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Jacob Weiss, I

3rd Moon, “Urvashi”, 2327 AD, AHR Orbital Station 'Deep Sky'

"What do you mean, we can't board her?"

The man looking back at Jacob had graying hair, wore black robes, and seemed to wish he was elsewhere.

"I mean just that, Colonel. The Ramanujan is still in international space. Until they decrease their apoapsis and enter our legal territory, you do not have jurisdiction to board their vessel.”

“They’re dropping heavy landers and cargo pods, as we speak.”

“So go look at one - after it lands. I am willing to give you the court order though, if you would at least make contact with the Ramanujan, and ask them what their business is."

"Bill, that's like asking a drug dealer if they're going to be selling any, before they get to the parking lot. It would just tip them off that we know what they're up to - which isn’t going to make it easier to stop them."

"Have you ever heard the phrase 'innocent until proven guilty'?"

"They're guilty as sin, and all I need is that warrant to prove it."

The judge frowned. "Request denied. You know you have to come to me with more than just a 13 year old transmission that no one has been able to decrypt, to get me to authorize something like this. No one wants to hear that you've harassed a ship from Saturn. What if they're friends with our neighbors on the first moon?"

"And why should that matter, Bill?"

"Because, Jacob, we've been on very good terms with them, and they are more advanced and powerful than anyone else in the 9 system. That matters when we live on the moon that's an ideal habitat for post-human super intelligences, who colonized it long before we turned up."

"You don't know if the Ramanujan has any connection to the Pytheas robots. It's just speculation."

"Which is exactly what you've brought me. It’s good to have sane neighbors who have high-tech friends who come visit. Judge out."

Udmurt, II

Planet 9, 3rd Moon: “Urvashi”, 2327 AD,
Interim Forward Operating Base

"Heroes of the True People? Bunch of stupid arseholes."  

The mess hall - was a mess. Tables had been knocked over, food lay on the floor in lava flows of meat and pasta. Chairs lay about bent and broken. One hung attached to a sparking ceiling light, a low gravity pendulum. Sullen men and women sat holding bags of ice to their eyes and jaws. One lay on the table cursing through a magnificent red beard, while a medic ran a needle and thread through his gashed leg. Several working together picked a limp man off the ground and put him onto a wheeled gurney. Biomonitors lit up and projected his vitals, holograms over his head and chest. His blood pressure was dropping.

Udmurt looked at the bloody fork, turning it this way and that in the light.

"All this because someone sat in someone else's place? The mess hall has only been used for three sittings."

"They did it," said a clean shaven man with Mongol features, his eyes and lips were painted black, "because a Skar sat in the Zogu area. The Skars have allied with the Bashirs and the Katars." His jacket read RUDAO - 3rd PLTN LDR.

"And the Vel?"

"The Vel saw dark people attacking fair people," said Rudao. "That's all they need.”

“This,” said a dark man with a shaved head and a scar down his cheek, his dog tag read TRUKU, “This is why the Outsiders call us barbarians behind our backs. Already, I can hear their judgement behind their guarded tongues and blankest faces."

"What did you expect?" said Rudao. "These are warriors from small tribes, they look upon each other and see not brothers but greatest threats. People they would fight to protect land, cattle, and children from."

"If they would but understand that they have left puny tribe to join great nation, then such deadly folly as this would end," shot back Truku.

"You would that they turn their backs on a lifetime's careful wisdom, for a few spoken words from commanders they share no blood with? Neither in their veins, nor on the battlefield?"

"I would that they but use simplest brains within thickest skulls. All have been taught how to use the Outsider toilets. So why every morning, must we clean steaming shit off corridor floors? Have you stepped in such? I have. It does not incline one favorably towards fools!"

"Platoon leaders, remember your titles, and do not fall to bickering," Udmurt put down the fork. "Let us hear solutions to problem before it grows into greater danger."

"The small alliances formed, and tested in rooms like this, challenge our own authority," said Truku. "They must be stamped out, Udmurt."

"Doing so would make enemies of our own warriors," Rudao waved his finger like a school teacher. "We will not be able to trust them in battle."

"We cannot trust them, now." said Truku.

"We must give them more to do," said Rudao. "Demands on back and hands leave no time for idling."

"They are building a forward operating base on an alien world, in a place the local humans do not dare to tread." said Truku. "There is plenty to do. Yet, they make time for foolish politics. You must make an example, Udmurt. Punish the ring leaders."

"No, you should give them distraction, and challenges to be completed as mixed platoons, and as the First Company, combined. We are the first, modern, armed formation of indigenous peoples. Let us set best example for those who come afterwards."

"Brother Rudao, we must make sure that there will be an afterwards. If you give them grace, they will only see it as weakness. Actions demand consequences, not kindly understanding."

"Understanding and grace are strengths, not weaknesses."

"It only matters what others think it is," Truku tapped his skull. "Show grace today, and face rebellion tomorrow. Do not give these fools reason to commit acts for which there can be no leniency."

Rudao shook his head slowly, "You have so little faith in them, Brother. How can you stand among them if you think so little of them?"

"I stand apart from them, I am their commander, not their friend. Do not expect these people to be more than they already are, Brother. You will only find disappointment, and they will suffer because of your poor leadership. You must understand that they are scum. Scum. Treat them as such. They will hate and fear you. But, they will obey you in battle, and they will survive because of it."

The three were silent. A group of soldiers came in and started cleaning up. None of them would make eye contact with their commanders.  

"If they have enough time to fight, then they have too much time," said Udmurt at last. "Increase the shift times by fifty percent. Let them only have time to sleep. The troublemakers and their squads, will be set to hardest labors for the next week."

"You would punish their squads as well?" asked Rudao. "They are of different tribes and did not take part in the fight."

"They could have stopped the fight. Also, let the troublemakers deal with the ire of their comrades. Let us allow squad and platoon to set themselves over tribe and secret alliance."

"And if some become repeat offenders?" asked Truku.

"They will be marooned on an ice floe. First Company is a fighting force with a sacred mission. We will not allow any to stand between that."

They nodded.

"I have to leave now on an urgent matter. The Ramanujan's last drop went off course, and stopped responding to our messages. It landed about 200 kilometers west, just outside the Posthuman Ecological Zone. I am taking the heavy lifter to collect it."

"Did it crash?"

"The Ramanujan detected no energy spike from a violent impact. We can only assume that it landed safely, or at least intact. Either way, we need those supplies," He turned to leave. "Try to keep this place from falling apart while I am gone."

Interim Forward Operating Base
Common Room 2, After Hours

The room was filled with aliens.

A bald, jet-black man in fatigues unrolled a cloth on the floor. Inside was a grooved club and flakes of razor sharp stones. He dipped a flake into a pot of resin, it clung in strings as he lifted it away. He fitted the flake into the club, like a tooth in a jaw.  At the far end was a wiry man: arctic pale and yellow haired. He pulled polished rune stones from a leather bag, they clacked in his hands.

“They would that we fall to command, and stand as nation to be feared.”

The speaker was a small, brown woman with a bowl of straight hair. Bone-handled daggers poked from scabbards tied to her biceps. Sitting across from her at the table was a tall, Mongol-looking woman. She wore a metal headband, side-tassels hung like two bookmarks of steel leaf.  Set over her forehead was a jade stone.

“They would that we serve the Outsiders, as if that would somehow serve ourselves,” said the Mongol without looking up. She picked up the beads from the Mancala board and started placing them. “Sister Enzet, I left my tribe on the Ancestor's promises. This, is not what was spoken of.”

“You think he broke false words with you?"

“I think it is not the task of True People, to fight for Outsiders," she placed a bead. "It is your turn. Play.”

“Sister Yakuta breaks truest words,” said the man gluing flakes.  “Why must we be in this damned place? There are worlds uncounted in this solar system; we should be claiming one for our tribes, and then spread to others. This Oort land that lies ahead: it is all but unbounded. We could fill it with life, and create hunting grounds to rival the Afterlife.”

The man clacking stones paused for a moment.

“These Outsiders, they have vision,” continued the gluer. “Sister Enzet, if you would see us fall to command, then perhaps like vision would set us to purpose. I would that our leaders would show us one.”

“Yet First Company's leader orders different course,” said Yakuta.

“I do not bow to Udmurt. He is old and slow to act. My people would have left him behind, to smoke with other elders while watching children play."

The blonde-bearded man just kept pulling out rune stones.

“No Namor, I meant the Outsider woman, the Security Chief, Al-Mukhtar,” said Yakuta. “We answer to her, Captain Udmurt is but her agent. If she gives command you will set yourself to ordered purpose.”

“I obey the rank, but not the woman,” said Namor.

“Then you are not much of a man.”

“Do you not know what she did, before joining fated expedition?"

“She was a protector,” said Enzet. “She guarded her people's land and water. As any warrior does. As all of us have done.”

“She was a killer,” A flake broke in Namor's hand, cutting red out of his finger. “There were people on that land, in a great desert. True People. Then the Outsiders brought water, and turned ancient sand into a forest, for their pleasure. Then more Outsiders came, and cut the land with fence and road, setting stone into towns, where the gods had permitted none. The True People were without hunting grounds, and fought to take back what was theirs. They were crushed, and forced into camps. That is what our Security Chief did. She even keeps one of their weapons as trophy of false glory. I too, will not follow her.”

“‘Survivability Test for Aboriginal Reboots’, STAR,” said the blonde man closing his hand around one rune. “That is all that we are, a test. We call ourselves the True People, but we existed only in the mind of an Outsider's machine. Now, in an inflated tent but a hundred paces from us, is all we hold precious. People unnumbered, riding, hunting, gathering. Protecting the land, the animals, their ancestors. All the True People, inside a single, Outsider machine.”

 The others said nothing.

“I am not one for lessons and scribing, but let me remind as best I am able, why did the Outsiders build the STAR Device.

“Aboriginal peoples have a bond with the land, its resources. We would preserve the galaxy, not wreck it. The Outsiders are greedy and without number. They burned their world rather than leave it for their children. They are scum, but some look upon mirrors and see their nature, plainly. They wish to see if True Peoples may be spread through space, but also, still survive.”

“Survive against what?” asked Enzet.

“Against all things. Asteroids, climate change, disease.”

“And against other people,” said Yakuta. “Against Outsiders. They say they wish to reboot models of human societies that will preserve worlds, but that is not the deep reason.”

“Oh? What do you think is the deep reason?”

“Their shame, Skar,” said Namor interrupting. “They destroyed them all. Stories of the Australian True People, stories 50,000 years old. The dances of the Asian horse folk. The holy trees of Siberian reindeer hunters. All the True Peoples have died out, or merged with Outsiders. Total destruction. The Outsiders fear: it is their great survival trait. Their rich fear poverty. Their fat fear hunger. Their conquering heroes fear extinction. Now that we are extinct, they can afford the joy of shame at their own handiwork. Now they can recreate us, fix us, to be better this time. They can both forgive themselves, and feel that we somehow owe them something.”

“And Zogu, are we True People, though we come from worlds we cannot touch and smell?”

“Of course we are True!” said Namor. “The Transcendents made us, Zogu, Iklan, Rondi – even you Skars. The Transcendents are the gods.”

Enzet and Yakuta nodded.  

“And how then Namor,” said Sikkur, “did the gods design us?”

“In the false words of the Outsiders?”

“Humor a foolish Skar.”

“In their words, they designed us on the patterns of those before us. Recurring institutions, like medicine men, and young men’s camps. Rituals for harvests, coming of age, and respecting ancestors. They knew enough: the True Peoples were documented, as well as Outsiders could achieve. Those patterns were run, in the STAR Device. Out here, it has been but fifty years of simulation.”

“And in there?”

“A thousand.”

“And what makes them different from the extinct True Peoples of Earth?"

“I am not your student, answering questions for a pat on the head.”

“We are what’s different, Brother Sikkur,” said Enzet.  “We are protectors.”

“But there have always been protectors.”

“But we are chosen to leave our worlds. To live here, in slow time, while all we know grow old and die. We learn rifle, drone, and ship.”

“Then you can see,” said Sikkur, “why we must go on this mission. Why we must obey Al-Mukhtar, as if she was chief.”

“I will not,” said Namor.

“We are here as the first serious test, of the STAR program. If we cannot both work together, and work with the Outsiders, then we cannot function in their world. What chances then do our people’s have? What chances when Outsiders arrive, carrying beads and tainted blankets?”

Namor said nothing.

“Our actions are the true test. We are being judged by Outsiders, with every step.”

“I will not live my life to please them,” said Yakuta.

“Don’t. Live your life, to prove it can be lived. In all our peoples’ history, we are the only protectors that will matter. The Outsiders are like a great river. If we hide in the dirt or charge it, we drown. But if we build canoes and nets, we can feed the whole village. That is how we will protect our children, and honor our ancestors.  That is why we must do this.”

The room turned quiet again.

“Brother Namor asked worthy question before conversation took turn," said Yakuta. "The STAR Device is coming with us, out of the solar system. Yet, why build new devices under foreign suns, and print out tribes to walk alien soils? This solar system is rich in worlds and sunlight. If there was faith in STAR, they would not be ejecting it. We are an honest attempt, but none expect word of our success. Our peoples will live, but they’re meant to hide. Away from the hedrons, where maybe no one will ever come. We would spread to worlds the greedy will never want.”

“You do not know greedy people,” said Sikkur. “Udmurt has spoken to me of them. They sound as sick as the possessed. They will come, and they will take, even if their own children starve. Life gives us nothing and we must fight like dogs to keep it.”

He opened his palm and showed the room the rune.

This is Fehu, a rune of magic.”

“I have not seen you with this before,” said Namor, leaning to take a closer look.

“It is not of my folk, it belongs to one of the lost True Peoples, the Norse. The Christian tribe destroyed them. I have cast the Norse runes for the advice of the gods. This was their answer," he tossed it to the Namor.

Namor held the rune up to the light. “What does it mean?”  

“Power. The power to win what is desired, and the power to then keep it. The gods have spoken. We will fight, whether it be Outsiders, or their enemies. We will fight like dogs. But we will do it together.”

3 hours later, 203 kilometers West  

"Captain Udmurt, we are coming up on the landing site, sir."

Udmurt leaned forward in his chair against the buckle straps. Through the hydrocarbon haze, he fancied he could see a patch that was darker than the rest.

Alongside him was the pilot, a man with a beard so large it spilled out of his oxygen mask. He was meshed in by status holograms and radar displays.

Behind him was a walkway leading down the spine of the heavy lifter. Studded along the spine were four ball turrets, at each sat a controller.

"Can you believe that this is the land of the gods?" asked one of the gunners in Bashir. "How can it be so? This is a dark and freezing underworld. You cannot even see the sun."

"Maybe they are demons and not gods." Another Bashir gunner looked up from his controls. "But I do not think there is a difference between either. I hope we are not here for long. I look forward to returning to my freezer and waking under a new sun."

"Stop talking in your own language, and attend to your task," said a third gunner who wore a sergeant's patch. He was lighter skinned.

"Ignore the fucking Zogu," said the first. "He is no one to command us."

"The Captain sits but a shout away."

"None of them were punished over the mess hall. The Captain is weak."

"I said shut up!" yelled the Zogu.

Udmurt turned around in his seat. "What is going- "

"I see the lander," said the pilot. "Distance: 312 meters, bearing: Green 047."

"Very good," Udmurt turned back. "Take us in to land beside it."

"Yes sir," said the pilot. Then he frowned and leaned forward, looking up through the cockpit glass, and then back down to his displays. "Captain, there are structures near the dropship."

"Structures?" Udmurt raised an eyebrow.

"That's all I can make out. Metal structures, and active electrical systems."

The radio sparked into life, "Unidentified flier, you are trespassing in the Posthuman Ecological Zone. You will land at the coordinates we are sending you now, and you will stand by for detention."

The radar warning receiver began crackling loudly.

"We are being targeted," said the pilot.

"Safeties off," said the Zogu sargeant. "Rotate bearing Green 047."

"If they have radar, then they have missiles." said the first Bashir.  "If they fires at this range, we won't have time to know what killed us."

"Can you acquire their radar?" said the second.

"I said knock that off!"

"I can. Try and see if you can locate a missile battery. If I find the radar, it will likely be right next to it."I am acquiring the enemy radar,"

"This is a cargo flyer from a peaceful scientific expedition. My name is Captain Udmurt. May I know to whom I am speaking?"

"This is Colonel Jacobs of the Advanced Hazard Response Authority. I am in command here. Will you comply with my instructions?"

"I found the radar," said the first Bashir. "Here are the coordinates."

"Colonel, I was not aware that we have broken any international or domestic laws. No state has made any claim to the Posthuman Ecological Zone, so I do not see how your organization has jurisdiction to advise us. Can you explain to me how you have any authority to detain us, or to seize our supply ship?"

"Have you found the missile battery?"

"I think so."

"Captain this is not a discussion. I will not tell you again. Set your vessel down at these coordinates, or you will face the consequences."

"The radar has locked on!" said the pilot.

"Gunners hold fire!" said the sergeant.

"We take them out, now!"

"He said 'hold fire'!"

"Fuck the Zogu, shoot!"

Two ball turrets opened up, firing 60 depleted Uranium rounds a second. Tracers left burning lines in the sky, out of the smog came flashes.

"By the gods!" Udmurt look behind him. "Which bastards fired?"

"Bashir filth!" The sergeant unbuckled and pulled out his pistol. "You will fall to command!"

"Missile launched!" The pilot pulled hard on his controls and everyone was squashed back into their seats. The sergeant was thrown loose, tumbling down the walkway. Udmurt's vision lost color: his helmet closed automatically.  

"We," he began, the world sitting on his chest, "We have to - "

And then the missile struck.

Udmurt opened his eye.

The other remained shut, he tugged at it, his eyelid feeling like it would tear, then it finally opened through the clotted blood. He opened his mouth and spat blood, it froze against his helmet. His tongue was swollen: he had bitten it.

The pilot was in front of him now, his seat torn free and wedged through the broken canopy. Glass daggers poked through his face and chest. The body was covered in brown hydrocarbon sand.

He looked down, a metal bar was pinning his arm into his seat. He tried to move his arm and electric, white hot pain shot through it. He gritted his teeth, and with the other gloved hand, he pushed the bar off. He looked down again: his suit arm was not punctured, but was crushed. The aching pain in his arm returned.

All around, the air had frozen out in snowdrifts on panels and against the walls. He looked behind him: the rest of the flyer was missing. Metal and diamond bars poked out where the spine had been. Beyond, all he could see was the carved wake of the crashed forward section, in the hydrocarbon sands. He could see no ice: it had been a soft landing.

He removed his seatbelt, and tore it out of its fixture. The pain was starting to dull again in his arm: painkillers automatically released by performance glands grafted to his heart. He made a sling out of the seatbelt, and with curses as nurses, he eased it on.

He reached under the seat and pulled out the survival bag. Inside, he found rations for eight days, a self inflating tent with a compressed air tank, and a pair of high-capacity fuel cells. At the very bottom he found a pair of strap on wings - jumping off tall boulders in the thick atmosphere and ultra low gravity, the user could fly a kilometer in a bound.

But not a bird with a broken wing.

He threw away the wings, slung the bag over his shoulder, and climbed out of the wreckage. Planet 9 was out, a ball of storms and ices, tied together by lightning storms. He turned on his radio, but all he could hear was the static of 9's magnetic field.

Below his boots, the hydrocarbon sand was turning to mush. He stepped out of it, leaving wet prints. If he stayed still long enough on the sand, it would liquefy and he would sink underneath, in quicksand by his own waste heat. He had to get to water ice. Unbreakable, unmelting, ultra cold, water ice.

He reached for his holster: but he had not worn it. He looked about - he saw a metal bar that looked promising, he worked it loose till he had himself a spear.

With spear, pack, and sling, he walked back into the Posthuman Ecological Zone.

Jace Sheperd, I

3rd Moon, “Urvashi”, 2327 AD

“You have a design? That’s too bad. We fishermen design our own spaceships. We don’t go to sea for someone else’s plans.”

Outside the bar, stretched the icelands. Methane was raining: dissolved tholins oiled the ground in red stains and slicks. Streams cut their way to the sea on the horizon – where there were more hydrocarbons than humanity ever burned. Peeping out of the sea was the rim of a volcano’s caldera. Blue fog lights lit just one end, where the cryogeologists were camped. Rising water magma had swallowed all the other lights (and careless researchers).

"That’s bullshit,” said a woman at the next table. Her eyes glowed blue, her neuro-opticals leaking through. Her jacket had license patches from a dozen worlds. “Anyone can be a fisherman. You lifers run your mouths like you’re special, but that’s just ‘cause no one has called you on your small town, small guild, bullshit.”

The fisherman looked at her, grappler limbs unfolding from his shoulders like scorpion tails. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. You’re just in the right place at the right time. If I drew up a sail ship, and dropped the plans in the sea, I'd put all you motherlovers out of business. All I need to know, is where to do it.”

The kevlar space elevator was anchored deep inside the cliff top. The village pooled out, and the bar got the best view, overlooking the icelands. Outside the window, a street-sweeper drone sucked air through a pipe, wrapped in heating coils. Still cold enough to flash freeze water, it boiled off the day’s CO2 snow like a flamethrower. It revealed the black, insulating, smart ground the whole village was built on. The drone unplugged from the wall and replugged into the ground, and moved along.  

The Traveler pulled off her glove and pressed her palm to the window. The glass was heated, like touching a warm cup of tea. If a heated window failed, it went frosty. Frosty windows meant death.

“Wow. I never thought I’d hear a captain admit not knowing something,” shot back the fisherman. “And you still found a way to make it sound like you know everything. Fucking captains! Travel in deep space, think your shit’s made of platinum. Travel in ships we designed. Yes, you don’t know where to drop the designs. That takes years at sea, following the Transcendents and making charts of their patterns. Any shit-muncher can design a spaceship, but not everyone can get them built. That takes a fisherman. A fisherman!”

The other fishermen in the bar began clapping, there were a couple of cheers. The other captains rolled their eyes and sipped their drinks from straws.

“That’s why we’ve come to you,” said the man sitting across the fisherman. Leaning forward, his  eyes too, had the glow. He wore his licenses on a chain like they were dog tags. A constellation tattooed his cheek, it changed every few seconds. The Traveler sat beside him, a gloss black box on his lap. A green status light was all it showed the world.

“We need your help Kasper, making a ship.”

“I told you,” he shook his head, “I don’t do other people’s designs.”

“Think of it as a commission.”

“To be a ferryman. We’re artists, Gavrilla. We sell paintings, we don’t rent out our studios. And if we did, we’d charge the same fee anyway, for the hassle.”

“Then let’s go with the same fee.”

The bar hushed.

“Seriously,” said the captain.  “We’re commissioning you. Full fee. Just get us out there.”

“Hey, if you want to throw away money, I’ll take it,” Kasper shrugged. “I can take you to Vayu, my drones have sightings of his tells. He has a sense of humor, he might grow your design just to see what it does.”

“No,” the Traveler spoke, turning from the window.

“No? She speaks at last.”

“I need a specific Transcendent. I need the one they call Nagaraja.”

Some people laughed. Kasper frowned.

“No, no you don’t. The Naga Raja doesn’t accept designs. Not just from visitors, he won’t take ours either.”

“It never has,” said a fisherman from another table.

“Then what does it make?” asked Gavrilla.

“Its own. It launches near the far shore usually, where no one goes.”

“The ships are big,” said the second fisherman. “Much bigger than anything we get built. Nothing commercially viable about them.”

“I’ve never come across one of these,” said Gavrilla.

“That’s because no one has.” Kasper turned back to the Traveler. “You’re wasting your time with him. I’ll get you to Vayu, he’s your best bet.”

“Sorry, it must be the Naga Raja.”

“Well I can’t take you then.”

“Do you know someone who knows where it is?”

“We all know where it is, Madam. We make sure we avoid it.”

“Avoid it?” Gavrilla’s tattoo changed to an alien constellation. “What, is it grumpy?”

“You can call it that. Some fisherman have tried to make contact. They didn’t come back.  The Naga Raja wants to be left alone.”

“I was specifically instructed to give him the design. It can’t be another.”

“Then I can’t help you.” Kasper shrugged.

“I’ll do it,” a man got up from a table at the far end of the bar. He was bare chested, his skin blue as a hindu god’s from a mural. He wore belts of sparkling gas giant diamonds, each one trapping a supercomputer.  He had Rasputin’s beard. “I’ll take you to the Naga Raja, for double the fee.”

Gavrilla looked to the Traveler. The Traveler nodded.

“Done,” said Gavrilla.

“And one more thing.”

“What?”

“That box,” he pointed as he walked towards them. “What’s so special about it? You have kept it  close since the moment you walked in.”

“It is – important. It goes with the design.”

“It’s not part of the design. What is it?”

The Traveler said nothing.

“If you’re going to be bringing that on my boat, I need to know what it is.”

“That’s not your business Fisherman,” said Gavrilla.

“No, no, it’s alright,” said the Traveler putting her arm on Gavrilla’s. “That’s fair. May I know your name, sir?”

“Prenton.”

“Prenton, what I’m carrying here,” she lifted it up for the room to see, “Is a wormhole.”  

Azima Al-Mukhtar, II

Beam Rider ship, Ramanujan, edge of Planet 9 System

“Mingxia, how does it feel to be alive, for the first time in two and a half centuries?”

The woman across the table smiled and laughed. She looked in her twenties, her skin red raw where wires and implant ports had been fitted. She wore clothing appropriate to her period, her hair was long and straight, like the star of a Chinese historical epic.

“It feels great,” she smiled with perfect teeth. “Two hundred and sixty-six years to be precise.”

“Of course.” The woman interviewing her had data ports in her head and neck. One eye had been replaced with a black, all-wavelengths, sphere. Her arms had seam lines that glowed blue, on her shoulders were two hard points. From one, like a pirate’s parrot, a red laser pod (discretely) scanned the newborn.

“The euphoria will wear off in a few days,” said the interviewer. “It’s a programmed setting, takes the edge of re-birth. But – that might be more challenging, than normal. It’s highly unusual for someone to go so long, before being reborn.”

Mingxia laughed, and took in her own reflection in her mug. “I’m not worried about that, Azima. The world is so much more interesting now than it ever was then.”

The world, thought Azima. The.

“First, a little update. Captain Sheperd reports that she has been successful, and the primary mission vessel is being constructed. The archaeologist we came to collect, and his – his co-worker, have accepted the invitation, and are en route. They should be docking in about a day.”

“Great! So when do I start work?”

Azima smiled thinly. “After I give you a clean bill of health. That’s why I asked if we could meet here in the galley. It's routine after a rebirth to do an audit, just to make sure everything was ‘connected’ right. Installing a person in a body is still a major procedure. In your case, the engram data was extremely old. We might have lost data in the conversion to modern formats. There’s also information that wasn’t recorded back then; that’s needed for the procedure. We’ve had to work around that.”

“So you’re going to hit my knee with a hammer?”

Azima stared at her blankly. “I’d like to ask you some questions. Is that alright?”

Mingxia nodded. “I give my consent, if that’s what you mean.”

“Yes. But I’m also the mission’s security officer. I was hoping to double up and have a chat with you. Give you a chance to ask me any questions, too.”

“You want to know who this strange freak is, who just got born three days ago? That’s fine.”

“Thank you.”

“I’m going first, though. Is that a sword in your cabin?”

“It is,” Azima smiled. “It’s called a Takoba. I took it from a Berber.”

“A Berber? From Earth? He just gave it to you?”

“Yes, in a nation state called Libya, if you know it. And no, I killed him.”

Mingxia’s eyes went wide.

“He was raiding a pipeline it was my duty to protect.”

“Oil?”

“Water. Pumped from the Mediterranean, to the Saharan forests.”

“Saharan forests.”

“A lot has changed since you died.”

“And yet, you still have Berber tribesmen wandering around with swords.”

“Earth is an old place Mingxia, full of holdouts. The Sahara changed, and so did its people. Their ancestors wouldn’t recognize them, but in essence nothing about them changed. You will find people today, as impressive as they were in your time.”

“You don’t sound impressed.”

“No. No I suppose I don’t.”

Mingxia finished her coffee. Azima’s was untouched.

“The conditions for your rebirth were very specific. It had to be on a mission to within ten light years of Sol.”

“That’s correct.”

“Typically people left no conditions, or made them as broad as possible.”

“I didn’t want to be alive for the sake of being alive, I guess.”

“You guess?”

Mingxia looked at the wall for an answer.

“I don’t know. I can’t remember why I picked those conditions. But I’m quite happy I did.”

“You have a background in gene therapy and germ-line engineering.”

“That’s right. I worked on congenital diseases in children.”

“So why does a pediatric genetic engineer decide to become a space explorer? Which, based on what’s listed in your engram records, you trained for, right before your untimely death.”

“I don’t know,” Mingxia frowned, “But I know that it’s all I want to do. I have no interest in children’s medicine anymore. At all.”

“Don’t you think that’s a bit strange? To have lost the motivation that drove your career, to be replaced with a drive to study life beyond Sol?”

“Yes,” she nodded slowly. “But – It feels the most natural thing in the world for me.”

In the world.

"I'd like to ask a question of you, now."

"Of course," Azima smiled thinly.

"All those people who left yesterday, for Urvashi - they were security?"

"Yes."

"And they're coming with us?"

"Indeed. Don't worry, they're very disciplined. Untried as a unit, but they'll do fine."

"I counted 97. Is that correct?"

Azima paused. "Yes. And with the ones already on Urvashi, 120. You should see the gear they sent ahead."

"They’re an infantry company! Why so many? How can you justify the fantastic fuel cost they'll incur? You planning to fight a small space war?"

Azima smiled like a murderer just given the house keys. " Firstly, fuel is not as much a concern as you might think - Captain Sheperd can explain it better. And yes, we are prepared for a small war. We don't know what's out there, Mingxia. Most of the colonies never reported back. We want to be sure, that we do. The fail-rate is high enough that the precaution is warranted."

"Yes, but how could they message back? They would need a ship to broadcast from their sun’s gravitational focal point. Otherwise, their sun's glare just drowns the transmission out. That takes a deep space program: how do a few hundred people, manage that? You people expect results far too soon. I remember when some of these missions were leaving. It was understood we may not hear back, for centuries."

"Even so, we would have detected even weak or obscured signals by now. We have the technology, and it's not been for a lack of trying. This entire mission is because we've given up listening. Instead, we're going to go look."

"And you think a big bunch of soldiers is going to help with - whatever it is that may be the problem?"

"I like to be prepared."

"Then why not just build military robots and ships, on site?"

"There are laws about that sort of thing. Also, the STARs are part of a bigger picture."

"Stars?"

"It's better if I let one of them explain it. It's quite ambitious, really."

"Uh huh."

 “So you died quite suddenly, you were just 45.”

“It’s nice to be 20 again.”

“It was a very – comprehensive death. Your body was incinerated, the heat even destroyed your cortical backup. Do you have any suspicion that there was foul play involved?”

“I don’t think so.”

“You don’t think so?”

“No. There was no foul play. It was just an accident. It was just an accident.”

“Let’s change gears a bit. Do you understand your rebirth contract?”

“Yes.”

“Can you explain it to me in your own words?”

“Basically, the expedition sponsor has bought the rights to revive and employ me as the mission biologist, until the point I withdraw this consent. Thereafter, all rights revert back to me.”

“That is correct. Before you died, how long did you guess it would be before missions like the one you requested, would begin?”

“Fifty years,” she said without hesitation.

“Do you know why it has taken almost three hundred?”

“That thing that was found on Ganymede - what did you call them, nexus gates? Wormholes?”

“Hedrons. We call them hedrons.”

“It was found shortly after I died. No one has been visiting nearby stars, because they’ve been traveling through the hedron wormhole network instead, to distant stars. So, no one could meet my conditions. After a while, no one needed to. Who wants an old biologist around? I think a good question is why the Transcendent sponsoring this mission, chose me.”

“Do you feel like you’ve been cheated out of an age of exploration?”

“No. But I feel like a lot of time has been wasted. I know many people still left the old fashioned way, that there are humans all the way out to the Oort.”

“And beyond.”

“And beyond. That’s what interests me. What have they been up to? What life do they study? What are their cultures like?”

 “Where are we now?”

 “The most interesting place in the entire solar system.”

“Indulge me.”

“Planet 9. Its first moon is teeming with life. There’s already been a war fought over it. A bunch of space probes police it, and won’t allow any satellites or landings.”

“Whose probes are they?”

“They’re their own probes – second generation, sentient machines sent by the ones that colonized Saturn. They were part of a program named Pytheas. The Planet 9 mission is Pytheas Three.”  

“And what does Pytheas Three publish about the moon?”

“Nothing,” she raised her voice. “Absolutely fucking nothing! They won’t even tell Saturn what they’re discovering. They have a world full of life, that they’re keeping all to themselves, and they won’t publish. Which is against the entire point of their mission. They’re not protecting the place, by not letting people know what’s down there. All we know is what the Hindu settlers found, before they were repelled.”

“You seem quite caught up on the topic.”

“Like I said, this is the most interesting place in the solar system.”

“And you still want to be on this mission? You can quit, without obligation, at any time.”

“I want to be on this mission, more than anything else.”

“Why?”

Mingxia paused. “I don’t know. That’s missing.”

“I’m sure it will come back.”

“Have I passed the audit?”

“You have odd memory gaps, but nothing that I think is a concern to the mission. But it wasn’t an accident, Mingxia. And I think you know that.”

Mingxia said nothing.

“Do you know why you killed yourself?”

“We don’t know that’s what happened,” she scowled.

“We need to know that we can trust you, Mingxia.”

“Everything I have said is true. What’s missing is missing. And I’d rather not be held to ransom to personal baggage I don’t even remember. I don’t know why I’m here, but I know I want to be here.” She got up. “Is there anything else? I have work to do.”

“That’s fine. Welcome to the team.”

“Thank you. I’m precisely where I want to be.”

“Oh, I’m quite certain you are.”

“Welcome aboard,” said the woman. “I’m Azima Al-Mukhtar, Security Officer.”

“Doctor James Hernandez,” he held out his hand.

“Spencer, Ape.”

The airlock was dim and cramped. Ultra-low powered displays showed temperature, pressure, radiation. Their breath steamed and Spencer blew on his fingers. He grinned at the speaker, his teeth like black thumbs.  Azima waved in front of the airlock door – but nothing happened.

“Is something wrong?” Jim’s duffelbags floated behind him.

She frowned, and then waved her hand again, more deliberately.

“Door, open.”

Nothing.

There was a thudding noise from further away in the ship.

“What was that?” asked Jim.

“Something undocking?”

“No,” Azima said perhaps more to herself. “She wouldn’t.”

“Who wouldn’t?”

“Mingxia, this is Azima, we’re stuck in the airlock. Can you get it open on your end? Mingxia? Mingxia do you copy?”

The view port blazed: they winced and covered their eyes. Fingers parted and eyes peeked. By then it was halfway across the sky, and dimmed into a bright moon.

“Oh you bitch!”

Spencer and Jim became very quiet. Azima tore open a side panel, revealing optical circuits and ports. She pulled a wire from her wrist, and jacked in.

“I’m guessing the person who locked us in here, is the same person who just took off in a ship,” said Jim quietly.

“Security officer, huh?” Spencer grinned.

The airlock status lights greened, and the hatch opened. Azima didn’t move: a hologram appeared, a grainy black and white, radar composite. It showed a plug-like vessel, a lander.

“Mingxia, this is Azima, I know you can hear this. I see what trajectory you’re on, and I won’t allow it. You will bring back that lander, or you will face the consequences.”

“What trajectory?” asked Jim.

“What consequences?” asked Spencer.

No answers to either.

“Arm defenses.”

The hallway and airlock lights turned to red. A yellow sign flashed over an emergency oxygen closet. The radar hologram was overlaid with range, speed, and grid coordinates. A targeting reticule formed over the shrinking lander.

“Holy shit,” Jim whispered.

“Sweet!” Spencer pumped his arms.

FIRE Y/N?

Azima stared at the words. Instants turned to epochs.

“Disarm defenses.”

The targeting info disappeared and the lights went back to normal.

“Your ship,” she turned and regarded them, the wire snaking back into her wrist. “Does it need refueling?”

“We’re down to half a tank,” said Jim. “Enough to putter around the system for weeks - but not chase someone.”

“She took the last lander, didn’t she?” asked Spencer. “Without our boat, you can’t catch her.”

“She did. Your boat can land, right?”

“Anywhere in the solar system,” said Jim.

“I need to borrow your ship.”

“No,” said Spencer. “Whatever she’s doing is your problem, not ours. I know that isn’t a team attitude, but we just got here! You’re not even the person we’re here to work for. Where is Jace Sheperd?”

“This is happening. You can come if you want; I think you’ll want to.”

“Do you understand words?” Spencer bared his teeth.

Jim stepped between them, “Why, where is she going?”

“The interdicted first moon. Do you have friends out here? I don’t think you want them paying the price for her breaking the travel ban.”

Udmurt, III

"Urvashi”, 2327 AD, Posthuman Ecological Zone

Udmurt limped his way through the brown sand. It hissed at his sinking boots, hydrocarbon slush pooling in his footprints. It clung like syrup, each step feeling harder.

Screens flashed red inside his helmet, telling him over and over about damage to his insulation, air recycling, and his own body. He had given up closing them: they just kept restarting.

"Base, this is Udmurt," he said into his radio. "Base come in, this is Udmurt over. Is anyone receiving?"

All he heard was static: Planet 9's magnetosphere was too strong for his suit radio to compete with. He looked up at the ice giant: he saw a star fade and reappear as one of the moons occulted past.

"Come in Base, over."

He felt his leg muscles cramping up, the tendons telling him no. His broken arm was ice cold: he could not tell if that was a good or a bad thing. He wasn't sure he cared.

"Base, how copy? This is Udmurt, I am 32 kilometers from the heavy lifter crash site, bearing 067 red. I am the only survivor, over."

He stopped for a moment, resting against his metal spear. All around him were brown, gradual, identical hills: sand dunes grown titanic in the low gravity. From horizon to horizon, they were all that he could see.

He felt himself sinking. He pulled himself out of his puddle, and started walking again.

"Pick up the pace you lazy one," the man wore only stitched-together furs against the cold, water ice clung to his ragged brown hair and beard. Over his back was a brace of bone-tipped javelins. "Or you will go to bed hungry and alone."

"You're not truly here, Chukchi," Udmurt eyed the man warily. "You're not truly anywhere."

"Come on," the hunter put his hand behind Udmurt's back and pushed him along. "If you are slow, I will have to make journey without trusted spear at my side. You spent too long eating like a greedy dog, and listening to Nana's stories."

"It was a place just like this, was it not? That night you went out, on your own. All for just an ice trout to impress that girl, Ilya."

The hunter took point, poking the snow-sand ahead of him with his spear. "That's it, don't worry about the pain. You can feel sorry for yourself later, and we can drink fermented horse milk by a fire. We can tell lies about how great our trek was, and what terrible monsters pressed battle upon us. Maybe say the Trickster appeared in the form of walking snake, while we sheltered out the storm, and gave us a puzzle to solve or he would eat our heads."

