by Bob Blanton
“Now that is interesting,” Admiral Michaels said.
“That’s what I thought. I assumed you would like to know. I don’t see how the incidents are related, but it is a strange coincidence, sir.”
“Yes, it is. Thank you,” Admiral Michaels said.
Day 9 01:10 CKT -- 19:10 ACST
“Uncle Blake, you are you ready?” Catie asked as she flew, prepared to replace Liz in overwatch so that Liz could replace Blake in dogging their wayward Fox.
“Definitely, I’m bored to tears.”
“Any change in course?”
“No, he’s on the exact same course as he was yesterday.”
“No pop-ups or jogs?”
“No. Liz, have you noticed anything up there?”
“No.”
“Catie, what are you thinking?” Blake asked.
“I’m thinking it’s time to try and bump him,” Catie said.
“Okay, you and Liz both come down and line up in front of him. Let’s see if he tries to dodge,” Blake commanded.
“On our way.”
Catie and Liz dropped onto the water and let their Foxes slow until they could dive. Then they dove down in front of Blake and their quarry, proceeding on the course at their top underwater speed. Once they were synced up on course, Catie was positioned ten meters to the right, and Liz was ten meters to the left.
“We’re synced up,” Catie said. “Slowing now.”
“He’s not moving,” Blake said. “Maybe he fell asleep.”
“It’s been over three days,” Catie said. “He’s been sleeping before. What’s changed?”
“ADI?”
“I can detect no changes,” ADI said. “He last came up to recalibrate his course fourteen hours ago.”
“That’s a big gap,” Blake said.
“Yeah, he’s been popping up every eight to nine hours,” Catie said.
“Let’s see if we can bump him,” Blake said.
“I’m sliding over,” Catie said. She continued to let her Fox slow down as she eased it over next to their target. “Extending the arm … contact.”
“I have control,” ADI said. “I detect no life signs on the Fox.”
“Where’s Commander Centag?”
“He appears to be in the pilot seat,” ADI said. “It seems he is dead.”
“Get the Foxes back to the Sakira,” Marc broke in. “We’ll figure out what’s going on there. Dr. Metra and I will meet you there with the Lynx.”
Day 9 14:10 CKT
As soon as the Lynx and the Fox were in the flight bay and the water level was below the port, Marc and Dr. Metra were in the dingy rowing over to the Fox.
“Hey, you closed the door on us,” Catie snapped.
“Use Flight Bay One,” Marc retorted. “We’re busy here.”
“Yes sir,” Catie muttered in a surly tone.
“I heard that!”
“Sorry.”
“ADI, raise the canopy on the Fox,” Marc commanded. “Any signs of life?”
“Canopy rising, Captain. And I still do not detect any life signs.”
“Can he mask his life signs?”
“It is unlikely,” ADI replied.
As the dingy bumped up against the Fox, Dr. Metra stood up, grasped the edge of the cockpit, and looked inside. “He’s not masking them,” she said.
“Dead?”
“Very.”
“How?”
“His oxygen mask is off,” Dr. Metra said.
“That would explain it,” ADI said. “I detected no cabin oxygen when I established contact. He had cut off the cabin air when he submerged the plane. I assume it was to prevent me from doing the same or introducing a sleeping gas into it.”
“You could do that?” Marc asked.
“Yes, Captain,” ADI replied. “There is a failsafe sleeping gas canister to deal with potential problems.”
“Couldn’t you have injected it into his air supply as well?”
“Normally, I could, Captain, but he seems to have modified the system.”
“Okay, so why shut off his own mask?”
“I have no data; however, he did so twelve hours ago.”
“That explains the lack of maneuvering, and his not popping up to recalibrate,” Catie said over the comm.
“ADI, continue to evacuate the water,” Marc said. “We’ll deal with him here, then decide what to do.”
“Yes, Captain.”
