Chapter Three

The City in Space

The cafeteria was standard, just like every cafeteria he had ever visited before on Earth or on another planet. The almost military layout of the long tables, most of them empty, was familiar. The walls were decorated with horizontal pictures of planets Tankar did not recognize. A long counter was placed at the far end of the room spread with food selections in glass cages and attended by three servers. The comfort and familiarity of the layout gave Tankar the confidence to approach and pick up a tray.

“New guy, which city?” asked a smiling waiter.

“Imperia.”

“Never heard of it. Must’ve been built after the most recent assembly.” The waiter persisted. “Which clan? I would’ve thought you were a Finn. No? Sveri? Russki? Norwegian? Ah, I have it!” he exclaimed. “You must be an Angle or a Usian.”

“No,” Tankar replied. “I’m from Earth.”

The waiter’s friendliness evaporated as his face shut down. “A planetary. Then you don’t belong here. There’s a canteen just for Model-B cards.”

“But I have a Model-A card!” Tankar handed it over and said, “Look!”

The waiter squinted at it in disbelief, then handed it back. “Guess it’s true. So planetaries speak interspatial these days?”

“Speak it?” Tankar asked incredulously. “We invented the language during the reign of Kilos II the Glorious!”

The man’s face turned to stone, and the nearest of his colleagues walked over. “Kilos the Glorious? Ha! More like Kilos the dog, the murderer!”

“How dare you insult the founder of the Empire?” Tankar demanded.

“Your empire is a long ways away, maggot. The sooner you forget it, the better off you’ll be.”

The third waiter interrupted. “Leave him be, Jorg. He doesn’t know anything. Planetaries are all like that in the beginning. They’re so arrogant it doesn’t matter if they’ve come from the Earth Empire or the Confederation or a free planet.” He addressed Tankar, “Listen up. You wanna eat? Choose, pay, eat, and then F off!”

Tanker held back. After all, he owed his life to these people, even though they saw him as a refugee. He would have to be patient, do his best to gain an understanding of this new world, and try to adapt. He would have to wait things out.

As a man of frugal tastes – gourmandizing was discouraged among the Guard – he looked at the food and randomly chose a slice of grilled meat, a green jelly, an oddly shaped piece of fruit, paid his 40 satellars and sat down at an empty table. The food was vastly superior to anything he had eaten before. At the table next to him two young men and a young woman were finishing their meal. The men were dressed soberly in short tight tunics cinched at the waist. The woman, a pretty brunette with coppery highlights in her hair, wore a longer, bright red tunic.

Her voice was loud, as if she did not care who heard her. “Rumor has it that Tan Ekator gave this scumbag a Model-A card. Just wait and see what happens after the Great Council meets on this!”

One of the men shrugged and replied, “He has the right to do it, Orena. Nothing in the charter says he can’t. All you can do is vote against him, if you’re still on the Tilsin two years from now.”

“The right?” the woman queried. “The right? My ass! That’s all you ever say, Ollemi. Our Teknor insults us, and all you can say is he has the right? You disgust me, and the same goes for you, Daras!” She directed the last comment at the other man sharing her table. Then she turned toward Tankar. “What do you think, brother? Do you think that anywhere other than on this stinkhole, Stellarans would let such an outrageous step go unpunished?”

Tankar did not speak at once, torn between embarrassment and fury at being disrespected. The woman prodded him again. “Where are you from? I’ve never seen you before…did you just get off the boat?”

He remained mute.

“So have the Mpfifis got your tongue? Or don’t you have an opinion?”

Tankar shrugged and stood up. He knew that it would serve no purpose to engage in a quarrel that did not concern him, even though it was expressly about him. The woman, Orena, leaped up and stood right in front of him, her face flushing red with fury. “You’re not going to sidestep this one so easily! When I ask a question, I expect a reply.”

Ollemi intervened. “Orena, that’s enough. Stellaran law….”

She turned her head to glare at her friend. “Oh, Rktel to the law. You quote it so often you forget the spirit of the thing!”

Tankar gently tried to push his way past her. In a second, she slapped him across the cheek. Until the slap, he had been patient in spite of the woman’s humiliating slander, but the slap had him seeing red, more from rage than pain. His left hand reached for his missing fulgurator while instinctively he struck back with his right.

The woman first rolled onto the table and then onto the floor as plastic plates and cups rained down on her head. Tankar stood, ready for a fight, expecting the two men to attack.

“Are you completely insane, brother? You know a man doesn’t hit a woman,” reminded Ollemi.

“But she….”

“Orena is a piece of work, I grant you that. But the law is the law, and you know she will expect her due.”

“Her due?” Tankar asked, having no idea what that meant.

