Rescue Branch (Kinsella Universe)

by Gina Marie Wylie

  “That certainly sounds elementary.”

  “It is the first rule of medicine, as well: first do no harm. It is the first rule of a lot of things.

  “Why is it so important? Obviously, in a struggle you want to win. People have speculated since time immemorial about why we struggle. After Darwin, it should have been obvious, but a large number of people couldn’t take the obvious truth: life is a struggle. You win or lose in the game of life. A great many people have made it their purpose in life to prove that wrong.”

  The admiral grinned, “Proving the opposite, I’m afraid. They have to struggle to prove their point. Life, Lieutenant, is competition. We human beings have made the competition as easy as we can, smoothed out the rougher edges and made it easier for everyone to do well.

  “After the Ad Astra flew for the first time, I gave the President a report that has upset a lot of people. We found a DNA planet a long way from Earth. There is no way to tell if we seeded it, it seeded us, or if there are other planets out there that might have done it. Since then, we’ve found only life that is DNA based.

  “On every planet we’ve found, that life has evolved. Yep, it’s true: the universe is ruled by that principle of competition: first don’t lose. Life is designed to compete. It is fundamental to our natures.

  “And thus, at some point we are likely to meet other intelligent species. And when we do, great care will have to be applied. If they are less sophisticated that we are, we don’t want to destroy them casually. If they are more sophisticated than we are, we don’t want them to destroy us casually. We have to recognize that there will be competition.

  “My mother-in-law is one of those who won’t admit the fundamental nature of the universe to herself. That doesn’t make her a bad person, but it leaves her not able to see the big picture. Our leaders have to know that there is a big picture out there.

  “On Earth we have pathogens, parasites and a whole host of species that try to prey upon us one way or the other. Other planets haven’t had to deal with us before, and it’s probably going to take a while for them to develop human-hungry species. It will happen. But intelligent species -- they don’t need evolution to help them compete.”

  “You’re saying our first contact with an intelligent alien species may not be peaceful.”

  “You just stated the guiding principle to remember in our contacts with other species. ‘Trust but verify.’

  “There’s no reason why two intelligent species can’t share -- we do it all the time among our own. However, we still have people who want more than the share they can get without cheating or chicanery. There’s no reason to assume alien species will be any different. We will have to deal with small-scale issues -- and be prepared to defend against the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.

  “You, Lieutenant, are a very careful player. You don’t quite recognize it, but that doesn’t detract from what you are. You are tempted to leave the Fleet and follow the yellow brick road.

  “It’s tempting! I know it’s tempting! I feel the same siren song in my bones. But we need careful officers in the Fleet who know the first rule of competition: ‘Don’t lose!’ It isn’t the place we want to make an unforced error. It isn’t the place we can afford to make an unforced error.

  “One thing to think about, going back to that PROP fellow. You can force a victory with a king and a rook. It takes a mistake on an opponent’s part to win with anything less, and mostly it’s impossible. Things change if there are other pieces left. If he gains even one pawn on an exchange -- he can exchange out the game and get a draw. What you might think is a dooming handicap is merely a caution.

  “I still don’t see how it applies to me.”

  “Ah, cricket!” the admiral said, assuming a false Chinese accent. “Compete! Stay in the Fleet and compete! Do well! You may never meet another sentient -- there are those who think we are unique in the universe. They probably think that the Earth is the center of things, instead of one out of many.”

  “I want a family.”

  “And what happened to Kat?”

  “Kat and Anna are right. A kid could die on Earth -- they do all the time. If you let the possibility paralyze you -- it could paralyze you anywhere. People survive on hope, not fear.”

  Becky was nonplussed when the admiral took out a notebook and wrote something down. “Admiral?”

  “You have reached the exalted status among those who know me. You never need to use that word again when addressing me informally. I’m collecting Stephanie Kinsella’s ten thousand best quotes. ‘People survive on hope, not fear’ will be there. Towards the top, I expect.”

  “I don’t know what I want to do -- I’m being pulled in so many directions...”

  “And I intend to make it even more difficult. Survey missions are dangerous. And it’s a waste of time to send a ship out to check just one system. Southern Cross was going to survey a half dozen; now there’s another added and it’s not a big deal. Eventually survey missions will be a year or two. It’s not fair to ask people to leave their families for that long -- and then take them away again anytime soon.

  “And it would be crazy to send entire families on one ship!

  “So, I’ve submitted a proposal to create a Fleet reserve -- reservists go on a mission of six months or more, then get a year off for every six months they were gone. We can’t afford to lose people like you, Becky, because you decided to get married and have a family. But denying people families would be an even larger error.”

  * * *

  Becky Cooper had her feet up on the deck rail, idly moving the swing, but not letting it move freely. Anna came out and sat down next to her.

  “I never thought we’d be able to compromise on a place to live with you,” Anna told her spouse.

  “You’re an engineer at heart, my love. Practical, but no imagination,” Becky replied. She was in her forties, but not that different in appearance from when she’d been a lieutenant.

  “And what, pray tell, are you?”

