by S. H. Jucha
Julien replied,
Soon afterwards, Julien passed a comm to Alex from the Joaquin Station Manager. The Outward Bound’s retro-fit was complete. Alex ordered a station shuttle for the transfer crew, which consisted of Second Mate Edouard Manet, as Captain, a Dagger pilot, Lt. Miko Tanaka, as co-pilot, two engineering techs, Lyle Stamford and Zeke Krausman, and Pia Sabine, as medical support.
From the bridge, Alex monitored their new shuttle as it slid out of the bay. If he hadn’t known it was his ship, he wouldn’t have recognized it. Gone were all the earmarks of an explorer-tug. It now had the streamlined hull of a super-long passenger shuttle with small but powerful Méridien engines and ventral hull struts that would allow it to land planetside.
Julien controlled the shuttle’s final approach. With sensors embedded in both the Rêveur’s newly-installed dorsal hull shoes and the Outward Bound’s struts, he was able to mate the two ships with minimal vibrations. The shoes extruded over the struts, securing the ships together.
With all preparations finally complete, Alex announced to the ship’s crew that they’d be underway the following morning at 8.50 hours. Then he placed a conference comm to the President, the Team, Commander Jameson, and the T-Managers.
When Julien signaled Alex that everyone was ready, the President spoke first. “So it’s time, Captain Racine.”
“Yes, Mr. President, tomorrow morning. Everything that you and I have worked for has been realized. And for our efforts, the Méridiens have rewarded New Terra beyond measure. Now it’s time to return their generosity and take them home. I wanted to thank everyone personally for their efforts on behalf of the Méridiens.”
“Captain,” then the President corrected himself, “Alex, it’s us who should be thanking you. Your courage and loyalty to these new cousins of ours have served this nation as few have done since Captain Ulam first landed our people here. You have made us very proud.”
“Captain Racine,” General Gonzalez added, “we will be waiting for your return.”
“Maybe you will bring more friends,” Minster Jaya added hopefully.
“And, Captain Racine,” Commander Jameson chimed in, “Try not to bang up my Daggers. I was hoping to get them back.”
Alex laughed and let the call end on an up note. He placed a last comm to his parents, getting Christie on the pickup. Her comm punishment had ended days ago, much to her delight. He spoke to his family for a while and was about to sign off when his mother gave him some last words of advice.
“Alex,” she said, “your name derives from Earth’s ancient Greek, Alexander. I wonder if you knew it means the defender of mankind. You have a good heart, my son, and I know you want to help others first. But remember this—not everyone can be saved. Please come home safe to us.”
* * *
In his quarters, Alex sat at his desk pondering the choices he’d made, wondering if he’d done everything possible to protect the crew and ship. And in reverse, he worried he was over reacting, taking his own nation down the path of weapons building that had aided in Earth’s decline. In the end, hunger finally chased him from his cabin.
The evening meal was subdued, even with the entire crew present. At its end, Alex stood and said a few words, telling them he was proud of them and they’d face the future together…come what may. Then he suggested an early evening for all. The nightly implant games were suspended by mutual agreement.
After leaving the meal room, Alex headed for the bridge and the quiet of the stars. He sat in his chair, not even greeting Julien, who kept his own counsel. Soon, he heard the opening hiss of the access way doors. Renée climbed into the second chair and reached out her hand to him. He took it in his and they watched the stars together in silence.
-36-
At 8.50 hours, Alex ordered the Rêveur underway, and Julien engaged their sub-light engines. Instead of a direct course toward Méridien, they circled deep toward Oistos. Eventually, the ship arced passed the second planet of the Three Sisters, the system’s most inward bodies—rocky, barren planets.
Alex and the Méridiens stood on the upper view deck of the starboard bay. Many of the New Terrans waited respectfully silent behind them.
The bay had been vacated for the memorial. Julien played the Méridien’s traditional eulogy, an Ancient’s poem set to music, Lament for the Dead.
Utilizing the bay’s tractors beams, Julien launched a large crate out though the bay doors, aimed at the New Terrans’ star. In the Méridiens’ memory, none had attended star services for more than two or three of their people in a single occasion. To witness so many of their comrades launched star ward in a construction crate, instead of enclosed in crystal covers as befitted the dead, was difficult for them to accept.
As the poem ended and the strains of music faded away, silence held the audience. Alex reached to hold Renée’s hand, and she squeezed his in return. Then in small groups, the memorial audience faded away, returning to their duties. Alex and Renée stayed for a while longer. Julien kept the bay doors open for them, holding the view of Oistos.
