Date Point: 14Y 4M 4D AV
Washington DC, United States of America, Earth
Esther Blum
Being a high-powered lobbyist/attorney meant that a phone ringing between midnight and dawn was usually news of something bad and relevant happening. The adage of the Chinese symbol for ‘crisis’ being a synergy of ‘danger’ and ‘opportunity’ never failed to occur to Esther in those dark moments between awakening and answering.
“Yes?”
“You’ll want to turn your TV on. Pull up the ESNN feed,” came the voice of Harvey, one of the leading execs behind this plush assignment of hers with The Tektwn Conglomerate.
Esther fumbled for the remote, found it, and turned the TV on. It took a moment of squinting blearily before her eyes adjusted, but she found the buttons for the channel guide and found ESNN.
…Sources within AEC have refused to comment, however, beginning at dawn this morning, a number of the Weaver assault shuttles landed at the Israeli Forward Operating Base, and a team of engineers left with equipment. Immediately following that, we’ve seen an up-tick in incoming Gaoian refugees through every available portal here in Folctha, John…
Esther muted the channel, as the talking heads continued to blather on. On the screen, several apparently new bio-field scanners were being shown, with the announcer announcing Something Of Great Importance.
“Okay, so there’s military movement on Cimbrean. Fill this in for me, Harv.”
“Esther, my sources are telling me something has gone really badly wrong with AEC on Gao. They are cycling refugees through as fast as the generators can refill the capacitors, and the Israelis are putting up those bio-scanner field things as fast as they can for anybody coming in from offworld.”
“Sounds like an outbreak of some kind,” she mused. “People get funny in situations like that.”
“An outbreak in the refugees, you think?”
“Make sense, doesn’t it?” she pointed out. “If they’re screening everybody coming through immediately, then they’re obviously worried about contagion somehow. Let’s hope it isn’t cross-species or something.”
“Yeah, it does. You’re right; I guess we’ll have to see. Anyway—the reason I called you is, if they’re moving ahead with evacuating en masse like this, then they’re probably going to want to get started on that Female colony or whatever. We’re in a good place for getting involved, but you’re going to have to jump on it.”
“I’m on it. Let me get up and get moving. I’ll call you back in a couple of hours and let you know where we are.”
Date Point: 14Y 4M 5D AV
AEC Command Center Camp Outfield, Lavmuy Spaceport, Gao
Colonel Martin Schul
Two days before, Colonel Schul had been desperately praying that their Patient 0 was an isolated case, and knowing that she almost certainly was not.
Within hours of the initial meeting with everyone, however, his prayers had proved fruitless when Patients 1, 2, and 3 had shown up, and after that he’d stopped keeping track. It really was almost an apocalyptic situation on top of all that the Gao had already suffered; a cross-species infection that was airborne, was contagious before the onset of frank symptoms, in a tightly packed refugee population that was already weakened, underfed and vulnerable, and who had no natural defenses of any kind to an infection from one of the highest-classified planets in the known galaxy.
At least, he thought, it was only one strain, and thus far they had managed to contain it to the one, major, refugee camp. It hadn’t gotten out into the general population, and they’d kept it from infecting the refugees on Cimbrean, which was good. Great Father Daar had ordered the evacuation of the entire refugee population, though, and Females, cubs, and Males who were infected were sent through to Cimbrean and safety in staggering numbers.
The Dark Eye nanofactory had been called on to produce additional jump gates, additional generators, bio-field arrays, food, and water. It had taken the better part of the last two days with engineers working around the clock…but now they were able to transition refugees at a truly enormous rate, and he began to hope that perhaps, just maybe, this might end up being a bullet dodged.
And nobody had died yet.
The response from the CDC had shown up in amazingly short order, and they’d started mapping things out. Their assessment wasn’t nearly as rosy as his half-hoped daydreams—they said that there was a high likelihood of the virus escaping into the general Gaoian population, and to Gaoians, at least, it was highly contagious. What nobody could really say was what the effects would be for infection that didn’t get caught and purged by a bio-field immediately. Nobody wanted to know, except in a very academic sense. For now, they were staying abreast of it.
But it wasn’t going to last. They all knew it. They could feel it.
Date Point: 14Y 4M 1W AV
Office of the Great Father, Highmountain Fortress, Gao
Sister Naydra
The excursion to Tiritya Island on Cimbrean felt like almost another lifetime ago to Naydra, as she sat and waited for the Great Father to return from yet another field expedition. She knew he was due back at his normal working office soon, and she knew he had a long working evening ahead of him. The Clan of Females, or, more accurately, Mother-Supreme Yulna, had identified a problem with the building of their Grand Commune that the Great Father was in a unique position to fix, and so Naydra had volunteered/insisted to be the one to take it directly to him. The consensus was that he tended to respond more urgently to things that a Female asked him in person, and less so through an emailed message.
