But it wouldn't be real, he told himself. He could create a scenario where he had a harem, where the girls were all willing lovers, but it wouldn't be real. And yet, with direct feeds to his brain, would he know the difference? It was a terrifying thought. Someone could be hooked up to a machine and left to enjoy it, while their bodies wasted away in the real world. It was, he’d learned, how certain forms of mental disease were treated. But it was still sickening.
An alert flashed into his implants, informing him the debate was about to begin. He lay back on the bed, then accessed the government datanet. An illusion played into his mind, a giant impossibly-huge chamber where the politicians and their watchers sat together, ready to hear what the President had to say. There was no such chamber in the Solar Union, he knew, if only because the politicians rarely gathered in person. It was really nothing more than a perceptual reality, designed to allow people to believe they were truly participating.
He looked from side to side. Yolanda’s avatar was nothing more than a representation of her true form, as was his own, but others were far less hesitant about presenting themselves as something they weren't. There were giant men, inhumanly beautiful women, countless people wearing avatars that belonged to fictional characters – he lost count of the number of people pretending to be Captain Picard, Harry Potter or Marian of Sherwood – and no shortage of outright monsters. It looked as though they couldn't have fitted into the chamber but it was just a perceptual reality. The chamber was as large as it needed to be.
A message popped up in front of him. Hey, big boy, it said. Want to fuck?
Piss off, Martin sent back, then blocked the sender. What was the point of having sex in a perceptual reality? Being able to do taboo acts wasn't worth the knowledge that it just wasn't real. Besides, there were few true taboos in the Solar Union and most of the population clung to the ones that remained. He didn't really want to spend time pretending he was something he wasn't, not when he could be having sex in real life. Or was it just another example of how humans constantly pushed the limits?
He shook his head, then looked back at Yolanda. Her avatar looked annoyed, which suggested she had received her fair share of unwanted propositions too. Martin wanted to hug her, to reassure her that everyone would be fine, but he couldn't find the words. Silence washed out a moment later, almost a physical effect, as the President appeared in the centre of the chamber. The magic of the perceptual reality made him seem as though he was also standing right next to Martin himself.
And what is the point of buying the best seats in the house, he asked himself, if a perceptual reality can make it seem as though you’re in the front row, or singing with the band?
“Citizens of the Solar Union,” the President said. “A major crisis has arisen in our affairs.”
There was a long pause. Martin’s implants reported files suddenly making themselves available to him. Side notes indicated that literally billions of downloads had been made within the first twenty seconds of availability. He copied the files to his implants, then pushed them to the rear of his awareness. They could wait until the President had finished speaking.
“Ever since the Foundation, we have known about the Tokomak – and the threat they might one day pose to us,” the President continued. “The day we feared has come. They intend to wage war on us, until the human race is crushed into submission or destroyed. We have no choice, but to take the offensive and meet them in deep space.”
He paused. Martin wondered if he was waiting for them to read the files.
“We have a plan, but we must act fast,” the President concluded. “This is no time for half measures. We must gird our loins and commit ourselves to war.
“There are details I cannot share,” he added. “They must not become known to the enemy ahead of time. And they will, if they are discussed in public. I ask for your trust and your confidence that we can win the war, that we can and should fight. I thank you.”
He stepped down and waited. After a moment, another figure appeared in the centre of the room. An ID stream identified him as Senator Bin Elliot, a combination of names that could only have occurred in the Solar Union. The profile that popped into Martin’s implants told him that the Senator was only a third of the way into his sole term, but already known for being a strict Isolationist. He didn't want any further involvement with Earth, let alone the Galactics.
“The universe is a big place, Mr. President,” he said. “I will not deny that the Tokomak have built themselves an impressive empire. I will not deny that they may pose a threat to us. But I do question the value of having us start a war with them, when there is plenty of room in the galaxy for hundreds of separate races. Let us withdraw our mercenaries from the Coalition and allow them to continue their war, as they have done for hundreds of years. We do not need to involve ourselves in their war.”
There was a pause. “The fact remains,” the President said, “that it takes two to make a peace, but only one to make a war. They have decided to make war on us. We do not get to tell them to piss off and go home” – a handful of chuckles ran through the chamber – “unless we give them enough of a black eye to make them think twice. They are unlikely to accept anything from us, unless it is unconditional surrender.
“We do not know what they would do to us, if we did surrender. They might treat us, to all intents and purposes, as a spacefaring race like the Varnar. We would be their servants, their slaves, but we would be alive. Or we might be ordered to return to the hellhole called Earth and shut down our space program. Or we might simply be destroyed.
