Executor Reed Ellis stood in the back of the room, not afforded a seat. He
was of too low a station to be officially part of the discussion. That was
not going to stop him from participating, however, whether they liked it or
not. He was rolling his eyes as they put forth all of these pointless
suggestions for how they could help. They could drop down food and other
supplies. They could spearhead cleaning up the orbital debris. All of that
was well and good, and they should absolutely do that, but their neighbor’s
planet was dying. They didn’t need help on the ground, they needed help
getting off of it. The rocket equation was tyrannical. It would be
prohibitively expensive to send them rockets, and then attempt to launch the
refugees over and over again until they were all up. There was a reason
people didn’t really do that anymore. There was a reason Earthans invented
space elevators, and why they had become the most common launch method in
the stellar neighborhood.
He couldn’t take it anymore. “Enough!”
“Executor Ellis!” The Mediator spat his name out like it was a bad taste in
his mouth. “You will wait to be called upon. We recognize that you have been
in close contact with the Proxima Domanians, but we all have the data. We
all know what they need.”
“Do you?” Reed questioned. He stepped forwards. A security officer took a
step too in reaction. “Really, son? Don’t forget your rank.” He kept walking
forwards, aware that the officer was still tensed up, and would not hesitate
to take him down to protect the diplomats. “We have to get our friends off
that world, and we have to go now, because it is going to take weeks just to
get there.”
The Mediator stood now. “It is not a viable option. The equator is fully
liquefacted now, and no space elevator is designed to operate at a pole.”
Reed shook his head. “Just because it wasn’t designed to work that way,
doesn’t mean it can’t do it. The Tangent can handle it. We’re gonna have to
keep the fusion torch array affixed to it just to traverse the distance
anyway. If you feed them isotopes, the platform will maintain station. It
won’t have to do it forever. My people have been running the numbers. With
the proper coordination, we can evacuate one pole in only—”
“Executor Ellis!” The Mediator shouted again. “We have read your proposal.
The decision has been made. The Tangent will remain where it is, the
christening will commence tomorrow, on schedule, and we will provide aid to
the Domanians in the best way that we are capable. You were invited to this
forum as a courtesy, but you do not have the right to be here. One more
outburst from you, and you’re gone.”
Reed stared at him as he stared back. He would actually prefer to leave.
This was the committee’s final chance to do the right thing, and it was
clear that they were not going to. He would have to take matters into his
own hands, so being in this room had become a distraction now. He might as
well go big. “You son of a bitch, you can’t just abandon these people!” He
lunged—and not even that far—but still, the security officer straight up
shot him in the head. What an asshole. Talk about overkill.
Reed woke up in his backup substrate feeling inconvenienced and annoyed, but
otherwise all right. His best friend and assistant, Shasta Clifford was
there, looking impatient and panicked. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“They put a hold on your respawn,” she began to explain. “They thought you
might do something during the ceremony, so they sentenced you to one week
deferred reinstantiation.”
Reed flew out of his pod. “It is illegal to make such a sentence in
absentia.”
“They’ve gone crazy,” Shasta decided.
“So we’ve missed our window,” he assumed.
She shook her head. “No. I figured, if we were going to stage a mutiny,
breaking someone out of blackout hock would be the least illegal thing we
did. The ceremony is starting soon, if it hasn’t already.”
He shook his head now. “There’s no time. I need to talk to our people. We
need to make plans.”
“Everyone is already in place,” she assured him. “They know the plan. We’ve
been talking, and we all understand what’s at stake, and what you need from
us. We’re ready to go, Executor. We just need to get you on that bridge.”
“There’s no time to make it. I can’t get up to the Tangent with enough time
to execute the plan. I would have to be on the maiden lift, and
there’s no way security is letting me through if I’m meant to be in the
buffer.”
Shasta smirked. “You think you’re on Bungula right now?” She opened the
door. On the other side of the hallway was a viewport showing outer space.
“We’re not even that far from our destination, in super-synchronous orbit
with the Tangent. A shuttle is waiting for you to make the intercept.”
If they were in super-synchronous orbit with the Tangent, it meant that
Shasta had activated the terminal in a scrapper, which was made to wander
around in a graveyard orbit, reclaiming plausibly reusable components from
dead satellites. He only put an extra body up here in case he ever needed to
bug out from Bungula, or even Rigil Kentaurus entirely. “This is, like, my
eleventh back-up terminal.”
“And the one that made the most sense, given our constraints,” Shasta said.
“Still, we gotta get going.”
“Okay.” He started to bounce on the balls of his feet. “I just need to do my
acclimation exercises.” He stretched, and cracked his knuckles and neck. It
was proving to be a little difficult, so he checked the mirror. He massaged
his chin and cheeks. “There was something wrong with the stasis field. This
body is agèd.”
She was waiting for him impatiently. “It makes you look distinguished and
regal, and maybe anyone who knows you’re not supposed to be there won’t
recognize you. Now let’s go!”
