by Alex Lamb
Ann nodded vaguely.
‘Great!’ said Kathy enthusiastically. She slapped her thighs as she got to her feet. ‘It’s been hyper to meet you, Captain Ludik. I really hope that one day we get to do it again.’
They didn’t shake hands because, these days, Galateans never did. Kathy strode to the exit and was gone.
Ann stared at the jittering hypercubes on the walls and wallowed in the silence that remained. A second blush coloured her features, slow and all-consuming, like a wave of embarrassment crashing over her head. She could feel something breaking inside her.
[Why do I feel like I’m drowning?] she asked her shadow.
[I don’t know,] it said. [Want to talk about it?]
But Ann didn’t want to talk. She could sense the answer sliding out of the mental fog inside her like an approaching ocean liner. In her old life, she’d always felt clever for being more rational and pragmatic than those around her. She’d been the cool one. A scientist and a policewoman at the same time. But since she’d come back, she’d been something else: a weapon.
It had started innocently enough. She had wanted to help as much as possible and so had done her duty on every awful mission they gave her. Not once had she flinched from action. She’d even changed her body in line with Psych Ops’ recommendations to make herself the perfect military icon. It was only now that she saw she’d become a robot. When had she let that happen?
She’d died the first time doing something brave and human. And she’d come back as a machine. Now that she was no longer useful, they weren’t bothering to hide it. She’d failed in her function. So what was left for them to do?
[I …] she started. [They’re throwing me away. I was never a person to them. Never.]
Had Will felt like this? Had he registered that look of bland calculation on their faces when they talked to him? That desperate desire to see him as less than a person because he was so much more?
She knew he had. She’d looked at him that way herself. She’d observed that hollowness in his eyes and exploited it – back before he handed the curse to her. She recalled how casually she’d messed with Will’s emotions all those years ago when she had no inkling of the depths of his isolation. She let out a guffaw of joyless laughter. How differently she’d treat him now.
What a fool she’d been. Who in their right might exploited unknown alien tech? But back then, everyone was doing it. The whole economy was based on stolen science. When the Transcended opened up all those new star systems, everything had changed. Yet that region had been home to the poor Fecund who’d borrowed tech from the Transcended and died from it. That should have been their clue. Instead, there was a boom in alien archaeology as humanity rifled through the ruins like rats in a dumpster.
With the boom had come the squabbling. Alien weapons were secretly stockpiled by both sides. Hence the perfectly logical plan to use the same approach to resolve the conflict. No matter that the tech they’d found wasn’t Fecund, or that it was dangerously advanced. They’d convinced themselves that action was necessary – that if they didn’t use Snakepit to prevent a war, it would surely start one. So they’d grabbed that world-sized weapon with both hands.
Ann had been paying for that stupidity ever since. They’d rolled her out for every genocidal horror they needed perpetrating. And Ann had always followed orders. Like a machine. And she was sick of it. Sick to death.
[Maybe you’re not seeing the upside,] said her shadow, somewhat wryly. [If this is how it ends, wouldn’t it be a meaningful way to go? What better finale to a life of battle could you want? And you get a free vacation. Could you ask for more?]
A laugh caught in Ann’s throat as she saw the bitter truth in her shadow’s words. This was her way out: the one she’d been waiting for. Of course she was going to make her exit count. And then, after forty-one years of fighting the good fight, Monet’s curse would finally be lifted.
2.4: MARK
Mark sat with Zoe in the public waiting area at Ritter Spaceport and tried to ignore the pillow fight happening around him. Across the great turfed expanse of the departures hall, between the glass columns and polychromatic seating clusters, giggling adults traded blows with state-supplied antibacterial cushions. For the fifth consecutive time, he refused a passing robot’s gentle attempt to press one of the soft weapons into his hands.
Hovering over the travellers’ heads, mini-blimps circled endlessly, displaying the kind of propaganda that had become a fixture of Galatean society.
‘Question authority – it’s your duty!’ read one.
‘Tolerating corruption is corruption!’ declared another.
