The Commodore’s Clock

FORT ZINDERNEUF

“No.” The Commodore ended the discussion, “I am not going to send one of our scout gunboats and a familiar back to Earth Prime with news of our discovery. Such an action would, well it would:

“Reduce our efficiency, not to mention our strength, by 20%;

“It would be very slow, the poor familiar would have to recover their energy after each jump;

“There would be no magister aboard to survey each jump;

“Yes, we have logged the locations of all our previous jumps, but it’s nice to be sure;

“There is no discernible advantage in trying to rush the news home. Time really isn’t an issue here. We would probably get home before they did, they having just the one familiar.”

The other ships had all returned to The Scouts without detecting anything resembling suitability for life.

The dimensions for First Prime had also been checked. First was very similar to First Prime. Lichens were quickly located. No higher life form had been discovered. First Secundus was an asteroid field suggesting that Secundus had sustained some kind of disaster, probably collision with another large comet or asteroid that had fragmented it.

“Let’s locate the closest Earth class star and get on with it.”

The Commodore had concluded the meeting with dispatch. He did not notice that Lieutenant Alicia St Marie had been glancing at Magister Joe Flowerdew with some regularity during the meeting. Similarly, he did not notice that Joe had been returning Alicia’s glances.

The Gurus, as the planetary searchers: James of Cooper, Joe Flowerdew, and the familiars had come to be known by the crew. The Gurus had spent several hours in deep contemplation before a new Earth Class star was decided upon. It was some hundred and ten light years distant so the trip would be lengthy.

A buoy was placed in orbit around One Prime. It would be suggested that the planet should be visited every thousand years or so to monitor its life.

+++++

As the voyage began, Alicia St Marie, a Lieutenant in the Royal Space Corps, and Journeyman Mage Joe Flowerdew, a Knight Commander of the Golden Dragon, just happened upon one another in the ship's lounge. These things do seem to happen to the young.

This spacious room reflected the influence of the Queen’s determination for the welfare of the crew. It was paneled in walnut. There was a tasteful arrangement of comfortable chairs and sofas, several writing tables, and bookcases. There were a number of paintings on the walls. Two great war horses, Traveller and Ronald, had pride of place, one at either end of the lounge.

Reading actual books seemed quite popular. After spending a shift watching a screen or screens, and using various types of controls, it was relaxing to enjoy the printed page. Leather chair, good lighting, good book: what could be better? So nothing could possibly be more normal than for Alicia and Joe to meet there when they had the spare moment.

“So,” Alicia hazarded. “You were the first one to talk to one of these ships, then.”

“Well, yeah, I guess. But I had plenty of help. We had a really great team on the Kasumi. There was Willie and Jake and Ellie. So yeah, we were a great team.”

Crystal, the ship's cat, sauntered up and deigned to recognize Alicia with some head butts and some leg rubbing. Mindful of her duties to the entire ship, she allowed Joe to scritch her ears and her bum - that special spot just before the tail. Then she moved on about her rounds.

“Do you like cats?” Alicia continued.

“Yes. And dogs, too.”

“Horses?”

Joe looked off vacantly. “Yes. But I’ve never had the opportunity to, you know… know one. Except for Bucephalus and Copenhagen and Babieca. But then they’re all familiars. Not the same thing, I think.”

“No. But horses are a part of our world, a part of our life, a part of the essential us. Somebody once said, ‘Horses are the wings of man’ and they got that part pretty much right. Horses move us spiritually.

“Do you know these two?” She pointed to the two large portraits at either end of the room.

“No. I don’t think so. The grey one looks kinda familiar, but I don’t know from what. I don’t know the other one. I’m not even sure what you call that colour.”

“The ‘other one’ is what you call ‘chestnut’. You might also mention the four white ‘stockings’ though that’s not strictly necessary.

“That’s Ronald. He’s the charger that led the famous Charge of the Light Brigade.”

“I know that poem:

Into the valley of death

Rode the six hundred.

“But how…?”

“Ronald carried the general. That’s how we know him. He brought the general safely through the charge and brought him home again. He then retired to Deene Park for the rest of his life. He outlived the general, too.

“The grey horse is Traveller, he was Robert E Lee’s horse during the American Civil War. Quite the iconic figure from that war. He and Lee are buried next to one another at the college chapel.”

Then Joe looked up and off into the distance. “I’m beginning to sense something. Sorry. Gotta go.”

