“But we in it shall be remembered –
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother….”
–William Shakespeare, “Henry V,” Act IV, Scene iii
“Hit the ground!” Kir shouted, on instinct as much as anything.
The three Titans dove low, as a disruptor shot vaporized a small rise ahead of them.
“Where are they?” Nas asked.
“Over there,” Kir said, pointing behind a hillock about twenty units away. Three figures in thermsuits had disruptor rifles and were firing a suppressing spread.
Tig unloaded five quick shots; disruptor rifles weren’t great at this range, but then, she wasn’t trying to kill them.
“Ted, how long until you can take off?”
“About three minutes,” he said. At least, if we ever want to land again, he thought.
“Unknown detachment, this is Centurium Oden. You are ordered to cease fire,” he shouted.
“Our orders come directly from the Navarchos Imperii,” came the comm reply.
“Navir? What in the Emperor’s balls are you doing?” Tig shouted.
“I got a call from the Navarchos Imperii a couple hours ago. Asked if I wanted to not only avoid a downcheck, but get a promotion. Just have to keep the humans from leaving. You know your career is over, Tig.”
“Solis’s career is over! I heard Navarchos Bass – he has Solis on tape ordering him to lie to the Floor Leader, Navir!” Tig said. “Don’t do this. You’re better than this.”
“No, I’m not. I don’t know what I was thinking, risking my career for a human.”
Tig unloaded twelve shots, one of which hit very, very close to them. “We won’t let you kill them. Ted,” she said, “I’d get off the ground as soon as possible.”
“Roger that,” Ted said. “Hala, what’s our Q?”
“17.4. About a minute until it’s up to 25.”
“We can’t wait.”
“Ted, you can’t,” Hala said, but Ted had already engaged the gravitics.
Kir looked at the attackers. Tig and Naskia were doing their best to keep them pinned down. But one of them was unloading a new weapon, a small phase cannon. It had a better range, better accuracy.
The Sally Ride was powering up its impellers. It needed just a few seconds. He got up, and ran backward, away from the defense of the hill, and turned as he was almost on top of the ship. He turned, and faced the attackers.
They fired.
He was hit by the energy pulse, and let out a scream, but he held his position. Again, they fired, again, he was hit, and again, he screamed.
He fell to his knees, but kept himself from falling completely, kept himself in the line of fire. He did not collapse until he heard the little ship’s impellers whine, then sing, and felt them push the ship up and away.
Tig saw him fall, and with a roar, stood and rushed the attackers, firing indiscriminately. They outnumbered her, but two of them were controlling the cannon, and only Navir had a chance to hit her. He hesitated, only to receive a shot from her disruptor; she quickly turned and fired on the others, and kept firing until they were no longer moving.
“Are they….”
“No, Dr. Freeman,” Tig said. “I had it on stun. But I’ll be damned if I carry them back. Did the Sally Ride get away?”
“It did,” Naskia said, rushing to Kir’s side.
It was immediately clear there was nothing to be done. Slushy blood surrounded him; he was barely conscious and there was no chance he would regain more than that. With his one uninjured hand, he grabbed Naskia’s shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” he said, “about your husband. I didn’t know he was….”
“You made up for it,” she said. “And more.”
“Tell Rixie I’m sorry too,” he said. “I hope I made it right.”
He said no more after that.
Tig picked him up, carefully; he was dead, but she would bring him home anyhow. She passed by Navir, and wished she could spit on him. That she had ever let him touch her…she shuddered. “Grab their weapons,” she said to Naskia. “Let’s go see how else we can help.”
* * *
“Engines at 63 percent, that’s the best they’re gonna get,” Hala said. “We’re burning out the reactor.”
“It’s good enough,” Ted said, pushing the ship to its limits. The reactor was consuming its fuel quickly, the gravitics were being overtaxed. He kept updating his calculations as he forced the ship through the atmosphere. “We’ll enter orbit in six minutes.”
“There’s no way it’ll be stable,” Hala said.
“Not remotely. We’ll get a few orbits. Maybe four or five. But it’s enough to get the message out. Enough to get them help.”
“And then we burn up in the atmosphere.”
“I’ll try to skip us off it. Then we’ll just be drifting without power.”
Hala looked out the viewport. Well, if she was going to die, let it be here. “All right, I’m going to start prep for communications,” she said. “And if you want to record a last message for Tig, let me know.”
“Wilco. You do the same for your family. Think he survived?”
“No chance,” Hala said.
Ted pushed the Sally Ride onward. “Then let’s make his sacrifice worth something,” he said. “Let’s make ours worth something.”
* * *
“Lemmy! How are you?”
Zhalem Ro and Lemm Tam went way back; they had been part of a group of friends when they were young Hoplites, before they separated into their career paths. Zhalem had gone into government administration, while Lemm had gone into the military, but they’d stayed in touch, along with a few others from the old crew – Rixie Tam, Yolan Ro, Oventa Pir.
They’d been a remarkably successful group. Lemm was a flag officer, Rixie was chief of security for Pryvani Tarsuss and a retired flag, Yolan was Clerk of the Imperial Senate, and Oventa was chair of the physics department at Vorsha Colonial University. As for Zhalem, she had merely become senior executive secretary to Emperor Tiernan IV ColVanos himself.
“Not well, Zhal,” said Lemm, wincing briefly at the old nickname. “Pretty awful, really. The Navarchos Imperii has gone rogue.”
There was a long pause. “Even more than he had?”
“Pardon?”
“Tenzi Ro just called me. He got a call from the Floor Leader, said that Solis was trying to start a war with Earth. He’s on his way down to meet with the Emperor right now.”
“Oh, no,” Lemm said. “He gave a series of orders to ships in the Sol System designed to move us away from Titan.”
“That would be consistent with what I’ve heard. We’re meeting in ten minutes,” Zhalem said. “I’ll let him know. Lemmy, stay safe.”
