Winning Peace - Chapter 31 (Patreon)

“-and, without further ado, I give you Pleistocene Park!”

I clapped along with the entire crowd, the press badge hanging around my neck having allowed me to snag a spot close to the announcement podium. Beyond that, four great beasts such as the Earth hadn't seen in thousands of years trundled past, a smaller calf chasing them from behind. Even if there was snow on the ground and it was bitterly cold here in the north-east of Siberia, I couldn't be bothered to care all that much.

“What you see here is the culmination of the dreams of five generations of geneticists!” The announcer cried, waving at the living, breathing wooly mammoths behind him. “We hope that they will represent a new age for humanity, the latest victory against the extinctions that our ancient ancestors helped cause!”

More applause.

…

Pop-Pop!

The sound of a champagne cork launching into the air heralded a series of raucous cries from the small group. The man holding the fizzing bottle stepped forward to fill a glass, then looked out over the crowd as the interlink caught his voice and seeded it to the speakers. “They said it was impossible, but we finally did it, folks! The great oceanic garbage patches are gone!”

Another round of hooting and yelling from the quite drunk and normally-reserved scientists. Catching some of the joy, I embraced one of my colleagues tightly as she cried happily. Even if I was only a lowly intern tasked with getting the crew coffee, it was a good feeling to have been part of the team that had accomplished this.

“It's been the work of a decade, but it's been worth it to get here! Our filtration system is also reporting a drop in fifty percent of 'forever chemicals' and other soluble pollutants! The world's oceans are cleaner than they have been in two hundred years!”

“Next up, the old oil fields!” One man in a lab coat cried enthusiastically.

The scientist on stage led the rest of the room in a round of laughter. “Maybe after a vacation! Don't go planning the next project just yet!

…

There was a tinking of crystal glasses as a full classical orchestra played in a perfectly-manicured courtyard, the Earth hanging bright and blue against a starry tapestry. Here, I was a young socialite, a beardless youth from a tragic background on the planet looking to make something of myself as an engineering prodigy. It was only by as much luck as skill that I'd happened to fall in with a fancier crowd, my gift of explaining complex problems in simple terms earning me an invite.

“It is my honor to declare the Torus Orbital Ring Complex as functionally complete!” The Prime Minister stated, taking a celebratory sip of his wine, many in the audience doing so as well. “Just don't scuff the paint, please! We're still working out the warranty!”

Polite laughter, so different from the other party I'd seen recently, flowed across the crowd.

“In conjunction with the transit stations on Phobos and above Venus, now both complete as well, humanity ushers in a new age of a connected and prosperous Inner Sol System!” The Prime Minister toasted the gala again, the crowd raising their glasses as well.

“It is also my great pleasure to inform you all that the military-industrial outposts in Trans-Neptunian space are nearly complete as well. A few have even begun operation in conjunction with the drone manufactories in the asteroid belt. With the valued service of our brave men and women in uniform-”

A particular gesture was made towards a gathering of smartly-dressed high-ranking officers, who smiled back and accepted the light applause sent their way.

“-the future of humanity, at long last, is looking brighter than ever before!” The declaration even got a few catcalls from a typically-sedate group of people. “Now, enough chatter from me! I hope you all have a wonderful time and enjoy the festivities!”

I sighed, warm pride burning in my chest.

…

“We're just about done, Admiral,” the older-seeming man stated, adjusting his uniform and tucking a stray strand of hair over one ear. I noted the silver at his temples, an affectation the General had taken to after achieving the rank. Even if there was no need for hair to go white anymore, large portions of humanity still collated visible signs of aging with wisdom, and part of the duty of a senior officer was to inspire confidence.

Also, I think he just enjoyed the look, but as his personal aide I'd never be so gauche as to bring the subject up.

“I'm glad the civilian government was able to see sense and declare Arcturus a zone of military control outside of designated space lanes,” the Admiral sighed, shaking her head.

“There's still Aurum Station,” a Rear-Admiral noted, manipulating the hologram to show off a new angle with a massive twenty-kilometer cylinder surrounded by a cloud of satellites, drone platforms, and asteroid-processing stations.

The General waved his hand dismissively. “That's a sop to the xeno-theory department that doubles as a housing solution for all of the families of military personnel in-system. The only reason it's as large as it is, is to ensure we can plausibly stake a military and political claim on the system if some aliens have a rule about population size.”

“Once we get the three moons of Eirene up and running properly, the bases should have a total population of fifty million dedicated personnel,” a Lt. General chimed in with a frown. “I still can't believe any interstellar society would be able to deny a claim on those grounds.”

The Admiral sighed. “There's an argument to be made that the soldiers won't actually be living on-base so much as being stationed there for a limited term by the head of the military. Having a civilian and industrial presence allows us to truly say the system is being actively developed. While I also believe it's ultimately splitting hairs with fine-print legalese, Aurum gives civilian colonization vessels a good jumping-off point to travel between the frontier and Sol.”

