She continued. “Where you are is not important, except that you are far beyond the help of your friends. How you got here is at most a trivial detail. A little narcotic in your food, a blast of energy, a fast, stealthy transport and… here we are.
“Am I the one who killed that pathetic Manchester? I am indeed. Did I frame you for his murder? I certainly did.
“Why did I do it? Now, you see why I took the initiative. It would have taken you five questions to get to an interesting and relevant one. The answer is as follows: I had to do something to drive a wedge between the people of this planet and your people. I had also to keep your people distracted and off-balance while we worked on some other schemes. I also had to get you alone. When I saw how you over-reacted to that Manchester’s advances on that boy –- which demonstrated what any more enlightened being would recognize as perfectly normal expression of a healthy sexual appetite – I saw how all of these things could be brought together.
“I approached Manchester and informed him that you would accept an apology, and that you would meet him in the Conservatory at midnight. Manchester, having previously been a servant of Lord Tyronius, knew how to gain entry. I met him there. The enforcers properly surmised the rest. He mewled after I first struck the blow, then gurgled and died. It was a good kill, a very good kill.
“I left the Conservatory through the balcony, which allowed me to enter your room through the window, then led you on a chase back to the Conservatory door. I locked the Conservatory from the inside and escaped through the balcony again. I hid the candlestick in your bag, where those two walking meat sticks managed to find it.
“And then there was a trial. Of that, I don’t know what was more entertaining, watching the prosecution strut and go through its rituals, or watching your defense sputter and fume because the system did not allow them to prove your innocence. It was hard to keep from laughing out loud.
“They found you guilty, you know? That jury of half-wits, four of them spent your trial dozing off and a fifth stared at your defense attorney like he wanted to swallow her whole. I can’t totally blame him, she would make a delicious dish.
“Now, of course, all of the inhabitants of this planet, think you escaped rather than face justice. Many in your own crew think you have escaped in order to find the real killer and prove your innocence. They are scrambling all over the planet like insects. The whole dilemma preoccupies everyone. What to do?
What to do?”
Redfire felt the cold steel blade of a knife against his temple. “By now, you probably have only one remaining question. Who am I, and who are we? Unless you are fatally dim-witted, you probably have a good idea.”
She turned the blade of the knife toward his temple, and it dug in with a little pain. “You are at a crossroads, Philip John Redfire. If you choose correctly, evidence will surface showing that that old man was murdered by an alien interloper, bent on keeping your worlds apart. You will return to your ship, resume your duties, resume your life with your family. Choose poorly, and everyone on your ship will die, and a lot of people on this planet, too.”
The knife swiped downward, cutting away the blindfold. The first images to register Redfire were girders and pipes, catwalks and rails. As his vision cleared, he saw Specialist NightStalker standing before him.
“Surprised?” she continued. “All the clues were there. If you really are worthy of what we are about to offer you, you should not have been surprised at all.”
“NightStalker?” he whispered.
“I can not say that I knew the woman for very long. A long needle pushed into the base of the skull kills quickly. She should not have been so trusting.”
He saw that she wore a kind of black leather tunic, with the symbol of a wand and the number nine superimposed on the left breast.
“I am an Aurelian, a Nine of Wands. You may call me, Mercuria.”
Winter – The Alcazar of General Ziang
Another cold, dim fluorescent morning dawned over the barren lands of the Dessicatation. William Keeler squinted through the window of his bedroom loft. The raggedy saw-teeth of the nearby mountain range were shrouded in a gray-white mist. It looked positively miserable outside, and he had slept horribly, awakened by one dream after another of fighting monsters in the decks of his own ship, monsters in the form of red-skinned beasts with carapace armor, hideously elongated limbs, and brains filled with metal spiders. He hated it when the symbolism of his dreams was too obvious.
“Are you decent?” called Lady Goldenrod from the adjoining chamber.
