“Guiyon is dead,” Simeon said, and saw both men go rigid with shock and grief. He thought better of them for it and paused to let them recover. “The ship’s logs are all but unreadable. Why don’t you fill us in?” Simeon suggested quietly.
“He is dead?” Amos’s drawn face had gone pale under its smooth light-olive coloring. “But, how is that possible? He was a shellperson, an immortal. Ah, perhaps that is why we are not at Rigel Base or some other Central Worlds facility where we thought to seek assistance.”
“He brought you here, to SSS-900-C, a space station and many light years from Rigel Base.”
“How can an immortal die?” Joseph asked softly, suppliant as he spread his hands wide in his lap.
“The feeder lines to his nutrient sources had sheared off and, as there was no backup . . .” Simeon trailed off and both Bethelites bowed their heads a moment, honoring the dead. “Considering the state of that truly ancient vessel of yours, he did well to get you this far.”
Amos glanced at his companion. The other man’s hard blocky face was drawn, and he nodded his head slowly twice, as if encouraging. Amos hesitated, cleared his throat and, throwing his chin up, spoke directly to Simeon.
“This is even worse than I had imagined. Guiyon must have been truly desperate. Can you defend yourselves?”
“Well, we fended off your out-of-control ship pretty successfully,” Simeon replied. “What did you have in mind?”
Amos leaned forward, supporting himself on the armrests of the chair. His eyes took on a fierce glow.
“I will tell you,” he said passionately, sweeping a look at those around the table. “We of Bethel are a peaceful people.” His fists met and clenched. “Virtually a defenseless people.” His mouth twisted in pain. “We were attacked from the skies above our peaceful planet. I do not know how you count the hours in a day or the days of a week, a month or a year. I do not know how long we were unconscious in the Sleep. We fled our home world for four periods of twenty-five hours before I took the drug. Just before I did, Guiyon told me that he thought we would have a solid five days’ lead. So nine days of twenty-five hours—two hundred and twenty-five hours.”
“Sixty minutes in yo‘ hoah, Mr. Sierra Nuevah?” Patsy asked.
Looking over at her expressionlessly, he nodded slowly.
Simeon called up a holo of Bethel, culled and realized from the Survey Service data base.
“That is our world as it appeared before this Exodus,” Amos said bleakly, watching the slow rotation on the screen. “Our capital city was there,” and pointed to where two large rivers flowed into a bay. “Keriss, we called it. The place where the Pilgrims landed and erected our Temple. The Kolnari . . .” He broke, squeezing his eyes closed, his face a mask of pain.
Reference, Simeon prompted silently, feeling the computer begin its work. Then he felt a mental lurch as he reviewed what Amos had said. The city of Keriss was there: past tense. Gus caught it as well, his pupils widening.
“They demanded unconditional surrender,” Amos was saying, his face wiped clear of any emotion. “By sneak attack, they disabled our orbital habitats, our communications, everything we might have used to call help.”
He folded his shaking hands, clasping them so tightly the knuckles showed white. “The Council of Elders convened,” he said. His lips tightened. “They decided this tribulation was punishment for the increasing immorality of the younger generation. Me!”
He stabbed himself in the breast with his fingers, “And those like me, who only wanted a little more freedom, who only wanted to have answers to reasonable questions. They would not listen to me—even though I am a male descendent, in the Prophet’s own line.”
Locked in bitter memory, Amos did not notice the surprise his words generated.
Ah, patrilineal descent system, Simeon thought.
“I thank the All-Knowing for Guiyon, for when I left the council chamber that last time, he called to me. Escape, he said. ‘To go where? How?’ I asked. He told me then of the colony ship that had brought us to Bethel. For three hundred years we had used it as a weather and relaying station, nothing more. I left to gather those who might follow me.”
His hands knotted together. “And the Kolnari . . . when the Elders refused surrender, they destroyed the city with a fusion weapon!”
