The adjustments left him weak and irritable, as if he was recovering from a bout of flu. He consoled himself with the mission’s success. It had cost them another hundred thousand dollars, but Rachael Lancier had cooperated enthusiastically. Over the last ten days of the mission, every car leaving the dealership compound had been carrying a part of the order. They’d been dropped off all over town at buildings he’d paid her to rent. Rachael’s workers had parcelled them up in the crates he’d shipped in months before. The entire list was on its way to Far Away via a multitude of circuitous routes. They’d arrive over the next few months.
His only regret was not being able to see Paula Myo’s face as the extent of the deception became apparent. That would almost be worth the feel of restraints clasping his wrists.
Seventeen days after the fateful night, Adam dressed himself in a loose-fitting sweatshirt and trousers, and left the A+A. A twenty-minute taxi ride took him to the CST planetary station. He wandered through the concourse without setting off any alarms. Content with that, he caught the express train to LA Galactic.
3
Few people outside government circles had ever heard of the Commonwealth ExoProtectorate Council. It had been formed in the early days of the Intersolar Commonwealth, one of those contingency groups beloved of bureaucrats. Back then, people were still justifiably worried about encountering hostile aliens as CST wormholes were continually opened on new planets further and further away from Earth. It was the Commonwealth ExoProtectorate Council which had the task of reviewing each sentient alien species discovered by CST, and evaluating the threat-level it posed to human society. Given the potential seriousness should the worst-case scenario ever happen, its members were all extremely powerful in political terms. However, since the probability that such an encounter would ever occur was extremely low, the Council members invariably delegated the duty to staff members. In this diluted form, the Council continued to meet on a regular annual basis. Every year it solemnly confirmed the galactic status quo. Every year, its delegates went off and had a decent lunch on expenses. As the Commonwealth was discovering, sentient aliens were a rare commodity in this section of the galaxy.
Now though, the Dyson Alpha event had changed everything. Nigel Sheldon couldn’t ever recall attending a Council meeting before, although he supposed he must have when both the Silfen and the High Angel had been discovered. Such recollections weren’t currently part of his memories. He’d obviously retired them to secure storage several rejuvenations ago.
His lack of direct recall experience had been capably rectified by the briefings his staff had given him on the trip from Cressat, where he and the rest of the senior Sheldon family members lived. CST had routed his private train directly through Augusta to the New York CST station in Newark; from there it was a quick journey over to Grand Central.
He always enjoyed Manhattan in the spring when the snow had gone and the trees were starting to put out fresh leaves, a vibrant green which no artist ever quite managed to capture. A convoy of limousines had been waiting at Grand Central station to drive him and his entourage the short distance to the Commonwealth Exploration and Development Office on Fifth Avenue. The skyscraper was over a hundred and fifty years old, and at two hundred and seventy-eight storeys no longer the highest on the ancient metropolis island, but still close.
He’d arrived early, ahead of the other Council members. The anxious regular staff had shown him and his entourage into the main conference room on the two hundred and twenty-fifth floor. They weren’t used to such high-powered delegations, and it showed in their hectic preparations to have everything in the room just perfect for when the meeting started. So he waved away their queries, and told them to get on with it, he’d just wait quietly for the other members to turn up. At which point his entourage closed smoothly and protectively around him.
From the conference room, he could just see over the neighbouring buildings to Central Park. The patina of terrestrial-green life was reassuringly bright under the afternoon sun. There were almost no alien trees in the park these days. For the last eight decades, Earth’s native species protection laws had been enforced with increasing severity by the Environment Commissioners of the Unified Federal Nations. Although he could just see the brilliant ma-hon tree glimmering dominantly at the centre of the park, every spiral leaf reflecting prismatic light from its polished-silver surface. It had been there for over three hundred years now, one of only eight ever to be successfully transferred from their strange native planet. For the last hundred years it had been reclassified as a city monument. A concept which Nigel rather enjoyed. When New Yorkers were determined about something, not even the UFN environmental bloc could shift them, and there was no way they were going to give up their precious, unique ma-hon.
