The Dreaming Stars

by Tim Pratt

  “I wouldn’t try to widen that opening,” Shall said. “This pod has needles hidden inside it, and the needles are all covered in toxins. If you so much as press on the outside of this pod, the spines will pop out, and this thing will become less peapod and more cactus.”

  “But with poisoned needles.”

  “I didn’t say it was a huggable cactus. That’s just the first line of defense, appropriate for the crime of merely touching the thing. After that, it has nastier surprises.”

  Callie nodded. “That opening though… it’s up near the head, too.”

  “You’re thinking a laparoscopic approach?”

  “I am. Keyhole surgery.”

  “Ashok has laparoscopic tools in his prosthetic arm.”

  Callie nodded. “I remember. When we did that escort job on, what was that planet, Illapa? Taking that oligarch to the mountain he’d bought so he could die on the summit, and we had to keep him alive for the journey, and Stephen convinced Ashok to add a suite of surgical instruments to his prosthetic, just in case. It was a good thing, too.”

  “Stephen was remote-controlling the surgical tools, though,” Shall said. “They came out of Ashok’s arm, but Ashok wasn’t running them.”

  “That’s all right. I wouldn’t want Ashok mucking around inside my body, but this is basically an engineering problem. He needs to reach through that hole, disconnect the necessary cables, draw them out through the hole, and plug us into this Axiom’s avatar.”

  “We probably can’t do that while the Axiom in the pod is alive, though,” Shall said. “It might wake up, or have a seizure, or who knows what.”

  “Ashok isn’t a killer,” Callie said. “I don’t want to ask him to do that part.”

  “I try to see the Axiom as more of a malignant tumor to be removed than people with rights to be respected,” Shall said. “Would you like me to do the… dishonors?”

  “Can you?”

  “Philosophically? With some difficulty. But if killing the thing in here proves too distressing, I’ll just erase the memory of the experience. That’s one of the advantages of being a machine intelligence.”

  “How about practically?”

  “Oh, I can do it. Some of the pods have life-support alarm systems that trigger countermeasures if the body inside dies – I assume solely for purposes of vengeance – but this one doesn’t appear to. Even if it does… I’m tough.”

  “I hate to ask you to do it–”

  “Then you can be glad I volunteered. Can you get down by yourself? I’ll… take care of this.” Shall extruded something needle-thin and flexible from the end of one of his manipulator arms.

  Callie patted his armor again, then went to one of the nearby pillars. They had spiraling ramps inside, leading up and down, and she walked back to the ground floor, thinking. If they succeeded in their overall goal, and exterminated the Axiom, all of them, that would be genocide. A crime the Axiom was guilty of ten, twenty, a hundred times over, to be sure. Were all the Axiom evil, though? The data they had certainly seemed to indicate the Axiom took active joy in slaughtering those they considered inferior, which was everyone… but she couldn’t be sure. What if there was a group of good Axiom, somewhere, just peacefully relaxing in deep space, meaning no one any harm?

  If there were, Callie would probably never notice them, and they could keep right on slumbering. These particular Axiom were devouring spaceships and the people inside so they could create an expansion for their favorite video game. Those acts of murder weren’t even necessary to further their goal – the swarm could have gotten by just fine by converting non-living matter. The Axiom had programmed the swarm to avoid attacking Axiom vessels, so they could just as easily have programmed it to avoid living things. They hadn’t, because they didn’t care.

  She was still glad she didn’t have to ask Ashok to murder anyone in their sleep, though.

  Lantern showed her the button that woke Ashok up, and he groaned. “Aw, really? I just stole this sort of flying war chariot thing, and I was doing a low flyover and checking out the territory. That battle I woke up near was just a minor skirmish, groups of scouts clashing, I think. The main battle was farther out, and they had these war machines, and this sort of, I don’t know how to describe it, mobile corpse desecration factory? I guess it was meant as psychological warfare, or else it was an engine actually powered by corpses, I don’t really understand the mechanics–”

  “Ashok,” Callie said. “Focus up. We’ve got a pod with a crack in it, and a dead Axiom inside. Can you reach in and snake out the cables so we can take its place in the Dream, with those tools Stephen set you up with?”

