Fleet of Worlds Read online

  Of course Citizen equipment could never fail dangerously. But still . . .“Sven, I’m confused. That equipment maintained the embryo banks safely from the attack until a Citizen ship arrived. Then it withstood experimentation while Citizens learned how to operate it. It ran long enough thereafter to gestate at least one generation, or none of us would be here. And then one day it burst into flame?”

  “Unfortunate, I know.” He coughed. “There’s no helping it, though.”

  Her ancestors’ computers were insufficiently trusted to be connected to the Citizen network. The same computers were entrusted with the primary Citizen records of the founding of the colony! At least one of those statements must be incorrect. Perhaps both were.

  What would the archivist have to say about the extensive, if inaccessible, pre-NP4 history files she had unveiled aboard Explorer? “So our past is lost. As you say, there’s no helping it.” Smiling to show she was joking, Kirsten added, “We won’t know until we inspect the derelict. I don’t suppose you have any records where it went.”

  “Now there’s a crazy idea,” Sven laughed. “Imagine, finding that ancient ship, lost in space, after all this time.”

  Doubtless, it was a crazy idea. Like Nessus, Kirsten was not about to let a little matter of insanity stand in her way.

  10

  The summons was both exhilarating and unnerving. Approaching the appointed time, Nessus tongued the message’s stepping-disc coordinates.

  His tiny sleeping quarters vanished; he reappeared inside an even smaller, clear-walled chamber that looked into an unoccupied waiting room. A blue beam scanned him, presumably checking for dangerous implements even as it took his retinal prints. His gentle rap on the foyer wall confirmed his suspicion: This was no ordinary entrance. He was enclosed in the near-impregnable material used in spaceship hulls. Ceiling-mounted high-intensity lights shone brightly on him. Their intensity could surely be raised to lethal levels—and visible light was one of the few things that could penetrate General Products hull material.

  Nessus was suddenly outside the security chamber, delivered by the stepping disc on the isolation booth’s floor. “Welcome to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” a recording fluted and trilled. “Please wait here.”

  He settled onto a pile of plush cushions. Nessus took no offense at being made to wait; the security precautions had unnerved him. He appreciated having time to regain his composure. Of course, much more than security was on his mind.

  Had he ever not been infatuated with Nike? For as long as Nessus could remember, the charismatic politician had been a darling of the media. Nike had such vibrancy and wit, such presence and poise—and such beauty—that he was constantly in the news. Nike’s exotic political positions had only increased Nessus’ fascination.

  Parental disapproval had only encouraged Nessus’ youthful obsession. He recorded Nike’s every major public appearance, viewing them again and again. Many political events were open to the public; Nessus had attended at least sixty. Intellectually, he knew Nike’s positions had changed repeatedly over the years. In his hearts, those shifts made no difference.

  To his supporters, Nike was creative, flexible, and original. To his detractors, Nike was ambitious and bold. Ultimately, which description best fit did not matter. Nessus abandoned his family’s generations-long tradition of Conservative allegiance. His family abandoned him.

  While most of Nessus’ peers wasted their time in idle socializing and frivolous hobbies, Nessus had volunteered for every experimental project that might attract Nike’s attention. None did, so Nessus proposed his own, even more innovative programs. His Colonist explorer initiative had supposedly risen to Nike’s personal attention.

  Today, he would finally meet Nike!

  “Follow me.” A tall, green-eyed aide, a green brooch pinned to his utility belt, had appeared across the room. His posture hinted at disdain for this scruffy visitor. “The Deputy Minister will see you now.” Then he was gone.

  Nessus trotted, hearts pounding, to the temporarily active stepping disc. He emerged outside an open office door. Merely the wide padded work surface visible through the doorway was larger than his living unit. Lush meadowplant covered the floor. The green-eyed aide ushered Nessus inside, bobbing farewell as, from the outside, he closed the door.

  “Your Excellency.” Nessus lowered both heads submissively.

  “Be comfortable.” Nike extended a neck gracefully, brushing heads with Nessus in greeting as though they were equals. “You may wonder why I asked you here.”

