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Tyler Night
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SaaA collaboration with @Jeddaven
Easifa System – Clockwise Spiral edge of the Yahsud Alnaar’s territory
Lovecraft Fangjaw was having a field day, top to bottom. For two days he and his team had camped in the wilds surrounding one of the arctic databases of the Yahsud Alnaar, a barren wasteland of machinery and ice, and had managed to not only destroy and recover one of its drones without alerting the network, but…
Direct access, he thought with a smile, take that, academic asscracks.
A treasure that hadn’t been seen in at least twenty years – to access raw source code for the Yahsud, extract it, and now safely quarantine it in a black box. They’d had to leave immediately, of course – the extraction team had almost ruined their quantum-decay distraction protocols with lousy timing, and half of them got shot to pieces by the remaining drones, but…
This could be it. The thrill of death was etched into his mind, but more so yet the thrill of victory.
But the memory of Asimov was clearly not done with him, because no sooner had they left the range of the Yahsud Alnaar – unfortunately on the wrong side of it from the fleet, so they’d be stuck spending the next three weeks getting back to them – that they’d detected something almost as exciting.
A new star had appeared in the vacuum of space, and it was in a very, very interesting location. Practically miraculous, if he were a religious man.
“Captain?” asked the still shaking intern at the controls to his left, “Should, uh… should we head for the fleet?”
He smiled.
“Oh no, kid. We’ve got something else to see first. How does two for two on world-shattering discoveries sound to you?”
“Te-terrifying, sir.”
“Great! Set a course.”
Easifan System Gateway
Light. Colour. All at once, a violent swirl of energy tore its way into the Easifan system, with a suddenness that perhaps even the original builders of the gateways couldn’t have imagined. Too look upon it was to be bombarded with a violent kaleidoscope of sensory input, light potent enough to blind, images of worlds unknown and swarms of artificial constructions visible through the murky soup of the portal.
Then, just as suddenly, peace.
The portal snapped shut just as suddenly as it had opened, warbling and wobbling like a blob of non-newtonian fluid struck particularly hard before vanishing entirely.
A new set of eyes looked upon Easifa; a bristling suite of artisanal sensors and cameras packed into a space the size of a small asteroid, its smoothly curved hull glinting in the distant light of the stars.
It was one small part of a greater whole, constructed with a particular purpose in mind, which it proudly announced to the system through every communication channel it could manage, both faster-than-light and based on every radio frequency it could spit out, in every arrangement of human language it could manage.
“Hello, there!” It chirped, friendly, androgynous, and welcoming; perhaps even informal. “Today, my name is Copernicus. I come bringing greetings and aid from the people of the Anarchist Federation of Europe, should you wish to receive them.”
Gaia’s Patience – Outer Planetary Temple-Garden of the Children of Gaia
“Out of the way, out of the way!”
Matriarch Fir Carolina was having a day both bad and blessed. First the hydroponics at garden twelve had been faltering and she’d needed to shout at a young sister-neophyte for playing near delicate systems (never a good look, and not something she enjoyed either)... but then someone had been kind enough to give her flowers for her birthday, and honestly that had really lifted her mood.
Then she’d had to taste-test the soup being made for the High Matriarch’s communal meal and the peppers had been absolutely rank, like someone had insulted her mother while defecating in front of her.
But now, as seemed to be forming a pattern for the day, the namesake of Gaia’s Patience was finally coming true. A blessing to paint over every fault – every diary and record for today would clearly scream “Today the Gate was opened! Lost Gaia awaits!”
As she made her way through corridor after corridor, either politely nodding, greeting and waiting as older matriarchs passed her by, or hurriedly waving on or crying out for younger women and men to move out of the way as she made her way to the second floor governing chambers.
As with all of the corridors and rooms she’d had to make her way through, it was dense with foliage from countless species – while ‘hydroponics’ was a term usually used to refer to the specific gardens used to supply food, the creeds of the children had demanded that Gaia’s Patience should be dedicated to the species of their lost, ancient homeworld.
Mothers only knew how many years of asteroid mining, chemical refinement, and careful biomatter recycling had been needed to create enough artificial soil with the right balance to actually sustain so much plant life.
But here, in the governing chambers, it was a different kind of life – people, mainly.
While the creeds forbade most from entering these chambers, matriarchs were freely allowed access – there just normally wasn’t any reason for them all to be there at once. So it was that the beautifully cleared and structured clearing, decorated and arranged in the style of an ancient Roman garden, was absolutely choked with women. A range of ages – from their early thirties in some cases, while many of the High Matriarchs were easily in their 80s at this point – but all of whom having been altered, their bones thin and elongated from centuries of life in low gravity and their scaled skin in shades of pale green from the mixture of reptile and plant-DNA their ancestors had been infused with to greatly minimize the amount of food they had to eat.
The High Matriarchs sat at the center of the throng on ornate, gold-plated chairs interwoven with old plant-matter, before at last shushing the crowd with a single raised hand.
There was bated breath, a message relayed on the comms – evidently translated from an old Earth tongue into the Children’s eclectic creole of German, Swedish, and Portuguese.
”Hello! Today, my name is Copernicus. I come bringing greetings and aid from the people of the Anarchist Federation of Europe, should you wish to receive them.”
The crowd was stunned.
Europe?! was silent, but the thought was universal. They knew people named Europe, that was an Old Earth location! What could it mean? Had humans actually survived after all? Perhaps their other half, those of the Children who had refused to leave Earth?
The High Matriarch in the lead, a stone-faced woman of 70 whose graying hair had been artificially maintained into a tight gray bob that framed her face and emphasized the eagle-like gaze she would hold on those who disappointed her, waved a hand at the murmuring crowd.
“Matriarchs! Sisters! Do not allow this blessed day to be undignified! Please, hold your tongues – we are about to open communications with these strangers! Instead, may your prayers help them to be friendly to us and with open hearts!”
Ahem, she thought as nervous murmuring gave way to silence, that’s better.
“Open the communications!” she cried, and slowly the soft noise of static filled the room.
“Friend Copernicus, my name is High Matriarch Thorn Versailles, speaking on behalf of the Children of Gaia. Long have we waited for the reopening of the Gate and the return to our ancestral home – tell us, are you truly from Europe?”
“Originally.” Copernicus replied, thousands of calculations running across the surface of its electronic brain as it picked apart and analyzed the voice it heard in reply. Storage banks quickly recalled a handful of snippets of information; most primarily, the records it possessed of the Children of Gaia, a pitiable if not nobly-oriented pre-apocalypse cult. This, then, presented a few immediate options, and a loosely-structured approach for the future of its conversation.
“Regrettably, I was forced to resettle away from Earth, along with the rest of my comrades.” They continued. “We’re in the process of preparing to re-establish contact with Earth, however -- it’s necessary to ensure we don’t disrupt the present biosphere, of course; I’m sure you understand.”
In the governing chamber, there was silence. Disappointment, certainly, and no end of questions.
But so publicly is not the place for them, Thorn thought, nor within our home.
She looked to the other two High Matriarchs, and whispered between themselves. After a minute or two, she spoke up again.