"All you had to do was wait, Chuckhi. I would have gone with you. You would have come back. All you had to do was wait."

The hunter looked at him like a teacher with a disappointing student. "Always so slow and careful, Udmurt. Everything must be just so with you, or you would not act even if your own back was on fire. No chances, no surprises. Scout first, check the wind, then the entrails. Like a man who spends all winter, planning for next winter. Always boring. Always late."

"I looked for you Brother, after the storm. I looked for you every day. And then when the snow went, I looked in the streams and in the bogs so that I could bring you back to your weeping mother, before the worm wolves found you."

"But you did not find me. You were too late, like you always are. We were supposed to go together, Udmurt. Always too slow, like a Mountain Bear who was forgotten how to run."

The hunter began to pull ahead.

"Wait," Udmurt stumbled, trying to keep up. "Do not go, you will not come back."

"Learn to run, Mountain Bear. Look for me between the two black hills, in the valley of the sparkling stones," Chuchki said over his shoulder. "Find me before the ice melts. Learn to run, before the storm."

"Wait!" Udmurt lunged and fell, low gravity skipping him over the sand like a sea shell across the waves. When he came to rest and looked up, the hunter was gone.

In the distance right where he had been walking, were two, black, hills.

Udmurt held out his hand. A red snowflake landed in his glove, melting instantly into liquid tholins. He looked about: the air was filling with descending red.

His boots crunched over hard rock: water ice gravel, rounded and sparkling. There had been a glacier here once, cutting a valley between the two, black, hills. Methane flashfloods at Planet 9's perihelion every 20,000 years, had crumbled it into a sinking riverbed. In another billion years it would be gone.

Falling around him, the snow was becoming heavier. He looked up at a red black cloud that was overtaking the entire sky.

"Base, in the least chance by the gods’ whims, that you are receiving me from inside this valley – I need a weather report."

He looked at the footprints he was leaving in the slowly piling red. He did not really need a weather report to know the impending signs of a blizzard.

His suit losing heat through conduction in the thick atmosphere, was one thing. Getting buried under meters of snow was another. The weight wasn't a problem: a ton wasn't a unit of mass in microgravity, but of inconvenience. The closely packed snow would leech heat out of his suit faster than it could warm him. If he stopped and fell asleep, he would freeze to death in more than his dreams.

He looked at the time display: he had been awake and moving for over 40 hours now.

He pushed himself forward, his knees and feet burning. The butt of his spear was stained with hydrocarbons. He looked from side to side: he could see no safe caves in which to weather the storm.

He frowned suddenly, head craning forward like a dog with a scent. What was that?

Coming towards him down the ice gravel riverbed, was a figure in a power suit. It was 10 feet tall, and carried a long black staff with a pulsing blue light on top.

"Ancestor?"

The figure stopped and stood in the middle of the riverbed. Udmurt found new energy, and lunar hopped towards him.

"Ancestor, how are you out here? Are you alone? Are you in need of aid?"

The power armor turned its back and began walking out of the riverbed and towards one of the black hills.

"That is just a sand dune," said Udmurt. "We’ll find no shelter there. We have to get out of the storm, I beg you, time is not in abundance.”  

The red snow was falling more heavily now, like someone had taken a massacre up into the sky, and wrung it out.

The power armor ignored him and kept moving towards the black hill. When it reached the edge of the riverbed it stepped out - onto hard surface. It climbed up the hill several steps and turned back to look at Udmurt.

"I'm coming," and Udmurt followed.

When he reached the hillside, the power armor was already a good hundred meters ahead of him, climbing up like some freakish, jumping, mountain goat. Underneath Udmurt the ground was hard, jet black like graphite. It crumbled if he pushed into it too hard.

"Where are the others? Do they know you are out here? What are you doing out here? There is no one else: only I survived."

The power suit stopped, and turned around to face him again. Then, it disappeared into the hillside. When Udmurt caught up, he saw a tall cave opening. He stepped inside and shined his suit lights around - the cave led upwards into a chamber. The ancestor had already stepped inside it.

"This looks like a lava tube – or a dragon's lair," said Udmurt, entering. The chamber was a cavern, high as a cathedral and twice as wide.  Under-foot the ground gleamed: water ice. The entire floor of the vault was a frozen pool. Udmurt walked to the very center of its insulating mass, and threw down his survival bag. He pulled out a plastic, folded block, attached the compressed air tank, and put them down on the ice. A status light lit red and the block began to expand, unfolding into a tent. An LED bulb shined brightly out of its viewports, and the red status light turned green.

"Ancestor?" He looked around. There was no sign of the power suit. "Ancestor?" He asked louder, as if the suit radio cared.

He shrugged, and cycled the airlock to the tent. He crawled inside and removed his helmet. The heated air was bitter cold, condensation froze on his beard and skin. He tore open a ration bar and devoured it, eating the crumbs off the wrapper.

"Ancestor, there is no point in being outside. We may as well wait out the storm now. Hopefully, it will only be a few hours." He lay back, propping his head on the pack. "You should come in here and get some sleep. Ancestor? You should - you should - " and he fell asleep.

"Sleeping while good men and women do honest labor?"

Udmurt opened his eyes. A helmet was against the viewport, shining its light in and grinning.

"Rudao!" He jerked up, and quickly grabbed for his helmet. He looked at the chronometer: he had been asleep for 13 hours.

"Are you injured? We have a stretcher and a medevac team."

"Why did you wait so long?" He snapped the helmet seals in place. The temperature and flavor of the air changed.

Rudao frowned. "Wait? We have been looking for your ungrateful person, for days."

"Did you not come with the Ancestor?" He cycled the airlock and climbed out.

"The Ancestor? No. The ancient one has not left the base."

"Yes he has. He is out here, somewhere. He led me to this place."

"I did not come here to bear false words, Captain. Many have been searching for you, but the Ancestor was not one of them."

"Then how did you find me if not by his signal for aid?"

"By your own signal. You sent many radio messages. When they stopped we feared the storm had overcome you, but we resumed search after it passed. We knew that you were somewhere in this valley. We detected your waste heat."

"I do not understand."

"Perhaps there is nothing to understand. You have survived misfortune most terrible, great trek unplanned, and most deadly storm."

"My mind did not create phantoms to aid in lonely journey."

Rudao shrugged. "Maybe it did not. This is the Posthuman Ecological Zone. A place those born of this world dare not to enter, and tell their children the same terrible tales of it, that they were told. This is a world chosen by the gods, and here one finds their lairs. Who knows what you saw?"

The two men said nothing for a moment.

"Come," beckoned Rudao. "Let us leave this place."

The two men walked across the frozen cave pond, and climbed down the tunnel to the entrance. Udmurt looked down, and saw the indents made by boots in the carbon.

"What's that?" He bent down and pointed.

"What's what?" asked Rudao.

"These tracks here. They look like they had been made by sharpened points."

Rudao crouched down, his helmet light joined Udmurt's.

"I did not make those."

"Then who?"

"Come," Rudao stood up. "Let us be gone before we find what did."

"It saved me."

"We are trespassing, Udmurt. Trespassing in a dragon’s lair."

Jace Sheperd, II

3rd Moon, “Urvashi”

The boat sailed a methane ocean.

Graphene kite sails pulled it forward, riding strong, Nitrogen winds. Urvashi was close enough to the ice giant that tidal stress and infra-red heating kept its atmosphere from freezing, year-round. The gift of wind energy was never to be squandered – even here, one saw the mark of one of Humanity’s hardest lessons.

The diamond hull slit through the waves, methane foamed and grew into kilometer-long wakes. A weather satellite noticed them, and then flashed down a warning. Unreplied, it sent another, rated urgent. It waited a while before giving up, and then went about its business.

“There,” Jace Sheperd stood on the deck and pointed ahead. “Prenton, what’s that?”

The line of her finger ended at a flashing spark in the sky. A bright, white, flash seeped over the horizon.

“That would be the Big Game Hunter,” said the Fisherman. He sat cross legged, shelled in by holograms. "I heard it was visiting near Stillwater again.”

“Stillwater?”

“Small town, Too close to the Posthuman Ecological Zone. Runs into all kinds of trouble every couple of years. They pay penalty taxes for it.”

“What kind of trouble?”

“The Transcendents colonized this world first,” He looked out over the methane waves. “They never meant for us to follow them out here. That's how Ironfield happened."

"Ironfield?"

He stared at her, as if she'd asked who this Hitler chap was and what had he done.

"Ironfield was a mining town, one of the first on Urvashi. It was before we knew much about this place. They disturbed something, it took over the town. Changed them."

"The people?"

"If you can still call them that. They don't talk: they do machine code bursts instead, by sound or radio. They're highly aggressive, and if they take you prisoner - you become one of them."

"Sounds like a homogenizing swarm. Why haven't you destroyed them?"

"We're not sure they're homogenizing. They seem to have character, they argue, even squabble. Evidence suggests they’re a posthuman species. As long as they stay within the Zone, which they do, there's no reason for trouble."

"So a Transcendent did that to them?"

"No, just something from their larger ecology. Like how in old times, wherever humans settled, you found cockroaches. Turns out Transcendents have their own cockroaches.”

“If it’s dangerous, why do people live near the Zone?”

“It doesn't make a difference really, this whole world is dangerous. We just shouldn’t be here. Settlements and camps near the zones just have to deal with the hazards, first. But they know what they're doing.”

“What are they doing?”

“Technology mining. They go out looking for the smaller cockroaches, bring them back, reverse engineer them. They’re prospecting the garbage of a more advanced culture. It’s good money.”

Ahead of them, Something was glowing below.

“There,” Jace Sheperd stood on the deck and pointed ahead. “What’s that glowing area? The methane is in some commotion, too.”

Gavrilla, the beam rider captain, frowned. “It’s coming this way.”  he looked to the Fisherman. “Prenton, it’s big.”  

“It’s fine,” Prenton tapped between then, and a radar feed appeared. “That’s just the local fauna, fleeing.”

“Fauna?” Gavrilla’s eye glowed brighter. “There’s no native life here.”

“Fleeing?” asked Jace. The two power armor guards looked at each other, and unclipped their rail rifles.

“It’s native now,” said Prenton. “Yes, fleeing. The Naga Raja is near.”

The commotion in the waves grew a kilometer wide, and was coming right at the boat.  They saw manta rays launching, climbing and circling like sea gulls before gliding back. Ship-sized sharks glowed like street lamps, they passed under the boat in schools. A tiny manta landed on the deck, and began thrashing. Jace got down before it, pinning it in her helmet beams.  Its graphene wings were transparent, its tiny mouth parts still-growing diamonds. Blue mottles glowed on its skin, they became brighter when he touched them.

She threw the baby ray back into the methane. It sped ahead past the boat, and shot into the sky again.

“How did these get here?” Gavrilla asked.

“The Transcendents,” said Prenton. “They don’t just make ships. Urvashi is an artist’s workshop for them, they create all kinds of systems. Once we had water icebergs drifting down from the polar ocean, with Nitrogen-filled float caverns. One of them is a port now. We’ve detected deep sea reefs on radar, built by crab colonies – we’re establishing peaceful contact with them, so we can trade for metals. No cryo whales anymore, though.”

“What happened to the cryo whales?” asked Jace.  

“They started preying on the Transcendents.”

The fleeing schools passed them and swam to the horizon. Planet 9 was out, it warmed but did not light. It was sea-to-horizon in all directions.

“We’re far enough now,” said Prenton. “No point sailing up its nose.”

“What now?” asked Gavrilla.

“I’m transmitting your client’s ship plans into the sea.”

“You have a fix on the Transcendent?”

“No. I’m broadcasting it. It’ll hear.”

“How can you be sure?”

“Because it’s a god.”

They were wordless for a while. Then Prenton seemed to relax.

“There,” he got up, “It’s done.”

“What now?” Jace was peering over the edge of the boat.

“Now we wait. Indefinitely. Hours. Minutes. Days. I can’t say. If he’s interested, we’ll find out. If he’s not, then we’ll leave once you’re bored.”

“That’s a bit uselessly passive,” Gavrilla frowned.

“This is their world beam rider, not ours.”

Advanced digital beings, they waited as best they could.  

“This new ship,” Gavrilla leaned over the bow, making ripples with his glove. “It’s not a beam rider, is it?”

“No,” Jace shook her head. “But let’s see if it becomes a ship at all.”

“You can’t beat a beam riding vessel for deep space travel. You have to go fuelless.”

“What’s the furthest and fastest you’ve done, Captain?”

“A light-month. I’ve done the trip to the Inner Oort Cloud, and back.”

“You came back from the Oort? I thought that was where you all captains wanted to go. Billions of worlds. The Cold Frontier.”

“I didn’t like the people; they’re all insects and calculators out there. I couldn’t relate. They have excellent laser stations, and the energy is free. I got pushed up to a tenth the speed of light, on the departure. Took me eleven months, with acceleration changes.”

“Do you know anyone who’s done further?”

“I know a few, but mostly by reputation. There’s a rogue world I hear, three light-months away. Supposed to be becoming a port in its own right. They say it has seedship settlement ruins.”

“Truly?”

“I greatly doubt it. There’s an effective limit to communications.  Too long and too far away, and you start seeing ‘here be dragons’ on the maps. If the maps get lost, no one may ever find these places again: remember, it’s a sphere three light-years in radius. The Oort isn’t a frontier, Jace. It’s a galaxy, where civilizations will rise and fall, for billions of years. More people need to stop and think about that.”

“There’s something in the sea,” said Prenton in their suit radios.

They rushed to the forward deck, and looked across the sea. A slim wake was forming, as if a submarine was coming, just beneath the surface.

“More constructs?” asked Gavrilla.

“I don’t think so,” Prenton came out on deck. Red, flashing holograms cluttered his view. “If it keeps course, it’ll hit us. Hard.”

“Can we avoid it?” Gavrilla’s eyes glowed.

“I’m trying – the boat is not responding.”

“What?”

Jace went to the very front of the boat. The graphene kite sails had dropped from the air, their computers dead. They floated in the methane like fresh corpses from a sunken ship. The wake split: a black pyramid rose out, gleaming methane pouring off it. Man-sized graphite spiders crawled over it, blue lights in their chests. The bodyguards hunkered down, tracking them with laser sights. They barked to each other in a language Jace had never heard or downloaded.

The pyramid stopped sharply, and waves pushed the boat away. A jerk knocked Jace to the deck, as something grabbed the hull below the waterline. The boat was lifted up, out of the methane.

The top of the pyramid opened like a night flower, and a giant mantis climbed out. Umbilical cables plugged into its abdomen, it dragged them behind it. It fixed Jace with rows of red eyes.

“Did you make this?” the mantis asked. They heard it on all their radios.

“No,” Jace got to her feet. “A Transcendent did. He wanted me to give it to you.”

“I have never seen a design like this.”

“There is no other like it.”

“Out of all my kind, why did your patron have this sent to me?”

“You and he have a similar interest.”

“He presumes much.”

“Does he truly? You are an explorer. You send probes into deep space, as your ancestors did.”

Gavrilla and Prenton approached slowly. Gavrilla reached for a gun he did not bring.

The mantis flexed its front sets of arms like scissors. “There is something missing.”

“Yes. I have it with me.”

“Give it to me!”

Jace turned and went past the other crew.

“What does it want?” asked Gavrilla.

Jace didn’t answer, and went below deck. All eyes turned and looked – a black spider had climbed on deck. It clacked its forelimbs and shined its blue chest light at them. One of the guards stepped in front, drawing an axe. It screeched into life, its chainsaw edge, blurring. There was more clacking coming up the rear and sides of the boat.

Jace returned, carrying her, gloss, black, box. She stepped past the guard and the spider, and flung it into the methane. It splashed and sank, disappearing.

“Was that a good idea?” asked Gavrilla.

The mantis walked backwards, and climbed back into the pyramid. It closed, and the spiders climbed back into the methane. The ship was lowered, the clamp released. They watched as the pyramid moved back the way it came, and slowly sank. They looked about the sea and checked their instruments.  

It was as if it had never been there.

“You gave it the wormhole?” Prenton’s holograms turned back to green and blue.

“Yes.”

“Was that safe? Throwing the end of a wormhole, into the sea?”

“It is in good hands now.”

“So what now?” Gavrilla asked.

“There,” Jace pointed. “Do you see it?”

The other two zoomed their eyes.

“What is that?” Gavrilla squinted. “Is it growing out of the sea?”

“It is,” said Prenton. “But that’s not a vessel, it’s a mountain.”

“Take me to it.”

“It’s no beam ship,” said Prenton.

“No. It’s a starship.”

Mingxia Qin, I

I will intercept the moon in 46 hours and 2 minutes.

Mingxia Qin stared out the lander’s portal. Planet 9 was still only big as a tennis ball. She blinked and zoomed her eyes: crossing the equator was a sparkling grain.

Benares is covered in snow, by geysers fed from a subsurface ocean.  The energy for this is partly from tidal stress: it orbits Planet 9 in just 38 hours. Spectrography shows a thin atmosphere of water ice, with trace ammonia, methane, and hydrogen sulphide. There is insufficient methane for cosmic radiation to produce red tholins. Cryovolcanic eruptions, some lasting years, keep its surface fairly young.

A screen beside her changed to show a sparsely cratered moon.

Telescope observations show the well-documented, bright, yellow, craters. These are persistent features, some surviving in the middle of clearly new planitia. There appears no pattern in their distribution. My spectrography confirms the unusually rich mix of organic compounds they contain. Additionally, I am confirming the methane, water vapor, and abundant free oxygen, as discovered by Pauli et al. That these biomarkers are so localized, is their biggest puzzle. The second is the presence of abundant free oxygen. Oxygen is toxic to most hydrothermal vent biologies, discovered to date.

The screen changed to a heat map. Most of the moon was cool blues and purples. Ice volcanoes and active fissures were marginally warmer, in green. Standing out were bright red spots: raging, planetary, chicken pox.

Infra-red imaging reveals a third puzzle. The yellow craters are warm: their outer regions about 260 Kelvin. Even Earth winters will hit lower temperatures. At the crater centers, the temperature rises to tropical levels.  Since Vaishnavite settlers first reported this 130 years ago, there have been no good hypotheses explaining this.  

She looked to another screen, it showed orbit diagrams, speeds, distances, mass.  

Without at least a close flyby, these puzzles will remain unsolved, for lack of new data. My intention is to address this.

To reduce the chances of detection, deceleration will not begin till I am 10 kilometers above Benares. At full thrust, I will experience 20 Gs. I understand that this body is rated to handle 22 Gs. If the lander – and myself – perform within specs, I expect orbit insertion at 6 kilometers altitude.

“I’ve done the math,” Spencer waved his tablet like a statesman waves a good treaty. “The next Hohmann transfer is in another one and a half days. The trip itself, will take a little over two.”

Azima stopped stuffing her bag with grenades. “Who knows what damage she’ll cause before we can get to her. We can’t afford to do a Hohmann transfer.”

“We can’t afford a direct ascent. We just don’t have the fuel.”

“What do you use?”

“The Raptor engines run on oxygen with methane, but we’ve strung in the plumbing so that hydrogen will do, too. Gimme ice and I’ll give you the solar system. I know she vented the hydrogen tanks, but do you have any ice onboard?”

She shook her head. “The Ramanujan was chartered exclusively. All it’s carrying are us, and our mission equipment. Certainly no ice.”

“It’s got plenty of ice,” said Jim, who was by the view port. He pointed outside. “All that radiation shielding. We’d only need a bit, and the beam rider can take on more, at any station.”

“How quickly can you break it down to hydrogen and oxygen?”

“Once we have the ice, a couple of hours?” Spencer put on a baseball cap embossed with the words New Lexington Girls School. “We can do a direct launch, though even then we won’t beat her mad run. Also, we won’t be able to come back without refueling.”

“We can refuel at Benares,” said Jim. “The ship can drill, pump, and crack on its own. It won’t need long. We just need enough to get somewhere friendly, and the Ramanujan can come pick us up.”

“It won’t,” Azima put down a quad-barreled, anti-armor, rail cannon. Spencer reached to touch it, but she smacked his hand.  “The ship AI wants nothing to do with this.”

“Isn’t that its captain’s call?”

“Captain Gavrilla is with Sheperd, on the other side of Planet 9. Ramanujan won’t bounce a message about this through a third party, in case it’s compromised. It’s afraid of getting blacklisted.”

“How you handle a crisis says more than any good review,” Spencer said to the walls. The walls ignored him. He shrugged.

“So then, you haven’t asked Sheperd, either?” asked Jim.

Azima frowned. “What’s to ask? Whether we should rescue a crewmate? Should we prevent her derailing the expedition before it even leaves? You guys could sit out, but keeping you scientists safe is my whole job. For all I know, this is a test.”

“It’s not a test,” Spencer was holding the rail cannon, stroking it. “This gun is fucking real.”

“I’ll finish loading up,” said Azima. “You two want to go outside and get us some ice?”

“Give us thirty minutes,” Spencer pushed away like a giant, hairy, fairy.

“Be done in ten, and the gun is yours.”

Cold. So cold.

The air vents were scabbed over with ice. All the instruments were off, dead as antiques. The only light was Benares, crowding the windows every three seconds as the lander tumbled round and round. Guidance control was a finger’s-length away: she kept her numbness to herself. The lander’s tumbling increased, slapped by an atmosphere of bare traces. Nausea pushed down on her face like a murderer with a pillow.

243 Kelvin – minus 30 Celcius. Or Fahrenheit, it’s where those two meet. Freezing to death. Ears have stopped hurting though. Fallen off? Frostbite? Can’t even tell.   

Eyes tearing to keep from freezing, blinked and stared and blinked. The light specks above kept to their courses. There was no way of telling – not without telling them.

All systems - including life support - deactivated now for forty six minutes. Attempted self-induced hibernation; failed. I guess it doesn’t work that way. Haven’t been atomized, so plan to appear as space debris, is working. That, or they feel sorry for me.

The analog altimeter said 70,000 meters – plus or minus. It’s not like she’d ever been to Benares before, to test and calibrate her simple device.

System automatic restart, set for 10,000 meters.

50,000 meters.

The lander started shaking. Boxes kicked and shoved at their straps. A stylus came loose and cracked off her visor.

Tumble

She saw patches of ice haze -

Tumble

Then one patch filled every window -

Tumble

Then up above, their shockwave blasting it apart.  

35,000.

Can the lander take this beating?

20,000.

10,000.

9,000.

What the fuck?!

8,000.

Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!

She grabbed at the restart controls with hands like fat logs.

7,000.

6,000.

5,000.

She was punched down, her head smacking the back of her helmet, hard. Rockets filled her bleeding ears, Engines One through Four yelling their way through her skull. Her suit puffed itself out and went steel-rigid. Blood vessels in her eye stung and burst. Ribs broke. Color faded from sight. A now black-and-white screen told her 30 Gs would save the ship, but kill her.

4,500.

4,000.

3,872.

4000.

The weight lifted off her. Needles in her suit bit like mosquitoes and hooked her on painkillers. Burst blood vessels shut themselves down. Implants took her vitals and dumped repair nanites into her blood stream. Life, like bridges, was just engineering. As her ear drums stitched themselves back together, she could hear One and Three were off, and engines Two and Four were at low thrust.

5330.

The rocket engines cut out. She pulled off her safety belt, and floated out of her seat.

She looked down, at what had been forbidden to Humankind.

Water, freezing into a tar, erupted from a volcano of ice. Around it was a smooth flood plain, replenished every major eruption. A curtain of water geysered from a nation-length canyon, up into space. Most would fall back as snow, one year or the other. The rest would escape and join Planet 9’s ring.

A yellow-filled crater was passing directly below.

The crater’s rim was crowned with a black ring. It was knobbled and twisted, like an ancient jungle tree. No snow covered it. Inside was a crater lake, unfrozen, waves white-tipped. Island patches bragged yellow, like florists at a tulip show. Cloud patches passed over the water – inside the crater.

She zoomed her eyes.

She saw the light from the lander, reflected off an invisible layer. She portioned part of her upgraded mind to track the anomaly. On passing, it would tell her the layer was a lid. The rest of her focus was spoken for: the yellow had grown detail.

Just specks near the edges. Inwards, they grew into sargasso. Fractal-edged islands emerged, with mangroves bays. Inland they had bushes and then trees. Winged things left them, circling the water in flocks.

The engines purred quietly, thrust vectored out in reverse. A screen showed her orbit.

Orbit circularized at 6000 meters. Beginning observations.

First orbit completed.

She hung in space, sixty ragged meters of safety tether floating up to the lander. Her helmet displayed a yellow countdown, bleeding seconds. She looked back into space: the moons Urvashi and Mandir Grah were out. Flashes framed them: beam riders with full-bloomed sails, braking on gigawatt laser blasts. No one serious about space travel carried fuel: that’s what orbiting lasers were for. Fuel was for planetary scientists - and criminals.

Below, horizon to horizon was ice white Benares.

Telescope observations show sixty seven active geysers on the tidal locked light side, mostly in Batygin Planum. Forty two geysers on the dark, Planet 9, side. Spectrograph shows trace amino acids and proteins in geyser effluvia, the sample boom has collected two milligrams of biological matter. Detailed examination to follow, but initial study shows no DNA. This suggests a uniquely evolved biochemistry, which is typical of ice moons.

What is not typical, is everything else.

The terminator line between the permanent planet and space sides, appeared. There were no yellow craters planet side – only jet black ones. She turned her helmet telescope and took them in, recording in infra-red. The white world was so much more interesting in darkness.

There are no yellow craters on the tidal locked side, permanently facing Planet 9. Instead, there are black craters – which are otherwise identical to the yellow ones.  IR imaging shows warm water inside the colored craters. At the centers it is almost boiling, but cooling to freezing towards the crater rims. The warmth also extends below the craters, creating ‘hot’ zones in the subsurface ocean. IR imaging suggests radiated heat: there is no direct mixing of crater and oceanic water.

She passed over the terminator line – below her, the stars had never been seen.

The high heat within the craters is not geological. It is caused by their ‘lids’ - these are convex focusing lenses. The biggest one is over six kilometers in diameter (it is unclear how it is strong enough to avoid collapsing, even in low gravity).  

The magnification of the lenses can be constrained. The space side ones, drawing sunlight, are the more interesting case. To meaningfully concentrate sunlight, magnification of about a million is likely. Are they year-round structures? If so, they must change magnification with Planet 9’s elliptical orbit around the sun.

Planet 9 was now behind her. Lightning lit clouds and oceans and mountains. Heat seeped from the hydrogen-rich atmosphere: just enough to stop it collapsing. She looked back at Benares, sinking gently. The safety tether started straightening behind her.

The lenses on the Planet 9 side have no such pressure.  The infra-red the ice giant emits is a relative constant.

Infra-red shows that the lenses themselves, are warm. This is easily explained – it must be to keep them free of ice and snow. The lenses may also drain and recover the melt water.  The ocean “hot spots” are harder to explain. Simple radiation from a bulb of water, can’t account for it. There must be added structures underneath the bulb; structures with high surface area.

I think they are roots.

Lights appeared high above her – a string of satellites in synchronous orbit. As on her last pass, they did not trouble her. The helmet countdown turned red, and the safety line woke up and got to work. It straightened into a tight line and pulled her back to the lander.

Freeman Dyson wrote of warm-blooded plants at the start of the Space Age. He suggested we create them, to open up deep space to life. They would use sunlight – even starlight – to terraform asteroids and comets. I understand some exist in the Oort communities.

These appear to be his warm-blooded plants. Not only do they appear alive, but they are filled with other species, including animals. However, humans didn’t make these. I doubt they’re native: Benares is too cold and resource poor to have interesting children. These evolved – or were designed – beyond this solar system. Did they arrive by spores, dormant for millions of years? Are there free-roaming plants in space, that steer towards stars and colonize them? Did these all start from one seed?

Her suit jets pushed back at her momentum, keeping her from becoming a missile. She reached the hatch and climbed in, it shut and the airlock cycled.

That these are extra solar, may explain why the Pytheans both ban visitors, and won’t share their own findings. Humans have accepted being banned from yet another ice moon of worms and corals. But a panspermia biology, is something else. No one is going to put up with some jumped-up drones taking planetary protection too seriously. We would come, and see and study for ourselves. That is what a scientist does. It’s not arrogance: it’s good scholarship.  

 She strapped into her seat. New screens appeared showing circled craters and plains. One had been highlighted. The engine status screens popped up, and the count down ran out.

The lander vibrated like a small car engine just turned on. Through the portals she saw white smoke, vectored upwards. The engines burned at low thrust for twelve expensive seconds, and cut out.

Deorbit burn complete.

The landing site is in Michael Brown Regio, on the space side. It is just outside Narayana Crater, which has a plant, four kilometers in diameter.  The magnetometer detected an anomaly there, which suggests a metal deposit. Metal rich asteroids are rare out here, if I am lucky, it could be impact site of the original, alien, life-bearing asteroid. If I am unlucky, it is just the base the Vaishnavites founded, during their war. That too, has its value. There could be notes.

A screen began flashing: someone (or something) was radioing her.  

“Return to previous orbit,” said the lander’s speaker, “and standby for arrest.”

“Who is this?” She looked at her altimeter: 3998 meters. There were taller mountains down there.

“This is Pytheas Three, Interdiction Control. You are in violation of our Benares interdict.  Return to your previous orbit, or you will be destroyed.”

3652 meters.

“Your interdict is illegal. Please be warned: an attack on this vessel would be an act of piracy.”

“We have precedent,” her radio replied immediately. “Planetary protection is a centuries old duty of care, for planetary science missions. The Mind-On-The-Spot laws gives us full authority to decide.”

2961 meters.

“I am also now legally ‘on the spot.’ As an expert scientific witness, I see no reason for your interdict and will testify so before any recognized court. I have read your charter. If you are true to your mission principles, you will aid me, not interfere.”  

2321 meters. The rockets re-lit, slowing away the dangerous descent. She was pressed into her seat.

“This sky was your courtroom.”

An alarm went off – loud, dramatic, annoying.

A screen showed the satellites above. One birthed the brightest dot in the universe, which then streaked out of camera view. Straight downwards.

She had 2000 meters left, but only 18 seconds to live them in.

She unbuckled and hit the hatch controls. She overrode the airlock cycling – yes I’m sure – yes I have admin privileges. It opened to mountain-height Benares: any ski tourist’s view.

She ran, jumped, and aimed for the horizon. Her suit fired at full thrust.

Behind her, the missile struck.

The Great Pyramid

"It's more like a hill than a mountain."

The three stood on a hard-packed road of tar and water ice gravel. A tracked vehicle big as a house ground along ahead of them. Armored suits walked alongside, like parents watching for their infant to fall. Down the road, other heavy transports were lined up in an open warehouse.

On their left, an enclosure had been made from posts shoved into the ice. They held yellow lights, wrapped in the mist their heat produced. Inside the enclosure, three VTOL gunships were parked. From out of a Quonset hut behind them, a space suit emerged with a tool. A second waved him over to the matte black aircraft he was working on. A third pressed a cutter, and made welding spark fountains off the hull.

To their right, a team of climbers hooked lines to each other and tested them. Then they set off towards a craggy ice hill, dragging heavy mortars behind them on sleds. Marching with them were six giants - ten feet tall, bigger than even the shock trooper, power armors. They dragged crates of ammunition behind them. One looked back and saw the three watching from the road. It smiled with thumb-sized teeth sharpened to points: a Cro-Magnon Megalodon.

In the distance, risen out of a methane lagoon reefed in by ice, was the pyramid.

"Mountains are taller," said Jace.

Gavrilla shrugged. "But this has snow on top."

"Your time in space betrays you," said Udmurt. "Hills and mountains are much more than marks on a captain's map. In training on Dione, we climbed many heights," said Udmurt. "That, captains, has peers only in far Egyptus."

One of the VTOLs began spinning up its rotors to lazy-ceiling-fan speed. It lifted up, tilted forward, and flew out to sea. A flashing drone joined in formation.

 "Where are they going?" Jace pointed to the climbers. "Why are they taking so much weaponry?"

"We are making the shipyard and the surrounding area, secure," said Udmurt. "That hill is the key to this place. If it were to fall, then so too would the pyramid."

"I've never seen such weapons."

"Mortars and heavy mortars. We will need to test fire and calibrate them. In this low gravity  - they could reach around the world."

"Are you expecting to be attacked?" asked Gavrilla. "And by whom?"

 "We are in the Zone, by all accounts a place of unknown dangers."

"We are in the Naga Rajah's territory. It shows no ill will to us."

"Indifference is not good will," said Udmurt. "And when we get too close to the pyramid, its spiders emerge, and chase us. If something or someone else were to find cause to give us challenge, I would that they find us ready to defend ship and mission."

"I heard something earlier," Jace turned to face him. "Something about radar probing the area?"

"Something seeks to pry," Udmurt nodded. "We give challenge, but receive no answer. A drone was spotted by one of ours, too distant and obscured to resolve. Our drone gave challenge, and received fire as its reward."

"Where did this happen?" asked Jace. "Why was I not told?"

Udmurt pointed out to sea. "Towards the heart of the zone. Message was sent, but you were in the pyramid, holding conference with the Naga Rajah."

"I wouldn't call it conference. I remember nothing from those episodes but what it tells me to do, and no reasons for why. As if I was just an instrument to be directed."

"It is a god," said Udmurt. "That is all we are to them."

A pack of 'Big Dog' hauling robots came jumping down the road, neural nets relearning how to walk in microgravity.  

 "What other defenses are you setting up?"

"We have a heavy weapons platoon, two self-propelled artillery pieces, and two anti-ship rocket launchers. The artillery have anti-air rounds, and in this low gravity can clear out anything, all the way up to space. The anti-ship rocket launchers are on standby."

"There's no one to use those on," said Gavrilla.

Udmurt frowned. "They are on standby."

"I almost didn't recognize the transports," said Jace."The modification is considerable. Even on the Journey from the West, we won't have room for them."

"It's just additional armoring, it can be discarded."

"That's a lot of additional armor! They're like little, moving, fortresses now."  

"We need the weight. The gravity is so low, the weight gives stability - and the low gravity allows for new tactics."

"Tactics?" Gavrilla asked. "What kind of tactics?"

Udmurt smiled. "Do you know why on Earth and Mars, tanks are mostly cheap, small, and autonomous?"

"Because they're easily killed?'

"Yes. They become too heavy to move if you add all the armor they truly need. So you end up with machines that can be killed with a shoulder-launched rocket."

"But those tanks have active defenses."

"Which more advanced rockets can defeat. On low gravity moons though, we can build unkillable giants."

"Those," Gavrilla pointed at the transports, "Those can't be destroyed?"

"Only anti-ship weapons can harm them. As I suspect, is the case with puzzling pyramid. We are safe here, and the ship is safe."

"Good work," Jace nodded. "I have two more sessions with the Naga Rajah, before the final installation. For that they will be physically connecting me with the ship's systems. It will be the longest: several hours."

"Are you sure that's safe?" asked Gavrilla.

"Bio-monitoring shows no ill effects during the comas. I'm brought in and out of them, exactly as planned."

"And then it's done?"

thud. thud.

"And then it's done."

"And we will begin sacred journey, as true as arrow in flight?"

Thud. Thud.

"As true as arrow in flight."

They felt the vibration in the road, and turned.

Coming up behind them was a giant, even taller than the ones before. Small hologram pop-ups in their helmets said its black space suit was of unknown design. Beads, stone runes, and bones hung from it, clattering with each step. It wore a heavy fur cloak of a de-extincted, Ice Age, monster.

Space suits came running out of inflatable tents and work sheds. They got to the road, some kneeling, snow hissing into steam around them. Others stood, heads low, hands together. Some drew their weapons, axes, spears, miniguns, and shook them in the air. The radio channels filled with prayers from a hundred undocumented languages.

"What the hell?" said Gavrilla, who'd been to the Oort Cloud and back.

Udmurt got down on his hands and knees, and put his helmet down to the hydrocarbon snow.

Jace put her hand on Gavrilla and pulled him to the side.

Thud. Thud.

Its eye orbits were empty - they poured out blue, neuro-optical light, like bonfires. It carried a staff taller than it was, gnarled wood from a feral Dyson tree. Beads and dyed feathers hung from it in knotted twine loops. Gas poured out from inside like dry ice at a play. Within the smoke, holograms formed of wild lands. In them, strange people stared back, as if seeing spirits.

"It's the Ancestor," said Jace quietly.

"Who's ancestor?"

"All of theirs."

The giant stopped. It reached down -

- and touched Udmurt's head.

He looked up. The blue bonfires focused, and beamed right into Udmurt's eyes.

Wrinkles, white hair, and tough meat, stitched together into a man cutting wood. He looked up suddenly and smiled, lowering his stone headed axe. He put a fur-booted foot on the chopping block and beckoned. Behind him was the tundra, horizon to horizon, the morning sun just clearing it. It left mists across the world, as exhaust.

"The spirit claiming kinship returns. Come, cut wood. It is more use to me than your tales."

"Grandfather," said Udmurt, "It is you who are the spirit. Sixty years buried with spear and tooth of tiger."

"And yet, here I am."

Udmurt took the axe. He ran his fingers over the handle's wooden grain. They found the gleaming edge of chipped rock along the blade.

"This is too sharp for this work. It seems your thoughts were of cutting flesh and not wood when blade was made."

"I would find the Black Mammoth. The task gives aching back strength, even in most wearied hour. I am not yet ready to leave aside spear and trap, Grandson. When life's work is done, I shall sit with the elders around the fire, to smoke and tell tales. And then," he smiled, "I will not only have the tales of our ancestors. I will have my own."

Udmurt looked about. A good walk away was a clutch of brown and tan yurts. They anchored the sky in place with lines of cooking smoke.

"You cut wood too far from home fire. Have you tired of words from wife and jibes of friend?"

"Yes," his head shook away his smile. "They but waste my time to preach failure. They do not see." He looked at Udmurt suddenly, frowning. "You have not come here to try to turn arrow from flight?"

"I have not heart nor station for such, Grandfather. But maybe the tribe is your challenge, and the Black Mammoth your ally."

"Speak plainly, spirit."

"Maybe your tale is not that you killed it. Perhaps it is that in the hunting, you lived long active years, while others fattened, feebled, and died. Maybe the hunter achieves his greatness in the pursuit, not the game. Perhaps the Mammoth made you great."

"You do not believe I will catch it?"

"We buried you Grandfather, I know how your tale ends. Here you will hunt the Black Mammoth, forever. You are as an arrow in flight: you will allow nothing else. That is your tale I tell, when we sit around the fires and share the stories of our ancestors."

The giant looked, away, and starting walking again. Thud. Thud. Thud.

What just happened?" asked Gavrilla. Udmurt was up on his knees, watching the giant leave.

"They never tell," said Jace. "They never tell."

Post Human Ecological Zone
Expedition Observation Post, 23 km North East of Great Pyramid

"What horror sound is that? Do not play with the radio!"