“We are a disruptive race, Senator. Within fifty years of discovering the technology to venture out into the galaxy, we have upset quite a few apple carts. The endless Varnar-Coalition War may be coming to an end, because of us. The trading unions may be being undercut, because of us. And some of our technological improvements, based on their technology, may upset the whole galaxy. I am not sanguine about their treatment of us, once we surrender to them. They may simply destroy us, root and branch, breaking their own laws to get rid of a potentially fatal threat.
“Perhaps, if we had chosen isolation fifty years ago, and contented ourselves with destroying every Horde starship that visited Earth, this could have been avoided,” he concluded. “But instead we chose to spread into the galaxy. And, in doing so, we eventually attracted attention from the so-called masters of the universe. They see us as a threat, Senator, one that they have to squash. There is no hope of peace and freedom, merely the peace of submission – or the grave.”
It was a convincing argument, Martin knew ... but he'd grown up in the ghetto, where the law of the jungle reigned supreme. Choosing not to fight, when challenged, wasn't an option. It was kill or be killed ... and escape was impossible. The Tokomak would mistake an offer of peace for a sign of weakness and move as fast as they could to capitalise on it. They certainly wouldn't believe humanity was offering to talk peace out of strength.
But would it convince the others? He watched the live feed as pollsters kept trying to track the ebb and flow of the debate, tuning out the other candidates as he monitored the public reaction. It seemed hard to be sure which way the public would vote; unlike on Earth, where the polls were untrustworthy at best, the Solar Union kept flipping between peace or war. He couldn't help thinking that made their polls so much more reliable, but it was immensely frustrating. By the time the President called for the vote, dozens of politicians had had their say ... while thousands of civilians had weighed in on the public networks. Some people were even posting tactical analysis statements, pointing out that the Tokomak outgunned humanity by a million to one ...
Not everyone agrees, Martin thought. They’d have to concentrate their ships in one place first, before taking the offensive. That would take years ...
“This is fascinating,” Yolanda muttered to him, on a private messaging channel. “I could lose myself here.”
“I think some people do,” Martin said. His nanotech
could keep him alive and healthy for years, if necessary. He could easily spend all of his time trying to keep up with discussions on a handful of online forums, if he wanted. But it wouldn't be real. “You’d lose your place on the ship.”
“I know,” Yolanda said. “But it might be something to do, later.”
Martin swallowed. He honestly hadn't considered that Yolanda would leave the military, one day. She would, of course. She was smart and capable and, once she overcame her confidence problems, could probably find a job anywhere. He, on the other hand, was only good for fighting and fucking, perhaps not in that order. The Marines would be his home until his luck ran out and he died.
And he would miss her. He would miss her terribly.
“The vote has now been called,” the President said. “Use a registered address to vote; unregistered addresses will simply be discarded. You have ten minutes to make your vote.”
Martin nodded to himself as the icon popped up in his implants. It was a simple question, compared to the slips he’d been told about on Earth. A YES was a vote for war; a NO was a vote against war. But it was a false issue, Martin knew, as he cast a vote for YES. They would get the war if they wanted it, if they took the offensive, or not. The Tokomak wouldn’t go away of their own accord.
Yolanda squeezed his hand – in real life, or the perceptual reality. He wasn't sure which.
“I voted,” she said. “Would it have been better, on Earth, if we had this system?”
Martin shrugged. He’d been told, like most of the children raised in the ghetto, that the Evil White Man was bent on keeping the Noble Black Man down. It had been a surprise – although it shouldn't have been – to learn that white children were taught equally unpleasant things about black men, just to keep the fires of racial hatred burning nastily. Divide and rule, Scudder had said, and he’d been right. As long as White and Black hated one another with a passion, there was no hope of unification against the Government.
“I don’t know,” he said. The ghetto would have voted for race war, he was sure, and so would most of the whites. There would have been a bloody slaughter. “Maybe it can only work up here, where everyone draws a line between them and the past.”
“The voting will close in one minute,” an AI said. “You have one minute to cast your vote or you will be counted as having abstained.”
“Should force people to vote,” Yolanda muttered. “It would work.”
Martin had his doubts. “People hate being forced to do something,” he said. “And they might not bother to consider the issues.”
“The voting is now closed,” the AI said. “Seventy-two percent of cast votes are for war.”
“Thank you,” the President said. “And let us pray that we win the war.”
Martin disengaged from the perceptual reality and crashed back into the hotel room. Yolanda lay on the bed, her body twitching slightly, as if she were in a coma. Martin shuddered at the sight – she looked dead, even though he knew she wasn't – and called room service. Even on Gunn Asteroid, it was possible to get good food if one had enough money.
