Dispersion: Book 2 in the Declaration Series

By jdgray1425

A group of pioneers leads the way to an alien planet, bringing with them everything they might need—except for the critical information necessary to save the mission. Among the travelers is Esther Patel, a woman setting out with her family on a two-thousand-year journey. She faces adventure and tragedy, meeting unexpected allies and discovering new abilities along the way that give her hope for the future.

In the years following our story Determinate, the Declaration series continues as a f leet of colony ships begin a voyage across the galaxy that will change humanity’s destiny forever.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Feb 12, 2021
• ISBN: 9781663215864

jdgray1425

jdgray1425 has a degree in food science from Purdue University and has served at various levels of management with several Fortune 500 companies. He has two children. Currently, he lives on the prairies of Minnesota with his girlfriend, Kim.

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Copyright © 2021 jdgray1425.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced by

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without the written permission of the author except in the case of

brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, names, incidents,

organizations, and dialogue in this novel are either the products

of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

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ISBN: 978-1-6632-1585-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-6632-1587-1 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-6632-1586-4 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021902088

iUniverse rev. date: 02/09/2021

CONTENTS

Vestiges

High Tide

Hibernation

The Republic

Odyssey

Backfire

Birth Of A BCMAI

Making The Rounds

Dr. Brimley And Mr. Lee

Joker

Commuting

Interruption

Ipsomorbus

Menagerie

Rebellion

Revolution

Neo-Natives

Air

Dogs And Cats

Predator And Prey

The Caretaker

Aphrodite’s Confession

Modifications

Budget Issues

Animal Enhancements

A Day At The Beach

Breakfast

Dating

Letters To Santa Claus

Oldest Generation

Turtleneck Sweater

Ancestors Day

Dog Days

Conspiracy

Prying Eyes

Full Circle

Flightless

Revival

Athena’s Diagnostic

Story Time

Santa Maria

The End Of The Story

Nina

Heaven

The New Commander

Kim, I sincerely apologize for the creation of the flawed

character Marcus Lee. I hope you can forgive me.

VESTIGES

Esther Patel waited patiently for the cleaner bots to finish. People had begun to move about the cabin once again. Many seemed to be avoiding her family’s small section of seats for the moment. But the mess had not deterred a crew of journalists from setting up nearby, taking advantage of the open area to record a documentary. Esther hoped she wouldn’t be included as a backdrop in her current condition. As far as she was concerned, they could leave her out of the recording altogether.

The cabin lighting brightened, and a journalist began speaking suddenly in what Esther felt to be an overly dramatic tone. "At this time and in this space, Earth’s last great religion, the Forge, had overwritten all other faiths and with them the old customs and beliefs. The Forge had survived the Great Declaration, a time of great suffering in which God had forsaken all humankind.

"While the Forge had persisted in serving the vestigial souls of the survivors’ descendants, there were also those like the Humanists who rejected the Forgist teachings. For the Humanist, civilization had surpassed any primitive concepts of God. The multiverse seemed infinite, and the Earth was just a tiny speck. By association with the planet Earth, humanity and by extension its God were demoted to insignificance.

"Together, under the interplanetary nation of the Republic, all people put away their differences and joined with a shared purpose in search of universal truth. With or without God, each group had faith in humanity’s potential to overcome all barriers to the exploration of the universe.

Now, after many years of preparation, a group of pioneers was leading the way to an alien planet. Why they went and the methods they employed may have been in question. But their leaders were extraordinary. The journalist looked past the camera to a colleague. How was that?

We’ll fix it in editing, said the other journalist. Let’s get some shots from the airlock.

Esther was not a leader. Nor did she feel extraordinary. Considering her current predicament, Esther took a moment to review her experiences and life choices. Could she have done anything differently? Esther wanted to understand where it had all gone wrong.

Others might say that the events of her life had been extraordinary and that those events had certainly influenced her. But her remarkable experiences were familiar to those who had found themselves on the wrong side of history.

No one alive could remember the Great Declaration or the start of the Pilgrim War. But Esther was old enough to remember when the great prophet BCMAI 1 spoke to the world on the Day of Judgment to end the multigenerational conflict.

Esther was concerned that some could say that whatever she had accomplished in her lifetime was for the losing side. She took some comfort in knowing that it might also be said that her lack of accomplishment toward the goals of the losing side had been, overall, beneficial to the world at large. However, she wasn’t quite sure who would say any of it.

Esther had never been particularly interested in politics or ideology. But if she were to be honest with herself, rather than listen to the Republic’s attempts to indoctrinate her people into the postwar society, she could say that during her lifetime, she had done good work as a medic. And she continued to practice medicine even today. With the Republic’s human medical enhancements becoming available to more adults worldwide, her practice had more recently focused on children. Children up to the age of eighteen could not be extensively enhanced and still required older methods of medicine. Who could blame her for that?

