by Clay Gilbert
Holder and Goodman looked at each other. “He did, huh?” asked Goodman. “Yeah, he did. I was just out of the Peacekeeper Corps then, doin’ my first tour of duty. Saw a dozen worlds in half as many years. Thought it was hot shit at first. Thought I was, too.”
Goodman grinned at Holder, and the two of them laughed. “That’s fine, that’s fine,” Turner said. “I’d have laughed at me, too. I didn’t know the Peacekeeper Corps wasn’t all that glamorous. Not at first, anyway. What I really hadn’t figured out was the extent of how unglamorous it was.”
I could have told you the Peacekeeper Corps wasn’t glamorous, Holder thought. I’ve known some of them. Hell, I tried to enlist to be one of them. Step or two above Recon duty, but not much. And I still haven’t heard about anybody killing anybody else on a Recon patrol.
Peacekeepers got set up by Homesec after the last Big War, right?”
“Yeah, that’s right,” Goodman said. “I was with the ‘keepers for a little while, before I got kicked up, or down, to a desk job.” He grinned.
“So what happened to you, Turner?” Holder asked. “I left the ‘keepers about four years ago,” Turner said. “I’d been in five years-did the first two on a contract out of school, and the other three just because. That’s how the Corps works, in peacetime, at least, you sign up for a contract, do your time, then stay until you’re ready to leave. I signed up for two years, like I said, and the next couple after that went so fast, I thought I’d probably stay in forever. But sometimes plans change.”
“Yeah, sometimes they do,” Goodman agreed, and Holder nodded, thinking of Annah, and how one misplaced hunk of space rock had changed everything for him.
“There were ten of us on that mission. We were all pretty excited about it. Command Control had told us that it was likely to be a little more than what we were used to, which could be pretty dull. Holder, some of the smartasses in the Corps sometimes called our quieter missions ‘Recon with guns.’”
Holder laughed. “No thanks. Quiet’s fine with me.” “Anyway, that’s what they told us. I was just eighteen, and anything that didn’t involve looking out a portal at the deep black for hours at a time or looking at hypothetical battle scenarios on paper in a classroom was just fine with me.” “Did they tell you anything about where you were going?” Holder asked.
“They told us we’d be helping the cause of Earth,” Turner said. “Sounded great to me. Until we got there, that is. ‘There’ was a little place whose first human visitors had named Waycross, because it was located in the middle of a main trade route between Earth Sector and the Magellan Cluster, just past Mercury.
That’s a pretty long stretch of road, as you know—but it was the closest inhabited world to Earth, and one of the newest discovered. Made it ripe for the picking. And very damn important to Homesec.”
“I imagine it was pretty important to the people who lived there, too,” Holder said. “Yeah,” said Turner. “We didn’t really think of them as people, though. Command Control told us there was an agreement between Homesec and the government on Waycross, so that they’d give us a certain number of things in trade a few times a year, and give us free passage through their airspace.”
“What’d the people on Waycross get?” “Shipments of supplies, that got flown in when the Homesec people came to trade. Well, that’s what people said, anyway. That’s not what I saw, but that’s what I always heard.”
“So why’d Waycross need a visit from the Peacekeeper Corps?” Holder asked.
“They decided they needed more compensation for the use of their airspace. Those people weren’t dumb. Some of them may have gotten a little greedy, but they all knew they were being ripped off. That’s what the Peacekeepers were sent in for: to make sure the trade ships from Earth landed. Might as well have called them ‘thief ships.’ Pirates are a hell of a lot more honest, let me tell you.”
“Did they try to stop the ships?” Goodman asked. “Yeah, they did. It’s hard to stop large batteries of guns, though. We didn’t even get off the ships. Some trade negotiations. We didn’t even get off the ships.” Turner’s voice trailed to a whisper.
“That’s just sick,” Holder said, imagining for the first time what the Homesec attack on Evohe must have been like for the people there.
“Waycross was important,” Turner said. “And not just for Earth. Homesec lied to the people back on Earth. Fabricated news reports saying that the natives had tried to bring down the trade ships; that they’d tried to hijack them. They even showed footage. But come on, man-any kid with a computer could put something like that together—you think the Earth government couldn’t fake some vids?”