  Ashok got to his clanking feet. “Sure thing, cap. Dead, huh? I’m guessing not from natural causes?”

  “I’ll tell you exactly as much as you want to know, Ashok.”

  “That’s OK. I’m good. Where to?”

  “Go up there with Shall.” Ashok and Lantern gathered their tools and set off toward the nearest spiral ramp.

  Callie beckoned Sebastien, who was staring up at the ceiling thoughtfully. She didn’t like it when he thought. He joined her. “Yes?”

  “We’ve got a player we can take over.”

  “And a one in forty-seven chance it’s the ruler. Not wonderful odds, are they?”

  “They’re not. Assuming we’re unlucky… how long until the next tournament?”

  Sebastien gave her a chilly smile. “You want to play the game.”

  “I want to win the game.”

  “You don’t lack for self-confidence, do you?”

  “The fate of Owain is at stake. What possible good would doubt do me?”

  “You have a… most remarkable mind, Captain Machedo. All right. As I understand it, any player can declare the start of a tournament. Everyone tries to be in a state of constant readiness, so they can compete successfully when someone does. Sometimes there are subjective years between tournaments, with all the players attempting to become as unstoppable as possible, and no one willing to trigger the event, and sometimes a new tournament is declared mere weeks after the last one, with those players who have some advantage attempting to strike fast before the others can develop their resources and replenish their forces.”

  “So, what, you just say ‘one, two, three, four, I declare interstellar war’?”

  “The process is a bit more formalized than that, but essentially, yes.”

  “How long do the tournaments last?”

  “Hours. Days. Months. It depends. Those who feel they can’t win will offer their services as vassals to the players they think are stronger, because if the one they support wins, they are guaranteed a better place in the rankings – well above the bottom, anyway. But of course, betrayals and attempts to wrest control of alliances are commonplace. It’s not just a battle game, captain. It’s diplomacy, of a peculiar Axiom sort. It’s logistics, supply chains, bluffs, double-bluffs, espionage. These creatures ruled a galactic empire. Everyone who wasn’t Axiom was a slave, or they were dead. You really want to go up against them in a game of empires? You are… competent, in your way, but you’re a fugitive hunter, a businesswoman, a ship’s captain – not a queen.”

  “I beat you, didn’t I?” she said.

  Sebastien’s expression didn’t change. “I was beaten. You were there. I’ll concede that much. I don’t want to argue. I suppose winning the game is your only hope. I do admire your audacity.”

  “Your admiration is the thing I crave most,” she said sourly. “Look, we can plug Shall into the game – he can offer advice on tactics and strategy, using his big computer brain. And aren’t you half-Axiom yourself, in your head? That gives us an edge, surely.”

  Sebastien gazed up at the distant ceiling again. “I understand how the Axiom think, to some extent. But the implants they put in my brain, the things they did to me, the augmentations… they weren’t meant to make me Axiom. They were meant to make me a useful slave. They didn’t make me as smart as they are – they made m
e as smart as their servants should be. I understand the Axiom the way they’d want a servant to, so I can anticipate their needs and desires. That does give me insight, absolutely. But no. I’m not half-Axiom. I wish. The Axiom are engines of greatness, directed toward terrible things. If I had their resources, I would direct those energies elsewhere.”

  “You’re starting to sound a little galaxy-conquery again, Sebastien.”

  He gave a sad smile and shook his head. “No. I’m done with all that. I would make the galaxy a better place, for everyone, and not just myself. I would build a better world.”

  “The first step toward a better world is keeping the current world from being eaten by tiny robots. Can you help me do that?”

  Sebastien nodded. “Let’s play, captain. Let’s play for the lives of everyone on Owain.”

