Tethered Worlds: Blue Star Setting

by Gregory Faccone

  The sun was setting on Adams Rush, the horizon's lavenders giving way to pink and orange. In the reclaimed and manicured suburban areas around the city, a daypark was nestled atop a hill. It glowed with the light of midday from industrial sized lumies floating above its fields.

  Tiny flurries fell, but wind from below churned them upward into random swirls. The sensation at sunset, with the multiple light sources refracting through the icy crystals, was akin to being in an ancient snow globe. It was a pleasing effect that attracted people to the daypark during winter months.

  The edge of the park facing the city was left intentionally rocky. A decision made, no doubt, by the early planners when they were wrestling this area into submission with arability terraformation. Old Roy Hodges was known to have loved the open spaces and natural rock formations of early Adams Rush. The heritage of enjoying the untamed wild he passed down was, unfortunately to some, becoming less the norm with each passing decade.

  One person, who preferred to venture no farther from the city than the suburbs, stood on a sculpted overlook. She leaned on a railing fashioned of man-made stone. Her cascading mane of yellowish blonde hair moved subtly with the changing winds.

  SloanVessna Doubravka was Jordahk's age, but more mature. Not emotionally, but physically. The former couldn't help but develop continuously over the 36, sometimes turbulent years of long adolescence. But the latter didn't kick in fully until the final half-dozen. And SloanVessna's had kicked-in rather grandly. In the two years since Jordahk had last seen her, she had blossomed into quite a woman.

  "Were you scared?" She tilted her head back in a decidedly feminine way, gazing at the early stars. "Doing whatever you did up there, with all those ships firing."

  "Sure, but mostly in spikes. The rest of the time it was a lot of tension punctuated with frantic action."

  Jordahk couldn't help it that his name had gotten around, but he wasn't going to add any details.

  "Max," Jordahk sub-whispered, "What's Sloan been doing the past two years?"

  "Looks like she went back to annex for training in software integration," the AI link-said so only Jordahk could hear. "Apparently started hanging out with that crowd."

  "Any..." Jordahk hesitated. "Relationships?"

  SloanVessna was wearing a long sleeved, black bodysuit, a style she had been just starting to favor at the end of their relationship. It clung to all of her new curves. She wasn't athletic, but her classic good looks didn't require it. On her feet she wore what looked to be tall, single-function boots, not treaders. Her retro-simplistic outfit was completed by an extra long, colorful scarf, wrapped fashionably around her neck. There was no need for additional winter clothes, not with her warming bodysuit.

  "Will you let me press through some low-level encryption?" Max asked privately.

  "Naw," Jordahk sub-whispered. "Just curious. Never mind."

  He was wearing his reassembled coat and the rest of the fancy clothes Aristahl had given him. He was also carrying his sling bag, which contained the hopefully temporary, clunky grister. SloanVessna wasn't carrying a defense weapon, not that she had many options to hide one in her outfit. She still refused to carry, not even the smallest spasm-shock stunner.

  Was he still the same person she had known? With maturing perspective, he saw her mindset more attuned to the capital's academia, or perhaps even the Hex worlds. It was an attitude you wouldn't expect from someone born and bred on Adams Rush.

  "I saw your buddy Durn in the city on his book tour," SloanVessna said.

  "Durn Stobahn wrote a book?"

  "Well, it was a postbook."

  A postbook sounded more plausible. They were short-format, usually written with a literary AI, and crafted immediately into AI generated simVADs for those who didn't want to read.

  "A postbook? Trendy. Max, can you find it?"

  "You know, kid," Max said, "sometimes you're even more old-fashioned than me."

  "I see you still have Max," SloanVessna said. It was her first upbeat tone.

  "Nice meeting you again, Sloan," the AI said.

  "Yeah." Jordahk was amazed how the cantankerous AI endeared himself to so many. "Max, where's Stobahn now?"

  "You're going to like this. He's gone on a publicity tour to the Palisades, trying to hawk his postbook."