This wasn’t going to take long, but it was important.
Naydra had learned a thing about patience from her experience under the loathsome Koruum’s filthy paws. Waiting was often simpler if one thought of it as choosing the battlefield for a fight, rather than putting off what one wanted to actually be doing. She got the feeling it was a lesson that was going to come in handy dealing with Daar as both a Male and as the Great Father.
His heavy tread up what seemed like an endless staircase was something she could hear coming nearly a full minute or two before he actually pushed the door open and ducked under the lintel to avoid cracking his head on it. Just as he was entering, she heard him sniff through that enormous muzzle, and his eyes met hers while he shut the door behind himself, unsurprised at her presence.
“Sister Naydra,” he rumbled, giving her a nod. Irritatingly formal.
“Great Father Daar,” she said, duck-nodding in deference as she stood. “I am aware you have many things yet to see to today. I came to give you a very quick update on our progress, and ask for your help with something minor, but important.” Naydra picked up the box she had brought with her and held it, nonchalantly.
“Come in, then, Sister,” he said, waving her into his office. She followed him, and sat on the Naxas-leather covered sofa inside that had been smoothed over decades, perhaps centuries, of being sat upon.
He stood behind his desk, stretching, for a moment, then turned to her. “How can I help, Sister?”
“Great Father, the evacuation has accelerated. We are moving the Cimbrean Female and cub refugee population in its entirety to the south side of Tiritya Island, in the lowlands between the two major rivers, as you may recall.” He nodded.
“I came to ask, if you would have a word with the Human governments from Earth. Mother-Supreme Yulna has been approached by several private agencies that are eager to do business with us, but they cannot yet because of governmental pressure and taxation at home.”
The Great Father regarded her for a long moment, then looked out the window, thinking. Finally, he spoke.
“Sister, I can ask that they allow some kind of dispensation, but I’m limited in what I can arrange with Human governments. ‘Member, there is more than one to talk to, and…I don’t think I can get you what you’re asking for.”
“Is there anything more you can do?” she asked.
“I can ask…I can make an ‘inquiry’, as they call it, and let them know this’s important to us, but anything more’n they might take it as interference in their government process. You gotta remember, they don’t do things like we do.”
Naydra duck-nodded in acknowledgement. “Yes, Great Father. I will leave it to you to handle.” She straightened. “I must be going—I have a great many other things to see to, and you are busy.”
The Great Father nodded at her again. “Thank you for coming, Sister. I will see to your request.” Behind his eyes, she fancied she could feel him wanting to say more but restraining himself.
She set the box she had brought in with her on his desk and patted the top. “Here. Something for you. You can open it after I leave.” With that, she nodded again and left.
The door closed behind her, and the Great Father was left regarding the box sitting on his desk. After a moment, he pressed the top of it, and with a click the stasis field inside deactivated and the top opened, releasing steam and the pungent scent of fresh corn dogs with a mild brown mustard sauce in a little dish.
He chuffed in amusement, and reached in for one.
Date Point: 14Y 4M 1W 2D AV
Refugee Camp, Tiritya Island, Cimbrean
Rav Simel Moshe Harel, IDF
The twin motivations of desperation and emergency made for interesting solutions. Any military force was familiar with the idea of making unlikely solutions out of impossible problems, but, Moshe thought to himself, perhaps never before had a solution quite like this, composed of equal parts advanced alien technology, duct tape, and prayer been created in such a short period of time.
The eye-bending black flash and thump of an incoming jump caught Moshe’s eye as he sat briefly for a rest. They’d been going since that morning, laying out measurements for what the Colonel said was going to be at least five more commercial-size portals capable of moving perhaps two or three hundred refugees at a time, each. This arrival wasn’t stuff, though, it was people. Gaoians, Female ones, and unless Moshe missed his guess, these were leaders from the camps outside of Folctha.
He ambled over, break-time apparently over. [“Good morning, Mothers!”] he said in his best Gaori, to much chittering and amused ear-wiggling.
“Good morning, Sergeant,” said the one in the lead..Mother…Ginai, he thought, in English.
“We’ve been busy marking things out this morning, Mother. The Colonel says that we’ll be moving in power supplies in a few hours, and then your people are going to send through additional parts for more gates.”
She duck-nodded. “We came to see that the camp is laid out properly. This camp is going to be longer-term, until we can build the Grand Commune here.”
“Any guidance will be more than welcome, Mother,” Moshe said. “Right now we’re just doing the basics, getting the first gate set up.”
