“Yes,” Zoë said, staring up at Jane. “I understand, Jane. Not a word.”
“Thank you, Zoë,” Jane said, and then bent down and kissed the top of Zoë’s head. “Go ahead,” she said, to me.
“Hickory, you remember when we had the conversation where I told the two of you that I wanted you to hand over your consciousness implants,” I said.
“Yes,” said Hickory.
“We talked about the Conclave then,” I said. “And you said that you didn’t believe the Conclave was a threat to this colony.”
“I said that we believed the threat to be negligible,” Hickory said.
“Why do you believe that?” I asked.
“The Conclave prefers that colonies are evacuated rather than destroyed,” Hickory said.
“How do you know this?” I said.
“From our own information on the Conclave, provided to us by our government,” Hickory said.
“Why didn’t you share this information with us before?” I asked.
“We were told not to,” Hickory said.
“By whom?” I asked.
“By our government,” Hickory said.
“Why would they tell you not to share this?” I asked.
“We have a standing order from our government not to share information with you on matters about which you are not substantially informed,” Hickory said. “It is a courtesy to your government, which requires security and confidence from our own government on numerous matters. We have not lied to you, Dickory and I, but we are not allowed to volunteer information, either. You will recall before we left Huckleberry that we had asked you what you knew of the status of this part of space.”
“Yes,” I said.
“We were attempting to discover how much of our knowledge we were allowed to share with you,” Hickory said. “We regret to say it did not appear you knew much. So we were not able to share much.”
“You’re sharing it now,” I said.
“You’re asking now,” Hickory said. “And Zoë has told us not to lie.”
“You’ve seen our video of the Conclave destroying the Whaidi colony,” I said.
“Yes, when you shared it with all of your colonists,” Hickory said.
“Did it match your own video?” I asked
“No,” Hickory said. “Ours was much longer.”
“Why would our version be so much shorter?” I asked.
“We cannot speculate why your government does the things it does,” Hickory said.
I paused at this; the construction of the sentence left a lot of room for interpretation.
Jane jumped in. “You said the Conclave prefers to evacuate colonies rather than destroy them. Are you saying this because of the video or do you have other information?”
“We have other information,” Hickory said. “The video shows only the first attempt by the Conclave to remove a colony.”
“How many others have there been?” Jane asked.
“We do not know,” Hickory said. “We have been out of communication with our government for the better part of a Roanoke year. However, when we left, the Conclave had removed seventeen colonies.”
“How many of those were destroyed?” Jane asked.
“Three,” Hickory said. “The rest were evacuated. In ten cases the colonists repatriated with their races. Four chose to join the Conclave.”
“You have evidence of this,” I said.
“The Conclave extensively documents each colony removal and shares it with every nonmember government,” Hickory said. “We have information on all the removals up to our arrival here on Roanoke.”
“Why?” Jane asked. “What relevance does this information have to the two of you?”
“Our government was well aware this colony was being founded despite the warnings of the Conclave,” Hickory said. “And while we did not know for certain, we expected that the Colonial Union would attempt to hide this colony from the Conclave. When the Conclave found your colony, we were to show you this information.”
“For what purpose?” Jane asked.
“To convince you to surrender the colony,” Hickory said. “We could not allow it to be destroyed.”
“Because of Zoë,” I said.
“Yes,” Hickory said.
“Wow,” Zoë said.
“Quiet, sweetheart,” I said. Zoë lapsed back into silence. I studied Hickory carefully. “What would happen if Jane and I chose not to surrender the colony?” I asked. “What if she and I decided the colony should be destroyed instead?”
“We would prefer not to say,” Hickory said.
“Don’t evade,” I said. “Answer the question.”
“We would kill you and Lieutenant Sagan,” Hickory said. “You and any other colonist leader who would authorize the destruction of the colony.”
“You would kill us?” I said.
“It would be difficult for us,” Hickory allowed. “We would have to do it without our consciousness implants active, and I believe neither Dickory nor I would choose to activate them again. The emotions would be unbearable. Also, we are aware Lieutenant Sagan has been genetically altered back to Special Forces operational parameters. This would make killing her more difficult.”
“How do you know that?” Jane said, surprised.
“We observe,” Hickory said. “We know you try to hide it, Lieutenant. Small things reveal you. You chop vegetables far too quickly.”
“What are they talking about?” Zoë asked Jane.
“Later, Zoë,” Jane said, and turned her attention back to Hickory. “What about now?” Jane asked. “Would you still kill me and John?”
“If you choose to surrender the colony, yes,” Hickory said.
“Don’t you dare,” Zoë said. She stood up, furious. “Under no circumstances will you do that.”
Hickory and Dickory trembled with emotional overload, attempting to process Zoë’s anger. “This one thing we must refuse you,” Hickory eventually said to Zoë. “You are too important. To us. To all Obin.”
Zoë was incandescent with rage. “I’ve already lost one parent because of the Obin,” Zoë said.
