by Cain Hopwood
“Moss to operations.”
“Go ahead Moss.”
“I’ve got an audio capture from the target. It’s in a local dialect, and our translation software can’t make head nor tail of it. Can you run it by someone there?”
There was a couple of seconds before he got a response.
“… Moss …Repeat.”
“Repeat. I’m attaching an audio file for translation.”
“Copy that, awaiting file.”
Jon fed the package down the tac-link. He was used to these kinds of transfers happening almost instantly, but in this case the audio package was dribbling back to base very slowly.
He poked Skip, showing him the transfer. “What’s up?”
“There’s no line-of-sight comms back to base. Everything’s going through a low power, tight beam satellite uplink on top of that peak.” Skip pointed out a craggy mountain on the other side of the valley. “Gritz set up a high bandwidth laser link down to the coast from there. But with this weather, the relay is falling back to the satellite uplink.”
“So there’s nothing we can do?”
“Not without boosting the uplink power.”
“I don’t think we want to do that.” Jon looked across at the peak, his brow furrowed. “I’m pleased Gritz placed it all the way over there, but I wonder why the Marbelites haven’t picked it up yet. They didn’t take long to find Gritz’s observation post.”
Skip answered without looking up. “Tight beam, low power. Ninety five percent of the emissions energy goes straight up. They’re a real bitch to detect.”
Jon’s tac-link bleeped and a fuzzy, heavily compressed voice announced itself.
“Operations to Moss.”
“Go ahead.”
“Your upload… stalled… do anything?”
“Please repeat.”
“…Upload stalled, Can you…”
“Negative operations. We cannot adjust uplink power without risking operational security.”
The connection blipped and spluttered, sounding like a glitching robot. “…eading. What…power”
“Might be better messaging them,” Skip quipped. “The link is fading in and out; the buffers are maxed.”
Just as Jon tapped the message glyph, he noticed that his file transfer had started moving. Within a couple of seconds it was already half done. “Looks like we’re online again,” he said.
Jon’s tac-link blipped, this time the voice was crystal clear. “Operations to Moss, we’ve adjusted the uplink power for you. Things are flowing better now.”
Jon’s eyes widened. “Skip, kill the uplink. Kill it now.”
“On it.”
For a few seconds Jon thought they might have avoided detection. Then Murdoch piped up. “We’ve got a lot of movement in the compound. Two, no three fighters are in the air.”
Jon looked out from under the shelter’s roof just in time to see two of the three fighters scream across the valley floor and up the side of the peak opposite them. They were heading straight for the uplink’s location.
“That’s a fast response time,” Jon said. “Skip, kill all laser comms with the uplink. They might back track them.”
Jon saw a flash in the corner of his eye. Both fighters were now hovering just off the peak and hammering it with beams of searing white light. Seconds later the sound of tortured air and rock hit them like a wall.
“Holy fuck,” Skip said in a small voice.
Jon thought fast. There was a good chance this would trigger a round of searching. And given they were literally on top of the redoubt, it would only be a matter of time until they were found. The shelter they were crouching under provided cover for a casual visual, or infra red search, but it wouldn’t stand up to serious scrutiny.
“Guys, unfold your shovels, we’re going to need cover, and we’re going to need it fast.”
Jon pointed at the snow drift the shelter was nestled up against. “We’re digging a snow cave there. Look sharp.”
He attacked the wall of snow, digging as fast as he could. He’d dug hundreds of snow caves, mostly when back country skiing. But never with this kind of urgency. Fortunately the snow was light, and he could move huge shovelfuls at a time. First, he dug a narrow entrance tunnel down at forty five degrees for a couple of meters, then he started going straight into the side of the drift. After thirty seconds of furious digging he started to flag, so Murdoch took over.
“Just dig straight in now, then widen it out,” he said, breathing hard as he climbed out of the already sizable hole.
“What will we do with the shelter?” Skip asked.
“Leave it until we’ve got the snow cave dug. Once we’ve got enough space, we’ll bring everything in and lie low. Get ready to spell Murdoch, I’ll keep an eye out for searchers.”
Jon looked out across the valley. The two fighters were circling the now steaming peak. He was watching the two so intently that he didn’t even notice the cheery flashing indicator in his HUD; his file upload had completed.
— 33 —
Colonel Whitfield struggled to contain his frustration, and to be honest anger. They’d only just restored contact with Jon, and now they were cut off again.
“What just happened?” he asked with icy calm.
“We lost the uplink sir.” The console operator was a flurry of fingers as he scanned the last minutes and seconds of footage. He then popped up the operations log. “It looks like the system at this end misinterpreted Lieutenant Moss’s earlier communication, as a request to increase uplink power. The Marbelites must have detected the uplink once that happened.”
“It shouldn’t do that, at least not when in ET mode.”
The operator swallowed. “It wasn’t in ET mode sir. When Gritz emplaced it that whole area was considered friendly territory.”
“Doesn’t Gritz normally run all his gear in ET mode, regardless?”
The operator nodded. “Yes sir, he’s chewed me out in the past for not setting up that way. I can’t tell you why it wasn’t set up in ET mode this time.”
