Chapter 5: Questor Dis

The face on the holo screen was well known to billions.

"Good evening, this is the LBC nightly news report for June 26, 4040, and I'm Freddie Nimblr."

Questor Dis turned up the volume. He didn't really care for Nimblr's style, but he watched his newscast every night. Nimblr had government contacts and got the really important news as soon as it broke, and for the sixteen odd billion of Sol system he was the "man on the scene", a trusted icon in every home who unfailingly brought the nightly scandals.

"Our top story tonight: Crisis in the Aurigan sector."

FreddieÕs face was replaced by a graphic showing the Human Stellar Network: a rough blob of blue colored stars with one of gold near the center that was Sol. A series of lines appeared, subdividing human space into its eighteen sectors. A bulge on the far side turned colors and glowed pink. The Network rotated, the scene zoomed in and Auriga expanded to fill the screen, a computer somewhere in Luna Broadcasting reducing an incomprehensible expanse of the void thousands of light-years across into a visual display a few seconds long. Questor, a man who had crossed those depths in real space, shook his head, annoyed at some unknown video designer who could so flippantly reduce such largeness.

Questor noticed things like that.

Of the fifty-seven stellar systems in the Aurigan sector, fifteen were inhabited. These turned green and were scattered about. One turned red and the scene zoomed in again. A dusty red and gray planet resolved with a few meager cities flashing yellow.

"Over one hundred and fifty Terran citizens were taken captive last month in Port Nuerjal, the capitol of the Aurigan sector."

FreddieÕs face was back on the screen. Behind him in a box a file vid showed a sea of howling faces chanting slogans and holding up banners.

"The mob, calling themselves representatives of the United Separatist Front, abducted the citizens from aboard a grounded commercial passenger shuttle in clear violation of the law.

"The terrorist, many identified as members of a quasi-religious sect called The New Order, are holding the citizens at the port facilities of the capitol, Baleen.

"Among their demands: a call for the government on Luna to recognize a Declaration of Aurigan Independence, which was secretly drafted and signed last April by representatives of fourteen of the fifteen worlds of the sector. Secondly, recognition and access to the inner systems by the Merchanters Free Trade Union, which was banned from the central sectors two decades ago, and strangely, a request to dissolve the Charter system and the Colonial Office.

"Government spokesperson Toshiro Kutuzov said at a press conference this morning that the safety of the hostages is the governmentÕs main concern, but did not rule out military action, saying that this administration adheres to the policy of the indivisibility of the Human Network."

Questor smiled and turned off his vid. That was all the news he would be listening to that night. A startling piece of news of a kind he had been waiting a long time to hear. This was something that was going to shake things up a bit. Within minutes his phone started beeping and his comp started chiming incoming messages. Soon all of his cadres were impatiently waiting for him to speak.

Questor fancied himself the head of some darkly secret society and these were his co-conspirators. They seemed no more than a group of armchair intriguers plotting grumpy plots over dark web portals and obscure middle-wave frequencies, but they were the movers and shakers of the lunatic fringe.

They were disgruntled old men and fractured ideologists, barely veiled gangsters and political extremists. Among them were a Senator, an Admiral and retinue of officers of the Fleet, several wealthy industrialists from the Earth Companies and other less prominent personages. All stood to gain from any political or economic upheaval. Questor Dis was their prophet. For years he had quietly preached to them of the changes that must take place and pointed out to a select few the vast cracks in the infrastructures of human society É quietly, and to a select few.

He was unobtrusive, this Questor Dis, ever since he was dismissed from the Fleet years before É for mutiny. Of course, he had been acquitted of any crime, but had been ostracized from the inner circles of power that he had tasted and lusted after.

Now he whispered idle threats to others like himself, who had some wrong to dwell upon, and waited for an opportunity to make some change to present itself that would allow him to inveigle his way back into the circles of power. He was sure that such an opportunity would manifest, they never failed in the course of human events.

"You see, it begins," said Questor, smiling, though the call was strictly audio and quite untraceable.

"Don't try to bullshit us into believing you planned this, Dis."

"I assure you, Senator, I had no part in these events." He made a mental note to eliminate the man from future confidence, even though it was useful to have an ear on the Senate floor.

"Have I not explained to you the course that events must follow? The Oligarchs of Luna cannot hold things together much longer. With ninety-five percent of humanity unrepresented in their councils, disintegration is inevitable."

"But if the government -- or rather, when the government calls in the Fleet, it will crush this rebellion. LunaÕs power will be restored."

"Will it?" said Dis. "For a time, but rebellion will spring up again somewhere and somewhen else. The causes for disintegration will still exist. This rebellion is here now. It is for us to take advantage of the fact. Now."

"But they will order the Fleet into Auriga."

"No, not by their own will, they will not. You see the ideology of the Republic revolves around the concept of a united humanity. 'One Republic, indivisible, with justice and security for all É ' How can the government order the Fleet to take action when it's been over a thousand years since men have killed other men over the words of school children? How can they when they believe mankind has outgrown such foolishness? The ugly truth is that man is quite capable of killing himself all over again."

"So," asked the Senator, who was definitely going to be a problem, "what's that got to do with the present situation, and how do we benefit from it?"

Dis smiled again. Conspiracy was his element. "Because of this minor ideological point, the government will stall. They will hesitate and exhaust every means for a peaceful solution. We must ensure there is no peaceful solution."

"How?" He wasn't sure if it was just one, or several voices.

"By any means possible. The Senator can stand on the floor and filibuster. Others can engage in bureaucratic loop holing, rumor spreading, maybe even some bribes. Anything that can make a difference or get things lost in the paperwork. We watch, wait, and do whatever comes to hand. We act as the situation dictates as it unfolds and do whatever we can to gather the strings of power into our own hands."

Blas, a man who was particularly influential, cleared his throat, an unmistakable sound. The others fell silent. Mostly they fell silent because Blas happened to be an Admiral in the Fleet. He was a man who could thwart the best laid plans, had not separate arrangements been made. A rumbling basso filled the channel, a voice finely calculated, offsetting perfectly the smoothness of Questor Dis.

"Talking treason's one thing, Dis, acting on it's another." The hint of insolence was perfect, and Dis knew that any who had reservations would go to the Admiral É then he would hear of it and accounts would be settled.

"The time for action is now," said Dis, "or all that we've dreamed of and planned for has been in vain."

The conference call was ended. He watched the LEDs go off one by one until only two were left connected. This was the conference after the conference, the conspiracy within the conspiracy.

"There you have it," said Dis to these two, Blas and one other. "The time for action is now, as I told them. They are our eyes and ears, our hands in the Fleet, the government and the private sector. They will shake things up."

"But what if they do order a Fleet action? I'm not the Fleet unto myself to stop such an order, and even though we can make some noise on the Senate floor, Constitution or no, the Senate doesn't make the decisions."

"There will be plenty of noise, Admiral, I assure you. No one ever accused the doddering old fools of the Security Council of decisiveness, and I don't think they're going to change any time soon. Besides, you said yourself the Fleet's not what it once was and has been stripped down next to nothing. That is where the government has gone wrong; they don't understand that it's the Fleet that's the key to a united humanity. Think of it. The Network, the worlds men live on, are like tiny bubbles of light in a vast ocean of darkness. We three have all crossed that deep in ships. We know that fear of the emptiness between the stars. It is those ships, gentlemen that hold humanity together. Control those ships and you control Man."