by Randy Dyess
“Computer, send additional scout ships to the Emea sub-territory. I want a continuous feed on the activities of this species.”
“As you command.”
“Now, how can I convince that idiot to not harvest all of them at once? It would be nice to just start taxing them. I could also mention that we could use them to seed the other sub-territories—they seem to be adaptable enough,” Woryant said to the empty room. You’ll try and you’ll fail, he thought as he turned back to his work.
Woryant was interested in why he couldn’t find the species in his database. The AI predicted that the nine intelligent species in his sub-territories had split no more than a million pulses ago, but that wasn’t so far back that the species wouldn’t have been in his database—he had information going back for hundreds of millions of pulses.
“Computer, get me more sample tissue from the new species. I want enough to finish my tests, as well as provide a treat, if they are as much of a delicacy as you predicted.”
“As you command,” the AI responded as Woryant turned back to his research. A chilling thought went through his mind right before he opened a comm channel, but, he dismissed the thought as foolish and started giving Klachur an update.
******
He’s just going to love this, Woryant thought as he opened the door to Klachur’s office.
“What are these creatures?” Klachur asked as his enforcer marched in the two remaining dirty, two-legged creatures.
“I don’t know, but they have infested the Emea sub-territory. Every system the Freack visited are full of these creatures. They’ve killed all the food sources in the sub-territory and have taken over the planets. Our food sources are gone, or reduced to unsustainable numbers if we harvest.”
“What? How are we going to harvest if our resources have been wasted by these creatures? What do you mean you don’t know what they are? How could anything develop in our territories without you knowing about it? Are you not doing your job? Do I need to replace you?”
“I don’t know the details, yet. They have the same DNA patterns as the intelligent species which used to inhabit the rest of your sub-territories; the AI has determined that it has been at least one million pulses since their paths diverted.”
This information calmed Klachur some, but he was still looking at Woryant like he was about to order his execution. “We would have had them in our database if they evolved here. Did someone seed them?”
“I don’t know. I think they came from somewhere else.”
Klachur got up and walked over to the creatures. He poked at them for a few minutes. “Are they of any use to us? Are they good to eat?”
“The AI predicts they are, but I’ve just started testing them. They may be a good food source for Tumihs and Uphids. I’m going to put their tissues through the analyzer as soon as I get back to my lab, and that should tell us if they are edible or not. I think, however, that we should develop them for other purposes. They seem to be quite intelligent and have rudimentary space travel and industries. We could develop this species and their output into a nice tax base. There are trillions of them—we could use them to repopulate our other sub-territories and move from food resource supply to technology.”
Klachur just looked at Woryant with anger. The enforcer had tried to get the Under Boss to understand how much more revenue they could make from taxes on an industrial base. Food was a commodity, so revenue was lower than from an industrial and technology tax base. Woryant thought he would give it one more try, but after seeing Klachur’s expression grow even angrier, he knew he was wasting his time.
“Enough with your schemes! Find out what they are and where they came from. If someone else has seeded my planets with their stock, I’m taking this to Slataxi and demanding he takes it to the Grand Council. Emea is my territory! Find out quickly!” Klachur shouted as he and threw Woryant and the dirty creatures out of his office.
Woryant instructed the Freack to take the creatures back to their holding pens. He rolled five of his eight eyes and thought, Whatever. You’re an idiot and I can’t wait to see your head bounce off the steps of the Grand Council’s execution platform.
“I wonder if I should have told him where I think they came from,” he muttered. “No, he would have executed me just to keep it a secret. He’s isn’t strong enough to handle something like this.” Woryant shut his mouth and followed the Freack and the creatures back to his lab.
******
“Report!” Klachur yelled at Woryant. “What have you found out? It better be good, or I will sell you to the slave traders on Groth.” Woryant shuddered as he thought about what his life would become once the slave traders got ahold of him. He wasn’t built for that type of life.
“Well, I guess that got your attention,” Klachur chuckled as all eight of his eyes rolled around in their sockets and his feet tapped the floor.
Woryant broke out of his trance and let the Under Boss laugh at him before he responded. “The new creatures are an excellent food source for the Tumihs and Uphids. In fact, they should consider them a delicacy.”
“Excellent. Delicacies always demand a premium. This may work out in our favor. How many of them would you need to harvest to meet our tax quota, and are there enough of them to create a market?”
“Yes, based on preliminary reports, I think there might be trillions of them in the territory. I still think we should just tax them, instead of harvesting them, though.”
“If you mention that one more time, I will harvest you!” Klachur shouted. “Harvesting those things as a delicacy is the only way to meet Slataxi’s demands.”
“Yes, Boss.” He had pushed Klachur a little too far. I’ll just have to wait until it’s my turn and show everyone what I can do. The taxes from this species will triple the revenue from this one sub-territory, alone. Once I spread the species out, I’ll be richer than the Grand Boss.