“Thanks, Zhal. You too.”
“Oh, and I’m keeping my pad on. Tell your comms officer to send through updates. Don’t worry about interrupting, fluid situation like this, the Big Guy wants us up to date.”
“Understood. Thanks again. Tam out. Comms, you heard her, be ready to forward information.” Then, turning to the astrogator, she said, “Time to Titan orbit?”
“Fifteen minutes.”
* * *
“Time?”
“Fifteen minutes, Uncle Aerti.”
“Thanks, Sorcha,” he said. The comms crackled again.
“Belfsec to base, checking comms. If you can read us, please respond.”
“This is Gama Actual, Belfsec. Situation report.”
“Sir…the Sally Ride is away. We were ambushed…Centurum Oden didn’t make it.”
There was dead silence.
“Sir, he gave his life – he shielded the Sally Ride to let it get away. I….”
Aerti nodded. “I understand,” he said. “Who was ambushing you?”
“A few officers. One I can identify as Decanus Navir Salus. Not sure about the others. Said the Navarchos Imperii had directed them to do it.”
“Are you okay? Is Naskia?”
“We’re all right. I stunned our attackers. Couldn’t…should’ve had my rifle on kill. I’m sorry, sir.”
“Ms. Belfsec…I will never be angry with you for choosing not to kill when you can avoid it.”
“Thank you, sir. We left them there. I assume they’ll wake up soon enough, but hopefully things will shake out by then.”
“Right,” Aerti said. “Nas, you on?”
“Of course, Aerti. Any luck?”
“No,” he said. “Basically, our choices are to let some humans die, all humans die, or everyone die.”
“Oh, no.”
“Yes. I don’t know that you won’t want to keep your oxygen on.”
“Not unless Sorcha and Niall have it.”
“My sentiments exactly. ETA, Ms. Belfsec?”
“We’ll be inside in five minutes.”
“Thank you, Ms. Belfsec. Naskia. We’ll see you soon.”
Aerti covered his eyes for a second. The worst part was that this wasn’t the worst part.
He hit the comms button. “Rixie, how are we doing?”
“Well…we’re wired for suicide. Have one saboteur detained.”
“I hate to say this…but good,” Aerti said. “Rixie…I…I’m sorry. Kir was killed defending the Sally Ride.”
Rixie paused a good long while. She looked down at Alex, who was simply stroking her left ring finger. She responded by stroking his hair, softly.
“Sir…he died defending it?” she asked.
“Yes. He shielded the ship from fire.”
“Did the ship…did it get away?”
“Yes it did, Rixie,” Aerti said, softly.
She closed her eyes. “He made it right, didn’t he?”
“Damn right he did,” Aerti said.
Rixie rubbed a hand over her eyes. She hoped she survived this somehow; she intended to request permission to vivisect Navarchos Solis.
“Navarchos Bass, I recommend him for the Order of the Emperor,” she said, finally.
“Thank you, Imperator. I concur. Before we die, I intend to note it in the record,” Aertimus said. “He’s more than paid any debts. Rixie…stay on this channel. Keep it open. I want all of us on when that bastard calls.”
Rixie didn’t respond. She focused on Alex. They had precious little time left. She intended to keep her priorities straight.
* * *
“Orbit established. We’ve got five loops. Let’s make ‘em count.”
“Aye, sir,” Hala said. “I’m going to start the handshake protocols Naskia gave me. Here’s hoping.”
It took only two minutes, but it felt like twenty. Naskia had left open a back door many years ago when she’d programmed the communications backbone, and once Hala connected with it, it would work brilliantly – but it wasn’t like tuning to a new radio station. Still, between Naskia’s instructions, Alex’s pad, and Hala’s brilliance, the Sally Ride managed to get access to priority channel one four minutes before Solis’s return call.
“It’s open, sir,” Hala said.
“As scripted, Hala.”
“Krypter, krypter, krypter,” she began. “This is the Terran Space Ship Sally Ride, broadcasting an emergency message on behalf of Titan Station. Navarchos Solis has locked out control of the base, and is threatening to release poison into its ventilation system, which would kill all humans and Dunnermacs on the station and injure all Titans on the station. On behalf of Navarchos Bass, we request emergency assistance from all ships within range of this broadcast. This message will repeat.”
She set the message up on a delay of one minute, fully prepared for no response; the immediate call startled her.
“Sally Ride, this is Archiploiarchos Lemm Tam of the Imperial Star Carrier Xifos. We are en route to Titan, as is the Gyfjon and Minatar. What is the situation on the station?”
Ted opened comms. “Archiploiarchos Tam, this is Captain Ted Martínez; by our countdown, Navarchos Solis is due to contact Navarchos Bass in two minutes; he has said he will release poison into the station’s ventilation system in thirty-two minutes.”
“Gorram!” Lemm said, pounding the table. “Xifos Actual to Gyfjon Actual, Captain Gwenn, what’s your best possible time to ground?”
“Thirty-four minutes, ma’am, at least with ingress,” Lauryna said. “We’ve been trying to get access to their hangars, no response.”
“You probably won’t Captain,” Ted interjected. “Navarchos Solis has control of most of the station, he’s used command codes to lock out Navarchos Bass.”
“Say again, Sally Ride, the Navarchos Imperii used command codes to lock down the base?” Lemm said.
“Affirmative.”
“Comms, send a priority one message to the palace updating them on the situation,” Tam said. Then, turning her attention back to the Sally Ride, she asked, “Captain Martínez, what is your ship’s status?”
“We are in a decaying orbit, we took off under duress, but that is not important. Whatever assistance you can render to Titan Station has to be the priority. Archiploiarchos Tam, there are two of us on this ship. There are a lot of good people down there. And not just humans.”