A shocked murmur ran around the table. No one had used fusion weapons in generations. Certainly not in any sector answerable to the Central Worlds.
“Murderers! Looters! Pirates!” he spat out the words and rubbed his face with his hands.
Another murmur. SSS-900-C was in a very peaceful sector; the only nonhumans were species who did not practice institutionalized violence. The settlers were mostly well-integrated types, if a bit rambunctious, but no more than was expected on a frontier. Piracy was an historical phenomenon or a sporadic occurrence far out on the Arm.
In a steady voice, all the more effective because of its calm, Amos went on. “A tenth of our people died in that moment, and all our leaders. The Kolnari told us that we must capitulate or they would strike again. They broadcast their message from a dark screen. They would strike again and again until we were obliterated to the last man. Just this implacable voice. The cowards! They did not even show us the face of our enemy. They gave us two hours to make up our minds.
“And so we began. It was very hard. We had to determine who we could take.” His cheeks grew red with shame as he continued. “First we took Guiyon from his column. We could not open the main bay doors. Ah, but we were so stupid, so innocent, so untrained! We’d managed to get supplies, disconnect Guiyon, gathered our people, fly to the ship without being detected and then,” he gave a harsh bark of laughter, “the doors refused to open! Some murmured that the Elders had been right. We were being punished for our sins.
“Then, Joseph here,” and Amos laid a light hand on the short man’s shoulder, “opened one of the service airlocks. Only it was much too small for Guiyon’s shell. He insisted that he didn’t have to be inside, that we must strap him to the hull near the bridge, so that his brain synapses could be wired into the command panel. He had to tell us everything that had to be done. We knew so little of such matters.” Another bitter snort. “And we were so afraid. None of us knew anything at all about spatial navigation. I had piloted a ship, but only a small one, and never beyond Bethel’s moons. Beyond Bethel’s moons,” and he made a broad sweep of his arm, “was not fit for men of Bethel. Also, we know nothing of the worlds outside our little system. Guiyon handled what outsystem commerce was permitted to us on Bethel.”
He paused, swallowing hard, and Chaundra filled a glass with water for him. Amos nodded gratefully and drank before he resumed his story.
“Guiyon dared not risk bringing us to one of the nearer colonies for fear of leading those monsters to an equally defenseless planet. Instead,” and he gave a mirthless laugh, “we may have led them to an even more defenseless space station. At least on a planet, one may know of safe hiding places. I do not know why we are here and not at Rigel Base. Guiyon must have changed course again. There were four fiends in our wake when I had to accept the drug. Well-armed warships, or so Guiyon thought. And we have led them here to you who have saved the poor fragment of our people who fled from our once beautiful planet.” He bowed his head, his shoulders slumping with his consummate despair.
An appalled silence had broken into a quickly rising babble of “they’ve brought trouble here.”
“they led fiends to us?”
“But we’re defenseless.” Simeon let out a modulated howl and they all shut up.
“Thank you,” Simeon said ironically when silence fell. When in danger, or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout, he added to himself.
“Guiyon brought them here because first, the engines were about to blow, and second, they were dying fast anyway, and third, SSS-900-C is, after all, on the main route in this quadrant of Central Worlds sphere of influence. Now, if we could examine the problem more ca
lmly?”
Claren turned to May Vickers. “As security chief, you’re required to defend us!”
Vickers looked at the man. “With stundart pistols?” she asked incredulously. “I’m a police officer with fifty part-time assistants. I lock up drunken miners and see domestic disputes don’t get out of hand,” she said. “I’ve never had experience with fiends and I want no part of four warships.” She crossed her arms across her solid chest and looked accusingly up at Simeon.
“Is it possible that you might have lost them?” Chaundra asked.
The two Bethelites shook their heads glumly.
“Unlikely,” Simeon said, “not when Guiyon was overdriving the engines and leaving an ion trail a blind alien could follow.”
Gus nodded. “Any warship could.”
