by John Scalzi
“She updated before her final trip. Everything but those last few days is in here.”
This took Cardenia aback. On one hand it made sense. On another, the idea of a person being … incomplete was odd. “Jiyi, show me Emperox Grayland I.”
A shimmer and a tall, wide woman appeared and walked toward Cardenia.
“You’re Emperox Grayland I,” Cardenia asked.
“Yes,” the woman said.
“You … know what happened to you? How you died?”
“I’m aware of the information, yes.”
“How do you feel about it?” This was all an aside, but Cardenia had to know.
“I don’t feel anything about it. I’m a computer simulation of a person. That said, given what I know about it, I imagine the actual Emperox Grayland I was exceptionally pissed about it.”
This made Cardenia smile. Then she got back on track. “You knew the Flow stream for Dalasýsla was collapsing.”
“I was given models by scientists that suggested that the stream was in danger of collapsing, yes. Given the data and my understanding of it, I thought it was possible, and likely.”
“But you didn’t evacuate the Dalasýsla system.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Politics,” Grayland said. “Evacuating the twenty million people who lived in the Dalasýsla system would have required immense planning and capital on the part of the Interdependency. There was no will for it.”
“The parliament didn’t want to save the lives of twenty million people?”
“They didn’t see it as a matter of saving those lives. They considered it a matter of someone they saw as a weak emperox trying to manufacture a crisis, as a way of shifting the balance of power away from the parliament. They also saw it as a threat to trade and the economy, since a large number of ships would need to be committed to an evacuation, at a huge cost.”
“What about the data showing the possibility of a collapse?”
“They held a commission which featured other Flow physicists poking holes in the findings, introducing enough doubt to undermine any political drive to do anything. Even the representatives from Dalasýsla voted down my recommendation to begin an evacuation. What eventually passed was a recommendation for further study. But money wasn’t appropriated in the imperial budget for that further study, so nothing came of it.”
“So—” So you did nothing, Cardenia was going to say, but then stopped because it would be rude and would make Grayland almost instantly defensive. Then she remembered she was talking to a computer who didn’t have feelings. “So you did nothing.”
“I sent the local duchess an advisory, and told the military and local imperial bureaucrats to assist, on an expedited basis, any Dalasýslans who wanted to leave.”
“And did they?”
“We don’t know. The Flow stream collapsed almost immediately after I sent the advisory.”
“So twenty million people died because of politics and bureaucracy.”
“Yes. Not immediately, of course. But the intentional nature of the Interdependency is that each system is reliant on the others for essentials. Remove one system, and its ruling house and monopoly, and the dozens of other systems will survive. But that one system will not. Over time it will begin to fail. The habitats in space and outposts on otherwise uninhabitable planets and moons will fall into disrepair and over time will become harder to fix. Farms and food production factories will also start to fail. Social networks will break down predictably, commensurate to failures of the physical plant and the realization that ultimately nothing can save the people in the cut-off system. Between the physical and social failures that will follow the collapse of the Flow stream, system-wide death is inevitable.”
“How long did it take?”
“When the Dalasýsla collapse happened, I ordered radio observatories in the Kaipara system to train in on Dalasýsla. Kaipara was the closest system by physical distance, seventeen light-years away. I was dead before they heard anything.”
“But they heard something.”
“Briefly. Most in-system communication in my era was through focused streams of data, so it would have been difficult to eavesdrop randomly. When I ordered the radio telescopes to listen I hoped someone at Dalasýsla would have the presence of mind to point a wide-spectrum transmitter at Kaipara. And as I understand it, someone did, for about a month, two years after the collapse.”
“What did it say?”
“Basically: civil war, murder, violence, sabotage of life-support systems and food production, the rise of cults of personality. There’s a classified report that was prepared by my son and successor, Bruno III.”
“Classified?” Cardenia turned to Attavio VI. “Is it still classified?”
“I didn’t unclassify it, no,” Attavio said.
“Why not? Especially if you believe the Flow is in danger of collapsing?”
“Because the problems that existed in Grayland’s era exist in ours, or mine, I should say. The parliament would still see raising the concern as a political move to marginalize them. No one wants to disrupt trade or the privileges of the guild houses. And in this case it won’t be just one system, like Dalasýsla. It will be all of them. There won’t be anywhere to run. What happened at Dalasýsla will happen everywhere. Unless I was absolutely sure, I wasn’t going to open that particular box of trouble.”
And here is where Cardenia, in her dream, departed from her script. “This is all stupid,” she said, to Attavio VI and Grayland I. “We’re doomed only if we keep doing what we’re doing. If we know a collapse is coming, we have to reform the Interdependency. End the house monopolies. Help every system prepare for the collapse.”
“It won’t happen,” Attavio VI said.
“You don’t know that.”
“Of course I know that. I’m the emperox. Or was.”
Cardenia turned to Grayland I. “You saw a collapse happen. In your time, they must have responded.”
“I was assassinated,” Grayland I said. “And after a brief vogue for entertainment about the lost system of Dalasýsla, everyone decided to forget about it. The other Flow streams looked stable, and thinking about Dalasýsla was inconvenient.”