“Everybody calm down,” I said. “No one is killing anyone. All right? This is a nonissue. Zoë, Hickory and Dickory aren’t going to kill us because we’re not going to let the colony be destroyed. Simple as that. And there is no way I would let anything happen to you, Zoë. Hickory and Dickory and I all agree that you are too important for that.”
Zoë took a sharp intake of breath and started sobbing. Jane reeled her in and sat her back down. I turned my attention to the two Obin.
“I want to make this clear to the two of you,” I said. “In all circumstances, protect Zoë.”
“We will,” Hickory said. “Always.”
“Good,” I said. “Do try not to kill me in the process. Or Jane.”
“We will try,” Hickory said.
“Good,” I said. “Settled. Let’s move on.” I had to stop a minute to recollect my thoughts; being informed I was an assassination target and Zoë’s subsequent and entirely justified meltdown had well and truly rattled my cage. “You said there were seventeen colony removals that you know about,” I said.
“Yes,” Hickory said.
“Fourteen of them had the colonists survive, and four of those joined the Conclave,” I said. “You mean those colonists joined, or the whole race joined?”
“The colonists joined,” Hickory said.
“So none of the races whose colonies have been removed have joined the Conclave,” I said.
“No,” Hickory said. “This has been a matter of some concern within the Conclave itself. It was assumed that at least some of these races would then accept the invitation to join the Conclave. The removals seem to have hardened resolve otherwise.”
“Races are not forced to join the Conclave,” Jane said from the couch.
“No,” Hickory said. “They are simply not allowed to expand further.”
“I don’t
see how they could enforce that,” I said. “It’s a big universe.”
“It is,” Hickory said. “But no race has been willing to forgo administration of their colonies. There’s always a way to discover the colonies.”
“Except this one,” I said. “That’s why they’ve had us hide. It’s more important for humans to survive in the universe than it is to control them.”
“Perhaps,” Hickory said.
“I want to see those files you have, Hickory,” Jane said. “And the extended version of our video,” she said to me.
“We will need to go to the technology lab to transfer them,” Hickory said.
“No time like the present,” I said. Jane and I kissed Zoë good night, and then we headed out the door to the Black Box, Hickory and Dickory taking the lead.
“Why did you say that in there?” Jane asked, as we walked.
“Say what?” I said.
“That we wouldn’t allow the colony to be destroyed,” Jane said.
“For one thing, our daughter was on the verge of a nervous breakdown thinking about Hickory and Dickory running us through with knives,” I said. “And for another thing, if the options are surrendering and turning every man, woman and child in the colony into ash, I know what I’m going to do.”
“You’re making assumptions on limited information again,” Jane said. “I need to look at those tapes before we make any sort of decision about anything. Until then, every option is on the table.”
“I can already tell we’re going to go round and round on this one,” I said, and looked up at the stars. Jane looked up with me. “I wonder which one of those has Huckleberry around it,” I said. “I think maybe we all should have stayed there. Then this would be someone else’s problem. At least for a while.”
“John,” Jane said. I turned. She had stopped several steps behind me now and was still looking up.
“What?” I said. I looked up again. “Made a constellation?”
“There’s a star up there that wasn’t there before,” Jane said, and pointed. “That one.”
I squinted, and then realized it didn’t matter whether I squinted or not, since I didn’t know which stars were supposed to be there and which ones weren’t. And then I saw it. Bright. And moving.
“Oh God,” I said.
Jane shrieked and fell to the ground, clutching her head. I sprinted over to her. She was convulsing now. I tried to get hold of her and her arm whipped out, her hand smacking palm first onto the side of my head, slapping me hard into the ground. I saw a white flash and spent the next few indeterminate moments immobile, trying not to vomit.
Hickory and Dickory hauled me up from the dirt, one at each arm. I looked around groggily for Jane. She was no longer on the ground; instead she was stalking furiously, muttering like a mad woman. She stopped, arched her back and screamed like a banshee. I hollered myself, in total surprise.
Eventually she stalked over to me. “You’re going to have to meet them without me, because right now I will fucking kill every last one of them,” she said.
“What are you talking about?” I said.
“The fucking Colonial Union,” Jane said, and stabbed a finger skyward. “That’s them, and they’re coming down now. Here.”
“How do you know?” I said.
Jane looked away and laughed an eerie little laugh that I’d never heard from her before and sincerely hoped I never would again. “Yes. Well. Remember when we were talking earlier about my new abilities, and I said I didn’t have a BrainPal?”
“Yes,” I said.
“Yeah,” Jane said. “Turns out, I was wrong.”
“I have to tell you, I thought you’d be happy to see me,” General Rybicki said. “Everyone else seems to be.” He waved out my window to the street, which was filled with the early morning image of Roanokers going out of their minds with joy that their isolation was coming to an end. “Where’s Sagan?”
“You need to tell me what the fuck is going on, General,” I said.