  Nessus settled awkwardly onto a guest bench. Artwork lined the large office. Much was holographic, of course, but crushed meadowplant showed that several of the large sculptures were carved from rock or cast in metal. Physical art, like the oversized office, bespoke vast power. It was surely meant to intimidate—and it succeeded.

  He had imagined this day so many times, in so many ways, that he was at a loss now for what to say. It was all Nessus could do not to pick at his mane—or to cross his necks flirtatiously. “Yes, sir.”

  “Nike. And may I call you Nessus? Good. Those human-style designations are especially apt given our subject—

  “—The recent Explorer mission.”

  Faces to faces, Nike’s elegance and charisma were overwhelming. Nessus had missed something in his delighted shock. What about the mission? His report on the Gw’oth? The crew’s capabilities? That was it. “Yes, Nike,”—how he reveled in speaking the name—“I consider the trip a success. A longer stay would have yielded more data, but not changed my positive assessment of the Colonists.”

  “Did you know I personally approved the experiment?” Nike watched Nessus closely. “I did. The Concordance is gifted with too few individuals able to search for danger in our path. Your imaginative solution to our problem is to be commended.” Nike paused, for no apparent reason other than to let Nessus bask in the compliments. “I did not lightly call you back to the Fleet.”

  “I understand.” The praise was exhilarating. “Then why, Nike?”

  “We face more immediate dangers.”

  Nessus had not forgotten the hyperwave-radio recall message. “Have the wild humans discovered the Fleet?”

  “Not yet. Our agents on Earth report that a serious search is under way.”

  “That has long been the case.” Very few Citizens could confidently say that, but Nessus was one. In his early attempts to advance among the Experimentalists, he had served as a General Products Corporation representative in Human Space. Quite possibly, he had recruited the human agents of whom Nike spoke. “They have yet to succeed.”

  “They never before expended such resources in the effort,” Nike persisted.

  The earlier, unexpected flattery suddenly made sense. Nike’s newfound interest in Nessus was not about the Explorer mission. This summons was about Nessus’ earlier experiences. A hundred human-standard years earlier, a mere fifty human-standard years after Citizens had made themselves known to wild humans, Nessus had first entered Human Space.

  Remembered fear and isolation flooded Nessus’ mind. Only Nike’s presence kept Nessus from rolling into a cowering, quivering ball. He told himself: Nike needs me.

  Would returning really be so bad?

  Every human world, even Earth itself, was an unpopulated wilderness. The poorest human tenements wasted volume profligately in hallways, stairwells and elevators, and individual food-preparation areas. And conditions in Human Space were primitive. When the Colonists’ point of origin had finally been located, wild-human technology had advanced little beyond that of Long Pass. The Concordance, directly or otherwise, was the source of what few improvements had been made since. How much of that technology, Nessus wondered, would have been transferred to the humans absent experiments and experience with the unsuspecting, easily manipulated Colonists.

  Primitive, but still dangerous.

  Nessus had challenged Explorer’s crew with thoughts of pebbles turned into kinetic-energy weapons. Should hu
mans find the Fleet, a stealthed ship jumped by hyper-drive into the Fleet’s path could utterly destroy Hearth. And if the wild humans were to discover the Colonists and their history . . . would that not guarantee hostility?

  Concentrate! After striving for so long to meet Nike, how could his thoughts have strayed?

  He heard, “. . . Agent quite highly placed in the United Nations bureaucracy. This United Nations search for the Concordance is wider ranging than any before.”

  Knowledge would impress Nike. “Respectfully, that search cannot be sustained. The wild humans’ primitive economy had become dependent on our General Products Corporation. Now that GPC has withdrawn, their economy has contracted. It will suffer for years.”

  The idea for GPC had originated in an historical entry in the Long Pass computers: the British East India Company. Concordance influence was more subtle, of course, than the crown-awarded monopoly over trade with the East Indies. GPC sold humans its indestructible hulls and accumulated vast sums of human money—funds whose main use was the purchase of behind-the-scenes influence. And much as India’s sepoy armies battled Great Britain’s enemies, the wild humans were readily manipulated into constraining other spacefaring species that might otherwise grow to trouble the Concordance.