Nigel’s chief executive aide, Daniel Alster, brought him a coffee which he drank as he looked out over the city. In his mind he tried to sketch in the other changes he’d seen to the skyline over the centuries. Manhattan’s buildings looked a lot more slender now, though that was mainly because they were so much taller. There was also a trend towards architecture with a more elaborate or artistic profile. Sometimes it worked splendidly, as with the contemporary crystal Gothic of the Stoet Building; or else it looked downright mundane like the twisting Illeva. He didn’t actually mind the failures too much, at least they meant the whole place was different, unlike most of the flat urban sprawls out on the settled worlds.
Rafael Columbia, the chief of the Intersolar Serious Crimes Directorate, was the second Council member to arrive. Nigel knew of him, of course, although the two had never met in the flesh before.
‘Pleasure to meet you at last,’ Nigel said as they shook hands. ‘Your name keeps cropping up on reports from our security division.’
Rafael Columbia chuckled. ‘In a good context, I trust?’ He was just over two hundred years old, with a physical appearance in his late fifties. In contrast to Nigel, who rejuvenated every fifteen years, Rafael Columbia considered that a more mature appearance was essential for his position. His apparent age gave him broad shoulders and a barrel torso which needed a lot of exercise to keep in shape. Thick silver hair was cut short and stylish, accentuating the slightly sour expression which was fixed on his flat face. Bushy eyebrows and bright grey-green eyes marked him down as a Halgarth family member. Without that connection he would never have qualified for his current job within the Commonwealth administration. The Halgarths had founded EdenBurg, one of the Big15 industrial planets, turning them into a major Intersolar Dynasty, which gave them almost as much influence as Nigel’s family inside the Commonwealth.
‘Oh yes,’ Nigel said. ‘Major crime incidents seem to be down lately, certainly those against CST anyway. Thank you for that.’
‘I do what I can,’ Rafael said. ‘It’s these New Nationalist groups that keep springing up to harass planetary governments that are the main source of trouble; the more we frustrate them, the more aggressive their core supporters become. If we’re not careful, we’re going to see a nasty wave of anti-Commonwealth terrorist assaults again, just like two twenty-two.’
‘You really think it will come to that?’
‘I hope not. Internal Diplomacy believes these current groups simply claim political status as a justification for their activities; they’re actually more criminal-based than anything else. If so, they should run a natural cycle and die out.’
‘Thank Christ for that. I don’t want to withdraw gateways from any more planets, there are enough isolated worlds as it is. I thought the only planet left with any real trouble was Far Away. And it’s not as if that can ever be cured.’
Rafael Columbia nodded gravely. ‘I believe that in time even Far Away can be civilized. When CST begins opening phase four space it will become fully incorporated into the Commonwealth.’
‘I’m sure you’re right,’ Nigel said doubtfully. ‘But it’s going to be a long while before we start thinking about phase four.’
The Common
wealth Vice President, Elaine Doi, walked into the conference room, talking to Thompson Burnelli, the Commonwealth senator who chaired the science commission. Their respective aides trailed along behind, murmuring quietly amongst themselves. Elaine Doi greeted Nigel with polite neutrality, careful to maintain her professionalism. He returned the compliment, keeping an impassive face. She was a career politician and had devoted a hundred and eighty years to clawing her way up to her present position. Even her rejuvenations were geared around promoting herself; her skin had progressively deepened its shading until it was the darkest ebony, to emphasize her ethnicity. Over the same period, her face had actually abandoned her more attractive feminine traits in favour of a handsome, sterner appearance. Nigel had to deal with her kind of politician on a near-constant basis, and he despised every one of them. In his distant idealistic youth, when he’d built the first wormhole generator, he had dreamed of leaving them all behind on Earth, allowing the new planets to develop in complete freedom, becoming havens of personal liberty. These days he accepted their dominance of all human government as the price of a civilized society – after all, someone had to maintain order. But that didn’t mean he had to like their eternal self-serving narcissistic behaviour. And he considered Doi to be one of the more reprehensible specimens, always ready to advance herself at the cost of others. With the next Presidential selection due in three years’ time, she had begun the final stage of her century-long campaign. His support would ensure she reached the Presidential Palace on New Rio. As yet he hadn’t given it.
