And All The Stars A Grave.

by Greg Curtis

“Then you know that the part that troubled us most wasn’t the actual isolation. It was the feeling of being picked on, held down, and never knowing why, or being given any hope of getting free of it.”

  “We shall make sure you know why then.”

  “Thank you.” He nodded to his guest. “Will it take you long to prepare your ships?” Funnily enough he suspected it wouldn’t. They had been preparing for this for some time. And he suspected that as fast and powerful as the new Force vessels were, they wouldn’t compare to the Calderonian ships. Hopefully, neither would the Kaiwhare’s ships.

  “Not long. An hour or so perhaps. We will only need a few and as you can see we are already heading for the gathering place.” The alien gestured at his view screen, and he stared with shock as he noticed at least a dozen more of the strangely glowing ships had joined them. Fast was not the word. And then he looked at the nav display and realised that the Sparrow and the first ship were also moving. Travelling back towards the Community. In fact moving very fast if the readout was to be believed. At least terrig one hundred, or in old-fashioned units, 2600 light years per year. Eight times as fast as the Sparrow’s current cruising speed. And its drive wasn’t engaged. He was being towed.

  “We will arrive in your space tomorrow morning.” Which by his shabby calculations meant they were going to go a lot faster still. Six hundred plus light years in a day. terrig a million? A billion? They needed a new unit for measuring speed. With some effort he put his disbelief behind him, figuring that if they could do all this so quickly, and much more he suspected that they weren’t showing him, they probably had a few more tricks up their sleeve. Yet more knowledge.

  “Can you tell if the fighting has started?” He couldn’t imagine how they possibly could, but then he couldn’t imagine either how they were going to be home by the following morning. They clearly had a completely different drive to anything he’d ever imagined. And one that he was certain they wouldn’t be giving him the details of. What else did they have? After ten thousand years it was surely a lot. Besides, he had the distinct feeling that they had been preparing for this for some time. That they had simply waited for him to ask for their help out of some sort of protocol. He had not been a surprise to them.

  “Skirmishes only, as each side attempts to get itself into a stronger position. A few hundred ships have engaged each other in separate battles, but neither side shows its true strength. Rather they conceal it, each pretending weakness and limited knowledge, while trying to guess the other’s strength, and waiting to strike at the moment of greatest effect.”

  “Like some obscene game of chess.” And his new guest nodded, a gesture he wouldn’t have thought possible from a creature with extensive fur and no visible neck. Or one that surely didn’t play chess. But one that he was suddenly sure, knew the game.

  “In ten thousand years it seems our enemies have advanced little. Once there was no one left to fight, nothing left to steal, they apparently ceased to progress, much as we expected. They have even gone backwards in some areas. It is strange that they did not understand that that would happen. That they needed us to give them that technology. Even now they poach your own. Your Force as I believe you call it, is a good match for them in space at least. After ten thousand years the Kaiwhare still have only a slight edge in weapons and technology, while the Force outnumber them. Both seem to play the military game with complex strategies. I would not pick the outcome.”

  “You mean the Community could actually win?” Which truly surprised Daryl, and upset him as he thought that he could perhaps have wasted his journey.

  “Only in space. On the ground the Kaiwhare have already begun preparing their plagues, and will release them in measured stages, starting tomorrow. We have intercepted their communications. Despite the fact that one hundred and fifty thousand Kaiwhare are now in custody, and many have been made to talk, the Force have not been able to find all the weapons. In the morning the Kaiwhare will use them to destroy the Community, and undermine the Force as they attack. It is their way.”

  “Oh dear God we have to stop them! Please.” He had images in his mind of bodies lying in the streets like fallen leaves, covered with blood and blisters. Of cities dead and dying. And of Karen, heavily pregnant, her life ebbing while he dallied.

  “As we shall. Calm yourself Daryl. None of their plagues will be effective. We have already made sure of that.”

  “You have?” It was good to hear, but he still couldn’t be totally reassured. Not when he heard they were readying the release, and knowing that Unity itself would surely be first on the list. And Karen was surely in the firing line. When had they had the time?

  “Of course. That was our first concern when we saw you arriving long ago and understood your haste. Why else would we have made contact so early? It was at least another month before you would have found us by your own devices.” Which Daryl realised, meant that all that stuff with the computer having difficulty understanding their transmissions was just a ruse. No doubt some sort of test. He only hoped he’d passed it.

  “I didn’t realise. I’m sorry. But this is all so fast. I wasn’t expecting to find you alive at all. I didn’t think your people had survived those plagues. I just hoped you had learnt enough before you died, that your knowledge could help us. I wanted to gain technology to fight. To save my people, my family.”

  “And for this you raided our ancient cities.” By which Daryl understood, he meant their most sacred graveyards. For death was serious to the Calderonians. His blood ran suddenly cold as he remembered all that he’d done to them.

