He knew he was grinning like a school kid, but he couldn't help himself. Yeah, John was up to something. And it would be something exciting, something amazing. With John, it always was.
It could even be something worth living for.
Six
Beth slid down the ladder to the hangar deck, feet dangling free, letting her hands slow her fall in the lunar gravity. She preferred to come down this way from her room on the floor above. Why take an elevator when you can drift down instead? One had to make the most of simple pleasures. Some days being on the moon felt like she was a little kid, sitting in the middle of the best playground ever created. Not that she’d let the people working for her get wind of such ideas. She’d never be able to keep discipline if they knew she had feelings like that.
The huge room was only dimly lit. The work crew was off shift right now. They'd never been able to collect enough techs whom they could trust absolutely to have more than one shift working on the project. This part of the base was deep underground, at the lowest level of the facility. Only a handful of John's staff were permitted access to the area. The retinal scanners in the elevator made sure of that. Secrecy was paramount to the project. If even a rumor of what they were working on got off the base and back to Earth, they’d be sunk.
She really ought to be in bed. They'd all be back at it early in the morning, and there was still much to do if they were going to make John’s crazy schedule. But Beth was still fuming inside. Going to bed now would be futile – all she'd be able to think about would be Dan. Coming here. John was good at dropping surprises in her lap, but she resented the hell out of this one. She’d come down here where she would have a little privacy to cool down.
Without thinking about it, she looked down at her left hand, where her ring used to be. When she realized she was looking, she shook her head with a sharp, decisive motion. That was a lifetime ago. She'd treat Dan just as she did everyone else. She hoped he felt the same, and would be able to maintain the same professional detachment she intended to display. If not, that was just too bad. It would be his problem, not hers.
Little pools of illumination from a few emergency lights spilled across the floor in front of her. They partially lit the metal frames around the project – her baby, her night and day obsession for the past few months. She walked a slow circle around the scaffolding, making mental notes about what sort of work had to be prioritized, if she was to have everything ready for next week. The crew was going to hate the rush. But they'd put as much sweat and tears into the work as she had. They'd be willing to put in the hours for a last push. And John was right – time was short. They needed to make this work and get some results worth showing soon. Those satellites floating above them on a daily basis were a clear indication that the world wasn’t willing to just leave them alone up on the moon. Others would be coming to set up their own bases. The secret would become more difficult to keep as the weeks wore on.
As she rounded the far end of the scaffolding, she heard a clatter from somewhere behind her in the gloom. The sound of metal clanging against metal echoed hollowly off the stone walls. Beth froze, wary, and then took a few cautious steps toward the sound. This area should be on lockdown during the off shift. No one but she or John should be here.
“Is someone there?” she called, trying for as stern a voice as she could manage.
No response. The darkness in the room seemed to glower at her. She’d never felt nervous in this chamber before, but Beth had the feeling she wasn’t alone down there. And she should be.
“Anyone?”
Still nothing. She stopped just outside one of the pools of light. There was plenty of reason for some healthy concern when it came to this job. Every nation on the planet below would be fighting it out for what they had here, if the word got out. That's why John hand-picked every person who was told what was really going on in the depths of his lunar base. Not that the solar power collection and helium-3 mining weren't important – they were. But what he had down here was so much more than that.
“Computer, full illumination,” she said in a loud voice. Immediately, lights came on across the ceiling, blanketing the room with bright white light. The darkness was banished as if it had never been, and polished metal gleamed everywhere in an expansive room, perhaps half the size of a football field and half as tall.
Still, she saw nothing. No movement, no one there at all. She walked through the scaffolding, looking for what might have made the noise, and finally found a small tray of tools scattered on the floor. Someone must have forgotten them, left them out, and they happened to tip over.
“Getting too nervous about this whole thing,” she said ruefully. She needed sleep. Between the stress of the schedule and her worries over John’s selection as pilot, she was imagining things. A good night of sleep would set her right. Tomorrow they’d begin the final stages of the project.
She collected the tools back into their tray and placed them on top of a large tool bin set around the frame. She'd sort out just where they were supposed to go tomorrow. For now, she needed rest. It was going to be a busy week. But she was excited about what would come after. All of the labor they’d put into this project would finally be realized. Some people down on Earth were going to be very surprised with what they had here, once they were ready for the big reveal. But first they needed to show that it worked, and that meant testing.
A short walk took her back to the ladder, and as she set her hands on the rungs, she said “Computer, lights out.” The system obediently bathed the room in shadow again as she began to climb.
Seven
The excitement of being back in space had worn a bit thin during the two day journey to the moon, even with the reading material Andy had provided him. The stopover at the International Space Station had been nice, but the trip from there was an uneventful cargo shuttle ride. Dan still couldn't suppress a grin as he wheeled his new chair down the shuttle ramp into the bay. The old motorized beast had been left behind on Earth; too much expense to lift it into space. Instead, as soon as his ride had landed on the moon a nurse had rolled in with a new chair, all plexiglass and aluminum, built on site. Probably built specifically for him. No motor meant he had to wheel it around himself, but the gravity was so light here that it wasn’t really a bother. If anything, he had a feeling he’d have to watch out not to push too fast and lose control.