  “I moved on, love. I expanded my horizons.” She waved where the dash-three planet hovered just over the horizon of Excalibur. The dash-three planet was a gas giant only fourteen million kilometers away. Since it was twice the diameter of Jupiter, it made a big splash in the local environment.

  The universe giveth and the universe taketh away. Excalibur was the size of Mars, but tidally locked to the gas giant. Except, that wasn’t the sun, and they had a somewhat erratic day. The gas giant was inside the water zone, and vast quantities of volatiles were evaporated away every day -- but it was a huge planet. It was estimated that the additional water would fall on Excalibur for several billion more years, creating a world-girdling ocean.

  Becky was content to worry about that -- in a couple billion years. As it was, the gas giant tugged on Excalibur’s “dash-side” where everyone lived, and even though Excalibur was roughly Mars-like in size, the gravity was a third of Mars’. Which made it something that Anna could manage just fine in, and at the same time wouldn’t doom their children not being able to visit a planet like Earth.

  As she thought that, Rick came dashing by in front of his mothers, hotly pursued by his three sisters, one older and two younger than he was.

  One of the sisters paused for a second. “He pulled Charlie’s pigtails!” she said in explanation, reversed course and headed back the way she’d come.

  “Who would have thought just naming her ‘Stephanie’ would make her so much like her godmother?” Becky griped for the thousandth time about her daughter. A few seconds later there were shrieks as Rick was nabbed.

  “I’m going to punish him,” Anna said. “I told him the next set of pigtails he pulled, I would make him grow pigtails and send him to school with them every day and let his sisters pull them whenever they felt like. I don’t like being ignored.”

  A spark glinted on the horizon, just for an instant. That was Becky’s ship, the Lewis and Clark. In a few days it would head back to Earth without h
er. Her hand fell on her abdomen. “Rick is going to have another, larger, surprise in seven months,” she told Anna.

  Anna grinned. “Ain’t test tubes grand?”

  “They will be if they can ever figure out how to warm them up before they use them,” Becky said acidly. “I nearly came out of the chair.”

  Anna laughed. “Cold test tubes; cold feet -- you’re always complaining.”

  She waved at the vista before them, “How can you ever get used to this?” There were almost always moons in the sky -- it was a news item every decade or so when the number got below five.

  “I recall you wanted me to pick a grand vista,” Becky said lightly.

  “I thought it would be metaphorical or poetical. I never imagined actually grand.” Anna waved to the east.

  “I have an unexpected trade delegation from Hermes. I have to meet with them tomorrow,” Anna continued.

  “I’ve been gone fourteen months and you expect me to object to a few hours?”

  “Well, I wasn’t happy. But a President’s day is never done.”

  “The only thing that would pry you away on my first full day back was bound to have the words ‘trade delegation’ in the explanation.”

  Becky paused. “I was looking though my mail. Is it true Kat and her family are thinking of leaving the Trojans?”

  “Eagle thinks it’s too settled. He says he loves the frontier.”

  “And what did Kat have to say about that?”

  “Something about how it had been years since she’d spaced anyone and she’d hate to get out of practice.”

  “Any idea where they’ll fetch up?”

  “Her daughter Addie is sixteen; she’s met a nice fellow named Lars Swenson. He’s off to a planet named Corinth. Kat says that it’s a heavy gravity planet on purpose. Addie is going to have to spend a couple of years in physical therapy -- and even then she might not ever be able to adapt to a 1100 centimeter gravity field.”

  “I’ve met her,” Becky said. “I’m willing to bet Corinth beats on the mat and gives up before she does.”

  “As near as I can tell, half the kids born out here are Steph’s god kids,” Anna said.

  “Not true. She looks on everyone out here as her children.”

  “And her daughter doesn’t even want to go as high as Earth orbit,” Anna mused.

  “Different strokes for different folks,” Becky told her. “If someone did that to one of my children...” she let the sentence go unfinished. Anna moved her hand and took Becky’s.

  “They didn’t. Although we did bring ours to an environment that has a marginally higher background radiation count than Earth. Still, none of them have six arms or wings.”

  “Steph is still a little crazy about wings,” Becky grumped.

  “You’re home for two years?”

  “They promised. You know what their promises are worth.”

  Anna laughed low. “I think it’s about time their mommies went and practiced telling bed time stories.”

  Becky laughed. “Oh, stories are what we’re going to practice?”

  Three girls, ranging from twelve to six, marched their brother up. “Here’s the pi-tail puller!” Steffie said.

  Anna grinned. “Becky, how say you?”

  “You’re right -- I think Rick has earned a respite from the barber’s chair for a year or two. His sisters can show him how to braid pigtails.”

  “I can show him how to braid them to his bed’s headboard,” Steffie said with venom.

  “I look forward to that, Steffie,” Becky said. Anna laughed and the round of laughs buoyed both parents beyond measure.

  Anna grinned. “Did I mention I have cookies in the oven?”

