The Back Channel by John Scalzi

Author:John Scalzi [Scalzi, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Science Fiction, Fiction, General
ISBN: 9781466830561
Google: _cfhi_BakaAC
Goodreads: 16180358
Publisher: Tor Books
Published: 2012-12-31T23:00:00+00:00

“Take another step, xig, and I’ll blow your head off,” said the colonist directly in front of Sorvalh. He was pointing a shotgun at her chest.

Sorvalh stopped walking and stood calmly at the frontier of the colony of Deliverance. She had been walking toward it for several minutes, having had her shuttle land at the far reach of a broad meadow on which the colony had situated itself. Her gown swished as she moved, and the necklace she wore featured audio and visual devices feeding back to her ship. She had walked slowly, in order to give the colony enough time to muster a welcoming party, and for another purpose as well. Five heavily armed men stood in front of her now, weapons raised. Two more that she could see lay on colony roofs, zeroed into her position with long-range rifles. Sorvalh assumed there were more she couldn’t see, but they didn’t concern her at the moment. She would be aware of them soon enough.

“Good morning, gentlemen,” she said. She gestured to the markings on their skin. “Those are lovely. Very angular.”

“Shut up, xig,” said the colonist. “Shut up and turn around and get back in that shuttle of yours and fly off like a good bug.”

“My name is Hafte Sorvalh,” she said, pleasantly. “It’s not ‘Xig.’”

“A xig is what you are,” said the colonist. “And I don’t give a shit what you call yourself. You’re leaving.”

“Well,” Sorvalh said, impressed. “Aren’t you fierce.”

“Fuck you, xig,” the colonist said.

“A bit repetitive, however,” Sorvalh said.

The colonist raised the shotgun so that it was now pointing at her head. “You’ll be going now,” he said.

“I won’t, actually,” Sorvalh said. “And if you or any other member of your merry band tries to shoot me, you’ll be dead before you can manage to pull the trigger. You see, my friend, while I was walking toward your compound, my starship orbiting above this location was busy tracking and marking the heat signatures of every living thing in your colony larger than ten of your kilos. You’re now all entered into the ship’s weapons database, and about a dozen particle weapons are actively tracking twenty or thirty targets each. If any one of you tries to kill me, you will die, horribly, and then everyone else in the colony will follow you as each individual beam cycles through its target list. Every one of you—and your livestock, and your large pets—will be dead in roughly one of your seconds. I will be a mess, because much of what is inside of your head right now will likely get onto me, but I will be alive. And I have a fresh change of clothes in my shuttle.”

The colonist and his friends stared at Sorvalh blankly.

“Well, let’s get on with it,” Sorvalh said. “Either try to kill me or let me do what I came here to do. It’s a lovely morning and I would hate to waste it.”

“What do you want?” said another colonist.

“I want to talk to your leader,” Sorvalh said.

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