The chair was nice, but his grin was for John, standing there in the hall ahead of him and practically dancing from foot to foot in excitement. He was always like that when he was eager to show off some new toy or pet project. And his enthusiasm was always catching, so Dan found himself feeling that familiar eagerness spread through him as well. Whatever John was involved in up here, it had to be exciting to light that fire behind his friend’s eyes.
“Dan, good to see you!” John reached out and pumped Dan's hand.
“You too, John. Thanks for inviting me up. You're right, this was amazing. Just what I needed.”
“You don't know the half of it. But I could really use your help, if you're willing,” John said.
“I figured you weren't going to the expense of hauling me up here for a joy ride.” He'd hoped as much, anyway. Dan could have lived with the trip if it was really just a pity vacation. Being back in space felt that good. It would have taken away the sting. But he'd hoped for more, and now he was burning with anticipation.
“So, show me?” Dan asked.
“Follow me.”
John led the way down the hall, into a lift. Dan wheeled himself along behind him, appreciating that his friend hadn’t asked if he needed help with the chair. Independence was going to be a touchy subject for a while, and he was glad that John never even brought it up. The doors snapped shut after the two of them had entered, leaving the other crew from the shuttle unloading. The lift felt big with just the two of them; Dan noticed that John hadn't invited the other new arrivals, and no one else had come anywhere near this elevator.
He l
ooked up at his old friend, saw new creases and lines that hadn't been there when they'd last met in person. The old sprinkling of gray had spread across his hair, too. It had been a couple of years, but it seemed like John had aged more than that.
Then John met his gaze. For a moment his face lit up with that boyish excitement again, before he schooled it back into a more serious mask. But the fire was still lit, there in his eyes if you knew him well enough to look. When John got that look, his enthusiasm was contagious.
The elevator was still descending. “Seems like we're going down a long way,” Dan said.
“We are. The project is about half a kilometer below the surface.”
“Why so deep? I thought you were mining helium?”
“We are, up top. This is another project. It's down deep because of security...and other reasons. You'll see. If you still want to be on board, after you hear the conditions.” John pulled out a tablet computer from a deep leg pocket.
“First off, what you will be shown is a secret known to only about two dozen individuals, period. It can't go any farther than that. Not now, at least. I've gone to incredible lengths to ensure the tightest security possible for the project. If you want in, you have to agree to the terms beforehand. Two years here on the lunar base, no unmonitored contact with Earth allowed, no returns to Earth without my explicit permission. If you see the project and want out, that's fine; you'll be put up here at the base above us at my expense. No salary. If you sign on, you get the salary and benefits listed in the contract here.”
He held the tablet out. Dan tried to read his mood as he took the device, but his friend had a good poker face on.
Dan scanned the contract and whistled. “I've signed NDAs before, John. But the contract you're offering beats the Air Force all to hell.”
John grinned down at him. “Well, that’s the plus side of working in the private sector. And there's some hazard involved as well. You need to thumb-stamp the NDA now, but you can wait on the contract until you hear the details.”
Dan pressed his thumb to the first document, tabbed to the second with his finger. He scanned the text. Two years at these rates would set him up for a long while to come, if he was careful with his cash. He shrugged and pressed his thumb into the stamp, letting the tablet take biometric readings and a fingerprint from him, sealing the contract. It wasn't like he had a lot of other plans.
“I trust you, John,” he said, handing the tablet back. It was a big leap, but his gut said he wouldn't regret this.
The elevator shuddered to a stop, but the doors didn't open immediately. John pressed a thumb against a spot on the panel, and placed his eye before a retinal scanner. Only then did a light over the door glow green.
“Majel, allow access for myself plus one,” John said.
The doors ground slowly open.
Dan was about to make a joke about John's ongoing affair with his computer, but what he saw stripped the thoughts from his mind. He rolled closer for a better look.
The room was enormous, but Dan didn't have eyes for the room. Instead, he was drawn to the centerpiece, a great latticework of aluminum scaffolding, gleaming softly in the light. And buried beneath the bars and beams, a ship.
At first glance, it looked a lot like the shuttle he had taken from the International Space Station to the moon. But where the lunar shuttles were blocky things, designed to fly in space, this looked aerodynamic. It had the sleek lines of a jet fighter, and delta shaped wings slipped gracefully from the sides of the ship. Sitting between the wings were the engines, which looked larger than anything Dan had seen on a shuttle before.
He waffled between curiosity and a sense of disappointment. The ship was gorgeous, but why all the secrecy over a new shuttle design? There had to be more to it. He glanced up at John, who merely shrugged and crossed his arms over his chest. He wanted Dan to figure out the mystery for himself? Fine, he could do that. He looked back at the ship, then began wheeling himself closer.
