The Final Act: Book III: The Settlement Chronicals

by W. J. Rydrych

  Continuing, "the infected Gath will be able to spread the disease, although the first symptoms won't show up for 48 hours. Within 72 hours death should occur."

  Dr Foley waited a moment for comments, and when there were none, she continued, "if the next Gath attack is as massive as previous attacks have been, thousands of Gath ships will be introducing the agent to the warrens, and nearly the entire planet will be infected simultaneously. Even sealing sections won't stop the disease unless traffic is stopped completely and early. Those with partial immunity, either inherent or as a result of surviving the disease, will continue to spread the virus indefinitely. At the lowest estimate mortality should be at least 80%, but could easily reach nearly 100% if they don't rapidly take steps to develop vaccines and limit the spread."

  Adding, after a moment, "That's why a major attack is required. If the infection were triggered by ships returning from a minor assault, its introduction would be limited to certain areas only, giving the Gath time to try to contain it."

  There was a long silence before Admiral Honecker said, "at the lower level of loss we feel the Gath will cease to be a threat to either Earth or Alpha 2 for decades to come, years in which both Earth and Alpha 2 can prepare; at the higher levels their civilization will collapse."

  Faud looked carefully at each of the ship captains, "if we do this we must be prepared to launch when the Gath launch their next major attack; and, if necessary, we must goad them into that attack. The special missiles have been built and stored here aboard the Stockholm, and all that's missing is charging with the soup, loading targeting information, and transporting the missiles to your ships and to the weapons platforms. By early tomorrow all missiles can be charged and targeted, and within an additional 24 hours distributed among the fleet, including selected attack ships, ready for launching.”

  "My proposal is to put everything in place and await the report of the emissaries. If the truce attempt fails, we launch the insertion phase as soon afterwards as possible; and within hours full coverage of all known hangers should be possible. The expected response will be the major attack required to avoid only partial triggering the disease through a limited Gath attack. As such we may well lose one or more motherships.”

  “If a treaty appears workable, we position viral-missiles on weapons platforms to be used if the Gath breach the treaty, which would also require leaving one or two ships on blockade duty to back up the weapons platforms. In either event, we would then proceed with the mission to Sirius."

  "Now," Faud continued, "I'd like to hear comments from all of you."

  Glancing over at Lt Commanders Sotelo and Evren, who had been in deep discussion between themselves, "is there something you want to bring up?"

  Sotelo raised his hand in a delaying gesture, as he continued the heated discussion with Lt Commander Evren, while the others in the teleconference waited. After a few more moments Lt Commander Evren stood and addressed Dr Foley.

  "We think the damage to the Gath civilization may be much more profound than you have suggested, and that the fatality estimates are conservative. More likely would be nearly total annihilation."

  Looking at Dr Foley, "the reason is the models, unfortunately, don't fully reflect the recovery cycle of a Gath psychology. They largely reflect how human survivors would act."

  Continuing to look at Dr Foley, "if the virus is brought in by the method you suggest, the pilots of the Gath ships will become infected. Those pilots will immediately brief their superiors, infecting them. These superiors will brief the next level, and so on and so on, and this will be done largely by face-to-face contact. The result is that the first infected will be the leadership strata, which will very probably be wiped out."

  Lt Commander Sotelo, facing Admiral Honecker, took over, "here is the difference between the human and the Gath psychology. In human society ideas work themselves upward and downward from the middle, the highly educated and motivated middle class. If leadership were wiped out, others would rise to fill the vacuum, and would take over the roles of the lost leaders. Perhaps not as well, but they would do it."

  Pausing, and looking around, "but the Gath are different. Aggressiveness isn't rewarded, except aggressiveness of the top leaders. Ideas come from the leadership elite, whether political or scientific. It is very unlikely that, if the leadership level is eliminated, others would rapidly rise to take their place. Perhaps in time, but very slowly."

  "With the leadership decimated, we believe they will lack the direction, or the will, necessary, to fight the plague. It is likely to continue to spread until only a few immune individuals are left, and their technology will disappear. And since they are dependent on their technology for their very survival, those that remain will survive at a pre-technology level.”

  “But their very existence now depends on hydroponics to grow food, and they obtain heat from the planet interior, and that requires an advanced technology to maintain.”

  “Remember, Beta 3 isn’t like Earth or Alpha 2 where resources exist on the surface; the remaining Gath would lack the basic elements of survival. If a few do, in time, return to the surface, they can be expected to regress even further; perhaps back to where they started.”

  Admiral Honecker looked at Lt Commander Sotelo, before saying slowly, "you saying that we are likely to wipe out the entire species?"

