Piers Anthony - Bio of a Space Tyrant 5 - Statesman

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Bio of a Space Tyrant

Volume 5

Piers Anthony

CONTENTS

Editorial Prolog

1. Pirate

2. Dream

3. Woman

4. Farm

5. Smilo

6. Forta

7. Rising Sun

8. Lady or Tiger

9. Demo

10. Persuasion

11.Titania

12. Triton

13. Phobos

14. Earth

15. Venus

16. Mercury

17. Rue

18. Hopie

19. Middle Kingdom

20. Laya

Editorial Epilog Solar Geography

EDITORIAL PROLOG

The Space Tyrant, as he came to be known, had risen from the status of a

helpless Hispanic refugee to dominance of the planet Jupiter. One might have

supposed that his career would have ended when he was deposed by his wife and

exiled, but that was not the case. Hope Hubris referred to himself as a

statesman: one who had lost power. But in truth his power abated only

temporarily, and eventually became greater than ever before.

As usual, his narrative of events and feelings understates the solid political

and economic groundwork he did, and perhaps dwells too much on his emotional

life. He was a far more competent and hard-nosed executive than he pretends,

and chance did not affect him as much as he allows it to seem. Not only did he

fashion the program that was to put mankind into the galaxy-what he terms the

Dream-he fostered the substantial bettering of the human condition throughout

the Solar System, benefiting the downtrodden and abused folk as much as the

leaders. I believe it is fair to say that at the end the Tyrant was almost

universally respected and loved, and every day the monument to him erected in

the Province of Laya, Saturn, is visited by throngs of people from all over

the System. That monument is impressive, consisting of a statue of a giant man

whose right hand rests upon a model of the Solar System and whose left strokes

a saber-tooth tiger, his gaze outward toward the galaxy, while a woman who

resembles him watches from behind. That says it all.

But in the end nothing could avail against the terminal physical malady that

Hope Hubris had, though for years

its nature was concealed from the public. Perhaps his knowledge of that malady

contributed to the abrupt and some say insane manner of his death.

Herewith, the final volume of the biopsy of the Space Tyrant, my father.

HMH

Chapter 1 PIRATE

We might as well have been children again, though I was sixty and my sister

Spirit was fifty-seven. We faced the presentation screen and gawked at the

magnificence of Planet Saturn. The rings were spectacular. Of course the image

was enhanced by false-color, making it more dramatic, but still it was a

wonder. All the colors of the spectrum seemed to be there in the great splay

of the rings, and in the roughly spherical body of the planet itself.

"Beautiful!" I breathed. "Jupiter's rings hardly compare!"

Spirit murmured agreement. "But nevertheless a sterner environment than we

knew on Jupiter," she reminded me. "Their residential band has about eight and

a half bars pressure, and their winds are up to quadruple Jupiter's-almost

five hundred meters a second."

"A thousand miles an hour," I agreed, making a rough translation in my head.

In my time on Jupiter I had become accustomed to the archaic Saxon

measurements, inefficient as they were. Of course such velocities were not

directly experienced, because the city-bubbles floated in the wind currents.

Survival would be impossible if relative wind velocity of that strength were

felt; storms whose winds were only a tenth as strong had been called

hurricanes back on ancient Earth, and had wreaked enormous damage. The

pressure bothered me more; as a former native of space, I tended to feel

claustrophobic in pressure higher than one bar, the normal atmospheric level

we lived in. It had been six bars on Jupiter, and would be higher on Saturn

even though the planet was smaller, because the residential band was deeper in

the atmosphere.

We were on our way to Saturn because we had been exiled from Jupiter, and the

ringed planet seemed to be the best prospect of those that had expressed

interest in taking us. I had just one personal acquaintance at Saturn-but that

one was Chairman Khukov, the highest political figure there. He had achieved

his dominance at about the time I became the Tyrant of Jupiter, and we had

worked tacitly together to buttress each other's power and defuse

interplanetary tension. I did not really like Khukov, but I trusted him.

"Ship ahoy," the ship's intercom announced. "Passengers to quarters."

I exchanged a glance with Spirit. We were in deep space between planets; our

trip had not been announced, because the new government of Jupiter wished us

no ill but wanted us out of the public eye. We cooperated because my wife

Megan headed that new government, and I bore her no ill will. She had done

what she felt she had to do, and I cannot say she was mistaken. The Tyrancy

had accomplished a lot of good, but had also become increasingly arbitrary

about the uses of power. Power does seem to corrupt the conscience, much as

alcohol corrupts judgment; from the vantage of my abrupt loss of power I was

able to see how far I had been straying. But because I was who I was, I was a

target, which was another reason for the secrecy of this transportation. Was

the other ship merely a passing merchant, or was it something else?

We retreated quickly to our quarters, obeying the authority of this ship. This

was a Saturn vessel, of the escort class, displacing (as the usage still had

it) about two thousand tons. She should be fast, capable of about three gees

acceleration, but only lightly armed. It was her purpose to transport us

swiftly and quietly to Saturn; she would be in trouble if attacked. We snapped

into our acceleration harnesses.

"Ship under attack," the intercom voice said, as if responding to my thought.

"Secure-"

The voice was cut off by the impact of a strike. The ship shook, and the power

blinked. We were not under acceleration at the moment; the normal course is to

achieve cruising velocity, then coast to the destination, conserving fuel. The

vessel was spinning to provide half gee in that interim.

"Better take evasive action," Spirit muttered. She and I had been career

officers in space for twelve to fifteen years; that was three decades past,

but the reflexes are never lost.

The ship did not. It drifted along on its original course, not cutting in the

drive.

