Into the Sea of Stars

Chapter 14

Not a word was said between the two as the same performance was repeated at half a dozen other colonies.

Ian knew he had been invited to the ritual display to be impressed. But for what purpose? Part of it, he guessed, was to judge his reaction. But by the informal way that he was treated, Ian suspected that Smith was looking for a contact that was not filled with ritual, nor blood kin, for that matter.

Finally a question almost anthropological in nature broke the silence.

"Why the swords? I mean, I've been observing your technological level and it's simply astounding. Why this anachronism? Now, don't take offense, but in my eyes swords are rather ridiculous in a technological level anywhere beyond the Napoleonic. It's even stranger when I can't trace any useful cultural lineage out of it. I mean, swords were never used in space in your time, at least, not in anything above a poorly written video thriller."

"But there is a cultural lineage," Smith replied. "There's a direct historical linkage that centers our society around the sword and the mystique of the warrior. One more stop, Ian Lacklin, and then I shall explain."

The adulation seemed to have put Franklin Smith in a jovial mood, and he laughed as he entered through the airlock into yet another golden room. Ian sat in the shuttle and waited as the waves of noise washed the interior. For several minutes he looked across the star-studded night, the familiar formations now changed, with some brighter, and others dimmed, or lost altogether. Finally he found the one he was looking for, almost lost in the harsh glare of Delta.

The chanting would soon be heard there, as well, Ian realized, and he, more than anyone else alive, would be the one responsible for the devastation to come. He, a historian, a studier of others, a bookworm lost in fantasies of the heroic past would be the cause. Ian suddenly realized that in this movement he might very well be the prime ingredient in the fate of an entire world.

As his eyes scanned the shuttle, Ian recognized the superior technology. Hell, they had a thousand-year head start, a thousand years without the long night, the plagues, the convulsive wars that followed. Only in the last two hundred years had Earth reemerged into the enlighten ment. For all practical purposes the only technological advantage his people had was the translight capability. In all others, they were sadly lacking. So now, thanks to his damnable curiosity, Earth's one small advantage would allow Smith to cross space in a matter of months-bring ing with him the fire and sword of vengeance.

The chants were still thundering as Smith slipped into the seat next to him, closed the airlocks, and broke free and away.

"The day we left Earth orbit," Smith suddenly stated, picking up on a question that Ian had already half for gotten, "we numbered just over one hundred thousand. The bastards who started the wars knew that we were trapped-we who were on that colony. Even if we made the engines, produced the sails, or deployed our ion packs, we were still trapped."

"Why?"

"Because the Earthside government forced one hundred thousand people aboard a colony designed for twenty-five thousand. It was such a crude analogy. Earth with her twelve billion had exceeded her carrying capacity, and those of us who protested and tried to alter that equation without resorting to war were forced onto a colony that had far exceeded its closed eco-capacity, as well. They knew we could only stay alive through massive trans shipments from Earth. Those bastards reasoned that if they were defeated, they could still destroy us outright or leave us in space to linger a slow death until we finally destroyed ourselves.

"I remember one of their leaders laughing at me when we had just reached solar system escape velocity. He said he would enjoy contemplating the ways that we would use to kill each other."

Smith stopped for a moment and looked straight in the direction of Sol and the Earth that he had escaped.

"I outlived you, you bastards!" Smith screamed. "You laughed at me and I beat you all. And I'll be back with billions to seek revenge."

"The sword," Ian asked, trying to divert Smith away from what appeared to be a potentially violent tirade.

"Yes, the sword, your question about the sword," Smith replied absently.

He looked off into space, as if searching for some distant, painful memory. "Consider this problem, Ian Lacklin. You are acknowledged as the great leader of a group. Be it through cunning, political stealth, charismatic awe, or, in the very rare case, through actual ability to rule. You have a closed system, there are one hundred thou sand people and you know that only twenty-five thousand will live. And you, Ian Lacklin, you alone can choose. What now would you do?"

Ian recoiled at the thought of the few possibilities. The harming of an insect was to him a moral question, and often he would catch a fly only to release it outside rather than kill it. True, he had played absurd "survival in the shelter" games while in graduate school, but this was different. The man before him was real and had faced that actual question-and had apparently solved it.

"I think I would have resigned or killed myself."

"Bullshit!" Smith thundered his response with such rage that Ian pulled back from him. "You sit here in your complacency and talk philosophical bullshit. First you absolve yourself of the problem, thereby attempting to make yourself morally superior. I hold such people in contempt. Complete contempt!"

"I'm not trying to show myself superior to you," Ian shouted back. "It's just that my mind rebels at finding a way to kill seventy-five thousand people."

Smith looked at Ian for a moment then smiled a sad, almost whimsical smile. "If any of my people had ever dared to speak to me like that, my followers would tear him apart. You know, I miss this. I truly miss this." He sighed and looked off into space for a moment. "Too bad it will have to end sometime.

"I still hold the moral whiners in contempt," Smith said, drawing the conversation back to its original path, "for they present an argument, such as nonviolence or disarmament and peace, while living in the safety of their sheltered lives. Let them truly be placed on the line, let them see their children starving in the name of peace, let them see their families bombed and raped-then see how their moral arguments stand.

