The End of All Things: The First Instalment (12 page)

“She won’t,” Gaddis said. Ocampo shrugged.

“This does not explain why this would be the
last
phase,” Ake Bae said, bringing the discussion back around. “It just makes the Colonial Union culpable for our actions.”

“No,” Gaddis said, before Ocampo could speak. “The Earth already believes the Colonial Union made the attack on Earth Station, to cripple us and to keep us dependent. Getting confirmation would mean a state of war between us.”

“Which would force the hand of the Conclave,” Ocampo said.

“Right,” Gaddis said. “Right now it’s playing nice with Earth but still keeping us at arm’s length because it doesn’t want to antagonize the Colonial Union. But if the CU’s verifiably responsible for the destruction of Earth Station, as shown by its own documents, it all falls by the wayside. The Conclave will invite the Earth to join.”

“Which will antagonize those of us who don’t want the humans in the Conclave,” said Utur Nove. “No offense,” he said, to Gaddis.

“None taken,” she said. “And that’s what we want, anyway. The division will weaken the Conclave, just as the Colonial Union decides that it’s a material threat and moves to destroy it.”

“A move which would fail,” Nove said.

Ocampo shook his head. “The Colonial Union will fail if it goes toe-to-toe with the Conclave, yes,” he said. “But it wouldn’t do that. It
didn’t
do it when it destroyed the Conclave fleet at Roanoke. It didn’t send its ships into combat with the Conclave’s. It sent
assassins
—Special Forces to sneak up and place antimatter bombs on each ship, and then detonate them all at the same time. It was a psychological blow as much as a physical loss. That’s how the CU did it. That’s how it would do it again. One assassin, one shot—total destruction. Which is how it will happen this time.”

“You plan to assassinate General Gau!” Nove exclaimed, following Ocampo’s implication.

“No,” Ocampo said, and pointed to Nove. “
You
are going to plan it.” He pointed at Ake Bae. “Or
you
are going to plan it. You two are both in rather better positions to make it happen. Whoever does it is not my particular concern. The point is whichever of you plans it, it will become obvious that you did it at the behest of the Colonial Union. The CU knows that humiliating Gau nearly brought the end of the Colonial Union. It knows that Gau requires loyalty to
him,
not the Colonial Union. Killing him destroys that loyalty. Killing him destroys the Conclave.”

“Which leaves the Colonial Union the largest power standing,” Ake Bae said.

“No,” Gaddis said. “Not without the Earth. No soldiers. No colonists.”

“Unless the Earth changes its mind,” said Ku Tlea Dhu.

“At the right time, we will motivate them otherwise,” Ocampo said. “We’ve done it before. We can be equally persuasive this time.” He motioned away from the room, toward, I guessed, the docks in which the
Chandler
was being worked on and equipped. “Unless you’ve got a better use for all the ships we’ve been taking.”

“A thing which is getting harder to do,” Dhu said. “We can’t trick all the ship captains as you did with the
Chandler
’s.”

“All the more reason to bring things to an active conclusion,” Ocampo said. “We’ve always been a small but potent unit. Small isn’t the problem. The potency of our actions is the key.”

“And all this begins by releasing the information on that,” Ake Bae said, pointing to the PDA.

“Yes,” Ocampo said.

“And where do you suggest we release it?”

“We release it everywhere,” Ocampo said. “Everywhere, all at once.”

“I think this is a good plan,” Gaddis said. “I even think we have a chance of making it work as we intend to.”

“It’s nice the two humans are in agreement,” Nove said. I noted that sarcasm was a near-universal trait of intelligent species.

“With respect, Ambassador Nove, our agreement is a good thing,” Gaddis said. “Don’t forget that through all of this, it’s
my
planet that is the most vulnerable. We lack spaceships. We lack military power. The governments I represent believe Equilibrium offers us the best chance to build up our defenses before everyone else turns their attention to us again. This plan can make that happen.” Nove shifted its weight, unhappy.

