“Oh? What?”
“It was a news item brought by a starship last week. You know that the Anderans have been sending out scouting ships from their base in Refuge?”
“Yes.”
“Well, there has been a little contact between them and some of the nearest clan colonies—still a long way from here, thank the Maker.”
“There’s nothing new about that, it’s been going on for a year or more.”
“Yes, but this bit of news was about contact with a strange ship that was from beyond the Rift—but not Anderan.”
“What? Who?”
“They weren’t sure. But it was close enough to this area that it probably isn’t Petrunan or Hebyrnan, so the only thing I can think of is that it was one of the Venanci transport ships.”
“But I thought they went back across the Rift?”
“We assumed they did, but it’s possible that one ship went back to take the news of what happened and the other stayed here. Maybe they are trying to find a habitable world to set up a colony. The Venanci troops have a nearly equal sex-ratio, so it would be possible if they found a suitable planet.”
“That’s…interesting. Where did this encounter take place?”
“No exact location was mentioned in the article, but I gather that it is several hundred light years from Refuge.”
“They are trying to put some distance between themselves and the Anderans.”
“Yes, that is what I thought. Oh well, it’s all academic anyway. I have no interest in contacting them even if I could. My warrior days are over.”
“I am glad of that. I think my fight may be over, too. I keep warning the people I meet about the threat of the World Stealers, but few are willing to listen.”
“The threat probably seems very abstract and remote. You may get more converts when the Anderan gate is finished and their colonizers come swarming through.”
“It may be too late then.”
“Perhaps, but the Perseus Arm is huge. I hope they will leave your people in peace.”
“So I keep praying.” He paused and looked at her a little shyly. “I… uh… I have been doing some research myself.”
“Oh? What about?”
“I was… I was looking at the possibility of adapting one of our gestators so that it could handle your genome.” He looked at her nervously, unsure of her reaction. Her eyebrows shot up.
“Brannon, are you talking about children?”
“Well…yes. If you wanted one, of course.”
“I… I’m not sure what I want. Whose child would it be? I mean I can donate the egg, but how…?”
“That would be the big question. There is no possibility of using my unaltered DNA, the result would be totally unviable. But there could be ways to introduce certain aspects of my genome into your own. The result would be… ours.”
“You can do this?”
“There have been some experiments in the past with cross-clan pregnancies. A few have worked out. I would have to do a great deal of additional research and some experimentation. But only if you agree.” He looked at her, trying to gauge her reaction. With great care, they had found ways that they could safely make love, but this was something different. He tried to find some memory from those he’d borrowed from her to give a clue to what she might be feeling, but could not.
“I’m going to have to think about this, Brannon,” she said at last.
“Of course. As long as you like. We have all the time in the universe.”
* * * * *
Tad Farsvar touched the controls on his ship and the bow thrusters nulled out the last of its motion relative to the Newcomers’ gate. His ship! He could still hardly believe it. She was small, but brand new and even had the new artificial gravity devices. Her cargo capacity was modest, as was her drive and fuel bunkerage, but she would do very well as a free trader. It was not as though he actually had to turn a profit with her. He had money in the bank. No, he wasn’t planning on making a big profit, but it would be nice if his… hobby could at least pay for itself.
“Life! It certainly is big, isn’t it?” He turned and smiled as Sasha came into the control room. She was staring, wide-eyed, at the enormous structure hanging a few dozen kilometers away. “I mean, I’ve seen asteroids that were much bigger, but they built this all from scratch!”
“Yes, it is amazing. And they did this in just two years.” Sasha sat down next to him and he took her hand. They had been formally betrothed a few weeks ago and they were now in their pre-marriage, cohabitation trial. So far it had been going very well. Tad had thought that this little trip might be a nice getaway, and so it had proved.
“Is it working?” she asked. “The news reports said that was, but I don’t see anything except the gate—and a lot of ships.”
“I gather that the hyperspatial ‘carrier wave’ is invisible. You can only see anything when a ship actually passes through. But it is working. Several test ships have gone through in each direction in the last few days.”
“But today is the official ‘grand opening’?”
“Yes, some big delegation of Anderan leaders will be coming through today. There will be all sorts of ceremonies and celebrations.”
“And we’re invited?”
“Yes. But we don’t have to go if…” He stopped when he saw Sasha go all starry-eyed. Tad found the Newcomers’ ceremonies boring, their parties stuffy, and not much fun. But Sasha clearly was thrilled at the idea of being included. Oh well, it would probably be a lot nicer having her along. He’d survive.
“And after the ceremonies… are we really going to go through the gate?” Her eager expression faded into apprehension.
“If we are allowed. There’s still been no official word on clan ships using the gate. But a lot of people want to.” He glanced at the sensor display; several hundred hopeful clan ships had gathered, although none had been allowed to approach as closely as Tad—there were advantages in knowing the right people. But he wasn’t sure what would happen next. He had a nice cargo of fissionables to trade if he was allowed through.
“It’s hard to believe we could just go through there and be in another whole star system,” whispered Sasha. “It’s kind of scary, too. What if we can’t get back?”
“I don’t think the Newcomers would spend all this time and effort on a one-way gate, Love. Of course if your drive should fail…”
“The drive is just fine, thank you very much! It’s your navigation we should be worried about.” Tad smiled. Sasha was a very good engineer, despite her youth and relative inexperience. Not that he was any older or much more experienced as a ship’s captain…
“If they do let us through, how far were you planning to go?”
His immediate reaction was to answer: ‘as far as I can’, but he knew that would not sit well with her. But in truth, that was what he wanted to do. He’d always wanted to get out among the stars and see new places. But even his newfound wealth wasn’t enough to buy a starship, and positions in the crews of the few starships that the clan did own were highly prized and hard to get.
But with the gates you didn’t need starships!