“Your customs might be different from ours. Here, we leave you two in the Great Park. She’ll have 10 bullets to your one, and you’ll have one arm tied behind your back.”

Another man broke into the circle of rubberneckers who now surrounded them and stood face-to-face with Tankar. “Enough already, you piece of work. Get out of here, now!”

The circle closed in, and one voice after another spoke up. “A planetary?”

“Yeah. That’s the guy who got the Model-A card.”

“Kick him into space!”

“No! Send him to the experiment cages!”

“Straight to the converter, I say!”

“Let Orena claim her due; she never misses.”

“Yeah. She should aim right for his guts!”

A head poked out from between the men’s legs. The head had short, tousled coppery hair, a quickly blackening eye and a bloody nose. “You move fast, planetary,” Orena muttered. “Leave him alone, guys. I insulted him without knowing he was there, and I got what I deserved,” she admitted. “At least he has the balls to act on his instincts!” She made a face and spat blood. “But, man, you hit too hard. In the end, I probably won’t claim my due. Nope. It’d give these idiots too much pleasure. They’d enjoy our killing each other without having the balls to join in.” She stood up. “Come with me!”

Orena took Tankar’s arm and pulled him toward her. “Come on! I want to talk privately.” She led him to a small park where she sat him next to her on a bench.

“This’ll teach me to look around before I open my big mouth,” she said dreamily. “But I have questions for you, and the first is: why did the Teknor give you a Model-A card?”

“The Teknor?”

“Tan Ekator.”

“Oh.”

“He’s only a technician, hence the name. At least that’s the case in principle. For a city-state to work, someone has to direct and coordinate, but that’s where his job ends.”

Tankar shook his head. “I don’t know about that,” he confessed. “I just saw him for a few minutes about two hours ago.”

“What did he say?” Orena demanded.

“Nothing that would interest you. He advised me to consult a book by a guy named Mokor at the university library.”

Orena sighed. “I’m not surprised. The conservos think Mokor’s book is the ultimate. We, the advantists, don’t think much of it; it’s not objective and gives the Pilgrims too much credit.”

“If you keep talking in riddles like that, I think I will have to give Mokor a read,” Tankar retorted. “I need to find my way around this place, and the sooner the better!”

“I can help with that,” Orena offered. “I took pretty in-depth history lessons. What do you want to know?”

“Everything!”

“That a pretty tall order, don’t you think? I can try and summarize the major points. But, be warned: don’t be surprised if what I say about the early stuff doesn’t correspond to what you learned on Earth.” She paused to ask, “What was your line of work?”

“Lieutenant in the Emperor’s Stellar Guard.”

Orena whistled softly. “I better watch what I say! Let’s get started. So, under the reign of Kilos II the assassin….”

“The Glorious!”

“If you keep interrupting….” she warned. “So…under the reign of the glorious assassin Kilos II, life became unbearable for every intelligent, freethinking person. Almost immediately after his coronation he issued edicts limiting research, cutting back on the rights of technicians, and setting aside all the important jobs for knights and nobleman. And that was just the beginning. Many universities closed, the professors deported or sent to the mines.”

Tankar struggled to understand. “What was their act of treason?”

“You only commit treason if you defy an order you once agreed to carry out,” Orena explained. “You do know how the Klutenide dynasty started out, right? By murder and usurpation? Nobody on Earth or in the outlying lands accepted their legitimacy; the people just submitted. But the Emperors secured the allegiance of military and civilian technicians by handing out massive favors. Those were the real traitors, in my book.” She paused to stare at Tankar before resuming. “Rebellion was out of the question. Flight was the only option for those who wanted to remain free, and it wasn’t easy. Two generations suffered horrors in silence but kept alive the flame of knowledge, stockpiling the right documents. Some of them were found, tortured, and killed.”

She shrugged. “Why should I spell out the details? You’ll read all about it in the books. Mokor may exaggerate their role in the events, but escape wouldn’t have been possible without the help of the Pilgrims.”

“The Pilgrims?” Tankar asked.

“At the time of the constitutional Empire under Antheor the 1st, three hundred years before Kilos II, a new religion was founded by Meneon the Prophet, a priest of ancient Christianity, and….”

Tankar interrupted again. “I’ve heard of Christians. There still are some in the Empire, but only among the commoners.”

Orena gave him a look that clearly said: stop interrupting me! “So, as I was saying, Meneon had a revelation. He said that since God allowed humans to conquer space, it must be part of the divine plan. The human race’s time on Earth was nothing more than a trial destined to eliminate original sin –” Orena grimaced at Tankar, “– maybe you know what that is, because I have no idea – one day man would find God in some corner of space, and a new era would begin.

