The Dreaming Oceans of San Miguel
A Novella
James Vincett
The Second Tale of the Far Frontier Series
Copyright © 2019 by James Vincett
All rights reserved
All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
Cover and art credit to Filip Velkovski
E-book ISBN: 978-1-7923-1715-6
Discover other titles by James Vincett
The Anuvi Incident
The Borrega Test
Hope’s Surprise
Twitter: @JamesVincett
Amazon Author Page: http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B00V2629X2
“The bold adventurer succeeds the best.” - Ovid
Known unknowns result from phenomena which are recognized, but poorly understood. On the other hand, unknown unknowns are phenomena which cannot be expected because there has been no prior experience or theoretical basis for expecting the phenomena.
Dr. Elio D’Appolonia
Chapter 1: Student and Teacher
Pale turquoise close to the surface, the color of the ocean water deepened through darker and darker shades of cobalt and navy. Secure in their hardened pressure suits, teacher and student descended with ease, taking temperature and salinity readings, and panning their cameras back and forth across the steep wall, their powerful lights penetrating the growing gloom. A slight current nudged them along at a few knots as they descended. A profusion of branching structures, of different textures, sizes and colors, covered the wall, and huge fans, some three or four meters in diameter, waved in the current. Thousands of hand-sized diaphanous polyp structures hung suspended in the water; most were mushroom-shaped, but some were star-shaped or tubular, and all trailed thread-like tentacles.
“Is this coral?” the young woman asked over the suit radio.
“The easiest answer is, yes it is,” Dr. Kanas replied. What the hell was her name? “It seems to have evolved the same structure to fill the same ecological niche.” That’s it! “Kirsten, can you give me a measurement of the wall angle?”
“Joanna, sir.”
“Huh?”
“Kirsten bailed out, remember? She got seasick on the boat survey.”
“Sorry.” He could remember the scientific names of thousands of species on hundreds of life-bearing worlds, but found a simple name impossible to recall. “Can you give me an angle?”
He knew the angle measurement, and the fact that it had varied since they began their descent. He wanted to make sure she was paying attention.
“Well, eyeballing it, I think it’s about seven degrees off vertical.”
“Good. How does that compare to the surface?”
“There are no beaches on this island, that’s for sure, but the angle at the surface is about twelve degrees off vertical.”
“Excellent. Now, remember on the boat ride over from the Lalande? Do you remember the shape of the island on the horizon?”
“It looks like the top part of an egg.” She paused. “In fact, most of the islands are shaped like eggs.”
“Excellent, Kirst-, er, Joanna. Actually, all of the islands have almost the exact same shape. They just vary in size.”
“Yeah, that’s weird.”
“Very. But can you tell me why that’s weird?”
“Well, presumably the islands have been here for a while, given the coral on the wall, and the vegetation on the island at the surface.”
“Yes.”
“There’s no sign of erosion!”
“Excellent, Joanna. Remember the storms we witnessed from orbit? Some had sustained winds of 125 klicks, with precipitation reaching one point five meters over twenty-four hours. Surely a force like that would cause some erosion.”
“Are there big birds in these islands?”
“No, Joanna. I’m sure there aren’t. However, there’s something warm inside them. Did you take infrared measurements from orbit?”
“Yes. The core of each island reaches several hundred degrees centigrade. Are they volcanic?”
“That’s a decent hypothesis, for sure. Especially given how the islands are grouped in arcs across the face of the planet, but we haven’t found any evidence for plate subduction or sea-floor spreading, have we?”
“Not yet.”
The islands presented quite a puzzle. This particular island seemed to be in relatively shallow water, and for size, measured about twenty klicks in diameter. The hardened pressure suits would allow them to descend to 800 meters, but the depth here was nowhere near that. Once they finished poking around down there, they would dig through the detritus on the surface to see what they could find.
“Dive 1, this is Carp. Acknowledge.”
“Dive 1, Carp.”
“We’ve picked up a tremor, Dive 1, six point five kilometers north-north-west of your position, three hundred meters depth. What is your status?”
“Haven’t felt anything, Carp.”
“Advise you surface, Dive 1. We'll meet you up top.”
Shit! We just got down here!
They suddenly began to descend much faster. Some new current, like a riptide, clutched them and pulled them deeper. The island wall shuddered, a shower of coral descending with them. Joanna screamed and turned toward him. Kanas could see her face behind the helmet visor of the pressure suit; her wide eyes looked at him. Nausea gripped his stomach, and he gasped as he panicked.
“Use your suit impeller!” Kanas cried. He had lost sight of her in the avalanche of coral, but he could still hear her breathing and her screams. The rumble around them grew to an almost unbearable volume. He tried to use his own suit impeller, but it couldn’t counter the force of the current.
The coral obscured his vision as it filled the water and descended beside him. He became aware of a soft light, and realized the polyps emitted a faint white and blue glow. Over the next few seconds the light grew much brighter, and he saw the polyps swarming against the wall. Below him, approaching fast, he saw a fissure that seemed to grow wider as he descended toward it. The polyps swarmed into it, their light illuminating the seabed. He glanced at his gauges and saw that he had reached more than a hundred meters in depth. He no longer heard Joanna’s breathing or her screams. He grasped a rocky ledge as the current tried to pull him into the fissure.
