In Earth's Service (Mapped Space Book 2) Read online

  In Earth’s Service

  By

  Stephen Renneberg

  Copyright

  Copyright © Stephen Renneberg 2015

  ISBN: 978-0-9941840-1-6

  All Rights Reserved.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.

  License Notes

  This eBook is licensed for your personal use only. This eBook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should purchase your own copy from a licensed eBook distributor. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Illustration © Tom Edwards

  TomEdwardsDesign.com

  Author’s Web Page

  StephenRenneberg.com/

  ALSO BY STEPHEN RENNEBERG

  The Antaran Codex

  The Mothership

  The Siren Project

  The Kremlin Phoenix

  DEDICATION

  For Elenor, with love.

  Mapped Space Chronology

  15000 BC - 2130 AD

  Rise of Planetary Civilization on Earth.

  The Mothership

  2130 - 2643

  Rise of Inter-planetary Civilization throughout the Solar System

  2644

  First human ship reaches Proxima Centauri and is met by a Tau Cetin Observer.

  Dawn of Human Interstellar Civilization.

  2645

  Earth Council signs the Access Treaty with the Galactic Forum.

  First Probationary Period begins.

  Tau Cetins provide astrographic data out to 1,200 light years from Earth (Mapped Space) and 100 kilograms of novarium (Nv, Element 147) to power human starships.

  2646 - 3154

  Human Civilization expands rapidly through Mapped Space.

  Continual Access Treaty infringements delays mankind’s acceptance into the Galactic Forum.

  3154

  Human religious fanatics attack the Mataron Homeworld.

  Tau Cetin Observers prevent the Mataron Fleet from destroying Earth.

  3155 - 3158

  Tau Cetin ships convert human supplies of novarium held in Earth stockpiles and within ship energy plants to inert material.

  3155 - 4155

  Galactic Forum suspends human interstellar access rights and imposes 1,000 year Embargo.

  Contact with other civilizations ends.

  Many human outposts beyond the Solar System collapse.

  4126

  Earth Navy (EN) established by the Democratic Union to police mankind when Embargo is lifted.

  Earth Council assumes control of EN.

  4138

  Earth Intelligence Service (EIS) established by the Earth Council.

  4155

  The Embargo ends. Access Treaty reactivated.

  Second 500 year Probationary Period begins.

  Human interstellar travel resumes.

  4155 - 4267

  Earth reestablishes contact with surviving human outposts.

  4605

  The Antaran Codex.

  4606

  In Earth’s Service.

  Contents

  Copyright

  Author’s Web Page

  DEDICATION

  Mapped Space Chronology

  Contents

  Chapter One : Krailo-Nis

  Chapter Two : Novo Pantanal

  Chapter Three : Ansara

  Chapter Four : Hardfall

  Chapter Five : Acheron Station

  Chapter Six : Solitaire

  Chapter Seven : Duranis-A

  Chapter Eight : Duranis-B

  Chapter Nine : Uralo IV

  Chapter One : Krailo-Nis

  Nisk colony world

  Nisk Draconis System, Outer Draco

  0.94 Earth Normal Gravity

  918 light years from Sol

  112 Billion Coleopterans

  Krailo-Nis was just as I remembered: bleak gray skies, distant dark mountains, mud and fungus as far as the eye could see and the kind of gloom only giant cave-dwelling bugs could love.

  It was a depressing sight from the elevated platform that a pair of semi-intelligent Nisk drones had pushed up to the port airlock as soon as the Silver Lining had landed. Now, with a light breeze blowing drizzling rain onto my face, the two drones watched me from the ground, oblivious to the water beading on their outer shells or the mud sloshing around their six long black legs.

  Beyond the drones was a drab, rain soaked landing ground occupied by dozens of alien ships – none of them Nisk. Their ships didn’t land here, partly because they were too big, mostly because they didn’t like mixing with bipeds. That’s why they landed outside the security barrier and never within sight of the spaceport. They didn’t build many ships, but the ones they did were behemoths. Just one nestship would have taken up the entire landing ground by itself, or so the Beneficial Society’s briefing notes said. It had something to do with Nisk mentality: if they went anywhere, it was in enormous numbers packed inside single ships.

  I guess they liked the company.

  Not that you would know it from Nisport. It wasn’t a bug town. It was an enclave set aside exclusively for alien visitors. At the edge of the landing field was a rundown, one level, rectangular terminal, utilitarian to the point of ugliness. Beyond the terminal was a collection of dilapidated, dirty buildings, all non-Nisk design. If you wanted to trade with the Nisk, you had to bring your own buildings. That’s why most structures were self erecting prefabs, functional with minimal visible comforts. Only a few were lavish structures designed to impress, an effort wasted on giant beetles with no appreciation of architectural aesthetics.