Dan rolled under the scaffolds in an arch-like spot, reaching out to touch the sleek metal. High density alloy composites – high grade stuff, horrifically expensive, he knew. The ship was built to take a beating, and to last for a long time. There were several doors down the side of the ship's twenty meter length, some open, some closed. A handful of men and women worked busily as bees around a hive, flitting here and there with components.
He rolled down toward the rear of the ship, intending to take a look at the engines. It didn't seem like the ship had a lot of space for fuel, so he had to wonder how much range it would have. Then he reached the engines, and stopped cold.
He'd expected to see the regular nozzles all rockets used to propel themselves with some combination of fuel and oxidizer. Mankind had been using that same system for primary propulsion for about a hundred years now.
This ship didn't have any nozzles. Or any sort of propulsion that he could discern. Instead, the rear of the ship was mounted with a series of large disks, each about the size of a tabletop. They seemed to be made of some sort of metal, but he couldn't identify the alloy on sight, and they were out of his reach. As he examined them, his head started throbbing a little.
“Don't stare at them too long, Dan. The headaches are one bit we haven't figured out yet,” John said. He'd walked in beside him while he was lost in examination.
“What do you mean, haven't figured out yet? Didn't you build them?”
“No. We found them. That's the secret.”
“Found them?” Dan's brow furrowed. “Where?”
“Here, Dan. We found them here on the moon, half a kilometer below the surface. We discovered them when we found this cave. Along with a bunch of other things.”
Eight
A hidden ship, buried on the moon? It wasn't possible. That was the stuff of science fiction, not reality. John had to be pulling his leg.
“You’re messing with me. What’s the story?” Dan asked.
“That’s it,” John said, shaking his head. His face was serious. “We almost missed the place entirely, because it was so deep. I was planning the solar and mining operation out here and sent probes over to look for underground caverns. It’s easier and safer to convert underground spaces into living areas than to build domes on the surface. Healthier for the folks who have to live here, too. Anyway, one probe came back with an odd reading at this spot, so we went in for a closer look. At one point, this cave was part of some sort of larger complex. Mostly gone now, although we've unearthed a bit of it. But the hangar was intact, and there were the remains of a ship in here. An old, old ship.”
“How old are we talking, John?” Dan asked quietly. He still felt like he ought to be waiting for the punchline of a joke.
“Maybe a thousand years. Maybe older. Hard to say for certain.” He watched the corner of John's smile quirk up a little on his otherwise serious face.
The number floored him. A ship out here, a base out here, from a time before humanity had even learned about flight? Again, it didn't seem possible, but John wasn't wearing a joking face. Dan looked at the ship again, and the strange disks on the back immediately brought back his headache. They were strange, in a way he’d never seen before. Was this all for real?
“So you rebuilt the ship,” he said. “What does the drive do? How does it work?”
“We haven't flown it yet. We have theories, but until we test, it's hard to say for sure. Not a lot of the ship survived, really, so it was a major rebuilding project. The power plant was intact, which was the most important component. The drives, too, which seem to be some sort of gravity drive. The main computer, although a lot of the database is either corrupted or beyond our ability to access. And a couple of other cool gadgets. Watch this,” John said. Then he called out in a loud voice “Can we get a cloak demonstration, please?”
A couple of the crew nodded and bustled into the ship, heading toward the nose. Dan waited another minute, wondering what they were doing, and then the ship just vanished. One moment it
was there, and the next it simply wasn't anymore. On instinct, Dan wheeled toward where the ship had been, but John reached out to stop him.
“Whoa! Not so fast, you'll hurt yourself. It's still there.”
Dan braked, then reached out a tentative hand. He made contact with smooth metal, gliding under his fingers, completely unseen.
“It's invisible?”
“Yup.” John had that kid's grin back in his voice, and looking over his shoulder Dan saw it was there on his face as well.
“Well, close to it anyway,” he continued. “The cloak is actually a field. We think it was pre-set for the original size of the ship. It's not something we've been able to tinker with, anyway, so the field is still the same size. Over here, it matches the hull pretty completely, because we rebuilt the engine frame about the same. But up by the nose, there are patches you can stand inside the field and be as invisible as the ship.”
Dan ran his hand over the invisible hull almost reverently, marveling at how solid and real it felt to his fingers, without even the slightest trace of its existence perceived by his eyes. “She's quite a ship, John. What do you have planned for her?”
“Well, I plan to take her up and go exploring. And I'd like you to fly her.”
Dan closed his eyes and bowed his head a little, hand still resting on the hull. He was torn between profound awe and childlike wonder.
“You're one of the best, Dan. I need the best for this. Earth needs the best for this. You see – that drive on the back of the ship, while faster than anything else we have, is still just an in-system drive. The ship has a second drive as well.”
Adventures of the Starship Satori: Book 1-6 Complete Library Page 3
