Far Side Two
Copyright© 2025 by Gina Marie Wylie
Chapter 13
I
Erica Mirableu accepted the offered hand of one of the crewmen and made her way down the ladder into the bowels of the German sub. She recognized the captain of the sub and saluted him. “Permission to come aboard, sir.”
“Granted, Miss Mirableu. Welcome to the U-37. Do you have any luggage?”
“We are to go out and back, with an hour or two on station. Four hours out, four hours back plus the two hours. I have my phone, a backup phone, and two backup batteries. I’m told I won’t even need Dramamine.”
“We have a staff observer position where you can belt in. A submarine isn’t as rough a ride as a 747, but even so, we go up and down rather often. Exec, see that Miss Mirableu is squared away. After we are underway, show her the head and how it functions. Oh, and please explain to Miss Mirableu that her phone won’t work that far from shore, even if there were cell towers here -- which there isn’t.”
“Captain, a moment. You reported that you heard the warning in your head. Did anyone else hear it?”
The captain shrugged. “The entire crew heard it, Miss Mirableu.”
Erica made a moue of distress. “This may be more dangerous than anticipated. The dralha can affect one percent of humans. This race can reach everyone.”
“Miss Mirableu...” the captain started.
“Erica,” she interrupted.
“Miss Mirableu, I’ve some thoughts on the message. They warned us about using echo sounders over the abysses and warned about nothing else. If Director Schultz orders it, I might be amenable to using radar, although that might violate the rules. They didn’t specify how long we could stay above one of the abysses. In fact, there was no other useful information in the message beyond the warning.”
“We’ll hope for the best. I have been requested and required by Director Schultz and the President not to start an interstellar war.”
A man came up from below, and Erica recognized the German Commodore. “Sir,” she said, coming to attention.
“Miss Mirableu, I have shamelessly used the fact that none on Arvala can tell me no, except Director Schultz, and sadly I forgot to tell her what I intended before we departed.”
Erica waved a vague salute. “I was raised French, sir. The reason the French have never beaten the Germans since Napoleon is the reason no French flag officer would have been willing to come.”
The commodore shook his head. “It was Richelieu who scuppered us in the Thirty Years’ War. He left a bad taste in our mouths for that. Napoleon was just a bad cold in comparison. Thankfully, both nations have gotten more rational in the last seventy-five years. What are your plans, Miss Mirableu?”
“As I said, avoid starting a war. Director Schultz has withdrawn to Earth, but I’m in contact with her. It’s too bad that your captain destroyed my plausible deniability that I was talking to her via the radio.”
The commodore lifted an eyebrow. “Your quartermaster is a telepath that I can talk to, and he can talk to Miss Schultz, and the messages go both ways,” Erica told him.
“Damn!” the captain said. “Sorry.”
“A secret shared by three people isn’t going to remain a secret long, and there are about thirty who know now on Arvala, but the fifty back home are increasing in number daily. It’s hopeless.”
“Captain, your XO has been briefed on the mission?” the commodore asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“Pass the conn to him, and the three of us will have coffee in the mess.”
When they were seated and had been served steaming hot mugs of coffee, the commodore gestured at Erica. “I am not meaning to disparage you, Miss Mirableu. What is your remit in the forthcoming negotiations?”
“I told you, I’m in telepathic contact with Captain Friedrich’s former helmsman, who is in direct radio contact with Director Schultz, and I understand that Jon Bullman will be there too. The Secret Service won’t let the President go to Arvala, but he’ll be in phone contact with Andie as well. I’m a mouthpiece and nothing more.”
Erica lost her focus for a second and then muttered, “Holy Hot Dogs! Grab your socks!”
Abruptly, she was transported bodily to someplace else. She was in a very large room with exquisite paintings of landscapes on the walls and a long table running down the center. The ceiling was very high and had paintings as well. People were popping into the room in groups of two or three. Andie and Linda, Jon Bullman and the President, the king of Arvala and Melek, two men who were obviously Tengri, a man and a woman that Erica didn’t recognize, all on their side of the table.
Across the table, aliens began to pop into existence as well. Dralha, writ the same size as the humans, then a feet away four blobs of color that really weren’t recognizable. Finally, a very old man at the head of the table who was standing as the rest were seated. It was he who started to speak.
“I hereby convene this Great Council of the world, some of you know as Arvala.
“The more sophisticated among you realize that this is a simulation of reality. To those less sophisticated, we need to recognize that there is no real place as this room. Think of it as a very realistic dream.”
“As convener, I introduce myself as Lucian, a member of a race that has lived some five billion years on this planet. Most of my fellows are busy doing this and that and frankly don’t care what happens here.” He waved at the four blobs. “The Tulia are more recent. A billion years ago. As Miss Walsh realized, they tried to rearrange things to their pleasure. They aren’t bad, but they were a little hasty in their attempt to secure a place of their own without all the pesky upstart younger races who they found obstreperous. As well as pesky, they were misbehaving and had no manners.
“Now they have been roused and found one of those pesky younger races had broken an old agreement. They acted abruptly, reminding the younger race of the original agreement. Of course, the Tulia are responsible for the recent damage to the planet.
“Now, again another younger race has appeared, only they have several branches. The Tulia, quite rightly, thought slavery repugnant and had disciplined the race known these days as the ‘Dralha’ for holding slaves of a related, but lesser species. The discipline was limiting them to one continent, and moving the related species to another continent. Arvala is blessed with many continents; there is plenty of room for everyone.
“Now one of the younger races holds slaves as well. It is amusing, and no accident that humans from another planet have arrived, a species that realizes slavery is foolish.” The old man laughed, “And it turns out that they are nearly as advanced as the Tulia. They recognized your error, after all.
“I stand inloco parentis for Arvala. You children will behave! Tengri and the Dralha must free any slaves. I am not the Tulia, lashing out indiscriminately! Take the Tengri -- their opponents range from 600 years behind them to their equals. You Tengri are six hundred years behind the Earth humans. You Tengri pay attention! The Earth people could kill every last Tengri. Their stated objectives are not to resort to that unless the Tengri are obdurate.
“The Tulia are very unhappy with the Dralha. There is a proposal advanced that the continent could be better used by the human former slaves and the Dralha and their lesser slaves simply should be removed. Tulia! Have a care! You have made mistakes before, made mistakes with simple calculations. Energy weapons from space? You’ve had to sleep for a hundred million years for the first mistake. Make an error like the first with energy weapons; your people would simply cease to exist, as would the planet. My people are fond of their original home and would take it very badly if you destroyed it. Cease and desist!
“Go back to sleep for the seventy-five million years before the continental uplift is complete!”
“They really, seriously, messed up those calculations, didn’t they?” Linda Walsh interjected. “If the continent rises up, the water has to go somewhere. The cracks in the crust will come back to haunt them in the future, once that water gets subducted. Haunt everyone on the planet. Ask the Tengri, B’Lugi, and the others who share that landmass about the effects of the volcanism. Above all, the Builder civilization -- which the Tengri destroyed.”
“As you should know, Miss Walsh, the arrow of time is harsh and merciless. There are no do-overs. Those who have to experience it have no alternatives.”
Linda sniffed in derision. “The best alternative is never to let it happen in the first place. The first thing I learned about babysitting is you never take your eyes off the really young. That or limit them in what they can do ... but still keep a close watch on them lest they are more ingenious than you believed.”
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