“Captain Martínez, believe me, I know. We will do everything in our power to help them. I swear it.”
“Thank you,” Ted said. He just prayed that would be enough.
* * *
“Very well, Navarchos Bass,” sneered the Navarchos Imperii, right on schedule. “So, it’s time for you to make your decision. Will you kill the crew of the Lem, or kill all the humans on the station?”
“Hello to you too, Solis. The answer is yes.”
“So I’m to gas the station. How noble. Very well, thirty….”
“No, sir. We have rigged the oxygen delivery system to vent if you attempt to gas the station.”
“You have incompetents working for you, then. That will suck in Titanian air. I’m a step ahead of you still, Aertimus.”
“No, you aren’t. I’m well aware of that fact.”
Ziah Solis raised an eyebrow. “Interesting. You would kill everyone on your station?”
“No, Solis. You would. We all go down together. The entire Empire will demand your blood.”
“Well played, Aertimus,” Solis said. “I can hardly wait for you to realize your awful mistake, and beg me for mercy. Why, it will be delightful. In fact, it’s so delicious that I certainly can’t wait half an hour.”
Solis pushed a couple buttons on his pad. “I’ve reset the countdown to fifteen minutes,” he said with a sneer. “This channel will be open; you may call me back any time before then should you change your mind.”
“We won’t, you son of a bitch.”
“We’ll see. Solis out.”
Xú wanted to cry in frustration, but she didn’t; she watched Aerti put his head in his hands, rub his temples, and lean back, looking into the distance as if some hope might materialize there. Eyrn picked up a pad from the corner, paused to kiss her husband on the cheek, and walked down the hall. Sorcha was holding on to her father and Lessy, tight enough that both seemed slightly winded – but neither complained, though Naskia, who had just arrived back, did carefully remove Niall from her daughter’s grasp. Tigoni sat in a corner, talking quietly to a pad. “I’m so grateful for that. So grateful for you. I died happy, because I died knowing you loved me,” she was saying, softly, so as not to disturb others.
The crew of the Lem milled about aimlessly. They talked quietly, a few of them prayed. Xú envied the reverent; she had been raised an atheist, and had seen no sign that any higher power was at work in the universe. She hoped she was wrong. Not so much for her – she could accept nothingness after death. But there were an awful lot of people in this room who deserved to live a long, long time, in this life or the next.
She saw Darren Xanthopolous, sitting in a far corner, leaning against the wall, arms wrapped around his wife, whose arms wrapped around him. Lysis was telling Darren that with their children’s new guardian, their kids would never want for anything. Zhan, meanwhile, was still and calm, in a pose of supplication, praying to a goddess with a wry smile on his face. She couldn’t tell if he was quite serious in his belief, but his prayer to Her, thanking Her for every day he had with Her, rang as true as anything ever spoken.
Over the comm line, she heard Alex and Rixie talking quietly.
“Rix… just in case…do you think we should…I mean, Ryan….”
“No need…Pryvani has one on file.”
“Did you tell him…I mean, from me….”
“Yeah.”
“Okay.”
Xú turned back, and she saw Alesia finally break down, weeping that she’d never get to tell her mother how proud she was of her, never tell her father how amazing his inventions were. Naskia carefully took her from Sorcha and comforted her, told her that of course her parents knew how deeply she loved them. Parents always do.
Xú put a hand on Tatenda’s shoulder, and nodded; he returned the look. They’d been rivals, once upon a time. They’d both been up for the command of the Lem. Between the two of them passed an unspoken conversation; Tatenda saying he was glad Xú had won, Xú replying ruefully that she wished he had to make these decisions. But she didn’t. Not because she enjoyed them, but because she would not put them on him. This was her responsibility. She had to see it through.
Xú saw Eryn sit down in the hallway, and begin talking to her pad. Without really realizing it, she found herself walking toward the enormous woman, steadily and purposefully. Eyrn was small for a Titan, but she still loomed as Xú approached, and heard what she was saying.
She was recording one last message.
“…we didn’t want to leave you. But we had no choice,” Eyrn said, eyes glistening. “Navarchos Solis wanted us to kill every human on the base, including your Uncle Niall. We couldn’t stop him. We tried, tried everything. But all we could do is rig it so that if he wanted to kill them, he’d have to kill all of us. Your father made that decision – told Navarchos Solis that we would die with our friends, with the humans from Earth, with Niall. It was the hardest thing he’s ever done, and you should be damn proud of him for it. I am. It means we’ll die, though. And we’ll never see you again.
“We’ll miss you. More than you can know. But someday, I hope you understand why.
“I’m not saying it doesn’t hurt. Part of me thinks I should throw anyone aside to see you again. But then, the crew of the Lem deserves the chance to go home. Alex and Rixie do. Sorcha deserves to bring her dad home. And fighting against that, even to the death, is…it’s….”
Eyrn didn’t cry, but she fumbled for words. “Girls, you take it easy on your brother. You listen to your grandpa and grandma. We love you so, so much. You be strong. You’re my kids, and your dad’s kids. There’s nothing you can’t do. Good…goodbye.”
Eyrn pressed a button on the pad looked down, and saw the Lem’s captain. “Shang Xiao,” she said, quietly, “what can I do for you?”
“You’ve done too much already,” Xú said. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be,” Eyrn said, softly. “Don’t. I know you would do the same for us.”
Xú nodded. “You’re right.”
She turned, and headed back to the control room, running at double time.
“Navarchos Bass,” she said, in a voice that carried despite her small stature, “I want you to call Solis back, please.”
“Shang Xiao?”
“Consider it a last request.”
Eyrn followed Xú in, looking at her quizzically, and helped to boost her up onto the console at Aerti’s right hand. “Navarchos Bass!” Solis’s oleaginous voice dripped. “So very soon to have reconsidered! I should have set the countdown to five minutes.”
