Guided by Starlight

by Matt Levin

  Ubhasa symbolized all that and more. It is the city that almost was, Nadia thought. The same contradictions etched across the planet felt especially prevalent with the trading outpost in front of her. It was a fitting place for Tori to explain the history of her people.

  “That is why we will help you,” Tori said. “Because if we don’t, if we stay isolated on this planet, then I’m committing my people to a slow death. We are now tied to the solar economy whether we like it or not. I grew up in a time before we cared for this thing called currency. But now, we have both money and poverty. So we need trade, and we need to reintegrate with the rest of the system. There is no choice.”

  “People like Derek will embrace that vision, I imagine,” Nadia said. “But you said there are still plenty of people here who prefer isolation.”

  “I’ll handle them,” Tori said, an edge of sharpness in her voice. Nadia could hear the war going on inside Tori, between her heart that agreed with the isolationists and her head that knew that would only lead to catastrophe.

  “If we have to rejoin the solar community, we want to do it through your people. Not the Union. Bypassing the old enemy might change a few minds,” Tori explained. “But we’d need something from you.”

  “Of course,” Nadia said.

  “We need trade, that much is obvious. But after the war, the closest planet with a real market was Enther. And the Junta imposed vicious fees on all commerce between our merchants and inner-planet traders. Even more so after our raiding parties clashed with Junta forces on Calimor.”

  Trying to do business in a market run by your rivals wasn’t exactly an enviable situation. Nadia better understood the desperation behind the Horde raids on Calimor.

  “Initially, I thought establishing our own foothold on Calimor was the only way forward. But then your ship showed up and you planted your flag there. I can direct my people to send you the food you need to keep your settlements viable, but I need, in return, access to duty-free imports from the inner planets as your own economy takes off.”

  The idea got Nadia’s head spinning. New Arcena could shift to spice production with imported food from Ikkren, and could then sell its produce on the solar market. The spice trade would bring fleets of commercial ships from the Union planets, bringing goods that could then be sold to Ikkren to pay them back for their assistance.

  It would take someone else to figure out the minutiae of the trading system, but it was possible. And it would transform the settlement efforts on Calimor. “I ought to run this by my leader,” Nadia said, “but I think we can make this work.”

  To her surprise, Tori’s face betrayed little emotion. “This is the price of integration,” Tori said. “If you accept the premise of the inner-planet developers, you accept it forever. You will be tied to a system that promises infinite growth and progress. But if you decide it’s not worth it anymore, you will starve. Ways of life will disappear no matter what.”

  Nadia figured that Tori probably didn’t really want to set up a trading relationship with her people. The woman had seen things Nadia could only imagine: a childhood spent roaming the empty ice plains of Ikkren, free from concerns about things like growth projections or profit margins. In that moment, she came to appreciate the depth of loss in Tori’s voice.

  But that was her story. Nadia had her own: one defined by the necessities of survival, of finding a way to bring millions out of cryo and creating a network of settlements and trade that could sustain them. Only then could she spend time romanticizing the past.

  “And one last thing,” Tori said. “Your people will need settlements beyond Calimor. Ikkren has a breathable atmosphere and plenty of undeveloped land. I’ve sent a list of coordinates for possible settlement sites to your ship’s computer. You should survey them before you leave.

  “Of course, we’d expect some kind of rent payments for any planetary settlements you set up. And we know you have lots of potential labor aboard your cryo vessel. We have plenty of planetary infrastructure projects that require a larger construction force. You could pay off some of your land debts by assigning workers to our projects.”

  Nadia wanted to fall on her knees and thank the woman profusely. Tori had not only given the Calimor settlement a path forward, she had just offered Nadia a chance to start work on her second settlement.

  But she stopped herself. Tori probably didn’t see the offer as charity, but rather as a kind of lesser-of-all-evils necessity. If we have to rejoin the solar community, we want to do it through your people, Tori had told her. Not the Union. The Horde leader wanted the refugees to claim all of Ikkren’s available real estate before the inner-planet developers showed up again, in other words.

