The Seraphine, Twenty-Six Kilometers Below
Lumiara, Survivor’s Refuge
4454.2.24 Interstellar
Janus found the captain, Lira, Mick, Nikandros, and Fury on the weather deck, waiting for him and his young charges before going ashore. To Janus’s great surprise, Fury was leaning against the captain’s leg, as she sometimes did with him. Fury looked at him with happy eyes, tail stirring, but she made no move toward him.
“Don’t worry, Mr. Invarian,” the captain said. “I haven’t stolen her from you, although I’m tempted.”
“I thought she was terrified of you,” Janus said ruefully.
“She is,” the captain said, patting the side of the great beast’s neck. “Emotions are messy, tangled things.”
Nikandros looked like he might say something, but the architect’s eyes flicked to the captain, and he stayed silent.
“Are we ready?” Lira asked.
Janus glanced back to see Matthias helping Callie up on deck. “As ready as we’re going to be.”
“Let’s go, then,” Lira said.
The seven of them made their way to the boarding ramp that rose gently to the docks, where four Cult members in gray robes waited for them. These are the survivalists, then, Janus thought. The survivalists were the enforcers of the Consensus, charged and equipped to control Cult members who broke the collective’s laws or endangered the survival of the remnant of humanity. Considering how well-armed people like Red Donika or some of her aspirants had been, Janus wondered what biomechanical or technological horrors a survivalist was capable of unleashing. From the deck of the Seraphine, they looked like regular people. He wondered if the color of their robes was significant.
Janus put his hand on the guardrail and followed Nikandros and Lira up the boarding ramp. Mick, Callie, and Matthias followed, and the Captain and Fury came last.
“Seraphine, departing,” the officer of the watch said.
“Is the ship leaving?” Mick asked.
“Old tradition,” the captain answered. “The ship isn’t leaving. I am. But I am the ship.”
Janus grinned. After seeing the captain guide the ship and the convoy through ice fields and ambushes, the Seraphine guided by both the Apostate’s orders and direct control inputs, he couldn’t disagree with the statement, although it was definitely either a particularity of naval culture or a throwback to a bygone era in which the crew’s efforts were set to nothing. Or, perhaps, it was the recognition that, no matter the crew’s efforts, a captain’s inattention or incompetence could kill them all.
“Architect Nikandros, Administrator Allencourt, welcome to the Deeps,” the leader of the survivalists said. “Emissary Invarian, good to meet you after hearing so much about you.”
The woman who’d spoken stood slightly ahead of her peers, although aside from her stance and her speaking, there was nothing else to indicate her status. She had gunmetal gray hair, cut short but not martially short, and wore a kind expression on a face that showed none of the slackness or disinterest of age.
“Master Preceptor Petra,” Nikandros said, inclining his head. “Thank you for welcoming us.”
“I always expected to ‘welcome’ you eventually, architect,” Petra said with a hint of mischief. “Perhaps, on your next visit, you’ll stay with us longer.”
“Perhaps I will,” Nikandros said, with less humor.
“Petra,” the captain said.
“Apostate,” the master preceptor said with genuine warmth. “Will you be staying with us? You’ve always known when to keep your head down.”
“Alas, I’ve left precious belongings back on the ship.”
Petra chuckled, then turned to Janus. “High praise, Emissary, though you wouldn’t know it.”
Janus swallowed. He knew the exchange between the three had been significant, although he lacked the context to tease out the full meaning. “You have me at a loss, Master Preceptor. You seem to know more about the situation than the depths and isolation of this settlement would suggest.”
“We have our special ways of knowing things,” Petra said, her smile pulling to the left side. Her eyes slid to one side. “And speaking of special ways, Nikandros, any attempt at surveillance of the Deeps will be viewed as hostile, and I will blame no one but you. You stand warned.”
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“I do,” Nikandros said, his tone carefully neutral.
“Good,” the master preceptor said. “That brings us to the young man you’ve been charged with escorting to us.”
Janus cleared his throat.
Petra cocked an eyebrow at him.
“I don’t believe the sentence was just, Master Preceptor.”
“Janus,” Lira said, but Janus held Petra’s eye.
“Go on,” Petra said.
“I truly believe that Matthias was not aware of the plot to bomb our colony.”
The master preceptor gave him a lidded look, and answered, “Wasn’t it you who said that there are some crimes severe enough the intention of the perpetrator doesn’t matter, Janus Invarian?”
Janus winced. He’d been quoting Nikandros at the time, and it had, at least in theory, been a private conversation, but that didn’t seem to be so relevant to some people on this planet. “I did. I was wrong.”
“Whom should we blame, then?” Petra said, clasping her hands behind her back. “We are the guardians of humanity’s remnant, and some of the habitats in Survivor’s Refuge less fortunate than Irkalla cannot survive without our regular intervention. Irkalla would last a mere two hundred years without significant loss of life. The Consensus cannot be allowed to devolve into war.”
