The ethos effect, p.49
The Ethos Effect, page 49
Thank you, beginning locking.
Van did not open the Joyau’s lock to orbit control, although be did put the fusactors on standby and link to station power.
His first effort was to link into the planetary comm channels and begin to scan them. Before he set foot outside the ship, he wanted to know exactly what had occurred on Damcus. He began to jump from channel to channel and net to net.
... the interim assembly has urged restraint... calling the massacre of women and children in the Revenant compound beside the Damcusan High Temple ‘barbaric’ and ‘unworthy’ of the people of Samarra... The screen showed the smoldering rubble of a structure that had been situated on a hill overlooking a city.
... the last of the moral reeducation camps was bulldozed yesterday in Telfor as hundreds looked on and cheered...
...shortages of cereal grains in the plateau region ... shipments of food seized from the Revenant Revealed Center in Dosodi have been diverted...
... fighting continues in the eastern highlands ... more than ten thousand armed Revenants have seized Remorya after their defeat on the plains of Dhar...
Van continued to switch and study. After going through more than a hundred different channels in an hour, he was convinced that Samarra was not under Revenant control. On the other hand, he wasn’t certain whose control it was under, although the planetary capital of Alion was reported calm and under the control of the interim or provisional assembly.
He began to make links planetside.
All in all, it was two days later—filled with link conversations, agreements, negotiations, and what amounted to institutional bribery—before he finally left the Joyau. Within his shipsuit was a small military stunner, and at his waist was the nanite bodyshield and powerpack The gray corridor outside the ship bore several long dark marks, as if lasers or other weapons had been used, and not thirty yards from the lock was a large and irregular synthetic patch, clearly recently applied.
He’d only gotten a dozen steps from the Joyau when three figures in shipsuits appeared. One, in a maroon suit, carried a military stunner slung over her shoulder. The other man and woman wore green, with orbit control logos on their chests.
“Ser? Commander Albert?”
“I’m Commander Albert,” Van replied.
“Ser... we just wanted to thank you, and to ask if you could carry messages outbound. We’ll pay double the interstellar rate.” That was the woman in green.
“The standard rate will be fine. IIS is a commercial operation. We don’t normally carry message traffic, but we’re equipped to do it. We’ll have to download at a spinward hub for retransmission, though. Would that be satisfactory?”
“Yes, ser.”
Van used his implant to access the stationnet and then the Joyau. Alya, Commander Albert here. We’re going to upload message traffic for later download at the next out-system hub.
We can only take a standard single load, ser.
I’ll tell them. Van turned to the three. “My chief tech tells me that we’re limited to one standard single load.”
“We won’t have that much. We’ve just gotten the station back in operation. Less than a week, ser.”
“You had to use shuttles to attack?”
The guard in maroon nodded.
“You’ll be going down to Alion on a station shuttle,” added the man. “We don’t have the commercial operations back yet. When you’re ready to return, just link to station operations, and we’ll send one down to pick you up.” He paused. “You’ll need to use paper credits. The transfer links don’t operate planetside. Better stop by the credit stall here.”
The three walked Van to the credit stall, where he obtained a thousand Samarran credits, hoping they would be enough, then to the shuttle bay. The woman guard accompanied him onto the shuttle.
An hour later, Van stepped outside the shuttle terminal in Alion—and was overwhelmed with the swirl of freezing air and smoke—smoke that held odors of burning wood, powder, hot metal, charred flesh, chemicals, plastics, and other synthetics exposed to excessive heat. For all that, there were three groundcars waiting, each with a driver gesturing.
Van stepped forward and took the first driver. He was glad he had the nanite bodyshield, and that terminal security had allowed him to bring down the stunner.
“Drohya building on the Occident.”
“Ah... I know that one...”
Van certainly hoped so. “How has the last week been?” he asked, once the groundcar pulled away.
“It has been terrible, but we have seen worst. Never... never will we bow to outsiders again. Better that the sky melt down and turn us all to ashes.”
Van tried not to wince at the response.
“Soon ... all of Damcus will once more belong to Samarrans, and not an infidel invader will remain.”
The groundcar whistled past a block in which all the buildings were blackened hulks, then along a stretch of boulevard where every third or fourth building had huge gaps—antique shell holes, Van thought. Fine white flakes of snow drifted out of a gray sky.
“What happened there?”
“The infidel Revenants, they said we would not destroy the royal row and the children’s home. They stayed behind the walls, and they had children as hostages. They died. We saved some children. We had to. The last time we tried to save all the children, we lost everything.”
The groundcar came to an abrupt halt opposite a squat fortresslike building set between two other structures with broken windows and traces of fire on the upper levels.
“Drohya, it is here.”
Van offered a fifty-credit note.
“It is too much. I will wait.” The driver smiled. “I am Reduaro.”
“I’m likely to be here a long time, Reduaro.”
“Who else will I driver?”
Van smiled and handed him another fifty.
“I will wait until the moon falls from the sky.”
