The Teop’s avatar continued to smile as she stood over a broad case. Then, she pressed a finger to its smooth surface. A mark swept around its periphery, creating a lid that lifted open on a mechanised hinge. Siraa and the Tanslot waited in their seats in careful silence, not quite watching one another but simultaneously refusing to look away.
Within the case was a shimmering metal fluid that perfectly coated its interior. The liquid rose into four distinct cylindrical stands. A simple thin white hairband rested upon each of the first three. The fourth held a set of tweezers and another infinitesimally smaller headband. The Teop used the tweezers to pick it up.
“Come here, darling,” she called out and began to chase the tiny galleon.
The ship swerved on its miniature ocean, bouncing on cresting waves, crashing down with each break in the surf. On its deck, the crew shouted as they organised themselves into shift parties, climbing, adjusting the rigging, raising the sails, and directing the ship into a long swerve. Turning and turning, the vessel slowly dragged itself to rest, floating beside the seating area. Then, dropping a black anchor to the deepest depths of its bowl, it impacted the hardlight below with an impossibly resounding thump, which shook the ground and made the glass walls of the tower rattle. Siraa felt it in her chest.
Seeming deeply amused, the Teop’s avatar leaned over the deck like a giant. She used her tweezers to deliver the headband into the waiting grasp of a crewwoman, who ran, clambering into the stern deck. Then, visible through the windows of its captain’s quarters, she delivered the relic bestowed upon them to her captain, who dismissed her and sat back in her velvet seat, putting on the device.
Teop took the other three headbands from the case and returned to the seats.
“Here you go, Siraa, dear,” the Teop said as she approached the old warrior.
Gesturing as if seeking permission, once Siraa nodded, Teop lovingly brushed back her short black hair and set the headband on her daughter’s head.
“There we go,” Teop said.
“Thank you.” Siraa tried not to look uncomfortable.
Turning to the Tanslot, the Teop gave the drone a prim look. Then she dismissively tossed the third headband up, high into the air above it.
Zipping with precise motion, the drone followed the headband, catching it as it arced back downwards. The Tanslot returned to floating over her seat, wearing the headband around the narrowest part of her avatar’s ovoid body.
“Very funny,” the Tanslot said.
Teop responded by sticking her tongue out and blowing a raspberry at the drone.
“Are these necessary?” Siraa asked the Teop as she sat down again.
“Not strictly, no. They only act as an intermediate interface for your neural lace or our equivalents. But you are here to be equal to us, so you having the physical ability to start and stop the procedure is important to me,” Teop patiently explained.
Siraa tried not to squirm over the suggestion of equality as she inhabited the Teop, a moon-sized entity, a sentient intelligence that was aware and advanced enough to control countless aspects of life support and civil and industrial activities for the myriad humans and drones aboard. With a quick glance out of the window again, she saw the kilometres-wide valley, knowing that even that itself was an insignificantly small recreation zone and a tiny portion of the massive daughter craft’s volume.
“Equality.” The Tanslot said quietly. “If that concerns you, I shall disable the last of her conceptual filters, let her think as broadly as her human mind is capable of.”
Siraa looked owlishly towards the Tanslot’s avatar. What the service vessel said, dismissive and cold, frightened her. But Siraa tried not to let it show, quickly narrowing her eyes and tensing her hands into tight fists.
“I was under the impression that service agents had no conceptual filters,” Siraa said, trying to remain professional with only a note of protest.
“It is done,” the Tanslot said.
“I don’t feel any different.”
That much was true. Siraa hadn’t even detected a signal to her lace. She considered that perhaps the Tanslot was only playing some sort of joke on her, some kind of higher intelligence humour. The Tanslot, though, did not deign to give her a response. Instead, the drone once again only stared without eyes.
“Let’s play nice, please,” the Teop interjected into their moment. She put on her headband, taking some time to ensure it sat just right in her hair.
“Are we all ready?” the Teop asked.
Siraa took a steadying breath before offering the Teop’s avatar a nod. As soon as she did, Siraa felt a tingling in her fingertips and toes that suddenly swept upwards until it engulfed her entirety. She saw stars. Her black armoured body fell back heavily into her seat cushions as her neural connections were repurposed for an experience she was not biologically designed for, neural lace accepting and interpreting a wider array of sensations and information than she was strictly able to process. So it overrode and blocked her natural senses of sight, hearing, smell, touch, taste, and everything else with it...
[UDT sync confirmed - 31,570,391,720,843.]
[Pre-refereed security clearance granted - Ref. Tol TonDer NILE.]
[Signal Sequence log unlocked, re-enabled.]
[“TextTrans” Record Event function enabled.]
Signal Sequence:
[Lace Adapted Interface, Handshake Complete - Confirmation signed T31 @ L20,843.]