They walked briskly down the corridor. Reed occasionally tipped over, and
had to catch himself on the wall, but he didn’t stop. There was no one else
here because material salvage was a fully automated task. At the end of
their journey, they did meet a bearded man, who reached out. “Hello, I’m
Trilby, and I’ll be your pilot today.”
Reed looked uncomfortably at Shasta.
“Oh, don’t you worry, sir,” Trilby went on. “I have no allegiances, and I am
no friend to the Bungulan government. I don’t care what you’re doing, and
will never have any reason to rat you out. I just push the autopilot button
and keep my head down.”
“We’re only trusting him to get us there,” Shasta explained to Reed.
Trilby picked up on Reed’s sustained trepidation. “Look, if you wanna dock
with the planet’s newest space elevator platform without being captured on
the sensors, you’re gonna need me. I know how to spoof our signature so we
just look like a hull maintenance drone coming in for a charge.” He stepped
to the side so they could see into the shuttle. “That’s why this thing is so
small. It only fits two, so I hope there’s no sexual tension between you
two, because it’s gonna be a tight squeeze.”
There wasn’t, which was actually what made it so awkward. Reed saw Shasta
like a daughter, and she saw him as a father figure. It was weird to have
her sitting on his lap, but it only took an hour, so they survived it.
“Where are you going to go now?” Reed asked Trilby once they were in the
maintenance bay, and out of the shuttle.
“I actually do need to charge up to make it to my next run, so I’m gonna sip
some power from this very spot.”
Reed was still nervous to trust someone who wasn’t already a part of the
plan, but this guy needed to understand why he couldn’t hang around too
long. “You need to go now. This station isn’t staying where it is.
That’s...sort of the point.”
Trilby winked, clicked his tongue, and pointed finger guns at Reed. “Gotcha.
I’ll be gone before you know it. Oh, one more thing,” he added as he was
reaching to the other side of his seat. “I was told to hand you this.”
It was a standard operational uniform, except there was something different
about it. The signifiers were all wrong. “No, this isn’t mine. I’m only an
Exec—”
“That’s what my ground contact gave me.” He pushed the button to make the
hatch close. “Have fun with your insurrection, or whatever...Captain!” the
hatch closed.
“Was this your idea?” Reed asked Shasta.
“No,” she replied, “but I agree with it. The Tangent must be led by a captain.”
“You can’t just declare a promotion, Shasta.”
“Frock that, of course you can. There’s historical precedent. It’s called a
brevet.”
He was shaking his head, very uncomfortable with this.
“I was wrong, what I said before,” Shasta began. “Breaking you out of
blackout hock isn’t the least illegal thing we’re doing today. This uniform
violation is. So put it on, get to your station, and let’s do this thing!
For Proxima Doma!”
He sighed, and echoed, “for Proxima Doma.” They had only been planning this
takeover for about a week, but that phrase had sort of become their group
chant. And that was really what this was all about. They had an obligation
to rescue their neighbors, and if that meant masquerading as someone with a
higher rank, then that was what it took. He was going to be court martialed
either way. What was one more charge? He dressed himself in his new uniform,
and they headed out.
They didn’t go straight to the bridge. They had to make one stop first. This
was the main armory of the platform, but it was not busy at all. War was a
thing of the past. They maintained a military and ranking system for
efficient organization and coordination. They kept it for the structure. But
people did not walk around with guns anymore. The integrated multipurpose
suits that most people wore regularly were not designed with weapons. In
fact if you wanted to carry one, it had to include a special utility adapter
since the IMS didn’t even come with holsters. Captains often didn’t wear IMS
units. It wasn’t required not to, but many wanted to give the impression of
fearlessness and steadfastness. They would go down with the ship, if it came
to that. Though, to be fair, their minds were probably streaming to a safe
back-up anyway, so it didn’t matter. The advantage it gave Reed today was
that it was easier to conceal a weapon within the loose fabric of
traditional clothing.
The weapons officer was on their side, and unlike Trilby, Reed could
personally vouch for her. She removed the gun from its holster, and
presented it to him. She wasn’t being patronizing. He hadn’t ever seen this
model before, and while he passed the requisite marksmanship tests just
fine, he wasn’t very experienced in firearms. “This is an autophasing maser
gun. You can toggle it between stun and kill, but that is not recommended,
and if you do that, it will be logged. Even if you don’t actually fire the
weapon, simply switching on manual mode will send a report to the relevant
ranking officials, which I guess is you now.” She eyed his new signifiers.
Reed looked down at himself. “These are just temporary.”
“Right.” She went on, “when autophasing is active, it will assess a target,
and determine their substrate status. If the individual has a quantum
consciousness backup stream, it will gladly just kill them.”
“I experienced that yesterday,” Reed said.
“Yes, we remember. To be blunt, sir, that was foolish. It made our
infiltration much harder.”
