The Serene Invasion

Chapter SIX





IT SEEMED TO Sally that, in her sixties, her life had entered a period of calm and quiescence that had its analogue in the collective demeanour of the human race in the middle period of the twenty-first century.

She was no longer ambitious as she had been when young; she was no longer as concerned about what people thought of her. She was happier in herself and in her dealings with others, had fewer worries, and if she thought of the future at all it was with positivity and confidence.

It seemed, likewise, that humankind since spreading from Earth and inhabiting the solar system had entered a period of maturity, of co-operation and tolerance. The human race teemed across terraformed planets and moons, inhabited vast spaceborn dwellings hollowed from asteroids. They worked together increasingly without the boundaries of nations to impede progress with concerns of petty national interest, freed from the malign influence of multinational business corporations. Religions had mellowed, even the more radical sects of Christianity and Islam which in the past had threatened head-to-head conflict; millions still believed, but without the self-righteous fervour of old. New cults had sprung up, many with the Serene at their core. Of the old faiths, Buddhism was increasing in popularity, as citizens drew parallels between the ways of the Serene and the philosophy of Siddhartha Gautama.

All in all, Sally reflected as she stared out through the dome of her surgery across the Mare Erythraeum, it was a good time to be alive.

She had seen her last patient of the day and had the afternoon to herself. Geoff, on some administrative tour of a farm in the south, wouldn’t be back until later that evening; she’d dine that night with Hannah and her new boyfriend. Before that, she had a lunch date with Kath Kemp.

Her old friend was a frequent visitor to Mars, and particularly to Escarpment City. The obelisks made interplanetary travel no more difficult than stepping from one room to the next – once the traveller had reached the embarkation obelisk, of course, which often took hours by conventional transport. Sally saw Kath perhaps once a month, when they caught up with each other’s work and reminisced about old times. She had gone through a period – on learning what Kath Kemp was, ten years ago – of not exactly mistrusting Kath but questioning everything about their relationship. She had wondered if she had been manipulated, if Kath had had ulterior motives for fostering their friendship – but for the life of her Sally could discern no such motivation on the part of the Serene self-aware entity. They were, she genuinely felt, two like-minded woman with a shared past in common, and even similar temperaments – even if one of them just happened to be an alien construct.

Trust, Sally thought as she switched off her com and left her surgery – that was what it boiled down to. She trusted Kath Kemp and the Serene, despite Nina Ricci’s increasing frustration at what she saw as the Serene withholding information from their human representatives.

She caught an electric buggy from the business core of the city to the Lip. It was a warm autumn day on the red planet and the plain was basking in hazy sunlight. Her favourite café was almost full, but she’d taken the precaution of reserving a table by the rail.

She was early, and admired the view across the flat, patchwork farmland as she waited for Kath to arrive.

A minute later the small, dumpy woman – she had thickened in old age, Sally thought – crossed the patio towards her table. Sally stood and they embraced, and then ordered coffee and salad.

Kath asked about Sally’s recent work, enquiring about the efficiency of new anti-cancer drugs trialled on a group of her patients – and for the next fifteen minutes they chatted about this and other aspects of Sally’s practice.

Sally had no doubt that the enquiry was part of a gathering of information which the Serene would collate and use to refine and direct future policy – but at the same time, she thought, Kath was genuinely interested in her work on a more personal level.

As they ate, Sally’s thoughts turned to Geoff’s forthcoming trip to Titan, and what he hoped Kath Kemp might reveal to him, Nina Ricci and Ana Devi, there.

“You do realise,” she said at one point, “that your promise to Nina has made Geoff uncharacteristically restless? He’s talked about nothing else for days.”

Kath laughed, wrinkles creasing around her kind eyes. “Nina is one inquisitive and perceptive woman. One in a million. She keeps us on our toes.”

“Every class needs an enfant terrible,” Sally said. “I suppose what you’ll tell them is confidential?” She was fishing, and smiled at Kath’s mischievous expression.

“It is, but won’t be in a couple of days.” Kath regarded her coffee, then looked up. “As we’ll be making it public anyway in a week or two, why don’t you come with Geoff to Titan? Make a holiday of it. Can you get time off?”

Sally felt a rising excitement. “I’m due a little leave, and I’ve only seen Titan on film. From what Geoff tells me, it’s beautiful.”

“One of the wonders of the solar system. Prepare to be amazed. We’ll also be going onward, outward, from Titan.”

“We will? But I thought...” Sally faltered. As far as she knew, Titan was the outer extent of human habitation in the solar system. Then she recalled what Nina Ricci had said about Serene work on the very perimeter of the system.

“You don’t mean...?”

“I can’t say, especially now, with security tightening as it is.”

“It is? I thought everything was going well on that front, what with the Obterek...”

Ten years ago, for a few weeks after their evacuation from Earth to Mars, Geoff and Sally, Ana and Kapil, had lived in fear of what course the Obterek opposition to the Serene might take. Despite constant Serene reassurances that they had nothing to fear, they had indeed feared: Sally and Geoff had discussed the situation, and Geoff had summed it up well when he described feeling that the human race was a tiny, insignificant and ignorant life-form caught in a battle between two vast and incomprehensible armies.

