Price nodded. ‘Aye, sir,’ he said, still clearly digesting his sudden change in status. He cast a glance over at Vachon, who did not meet his gaze. ‘Understood, sir.’
If the emergency access procedure failed, Samson wanted to give the rest of them at least a fighting chance of surviving. There was no way the Bounty could outrun a Gauss round, but he supposed they might be able to dodge them, or survive a couple of non-critical hits before getting out of range and returning to the planet surface.
‘The ship is yours, Lieutenant Price.’ Samson felt odd saying it, and wasn’t at all certain that he had the authority to do what he had done. He was the senior officer in the sector, however, so until someone above him said differently, he would act the part.
There were plenty of things that could go wrong when mating a vessel of the Bounty’s age to the much more modern airlock on the depot. Samson resolved to change his inclination to puzzle out the worst possible consequences, and focused on his boarding suit. He’d tied himself in knots of worry with what might have gone wrong at each step, yet they’d made it through. He needed to have more faith in his judgement, his equipment, and the people around him. Well, some of the people…
Harper was waiting for him at the airlock, already dressed in her suit. She gave him a nod, and they both donned their helmets. The seal was confirmed by the green light in his visor heads-up display, followed a moment later by a second that indicated his suit was up to the correct pressure. He opened the airlock, and they both stepped in. The door shut behind them, its motors grinding and whining as it did. A green light flashed above the outer hull door to indicate pressure on both sides was even, so Samson hit the button and waited to see if the Bounty’s sensors were correct in indicating that the join between ship and depot was sound. Things would get ugly fast if it wasn’t.
The open door revealed the pristine white of the naval depot’s hatch. A large red T-shaped handle invited pulling, so Samson did. The depot’s hatch slid open soundlessly, its newer and well-maintained gears showing up the Bounty’s neglect. That revealed the promised land of the depot’s airlock. Should they pass the biometric screening, all would be well. If they didn’t—well, he hoped the gas used would give them a humane, painless death.
They moved into the depot and shut the hatch behind them. Once the airlock was confirmed as up to pressure, they were officially safe from explosive decompression. Samson and Harper removed their helmets and gloves. Harper went to work at the control panel.
‘Officer one, present for optical scanning,’ the depot’s computer said.
Harper opened her eyes as wide as she could, and moved her face closer to the panel. Samson watched, but couldn’t see any sign of a laser or whatever was used for the scan.
‘Optical scan confirmed. Harper, A. Lieutenant. Present implant for scanning.’
She held her wrist up to the panel, and gave Samson a hopeful look.
‘Implant scanning confirmed. Harper, A. Lieutenant. Present right hand for scanning.’
She pressed her hand against the screen. This time Samson could see flashes of red and green light as both her fingerprints and blood were scanned.
‘Print scanning confirmed. Harper, A. Lieutenant. Officer two, present for scanning.’
Samson stepped forward and took his place in front of the panel. The computer took him through the same scans, and he let out a breath of relief as each one confirmed his identity. There was an uncomfortable pause.
‘Hopefully that’ll do it,’ Samson said.
‘I don’t see why not. The scans were all fine. This process exists for a reason. The Navy knows things go wrong, and personnel might need access to a facility.’
‘That’s great, so long as you still have two officers alive,’ he said.
He hadn’t intended to imply that it was lucky he hadn’t carried out a summary execution, but she didn’t respond—either by choice or because there wasn’t time.
‘Biometric scans confirmed,’ the computer said. ‘Welcome to Capsilan Depot. Your distress incident has been logged and transmitted to the Admiralty.’
‘That was nice of it,’ Samson said. He’d need to make a full report, and soon. The Admiralty could take control of the station from Naval Command in the Core and cause them all sorts of problems if there was suspicion of unauthorised access to a depot.
