by M. D. Hall
‘…that’s the official view, but the uncensored records tell a different story…’
‘Uncensored records?’
‘There are frequently two records of most naval encounters, what actually happens, and what is meant for public consumption. If you check Starseeker’s logs, they show clear evidence of the spy ship’s destruction, including remnants consistent with its size and crew compliment, but we don’t believe it was destroyed. The commander’s original records show no trace of the ship, even at the subatomic level. Drones had been previously been lost in that war, and trace elements always remained, but not on this occasion.’
‘So, if it wasn't destroyed?’
‘It had to be taken.’
So, Jaron isn’t the only one with questions, thought Gorn.
‘Also, Starseeker was completely outgunned and she, together with our other ships should have been destroyed in minutes, without them even seeing their attackers. The Agency surmised the enemy was testing us, for a reason we can’t fathom, and concluded it was Starseeker’s action alone, that prevented an all out assault upon our home world, an assault we wouldn’t have survived. The Supreme Council was split. We think the Agency was only partially correct. Something else is going on, and we’re at a loss to know what. In time, we’ll learn what it is, hopefully before it’s too late. Suffice to say, for our purposes, and despite their differences, the Council resolved to end hostilities.
‘They were now faced with another problem. Suitable land, for an increasingly rapacious populace, was becoming scarce and the Balg were not the solution. Other targets were found, but none within easy reach. As Balg space is vast, we couldn’t go through it, and it was a logistic nightmare to go round it. Other, more imaginative solutions had to be found. Fortunately for us, such a solution was suggested to the Council; the targeting of a non-emergent civilisation. It had the advantage of being more accessible, but came at a price…’
Gorn ventured. ‘Might the suggestion have come from one of your people?’
She looked at him, her face, which had been most expressive, now mirrored that of her brother, and became impassive.
Gorn wondered if Narol had said too much, and again looked around watchfully as if he was likely to spot an eavesdropper. His Aunt broke the silence. ‘You’re partially correct, while the original idea wasn’t ours, we used our influence to sway the vote of the Council. We knew we couldn’t achieve any success in a war with the Balg, history was clear on that point. Armed with the knowledge that many Council members had no stomach for another conflict, we appealed to their greed and avarice, to deflect their attention from the real danger exposed by the proposal.’ She then told him of the encounter with the Custodians, three thousand years earlier, and the imposition of the Accords.
‘How can you be sure these beings are still a threat? They might not even be in this region of space anymore?’ he asked.
‘The demonstration of power was beyond anything we had ever seen. A civilisation doesn’t achieve that kind of power overnight. We have no idea how old they are, but beings like that don’t just fade away or disappear. Make no mistake, they are still out there, watching and waiting.’
‘Could they be the Balg?’
‘I don’t think so. There’s nothing to suggest they’re the same, both are more powerful than us, but that alone isn’t enough. Who knows, perhaps they choose to appear different,’ she replied.
Gorn knew he was missing something. ‘Why have the Council decided on a course that will destroy us?’
‘Because, my dear nephew, it’s not their intention to invade, but to take by stealth. The edict within the Accords prohibits any direct act of violence against a non-emergent race. Despite the warning, we have scoured a vast area of the Rionus Arm, and discovered several potential worlds, infiltrating the most promising.’
‘Infiltrating?’
‘By using Agency operatives. Put at its simplest, the people of those worlds will be given the means to become emergent and then we can, without fear of retribution, take the worlds as our own.’
She could see Gorn struggling to hide his disgust, but still she continued. ‘Such action takes time, which is a luxury we no longer have. A contingent, headed by two agents working on one of the target planets, have brought the plan almost to fruition. The final part involves Eclipse,’ Narol watched the expression on Gorn's face change, and smiled. ‘You begin to understand.’
His aunt was wrong, he was not beginning to understand, he understood everything. It all fell into place, effortlessly, but he thought it wiser to keep that to himself.