“Thank you for sharing this information with us, friend Copernicus. If we might, we would like to meet in person and discuss more, but…” she grimaced, “we cannot allow outsiders to enter the temple-garden except in the most dire situations, in case of disease. Many generations have worked very hard to nurture what we can of a living biosphere within this planetoid. Can we send a ship with representatives to meet you in a clean, neutral environment?”
“Of course!” They replied, inwardly pleased at the care the Gaians were showing for the biosphere they’d constructed. “Although, I will say, I am not a biological being. I am an artificial intelligence, and I can assure you, the vessel I am speaking to you through has been thoroughly sanitized by a bath of ionized radiation. Nonetheless...” It said, pausing,
“We maintain similar quarantine procedures in our dwelling places, and would be more than happy to accommodate your own. It would only be fair, after all.”
The AIs words lingered, and there was a long, long pause. To Copernicus, it might have felt like a lifetime of silence considering how quick the earlier response had been.
Carolina had had to step out of the chambers, catching her breath – the moment the voice had stopped speaking and the comms had been cut, the room had erupted into argument. She’d left through one of the little side doors – an emergency exit – and was now resting against a wall, her face held in her hands.
Artificial intelligence?! her mind screamed, Have other colonies been lost as well?!
The last thing she’d heard before it was lost in the arguing was High Matriarch Thorn’s desperate, failed demands for them all to calm down… but how could they?
Mother, she thought, I need a strawberry.
She found a whole bush of them about ten or so minutes later, of course, on the fifth floor – now primarily containing a mixture of plant and fungal species from across the old European continent. As she sat with her legs crossed in the dirt and tried to enjoy the taste of it despite the bitter irony given the communications that had just gone on, with the weight of it in her mouth, Carolina had to admit this was following the pattern. Of course the Gate would finally reopen only for an AI to appear from it – there couldn’t have been a nastier joke if she’d tried to come up with one.
The sound of strawberry branches being pushed aside distracted her from her melancholy. A young man, probably no more than twenty-three and with gentle gray eyes, held out a nervous hand. She couldn’t help but sneer a little at her nightmarish contemplations being interrupted by a younger man of all people.
“Matriarch-Sister Fir Carolina? Y-you, um, sorry. I have been asked to summon you, please. The High Matriarch said you would be eating strawberries.”
Carolina sat there, mouth half open and strawberry half-chewed, and couldn’t help but slowly grimace. The initial annoyance gave way to worries that she struggled to keep tightly sealed beneath her face; Am I famous for strawberries? crossed her mind, followed by The Matriarchs want me. Right now? That’s bad, probably.
Nevertheless, dignity was always called for – what being a matriarch called for. Tilting her nose ever so slightly upwards, she took the young man’s hand to stand up, quickly wiped the tiniest remains of strawberry juice on her long, dull-grey tunic, and nodded for him to lead the way.
As the network of corridors, gardens and resting chambers gave way to the more sterilized, mechanical environments at the base of the great temple-station that served as the core of its infrastructure, Carolina was already starting to sweat. Not just because of the build up of temperature from so much machinery and the engines, of course, but also because this served as the entryways to the vast array of launch bays for Gaia’s Patience. People milled about from place to place – for the most part men, their domain within the Children of Gaia largely relegated to the use and maintenance of machinery that didn’t directly sustain or modify living things; transportation, weapons, electronics and communications.
Carolina shuddered a little, despite the warmth; it was so… sharp. A massive, triangular room of bronze-like metals and dark gray stone, with craggy domes of metal and rock rising periodically from the ground like giant, ugly boulders; some taller and thinner, others wider. Of course, in truth they were long-range shuttles, whether for attack or simple transportation – vacuum sealed against the underside of Gaia’s Patience, their crew only being able to enter or exit when the seal was complete.
Water… she thought, and air.
The two most precious resources in the whole system.
“Matriarch-Sister, there they are,” spoke up the young man, gesturing to a small group gathered by one of the taller, thinner shuttle ends. It was a single High Matriarch – a short woman of about sixty who looked so fragile she couldn’t actually be standing in the heavy, many-layered robe she wore – providing instructions to a crew of young men. As soon as she saw Carolina approaching, the tiny spectacles on her face practically bounced around with excitement.
“Ah, good, excellent,” said the faintly owl-like woman, “you’re here, Carolina, correct?”
“Um… yes, High Matriarch. Fir Carolina.”
“Good, good…!” hooted the elderly pomeranian, “I have a task for you, you know. High Matriarch Thorn Versailles has asked me to give you a little assignment.”
“Oh.”
“Yes, see, some of us were certain we should just blow up the heathen machine, but, well… some of us think if it wants to talk to us it might be different. For the safety of Gaia’s Patience, however, we have decided the communication should all be handled by a trustworthy matriarch…”
“Oh.”
“...from a shuttle, yes. And we thought, aha, we know the person! So chop chop!” she clapped her hands together a little bit like a seal, “These lovely boys will get you there safe, dear. Confident of that, yes yes.”
As Carolina looked around the small crew of men, nervously smiling and nodding in response to the High Matriarch’s complements… she realized that they couldn’t have been much more than boys of maybe eighteen or nineteen, probably brother-acolytes on paper but still brother-neophytes in practice.
She thought about protesting the decision, of course. She could try and argue it, but… something in her chest refused to let her.
Adrenaline, probably, she thought with a grimace just barely escaping her face.
“Yes, High Matriarch. Of course.”
“Good, good! Get to it then!”
Copernicus watched as a seed-like shuttle – maybe just a hundred or so meters long, a relatively tiny object – emerged from the underside of the planetoid-station and engaged a set of simple ion thrusters to drift closer towards the Gate.
The video of a woman in her late thirties, with slightly rounded features and stray wisps of scalpy blonde hair, was projected through to Copernicus as she started to speak.
“He-hello, ahem,” she said, trying not to seem too nervous on the video but relentlessly sweating all the same, “this is Matriarch Fir Carolina of the Children of Gaia. For reasons we would rather not disclose at this time, the High Matriarchs have asked me to speak on their behalf, away from the Temple-Garden. Do, uh…”
Mothers, hold it together.
“D-do you have, um, human crew aboard your…”
Her brow furrowed, suddenly realizing she wasn’t sure of the proper term. What was it that the Asmovund gear-people called it again?
“...shell? Chassis? Your… body?”
“One of my bodies, but -- no, I do not.” It replied, unsure whether to point out how scared the poor woman seemed or not. Considering her fearful curiosity, it reasoned, it was perhaps best to stick to answering questions for the time being.
“Admittedly, I do wish I did, but... It is safer for them to wait behind the Gateway for the time being. Not to imply that you are a threat, of course; it is merely that I have several bodies, and not all of them do!”
Carolina bit her lower lip, clearly trying to find a way to admit she was struggling to understand what the machine was talking about without seeming like an idiot.
Her mind wracked itself with questions, trying to remember what they knew about AI. There had been records of course, once upon a time – even the knowledge of how to make them, supposedly. But the steel ghosts had, as with all things, eradicated much of their history and knowledge from before the gate was originally opened.