{trans.: NTC}, relay, Tracked Copy, received @L20,843, check to read:
[x].
Being read @L20,844 in Personel Suite 103,009., Independent Daughter Vessel “Teop”. o/o Tol TonDer NILE by:
“Text-Trans” (recognised archaic non-sentient. Note Well: “TextTrans” Record Event function will remain enabled to document End-Read-point).
(so cleared)
&
“Orette Tol” (invited party. Note Well: E&E Service on record. Note Well: simulated mind-state & engram will remain enabled to document End-Read-point).
(so cleared)
&
“Siraa Teop” (invited party. Note Well: E&E Service on record).
(so cleared)
&
“Teop Aft Teh Tol TonDer NILE” (invited party).
(so cleared)
&
“Tessaloi Aft Teh Tol TonDer NILE” (invited party).
(so cleared)
&
“Tanslot Aft Teh Tol TonDer NILE” (invited party. Note Well: E&E Service on record).
(so cleared)
&
“Tol TonDer NILE” (authorised holder. Note Well: E&E Service on record).
(so cleared)
Sentient perception of the following document will be recorded.
Each check to proceed:
[x]
[x]
[x]
[x]
[x]
[x]
[x]
[Thank you. Proceeding:]
Note Well: Attention: The following is a text-only dynamically scrolled document which may not be vocalised, rerecorded, copied, stored or media-transferred in any conventionally accessible form. Any attempt to do so will be noted.
Please adjust reading speed:
[Human].
Begin-Read point of Tracked Copy document:
From: Tol TonDer NILE
To: Siraa Teop
& strictly as cleared:
[PostH. Interrog. w/ Orette Tol, c/o E&E, AAMOF Final Service.]
Teop: I know it’s a lot to take in, dear. Please, take your time. The system will record everything, and we can review anything we miss afterwards.
Tessaloi: We’ve already wasted so much time! Let’s get on with it.
Text-Trans: Note Well: Tessaloi is repeatedly trying to fast-forward the simulation. This is declined by all other involved parties.
A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.
Tanslot: Forgive my sister. She is just not used to speaking with humans like we are. She has no crew.
Tessaloi: I got a crew today, actually. Ignore her. She thinks she’s a bigger deal than she really is.
Siraa: I’m ready.
Teop: Well done, Siraa, dear!
Tol: Orette, provide a debrief on your final mission. Start from the beginning, and explain how you were recruited. You had resigned from the E&E Service and left for the independent Mai-Sophos system without intending to return.
Orette: The parliament of Mai Sophos was in session. The entire world waited with bated breath. Finally, it was the day that they would announce whether they would remain independent or join the interstellar pan-humanity of the Accord.
Siraa: I’m not familiar with the Accord.
Orette: Don’t you remember the Accord? Aren’t they still flying around out there? No matter. For anyone else reading this, abridged: united democratic peoples and their Caretakers spanning a narrow region within the expanse of the NILE stem systems.
Teop: It was an old alliance of Caretakers, back when they still wanted to fight back. Before my time, actually. But I think Mother was in it?
Tanslot: Dead and buried. Continue.
Orette: We’d done everything possible to stop you, Tol. I wasn’t a member of parliament. I wasn’t of this world. I was just an alien sitting amongst friends, high in the House of State Legislature. I was a subject matter expert for the party opposing you.
The conference room was filled with politicians, aides, and hangers-on. The team of native experts and their advisers had worked towards this day for years. We were waiting for a speech from the head minister of planetary affairs. He would be the one to make the announcement.
The trid display showed the grand chamber ahead of us, packed out by the government and its opposition. Their numbers churned, finding their seats whilst trying to look composed for the cameras. I remember the smell of black cafe and stim smoke.
Across the table from me, Nelan and Besdan, my personal assistant and public image advisor, murmured to one another. There wasn’t anything to see on screen yet, and the results were entirely secret until the official announcement. So without even a leak to go off of, all we could do was wait. Frustrated and tired, I ran my hands over my face, palming my tired eyes. The feeling of my fingers over the stubble of my shaven head...
The wait would be another twenty minutes or so.
Siraa: Can I check the terminology? You used the word minutes.
Orette: One hundred seconds to a minute. One hundred minutes to an hour. The Maian day was shy of eighteen hours and used a digital calendar.
Siraa: Thank you. Please, don’t let me stop you.
Orette: I stopped myself when I smudged the complicated makeup and face paints I had to wear. My hands smoothed down the sides of my dark shirt as I stood. Nelan looked over. He was a typical Mai with a large nose and long limbs. Hair combed back, beard well kept. The Mai were alien but close enough. We were all human-descendent. His black and white striped face offered what I recognised as sympathy. Our eyes met, and we nodded at each other - understanding - both as tired, stim wired, and ready for what was to come.
