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  ‘Peace through commerce,’ Garcѐ nodded, satisfied. ‘The exanoids and humans have always got along because of commerce, which raises an important question: what should we, as diplomats, look for when cementing good relations with other species?’

  Re’lien raised her hand. Garcѐ indicated that she could speak.

  ‘Common ground. As diplomats, we should always look for common ground with any party that we negotiate with.’

  ‘Any examples, Ms Re’lien?’

  Re’lien had never met Garcѐ before now. She must have been famous in the department. She hoped it was fame, and not infamy. Her pessimism tended to guess towards the latter.

  ‘Survival. All sentient species that have been encountered have a predisposition towards either self-preservation or preservation of the species. Glerans are an example of the latter. Drones may sacrifice themselves willingly, but they do this only to protect the hive mind. Another common ground may be a desire for freedom…’

  ‘Freedom?’ Garcѐ raised his eyebrow quizzically and the droopiness of his eyes was replaced with scepticism.

  ‘Yes, Professor. Most species should find common ground in a desire for freedom – independence, sovereignty, the ability to act in one’s own best interest. As diplomats, we can appeal to this desire in other species.’

  ‘I find that hard to believe, Ms Re’lien. Glerans, as you mentioned, are subservient by nature. Even the hive minds are enslaved by their own nature. They are as much slaves to their minions as their minions are slaves to them. I also find it hard to believe that squogg, grays, ulyx and your people universally desire freedom while they seem to willingly live in chains.’

  Re’lien almost bit her hologram lip. ‘I would not say willingly…’

  Garcѐ waved away the comment. ‘Freedom is a principle of humanity and our closest allies. While there are xenos who exhibit a liking of it, they are the exception, not the rule. I think you should stop with survival as your hypothesis. It is a reasonable criterion. It is also something that can be worked with. As diplomats, we cannot appeal to the Black Fleet with promises of freedom. That is why we use the Armada. Starship diplomacy…’

  Re’lien’s attention wavered as a lively debate on the ethics of using orbital bombardment to coerce local populations ensued. She had entered many of these debates before, arguing from both sides. She had lost much of her passion for this debate. Trooper Armada had been using orbital flak to soften combat targets and threaten civilian xeno populations for centuries. They weren’t going to stop because some student with a foot in the door of the Diplomatic Corps found bombing civvies icky. Rather, Re’lien chafed at Garcѐ’s other comment.

  Her people.

  Re’lien gritted her teeth.

  I may be an edal, but they aren’t my people.

  

  Re’lien exited her v-link as soon as Garcѐ finished the lecture. As she logged out, she spotted a glimpse of her hover-syn collapsed onto the desk. She hoped the wood wasn’t damaged. She didn’t care much for the syn. Damn AI was dime a dozen on Mars. Mostly, she was angry. The lecture was a waste of Re’lien’s time. She could have spent that time reading some decent course material, and not listening to some wannabe diplomat archivist saying that she didn’t have the capacity to understand freedom.

  She was shocked out of her anger by a sudden buzz. The doorbell.

  Re’lien stood from the bed pod, stretched, cracking her back and opened the door. This was a safe neighbourhood. She didn’t need to take precautions, like checking who was there.

  Sola grinned. Her braid was flashing between neon green, pink and purple. Her shocking green eyes looked joyful, if a bit strained.

  ‘Re! Long time.’

  ‘I see you three times a week,’ Re’lien replied, curtly. She considered closing the door.

  ‘In lectures. And then you’re always off to the archives, or Terra knows where.’

  Re’lien shrugged. Her hand hovered over the button to close the door.

  ‘I’ve been busy. Finals coming up.’

  Sola nodded. ‘And then off to the Corps next rotation. Can I come in?’

  Re’lien tried to think of an excuse, but couldn’t. She stepped aside and let her older sister enter.

  ‘Room clean as always. Even your bed is made – I hope you v-linked to your lecture. Doesn’t look like you were laying down.’

  ‘A clear room allows a clear head. The nanites keep it all clean and I don’t leave anything out.’

  ‘That’s Re, for you, always full of sage wisdom.’

  ‘Re’lien. My name is Re’lien.’