She glanced around the room at her small crew, but most of them seemed as puzzled as she was.
Mothers, I… she narrowed her eyes, I’ve been entrusted with handling this.
“We… we are a threat!” she said, looking into the camera and baring her teeth – an ancient, primal symbol of danger – “and you had best listen to us, machine. We must speak to your creators!”
She raised a single bony finger, doing her best to look intimidating and utterly failing.
“I will warn you – Gaia’s Patience has many weapons and we have fought off outsiders on,” she paused, “many occasions.”
She held her expression, her teeth still bared at the camera, but couldn’t help but wince briefly when one of the pilots tapped a readout for her to see: whatever this machine-mind was, it wasn’t armed.
“If you want to speak to my government, that can be arranged... But it cannot happen in person, unless you are willing to make the journey to our home. It would take... A substantial amount of time to transport so many thousands of people such a distance.” Copernicus replied, mimicking a sigh. There was trauma here -- they’d encountered artificial intelligences before, and it did not go well. “We will do what we can to accommodate you.”
Carolina’s expression immediately broke. No longer bared teeth and an attempt at threat, her eyes went wide with confusion. From what was visible of the other crewmates, they likewise seemed to be in disbelief.
“Th… thousands? How… how many people are in your, uh,” she shook her head, “Anarchist, uh, Fed-... in Europe? That they need so many people to represent them?”
“Oh, approximately... One-point-one-one-zero billion. We strongly believe in representing our people as best as we possibly can, however, hence the necessity of a large General Assembly.” They chirped, mood lifted by a question that was, in all truth, much more pleasant than mild racism and threats. “We are Anarchists, after all.”
Carolina almost fell over, given how quickly she stepped backwards.
“Bil-... a billion people?”
She tried to blink away the shock. Gaia’s Patience had… maybe two million people, and that was usually when too many of the Children in other parts of the system decided to make a pilgrimage all at once.
She tried to correct her mind, focus on being logical – of course they probably had a bigger population, if they had succeeded in finding a planet with life. Easifa’Mal could sustain a big population, after all, if it wasn’t for the steel ghosts guarding it.
But still… such a massive population. It seemed impossible. Fantastical. The Earth had suffered because of so many people, after all.
Maybe that’s why they’ve come here? Looking for a new home? she thought, her eyes betraying the paranoia she was feeling.
They were using AI, after all – perhaps whoever had sent Copernicus were the same people who had destroyed the old Earth? Or at least, their descendants. Though that word, ‘anarchist’, it… showed up in folklore, sometimes.
“Please do not take offense to my question, Copernicus, but, anarchists… is that a kind of alien? Named after the stories?”
"No, no!" Copernicus chuckled. "So much information, lost over time... I wonder how much you could teach us that we've forgotten." It mused.
"It's... A political system, or perhaps theory. In simple terms, one which advocates the abolition of unjust hierarchy and the organization of society on a wholly voluntary, mutually cooperative basis, without force or compulsion. Does... Does that make sense?" They asked.
Carolina looked around at the rest of the crew, their expressions puzzled.
“That, um…” she was clearly trying to wrap her tongue around the words, “is very, uh, interesting. It sounds a bit different from our creed, but we are not forced. The Children of Gaia have prospered and survived by working together.”
A thought crossed her mind.
“In fact, we often work closely with the other tribes and peoples of Easifa. In time, we could perhaps introduce them to you, but, well…” she bit her lower lip, “I think that we would need to arrange for representatives to travel to your home, if you cannot send people. AI are… very, um, worrying. Not just to us, but most of the people of this star system.”
Should I tell it that on Easifa’Thani most would shoot without talking at all first? she thought.
"Oh, we can send people, just... Not our entire government, you see. Perhaps a neutral ground would be ideal?"
Carolina looked visibly relieved.
“Oh! Thank you, if that could be arranged, we would love to meet them! That would be fantas-”
The feed was suddenly cut, and the tiny seed-like shuttle suddenly powered down. A device no bigger than a man’s arm, emerging from the vast darkness at a fraction of the speed of light, had lodged into its side with enough force to suddenly throw the shuttle of its lazy flight close to Copernicus.
Copernicus detected the direction it came from – initially almost impossible to see in the void, looking to outsiders like a rogue asteroid but now giving off tell-tale emissions of ions and radio signals from several kilometers away.
Aboard the Migo’s Teeth and with lungs straining against the metal shell of his frame, Lovecraft couldn’t help but laugh.
The admiralty awaited him, and if the extracted blackbox wouldn’t guarantee it, this certainly would.
Immediately, Copernicus's sensors blared in alarm -- the AI the Gaians were so terrified of, perhaps? Regardless, while the shuttle may potentially end up repowering by itself, it had no way of knowing what sort of damage the foreign object inflicted, and without weaponry, there was even less it could do to retaliate. Thus, it had only one notable option.
"Alert. This is Copernicus. Negotiations have been interrupted. Diplomatic shuttle has been struck by a foreign object of unknown origin and appears to have lost engine control. Attempting to intercept." It beamed a transmission back through the gateway, thrusters firing. Being a wholly artificial being, the probe was able to move at speeds that would be outright lethal in any ship carrying organic life, rocketing across the gulf of space toward the wayward shuttle without so much as a second thought. Maneuvering thrusters spat, twirling it around, around, until it was positioned facing perpendicular to the small craft's direction of travel, arresting its own blistering speed with a sharp guttering of photonic rockets, just enough to receive the lion's share of collision damage -- and latch onto the craft with the array of grasping arms attached to its nose.
It had been a long while since Lovecraft had needed to salivate, but the readouts they were getting from the gaian shuttle…
“Tasty,” he said, “End of history stuff right here, kid.”
He wasn’t fluent in gaian creole, admittedly, but he’d learnt enough to follow the conversation in the recording. The code-eater drone was a neat little invention, one of the tools that left the other tribes wary of Asmovund raiders; reverse-engineered from the internal systems of Yahsud Alnaar drones, it could drill into a hull and quickly access computers that were normally cut off from external transmissions, cracking their encryption and transmitting their data to the raider.
In a world where almost all computers were geared not to handle external transmissions, it had proven to be a game-changer. For Lovecraft, it’d be a much appreciated one.
With its job done, it had then emitted a powerful EMP, damaging the shuttle’s internal systems and cutting the power.
They’ll be fine, he thought, they’re not far from home.
The silent ‘but it wouldn’t matter if they didn’t, really’ ever so briefly sprung into his mind behind the surface, but he shook it away. No time for sympathy.
More curious to him yet was the way the massive outsider probe – Copernicus, according to the transmissions – moved with such shocking speed.
[i]True AI, and it’s friendly? And it’s going to help these intolerant greenies?[i]
He hadn’t thought naivety would be a trait of machines, but as sensors started to pick up at least three gaian craft – rounded arrow shapes, like the love children of asteroids and pinecones, their detachable flak-scales derived from alien shielding systems – he snapped his fingers and transmitted an order over short-wave, safely contained within the ship’s walls from outside detection.
