Fleet of Worlds Read online

  Nor could she cajole Nessus for reassurance. Once they had exited the singularity and reentered hyperspace for the flight home, he had locked himself in his cabin, and answered no inquiries. His manic phase had given way to its opposite.

  On the other head, Nessus’ withdrawal during the long journey home gave her unsupervised time to think.

  GW’OTH VENTURES ABOVE the ice fascinated Kirsten. How brave they were to explore such a hostile domain with only the most primitive of technologies to sustain them! Their quest for knowledge, the expansion of their capabilities, and the vigor of their efforts were inspiring—

  And they awakened in her a new attitude toward her own kind.

  Colonists did not have pride. Why would they, without successes to call their own? NP4 had been tamed before they first set foot on it. Their technology had been handed to them, and even that technology, everyone knew, was far beneath what the Citizens controlled. Their benefactors considered them unworthy, or unprepared, or in some other as-yet undefined sense not ready, to share in all that the Concordance had researched and invented.

  Knowing in the abstract of whole worlds with indigenous civilizations was one thing. Observing the strivings of the Gw’oth was so much more. The experience made the lost home of her kind real to her. Somewhere out there was a world, a place as real and unique as the ice moon of the Gw’oth.

  In her mind was a pale blue spheroid that resembled NP4, but with all outlines blurred. Her ancestors must have tamed that world, and developed their own technology, and ventured unaided into interstellar space. If she could respect the Gw’oth for their accomplishments, how could she not admire her own ancestors?

  What were they like? How did they organize themselves? To what goals did they strive? What language did they speak? Surely it was more logical and structured than this English the Citizens had invented for them.

  Her newfound interest made all the more troubling how little could be found in Explorer’s library about the Colonists’ long-ago rescue.

  THREE ON THE bridge was a tight fit. Omar and Eric sat side by side, hips touching, sharing Nessus’ padded bench. Omar had brought in a tray with three hot bulbs of stim juice. “Thanks for coming,” Kirsten began.

  “What’s up?” Omar waved at the controls in front of him. She took the gesture to mean: Do we need Nessus here?

  That Nessus continued to hide in his cabin served her purpose. Her ability to formulate such rebellious thoughts remained new enough to surprise her.

  She had decreed a sanity break in normal space. Diamondlike points of light shone through the bridge’s presently uncovered view ports. The distant Fleet remained invisible to the naked eye. “It’s really empty out here, isn’t it?”

  “That’s not exactly big news,” Omar said.

  “No, but it’s hard to truly grasp how empty until you’re living with it.” She let them consider that for a moment. “Imagine how unlikely it was that a Citizen ship should encounter our ancestors adrift.” How very unlikely, given that hyperdrive-equipped ships dropped back into normal space only occasionally. How especially unlikely, if adrift meant, as was always part of the story, that their saviors noticed a ship whose fusion drive was inoperative. Explorer’s sensors could not spot such a derelict unless it was nearly on top of them.

  Eric glanced in the direction of Nessus’ cabin. “We were lucky, I suppose. We should be thankful.”

  Had that passing look denoted fear? Skepticism? Warning? She would know soon enough. If she were correct, this would be the hardest on him. “You both know I’ve been researching primitive technology. I thought it could be instructive to contrast the Gw’oth experience with what Citizens have seen in their travels.”

  She called up a holo to summarize her findings—or rather her paucity of findings. She opened a second display. “Here’s how I queried the library. Am I doing anything wrong?”

  Omar studied the images. “Your queries look fine to me.”

  “Nessus told us he didn’t want our investigations influenced by knowledge of other aliens,” Eric said. “I’m not surprised he removed such material from our library. He was obviously right—some of us couldn’t be trusted not to look.”

  Kirsten ignored the criticism. “Next, I wondered if the history of the Citizens themselves might have relevant material.” Two more holos she opened implied another excision from the library.

