by Richard Fox
“Target acquired, five degrees off starboard,” he said.
“Locked and ready to shoot, Sergeant,” Corporal Amanda Bello replied. There were chuckles along the deck.
The vessel accelerated, and then all Jack could hear was the wind. Jack was from Ganymede, used to living beneath the domes, and open sky gave him a sort of reverse vertigo. Still, he had to admit, at forty thousand feet, Aoiten lived up to its name, Blue Heaven. The surface, by contrast, could boil lead.
Jack heard the hatch from below open. Recognizing the footsteps of Dr. Walton, the research team leader, he didn’t bother to turn around.
“Rifle’s a little overkill, don’t you think?” Walton asked.
Jack knew better than to engage. “Standard procedure,” he replied.
Walking away, the doctor muttered something about the military presence here being only “standard procedure.”
Ignoring the jibe, Jack said, “Prepare to shoot.”
“Awww … yeah …” Agrawal drawled, and Jack could hear the grin in his voice.
Grinning himself, Jack tapped his left hand on the rifle’s sight. A red light at the bottom of the viewer lit to show the record was on and he was “shooting.” The new MP-560 rifles’ holo record was state of the art.
“My mama is going to love this,” said Bello.
“Getting it for my baby sister,” said Chang.
Jack began mentally narrating the scene for his son and Kathleen. Hey Isaac, buddy, got something to take your mind off your flu. See those tiny little green things that look like the whirligig your grandpa made you? Those are tiny plants that live up in the clouds. Yeah, they’re neat, but not the coolest thing here. As we get closer, you’ll see them—
A light flashed in the sights and the automated zoom focused on what looked like a floating whale, twice as large as the cloud-skipper, just beyond the “whirligigs.” Jack resumed his mental narration. There they are, Isaac. A pod of “zephies.” They eat the whirligigs. Aren’t they cool?
As the cloud-skipper approached, the zephies become clearer. Pink, orange, and yellow swirled around their giant bodies. Their skin reminded Jack of soap bubbles, or the sheen of oil on a puddle. The creatures had tiny, iridescent blue light sensors along their bodies and two large slow-blinking eyes on the heads. Their giant mouths never closed, and were eternally stretched into a blissful smile. Between their lips stretched cords that caught the whirligigs.
Another pair of footsteps approached.
Without turning, Jack asked, “Heya, Kip, what’s up?”
“Can I peek through your scope?” Dr. Kip Sanders asked.
“Not supposed to,” said Jack, slightly exasperated. Consorting with grunts like Jack, the deckhands, and the ore traders wasn’t winning Kip any friends among Walton’s crew.
“If anyone asks, say you needed my xenobiological expertise to help you determine strategic vulnerabilities,” Kip replied. There were chuckles among the Marines.
Without looking, Jack could tell Kip was probably bouncing on his heels, and Jack found himself smiling despite himself. Not releasing the rifle, he held it up so Kip could have a peek.
All of twenty-eight, Kip was nearly eight centis taller than Jack and had to bend low. “This scope is awesome!” Kip exclaimed with a little too much gusto. “Look, there’s twelve of them! Twelve … and I think those are juveniles.”
Jack looked back at the other scientists gathered on the deck. Walton was frowning disapprovingly at the younger scientist.
“Go confer with your buddies,” Jack said. Make friends with them, you idiot-genius, they’re your peers, he couldn’t say aloud.
Kip’s face hardened.
“You’ll get me in trouble, Kip,” Jack murmured, and the doctor relented and went back to his tribe. As he went, Corporal Bello’s eyes followed him longingly. Kip approached the researchers and sidled up to a pretty little grad assistant who blushed profusely. Kip was too skinny, with permanently rumpled red hair and a face full of freckles. He was almost literally the redheaded stepchild of the expedition, and all the women on the ship were still gaga over him… which Jack was pretty sure just went to show how little he understood women.
Walton’s eyes flicked between the grad student and Kip, and his expression soured.
Jaw tightening, Jack returned to his sights.