Then, as the weeks lapsed and turned to months, and the threat of Obterek action never materialised, their fears eventually receded. It must have been years, now, since Sally had last considered the Serene’s galactic opponents.

Kath was regarding her empty plate as if wondering whether to tell Sally something. At last she said, “There have been worrying developments lately.”

“The Obterek ?”

Kath nodded. “We wondered when they might next make a move. It was too good to be true that this period of quiescence, which had lasted for almost a decade, would continue indefinitely.”

“What happened?”

“An incident on Earth just yesterday. You’ll hear about it soon enough. A breach in the charea. A tiny breach, but nevertheless very worrying, as even the tiniest, briefest breakdown in our systems is a reason for the alarm bells to start ringing...” She laughed and said: “Listen to me, spouting platitudes like some jaded news hack.”

“You think it might just be the start of...” Sally let the question hang.

Kath sighed. “That’s our fear, but you can never tell with the Obterek. We’re monitoring the situation, stepping up security...”

At that moment Sally’s softscreen chimed. She moved to cut the call, but Kath leaned forward and said, “No. I think you had better accept it.”

Nodding, a sick feeling in her chest, Sally rolled up her sleeve and tapped her forearm. Instantly Ana Devi’s face stared up at her, unusual in that the woman was not smiling. “Ana?”

“Sal. Can I see you?”

“Of course. Are you... is everything okay?”

“Yes. No. No, it isn’t. Can I see you? I just want to talk...” The Indian woman smiled up at her, but Sally could tell that she was close to tears. “I’m back on Mars. Will you be at home this afternoon?”

“All afternoon. I’ll be back in... say an hour. Drop by at any time, Ana.”

Ana nodded, thanked Sally, and cut the connection.

Sally looked up and stared at Kath. “That was Ana. She seemed...” She shook her head.

Kath said, “You’d better be getting home, Sally. Be there for Ana, and give her my condolences.”

Kath stood and made to leave.

“Kath?” Sally said.

“Ana will tell you all about it. I really must be going.”

They kissed cheeks, and Kath said, “I’ll see you in two days, Sally, on Titan.”

She watched her friend hurry from the café, then made her way home with a feeling of dire expectation in her chest.





SHE SAT BENEATH the cherry tree in her garden and waited.

The sun was going down and birdsong filled the warm air. If she closed her eyes she could imagine herself back in Shropshire. When she opened her eyes, however, the quality of the light – somehow hazier and less intense – told her that she was no longer on Earth, and the tumbling shape of Deimos gave the game away.

But the back garden and the cottage were as restful as ever, a piece of England transplanted, which Sally found a refuge from the pressure of work. She knew that Ana loved the cottage and the garden, and thoughts of Ana brought back what Kath had said. “Give her my condolences.”

Had something happened to Kapil or to Shantidev?

She started as she heard the squeak of the gate at the side of the house, and a second later Ana came into view along the path.

Sally stood and faced Ana down the length of the garden, and something in the Indian woman’s posture made Sally run to Ana and hold her as she sobbed on her shoulder. She inhaled the woman’s scent – rosewater and shampoo.

She led Ana back to the cherry tree and sat her down on the bench, then sat beside her and held her hand. “Ana? Tell me...”

“I hadn’t seen him for ten years... and I expected to find the man I had last seen. Brash. Arrogant... If I succeeded in finding him at all... But I found him. Against all the odds. Found him... I didn’t really expect to. But I did!”

“Ana. Take it easy. Slow down. Does Kapil know you’re back?”

“He’s... he’s on Venus. I contacted him. He’s on his way back. But... but he won’t get home until later tonight. And I just had to talk to someone...”

“Of course, of course.” She gripped her friend’s hand. “Tell me.”

“I went to Earth especially to find him.”

She recalled Geoff telling her last week that Ana was going to New York to try to find her brother, Bilal.

“Ana, what happened?”

The Indian woman stared at her, stricken. “Someone murdered my brother,” she said.

Sally wanted to say that that was impossible, that people were not murdered anymore. The coming of the Serene had seen to that...

“But who...?”

“I know who, Sally. I saw him. You see, when I was leaving the orphanage that afternoon, I saw someone. I didn’t know who it was at the time, only later... It was Bilal’s old boss, the businessman James Morwell. Only... only this was a different, younger version of James Morwell.”

“But why would he want to murder Bilal?”

Ana shook her head. “I don’t know. I can’t imagine. But... later I was questioned by a Serene self-aware entity. It... it entered me, just as ten years ago it saved me from the Obterek at Fujiyama, and when it came out it told me that I had been correct. I had seen James Morwell, and he was working for the Obterek.” She looked up, into the sky, and said, “And the self-aware entity told me, Sally, that they feared this was merely the start of a new, concerted Obterek onslaught.”

Sally held her friend as the day darkened towards evening and a chill crept over the garden.