EL-MASRI: Note where they are, but steer clear of them for now. If we find the cargo containers with our supplies, we can go back and deal with them. But for now, let them be. We have other priorities.
GANAS: Here, Aurel. Make sure to record everything Malik says.
SPURLEA: Will do.
EL-MASRI: All right, let’s get back in there.
[Door opens, closes.]
DAMANIS: I thought you had forgotten about me.
EL-MASRI: We wouldn’t do that, Malik.
DAMANIS: That’s good to hear. I’m sorry to take up so much of your time. You must be busy as colony leader.
EL-MASRI: Well, talking to you has been helpful, and you can be a little more helpful to me still, Malik.
DAMANIS: How can I do that?
EL-MASRI: I need you to tell me everything you can about where you landed and how you got here from there. That will help us find where you landed, and might help us find the rest of your crew.
DAMANIS: I’ll tell you, but I don’t think you’ll find the rest of my crew. I think they’re all dead.
EL-MASRI: You said that at least a few of your crewmates were alive when you landed. You’ve survived so far. So it stands to reason some of them might have as well.
DAMANIS: Unh.
EL-MASRI: Why are you shaking your head?
SPURLEA: Malik, did something else happen to your crew before you came here?
DAMANIS: Yes.
EL-MASRI: Tell us about it. It could be useful to us.
DAMANIS: After we landed, those of us who were mostly uninjured started helping those who were worse off. There were about ten of us at that point. We went back into the container so we could see who was living and who was dead. The dead we moved to one side of the container. The living we moved out of the container so we could see how badly they were injured. About half had broken bones but were still conscious or still able to move around. The rest were either unconscious or not able to move because they were too injured or in too much pain. We went back into the container and took the clothes off the dead to make slings and braces, and to make bandages where people were bleeding or had open breaks.
SPURLEA: So, ten relatively uninjured, about ten or fifteen somewhat injured and the same number severely injured. The rest dead.
DAMANIS: Yes. May I have some more water?
SPURLEA: Of course.
DAMANIS: When we were done with that, those of us who were still uninjured got together to discuss what to do next. Some of us wanted to find your colony. We knew it was down here because that’s why we were over your planet in the first place, and were knew you couldn’t be too far away. But none of our PDAs survived the fall and we couldn’t signal you, or use them to keep track of whoever wandered off. Most of us wanted to build a better camp and get ourselves squared away, find some water and some food before we did anything else. I said we should move the dead out of the container and the living back in, so they would at least have shelter. One guy, Nadeem Davi, started talking about how we should consider the possibility of using the dead for food. We argued about that so long that we didn’t notice what had happened to the forest.
EL-MASRI: What had happened?
DAMANIS: It had gone dead silent. Like it does when there’s a predator around, right? Everything that could get eaten just shuts up and hides. We finally noticed it when we all stopped talking. It was dead silent except for our injured. And then—
SPURLEA: And then a pack of animals was on you.
DAMANIS: You know about these things?
EL-MASRI: We just call it “the pack.” We don’t call them anything else because we’ve never caught one by itself. You don’t see them, or you see dozens of them. There’s nothing in between.
DAMANIS: I didn’t know that. I saw them coming out of the woods and they reminded me of the stories my grandmother told me of hyenas in Africa. There were just so many of them. One or two for every one of us.
EL-MASRI: We lost fourteen people to the pack early on before we learned not to wander too far into the woods alone. We go out in groups of four or five and always go armed. They seem to have gotten good at recognizing rifles. We don’t see them as much as we used to.
DAMANIS: They made up for it with us. They went for the injured ones first, went right for their necks and open wounds. There was nothing we could do for them. Some of the less injured tried to run or crawl, but the pack went for their injuries, too. Like they knew that was going to cause us the most pain and drag us down so they could have us. Then at least a couple dozen got into a smaller pack and headed toward those of us who were still uninjured. Some of us tried to run, and didn’t notice that there was another small pack flanking us. Nadeem was one of those; he went down fast and six of them were on him before any of us could do anything. Then the rest of them came right at us.