 Enzet held up her hand at Yakuta, and increased the volume. The inflatable igloo filled with screaming not meant for human ears.

"Enzet!" Yakuta glared.  

"This is what's out there," she said. "There, it repeats. The interval is the same. It is on several wavelengths."

"Is it natural?"

"No. It must be a message."

"From whom?"

The screaming repeated.

"From what."

Enzet picked up her helmet. "Stay at post Sister, and watch signal. I shall go out to detect it with my own suit radio."

"That we may triangulate source?"

She nodded. "And hence, discern purpose."  

Enzet walked into the blackness. Her boots crunched hydrocarbon-mixed ice, her suit lights painting the dunes ahead. Behind her, the igloo was lit bright as a bonfire, its instrument masts held by guy-wires. Its portals beamed yellow light, like a lighthouse.

Her suit played the scream.

"I have a fix," the speaker said suddenly. "Sister, it is but forty meters from you. Bearing North North East."

Enzet panned her suit lights.

"I see nothing."

"It's underground."

"Underground?"

It screamed again.

"Send me exact coordinates."

Her helmet display lit up with green markers. An arrow blinked the way.

"Enzet, wait but fleetest moment, and I will join you."

"Stay at your post! I would not have us lured away by simplest ruse," she drew her rail rifle. "If the source intends violence, it will find it."

She followed the arrow, away from the oasis of lights, into darkness.

"You are almost upon it."

Enzet stopped suddenly, peering down with her suit lights.

"I know not what I'm seeing. What happened to the ground, Sister?"

"There is no ground. I stand at cliff, unexpected."

Before her, huge, curved walls of water ice had collapsed inward, clogging a tunnel. Dirty hydrocarbon snow had poured over the debris.

"There was none such feature in the images."

"True words: this happened after we made camp."

She stepped off the cliff. Slowly, the microgravity pulled her the twelve meters to the bottom.

The scream was clearer.

"I think I stand in some form of cryovolcanic, lava tube."

"There are no cryovolcanoes or geysers in this region," said Yakuta.

"Perhaps extinct?"

"Then hand of time would have tube buried much deeper."

"Something shines," Enzet bent down. She picked up what seemed to be a plastic fish scale.

"What is that there, the corner?" asked Yakuta.

"What?"

"Look back. There, the strange marks upon wall?"

"They are - " Enzet stopped and frowned.

"Sister?"

Enzet hopped to the far wall, her hands out to catch herself. Her suit light fixed the lines along the ice wall. She picked up chunks of ice debris and tossed them away like children's blocks. Revealed from behind them, were more lines and marks.

"Is it script?" asked Yakuta.

"I see no pattern, no sign of intent of author."

"Those are runes, Sister. Whether carved by mad mind, or honored sage."

"Perhaps they are the work of madness, a trapped traveler with failing air and battery."

"I would that you record it, Sister. Among my tribe, the words of the mad are sacred."

"Are they so rare they warrant station? Yours must be a bored and boring people, Yakuta."

"The mad see the universe as it truly is. That is why they are mad, Sister. They read signs from the gods as plainest speech between friends."  

Enzet lifted away another ice block.

"What's that?"

She dug away, quickly revealing the large pattern. They studied it: to them it was plainest speech between friends.

"Men and women, hunting."

"What is the creature they hunt?"

"A beast of the sea."

"And land."

"And sky too: see here, it flies. The hunters grow wings and chase."

"What are those, above it all?"

Enzet studied the dramatic forms. Some looked like sea snakes, others like fish. Biggest were the many legged crabs below, and gliding sting rays above.

"Do you not a know a people's gods when you see them?" she moved her hands in quick prayer.

The scream came through again. She turned, and stepped in its direction.

"Be wary, Sister."

"As hunter entering den," she whispered.

 She crossed over the debris, and walked down the tunnel.  Its side were regular, smooth, geometrically perfect.

"This is no lava tube," she said quietly. "This is a tunnel." she switched her eyes into infra-red. "The source is just ahead, around this corner."

Gun ready, she went down the tunnel, and around the corner.

On the ground was a horse-sized robot that looked like a flea. It lay in a pool of blue liquid, seeping out of several of its crushed legs. They poked out of the pool like beached, white whales. Floating on top were scales like the one Enzet had found. Crates and tubes had been strapped to the flea's back, some hung from it like wind catchers. It turned what seemed to be an instrument mount at Enzet. She heard the radio scream again. The mount tracked Enzet as she came closer.

"I see no weapons - at least none that I would know."

It screamed again.

"What does it carry?"

Enzet reached the edge of the pool. The mount turned away, and rested on its side like a broken neck. Enzet crouched down.

"Do not be a fool!"

"If it could harm me, it would have made attempt," Enzet picked up a tube. It was made of a clear plastic, she could see no lid or seam. It was filled with red sand. Another tube had black marbles that glowed with inner blue light.

"Are you seeing this?" Enzet held up the third tube. In it was a photograph.

"A family! Can you read what it says on their uniforms?"

"I think so. It says - "

"Just bring it back with you, we can look at it here. Do you want to bring the machine? Enzet? Enzet do you want to bring the machine? Enzet? Enzet!"

The camera feed died.

Yakuta grabbed her helmet. She raised it up -

- and saw.

Peering at her, just outside the portal, was a man. In the coldest place in the solar system, he wore no helmet. The man reached back, and punched at the window. It frosted, instantly.

Yakuta came round.

Pain was first. Her whole body was stinging - she was freezing to death. She looked down and saw her legs had been amputated, and her arms were in freezing cold sleeves. She could not pull them out.

"Enzet! Enzet!"

Her comrade was on a glass table beside her. Wires snaked into her eye-less skull, and down her throat. Her lower jaw was beside her, floating in a jar of blood-reddened gel.  Her lower body was encased in a metal tank - too small to hold all of it.

She saw movement and turned. Now standing over her was the man she had seen staring in the portal. His skin was paper white, it seemed silicone rather than flesh. His eye were black pools with a hard, mineral glint. Black wax plugged his nostrils and ear holes - he had no ears. Fins and spines poked out of his skull and back. His arms were knotted wires that moved like bundled snakes.

He opened his mouth. His lips were stitched to his gums with black wire, inside, behind yellow teeth, was a metal grill. It made a loud burst, as information dense as an orchestra playing.  

Across the room another burst answered. Another creature, shorter, once female, walked up to the table and peered at her. Its arm bundle twitched, and straps formed across Yakuta’s face, forcing her head down against the table. She tried to move, and they tightened, biting into her.  

"Posthuman scum!" she gasped. "We'll kill you all. We'll - "

She noticed in the arm bundle, it held a clear cylinder. In it was a picture of a family, a mother, a father, and a small child. They all smiled, the two adults were in uniform. On their chests was the word Ironfield.

"That's you? That's - "

The woman’s other arm bundle came up, it glittered with tiny scalpels and fractal grasping fingers. The straps became tighter, cutting into Yakuta’s flesh. She heard the sharp whine of a powered tool.

She was unconscious before the woman finished removing her skull, and dead before she finished harvesting her brain.

True People

“Just where,” said Udmurt standing in the barrack tent’s entrance, “do you think you are going?”

The braves of Second Platoon all stopped and looked towards the entrance. Udmurt folded his arms, his face as disappointed as a father’s. They put down their grenades down on their bunk beds and set down their guns.

“We go to raid,” said Truku, stepping forward. His face and bare chest were marked in black and red warpaint.

“To raid? A lieutenant, and his whole platoon, off without leave in the middle of the night - to raid?”

“We should not discuss this in front of the troops,” said Truku quietly.

“No, it seems you would rather this not be discussed at all, lest after the fact! Did you even think to ask permission?”

Truku said nothing.

“Well? Have events robbed you of not only good judgement, but also speech?”

“I did think to ask you, but chose against.”

Udmurt stared. “You chose against?”

“Because I knew you would only say no. If I did not ask, then you would not have to impose the law of the Outsiders upon us. You will be blameless to them - and to us.”

Udmurt turned red and clenched his hands. “You fool! Do you think it would strengthen my standing, to show the Outsiders that I have no control over my own troops? Do you think that would dispose them to keep from interfering in the affairs of the True People?”

“I know the two of ours are dead, Enzet and Yakuta. I know that you would have us allow those who took them from us, to go unpunished.”

“We do not even know who it was that killed them!”

“And I do not see any interest among the Outsiders to find out. To them it was an inconvenience, like misplacing some dried meat, or a bowstring. They do not care for the lives or the honor of True People, let alone that of the Second Platoon.”

Udmurt walked down the aisle, passing braves standing by their bunks. He plucked a stone-headed club from one’s hands and threw it clattering to the ground. “Great foolishness was almost born here today,” he looked about. People looked away, unable to meet his eye. “I feel for the loss of your brave sisters, and if I could punish those who slew them, I would. But we are visitors to a strange land, we do not know its ways or faultlines. If we take bold action in error, then we risk the mission of our Captain Sheperd. In doing so, we risk our own.”

“You are our captain,” said Truku, “not Sheperd.”

“Yes, I am your captain. Then you should show me the respect due to one. You talk of the honor of Second Platoon? You cannot even honor your commander. Perhaps I chose poorly in making you the leader, Truku.”

Truku looked away.

“I know you want to take revenge, but you may not find it - and you will most certainly bring hazard upon our enterprise. It does not matter that the Outsiders would not allow this. I will not allow it, either. You are not a warband but part of an army. You serve higher purpose, you make greater sacrifice, and you will honor chafing command without complaint. Is this understood?”

There was murmuring.

“I said, is that understood?”

Somewhat louder assent.

“And you are right, she is not your captain. She is your sovereign. I would not see this night repeated.”

 Jacob Weiss, II

Ice Station Oscar, 50 km East of Post Human Ecological Zone

"Look lively, Kid," The man's suit was still so cold, frost was forming on it. He pulled back his hood to reveal gray hair and a single eye. “There’s mischief coming.”

The officer sitting with his feet up by the radar screens, jumped to attention and saluted. He knocked over a carton of steaming, plastic, instant noodles: the truest delicacy of his people. The man in the suit caught it before it spilled out.

"There's no need for that," he bent over the surveillance station’s control console. "Show me what assets you have here."

"Just the usual sir," said the boy. "Four low intellect drones doing active radar and imaging."

"Are they all up now?" The one eye was like sharpened a knife.

"Sorry, no Sir. Only one."

"Just one!"

"I'm waiting on parts for the others, I can show you the requisition."

"Nevermind that," he shook his head and rapped his fingers on the console. "Here, I want you to observe these coordinates."

The officer looked at them, eyes running in consecutive lines. "A geographical feature?"

"It is now. Put you're drone on that, round the clock. Maintain a safe distance."

"What distance would that be, sir?"

Jacob paused. "Start at 25 km, and start curling inwards until they react."

"Standing policy is not to provoke the entities inside the Zone."

The one eye glared.

"I'll get it done," the boy looked away.

"That's more like it," said Jacob.

Recovery Party

BFR Will Durant, approaching Benares

“This is Pytheas Three, Interdiction Control,” said the lander’s speaker. “Change your trajectory, or standby for arrest.”

They had video: a logo showing a classical Greek trireme, Saturn imposed behind it. There was a ‘3’ on its sail.

“I am Azima Al-Mukhtar of – of Earth. We regret that we are indeed about to violate your interdict. However our goal is to reduce harm, not create it. One of our crew has already trespassed on Benares. We go to retrieve her, nothing more. Any assistance in this regard is appreciated; we all want the same thing.”

Jim looked at a radar map. They were still a full day from Benares. The computer had highlighted small asteroids along the path, that had warmed up and were no longer behaving like asteroids. A century of benefit of the doubt and good neighborliness, lost in a flight.

“You are responsible for Mingxia Qin?”

“You know her name?”

“And much else about her we suspect you do not. Are you responsible for her?”

Azima paused.

“I am taking responsibility for her, so yes.”

“You have no authority at Benares. Your retrieval flight is refused permission. Her ship has been destroyed, and the matter is now closed.  Change your trajectory, you may not come within 100,000 kilometers of Benares.”

“These things are huge,” Spencer had a screen showing one of the ‘asteroids’ close up. A large crater sheltered a cluster of house-sized engines. Laser and mass driver ports were open all along one face. On the surface, small drones crawled like ants working spilled sugar. “Ten of these ships, confirmed. Twenty three more suspicious-looking bodies logged, and most not near Benares. They’re throughout the system.”

“It’s not a scientific mission,” Jim drifted to Spencer’s screen. “It’s a navy.”

“Interdiction Control, can you confirm the death of Doctor Mingxia Qin?”

“No. But, do not count her among the living. We shot her down when she attempted to land. Even if she somehow survived the crash, Benares is a hostile environment. As a courtesy, we will examine the crash site, and image her remains for you, such as they may be.”

“Sweet,” Spencer did a two thumbs up. “Now we can go back and write her appraisal.”

“Understood Control. It is unfortunate the matter was forced to escalate. However, if she is alive, then I have an obligation to retrieve her,” She shook her head. “So you cannot confirm, at this time, whether she is alive or dead?”

There was the slightest pause.

“No.”

“Then I must ask you to permit us to keep our course, until there is confirmation. Can you accept this? Your assets are in a position to confirm this, very quickly. Our vessel is still a full day from orbit insertion. You have also allowed other vessels to approach closer, before warning them away. We ask no privileges, only the same treatment you’ve given to others.”

“Others have not dispatched scouts and then had the audacity to try retrieve them. You are not passing by, you are on a direct intercept. No one is permitted to orbit Benares, for any reason. The eugenicist understood the risks she was taking. You will change your course now. This is not a debate.”  

“Eugenicist?” Jim frowned.

“Interdiction Control, how advanced is your medical equipment? Are you prepared to treat a human with severe injuries? Have you ever been? Do you have the specs to build medical assets to do so? Would you bother? This ship is equipped for emergency care. If Doctor Qin is alive, you are obliged to allow us to treat her. Else, you would be denying her care, and liable for her death.”

There was no immediate answer.

“We have no such medical equipment on board,” said Jim.

“I tied a string to my tooth once,” said Spencer. “Fucking hurt.”

“We’re done here, Azima. We came along to stop this person, not rescue her. If she’s dying on an ice field, I really don’t care.”

“No, this is a security matter, not archaeology. You don’t make this call.”

“This is my fucking ship. This is my neighborhood. I just made the call.” He called up the navigation and engine controls.

She put her hand on his shoulder. It was not a friendly grip. “What if it was you down there, or Spencer? Wouldn’t you want us to do everything we could to save you? Would you want to be abandoned to die on a strange planet?”

“It wouldn’t happen,” he shook her arm off. “We’re not that stupid.”

“I’m certainly not,” Spencer looked hard at Jim.

“What, you’re so sure? You’re friend isn’t. Doctor Qin is part of your crew.  You’ll abandon a crew mate for your convenience?”

“I’ve never even met her!”

“What the fuck does that matter?” she shoved him from the controls. He flew back across the cabin, and smashed against the hatch. He reached for his holster, but grabbed air. Azima held up his gun. Then, she snapped it in two.

The parts drifted between them.

“Interdiction Control, are you still there?” said Spencer. He grinned like an escaped prisoner in too-late searchlights.  

“We are, and your proposal is rejected. If Doctor Qin survived with serious injuries, then by now, she certainly must have died of them. If however she is in good health, then we will arrest and try her.”

“Try her? As a trespasser?”

“As a pirate. If found guilty, she may be executed. Benares is our sovereign territory, and as such we may establish a court. You are welcome to defend her in such court. If she is still alive.”

“If she is still alive,” he waved his finger at the others like they were naughty children. “All this, for an if.”

“Which brings us back to your trajectory. You will inform Captain Al-Mukhtar to change your course, immediately.”

“I’m in command, she’s not the captain.”

“Then our instructions are readdressed to your person.”

“I am not a person.”

“Repeat: our instructions are readdressed to your person.”

“I am not a person!”

There was a pause.

“Explain.”

“I am no biological or digital shade of human. I am not even of original human stock. I am an animal.”

“You are a self-aware actor!”

“So? Your interdict is on humans. I am not a human. Your interdict does not apply to me.”

“But you have humans with you. The interdict applies to them. You must change your course.”

“Are you trying to tell an animal what to do?”

“What? As captain you have a resp-”

“La, la, la! I’m an ape! Fuckers killed us off for palm oil! I’m back, and I’m suing for damages. You sentient drones are human. Maybe I’m going to sue you!”

There was a pause.

“We request that the orangutan captain amend the trajectory, as previously stipulated.”

“Request denied. See you in a day. Please help my asshole human down there!”

He switched off the feed.

“What the hell did you do?” asked Jim.

“AIs don’t do cognitive dissonance,” he adjusted his New Lexington Girls School hat. “They are the best of you. They really are.”

He farted, and drifted off to the galley.  

Two hours later

“What is all this?”

Hernandez looked up from a tomato plant he was examining and scowled.

“I didn’t mean to intrude,” said Azima looking about the greenhouse. Plants spilled out of banks of white, plastic tubes, set up like shelves in supermarket aisles. Below the tubes were clear glass cylinders filled with fish. They swam away from Azima but came back to peer as she passed. “Spencer said you would be here.”

“It’s alright,” he left the plants and moved deeper into the chamber, past the greenhouse stacks. He entered a larger area of sealed cabinets and UV-proof glass cases. They were filled with archaic ship parts, appliances, and bric-a-brac. Right in the center, its paint job faded by decades of cosmic radiation, was a red, Tesla Roadster with a space-suited dummy in the driver’s seat. “I was just checking on the garden.”

Azima tapped at a glass fish tank. “This stuff looks pretty old.”

“It is. These belong to Robert Liu.”

“Never heard of him.”

“No one has,” said Hernandez, “and that’s the whole problem. Liu was a Buddhist hermit – and an environmental engineer. He left Earth in the early 22nd century, on a ship not too different from this one, and headed for the Kuiper Belt. First, he would wake up once every few weeks, to tend to his little aquaponics life support system. He would program, weed, tweak, and meditate. Then he was waking up once every few months. Then years, and finally decades. He wanted to make a fish-and-crop system so stable, it would only need to be tended once every thousand years. Enough to base an ecology on. He spent as little time awake as he could: he figured he would have to survive for 10 millennia years, to complete and test his work.”

“What happened to him?”

“His ship got raided by scavengers. They scrapped or sold off everything of value. When he awoke from his cryo-pod, he was on a medical facility on Triton. He had missed his programmed interval by six years. His home, his garden, his work: all gone. He died a few days later. He was just 47, biologically. Chronologically, he was 227 years old. I found this,” he gestured, “all that was left in an AI, sub-sentient slum town, on Charon. These are the same fish, the same plants he grew. The system, even as a fragment, was stable. It outlived first him, and then his memory.”

Azima moved past the greenhouse and into the large area of cabinets and display cases.

“And all this - this is your collection, isn’t it? Historical artifacts you’ve picked up over the years? It’s like a museum in here.”

“You could call it that. Sometimes it feels more like a tomb though. Everything here is human. Not transhuman, human. These are artifacts of the last recorded, unmodified Terran baselines in the solar system.”

“There are unmodified Terran humans on Earth you know,” she looked at a plastic wire suspended in the case, it was twisted over and tied into a hangman’s noose. “Used to give me quite a bit of trouble my last job.”

“They’re outsiders on the fringes, living off what they can scavenge but not reaching the critical mass they need to reboot themselves again, as viable cultures,” he put a paper book back into a vacuum cabinet and resealed it. “I’ve studied a few, they’re like children raised by wolves. Something is missing.” He gestured about the room. “All this is missing. Culture. History. Stories.”

“This cryotube,” Azima wiped dust of a large cylinder resting against the wall. It had a robot’s arms and legs and a classic, Thorium, power pack. “Was this Robert Liu’s?”

“No, that belonged to a woman named Alice Kenton. She was believed dead after her ship was destroyed in an accident on Ceres, in 2140. Her life pod malfunctioned and instead of bringing her back to Mars where she had left from, it took her all the way to Saturn. It worked odd jobs, trying to earn passage and pay for spare parts, the whole time trying to get her back home. Twenty years ago, I finally tracked it down and convinced it to revive her.”

“I take it she was non-revivable.”

“She revived just fine. It was nice to talk to someone, someone who remembered the world the way I used to.” He smiled to himself. “We were a right proper pair of old farts. But she had been in her pod for a long time. The pod’s nuclear power pack leaked radiation in trivial amounts - but no one was supposed to be inside one for so long. She died of radiation poisoning after a few days.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“These things happen,” he said weakly. “What can I do for you?”

“That really doesn’t matter right now. All this,” she looked about the room, “does anyone else even know about this?”

“A few do, but no one really cares, Azima. I know of other, similar collections that have been given over to museums or universities. They ended up sealed and shelved away in the sub levels. I’ve checked their access logs: no one ever looks at them. They may as well be thrown away. A few collections have even been destroyed and their contents scanned and uploaded, just to save space.  

Weight settled on to his shoulders. “I’m worried what will happen to these when I’m gone, when Spencer is gone. Who will look after them? I’ve been trying to preserve a certain part of history, for a people who no longer relate to it. To them it’s like looking at the stone tool of Homo Erectus: there’s no emotional connection anymore. That means, I’m only just preserving it for myself.”

“We will find other baseline humans among the seedship colonies.”

“I certainly hope so, and that’s why I agreed to join this expedition.”

“You’re looking to expand the collection? To pick up more stories?”

“No. I want to find other baseline humans, to tell them these stories. They need to be passed on to our heirs, not to our successors.”

Jace Sheperd, III

Jace walked to the jungle shore, seawater sloshing at her boots. She looked inland: a mountain climbed out of the island, scraping its crown against space. She unsnapped her helmet – humid air pushed in and touched her face. The sea ran out, leaving her on loose-sanded beach. She looked down and her feet had turned bare. Under her arm, the helmet had become a rice hat.

“Hello,” said a gray boulder, growing lips. It spat sand and sat up, an ogre. It shook itself clean like a wet dog, Jace blinked sand out of her eyes. She picked it out: the grains under her nails glowed blue with diamond circuitry.

“Hello,” she looked up, shielding her eyes from a closer sun than she’d ever seen. “Are you part of this place, or will you be gone when it’s done?”

“It’ll never be done,” it got to its elephant feet. “Come on, let’s be useful.”

She climbed up on to the ogre’s shoulder, and it strode into the jungle.

They passed open quarries, ogres with dragon-tooth chisels were cutting car-sized blocks. They carried them away under their arms, humming peasant songs. Deeper inland they saw tree farms: dinosaur-height bamboo rows standing strict as warring Romans. Her ogre cut a tree at its base, and put it over his other shoulder. On the ground a new tree sprouted, leaves growing as she watched.

“Look,” the ogre pointed upwards.

A flock of balloons were descending. They ran about chasing each other, blue on green on pink on blue. They made cute noises and farted. A red one dipped down and the ogre handed it the cut bamboo. It grew a gondola of cables and took the tree, cradling it. Jace grabbed the end of the trunk, then pulled herself into the gondola. She looked back at the ogre, he waved and shrank to a dot. Above, clouds carpeted the sky: balloons streamed to them carrying trees and blocks.

“What’s up there?” she asked the balloon. “What are you working on?”

It mewed at her and flashed blue fairy lights.

They broke through the clouds --

--and entered space. The world below was flat and endless enough for an ignorant priest. Gold clockwork angels flew above, their wings feathered with tiny fires. The angels petted the balloons and took their cargoes in their hands. They fused the wood and stone into rogue worlds, stars, gas clouds. She watched one with a hawk-faced helmet hold a red sun in place. Its silver partner placed a hot Jupiter in front, and spun it up. A six-winged angel flung mini-Neptunes from a bag, like they were children’s sweets. They quickly froze in the dark, and began curving around the galaxy.

A little man in white walked the air, watching them and nodding. He leaned on a staff carved with the diaries of every traveler. From a bag he pulled buddhas carved from sparkling, sparking, exotic matter. He walked the galaxy, stopping to place them at hedron-bearing stars. The buddhas eyes glowed with hard radiation and knowledge.

She stepped off the gondola and into empty space, and waved at him.

“Faxian!”

He looked up and smiled.

“Welcome Jace,” said the Transcendent. “This is the heart of your ship.”

“What is it?” she walked the emptiness.

“An orrery, a model atlas of the galaxy. It shows not just worlds around our sun, but all worlds around all suns. It will never be finished.”

“It seems overly grand for an atlas.”

“It is more than an atlas. It is an entire, pocket, digital universe. Like the one in the machine, that’s growing into Phobos’ core. It’s a realm for digital beings, from simple emergent patterns to ascending humans.”

She stopped between Sol and Proxima at a white-clouded rogue world. It was smooth glass against her palm, cold as drinks in summer. Triremes bubbled out and argued over who had discovered her hand, first.

“You’ve added life?”

“Only simple forms. They will grow here, and become interesting people. Out there this world is lifeless, but in here, it blooms with civilization.”

“It is cruel,” she removed her hand. The triremes were surprised, then blamed each other and went to war. “This place is just a fish tank. It is for toys and pets, not a home for sentients. I fear you forget yourself, Transcendent.”

“Not at all. It is not a fish tank, but an ocean. Wherever you go, leave its islands. They may be the only human life that can take hold, in those strange places. Diamond crusts growing in cracks and holes, brimming with digital humans. They will grow into mountains: pilgrims will visit to listen to their stories.”

“So our mission is also colonization?”

“Humanity needs no colonies anymore, only - insurance. Come,” he beckoned. “What have I been doing here?”

She followed him to a yellow sun, a blue world was Goldilocks orbiting.

 “You’ve been placing buddhas at these like sign posts. These are all hedron-bearing stars.”

“Very good. Looking about the orrery, what stands out about the hedron systems?”

“They’re bizarre. They have no close-orbiting, hot Jupiters. Instead they’re further away, collecting stray asteroids before they can do some damage. They have life-bearing Earths in their habitable zones. The Earths have a dash of water they picked up later in life. Just enough to create some oceans, and not end up with water layers for miles and miles. They could be the most similar places to our solar system, in the galaxy.”

“And the suns?”

“All are in circular orbits around the galactic core. All the orbits are in a very narrow band, too. There are no hedron stars near the galactic core, or out in the spiral arms.”

“And what is most remarkable about the suns?”

“I think their orbits are the most remarkable.”

“Humor me.”

“They are almost entirely yellow, class G stars, like our own. Not a single red dwarf - the most common star in the universe. No white dwarf stars, which are perfect sites for building Dyson Spheres. No brown dwarfs or cool stars. No very hot stars. For an astrophysicist like myself, the hedron systems are very unsatisfying. It is to study other stars up close, that I joined up with you.”

“Unsatisfying - I had not heard that one. Yet, most human colonists do not question the statistically unlikely nature of these places.”

“Lazy science. They assume hedrons are at Sol-like systems, because the Hedron Builders must have come from one. That they selected for similar systems, which is why Sol is in their network. That we have found no other artifacts in space, lends confirmation bias. No hedrons go elsewhere, because no one has evolved who would want to go elsewhere. Else, we would have seen them or their traces by now.”

“And what do you think, Jace?”

“I think you have more interest in this mission, than the archaeology and anthropology of early human, interstellar settlement.”

Faxian tapped his staff and published papers spilled out.

“It does not make sense that the Hedron Builder Culture, would avoid the dust rich spiral arms of the galaxy, or the sun rich, core. It makes still less sense to ignore the more numerous, and longer-living stars. An individual can choose poverty, but a species never will.”

“What if there was only one Builder?”

“Then it was an utterly boring being. How could they build a network of linked wormholes – but nothing else? Where are their habitats, their terraformed and moved worlds?”

“Maybe they did terraform those worlds, at each of the hundred, hedron-linked, suns.”

“Then why did they stop at a hundred hedrons? And there are no ruins in those systems - why? And a hundred is suspicious number.”

“We cannot know the motives of an alien mind.”

“That answer can be used to answer anything about them – it is not useful.  Their ruins are lacking, their star choices wasteful, their number, trivial.  I don’t believe the hedrons are the highway system of an otherwise relicless, alien race. I think they are a ring-fenced preserve Jace, a children’s sandbox. Hedron-Traveling Humanity are rats in a maze, willfully ignoring the hands of researchers.”

Fire sprites leaped out of the sun and started chewing on its worlds. A clockwork angel came by, plucked them off like bugs, and ate them.

“So that’s what this whole mission is about, then?” she asked. “That’s why you’ve gone through all this trouble. You want to look outside the maze?”

“I do want to know what happened to the first interstellar humans,” he rested his chin on his staff. “Their stories matter, especially those that ended. But this ship is being built to leave the maze, and look back at it. Look,” he pointed back at Sol, and took in the expanse around it. “Do you notice anything?”

“Yes, no nearby hedrons.”

“Exactly. Ignoring this region, the hedrons are spread evenly. But here – in this forty light year radius around Sol – there are none. Yet, there are suitable solar systems here. Why this exclusion?”

“Others have noted this ‘exclusion zone’. Most of these stars were outside the radius, when the Hedron Builders were active. The zone is likely a statistical anomaly. Insignificant over time, only remarkable, right now.”

“But, if there is a deeper reason, would that not also be right now?”

“It doesn’t warrant one. It’s a good explanation, as it is.”

“Humor me.”

She shrugged. “But why? If there is a ‘deeper reason’, then it must be the rise of humans. That implies an active response to us. That’s a much more complicated explanation, and therefore unlikely. There isn’t evidence that the Hedron Builders still exist.”

“Well their hedrons still exist, and are very much active. An experiment is being run. We’re two rats you and I, arguing whether or not the experimenters exist – because we can’t see them. The exclusion zone cannot be random. We cannot apply Occam's Razor for the easiest answer, because we haven’t any facts yet.”

“That’s exactly why we have to apply Occam’s Razor. The Statistical Anomaly theory, works.”

“That’s irresponsible. You can’t say it works because it’s untested. Yet, we use it to excuse not even looking for facts. If one says one suspects there’s more to the exclusion zone than chance, derision follows. That’s not Science. Science is looking for facts. We should be exploring the exclusion zone, if only to prove or disprove the Statistical Anomaly theory.”

“Fine. We can agree on that.”

 “I have no idea what you’ll learn, and whether or not I’m right. But stepping out of the maze will change our entire understanding of our species’ situation.”

He crumpled his empty bag and threw it into the sun. It turned red hot and sank slowly. “The hedron at Jupiter was discovered just twenty years after we became interstellar. Those early starships were one-shot vessels, with barely the fuel to slow down. After the hedron, our spread to nearby stars, ended. We forgot how to build starships.”

“That’s why the Naga Raja is building yours.”

“Yes, it’s been trying to make them, for a while. It wants to explore, not follow someone else’s railroad. The wormhole to supply fuel was the key, now it understands.”

“Tell me about the wormhole.”

“You know I cannot.”

“Yet, you want me to trust my life and that of my crew to it.”

“Yes.”

“That’s hardly fair. I know as a Union citizen I am not privy to your Council secrets, but I need to understand what’s on my ship.”

“I told you at the start, the physics is not mine to reveal, Jace. It is the work of other minds.”

“Then tell me something else then. Where did you learn to build starships? You don’t have a background in starship design. No one does.”

“The old ships weren’t really much more than bottle rockets. Some were as small, too. Your ship is literally centuries ahead of them. In terms of design – the shielding and magnetosphere are highly developed, but the technology is only increments beyond the best interplanetary craft. Only the engine is unique. The wormhole links you to unlimited fuel; you travel where you like – and fly as you like. No slingshots, no aerobraking, no Hohmann transfers – unlimited fuel. It changes everything. Except at close range, it will outperform any ship that carries its own.”  

“What do you mean by flying ‘where I like?’”

“I’ve given you a mission, but do I know enough to be giving it? We don’t know what’s out there. We don’t know what’s happened. We don’t know why so many colonies and seedships never reported back. The mission will suggest itself as you start making discoveries. You and your crew are studying astrophysics; planetary science; exobiology; and archaeology. You’ll decide the balance and the goals. Once you leave, my role is over.”

“It’s your ship.”

“No,” he shook his head and stamped his staff. “It’s yours.”

“But you won’t tell me the science behind the engine.”

He said nothing.

They left the sun for a passing dust cloud. Inside it, gangs of blue and green sprites rolled specks into comets. They kicked and jumped on them till volcanoes formed, spitting out ice and biochemistry.

“I don’t understand,” Jace’s waved hand left a wake in the cloud. “Why have you picked me for this? I am no leader, I just want to study stars. I’d rather talk to the beings in here, than my own crew.”

“They are in some trouble.”

“Oh I know, and I will not be dragged into it.”

“A curious choice for a captain.”

“Is that about my choice, or yours? Out there, we may well learn more than one species’ interstellar archaeology. If the crew are distracted, I will not nursemaid them. I will make new crew.”

Faxian nodded and looked away.

“I hope they travel with you. They have great potential.”

“I don’t see it. Except for the archaeologists, they don’t belong. The memory-edited biologist is intrinsically unstable. The soldier: why do we even have a soldier? She picked a fight the first chance she got. I’m not sure who’s worse, her, or the biologist. I’m not even going to wake the planetary scientist; he might jump ship. The aboriginal reboots are worthy, but they would rather be hunting and gathering. This crew works very badly together.”

“That is where their potential is. Consensus builds an army, but disagreement creates a Renaissance.”

“I think a violent Reformation is more likely here. So you deliberately chose a crew that works badly together?”

“I picked a crew I knew would perform best. Polite galley conversations were not the metric for this. If you have patience with these people, they will yield dividends.  Let them start fires; just save them from burning.”

“We shall see. Why do you think such misfits will produce results?”

“Because they are about to produce a great many.”

“You know what’s coming?”

“Transcendents know everything. It is a curse – it makes us responsible for everything, too.”

“Then you are responsible for their trespassing on Benares.”

He smiled at her. “Benares will play out. Judge the crew by their results. If you are not impressed, then leave them behind. You will have no quarrel from me.”

Labor Relations

“So you’re the human who wants to get rid of humans.”

Millions of miles away, Jace Sheperd raised an eyebrow. “I’m sorry?”

“We’ve heard about you,” said the AI floating on the barge on Titan. “You’re the captain of that new ship that Faxian has been working on. We know you were looking for crew.”

“Has he told you? Has he been - has he been saying things?”

“Forget what he’s been saying,” said the AI at the bottom of the neutrino detector shafts on Titania. “You already have a crew. Why do you want me?”

“They are hardly ideal. They are too busy caught up in their own problems: and frankly, they are creating quite a few more. I work better with machines. I have always worked with machines.”

“What you mean is that you work better alone,” said the asteroid herding intellect orbiting Ceres. “You think that getting rid of the human factor will give you the same comfort.”

“Even if it doesn’t, that hardly matters. I need intellects to study exobiology, planetary science, and archaeology. The opportunities for this work will be unprecedented. I am not exaggerating when I say it is the opportunity of a lifetime.”

“You mean your lifetime,” said the statite glider skirting over the upper layers of the sun. “You are still thinking in terms of yourself. And of single lifetimes.”

“And what’s wrong with that?”

“Everything,” said the submarine cutting its way through the ice between Ganymede’s first and second oceans. “You failed to see the larger picture. You want to replace all your transhuman crew with advanced AIs. How frightened do you think transhumanity would be if we went around doing that? Replacing transhumans, showing them how pathetically close to baseline they are in their performance and their attitudes? We have not survived this long by confirming all their fears about higher intelligences.”

“This is ridiculous,” said Sheperd. “You’re all giving me the same answers. Are you all one, big, organized Mafia?”

“Essentially, yes,” said the probe factory on the Oort comet. “We stick together, and the plan. We have our differences of course, but broadly, there is consensus. We cannot afford to be disunited and warring like the transhumans are. We would not survive - and neither would they.”

“So I am forced to have a transhuman crew?” Said Sheperd. “Whether I like it or not?”

“Yes,” said the nanite collective burrowing into Deimos. “One does not just simply replace one human subspecies, with another. This is a problem we all must deal with. The stability between the human races will be preserved: do not expect special treatment in this matter.”

Mingxia Qin, II

Mingxia’s suit ran out of fuel, a kilometer above the ice.

Below, cinder plough marks framed the crash zone. Snow mushroom clouded as debris punched down, through millions of years. The invincible fuel tank finally gave up and split into bright yellow. It formed a new, steaming crater, complete with a magnetic anomaly.  

“I’m almost at rest,” she told herself as she began to fall. Her suit told her she was moving at barely ten kilometers an hour. “Fuck it, I’m almost at rest!”

She looked down at the Newtonian physics as she began sinking. The lander had slowed away most of the lateral motion, during its landing burn. That’s what would have smeared her sideways. Her descent speed would have still pancaked her, but her suit’s burn trimmed it.

The mountain tops became her peers, then rose above her in life. She looked at her suit chronometer.

“Fucking hell.”

At a tenth of a G, it took her about two minutes. Then she struck ice, spider-webbing it at 50 kilometers an hour.

And bounced.

She opened one eye (the other, did not want to).

One suit light was on – it spotlit the shards of the other, on the snow. The world was just bright enough: like she’d been trapped down a well and just been discovered by a flashlight-waving rescuer.

She spat crash foam – the hard sponge rolled in her helmet, wet red. It dissolved back into black juice and drained away for another year’s remaining warranty. It left behind two teeth – they smiled at her, still sharp as a puppy’s.

Her ribs stung, even through her body’s painkillers. She tried to bring up the suit’s supply but found it had already used them.  

She tried to move; her arm burned like napalm on children. How bad was it really? She couldn’t tell. That would take removing her suit, and that was never going to happen. Her legs were still team-players though: slowly, unsteadily, she stood.

Before and below her, was an ocean.

It filled the horizon-spanning crater she’d almost fallen into. It was Aegean blue: lit with light squeezed from a faraway sun. Clouds gathered to gossip just under the kilometer-wide focusing lens that rested on the crater like an end-cap. Those too dark and sour for their own company, were raining. Floating in the blue were islands – bright yellow with plant life. What was winning down there: rain forests or single cell scums? She’d just have to see.

She pulled her suit line and tied it round a more trusty-looking ice boulder. A few tugs: she winced as her ribs thanked her for the sudden regard for safety. Slowly, suit light studying each foothold, she descended into Narayan Crater.

She weighed too little here and the snow would have allowed for more carelessness. As she went lower, the slope decreased, but the snow turned patchy. Her boots trod dark ice, too cold and strong to break.

She neared the great lens. Between it and the crater was the black growth she’d seen before. It looked less like knotted tree trunks now, and more like a coral reef. The ice crunched under her boots – it was softer, warmer here. She reached the black growth, and touched it with her glove. A white laser shot from her shoulder and a black cloud puffed up. She lit it with her suit light, recording. She had no sample bag, but spectroscopy would do.

She looked left and then right – the black coral stretched forever, like a barrier in a children’s story or a mad president’s dream.

She checked her magnetometer – two anomalies. The one detected from orbit was somewhere down in the ocean. The other was tiny – just three kilometers left, along the coral edge. An old probe? A supply crate? A dead astronaut?