Gaddis turned her attention back to Ocampo. “Which isn’t to say it doesn’t have risks. Principal among them being that the Colonial Union has to believe you are dead. And died loyal. If they think you’re alive and a traitor, you know they won’t stop looking for you.”

Ocampo nodded. “The Colonial Union knows what it means when a ship is taken,” he said. “They know everyone but the pilot is killed. They won’t think it will be any different for me.”

“You are an undersecretary of the State Department,” Nove pointed out.

“On vacation,” Ocampo said. “Nothing to identify me as anything other than an unlucky civilian.”

“You don’t think they will suspect you,” Gaddis said.

“I’ve been part of this for several years now,” Ocampo said. “I’ve been funneling information to Equilibrium all this time. If they were going to catch me they would have done it before I left.”

“You had people you used,” Thu said.

“I had a small number of people who operated independently and subcontracted,” Ocampo said. “I cleaned up before I left.”

“You mean you had them killed,” Thu said.

“The ones who could bring things back to me, yes.”

“And
that
won’t look suspicious at all,” Gaddis said, archly.

“Give me a little credit for subtlety,” Ocampo said.

“All this talk,” Ake Bae said. “All this planning, all this strategizing, and yet we still don’t know your endgame, Secretary Ocampo.”

“It’s the same as the endgame for Equilibrium,” he said. “The end of the Conclave. The end of the Colonial Union. The end to superpowers in our little corner of space. And when it’s all said and done, our group, which acts in the shadows, fades into them forever. And we go back to our worlds.”

“Yes, but
you’re
dead,” Ake Bae said. “Or at least the Colonial Union thinks so. And it is in your—and our—interest for them to continue to believe so.”

“For now,” Ocampo said.

“And later?” Ake Bae asked.

“Later things will be very different,” Ocampo said.

“You don’t think this will be a problem.”

“I don’t.”

“And you’re sure about this.”

“Nothing is ever certain,” Ocampo said. “But to go back to earlier points in this conversation, after what I’ve done for this group of ours, and for our goals, I think I’ve earned some confidence for my opinions. And my opinion is: No. When all is said and done, this won’t be a problem at all.”

And then they started talking about the mold problem some more.

I came away from this with two thoughts.

One, and again: Ocampo was a real piece of work.

Two, that sob story he told me about humanity and the Colonial Union was a load of crap.

Scratch that—not
entirely
a load of crap. What he told me was the nice version. The version where he was a selfless martyr for humanity rather than the guy who was planting a bomb in order to profit from the chaos. I had no love for that Ake Bae character, but he or she or it was not wrong. Whatever Ocampo was up to, he was in it for himself as much as, of not more so, than he was for anyone or anything else.

And then there was the third thought: Ocampo’s megalomania, or whatever it was, had already gotten thousands of people killed.

Not
only
his megalomania. He wasn’t working alone. But he sure seemed to be doing some of the heavy lifting.

And soon, they would want to use me to do more of it.

* * *

And then, like that, it was time.

“We are giving you a mission,” Control said, one morning, or at least during the time of day that I’d been thinking of as morning since I got to the Equilibrium base.

Okay,
I thought to Control.
That’s good news. What’s the mission?

“We will provide you with a mission brief once you’re near the skip point.”

So two or three days from now,
I thought.

“Sooner than that,” Control said. “More along the line of eight of your hours.”

That was an interesting admission. Skip drives, which are how we travel immense distances in space, only engage when space-time is flat enough—that is to say, far away from a gravity well.

By telling me the rough amount of time it would take to get to skip distance, Control was telling me something about where we were. That the base was someplace that had a low mass, not especially close to anything more massive, like a planet or moon.

Basically Control was telling me we were at an asteroid, at a far distance from its star.

Which I
knew,
but which Control didn’t know I knew. Control never told me.

By telling me now, either Control slipped, or didn’t think it mattered.