"I think, Ian Lacklin, my pudgy, bespectacled, bookish professor, I think that if you were suddenly in the same situation as I…" His voice trailed away for a moment, as if the images he was arguing over were wavering before him like phantoms. "I think, Ian, that you, too, would finally learn to decide the fate of tens of thousands. Learn, at last, just how easy it really is. But back to the answer of your question, my friend."

He spoke a couple of quick commands into the nav system and the shuttle rolled into a different trajectory, aiming itself toward a close sweep of the small planet that was the source of Franklin Smith's strength. Then he turned back to their conversation.

"In short, Ian Lacklin, I had to devise a way to kill seventy-five thousand of my own people, otherwise all of us would die. Our council thought of raiding another col ony, but we had yet to build the necessary weapons, and anyhow, the colonies were already destroyed in the open ing stages of the war or far ahead of us on their trajec tories.

"So we had to take in the following considerations before cutting back on our population. Our ecosystem was susceptible to sabotage; a small group of malcontents could seize a key point-the reactor, the central control system, or one of a hundred other points-and thereby blackmail the rest. Therefore I was forced to move swiftly and to create a state of tight control. It had to be harsh, ruthless, and unswerving in loyalty; and most important, instantaneous to command without thought of personal self.

"I realized, Ian, that a system employing Bushido was the key."

"Bushido?"

"An ancient" word. Japanese, meaning a code of war riors' honor. It suited my needs perfectly. A system of feudal overlords with retainers who valued honor more than life; service to their clan's lord became the definition of their life. In short, Ian, it became the only way. I needed to instill discipline and an acceptance of death to serve the greater whole-a society where death was accept able."

He fell silent for a moment and looked away. And Ian noticed a tremor in his jaw, as if he was fighting for con trol.

"I had to kill seventy-five thousand so twenty-five thousand could live," he whispered. "And there was no escaping that trauma. No escape for Dr. Franklin Smith, professor of philosophy from Berkeley.

"Our governmental system had been democratic, but the ruling body of our unit came to me, knowing what had to be done. They knew a democratic system would deadlock over the question of who would die. They feared some of the malcontents' taking over, and knowing that I was the pacifist and philosopher, they felt comfortable with my becoming the Angel of Death. Oh, they could wash their hands of it then-the stigma would be carried by Smith. Let Smith kill them; afterward we'll deal with him. I begged them at first not to nominate me, but in the end I took the position."

"What did you do then?" Ian asked, realizing why it was that Smith had spared him. Ian was the cathartic, the only one in Smith's universe that he could unburden to. He had for the moment become, like of old, the confessor to a Pope, the confessor to a god.

"I was married, you know," Smith replied, his voice barely a whisper. "Janet… Janet. I told her why and she understood. Then I killed her."

He looked away again and started to sob. The planet was rolling by beneath them, the shuttlecraft skimming a thousand meters above the surface. Pits the size of cities dotted the landscape, and from them rose streams of pay-loads propelled upward by the mass-drivers. As they ap proached the equatorial band, it seemed as if the planet were rimmed with the spokes of a wheel soaring upward to the geosync points, where processing plants manufactured the needs of a billion people. Ian didn't say a word as the quiet sobs filled the shuttle. Suddenly Smith stiff ened and with a forceful effort turned and looked back at Ian.

"With that one death I gained the understanding and, thereby, the control over the others; they listened to one who had made the penultimate sacrifice. First, I ordered that the best and the brightest would be saved. Those with the superior intellect and the superior genetic ca pabilities would live to breed a superior race. They were isolated in a secure portion of the colony. The single door way into that section became known as the Portal of Life, for only those chosen could go through it.

"Next I selected those with unique skills and knowl edge who had not earlier been selected. I now had half the people that I could save."

"What did the council say to this plan?"

Smith's expression hardened. "They said nothing. After I killed Janet, my first order had been to kill every member of the council. They gave me the power-I used it. I killed them, for they all deserved to die. They would have used me in the end as their scapegoat, their Judas, and turned against me. For I realized that only by yielding to the decisions of a wise clan lord could we survive, and I would become that lord. I had already selected my bodyguards, those who would be my first generation of priests, though I knew that my cult would have to be developed gradually.

"I then created the Order of the Sword, and the system to exercise it. Hardly anyone had experience with sword work. It was fair, and simple. Our stores of steel were adequate and we manufactured those first weapons easily enough. Crude, they were, but sufficient. And thus for six months, day by day, the fighting of pairs became the path out. And with it, the forcing of obedience to my will, since those who were the best, those who could take the discipline, gradually became my closest guards and car riers of my will."

He chuckled with a deep solemn tone, which Ian found to be strange after the emotional outbreak of earlier.

"Human nature… so strange, so strange. They came to enjoy it, this warriors' code. The women became the fiercest at times, especially those who had lost children. Don't look at me that way, Ian, you must have known that when we were exiled we brought our families and children with us. It was a penal colony."

"What happened to the children?"

"Those with superior abilities were sent to the isolation area until the trials by arms were over. Those over twelve who did not make it that way had to fight. Those under twelve… we put to sleep."