“Iffen they couldn’t see the trail, thar’s all them pieces of the ship rollin‘ about, saying ’theah heahh!‘ ” Patsy waved her arms like a signalman. “We cain’t hardly say they passed on through.”
“My information banks give me no information at all about any group, or star system, known as Kolnari,” said Simeon. “While I realize that your experience with these people is short-term, had you even heard of them on Bethel before they struck?”
Amos shook his head. “Guiyon had heard rumors of a band of marauders in the Arm from the few traders that came to Bethel. He was also forbidden by the Elders to tell any but themselves what news traders brought of the worlds beyond Bethel. On the ship, he did tell me,” and Amos furrowed his brow, trying to remember the exact words the shellperson had used, “that they struck so swiftly that no alarm could go forth. That that was how they avoided detection by any force great enough to come against them.”
“Central Worlds, for instance,” Channa said with a rueful quirk of her lips.
Amos nodded. “The first wave of destruction was aimed at our air and space ports, at communication installations. The strike was as complete as it was unexpected. They chose not to show themselves to us until all our space capacity was destroyed . . . or so they thought. All we know of them was from a very brief time when we fought them. They follow us to destroy the evidence of the destruction of Bethel, the latest of their crimes. They will kill, and quickly. No doubt,” he added with scorn, “they feel uneasy being only four instead of three hundred.”
“Three hundred?” Simeon asked.
“Three hundred ships. So Guiyon told me. He had seen them coming in but was forbidden by the Elders to speak until they had decided what to do.”
Gus whistled. “If that’s three hundred warships, people, not only do we have a problem, this whole sector has a problem.” The Navy was much larger, but it was scattered.
“Have you had any recent word from Central, Simeon?” Channa asked him.
“Basically no more than an acknowledgement of the . . . ah . . . incident in the vein of ‘Gee, that’s too bad, but you’re equipped to handle it and when your reports are filed, we’ll see what we can do.’ But of course that’s based on what happened yesterday; this may get us action.”
At least I hope it will, Simeon thought. Three hundred ships! Shit! Simeon opened a tight beam to Central with a mayday flag attached. Hopefully he’d have some hard news before too long.
“What sort of armament did they have?” Gus asked while the rest of the station’s leaders sat, trying not to look at each other and especially not at Amos and Joseph. Amos had gone even paler and the blue of his eyes had faded. He just sat there. On the other hand, Joseph was watching each and every one of the station heads with a critical gaze and the slightest of knowing smiles on his full lips.
Simeon could see that the initial numbness his people had felt was giving way to fear. Gus was fighting it with trained reflex, but the others were edging slowly toward panic.
“You must have something to fight with,” Joseph said, suddenly leaning his arms on the table and directing a piercing gaze from one face to another. “We fought, and we had much less than you did who turned the vessel from your station yesterday. With what did you blow it into pieces? Do you have more? That is something. It is more than we had who saw our ships withered to slag. Our city . . .” He broke off and struck his fists impotently into the table. “We have brought you warning. We had none!”
Amos caught his friend by the wrists before he could damage his hands. “Peace, my brother,” he said softly.
“Oh, youah brothas?” Patsy said in mild surprise, peering closely at both to find some familial resemblance.
“Not of the blood,” and Amos touched his temple with his index finger, “of the mind.”
“Unh-hunh!” Patsy blushed and tightened her lips into a straight line.
“I’ve sent a message to Central Worlds,” Simeon told them in a brisk voice that he hoped sounded as if he had matters well in hand. “They’re consulting with the Space Navy brass—to see what to do. I was hoping they’d tell me what they were doing, and or what we can do. I should’ve anticipated a full fledged diplomatic-bureaucratic-governmental-gunfight, complete with quarrels over jurisdiction. Everyone with something to say about this has to be tracked down and given an opportunity to give his fardling opinion in triplicate. Amos, believe me, kid, I know just how you feel about elders. The good news is that Navy intends to act fast, only there aren’t any Navy units close. The nearest is eighteen days away. This is assuming the brass cut movement orders today and not sometime after we’ve become the subject of mere academic debate, because we don’t exist anymore.