The slogans were written in spiky, jiggling letters wearing bright, Psych Ops-engineered colours. Speakers played quirky, upbeat music with carefully mistimed beats. It sounded like a dance-party soundtrack being performed by malfunctioning robots.
They could have chosen to sit in the Quiet Corner, of course, with its gentle mood music and roving therapists, but Zoe hated that part of the lounge even more. So they stayed in the central concourse and suffered.
Mark understood the merits of organised social play. He just preferred to do it on his own terms rather than having fun dictated to him. As far as he was concerned, the waiting lounge was a perfect example of the weird social pressure the Photes had forced upon them. Nothing was simple any more. Not even the act of enjoying oneself. He hated the deadly serious water fights and the endless compulsory voting, the veiled humour and the not-so-veiled martial order. He longed for the day when they could all go back to being normal. More than that, he couldn’t wait to get the hell off Galatea and back to the relative sanity of his ship.
He fought the urge to retreat into his interface to block the whole place out. He and Zoe were trying to avoid making themselves obvious and ramping up their network footprint would only attract attention. Similarly, they could have simply commissioned a private shuttle. With their level of authorisation, they’d have been given their choice of vehicle. But that would also have made their movements obvious, and Mark didn’t want to give the bastards in Defence the opportunity to zero in on him. They weren’t hiding, exactly. He and Zoe just didn’t feel like giving the Fleet any more help than they’d already received.
His mood upon landing had been very different. While the two of them were transported under guard to the inevitable secure facility, he’d felt guilty and foolish. They’d screwed up, even if the people of Earth had made it out alive. He understood how close to disaster his recklessness had taken them and could feel the end of an era coming.
Mark had handed over a full memory dump and spent several days discussing his experience and motivations with an army of roboteer therapists. While not an official Galatean citizen, he felt a professional duty to the government that had hired him, and so had tolerated their every request to peer inside his head.
His feelings towards the Galateans had begun to change around the same time their questions had dried up. When Zoe had probed them about the next mission, the hedging started. So Mark had made the request more direct. Did the Galateans wanted to suspend them or kick them out? Or kill them, maybe? He got no reply, not even to his joke. He asked if they had new mission-limit guidelines they’d like him to abide by, or extra safeguards they wanted to implement on his ship. Nothing.
Shortly after that, he and Zoe had been parked in the officers’ resort and asked to wait.
While the resort had no shortage of luxurious amenities, its status as a kind of voluntary prison was clear. As the days rolled by with no information, he’d grown ever more restless. The impressive view across Sharptown One lost its appeal and their private pool started to feel awfully small. The resort began to resemble permanent enforced retirement. After two inscrutable weeks since their arrival, Galatea deciding to execute them no longer felt like a safe topic for satire.
True to form, Zoe had lost it first. ‘Fuck this!’ she declared one morning after another ideally nutritious but entirely predictable
breakfast. ‘So we fucked up. We still run the best damned embership in human space and we’re not helping anyone sitting here. I’m done with feeling guilty. I’d rather be saving lives.’ She slammed down her fork, and that was that.
She had a point. Human colonies were independent these days. They had to be. The Photes kept blockading communication routes, making centralised command impossible. Consequently, there was no shortage of jobs for skilled military pilots. And even if they sequestered the Kraken from him, they couldn’t take the Gulliver. They could go and help St Andrews instead. That place badly needed support. Its population was already smaller than Earth’s had been in its final weeks.
So they’d quietly checked out of the resort and headed straight for the local shuttle terminal. No one had stopped them. The Galateans were more subtle than that. Now Mark sat hoping that the shuttle arrived before the authorities.
‘Was what we did so goddamn wrong?’ he asked Zoe. ‘I mean, if that ark-hedge story hadn’t been totally in character, we’d never have fallen for it. If anyone needs to take a look at themselves, it’s Galatean-fucking-high-command.’
‘I’m with you,’ she said, ‘but the Academy’s unlikely to see it that way. We’re talking about an entire colony here. As fuck-ups go, this one was major.’