  “Kirsten, why are we here?” Omar asked. “It wasn’t to sympathize with what Nessus chose to exclude from the library.”

  Her eyes twitched involuntarily toward Nessus’ cabin. Had her precautions been successful? “Bear with me.” She offered another query. It was the opposite of what she had queried for before: everything unrelated to pre-spaceflight technology history.

  A warning message chastised her for her overbroad search. The only hint the library provided as a measure of the relevant results was two very large numbers. One number was merely the count of related files. The second number, an even more prodigious value, showed the extent of the data in those related files. “Consider this, gentlemen. I ran complementary queries. The first asked for everything related to early technology history. The second asked for everything not. The combined results should encompass the capacity of the library. They don’t.”

  “Obviously,” Eric sniffed, “Nessus anticipated your prying. The unaccounted-for storage must be files he reserved for himself.”

  “Obviously. As a confirmation, consider these queries.” Her next requests sought what was, and what was not, in the library regarding hyperdrive technology. It was no secret Citizens reserved hyperdrive theory for themselves. To no one’s surprise, Kirsten’s paired searches revealed another large inaccessible region. “Are we agreed? This is a valid way to measure the extent of hidden data on a given topic?”

  Saying nothing at all this time, Omar looked pointedly at Nessus’ controls.

  Perhaps there was more to their captain than Kirsten had suspected. She ignored the apparent warning. “It works with searches using date parameters, too. Would anyone be surprised to know there’s an off-limits region that continues to grow even as we travel home?”

  Omar stood, clumsily dismounting from the padded bench. A shoe-tip caught, and he fell across Nessus’ control console. “Crap!” He got back to his feet, juice all over his shirt, his beverage bulb squashed flat. “That’s hot.” The liquid beaded quickly, unable to adhere to the nano-cloth, and trickled to the deck.

  More stim juice dripped down the controls. Omar removed his shirt and with it blotted ineffectively at the console. Reflexively, Kirsten looked away—it was unseemly for her to see Omar’s bared chest. But she looked back at what his hands were doing.

  That was no random spot on the console! Growth in the archives even while they remained in hyperspace suggested Nessus did not limit his eavesdropping to the Gw’oth. Kirsten had found a sensor hidden on the bridge—exactly where the spill had occurred and the location Omar’s wadded shirt now covered and muffled. He, too, had located the concealed camera.

  “We can get away with this only once.” Omar was suddenly more direct than Kirsten had ever seen him. “Nessus may be suspicious regardless. Whatever you have to say better be important. And Eric—do not ask.”

  Eric looked ready to explode, but he stayed quiet.

  “There was an unfortunate spill before I called you both here,” Kirsten said. “Hopefully it worked.” Nessus would never believe two innocent accidents could occur so close together. “I’ll tell you what’s so important.

  “We’ve all been raised on the heroic tale of the rescue of our ancestors. How dangerous the tumbling derelict was, its hull agape, the victim of unknown and unknowable assailants. How back-projection along its apparent path suggested no plausible candidate sun for hundreds of light-years. Perhaps it had been adrift for a long time, or its crew had changed course in a desperate run from peril. Either way, there was no clue to its point of origin. After the embryo banks were rescued, the wreck was ab
andoned in deep space, its fate unknown. All in all, what we’ve been taught is how very little the Concordance knows of our past. Now watch.”

  Her final two queries revealed yet another inaccessible region within the library. Its topic was “pre-NP4 history of Colonists” and its extent was vast.

  NESSUS HAD BEGUN to dare to hope that this mission would be deemed a success. The Colonists had functioned well as a team, operated the ship effectively, and learned a great deal about the Gw’oth.

  As importantly, they had proven loyal. Kirsten’s assertiveness, as respectfully expressed as it had been, had briefly worried him. He need not have been concerned. When the time came, she had helped implant the comet with a thruster-equipped probe. Obedience to Citizens was an ingrained part of Colonist society.

