Copyright © 2013
Chronos Productions Motion Picture Studios
All rights reserved.
For Joey and Jackson
Acknowledgements
Snakes in the cradle
All the stars in a jewel box
Fly boys and Archaeologist girls
Fort Oort
Hangar 3
The Kanaafutura
Langley Stay, Voids End
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I would like to acknowledge all the members of the Chronos Productions team for their ongoing work in bringing the Pandoran Age Universe to life. The Artwork, animation, music, and acting. It has been a delight to watch the vision take form and color, sound and aspect, persona and personalities. Life must either be, indeed, a grand adventure or it is nothing at all.
–Dante D’Anthony
Snakes in the Cradle.
My name is Winteroud Sole and I am twelve standard Caldris years old. The name “Winteroud” was my father’s idea, an homage to my mother who was not born on Caldris, but on the far away world of Erial, which is always cold.
He and my Mother met in college at the University world, Lux, where the NeoWrightians settled. I have never been to Erial, or Lux, but I have studied them both extensively on the hypercasts, and in the family computer libraries.
Today the Royal Security detectives came and questioned me at length. I could feel their eagerness to know all about me, for I am an empath and that is a very special gift. Mother was furious. Father was somewhat proud actually.
I think Officer Hammerstein is a good egg.
I could feel Officer Hammerstein was deeply troubled over many things. A desperation has formed in his mind and he believes I may be able to help him sort out his most current sleuthing.
He is probably right, although I fear he doesn’t understand that it may kill him if we untangle this particular mystery. Him and many others. In his mind I perceived a layering, a mentality of his military background that sees everything as a war.
Neil Thacker
I have always been an empath. Caldris is known for producing an abnormal number of us. Some say it is the massive amounts of heavy metals in the planet. Others say it is how the metals interact with the complex fields which stream into the higher dimensions. I don’t know. I have always been this way and although my mind swarms with the impressions and feelings of others, I have not yet learned exactly what it means to be a human without empathic powers.
My Educator at the school says, “You will learn with time how they live their lives in solitary realities. There is a sadness about them, alone in their thoughts. But not now. Not yet. Now when you feel their thoughts and emotions across a room it seems you are one with them. It is not so, Winteroud. You share their reality, and they are immune to yours.”
Officer Hammerstein is very sad. That much I could tell right away. He is a man with a mission, as they say. His mission has hit a “platinum wall, me boy, a platinum wall with heavy-duty military defense shielding wrapped around an enigma.” More accurately, I realized the machinations of very bad and powerful men who wish to keep the Officer on one side of the truth.
I think my mother knows best, and rages against the dangers of my involvement in the Hammerstein case. Father is carried away with the pride of his son being treated by the Royal Security Detectives as someone important and worthwhile. Later, I know, he will pass through the sudden pride and begin to mull over dangers to the family and the estate.
We are an old family, long in the business of mining the volcanoes. Danger and opportunity our twin fellows for generations. He will see the danger soon enough.
It’s Moonsweek and all four moons are purple in the evening skies. The tides are frothing at the ancient steps of the estate. Each evening now I have sat on the sea steps and felt the minds of the balloon crabs eager for Silver-darters swarming in the shallows. Hunger and gluttony, simple creatures.
The silver darters have no minds at all. They have the most primitive of neural nets, their existence all stimulus and response. The universe to them is not even a place. Stimulus. Response. That is all. In their swarming, however, wonderful patterns emerge which can be thought of as a hive mind. Although such is a poor analogy; when one thinks of the great and terrible hive mind of the Imperials at far away Deneb IV, with all its billions of humans and millions of Transhumans, I embarrass myself with the analogy.
My android, Edward Gibbons, sits mechanical behind me, ever watchful. Father came around to fear as I knew he would and cautioned the android, “Watch for assassins,” he said simply, grim and fingering his disruptor. It is an antique, like so many things at the estate. It was old when our ancestors first plunged onto the world in a fiery ship after crossing the void.
I felt Hammerstein and his men before the bells announced the arrival of the aircars this time. They came in the morning as the moons set and the sun, blue and gleaming, lifted itself with its intense glory among the cumulonimbus clouds, like marshmallow mountains in the sky. Six Royal aircars came, like they owned the clouds, which in a sense they did.
Father stood defiant at the agents strolled coolly to the gate at the landing pads. “I’ve considered your offer for my son to work with you on the case, Officer Hammerstein. I think it’s best he not.”
I could feel Hammerstein’s regret like a… “heavy-metal core drill”…he thought, disappointed that he would have to resort to intimidation.
“Your family charter, granted by Queen Altair. How many generations now?” Hammerstein said darkly. “A shame if it were withdrawn, having been such a long and fruitful benefit to you, and to yours.”
Now father’s eyes darkened. “You resort to extortion? There are other Empaths! Why does it need to be the boy?”
“We’ve tried others. Older Empaths are too sensitive. One died, another is in intensive care. It is the boy’s very limitations that will make him at once useful to the case, yet not in danger of damage. Any older and he too would be of no utility. This case moves into the direct security of our entire stellar system-this world, and all the others under the dominion of the Royal family.”