“Which means that at best we can look forward to thirteen lucky days with our naked butts hanging out waiting for a kick from a booted foot. That nearest Navy unit is a patrol corvette, a warship only by courtesy.”
“Then you must flee!” Amos leaned forward urgently. “You cannot hope to defeat them. You must leave this place.”
“Great idea,” Simeon agreed, “in principle. Only the station can’t move. That’s why it’s a station. It’s stationary. Get it?”
“You mock me most unfairly,” Amos replied with solemn and offended dignity. “I have no knowledge of space stations or of your capabilities. Further, I am not wrong. If the station itself cannot move, then its people must.”
“As far as such advice goes,” Gus cut in, “he has a point. We should evacuate as many as we can—children, the sick, nonessential personnel. Whoever we can, or whoever’s hot to go.”
“By my calculations,” Simeon said, finishing them in that instant, “given the number of ships currently in or near me at the moment, we should be able to evacuate over a thousand souls.” He liked that touch. “Not counting crews.”
There was silence for a moment. A thousand was a fraction of the average ever-shifting population of the station.
Amos broke the silence hesitantly. “How many people will that leave on the station?”
“Fifteen thousand, or so,” Channa said grimly. “Our population varies. Simeon, does your estimate include emptying cargo bays and stuffing our people into them in suits?” A desperation procedure and liable to result in some fatalities.
“No, we could evacuate a few hundred more that way.”
Although, given the average softperson’s reaction to long-term confinement in tight spaces, we probably won’t get many volunteers for traveling that way.
“And before you ask,” Simeon continued, “no, I haven’t even asked the captains their views on such an . . . exodus. That’s a best case scenario. We can’t prevent those who aren’t docked in the station physically from leaving, so the scheme is still just inside this room. I think that before we start bringing anyone else into this, we should have at least one plan to present, preferably more than one.”
“Evacuation plans?” Chaundra asked, his brow farrowed.
“Those,” Simeon said, “and plans to fight for the station.”
There was a certain brightening around the table. Nothing visible, but the lift in attitude was almost palpable.
“That’s right up your alley, Si
meon,” Channa said gently, “even if this isn’t a military installation.”
“To fight,” Joseph said, his dark eyes glinting with revived hope. Or was it vengeance? “Yes, this is what we would like to do, but how? Did you not say that you had no weapons? And surely they will not give you a chance to combat them. Why should they not simply rush in and destroy you? That would be but child’s play for them.”
“We will employ guile.” Geeze, their lingo is contagious, he thought. “Remember, you said these people were pirates?”
“Yes,” Amos said. “When they made their initial demand for surrender—they mentioned deliveries of materials, machines, labor. Pirates, but they speak as though they were a people, a nation. The High Clan, they sometimes named themselves. At others, the Divine—” his mouth puckered in distaste “—the Divine Seed of Kolnar.”
“Right.” Simeon spoke briskly. This is just another exotic scenario, he told himself firmly. Games theory experience—don’t freeze up now. You’ve done things like this thousands of times. “So they’re no more than criminals, not a true army, disciplined, strategically trained. More like guerillas. Jump in, grab what they can, jump out. Right now, they’re pursuing you, and these four ships aim to destroy you to keep you from spreading any nasty rumors about them. So, what we better do first, is get their minds off killing by distracting them with the material things they wanted from you in the first place. Right?”
Every station officer thought about this. Then Gus nodded slowly.
“If these people are space-based, and from the description I think they must be—what a prize the SSS-900-C would be!” He turned to Amos and Joseph. “What sort of industries does . . . did Bethel have?”
“Very few,” Amos said, rubbing a thoughtful hand along his stubbled jaw. “We could maintain equipment and manufacture some components for in-system work. We traded rare foodstuffs and organic molecules for what little else we needed. Traders came perhaps once in a generation. The latest only last—”