Exodus: Empires at War: Book 11: Day of Infamy (Exodus: Empires at War.) (5 page)

*     *     *

CAPITULUM, JEWEL.

It wasn’t the most
exclusive jewelry store in Capitulum.  That was reserved for the moderately
rich, and entry was by invitation only.  Of course, the nobility and the very
rich didn’t shop for their jewelry in stores.  They had their pieces made to
order.  But Newmans was as exclusive as someone of Tomas Gijardo’s wealth and
status could afford.

“I would like to see that
one,” he said to the clerk, pointing to a one carat ring in the case.

“A good choice, sir,”
said the Malticon clerk, barely able to look over the counter from his one
meter and a third height.  His species looked as close to human as possible,
with the exception of some differences to his limb joints and fingers.  They
fit into human society much easier than most species, and there had to be a
couple of hundred million of them in the city.

Wonder if you say that to
everyone, no matter their choice?
thought Gijardo, taking the ring from the
humanoid hand and turning it to catch the light. 
I think I can afford this,
and I think she’s worth it.

Tomas was an up and
coming business analyst with one of the largest firms in the city, which made
it one of the largest in the Empire.  Someday he would be a big name in the
firm, and then he might be one of those who ordered specialty jewelry.  But for
now this was all he could afford.

“I’ll take it,” he told
the clerk.  From the return smile he wondered if the being was getting a
commission on the sale.  He swiped his wrist over the sensor, authorizing the transaction
through his implant.  As far as he knew it was a foolproof system, safe from
any hackers or cyber criminals that might still exist in this day and age. 
What criminals there were still made a living, but not from preying on people’s
savings and bank accounts.

Tomas walked from the
store and onto the street, his eyes taking in the sights of the city.  This
section of Capitulum was made up of towering megascrapers, reaching thousands
of meters into the sky, each taking up an entire city block.  Interspersed
among them were small parks, also city block sized, bringing slices of nature
into the urban landscape.  The streets were busy, swarming with people about
their business.  All of the buildings boasted lines of street side stores, from
individual specialty shops like the jewelers, to mega department stores that
took up the second and third stories of the buildings.  Above those stores were
business offices, belonging to accountants, lawyers, lobbyists and others.  
And above those in most of the buildings were the apartments of the people who
worked here.

Many of the stores
advertised the upcoming Christmas holiday, an event that had been adopted by
many of the alien citizens.  Some because they had converted to one of the
Christian denominations of the humans, most because everyone enjoyed a good
party, and Christmas was a great segue into the New Year’s/Empire Day holiday. 
Holoboards lit up with the news of sales, competing with the propaganda grams
trying to arouse the patriotism of the people.

Tomas knew that the
Empire was at war.  Things were bad in Sector IV, and in the other human
polities.  Some core worlds had been hit, hard.  People were dying, and some
resources were becoming scarce as they were funneled into military production. 
But here in the capital they were still safe and sound.  Food, clothing and
energy were plentiful, and if there were fewer new aircars on the market, that
was something Tomas could live with.

No way they’re going to
get me in uniform
,
he thought as he walked into the building that housed his firm.  That was for
the little people, those who didn’t work for one of the most powerful
corporations in the Empire.  He would be protected through the entire war,
while others went to fight, so he could continue his rise to power within the
organization.

He took the private lift
to the firm’s floor, thankful to finally get away from the crowds.  Sometimes
he wished he lived on one of those frontier worlds, where every day was an
adventure.  Then he remembered the war, and was happy to be living in a place
that was untouchable.

Later that evening Tomas
took the lift up to his luxury apartment.  Space was not a concern in this
society, and even people on the dole had at least a hundred square meters of
living space in Capitulum.  Tomas’ living space was much larger, over nine
hundred square meters divided among two bedrooms and bathrooms and a large
central gathering area.  Which included a good sized balcony, on which he sat
with a drink, enjoying the evening.  The wind screen was up at the moment,
holding out the rush of air that ran between the buildings most of the time. 
Still, it was a pleasant evening, the sun reflecting from the surfaces of the
buildings around his.

Megascrapers rose around
him, towers thin or flattened to give most of the apartments within a view of
the outside world.  It was a fairy tale landscape of impossibly fragile looking
buildings rising above the clouds.  They looked fragile, but with modern
materials they were anything but.  Off in the distance was a large archology, a
thousand meters high, covering over two million square meters of ground space. 
The majority of the apartments in that structure did not have an outside view. 
They either opened onto the inner courtyards, or used smart screens to recreate
the outdoors.  Tomas actually thought the smart screens did a better job than
an actual window, no matter how large, since the view could be changed to
whatever the occupant wanted.  But there was status in having an actual
physical portal on the world at large.

And with smart screens
one could screen out all of the advertising hanging in the air around the
city.  Holos were everywhere, at street level, up in the sky.  Some were just
generalized boards, but some actually took their cues from whomever was looking
at them and displayed targeted ads.  Tomas wasn’t really sure how that worked,
since their implants were supposed to be shielded from direct taping.  The
holos did light up the town at night, much like the old video boards he had
seen on the history vids, and that added color to the city, though he wished
there was a little less of it.

Tomas’ implant warned him
that it was time to get ready to go out.  He thought about his coming date with
the love of his life, checking out a new club in one of the older sections of
the city, where all the buildings were low rises, though tastefully historic in
nature.  First they would eat at a small bistro where he had reservations,
thanks to some name dropping of his bosses.  Then the club, where they could
dance and talk to the wee hours of the morning.