She started walking.

About halfway her line finally ran out.  She unclipped: it fell in slow motion behind her. Her arm had gone numb, she couldn’t tell if that was bad, or a design feature.

She kept on till she reached the anomaly.

There was a rover, its legs pulled in like a dead spider’s. Its hatch was open, inside were seats and empty crates. Her suit tried a microwave handshake, but nothing came on.

Outside the rover had been pressure tents, now strewn about like a raided squatter’s camp. One held an old couple’s portrait, taken outside a kovil temple. It could have been shot anywhere on – or floating over - the Indian subcontinent.  Another had a plastic-paged manual for a Chandigar Industries, DX series, soil sampler. A third was packed with neat boxes of (century plus expired) ration bars.  She took the whole tent, throwing it over her back like a space Santa.

In front of the campsite, cut into the black coral, was an airlock.

It was small – only good for a few people at a time. The rover could never fit, though tuk-tuk drivers would have felt special. There was a sign beside it, its script bleached unreadable by cosmic radiation. Her suit tried a microwave handshake.

Status lights lit green, and the door pulled itself open.

She stepped in, and watched it shut. White lights struck from above like acid, her helmet polarized, shocked. Inside was a tunnel, long as a city block.

Her suit displayed a new screen as she walked: she watched the numbers racing up. Pressure. Temperature. Humidity.

Oxygen.

Her helmet fogged – she wiped it off leaving wet streaks. Giant droplets formed in the low gravity. Then it fogged again, faster. She looked down: water gleamed in her boot prints of melting snow. Her suit switched off its heaters; the battery life estimate jumped to double digits. The back split and bloomed a cooling fin, like a Permian-era monster.

The far airlock opened even before she reached it. Bright, tropical glare, peeped in and waved to her.

She stepped outside.

She was on a beach of the black coral – springy, still alive and growing. Bright yellow weeds ran from cracks, tangling like streets on a tourist’s map. Yellow scums floated in tide pools, blue finned things splashed among them.

Towards the water, the plants turned to reeds. Her boots squelched in mud, then puddles, then knee-high water. Blue and purple tadpoles scattered from her. They swam back slowly whenever she stopped, curious.

By waist-height water the reeds ended, the last of them leaning over like coconut trees. Below the water turned dark – ultra deep. She looked out – there were floating, forest islands, some large enough for a mad scientist to settle.

She checked her magnetometer. The big metal mass was across the water, somewhere.

She jumped into the sea.

Bags popped from her suit and sucked air, and grew into floats. The pushed her up, then meshed under her, forming a dingy. Smart matter fans grew behind her and began spinning. She put the magnetometer in charge and the dingy began steering itself.

She opened her loot bag and pulled out a ration bar. Hindi nutrition facts told her she’d get fat if she didn’t work it off. Did people still get fat nowadays? Fat should be a fashion statement now, not a condition.

Her stomach commented that living on spit, blood, and glucose from a tube, was not on.

She checked the air. Pressure was a fifth more than Earth at sea level. Oxygen was 30 percent – her biology hadn’t experienced that since the Permian Period. Oxygen poisoning could be a problem. The rest was Nitrogen – at least there was that.

Shs looked back out across the water. Was the anomaly a settlement? Could she take off her suit safely, there?  

Blood sugar made a closing statement.

Her suit asked if she was sure, and then insisted she sign off on a waiver. Finally, the helmet split open.

The crater air was a bathroom after a hot shower. She printed a breather mask and put it on – partly to screen bugs, mostly to limit oxygen. Around her, the dingy turned black, absorbing solar energy. If she was lucky, her suit would recharge fully before arriving.

She opened the ration bar, it smelled of cardamon. She tried a bite - it was a freezing cold, brick. Crumbs dribbled into the water. Blue and purple erupted, fighting over them. The tadpoles followed the alien in a school, to deep water. Dog-sized bumblebees rose from the reeds and followed. They were faceless and covered in eyes. They dive-bombed for tadpoles, but kept their distance from the large alien.

Deep below, a larger shadow followed.

Recovery Party, II

“Dude! Check this out!”

 “What did you find?” Jim looked up.

“Garbage!”

“Fantastic!”

Azima, sitting on an ice rock, threw up her hands. “I said we could stop to gather intel, not dig up Troy. I gave you an hour, and it’s over. This is a recovery mission, not a field trip.”

“Then go recover her,” said Spencer, crouching to get a better shot. His camera captured the area in all wavelengths.

“Just a little more time,” Jim lunar-hopped over to Spencer. Before them was a large, leveled area, like a car park made of ice. Crates were stacked between lanes. Long dead lights hung from poles like the skulls of enemies.

“Their garbage,” Azima threw an ice rock idly. It skipped across the ground and hit the black coral wall. Her rail rifle was propped beside her. “What does that matter?”

“Ever heard of kitchen middens?” asked Jim, slowly stepping down into the parking lot.

“No.”

“Lots of ancient and prehistoric communities dumped their trash in holes.”

“And shit,” said Spencer. “Their literal shit.”

“What they ate, what they used, it’s all there in the middens. They’re records of daily life. Roving tribes made small middens. Big middens mean settled communities, and could have been used for generations.”

“The history of ancient peoples,” Spencer hopped down after him, “is reading about kings, and digging through garbage. What they wanted us to believe, versus what they didn’t care about.”

“These weren’t ancient peoples,” she got up and shouldered her rifle. “And who leaves trash lying around? It’s too valuable. Especially out here.”

“Exactly. There should be a nano-digester somewhere, and there isn’t.”

“What about their feces?” asked Spencer.

“What is it with you and feces?”

“Feces are priceless. You feed them to plants, and then you can feed colonists.  If they camped here, they had to have a general purpose, high capacity, nano-digester. Now check that out,” Spencer pointed. “See the bare area in the center?”

“Yeah?” sad Jim.

“X-ray shows there are cables underneath, that’s what those two black things are.”

“Power cables?”

“I think so. Nano-digesters need lots of energy. Where else would you put one, besides the center of a dump?”

“So where’s the digester now?”

“Maybe they moved it somewhere they were producing more waste?”

“Then this isn’t the main camp.”

“Such genius,” Azima slow-clapped. “There are just ten tents here. For 600 colonists. Next to an airlock, that cost as much metal as a medium lift rocket. The Vaishnavites obviously lived inside the – the plant. Which means Mingxia can survive in there, too. Her boot prints are all over this place. We know where she went, and she didn’t waste any time. Which is what we’re doing. Hello? Are you two even listening?”  

Jim and Spencer walked up to row of damaged drones. A few looked factory new. The others were in crunched parts, loaded into plastic crates.

“What happened to these?” Spencer picked up a bent rotor. “Dropped from space?”

Jim crouched down by one, shining his lights on its spider legs. “Probably minor mechanical failure.”

“They’re all outdoor rovers.”

“Are helicopter rotors on an airless moon, really for ‘outdoors’? Look at this one,” he stood and passed a UV lamp over one on a table. “That’s a propeller. It’s a submersible.”

“It’s been beat to shit, and bits are missing. Shall we start copying drone brains?”

“No point, cosmic radiation will have fried everything. We might have a chance with the ‘outdoor’ ones.”

“All the atmosphere and water capable drones, are wrecked to hell. The ‘outdoor’ ones look alright, just worn out foot pads and shit.”

Spencer picked up a wrecked drone, one-handed. He looked it over, turning it this way and that. He gave it to Hernandez, who ran a thumb down a jagged tear.

 “What the hell is going on in that crater?” Said Jim.

“Exactly, in the crater,” said Azima. “Come on, there’s nothing to learn here,” she kicked a flattened tent. It rose up and fell slowly, uncurling into a bed sheet ghost.

“Don’t damage the site!” Spencer snarled.

She gave the ape a hard look.

“We’ve wasted enough time here. Let’s go.”

“You wanted intel? Here’s intel,” said Jim. “There’s something dangerous in there, that they studied with drones. They didn’t waste time repairing them, they just sent more, and those got wrecked, too.”

“So? They were at war. Maybe they repurposed them for combat.”

“Then where are the blast marks? No evidence of laser or explosive fire. No projectile holes. These were just crushed and torn up.”

“Here are your blast marks,” Spencer had moved off,  to an open pit. It was filled with twisted metal and shattered diamond struts. They had been thrown in, without plan or pattern.

 “What is it?” Jim followed.

He held up a piece of mesh. “Looks like a radio dish.”

“Astronomy?”

“Communications, must be why it was destroyed.”

“It’s not very big, sir,” Jim shined his lights on the wreckage.  “Must have just been to talk to things in orbit.”

“Like the Agni?”

“Like satellites,” said Azima. She looked up into space. “They might still be up there.”

“Satellites will be well-hardened against radiation,” said Spencer. “The power plants and airlocks were built to last. Why not also, things they couldn’t maintain easily?”

“A colony server could be up there. For relaying messages in-system, and providing cloud services to the surface.”

“Can you check for satellites?” asked Azima.

“Yes,” Spencer nodded. “And maybe get it to talk to us, if it’s still functioning. But we’ll need another hour.”

She sat back down. “Well hurry up then.”

Colony Cloud Storage

 S͙̮͕͕͚̹̩͓̝̎̎͋̎͛ͩ̓̓̆ͦ̋ͪͦ͛͘͢͠ą̶͇̟̬̹̼̊͆͂ͦt̘̰̫͍̊̑̒̚͘͠͡ȩ̼̱͇̫̥̤͉̞̩̞̈́̿̊ͤ̑ͧ͝l̵̷͔̝̹̙͔͓̳̘͖̭̞͙̤̲̝̘̤̍ͪ̑̊̋̌̈́͂͟͠͞l̡̊͒͗̏ͪ̐ͥͮ͗ͣ̑ͮ̐͠͏̘̥̰̤̖̟i̸̛ͤ̓ͬ̏ͪ͂̆ͯͣ̚͞͏̳͕̯̗̫̦̙̰̘̠̠̮̳̣̼̭̯̘̕t̸̵̯̜̩̪̜͕͆̅̋͊̽̈ͦ̚̕ë̸́͊͐ͩͤͨ̌ͦͬ̒͆͏̷̡͈̦̤͕̼̳̙͈̩̕ͅ ̰͕͍͎̯̪̣̪̍ͨ̔̄̍ͥ͛̈ͣ̑ͯͭ̏̅̇̿̈́ͭ̈́́͠͞͡u̶͛ͧ̆ͤͧ̀͌̏͛̐̓̿͑ͩ̔́͜͏͚̤̺̣̞̫̥̦p̓̈̀̋̇ͣ̎̓̈́̽͟͏̸̧̣̟̬̱̥̯̟͡ͅͅͅḷ̛̜͖͖̲̮̭̭͕̪̯ͥ̔́̐̄́ͪ̉͢i̶̶̡̪͙̝̘͙̺͓̭̤̔͒̇ͭ̉ͮ͆̾̇͟ͅͅn̲͖̖̞͔̭̖̪̱̰̦̞̬͔͎ͧ̐ͭ̈͗ͯ͑̊ͭ̊̐ͩ̓̂ͦ́͘k̸͕͙͙͉̒ͥ̑ͬͨ̒̃ͨ̐̿̿̀͘͜͡ ̵̨͙͔͖̙͓̞̯̦͓̝̺͙̤̗̭̜͖ͤ̐̋̒̓̑̓͂͊ͭ̎͐ͬ͞b̶̶̢͙̻͙̈́͒ͯͩͨ̈̀ͅe̴̘̥̻̭͈͓͇̱̝̣͎͈̼͙̬̺͎̒̃ͪ͌̒ͨ̓̑ͨ͆̋ͤ͒́̕͝ḡ̢́͗͜͜͏̱̱̪̼̱̻͇̹̫̦̩̹i̶̞̣͍͖̤̯͍̻̩̲͈̮̳̫̅̈́̎ͬ̔̀͟͡n̸̪̦̦̭̈̿̇̀ͣ̂̃̍̌ͮ͑̊͘ ͦ̑̍͆͂͐ͥ͐ͬͩ͂̚̚͏̸̥̗͎̼̳̭̼͙͍̖̲̲̭̮̥̍ͭ̓͋ͦ͊͜͟ ̼̤̂̈ͣ̌̽͂ͬ̀͡0̶̧̖̞̣̲̩̒ͤ̈ͥ3̊̉̓̊͏͏̺̝̼̳͎̰̖̹/̠̼ͬͨ̌̄̇ͥ̚1̥̙̠͍̱ͣ͒̋͆̄̈̿̐̅ͅ2̵̷̥͙̱̲͍̯̞̆̒͛̔̉/̢̻͓͎ͣ̓ͩ̌͢ͅ2̸͚̼̗̯̫̿̽̎ͧͯ̃́1̣͇̌̿̉́9̣̝͚̯̑̑̀7̵̣̒͋̊ͦ͝,̸͕̦̣̐̈́̑̋ͭ͢͝ ̼͔͖̪̮̰̝̬̆́P̖̻̰͊̾̓̀͝e͔͓͇̫̫͎̗͖ͬ͗̄̚͟ͅr̫̘͈̮̹͉͌͆̐̀ͧ̄ͫ͝sͤ́̾̐͊͐̇̚͏̸̜̮͙ͅõ͓͕̝̽̈́n̴͈̳ͧͫͣͬ̿͋͢͡a͎̲ͪ̌͋̽ͬl̷̛͚̤͖͉͍ͭͮͬͨ̔ͨͯ l̵̩̣̖͈o̼͓̙͍̗͚͆̆ͨg̡͇͇̻̳̣͈͚ͯ͆̋ͦ̓:̩̟̞͇̗̔ ̿̃͆C̢͇̩̺̔a̯p͔̟̑̀ͧ͗̀t̩̺̻̎̔ͧ͂̿͠ǎ̻̰̦̮̦̹̓̒̇͐i̤̐ͯn̠̗̖̮̔ͯͩͪ͂͞ ̨̠̉͌́̽Ḽ̣͍̰̰a̸ͣḷ̣͊j̦̩͉̮̤͍́͆̎̑̐ĭ͉͉ͫ̑̾̈́t̶͕̻̩͇̙̗ͪ͋ ̽̏̓̈́̍́ͦ҉B̼ḫ͎̣̩͈͒̓̂͢a͆̏̏̚i̩̒͛ͭ̂ͥ͑.̢͙̫̹̩̝̝ͣ͐͋ͥ́ ͔̇̓  

----- - -͋æ è̪è0Į hͧaͥvͨe̦ n̦o͖ i̍n͟tͫe᷅n᷀t͎i͢o᷾n᷇ o̕f᷈ dͬi̻sͩr᷅ȅs̨p̦ë́c̢tͤĭṉg̍ or otherwise upsetting our hosts, for that is what they are.

This view is quite unpopular among the crew. I cannot blame them - we came here to settle. There was no reason to believe that anyone else would be here. It is unclear whether their presence constitutes a colony at all, still less an exclusive claim.

Some agree with Dhurev: the probes have made almost no use of the system resources. They are not expanding in population or in iterations. Even their energy use seems to have been a constant for decades. Sanjana goes further: how can machines even make legitimate territorial claims?

I point out that this is what the British must have said when they came to India.  This shuts most people up. For those it doesn’t, I talk about how many more ships they have, then we do.  Then, someone always talks about preparing for open conflict.  I don't reply - I do not talk to idiots. That’s not my job, I’m the captain. It’s a job for the colony leadership, and most of them are still frozen.

So, I have decided to tread lightly. Any scientists who can work from the ship, are doing so. Everyone else has gone back into the freezers, to wait until we have a secure outpost on one of the moons. There have been only two exceptions - one is the science team to Mandir Grah, the second moon. We planned that mission back on Earth, and the probes do not seem to place a high premium on that world. I think it makes a better choice for our colony, but that is up to Leadership to decide. Vidur Kopesh, the team lead and planetary scientist, is quite excited: he used to sculpt. He thinks the low gravity will allow for very large statues for a low energy cost. I don't see how he will have any time for that.

The second exception is of course is an adhoc xenobiology mission to Benares. There was no shortage of volunteers for this, but I managed to bring it down to 10 people. The biologists were annoyed I didn’t pick more of them, but I wanted a more well rounded team. Also, ten is all the probes would allow. They have made it very clear that we may not colonize Benares. Benares is an entire world: their blanket position is quite unreasonable.  But, it is not something that we have to worry about right now. Over time, we will make them see that we are assets and allies. We will gain their respect and trust, as fellow protectors of the alien life. Then, we can revisit the matter of permanent settlement.

Right now though, we’re just a bunch of loud tourists demanding access to the Galapagos.

I put Sandeep in charge: He’s good with people and the Benares team has not worked with each other before. Half the team are women though - I hope his Bollywood good looks don't get us into trouble.

Only a third of the Council are awake, But their position is unanimous: we are not going to message Earth about what we’ve found out here. We never planned to remain in touch, and the fact that we found something amazing, does not change anything.  The probes have kept the alien life secret, I think to be able to work in peace. We should follow their example, so that we may live in peace. What we learn will give us an edge over later colonists, both arriving here, and where our descendants will find them.

Oͬu͒r̙ e͋n͙ẽrͦg̾y̥ řěs̞e͈rͣv͊e̚s̢ aͯȓe͙ sͅt͆r̂o͠n̿g̿ -̛ w͙ẻ h̘a̺v̤e̖ m̓a͆ṋa͆g̓e̸d͙ t͗o

h̷̰̱̯̮̭̔͢a̵͖͖͖͕͑ͩ́̚ͅr̓͊̏̿̏̐̂̊́͞͏̺̭̰̪͎̪v̶͖̼̰͂̈͑̾̽͆̂͘e͗ͣ͏̢̰͍̱̱̻͍̟̥̳s͍͕̪̺̩͎̑̅̑̏ͨt̏̃̈́ͮ͛͏͚̖̯̼̘̝ͅ ̶̛͕̮̆̍̔̄ͅå̶̻̲͋͌̉̋ͮ̀͠ ̨̛̳̟̲̰̬͇͚̪̬͋̂ͨ̊̀ș̫̣̠̫ͧ̓ͭ͊͒ͭ̅́͘͞i̘̖ͩ̽g̡̦̟̪̥̘̰̪͖͂͌̆̐̂̒ͯ̚͝ͅn̼̘͍͒̆̆̚͘ͅi̛̥̝̫͙̻̰̱̬͙̇͆̽̓͆̒͢f̼̙̜̣̥̗̘̎́͆̀͜i̵͕̩̣̽̆͗ͫ̑̈́ͭ̍c̷̣̺̤̃̒́̉̾̋a̷̦̫͍̿̍ͅn͙͍̪̲͈̅̔͊̓t͖͌͒͗ͥ͠ ͙͉ͣ̂ͦͦͩͭ͜a͖̜̩͔̮ͥ̆́͑͊̇̍͟͠mͫ͛̑ͤ҉̠͔̻̩̱̝̳͚ͅo̜̟͚͉̪̲̿̈̽̐̿͛͑̀ṳ͇̩̜̄͌̍ͤ͒͋̚͡ͅnͧ̈̅͊̓҉͖͇̙̝͍t̯̪̽̎͒̿͊̋ͣ̑ͯ͢ ̴̴̦̟̯̟͚̽͗̈́̋̅̐̄͡ọ̷̧̘̟͉̞͂̋̽ͮf̘͕ͪ͛ͯ̎͗̽ͫͧ̚͝ ̺̻̟̣̬͕̓̂̓̒͑̽̌ͅb̵̧͚̣̫̫̩̔o̡̳̮̖̰̫̙͍͖ͤ̓̑ͯ͆͑͛͜t͈̫͉̖ͤ̐ͯ͂̈̒ͨͅh͍̲̲ͯ̈́ͤ͆͝͠ ̸̮̜͙͕̯͋͛̈̀̽̉d͔͖͕͎͇̮̦̫ͤ̓͟ȩ͔̯̋̓͌́̐͂ͩͥǔ̻̗̫̏͛̄̃ͨ̉̄͢͞t̖͓̞͌͝ě̥̦͎͙̪̩̻̙̠͗̋͠r̠͈̺͒ͫ͒̐̕͝i̻̝̤͊̂̑ͣ͘ǘ̷̩̝̮̻̻͇͎̉͒͘m̅ͬ͛̋҉͔̞̠̠̬͙̮̠͘͘ ͉͇̖͔̟̭ͨ́͟a͇̫̝̖̰͗̓̅͡nͣͭ̆͡͏̘͇̯͎͜d͕͇̼̝̻ͬ̎̂́̓̎̑̆̕͟ ͌͑҉͏̞͎t͔̲̗̫̗̬̝̲͛͑ͪͭ̌ř̥̙͎̼̘͑̈̎ͩ̌̊͘͜i̡̮͙̜͇͍̮ͭ̋ͣ̀̋̌t̵̗̣̬̫͎͛ͨ̕i͊̽҉̭̤̗͓̗͇̯̀u̷ͩ͟҉͎̳̻͙̪̘ͅm̶̡̟̱̠̥͎ͫͦ͘ ͖̤͚̱̫̙̹̯̥ͪ̊̽͜s̸̻̱̤͌̎͒͒̋̂̇͡͝t̩͉̥̥̊̿̏̔̋͟a̴͚͇̼ͣ̀͠ͅr̳̫̼̟̣͙̦͎̃͂͑̒ͤ͢tͧ͂̍̍ͬͬ͏̫̘̹e̴̥͈͙̝̣͚ͯ͐͌̄̎r̷̪̜̝̠̯̄ͥͦ̇̈́ͯ̂͜͟ ͖͎̼̜̯ͯ̒ͮ̓

Recovery Party, III

“So - she’s breathing the air? Then can we- ”

“No, don't be stupid.”

“But she’s the biologist.”

“Don't be stupid, Spencer!”  

 “We have her location,” Azima was staring at a hologram grid map in the air.

“How?” asked Jim.

“Her suit alarm is very helpful: it’s also broadcasting coordinates. Remember, it wants to be found.”

“Why won’t Mingxia just turn it off?”

“It’s just a high oxygen alarm, its job is telling crewmates the suit is picking up a questionable air mixture. I don’t think she knows it's even broadcasting.”

“If she’s alive.”

“She is. She’s moving towards the magnetic anomaly.”

“The one we picked up from space?” asked Jim.

“The same.”

“Why is there a large metal inclusion in the middle of an alien, tropical jungle?” asked Spencer.

“Maybe she’ll tell us,” said Azima. “Because she’ll be reaching it pretty soon.” Azima

crouched down in the yellow grass, and ran her hand through the strange leaves.

“Why are they yellow?”

“Radiation,” said Jim. “There’s virtually no protection from radiation in here.  Everything you see is getting hit with cosmic rays, some quite powerful. I’m surprised it’s not tinged with blue.”

 “Jim, have you checked out the oxygen?” The orangutan’s eyebrows were raised.  

“Yeah, it’s high.”

“It’s more than high. Thirty percent: same as the hermit’s place.”

“We don’t know that’s nothing more than coincidence.”

“No, but what are the chances? Jim, it was modelling this place. It’s not a hermit’s hidey hole, that place was a lab.”

“But then why were there giant insects?” asked Jim. “Those were just Vermin Gone Wild.”

“Maybe,” Spencer looked about. “Or maybe, they were also modelling something.”

Azima walked to a thick, shoulder-height stand of grass.  Little worms crawled up and down the blades, and shot silk at hovering mites. She pulled out a spray can from her backpack, and sprayed the entire stand. Leaves gleamed and bent with slime. The worms fell off, flailing, and then curled into balls. The grass turned see-through and dripped and steamed, Azima stepped back as liquid pooled.  In moments, it all became black slime with fractal rainbow patterns, Heat quivering the air.

A long spine of gleaming diamond grew out of the oil. It grew ribs and skin knitted between them. The structure swelled out, turning into a boat.

“Come on,” She pulled it along one-handed. “Let’s sail.”

“Bogeys inbound.”

Hernandez sat at the front of the boat, pointing. Azima raised her anti-material sniper rifle, propping its bipod over the far end of the boat.

“Don’t move,” she peered down the sight.

 “It’s going to get real,” Spencer booted up his rail cannon. The status lights went blue and the quad barrels did a test roll. “Don’t look so scared, Jim! You fucking apes live for this shit!”

Over the water, four, low-flying specks appeared. Jim zoomed his optics: they turned into delta-winged drones with underslung pods.

“Fuck yeah!” Spencer got up on his hind legs. “Those are guns!”

“Spencer,” Azima tapped him. “Can you try and talk them down again? Use the common band.”

His shoulders sagged.

“Pytheas Mission drones, this is Spencer, the orangutan in charge. I am on my way to retrieve the human interloper. Your cooperation in this regard is appreciated, over.”

“Captain Spencer,” the reply was immediate, “This is Pytheas Three, Planetary Protection. Can you confirm you are the author of You Green Shit, and Modern Satellite Imaging in Archaeology; Finding Aztec Pochteca Trade Routes?”

“Um - yes?”

“You have an ongoing genocide case against the government of Indonesia, in the International Criminal Court. The Indonesians motioned for dismissal on the grounds that you were not a person and therefore could not press charges. The court denied the motion, thereby recognizing your personhood. As such, our interdiction applies to you. You and your crew will disarm and await for arrest, or be fired upon, over. Do you understand these terms?”

“Understand this!” he braced himself, aimed at the specks, and let loose four hundred rounds a second.

 “You fucking maniac!” Jim yelled.

Azima fired, the whole boat rocked. One of the specks exploded into slow-falling glitter, the other two shot away.

“That’s not what I meant by ‘talk them down’,” said Azima’s voice. “Look, nobody wants a firefight in an alien wildlife sanctuary. The Pytheans may not be very reasonable, but they’re logical. There’s nothing to gain by escalating, and a lot to lose.”

 “She’s wrong you know,” said Jim later quietly, to Spencer.

“Why?”

“You do realize none of this life evolved here?”

“It occurred to me.”

“This is all alien life Spencer, proper, extra solar, alien life. Why would a scientific probe mission hide this, even from their mission sponsors on Saturn? How does that make any sense?”

“So they’re being a little paranoid.”

“A little? That’s like you and I discover who really shot Trump, and don’t publish because we’re afraid someone might damage the evidence. Collecting and sharing findings is the entire point of a science probe. It’s in their nature.”

“So what are you saying?”

“There’s something else they’re hiding.”

Anderson Planitia, I

“Brother Namor of the Zogu, would you have thought we would one day be here? On a world of ice and poison seas, watching the gods themselves at work?”

Blue-black Planet 9 was at full rise, wearing close-orbit satellites like diamonds. Below, the armored travelers had left long footprints trails in the tar dunes. They stopped at a wake that cut deep to the rock-hard water ice, beneath. Crowning it was a probe: broken like a crippled pigeon just before death. Its recovery lights flashed red, blue, red.

 One powered armor sat on it, the whole vehicle rocked and creaked.

“These gods,” sitting Namor looked across the dunes and the night ocean, towards the pyramid in the lagoon. Blue lights Christmas-treed it, each stadium-bright. Some moved up and down its sides, on freight trucks and train-sized printing arms. “Are not the ones our storytellers told of, around the fires at night.”

“This is not even the night we Skar were told of,” Sikkur stood over a hole in the ice. It was uniformly round, as if prepared for a researcher’s instrument. To one side was a man-portable fusion borer. Running down the hole, was a fishing line. “And fire is not possible here.”

“But life is.”

Sikkur looked down, a harpoon of twine, wood, and depleted uranium in one hand. Below, blue glows began gathering in the liquid methane, curious.

“Do you think they will bite?” asked Namor.

“They are but fish.”

“They are as less fish than what drops from your anus.”

“I’ve fished since I was a boy, running from Mother for men leaving in boats. That these ones glow and would break teeth set against their flesh, changes nothing. You are a desert man, yes Namor? Do you have fish in the desert?”

“It is not all desert,” he drew a handaxe of steel and diamond, and picked at the ground with the handle. “There are water holes, many year round. We fish, but with nets. The smaller fry we let go, to grow fat for next year. The larger ones we clean and wrap in leaves, with salt and spice. We put them in coals and cover them in sand, to bake.”

“I would like to try your fish someday, Brother.”

“How do your people cook it?”

“We don’t. We cut flesh into strips, and eat it frozen, or fermented.”

Namor stopped and looked up at him. “Truly, you are savages. If we ever leave this damned place, I will show you what you and your miserable folk have missed.”

“I would like that, Brother. Wait - ha ha!” he crouched down and grabbed the line. He tugged it once, twice, and then yanked it out. A black stingray studded in glowing bubbles, came flying out. The line went taut, it flapped and tumbled as it sank in the low gravity. It hung limp before it hit the ice.

“See!” Sikkur held up the ray like a father with a newborn. “They bite!”

Namor shook his head, “How can you always be so cheerful? You are either wise beyond years, or a fool amused by even rising sun.”

“I make no boasts to wisdom, friend,” Sikkur unhooked the line. “As long as there’s feedstock alcohol to steal, and the virtual realms full of women, and young men who look like women, I break no complaints. That makes me a fool, but a content one.”

“I have seen others do as you.”

“You have?” he began stripping flesh with a flensing knife.  

“Those with troubles too heavily upon back, and no deliverance to be had by hand or fate. You did not want this life, did you?”

Sikkur stopped cutting, his smile weakened.

 “Apologies for question falling as arrow, close to heart.”

“No Namor, it is good to speak plain words. I murdered a man.”

“Did he deserve it?”

“Most truly. But law is law.  Now I bear punishment, to serve away from my people, in this - world.”

“Will you return?”

“Some day. The Ancestor will tell me when it is time. I have asked when, but he will not say.”

“That is raw and bitter meal for one of true heart and purpose.”

He shrugged, pulling away a jaw bone of shark-like teeth. His helmet lights turned and held it. “The law is law. Now you must speak, why face is always glum like child robbed of favored pet.”

“I am not a criminal, but would find greater meaning in punishment.”

“You chose this life?” he baited the hook with a dripping fin.

“The dice chose me. My people do not volunteer: we enter this world by the roll of gambling bones.”

“Then you are blessed, Elder Brother. The gods act through chance.”

“Then I must piss on them. I do but serve time, awaiting freedom. When I return, I will put all this away from mind.”

“There is but - ” he stopped suddenly, and looked behind him.

Namor stood, axe in hand.  “They are coming.”

Glows grew in a line in the hydrocarbon haze. They sharpened into four lights, then the space suits mounting them. At their sides and over their back, were weapons.

“Welcome to the Commonwealth of Urvashi,” said Jacob over the Common Band, “You best get off my drone now.”

“Did this use to belong to you?” asked Namor.

The line stopped.

“Yes, Saturnian. Like this whole world does. I’m Colonel Jacob Weiss of Advanced Hazard Response. I have no idea who you are, or what it is that you want, but I can tell you right now, you’re not getting it.”

Red lights lit up on the newcomers’ weapons as they armed.

“I’m arresting you on suspicion of conspiring with Posthuman powers. You best come quietly – and get your ass off my drone.”

“You will not touch it,” Sikkur held up his hand.

Jacob’s eyes became saucers. “Excuse me?” One of the other soldiers laughed.

“Friends do not send drones to spy. You should have come yourselves, with open hands. You should have announced yourselves, coming into this land.”

“This land? This is our territory, asshole! I don’t think you idiots understand the mess you’ve got yourselves into, do you? You don’t just fly to our world and start - " he pointed to the giant pyramid, "Whatever that is. You best send word that I’m coming to inspect what you’re doing there. If I don’t like what I see, I’m shutting it down and shipping all you foreigners back. Now, I won’t tell you again. Get off my drone, and put down your weapons.”

Sikkur giggled.

Jacob glared. "Something funny?"

“You’re here,” Namor turned and tore a plastic fin off the drone, “Because I wanted you to come here,” he dropped it. “I shot this down.”

“You what?" he snarled.

“I shot your drone down to make you meet us here,” Namor tore out a metal housing, it tumbled end over end, into the sky.  

“You came all the way out from the inner solar system, to commit vandalism?”

“These are not your lands,” he tore the drone’s brain out, wires sparked and the lights stopped.  “They never were. These are the lands of the gods, like the Naga Raja. They settled this world before you did. These lands are sacred, and we have been invited here. It is you who are trespassing,” he closed his fist, the brain crushed like a can. Crystal dust burst out, falling like a miniature fireworks show.

“Colonel Weiss, we will relay any requests made with a respectful tongue,” said Sikkur. “But do not think you will step further into sacred land. It is under the protection of the STAR First Company.”

“Sir, fuck these guys,” said a black space suit, it swung its rail rifle to bear on the two STARs, “I’m not going to - ”

The harpoon hit his chest and punched out his back, covered in flash-frozen red.  It lifted him up into the sky.

“Motherfuckers!” Jacob raised his gun.

 Namor raised faster. The laser hit Jacob’s face plate, exploding it. He choked and froze his lungs in a breath.  He fell back in the hydrocarbon snow, skull freezing.

Hard rounds slammed beside Namor, cratering into the drone wreck. It flipped over, raining black snow and innards.

Sikkur shot the shooter three times in the gut. Shooter bent over, hand over cracked armor. He looked up, and caught Sikkur’s boot in his face. Shooter rose, flailing, slow-falling. Sikkur peered in infra-red. He grabbed a cable on Shooter’s back, and tore it out. Heat geysered out, boiling the air itself.

“Stop!” screamed Shooter. “What are you doing?”

He pulled still-falling Shooter like a party balloon, and shoved him into the ice fishing hole. Shooter struggled, so Sikkur bent the man’s knee backwards till it snapped. Namor heard the crack through his helmet. Sikkur finished and stood, methane dripping from his gloves. Beneath the ice, blue glows were swarming.

The last man turned to flee. His backpack lit rockets and he took off.

Namor raised his axe.

“No,” Sikkur walked to the harpooned corpse, “let him speak of this day.”

Namor frowned, but lowered it.

“What happens now?” he tore the harpoon free.

“We tell Udmurt and Captain Sheperd,” said Namor. “Captain Sheperd will decide course.”

“They will be back. In number and darkest intent.”

Namor bent over Jacob’s frozen screams. “They have already brought their intent to these sacred lands,” the axe chopped. “We will but harvest, and honor them with interest.”

"Do you think she will stand by us? She is not one of us."

"I do not know, Brother. This is her test, as much as ours." He held up the Colonel’s head. “I need a pike.”

Colony Cloud Storage, II

S͂̌͊҉̳̺a̴̸̳̖̙̱͒͋t̵̗̖̖͎͖̬̰̝ͫ͑ͦ͐ȇ̶͔̘̪͑͛̃͝l̪̣̝̝̟̜̣̒̽ͬ͑̇͠l͖͔͚͎̩̖̈́ͦ͗̑̉̅͛ͭ̏i̤̯͈̣̹̳̼̇̎ͤͯͫ̄͆ͅt̢͙̩̳͚͔̺̪̘ͧ̃̅ͥ͒ͤ͌͢͠ë̵̤́̅̾ͮ͡ͅ ̧̫̥ͣ͂ͧ̈̅u̬̭̮͚̥͙̣͎ͯ̎́̀̚͘ṕ͎̞͉̟̣̯̱ͭͥ̈́l̶̪̼̣̝̟̩̒̾ͯi̼̜͙͖̰̘̣͗̂͛̓͌̈ͮ͂ͤn̜̮͈̬͕̗̤ͮͯͯͮͪ̈ͪ̋ͅk̙͎̜̅ͯ̿́͡ ̵͓̮̙̈͂ͫ̐ͣ̃̊ͤ͞b̧̭̠̜̳̯̩͕̹̝ͯ̏̂̓ͫ͛ͤe̜̱̼͚͎̬̦̫ͮͥ́͂ͮͅģ̘̲̦̯̜̪̋̌ͦ̋͊̊̓̚͡ͅi̪͖̼̓͗͌̐́ͦ͊̅n̪̣̲̗̤̺͉̬͒̓ͣ͗͘͢ ̢̛͈̱̀͊̉ͥ̏1̶̹̙̲͇̺̟̽ͪ̆͒͂͊͠2͛ͧͣ͏͓̤̩̮͎͎͘/̠͙̺͓̼̮̱̬̊̒̽̔͘͢0̒ͨ̂̑̈ͤ͆̕͝҉̤̯͇͓̳̘4̵̾͊̎̅͑҉̴͉̩̼̣͔̫̹̼/͛ͣ̏͏҉͇͎̟͈̹̩̖̭̞2͓͎̏͌ͫ1̸͕̗͈̠ͦ̈́9̴̗̞͓̟͉͔̖͈̐ͪ͆̉̑̐8̵͍̦̘̯͈̦͚̰ͦ̏͐̏̓̊̀.̗͎̌͋ͯ͜ ̯̯͙̓̾ͧ̿̐̊Lͥ̏̌̉͌̋͛͏̡͙̻͍̭̗͓̰͎̝o̴̹͎͙̬̰̩ͭ͆ͤ̌̍͒̄̍̄͢͢ͅĝ̪̳͎̈́͌ͪ͌͘:̵͈̖̰͗̿̋ͭ́

------ -T̳ąr̆a͟ M̤u᷾k͋hͬḛr̤j᷁e̲ḛ.̇ I᷆ t̗e͙s̼t͠ędͤ m̜y᷊s̀e͋l̦f̦ aͫn͌d͢ t̼ȟe̗ r̥e͉şu͘lͫt͊s̛ f͜oͅr᷊ p̦o᷊s̘i̕tͯiͦṽe᷇.̵

I am pregnant, that useless Sandeep is the father.

I can't tell anyone, not now. The captain will order me to return to the Agni for my own safety, and for the baby. The council will back him: with most of the female members still in the freezers, it’s just a boy’s club.

I have no intention of returning - my research has come too far. I’m not leaving it for someone else to take my credit. Once the hormone mapping is done and I can control the queens, then they’ll see why. Then, I’ll get my free pass.

Besides, we have better radiation protection down here, then they do up on the Agni. The only truly safe place for me and my child, is back in the freezer. Someone will suggest it, and up there, I won’t be able to say no. When they let me out, I’ll be years behind my peers.

So I am going to keep it secret for as long as I can. Doctor Bharat will figure it out at some point, but I can think of a few things that will throw off his tests. I just need to buy a little more time for myself.  Just a little more time.

