Kinder des Schicksals 4 (Xeelee 9): Resplendent

up in an effort to wreck the
human processing plants there. But thanks to smart intelligence by
the Commission for Historical Truth they had been met by an
overwhelming response. It had been a famous victory, the excuse for a
lot of celebration.
    If a little eerie. Sometimes the Commission’s knowledge of future
events was so precise we used to wonder if they had spies among the
Xeelee. Or a time machine, maybe. Scary, as I said. But there is a
bigger picture here. After fifteen thousand years of the Third
Expansion, and eight thousand years of all-out war with the Xeelee,
humanity controls around a quarter of the disc of the Galaxy itself,
a mighty empire centred on Sol, as well as some outlying territories
in the halo clusters. But the Xeelee control the rest, including the
Galaxy centre. And, gradually, the slow-burning war between man and
Xeelee is intensifying.
    So I was glad the Commissaries, with their apparent powers of
prophecy, were on my side.
    We descended a couple of decks and found ourselves in the
corvette’s main loading bay. The big main doors had been opened to
reveal a wall of burned and broken flesh. The stink was just
overwhelming, and great lakes of yellow-green pus were gathering on
the gleaming floor.
    The wall was the hull of the injured Spline. The Kard had docked
with the Assimilator’s Torch as best she could, and this was the
result. The engineers were at work, cutting a usable opening in that
wall. It was just a hole in the flesh, another wound. Beyond, a
tunnel stretched, organic, less like a corridor than a throat.
    I could see figures moving in the tunnel - Torch crew, presumably.
Here came two of them labouring to support a third between them. Kard
crew rushed forward to take the injured tar. I couldn’t tell if it
was a he or a she. That was how bad the burns were. Loops of flesh
hung off limbs that were like twigs, and in places you could see down
to bone, which itself had been blackened.
    Tarco and I reacted somewhat badly to this sight. But already med
cloaks were snuggling around the wounded tar, gentle as a lover’s
caress.
    I looked up at the Commissary, who was standing patiently. ’Sir?
Can you tell us why we are here?’
    ’We received ident signals from the Torch when it downfolded.
There’s somebody here who will want to meet you.’
    ’Sir, who - ’
    ’It’s better if you see for yourself.’
    One of the Torch crew approached us. She was a woman, I saw, about
my height. There was no hiding the bloodstains and scorches and rips,
or the way she limped; there was a wound in her upper thigh that
actually smoked. But she had captain’s pips on her collar.
    I felt I knew her face - that straight nose, the small chin -
despite the dirt that covered her cheeks and neck, and the crust of
blood that coated her forehead. She had her hair grown out long, with
a ponytail at the back, quite unlike my regulation crew-cut. But -
this was my first impression - her face seemed oddly reversed, as if
she was a mirror image of what I was used to.
    I immediately felt a deep, queasy unease.
    I don’t know many captains, but she immediately recognised me.
’Oh. It’s you.’
    Tarco had become very tense. It turned out he had thought the
situation through a little further than I had. ’Commissary, what
engagement has the Torch come from?’
    ’The Fog.’
    My mouth dropped. Every tar on Base 592 knew that the Fog is an
interstellar cloud - and a major Xeelee concentration - situated
inside 3-Kilo, a good hundred light years deeper towards the centre
of the Galaxy. I said, ’I didn’t know we were hitting the enemy so
deep.’
    ’We aren’t. Not yet.’
    ’And,’ Tarco said tightly, ’here we are greeting a battle-damaged
ship that hasn’t even left Earth yet.’
    ’Quite right,’ Varcin said approvingly. ’Ensigns, you are
privileged to witness this. This ship is a survivor of a battle that
won’t happen for another twenty-four years.’
    Tarco kind of spluttered.
    As for me, I couldn’t take my eye off the Torch’s captain. Tense,
she was running her thumb down the side of her cheek.
    ’I do that,’ I said stupidly.
    ’Oh, Lethe,’ she said, disgusted. ’Yes, tar, I’m your older self.
Get over it. I’ve got work to do.’ And with a glance at the
Commissary she turned and stalked back towards her ship.
    Varcin said gently, ’Go with her.’
    ’Sir - ’
    ’Do it, ensign.’
    Tarco followed me. ’So in twenty-four years you’re still going to
be a