Empery

by Michael P. Kube-Mcdowell

  As spanking new outside as Charan appeared to the eye, it was in fact a relic of an era, the feeling of which was almost impossible to recapture, when the frontier had represented challenge and mystery instead of terror and death. Tilak Charan was the third name the vessel had borne. When Barnstable had first crossed paths with it, it had been called Weichsel. When it had begun its life more than a century and a half ago, its name was Taipeng. Barnstable did not concern himself with the changing appellations, for he knew it best by the hull registration under which all the ship’s work records were indexed—USS-96.

  Like its sister ship the Joanna Wesley (formerly Journa, nee New York), which was in the care of Yard 102, USS-96 was part of the Survey Branch’s last great shipbuilding project. The sixteen vessels that had comprised the Cities Series were to have been the spearheads of the Survey Branch’s Phase III search, fresh blood for the millennium-long pursuit of First Colonization Worlds. Aided by a much larger fleet of unmanned drones, the Cities vessels were to have pushed hard at the limits of the known, more than trebling the volume of explored space in the course of a five-hundred-year plan that would add four thousand new star systems to the catalogs of the astrographers.

  But Thackery’s Revision had intervened, abruptly halting the expansion and canceling the Survey Branch’s plans. Of the sixteen Cities hulls, six were never more than engineering drawings, and three were abandoned with their keelspines freshly laid. Seven were completed as “generic” AVLO hulls and renamed for seven of the Unified Worlds. Five of those seven misbegotten survey ships now patrolled the Perimeter in their new identity as Sentinels.

  Except for the journey inbound to Earth from the Centers where they had been built, the two remaining ships—USS-96 and USS-97—had spent the next hundred years as deepships in name only. In the decades immediately following the Revision, when the panic was most palpable, they had been flying archives, filled with nonvolatile memory cubes representing what was hoped would be a meaningful abstract of the species’s collective knowledge and history.

  Later, when fear of the Mizari had mellowed to paranoia, the memory cubes had been removed from USS-96 to make room for berths and accommodations intended for Earth’s ruling elite and the Service’s senior staff. When the list of those demanding to be part of the evacuation grew too long for USS-96 to accommodate them, the same had been done to USS-97. For thirty years the two ships were quietly held in reserve, ready to leave orbit literally on a day’s notice. But the need had never arisen.

  Three factors led to the next phase of the ships’ careers. Progress on the Perimeter listening posts gradually erased the fear of a sudden, overwhelming attack by the Mizari. The Service withdrew from the evacuation plan, prompting a few key Terran officials, embarrassed by the suggestion of selfishness and cowardice, to remove their names from the list. And as the new Defense Branch matured, it began to exercise its claim on the resources of the Service, especially those it felt were being underutilized.

  As a consequence, both ships underwent still another metamorphosis, this time to emerge as engineering test-beds. Every new development in deepship technology between the mid-500s and the early 600s was field-tested on USS-96 or USS-97, or both. The procedures for upgrading ships in the field were worked out, sometimes by trial and error, on their viscera. Toward the end experimentation overran development, and both ships diverged sharply and in different directions from the standard internal plan for deepships.

  That was how Barnstable had first found USS-96—its lines marred by the addition of experimental doughnut-shaped AVLO radiators forward and aft, its innards ravaged by a succession of tinkerers, all of whom had treated the ship as a disposable good.

  It was Harmack Wells who had rescued the ships from slow death at the hands of the Office of Systems Research. Soon after Wells took office, USS-96 was moved into Barnstable’s F-bay, USS-97 into Yard 102. In the six years since, both ships had been stripped down to the bone and then rebuilt with state-of-the-art components. Virtually the only original equipment left in place were the AVLO-L drives, and even those received new controllers and peripherals.

  The thoroughness of USS-97’s renovation and the degree of interest the Director’s office expressed in its progress had long ago caused Barnstable to wonder if the ship were being readied for a role as fleet flagship. But it was not until five weeks ago that his suspicions were confirmed, when USS-96 and USS-97 were both assigned flag crews.

