If the Bug is already hard to see, then it’s near the bottom. The guide is right. I could get hurt if I remain here. I hurry back to my people.
My heart is pounding. My fatigue is in the background, a steady thrum, but it has receded. The water and that little bit of food have helped.
Maybe I’m acclimatizing to the heat.
Or maybe I’m just ignoring it all because of the emergency.
Less than five minutes later, the Bug returns to the surface, coming up the way it went down. Leg after leg pops out of the hole, gripping the edge. Then the pod comes up, followed by the other legs.
This time, the Bug does not disengage itself from the opening. Instead, it leans the pod over one side and touches the pod to the ground. A door opens, and Seager steps out. She looks bewildered. She puts a hand over her face, shielding her eyes from the bright light. She is covered in blackness.
She stumbles as she steps away from the pod. Ilona heads over with water and food as Quinte comes out, then Kersting, who raises both of his arms over his head in triumph.
The Bug doesn’t wait. As the three of them step away from the pod, the door closes.
Then the Bug centers itself over the hole again, and repeats the entire procedure.
I let out a small sigh of relief. My people are going to get out. I’m not going to lose any team members today.
And considering how careless I’ve been with this underground work, that’s damn close to miraculous.
~ * ~
THIRTY-ONE
We travel back to the hotel in one of the undamaged hovercarts. I finally understand the practicality of these vehicles. Their relative thinness allows them to go around debris fields—and there are several debris fields throughout this part of Vaycehn. The hovercart’s pilot is very conscious of his passengers, never tilting the vehicle far enough to make us uncomfortable, but he still manages to maneuver around some dangerous areas.
Besides the pilot, there are only three of us in this vehicle. Bridge, Ilona, and I remained behind after the rest of the team went back to the hotel. Everyone got out of the cavern, but looking ragged. Even Mikk and Roderick, so seemingly indestructible below, looked almost ruined by the experience.
The tension, the heat, the physical labor had exhausted them like it exhausted me.
But my work wasn’t done. I needed to let the guides know we were heading back into the cavern as soon as we could.
Of course, they didn’t want us to. It quickly became clear that we would need permission from the city again, and I couldn’t tell them why. I hadn’t told Bridge or Ilona, either, when they started the negotiations with the guides. I didn’t want the news of the ship to leak to the Vaycehnese.
Bridge managed to convince the Bug operator that clearing the debris and inspecting the caverns for more damage was a priority. He did that not with authority and argument but with money.
This trip is going to cost us a lot more than expected. But it’ll be worthwhile—if the ship remains long enough for us to investigate it.
The guides don’t want us to go below for more than two weeks. That’s now long groundquakes continue after the first large one. But Bridge managed to get the guides to admit that such aftershocks only happened after a pure groundquake—one that occurred without an accompanying death hole.
The death hole quakes were usually one-time things.
Usually.
I know it will take a lot of argument and probably a handful of bribes to get us below. Bridge and Ilona are going to handle that, and I have told them to use their discretion.
We need to go below again, and the Vaycehnese shouldn’t stop us.
However, a repeat of today’s underground disaster could.
I’m not sure how many of the Six will be willing to go below again, and I’m not sure how to convince them.
I’m going to need to talk to the geologists and archeologists, and I’ve told Ilona I’ll need some Vaycehnese expert, someone who’ll help us prepare for disasters underground. At least, prepare better than we have been.
As we head back to the hotel, the damage from the quake becomes clear. Roads have collapsed. Some buildings have lost entire sides, while others remain standing undamaged.
The cloud of dust in the distance is, according to the hovercart’s pilot, from the death hole itself. It blew outward, sending debris a kilometer into the air. Some of that debris will float around for days.
I want someone from our team to figure out exactly where that death hole is in relationship to the underground room we’ve found. I want to know when the death hole appeared and whether or not it really was tied to the ship. I want a lot of things, and I’m too tired to ask for them.
We’ll need to have a meeting when we get back—I have to brief our people—but I’m not sure a meeting will be the most productive thing to do first.
First, we’ll need sleep.
My brain is mush. I’m so tired I’m shaking. I realize now how close we came to a complete disaster.
And yet, part of me doesn’t mind.
An intact working Dignity Vessel arrived in front of us. Intact. Working. It seems like a dream now, and I’m worried that when we get back the ship will be gone again.
We have readings from it, though. Readings and recordings, and I actually touched it.
I touched it. A living, breathing part of history. I’m still amazed.
The hovercart stops outside the hotel. We climb out—or rather, Bridge and Ilona climb out. I try, stagger, and nearly fall. Bridge catches me. His gaze meets mine.
He looks terrified.
“Are you sure you’re all right?” he asks me softly.
“Nothing sleep won’t cure,” I say.
But sleep is still a long way off. Ilona talks to the hovercart pilot, probably telling him when to return, something I would normally do. But I’m barely able to walk.
Bridge puts his arm around me, supporting me. Usually I hate to be helped, but his arm is comforting. I need the assistance.