“Of course, I’m summarizing and probably leaving things out. Anyway. Meneon quickly spawned disciples. This new religion appealed primarily to astronauts and well-off merchants who must have seen the doctrine as a comfort in their crushing loneliness. While the Menians, his followers, were few in number, they were powerful. The early emperors were not the stupid, bloodthirsty monsters that their descendants would become. They protected worship and gave converts perks and rights, especially the right to arm and fortify their monasteries, as well as the right to offer asylum.

“A few Menian priests joined each interstellar expedition, and most of them were good technicians. But, with the coronation of Kilos II, everything changed. He wouldn’t tolerate the independent-mindedness of the monks, or of artists or scientists. Little by little, he sliced away their perks. The monasteries remained powerful, so the succeeding emperors stopped short of direct persecution. That wasn’t from lack of desire, as the monks were unflinchingly hostile, in part for moral reasons, but their primary issue was that the starships in circulation belonged either to the Stellar Guard or to the merchant marine, and the monks were forbidden to travel that way.

“And so the monks forged an alliance with the technicians. The monks would provide refuge in the monasteries and help build clandestine starships; eventually, monks and techs would all leave together to escape the emperors’ tyranny and to find a free planet.

“They succeeded, and 432 Earth years ago the exodus took place. 745 starships took flight and transported 131,000 technicians, sages, artists, writers, and free men and women as well as 12,000 Menian laypeople and monks. The Emperor’s Stellar Guard was so blindsided that only one starship was damaged.”

Tankar cringed at the news the Stellar Guard had failed in its duty. Orena continued the history of the People of the Stars.

“Those men and women, our ancestors, found an unblemished planet near a star from the Swan Constellation. They established themselves and developed their new civilization over the next decade. But just as the first cities began to bloom, imperial starships showed up. After a short battle, my people were again forced to flee. Twenty-five years later, imperial forces showed up once more.

“After that, our ancestors decided to run far away, and, along the way, they found the first city-state floating aimlessly in space. We’ve never discovered who established it. It wasn’t our enemies, the Mpfifis, though they do live and travel on similar craft. The city was intact but abandoned. All the equipment was in working order, but there was no indication as to who might have built it.

“The size of the gangways, of the rooms and doors, did suggest the previous inhabitants were not very different from us except that their lighting systems hinted that their eyes were especially sensitive to purple. We’ve analyzed traces of radioactive metal and concluded they’d been around for five hundred thousand years.”

She turned to Tankar. “If you’re interested, you can see the film someday.” Then she continued, “The space city was enormous, and we were able to adapt the engines for ourselves. The weaponry was far better than anything we had known or developed here or in the Empire. I’ve never seen that first ship,” she admitted, “but it’s still in service and is called Encounter. Many refugees established themselves there, and others followed.

“The initial plan was to use this empty city as a stepping stone to a livable planet as far away as possible because life onboard is so much more comfortable than onboard a standard starship. The seekers struggled to find a livable planet, but, over time, they got used to being nomads. When they did find the hospitable planet, they opted to use it as a base for building more city-states.

“As the population increased, new city-states were built; we have about a hundred in all now. They all meander through the cosmos and around our planet, which we call Avenir. That’s where we have our home bases and factories, but we only live there when absolutely necessary. We’ve been in touch with some intelligent non-human races, and even some human-inhabited planets. Those planets have been luckier than we were, because the Empire knew nothing about them. The Teknor told us in the lunchtime news that the Empire is crumbling as we speak….”

Tankar struggled to comprehend their nomadic way of life. “And you can live this way, without roots?”

“Not only can we, we wouldn’t want to live any other way!” exclaimed Orena. “As you may have guessed, we don’t like planetaries, people who were born and live on planets. You all hook on to little balls and only leave them for a quick hop into oh-so-scary space. We are royalty; we get to travel whenever and wherever we like, from star to star. Soon we will be able to move from galaxy to galaxy.”

“You’ve visited other galaxies?” Tankar was stunned.

“Why not?”

“But it’s so far,” he insisted. “Even traveling through hyperspace.”

“We don’t really care about travel time. We’ve come a long way since our ancestors fled Earth, and our city-states are self-sufficient. Those first settlers were highly intelligent, and, in our society, almost everyone works in research in some form or another, even the Pilgrims who hitched a ride. It’s been like this for four hundred years. You know, the two city-states that left to explore the Andromeda Nebula have yet to return.”

Trying to get his facts straight, Tankar asked, “How is your society structured?”

