Trevon Herald
20th Aug 2219
‘Instant Space Travel Confirmed!
Lynthax: ‘We Have Achieved the Impossible.’
President Totelage: ‘We are about to embark on a great journey. … This is a renaissance for mankind.’
‘In a major turnaround for the Lynthax Corporation, the company has finally admitted to achieving instant space travel. In a press release issued by the White House, the President has since announced that a major demonstration of the new wormhole technology will take place this evening on the lawns of the White House.
‘Meanwhile doubts remain as to what will be the Asian Bloc reaction…’
It was dark in the hangar. Scat must have gone there to check his programme for the following day. He couldn’t think of any other reason why he would find himself there at that time of night. The place was empty. Only lights spilling from the cabin onto the grey hangar floor below gave any indication that the Pathfinders worked around the clock. He looked around. There was no one about the place.
He walked across the hangar and saw a helmet on the ground a few feet away from the bottom stair. It was lying discarded, the neck ring facing up. He could see it was still rolling slightly on its dome. Scat asked himself why it would still be rolling if there were no one around. It would have lain still by now.
He took hold of the railing and started up the steps, looking back at the helmet, silently questioning its meaning. Then the cabin door at the top of the stairs swung open and stayed open, refusing to swing back on its retaining arm. He stopped, ready to give way to whoever was about to leave the cabin. The stairway became narrower as he waited.
No one emerged.
He continued up the stairs, craning his neck to get an early glimpse of whoever it was inside. The windows were no longer transparent. They only emitted a yellow light, no images.
Finally, he stepped into the cabin. It was dark again; no lights were on. He looked through the cabin window and back down to the hangar floor. He could see his shadow inside the shape of the cabin window as it hit the floor—light memories from an instant ago. Now the cabin lights were moving away from him, crawling across the floor.
‘Hello!’ he said. ‘Anyone at home?’
A monitor flickered to life and then held steady. Scat turned to look at it. A man was sitting at the desk, watching the monitor, his back to the door.
‘Evening,’ Scat said in greeting.
The man swivelled around. He was now fully facing Scat, hands on each armrest. Scat thought his head looked a little weird. He took a step forward to get a closer look in the dim light.
It was a ball, not a head. He stopped, stepped backwards towards the door, and then stopped again. The ball had started to spin. Slowly at first, then faster. It began to glow a dull orange; at first as a pinprick at the centre, then slowly expanding through a white cloud until the whole ball was alive, radiating energy. The orange grew brighter and brighter until it lit up the entire room.
Scat thought he saw himself, looking back through the orange glow. His mouth dropped, his eyes grew wider. He froze in mid-step, gazing at the sphere. He screamed and then he yelled, telling himself to turn and walk away. But neither of him heard.
Scat awoke as he usually did, bathed in sweat. The dreams were getting worse; it was as if he were living every day on the edge.
He had no idea if ISRA had caught the message to Nettles, and what they might be doing with it if they had. Nor could he be sure that Lynthax hadn’t detected the steg programme on his ID. The combination of a lack of sleep and general uncertainty was wearing him down.
Still he had to play along.
Petroff had called yet another meeting for early this morning. It was a planning session aimed at working through the practical issues of mass emigration. There had been several of such meetings over the past few months during which they brainstormed the services and materials needed by the first batch of immigrants.
Scat liked these meetings; the end game seemed a decent one. However, he had wondered out aloud why he was included: he wasn’t an economist or behavioural scientist.
Lombardi had heard him and had been characteristically blunt in his reply. He was there as part of a wider agreement with the politicos; he was their token Man of the People: it helped to hear his views, but he was to be mindful of his station in life.
Scat looked at his watch and realised the meeting was due to start in less than 10 minutes. As it was to be held in the main conference room, and it would take that long just to get there, so he would make do with a splash-and-dash and hope the deodorant worked. Nor was there time for breakfast but at least he could take a coffee with him.
