“Close the hold and constrict the wormhole,” growled the male. “Then continue on.”
The Captain nodded, then looked over at his Helm. That human acknowledged, then double checked the course, nodding back at the Captain. “Estimated time to entry to the enemy home system, one hundred and seventy-three hours.”
One hundred and seventy-three more hours, thought Jasper, running a hand across his sweating brow. And then it was another two days from the hyper barrier to the double planet. They really could do the trip in much less time with their military grade grabbers, but it wouldn’t do to attract that kind of attention.
SUPERSYSTEM, SPACE OUTSIDE HYPER BARRIER OF CENTRAL BLACK HOLE. DECEMBER 25TH, 1002. D-7.
“We’re about to leave hyper, my Lord,” said the Captain, looking up at the Cacada male who stood over him.
Ahead was the dark blot of the largest gravity well that anyone on the bridge had ever seen. Probably the largest that almost any member of the Empire had ever approached. It was an intimidating sight, made more so by the fact that it would take Fool’s Bane over a week to get within range of its target. Over a week during which they could make a fatal mistake that turned the scrutiny of the enemy on their ship, basically ending their mission.
“Jumping from hyper, now,” called out the Helm, and the back dot of the hole opening between the dimensions appeared ahead.
The ship slid through the hole, the feeling of brief nausea coming over the human crew. The Captain looked up at the Cacada male, who looked like he was about to pass out on his feet from the passage. The human had always wondered at the weakness of the huge beings who were so strong in almost every other measure.
It took fifteen seconds for the Cacada to recover, time when the being was helpless. In that time the ship’s passive sensors and computer system had started on their catalogue of the system objects. First and foremost was the massive black hole in the center, the reason for this system’s being. It was immediately detectable by its graviton emissions, which actually made it much more difficult to pick up the lesser emissions of all of the other objects in the system.
“What have we got?” asked the Overlord in the voice of a male in distress.
“Only the black hole so far, my Lord,” said the Captain. “Coming in at the estimate of twenty-eight standard masses.” Twenty-eight times more massive than the Ca’cadasan home star, upon which all such measures were compared.
“What of the rest of the system?”
“No large planetary bodies that we can detect, my Lord” said the Sensor Tech, working her station and interpreting the incoming data. “We are picking up a large object on visual.”
The central holo changed its view, zooming in on the image of a slender ribbon bisecting a distortion in space. The ribbon was slightly lopsided as they had not entered the system perfectly aligned with the orbit of the structure. It was well lit by its own external lighting, looking in the distance like a child’s toy. Until the scale of the distance, sixty-two light hours, registered, and they realized how large it really was.
“That is the target,” said the male with a predatory grin. “Continue into the system on the planned course. I want us broadcasting the recognition code all the way in.”
And if the code is not legitimate, we are doomed, thought the Captain as the ship forged ahead at just under two hundred gravities, high for most merchant ships, but not unreasonably so, and nowhere within the range of a warship. It would take them over two hundred hours to get into their attack range. Over two hundred hours of time for them to be scrutinized, detected, tracked down and destroyed.
“We’re starting to pick up other objects, sir,” said the Sensor Tech, turning to look at her Captain and eliciting a growl from the Cacada.
“Show me,” growled the male, pointing a large lower right index finger at the human female.
The holo switched views, first zooming in on a section of space near the target station, to a cluster of other large objects in order around the back hole. The view switched again, this time showing what appeared to be a wormhole ship gate. It zoomed out, and the objects were indicated by blinking icons, Ca’cadasan script underneath. A dozen gates, over a hundred warships hanging out. Other vessels were transiting toward and away from the gates, moving the materials that kept the human Empire in the war.
“We have them,” shouted the male, raising all four fists into the air.
Getting a little ahead of ourselves, aren’t we? thought the Captain. There was no guarantee they would get within attack range. In fact, if the Captain were a betting man, he wouldn’t have given them a chance in hell of getting there. Unless these humans were asleep.
* * *
“I’ll be done in a moment, honey,” said Margo Saunders, looking up from her desk as Tomas walked into the classroom.
There were about thirty children in the room, clustered at workstations talking among themselves and working on their lessons. Tomas wasn’t really sure he liked children all that much, having never been around that many of them. He had to admit that these seemed to be very well behaved. He had asked Margo one time why these kids still needed to come to school, since they could learn everything they needed from the city databases.
“They get socialization,” said Margo. “They still work at home, two days a week, and physically come to school another two days.” That left them with one play day each week, when they visited the zoo or museums, or simply played in the park.
Supposedly the children learned to get along with other children, which would translate into getting along with other adults when they got older. He guessed that it worked, since he had been through the same process himself, and hadn’t turned out that antisocial.
“Class dismissed,” said Margo, getting up from her desk. The students started talking louder as they shut down their stations and gathered up their things. Tomas watched them, thinking that he might find them kind of cute someday, with a little work. He looked over at Margo, wondering if she might someday become the mother of his child, if they could get a reproductive license. It might take some time, but he was sure he would eventually be able to get one or more, since his company would not be willing to let him relocate, and he didn’t want to go to a branch office on some no name world out in the frontier anyhow.