“I certainly hope not,” Keeler answered. Without awaiting his response, she had entered the chamber, wrapped in thin gold veils and a low cut tan shift. “Nice dress you’re almost wearing,” he added.
She leaned up and kissed him. It felt odd, not unpleasant, nice in most of the superficial ways a kiss from a beautiful woman ought to be, but without ardor, without passion, almost perfunctory. “Are you in a big hurry to go downstairs, listen to a bunch of boring old exposition and eat figs?” she whispered lustily.
“What did you have in mind?”
She leaned in close to him, and touched his neck and shoulders. “Whatever it takes to make you happy.”
“Excellent, make my bed and wash my underwear,” He pulled away and made for the hallway. Lady Goldenrod followed at his heels, laughing and throwing things at him – vases, shoes, and the occasional jug.
They arrived in the kitchen, where they found Blade Toto, already at the table. “The Ghost is in there, talkin’ to the Old General,” Toto told them. He leaned back in his chair, and bit into one of the exotic, brown, sticky fruits Ziang had provided.
The captain’s ear pricked up. “Really?” Keeler gestured for the woman to be quiet and quietly crossed the kitchen to a large glass door, from which he could view the scene.
Dead Keeler and Ziang were standing in a tiny courtyard. When Ziang spoke, his breath made smoke in the air. It occurred to Live Keeler that he had no idea how his ancestor made himself heard. The Ghost had no lungs and no speech organs, no physical presence at all. How he made the air vibrate was a complete mystery, and the cold air gave no clue. Keeler closed his eyes and strained mightily to hear the words exchanged outside in the cold.
Ziang: “Your children have done surprisingly well.”
Dead Keeler: “Strong, yes. Smart, yes. Spiritual, yes. In mind body and soul, they have what it takes to stand up to the enemy. I have seen them in battle, though. They are ill-prepared, and they lack resolve.
They are unprepared to make the necessary sacrifices.”
Ziang: “They simply do not know what the stakes are yet.”
A gust of wind blew just then, and whatever Dead Keeler said was lost to it.
Ziang: “… a genetic protocol because they were on the frontier, and far from the rest of humanity.” Dead Keeler: “Humanity was ever noble as a man, and ever as much vulgar in large groups. I am not ashamed at what we did, neither should you be.”
Ziang (sounding bitter): “What had to be, had to be.”
With that, the General turned toward the house. In a comical flurry of activity, Keeler and Goldenrod lurched for the table, almost stumbling over each other. As they took their benches, they attempted to strike casual poses, juggling with fruit, biscuits, and coffee, before finally seating themselves.
Ziang came in and slammed the outside door behind him, nearly rattling the glass from its frames.
Dead Man Keeler followed him, passing through the door, an easy trick for those whose presence exists only in the space between the orbits of electrons and atomic nuclei.
“I hope the breakfast I have prepared is adequate,” Ziang told his guests, still in a pique. “I rose early and prepared it for you.”
“Oh, it’s shah-riffic,” Keeler replied with gusto, loudly chewing on some kind of dried meat although these were the kinds of mornings he would have favored a hot bowl of oatmeal and toast with lemon marmalade.
“Yes,
and we definitely were not listening in on your secret conversation in the courtyard,” Goldenrod added with a sly, smug look that said “Don’t ever tell me to wash your underwear again.” Ziang seemed not to notice the remark, as he settled into a heavily padded seat at the head of the table. He rubbed Queequeg’s ears and the cat purred appreciatively, “At last, someone who cares about my needs.”
“Cats are among the things I miss the most,” Ziang sighed. “We almost lost the cats, you know. A parasite from the colony-planet Jasmine nearly extincted them.”
“Another reason I prefer never to leave the ship,” Queequeg said. “But you’re okay. Any more fish?” Live Keeler pulled out his notepad. “Shall we pick it up at the end of the Fifth Crusade? Vesta’s Resurrection. The Century of False Peace?”