Just a few moments after the current began, it stopped. He hugged the ledge, gasping for breath, and then began to ascend using the power of the suit. As he ascended, the polyps grew even brighter. Suddenly, streams of smoke or dust ejected from the wall out into the water. Some streams reached two or three meters in length, as if driven by powerful jets. Most of these plumes were dark in color, but some looked blue or green or even white. The polyps swarmed through the clouds.
Then he felt it: a cool sensation, in his boots.
Water.
Somehow, his suit had been breached, either due to impact or pressure. At this pressure the breach was probably microscopic, but his suit was filling fast, weighing him down. He used the suit's wrist controls to dial up the impeller to maximum power. He made some progress, but the speed of his ascent soon slowed.
Then the voices began.
Am I mad? Is this some sort of pressure sickness?
At first a babble, the voices soon sounded familiar. Family members and friends, far away, spoke to him from his memories. Their faces appeared on the glowing polyps in front of his helmet visor. His mind’s eye became overwhelmed with memories of his childhood, adolescence, and early adulthood, several different vision streams flowing through his awareness. The emotions came on fast and strong, and he wept and laughed and felt f
rustration and anger all at the same time.
He became aware of a looming presence, like an undefined but huge shape, above and beyond the memory streams. Vast and alien, it seemed to scream at him with silence, a void so full of meaning he couldn’t even begin to comprehend it.
Just at the edge of his mind, at the very limit of his awareness, he saw The Answer. It was the solution to All Questions and the One Question. It was so wonderful, terrible, vast, obvious and obscure, that he wept at the possibility of it.
Before he could grasp it, the water entered his lungs.
Chapter 2: Past and Present Complications
Captain Caroline Talbot sat at her desk in the small office on the Solstice reserved for her use. She looked at the tablet in her hands, and again read the short missive she had received weeks earlier.
Captain William Bandele was sentenced to the Union Security Service medium security facility in Tycho Crater.
William Osatari Bandele had been one of her instructors at the Academy, and had commanded her cadet cruise on the HSS Lalande, where she and Cord Kessler had fallen in love. She owed Bandele her career in the Exploration Service. She loved him like a father.
From what she could determine, a few years ago he had commanded the HSS Vitus Bering during its mission to the Anuvi system, where the Bering's crew discovered something so strange and consequential, it had nearly begun a war with the Naati. During the course of the mission, events had led to the destruction of the Bering and the death of most of the crew. The Imperial bureaucracy had given the discovery and its fallout a name, the Anuvi Incident, and then promptly classified any information related to that event. The Exploration Service tried Bandele, as commanding officer, for negligence leading to the deaths of personnel and destruction of the vessel, and found him guilty.
She leaned back in her chair, the frustration and anger eating at her gut. To her surprise, the Exploration service had assigned to the Solstice someone who had been present during the Anuvi Incident: Emerans Van Zant, Political Officer and agent for the General Intelligence Directorate. He had told her that Bandele was not responsible for the loss of the Bering. She looked at the tablet and thought about that conversation for what seemed the millionth time.
“Bandele was not at fault for the loss of the Bering,” Van Zant had said.
“How do you know?”
“Because I was there, in the Anuvi system. I saw what happened. Well, at the end, anyway.”
“What?”
“The loss of the Bering was not Bandele's fault. He was forced to go to the Anuvi system by an agent of the General Intelligence Directorate. A woman by the name of Adrianna Batista.”
She remembered the anger she had felt when she had heard Van Zant's explanation. The anger I still feel. He explained that his presence on the Solstice was a direct consequence of the Anuvi Incident, and not because of Bandele's actions.
The Crown had assigned political officers to exploration vessels because of what the crew of the Bering had found in the Anuvi system.
What did they find? Why did the brass put Van Zant on my ship? Did they expect the crew of the Solstice to find something? Because she had been Bandele's student?
She privately questioned Van Zant's motives for telling her classified information. He had seemed genuine at that moment, but now she suspected he was trying to gain emotional power over her by acting like a friend and confidant.
What the hell does he want?
Now, the Solstice was searching for the Lalande, which had gone missing weeks ago. The memories and feelings of frustration, anger, and doubt surged inside her.
“We've found something, Captain.” It was Lieutenant Calhoon on the intercom.
“I'll be right there.”
She exited her office and strode through the corridor to the command deck. A dome nine meters in diameter, the command deck had two forward stations for sensors / communications and flight, an additional six stations spaced around the wall for engineering, communications, environmental, and science, and a large command chair in the center. A colorful multidisplay, covered with a dozen flat and holographic images, occupied the entire forward wall.
