Authors: Migration
Disagreement was mounting over interpretations of the degree of autonomy the offspring worlds should expect to enjoy, and what say they should have in the allocation of resources. Scarcity and desirability were what determined value, and in the present condition the commodity in greatest demand was structural material and the support engineering needed to turn it into habitable space. Some of the demands that were being voiced amounted to aspirations to sovereignty, which in effect made some of the activities engaged in by Lubanov’s office exercises in foreign intelligence. While this had the familiar feel of working on home ground as far as Lubanov was concerned, “foreign” wasn’t a word that the
Aurora
’s original founding charter had used.
He sat in his office in the Directorate center on Astropolis, contemplating the latest message from Lois Iles – referred to by Lubanov’s office as “Pixie” – still on Plantation, displayed on the main screen. The “Magician” – although most of his serious work these days seemed to be with psychologists of both human and artificially intelligent nature – who had gone there in search of the crazy robot had missed it too. The inescapable conclusion was that it had been spirited away to Etanne while everyone’s attention was focused on Sarc. Score one for the opposition, Lubanov conceded grudgingly. Characteristically, he had written the setback off to experience without wasting time on chafing or recriminations. The thing to do when these things happened was learn what one could from them and move on. And the intriguing question raised in this instance was,
why
? What was so important to the Dollarians about getting Tek to Etanne?
Lubanov had learned enough to know that the Dollarians had political ambitions that went a lot further than dedication to rediscovering a secular old-world doctrine of acquisition and competition – which Lubanov saw as contrived to isolate individuals by setting each against all, thereby empowering a controlling élite who acted very much in concert to promote
their
common interests. And from the energy they were expending on helping to spread the overpopulation scare and denounce as irresponsible a program that could be invaluable to future generations by informing them on the right preparations for arrival at Hera, he suspected that their design was to delay or disrupt the
Envoy
program – possibly with a view to gaining control of its resources for their own advantage.
The possibility that he feared most was some kind of physical sabotage. But proving something like that was another matter. If Lubanov could have had his way, he would send in a force from
Aurora
’s Police Arm, put the whole of Etanne under martial lockdown until
Envoy
was launched, and put an end right there to all the guessing and the risk. But Ormont was adamant that such heavy-handedness would not be in keeping with the principles that
Aurora
had been conceived to uphold. In any case, it wasn’t Ormont’s style.
Accordingly, some time previously, Lubanov had persuaded the engineering managers and supervisors involved with
Envoy
to introduce a system of security precautions – the first time such a thing had been known since
Aurora
’s departure. These required tighter restrictions on the personnel authorized to work outside on
Envoy
or as remote telebot controllers, and permanent logs of all telebot operations. In addition, he had quietly instituted a series of background checks on new applicants for work on the construction and modification program.
Beyond that, he could do little without a better idea of what was afoot. He had tried infiltrating two plants of his own among the Dollarians without Ormont’s knowledge – one didn’t involve a superior in matters that would compromise him if they went sour; being prepared to take the bullet was what Lubanov understood by loyalty. Both the plants had been uncovered, the second meeting with a nasty accident shortly after being evicted from Etanne. Whether it had been just that or a message, Lubanov didn’t know, but his suspicions inclined toward the latter. Either way, his enthusiasm for attempting a repeat had been dampened.
Then he learned that fortuity had provided another set of eyes and ears – not to mention various other types of senses that could all prove useful – in the form of Tek, undergoing preparation on Plantation to be sent to exactly where Lubanov wanted them. And if Tek got into some kind of trouble, it wouldn’t be at the risk of any human cost that Lubanov might lose sleep over. He had just needed some way to communicate with it first, convince it that the Dollarians were selling a line, and recruit it to a better cause. But Tek disappeared abruptly before anything could be organized. Either because Pixie or another of Lubanov’s people on Plantation had been spotted, or as a general precaution, the ruse was set up on Sarc, and Lubanov had fallen for it.