Upon opening the depot’s airlock, Samson was presented with the security panel on the depot’s access door. He scanned the biometric chip in the back of his hand, and pressed his thumb on the glowing outline on the screen. With a hiss and a short gust of stale air, the depot opened. Internal lights blinked on, as the depot came to life for its new human inhabitants.
That done, he returned to the Bounty’s airlock to bring the rest of his people through. They were gathered by the hatch when Samson got back. Everyone’s lives had hinged on this, so the relief was palpable.
‘Welcome to Capsilan Depot,’ Samson said. ‘We’ll take up residence here for the time being. Make yourselves at home.’ He caught himself on the last part too late, a relaxed utterance caused by his relief at having finally gotten them there. He had to remain firm with the mutineers, and didn’t want them to think they were off the hook now that the danger had passed and everyone had behaved themselves.
‘Lieutenant Price, please see Ms Harper to the brig.’
‘Aye, sir.’
‘The rest of you may continue on the terms of your parole. Mister Vachon, please transfer the station from autonomous to manned control. Rating Kushnir, help him as needed.’
‘Aye, sir.’
‘Corporals Féng and Smit, keep an eye on things until Lieutenant Price relieves you.’
‘Aye, sir.’ There was no uncertainty in what he meant by ‘things’, as they trotted off after Vachon and Kushnir.
He walked ahead of the others toward the operations centre, while the depot continued powering to life. He could hear the fans working hard to recycle the stale atmosphere now that there were people on board once again, and the temperature was quickly rising to a comfortable level.
He followed the directions on the wall panels to the command deck. Although all naval depots followed roughly the same layout, he had never been on one so small before. It had everything it needed to have, though. There was a mess hall, galley, accommodation on the lower level, and a munitions arsenal on the one below that, as well as a hangar that Samson suspected might just be large enough to dock the Bounty in. That reminded him of his earlier thoughts on how to while away the time as they waited for relief.
The level he was on contained the guard room, the officers’ quarters, and the command centre. In busier systems, depots were permanently manned. Perhaps one day—a day not too far off—this one would be too, but for the time being, it felt like Samson’s personal little kingdom.
He got to the command centre and flopped down in the duty officer’s chair, which was far more comfortable than the master’s chair on the Bounty. When the door hissed shut, leaving him entirely alone, he let out a deep sigh and tried to allow some of the stress of the past few days to leak out with it. He had slept only intermittently since the attack, and the fatigue was starting to take its toll. If he was being honest with himself, he had to admit it already had—he was exhausted. However, he wasn’t quite at the end of the ordeal.
He powered up the control panel and started to activate all the command systems. Although he was eager to get in contact with the Admiralty, the depot’s security was his first duty. A quick diagnostic told him that everything was functioning as it should. The crew areas were airtight, the environmental and artificial gravity controls were within required parameters, and the weapons system was active and monitoring against outside threat.
Satisfied that everything was as it should be, and that he had brought the remnants of the Sidewinder’s crew to safety, he activated the communications relay and prepared himself for a conversation he had been going over in his head ever since the attack.
> 16
Samson didn’t bother going through the intermediary stages usually required to consult with someone in a position of authority high enough at Naval Operations Command at the Admiralty to actually make a decision. He transmitted a distress message on the emergency channel; although there was no longer any immediate danger, he felt the recent loss of a warship warranted the urgency.
It took a moment for the Nexus Relay to generate enough of a charge to beam the signal back to Sol system and to the Admiralty at Mare Crisium on the Earth’s moon. The screen flashed up with the successful transmission notification, followed by the Navy’s automatic response placeholder, helpfully requesting him to wait.
A stern looking woman in a lieutenant commander’s uniform appeared on the screen a moment later.
‘Please state the nature of the emergency.’
‘TUS Sidewinder destroyed in Oculus 414 Frontier System, with loss of all crew bar seven souls.’
‘Patching you through to Frontier Command Operations.’
