David Drake: The Chosen

The mirrored wall dissolved into its impossibly real pictures. This time they were much more personal. John-an older John-lay beside a hedgerow. His face was slack, eyes unblinking in the thin gray mist of rain. One hand lay on his stomach, a blue bulge of intestine showing around the fingers.

John sat stripped to the waist in a metal chair, waist and limbs and neck held by padded clamps; another device of levers and screws held his mouth open. A single bulb shone down from the ceiling. A Fourth Bureau specialist dressed in a shiny bib apron stepped up to him with a curved tool in his hands.

"Shame, Hosten, shame," he said. "You have neglected your teeth. Still, I think this nerve is still sensitive."

The curved shape of stainless steel probed and then thrust. The body in the chair convulsed and screamed a fine mist of blood into the cellar's dark air.

Another John stood in the dock of a courtroom. The Republic's flag stood on the wall behind the panel of judges. They whispered together, and then one of them raised his head:

"John Hosten, this court finds you guilty as charged of treason and espionage. You will be taken from this place to the National Prison, and there hung by the neck until dead. May God have mercy on your soul."

The visions died. John touched his tongue to his lips. "I'm not afraid to die," he whispered. Then aloud: "I'm not afraid, and I know my duty. I'll do what you ask, no matter how long it takes, no matter what the risks."

"Good lad," Raj said quietly, and gripped his shoulder. "You and your brother will both do your best."

* * *

Jeffrey Farr looked at the mirrored sphere. "Seems like I'm going to be in action a lot," he said.

He tried to sound calm, but the quaver was in his voice again. Those scenes of himself dying-gut-shot, burned, drowned, the Chosen executioners with whips made of steel-hook chains-they were more real than anything he'd ever seen. He could feel it. .

"If you say yes," Raj said. "I'm not going to lie to you, son. Soldiering isn't a safe profession; and if you refuse, the final war between the Land and your country may not be for a generation or more, possibly two."

"Yeah, and the horse might learn to sing," Jeffrey said. He was a little surprised at Raj's chuckle. "And if I had kids, they'd be around when it happened, anyway. I'll do it. Somebody's got to. A Farr does what has to be done."

Unconsciously, his voice took on another tone with the last words; Raj nodded approvingly and handed him the balloon snifter.

"Good lad."

"There's just one thing," Jeffrey said. He looked up; the. . computer. . wasn't there-wasn't anywhere, specifically, while he was in its mind-but that helped.

"Just one thing. If, ah, Center can predict things, and manipulate them the way you're saying, couldn't you change the Chosen? You showed me what would happen if the Chosen took over by themselves , didn't you? Left to themselves, on their own."

correct.Raj nodded.

"So, you could help them , and sort of twist things around so that they built a star-transport system? It'd be easy enough, with you showing all the technical stuff they had to do every step of the way, not like reinventing it, not really. And you could get whoever you picked to the top in Chosen politics, couldn't you? Make 'em next thing to a living god."

Raj leaned back in his chair. "Smart lad," he said admiringly. "But then, you've got a different perspective on it than your brother-your brother to be, I mean."

probability of medium-term success with such a course of action is 62 %, ±10, Center said. unusually high degree of uncertainty due to stochastic factors. we cannot be certain of coming into contact with a suitable chosen representative. this course of action is contraindicated by other factors, however.

Raj nodded, his hard dark face bleak. "It might be possible to get Visager back into interstellar space with the Chosen running things," he said. "But you couldn't change them into something we'd want in interstellar space-not without redesigning their society from the ground up, and that would be impossibly difficult."

impressionistic but correct. observe:

The blank hemisphere cleared. Once again Jeffrey saw the blue-white shape of a planet from space, but this time it was not Visager. A shimmering appeared, and spots blinked into existence in the darkness above the planet, tiny until the perspective snapped closer. That showed huge metal shapes-spaceships, he supposed-with the sunburst of the Land on their flanks. Doors opened in their sides, and smaller shapes fell towards the cloud-streaked blue world, shapes with wings and a sleek shark-shape to them. The viewpoint followed them down in a dizzying plunge, through atmosphere and cherry heat, down to the ground. They landed amid flames and rubble, burning vegetation, and shattered buildings. Ramps slid down, and gun-tubs in the assault transports fired bolts that cut paths of thunderous vacuum through the air to clear the perimeter of the landing zone. War machines slid down the ramps on cushions of air, their massive armor bristling with weapons and sensors.

A head appeared in the turret of one of the war machines as it slid to earth and nosed up, dirt howling from around its skirts. The man's helmet visor was flipped up, and his grin was like something out of the deep oceans.

"Let's do it, people," he said. "Let's go. "

probability of successful redesign of chosen culture is 12 %, ±6, Center said.

"We could put them on top; we could even get them out to the stars," Raj said. "But they'd still attack anything that moved-it's their basic imperative."

"Yeah, I can see that," Jeffrey said, linking and cracking his fingers-then looking down suddenly, conscious that his real hands weren't moving at all, somewhere he couldn't see. Raj nodded wryly. And for him, it's like this all the time. It felt real , but. .

"Yeah," he went on. "They've got to be stopped, here and now."

"You and your brother will do it," Raj said. "With our help."

* * *

— and the meteorite was smooth under his fingers.

John Hosten half fell to the dock. Raj? he thought. Center? Was this some sort of crazy dream? Maybe he was realty back in his bunk at school, waiting for reveille.

The dockers were looking at him, dull curiosity, or simply noting that he was something moving. Jeffrey Farr three-quarters fell down the net after him, his face stunned and slack. John caught him automatically, pushing the limp form against the cargo net so that he could cling and support himself. " You too? "

do not show distress,the machine-voice said in his mind.

Pull yourselves together, lads, Raj continued. The voice was equally silent, but it had the modulation of human speech, without the sense of cold bottomless depth that Center's carried.

"John! Jeffrey!"

There was anger in the adults voices. Jeffrey's face was pale enough that the freckles stood out like birthmarks, but he smiled his gap-toothed grin.

"Hey, we're in some shit now, man." "Lets go."

* * *

"Say good-bye to your father," Sally Hosten said.

John stepped forward. "Sir."

Karl gave a tiny forward jerk of his head. " Min sohn. "

He extended his hand; John stared at it in surprise for an instant. That was the greeting among equals. Then he bowed and took it. The impersonal power clamped briefly on his. A servant came forward at Karl's signal.

"Here," Karl said. He handed John a cloth-wrapped bundle. Within was a gunbelt and revolver. "This was my father's. You should have it. This and my name are all that Fate allows me to leave you."