But now it appeared that maybe the chance Lubanov had tried to seize might not have been lost after all. Before Tek vanished, Pixie had revealed her involvement to Korshak and explained the reasons for Lubanov’s interest – to the extent that she was aware of them herself, anyway – to prevent him from unwittingly derailing Lubanov’s plans. Now, Korshak had volunteered to help, and concocted an outlandish scheme to follow it. He would pose as an aspiring Dollarian who had exiled himself on Plantation for a period as a means of self-preparation, and in that role introduce himself to another Dollarian inductee that he had identified there. His plan was in this way to meet whoever the inductee’s contact on Plantation was, and thence obtain an interview for himself at the Dollarian Academy on Etanne, which hopefully would result in his admission. Korshak’s appearance would have to be altered to some extent, of course, but his stage experience would enable him to take care of that. Korshak knew Tek from his work with Masumichi. If he did manage to get himself accepted into the Academy, and if he could find Tek and talk to it, there could be a chance of saving what had seemed to be a lost cause.
Lubanov didn’t put the odds of success at anywhere near what he would normally bet on. But had he believed in any of the old-world gods, he’d have to accept now, he concluded, that they were telling him something. This wasn’t the kind of situation that people like him let go to waste.
“Voice on,” he instructed. “Connect to Hala Vogol.” A window opened on the screen he was using, showing the face of the assistant who was coordinating with Lois.
“Yes, chief?”
“I’ve just read the latest from Pixie. We go with it, no question. But the next part depends on how Magician gets along with this Dollarian newbie that he’s found out about. Now that he’ll be visible, we can’t have him going down to the subsurface anymore. How are you planning on keeping tabs on where he goes from here?”
“He is aware of that, and has arranged to stay with his friends at Jesson,” Vogol replied. “Pixie is an old acquaintance of theirs who’d be expected to visit, so she’ll have no trouble staying in contact.”
Lubanov nodded. “That’s good. Look, if Magician does manage to get himself into the Academy, we’ll need a way of communicating with him. If they take him on board there, it will be as a novice. The novices aren’t permitted to carry regular phones.” Lubanov knew that from the reports of the people he’d tried to insert there. “Can you send some equipment to Plantation for Pixie to pass on to him? Make sure that Pixie can brief him on how to use it.” Various devices existed that enabled surreptitious communications. Lubanov would leave it to Vogol to pick something suitable. “Also, it’s important that we know of anything that occurs there or that he comes across relating to
Envoy
. The same goes for the robot, if the Magician can recruit him. Make sure that Pixie alerts him to be looking out for the word.”
“I’ll take care of it,” Vogol promised.
The bear paused in its rummaging beneath a felled log and watched as Rikku moved closer. Rikku moved carefully through the undergrowth, following the line of the fence, which in places was barely visible. Deer, pigs, a few bison, apes, and other kinds of animals that could mix together shared this section of the reserve, but with the restricted space they tended to become intensely territorial. The rule was to keep them well fed, which allayed aggressive instincts. All the same, Rikku kept a firm hold on the stunstick that he carried, and drew reassurance from the solid feel of the firearm holstered at his hip as a backup. The carnivores that couldn’t coexist had to be segregated, which was why it was important to be sure the fences were kept in good repair.
He stopped to clear aside a growth of vines and creeper, and tested one of the support posts. It yielded enough to reveal loosened flanges where the horizontal struts joined. Rikku grunted and moved on to try the next one. “The section here needs looking at,” he called to Yonen, who was following several yards behind. People always worked in twos, minimum, on these duties. “Looks like it’ll need half a dozen brackets with fastenings.”
“Got it.” Yonen made a note in his pad. “That brown fella up there seems to be taking an interest in you.”
“I’m keeping my eye on it.”
Yonen was about the same age as Rikku, which meant they would both have been boys when the
Aurora
left Earth. But unlike Rikku, Yonen was here just as a break from his normal existence on Siden, where he was training in some kind of engineering.