“Why would I reconsider, Solis? I’m not the one who’s set to kill everyone here. You are.”
Solis sighed heavily. “Oh, how disappointing. Just calling to argue, eh? Well, you’ll be dead soon. I’ll indulge you. No, Aertimus, I’d just kill the humans. You’re the one insisting on putting yourself in the firing line.”
“That’s our duty,” Aerti said. “To protect those who can’t protect themselves.”
“And you’d kill everyone on the station to do that?”
“Yes,” Aerti said. “And you know it. So I ask you to end this. Don’t condemn everyone here to death. You’re an Imperial Officer. Surely you don’t want to be known as a butcher.”
Solis laughed. “But you see, Aertimus, that’s just it. You say you’re capable of killing every man, woman, and child on that station to safeguard the humans’ pitiful lives. I don’t know if you are. Indeed, I rather doubt it. Any second, you’ll be begging me to kill the humans, and save you. But no matter. You see, I know this with certainty: Am I willing to kill you all to preserve the Empire? I am.”
Aerti gaped at him. He did not know how to respond to the Navarchos Imperii. He just stared.
“These humans you love, the ones you treat as equals – do you really think they are our equals, Aertimus? Honestly?”
“They’re as smart as we are. And their size….”
“Oh, no no no. I don’t mean that. No, I do not think the humans are weak or lesser beings, not when it comes to intelligence or skill, and physical prowess is overrated. They have learned much. They will learn more. They are not stupid; no, they’re far worse than that. Were they stupid, they would be no bother, no concern. But they aren’t. They’re evil, Aertimus. Evil to the core. And if we shake hands with them, we seal our own fate.
“Do you know the history of these vermin?” he mused. “These filth? These vile little creatures you are willing to die for? I do. A century ago a group of these creatures set out in little boats from one corner of their planet. They found new lands they had never known, new cultures they had never met. Did our brave explorers bring greetings, in the grand spirit of friendship and peace? No, they slaughtered the unfamiliar humans. They stole their land. They stole their goods. They stole them, outright, and forced them into servitude of the most brutal kind. They treated each other far worse than we have ever treated them.
“Now, no doubt they will tell you that this was but a dark chapter in their history. And it’s pretty to think so, but it is nothing of the sort. Just three decades ago, one of their most powerful nation-states took it upon itself to slaughter wholesale those it found undesirable. Humans who worshiped the wrong god, or had the wrong skin color, humans who had been born disabled and defective. They did not do so in a grisly manner, no, Aertimus, they transported them in trains, like animals to be butchered. Packed them into small rooms and poisoned them. Simple. Efficient. Clean. Six million humans, Aertimus. Six million humans they killed as if they were but garbage to be disposed of. Six million humans in less than a year. And that does not even begin to contemplate the war that engulfed the world at the same time – which killed more than twelve times as many. No, these six million were killed for no military purpose, no civil purpose, no purpose at all.”
Solis paused for effect. “That war, the one fought at the same time, it was ended by those nations who opposed this vile regime, and you may think that this is proof that most of the humans were good, decent beings. That good triumphed over evil. But that war was ultimately ended by the use of fusion bombs, dropped not on military targets, but in the middle of populous cities. They deliberately targeted civilians, Aertimus! Killed hundreds of thousands of them with just two bombs! And this was but 30 years ago!
“These are but the highlights of that time. There were nations where the color of your skin meant you were unable to vote, or hold office, where it meant you could be killed for breaching an ethical code that changed at a whim. There were nations that repressed their residents, building walls and fences not to keep others out, but to keep their own kind in. Some nations grew rich while others struggled; small groups of criminals stockpiled weapons, and built bombs, and flew primitive aircraft into buildings in an effort to kill as many civilians as possible, to scare the world into doing their will. And the aggrieved humans reacted as one had to know they would, by starting wars against anyone who even looked like the criminals.
“And even now, even today, nothing has changed. Just three years ago — three years — they nearly started a war with rapidly mutating nano-scale robots. They nearly lost containment on them, nearly wiped out all of their civilization. Can you imagine the stupidity of these creatures? The arrogance? The vile depravity in their hearts? Can you imagine what idiocy led to that?”
“Yes,” Xú said, her voice quaking. “Yes, Navarchos Imperii, I can.”
“Ah, the tupp talks. You should –”
“No!” Xú shouted, causing Solis to raise an eyebrow, and Aertimus to flinch. “You want to read our list of failures? Our mistakes? Our crimes against all that is good and decent? Our species pleads guilty to any you care to mention. These crimes cannot be undone, and I can list dozens more just as bad, from the way women were systematically oppressed to the people killed for daring to love the wrong person. I can tell you the way belief in religion – faith that there is something greater than us all – has led to wars and suffering, and when nations deliberately chose to tell their people not to believe in those religions, they managed to inflict no less suffering. I can tell you of evil and discrimination and hatred and torture, and I will get no more than a thousandth into the worst of our history.
“But when you start to lecture me on the Short War, Navarchos, I must speak. For I was there, in Singapore, and I was one of the people who managed to hold containment. The doctor who ultimately saved humanity is among my crew. I have seen my species at its worst – and at its best, for we stopped that threat by forgetting our differences, working together, and afterward, choosing to walk the path of peace. By recognizing our crimes, and choosing not to repeat them.
“We have failed, over and over. But each time, we have learned. We have stepped forth into the stars together, with laws in place prohibiting us from repeating the mistakes of Columbus and his ilk. We reacted to the horror of the Holocaust by vowing to never again allow such a horror to rise. We learned not to discriminate, learned that our differences make us stronger, learned that each and every human is unique, and must be allowed to pursue their own path. We learned that some weapons are horrors beyond horror – and that their use is not merely poor strategy, but vile and unforgivable. We have not been perfect in our growth, we have not been flawless. But we continue to take more steps forward than back, to refuse to slide back into the abyss.