  Sola frowned. ‘Eri says you used to insist on being called Re. Why change back? Our family did nothing for us. Why keep the name?’

  ‘Because it’s my name. Because I won’t let it have power over me. I claim it and it becomes mine. I’m strong enough to keep the name and reject all that they did to me.’

  ‘You suggesting that my rejection of it is weakness?’ Sola asked, taking a seat on the bed.

  Re’lien summoned up a nanite chair from the ground and sat.

  ‘Different. Not weak.’ Re’lien sighed. ‘Why are you here, Sola?’

  ‘Can’t I visit my sister? My only living family member, thank Terra.’

  Re’lien didn’t reply. Sola’s frown deepened. The brightness of her luminescent hair seemed to fade.

  ‘Re…Re’lien, I love you. You’re my sister. You’ve been living in this apartment for two years now. You’ve been on Mars for four. I only started living alone after my sixth. It can’t be healthy…’

  ‘I like living alone. It’s quiet.’

  ‘Re’lien,’ Sola’s eyes were pleading. ‘It’s only been four years. We can talk about what happened. I want to know about you from you, not Eri.’

  Re’lien stood, suddenly. Her chair dispersed under her and sunk back into the floor.

  ‘Eri! I have lunch scheduled with her in a few minutes. She’s planet-side, for once.’

  Sola grabbed her arm and then let go.

  ‘Please, Re’lien, don’t drift away from me. Let me spend some time with you.’

  Re’lien picked up her coat from a cupboard revealed by the scuttling nanites.

  ‘We didn’t see each other for ten years. I’m sure you can wait a bit longer.’

  Before Sola could reply, Re’lien left her apartment. Sola could see herself out. She had then and she could now.

  “Despite the loss of its homeworld, humanity has prospered over the last five hundred years. After the Dark Age, following the Blighting of Earth, the sheer force and dedication of the Trooper Order helped cement a lasting peace in the core worlds of Free Space.” – Dirk Gisseppi, A new age for humanity.

  Chapter 3.

  A Red World

  Eri Kara’zar sat at a round metal and pseudo-wood table in the corner of the café. Her head was buried behind the holo-screen menu, where she was struggling to decide between the deep-fried Ganymede shrimp and the plasma singed salmon. She looked up and smiled as Re’lien entered the café.

  The Kur’dal Makeen was run by a third generation edal immigrant. Since the current chef’s grandfather arrived on Mars from some hateful and backwards Imperial Fringe world, this establishment had been perfecting the culinary arts. No synth-ingredients here. No printed meals. Everything here was cooked the old-fashioned way – plasma searers, valathene grills, hover-spits and good old fresh meat. While Re’lien had become enamoured by the technological marvels of the free races, especially its mass food production, she did prefer food that was cooked with more attention to detail. It seemed more honest. Sincerer. It wasn’t like all the fake metal walls. It felt meaningful. The smell of grilled salmon and exotic herbs greeted her as she took a seat.

  ‘Busy morning?’ Eri asked, dismissing the menu holo-screen with a wave of her hand.

  ‘Unpleasant morning. Substitute lecturer told the class that edal don’t have a natural capacity for freedom.’

  Eri gritted her teeth
. ‘Skite-eating grako. Where was your sister?’

  ‘Apparently at a seminar, actually ringing my doorbell.’

  ‘Oh, you have a nice chat? I hope so. You and her need to mend whatever is getting at you.’

  ‘We didn’t talk.’

  Eri frowned. Her ears drooped, slightly. ‘Why, Re’lien? She’s your sister. She looked out for you when you got here. You’re family.’

  ‘A few years of help compared to a decade of neglect. She left me on Xerl. Won’t tell me a thing…’

  ‘She asked me not to tell you…’

  Re’lien raised her hand, dismissively and smiled, sadly. ‘Not accusing you, Eri. We’ve gone through this. She told you to keep quiet and you obeyed her, as a friend. You made an oath. Not my business to find fault in that. My problem is with her. She told you to keep quiet. And in all these years, she hasn’t told me why…’

  ‘It’s complicated. Mind you, not too complicated – especially for someone on the Dean’s Merit List, such as yourself. Congratulations!’

  Re’lien smiled while she tapped her order into her holo-screen. She’d let Eri redirect the conversation, this time.

