“We were lucky,” Isaac admitted, then shook his head. “No, we weren’t lucky. Reletan-dai saved us. So long as Shezarim was in the fight, the Escorts focused on her to the exclusion of everything else. The Matrices got hammered, again, but we only lost Ice Witch in the end.”
“We’re going to feel the loss of Reletan-dai and the other Assini who’d already woken up,” Catalan pointed out. “None of them are going to be as quick to adapt as Reletan-dai was. That man was…exceptional.”
“And I think he saved us all—but I also think his goal was to save his people,” Isaac replied. “He trusted you to do that, Captain Catalan, and you honored his trust. And mine. Thank you.”
“I only did my duty, sir,” Catalan replied, clearly uncomfortable.
“I know,” the Admiral said with a smile. Officers who would go as far as Octavio Catalan had and claim it was merely their duty were precious commodities.
“We’ve got a lot to handle here,” he continued. “Your priorities are threefold, Captain Catalan:
“First, I want the cryo-bay set up as an independent space station in Vistan orbit, with its own power source and maneuvering systems. We’ll need to start waking up carefully selected individuals and get them ready to decide where they want to go. My inclination is to send them to Refuge, but it’s not for us to decide.
“Secondly, I want that database analysis complete—and I want those human eyes on it, those key personnel. I know you’re getting used to leaning on D, but remember that they are a Matrix. I’m not entirely certain how far we can trust them.
“Thirdly, I want Interceptor’s warp drive repaired. She no longer needs to be able to catch another ship, just capable of making the journey back to Exilium. You’re going to be couriering D and the science databases we’ve acquired back home.”
“I think we can trust D, sir,” Catalan argued. “They’re supposed to be loyal to us first, and everything they’ve done supports that.”
“I agree, and that’s why I’m letting you take them home—but let’s still keep human eyes on everything,” Isaac told his subordinate. “We all have a lot of work to do, Octavio. I don’t think I’m leaving Vista anytime soon, but I want you ready to go as soon as possible.
“I suggest you get to it!”
It took over two days to complete the search and rescue and get the fleet back into Vistan orbit. Seventeen of Ice Witch’s crew had survived in the end, a sparse fragment of a crew of over two hundred. Another two hundred dead across the fleet.
Over four hundred more deaths under Isaac’s command, mostly human but with enough Vistans on the list to remind him that they’d fought for their own world bravely.
They weren’t sure how many Assini Reletan-dai had woken up to crew Shezarim for her final flight. Somewhere in the region of two hundred, but Interceptor’s teams were still going through the records on the cryo-bay, trying to find the right people to wake up this time.
Once the fleet returned to orbit, Isaac found himself facing a surprisingly peremptory message from the Great High Mother, demanding that he attend her in the orbital habitat that was now acting as the Vistans’ capital.
Four power-armored Shining Spears were waiting for him when he arrived, and he stopped in surprise.
“They brought their people back from Interceptor,” Connor whispered to him. “I guess they became the Great High Mother’s personal guard. Makes sense, I guess.”
It was odd, Isaac realized, that he had handed over the technology for the Vistans to build modern warships, but he blinked at the sight of Vistans in modern armor.
Shaking his head at himself, he approached the Spears and saluted.
“Admiral Isaac Lestroud,” he introduced himself, aware it was probably pointless. “The Great High Mother summoned me.”
“She is awaiting you, Admiral. The First-Among-Singers is also on her way,” the Spear told him, piquing his curiosity more. “If you will follow us?”
The Spears fell in around Isaac, Connor and their Marine guards. The two human Marines weren’t in power armor, and Isaac could feel their tension.
The rotating habitats were impressive. The sheer scale of the project was huge, but so was the fact that they’d had to bring in a lot of water to meet Vistan environmental needs. Isaac’s dress uniform trousers were soaked halfway to his knee by the time they’d made it any distance, and he half-wished he’d stuck to his regular uniform.
His regular uniform doubled as an emergency vac-suit and was waterproof. The white fabric of his dress uniform was definitely not.
Their eventual destination looked no different from any other part of the station until the guards led them into a large assembly hall.
Even the hall had the same plain fixtures and walls as everywhere else in the station. The ceiling, however, was a massive version of the mixed holographic/datasong projectors the Vistans had been developing.
To Isaac’s eyes, it was Vista as seen from the station’s position. It wasn’t a true representation of what you would see outside the station—it wasn’t spinning, for example—but it showed everything going on around the Great High Mother’s homeworld…
And the sickly gray appearance of that homeworld.
“Admiral Lestroud, approach us,” the Great High Mother instructed from across the hall.
He obeyed, seeing that Sings-Over-Darkened-Waters was already standing by Sleeps-In-Sunlight.
Vistan body language was still nearly unreadable to humans. The Assini were far more interpretable in many ways, despite being four-legged centaur-like creatures with beaks.
He approached the Vistan leader’s chair and saluted crisply.
“Honored ally,” he greeted her formally. “You requested my presence.”