The original plan had been to carry a broad representation of Earth’s animal and vegetable life-forms almost entirely in the form of frozen fertilized ova, seeds, and clonable DNA. However, when Plantation was conceived, the restriction was relaxed to allow some selected types to be raised and to reproduce for a period, the idea being to maintain a limited but rotating population that would provide a changing variety through the years and generations of the voyage ahead.
Rikku was glad that the decision had gone the way it had. The mystery of how organisms came to be alive had long fascinated him, and it was a source of profound cognitive stimulation for him, as well as a psychic satisfaction in itself, to work among living things. In some ways, he would be sorry to have to leave it all when the time came, which would not be long now, for him to move to Etanne.
He was familiar with the studies that Sofian astronomers had made of Earth’s Solar System, and had seen the images returned by probes during the years of early space exploration that had preceded
Aurora
. All in all, lifeless bodies were pretty dull and repetitive places of dust, rock, ice, and sometimes a few gases, where nothing very interesting happened. An alien arriving on Earth, whose only prior knowledge had been of such examples, would immediately be struck by the presence of two classes of objects that absolutely didn’t fit in or belong. First, there would be all the artifacts created by humans, such as clothes, buildings, vehicles, and tools, which natural forces left to themselves could never produce. And second, the even more astonishing complexity and abnormality of living things, which in addition to exhibiting forms that violated all the rules of chance, were able to extract whatever materials they needed directly from their raw environment, and reproduce themselves by purely self-contained processes without external assistance. If it took all the ingenuity and resourcefulness of human minds to conceive and create the former, then what kind of incomparably more powerful mind had been necessary to bring about the latter?
The sages of the old world had understood such things, and their wisdom was being resurrected again on Etanne. Most powerful of all had been the sect that had inspired the Dollarians, which had become universal in commanding a worldwide following. It was singularly apt that Rikku should be destined to join them now, because the principle that the Dollarian creed embodied had been that of survival and growth in the face of competition, thereby epitomizing the processes that shaped and guided living things. Hence, mastering the mysteries and disciplines of the Dollarians would provide the necessary grounding and insights for eventually comprehending the forces that drove life itself.
A bell sounded from the direction of the warden’s station. One… two… three peals. It was a signal that Rikku and Yonen were wanted back there. They looked at each other questioningly. “What have we done now?” Yonen said.
Rikku raised his shoulders in a sustained shrug. “Nothing that I can think of. Did you finish with that pump that Jor-Ling said he wanted to use?”
“All back together and working.”
“Well, there’s only one way to find out, I suppose.”
They turned, and keeping a distance of a few yards between them, began retracing their path in the direction they had come. As any conscientious scholar would, Rikku had tried to arouse Yonen’s awareness to the wondrousness of it all, too. But Yonen didn’t think there was anything especially remarkable about life, and that it could arise of itself, spontaneously from nonliving matter. Rikku decided that familiarity from childhood could dull a person’s sensibilities and render them blind to the obvious.
Behind them, the bear looked away and returned to its rummaging.
“Yonen, I need help loading feed bags to haul out to the Little Gully,” Jor-Lin said when they returned.
“Sure thing.”
“And Rikku, you have a visitor. He’s waiting in the clinic.”
“Oh? Who?”
“I didn’t ask. He says that Melvig Bahoba sent him here. I think he’s interested in that outfit that you’re waiting to hear from.”
Jor-Ling and Yonen disappeared around the corner of the station’s lab annex, and Rikku went the other way to the veterinary wing. Gallier, the resident animal clinician who ran the wing, was away attending to something on the far side of Ringvale that day, which meant that Rikku and the visitor would have it to themselves. Doubtless, that was why Jor-Ling had put the visitor there.
The visitor got up from the stool by the dispensary counter as Rikku entered. Around forty, at a guess, he was a little older than Rikku had expected for some reason, of medium height, clean-shaven with a head showing a shadow of dark stubble, and dressed in a rough cloak over a plain rustic tunic. There was a light suppleness in his movement, and his eyes were dark and alert, giving Rikku the feeling of having taken in all there was to know of him from the outside even in those few seconds.