by Mel Keegan
“All gone,” Mark finished bleakly. “These worlds, these people, have been so completely obliterated, we weren’t even able to find a trace of who they were. They might have been humanoid. They might have been very different. I’m afraid we may never know.”
“I’m seeing a … a debris field,” Dario added. “There must have been something rather like Sanmarco Space City, or perhaps an enormous transit platform serving the big ships that connected the outer worlds. It’s just so much metal confetti now, too corroded to yield useful information.”
“Do we know when?” Vidal wondered. “How long since the Zunshu hit this system? Not recently, surely.”
“It’s hard to say,” Mark told him. “Based on information returned by the Aenestra, an educated guess would be about twelve hundred years. This devastation is … old. What’s worse is, this is probably not the only killing field. I’d be prepared to wager that if we dropped out at the next gate up the gravity express, and the next, we’ll find similar scenes.”
“Why?” Shapiro was pale in the instrument lights. “In the name of anybody’s god, why would a species intelligent enough to master gravity physics and fly transspace destroy every civilization they can reach?”
“Now, there’s the real question.” Mark’s brows arched as he watched the navtank image of a ruined world where a hemisphere had been smashed, the atmosphere torn away. Any work ever built there by an intelligent species was gone. “Our philosophers and physicists have been trying to answer this question since the pinnacle of your people’s technology was the musket, Harrison. I’ve never heard a really convincing argument.”
“No?” Shapiro closed his arms about himself, as if he were cold. “What was the most compelling answer your philosophers suggested?”
It was Dario who said, “Racial purism. The theory was, the Zunshu were so elitist they refused to share the universe with anyone or anything different from themselves. And, incidentally, I don’t buy it.”
“You don’t?” Vidal gestured at Midani Kulich, who hovered around the Resalq group, following their conversation with the aid of a handy. “Forgive me if I notice, you people have a history of racism. His brother – and yes, I know it’s the wrong term! – is a son of a bitch about it. And before you get all bent out of shape, humans have been a thousand percent more racist, sexist and prejudiced against every other religion, ethnicity and caste than Resalq ever were!”
“Oh, we know your history,” Mark said darkly. “And yes, we’ve had our elitists, like Emil Kulich. But as a species matures, develops, the old primal baggage is eventually left behind. Long before a race reaches the level of technology needed to fly transspace, prejudice, much less any tendency to commit genocide, would be left far behind.”
The argument was sound but a thread of doubt niggled at Marin. “And suppose the Zunshu didn’t develop the transspace physics.” Most heads swivelled toward him. “They use it,” he said slowly, “but suppose they were a comparatively young – dumb, prejudiced, violent – species when they stumbled over alien tech, the way we do. They researched it, figured it out. Factor in a big element of luck. They’re still driven by primitive, xenocidal urges, and transspace gives them a reach so long, they can kill at whim, maybe ten thousand light years from home.”
“Well, shit, it’s … interesting,” Vidal whispered. “Mark?”
“It’s been suggested,” Mark admitted, “and there’s no way to refute it, of course. It’s not impossible, but we think it’s unlikely. The level of technology required to even begin to understand gravity physics, horizon dynamics and transspace, is so high, we believe this level of science and xenocidal tendencies are mutually exclusive.”
“You believe?” Travers echoed.
Mark could only shrug. “There’s no way to be sure. You can be as faultlessly logical as a calculator, and still be dead wrong.”
As they spoke, Lai’a had left behind the ruined world. Ahead, the blue-gray sphere of the most terrestrial planet this system possessed had swelled to a globe in the navtank. Marin watched it grow as the old Aenestra data streamed beside it. It was Shapiro who asked,
“The Aenestra didn’t record any sign of Resalq escape pods?”
“No – but then, no one knew to look for them,” Dario said thoughtfully. “The ship stood off and performed a routine planetary survey, which doesn’t probe deeply enough to register small objects or individual life forms. Basically, if they didn’t receive at least broadcast radio from the surface, they’d assume the highest life forms were animals, or perhaps some kind of pre-industrial civilization – best left alone. On your world and ours, there was a damned nasty history of primitives being jeopardized by premature contact with technology.”
“And the Aenestra found nothing even as simple as radio,” Shapiro mused. “Meaning, if Resalq are survivors here, they’re off the air. And speaking of air, what does the Aenestra say of an atmosphere on this world?”
The planet was large enough in the navtank now for Marin to see land masses, mountains, small oceans, the high fleece of dusky clouds. The world looked as dry as Ulrand; not quite as arid as Celeste.
“There’s an atmosphere,” Mark was saying, “but it’s very thin – as you’d expect. The craters where at least two Zunshu devices erased the major cities are on the far side. The damage done to the ecosystem couldn’t have been any worse if a comet or large metallic asteroid had impacted. A global extinction event, leaving just enough of a biosphere for a few hardy forms to hang on. In similar circumstances, on devastated worlds, we’ve found insects, worms in the deep ocean, a kind of arachnid in the polar ice, hibernating ninety percent of the time and emerging – in fact, thawing! – for just long enough to accommodate a reproduction cycle before it literally freezes back into the ice.” He sighed over the planet. “Years of so-called nuclear winter, and then … this. Thin air, little liquid water.”
“And it’s cold, dim,” Vidal said quietly. “The people who were native to this mudball would’ve evolved to be comfortable in the cold and dimness under this sun, but – shit, Mahak, any Resalq who landed here must’ve wondered what they’d done to be dumped down here for their sins!”
And if any Resalq were here, Marin saw at once, they were absolutely off the air. Lai’a had been looking for any faintest sign of activity from the planet, but had not detected even a humble carrier wave suggestive of wireless telegraphy. The scan parameters reset as he watched and another search began, this time looking for concentrations of metals common to Resalq industry.