“In short, Navarchos Solis, we have learned. And if our history is littered with horrors, it is the remembrance of those horrors that spurs us on to be better.”
Xú looked at Navarchos Bass, at Eyrn, at Tig, at Naskia and Niall and Sorcha and Alesia, at Darren and Lysis, at Zhan. She looked those members of her crew who stood in the watch room, all with eyes fixed on her.
She turned back to Solis. “Navarchos, You have told Navarchos Bass that he must choose: send us to our cell and condemn my crew alone to death; leave us loose on the station, and risk other people who have committed no crime; or, should he resist, to endure death, along with all those men and women who have chosen to stand by us. You have asked Navarchos Bass what he would have us do. You have not asked this of us. But this is our decision, not his. And we have made our choice.”
She looked at her crewmates, and smiled through her tears. “My brave and worthy crew, the finest any captain has ever had the honor to command, crew of the Terran Space Ship Stanisław Lem: Stand down. Prepare to return to our holding cell. We will face death ourselves. We will not allow harm to come to our friends.”
Solis smiled triumphantly. Aerti looked at Xú, aghast. “Shang Xiao Xú, I….”
“You have been kind to us, Navarchos,” she said, sadly. “Kinder than I dared hope. But your children deserve their father and mother. I will not separate you both from them, nor anyone else on this station. If our choice is the death of a few, or the death of many, we choose to minimize the damage.”
“But Shang Xiao,” Rixie called over the comms. “We can do this. He wouldn’t dare kill us all.”
“Of course he would,” Xú said, looking at the grinning spectre on the viewscreen. “He’d be happy to do it. He could blame the savage humans for turning on the Titans. He could goad, not just Earth into war, but your Empire too. I won’t allow it. There are too many good people here.”
“You are damn brave, Shang Xiao,” Eyrn said, quietly.
Xú looked at Eyrn, and smiled softly. “History has taught us many things, and one of them is that no race, no country – no people holds a monopoly on savagery, nor is any immune from it. Not even yours. But it also teaches us that most people want to do good, and try to do good, as best they can. It has been my great privilege to see it is true of your species as well as ours, no matter how your savages may bray.”
“Enough of this,” Solis said. “Your talk is tiresome. You have decided. So be it. Navarchos Bass, I will keep my word. Take the humans to the detention cell; I will reconfigure the ventilation system to harm only those in the cell. Hurry. You have five minutes,” he said, tapping his pad.
“I’m sorry,” Xú said to her crew. “There is no other choice.”
“None you would have made,” Tatenda Marechera said, quietly. “That is why we are honored to die with you, Shang Xiao.”
I gots me a few more issues with this chapter;
First: (not in any particular order)
Xu Speaking:
“You have been kind to us, Navarchos,” she said, sadly. “Kinder than I dared hope. But your children deserve their father and mother. I will not separate you both from them, nor anyone else on this station. If our choice is the death of a few, or the death of many, we choose to minimize the damage.”
How about the children of the crew members you just resigned to death? You didn’t bother to ask them. I think they might have issue with you casually resigning to death their parents (or spouses). I also don’t recall you bothering to ask the crew members what they think. After all it is their lives, its not a combat situation.
Second:
“They found new lands they had never known, new cultures they had never met. Did our brave explorers bring greetings, in the grand spirit of friendship and peace? No, they slaughtered the unfamiliar humans. They stole their land.”
Solis is being a tad hypocritical here. As I recall (from the wiki) Titans occupying and subjugating the Dunnuermac and occupying thier lands leading to the Docor crisis…Probably doing the same to the K’pata race they recently discovered..And I’m sure if we dig a bit deeper there was a lot of subjugation of their own races – Jotnars (the bluefaces)
All those terrible things did happen but not all at once and not everything was terrible. Good things happened too with trade and commerce as well as cultural exchanges..
Third:
As long as options are available, I would not resign myself to death..Sounds noble on paper (or computer) but not so much in real life…And options do exist..They could stall for time, bullshit Solis while the others are searching for a solution…..Personally I would rather go down fighting than wait for death…
1) I agree with you there.
3) It could still be a ruse. I don’t see the whole crew dying, so either there will be a timely rescue somehow or this is a con aimed at Solis.
2) Yeah, Titans aren’t exactly clean as a whistle when it comes to their relations to others.
They might pretend that they’re the good guys, but they did conquer the peaceful Dunnermac, take their worlds and enslave them. And right now, Titans still “occupy” what was formerly Dunnermac territory : all they did was grant some autonomy to Great Ocean, but Titans haven’t left those worlds, they are still claiming them as their own. And in “exchange” for that, they stopped enslaving the Dunnermacs (and boy did that take some sacrifice to make it happen) and gave them civil rights, but of course not as much as Titans (the unfair repartition of seats in the Legislature).
And unlike Humanity, who is getting better and better at this (with big setbacks from time to time, no doubt), Titans commited those crimes long after they reached the stars. When they were already an highly advanced civilization. So if we compare human crimes to titan crimes, let’s take into account the level of civilizational advancement : Solis doesn’t have a moral highground to stand on.
But of course, he can’t see that.
I know its a primitive approach, but could the crew that stayed behind not be swallowed by the Titans? It could buy them precious time, up to 24 hours if I recall. Normally air is only ingested in the stomach during eating so their supply should remain untainted. Unless the gas makes the Titans sick enough to vomit.
Well being swallowed might buy them some time…if they have a sharp hunting knife. If the titan is still breathing though, not so much 🙂
Well it said the gas only makes Titans ill, not kills them.
Zamik is specifically said to cause vomiting. Anyway, a cleaner alternative, grabbing a titan environment suit and putting the humans inside, has already been mentioned by Xú Mùlán. She wasn’t confident that she and her crew would be fine in the long run, seeing that everybody else on Titan Station would be sick or dead. But more importantly, it wouldn’t protect all the innocents aboard Titan Station, and right now that’s Mùlán’s highest priority.