The placeholder appeared again. An emergency might feel urgent to a commander experiencing it first-hand, but the Admiralty—where they could offer little help beyond words of reassurance and the promise to dispatch support—took a more pragmatic approach. They were so far away, there was nothing they could do to directly influence the situation. All that was within their power was to gather the intelligence and formulate a long-term response. In naval operations, there was no such thing as the cavalry arriving at the last moment to save the day. You had to be sure that whatever you brought into a fight would be enough to get you out the other side of it.
‘Frontier Operations. Commodore Iyabo. I understand you’re reporting the loss of TUS Sidewinder. Who am I speaking to?’ The image of a powerfully built man in later middle age appeared.
‘Samson, J. Lieutenant. 414-3187. I’m transmitting a file with the names of the other survivors.’
‘Sidewinder is a complete loss?’ Iyabo said.
‘Completely, sir. Blown to pieces.’
‘By whom?’
‘I don’t know.’
Iyabo frowned. ‘I’ll need a complete report, but for now give me the main points.’
Samson walked him through everything that had happened, from the moment they had hailed the Bounty up until their arrival at the station, but chose to omit the mutiny. He still didn’t know how he wanted to deal with it. The fact that it had happened at all felt like a mark of no-confidence in his ability as an officer, and he felt he was on tenuous enough ground as it was without highlighting that his own crew had defied him. There was a time for that—he very much intended that Harper and the others would answer for turning on him the way they did—but that time did not feel as though it had arrived. There were more important matters to deal with first, and he wanted to give the impression that he had everything under his control.
‘At first glance it sounds like an overly ambitious pirate,’ Iyabo said. ‘Did Sidewinder get involved in any operations focused against any individual or organisation in particular?’
‘Not during my time aboard,’ Samson said.
‘Well, pirates don’t randomly decide to attack and destroy warships for no reason. Is there anything you’ve left out?’
Samson grimaced. ‘There is something, sir. I don’t know quite what to make of it, nor how to put it.’
‘Spit it out, Lieutenant.’
‘Sir, we found some unusual objects on the Bounty. I’m pretty sure they were what the old man was willing to die to protect.’
‘Unusual?’
Samson described the two objects, saving the most intriguing for last. ‘The piece of metal looked like it had writing on it, sir. I suppose it could have been decoration, but even if it was, nothing about it seemed human in origin. I can confirm I’ve never seen anything like them before, but I realise that doesn’t mean a whole lot.’
Iyabo frowned and remained silent a moment. ‘You’re saying you think these objects are of alien origin?’
Samson took a deep breath. Even with all he had seen, he felt like an idiot saying it. ‘Yes, sir. I think the objects may have been of alien origin.’ He took a breath and waited for the reaction.
The commodore’s face was inscrutable. That struck Samson as being a better reaction than it might have been. At least he hadn’t burst out laughing.
‘A big claim,’ Iyabo eventually said, stroking his clean-shaven chin. ‘The objects are not recoverable?’
‘I don’t think so, sir. Assuming they weren’t destroyed with the Sidewinder, I suspect they’re now in the possession of the ship that destroyed her.’
‘A shame. Having the objects would be useful. Get all of your sensor scans to us immediately,’ Iyabo said. ‘If something has been discovered out there, we need to know about it. We’ll extrapolate what we can from them. Are you familiar with the Alpha Protocol?’
‘I, uh—no, I’m not, sir.’ Samson could see from Iyabo’s eyes that he was reading something on his screen.
‘I see,’ Iyabo said. ‘All Frontier officers are given a briefing on it before posting, but yours was a little hastier than the norm. Capsilan Depot’s computer will have everything you need to know on file. I suggest you read up on it as soon as we’re done here.’
‘Aye, sir.’
‘Alpha Protocol deals with procedures for first encounter with any alien life. The salient detail is that all sites, objects, and life-forms are to be secured by naval personnel until diplomatic or scientific strategies can be implemented. As the only man on the ground, that responsibility falls to you until we can get another ship out to you. If your data checks out, invoking the protocol will be my next step.’
