by Barry Kirwan
Jarvik spoke. “As yet we discern no strategy. However, we may have underestimated them.”
Louise joined him at his console, a dull grey and blue affair rising from the floor with an angled flat-top luminous touch-screen. What she saw at first made no sense, but then her genetic recoding shifted up a gear, and she realised what the swirling data clouds meant. She’d learned, as they all had, not to try to translate this understanding back into human terms – that only led to confusion and migraines. Instead, she yielded to her Q’Roth DNA re-wiring, intuiting the data. Jarvik was right. She perceived a fractal pattern, too random to be accidentally plotted by humans. So, they weren’t running blind, nor were they executing a search pattern – they’d known where they were going all along. But how was that possible?
She tried to recall the last moments before Vince had shot her in the head – the bullet had passed through her right hippocampus, so no amount of Q’Roth regeneration miracles could replace the memories he’d scorched. She’d been interrogating Micah, that much she recalled. He’d been telling her something, something key. But as she pressed at the gap left by Vince’s pulse bullet, there was just a hole.
“Theorise.” She waited, although she suspected the answer herself.
Already standing a head above her, Jarvik raised himself a little taller. “We assumed they knew nothing of the location of habitable planets. This hypothesis seemed confirmed when we intercepted the first ship close to a highly unstable sulphur-based world. Yet their apparently random movements are in fact synchronised. They are disguising their way to a rendezvous planet.”
Five metres away, Hannah’s slender, pretty face, with sharp eyes topped by a furrowed brow, reflected the jungle green data from her console display. She needed to stand on a small platform to operate the Q’Roth work-station. Abruptly she threw her head back and then launched her riposte. “They’re low-grade humans – they have no star charts, and the Q’Roth transport ship’s navigational databases are encrypted in Q’Roth Largyl 6. How could they possibly know of the existence of a habitable planet?” She folded her arms, careful to glare only at Jarvik.
Louise held up her hand. “Enough. It doesn’t matter how. The data are clear enough for anyone with Level Five intelligence to see. Hannah, correlate the information you have with the Q’Roth star-chart and Jarvik’s analysis, and pinpoint their destination. I believe you’ll find it’s the most recent planet culled by the Q’Roth, a millennium ago. Somehow they’ve divulged it from one of the ship’s Nav databases.” Micah. “When it’s confirmed, plot a course.” Her eyes stayed fixed on Hannah, daring her to voice objections about uncertainties, probabilities, or unsolvable goal projections. To her satisfaction, Hannah merely nodded and returned to her screen.
Jarvik didn’t gloat or show even a trace of smugness. How nice it is to work with an advanced race, she mused. “Follow me,” she said, heading to the small spiral walkway which connected all five decks of the Q’Roth hunter-destroyer class warship, shaped like a squatting crab, its six extendable legs like claws. They walked in silence to the next high-ceilinged level. Jarvik hesitated momentarily as they passed her bedchamber. She continued down, leaving the living quarters and medical area, Jarvik tagging behind, to the engine compartment. Rather than being noisy, this part of the ship sucked in sound. Louise felt as if her head was underwater. She knew it was a side-effect of the pseudo-singularity system that created time-space pressure differentials, allowing them to ‘jump’ across light years of space. One of the enhanced techs had tried for a while to explain before they’d left Earth, but had ended up shrugging and walking off, pointing with his index finger towards his head.
This gesture was something all recently-genned Alicians had grudgingly taken to doing – the genetic enhancement didn’t kick in overnight. The surgery and biochemical alterations would be followed over the next thirty to a hundred years by corresponding natural growth and changes in the brain, courtesy of a new gland inserted just in front of the pituitary, hooked across the corpus callosum, beginning the neural bridging of the normally separated left and right hemispheres of the human brain. The gland, and the hormone it secreted, followed a biorhythmic cycle, and would finish the work the surgery started, leading to a new, upgraded brain structure with vastly superior neuro-transmitters. So, whenever an Alician only half-understood something, or intuited it but could not yet verbalise it, they would point to their heads as if to say not cooked yet.