“Do you still have your flier available?” she asked.
“I believe it’s still here, yes. What did you have in mind?”
“If you would arrange a flight crew, Sergeant, I’d appreciate it. Mother Kyrie and I want to see the site that Naydra identified as a good place to begin building. The northwest coast, I believe it was,” Ginai said. The other Mother named, Kyrie, bounced a little.
“I would be happy to, Mother. Give me just a few minutes.” With that, Moshe hustled off to find the requested flight crew, who he was pretty sure were waiting to see if they were going to need to ferry anything or anyone back to Folctha. Sure enough, they were onsite and quite irritated at having to sit and wait. In a few minutes, the Weaver was warming up and the two Mothers boarded.
As they dusted off, Moshe turned to the remaining group of ten or eleven Mothers. “How may I help you, now?” he asked.
Date Point: 14Y 4M 1W 2D AV
Northwestern coastline, Tiritya Island, Cimbrean
Mother Ginai
Mother Ginai, being considerably older than most of the Females on Cimbrean, contented herself with settling into the seat on the now-aloft Weaver and putting on her headphones to listen to the chatter from the crew.
Kyrie, for her part, was excited to finally be riding in a Human machine, being piloted by Real Human Pilots, and was pestering the pilot and copilot with questions. She was one of the younger Females, and going by her ruddy, tightly-curled fur, very likely had a lot of Emberpelt in her background. Unexpectedly, she had shown quite an aptitude for working with the architects of Ironclaw and had been accepted as an Associate of theirs several years before.
Ginai contented herself with half-listening to the interchange, looking out the window and watching the landscape below. She knew it wasn’t going to be a long flight—the Weavers that the Humans had created were every bit as capable as a regular Dominion shuttle. More so, in fact. Her attention was arrested, though, when she heard the truly horrible sound of a Human that was trying to sing and failing in every conceivable way to produce a pleasing sound. He was apparently trying to teach Kyrie how to sing something called “A British Tar”.
Trying to decide whether to endure the continued pain of a tune being brutally murdered or the sound of the wind outside, she eventually opted for the latter. It didn’t help much.
They flew over a ridge of peaks crowned in snow and wreathed in clouds, descending into the decidedly cooler side of the island onto a rocky plateau that ended in a direct, plummeting drop into the ocean. There was plenty of room, and the pilot brought them down maybe a hundred meters from the cliffs. Almost before the doors were open, Kyrie had descended and was prowling around the site.
Ginai took her time. The younger Female was going to be evaluating things, she had no doubt, for a while. Despite the sea breeze ruffling her fur, the rocks were actually quite warm from the sun, and she sat in the lee of the transport enjoying the scent of fresh air and quiet.
She’d almost fallen asleep in the sun when her younger Sister came bouncing back over to her. She was here to get a report….so she got back to her feet.
“Well? Was Naydra right?” she asked without preamble.
“Most definitely,” Kyrie said enthusiastically. “This is all fairly middle-aged basalt base, geologically stabler than the other side of the island, and that,” she said, pointing at a wide bluff above them, “is ideally suited for a space elevator anchor, I think, if we were to plan with that in mind. We’re close enough to the equator for it.”
“What of other needs, Sister? Fresh water, food, and so on?”
Kyrie waved a paw dismissively. “Desalination is just as easy and probably less risky than drinking groundwater or out of a river anyway. It’s just an extra step, is all—there are even some Human communities on Earth that use that technology. We haven’t used it on Gao in decades, probably, but there’s no reason we can’t here.”
She looked around. “As far as food goes…I think the river valley on the other side should have plenty of space for livestock and agriculture. The soil is certainly fertile enough.”
Ginai surveyed the plateau. Already, it felt a little more like home than anywhere else she’d been in the last several months, and she allowed herself to feel hopeful at the thought.
“Let’s get back to the others.”
Date Point: 14Y 4M 2W 1D AV
AEC Command Center Camp Outfield, Lavmuy Spaceport, Gao
Colonel Martin Schul
Colonel Schul had begun to associate waking up, getting up, and getting ready for the day with a sense of hesitant dread. Every time he went to bed at the end of an unreasonably long day, it was with the apprehension that the other shoe he kept sensing would drop, would come down when he wasn’t at his post and ready. Metaphorically speaking. He didn’t really have a post so much as a mobile command center that was comprised of his boots, his phone, and his tablet.
Not that a new emergency happening when he was off duty was worse, per se, than when he was on…it’s just that he wouldn’t know about it until later.
Halfway through his coffee for the morning, he set the cup down and cursed.
The pandemic had escaped the refugee camps, and was loose in the general population.