It was a good life to
Tomas’ way of thinking.  And one he planned on enjoying as long as he had youth
on his side.  He thought about his great grandfather, a man who had lived over
three hundred years, and was currently in a hospital, expected to die at any
time.  He visited regularly, something he saw as a familial duty.  Hospitals
were more or less places for people to die.  Medical science was advanced
enough that long hospital stays were almost unheard of for normal citizens.

We pay too much for
hospitals and clinics as it is,
thought the young man, walking out of his
apartment and calling for a taxi on his implant, ordered to meet him on the
rooftop landing pad. 
People are healthier than ever
, he thought,
getting in the lift and commanding it to go up, hoping there wouldn’t be too
many stops along the way.  Humankind suffered none of the genetic disorders
that had plagued it in the past; diabetes, hypertension, cancers, heart disease. 
Only someone who really wanted to became overweight.  And it took an
exceptional microbe to last more than a couple of hours in a nanite protected
body.  But government insisted on having more than enough hospital and clinic
space and staff, as well as emergency medical personnel and vehicles, all of
which came out of Tomas’ pocket.

Foolishness
, he thought as he left
the lift to the sight of the cab coming in for a landing.  He stepped into the
cab and sent it the address for Margo’s apartment. 
Soon enough we’ll be
living in the same space.
  Margo was an old fashioned girl, raised on a
frontier planet.  And she refused to move in with him while they were still
nothing but friends and sex partners.  In less than a month that would change.

*     *     *

“Christ,” cursed Sean,
looking at the face of his most trusted Ambassador in the holo hanging over his
desk.  “I don’t think I can push that through Parliament.  They’re already up
in arms about us giving our allies access to so many of our secrets.” 
Secrets
they might use against us in a future conflict
, thought the Emperor,
shaking his head.  He didn’t concern himself about possible might be future
events, not when he had an annihilation event on his doorstep.  But not
everyone in the government had the same attitude.

“The High Lord says they
are going to vote tomorrow on a measure to bring their fleet home, your
Majesty.  What are we going to do if their ships start leaving their posts?”

What can we do?
thought Sean. 
Fire
on them?  Start another war?
  Of course he could deny them access to the
wormhole gates and make them take the long way home, a petty move that would
earn him few friends in their Empire.

“Fortunately, there is no
indication of a Ca’cadasan offensive in the immediate future,” said the
Ambassador, raising an eyebrow, turning the statement into a question.

Sean nodded, saying
nothing.  The Ambassador of course did not know everything that was going on. 
Need
to Know
was a concept the Empire took seriously.  The Ambassador to a
friendly power needed to know what was important for their job, which did not
include complete military intelligence.  There was an indication that something
might be happening on the frontier facing the Ca’cadasan Empire in the near
future.  A lot of ship movements, including penetrations of the frontier. 
There had been months of skirmishes between groups of vessels up to the task
group size.  Intelligence agreed that it was time, and missing the Elysium
ships could be telling in a coming fight.

The Ambassador gave him
another questioning look.  The Ambassador was not an idiot, and as a former
Admiral he still had connections with the Fleet.  But Sean was not about to
confirm or deny anything dealing with either front. 
And there’s a major
offensive in progress on the Klavarta front.  Something neither the Ambassador
nor our allies in this region of space need to know the details of.  It’s
enough that they know we have allies, and that they are fighting hard for the
common goal.

“Make sure the High Lord
knows that the Crakista are still onboard,” he told the Ambassador.  “As well
as the Klassaks and the Margrav.  If they leave the alliance, they will miss
out on the benefits of our community.”

“I don’t think they want
to leave the alliance, your Majesty.  I think what they do want is to be on an
even technological playing field with us.”

“And they will get this
by our giving them wormholes?  They still won’t be able to make their own
without an enormous industrial investment.  The same with the launching and
particle beam systems.  And they’re already complaining about what the war is
costing them.”  Sean felt himself getting angry.  As if he didn’t have enough
trouble with his own people, now he was having to deal with the childish
tantrums of other governments.

“What do you want me to
do, your Majesty?”

Do I give in to Elysium?
thought Sean.  If he gave
them wormholes and Klassekians, he would then get the same demands from the
other members of the alliance.  He doubted his traditional allies, The Klassak
Concordium and the Margravi Hegonomy, would jump ship, since they owed their
existence to his Empire.  The Crakista had said that they would side with the
humans because the alternative, the Ca’cadasans ruling the Galaxy, was
unthinkable.  The Crakista used reason to make their decisions, not letting
their emotions interfering.  Though it might be a good decision to force the
humans to give up all of their secrets, since the logical response to their
withdrawing from the alliance would be to beg them to stay, no matter what it
took.

“Try to get them to see
reason, Ambassador.  If the Ca’cadasans win, Elysium is the next to fall.”

“And if they still insist
on a technology share?”

“We will deal with that
when it comes.”

Sean dismissed the com,
no longer wishing to talk about this problem.  He reached up and rubbed his
neck, working on a kink.  There was not an Emperor he could think of who had to
deal with so much.  A war that might exterminate the human species had never
happened since the days the predecessors had left Sol system on the run. 
Dealing with so many other powers that had their own agendas?  The Empire was
used to fighting its own wars.  The Death Machines that humanity thought they
had destroyed, returned and threatening an entire region of space.

“Your Majesty,” came a
call over the com while he was still thinking about what he needed to do next. 
“We have a problem on the Fenri Front.”  The face of Sondra McCullom hung in
the air over his desk, people moving frantically behind her in the war room.