Johnny Winger and the Hellas Enigma

by Philip Bosshardt

  He knew the lifters and rescue cats would be mustered and on their way in less than ten minutes. They were only about twelve klicks from Southlocks as it was. In a pinch, they could have probably hiked back on foot.

  It galled Duncan Price to have to phone in an emergency to PubSec. UNISPACE agents were supposed to be able to take care of themselves. But he had civilians with him and you couldn’t be cavalier about that.

  The real question was what now? Given the evident power of that thing on the platform, the Frontier Corps inspector had no trouble believing Dao had somehow been—what had Nygren called it?—displaced, or worse. The Chinese meteorologist, or whatever he was, could well be atom fluff now, or lost in some weird dimension of spacetime, if Nygren could be believed.

  Trouble was, he couldn’t close the case on Dao without some kind of proof. Price shook his head, plodded back over to where the others were standing at the base of the hill.

  None of this made any sense.

  The rescue force consisted of two marscats, specially equipped to assist stranded expeditions. For long distance rescue, PubSec maintained a small fleet of lifters and hoppers, able to traverse the whole planet in a few hours.

  Price took some heat as he helped load their gear onto one of the cats.

  “What gives, Detective?” It was Gilchrist, the hard-ass from Texas who was Rescue One team leader. “You drive your cat off a cliff or something?”

  Price knew he had it coming. “She just needs a little tune-up, Gil. This is what I get when PubSec mechanics work on her.”

  The ribbing went on for a few minutes, until all the expedition gear had been transferred.

  Gilchrist and Price did a quick walkaround of the displaced marscat, looking for anything they might have missed.

  “Seriously…what the hell happened? She looks like you rolled her down the side of a mountain.”

  Price shrugged. “I’m not sure I understand it myself. Nygren—the Green Mars fellow over there with the blond beard—has some kind of theory. There’s a machine over that ridge—we marked it with beacons—that somehow generates quantum states. Twists spacetime. Green Mars says it’s even affecting their asteroid…pulled it off course. It went off a few hours ago. Jeez, Gil—“ Price shook his head at the memory. “—it was like a quake and a dust storm at the same time. Whatever that thing up there puts out, it blew right through the cat. When the dust settled, well…you see what happened. We’ve got to report this to UNISPACE. And somehow figure out how to shut that mother down. It’s shielded too,” Price added. “Barrier nanobots. Bad ones. I’m not equipped to deal with that. We need something stronger.”

  They set off for the half hour ride back to Mariner City. It was late and the sun was low.

  As the two marscats rolled down out of the Tectonic Hills and picked up the hard packed dirt transway back to Southlocks, Greg Nygren put in another call to the Green Mars Ops center. He wanted to find out the status of course correction for 2351 Wilks-Lucayo. What he heard made his face turn pale.

  Nygren shut off the link. “She’s not responding to our commands.”

  Hamil was grim. He rubbed his chin nervously. “Impulse motors firing okay?”

  “Maybe there’s an obstruction in the feed system,” said Gellar. “Remember what happened when that conveyor motor got fried…dust shorted it out.”

  Nygren shook his head. He sipped at some juice, blotting up a spill in his lap as the marscat bounced over a few ruts in the road. “Telemetry says the motors are operable. The feed system is working. The catapults are getting enough raw material and they’re firing at the right speed. We’ve got momentum transfer we can measure. But…” Nygren shook his head. “…it’s having no effect. Wilks is not changing course.”

  Hamil said, “Then something’s holding it in position, countering our impulses…that thing we found up in the hills?”

  Nygren was thoughtful. “Farside may be right…this could be the first practical application of string theory. I can’t explain it any other way, can you? Imagine it, gentlemen: a technology so advanced, it can somehow manipulate the underlying structure of spacetime, make whole worlds change course, rearrange the planets to suit any need…and hold them in their new positions against impulsive maneuvers, maybe even counteract natural gravitational forces. Incredible….”

  “Who could do such a thing?” asked Price. “Who has the capability, the knowledge, the resources to prove out such an idea and make it work?”