Apparently, on the other side of the Rift there were gates like this one (well, smaller gates) linking nearly every inhabited star system. You could get almost anywhere worth going in a normal ship. The prospect was dazzling. Tad wanted to just go and go and go. But Sasha wasn’t quite so daring (reckless, she would say). So, something a little more modest for the first trip.
“Oh, I think just to the other side of the Rift and back.” He paused and then laughed. “Just to the other side of the Rift! I can’t believe I said that. A thousand parsecs and back again! Incredible!”
Sasha laughed, too. She was amazingly pretty when she laughed and Tad leaned over and kissed her. She kissed him back and they became so involved in that they almost missed what they had come here to see.
“Oh! Look! Something’s happening!” cried Sasha.
Tad disent
angled himself and looked where she was pointing. The empty area inside the ring of the gate was shimmering. Stars and vessels on the opposite side began to blur and ripple as if viewed through a sheet of falling water. As he watched, the ripples were tinged with a wildly shifting spectrum of colors. Then the colors combined into a dazzling white flash, and for a moment he was looking through into somewhere else. A large vessel was suddenly there, where an instant before there had been nothing. The ship moved out from the gate and then the ripples were back again.
The newly arrived ship maneuvered clear and then the process repeated itself and another ship was here, flung across the Rift in an instant. Ship after ship passed through the gate and Sasha was gaping in astonishment. “Wow!” she gasped. “That’s incredible!”
It was incredible, but Tad was hardly paying attention to the ships. During the instant that each ship made the jump, he could see through, to the other side of the gate. There were stars on the other side.
And the stars were beckoning to him.
* * * * *
“My God, is he bringing the whole bloody fleet with him?” grumbled Sir Charles Crawford. “We’ve been watching this parade for an hour already and the Protector’s ship hasn’t even come through yet!”
“We’ve only been waiting twenty minutes, dear,” said Regina, patting his arm. “But I agree: he is overdoing this. On the other hand, it is certainly a spectacular opening for your gate.”
“It’s not mine anymore. Once the construction is done and the operations staff formally takes charge it’s not mine anymore.”
“That might be true for some normal gate, Chuck,” said Sheila VanVean from a few meters away, “but not this one. The big wigs might name it after some other big wig, but for anyone who ever worked on this project, it will always be ‘Crawford’s Gate’.”
“Damn right,” said Greg VanVean. “Without you riding all of our asses it never would have been done in time. Hell, without you, the stinking thing would be hooked up to some Venanci gate right now.”
“The main thing is that you all did it,” said Regina. “It was the thing you came here to do and you did it.”
“Well now,” said Greg, “that must be his High, Grand Imperial Muckety-Muckedness now.” He pointed to the ship coming through the gate. It was the biggest one they had seen by far.
“Yes, that’s Invincible,” said Crawford. “Congratulations, folks, the Protector is here and this is now officially Anderan territory.”
“Whether the clans like it or not,” snorted Regina.
“Hey, the march of progress,” said Greg. “You can either get in step or get trampled. That’s the way it’s always been.”
“Unfortunately.”
“Well,” said Crawford to change the subject, “we have to be over on Invincible for all the hoopla in less than two hours, Regina. We better get changed. I can’t believe I’m going to have to wear that ridiculous… er, I mean that marvelous uniform again.” He glanced at Sheila, who laughed.
“You look wonderful in your uniform, Chuck.”
“Yes, he does,” agreed Regina.
“And I’m sure you’ll come back with a chestful of medals to hang on it, Boss,” said Greg. “And your knight’s sash and sword. You will really look the fop then!”
“I suppose. Assuming the Protector confirms the knighthood.”
“He will,” said Regina. Then she grimaced. “And mine, too, I imagine. He’s had a week since the first test ship went through and brought him all the news. It’s like Petre said: he’ll want heroes, not scapegoats.”
“So, Sir Charles,” said Greg, “when are you starting your own firm, and when can we sign up?”
“Oh, that will take some time. It will take a lot of negotiations with the baron and then I have to find financing…”
“You may have more money than just twelve years back pay,” said Regina. “I’m sure there will be rewards and grants coming your way. I understand you’ll get a share of any prize money for the captured Venanci ships, and any ransom gotten for their crews, too.”
“Huh. Hadn’t even thought about that. Well, it will still take some time. Have to go back and do some thinking and planning.”
“What about you, Regina?” asked Sheila.
She stared out the viewport and shook her head. “I’m not going back,” she said quietly.
“What?”
“I’m not going back to Andera. I didn’t like what was happening there before we left and I doubt I’m going to like what I’ll find there now. It’s becoming filled with people like Petre Frichette. Oh sure, he’s a nice young man, but he’d have let a million people die if he thought it was in the Protector’s best interest. I can’t deal with that sort of thinking. I’m not going back.”
A chill went through Crawford. He’d become very fond of Regina and he didn’t want to lose her now. “But… but what will you do?”
“Well, there will be a need for terraformers on this side of the Rift, too. Probably a big need. Heck, I could probably find work among the clans if I had to.”
Crawford stood there in confusion, uncertain what to say, until Sheila nudged him. “Hey, big guy, seems to me there will be a need for construction firms on this side of the Rift, too. A zillion new gates to build.”
“And who says that a construction outfit can’t have a terraforming department?” added Greg.
Crawford looked at Greg, then at Sheila, finally at Regina. “Crawford & Nassau Construction?”
“Crawford & Nassau Construction & Terraforming.”
“C&N Construction & Terraforming?”
“C&N Worldbuilders,” said Regina firmly.
“Not bad,” said Greg.
“I like that,” said Sheila.
Crawford looked out the viewport and put his arm around Regina. He looked out, past the assembled ships, to where the stars were beckoning.
“Yeah, so do I.”
The End
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