Bringing Stella Home (48 page)

“
So what are you doing
about it?” Sholpan asked.

“
I promised to send a
detachment of troops to restore order,” said Qasar. “Someone has to
enforce discipline.”

Did you even think to find
out what they’re rioting about before you sent in the troops to
murder them?

“
It does sound tiring,” she
conceded.

“
By the gods, yes. I feel
like a sublighter lost between stars. The planetborn are leaving in
droves—half of the smaller colonies are almost abandoned, and the
ones that are still inhabited are half deserted. To abandon their
own people so dishonorably—can you believe it?”

Yes I can.

Qasar sighed. “There’s too much damn
work to do, and no way to get these lazy planetborn to do
it.”

“
I spoke with some of my
friends today,” said Sholpan. “They gave me some information that
we might find helpful.”

“
Oh?” Qasar said, raising
an eyebrow. “What did you learn?”

That my people are
starving. That you’re killing them.

“
I learned—I learned that
they’ve been having some problems. They—”

“
Oh, not more problems,”
Qasar groaned. “A general doesn’t fly every damned ship in his
fleet—why must I babysit these useless—”

“
You don’t have to,” she
blurted, her cheeks red with anger. “These people are perfectly
capable of running things themselves. They want to! It’s
just—”

“
Just what,
exactly?”

Sholpan took a deep breath, choosing
her words carefully. “Milord, the people would rule themselves if
they could only take care of their basic needs. Take my people, for
example—their food supplies are dwindling, and they have no way to
replenish them. When the people starve, it’s no wonder that
discipline breaks down.”

“
Why are they starving?”
Qasar asked. “Can’t they produce more food?”

“
No,” said Sholpan, “all of
the food imports come through Kardunash IV, and for some reason,
the suppliers have stopped—”

“‘
Import’? What does that
word mean?” He stared at her, genuinely puzzled.

“
Import?” she asked.
“You’ve never heard of imports?”

“
No. Should I
have?”

“
It—it’s a planetborn
thing. It’s when you trade for goods and services instead of
producing them yourself.”

“
And they do this for their
basic needs? Why?”

Sholpan blinked in disbelief at
Qasar’s ignorance. “Because some communities are better at
producing certain things than others. Take my home, for example.
It’s a mining outpost in the middle of an asteroid field. If we had
to produce all our own food, almost a third of our living space
would be dedicated to hydroponics. But Kardunash IV is a
terrestrial planet with a thriving biosphere—it has more than
enough resources to feed the entire system. That’s why we import
our food—because it’s cheaper to let them produce it for
us.”

“
Kardunash IV? You mean the
fourth planet?”

“
Yes. Why?”

“
We slagged that world at
the start of the invasion. The surface has been utterly
wasted.”

Sholpan’s eyes widened, and her
stomach felt sick. “You mean, the entire world has
been—”

“
Annihilated? Yes. We made
short work of the place.”

A wave of nausea swept through her
body. Her legs went weak, and her arms began to shake.

“
You mean, they’re all
dead? Everyone?”

“
Yes.”

“
Why?” she cried, half
screaming.

“
Kardunash IV was the
strongest world in the system, was it not? We could not expect to
win the war without defeating our enemy at their strongest
point.”

“
But—but there were
billions of people living there. Billions! How—how could
you?”

Qasar frowned. “Would you have us
fight all those billions of people man to man? With our limited
forces?”

“
You wouldn’t have had
to—they were all innocent civilians!”

“
And what is a ‘civilian’?”
asked Qasar, clearly annoyed by the turn the discussion had taken.
“I hear this word over and over—is it some term the planetborn use
for their women?”

Sholpan opened her mouth,
but found herself at a complete loss.
Stars,
she thought to herself,
he really doesn’t know.

“
What’s done is done,” said
Qasar. “Weeping and moaning about it will change nothing. If
Kardunash IV is gone, how else can we feed the people?”

Think,
Sholpan told herself, trying in vain to force her mind to
clear. Tears burned in her eyes, but she clenched her fists and bit
her tongue until the worst of it was passed.

“
They only need enough to
weather the immediate crisis,” she said, her body still trembling.
“The key is to build up capacity as soon as possible. Hydroponics
modules are relatively cheap to make, but we’re going to need
thousands of them if we don’t want everyone to die of starvation.
And they’ll need supplies until the hydroponics start
producing.”

“
I see,” said Qasar. “Most
of our ships have a three-year supply of foodstuffs. Will that be
enough?”

“
I hope. What about the
modules?”

Qasar waved his hand. “Not a problem.
I’ll set my engineers to work on it immediately.”

He’s listening to
me,
Sholpan realized with a start.
He’s actually considering my advice.

“
That’s not all,” she said,
emboldened. “There will be other needs, I’m sure. Food is just the
beginning.”

“
And what do we do to
prepare for those?”

“
We—we should form a
governing council for the system. Gather delegates from the
surviving settlements and have them draft a
constitution.”

Qasar’s eyes narrowed. “You mean to
set up a council to undercut my authority?”

“
Not at all,” said Sholpan,
leaning forward. “It’ll only be for domestic affairs. We want them
to govern themselves, right?”

Qasar nodded wearily. “We certainly
do.”

“
It shouldn’t be too hard
to draw something up, if we pattern it after the government that
was in place before—before the invasion.”

