A Hope For Tomorrow, page 1
The Tannhauser Gate
Willum Morsie
2024
The Tannhauser Gate
The Tannhauser Gate
The Tannhauser Gate
A Hope For Tomorrow
by
Willum Morsie
Pesky Publishing Ltd
Copyright © 2024 Willum Morsie and Pesky Publishing Ltd
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
First edition, 2024
ISBN 978-1-0687533-1-2
Published by Pesky Publishing Ltd
Preface
All good stories have a story themselves. This book started off as a small story amongst friends before being adapted into, at present, four books, with this forming book one.
At some point in 2010 a group of university friends got together and built a universe with complex interplay, unique characters and a plot to keep you guessing. Almost a quindecade after the first words were put to page the first book has finally been completed.
The book was then written, tweaked and tuned by Willum Morsie before finally ending up here, in your hands.
Morsie would like to thank all those who helped shape this story. Whether that was just by listening to the raw ideas or shaping them with input. Morsie would also like to thank those university friends that helped start this idea. While we were once one big dysfunctional family most of those relationships have now drifted apart. But this story keeps one part of that family alive.
Lastly, Morsie would like to thank Pesky Publishing Ltd. This story had been consigned to the annals of history, dust growing more than the words. Until one chance interaction with Pesky Publishing Ltd revived the story and the want to get it finished.
All that is left is for you to enjoy this story.
January 3739, Earthen Standard Time Date
The Sisters of Serenity
Home for Troubled Orphans
Somewhere far away from Earth
Lying on her front, with the soft, blue grass beneath her and the bright stars above, a thin, dark-haired girl of five sang an ancient Christian hymn and drew diagrams for devices that contemporary science said were impossible.
This was the Republic, second largest and at least third most powerful spatial power in the galaxy. But the girl neither knew nor cared about interstellar politics as she began the third verse of O, for a Thousand Tongues to Sing and scrawled a mathematical equation in symbols none but she ever used or understood.
A short distance away, the orphanage matron stared down a government official with the uniquely disapproving stare of nuns, teachers and grandmothers alone. In this case, it helped that the matron was all three.
“I don’t think I’ve been told the full story of this project, Mr Weams,” the matron stated, each word a weapon that was loaded, but not yet fired. “It seems to me that you haven’t thought through the fates of these children enough.”
Mr Weams smiled. “I assure you, the happiness of the children is among the prime concerns of the Tomorrow’s Hope Project,” he replied. “You’ve seen the facts and figures. On-board food, education, entertainment. The ship’s library contains everything from modern classics such as A Dance in the Moons to ancient earth classics by Victor Hugo and even ancient reference books like the OED. We have a choice with these kids, matron. We can keep them cooped up in here. No future prospects to speak of. No real hope. Or we can let them go free, out there, to glitter in the dark alongside the stars.”
It was a good line, the matron had to concede. Clearly thought up in a boardroom of salespeople with the sole purpose of making something so horrid sound like an excellent idea.
It was true, in its way. The orphanage relied on donations and volunteers, and neither of those things had been growing as fast as the number of orphans. The Tomorrow’s Hope Project seemed like the perfect solution for everyone. An unwanted dream come true, or an undesirable answered prayer.
“These kids whom you’ve selected for the project,” the matron started and paused to look around, “I have to question the judgement.” She gestured to the little girl on the grass, who ignored her, entirely wrapped up in her own sketches. “I love these kids like I loved my own, Mr Weams, but most of the ones you’ve picked are the unusual ones. The ones with the delicate minds, or those we struggle to teach, because they get too wrapped up in scribblings that can’t be understood. I want to know who made these choices.”
“No need to worry, matron,” Mr Weams cheerfully assured her. “The selection process has been investigated and signed off by the highest authority there is.”
The matron raised her eyebrows feigning shock and chuckled, “Goodness. That’s funny. The sisters and I talk with Him three times a day at the least, and He never signed anything for us.”
Mr Weams, refusing to be put off, countered, “My apologies, matron. I refer, of course, to the highest human power. Save the Republic President, of course.”
He presented a small tablet computer, above which a logo floated in hologram form. The matron raised her eyebrows in real shock.
“Is this a joke?” she demanded. Mr Weams, still cheerful, shook his head.
The matron recognised the symbol, but only because her previous employers had taught her of it. The symbol of the highest authority. The assembly that sat in judgement over everything in the Republic, they said. Not everyone even believed in its existence.
“The Tannhauser Gate,” the matron breathed.
“The very same,” nodded Mr Weams. “Our senior sponsorship partners. They care as deeply as we do about the fate of the children. And no one’s welfare is beyond the control of the Gate.”