  Sotelo didn't say anything for a moment, and then said quietly, "yes, we both agree. Without their leadership levels the Gath civilization will almost certainly die. Few could be expected to survive. It's not possibly genocide, it is genocide."

  Later that day . . . .

  Faud sat by himself thinking. By the end of the week everything would be ready for their final cast of the dice. Faud fully understood their chances of withstanding an all out assault by the Gath was questionable, and the peace mission could well have been interpreted as a sign of weakness and precipitate that final action. In fact, before the earlier teleconference with the ship commanders he had met privately with Lt. Commanders Sotelo and Evren, and both were convinced that would be the result, and both felt it would be immediate; well, at least within a few days or weeks. The Gath never made fast decisions.

  The expected battle was one thing, and he was trained to accept that risk. What they planned to do to another sentient species was another thing; now the realty of Admiral Lundblad's comment as to decisions having to be made that he felt himself incapable of hit home. Well, he alone was responsible for the decision, and he alone would have to live with the result."

  Two days later, On Gath . . . .

  Gath-1 moved ponderously down the hallway toward his quarters. The meeting with the council members and the aliens had been long and stressful. But while stressful it was clear the end was in sight. For many hours they had held discussions with the alien emissaries, and now fully understood what the aliens were proposing.

  Neither Gath-1 nor Gath-2 believed the threat of the aliens, nor did many on the council. If they had been able to destroy the Gath they would have done it years ago. What it had shown, however, was that the aliens were weakening. Sending Gath-Tuk-1 and Gath-Tuk-2 and the two aliens to ask for peace showed that very clearly.

  The Gath felt no pressure to agree to any alien proposals. The population reductions in the early years of the blockade, with the resulting reduction in demand for key resources, had allowed the situation to stabilize; the population could be sustained indefinitely while still keeping the war effort at a high level. They could continue the war indefinitely.

  The council had agreed with Gath-1 and Gath-2; it was time to mount the final strike against the blockading fleet. The aliens had shown they were weakening, and with just a little more effort they could be disposed of.

  They would issue the order the emissaries were to be eliminated, and preparations made to launch their attack as soon as the ships could be fueled.

  EPILOGUE TO BOOK III

  It is finished; at least as finished as it can ever be. My time grows
short, but while time remains I must briefly tell what transpired after the events of which I have written, and of the years from then to now. Log entries, as well as other records of the final days of the fleet at Beta 3, are absent from recorded history; with the only record those hidden deep within these archives.

  It is recorded that, in Alpha Year 60 negotiations with the Gath were initiated, but the record is silent as to the result. It is also recorded that one more battle took place with heavy losses on both sides, and since Earth ships remained in orbit after that battle it was presumed the humans repelled that last attack. In any event, in Alpha Year 61 the Earth Fleet abandoned the blockade and began its journey to Sirius, leaving behind only a number of monitoring satellites and weapons platforms.

  In any event, the Gath never again threatened Alpha 2; they disappeared from the face of history, and all further contact with the planet was forbidden.

  On Alpha 2 the years following the Gath expulsion were ones of peace and prosperity; a golden age. The population expanded, technology advanced, and the new civilization flourished. While in time dwarfed by the newer and larger colonies developed in the Sirius star system, and other new colonies as well, by Alpha Year 192 total population had passed the 1,000,000 mark and expanded over most of the planet.

  But in Alpha Year 192 there was a curious event. History records that on Alpha 2 over 5,000 persons disappeared; no trace ever being found. The occurrence occupied so much attention that it was hardly noticed that, in addition to the humans, many Torgai and other creatures had also disappeared. There seemed to be no rhyme or reason to the disappearance. Some were elderly, others children, and they came from a broad spectrum of races and occupations. As time passed questioning of the event fell by the wayside, and it became clouded with myth, until it became merely parts of old legends; a children’s tale.

  But not completely a children’s tale. In these archives are records collected from Earth, from Alpha 2, and from other planets as well, stored here before the colonies turned on Earth. And those records tell not only of the early years of Alpha 2, but also what happened in years following. And what those records tell make me fear for the Aberi. Even with their long history there were some lessons even they had not learned. When you unleash events you can't control, those events may expand outward in ways beyond your control, like the ripples of a pebble thrown into a quiet pond.

  The impetus of the Aberi archives, and the need to relieve Alpha 2, had propelled the human race into space prematurely, and with the re-conquest of Alpha 2 and removal of the Gath threat it was only a matter of time before humans expanded even further. Within 500 years the thriving colonies on Alpha 2 and Sirius had begun to themselves send expeditions to still more distant star systems in competition with each other and with Earth. Within 1,000 years the ever expanding human empire covered systems as far as 300 light years distant.