“Have you found out where they came from?” Klachur asked, breaking Woryant’s day-dream.
Woryant was worried, but reported what he had determined, anyway. “All indications are that these creatures originated on AES-14753x.”
“Where the hell is AES-14753x?”
“The Feebie neutral border zone.”
“What? Are you sure?”
“Yes. I found a reference to them in a Nuszulu database. They call themselves ‘humans.’”
“Did the Feebies send them into my territory?”
“No, I’ve seen no sign of any Feebie involvement. I think this species developed on its own and spread into Emea since the last harvest. They seem intelligent, and they have rudimentary FTL travel.”
Klachur was worried, for no Syndicate member wanted to face war with the Feebies. They were the stuff of both legends and nightmares for the members of the Syndicate. It had been over ten thousand pulses since the last contact with the Feebies, and it had been disastrous for the Syndicate. If it hadn’t been for the fact they were at war with another empire, the Syndicate would have been overrun and disbanded. He was worried that they were starting to make a push into his territory.
“Are you sure the Feebies aren’t involved?”
“I haven’t seen any evidence of Feebie technology. I’m still waiting for my scouts to report back to get the rest of the details.”
“Find out for sure, and keep this quiet. I don’t need Slataxi telling me I have to abandon my sub-territories because the Feebies are involved.”
Woryant was shocked at Klachur’s statement; the thought of the Syndicate ordering them to abandoned this region of space to prevent another war with the Feebies had never crossed his mind. This enforced the need to keep his discoveries to himself—he never should have brought this up to Klachur, in the first place. Letting the harvest go on and then reporting to the Grand Boss that Klachur was harvesting a possible Feebie species would be a perfect way to get rid of him, but it might also end his chance to run sub-territories, as well.
“Yes, Boss,” he responded as
Klachur stared at him. “I’ll find out more and keep the discoveries quiet.”
“Let me know what you determine. I also want your AI to run a probability scenario, so we can harvest this sub-territory without letting anyone know what we are doing and where these things come from.”
“Yes, Boss,” Woryant said as he turned to leave Klachur’s office. He had come close to losing his life this time; there would be no more trying to get the idiot to change his ways.
******
Woryant spent the next twelve rotations investigating the new species. His AI had determined the pattern they should use to harvest the new species, as well as keep them rare enough to remain a delicacy. Woryant had gone over the plan and changed it to make sure no other Syndicate member could figure out what they were doing.
“Get in here!” Klachur’s head appeared on the enforcer’s viewer.
Oh, great, he’s back, Woryant thought. The Under Boss had been gone on one of his trips, and Woryant had twelve wonderful rotations to himself. He had made great strides on both the new species and his plan to get rid of Klachur.
“Tell me you weren’t just goofing off while I was gone and that you have a plan,” Klachur demanded once Woryant was in his office.
“My AI has created a plan, which I’ve tweaked in order to hide our activities from the others.”
“Show me this plan, so I can tell you where you went wrong.”
Like you would know what was wrong with it. I could show you a plan to invade this planet and you would approve it. Now, that’s a thought, having Klachur order his own death, Woryant thought. “The plan I developed has us harvesting only one planet per blem.”
“Why so slow?” Klachur interrupted.
He wanted to tell him that, if he would shut up, he would tell him why. These thoughts are getting too dangerous; I need to keep myself under control before I blurt out something and get myself killed. “We need time to build up a market,” Woryant told the Under Boss. “If we harvest rapidly, we would flood the market and the prices would drop. Harvesting one planet per blem is enough to make this species seem rare. This maximizes our pricing strategy and increases our revenue stream. Just the revenue from a few planets would be enough to pay Slataxi’s taxes.”
“Really? You’re not over-estimating, are you?”
“No. Humans would be extremely tasty to both the Tumihs and Uphids, and they would become addicted to their meat.”
“Addicted. I like the sound of that.” Klachur sat back in his chair, dreaming of having the Tumihs and Uphids addicted to something he controlled. If he could control their leaders and military commanders, he could gain control over their powerful territories. I wouldn’t even have to stay in the damn Syndicate. I could go out on my own, he thought as a smile spread across his face. I’ll need to get rid of this idiot, first.
Woryant watched Klachur go through his little day-dream. The Under Boss wouldn’t pass up an opportunity to turn others into his slaves, and addiction was a powerful control over a species. Even with all the medicines out there, addiction was impossible to defeat.
“Here’s what I want you to do,” Klachur finally said after coming out of his trance. “Stay with my plan.”
Your plan? thought Woryant.
“Harvest one planet per blem, like I told you to. Start finding other species who might think these things are a delicacy, as well. What do they call themselves, again?”
“Humans.”