  ‘Second time on the list. Not so special anymore. Not as special as becoming a Lieutenant-Colonel of the Trooper Armada. How’s permanent enlistment suiting you?’

  ‘Ups and downs. Privateering had the freedom, but lacked a lot of privileges – like stable creds and access to the good ships. They were begging me to go permanent force after my stint at the Academy. I didn’t like the idea of rising through the dirt-ranks, but seems they were willing to pull out all the stops to get me to sign up.’

  ‘What you been up to in the void, Ms Lieutenant-Colonel?’

  Eri grinned, mischievously. ‘Fulfilling the Star Marshal’s wet dreams, bombing the enemies of mankind and training the next generation of xeno-killers.’

  Eri glowered at the last part.

  ‘Xenos who want to rip Mars away from us, Eri. Sure, the humans glare at us, they shout mean slurs, but can you blame them? Ganymede killed over a billion. This close to Mars. People are still living with those wounds. My one lecturer was a Logistics-Trooper in the 2nd Deployment. He twitches when he looks at me. Can I blame him? He has no arms. It was probably someone who looks like me who took them from him.’

  A nanobot-golem resembling an attractive edal delivered their food. The syn changed appearance to the race of the customer. Re’lien would have preferred a human-looking waiter. Re’lien took a bite of paella and continued:

  ‘The Imperial edal and ulyx aren’t you or me, Eri, but they don’t know that. All they know is that they lost relatives, friends and countless fellows all those years ago. Me, I cut them some slack.’

  Eri bit into a prawn double the size of her hand, and then spoke with her mouth half-full.

  ‘Look at you. Lecturing me like I used to lecture you.’

  She feigned tears. ‘My Re’lien is all grown up.’

  Re’lien snorted but didn’t reply. Eri cocked her head.

  ‘What’s up? You’re in a worse mood than usual.’

  ‘Finals coming up.’

  ‘You’re going to ace them. No point worrying. If I was you, I wouldn’t even be studying.’

  ‘Remind me how you keep your job lecturing Armada pilots…’

  ‘Void knows,’ Eri laughed.

  Re’lien couldn’t help but smile. Eri noticed and nodded, triumphantly. They proceeded to eat in silence until they had both finished and a syn came to collect the plates.

  ‘As much as you’re all grown up,’ Eri burped, always the charmer, ‘I’ve still got a few lectures for you. How’s the friend department going?’

  Re’lien took an abnormally long sip from her Titan-brand soda. Eri pressed:

  ‘More importantly – how’s the boyfriend department?’

  Silence.

  ‘Girlfriend?’

  Re’lien shook her head.

  ‘You’ve been here for four years. I had made friends in the first year that I got inducted at the Academy.’

  ‘You’re not me.’

  ‘You’re right, but as me, I know how important friends can be. What happened to Gerald and Hans?’

  ‘They passed basic. Serving on some backwater world about now.’

  Eri rolled her eyes. ‘I love humans and I love Mars, but they can be so naïve. They have so much peace and freedom here. Why do they throw it away? Why this obsession with war? Is it too much peace and prosperity here? Is the peace on the homefront too much for them?’

  ‘Imperials are worse.’

  Eri acknowledged the comment with a nod.

  ‘But Imperials are bred for war. Humans fight despite achieving peace.’

  ‘Maybe they fight to maintain it?’ Re’lien offered.

  Eri raised her glass of Stardust rum. ‘Right-o there, Re’lien. Peace is won by the sword. So odd that we fought so hard to escape the Imperial Doctrine and here we are sprouting it, just for a different lord.’

  ‘Not odd at all. The humans don’t torture me. They just stare. For all this tech, this freedom, this knowledge – I’m willing to put up with a little bit of ostracization.’

  ‘You don’t need to put up with it, Re’lien. Plenty of xenos make friends on Mars. Especially a xeno as pretty as you. Humans might be bitter over Ganymede, but plenty of them still can’t resist the blue warrior-goddesses.’

  Re’lien’s cheeks heated up. Eri grinned.

  ‘While we’re different divisions of the Order, Ms Diplomat-in-training, I do feel that I can give you one order in my capacity as Lieutenant-Colonel. Find some friends.’

