Chapter Text
If Cypris Amstell was expecting anything, it wasn't the arrival of a team of Heptite Guild security officers at her door well before sunrise. Even more unexpectedly, they had bypassed the Privacy lock and were now inside her quarters. Cypris mentally formulated a complaint to the Federated Sentient Planets about this egregious breach of Privacy.
Two solidly built women busied themselves packing up her belongings and placing them into a storage pod in the hallway. Two more women attempted to rouse Cypris from her pretend sleep -- in fact Cypris was already well aware of their presence, having heard them from the moment they left the lift at the far end of the Quarantine Level. The damnable spores may have taken away her freedom, but in exchange they gave her preternaturally sensitive hearing. Sheer buggery.
She felt a bundle of something land on the sleeping unit next to her head. She opened one eye just enough to see a set of Guild coveralls. An undergarment followed, one of its long sleeves flopping around her bare shoulder in an absurd embrace. A pair of boots and then a loaded carisak joined the pile of clothing. Cypris propped herself up on one elbow and glared at the intruders.
The two guards left the sleeping area to confer with the pair in the hallway. The meaning was clear. Cypris glowered, took the garments with her to the sani, showered, and got dressed.
"What?" she asked the guards, who had their backs to her. No response. They're all deaf, she realized. She wondered what enhancement the symbiont had given them in return for taking their hearing. Brute strength, she supposed.
Being careful to maintain a respectful distance, Cypris moved sideways until she was in view of the closest guard, who turned to acknowledge her. "Intrusion we regret," the guard said in the fractured syntax typical of Aurigans. "Move you to permanent quarters we must."
Cypris resisted the urge to reply in the same scrambled word order. She'd barely had five weeks to settle into her apartment, and clearly these guards meant to oust her. No ceremony, not even a warning.
"Restraining you also we regret," said the guards' spokeswoman. "Safety for you as well as others. Face away please."
Cypris complied. She did not flinch nor resist as her wrists were shackled to a chain around her waist. Two of the guards led the way to the lift, the other two followed behind her. She could see the pod with her belongings about 50 meters ahead of them, bobbing slightly as it made its own way towards the service lift.
In another life, Cypris would have reacted with outrage and hubris to this indignity. In this life, she was a prisoner in all but name, a pariah but also a heroine. The architect of the Guild's near destruction, but also its savior for undoing the terrible damage she had done.
They emerged from the lift at the hangar level. Waiting for them was a large wrecker, the sort that could hoist large heavy machinery out of the muck. She'd seen enough of those on her home world.
The guards escorted her inside the wrecker's cargo hold and strapped her into a jump seat attached to the forward bulkhead. "Detained you are no longer. Exile you are," said the spokesguard as she removed the shackles.
Cypris finally lost her composure. "What do you mean, 'exile'? What's happening? Where are you taking me?" she yelled, but the guards were already outside the wrecker's hold. She was no longer shackled, but the seat harness was locked for transport.
All she could do was watch as crews loaded up the cargo bay with a miscellany of pods, pallets, and a couple of utility vehicles.
She heard the wrecker's crystal drive bark to life. The crew finished securing the cargo and the outer doors, then filed past her to the passenger cabin without acknowledging her. Within a few more minutes, the craft cleared the hangar and accelerated.
She was already resigned to spending the next several centuries stuck on this ghastly planet. What more could they do to her, drop her off at the north pole to fend for herself?
Cypris Amstell, Ph.D. was, of course, the promising young scientist whose vendetta against the Heptite Guild resulted in an act of biological warfare. Her bioengineered virus was harmless to the trillions of ordinary citizens it infected, but specifically deadly for anyone exposed to the spores native to Ballybran, the Guild's headquarters.
The planet Ballybran was the sole galactic source of Ballybran Crystal, a substance with such unique and varied properties that it found uses in almost every aspect of modern life from transportation and communication to advanced computing and even fine arts.
Ballybran Crystal made it possible for a handful of scattered colony worlds to unite and organize into the Federated Sentient Planets, a united organization now consisting of millions of planets. The vast economic power made possible by this union of worlds enhanced the living standards and basic freedoms of all its citizens.
