Speaker To Aliens

By T. Jackson King

Helen Sarkissian wants to be the first Human to talk to Aliens. So she signs on as a linguist crewman aboard a Shi'ite-run starship. But she is bisexual and must hide her nature from the Shi'ite religious police, while fighting for everyone's rights as the religious tensions that divide the Western Alliance humanists and the Shi'a colonists threaten to erupt into violence. Will she and every non-Muslim on board the starship end up dead? Or will human differences be put aside in the face of a more pressing threat--the Swarm aliens who were first to colonize the world of 36 Draconis refuse the Shi'ite demand to leave. Who will triumph in a battle to the death between Human jihad warriors and Swarmers who have never been defeated? And will Helen be able to communicate the concept of peace before both sides are destroyed?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wilder Publications Inc.
• Release date: Jun 14, 2013
• ISBN: 9781617206580

T. Jackson King

T. Jackson King (Tom) is a professional archaeologist and journalist. He writes hard science fiction, anthropological scifi, dark fantasy/horror and contemporary fantasy/magic realism--but that didn't begin until he was 38. Before then, college years spent in Paris and in Tokyo led Tom into antiwar activism, hanging out with some Japanese hippies and learning how often governments lie to their citizens. The latter lesson led him and a college buddy to publish the Shinjuku Sutra English language underground tabloid in Japan in 1967. That was followed by helping shut down the UT Knoxville campus in 1968 and a bus trip to Washington D.C. for the Second March on Washington where thousands demanded an end to the Vietnam War. Temporary sanity returned when Tom worked in a radiocarbon lab at UC Riverside and earned an MA degree in archaeology from UCLA. His interests in ancient history, ancient cultures and journalism got him several government agency jobs that paid the bills, led him to roam the raw landscape of the Western United States, and helped him raise three kids. A funny thing happened on the way to normality. By the time he was 38 and doing federal arky work in Colorado, Tom's first novel STAR TRADERS was a stage play in his head that wouldn't go away. So he wrote it down. It got rejected. His next novel was published as RETREAD SHOP (Warner Books, 1988). It was off to the writing races and Tom's many voyages of imaginative discovery have led to 23 published novels, a book of poetry, and a conviction that when humans reach the stars, we will find them crowded with space-going aliens. We will be the New Kids On The Block. This theme appears in much of Tom's short fiction and novel writing. Tom lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico, USA. His other writings can be viewed at http://www.tjacksonking.com.

Book preview

PROLOGUE

From a graduate course seminar given by Saad Idnn Ibrahim, Sunni Lecturer and Fulbright Scholar at the University of California Los Angeles, United States, Western Alliance, A.H. 1451, or C.E. 2030.

"—students today will wonder at the speed with which Shi’a Islam spread across the world. The hordes of white-robed Iranian Martyrs took Jerusalem in 2016, Istanbul in 2017, Mecca in 2018, Europe in 2021, Central Asia in 2022 and by 2024, Shi’a Islam ruled over subject populations from Tanzania north to Samarkand, from Britain east to Indonesia, the Martyrs singing Allahu Akbar—God is Great! But the peaceful Muslim majority were the first victims of the Shi’a jihad to establish a world state or Umma of Islam.

"The imams and ayatollahs of Qom say it is the Spirit of Muhammad, newly reborn in the Second Husain. The nations of the surviving Western Alliance point to the fifth column of foreign guest workers in Europe and Africa, who rose up and deposed democratic, socialist and fascist governments alike. The Hindus say little and profess a belated neutrality, hoping the Council of Imams will not emulate the Mughal Empire. The Chinese say the barbarians have finally shown their true colors. The black Africans are too preoccupied with starving to blame anyone. The rest of the world rejoiced that only a few radioactive craters pockmarked the Holy Land, Arabia, Iran, Europe and the former states of the Russian Federation.

