“I could have done all of that without enslaving the human race to a false god,” Etherus said. “And I would have, when the time was right. The Entity merely forced me to act sooner.”
Ben nodded. “When the Grays defeat the Entity, what will happen with all the slaves?”
“They’ll be released, and they’ll make new lives for themselves on the planets where they reside. By the time humanity is finished rebuilding here to the point that they can return to their homes, they’ll find all of the star systems around them already teeming with people.”
“But there’ll be duplicates. How are you going to decide which bodies get souls?”
“Let me worry about that, Benjamin. It’s a temporary problem that will be resolved as soon as this generation dies.”
Etherus laid a heavy hand on his shoulder. “I will leave you now, but we will see one another soon, my friend.”
The weight abruptly left his shoulder, and the shining light of Etherus’s presence vanished with it, leaving the room dark and filled with shifting shadows. Ben looked around, wondering if Etherus used the same cloaking technology as the Grays, or if his sudden appearances and disappearances were a product of something else entirely.
Maybe I’m hallucinating, he thought, wondering not for the first time if Alexander was right about him having lost his mind.
Chapter 38
One week later...
Catalina stepped out onto her habitat’s back porch and took a deep breath, inhaling the strange smell of her new home. The air was thick and humid, and the jungles had a sharp loamy scent that made her wonder about alien molds. The air had tested safe, so she was probably worrying for nothing.
In the distance she heard an alien predator let out a warbling cry, Araaa, araaa... It sounded like a vulture mixed with a dinosaur. She hadn’t seen any of the larger predators yet, but she wasn’t in a hurry to, either. There had to be a reason that all of the colonists had been given weapons.
Catalina heard the airlock behind her open with a hiss of escaping air, and she turned to see Alexander coming to join her on the porch.
“Hey there, beautiful,” he said.
She smiled. “Hey there, handsome.”
Their habitat consisted of an inflatable white canvas dome with a second, transparent dome to act as a greenhouse where they could grow seeds from Earth. The greenhouses probably weren’t necessary, but field tests were still being conducted to see how terrestrial plants would fair in the unfamiliar environment.
Water was an issue, but the colony had been started next to a river, and the water had tested safe, so now it was just a matter of setting up a treatment plant and laying down pipes to connect all of the habitats.
Alexander wrapped an arm around her shoulders and nodded to the view from their porch. The habitats were all close together for the time being, arranged in rows in a field of tall, bright green grass. Overhead stretched a pinkish blue sky, and the horizon soared with craggy green mountains that reminded Catalina of the Hawaiian Islands back on Earth.
“Beautiful,” Alexander breathed.
She gave him a sideways look. “Don’t get too comfortable.”
Alexander regarded her with a frown but said nothing.
She’d recently made friends with one of the Grays, and convinced it to help her find out where the Avilon had gone. After that, it was just a matter of finding a way to get there. Maybe they’d be able to steal one of the Grays’ saucers.
Alexander remained skeptical of her efforts. They’d been arguing about it just last night.
“Even if you can find out where they went, how do you suppose you’re going to get there? The Grays aren’t going to help you find them just so that you can make me immortal again.”
“What makes you think I’m going to tell them why I want to go there?” she’d countered.
She was still mad at him. He was all but dancing in the fields, full of life and vigor, as if he weren’t living under a death sentence. He should have been spending every waking moment looking for a way to save himself! She shouldn’t have to poke and prod him into caring whether he lived or died.
She glanced sideways at him, wondering when he’d start to notice himself aging. Maybe that would snap him out of it.
Alexander sensed her scrutiny and turned to her with a smile. “It’s everything we ever dreamed of finding beyond Earth. A thousand times better than Proxima.”
Catalina nodded slowly.
“Some of the other colonists are planning to take out the rovers and explore the jungles today,” Alexander said. “I was thinking of joining them. You want to come? This is all a new frontier for us, everything is unexplored, just waiting to be discovered.”
“Sure, I’ll come,” she said, without any real enthusiasm. She was more interested in seeing what her alien friend had found out about the Avilon. This is just temporary, she thought, gazing out at the soaring green mountains on the horizon. She’d be more enthusiastic about making a life together once she knew that it would be forever.
* * *
Remo walked through the open doors of the airlock and into the church with Deedee leading him by the hand. The pews were made up of rows of folding chairs. They were all filled, leaving standing room only at the back.
“Etherus is real!” Benjamin said, his voice booming out from a makeshift stage of empty storage crates. “I’ve seen him with my own eyes!”
Remo went to stand in the aisle with Deedee so he could get a look at the child preacher on the stage.
“Why doesn’t he appear to us?” someone called out.
“If he did, you wouldn’t need faith to believe.”
“Why do we need faith?” shouted another.
“What is faith but a sincere and overwhelming desire to see the proof of that which you believe? Without faith you cannot prove that you really want to live in Etheria. You’ll lie to yourselves and to others just to get there, but you won’t really appreciate it, and if you don’t appreciate it, you might take it for granted and throw it away—again.”
“Again?” Remo wondered aloud.
“Shhh,” Deedee said.