A few minutes later, one of the enormous beasts was casting a shadow on the deck as the cloud-skipper sidled up beneath it. The zephies were completely harmless. Tiny tail fins gave them some directional navigation, but not a lot. They weren’t capable of much more than floating on the breeze like the whirligigs, they couldn’t effectively ram the vessel, and even if they expelled all the helium from their levitation bladders and landed on the deck, their mass wasn’t enough to pose a risk.
Jack blinked as the cloud-skipper lifted closer to the great beast. The zephie was silent. By contrast, the humans on the deck were talking animatedly.
“How close are we getting?” someone asked.
“Close enough to touch it,” Walton replied.
A hush fell over the assembled group, researchers and Marines alike.
The little grad student said, “Oh, I didn’t think we’d really do that.”
“But like you said,” Walton replied. “It would be fun.”
“Fun? What the hell?” Kip interjected, stepping much too close to the older doctor. “We shouldn’t be touching them! We have no idea what affects we’ll have on it.”
Walton held his ground. “We have enough data to know we’ll have absolutely no affect on it.”
“That’s bullshit, and you know it,” Kip declared, gesturing wildly. Walton swallowed, and drew himself up a little straighter.
Jack’s jaw clenched. He suspected Kip didn’t realize he was being frightening or intimidating.
An older woman adjusted her glasses and looked nervously between the two men. “Dr. Walton, I have to agree with Dr. Sanders. We really haven’t been studying them long enough—”
“We have years of data, Emily,” Walton said.
“It’s not worth it,” Kip snapped.
Jack looked above his head. They were about ten meters below the creature now and had only a few minutes to figure this out. Lowering his rifle, he inclined his head to Bello, and without a word she took his spot.
Jack loped over to the researchers. “Dr. Walton, sir, I don’t think we should do it.”
“They’re harmless,” Walton said, his lip turning up into a sneer.
“I know that,” Jack said. “It’s the unknown unknowns I’m worried about here, sir.”
Kip nodded. “Yes, that.”
“Quoting Rumsfeld?” Walton retorted. “You’d probably rather shoot it.”
“No, sir,” Jack replied, keeping his voice even. His hand tightened on his rifle. “But in my assessment, we should not touch the zephie.”
“Zeppelin balaena,” Walton corrected. “And you’re out of order. This is a research mission and you’re under my authority except in the unlikely event of an attack.”
“I don’t … I don’t think I want to touch it now,” the grad student said.
Walton’s face turned red. Kip ducked just before his head brushed the creature’s abdomen. “Don’t do it,” he said. Walton threw up a hand, and let his fingers stroke the opalescent pink and orange skin.
“See?” he said, glaring at Kip, Emily, and Jack.
Corporal Bello said, “Oh my God.”
Jack looked up. Where the scientist had touched the zephie, its skin was turning black, and blackness was oozing from the fingerprints like India ink spilled on paper, rising up and around the creature’s abdomen.
Using his implant, Jack contacted the skipper’s pilot. “Take us down, now.”
“I’m only under your orders—”
“This is an emergency,” Jack said.
“It’s … It’s …”
A scream pierced the air; high, plaintive and terrible. It reminded Jack of Is
aac’s wail of pain when he’d been just a newborn and gashed by a flying shard of glass during a hover accident. Jack’s wrist had been broken in the same accident, but Isaac’s cry had been worse. He’d never felt such a jolt of pure terror, not even in combat. On the cloud-skipper, the memory came back, drenching him in sweat. It took him a moment to realize the scream was coming from the zephie.
“Gotcha, Sergeant,” said the pilot.
The craft lurched beneath Jack’s feet, and for a moment, he was weightless as it dropped, and then his feet reconnected with the deck. “Science team, down below!” Jack ordered.
The researchers ran, all except Kip. Above their heads, the other zephies in the pod converged on the one with blackening skin. Nudging it with their bodies, they added pitiful mewls to the first’s continuing scream. Where their bodies touched the first, the blackness spread to them.
The ship was less than fifty meters away when the first zephie went silent. Deflating in a rush of rank gasses, it disintegrated into hundreds of kite-sized pieces that began drifting to the surface like so much ash.