“This will probably seem as murky to you as understanding your hierarchy would be to us. It might be easier if you understand that all of our ancestors were sages and technicians. They were all humans who simultaneously admired order, efficiency and independence.” Orena considered Tankar. “Have you never been part of a scientific team?” she asked, curious.

Tankar recalled a six-month internship he had spent in the technical mastery center. He remembered a stimulating atmosphere that was at once calm and relaxed. And the discipline was as rigorous as in any branch of the Guards.

“So our ancestors were scientists,” Orena picked up. “Add to that the dreadful tyranny of several centuries, and you’ll see why we Stellarans don’t want political bosses and prefer to be overseen by Teknors.”

“Isn’t it all pretty much the same as Earth?” Tankar asked.

“Oh, no!” Orena cried. “The Teknor’s authority is limited to technical matters: how the city-states operate, defense against an attack, general commercial exchanges with planetaries, and, in a way, the overall game plan.”

“But who handles internal security?”

“We do, of course, who else?”

“Well…what happens if a mechanic says he doesn’t want to work on or repair an assigned motor, for instance?”

“First of all, that never happens, or almost never. The mechanics aren’t stupid: if they ignore the motors they’ll pay the price too.”

“Okay, but what if someone wants a raise or threatens to strike?”

Orena looked puzzled. “He or she can’t get a raise. All Stellarans get the same salary.”

“Then why were you all so hot and bothered about my Model-A card?” Tankar demanded.

Orena stiffened and her body language became defensive as her voice darkened. “Because planetaries who live off a city-state should never get an A-card.”

Tankar paused for a moment, thought, then asked, “If everybody earns the same, how do you reward initiative?”

Orena relaxed and explained. “The salaried work we do is for the greater good of our society and only takes about two hours per day. The rest of the day we can create things, and that can boost our income. For instance, I write fantasy novels set on planets. That’s why I studied historical cosmology. Other people sculpt, or paint, or invent, or do research, all kinds of things. They can trade either within the city or with a different city-state or even with planets.”

“What about the admin jobs?”

Orena nodded. “Those jobs are considered work for the greater social good of all.”

“Do you have soldiers?”

“Yes and no.” Orena could see that Tankar did not understand, so she tried to explain. “We have no professional soldiers, but many of us have studied the martial arts. We’ve had to because of the Mpfifis.” Suddenly she understood his reaction. “Oh, I see; you were thinking of enlisting. Sorry, we have no army and, even if we did, as a planetary you wouldn’t be allowed to join.”

Bitterly he said, “And that’s still my worst, my unforgivable sin.” He grew melancholy and reflective. “I’m beginning to understand how commoners feel about the nobility, even the Guards. Any child can become a Guard if he is skilled enough. But here, to you and everyone else on this starship, I’ll never be anything more than a parasite.”

A bit embarrassed, Orena suggested, “Nothing can stop you from doing something creative.”

“Creative? I don’t think so. I was trained to destroy. Create? On my own? What would I create?” He spat out the last word. “Scientific research could be a noble thing, but scientists in the Empire never exceeded travel beyond 150 light-years, and you guys have visited other galaxies. What chance do I have of discovering something you’ve not found in four centuries? I’m young, and I’m strong, and the only job I know, the only one I’ve ever had, is soldiering. You would have done better to leave me adrift in my spacesuit. Everyone would be happier, including me.”

Orena stood in front of Tankar trembling in frustration. “Have you planetaries sunk so low you’ve lost the capacity to adapt? When I first saw you a short time ago fighting us all I thought, ‘This is one planetary parasite who acts like a grown man!’ Could I have been wrong? Damn guards with their rules about hand-to-hand combat. With so many cowards it’s no wonder your Empire is on its last legs.” She stood before him, shaking with rage.

“I fought on my own!” he exploded. “I had a goal, and now I have nothing. I failed in my mission and now find myself living on your handouts with no hope of ever becoming a real man again. I have another question: what happens if your city-state is destroyed and all of your friends are gone?”

“I’d go to another city-state and keep moving. Why would this mishmash of steel plates called the Tilsin matter to me? I was born on the Robur and spent a few years on the Suomi and on the Frank. I also have lived on the Uso, the Anglic and the Nippo, and I felt at home on all of them. I loved my companions, and I would have sought revenge if they’d been killed. But good companions can be found anywhere, no? I don’t understand your question.”

“And I don’t get your perspective. Is frequent city-state hopping standard practice with you all?”

“For many of us, yes. At each conjunction, people move around; some come, some go. It’s harder for specialists who need to do direct swaps, but there are always volunteers.”

“That might make sense for a soldier like me who has no possessions, but for you guys? What about housing? Your stuff?”

“Lodging is always available. As to our possessions, they come with us, or we get new ones.”