‘The Academy has been throwing lives away for years,’ Mark growled. ‘What did they expect from us? If they don’t like the way we work, that’s their lookout. We’ll fight someone else’s battles instead. They can’t stop us.’
The Gulliver and the Vartian Institute banner it flew under were protected by an old interplanetary treaty. In effect, their significance during the last forty years of human history had put them above the law, allowing them to retain privileges now impossible for others to acquire. It was the only reason they were allowed to fly without a ship full of subcaptains and social-accountability officers.
‘Don’t be so sure,’ said Zoe. ‘They might just arrange for our shuttle to have an accident so they can minimise their intelligence risk. Our disposability indices must be nosing into the yellow right now.’
Mark grimaced. Things had felt bad ever since they’d made the hand-off to the second carrier halfway home. They’d been given pretty short shrift by the admiral in charge and it was clear they were never going to be told where the people of Earth were headed next.
‘There are other carrier teams now,’ Zoe added, ‘with younger pilots who do what they’re told.’
It was no secret that the Galatean government hated making room for special-case citizens, particularly since the Second Surge. But just like Ann, Mark and Zoe were celebrities – useful as much for their propaganda value as their talents. The only reason they weren’t being mobbed in the departure hall was because their faces had been fashion-copied so often as to render the sight of them mundane. Mark bumped into near-lookalikes at least once a month and always found it unsettling.
A gentle gonging sound signalled boarding for the next orbital shuttle. The mini-blimps all swapped their messages to gate-indicators and robots started circling again, this time gathering the pillows that had been dropped – for DNA-testing, no doubt.
‘I can’t believe it,’ said Zoe as they strode for the exit. ‘We’re actually getting out of here.’
Then, as they neared the doorway, they caught sight of a familiar figure waiting for them – Ira Baron-Lecke. Mark’s heart sank. Reality reasserted itself as he realised they weren’t getting offworld after all. The Academy had sent the most persuasive force possible to collect them: an old friend.
Ira was hard to miss. He stood a little under a metre and a half tall and was almost as wide, with a head like a polished bullet. Mark sighed as he approached his former mentor.
They hadn’t seen each other in over a year and it surprised Mark how old Ira looked. Not in body, of course. Ever since age-reversal therapy had been perfected, letting yourself deteriorate unnecessarily had been considered a crime. Instead, Ira looked old in his eyes. You could feel the full century of his life experience in that gaze, along with all the weary weight it had brought.
‘Hi, Mark, Zoe,’ said Ira quietly. ‘You know why I’m here, right?’
Mark nodded. He noticed that the other travellers were suddenly giving them a lot of room – almost as if they’d all been in on the interception from the start. That sort of thing happened on Galatea.
‘Want to go somewhere and talk about it?’ Ira offered.
‘Sure,’ said Mark. ‘Whatever.’
Ira led the way towards the officers’ lounge and privacy spaces.
‘We haven’t seen you in ages, Ira,’ said Zoe cautiously as they walked. ‘How’ve you been doing?’
He replied with a shrug. ‘Oh, you know, so-so.’
Mark didn’t know. Until about ten years ago, Ira Baron had been the Fleet Admiral of IPSO, the de facto ruler of the entire human race. That was before the Second Surge, and the Suicide War. After that, they’d asked him to step down. Ira had been only too eager. Since then, he’d been in a kind of retirement limbo – running the odd errand for the Academy despite no longer having a formal position. Now he had no partner, no job and no responsibilities of any kind. Mark couldn’t imagine what that felt like. Of all of the ageing clique who effectively comprised humanity’s royal family, Ira’s role had changed most.
‘Lost some height, I see,’ said Zoe.
‘I let them stretch me for the political work,’ said Ira, ‘for public appearances and all that, but I was never comfortable with it. No point keeping those changes afterwards.’
‘Of course not,’ said Zoe.
She shot Mark a worried glance. Reversing a height augmentation was always a painful experience. It wasn’t a choice you made lightly.