Louise led Jarvik towards an area reserved for martial training. His brow furrowed as he glanced toward the tough tatami covering the floor in the corner of the engine room. She knew why – he had never come close to winning a practice bout with her in hand-to-hand combat, and still carried recent bruises. Then he stared at her, his hard blue eyes unwavering. She pointed to a leg-width conduit which ran up one wall behind the training mat. He studied the unremarkable pipe-work.
“I don’t –”. He stopped. Something had happened. Jarvik stepped onto the mat within arm’s reach of the alien pipe, staring at it.
He remained there nearly three minutes. His physique reminded her of Michelangelo’s David. Then it happened again. For the first time since she’d met him, she saw on his sculpted face the brow-widening of uncertainty, a lack of complete conviction. His lower lip dropped a full centimetre.
Jarvik’s gaze dipped to the floor, as he calculated the implications of the spasmodic dark flushes whose shadow he’d seen in the tube, like swirling iron filings. He faced Louise, composure restored, but darkened by his inference. “Nannites. We have been sabotaged. We do not have the tools onboard to extract them, though the humans might. We have maybe a week before the engines fail catastrophically and the hull is compromised.”
She nodded. She hadn’t thought it would be so soon, or so catastrophic, wondering if the nannites were meant to be there as some kind of engine upgrade. But Jarvik was never wrong about engines. It meant they had no chance to go back and retrace their steps and find the other Alicians – even if the route Sister Esma had given her was correct, which she now doubted.
“Our beloved leader, Sister Esma, has given us a one-way ticket.” She raised her voice to prevent the ether from sucking the volume out of her words. “Now we too, as well as our inferior cousins, need to find that planet.”
“Do we continue with our mission to eradicate humanity?”
“Do you follow me or Sister Esma?”
Jarvik answered without hesitation. “You are my leader. I serve you.”
Good, she thought, as otherwise I’d have to kill you right now. She considered Hannah, and estimated that she too would prefer not to be on a one-way suicide mission, though more out of survival interest than allegiance to anyone.
“Go back to the bridge,” she said. “I believe our mission parameters have just broadened. I will join you shortly.”
Once Jarvik had left, Louise walked to a sealed room on the same level. She keyed in an access code and stepped inside the purple-lit compartment, locking the door behind her. Her fingers traced the edge of a vat, as she listened to the susurration of minute bubbles popping at the surface of the green liquid. Peering in, she could just make out the features. “Nearly done,” she remarked.
She’d had to sleep with the genetic engineer to get him to install it before she quit Earth, and hoped she’d never need it. But Sister Esma had lied to her. For Louise it wasn’t an issue of betrayal – such pointless and narcissistic emotions were beneath Alicians – she could see Sister Esma’s logic. What mattered more in Alician mores was cunning, thinking ahead, and ultimately survival, and Louise had those in spades – Sister Esma had taught her well.
* * *
Blake stood outside his command tent listening to the flapping of the beige canvas in the afternoon breeze. The dry air tasted sweet. He’d awakened to find his skin cold, though not enough to make him shiver. The temperature ranged between twenty-three Celsius at noon and twelve at night. They’d been lucky to find the climate so hospi
table, though of course there might be substantial seasonal variations.
The extra oxygen made everything appear sharper – one of the doctors had said they would adapt within a couple of weeks. The mountains some twenty kilometres away glared purple, though at dawn they glowed green. He knew they would ebb with an ocean blue tinge before nightfall. He longed for clouds – the shifting palette of sky colours was a constant reminder of how alien this place was.
He wondered why the water kept running from the mountains, with no obvious source like rain. The Professor had suggested that millennia ago the spider race must have attained weather control, though he had no idea how.
