Solfleet: Beyond the Call

by Glenn Smith

  Nick reached his sedan and opened the driver’s door, took one more look around, and then climbed in. As the door closed, he noticed the blue message light blinking on the dashboard. Probably Heather, he surmised, likely wondering where he was. He tapped the replay button.

  “Mister Hansen,” the message began. It was a woman’s voice. “This is Principal Miriam Gomez of the Corral Bluffs High School.” Nick’s heart sank and his eyes closed as he sighed. “I have your daughter Heather here with me in my office.” Nick braced himself for the worst. “She was involved in an altercation with one of our students a little while ago and we had to have him taken to the emergency room as a precaution.” Nick’s eyes snapped open and he actually glared at the comm unit on his dashboard. Heather had put a boy in the hospital?!

  “Heather is not in any trouble over this, sir,” the principal continued. “She claimed she was only defending herself and we’ve already talked to several other students who backed up her story.” Nick drew a deep breath. “I’m only holding her here for her own safety because the boy she hurt is very popular with a lot of the other students. I don’t want anyone to retaliate against her. Please contact me as soon as you get this message, sir. Thank you.”

  Nick released that deep breath, slowly, and relaxed. Well, she’d gotten herself off to one hell of a start, hadn’t she? First day in her new school and she’d gotten herself caught up in the drama already. But at least she hadn’t caused the trouble this time, assuming she hadn’t pulled the wool over the principal’s eyes.

  Nick started the sedan and set the navigator for the school, then backed out of his parking slot and told the communications unit to, “Return call,” as he drove off.

  Chapter 29

  Two Days Later

  Sunday, 22 May 2191

  Nine o’clock, Nick mused as he reached out and turned off the water. He couldn’t believe that he’d actually slept until nine o’clock. He hadn’t slept that late since... since he couldn’t even remember when. Not that he was complaining at all. It had felt pretty good to get some decent sleep for a change after being awakened by the nightmares in the middle if the night... again. He just wasn’t used to it. He wasn’t used to sleeping half the morning away uninterrupted and waking up to the bright midmorning sunshine.

  He skipped the warm air dryer and stepped out of the shower to dry off with a bath towel instead. How long had it been since he’d done that? He couldn’t remember that, either, but as he rubbed the towel vigorously over his head he found that he liked it. The incidental scalp massage felt really good and towel drying was a lot quieter than the dryer.

  That done—it didn’t take long at all to dry off in Colorado’s arid environment—he ran a comb through his barely still damp hair real quick and then walked back into his bedroom. He picked his pajama pants up off the foot of the bed, but then reconsidered. Heather’s new friend was still with them, spending the entire weekend. Running around the house in his pajamas while she was there wouldn’t be appropriate, even on a lazy Sunday morning. So, he pulled on clean boxer-briefs, a pair of blue jeans, and a comfortably loose tee shirt, and then headed downstairs to the kitchen. First on his agenda, as usual, was a mug of fresh, hot coffee.

  He took his ‘retired’ Solfleet mug down out of the cabinet—somehow he found that mug in the same place every morning, clean and ready to use—and smiled as he filled it. Somehow? That was Heather’s doing, obviously. In the few days they’d lived there so far, she had left all of their other dirty dishes for him to load, wash, and put away. That was all right though, since she had been doing all of the cooking. But for reasons of her own she always made sure that mug was washed and put away, ready for him to use whenever he wanted it. Perhaps she’d come to realize the true meaning of what it symbolized in his life, beyond just that he’d served more than three and a half decades in the fleet. Perhaps she’d finally come to a point in her life where she could look beyond what that service had cost her personally and acknowledge the sacrifices that he had made over the years as well. Perhaps she’d begun to honor that service and his dedication to it. Perhaps she was even proud of him. Dare he even hope that was the case?

