“Nuclear fission? They weaponized nuclear fission?” Katana asked.
“And fusion, Your Dominance,” Overjudge Kirpan clarified, “it’s the only way they could make weapons so powerful in such small casings.”
“Do they not understand what they do?” Katana exclaimed, one hand on her head in dismay. “They’re a second damned Psychocracy!”
Everyone in the room cringed at the mention of the greater galaxy’s old enemy.
“It’s possible,” Kirpan said haltingly, “that they were simply hesitant to use them. Prior to their destruction, Waffen reported that the human nations had access to plentiful, purpose-built nuclear and thermonuclear devices, and had possessed the prerequisite technology for some two of their centuries now.”
“This is an insane race…” Katana moaned, half to herself. “Why did that unlerm Judge give one of the Idrisat Brood a killing mandate? We should’ve stopped at Kormoran!”
“If Your Dominance wishes it done, it is still possible for us to offer terms.”
Instantly, the room was flooded with foul-smelling anger, mixed in with the acrid, sour scent of fear. “No, it isn’t; ask the Magistry of Foreign Affairs. If we are seen making a conditional surrender with savages, the Council will pounce on us. They will cut our lands up between themselves; they will rape our men and butcher our children. Everything the Venerable Ancestor ever worked for will be swept away. No; we have to keep fighting.”
The Overjudge simply blinked twice. “It can’t be that bad, Your Dominance. Can it?”
Katana took a deep breath, her antennae starting to fold back. As she spoke, she seemed to be suppressing a whimper. “It’s them or us now, and I fear that we will lose too much to resist the advances of our neighbors, even if we win.”
The short, pained gasps of someone breaking down could be heard throughout the chamber. From her place on her enormous throne, Katana could see one of the attendants curled up into a ball in the corner, sobbing quietly. “Why, you–I should have you flagellated for such uncouth behavior in Her Dominance’s court!” one of the Judges yelled, storming towards him.
“Hold,” Katana said, putting a hand out. “It’s not becoming of a High Judge to weaken as I have. Let him be.”
The Judge came to a sudden stop, hesitated for a moment, then begrudgingly returned to her position. Katana didn’t like just how long she had paused before obeying her.
“Your Dominance, the people of the Combine look to you for guidance in these trying times.” Overjudge Kirpan said. “What shall we do?”
Katana had to think for a little while. When she was done, the smell in the room only got a little better. “Inform the reactor foundries to begin re-gearing a part of their production; I want weapons of my own, small enough for an Aerial Knight to carry. When they have done so, raise every levy we have left and point them towards the front.”
The High Judge then turned her gaze skyward, to address all in her chamber.
“The dynasty has persevered through all of the tests of history; I shall not be the one to bring about our downfall.”
However, as she said it, the words almost caught in her mouth, and she could only wonder if history would vindicate her.
—
“Marshal Kuznetsov, someone is here to see you. They say they’re from the, ah… the Ford Initiative? Don’t know who they are…” Nadia trailed off, checking a notification on her tablet. Georgy looked up from his desk, momentarily diverting his attention from the ever-growing pile of paperwork on his desk. Nowadays, he couldn’t get any time for himself, and it was starting to take a toll on him; the wrinkles on his face were seemingly getting deeper by the day, and purplish bags had taken up permanent residence below his eyes. The fact that Svetlana had just arrived at a hospital barely three kilometers from the Kremlin, and yet Georgy simply couldn’t spare the time to see her, wasn’t helping things either.
“They’re corpos. Send them in,” Georgy huffed.
Nadia nodded, pressing a few buttons on the PDA. Moments later, the door swung open and a skinny, tan man in a suit strode through confidently, carrying a chrome briefcase. Georgy could see, nestled carefully in his lapel, a Planetary Technologies pin.
“Marshal Georgy Kuznetsov, pleased to make your acquaintance,” Georgy called to him, smiling a smile that failed to reach his eyes, “please, do sit down.”
The man hastily took his seat across from the Marshal. He held up his briefcase, gesturing to it with his free hand. “May I?”
