9

They gathered in the ship’s tactical planning center, a conference room just aft of the bridge. One of the lighting panels over the table flickered unsteadily; a young crew member was standing on a step-stool below it, trying to tighten the light fixture with a pair of pliers. The six council members – two women, four men, none of them younger than sixty – took their seats around the table, waiting in silence. Eventually, the young man apologized.

“Sorry, I can’t get it,” he said.

“It’s fine,” one of the men replied. “Leave us, please.”

He stepped down, collected the step-stool, and made for the door. It slid shut behind him a moment later.

Near the head of the table, one of the men took a sip from a coffee mug. “I trust you all slept well,” he said.

Several chuckled at the old, familiar joke.

One of the women cleared her throat. “I may still be groggy from hibernation,” she confessed, “but my watch seems to indicate I’m up about forty years early. It was your shift, Lonergan – please, fill us in.”

Lonergan nodded. “I woke you because the conditions are ripe. I believe it’s time.” He typed on a datascroll in front of him, and a hologram appeared over the conference table, showing a schematic for a large electronic device. “I’ve been following the development of this project for the past six years. We acquired the blueprints several months ago, and tested it successfully two days ago. We’ve combined it with precision orbital weaponry to make a highly effective system. It’s exactly what we would need to place major metropolitan areas under direct threat, per the plan.”

“It’s a nuclear weapon?” one of the men asked.

“No,” Lonergan replied. “It has nothing to do with fission, and there are no radioactive elements. It’s an energy teleportation device, essentially. The base station sends energy to an object of our choosing, which then becomes unstable and explodes. But it gives us a high degree of control over both targeting and destructive force. We could take out a single car, or a building … or an entire city. If we were so inclined.”

The group studied the design in silence for a time.

“Is this device commonplace today?” a man asked.

“No,” Lonergan said. “We took the plans before the lab could test and commercialize their own prototype. Ours is the only version in existence.”

“It seems suitable,” the woman noted. “But that’s only part of our readiness criteria. What about signs of unrest?”

Lonergan turned to her. “The galaxy has changed since your last shift, Egline. There are currently four separate civil conflicts occurring in the Territories.”

“The Federacy is our main concern,” one of the men pointed out.

“The Federacy is embroiled in a historic corruption scandal,” Lonergan continued. “The Guild’s true origins have been revealed.”

“They know of the Senate’s involvement?” Egline asked, taken aback.

“Yes,” Lonergan said. “But our secret remains safe, as best I can tell. The Guild is now defunct, and the senators who ran it are all dead, killed by their assassin underlings.”

“What are they saying in the media?” another man asked.

“They’re livid,” Lonergan said. “The pundits are calling for criminal investigations and a complete overhaul of the Senate oversight process. The people are angry. They feel betrayed, and rightly so.”

“Armed protests?” one of the men asked.

“Not yet. But major demonstrations have occurred on every planet in the Federacy, and the Senate has only taken weak steps toward anti-corruption measures.”

“It seems the galaxy has not changed, then,” Egline observed, with a wry smile.

Lonergan smiled in return. “Perhaps it’s more accurate to say it has returned to the state we are most familiar with.”

“Just as he said it would,” one of the other men noted.

“Yes, and that’s why I woke you,” Lonergan agreed. “Both readiness criteria have been met. Are we in agreement?” He looked slowly around the room. The council members nodded, each in turn.

“Then it’s decided. I’ll wake him myself.”