Ira took them to a quiet room on the executive level with a view over the polychromatic concourse and ordered some drinks.
‘I’m having a Scotch,’ he said. ‘Anyone else?’
‘I’ll take one,’ said Mark.
Zoe huffed. ‘Gin,’ she said. ‘It’s almost lunchtime. And I don’t need this liver anyway.’
It was true. She had a spare growing aboard the Gulliver, but Mark knew she wasn’t thrilled by how the meeting was starting. Mark could metabolise away alcohol in minutes. Zoe had less effective augs. It was unclear whether Ira had retained any metabolic support at all.
‘So what happened?’ said Mark as they sat. ‘Are we on death row for crimes against humanity?’
‘Not exactly,’ said Ira. ‘They’ve okayed your mission to Backspace.’
Mark’s pithy comeback died in his throat. Something slid off a cliff inside him. ‘You’re kidding,’ he said.
‘Nope,’ said Ira. ‘You can even lead it, if you want.’
Mark groaned and rubbed his eyes. This was the prize he’d wanted more than anything – the chance to change the nature of the war. He’d spent years trying to prove himself worthy of that opportunity. Years of bargaining and campaigning and addressing every yes-but they threw at him. Now, apparently, he had what he wanted – as a punishment.
‘They’re getting us out of the way,’ he said.
Ira shrugged again. ‘The mission will be drawing together all those remaining people who might be able to secure Will’s help, just in case he’s still there. You and I are both on that list.’
Mark winced. He’d studied this project for years. At first, his fascination with the Depleted Zone had come from a desire to locate his half-mother Rachel. By the time the expected lifespan of her coma-storage system had passed, his team had found the second lure star. From that moment, Mark had been hooked. If there was a lure star, there had to be a gate. And if there was a gate, there had to be clear, navigable space beyond the Zone – space free of Phote blockades. That meant a chance to reach Snakepit, the way they had tried and failed to do at the start of the war.
‘Do you believe them?’ Mark asked Ira, his stomach turning over. ‘Is this actually real, or are they just burying us in space?�
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‘It’s real,’ said Ira. ‘And I believe in it. It’s the first piece of strategy I’ve felt good about for a while. Fighting the Photes on their terms isn’t getting us anywhere except dead. On the other hand, long-shot missions have pulled Galatea’s ass out of the fire before. I’ve seen them work. I’ve even flown them.’
‘They’re also what got us into this mess,’ Zoe interjected.
Ira held up a huge, meaty digit. ‘No,’ he said. ‘That was a conspiracy. The long-shot mission was what got us out of it.’
‘You call this out of the mess?’ said Zoe darkly.
‘I call us not dead yet,’ said Ira. ‘And that’s the point. Testing the unknown is how you make progress. Finding ever-smarter ways of staying safe is how you die. Plus,’ he added with a shrug, ‘it’s this or storage for me, so my decision isn’t difficult.’
‘Storage?’ said Zoe, appalled. ‘They’d do that to you?’
‘What other option do they have?’ he said with a chuckle. ‘They can’t kill me because I’m the great Ira Baron. But while I’m walking around, I’m an embarrassment.’ Ira waved her concern away. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘you guys both know you don’t get to walk away from this. The government understands your little gesture this morning, and frankly, I empathise. They know they share some of the culpability for what happened, so they’re changing their strategy. Which means you get your dream mission with a brand-new ship and a first-class crew. You can choose to participate in that if you want.’
‘What’s the alternative?’ said Zoe.
‘Nothing as good,’ said Ira. ‘The mission will go ahead without you. The Gulliver will stay here, for strategic reasons, and you’ll spend the next few months in another resort. It’s a nice one, but in a much smaller cavern. After that, you’re free to do what you like.’
‘Of course I’ll take the fucking job,’ Mark snapped. ‘You can’t dangle my life’s work in front of me and then tell me it’s leaving if I don’t play along. When do we go? Does Zoe have time to let her family know what’s happening?’