The Slowest Spacecraft (part 2)
"It was almost five Standard yearcycles ago when the Yansmar homeworld sent out their planetary distress call. The capital city of N'quir was in ruins, devastated in an instant. Almost instantaneously, a second event shattered the floor of the Sea of Lysiu, on the opposite side of the planet."
"My ship, the Vortex of Chaos, and I were not far away, having previously completed a delivery of biologicals to one of the Yansmar orbital habitats. We turned Vortex around and poured the plasma on. We were one of the first ships to arrive, within just a few hourcycles of the disaster. The difference a few hourcycles can make..." Her breath caught in her throat. She stopped to take another sip of port.
"When we left, the planet had been a thriving, growing world. When we returned it was clear, that early, that the planet was racing towards complete ecological collapse. Earthquakes rocked the planet. Tidal waves raced across the oceans and rolled towards the densely populated coastal lowlands. Magma spewed from both event sites, throwing enough dust and ash into the atmosphere to block most of the light from the binary suns."
"We did the best we could. We saved as many Yansmar as possible. Vortex and I ferried hundreds from the city of Ehenn on the coast of Lysiu to one of the orbiting habitats. On the last run, we lifted with the airlock doors open, because we'd waited until the last possible moment. We left millions behind when the massive wall of dirtied water erased the city."
"There was no time to grieve for the ones lost at Ehenn, as Vortex and I raced back down to another city. When that city was lost, we went on to the next. I lost track of the thousands we carried to safety over the next several days. No matter how many we saved, there were always those left behind. Spacecraft of all sizes and shapes raced from a thousand systems to help, and still almost half a billion people died."
"They died along with the planet. Vortex and I watched the death throes of Yansmar, as entire continents rumbled constantly from earthquakes, tectonic plates broke apart, and the Sea of Lysiu boiled away. The planet was awash in orange, white and black. Flames, steam, and ash were the only constants. As the planet's magnetic field failed, the surviving government called for a complete evacuation."
Her words drained away, too full of the terrible memories of that time and place. She picked up her glass once again, raising it in the air.
"To the Yansmar who died in that terrible cataclysm." Her voice was weighted with sadness.
"To the Yansmar," the others at the table replied, joining the toast. Captain Gale drained the remaining port from her glass. The bartender's twentieth tentacle reached the entire distance from the bar, picked up the bottle on the table, and refilled it without a sound. More credits changed owners at the bar.
"It was daycycles before enough specialized disaster relief ships arrived to begin to tackle the remaining rescue operations. With the ships came the specialists trained for these situations. That gave some of the surviving Yansmar leaders time to wonder what had murdered their world."
"J'orrr of Grove F'rrrnkell, have you ever spoken with a Human before?" Captain Gale looked towards the top of the alien, in the generally accepted way to address a species one was unfamiliar with.
"You are the first Captain Human Maggie Gale. I have not shambled from my Grove before this."
"Look around F'nordalp'leen's." J'orrr rotated on his foot-stalks. "There are many people here this nightcycle, from..." She stood up, pointing two fingers at a golden-feathered alien perching on a post next to the bar. Ro#chon was always at that post, daycycle or nightcycle; as far as anyone knew, this was where it made its home and its living. As far as anyone knew, Ro#chon might have been born there.
Ro#chon dipped its long golden beak in acknowledgement, the alien's thin body swaying just slightly to remain perfectly balanced on the two spiky claws grasping the pole. Ro#chon's tawny wings fluttered as a third claw reached out from under them to the surface of the bar. One of four bony talons pecked at an icon on a computer tablet, while the other three clutched the tablet deftly. The alien flipped the tablet around in claws that seemed incapable of such dexterity, holding it so that Maggie could read the number there. "...sixty-eight different races."
One approximately humanoid alien and another resembling a walking cylinder of bony plates entered the bar, apparently engrossed in some ongoing philosophical debate. A digit reached out from under Ro#chon's mantle of feathers.
"Make that seventy different races here, in just this one place." As the number on the tablet increased, the tentacles of the bartender passed out the payoffs on all the related bets. There were enough that a twenty-first tentacle made an appearance. More money changed owners. "For some, that would be sixty-nine too many."
"This is what the Rooted Ones whisper in their Groves."
"Offspring, the aliens are not interested in the ramblings of the lesser of our peoples." The tone in E'efff's interruption was universal, even if E'efff's kind was new to most of those in the room. His Offspring's words were not something spoken of to strangers. Something fluttered from the crown at the end of J'orrr's stalk, perhaps pollen of some sort. Walder, very drunk and now gently snoring in his seat, breathed some of the fine grains. His beak-like nose twitched twice, then he sneezed. He did not wake from his stupor. The others ignored both J'orrr's and Walder's outbursts, as the polite thing to do.
"Apologies, Secondfather. Apologies, Captain Human Maggie Gale. Apologies, Alien Acquaintances. Please Captain Human Maggie Gale, continue."
"There are thousands of known races amongst the trillions of beings in known space. The Coterie expands every daycycle. Still, there are undoubtedly trillions more we haven't met yet. Despite this fact of nature, it seems inherent that each species turns to outsiders first, to place the blame for whatever goes wrong. This is even true of events that appear to be part of the random chaotic nature of the Universe. There are those in the bar that could tell you of the elaborate belief systems that explain, rightly or wrongly, the histories of some worlds. The Yansmar are no different. They started to look at the time period just prior to the cataclysm, trying to find some kind of explanation. They had outgrown their theologies, but they still hadn't outgrown their instinctive distrust of outsiders."
"Vortex was in the middle of yet another emergency run when we got the call."