We walk through the main doors into controlled chaos. The furniture has moved. Some of the potted plants that had been on the counters were gone, bits of dirt still littering the floor.
People are standing in front of the desk, the line five deep, the hotel employees looking frazzled. Many of the people at the desk are trying to check out. Others stand near the chairs, looking up.
I glance up too. Nothing has fallen, nothing looks different, but I’m not sure of that.
The elevators are blocked off, as are the mechanical stairways. We have to climb to the top floor.
The muscles in my legs scream with pain. They barely function. Twice my legs wobble so badly that Bridge has to keep me from falling.
Halfway up the stairs, Bridge asks, “What really happened down there, Boss?”
“Gravity,” I snarl. I’m beginning to hate gravity.
By the time we reach the top floor, I have decided that I’m not beginning to hate gravity. I do hate gravity. I hate it with every fiber of my exhausted being.
Bridge leads me to the door of the suite. “Maybe we should wait a few hours before we meet.”
Sensible, of course. But the team needs to know what they’re dealing with.
Or do they?
If they don’t know, they won’t let anything slip to the authorities in Vaycehn.
“Tell Ilona to figure out how to get us down there again as soon as possible,” I say.
Bridge is frowning at me. I want him to be taking notes. I want him to be nodding and agreeing. I don’t want him to look so disapproving.
“We’ll also need some training on surviving groundquakes, and we’ll need better guides, some that will be able to help us get out should another groundquake occur.”
“Boss, I don’t think that’s reasonable—”
“It is,” I say.
“You’re tired.”
I pull away from him and draw up to my full height. He’s treating me like a child. Like a stupid
child who doesn’t know her own limits.
“We made the discovery of a lifetime down there, McAllister,” I say. “We have to get back to it and quickly.”
“If it was there before, I’m sure it will be there later,” he says in that same damn patronizing tone. I’m grateful for that tone when he uses it with the Vaycehnese. I hate it when he uses it on me.
“It wasn’t there before,” I say, “and it might be gone in a few days.”
His frown grows. I get the sense that he doesn’t believe me at all. Damn the exhaustion.
“I need rest,” I say. “We all need food. Then we need to meet and look over everything the team brought back. We’ll need a plan. But first, you and Ilona need to get us back to that room.”
“When it’s safe,” Bridge says.
“As soon as possible,” I say. “If you can’t follow that instruction, then find me someone who can.”
He holds up his hands. “All right.”
He waits as I unlock the door. I step inside the room. It’s cool and dry, the air on me like a caress.
“You’re not going to tell me what you found,” he says.
“No,” I say. “It’s better that you don’t know when you talk to the Vaycehnese.”
“It’s that big?” he asks.
“Bigger,” I say. “Much, much bigger.”
~ * ~
THIRTY-TWO
Coop kept Lynda’s team on the bridge for a ten-hour shift while his ^^ team rested. His entire team was up and ready for duty within eight hours, but he ordered them to take some downtime. Dix went back to his cabin to get more sleep. Yash decided to have a proper breakfast, something she hadn’t done in weeks. Both Anita and Perkins went to the gym for some much-needed exercise.
He probably should have relaxed as well, but he wasn’t able to. His mind worked too hard. He felt like they were still in the middle of an emergency, which they were and they weren’t. Nothing actively threatened them—no attacks, no problems from the interior, no failures on board ship—but they still didn’t know where they were or what they were facing.
He let Lynda run the bridge while he inspected various systems. He spoke with the engineers repairing the anacapa. The damage there was extensive, and they couldn’t wait to get into the sector base to use backup equipment to make sure everything was running.
He didn’t tell the engineers that he wasn’t sure if the equipment was even in the base any longer, let alone whether or not it would be in any condition to use.
The other repairs were going slowly, but the mood on the ship had measurably improved. His crew usually didn’t like leaving the Ivoire, but this time, everyone he spoke to questioned when they would be able to disembark.
Being in foldspace, not knowing how long they were going to be there, or when (if) they would ever be able to leave the ship again had had an impact on everyone. They all wanted to leave the Ivoire for a short period of time, not because they wanted to visit the sector base or Venice City, but because they wanted to exercise their freedoms.
He understood that. If he were a more impulsive man, he would have left the ship already, inspecting the sector base and trying to figure out what had gone wrong.
But being impulsive was the worst thing he could do there. He had a hunch that his presence—the crew’s presence, five hundred strong—was an advantage he could keep from the outsiders. They had no idea how many people were on the Ivoire, whether or not there was anyone on the Ivoire at all, let alone the people who belonged on the ship.
He was going to maintain that advantage for a while longer, until he had a sense of the outsiders.
He stopped in the science labs last, just before he returned to the bridge. The science labs were a warren that ran along the belly of the ship. Each lab had protective walls so thick that nothing could get through. Each lab also had the capability of running its own environment separate from the ship, which enabled the scientists to run the occasionally risky experiment without endangering everyone else on board.