  Even then it was not clear which of the two ships would be primary. Not until the recommission orders came through specifying that the ship in Barnstable’s F-bay was to have F-1 Tilak Charan as its transponder ID was the picture complete. Wells was going to the Perimeter, and it was Charan that would take him there.

  For Barnstable that news was the vindication for a lifetime of labor. Even learning that Wesley’s unreadiness—she was still six weeks from full flight certification—had been a factor in the choice did not dim his pride. “First and best,” he had told the refit team at their final meeting that morning. “That’s what Charan is—that’s what we are.”

  As much as Barnstable was pleased for his own sake, he was even more pleased for Charan. Though he knew better than most that ships were mere technological artifacts, he was enough the romantic to also believe that each ship had a proper destiny conferred on it by the intent of the builder. When that destiny was frustrated or unfulfilled, it could only be viewed as a tragedy.

  From his office greatport Barnstable watched as the black spider that was the base tug entered the spaceward end of F-bay and nosed close to Charan’s bow. Two waldoids were standing by in case of trouble, but the tug pilot was skilled at his job, The six slender grapple arms gracefully closed on the flared circular rim of the forward radiator. After a brief pause to be certain all was secure, the slipway’s anchors releasedCharan, and the tug began to edge the flagship out of the yard.

  For the last time, Barnstable thought. This time Charan would not return. At long last she would become what she had been built to be—a deepship, riding gravity’s own wave between the stars.

  “It’s about damn time,” Barnstable said to himself, watching the tug’s chemical thrusters fire as it pointed Charan toward Unity Center. “About damn time.” Then he turned away from the greatport, surprised to find his eyes bright with moisture. Tomorrow another ship would fill the empty bay, and he could not allow himself to think of Charan for very long.

  “… the mighty arm of the chosen people of God. O Benefactor, look with favor on the labors of those who follow the path You have shown us, that we might win back the promised lands and earn the right to live forever in the infinity of Your Creation. Give us strength and comfort as we prepare ourselves to face Your enemies…”

  Though Janell Sujata was standing just a few metres away from the Most Reverend Bishop of the Holy Redemption Church, she was not listening to his invocation. Looking out from the temporary rostrum at one edge of Unity Center’s great central atrium at the overflow crowd gathered on the balconies and the main plaza, Sujata wondered just when she had lost complete control over the departure ceremonies.

  Perhaps my failure was not anticipating the amount of fuss that could attend the sailing of a single ship, she thought. If someone had told me a month ago, I would not have believed it.

  A month ago everything had seemed in order for a quick, quiet departure for Wells and his staff. The Committee had given its pro form a approval to the relocation of Wells and the command staff. Wells had accepted her requirement that the journey be made in the minimum time possible, forcing Charan to stay in the craze, incommunicado, until its approach to Lynx Center. Satisfactory arrangements had been worked out for the Deputy Director of Defense to report directly to the Chancellor in Wells’s absence.

  The first clue to what was coming, the significance of which Sujata unfortunately missed, was the attention that Charan garnered after being moved to a station-keeping zone adjacent to Unity Center. From the first day, buses je
tted almost hourly between the Center and the ship. Some carried Earthnet and outworld journalists, others dignitaries who had requested tours.

  Most often, of course, the buses carried members of Charan’s crew, who were readying her for departure but not yet ready to take up residence. Gradually those who needed to be there began to crowd out those who were merely curious, and after two weeks the tours were halted. The next day the crew began to occupy the ship on a continuous rotating schedule, serving notice that Charan’s sailing date was drawing near.

  But by then the Defense Branch had forwarded to Sujata without comment more than fifty internal inquiries as to whether there would be any formal send-off for Charan and the command staff. Some of the inquiries, assuming that there would be a ceremony of some sort, merely asked for the schedule and other details. The referrals did not quite add up to an official request on Wells’s part, but Sujata nonetheless took the hint. Conscious of the psychological aspects of the transfer, she saw no harm and some possible good in a quiet, in-house salute to those who were leaving.