  Nessus had left behind highly placed agents, including a deputy undersecretary of the United Nations. Most had been recruited—compromised or bribed—very indirectly. They might still be reporting by hyperwave radio to the foreign-affairs ministry.

  “Nike, wild humans sought the ‘Puppeteer’ home world the whole time I was in their region of space. The progress of some such efforts I tracked myself through the human news media. The UN also hunted us in secret. My agents reported on those efforts to me, often without knowing it. The longer those quests failed to find us, the deeper into space the humans looked.” Each time Nessus appeared without protection under their yellow sun assured them that Puppeteers had evolved nearby a similar star. “While they keep looking at yellow suns, they’ll never find us.”

  “And yet, despite their failures, they keep looking,” Nike said. “Tell me about the ARM organization.”

  “The Amalgamated Regional Militia.” It was an uncharacteristically modest name for an extremely powerful entity. “The ARM evolved as the law-enforcement branch of the United Nations. Its operatives are called ARMs, too.”

  “Are these ARMs capable?”

  “Some.” Once more, Nessus found himself struggling not to pick and tug at his mane. “ARMs are given psychoactive drugs to make them paranoid. When one such is smart, too—”

  “I am told Sigmund Ausfaller is such a smart one,” Nike said. “He is the organizer of the latest United Nations search for us. Our source says Ausfaller feels the haste in GPC’s withdrawal from Known Space might have left traces, new clues. I fear his assessment could be correct.”

  Ausfaller! “He is among the humans’ very brightest, a natural paranoid, and not easily distracted.” Nor, despite several surreptitious attempts, had Nessus ever found a way to corrupt him. What might Ausfaller attempt if he were to find the NP4 colony? And yet . . .

  Nessus had the start of an idea. It was not fully formed, nor necessarily practical. He would have to do a lot of thinking before he dared articulate it to Nike.

  On the other head, it just might be brilliant.

  WITH A FINE-TOOTHED comb in one mouth and tiny scissors in the other, the stylist made the final adjustments to Nike’s mane. The dyes had already been touched up, the hair carefully teased and layered, and the braids reknotted and arranged. Hundreds of jewels had been woven into place. Nike craned his necks, admiring the effect from all angles. His elaborate coiffure required the twice daily ministrations of a master hair artist—and that was the point. Only one as successful and powerful as he could afford the expense.

  Nike chanted his approval. The hair artist dumped his tools and unused ornaments into a sack and vanished from Nike’s residence via stepping disc. The many instruments could be sorted and repacked elsewhere.

  The figure in Nike’s mirror was virile and commanding. Surely few in the audience of tonight’s ballet would be more dashing. Completing a pirouette of inspection, he bobbed his heads high/low, low/high, in satisfaction both with what he saw and his upcoming appointment.

  Nessus, despite his excellent record, had been distracted, sometimes all but tongue-tied, at their first meeting. Was he sexually infatuated? Another hero-worshiper? Either way, after the evening to which Nike had invited Nessus, the smitten scout would do whatever Nike asked.

  Knowing just how spectacular he would look by farm-world light, Nike had directed Nessus to meet him on a shore promenade. They would go to the ballet soon enough.

  Nike dipped a head into a pouch of his decorative sash—no utilitarian pocketed belt tonight!—and with a quick manipulation of his transport controller left the residence. He emerged to a place, rare in the world, devoid of lamps, chandeliers, and glow panels. Artificial light could only detract from the view.

  Rising from the blackness of the sea was the planet NP1. Beneath its ring of equatorial-orbiting suns, that most ancient of Hearth’s companions shone in full phase. Its seas sparkled in brilliant blues and greens; its icecaps were pure white. Countless reflections shimmered on the swells that rolled slowly up the shore. A crescent NP5 was setting on his other side. Its suns were polar-orbiting, to provide a more constant climate from pole to pole. The visible arc of that world revealed vast cyclonic storms. His still-to-be-conceived children would be old before those storms subsided and this most recent world to join the Fleet became fully tamed and productive. As for NP2, NP3, and NP4, Hearth’s rotation had temporarily hidden them from view.