“How did your day go?” he asked the love of his life as she came up to him and give him a quick kiss. “I’m surprised the little monsters haven’t killed you by now.”
“You know they’re not that bad,” said Margo with a smile.
Tomas wasn’t sure why Margo worked as a teacher, running two shifts of thirty students each through her classroom each week. It was nowhere near as lucrative as his own profession, and required some altruism as well. It was work, which meant she was not on the dole, and it seemed to give her a purpose. That was one of the things he loved about her. She was not out to get ahead no matter what, like the people he worked with and against. She lived in a different world, and had made it clear that she intended to stay in that realm.
“Do you have any plans for Empire Day?” he asked as they left the room to head for the lift. Margo lived in this building, as did all of her students. It was a working class building, again not as high of socioeconomic status as where he lived, but respectable, since no one in this structure was on the dole. All had purpose, even if it was only in supervising waste disposal robots.
“I guess I’ll spend it with you, since I don’t have anything better to do,” she said in the laughing tone he loved.
“And what are you doing at the moment?” he asked in a similar tone, running a hand through her hair.
“Your place or mine?” she asked, her eyes twinkling.
“Well, since we’re only fifty floors from your apartment, and mine is at least seven minutes from here by aircar…”
“Mine it is,” she said with a laugh.
Later, as they were both laying back in her bed basking in the glow of their after lovemaking aura, Tomas f
ound himself turning and looking into her face. He knew rationally that she wasn’t the most beautiful woman in the world. There were biosculpted actresses and models, and sometimes just women of wealth, who were breathtakingly beautiful. But Margo had a natural beauty that those women didn’t, something of the mythical girl next door of Old Earth. He looked at her through the eyes of love, rose colored glasses that made her appear much more lovely than any of those artificially enhanced women.
And she was very good in bed. He wasn’t sure how good he was, not objectively, but she seemed to be satisfied, as evidenced now by the flushed skin on her chest and face.
“I wish you would go ahead and move in with me,” he said, reaching over and stroking the side of her face
“I work in this building,” she protested. “My contract calls for me to live here near to the school.”
“I could support you, you know. I could even buy you out of your contract.”
“I’m a teacher, Tomas. It’s what I do.”
“Then teach in my building. There are kids who need instruction in my building as well.”
“I really don’t think that’s a good idea.”
Tomas lay there and thought. He wished had had brought the ring, and even thought about running home and getting it. But he thought it better to wait until the time he had planned, when it would have the most impact.
“Look, I spend time at your place on the weekends. And you come over here on the weeknights, at least some of them. Why can’t you be satisfied with that for the time being?”
I guess I’ll have to be, thought Tomas, now wondering more than ever how his proposal would go over. What if she thought he was pressuring her, trying to make her give up her life.
“Oh, don’t be so sad,” she said, rolling over and facing him, placing both hands on his chest. “We’ve got each other, we have tonight, and the future looks bright for the two of us.”
For some reason those words sent a shiver down Tomas’ spine. A shiver of dread.
Chapter Seven
Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain - and most fools do. Benjamin Franklin
DECEMBER 26TH, 1002. CAPITULUM, JEWEL. D-6.
“Jennifer,” yelled Sean as he walked into their living area. This was a private room, large enough to entertain a score of people among lavish furnishings, but only open to personal friends of the Emperor and his wife. The trappings of Christmas still occupied the room. A fresh cut tree that was still giving off the wholesome odor of pine, decorations that had been in the family for generations adorning it. Some presents, unwrapped and scattered about. The servants had, of course, cleaned up the wrapping paper and other trash. Not everyone in the Empire celebrated this holiday. In fact, it was little known on whole worlds, those supporting population majorities of other faiths. As Reformed Catholics, the Imperial Family had followed the tradition since the founding of the Empire, even the non-believers among them.
“I’m in the nursery,” she called back, her voice carrying over the cries of a baby.
Sean smiled and headed for the room that had been converted into a nursery for the twin boys. The room was finished in boy blue, with numerous cartoon characters on the walls. Jennifer knelt on the floor beside a small apparatus used for holding the babies in place in the warm water of the small bath. She had a soapy sponge in her hand, and was rubbing over the back of the baby that was in the water, holding his head up with the other hand. The baby was not really crying in fear or anger. They both had gotten over that reaction to the bath, but Augustine still complained when he was made to do something that wasn’t his idea. So he was irritated and showing his displeasure.
Sean looked into one of the twin cribs as he passed by. Glen was wide awake, looking at the mobile hanging overhead as he kicked his legs and waved his chubby little arms. Frog’s legs were what Sean thought of when he saw his children lying on their backs. Bow legged little skinny limbs that made them seem to serve no useful purpose but to get in the way of whatever the care givers were trying to do. Glen was smiling and cooing, and the Emperor was once again struck by the very different personalities of the physically identical boys.
“You could have a nanny do that, you know,” said Sean, kneeling down next to his wife and kissing her on the cheek.