  Jordahk rolled his eyes. SloanVessna noticed. "Why shouldn't he get a little fame and prosperity? He did earn the Noble Edge after all."

  Jordahk turned to the horizon, realizing how much he had changed, and SloanVessna had not, at least on the inside.

  Next year would be Investiture for them both. On Adams Rush that meant they'd be able to vote, own property, and participate in the issue tallies. No doubt SloanVessna was planning a big gala.

  The girl wasn't all hard, corded muscle like Glick, an infatuation from the year before that almost became a relationship. SloanVessna couldn't bruise him a thousand ways, as demonstrated that very day by his mother. Even Solia could hold her own in a quick spar. His ex-girlfriend was the only woman close to him who couldn't possibly kick his butt. It was a strange relief.

  "They've taken the last of it away." She pointed to the horizon were the beam shone up into space, tracing it with her finger. The mostly intact egress had been disassembled once again, more completely this time, and carted away in superhaulers. "I hear it's going to Patram, or the Palisades."

  "The Palisades won that argument," he said, "although I think it would've been safer at Patram." The latter was his mother's homeworld. The Patram Guard was likely the single largest, and most respected starmada in the Asterfraeo.

  Despite SloanVessna's urban attitude, or as much of one as you could have on Adams Rush, he felt comfortable around her. She was who she was, and he knew where she was coming from. She probably felt the same way. Both their lives were changing. Perhaps this meeting was just for a touch of the old familiar. He didn't blame her, it was long overdue.

  They exchanged smiles, communicating much in silent acknowledgment. He stepped closer to her, putting his back to the sunset. Its last warm rays illuminated the Thule-Riss's peaks. He seemed to look at the mountain range a lot at this time of day.

  The colonizers of Adams Rush were proud, having reclaimed a less-than-hospitable planet. In the days during the war, when legendary Thule-Riss Quext allegedly spent time in those mountains, it was a hardy lot who looked up to him from below.

  Nowadays, he thought it unlikely that people like SloanVessna would tolerate the presence of a powerful Sojourner in their midst. There was no doubt, after the events of the Egress Incident, that Adams Rush was changing. Though that round had been won, a new mindset was evolving. One that had taken over many worlds. To the cosmopolitan it was progress. But to people who liked to venture forth, uninhibited by those who would mind their business, it was anathema.

  In 50 years would his homeworld still be considered frontier? Or would it be one less world where those with the freespacer mindset would go. Some worlds had matured and yet retained their founding mindset. Patram came to mind, and he doubted mystic-based Demeter would ever change. Even Chryson Genos, a place with few societal constraints, continued to attract the same type of colonist they had a century before. He hoped the future of the frontier mindset wasn't limited to the Strident Cluster, the Far Worlds, or whatever places lay beyond their local clusters.

  Though many no longer fit into Roy Hodges's treaders, Jordahk felt he had to protect the legacy of cooperation between Sojourner and colonist, freespacer and cosmopolitan. He wasn't sure how, but Adams Rush was a big place. Perhaps it started with protecting people like SloanVessna.

  It was a mystic ship crafted during the war at the famed, long gone staryard Adranus. Although top-of-the-line, and crafted by Sojourners and imprimaturs, at the time it was not considered terribly remarkable. That was before the tide of centuries swept mystic advancement away.

  Today, the power of its largely defensive weaponry, the efficiency of its shield controllers, and even the downhi
ll speeds made possible by its starkeel put it in the exceptional category. But a ship's offensive specs were paramount when starmada commanders filled their semi-peacetime squadron rosters. Thus a peculiar division of Perigeum Starmada, who originally captured the ship during the war, were never pressured to give it up.

  Besides, it took years to dissect, analyze, and duplicate as much as possible the mystic technology it contained. As it turned out, the greatest value the ship offered was not in its mystic parts or even its starkeel, but rather the ship's AI itself. The Forward Scout Support class was designed to operate autonomously for long periods. It needed a brain of sufficient, independent reasoning power. Most manned fleet ships didn't require such attributes.