"What is definite is that just as the Martyrs held sway over the largest empire since Alexander’s, the discovery of the Translight stardrive by the Baha’i heretic Megum Ben Ahmed in 2022 gave the imams something to do with the captured rockets of Baikonur cosmodrome. They used the Russian Energia heavy-lift rockets to throw massive cargos into space, relying on subject peoples for technicians, contracting with the Western Alliance for scientific experts only when they had to. But their desperation to spread the Prophet’s Call to other planets can be seen in their hiring of female Western experts—so long as they wore the chador.

"In 2026, six QomDrive starships left Earth orbit for the nearer habitable stars, seeking to spread the Prophet’s Call to new lands. One of these was The Sword of Islam, a ship captained by a Harvard-educated Shi’ite and crewed mostly by Western-trained Iranians, Afghanis and Iraqis. It carried a Shock Brigade of Martyrs from the dregs of Yemen, Sudan and Somalia, a colonizing group of farm peasants, and a small complement of contracted Western and Asian experts. The eight hundred humans aboard The Sword of Islam are now known to have been the spark for what has become known as The Draconis Incident."

CHAPTER ONE

Female! Where are you bound? called a harsh, guttural voice in Yemeni-accented Arabic.

Helen Sarkissian adjusted her chador robe, then turned to look down the First Deck hallway she’d just entered. The voice belonged to a dark-skinned, hawk-nosed man, clad in white robes and a soiled turban. The pits of some former disease pockmarked his sallow face. His brown eyes carried hatred. Helen stilled her fear, raised her hand and opened it to show the Pass Key given her by Captain Hohshemi Talaghani.

Martyr, I am on the Prophet’s business, sent by Captain Talaghani to run new linguistic programs on the infidel computer. Up on Second Deck. May I have your leave?

The man grimaced, showing rotten teeth. You may, if you accept my escort. The Holy Koran forbids females to go abroad without a man.

Damn! Helen bit her tongue, tempted to say the Koran said no such thing, but then she nodded demurely. The escort of any Sword of Islam does me honor. Will you precede me?

Of course! The Shock Brigade officer—the glitter of two crescents on his neck wrap indicated a sergeant—rustled past her in stained robes. She followed three paces behind, just as her UC Berkeley instructor in cross-cultural anthropology had taught her.

Only . . . he’d never warned her what it would feel like to be one of just eight Western women stuck aboard a starship run by Medieval religious fanatics. Fanatics who saw women as good only for birthing babies, planting crops, doing heavy labor, and tending to the husband’s every whim. The only thing that kept her from going crazy was the presence of twenty other contract specialists from the Western Alliance and Asia. Still, she missed her mother, she missed the memory of her murdered father, and she missed their home in the Armenian-American community of East LA. No longer could she hear the chanted rites of the Armenian Apostolic Church, rites which her priestly father had performed at home for the family. The memories forced her back to the core question. Was a trip to the stars worth putting up with the Shi’a?

She hoped so—for she had bet everything on the chance to be the first human to talk to Aliens and only the Shi’a had Translight starships. Helen picked up her pace as the Shock Brigade officer walked quickly up the ramp leading to Second Deck.

It had been two weeks since they’d left Earth orbit in The Sword of Islam. Two weeks of gradually increasing oppression, of dark glances from brown-skinned men, of curious yet fearful looks from the heavily robed and veiled Shi’a women the few times she’d seen them while going to market in the First Deck suq. Then there was the outright hatred from the omnipresent mullahs and khatibs who flowed out of First Deck’s mosque to every corner of the ship, like rats seeking the last kernel of corn on a doomed plague ship. Two weeks in which the mullahs had tightened the screws on where she and her fellow Westerners could go, where they could exercise, when they could leave their purdahed quarters on light-gee Sixth Deck, when and where they could talk—the Shi’a clergy controlled everything except the nightmares that stalked her dreams. Her nightmares were her own.

At the top of the ramp she slowed and looked up, squinting in the bright light. Martyr, will you slow your pace? I am unused to fast walking—living on Sixth Deck does not make you stronger.