SPURLEA: How did you manage to escape?
DAMANIS: I didn’t at first. One of the pack things bit into my calf and took a chunk of it. I managed to kick it off and then ran as fast as I could in the other direction. By that time the rest of the crew was down and I guess the pack decided there was more than enough where they were. They didn’t need to follow me. I just kept running until my leg gave out on me.
EL-MASRI: Do you remember which direction you mostly ran? North? South?
DAMANIS: I don’t know. Mostly south? I remember the sun being to my right when I could see it, and I think it was morning here when we landed. So, south?
EL-MASRI: What happened then?
DAMANIS: I rested, but not too long, because my leg was already beginning to hurt, and I didn’t want it to stiffen up on me. I kept heading south, and after a while, maybe ten minutes, I came to a stream. I remembered reading somewhere once that if you ever get lost in the woods that you should find a stream and then walk downstream, because sooner or later you’d find civilization that way. So after I drank some water and washed out my wound, I just started walking downstream. I walked and then I would rest for a couple of minutes and then I would start walking again. Eventually I came out of the woods and saw your colony. I saw a couple of people in a field.
SPURLEA: That would be the Yangs. They found him out in what was supposed to be their sorghum field.
EL-MASRI: Go on, Malik.
DAMANIS: I tried yelling to them and waving my hands, but I didn’t know if they could hear me or not. Then I passed out, and when I woke up I was here, and Doctor Spurlea was trying to fix my leg. That woke me up.
EL-MASRI: I don’t doubt that.
DAMANIS: And that’s everything, sir. That’s everything I know.
EL-MASRI: All right. Thank you, Malik.
DAMANIS: You’re welcome, sir. Can I have my painkillers now? I’m really going to start crying soon.
SPURLEA: Absolutely, Malik. Give me one minute to talk to Chen here, and I’ll come right back and hook you up.
[Door opens, closes.]
EL-MASRI: Well, at least now we know how he got the Rot. That pack bite would do it.
SPURLEA: And if it didn’t, washing the wound in the stream water did.
EL-MASRI: You can’t blame him for not knowing that the stream is packed with the Rot’s bacteria.
SPURLEA: Believe me, I don’t. His blood work just pinged, by the way.
EL-MASRI: Bad news?
SPURLEA: Don’t make it sound like you care, Chen.
EL-MASRI: Just tell me.
SPURLEA: He’s got it in his blood. He’s got about twenty-four hours before the septicemia blows him up from the inside.
EL-MASRI: We don’t have enough painkillers for you to let him ride out that whole time, Aurel. That’s how we got into this situation with the painkillers in the first place.
SPURLEA: I know.
EL-MASRI: You’re going to take care of this, then.
SPURLEA: When I go back in I’ll give him enough to get him to sleep. I’ll take care of it from there.
EL-MASRI: I’m sorry I have to be like this to you about i
t.
SPURLEA: I understand, Chen. I do. I’m just certain that when I die and meet Hippocrates, he’s going to be sorely disappointed in me.
EL-MASRI: He’s going to die anyway, and painfully. You wouldn’t be doing him any favors.
SPURLEA: I’m going to change the subject by saying, Look, here comes Magda.
GANAS: The easterly team found the containers with the crew from the Erie Morningstar.
EL-MASRI: What’s the report?
GANAS: Everyone’s dead. Death at impact at one site. Death by the pack, it looks like, at the other. They’re less than a klick apart, with the death-by-impact site being the most northerly one. The team took pictures, so if you want to have nightmares tonight, you can look.
EL-MASRI: No other containers?
GANAS: If they’re there, they haven’t found them yet.
EL-MASRI: Have them keep looking. Give all the other search teams the coordinates and fan out from there.
GANAS: How is Malik?
SPURLEA: The Rot’s in his blood.
GANAS: Jesus.
SPURLEA: Just another perfect day here in New Seattle.
EL-MASRI: Look at it this way. It’s unlikely to get much worse.