“Okay, humans. I don’t like that name—find something that works better with my marketing plans. I want at least two more species vying for this delicacy.”
“Yes, Boss.”
“I’m not finished! Don’t interrupt me again,” Klachur commanded. “Once the first planet is harvested and processed, I want you to plan a trip for me through the Tumih’s and Uphid’s territories. I want to ‘bump’ into all the leaders and military leaders of their territories—in fact, arrange it so that I host parties for all of them. Have enough processed units for the parties for me to give out as gifts. I want all of them to come begging to me for more by the time I finish this trip. While I am out, you’ll continue with my harvesting plan and have more units ready for me when I need them. I’ll give them a little taste, and then I’ll start charging a premium. Do you think you can handle these tasks while I am out doing the hard work?” Woryant didn’t respond. He didn’t know if Klachur was finished, yet. “That requires a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer, you idiot,” Klachur said. “Look at what I have to put up with! I wonder if the Tumihs or Uphids have better underlings—might be something to watch out for during my trip.”
“Yes, Boss,” Woryant nodded in agreement, but thought Klachur was still making a huge mistake. This species was intelligent and seemed to be somewhat aggressive. They should take advantage of that and make them into slaves and foot soldiers. Just another mistake the idiot’s making, he thought to himself as he made his way back to his lab.
Chapter 7
Cindy looked out the window of the small café and watched the dust blowing down the street. Why is it always so dusty here? You’d think living in a city of eighty-million people would keep me out of the dust.
Humans had left their original solar system over six hundred years ago, and had been spreading into the stars ever since. The first set of planets discovered and settled were consider the inner-core worlds, which were the richest, most populated, and most powerful. They were ruled by the most powerful senators and were headquarters to the largest and wealthiest corporations. Over the last six hundred years, cities on inner-core worlds had grown and merged to cover the entire planet. Only a few parks, the deepest parts of the oceans, and a few lakes remained free from buildings.
Inner-core worlds were filled with glamour and luxury. Artificial intelligence ran the systems, and robots performed the work. People who were only able to live in the worker hostels in the deepest and grimiest parts of the inner-core world cities were considered beneath the humans who were rich enough to be able to live on the surface. While slavery was illegal, you couldn’t tell by the way the wealthy treated the poor.
The next group of settled planets made up the outer-core worlds. While they were slightly less desirable, they were still wealthy in their own rights. Outer-core world senators and corporations were just as rich and powerful as their inner-core rivals—something that frustrated anyone from an inner-core world.
Inner-corers thought that, since their planets were settled first, they should always have the advantage over other planets. Outer-corers thought that, since they had the same number of people, the same amount of wealth, and the same number of corporations controlling billions of people, they should be considered equal. They disagreed on almost everything, except for how they viewed people who lived in the rest of human space: the rim worlds.
The inner-rim planets were considered middle-class, and small corporations and only slightly rich senators called them home. The cities on these planets did not actually touch each other, and green space and open oceans covered large portions of them. Like the humans on core worlds, the people of inner-rim planets were still independent and not owned by a corporation, like those on the outer-rim planets. The inner-rim planets were the destination of anyone who could escape the corporate-controlled life of an outer-rim world.
Outer-rim planets, asteroid fields, and planetoids were completely owned by corporations, most of which were headquartered on inner- or outer-core worlds. The people were basically indentured to one corporation or another, and most owned no property and had no basic human rights. There were no governments or senate membership on these planets, and their inhabitants were not allowed to vote.
Four-hundred million people lived on the outer-rim planet of Candus with eighty-million of them living in its largest city, Candus City. This did not mean Cindy’s life was one of glamour, though. In fact, it was one of dust, long hours of work with her family on potato farm AC1245898A during the harvest season, and more long hours of wor
king at the café during the off-season.
Girls on Candus were raised to work from the time they were eight until they were eighty. Small breaks were given for childbirth, but only for a few days. After you turned eighty, you’d better hope your children or grandchildren had the means to take care of you, because the Candus Corporation wouldn’t. Pensions and retirement plans had been dropped centuries ago as corporations became as powerful as the old-fashioned nations which once ruled Earth. Even though the planet had no government and its inhabitants could not vote, it would be represented in the senate by the corporation that owned it. Corporations had senate membership based on the number of people working for them, and the core world planets were more powerful than any government.
A few of the most adventurous outer-rim citizens escaped their lot in life by settling newly-discovered planets or becoming independent miners on some small planet or asteroid. They often made enough money to come back and buy the lease to a local business. They were still owned by the planet’s corporation, but the owner of the lease received most the profits. This was a way for the corporations to provide “luxuries” to the people of their planets without the risks involved with running a small business. Cindy was lucky enough to spend most of her year working in one of these independently-owned businesses. It was only a small café on a small planet, but it was a huge step away from the lives most people lived on a corporate-owned world.