  For many years the peculiar division found no way to reprogram it to serve new masters, at least not without destroying all the reasoning that made it so valuable. Only when the first of their mysterious leaders intervened was the AI coerced to serve, though still not turned.

  Mystic AIs couldn't be duplicated. In many ways, those of Sojourner creation couldn't even be matched. But with the help of imprimaturs, mystic/scientum hybrid AIs were closing the gap, at least when it came to raw power rather than personality.

  The peculiar division was obsessed with all things mystic, absorbing all such information into their hierarchy of secrecy. They were the Archivers. With the Sojourners gone, they had become the new adepts of mystic technology. They shared enough advances with the broad non-mystic populace, whom they called "proxies," to justify their budget. It was with increasing regularity that they allowed new mystic inspired technologies to filter down into regular Perigeum Starmada ships.

  Plumbing the lonely depths between stars was nothing new for the Forward Scout Support class, although this one couldn't recall those memories. The ship was named Auscultare, after its AI. The current space it traveled was not interstellar, but the emptiness above the elliptical of even a busy star system could be considered lonely.

  "Why are we tracking this one down personally instead of using the owls?" the man aboard Auscultare asked. As usual, he appeared rather irritated. "Why am I being forced to waste myself out here? Collecting garbage is beneath even you."

  The man had a variety of characteristics outside the human norm. His solid, barrel shaped torso, bloodshot eyes, flushed skin, and penchant for constant perspiration were just surface indicators.

  "I doubt you'll want to hear my suppositions about your second query, Commodore," Auscultare said. "But regarding your first, I believe this is our most solid lead, and likely what we've been tasked to find."

  Auscultare had a large bay for servicing scouts and sneakerships. These days, owl assault shuttles were the primary cargo, and they were out tracking down other possibilities. The AI's above average sensor suite was focused on a small object upon which they now closed.

  The man flexed his arm. "Let me see it."

  The limb had been repaired recently with semisynthetics and full bone replacement. Powerful, but an uncomfortable mix of choices the man did not have to make. After all, Auscultare was there after the original injury and rendered primary care in his own medical bay.

  Auscultare was the size of a destroyer, and his bridge was not small. The man chose sub-adequate lighting, which, to human eyes, probably appeared "gloomy." But there were no other human eyes aboard.

  A small object, gently rolling, appeared on the active bulkhead at the front of the bridge.

  "Can't you get a better picture than that?"

  "I'm sorry, Commodore, but the object seems resistant to conventional scans. I've had to initiate some of my oldest routines to clarify this much. It seems strange that two hundred-year-old rubrics would fit... this object... I can't seem to recall who set up my systems this way."

  The man sub-whispered to his personal AI and worked a hard control on the panel.

  "Concentrate on the task at hand, AI. How many times do I have to tell you?"

  Auscultare felt a bad sensation, one that made him want to run a diagnostic. But there was nothing wrong, just two undefinable pressure points in the quadnapse structure of his brain. The sensation got worse as he pursued the old files. As usual, the thing to do when this occurred was to back off and listen to the Commodore.

  "Enough with the details. Is it significant?" the man asked.

  "Its strange resistance makes it significant, and as we close, its shape is aligning with silent search parameters beyond our access."

  "Unknown parameters... I don't need to be reminded just how mundane this task is. The proxy Starmada has entire squadrons dedicated to this sort of dross." The man punched hard controls with more force than most humans. "No, 'we have to do it alone.' Weeks of my life wasted."

  After minutes of silence, the man bolted upright, his attention riveted to the forward display. He stared at it without complaint.

  "What... the... drak?" The Commodore's mouth stayed open in what Auscultare pattern-recognized as pleased bewilderment. "Well, go out there and get it!"

  "I'm launching a work pod now. The approach needs to be done delicately."

  If the man heard, he made no response other then dashing to the lift.

  When he arrived in the bay, its doors were open and the work pod already launched. A half meter of soft air held in atmosphere. Unlike the hard air of personal shields like scutums, soft air was designed to let objects of reasonable mass pass through slowly.

  "Show me what's going on out there, dolt," the man commanded.