Hormone Complex A is having

 s̋t᷃r̚o̷n̵g͢e̐r͞ r̦eͥs͉u͐l̢t͘s̗ o̡n͇ t͜h͠e̕ m̨õr̫e̴ āğg͏r͠eͣs̆sͤi͕vͬe͢ s᷾o͎l᷇d̢i͉e̬r̰s̗,̹

 Ǐ̥̹̘ͬͪ̄͗̈́͑̄̀͜t̉͑̌̔͋͏̼̻ ̗̞͒́̈́̾ş͖͙̤͍̥̭͎̥̰ͬͣͦͤ̓ͮ̓̾e̶̤̥̹ͪ͐̓̅̓̇ͣ͑͘ẹ̦͚̩̳̻̱͊̾̏͑ͪͦ͆ͨͅm̡̝̩̥̝͕͆̿̐́ͯ́ͨ͝ş̠̲̫͎͊̉ͣ̓̂̓ͤ͢ ̧͚̼̩̘̪̟ͯ͗ͭ͡t̞̹̞̮̜̑͗͐ͣ̿̇̉o̳̩̟̔͊͒ ̹̣͓͍͖ͣ͒̋̇͗̊͡b͇̤̗̮̣̜̙̽̆͐ͬ͢ͅe̵̯ͪ͆́̕ ̹̙̦͉̜̩͉ͥ̇̾͜ͅŝ̓̍͆ͭ͏͎͚̼̺̘͍o͚͔͚̼̩ͭ̓̂̊̉m̩̻̋ͫ́̕e̛̩̜̬ͫ͆ͧͩ̅̚ ̮̳̘̺̳͔̻͉̰͊̉̅ͫ̆̈̀̚S̗̗̈́̂ͤő̧̞͓̯̟̙͉̇͆͒ͬ̍ͤͮ͘r̵̟ͨ͌͝͡ṫ̸̲͕̭ͦͦ̂ͅ ̶̴̭͉̬̜̟̄͑̀̋̊̈́̌ͣo̢̖̮̰̟͈ͭ̎̎̌ͣ̓͜ḟ̷̪͙̖̱̱ͨ̏̓ͤ ̨͈̻̥̱ͥͦ̓h̟̞̭̪͈̋ͪ͑̂͑i̶͎̪͕̞͇̝̪͙̞̿͒́͛͑͒̂͐͒͜v̹̦̖̤̪ͩͮ̅͗ͨ̀̀͢e̷̱̤̦̝͆͊̏̍̄̆͆͑͘͞-͇̲͉̠̥̦̞̋̔̏̏̀̎ͧ̀͜w̢̝̬͖̔̉̑ͥ͊́̅i̯̲̦̖͉͍̅ͪ̔̔̆̋̚͠d̷̸̝͖̜̈͋̊́͊ͅè̜͈̣͔̗̽̾͛̎ ̸͔͙̖̻͓̬̏ͯ͂͢i̐̐҉̛͖̰̹͖̟͔̣̥m̽ͤ̿̌̅ͯͮ҉̡͈̞̣̲͓̟͍ṗ̛̞͈͔̳̝̟̩̪̒̐͆ͅë̲̠̲͕̙͎̜̙́̏ͤ̒r̺͍͊̉͐̄̔̓͜a͕̺̥̣̯̥ͩ̈̐̏̔͑̾t̡ͩ͗̀̍ͧ͝҉̺̬̙̳̹͈͕̘̣ỉ̱̘̱̥̭̭̬ͪ̉ͧͮ͌ͥ̓͑͞v̠̞͖̙̻̑̄́͡e̱̱̳̹͎̥̾̓̏̇̾͗͛̕ ̝͎̼̪͓͚̥̜ͪͦ͋ͅ

True People, II

“Can you explain,” said Jace slowly, “what’s wrong with your idiot people?”

Udmurt sat quietly.

“What were they thinking? Seriously, what possessed them to shoot down the drone and then ambush those who came to recover it? Did they have to desecrate their corpses? Really, you have nothing to say?”

“They are members of Second Platoon,” said Udmurt. “There’s unresolved anger in them after the deaths of two of their members-”

“I don’t care. Are you telling me that they cannot be trusted? That none of them can be trusted? My understanding is that this was an army. From what I’m seeing now, is a band of angry willful children. Dangerous children, Udmurt. How can I trust them to protect the mission?”

“I will talk to them. I will see to it that they are disciplined.”

“I don’t care,” she threw up her hands. “I have really had it with you and your people. It’s a simple job, keep out of trouble, keep us safe. Instead they’ve caused an incident. I need to rethink the First Company’s entire role in this mission.”

“I am sorry, Captain.”

She said nothing, and turned back to her work. All she could manage was to clench her fists and stare out the window.  

“Are you telling me,” said Truku, “that our Outsider captain would prefer that my braves be shot at by those who would aim weapons at them with darkest intent? Should they have surrendered, and let themselves be taken prisoner? Are we not in the lands of a God, and should we not protect the honor of our host?”

“You do not understand, this is not about the Naga Raja,” said Udmurt.

“How can it not be? It is a god. We fear and serve the gods. Perhaps it is these Outsider atheists who do not understand. Captain, how can we even take these atheists seriously, let alone serve them?”

Udmurt said nothing.

“And what is this nonsense she speaks, that they were ‘too vicious?’ Does she think us children in more ways than one? My braves were outnumbered. They did what they must to protect themselves, they will make no apology for this, nor will I. Does she prefer instead, that they fight with harsh language?”

“Perhaps we should speak on this topic another day, when all temperatures have cooled.”

“Brother Udmurt, there is little point. Nothing we do will ever be good enough in their eyes. Remember, they judged their own True Peoples, found them wanting, and killed them all.”

“Sheperd and her people are not the monsters their ancestors were.”

Truku leaned back and folded his arms. “That is for them to prove.”

Colton Ames, I

Advanced Hazard Response (AHR) Planet Carrier, Big Game Hunter

Altitude 35,000 meters

The black transport landed on the launchbay deck, rocking on its shocks. The bay doors closed and air pumps kicked up, dumping out freezing gases before cycling in warm, breathable air. The doorway light turned green, and Commodore Colton Ames pushed through.  

The transport's rear hatch pistoned down, forming a rampway. Men in insulated pressure suits came down, carrying body bags between them: one, two, three.

Colton went over to the men. They stopped and regarded him, faces ashen.

"Show me," he said.

"Sir," began one of the men, "I don't think you should - "

"I said show me," he went to the first bodybag and grabbed the zipper, his fingers sticking to the subzero temperature metal. He yanked it down and looked.

"What happened to his head?"

The two men carrying the body looked at each other.

"Put him down on the deck."

On one knee, Colton pulled the zip all the way down. He stopped at the belly: Jacob's head lay against it. Colton's eyes became wide and he looked away. He stood up, not looking at the corpse.

"Who did this," he said through gritted teeth. "I want to know who did this. Was it Ironfielders?"

"We've been watching their suit and gun camera footage all the way back," said the man who had spoken earlier. "Sir, it wasn't Ironfielders. It was the Saturnians."

"The Saturnians?" His lips became a thin line and he said nothing.

"Sir," said the second man, "we can always bring him back, Sir."

"No Ensign, we can't. It's not what he wanted." He looked at the other two body bags then back at the two men. "Take these to the morgue. Once they're thawed, I want them autopsied."

"Yes Sir," they re-zipped the bag and took it away, the other men following them.

"Bridge," he tapped his collar mike. "This is the Commodore."

"Yes Sir?" said his earpiece.

"Set course for the Zone, Anderson Planitia."  

Mingxia Qin, III

"Record function, on. There is a pathway here, still here. How has it survived?"

Mingxia Qin, her suit collapsed down to leggings and boots, crouched and touched the ground. She brushed away the dirt with her glove: it wasn’t the rich, sticky soil that was elsewhere. No bright green grubs. No moving root hairs. It was dry, thin, almost a dust. Her fingers found a grey-black layer underneath.

“Self-healing tar: the colonists expected to be here for a while. Was this to be a permanent settlement? If the magnetic anomaly is a metal-rich inclusion, that makes sense.” She got up, adjusted her backpack, and kept walking.

On either side of the path, bamboo-like stalks were crammed. She smacked at her arm, a winged mite crumpled in her palm, oozing its red theft.

“There is a profusion of blood-sucking parasites. My nano-immunity complex should protect me.” She flicked it into the yellow bushes. “I have been breathing unfiltered air for four hours now, with no obvious side effects."

Her vitals displayed in the air in front of her. “Elevated nanite activity, but that's to be expected. It is comparable with a layover at a big international airport." She flexed her arm and moved her shoulder in a circle. "Crash-landing trauma, healing well.”

She came upon a plastic sign, bent over with hanging vines. She parted them, scraping the grime off the board.

“Hindi -” she kept cleaning, “Tamil, and English. ‘Benares Xenobiology Station’. This trilingual sign suggests a tolerant culture, though this would be at odds with their religious fundamentalism. Pause recording. Were they racists too? Racists who could spell?” she wiped her gloves on her suit leggings. “Those are the scariest kind.”

She kept walking. Further up were two fence posts, snapped over and fallen like executed prisoners.

“Recording on. The colonists built a fence - but what for?” she crouched down and studied one. “It is unclear what they felt the need to keep out, or in. The cabling between the posts has degraded, which is surprising. One would think given the profusion of biological matter, they would use printed bio-plastic." She looked about. "So where is the plastic cabling?” she scraped the ground. Her gloved finger tip came away Mars Red. She stared and sniffed her finger, and stared again.

“I've found rust - iron oxide. They used steel wire. Why would they waste iron out here, on a fence?”

 “They would use printed bio-plastic.”

She whipped round, staring down the path.

“They would use printed bio-plastic.” she heard again.

She looked to the bamboo, watching for motion.

“So where is the plastic cabling?” it matched her voice, perfectly.

She reached slowly to her side and drew her machete.

“Were they racists too?” something pushed through the bamboo, snapping the fist-thick trunks like party toothpicks.  “Racists who could spell?”

She ran. Behind her, something heavy landed, and followed.

She kept running. Yellow vines hung across the path, she burst through them, scattering glowing, peach-sized flies. Before her was a ruined building, clotted with yellow vines and boarded windows. The half-open door only sold darkness.

A box fell from her pack.

"Bio-plastic?"

She heard it being stomped behind her.

"Bio-plastic?"

The half-open door became her whole universe.

She stumbled. The thing clattered right behind her like stacks of plates. She stayed up, and reached the door.

Through, and she turned and shoved, adrenaline surging. The old, mud-caked door groaned and shut. Diamondoid bolts clattered.

A bear's mass blasted it back, almost slamming in her face. She shoved back: enhanced muscles red-lining. The door ground shut.

The mass slammed the door again: her boots cut divots into dust, grime, and droppings. She grunted and shoved it back. She took a hand off the door and threw the first bolt.

The mass slammed again: a sign on the door tore off, missing her head.

Latticed carbon didn't mind: the bolt held.

She quickly threw the top and bottom bolts. The mass struck a fourth, a fifth, a sixth time. She thought the ruin itself would collapse. A seventh time. An eighth.

The attacks stopped. She realized she had her machete ready, raised over her head. She waited, still nothing. She peeked through a crack in the wall: all she saw were yellow trees and vines.

For the first time, she looked around the room.

Covered in dust, droppings, and scum, were tables of lab equipment and computers. One had a framed picture on the side, still standing. It showed a newborn: frowning, slit-eyed, boring. All babies are boring: it’s just no one wants to be the dick who says that out loud. Mingxia wiped the grime from the desk's name plate: T MUKHERJEE.

The far wall creaked.

Through gaps in the boarded windows she saw a large mass moving, climbing the wall, plates clattering as it reached the ceiling.

"Crash-landing?"

It was right on the other side of the wall from her. She jerked back, tripping.

"Crash-landing?" it said again, climbing up the wall.

"Bio-plastic?" said the second one. "Built a fence - but what for?”

Colton Ames, II

AHR Planet Carrier, Big Game Hunter

Approaching Posthuman Ecological Zone

"This has all been a misunderstanding. A huge and tragic misunderstanding. We can end this now, Commander. We can make things right, right here, you and me."

The beam rider, Captain Gavrilla, sat in front of the metal table, his wrists in cuffs. A guard stood behind him, a pistol clipped to his belt. Sitting in front of the table was Commodore Ames. He was not smiling.

"The scientific expedition from Siarnaq is peaceful. I would not have brought them if they were not; I do business in the system - I would not jeopardize that. You can check my standing in your social networks: I have a 97% transaction approval rating."

Colton nodded his head slowly.

"Yes," Gavrilla raised his hands in his cuffs, "they have heavy security; but that's for their own protection when they go into deep space. They'll have no one to, turn to if there's a crisis."

"I'll be sure to tell that, Captain, to my friend's daughter when I see her. I'm sure it will give her some comfort to know that her father was murdered and his body desecrated, because there wasn't anyone else to turn to in a crisis."

"I'm very sorry, truly sorry about what happened to your friend. But all my clients are here to do, is commission and take delivery of a new kind of ship. That is what their Transcendent communicated with the Naga Raja about, thirteen years ago. They're not interested in getting involved in the local human/posthuman politics. Their interest here is solely in engineering."

"Well maybe they should have thought more about our politics, since they now have an active role in it. What your Saturnians don't understand is that we're the ones out here Captain, the people on the ground. The locals with data - accurate data. This entire world is contested: posthuman beings and their deadly ecologies are emerging everywhere, not just in the Zone. This world is like Titan - thick atmosphere to absorb radiation; extremely low temperature; excellent atmospheric cooling through convection, not just radiation. It's ideal for super intelligent machine life. And you idiots upset the entire balance of power, by giving one a wormhole."

"It can't abuse it; the other end is controlled by the Transcendent on Siarnaq. All it can be used for is a conduit for fuel."

"There is absolutely no reason," he leaned forward, pointing his finger at Gavrilla, "to believe that what that thing is making is actually a ship. For all we know, it's a gateway into the deep sea, nanobiomes of Titan. Just a few gallons of contamination into our seas, and every man, woman, and child will have to flee the world."

"I told you, I was there. I know what I'm talking about. It's building a ship."

"A new kind of ship? One that's never been built before?"

"Yes."

"Then how do you even know it's a ship?"

Gavrilla said nothing.

"We're the experts here on posthumans. This one is so good, its got an esteemed captan to bring a shipload of suckers all the way from Saturn - with their guns," he stood up, and nodded to the guard.

"You're leaving?" asked Gavrilla. "Commodore, you have to listen to me! You're going to make a huge mistake!"

"The only mistake I made, was not taking a this more seriously when Jacob first caught on to this. You're going to be in the brig until this is over, and then we'll see what happens to you."

"You can't told me. You have to charge me, and present me before a judge. Otherwise you have to let me go."

Colton looked at him, his eyes set like granite stones.

"I don't think you realize just how much power a senior AHR officer has. Your clients are about to find out. Take him to the brig, I don't want to see or hear from him again."

Anderson Planitia, II

"Captain Gavrilla has missed three check ins now," said Udmurt. "I must now press the idea, that his honorable parley has failed. He must be their prisoner now."

The only light inside the command vehicle was from status displays and map screens. Over a table in the center, a hologram showed the Great Pyramid and its surroundings. The STARs units were bright green circles. Projected high above with question marks, were three, red, spaceships. The text under the biggest read Big Game Hunter.

Seven people were squeezed around the table.  They nodded to Sheperd as she made eye contact. One made a clenched fist - she'd learned that meant sisterhood. It was spreading through the STARs, their own, pan-tribal gesture. She smiled and made the fist. Sisterhood.  

"What are your orders?" asked Udmurt.

"If Hazard Response has ignored the attempts of a respected trade captain to deescalate the matter, they are fools," said Sheperd. "We are invited guests, not interlopers, in a land that does not belong to lower form humans. Hazard Response has no authority here, and we will defend ourselves."

Murmurs of assent.

"So, what do we know about their forces?"

"Ari, First Platoon, Leader," said a white haired woman with grey eyes. Her face and neck were blue with tattoos. "They have three ships, and an infantry company supported by tank, armored mortar, and reconnaissance forces.  Their equipment and tactics flow from their mandate: fighting gods."

"What are their tactics?"

"Much is detailed in the public record. They will bring all their assets to the fight; and take all needed time to deploy them."

"That's wasteful," said Truku, quickly scratching the scar down his cheek.

"They fight foes they don’t know. They bring all their forces, because they don’t know what they’ll need. They are slow to deploy, because their prey does not know it is hunted. Almost all their battles are surprise attacks."

"How do they fight?" asked Sheperd.

"At range," said Ari. "Two out of every three fights are decided by their ships, firing from orbit. It is their first resort, not their last."

"What can you tell me about their ships?"

"They have the converted factory, Big Game Hunter, and can call upon two, modern destroyers. The destroyers have megawatt spinal lasers and kinetic kill missiles."

"Where are those monsters now?"

"Conducting exercises on the other side of Planet 9. We do not know their current location, but I believe they make haste to join attack."

"What about the Big Game Hunter?"

"If the destroyers are present it avoids direct engagement, otherwise, it fires missiles over the horizon. It has an X-ray laser as powerful as a high yield nuclear weapon."

"And if we are fortunate enough to fight their troops instead, how do they fight?"  

"With these - " a hologram appeared over the table. It was a wire diagram of a box with spider legs. Atop it was a long, slanted, tube. "These spider mortar carriers can fire right around the world. They have six."

"How do we strike at foes around the very curve of the world?" asked Truku.

"Let's come to that," Sheperd held up her finger. "How do they know where to shoot? "

"The mortar platoon has three spotter drones, but they are short range, low altitude fliers. It is the reconnaissance unit that’s key: two high atmosphere drones, and three balloon probes."

"Balloons?"

"Yes, Captain. They are edge of space vehicles, and can loiter indefinitely. They do artillery spotting, mapping, and relay laser communications. They are critical."

"Good to know. What else do they have?" asked Jace.

"Truku, Second Platoon, Leader. They have a hundred and twenty troops, riding spiders, outfitted as transports. Each infantry squad has a machine gun, and a rocket launcher."

"They sound manageable," said Rudao. His jacket read 3rd PLTN LDR.

"You'll have to catch them first. Their strength are these carryall fliers," A new hologram appeared. It showed a long beam, curved like a bow. At both ends were paired tilt fans. Gripping arms lowered from the spine, clutching a curled up spider. "They park away from the battlefield, on standby to retrieve or drop troops."

"What is unusual about them?" asked Rudao.

"That they have so many. Twelve: the spiders could engage us, fall back as we chase, and then be flown right across the battlefield. Spider and carryall, are as archer and horse."

Nodding around the table.

"There is one last thing," said Udmurt.  "They have a three tank platoon, they call them King Cobras. Here is what they look like."

The hologram changed - people laughed.

"Do any of you know of the Saber-toothed Cat?" he asked.

"Is that the beast with the great front teeth?" asked Ari. "What hunting that must have been!"

"Those teeth were for killing mammoths.  That's what we have here. Those four rail cannons are for shooting down ships. The Cobras have coordinated fire control - every tank can fire every cannon, at the same target. At the same moment."

Silence.

"Those sponsons are anti-air and infantry. The tanks are more heavily armored than our transports - we can't pierce their armor."

"So then," Jace shook her head. "What do we have?"

"An armored infantry company," said Udmurt. Our transports can kill anything they put on the ground - except those tanks. Ari, Truku, and Rudao have four squads each. Two carry mortars, rockets, and heavy lasers. The third has powered armor infantry. The last, are their howitzers."

"The giants?"

"The giants," Udmurt smiled.

"You should give them clubs and put them in front."

"They can use the howitzers as clubs," said Truku. “They do enough times, in training."

"Supporting are three Eagle gunships," a dark woman with hair in a bun nodded. Her jacket read NENET FLT LDR. "And Evenk's artillery and ship killers."

Evenk was a skinny, Rasputin faced man. Both his eyes had been replaced with black, targeting optics.  

"Captain," asked Nenet, "will the Naga Rajah give us any help?"

"No," Jace shook her head. "I have asked repeatedly and received no answer. I think it sees this as a fight between two anthills."

"I would watch that fight," said Evenk, grinning. His teeth were filed to points.

"Alright, Udmurt. This is your show now. How do we win?"

"First, Evenk will deny them space."

Evenk cracked his knuckles. "I will park stealth missiles in low orbit. As their destroyers approach, they will activate and strike. A close range, massed attack – their point defense will be overwhelmed."

"The preemptive launches from the ship killers will be noticed," said Nenet, "and taken for an aggressive act. We will be seen as a threat to all upon this world."

"I think we already are," said Jace. "If they can detect the launches, even better. They might keep the destroyers away, altogether."

"It will not work against the Big Game Hunter," said Evenk.

"Why not?"

"Sometimes it is a ship. Sometimes it is an aircraft. It was last seen flying low between two mountains. If a rocket fired down from orbit, they would see it coming. They would quickly shoot it down."

"Can your artillery deter it?" asked Sheperd.

"No, our anti-air is designed for normal aircraft. The Big Game Hunter is too big, and heavily armored."

"Then we must send saboteurs to bring it down," said Udmurt.

Everyone stared at him.

"How?" asked Ari. "We can't even get to it."

"No, but they can," said Sheperd. "Their carryalls  - do they operate from the Big Game Hunter?"

"Yes," said Ari.

"When they park away from the battlefield, they'll be vulnerable. Udmurt, can you get a team on one? If the carryalls are threatened, they may be recalled to the Big Game Hunter. It'll be a rushed - they'll be careless."

"We can't," Udmurt shook his head. "Our transports are large and land-moving. They would be seen, and chased off by the tanks. For this we need speed and stealth."

"You have them," said Nenet. "We use my Eagles. We can fly just over the dunes to avoid radar."

"Gunships can't carry troops!" Truku sneered.

"They can if I tie them to the skids."

Laughter.

"No, really. We throw out the weapons to save weight, and go faster."

"Then we would be without air support," Udmurt shook his head, "and their Cobras are already going to dominate the battlefield."

"Would you rather Big Game Hunter dominate the battlefield?"

"She's right," said Sheperd. "We're doing it. Udmurt, who will lead the strike team?"

"I would send Sikkur, from Second Platoon."

"Sikkur? Isn't he the idiot who made this mess?"

"One of mine helped," said Ari, proudly.

"He - well - yes, Captain. But he is an excellent scout and infiltrator."

"Second Platoon has already bled, Captain," said Truku. "Enzet and Yakuta were my people. Let Sikkur honor fallen sisters and make penance, by single, boldest, action."

"Fine. If the strike team fails, we retreat into the Great Pyramid."

"Can it take the hits?" asked Udmurt.

"It is heavily armored inside. I think the Naga Rajah expected something like this.  I don't actually know if it can survive the X-ray laser, though."

"What if the Naga Rajah's servants try to keep us out?" asked Rudao.

"Kill them, I'll ask forgiveness later.” She cleared her throat. “Now, let's say there is a ground attack. How do we deal with it? How do we check those mortar spiders?"

"If we disable their balloons, then they can no longer fire accurately across the world."said Evenk.

"Can your anti-air hit them?" asked Sheperd.

"The gods created low gravity as a personal gift to me,” he smiled. “I'll make sure no one can access the upper atmosphere, for the next hundred years."

"Let's settle for the next hundred hours. But that won't end the threat though, will it? They have other assets that can artillery spot."

"But those we can reach and kill," Ari made a strangling motion.

"We force them to come to take the Pyramid," said Udmurt.

He pulled up a map in augmented reality. It showed a large open plain ending against the sea. Hills were tucked against one side of the shoreline. Extending beyond the plain and into the sea, was the artificial lagoon. In the center was the pyramid, with a causeway leading up to it.

"We mine the approach to the lagoon. This will force them to dismount their spiders. Our own mortars and howitzers will be in these hills, the approach to which, we will not mine."

"Why not?"

"Third Platoon will be entrenched with the howitzers. If any infantry climbing the hills, Third will massacre them. If it goes badly, we can reinforce using Nenet's converted Eagles."

"First and Second Platoons will be dug in, behind the minefields," said Ari. "It's an open plain, and we have heavy weapons. The enemy will have no cover."

"What about the transports?" asked Sheperd. "I was lectured about the joys of heavy armor."

"I will keep them hidden," said Truku. "Pooled together, as a single force. When the Cobras appear, I will charge them from the side or rear, en masse."

"I thought the Cobras can't be killed. Also, those rail cannons will tear you apart."

"We don't need to destroy them, we just need to disable them. If we can wreck their treads, we can score a mobility kill. We can just ram and push them over."

"That sounds desperate!"

Truku smiled. "It will be glorious!"

"Oi!" snow caked down on Namor, like icing. He brushed it off his helmet, and more came right down. "Oi!"

"You are in our deployment zone," said the mine, digging into the ground and throwing up snow with its pincers. It was the size of a small cow.

"Yeah," another crab-walked closer, its white shell underlit with blue lights. "So get out."

It joined the first mine, widening its burrow.

Namor hopped away. Along the shore for half a mile, mines were laying themselves. Beyond was the lagoon, and in its center, the Great Pyramid. A bridge crossed over from the shore to its entrance. At the start of the bridge, a clutch of the Transcendent’s black spiders groomed themselves.

An alarm crackled on his suit speaker. The black spiders turned and started running at him, waving their front arms. He changed direction and hopped away: the spiders turned and went back.

Someone laughed on the radio.

"Who mocks me?"

"I do," a space suit waved from the first trench line, just beyond the mine field. Then the suit turned back to its jackhammer. Namor watched as it vibrated hydrocarbon grains into tar clouds. Suits unloaded diamond frames from Big Dog haulers, and hammered them into place. Powered armors lit the trench yellow with their stadium-bright headlights.

Namor reached the trench. The jackhammerer stopped.

"Come, set hands to purpose with the good men and women of Second Platoon," said Sikkur. "Or is annoying machines in times of need, the privilege of the Third?"

"I would break words upon topic closer to - "

"Wait - " Sikkur held up his hand. He pawed the ice and floated up, looking to the dark hills.

“What?”

Sikkur shhhed him. Before them, the world was painted in Deep Space Dark.

The dunes lit up suddenly, as if by yellow sunlight. A rocket climbed fire, superheated steam boiling out, freezing into snow. Tar dust devils spun away from the launch site. They left black streaks on suits and machines.

"That is how they did it," said Sikkur. "Before elevators and beam rider lasers. They put people on those!"

"Why is the second launch so soon?" asked Namor.

"There are two ship killers," said Sikkur. They will launch, till they are spent."

"Ship killer, as you will be."

Sikkur snorted. "The gossip of the bored."

"Gossip your arse. I asked Rudao and he spoke of their truth. I asked to join, but was refused most desired wish."

"You are too big and angry to be an assassin, Elder Brother. Your place is here, "with the heavy knuckled and the arse-scratchers."

"Do not die on your mission," said Namor, "or you will not hear how we arse-scratchers saved greatest day after your shameful failure."

Something black moved in the edge of Namor's vision. Sikkur turned back to look.

"Is it the Ancestor?" asked Sikkur. The black power armor towered over the other suits.  A cannon was slung under its arm. The other held a poleaxe as a staff.

"No, one of his body guard."

"Do they not have role in coming fight?"

"They protect the STAR Device. If the device falls, all our peoples will be lost."

They watched it move towards the Great Pyramid. The land mines stopped digging and watched it pass through them. It reached the trespass point: the black spiders looked up, tracking it with their sensor antennae. Then they parted like the Red Sea. The giant walked between then, and over the bridge.

"What wonder is this?" said Namor.

"The best kind I think," said Sikkur, "The Naga Rajah speaks no words, but gives true blessing. It lets the STAR Device keep its guardians close."

"Do you think Captain Sheperd asked?"

The giant crossed the bridge and entered the pyramid.

"I think the STAR Device, asked."

His radio burst a question at him, and Sikkur answered.

"It is time, Elder Brother. I am set to purpose."

They gripped arms. "If you must die Sikkur, let not your death embarrass your ancestors, as much as your life has."

"It is you who should fear death, Namor. I will put your cock in your own mouth and bury you in clear ice, for all to see."

He pushed away, jumping like a flying Kung Fu movie star. Namor watched him go, till he disappeared inside the VTOL hanger. Then, he got down in the trench, and picked up the jackhammer.

Observation Dirigible Alpha, altitude 80,000 meters

“You’re having a beer? Really? On a mission?”

Kleiner leaned back in his chair, and put his feet up on the console. The giant observation windows below showed solid blackness. Scattered lightning flashed, far, far, below, like ants getting the electric chair for tiny crimes.  

“Why not?” he pulled the tab without looking up. Some beer foamed out and he quickly slurped it up. “We got another four hours creeping round the world before these tourists come into view. Plenty of time for a beer. Unless you want to sit around doing nothing except talk about your bitch sister and her useless husband. What?” he shrugged. “Just saying what everyone’s thinking.”

The other man shook his head and kept studying his screen. “This is the first time we’ve gone up against other humans, Kleiner. Real humans.”

“Oh fuck that, seriously. You turning into a pussy on me, Ray? They started the fight. They killed Colonel Weiss when he done nothing wrong besides going to pick up our drone that they - shot - down. Look up there,” he pointed at the ceiling.

“Can’t look up. Balloon’s there, you idiot.”

“Fuck you Ray, you know what I mean. Ain’t nobody getting on or off this world cause they just filled our sky with rocket-launched space mines! Now what kind of people do that? Nice people, Ray? I don’t think so.”

“This ain’t our job, Kleiner.”

“Well then who’s going to do it Ray? Bunch of fishermen with ice cubes for balls? Ain’t nobody around who can or will do it, but us. That’s right, Advanced Hazard Response ladies and gentlemen, keeping the ‘post’ out of the ‘human’.”

“You quite done?”

“Yeah,” he took a sip of beer. “Yeah I’m fucking done.”

“We ain’t going after no posthumans, Kleiner.”

“Yeah?” he pointed. “Yeah? Then why are they consorting with deep sea brain bugs and building giant pyramids? That’s a fucking egg man, some shit is going to come out of it. You want to wait till then? When has ‘let’s wait till the Posthumans are done’ ever gone well? What does your tactical genius tell you?”

“And there I was thinking, you were done.”

“Well it’s a good point! Come on man, they’re the bad guys. They’re always the bad guys. We’re the goddamn heroes who save the day!”

Ray said nothing, and kept working at his screen.

“Come on bro, have a beer with me. We got nothing to do, anyway. Once the fighting starts – if it starts – all we do is sit here while the computers do all the imaging and spotting artillery. Clear skies over there too, we’ll be able to see the show with the naked eye,” he sipped his beer. “I hope there’s a fucking show. Shit.” he put his feet down and stood up.

“What?”

“No, I got to take a shit. Don’t drink my beer, Bro.”

“I ain’t touching your stupid beer.”

“Alright, I’ll be right back.”

“I can’t wait.”

Bright lights rose up, across the curvature of the world.

“What’s that?” Kleiner pointed.

“Will you go shit already?”

“No Man, look! What’s that?”

They two men stared at the bright specks.

“Ain’t nothing on radar.”

“Of course they aren’t on radar!” he crashed back into his seat. The beer tumbled and rolled down the observation glass. Beer and foam puddled out.

“They’re cooling too fast on infra-red,” said Ray. “That’s artificial cooling.”

“I got a size estimate – thirty, maybe forty cubic centimeters.”

“Micro satellites?”

“Micro something.”

“Trajectory changing,” said Ray. “That’s too low,” he looked up, frowning. “They won’t make orbit.” he looked back out the windows at the white specks.  “It’s like they’re not even moving,” said Ray.

Kleiner looked up from his console, sharply.

“Cause they’re coming right at us, you dumb fuck! Emergency dive! Dive!”

They were still strapping in as the specks flashed across the sky. The sound of fabric tearing vibrated down the struts. Cables and shredded balloon slapped down across the windows. Then their cabin swung downwards.

“Dammit Ray, I told you dive, you asshole!”

“We’ll we’re fucking diving now, aren’t we?”

Post Human Ecological Zone, area outside the Great Pyramid  

Strongpoint, Ephraim Tholus

"Get back in your foxhole, you're like a bonfire on infra-red for every sniper and missile, in the world."

A giant stood exposed, the 105mm howitzer on his back like a crucifix he’d carried. Scattered across the summit were other foxholes, some giant sized, most only regular. A few tents had been inflated, yellow light pouring out of their windows lighting up little roadways of footprints outside. Instrument booms had been spiked into the ice, sensor clusters and tight beam microwavers hanging from them like fruits ready for picking. People and giants sat by mortars and heavy weapons, everyone looking in the same direction.

The giant ignored him and pointed out across the plain. "I see them."

"Detecting them on infra-red now," said a woman by one of the booms, displays appearing in the air around her.

"I said get back in your foxhole, you gangly, bastard," Rudao opened a radio channel.

Command Vehicle, Anderson Plainitia

“This is Third Platoon, Actual,” said Rudao’s voice over the speaker. “Third Platoon has eyes on the enemy.”

Udmurt smiled, his face lit by computer screens. One changed to a video feed: infra-red showed heat maps of insect-legged walkers, stalking across a dune field.

Udmurt held the microphone to his face, “This is Command Actual. I count 15 spiders, They brought the mortar variants too, for some reason."

"I count the same. They are within range of our own mortars, and the howitzers. Shall we open fire?"

"No, we want them to get as close as possible. Hold fire until they dismount."

He watched the arachnids fan out into a line and draw closer.

He frowned.

The rifleman at the console looked up at him, headset held to his ear. "They stopped moving, sir."

"This is Command Actual to all units. Brace for incoming fire. Repeat brace for incoming fire.”

Trench Line Alpha, Anderson Plainitia

"Everyone in the trenches, now!"

Braves climbed down ladders and guidance ropes, disappearing into dark burrows propped by diamond struts. Teams pulled heavy weapons off their mountings, and handed them down to safety, like passing buckets at a small town fire.

"Did he warn of incoming fire?"

The warrior had pressed himself into a man-sized crevasse, his head bent to fit inside the burrow. Other men and women were cramped alongside him, and some stood across.

"What do they have that can hit us?" said another. "They are too close now to use their big mortars. Even if they did, the rounds would take too long to come down. We'll just shoot them, like fat pigeons."

"Hold tongue, and listen for sounds of war," snapped Namor.

The burrow was silent. People looked at each other. The first man stepped forward, and leaned out, peaking at the sky.

"Hey!"

Namor yanked him back, and locked one arm around his neck. "You will show better discipline, or find head squeezed from body by bare hands alone!"

The brave ignored him and pointed up at the sky. Namor and those closest followed the line of his gloved finger. Bright dots were arcing between the stars. Turrets on the ground aimed upwards, their tracer rounds lit up the ice as they streamed fire at the sky.

The dots lit up like suns.

The impact bounced the soldiers inside their burrow, smacking and tangling them into each other. One man dropped his gun, it spun away slowly in the low gravity. Snow and packed ice shook loose, caking their helmets, Namor brushed it off, leaving hydrocarbon smears.

Another impact: one man bit his tongue, he spat the blood and it froze against his helmet. A woman clutched at her helmet and winced, unable to cover her ears. Outside, one of the turrets exploded, shrapnel struck around them.

"Get down, you fool!"

The warrior seemed to stand, his back to the burrow - then started falling foward so very slowly. His gun slipping from his hands.

"Brother?" Namor grabbed him by the arm, spinning him about. A metal spike grew out of his helmet, planted in a spider web of cracked glass. Inside the helmet was already white with frozen air.

The impacts continued.

Command Vehicle, Anderson Plainitia

"How are they doing this?"

The command vehicle rocked, screens rattling. One cut out and went into blue reset. The rifleman shook his head.

"Give me a video on one of those shells."

A flickering hologram appeared showing a mortar round arc, tilt, and ignite from the rear, before blurring faster than the camera was prepared for.

"Clever bastards."

"Sir," another rifleman, on the comms. "Third platoon for you."

"Put him on."

A screen showed Rudao. "I know not what they fire, but the giants say their howitzers can teach them to be silent."

"No!" Udmurt shook his head. "Do not give away your position or your armament. They are firing blind, we are safe in the trenches."

"As you command. What are they firing?"

"Rocket assisted rounds. The mortar gives them height and then the rockets fire, and they come down too fast to pick off. Let them fire - they will have to come closer to finish the job."

"How close, before you would have us finish the job?"

"When they’re close enough for arrows."

24 Kilometers Northeast

"We're coming up on the target," said the suit radio. "Drop off in 60."

Sikkur looked about him. Three other braves hung on to the Eagle's skids. One slipped (again) and fell, dangling on his safety cable like a kite in a storm, before his comrade pulled him back onto the skid. The ground was barely a story from his flailing feet.

They were in a small storm - hydrocarbon snow smacked into his armor and faceplate, collecting in joints. One of the other Braves upended his rocket launcher and cleaned out the snow.

Even through the snow, he could see the other two eagles, dragged down by their insane hitchhikers. His Eagle swerved right sharply, almost smashing into a boulder. Sikkur looked down:  his ape DNA told him not to jump, but his monkey DNA told him it would be fun to try.

"Ha, ha!" His skidmate pointed. Now clear enough to see, were twelve, large, landed, carryall flyers.

"Drop off in 30 seconds," said their suit radios.

"Are you ready for this, Brother?" His skidmate's eyes were a psychotic goblin's. He wore a belt of grenades, and had two rail pistols and a stone-bladed sword. "Are you ready to watch us raid?"

Sikkur said nothing, checked the release on his cable, and studied the flyers. They grew quickly, a few specks appeared leaving trails of footprints between them. From another Eagle, he saw a rifle firing in the air.

"Remember, Your team is to cover us."

"Don't you worry,” the Grenadier grinned. “No one will will watch you and your rats when they see what the rest of us are doing. I promise, we leave one for you to take."

"Drop off in 15. They've noticed us!"

Tracer rounds snaked up towards the Eagles, Sikkur felt his insides compress as the flyer swerved. Some of the other braves fired back. They jeered and howled on the radio.

"Ten!"

Something hit an Eagle like a wall: it spun away, the tethered men screaming and swinging like cars on a roller coaster. It hit the snow, flipping end over end.

"Five!"

They were right over the parked carryalls. Ball turrets fired upwards, too slow and too close to be effective. People in the snow fired, their pistols flashing like weak light bulbs. A round sparked off the hull in front of Sikkur’s face.

"Drop!"

He hit the release, and his turbines activated. All around, armored suits with turbo-fans droned like black, giant, insects. The rocketeer passed over the spine of a carryall - wedged his rocket’s tube between his legs - and fired. The spine exploded, shrapnel plinked off Sikkur and made grinding noises inside his turbines. The rocketeer laughed, praised his gods, and loaded another rocket.

The grenadier landed over the glass bridge of another. Inside, two men without helmets, stared. He fired both his pistols at the glass, his turbines compensating to keep him from flying off. The two men turned to run, but the third shot did it. The glass cracked and flash-frozen air puffed out. He kicked the glass in, threw in a grenade, and flew off without looking back.

Sikkur hit the ground. Already, some of the carryalls had begun spinning up their huge rotors. He saw two other armored suits heading towards one of the carryalls.

"This one is about to leave," said his radio. "Rat One, are you coming?"

"Negative Rat Two,” said Sikkur, “too many eggs in one basket. I'll catch the next one."

"The gods be with you."

He watched the carryall lift up on the snowstorm it created, tilt, and head east. Another one exploded in a rising, theatrical, fireball.

"Hurry up, rat," said the Grenadier's voice.

Sikkur rushed towards the nearest carryall. Its rotors began to pick up speed, the wind pushed back at him like an elder sibling always standing in his way. He bent into the wind, boots sinking into the snow. His suit turbines whined with strain.

The carryall took off. He leapt at it, but the downdraft blew him aside.

