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Logan, Hood and Bishop jumped to attention as DeChastelaine entered the conference room. So that’s what he looks like when he’s in a good mood, thought Hood.
“Good morning, everyone,” said DeChastelaine as he moved towards the head of the oval table. The three admirals waited until he was seated before taking their own seats. “First of all, I take great pleasure in congratulating Fleet Group Admiral Logan on his brilliant handling of the entire Rift war and its successful conclusion. You have vindicated my faith in you, and I’m personally grateful. By the way, your temporary promotion to that rank is now a permanent promotion. I hope you concur with that action, Admiral Bishop?”
Bishop gave a small smile and said, “I do, My Emperor. Admiral Logan has certainly earned that promotion.”
“Glad to hear it. It’s so nice not to be at loggerheads with my Chief of Space Force Operations all the time. Once in a while is okay. That’s once in a long while, by the way.” Everyone, including DeChastelaine, laughed. The Emperor turned to Logan. “I’ve read your final report, more than once actually, but I’d like to hear what you didn’t put in it: impressions, personal observations, that kind of thing, plus anything else that you think I’d be interested in hearing. You can start with the negotiations with the Tollarians.”
“Of course, My Emperor. They didn’t start out as negotiations, but rather as an exchange of information. Once the Tollarian Fleet Commander realized his attempt to intimidate me had failed, he was pretty forthcoming. He confirmed my suspicion that the Tollarians who had not ascended to a higher level of consciousness needed time to get themselves organized into a functioning society again. I was surprised to hear that there are almost a billion fallen Tollarians. That’s the term they call themselves. Initially they were scattered across several hundred colonized worlds, with about ten percent on their homeworld. That works out to roughly 100 million, and that sounds like a lot, but it’s not if you realize that not all skills and abilities were represented proportionately in that number. For example, he told me that almost all their healers ascended. Some critical skills needed by a functioning society virtually disappeared altogether. And while their civilization was highly automated in terms of food production, those automated systems still needed supervision by technically trained administrators, and many of them had ascended as well. So for the first few months, the remaining Tollarians had to scramble to re-acquire the skills they lacked AND to rescue relatively small groups of fallen from colonies where there just weren’t enough people left to keep those colonies viable, no matter what they did. That kept the Tollarian Space Force, what was left of it, busy for months.
“What their Space Force didn’t realize at the time was that the Gorgons had captured a fallen ship commander who showed them how to operate his ship. I imagine it was under duress. With that one ship, the Gorgons travelled to the system where the Tollarians stored their obsolete but still functional military ships, and they quickly learned how to re-activate those ships. The Gorgons also learned about the Stargate. That was something that the Tollarians had literally just discovered a short while before the Ascension. The Gorgons decided that they would keep an eye on the Stargate while the bulk of their salvaged fleet was used to try to keep the fallen Tollarians off balance. What we initially encountered during the Rift exploration phase was the garrison force that the Gorgons had left to guard access to the Stargate from all directions. That force had standing orders to destroy any ship that threatened to discover the Stargate’s existence. Apparently, the Gorgon commander of that garrison force decided that he would use his orders as an excuse to cover himself with glory by attacking the Empire directly.
“The main Gorgon offensive against the Tollarians almost succeeded, but once the Tollarians gained the upper hand, they neutralized the Gorgon Space Force, learned about the ‘war’ with a race that called themselves Humans and organized a large fleet to send to the Stargate to take control of it. Based on the data about the Empire that the Gorgons had captured from the TD39 starbase, they made sure their fleet was large enough to prevail in any confrontation. The large debris field we detected after re-emergence from the ring was what was left of the two Gorgon fleets we detected before being sucked in the first time. I was shocked to learn how much more advanced technically the Tollarians are than us. I suspect that those 366 Tollarian warships could have taken on my entire Rift Fleet Group all at the same time with a better than even chance of wiping us out completely. When I very carefully asked the Tollarian Commander if the Tollarian Hegemony had any interest in expanding into our side of the Rift by force, he laughed and said his people would have their hands full for decades, maybe even longer, just regaining control of the territory they had prior to the Ascension. He went on to say that their culture is not aggressive by its nature and that they had plenty of room for growth on their side of the Rift.
“The one area of potential conflict with the Empire, which he was quite adamant about, was control of the Stargate. He made it VERY clear that the Stargate would remain under Tollarian control, and if the Empire wanted to challenge that, the Hegemony was prepared to go to war over it. I believe him. I don’t think he was bluffing this time, My Emperor. I did get him to agree in principle to the request that any attempts to explore the Stargate would include humans working with Tollarians. I strongly suspect that their insistence on retaining control over access to that device is a result of their fear that we impulsive humans, that’s the phrase he used, might somehow antagonize the race that built the Stargate if we were allowed to play with it however we wished. And after what I saw on the other side of that artificial wormhole, I’m inclined to agree that very careful joint exploration efforts is the least risky strategy. The object that we detected moving to intercept us on the other side, based upon visual data when it passed in front of the red super giant, was almost inconceivably large. Our best guess is that it would barely fit through the Stargate.