Excusing myself, I left the meeting to find a restroom. Stepping past the doorway to the changing area, I locked myself in and cast up a trid of my face using my bracelet/console. Then, with a huff, I saw about fixing my ruined makeup, using pieces from a case I kept in my bag. Despite my bad habits, I had to be ready for the camera.
In the tradition of the Mai natives, I drew on this swirling mix of green and turquoise every day. It was supposed to express my life and work for all to see. You know all about that, I bet. It was a pain to get right, though; half of it was fiction anyway. Compared to the locals, my eyes were large, and my nose small. The markings, according to Besdan, did well to exaggerate my xenotic heritage and make a show of it. It got me looks. That was the point.
I was finishing up when my earpiece started chirping, and the trid vanished. The smooth black bracelet/console flashed green. So I answered it.
“Hello,” it spoke to my earpiece in the Accord’s bridge language NTC, used back then when a participant wasn’t sure which language to use at the start of a conversation. “How do you do. Hi there.”
“Hello. Is this a machine?” I answered in Maian.
“Yes. Hello,” it responded in fluent Maian. “Ambassador Hyrun Sambarr would like to be connected to you. Shall I put you through to the Embassy of the Human Accord? Please be aware that this qualifies as an interstellar transmission under the disambiguation of the diplomatic communications act-”
“Fine. Fine,” I cut in.
Tanslot: The Sambarr was involved?
Orette: The Sambarr was more than just involved. I’ll get to that.
Siraa: I am unfamiliar with the Sambarr.
Teop: Oh, the Sambarr is one of Tol’s sisters, but they don’t talk much anymore.
Tessaloi: That’s putting it mildly. I intercepted this mind-state in a tight cast on a slow, lightspeed crawl in deep space. It was directed towards the Inmet-Sambarr system.
Tanslot: My, my, someone’s been getting her hands dirty.
Tessaloi: You’re one to talk.
Teop: Please continue, Orette.
Orette: Posing as best I could with my posture straight, I put my serious face on, assuming they could see me. I knew catching a micro-camera floating in the air would be impossible.
I had warned the locals that the Accord would use spyware, even inside the centre of an equivi-tech planet’s governance. Once upon a time, it had been my job to review just that sort of espionage on the other side of the divide. I told them all your tricks. I didn’t have the clearance to know what they did with that information, though.
Of course, the Accord would be more likely to co-opt the mind in my bracelet/console or the building’s security system. Sophos probably wouldn’t allow that, though.
I wonder which you did. Was it both?
“... Put me through,” I said.
A pause on the line. I double-checked the door was locked before pacing around the room. The wait would be deliberate. The Ambassador was trying to make me uncomfortable. Even though I knew the game, my heart was beating hard, thumping in my chest.
Give me a second. He’s the reason I died. I don’t want to go over this.
Tol: Continue, Orette.
Orette: “Orette Tol. How are you?” The Ambassador.
“Don’t call me that,” I said after he used my full name. Once upon a time, I was your favoured child, Tol. Now, I am a free woman - or I was. How long have I been dead?
“We’re going to be hosting a media event within the hour,” Hyrun said, ignoring my protest. I could hear him smiling. “I have someone here who is very excited to meet you.”
That was when I put everything together. I have to admit I was speechless.
“Your hand was well played,” he said, his smarmy voice pausing for dramatic effect. “Nevertheless, Service Support will be here within the day.”
“Just like that?” The adrenaline in my veins gave way to a deep stomach ache. My neck and face felt hot. The room was spinning.
“Mhm. Yes. I do expect you to come to join us at the event. It would be a shame if we had to look into extradition before the local judicial system is supplanted. We have a lot to catch up on, do we not, Orette Tol?”
I don’t remember hanging up. I was too strong for the local architecture, and the door rattled on its hinges as I stormed out. Everyone stood when I reentered the meeting room, watching me with wide eyes and careful postures. I took a breath, gauging their reaction, and evened myself before speaking.
“I’m going to the embassy,” I said.
Nelan was caught off-guard. The paint on his face couldn’t hide it. Still, he looked intense when he realised what was happening and picked up his coat. I didn’t say no. Ten minutes and we were outside, leaving the halls of the foyer, passing the house’s guard, and navigating through press and ‘officials’ trying to get the first word out of us.
“Yes. Hello. No, I’m afraid I can’t comment. You’ll find out when I do,” I said. The lie caught in my throat. “Sorry. Excuse me.”
We stooped into an autocar that I called with my bracelet/console. The sleek white vehicle was uniform to almost everyone in the city, issued quickly from a central depot available on request. It was dumb tech and had no self-awareness. Still, it got the job done, reading its surroundings using cameras - no driver necessary. Every side of the car and the roof had windows more transparent than glass, at least from within. It was metallic white and impenetrable from the outside, giving us a little privacy, provided that my console hadn’t been co-opted after all.