Day 9 15:10 CKT
“Dr. Metra, what do you make of the situation?” Marc asked. The team was meeting in the conference room in the captain’s cabin aboard the Sakira.
“I don’t know. The commander and the three he released with himself were the main trouble makers on the Sakira,” Dr. Metra explained. “I would assume if he had other allies, he would have brought them along. With the four FX4s he expected to find inside Flight Bay One, he could have taken seven others.”
“That makes sense,” Marc said. “What did you find on his body?”
“I did not find the other half of the communication relay,” Dr. Metra said.
“So, it’s probably on Paraxea with his allies,” Marc suggested.
“I would assume,” Dr. Metra said. “There must have been more to his plan than just killing the captain.”
“Do you think that the rest of the crew are safe?” Marc asked.
“Do you mean their health, or if can you trust them?” Dr. Metra asked.
“Whether we can trust them,” Marc answered.
“I’m not sure. We are far outside of standard protocol. Although with you as captain, I’m not sure what they can do. Maybe we should ask ADI.”
“ADI, given our current situation, are there any circumstances where a member of the crew could violate my orders and try to communicate with Paraxea?”
“No, Captain. They would need your permission to access the external communications.”
“Are there any circumstances where they could trigger a protocol so that you would communicate with Paraxea?” Marc asked.
“I am sending the standard updates to Paraxea now, Captain. The crew would not be able to change how I do that,” ADI said.
“Are there any circumstances where you would communicate more to Paraxea than you have currently been instructed to by Dr. Metra or me?” Marc asked.
“That would only occur if all members of the command crew were dead as well as the doctor,” ADI said. “There are five of you now.”
“Is there a way to prevent that?”
“Only by ensuring that there is always a living person to assume command,” ADI said.
“I’m good with staying alive,” Blake said.
“Huh,” Marc said, “I am too. Okay, so back to the crew. What would the advantage be of bringing them out of stasis?”
“There are one hundred forty-five remaining crewmembers,” Dr. Metra said. “ADI, please list the officers and their qualifications.”
“Yes, Doctor. “There are eighteen officers left in stasis: four intelligence, officers who are essentially analysts; the chief engineer; two pilots; the propulsion engineer; the communications engineer; the robotics engineer; the weapons engineer; the reactor engineer; two hydroponics engineers; the science officer; the navigator; the electronics engineer; and the environmental engineer, and the chief steward.”
“That is a nice collection of knowledge,” Marc said. “But explain the chief steward.”
“The chief steward is responsible for life inside the Sakira. All the cleaning, the cooking, food supplies, the hydroponics and environmental systems, and all non-ship-critical maintenance.”
“I see. That makes sense. That is a lot of talent.”
“Yes, it takes a lot of specialized knowledge to run a starship. We also have a contingent of civilian scientists.”
“ADI, please list the scientists,” Marc asked.
“There is an architect, a chemist, an energy scientist, an environmental scientist, an anthropologist, an astrophysicist, and a p
hysicist,” ADI iterated.
“And the crew?” Marc asked.
“ADI, please list the crew for ship operations first,” Dr. Metra instructed.
“There are six ship pilots, eight weapons specialists, eight propulsion specialists, ten electronics technicians, four reactor specialists, four maintenance chiefs, four communication specialists, and forty crewmen,” ADI listed. “Under the chief steward, there are four environmental specialists, four nurses, two cooks, a supply chief, and twenty maintenance stewards.
“Nice skill sets there,” Marc said. “Are you familiar with any of them?”
“I am friends with the chief steward, the anthropologist, and the astrophysicist. I’ve worked with the environmental scientist on a previous mission,” Dr. Metra said. “I don’t like the chemist, but the energy scientist seems like a nice person. The other crew members I’m familiar with only as regards their medical conditions.”
“Okay, that’s good for now,” Marc said. “I think we’ll postpone the decision about waking the crew for now.”
“What do we do with Commander Centag?” Marc asked.
