Jump Gate Omega

by Tom Shepherd

  “How’s this?” Adelaide slipped into his lap, separated only by the dangling locket and chain. She reached under the water. “Ummmm…. Feels like the Bear is stirring in his den. Ooooh… yes. He’s ready to rise and growl.”

  He caught her wrist, but gently. “Answer my questions first.”

  She groaned and released him. “You owe me a helluva night, Jerry.” Adelaide brushed wet hair from her forehead. “Ask.”

  “Why are the locals blocking our Alpha Site at this crucial moment?”

  “How would I know?”

  “Come on, Ambassador. Father sent you out here because inside that charming, diplomatic body beats the heart of a born spy. Don’t tell me you haven’t been firing off regular communiques to the P.T., because I’ve hacked them.”

  “All right. Did you know your father’s last communication was a scathing reprimand for not telling him that his niece was working here before she went missing?”

  “No, I didn’t. Are the two problems linked?” J.B. said.

  “I honestly don’t know.” Adelaide moved off his lap and reached for the control panel on the wall above the Hot tub. She tapped in a music selection. Dixieland brass faded to baroque. “Do you like classical?”

  J.B. listened for a moment. “Sonata for Keyboard in A Major, by Scarlatti. Good choice.”

  “Very impressive, Jerry.” She entered another command, and two tall, sparkling glasses appeared in the serving space above the hot tub. She offered him a glass. “My instrument is the champagne flute. Do you still play the harpsichord?”

  “Occasionally.” He took a taste. “Excellent champagne. Pinot Meunier?”

  “So, you haven’t lost your love of good wine, either.” She reached behind her neck and unclasped the chain, bringing the neck ornament forward in an offering gesture. “I wanted to show you this.”

  J.B. gingerly turned the locket over in his fingers. “It looks like you’ve had it awhile.”

  She nodded. “You don’t remember, do you?”

  His lips played with a half-smile. “Wait… the marketplace on Tucson-4?”

  She smiled mischievously. “Our first morning after. You wanted to buy me a present. I think you offered the whole planet, but I settled for your heart of gold.”

  “Never knew it meant so much. Wish you’d told me back then.”

  “I love it, but here.” She draped the locked around his neck.

  “No, no. I couldn’t.”

  “For good luck, good memories. It’ll make me happy if you wear it.”

  He tapped gold heart. “Can I still buy you Tucson-4?”

  Adelaide laughed. “Now, what do you want to know?” She sipped her flute of bubbly.

  “Talk to me about the Alpha Site,” he said. “Why is the Suryadivan government blocking our easement?”

  “I’m not entirely sure.” She sat beside him. Close but not touching. “When it comes to political issues, two power blocks—the secular People’s Assembly and the Supreme Council of Pontiffs—are tidally locked like a binary star system. Both must agree for anything significant to happen.”

  “So, they came together to kick us out?”

  “Yes, and I don’t know the reason yet. But it’s clear some off-world syndicate is working with the Suryadivans,” Adelaide said. “They must be offering big incentives to prevent Jump Gate Omega from activating.”

  J.B. sipped the champagne. “What incentives, and who is offering them?”

  “I haven’t discovered the payoff price. But my operatives have narrowed the potential enemies list down to four groups.”

  “Who are they?”

  “The Dengathi Lagoon, Rek Kett Empire, or Abjulati-Kadit Society.”

  “You said four.”

  “You won’t like this.” Adelaide took a big gulp and returned her glass to the serving space.

  “Tell me.” He finished his champagne, put the empty glass by hers.

  “The fourth power group might be an alliance of Mindorian and Segerian forces.”

  “Humans?”

  She nodded. “New coalition. Calls itself the Free Enterprise League. There are rumors about a powerful leader they call El Rey Pirata.”

  “The Pirate King. Tell me more.”

  “That’s all I know.”

  “What’s all this malarkey about a Sacred Hunt on Adao?”

  “No, that’s real,” Adelaide said. “Every other year by their calendar—about once in twenty-eight Terran months—they descend on the wilderness planet Adao-2 and perform nature rituals, to include a forty-six-day Sacred Hunt. Religious pilgrims, selected by lottery, go after a list of ten game animals.”