  But it was still a win. “Thank you,” she said quietly, hoping the solemnity of her voice could capture her gratitude adequately. Tori just stared back, her signature blank expression holding fast against the rage of the wind.

  The two women mumbled parting pleasantries, and Nadia headed back down to the Exemplar’s landing site. She needed to check in with Isadora, report her progress, and submit Tori’s trade proposal for approval. And then, hopefully with Isadora’s blessing, she would head out to the Ikkren wilderness to scout out potential settlement sites.

  Aboard the ship, the heat of the vessel’s air system enveloped her like a warm blanket. Letting herself enjoy a few deep, calming breaths, she headed for the ship’s galley in the starboard wing. To her surprise, she found both Boyd and Derek sitting around the table.

  Boyd looked up first with a painful wince on his face. “Derek brought some kind of poison from Ubhasa. And he called it a gift.” Nadia noticed a shot glass with a thin film of clear liquid at the bottom in Boyd’s hands.

  “It’s grain liquor,” Derek explained, pouring a glass for Nadia. “On Ikkren, we’d consider it a delicacy. Give it a decade or so, and you’ll find yourself hating it very slightly less.”

  Nadia leaned against the wall and folded her arms over her chest. Derek had already let her know that he wanted to stay aboard for at least the duration of their stay on Ikkren. Past that, who knew.

  But Nadia could get used to this. Boyd and Derek’s bickering seemed to have cooled, at least somewhat. There was something about the warmth of the vessel, amiable companionship, and the surprising success of her meeting with Tori that made Nadia’s cheeks flush with simple happiness. She’d enjoy the moment for as long as it would last.

  Boyd seemed to consider finishing the remnants of his liquor, but he pushed away his glass and shook his head in disgust. “Sorry,” he said, turning to face Nadia. “I forgot to even ask: how was your meeting with Tori? Did we get some kind of trade offer? Were there any catches? And where are we headed next?”

  Derek slid a glass of grain liquor across the table, and Nadia let out a light, simple laugh as she tried to figure out which question to answer first. Eventually, she settled on the last one. “To the middle of nowhere,” she said, picking up the glass and raising it in a toast.

  CHAPTER 25

  * * *

  It was so hot that Russ almost couldn’t even feel how hot it was anymore. The underground bunker provided shelter from the blistering sun, but the air conditioning systems had long since gone offline, and it was still unbearably stuffy.

  He and Riley had come to an unspoken agreement that they would conserve their strength by lying down against the coldest wall they could find and mostly avoid conversation. Their single, empty water bottle lay on the floor between their outstretched feet, as if taunting them.

  He had stopped sweating as much, at least. Although he was pretty sure that was a bad thing.

  It was hard to believe they had only been planetside for less than a single day. They had touched down in the Nen Fatha spaceport in the morning, left with the three enforcers around midday, crashed an hour later, and now it was the late afternoon. Russ had been running on adrenaline for nearly the full day. He felt an overpoweringly heavy weariness, especially in his shoulders and back
.

  Which wasn’t good. A detachment of Syndicate forces were coming to pick them up, which meant he’d be negotiating with Lena Veridor soon. He had a semblance of a plan, but it boiled down to him essentially asking her to bankroll the defense of the Calimor settlement for free. He doubted the most powerful criminal overlord in Natonese history would be inclined to see the value in their plan. Russ needed to be frosty.

  And that was assuming the Syndicate didn’t just kill them on the spot. He had to admit, it looked sketchy: one of their gunships destroyed, all three enforcers dead. Even though Russ had only killed the one who went rogue, he had no way to verify his story. He knew how it would look from an outside perspective.

  Jerking his head to the side and trying to wake himself up, he looked over his shoulder toward Riley. Unlike him, she preferred to sit cross-legged. Her eyes were closed and her chest rose and fell in slow cycles. “Meditating?” he asked.