“The Sixth Crusade was called the Anti-Crusade, the Unholy War. Its spark was a movement that arose within the Inner Colonies, a conspiracy of anti-priests, anti-clerics and anti-monks. They and their followers set out specifically to destroy every vestige of faith and religion from human civilization.” Keeler interrupted, “According to our legends, that’s what all the Crusades were about.”
“The Sixth Crusade was the Crusade that defined all of the Crusades as a human struggle against between meaning, and nothingness. It was preceded, as you stated, by the century of False Peace, and precipitated by technological developments that brought every arm in the galaxy within human reach and immortality itself within our grasp. Do you know what motivated the Unholy in starting this Crusade?” Ziang asked.
Keeler answered. “It was hubris, mostly, and arrogance. Our technology had brought us to the edge of godhood. We could create worlds, control the destiny of things. The Unholy thought this meant that religion was a ridiculous set of superstitions and it was absurd for humanity to be clinging to them. We had left our home planet and were among the stars, what need did we have for a mythology created by our primitive, agrarian ancestors.”
“A conventional explanation that’s wrong,” Ziang said. “Or, at best, only partly true, which is worse.
The Unholy wanted to eradicate every trace of religion as a form of… experiment. They wanted to see what would happen if they wiped away every trace of the Old Gods? Would Jehovah intervene to preserve himself, miraculously? If all religion were wiped clean, what would replace it? Would humankind create new Gods, would the old Gods reassert themselves, or would we move on as atheists, amoral and existential? They felt the only way to determine whether or not God lived, was to try and kill Him.”
“And if only one God did assert Himself,” Keeler added, “That would settle the issue of which religion was the One True Faith.”
“True, true. In any case, the Unholy War was less a battle of guns and ships, and more one of conspiracies and plots, covert operations and sudden, destructive attacks. Across the galaxy, temples were burned and obliterated, ancient texts were destroyed, by fires and bombs of arsonists. Monks and holy men died by the millions, from poison and bio-bombs. There was a planet called St. Augustine, whose population was devastated when the Unholy soaked an entire shipment of Eucharist bread in cyanide. It took centuries, but eventually, the Unholy took power on many worlds, including all of the Inner Colonies. They abolished prayer, or the display of any religious icon was punishable by death.
“Their anti-Crusade spread across the galaxy, always underground, always discreet. Holy places, repositories of spiritual wisdom were their favored targets. Rome, on Earth, was obliterated by an antimatter bomb, as was Mecca. Jerusalem was nearly destroyed, but saved by some miracle, or other.
Iest was burned to ashes, Lhasa was spared only because anything of religious significance was moved to secret and sacred places. The Ganges was poisoned, so that none could bathe in it…”
“The Unholy struck at Earth?” Live Keeler asked.
“Earth was the home of All Humanity’s Gods.”
“They must have known their cause was futile,” Keeler said.
Ziang smoldered. “They were ruthless and patient, and they came very, very close, and in the end, they nearly succeeded. Many religions did vanish under their assault.” He paused a moment to grunt. “…
so much for the Unitarians.”
Live Keeler felt he should say something then. “Perhaps, in their failure, they realized that God could not be killed, and in that answer, found faith.”
“God can not be killed,” Ziang came back. “But not for lack of trying. By then end of the Sixth Crusade, a third of humanity had been killed, and half the survivors lived under the Dark Forces. The Unholy had succeeded in creating a Great Schism in the Commonwealth. Believers, those that survived, were driven into the hinterlands of the galaxy. By the end of the Sixth Crusade, the Outer Colonies tended to be profoundly religious, while the Inner Colonies were bound to a fanatical, agnostic secularism.”
“And Earth?” Keeler asked.
Dead Keeler answered. “Earth was neutral territory, meaning it was full of people from both sides, spying and plotting on each other.”
“The stage was set for the conflicts that followed,” Ziang explained. “The lines were clear, on the one side, those who believed in Something, finally united in purpose. On the other, those who believed in nothing, just as resolute that nothing should prevail.