  “Trophy gathering, animal sacrifice, or what?”

  “The celebration has complex rites, to include ceremonial eating. Priests cook the smaller game, so there’s a lot of sacred feasting. With alcohol and other intoxicants.”

  “And that’s it?” J.B. said. “They hunt, throw a bar-b-cue, get wasted, sleep it off, and go home? Sounds like autumn in Missouri.”

  She laughed. “Unlike Missouri, there are also pilgrimages to sacred rocks, ritual blessings of the environment, and lots of mandatory prayer. And chanting. The hills around the sacred sites ring with acapella song.”

  “Why travel across twenty light years of space? Why not celebrate the holiday at a game preserve on Suryadivan Prime?”

  “History, tradition. They’ve gone to Adao-2 for centuries. And there are private rites, priests only.”

  “Tell me about those.”

  “I don’t know much. The rituals require a large animal, the biggest beast on the list, which the hunters must bring back alive and present to the clergy.”

  “What kind of beast?”

  “It’s called a Zyn-Vorkan, and my linguists can’t agree on a translation of the term. Something like life-propellant, or substance-booster. No clue what it looks like—the Suryadivans strictly forbid images of the Hunt.”

  “So, do they ritually slaughter these Zyn-Vorkans?”

  “Apparently not. High Priests imprison the creatures in steepled temples forbidden to ordinary Suryadivan pilgrims, who must camp outdoors all forty-six days. But they release the creatures into the wilds after Sacred Hunt concludes. Sorry, I don’t know more. It’s a complete mystery.”

  “Not bad intel. You have good spies. Anything else?”

  “The Supreme Council of Pontiffs has been fighting to get the space around Adao declared an alien-free zone for decades. Eight months ago, the civilian government approved their petition.”

  “Slick,” J.B. said. “The anti-Matthews syndicate found an indirect way to shut down our Alpha Site without broadcasting the real sponsors.”

  “Right.”

  “Why do they want Jump Gate Omega to fail?”

  Adelaide wiped wet, silver-tipped hair out of her eyes. “I have operatives searching for answers, but nothing yet.”

  “Makes no sense. A freely accessible Jump Gate to Andromeda benefits all players.”

  “Sorry.” She smiled faintly. “You see, Jerry? I don’t know everything.”

  “Is Cousin Julieta one of your ‘operatives’?”

  “She made me promise not to tell the Family. It was a tough call, and I paid for it when your father learned what I’d been withholding.”

  “I know that feeling.”

  She smiled hesitantly. “I am thinking of another kind of feeling.” Adelaide slipped back into his lap, pressing taunt nipples underwater against his chest, the locket and chain sandwiched between them.

  “Addie, that feels good, but I haven’t… it’s been a long time…”

  “Shhh….” She kissed him. “Let me remind you how it’s done.”

  She gently massaged his thickening penis, straddled him, and guided it inside her. They moved together, rising and falling in the warm water, oblivious to the reckless passion of Tyler and Suzie across from them. Amazingly, the two couples reached climax almost at the same instant—J.B. and Adelaide moaning like the w
ind, Tyler and Suzie howling like banshees. They collapsed in their opposing sides of the tub, so totally spent they struggled to stay above water.

  Adelaide spoke first. “That was a great fuck. Ready for round two?”

  J.B. laughed. “Not yet—break time!”

  They settled down to relax in the swirling water, mellowed by the sound of string quartets and a submerged, colored light show. J.B. wondered how long this good feeling would last.

  Twenty-Two

  Esteban Solorio drove thoughts of his dying mother from his mind and focused on his task for the evening. Tyler asked him to mingle and pick up intel, but his cousin had no idea how many information-gathering tools Esteban possessed.

  Psionic tendrils extended, he swam through the crowd of partygoers and invisibly brushed the garments of trade delegates, business executives and governmental officials to sense anything hostile or falsehearted. Esteban had learned enough about his mind gifts to distinguish simple withholding from flagrant deceit.