We got out of our harnesses, acting as one. Obviously the ship's captain was a

noncombatant, uncertain what to do in battle. That would get us killed

promptly enough. He didn't realize that the first thing to do was to put the

ship under acceleration, regardless of its course.

We burst into the control chamber. "Get it moving!" I barked in Russian.

"But the damage report is not yet in," the pilot protested. He was young,

obviously inexperienced: the kind normally used on what is called a milk run,

a routine mission. "The captain has not-"

I reached down and took his laser pistol from his body. I gave it to Spirit.

"Get out of that seat," I said. I didn't have time to educate him in battle

procedure.

"But you are passengers!" he said. "Not even of Saturn-" Then he turned his

head and spied the laser bearing on his right eye. He got out of the seat.

I jumped into it. The ship's controls were unfamiliar in detail, but I

understood the principle well enough. In a moment I had the drive started.

Meanwhile, Spirit was marching the pilot out of the chamber. I knew where she

was headed. I spoke into the intercom. "Captain, I am assuming temporary

command of this vessel," I said in Russian. "Acknowledge, and relay the

directive to your crew."

"This is impossible!" the captain sputtered.

"Captain, we don't have time for debate. I am taking evasive action, but very

soon the pirate will reorient and tag us with another shell. We have to fight

effectively, and for that I require your implicit cooperation." I guided the

craft on a random course, getting the hang of the controls in the process.

This was a good little ship, I realized, capable of more acceleration than I

had judged. I verified that she had not suffered any critical damage; she was

responding perfectly. We had been lucky, so far.

"This is piracy right here!" he huffed. "I will not-"

"Captain, do you know who I am?" I cut in.

"No, they did not inform-"

"I am the Tyrant of Jupiter, deposed."

He made a gasp of surprise. Then Spirit's voice came: "Chamber secured, sir.

Orders?"

I had of course been distracting the inexperienced captain while Spirit made

her way to his office. Now she had her pistol on him. She could not speak

Russian, but the weapon was surely persuasive enough.

"Captain," I repeated. "I am assuming command. I do this because of the need

to save this ship from destruction by the pirate, and will return control to

you when the crisis abates. Acknowledge."

This time there was a laser pointed at his eye. "Acknowledged," the captain

said.

"Direct your crew."

He obeyed, ordering the crew to obey my orders. I had taken over the ship

illegally, but the authority was mine for the duration.

"Observation," I said, addressing the officer I knew would be present. "What

is the nature of the enemy?"

"Destroyer-class vessel, sir," he answered promptly. "Now showing pirate

colors."

That meant that the attempt to communicate with the ship had resulted in a

skull-and-crossbones picture on the screen, the universal signal of piracy.

The fact that it was of the destroyer class told me all I needed to know about

its capabilities, which was why the observation officer had not said more. He

was obviously experienced, perhaps retired to this ship after long service.

"Armament," I said. "What are our resources?"

"Five cases stungas grenades, sir," he said. "Hand weapons, laser."

It was my turn to be stunned. "Hand weapons? What of the space cannon?"

"Dismantled, sir, in favor of the drive. This is not a combat vessel."

Obviously not! "Propulsion," I said. "What is our maximum acceleration?"

"Five point two gee, sir."

"Five point . . . !" I exclaimed. The fastest ship in my fleet in the old days

had been the destroyer The Discovered Check, upgraded to a capacity of 4.5

gee. This little escort ship supposedly could leave that ship rapidly behind.

Perhaps they had figured to outrun any trouble along the way.

But no ship could outrun shells or drones, let alone lasers. The pirate had

gotten too close, and now it was way too late to flee. But we couldn't fight

either-not with hand grenades.

"Spirit," I said.

"Have to try chicken," she said in Spanish. If any of the Saturn personnel

knew that language, they might still miss the implication. That was the

intent. If they caught on, there would be a counterrevolution aboard ship.

Chicken. When two foolish kids got into transport bubbles and headed straight

for each other. Collision course- and the first to swerve was "chicken." The

game had been played in one form or another for centuries, and had accounted

for its share of injuries and deaths.

I nodded. The pirate was matching our velocity, or trying to, so as to have a

steady target for another shot. It had made no effort to communicate; there

had been no demand for surrender. It simply intended to hole us; then its

personnel would board in space suits and take the spoils. It was the way of

the more vicious pirates, and it was evident that they had not been rousted

out of this region of space. But they were bold indeed to tackle a marked

Saturn ship; that would bring a fleet out here to extirpate every pirate ship.

I oriented the ship, then jammed up the drive. Suddenly we were accelerating,

in the relative framework of the two moving ships, toward the pirate.

It took a moment for the pirate to realize what was happening, for this was

completely unexpected. It was like a wounded rabbit charging the pursuing

hound.

The pirate reacted by firing another shell at us. That was an error; we now

presented a minimal target, end-on, and were accelerating; there was little

space or time for this. The pirate had to move in a hurry, or be rammed. That

would likely destroy both ships.

Now our own crewmen were catching on. "Suicide!" someone screamed in Russian

on the intercom.

"It is chicken," I said in Russian. "But we have less to lose than they do."

"All will die!" the voice cried.

"Armament," I said.

"Sir," the experienced officer replied immediately.

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摘要：

BioofaSpaceTyrantVolume5PiersAnthonyCONTENTSEditorialProlog1.Pirate2.Dream3.Woman4.Farm5.Smilo6.Forta7.RisingSun8.LadyorTiger9.Demo10.Persuasion11.Titania12.Triton13.Phobos14.Earth15.Venus16.Mercury17.Rue18.Hopie19.MiddleKingdom20.LayaEditorialEpilogSolarGeographyEDITORIALPROLOGTheSpaceTyrant,asheca...

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Piers Anthony - Bio of a Space Tyrant 5 - Statesman

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