“The Seventh Crusade was also called ‘The War of the Dark Realms’ The Thirteen Princes of the Unholy, each holding sway over a different sector of space, launched a grand master plan to turn the Religious colonies against one another. They dispatched false prophets and Messiahs, genetically and technologically equipped to perform miracles, in hopes of splitting the faiths. They succeeded in dividing the forces of the faithful. Only in the last did they join forces to fight back the expansion of the Princes.
“The Crusade was not so much a victory for us, as a failure for them. On worlds where the Unholy had succeeded in eradicating faith, they had to keep the populace contented. They emphasized hedonistic pleasures, and self-fulfillment. Now, humans may be content to live for these things, but they will not fight and die for them. The Unholy could not find enough willing warriors to fight for them. They tried conscripting people, but their warriors were undisciplined as well as unmotivated. In the end, they tried clones, androids, cyborgs…automatic war machines…”
“Berserkers?” Keeler asked.
“Some of them called them that,” Ziang spat. “But the true ‘Berserkers,’ the ultimate weapons, did not come until the Eighth Crusade. a.k.a ‘The War Against the Night’ The Princes began consolidating their power into building Megadeathships, huge vessels the size of small moons. These ships would approach a planet, then dispatch 20 – 30 enormous Destroyers that they carried piggy-back. The Destroyers would obliterate every major city on the planet, one-by-one, until the colony surrendered. If they still held out, the Megadeathships carried a doomsday weapon that could pulverize an entire world. However, they required a crew of perfectly synchronized hive-warriors.”
“The Strange?”
“Exactly. The Megadeathships moved through space and destroyed many Commonwealth colonies, until, by complete chance, a weakness was discovered. Both destroyers and Armada Ships were vulnerable when their main guns were fired. A precisely timed attack would destroy them. By using this tactic, the Commonwealth was able to defeat them.
“At the end, the Thirteen Dark Princes abandoned corporeal existence for life as huge, planet-sized clouds. They swallowed worlds, and their populations, digested bodies and souls. They were ruthless, and to defeat them would require a miracle.”
C h a p t e r F i f t e e n
Winter – Somewhere
Winter – Somewhere
Phil Redfire pulled against the bands at wrist and ankles that bound him that bound him to the rough metal girder behind him. They were not metal, not cloth, not rope or plastic, but they bound him without giving in the least.
“How did you bring me here?” he asked. “I would really like to know how you escape
d from Habi Zod without drawing attention.”
NightStalker … no, she was Mercuria, she always had been Mercuria … met his question with a sweet, sweet smile, tinged with malicious delight. “What do you remember?” He thought hard. “You came into my cell, told me that a verdict had been decided and I was to be removed to the village. There was a flash of light, and I felt something stabbing into the base of my neck.
Then, I woke up here.” He rocked his head slightly, and found the back of neck was still sore. Something had stuck in there.
She nodded, apparently satisfied. “Very good.”
“You had an ally,” Redfire said. “You had to. Someone in the crew, maybe. Then again, you’ve been here long enough to make allies among the population.”
“Winter is already ours,” she told him coyly.
“I can’t believe the Echelon would want this cold, miserable little planet.”
“Ahhhh,” she said, shaking a finger at him. “This planet has a great, great gift that compensates for its climate and the ramshackle state of its technology.”
“You want to live forever… here?”
“We don’t want the cake, we only want the recipe. This is a small planet. It can be taken without displacing the native population, but the climate is untenable. However, the Echelon are very excited about the prospect of eternal life, and the construction of pleasure domes would make life here far more bearable. If permanent inhabitation becomes necessary, we will have to transform it. Using our technology, we can change the ecology and climate of a planet as easily as you would change the curtains in your sleeping chamber.”
“What if the anti-aging effect is tied to the climate, in some way? The natives believe that the harshness of the climate is the price they pay for their long lives.”
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