His Majesty's Starship

by Ben Jeapes

  “Paul Ganschow. I’m the delegate for Starward.”

  Now Hannah recognised him: one of her fellow hostages. “How can I help you, Mr Ganschow?”

  “I wondered if your prince was up there.”

  “On Ark Royal? No, sir.”

  “Well, he’s vanished and he’s not answering his aide. Could he be on UK-1?”

  “One moment, please.” Hannah called up the log of traffic in the Roving orbit. “Apart from ourselves, no vessel has had any contact with UK-1 since its arrival.”

  “Damn. Where the hell is he?” The question was rhetorical. “Thank you, Ms Dereshev. Oh, we might be in for interesting times down here, so you might like to stand by.”

  “Can you explain, sir?” Hannah said.

  Ganschow grimaced. “That maniac Krishnamurthy’s vanished too.”

  *

  James wasn’t naturally claustrophobic but it was oppressive in the pridehall. The ceilings were low and his head brushed them several times, and the dark red stone seemed to absorb the light. They turned and twisted and walked down ramps and up steps until James was hopelessly lost in the maze of passages, but there was a sense of purpose to their procession that told him he wasn’t being deliberately confused. It was just the layout that the Rusties preferred.

  Finally they came to a lift and now James had to cock his head to be able to stand under the low ceiling. The doors shut and the lift started down.

  It travelled for about a minute. The smell of Rustie was gagging him, his neck was aching and he had to swallow several times to clear his ears. Then the doors opened and they stepped out into yet another passage.

  This one didn’t last long. It curved around into (James felt a surge of relief) a vast, domed chamber. At least as big as the dome of St Paul’s, James thought, and it looked bigger still from the fact that it was completely bare.

  And then he stopped dead. Standing in the middle was another group of Rusties, including Iron Run, and-

  “Your Royal Highness. They got you too.”

  It was some small comfort that Krishnamurthy looked just as dishevelled and bleary eyed as James felt.

  “What are you doing here?” James said. Krishnamurthy spread his hands in a wide shrug.

  “Perhaps the same as you?” he suggested.

  “If you think-” I’m James said.

  “Please,” said Arm Wild. “It is important that you see this together.” He walked to join the group at the centre of the dome and James reluctantly followed.

  One of the Rusties was holding a small device in one grasper: it touched a control and an image suddenly appeared in mid-air. An image that was ... not a Rustie.

  At first glance, it might indeed have been one but James had been around the First Breed long enough to note the differences. Its front legs were longer so that it appeared to be rearing, either in surprise or prior to attack. The legs were more powerful than those of the First Breed and the shoulders larger, more muscular, though the general impression was of a body sleeker than a Rustie’s. The head, too, was bigger, the muzzle blunter. The skin was darker, not as ruddy as a Rustie’s, and smoother with it.

  He had seen the type before. It was the same as on the monument up above in Capital, and a common theme in the carvings that covered the pridehalls.

  “Another breed,” Krishnamurthy murmured in amazement. “There’s two of them.”

  That took you by surprise, didn’t it?, James thought smugly.

  Iron Run spoke and Arm Wild translated. “Iron Run says, thank you for coming. We hope your rest cycle has not been unduly disturbed.”

  At three in the morning ... James thought. “I wouldn’t have missed this for the world,” he said.

  “It’s my pleasure,” Krishnamurthy said, not taking his eyes off the image.

  “Iron Run says, you are the first humans to come here. Once this place was the command bunker of the ruling pride of this nation, but now it is a museum, a cathedral, a tomb, a temple, all in one. This place is special to us for it is here that we remember the Ones Who Command. This chamber is but part of the Complex of Remembrance.”

  James wasn’t sure if Arm Wild was now speaking for Iron Run or for himself: still translating or making it up as he went along. “Tell us of the Ones Who Command,” he said. He mentally appended an “-ed” onto the end of the verb, but he had noted Arm Wild’s continued use of the present tense and, out loud, he stuck to it. The title wasn’t so much a description as an honorific.

  The Rustie with the remote touched another control and the laser image of a city appeared around them.

  James bit back a gasp: he had been in v-cubicles before but he had never known this scale of immersion was possible. A discreet look around showed no blank areas, no interference patterns. The laser signals had to be coming from all over and were perfectly coordinated.

  But he was not here to admire the tech. He turned his attention back to the city itself. It was Capital: he could see some familiar landmarks, including the former park where the Dome now stood. But, where up above on the surface the scenes would have been full of Rusties, here the crowds were all Ones Who Command, all shapes and sizes – a hustling, bustling, thriving community that looked somehow macabre. It was like an imitation of the real thing, Ones Who Command instead of First Breed.

  For about ten minutes they silently absorbed scenes of a world that James would never know. The society and culture of the Ones Who Command. They were every bit as varied as humanity: great cruelty and great love, great beauty and great ugliness. Finally, Arm Wild spoke again.

  “The Ones Who Command came from the same ancestral stock as the First Breed,” he said, “just as you and apes have common ancestors. Yet, like you and apes, there was that tiny percentage of difference in DNA between us that made us brutish beasts and them intelligent, thinking creatures. They were the first sentient species on the Roving. They built our world’s cities, they fought the wars, they created our society. They built our spaceships and, finally, our prideships. They discovered step-through and they created us.”