Coop inspected the labs twice a year, but otherwise he rarely went deep within them. He usually left the management of the labs to his chief science officer, Lay la Lalliki.
Lalliki was a tall, thin woman with large dark eyes and dark hair cut so short that Coop could never figure out what color it was. Her skin was pasty, and her gaze always seemed distant, as if she was never really looking at anything in front of her, always seeing something in her imagination instead.
Still, she was a superb officer, and despite her occasional vagueness with nonscientists, she was very good at handling her staff. The scientists were a temperamental lot, and many of them were annoyed at serving on the Ivoire instead of the Pasteur, the Fleet’s premier science vessel.
Fifty percent of the Fleet’s best scientists scattered among the regular vessels, like the Ivoire. The rest went to the Pasteur and engaged in cutting-edge research—or so he was told.
He never really paid much attention. He was just happy to have excellent minds on board his ship. The brightest minds were spread among the various ships for just the reason he was encountering here—sometimes the Fleet’s ships got cut off from each other. If all of the best scientific minds had congregated on the Pasteur, it would have done him no good.
He had brilliance here, and he knew he could rely on it.
Mostly the science team worked on their various projects, even while the ship was in a state of emergency. Not all of the geneticists, for example, needed to focus on foldspace or the current location of the Ivoire. They kept to their work and seemed content with it.
But several members of the science staff had been pulled to work on the sector base issue, as well as on those particles.
Lalliki managed all of it.
She met him outside the labs at his request.
She looked tired, the shadows under her dark eyes deep. He wondered if he looked as exhausted as well, then decided not to think about it.
“Lynda tells me that you think those particles are unbonded nanobits,” he said.
“We have no idea,” Lalliki said, sounding annoyed. “We have unbonded nanobits that we pulled from the airlock, but we have no idea if they’re ours. We discovered that the Quurzod weaponry had loosened some of the nanobits on the exterior after we entered foldspace. For all we know, they could have coated inside when we were doing the grab from outside the ship.”
He usually liked her caution, but on this day, he wanted some certainty.
“Those nanobits couldn’t be the particles we’re seeing, then?” he asked.
“Oh, they could be,” she said. “Or that could be something else. It’s just not safe to say.”
He suppressed a sigh, then nodded. Normally, at this point, he would have asked about some of the other ongoing work, but he simply didn’t have the energy or the interest.
Instead, he said, “As soon as I decide that we can enter the sector base, I’m going to need three of your people to investigate what’s going on. In addition to good minds and great researchers, I’ll need people who are good in an emergency. There’s the possibility that we could get surprised once we enter the base, and I want to make sure the scientists can respond with force if need be.”
Lalliki gave him a sideways look. “You think that these outsiders you’ve been monitoring could be hostile.”
“There’s that possibility,” he said.
“We could lose people, then,” she said.
“There’s that possibility, too.” He kept his voice soft. He understood her dilemma. Unlike other sections of the ship where the crew had redundancies, the science labs had individuals who specialized, and people who supervised them. Those who supervised often had better minds than those running the experiments.
A loss in the science labs meant the loss remained until the ship hooked back up with the Fleet. Even then, there was no guarantee. The loss of one particular scientific researcher might mean that research halted for good.
“I’ll have
names for you when you’re ready,” she said.
She didn’t complain. She didn’t argue. She knew how important this was. He appreciated that. He occasionally got arguments about his assignments from the medical staff. But Lalliki was much more professional than that.
He also knew she would struggle with the decision as she tried to figure out who would do a good job, who was good enough to back up the advance team, and who, at the same time, was expendable.
“Thanks, Layla,” he said. “I’m hoping this is going to be an easy one.”
She let out a small snorting laugh, the sound she made when someone said something too good to be true.
“It hasn’t been easy so far,” she said. “I don’t know why things should change now.”
Because I want them to, he almost said, but didn’t. He knew that what he wanted and what was going to happen were probably two different things.
But he wanted to hold onto the illusion of control a little longer.
Even though he had a hunch it was an illusion they could ill afford.
~ * ~
THIRTY-THREE
Five hours later, I’m at the head of the conference table in the big meeting room in my suite. The entire team has gathered. It’s a repeat of our first night—sort of. We’re all ragged.
I’ve had four hours of sleep that, while not refreshing, at least took the edge off of my exhaustion. Except in my muscles. I tried to get out of bed, and I could barely move. My upper thighs had seized up, my knees ached, and I couldn’t lift my arms over my head.
My second shower since I returned from that cavern helped, but didn’t make it completely better. I got some movement back. Now, at least, I can walk around the suite without groaning like a sick person.
In the past, I’ve gotten exhausted diving into wrecks, but my muscles have never seized up. Some of the team tells me this is normal for people who exercise in gravity. If so, I don’t see the point. As great as our discovery is, I am really beginning to wish it had happened somewhere in space, without all the hazards of sore muscles, groundquakes, and falling rock.
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