There is no way forward, no way back, no way around.
I am an aristocrat. A minor one, but of stock. I understand the rules of class, and breeding. The Duke is vastly more powerful than I, but we are of a class. I can speak with her; gentry to gentry. We can communicate as equals.
I must persuade her to call off the attack.
Impossible! A middle-aged Irish widow, armed only with a pair of scissors. What can she do; kill an army with gum and tissue? The death of a thousand papercuts?
Perhaps I could buy her off. A prize beyond prize: a jewel from the stars, from their goddess itself. Arthur said that sapphires are unknown on this world. A stone beyond compare.
I am writing as fast as I am thinking now.
I must go and face the Duke of Yoo, female to female. I am of Ireland, a citizen of no mean nation. We confront the powerful, we defeat empires. I will go to her and name myself and I shall offer her the Blue Empress. The true Blue Empress. Beyond that, I cannot say. But I must do it, and do it now.
I cannot make the driver of my spider-car take me into the camp of the enemy. I have asked her to leave me and make her own way back to Yelta. I am writing this with a stub of pencil. I am alone on the high altiplano. Above the shield wall the cloud layer is breaking up. Enormous shafts of dazzling light spread across the high plain. Two mounted figures have broken from the line and ride towards me. I am afraid – and yet I am calm. I take the Blue Empress from its box and grasp it tight in my gloved hand. Hard to write now. No more diary. They are here.
PLATE 13: V. Gloria medianocte: The Midnight Glory, or Blue Empress. Card, paper, ink.
LITTLE SISTERS
Vonda N. McIntyre
VONDA N. MCINTYRE (www.vondanmcintyre.com) writes science fiction. Her novel Dreamsnake won the Nebula, Hugo, Locus, and Pacific Northwest Booksellers awards. The Moon and the Sun won the Nebula. The film version, from Bill Mechanic’s Pandemonium Films, stars Pierce Brosnan, Fan Bingbing, and Kaya Scodelario, and was directed by Sean McNamara. It will be released in 2016. “Little Sisters” was published by Book View Café, and is a companion piece to “Little Faces,” nominated for the Nebula, and reprinted by BVC, which also digitally publishes McIntyre’s backlist.
DAMAGED NEARLY TO extinction by a war it had won, Qad’s Piercing Glory tumbled through deep space, its engines dead, deceleration impossible. Glory’s Mayday shrieked, insistent, while Qad, beset by nightmares, slept in his transit pod. Glory focused its failing resources on keeping Qad alive.
Decades later, in the nearest shipyard, Executives registered the cry for help. They created an account for this new consumer and dispatched space boats with gravity tractors.
A millennium later, the space boats returned. The ship floated obediently in their tractor nets, its tumbling damped, its momentum slowly, inexpensively reduced from interstellar speeds. The boats minimized energy expenditure and Executive attention, guided by Artificial Normals. The rescue required little intelligence, and had not been marked as emergency or priority. The estimated account expenditure reached neither level. The boats put the disabled ship into a repair bay and signaled for awakening.
Qad woke in the cold and dark, surprised to wake at all. He had expected to freeze in the wilderness of deep space, or burn in the brilliance of starbirth. He pulled out the transit pod catheters and intravenous supply lines, indifferent to leaks or smells. Cleaning was the job of Artificial Stupids. He ignored their jobs; he barely noticed their existence.
He felt his way to the darkened bridge. Glory’s viewscreen displayed the unlit interior of the repair bay in real time, showed him the rescue and approach in past time, and offered him the repair agreement. He accepted it. What choice did he have? Light flooded the bay and the bridge.
The Artificial Normal shaved him clean, gave him a fashionably architectural haircut, and painted the faces of the little sisters. It offered him a display of fashionable clothing and guided him to a selection that flattered him and the new haircut. He paid, on credit, the licensing fee for the patterns and waited while Glory created them.
He preferred to dress himself, but he had to let the Normal fasten the hundred buttons down the back of the open-fronted coat, and tie the bow of his modesty apron. It laid out his sword belt, scabbard, and blade. He checked the edge and strapped on the weapon. Finally, the Artificial opened his drawer of medals and pinned them on in their proper order. The two he had recently designed remained in their presentation boxes. He hoped and expected the Executives to accept them, to award them, to reward him.
At the access tube, a leader light waited to guide him into the shipyard. He followed it. His boots rang on metal grating. Gravity increased, making the horizontal walkway feel like a steep climb. Qad wondered if standards had changed, or if the Glory had miscalculated his sleep therapy. He could hardly meet the Executives with sweat dripping down his face. He paused for a moment to slow his heavy breathing. The leader light stopped with him, then oscillated before him, urging him to continue.
The eldest little sister squeaked with hunger, and the others joined the cry, a demanding quartet. They expected to be fed when he woke, but the invitation of the Executives took precedence. He opened himself to the sisters so they could take sustenance from him. No matter his exhaustion, he must withstand the drain on his resources in order to distract and quiet the little sisters during his meeting.
The leader light lost patience and skittered down the grating. Qad followed, ignoring the pain and fatigue in his thigh muscles.
He reached the executive chamber not a moment too soon. The double doors opened.
Three Executives sat on a dais at the far end of the chamber. Qad strode toward them, stopped a proper five paces before them, and bowed.
“It’s time,” said the central Executive.
“My report: I took my Piercing Glory on a mission to explore and claim new worlds. I found two systems with suitable planets. I cleared them.” Qad held out his two medal boxes.
The Chief Executive beckoned him forward. Qad approached and placed the medals on the table. The Executive leaned over his huge belly, concealed by an embroidered lace modesty apron, and reached with spidery, sinewy arms to open the boxes.
Qad was proud of his designs. They displayed the position of the conquered worlds, the level to which he had cleared them, the potential of their remains. The medals would hang prominent on his chest. Impressive, but not too overwhelming.
The Executive inspected each one, reading them easily.
“Adequate,” he said. On either side of him, the other Execs murmured agreement.
Qad suppressed a frown. He had expected compliments, not an edge of criticism.
“And the damage to your ship?”
“Piercing Glory behaved with great courage in clearing the second planet. It was nearly destroyed. The inhabitants had nearly reached the danger zone, with powerful weapons. They would have achieved interstellar flight soon, and threatened our civilization. My ship has sent the proof to you.”
“You cleared the worlds to the third level of evolution.”
“We did.”
“While the directives limit clearing to second level.”
“Those directives are new,” Qad said. “Many years behind my expedition.”