This is how I envision the (soon to be famous) final scene with Solis.. (love this movie)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWFCQVxaMMw
Part of me wants it to end like Oblivion, when he says “Fuck you Sally” and detonates the Nuke.
“Fuck you Solis” and detonates the makeshift nuke they made. Then the credits song from Oblivion play. https://youtu.be/pdjHZkOEjPc
But of course then Humans would be made out to be everything Solis feared.
I don´t get princess Mulan (Xu). Solis states that he wants all humans dead and will sacrifice every human-friendly titan for the sake of (his image of) the empire. He´s a raging madman.
After that outbreak he accuses the entirely human race of “beeing evil” and bringing up cruelties which (from Mulan and every other humans point of view) happend 200 years ago. Instead of doubting his presumptuous nature and intentions, she feels the need to testify, apologize and essentially commit suicide.
She should know this plays in Solis hands and is a betrayal to the people serving under her.
I think Xu isn´t fit for command, she seems much too traumatized of the event with the nanomachines. She is easy to influence, in the face of this danger (titans) she´s fast to give up and hope for the best instead of taking actions.
Could you do better, or are you a back-seat driver.
Actually, Solis will only sacrifice the lives of Empire citizens if it is necessary in order to kill the human astronauts. But Mùlán has now seen enough of Solis to know that he’ll try to kill the human astronauts no matter how many innocent lives are lost in the process. So she’s decided to minimize the loss of life by sacrificing herself and her crew. While that does play into Solis’s hands somewhat she’s now convinced that humans and titans are very similar, meaning that despite what Solis thinks, war can still be averted by good diplomacy.
“So she’s decided to minimize the loss of life by sacrificing herself and her crew.” – So if you´re faced with a psychopath with the clear intention of murdering you the correct course of actions (as a commanding officier) is to “minimize the loss of life”, accepting his agenda and kill the people who trusted you? Even if she´s a pacifist I don´t see how her decisions make much sense.
The options here are:
1. Her and her crew die
or
2. Her and her crew die, along with everyone else on Titan Station.
I think her decision makes perfect sense.
The thing is, Solis also wants Niall to die (so he won’t “defect”). He said so clearly before.
I don’t think Xù has any right to decide for him.
If Niall manages to get to earth, the humans close the physics gap in one titan year, close the technology gap in 2 titan years, and can have a fleet in 3. Not 100.
Having the perfect blueprint for new technologies and building those technologies at an industrial level are two very different things. The massive cost in money and raw material would drag things down a bit more than that think, but yeah, it would considerably accelerate things.
So wanting to kill Niall makes sense for Solis, yes.
My point was, if Xù can maybe make that call for her crew (and that’s debatable), she can’t make it for Niall too. And I assume Solis will want Niall to die with the rest of the crew or no deal.
Why does Solis want Niall dead? In his eyes, he’s just a pet.
3 titan years is 20 years. Building stuff where you don’t have to make false starts (because you’ve got a guy who has all the answers about what’s going to work) at least doubles your rate of progress. Think where we were in 1975 as compared to today.
It’s still a massive amount of ressources to find. Normal technological progress pays for itself : you build something new, you sell it, and that pays to build something a bit newer. Here, we’re talking about a massive technological jump in a bunch of different areas. You’re gonna have to suddenly come up with the money and raw ressources for that.
So yes, a big shortcut, but not as short as you think.
Besides, some of those technologies that work great for Titans might not be optimal for humans (for obvious reasons) and might need to be refined for human use.
@smoki : no, Solis knows Niall and other humans aren’t just pets. He knows they’re just as smart as Titans which is why he thinks they are a threat. Niall is not only a very smart human, he knows advanced Titan technology. Letting Niall live now is taking a risk that knowledge could make it back to Earth.
@Nighteye, my mistake about pet thing but Solis want to destroy earth anyway immediatly human crew die or not!
If Solis really believes that humans are THAT dangerous..then he should implement the final solution…
Kill them all….
All ….
Including the non-terran humans. It would make sense. Even the pets that have shown to learn and adapt should be killed. Lest they team up with the Terrans and turn on their Titan oppressors.
Logical right?
For Ziah Solis humans are the personification of evil itself. The act of first contact is to him welcoming evil with open arms. That is why he specifically wants the crew of the Lem killed as a symbolic act of rejecting evil. If he succeeds in executing the crew then other humans and eventually other non titans and ultimately other titans will take their place as the representation of evil.
That is why I think Bass ought to tell Solis that Ted and Hala are off station. It would be even better to tell him that they will be rescued by Gyfjon and then be escorted by Bass to Archavia to be presented to the emperor as representatives of Earth for official first contact. Once Solis knows that then his rationale for killing the others falls apart.
“.. like animals to be butchered. Packed them into small rooms and poisoned them.”
“Now take them to the detention room and poison them!”
So I’m curious how long is the statute of limitations for guilt going to be? My guess it is infinite. Nice speech..yup we are horrible and deserve to die because of what our ancestors did.. Generational guilt in perpetuity…
So basically Contact is a novel length lecture on the sins and evils of our species..Or I should say certain subsets of our species. The funny thing is I kind of agree with Solis on some aspects..Humans can be fucked up bastards in many areas.
Solis represents the prosecution (judgement) of our species in the mind of the author (guessing here). I have heard variations of this argument to the extent that humans doesn’t even deserve to be in space because of our past sins…
You realize Solis is the bad guy… right?
Hmmm… uhh…..ummm…. yeah 🙂
The funny thing about bad guys is that there is always a kernel of truth in what they say
Well written ones anyway.
