“No, Mr President,” he said. “If they can talk to us, they’re not interested in talking.”
“Maybe they’re talking to their prisoners,” Spencer said, hopefully. “Ambassador Prachthauser could tell them how to communicate with the government, couldn’t he?”
“If they’re interested,” Paul said. “They might be being sucked dry of everything they know about us.”
The President rubbed his eyes. “Major Neilson, tell me about the civilian population? How are they coping with the…war?”
Neilson, one of the military officers Paul didn’t know, leaned forward. “It’s really too early to tell, Mr President,” he said. “The vast majority of citizens stocked up on food, drink and emergency supplies during the week before the predicted arrival date and should be fine, those who remained in the cities. Hundreds of thousands set out of the cities and are scattered all over the countryside. Civilian morale is hard to measure at the moment, but people are scared; we’ve already had riots in a dozen cities and an upsurge in looting and other crimes. Those who are without electric power are actually taking it worst; there seems to be a belief that the entire country is coming to an end and they’re taking it out on everything. Some lit fires which started to get out of control. The lucky ones with power are coping better, but that might change…”
He paused. “You have to talk to them, sir,” he added. “The country hasn’t been shocked like this since Pearl Harbour. 9/11 was a pinprick compared to this and…well, there’s a lot of speculation out on the internet, some of it pretty accurate. If they get the idea we’re losing the war…”
General Hastings fixed him with a look. “That’s another issue, son,” he said, not unkindly. “What about the damaged bases and facilities?”
“The death toll near the bases and the other targeted facilities was pretty high,” Neilson said. “FEMA reports that the destroyed harbours and dams caused massive flash floods. The survivors are being helped as best as we can, but our resources are badly overstretched and we can’t help everyone.”
The President’s eyes narrowed. “Are you telling me that we’re going to abandon American citizens?”
Neilson looked terrified. “No, Mr President,” he said, “but I must caution you that we’re not going to be able to save everyone. We were never allowed to raise a stockpile of disaster recovery equipment in every state and the equipment we do have is often in the wrong place to be helpful. We daren’t launch aircraft, even helicopters, and some of the roads have been bashed up. The response from the locals has been very good, but they don’t have the right equipment, and in some cases they have even tried to refuse to allow us to use it.”
“Seize it,” Deborah suggested, angrily. “I cannot believe that anyone would be so selfish while the country is under attack. We need that gear, so take it off them and put it to use saving lives!”
“We have done,” Neilson admitted. “In a few days, we should know just how bad it is all over the United States, but at the moment, the best we can really do is accept the fact that local command has devolved down to the state level or lower and let them get on with it. Once we have a full and accurate report of the state of the nation, we can begin shuttling equipment around the country, although it will be years before we can recover from this.”
“It’s probably worse everywhere else,” General Hastings said dryly. “I took part in a study of the Russian infrastructure and if the aliens destroyed only a handful of vital points, they’re going to be completely fucked.”
The President gave him a reproving glance. “We might need the Russians,” he said. Paul knew that he was right. “What are the aliens going to do to take advantage of the chaos they’ve caused?”
Paul yawned and desperately tried to cover it. “I don’t know,” he said, tiredly. He really needed a few hours sleep and a shower. He probably wouldn’t get them anytime soon. “I think, however, that the choice about what happens next isn’t ours, but theirs. The aliens will decide the next move.”
Chapter Eleven
I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires.
-Susan B. Anthony
The massive hanger bay normally carried the spaceplanes that would be used to carry the believers down to the surface of their new world. Now, the craft had been moved back to the rear section of the Guiding Star, allowing the space to be used for the remains of the human space station and the handful of captured satellites. The space station had fallen easily, almost without a shot being fired, and enough of it had been captured to allow the researchers to study the remains. The other researchers would examine the human captives, but for Researcher Femala, there was nothing quite like examining the human technology. It promised to be the most interesting – and productive – line of investigation.
The space station, after a few cycles of study, had been…puzzling. It hadn’t been hard to locate and identify most of the components and there was nothing really new in its design, but some of the technology was more advanced than she had expected. A race that had a space program was a rarity, as far as they knew, but those that had had a space program had pushed it to the limit. This race seemed to combine advanced computers and technology with a space program that was barely enough to maintain twelve people in orbit. The spacecraft that had, however futilely, opposed them in orbit had been junk, primitive junk…and yet some of the tech she was looking at was more advanced than any she’d seen before. Were it not the foulest blasphemy, she would have wondered if it were more advanced than that of the Takaina.
