Interregnum (Children of Steel Book 2) Read online

  "That's what they teach you, but that's wrong. They can motivate you by pain, they can simply kill you when you're not needed or too injured. No, we're free because it goes against their culture to keep us as slaves, because it preys on their guilt and their most cherished beliefs that 'all are created equal.' Because they know that eventually slaves revolt, and when they do, they're not very forgiving of their masters.

  "Why are we able to have children? Why aren't we all born sterile?"

  I thought about that one, I had an answer, but suddenly I wasn't so sure it was right. "You know, I never really thought about that. They tell us it's easier that way."

  "The Hong Kong disaster," Balizar said.

  "What's that got to do with it?"

  "Why did terrorists nuke Hong Kong?" Balizar asked me.

  "Why do terrorists do anything?" I said, "Oh, I know the reason they gave was economic freedom, human rights, but that's the same story every terrorist gives."

  "The Chinese nuked Hong Kong." Balizar said looking over at my shocked expression. "Oh, they covered it up well, but the governments, the corporations; they all know the real reason. You see, the Chinese were the first to push Animen into high production, they weren't concerned with trials, or other such things, they just saw a way to quickly gain an expendable and powerful workforce that they could abuse and that they wouldn't get hit with human rights violations over.

  "The Animen they produced were all sterile, couldn't reproduce, they had no future, and they knew it, there was nothing down the road for them, each one of them was born a dead end, and they were smart enough to know it, and human enough not to like it. They rebelled; they took over Hong Kong, slaughtered everybody in the city, and were moving onto the mainland. China suddenly found itself staring at an army of a couple hundred thousand berserkers with modern weapons and armor. They had no choice really.

  "So it was covered up, and the law was handed down to everyone: No sterilizations."

  "So why are we even here? Why create us?"

  "Because they need us, humanity was starting to stagnate. The majority were happy just sitting at home. The corporations needed to keep expanding to make a profit, without us, there would be no workforce. We're not human, so they don't feel too bad about our circumstances, but we're human enough that they feel guilty. That guilt can either lead to compassion or to anger."

  "So what does all this mean, and why are you telling me?"

  "It's simple, Raj, over time Tri-Star decided to treat its employees well, to try and become more of a family. To do all it could to promote an atmosphere of something just more than a job. Then we came along, and at first they struggled with us, they didn't know where to put us in that hierarchy, how to treat us. Until about twenty years ago, we got a new CEO who thought we should be treated like the companies 'children', which meant there was a responsibility to us, a responsibility to be more, do more, to treat us better."

  Balizar looked over at me again, "Some people can see the future more clearly than others. They created so many different species of us to try and keep us from teaming up against them, but this CEO saw that as long as it was 'us and them' that couldn’t be stopped, that it eventually would happen. So he decided to eliminate the 'them' make everyone 'us.' Give everyone a future."

  I shook my head, "Sounds pretty ambitious, think it will work?"

  Balizar shrugged, "Damned if I know. But for it to work, it means that those people in the company who want to keep things the way they were, they had to be moved to places where they couldn't cause problems."

  "Like a cemetery?" I said a little sarcastically.

  Balizar gave a little start, surprising me. "No, we've avoided that kind of thing. But once that was done, the next battle has been to remove those promoting that separation in government. Now on Earth that's impossible, same on a lot of the colonies. But not all of them and those are the ones where Tri-Star has been building."

  That stopped me dead in my thoughts, "We?"

  Balizar nodded, "There are those of us in the company who agree with this goal, and have been working towards it. It's kind of an unofficial group, I'm sure the board, not to mention Earth's governments, would have a fit if they knew about it, but the logic behind it is hard to argue with. Animen won't remain second-class citizens forever, regardless of whether we are happy in that role or not, no matter how much conditioning and training they put s through, it just won't last.

  "So if Tri-Star is to survive, it needs to start preparing for it now, so when the time comes, everyone who works for Tri-Star can accept it. The same is true for Humanity, when the time comes, those places that accept it, will survive without a war or a revolution."

  "But those places that don’t, won't?"

  Balizar shrugged, "Maybe, maybe not. It's hard to see the future, but you can be sure that were will be revolutions and war, and a lot of people dying, on both sides. You do what you can, for those that you can, and well, screw the rest. They have eyes, if they can't see this coming, or if they refuse to deal with it, that's their problem, we have enough of our own."

  I nodded, there were a lot of worlds out there, I could see where it could get messy, and I could also see his logic.

  "So, again, why tell me all of this? Why the lesson? I don't see this as really having anything to do with what you're teaching me."

  Balizar laughed, "Why, Raj, it has everything to do with why I'm teaching you. I'm asking for you to help!"