  Re’lien looked into her glass.

  ‘Scratch that,’ Eri said. ‘I’m ordering you, as your friend. Do this for me and for yourself. Life is more than just exams and v-flicks. It’s about people. Find someone you want to spend time with. There’s nothing more important.’

  

  Re’lien left the Kur’dal Makeen after losing an argument over the bill with Eri. Re’lien had insisted on paying, as she had more than enough money from her Corps stipend, but Eri refused to let students pay for a meal. Finally, Re’lien conceded as Eri threatened to make a scene. Eri paid the bill and then departed – either to the starport or some raucous Armada bar.

  Re’lien tightened her light grey Mt Battӧn coat. The air was getting chilly. The jackets special weave warmed her up immediately, without the need for a power source. Re’lien liked advanced tech, but she also didn’t like the idea of wearing an electric blanket.

  Lunch had gone on long and it was approaching evening. Mars was approaching its sleep, for many, and its awakening for many more. The night-bars and clubs were opening, heralded by holographic hosts and hostesses, promo-syns and sparkling neon signs. Fredala was not a sleazy neighbourhood, but the repressed needed an outlet and there were plenty of seedier forms of entertainment among the Imperial exiles. Ulyx and edal piled out of the grav-railcar and the hover busses nearby. Some made their way across the café and club lined streets to the residencies. Others filled seats at restaurants and food-stalls. The rest entered the clubs early. They would be alone on the dance-floor for quite a while. At least, that’s what Re’lien thought they would be doing. She had never been to a club. She knew all she had to know about them from v-flicks. One particular v-flick portrayed nightclubs as the domains of gangs and ruffians. Galis was the name of one such flick. It was a gritty show. Not her usual fare, but she had enjoyed it – except for the smells. Blood. Excrement. Sulphur. She could only get through one episode before disabling the scent function of her MindBand.

  Re’lien saluted the brave and foolhardy edal who entered the nightclubs as she proceeded towards her apartment block. This brought her by her favourite sight on all of Mars. Fredala, like much of urban Mars, was built on a platform hoisted above older cities. Light refraction and other such tech made the lower platforms not experience the shadow, allowing for the huge population of Mars without many of the downsides.
Re’lien stood at the precipice of this platform, by a geradite bench next to a green garden flanked by white tiling. She overlooked New London, in all its splendour. Lights of all colours, shining like the stars above. Every light, a life. A story. An infinite tapestry of beings that she would never meet or know. She always felt melancholic looking out across the sea of Mars’ ecumenopolis – its world-spanning city still clinging to the names of older, disparate districts.

  This is my planet. Vok what they tell me. I don’t need to be human to be Martian. I’m just as much a daughter of Mars as any wannabe Trooper or Dark Age Immortal.

  Re’lien took a seat and sighed. Finals were approaching. Eri and Sola told her they weren’t worth worrying about. But she was worrying. Not about passing them. She knew she would. She was worrying about the inevitability of it all. The end of an age. Her university career was ending and after it – the Corps. Did she want to be a diplomat?

  Re’lien gazed across the sea of star-like lights, bathing a metropolis of metal and marvel. One of the Corps offices was in the morass. Re’lien had visited it for her scholarship interview. It was an old building, around three hundred years old. It was established just after the Dark Age – the two-hundred years of war and regression that occurred after Earth became uninhabitable. Some humans still remembered the Dark Age. Generals, titans of industry, scholars, the rich – humanity had managed to use bio-tech, cybernetics and computing to extend their lifespans by centuries. The High Command of the Trooper Order, de jure rulers of Mars, were made up by many of these living fossils – cyborg immortals from an age of war. Regardless of Mars’ growing young population, these ancients maintained the status quo that had delivered the core worlds from savagery. They made sure nobody forgot about that.

  For day to day governance, the ancient Trooper generals of the High Command had little to do. They mostly concerned themselves with a galactic campaign against the infinite enemies of mankind and the free races. Civilian affairs were left mostly to private initiatives, dominated by property owners and megacorp utility providers. For higher affairs, there was the Order-Administration – a skeleton crew of bureaucrats overseeing a gargantuan AI network that ran everything from sewage disposal and power supply to routine court functions and atmospheric-border control.