“So many lost, Alex,” Renée whispered. “My hope goes with them that they will be the last of our people sacrificed to the silver ships.”
Alex couldn’t imagine what the Méridiens were feeling. Their society fervently believed in the sanctity of life and had built layers of protection for each and every individual. In one day, a silver ship had torn apart the façade of their safe society.
* * *
After the memorial, Alex appeared to settle into his watch with Renée as company, but his link with Julien was active.
It had taken Alex forty-seven days after tethering the Rêveur to reach New Terra, arcing out and back into the ecliptic. Within an hour, the Rêveur had surpassed Alex’s incredible velocity of 0.02c, and now, just four hours later, they had reached 0.1c. Top sub-light velocity for the ship, according to Julien, was 0.71c. They’d pass through the ice asteroid fields in just four days.
The crew’s time was filled with daily training and nightly implant games. For Alex, Tatia, and Edouard, it was occupied by comm protocols, department regulations, and tactical training games, Andrea joining them for the latter subject.
Alex was commed in his cabin soon after they cleared the ice fields. It was second watch and he joined Tatia on the bridge. he sent and was pleased when she responded via implant, having overcome her natural tendency to respond to a New Terran with her voice.
Alex said and observed Tatia’s puzzled expression. He watched her eyes defocus and knew she was querying Julien, reminding him she was a grounder not a space explorer.
Tatia responded,
They had been briefed by Julien on the transition effects of entering and leaving FTL as well as the flight oddities. Alex had spent many nights reviewing aspects of the process with Julien. The universe was always in motion, Julien had explained. Stars and planets weren’t fixed. Their positions relative to other celestial bodies, onc
e known, were fixed in databases with time stamps, directional courses, velocities, and orbital trajectories, if necessary. Then courses were calculated integrating the time difference from the original time stamp to project where the celestial bodies would be at the expected time of arrival. SADEs were quite accurate at calculating the intricate equations, but they still erred on the side of caution.
According to Julien, the greatest danger lay in the FTL exit. The starship’s hull could manage space dust and small rocks with its electrostatic field. But anything larger, when exiting at 0.7c, he’d explained, would be catastrophic. With their high-quality sensor suites, fast maneuverable ships, and superbly-tuned inertia systems, the Méridiens simply evaded obstacles before they became a problem.
But you couldn’t steer around an alien energy weapon, Alex thought.
Alex ordered. He felt an odd twisting in is head, a touch of vertigo that passed quickly. Julien blanked the view shield and screens, having explained that the twisting of space would overwhelm a human’s optical senses.
Tatia, on the other hand, looked as if she’d tasted something rotten and steadied herself against the bridge console. She regained control, straightened up, and flashed Alex a crooked smile. she announced.
Alex checked in with Terese who was monitoring the crew’s reactions. Two of the Méridiens, who knew from experience how hard the FTL transfer was on them, had preferred to be in a state of unconsciousness. The New Terran crew had a range of responses and Alex requested a list of people who would need to be debilitated for future transitions.
Alex queried Julien.
Eight days and seventy-three years, for my Méridien friends, Alex thought. He kept the crew busy, practicing emergency drills of all types. Up until now, the Méridiens had relied on their SADE and their stasis tubes in emergencies. Now, they were well aware of their vulnerabilities and took to the drills with a passion, especially since the GEN machines and additional supplies had supplanted their stasis tubes. It was of no consequence to the Méridiens. Come what may, not one of them wanted to use the stasis tubes again.
The crew practiced manual hatch operation, isolating ship compartments in case of decompression, operating fire suppression equipment, and the ship’s intercoms. They practiced operations with the department heads incapacitated, emergency medical procedures, and, most importantly, flight bay support.
* * *
Eight days and ten hours later, they exited FTL just outside the Oikos system. The crew was anxious to download vids from Julien, but there was little to see at this time. Alex waited on the bridge while Julien compiled sensor data from his active telemetry. Renée dispatched a lengthy comm to House de Guirnon, summarizing the events of their attack, rescue, and return.
Méridien was the fourth planet outward from their star. As they closed at 0.71c from outside the heliosphere, Julien reported no signs of the silver ships and everyone breathed a sigh of relief. He did detect extraordinary outbound traffic from Méridien’s orbital stations. Shuttles filled the sky traveling from the planet to the stations and back, and the vessels leaving the planet’s orbit were headed primarily on one of two courses.