“I enjoy doing this,” she said, finishing with the sponge, then ladling water over the soapy skin of the infant with that same hand. “They’re my babies, and I want them to bond with me.”
Sean had to admit that the babies had bonded with their mom. Though he had to think that they weren’t just his and Jennifer’s children. They were the legacy of the Empire, the hope of the future, if there was to be one.
“Where are the guardian agents?”
“I told them I wanted to be alone with my children,” said Jennifer, looking at her husband with a frown. “I know they’re necessary, but I really don’t like them looking over my shoulder. They make me feel like I’m a risk to my own children. And this one is done.”
Jennifer picked up Augustine and carried him to the changing table, making sure to support his head. She lay the still complaining baby on the table and starting working on him with the towel, making sure he was completely dry.
“Why don’t you dress your son while I get the other little dirt monster into the bath.”
Sean nodded and pulled out a disposable diaper, then arranged it under the baby. He still didn’t have the confidence of his wife, and was very careful with the child, probably more than necessary. But he had the diaper on in no time, then dressed the baby, another skill that was just barely developed. In one way it felt wrong for an Emperor to have to spend time dressing a baby when they had people in the palace to do that, well paid and very good at their jobs. In another way it felt so natural to take care of his own children, and it made Jennifer happy to know that the father was taking such an interest in his children.
He looked over at his wife as she worked on running a soapy cloth over Glen, who took it as calmly as he took everything else. Jennifer beamed at her son as she used a cloth that might have been used on a common child whose parents were on the dole. Most people on a core world, and especially one like Jewel, would only have one child per couple, if that, and then only later in life. Just enough to keep the population up on worlds that were already overcrowded. He and Jennifer could have as many children as they wanted, and he thought of the injustice of such a thing. If a commoner had more children than they were supposed to, they would face severe penalties up to and including losing the children and having their personalities wiped. Every child he and Jennifer had would be celebrated by the Empire.
Of course commoners could always move to the frontier if they wanted large families, something that was encouraged. The frontier could be dangerous, especially during wartime, though ten times more people had been killed so far on core worlds, two in particular, than on all the frontier and developing worlds and spaceships put together. But the perception of less developed worlds being more at risk continued.
“Could you put him in his crib?” his wife asked, looking over to check on how her husband had dressed the baby and giving him a satisfied smile.
Sean put Augustine in his bed, flat on his back, and the child was out in an instant. The baby had a full set of nanites in his body, as well as a basic implant, and would be monitored at all times by one of the nurses. There would be no accidental or unexplained deaths with these twins, and the parents wouldn’t have to worry about being woken in the night by crying babies needing to be fed or changed. That was one thing Sean had insisted on, since he needed his rest, and Jennifer had been glad to go along with him on that insistence.
“Get this one dressed while I get their bottles ready.”
Sean dressed Glen, again amazed at the difference in the personalities of his children. Augustine would probably grow to become a feisty lad, one who would sit the throne with authority, and probably need some tempering and control while he learned to rule. Glen would be
calm and controlled on his own. By precedent he would not become the Emperor, unless something happened to his brother. All because he had been lined up wrong in the womb and had come out second. Of course, precedent had been overturned in the past, when the older sibling was determined not to be competent for the post of ruler. He didn’t think that would happen with Augustine, especially since the experts were telling him that his manner as a baby would not set his future personality as an adult.
Sean smiled at the baby and received one in return. He really couldn’t tell what the little being would look like from his current baby features. But he had seen the geneticists’ representation of what they would look like at various ages, from toddlers up to young men. Both would have Sean’s complexion, a mixing of the African-American Streeters, the Chinese Lees and the Russian Romanovs that were dominant in his line. Jennifer would add some lightening with her Northern European complexion, but neither would ever be confused with pure Irish. Jennifer’s red hair and Sean’s ice blue eyes, looking out of strong faces that reminded the Emperor more of his father’s than his own.
“I’m ready for bed,” said Jennifer when she was finished putting up the bathing equipment.
“I’m ready for some sleep myself,” said Sean.
“I didn’t say sleep,” said Jennifer with a slight smile. “That’s for after.”
After, Sean was too awake to sleep, while Jennifer went under like a pole axed animal. He retreated to the terrace outside their room to stare into the night while he enjoyed a pipe, an affectation he had decided to adopt after becoming a father. He was alone, or as alone as could be expected, to all appearances by himself, though he knew that almost a platoon of armored Marines watched over him. He went with the illusion of solitude, staring out over his city, down the hill from the palace complex. Megascrapers dominated the twin downtown sections, rising up multiple kilometers into the air like narrow fingers. Most were dark at this time of night with the exception of a few lights on in apartments and offices occupied by night owls, and the ever present navigation markers. Smaller skyscrapers surrounded the megascraper areas, and the city sprawled out for hundreds of kilometers in almost every direction. The sky was still full of the traffic of aircars, here and there an emergency vehicle with flashing lights running past the queue.
Exodus: Empires at War: Book 11: Day of Infamy (Exodus: Empires at War.) Page 8