The first prospectors to discover and mine Ballybran Crystal quickly discovered the planet's unique hazards. Violent winds aptly labeled "Mach Storms" made exploration and extraction mortally dangerous. Sonic waves and piezo discharges by wind-whipped crystal outcrops ruined minds and crippled equipment. A mysterious infection could turn flesh into stone, but could also leave survivors with enhanced senses and near-miraculous recuperative powers.
The FSP, at once desperate to fill the growing need for crystal, but at the same time mindful of the welfare of its citizens, eventually closed the planet and placed the Heptite Guild in sole control of extracting and marketing Ballybran Crystal.
The Heptite Guild and the FSP, therefore, had a symbiotic relationship as vital to their survival as the symbiosis between Ballybran spores and their human hosts. Eliminate one or the other, and risk destroying everything that depends on it.
Although Guilds were a part of nearly every part of galactic commerce, the Heptite Guild's small membership and vast wealth attracted a unique level of attention. Some wanted a share of the wealth for themselves. Others resented the disproportionate power the Heptite Guild held in matters of commerce and politics. Still others were suspicious of the secrecy afforded the Heptite Guild about nearly every aspect of crystal production.
A few misguided souls took matters into their own hands and attempted to land on the planet. Smugglers saw an opportunity to make off with whatever scraps of crystal they could carry. Activists sought to defy the monopoly controlling the planet with a symbolic invasion. Most died on impact with the planet. The few that survived were rewarded with a life sentence.
This life sentence was not something imposed by due process of law, whether by the Heptite Guild, or by the Federated Sentient Planets, which governed the inhabited worlds of the Galaxy. Indeed, it would have been far more practical to deport these interlopers to Regulus for adjudication and rehabilitation.
The spores claimed for themselves all living things, plant and animal, whether native to Ballybran or arriving from beyond. A being, once in symbiosis with the spores, could not survive for long away from the planet, "long" being a relative thing depending on the completeness of the host's adaptation.
None of the fools landing on Ballybran were capable of damaging the Guild in any meaningful way. Buildings were reinforced for protection against the planet's own weather; a direct hit from a crashing spacecraft could do nothing by comparison. Flying craft were likewise protected from the erratic peizo discharges from crystal faces, and the fulminant sunspot activity from Scoria, the planet's sun, and could easily maneuver out of the path of an out of control lander.
Cypris Amstell used subterfuge and her knowledge of bioengineering, to subvert the Guild's trade secrets and use that knowledge to attack them in a way never before attempted -- and almost succeeded. A combination of hubris and remorse led her to undo the worst of the damage before it became a catastrophe. Even with that act of mitigation, the only safe way to keep her from re-offending would be to confine her for the rest of her life. And the only way the Guild could safely do that was with Ballybran's own spores.
Soon enough, the wrecker set down outside the Patmos colony. Cypris barely felt the landing, and wasn't sure the trip was even over until the exterior hatch was opened and people began unloading the various pallets, vehicles, and pods occupying the cargo bay.
She stretched as best she could against the harness holding her to her seat. Her muscles were sore and tense not just from the hours of sitting, but from the outrage of being ousted from her apartment before daybreak and stuffed into a cargo hold without any meaningful explanation.
Detained you are no longer. What the nard was that supposed to mean? Exile? As if being the only occupant of an empty housing wing with no human contact wasn't already exile enough?
A blast of chilly air from outside stung her face and blew fine dust into her hair. Her stomach growled. It was nearly mid-day and she hadn't eaten. She needed to use the sani. She clenched her fists and felt her face go red from frustration.
The cargo door was far enough away that she couldn't see much of what was going on outside. There was a paved area that extended to a squat building. Beyond that, brownish rolling hills and a grey sky. She had no wrist unit to check the time of day; it was one of the many devices she was not permitted to have. No sign of shadows to indicate the position of the sun either.
The bulkhead door opened, and she could hear the tail end of a conversation from within the passenger cabin. Laughter. Then a man backed through the door into the cargo bay, still laughing and talking. Cypris recognized him.
Bachan Sookdeo, Chief of Guild Security. Her jailer. The smarmy Guild representative responsible for pressganging her away from Onescue University and back into Heptite Guild territory. Responsible for evicting her from her home that very morning. Had the grimy creep nothing better to do than torment her?
He made eye contact with her, and she looked away. Cypris had absolutely nothing to say to him. She felt the seat harness release, but stayed seated. Bachan walked down the ramp, then turned and looked pointedly at her.