“I’ll take care of the body,” Dr. Metra said.
“What else?” Marc asked.
“Well, the Chinese certainly know something is up,” Blake said. “They’re pretty good at containing secrets, so it might not go any further. They don’t have a reason to connect it with us, but as soon as you unveil the new Lynx, they’re going to assume this was us.”
“But what can they do?” Liz asked.
“Nothing specific, I don’t think,” Marc said. “But they’re obviously interested in the technology, so they might come looking for it.”
“We’ve been preparing for that eventuality for six months,” Kal said. “I think this just steps up the timeline.”
“Could they get more aggressive?” Blake asked. “Come in with commandos instead of spies?”
“That is something we need to be prepared for,” Marc said. “Kal, I want a plan in two weeks.”
“You’ll have it.”
Chapter 37
Board Meeting – April 1st
Samantha gave Marc a quick kiss as she entered the meeting room. “You look better.”
“What do you mean by that?” Marc asked.
“Every time I’ve seen you in the last three weeks, you’ve looked exhausted. You’ve been terrible company whenever we went out, but now you look like you just got back from vacation. You didn’t go somewhere without me, did you?”
“I’ve been here the whole time,” Marc said. “Must have been working too hard.”
“Yeah, I’m sure that’s it,” Samantha said, not believing one word of it.
“Hello, Catie,” Samantha said. “Where did you guys go in the Mea Huli?”
“We sailed over by Australia,” Catie said. “Liz and I wanted to work on our tans. I think Uncle Blake was hoping to find a sheila,” she laughed.
“No doubt,” Samantha laughed with her. “Hey, Kal, when did you get back?”
“Yesterday,” Kal said. “We had a good training exercise down in Perth.”
“Drink much beer?”
“Our fair share,” Kal said.
“Let’s bring this meeting to order,” Marc said as Blake finally arrived.
“Hey, don’t look at me,” Blake said. “I’m five minutes early.”
“Remember, Dad always said you were late unless you were fifteen minutes early,” Marc said.
“And I followed that advice dutifully while I was at home and during my career in the Navy. But now I’m trying to enjoy this island paradise and not let work ruin it for me.”
“The meeting,” Marc said. “Where are we on construction?”
“We have the Sky Princess here, so we’re moving the construction guys onto her. We’ve started with the ones on Arutanga first; hopefully, that will relieve some of the pressure that the locals are putting on Sam.”
“It’s already helping,” Samantha said. “They can at least see the light at the end of the tunnel.”
“Quad one is complete. We’re putting the building up as fast as we can. They’re all mostly prefab, so it’s going fast. We can come back later and replace those we want, but this gets us off the ground the fastest.”
“That’s great,” Marc said.
“Our first Lynx came off the line yesterday,” Blake continued.
“Hey, that was my announcement,” Catie hollered.
“Payback is hell,” Blake said.
Catie stuck her tongue out at Blake, “Just remember that,” she muttered.
“Oops! I forgot that flows both ways,” he laughed. “Anyway, back to construction. Our polysteel production is really accelerating. Once we open the facilities on Delphi City, it will really start picking up. We’re going to need to double that workforce,” Blake said, giving Kal a look.
“Sam?” Marc said, trying to move the updates along.
“For those of you who have been out of touch for a while,” Samantha said, “we have closed the deal with Herr Johansson. He’s ecstatic about the scooters, and we’ll have the first prototype here on Rarotonga in two days.”
“I’ll bet you can’t wait until we’ve moved to the city,” Blake said.
“Yeah, then at least I’ll get a little more leash to move about,” Catie gave Liz a mean look, thinking about the last week of virtual imprisonment.
“How are we doing on patients?”
“We are keeping the facilities full,” Samantha said. “Price increase didn’t do anything to the demand.”
“Liz?”
“Just keeping my head above water,” Liz said.
“Catie?”