Holder laughed. “Right.” “Believe me, nothing like that happened. We were sent there to ‘keep the peace’-Homesec’s peace. Turned out it didn’t matter who we had to kill. But those news reports really helped Homesec’s cause, back on Earth.”
“Commander Reynolds did all that?” Holder asked.
“No, man, no. Not Reynolds. His predecessor, Douglas. Real hardliner. A lot of the HPF people thought Reynolds was soft on Offworlders, once he came in. Just because nothing else like Waycross happened under Reynolds’ watch. I can tell you, I didn’t look at things the same way afterward. There were a lot of people who didn’t. The Maestro was one of them.” The ‘com that Turner wore on his wrist gave a shrill sound.
“Excuse me for just a moment, boys.” Turner plugged in a set of headphones to the port on the side of his ‘com. “Go ahead.” he said to whoever was on the other end, as Holder and Goodman exchanged apprehensive glances. After a few moments, he took off the headphones, and turned back toward them.
“Goodman, how fast can this thing go?”
“We manage,” Goodman said. “Don’t we, Holder?” he added, glancing at his friend.
“That we do,” Holder agreed.
“All right then,” Turner said. “If I give you some coordinates, will you trust me?”
“I think that’s doable,” Goodman said. “Where are we going?”
“You’re about to get a first-hand look at just what pirates do.”
* * * Annah was flying. She watched in amazement as, all around her, the Sea of Stars unfolded. So bright up here, she thought. This is what I have always wanted. And Holder made it all come true for me. But where is Holder? The awareness of the Shapertrance came over her, although she was in her bed at the hearth-fire of her parents, asleep. He is here, where I am now. I am seeing through his eyes. But what are these other lights? These other shapes-other ships-so many of them now, like new stars, suddenly born. Some of them are pulling alongside Holder’s ship-but now, some of them are firing on it!
The shock threatened to pull her from the trance, but she kept her mind in the rhythm of vision. Dearest, what are you doing? Why are they firing on you? Dearest, be safe— Annah willed herself awake, extracting her conscious mind from the dreaming-space as she had done many times before. She got up from her bedding and made her way into the woods to ease the aching of her bladder, which had been done no favors by the stress of the dream. As she squatted there, she found herself slipping back into the trance, and her eyes were momentarily blinded by the glare of fire. First Ones, what is happening? Have Holder and Goodman been caught, and forced to fight? Beloved, she thought to Holder, wherever he might be. Be safe. She pulled herself from the trance once more. Serra. I must find Serra.
* * * “Children. They’re killing children.And families.” “And why not?” Goodman asked Holder, spitting the words out like rotted meat. “They’re not human.”
“Cover me!” Turner’s voice burst out from the ship’s ‘com. Holder squeezed a bright blue blast from the central cannon. In an instant, it sliced through the soldier who’d been striking at Turner with a curved blade as sharp as the fang of one of the cavern-serpents of Saturn. The burst had narrowly, but cleanly missed the screaming infant Turner now carried tucked under his arm. The child had blue skin, a multiplicity of squirming limbs, and onl
y one orange, ovoid eye, but it settled down as Turner shifted it to rest more comfortably against his shoulder, and Holder could see an actual smile on its tiny face as it wrapped several of its limbs around Turner’s neck, hugging him tightly.
All life is the same, Holder knew Annah would say, and he knew it was true. This child, and Holder could now see it was a male, he was like any other. And now he was an orphan.
Less than an hour before, their ship had materialized out of hyperspace, flashing out of darkness into a sea of fire.
“Looks like we might already be too late,” Turner had told them. “Take us down, anyway.” Holder had been piloting the ship, and he’d brought them down close enough to see a large group of armed troops wearing dark blue Homesec uniforms, each of them with an all-too familiar gold H on their right shoulder.
“Yup,” Turner had told them. “HPF. They’re getting organized.”