  Callie and Sebastien had to lay on the floor this time, since the pod they were hijacking was still occupied by the dead Axiom. She’d asked Shall if the creature was definitely deceased, and he’d said, “I was thorough. I’d rather not talk about it.”

  They still didn’t know what the alien in the pod looked like. They’d never seen an Axiom in the flesh – no living being had, apart from other Axiom. Ashok’s laparoscopic tools had cameras, of course, so he could see what he was doing, but all he saw was close-up bits in passing. “Its flesh is dark green, in parts,” he said. “Unless I was looking at clothing. I didn’t see anything that looked like eyes or a mouth or a nose. Lots of bumps that might have been sensory organs, but alien biology is more Elena’s department. I just disconnected the wires and got out of there.”

  Once the cables were properly arrayed, Ashok hooked the diadems up to Callie and Sebastien, then ran an ancillary cable into Shall’s central processor.

  “It’s going to be crowded in the avatar,” Sebastien said.

  “You’ll just have to squish over to make room.” Callie closed her eyes. “Let’s get in there and see if we’re the king.”

  Chapter 28

  Callie rolled over in a pool, and smaller creatures rushed away from her, and then fluttered around, making alarmed chirping noises. The water in the pool was black, and warm – it wasn’t even water, was it? Her body was immense, tentacled, buoyant – and hungry. The twittering things were much smaller than her, a bit like dark purple seahorses with arms, each with a single, large eye above its snout.

  Sebastien translated. They say you passed out. They’re asking if you’re all right.

  “I’m fine.” The sound that emerged from her mouth – mouths, she had many, all over her body – was a grotesque bubbling. “Just drifted off for a moment. Carry on.”

  Unfortunately, “carry on” apparently meant feeding her, because they reached into the water and lifted out disgusting pink slug-eel things and started throwing them into her mouths. She swallowed instinctively – the worst part was, the slimy monstrosities tasted delicious, salty and fatty and luscious, and the texture was nice too, even though the slug-eels wriggled on their way down her many gullets. She was intellectually if not physically repulsed, and shouted, “Enough! I am full! Leave me!”

  The attendants all disappeared beneath the water and didn’t reemerge. Where did they go? She probed around under the black slime with her tentacles and found openings in the wall and floor in various directions – tunnels, leading elsewhere in… wherever they were.

  She hauled herself out of the pool, which was easy, because her strength was as titanic as her body, and she had so many tentacles some dragged behind her, unneeded. She left a trail of black ooze as she tentacle-walked toward a huge arched doorway. The pool room was round, with a domed ceiling, and the next room was round, too, but seemed to be a shower of some kind – as soon as she stepped in, clear fluid sprayed from nozzles all around and above, washing the slime away. The fluid wasn’t water, though – it was viscous and oily. But her body responded to it well. It felt good, relaxing, and restorative, like a good rub-down with lotion.

  She moved into the next room, and there were more attendants there, though these were less aquatic, and furrier. There were squishy cushions everywhere, and tanks situated on pedestals every few meters, holding the eel-slug things. Bowls of snacks? The attendants chittered at her, and she bellowed for them to leave her alone. She dropped onto a vast cushion when the room was unoccupied, arranging her tentacles as comfortably as possible beneath her.

  This is so gross, she said. Am I the ruler? She looked up and to the right, and Sebastien told her which glyphs to access.

  Alas, no, he said. You came in twenty-third in the last tournament – firmly in the middle of the pack. You were a vassal to the current ruler in that bout, but you held out a while before you pledged fealty – hence the lower standing.

  Crap. Well, it could be worse. At least we didn’t pick the loser.

  How can I review our current resources? Shall asked.

  Sebastien directed her to open the proper directories so Shall could catch up. Callie was annoyed that she couldn’t read anything herself. She was fine with taking expert counsel, but it would be nice if she could at least read the material herself, too.

  After a long time spent looking at information she couldn’t parse, she said, “Well? Any preliminary findings?”