Due to her upbringing, Esther had received enhancement technology late in life. She remembered how the back of her hand used to look without the embedded antennae running through her skin. As she turned her hands over now, she couldn’t help but think that these hands were somehow not hers. Esther followed the silvery blue lines until the sleeve of her robe covered them. The tracks ran everywhere, face and body. And the technology didn’t just eliminate moles and old scars. Even the stretch marks from her pregnancies had been removed. She felt unnaturally good all the time. And the technology also messed with her natural cycles. In many ways, Esther felt like her identity had been erased.

Deactivating the birth control settings had helped restore a recognizable, and therefore welcome, aspect of her previous existence. After all, at her age, why should it matter? Even so, she didn’t feel like herself, nor did she recognize her reflection. And now she was doing something that was definitely not like her.

Her husband Basim had been a Pilgrim soldier during their early days together. Afterward, he had become a successful turkey farmer. Together, they had raised their three girls. Esther believed that her family would be her life’s supreme accomplishment. A simple life was all she had ever wanted.

Esther was absolutely not interested in the Republic’s most recent goals of space exploration. But for reasons Esther didn’t clearly understand, they had given up their safe, respectable life a month ago. Along with their three children and her brother Jerimiah and his family, she and Basim now found themselves about to board a colony ship named Polo bound for a distant planet, P2-456c.

During the last few weeks, the orientation center had been teeming with people from all walks of life. So many families, Esther thought, and the only required qualification was that they wanted to participate in this life-changing event, as long as the children were not too young and as long as the adults were willing to be surgically embedded with enhancement technology.

To designate which ship each family was to board, each person had been issued a colored robe. Though the robes were similar in appearance, fashion consciousness was a consideration in the attire’s design. Mosaic patterns and varying textures offset the predominantly bland color choices, and no two robes were exactly alike. The Polo’s passengers were dressed in light blue robes with a checkered pattern, with alternating glossy and flat reflective squares interwoven into the cloth’s textured bands.

The color choices were meant to encourage socialization among shipmates. And even with embedded identification technology, Esther appreciated knowing that her children would be directed to the correct ship based on robe color if lost. Unfortunately, despite the unique patterns, the robes failed to distinguish her family among the hordes of Polo passengers. Esther had spent more than her fair share of time tracking down her children, who were camouflaged in the crowds of blue-robed children.

Passengers bound for the ship Niña wore tan with octagonal patterns. Bright green stripes designated the Pinta passengers, and there were light orange rounded-scale textures for the Santa Maria. Yellow robes with subtle inlaid white splashes that faded back to soft yellow had been distributed to the Mayflower passengers.

The human crew wore dark colors easily seen among the crowds. Officers wore rich black robes topped with a pellegrina. Less elaborate dark blue uniforms designated engineers and scientists. Except for the crew, the passengers were expected to change into less uniform attire once safely on board their respective vessels. Esther envisioned bright multicolored robes with flashing lights for her children.

Through sheer luck, Esther, her entire family, and every other passenger and crew member destined for the galactic fleet that day had somehow survived the short trip from Earth. She had not expected to get this far. Now she waited with her family on one of fifty-two launches spinning helplessly in space. Their Dhow class transport had been designated as the Three of Diamonds. Since the bumpy launch, they had been drifting gently toward their destination.

Esther’s brother, Jerimiah, sat looking amused at her situation.

What are you smiling at? she said coldly.

You puked, said Jerimiah, covering his mouth with his hand.

Esther could not tell if Jerimiah was trying to cover his grin or if her genetic disposition toward motion sickness had finally manifested in her brother after all these years.

Ugh, I know, just like in the simulator, Esther replied. The cleaner bots had thankfully finished.

I thought the medical enhancement tech was supposed to prevent that from happening, replied Jeremiah.

No, thought Esther, that hand motion over his face was Jerimiah’s old habit of stroking his beard in contemplation, as though he could extract his mind’s inner workings by milking ideas from his face. But Jerimiah had chosen to remove his beard, as had many ex-Pilgrims. Too late in life for that change, perhaps, Esther thought. Now this has become a vestigial habit without purpose, not that it ever had one.

I guess I’m just a special case, said Esther, rechecking her robe for traces of vomit. Nothing remained. Esther had mostly recaptured the contents of her gut in a bag. But her youngest, Rebecca, had missed the mark entirely. Even so, the cleaner bots had been thorough, and her robe was apparently impervious to stains.

