Today's FFF story. More stories here.
Sanction was an unremarkable moon.
At least by the Ambassadors’ eyes, which was all she had with which to judge the moon. Sanction was an oblong, chondritic rock. Its black, grainy surface held three manmade structures: two embassies and a tree-of-life. The tree-of-life was someone’s quixotic stab at panspermia; at odd intervals, it shed radiation hardened spores into the solar wind.
There were no Libraries or Arsenals located on Sanction. By design, treaty and agreement, Sanction was an informational blank slate. Sanction registered in no databases, contained no cross references and had no indexes. If you wanted to see Sanction, you had to go to Sanction.
Also, by treaty, Sanction was always equidistant between Mars and Earth. A ship leaving from either planet, and using reaction thrusters, would reach Sanction at roughly the same time. Earth always insisted on fairness.
Mars. The Ambassador had been a Martian Legal Entity for only three or four weeks; she’d emigrated from a poor moon in Earth’s Orbit, well within the Latency. She needed a job, and there was an opening for the Ambassadorship to Sanction. Good pay.
Mars. The general wiki that most of the solar intranet accessed had a simple entry on the planet: Mars (disambiguation)—a failed colony of no historical importance. Martian Legal Entities liked the entry and never tried to modify it in any way; the less attention from Earth, the better. In the Solar information economy, Mars appreciated the importance of being unimportant.
Job description: spend one year on Sanction, and handle anything that might come up; do not talk to your replacement as he may be contaminated; have fun; and don’t get us blown up, o.k.? Mars further stipulated that the Ambassador could take her phone, network disabled, for entertainment and personal defense. And as many books—hard, physical, books—she could cram into her ship. One year is a long time anywhere; on Sanction it was forever.
The Ambassador figured she could ride out the year; she was sufficiently familiar with Earth and her ways to interact with whomever Earth sent. She was sufficiently distrustful of Earth to adequately guard Mars’ interest; though she retained some Earth norm quirks like a bias, bordering on prejudice, in favor of bilateral symmetry.
She sent the one signal allowed to the man she was meant to replace: “Arrived; in orbit; and ready to assume duties”.
Almost immediately, the resident Ambassadors ship rocket up from the surface of Sanction and past her; as his shipped past, her phone registered and SMS. The Ambassador hesitated: do not communicate with the outgoing Ambassador. Her phone immediately began describing the message: an outrageously large 50kb text titled, simply, ‘Last Will and Testament’.
The Ambassador was about to break protocol and text him back when the old Ambassadors ship detonated some kilometers behind her.
Suicide.
The Ambassador was stunned for a moment. “His choice,” she thought, hitting ‘save’ on the message for later delivery to Mars.
She hit the preprogrammed codes on her console: land.
There was work to do, and only a year to go, she thought, merrily.
(Made a minor edit for grammar)
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