  Then Berberon had intervened, asking if he might have the chance to address Wells and his staff as a way of underlining the Terran government’s support for a move over which the Nines were reportedly ecstatic. She could not refuse him. But Berberon’s involvement brought with it demands for access to the ceremony by Earthnet and a flurry of requests for invitations for officials from other Observer missions. Suddenly the quiet leave-taking had become a major media event.

  Her one victory had been to keep Wells himself off the podium and away from the microphones. Instead he stood as part of a neat pattern of human bodies a few metres in front of the rostrum in a reserved area on the plaza. Wells and his staff, wearing rust-colored, high-collared tunics that only could be considered officers’ uniforms, formed the front rank. She had seen the tunics before, but there was one new detail. Each of the men in the front row wore above his right breast pocket a small gold trigon made up of three discontinuous bars.

  Standing behind in four rows of ten abreast were the flag crews of Charan and Wesley, thirty-five men and five women dressed in the blue unisex jumpsuits that had been standard deepship garb since the Service’s earliest days. Compared with the front row, the crews seemed almost painfully young. Even so, they had well learned the stoic soldier’s mask: Their faces were as unmarked by emotion as they were untouched by time.

  Berberon was at the podium now, and Sujata forced herself to listen, though she knew that his words were riddled within sincerity.

  “Every great civilization draws much of its greatness from the quality of the men and women who answer the call to defend it,” Berberon was saying. “A city, a nation, a world, a species that does not enjoy the loyalty, does not inspire the sacrifice, of its strongest, brightest, and bravest men and women, cannot be called great no matter what its other accomplishments might be.

  “Yet those who answer the call have been rarely accorded the depth of gratitude their service deserves. They perform their off times onerous duty in the twilight of our consciousness—we know they are there, but for some reason we do not see them. They do for the rest of us what we would have trouble doing for ourselves, asking nothing more than the opportunity to follow the dictates of honor. But they have earned much more.

  “So it is altogether fitting that we take this occasion to say to the commanders and crews of the flagships Tilak Charan and Joanna Wesley, thank you. We thank you for what you have done and what you will do. We thank you for what you have already sacrificed and for what you will sacrifice. And we thank you for the courage you have shown, and the courage you will show as you face the challenge of keeping your homeworlds safe.”

  A well-constructed speech, Sujata thought as Berberon interrupted himself by leading the enthusiastic applause for the crews. All the magic words—bravery, duty, sacrifice, honor—a paraphrase of Eric Lange’s famous quote about what the brightest and best mean to society. How could they doubt that you are their friend?

  At Berberon’s prompting, Wells acknowledged the applause with a raised hand. That gesture drove the intensity of the tumult a notch higher. It began to fade only when Berberon stepped away from the podium, making way for Sujata to replace him there. It was as if the crowd wanted there to be no mistake about who was the object of their acclaim.

  She had struggled with her own role in the ceremony. In the end she decided to keep it simple—a few words that were meaningless because they were merely the public echo of agreements already made.

  But she had not realized the context that Berberon and the others who had preceded her would create, the climate in which her words would be heard. As she came to the podium she discarded her planned remarks and cast about for the minimum she could say to satisfy the expectations of both Wells and his supporters.

  “Harmack Wells.”

  Wells took one step forward and looked up at her.

  “By the authority of the Chancellor’s Office, I hereby appoint you Commander of the Perimeter Defense Force of the Unified Space Service.”

  The crowd roared its approval, and the sound rained down on Sujata as a tangible entity. Wells saluted, though whether he was answering Sujata or the crowd, she could not say.

  “With the blessings of wisdom, may we have peace in our time,” Sujata said. “Commander, your ship awaits you.”

  A second salute, this one clearly meant for Sujata, and Wells turned to face the uniformed assemblage. One row at a time, beginning with the rear rank, Wells’s party marched down the aisle that had been kept clear for them, across the center of the plaza to the spiral slidewalk that led down to the shuttle terminal. The thunderous applause continued long after the last of them had vanished out of sight.

