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The planet Dianis, IDB Central Station
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IDB personnel congregated at the entrance to the ops-mission gallery. Many of the three hundred staff were there. Some, from Ready Reaction, Civilization Monitoring, and others were dressed like Achelous, still wearing their in-country garb. Voices rose as acquaintances were renewed, and the gathering funneled through the doors for the director’s briefing. For many of the IDB staffers, the rare all-hands meetings were the few times they saw one another.
“Atch.” A soft touch plucked at his elbow. “Still pounding ground?”
Achelous turned. Gail Manner, chief of Solar Surveillance, smiled at him. It was the first time he’d seen her in person since the last all-hands meeting, though they often spoke via A-wave. He noticed that she’d cut her hair to just above the shoulder, but her eyebrows, finely shaped nose, high cheekbones, and green eyes were still as timeless as the first day they met. “Hello, Gail.” He reached an arm around her waist and kissed her on the cheek.
“Hey, you two, are you licensed to have children?” Ivan Darinarishcan from Ready Reaction stood behind them. “Clear the door, and I'll ignore this obvious infraction.”
Gail made a face at him, and Ivan grinned mischievously as he said, “Old loves never die, eh?”
Achelous smirked. “You just wish you had friends in high places.” Gail smiled at the reference to her headquarters on Dianis’s moon.
“Yeah?” Ivan said as he found a seat in the gallery. “The only friends you need are the ones that wear these.” He pointed to the Ready Reaction Force emblem on the shoulder of his fatigues. Twice in the past year, Ivan and his team had gone in-country to back up Achelous when things looked dicey. On both occasions, the sudden appearance of reaction force personnel had averted bloodshed.
“So, how’s Marisa?” Gail whispered into his ear.
Achelous turned back to her. “Doing well. Feisty as ever. Still can’t believe I traded in a beautiful galactic for a provincial princess.” With Gail in charge of all the optical and aural surveillance equipment orbiting Dianis, it was hard to keep a secret from her. And what woman wasn’t curious about who her ex was involved with? The fact that Marisa was an indigenous native on a ULUP Class E planet hadn’t fazed Gail. She was human like Achelous and knew that neural conditioning, IDB policy, and ULUP regulations could only go so far in curbing passion.
“Well, if you hadn’t been smitten by the native women, we might have lasted longer.” She gave him a teasing smile.
Achelous could never forget those lips, and he was tempted to kiss them, but the director began making noises from the podium. “Let’s take our seats, people; we've business to attend to.” As they sat down, Achelous reflected for the thousandth time how things might have been had Gail not been stationed out-system for three years. By the time she returned to Dianis, their nuptial contract had expired. Neither person had solicited to renew it, both waiting for what they found when they were back together. But by then, the fire had waned, stressed by careers and dampened by the war, but their friendship had grown. In the three years Gail had been gone, Achelous had not pursued another woman, and Gail knew it. It wasn’t until after they mutually agreed on lapsing the contract had Achelous fallen for Marisa.
Clienen Hor, the director of IDB Margel Damansk, brought the meeting to order. Balding, trim of build, crisp in his IDB khakis, Clienen waited until his staff was quiet, his gaze serious but open. Spread around the walls of the gallery were the video screens that connected remote IDB staff based on space stations or other planets in the Margel Damansk quadrant. After wading through some administrivia, the director came to the point of the meeting. “I’m sure you have all heard different rumors. No point in commenting on them as I'm here to inform you of what is official. At the request of the government of the planet Looar Sonreit, the federation has decided to shut down the Margel Damansk transportation arm.”
A murmur circled the room, some heads nodding as if they expected this. The Margel Damansk arm bridged fourteen solar systems and covered six thousand light years along its main axis. It afforded access to the heavy metals in the great Margel Damansk asteroid belt. Exploration of the inhabitable planets along the route had been a bonus.
“There is concern from Looar Sonreit that the arm’s exposed location makes it an inviting target for the Turboii and their minions. The fear, rational or not, is that the Turboii might try an end run and sweep this way.”
Another low murmur traveled around the room; this time, more heads were shaking than nodding. Avaria and its allies were in a death-grip war with the Turboii. Only in the past year had the Avarian Federation finally developed a strategy to halt the advance of the Turboii through federation space. An unpredictable war of strike and counterstrike now prevailed, which was far better than the previous wholesale loss of eighty-four billion humans -human lives harvested as food for the Turboii and their minion armies. A hand went up in the audience. The director acknowledged it. “Yes?”
“We are nine thousand light years away from the nearest Turboii incursion,” the speaker said. “If they wanted to attack the Margel, if they even know where we are, their shift technology is archaic. Their generators are wholly inefficient. We know that. Trying to reach here would be like sailing across an ocean in a bathtub. They’re not bringing an army.”