The matron glared thoughtfully at the floating symbol, and then turned to leave. The girl on the grass stopped her singing and watched as the matron stopped short. There was another child on the matron’s other side, grasping the woman’s hand in a tiny one of his own. His bright red mop of hair poking out from behind the matron’s skirt. The child hadn’t moved when the matron went to walk away. Instead, he chose to focus his awkward, unguarded gaze on the government representative.
“Hoiser,” said the tiny redhead, taking both the matron and Mr Weams by surprise. The girl on the grass tilted her head and laid aside her pen.
“Tann-hoiser Gate,” said the boy, blinking at Mr Weams, who blinked back, and quietly turned his tablet away from the matron so that he could tap, unseen, at the screen.
“Is this child destined for the project, matron?”
“Yes,” replied the matron, frowning. “His parents requested it when they left him.”
“Good. Good,” smiled Mr Weams, tucking away the tablet and shaking the matron by the hand. “All is arranged, then. You won’t hear from us again until the day of transportation. Good day, matron. Good day.”
The girl on the grass was intrigued by the matron’s expression. Ever since the words ‘Tannhauser Gate’, her expression had been unsure. The matron was almost never unsure. She always told the orphans that everything happened for a reason. The Tannhauser Gate had to be something very special to get to the matron. Strange, then, that of all people, a little boy of about two had seemed to recognise the name.
It wasn’t long before the girl on the blue grass was struck by a new idea, and remembered the last verse of O, for a Thousand Tongues, and so went back to drawing and singing, the name of the Tannhauser Gate already forgotten. Above, the sky darkened, and the stars shone all the brighter for it.
This was the Republic. Big, and powerful. And as a result, full of secrets. Big, powerful secrets, that glittered away, unsaid, on dark nights.
Like stars.
Metropolis, The Republic, 3752
It had been ten years since the President of the Republic had been ‘delighted to inform the galaxy that poverty in the cities of the Republic was a thing of the past’. This wasn’t technically a lie. The income for anyone who could afford to live inside a Republic city was well above the poverty line. And for those who didn’t fancy living in the shiny apartment blocks of the cities themselves, there were stately houses with spacious grounds surrounding each now poverty-free city inside Republic Space. The fact that some pretentious town planner with a poor grasp of French history had decided to name the idyllic, English-speaking suburbs the ‘Banlieues’ was unfortunate. That said they were elegant and refined and the cities themselves were sparkling and glorious, so no one really minded. In fact, anyone who happened to land their spaceship in one of the Republic’s in-city docking ports would assume the place was a real-life utopia.
Unfortunately, not everything was as ideal as it first appeared. If the tourists were to venture further afield, maybe if they headed down the wrong alleyway or got lost down a side street, they would see a much darker and more unpleasant colony.
This sprawling warren of shacks, known as ‘The Outer Slums’, had started as a small settlement but had expanded to engulf the non-city portions of the planet. It became home to the ever-increasing number of people who had nowhere else to go. Other planets
And then, ten years ago, the Outer Slums had been crossed off the map. They officially no longer existed to the city dwellers, or to the rest of the Republic controlled universe. No one wanted to know, and no one wanted to help. And if anyone ever did discover the depravity behind the affluence, someone or something made sure they kept quiet about it. The Outer Slums were the lowest of the low. No one could redeem themselves from there. Or so the authorities made sure.
Elios Bennett was on a mission. He’d been skulking in his usual haunt for hours, hoping to get lucky, waiting for a stray tourist to mug or a fellow thief to borrow a favour from. He needed money, or rather, he needed what money could be traded for. Folk need the stuff you can buy with money, but Elios knew cold cash is pretty useless on its own. In fact, Elios had considered often, enough coins could fill a sock and make a pretty decent flail, but in the Outer Slums the only people with that much wealth were the better off drug dealers and gang leaders. He knew from firsthand experience; they’d rather carry jimmy-hooks and knuckle-crackers and so would have no need for a coin sock. Besides, as Elios would inevitably think, rocks could be weaponised just as easily. They were cheaper and heavier, and less likely to get you mugged compared to walking around with an entire sockful of cash.
All of this was theoretical to Elios, of course, who had never owned a pair of socks in his life. His damp feet were protruding from the tattered remnants of two paper bags that he’d found in a refuse site behind Madame’s. A hybrid bakery and brothel next door to a drug den where Elios spent much of his time. The Madame, who baked the bread and looked after the poor wretches who found themselves in her service, had discovered from a young age that customers were always hungry after indulging the kind of entertainment her girls offered.
Elios hated the place. The stench of sweat and cheap perfume from the brothel upstairs and clouds of sweat and smoke from the drug den next door seeped into the bread, making it inedible to anyone who wasn’t famished.
