Planet America (33 page)

When Gordon finished, he simply held his arms out in front of him and said, "I think you'll agree some discussion would be helpful at this point."

That opened the floodgates. Nearly all of the representatives. began talking at once. Most had just one question in mind.

"How could the entire population of a planet be sentenced to prison?" someone finally got out. "What crime could possibly call for such a sentence?"

Gordon looked over at Hunter, who was taking a long sip from his whiskey glass. He knew this question was coming.

"You are not criminals," Hunter began. "I don't believe you're in prison because of anything your ancestors did wrong. You're in prison because the people who did this wanted you out of the way.
Way
out of the way. Why? To take over the Earth and thus, an empire. It sounds grandiose, but it's the only explanation. I've told each one of you about my experience in the mind ring. In my opinion, as soon as all those rockets left Earth, that's when the
Second
Empire began. So they are the ones responsible for this...."

Another sip of Seagram's. He swirled the ice cubes around in his glass for a moment.

"Where I came from, the historians will tell you that the First Empire most likely colonized every planet and star system in the Galaxy. Some consider it the greatest of the four empires, even though they know next to nothing about it, nor the other two as well. But one thing is for certain: The First Empire must have been made up of
all
of the peoples of Earth. That means
you
are the remnants of the First Empire. And that means the Galaxy was taken away from you. It means Earth was taken away from you. You were shipped way the hell out here, where no one would ever think to look for you. They built this monstrosity of a star system and then fixed it so your evolutions would crawl along with the speed of a glacier, while the rest of the Galaxy was moving faster than the speed of light. That's very sinister, gentlemen. It's cruel and unusual punishment. And it has to be changed—"

The representative from Planet Germany asked, "You've con-finned that we are locked inside a very elaborate concentration camp—and we have been for centuries. You say there are a million soldiers out there with weapons that will make our heads spin. My friend, how exactly can we change any of that?"

Gordon took over. "The first thing we do is come to an agreement on one major point," he said. "Just for self-preservation alone, no planet can attempt to reach space until the whole situation can be properly assessed. We suggest that when you return home, you tell the facts to your people and warn them that from this moment on, frankly, nothing will ever be the same again. That's really why we brought you here. We uncovered the secret, and we had to tell you. Through our three friends here we had the means to contact you, unorthodox and unde-tectable as it was. I think everyone in this room would have done the same thing if they were in our position."

There was some discussion, mostly about how best to reveal the facts to the peoples of their individual planets. Each of their worlds had suffered cataclysmic events in their histories, yet none of them had ever figured out why. Now they knew, and as it turned out, nearly two dozen of them had space-launch programs nearing completion. Money, time, and resources had been spent in these endeavors. But in the end, the space-ban agreement just made sense. It really was for everyone's own good.

Eventually, there were handshakes all around, even some embraces. Nothing was ever written down. No language ever formalized. There wasn't even a show of hands for a vote. They just
agreed
with each other. Though the people in the room didn't know it, that was the moment the United Planets was born.

And it was in the next moment that their first crisis arrived.

One representative spoke up. He'd sat stone silent throughout the historic meeting. Even now, his voice was barely above a whisper.

"I believe we might have a problem," he said. "There is a cabal of industrialists on my planet that has been secretly working on an orbital spacecraft for two decades. They call it the Love Rocket. These industrialists are not under my government's control; frankly, they are too big for that. The last I heard, they were ready to launch this spacecraft at any time. Possibly any minute ..."

Every eye in the room was suddenly burning a hole through this guy. No one wanted to hear this. Seeing one of the Home Planets utterly destroyed would be bad enough. But the unspoken fear was that while one world was getting pulverized by Moon 39, the invaders might somehow get wind that the other planets were hip to what was going on, setting them up for invasion, too.

"Well, surely you can talk them out of it," Gordon told the man now. "Just present them with the evidence and—"

But the man just shook his head. "Even if I could get back to my world in time, I have to tell you that the chances of them heeding my warnings are nil. Even your friends here would find them like a brick wall. These are vainly obstinate men I'm talking about. To them it's all about ego. They wield much more power than my government does, and at this point they would probably try to overthrow us rather than be told they cannot launch. This is arrogance to the nth degree. I realize that. But this space program of theirs is a pure power play. Plus their launch site is so secret, even we have no idea where it is. Trying to find it will take weeks, months even. By that time, they will know we are looking for them, and they'll launch it anyway. I'd almost have to say they will be impossible to stop—"

"The fools!" Pater Tomm suddenly bellowed angrily. "What the hell planet are you from?"

The man just shook his head slowly.

"Planet France," he replied.

18

Moon 39

The noise made by the Event Detection Rlarm was so
loud, it woke Zenx Xirstix out of a deep sleep.

Xirstix was the supreme commander of the Bad Moon Knights' detachment on Moon 39. His luxurious billet was located more than a half mile from the intelligence center near the hub of the huge military base. Yet lying mere in bed, eyes closed, still half asleep, Xirstix could hear the alarm screaming full throat. It was an unexpected way to begin the day. It was a sound he'd been waiting to hear for a long time, yet for some reason, now that it was actually happening, he didn't want to believe it was true.

Xirstix was the highest-ranking officer at the BMK outpost. He was a Star Marshal with seven galactic clusters, a brilliant military officer just 188 years old at last count. He was proud to be serving on the top-secret if very isolated post. It was great for his career advancement. Being in the BMK was all about guts and glory. As commander of more than one million men, Xirstix was in his element. He would be well paid for his services, and at any minute he and his men could be called on to start a blood frenzy on one of the Home Planets. What more could he ask for?