I could feel father was ready to hand the charter back rather than place me at risk. I could also feel a deep sense of loyalty to the Royals. For many generations they had stood excellent in good government of the worlds under their care. “What is this case that you ask my child to involve himself with? Such that ruins the minds of older Empaths?”
I answered for Hammerstein, “The Princess has been taken.”
All the people at the gate exuded shock. My family for the revelation, the detectives that I knew.
Vindication ran deep in Hammerstein now, “The boy is right, and now you see, indeed, his gift is true. I am the only one in this group that was aware of the Princess’s abduction.”
He glared at me, solemn-yet sympathetic. “Say no more about it, young man, of what you sense lest we are alone.” Then, sharply, at his men: “A word from any of you and your rank is gone and you’ll find yourselves transferred to the loneliest moon in the belt.”
There came a clicking of heels. One of his younger officers, a woman of great beauty and self discipline, ached with the shock, and struggled with all her being to maintain her composure.
Quite grand, such discipline and depth of feeling. I will never forget her overwhelming pain at the loss of the Princess, and her stolid chin as she held back her tears, I think, as long as I live.
I determined then I should find the Princess, with Hammerstein, and root out the devils who did this. “Duty, father.” I stood, small but somehow towering now in the minds of the detectives, “Duty and honor. For the Royal family, for our own.”
“Duty
and honor,” he whispered. “But the boy takes his personal android, and a disser.
He tossed me his disser and I caught it easily, knowing afore he announced it, and felt the generations of my forefathers (and a particularly self possessed Grand Matron) land in my hands with it.
A half smile curled up the side of Hammerstein’s face, “But of course.”
And I gathered with the Royal Security detectives and we took to the clouds in their aircars. The last of the moons had faded and the volcano littered Tangerine Sea glimmered beneath us. Thus began my first great adventure.
I could feel mother’s fears as the estate seemed to diminish with distance like a toy. A dark winter had of her own had come now. I knew she would not feel the light and warmth of Caldris again until she held me safe again in her arms. That day would come, I pledged. This was not that day, but I am an Empath and I know: there are greater things in Cosmos and Worlds than men imagine. That day would come.
I knew the ride across the Tangerine Sea well, straight to the Capitol, Cezanne Mons. The tangerine is from the reefs, thousands of square kilometers of them. I understood the name was from an Earth fruit. I had seen them in a garden once, at the palaces in fact, where we were headed. I had never tasted one. I had eaten oranges though, and they too are an Earth fruit, similar it is said.
Hammerstein’s angst impinged on my senses like his soapy smell. He had his aircars decked out with some serious weaponry. They were flying in military formation. I picked up bits and pieces of his memories of Navy days. Caldera Squadron, edge of the system duty. Hard duty, the ships had gone into hyper then orbited the entire system. Over, and over and over again. No communications with command. Silent. Waiting.
I sensed the man’s patience was like a continental plate. Slow, persistent, and capable of volcanism when pressed. I also sensed he cared about what happened to me. Didn’t want me harmed, was determined to watch my back even if it cost him his life. That was a good feeling, a rare one I was to learn. Few people are willing to die for their comrades. Hammerstein wouldn’t have blinked. He was ready to make the ultimate sacrifice for his duty. Any time, anywhere.
His thoughts that morning, however, were like a hover-tank in a moon battle; not about sacrificing his life for his King and Star System, but about finding the kidnappers and making them pay with theirs. It was the first time in my life I had actually sensed an anger ready to take life. It was frightening. Mother and Father’s minds had always been about the family estate. The most anger I had felt from them was when they were ready to fire an errant employee. Hammerstein wanted blood justice.
I hoped it wasn’t clouding his judgment. Even my young mind could sense an array of people he suspected, all of them powerful across worlds, all of them deadly-even for a battle hardened Navy veteran, even for a grisly old detective.
The aircars moved in unison over the Tangerine Sea. The Detectives were silent, quiet as adults often get when lost in their thoughts. How quickly they forget a boy. A boy who can sense their thoughts even. Thus the quiet was only broken by the hum of our flying machines, but in my mind their thoughts and feelings were a symphony-sometimes sublime, courageous, and determined. Sometimes dramatic, grim, and portentous.
When Cezanne Mons appeared in this distance, swathed in clouds and even smoking that early morn, I felt my usual excitement at visiting the capitol. The city hugged the base of the huge volcano with the casual ease of a people who had learned to ride and manage volcanoes like the pack animals of some semi-primitive world.
The Legislature buildings stood biomorphic, with curving lines, a sweeping and expressionistic architecture. The Palace buildings, smaller and on a higher ridge, echoed the more formal and traditional symmetries of palaces back through the ages, before the dawn of the space age. They could be any palace perhaps, such as on ancient Earth before mankind took to the planets beyond the world of our race’s birth.
Steve Allman
The rest of the city, private businesses and such, spread out along the shore lines in various combinations of towers and conglomerations of buildings. Haphazard, come as you are. Sometimes opulent, sometimes tawdry, sometimes respectable. Sometimes-even I knew at twelve standard years-sometimes very naughty.