  I felt my jaw drop.

  "What?" I asked.

  "Cassy and you would be a great asset to our little cause, and you're smart enough to see the big picture. Besides, it'll give you a hell of a story to tell your grandcubs when you're old and grey."

  Balizar stuck out his hand. "So, how 'bout it?"

  I looked at his hand; Balizar had just told me that he was a member of a secret organization inside the company, one that had the goal of promoting the acceptance of animen as equals. Something that went against everything I had been taught as a cub.

  I sighed and shook hands with him, "This is crazy," I said.

  "We can either build the future we want, or have one chosen for us that we fear, and I do not want to see my friends, my family, and yes, my company, involved in a war of extermination between the races."

  He grinned suddenly then. "Besides, it'll be fun."

  I started to wonder then just what Balizar's definition of 'fun' was.

  "Cassy is going to kill me."

  "Nah, I already talked to her."

  "You did?" I said surprised.

  "Yup. She was quite adamant that you be told. Said we shouldn't sell you short, that you were a lot smarter than you let on."

  "So now what?" I said thinking about that. If Cassandra was onboard, then I knew I was doing the right thing.

  "Now, we get back to training. Then shower, then dinner."

  "I mean, about this whole thing you just told me," I said waving my arms around. "What about that?"

  Balizar sighed with a grin, "You watched too many holo's as a cub, didn't you? We're looking at something that is going to take decades, maybe longer. It's not going to start happening after the next commercial break. Besides, I still have a lot to teach you. Now, up on your feet, let's go."

  It was late; I was lying in bed with Cassandra curled up against me, asleep after making love. When I'd first come aboard the Astra years ago, I'd been pretty inexperienced, naive really.

  When I came back last year with Cassandra, I thought I had it all figured out, but in a way, that had also been a bit naive.

  And now? Cassandra had gotten over most of her issues, from the war, and I think I was done with mine now as well. We were together, we were happy, we had a future, and life was good. We had jobs, we had our goals, and we had a cause to work on that was a good one.

  I hugged Cassandra and she snuggled closer in her sleep. I hoped I wasn't being naive about this once again. But tomorrow was another day, and I would worry about it then. For now, I'd
just enjoy what I had, because right now, I had everything I’d ever wanted.

  END

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  Thank you,

  John Van Stry

  www.vanstry.net ([email protected])

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  If you liked this book, you might like my other stories:

  Urban/Modern Fantasy:

  Portals of Infinity, Book One: Champion for Hire

  William is just your typical engineer fresh out of college with a stressful job, a boring life, and not a lot of prospects of anything better in the future.

  Until one weekend while hiking in the woods he stumbles across a portal to another time, or perhaps another place. The more he investigates this new world the more he realizes that it may just be able to offer him a lot more than the one he's been living in.

  However, there are forces at work beyond anything that Will has ever come across before and the local goddess seems to have taken a liking to him. Will may soon find himself getting an offer he cannot afford to refuse.

  Portals of Infinity, Book Two: The God Game

  Will’s life has definitely changed since that day he went hiking in the woods of Pennsylvania. He’s discovered that reality is a lot bigger and stranger than he had ever imagined. Learning about the portals that link the infinite number of worlds opened his eyes to that wider reality. Learning that he was being groomed to become the Champion of a God in one of those realities was an even more startling discovery.

  But now it’s time for him to pay the bill for his ‘recruitment’. Just as the Gods on a single world fight and jockey for power and position, the older Gods from the many different spheres of the infinite play a much larger and more complicated game. The Goddess Aryanna has a quest she needs completed, and William and four other Champions are the ones tasked to do it.

  What bothers Will however is what could a Goddess possibly need? And why would it take five Champions to retrieve it?

  Portals of Infinity, Book Three: Of Temples and Trials

  With the first of what he suspects will be many favors completed, William finds himself busy with important tasks back at his home on Saladin. Queen Rachel has several jobs she needs him to do, and Feliogustus has similar tasks in mind for him as well. All in all, it seems easy enough to Will, it’s not like he’ll be fighting in any wars, or traveling across the infinite on a strange quest after all.

  But things aren’t always as easy as they might seem, and both politics, as well as the other gods, aren’t going to ignore Will, or the tasks he’s been set to complete. And is if dealing with that isn’t problem enough, when the time comes to do some serious diplomacy between Hiland and a neighboring Kingdom, a deadly problem comes from a most unexpected quarter, forcing Will to take immediate action to payback both his, and his God’s foes.

