Seeds of Memory

by J. Richard Jacobs

  Prang was wealthy, of course, but a worthless, spineless bloodworm who was about as popular as a shagrat in a Neather's cupboard. Villers, a man no one trusted, would not be welcome in the top slot. There was something about that man, Villers, that bothered everyone, something you knew was there but couldn't quite put your finger on. Those two represented no problem, and Washton fully intended to take care of them anyway, regardless of what happened with Su.

  But Su—Su would be first. Washton was tired of being humiliated by the man who had put that gash in his desk.

  * * *

  Chapter VII

  “First pulse field initiated at 0750, Alex. Second field will commence at 1750. SESC 128 Alpha is moving into our track ahead. Range, five thousand kilometers. Commands?"

  Guchi. The damned fool.

  “Not yet, Rammix. Advise me when we are ten minutes from minimum avoidance."

  “Yes, Alex."

  Pax opened the station com frequency again and hailed SSC Chief Yamaguchi. A full three minutes passed before his image materialized.

  Dimwitted psychological games.

  Pax was beyond game-playing. She pulled the trigger on time—she was going to Gamma Volantis.

  “Yes, Pax. What is it?"

  “Are you responsible for pushing that freighter into our path?"

  “I am. Listen to me Pax, shut it down and come on back. We can have this all straightened out in less than two hours. The legals tell me it's just a formality, but they are bound by regulations to bring you two before the commission, and I'm stuck with that. I have to do what they tell me."

  “No, Guchi. You put the head jerk on. I want to talk to that imbecile before we all have to feel sorry for what's about to happen here."

  “Aw, Pax, please. You have a two hundred year envelope you're working in. What difference is a couple of hours going to make?"

  “As far as the mission is concerned, none. As far as I'm concerned, that's another story. During prep over here I've come to some startling realizations, Guchi, and don't bother asking me about them because, even if I felt like explaining, and I don't, there's no way you'd ever understand. Now, move that freighter."

  “Can't, Pax. Sorry."

  Pax ground her teeth at his response. They understood nothing. There was absolutely no way ordinary people could know. Pax was certain that all the Finders, in their own way and time, arrived at similar conclusions, conclusions that were—unavoidable. Maybe not in specific detail, but assuredly in basic nature. They had all been asked to give up everything that they had been, including their connection to Earth and all her cultural trappings (or should that be traps?) to make an indelible change, and every one of them had made that commitment with a willingness that could only be described as zeal. For the Finders, there would be no retrieval of a previous life. It would be ancient history, and so would they. All of the Finders would become living fossils of a time long past, in a history perhaps forgotten.

  What sort of person would volunteer to do that? One who valued their ties, family, life-style, commitments, even Earth herself? Not likely. Explorers, ancient or modern, of Earth or the solar system, had the idea that they could or would return and that their discoveries, their findings, would be minimally heralded as at least interesting. Not so with the crews of the Finder flights. They were going out to make contact with engineered humans living in unknown, alien environments.

  With the Finder missions there was no way to predict anything. Maybe the original colonists had been welcomed by an indigenous species when they'd arrived. Then again, maybe they had fought over something or other and won ... or lost. Perhaps they had become part of the food chain in their new home, and no one could know whether they had taken a high link in that chain, or somewhere ... else—near the bottom. Suppose it had been possible for them to crossbreed with an indigenous species and they'd melted away into something part human and part ... something else—something alien. The list of possibilities was endless, but one thing was now shining clear to Pax; none of the Finders could have been the least bit content with what had been their prior lives. They were all aliens at home and all at home with the alien. Would any of them be fortunate enough to discover whatever they sought at the far end? Unknown, but then, that was the whole idea, wasn't it?

  “Move that freighter, Guchi."

  The segments of the iris peeled back, and Lavan drifted through, crabbing slightly to compensate for the minute acceleration of phase one pulse. Pax switched off the audio transmit but left the video on, so Yamaguchi wouldn't think she had cut him off again, and waited while Lavan snapped her hardwire connector onto her shell.