“They’re evil, Aertimus. Evil to the core.” Ziah Solis
“Only a Sith deals in absolutes.” the other Obi-Wan
Or anybody else that uses fear for motivation.
Unless the someone has codes that override Solis’, the humans are screwed. Solis has turned his office into a bunker, so it will take time to get to him. I don’t trust Solis. I think he’s going to try to silence the Titans on the station as well.
Lemm is passing info on to the palace so if they have an override code she might be able to use it to release Solis lock.
I’m sure there’s a failsafe in their systems for when the emperor needs to oust someone in power. I’m sure the moment he issues Solis’s termination, all standing orders will be automatically rescinded and his override codes will be released.
There IS such a system. It’s been stated before. But apparently, there’s a law that says the Emperor needs reports, by 3 different persons, of 3 different crimes commited by the Navarchos Imperii to actually do it.
Solis actually taunted the Floor Leader about finding 2 more. I’m surprise he doesn’t even contemplate the possibility that the Emperor will break the law for the greater good, say gorram it and kill the codes anyway.
Don’t think he realized that Lemm could manage a nearly direct connection to the emperor. So now he’s got the reports of a flag officer and two captains. That’s three right there.
Kir sacrificing himself was pretty much a given. I would have liked for Tig to kick Navir in the nads for that ! 😀
Xù’s decision is honorable but I’m not sure it’s the right one. Or it might just be smokescreen.
Can I just say ? Solis’s monologue about all of Humanity’s most horrible crimes was way, way, over the top. I know the liberal tone of Contact is way more heavy-handed than in the other stories, but come on ! Could it possibly have been more obvious and in your face ?
It is paragraphs of “humans are such horrible oppressors”, but
a) over-the-top is right in character for Solis at the moment
b) they really are horrible things and
c) Xù’s sacrifice at the end shows humanity in a very positive light. So I’d say it was handled well.
Xu’s action a smokescreen? Possibly if they’ve found a way to do a holoprojection of the crew into the detention cell that’s good enough to fool whatever sensors Solis can use to scan the cell.
Hmmm, at this point I don’t think there is any reason to put a lot of trust in the naviarchos imperii doing what he has promised. Alex still has the right answer but while they search for the elusive red wire they need to keep Solis talking. After that little speech of his the emperor needs to call him up and let him vent his paranoid frustrations in return for not gassing the crew. Another thought is that he’s fixated on killing the entire crew of the Lem as a way to make first contact never happen, irrational though that may be. Ted & Hala are out of his control now and if someone tells him that news it might cause his whole scheme to collapse in his own twisted mind.
well Kir redeemed himself. good for him his soul can peace. Unless Emperor removed with Speedy’s Gonzalez style, this situation is fucked up. Mulan should have take her decision because others record goodbye messages but it’s the right decision!
Putting myself in Aerti’s shoes (insert obligatory joke about my fitting in the space for the big toe), that’s not really Xú’s choice to make.
He’s in command there and it’s his job to protect everybody there, not to gas the humans. Especially if he wants to avoid a war with Earth. It’s nice of her to offer and she can make choices for her crew, but she can’t make the choice for him.
Poor Aerti has barely been able to get a word in edgewise in this chapter let alone make a command decision. Anyway since Xu’s noble speech “If our choice is the death of a few, or the death of many, we choose to minimize the damage.” pretty much quotes Spock before his death that really wasn’t death I’m thinking that the trick will be to make Solis think he’s accomplished his mission and killed the Lem crew without it really happening.
ps: replace ‘because’ by ‘before’ regarding my 1st comment!
I get the impression that only after talking with Ziah Solis just now did Aertimus and Mùlán realize that there was no chance of calling Solis’s bluff about killing the humans even at the cost of the lives of everybody else on Titan Station; Ziah is so convinced that humanity needs to be stopped that any and all casualties along the way are justified as necessary sacrifices. Presumably this is why Mùlán made her decision just now instead of earlier, as well as the reason Aertimus is going along with her decision. If your only choices are “the crew of the Stanislaw Lem dies” and “the crew of the Stanislaw Lem as well as everyone else on Titan Station dies” then the choice is obvious.
Not if he has to do the killing himself. Remember that Kir needed to actively flood the cell with Zamik. Solis did not do this remotely.
After Kir and his men rigged everything up they transferred control to Ziah. It was Ziah who activated the system the first time, and who will be doing it now.
From chapter eighteen:
“Centurum Oden…have all Titans cleared the cell?”
“No, sir.”
“Clear them,” Solis said. “By force if you must. Ten minute countdown is active….now.”
And from this chapter:
Take the humans to the detention cell; I will reconfigure the ventilation system to harm only those in the cell.
I missed that, but it doesn’t change my point. Can the humans open and close the door to the cell by themselves? No, they probably can’t reach the button. He’s have to do it for them, and while such behavior might be acceptable in “24”, it’s not acceptable anywhere else.
Early on Bass asked Solis what was the end game to all of this. Before he allows Xu and her crew to walk into the cell it might be a good time to repeat the question. When Solis kills the crew his fear becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy: The martyred humans becoming the rallying point for all non-titans and increasing numbers of titans themselves to view xenophobics like Solis as the far greater threat. If he takes his finger off the trigger there will still be a political debate he could still have some slim hope of winning although the more rational rest of the universe knows better.
And Kir redeemed himself, making it right. Oh, Glory! So many sacrificing themselves for good and honor. What heroes we have developed. Xu is worthy of her command, and so is Aerti. The emperor can remove Solis, but perhaps not in time. Holy cow, what a mess.
I see no email notice for this chapter. Just for your general information… But I managed to find it on my own… ;-}. Happy, happy, joy, joy, joy!
That last bit where they all felt they were going to die, wow that was really good. Xu made the brave choice, and honestly even if the worst happens I feel Solis plans would backfire. Hell play this conversation to the legislature and I feel first (official) contact would be all but assured. Play it to Earth, along with Solis being executed, and there’s not a question of war.