He arrived late, but he hadn’t missed anything. As usual, the conference room was in darkness, with Petroff at the main media station bathed in light. The man was flicking through his notes, referring to the neuralnet, and adjusting his presentation. He looked stressed. Lynthax execs and senior lab rats stood in groups along the curved and banked seating, chatting. Ratti noticed Scat arrive and walked across to meet him.
‘Morning, Scat. There’s a delay. Petroff’s busy downloading a series of updates from Head Office. How’re the heebie-jeebies coming along?’
Scat ignored his question.
‘What’s up?’ he asked.
Ratti looked back up at Petroff.
‘There’s been a hiccup. ISRA knows about the wormholes, or some of them. I can’t say any more than that, not without clearance. Maybe Petroff will fill you in.’
Petroff started to talk over the microphone without looking up, his head still buried inside of his briefing notes.
‘OK, gentlemen. We don’t have a lot of time, and we’ve got a lot to cover off,’ he said, still lost in thought. ‘Right, ISRA is pissed with us—it knows we have some wormholes. I understand we were outed by one of the NARRies, or at least by an ISRA agent pretending to be one.’
He looked up, very briefly, and then back down again.
‘So what does this mean? Well, on the PR front we’re to lay on a wormhole demo for the US President. That’ll happen later this afternoon. On the political front, the Western Bloc gets to lease a few more holes to help them stay ahead of the Asians. Apparently, they’re becoming decidedly hostile.
‘On the flip side, we’re as certain as we can be that ISRA still doesn’t know how many holes we have, or how advanced the programme is. As for the Western Bloc wormholes, well, they’ll be owner-operated, just as before, so we won’t be giving up any technical specs. And in return for them, the Western Bloc has promised to run interference for us at ISRA: they’ll block any attempt by the Authority to apply sanctions.’
There was some murmuring as his audience caught up with him, but Petroff carried on.
‘From what I can make of it, it’s a set back, but not a disaster. It just means we’ve got to go public with some aspects of the programme, and be more careful in hiding the bits they still don’t know about.’
‘Oh, and yes, ISRA will be sending a mission to watch over our NARRies just as soon as we can agree dates.’
Petroff paused to sip water from a small blue bottle. This time he took a long look around the audience, to gauge its reaction to the news. He then noticed Scat and froze in mid-gulp. There was a hint of embarrassment.
‘OK, gentlemen: that was the overview. The remainder of the briefing is for grade-two staff and above. Everyone else will need to leave. You’ll receive a “need to know” briefing afterwards, if it’s appropriate to your work.’
Several senior lab rats got up and left the room. Scat followed them out at a leisurely pace.
As he cleared the first corner in the corridor, he burst into a fast walk.
132
Even before he could clear the doorway to his bunk, Scat was giving up the bad news.
‘Birdie, we’re in trouble!’
Goosen looked up from his e-reader.
‘We always are, Scat.’
Scat went immediately to his bed and sat down.
‘Well more than usual then,’ he said. ‘The Authority got the hint. It picked up our message. It then leaned on Lynthax. They’ve found out much more than we thought they would, and in quicker time. Nettles or Reggie must have been open with them.’
‘But that was the idea, wasn’t it?’
‘Of course it was, but we were hoping they’d be discreet about it.’
Scat then told him how Lynthax had recruited the Western Bloc to blunt ISRA’s attempts to bring it to heel.
‘Which means we’re buggered,’ he added, getting up to pace around the room, still trying to work through the consequences of what he had heard.
‘How so?’ Goosen asked, not quite sure why ISRA would be any less interested in the rebels than they were in the NARRies.
‘Because, Birdie, the Western Bloc still wants blood and Lynthax needs the Western Bloc to keep the Authority off their backs. They’ll deal us into the pot, I’m sure of it. Hell, Lynthax has just handed over more of its precious wormholes.’
‘That’s a negative view of things, Scat. What makes you think we’re to be offered up?’
Scat screwed up his face.
