"That was the final list of the refugees from the planet, Captain," said the young officer. "Your daughter's name is not on it, Sir. We have to assume..."
"Yes, I know... I understand," replied Atreides.
As the shuttle took off for the Charlemagne, Atreides looked back at the surface of the planet, wishing that there was some other way to help. It was only a short shuttle flight back to the ship, but to the Captain it felt like an eternity. No-one spoke, not even the usually garrulous pilot, Lieutenant Fiori. She simply kept her eyes on the controls and said nothing.
"Glad to see you safely back," Elliott said as Atreides stepped out of the shuttle bay. "Prime Minister Drysdale is waiting for you. Please, come this way."
"I suppose I'll have to get this over with," Atreides murmured as he and Lieutenant Elliott walked the short distance to the guest quarters. He had only just returned to the ship, after seeing what the damage was like in person. It had not put him in the best of moods.
"The Prime Minister Drysdale is ready to see you now," said Lieutenant Elliott.
"Thank you," said Atreides.
Drawing in a deep breath, Captain Atreides pressed the panel to open the door and strode in to the quarters of Prime Minister Drysdale. He had a lot of things to say, but just how much could he get away with whilst still remaining within the boundaries of diplomacy?
"Well, are you satisfied with the way things turned out, Drysdale?" Captain Atreides asked once the door was shut. "Because the way I see things, you are solely responsible for everything that has happened here."
"How can you say that?" Drysdale demanded.
"Are you aware of the consequences of your actions? You may have doomed your planet to it's fate by your decision alone." Atreides was already having a hard time keeping his emotions in check.
"Captain Atreides, I loved my planet, and I loved my people, in much the same way that I suppose you must also love you ship and your crew. Nothing, and I do mean nothing, was more important to me than their protection, and I simply put their interests before those of the Commonwealth. When I evoked the Defence Act, believe me, I only had their interests in mind. You dishonour all the young men who died today if you think otherwise," continued Drysdale.
"Your actions very nearly took us to the brink of a war. Are you aware of what kind of allies those aliens have?" Atreides asked pointedly.
"Well, what's done is done. I trust there'll be no more retaliatory attacks over this, not now that the Commonwealth is involved," Drysdale said, "so those aliens can look somewhere else for their needs, and they can go and threaten someone else."
"Those aliens weren't nearly as threatening as you're making everyone believe," Atreides muttered.
"I've read the Commonwealth Institutes report and recommendations. They saw no problems with the alien's formal requests. The Great Dry Lake region was unpopulated and the land was unsuitable for agriculture. All they asked was a right to mine salts and to build a spaceport for cargo freighters to refuel," continued Atreides. "Your refusal was quite blunt, very abusive and a sabre-rattleling of the worst kind. You had no authority to say what you did."
"What were we supposed to do? They wanted to take our natural resources, and in exchange, they wouldn't conquer us for another one hundred years." Drysdale drummed his fingers on the tabletop irritably. "In one hundred years, I wouldn't be there to care whether the planet would be conquered or not - that was their logic. Why shouldn't I have replied in the way I did?"
"Yes, but did you have to be quite so rude in your reply to them?" Atreides couldn't believe the man. He had been drilled at the academy that diplomacy under any circumstances was the paramount thing in any situation with an alien race. He would never have dared to use the kind of phrasing that Drysdale used, even in private.
"Anyone would have done the same. We were right to refuse them." Drysdale shuddered. "Even so, we're better off without those...those bug eyed freaks."
"Please don't call them that by word, they are a sentient life-form, but obviously they will have values and traditions that seem strange compared to ours, their brain functions and physiology are completely different," replied Atreides.
"At least I can still rest with an easy conscience. I was totally blameless in this affair. No one could have predicted such an outcome and I will write that in my report," said Drysdale.
"It's true that no-one could have known what was going to happen, but surely you could have done your research a little better? I know that you wouldn't have offered them what they wanted, and nor should you have done, but did you quite have to go that far?"