  “It’s breathtaking,” Nessus said. The tremor in his voice suggested he had wished to say you are breathtaking. He stood nearby, one head resting on the stout railing that separated the promenade from the gently sloping beach. His mane was as plain as could be: unimaginatively cut, earnestly combed flat, and bound into large clumps by a few simple ribbons. Still, by comparison with the holos in his file, Nessus was being uncharacteristically formal. Nike appreciated the attempt.

  “It is beautiful,” Nike agreed. There was no need to mention the exclusivity of this location, for the restricted stepping-disc address, and the one-time-use access code, said it all. They were sharing one of the few, small parts of Hearth not covered in arcologies.

  Also unspoken was the prospect that Nessus, by remaining in Nike’s favor, might join the community of privilege. Nike felt a moment of shame. No promise would be uttered, but a thousand generations of social convention spoke as loudly as words. Peril to the Concordance must be averted. He would do what he must to see that Nessus returned to Human Space.

  “This is not natural.” Nessus looked himself in the eyes briefly. As Nike suffered another twinge of guilt, Nessus continued. “As beautiful as is this unending night, other worlds have suns to warm them.”

  Suns, not the waste heat of a trillion occupants. Alone among the worlds of the Fleet, Hearth had no suns. Nike extended a neck. He pointed a head, lips pursed and tongue extended, at NP1. “We can enjoy that perspective from here.”

  Nessus swung a head from side to side disapprovingly. “I know it will never happen, but I wish I could show you the beauty of a true sunrise. The sky shading from darkest, star-spangled black to pale blue. Clouds aglow in yellows, pinks, and reds.” For a long time, they stood side by side, watching long waves rush far up the shore. “I will enjoy the sunrises on Earth.”

  The words meant success—and renewed pangs of shame. “It’s getting late,” Nike said. “We should be on our way.”

  11

  Kirsten led cautiously through thick underbrush, bending foliage from her path with a sturdy fallen branch she had retrieved from the forest floor. The dominant plants ranged from waist-tall to twice her height. Dense shrubs that she might almost call hedges predominated; they failed to qualify because of their plethora of colors. Fr
uits and flowers might fairly span the rainbow, she thought. Leaves should be green.

  Like Omar and Kirsten, Eric wore muted colors today. It wasn’t just for concealment. He had eased off on the styles and colors of a man seeking a mate. Perhaps his intentions had evolved during their time together aboard Explorer. Certainly his manners had.

  “What’s with that one?” Eric asked.

  He was huffing from the unwonted exercise, and Kirsten suspected a stall. She hid a smile. “Which one?”

  From the boulder where he had settled, Eric pointed. “That red thicket to my left, with dangling purple tendrils.”

  “I forget the name, but it’s an insectivore. Citizens once planted them on the periphery of fields to protect crops.” As though to demonstrate her point, several tendrils on the nearest red hedge lashed out, converging with a snap. A bit of diaphanous wing fluttered to the ground, the remains of a purple pollinator.

  Omar grimaced at the display, and dropped his backpack. The groundcover into which it settled with a soft whoosh was dusty yellow, mosslike in texture, with scattered spiky flowers. “And this little training exercise you talked Nessus into authorizing—you say it’s safe?”

  “Relax, guys,” she told them. “We don’t smell a bit appetizing to anything here.”

  Could anything here even smell them? Kirsten found the odors a bit overpowering. An artificial herd pheromone had permeated the air aboard Explorer, but that was a single scent. Countless pungent, spicy aromas surrounded them here. The next time, she’d bring nose filters.

  Having twice navigated interstellar space, she had expected the jaunt across the ocean to the continent of Elysium would seem inconsequential. In practice, leaving Arcadia was visiting a whole new world, and the suborbital hop was the least of the experience. Amid all this strangeness, she had no impenetrable hull, nor even a sturdy spacesuit, to protect her. It was too easy to forget, especially when not a farmer, that most of NP4 was a Citizens’ nature preserve.