Nelan hadn’t said a word this entire time. He sat facing forward; I sat across from him.
“Ten years,” he said, looking out the window as we sped onto a rising highway. “And just like that it’s over.”
“This isn’t the end,” I said quietly. “Nothing that can’t be undone. You’re all still here to fight.”
I gestured to him as I sat back in my seat. It caught his attention.
“Are you going to use that?” I asked, referring to the pistol hidden in his jacket, beneath his coat.
“I’m not supposed to let you get home, if you turn out to be a plant.”
“I figured.” I hired him as my PA despite suspecting he was a member of the local security bureau. They wanted to keep an eye on me. It made sense.
“Thing is, I don’t think you were,” he said.
I didn’t say anything. This time I looked out of the window. We were driving around the ring road, and I could see the NSB plaza. The big screen there showed the news. Though I couldn’t hear it, the headline was enough.
The Maian parliament had voted in favour of joining the Accord. Sophos did not veto the decision.
Hundreds of people in that plaza alone must have been watching, sitting and standing, or just going about their lives but stopping to see where their government was taking them.
“I think you had your own reasons,” Nelan said. “It just didn’t work out.”
“A gun wouldn’t do much if I was still active in the Service,” I said.
“No. It would send a message, though.”
I laughed and shook my head.
“Take me with you.” His request surprised me.
“What?”
“If you’re going back out there, take me with you.”
“Thought you were loyal to the cause.”
“I am. I was.” He frowned, eyes distant. “Ever feel like you don’t know what’s really going on?”
“You have no idea,” I said.
“Besides, it feels like we’ve given away something that can’t be undone, even if you change a few rules and regulations. Even if we reverse the decision and secede, it still happened. We willingly gave away our independence. I wouldn’t expect you to understand. But...”
I looked into his eyes as his determination grew.
“If I stand any chance of actually doing something about it, I need what you have,” he said. “I need perspective. I need to see what’s out there.”
“All humans are free in the Accord. We can do anything we like. No laws, just paradise.” I recited the pitch I fought so hard against for so long before adding, “But what they don’t talk about is how they encourage you to behave, and what they have to do to make sure all their pet humans live soft, peaceful lives.”
I couldn’t finish. I knew that going over my loathing was selfish. These weren’t my people who had voted to dissolve their culture without realising the repercussions. My culture was the enemy, and I didn’t share their loss, no matter how far I tried to run. He didn’t say anything more; instead, he fixed his stare out the window again. So I didn’t press him further.
A vast, geodesic dome lay overhead, countless orange lights beaming down upon the inhabitants of Mai, an artificial sky of metal construction that sealed them from the world beyond. The planet lacked an atmosphere, so their Caretaker provided it for them.
The autocar pulled off of the highway and onto a rail system that leapt through the carefully and orderly designed metropolis. We were headed for the needle, a vast tower in the city’s centre that pierced the sky dome and led to a great space elevator. Our path took us higher and higher, cutting between tall tower blocks and platforms built atop each other as superstructures, with regular city buildings stacked higher and higher upon them, dotted with small parkways, grown in their shade with artificial light.
At the needle, the autocar joined itself to a great elevator shaft and became one of the hundreds ascending to the surface of the great dome, a machine city in and of itself, and then higher still to the orbital framework. Even as Nelan remained unmoved, I couldn’t take my eyes away from the view as we were lifted kilometre after kilometre upward, through fabrication complexes, mass stores, and finally up high enough to see the dome below us, and the roughly cratered surface of Mai beyond.
The Caretaker Sophos reached out in vast arches, connecting hundreds of these dome cities on the surface of Mai, out to beyond the horizon, where the sparkling stars reflected on its brilliant metal plating. These domes connected to other space elevators along the equator, pushing mass upwards into the orbital ring it was constructing, the first of its kind in this system, at least.
That was why I first joined the Service, to see the wonders of NILE Stem. Sometimes I dimly remembered being young and hopeful. Of course, I didn’t feel that way anymore, but I still liked seeing the sights.
The Embassy of the Accord was built above the dome, where the needle met the path to orbit. It was housed in an ornate hub of its own, constructed of silver spokes supporting a vast platform, practically floating off to the side of the space elevator. A hemisphere of a vast hardlight force field, shimmering like a diamond, capped the platform that, I surmised, must have required its own power source that nearly out-performed the entire city below.
The Mai-Sophos system didn’t have field tech and everything that entailed, which I reasoned was probably what Caretaker Sophos hoped to get out of joining the Accord.
It was Nelan’s turn to stare, transfixed in wonder at the shining field array. However, I have to admit I was less interested in that sort of architecture. It didn’t feel as real, as authentic, evoking instead a sense of wonderment that came from defying the physics humans had initially evolved to conceptualise and understand. You could only live in a dream so long before it lost its appeal.