"Honestly, it wasn't my fault. I made the best decision I could under the circumstances." Prime Minister Drysdale seemed mortally offended, and Atreides wondered whether the man felt any feelings of gratitude towards his rescuers at all.
"That may be so, but the consequences are painfully obvious," Atreides pointed out. He shifted his weight to the other leg. "You are to stay here until a more suitable means of transportation can be found for you. You're perfectly free to wander around the ship, just don't go to any crucial sections."
Captain Atreides left Prime Minister Drysdale and his entourage to return to the Bridge and to supervise the flight checks before take-off. Once out of the room, Atreides breathed a huge sigh of relief. Though normally a calm and collected man, just another single minute with that pompous ass Drysdale and 'the old man' Atreides might have exploded with rage. Things could have been so different with someone else governing the planet; it might never have come to this at all. Hindsight was always easy though; who could really have expected or predicted that the aliens should have reacted in that way to a simple request? With his hand on his heart, Atreides himself was surprised and saddened by the final outcome. Now he would have the company of Drysdale among the refugees until they found more suitable transport.
The planet was almost eerily quiet, a far cry from the bustling world it had once been. Buildings that stretched into the sky now lay in ruin, whilst great scars cut their way across the continent, just another sign of the ferocity of the attack. The general consensus was that the aliens had wanted the resources of the world for themselves, but some suspected some ulterior motive. Only those in command knew the true reason.
From the observation deck, young Billy Dawson watched a mechanical drone as it flew across the still and silent waters of the lake towards the ship, and then waited, hovering like a bird feeding on nectar, until the bay doors had opened to let it inside.
The last of the drones now returned aboard the ship; their results had confirmed what everyone already knew. No more human survivors remained on the surface of the planet and the planetary wide radiation levels had reached a plateau at 1.6 Gy.
Once it was apparent that everyone was on board, the crew began the series of final checks before the ship took off. No-one was really happy with the situation, but there was nothing they could do - the aliens had seen to that - and the fragile ceasefire had been earned at great cost, to both parties. To jeopardise that now would be foolish, and would possibly result in even worse consequences.
As the ship finally lifted from the remains of what once had been a thriving spaceport, and gradually gained height, Chief Engineer Hayes concentrated fiercely on his dials, watching the temperature gauge rise toward the red line.
As it stopped just below the safety cut-off, he heaved a sigh of relief, then turned to his second in command.
"I'll send a message to the Old Man to say we can break orbit whenever he's ready", he said."I hope it gets through - I wouldn't trust the coms system as far as I could throw it at the moment - not after that last hit from the aliens...."
"OK, Chief", Second Engineer Vaughan replied. "Best news he's had for a while....since we got to this accursed planet, anyway...."
The Chief turned back to his control panel, sent the message, and resumed his scowl at the instruments, daring them to malfunction.....
Lieutenant Elliott waited for the Engineering section to report that they had completed the necessary repairs to the Star Drive engine. While he waited his thoughts turned back to Astra again; would she ever forgive him for what he had been forced to do. She must have known that his hands were tied, and that he had little choice. It was necessary to protect everyone, and written in the mission code to which every single one of them had signed up to before embarkation.
Elliott looked up at the flashing orange light that signified a new message from the Chief Engineer.
The message from the Engineering section came in, saying that the damage had been repaired and that they were free to leave. There was no trace of the alien craft, either.
Lieutenant Elliott walked onto the Bridge. "Captain," said Elliott, "the Chief says we are ready to leave now... And may I say how personally sorry I am Sir!"
"Thank you, Lieutenant," replied Captain Atreides, "I appreciate it!"
The crew of the exploration vessel Charlemagne and the refugees they'd rescued looked down at the scarred planet with feelings of regret and loss, but also with new hope. With a weary sigh, Captain Atreides gave the order to leave the system and resume their mission to discover the very end of the universe.
All you have to do is add a line or a paragraph previous to the last, so that the story continues backwards.