Tankar paused, deep in thought, then, “I’m afraid I’m going to struggle to adapt to a life here. Have any other planetaries spent time in your city-states?”

“Very few.”

“What happened to them?”

“Some assimilated just fine. Others died. And a few became so anxious that they went back to their Earth. My father was one of them.” She paused and looked off into the distance. “That’s why I hate planetaries so much…and vice-versa.”

Surprised, Tankar asked, “Your father was a planetary, and you hate us?”

“What’s strange about that?” Orena demanded. “He spent 20 years here, was adopted into our world and then deserted us. He betrayed us.”

“Yeah, I know the drill…you can only betray what you’ve accepted.”

“Of course!”

“I accepted the Empire. Should I allow myself to learn how to be part of the world here, will that make me a traitor?”

“It’s not the same thing, Tankar! Were you ever given a choice? Could you have done anything else?”

He thought for a moment and said, “No…I guess not. Guards are recruited very young. I was only three when they took me from my family. My father….”

Again, the shadow of his father’s phantom figure crossed his mind’s eye. But it was a shadow lacking nuance, missing specific, identifying traits.

“I barely remember my parents,” he said, feeling suddenly and unexpectedly anxious. “I don’t even know their names. My last name, Holroy, is unlikely to be my own, but it’s serviceable. My mother…I can’t recall…except she was blond…and smiled at me a lot. But what’s the point of bringing up the past? I could’ve run into them on the street and I wouldn’t have recognized them. I don’t know what class they belonged to. I may have killed them during the spring uprising.” Choking back unfamiliar emotions, he admitted, “I don’t like rummaging through the past.”

“And you call that civilization? You would lay down your life for that?”

“What else would I die for? I don’t know anything else…or at least I didn’t before I met you.” Tankar stood up and began to pace.

“I was taken away from my family at the age of three! What does a toddler know of such things? Nothing. I was a piece of clay to be molded at will. In primary school, I learned to read, write and count, but I wasn’t taught like other kids. I was taught an iron discipline from day one, and, in middle school? Long civics lessons.”

He recited sarcastically, just like the good schoolboy he had been: “At the top of the Empire is the Emperor who reigns and governs for the collective good. His personage is sacred and none may look him in the eye. He is the embodiment on Earth of the divine. His word is the word of God. Right beneath him are the nobility….”

He paused. “You know, I still believe all of it, or at least most of it. Up until now, any other life would have struck me as crazy and finite. And yet, here you all are, you the descendants of the traitor-scientists. I’m beginning to think you could destroy the Empire, if you wanted to.”

He turned back to Orena. “In any event, when I turned 13, I was sent straight to the barracks. Super-technical lessons in math, physics, chemistry, biology were drilled into us. We learned how to maintain our starships, how to survive and do battle in foreign or hostile settings. Awakened at five every morning, in bed at eight thirty no matter the time of year. And boy, were we in good shape! We all could run, jump, climb, swim in freezing-cold or near-boiling water, throw a grenade or a javelin, shoot a rifle or a pistol and handle a fulgurator. We learned to handle cannons in cold so bitter our hands stuck to the steel. Our hands would bleed, but we weren’t allowed to dirty our training uniforms.

“Oh! And the discipline,” he added. “The inhuman punishments. We were whipped, deprived of food and drink and, worst of all, sleep. I went through all of that, for the great glory of the Empire. And you’re trying to convince me it was all for nothing? How could I believe that? I’m a Guard and will be one for the Emp—. Oops, I did it again, didn’t I? And don’t forget the combat training with and without weapons.”

He stared down at his clenched fists and unfurled them. “I can kill a man with these as easily as I could a chicken. Killing is what I do best. Even if you were to take me in, me, I’d never fit in. Too much is different.”

“Less than you might think, maybe. There are worse places in the cosmos – say in Mpfifi-space.”

“Who are they?”

“The Others. Non-humans. Like us, they live in nomad cities. They attack us, kill us all, and destroy everything. Sometimes we win, but more often….” She listed a litany of vessel names. “Kanton, Uta, Espana, Dresden, Rio, Paris II, Norge II. All lost. Once, we arrived at the Roma in time to save some survivors. I was on the Suomi.”

Tankar asked, “Suomi, Roma, Espana all sound like Earthly place names to me. Is that right?”

“Yes, you’re right. In the past, we borrowed names from the base planet. Tilsin is the newest of our space cities, and it was settled by people from other starships: the Frank, the Usa, the Suomi and the Norge I.”

Tankar checked his digital time display, and cracked a smile. It was still on Earth time. “What’s the time here?”

“16:32. We divide time into 24 chunks, just like on the old planet.”