He swore as a message popped up in his inbox. They were to return to the ship in five hours or be counted as deserters. Martin could guess why, too. If someone had ordered the attack on the Tokomak ship, they’d probably had war plans already drawn up, just waiting for the public to authorise them. Five hours ... he hesitated, then sent a message to Yolanda. They could eat something nice, then run back to the ship. There was no time to remain immersed in the datanet.
“There will be war,” Yolanda said. She sat upright, then smiled at him. “And I voted for it.”
“So did” – Martin checked his implants to get the number – “over two billion other humans,” Martin said. “I don’t think you can blame this on you.”
“I won’t,” Yolanda said. “Martin ... are you scared?”
Martin blinked in surprise. In the ghetto – or the Marines, for that matter – it was a point of honour never to admit to being scared. Or to show any other sign of weakness, for that matter. If he’d ever shown the slightest hint of homosexuality, he would have been driven out of his home, no matter the lectures on tolerance he’d received at school. It was just the way things were, he'd thought at the time. Being interested in men was just another sign of weakness.
But two of the Marines are gay and no one gives a shit, he thought. There are worse things out there than men who like men.
“A little,” he confessed.
He changed the subject, quickly. “I ordered food,” he said. “It should be here in a few minutes.”
Yolanda ignored him. “It just struck me,” she said. “I could die in the war. We could both die in the war.”
“Yes,” Martin said. Hadn't she said something similar when she’d served on the jury? “It’s a possibility.”
“And I wouldn't have lived,” Yolanda said. “I ...”
“Now you’re being silly,” Martin said. “You were at your lowest ebb four years ago, but now you have a whole new life and a career. I bet none of your stepsisters have a hope of winning a place on a starship.”
“I know,” Yolanda said. “But I still feel rotten.”
She leaned forward and kissed him. Martin jumped – she rarely showed any signs of physical affection – and then pulled back. His body reminded him, sharply, of just how long it had been since he’d slept with anyone, but he told that part of him to shut up.
“You don’t have to do anything,” Martin said. “I ...”
“Now who’s being silly?” Yolanda asked. “And I want to be normal.”
And then she kissed him again, hard.
Chapter Twenty-Five
The Heinlein Foundation filed suit in New York against Progressive Publishers, after they published an updated version of Heinlein’s famous novel, Starman Jones. The complaint attests that the ‘updated’ version not only destroys the soul of the book – the guild system is presented as reasonable – but adds sex scenes that were simply lacking from the original version. This bowdlerisation is particularly odd, the suit goes on to note, as the publishers also modified Tess of the d'Urbervilles to remove all references to rape.
-Solar News Network, Year 53
“And there has been no report from Supreme Flower of the Delicate Evening?”
“No, Your Excellency,” the Admiral said. “She has not returned from her mission.”
“I see,” Viceroy Neola said, coldly. “And the Captain was reliable?”
“His ship was decked out in her finery two years ago, for the grand parade,” the Admiral insisted. “Her interior design even won first prize against very stiff competition. He is a reliable officer.”
Neola looked down at the chart. Losing one ship wasn't a problem – she had hundreds on the way – but it was worrying. Had Supreme Flower of the Delicate Evening run into something her Captain couldn't handle ... or had she simply suffered a catastrophic failure? It happened, she knew, no matter how many precautions were taken. A starship went into deep space and never was seen again. But there were other possibilities, none of them good.
She shook her head, dismissing the thought. Who would dare attack a Tokomak cruiser?
“I want the first units to make their way to Hades at once,” she ordered. “Do you have an updated ETA for the fleet?”
“Three months,” the Admiral stated. “There have been ... delays.”
Neola clicked her fingers in irritation. It had been centuries since more than a handful of battleships had ventured out of the Core Worlds and made their way to the outer edge of the Empire. No one had seen any need to deploy more than a handful of smaller ships, not when they were capable of handling anything they might encounter along the Rim. Besides, the smaller powers, like the Varnar, could certainly hold the line against any new threat until the Tokomak could respond. But it meant there were a whole series of problems in getting the fleet to move through the gravity points to Varnar.
“Tell them to expedite
their departure,” she said. The last fleet review had been magnificent, full of pomp and circumstance. Thousands of starships, an unforgettable display of wealth and power, had paraded over the Homeworld, showing off their might to the universe. But why were they having so many problems reaching the Rim? “And the fleet train?”
“It should be ready for deployment within a month,” the Admiral said. “The Varnar have also requested a considerable amount of resources.”
“Put their request at the back,” Neola ordered. “They can wait until we've dealt with their upstart race, these humans.”
She looked up at him. “Have you prepared the formal demand for Earth?”
“Yes, Your Excellency,” the Admiral said. “It will give them the choice between submission or inevitable defeat.”
A Learning Experience 2: Hard Lessons Page 25