‘Eclipse will lead the expedition to the planet. Within a few months, the strategy will mature, and that world will be ours. It’s our intention to frustrate their plan, in such a way that the enterprise can’t be kept hidden.’
‘I don’t serve on Eclipse.’
Narol’s eyes narrowed as she regarded her nephew. ‘Now you're being deliberately obtuse. You need to inform Commander Darl you’ve changed your mind.’
Gorn needed to be more subtle with his aunt. ‘How did you know…?’ He thought it would do no harm to let her witness his realisation of her machinations, and better she thought the answers had to be teased from him. ‘The meeting with Commanders Gakar and Darl, the comments of Gakar afterwards, he’s one of yours, isn't he?’
She simply smiled.
Gorn was unsure how he felt about this knowledge. Four people in his life were not who they purported to be, how many more would he uncover? I've always considered trust as a given, if I continue along this path, maybe it’s a luxury I won't be able to afford, he thought. Despite his disappointment, part of him was becoming intrigued. ‘The vacancies on Darl's bridge, I take it you engineered them, as well?’
‘One certainly, the other was pure coincidence. If our intelligence had been better we wouldn’t have had to sacrifice a valuable asset. One of the officers has been transferred to deep space duty.’
Gorn could not resist adding. ‘I'm surprised your sources let you down.’ It was the first time, in the last few days, he was not the one being kept in the dark.
‘So were we,’ Narol responded.
‘Deep space, isn’t that a rarity?’
‘It seems only a handful of the military, and even fewer in the Agency, are aware of what’s happening. We can't find out where the ship is heading, and its mission remains a closely guarded secret.’
Gorn was impressed by her candour, but still uneasy. He would find out more about this mystery mission later, for now, he needed to get back to the matter in hand.
‘What’s the name of this planet?’ He asked.
‘The planet you and I will try to save is Telluria, the inhabitants call it Earth.’
His eyes widened.
‘Oh yes, I’ll be there as well. We do this together.’
Ω
It was not enough for Narol to persuade Gorn she was telling the truth. He needed to come face to face with someone possessing firsthand knowledge of what their people had visited upon unsuspecting victims, across six hundred parsecs. More than that, it had to be a perpetrator. Until that happened, she could never rely upon him to do what needed to be done. After that meeting, if it went according to plan, he would belong to her. The ideal person to convince him? Darl!
She had known the flagship commander for years, and was currently archaeological liaison on board Eclipse. If she was asked to describe her relationship with him she would probably sum it up as prickly. It would not be easy for Gorn to elicit the information he needed from Darl as he was a difficult lock to pick. Fortunately, there were three keys to this particular lock, two were already in Gorn's possession, the third was about to be placed in his hands.
Key number one, was acceptance of Darl's offer. Suspecting, as he did, that his current commander was an associate of Narol would make her nephew less inclined to return to his old posting.
Key number two, was to accept an offer, not yet made, to participate in a forthcoming zagball m
atch. As soon as Gorn accepted the offer of a bridge appointment, Darl would be manoeuvred into setting up a tournament to showcase the astonishing abilities of his young officer. It was essential for Gorn to initially refuse the invitation. Having committed himself to the match, Darl would be desperate to save face, and would need to persuade the young officer to take part. Someone, close to Darl, would suggest he invite Gorn to an informal meeting.
It would be at that meeting that her nephew would use the third key, essential if Darl's tongue was to be loosened. Gorn would also gain, what Narol and the others in her group considered vital, Darl's trust. That trust, would enable ship-wide systems access on board Eclipse. She finished her explanation, being careful to leave out any reference to his present commander. ‘That access is critical on two fronts…’
‘I will find confirmation of what you’re telling me, and without access, I can’t derail the invasion of Telluria.’
Narol was visibly impressed. ‘Precisely, any questions?’
‘You're assuming I will join Eclipse?’
‘It’s not an assumption, Nephew, I know you'll accept Darl's offer, if only because there are too many questions flying around in your head, and the answers can only be found on that ship.’
