“Living are creatures you?”
“We are living creatures.”
“You travelled space have? Through.”
“We have travelled through space.”
“Whole tendrils of a are you?”
“We are not tendrils of a whole; we are the whole. We are creatures of flesh and blood. We do not exist as you do, as creatures of gas and, er, stuff.”
“Impossible.”
“It is possible. There are many varied kinds of life.”
“Rocks are you. Excreta are you. Are worthy not to talk with us.”
“We have to talk with you. We owe you this.”
“Where is the planet from which you come?” said the Prisma. Our translator was, I noticed with some relief, finally getting the hang of the creature’s syntax.
“Far far away. You cannot reach it.”
“Can it be inhabited by our kind?”
“You cannot reach it.”
“It can be inhabited by our kind?”
“No, and you cannot reach it.”
“You have no idea who we are. We are the most powerful and fearsome creatures in all the universe.”
You are, I thought to myself, a bunch of arrogant fucks; and then I realised my murmur-talk device had translated this into speech.
I switched off my communicator and turned to Albinia.
“What do you think?”
“Something is happening.”
“What?”
“I don’t know. Something.”
I turned on my communicator and spoke again to the Prisma:
“We are here to trade; do you understand that concept?”
“You have come from far away; how? What ships do you possess? Are you long-lived?”
“We give you a thing; you give us a thing. It’s called trade. Do you understand this concept?”
“We have sent spaceships into farthest space; they have never returned. Can you explain this?”
“Well, it’s a dangerous universe out there.”
“We are the most fearsome species in existence; no harm could come to creatures such as us. Our voyagers were told to conquer and destroy and then return to fetch us. That was ten thousand years ago; and they are late. And we are full of wrath.”
Albinia and I exchanged glances; this wasn’t looking too promising.
“Be that as it may,” I continued to the Prisma, “let’s talk a bit more about this concept of ‘trade.’
“You see,” I continued, getting into the swing of it now, “you have the ability to create metal artefacts with the power of your thoughts, and we could maybe sell stuff like that. Whereas we-”
“Perhaps the journey was too long, and they died. We long to travel swiftly among the stars, rather than being trapped at sub-light speeds. Can you do that? Journey faster than light?”
“We can.”
“Can you teach us how?”
“We could certainly give you some hints,” I temporised.
“Then we can ‘trade,’ ” said the Prisma.
Albinia patted my arm. I switched off my communicator. “Yes?”
“Firstly, these creatures are a bunch of dangerous fucking lunatics,” she pointed out, quite accurately. “Secondly, I’m detecting some kind of weapon. Don’t know what. It involves the planet, and the sun, and a fleet of-something nasty. I think they’re aiming to attack Explorer again.”
“What should I do?” I asked her, for though I was Master-of-the-Ship, I trusted her judgement totally.
She thought, for a brief moment, with her merged-with-Explorer face, then a cold look came upon her.
“They’re bastards; let’s fuck ’em,” she said.
And so we fucked ’em.
I triggered the self destruct switch.
And our landing craft exploded; and obliterated into particles so small they could not be assimilated by the Prismas.
And then a searing wave of heat from the explosion ripped through the alien creatures, sundering them into a billion wave-lets.
And then-as I was later told-in orbit above the planet, the Prisma battle fleet emerged from the shadow of their moon and launched a massive attack upon Explorer.
At the same time, Prisma drone ships leaped from hiding places amidst the gas giant’s rings and rained missiles and heat-energy upon Explorer, drenching its forcefields.
However, Explorer’s shields deflected the enemy’s beams and missiles with ease; and it then counter-attacked, using its disruptor ray at full capacity; and the entire Prisma fleet was obliterated in an instant.
And all that was left was a swirl of random atoms in space.
For such is the power of Olara; we do not seek war, but when we fight, we always win.
At about this time, I woke up on my simulacrum bench. And I staggered to my feet and saw that Albinia’s skin was close to burning point; steam was rising from it. The simulated experience of being burned alive on the planet was manifesting as actuality on her real body.
I doused her with cooling spray, just as she woke up, and screamed with agony. Then I cradled her, as Phylas entered.
He turned ashen at the sight of Albinia.
“She’ll be fine,” I snapped. It had been my idea to take Albinia with me on this mission; but to risk the life of a Star-Seeker was, in retrospect, a reckless and a foolish thing. I knew it myself, and I desperately hoped no one would be vulgar enough to tell me so.
I carried Albinia to the sick room and placed her in healing stasis. Then I returned to the Hub.
“What’s happening?” asked Commander Galamea. “Explorer isn’t moving.”
I am not-well, said Explorer, forlornly, via our murmur-links.
“Manual operation,” I said, and spoke directly to Explorer: “Your human half is unconscious. She has been injured. Seal the system.” Injured, how? said Explorer’s voice.
“Psychosomatic sympathetic burns. We died, down there, and we felt it here.”
“Your fault,” said Morval, cruelly. “You jeopardised the life of our Star-Seeker. You-”
I should have known it would be him.
“Explorer: these are my instructions,” I snapped. “Bomb the gas giant, kill as many of those ugly big parent-fuckers as you can. Then seal the system. Get us out of here.”
“I need to-” Commander Galamea said.
“DO IT NOW,” I screamed, and Explorer heard my voice of command, and on the wall-screen I saw plumes of cloud start to emerge from the gas giant. Teleported bombs were exploding on the planet’s surface.
Explorer accelerated; but the stay-still fields were not in place so we were scattered like ritsos, and I flew across the room and crashed into Commander Galamea. We gripped each other, just as the stay-still came on; and for a few awkward moments we were held aloft in each other’s arms, as if swept up by an imaginary wind.
Then Explorer slowed down, and the stay-still fields were released, and we dropped to the ground like stones off a bridge.
The Commander and I staggered to our feet, bruised by each other’s bodies. Then, carefully avoiding eye contact, we studied the panoramic image around us of the stellar system of the Prismas.
“Show the barrier in false colour,” I said, and Explorer changed the screens so that they revealed the shape of the invisible barrier in space that now encaged the Prismas; a shifting-sands-wall that would trap the Prismas, irrevocably and for all eternity, in this little bubble of space.
Galamea whispered to me: “You were wrong, of course, to take Albinia.”
I nodded, to acknowledge that I knew she was right.
“Nevertheless,” Galamea said, “that was a good first mission. You were fair, but decisive.”
“They were a bunch of evil bastards!” I said angrily.
“No,” said Galamea, kindly. “Not evil, not bastards; these are aliens. We can’t judge them by our own ethical and cultural standards.”
“Even the Stuxi?”
Galamea thought about that. “Actually, they really were evil bastards,” she admitted.
Later, I recorded the summary in my log for the mission: No potential for trade. Danger Rating 4. Alien hostiles Quarantined, in perpetuity.
Later still, I went to visit Albinia in the sick room. Her flesh had peeled off, she looked like a corpse. But she was awake. She fixed me with a scornful glance; there was no trace of the absent, dreaming Albinia. This was a cold hard woman, looking at me as if I was a nobody.