  Portals of Infinity, Book Four: The Sea of Grass

  With no otherworld tasks to run for Fel, Will has spent the last year mainly helping Rachel consolidate her hold on her expanded kingdom. Barassa has been set back, for now, but Will knows it’s only a matter of time until they’re at odds once more and Barassa still has the bigger army. So taking the time to learn more about their enemy seems like a good place to start, and of course, Rachel has more things she expects him to do, even if he has no idea just how he’s going to do them.

  Fel also has things for Will to do as well, even if they are the more mundane jobs that a Champion of the faith must perform. Escorting missionaries isn’t the most exciting or glamorous job, but its one Will must do. At least the people are different, interesting, and friendly, and some perhaps a little too friendly. But that’s never gotten him in trouble before, right?

  The Hammer Commission

  Mark's job seems pretty dull, working as an investigator into crimes committed against Church property, theft of holy objects, vandalism; nothing terribly exciting but he does get to travel the world.

  That's just the window dressing. Mark does work for the Church, but as an elite member of a thousand year old secret society that hunts down devils, demons, and other evils. His job is not just to find them, but to remove, dispel, or kill them: he's on the front lines of the secret ongoing war between Heaven and Hell. However as wars go, it has been a fairly easy one for the last few decades, with nothing seriously evil having been summoned since the last world war.

  But all of that is about to change, and the question for Mark may not be can he survive, but can he survive long enough.

  Science Fiction:

  Children of Steel

  Raj is just your average everyday genetically modeled and artificially created anthropomorphic worker for one of the many corporations of the future. Extensively trained and conditioned from birth he's now indentured for the next fifty years of his life; assuming he doesn't die first, or somehow manage to pay off his creation and training debts.

  Created by the corporations to deal with the harsh labor shortages of the twenty second century when humans will no longer take on the dangerous jobs Raj finds himself now in the harsh world of space exploration, trading, corporate maneuverings, and sometimes the even more dangerous fanatics that hate Raj and his fellows. No longer in safe confines of the training academies he must learn how to live and deal with both his fellow workers and the humans he encounters and not get saddled with extra bills or fines because he's screwed up or worse yet, get 'put down' because he's lost his temper one time too many.

  After all, it's not like he's human...

  Danger Money

  Jotun was born and bred to be a corporate assassin, back in the days of the Corporate Wars. Confined these days to life in a gilded cage, Jotun welcomes any opportunity to get out and lately he's been getting out a lot. But as a genetically designed and Laboratory bred animorph by a company that isn't quite sure if it trusts him anymore his choices are few: do the jobs that eventually will kill him, or refuse, which will also kill him.

  Of course it isn't like he doesn't enjoy the work, but when everybody wants you dead you start to wonder if there isn't more to life.

  When an unexpected betrayal kills the few friends he has and nearly him as well, Jotun realizes he has bigger problems than his lifestyle, namely finding out who betrayed him and paying them back, no matter what the cost.

  Danger Money is a Science Fiction story that takes place in my Children of Steel universe, a future where genetically created animorphs serve as second-class citizens and handle all of the dirty and dangerous jobs that are part of humanity's extension to the stars.

  Dialene

  Dialene's Captain decided to play pirate, and one well placed nuclear torpedo later she finds herself prisoner of the Corporation whose ship they were attempting to raid; her friends and lover all dead. With no corporation to ransom her back she finds herself in the unenviable position of having to work off the debt assigned to her for her part in her Captain's actions. With concerns as to where her loyalties lie she has but two choices: Work in the mines on an airless rock where a small fem like her would not last long, or work in the company bar entertaining those very same miners.

  At least working in the bar beats the alternatives, until one day an interesting character inserts himself into her life.

  A Novella from my Children of Steel universe, Dialene is a foxmorph who until her capture was a highly rated shuttle pilot working a deep space trader for one of the more notorious corporations. Like most of her kind she had no
choices in her employer who considered her nothing more than a disposable asset.

  Shorts: The Furry Years

  A collection of short stories that I wrote years ago for several of different anthropomorphic fanzines. Includes the following short stories:

  Changes: The hero of the story wakes up in the morning to find his world has changed, rather drastically for him, hardly at all for others.

  Old Business: This is from my ‘Children of Steel’ universe, it’s about the beginning of it all, the very first of the sentient animen (or animorph) ever to be created.

  New Beginnings: Jack is the new bartender at a small pub, a nice quiet pub in the business district. The patrons tend to find his opinions humorous, as what does a bartender know after all? (More of a slice of life type story).

  Fox Hunt: A joke that I just could not resist.

  Easy Money: What happens to spies who come in from the cold? Especially ones who grew up on the wrong side of the tracks? Nothing good I’m sure...

  Available in eBook format at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Smashwords, Kobo, iTunes, and wherever eBooks are sold, available in print from CreateSpace or Amazon.