I said, ‘Things weren’t weird enough already.’
My future self murmured, ‘You get used to it.’
Varcin’s expression softened a little. ‘Think of it as an opportunity. Every Expansion citizen should see the home world before she dies.’
‘Come with me,’ I said impulsively to Tarco. ‘Come with me to Earth.’
‘All right.’
Dakk put her hands on our shoulders. ‘Lethe, but this is a magnificent enterprise.’
I hated her; I loved her; I wanted her out of my life.
III
It was all very well for Varcin to order us to Earth. The Navy wasn’t about to release one of its own to the Commission for Historical Truth without a fight, and there was lengthy wrangling over the propriety and even the legality of transferring the court of inquiry to Earth. In the end a team of Navy lawyers was assigned to the case.
We were a strange crew, I guess: two star-crossed lovers, court members, Navy lawyers, serving officers, Commissaries and all. Not to mention another version of me. The atmosphere was tense all the way from Base 592.
But at journey’s end all our differences and politics and emotional tangles were put aside, as we crowded to the hull to sightsee our destination.
Earth!
At first it seemed nondescript: just another rocky ball circling an unspectacular star, in a corner of a fragmented spiral arm. But Snowflake surveillance stations orbited in great shells around the planet, all the way out as far as the planet’s single battered Moon, and schools of Spline gambolled hugely in the waves of a mighty ocean that covered half the planet’s surface. It was an eerie thought that down there somewhere in that sea was another Assimilator’s Torch, a junior version of the battered old ship we had seen come limping into port.
This little world had become the capital of the Third Expansion, an empire that stretched across all the stars I could see, and far beyond. And it was the true home of every human who would ever live. I was thrilled. As our flitter cut into the atmosphere and was wrapped in pink-white plasma, I felt Tarco’s hand slip into mine.
At least during the journey in we had had time to spend together. We had talked. We had even made love, in a perfunctory way.
But it hadn’t done us much good. Other people knew far too much about our future, and we didn’t seem to have any choice about it anyhow. There could be no finer intelligence than a knowledge of the future – an ability to see the outcome of a battle not yet waged, or map the turning points of a war not yet declared – and yet what use was that intelligence if the future was fixed, if we were all forced to live out pre-programmed lives? I felt like a rat going through a maze. What room was there for joy?
I hoped I was going to learn this wasn’t true in the Commission’s future libraries. Of course I wasn’t worrying about the war and the destiny of mankind. I just wanted to know if I really was doomed to become Captain Dakk, battered, bitter, arrogant, far from orthodox – or whether I was still free, free to be me.
The flitter swept over a continent. I glimpsed a crowded land, and many vast weapons emplacements, intended for the eventuality of a last-ditch defence of the home world. Then we began to descend towards a Conurbation. It was a broad, glistening sprawl of bubble-dwellings blown from the bedrock, and linked by canals. But the scars of the Qax Occupation, fifteen thousand years old, were still visible. Much of the land glistened silver-grey where starbreaker beams and nano-replicators had once worked, turning plains and mountains into a featureless silicate dust.
The Commissary said, ‘This Conurbation itself was Qax-built. It is still known by its ancient Qax registration of 11729. It was more like a forced labour camp or breeding pen than a human city. It was here that Hama Druz himself developed the Doctrine that has shaped human destiny ever since. It is the headquarters of the Commission. A decision was made to leave the work of the Qax untouched. It shows what will become of us again, if we should falter or fail…’
And so on. His long face was solemn, his eyes gleaming with a righteous zeal. He was a little scary.
We were taken to a complex right at the heart of the old Conurbation. It was based on the crude Qax architecture, but internally the bubble dwellings had been knocked together and extended underground, making a vast complex whose boundaries I never glimpsed.
Varcin introduced it as the Library of Futures. Once the Libraries had been an independent agency, Varcin told us, but the Commission had taken them over three thousand years ago. Apparently there had been an epic war among the bureaucrats.
Tarco and I were each given our own quarters. My room seemed huge, itself extending over several levels, and very well equipped, with a galley and even a bar. I could tell from Captain Dakk’s expression exactly what she thought of this opulence and expense. That bar made a neat Poole’s Blood, though.
It was very strange to be in a place where a ‘day’ lasted a standard day, a ‘year’ a year. Across the Expansion the standards are set by Earth’s calendar – of course; what else would you use? A ‘day’ on Base 592, for instance, lasted over two hundred standard days, which was actually longer than its ‘year’, which was around half a standard. But on Earth, everything fit together.
On the second day, the court of inquiry was to resume. But Varcin said that he wanted to run through the Commission’s findings with us – me, Captain Dakk, Tarco – before it all unravelled in front of the court itself.
So, early on that crucial day, the three of us were summoned to a place Varcin called the Map Room.
It was like a vast hive, a place of alcoves and bays extending off a gigantic central atrium. On several levels, shaven-headed, long-robed figures walked earnestly, alone or in muttering groups, accompanied by gleaming clouds of Virtuals.
I think all three of us lowly Navy types, Tarco and I, even the older Dakk, felt scruffy and overwhelmed.
Varcin stood at the centre of the open atrium. In his element, he just smiled. And he waved his hand, a bit theatrically.
A series of Virtual dioramas swept over us like the pages of an immense book.
In those first few moments I saw huge fleets washing into battle, or limping home decimated; I saw worlds gleaming like jewels, beacons of human wealth and power – or left desolated and scarred, lifeless as Earth’s Moon. And, most wistful of all, there were voices. I heard roars of triumph, cries for help.
I knew what I was seeing. I was thrilled. These were the catalogued destinies of mankind.
Varcin said, ‘Half a million people work here. Much of the interpretation is automated – but nothing has yet replaced the human eye, human scrutiny, human judgement. You understand that the further away you are from a place, the more uncertainty there is over its timeline compared to yours. So we actually see furthest into the future concerning the most remote events…’
‘And you see war,’ said Tarco.
‘Oh, yes. As far downstream as we can see, whichever direction we choose to look, we see war.’
I picked up on that. Whichever direction … ‘Commissary, you don’t just map the future here, do you? I mean a single future.’
‘No. Of course not.’
‘I knew it,’ I said gleefully, and they all looked at me oddly. ‘You can change the future.’ And I wasn’t stuck with becoming Captain Dakk. ‘So if you see a battle will be lost, you can choose not to commit the fleet. You can save thousands of lives with a simple decision.’