The messy event had strangely comforted Esther. There seems to be at least one defining characteristic of my body that the enhancement tech hasn’t erased. Will Rebecca grow out of, or be medically enhanced out of, her hereditary motion sickness?

As the cleaner bots left, the once vacant walkways nearby suddenly became more congested.

Esther continued, This low gravity … it’s not for me. Oh, what are we doing, Jerimiah?

Jeremiah’s expression switched from an amused curiosity to a more serious form of interest.

Esther continued, I understand why Basim wants to go. It’s a fresh start for him, to escape his past. But why do you and Sarah want to go so badly?

Jerimiah paused for a few moments. After catching himself about to stroke his nonexistent beard, Jerimiah slowly began to put his words together. Well, Sis, if we put aside the adventure of it all … at least for Sarah and me, we felt like we didn’t belong in the Republic. Everywhere you go, there is a reminder of our history. But it’s not really about what we want for ourselves any longer. It’s more about what we want for our children. It’s strange to put into words really. I guess we want our children to have something of their own, a chance to make something for themselves from a world that wasn’t … corrupted by us. That’s something we never had when we were growing up. Do you see?

But it’s not like we are really escaping our world. We are bringing it all with us.

Maybe so, Jerimiah said, as he again stopped short of touching his face.

You know, it’s not too late to go home, said Esther hopefully.

You remember what Mother always used to say about home, don’t you?

Home is where the family is, they said together. Esther spoke the words more quietly and less enthusiastically than Jerimiah.

An announcement was broadcast over the intercom: All passengers, please take your seats. We will be docking in a few minutes. All passengers, please be seated.

HIGH TIDE

This was it! It was finally happening, a historic moment for humanity. The first human attempt at colonization outside of their solar system, and Gideon Onwuatuegwu was their conductor.

Commodore Gideon Onwuatuegwu’s mind was filling with the images of ascending spacecraft. An invasion force of some 30,000 colonists was heading his way. As the transports escaped the gravity of their home worlds, they began to rotate. At first, their paths were unharmonious and silent, a scattered series of launches that might arrive whenever, if at all. Onwuatuegwu’s fleet lay in wait.

Each ship in the new fleet rotated to generate the effect of gravity, and each was to be visited by the many whirling Dhow class transports that increasingly polluted his view of Earth. Each launch would soon be required to align with the direction of spin and rotational velocity of his larger host ships. On the approach, the Dhow transports appeared to Gideon to suddenly come together in a sort of dance, first as individuals and then culminating in a kind of coordinated formation. Gideon imagined music playing. Though all flight paths were preplanned and completely automated, he, as commodore, directed the imaginary orchestra, which in turn guided the silent dancers to their destinations.

To Onwuatuegwu’s surprise, there was suddenly real music. Bompapa-bommmpaa-Bompapa-bommmpaa. The music, no longer just in his mind, grew louder. He realized then that Athena must be watching. This idea was quickly confirmed by the thin glowing pink sensor strip running along the walls parallel and near to the ceiling of his command room. His hand’s motion determined the music’s tempo, and through Athena, the music gave the movement of the little spacefaring objects their direction. Gideon continued and waved more forcefully as he executed each controlled collision across the fleet with both arms. The music saturated the command room and echoed down the many empty hallways as the first little transport approached for docking.

Gideon was not one to dwell on the past. But the scene inspired him for just a moment to realize the summation of all of human history. And surrounding him, the vastness of space dwarfed his otherwise grand fleet of ships.

While small drones continued to transmit the breathtaking scene as they weaved in and around the merging armada of transports, in the Odyssey’s control room, Gideon stood securely on the rotating floor. In contrast to the command room’s bright white background and Athena’s pink sensor strip glowing against it, Gideon’s brown skin displayed silvery blue lines, though most of them were hidden under his long robe. These blue lines functioned as antennae for the medical and communication technology coursing through his body. Underneath his long black dreadlocks, visible only at his forehead, was a metal ring that wrapped ornately around his head.

Gideon looked down at the bold blue colors of Earth’s oceans. One last time, he looked out across the beauty of the sphere that had once nurtured all known forms of life.

Ironically, Gideon, commodore of the first fleet of starships, still felt a kinship to the most distant of his ancestors. God was a part of the Earth. The plants, animals, and humans were all one with God. Since then, Gideon had elevated himself by traveling the high seas of space. But he had not left God behind. When he walked among the stars, Gideon felt at one with a larger God. His God encompassed the universe but also had a plan for His or Her lowly creations from Earth. The human experience now included interstellar travel. Whatever doubts he might have, he let his faith carry him forward.