  The force barrier surrounding the enclave wasn’t for our protection, but to ensure we didn’t go poking around where we weren’t wanted. Not that the Nisk were xenophobes. They didn’t fear or hate aliens, they simply preferred to keep interactions with other species to a minimum. Considering the instinctive human revulsion for bugs of any sort – let alone giant creepy crawlies – I was happy to respect their wishes.

  Even if I wanted to explore, there wasn’t much to see. Nisport was the only settlement on the surface of a seemingly primitive world shrouded in endless gray cloud. On every continent, forbidding mountains rose from quagmire plains and murky rivers emptied into dark oceans – all tectonically engineered by the industrious Nisk. From orbit, Krailo-Nis appeared to be a damp wasteland rather than home to more than a hundred billion sentient beings, none of whom lived on the surface.

  They inhabited an enormous subterranean world-city that honeycombed the planet’s crust while the surface had been engineered to provide an ideal habitat for the fungus and blue green algae that covered Krailo-Nis. The genetically engineered surface life clung to every rock, choked every waterway and saturated every ocean, producing the vast quantities of food and oxygen required by its inhabitants. It was why Krailo-Nis’s atmosphere contained more oxygen than Earth’s, produced by a fraction of the biomass and why I wore a respirator over my nose and mouth to avoid oxygen toxicity.

  A few human ambassadors had been permitted down into the subterranean galleries to present thei
r credentials, but generally visitors weren’t allowed below ground. We were free to land at Nisport, providing we completed our business and were gone in three days. The restrictions were partly due to the demand for landing rights by so many races and partly because the Nisk weren’t that interested in trade. They were, after all, one of the most self sufficient species in the galaxy.

  Fortunately for us, they had a sweet tooth.

  They loved sugar and honey, the only products the human race had which held any interest for the giant beetles. It was why the Silver Lining’s cargo hold and the three vacuum-radiation-sealed containers we towed were packed full of brown sugar. In return, we’d get ten kilograms of niskgel, a gelatinous solution secreted by royals, their highest caste. It was gram for gram one of the most expensive luxury products in Mapped Space. Human pharmaceutical companies turned it into anti-aging creams with seemingly miraculous powers, yet try as we might, we couldn’t synthesize the stuff ourselves. We suspected it had something to do with the super fungus they ate, but they wouldn’t sell us a sample at any price, so we couldn’t be sure. They said it was for our own protection because their mega-fungi could double as an invincible bioweapon able to turn habitable worlds into fungal swamps in the blink of an eye. Likewise for the blue-green super algae, which could raise any world’s oxygen content to toxic levels. Maybe it was true or maybe they just wanted to protect their monopoly. Either way, guys like me lugged tons of sugar to what the Nisk considered a remote outpost for a few kilos of gooey gold – only I wasn’t really here for niskgel.

  Jase Logan, my copilot, would handle the cargo drop. Nisk drones would check its quality and weight, then load a precisely measured quantity of niskgel in return. Normally we’d boost and bubble in twelve hours, only I’d punctured the vacuum seals on some of the sugar containers, deliberately contaminating their contents to slow down the dimwitted drones. Anything out of the ordinary and they’d call for an attendant to assess the situation. I hoped the ensuing argument would keep us on the ground for our allotted three days, just in case my contact was late.

  At least that was the plan.

  A mechanical whine sounded as the Silver Lining’s belly door opened down to form a ramp to the ground and the three VRS containers astern were lowered by their supporting gantries. Five drones immediately scuttled forward, mindlessly tramping mud through our internal hold as they began unloading the cargo.

  The Nisk were, by all accounts, a respected and peaceful member of the Galactic Forum, the only sentient coleopterans in Mapped Space, yet the sight of them made my skin crawl. It was all those legs scuttling beneath dead black eyes. Perhaps that’s why they kept their mostly bipedal visitors in a walled enclosure, because they knew how we felt. Or maybe they felt the same way about us?

  They didn’t use bots of any kind. They’d rather breed drones than waste resources on machines. It wasn’t a technological limitation, but a cultural preference. Ninety percent of the planet’s population were drones. The rest were mostly attendants whose primary purpose was to supervise the workforce and see to the safety and comfort of a few million royals. No human ambassador had ever laid eyes on a royal and probably never would. We dealt with attendants who were the organizers of their society, the arbiters of law, the engineers and scientists and when required, the commanders of the mighty Nisk military. Attendants and royals were both highly intelligent, well above human norms, while the drones were about a third below. The aesthetic royals did the breeding and created endless geometric artworks that made no sense to humans, but were highly regarded by the diligent attendants. There was no system of government as we understood it, just biologically determined roles and duties according to physical caste.

  Krailo-Nis alone contained more than three times as many Nisk as there were humans in all of Mapped Space and as best as we could determine, its industrial capacity dwarfed Human Civilization’s total output. Yet to the Nisk, Krailo-Nis was a remote, relatively unimportant backwater, the only one of its kind in the Orion Arm. We didn’t know where their homeworld was or how many colonies they had scattered across the galaxy, only that they were somewhat detached from galactic life. One could only wonder what the galaxy’s fate might have been if they’d been an aggressive species, or what would happen to anyone who unwisely provoked them, Access Treaty or not. If ever there was a sleeping giant in our midst, it was the industrious, unassuming Nisk.