  “I've been listening in down there,” Lavan said. There was a firmness in her voice Pax hadn't heard before. “You have the slightest idea why they're pushing us over something like last night?"

  “Not even part of a clue, but I'm not shutting Hermes down."

  “Good. Have you thought about how much it costs to move a freighter the mass of Old Ironsides? Plenty, I can tell you. Takes a crew of twenty to make sure she doesn't turn into a fireball during the preheat cycle—and she eats bundles of hydrogen doing it. She's an old line freighter from before the dark years. They used that one, Old Ironsides, as a roidlet collector when I was stationed in the Belt. What they're saying they want from us isn't worth that much—it's something else they don't want to tell us."

  Yamaguchi looked impatient and tighter than a trumpeter's lips. Pax turned the audio back on.

  “All right, Guchi. Suppose you tell me what's really going on, but I suggest you do it soon—before I put Old Ironsides out of her misery ... or worse."

  “I've told you all I know, Pax. We have a crew of over—"

  Another figure pushed Yamaguchi aside, and the chinless, hairless, colorless face of an SESC diplomat named Dominici came into view. Pax's opinion of the man was less than pleasant, stemming from their first encounter during the primary phase of training for Finder. To Pax, he looked like a melting wax dummy. His large, pale-as-death eyes sagging downward at the corners, the tip of his nose overhanging his upper lip, and his scalp, a firm-fitting, pallid helmet with faint brown spots, all served to heighten the illusion. When he spoke she was certain his pants were several sizes too small.

  “Lead Officer Pax, Dr. Lavan ... this is Cultural Contact Council Director, Roland Dominici. We want you to shut down Hermes and return to the station. That is a direct order from Finder Flight Chief of Operations, Dean Whitaker."

  “Tell us why."

  “I'm not at liberty to—"

  “Then get someone who is."

  “I can't divulge—"

  “You—of all people—should be more aware of what we can do than the JS9 crew is, Dominici, and we are prepared to do what we have to, so speak to me."

  “I don't have enough information to give you any details, Pax."

  “Pinch the details and stick them some place dark. Just give us the general idea."

  “All right, Pax. All right. All I can tell you is what I was told. There is ... there is ... some kind of ... glitch in the program—it's for your own good—now, shut it down."

  * * * *

  “You're telling me three have already gone and one is threatening to vaporize JS9? That we have contained only two of the six?"

  “Yes, sir. That's about it."

  “My god, I can't believe I'm hearing this, Whitaker."

  Whitaker watched the color of the plump, loose-fleshed man overflowing the chair of the president of United Surface Earth change from bureaucratic bland to the pink of near vessel-bursting pressure and wondered how a jellyfish with such obvious lack of internal discipline had accomplished ascendancy to this high office.

  “Mr. President, haven't you been reading our reports?"

  “Yes, yes, yes—I have been reading your cursed reports, Whitaker, but what good are those stinking reports if we have four lunatic squads fanning out at sixty-eight percent of the speed of light, huh? What good are they?"

/>   “That's fifty-nine percent, sir—and they're not lunatic squads. True, the gene therapy and mental conditioning has taken an unforeseen turn, but they're as sane as anyone else you would call normal. You're making it sound like some fiendish plot to take over a world they are trying to get away from and, from what I know of them, you could say they're trying with considerable enthusiasm."

  “Isn't it? Isn't it, Whitaker? For all we know, you may even be the one behind it. They're yours, right?"

  “With all due respect, sir—that is patently absurd."

  “Absurd, is it? Sane? You call the openly hostile opposition to USE policies sane? Normal? Dammit man, they are dangerous ... and you know it."

  Dangerous? Perhaps. Part of the gene therapy and mental conditioning was intended to enhance survival instincts, to make them a little more resistant to the stress of alien conditions. Designed to make them more capable, more fiercely human. So the outcome was a little on the extreme side. Certainly the actions of Pax and Lavan on JS9 had made that clear, but, to Whitaker, their actions were more desirable than passivity. As far as he was concerned, it was safer to have them out there than gnashing their collective teeth against Earth's frustrating status quo.