  The Fleet would have more scouts and better preparation for its dash from the galaxy . . . and those happy, risk-reducing results were because of him. When he returned in triumph, in this, the Fleet’s time of need, all things would be possible for him.

  So many had doubted him. It had gladdened him to imagine what consternation his unorthodox success would evoke in his heads-under-their-bellies parents. He had daydreamed of recognitions and honor from his new friends, the Experimentalists. The achievements of this mission could result, quite possibly, in that most precious of rewards: a mate. And not just any mate—

  When he returned in triumph, even subtle, graceful Nike would surely be approachable.

  Yes, he had begun to dare to hope . . . until the private recall message had arrived. Its few brief words left him cowering in his cabin, all thoughts of personal advantage forgotten. Nothing seemed to matter. He ate from the small synthesizer in his room. He could not be bothered to replace the sensor that had shorted out on the bridge. The Colonists would get him back to Hearth whether he paid attention or not.

  The unexpected message read in its entirety: “Return immediately to the Fleet. Wild humans are close to finding us.”

  “I CAN’T EXPLAIN what’s going on,” Kirsten said, “beyond that the Concordance knows far more about our past than they have shared. I intend to discover the truth. To begin with, I’m going to find our ancestors’ ship.”

  “That’s impossible.” Eric sat slumped on Nessus’ bench, his belief system shattered. He looked deflated. “It was abandoned hundreds of years ago. How can we possibly know where to begin?”

  How can we possibly know? He believed her! Kirsten set aside all her doubts and uncertainties. “Whatever clues there are will be found where we are now going.

  “Whatever secrets the Concordance has, they hold on the Fleet of Worlds.”

  QUEST

  Earth date: 2650

  8

  Nike’s office was a stepping disc away from his apartment. Barring emergency, he never commuted that way. Teleportation offered efficiency, but neither comfort nor information.

  He teleported now to his arcology lobby, walking briskly off a stepping disc there and pressing through the gentle force field that divided the climate-controlled atrium from the exterior walkways. Buildings extended up and down the mall as far as the eye could see. The least of the arcologies towered to a thousand times his height.

  Herd scent embraced him like a warm bath. With a sociable nudge, Nike plunged into the unending stream of pedestrians. Chance bumping and brushing of flanks was as reassuring as it was unavoidable.

  Heads craning as he walked, Nike surveyed utility belts and decorative sashes, the ribbons and jewels adorning manes, and ornamental brooches. As always, he spotted the greens of those declaring their Conservative loyalties and the orange shades that identified Experimentalists.

  Declarations of allegiance to hobbies, professional affiliations, and social clubs greatly outnumbered any factional color. The spectrum of adornment only highlighted a reality Nike had sadly accepted: Passions had cooled in the years since the discovery of the explosion in the galactic core.

  And why not? The sky glow of continent-spanning cities masked the shifting of constellations. Only sophisticated instruments could discern the operation of the reactionless drive that continued to accelerate the Fleet of Worlds. Departure from the galaxy would change nothing for the vast majority of Citizens, or their children, or their children’s children, for countless generations—for those who still measured the passage of time in generations. Births were as rare as deaths among the Citizens.

  Thus the extraordinary had become mundane had become all but forgotten. Escape from the galaxy had been entrusted to Conservatives too unimaginative to have initiated it. This was how the Concordance dealt with every emergency. With a tremble of frustration, Nike straightened the large orange brooch pinned to his utility belt.

  Conversations ebbed and flowed all around him. They dealt with family and friends, art and theatre, shopping and government. The little political discussion he heard involved nuances and trivia, nothing that might favor reconsideration of those most suited to lead from behind.

  Of course, few shared his knowledge. With that recollection, Nike declared this unscientific poll sufficient for the day. Nearing a public stepping disc embedded in the walkway, he dipped a head into a pocket. With nimble lip nodes he retrieved an address from his personal transport controller; his tongueprint authorized access to a secured file. The disc flicked him instantly to a restricted location: the employee vestibule of the foreign affairs ministry.