Or maybe it’s a gift, she thought, with a certain amount of wry amusement. The Takaina had never encountered a race more advanced than their own, but if they were to locate one, it was well that they had located one that had never bothered to actually use what it had developed. It was a certain sign of carelessness and, perhaps, a warning that the Takaina themselves were falling behind what was expected of them. The human race, given a relatively few cycles of warning, might have been able to really hurt the expedition; she’d watched in horror as several of the parasite vessels had been blown out of space by their weapons. They’d suffered worse, of course, but…
“Researcher,” a voice said, from behind her. Femala twisted in space to see the High Priest, floating behind her, watching as her people swarmed over the alien wreckage. She twisted her head into the closest one could come to a full genuflection in zero-gravity, wondering why the High Priest had chosen to come talk to her in person. He rarely had anything to do with anyone below the level of a Priest, apart from the military officers. “What can you tell me about our new friends?”
Femala caught the undertone in his voice and shivered. According to a strict interpretation of the Ways of Takaina, she should have been exiled from her people…which in interstellar space meant certain death when she left the starship without a spacesuit. A sterile female was useless for breeding children and her undoubted competence at science and technology wasn't enough to make up for the fact that she wouldn’t carry new scientists and warriors to term. The High Priest had intervened to save her life…and she still didn’t know why.
“They’re advanced,” she admitted bluntly. Her special case gave her a certain amount of freedom from the constraints of normal Takaina society. She no longer had a Clan who could be held accountable for her actions. No one could subject her to the informal inter-Clan discipline that kept the majority of society in line. She knew, from her studies of the starship that had carried them to their new world, that such measures were necessary, but that didn’t make them any easier to bear. “Some of their tech is primitive, but the rest is actually as capable as our own, if not more so.”
“Really?” The High Priest asked, with interest. He, at least, didn’t seem to care about the possible inference that the belief that their status as the most advanced race known in the universe wasn’t divinely ordained. “And yet, they were unable to prevent us from seiz
ing the high ground.”
“Yes,” Femala agreed. Her position did give her a certain insight into how the higher echelons worked. The High Priest had probably decided that their ordained superiority still held true; after all, the aliens hadn’t bothered to develop their capabilities to the point where they could destroy Guiding Star in flight. That was the real nightmare.
The High Priest listened as she ran through the handful of discoveries they’d made so far. There was, as she freely admitted, nothing that was new, but much that was surprising. Dozens of alien devices were understandable, but their use was confounding; she couldn’t imagine a use for a device that propelled a stream of hot air, unless it was for localised drying of alien skin. Others were just strange, if understandable; one advanced computer seemed to be useless for anything, as far as they could tell, while another had disintegrated when they’d tried to open it. They hadn’t found anything that was an obvious weapon, but the warriors who’d gone through the space station first had suggested all kinds of possible weapons, based on their experience of drilling in space. A little ingenuity could convert some of the human devices into weapons easily enough…
“We must proceed,” the High Priest said finally. “You will accompany me.”
Femala wanted to argue – she didn’t have any special interest in the aliens, apart from their technology – but one didn’t argue with the High Priest, particularly one who’d saved her life. She followed him meekly through the airlock, through the security check, and along the corridors, silently cursing the lack of gravity. Normally, when both sections of Guiding Star were linked together, there would be gravity, but with a planet of hostile aliens below them, the commanders had taken the decision to keep Guiding Star in zero-gee. If they had to alter course quickly, it would save them from accidentally damaging their own ship.
The handful of alien bodies recovered from the space station, all dead through exposure or suffocation, had been quickly studied and then dissected. Femala watched, dispassionately, as the first alien body was checked, carefully, for any surprises. The Doctor examining the body barely spared her a glance and Femala felt the old hatred bubbling up within her; the doctor could have children, as many children as she wanted, and she had a safe place within society. Femala had none.
“We can survive on their world,” the Doctor said, ignoring Femala. The High Priest didn’t reprimand her for that. Why should he have? “Their biochemistry is different from ours, obviously, but we should be able to eat some of their foods and grow our own crops on the surface. The subject froze quickly enough to allow us to study the bacteria and viruses running through the body and we believe that the chances of a cross-species infection are extremely low. They may have the same basic body shape, but their interior is very different…”
Femala listened absently as she droned on. Her attention was taken up by the images coming from the humans in their cells. The Inquisitors would be asking them questions about everything and nothing, carefully comparing the answers to try to detect alien lies, if they decided to tell lies. They’d intercepted literally billions of transmissions from the alien world – they called it Earth, it seemed – but most of them had been completely confusing. Humans seemed to spend a great deal of their time watching other humans doing normal human things…which puzzled the sociologists no end. The best they’d been able to come up with was that they were instructional films to teach younger humans to be adults, but that made no sense at all. A race that needed to be taught so comprehensively, covering every imaginable situation, was a race on the brink of extinction. What sort of race needed instruction on how to mate?