He’s taken us right into the middle of a war zone, Holder had thought, and he’d been right. Turner had explained to them that this planet was rumored to be where supplies were being made for the same group that had smuggled the bomb through at Homesec Central Headquarters. This family-these people, whose child was all that was left, now-hadn’t seemed to know anything about any weapons, other than that they’d cowered in fear at the sight of the ones the HPF troops were carrying, and they’d begged for their lives right up until the very second they’d had them taken away. There’d been another, much smaller spacecraft lifting off under fire from the Homesec ground troops as their ship flashed in from hyperspace. “I guess they were the ones who called,” Holder said.
“They needed us,” Turner had said. “They got caught in a firefight trying to keep these poor people from getting taken apart by the Homesec troops, and they were outgunned.”
Holder’s mind was brought back to the present by the sound of blaster fire and the sight of several more natives scrambling to get on board the ship. Holder was already unlocking the bay doors when he heard Turner’s voice over the ‘com.
“Let’ ‘em in, Holder. We need to save all we can. We’ve taken care of the last of the Homesec guys, I think. I’ll make a last pass, just to be sure, and Goodman and I’ll be in, and we can get out of here.”
“Sounds good,” Holder said. They’d managed to save ten natives, in all. Ten. Out of God-knows-how-many in this settlement. Six males, three females, and a young adolescent female. They didn’t say anything. Holder imagined they didn’t speak Standard; another reason the Homesec troopers’ demands might have terrified them. Holder noticed that there was no anger in their eyes as they looked at him. What he saw there was gratitude. Turner and Goodman boarded the ship a few minutes later, Turner with the native infant still tightly hugging his neck.
“Where to now?” Holder asked. “We’re headed back to base,” Turner said. “I’ll give you the coordinates.” He stretched his arm up, stroked tiny blue fingers. In the aftermath of all the struggle, the child had fallen asleep.
* * * “Annah, there is little that we can do,” Serra said. “I do not want to hear that.” Annah frowned at the Elder Shaper. “They were firing at him.”
Serra smiled. “I understand. But from what you tell me, your Holder is a pilot. I am sure it is not the first time he has been fired at. He is doing this, in part, for you.”
Annah sighed. “I know. But I want to do something for him. I am useless to him here.”
“You need to continue your training. That will help your people. And that is what Holder would want you to do.” “I want to help our people, Serra.” Annah looked at her. “Now that I know there is a way that I can. But I must help him, too. Is there something I can learn that can help him?” “There may be, in time. You need to focus on your training, for now. Do the Vision work I asked you to do. Try to work on recovering your memories of your heart-song. And meet me here again, in three days.”
“I will, Serra.” “Very well. If I find anything, in Vision or anywhere else, that will help Holder, I will tell you. But I think that the answer, if there is one, will come from you.”
“Thank you, Serra,” Annah said, feeling shaken. “I will see you in three days.” Annah made her way down the hill from the heart-place, still haunted by her dream of the night before. Why were they firing on him? Holder, what have you gotten yourself involved in? I need you to keep your promise. I need you to come home to me. What I have to do—I am not sure I can do it, alone. But I will try.
Annah was surprised when, halfway home, she met Ardan, approaching from the opposite direction. “A fair day to you, Ardan,” she said, and smiled.
“A fair day to you, Annah,” Ardan said. “Although it is nearly evening,” he added, laughing. Annah laughed, too. “Hmmph. I was only being polite.” “I know,” Ardan said. “So, meeting with the Elder Shaper again?”
“Yes,” Annah said. “She says my training is going well, but I do not feel it is. I feel as though my learning were a stream that flows for many spans through a wide channel, and then reaches a place where the way narrows. I feel my way has narrowed, and I do not know why.”
“I would not worry. Streams have a talent for finding their way.”
Annah brightened. “So where have you been?” “I have been in the Flatlands with Kyrin, visiting some of her family, and friends from her old Grove. We are talking of having our Promising soon.”
“I am glad for you, Ardan,” Annah said. “Why did her family leave the Flatlands? Not that it is really any of my business.”
Ardan smiled. “She would not mind. She is your friend, Annah. The Flatlands were very inhospitable, it seems, for a long time after the Restoration. That is what history says, and from what I have seen, it is so. Kyrin’s family were not the only ones to leave, either. And now many of those who had gone are returning.”