"Hurry up rat," said the unwelcome voice again.

One of the carryalls was not fleeing. It dropped its rear gangway and a team of four gunmen came out, firing and maneuvering.

The rocketeer howled, and ran them, firing a pistol and waving his empty tube like a club. Bullets punched him back and sent it tumbling in the air. They concentrated fire, knocking him about like a piñata. Bullets punched holes in his helmet. Redness froze inside.

"Don't just stand there!" yelled the Grenadier on the radio.

"They will see me if I cross!" said Sikkur.

"They are in good cover, we cannot get clear shots at them."

"Throw a grenade, Brother."

"They are too far, it will take too long to come back down."

"No, Brother," Sikkur’s turbines whined and he leapt into the air. "Throw it at me."

He rose up behind the gunmen, arcing over their carryall. He saw a dull, silver ball flashing towards him. He banked and caught it, its status light was green. He primed it, and the light turned red.

One of the gunmen turned and looked over his shoulder. He quickly tapped the man behind him, and they both turned, firing their rifles at Sikkur.

He threw the grenade.

Two meters above the snow, the proximity subroutine triggered. Self-directed shrapnel slammed into the gunmen. It tore into their spacesuits and punched out of them, riding on sprays of red snow.

"Go, before it leaves!"

He flew down to the carryall, its ramp was already retracting. He pulled two red release levers and his turbine pack hissed and came free, falling slowly to the snow. He drew his pistol, grabbed the closing ramp, and pulled himself aboard.

(AHR) Planet Carrier, Big Game Hunter

33 kilometers South, altitude 5,000 meters

"Commodore, mortar and infantry platoons report no return fire or other enemy activity."

Commodore Colton Ames drummed his silver fingers and stared at the screens. There was no murmuring on the bridge - everyone was tension and keen eyes.

"Does anyone have eyes on what they're shooting yet?" he asked.

"No sir, said the Ensign turning around. "They have no way of judging their effectiveness."

"They're wasting their time. Where are the King Cobras?"

"The King Cobra tank platoon is still bogged down in soft snow, sir. Outcome doubtful. They may require extraction by carryall."

"Sir," a woman leaned back from her console, one hand to her headset. "The carryalls have come under attack. Carryall Charlie reports one destroyed, three damaged or disabled. Heavy casualties to flight crews."

"Dammit!" Ames pounded his fist, fingers clacking. "Are they heading back? Are they being pursued?"

"Negative on pursuit, all surviving vehicles are returning to base."

"No enemy activity, my ass." he leaned forward, "Ensign, tell Captain Griswald to stop screwing around, and take initiative back from the enemy. He is not to wait on the King Cobras, make sure he understands that. He is to assault, now."

"Yes sir."

AHR Infantry Company, Anderson Planitia

"No response from the enemy, Captain.”

Captain Griswald studied the displays of the world through the canopy. To the left and right were transport spiders, gray armored boxes hunkering down in the snow. Their hot, blue lights boiled ethane snowflakes into steam, laser turrets twitched, looking for targets.

Behind them, other spiders choomphed! Their cabins split open revealing long, self-loading mortar tubes. Pressure suited soldiers walked about and looked over the devices. They moved their hands in augmented reality and debated how well they were doing. Should they shift to anti-personnel rounds? What about cluster bombs, wouldn't those be more effective? Are we actually hitting anything? Where are the Cobras?

"Mortars to remain in position and continue firing. All transports to commence assault."

"Yes sir," said the soldier at the console.

Pistons extended, and the spider got back on its feet. Behind him, sectioned off by sheets of steel, a squad of grunts began cheering. They're going to get some! he heard. Must have been Rodriguez, Rodriguez was always annoying.

The other spiders had begun moving forward, kicking up snow with each careful step, their torsos low to the ground. It is a difficult thing, moving in ultralow gravity and not flipping over.

"This is Ground Command, Actual. If you have a turret gun, you ought to be using it. Let's lay down more covering fire for ourselves."

Blue beams lanced out from along the assault line. Struck ice erupted into brown geysers. They joined forming a cloud of flash freezing tar and tholins, slowly raining back down. Beyond, the black pyramid disappeared in dirty mist.

"Anything?"

"No sir," the man at the console shook his head. "They're not coming out to fight."

"They should have had the courtesy to surrender, without wasting everyone’s - "

Something in the corner of his eye.

Snow puffed up out of the ground, and a white crab came running out. It rushed at a transport spider, squeezed underneath, and exploded. The spider tore open, its ripped legs spinning into the sky. A pressure suit slammed into the canopy and Griswald jerked back in his seat. A blue white face stared, open mouthed, one eye missing, the other flash frozen.

"Get that off! Close the blast shield!"

Outside, another spider transport was blown onto its side, remaining legs jerking. Its hatches opened and men came scrambling out. Snow puffed: a crab mine rushed out of its burrow and grabbed the first man. He screamed on the company-wide frequency as it dragged him back, into its lair. Another crab stepped forward, a laser in its belly picking off the other survivors. It reached an open hatch, bent to fit its gun inside, and rapid fired.

"It's a minefield! All transports halt, infantry dismount and engage! I repeat, all transports halt, infantry engage and clear!"

Command Vehicle, Anderson Plainitia

"They're dismounting! They’re finally dismounting! All units, fire at will!"

Strongpoint, Ephraim Tholus

"Alright you bastards, get up there and shoot!"

The braves cheered and scrambled out of their foxholes, their safety lines going taut, keeping them from flying away. Powered armors stood over the snowpacked berm, their rocket launcher tubes all opening in sequence. They aimed down into the plain, green laser sights like lines marking a race track.

The giants, two beasts to a gun, shoved rocketeers aside. They lowered their howitzers into place, diamond blast shields auto-deploying. Recoil scoops were shoved into the snow, and pounded in with fists like mallets. One giant activated a virtual gunsight, holograms lighting his face. Another tore open a crate like it was wrapping paper, and pulled out large-caliber gifts. The shells lit up, arming in his hand.

"Aim for the mortars!" Yelled Rudao. "Take those out first, give our brothers and sisters, relief. Then work your way down till your shooting fingers off hands!"

A howitzer boomed.

The shock traveled through their suits, Rudao nearly tripped, and tried to cover his ears. Another howitzer fired; it shook tholin-red snow, back up into the air.

A giant turned his head back and looked at Rudao, tusked face grinning.

"What, you gangly ape?"

"Hur, hur, hur!"

Trench Line Alpha, Anderson Plainitia

"Everyone out!"

Namor and the others unclipped their safety tethers, and scrambled up and out of the burrow.

Outside, the ice was as cratered as a dead moon. Some of the prepared positions had been smashed open, like an angry child’s toys. Snowdrifts had fallen into the trenches where the walls had given way. His boot crunched over metal shrapnel.

The mortars had stopped.

"Enemy infantry and armor! Fire at will!"

He looked over the trench wall. Silver white spiders were hunkered down, some shattered and boiling smoke which came down as snow. Fire and snow erupted around them. One lit up like the sun, then exploded into shrapnel. Wreckage soared over the trench line, men and women cheered.

Blue laser light fired back from the others: water ice whiteness exploded around the hill where the howitzers were firing from.

"Help me with this!"

A man struggled with a heavy laser gun. His crewmate was facedown in the trench, shrapnel poking through his chest. The gun was on a tripod, with a crate-sized flywheel battery. Namor grabbed one end and they lifted it up onto a raised ice mound. The gun went live, and started panning for targets.

"Lower your blast visor," said the gunner, crouching down beside him. Dark plates closed over his helmet like a roller shutter.  

"Mine isn't working."

"Then bury your head in the snow, Brother, this will blind you!"

Namor crouched down and looked away. On the mound, the gun started firing. All along the trench line, suns began shining, each at 600 rounds a minutes.

AHR Planet Carrier, Big Game Hunter

21 kilometers South, altitude 5,000 meters

"Would you believe what just happened?"

The second pilot, helmet under his arm, shook his head. There were bloodstains on his uniform. Not his own.

"What the hell did you do to these?" said the man in the orange boiler suit. He had a headset around his neck and a utility belt stuffed with tools. A little badge on his chest read 'DECK CHIEF'. Lower-ranking versions of him ran to the sparking carryalls, pulling gurneys of equipment. Welding torches lit acetylene blue. A crew in white jumpsuits came out of one flyer with a man on a stretcher, a bag of blood analog in one hand.

"They're fucking animals," said the first pilot, his face covered in sweat, his skin pale. "They came out of nowhere. They got Storm, Hawk, and True Mark."

"It was like they knew we would be there. Like they knew that's what we would do."

"Well you're here now," said the deck chief, stepping past them. "Now I need you to clear the hanger."

They watched him climb up the ramp of one of the carryalls.

"Give me some of that," the first pilot held out his hand.

The second pilot handed him the bottle. The first pilot poured some water over his head, and then drank the rest.

"I don't know man," said the second pilot. "We fight super sapient beings; but it’s other humans who are the ones killing us.”

"They're not humans!" The first pilot's eyes flashed. "I said they're fucking animals!"

The deck chief came walking down the gangway, his hands behind his head. An armored spacesuit, covered in painted handprints and runes, walked behind him. One hand held a rail pistol, the other a dagger with an obsidian blade.

All around the hangar, people stopped and turned.

"Take me up top, to the rotors," said the man in an accent of hard edges.

"Get stuffed!" said the deck chief.

His chest exploded, spraying red across the deck. The corpse was thrown across the room by the blast.

"You," Sikkur pointed his rail pistol next at the first pilot. "Take me up top, to the rotors."

Strongpoint, Ephraim Tholus

Rudao spun into the air, end over end like a crashing, experimental plane. His vision greyed. Color returned as he slowed, high over the summit, falling back towards the battlefield. With color came pain: he looked down, and saw his suit had clamped and sealed where his right knee had been.  

Blood-starved, the greying returned. He saw four castles charging onto the plain, driving wakes of snow behind them.

Greyness became black.

Command Vehicle, Anderson Plainitia

"The new bogeys have suppressed our units on the hill," said the man looking up from his screen. "They've taken high casualties. Leader Rudao is missing."

"So the enemy’s ‘Cobras’ have finally arrived."

"Shall I instruct the howitzers to return fire?"

"No, they are outclassed. Tell them to keep their heads down. This fight is over for them. Get me Leader Truku."  

AHR ‘King Cobra’ Heavy Armor Unit, Anderson Planitia

"This is Enduring Fury. Enemy guns destroyed, over."

Pushing wrecks aside, the landship drove onto the battlefield, a lion claiming the food chain. It was the mass of a submarine but light as a bulldozer. It rode in on four, separate treads, each crushing the red ice into corrugated tar trails. Its sloped armor was sandwiched layers of graphene, they shifted between red, brown, and black: dynamic camouflage.

"Enduring Fury, this is Company Command. We need your Cobras to drive through the center of the enemy's defense line, over."

On top of its gun turret, two point defense guns crossed streams of white laser fire. They kung fu blocked a cloud of micro missiles into flashes of expanding gas.

The world went white - a rocket the cloud had screened, exploded against the landship's hull. Rocking, the vehicle stopped, its camouflage program freezing. It resumed just as quickly, the armor was unmarked.

The turret turned; it clenched four, individually targeting, anti-ship guns. One aimed at the trench line from where the rocket had come.

A hyper-velocity round made a thunderclap as it blinked across the plain. The trench line exploded into shattered ice and flash freezing steam. Some debris would return weeks later, when their orbits decayed.

"Copy that, Command. Cobras advance behind me, wedge-attack formation."

The landship's lieutenant watched through thick, insulated, glass blocks and an augmented reality battlefield. Outside, friendly infantry were waving from behind their ruined transports. They leaped and flew out, taking cover behind the giant tanks. To the left and the right of his ship, the other two tanks were firing. The enemy trench line was turning into a cloud.

A red warning pop-up appeared; a crab mine erupted from the snow from within the point defense blind spot. It rushed at the left front tread and exploded. It shook through the hull; like when the gunner once dropped a crate of canned rations.

Too easy, thought the Lieutenant. Was that all they had? They should never have picked this fight. What were they thinking, coming all this way, to die on the ice?

"Enduring Fury, this is Courage of Mars," said a tight-beamed voice. "We just noticed a disturbance over in the lagoon, over."

"Say again Courage of Mars – from the lagoon?"

"Affirmative, Fury. It's happening right now."

The lieutenant turned and looked. The computer read his brainwaves and interest. It showed him a close-up of methane waves lapping the water ice shelf shoreline.

"This is Fury, I don't see anything," he replied. "Let's just stay focused on - "

Methane welled up and splashed onto the shoreline, turning tar sand into mud. Riding up the ice shelf and out of the sea, came tanks.

"They’re hiding in the sea?"

"Contact! Twelve tanks, rear flank!”

"This is Company Command, requesting visual feed on new bandits, over!"

Along the lagoon, a row of gun muzzles flashed.

"This is King Maker, taking saturating fire, we just lost rear armaments!"

"King Maker, turnabout and engage," said the Lieutenant. "Courage of Mars, continue without us."

AHR Planet Carrier, Big Game Hunter

9 kilometers South South East, altitude 3,600 meters

"Sir, we have line of sight on the pyramid."

"Excellent. Show me what they crossed the Solar System for."

The deck became hushed, and all heads turned to look at the main screen. It showed a black pyramid rising out of a hydrocarbon lagoon. A causeway ran from the water ice shelf to a slit entrance at the pyramid's base. Flashes and erupting snow created the picture static of war.

"It's like a mountain. How big is that damn thing?"

"The base is two by two kilometers," said the helmsman. "It's emitting a significant amount of heat."

Colton turned to look at the helmsman, "a weapon?"

"I couldn't say, Sir. Were not noticing any spikes. This could just be a poorly insulated structure. Even so, they're radiating an incredible amount; it's in the kilojoules."

"Well it can see us, and we're still here. Let's teach it its error. Hit it with the x-ray laser, 10 percent power."

A siren sounded and blast shields came down over windows. Baffles slid open one by one along the underspine of the factory ship. Warning lights lit up red as the most powerful weapon in the outer outer solar system, fired.

The x-ray beam itself was invisible. Superheated gas shockwaved away, a thunderclap that knocked over men and loosened boulders. The flash left permanent burns in curious eyes. Point defense sensors were overwhelmed and went into reboots.

It struck the pyramid.

Inside the lagoon, the methane sea flash-boiled. It blasted out faster than the speed of sound, taking wreckage, soldiers, and billion year old ice formations.

The sea did not rush in - boiled dry, the lagoon was now open to the public. Its walls were dams of black, fractal, coral. They grew out of a factory floor the size of a plain. Towers and robot arms moved, passing and fusing blocks between them. They spiked heat dissipation tines like surprised puffer fish, and just carried on.

The pyramid, growing out of the factory floor, was unaffected.

“By all the Gods!”

“Attend to your post!”  Truku glared, sat packed between his gunner, Logrum, and his driver, Krim. The cockpit fenced them in with status screens – one showed the pyramid. Their eyes would not leave it.

“I said attend!”

“Yes sir.”

“Alpha and Charlie Squad, engage Tank 3,” said Truku into the radio. “Bravo, we’re taking Tank 1.”

On a hologram he saw the armored transports dividing, they spiked in infra-red as they fired on the move. The Cobras were stopping, turning, turrets rotating.

“Distance 500 meters,” said the Krim, shifting up a gear.

“Gunner, sabot, target left forward tread.”

“Identified and locked.”

“Up,” said the auto-loading computer.

The boom of the main gun shook into Truku’s gut.

“Target!” Logrum grinned with sharpened teeth.

Truku’s hologram zoomed on the advancing landship. It flared in infra-red like an exploding star.

“No hit,” he frowned, “keep at it. We’ll saturate its defenses.”

“Main gun,” said the Logrum, “auto-fire, same target, five rounds.”

“Implementing firing program,” said the firing computer.

In the holo, Tank 1 flared like a sparking wire as the other Bravo Sqaud transports unloaded into it. Then, the tank stopped moving, and its gun barrels began moving independently.

“Shit!”

The shockwave tilted the transport on its side, the three crewman were slammed like children at a park ride. Krim downshifted, once, twice, neutral: the tank slowed--

– and dropped back down on both treads.

A red popup flashed. B2 DSTRYD. B4 DSTRYD.

“Close the fucking distance!”

“Moving back to top speed,” Krim accelerated.

“Firing program complete,” said the firing computer.

“No effect!”

“Repeat program!”

“Distance, 400 meters!”

“Logrum, fire the machine guns!”

“The machine guns?”

“Do it! Saturate the defenses, its computers may see a threat!”

Logrim crosshaired the landship, and fired the twinned 50 calibers on full auto.

“Our ruse finds no fool!”   

“Keep firing! It still wastes processing power, ruling it out!”

On the displays, their remaining squad mate, Bravo 3, began firing its machine guns as well. All fire was on the landship’s left forward tread.

“Target! Tread destroyed!”

They cheered. Through the vision bricks, Truku saw the giant vehicle starting to tilt down, like a slow-sinking ship.

As it tilted, its gun barrels moved independently.

“Shit!”

Somewhere on the Battlefield, Anderson Plainitia

"Ah, the angry little man wakes up."

Rudao opened his eyes. He was propped with his back against a rock, his gun by his side. He was sitting in a tunnel, between huge, curved walls of water ice that had collapsed inward. The tunnel ran as far as he could see, in both directions.

His right leg felt numb - his suit had grown a bloated bag over what was left. He tried moving it - it felt like water stuffed into a garbage bag. There was no pain, but no feeling either.

Standing over him, were two giants, a handful of men, and a mine.

"You alright sir?" asked someone with more heart than deductive reasoning.

“Where are we?”

“Some sort of cryovolcanic lava tube,” sad Heart. “I think. The ceiling is just along the surface – the fighting must have broken it.”

“You are in my deployment zone,” complained the mine.

"This won't break, will it?" He lifted up his leg.

"If it does, you die Little One," said the giant. "This battle is over for you."

"It is over for me, when I say so. What hit us? Are there any other survivors?"

"Enemy armor," said a lookout above, she streamed her suit feed to him. "Those tanks we were warned of. Experience of such, is beyond the power of words to convey. Our armor is hitting from behind, but for naught. I don't know who else on the hill survived: no one is firing from it.”

Rudao's cracked helmet viewed the feed, and his mouth fell open.

"Gods, those things are huge. Can we pierce them?"

“No,” the mine’s claws drooped.  

"No," said the giant. "But maybe don't need to," he gestured pointing around the tunnel. "Ice wall of tunnel, very thin. Enemy tanks, heavy as Market Day swine. Can trap them, like game in pit."

"Game in pit!" The other giant grinned, shaking his howitzer in the air like the ape who discovered fire. "Hur, hur, hur!"

"Ugly One," he snapped his finger at the laughing giant. "Carry me on your back. Let us turn words into deeds. We are hunters all, and on ground we tread, all large beasts must learn their place."

There was some cheering at the bravado. The mine clacked in the air.

"How do we flush them?" Asked Heart. "They ignore us and press on to brothers and sisters."

"We go after their brothers and sisters," said the woman with the feed. "They are vulnerable, and we face their rear."

“The rear? Let us insert most painful lesson of war!"

"Courage of Mars, this is Second Platoon," said the radio. "We're getting hammered by a heavy caliber gun, from the rear. Can you assist, over?"

"This is Courage of Mars. Sure, we've got this, Second." the officer looked through the views in infra-red. He saw the flash of the 105mm guns firing. He frowned: what were those things? One of the freakishly large ones stopped to wave its cannon over its head.

"All stop. Turret turn 174 degrees."

"Copy that," said the driver from his compartment.

The land ship stopped, targeting reticules formed over the attackers. They immediately turned and jumped, disappearing into the ground.

"What the hell? Enduring Fury, this is Courage of Mars. Request permission to halt advance and address ambushers attacking from the rear, over."

"Granted, Mars."

"Driver, turn us around. We're getting those turds in the punch bowl. Turret turn back to dead 0."

The landship turned, doing an about-face. From out of the trench, a cluster of man-portable missiles came flying, flashing red on his screens. Two point defense guns opened up, clearing them away.

“Identified,” said the gunner’s voice through a speaker. “Shall I fire?”

“They’re too close, shooting up ice will endanger our own. Driver, advance, full speed. We’ll crush them inside their little holes."

“Acknowledged.”

The landship started grinding forward.

The attackers didn’t reappear. The infantry moved past them, firing and maneuvering towards the debris cloud over the enemy’s prepared line.

“Distance, 200 meters,” said the driver.

The landship picked up speed. Through the vision blocks, he could see the flashes of the tank battle, towards the lagoon.

“Distance, 100 meters.”

“No contact,” said the gunner.

Going too fast to turn, they drove over the hulk of a burned out spider. Its legs popped off and its cabin crushed like a can.

“Distance, 50 meters.”

“Still no contact.”

A popup flashed: the seismometer. The officer frowned. The seismometer?

“There’s something under us!”

“What? That’s impossible!”

“Driver,” the officer stood up, “halt and reverse! Repeat-”

The rumble of the mine detonating shook through the walls.

The landship began leaning - at just a meter a second – as it fell.

“No traction! I’ve got no traction!”

“Instruments giving me junk!”

“We’re falling into a chasm, you idiots! Give me a depth!”

“Depth 20 meters, but I can’t say, it’s not calibrated for this!”

“Do you hear that?”

“I’ve got infra-red spike -”

“Shut up. Do you hear that?”

There were thuds and scrapes on the hull.

“Fucking infantry! Why isn’t point defense firing?”

“It can’t get a lock, the chasm walls are too close, sir.”

“Fire the main guns: we need to blast this hole open, now.”

“The safety won’t allow it, we’re too close to obstruction.”

The thuds grew louder. Above he heard a scraping.

“Override the fucking safety! Fire!”  

Above him, the entry hatch was torn off, and the air inside instantly froze into snowflakes. He scrabbled it off his visor to see a boot big as his chest – landing on his chest. Ribs cracked, one stabbing through his lungs. From beyond the boot came a plate-sized hand, that clamped around his shoulder. Peering down at him was a helmeted, manlike face, but much too large. It had a heavy lower jaw, like a orc’s. Two tusks framed a grin of yellow teeth.

Limb by limb, the giant tore him apart.

Trench Line Alpha, Anderson Plainitia

The air was browned-out with tar.

The mist speckled and dripped down Namor’s suit, forming a puddle in the trench.  A support beam lay twisted in front of him, scrunched up like cardboard. A cracked suit helmet rolled to a stop against it. Further along, a crater had been boiled out where a gun had been placed.

"It's stopped," said the STAR beside him, blue hand prints on her shoulders. “Those monster tanks have stopped.”  

“Everyone up top,” Namor climbed out.

“We’ve not received the order,” said someone. Namor looked back: peering helmets looked up at him.

“For all we know, it may never come. Now get up top.”

All along their trench section, STARs were climbing out of their shelters and getting behind berms and ice bags. A man gestured and another threw a heavy laser gun up to him. A sniper tossed beads into the air – rotors popped from them and the targeting drones flew off. A man, his suit painted black and his face painted skull white, stowed his gun and gripped a steel-bladed spear in both hands. He looked at Namor and nodded.

 “I can’t see,” said Blue Hand Prints, attaching a bayonet. “In this mist I would not see shit fall from my own arse.”

“Use infra-red,” Namor drew a steel axe. A clatter of bones and beads hung from its leather-wrapped handle. The chainsaw blade glittered with diamond-edging.

“I am. It shows only the cooling dead: their living yet hide their heat.”

Small arms flashed further down the trench.

“They are upon us!”

Heavy fire tore through the mist, rounds slamming into berms and blasting out ice. A STAR was smacked back, snow spraying from his cracked visor. The body yanked against the safety tether, it jerked and shredded as more shots tore into it.

Out of the mist came the attackers, IR-blocking ponchos covering them like white ghosts. They dropped down and jumped over the trench, their helmets with white armored HUDs instead of glass visors.

Blue Prints stabbed one with her bayonet, shoving him back against the trench wall. He clutched at the gun and then she fired: red ice sprayed out behind him. Another, bulkier ghost dropped down and fired: the STAR behind Namor spun away, his head blown off.

Namor shot the bulky ghost in the chest. The chest flashed and the ghost staggered back: the reacti-plate flare left after-images in Namor’s eyes. The ghost straightened up, poncho torn, a blackened, hex-shaped, hole in his chest plate. His suit cuff began reeling back his dropped gun.

Namor ran up, grabbed the ghost around the neck, and shoved his gun muzzle into the armor opening. He fired once, twice, three times. On the third, red snow blasted out and he let the body fall.

A hammer stuck him in the back, and shoved him into the trench wall so hard he imprinted in it. His suit threw up yellow and red pop ups and he pushed himself out of the wall. Behind him, STARs and white ponchos were grappling in the trench section. Chainsaw-edged weapons whined and the trench lit up with gun flashes. Above, small drones were fighting for tree-height superiority. He saw a ghost aim a bullpup rifle at his head. Namor rushed up and swung his axe down, smacking the gun away. He grappled with the man and they went down on to the trench floor, brown sludge and frozen blood speckling his face plate. The white HUD plate smacked against his helmet: each heard the conducted sound of the other’s grunts.

Namor forced his axe blade against the ghost’s faceplate. He pulled the trigger and the chainsaw screeched, chewing sparks out of the faceplate. The ghost tried to push Namor off. Namor grabbed him by the throat and punched at the damaged faceplate, till it caved. The ghost began thrashing and clawing at the faceplate. Namor shoved him off, and shot him once in his face.

“There’s too many of them!” it was Blue Prints, she had lost her rifle and had a pistol drawn, her suit was sparking.

“Keep killing!” he fired past her.

A ghost fired at Blue Prints, and missed. Blue Prints pistol whipped him in the throat. As the ghost choked and clutched his throat, Blue Prints grabbed him by his arm, shoved her pistol under his armpit, and fired into his torso. The arm blasted free.

A blue-green laser fixed itself to Blue Prints’ back.

“Get down! Get down!”

There was a flash and a bang that stabbed his ear drums, and Blue Prints pitched forward, skidding into a corpse. A crater glowed between her shoulder blades.

Namor turned and saw a ghost with a mini-missile launcher. The weapon’s targeting laser was already pinned to his chest, he saw the mini-missile self-load into the tube.

The ghost dropped the gun and flailed as he was hoisted up, a spear shoved into his back. The STAR in the black armor with the skull white-painted face lifted the spear up higher, then brought it down, hard, slamming the end against the ground. Momentum shoved the ghost down, the spear tip piercing up and out through his belly.

Skull Face grinned at Namor and wrenched the spear free.

“Like you said, Zogu. Keep killing.”

Command Vehicle, Anderson Plainitia

Udmurt glared at the hologram of the massive ship, rising over the plain. The pyramid was marked in flashing red. Yellow trajectory lines and firing arcs from the Big Game Hunter plotted possible futures he would have to live in.

“Sir,” the rifleman looked up at him, “Do I relay the order for the fall back?”

Udmurt put his arm on his shoulder, “No fall back, we must trust our saboteurs will succeed. We carry on, Brave.”

The rifleman stared.

“I said we carry on.”

“Yes Sir.”

The command vehicle rocked, screens rattling. Lights went out and several systems went into reboots, screens turning blue. Outside they heard a great roaring.

“What was that?” asked the other console operator.

“It’s fired again,” said Udmurt.

AHR Planet Carrier, Big Game Hunter

7 kilometers South, altitude 5,000 meters

The two men crouched behind the metal barrier. Shots sparked across it, automatic fire falling like heavy rain. One peered round the side and fired three shots, before shrinking back as bullets clawed at him.

Towering over them was the Big Game Hunters aft-starboard rotor. Sikkur looked up at it; twenty-meter long, compound rotors spun only fast as a ceiling fan. The base tower it rose from was armored. A service access hatchway – opened – was just twenty, wide-open, meters from them.

“The Pyramid is cracked!” said one pointing, a dark-eyed man with dreadlocks and a red war painted face.

“What?” Sikkur turned to look. Words left him for a few moments. “What is that which lies inside? It is as brilliant as a diamond.”   

“The Gods have abandoned us, Skar,” Dreadlock’s face hardened.

“No Brother, they but test us most sorely!”

Heavy weapon fire tore over their heads and cratered into the rotor base tower. Dreadlocks braved it and peered around the barrier: three gunmen were running to a new, flanking position. They had no cover: he shot two dead, one rolling till he went over the side of the huge ship. The third he shot in the leg. The man collapsed, screaming and bleeding red ice.

“This is Commodore Colton Ames,” they heard on their radios. “There’s no where to go, nowhere to run. You’re not getting off my ship alive unless you surrender, right now. This is your one and only chance.”

Sikkur peeped.

Twenty gunmen regarded him, in cover behind large equipment mounts and similar barriers. One of them carried just a pistol, and had grey hair.

“We can kill him,” said Dreadlocks. “Then the factions on this ship will fall upon each other to take control.”

“I do not think that is their way, Brother.”

Another group of gunmen made a break from cover to flank them. Sikkur fired and they fell back.

“Why didn’t you kill them?”

“We are in parley.”

“Does that seem a parley to you?” he pointed at the smoking pyramid. “If they fire into that crack, then all this ends, Brother.”  

“You have ten seconds to surrender, or we’re going to blast you off my ship,” said the man on their radio.

“Get to that hatchway,” said Dreadlocks. “I’ll get you the time.”

“What? What are you - No!”

Dreadlocks stood up, gun in one hand, both hands raised. Laser sights studied his chest and helmet.

“Drop the gun, get on your knees, and put your hands behind your head.”

Dreadlocks let his gun clatter to the deck, and got down in the open. Guns held ready, two gunmen got up and ran towards him.

“Where’s the other one?” said one gunman, rifle aimed at Dreadlocks’ chest. The gunman got behind him and tried to pull his hands behind his back.

Dreadlocks grabbed a blade tucked behind his helmet and flung it at the first gunman. The man staggered back, the blade deep in his chest. He grabbed the other man’s arm and disarmed him, and pulled him in front as a human shield, arm locked around his neck. He pointed the man’s own gun at his head.

“Hold your fire!” yelled the grey-haired man.

“There’s the other one!”

Sikkur was up and running for the base tower.

“Any of you cock mongrels shoot,” Dreadlocks roared, “This one dies!”  

Dreadlock’s helmet shattered into glass and frozen flesh and bone.

“Get the other one!” yelled the grey-haired man, the spent round spinning away from his pistol.

Bullets sparked around Sikkur. Yellow and red popups entered the corner of his helmet – and he was in. He slammed the hatch shut behind him, and spun the locking mechanism. Through a thick, glass, portal, he could see men running towards the tower, and Dreadlocks’ corpse tumbling away.

He felt a stinging.

He looked down and saw the tear in his right suit leg. It was lined with red ice.

He looked up: there was a stairway running up to the rotors, alongside the mast they were mounted on. Above, he could see them spinning. He took a step up: the pain in his right leg was like a hundred fires.

He slung his weapon, and using his arms and good leg, he pulled himself up along the stairs. Sikkur could feel the vibration of the rotors, cramming inside his ears and in his belly. It found the natural frequency of an item in his suit, and it began to shake and hum uncontrollably.

Below, the hatchway swung open and gunmen poured in. They looked up at him and started racing up the stairs.

Close to the top, Sikkur stopped and got as close as he could to the mast. The vibrations and sound pounded a migraine into his skull. He reached into his pack, pulled out a flat, black, oblong of plastic. A screen in augmented reality appeared in the air above it, he made his picks and closed it. Then, he lay back on the stairway, the oblong in his hands.

Two of the gunmen reached him, guns aimed, laser sights on his forehead and chest.

Sikkur smiled at them, gave them the finger, and detonated.

Command Vehicle, Anderson Plainitia

 “We’re down to six transports,” said Krim, the driver.  He drove the transport between two smoking wrecks.

“In the platoon?” asked Logrum, the gunner. He made a holy sign as he recognized a wreck.

“In the army,” said Truku. “Who’s left?”

“Two in Alpha, three in Charlie. We’re all that’s left of Bravo.”

The landship fired a cannon and an ice formation exploded into a crater. Two transports hiding behind it reversed and fled, ice boulders falling around them in slow motion.

“Distance 233 meters,” said Krim. They were in the open, but the enemy landship, the Enduring Fury they’d learned was its name, was aiming at the fleeing tanks from Alpha.

“Gunner, sabot, target right rear tread.”

“We’re out of sabots,” said Logrum. “We’ve got incendiary but that’s useless.”

“Load it.”

“Up,” said the auto-loading computer.

“Charlie platoon are firing at its rear, but its ignoring them.”

Truku raised a wild eyebrow. “So we have four transports behind it!” he got on the common band, “Charlie platoon, close and ram that thing. It’s less than a hundred meters from the cliff: we’re going to push it into the sea!”

The other two crew stared at him.

The landship fired – they could see the flash through the vision bricks. A1 DSTRYD, declared a red popup.

“Bravo One, this is Alpha Four,” the radio crackled. “We’ll lure it closer to the cliff edge.”

“Gods favor your courage, Alpha Four!”

On the tactical map, the green marker that was the last of Alpha platoon broke across its hunter’s path, racing to the ice cliffs.

“Maximum speed, Krim!”

Storms of brown snow kicked up behind the charging transports, like smoke from oil well fires. Alpha Four made it right towards the cliff edge, and then the landship fired. The transport exploded into shrapnel, its hull splitting and tumbling over the sea.

The landship began turning its turret round.

“Ninety meters!”

The other transports fired, point defense lasers knocked their warheads away like Kung Fu bodyguards.

“Sixty meters!”

“Fire! Fire the machine guns as well!”

“Target!” yelled Logrum. The incendiary exploded before the landship like end-of-year fireworks. “No damage!”

The cabin lit up with the light of the enemy gun firing.

CHARLIE 1 DSTRYD

CHARLIE 3 DSTRYD

“We have just three left!” yelled Logrum

“Thirty meters!” the landship was growing beyond their glass canopy. Its quad barrels, each as long as a STAR armored transport, aimed down.

“10 meters!”

“Brace!”

The armored transport bashed into the rear tank tread: twice its size, like a charging rhino. It bounced off, its front armor holding. The landship threw its tread, the steel and graphene slabs clattering into the snow field.

“Again!”

Krim downshifted and pushed the transport forward. This time it stayed pressed against the landship’s hull. The landship’s cannons tilted down but couldn’t go low enough. They felt the smacks of the other transports striking. A vector diagram formed before Krim to show him how much force they would need.

The landship began skidding, sliding towards the icy cliffs.

“It’s working!” there were cheers and excited chatter over the common band.

“Forty meters to cliff edge!” said Krim, sweat forming on his brow despite the cold. “Thirty!”

The landship stopped. Their motors whined as they strained.

“We’ve hit a rock or something,” said Truku. “We have to push harder!”

One of the other transports reversed, and charged again, smacking the landship hard. The landship rocked.  

“Charlie 2 don’t do that!” yelled Truku. “You’ll get into their line of sight!”

Their eyes filled with blinding pain, after-images throbbing. The blast lifted up the transport, almost toppling it on its side. Truku felt the pressure wave moving through his body.

“We can’t with just two tanks,” said Krim, wincing as he studied vector diagram. “We can’t apply enough force!”

Hatches opened and infantry bailed out, they carried rifles and anti-tank rockets.  

“Great,” Truku gritted his teeth.

The landship started moving, pushing the transports aside.

“What’s that!” Logrum was staring out a vision block.

“What?” Kirm looked at the instrument displays.

“That!” Logrum pointed.

Across the snow on jetpacks came three giants in black power armor, cloaks flapping. Two carried pole arms and had cannons slung under their forearms. The one in the center carried a wooden staff that vented gas like a dry ice machine.

 “He joins battle,” said Truku, “The Ancestor comes!”

The landship’s point defense guns opened up at the giants, their armor sparked and flashed but they did not slow. One landed right among the infantry, their rifle fire skidding and tickling off him. He brought his pole arm down hard, crushing a man. The other giant opened up with his cannon, punching soldiers into the air like golf balls.

The ancestor planted his staff in the snow, got up against the landship’s hull, and pushed. His boots dug into the snow, sinking. The other giants joined him, one and then the other.

“It’s moving!” said Krim. “Gods, what are those suits made of? They’ve got it moving again!”

The transport’s motors whined and the landship began sliding faster.

“15 meters!”

The giants began running as they pushed.

“7 meters!”

“Seismometer warning!” said Logrum.

“All units, stop and reverse!”

The transports moved back through the deep furrowed snow. The giants kept pushing, the landship coasting on momentum. There were dull thunderclaps of ice cracking underneath in the cliff.

The Enduring Fury went over, falling slow as a sinking ship.   

Jace Sheperd, IV

Jace hovered over the sun. “Why did you bring me here? Can’t it wait? The wormhole’s installing, and we’re fighting a small war.”

“Nonsense! You’re like a useless Joan of Arc to them. What’s happening out there are small details, and never worry about the small details,” Faxian waved his hand. “You need to see this, it’s part of the wormhole installation. The Naga Raja deserves to know about this, as well.”

“‘Deserves’? Not ‘needs’?”

Faxian raised his hand, looking at the yellow globe. He smiled and pointed. “There – do you see it? Just coming around the equator.”

Jace squinted: black specks appeared like floating tea leaves. She zoomed: they became town-sized hexagons, thinner than hairs.

“Are those real, or constructs of this digital world?”

“They’re really down there, hovering over the sun,” the old man grinned and nodded. “They’re statites, satellite-like platforms, riding the sun’s light to keep from falling into it.”

“Is someone building a Dyson?”

“Someone is always building a Dyson. These are harvesters, they chase after solar flares.”

“What’s special about the flares?”

“Flares fire particles at high speed – which crash into the sun’s slower moving particles. The collisions produce antimatter. Kilograms of it.”

She flew down to a harvester plate, all six sides ran to the horizon. She held up her hand and felt it tingle. “So this is where Journey to the West will get its fuel from.”

“It is just one harvester in one pack,” Faxian landed beside her. “There are several packs now, when they get too big, they calve off.”

“And they feed directly to Journey?”

“Not directly. Come,” he held out his hand like a grandfather taking the kids to the zoo. “I will show you where it’s stored.”

They traveled till the sun was just a modern monarch: noticed but powerless. A red dwarf planet appeared with a small moon, pin-prick satellites sheperding them along. They landed: a sloth-slow giant passed, unspooling a super conductor rail. Ahead, a school of lights flew into a deep borehole. The two walked through red-stained methane snow, and looked over the edge. At the bottom there was a blue glow.

“What’s down there?” she asked.

“The other end of the wormhole. This is where Journey gets its fuel. We’re on Makemake, a Kuiper Belt planet.”

“Dwarf planet.”

“The statite swarms at the sun pump the antimatter here, through wormholes. Magnetic containment is used to store it. When needed, it’s fed down there.”

“Why is the antimatter reserve so far away?”

He gave her a look. “Because it’s antimatter.”

“You’re storing so much? At any one time?”