GANAS: Don’t jinx it.
EL-MASRI: Thank you, Aurel, Magda. I’ll let you know when or if we find those supplies.
SPURLEA: Thank you, Chen.
GANAS: There goes a right bastard.
SPURLEA: We knew what he was when we hired him.
GANAS: I know, but it’s painful to be reminded of it so frequently.
SPURLEA: Without him we might be dead already.
GANAS: Which is also painful to be reminded of so frequently.
SPURLEA: Come on. We have to give Malik his painkillers.
GANAS: Did Chen tell you to finish him off after you did?
SPURLEA: He did.
GANAS: Will you?
SPURLEA: I don’t know.
GANAS: You’re a good and decent man, Aurel. You really, truly are. How you ended up on a wildcat colony is beyond me.
SPURLEA: You’re one to talk, Magda. Let’s go in.
GANAS: All right.
SPURLEA: And turn that off. Whatever I do, I don’t want a record of it anywhere but on my conscience.
[Transcript Ends]
EPISODE THREE
We Only Need the Heads
Hart Schmidt went to Ambassador Abumwe’s temporary office on Phoenix Station when she pinged him, but she wasn’t there. Schmidt knew that the ambassador not being in her office wasn’t a good enough excuse for him not to be in her presence when commanded, so he did a hasty PDA search on his boss. Three minutes later, he walked up to her in an observation lounge.
“Ambassador,” he said.
“Mr. Schmidt,” the ambassador said, not turning to him. Schmidt followed her gaze out the wall-sized window of the observation deck, to the heavily damaged ship hovering at a slight distance from the station itself.
“The Clarke,” Schmidt said.
“Very good, Schmidt,” Abumwe said, in a tone that informed him that, as with so many of the things he said to her in his role as a functionary on her diplomatic team, he was not telling her anything she didn’t already know.
Schmidt made an involuntary, nervous throat clearing in response. “I saw Neva Balla earlier today,” he said, naming the Clarke’s executive officer. “She tells me that it’s not looking good for the Clarke. The damage it took on our last mission is pretty extensive. Fixing it will be nearly as expensive as building a new ship. She thinks it’s likely they’ll simply scrap it.”
“And do what with the crew?” Abumwe said.
“She didn’t say,” Schmidt said. “She said the crew is being kept together, at least for the moment. There’s a chance the Colonial Union may just take a new ship and assign the Clarke’s crew to it. They might even name it the Clarke, if they’re going to scrap this one.” Schmidt motioned in the direction of the ship.
“Hmmmm,” Abumwe said, and then lapsed back into silence, staring at the Clarke.
Schmidt spent a few more uncomfortable minutes before clearing his throat again. “You pinged me, Ambassador?” he said, reminding her he was there.
“You say the Clarke crew hasn’t been reassigned,” Abumwe said, as if their earlier conversation hadn’t had an extended pause in it.
“Not yet,” Schmidt said.
“And yet, my team has,” Abumwe said, finally looking over at Schmidt. “Most of it, anyway. The Department of State assures me that the reassignments are only temporary—they need my people to fill in holes on other missions—but in the meantime I’m left with two people on my team. They left me Hillary Drolet, and they left me you. I know why they left me Hillary. She’s my assistant. I don’t know why they chose to take every other member of my team, assign them some presumably important task, and leave you doing nothing at all.”
“I don’t have any good answer to that, ma’am,” was the only thing that Schmidt could say that wouldn’t have immediately put his entire diplomatic career in jeopardy.
“Hmmmm,” Abumwe said again, and turned back to the Clarke.
Schmidt assumed this was his cue to depart and began stepping back out of the observation deck, perchance to avail himself of a stiff drink at the nearest commissary, when Abumwe spoke again.
“Do you have your PDA with you?” she asked him.
“Yes, ma’am,” Schmidt said.
“Check it now,” Abumwe said. “We have new orders.”
Schmidt drew out the PDA from his jacket pocket, swiped it on and read the new orders flashing in his mail queue. “We’re being attached to the Bula negotiations,” he said, reading the orders.