Thompson Burnelli was less effusive, a straight-talking man who was North America’s UFN delegate in the Commonwealth Senate, and as such the representative of a huge conglomeration of old and powerful interests made up from some of the wealthiest Grand Families on the planet. He looked the part, a handsome man, wearing an expensive grey silk suit, so obviously a former Ivy League college athlete. His air of confidence was never something that could be acquired through memory implants and bioneural tweaking; it was only available through breeding, and he was very definitely one of Earth’s premier aristocracy. Nigel had hated that kind of rich-kid arrogance while he was at college – as much as he did the politicians. But given a choice, he would prefer to deal with Burnelli’s kind any day.
‘Nigel, this must be somewhat galling for you, I imagine,’ Thompson Burnelli said with amusement shading close to mockery.
‘How so?’ Nigel asked.
‘An alien contact that your exploratory division had nothing to do with. Some fifth-rate academic astronomer makes the most profound discovery in the last two hundred years, and his only piece of equipment is an equally decrepit telescope that you could probably pick up for a thousand bucks in any junk shop. How much does CST spend on astronomy every year?’
‘Couple of billion at the last count,’ Nigel replied wearily. He had to admit, the senator had a point. And he wasn’t the only one making it. The unisphere media had adopted a kind of gleeful sarcasm towards CST since Dudley Bose announced his discovery.
‘Never mind,’ Thompson Burnelli said cheerfully. ‘Better luck next time, eh?’
‘Thank you. How did your continent’s team do in the Cup?’
The senator frowned. ‘Oh, you mean the soccer thing? I’m not sure.’
‘Lost, didn’t they? Still, it was only the first round of eight, I don’t suppose you suffer quite so much getting knocked out at the bottom. Better luck next time.’ Nigel produced a thin smile as the senator turned away to greet Rafael Columbia.
More Council members were arriving, and Nigel busied himself welcoming them; at least they could swap football small talk. Crispin Goldreich, the senator chairing the Commonwealth Budgetary Commission; Brewster Kumar, the President’s science adviser; Gabrielle Else, the director of the Commonwealth Industry and Trade Commission; Senator Lee Ki, director of the phase two space economic policy board, and Eugene Cinzoul, Chief Attorney at the Commonwealth Law Commission.
Elaine Doi raised her voice above the burble of conversation. ‘I believe we can call this meeting to order now,’ she said.
People looked around, and nodded their agreement. They all started hunting for their respective seats. Nigel gave the one empty chair a pointed glance, and sat to the left of the Vice President who was chairing the meeting. According to protocol, he was the ExoProtectorate Council’s deputy chair. Aides began to settle behind their chiefs.
The Vice President turned to her chief of staff, Patricia Kantil. ‘Could you ask the SI to come on line, please.’
That was when Ozzie Fernandez Isaacs chose to make his entrance. Nigel quashed the smile that was forming on his lips; everyone else around the table looked so surprised. They should have known better. Back when Nigel and Ozzie assembled the math which made wormhole generators possible, he’d been a genuine eccentric; moments of pure genius partied with surfer-boy dumbness to claim the dominant personality trait throughout his undergrad years. A time which Nigel had spent alternately worrying himself sick about the days Ozzie spent out of his skull, and shaking his head in awe as his friend cracked the problems which he’d considered unsolvable. They’d made a great team, good enough to compress space so Nigel could step out on Mars to watch the NASA spaceplane landing. After that, taming the beast they’d created was always Nigel’s job, transforming that temperamental prototype pile of high-energy physics equipment into the ultimate transport method, and in doing so fashioning the largest single corporation the human race had ever known. Management and finance and political influence were of no interest to Ozzie. He just wanted to get out there and see what wonders the galaxy held.