The white-robed Martyr looked over his shoulder with a scowl, then headed for the ship’s technical stations entry door. Follow!

She followed as best she could, still getting used to a world where her feet pointed toward the ship’s outer skin, while her head pointed up toward the lighter gee inner areas of the starship. So long as the titanium tube of The Sword of Islam rotated about its inner Drive Tube, that long did they have weight. And spingee was something she’d experienced in low Earth orbit aboard the Freedom/Goddard Space Station—in company with her lover Bill Mabry and her roommate, Mariela Santini. The Shi’a might possess the wonder of faster-than-light star travel through the stolen secret of Translight, but they could only make gravity the same way everyone else did—by spingee.

Ahead, the Martyr turned left down a feeder hallway that curved upward visibly. Helen followed to a part of Second Deck she knew well. They stopped before a red-striped slidedoor. The Martyr turned to glare at her.

Beyond lie the Western infidels. Are you of the faith?

No, she said. But I respect the Prophet.

As well you should! he yelled, spittle dripping from qat-stained lips. Females! He turned from her in disgust, disappearing down a green hallway painted with the golden lances of verses from the Koran.

Males, she muttered to herself, then faced the admit panel. She touch-keyed in her access code and stepped inside.

Helen! yelled Mariela, looking relieved. I was expecting you twenty minutes ago. What kept you?

Bad luck. Helen stripped off the chador robe and niqab headgear, flung them into a corner of the entry alcove, shook free her blond braids, and stepped up to hug Mariela. Had to get a Pass Key on First Deck, then a damned Martyr forced me to accept his escort.

Oh. Mariela hugged her back. Well, at least he didn’t claim you for his third wife. Her roommate turned and led the way into the noisy bedlam of Technical Support.

She stepped into the big square room, a place nearly filled by the giant horseshoe of control boards occupied by her fellow First Shift colleagues. Mariela continued over to her own Ecosystems station, on the left side of the room. Friendly voices interrupted their conversations to welcome Helen. She returned their hails with a smile, a laugh or a shrug, all the while telling herself she was safe, safe among colleagues who weren’t crazy Shi’ites.

As Mariela sat down at her work station, she said something silly to curly-haired Ethan Lancaster, the refugee Scotsman from Edinburgh who handled Astrophysics. He chuckled. Helen walked past the Cray 7 supercomputer in the middle of the room and sat at her station on the right wall, next to Willard Rustow, their Shift Boss, a former NASA executive and the one who represented them all before the ship’s Council of Faqih jurists. Willard stared moodily at his Remote Analysis readouts, ignoring Helen’s late arrival. Well, she could ignore him. She checked out her fellow Shifters.

Against the far wall, Jane Sawyer leaned back from her Computer station, her manner one of moody relaxation. The Toronto native spared Helen a nod and a brief smile. Next to Jane sat Esperanza Luna from Rio de Janeiro. Dark-eyed Esperanza glanced back from her Microbiology-Botany work station, a tremulous smile filling her Latin features. As for Bill, who sat between her and Esperanza . . . he looked up from his Fusion Systems board, smiled welcome, then turned to talk with Jane and Esperanza. Helen smiled at the three of them, then focused on her own Linguistics work station, wondering just why Willard was acting so distant.

Overhead, the air conditioning outlet chilled the back of her neck, making her shiver after the heat of the ship hallway. The air held the scent of magnolias—an artificial odor, but better than the reek of oil. Helen leaned over her work station’s three touchpanels, keyed in her Basque-to-Arabic transliteration program, and waited for the holoimages to come alive before her. As she waited, she pondered things far removed from her research project. Like what she’d gotten herself into . . .

On First Deck below, in the Command Bridge of the ship, college-educated Shi’a such as Talaghani and his officers tended to critical functions like Astrogation, Security, Communications, Life Support, Weapons, Translight, Faith, the TAL transatmospheric shuttles—and the horses. Horses! Helen shook her head, still amazed despite two weeks in transit. Hawks she’d expected. But horses? It was crazy, even if the horse dung added to the fertility of the Third Deck Farms. But the Shi’a were determined to ride their horses across the soil of any world orbiting 36 Draconis, the same way that Muhammad, Ali, Hassan and Husain had done in the First Call.