“Well, we all know how paranoid Gritz is, so when Moss restored the link, he wouldn’t have thought to check it.” The colonel took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “So, what do we have?”
“We have the file the lieutenant was uploading.” The operator did a quick review of an equipment list. “The relay the Marbelites took out was the only uplink capable relay in the equipment cache. But Lieutenant Moss still has line-of-sight comms relays. We will need to wait until the weather clears before they’re useful though.”
The colonel nodded. “Pipe the file he sent us to my briefing table, I’ll review it. Maybe it will contain something that will give us some insight into this whole debacle.”
He stalked across the floor back to his briefing room. It wouldn’t do to display too much frustration, it caused tension, and more mistakes were made. Once there, he reviewed Moss’s last recording. There wasn’t much to it. Two locals chatting on a balcony, interspersed with Moss’s commentary as he planted a bug on one of the creatures. The translation software didn’t pick up anything, so the two weren’t speaking any of the seven known Galingua dialects.
He tapped the Galactic com pod on his belt. It took a moment to respond.
“How may the admiral’s office be of assistance colonel?”
“Can you please send over a translator who speaks the local Marbelite dialects.”
“Please wait.”
It was nearly a full minute before the aide came back to him.
“I’m sorry colonel, there are no translators available.”
“Very well, when will one become available?”
“You misunderstand colonel. There are none available, because none exist. The Doyenne hasn’t hatched any for over fifty cycles as the Marbelites all now speak Galingua.”
“Which dialect do they favor?”
“I believe their vocal physiology favors Galingua Five.”
“Thanks, Whitfield
out.”
The colonel frowned, that was interesting; Galingua Five was one dialect his software should be able to translate. So if the admiral’s officers couldn’t help, then he’d have to find another way to make sense of Moss’s recording.
He opened a tac-link channel. “Sergeant Gowlett, report to the briefing room.”
He didn’t have to wait long, Kryspin Gowlett came at a run and saluted neatly.
“Sir.”
“At ease sergeant. I have a recording here that needs to be translated.”
Two or three different expressions passed across the sergeant’s face. “Sir? Shall I fetch a translator?”
“I’ve already tried that, but this is in a local dialect. The translators don’t speak it, apparently.”
“I’m not sure how I can help sir.”
“Not you, but do any Marbelites frequent your bar.”
The sergeant’s face went a very calculated blank. “What bar would that be sir?”
Colonel Whitfield leaned forward. “You always have a bar of some kind Gowlett. It’s against regulations, but I look the other way; I’d rather the men drink your rocket fuel, because at least it’s not actually poisonous. Unlike the stuff they’d try to brew themselves if you weren’t around.”
The sergeant relaxed visibly. “Yes, sir. Well, we do get the odd Galactic in there occasionally.”
“Any real locals, Marbelites I mean.”
“Yogis? They’re pretty rare.” The sergeant frowned. “There’s one that came in a couple of nights ago. He… She… It had a couple of whiskeys.”
“Weren’t you worried about poisoning it?”
“No, sir. Captain Lepok had analyzed one of the local beverages; they’re loaded with ethanol. Funny though, the Yogi did look a bit buzzed when it left.”
“Does this Yogi have a name?”
“Not that I could pronounce sir.”
Colonel Whitfield thought for a moment. It was tempting to just hand the recording over to the admiral’s office and let them handle it as any other piece of intel. But, they’d probably just put it in the too hard basket.
He scrolled back over the footage. From what he knew of Marbelite body language, the constant punching and touching the larger Marbelite was inflicting on the smaller one, was the equivalent of a human raising their voice. The two were probably arguing, and he had a hunch it was something to do with all the Galactic hardware they’d suddenly acquired.
He paused the recording. “Sergeant, I want you to ask around. Find out who this Marbelite is that visited your bar. It must have earned some trust if it’s inside the base. I want to know its background.” The colonel stabbed a finger at the images on the table. “Specifically, is it friends or enemies of these two? Because I want to know what they’re talking about. And it’s currently our best chance of finding out.”
“Yes, sir,” Sergeant Gowlett said, then saluted, spun on his heel and left.
For a couple of minutes the colonel debated with himself the wisdom of trusting a native with the translation. They’d had problems with native guides in Brazil, although in Afghanistan they’d been reliable; once they’d proved their loyalty. The Marbelites were a clannish lot, and to his mind more like Afghans than Brazilians. As long as this bar hopping Marbelite was not good friends with the mountain group, there might be a chance of getting an accurate translation.
The colonel smiled. Besides, he had a couple of tricks he could use to make sure he got a faithful interpretation.
— 34 —
Jon mentally prepared himself for the snow cave to collapse as another flyer passed over them; this one’s engine rattled his very bones.
“That one’s passing straight overhead,” said Skip. “And it’s a monster.”
Jon reviewed the feed from the remote at the end of the cave’s air-hole. All he saw was blue and gray metal sliding past the camera.
“They’ve got just about every aircraft and flyer out searching. I can’t imagine what a mob of hill clansmen would want with something that big though. It must be close to the size of the Aquina.”
“It’d carry a lot of Yogi’s,” said Skip.