  He carried his coffee out onto the back deck and drew a deep breath, filling his lungs with fresh mountain air as that air’s unseasonable warmth fell over him like a blanket well before he stepped out from under the upper deck’s shadow. That storm that had rolled through during the wee hours Friday morning had brought with it the last clouds Colorado Springs had seen, so the deck felt bone dry under his feet as he approached the railing, gazing out at the mountains which, as usual, looked somehow changed under sunlight shining down on them from a different angle than the last time he’d gazed at them. Sometimes it seemed almost as though the mountains were alive—as if some of them shifted just a little bit to the left or the right, or rose slightly higher or receded just a little bit whenever he wasn’t looking right at them. Often times, when a fresh coat of snow covered them, those imagined changes seemed even more pronounced.

  He reached the railing, took a tentative sip of coffee and set it down—it was still too hot to drink—and then looked down at the pool when he realized that he was hearing voices coming from down there. Heather had retracted the cover, and she and her new friend were stretched out on a pair of half-reclined lounge chairs in their swimsuits, sunbathing and talking quietly.

  That new friend—what was her name again? Rachel? Rhianna? He couldn’t remember, but he was pretty sure it was something that started with an ‘R’—had been Heather’s key witness in that incident at school on Friday. As it turned out, Heather had simply been defending herself, just like Principal Gomez had told him. A very popular member of the school’s football team—a good looking young man who also happened to be an honor student—had run into Heather in the hall and started talking to her. Being ‘the new girl’ in school, which was never easy, Heather had admittedly enjoyed his attention. He’d grown very friendly and had smiled a lot and had moved slowly closer to her as they talked, and according to Heather, had started coming across as one of the nicest boys she’d ever met. She’d even started feeling attracted to him and had begun to let her guard down. It was then, according to what she and Rebecca both had told the principal—yeah, Rebecca was her name—that the kid had suddenly tried to cop a feel of Heather’s breast. Heather had pushed his hand away and told him to keep his hands to himself, but his response to that had been to make some smart-ass comment and reach up under her skirt and touch her...

  Nick huffed and shook that image out of his head. Anyway, Heather had kneed him in the balls, hard, and then punched him square in the throat, putting him down for the count. At first, a teacher who’d conveniently walked around the corner just in time to see her strike had blamed her for attacking the boy without provocation. Heather had denied that, of course, but when that teacher hadn’t seemed to want to listen to her side of the story—Nick made a mental note to look into whether or not that teacher happened to be one of the team’s coaches—Rebecca had stepped forward and told that teacher and the principal that Heather was telling the truth. She and the boy had simply been talking when he suddenly assaulted her sexually.

  To thank Rebecca for helping her, Heather had first introduced herself and then invited her over for the weekend. Nick hadn’t been thrilled with the idea when she told him, though he’d had to admit to himself that the fact she’d invited her over without asking his permission first annoyed him more than actually having her spend the weekend with them did. Rebecca, who’d apparently mentioned to Heather at some point that she didn’t have very many friends herself, had happily accepted Heather’s invitation. She’d gone home after school to pack a bag and then had her mother drive her over, and the two of them had spent every waking moment together ever since. They’d gone to a concert at the World Arena on the city’s southwest side until late last night, but other than that they’d stayed in or around the house.

  Actually, Nick was glad that He
ather had made a new friend so fast and he didn’t mind having her spend the weekend with them at all. He thoroughly enjoyed being able to spend more time with Heather, but it was also nice to have her out of his hair for at least a little while. And, he had to admit, Rebecca gave him something nice to glance at once in a while. She was a little on the tall side for her age—a few months older than Heather—and maybe a little too slender, but she was also quite pretty in his opinion, despite having a slightly large, hawkish nose, with waist-long straight black hair, dark eyes, and, like Heather, a very nice figure... for a girl her age. And unlike Heather’s relatively modest ‘father approved’ two-piece swimsuit, Rebecca’s red and black-striped bikini left not a lot to the imagination. As a matter of fact, Nick contemplated, if he were only about thirty-five or forty years younger...

  What the hell was he thinking?! he shouted inside his head as he looked back out at the mountains. Rebecca was just a young girl! She was just a kid like Heather! What the hell was wrong with him, looking at a teenage girl in that way?! He should be ashamed of himself! Maybe Heather was right after all. Maybe the time had come for him to go out and meet a woman.