“It would be a shame for the materials in the Arcturus Stream to go to waste,” the General nodded. “Even if the system is metal-poor, helium, lithium, and beryllium can be repurposed into a lot of materials and ingredients for advanced technology. Until we manage to make the next leap into true atomic-scale fabricators, we can't just turn down the opportunities presented by an unexploited bed of resources like this.”

“As long as they don't pollute the transit lanes too much with traffic,” the Rear-Admiral nodded. “We're already seeing a significant uptick now that the Stellar Council has cleared Terra Nova, Demeter, and Eden Prime for colonization.”

“Don't remind me,” the Admiral sighed. “I've been getting complaints about the joint-commission for transit control. The Stellar Council is looking to spin it off into its own branch instead of having one for the military and one for civilians, each operating separately.”

The Rear-Admiral chuckled “As much of a headache as that sounds like, it would actually solve a lot of the logistics issues we're running into with the civilian-chartered industrial processing ships we're calling in for the bases keep claiming military precedence on the routes and relays.”

“Well, at least we'll have the anti-matter problem solved soon,” the General stated.

“The Mercury Republic accepted the proposal?” The Rear-Admiral asked, surprised.

“They did,” The Admiral stated, then looked around the room to me. “You have the document?”

“Yes ma'am,” I nodded, extending an arm and tapping quickly into the interface that popped up. It was a shame heavy cybernetic modification, or at least visible ones, were still frowned on in upper-tier command staff.

Instantly the documentation popped up on the holographic display.

“Those lunatics trying to settle that sun-blasted iron ball realized they needed something to export to make the colony valuable. With the large-scale deployment of nanolaminate material enabling the construction of both craft and solar panels that can survive that close to Sol, they've already started pumping out automated satellites to create the stuff. We're looking at rolling out a similar system on Themis as well.”

“I still don't see why we can't just-”

The conversation abruptly cut off as a signal cut through the system and shut down all of the displays.

There was a moment of stunned silence as the command staff looked at the emergency broadcast from the survey ship.

“First Contact protocols, now! Go, go, go!”

…

My eyes, my true eyes, slid open as the door behind me opened.

“Well?” The familiar voice asked.

My primary body turned to look at her. “Well, what? It takes confirmed contact with not one, but two alien civilizations for you to finally take me up on the offer to visit?”

Sasha sighed, looking barely older than the last time I'd seen her. “Ezekiel, we really don't have time to rehash old drama. Humanity needs you.”

I eased myself out of my seat and floated over to the outright-illegal canned stimulants I'd cooked up for myself. Cracking one, I slowly twisted around and sighed.

“They're doing fine on their own,” I stated, snapping my fingers and popping open a window to watch as the accosian and human diplomats spoke next to a raised pavilion where an insectoid creature began chittering loudly.

“They're not and you know it. I don't think for a minute that we've actually managed to purge all of your back doors despite my best efforts. So I don't need to tell you about the cultural problems we're encountering. The accosians have already threatened to quit the conference entirely when they found out about our consumption of meat and the translation software for the rachni queen is barely serviceable.”

I sighed and rolled my eyes. “It's past time for humanity to make its own way without me. Wasn't that why you stopped taking my calls?”

“I stopped taking your calls because of the Asclepius treatment,” Sasha stated. “And the fact that you did it without informed consent, then refused to elaborate on your reasons.”

“You and I both agreed that, at that point, society couldn't take another heavy blow. You gave me a choice between breaking one of two commandments. I chose the one that hurt you instead of humanity at large,” I replied absently.

“And you didn't even explain it to me,” she continued, scowling.

“I asked you whether or not you would be able to keep the secret,” I stated. “When you told me that, if it was something that would justify doing what I did, that humanity deserved to know. You can't have it both ways.”

Sasha sighed and shook her head. “I kept quiet about the secret war you waged against authoritarian governments on Earth after the Short War. I agreed with you that it was necessary to do what you did to fight the Last Dog’s influence. I compromised my beliefs and values so many times on behalf of a future that you could see and I never could.”

I drained the can of slightly-radioactive cherry-flavored sludge and dropped the empty into the recycler. “Did I, or did I not deliver on my promises?”

“It's not about whether you delivered on anything!” Sasha yelled, floating forward. “It's about trust, Ezekiel! My trust! Trust you abused and wouldn't explain why! It was about knowing you'd never put me before the things you thought you had to do for other people! I wanted you to, just once, think about what I was going through after all of the madness of a decade of supporting you... and you couldn't.”

“Did you ever think it was the same for me?” I asked calmly, rubbing tiredly at my face.

“You never let me in!” Sasha cried, literal tears edging out of the corners of her eyes. “You never wanted anything except to achieve your goals! I thought I finally understood that! That's why I'm here begging for your help, to help humanity!”