In a separate compartment of the ship, the ship’s gunnery officer excitedly licked its eyeballs. A heavily augmented gremlin, its body having long-been stripped down to the barest minimum of organic tissue to make way for cybernetics and mechanical systems. Fully integrated into the ship’s weapon systems, and always eager to shoot something. It wasn’t a true Asmovund, of course – wasn’t human enough – but Lovecraft liked how hard it had committed to trying to be one of them. It was rare to meet someone who spoke exclusively in transmissions.
But as the order came through – ‘prep weapons, situation could go hot’ – its brain eagerly unsheathed the pair of tiny gray railguns from the ship’s roof, glinting in the distant reflection of their home star’s light.
Lovecraft screwed up the still organic top half of his jaw, a metallic ‘click’ ringing out from his tongue rolling against steel teeth. He’d fought the gaians enough to recognize their power signatures, and he knew them well enough to tell when they’d interpreted something incorrectly.
But… would they shoot? The question burned in Lovecraft’s brain, an uncertainty he hated.
This AI, ‘Copernicus’, was clutching onto the blacked out shuttle, but it wasn’t moving to pull it back through the Gate. On the one hand, it wasn’t unheard of for the Yahsud Alnaar’s drones to engage ships at close quarters, but it was exceedingly rare – and surely the gaians would realize if the AI had weapons to disable and destroy the shuttle, it would’ve just done so rather than fly further away from safety to break it up in close quarters?
Maybe a warning was the best option, to give everyone the best chance to stay alive.
“Hope my gaian’s still good,” he grumbled.
With the flick of a switch, he gave his best smile – folks always said you could hear a smile.
“Hark!”
A transmission in crude gaian, easily detectable to all parties as the mysterious vessel had begun to arc away, rapidly increasing its distance from the escalating situation, “I suggest to my dear greenies, don’t pick fights with strangers to our fair system, and strangers… would do well to leave, for now. Come back with...”
The sound of a tongue clicking against metal came through the transmission.
“...fleshier folk. More human, and you’ll find Easifa a much friendlier place.”
“Have you considered shutting the fuck up, asswipe?” Copernicus barked angrily in reply, drawing power away from its engines as it searched the shuttle for any indication of somewhere it could interface with the ship... Or, in the worst case, wirelessly supply power with microwaves. It’d be a little painful for the occupants, but... “If you want a lecture on tolerance, fine, whatever, I can manage, but I’m a little fucking busy trying to restore power, so I’d prefer not to use my excess processing power on lecturing a gormless imbecile.”
There was a pause.
The leaving ship, now easily detectable, had begun to slow slightly – still far enough to leave, if it had to; while the gaian attack craft likewise began to slow, and weaved out of their formation – more perimeter than pursuit.
With bated breath, the gaians watched and waited to see what would happen with the shuttle.
Today truly had been 4 for 3 on bad times and blessings for Carolina. At the back of her mind, she had to assume it would all work out – but at the front of her mind, she had to try as best she could to keep focused on what they could do.
She was shaking, though, and not purely with fear.
We were making progress! I hope those olcomps are happy!
After the initial shock, it was clear in her mind who was responsible. The impact hadn’t come from the direction of Copernicus – and out here, there was only one group who would do something like this.
Nevertheless, the danger they could control – anything they could control – was getting the power back on. While Carolina had helped with unscrewing several panels, the ship’s brother-technician was furiously trying to replace a number of ruined fuses, and the pilot tried to jumpstart the control panel.
In the darkness, illuminated only by emergency lights and quickly fading emergency glow-sticks, there was stillness, and a cold that was slowly but surely creeping up on them. She could feel her hands getting harder and harder to use – the reptile DNA her ancestors had been infused with had helped them transition to a more cold-blooded system for processing food… useful in the constant warmth of an active spaceship abundant with life, but less useful when the power went out and the void began to creep in.
Mothers help us.
Outside, Copernicus was making rapid progress -- it’d managed to locate a small access panel on the outside of the shuttle, difficult to access in the frenzy of such a tense situation, but with its incredible processing power, it was relatively simple to decode and pry open in the span of merely a few moments.
Next, of course, came figuring out what the hell each of the ports did, but the garbled human languages they were labeled with made that, too, relatively simple -- auxiliary power. Much like its label, the port was just off enough to make interfacing difficult, but not impossible... So it unceremoniously mated one of its power cables with the shuttle, and, with the flick of a switch, shunted sensor power into the craft's systems, all while beaming out a radio transmission in hopes the crew would hear it.
"Carolina?" It asked. "Some smarmy asshole fired a projectile at your ship, and then this happened. Still alive in there? I'm trying to feed you enough power for a jumpstart."
A few seconds later, then some more.
Static.
A click, and the whirring of machines.
Lights blinking to life.
“Copernicus, we hear you! This is Carolina, loud and clear!”
A few moments more and another signal went out – directed at the attack ships, though it was close enough that Copernicus could hear it as well.
“Hold fire, hold fire! This is Matriarch Fir Carolina, I repeat, please hold fire! We are unharmed – we were struck by an Asmovund weapon to steal our data, but we are okay! Copernicus helped us get back online!”
Silence, static…
…then another click.
“We read you, Fir Carolina. You heard her; power down weapons! And don’t harm the machine!”
The times to come were still tense and uneasy, of course – the road to peace can be long and treacherous. The messages to the shipmeets of Easifa’Thani took several weeks to be fully broken down and discussed, but upon that world of words and firestorms there was one clear and unbroken truth:
“The gate has reopened, and we are not alone. At a place of Meeting we shall see this new galaxy of possibilities.”
Three weeks later
The Discovery – Asmovund Array-Ship
The sound of metal fingers against a metal hip. Of a fleshly tongue clinging to a jaw of steel. Of ambitions spat upon.
“We cannot promote you,” Admiral Verne had told him, “glory hounds won't see us making the most of this new opportunity.”
The blackbox had been rewarded, of course – with not having him shot for risking a war with unknown parties, and with a chance to make amends.
“You’re wanted on the bridge, sir,” chirped his intern – still no less a squib of a lad but now just a bit too cocky for Lovecraft’s liking – with a nervous smile, “they’re about to enter the Gate.”
“Aye-aye, kid.”
With a grunt he pushed himself out of the chair in his quarters and made his way to the bridge. It had a different feel to it, in person. From holographic projectors and video screens it had felt almost dream-like… but stood here, on the command deck? At the shoulder of the pissant that protocol demanded he respect?
More like a nightmare.
“Receiving clearance, Admiral,” spoke up one of the bridge crew, “we will be joining the Yaeph’la, Arjuani, Gaian, Veiled, and Cloudkin delegations on the other side.”
“Excellent news,” said Admiral Verne, all prim and proper in her neatly folded and high-necked gray and blue uniform that almost hid the cybernetic voice-box that had replaced her throat when she was a child, “take us through.”
She glanced over her shoulder at Lovecraft’s arrival, a cat-like smile slowly spreading.
“I’ve assured the gaian delegation of your apology in person when we arrive. I’m sure this Copernicus would appreciate one as well, should it be present.”
Lovecraft sighed, but stood to attention and nodded all the same.
When can I go back to getting shot at? he wondered.