“
And you know how to do
that?”

“
Yes,” said Sholpan. She
paused. “If you would delegate to me some of your authority, I’m
sure—”

“
Consider it done. Anything
you need, let me know.”

Sholpan nodded and rose shakily to her
feet. “I will,” she said. “And now, if you’ll excuse me, I must be
going.”

“
Why?” Qasar asked. “It’s
so pleasant talking with you.”

Because if I don’t leave
right now, I’m going to have a nervous breakdown.

“
You need your rest,” she
said. “You look tired.”

Qasar nodded. “Very well. You may
leave.”

Sholpan walked to the door, her legs
numb. Before palming the access panel, though, she stopped and
turned around.

“
W-why?” she asked. “Why
are you doing this?” The forcefulness in her voice caught them both
by surprise.

“
Doing what?”

“
Fighting this war.
Slagging entire worlds. Conquering every system from here to—to the
end of the universe. Why?”

Qasar smiled at her as if she were a
child. “Because the great god Tenguri has given us the universe,
Sholpan,” he said. “The high shaman prophesied this many years ago,
long before the Generals convened the High Council. And if the
great god has given us the universe, who are we to refuse our
destiny?”

Sholpan blinked. “Your
destiny?”

“
Yes. We conquer because it
is our destiny. You can’t run from destiny, can you?”

“
No,” Sholpan said softly
as the door hissed open. “I guess you can’t.”

* * * * *

Dammit, boy,
thought Danica as she ran down the hallway with
James in tow.
Did you leave your brains on
the ship, or are you just trying to get us killed?

She rounded a corner and paused long
enough to scan her wrist console for an alternate route to the
docking yard. Behind them the shouting grew louder—a few more
moments, and their options would start to become real limited.
Figuring she could read a map just as well in the maintenance
corridor, she keyed open the nearest access door and tossed the boy
in.

“
Where are we going?” James
asked as the door slid shut behind them. “Stella is—”

“
Shh!” Danica hissed. “Stay
down. And give me this!” She snatched the pistol from his
hands.

“
I’m sorry,” said James,
his face as pale as death. “Believe me, I’m—”

“
Stay quiet and follow me,”
she whispered.

A quick glance at the map on her wrist
console showed a nearby shaft that connected with a side corridor
running toward the docks. Without a second thought, Danica started
running.

We don’t have much
time,
she
thought
to herself.
Security is probably going to
freeze
all outgoing traffic as soon as the
alarm goes station-wide.
That meant that
they had only a matter of minutes to get back to the
ship.

“
Where are we going?” asked
James, breathing heavily behind her.

“
We’re getting the hell out
of here.”

“
What?”

He stopped in his tracks, forcing her
to turn and face him.

“
We’re aborting the
mission, Ensign,” she said. “It’s over—we failed.”

Even in the meager light of the wrist
console’s LCD display screen, she could read the horror and
disbelief on his face.

“
No,” he said. “I didn’t
come—”

“
Don’t tell me what you
came for,” she retorted. “The way you’ve botched things, we’ll be
lucky to get out alive. Now let’s stop wasting time and get back to
the ship.”

“
No,” said James. “I’m not
going.”

“
What?”

“
I said I’m not
going.”

Danica stared at him and frowned. His
voice was calmer now, and his cheeks weren’t quite so pale. His
face had a certain serenity to it, the way someone looks when
they’re about to say goodbye.

“
Ensign, you can’t possibly
be serious.”

“
I didn’t come this far to
turn away and run.”

“
They’ll find you and kill
you before you get to her.”

“
Maybe.”

“
James—be reasonable. Anya
and Ilya are waiting for us. Do you want me to leave them to
die?”

“
No. I understand. Leave
without me.”

Danica’s stomach twisted into a
knot.

“
Ensign McCoy,” she said,
her voice shaky despite her best efforts to control it, “I order
you to come with me.”

“
I can’t,” he said. “I’m
sorry. If I ran away from this chance, I’d never be able to live
with myself.”

“
Ensign!”

“
Thank you for all your
help, Captain. Goodbye.” Without another word, he turned around and
headed back the way they had come.

Danica felt rooted to the spot, as if
her boots were riveted to the floor. In the darkness, the
maintenance corridor felt like a tunnel with two ends—a turning
point in her life that could only be crossed once. On the one hand,
she could return to the ship and escape with her life. On the
other, she could throw her lot in with James and go with him to the
bitter end. One way or the other, she had to make a choice, and she
had to make it now.

And then she realized that
she’d already made her choice, the moment she’d left the
Tajji Flame.

“
McCoy! Hold
up!”

“
What is it?” James asked,
stopping.

“
I’m coming with
you.”

A smile spread across his face. Before
Danica could order him to keep moving, he turned and sprinted down
the corridor, so fast she could hardly keep up.

As she ran, she lifted her
wrist console and sent a message back to the transport:
Alpha squad lost. Abort mission and return to
base immediately.
The screen blinked, then
flashed confirmation that they’d received the message.

At least some of us will
come out of this alive,
Danica told
herself.
No one will say that I didn’t
take care of my men
.

The thought hardly comforted her, but
that didn’t matter anymore.

* * * * *

Anya leaned forward in her seat on the
Hameji transport and glanced down at her wrist console. Her blood
ran cold as she read Danica’s message.