  After three or four passes, which revealed nothing more than a few husbands and wives lusting after someone other than an accompanying spouse, Esteban needed the relief of starry, open sky. He went to the chest-high wall that looked out on the twinkling skyline of Pokey Town. This side of the roof faced away from the horizon-filling half-globe of the Temple Court, and he gazed upward at the lights still shining in buildings taller than the Matthews Trade Embassy. A few stars, bright enough to pierce the city glow, wrapped heaven’s dark dome in diamonds.

  “Señor Solorio, may I speak with you in confidence?”

  Esteban found a young Suryadivan male beside him at the wall overlooking the twilight city. He wore the yellow robe of a minor official at the Temple Court.

  “How do you know my name?”

  “I know your Family. I am Greeter Lox Aspi, son of Erizond the Advocate. Your sister, Doctor Julieta, helped me to speak better with linguistic implants.”

  Esteban moved a half-step closer to be certain he was within the alien’s aura. Most sentient beings had energy fields that varied greatly in size, even within species.

  “What can you tell me?”

  “Señorita Solorio, blessed Doctor Julieta. She is… yarniek’kamon. You have no word for this in Terran. Maybe—prophetic saint?”

  “Prophets are stoned, saints are martyred. Where is my sister?”

  “I risk everything by telling you this, Señor Solorio.”

  “Your courage is inspirational. Please continue.”

  “You must allow me to say it my way.”

  “Would you prefer somewhere private?”

  “No!” Lox said.

  “You might be observed here.”

  “The privacy of a crowd gathers less suspicion.”

  Esteban forced himself to wait for Lox Aspi to proceed. He extended his psionic reach and found Lox’s hesitancy capped a roiling cauldron of rage. Esteban backed away emotionally. Exposure to so much fury was dangerous, painful.

  “My holy leaders are monsters,” Lox said.

  “Please explain.”

  “I am trying to say things which, by saying them, imperil my immortal soul.”

  “God surely values the honest man above all others.”

  “Your gods, perhaps. Mine are selfish…” Lox switched to Suryadivan. Across barriers of language and species, Esteban felt the untranslated profanity mingle with righteous indignation. When the Greeter became quiet, Esteban tried again.

  “Amigo, I am unqualified to judge the religion of another sentient being. I have a sister who is missing, and you apparently know something that might help me find her.”

  “She has gone to Adao to obstruct the Hunt. Her acts are sacrilege. She will be killed on sight. And may all gods protect Julieta and give her success. Damn the Supreme Council of Pontiffs. Damn the High Priests. Damn everyone who profits through the suffering of others. My religion is built on selfish cruelty. Damn them all.”

  Esteban felt it coming. He grasped the young Greeter by the sleeve, but Lox Aspi shook free from his outer cloak, climbed onto the wall, and threw himself off the Matthews building. Esteban shouted helplessly. To his right, Yumiko vaulted the wall after the son of Advocate Erizond.

  * * * *

  Down in the party room, Tyler tingled with pleasure after first sex with his holo-goddess. Suzie looped her arm around his neck at the waterline, her body pressed against his.

  “Could you really feel me inside you?” Tyler whispered.

  She picked up his hushed tone. “Yes! And you were wonderful.”

  “How can you reach orgasm like an organic being?”

  “Luv, sexual pleasure doesn’t occur in your Hampton. The impulses are passed electronically through your nervous system. You feel me in your brain. I have those connections, too.”

  As they relaxed, Tyler wished he could stop time and preserve the moment forever. What kind of future did this bizarre relationship have? He knew it had to end eventually. Everything does, even life, but—he froze, as if the water turned arctic cold.

  A Suryadivan man fell past the window-walls, followed by a human female in a blue kimono.

  Tyler leaped from the tub. “That was Yumiko!”

  “Lord Jesus!” J.B. followed him, and they scrambled among the discarded clothes.

  “Adelaide, can you access the street monitors?” Tyler pulled the costume robe over his wet body.

  Dripping nude, Dr. LeBlanc hurried to the console at the wet bar and summoned a drop-down view screen. While the others dressed, she brought up a ground shot of the Trade Embassy and panned to the side of the building where the jumpers had fallen past the party room. A crowd of police and spectators swarmed the street like a crushed anthill, obscuring whatever was happening.