  “I don’t know,” said Nygren, “but I’d sure like to meet ‘em. If Green Mars could get their hands on such a technology, we could re-make Mars in a single lifetime. Hell, we could remake the whole solar system.”

  They reached Southlocks and pulled inside the main enclosure. As they de-suited, Price reminded Nygren, “Whatever happened up in those hills is classified. Keep it to yourselves. This is still an ongoing investigation.”

  He didn’t have to add: the case file just got a whole lot bigger.

  Frontier Corps maintained a small field office in a low brick bungalow on Face Cut Street, lower ward. It was a modest structure, with a bakery on one side and a hobby and craft shop on the other. Canyon Head Park was a block east, with its vast Perspex dome revealing the tortured chasm of Candor in the fading blood red light of a Martian sunset.

  Price went upstairs to his office and linked in to the local Net. He had two reports to make, one to UNISPACE and another one, perhaps sanitized a bit, to his immediate colleagues at MarsFed.

  Price knew both reports would take some thought. How could be explain it? How could he explain what had happened?

  Ostensibly, he had made the trip outside to see if the disappearance of the Chinese meteorologist could be explained by retracing his last known steps, looking for evidence PubSec might have missed. After encountering what Nygren had called a quantum state generator and witnessing what it could do to their marscat, the detective was inclined to report that Dao had somehow suffered the same fate.

  It fit some of the facts. But where had the platform come from? Who built it? Who put it there? Price went over the expedition logs from Dao’s last trip again and again, looking for the tiniest piece of nuance, something he might have missed before. He was acutely aware that once he pressed SEND, the report would be public knowledge in minutes. There were no secrets on Mars.

  He would need to be specific and factual in whatever he wrote.

  One hour later, the detective was satisfied that the reports would suffice. He sent the sanitized version off to MarsFed, two levels up on Central Street. No need for the politicians to know all the gory details. It was a bland summary and nothing more. He attached a link to Green Mars’ directories, c.c. to Greg Nygren.

  Let the eggheads explain it to the politicians, Price decided. He had better things to do.

  The UNISPACE version of his report would be the complete one. All the details were there, even video and still imagery of the wrecked marscat. That ought to open some eyes. He pressed SEND and sank back in his seat, fatigue washing over him. The files would go automatically to PubSec here at Mariner City. No doubt the local cops would be buzzing like an angry hornet’s nest over being upstaged by Frontier Corps.

  The files would also be squirted back to Earth. UNISPACE was part of the same Paris-based bureaucracy as UNIFORCE and the rest of the UN’s enforcement arm.

  Who knows, Price thought. Maybe even UNSAC himself would see it.

  Price knew the response time would take some minutes, perhaps several hours. UNISPACE wasn’t known for speed. Besides, Earth was on the other side of the Sun…any comm signal would take nearly an hour to get there anyway.

  He decided to venture up to top ward. There was a little dive called Marty’s—a sandwich shop, bistro and bar all in one—out near the dome. Great sub sandwiches, veggie wraps, a decent selection of local brews—and you couldn’t beat the view.

  With the sun settin
g over the rim of Candor Chasma, Price figured he could use a toasted goat cheese wrap and a beer to take the edge off.

  He figured it was only a matter of time before the real storm hit.

  He got back to the office an hour later. To his surprise, he had a reply…UNISPACE must have responded almost instantly. Had they even read his report? He clicked on the icon and the video popped up.

  He didn’t recognize the respondent but the screen annotation said WINGER, MAJOR J., UNQC. That meant Quantum Corps. Price had heard of the unit; they’d been instrumental in fighting off some nanobotic threats in the past. Didn’t they run BioShield too?

  Quantum Corps wasn’t UNISPACE, so Winger might not be responding to his report. He raised the volume bar on the screen.

  “…your report at 1530 hours my time. It was forwarded by UNISPACE-Paris to Table Top. I wanted to contact you directly, Inspector. The device you described is very similar to one I encountered here, only a few days ago—“

  That got Price’s attention. The detective sat up abruptly in his chair and watched as WINGER, MAJOR J., UNQC, proceeded to describe an experience that made the hairs on the back of Price’s neck stand up.