“Well, whatever it’s for, it didn’t detect us.” Jon waited a moment watching the ship as it receded. “Actually, it looks like it’s coming into land, not searching.” He swung the camera, catching a flash of the angry setting sun as the ship eclipsed the orb, and then sunk into the valley. It was getting dark. They’d been huddling in the snow cave all day hoping not to be discovered.
“What do we do next boss?” Murdoch said in a slow drawl. “This cave is nice and cozy, makes a change from that drafty shelter, but we can’t stay here forever.”
“No,” Jon said. “Trying to leave now would get us captured for sure. We have plenty of supplies in Gritz’s cache for the moment. But they’ll only last so long.”
“So how long are you planning we stay?”
“Two or three days. I’d like to see if we can recover anything from the micro obs-drone we planted last night. And I’d rather not leave until we’ve re-established contact with base.”
Skip’s head popped up. “Those Yogi fighters trashed the only relay with a satellite uplink.”
“The satellite uplink is only the backup,” Jon said. “The main link is terrestrial laser, so any of the relay drones should be able to connect into the coastal uplink.”
“Once the fog clears, yes.”
Jon shrugged. “So we wait for the fog to clear.”
“It’s been foggy for the last seven days.”
“Yes, and in the meantime, we recover that micro drone and see what’s on it. We also need to work out what’s the last possible day we can leave given the supplies we have.”
Both men nodded. Jon continued. “Skip, what’s your plan for restoring the comms network here?”
Skip brought up a three dimensional relief map of the valley. There were several flashing red dots, Gritz’s drones. He pointed at the peak above the redoubt. “We’re here. Most of the network’s relays were hooked in using the uplink, which is now slag. We’ll need to do some reconfiguring, and we can’t see any of the nodes from here, so we’ll also need to place another relay somewhere between us and the network.”
“How about just above us?” Murdoch said. “The top of that spire would see the whole valley.”
Jon frowned. “That’s rather close. If it’s discovered…”
Skip zoomed and rotated the map. He pointed at a knoll a few kilometers up the valley. “I’d place the relay there. We can bounce a signal to it from here, and while it can’t see the whole network, we can reconfigure the other nodes as a mesh.”
Jon’s head moved up and down slowly. “And, it’s on our side of the valley, so we should be able to fly a drone to it safely. Do it.”
While Skip and Murdoch restored the communications network, Jon reviewed the supply situation. Things weren’t as dire as when they were stranded farther inland, but they weren’t out of the woods by any means. They had plenty of power for the drones, not that they could safely fly them with the relentless Marbelite patrols. There was also at least half of Gritz’s food and ammunition remaining. That amounted to a shade under forty man days of rations.
It didn’t take a mathematical genius to figure there wasn’t enough supplies to get them south of the no fly zone, and to safety. Especially because as soon as they left the mountains, the snow cover would disappear. And hiking they’d make much slower time than on skis.
The crucial thing was to ensure they had the supplies they needed to get far enough south, so the colonel could arrange a supply drop. Jon figured a week of skiing and hiking would do it. That left about five days they could linger here before they had to leave. Jon just hoped that the intensity of the searching reduced in that time, otherwise they’d be running the gauntlet just getting clear of the redoubt.
It took Skip and Murdoch the best part of an hour to emplace the communications relay. As soon as the network was running
again, Jon checked in on the balcony.
“No fresh footprints,” he announced after a close inspection of the balcony floor. “Our friends haven’t been back.”
A quick scan of the micro drone footage from inside the door, confirmed there’d been a little activity in the room that morning, but nothing since.
“I’ll keep monitoring this,” Jon said. “You two see about setting up the uplink back to base. As soon as this fog clears, I want to get through to the colonel.”
— 35 —
Colonel Whitfield pulled up a chair to the table the large, and rather scruffy looking Marbelite was seated at. The Marbelite’s fur wasn’t the pristine white typical of the natives, though the colonel didn’t know whether that was due to age or neglect.
“Mind if I join you?” The colonel said in his best imitation of Galingua Five. It was just a lower, raspier version of the Galingua four they’d been learning.
The Marbelite grunted, tossed back his drink and then waved the empty glass about impatiently.
“I get it,” The colonel said. “Hard to talk with a dry mouth.” With a look he summoned Sergeant Gowlett over, who poured a slug into the Marbelite’s glass.
“What will you have colonel?”
“Same please, Kryspin.”
The sergeant poured the drink then took his leave. It was late evening, and while most of the bar’s patrons had left, two hardy souls were trying doggedly to assuage the boredom of life on base with drink.
The colonel smiled to himself. How did these men get bored on a military base under an unknown star while surrounded by a variety of races that would have caused any number of earthly scientists a frenzy of excitement. Still, soldiers were soldiers. And deployments were deployments.
All things considered, apart from the exotic locals and locale, Marbel wasn’t all that different from some of the other places they’d worked out of. Except here, instead of a Brazilian contra, the colonel was trying to get help from an alien that looked like the lovechild between a wombat and a polar bear. His approach would be the same though, first he had to ensure that his information about this Marbelite’s background was accurate.