The human race just didn’t make sense!
***
Francis had started to lose track of time. The alien cell had remained firmly closed and they’d started questioning him at once. Some of the questions had been simple and easy to understand and he’d spent hours explaining how the United States actually worked, others had been plain confusing. The aliens had displayed an image of Bugs Bunny at one point, followed by Bart Simpson, and had asked him to explain just what they were. It just didn’t make sense!
Or maybe it does, he thought, as he found himself being gently awakened by the alien voice. They’d let him sleep in brief periods, but without his watch, it was impossible to tell how long he’d been in the hell the aliens had created for him. It felt as if his entire world had shrunk down to the metal cell and the questioning, impersonal voice. They just kept questioning him…and they never made the same mistake twice. He had started to suspect that he was actually talking to a computer, one with a computer’s odd sense of priorities, but again, it was impossible to tell. The whole position was unpleasantly like some of the drills he’d been run through by the State Department, before he'd been sent to London; they’d known that, these days, Ambassadors were hardly respected by anyone. Francis had once supported measured responses, rather than a modern-day version of the Relief of Peking, but now…now, he would have been grateful to see the United States Marines bursting down the metal hatch to rescue him. Hundreds of kilometres from home, cut off from the handful of remaining humans on the ship, it was easy to believe that he’d been abandoned…
The hatch opening shocked him. The two aliens who stood there beckoned him forward, taking care that he never got between them. Francis found that rather amusing; they’d probably spent most of their lives in zero-gee and they were worried that an out-of-shape ambassador was going to overpower them. Their weapons looked useable, but they might have been keyed to their touch only…and even if he did steal one of the weapons and kill them, where would he go? One man couldn’t overwhelm an entire alien ship unless he was a star in a bad movie.
They pushed him gently down the corridor into a large room. It was as bare and undecorated as the remainder of the ship, but there was a large porthole set within the wall, open to space. He saw the blue-green globe of Earth orbiting below, caught a sight of the eastern coastline of the United States, and felt a pang of homesickness that was almost painful. There was no sign of anything man-made in orbit now, nothing, but a handful of alien ships, barely visible.
“Francis,” a voice called. Francis turned to see Gary there. The ISS commander looked as if he’d been through the wringer as well; there was a dark bruise on one side of his face and at least two days worth of stubble on his chin. The aliens were escorting the others into the room; the two girls looked tired, but very relieved to see them. Katy even gave Gary a hug in zero-gee. The Russian and Frenchman looked tired as well; Stanislav was sporting his own bruise, on his chest.
“Had a little disagreement with the doc,” he said, when Francis looked at it. “The guards struck me and…well, you see.”
Katy winced. “I have some first aid training,” she said. “Do you want me to take a look at it?”
“I’ll live,” Stanislav said, firmly. He looked over at the aliens, gathering at one end of the room. “I think our hosts want to tell us something.”
The alien leader, the one wearing a gold medallion, seemed to drift forward slightly, coming to face the humans. Two other aliens, both female, stayed behind him; the guards watching the humans from their positions. Francis wondered, looking at one of the females, if she had been the doctor who’d examined him; the marking on her forehead was the same.
“You will be returned to your homeworld,” the alien leader said, his voice echoing in the room. Francis realised, suddenly, that there was almost no airflow in the room at all, something that could be very dangerous in space. Did the aliens even need to breathe? They clearly heard, but where were their ears? The sides of their heads were bare. “You will carry with you our message to your people.”
Here it comes, Francis thought, dryly. Having sucked their human captives dry, they would proceed to make what use of them they could. Returning them from orbit would be a gesture, but, more than that, it would be a sign that they were prepared to open communications, if only on their terms. They held the more powerful pos
ition, he knew, so…well, they could determine their own terms and make others stick to them. How very…human of them.
“We have come to bring you the Word,” the alien leader said. “Your people will hear the Word and will become one with us, with the Takaina.” Francis felt his heart race suddenly, thinking hard – was that their name? “You will join us in our worship of God.”
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