by Drew Wagar
License
Mutabilis
A novella based on the space trading game Oolite
Published by Drew Wagar at Feedbooks
Copyright 2008 Drew Wagar
http://www.wagar.org.uk/
License
Mutabilis is licensed according to Creative Commons BY-NC-SA.
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Attribution. You must give the original author credit
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Any of these conditions can be waived if you get permission from the copyright holder
Thanks
Thanks to:
My wife Anita and my two boys Mark and Joshua, for letting me have time to write this.
David Braben and Ian Bell for the original Elite game.
Robert Holdstock for his original novella ‘The Dark Wheel’.
All the readers of Status Quo, particularly those who took the time to email back and tell me how much they enjoyed the story.
To Neil Badman, who won the coverpage competition.
To all those who provided an entry for the coverpage competition – you can find all the other entries online via my website, it's worth a look.
To Bob Lavelee, who did a fantastic professional job in editing the text and provided some useful feedback into the bargain
In particular I’d like to thank Captain Hesperus, Star Gazer, Cmdr Maegil, DaddyHoggy, Rxke, Magamo, Jack_H, TGHC, Cos, Cat and Littlebear for their most excellent feedback.
To Disembodied, for his excellent ‘Rough Guide’ to planets in the Elite universe and amazing proof reading skills.
To Ahruman, for keeping Oolite going after a change of leader. High praise indeed. The sheer scale of work has to be seen to be believed. Oolite has changed enormously since I wrote Status Quo.
Dave Hughes (Selezen), for his invaluable assistance all matters to do with Raxxla, timelines, inconsistencies and the various factions in the Elite universe. I hope you enjoy having your own crisis!
To Dr. Nil, for advertising Status Quo within the game itself, with his excellent ‘Your Ad Here’ OXP add on.
To Commander McLane, for improving my Tianve Pulsar OXP add on and generally being a good egg. Thanks for the encouragement!
To P.A. Groove, for creating the ‘Famous Planets’ OXP add on and providing some of the scenery referred to in ‘Status Quo’ to players of ‘Oolite’.
To Killer Wolf, for the loan of a ‘Vampire Mk1’, a fearsome new ship for Oolite players.
To Roberto, for his excellent “Justice for Mrs. Combs” stories. Find them in the Oolite bulletin board, and enjoy!
To the open source community: for Oolite itself, the Openoffice suite used to write this novella and the Ubuntu operating system that runs my PC. This story was written using second hand 8 year old Dell X200 Laptop and no Microsoft products were used in the production at any stage.
Prologue
Prologue
A fable as old as space travel itself, a mystery and an enigma: Raxxla. The very name causes conversation to cease, and meaningful glances to be exchanged.
The younger generation mocks it, until quelled by stern glares from their greybeard elders. Parents tell their offspring the story of a ghost planet, beyond witchspace, lost in the void. The name is interspersed throughout popular culture as a synonym for futility.
Pervading opinion suggests it is indeed a planet, but no one has ever seen it and lived to tell the tale. Its very existence is in doubt, its reputation spread only by hearsay via notorious borderland trading posts on the edge of inhabited space, far from civilisation. Where there is any overlap in the reports that have come back, they seem to suggest Raxxla contains some kind of alien construct – a gateway or portal to… somewhere else. The nature of this device remains unclear.
A number of missions have been undertaken with the express purpose of locating Raxxla, some official, others less so. The most recent being undertaken some eight years ago by the Ryder Expedition in early 3132. Two members of the expedition were recovered in an escape capsule some months later, raving incoherently and dying shortly afterwards of an obscure degenerative brain disease. As a result, some pundits have suggested Raxxla is guarded by a corps of ruthless, power crazed Elitists who will stop at nothing to preserve their anonymity.
A planet older than the Galaxy itself, a gateway to different dimensions or a power base for a clandestine group of Elite combateers; Raxxla remains as inexplicable as it is elusive.
– Extract from the Elite Webcon Interactive Knowledge Institute (Elite-Wiki)
Like the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, many have tried to find Raxxla. No one has yet succeeded, or even returned from such an expedition, but there seems to be no shortage of crazy folk willing to slip berth and go questing.
Does it exist or not? A gateway to riches or nothing more than a story concocted after one too many Anlian heavy-gins in the local Coriolis bar?
As legends go, Raxxla is one of the least well supported myths on record; no memrecs, no visios, not even a remotely plausible artefact of any kind. The only thing it has going for it is a vague similarity in the stories and that anybody who goes looking for it never comes back in one piece, physically or mentally – hardly convincing proof. Ask yourself how an entire planet can remain hidden for centuries.
So, almost certainly a complete load of Leestian grub dung in our opinion, a bedtime story for the younglings. We hear there is only one thing you can believe: don’t believe one thing you hear. Maybe we should ask members of the legendary Dark Wheel… No? Apparently they don’t exist either.