Her touchpanels flickered, then the air filled with the blue ovals of her transliteration program. Reaching out, she keyed in a self-check routine, where one algorithm checks another. It gave her time to worry.

Helen recalled a Cal-Tech friend’s warning. He’d said that once they were out of Earth orbit, Helen’s indentured labor contract with the Shi’a would be worth about as much as a pile of dung. She hoped not. She looked forward to finding Aliens. Would the principles of semiotic analysis apply? Would they even speak in phonemic sounds, like humans? So many questions, so many unknowns. Including her Muslim masters. She had not expected the disdain she’d encountered, even from the highly educated Shi’a of Command Bridge. After all, they were all humans even if they hailed from different cultures and religions. But the Shi’a disdain for the corrupt West had carried over to the starship crew and khatib village preachers.

Willard stirred beside her. Helen, Talaghani has complained to me about you and Bill swimming together in the Gymnasium pool. True?

Damn all spies! True. But we were very careful. We—

Weren’t careful enough! Willard interrupted sharply. "You know imam al-Sadr has these khatib preachers running all over the ship looking for transgressions to the Shari’a religious law. Co-ed swimming is a violation. No more such trips."

Okay, Boss.

Willard persisted. "Helen, if the mutawain religious police had caught you, they’d have beaten you with those batons they carry."

Understood. I’ll try to make your life easier.

Willard eyed her, his face unusually tense for a man adept at jovial supervision. Acquiescing is not enough. Things are unsettled in Command Bridge and in the Mosque. I need your willing cooperation. Do I have it?

She ground her teeth, but then noticed the tired tone in his voice. Sure, Boss. Sorry to be a problem. It’s just hard to adjust.

He nodded, then turned back to his own work station. Agreed. Remember, we’re contract employees here. We observe company rules. Even when the rules go against the normal Islamic tradition of allowing non-believers to follow their own beliefs. Now let’s get to work.

Damn, damn, damn! What kind of life was this where you couldn’t jog, couldn’t go out in the hallways without covering every inch of bare skin, couldn’t go to your Lab or run any machine without a male escort? And what kind of life was it when the men of the Shock Brigade leered at you because, in some traditional Muslim cultures, any unescorted woman was considered a prostitute?

At least she had Bill. And wonderful Mariela. They meant the world to her. But did Bill value her for more than the fun sex? Did Mariela love her for more than being the right gender? Helen touched the blue oval control surfaces as the diagnostic routine ended, then brought up a stored analysis program. Maybe work would take her mind off the harsh realities of life aboard the Sword. And her desperate fear about being a closeted  bisexual in a culture that decreed death for anyone who wasn’t straight hetero . . . .

The matched cognates of Basque and Egyptian Arabic appeared in the holoimages. The looping blue lines constituted her assigned duty. Which was to transliterate Basque into the native Farsi of Talaghani and the other Iranians, while deducing lessons of automatic translation that might be useable if The Sword of Islam encountered Alien lifeforms at 36 Draconis. What Talaghani and the Martyrs might do if they ever met other people frightened her. Frightened her badly. How can you communicate with the Alien if you can’t even deal with other humans?

She bent forward, aligning her eyes to the electro-optical perceptor stations so she could blink in program changes as her fingers changed values on the floating holoimages. The blessed complexity of linguistics analysis almost wiped out the memory of the angry Yemeni Martyr . . . .

––––––––

Captain Hohshemi Talaghani watched the Armenian-American woman on his flatscreen spy monitor, hearing the voices of the Western infidels on Second Deck. He wondered idly whether the blond-haired linguist would ever learn proper respect. It did not pay to defy any Martyr, even half-educated ones like the Yemenis. And while the Council of Imams in Qom had decreed The Sword of Islam would accept such irregular females, they were essential only until they reached the new Paradise of 36 Draconis. A light tread interrupted his Command Bridge privacy.