Kip had tears in his eyes.
Jack didn’t feel great, either.
Patting her rifle’s holo-record sights, Bello’s lips twisted angrily. “I got it. I got it all.”
Several other of his Marines nodded and patted their own weapons.
“I’m reporting him,” Kip said, his voice thick, and then he stormed below deck.
Jack released a long breath. He looked at Bello and the rest of his Marines. They were all younger than Kip. Wiping his face, he said, “When the inquiry happens, you tell them I ordered you to record this.”
Ganymede
1 YEAR, 11 MONTHS, AND 3 DAYS PRE-INVASION
In the waiting room of Orbital Inc., Jack’s comm chimed. Flipping it open, he saw a text from Kathleen. Isaac is sick again. Picking him up from daycare … Have you had your interview yet?
Not yet, Jack typed back clumsily. The index and middle finger of his right hand were in a med repair sheath; a casualty of working security on Ganymede’s surface level ice-depot.
I know you’ll do great, Kathleen typed.
Jack looked around the opulent waiting room. He wasn’t so sure. Thanks, he replied, and let out a long breath. This wasn’t how it was supposed to be. He was supposed to have retired from the Marines with full pension and picked up a job with the Ganymeden Police Department, not at a dead end at the ice depot.
After the trial, Kip had said, “I can’t believe they gave you an Other than Honorable Discharge.”
The guy had no sense for politics. Jack hadn’t been surprised. Someone with Walton’s incompetence didn’t rise in the ranks without connections. Walton’s connections hadn’t appreciated the publicity brought by a Marine holoing their fuck-up. Kathleen had said she was proud of Jack for sticking up for his guys.
Jack had supported them, and now Kathleen had to support him and Isaac.
Catching his shoulders slouching, he straightened. His eyes went to the wall of windows at the far side of the room. Ganymede habitation zones were under ice. Each zone had a large, central above ground dome. Made of ice, polyglass, and clear insulate, the domes were over a kilometer wide and had full-spectrum light orbs beneath their apexes. Terraces spilled out beneath the orbs in a funnel shape to parkland at the very bottom. Managed by Ganymede Agricultural, the terraces were lush, green, and beautiful. To have a window that overlooked a terrace was the height of luxury. To have a wall of windows …
How the hell did Kip think he could get a job at this place?
His eyes slid to his right. There were at least twelve men and women obviously surgically and cybernetically enhanced. They were all over seven feet tall, and the skin-plating on their exposed hands, necks, and faces glinted in the indirect orb light.
On his left were some people who wore suits, but much nicer suits than his. He heard one man whisper to a woman, “I’m asking if they had any cases of spontaneous combustion here.”
Jack felt the hair on the back of his neck prickle, remembering a conversation he’d had with Kip.
“You have to take the job, Jack. It’s for my aunt. She lives on your frozen ice ball, and she’s an astrophysicist,” the doctor had said. “You have to.”
He’d sounded so earnest, and it had made Jack uncomfortable. There had been all sorts of crazy, unbelievable rumors in the ‘Net about astronomers and astrophysicists self-combusting. Jack had quipped, “What, you think she’ll catch on fire?” just to keep the conversation light.
“That’s not funny,” Kip had said.
In the waiting room, the woman shifted in her seat. “There hasn’t been a case of spontaneous combustion in over a month.” She pushed some old-fashioned glasses up her nose. “And those were just rumors.”
Someone else said, “I heard it was biological warfare.”
“Nonsense,” said someone else. “There isn’t a virus that causes self-combustion.”
“The pattern was viral,” said the first suited man.
“I’m more worried about the people reported to be having psychotic breaks,” said a woman.
“Coincidence,” a man said. “And rumors.”
Jack shifted uneasily, remembering his conversation with Kip again. “My aunt Amelia had a nervous breakdown,” Kip had said. “She still has … episodes. We all agree she’s better if she stays where she is. She has her work, and her home on Ganymede. But I want you there. I know you’ll stand up if you see something wrong.”