  Two large VADs appeared in the middle of the bay. One originated from Auscultare, showing the construction-yellow work pod matching rotation with the object. The other was from the work pod's eyes showing a close-up that refused to clarify fully. Crescent shapes and slivers of energy showed up around the object in the multi-spectrum bands. In the visual spectrum the object remained fuzzy.

  "I'm getting strange readings from the detensor, Commodore."

  "The detensor?" The man squinted.

  A detensor was a sensitive piece of equipment used to detect distortions in space. Most were from massive or energetic objects like suns and planets, or fusion and teslanium fission reactors in stations and ships.

  The work pod closed to within a couple of meters and extended multifunctional arms. Its minuscule brain seemed unsure even with Auscultare augmenting, and the claws kept shifting positions.

  "These readings are all wrong," Auscultare said.

  "Get it, you infra-capable..." The Commodore seemed anxious now. "And don't smelt it."

  The VADs filled briefly with polygons of light, as if each was a tiny door opening to a colorful dimension. The readings went haywire, and an alarm went off.

  "Commodore, a score of locked files have just been flagged for relevancy. They're two centuries old and require permission to be opened."

  "You've been acting quirky enough. We don't need any more AI psychosis. Just grab it!"

  "But these files relate to mystic, and the work pod is one hundred percent scientum. If you'll let—"

  "I. Said. Grab it."

  One claw reached out but couldn't make clean contact. A flash of light burst from where they touched, and the object tumbled in a different direction. The pod's other claw shot out to grab it before another approach would have to be made. Amazingly, it grabbed the fuzzy object dead center.

  The VAD from the work pod flashed white, filled with digital noise, and shut off. The work pod shook in Auscultare's view, light streaming from every seam. It exploded, debris flying in every direction.

  The Commodore let out a string of expletives. "Drakking unreal."

  "The nature of the object shifts, and is hard to define," Auscultare said. "I may lose it on this new vector if we do not pursue immediately."

  "Do it, you radiated idiot, that's what were here for!"

  The Commodore stumbled to one side under the force of sudden inertial change, and fell. The stars swirled through the open bay doors.

  "The emergency rendezvous required a
rather radical maneuver. I've made a note in my maintenance log that the cargo bay grav weaves need to be replaced."

  Once past their lifetime, weaves underneath deck plates had reduced ability to generate gravitational eddies and override inertial forces.

  "No drak." The Commodore's eyes remained glued to the VAD as he regained his footing.

  "I have no remaining work pods ready to launch."

  "Go for an open bay catch."

  "Under these circumstances, that's a risky maneuver. My thrusters may very well interfere."

  "Auscultare, if you lose this thing, I'm going to interfere with your core by ripping it apart with my bare hands! Do you understand me?"

  The man was staggered again by another radical course change.

  "Yes, Commodore."

  After a series of maneuvers outside the norm for ships as large as destroyers, Auscultare was lined up in front of the object but far enough away to minimize thruster interference. The object looked almost normal in the VAD.

  "Cutting main thrusters, initiating a deceleration burst."

  The Commodore looked away from the VAD and stared out the open bay. A dot appeared, which grew into a metal object not even a half-meter long. Their vectors were not perfectly aligned, but it managed to slam into a corner of the bay's soft air barrier. It was not sufficiently massive to penetrate. The Commodore ran to it, stretching and pressing through the soft air. He fell just short.

  "Commodore, I'm concerned about additional incidents."

  "Close the bay doors and shut off the soft air."

  "But—"

  "Do it. This is my territory. Its residual energy is mostly spent."

  "Mostly?"

  The bay doors closed, and the object fell into the man's hands. His hair stood on end, and an expression Auscultare could best describe as "wild eyed" filled his face. He began to laugh hysterically. Another alarm went off, and Auscultare initiated a procedure he had known nothing about just a moment before.

  The Commodore didn't appear to hear the alarm. He spun and stopped, holding the object in both hands while staring intently at it. Auscultare detected a rise in temperature in both the object and the man.