Gorn was unsure if he liked his aunt, but she was right, he would seek out the answers. The ship was not the only place he could find them, but something told him to keep that particular information, to himself. ‘You talk as though gaining Darl’s trust is a given, the third key must be very special.’
Narol produced a small silvered container from her pocket and, leaning forward, handed it to him. Gorn turned it over in his hand for a moment, opened it to reveal a capsule inside, then looked to Narol for an explanation. ‘What you need to do is not straightforward, but this will make things easier. Darl likes to drink intoxicants, to excess. When he invites you to his villa, you’ll be expected to join him. He’ll only open up to you if he’s relaxed enough, and if he thinks you’re unlikely to remember what he said. This capsule, when taken three hours before you visit him, will negate the effects of what you drink. You will have to feign intoxication, I expect you’ve seen what it does to some of your fellow cadets,’ Gorn nodded, ‘so mimicking their actions shouldn’t be too difficult, and you’ll be able recollect everything he tells you.’
Gorn was impressed, Narol had thought everything through. ‘You hinted at something wrong with the direction our people have taken. Surely it wasn’t always like that?’
‘Not at the beginning. When we first encountered an alien race, conquest was the furthest thing from our minds.’ Narol breathed out slowly before continuing. ‘What does history tell us about that first race?’
Every Te-an was taught this story from the moment they could talk, and so Gorn merely repeated what everyone knew to be true. ‘We came across the Graasin who, after initial friendly overtures, attacked us. It was only by a stroke of good fortune that we were able to turn the tables on them, otherwise our first encounter would have been our last.’
Narol nodded. ‘It’s wonderful what history teaches us.’ Gorn could not fail to notice the heavy note of sarcasm. ‘The Graasin were not only more technologically advanced than us, they had produced wonders in art, music and literature, reaching extraordinary cultural heights. Theirs was a society that had driven all desire for conflict from their psyche, and believed similarly advanced races had to be equally enlightened. The last six thousand years of their existence was a halcyon age, reaching out to the stars to feed, not only an insatiable appetite for knowledge, but an equally strong need to pass on all that they had learned, to whoever they might find in their search through the cosmos.
‘First contact was peaceful, and probably remained so until we discovered the whereabouts of their home planet, together with the identity and location of all civilisations with whom they had made contact, many of them in our local area of the galaxy.’
Gorn’s quiet eyes considered his aunt dispassionately. ’I take it no records exist of the decision to turn on our new found friends, because that’s where your story’s taking us, or am I wrong?’
‘You're not wrong, and as for the records...’
’You have a theory?’
‘It’s more than a theory, but I can’t claim credit for it. Despite what we became, our original intentions when venturing into interstellar space were altruistic. We had achieved what many considered impossible, and this was confirmed by what we saw on our travels. The records, the uncensored records, do show that for years, we only come across backward civilisations and, out of genuine concern for their welfare, kept our distance. We became benevolent observers, until we came across the Graasin.’
‘What do the uncensored records say about them?’
‘Interestingly, they say nothing. Which suggested, to some of us, that what we did to the Graasin wasn’t universally endorsed. Our efforts to uncover the truth have met many obstacles,’ she looked searchingly at her nephew before asking. ‘What do you think might have happened?’
He answered, without hesitation. ‘I have to think that most of what we’ve been taught, apart from our conquests, is true,’ Narol nodded, and so he continued. ‘We had no outposts back then, and our population was comfortably sustainable from Te’ath’s resources, alone. In which case, we had no need to take from the Graasin,’ he saw Narol’s eyes widen, which prompted him to qualify what he had just said. ‘To offer a rationalisation I need to put myself in their shoes, I’m not condoning anything we might have done.’
‘I know, I was teasing you. Ignore me and continue, please.’