Next chapter is going to be a doozy no matter the outcome.
Two corrections:
The holocaust claimed 11 million lives, not 6. That includes Gypsies, homosexuals, communists and the disabled. 6 million is just Jews.
WWII ended with two fission bombs, not fusion.
I assume D.X. Machina wrote it that way on purpose, to show that while Solis has read some stuff about Earth history he didn’t study it deeply and therefore has some of the details incorrect.
Perhaps. 6 vs 11 is a common mistake, possibly due to Jews getting more political clout post-WWII than the Roma or (until recently) gay people.
Fusion vs fission? Could be a mistake on either of their parts. There was about one titan year between the first fission (1945) and first fusion bomb (1952).
Yeah, it bugged me too, but Faeriehunter makes a good point. DX is very good at recent history, but everyone makes typos, so let’s get his response first.
FYI: 3 million jews died came from Poland. Among them were my grandparents and aunts and uncles (10 total) . After the war only 10,000 remained. The localized level of hatred was so visceral that a couple of pogroms was organized in the Polish countryside – after the war.
For a couple of decades after WWII there was not much talk or discussion about what went on. It wasn’t until 1970s that the general public really knew what happened.
Yes about 11 million died in the camps but jews were the primary targets..Sooo if you are targeted for death for being just who you are and the world doesn’t give a shit, you would be motivated too to let people know what happened…And the world didn’t give a shit (for the most part – there are many notable exceptions)
FYI
Pogrom definition:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pogrom#After_World_War_II
Fusion bomb? news to me….
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pure_fusion_weapon
I think there have now been two events that Solis has not predicted in his grand scheme: Sally Ride’s transmission to the Xifos, and Lemm’s transmission straight to the Emperor.
These two events have pretty much guaranteed the failure of his plan. The Emperor will make damn sure that diplomacy will win out before it comes to hostilities, before Solis’s plan to goad Earth into a war comes to fruition.
On the other side, Earth isn’t the savage place he’s become convinced it is. As I’ve mentioned before, in his study on the subject, he’s left out the context of the perception of time. 100 years? Try over 600. 30? Try 200. When he sees Earth’s history through his own perception of time, it compresses all these acts down into just a few generations when in fact it is dozens. He also lacks the full story, as it is obvious that he really only saw the information that matched up with his and Gerhatt’s views. A fairly textbook example of confirmation bias.
1492AD to 2155AD = 663 Earth years or 102 Archavian years.
Didn’t feel like doing the math, which is why I used the qualifier “over”.
Should have seen that coming. The Emplrer better hurry up and take out Solis! He has five minutes. Oh Lord almighty this is seriously coming down to the wire! It’s very nearly painful to wait for the next update.
Well, the situation is pretty desperate. Guess it’s up to the Emperor now.
“Packed them into small rooms and poisoned them.” Hm, sounds strangely familiar. *looks at what Solis was/is going to do the Stanislaw Lem crew*
As I suspected from Aertimus’s command in the previous chapter, he was underestimating how committed Solis is to provoking war between Earth and the Empire. There was no way that Ziah was going to hold back on deploying the zarim just because he’d be killing titans too.
Say, can/did the Sally Ride send a message to Earth? It’s pretty important that Earth’s leaders are brought up to speed on what’s really going on.
zamik, not zarim
I’m kind of wondering about what Zamik is, especially considering that it is not mentioned in the wiki. I’m wondering if it’s going to figure later in the story.
I imagine most space stations and bases in the empire have a supply of the stuff on hand for dealing with pests. They’re traffic hubs, so it stands to reason that some pests get dropped off, as was shown in Nomad when Luke was attacked by that bug.
It seems to be hooked into environmentals and can be used to fumigate anything from individual rooms all the way up to the entire base. Which is efficient and free of danger if the system doesn’t get hijacked by a rogue madman with all sorts of clearance.
But is it really deadly to humans while sparing titans?
Is it going to turn out to be agent orange or Raid or some such?
Solis’s assertions aside, humans are considered cute pets. Lots of places on Earth have bug spray. Do you know any place that stocks cat spray?
The previous two chapters specifically say that zamik is for pest control. And it’s not that titans are unharmed, just that Solis had set the concentration of the stuff so that while all humans will die, the titans will “experience dizziness, vomiting, nausea, double vision” but eventually recover. Unless they’re too sick, young or old, then they’ll die too.
The difference in lethality is probably just a result of humans being a lot smaller than titans.
I know what Solis said. It remains to be seen what actually happens. I don’t take his word for anything. We so far haven’t seen humans and titans reacting differently to any chemical except soda, and that was more comic relief than anything else.
Well, I guess we’ll know in a few days.
Sally Ride was transmitting on Archavian frequency. Unless they had time to reconfigure again before losing orbit, I doubt it.
I had overlooked it earlier, but at one point Ted is telling Hala to record a last message for her family. Most likely the Sally Ride can communicate on more than one frequency at once.
Or for it to be picked up out of their wreckage or derelict, depending on whether Ted can successfully skip his ship off the atmosphere.
The Sally Ride is just an exploratory vehicle. The Stanisaw Lem might have more than one comm system, but the Sally Ride probably doesn’t. It’s not meant to be full autonomous.
Even today most of the orbiters & rovers at Mars can link through other orbiters to relay data to Earth. It’s highly likely before Lem & Sally Ride show up at Titan there is already several TDRS relays in orbit positioned to provide nearly continuous link with both vessels. Both vessels will also have multiple transmitters & receivers so there would be no problem with having simultaneous links with both Earth and the titan vessels.
Seems likely that might have been overlooked by the authors. Seems unlikely that the titans would allow humans to set up satellites in orbit. Also, the Lem never got a chance to deploy their own before the Sally Ride got hit.