Redemption Ark

Now, finally, they had some measure of their adversary. But what of Resurgam itself? There was no radio or other EM-band traffic coming from the system’s sole inhabited planet, but the colony had clearly not failed. Analysis of the atmosphere’s constituent gases revealed ongoing terraforming activity, with sizeable expanses of water now visible on the surface. The icecaps had withered back towards the poles. The air was warmer and wetter than it had been in nearly a million years. The infra-red signatures of surface flora matched the patterns expected from terran genestock, modified for cold, dry, low-oxygen survivability. Hot thermal blotches showed the sites of large brute-force atmospheric reprocessors. Refined metals indicated intense surface industrialisation. At extreme magnification, there were even the suggestions of roads or pipelines, and the occasional moving echo of a fat transatmospheric cargo vehicle, like a dirigible. The planet was certainly inhabited, even now. But whoever was down there was not much interested in communicating with the outside world.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ Scorpio told Clavain. ‘You came here to take the weapons, that’s all. There’s no need to make this any more complicated than it has to be.’

Clavain had been alone until the pig had visited him. ‘Just deal with the starship, is that it?’

‘We can start negotiations immediately if we transmit a beta-level proxy. They can have the weapons ready for us when we arrive. Nice quick turnaround and we’re away. The other ships won’t even have reached the system.’

‘Nothing’s ever that easy, Scorp.’ Clavain spoke with morose resignation, his eyes focused on the starfield beyond the window.

‘You don’t think negotiation will work? Fine.We’ll skip it and just come in with all guns blazing.’

‘In which case we’d better hope they don’t know how to use the hell-class weapons. Because if it comes to a straight fight, we won’t have a snowball’s chance.’

‘I thought that Volyova turning the weapons against us wasn’t going to be a problem.’

Clavain turned from the window. ‘Remontoire can’t promise me that our pacification codes will work. And if we test them too soon we give Volyova time to find a workaround. If such a thing exists, I’m pretty sure she’ll find it.’

‘Then we keep trying negotiation,’ Scorpio said. ‘Send the proxy, Clavain. It will buy us time and cost us nothing.’

The man did not answer him directly. ‘Do you think they understand what’s happening to their system, Scorpio?’

Scorpio blinked. Sometimes he had difficulty following the swerves and evasions of Clavain’s moods. The man was far more ambivalent and complex than any human he had known since his time aboard the yacht.

‘Understand?’

‘That the machines are already there, already busy. If they look into the sky, surely they can’t miss what is happening. Surely they must realise that it isn’t good news.’

‘What else can they do, Clavain? You’ve read the intelligence summaries. They probably don’t have a single shuttle down there. What can they do but pretend it isn’t happening?’

‘I don’t know,’ Clavain said.

‘Let us transmit the proxy,’ Scorpio said. ‘Just to the ship, tight-beam only.’

Clavain said nothing for at least a minute. He had turned his attention back to the window, staring out into space. Scorpio wondered what he hoped to see out there. Did he imagine that he could unmake that glint of light, the one that had signalled Galiana’s end, if he tried hard enough? He had not known Clavain as long as some of the others, but he viewed Clavain as a rational man. But he supposed grief, the kind of howling, remorse-filled grief Clavain was experiencing, could smash rationality to shards. The impact of so familiar an emotion as sadness on the flow of history had never been properly accounted for, Scorpio thought. Grief and remorse, loss and pain, sadness and sorrow were at least as powerful shapers of events as anger, greed and retribution.

‘Clavain…?’ he prompted.

‘I never thought there’d be choices this hard,’ the man said. ‘But H was right. The hard choices are the only ones that matter. I thought defecting was the hardest thing I had ever done. I thought I would never see Felka again. But I didn’t realise how wrong I was, how trivial that decision was. It was nothing compared with what I had to do later. I killed Galiana, Scorpio. And the worst thing is that I did it willingly.’

‘But you got Felka back again. There are always consolations.’

‘Yes,’ Clavain said, sounding like a man grasping for the last crumb of comfort. ‘I got Felka back. Or at least I got someone back. But she isn’t the way I left her. She carries the Wolf herself now, just a shadow of it, it’s true, but when I speak to her I can’t be sure whether it’s Felka answering or the Wolf. No matter what happens now, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to take anything she says at face value.‘