And yet all of his followers will be discomforted by the lack of updates, she thought. Like most roving reporters, Kratzok had a private following of hundreds of thousands of people who read his reports. They wouldn't be his exclusive fans, of course, and he had to work hard to keep their interest. He may lose them all before he gets home to start putting out new copy.
“I think we don’t have a choice,” she said. She’d spoken briefly to the crew, once they’d departed Martina, giving the same rationale she’d given her captains. Their standing orders called for them to protect humans and win allies and intervening in an ongoing genocide would serve as a way to do both. “Someone has to do something.”
Kratzok met her eyes. “Why us?”
“We’re the ones on the spot,” Hoshiko said, simply.
She smiled to herself as she remembered one of her few meetings with her legendary grandfather, when he’d slipped back into the Sol System as a private trader. He’d been full of stories about men who’d passed the buck further and further up the chain of command instead of taking action for themselves, which ensured that the situation constantly worsened and that the superiors themselves had to demand orders from their superiors. Hoshiko had no idea why anyone would fight in a shit-tip like Afghanistan when the solar system was ready for the taking, but the principle was the same. Nipping a problem in the bud tended to be cheaper, in the long run, than allowing it to fester.
But then, her grandfather had been used to a world where he could call Washington and expect an answer within minutes. She lived in a universe where it could take hours to get a signal from one end of the solar system to the other, days to get a courier boat from Sol to the nearest inhabited star ... and six months for a one-way trip from Sol to Martina. The vast authority she’d been given - she’d gone over her orders very carefully when she’d first been assigned to Jackie Fisher - was necessary. It was unlikely that any problem would agree to wait for a year while she sent a request for orders to Sol and waited for a reply.
If, of course, I don’t get summarily dismissed for gross incompetence and stupidity, she thought, ruefully. They wouldn't have sent me out here if they didn't have faith in my ability to use my own judgement.
“So we are,” Kratzok agreed.
Hoshiko shrugged. “There’s no one else in the sector I can ask for orders, or even for advice,” she said. “I am ambassador-at-large as well as commander of the squadron and this ship. The buck stops with me and I say yes, we have to put a stop to attempted genocide. I hope you’ll explain that to the folks back home.”
“They may not care about events so far from Sol,” Kratzok pointed out. “Earth’s collapse is absorbing most of their attention.”
“Idiots,” Hoshiko muttered.
She shook her head in disbelief. A vast universe just waiting for humanity, enough space for every living human and the Solar Union was worried about affairs on a planet crammed with people too stupid to take advantage of the chance to leave. It wasn't as if emigrating to the Solar Union was difficult, not when there was no shortage of receiving stations scattered around the globe. And if the local governments tried to stop their people from fleeing, the Solar Navy could hand out a beating in an afternoon that would make them think twice. No, the only thing stopping the locals from leaving was their own stupidity.
But then, in the Solar Union, you are expected to work and follow the rules, she reminded herself. It isn't as if they’re hard rules to follow too.
It was hard, very hard, to believe that Earth was anything other than a cesspit. She’d been told that there were places on Earth where women were little better than slaves, places where great mobs of ill-trained idiots only survived because the government fed them, where criminals pleaded mental disorders and were let free, places where being the wrong colour, or the wrong religion, or the wrong ... well, anything ... could lead to certain death. Hoshiko found it hard to wrap her head around the concept of women being automatically inferior, let alone any of the other issues. Surely, such a world would have collapsed into anarchy a long time ago. Her teachers had to have been exaggerating ...
... And yet, if they weren't, why weren't far more people fleeing into space?
“Many of them have ties to Earth,” Kratzok pointed out. “And even if they didn't, Earth represents a pool of untapped manpower.”
“Which could move to the Solar Union at any point,” Hoshiko noted. Her grandfather had talked about self-selection, about how the best immigrants were the ones who were prepared to move and put in the hard work to earn money and blend in. “And problems on Earth don’t concern us.”
Kratzok gave her a droll look. “And problems on Amstar do?”
“Touché,” Hoshiko conceded. “The difference, though, is that humans are not trying to slaughter other humans, but being slaughtered themselves by another race. We are the protectors of humanity against outside threats.”
“And internal threats can go hang?”
“If an alien force attacked Earth for the third time, I would die in its defence,” Hoshiko said, dryly. She had been at the Battle of Earth, after all. “But there’s a limit to how much we can do to save Earth from itself.”
She looked past him, out into the darkness. “We made a very deliberate decision to cut our ties with the past,” she added, slowly. “To step away from Earth and its corrupt and inefficient governments, its hang-ups about proper behaviour and the right way to live. I see no point in looking back. If they want to wallow in squalor, let them.”