  Leaving the russet colored drones to their work, I rode the elevated platform’s gravity slide down to the mud then hurried across to the terminal for processing. Before landing, I’d been required to transmit profiles of everyone aboard: me, Jase and Izin. I didn’t know if the Nisk had been attacked during the Intruder War and carried a grudge against Izin’s race, but if they did, they showed no sign of it.

  I stepped inside a doorless arch high and wide enough for two Nisk, then a drone scanned me, confirming my identity. It was a meter taller than me with six multi-jointed legs and two slender antenna-manipulator arms. Its thick mandible turned in my direction and spoke through a vocalizer. “Sirius Kade Human of Silver Lining ship, why bring you weapon projectile into Nisk zone open?” it asked in an oddly composed version of Unionspeak.

  I glanced at the MAK P-50 holstered at my hip. I’d strapped it on out of habit, not because I expected trouble, although doing pick-ups for Lena Voss – my Earth Intelligence Service controller – always carried risk. “It’s for self defense only.”

  “Sirius Kade Human of Silver Lining ship, weapons firing in Nisk zone open prohibited.”

  I looked up at the drone, waiting for more, but it just stood staring at me. I shifted uncomfortably, feeling as if the massive coleopteran was considering eating me whole. “I understand.”

  The drone turned back to its console, making no attempt to confiscate my weapon. After a moment, it handed me a small gray disk inlaid with symmetrical intersecting lines. “Sirius Kade Human to retain identifier locator at times all.” It fixed its impenetrable eyes upon me, waiting.

  “Will do,” I said, realizing the drone not only lacked conversation, but was operating at the limit of its ability.

  “Sirius Kade Human, entry temporary to Nisk zone open approved,” it said, then promptly ceased to recognize my existence.

  Free to proceed, I started across a floor tramped with the muddy footprints of a thousand alien species, suspecting the concept of cleaning had been omitted from the simpleton drone’s training. The terminal was a picture of Nisk minimalism with none of the amenities found in human spaceports, just bare walls and a roof over our heads.

  Dozens of nonhumans milled around in small groups inside the terminal, casting furtive glances at each other and at the drizzle and mud outside. None wanted to be here a second longer than necessary and by the way some glanced at the big drones, they were as uncomfortable trading with giant beetles as I was. My implanted DNA sniffer area-scanned them all, confirming they were mostly Orion Arm species mixed with a few unknowns from further afield. A couple wore full environment suits preventing line of sight DNA scanning, although none paid me any attention.

  Outside the terminal, two armed sentry drones and a handful of aliens sheltered from the drizzle under a wide awning, more interested in the town than a solitary human passing through. Their lack of curiosity reassured me that this was going to be another routine data pick-up.

  I’d received Lena’s request nine days ago. She’d said it was a simple retrieve and run, nothing more than a minor detour. I only needed brief physical contact with her agent – a handshake would be enough – then I’d be gone. Nothing I hadn’t done a dozen times before, barely worth my fee as a freelancer, especially considering the extra credits the niskgel would bring in. For all the Nisk knew or cared, I was just another biped seeking to profit off the vanity of my species. Even Jase and Izin had no inkling of my true motives for visiting bug central. It had been tricky at times, but I’d managed to keep my EIS sideline hidden from them for a year now. I didn’t like lying to th
em, but it wasn’t called deep cover for nothing.

  This far from Sol, the only human law was an Earth Navy frigate, and they were rare. There were plenty of alien ships of course and alien worlds, even some big ones, but most were off limits to humans for at least another forty nine years. Once we earned Forum Membership, becoming formally recognized Galactic Citizens, a lot of closed doors would open for humanity providing we didn’t screw up. It was all on our shoulders, our responsibility, to prove we could respect galactic law as enshrined in the Access Treaty. That was no small task considering the horde of bottom feeders looking for fast credits far from Earth. And while there was no one to help us, there were plenty watching, waiting for us to fail – again. While most alien governments would report any breach, none would lift a finger to help or take any part in policing mankind.

  Nor should they. That was Lena’s job – and mine.

  Summoning an image of Nisport’s grid-like layout into my mind’s eye from my threaded memory, I crossed the mud splattered metal grating that passed for a road and headed south toward a small cluster of human prefabs a kilometer away. They contained the Earth Council embassy, a tiny Beneficial Society of Traders office that managed our barter deals with the Nisk and sleeping quarters and stores for both. There were no support facilities typical of human trade bases – no repair docks, bars, merchants, stim dealers or brothels. The Nisk refused to allow anyone to establish permanent bases in the Nisk Draconis System because with such a large population concentrated in one place, a single planet busting attack could have devastated their civilization in this part of the galaxy.