“The holo-vid, Julien,” Alex requested. “Place the Oikos system in the center. Draw a red line from the system to the point of your attack. Draw a blue line for our direction of approach and add yellow lines to indicate the courses for the exiting ships.”
Their blue line was about one hundred degrees out of phase with the Rêveur’s original course, represented by the red line, and about twenty degrees off the system’s ecliptic. The yellow lines were nearly opposite to the trajectory of the red line.
“That can’t be a coincidence,” Alex commented to Renée and Tatia, marking the holo-vid’s opposing yellow and red lines.
“No, it can’t be,” replied Renée.
Julien sent to Renée.
Renée interrupted,
Alex turned the bridge over to Tatia and followed Renée back to his suite. He queried Julien on the quick response and was reminded that the Rêveur and all Confederation systems had FTL comm. In his cabin, Renée took a seat at the table, an earnest expression on her face.
“Captain, I’m concerned as to why I’ve received a private comm from my House. It’s voice only and will unencrypt after reading my brain pattern. It will play only once then the accompanying application will delete it. I’ll link with you so that you can hear it as it plays. Don’t communicate with me in any manner until it ends.”
She held up a finger to silence him and the message began. a man’s voice said,
Alex sat still as he replayed his copy of the message for himself. When it finished, he reached out for her hands. “I’m so sorry, Renée, for the loss of your father.”
She looked up, offering him a sad, tentative smile. Having heard that her brother was preparing to lure his people planetside, probably to abandon them so he could commandeer the ship they’d worked so long and hard to restore, his first thought had been for her and the loss of her father.
Julien broke into their conversation.
Renée retorted hotly.
Alex countermanded.
“Captain, my people are planning to betray you! You must turn around. Take the Rêveur and return to New Terra.”
“Renée, your brother is only one person.” he said, gripping her by the shoulders. “Your people are fleeing from something, probably the silver ships or whoever or whatever sent them. If that’s what’s happening, then we have a job to do. Sooner or later, this menace will come for New Terra, and my people don’t have the resources or tech to vacate our planet. And, not to put to delicate a point on this, but aren’t your people just running to the far end of the cage after the beast has crashed through the door?”
“You’d still defend my people without their support?”
“We need information. I say we go where we can find it. The question is what will you do?”
Her eyes narrowed as she thought furiously. “I’ll talk with my people on this ship,” she said with fierce determination then spun around and hurried from the cabin.
Alex strode toward the bridge, comming his First Mate. Once on the bridge, he included Tatia in his comm to Julien.
Tatia exclaimed.
Julien said.
said Alex. His implant picked up Renée approaching the bridge, and he admonished Tatia to wait before saying
anything.
Renée entered the bridge and said, “I’ve shared my brother’s message with my people, Captain.” Alex had relayed his unencrypted copy back to her as she left his cabin. “We are of one mind. The Méridiens of this ship will follow our Captain, wherever he chooses to go, whatever he chooses to do. We will not dishonor the sacrifices he and his people have made for us.”
Alex was grinning at Renée, who smiled back at him.
“You heard her, Julien. I need information.” he ordered.
“Ready, Captain,” the glee apparent in Julien’s words.
“I want you to operate in the open as the SADE of a House liner returning to the system. Gather all the intelligence you can on what this panic is about and summarize it. Where’s the problem? How big is it? How long has it been happening? And when you have that information, I want you to find us some allies. Some Méridiens have to be trying to fix this problem. Locate them for me. Until then, maintain course and acknowledge the House comms as expected.
“Tatia, you have the bridge,” Alex ordered. “Renée, may I see you privately?”
Alex commed the entire crew to bring them abreast of the dilemma. He heard angry rumblings from the New Terrans when he explained Albert’s betrayal, but they ceased when they learned of their Méridiens’ declaration. His plan, he told them, was to gather information on the nature of the panic, locate the danger, and, if possible, test their weapons.
In his cabin, he turned to look at Renée. “I need to understand what your decision means to you—refusing to obey your brother.”
“Our betrayal places us outside our House, and no one stands outside their House. It’s how order is kept.”
“Someone, sometime, must have disobeyed his or her House before you. What happened to them?”
“They are declared as Independents and are relocated to a system near here, where our government provides for them. They are allowed to live as they chose, without House allegiance, and form whatever industries they wish to support themselves, but there is no transport off planet for them.”