“Handy for me.” He looked into Orena’s eyes. “I really would like to thank you for all the info and, um….” He hesitated, feeling awkward. “I’m so sorry I hit you! My fist struck out automatically, and I failed to restrain it. On Earth, no one, not even one of noble or royal rank, would’ve spoken to me as you did.”

Orena unpocketed a small mirror and looked at her reflection. “Oh, it’s no big deal. No broken teeth, which would’ve meant expensive dentures. My nose is still slightly swollen, but it’ll be okay tomorrow. Would you like to take a tour of the city now?”

“I don’t want to impose. I have a map….” He picked it up from the bench to show it to her.

“I put in my two hours at the hydroponic grounds this morning. I’m free.”

“As somebody who despises planetaries….”

“There are different types of planetaries. The ones I’ve met to date have little cultural understanding and less backbone. You’re not like them. Plus, I find you amusing.”

He started to get upset but decided to laugh it off. “So be it. Let’s go.”

They fell into step as they crossed the park to an unconstructed gangway that they followed to find a six-street star-shaped crossroad.

“Let’s take the first on the right. I can’t guide you everywhere; I haven’t seen it all myself. But once you’ve gotten an overview at Observation Post 32, you’ll have a sense of the general layout.”

The street seemed to go on forever, backlit by dreary fluorescent tubes. The sole distinguishing feature on each metal door was its number.

“This is a residential area. Isn’t it hideous? Inside, however, the apartments are very different. In the shopping districts, the stores are cheerful. You can buy stuff from many different planets, including Earth.”

“What?!” Tankar exclaimed. “How is that even possible?”

“Smugglers from the free worlds beyond the sphere of influence of your Empire sometimes lay over at your outposts.”

Tankar recalled overhearing a conversation between two senior officers. The men had spoken of starships so fast that nothing in the Empire could catch them.

He and Orena went down an anti-gravity shaft to another walkway where they hopped a transport wagon to the outer edge of the Tilsin. They finally arrived at a door that opened onto a wide railed gangplank.

“Beltway 7,” the young woman answered before Tankar could ask the question. “This area is part of the Tilsin’s defense system, and it transports both people and materiel over that bridge anywhere on the chassis. The signals are steady, so we can proceed. Never cross if they’re flashing,” she instructed.

They saw a porch and crossed it to greet the guard in charge.

“Names. Cards?”

“Orena Valoch. Hydroponist and novelist.”

“Tankar Holroy.” He hesitated before Orena added, “Planetary”.

The man raised his eyebrows. Orena explained further. “Model-A card, on the Teknor’s orders.”

“Fine. Proceed.”

“The observation posts are the city-state’s eyes, and they are always staffed, but, in peacetime, people can visit.”

When they arrived at the actual post, it was a largish room with a gray screen covering an entire wall. Five technicians sat before it comfortably ensconced in ergochairs, backs to the screen.

Orena spoke to the youngest tech, who looked to Tankar to be of Mongolian descent.

“Hi, Pei.” She addressed the other men. “Hello, brothers. I’d like you to meet Tankar Holroy of the Earth Empire’s Stellar Guard.”

“A planetary. Are you out of your mind, Orena?” one of the men demanded.

“Model-A card, Teknor’s orders.”

“I suppose Tan knows what he’s doing. Hey….” Pei stumbled then said, “Mister Holroy.”

“The actual title is Lieutenant but it’s not important. Rather than discussing rank, I’d really like to know how the observation posts work. Why is the screen dark?”

Pei half smiled. “Have you earthling Guards really found a way to study hyperspace as you fly through it? We’ll emerge shortly.”

Tankar scanned the room for an empty seat or a guardrail. Transit in and out of hyperspace was tricky enough on a terrestrial starship.

“What do you need?”

“Somewhere to sit or something to hang on to.”

“Ha! You guys must still use Cursin hytrons. We dropped those a long time ago. Don’t worry, you won’t feel anything.” Another tech grinned, “If you had half a brain, you’d have guessed. Since you’ve been aboard the Tilsin, we’ve emerged twice.”

“Okay, guys, just shut up!” Orena said. “It’s not Holroy’s fault that he’s from a land of savages. Why don’t you show him your screen since we’ve just emerged? You’re some security guys; you didn’t even see the emergency light blinking.”

Embarrassed, the men turned their attention to the control panel as the screen lit up. The stars teemed, and Tankar cried out in surprise and wonder.

“Is that the galaxy’s center?” He recalled his cosmography lessons as a young cadet and the huge mock-up of the Milky Way hanging in the Academy’s foyer. In the past, he had often stood there daydreaming in front of the spacescape, contemplating the tiny purple area on the outer edge that marked out the total Empire.