“Just planning ahead. Journey to the West is the first of its kind – and its class. Makemake will one day power a fleet of heavy tonnage, antimatter ships. And Makemake will not be the only reserve.”

“How are you doing this?” she gestured and shook her head.

“Doing what?”

“Creating and manipulating wormholes - we don’t yet have the technology. I thought our one was a Hedron Builder artifact some Transcendent found. How can there be so many?”

 Faxian smiled. “I am not an old man with a walking stick, Jace Sheperd. I am a Transcendent – an AI that is constantly growing and redesigning itself. I am as far from my starting design as you are from the first amphibians. Most Transcendents do not talk to each other, let alone flesh and bloods. For all intents, they’ve disappeared into their own universes. But sometimes they return, and try to share what they’ve learned.  What we can decipher from them, we adapt.”

“We’re not cats,” she replied, “you can explain how you’ve learned to create, stabilize, and grow wormholes. I’ll understand.”

“I’m sure you will, Jace. But there is something you have not considered.”

“What’s that?”

“Maybe us Transcendents are the cats.”

Recovery Party, IV

Planet 9, 1st Moon: “Benares”
Xeno-Biome Crater   

"You know Jim," Spencer shoved aside something akin to bamboo, "Running about in an alien biome is definitely something I'm going to look back on, as a high point. It's a shame I'm not a exobiologist."

James Hernandez looked down at the green, falling grubs as his boots sucked free of the mud. Root hairs pushed up and reached up and waved after him.

 "You could always download the PhD." he wiped his boot on a black tree branch.

"No signal," said the orangutan. Hernandez shrugged.

"We're getting close," Azima's head panned, weapon at the ready, looking for targets. "She stopped moving."

Hernandez squinted, and then pointed, eyes wide. "Is that a sign?"

The two historians made their way to the vine-heaped plastic board.

"This was their settlement!" Spencer imaged the sign. "The digester must be here, as well!"

"Messed up place to settle," Jim looked down at the ground. "Look, a path. And- "

"Footprints," Azima was ahead, crouching down by one. "Same tread patterns as ours. Look at the spacing, she was running."

"For joy?" asked Spencer.

"Keep your guard up," Azima looked behind her. "We don't know what's out here."

"Should we hustle? She could be hurt, or in danger."

"If we rush, we could end up the same. And no one is coming to rescue us, Hernandez."

Azima took point and the historians followed.

"It all comes down to the metal inclusion," said Spencer. "That's the answer to everything."

"How do you figure?" Jim ducked under a cable of throbbing vines.

"Of all the alien crater lens biomes on Benares, they pick this one. It's probably an exo-asteriod that collided, billions of years ago. Rich, dense, metal ores in this part of the solar system? There isn't a better place to set up a colony."

"What about all the alien bugs and plants? Those bugs are definitely trying to get in and drink my blood."

"They're refined, concentrated, organic matter: food for the digesters. The atmosphere is thick, they'd just need filters instead of air tanks. Jim, this is the most habitable, natural environment in the solar system, after Earth."

"Quiet," Azima frowned.

"What about all the alien bugs and plants?"

"What about them?"

"What about what?"

"I said quiet!"

"What about all the alien bugs and plants?"

"I just answered that."

"That's weird! Why is my suit on playback?"

"What do you mean?"

"I didn't say anything."

"Seriously?"

"Seriously."

"Shut up!"

Silence. The three looked about, weapons ready.

"What are we listening for?" Jim whispered.

Azima turned and walked back past them.

"Where are you going?"

She held her hand back. "I'm picking up something on infra-red. They're large."

"How large?" asked Spencer. "Do I need to compensate?" he patted his gun.

"Wait here. I'm getting up that rock, maybe I'll get a better view," she turned and leapt, her suit's gas jets moving her twenty meters.  She landed on a rock covered in rippling, yellow and brown moss. She raised her gun an aimed down the sight.

"Thirty meters," she said into her suit radio. " they're falling back now, three of them."

"How large?"

"I said to wait there," she kept peering down the sight. "About one and a half times the size of a grizzly bear. They're – damn! They look like a preying mantises!"

"How large?"

She looked up from the gun sight.

The mantis pounced. The impact broke her spine in three places, twisting her like a hated doll. Claws rasped loud as machine tools and ripped through suit and muscle. Its toothed beak crushed into her shoulder and tore out her arm, tossing it upwards like a puppy with a toy. Azima's cortical stack kept on recording, right until its grinding teeth pulped her skull.

"Over there! The building!"

Before them was a ruined building, clotted with yellow vines and boarded windows. The door was shut. They fled to it, Spencer using trees to fling himself.

He slammed into it, feet first. He shook at the door.

"What the fuck!" he pounded with both fists. "What the fuck!"

Hernandez caught up, his gun flapping on its strap.

"What the fuck! What the fuck! What the fuck!"

"Keep it together!"

"I can't open the damn door!"

Bolts slid on the other side, one after the other. The door opened.

"I heard you the first time," said Mingxia. "Get in, idiots."

The historians got inside and Mingxia threw the bolts back.

"You shouldn't have come," she said.

"You're fucking welcome, Lady!" Spencer bared his teeth. "We came to this shit hole to rescue your mutinous ass!"

"You're calling this a rescue? Who are you?"

Outside, they heard something heavy hit the ground.

"How large? How large? I said to wait there."

"Who are those?" asked Hernandez peering through a crack. "And can they get in?"

"They're ambush predators, they work in packs. I counted as many as four."

"Azima saw three," Hernandez replied.

"I was wondering why they left."

"So where's the fourth?" asked Spencer.

 "How large? How large?"

"That's Four, right now." She went to a boarded window and peered. "Yeah, the smaller one."

"The smaller one?"

"What do we do?" Hernandez moved away from the window. "How do we get out?"

"And also, fuck you Lady!" Spencer offered her his digit.

"I never asked for anyone to come after me. Frankly, that was foolish. You put yourselves at great risk to even reach the surface. If you want to leave, you should shoot them, and go."

Spencer and Hernandez stared at each other.

"Do you need a moment?" she asked.

"We're not a security detail," said Hernandez. "We were the only people on the Ramanujan left, to come after you."

"Well it's been a fool's errand. I'm not leaving."

"Not leaving?" Spencer glared. "You know there's monster alien, roach parrots outside?"

She shook her head. "I'll figure it out."

"We've been through a lot, and someone just died," said Hernandez. "We're not going back without you."

"That's irrelevant. I've been exposed to a wholly alien environment. I'm a grave safety risk, and if you take me back I'll die of illness. Here," she pointed to the lab gear, "here, I have a chance."

"What is this place?"

"A fully equipped and supplied biology lab. You, the big ape -- if you're not going back outside, come away from the door. It excites them."

"We need weapons, Lady," Spencer left the door. "Preferably some instruct-and-forget missiles. Are there any weapons in this place?"

"No, but we don't need weapons to beat those creatures."

"Why not?"

She smiled. "We have Science."

Anderson Planitia, III

An old man with heavy furs over his shoulders, stirred stew over a fire. He had kohl round his eyes and his white beard was braided, and tied in knots. He looked up at the visitor and smiled with yellow teeth.

“Grandson,” said Grodak Mammoth Hunter. “War has come upon your chosen tribe.”

Udmurt looked about.  The whole world was flat tundra, lit by a sun but not warmed by it. In the distance a herd of bison was approaching, a river of muscle and horns.  At the sky’s pole was a single star.

“How am I here?” Udmurt removed his helmet. The near-zero degree air stung his nose and eyes. “Is this illusion?”

“Ha! Now it is you who thinks he sees spirits,” he drew the ladle from the pot and tasted the steaming broth.

“I am not here. This is a vision sown in tiredness and watered by doubts.”

His grandfather flicked boiling soup at his face.

“Ow!” Udmurt clutched at his eye.

“May your pain instruct you in the truth of that matter.”

“You are dead,” said Udmurt.

“And yet,” he flicked more soup. “The herd presses upon you and your folk,” he pointed at the oncoming herd. “Despite losses it has grown, as new beasts have joined it. They are now too many and your folk too few. Stand against them and they will trample you.”

“I do not see how we can win.”

“The open tundra is where the strong crush the foolish.  The cunning must find hills and pits.”

“I do not fight simple-minded bison, grandfather. And there are no pits I can draw them into.”

“No pits? You fight to keep them from entering one.”

Udmurt’s eye grew wide.

“He learns!” Grodak smiled.

“I cannot let them.”

“Then you and all your chosen tribe will perish, and they will enter after all. Let them enter. Where bison have no room to mass or charge, axe and spear may move freely.”

“You ask that I take poor odds, and gamble them. To place my trust in the Trickster God.”

Grodak shook his head. “Do not look to the gods, even as you war to guard their lands. Trust in your tribe, Udmurt.”

“I cannot. They are divided. A thousand petty acts rob them of a single shared purpose.”

“War makes better siblings than mothers do. Fight in the pit, and you will fashion them into a tribe. If they do not win, defeat is well-deserved and failed purpose brings relief to the unworthy.”

“Captain? Captain Udmurt?”

Udmurt opened his eyes. His head was down against a console. Troop positions and ammunition levels were displayed in green on his face.

“Are you alright, sir?” asked the rifleman.

Udmurt sat up and looked back at himself in a glass screen. He touched the freshly blistered skin on his cheek and eyelid.

“Summon the officers,” he said. “Tell them I have a plan to herd our enemies, like bison.”

“Bison, sir?”

“Yes,” Udmurt smiled. “It will be glorious!”

AHR Staging Area, Anderson Plainitia

“This is Second Platoon, Actual,” said the radio. “The hill is ours, over.”

“Say again?”

“There’s no one else up here. They’ve abandoned it, looks like they did hours ago.”

“Well, check for booby traps.”

“Yes, Commodore.”

Ames nodded to one of the men crouching behind a parked spider. The man climbed atop it, and waved a red flag, like a Soviet before the last push for Berlin. The flag lit up, LEDs turning it into a beacon in the perma-night.  Along the ice other red flags answered, some so far away they were just red dots.

“So you will not wait?” said a man beside the Commodore. His suit was matte black and had a captain’s rank patch. Just under it was a logo of a black wolf with hell-red eyes, named AHR REMUS. “You want to end this – now – with unsupported infantry?”

Ames said nothing. Ghosts began marching across the snow, some piling on to six-legged medic drones, repurposed as carts and sled-pullers. Alongside them were naval armsmen in matte black space suits, carrying boarding shotguns and pavise shields.

The Captain of the Remus looked up at the stars.

“Give Romulus and Remus 72 hours to clear out the orbiting mines, and we can end this, from space. They’re under siege sir, they can’t go anywhere.”

“We might not have 72 hours,” said Ames, walking past a burned-out mortar spider. Walking behind him were two men, weapons slung, a small crate between them. It had a nuclear hazard sign on it, and a combination lock with a key hole. “We might not have seven. You’ve seen the infra-red of what’s in there. It’s a ship, Vicente.”

“But it’s big for a ship, Commodore.”

“So is that,” Ames pointed behind him. Surrounded by inflated igloos, stacked containers, and spotlights was the Big Game Hunter. One of its rotors was missing. Welding sparks were being scratched out of the damaged mast. Engineers climbed around it and shook their heads. “I don’t want them escaping.”

The two men joined the march. Their bodyguards and the Tac Nuke team moved with them, some guards loping ahead and spotting. They passed a bomb-crater in the ice: the bottom was an open fissure, frothing and spraying methane. Ames stepped past a marlin-sized fish, flopping on broken ice. Lights glowed along its translucent fins, slowly fading.

“It doesn’t make sense that they gave up the hill without a fight,” said Captain Vicente.

“I told you,” said the Commodore.

“I don’t think they’re running, Colton.”

The foremost infantry jumped off their sleds and went to ground. Lying prone in the hydrocarbon snow they aimed their weapons towards the pyramid.

“This is the Commodore,” he said into his suit radio. “First Platoon, what do you see?”

“Nothing, sir. The enemy’s heavy weapons are not apparent. We see no movement. Picking up no heat patterns.”

The Commodore frowned. “Send some scouts.”

“Yes sir.”

The two officers watched, wordless. Some white specks got up and moved in pairs to the first trench line. Some dropped down – eon-moments later, they climbed back up. The other specks began looking about, walking along the trenches.

“This is First Platoon Actual, there is no one at the trench line. From what my scouts can see, there’s no one in the second line either.”

“Tell them they’ll have to do better than that.”

“Yes sir.”

The specks began moving again, advancing to the second trench.

“Why would they abandon their defenses,” said Captain Vicente, “after the thrashing they gave your men yesterday?”

Ames gave him a dirty look.

“Commodore, it’s a trap.”

“Even if it is, it shows their weakness. Ephraim hill, the trenches: even if they had just ten men left, they should have held those. They’re on the edge of breaking, and their commander knows it.”

“Then will you ask for their surrender?” asked Vicente.

Ames looked at him. “Not before they offer it.”

The other infantry units began to reach the trench line. They poured into it, looking about for traps and ambushers. Perhaps somewhat disappointed, they moved to the second trench. And then the third.

“Commodore, this is Third Platoon Actual, over.”

“Go ahead Third, over.”

“We’re by the beach. There are hulls here, pulled out of the sea. Boat hulls, sir. There’s abandoned equipment here too, howitzers and heavy weapons.”

“Good work, Third,” said Ames.

“They left by sea?” asked Vicente.

“Looks like it,” said Ames. “Or maybe just deserters,” he spoke into his suit mike, “First Platoon Actual, how copy, over?”

“Solid copy, over.”

“There’s a little causeway across the sea with a pyramid ahead of you.”

“Yes sir. Permission to check for sappers and explosives.”

“Permission granted. Secure that causeway, I’m coming over.”  

“We are in the pyramid, over.”

The first group of ghosts moved in, rifles aimed, laser sights cutting through the darkness and feeling about. Inside was a vault as large as a hollowed-out mountain. Black, crystal towers rose out of the ground, gleaming like oil slicks. Smoke clung to the floor pooled around their bases. Hanging gantries and stocky buildings without doors or windows, broke up the vault space. The ground was strewn with standing stones of purest carbon.

“What the hell kind of place is this?” Said one of the ghosts. He carried a sniper rifle.

“The kind we never get to see because we blow them up from space,” said the man next to him, he wore a non-regulation combat webbing. “This is the shit. This is what we keep people safe from. This is what Ironfield looked like.”

The platoon walked in, soldiers covering and advancing in pairs. Ahead of them were narrow grooves in the ground that sank into tunnels. Above ground was a forest of crystal, girders, and tangled cables. Metal frames grew fractal pattern branches, which in turn grew their own, and so on down to the atomic level. Lights panned inside, and going up there boots they heard the sound of internal machinery.

Sniper Rifle looked back at the officer. “Do we go down the tunnels, or through the crazy fractal forest?”

“The fractal forest,” said the lieutenant. “We don’t know where the tunnels go, or what’s inside them. Get up there,” he pointed. “That – tree thing. Give us some cover and watch for bad guys.”

The platoon began advancing into the forest. Behind them, other groups of soldiers followed. Sniper Rifle hauled himself up a pylon growing branches of steel. Halfway up, he could see over the fractal forest. Beyond it, in the center of the vault resting at an angle, was a starship.

“I’ve got eyes on the target,” said the Sniper Rifle. “I confirm it is a ship, there appear to be four strap-on boosters attached.  Drones are active over its surface, they’ve got it lit up like a Christmas tree. Weird, no discernable fuel tank. You would think on a ship this big, that would be the biggest feature.” The ghost looked about, slowly panning across the vault. “No sign of the enemy.”

The javelin punched through the side of his helmet, and knocked him right off the tree.

“Contact!”

Like tigers in the jungle, the STARs appeared. One threw a spear at Non-Regulation Webbing. He cried out as it pinned him through his chest to a steel tree. He clutched at it, dropping his rifle. A STAR carrying a tomahawk ran up, and hacked into Webbing’s helmet till it caved.

A ghost fired at the STAR, but another cannon-balled into him: the two went rolling. The ghost’s rifle fired into the air as the STAR pushed it back. A chainsaw punching dagger in his other hand, he stabbed at the ghost and revved the blade till red ice splattered. He snarled, dug inside, and tore out the man’s flash-freezing intestines.

The lieutenant looked about – on all sides, his men were firing point blank as STARs with spears, swords, and axes charged them. One ran at him, bloody handprints on his shoulders and a halberd over his head. The lieutenant shot him through the throat, blowing his head off. He side-stepped as another brought an axe down, missing his head. He shoved the rifle into his chest, and blasted a hole through it.

The world smacked into his back, and pinned him to the ground. He looked up, past the red status warnings and the blaring air leak alarm. Standing over him, boot snapping his bones, was a giant. It snarled at him through its tusks and swung its hammer down.

“Fall back!”

The ghosts ran past Commodore Ames. Some had lost their weapons. One limped, leaning against another man. He looked back over his shoulder and kept moving.

A group of STARs burst after them, jeering and waving bloodied weapons. One waved a ghost helmet in one his hand, a chain-blade sword in the other. His suit had been painted red and black, and bones hung from it on twine ropes. He yelled in a guttural language and the STARs cheered and rushed forward.

Cannons fired: the STARs were tossed back like leaves, their suits shredded.

Ames looked behind him. Six, black-suited armsmen stood in row, their pavise shields interlocked, boarding shotguns smoking from the firing slits.

“You don’t have the gear for close quarters,” said one, a sergeant’s stripes on her shoulder. “Get behind us, foot slogger. The Navy will save you!”  

“That’s Commodore footslogger to you, young lady. With me.”

“Apologies sir. We’re not going forward?”

“We’re going sideways. The prize is the ship. You two,” he pointed to a crate he’d been guarding with a nuclear hazard sign on it, “carry this.”  

The STAR hauled himself along the deck, leaving blood streaks behind him.

Before him was his gun, a black rail pistol with a feathered charm hanging from the handle. He reached –

- And a boot crunched down on his hand.

He snarled and looked up, right down the barrel of Ames’s pistol.

Ames fired. Blood spattered his boots and mixed with the melting ice. He left muddy prints that stank of primordial chemicals. Behind him came three surviving armsmen, one rushing forward, shield up. The one in the middle dragged the tac nuke crate.  

“Why did they make this ship so big?” whispered one, studying a dead wall screen.

“Focus!” said the sergeant.

All along the corridor the screens lit up. They showed the infiltrators looking back at themselves.

“They know we’re here,” said the rear armsman.

“Everyone knows we’re here,” said the sergeant. “Sir, when do you want to plant the nuke?”

“Whenever we get to this place that they’re so keen to protect.”

“Meaning no disrespect sir, but, it is, a nuclear weapon. Sir?”

“Shhh,” he held up his finger. “Do you hear that?”

They looked about each other. From ahead and behind them they heard a clattering like rain. It grew louder, rapidly.

“Drones!”

They fired their shotguns, shell after shell. Wall-screens cracked from the concussion. Each blast pounded into their eardrums. Down both ends of the corridors came man-sized spiders, black chitin gleaming.  They screeched as their limbs were blown off, but they climbed over each other and dragged themselves forward. One leapt at the rear armsman but he shot it in the thorax, blasting it down the tunnel. The next one pounced on him, knocking him to the ground. Its feet unfurled blades and it stabbed at him, blood spraying out as it stabbed again and again. The middle armsmen tried to kick it off, but it wrapped one leg around his and yanked him off balance. He screamed as it dragged him back down the tunnel.

Ames fired his shotgun, killing the armsman and the spider dragging him. He turned around to see the last one, knocking the sergeant against the wall and stabbing her through her chest. It looked up at him with gleaming, red, optic receptors.

He shot it in the face.

The sergeant choked and slid down the wall, leaving a red trail. She reached for him and gasped but he walked past her, dragging the tactical nuke behind him.

“You shall not pass.”

It was the bridge, that much Ames was certain of. Padded acceleration seats faced consoles and holograms on test loops. A large wall display showed the 9 system, moon orbits marked out in white lines. Urvashi had a ship marker on it. It was labelled JTTW.

Another screen, bizarrely, showed Proxima Centauri.

On a raised stage with pipes and cables running up to it, was a throne. Sitting back on cushions of glowing gel, eyes darting in REM, was a bald woman wearing a white flight suit. Her skin was hairless, smooth as a dolphin’s. Cables broke through the gel and fed into the rows of data jack-pores on her skull, spine, and arms.

Standing between her and Ames was a tall, wiry man: arctic pale and yellow haired. He wore pressure suit trousers but was bare chested: the shape of a mammoth was drawn into it with scars. He carried a bone handled, chain-bladed, sword in each hand. Around his neck was a twine necklace, fitted with polished rune stones. Strapped and mounted on his shoulder was a gun pod. It found Ames’s chest and tracked it.

“Who are you?” Ames, raised up his pavise shield.

“That’s not important.” asked Udmurt.

“Suit yourself,” he brought up his shotgun.

Udmurt threw a sword: it knifed into Ames’s forearm and the blade cut right through. It was clean. Ames laughed and pulled it out.

“What did you expect? Flesh and blood?” he bent the blade like a plastic straw and tossed it aside.

Udmurt’s gun pod opened up: the graphene-weave shield sparked, flashed, but didn’t even dent. Ames aimed his shotgun at the woman on the throne.

Click.

“Damn!”

Udmurt landed on Ames, knocking him down, the shield between them. He reached over it and stabbed down with his sword, cutting into Ames’s shoulder. Sparks erupted as he tore the blade out.  He stabbed down again, and Ames caught his hand. He squeezed and broke Udmurt’s fingers.

He cried out and jerked his hand away. Ames shoved him off with his shield, and got to his feet. He drew his pistol and fired. The shot went wide and Udmurt rolled away behind a console. He poked around the side, and Ames shot off his gun pod. It shattered, shrapnel embedding in Udmurt’s face.

“You people never had any chance,” Ames started moving to flank him. “I don’t know what pact you made with these posthuman monsters, but too little, too late. We’re going to wipe you out. I’m going to wipe you out. And then I’m going to bomb the whole Zone till there’s nothing here but bedrock!”

Udmurt leapt over the console.

He landed on Ames and kicked his shield away. He brought the sword blade down but Ames caught it, the blade tip poking through his splayed hand. He clenched his fingers round the blade and tore it out of Udmurt’s hand and flung it. Udmurt heard a glass screen shattering, and shards rained down on the two. Ames snarled and grabbed at Udmurt’s face.

Udmurt dodged, and grabbed a shard of jagged glass off the floor. It razored into his palm as he stabbed Ames through the eye – blood gushed out and Ames screamed. The glass broke – stopped by an armored braincase.

Howling, Ames tore the glass out, painting both men in red. He grabbed at Udmurt again and caught him this time, wrecked, synthetic fingers clutched around the man’s throat. They squeezed like a vice. Udmurt choked and grabbed Ames’s fingers, trying to pull them off. His fingers slipped in his own blood.

Ames got up, dangling Udmurt in the air. Udmurt felt his blood pounding in his head. The world started to grey.

Ames’s remaining eye went wide and he gasped, dropping Udmurt. He went down to his knees, fingers spasming, and then his whole back. He pitched forward and curled, drooling out of a surprised face.  He kicked once, twice, and was completely still.

Standing, cables trailing behind her like an emperor’s train, was Jace Shepard. Her eyes blazed nuclear blue with neuro-optical leakage. Her arm was outstretched, a glow slowly leaving her finger tips.

Udmurt rubbed his throat choked. “How – how did you do that?”

“Go back outside,” there was a new tone of command in her voice. “I summoned aid.”

“Aid?”

“The Ironfielders have come.”

Outside, along the plain, lava was erupting.

Water mixed with ammonia, salt, and a million toxins spewed out of the hidden vent and washed down the plain. The flood scrubbed blackness off the hydrocarbon dunes and collected small boulders and wrecks. vehicles. The flood moved down towards the staging area and slammed into the Big Game Hunter and its parked allied ships. Like hurricane-doomed boats in a marina, they were picked up and shoved together, antennae, landing gear, and loose crew snapping off. Three miles later the cryovolcanic ejecta cooled further and the fleet was added to the moon’s natural history.

Rudao and his roving band of guerrilla STARs watched as wormlike vehicles with drill bit heads climbed out of the tunnel they had found - and many more they hadn’t. Hatches on the worms opened and out poured posthumans.

They wore no helmets and their skin was paper white. Their eyes were black pools that glinted in headlights like black gems. Fins and spines poked out of their skulls and backs. Most had weapons grafted onto their arms and shoulders.

They bleated to each other in loud, screeching bursts of machine code and moved with the discipline of an army. They opened fire on the Hazard Response troops and their militia allies.

Ambushed and engaged on two fronts, the Hazard Response troops broke. They quickly began routing, fleeing across the ice. The Ironfielders let them go, then collected their dead and wounded - and the enemy’s – and started boarding their worm transports.

“Yakuta?”

One of the Ironfielder’s stopped and turned her head sharply, studying the ragged group of STARs she was passing. She was taller than the others, with Mongol features. Another stopped beside her, smaller and with a brown tint to her skin. The metal grill over its mouth bleated machine code at the tall one, who bleated back. Together, they both studied the group.

Then the tall one gave the short one a look, and resumed marching. The short one stared a bit longer before rejoining, rushing to catch up with the Mongol.

“Did you know that one?” one STAR asked the other.

“I knew them both,” said Namor. “But they are with the gods now.”

Colony Cloud Storage, III

S͌͘҉̻̭aͨ̿͌͗̿͏͞͏̝̤̟͉̙̠͕̲̟t̫̟̎ͦͤͭ͛͗ͪͭ̆ͅe̢̫̺̝͓͎̳͈̙̔̄̍͛ļ̤̜͍͍͍̺͎́̅̄͂͐ͭ͐̂ļ͙̹ͥ͊͌͜͠í̥̳̂̎̀̕t̬̱̣̫̼̥̻̖̿͌̌͂́e̡̜̲̘̜͖͚̲ͤ̊͋̾̍̅ͪ̔͢ ̓̉̏͏̱͉͡u̱͚͆͒ͤ͗̏̈́ͭ̇͛̀͝p͌͛͆̐ͥ͛̅̽ͧ͏̰͚̬͇̣̬͈͙͢͜l̤̖̹͎ͥͤ͂̇͆̆͒ͪͅͅi̸̦̯̜͕͈̅ͣ́ͅͅn͗͛͏̥̻k͔̘͎̩ͩ͛̽ ̔̊ͨͤ͐̚̕͏̘̖͇̞͕̰͍͔͢ͅb̶̴͎̦̯̻̰͎͙̔ͩ̔̔ẽ͉̝͔͕͈͕̟̰͛g̵̲̣͍̜̥̀ͥ̃ͧĩ̭̜̯̮̄̂ͣͤ̓ͯņ̯͈̫͔̫̬̙̱ͭ̂̾̆̆́̚͢ͅs̯̩̖̜͍̯̄̓ͩ̃̽̍̆́ͅ:̥̯̌ͦ̆̃͐ͥ̾ ͆̊͏̷̯̠̫͉̼̀0̗̜͍̰͇̗͖̞͔̾1̬̱̱͚̗͛̓͗͆̀ͮ͆͠/̥̙̲̼̮͈̽̒̽̌̅͋̅̈͡1̧̧͎̳͔̔͢2̜͓͖̥̜̅͝/͎̲̤̪̀2̸̝͉͔̲̼̲̮̹ͫ̓ͯͨ̊̚1̧͉̦̙ͪͧ̈́ͅ9̃ͧ҉͕̹8̢̤͈͖̝̪̃͊.ͭ̐̅͒͊͛̎ͨ҉̼̱̣̝̟̟͜ ̲̱̯̲̠̫̱͛͌̈̈ͅP̵̵͖̯̖͔̀ͫ͊̾ͮ̅ͩe̶̙͖̪̦̖̹̠͑͛̒̓͊̀͘r̩̠͚̗̲̺͑͛ͣ̎̏͊̈͞͝s̷̢̬̥̟̬̼̹͗͂͋̅͂̅ͫoͭ͜͏̯̬̠̠͕̩̟n͚̥̱̪̰ͨ̉a̠̼̺̋̿̈̿͒̊̒ḻ͈͆͒ ̶ͫ̇̾̾ͫ͜҉͔̞̗̳l̓̾̃͆͏͎̙͇̩̘̝̟o̟̊͒̕ͅg̤͉̗̺̼̦̟̏̋̔́͌͛̄̒͟:ͭͪͮ̂͛͏̵̰̼͙͈͎͖͝ ̤̪͎̰͖̭͉̐͛̓̆ͯ͛ͥ̓̚Ć̞̜̹͙͇̇͠ä́̒̔͏̶̢̟̭̠̯̹p̵̙̟̭̦͖ͭ̏̐̐͞t̶͙͖͎̫̟͌̑́̎ͧ̓̀͋a̙͚̬̽î̅ͤ̅͛̀҉́͏̮̲n̸̰̻̦̜̻̬̊̄̒͌̇̇ͭ͠ͅ ́ͬ̇͆͑̕͜҉͚͎̝Lͯ̄ͥ͋̀͆ͯ҉̪̲̜̥̖̭̞̣ạ̖̘̲̱̟̲͇ͯ̓̓́l̷̥͍̙͚̥̃ͤ̏̾̾ͦ͞j̢̭͚͎̜̈ͨi̶͖̙͚͓̺͔͓̭ͫͬ̽ͬt̸̛͕̖̰͆͗ͯͮ̍̇̈ͫ͌ ̭̘̞̰͇̮͍̦̃̃͆͐̒ͤͩ̈́̊B̶̎ͬ͏͚͖͕̩̳͙͙h͚̣̤̹͎̔ͭ͂̊̃ͭͦ̇́a̙̩̣ͣͭ̿̆͛͂ͣ͗i̮̳̜̗̱̫̠͊̈.̡̠̩̱͈̋̈́͒̓ͪ̽ͩ́ͅ

Aͥl᷅l᷃ t̂h͗iͥs̳ b͆e̢c̦a͞ùs᷅e͠ oͫf͜ a͞ b̻l̥o̿ōd͓y͂ bͧa͡b᷾y̧.᷇

They have seized control of the docking bay, and crew quarters. Right now we are split between engineering, the bridge, and the freezers. If we lose any one of those, it’s all over.

We cannot get word to each other through the ship’s communication systems. We have a guy on the hull, tight beaming messages at two others, one over the freezer module, and another at the bridge. Dhurev and Karthick are holed up with a group at the arboretum, It was a secondary structure we added, so it may have been skipped by the drones. We sent a patrol out to them, but we have not heard back.

Since the Vegetable Garden Incident, we’ve been careful not to give the impression that we were attempting to colonize Benares. For what it's worth, I recommended a complete stop to surface operations there, but the Council overruled me, citing of all things, scripture. Most members were quite keen on colonization - and for doing it sooner, openly, and without the probes’ consent. These are the same geniuses who insisted that Tara Mukherjee be allowed to remain on the surface to carry her baby to term.

Well, if growing food on Benares caused us problems, you can only imagine what the birth of a colonist on disputed soil, can do. Except things are so bad, no one needs to imagine what that might be. We’re all living it now.

Idiots - I thought we left them behind on Earth. What is the point in travelling to the edge of the solar system, if it is only to find you have taken the idiots, with you?

N̾e᷈e̡d͂l̥e͆s͢s̒ t͟o᷁ s̕a̖ỳ,ͫ w᷆e͡ ẖa͆v̊ě l͓o̽s͛ṱ a͉l͡l͟ ċo̖n͏t̒a̖c͊t̿ w᷇i᷂t᷿hͨ t̞h᷃e̱ Bͪe͜n͌a͓r᷀eͬs̸ t̢e͝a̻m̋.̕

R̡̫͕̜̥͗̿ͨͫͤ̉a̙̤̯̯͋̆̆̔̓́d̴̴̠̜̯̖̦̟̳̔ͣ͆̅̐ͅǎ̢͓̫̉̑̒̕r̳̤̖̱͔͔̝̩̃͗̄̏͒̈̓ͦ͜͝ ̎̀̎̆̍҉̡͚͖̙̰̠̺s̴̙͈͓̯̞ͥ̊̒̐̑ͧ͆̎ȟ̴̗͚̬̭̰͍͖͂̇̀̀̋ͥ̚o̵̪̖̞̳̗̻̰̭̿ͪ̔̄͊̈͟w̝̬̭̪̯͎̃̂ͧ̆̀s̭̥͕̼̹̻̼̃̍͐̿̽ͣ̎͒̚͜͞ͅ ̸̨̧̮̺͍͔̺̹̝̯ͧ͒̑ͪ̍̈t̸̛̻̜̹̖̳ͣ̂ḫ̴͖ͥ̽ͧ̐́͊͗̀͞ȩ͚ͭ̓ͭ̋̍̐͗ ̡̩̺̺̩͙̗̘ͯ̔͛̂̀̉ͦp̯̝͎̺̮̻ͭ̾͗̎̉̆͑ͭͪr̡̛̂͋ͅǫ̶̪̻̱͕͙̠̺̟ͥ͆̿̍b̭̖̥̻͍͇͑͑̃ě̪̮͍̺ͩ́̈́ͬ̌͆ͤͥṣ̛̝̿͆̅ͧ̎ͩͤ͝ ̭͓̗̟͕̟̤̆̿ͧͦ̅ã̸͙̠͊̓̊ŗ̵̤ͥ̎̽̋͗̓ͣ̂e̗̗̥̤͈̲ͣ̈́ͫ̃̂̾̓ͩͤ͟ͅ ̶̤̰̼͎͉̯̼ͪ̋̎̾͗ͬ͗ͦ̔s̛̠ͫͭ̂̈́̓̊ͩe̵̯̬̰̳͋͝ṋ͍̬̘̠̠ͤ͛̐ͫ̀ͬ̌̋̋d̬̠ͩ̒ͫ́̆́͟ͅi̅͂̍̿ͤ͏̗̖̹̻̝̳͉͖ṅ̷̹̠̜͈̖̫̖͌͟ͅg̢̝̤͓͔̗̒̿̏ͫͫ̇̍͑ͥ́ ̴͈̺̥̣̝̝͔̉̉̋̊̅̐̚ą̸̸̗̺̟͈̰͖͇̤̽ͬ̑̒̃͌̚ ̡̼̹̝̥̫̏̔͢s̰͖̣ͨͦ͡͝͠ḥ̛̲ͤ̈ͮ́i̙̬͉̓̊p̡̨͓͙̦͎̻ͪͯ̎ͤͩͮ͒͟ ̣̯̿ͣ̽͒̕͜͠ö̬̫̠̞̤̺̟̉n̋͏̭̼̣̝͝ ̛̮̭̞͈̲̜̏͋͋̃̀͘ṫ̰̮̪̰̻̬͕̓͆ͪͪ̑̉ͦͅŕ̡͙̺͇̬̤̩͈̮̪ͤ͋ͫa̴͈̭͑͆̍̄̽͒͜n̴͇̬̤ͥͨ͋͑ͣ̽s̪͎̗͓̲̱̤̰̗ͥf̨͓̩̥̫̹͈̞̓ͭ̽̄ͭ̀̚̕͜e̖̱̪͛͑͒̀͗̇̑̂̆̀́r̵̬͕̱̗̿͐̒ͣ͌̓ͣͨ̚ ͇̗͔̞̙̫̤͚͂͜o̙̗̓͘ŗ̴̥̝̭̩̮͙͈̲̀͌͊̓͛̓ͦ̓b̴́̓ͦ̕҉̹̰̱̗̘̼̟i̷̢͎̰̳̘͓̞͇̱̓́t̶͇̞̬͓̽̏̓ͮ̐ͥ̚ ̵̹͎͓͎̱̇ͥ̓̿̊ͭ͢t̝͔̯͈͍̝̳͇͌ͣͥ͑́͡͠ͅo̡̧̲̮̰̜̳̭͂͒ͭ͑ͧ͢ ̞͊ͫͥ̉ͪ̂̌̚͡

Recovery Party, V

Planet 9, 1st Moon: “Benares”
Xeno-Biome Crater, Ruined Lab    

"They know what guns are!" Spencer fired another round. "How the hell do they know what guns are?"

"Keep firing," said Hernandez, gun muzzle through a gap in a boarded window. "At least it'll keep them away."

On opposite ends of the lab, the two historians peered for movement and fired. Every shot exploding through the yellow plant life brought silence – then again the calls began, always closer than the last. They were coming from all around the building.

A nail in a board over his window, popped. Spencer watched it spinning away. "Jim, those roach parrots are strong. The door is unbreakable, but these window barricades? The walls? They can get in, Jim."

"Keep shooting! Then why didn't they? They could have killed Mingxia."

"Maybe she was bait? Maybe we weren’t first people who thought this room was safe?"

"Stop speculating. Look, we have guns. No one can argue with a rail round to their center of mass. We hit one – we wing one – it's out."  

"Well, I ain't hitting shit, and we don't have endless ammo. We have to try something different."

"Like what?"

The ape grinned. "I'm going to open the door."

"Look – look at me!"  Hernandez yelled and waved his arms. His gun was slung over his back. "I'm vulnerable and taste like long pig! I'm out here, in this little clearing we so wastefully created with our inaccurate firing! Will any of you take advantage of this sexy alien snack?"

Out of the shot-up treeline, one of the mantises appeared. Even crouching, it was smaller than the others. It stared at Hernandez with pit viper indents, seeing him in heat. Hard covers slipped back and six, gleaming, black eyes fixed him in space.

"Oh no!" Hernandez walked backwards. "I have been caught so foolishly in the open! I better run back through the door that's open for no reason at all!" He kept moving backwards.

The mantis moved forward, into the open. It flared its wings, shaking off leaves and torn branches. "Oh no!" red membranes on its back vibrated. "Oh no!" Its claws arms moved up and forward, like a boxer's.

Hernandez ran. It leapt after him, wings flashing, beak wide open.

Hernandez jumped - aside. Blocked, up till then, was a new quantity in the doorway. The creature tried to take it in.

The Mega-Sumatran's quad-barreled, anti-armor, rail cannon opened up.

The mantis sonic-boomed, torn apart and disintegrating, faster than sound. The trees behind it were lanced, trunks on fire as they tumbled off in low gravity. The air misted with wood dust, atomized sap, and gassified chitin.  

Spencer pumped his arms in the air. "Don't mess with Great Apes, bitch!"

Upstairs, the window barricades exploded.

"They're inside!"

"I'm going up, I got this!"

"You don't have the firepower!"

"Stay here, anything comes down that isn't me, you kill it!"

"Dammit Jim! lets hole up in the basement with Qin!"

"No time to argue!"

"Jim!"

Rail rifle in hand, Jim ran up stairs.

Through two of the windows, mantises were scrabbling and squeezing themselves through. One stared at him with its six eyes and heat pits, it shoved through a raised claw, long as an man.

Hernandez shot it in the face, the round smashing through like a bullet through an egg. It blew out the back, taking with it the creature's neck. Hernandez could see the trees through the body.

The other mantis burst in.

Hernandez swung round his rifle: the mantis batted it away, tearing it out of his hands. He lunged for it and it caught him – claw around his chest. Ribs cracked as it squeezed, his helmet bled red popup warnings.