Gideon watched more closely now as one of the approaching Dhow transports, the Seven of Hearts, spun to perfectly match the Odyssey’s rotational velocity. Compared to its symmetrical cylindrical host, the Dhow was a strange whirligig with a telescoping counterbalancing mast extended well above the payload section to offset its otherwise lopsided nature. The Seven of Hearts’ mast also supported a bulging drive section just above the fuselage at the rotational center. It was possible to reconfigure the Dhow to launch from the ground and land. The extensions, mechanisms, and aerodynamic forms involved in planetary transport through the atmosphere now required some imagination.

The airlock was located off-center of the Odyssey to preserve simulated gravity during loading. The passengers would continue to experience the same subtle G-force as they disembarked, at least until the lifts descended gently to the lower, or rather more outward, walkways.

Just as the first of the whirling transports prepared to dock with the Odyssey, the airlock clamps extended to orchestrate a controlled collision. The bump after the maneuver was barely noticeable from the interior environments. But outside the ship, Gideon’s mind received the scene at close range. And then suddenly, triggered by this simple event, what had once seemed a distant memory was now made more vivid by the Mindwear device glistening along his forehead.

The Mindwear enhancement technology improved memory recall. Usually, all of Gideon’s many technological enhancements performed automatically in balance and harmony with his body. But currently, his memory enhancement seemed to be drifting in a different direction than his mind. The memory was strangely unwelcome. Gideon was not one to reminisce. Recalling facts and data trends was useful. This memory, however, was an interruption. He told himself, My course is forward … always forward. But like it or not, now rushing back through Gideon’s mind was a perfect replay of his early days aboard the oceangoing vessel Sommerfugl.

Brace for impact. Those words were not commonly used on board a 400-meter-long, fully loaded cargo ship. But on that day, brace for impact was heard a second time, blaring over the intercom.

The Sommerfugl was older than most oceangoing vessels. Though sturdy, it was constructed more from well-built cargo containers than actual ship parts. The Sommerfugl was one of the last of the intercontinental transports still utilizing fossil fuels for power. Fusion generators powered most modern sea vessels by then. There were advantages and disadvantages since both fossil fuels and tritium fuel for the fusion generators had been difficult to acquire. But the ship’s owners guild controlled some of the last remaining oil reserves and refineries. Refueling had still been practical, as long as the Pilgrim War continued to be held at bay in that part of the world.

Gideon remembered how, on that day, the Sommerfugl had begun to shudder and creak, and the solid steel walls and floors had seemed to lose their ordinarily reassuring stability. But Gideon Onwuatuegwu, then helmsman of the Sommerfugl, had stood firm.

The captain and the rest of the bridge crew had been looking behind the great ship, watching the disaster unfold. Gideon looked forward, past the now antiquated console of controls and indicators, toward land, and awaited further orders.

Gideon had always been a natural helmsman. He was no stranger to the limited effect of his control on the ship. No ship that massive turned on a dime. The vessel had to be coaxed in one direction or another, gently led like an enormous lumbering beast. It first had to want to go where it was being led, and then it had to be asked respectfully. Then, given enough time to decide through long debate, it would finally capitulate. But the great, pertinacious juggernaut would simply not go along with the radical maneuvers that were then being demanded by the captain and crew.

The men on board had begun to conceive many ways to motivate a rational being into quick action, such as whipping, beating, kicking, and screaming. All the abuse imaginable might have been laid in futility against a ship of that size. But Gideon’s duty was to turn his shipmates’ very rational panic into practical efforts toward moving the uncompromising and irrational vessel that was his to steer. Gideon, more than anyone, understood why ships were called she.

Gideon had started to sense that the men had interpreted the ship’s inaction as a lack of urgency on the part of their resolute helmsman. And perhaps they had begun to entertain the notion that Gideon, the helmsman, needed to be motivated by such measures. But Gideon had stood firm, looking onward.

Up until then, at least, the men had been content to strenuously remind Gideon that somewhere behind them, a terrible, larger, and even more obstinate entity was at work. Gideon had mused that Mother Nature was also female. Compared to her, the Sommerfugl felt submissive and compliant.

Somewhere in the vast expanse of the Pacific Ocean, an enormous section of the Earth had broken loose. The Rim of Fire had awoken again. Dormant for too long, its muscles had become tense, and its joints had become rigid with compression. A little stretch was all it had needed before going back for another long nap. But that simple action had severely disrupted the great waterbed on which they all floated.