Lira started to answer, but the captain put a hand on her arm and shook his head.
Janus felt like he had the first time he met Nikandros, his beliefs challenged by someone who at least thought they knew the answers, his fate hanging in the balance of his answers. The master preceptor had at least provided him with some of the rules of this engagement, in that she’d let him know that nothing was hidden from her. “If anyone is to blame, it is the individual who brought the bomb by threatening violence against other Cult members. Since the bomber is dead, the faction that either directly or indirectly supported his actions should bear the blame, and the purgationists represent a minority within the Consensus. I can only assume…” He paused.
“Finish your thought, Emissary.”
Janus swallowed. “I can only assume that the reason you haven’t already acted against them is because of the logistics of doing so, because of a rule I am ignorant of, or because doing so would lead to the war you mentioned.” And that would only be true if the purgationists had deeper ties to one or more major factions than Lira and Syn’s investigations had uncovered.
The Betan hacker had been thorough. Misdirection could only have been achieved through long planning and impeccable execution.
“What should we do, then, Emissary?”
She’s confirming my suspicion, Janus thought, wishing Lira could handle this conversation. “Punishing Matthias is only symbolic, a concession to power, and it weakens the legitimacy of the survivalists.”
“You’re becoming less interesting, Janus,” Petra warned. “Whom should we blame?” she said, enunciating each word.
“Me,” Janus said, somewhat helplessly. “I could have stopped it from happening. I knew the danger. I ordered the drone to fire. The only person who knew more and isn’t a purgationist is Nikandros.”
“You would take responsibility in place of the boy?” Petra asked.
Janus felt the old bile from his days as an outsider in Prime Dome rise in his throat. She wouldn’t go after the purgationists, and she wouldn’t go after Nikandros, but a sacrifice to the Consensus’s sense of morality or fear had to be made, and Janus had decided he couldn’t live with Matthias filling that role. “If you’ll allow me to finish my journey to the Core and deliver my people to safety, I will return and serve out the sentence in his place.”
“That’s not necessary, Janus,” Nikandros said.
“The survivalists determine what is necessary, Nikandros,” Petra said. “But Janus is mistaken on several counts. Matthias has not been sent here to be imprisoned by us, he has been sent here to serve with us. This is a time when no member of the Cult can afford to be as naive as he was, and he will learn this by standing watch over some of our people’s worst deviants. His time here will make him a more valuable member of the Consensus, and it will also protect him from reprisals.”
Matthias gaped. “I… I am honored, Master Preceptor.”
Petra gave him a short nod, then looked at Callie. “He is allowed to have a guest, even for the whole length of his stay. Matthias is not the only one in need of seasoning.”
Janus’s emotions swung from pleased surprise to shock, and then anger. Who was the master preceptor to take his sister away from him?
“I’m also honored, I guess?” Callie said with less certainty, and Janus’s heart fell. “But ma’am, I like Matthias, I really do, but I’ve known him for a few months. My uncle and my brother need me.”
Janus felt his happiness restored even as Matthias’s crumbled.
“I’m sorry,” Callie said, reaching for Matthias’s face.
He allowed her to touch him, but he stood there stiffly, with his hands at his sides. “I understand,” he said leadenly.
“Well,” Petra said with a smile. “Now that all those high-flying emotions have been settled, let’s give you a tour of our humble settlement. We should have about an hour to see the place, and then I believe we’re scheduled to have a party.”
Lira caught Janus’s eye, a glimmer of anger smoldering within them, and he knew they’d have things to talk about later. But for now, Janus felt about as happy as he had for weeks, or maybe longer, when Callie put an arm around his waist and he pulled her into a walking hug. “It’s good to have you back, Bug.”
“You know I didn’t start the mutiny because of Matthias, right?”
“Uh huh. Said so all along.”
And he had, although he suspected both he and Callie couldn’t have quantified how much the pretty and now crestfallen boy who walked behind them had influenced their destinies.
But Janus had more things to worry about, things he did his best to conceal behind his happiness.
He appreciated the justice of Matthias’s assignment, and he believed the time here would indeed make the young man better. It might even have done Callie some good, although, selfishly, Janus was glad she’d turned Petra down. But the master preceptor had told him he’d been mistaken on several counts, not just that Matthias had been sent here to be imprisoned.
If he were to read into the conversation in ways he really wasn’t comfortable doing, he would be forced to one or more alarming conclusions.
The purgationists were a front for a larger group.
Opposing that group would lead to war.
The master preceptor considered Janus as innocent and misguided as Matthias.
Nikandros was a purgationist.
And Janus’s people would not find safety in the Core.