  “…place called Shavindra, …Kolkata, India…couldn’t penetrate the barrier bots…nearly lost my entire detachment—“

  Price’s mind was racing and he only caught snatches of Major Winger’s words. What the hell was happening? Whatever it was, it was happening on both Earth and Mars. It didn’t make any sense.

  Dao Wen-Hsien goes missing, after becoming a suspect in a grisly accident down south, in Hellas Basin. Green Mars’s asteroid gets jerked off course. And now some weird contraption out in the Candor canyonlands goes off and bollixes up spacetime throughout the solar system.

  I’d better play this video again, Price decided. And listen more closely.

  As he replayed the file, one thing came through loud and clear: he and this Quantum Corps major needed to meet, in person. Time delays made communicating with Earth tough, almost impossible.

  Either he comes here or I go there. And indeed, as Price watched the replay, the Major had the very same thing in mind.

  “…to compare notes, Inspector. I’ll send my request through channels, but for now, I’d like to see all your case files…on this fellow Dao, on your encounter with the generator…everything—“

  Price sank back in his chair and stared at the ceiling. Earth was up there somewhere, several hundred million miles away. So were the answers he was looking for. Major Winger had a few of them. Price figured he had a few himself.

  This case was getting curiouser and curiouser by the moment.

  It was high time for Frontier Corps and Quantum Corps to start working together.

  CHAPTER 5

  U.N. Quantum Corps Base

  Table Top Mountain, Idaho, U.S.A.

  September 14, 2080

  Jurgen Kraft glared back at General Wolfus Linx with what he hoped was an appropriate level of disgust.

  “With all due respects, sir, closing this base…closing down Quantum Corps, is not a viable option. We’re right in the middle of a major operation. We’ve made substantial progress in locating Red Hammer’s new base and it’s only a matter of time before we shut down this big generator. We can’t pull the plug now…not when we’re so close to breaking this case.”

  Wolfus Linx—CINCQUANT-- had a great mane of white-streaked hair and a thick gray moustache. With his iron military bearing, he was the image of Teutonic rectitude. He was secretly proud of the nickname he had earned—behind his back: the Prussian Lion.

  “General Kraft, I understand your feelings. I feel the same way. But Bosch says the directive comes right from UNSAC. Orders are orders. Red Hammer’s demands include shutting down Quantum Corps. If we can’t get control of that asteroid, we’ll have no choice but to do what they say…the alternative is—“ Linx shrugged, shutting off the debate. “And how close are you, Kraft…how close really are you…to solving this case? I read the after-action reports from Kolkata. Your boys got their asses kicked by those bots. Didn’t even get close to that generator.”

  Kraft felt the vein on his forehead starting to throb. He swallowed his anger. His boys had at least managed to isolate the problem. Now it was just a matter of the right tactics, the right equipment, to get back in there and finish the job.

  “I’ve ordered Major Winger to stop by, General and give me an update. He’s been working with engineers from Autonomous Systems Lab—we even dragged old Doc Frost…that’s Dr. Irwin Frost…out of retirement to help out. In fact, 1st Nano has already developed a list of options for a follow-on mission to Kolkata.”

  “I want to see those options…get me that list by 0900 hours, Kraft—“ Linx stopped in mid-sentence.

  Major Johnny Winger had just appeared at Kraft’s office door.

  “Reporting as ordered, sir.” Winger saluted both officers. His throat suddenly went dry. What the hell was CINCQUANT himself doing here?

  “Winger…come in, come in. I just informed the General of the mission tactics you’ve been working on. He’d like a quick rundown.”

  “Yes, sir…ah, Colonel Kraft, General Linx—“ Winger held a small data chip in his hand. “Ops just monitored a communication from Mariner City. UNISPACE forwarded it to us. It was addressed to me and to you, sir. Just came in via SOLNET.”

  “Mariner City…Mars?” Kraft took the chip and inserted it into his reader. The scowling, rather haggard face of Inspector Duncan Price came into view.