Six Months after the Formal Surrender…
Easifa System – Clockwise Spiral edge of the Yahsud Alnaar’s territory
Lovecraft Fangjaw was having a field day, top to bottom. For two days he and his team had camped in the wilds surrounding one of the arctic databases of the Yahsud Alnaar, a barren wasteland of machinery and ice, and had managed to not only destroy and recover one of its drones without alerting the network, but…
Direct access, he thought with a smile, take that, academic asscracks.
A treasure that hadn’t been seen in at least twenty years – to access raw source code for the Yahsud, extract it, and now safely quarantine it in a black box. They’d had to leave immediately, of course – the extraction team had almost ruined their quantum-decay distraction protocols with lousy timing, and half of them got shot to pieces by the remaining drones, but…
This could be it. The thrill of death was etched into his mind, but more so yet the thrill of victory.
But the memory of Asimov was clearly not done with him, because no sooner had they left the range of the Yahsud Alnaar – unfortunately on the wrong side of it from the fleet, so they’d be stuck spending the next three weeks getting back to them – that they’d detected something almost as exciting.
A new star had appeared in the vacuum of space, and it was in a very, very interesting location. Practically miraculous, if he were a religious man.
“Captain?” asked the still shaking intern at the controls to his left, “Should, uh… should we head for the fleet?”
He smiled.
“Oh no, kid. We’ve got something else to see first. How does two for two on world-shattering discoveries sound to you?”
“Te-terrifying, sir.”
“Great! Set a course.”
Easifan System Gateway
Light. Colour. All at once, a violent swirl of energy tore its way into the Easifan system, with a suddenness that perhaps even the original builders of the gateways couldn’t have imagined. Too look upon it was to be bombarded with a violent kaleidoscope of sensory input, light potent enough to blind, images of worlds unknown and swarms of artificial constructions visible through the murky soup of the portal.
Then, just as suddenly, peace.
The portal snapped shut just as suddenly as it had opened, warbling and wobbling like a blob of non-newtonian fluid struck particularly hard before vanishing entirely.
A new set of eyes looked upon Easifa; a bristling suite of artisanal sensors and cameras packed into a space the size of a small asteroid, its smoothly curved hull glinting in the distant light of the stars.
It was one small part of a greater whole, constructed with a particular purpose in mind, which it proudly announced to the system through every communication channel it could manage, both faster-than-light and based on every radio frequency it could spit out, in every arrangement of human language it could manage.
“Hello, there!” It chirped, friendly, androgynous, and welcoming; perhaps even informal. “Today, my name is Copernicus. I come bringing greetings and aid from the people of the Anarchist Federation of Europe, should you wish to receive them.”
Gaia’s Patience – Outer Planetary Temple-Garden of the Children of Gaia
“Out of the way, out of the way!”
Matriarch Fir Carolina was having a day both bad and blessed. First the hydroponics at garden twelve had been faltering and she’d needed to shout at a young sister-neophyte for playing near delicate systems (never a good look, and not something she enjoyed either)... but then someone had been kind enough to give her flowers for her birthday, and honestly that had really lifted her mood.
Then she’d had to taste-test the soup being made for the High Matriarch’s communal meal and the peppers had been absolutely rank, like someone had insulted her mother while defecating in front of her.
But now, as seemed to be forming a pattern for the day, the namesake of Gaia’s Patience was finally coming true. A blessing to paint over every fault – every diary and record for today would clearly scream “Today the Gate was opened! Lost Gaia awaits!”
As she made her way through corridor after corridor, either politely nodding, greeting and waiting as older matriarchs passed her by, or hurriedly waving on or crying out for younger women and men to move out of the way as she made her way to the second floor governing chambers.
As with all of the corridors and rooms she’d had to make her way through, it was dense with foliage from countless species – while ‘hydroponics’ was a term usually used to refer to the specific gardens used to supply food, the creeds of the children had demanded that Gaia’s Patience should be dedicated to the species of their lost, ancient homeworld.
Mothers only knew how many years of asteroid mining, chemical refinement, and careful biomatter recycling had been needed to create enough artificial soil with the right balance to actually sustain so much plant life.
But here, in the governing chambers, it was a different kind of life – people, mainly.
While the creeds forbade most from entering these chambers, matriarchs were freely allowed access – there just normally wasn’t any reason for them all to be there at once. So it was that the beautifully cleared and structured clearing, decorated and arranged in the style of an ancient Roman garden, was absolutely choked with women. A range of ages – from their early thirties in some cases, while many of the High Matriarchs were easily in their 80s at this point – but all of whom having been altered, their bones thin and elongated from centuries of life in low gravity and their scaled skin in shades of pale green from the mixture of reptile and plant-DNA their ancestors had been infused with to greatly minimize the amount of food they had to eat.
The High Matriarchs sat at the center of the throng on ornate, gold-plated chairs interwoven with old plant-matter, before at last shushing the crowd with a single raised hand.
There was bated breath, a message relayed on the comms – evidently translated from an old Earth tongue into the Children’s eclectic creole of German, Swedish, and Portuguese.
”Hello! Today, my name is Copernicus. I come bringing greetings and aid from the people of the Anarchist Federation of Europe, should you wish to receive them.”
The crowd was stunned.
Europe?! was silent, but the thought was universal. They knew people named Europe, that was an Old Earth location! What could it mean? Had humans actually survived after all? Perhaps their other half, those of the Children who had refused to leave Earth?
The High Matriarch in the lead, a stone-faced woman of 70 whose graying hair had been artificially maintained into a tight gray bob that framed her face and emphasized the eagle-like gaze she would hold on those who disappointed her, waved a hand at the murmuring crowd.
“Matriarchs! Sisters! Do not allow this blessed day to be undignified! Please, hold your tongues – we are about to open communications with these strangers! Instead, may your prayers help them to be friendly to us and with open hearts!”
Ahem, she thought as nervous murmuring gave way to silence, that’s better.
“Open the communications!” she cried, and slowly the soft noise of static filled the room.
“Friend Copernicus, my name is High Matriarch Thorn Versailles, speaking on behalf of the Children of Gaia. Long have we waited for the reopening of the Gate and the return to our ancestral home – tell us, are you truly from Europe?”
“Originally.” Copernicus replied, thousands of calculations running across the surface of its electronic brain as it picked apart and analyzed the voice it heard in reply. Storage banks quickly recalled a handful of snippets of information; most primarily, the records it possessed of the Children of Gaia, a pitiable if not nobly-oriented pre-apocalypse cult. This, then, presented a few immediate options, and a loosely-structured approach for the future of its conversation.
“Regrettably, I was forced to resettle away from Earth, along with the rest of my comrades.” They continued. “We’re in the process of preparing to re-establish contact with Earth, however -- it’s necessary to ensure we don’t disrupt the present biosphere, of course; I’m sure you understand.”
In the governing chamber, there was silence. Disappointment, certainly, and no end of questions.
But so publicly is not the place for them, Thorn thought, nor within our home.
She looked to the other two High Matriarchs, and whispered between themselves. After a minute or two, she spoke up again.