  At the moment, the SESC had six hundred and two hyper-humans on their way back to Earth, and if they were successful in stopping Hermes it would be nine hundred and three. If Pax made dust out of JS9, the crews they had in custody would see it as a sign, a heroic symbol. What would be their reaction to that? Whitaker was opposed to the effort to detain Pax. The Hermes should go. And what about the two crews already contained? They, too, should go. They all should go. Perhaps even he should go.

  “Mr. President, these people don't need to demonstrate their loyalty to USE. They do need to demonstrate a willingness to put themselves in harm's way and the toughness to survive the experience. If they do survive, and I stress the if, they're not going to organize the colonists, if there are any colonists alive out there, and lead an invading horde back to us."

  “Oh? And where is your guarantee of that, huh? My advisors tell me they may do just that. Well, Whitaker?"

  “Oh, for god's sake, man, listen to yourself. The closest Finder won't reach its objective until ninety years from now—maybe a hundred before they make contact ... if they are successful in finding a surviving colony. And if we assume everything went well for the original colonists, which is doubtful, they'll be technologically primitive by our standards—at best."

  “So? What the hell is that supposed to mean?"

  “So, let's assume further that our people decide they want to convince the colonists that it would be worth their while to come back here and claim their birthright. For the sake of argument, let's say that they're successful in doing that. How long do you think it would take for them to get themselves into a position to actually do it? One ... two more centuries maybe, then another in transit. That's four ... five hundred years, Mr. President. Five hundred years before they could conceivably be back in our system, using the technology they may or may not be able to develop in the time available to them. And what would we have been doing during that time? Going backward? I think what I'm witnessing here is the birth of a new mental disorder. What shall we call it? Colonophobia?"

  Whitaker had been subjected to the same preparatory treatments and therapies as the regular crews. He and several of his top officers had volunteered to serve as alternates on the off-chance someone dropped out or was injured beyond repair during the long training period. He had noticed no changes in himself that would indicate the problems envisioned by their spineless slob of a president and his obviously not-too-bright lackeys.

  “I believe it would be the simplest and safest solution, sir, to put the other two crews back where they belong. And I suggest we do it as quickly as possible—before we suffer more serious difficulties at JS9 and at home."

  “Mm-hmm. Well, all right, Whitaker. All right. I'll want to take this up with my staff before I make a decision. In the meantime, stay here in Mars Central and be ready to consult with my experts at a moment's notice. That's all, for now."

  A back-handed wave and a, ‘That's all, for now.’ The decision, Whitaker knew, was going to be a continuation of the present paranoid policy. They were going to try to stop the Hermes, in spite of knowing it couldn't be done. He raised his two meters of heavily muscled body to attention, snapped a salute to the garden slug in the president's chair, and left. He had some things that needed his attention before the whole project, less four, came unglued.

  * * * *

  When Pax looked at Lavan, what she saw was a little girl brandishing a mischievous grin that caused wrinkles to appear where there were none normally. She almost looked her age, until she winked and Pax was forced to laugh out loud. After regaining her composure she asked Rammix for the latest information on SESC 128 Alpha. The Rammix told her the ship, including her cargo train, was eight hundred four meters in length. She was run by a working crew of one hundred, plus a tech crew of twelve. She had no weapons and was made of old Earth alloys. The ship was unable to get out of her own way pushing an unloaded twenty-five hundred mass tons with an antiquated fusion plant that spewed every kind of dirty radiation known.

  “What do you think, Marta?

  “Call them and let them decide. That's all we can do. If they decide to stay, they'll have to suffer the consequences—that's all."

  Pax nodded her agreement and had the Rammix make the connection. She didn't want anyone hurt. Not any of the innocents, anyway.

  “Hello, Hermes, this is Ironsides, LO Martin Reese in the driver's seat. A very good morning to you. Nice day for a trip to a distant star, isn't it? To what do I owe the honor of this call to my humble hauler?"