“No. It’s a globular heap.”

Fascinated, Tankar looked all around. To the right a nebula of gas like a flickering curtain veiled a whole segment of the sky while, on the left, a large opaque scarf appeared looking like an abyss toward which their star city was plunging rapidly.

One of the men stood up and spoke into the phone. “We’re approaching a planetary system the Teknor wants to investigate.” The man leaned over a device in front of him as Tankar approached to look into another viewer. Shiny bands pulsed on the screen.

“Do you have this in your fleet?”

“Nothing like it. What is it?” Tankar whispered.

“It analyzes unusual weather conditions. Every time an object enters or leaves hyperspace, it captures the Lursac waves and analyzes the movement. Here, have a look.”

The top band was rigid. A string of numbers rolled out on the display.

“Distance, 300,000 kilometers. Incline plus 30. Right ascent 122. This might indicate another race or our people; we might never know.”

Tankar was about to ask whether there was a way of tracing the thing in hyperspace but thought better of it. Nothing in the mechanism seemed to resemble a tracer.

An alarm bell rang. Pei said, “Ah. We’re about to dive back in. This was a short stop. Must not be much of interest in this system.”

Orena spoke. “It’s 6 p.m, Tankar. I intend to take you to dinner, so we must go. Bye, all!”

“See you this evening, Orena?” Pei asked.

“Not tonight.”

Pei’s face darkened. “I see.”

“We’re both free agents, Pei.”

After they left, Orena was uncharacteristically silent, leaving Tankar to his own thoughts. They arrived at Orena’s flat some time later.

To Tankar, accustomed to monastic Guard cells, Orena’s flat was small but lavishly furnished. On Earth, only someone noble or royal would own sofas covered in rare fabric. Have a polished natural-wood table and leather-bound books. Some paintings, mostly planetary landscapes full of light, hung on the walls like open windows. Tankar stopped, compelled by one of a reddish desert almost covered in purple mist where, at a distance, might have been hills.

“Mars?” he asked.

“No, just some random planet.”

“Did you paint these?”

“Me? No, of course not.”

“So you bought them? The Emperor would give thousands of dollars to own one of those such works.”

“It’s not likely he’ll ever get a chance to see them. They were painted by Pei, you know the young guy we met at the observation post?”

“Right. Yes. Tell me: why did he look so angry when we left? Because I’m a planetary?”

She smiled. “That’s part of it. But his main problem is that you’d be having dinner with me instead of him.”

“So that’s it. You’re all an odd bunch.”

This time Orena laughed out loud. “You think so? I need to leave you for a bit to get dinner ready.”

While he waited, Tankar scanned her bookcase and found that most of the volumes were about history. Several were in interspatial, others in various languages he didn’t understand except for one in English and another in French. The English one was A Brief History of Space by A. C. Clarke, London 1976. How was that even possible given it was only 1884 in Empire years? The book must be several millennia old, published during the first civilizations before the Great Catastrophe. The other book he noticed was called Aperçus sur la Colonisation de Mars [Perspectives on the Colonization of Mars] by Jean Vérancourt, dated Paris, 1995. Not much more recent. He thumbed through both volumes and thought of borrowing them. He was intrigued by the revelation that, long before the Empire, men had launched into the cosmos, albeit only within Earth’s solar system.

Orena laughed from the kitchen. “Food’s on, noble Guard!”

He turned so abruptly he nearly dropped the book. Orena had changed from the red tunic she had been wearing since he met her in the cafeteria and was wearing a long diaphanous dress from material so silky and thin he had never seen anything like it even at the imperial court.

“And this evening’s menu,” she spoke, oblivious to his embarrassment. “Betelgeuse consommé, roasted lakir from Sarnak, Aldebaran turmak shoot salad, hydroponic fruit and Téléphor-II wine.”

Tankar smiled. “That doesn’t tell me much. I have no idea what those delicious-sounding foods might taste like.”

“The lakir is a small animal. Turnak is a vegetable. As to Téléphor, it’s actually a very old human colony, one of the first from before the Empire. I hope you’ll enjoy the wine.”

“I’ve never tasted wine. Among the Stellar Guards we drank water or, on especially hard days, liquor.”

Delighted, Orena said, “Then it’s about time! Come with me.”

The table was set with sparkling crystal and silver. He sat across from Orena. “I need to ask you a question, Orena, maybe a stupid one and surely a crass one. But I need to know so I can better come to understand this world. Are you rich? Are you a member of the upper class?”

“How many times do I need to tell you we have no social classes here? Am I wealthy? Well, my books do sell pretty well. But why would you ask that question?”