Talbot sat in the command chair and looked around. She saw most of the Solstice’s leading crew on the command deck. Commander Kessler, the Chief of Survey, stood behind Lieutenant Calhoon, who sat at the forward sensors and communications station. Van Zant, the Political Officer, stood off to the right, leaning with his shoulder against the curved wall of the deck. Dr. Dabisha, the astronomer, sat at the aft science station, and Dr. Vargus, the planetologist, sat at the starboard science station. Dr. Orolo, the xenosociologist, stood at Dr. Vargus’ shoulder. Lieutenant Commander Mitchell, the Chief of Security, sat at the port communications station. Talbot knew the rest of the crew, the mission specialists and technicians, watched the larger multidisplay in the ship’s lounge, located in the center of the Crew and Lab Section.
“Sitrep,” she barked.
“We’re flying in a low equatorial orbit around the world of San Miguel, with an orbital period of 118 minutes,” Lieutenant Calhoon said. “We have spent the last two orbits scanning the surface searching for the Lalande and any sign of her crew.”
One of the Polaris class of exploration vessels, the Lalande had been weeks overdue at Silmais Orbital. Once the Solstice had concluded the survey of the world of Hope, Vice-Admiral Arinze had ordered the Solstice to determine the fate of the Lalande and continue the survey of San Miguel.
“We have received no response to our attempts at communication, Captain,” Lieutenant Calhoon continued. “However, we were able to access the CommSense satellite network the Lalande placed in orbit.”
The image of a blue-white marble dominated the multidisplay. Beautiful.
“It is,” Dr. Dabisha said.
Talbot blushed; she hadn’t realized she had spoken aloud.
“We’ve received a large amount of information from the satellite network.” Dr. Dabisha sat at the aft science station and tapped a few keys. “San Miguel is an Earth-like ocean world with a Hominin compatible atmosphere and biosphere. This is a composite image composed of data from our own sensors and information downloaded from the network. The planet is a little smaller than Earth, but has approximately the same density and gravity. 87% of the surface is covered with ocean, with the continent in the northern hemisphere comprising approximately 11%. Over 100,000 islands, scattered in arcs and clumps across the oceans, comprise the remaining 2% of land surface.”
“Have we found the Lalande?”
“Yes, Captain.” Dr. Dabisha tapped a few keys and the image on the multidisplay zoomed to the southern edge of the continent.
Captain Caroline Talbot stood and walked toward the display. The memories again flooded into her mind the moment she saw the spacecraft. She looked at Kessler with a sidelong glance, but if the same memories filled his thoughts he didn’t show it; his face remained expressionless and he didn’t look at her. Talbot looked back at the multidisplay; the spacecraft seemed to be resting on the shore of a bay. “Those smaller objects nearby, they look like structures.”
“They are,” Dabisha said. The image zoomed in to a rectangular structure about thirty meters from the spacecraft. “I’m sure that’s a portable inflatable structure used to house field labs, and these smaller units here are crew tents.”
“No sign of the crew?”
“No, ma’am.”
“We find anything else?”
“Here,” Dabisha said. The image on the multidisplay changed to show an oblong object floating on the surface of the ocean. “This is located approximately three hundred kilometers east of the Lalande. The object is about fifteen meters long and seems to be drifting.”
“That’s the Carp,” Kessler said, “a Model 2-A Sea Ranger submersible with a crew of five. It was the only one at Silmais Orbital.”
Dabisha tapped a few more keys on the science station, and the image zoomed outward. A red line appeared on the mul
tidisplay, stretching from the Lalande’s landing site on the south coast of the continent, across a broad strait and twisting among a number of islands. The line then wandered across the vast ocean. “I downloaded the vessel’s course from the satellite network. It looks like it was surveying this chain of islands, here. At this point it seemed to lose power, and drifted for fourteen weeks. Something has impeded it's drift.”
“We need to see what kind of shape it’s in,” Kessler said. “We brought a couple of surface craft, but if we want to complete this survey, we’ll need that sub.”
“Before we continue the survey, we first need to find out what happened to the crew of the Lalande.” Van Zant gestured at the multidisplay. “There are undoubtedly dangers here we know nothing about. Has everyone already forgotten what happened on the last mission?”
“Nobody said we weren’t going to be cautious, Mr. Van Zant.” Talbot sat back down in the command chair.
“They were surveying those islands for a reason,” Kessler said. “It may be what we need to know is there.”
Talbot leaned back in the command chair. Who should I heed? Mr. Adventure or Dr. Paranoid? “I agree with Commander Kessler. We need that sub. We can assess the condition of the submarine first. If it is usable, we can crew it and continue the survey of the islands. No doubt there is information in the sub’s computer that will tell us what they were doing.” She spun around and looked at Dr. Dabisha. “Can we access the sub’s computer from the CommSense satellite network?”
Dabisha tapped a few keys and shook his head. “There is no response from the sub's computer, probably because it is powered down.”
“Well, we’ll try and get direct access to the sub’s computer when the time comes.” Talbot spun her chair forward and faced the multidisplay.
“I volunteer to command the sub and continue the survey of the islands,” Kessler said.
Of course you do. “As you wish, Commander Kessler. While that survey continues, the crew of the Solstice can investigate the original landing site to try and determine the fate of the Lalande's crew. Lieutenant Commander Mitchell will lead that investigation, with the able assistance of Dr. Webb and Mr. Van Zant.”
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