  “I’m sorry but yes. Please forgive me. I meant no sacrilege to your departed. I was simply desperate. If there is any way I can repair the damage or make amends please tell me.”

  “There is no sacrilege young Daryl.” He had the strange feeling that his hairy guest was actually surprised by the concept.

  “You did whatever you could to help your loved ones. How could that ever be wrong? Our ancestors are not disturbed by your presence among them. Rather they are honoured by your asking for their help. As are we. We take it rather as a compliment. That someone with such need and such noble purpose should seek knowledge from any of us, alive or dead - that is a good thing. Were our ancestors still living they would have helped you themselves. Had you come to steal for selfish gain, to create harm, or to denounce our ancestors such as the Kaiwhare might have, that would be something else. But you have done no such thing.”

  “Thank you. You should also know that I have four of your city computers in my lab, or parts of them anyway, the information of several more on the computer, and that some of your ancient cities have been stripped bare of their protectors. QA 40 especially.”

  “Had Daryl, had. Even as we speak the computers are being returned with care to their resting places, the damage is being repaired, and the machines reawakened. All will be as it was and our ancestors can rest once more, well pleased that they could help you in your time of need.”

  “I’m very pleased to hear that.” Which didn’t even come close to how relieved he felt.

  “May I ask another question?” Finally, having heard enough from his guest to at least be able to put his fear away for a little while, his ancient curse curiosity, was biting at him.

  “You mean about the plagues and how we survived, and whether or not we found those you call the Ancients?” Daryl nodded.

  “That’s not an easy thing to answer, if only because there is some knowledge we would rather you didn’t have until you’re ready for it. But yes, in a way we found the Ancients, though they are nothing like you have imagined. Even we were scarcely ready for what awaited us when we first met with them and we had a clearer idea of what to expect. And yes, they could cure us, as we had hoped and you guessed, though their cure like our help for you came at a cost. Not the least of which was that we did not return. That we did not continue our war.”

  “Our ancestors were very ill by then, many had lost nearly all t
heir family, and many if not all found it hard to accept their terms. The plagues were bad enough, but the hatred had poisoned our very soul. In the end however, we found the will to do as they asked, and in time to forgive. Something like the Edenites managed with their vow.” Daryl started as he heard that, realising how thoroughly they’d downloaded and researched his computer to know about that. If that was how they had learned about it. He was slowly becoming certain that it wasn’t. They had known everything long before he’d arrived. But it wasn’t important.

  “I met with the Elders of the Edenites once, before I learned that their disaster was caused by the Kaiwhare. Six or seven months ago, I guess. And I was awed by them. I felt so ashamed of what I believed my people had done, and troubled by the thought that I was making them dredge up ancient and terrible memories. I think I fully expected them to hate me. But they didn’t. They were polite, and I think some of them even believed me, believed I would try to solve this mess, and bring the guilty to justice. And when they told me of their vow, I was humbled by it. In their shoes I don’t think I could have done the same. I don’t know how they did it. How they found the strength. And if your ancestors did the same, then you should be very proud. To bury your own well deserved hatred of those who have hurt you and your loved ones so terribly for the future of your people is an enormous achievement.”

  “We are proud, and thank you. It is pleasing that you should understand, and I too look forward to one day meeting the Elders from New Eden. For even though we have the records of our ancestors to guide us in our voyage of self-discovery, no record can truly capture the heart of it. What it must be to watch everyone you love, your home and even your health being destroyed by evil, to give in to your hatred as your only means of survival, and then finally somehow, to renounce it.”

  “I think they too would enjoy that meeting. Not least because it would show them that they made the right decision. That there is a future for their people because of their vow, as there was for yours.”

  “A very different future to that which they imagined when they settled Eden.”

  “Your ancestors and the Edenites both. But in many respects perhaps not so different. It was still a future in which they could live and prosper, raise children and grand children, and grow old peacefully. And that was their purpose as it should be for everyone.”

  Which was only the truth he suddenly understood. That was what every race just as every parent aimed for. And strangely enough, no matter how strange the future, that was what both the Edenites and the ancient Calderonians had achieved. Nor were they alone. It wasn’t completely true that the Earth had been totally isolated by the Community. Some of them had been welcomed with open arms and shown a whole new universe of possibilities, and they in turn would assist the rest of his people to advance into a strange new universe more quickly and easily than they would have otherwise.

  “And a future that you want for the Community, almost as greatly as we do.” His guest just nodded and Daryl realised he’d finally seen through to the heart of what motivated the Calderonians. It had all been in front of him, and somehow he’d missed it. But from the beginnings the Calderonians had wanted to be a parent race. Guiding others as they themselves would have wanted to be guided. Assuming they hadn’t been, and suddenly he wasn’t so sure of that.

  To that end they had taken the Kaiwhare into their hearts, and tried to give them everything they could, only to find their generosity turned against them, and to be grievously wounded by the betrayal. Now they saw another chance to do the same, but this time they would be far more cautious. He couldn’t blame them for that.