With a start, Georgy moved to clear some of the scattered papers from his desk. “Oh, of course.” he said offhand, gesturing for Nadia to help him. When she arrived, he handed her the stack of orders he was previously going through for safekeeping.
“Now,” Georgy said when the last papers were off the table, “what did you wish to discuss, sir?”
The man gingerly laid his briefcase out before the Marshal, popping its latches and flipping it open. Inside was yet another stack of papers. For a moment, Georgy’s brain shorted out and he picked one up, reading it front and back for a place to sign. It took him several seconds to realize that it wasn’t a bill or executive order, but rather a schematic.
It looked to be a regular ASQ-2014 autonomous survey warp probe, of the same variety that Planetech itself manufactured, except Georgy could see that the bulbous, high-power radar emitter has been removed, along with the optical telescope, radiological, electromagnetic, and gravimetric sensors, and basically every one of the various sampling and cataloging tools that made it a survey probe and not a particularly-advanced toy drone. The saved mass had apparently been used to put a thin layer of high-density composite armor around the probe.
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“I… see. The point of this machine being?” Georgy narrowed his eyes at the blueprint.
“If you would look towards the space previously occupied by our radar sensors…” the man pointed to the front of the probe. In fact, now that he looked at it, Georgy didn’t think the 2014’s nose cone had such a shallow angle. Judging by the cutaway diagrams, it was mostly hollow, but in its empty space was a conical object that Georgy had no difficulty recognizing.
“Is that a…” he began.
The man flashed him a knowing look, finishing his sentence. “Thermonuclear warhead designed by General Fusion, programmable for yields between two kilotons and thirty megatons. And that isn’t even to mention our optional, proprietary reflector design, which we calculate can redirect a full three quarters of electromagnetic radiation from the blast into a forty-five-degree cone in front of the probe.”
“So you’ve created an atomic shaped charge?” Georgy’s eyebrows raised.
The man shrugged. “Well, it only works for the ten to fifteen megaton bracket, but yes. Also included is a high-thrust engine upgrade–we don’t really need fuel efficiency if we’re just going to warp in on top of the enemy, are we?–along with improved command-and-control functions, allowing a human pilot to guide the probe from a safe location in the unlikely event that the built-in homing programs are unsuitable for the situation.”
Georgy thought about this for a moment. “You’ve created an ICBM.”
“On a larger scale, yes. Would Interstellar Autonomous Kill Vehicle work? MAKY?”
“Mackie,” Georgy nodded; he liked the ring of the word. “I assume you’re going to be selling these to the other nuclear powers?”
“Of course; what are arms companies if not equalizers of men?”
“Yes, I remember that whole thing about Samuel Colt,” Georgy waved dismissively, “but Colt didn’t know that you don’t need to fire off one silo at a time.”
Then, his look became hard and commanding. “Fuck equality between men; it’s a lie to make the ones in last place feel better.”
The man looked down as Georgy was about to go on a rant. “If that is what you wish, sir.”
Georgy stopped, his tirade stifled before it ever was. “But I don’t really care about that. Right now, all I’m wishing for is weapons.”
The man blinked once, a mischievous smile spreading across his face. “That, my friend, we can provide.”
—
Alpha Centauri, as the humans called it, was a friendly world, if somewhat barren. The plants were small, so the animals that ate them were small, and there were no terrestrial predators on the planet larger than the half-meter companion mammals that humans called housecats. Humans, with gene-tailored bacteria and purpose-bred flora, were slowly turning the planet into a copy of their homeworld; it was predicted that, within a century or two, the only place one could find Alpha Centauri life on Alpha Centauri would be in an enclosure or in someone’s home. Such was the price of progress.
Of course, Rapier had only read that, so what did he know?
By some anti-miracle, the cuffs around his hands had worked their way into the chinks of his wrists, and were now beginning to chafe badly against his exposed, sensitive skin. Irritated, he started to wriggle his hands around in hopes of unsticking them.