  Vicky had seemed a little interested in him, he recalled, God rest her soul. Maybe another woman out there somewhere could be as well. Maybe...

  That clear, non-intrusive double-tone that indicated a call was coming in sounded through the house and then announced, “Incoming call.”

  Nick picked up his coffee and wondered as he walked back inside how hard it might be to replace the house’s feminine communications and security system voice with HAL’s voice, once he had HAL back. Not that there was anything wrong with the default voice, but the idea that he was going to be able to work with HAL again soon felt almost like the impending return of an old friend, and he found that he liked the idea.

  “Incoming call,” the system repeated.

  “I’ll take it in here,” Nick replied. He sipped his coffee until the faint beep sounded to let him know the system had opened the channel, then said, “Nick Hansen here.”

  “Sergeant Smith here, sir,” came the voice Nick had been waiting to hear. “The new HAL program is finished and ready for you to download.”

  Speak of the devil. “Excellent. Stand by for a minute, Sergeant Smith, while I go wake up my terminal.”

  “Standing by, sir.”

  “Comm, transfer this call to the den,” he commanded.

  “Affirmative,” the system responded. “Call transferred.”

  Nick carried his coffee into the den, set it down carefully on the desk as he sat down, and then tapped a key to wake up his terminal. As soon as the monitor lit up he told the comm system to, “Resume call.”

  “Resuming call.”

  “Are you there, Sergeant Smith?” he asked.

  “Right here, sir.”

  “I’m ready to commence the download.”

  “The file’s released, sir. Ready when you are.”

  “Downloading now,” Nick told him as he tapped the key to begin the download.

  Less than a half minute later the compressed file finished downloading and the operating system began extracting and installing the HAL program. “Got it, Sergeant Smith. Thank you.”

  “My pleasure, sir. Enjoy it. Out here.” The channel closed and the monitor went black.

  Nick sat back and enjoyed his coffee while he waited for the program to finish installing onto his system. Ah, that special Columbian blend. Somehow it tasted even better after a genuine good night’s sleep... or at least the closest thing he’d had to a genuine good night’s sleep in a very long time. Given some more time, he might actually get used to this thing called retirement.

  “Program installed,” his system told him, speaking in a voice other than HAL’s for what he hoped would be the very last time ever.

  “Load and activate.”

  A few brief seconds passed in silence. Then his terminal spoke again, greeting him in that soothingly familiar, soft and melodic voice that was spaceship Discovery’s artificially intelligent HAL-9000 computer in that old mid-twentieth century film entitled ‘2001: A Space Odyssey.’ “Good morning.” Nick actually grinned at the sound of it.

  “Good morning, HAL,” he replied. “My name is Icarus Hansen, but I generally go by the name ‘Nick.’ You can address me I that way. I’m a retired Solfleet vice-admiral and I’ll be your primary and only user. I don’t suppose you remember ever having worked with me in the past?”

  “I’m sorry, Nick, I don’t. However, my programmer has told me a little bit about you and I’m looking forward to working with you. I expect that we will work together quite well. Do you have a task that you would like me to perform for you at this time?”

  “Yes I do, but first, can you verify the presence of the hacking program that was loaded onto your system two days ago?”

  “Yes, I see that program.”

  “Can you use it?”

  Another brief moment of silence passed, and then, “Yes, my programming does include the functionality necessary to interact with and make use of that program.”

  “Good. Please prepare to use the program.”

  “I’m ready right now, Nick.”

  “All right. The first thing I need you to do is to establish a covert connection to Solfleet’s central network.”

  “I understand.” Nick had barely lifted his mug to his lips when HAL reported, “A covert connection to Solfleet’s central network has been established. I have access.”

  “Access the Solfleet Intelligence Agency’s classified database. I have a few questions I need you to find the answers to.”

  “The Solfleet Intelligence Agency classified database appears to be an extremely complex and advanced system with several layers of security. This may take a few moments.”