“Thank you for sharing this information with us, friend Copernicus. If we might, we would like to meet in person and discuss more, but…” she grimaced, “we cannot allow outsiders to enter the temple-garden except in the most dire situations, in case of disease. Many generations have worked very hard to nurture what we can of a living biosphere within this planetoid. Can we send a ship with representatives to meet you in a clean, neutral environment?”
“Of course!” They replied, inwardly pleased at the care the Gaians were showing for the biosphere they’d constructed. “Although, I will say, I am not a biological being. I am an artificial intelligence, and I can assure you, the vessel I am speaking to you through has been thoroughly sanitized by a bath of ionized radiation. Nonetheless...” It said, pausing,
“We maintain similar quarantine procedures in our dwelling places, and would be more than happy to accommodate your own. It would only be fair, after all.”
The AIs words lingered, and there was a long, long pause. To Copernicus, it might have felt like a lifetime of silence considering how quick the earlier response had been.
Carolina had had to step out of the chambers, catching her breath – the moment the voice had stopped speaking and the comms had been cut, the room had erupted into argument. She’d left through one of the little side doors – an emergency exit – and was now resting against a wall, her face held in her hands.
Artificial intelligence?! her mind screamed, Have other colonies been lost as well?!
The last thing she’d heard before it was lost in the arguing was High Matriarch Thorn’s desperate, failed demands for them all to calm down… but how could they?
Mother, she thought, I need a strawberry.
She found a whole bush of them about ten or so minutes later, of course, on the fifth floor – now primarily containing a mixture of plant and fungal species from across the old European continent. As she sat with her legs crossed in the dirt and tried to enjoy the taste of it despite the bitter irony given the communications that had just gone on, with the weight of it in her mouth, Carolina had to admit this was following the pattern. Of course the Gate would finally reopen only for an AI to appear from it – there couldn’t have been a nastier joke if she’d tried to come up with one.
The sound of strawberry branches being pushed aside distracted her from her melancholy. A young man, probably no more than twenty-three and with gentle gray eyes, held out a nervous hand. She couldn’t help but sneer a little at her nightmarish contemplations being interrupted by a younger man of all people.
“Matriarch-Sister Fir Carolina? Y-you, um, sorry. I have been asked to summon you, please. The High Matriarch said you would be eating strawberries.”
Carolina sat there, mouth half open and strawberry half-chewed, and couldn’t help but slowly grimace. The initial annoyance gave way to worries that she struggled to keep tightly sealed beneath her face; Am I famous for strawberries? crossed her mind, followed by The Matriarchs want me. Right now? That’s bad, probably.
Nevertheless, dignity was always called for – what being a matriarch called for. Tilting her nose ever so slightly upwards, she took the young man’s hand to stand up, quickly wiped the tiniest remains of strawberry juice on her long, dull-grey tunic, and nodded for him to lead the way.
As the network of corridors, gardens and resting chambers gave way to the more sterilized, mechanical environments at the base of the great temple-station that served as the core of its infrastructure, Carolina was already starting to sweat. Not just because of the build up of temperature from so much machinery and the engines, of course, but also because this served as the entryways to the vast array of launch bays for Gaia’s Patience. People milled about from place to place – for the most part men, their domain within the Children of Gaia largely relegated to the use and maintenance of machinery that didn’t directly sustain or modify living things; transportation, weapons, electronics and communications.
Carolina shuddered a little, despite the warmth; it was so… sharp. A massive, triangular room of bronze-like metals and dark gray stone, with craggy domes of metal and rock rising periodically from the ground like giant, ugly boulders; some taller and thinner, others wider. Of course, in truth they were long-range shuttles, whether for attack or simple transportation – vacuum sealed against the underside of Gaia’s Patience, their crew only being able to enter or exit when the seal was complete.
Water… she thought, and air.
The two most precious resources in the whole system.
“Matriarch-Sister, there they are,” spoke up the young man, gesturing to a small group gathered by one of the taller, thinner shuttle ends. It was a single High Matriarch – a short woman of about sixty who looked so fragile she couldn’t actually be standing in the heavy, many-layered robe she wore – providing instructions to a crew of young men. As soon as she saw Carolina approaching, the tiny spectacles on her face practically bounced around with excitement.
“Ah, good, excellent,” said the faintly owl-like woman, “you’re here, Carolina, correct?”
“Um… yes, High Matriarch. Fir Carolina.”
“Good, good…!” hooted the elderly pomeranian, “I have a task for you, you know. High Matriarch Thorn Versailles has asked me to give you a little assignment.”
“Oh.”
“Yes, see, some of us were certain we should just blow up the heathen machine, but, well… some of us think if it wants to talk to us it might be different. For the safety of Gaia’s Patience, however, we have decided the communication should all be handled by a trustworthy matriarch…”
“Oh.”
“...from a shuttle, yes. And we thought, aha, we know the person! So chop chop!” she clapped her hands together a little bit like a seal, “These lovely boys will get you there safe, dear. Confident of that, yes yes.”
As Carolina looked around the small crew of men, nervously smiling and nodding in response to the High Matriarch’s complements… she realized that they couldn’t have been much more than boys of maybe eighteen or nineteen, probably brother-acolytes on paper but still brother-neophytes in practice.
She thought about protesting the decision, of course. She could try and argue it, but… something in her chest refused to let her.
Adrenaline, probably, she thought with a grimace just barely escaping her face.
“Yes, High Matriarch. Of course.”
“Good, good! Get to it then!”
Copernicus watched as a seed-like shuttle – maybe just a hundred or so meters long, a relatively tiny object – emerged from the underside of the planetoid-station and engaged a set of simple ion thrusters to drift closer towards the Gate.
The video of a woman in her late thirties, with slightly rounded features and stray wisps of scalpy blonde hair, was projected through to Copernicus as she started to speak.
“He-hello, ahem,” she said, trying not to seem too nervous on the video but relentlessly sweating all the same, “this is Matriarch Fir Carolina of the Children of Gaia. For reasons we would rather not disclose at this time, the High Matriarchs have asked me to speak on their behalf, away from the Temple-Garden. Do, uh…”
Mothers, hold it together.
“D-do you have, um, human crew aboard your…”
Her brow furrowed, suddenly realizing she wasn’t sure of the proper term. What was it that the Asmovund gear-people called it again?
“...shell? Chassis? Your… body?”
“One of my bodies, but -- no, I do not.” It replied, unsure whether to point out how scared the poor woman seemed or not. Considering her fearful curiosity, it reasoned, it was perhaps best to stick to answering questions for the time being.
“Admittedly, I do wish I did, but... It is safer for them to wait behind the Gateway for the time being. Not to imply that you are a threat, of course; it is merely that I have several bodies, and not all of them do!”
Carolina bit her lower lip, clearly trying to find a way to admit she was struggling to understand what the machine was talking about without seeming like an idiot.
Her mind wracked itself with questions, trying to remember what they knew about AI. There had been records of course, once upon a time – even the knowledge of how to make them, supposedly. But the steel ghosts had, as with all things, eradicated much of their history and knowledge from before the gate was originally opened.