‘When will that be, sir?’
Iyabo’s eyes started scanning his screen again. ‘I can have the Peterson to you in ten days, and Nautilus three days after that. The destruction of a warship alone justifies me sending them to the system, but if what you’ve told me about the objects is accurate, I suspect the Peterson and Nautilus will be the tip of the spear.’
‘I don’t believe anything I haven’t seen with my own eyes, sir. The objects were strange. Strangest things I’ve ever seen.’
Iyabo hmphed. ‘Probably a good attitude to have. This needs to be dealt with carefully. Ordinarily I’d be more sceptical of a report like this, but with the destruction of a naval vessel involved, I’m willing to accept there may be more to it. I want to make one thing very clear, Lieutenant. Enacting the Alpha Protocol is a very big deal. If you’re wrong about this—if you’re making more out of something than is there to try to get your career back on track—you’re finished.’
‘I can assure you I’m not,’ Samson said.
Iyabo nodded. ‘I’m not going to be the man who dropped the ball on this one, Lieutenant. This could either be the biggest thing to happen to mankind since the Nexus, or it could make us both into the biggest idiots in the galaxy. Do not screw this up, Lieutenant.’
‘I’ll do my best.’
‘I’m going to stay on duty until we have more to go on,’ Iyabo said. ‘I’m prioritising it, but putting it on lockdown. I don’t want word of this getting out before we have something firm to take up the chain. I’ll be in touch again in one hour, once I’ve had a chance to take a closer look at this.’
‘Yes, sir.’
‘Frontier Command out.’
The screen went dark, leaving Samson to digest the reality that if he was wrong about this, he had struck his career the fatal blow. It was a shame they hadn’t been able to hang on to some of the artefacts, but as he’d said to Harper, if they had, they’d all probably be dead now. Still, simply because they’d lost the ones from the Bounty didn’t mean there weren’t more of them out there.
It fed a thought that had been lurking in his head for a while now, but first things first. He accessed the depot’s computer and brought up the details of the Alpha Protocol.
Samson could see why Commodore Iyabo had been so stern with h
im. The Alpha Protocol was a terrifying piece of legislation, and he could see why they’d need a scapegoat if it was improperly invoked. The emergency powers it conferred to the military were absolute—and, as with any absolute power, that opened the door to potentially horrific misuse.
The emergency powers it provided could be invoked by officers ranked commander and higher without any senior oversight, but the text contained severe censures for application against any officer who invoked it flippantly. Dishonourable discharge would be the best-case scenario in that event.
If Iyabo jumped the gun and invoked it erroneously, his career would be over. Samson’s too. He hoped the data was enough confirm his suspicions. If he was wrong on this, it would mean a court martial. He didn’t reckon he’d manage to avoid one a second time.
The protocol enacted a number of emergency powers to ensure that any alien technology was secured and that information about first contact was disseminated in a controlled and panic-avoiding way. After that, it dealt with first contact and interaction with an alien species until an organised governmental response was formulated. Above all, the protocol was focussed on keeping things quiet and controlled.
Simply not acting on information was enough to bring down its wrath on an officer’s head. It made sitting on the depot waiting for help to seem a very tenuous proposition. Part of him hoped Iyabo would hold off enacting the protocol until the relief ships arrived and someone else could shoulder the responsibility, but Samson was convinced he was right.
He headed for the mess, where the depot’s sensors said everyone had gathered. That involved taking the elevator down a floor and walking one corridor over. They were finishing up a meal when he arrived, reminding him of how much he wanted a decent meal himself.
‘Good news,’ he said. ‘Frontier Command has dispatched two corvettes, the Nautilus and the Peterson. The Peterson should be here within ten days, with the Nautilus following on a few days afterward. I’ve not been given any indication as to what’s to become of us, but I suspect that will be updated when I communicate with Command again.
The Alpha Protocol: Alpha Protocol Book 1 Page 12
