With the centers of power gone, the rebellions on the other planets could not be put down, and soon the entire Empire was in chaos, though few planets died as completely as Capitol. And it took only a hundred years after the Empire's death for the Enemy, poisoned by the rebel planets it took over in a quick grab for power, to also fall victim to the general destruction, thus setting the stage for our own age — the Age of Diversity.

Hunter and Halleck, Revolution in the Age of Diversity, 6601, pp. 5–8.

7

JAZZ WAKENED to see the lid of the coffin sliding back, the amber light winking at the edge of his vision. The memory tape must have just finished, he thought, though of course he had no memory of it happening. His body was hot and sweating — like all somec users, he believed the warmth was caused by the drugs used for waking.

He sat up abruptly, rolled himself over the edge of the coffin, and dropped to the floor in push–up position. Twenty push–ups and thirty sit–ups later, he got to his feet, the blood flowing, feeling refreshed from the long sleep.

Only then did he notice that it was not the amber light flashing in the coffin. It was the red.

He had been reaching into the cupboard for the packet of clothing that would have been prepared by the ship for his waking. But the red flashing light sent him immediately to the control board.

QUERY.

RESPONSE: ENEMY SHIP ROUNDED SIIS III SEVEN MINUTES AGO.

QUERY HOSTILE ACTS.

RESPONSE: Two PROJECTILES LAUNCHED, IMPACT 1.7, IMPACT 3.4.

QUERY ATTACK PATH.

RESPONSE: RANDOM UNPREDICTABLE.

That meant that the enemy pilot was still guiding the projectiles. Jason immediately began searching through space for the enemy captain's mind, even as his fingers automatically sent half of his projectiles — a pitiful two on a virtually unarmed colony ship — and he found, yes, the mind controlling the projectiles. Found in the mind the path the projectiles would follow. And then maneuvered his own ship, just slightly, in a feint. The other captain followed the feint, committed the first projectile, and then when it was too late for the enemy to alter course in time to strike him, Jason shifted again, just enough to keep his ship out of reach.

The second enemy projectile was easier to dodge. And now it was time for the opposite maneuver as Jason controlled his own weapons, seeing in the enemy's mind his evasion plans, countering them just in time each time, until his first projectile made contact with the giant stardrive of the enemy ship, and its image on the holomap became an ever fainter, ever expanding globe.

Just before the contact, Jazz had heard the enemy captain crying out for help, had felt him fumbling with a microphone, had heard in his mind the faintest wisp of a prayer as he realized that contact would be made, and then had heard for an infinitesimal moment the agony of death, and then felt the peace of death, the absence of mind.

Jazz leaned back on the upholstered chair, noticed how cold it felt on his naked, sweating back.

The red light was still flashing. Jazz was puzzled, leaned forward again.

QUERY.

RESPONSE: SECOND ENEMY SHIP, ROUNDED SIIS III FOUR MINUTES AGO.

QUERY HOSTILE ACTS.

RESPONSE: Two PROJECTILES LAUNCHED, IMPACT 0.2, IMPACT 1.9.

Impact 0.2! Jason shouted at himself. And even as his fingers played along the control board and his mind sought the enemy captain's mind, his intellectually unfazeable mind was saying to him, "You fool, he would never have called for help by radio unless he had someone else nearby."

The other mind found; the flight path of the projectile mapped; contact inevitable; and by reflex Jazz did the only possible maneuver that would ensure survival: he swung the starship very slightly — and intercepted the projectile with the payload section of the ship, catching it deftly with the only portion of the ship the weapon could strike without causing a nuclear explosion.

At the same moment, Jazz released his last two projectiles, hoping that there would be no more enemy ships.

And his control room shuddered with the shock of impact. The enemy projectile was not nuclei, of course — on the surface of the stardrive, a nuclear explosion would not penetrate through the shielding. Instead, it was equipped with high intensity fusion–source lasers, and it melted a path ahead of itself for a critical number of seconds. Just long enough, with a few meters to spare, to penetrate the shielding of a stardrive.

Jazz didn't bother to wonder whether the projectile had had to force its way through enough payload that it would run out of fuel before penetrating to the stardrive core. He was too busy moving his ship (the controls still respond, good) to avoid the second enemy missile; and then he immediately shifted his attention to guiding his own projectiles as they homed in on the enemy ship.

He saw the enemy captain's disbelief as he realized that he had made contact — and yet Jason's ship had not exploded. And then the panic as the enemy captain tried to dodge Jason's projectiles, couldn't, and realized horribly that he would die as his fellow captain had just died.

And then the globe of fading light on the holomap.

QUERY.

RESPONSE: No ENEMY ACTIVITY.

QUERY LOCATION.

RESPONSE: SIIS III.

So Jazz had reached his destination; as was often the case, the Enemy had dispatched warships to intercept the colony ship before it could land. Those Enemy craft might have been orbiting Siis in for as much as a century, waking their captains only when Jazz's ship was sensed as it decelerated to subluminous speeds. Traditional pattern, except that there were two ships instead of one.

The tension of battle fading, he remembered how he had stopped the enemy projectile, and felt a horrible burning sensation in his stomach and groin.

He got up from the chair and went to the cupboard, dressed, and then for safety put on a pressure suit with a field helmet. He adjusted it for transparent and semipermeable, and then turned the wheel on the seal lock of the door leading to the back of the payload section.

The storage compartment was completely undamaged — none of the animal coffins had even come loose. Which left only one conclusion: the projectile had entered the payload section in the passenger tubes.

Jazz readjusted for impermeable, and opened the door at the back of the storage section. No rush of air into space — the monitor area was also undamaged.

Jazz looked at the dials that told the condition of all the passengers in each of the tubes. The A section dials were all functioning, and their message was uniform: no life in any of the coffins. The C section was as bad: the dials were all dark, meaning that the life–support system was out.

Only B section was intact, showing no damage. Jazz wasn't sure whether to be horrified at losing two–thirds of his colony, or relieved at still having one–third.

He opened the door to B tube and walked down the rows, inspecting each coffin for damage. There was none that he could detect, not even a shifting of the bodies. Noticing who was still alive also told him who was not. But among the survivors was Hop Noyock, and Jazz felt an unreasonable gladness, as if Hop's survival insured the success of the colony after all.

At the end of the tube was another door, which led to the schoolroom, where all the memory tapes of the colonists were stored, and where at the end of the voyage Jason would waken each of the passengers.

Beside the door a warning light was flashing red.

Jazz punched in the code on the doorbutton that flushed all atmosphere out of the tube. When the green light flashed on, he opened the door and found chaos.