Ben paced down the stage, giving the crowd a minute to absorb everything he’d said.
“There was a rebellion in Etheria. The rebels wanted to do as they thought best, and not as Etherus dictated. The rebels lost, but not before millions died in the fighting. Despite that, Etherus decided to have mercy and give them what they wanted. He gave the rebels their freedom by putting them in human bodies. We are those rebels! But what did we do with our freedom? What did freedom bring us? It brought us war and poverty, and misery of every kind!”
Remo had had enough. He left Deedee’s side and strolled down the aisle.
“Remo! Get back here!” she hissed.
He ignored her, walking straight up to the stage.
Ben saw him approach and pointed to him. “You have a question, Mr. Taggart?”
“You betcha, kid. How’s a nine-year-old become the leader of his very own religion?” Remo held up a hand to forestall Ben’s answer. “Wait, I know—he lies about meeting God and tells everyone else that they have to have faith or else they’ll defeat the very purpose of their lives. You want to know what I think?”
“No, but you’re going to tell us anyway.”
“I think you’re a fraud. I think Etherianism is a clever way to lull us all to death with a smile on our faces. Don’t worry! Soon you’ll wake up in paradise!
“You’re shoveling a whole lot of bullshit, kid. You’re not the first, and you won’t be the last, but what surprises me is that so many of you—” Remo turned in a circle to address the crowd. “—are eating it up like candy.”
The crowd devolved into chaos. Dissenting voices rose to all sides, but they weren’t arguing with him—they were arguing with each other. Not everyone here was a believer. At least half of them had the same doubts as he did, and now they were busy expressing them to the friends and family they’d come w
ith.
Remo turned back to Ben and shrugged. “Oops.”
Ben glared at him.
Someone stepped out into the aisle and shouted, “God is dead, and so are you!”
Remo spun around just in time to see the man who’d said that pull the trigger.
Bang!
Ben dove off the stage, and the crowd stampeded for the exits. Remo lunged at the man who’d fired at Ben, knocking him to the ground.
“What are you doing!” the man said. “We have to stop this madness!”
Remo got a firm hold on the gun and pried it free of the other man’s fingers. “You’re not going to stop it by killing their leader, you idiot! You’ll just make him a martyr!”
“This is all his fault! We’re all going to die, and it’s his fault!” the man sobbed.
Remo jumped up and tucked the man’s sidearm into his own gunbelt. He spent a moment looking around for Ben. The church was empty, but for a few stragglers, and there was a bright red smear of blood where Ben had dived off the stage. Fat drops trailed from there to an exit behind the stage. Remo frowned, hoping Ben was okay. He heard a scramble of movement and turned around to find the shooter running out the nearest exit.
Now Remo stood all alone in the church amidst a sea of overturned chairs. Was this his fault?
All he’d done was voice everyone else’s doubts. If those doubts were strong enough for someone to try to kill Benjamin, then this attempt on the boy’s life wasn’t the end of it.
It’s just the beginning.
Chapter 39
“Alex, meet Fa-ta-na,” Catalina said.
Alexander looked up from his work. He was planting seeds in their greenhouse. My new hobby...
He spied the diminutive Gray standing beside his wife and frowned. The Grays were all diminutive, but this one was particularly short—less than four feet tall. “What’s he doing in our hab?” Alexander asked, his nose wrinkling at the sight of the alien more than the smell of fertilizer inside the greenhouse.
“This is the Gray I told you about. The one who’s been looking into the Avilon for us.”
“I see,” Alexander replied. “And? You know where it went?”
“I c-an lee-d y-oo th-air,” the alien said.
Alexander’s eyebrows floated up. “Why would you do that?”
“Y-oo are n-ot h-appy h-ear.”
“I’m as happy as a pig in poop,” Alexander replied and wiggled his fertilizer-caked fingers at the alien.
Fa-ta-na looked up at Catalina. “H-e d-os n-ot w-ant to l-eave?”
“Give us a moment, Fa-ta-na,” Catalina replied. “You can wait for me outside.”
“V-ery w-ell.”
Alexander watched the Gray enter the nearest airlock. Catalina walked up to him. “What’s your problem?” she asked.
“I don’t have a problem,” he said.
“Yes you do. You’re going to die, and you don’t seem to care! Do you want to die?”
Alexander sighed. “Even if we do find Benevolence, what makes you think he’ll want to help us?”
“He has to! We created him. He owes humanity this much at least.”
Alexander considered that. “What if he’s had a spiritual awakening like Ben?”
“That’s a risk we’ll just have to take. It’s better than giving up!”
“All right, I’ll play along. Tell me more.”
“The Grays have offered transport to anyone who wants to join the Avilon. The harvester leaves tomorrow, and it will arrive in about six months.”
“We’re going to live for six months on board one of their ships?” Alexander asked. “What are we going to eat? How are we going to go to the bathroom? Or sleep? The Grays’ needs aren’t the same as ours.”
“I don’t know. How did the Entity use harvesters to transport everyone away from Earth? They must have a way.”
Alexander sighed. “Let’s say they do. What then?”