“Aletha, know your place,” Shasta scolded.
“No, it’s fine, I want honesty,” Reed contended. He turned back to Aletha.
“I regret it. I was just trying to get out of that room, and dying felt like
the fastest way.”
Aletha nodded. “If the individual is not streaming, it will automatically
switch the setting to stun mode. That’s why manual mode is not recommended,
because you don’t know whether the person you’re targeting will come back or
not. Now, they are developing eyewear that will show you the
substrate data, so you can make an informed decision on the fly, but they
are having syncing issues since it is very possible to point the gun at one
target, and be looking at another.”
“Okay,” Reed said. “Just so I can be completely careful, does it have a
decoherence setting?” Decoherence weapons were mostly illegal mostly
everywhere. If your consciousness was streaming to a back-up, or multiple
back-ups, decoherence would be able to disrupt those signals, and prevent
reinstantiation, possibly even permanently. In a civilization with
ubiquitous and fairly easy mind uploading, this was a way to bring back the
true death. A sophisticated enough decoherence transmitter could destroy all
signals and all back-ups.
Aletha stared at him blankly. “This doesn’t have that feature. I do have
access to weapons that do. It would require executive clearance, but I could
probably subvert that.”
“No. I’m asking because I don’t want it, not because I do,” he clarified. “I
wouldn’t want to do it accidentally.”
“That’s not a concern,” Aletha promised. She reholstered the gun, and handed
it to him. She handed another to Shasta. “The rest of our people are armed
with their own already. When you leave, I will be locking this room down so
no one else can arm up.” She gestured to the lockers behind her. “So if you
see anything else you like, you’ll need to check it out now.”
Reed scanned the lockers for anything that might be of use to their cause,
and would not be unethical to employ. “I think we’re set. Thank you for
this, Aletha. It will not make your life easier.”
“For Proxima Doma,” Aletha declared.
“For Proxima Doma,” he echoed again.
“I’m going to use the range in the back for target practice,” Shasta told
him as he was leaving. “I shouldn’t join you on the bridge anyway. I would
just make you more recognizable.”
“Very well, Shasta. I’ll see you on the other side.” He left.
When Reed stepped onto the bridge, he found himself in good company. While
the Tangent did have its own captain, a lot of people here were captains
themselves, visiting from their respective vessels, here to celebrate the
accomplishment. He blended right in, and no one was paying much attention to
who he was, or whether he belonged there. The Head Architect of the platform
was on a little circular stage that likely wasn’t usually there, though Reed
didn’t know much about it. The Tangent was of a unique design, so the
general shape of the bridge was already different than what he was used to.
The architect was going through their spiel, talking about how this was a
passion project of theirs, and how proud they were to see it finally come to
fruition. The hologram next to them was showing the interior feed of the
elevator pod, where all of the diplomats and dignitaries were sitting for
the first trip. Some were gazing out the window. Others were chatting with
each other inaudibly. A few seemed to be busy conducting business.
The trip was going to take a while. They were traveling at express speeds,
but still needed to cross tens of thousands of kilometers, so it was never
going to be instantaneous. Reed consulted his watch. They were waiting to
begin the takeover until after the pod passed out of the planet’s
atmosphere. If all went according to plan, they would sever the tethers just
under the pod, and let them drift down to the surface. The pod, meanwhile,
would be stuck with the Tangent, and when they commandeered the platform,
all of those very important people could serve as hostages. It wasn’t going
to be pretty or nice, but he wasn’t going to hurt anyone; not permanently,
anyway. He just needed the authorities to think that he would, so they
wouldn’t blow them out of the sky.
“Boss,” came the whispering voice of one of his compatriots through
his earpiece. “Clear your throat if you can hear me, but you are in mixed company.”
Reed cleared his throat.
“There is a problem in engineering. I’m hiding behind a coolant tank, but
the others have been caught. I’m blocking all outgoing transmissions
except for mine, but they are about to send someone out of range, and call
for help. What do we do?” This was too early. They weren’t ready yet. That elevator pod absolutely
had to come with them. There were some rather important people here already,
but the ceremonial travelers were vital to counteract the fact that they
were slower than everyone else. If a Teaguardian got in the fight, without
leverage, it would be over in seconds.
Reed quietly separated himself, and found a humming auxiliary power
monitoring station to sort of dampen his voice. “Lift control, are you in
position?” He heard a long beep, a short beep, another long beep, and
another short beep. That meant yes. “Okay,” Reed replied. “Your job
has become more important than ever. Take control. Take it now. Don’t let
that pod stop or reverse. We have to move up the timetable, so—”
“Hey!” someone shouted on the bridge. “Hey, he’s not supposed to be here!
Yeah, you, Ellis! You’re not a captain!”
“Everyone execute your directives!” Reed ordered hurriedly. “Go now! Go!
Take the platform!”
The fight began.