Captain Talaghani! Why do you look upon infidel women? Their tight clothing is obscene! said the croaking voice of his co-commander, mujtahid Ali Sayyid Muhsin al-Sadr. Hohshemi looked up at the white-turbaned Iraqi.

Security, he said. It is my onerous duty to gaze upon the Western infidels to be certain they do not sabotage the Call. Do you suggest I am less than faithful to my wives and the Koran?

Al-Sadr’s black eyes glittered dangerously. No . . . But it seems you often observe those of Second Deck, even when they are off-duty. The white-turbaned, second-rank mujtahid looked around the horseshoe of workstations which encircled Hohshemi’s Command dais. What if one of these was to cast faithful eyes upon the uncovered females and beardless males of Second Deck? They would be corrupted!

Hohshemi glanced at his brown-robed officers, their backs to him as each man bent to his duties, then back to mujtahid al-Sadr. "Do you suggest the efforts of you, the pasdaran Revolutionary guards and the mutawain police are ineffective? Or that I would allow my officers to be seduced from the Call by the mere sight of a female!"

Al-Sadr turned expressionless as he gathered up his robes, then took his seat beside Hohshemi, Faith wedded to Command. Of course not, Captain. The Koran’s word is all-powerful. Only man is weak.

Turning away from the last in a series of prickly arguments he’d had with the rural village-born mujtahid from southern Iraq, Hohshemi looked at the front wallscreen’s rainbow colors, aware of the humming tension that lay over his Bridge. He called to his second-in-command, Lancer Tahir Nanbullah, sitting below the screen.

Astrogator, how long until Breakout?

The swarthy Afghan turned and gave a black-bearded nod of respect. Two weeks, three days, four hours and seven minutes. We are nearly halfway there, Struggle Leader.

At what distance will we be from the star upon arrival?

Eight light-hours, Tahir said.

Hohshemi nodded thanks to his fellow Harvard graduate, both members of the class of 2018, before the Western Alliance realized just how foolish it was to educate the leaders of the Hijra. Tahir’s blue eyes—a relic of Soviet foolishness in repeating the British errors of a previous century—looked at him with full faith. Ever since they’d saved each other’s lives in the taking of Zanzibar harbor, each trusted the other like a brother. Hohshemi glanced sideways at the impassive face of al-Sadr, then back to Tahir.

Any evidence of Drive Systems interference by Second Deck?

No, Struggle Leader, Tahir said, frowning slightly. Only the normal Fusion power plant maintenance functions and plasma field checkouts. They seem to be complying with their contracts.

That, interrupted al-Sadr in a harsh tone, is a judgment made by the Faith, not by technicians such as yourself.

Tahir looked irritated, then gave the ceremonial chest-slap of a former Martyr commando. So it is, Faith leader. I only report my observations. Tahir turned back to his Astrogation boards.

Hohshemi tried not to frown. The uneasy alliance on Sword between illiterate Shock troops from the hills of the Mideast, the inflexible imams assigned by Qom, and the few educated Hijra members like himself, Tahir and the rest of the Crew, did not need internal dissension. Particularly not when they carried the insidious seed of Western infidels next to their heart, much the way Husain, grandson of the Prophet Muhammad, had been betrayed by the rich Ummayyads of Damascus on that last fateful journey across Iraq. Hohshemi tried never to forget the lure of materialism, of things made by man, of heresies that mocked the Book. Ever since that first day at Harvard, when he’d been laughed at by the whole class for going out into the hallway to prostrate himself, face Mecca and say his mid-day prayers, Hohshemi had never forgotten that materialism and greed ran the West. Or that money was their god. He turned to al-Sadr.

Faith Leader, there is nothing to worry about, he said. The Farms feed us. The women work the fields and give birth—already we have six new sons added to the Call. We have covered half the 76.6 light years distance to our promised star home. And the shuttle landers are ready to plant the colony.