“Some people would say that was cruel,” Kratzok noted.
“And what,” Hoshiko asked, “would they have us do?
“We offer to take anyone who’s willing to work; hell, we even make sure that local governments can't keep people from leaving. It isn't as if the Earthers don’t have access to the datanet. Beyond that, what are we supposed to do? Send in the troops, crush the local governments and rule the planet ourselves? We’d have to create a police state infinitively nastier than anything that ever existed in human history just to root out the irredeemable bastards and condemn them to permanent imprisonment. And what would creating such a state do to us?”
Hoshiko shuddered at the thought. Her grandfather had been a great man, but his Commentary had talked, with a certain amount of fear, of the prospects for abusing Galactic Tech. It was possible to strip privacy away completely, to monitor an entire population 24/7 ... and, with AIs to do the monitoring, escape would be completely impossible. Hoshiko had grown up without many of the taboos that were taken for granted on Earth, but even she disliked the thought of being under constant observation. And who knew what having so much access would do to the watchers?
Maybe that’s why so many religious people become fanatics, she thought, grimly. They believe that they are being watched every hour of every day from birth until death.
And constant inescapable surveillance was only scratching the surface. She had no fear of having implants installed in her brain, yet a redesigned implant would be enough to steal her independence and turn her into a drone. A Borg. Even the worst of criminals weren’t fitted with control implants, no matter what they’d done. Stealing someone’s independence of mind was a taboo so strong that the merest hint of it was enough to start a full police investigation. And if someone was discovered to be hacking implants or controlling unwilling victims, the Solar Union would never be satisfied with mere death. Their revulsion would be so strong that the usual prohibitions against cruel and unusual punishment would be forgotten.
Kratzok cleared his throat. “A debate for another time, perhaps,” he said. “What do you intend to do when we reach Amstar?”
“Warn the Druavroks off, if I can,” Hoshiko said. “If they won’t leave, I’ll have to engage them before they can turn their weapons on the planet itself.”
“And once you hold the high orbitals?”
“Try to impose a peace on the planet,” Hoshiko said. “There are human and alien factions on the surface who
will support us, I think. The trick will be preventing them from committing genocide themselves, against the Druavroks. Revenge is a very powerful human motivator.”
Kratzok leaned forward. “And then?”
“I don’t have any solid long-term plans,” Hoshiko admitted. “Our information on the sector is very lacking, Max. If we’re lucky, we can put together an alliance of other races and ... convince ... the bad guys to stand down. If not, we may have to make up a new plan on the fly.”
“I’d like to go down to the surface, if I can,” Kratzok said. “A full set of sensory recordings will be needed, Captain. They’ll do better than a thousand pictures at explaining the current situation.”
“Assuming the situation is not resolved, one way or the other, before the recordings reach the Solar Union,” Hoshiko said. She’d never cared for full sensory recordings herself - it was a little like living through someone else, rather than living her own life - but she understood their value. Everyone who accessed the sensory recordings would be assaulted by everything the reporter saw, not just the sights and sounds. It was almost as good as actually being there, she’d been told, but she had her doubts. “There’s no way to speed up the signal, I’m afraid.”
“No,” Kratzok agreed. “There should be some interesting stories to tell, Captain.”
Hoshiko looked at him. “Why are you here? I mean ... why are you on the squadron?”
“There aren't many true scoops these days,” Kratzok said. “The reporter who breaks a piece of news, Captain, is often overshadowed by other roving reporters or armchair analysts who are happy to elaborate on The Meaning Of It All. Getting the sort of fame I want isn't going to happen in the Solar Union. There are just too many competitors.”
He sighed. “And then there's the rush to get your recordings and articles online before someone beats you to the punch,” he added, “and then you make a tiny little mistake and your career is blown out of the water. Being here, Captain, limits the competition’s ability to put out their own stories.”
“Except you didn’t know something was going to happen,” Hoshiko pointed out.
“I was losing readers,” Kratzok said. “A couple of my rivals had lucky scoops, a couple of others ...”
His voice trailed away. Hoshiko understood. Being a reporter - or an artist - in the Solar Union meant an endless battle to stay in the public eye. Losing subscribers to his mailing lists, online sites and suchlike indicated that a reporter was slowly sinking into obscurity - and, once the downward slide began, it was very hard to stop. Gambling that something would happen he could use to rebuild his career had been his only reasonable option.
She smiled. Being the sole reporter in the Martina Sector would give Kratzok a lock on all articles and recordings, at least until another reporter arrived. And none of his rivals would know there was anything that needed covering for at least six months, giving Kratzok an edge they’d find hard to beat. Kratzok would have ample time to make all the contacts he needed before anyone else arrived.