Rybicki looked back toward me. “Excuse me?” he said. “I’m not your commanding officer anymore, Perry, but I’m still your superior. A little more respect would be in order.”
“Fuck that,” I said. “And fuck you too. There hasn’t been a thing about this colony you’ve been straight about since you recruited us.”
“I’ve been as honest with you as I could,” Rybicki said.
“As honest as you could,” I said, and there was no mistaking the incredulousness in my voice.
“Let me rephrase,” Rybicki said. “I’ve been as honest with you as I’ve been allowed to be.”
“You lied to me and Jane and an entire colony’s worth of people,” I said. “You’ve shunted us to the ass end of the universe and threatened us with annihilation from a group none of us even knew existed. You took colonists trained on modern equipment and forced them to colonize with ancient machines they barely knew how to use. If some of our colonists hadn’t happened to have been Mennonites, the only thing you would have found here would have been bones. And because you didn’t survey this planet well enough to know it has its own goddamned intelligent species, seven of my colonists have died in the last three days. So with all due respect, General, you can kiss my ass. Jane’s not here because if she was, you’d probably already be dead. I’m not feeling any more charitable to you myself.”
“Fair enough,” Rybicki said, grimly.
“Now,” I said. “Answers.”
“Since you mentioned annihilation, you know about the Conclave,” Rybicki said. “How much do you know?”
“I know what information you sent us,” I said, neglecting to mention I knew anything else.
“Then you know that it is actively seeking out new colonies and getting rid of them,” Rybicki said. “As you might expect, this is not going over well with the races who have had their colonies expunged. The Colonial Union has taken the lead in resisting the Conclave, and this colony has played a major role in that.”
“How?” I said.
“By staying hidden,” Rybicki said. “Christ, Perry, you’ve been here for almost a year. The Conclave has been going nuts looking for you. And every day it hasn’t found you, the less terrifying it looks. The more it looks like what it is: the universe’s biggest pyramid scheme. It’s a system where a few strong races are leveraging the gullibility of a bunch of weaker races to snap up every habitable planet in sight. We’ve been using this colony as a lever to pry off some of those sucker races. We’re destabilizing the Conclave before it can reach critical mass and crush us and everyone else with it.”
“And this required deceiving everyone, including the crew of the Magellan,” I said.
“Unfortunately, yes,” Rybicki said. “Look. The number of people who knew about this had to be kept to an absolute bare minimum. The Secretary of Colonization. Me. General Szilard of the Special Forces and a few of his handpicked soldiers. I supervised the load out and engineered some of the colonial selection. It’s not an accident you have Mennonites here, Perry. And it’s not an accident you had enough ancient machinery to get you through. It’s regrettable that we couldn’t tell you, and I’m sorry that we couldn’t see another way to do this. But I’m not going to apologize for it, because it worked.”
“And how is this playing back home?” I said. “How do the home planets of our people feel about you playing with the lives of their friends and families?”
“They don’t know,” Rybicki said. “The existence of the Conclave is a state secret, Perry. We haven’t told the individual colonies about it. It’s not something they need to worry about yet.”
“You don’t think a federation of a few hundred other races in this part of space is something most people might want to know about,” I said.
“I’m sure they’d want to know about it,” Rybicki said. “And between you and me, if I had my way, they probably would know about it already. But it’s not up to me, or you or any of us.”
“So everyone sti
ll thinks we’re lost,” I said.
“They do,” Rybicki said. “The second lost colony of Roanoke. You’re famous.”
“But you’ve just given the game away,” I said. “You’re here. When you go back, people are going to know we’re here. And my people know about the Conclave.”
“How do they know?” Rybicki asked.
“Because we told them,” I said, disbelieving. “Are you serious? You expect me to tell people they can’t use any technology more advanced than a mechanical combine and not give them a reason? I would have been the first death on the planet. So they know. And because they know, everyone they know back in the Colonial Union will know, too. Unless you plan to keep us stranded. In which case those same people who are jumping for joy outside that window will string you up by your thumbs.”
“No, you’re not being put back in the hole,” Rybicki said. “On the other hand, you’re not quite out of the hole yet, either. We’re here to do two things. The first is to pick up the crew of the Magellan.”
“For which they will no doubt be eternally grateful, although I expect Captain Zane wants his ship back,” I said.
“The second thing is to let you know that all the equipment you haven’t been using, you can now,” Rybicki said. “Say good-bye to the second millennium. Welcome to modern times. You can’t send messages back to the Colonial Union yet, though. There are still a few details to develop.”
“Using modern equipment will give us away,” I said.
“That’s right,” Rybicki said.
“You’re giving me whiplash,” I said. “We’ve spent a year hiding so you can weaken the Conclave, and now you want us to give ourselves away. Maybe I’m confused, but I’m not sure how getting ourselves slaughtered by the Conclave helps the Colonial Union.”
“You’re presuming you’re going to get slaughtered,” Rybicki said.