Al-Sadr squinted at him. You are certain there is a planet on which to plant the Call?

Of course! he said loudly, drawing side glances from the First Shift officers who ran critical ship functions. The captured Kepler telescope clearly showed several Jupiter-sized planets transiting the F5 main sequence star, while its spectrum indicates a low rotational speed—further evidence it has shed much of its mass into a planetary disk. The star’s liquid water habitable zone is wide. And Kepler has documented many super-large Earth-type planets circling other stars. We shall have a new home on which to plant the Prophet’s Call.

Al-Sadr put elbows on his chair arms, folded palms together, then rested his chin on clenched fists as he peered at the front wallscreen, where the colors of QomSpace flickered like a thousand rainbows. Then it only remains for us to maintain discipline and Faith until we arrive. True, Captain?

True, Faith Leader, Hohshemi said. He looked down at the monitor screens protruding from either arm of his padded Command chair. Each reported on a critical function aboard The Sword of Islam.

So far, all had gone well—except for the tendency of the horses to jump too high in the lighter gravity of Third Deck. The hawks flew well. But he missed his three wives back on Earth, in his ancestral home of Isfahan, especially Mahtoob, his first wife. She had gone to live with the wife of their eldest son in Hamadan, taking his picture with her. Fadhila and Laila had stayed in Isfahan, promising to weave him a new prayer rug of colors most glorious. He sighed. Most of the Bridge Crew had also left behind wives and families, trusting to the providence of Allah. For now, 36 Draconis lay before them, the reaching of it a challenge not unlike that faced by the first Believers who had spread the Prophet’s Call in great jihãds across the known world of the seventh century C.E. Now, one-third of Earth’s people bespoke the Shahada daily, acknowledging there was but one god, Allah, and that Muhammad was his Prophet. Hohshemi and his Crew were the Hijra, the new Migration patterned after the Prophet’s first example, but this time going out to the stars.

Allah-willing, the Call of the Prophet would be planted on a new world.

––––––––

Ali al-Sadr sat beside Talaghani, feeling terribly afraid.

He never let anyone know he was afraid. Afraid of space, afraid of the constant threat of contamination from the infidel dhimmi of Second Deck, afraid of his fellow imams, afraid of the tarika secret societies represented among the Martyrs, afraid of . . . too many things. He remembered his years of study at Faiziyeh theological college in Qom, his later study in Tehran at the Hussaineh Ershad center, and his brief service in Oman before being called to serve the umma, the body and world-state of Islam. He should have been comforted by those memories. He should have been consoled by the knowledge that the Koran, the Hadith sayings, the Sunnah Traditions and the Jaafari Laws of the Imamate in Kerbala held sway over one-third of the world. Five times a day the Umma of Islam repeated the Shahada while facing Holy Mecca. The two Great Satans of godless Russia and immoral America had been thrown back and defeated. This was the time of redemption. Of doing what earlier followers of Caliph Ali Ibn Abi Talib had failed to do on the Plains of Kerbala thirteen hundred years ago. Still, Ali felt afraid. Still, he questioned his own worth. Even his prayers to Allah lacked conviction.

To the right of Ali, a Syrian crewman looked up from his Communications board. Captain, we are receiving a QomSpace signal from Kerbala. Do you wish to hear it privately?

Talaghani glanced briefly at Ali, then to the Syrian. "Hafez al-Siba’i, put it on the main screen, with sound. I have no secrets from the umma."

Hafez nodded his turbaned head, then reached out to the touchboard. Ali sat back in his unpadded chair, eyes lidded, wondering what new orders awaited them. On the front screen, rainbows cleared. A black-turbaned ayatollah looked out at them, a scowl on his face. Shirazi! His superior in the Council of Imams. Black eyes blinked, then tight lips moved.

"La ilaha illa Allah; Muhammad rasul Allah!"

Ali waited as Talaghani replied to the Shahada salutation, using Farsi-accented Arabic.