  The scene changed and they were in a rural setting. A pride of Rusties lurked under a tree but they were subtly different to the ones that now surrounded James. They were shy, skittish. They munched at the grass or fruits hanging off the tree and when the viewpoint came too close they were spooked by the One Who Commands making the recording. More scenes followed and one showed, with blunt candour, Ones Who Command massacring a group of the smaller creatures that were in among the crops. There were scenes of Rusties together in their prides, lounging under bushes or sheltering in caves. What was clear was that they were far from the technologically sophisticated creatures that the humans had come to know.

  “Eventually, the Ones Who Command began to experiment on us, as your scientists did on the lower orders of Earth animals. One pride in particular was highly skilled in genetic matters and they took the work further than your scientists ever did. They created us, their First Breed.”

  Now Rusties and Ones Who Command were clearly coexisting. James saw First Breed working machines or toiling in fields or running errands. He frowned: they might have been living side by side but there was no hiding who was in charge. In one telling scene, he saw what he assumed was a mixed-species fire control unit tackling a blazing building. The Ones Who Command had breathing apparatus.

  Then war struck. Fleets of jet aircraft streaked above them; cities were pounded into rubble; armies marched across the face of the Roving.

  “At this time there were still different nations on our world,” said Arm Wild, “and occasionally they still fought. The last war was fought at the end with viral weapons and one strain got out of control. It was created by the same pride that made us, and it was designed only to attack the DNA of the Ones Who Command.”

  James nodded, guessing what was coming, even as the display changed its theme again. Ones Who Command dying like flies. Burning cities, anarchy let loose upon the world.

  Peace retur
ned but it was a strained, Pyrrhic peace. Again the display showed different communities from around the world, including a war-scarred Capital, but where there had been crowds, now there were only smaller groups.

  “Every One Who Commands on this world was affected by the virus but only about half died. The other half survived, but sterile. The virus had interfered with the initiation stage of their reproductive cycle. The pride that created the virus was dead: others tried to reverse the effects but they never achieved the same breakthroughs as our creators. So, no more Ones Who Command would ever be born. Ones Who Command who were cloned inherited the same sterility.

  “The First Breed live longer than humans, James Windsor, about half your average lifespan again, and the Ones Who Command lived even longer than that. That is a long time for a race to die of old age.”

  Arm Wild was silent for a moment and the Rusties waited, their heads hanging low. Eventually Arm Wild lifted his head and carried on, and James hated to think of the intensity of emotion that was filtered out by Arm Wild’s translator, leaving just the bland, matter-of-fact words.

  “The pride who ruled this nation made contact with the other ruling prides and they buried their differences. They knew there was no escaping their fate but they resolved that their culture would not die. If they could not survive themselves, they would survive in memory. They would perpetuate the civilisation they had created. They handed it over to the First Breed. We would continue on this world and honour their memory.

  “But, again, the geneticists had been too clever. When they created the First Breed they were careful not to create a threat to their dominance. They denied us initiative, invention. We know what these concepts are, we value them, but we do not have them. We can look after ourselves, we can have good ideas and we can see what needs to be done if it is clear and apparent, but we cannot think laterally. No First Breed has ever invented or created something new.

  “The Ones Who Command trained us up to replace them, but still, our entire civilisation is borrowed. We can appreciate but not originate. We are a race of brilliant mimics, good servants, but we are not creators and we are not leaders.”

  The view changed so suddenly that James was dizzy for a moment. He was in space. The Roving hung above him, with orbiting ships and satellites scudding across the sky between him and the far away ground. He looked down at his feet and only saw stars. A prideship lumbered past, seeming to pass into the floor.

  “So the Ones Who Command chose to look elsewhere for a race that could rule this world,” said Arm Wild. “They were already doing research into step-through and they redoubled their efforts. A century after the war ended, they had interstellar flight. Over the next fifty years they discovered various potential candidate races, yours among them. Ones Who Command who were only infants when the war broke out devised the Earth Mission and the Convocation. They laid out the rules that must be followed and the procedures to which we had to adhere. First Breed crews – by now all the crews were First Breed, there were only a handful of Ones Who Command left – observed your world for forty years so that the Ones Who Command back on the Roving could learn about you and invent the translators.”

  Arm Wild stopped speaking and the images faded away. Humans and Rusties were left standing in the gloom, looking at each other.

  “This is fascinating,” Krishnamurthy said when it became obvious Arm Wild didn’t intend to continue, “but why are we here?”

  “Can’t you guess?” James said, and light poured into the chamber from behind them. They turned round to see the door that had opened in the wall of the chamber to let in the light, which was suddenly obscured by large, gleaming shapes that moved through the doorway and glided towards them.

  *

  “What was that about?” Gilmore came up through the hatch, stretching, just as Ganschow’s image vanished.

  “Good morning, sir,” Hannah said. “All repairs are completed and the prince has vanished.”

  “The day gets better and better.” Gilmore rubbed his neck. “How definite is that?”