“I did,” she confirmed. “My First-Among-Singers has relayed the course of the battle just fought in our system. We are once again aware of how fledgling our ships and arms are compared to both yours and those of the beings who would destroy us.
“I am also made aware of the ships being laid down in the yards built for the evacuation freighters, ships your people have designed for us.
“My people and I are in your debt, Admiral Lestroud, and so I find myself afraid,” the Great High Mother told him. “Our world is broken, our race surviving only by the shallowest of waters and your aid.
“We fear the price you would demand of us in payment for all of this. Already a great war had been brought to our system. You protected us, but the battle fought against the Assini’s Escort Matrices was not our war.”
“It was not mine either, honored ally,” Isaac said carefully. “It was the Assini’s war, and one in which we chose to aid them to repay the assistance of the Matrices who have helped both of our peoples over the years.
“In turn, we have been given access to both Matrix and Assini technological databanks, databanks I intend to see shared with your people in payment for your assistance against the Escorts.”
“And once again you would place us in your debt, Admiral Lestroud,” Sleeps-In-Sunlight noted. “And once again I fear your price. Speak now, Admiral. Lay our fears to rest or lay them bare for all to hear!”
Well, that was a harsh place to start from…but it helped that Isaac knew what he wanted.
“Very well,” he told her. “Understand first that I speak with the full authority of the Republic of Exilium, but what I say must pass our Senate before it is law. I am our ambassador and my word will not be discarded lightly, but it could happen.
“You must understand that we of the Republic of Exilium are very few. We are exiles, flung a galaxy away from home. Four million souls in the darkness of a strange void.
“We find ourselves surrounded by the Matrices, many of them hostile, some even truly genocidal. A handful are friendly.
“We cannot turn aside any help, nor can we betray the oaths and honor that led us to be exiled. I look at the stars around us, and I see that we are not alone—and that worlds like yours are threatened by the R
ogue Matrices.
“And I see only one way to save those worlds: to fight. To take that fight to stars we have not yet explored, to find the Rogue Matrices shipyards and AI seed factories and destroy them.
“That war, that crusade, cannot be fought by the Republic alone. We need friends and allies. We helped you because you needed our help. Now we hope to ask for yours—but if you cannot stand alongside us as equals in the line of battle, your help is useless to us.
“So, I have offered technology and ships and aid so that when the time comes, when we are ready to take the fight to the Rogues so that what happened to Vista never happens again, you will be ready and able to fight by our side.”
He’d apparently brought the Vistan court—or press pit, whatever the audience was—to silence other than the ever-present chirping, but Sleeps-In-Sunlight seemed unperturbed.
“And if I were to tell you, Admiral Lestroud, that my people have suffered enough? That I will not ask my Spears and Star-Choirs to go to war at your side?”
“Then I would ask if you would permit us to recruit volunteers from among your people,” he told her. “And I would be disappointed if you refused…but you are the Great High Mother of the Vistans. Your thoughts must first be for your own people, not for strangers you have barely met.”
“And shouldn’t your first thoughts be for the good of the Republic?” she asked.
“They are,” he said quietly. “But Captain Catalan committed the ESF to protect your people, and I will honor that oath. I swore to protect the remaining Assini, and I will honor that oath.
“And I swore an oath once, long ago, to protect the weak and uphold the helpless.”
He smiled.
“I will honor that oath.”
“My oath as a Great Mother was similar to that last in many ways,” Sleeps-In-Sunlight told him. “The intended focus was my own people, but we never restricted that. ‘A Mother should look to all children, not just those of her Clan, when they have met their own Clan’s needs.’”
“My people say that if you have extra, you should build a longer table, not a taller fence,” Isaac said gently.
“I look forward to learning more of your people in the years to come, Admiral Isaac Lestroud,” the Great High Mother of the Vistans told him. “We will stand by your side. These Rogues destroyed our world, and you are correct: this cannot happen again.
“Not while we have the power to stop it.”
68
For the first time since her husband had left Exilium, Amelie was able to have a live conversation with him—unfortunately, it was with her entire Cabinet present. Isaac was linked via the newly installed updated tachyon communicators, allowing a real-time holographic communication from fifty light-years.
He stood at the far end of the table, facing her and her Ministers calmly. It had been months since she’d seen anything except recordings, and there was an edge to his face and eyes she didn’t like.
“Those are the terms I promised the Vistans,” he told the Cabinet levelly. “A full alliance, technological exchange, assistance with building their new fleet, continued assistance with the evacuation.
“With the help of the Matrices, we should be able to begin the full reconstruction process on Vista once the last evacuees are lifted out in thirty days. XR-13-9 will be providing replacement terraforming spikes.”
He shook his head.
“All of that effort to knock aside the ones the Rogues brought, and now we’re going to finish the job ourselves. Unlike the Rogues’ spikes, though, XR-13-9 believes they can program the new ones with the ecological data from the Vistans.
“They won’t be able to fully reconstruct the original ecosystem, but the result will be a blend of the ecologies of Vista and the Assini homeworld. It won’t be a perfect repair, but it won’t be a regular Constructed World, either.