“Hmm. I told Holder the same thing, once, that many places on our world are still catching up; still restoring themselves.”
“Many things have changed in the Flatlands: many new growing things; many creatures only known from Memory, even streams and valleys seemingly carved out of the rock and soil overnight.”
“I see,” said Annah, feeling as though she were in the trance that overtook her when she worked on her training exercises.
“Kyrin’s cousins told us that the Flatlanders believe there is a reason. They say it is because the Shapers are returning, and the land is remembering itself. They say it is because the Restorer has come into the world. Have you heard of this Restorer,Annah? Do you think this is so?”
Annah thought for a moment; remembered Serra’s question to her: When was the last Shaper born on this world? Eighteen cycles ago, when she had been born-and before that, not for more than a hundred cycles. “I have heard of such a thing. It could be, Ardan.” She said nothing of what Serra had told her; that she herself was the first of the new Shapers since the Restoration had happened. That she could be the Restorer. I am not special. I am myself, and nothing more. She thought for another moment. “It will not be enough merely for the Shapers to return, or the land to remember itself. Our people must remember themselves.”
Ardan looked puzzled. “What do you mean?”
“I am not sure exactly what it means yet. I only know that it is so.” She shook her head as if waking from a deep sleep, then looked back at him and smiled. “Do not worry, Ardan. I think I spend too long in the Shaper’s trance, these days. How goes your building?”
Ardan grinned, and the serious, almost frightened look he had worn while Annah spoke fell away like morning’s veil of mist. “Very well. I did some building while Kyrin and I were there. A new homeground and hearth for her family. And the beginnings of one for us.”
“What?” Annah asked.
“For Kyrin and I. I think we are going to leave Laughing Waters Grove and go to the flatlands. She still thinks of it as home. My home is with her now. You understand that, do you not?”
“I do,”Annah said. “I am happy for you,Ardan.” “I am happy
for you, Annah. You have changed things, you know. For me, for Holder. I think you will change things for many.”
Annah blushed, turning away for a moment. “I only try,” she said. They had reached the place in the Grove where the homeground of Ardan’s parents lay. “A fair evening to you, Annah,” Ardan said. “I am sure we will speak soon.”
“A fair evening to you, Ardan. I am sure we will,” she added, although she was not.
This world is remembering itself, she thought. And with remembrance comes change.
Gary Holder’s Journal, August 31, Year 250, Homesec Reckoning.
“Everything changes.” You told me that, Annah. Feels like a hundred years ago now. You’re still back on Evohe-safe, I hope. And I’m still here. Well, Goodman and me. “Be my eyes,” you told me—so I’m trying to do that. “Here” is a place called Holdfast. Interesting name for a pirate planet, eh? That’s more or less what Holdfast is, and has been for some time, so I’m told. And I guess a pirate is what some people would call me, now. Goodman, too. But, as I’ve often hoped people could understand about you and me, truth is in the eye of the one who tells it.
What we’re doing here is important. It’s also dangerous. We’re trying to save people. People like you, Annah. Offworlders. Earth’s changed. As the war’s gotten worse, and it has, the people running things have gotten worse, too. It’s like their hate is a sickness. Anyone who isn’t human, or even completely human, is a target.
Back on Earth-I can’t bring myself to say ‘home’ anymorethey’re trying to pass a bill that would outlaw anyone who has more than a certain percentage of Offworlder blood in them. It’s totally insane. The law hasn’t quite gone through yet. It seems that some of the representatives in the World Congress can’t agree on exactly what percentage of bigotry is allowable. Thank the gods for small blessings.
Holdfast is a halfway point; a stop along what, in old Earth history, would have been called an ‘underground railroad’ for the people Earth is trying so hard to get rid of. In a way, we’re helping that happen, just not the way the bigots would prefer. I’ll tell you about all of that, sometime. You’ll read these journals, these records. And we’ll talk about them together. I miss you,Annah. In everything we do here, and especially in the faces of all the people we’re helping-I see you in every one of them.