“These luxurious fabrics, these collectible books, the silver, the crystal.”

“Oh, you poor barbarian.” She sighed. “Okay. My dress was expensive. The rest is within the reach of anyone with a Model-A card. We have silver forks because they’re pretty, crystal glasses because they’re as easy to craft as glass ones. The linens in our homes are lovely because the Vélinzi sell them to us in exchange for the weight of the iron they sorely need. That’s the secret to commerce, Tankar, not just here on the Tilsin or on our other city-states but throughout the Empire too, I’m pretty sure. You bring merchandise to the place where it’s in short supply from a place you can get it cheap. As to the paintings? Once again, they were a gift to me from Pei. You know, the comm tech from the observation post. He’s also a painter.”

“…and your friend.”

“If he weren’t, he would hardly have given me five of his paintings, would he? He usually sells them for five hundred stellars each.”

“The Emperor would pay a hundred times that.”

For a moment, Tankar imagined he was back on Earth with 10 or so of the paintings. He could have sold them and been able to afford the initiation fees to join the noble class. And his harsh soldiering life would have been over. His future children would have no fear of hard laws and unfair administrators. He might even reconnect with his family. But no. He shook his head and returned to reality. That couldn’t, wouldn’t ever happen.

“Aren’t you drinking, Tankar? Don’t you like the Téléphor wine?” Orena asked.

“Oh, I do. Everything’s superb, Orena, it’s just that it all feels so unreal. Four days ago, the war minister handed me secret fleet orders. Just yesterday, I tumbled into the void and thought I would die in space. This morning, I woke up fully expecting to be treated like a prisoner of war. I thought I’d spend my days hopelessly rotting in some dreary metallic cell. And tonight, I’m having dinner with a beautiful woman. It seems as though I’m simultaneously a wealthy man and a pariah.

“For the first time in my life I’m free. But I’m stranded in a foreign land that tolerates and nourishes me as if I were some kind of a parasite. And the person serving me this wonderful meal is the woman who routinely shows nothing but contempt for all planetaries as well as being the woman I punched in the face. I don’t get it. And I can’t feel that I’m absolutely safe, not yet.”

Orena listened attentively as Tankar went on.

“There’s a game the political police play on Earth. They swear to a prisoner that he’s a free man. Then, as he walks out the camp’s gate, they execute him by shooting him in the back. There have been legitimately released prisoners who refused to leave until hunger and despair compelled them to risk everything.”

Then, abruptly rising from his chair, he asked, “Are you playing a similar game with me? If you are, it’s not worthy of you. I’m a soldier, and if I’m to be killed, please deal with me honestly.”

“Don’t you dare to compare Stellarans to the scum of the Earth, Tankar. We have our shortcomings, vices even. We aren’t saints; we’re not even Pilgrims. But if there’s one thing we would never do, that is lock a man up whose only crime was to be different. You mustn’t expect much friendship from the People of the Stars. To most of us, you’re planetary vermin, and that’s all you’ll ever be. Some will try to kill you, but in that case it’ll be personal and in-your-face. In our world, assassination merits one punishment only: exile into empty space without a spacesuit.” She sighed before adding, “Some day you might assimilate, just as my father did. I hope you’ll be able to learn while you’re here, as my father did. I hope you’ll gain even more from your experience, and that, unlike him, you’ll not go back to your Earth.”

“Could it be your father is the reason I’m here?” Tankar asked.

“Partly.” Orena nodded. “I saw how lonely you were, and I remembered the six long years it took him to adapt. And, as I said, you amuse me.” Changing her tone, she added, “Enough of this! Do you like music?”

“Yes. I even play the flute,” he admitted, blushing with embarrassment. “Guards are encouraged to undertake any activity that will add spice to cruiser life.”

“I’ve got some excellent recordings of pieces you’re unlikely to have heard. They’re by composers who predate the spatial era, and they were discovered in old colonies like Téléphor or Germania. Have you heard Beethoven?”

“No.”

She slipped a thin magnetic band into a small module. “You’ll like this. It’s his Concerto no. 5, said to be composed for an emperor. A prehistoric emperor, or almost.”

Music flooded the room, and the two of them listened in rapt silence. When it was over, Tankar took his time to emerge from the waking dream created by a man long dead. “That was magnificent, Orena,” he said in hushed tones. “Our modern composers can’t touch the brilliance of such an old master, save maybe Merlin. But it’s getting late. I need to go. I don’t even know where my lodgings are!”

“You mean you haven’t figured that out yet? The apartment will be empty. You need to buy furnishings. You can’t go there now.” She smiled mischievously. “But if you agree to stay the night, I can assure you nobody here will take offence….”