“In exchange for that assistance, the Vistans will provide combat task forces to assist in neutralizing the Rogue Matrices in this region. The long-term strategy of that operation will need to be drawn up over the next few months, but I don’t foresee commencing major operations for at least a year.”
“You do realize that this government has to approve any operation on the scale you are suggesting?” Father James asked dryly. The pacifistic priest sounded more amused than upset, to Amelie’s surprise.
“I do,” Isaac confirmed. “The alliance with the Vistans is inside the authority you gave me. I could argue that operations against Rogues in the area of the Hearthfire and Refuge Systems would be included as well, but I won’t.
“We now know that the Rogues we’ve faced have been less aggressive than the original Matrices close to the Assini homeworld,” the Admiral continued. “They’ve been genocidal, yes, but almost incidentally. The Matrices close to the Assini actively sought out other intelligences to destroy.
“We have to assume that we have been lucky, Ministers. We need to make contact with the Construction Matrices near us and near Vista and establish their threat levels. With the assistance of XR-13-9 and the Assini, it is possible that we will be able to turn some of those intelligences into allies.
“Some we may simply be able to leave be. I suspect, however, that at least half or more of the Matrices outside of XR-13-9’s verification network will need to be disabled or destroyed.
“I don’t like the idea of committing ourselves to a massive offensive like this, Father James. I just don’t see a choice.”
“And how many civilizations do you think will die if you don’t stop them, Admiral?” James asked.
“One is too many,” Shankara Linton interjected. “I agree completely with the Admiral. My only question is our resources. Again and again, we have run up against the limits of our industrial base and population. You and I agreed, Admiral, that the ESF can only support three battlecruisers.
“We can’t fight an interstellar war with three battlecruisers.”
“I know,” Isaac granted. “Part of the solution is XR-13-9-D. Interceptor will be leaving Hearthfire within the next few days. Captain Catalan and his pet Matrix will be home in seventy-five days.
“While D itself is too large to incorporate into a warship, they have suggested that they will be able to bud off lesser Matrices, equivalent to the units in a Matrix combat platform, that can be included into a new battlecruiser design…and into our chain of command.”
“You cannot seriously be considering building AI warships!” James replied, sounding as horrified as Amelie felt.
“I must agree with James,” she said, leaning forward and meeting her husband’s gaze. “We have seen the consequences of the Assini’s tendency to build themselves automated defenders.”
“And I agree with you both,” her Admiral said. “These Matrices will be part of the crew of the new ships, acting as an augment to the executive officer and replacing as much as thirty or forty percent of the hands aboard the ship.
“They will be part of the chain of command, reporting to the ship’s Captain and XO, and they will most definitely not have control of the ship’s weapons. Their presence, however, should allow us to increase our ship strength by at least fifty percent.
“The databanks we have from the Assini and the Matrices also included a number of systems to expand our autonomous mining and fabrications in Exilium. We should be able to increase our industrial base and increase the number of ships our ESF personnel can man.”
“That still doesn’t get us anywhere near the level necessary to wage war on a collection of self-replicating artificial intelligences that control a sphere, what, four hundred light-years in radius?” Amelie said softly. “What’s your plan, Isaac?”
She was pretty sure she knew. It was obvious, really, now that they knew there were other civilizations out there they had to save.
“We need more allies like the Vistans,” he told them. “We need to seek out civilizations that have not yet encountered the Matrices. We know there have to be species out here that are exploiting t
heir own systems, potentially even interstellar civilizations.
“The Matrices’ net expansion is slower than the speed of light. Civilizations advanced enough to help us will have some idea of what’s coming. We have to convince them to stand with us; we must provide technology and perhaps even entire ships to them.
“We have no choice, Ministers,” Isaac stated calmly. “We cannot fight the Matrices alone, we cannot wait for them to come to us, and we are not prepared to stand by and let other civilizations die because we did not act.
“We must find allies. We must build a grand alliance and wage war against the Matrices until they are no longer a threat.”
The Cabinet was silent.
Amelie leaned forward.
“I don’t think a vote is necessary, do you?” she asked them. “Isaac is right, and we all know it. We cannot stand alone against the Matrices, and we cannot stand by while they destroy civilizations left and right.
“It falls to us, then, to put this into a plan we can put before the Senate and our people. If the Republic of Exilium will take up this crusade, then we must do it as one body.”
Once the Cabinet had dispersed after the meeting, Amelie moved Isaac’s hologram over to her with a gesture. She was alone, but she could at least see her husband for a while longer.
“I’m guessing you’re not coming home anytime soon,” she noted sadly.
“No,” he conceded. “I wish it were different. I miss you.”
“I miss you too,” Amelie told him. “You’ll be pleased to know that Emilia is going to be running for President. Of course, I officially have no position on the election. Neither do you.”
Isaac laughed. She’d missed that sound and smiled at him.
“Of course not,” he confirmed. He’d refused to even have an opinion on her election, which had been heartwarming if occasionally annoying.
“I definitely won’t be home before then,” Isaac warned. “I don’t think I can justify leaving before we hit the point of no return on Vista.”
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