Van walked toward the entry. It had taken several fund transfers to obtain a lease on the first floor of the building and nearly thirty links to track down Jahil Monsa—the former manager. A gaunt figure in an expensive singlesuit that was far too large stepped out of the entryway.
“Jahil?”
“The same. Director Albert?” Jahil Monsa walked slowly forward. His left arm was in a sprayed cast, and he limped. Van nodded.
“I cannot believe that you got us an office so quick. And equipment”
“It will take a week or more before they’ll have more than a single comm line.”
“Longer than that,” snorted the slightly built man. The two walked inside.
The front part of the long room inside the door had been turned into a waiting area, with a couch and several chairs. Behind the waiting area were ancient bookcases, used as dividers, with the boxes of office equipment behind.
Jahil gestured to a solidly built young man in a maroon jumpsuit who had set down a heavy box of something. The jumpsuit showed places where insignia and patches had been removed. “This is Harad. He’s a former Samarran commando. He knows comm systems, too. He’s been helping me get this place organized.”
“I assume you’re putting him on the payroll,” Van said.
“I wanted to ask first” Jahil frowned slightly. “There are few credit facilities...”
“I made a substantial deposit with the Bank of Samarra. We already have a message contract with the provisional government. I reopened the IIS planetary account. You have draw privileges. No one else but you.”
Harad smiled, interrupting almost apologetically. “You are... were a soldier?”
“Deep-space pilot for the Taran Republic.”
Harad looked to Jahil. “I told you. Others would wait”
Jahil shrugged.
Van was afraid that Jahil would collapse, so frail and worn did he appear. “Let’s sit down and sort things out.” Van took one of the straight-backed chairs. “You look like you’ve been through quite a trial.”
“I survived. Most who were sent to the faith reeducation camps did not.”
“Faith reeducation?”
“We needed to learn the ways of the Prophet.” Jahil snorted, and looked as though he wanted to spit. “Which ways?” asked Van.
“That we should give more credits to the Temple, and that our women should serve strangers before they serve us, and that those who do not believe as they do...” Jahil broke off.
Van looked at the slender man and nodded. “And those women who love women, and those men who love men are cursed and reviled?”
Jahil looked up sharply.
“I came from a family with two fathers,” Van said quietly. “I am not like them in that, but I love them and understand. My sister married her woman partner, who is a doctor.”
Jahil smiled ruefully. “You see much.” A brighter smile crossed his face. “With Director Desoll, I was never certain. What happened to him?”
“He was killed when his ship malfunctioned. He was testing some experimental equipment. It was very unexpected. I had not expected to succeed him.” Van shook his head, then offered a smile. “How do you feel? Are you up to rebuilding the IIS operations here?”
“I feel much better over the last week, and even better today.” Jahil grinned boyishly, and Van could see that he had once been extraordinarily handsome. “I should not hate. So I will not, but I am glad that the Coalition and the Argenti fleets came to Samarra, even if they could not stay. I am most glad it happened when it did. Another six months, and I would have been dead. It is hard to conceal what one is, and after they shot Ibrim, I was in shock...”
Van had not known about the Revenant “faith reeducation camps.” Trystin might have, but Van could not recall any mention of them, nor had he found any references to them in the IIS files. “We have a great deal to do. I’ve laid out a general plan. It’s only general because you know Damcus better than I do. It will take work.” Van smiled. “I think it will generate millions of credits over the next ten years, and help Samarra become stronger than before. It will also make you very well-off...” Jahil smiled. “Tell me more...”
Chapter 85
Van stood in the shade of the rear portico, looking out at the garden, past Dad Almaviva’s greenhouse. The morning sun was bright, but to the northwest he could see dark clouds rising over the badlands, and the distant rumble of thunder rolled toward him.
Almaviva straightened from the row of beans, and gestured to Cicero, who was pruning the pear tree at the edge of the garden.
Abruptly, from nowhere, four troopers in green fatigues dashed past Van, as if he were not there, then stopped at the edge of the garden. Without a word, they leveled their slug throwers at the two men and opened fire.
“No!” Van yelled, but no words came from his mouth, and none of the troopers turned. Van tried to move, but he was rooted in place.
Then, as suddenly as they appeared, the armed troopers turned and marched out of the garden. Lightning flashed, and thunder rolled, and Van stood on the plaza before the Parliament House in New Oisin, with red rain falling all around him.
As he watched, a tree began to grow from the center of the building, an oaklike tree that began to slant to the right as it grew. Then a branch thrust itself down, as if to try to keep the tree from overbalancing itself, and the oak grew more massive and more gnarled and twisted. With each moment, the oak leaned more and more.
Van watched, transfixed, as the giant tree began to topple. The enormous roots pulled out of the Parliament building, and building stones were flung across the plaza, slowly bouncing. A spark from somewhere ignited the fallen and splintered tree, and within moments, the plaza was an inferno.
Van threw up his hands...
He sat up in the wide bunk of the commander’s stateroom aboard the Joyau. Sweat streamed down his face. Slowly, he swung his feet to the side and stood, walking deliberately to the fresher, where he washed his face, then blotted himself dry.