Again by his count, he'd been on Moon 39 for ninety-one years. His successor had been there three times as long and had stomped two of the Home Planets. (He'd died on Moon 39 of old age.) Under Xirstix's command, he'd incessantly schooled his troops on the three necessities of being a BMK space mere: smarts, efficiency, and total ruthlessness. True, they were way out there, beyond the outer limits of the Galaxy, in a place so isolated, he hadn't heard from any of his superiors since the last time the garrison was paid, nearly thirty years ago. But isolation was no reason for soldiers to go slack. To the contrary, he worked them so hard, they were among the finest units in the entire Black Moon Knights organization, a force of mercenaries that numbered some one hundred thirty million strong. Or at least that's what his superiors had told him three decades ago.

At first, Xirstix thought that he was still asleep and dreaming that he heard the Event Detection Alarm go off. He frequently dreamed such things, along with visions of the carnage his corps could cause on the unsuspecting planet below. Or maybe it was another false alarm. There had been a glitch in the system earlier that week; the warning device had gone off unexpectedly, shortly after the satellite experienced a series of minor quakes, not an unusual event for the ancient artificial moon. His technicians never did find the cause of the glitch. But then again, the Event Detection Alarm was the oldest piece of equipment on Moon 39. There was a chance the damn thing was just broken.

So, just go back to sleep.... It's not a real alarm. That would be too good to be true.

But then two of his aides burst into his bedroom and informed him that an event
had
been detected on the Home Planets. This was not a false alarm or an unscheduled simulation. One of the worlds below was attempting a space launch. The still-pealing Klaxon in the distance seemed to confirm this.

Xirstix didn't give it another thought. He jumped from his hovering bed, ordered the aides to lay out his best uniform and make ready his sky car.

"But first of all," he told them excitedly, "alert the garrison that this is
not
a drill."

There was already a dozen officers gathered around the Event Detection Alarm when Xirstix arrived at the intelligence center. He was an imposing figure, six-two, with a cleanly shaved head and matching cheek scars, evidence of a wild and checkered youth. He was dressed in a shimmering combat uniform, shoulder fins and wing projections in place. He always carried not one but two ray guns in a holster tied around his waist. The ray guns were made of reatomized silver. They had cost him a year's salary.

The warning Klaxon was still blaring when Xirstix walked into the central control room. One wave of his hand, and the device fell silent. Those assembled snapped to attention; his officers even added a bow. But he glided past them to speak with the custodian of the usually somnolent event scanner, a lowly tech.

"
Is
this a true reading?" Xirstix asked the soldier.

The man was nervous but confident. "Aye, sir," he told Xirstix. "We have confirmation of a launch, both on instruments and visual, from Planet Thirty-six Minus Eleven."

"That would be Planet France, sir," one of Xirstix's officers whispered in his ear.

Xirstix pushed the toady away from him. He knew each of the Home Planets by name and number, as well as their position around the sun.

"Show me the visual replay of the event," he told the tech.

The man pushed few buttons. The monitor in front of them came alive with a fuzzy aerial shot of the launch site on Planet France. It was located in a thick woods just outside Paris. There were a few dozen people gathered around the heavily camouflaged launch pad. A rocket slowly was rising off the pad.

"Where is this rocket now?" Xirstix asked.

"It's in orbit, sir," the tech replied. "And it appears they may attempt a landing on the system's moon. All they will need is another burn, and they could intercept the moon as it is waxing toward them."

Xirstix could barely contain his excitement. He took a moment to check the scanner numbers himself. Everything was in working order, including the sensor confirming the spacecraft was in orbit. This meant his huge army was about to get a taste of blood.

He turned to his officers and said, "Implement Invasion Plan Alpha-One. I want our lead elements on France in less than two hours."

19

More than a half million men would eventually take
part in the invasion of Planet France.

They met little opposition. The BMK had appeared so suddenly and had attacked so quickly, it took just a matter of hours to overwhelm the handful of national police strong points on the near-defenseless planet.

Psychological warfare played an important part in the early going. The BMK's troop shuttles made a horrible noise once they entered the atmosphere; they also appeared as bright, fiery lights during their last stages of entry. On the first night of the attack, the skies above Planet France's largest cities looked like they were raining fireballs. Huge upper atmospheric blasts rocked the planet pole to pole. The population was absolutely terrified. Gigantic, heavily armed aliens were suddenly falling on top of their homes, their schools, their churches. They were carrying very exotic weapons and mowing down anything that moved in the streets. It didn't take long for the planet to go into a collective state of shock.

Of course, this was exactly the reaction the BMK counted on to make the planet's subjugation go that much quicker.

In all, it took just four days, not quite a hundred hours for the invaders to spread out over the countryside and solidify their prize. The planet's tiny national police force had been eliminated; its political leaders tortured, killed, or thrown in prison. Many of the planet's intellectuals were rounded up and shot; its religious leaders were executed as well. The BMK troops in the cities were encouraged to loot. For any citizen who choose to defy them, ten were executed. Men, women, children, the elderly—no one was immune.

By the fifth day, there was no resistance at all.

On the sixth day, life on Planet France returned to a kind of perverse normality.

The invaders insisted that shopkeepers reopen their stores and essential businesses get back to work. The sidewalk caf6s, numerous in every city, were reopened as well. Just about everything looked as it did a week before, except now there were heavily armed space soldiers at every intersection, and the rumors said the entire planet was either being sold into slavery or ground up as food for the brutal, mysterious invaders.

Such talk was running about as thick as the coffee in the city of Le Mans. The invaders didn't like the cuisine, apparently, but business was fine at the sidewalk cafes, busy even, as the newly conquered citizenry met to whisper about what would happen next. In one of these cafe's—the
Chez Nous
—sat Hawk Hunter. He was drinking a latte.