Right now, having been refused entry into the drug den due to lack of funds, Elios was leaning against a pillar across the street from Madame’s with his space monkey, Moncello, perched on his shoulder. Both monkey and master were shaking uncontrollably, and not just from the chill of the spitting rain. Elios needed The Drug and, having been barred from the drug den, the only way to get The Drug now was to buy it from one of the dealers. As so often was the case for slum dwellers, Elios found his options blocked by the bitter wall of poverty. Theoretically, he could break into the Banlieues and steal The Drug from one of the legal chemists, but that took time and effort, not to mention, it was very risky. Especially when a person’s judgement was impaired by withdrawal.
Elios was getting desperate; he knew that it wouldn’t be long before the sweats would start and then the anger. Elios didn’t want to think about what would come after that. The last time he’d been that far gone, things hadn’t turned out well. Not for him, and certainly not for that poor sod who got in his way. The details were a bit hazy, but Elios knew he had woken up with The Drug leaves scattered around him and blood on his shirt and hands. He couldn’t let things come to that.
Across the road a couple of young employees came out of Madame’s front door and lit a couple of smokes. Moncello’s sensitive nose twitched in disgust and Elios patted his wet back comfortingly. The smokes were drugs, certainly, and theoretically no less addictive than the type Elios needed, but they weren’t The Drug. And Elios needed The Drug soon.
One of the employees called to Elios, inviting him over for a good time, but Elios was too overcome by his burning need for The Drug to answer. The person shrugged unconcerned and finished their smoke before they and their companion headed back indoors.
Suddenly the space monkey on Elios’s shoulder uttered a soft squeak and cocked his head to one side.
“What’s wrong, Moncello?” Elios asked, hastily checking around him. “Do you hear somethi—” He broke off mid-sentence, frozen to the spot, listening intently.
A course sniffing and shuffling sound was coming into focus.
A horrid sinking feeling attacked his stomach. That faint snuffling told him all he needed to know; only one creature in the whole of the Outer Slums made a noise like that. Huge, fanged, pink-eyed sniffer moles were deaf and blind, but their sense of smell was second to none. Some of the hardened street thugs used them to intimidate the common slum dwellers and sniff out rival criminals who had ventured into their territory.
Elios swore under his breath and retreated into the shadows. He wasn’t important enough to be considered a threat, but he still didn’t want to get in the way of one of those beasts, and he wasn’t particularly anxious to meet the mole’s owner. Anyone with enough cash to afford a sniffer mole had to be influential in the slums. The most powerful and influential mole owners stayed because they could make a profit rather than because they had nowhere else to go. Elios knew of several dealers who actually lived in the Banlieues and commuted to the Outer Slums each day to sell their wares. Many of them even had families. In fact, Elios’s favourite supplier of The Drug, a middle-aged man named Percy who would sometimes throw in an extra leaf or two for Moncello, was leading an entire double life. He’d told his fiancée that he was a policeman from New Brussels who had emigrated to this part of the galaxy to look for work.
The snuffling grew louder, and Elios and Moncello watched as a large quivering snout poked out from behind one of the abandoned shops that lined the alley. The snout was followed by two huge fangs and Elios felt a wave of panic rush through him as the rest of the mole appeared. He wanted to run but he was frozen to the spot. He even had to remind himself to breathe.
The chain around the sniffer mole’s neck clanked menacingly as its owner tugged at it. Elios vaguely recognised this particular mole’s owner. The man had been an acquaintance of Elios’s late mother and had sometimes helped her find work in the slums. In return, she had offered the man her services free of charge.
Elios had no desire to be found, especially not by one of his mother’s old clients, and began to wonder if it was maybe a good thing that he’d been free of The Drug for the last couple of days. Combined with the dirt covering his body, there was very little to distinguish Elios’s smell from that of his surroundings, and, despite their impeccable noses, sniffer moles were by no means infallible. On top of all that, it wasn’t as if the mole was actually looking for Elios. If only the streets weren’t so narrow, he thought.
Its claws clacking on the muddy cobbles, the mole and the gangster passed within two feet of where Elios and Moncello were hiding, completely unaware that they were being watched, and disappeared down one of the side alleys. As soon as he was sure they were gone, Elios emerged from his hiding place and fled in the opposite direction.
To an outsider, the twisting labyrinth of the Outer Slums was a treacherous and confusing place. The snaking alleyways wriggled back on themselves, tricking and teasing the unfortunate newcomer. As if getting lost in this hellhole weren’t enough to worry about, the uneven cobbles and loose bricks and slates were perilous death traps to anyone who lowered their guard for an instant.
Elios had lived in the Outer Slums for as long as he could remember and knew all of the shortcuts and back alleys that allowed him to avoid the more dangerous patches, but he still kept his fist clenched around the switchblade in his pocket. He kept the knife for protection, at least that’s what he kept telling himself. Elios didn’t like to dwell on the other uses the knife could be put to, especially when he was so desperate for The Drug.