It was the time spent in between his forays out amid the virgin stars that made him a legend; the wildman of the Commonwealth, the ultimate alternative lifestyle guru. The girls, the old vices, and the brave new narcotic stimulants, chemical and bioneural, which he pioneered; Ozzieworld, the H-congruous planet he was supposed to live on all by himself in a palace the size of a city; decades spent as a tramp-poet worldwalking to witness the new planet cultures forming from the bottom end of society; the hundreds of naturally conceived children; outré rejuvenations so he could spend years in animal bodies – a lion, an eagle, a dolphin, a Karruk nobear; the attempted dinosaur DNA synthesis project which cost billions before it was hijacked by the Barsoomians; he owned a secret network of wormholes linking the Commonwealth planets which only he could use; his thought routines taken as the basis of the SI. Everywhere you went in the Commonwealth, the locals would tell of the time when Ozzie passed through (an unknown in disguise at the time of course) and enriched their ancestors’ lives by some feat or other: organizing a bridge to be built over a treacherous river, rushing a sick child to hospital through a storm, being the first to climb the tallest mountain on the planet, slaying – in single combat – the local crime boss. Turning water into wine, too, if the tabloid side of the unisphere was to be believed, Nigel thought. After all, Ozzie was certainly an expert on the opposite process.
‘Sorry I’m late, man,’ Ozzie said. He gave the Vice President a friendly wave as he walked over to the last empty chair. As he passed behind Nigel, he patted him on the shoulder. ‘Good to see you, Nige, it’s been a while.’
‘Hi, Ozzie,’ Nigel said casually, refusing to be out-cooled. It had actually been seventeen years since they’d last seen each other in the flesh.
Ozzie finally made it to his chair and sprawled in it with a happy sigh. ‘Anyone got some coffee, I’ve got a bitch of a hangover.’
Nigel gave a quick flick of his finger, and Daniel Alster had a cup taken over. Several Council members were struggling to keep their disapproval from showing at the legend’s disrespectful attitude. Which was, as Nigel well knew, what Ozzie was hoping for. There were times when he considered Ozzie having a rejuvenation to be singularly pointless; the man could be extraordinarily juvenile without any help from the popping hormones of an adolescent body. But the acceptance and adoration he was granted by the Commonwealth at lar
ge must have made that same young Afro-Latino kid finally feel content. Even in the politically correct twenty-first century those two cultures never mixed, not out on the San Diego streets where he came from. Ozzie had gotten the last laugh there.
‘Are you here in an official capacity, Mr Isaacs?’ Crispin Goldreich asked, in a very upper-class English accent, which simply reeked of censure.
‘Sure am, man, I’m the CST rep for this gig.’ In his casual lime-green shirt and creased ochre climbing trousers he looked hugely out of place around that table of masterclass power brokers. It didn’t help that he still had his big Afro hairstyle; in over three centuries of arguing, pleading, and downright mockery Nigel had never persuaded him to get it cut. It was the one human fashion which had never, ever, come around again. But Ozzie lived in hope.
‘Don’t look at me,’ Nigel said. ‘I’m the operations side of CST; Ozzie is the technical adviser to this Council.’
Ozzie gave Crispin Goldreich a broad grin, and winked.
‘Very well,’ Elaine Doi said. ‘If we could proceed.’
The large wall-mounted portal overlooking the table bub-bled into life with tangerine and turquoise lines scudding backwards into a central vanishing point, looking like some antique screen-saver pattern. ‘Good afternoon ladies and gentle-men,’ the Sentient Intelligence said smoothly. ‘We are happy to be in attendance at what will surely be an historic meeting.’