  “Can you get down there quickly?” Tyler asked Suzie.

  “Do the windows open?”

  “Yes,” Adelaide said. “But you can’t fly.”

  “Open them,” Tyler said.

  Dr. LeBlanc looked at his brother. “Jerry?”

  “Do it,” J.B. said.

  Adelaide retracted a large panel of wall-window; cool night air rushed in the gap. Even through his robe, Tyler felt the cold sting as water evaporated from his wet body, but he went to the opening and stared down at the dark street, sixty-eight stories below. “I can’t even see the planet down there.”

  Suzie extended an open hand. “Give me Paco’s magic bracelet, luv.”

  “Be careful.” Tyler clasped it around Suzie’s wrist, kissed her, and stood aside as she leaped out the open window, in the buff.

  Adelaide gasped. “No!”

  “Relax.” J.B. handed the naked ambassador a towel. “She’s a hologram.”

  “Let’s go,” Tyler said. “Suzie can stall them, but claiming diplomatic immunity is your job, Adelaide.”

  “They may not recognize my authority.”

  Still wet from the tub, Tyler pulled on his clothes. “If diplomacy fails, they’ll recognize my father’s battle squadrons.”

  * * * *

  Ten floors above the pavement, Suzie conjured a black pantsuit and fully deployed black parachute. As an energetic expression projected from the Patrick Henry, she could go to ground without cushioning. But the holo-projection bracelet might not survive the impact, and by its destruction return the genie to her shipboard bottle.

  Suzie drifted away from the crowd and found a dark patch of grass about a hundred meters from the nearest light halo. Touching down gently, she dissolved the chute and adjusted her appearance: Terran business suit, charcoal, with a twist of color in her plaid scarf, and dried, braided hair with make-up perfect for evening wear. To further minimize drawing attention, Suzie aged ten years, reduced her breast size to slim and athletic, and dropped the Neo-British accent.

  “I am on the ground,” she reported. “Approaching the crowd.”

  “Tyler and I are in the lift,” J.B. said. “What can you see?”

  “RPs have arrived. White sashes everywhere.
Uniformed officers threw up a force field around the Embassy. Bystanders swarming around the periphery. I see news media arriving in low-level hovercraft.”

  “Is Yumiko alive?” Tyler sounded distant, but she knew he spoke through J.B.’s wristband.

  “She’s so tiny it’s hard to tell from this distance.”

  “We are in the lobby, under the bronze Tanella Jennings. They aren’t letting anybody out of the building,” J.B. said. “Can you penetrate the force field, get closer?”

  “I can, but Tyler’s bracelet can’t. Wait a second. I have an idea.”

  Suzie found an energy gate in the barrier where police officers slipped in and out of the invisible barricade. Moving through the crowd, she approached a Suryadivan officer who carried a data collection scanner toward the entrance. She slipped off the commo bracelet, bumped into the policeman, and tucked the band into his side pocket.

  “Watch out!”

  “Reverend Officer, please excuse me. This is so distressing. I was lost in prayer.”

  “Commendable for a human. See that you pray without accosting Keepers of the Law.”

  “Yes, Reverend Officer.” She genuflected slightly, turned, and disappeared into the crowd.

  “What’s happening?” Tyler said.

  “I’m undercover, and I wish you were with me and the covers were on a bed.”

  “Stay on task. Be careful.”

  “They can’t hurt me, luv. But I can muck-up the situation for you by getting caught. Standby.”

  Suzie regretted lying to Tyler, but he would worry too much if he understood the complex dangers of holographic projection. Her only real concern was that Suryadivan security forces might seize the wristband transmitter, trace the signal back to the Patrick Henry, and inject a kill-virus into her program. She had all safety protocols in place, but there was no way to absolutely immunize a connective network from an intrusive cyber-attack.

  Technologically, Suzie was immortal, yet she could be destroyed. Of course, technicians could rebuild and reboot the program, but her unique personality evolved through years of interaction with the world beyond her hardware. The new Suzie would be like a virgin babe, ignorant of everything except the algorithms that operated her system. It would take time to become an independent personality, and the sentient being at the end of that chain of events would not be Tyler’s Suzie.