“Hey! Don’t try to get out of those!” one of the guards yelled suddenly, pointing at him. With a sigh, Rapier dropped his arms. There wasn’t any point in asking for help; if Rapier’s own brief experience as a brig guard said anything, complaining was the first step to receiving a beating.
This left him with only the slowly descending whine of the shuttle engines to keep him company. The brief period of worry that came with the trip from orbit came and went with the entry plasma, and now they were shooting above the human core world at supersonic speed to whatever fate awaited them. By this point, Rapier was almost hoping that he’d find neuroforming masks awaiting him when he landed; he had read too much of what humans did to their enemies in olden times, and had a lot of time to think of what might await him too.
Some humans were fond of putting knives underneath the little keratin segments that terminated each human finger and toe and prying them loose. Others would cut the skin from the heads of stricken enemies, dead or alive. Yet, that which most disturbed Rapier was a practice that the people of Hellas accused the people of Iran of during their ancient times, where the condemned were slathered in milk and sweet-nectar and left for the insects to devour. For Rapier, it hearkened back to what he had read of the Before, where both the Venerable Ancestor and the Tenth Warlord were known for leaving miscreants tied up in baskets hanging from the trees, unable to escape the poison winds that scourged Poslush at the time. By the end of the first few days, they would be quite literally vomiting their guts out.
Suddenly, the sound of the thrusters redoubled, and Rapier and the others in the craft were gently pushed towards the front. No one complained, however, for obvious reasons. Besides, there wasn’t much point in asking the pilot to ease up on the brake, just as there wasn’t much point in asking the tides not to rise.
After a few minutes, the sensation of being pushed fell away, before being replaced with a brief falling sensation that sent Rapier’s stomach shooting into his throat. A few seconds later, the whole craft jostled as it finally made contact with the ground.
“Alright, everybody up!” one of the guards called. Dutifully, every Poslushi in the room stood as the rear ramp of the shuttle lowered. Rapier could see a concrete field outside, with, quite curiously, a Poslushi waiting before them, unchained, unharmed, and seemingly free. Rapier couldn’t help the feeling of relief that came with seeing his traditional attire; maybe the humans actually valued his culture, unlike his own kind.
One by one, the inmates began to move forward, jostled occasionally by the butts of the guards’ rifles. Ahead, Rapier could see the Poslushi give a brief greeting to each of his countrymen as they passed by. Then, as he saw Rapier, his antennae perked up in surprise.
“Captain-General Rapier?” he asked.
“Yes?” Rapier asked.
The air smelled of apprehension. “The war must be going as bad as they say if they’ve caught you.”
Rapier couldn’t really think of a way to answer him, and so he changed the subject to something of far greater concern to him. “What’s it like here?”
Instantly, the Poslushi perked up, obviously happier. “Oh, it’s wonderful! They’ve let me go to school; I’ll be one of the Acolyte Caste!”
The Poslushi didn’t have the sedate calm of a neuroformed being, but Rapier was still suspicious. “And they don’t hurt you?”
“Of course not; the humans actually seem to value us quite highly. You know what, I think they’re performing an ancestry play tonight; I should show you where the stage is once you’re through getting registered.”
Rapier only vaguely remembered what an ancestry play was; he wasn’t sure if he had ever seen one himself. “Registered?”
“They’ll need to know who you are,” the Poslushi explained. Suddenly, he cringed as he noticed something. “Have your cuffs been like that?”
“Yes.”
“You could’ve told someone.” the Poslushi said, pulling them out of the chinks and letting them rest on his forearms instead.
“I could’ve?”
The Poslushi opened his mouth to say something, but decided against it. “There’s a clinic not far from the registry center. They should have cream if you start to itch. Now, get to the registry line; I’ve spent too much time on you already.”
With a pat on the back, he sent Rapier on his way. While he walked, Rapier reflected on what he had been told. Ancestry plays were as Poslushi as they came; there was no way humans would preserve that if they didn’t want to preserve the culture. It provided Rapier no small amount of discomfort to imagine that people in a prisoner camp were being treated better than he had in his own flagship, but Rapier was more concerned with trying to find out where he could learn the showing times.
Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad after all.