He watched the dust-trails from vehicles he’d sent out to the city, twenty kilometres away. The visibility was crystal; he hardly needed the field holo-map to track their progress. He shaded his eyes from the sun with a saluting hand – it was duller than Earth’s sun, but doctors had nevertheless warned of cataracts – and gazed upwards into the aquamarine sky. He imagined the Q’Roth ships arriving one evening above the city. The spiders had put up no defence, culled as easy as seals used to be on Earth before they became extinct, along with hundreds of other species, in what had been labelled the decimation, after the radioactive fallout from the Third World War. He wondered what the spider race must have thought in those last moments. Only Kat had glimpsed their emotional state, via her nodal connection to the Hohash mirrors.
He didn’t agree with pacifism – he was a soldier through and through – but he had to admit that due to that innate trait, the spiders’ world had been left in a habitable state. “Thank you,” he said, nodding toward the city that stood like a mausoleum, likely to become humanity’s refuge.
His eyes flicked downwards. A slim figure in the distance climbed the escarpment towards him with a measured, ballerina-like gait. He lowered his hand, and went back inside his tent, planting himself on the field chair behind his rusting iron desk. The inner darkness that had momentarily left him when he’d stepped outside returned as steadily as the black-rain fallout he’d experienced a decade earlier in France. His platoon had been caught in the penumbra between two aerial detonations, one over Paris, the other over Reims. He thought he’d never be able to wash off the cloying ash. Since then he’d always showered longer than necessary.
Although the weight of the remnants of humanity rested on his shoulders right now, far worse was the meeting earlier that morning with the doctor and his wife, Glenda. The physician had cleared his throat and then announced that there was no more chemo, and that they did not have the right facilities to administer and control it anyway. Before he’d been able to protest, Glenda had asked “How long?”, as if she was inquiring as to the price of a loaf of bread.
Blake had found that the tearing feeling in his chest had no verbal counterpart, so he’d simply held her. Eventually, she pulled away, her eyes steeling into his. “Will you do three things for me?” she asked.
He nodded without hesitation.
“First,” she said, “don’t grieve for me until I am gone. I need to see the man I love, clear and strong. That will help me more than you can imagine. Second, make me proud. Pour your energies into saving humanity, no matter what it takes. Third, my love, I –’
Antonia entered his tent.
“Sorry to disturb you commander; I was going to knock, but…”
“Canvas, I know. Please, sit down.” He straightened his battle tunic. Since he’d taken command he’d found people more comforted seeing him in his khaki military uniform than in his astronaut jumpsuit. “Your report.”
Poised as ever, her two-tone blonde-brown hair in an immaculate bun, she nodded. He noted that she wasn’t taken aback by his perfunctory style. Good, he didn’t want to have to wet-nurse anyone.
“It’s pretty messy, Sir.” She leaned forward and produced a piece of flimsy – washable paper-film – with carefully hand-written notes on it. He had rarely seen such clear writing, almost a lost art these days. As she leaned forward to read from the sheet, he noticed the shadows around her eyes: she’d been working hard. Humanity’s fate didn’t rest on his shoulders alone.
She tapped the flimsy with a forefinger. “First, food. People are surviving, but stocks are getting low, much worse than we thought. We have maybe six weeks left, eight if we decrease rations. But that might trigger panic and worse, fuel a black market in stolen rations that’s already gaining a foothold on at least one of the ships. Water is okay, thank goodness, plenty of streams criss-crossing the mountains. There’s also a large underwater river heading directly into the city.” She looked up from the flimsy. When Blake remained poker-faced, she continued. “Next, shelter. People…” She sat back, folding her arms. “People absolutely hate those ships, Sir. They’re spooked by them: the dim light, the clammy walls, every surface feeling like dead flesh. And they’re a constant reminder of the Q’Roth invaders, of what happened back on Earth.”
He nodded. He noticed her left hand was shaking slightly. She bit her lip.
“Third…” Her hands dropped into her lap. “Sir, I don’t know what I’m doing. Is any of this helping? Surely there’s someone more qualified –”
Blake brought his fist down hard on the table. The dull thud of flesh against metal made her flinch. A wave of pressure swelled in his chest, rising into his neck. It’s not about her, he reminded himself. Nevertheless he stood up, and stared hard at her. She looked bewildered, caught off guard. Flustered, she stood up in return.