Jack flexed the frostbitten fingers in the med sheath. Not that standing up had saved the zephies.
“You let go from Dome 5 Operations, too?” the woman sitting beside him asked out of the blue. She was nervously tapping at a data pad. “I don’t know what the founders think they’re doing,” she continued. “The population is growing, and the waiting list for immigration is almost ten years long … and they let almost the whole project team go.”
Dome 5 was the proposed new habitation area on Ganymede, and Jack blinked in surprise at the news.
She sighed. “I’m thinking that at three hundred years old, the founders finally have dementia.”
Jack tensed, feeling defensiveness on the founders’ behalf. Like all Ganymedens, Jack had been raised to revere the founders. He knew it was brainwashing, like his time in boot camp had been brainwashing. But like the indoctrination in boot camp, Jack didn’t feel it was a bad thing, at least not after seeing the other inhabited worlds. “Singapore in the stars but self-sufficient!” had been the founders goal, and they’d more than succeeded.
“Jack Morita,” someone called.
“That’s me,” he said to the woman, relieved to be able to walk away.
“Good luck.” She smiled. “Unless you’re applying for the thermodynamics position.”
Shaking his head, he turned and saw a young man waving to him.
Jack followed the guy down a maze of corridors and past the Human Resources department. The man reached a door with a placard that said, Jacob Hsu, Vice President, Astro-Engineering … which seemed really not Jack’s department. A light on the guy’s data tablet blinked, the door opened, and his guide held out a hand to indicate Jack should enter. Jack did so, and the guy left without a word, door sliding shut.
The office had its own dome directly overhead, and the light was momentarily blinding. As his vision returned, he saw a man sitting at a desk, his face unreadable in the glare; an elegantly dressed woman with sharp eyes leaning against a bookshelf; and a man with skin- plating covering his neck and the sides of his face all the way to his temples. His hair was too long for hand-to-hand combat, Jack thought. Armor made people cocky.
The room had green walls, and at the far side of the room a holo of Habitat One, an orbiting space station, was projected, along with projections of the founders looking much younger than one hundred years.
“He doesn’t have skin-plating,” said the woman, sounding surprised.
Jack straightened; this
was a wasted trip. “No, ma’am. Most First Contact Federation Marines don’t wear the stuff. It’s heavy and ups the metabolism, requires more food and water rations—costly during space travel—better to just put your armor on and take it off.” He didn’t mention the ongoing med costs and complications the things saddled wearers with for life.
She waved a hand. “He has a friendly face. He’s not tall or imposing. He’s fine by me as long as you don’t turn him into a human insect; it will upset the doctor.” She looked accusingly at Long Hair.
Jack’s brows furrowed. “Insect” was the less than polite term for skin-platers.
“Hmmm,” said the man at the desk. Jack assumed he was Hsu. Jack could see him a little better now. Dark hair, broad shoulders. There was a silence that stretched too long, and then Hsu said, “Well, Mr. Morita, I can offer you 100,000 GR to start.”
Jack felt his spine go rigid. It was three times his ending salary in the Marines, and five times what he was making at the ice depot. What were they going to ask him to do? Be military escort for above-ground research at the height of meteorite season?
“I guess that depends on the job,” he said, wondering why he was asking. What were his options?
“You’ll be guarding a person of importance,” said the woman carefully.
“Would that be above ground, miss?” Jack asked.
“Doctor Inez,” she corrected. “And it would be in her personal residence, in Dome 2.”
No more hour-and-a-half commute to the Herschef refinery’s ice depot … his fingers twitched, as if his body was reaching for the opportunity.
“It is vital she be protected,” said the man at the desk.
Long Hair and Dr. Inez exchanged glances across the room.
Frowning, Long Hair looked at Jack. “We have the outside covered.”
“By insects,” put in Dr. Inez.
“But we need people on the inside as well.”
Feeling a chill that wasn’t the room’s temperature, Jack’s eyes went to the holo of Habitat One. “With all due respect, if this person is so important, why not just move her to one of the orbitals?”