“Apparently so,” Abumwe said. “Deputy Ambassador Zala ruptured her appendix and has to withdraw. Normally protocol would have her assistant step up and continue negotiations, but Zala’s plank of the negotiations hasn’t formally started, and for protocol reasons it’s important for the Colonial Union to have someone of sufficient rank head this portion of the process. So here we are.”
“What part of the negotiations are we taking over?” Schmidt asked.
“There’s a reason I’m having you read the orders, Schmidt,” Abumwe said. Her tone had returned. She turned to face him again.
“Sorry, ma’am,” Schmidt said, hastily, and gestured at his PDA. “I’m not there yet.”
Abumwe grimaced but kept whatever comment about Schmidt that was running through her head to herself. “Trade and tourism access to Bula worlds,” she said instead. “How many ships, how large the ships, how many humans on the ground on Bulati and its colony worlds at one time, and so on.”
“We’ve done that before,” Schmidt said. “That shouldn’t be a problem.”
“There’s a wrinkle that’s not in your orders,” Abumwe said. Schmidt looked up from his PDA. “There’s a Bula colony world named Wantji. It was one of the last ones the Bula claimed before the Conclave told the unaffiliated races they could no longer colonize. They haven’t put any of their people on it yet because they don’t know how the Conclave would react to that.”
“What about it?” Schmidt asked.
“Three days ago, the CDF received a skip drone from Wantji with an emergency distress message in it,” Abumwe said.
Why would the Bula on an officially uninhabited planet send the Colonial Defense Forces a distress message? Schmidt almost asked, but didn’t. He realized it was exactly the sort of question that would make the ambassador think he was even more stupid than she already believed he was. Instead he attempted to figure out the question on his own.
After a few seconds, it came to him. “A wildcat colony,” he said.
“Yes,” Abumwe said. “A wildcat colony that the Bula don’t appear to know anything about at the moment.”
“We’re not telling them it’s there?” Schmidt asked.
“Not yet,” Abumwe said. “The CDF is sending a ship first.”
“We’r
e sending a warship into Bula territory to check on a human colony that’s not supposed to be there?” Schmidt said, slightly incredulously. “Ambassador, this is a very bad idea—”
“Of course it’s a bad idea!” Abumwe snapped. “Stop informing me of obvious things, Schmidt.”
“Sorry,” Schmidt said.
“Our job in the negotiations is twofold,” Abumwe said. “We negotiate the trade and tourism rights. We also negotiate them slowly enough that the Tubingen is able to get to Wantji and pluck that wildcat colony—or what’s left of it—from the planet.”
“Without telling the Bula,” Schmidt said. He kept the skepticism from his voice as politely as possible.
“The thinking is that if the Bula aren’t aware of it now, there is no point in making them aware,” Abumwe said. “And if they become aware, then the wildcatters will have been removed before they present a genuine diplomatic issue.”
“As long as they overlook a CDF ship having done time over their planet,” Schmidt said.
“The thinking is that the Tubingen will be long gone before the Bula know they’re there,” Abumwe said.
Schmidt refrained from saying, It’s still a bad idea, and chose something else instead. “You said it’s the Tubingen that’s heading to this colony planet,” he said.
“Yes,” Abumwe said. “What about it?”
Schmidt accessed his PDA and searched through his message queue. “Harry Wilson was attached to the Tubingen a few days ago,” he said, and turned his PDA to the ambassador to show her the message Wilson had sent him. “Its CDF platoon lost their systems guy on Brindle. Harry was stepping in for their current mission. Which would be this one, wouldn’t it.”
“Yet another team member of mine farmed out,” Abumwe said. “What is your point?”
“My point is that it could be useful for us to have someone on the ground on this,” Schmidt said. “You know we’re getting dealt a bad hand here, ma’am. At the very least Harry can tell us how bad of a hand it actually is.”
“Asking your CDF friend for information on an active military mission is a fine way to get yourself shot, Schmidt,” Abumwe said.