  “Have you checked your sensors recently?"

  “Nope. The system's been shut down for repairs—again. Why?"

  “You're in a direct line with our path out of orbit, and we have initiated first pulse. We can still maneuver around you, but your hull is going to be hit by a pretty heavy spray of neutrons if you're near those coordinates in six hours."

  “Hey, now, that's serious stuff. I have plenty of plasma in the pot, and the blast tray is hot enough to take a couple of bursts without damage. I can probably swing this train around and be out of your way in two hours, maybe less. We're running blind, but it's nothing we haven't done before. How does that sound?"

  “Stay right where you are, Reese."

  Guchi, you raving lunatic.

  “And you can take a long flight in a small universe, Yamaguchi. I'm not going to have my old girl crystallized for you or anyone else and, at last report, my crew can still make babies. My ship remains intact, and my crew stays productive. Got that?"

  Where were you when I was looking for a real man, Reese?

  “Rotten piece of work, Guchi. You knew they couldn't see us."

  “Orders, Pax. As for you, Reese, you move that ship, and I'll see that you face charges."

  “You go right ahead and do that. Facing charges is how I won the pleasure of running this old wreck. Pax?"

  “What, Reese?"

  “What is your first name?"

  “Alex—Alexandra. Why?"

  “And your destination?"

  “Volans. Gamma Volantis."

  “We're having our first in January, and we've been name-hunting. How does Alexandra Volans Reese sound to you?"

  128 Alpha's twin tubes flared, and the clumsy assembly of freight boxes, pressure spheres, and bulky hydrogen mangler, all held together by a flimsy network of girders, wires, and tubes moved slowly off screen into the deep black of surrounding emptiness. Reese smiled at Pax from the com, a line of gleaming white on a rich chocolate background. A tear that was wandering around in his eye broke free and drifted out of view as he said, “This may sound a little stupid, but ... but I wish I was going with you, Alexandra. Do me a favor and say hello to the stars for me?"

  “That's not stupid at all, Martin. I'll not only say it,
I'll shout it—and as soon as we find something worthy, we'll name it for you."

  Reese blew her a kiss, pushed a big thumbs up at the screen, then cut the connection.

  “Pax, you're not going to get away from here. I think it is only fair to warn you that I've been given orders to shoot if you don't comply."

  “Did Whitaker give you that order?"

  “No, Pax. That one came straight from the president. Are you going to shut it down, or do I have to follow that order?"

  Pax cut the audio again. What did the president have to do with Finder, and what glitch could possibly be worth all this?

  “Well, Marta, what do you think?"

  “Well-l-l, I think I like Reese, and I believe that idiot back there is going to shoot if we don't stop. Too bad we can't cycle up faster."

  “Right. Too bad for Guchi. Rammix."

  “Yes, Alex."

  “Erase all SESC protocols. Go to full range defensive and lock aft particle pulse weapons on JS9's core."

  “Status change complete. Target acquired."

  “Thank you, Rammix. Stand by."

  A quick scan of the panel showed phase one elapsed time as four hours, twenty minutes, and their velocity relative to JS9 was a blazing one hundred eighty-three meters per second. Not exactly what one could call a quick getaway. They were now a bit over fourteen hundred kilometers from the gaseous hulk of Jupiter and beginning their slow spiral outward, but still an easy shot for the station's weapons. Pax toggled the audio.

  “It's your call now, Guchi. How do you want this to go?"

  “Peacefully, Pax. Are you shutting down?"

  “No."

  “Pax."

  “No, Guchi."

  “Pax ... this is your last chance to—"

  Yamaguchi's eyes flicked up to something above the com-cam and his color went pale as the dingy white bulkhead behind him.

  “What the hell? Devreaux, give me...” Yamaguchi reached over and shut off the audio, and Pax watched as a series of silent orders were passed from him to others in the control compartment. Then the screen flickered, stuttered and went blank.