  “Sir,” whistled the guards who encircled the entry area. Taking turns, they briefly lowered their heads in respect. The motion began with the guards standing nearest to Nike and traveled around the group, so that at all times most sentries remained attentive to the discs.

  Pulling his head from his pocket, Nike assumed the wide-legged, no-need-to-run stance of confident leadership. “My greetings,” he chanted formally. He gestured, and two guards sidled away to clear his path. He walked briskly to a second group of restricted discs, discs that provided access to workspaces within the ministry. Another tongue-locked address delivered him to the maximally secured complex of offices that was Clandestine Directorate.

  Functionaries emerging from their warren of work nooks repeated the gesticulations of esteem. “Deputy Minister. Sir. Your Excellency.” Nike most savored grudging bows from the Conservatives in this herd. With the Conservatives in power, of course the Minister was a Conservative. All ministers in the present government were Conservatives.

  Whatever the political balance, however, most positions of responsibility in this ministry remained with the Experimentalists. Despite generations of acculturation, few Conservatives could bear to deal directly with Colonists. There were never enough, and anyway, managing the Colonists was the simplest part of the ministry’s mission. Only the truly exceptional could cope with wild aliens, and none but Experimentalists had the flexibility of mind to work with the exceptional. The Clandestine Directorate was and would remain an enclave of Experimentalists.

  Too many in Nike’s party bemoaned the short memories of the masses. He did not. To deny the wisdom of the majority was the very definition of insanity. Those who now led the Experimentalists from behind had resigned themselves to another epoch of powerless opposition.

  Which was why, thought Nike, when we Experimentalists next return to power, the party will not be led by any of them.

  Nike straightened again into the stance of supreme confidence. Heads held high, he strode toward his private office. Its personal door bespoke his high status. Just before shutting it, he announced to all, “I am not to be disturbed.”

  “. . . DISAPPEARANCE OF GENERAL Products representatives continues to stoke interest in Puppeteer affairs. United Nations authorities continue their full search for your home system. They rationalize the hunt by claiming that in GP’s absence some contractual commitments might go unfulfilled or warranty obligations become unenforceable. I have yet to gain access to the investigators’ files, but it is thought a wide-ranging analysis of astronomical anomalies might—”

  Nike
paused the hyperwave message. The human in the recording stood unmoving. A thousand details, from her bold skin-dye pattern to the cut of her clothing, made clear that she was not one of the Colonists.

  Her use of the term “Puppeteer” told Nike the same. When representatives of the Concordance had eventually revealed themselves to the indigenous civilization within the tiny bubble of stars so presumptuously deemed Known Space, the human explorer Pierson had likened Citizen anatomy to a three-legged centaur with two sock-puppet heads. The name Puppeteer had stuck.

  The wild human’s mouth had been open at the moment the image was frozen. Just now, that gaping orifice made the torrent of bad news seem unending. At least having a personal office meant Nike might compose himself a bit in private.

  Perhaps the wild humans would have the last laugh. Following the success of the Colonist experiment, many Experimentalists had taken human names as an affectation. The appellation he had chosen was suddenly like ashes in his mouths: Nike, the deity of victory.

  The question was: victory for whom? How might wild humans react if they were to discover the Fleet—and with it, the Concordance’s human servants?

  At least the wild humans continued to look, mistakenly, for a home world still anchored to a solar system. Not even the most trusted human agent had been told that six worlds had flown free of their sun.

  Nike found himself pacing around the soft, padded work surface that occupied a significant fraction of his office. He needed to calm himself. With one mouth holding a comb, the second a mirror, he meticulously smoothed and layered and arranged his braids. As always, the grooming routine soothed him.

  His intercom lowed. “Your Excellency.” His assistant’s voice was softly respectful over the intercom.

  “Yes,” Nike replied.

  “It is nearly time for the rally. You asked to be reminded.”