The approaching doom should have made Gideon tense with fear, like his fellow shipmates. But unlike them, Gideon had faith. Some would not be so humble, piloting a machine of such power. But Gideon knew that the ocean and the underlying world were too large and too overwhelming for him to think he could actually be in control. Gideon took comfort in his knowledge of a still greater force than the Ring of Fire. He put his faith in a power so impossibly intransigent and indefatigable that there seemed to be no purpose to the will of any man, boat, or planet. Gideon steered his vessel at God’s pleasure. Gideon thought that perhaps God was a woman also. Considering what he was up against, he hoped that She was and that She was feeling generous today.

On that beautiful March morning, as the ship was arriving at Taizhou Bay, the Sommerfugl had received a late tsunami warning. The ship was fully loaded with cargo containers, leaving the captain only one choice: try to slow the approach toward land and hope the shock wave would travel underneath them.

Then, as the wave struck the cargo carrier from the stern, the captain and crew were thrown by the surging tide. At first, the rear windows of the conning tower were sprayed with thunderous jets of seawater. Then the water smashed through and washed the bridge crew to the floor. Gideon was able to remain standing, holding firmly to the helm controls as he felt the cold water rush around his feet. The spicy smell of the seawater penetrated his nose, but he continued to look forward to land.

Beneath his gaze, the many cargo container stacks tilted precariously before a rush of foaming water from the stern engulfed them. The wave liquefied their once tight-packed grouping, finally allowing them to spill into the bubbling sea. He saw that all the bridge crew were slipping or rolling on the floor or trying to hold on to their chairs. But Gideon stood firm, looking through the shattered glass panes and over the deck to the swirling cargo container maelstrom below. At that moment, he felt the full power of the natural forces surrounding him while the tsunami carried the massive ship forward, hurtling it toward the shoreline.

Gideon was under no illusion that the helm controls had not become useless toys, but he felt as though he understood where the wave was taking them, and he gave into the course that was forced upon his ship. Gideon rode the wave, standing at the helm, piloting the vessel toward its ultimate fate. Then he heard the order from God: Steady as she goes.

Steady as she goes, Gideon announced.

He repeated the order, out loud, for the bridge crew, as was the protocol for the helm. The surge of water then took them up and overland, and he saw the hills, filled with onlookers. The townspeople had scurried to high ground at the first tsunami announcement and now had front-row seats as the Sommerfugl’s bridge approached at eye level. They saw Gideon Onwuatuegwu standing tall and proud at the helm. Some of the onlookers, perched precariously as the ship blasted by, pointed instinctively. Some seemed to be waving before the water caught them. Gideon waved back calmly as if on parade. Immobilized by their circumstances, the captain and others of the bridge crew forgot the courtesy of a wave. Instead, the captain and his first mate were busy grasping for their chairs and struggling to avoid falling forward through the open windows.

The ship narrowly avoided running aground atop the hill. The Sommerfugl and its parasitical debris turned with the flow before pouring into and then gliding across an inland waterway, where the engines shut down for the last time. The impellers and rudder were damaged beyond repair, and the ship itself was buried in meters of silt, but some of the cargo was salvageable, and all the crew had somehow survived.

From that day on, Gideon was famously known as the tsunami pilot, the helmsman who had steered his crew to safety through impossible odds. His legendary reputation gained him several speedy promotions, and everyone wanted him to serve on board their ship, if for no other reason than because he was calm under pressure.

But why was he now going on this trip to another planet? His reason wasn’t to start a new life for himself or his family. He sometimes regretted not starting a family. But he had made his choices and accepted the outcome.

In many respects, this mission was like other jobs he had accepted, transporting cargo and passengers. Gideon loved the freedom of traveling the vast expanses with the feel of a good ship below his feet. But each voyage was longer than those that came before. First, he had traversed the oceans. Then had come the interplanetary missions. And now he intended to travel across the galaxy.

But there was a permanence to this departure. This mission would be his last, and Gideon would see it through one way or another. Commodore Gideon Onwuatuegwu vowed to lead the colonists to P2-456c and fulfill his legacy as a founding father of a new world.

The docking clamp held fast, the airlock doors opened, and a flood of passengers poured onto the loading deck.

HIBERNATION

Esther and her family, along with their fellow passengers, were suddenly given a virtual holographic tour of the Polo in anticipation of their arrival. Triumphant music and scenes of the rotating ships from space-side once again threatened to make Esther queasy. The announcer made some welcoming remarks before the informational portion was broadcast. There was nothing in the announcement they had not heard before. Esther felt it was just a long-winded way of saying, It’s time.

The presentation continued. "Once on board the Polo, you will be directed to quarters for immediate hibernation. There you will sleep for the next ten years in a state-of-the-art hibernation chamber.

"In ten years, or the blink of an eye for those in hibernation, we will reach the edge of our solar system. All