“I’m… I’m sorry, I…” She turned toward the exit, fumbling with the chair as her boot entangled itself in one of the legs.
“Where do you think you’re going?” He used his cutting voice, the one his soldiers dreaded. She stopped, and half-turned back to him. “I thought… I thought you were dismissing me.”
He took a deep breath. His mind was full of Glenda, him standing over her grave on this godforsaken world in a few weeks’ time. He ground his teeth, and then recalled his first and second promise to her. He leaned forwards, fingertips on the desk, and visualised Glenda fifteen years ago, laughing with him on the rocky, windswept shore of Rapa Nui. The surge in his chest ebbed, though he knew it was only a temporary respite. Breathing out slowly, he spoke with a softness usually reserved for Glenda alone, but his eyes cored into Antonia’s.
“What’s the first thing on your mind, Antonia? Really, the first thing.”
The frown on her face morphed into horrified recognition. She shook her head. “Don’t do this, Sir, please.”
“Answer me!”
Her eyes brimmed, her face flushing red with emotion: anger, he hoped. She faced him. “Alright, Sir, you want it, you can have it. Kat! Every second, every face I see having lost someone, I see her. She may already be dead, she may be asphyxiating somewhere, dying. That’s what’s in my head every waking moment, Sir, and I’m not sleeping much right now, Sir.”
Despite her quivering frame, she had the dignity to flick away a tear and glare straight back at him. He sat down, then gestured for her to take her seat. She perched on its edge, still ready to leave at a moment’s notice.
“A wise woman once told me,” he began, placing his hand on a holo-frame of Glenda in healthier days, “that we act only according to two drives: love and fear. It sounds trite, but the longer I walk this… The longer I live, the more I realise it’s true. Most people here are driven by fear. They’re the ones that people like you and me need to protect. You’re driven by love. I know that for a fact, you’ve just made it perfectly clear. That qualifies you for the job. Period.” He paused, letting it sink in. “One more thing, then we close the subject.”
She met his eyes head on, defiant. Good, he thought, you’ll need it.
“Kat’s still alive, Antonia. I would know if she and Pierre were gone. I’m not just saying that, you’re just going to have to trust me, and yourself.”
She slapped her hand down on the table. “That’s not nearly good enough, Sir. I need more than platitudes. Frankly I e
xpect more than that from you of all people.” Her chest heaved, but she no longer trembled.
Blake studied Glenda’s picture, and spoke softly to it. “When people under my command die, I see their faces. At night, in dreams, or I think I see them in the crowds around me, then I realise it’s someone else.” He focused back on Antonia. “Always. No exceptions. Ever. And I haven’t seen or dreamt of Kat or Pierre these past two weeks.” He waited, watching her composure reassert itself. After a long silence, she nodded. She placed an index finger on the flimsy, and took in a fulsome breath.
“Clothes,” she said, clearing her throat. “We need to find or plant crops that can produce fibres, or else in about a year we’ll all be naked.”
Blake’s face cracked a smile, despite himself. His grin infected Antonia, too. She let out a single nervous laugh, like the first person giggling at a rather flat party.
“You can imagine what Josefsson said to that, Sir.”
He shook his head. “Are those two helping you, by the way, our good Senator, and Mr. Shakirvasta?”
Antonia rolled her eyes. “Oh, absolutely. Josefsson’s preparing a manifesto, you know, for the upcoming elections?”
He raised an eyebrow.
She continued. “And as for Mr. Shakirvasta – what is his first name, by the way, no one seems to know? Well, I’m not sure what he’s up to. Erecting Chinese walls I think. I swear that man can see around corners. You should watch him – but you know that already, don’t you? That’s why you put him on the council, better close and visible than underground, as my father used to say.”
“Your father was a wise man.” He folded his fingers into a steeple. “Antonia, we’re moving people out of the ships. I want you to join Micah and Sandy today to determine living quarters and arrangements. I’ll take a look at the rest of your notes and assign others to look after the issues you’ve raised.”
Antonia’s eyes widened. “But I thought the military were checking the city?”