She glanced around the room at her small crew, but most of them seemed as puzzled as she was.
Mothers, I… she narrowed her eyes, I’ve been entrusted with handling this.
“We… we are a threat!” she said, looking into the camera and baring her teeth – an ancient, primal symbol of danger – “and you had best listen to us, machine. We must speak to your creators!”
She raised a single bony finger, doing her best to look intimidating and utterly failing.
“I will warn you – Gaia’s Patience has many weapons and we have fought off outsiders on,” she paused, “many occasions.”
She held her expression, her teeth still bared at the camera, but couldn’t help but wince briefly when one of the pilots tapped a readout for her to see: whatever this machine-mind was, it wasn’t armed.
“If you want to speak to my government, that can be arranged... But it cannot happen in person, unless you are willing to make the journey to our home. It would take... A substantial amount of time to transport so many thousands of people such a distance.” Copernicus replied, mimicking a sigh. There was trauma here -- they’d encountered artificial intelligences before, and it did not go well. “We will do what we can to accommodate you.”
Carolina’s expression immediately broke. No longer bared teeth and an attempt at threat, her eyes went wide with confusion. From what was visible of the other crewmates, they likewise seemed to be in disbelief.
“Th… thousands? How… how many people are in your, uh,” she shook her head, “Anarchist, uh, Fed-... in Europe? That they need so many people to represent them?”
“Oh, approximately... One-point-one-one-zero billion. We strongly believe in representing our people as best as we possibly can, however, hence the necessity of a large General Assembly.” They chirped, mood lifted by a question that was, in all truth, much more pleasant than mild racism and threats. “We are Anarchists, after all.”
Carolina almost fell over, given how quickly she stepped backwards.
“Bil-... a billion people?”
She tried to blink away the shock. Gaia’s Patience had… maybe two million people, and that was usually when too many of the Children in other parts of the system decided to make a pilgrimage all at once.
She tried to correct her mind, focus on being logical – of course they probably had a bigger population, if they had succeeded in finding a planet with life. Easifa’Mal could sustain a big population, after all, if it wasn’t for the steel ghosts guarding it.
But still… such a massive population. It seemed impossible. Fantastical. The Earth had suffered because of so many people, after all.
Maybe that’s why they’ve come here? Looking for a new home? she thought, her eyes betraying the paranoia she was feeling.
They were using AI, after all – perhaps whoever had sent Copernicus were the same people who had destroyed the old Earth? Or at least, their descendants. Though that word, ‘anarchist’, it… showed up in folklore, sometimes.
“Please do not take offense to my question, Copernicus, but, anarchists… is that a kind of alien? Named after the stories?”
"No, no!" Copernicus chuckled. "So much information, lost over time... I wonder how much you could teach us that we've forgotten." It mused.
"It's... A political system, or perhaps theory. In simple terms, one which advocates the abolition of unjust hierarchy and the organization of society on a wholly voluntary, mutually cooperative basis, without force or compulsion. Does... Does that make sense?" They asked.
Carolina looked around at the rest of the crew, their expressions puzzled.
“That, um…” she was clearly trying to wrap her tongue around the words, “is very, uh, interesting. It sounds a bit different from our creed, but we are not forced. The Children of Gaia have prospered and survived by working together.”
A thought crossed her mind.
“In fact, we often work closely with the other tribes and peoples of Easifa. In time, we could perhaps introduce them to you, but, well…” she bit her lower lip, “I think that we would need to arrange for representatives to travel to your home, if you cannot send people. AI are… very, um, worrying. Not just to us, but most of the people of this star system.”
Should I tell it that on Easifa’Thani most would shoot without talking at all first? she thought.
"Oh, we can send people, just... Not our entire government, you see. Perhaps a neutral ground would be ideal?"
Carolina looked visibly relieved.
“Oh! Thank you, if that could be arranged, we would love to meet them! That would be fantas-”
The feed was suddenly cut, and the tiny seed-like shuttle suddenly powered down. A device no bigger than a man’s arm, emerging from the vast darkness at a fraction of the speed of light, had lodged into its side with enough force to suddenly throw the shuttle of its lazy flight close to Copernicus.
Copernicus detected the direction it came from – initially almost impossible to see in the void, looking to outsiders like a rogue asteroid but now giving off tell-tale emissions of ions and radio signals from several kilometers away.
Aboard the Migo’s Teeth and with lungs straining against the metal shell of his frame, Lovecraft couldn’t help but laugh.
The admiralty awaited him, and if the extracted blackbox wouldn’t guarantee it, this certainly would.
Immediately, Copernicus's sensors blared in alarm -- the AI the Gaians were so terrified of, perhaps? Regardless, while the shuttle may potentially end up repowering by itself, it had no way of knowing what sort of damage the foreign object inflicted, and without weaponry, there was even less it could do to retaliate. Thus, it had only one notable option.
"Alert. This is Copernicus. Negotiations have been interrupted. Diplomatic shuttle has been struck by a foreign object of unknown origin and appears to have lost engine control. Attempting to intercept." It beamed a transmission back through the gateway, thrusters firing. Being a wholly artificial being, the probe was able to move at speeds that would be outright lethal in any ship carrying organic life, rocketing across the gulf of space toward the wayward shuttle without so much as a second thought. Maneuvering thrusters spat, twirling it around, around, until it was positioned facing perpendicular to the small craft's direction of travel, arresting its own blistering speed with a sharp guttering of photonic rockets, just enough to receive the lion's share of collision damage -- and latch onto the craft with the array of grasping arms attached to its nose.
It had been a long while since Lovecraft had needed to salivate, but the readouts they were getting from the gaian shuttle…
“Tasty,” he said, “End of history stuff right here, kid.”
He wasn’t fluent in gaian creole, admittedly, but he’d learnt enough to follow the conversation in the recording. The code-eater drone was a neat little invention, one of the tools that left the other tribes wary of Asmovund raiders; reverse-engineered from the internal systems of Yahsud Alnaar drones, it could drill into a hull and quickly access computers that were normally cut off from external transmissions, cracking their encryption and transmitting their data to the raider.
In a world where almost all computers were geared not to handle external transmissions, it had proven to be a game-changer. For Lovecraft, it’d be a much appreciated one.
With its job done, it had then emitted a powerful EMP, damaging the shuttle’s internal systems and cutting the power.
They’ll be fine, he thought, they’re not far from home.
The silent ‘but it wouldn’t matter if they didn’t, really’ ever so briefly sprung into his mind behind the surface, but he shook it away. No time for sympathy.
More curious to him yet was the way the massive outsider probe – Copernicus, according to the transmissions – moved with such shocking speed.
[i]True AI, and it’s friendly? And it’s going to help these intolerant greenies?[i]
He hadn’t thought naivety would be a trait of machines, but as sensors started to pick up at least three gaian craft – rounded arrow shapes, like the love children of asteroids and pinecones, their detachable flak-scales derived from alien shielding systems – he snapped his fingers and transmitted an order over short-wave, safely contained within the ship’s walls from outside detection.