“When I described what we saw on the other side to the Tollarians, they were of the opinion that the object was some kind of automated sentry that was programmed to respond to any visitors but which would not follow visitors back through a Stargate. They also speculated that the red super giant star system, with its hundreds of Stargates, might be a central transit hub, or perhaps could be what we would call a flytrap: in other words, a way of monitoring the evolution of hundreds of species by capturing a few specimens of any that finds a Stargate and send explorers through it.” Logan stopped when DeChastelaine held up his hand.
“What a curious concept. The Transit Hub I can understand, but why would a race that advanced care about the progress of less developed races that might potentially evolve on the other side of the galaxy?”
Logan hesitated before speaking. “I asked that same question and the answer I got is, I have to admit, highly speculative and far fetched. Some of the Tollarians believe that the Stargate builders went around our galaxy genetically upgrading lifeforms that had the potential to develop intelligent life. The basis for this theory has to do with the fact that their homeworld and its moon have very peculiar mathematical relationships with each other and with their sun. Those relationships are so unlikely that they have to be the product of artificial engineering by an advanced race that wanted to see intelligent life develop on their homeworld.” Logan stopped to gauge the reaction among the others. Neither Bishop or the Emperor seemed to understand the implications of what he had just said, but Hood did. Her eyes opened wide with understanding.
“Just like Earth and its moon,” said Hood in a voice so low it was almost a whisper.
“Ah, yes, I remember reading something about the size ratios and orbital characteristics that seemed highly unlikely,” said DeChastelaine. “But I don’t believe the theory that our moon is an artificial construct ever got widespread acceptance among astronomers. How odd that the Tollarians would have a similar situation.”
“There’s actually an even bigger coincidence, My Emperor,” said Logan. “When my Fleet Astrogation Officer compared data with his Tollarian opposite number, they were stunned to find that the Tollarian homeworld and Earth are exactly the same distance away from the Stargate. The chances against that happening randomly are literally astronomical. It also confirmed in their minds that the Stargate builders tried to encourage intelligent life to develop on both planets. They would have positioned the Stargate precisely in the middle for convenience, in case they wanted to monitor both planets, and maybe as a signpost to let us know what they had done. As I said, it’s a highly speculative theory, but after seeing the data and observing hundreds of stargates, I’m inclined to view that theory as plausible. I can’t imagine the engineering challenges of building even one stargate, let alone hundreds. Any civilization that can do that could probably engineer a moon of the right size and in the right orbit if they really wanted to.”
DeChastelaine shook his head. “I grant you that the coincidences are stunning, but I still have trouble accepting that theory. We know our moon is billions of years old. How could a civilization that old have relics still in existence now, and how could they have known that far back in time that the Earth and the Tollarian homeworld would have the right conditions, temperature, water, biosphere, etc. in order for intelligent bipeds to evolve? However, my skepticism about the Tollarian theory doesn’t change the fact that those stargates and that sentry were built by someone far more advanced than we are. If the Tollarians are willing to let us participate in joint exploration efforts, that’s fine with me. I noticed from your report that they’re also willing to let us keep one squadron in RCP01 as observers as long as we keep our distance from the Stargate. I’m grateful for that concession. Is there anything else that wasn’t in your report that you’d like to comment on, Admiral?”
“Yes, My Emperor. As I said in my report, the Tollarians are willing to exchange diplomatic missions with us, and that would be the next step in our relationship. I like the Tollarians. I think we could learn a lot from them, and they would make great allies if we could convince them to sign a mutual defense treaty.”
DeChastelaine turned to look at Hood and Bishop to gauge their reaction to that idea. “That’s a very interesting idea, Admiral, especially now. The Rift war couldn’t have ended at a better time. The Kravell Empire is getting bolder each week in terms of military operations that, while not technically a violation of our treaty, are getting damn close to crossing a line. And they’re not the only neighboring species that seems to be more active lately. Having a military ally just might be the thing that keeps the peace. Now if only I could get the Tollarians to help me keep the mega-conglomerates in line. THAT would really be helpful.”
DeChastelaine leaned back. “With the Rift war over and you now back here on Earth, I see no reason why you should not take some well deserved rest and recreation, Admiral. Take as long as you like. When you’re ready to come back to active duty, we’ll find a position where you can make use of your talents. I’m going to adjourn this meeting now. Admirals Bishop and Hood, if either of you have comments, thoughts, questions to share with me, by all means send me a report. The three of you are free to stay here longer if you wish.” With that, Dechastelaine stood up and after a quick nod, he turned and strode out of the room.
Bishop spoke first. “I think I’ll follow our Emperor’s example. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you again soon, Admiral Logan. You too, of course, Admiral Hood.”
When Logan and Hood had the room to themselves, Hood stood up and said, “It’s almost lunch time. How about you join me at the Flag Officer’s Dining Room and tell me all about the Rift war from your perspective. I swear, sometimes your FTL messages were so lacking in details that I wanted to scream. What’s it like commanding a squadron, and then a fleet, and then a fleet group?”
Logan laughed. “Okay, Corrine, but I’m warning you right now. It’s going to be a long lunch.”
This is the end of Empire in Crisis.