The director’s nod was ever so slight. “Right. I’m not here to debate Galactic Command risk assessments. Perhaps they would be interested in your opinion?” He paused to let his point sink in. “This is what I’m being told, and I am just passing it on to you. Furthermore,” he took a breath, “there is the threat that if the Turboii found the Margel transportation arm functioning, they would somehow be able to infiltrate the transportation network and use it to shift their armies straight to Looar Sonreit, effectively bypassing all of our defenses.” In support of his point, the director posted a well-known system diagram of the Margel Damansk transportation arm on the holographic display pedestals distributed around the auditorium. The 3-D graphic showed a large Y-shaped transit system replete with planetary nodes, field-generator stations, and commercial-access zones. The planet of Looar Sonreit sat at the very foot of the Y, serving as the gateway to the arm, with Dianis situated at the crucial juncture of the Y. Fourteen solar systems dotted the six-thousand-light-year length of the network. An amorphous cloud hovered at the top of the Y—the immense, commercially exploitable Margel Damansk asteroid cloud.
The noise in the chamber rose, and an edge crept into it. More hands shot up, and multiple conversation icons were flashing on the video panels. One person burst out, “And how are the Turboii going to do that? They would need the control codes to get in, and we can change the control codes instantaneously. They would need the codes and signatures for every transportation node they planned to use at transmit time.” The voice, belonging to the senior network security manager, became strident. “We already change signatures and codes hourly.”
The director’s frown deepened. He waited a full minute for the hubbub to subside. Finally, he met the undaunted gaze of the questioner. “As I said, these are the risks that have been expressed to me.” Before he could be interrupted again, he held up his hand and said, “Save your comments for the end and make them useful. I have the same reservations as you do. I took them up with Branch headquarters. They admitted they have some of the same issues as you, but I’m told the decision is now final and has been conveyed to Looar Sonreit.”
"Final?" The word rang out above the resulting commotion. “Crazy...”, “...work lost...”, “...extrasolars will run wild...”, and “...how did this happen so fast...” were snippets that reached the director.
He went on. “There were economic considerations as well. The Margel transportation arm has been losing money since the start. With only one mining conglomerate using the system to ship freight, the receipts have been low, and the Transportation Authority wants to close it. The system has also been a substantial burden on IDB resources, and this is a time of war. The IDB is stretched thin. With the war at a crossroads, we’ve been able to go back into some of the worlds we’ve freed. But for the IDB, it means evaluating, monitoring, and reconstituting more war-ravaged planets.”
Achelous turned to Gail, consternation brewing. She returned his expression with the same surprise. Sensing where the director was going, Achelous stood up. “Clienen,” he called out. “Since when has the Margel Damansk been a burden to the IDB? This is what we do. We’re not here because we’re forced to be here. We’re here because we need to be. These planets need our protection and monitoring. ULUP was enacted to prevent—”
“I know why ULUP was enacted, Atch,” Clienen responded. “And you are right, it was a poor choice of words, but that is the attitude of many in the government. There is a war on. IDB resources are scarce. We’ve been recently tasked to reconnoiter and assess three new worlds liberated from the Turboii. Those worlds are a mess. They need our help and assistance the same as Dianis.”
The reference to Dianis caught him off guard. Then Achelous waved his arm to take in the audience. “I think we all understand the grave situations those people and planets are in. But the risk to Dianis has not abated. Some might say the need here is greater because Dianis is following its own natural growth and hasn’t been decimated by the Turboii. Clienen, closing down the Margel arm is one thing, assuming the security threat is real, but what does that have to do with Dianis?”
“Unfortunately,” Clienen said, “with the closing of the transportation nodes, we will be drawing down Margel Damansk IDB resources as well. We will be closing Dianis station and curtailing all operations here. Most of you will be reassigned to new systems and worlds. Probably in assessment and recovery operations. It’s not official yet, but I’ve proposed the entire Margel IDB staff be reassigned to the Dominicus sector.”
The room erupted: people standing, shouting, staff on the remote monitors gesticulating, and people waving their hands to be heard. Achelous was stunned. It was worse than he expected, much worse. He leaned close to Gail to be heard over the noise. “I thought they might close the arm to commercial traffic. I knew there would be changes. But to shut down all operations, including Civilization Monitoring on Dianis is, is, just...irresponsible!”
She shook her head slowly. “They can’t mean solar recon, too?”
Achelous glanced to where the director was attempting to make some point while surrounded by IDB staff from at least three different departments. “I don’t know. I will talk to Clienen after the meeting.”