She struck her hand out wide at the floating image.

“That is my goal!” I shouted, legitimately angry now for the first time, gesturing to the same screen as it hovered in place. “I gave my species everything they need to make this happen! I retired specifically because I didn't want to be some god-king guiding every action they take! I'm focused on the bigger picture! If humanity can't pick a set of diplomats and negotiate their First Contact, then they're not worth me dragging them across the finish line!”

 Sasha stared at me in disbelief. “What could possibly be-?!”

I snapped on all of the other screens, hitting Sasha with enough stimulus right in the face to stop her in her tracks. “That's a Reaper. It's a billion-year old corpse of a cybernetic flesh golem created from billions of sentient beings fused together permanently by a lunatic artificial intelligence gone rogue. There's a fucking army of those things waiting out beyond the edge of the galaxy and I've been spending the last twenty years doing barely anything save for ramping up my tech base to kill them! And the worst part is that fucking vaccine that everyone whines about was to make them resistant or immune to as many forms of their brainwashing as I could!”

Seeing that she was still attempting to wrap her mind around the assault of information I'd dumped on her, I continued charging ahead. “I've had to, occasionally, take a short break from working on that problem because I couldn't live with myself if the entire accosian race died when their planet blew up. So forgive me if I don't come riding to the rescue and taint the first true moment of independence my species has had from my influence and enjoy watching them grow beyond my shadow!”

“Ezekiel, I-I-” Sasha started, choking on her words as I sighed and leaned back against nothing. “Why didn't you tell me all of this sooner? I would have-”

“You gave me a choice, Sasha. I chose. Tell me, honestly, even now... do you think humanity is ready to have real, solid proof of something like this thrown in their faces?” I paused to let that sink in, then drove it home. “When, realistically, they can't do a damn thing about it? When they've fought me for every inch of advancement I've put forward in the last decades?”

“This would have changed everything!” Sasha argued passionately.

“Exactly! It could have triggered them early! Humanity doomed because I couldn't stomach the jeers and insults of a bunch of self-centered and morally-righteous politicians!” I replied, my tone no less-heated.

“It would have made me stay with you!” Sasha screamed at the top of her lungs.

I clenched my eyes shut as something tore at me inside, a sign that for how little flesh and blood was left within me, I still hadn't ceased to be human. “You said it yourself, Sasha. You'd compromised yourself enough by that point. Do you really want to be... me? Someone forever standing outside of their own species for the sake of-”

I felt her coming and could have avoided her, but didn't. Instead, I allowed her to crash into me, clinging tightly. “Shut up! Shut up, you stupid, self-sacrificing martyr-obsessed asshole! You want everyone else to start making choices without you!? Fine, this is my choice and you don't get a say!”

I felt her lips press against my own and, for the first time in a very long time, embraced her back.

…

In the year 2165, a Stellar Council survey ship in the Shanxi System caught the faint signal of a repeating emergency beacon. Although not identifiable as such, the pattern alerted the crew to an artificial origin and took it upon themselves to investigate. The SCV Ibn Battuta discovered a drifting craft with malfunctioning reactors made of a strange organic substance. Captain Samuel Uremeshi brought the object into a safe orbit around the main garden world just in time to be met by a second craft investigating the same repeating signal.

Although interactions were confused and haphazard at first, this would go down as the first meeting between both the Rachni Swarm and the Accosian Collectives.

The following months were a turbulent period for the three polities as they attempted to master each other's languages. Especially difficult were the rachni, who relied on a complex series of pheromone exchanges and body language to properly signal what they intended, but the accosian speech was laced with both subsonic and supersonic tones outside of normal human hearing range.

Although several moments threatened to permanently derail the talks, eventually an agreement was set up by which all three parties would jointly colonize Shanxi, the human-named garden world in the system, as an expression of good faith in each other.

This initially seemed deeply unfair to the rachni queen, She Who Walks In Shadows, who was self-reportedly one of the last of her kind after an extermination campaign by the same Prothean that left the ruins on Mars. Still, the rachni queen bargained hard for the rights to many of the airless rocks of the system, allowing her void-capable species to grow in areas that either air-breathing species would only be able to process for building materials.

A memorial placed in permanent holding at the planet's lagrange point dedicates thusly:

“Through Adversity and Struggle, We Come to Know the Value of Peace and Companionship.”

???: 11-20 (New)

Human Language: 1-20 (New)

Human History: 1-20 (New)

Human Society: 1-10 (New)

~~~

...and there we go! First Contact!

I don't have much to add this time, other than I'll have a chapter of Industrious out next. Probably the OG. I think I'm also going to get to working on a new chapter of Where Your God is for later in the week. I'll have at least one more Winning Peace chapter to do this month as well, but I need to do a bit of thinking on that to get it right. I'm planning for it to involve a much more... energetic exchange.

Until then... Rock on, stay awesome, and thanks again for the support!