In a separate compartment of the ship, the ship’s gunnery officer excitedly licked its eyeballs. A heavily augmented gremlin, its body having long-been stripped down to the barest minimum of organic tissue to make way for cybernetics and mechanical systems. Fully integrated into the ship’s weapon systems, and always eager to shoot something. It wasn’t a true Asmovund, of course – wasn’t human enough – but Lovecraft liked how hard it had committed to trying to be one of them. It was rare to meet someone who spoke exclusively in transmissions.
But as the order came through – ‘prep weapons, situation could go hot’ – its brain eagerly unsheathed the pair of tiny gray railguns from the ship’s roof, glinting in the distant reflection of their home star’s light.
Lovecraft screwed up the still organic top half of his jaw, a metallic ‘click’ ringing out from his tongue rolling against steel teeth. He’d fought the gaians enough to recognize their power signatures, and he knew them well enough to tell when they’d interpreted something incorrectly.
But… would they shoot? The question burned in Lovecraft’s brain, an uncertainty he hated.
This AI, ‘Copernicus’, was clutching onto the blacked out shuttle, but it wasn’t moving to pull it back through the Gate. On the one hand, it wasn’t unheard of for the Yahsud Alnaar’s drones to engage ships at close quarters, but it was exceedingly rare – and surely the gaians would realize if the AI had weapons to disable and destroy the shuttle, it would’ve just done so rather than fly further away from safety to break it up in close quarters?
Maybe a warning was the best option, to give everyone the best chance to stay alive.
“Hope my gaian’s still good,” he grumbled.
With the flick of a switch, he gave his best smile – folks always said you could hear a smile.
“Hark!”
A transmission in crude gaian, easily detectable to all parties as the mysterious vessel had begun to arc away, rapidly increasing its distance from the escalating situation, “I suggest to my dear greenies, don’t pick fights with strangers to our fair system, and strangers… would do well to leave, for now. Come back with...”
The sound of a tongue clicking against metal came through the transmission.
“...fleshier folk. More human, and you’ll find Easifa a much friendlier place.”
“Have you considered shutting the fuck up, asswipe?” Copernicus barked angrily in reply, drawing power away from its engines as it searched the shuttle for any indication of somewhere it could interface with the ship... Or, in the worst case, wirelessly supply power with microwaves. It’d be a little painful for the occupants, but... “If you want a lecture on tolerance, fine, whatever, I can manage, but I’m a little fucking busy trying to restore power, so I’d prefer not to use my excess processing power on lecturing a gormless imbecile.”
There was a pause.
The leaving ship, now easily detectable, had begun to slow slightly – still far enough to leave, if it had to; while the gaian attack craft likewise began to slow, and weaved out of their formation – more perimeter than pursuit.
With bated breath, the gaians watched and waited to see what would happen with the shuttle.
Today truly had been 4 for 3 on bad times and blessings for Carolina. At the back of her mind, she had to assume it would all work out – but at the front of her mind, she had to try as best she could to keep focused on what they could do.
She was shaking, though, and not purely with fear.
We were making progress! I hope those olcomps are happy!
After the initial shock, it was clear in her mind who was responsible. The impact hadn’t come from the direction of Copernicus – and out here, there was only one group who would do something like this.
Nevertheless, the danger they could control – anything they could control – was getting the power back on. While Carolina had helped with unscrewing several panels, the ship’s brother-technician was furiously trying to replace a number of ruined fuses, and the pilot tried to jumpstart the control panel.
In the darkness, illuminated only by emergency lights and quickly fading emergency glow-sticks, there was stillness, and a cold that was slowly but surely creeping up on them. She could feel her hands getting harder and harder to use – the reptile DNA her ancestors had been infused with had helped them transition to a more cold-blooded system for processing food… useful in the constant warmth of an active spaceship abundant with life, but less useful when the power went out and the void began to creep in.
Mothers help us.
Outside, Copernicus was making rapid progress -- it’d managed to locate a small access panel on the outside of the shuttle, difficult to access in the frenzy of such a tense situation, but with its incredible processing power, it was relatively simple to decode and pry open in the span of merely a few moments.
Next, of course, came figuring out what the hell each of the ports did, but the garbled human languages they were labeled with made that, too, relatively simple -- auxiliary power. Much like its label, the port was just off enough to make interfacing difficult, but not impossible... So it unceremoniously mated one of its power cables with the shuttle, and, with the flick of a switch, shunted sensor power into the craft's systems, all while beaming out a radio transmission in hopes the crew would hear it.
"Carolina?" It asked. "Some smarmy asshole fired a projectile at your ship, and then this happened. Still alive in there? I'm trying to feed you enough power for a jumpstart."
A few seconds later, then some more.
Static.
A click, and the whirring of machines.
Lights blinking to life.
“Copernicus, we hear you! This is Carolina, loud and clear!”
A few moments more and another signal went out – directed at the attack ships, though it was close enough that Copernicus could hear it as well.
“Hold fire, hold fire! This is Matriarch Fir Carolina, I repeat, please hold fire! We are unharmed – we were struck by an Asmovund weapon to steal our data, but we are okay! Copernicus helped us get back online!”
Silence, static…
…then another click.
“We read you, Fir Carolina. You heard her; power down weapons! And don’t harm the machine!”
The times to come were still tense and uneasy, of course – the road to peace can be long and treacherous. The messages to the shipmeets of Easifa’Thani took several weeks to be fully broken down and discussed, but upon that world of words and firestorms there was one clear and unbroken truth:
“The gate has reopened, and we are not alone. At a place of Meeting we shall see this new galaxy of possibilities.”
Three weeks later
The Discovery – Asmovund Array-Ship
The sound of metal fingers against a metal hip. Of a fleshly tongue clinging to a jaw of steel. Of ambitions spat upon.
“We cannot promote you,” Admiral Verne had told him, “glory hounds won't see us making the most of this new opportunity.”
The blackbox had been rewarded, of course – with not having him shot for risking a war with unknown parties, and with a chance to make amends.
“You’re wanted on the bridge, sir,” chirped his intern – still no less a squib of a lad but now just a bit too cocky for Lovecraft’s liking – with a nervous smile, “they’re about to enter the Gate.”
“Aye-aye, kid.”
With a grunt he pushed himself out of the chair in his quarters and made his way to the bridge. It had a different feel to it, in person. From holographic projectors and video screens it had felt almost dream-like… but stood here, on the command deck? At the shoulder of the pissant that protocol demanded he respect?
More like a nightmare.
“Receiving clearance, Admiral,” spoke up one of the bridge crew, “we will be joining the Yaeph’la, Arjuani, Gaian, Veiled, and Cloudkin delegations on the other side.”
“Excellent news,” said Admiral Verne, all prim and proper in her neatly folded and high-necked gray and blue uniform that almost hid the cybernetic voice-box that had replaced her throat when she was a child, “take us through.”
She glanced over her shoulder at Lovecraft’s arrival, a cat-like smile slowly spreading.
“I’ve assured the gaian delegation of your apology in person when we arrive. I’m sure this Copernicus would appreciate one as well, should it be present.”
Lovecraft sighed, but stood to attention and nodded all the same.
When can I go back to getting shot at? he wondered.