‘It was the precursor to our expansion, so it’s likely the Council was conflicted. To some, the Graasin were a reminder of our limitations, and were to be punished for the crime of being what we aspired to be. It was nothing more than old fashioned jealousy, with terrible repercussions. As for the uncensored records? The only possible explanation is the Council wanted the records expunged.’
Narol was about to speak, but he had not finished. ‘Once the dust had settled and the Council had time to consider the consequences, they saw an opportunity,’ he paused before adding, as though speaking to himself. ‘The spoils must have been immense. What they did was bad enough, but to move from one isolated act of evil, to an entire strategy predicated upon that evil, it’s…’
‘Inconceivable?’
‘Almost, but I’m beginning to understand that I shouldn’t be surprised by anything.’
Narol smiled, grimly. ‘I’m sorry to say that you're right. All our enquiries have led us to the same conclusion, but on a brighter note, it seems we made the right choice in you.’
If Gorn was flattered, he kept it to himself.
His aunt continued, taking up the narrative. ‘Next contact was terrible, brutal and final. Unlike us, the Graasin had not developed weapons systems, or shields beyond the crude and inefficient level of their initial ships, thousands of years earlier.’
‘It’s one thing to theorise about what happened, but is there any hard evidence?’
‘Of the kind you would accept?’
He knew she was referring to Eclipse. The truth about the Graasin would be concealed, with all the other hidden truths. All that was needed was the third key.
Narol continued her narrative. The military slowly, but inexorably replaced the truth, with a myth, which has grown more powerful as the years pass, and memories fade.’ As though recalling something from far off, she asked. ‘Do you recall how the Graasin looked, in the story?’
’I don’t think I ever saw an image of them, but they were supposed to be grotesque.’
‘They were actually hominid, a little smaller than us, they retained a prehensile tail and were covered with a fine orange fur. They looked perfectly harmless, so a decision was made to withhold the image, it didn’t fit the story. The Graasin became fixed in our rewritten history as belligerent monsters, while we developed a taste for what we had done, and honed our skills in the art of st
orytelling.
‘How our people would perceive an inexorable scouring of the local galactic arm, was the tricky part. The Council wasn’t so crude as to suggest that all the conquered were aggressors, bent on subjugation. Attempting to justify slaughter on such a flimsy premise would never be accepted; the naïveté of even a loyal populace doesn't stretch that far. It was only possible to use the ruse intermittently, carefully selecting cases for maximum emotional effect.
‘The fact that several of the civilisations we destroyed were human, was assiduously kept from the masses, it was felt this information would create unwelcome enquiry. The only images displayed were of beings whose physiology was so different from ours, as to frighten a gullible populace into believing, it was the driven will of such ‘monsters’ to murder the innocent; perpetuating that particular lie was easy.
‘Elaborate tales were created to account for our actions. Non-existent allies and associations were created. Trade with phantoms, and figments of our imagination were peddled to the people, who never once questioned the truth behind the claims. Over time, the Council discovered that tales and myths were no longer necessary. People, most people, had stopped caring about the source of their good fortune, and that, nephew, is where we now find ourselves.’
He was uneasy. It did not sit well, that a person he had never met before this morning, should know so much about him, and be able to predict what he could, or could not do. Shelving that thought, for the moment, he applied himself to the matter at hand. ‘You think we’re salvageable, that we aren’t so different from the Graasin. More than a little arrogant, if you ask me, and you are asking me. More than four and a half thousand years of taking what we want, and you think we would just give it all up.’
Narol feigned surprise. ‘Oh, it isn’t just me; you think the exact same thing!’
Ω
Gorn wanted to dismiss Narol’s claim as absurd, but he could not, and the reason? She was right. Why else would he agree to talk with her. When his mother told him he was the one person who could save their people, he was more than happy to accept that. I’m sitting here because I believe I am ‘the one person’! Self pity threatened to consume him, but before it could take hold, other concerns began to surface. Images of his friends flooded his mind, with one persistent image, and a single question, to which he needed an answer. ‘How could Jaron agree to be part of this?’