“You’ll have plenty of exclusives here,” she said, thinking hard. “I may even be willing to offer you an interview with myself.”
Kratzok blinked. “You would?”
Hoshiko smiled at his confusion. She’d declined his first interview request, when he’d first arrived on station, and rarely spoken to him until the refugees had arrived. And ambushing someone to demand an interview, even a serving government officer, was the kind of conduct that could get a reporter slapped with a heavy fine or a restraining order. But now, he could help her as much as she could help him. The Solar Union would find it harder to condemn her if public opinion supported her actions.
Because my orders are a little vague, she thought. If they feel I overstepped myself, they can find grounds to condemn me.
“All I ask is that you explain why we’re doing what we’re doing as well as what we’re doing,” she said. He’d understand the unspoken part of the offer. You scratch my back and I’ll scratch yours. He'd know what she was asking him to do, but it worked in his favour as well as her own. “The public needs to know the truth.”
“Of course, Captain,” Kratzok said. He gave her a long considering look. “When can we hold the interview?”
“After we reach Amstar,” Hoshiko said. “I have too much work to do to sit down with you before then. But you can watch from the bridge as we enter the system.”
“I look forward to it,” Kratzok said. He paused. “They’ll see us coming, won’t they?”
“Yes,” Hoshiko said. It wasn't easy to fool gravimetric sensors. The Druavroks would see her squadron as it lanced towards the system. She’d thought about having her warships towed by freighters, but there hadn't been time to organise it. “But we’ll do our best to keep them guessing.”
Chapter Six
The Swiss Government declared a state of emergency after armed militia bands tried to cross the border into Switzerland from Austria. Martial law has been declared. Members of radical Islamic groups have been rounded up and marked for deportation.
-Solar News Network, Year 54
“This,” Thomas muttered, “is incredibly frustrating.”
He wasn't sure if the XO had assigned him to the task because he wanted a fresh pair of eyes or he merely wanted to give a young and inexperienced ensign a task that would keep him busy for several days, but either way he hadn't been able to pull anything useful out of the datafiles they’d obtained from Martina. Either there wasn't much on the Druavroks, which struck him as unlikely, or the local settlers had deliberately decided to withhold information the squadron could actually use. Their homeworld was clearly identified, their history as yet another race of bully-boys was discussed, but there was very little else. There was certainly nothing that might suggest why they’d suddenly decided to declare war on the rest of the known universe.
Or maybe it’s just the bastards on Amstar, he thought, as he flipped through the remaining files. The rest of the Druavroks might have no intention of fighting a war.
He puzzled over the thought for a long moment. The Tokomak had spread millions of settlements of every known race right across the galaxy, mixing hundreds of races together in melting pots that hadn't been anything like as effective as the Solar Union. He’d been told at the Academy that they’d probably hoped to play divide and rule. They’d certainly not bothered to do more than the bare minimum to ensure that everyone got along. Given that some races rubbed others the wrong way, fighting and ethnic cleansing on a galactic scale was perhaps inevitable.
But we took in aliens and invited them to live with us as equals, he added, silently. The Tokomak had far greater resources. Why couldn't they do the same?
The Academy had had some pretty sharp things to say about the Tokomak, he recalled. They were the masters of the known universe - had been the masters of the known universe - but they’d been sluggish, slow to move and unwilling to recognise that other races moved at a faster pace. Maybe it had been so obvious to them that races should work together that they hadn't realised that other races might disagree. Or, perhaps, they’d hoped there would be war as a way to stay on top. They’d certainly played favourites among their subject races.
He sighed and turned his attention to the holographic display showing the local sector, including five hundred settled systems and nineteen homeworlds. The Druavroks came from the far side of the sector, he noted; Amstar was in the rough centre, surrounded by a number of other multiracial worlds. There was surprisingly little data on all of the worlds, save for charts showing gravity points and pre-war trade routes. God alone knew what half of them looked like now. The squadron had collected a great deal of intelligence, but most of it was contradictory. It was impossible to tell what might be waiting for them at Amstar.
The hatch opened. He turned and straightened in his seat as the Senior Chief entered, then rose. Technically, as a commissioned officer, he was Siskin’s superior, but only a complete idiot of an ensign would take that for
granted. The Senior Chief, like the XO, dated back all the way to the pre-Contact wet navy. He had more practical experience than all of Thomas’s graduating class put together.
“Ensign,” Siskin said.
“Chief,” Thomas said. He hesitated, unsure if he should ask for help or not, then took the plunge. “I can't draw anything else useful from these files.”
Siskin gave him a considering look. “You can't get into them or there’s nothing important in them?”
“There's very little important in them,” Thomas said. “I thought the Tokomak had a fetish for recording everything.”
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