  This world is largely aquatic, Shall said. That seems to be your… the player’s specialty – resource extraction and development of alien oceans. When it comes to protecting your territory, you’re in good shape. You have vast navies of bioengineered leviathans, tiny infiltrating parasites, and all sorts of things in between. You’re in an excellent defensive position across the breadth of your holdings.

  Your spacefaring assets are middling, Sebastien added. Mostly a fleet cobbled together from your various temporary allies over the millennia. You wouldn’t embarrass yourself in a fight, but you wouldn’t be able to beat anyone in the top ten, either.

  Looks like our host has gotten ambitious lately, though, Shall said. We’ve managed to get… they’re little creatures, sort of like flukes… into the bodies of some of the enemy generals and officials, and they could be triggered to make their victims sick, or even to kill them. The whole biotech thing is solid for us. We’ve got some bioengineered spacefaring creatures, too, that feed on radiation. They’re intended as ship killers, but they’re still in the R&D phase.

  “Can we win the tournament?” Callie said.

  Normally, the Axiom take a long view, Sebastien said. They’re not just thinking about the next tournament, or the next ten. As long as you don’t come in last, you’re still the ruler of a vast civilization, and you can position yourself for greater glories in the future. Think of how the Axiom behave in reality – they’re already planning for ways to survive the heat death of the universe, and that’s, what, trillions of years away? They are the ultimate long-term planners. But if we don’t think about anything beyond the immediate future…

  I see what you mean, Shall said. If we threw every single thing we had at the fight, burned every advantage, called in every marker, used up every resource, went absolutely entirely all in, even if it would leave us utterly emptied out and vulnerable at the end… What do you think?

  It’s not like I’m an expert in Axiom game theory, Sebastien said, but… I think we’d be competitive.

  “Let’s do it,” Callie said. “Let’s survey our resources, deploy them as strategically as possible, and then declare war.” Without even thinking about it, she reached into one of the tanks, snatched out an eel-slug, and munched it down. She’d wondered why the Axiom would choose to inhabit an avatar that could get hungry, but being hungry made eating so much more satisfying, didn’t it?

  She ate another one.

  Sebastien and Shall looked over her resources while she explored the rest of her palace. She was underwater, in the interior ocean of an ice planet – shades of Ganymede – and there were ample observation areas in her palace. She reclined on cool tile and watched city-sized monsters sport in the fluid beyond, which was
so clear it was like seeing demon-whale hybrids fly through the air. She ended up in a room with a pool of clear fluid in the center of the floor, and an attendant asked her if she wanted to go for a swim, according to Sebastien’s distracted translation.

  Callie agreed, and dropped into the water (probably not really water), finding it warm and pleasant, then she dove. The seahorse attendants followed along, trailing behind her, but she ignored them as she explored the depths, the grottoes and caverns, the reefs and stone forests, the spawning laboratories for the leviathans… and the punishment pits, where attendants who’d displeased her darted beneath metal bars, dodging to escape the unfurling jaws of predatory beasts like serpentine sharks. Bits of dead creatures and clouds of whatever they had for blood floated in the water there. “Set the prisoners free,” she shouted, sending up streams of bubbles. “All is forgiven today.”

  The attendants were hesitant, doubtless expecting some sort of trick, but they obeyed, and the freed creatures fled. The predators chased after them, and Callie reached out with her mighty tentacles and crushed them, eating half of one before she even thought about it. Her body had its own imperatives, and if she didn’t exhibit conscious control, she defaulted to them.

  The thought depressed her, so she returned to the palace, and sat in seclusion while Sebastien and Shall plotted.

  They were there for days of subjective time. Callie swam, sometimes, and tried to do good works – setting enslaved underwater miners free, feeding the hungry in the grotto-ghetto where a race of starfish people lived – but mostly she just kept to herself in the palace, trying to ignore her titanic and endless hunger. They discussed tactics and strategy, and she demanded supplies so she could draw on the walls of her meditation chamber, marking out the positions of various forces, because it was far too much to hold in her head.