  “We ran the file several times in Ops,” Winger reported. “Just to authenticate and validate. It’s real. This fellow Price is an inspector with UNISPACE. Frontier Corps. He’s based at Mariner City. He’s got some interesting news for us.”

  The three of them listened to Price’s report. Imagery and video footage of the quantum generator in the hills north of Candor made Kraft and Linx sit up straight. When the files had been run and Price’s verbal report was complete, Kraft popped the chip out and turned it over and over in his hand.

  Linx rubbed his moustache wearily. “You may be right, Kraft. This thing suddenly got a hell of a lot bigger.”

  Kraft’s mind was racing. “We need confirmation of effects, Winger. Get with Nakamura at Phoenix Station…see if GreenMars confirms the effects on the asteroid from here.”

  Winger reported, “Already done, sir.” He handed over another data chip, which Kraft inserted. Kaoru Nakamura, chief engineer Earth-side for the GreenMars project, came into view, reporting the latest results from 2351 Wilks-Lucayo.

  The news wasn’t good.

  The three of them watched Nakamura’s report, with its simulations of asteroid motion through the gravity wells of the outer solar system, with sinking feelings. When the Japanese physicist was done, Kraft angrily popped the chip out. It fell to the floor. The Table Top commander didn’t pick it up.

  “So this fellow Price thinks you and he should meet in person,” Kraft muttered. “But I need you here, Winger. We’ve got our own case to work…”

  “It looks like the two cases are related,” Linx observed. “Are there any more of these damned things around? Farside could help us with that.”

  Kraft knew he couldn’t show any hesitation or lack of initiative with Linx looking over his shoulder. He’s not going to have any reason to shut down Table Top on account of me.

  “Get back to this detective, Major. I want all his files on the case down here...General, can you run interference with UNISPACE for us? I don’t want any turf wars or bureaucracy interfering with my investigation at this point.”

  “You got it, Kraft. I’ll speak with UNSAC or Bosch right away, get a directive from Paris they can’t ignore.”

  “Thank you, sir.” The more he could involve CINCQUANT in the case, the less time the General would have to dwell on shutting down Quantum Corps. “Winger, get me a list of tactical options for
assaulting that temple complex in Kolkata. And get me a list of mods for ANAD you and Doc Frost are working on too. If I have to send you to Mars, I want someone else from 1st Nano to carry on here…we’re probably going to have to pursue two investigations in parallel now.”

  The atomgrabber had already been considering who could work back-up if he left Table Top.

  “Sir, I’d like to suggest someone for backup…someone I know could do the job if I’m in the field.”

  Kraft retrieved the Nakamura chip and inserted it to replay the report. “Who’s that, Major?”

  “ANAD, sir. Specifically, 3rd Swarm ANAD. He’s more than ready for some important command duties.”

  That brought things to a complete stop in Jurgen Kraft’s office. An uneasy silence lasted for a full five seconds.

  Linx cleared his throat. “That’s a rather strong statement, Major. The integration of ANAD swarms into our outfits hasn’t gone that smoothly. What makes you think these bugs are ready now?”

  Winger had already given the question some thought. “Just this, sir: the ANAD swarms have been working with our platoons on tactical sims and maneuvers for some time now. We’ve trained them in our procedures and they’re a key part of any operation we conduct…some ops we can’t do without them.”

  “So what’s your proposal, Winger?” Kraft asked.

  “Sir, that ANAD…that is ANAD 3rd Swarm be commissioned…if that’s the right word, sir…as a platoon leader…as a command element.”

  “Command element…are you crazy?” Kraft growled. “We don’t even know which end is which when it comes to these swarms. How do you suppose nanotroopers will react when receiving orders from a …fog bank?”

  Winger licked his lips nervously. “Sir, our troopers work with ANAD everyday. They know what he…or they, can do. With all due respects, sir, it’s not that big a step. And it just might help make the transition to a fully integrated force go more smoothly. As far as getting along with ANAD, it hasn’t been a big problem for us.” That wasn’t entirely true, Winger knew, but he didn’t want to concede Kraft’s point.