“We arrive, make our case to Benevolence, and—”
“I mean after that. Are we coming back here?”
Catalina shook her head. “It’s a one way trip.”
“So how do we know Benevolence found another planet as habitable as Forliss? Dark Space has at least half a dozen other habitable planets besides this one, and there’s only one way in or out of here. It’s hidden. It’s habitable. It’s safe. You might not be able to say the same about wherever Benevolence ended up.”
“Why would he settle for a barren, dangerous rock? The Grays helped him get wherever he was going, so it’s safe to assume they would help him go somewhere just as good as Dark Space. Why would they even agree to take us there if that weren’t the case?”
“Because we’re not happy here, apparently. Sounds to me like they’re trying to weed out the troublemakers and make them Benevolence’s problem.”
Catalina threw up her hands. “Unbelievable! You’re still finding something wrong with this idea! Do you even love me?”
Alexander’s brow furrowed and he shook his head, confused by the change of topic. “Of course I do.” He stood up and regarded his wife solemnly. “I love you more than anything.”
“Well that’s not how it seems. It seems like—”
Alexander took two quick steps toward her and kissed her, stealing away whatever she’d been about to add to that.
She withdrew after only a second, leaning away from him. “You’re full of shit,” she said.
“No, I mean it. I really do love you, Caty.”
“I mean it, too.” She nodded to his hands, a wry grin tugging at the corners of her mouth.
He realized she was being literal, and he barked a laugh. “I guess I am.”
She laughed with him, and he smeared her arms with fertilizer.
“Hey!”
“Now you’re full of shit, too.”
They laughed some more, and the remainder of the tension between them disappeared.
“You know I’d go anywhere with you, Caty. I’m just worried. I don’t trust the Grays.”
“Neither do I, but so far they don’t seem to want to hurt us.”
“You mean besides making us mortals again.”
“Besides that,” Catalina said.
Alexander kissed her again, and this time she let him. An unknown future awaited, but one thing was certain—where ever they were headed, they would get there together.
* * *
“Today will be known as Founders’ Day,” Governor Ling Chong said, her eyes traveling around the table to address each of them in turn.
When her gaze settled on him, Councilor Markov inclined his head to her. The six councilors from the Liberty and the Governor herself had been among the first that the Grays had brought back. Now they had to string together a unified government before the colony on Forliss became too big to control. The incident in the Etherian Chapel was proof that they needed to get organized, and fast. Bishop Benjamin was lucky to be alive.
“Today will mark the foundation of the Imperium of Star Systems,” the governor went on. “A fresh start for humanity. It will be an empire unlike any human empire that has come before, because it will be unified across not one, but many star systems.” The governor paused to let that sink in. Councilors nodded and whispered their agreement with those ambitious plans.
Dark Space spanned four solar systems in a tightly packed group just a couple of light years across. It was an ideal nucleus for humanity to expand from. Even without the Grays’ help, they could use the Liberty to reach those star systems over time. The colony on Forliss was just the beginning.
“Please direct your attention to your holo tablets,” the governor said. “Read through the Constitution one more time if you feel the need, otherwise, simply add your signatures to the final page.”
The councilors all waved their holoscreens to life and began flipping through the document. Markov joined them and gave the Constitution a final, cursory look. After just a few minutes, they signed the document unanimously.
Before the others could join her, Benjamin walked into the habitat, flanked by a trio of Grays and a young girl.
“This is a private meeting, Benjamin,” the Governor said. “How did you get past my guards?”
“You will address the bishop as Your Excellency or Your Holiness,” the girl said.
Councilor Markov almost laughed at that, but he managed to contain himself. Curiously, Ben wasn’t wearing any bandages from the attempt on his life. Then again, the Grays seemed to have the technology to cure just about anything, so maybe it wasn’t that curious.
Admiral Urikov walked in behind Bishop Benjamin. Aha, that explains how they got past the guards, Markov thought.
“You need to hear this, Governor,” Admiral Urikov said.
Governor Chong sat back down and folded her hands on the table. “I’m listening.”
Benjamin proceeded to explain that the Grays were offering to take anyone who wanted to leave Dark Space to go and join the Avilon.
“That’s Benevolence’s ship, isn’t it?” the Governor asked.
“Yes,” Benjamin replied.
“And why would we want to follow him?”
“Because if you find Benevolence, he may be able to help restore your immortality,” Ben replied.
Markov’s eyebrows hovered up, and he stroked the black beard growing on his chin. “Then why would the Grays help us find him? Weren’t they the ones who insisted it’s immoral for us to live forever?”
Ben nodded.
“So what’s changed?”
“If the malcontents stay, they’ll threaten the success of the colonies.”
“Of the Imperium of Star Systems,” Governor Chong corrected.
Ben cocked his head at that and Markov made a twirling gesture with his finger, rotating his holoscreen around so Ben could see the Constitution. The boy walked up and scanned through it.
“Very interesting,” he said. “I see you were careful to outline the division of church and state.”
Exodus: Book 3 of the New Frontiers Series (A Dark Space Tie-In) Page 26