  “I imagine Mr Ganschow’s looked everywhere plausible.”

  Gilmore frowned. “Does UK-1 know?”

  “I suspect they’re going to shortly.”

  “Hmm.” Gilmore sat at the command desk and idly checked the displays. Hannah knew he wasn’t as dismissive as he appeared. Sure enough: “He can’t have vanished! What could he have done? Gone for a midnight walk and got lost?”

  “Or someone got him lost,” Samad suggested.

  “The Dome’s still under guard by the Rusties,” Hannah said. “They’d have stopped any foul play from our own species.”

  They considered the implications which that raised in silence.

  *

  The shapes were globes, transparent, and inside each was a One Who Commands. Each globe was mounted on a flat platform that slid across the floor towards James and Krishnamurthy. Inside, each creature reclined on a couch with cables rising from out of the platform plugged into it. The design was alien but James recognised a life support system when he saw one.

  The globes made a half circle around them. All the Rusties had moved their front legs apart and were hanging their heads low.

  “Greetings, Excellency R.V. Krishnamurthy, Prince James Windsor,” said a voice. It was exactly the same voice as a Rustie’s translator unit used and it was impossible to tell which of the globes it came from, but the One Who Commands in the centre globe had lifted its head up and was looking right at them. “I am March Sage Savour, leader of this planet.”

  James bowed, Krishnamurthy put his palms together.

  “Our servants of the First Breed have done well in coming this far,” March Sage Savour said. “You now know the full facts. The purpose of the Convocation was to find a compatible race that could take our place. We have studied the presentations of the delegates and the reports of the First Breed on the Earth Mission, but the two of you together have displayed the best empirical evidence of your worthiness to follow us.”

  The One Who Commands looked at James. “We were already impressed by your performance, by Polyglot, by your captain’s strategy against Shivaji, but UK-1’s use of step-through surpasses all that. A clear sign of initiative and invention, and above all of the technological ability needed for this task.”

  It looked at Krishnamurthy. “You have not impressed us so much in that area. Your ship, indeed all your space technology, is acquired from other Earth governments. However, your grasp of the way we have run our planet in time past is exemplary. What you did took daring and courage. The other governments sought to impress us with words. You used actions.”

  March Sage Savour paused. “We have debated long and hard on this point, because we originally imagined only one government replacing us, but we cannot escape the facts. James Windsor, your government has the technology. R.V. Krishnamurthy, your government has the will and the understanding. We invite you jointly to replace us. Do you accept?”

  James and Krishnamurthy slowly turned their heads to look at each other.

  Him? James thought. This madman? You know what he’s like. What sort of creature are you if you think he’s going to make a good replacement?

  What was going through Krishnamurthy’s mind, he could only guess.

  Krishnamurthy was opening his mouth to speak so James said something, anything, to interrupt.

  “Why us?” he said.

  “March Sage Savour has already explained that, Windsor,” Krishnamurthy snapped. He turned back to the Ones Who Command. “On behalf of my gov-”

  “I meant,” James said, “why us humans? Were we the only other race you found?”

  “That is an excellent question,” March Sage Savour said. It looked at Krishnamurthy. “Take note of that. Arm Wild, show them.”

  Planets hung in space around James: apparently separated by a few feet, in fact separated by lightyears. Thirteen of them: the homeworlds of the species recognisable as sentient that the Rusties had d
iscovered. One was Earth.

  “We eliminated all those whose biospheres were incompatible with our own,” said Arm Wild. Five vanished and the remaining eight realigned themselves, to be spaced evenly around the watchers.

  “Four have not yet reached what we considered a desirable technological stage. In your own terms, the least developed appeared to be at the stone age, the most developed was approaching the use of industrial technology. We have seen evidence of steam power. Remember that all our observations are done covertly, from orbit, so we cannot be too specific.”

  Four more worlds vanished. Four were left.

  “Two of these have achieved limited space flight. One has sent robot probes as far as its nearest neighbour, the next planet in towards their sun. The other has so far confined itself to artificial satellites in its own orbit. Neither has sent people into space.”

  “This information is current?” Krishnamurthy asked.

  “Indeed, yes. They are still under observation.”

  “And this world?” James indicated the only planet left that wasn’t Earth. Arm Wild paused before answering.

  “It was the second potential candidate world that we discovered, and at first almost ideal for our purposes. They are a spacegoing civilisation, very similar in scope and scale to ours and to your own. Therefore, it was thought, they would have had the mental capacity to accept the technological concepts we would introduce.”

  “What stopped you?”

  “This.” Another planet appeared suddenly. “The next planet out from their own in the same solar system. A different atmosphere, different biosphere and inhabited by its own native species, less advanced technologically. We arrived just in time to witness their extermination by their neighbours. The Ones Who Command did not think this was auspicious, so we remained hidden.”

  Fleets of ships fell upon the world and the glare of nuclear weapons shone out against its surface. “I see,” said James thoughtfully. Aerial views showed communities being razed, forests being burned. Intercepted transmissions from the aggressors showed the wholesale slaughter of the natives with no quarter being given. James glanced at the other human present.