– Extract from the Unofficial Galcop Conspiracy Theory Archive, Tianve
The Dark Wheel is not a legally recognised organisation.
– Extract from Lave Space Licensing Authority Log
Chapter 1
Chapter 1
Larais was not a beautiful planet, in fact the Galactic Census entry was short, somewhat ‘tongue in cheek’ and to the point – “This world is a revolting dump.”
As accurate as this currently was, the description didn’t do justice to the planet’s past. Long ago it had been an industrial planet, churning out fusion energy products: drive cores, reactors, missile warheads and the like. It was the centre of an atomic industry shipping products all around the eight galactic regions and one of the richest planets in the quadrant. Virtually the entire surface of the planet was covered in factories, power plants and vast condominiums built to house the billions of dependent workers.
A downside of this was severe pollution, but huge atmospheric scrubbers kept the air breathable for the most part, although a constant thick orange haze of hydrocarbons blanketed the planet in a permanent shroud.
Then, Quirium was discovered.
Easy to store, easier to use, easier to make. A far more powerful fuel.
Within a short space of years atomic power was obsolete. The atomic economy crashed abruptly and a billion individuals found their livelihood gone, the foundation literally pulled from beneath them. Larais became a ghost planet virtually overnight. The huge buildings were abandoned, left empty and open to the elements. Everything of value taken away, and later looted by privateers.
But the big atomic fusion power plants were too big and too expensive to dismantle. The economy was in tatters and there were other pr
essing priorities.
Initially it was planned to shut them down gracefully, but the cost of working on the planet became prohibitive. The desire to preserve anything as the mass exodus ran its course lost momentum and eventually fizzled out entirely.
The reactors went unattended, broke down and ultimately poured their reactants into the atmosphere. The scrubbers had long before ground to a halt. Everything on the planet disappeared into the deepening orange haze and was forgotten for generations.
Three centuries later it was accidentally discovered that an airborne plant growth was feeding on the thick hydrocarbon haze, creating incredibly fine, yet strong, filaments which could be woven into dazzling garments of extraordinary grace and beauty. Huge anti-grav combines were built to harvest these tenuous plants, eventually resulting in a reasonably strong agricultural economy as the Galactic Co-operative came to power.
Down in the haze, underneath layers of high pressure poisonous gas and smog, the surface of the planet wasn’t entirely quiescent.
The native species had been a type of semi-intelligent rodent. It was assumed by most that it had perished after the industrial collapse, but no one ventured down to the original street level to be sure. Not even the hardiest of anthropologists were keen to examine what three hundred years of poisonous gas and radiation might have resulted in.
Amidst the crumbling remains of a broken and vanished industrial past, Galcop had constructed a virtually impregnable high security prison.
Designed to hold prisoners requiring absolute secrecy, it was completely automated. Guarded by intelligent machines, immune to corruption, bribery, boredom or loneliness; carrying out their tasks without thought of change or variety.
Few knew of its existence, and fewer cared. Only those whose jobs required occasional attendance were able to approach in specially modified Adder class ships, particularly designed to manage the pressure of the turbulent and polluted atmosphere.
One such ship had recently dropped out of witchspace and was quickly approaching the planet. There were three occupants: two Galcop pilots and a passenger.
“Secure from torus drive,” the first officer noted. “Co-ordinates for docking location locked in. Autopilot steady.”
“Atmospheric shielding?” the Captain asked.
“Check.”
The first officer was a young, newly qualified officer, keen to impress his grizzled and jaundiced superior.
“Charge the hull, negative polarity.”
“Sir?” the query came back.
“Just do it. You’ll see.”
The Captain looked over the controls and noted the astrogation settings. He turned to the passenger, seated at the rear of the cramped cabin.
“Should be planet-side in about twenty minutes, sir.”
The figure nodded in acknowledgement but said nothing. The Captain turned back to his controls. He wasn’t happy with the mission, not happy at all.
It had seemed straightforward enough, fly to Larais, drop off a passenger, wait for an hour, pick up another passenger and then return to Lave.
Then it started to look distinctly odd. Firstly Larais was a ghastly place to have to go to, and all destinations planet-side were security classified, so he had no idea where he was going, or what kind of base he was expected to dock at.
Secondly, going to Larais meant flying an Adder, a tiny, primitive ship class that should have been retired a generation ago, a far cry from his luxurious second generation Boa. The Adder class’ only saving grace being that it was one of a few ships that could cope with repeated atmospheric entries without costly and frequent overhauls, that and it was the only ship that could cope with the strange toxic atmosphere of Larais. Its primitive fusion powered atmospheric engines seemed to actually thrive on it.