“No one wants the Interdependency to end. Including the House of Wu. There’s too much money and power at stake,” Attavio VI said.
“And the survival of humanity doesn’t matter?” Cardenia asked, incredulously.
“Not if it means the end of the Interdependency.”
“The survival of humanity was the point of the Interdependency!” Cardenia shouted, at the computer simulation of her father.
And this is where, in her dream, both Attavio VI and Grayland I laughed in her face.
“My child, that’s never been the point of the Interdependency,” Attavio VI said.
“It’s just the excuse we gave for it,” Grayland I affirmed, nodding.
“Then what is the point?” Cardenia asked, still shouting. “What is the Interdependency?”
And here there was another shimmer, and another figure walked toward Cardenia, a figure that Cardenia knew was meant to be Rachela I, prophet-emperox, the legendary founder of the Interdependency. It was meant to be Rachela I but looked like Naffa, Naffa who had been caught in the explosion of the presentation balcony, Naffa, the last sight of whom that Cardenia would ever have was her being torn apart by the blast, Naffa, covered in blood, who stood in front of Cardenia now, as Rachela I, to tell her what the Interdependency was and is.
“It’s a scam,” she said.
And then Cardenia, who even dreaming could no longer pretend not to know what had happened, willed herself awake, to find herself in a bed in her own very small, very secure private hospital, surrounded by imperial bodyguards, a phalanx of doctors led by Qui Drinin, and a small contingent of imperial guards, including the one, right there, who would tell her what she already knew, that her friend Naffa Dolg was dead.
PART TWO
Chapter
7
The fighting near the University of Opole had subsided enough that Marce Claremont had been able to return to his apartment in graduate housing to pack for a trip from which he would likely never return.
Which did bring up the question: If you are leaving forever, what do you take with you?
Marce’s triage was helped by certain factors. With regard to clothing, Marce was already packed; he had enough clothes at home in Claremont that he didn’t need any from his apartment in Opole. The only thing his apartment had to offer in that regard were some casual shirts with clever astrophysics comments silkscreened on them. Marce was reasonably sure he could leave those behind. The clothing he did pack was mostly neutral in color and design. His father pointed out that fashion on Hub would be so dramatically different that he would have to restock anyway.
All the music, books, pictures, entertainment, and much of the personal communication that Marce treasured was stored in a thumb-sized data crypt, along with what appeared to be close to one hundred thousand marks of spending money, the latter accessible only through Marce’s biometrics, theoretically. Marce wouldn’t have to waste space on any of those.
That left things—objects of sentimental value. The large majority of these sorts of objects also resided in Claremont Palace, both because that’s where Marce had lived most of his life, and also because the apartment in graduate housing was ridiculously small. Of the objects that were at the apartment, Marce chose four. Two were books, given to him by his father, one on his thirteenth standard birthday, and one when he received his doctorate.
The third was an obsolete music player given to him by Vrenna, who took the player to a Green Gods concert and managed to get it signed by three of the four members of the band. The player didn’t work anymore and the Green Gods had broken up years ago, members dispersing into oblivion and/or ill-advised solo careers. But he kept it to remember that time in his life, and to remind him that Vrenna, despite often being a pain in his ass as they grew up, was occasionally capable of being thoughtful and kind.
The final object was a threadbare stuffed pig named Giggy, bought for Marce on his first birthday by his mother, who had given Vrenna a stuffed bear named Howie at the same time. Howie had disappeared years before—there was reason to believe Vrenna may have launched him into the sky using a homemade rocket—but Giggy survived and accompanied Marce to every new home. Fiction would dictate that Giggy was the sole remaining gift Marce had from his now-departed mother, but in real life Marce had many gifts and owned many things that were either from her or reminded him of her. Giggy was simply his good-luck charm.
Marce stuffed all four objects in a small rucksack, and then considered the rucksack. Not a lot to leave a world with, he thought. Marce had been doing his best not to think too much about the fact that he was leaving the planet to go to a place where he knew no one and where he would likely spend all the rest of his life. The Flow stream to End would last longer than the one going out from it; it might be open for years yet. Theoretically it was possible at this point that he could make it back. It was just deeply unlikely. Marce’s way of dealing with the fact he’d never see his father or sister or any of the people he’d ever known in his lifetime was to think about the practical issues of leaving the planet.
Which he had attended to; the day before he’d met with Gazson Magnut, the chief purser of a ship called Yes, Sir, That’s My Baby, and arranged passage. It hadn’t been cheap—it had in fact cost more money than Marce figured he’d ever spent on everything else he’d ever bought in his life up to that point—and Magnut had tried to upsell him on several other things, including a faked set of travel documents. Marce noted Magnut seemed mildly disappointed when he pointed out his travel documents were in order. With that taken care of, all that remained was to set up resignation and farewell letters, all of which would be sent after the Yes, Sir was in the Flow.
And this, the collecting of important objects. Everything else in the apartment could be collected by Claremont staff later.