Gail nodded quickly. Achelous had been recruited for the Margel Damansk IDB director’s position but had turned the position down and had recommended Clienen. Achelous believed IDB should be in the field and any job at a holodesk was for administrators, not for field-ops staff. Knowing Achelous had a special motivation to stay on Dianis, Gail said, “I have some contacts I can call, too. The head of the Solar Surveillance data center will know what is going on; he is responsible for the allocation of surveillance assets outside of the arm.”
Achelous listened to the director’s attempts to calm the nerves of the IDB personnel. His reassuring words told them they all still had jobs, the transition out of the Margel would be made with the greatest consideration for the Dianis provincials, and that automated monitoring would be left in place.
But Achelous knew that leaving the planet physically unguarded, even with the sensor grid in auto, would expose the ignorant, unsophisticated population to the depredations of extrasolars.
Achelous felt Gail’s hand on his arm. “What are you going to do about Marisa and Boyd?”
“I don’t know,” he replied, the sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach so intense he felt a wave of vertigo. The sudden realization that his life faced a chasm of calamity overwhelmed him. He had long known that he could not continue his double life forever and that a choice would have to be made. Up to now, he planned to resign and go native. But now is too soon! I am not ready! He thought. He was sworn to protect indigenous populations from outside influence, and yet here he was, an outside influence living, loving, and having a child with a provincial. The ULUP penalties for consorting with an indigenous native were steep. Achelous attempted to reconcile his behavior by rationalizing that he was in no way subverting, advancing, or otherwise artificially affecting even the smallest part of Dianis society. To Marisa, Boyd, and even Eliot, he was just an Isuelt trader.
Achelous slouched deep into his chair. The cold reality was that he was living on borrowed time. Each sunrise with Marisa brought him one day closer to his time of reckoning. Then his mind leaped at the possibility of bringing Marisa and Boyd off-planet with him, and immediately his spirits rose. There were the practical issues of sneaking them off the planet and establishing their Avarian Federation citizenships, but he knew how to do that. He was an expert on the system’s strengths and weaknesses. They could start a new life on another world, perhaps even on his home world, even though he’d not lived there for almost thirty years. Reality, though, was something else. Achelous scowled; he was deluding himself.
“What?” asked Gail.
The crowd in the auditorium began to filter out while Achelous stared at the ceiling. The image of Marisa floated before him. She had built Marinda Merchants and her trading fleet into the largest trading enterprise in Tivor. “She’ll never leave,” he whispered.
Gail leaned closer. “What was that?”
Achelous groaned and turned to face her. “Marisa, her life is in Tivor. She’s like a flower blooming in the spring prairie, pushing through the last snow, a pioneer, the first to face challenges. Others look to her for leadership and inspiration. Marisa needs no invitation for an audience with the aorolmin, the ruler and Duke of Tivor. His hall is always open to her, and when she counsels, he listens.” It was, he reflected, one of the reasons he had made Tivor his base of operations. Tivor welcomed all traders regardless of race or creed as long as they were honest. No small part of that came from a culture fostered by Marisa. Miraculously, she had fallen in love with him, of all people, a man twenty years her senior, a man with no known past and a predilection for wandering and resistance to marriage. “Marisa will never leave Dianis. And even if she would, how can I ask it of her?"
Appalled at the notion of extracting a pair of provincials off-planet, Gail stammered, “Oh, and what would you tell her? Um, honey dearest, I’m really an IDB agent, which means Interspecies Development Branch. I’m from an advanced space-faring federation, and I’ve been reassigned to a new star system. Will you come with me? And, oh, by the way, no one must know you came from Dianis because it’s a Class E planet, and I’m not supposed to be sleeping with you because you are an indigin." Gail quickly glanced around to ensure no one was eavesdropping. She smiled cynically. “Yeah, right. Can I be around when you tell her? I’d pay to see it.”
The gloom around Achelous became palpable. Realizing she had hurt rather than helped, Gail softened her tone. “You’ll figure out what to do, and in time she’ll understand. Just ease her into it. If she gets mad, you'll just have to trust that her love can temper her anger.”
Achelous nodded, watching Ivan converse with Clienen. Those two friends of his would factor prominently in any plan he devised. First, he had to decide about Marisa. Explaining the situation to her had its perils, all of which were compounded by the plight of his son if the boy’s existence became known. The ULUP rules were clear. Boyd was, by birth, an extrasolar and subject to extradition. The deportation would happen in the night, conducted by a Ready Reaction team. The child removed from his bed with no alarm. His mother would find the bed empty in the morning and, to the end of her miserable days, would never know what became of him, destined to search and never find. The pain it would cause her— Achelous swore that under no situation would he allow that to happen.