  Riley snapped awake. “Sort of, yeah,” she said. “Well, not really. Actually—”

  The sound of roaring engines cut her off. It sounded like a small contingent of ships were circling overhead. After landing, the sound of their engines ceased. The Syndicate was here.

  All Russ and Riley could do was exchange grim glances as they heard footsteps and low voices coming from the entrance to the base. Flashlight beams danced on the ceiling overhead.

  Russ pushed himself to his feet, fought off a wave of dizziness, and moved to the front of the office to meet the arriving enforcers. Two fireteams of Syndicate troops had fanned out in the main bay, crude assault rifles brought to bear.

  They weren’t moving with the level of discipline and strategic positioning he would have expected from an actual military force, but these guys were no amateurs, Russ thought. He slowly held up his hands.

  The flashlight beams all moved toward his torso. If Russ was in full control of his faculties, he might have bristled under the gaze of nearly a dozen rifle barrels. But the prospect of even just a sip of water outweighed such concerns at the moment.

  One of the Syndicate fireteams moved into the office. Two trained their weapons on Russ, two on Riley. Another figure entered, this one with arms and shoulders almost as muscly as his legs were thin. He sported wavy black hair and a thick mustache.

  “Well well well,” the man said, grinning even as he spoke, “I think we all know what happens to people that fuck with us. You two must’ve felt pretty special, taking out a team of enforcers and commandeering one of our gunships. But then you couldn’t fly it and ended up crashing in the middle of the badlands. How’s my guess?” the lead enforcer asked, still grinning. Way too much teeth, Russ thought.

  “One of your people turned on us,” Russ explained. “She fired her gun off inside, forcing us to crash. That took out the others.”

  “How long did it take you to cook that up?” the lead enforcer asked. “Pretty convenient that no one’s left alive to corroborate that. Or that there didn’t happen to be any recording devices aboard the gunship.”

  Russ knew this was a possibility. There was no reason the Syndicate would believe their story, and they had little reason to not just shoot them and loot whatever they could off their bodies. Imagining their faces when they realized how little cash he and Riley had on hand seemed darkly funny to him. Funnier than it had an hour ago.

  “I can make the Syndicate a lot of money,” Russ said. If he couldn’t prove that his story was correct, the best option was to appeal to the criminals’ greed.

  “Moving on to desperate bargaining already?” the lead enforcer asked, still grinning. Russ fantasized about punching the other man hard enough to knock some of his damnably large teeth out.

  “Stand down, Ken,” a woman’s voice said from the hangar bay. The voice wasn’t particularly loud, but it carried in the emptiness of the abandoned base. The enforcers immediately lowered their weapons.

  The social dynamics were easy to read, even in the dim lighting. Their detainers’ eyes widened and their backs stiffened at the command. This wasn’t the kind of loyalty that Russ or any of his colleagues showed Isadora. This was raw fear. That could only mean one thing: Lena Veridor had come herself.

  Looking back out to the main bay, Russ saw the silhouette of a woman standing in the center, her gaze focused on him. No one said a word—or moved, even—as she walked slowly to the office and regarded both him and Riley.

  She was shorter than he expected, wiry, and had deeply tanned skin shriveled from years’ worth of exposure to the harsh Zoledo sun, he figured. Half of her head was bald, the other half had hair that fell down straight along the side of her face. She sported a violet combat suit.

  “Russ Kama,” he said, extending his hand. She just stared at him.

  “You look like a serious person,” Lena said at last. “I, too, am a serious person. So I don’t expect you invited me here to waste my time.” Slowly, Russ pulled his hand back.

  “Give them water,” Lena commanded. “I’m going to get set up in one of the adjacent offices. Bring them to me when I’m ready.” And then she departed the room. Every enforcer’s shoulders seemed to relax as soon as the boss left.

  The enforcer commander wasn’t grinning anymore. “All right,” he sneered. “Get them each a bottle of water.”

  The enforcers brought in a pair of bottles from their gunships, and two stayed in the room to watch over them. As much as both of them tried to control themselves, neither Russ nor Riley could help but down their respective bottles within seconds. The water was lukewarm, but it still helped Russ feel like his entire mouth wasn’t turning into a desert.