He walked slowly around the stateroom, barefoot, until he cooled down, then slipped back into the bunk, on the side where the sheets were cool and dry, and not damp.
In time, he woke, and washed, and dressed, and made his way to the cockpit.
There he settled into the command couch and studied the monitors. He could feel himself frowning, knowing something was off, not quite right Van glanced around the cockpit again, and then again.
Countdown beginning at sixty... fifty-nine, fifty-eight... The numbers announced themselves slowly, death-marching downward. Van tried to focus his thoughts, thoughts that felt so sluggish. Something ... there was something wrong about those numbers, something he should have recognized. He tried to remember what... and what he should be doing...
... thirty-six, thirty-five, thirty-four, thirty-three, thirty-two...
The transmission from the Elsin broke off, and the Elsin had vanished. Energy flared across the boards, searing Van with its heat. Somewhere, in the distance, eight gleaming white stone towers began to melt before exploding into vapor... and the screams of millions echoed through Van’s mind.
Once more, Van bolted up in the bunk.
This time, he did not even think of trying to get more sleep as he rose to take a shower and don a clean shipsuit.
After leaving Damcus behind, after almost two weeks there, Van could have expected nightmares with shattered buildings, with gaunt figures like Jahil, or empty-eyed children, and the shapes of burned-out buildings, or the smell of ashes and death, but nightmares about his fathers—and trees?
The nova dream was familiar, at least, if unwelcome, but the dream about his fathers and the giant tree bothered him more—far more—even if he could not say why.
Chapter 86
Van shifted his weight in the command couch as the Joyau approached Angslan, a formerly independent system that had been “annexed” by the Revenants nineteen years earlier, although they had not closed down the IIS office in Ingelar until four years later, according to IIS records. That was still fifteen years ago, Van thought to himself, wondering what he would find.
Angslan control, Coalition ship Joyau, for approach and locking. Joyau, request registration.
Control, registration information dispatched How tight was the Coalition control of Angslan?
Wait one, Joyau. Continue approach.
Continuing approach this time. Van checked the monitors and EDI indicators. There was one other commercial ship in-system—and the drive signature was Hyndji. But there were three Coalition frigates and four corvettes—most of them near Angslan on what looked to be a former out-system base.
Coalition ship Joyau, your registration is approved. Clear to charlie one this time. Be aware that no incoming cargoes are being allowed planetside, except equipment for Argenti and Coalition forces. No travel planetside is permitted, except for Coalition and Argenti forces and support groups.
Control, Joyau, no cargo to declare. Bearing message traffic for rerouting. Interrogative outbound cargo.
Message center is operative for other stellar destinations. Planetbound traffic will be delayed and screened. Outbound cargo is embargoed at this time.
Stet.
Van eased the Joyau through the docking and locking process almost silently. He’d hoped to get planetside, but it didn’t look that likely. So the stop at orbit control was going to be useful only for messaging, reenergizing, and for whatever informal ion he could gather.
Once the ship was locked in place and on station power, he took a deep breath.
“Not good, ser?” asked Alya.
“They’ve got the entire planet quarantined. They’re not calling it that, but that’s what it amounts to. Go ahead and get the mass tanks topped off. I’m going to see what I can find out.”
He unstrapped and walked back to his stateroom, where he called up the files on Angslan. There wasn’t anything obvious, except that the annexation by the Revs had been peaceful.
After a moment of reflection, he pulsed through a message to orbit control administration—and got a simmie, dressed in a white uniform.
“This is orbit control administration. How can we help you?”
“This is Van Albert, commander of the Joyau and managing director of IIS. We’re a Coalition foundation, and we’ve traveled here to try to reopen our office planetside.” Van waited.
The simmie smiled politely. “Let me see who might best help you.”
Van waited for several minutes before the holo projection switched to the figure of a Coalition commodore in a wrinkled singlesuit. Her face was drawn, her eyes tired, and set in circles of black.
“Commander Albert. Or should I say Commodore Albert?”
“Commander or director. The commodore doesn’t count for much anymore.”
The faintest smile crossed her face. “Commodore Yoriki. I’m in charge of the restoration work here. I understand you had hoped to go planetside to reopen an office?”
“That had been my hope. I’ve just finished a similar project in another system.”
“It would have been my hope as well, Director Albert. But the Coalition has been forced to adopt an embargo of Angslan. That precludes commerce and travel.”
“Might I ask why, and how long this might be expected to continue?”
Yoriki shrugged tiredly. “The Revs smashed the local culture, then sent in waves of their most fervent believers. They’re still a minority, but they control all the local institutions. We aren’t about to risk Coalition forces. So we’ll just keep the place isolated until they adopt the political changes the Coalition requires. We’ve also grounded all air transport until that happens.” Her smile was simultaneously wry and cold.
“What political changes?”
“The restoration of the open representative democracy, the abolition of required polygamy ... the physical destruction of all reeducation centers... and the return of all commercial establishments to their original owners or heirs. In addition, any religion must permit open access to all buildings and establishments.”
“I take it that these changes are being resisted.”
“You might say that.”