"The children?"

"Don't call upon your moral superiority with me, Ian. If we had left them back on your Earth, they would have been vaporized in the war. Is that superior?"

Ian didn't particularly care for the way he said " your Earth," but he thought it best not to argue the point.

"But all those thousands who missed being defined as superior by only a small fraction, or by several points in the tests you once used. Would it not have been wise to try to save them? What about the brutes, the savage an imals who would survive by killing, were they worth saving?"

"If I had not let them think they had a fair chance, they would have overthrown my plan. Can't you see the beauty of it? I let them think that they had the advantage. However, it was so simple. I matched brutals against bru tals. Those who might oppose me against those who might oppose me. And those who might be worth saving, I tried, when possible, to match them against weaker opponents who were not worth saving but whom I could not simply execute.

"Through the fights it was so easy to deceive them and to keep them from destroying all of us in a mad frenzy of destruction, as the scum back on Earth had prophesied.

"And so for six long and bloody months, I reduced us step by step. The bodies were processed for their valuable resources, my people learned a new code, and we were transformed. And as I watched the Earth disappear as tern, fading to a blue speck lost in the glare of a minor sun, I learned control.

"For they had destroyed Paradise!" He shouted the words, and Ian was tempted to tell him that he was not preaching to the multitude, but thought better of it.

"We saw what was coming, we had spoken out against it, and for our effort those fools had us exiled. I learned, Ian Lacklin, what is the nature of power. I could hop to one of my colonies right now, command ten thousand to kill themselves, and they would do so without question and consider it an honor. That, Ian Lacklin, is power- and it rests in my hands.

"Never again shall I ever let happen what those on Earth forced us to do."

They finally swung in to the dark side of the planet, and its surface was banded by necklaces of lighting that illuminated the planet as if it were day. Ian was amazed at the power being harnessed there. Smith's people were literally tearing the planet apart. As if reading his thoughts, Smith suddenly spoke again.

" Gregor gave me a report on our progress before you joined me. He said that it was recently calculated that if growth continues at its current rate, we will totally con sume the mass of that planet in four hundred years. Al ready we are developing five of the moons on the first gas giant."

"Which one is that?"

"It's called Janet."

"Of course." Ian said it with such understanding that Smith suddenly reached out and touched him on the arm and smiled briefly.

"But as I was saying, I saw the path. Once the Time of Blooding had finished, I realized that the warrior code must stay. So with the coming of the next generation, I encouraged its development along with rigorous training of the mind and total discipline. Ian, I knew that the odds were still against us. I had set a course that would take seven hundred years-fearing that if we went to the closer stars, we would find ourselves in competition. I knew many were bound for the galactic core, but space is im mense. We had contact with several colonies on the way out, but most we would not reach. Two did make starfall here at Delta Sag and we were forced to deal with them, since of course they were not of us."

"I know. I found the results of your actions."

Smith ignored his comment and continued.

"I created a warrior — guard elite, and I acted as a guide to the future so that there would be a continuity with the past. As least, that is what I told them, but I knew what would happen after only several generations.

"I was awakened every twenty years, or when there was a crisis to advise- to give counsel and to plan. The first time I was greeted like an old friend returning. The second time only a few from the 'Earth Time,' as they were calling it, still remembered me. And on the fourth time, there was not one in fifty. And I started to become first an advisor, then a legend, and finally a god-as I knew I would."

He smiled at Ian as he said the words, and a man who had sounded before to be so sane now took on a different edge, his powerful appearance and deep rich Voice lending only more power to the image of something almost su perhuman.

"My awakening became a religious event, a long- cherished high holy day by which people measured their lives. When I knew the time to be right, I laid out the next step-the bonding of all by one common blood. It became a most sacred privilege to bear my child, even if induced artificially. And it became the most cherished dream of a maiden to surrender her virginity to me and then to bear my child." Smith looked at Ian and gave a slightly lascivious smile.

"It was easy to keep track of the genetics of it, and within a few hundred years every single person became a descendent of myself. I am, therefore, truly the Father of all my people!"

He shouted out the words and laughed as he did so, and then fixed Ian with his gaze.

"And I knew one other part of the formula that was necessary for our health and survival. A people must al ways have a dream. And I gave them the dream. That we would increase in number and then return one day to the paradise that had been fouled by those who are not of our blood. They would return to the promised land, led by their Father-and we would purge the Earth of its filth. We would take our revenge for having been driven out. We would take our revenge for the Blooding Time. And we would then dwell in the realm of Paradise for ever!"

Smith grabbed lan's arm with such force that Ian feared the madman's grip would burst right through his skin and shatter the bone beneath.

"And you, Ian Lacklin, you gave me the means of my return. Your people are weak, your own ship's computer tells me you number not half a billion on the entire planet. You have but a weak central government controlled by an overgrown bureaucracy. There is no way that you can defy me. We have searched to transcend light for a millennium, and to think that its discovery would be a mere accident by an amateur back on Earth. But now I know. I have the data in your machine to tell me how. And then I shall return in glory and my people can at last return to Paradise!"