+++++

The Gurus were huddled in consultation.

“Okay.” Joe began. “You all know that when I was first recruited it was because I had the ability, somehow, to sense intention. Since the Riffian War, I’ve been learning from other magisters and mages, and I can now sense intention on a much lower level. When the Riffians were coming, well, they were focused and intent. It was fairly easy to determine their intent. Like when a hunter raises his gun, it’s pretty intense.

“We do not have that here. Plus, we have many divergent sorts of intention. I can clearly sense some pretty normal intentions. Like: finishing a chore or task or job; finishing some sort of training; pretty much workaday sorts of things that you might expect to find in any society.”

“I quite agree,” Sir James of Cooper opined. “When I first became aware, I could sense the impending Riffian invasion. I knew they were coming; I knew approximately where they were coming from; and I had a pretty good idea of their ETA. I believe that the ETA is within the next four to six hours. But that is all I can detect.

“Additionally, this system seems to be perfectly normal. There’s an odd cloud of dust that is present in varying density, kinda like any cloud when you think about it. Except it’s in space. It’s easily discernible and shouldn’t pose a threat.”

Copenhagen summed it up. “There’ll be no problem with jumping other than the usual one of knowing where you’re jumping too. So we’ll need a good survey of the planet and its dimensional cousins before any jumps, but any mage will be able to do local jumps once we have that all figured out.”

“Thank you, gentlemen,” the Commodore was gracious in the presence of good news. “You are an excellent, though most unusual, team. Imagine, a Magister, a Mage, and an Admiral. A gifted team, to be sure.”

+++++

This time, HMS Sparrowhawk, captained by Lieutenant Edward Carpenter DCM was first away. He was an original member of the Mississippi Yeomanry who had made the most of his opportunities. He’d transferred out of the Space Grenadiers and into the Space Corps as soon as it was humanly possible and had tested for pilot training as early as he could. He’d been lucky when prospecting the Earth Prime asteroid belt and was a wealthy man as well as a diligent and very capable officer.

Sparrowhawk was approaching Xray Prime over one of her ice caps. It was felt that the additional magnetic fluctuations that were known to occur at a planet's poles, would aid in masking their approach.

Captain Carpenter maintained a high orbit above the pole while every sensor the ship possessed looked for any sign of their detection. Then probes were launched.

The wisdom of the polar approach was quickly justified. It was also quickly determined that there was life on the planet. The seas at the edge of the ice pack teemed with life of different types. None of that life seemed prone to communicate.

The probes continued to the nearest continental landmass and the exploration recommenced.

Forest-like vegetation was immediately encountered

“I have a farm!” Announced Petty Officer Jeppe Christoffersen from his station in the control room. Babieca and Bucephalus hurried to his station and Scout tuned-in too.

“See. I’m at the edge of a cultivated field. You can see. On one side, trees and bushes, grasses and - I think - fungi. On the other, the soil has clearly been worked and one type of grass is growing and thriving.”

”Yes,” Copenhagen concurred.

An arrow appeared on the screen pointing to a shape in a far corner of the screen, “Can you focus and enlarge?” Scout inquired.

There it was. The image wasn’t too clear, but it quickly became evident that one life form was riding another and the second one was towing what looked like a wagon of some kind.

“There you have it,” the Commodore smiled. “Attention to orders. The survey is to continue until we have a complete picture of the planet. However, no contact is to be initiated. I say again, no contact is to be initiated.

“Be prepared, however, to think on your feet if contact is made accidentally. Minimal impact.

“Let us know this planet as Cecilie Prime in honor of the Queen. Long may she reign.”

There was a quiet murmur of ‘hear hears’ throughout the ship.

“Most excellent,” Ma’am contributed.

+++++

All the probes had been recovered. There had been no accidental contact. The Commodore, the Mages, the Magister, the Familiars, and the Ship were again in conference. They had a complete map of Cecilie Prime to consider. Additionally, mages had jumped to Cecilie and Cecilie Secundus where it had been determined that both possessed life that seemed to be at approximately the same level as that of Cecilie Prime. There was no evidence of magic work.

“I am of two minds,” the Commodore began. “It is tempting to make first contact with the peoples of this planet. They are pre-industrial and we might be able to help them on their way to civilization with medicine and science. However, that might be dangerous, for us - I mean - as it seems rather imperial. I mean for our vision of ourselves, you see. Paternalism can be a two-edged sword. Certainly there’s some history to support that idea.”