Since I knew Control had done this before many times, it didn’t seem likely it was a slip. So Control figured it didn’t matter. And I figured it didn’t matter because either they thought I was well conditioned to respond like they told me, or they didn’t plan on me surviving the mission.

I thought about my armaments—a couple dozen missiles and beefed-up beam systems, perfect for blinding communication systems and incoming missiles. And then I thought about my defensive systems, which hadn’t been substantially upgraded from when the
Chandler
was a trade ship.

So, yeah. I was betting on the “not coming back” scenario.

All right,
I thought.
It would at least be helpful to know the general sort of mission it is, however. So I might practice some simulations on the way
.

“That won’t be necessary,” Control said. “We prefer you to stay focused on the mission once it starts.”

Understood,
I said.
Does this mean I’ll have control of the ship to skip distance?

“No,” Control said. “We will control the
Chandler
for the disembarkation and for a short portion of time thereafter. After which a course will be set. You will have full control after the skip. Until then you are to monitor systems. We will keep a communication channel open so you may alert us if there are any problems.”

The further I get from you the longer the lag will be in our communication,
I pointed out.
The speed of light still applies
.

“We don’t anticipate any problems,” Control said.

You’re the boss,
I thought.
When do we start?

“Secretary Ocampo has asked us to delay the start of your mission until he can say good-bye to you,” Control said. “As was your request.”

Yes.

“As a courtesy to him, we will allow this. He is currently otherwise engaged. When he’s done, he will travel to you. You will have ten of your minutes to say your farewells. This will happen within the next two hours.”

Understood. Thank you, Control. It means a lot to me.

Control didn’t say anything to this; I could see that it had broken its connection. That was fine.

I had a couple of hours to prepare for my mission.

I prepared.

* * *

“I remember the last time I was here,” Ocampo said.

He was standing on the bridge of the
Chandler
. With him were Vera Briggs and an escort of two Rraey soldiers.

I imagine it looks a little different now,
I thought to him.
A bit emptier
.

Ocampo visibly winced at this; I could see it happen through one of the bridge cameras. Vera Briggs was silent and staring, in a horrified fashion, at the box containing my brain. The Rraey, for their part, were unreadable to me. That’s the thing about aliens, I suppose.

Thank you for coming to see me,
I thought, to both Ocampo and Briggs.
I really appreciate it
.

“You’re welcome,” Ocampo said. “To be honest it’s nice to be off that rock—”

One of the Rraey made a throat-clearing sound here, suggesting some nonverbal cues were universal; that is, if you have a throat.

“—it’s nice to have a change of scenery, I should say.” Ocampo fairly glared at the Rraey.

I don’t want to take up too much of your time,
I thought
. I know the two of you are busy. Also, Control told me that I had ten minutes with you
.

“Right,” Ocampo said. “And in fact we should probably start on our way back. They were annoyed with us enough when I insisted we say good-bye.”

I understand,
I replied.
And I think I need to get started anyway
.

From outside the bridge came a loud clanging noise, followed by what sounded like voices. It might have been the
Chandler
’s intercom speakers acting up. Or it could have been something else.

Both Ocampo and Briggs jumped. The two Rraey said something to each other in their own language and hoisted their weapons. One of them held a hand out to Ocampo and Briggs, signaling that they were to stay on the bridge. The Rraey then exited the bridge to investigate.

The automatic, reinforced door to the bridge slammed shut, sealing Ocampo and Briggs in and the Rraey out.

“What the hell?” Ocampo asked.

There was a low thrumming sound as the
Chandler
’s engines ramped up from their resting phase to propulsion phase.

“What are you doing?” Ocampo asked me.

I’m not doing anything,
I replied.
I don’t have control over the ship yet.

There was a banging on the bridge door. The Rraey were trying to get back in.

“Open the door,” Ocampo said to me.

I don’t have control of the door.

“Who does?”

Whoever it is that has been running my simulations. I don’t know who they are. They just told me to call them Control.