  During their long reign as master of much of the galaxy the Aberi had learned a lesson; intelligent species were rare, and when encountered must be cherished and protected. During mankind's expansion intelligent species were occasionally encountered, but when encountered were methodically destroyed or brushed aside by the advancing wave. Only those on planets of marginal interest to humans were left undisturbed. Except for the Torgai, humans could not co-exist with other intelligent species. Even the Kraa of Alpha 2’s early years had been relegated to a few protected sanctuaries.

  While for untold millions of years various species had broken free of their planets and embarked on wars of conquest, the human expansion was unlike any that had come before. In the past some unifying force had been behind the outward thrust, a strong political unity that united the expanding species. And when that unifying force weakened so did the expansion, eventually receding. With the humans it was different; there was no strong unifying force to begin with. In fact, perhaps Empire was a misnomer. Rarely did control by any group or individual extend beyond a cluster of star systems. The various sectors behaved more like the city-states of old, cooperating when it was to their benefit, fighting when it was not. Each sending their own expeditions to form new colonies, which in time rebelled against their parents, only to send their own colonization expeditions.

  While the cultures that developed differed greatly from each other, as did even the appearance of the species as it adapted to differing conditions, for many years they retained a common thread of mythology and legend; but as time passed even that was lost. While in many ways they changed, something that didn't change was the basic nature of humans. As humans had behaved on Earth, so they behaved in space. They not only conquered native races, but also preyed upon each other. Expeditions sent from one star system often fought with those from other star systems for control of sectors of space.

  But in spite of their internecine warfare the advance continued. If an expedition from one star system were defeated, another would be mounted from a totally different source. If an alien advance seized planets from the humans, it was just a matter of time before the humans returned, often a different group from a different sector. The end result of the ebb and flow of mankind's advance was an inexorable movement down the spiral arm of the galaxy from their first homeland, Earth.

  Why the human advance was so unstoppable, while more technically advanced cultures seemed after a time to lose their drive and fall back, was debated on many worlds. Perhaps the answer was that in their disunity lay their strength. The ever expanding human species was a bubbling cauldron of forces without an overall leader or overall center of control. There was no head that could be cut off. It was anarchy on a galactic scale.

  Why this lack of central authority? One reason was the galaxy was simply too vast, and human life too short. In empire-creation, rarely can control be extended beyond the distance the ruler can send his forces over his lifetime or, at most, over the lifetime of himself and a few generations of his descendants. Governors near the edge of the empire could safely rebel, since by the time word reached the center and forces could be sent the parties’ natural lifetime had expired. So rarely did a single human empire extend beyond 50 light years or so from the center. Humans lacked the advantage of the Aberi with their long lives and ancestral memories that allowed a cohesive empire extending for thousands of light years.

  By Earth Year 3,000, Earth sat like a spider at the center of an ever expanding web of colonies extending out for over 300 light years. While exercising little if any direct control, Earth was still the spiritual center, and recognized as such by all.

  In Earth Year 4,000 Earth sat like a dead stone at the bottom of a pool, the victim of its future generations, memories of its past glory faded; and in time it existed only as myths of former greatness before fading from memory completely. But the ripples of its initial impetus continued.

  Now the ever expanding ripples of conquest were approaching the Aberi home worlds. At one time this would have been a minor concern for the Aberi. They would have swatted the approaching species like a fly, a minor irritation. But now it had been long since the Aberi had resorted to violence; they had no need, their once unmatchable power had created an aura of invincibility. The Aberi had become a peaceful, contemplative race. What would the result be when the human wave arrived? The Aberi might recognize the danger, but whether they did or did not were they still capable of again becoming what they were before? Could they resist the onslaught the more primitive races could not?

  But that is not my story to write, and not the story of humans alone. In future archives established in far off sectors of the galaxy by the Aberi, and perhaps by other races as well, the story of mankind's leap to the stars is even now being recorded for other fledgling civilizations to decipher and learn from, or not. But even there the full story won't be recorded; the missing parts will be here in the 'old archives', and in this book.

  Here, on Earth, it is finished. For generations too many to count my ancestors have searched for and brought together in these archives the story of mankind's first jour
ney beyond its own solar system, but when I die none remain to take my place. Historians will tell of the trials and successes of the years of expansion that followed, but the first colonization effort, that of Alpha 2, always held a special place in history for me, since my long dead ancestors originated on that planet, and played their part in those early years. Therefore, I have pre-empted that story.

  While this book has come to an end, the history of mankind has not.

  Torku-Ra, of the House of Hath

  Keeper of Records