People, they create new generations, out among the stars, genetic copies of themselves, and ever the same tawdry dramas replay. No wonder.
The Detective’s aircar’s windshields were graced with special displays-many of which not visible to the ordinary aircar mind you-and I could see the force field domes over the palace. The general public is not privy to such things.
“Hammerstein, six cars. Royal Security. Arriving with Empath to review crime scene.”
We hovered for a moment and holes appeared in the force domes. I could sense the hidden guns in various parapets of the palace engaging on us. They trusted naught. I hadn’t noticed them on visits to the palace before, field trips with my teacher. Mr. Gibbons sat mechanical and glistening behind me.
My father’s disser stuck out of a pocket on my vest like an old Earth cow man. This was no frontier shack however. The Royal Palace at Cezanne Mons was storied and fabulous and built with the finest refined metals mined from the very volcano poised behind it. Platinum mostly.
Some said it backed the currency. I felt that was hyperbole.
We followed a flight path illustrated in hologram on the windshields, Hammerstein was looking grimmer than ever. I sensed he was hoping against hope the Royal family would be away today, and he would not have to look in to their eyes having no news for them, but another Empath and a boy at that.
I steeled my resolve.
We traversed the holes in the force domes and they resealed behind us. The tension I read from the gunners at the parapets remained high until all six of the aircars were down and we stepped into the courtyard.
It was full of tangerine trees, and I felt the echoes of many long evenings which others had spent there pleasantly. A good portent, I thought, but it didn’t last. There was a shadow of dread hanging over the palace, and a few steps forward the tangerine dreams faded and sadness prevailed.
Caldris is, of course, a slightly higher gravity world than old Earth standard, and as such most Caldrisians are in fact more muscular and shorter than say, a typical Earth person. Hammerstein, his fellows, and now the Palace Guards, however, I noted, were tall. Even for Earth and worlds of comparable gravity. The guard that approached us in the courtyard was exceptionally tall. He must have towered over the King and Queen.
Impressions assailed me; the guard didn’t think much of Hammerstein and the Royal Security team in general. The guard felt it was their fault to begin with and their investigation was a bumbling farce.
Hammerstein’s methods were circumspect however, so I rejected the guards opinion as self important judgmentalism by a person unqualified to actually assess Hammerstein’s efforts.
“Agent Hammerstein.” The guard said coolly.
Hammerstein bowed, “Captain Venkatesan.” He turned to me then, “May I introduce Master Winteroud, heir of the Sole estate, certified empathic. He will review the scene with us, slowly, and in phases.”
Captain Venkatesan’s immediate emotion was concern that I would be harmed. This surprised me. He didn’t strike one as a soft hearted man with maternal instincts toward young people. One of the things one learns as an empath early; people’s exterior appearance is entirely meaningless more often than not than as a reflection of their deeper
selves. Captain Venkatesan looked as cold an uncompromising as the business end of a disser. In fact his essential nature was to protect the weaker around him.
“I don’t like it, Hammerstein. Any harm comes to the boy and I’ll have the Kings ear that you face negligent homicide charges.”
Hammerstein had been expecting that. “I’ve conferred with the top planetary experts regarding Empaths. Firstly, the boy’s sensitivity to the quantum echoes hasn’t fully developed. Secondly, we move toward the scene slowly; the f
irst sign of discomfort we withdraw him.”
“On your authority then, and with my stated reservations.” The Captain’s face was flushed, but he stepped aside and we moved through the gardens past a series of low, long fountains with holograms of sea creatures leaping. We came at length to a tall pointed arched doorway to an exterior antechamber. A stainless steel door of immense size was carved with geometric triangular motifs and inlaid with mother of pearl and brilliant blue lapis lazuli.
I sensed things then. Doorways are like that, capturing the passing thoughts of people busy with tasks. This was the Royal libraries and private schools of the Royal children, and some of the more esteemed nobles, but there was something else. I could sense the Princess, though I had never actually been close enough to sense her before. A muddled compilation of self images came through-as she thought the world saw her, as she saw herself, and a grave concern regarding a task-she had been researching something...“The Arcturian Wars.” I said aloud.
“This is the Library and the Princess had been doing research-she was profoundly concerned that an aspect of the Arcturian Wars had completely been misunderstood by the public.”
Hammerstein’s female officer spoke then, “Brilliant!” At which Hammerstein felt obligated to introduce her at last, “Winteroud this is officer Tokushima.”
Steve Moore
I already knew that, of course. I bowed, and wished I was older. I could sense she thought I was a “cute little boy”, which was infuriating to no end. She was in the full flower of womanhood; all I could do was wait, grow, and dream. I also sensed she was in love with Hammerstein, which was funny because he didn’t have a clue and thought of her as far too young for him, and more or less a distraction with all her beauty moving through criminal investigations like a fine art piece at a demolition site.
“Maam.” I said, which I immediately regretted.
The Princess of Caldris Page 1