  Book II

  Stone Face

  CONTENTS

  1

  Away Mission

  326

  2

  Early Returns

  352

  3

  Stone Face

  366

  4

  Investigation

  384

  5

  Communication

  416

  6

  Revelation

  434

  7

  Body of Work

  464

  Chapter 1 -- Away Mission

  “Exit from High Fan at 2201 dash 33 point 12 seconds, GMT,” the navigator intoned.

  Admiral Stephanie Kinsella hid her smile. Like, someone hadn’t noticed they’d come off High Fan? The only mysteries were when and where, and only anal persons like herself and her navigator cared which tick it had happened on -- everyone else was just glad that it was over. The ‘where’ question was of more import.

  “Begin confirming our location,” she replied in her august majesty as commander of the Federation survey cruiser Valley Forge. “Commence active scans of the local area.”

  The navigator, of course, had begun to confirm their emergence point the instant there were stars to see again, while the sensor officer had begun to sweep the area with radar and lidar the instant they had returned to normal space.

  Space travel was inherently unsafe and the Federation Fleet had learned early that formal procedures reduced the number of errors and thus the number of deaths considerably. It was when you started taking short cuts and assuming things were nominal that you ran into trouble, so, even though their dialog sounded like a bad space opera drama on HD, she said the words and insisted that everyone else do the same.

  “We’re within our estimated point of arrival,” the navigator reported.

  That brought another near smile to the admiral’s face. A “point” that was two light minutes in diameter. On the other hand over thirty-two light years, it wasn’t bad navigation, either.

  “Very good, navigator,” Stephanie told her.

  “Major bodies located, sir,” the sensor officer reported. “There are two within an AU of the primary, one of which is a very large stony planet that is within the water zone. There is a gas giant about three times the size of Jupiter and another half that size at four and ten AUs. There are at least two more, Neptune-sized bodies, further out. We’re working on refining the orbits.”

  This was Stephanie’s third survey mission, although the first only counted as half a mission. These days the procedures were more thorough and rigorous than either of the earlier missions. This star was the third to be visited by Valley Forge on this mission.

  “Screen four, Admiral!” one of the sensor techs said, his voice excited. “That’s the dash II planet.” The image on the screen barely showed a disk, but the disk was blue slashed with white. “There is water vapor, oxygen, and nitrogen in the atmosphere.”

  They were four light hours away from the primary star of the system, “above” the plane of the ecliptic. Surveys at a distance could tell what plane the system rotated in, even if the detection of planets from a distance of more than a few light years still wasn’t possible -- all of the planet-finding telescopes had been canceled, as had all the new ground-based telescopes. They were no longer needed.

  So far no system had been found where the planets didn’t orbit the primary in the same plane as the primary’s rotation and, because of gravitational forces, there was a lot less debris out of the plane. Also known for some time was that stars rotated in random planes, without particular orientation to the plane the galaxy as a whole rotated in.

  “Navigator, prepare to drop us a light hour above the plane, directly above the dash II oxygen planet,” Stephanie commanded. “Let me know when the calculation is made and you’re ready to jump.”

  The sensor officer spoke. “Admiral, we’re getting some funny Doppler data from that oxygen planet.”

  “Funny in what way, Lieutenant?”

  “Well, I’d say the planet has a moon, except we should be able to see the moon.”

  Stephanie chuckled and spoke aloud, “Ah! An invisible moon! Outstanding!”

  Stephanie could see the man was looking confused. “Lieutenant
, another explanation would be that the moon is in an orbit with a very high degree of eccentricity and that said moon is currently occulted by the planet.”

  The sensor officer looked dubious, but Stephanie had already moved on. “Navigator, belay my earlier order. I want us a light hour beneath the plane.”

  “Aye, aye, Admiral,” the navigator replied.

  Two hours later they made a much shorter jump.

  Sure enough, there was a moon that had been obscured by the rather large planet. The moon was the size of Mercury in their own solar system. However, most amazing, was that the moon had an atmosphere.

  “Talk to me about that moon’s atmosphere, sensors,” Stephanie asked.

  “Admiral, again, this is an anomaly. The atmosphere is mainly methane, with strong ammonia and carbon dioxide components. It appears to be about four percent nitrogen. We can see a visible disk, so we can measure its diameter. The moon’s albedo is very high, more than point nine.”

  Stephanie pushed one of the intercom buttons on her console. “Planetography? Have you been following this?”

  “Yes, Admiral. We are seeing a recent capture. It’s too early to tell how recently it arrived, but it’s definitely a new arrival. Of course, that could mean anytime in the last ten million years.”

  “Keep me posted on your findings.”

  Stephanie Kinsella grinned. Well, if an invisible moon wasn’t going to be on the table, something from deep space was going to be almost as interesting.

  Of course, a light hour was too far away to see smaller objects -- say about the size of a house. A house that, if it slammed into the Valley Forge would write finis to the expedition and everyone on it.

  “Navigator, compute the fan well for the planet, then compute a course that will keep us four light seconds from it. I’ll want a course laid in to take us system south at once, if we detect debris. Sensors, I want every lidar and radar we’ve got hot and scanning starting right now. If there is any debris detected, I want us out of there at once.”