“Well, as you heard from Uncle Rat Fink, the first Lynx is off the production line. It’s passed the first round of ground tests with flying colors. It will be ready for test flights next week,” Catie said. “I’ll be the test pilot.”
Marc rolled his eyes. “I was kind of assuming that you would be. Sam, will there be any problems with the government on that?”
“She’ll need to have an adult copilot,” Samantha said. “But since she’s taking off and landing on Manuae, I don’t see any issues.”
“Sounds like you’re good, Sweetie,” Marc said.
“Dad!” Catie groaned.
“I mean Cer Catie,” Marc corrected himself. “And?”
“We’ve submitted the design info to New Zealand to begin the certification of the airplane. Once we have verified its flight worthiness ourselves, we’ll begin that process.”
“That sounds good, anything else?”
“Not much, just helping out the car design team; ADI’s doing most of the work.”
“Fred?”
“Just tracking our orders. Johansson just put in a pretty big one for batteries,” Fred said. “He’s asking about the fuel cells, but we still don’t have a design ready there.”
“It’s coming,” Liz said. “Dr. Nikola is very confident she’ll have something within the month.”
“Okay, with that, I’m going to close the meeting,” Marc said.
◆ ◆ ◆
“Here we are,” Blake said as he gave a flourish and pointed to the Sky Princess. Marc had asked for a tour, and Catie had decided to tag along. Of course, that meant Liz had to come as well.
“Our very own cruise liner,” Catie said. “Is it really seaworthy?” The ship did look a bit worse for wear.
“It made it here, didn’t it?” Blake said, “and you can see that it’s still floating.”
Marc laughed at Catie. “Are the modifications done?”
“Yes,” Blake said. “It was mostly repairs; we didn’t need to modify much. Putting that new septic system on her was the biggest effort. Now even Dr. McGenty wouldn’t complain.”
“Good thing,” Marc said. “That man can really try one’s patience.”
“Yes, but he was a good sport and tried out the toilet prototype for Tomi,” Catie said.
“You couldn’t
manage to flush him down it, could you?” Blake asked.
“No, but Tomi did suggest we see how the treatment plant would process his body,” Catie replied.
“Yep, that’s our Dr. McGenty; he can make enemies faster than a speeding bullet,” Blake said.
Marc laughed. “Enough already, let’s check our ship out.”
Blake led them up the gangway onto the ship. “There’s a pool on the upper deck, the guys like that. The women even come over once in a while to use it.”
“What’s the matter with the beach?” Catie asked.
“I don’t know, I think it has to do with the bar and the lack of sand,” Blake said. “It’s a saltwater pool, so no chlorine sting and also no children or surfers.”
“I guess that would be attractive,” Liz said. “I might have to try it out.”
“I’ll go with you,” Catie said.
“Ahh, I’m not sure I like that idea,” Marc said.
“We’ll come when they’re all at work,” Catie said.
“Don’t worry, I’ll keep her safe,” Liz whispered to Marc.
Marc shook his head and sighed. The problems of being a father with a teenage daughter. “Let’s see what the accommodations look like.”
Blake led them down the passageway. “Here is the basic room,” he said. “We converted them all to singles and put new beds in them. We converted the suites into small public spaces so the guys can watch TV in small groups or play cards.”
“Cards?” Catie asked.
“You don’t think you’ve burned your bridge there yet?” Marc said.
“You never know,” Catie said. “They might not have wanted to admit they lost to a girl.”
“Maybe, but for now, why don’t we stay focused on the tour,” Marc suggested.
“This is the main dining room,” Blake said. “It’s set up like a cafeteria; basically, there’s food here all the time. Since the guys work a rotating shift, five days on, two off, we’ve got crews at work seven days a week. There’s always someone here on their day off.”
“Okay, you have to feed them,” Marc said. “How about if they want something different?”
“We have two restaurants on the ship that they can go to and spend their own money,” Blake said. “So far, they’ve been pretty full every night. There are also two bars and two nightclubs.”
