With supreme self control, Andr sat quiet. His flesh was still slightly tender where the medical nanonics had been removed. And he was sure those bastard anglo quack doctors hadnt fully cured his intestinal tract; he kept getting raging indigestion after meals. If you could call what hed been fed meals. But his indigestion was nothing to the suffering inflicted by the awesome injustice brought down upon his poor head. The Navy blamed him for the antimatter attack against Trafalgar. Him! An innocent, persecuted blackmail victim. It was diabolical.
Hello there.
Andr glared at the badly overweight, balding, middle-aged man in the couch next to him.
Guess we ought to introduce ourselves, seeing as how were going to spend the rest of our lives together. Im Mixi Penrice, and this is my wife, Imelda.
Andrs face cracked in mortification as a timid woman, also fat and middle aged, waved at him hopefully from the couch beside her husband.
So pleased to meet you, she said.
Guard! Andr yelled frantically. Guard.
There was never any contact between the Confederation at large and Traslov, in that every flight was strictly one way: down. The theory was simple enough. Prisoners, voluntarily accompanied by their family, were shot down into the equatorial band of continent not covered by glaciers. Sociologists, hired by participating governments to reassure civil rights organizations, claimed that if enough people were brought together then theyd inevitably form a stable community. After a hundred years, or a million people, whichever came first, the flights would be stopped. The communities would expand in the wake of the retreating glaciers. And in another hundred years a self-sustaining agrarian civilization would emerge with a modest industrial capacity, at which point theyd be allowed to join the Confederation and develop like a normal colony. As yet, no one had found out if an ex-penal colony would want to join a society which had exiled every one of their ancestors.
Andrs drop capsule fired down through the atmosphere, hitting seven gees at the top of its deceleration peak. It plummeted through the low cloud layer and deployed its parachute five hundred metres from the ground. Two metres from the ground, retrorockets fired in a half-second burst, killing the capsules final velocity as the chute jettisoned.
The capsule crashed into the scorched earth with a bone-numbing impact. Andr gasped in shock at the pain transmitted along his spine. Even so, he was the first to recover, and flipped his strap catches open. The hatch was a crude affair, like everything else in the capsule. A wonder they ever got down alive. He pulled the release handle.
Theyd landed in a broad valley with gently sloping sides and a fast stone-bed stream running along the bottom. The local grass-analogue was an insipid grey green, its monotony broken by a few wizened dwarf bushes. A cold wind blew against the capsule, carrying tiny grains of white ice. Andr shivered violently; the chill factor took it well below freezing. He had thought to simply collect his share of the survival equipment from the baggage lockers ringing the base of the capsule and hike away from his fellow exiles. That action would have to be reconsidered now.
When he looked along the other end of the valley, he was amazed to see the distinct globular shape of starship life support capsules embedded in the soil. He could see at least forty of them. A definitive count would have shown Andr that a total of sixteen starships had been involved in the incident which had seen them cast away here.
A lone figure was striding vigorously over the frozen ground towards the drop capsule: a young man in a black fur coat, with a crossbow slung over his shoulder. He stopped just below the hatch and put his hands on his hips to grin up at Andr.
And a very good morning to you, sir; Charles Montgomery David Filton-Asquith at your service, he said. Welcome to Happy Valley.
The bath water was imbued with the scent of tangerines; bubbles covered its surface to a thickness of ten centimetres. Ione sank into the blood-warm water with a contented moan, sliding down the marble until only her head was visible.
Ooh, that feels good.
You should relax more,tranquillity said. I am capable of supervising most activities.
I know, but everyone wants the personal touch; Im starting to feel like a nursemaid rather than a dictator. And I still havent decided what to do about the Laymil project centre.
Most of its staff are on sabbatical from their university. Downsizing will be a simple matter.
Yes. But I feel we should make more use of its resources, turn it to something new. After all, you and I are technically out of a job these days.
A curious viewpoint.
Face it, weve got to find something else to do. I really dont want to stay here.she allowed the images from the shells external sensitive cells shimmer up into her mind. Jupiter orbit was alive with starship flights, both Adamist and voidhawk. Two large industrial stations specialising in organic synthesis were being manoeuvred over to Aethra, where they could start repairing the damage to the young habitats shell. Joshua had transferred all forty-odd young habitats from the stage-one systems into orbit above the glorious orange gas-giant.
This star system is going to be the heart of the revolution,tranquillity said.
All the more reason we should go somewhere else. Whats our status right now?her consciousness drifted through the habitat, perceiving the state of the induction cables, the parkland, the light-tube, the vast ring of energy patterning cells. Fusion generators out on the docking ledge were still supplying seventy per cent of Tranquillitys power. How do you feel about making another jump?
Where to?tranquillity asked.
I think its time you and I went home.
Home?
Kulu.
Is this some obscure bid to succeed the throne? Your royal cousins will have a collective heart attack.
But they can hardly refuse me, not after our contribution to the Liberation. Technically, we are a dukedom of the Kulu Kingdom. And theres a lot of He3 mining activity around Tarron, Im sure the cloudscoop crews would prefer to be billeted here. And we are an extremely valuable economic asset to any star system.
Why?
Carrying the revolution forwards. We are bitek, they are one of the most anti-bitek cultures in the Confederation. Yet they employed bitek at the first sign of trouble. Thats a chink, one we can prize open with our presence. This ridiculous technological segregation has to stop. It helps no one. This is the chance for that new beginning I spoke of. Another little change to add to the momentum for overall cultural reform.
It will not be easy.
I know that. But you have to admit, its been awfully quiet around here since Joshua left.
I still find that hardest to believe. Handing over the Lady Macbeth to his brother and giving up flying. Will he be happy living on Norfolk? Its very peaceful there.
Ione laughed, and reached for a cut-crystal glass of Norfolk Tears. She eyed the fabulous drink as if it was the last drop left in the universe. I think its about to become a whole lot noisier.
Syrinx and Ruben stood patiently in the hospital waiting room as the psychology team assembled. Some of them she knew from her own therapy sessions, and exchanged warm greetings.