  The atrium’s high-intensity lights began to dim to permit the progress of the crew and the departure of the ship to be shown holographically in the middle of the atrium. Her presence no longer required, Sujata took advantage of the moment to descend from the rostrum and retreat to the privacy of her office. The only one who seemed to notice was Berberon, who fell in beside her wordlessly and escorted her out of the plaza and up-station to her office.

  “Did you see that display?” Sujata demanded the moment the door closed behind them. She flung her jacket into a chair with an intensity that told her she was more disturbed than she had realized. “It isn’t just the Nines—you’re all crazy. What is it about you people that the prospect of a fight excites you instead of terrifying you?”

  “I tried to tell you once,” Berberon said. “You’ll never understand us unless you embrace it.”

  “I resist your explanation,” she said stiffly. “This has to be something you’ve taught yourselves, not something you inherit. You’d never have survived otherwise.”

  “We almost didn’t,” Berberon said idly. “Mind if I watch the departure?“Sujata gestured with one hand. “I intended to watch. I just had to get away from that crowd. Holo on,” she said sharply.“Channel one. No audio.”

  The holo showed a twenty-place bus with blue-and-white Transport markings jetting across from the station to Charan, which was waiting two klicks away with a caretaker crew aboard. Though there was no video from the bus’s passenger compartment, Sujata knew that it carried only half of those who had stood in the plaza. Against the small, but real, possibility that one ship or the other might be lost en route to Lynx Center, everything had been duplicated or divided, including personnel.

  The Traffic Office’s lane regulations required a minimum one-day spacing between AVLO ships on the same route, but it would be as much as a month before the second half of the expedition left. Wesley would not be ready to leave the Yard for five days, and final preparations could add up to four weeks to that. With Sujata’s approval, Wells had chosen not to wait. .

  So Wesley’s crew and passengers—which included Farlad, the vice chairman of the Strategy Committee, and one of its members, as well as two senior command officers—had parted company with their mates so
mewhere between the plaza and the terminal. Along with Sujata, Berberon, and a large fraction of both the Service’s million and Earth’s billions, those assigned to Wesley were now merely spectators.

  Its thrusters showing as tiny orange halos, the bus edged alongside Charan and extended its transfer tunnel to the forward three-o’clock entryway. One by one Charan’s crew drifted down the tunnel, caught the circular handrail just inside the hatch, and twisted as needed to bring them down upright on Charan’s gravity-ducted decking.

  “Is what they do so much more admirable than what we do?” Sujata asked as the net changed feeds to show the bridge crew settling into their couches. “Absent the martial context, that crowd out there never would have responded to either of us with that kind of enthusiasm.”

  “A lesson learned by thousands of tottering dictators throughout history. No, of course they wouldn’t,” Berberon said. “There’s nothing in the genome to fire them up over diplomats and administrators. Government was invented by man, not nature.”

  “You won’t give up on that, will you?”

  “Not when I know I’m right.”

  It did not take long for Charan’s crew to have her ready for departure, as the caretakers had already attended to everything that could not be handled by the crew and the ship herself in the last few minutes. As the scheduled power-up neared, Sujata walked to the greatport and opened the shade.

  “Can you see Charan from there?” Berberon asked, crossing the room to join her.

  Sujata waited until Berberon stood beside her, then pointed. “There—a couple of degrees southwest of Procyon, in Canis Major.”

  “I see it now,” Berberon said. “Pretty thing, picking up the sunlight that way.”

  Just then, Procyon and the other background stars forward of Charan’s bow and aft of her stern seemed to jump to new positions as the AVLO drive suddenly came alive. The distortion caused by the twin gravitational lenses was the only evidence of the tremendous power being drawn from the spindle by the tiny vessel. Within a few seconds the ship was perceptibly moving, the ripple preceding it growing ever larger as the drive built up toward the craze.