Third, he’d been forbidden from filing a flight plan. This wasn’t that unusual for citizens of high importance, but it always made him nervous. No one knew where they were, if something went wrong there would be no rescue. This ought to be a milk run. Ought to be.
Finally, their passenger was covered in an onyx airtight environmental suit, completely covering his (or her, or its?) body from head to foot. The suit looked like dark burnished metal from the outside, giving the passenger a vaguely insectoid look. Inside the suit, the occupant was supplied with intravenous food and water, with waste products being disposed of automatically, as well as being capable of supporting the occupant in a complete vacuum if necessary. That said, it wasn’t a pleasant experience by all accounts. He couldn’t imagine anyone wanting to wear such a suit. He assumed the passenger was one of the rarer species, unable to cope with an oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere.
The passenger had ignored any and all pleasantries. In fact, they hadn’t spoken throughout the entire three day trip. The Captain found it unnerving. That and the document holder he’d never seen the passenger put down once the whole way.
I’ve got a nice Ophidian class yacht waiting at Leesti central four. Retirement in six months. Just cruising until then. Six more months – hold that thought.
Visibility through the forward viewport began to fade away as the Adder dropped into the atmosphere of Larais. Soon nothing other than orange haze was visible all around.
A whole planet covered in smog. No wonder the environmentalists use it as an advert for change.
The Adder began to vibrate as the heat shield began to protect them from the fierce friction of their approach. They began to feel a noticeable deceleration.
“Approach looks good, speed and temperature on track,” the first officer obviously liked the sound of his own voice. The Captain smiled to himself; he’d been young once too.
Their speed continued to be radically reduced as the patented heat shield did its work. Visibility was dropping just as radically and there was nothing to see at all in any direction, just uniform haze.
“Mach 5 and slowing. Switching to atmospheric engines and extending flight panels.”
Outside, sections of the Adder’s hull folded and extended outwards. Inside all three passengers experienced a sudden sensation of drag as the Adder suddenly became an aerodynamic flying machine as opposed to a small rectangular brick falling out of space.
Suddenly the Adder shook violently. There was a flash of blazing white light from outside. Vague colours flashed around the cockpit, strange discharges of electricity. Harmless, but disconcerting.
“It’s called ‘St. Elmo’s Fire’,” the Captain said, looking at his bewildered first officer with amusement as he wrestled the ship back on course. “Massive plasma discharges out there, mucks up your instruments big time unless you polarise. Now you know.”
“The census didn’t say anything about lightning strikes!” the first officer complained.
“ Those guys had a sense of humour. You’ve just got to read between the lines – a revolting dump – get it?”
“Very funny.”
“They didn’t have much space for accurate descriptions in the old Fibonacci storage devices of the time, so they made some of the descriptions pretty cryptic. They’ll update them one day. Don’t worry; we’ll be through in a minute.”
The Adder shook again as another fierce bolt of plasma struck around them.
“Atmospheric control established, searching for nav beacon,” the first officer intoned. “Got it. Range six thousand five ninety and closing.”
“Good work,” the Captain said. “Let’s bring her in nice and gentle.”
The range indicator kept counting down, and the radar altimeter showed they were getting closer to the planet’s surface. Visibility remained zero, and the haze was darkening down to a deep, thick, smoky ochre.
Some course corrections appeared on the astrogation console and the first officer adjusted accordingly.
“Atmospheric pressure six times ambient,” the first officer noted. “It’s like flying into a gas giant. You sure there is a surface down there?”
“You just watch your speed and altitude.”
Suddenly, out of the gloom loomed a huge shadow. As they closed the shape of an enormous tower block formed out of the mist. The Adder was dwarfed into insignificance, passing between the tops of ancient buildings. The Captain could see the jutting aerials and dishes of old style comm arrays, the gaping mouths of air scrubbers and, further down, dark and empty windows. There were no lights in evidence. It looked cold, desolate and dead. He shivered.
They descended still further. There were buildings all around them now, rising up like sombre tombstones, obscuring what little light remained. The first officer flicked on the powerful landing lights. Four beams penetrated the gathering gloom.
They passed a number of landing gantries suspended up against the high reaches of the building they were closest to, most were empty. The Captain saw the landing light beams pick out the outlines of two other vessels. One looked like an Ophidian yacht like the one that awaited him back home, the other was much larger and only half visible in the mist.
That looks almost like… no, it couldn’t possibly be one of those here on a Galcop planet! Must be an old wreck of some kind.
“They could have arranged for us to land in daylight,” the first officer said, miserably.
“This is daylight,” the Captain retorted, turning his attention back to the descent. “It’s one hour after noon local time.”
“Nice. What a hell of a place.”
The radar altimeter beeped abruptly and then gave a continuous tone.
“Visibility is less than fifty metres!” the first officer said in alarm. “Still can’t see the landing site, even though we’re on top of it!”