Marce swung the rucksack over his shoulder, took a last look at the apartment, and decided that he would not miss it at all. It was, like nearly every academic institutional residence, entirely forgettable in every way. Then he headed down the stairs and out of the dormitory, down a street that was almost entirely empty except for a couple of people far down the road, and the van, which drove up to where Marce was, and opened up to reveal a couple of very large men.
The van then took off again, Marce in it, because the very large men had jumped out and dragged him into it before he really knew what was going on. The rucksack with all the sentimental objects stayed behind on the sidewalk, because sometimes that happens when you get kidnapped.
* * *
Ghreni Nohamapetan smiled at Marce Claremont across a small table. “Lord Marce. So good to see you again. I’m glad we could have this meeting on short notice.”
“Lord Ghreni,” Marce said. “Since you had me kidnapped to be here, I don’t think it was something I could really refuse.”
The two of them were sitting in a windowless room that looked like it had been made out of a storage container—which meant it probably was a storage container, repurposed. Marce had no idea of its location. He’d been in the room all of ten minutes, placed there by the thugs who had grabbed him, before Ghreni arrived.
“I don’t like the word ‘kidnapped,’” Ghreni said.
“With all due respect, Lord Ghreni, at the moment I don’t really give a damn what you like.”
“Fair enough.” Ghreni leaned back in his chair and considered Marce. “Rumor is that you’re planning to leave End behind.”
“If I were, I don’t see how it’s any of your business.”
“Well, see. There’s a war on, and the duke has noticed that several of his nobles—or their children, adult or otherwise—are now suddenly trying to book passage off the planet.”
“That will happen when there’s a war.”
“I suppose it might,” Ghreni agreed. “The duke doesn’t see it as a vote of confidence in his leadership skills, however, so he’s been inviting those who are interested in leaving to stay.”
“I don’t think you’ve kidnapped me to extend me this invitation, Lord Ghreni,” Marce said.
“No, I suppose that would be going the long way around to do it. You’re correct. I’ve invited you here for other reasons entirely. You’ll recall the other day when I asked your father to assist the duke with the release of imperial funds.”
“I recall him telling you ‘maybe.’”
“He did—which I took to mean ‘no, but politely.’ And to be clear, if that really was his answer, his reasons were both ethically and legally sound. It was a good choice for him to make, for those reasons.”
“I’ll tell him you said that.”
“I don’t doubt that you would,” Ghreni said. “Just not yet. The problem with your father’s answer, legally and ethically admirable as it might be, is that right now the duke really needs that money, because he really needs those weapons. And even ‘maybe’ doesn’t work with the time frame we’re under. So where persuasion didn’t work, compulsion might.”
“You’re holding me for ransom.”
“Yes. And I do apologize for that. Your father isn’t susceptible to other … blandishments that I or the duke might offer. He doesn’t seem interested in money or power or anything else tangible. And he has no patriotism for End or loyalty to the duke. But there’s no doubt that he loves both you and your sister. From there it was just the matter of choosing which of the two of you to pick. We considered your sister…”
Marce laughed at this, and Ghreni as gracefully as possible acknowledged the laugh.
“… but she presented problems in terms of acquisition.”
“You mean that she would have gutted the thugs you sent after her, and then would have come after you next, after they gave you up.”
“That’s exact
ly what I mean. You were, and I mean this with no disrespect whatsoever, the softer target.”
Marce nodded at this. It was true enough. He was a scientist, and Vrenna was a soldier, or had been before she had taken over Claremont’s constabulary. Of the two of them, he was much more likely to be taken by surprise, and rather less likely to snap anyone’s neck.
“There is also the matter that you are intended to leave the planet, and she’s not.”
“So?”
“You’ve never left End before. You’ve never even gone to the imperial station, even when your sister was in the marines. Your leaving now is interesting.”
“You mentioned there was a war going on.”
“Yes, but I don’t think that’s why you’re leaving. If you were leaving because of the war, it wouldn’t just be you. Your sister and father would be leaving as well, or at least trying to. But it’s just you.” Ghreni reached into his pocket and pulled out a data crypt, laid it on the table. “And by this, at least, you’re not leaving with the family inheritance.”
Marce stared at the data crypt. It had been taken from him when he’d been kidnapped, along with the other personal items that were on his body rather than in the now-missing rucksack.
Ghreni pushed it over to him. “Take it.”
Marce took it, put it in his pocket. “Is it empty?”
“No. I don’t need your pictures and music, and I’m afraid the duke needs more than a hundred thousand marks from your family. Until and unless your father helps us, it’s not as if you’re going anywhere anyway. And because I think he wants you to go, now, I think we’ll get what we want from him.”
“And if you don’t?”
Ghreni shrugged. “For starters, you’re not leaving the planet.”
“‘For starters.’”
“The duke really needs access to that money.”
“Enough to kill me?”
“He wouldn’t be killing you himself. But now that you mention it, at the moment, hundreds and possibly thousands of people are dying daily in this stupid rebellion. If placing one life in the balance—yours—means thousands more will live, isn’t that a risk worth taking?”