  Riley set her water bottle on the floor and straightened her back. “Wanna go over our proposal, again?” she asked.

  “Actually, I’d rather hear about your sort-of-but-not-really meditating,” Russ said. His whole body felt weak, and repeating the same negotiation twice—a practice round with Riley, then for real with Lena—felt exhausting. He’d rather just rest and listen to Riley.

  She must have understood his reasoning. She looked down to the floor and to her right. Which was her tell for thinking over something or trying to figure out what to say, Russ had surmised. He gave her the space to decide how to respond.

  “I kept that pamphlet the missionary gave me back on the spaceliner,” Riley said. “I dunno if you saw, sir. But I’ve been reading it and...I dunno, it’s helping.”

  Russ had seen Riley keep the pamphlet from the Ashkagi missionary, but he had mostly forgotten about it. She must’ve been careful to avoid taking it out around him. But he wasn’t angry. Maybe it was because his fears that one of the missionaries back on the spaceliner might’ve been some kind of violent radical had proved unfounded. Or maybe it was because, in the weeks since, he had grown to trust Riley’s instincts. If Ashkagi theology was something she was interested in, then it couldn’t be too bad.

  Or hell, maybe it was just because he was tired. And hot. The water helped his throat, but he still felt damnably thirsty and dizzy.

  “You want to tell me more about it, soldier?” Russ asked in a tone of mock severity.

  “Actually, that sounds kinda nice, sir,” Riley said, the edge of her mouth upturned. “Honestly, I’m having a hard time wrapping my mind around some stuff. Their gods, the Ashka, aren’t really omnipotent or anything. They’re more like...trailblazers. They lay out paths for us, but they can’t control which ones we take. Or if we walk at all.”

  It didn’t take much to hear the pain in Riley’s voice. She disguised it—poorly—in a tranquil, airy tone that she always used when she was trying to dance around the trauma of losing her squad and her partner right before the evacuation from Earth.

  It made sense to Russ: the idea that all the death and misery that had brought Riley to where she was now was part of some divine plan. Or design, at least. Usually, it went one of two ways. Foxholes had a way of making soldiers into either atheists or believers.

  That was how it had been with Russ’ parents.
They had met flying fighter jets for NATO, before it had merged with the growing UN military. His mother had gotten more in touch with her Christianity while on deployment, whereas his father had gotten less devout. After they retired, Ma would still drag Pa to church every Sunday, a younger Russ in tow, but she always knew Pa’s heart wasn’t really in it any more.

  As it had been with Russ. He had packed Ma’s old King James in the footlocker he had brought aboard the Preserver, but it was more out of sentimentality for his deceased mother than out of genuine belief.

  “There’s some stuff that’s a little out there,” Riley continued. “They think the only reason the original Natonese settlers arrived safe was because of the Ashka. Apparently, their theologians are saying the same thing about us. That we’re harbingers of a new era. Or a manifestation of divine grace. Something like that.”

  “And do you believe that?” Russ asked, crossing his arms. If the two Syndicate enforcers watching over them cared at all about their conversation, it didn’t register on their faces.

  Riley shrugged. “No. Probably not. But I can’t help but think it might be ni—”

  “—boss is ready to see you,” one of the enforcers from back in the hangar barked, knocking her knuckles on the door to the office.

  “Guess you’ll have to fill me in later,” he said to Riley as they both stood up.

  But the other enforcer held her hand up. “Just you,” she said, pointing at Russ.

  Russ and Riley exchanged glances. “Their house, I guess,” she said, shrugging.

  She was right, but Russ didn’t like it. Most likely it was a power move, like practically everything else the Syndicate had done. He figured it was unlikely they were isolating them to make it easier to take them out...right?

  “Touch her and I’ll rip your throat out,” he muttered to the enforcer as he slid past her. He caught the enforcer stifling a laugh. It must have looked ridiculous: a man half-dead from heat exposure threatening her. But Russ meant it.