Indeed, there is no god but Allah and Muhammad is the Prophet of Allah, repeated Talaghani, all his attention on Shirazi. "Ayatollah Ahmed Mahdi Hasan Shirazi, marja-yi mutlaq of all Islam, greetings from The Sword of Islam. I Submit. What is your command?"

Shirazi looked briefly at Ali, the mutlaq’s black gaze chilling him, then fixed on his co-commander. "Captain Hohshemi Muhammad Talaghani, the new crescent moon is sighted in Qom. Ramadan is begun immediately. Ensure the piety of your crew and . . . the dhimmi Servants."

Immediately. Talaghani looked to Ali. Will the Faith Leader issue the necessary instructions for fasting?

Yes. Ali fingered a control on his chair’s armrest; a preset signal went to Faith Command and the adjacent Mosque. Talaghani nodded seriously, then turned back to Shirazi’s dour image.

"Your command is obeyed. Tomorrow is Friday ship time and we will observe a penitential taaziyah march about the Mosque of Fatemah before prayers—with the help of mujtahid Ali al-Sadr. Is the Umma of Islam well?"

Shirazi’s face turned blank at the Captain’s mention of the pan-Islamic governing body of their world-state. "It is well. New Martyrs have sacrificed themselves in Malaysia, in Benares at the Mosque of Aurangzeb, and in Stockholm during demonstrations against the Scandinavian immorality. China and Japan have offered to build new mosques in their capitals. The Western Great Satan continues its infidel broadcasts to the other dhimmi, exhorting them to defiance of the Second Husain. But matters other than the start of Ramadan compel me to contact you." Shirazi paused, his mood turning even more dour. Ali leaned forward in his chair, unable to control his fear and his curiosity.

"One of your brother ships, the Shatt al-Arab, has destroyed itself, Shirazi said. Ali’s mouth went dry. Fragmentary reports indicate the dhimmi aboard her attempted to reach the QomDrive Tube. Their attempt set off the Jinn Protector built into each Drive." Shirazi blinked once.

Talaghani cried out, striking his forehead with his hand, then slapping his chest. Ali and the Bridge crew emulated his pious actions, a trifle later than their Captain. Ali felt great fear.

Allah curse them! Talaghani said, his eyes filling with tears. What of the other ships?

Safe, Shirazi said, now looking at Ali. Faith Leader, be alert. Watch your infidels closely. Some of them may seek martyrdom to their heretical beliefs. Take whatever steps are necessary to control the situation.

Ali slapped his chest with the flat of his palm. Your command is my obedience. Shall we chain them to their stations?

Hardly, Shirazi said, his tone dry as sand. "Even dhimmi need to relieve themselves. But watch every action, their every word. Even mild rebellion must be suppressed."

Beside Ali, Talaghani raised his palm. "Pardon, Ayatollah Shirazi. We have . . . unavoidable need of these Servants until we arrive at 36 Draconis. May I monitor mujtahid al-Sadr’s actions, in case they cause the very action we seek to prevent?"

Shirazi sat back in his wooden chair, a huge wall picture of the Second Husain the only backdrop to his image. "You may. But be careful that pragmatism does not degenerate into heresy. And mujtahid al-Sadr—"

Yes? he said, struggling to control his voice.

Additional orders for you and Faith Command are encrypted at the end of this signal. Decode, understand and obey.

In the name of Allah, I will!

Shirazi turned back to Talaghani. Captain, the Prophet’s Call must be spread outward to other worlds. Do whatever is necessary to ensure the success of your mission. Remember—God owns you body and soul. The image disappeared from the screen, to be replaced by the rainbow colors of QomSpace. Talaghani turned to Ali, his dark brown face somber, only his wet eyes showing animation.

Faith Leader, will you give a memorial sermon tomorrow at the Mosque, in honor of our fallen brothers?

Ali felt puzzlement. Talaghani seemed truly pious, truly overcome by sorrow for the martyred followers of Caliph Ali. Not the Western-trained—and perhaps contaminated—technocrat he’d come to know during the last few