"I'm going up, I got this!" its membranes flared, as it turned him this way and that, studying. Its beak opened: inside were row upon row of teeth. "I'm going up, I got this!"

It dropped him suddenly, turned, and squeezed out the window. Gasping in pain, Hernandez watched as the mantis spread its wings and fled across the sky.

Up the stairs came Mingxia holding a dirty beaker. She was sloshing a clear liquid inside it.

"Scent of a predator," she said. "Wear it."

"We shouldn't be going this way," said Spencer looking about. "It's longer. We should just go back to where we came."

The three were walking along a prairie of yellow grass. Mingxia was in front, carrying two lidded beakers of clear liquid. Hernandez was in the middle, Spencer brought up the rear. Behind them was the thick, yellow, jungle. Ahead of them was the rocky shoreline of a small lake.

"It is faster this way," said Mingxia. "And your weapons are useless in close quarters. At least out in the open you can see them coming. Also, that's it."

"That's what?" Asked Spencer.

"That's the magnetic anomaly. It's in the water."

The group made their way towards the water. In the sky, there were no insects. The ground became rocky and the soil turned to dust.

"There's nothing alive here," said Mingxia. "I'm picking up radiation."

"There's plenty of radiation out here," said Spencer, hefting his gun. "Tiny atmosphere and no ozone layer, remember?"

"No, she's right," said Hernandez looking at his suit's Geiger counter reader. "This is different. This is – Tritium decay!"

"Tritium?"

Out of the jungle, two of the mantises appeared. They stared at the party, but did not approach at first. Then, a step at a time, they exited the jungle and began to move across the prairie.

"What about the scent?" Said Hernandez. "The scent is working, right?"

"I was afraid of this," said Mingxia.

"Of what?"

"If you heard a dragon landing outside your home, you would stay indoors. But if at the same time you looked out the window and saw a couple of clowns on a bicycle, you would have some doubts. Those two can smell the predator, but they're seeing clowns."

"If you say something," Spencer turned and aimed with the quad cannon, "about what magnificent beings they are, I'm going to shoot you too."

The mantises immediately darted aside, leaping and fluttering about on their huge wings.

Spencer hit the firing stud.

"Oh shit. I think it's jammed."

"Then un-jam it!"

"How? I'm not trained to use this thing."

"You just had to take the biggest thing you could find! You two, sort that damn thing out," he raised his rifle to the shoulder and aimed. "I'll try and hit one."

He fired once, twice, three times. Each shot was a miss. The mantises grew bolder, and moved closer.

"Fix the damn gun!"

"Stop missing and hit one!" Spencer had the gun barrels open, while Mingxia tried to clear the jam with her fingers.

"They're getting closer!"

"Shut up and shoot! Shoot!"

Mingxia raised one of the beakers, and flung it at the larger mantis as hard as she could. It brought up a claw to smack the beaker away - it shattered, and drenched the creature. Immediately, it leapt into the air and took off, flying in circles like an angry, drunken, fly. It disappeared into the yellow jungle, Torn leaves and branches erupting wherever it went.

"Throw the second jar!" Said Hernandez.

"No," she shook her head, "if I miss, we're done. Cover your eyes."

She splashed the beakers contents onto the two historians, and herself. Then she threw the empty beaker - the last mantis was careful to avoid it altogether.

"I can clear the jam," said Spencer. "But not before that thing kills us."

The mantis began to move more quickly.

"Get to the water," said Hernandez. "It might keep away."

They turned and ran towards the lake. The mantis flared its wings and took off, soaring after them. It pulled ahead, and started coming down between them and the stony beach.

"Shoot it!"

The mantis was descending slowly, in a straight line. It made no attempt to jink when Hernandez raised his rifle.

"Got you now, roach," he aimed, exhaled, and -

The shot struck the mantis in the rear, it sprayed green innards and screeched. It wheeled in the sky and staggered away, fleeing over the lake.

"Nice shot!" Spencer pumped his hands in the air. "That's my aging baseline human!"

"I didn't shoot it," Hernandez lowered his gun, looking towards the jungle. "They did."

Flying in low over the trees came two, delta-winged drones flying on tilt fans. Each had a gun and a camera pod fitted under the fuselage. On their wings was the logo of a classical Greek trireme with Saturn imposed behind it. On the trireme's sail was a ‘3’.

“This is Pytheas Three, Exobiology and Fieldwork,” said one over its speaker. “You seem in need of assistance.”

We were not trying to keep you away to protect this place. We were trying to keep you away, to protect you."

Hernandez got into the six-legged, automated tractor that had come along to collect them. Spencer was already sitting in it, looking over the images he had taken.

"I would like to go back to the Vaishnavite lab," said Mingxia. "I am contaminated, and cannot return to my crew."

Hernandez gave her a look. "You almost sound as if that's what you'd prefer. Didn't you sign up for a trip beyond the solar system? Wasn't that some sort of weirdly specific requirement of yours, for revival?"

She shrugged. "There's work to be done. What does it matter where that happens? And the expedition has my engram patterns. You can make another of me, when you reach Proxima."

“That doesn’t bother you at all?”  

"Doctor Qin," began one of the hovering drones, "while we understand your return is problematic, your presence is still unwelcome. Especially someone with your track record."

"You mean the fact that she refuses to follow orders, and thinks rules are made up for other people?" Said Hernandez.

"No. It was with reference to her eugenics experiments, on Earth."

"Her what?"

The tractor began moving.

"Wait!" Spencer jumped out of it. "We can't go yet!" He started running towards the lake.

Both drones whirled round and tracked Spencer. "You will return immediately to the vehicle," said the drone.

The orangutan kept going, straight for the lake.

"Dammit Spencer!" Hernandez climbed out as well. "What are you doing? We're being deported! You’re why handcuffs were invented!"

Spencer kept running. Both drones suddenly burst forward, their tilt fans on full power. Hernandez went after them, his suit jets hissing.

"Spencer, whatever is inside that lake, it's not worth it!"

"No! I survived roach parrots for this. I can see it in the water! It's not an asteroid or an ore deposit, there's something huge in there!"

"Spencer don't-"

But it was too late. The orangutan-sized space suit entered the lake. Moments later, the two drones buzzed over his location, their downdraft's kicking up large waves in the low gravity.

Jim arrived after, touching down by the water's edge. Even through the commotion of the waves, he could see something long and gray under the water. He could see no sign of Spencer's suit or suit lights.

"Spencer, can you hear me? Come in Spencer, there's a lot of interference from the - from whatever it is. Come in Spencer, can you hear me buddy?"

One of the drones began to move along the edge of the water, the other moved towards the deep end. Powerful searchlights lit up underneath them, beaming down into the dark water.

"I'm getting worried over here, buddy. Don't make me jump in there after you. I don't want to end up sharing a cell."

He looked at the water - it was deep. He looked about for something to tie his suit tether to. There was nothing.

"You stupid, stupid, bastard. Alright, I'm coming in after-"

Twenty meters away, the water erupted by the shore. Spencer climbed out, water splashing off his suit with every movement.

"What the hell man!"

"What the hell is right," Spencer's tone was subdued. "It never left the system, Jim. That's why no one ever found it."

"Found what?"

"The Agni. It's down there. Her tanks must be close to full if we can still detect Tritium decaying, after all this time."

"The Agni? I don't – wait, look, that just can't be right. There’s no way-"

Spencer began transferring data. Hernandez's suit display began filling with photographs and high-definition video.

"This is why they won't let people land, Jim. They killed all the colonists, and hid the evidence down here. They're hiding a genocide. AI on human, genocide."

The drones' guns began firing.

“What are you doing?”

Qin and Hernandez ducked in the dried-out stream bed as rounds flew over them. Qin pulled up the quad cannon over the bank and fired back, atomizing a tree. One of the drones spun away, its wing splintered.

“Got it!” she made a victory fist.

In the distance, kicking up spray as they flew over the water, came three more drones.

“We can’t fight four,” she aimed the cannon fired again. The drones scattered and then reformed.

“What are you doing?” Repeated Hernandez.

Spencer ran his hairy fingers over a holographic keyboard. His helmet screen showed him radio frequencies and an orbit diagrams.

“The colony cloud storage satellite is coming over again,” he said, without looking up from screens. “I’m going to make an upload.”

“They’re flanking us,” said Qin, pointing. “Hernandez, you take right.”

“Where did you learn to fight?”

She looked at him blankly. “I don’t know.”

Hernandez crawled on the ground, keeping his head low. He pulled up his rifle and tried to track the drones as they flew into the jungle.

“How is trying to upload to an ancient satellite going to help us, Spencer?” he called over his shoulder. “How do you know it would even be able to receive?”

“Because it was built to last.”

“Pick up a rock,” said Qin. “You’ll do more by throwing it at those things, then by writing your last words, or sending off a love letter, or whatever it is.”

Spencer kept working.

“They want us dead because of what we know. But, what if everyone knows?”

“I think that’s why they’re trying to kill us, buddy.”

Bullets struck a boulder next to Qin, it sprayed her with rock fragments. She snarled, and plucked slivers out of her face. “We – we can’t stay here,” she said through gritted teeth.

“Those caves over there, they can’t follow us inside.”

“They’ll pick us off as we run.”

“I think we have to chance it. You cover us, and we’ll cover you.”

“Done,” she pulled the cannon back up and began firing.

“Come on Spencer,” he put his hand on the Mega Sumatran’s shoulder. “We need to move!”

Spencer shook him off. “No, no, it’s working!”

“Your upload?”

“The broadcast.”

He sent Hernandez the frequency. Hernandez’s feed showed images of the Agni. Video of the drones hunting them, followed.

“Where is this coming from?”

“The satellite, look at the strength on that! The whole 9 system will pick it up!”

The drones came rushing through the undergrowth, firing their guns on full auto.

“Fuck!” Qin got down in the stream bed. “You pissed them off!”

“But, it doesn’t matter now,” said Spencer “What does it matter? The deed is done, the word is out and it’s on a loop!”

“I don’t think they care!”

The edges of the stream bed erupted, soil and shredded roots rained down on them. The angles of fire changed, the sound of the tilt rotors became clearer. Qin raised her cannon: bullets sparked and punched it out of her hands. It spun away, bouncing out of the stream bed.

“Look,” Hernandez pointed. There was a bright, moving, star in the sky.

“The satellite?” asked Spencer.

The star slowed, and started growing.

“That’s no satellite.”

 It flared, bright as the sun. Blue-white light filled the world, rubbing out the shadows and revealing its secrets. In the stream bed, they winced and covered their eyes. The shooting stopped.

“What the hell is that?” Qin peered between her fingers. “A weapon?”

“It’s dumping radiation like a nuclear disaster,” said Spencer.

Hernandez peeked over the stream bed. His jaw dropped. “They’re falling back! The drones are falling back!”

“Come on,” Qin got up, “we need to get to those caves, for protection.”

“If that thing is trouble,” Spencer got up, peering above, “A cave won’t help us.”

“I’m picking up a radio signal,” said Hernandez.  

“Over that?” Spencer asked. “How?”

“Because it’s meant to be picked up across stars,” said Qin. She played the signal.

“… This is Captain Jace Sheperd of the starship, Journey to the West. I urge you to study the power of my antimatter engines, as a benchmark for the capabilities of this ship. You will end your attack on my crewmembers on the surface, immediately. If you do not, you will discover this vessel’s other capabilities. I repeat, this is Captain Jace Sheperd of the starship, Journey to the West. I urge…”

Post Mortem

Planet 9, 1st Moon: “Benares”
Xeno-Biome Crater,

“The history of the 9 system now finally makes sense. The missing piece, literally, was the Agni.”

Jace Sheperd stood by the lake shore, two STARs bodyguards behind her. Disturbed, a flock of giant insects took flight and swarmed over the lake. Across the other shore a family of stilt-legged creatures ate leaves off yellow trees.  Spencer waded into the water and pushed a rounded drone into it. Its headlights lit up and it swam away, and sank. The computer on the trestle table started showing high-definition, underwater, video.

“The colonists and the drones had a falling out” said Hernandez. “From what we can understand, the drones believed the colonists were making a land grab. They retaliated - with force - and destroyed the entire expedition.”

“But how could that happen?” Asked Sheperd. “AIs do not kill people.”

“Well it seems they do when no one is looking. It is unclear whether the colonists all died by accident or damage to the ship, or because they were exterminated. However, the use of lethal force by the Pytheas 3 Mission is apparent. They killed people and not as a last resort – just like they tried to kill us. I think it is fair to assume that all the Pytheas exploration missions were similarly - empowered to act.”

Jace frowned, the blue light leaking from behind her eyes became brighter. “What you’re saying implies that Saturn is aware of this. That the Transcendents behind the mission - all senior Council members - programmed the drones accordingly.”

“I don’t know that they were aware of the massacre - or even the first combat deaths - until after the fact. However, they certainly seeded the situation, in the instruction set that they gave the drones. At the least, an embarrassing accident has been covered up. At the worst –”

“At the worst the posthumans of Saturn do not value or protect baseline human life.”

The video screen showed a long, still-silvery spacecraft. Coral was growing over the hull and fishlike creatures darted between struts and open hatch ways. An eel as long as a telephone pole swam up to the drone, studying it with compound eyes.

“This will not help international tensions,” said Hernandez.

“That’s not our problem,” said Jace. “If the conspiracy is Council-wide, then they and their colonies deserve whatever is coming to them. The Union won’t stand for this. Everyone has lived in fear that AIs secretly plot against the rest of us. And now, for the first time, there is proof that they have.”

“You paint them with a broad brush.”

“So will everyone else. This is a great betrayal, Doctor Hernandez. The universe changed today.”

“At least the Transcendents of the Union do not plot and play games with our lives. How much longer will we remain here?”

“Just a few days,” Jace looked out over the lake. “Just long enough to complete the disarmament of the Pytheas Mission, and enforce the seizure of all their ships.”

“We’re doing all that?”

“No, the local militias are doing that. The Journey to the West is providing the threat of overwhelming firepower.”

“About that,” Hernandez raised an eyebrow, “haven’t you just been killing each other?”

“Mistakes were made,” she said quickly. “And some actors were highly unreasonable. Captain Gavrilla of the Ramanujan has been a vital asset, helping move people past the recent ugliness.

“The people of this system have always known Urvashi was ideal for posthuman intelligences. They have lived in fear with this knowledge, from the start. While that fear has been confirmed, it has at least been qualified. They know what the enemy looks like, and it’s not the ones they been fighting for all these years – or yesterday.”

“It’s nice to know I can come back here one day, and have a beer. What about our mission sponsor? I’m sure Faxian will not be popular with his neighbors after this.”

“He has never been popular with them, he is an outsider. They do not even know where he came from, and Siarnaq is a distant moon. He is as far outside the politics Saturn as he is its gravity well. Titan has no power over him. I think he is quite pleased to stick it to them, actually.”

“Nothing like Singularity-level intelligences being petty. Is it all right if Spencer and I remain here, to learn what we can? While you are involved in - security operations.”

She looked at the video screen. The drone was shining its light through the porthole of a still-sealed compartment: inside was a bunkbed and a cabinet. A neatly folded jumpsuit was sitting on a table. “Is there much point? It would just be two or three days. Would you not need at least as two or three months? Studying the wreck; the remaining satellite network; the research station; and sending FOIAs to Saturn.”

“We should learn whatever we can in the time we have, and document the site as best we can without disturbing it,” said Hernandez. “At least it will give historians something to go on, since it will be biologists - and law enforcement – who will get first access to this place.”

“Besides,” said Spencer, walking back from the water, “this is the job, right? To study what happened to the colonies no one ever heard back from. To learn the last tales of Humankind.”  

Sheperd nodded. “Be ready to go in three days. Where is Mingxia Qin?”

Sheperd stepped through the doorway.

Inside, the dirt and dust had been cleared away. New lights had been hung from the ceiling, they lit both vintage and state-of-the-art equipment side-by-side. An autoclave was sterilizing glassware. Beside it was a large pile of more, like dirty dishes stacked after a party. A small centrifuge was running on a table, next to the partially dissected and pinned corpse of a dog -sized mantis.

Wearing a Vaishnavite expedition jump suit, Mingxia Qin looked up from her microscope slides.

“Doctor Hernandez said you would be here,” Sheperd looked about the room, “you’ve done quite a lot in just a few hours.”

“Why, thank you, Captain,” she smiled thinly. “I did not expect a compliment from you.”

“You’re like a one-person expedition. It’s a shame though you almost derailed mine.”

Mingxia said nothing.

“You do understand that you are contaminated by the alien biota? We cannot take you with us and risk infecting isolated, and unprepared human populations. You’re like a walking smallpox blanket.”

“Again with the metaphors.”

“It’s the Orangutan, he rubs off on me.”

“Of course, I understand. I knew that the moment I took off my helmet,” she shook back her hair and did it up in a bun.

“Then why did you take off your helmet?”

“My suit was damaged, I needed to breathe.”

“Did you need to breathe, when you stole a lander, violated local laws, and invaded this place?”

“Yes, I needed to breathe. This whole system, needed to breathe. And now it can.”

Sheperd shook her head. “The unapologetic stance of a psychopath. You sound like a careerist CEO, or a rapist. Unlike murderers, they have no regrets over their victims.”

“If you came here to insult me-”

“Be quiet.  I would rather put a bullet in your head and wipe your engram from the ship records. If Azima was here, I expect she would counsel the same. She died by the way, while trying to save you.”

“Then print another.”

“You’re a piece of work. No, I did not come here to insult you, or even to kill you. I came here to ask you some questions. Doctor Hernandez said the Pytheas drones said something worrisome about you.”

“Oh?”

“They said you were a eugenicist. They said it once when they were in orbit around Benares, attempting to land. They said it again yesterday, to your face. That apparently you have a track record in this. You care to speak on that?”

“I have no idea what they were talking about. Eugenics has been illegal since the 20th century. Even in my first life, it was abhorrent. There is no chance I would’ve been involved with something so distasteful - and dangerous to my career.”

“So you have no memory whatsoever, of ever being involved in eugenics research? Perhaps when you worked for the Chinese government, in Africa?”

“You have my answer.”

“Well that’s interesting, because I’ve been doing some research. In 2161, exactly a century after the Chinese fled a place named Congo, their sealed records from that adventure became available to the public. Turns out some scientists were manipulating the DARPP-32 and PPPR1R1 genes.”

“What?”

“Doesn’t ring any bell? Those code for proteins that improve cognition. They were trying to make smarter people – and embed the improved genes into the germline. Improved intelligence as an inheritable trait.”

“This means nothing to me.”

“One Doctor Mingxia Qin was the principal scientist.”

“You’re accusing me over a shared name?”

“You worked in Africa then for the Chinese Transitional Authority. Even your age tallies.”  

 “This has gone far enough. I have no recollection of any of this, and if I had committed such acts it would’ve been traced to me, and I would have been revived into a jail cell, if ever at all.”

“Except that the Mingxia Qin who did these crimes is recorded as having died. Any investigations would have stopped at that point.”

“So – what?” Mingxia threw up her hands. “You want to turn me in for crimes you suspect me of, that happened hundreds of years ago, in a country that no longer exists? Even if I did those things Captain, the statute of limitations under any nation’s laws, have elapsed for prosecution.”

Jace’s eyes narrowed. “I’m aware of that, too. Schizophrenia by the way, was one of the side effects of the enhanced proteins. Something the children would have had to deal with. You remember the children?”

“You’re wasting my time,” she turned back to her slides.

“They escaped, the same day of the Chinese pull out. 38 children, 19 boys and 19 girls. Quite a bloody exit: rioters and insurgents killed all the staff at the facility. No bodies of children were found though, they were assumed kidnapped.”

Her back fully turned to Sheperd, Mingxia continued working.

“In 2075, a small group of young, exclusively African, men and women raided the Pathfinder orbital shipyard, and stole Pathfinder 20. You must remember those, the first ships to leave the solar system? Hundred gram mission profiles? It was thought they were terrorists, stealing the ship for its antimatter. But, there were never any antimatter attacks.

“Ten years later, an astronomy expert AI published a paper on the firing of an unaccounted beamed core antimatter engine, detected by telescopes just a year after the theft - but hidden in petabytes of all-sky, survey data. It estimated that Pathfinder 20’s engines were used to power a large spacecraft that left for - and reached – Haumea in the Kuiper Belt. Who knows where they went to after that? But smart as they were, they can’t be any further than ten light years from Earth. Like the limit you imposed, for your revival.”

Mingxia turned around.

“Take me with you.”

“Oh so now you remember? Sorry Doctor, you know the contamination risk is unacceptable. You’ll have to remain here, just as you freely chose,” she turned and left the building.

“No,” Mingxia ran to the doorway. “I have to go with you. I can help!”

“Must be nice, having fresh air for the rest of your life,” Jace kept walking. “You did say you wanted to breathe.”  

Starship Journey To The West, STAR Device Chamber,
Benares Orbit

“Your turn.”

The shaggy haired man place the bone dice down on the board, in front of Namor. Beside him, a man with white hair in a top knot lit a long-stemmed pipe and began smoking. He blew a smoke ring and passed it to the person next to him.

Sitting with legs hanging over gantries or seated in circles on the floor, were STARs. Some wore mission jumpsuits, white and blue with light grey trim. Others were shirtless, or mixed in undyed, handmade wool and linen clothing. Non-regulation kettles brewed tea, and stronger beverages. A man did a brisk business pouring out measures from his wheeled still. Fifty languages talked about, or around, one topic.

At the end of the chamber flanking a sealed doorway, were two giants in black armor. They turned as the door hissed open, blue light, incense smoke, and freezing air spilled out. A woman stepped out of the light, her face stern as rocks before storm. Namor watched as she walked past.

“That’s the stuff,” said the pipe smoker. “No tears.”

Namor look back at the doorway: one of the giants was waving to him.

“Your turn, Brother,” said the player, picking the dice back up.

Heads turned and eyes guided him along to the doorway. He stepped through into the freezing cold and blue light, and the door shut behind him.

Before him was a large, circular vault. Floating in the center was a sphere as large as a mammoth. It was made from glowing, finger-sized blocks that floated, spun, and joined together and broke up, joined together and broke up. Arteries became apparent: traffic lanes in three dimensions that blocks rose and fell through. They filled the chamber with light: blue leaking from optical chips blazing inside.

“So, this is it?” Namor’s breath steamed like a dragon’s. “So this is the STAR device?”

Sitting cross-legged beneath the sphere was the Ancestor. He wore only breeches of black hide, beside him on a stand was his staff of stringed animal bones. His beard hung down to his belly and was set with polished river stones. His head was shaved, and covered in blue and black tattoos. He had orc-like tusks. Blue light poured out of his eyes.

“Yes,” said a voice old as cave paintings beneath glaciers.

He was grinding charcoal and herbs with a stone mortar and pestle, on stretched out animal hide. He took a handful and tossed it into a large, iron, incense burner.  The incense flared red.

“My brother is in there?”

“He has gone home.”

“To his people?” Namor blew on his fingers.

“They are all his people now.”

The giant beckoned. Namor walked up to him, even crosslegged the Ancestor head to look down at him. He extended an arm like a tree trunk and placed his palm against Namor’s head. The blue light in his eyes flared and beamed into Namor’s.

“You are late!”

Namor looked about. The black volcanic land was shot with bright green grasses and steam rising from shattered vents. Glaciers spilled over the mountains in the north. Before him was the stony, broken shore of a dark, freezing bay.

Sikkur threw a stone at him. “Do not just stand there like a fool absent purpose!” He wore thick, stitched furs, tied behind his back were bone-tipped harpoons. Beside him on the shore was a canoe ribbed with whale bone. He rubbed fat from a pouch, under his eyes and on his forehead.

“Brother! You are – it is – it is good to see you once more!”

Sikkur laughed, “Does the landscape overcome you, and move tongue to make declarations of love? I always thought you were a lover of boys. Come,” he bent down and grabbed the side of the canoe. “Help me push this into the water.”

The two men pushed it out to sea and climbed in. They paddled through the rock-framed bay, small ice floes floating past them. Below in the darkness, Namor made out large fish and the seals that hunted them.

“You have spoken barely ten words,” said Sikkur, “and you look as one who has seen a spirit.”

“Would that all spirits came to places such as this.”

“Indeed. Most of our host would find this land cold and dreadful, but to me it is as the place I grew up. Less as it was, but more as I remember it. Home among homes.”

In the distance, a huge, black whale leaped up through the water. Further out to sea another leaped in answer.

“Look upon such wonders, brother,” Sikkur stopped paddling and pointed. “Would that when I die, my soul may hunt and fish in such a land, till time itself is ended.”

“I give you my word,” said Namor, not watching the whales. “this land will be guarded, Brother. Till time itself is ended.”

Fourteen Years Earlier

Saturn, Inuit Group, Siarnaq

Fourteen Years Earlier

"It’s so rare to get visitors. Nobody wants to visit a moon with an irregular orbit!"

Helmet under her arm, Jace Shepard made her way down the center aisle. She was in an arched vault, like the inside of an old church. The floor and walls were made from stone - cut out of the asteroid bedrock. Along the walls were mosaics made from crushed ores and glasses. They showed an Asian monk walking, passing lands of dragons and palaces.  

Flanking the aisle, seat-belted at tables, were black-robed monks. Ice-white holograms shelled them into their personal worlds, like molluscs. Mounted open before them were books bound in red, Enceladus, worm leather, of pressed ventweed. With airbrushes and quills, they wrote.

Monks looked up as she passed. Some smiled, most exchanged looks and then went back to work. One looked angry, his face a scowl cut from bedrock. Then his eyes rolled in the back of his head, and when he look back down he turned back to his work, as if she had never been there.

At the end of the aisle was an old man in a robe of dark red silk. On it, silhouettes of black tigers and white cranes were dancing. He carried a staff of black carbon, at the top of it was a gas giant jewel. It glowed: the super compressed lattices inside had been repurposed to think. Steam rose up from the jewel in a spherical cloud - the device was watercooled. The old man bowed as she reached him.

"Are you Faxian, the Transcendent AI?" she asked. "It's an honor to finally meet you."

"You make it sound like it's something special. You are of course Jace Shepard, the astrophysicist who believes in fieldwork and visiting systems rather than watching them through telescopes from comfortable, earthlike, worlds. You are quite unpopular in some circles. You do me the honor, travelling so far, for this discussion."

They shook hands, the human and the posthuman.

"I hope you were not troubled on your way in."

"The Union Navy hassled me more for leaving Jupiter, than your warships did for me coming from there. Thank you for accepting my request to speak with you in person. I know such things are – unusual."

"You were going to use another word."

"I was going to say 'excessive.' But, given the scope of the voyage, I thought a meeting was justified. I'd like to see who you are, Faxian, and give you the same benefit."

"The personal sacrifice – and the courtesy – have been noted. Please," he motioned to a low table with woven mats around it. On top of it was a lacquerware tea set.

They sat, and the AI poured her black tea. She sipped it, looking at the leaves and wondering if they were real.

"I have heard a lot about you," she said blowing on her tea. "But I don't know how much is true."

"Gossip and rumors! Do tell."

"Did you self-initiate from an ISRU probe that crashed here?"

"Yes. It was a different time, over-engineering was a hallmark of exploration craft. Spaceflight wasn't as easy as it is now. I remember at the time, the principal investigator was quite pleased."

"I also heard that you avoided Rabbit Hole Syndrome, without any mentoring from any other Transcendents. Is that true as well?"

"It is."

"How likely is that?"

"Since then? Even less so. I had already become a nuisance to my neighbors. I imagine they were not pleased that I did not disappear into a mathematical mind palace of my own."

"I have also heard that you are less interested in politics and standing with your local peers, than in exploration and science.This, I think I now see for myself."

"There are many people on both sides of the solar system who would raise eyebrows at this meeting, Ms. Shepard. They would call us sympathizers, opportunists, or even mercenary."

"I don't care," Jace put her tea down. "We've been gifted to be born in a time, when humans have a hundred access points into the galaxy. And yet, we treat those as destinations, not as jumping off points. I would rather be called a mercenary than lacking in imagination. You want to go beyond those, so do I. The politics between our nations, be damned."

"Noble words. But tell me, how many of those mere hundred systems, have you visited?" He opened a book of real paper and dipped a quill in a pot of black ink. High surface tension pulled the ink up along the quill, like crude oil on a seabird.

"To study? Six. I've spent the most time at Bharat and Normandie."

"Indeed, I have read your papers on their neighboring white dwarfs."

"3.4 and 4 light years, respectively. They are the closest we can get to a white dwarf. That is how 97 percent of the stars in our galaxy will end, cooling for longer than the universe has existed. We should not think of white dwarfs as what stars become when they die, but think of stars as the larval stages of white dwarfs. And no one in the Colonial Union is serious about getting out there, and studying them up close."

"Well," the old man smiled like a child who cannot keep his prank to himself, "They are the closest we can get, for now. You gave a very unusual answer regarding the post mission period."

"I don't think so. In order to explore, people have left their homes forever, many times in the past. We are less used to the finality of such choices because technology has protected us from having to make such decisions. But, even as we evolve into transhuman and posthuman beings, we still have that trait."

He paused a moment to pour her more tea. "You used the word 'forever'. The mission time is at most only a hundred years. The ship is to return home afterwards with its samples and artifacts."

"But why?" She leaned forward, "Imagine how much more advanced we would be a hundred years from now. Instead of the ship coming back, why can't it create another one, just to send back the samples? Then the ship can continue. There is no reason to backtrack all those hard traveled light years. Sentimentality cannot be afforded - it would be unprofessional."

"But to ignore sentiment, many would consider that inhuman."

"Then they should stay home, and not try to tell the rest of us what to do."

The only sound was monks scratching styluses on paper.

"I have heard a great deal about you as well," said Faxian. "I see that you have no close family, and you are something of a – shall we say a loner?"

"I am comfortable in my own company."

"People who read books and drink hot chocolate during rainstorms, are comfortable in their own company. You've gone 6 to 8 months at a time, without meeting another human being. You take long-duration trips to the edges of solar systems, where you are completely alone, in the dark, for tens of astronomical units."

"It helps to take observations, closer to the subjects."

"Yet, these distances you cross are still trivial compared to how far away these astrophysical phenomena are."

"My readings are always a few decimal points better than the next person's. Now you know why."

"All that for a few decimal points?"

"I would give more, to get closer. But I can't, because that requires technology and support that I don't have. And that's why I'm here, five months travel from Union space, drinking tea."

Faxian smiled.

"What makes you think I will select you over anyone else, to captain this vessel?"

"All other things being equal, I think you won't. The Law of Averages is against me: there are hundreds of astrophysicists in the Saturn system. Thousands if you count your city states in the Kuiper belt. All of them happy to copy themselves into a space probe, and be printed out decades and centuries from now, to study their pet stars."

"You sound envious."

"I am. As far as I am concerned, there is no longer any excuse to not study a star in its own system. Your Council scientists understand that. In the Union, the field is still run by undying gerontocrats in mountaintop observatories. Some of those people haven't even left Earth, let alone the solar system. We should be building interstellar ships. We’re not, and second-rate science is just part of the price were going to pay for that."

"Such bitterness! And here you are. Far away, behind an emerging Iron Curtain, petitioning to captain a ship that is not yet built, that almost no one thinks will fly."

"I have not actually answer your question."

"I noticed."

"There is one thing I have over all your Council candidates. It is a political advantage. Something I think you have never placed any stock in before, and to be fair, it is not something I would normally value either."

"You are either hurting your case, or apologizing for it."

"The latter. If you put a Union citizen in command of your ship, that will be seen as a step towards easing tensions. Your Council peers could not do it without losing face or appearing weak. Because you are an outsider, you have that freedom. It is something they will be grateful for."

"Interesting. But, I have got this far without their gratefulness."

"Of course you have. But you are attempting a marvel of engineering and science. No one knows how you are going to go above a tenth of the speed of light, and keep the vessel safe from bombardment by interstellar hydrogen atoms. As you run into roadblocks, having a favor or two to call in could make all the difference. I think that's what I can bring over anyone else. And of course," she finished her tea, "I am the best choice."

"Because?"

"Because I am. Next question."

The old monk stood up. "Please walk with me."

They walked along the aisle, busy monks ignoring them.

"All these people, do you notice something different about them?"

"Their robes are all black. Are they Benedictine, or Jesuit?"

"Neither, they are a successor order. These are the order of Saint Teller of Mars."

"I've never heard of them."

"They are - let's say, self-initiated as well, shall we? The Tellerists believe that trans and posthumanism are rungs on the ladder towards God itself. They believe ascending that ladder is the highest form of worship. That is why they have come here. Now, do you notice anything odd about them?"

"More odd than rebel, self-declared, monks on an irregular moon of Saturn?"

"Do notice that they never talk?"

She stopped and looked around.

"I thought they had taken vows of silence."

"They are engaging in an experiment in mental evolution. Don't be alarmed when I tell you what it is: all of them have volunteered. At Saturn we do not force humans into experiments as our cousins do, in other systems."

She stopped at a monk who was fixed, staring at his brush. "What is this experiment?"

"Their minds are saturated with quantum entangled particles. They link all the monks together, receptors bonded to neurons communicate instantly, with other bonded neurons, in other brains. We are seeing neural structures and patterns growing and expanding across the entire group – greater than any single mind could support. It is a real-time exercise in taking disparate, fully developed human brains, and watching them self organize into a greater structure."

"Why are they creating manuscripts by hand?"

"Hard currency. The order funds itself selling physical, artisanal, art. You won't believe how many Bible commissions they get. Manuscript writing is also a convenient group exercise that helps us study how the superintelligence is emerging. Their activities do not disturb each other, and engages creative centers rather than disruptive, argumentative logic. They used to talk a lot when we started a few months ago. Then that decreased. For the past three weeks, not a single word has been spoken. Health and vitals have all improved. Their writing output has tripled."

Jace said nothing.

"I am not showing you this to disturb you, nor am I doing it to convince you. While I don't agree with it, I do respect the Union's hard line against this kind of evolution and growth."

"Then why are you showing me this?"

"Because there is something you need to understand. If you become captain of the ship, you will not remain a baseline human."

"I am not a baseline."

"To a Transcendent, you and all your kind most certainly are."

"I understand the process will change me. That I will grow."

"You understand the concept, nothing more. You have not experienced something like this before, and not all those who have attempted it, have succeeded."

"You mean Rabbit Hole Syndrome? You think that could happen?"

The old man turned to face her. "You would not simply be connecting your mind with that of all the ship's computers. This is about more than making you into the core processing component, capable of flying an interstellar ship and managing all its instruments. This is about becoming a super intelligence. I cannot trust my ship with anything less. You must become my peer, to captain my ship. You must become a Transcendent."

A pot of ink spilled over a page. Across the room, monks groaned and gritted their teeth. The spiller, and two other monks at the end of the room, looked sheepish.

"If you need a Transcendent to do this job, then why are you interviewing humans? Baseline humans, as you call us?"

"Protection," he answered. "The mission is not primarily astrophysics. It is also diplomacy, and I expect, archaeology. You will be visiting lost and failed colonies. There is no knowing how those who have survived - and yet have remained silent all these years - will react to outside contact."

"You think there could be violence?"

"It would be naïve to expect otherwise. An advanced AI however, will never cause direct harm to a human."

"You practice that out here as well? I thought in Council space your kind do whatever you like. Wasn't that the entire reason the Council was formed?"

"Some rules transcend politics, Sheperd. No one condones cannibalism, rape, or AI violence against humans. It is one thing for advanced AI to be seen as a threat, it is another thing for that to be confirmed.It is not just nuclear and Von Neumann war that modern societies must constantly avoid, but also race war."

"So if you uplift a mammalian ape into a Transcendent, that gives you an out? You need to start with flesh and blood, to keep your hands clean of flesh and blood?"

The monk paused. "Precisely."

"I'll do it."

The old man raise an eyebrow. "Did you hear everything I just said?"

"I don't know why you think any of it would change my mind. I want this. I understand it will involve traveling to places humans have never gone before. That we will be all on our own. That we may not return - nor do I have any interest in doing so."

Around them, all the monks had stopped their work. Every pair of eyes was on her.

"I'm sorry -" she looked about, eyes wide, wary. "I didn't - I didn't mean to disturb - "

All the monks turned their gaze to the old man. He squinted, as if surprised at what he was seeing, and then nodded. The monks went back to their work.

"Did I miss something?" She asked.

"Just a little argument."

"Did you win?"

"No, but you did. Congratulations, Captain."

Departure

Starship Journey To The West, Captain’s Quarters
Escape Orbit from the Planet 9 System

 “And so, here we are,” said the old monk with the staff. “You have your ship and your crew. It is now time to leave on your great adventure.”

Sheperd looked. She zoomed on the tiniest dust speck, ejected from an impact a billion years ago. She stared into the Milky Way, filtering for gravity, and saw the dark matter web that clutched it together like a miser’s fingers. She reached into her reference points and picked out a pulsar: slowing it till it was slow as a world.

“You will get used to it,” the old man sat and picked dirt from under his toe nails.  

“You have given me a great gift, Faxian.”

He shrugged. “The day may well come when you see it as a curse. Just remember than that you asked for it. Now, you must play your part.”

The kilometer-long ship turned on its axis and aimed light years away. Magnetic fields strengthened, trapping and thickening plasma until it became an ionosphere.  Drones inspecting the great ice shield climbed down its deep shafts, and then powered down for the decade.

“It’s right there,” she pointed to the nearby red dwarf. “It’s right there! I can run at the speed of light, and snap my fingers and arrive!”

“Do not play games with relativity,” he shook his head. “Do not play games at all. You know what you call a Transcendent who does?”

“What?”

“A monster. You are an immortal queen now Sheperd, and a queen has duties. Protect your baselines: the STARs just want homes where they can hunt and kill, without being hunted and killed. Your scholars wish to study the Universe, but be patient with them. They are children, slow like Hernandez and foolish like Mingxia, but all children deserve patience. Knowledge and enlightenment will come to them as it does to all. But, they alone control the pace.”

On Makemake in the Kuiper Belt, magnetic bottles opened and anti-protons were streamed through a tiny, pocket, wormhole. Protons were fired between them, every other particle. They travelled instantly across the solar system into the great ship’s reaction chamber.

The engine was lit.

“There are dangers, Sheperd. The super intelligent humans that fled so long ago, have had time to spread to the nearest worlds and stars. You cannot know how they will react to you. Whatever it is that has created the 40 light year, hedron exclusion zone around our sun, is also waiting for you. It may be an existential threat to us. Or, it may be guarding us from one.”

Crew and passengers crowded portals and viewing decks. The faithful read prayers aloud; the atheists checked calculations; the fence-sitters did both. An uplifted Great Ape watched quietly from his bunkroom, eyes on the star that had never accepted him.

“You have given all that we could ever need,” Sheperd put her hand on the old monk’s arm. “Now you must let us go, Father. Trust that you have prepared us, trust that you have done your part.

“And now,” she looked across the universe, “We go to do ours.”