Formic warships so we can tell the nanomaterial where to go once they infiltrate the hull.”

  Lem shook his head. “That’s unacceptable, Norja. You’re telling me an impossible scenario. We don’t have two years. The normal production schedule is out the window here. If we operate as usual on this, by the time we have our NanoCloud ready and loaded onto IF warships, Earth will be a charcoal briquette.”

  “What do you want me to do, Lem? Move the NanoCloud into production before it’s been approved? Before we have funding? Do you have any idea how expensive it is to produce that material? The smaller it is, the higher the price tag, Lem.”

  “I’m aware of the economics, Norja.”

  “Then you know that if we start before we’ve secured funding from the Hegemony, we risk putting this company into a financial free fall. And we’re not even certain the damn thing is going to work.”

  “I saw a demonstration, Norja. The NanoCloud works.”

  “You saw Benyawe wave a wand in a controlled environment. A laboratory is not a war zone, Lem. We haven’t field-tested this thing.”

  “Then we ask Benyawe to move her team to the Formic scout ship and start conducting field tests immediately. And we get on the docket with the Hegemony to present. Or I go directly to my father on this one. Because if our fleet departs on a preemptive strike without the NanoCloud on board, we lose.”

  “A preemptive strike isn’t going to happen, Lem. That would be the Polemarch’s call. And the guy’s a coward. He’s like McClella
n. He’s way too cautious. He’s not going to commit any ships until he knows the battle is in our favor.”

  “Which will be never,” said Lem. “There will never be a scenario in this war wherein we have the advantage. He should know that.”

  “I know.”

  “Then why is Ketkar the Polemarch? If he’s incompetent, what is he doing in that position?”

  Norja hesitated, uneasy. “It’s complicated.”

  “Meaning what? What do you know?”

  “Look, this is not the time or place to have this conversation, okay? We have a room full of dignitaries we need to entertain.”

  “You think I want to sit down and finish my peas while engaging in political chitchat? I’m done with the meal, Norja. If you want to play host, fine. But I need to do something.”

  “There is nothing you can do right now, Lem. This is in the hands of the people at CentCom. Let the IF handle this. That’s why they exist. Come back inside and pretend to be interested in these boring people. We’ve got twenty minutes left in this event, tops. Smile, tell a funny anecdote, be charming. That’s what we need. Do that, and you are helping the war effort. Because if these people can help us annihilate this tax, then that’s more funds for projects like the NanoCloud.”

  He stepped to the side and gestured for Lem to go in.

  “We’ll catch up later, Norja. Right now I have work to do, and it isn’t here.”

  He turned and left. Norja didn’t try to stop him. Lem took one of the company subway cars back to his office, not certain what he would do once he got there. As soon as he opened the door, one of his assistants, Xianxo, sprang to her feet. “Mr. Jukes, I’ve been trying to contact you for the past hour, but no messages were getting through.”