Cypris stood up, wanting to stretch her cramped muscles, but not in front of that fool. He didn't need to know she was uncomfortable. She followed him down the ramp and was outside on the planet surface for the first time since Bachan first pulled her out of a shuttle and abandoned her on this loathsome, disease-ridden planet. How many months ago?
Two, give or take. Hi, Cypris!
That was Lars Dahl, Guild Master. Or Killashandra Ree, Deputy Guild Master, she couldn't quite tell which, talking to her inside her head. At least she now knew who this Milekey character was. Nard him. Nard all of them.
How can you still talk to me like this? From wherever this is? She thought the words to them.
Anywhere and everywhere. Laughter, like the tinkling of a bell.
Privacy! Cypris insisted.
The voice (voices?) left her head.
The sun was low on the horizon and the sky had a greyish-silver cast. It'd be a stretch to call it sunlight or even daylight. The wind came in periodic gusts, smelling of snow plus a faint odor of cinnamon and terpenes. Spores. All the narding spores she could ever want.
She expected to hear a witty reply in her head.
There was a small crowd of people waiting outside on the paved apron surrounding the building.
"This is Cypris Amstell," Bachan said. "Cypris is here because through her intentional criminal actions she ended the lives of six Guild members and harmed hundreds more with an act of biological warfare. She will be spending the rest of her life with you here on Patmos, and, we hope, integrating successfully into your community."
Cypris seethed. Who were these people and what right did they have to know so much about her? Were they jailers? Prisoners? A woman who appeared to be their leader motioned Cypris to follow her inside.
Patmos was an island off the polar shore of the North Continent, about 300 square kilometers in area. It featured a cool temperate climate, suitable for growing grains and seasonal produce. The variety of suitable crops and abundant sea life ensured that its residents could enjoy a complete, nourishing diet, backed up if necessary by the basic subsistence allowance mandated by the FSP.
Ballybran had very little axial deviation; just enough to allow for mild seasonal variation, and more importantly, enough to prevent the most violent storms from reaching the polar area. The climate was bracing but not dangerous. The growing season on Patmos was adequate for the colony to provide for their own needs, with enough surplus in most years to earn a modest income from the Guild.
The colony was geographically isolated from Ballybran's crystal ranges and population centers. More importantly, it was well outside the normal zone for Passover storms. It was safe, self contained, and, though lacking the most modern infrastructure, perfectly suitable to support a colony of exiles with minimal Guild oversight.
Housing for the island colony was entirely underground, as were machine sheds and granaries; this maximized the available area for agriculture, as well as providing shielding from the sonic assault of the Passover storms. The quality of the accommodation and amenities, while not luxurious, exceeded the FSP's minimum humane standards for detainees. The facility was built to house a maximum of 100 people, however the population rarely exceeded 30.
For all practical purposes, the Exile colony at Patmos was self sufficient. As galactic citizens, they were entitled to the usual basic subsistence -- housing, nutrition, clothing, and a stipend for personal items. Colonists with credit balances were billed at cost for these services; once financial resources were exhausted, subsistence continued without charge.
Exiles were encouraged to maintain an informal government to manage the colony, resolve disputes, and, where necessary, administer discipline, all under the FSP guarantees of detainees' basic rights.
Work was available and encouraged for all colonists according to their physical capabilities; all work assignments, paid at the statutory minimum rate, were for the maintenance and improvement of the colony itself. The Heptite Guild deducted a 30% tithe from every colonist's wage and deposited it into a reserve fund for long term upkeep of the facility.
Twice a month during the growing season, agricultural surplus was tallied and transported to the mainland by unmanned drone; these shipments were exhaustively inspected on departure and landing to deter stowaways. Only one person ever attempted to stow away on a cargo drone, but fell to her death from her improvised platform; there were no further attempts.
The colony's relative freedom depended on maintaining good relations with the Guild. That meant it was up to the colony itself to maintain order and civility. Any form of so-called "prison justice" that would infringe a colonist's FSP freedoms would result in the Guild disbanding the colony and replacing it with an actual prison, something explicitly provided for in the colony's charter.
Nothing about the Patmos colony, therefore, could be deemed cruel or inhumane with regard to the rights of colonists. They were as free as any other citizens to petition the FSP Council to redress complaints about their treatment by the Heptite Guild; thus far the Guild had prevailed in every instance