  Chapter Nineteen.

  On Daryl’s screen he could see the battle taking shape in front of him. A battle of such proportions as to make everything he had ever imagined insignificant.

  The Kaiwhare, no doubt believing themselves superior because of their ten thousand year technological edge, had decided to end the Interstellar Community once and for all. Before their captive agents talked. And they had brought a fleet of over one hundred thousand ships to do it. Of course most of them were cloaked, so they couldn’t be seen, except through the aid of whatever the Calderonians had done to his ship’s sensors. Unless of course they were simply feeding their own data straight to his ship.

  Against them the Force had massed an even larger fleet, and again most of them were cloaked as well. While far below, Unity - the symbolic and strategic objective for both sides - held its breath and waited. Its fate was in their hands. Daryl waited too, every bit as worried. His love and his unborn child were down there somewhere. They were the only reason he had made his incredible journey, and the only thing that mattered in his life right then.

  “Take us into the centre.” He turned to see that Thyri had arrived in his usual impossible fashion, and was seated in the co-pilot’s chair beside him. Or rather he was seated where the chair should have been. It was gone and in its place was a massive white leather armchair, surely far more comfortable and better designed for his bulk than anything in the Sparrow. And again he had arrived without a sound. He wished he knew how they did that trick.

  Obediently, Daryl plotted a course directly for the middle of the battlefield, an empty void of space one hundred thousand klicks above the planet, and midway between the two moons. He should have been more nervous but for some reason, over the previous day he had come to trust in the judgement of Thyri. To accept his assurances that they could stop this thing. Not that there was any choice. And besides, he was simply too tired to care. The best part of five months without sleep as he chased down a legend, a full night and day of speaking with the Calderonians about their plans, and the shock of having had his search so abruptly ended while finding out that the battle was scheduled for the morning - all had left him close to exhausted.

  Surrounding the Sparrow were two dozen of the great glowing ships that had carried him back, keeping perfect formation. The net result being that his tiny craft was surely nearly invisible, lost as it was in the middle of the gigantic glowing orb that they made. The only thing that puzzled him was that as they approached, uncloaked, the others should surely have seen them and backed off or at least made enquiries of them, wanting to find out what new danger approached. But neither side did anything other then continue with their obscene game of tactics as they kept manoeuvring their ships into battle formations, preparing for the assault. Perhaps they were also cloaked.

  Neither side wanted to strike first in this battle, though soon one would have to. They both wanted to wait and see what their enemy had up his sleeve. Each Daryl realised, was largely blind to the other’s cloaked vessels, and both apparently to the Calderonian’s craft. Only he through the Calderonians aid had that luxury. And so each was cautiously probing, testing the enemy and looking for weaknesses. But did that mean that they hadn’t seen either him or the Calderonians?

  A couple of minutes later they were directly in the centre of where the battle was surely to begin, and Thyri made him stop and hold position there.

  It must have been some sort of signal as immediately his communications panel began buzzing. Looking at Thyri and seeing him nod, Daryl pressed the button that turned on the viewer, and stared immediately at an image of one very large Myran in full Force uniform. Daryl didn’t need to count the number of stars and signals on his vest to realise that he was surely an admiral at the least.

  “Doctor Chalmers?”

  Daryl nodded, somewhat surprised again by the correct use of his surname. It had only been used a handful of times since he’d been in the Community, and mostly when he was in trouble.

  “I know your ship is primitive and you don’t have the sensors to see what’s all around you, but please believe me when I say you need to get it docked in Base 412 urgently. You’re in the middle of a battle field.”

  “We know that Admiral.” The admiral had surely been about to cut him off, no doubt expecting him to comply as quickly as he could, when his words registered, and in
particular the emphasis on the ‘we’. Daryl had left alone.

  “We?” Daryl pressed the button that widened the zoom allowing the admiral to see his companion, and watched as the admiral first set eyes on Thyri. He wasn’t disappointed as the Myran’s eyes practically bulged out of his heavily wrinkled face. Like undoubtedly most members of the Community by then, he recognised his species. Before he had a chance to say or do anything, Daryl took the initiative.

  “Admiral, may I present to you Ambassador Thyri of the Calderonians. He and his comrades have come a long way to help us.”

  Again it must have been some sort of signal as the admiral’s aids who he could see in the background, started jabbering excitedly at each other and pointing at their screens. No doubt the Calderonians had elected to show themselves. The admiral’s head swivelled one hundred and eighty degrees to stare at their screens and then straight back at Daryl and Thyri. The wheels behind his eyes were spinning furiously.

  “Ambassador, I am truly pleased to see you, and any aid you can give us would be most appreciated, but you are still sitting like a target in the middle of a battle field. Doctor, please dock immediately, and bring your friends with you. We’ll send some ships to escort you to safety.”