‘Ah, Petroff threw me out of the meeting when he realised I was there. He tried to cover his tracks, but he had already farked up. I reckon we weren’t to know. He probably meant to keep us in the dark. He’ll be kicking himself.’
‘And you suspect we’re to be handed over?’
‘Yes. We’re no longer needed.’
Goosen saw something else:
‘Which means us saying goodbye to independence, as well. Why would they meet their end of the bargain now?’
‘Oh, fark! Who on Earth can you rely on to do the right thing?’
‘No one, Scat. That’s why we’re rebels. It’s why we wanted our independence, remember?’
‘You’d better get the guys together. We can’t be handed over without a fight. Somehow we gotta fire this rebellion up again.’
Goosen didn’t get a chance to fetch anyone. As he opened the door to leave, he stepped into a five-man security detail just as it was preparing for a hard entry. He stepped backwards with his hands in the air.
The squad leader stepped through the doorway, holding two neural disrupter bands in one hand and a Pulsed Impulsive Kill Laser in the other.
‘Put these on, gents, and please, no heroics: as you know, there’s nowhere for you to go.’
The guards led them down the corridor, back into the hangar and then into the adjoining building where they had spent their first night locked up in the pens. Workers were ripping up the carpet tiles and pushing the furniture to one side. Several pens were already open, the grills pulled back on their hinges. The guard commander walked them across to one.
‘Inside, gents. Your friends are waiting.’
133
Petroff had Scat brought to the hangar a little later that afternoon, shortly before he was due to oversee the White House wormhole demonstration.
‘Take a seat,’ he said, smiling at something he was gazing at on the neuralnet. ‘You can relax. You’re not being handed over to the Western Bloc. We’re handing you over to ISRA. They’ll be visiting soon—although we don’t have a date yet: they’re still negotiating.’
‘Who is?’
‘The Western Bloc and ISRA. We were fortunate. ISRA wanted to close us down; to kill our leases and take over the programme, but the Western Bloc wasn’t so happy—it would have given the Asian Bloc access to wormhole technology.
‘So, we did a deal. In return for a few more holes, the Western Bloc agreed to block them, though they still couldn’t stop ISRA whinging on about their right of access to the NARRies.’
Petroff sounded a little unhappy about that, but he shrugged it off.
‘So we’re to let the bastards establish their missions on these planets we’re opening, and hand you lot over into their custody.’ It sounded as though he thought it a mighty strange thing to have to do.
‘Sounds complicated, sir.’
‘Believe me, it is. ISRA is acting as if it’s got a water melon stuck up its arse, and the Asian Bloc is one temper short of a tantrum, but we expect the Western Bloc to shield us from both. Now that we’ve agreed to augment their intelligence and military capabilities with a few more holes we should be able to continue almost as we were, but …’
‘But?’
‘But our priorities have got to change. Until we can replace you lot with legal labour, the Pathfinder phase has to end. We’ve been “outed”, so, in order to protect the remainder of the project, we’ve to be seen to use our technology more “productively”. That means we have to move on to the emigration and resource delivery stages a little earlier than we would have liked. But what the heck, eh? It’s a small sacrifice. At least we’re still dictating the terms of migration.’
Scat understood what that meant.
‘So we’re out of a job?’
‘Being locked up and under ISRA’s supervision will mean the same thing, Scat.’
‘I guess it will. And our independence?’
‘A dream, still, Scat. The Western Bloc insists on it. Reneging on independence is another condition of their support.’
Perhaps Lynthax wasn’t making the sacrifice after all: the New Worlds were.
‘So, it was all for nothing?’
‘Yes,’ Petroff replied, feigning surprise. ‘I guess it was. But be grateful, Scat. At least you come out of it with your heads. The Western Bloc still wants to get its hands on you.’ With his fist, he made an upward, yanking motion beside his own head. He stuck out his tongue. The implication was obvious: were the Western Bloc to get its way, the rebels would be hanging by their necks from the streetlights along the airport perimeter.
‘Well, I guess we should be grateful to ISRA for that, eh?’ Scat observed.
