David Weber: The Honor of the Qween

"What you may not realize," Courvosier went on, "is that more is involved here than just strategic real estate. The Cromarty government is trying to build a fire break against Haven, Honor. We're rich enough to stand up to the Peeps, probably, and we've got the technical edge, but we can't begin to match their manpower. We need allies, but, even more, we need to be seen as a creditable player, someone with the guts and will to face Haven down. There are still a lot of neutrals out there; there probably still will be when the shooting starts, and we need to influence as many as possible of them to be `neutral' in our favor."

"I can see that, Sir."

"Good. But the reason I'm surprised the Admiralty assigned you to this particular effort is that you're a woman." Honor blinked in complete surprise, and Courvosier laughed without humor at her expression.

"I'm afraid I don't follow that, Sir."

"You will when you get your download," Courvosier promised sourly. "In the meantime, let me just give you the high points. Have a seat, Captain."

Honor sank into a chair and lifted Nimitz from her shoulder to her lap as she regarded her superior. He seemed genuinely concerned, and for the life of her, she couldn't see what her gender had to do with her suitability for command.

"You have to understand that Yeltsin's Star has been settled far longer than Manticore," Courvosier began in his best Saganami lecturer's voice. "The first colonists landed on Grayson, Yeltsin's single habitable planet, in 988 P.D., almost five hundred years before we arrived on the scene." Honor's eyes narrowed in surprise, and he nodded. "That's right. In fact, Yeltsin hadn't even been surveyed when they left Sol. For that matter, the entire cryo-process had been available for less than ten years when they shipped out."

"But why in God's name come way out here? " Honor demanded. "They must've had better astro data on systems closer to Sol!"

"They did, indeed, but you've already hit their motivation." She frowned, and he smiled thinly. " `In God's name,' Honor. They were religious zealots looking for a home so far away no one would ever bother them. I guess they figured five-hundred-plus light-years was about far enough in an era before hyper travel had even been hypothesized. At any rate, the `Church of Humanity Unchained' set out on a leap of faith, with absolutely no idea what they were going to find at the other end."

"Lord." Honor sounded shaken, and she was. She was a professional naval officer, and the mere thought of all the hideous ways those colonists could have died was enough to turn her stomach.

"Precisely. But the really interesting thing is why they did it." Honor quirked an eyebrow, and Courvosier shrugged. "They wanted to get away from `the corrupting, soul-destroying effect of technology,' " he said, and she stared at him in disbelief.

"They used a starship to get away from technology? That's—that's insane, Sir!"

"No, not really." Courvosier leaned back against a table and folded his arms. "Mind you, that was my own first thought when the FO handed me the background on the system, but it actually made sense, in a crazy sort of way. Remember, this was way back in the early fourth century of the Diaspora, when Old Earth was finally getting a real handle on pollution, resource depletion, and overcrowding. Actually, things had been getting better for at least two hundred years, despite the eco-nuts' and `Earth First' groups' efforts to kill the various space initiatives. The Earth-Firsters probably had a better case, given the resource demands STL colony ships made on Sol's economy, but at least they recognized the spinoff advantages. Deep-space industry, asteroid mining operations, orbital power collectors—all of them were on line at last, and the quality of life was climbing system-wide. Most people were delighted, and the Earth-Firsters' only real complaint was that it could have climbed even faster if people would only stop building interstellar colony ships.

"On the other hand, there were still crackpot groups—particularly the extreme `Greens' and the Neo-Luddites—who didn't distinguish between the colonizing efforts and any other space activity. They insisted, each for their own reasons, that the only real solution was to throw technology out on its ear and `live the way man was intended to live.' " Honor snorted in derision, and he chuckled.

"I know. They'd have looked pretty sick if they'd tried it, especially with a system population of over twelve billion to feed and house, but most of the idiots were from more developed nations. Extremists tend to grow more extreme, not less, as problems get closer to solutions, you know, and these extremists didn't have any real concept of what a planet without technology would be like, because they'd never experienced it. Besides, after three centuries of preaching the evils of technology—and their own societies' `greedy, exploitative guilt'—the `Greens' were techno-illiterates with no real relevance to the world about them, and most of the Neo-Luddites' job skills had been made redundant by new technologies. Neither background really qualified them to understand what was happening, and sweeping, simplistic solutions to complicated problems are much more appealing than tackling the real thought that might actually solve them.

"At any rate, the Church of Humanity Unchained was the product of a fellow named Austin Grayson—the Reverend Austin Grayson from someplace called the State of Idaho. According to the Foreign Office, there were hordes of lunatic fringe groups running around at the time, and Grayson was a `back to the Bible' type who got caught up in the ban-the-machine movement. The only things that made him different from other crackpots and bomb-throwers were his charisma, his determination, and his talent for attracting converts with real ability. He actually managed to assemble a colony expedition and fund it to the tune of several billion dollars, all to take his followers away to the New Zion and its wonderful, technology-free Garden of Eden. It was really a rather elegant concept, you know, using technology to get away from technology."

"Elegant," Honor snorted, and the Admiral chuckled again.

"Unfortunately, they got a nasty surprise at journey's end. Grayson's a pretty nice place in many ways, but it's a high-density world with unusual concentrations of heavy metals, and there isn't a single native plant or animal that won't kill any human who eats it for very long. Which meant, of course—"

"That they couldn't abandon technology and survive," Honor finished for him, and he nodded.

"Exactly. Not that they were willing to admit it. In fact, Grayson never did admit it. He lived another ten T-years after their arrival, and every year the end of technology was just around the corner, but there was a fellow named Mayhew who saw the writing on the wall a lot sooner. According to what I can dig out of the records, he more or less allied with another man, a Captain Yanakov, who'd commanded the colony ship, and the two of them pulled off a sort of doctrinal revolution after Grayson's death. Technology itself wasn't evil, just the way it had been used on Old Earth. What mattered wasn't the machine but the ungodly lifestyle machine-age humanity had embraced."

He rocked on his heels in silent thought for a moment, then shrugged.

"At any rate, they abandoned the anti-machine portion of Grayson's theology and concentrated on creating a society in strict accordance with God's Holy Word. Which—" he darted a quick glance at Honor from under lowered brows "—included the theory that `Man is the head of Woman.' "

It was Honor's turn to frown, and he sighed.

"Damn it, Honor, you're too Manticoran! And," he added with a sudden genuine laugh, "God help us all if your mother ever ended up on Grayson!"