“I don’t think we should make contact.” Wilde commented. “I do not think that would be in anyone’s best interest. They need a chance to develop. What I mean is, they need to have their own myths and legends. Their own version of ‘El Cid’. And, I might also add, their own version of St Francis of Asissi and all the rest of it. The good and the bad. I think we should set a beacon of some sort and just monitor them from time to time.” Wilde paused.

“They need their own ‘Mona Lisa’, too. And their own Mozart. Then there’s the ethics of the thing. What is the right thing to do?” Joe continued, “At what point in the development of a planet’s civilization is it right to intervene? Is it ever right to intervene? I’m inclined to agree with Wilde. But that beacon should be something significant and should tell them that they are not alone. They can discover it though, without it being thrust upon them.”

“I think we should build it on the second moon,” Scout contributed. “That way they’ll have had a chance to settle and develop before they ever find it. They’ll need to be able to get to that moon first. Plus, if it’s still in that funny cloud that lengthens the ultraviolet wavelength, it might be pretty dramatic. It’s all tinted purple just now. I wish we had time to study that.”

“Not too grand,” the Commodore thought. “The beacon, I mean. Not Versailles, much smaller, like a frontier post, or a small castle. Built of serious stone. To last. Solid, like the Pyramids of Earth. Really built to last!

“Staff, get the sappers started on this right now. We’ve no time to waste.”

“Good idea,” Ma’am decided. “We’ll name it Fort Zinderneuf. I’m reading Beau Geste. I saw the movie first, but the book is better. Doing literature is not like reading an engineering article. Literature is really important. It’s what civilization is all about. Literature is about the ‘why’ of it. About the mysteries we create.

“It only took an instant to read Beau Geste. But I had to go back and read it carefully before I began to understand ‘why’ they were doing what they were doing. Yes. Fort Zinderneuf is just the thing.”

Ma’am had named it, so that was that.

+++++

Alicia and Joe were dining. The mess deck, as with the lounge, clearly exhibited the Queen’s influence. Light and airy with tables and chairs. No benches and fixed tables. Some of the tables could seat eight or ten diners, while others were far more intimate, for two, or so.

Alicia and Joe were at an intimate table for two; they were enjoying chicken parmesan with a nice chianti. There had been an excellent Caesar salad and cheese ravioli marinara. Delightful. They would only have one glass of wine. They were off duty, but there was no way of knowing when an emergency of some sort might develop.

“What will you do when we get home?” Alicia wondered.

“Well, I shall ask you to dinner where we can drink champagne.” Joe grinned. He was feeling very good. Buoyant and optimistic. “And a nice trifle like my mom used to make. For dessert. If they have it.”

Alicia looked mysterious. “Well I’ll certainly say yes to that.”

“Yes,” Joe exulted in a dignified Canadian sort of way.

“Tell me,” Alicia wondered idly. “Will you always be off somewhere in space.”

“I think probably not. I was enjoying myself playing baseball when they first called me to duty; I was enjoying my mage training and research at the Great Library when they asked me to join this mission.

“I’ll always go where the King asks, but mostly I just want a little farm. Somewhere on Prime. I’d like a flock of ducks, too.”

“How about horses?” Alicia wondered.

Joe grinned.

+++++

“Did you hear him? He called me ‘admiral’ again. He just does that to piss me off. I wonder why?”

“There, there,” his orderly comforted as he helped his magister into his favorite kimono. The blue one with cranes and volcanoes.

“He thinks he’s complimenting you, Jimmy. More than anything in the world, he wants to be an admiral. So it’s inconceivable to him that you could want anything more.” Chief Steward Caprotti was wise in the ways of his world. He had been Sir James of Cooper’s orderly for years; he’d been calling him ‘Jimmy’ for all of those years, though only when they were in private, to be sure.

Then, as he was gently massaging Jimmy's shoulders while he settled him into the kimono, he felt him go stiff beneath his fingers. He stepped back and looked at Jimmy carefully and immediately knew that he had sensed something. His eyes seemed all vacant as though he were looking inward. They stood still.

“Shit! Something’s coming! Now I have to go see that shithead again.” He rushed off to find the commodore, cranes and volcanoes flapping.

NEXT CHAPTER

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