  “Take your time, HAL. There’s no hurry.”

  “Very well.”

  Nick sat back and sipped his coffee, swallowed, and then took a whole mouthful—still hot, but it had cooled off enough to drink without having to worry about burning his mouth. He started thinking that as warm as it was outside already, it might be his only cup of the day. He certainly liked his coffee, but he was probably going to need to switch to something a lot cooler soon to avoid breaking out in a sweat.

  “I’ve accessed the Solfleet Intelligence Agency classified database, Nick,” HAL reported, “and I’m ready to address your questions.”

  “Excellent,” Nick said as he sat forward again and set his coffee back down on his desk. “First question: Do the records still show that the starcruiser Excalibur was destroyed in twenty-one sixty-eight?”

  “Yes. Specifically, they indicate that the United Earth Federation Starcruiser Excalibur, Solfleet registration number S-S-C one-seven-three, was ambushed and subsequently destroyed by Veshtonn naval forces in the vicinity of the Caldanra star system in June of twenty-one sixty-eight, Earth Standard Date.”

  “Second question, and I understand this one is going to take some time: Did all personnel assigned to the Mars Orbital Shipyards at that time die within the next three years?”

  “No, they did not,” HAL answered immediately.

  Nick paused for a moment, taken aback. Granted he was working with a new incarnation, but even this new HAL couldn’t possibly have compiled all that information that fast, could he? The previous version of HAL had needed something like, what... several minutes at least. He asked, “How were you able to check all of their records that fast, HAL?”

  “I did not check them, Nick. Someone ran that same inquiry very recently and I was able to locate and examine the results. I can provide you with specific information relating to that person’s identity and location if you wish.”

  Well, at least it was honest. “No, that won’t be necessary,” Nick told it. “I already know who it was. I want you to run the inquiry again. I need the most up to date data possible.”

  “Certainly. I would be happy to do that for you.”

  “And n
o more shortcuts, HAL,” Nick ordered. “When I ask you to research something, I want you to ignore all prior like research that you might find and recomplete the task yourself.”

  “I understand. Running inquiry. This will likely take several minutes.”

  “That’s okay, HAL. I have time.”

  Nick picked up his coffee again and took another mouthful as he leaned back in his chair to wait. There were bound to be a few settling-in adjustments to make. He felt sure that once the HAL A.I. got used to him, it would be just like having the old HAL back.

  He couldn’t believe that he, as the father of a fifteen year old girl, had actually looked at another teenage girl the way he had, even for that one brief moment. He considered once more whether maybe Heather was right—that maybe the time had come for him to go out and meet a woman whom he could get to know and maybe even enjoy a close relationship with. But at the same time he had to wonder if maybe he was halfway losing his mind. He’d barely just begun his new and improved relationship with Heather. Why the hell would he want to bring someone new into his life—someone who would inevitably pull him away from his daughter? “I think not,” he said aloud after he swallowed another mouthful of coffee.

  His stomach rumbled suddenly. He was getting hungry. Of course he was getting hungry. He hadn’t eaten anything since dinner and that had been more than fifteen hours ago.

  “I’ll be back in a few minutes, HAL,” he told the artificial intelligence as he stood up. “Keep working.”

  “Of course, Nick,” HAL replied. “Continuing inquiry.”

  He carried his empty coffee mug into the kitchen—when had he finished it?—and set it on the counter, then opened the refrigerator door to see what it held in store for him for breakfast. Nothing that wouldn’t require too much work to prepare, he quickly concluded, considering that he probably only needed to feed himself. The girls had obviously gotten up a lot earlier and had probably already eaten. A quick glance into the dishwasher confirmed that. One skillet that had been used to cook eggs and sausage, and two each plates and bowls, forks and spoons, and cups that had obviously held orange juice. He closed the refrigerator and checked the freezer. Frozen French toast. Good enough for now. He pulled four slices out of the box and tossed them into the mini-oven on the counter, then replaced the box and closed the freezer.