‘Yes. You can be grateful. Anyway, the deals have been done. You’re protected from the Western Bloc, we’re protected from ISRA and the Western Bloc gets wormhole protection from the Asian Bloc. It’s complicated, and it’s messy, but beggars can’t be choosers—to my mind we’ve entered into a Devil’s pact.’
‘Funny that, Mr Petroff. I’m sure ISRA will be saying the same thing about this NARRie agreement they have with you.’
Petroff heard the barb and let it go.
134
Scat heard pen grills opening and closing throughout the night as Pathfinders returned to Runnymede from their various missions. A number of them were unexpectedly wormed in from the now numerous, newer base planets that Lynthax had established with their extra wormhole constructs. The rounding up of the remaining Pathfinders continued into the next day, and the following night, until it appeared the round up was complete.
This time, though, there was to be no briefing to satisfy their curiosity. All they learned was what Scat managed to pass on to them as they arrived. The result was the same: dismay, despair, disappointment, followed by anger. Discipline broke down, tempers flared. Guards used neural disrupters to quieten the louder protests and to remind the Pathfinders, that once again, they were prisoners, defeated rebels, and that Lynthax was their jailer.
Scat held most of the Chapter together, but Khan was inconsolable.
He remembered his son, Farrin, his complaint of unlawful death against Lynthax, his unfair dismissal and the family’s eviction from his diplomatic residence. He recalled seeing his wife and daughter for the last time, over eight years ago, just before Scat dropped them off on Trevon where Reggie took them in. He remembered Scat asking him to suck it up and to play his part until they had gained their independence. And now that sacrifice was for nothing.
Khan cursed the guards in his God’s name, invoking all manner of condemnation on them. They didn’t understand any of it and passed his curses off as the ranting of a superstitious fool. In a matter of days, he fell into himself. It was all Goosen could do to make him eat.
The
others were just seriously pissed.
On the seventh day, a handful of NARRies joined them. Picton was one of them, although Scat was unaware of his arrival.
They ate their meals in their pens. They completed their ablutions in their pens. They exercised in their pens.
Until the 14th day.
From then on, and in small groups, they left the pens to walk around a small outdoor courtyard for an hour at a time. The groups began to get bigger, the excursions longer. Kahn eventually joined them, his pale face looking up at the sun, his hands held out in prayer.
On the 23rd day, Scat found Picton sitting with his back against the courtyard wall. They didn’t acknowledge each other. Picton was grateful.
A few days later, the courtyard was equipped with some exercise gear and a few games boards. The guards then laid out a media station under a tent that ran alongside the walkway between the pens and the hangar. Sitting inside the tent, Scat could just about see through the rad-hardened glass and into the hangar. Flashing red lights told him a wormhole was still in use inside the chamber.
On the 34th day, the guards turned on the TV and encouraged everyone to watch the news. It was announcing the first mass migration of humans from planet Earth. Four hundred or more ex-Pathfinders and ex-rebels gathered under the tent and along its sides to watch.
It began with a consignment of wheat arriving in India. It was newsworthy because the wheat was coming from Boston, an agricultural planet, some 12000-plus light years from Earth. It listed the 270 planets in the Milky Way that Lynthax had identified as being potentially hospitable to man; it mentioned the 18 or so planets that they had proven habitable; and then it focused on the two that were being developed with the basic infrastructure needed to receive their immigrants from Earth. Missing was the detail. It was light on the hard data. There was no mention of the total number of investment dollars deployed, the numbers of scientists employed, or even the space co-ordinates of the habitable planets.
So they’re still holding back, Scat thought: the numbers were at least five times those being reported.
After the break, the news moved onto the main event, live from Mexico City. 100,000 people were queuing up inside the Olympic Stadium to step through a now idle wormhole and onto the planet Concord, an incredible 14560 light years away. In realtor terms, today was an “open house”: it was a chance for potential emigrants to view their intended new home and then to confirm their willingness to settle permanently.