“It’s hunting for the pods now,” Tor growled. “We’ll slingshot around the entire planet, but … damn, Mark, it looks crappy from where I’m standing.”
“It does,” Mark agreed. “We always knew this was an incredible longshot.”
“It’s just debris, anywhere you look.” Jazinsky was running current data and the Aenestra feed, side by side. “Whoever these people were, they were all over their home system, mining, building, developing. At its height, this civilization would have been noisy, dirty – like Earth in the late twenty-second century, Richard, just before we broke out with the Auriga engine. Now … look at it.” The white-blonde head shook slowly. “You can see Zunshu paw prints everywhere. Their signature is easy to recognize. They mopped up everything, right down to orbital platforms, dockyards, any big ships that must have gotten out and played tag in the outer system. Damnit, Mark, this must be giving you the heebie-jeebies.”
“It is,” Mark confessed. “And I’m not the only one.” He was frowning at Midani Kulich, who had visibly changed color.
Lai’a was driving around the planet under power, scanning the inner system while it probed and imaged the world with a science platform more robust than the Aenestra’s. The bottom line was not long in coming.
“There is no sign of Resalq presence in this system, Doctor Sherratt, either current or previous, and no sign of indigenous intelligent life on Orion 521-D. However, I am able to detect very faint, anomalous energy
emissions from a point in the asteroid field beyond the sun.”
“Anomalous?” Tor echoed. “Meaning what?”
“Meaning,” Lai’a said coolly, “energy signatures which possibly indicate the presence of simple nuclear power cells. The Aenestra did not report this; the source is faint enough to be lost in the background interference off the Orion Drift. I detected it only because I am deliberately searching the system for such traces.”
“A hulk, drifting, decaying, engines corroding, toxic,” Dario guessed. “The Zunshu might even have missed one.”
“Or ruins on one of the asteroid mines,” Tor added. “A near miss implosion creates mayhem, decompression, total casualties, even though the facility still exists – again, toxic, corroding, decaying.”
“Worth a look?” Jazinsky wondered.
“On the way out.” Vaurien turned his back on the tank. “We’re leaving. If there were Resalq hanging on here, Mark, we’d have found them by now – it’d take machinery for life like us to survive here. The air’s too thin, the water’s too acid, almost all native life was obliterated in the Zunshu strike, so there’s no food, which means everything has to be recycled just to buy another week. A thousand years? Humans and Resalq wouldn’t last a thousand days without viable machinery. And we’d be seeing it right now.”
“Yes,” Mark said quietly. “Even if fugitives from the Ebrezjim did find their way here, their fight was probably over a long time ago. Or, if a handful of survivors eventually retired to the operable cryogen tanks, but didn’t dare set a comm beacon – well, they’ll keep. Another expedition will find them. It can’t be us.” He lifted his head, seemed to shake off some burden. “Lai’a, we’ll leave the system on a course to intercept this anomalous energy emission of yours. Low-level radiation, you say?”
“Probably only residue from an abandoned mine,” Lai’a warned. “Will I return directly to the Orion Drift?”
“We will.” Mark gave the whole company a tired smile. “Thank you for indulging us. There was only ever a faint chance.”
Lai’a was already moving, and Marin was unsurprised when it performed a micro-jump of just a few minutes in e-space before dropping back out on the fringe of a formidable asteroid field. Arago generators powered up at once; multiple objects were shoved aside as Lai’a drove through like any asteroid miner. The navtank was stygian, with just a handful of icons marking the positions of large bodies. This far from the dim sun, the cold was intense, the light levels so low, the vidfeed was almost unintelligible.
The visuals cleaned up with enhancement. Lai’a supplemented them with a graphical overlay, making sense of an image comprised mostly of grain and guesswork. Marin frowned over it – a minor planet, potato-shaped, too small for its mass to collapse it into a sphere, and yet –
“It measures just under 400 kilometers on its longest axis,” Lai’a reported, “and indications are, it is hollow.”
“What, all of it?” Travers was astonished. “That’s too big for the whole thing to have been a mine, surely.”
“Or to have just been a mine,” Vidal mused. “It might have started out as one … Lai’a, you getting a better look at that energy signature?”
“Stream the data to the tank,” Dario invited.
A moment later the information began to scroll, and Jazinsky swore softly. “That’s a boatload of residual heat, for an abandoned mine.”
The internal temperature of the hollow planetoid was around 2oC, just above the freezing point of water. Too cold for humans or Resalq to thrive, but likely comfortable enough for a species that had evolved on the world of an orange dwarf.
“Nuclear generators,” Tor said softly. “See, here? That’s … damnit, Dar, tell me this isn’t the signature of fuel-grade plutonium.”
“It is,” Dario affirmed.
“That stuff’s bloody deadly,” Jazinsky looked up at Vaurien. “We haven’t used it in centuries.”
“But it’s low tech, simple, and it works.” Vaurien looked from Mark to Dario and back. “The kind of tech you could scratch together in a hell of a hurry, with your back against the wall.”
“Or,” Vidal added, “maybe these people were still using plutonium reactors when the Zunshu came. If this asteroid started life as a mine, it might easily have been powered this way.” He gave Mark a dark look. “Lai’a, you reading anything like liquid water inside?”
“And widespread machinery,” Tor said sharply.
“Yes, on both counts.” Lai’a streamed the pertinent data to the tank. “Large bodies of liquid water, measuring in the millions of liters. The heat blooms of heavy machinery, low-level activity. However, I am also reading pressures and temperatures which are at odds with the requirements of humans and Resalq.”
“Microwave transmissions?” Mark prompted.
“No. But there are many thousands of heat signatures consistent with cabling,” Lai’a told him. “It would appear the occupants broadcast nothing on-air. Their generators are heavily shielded to prevent radiation spill. The hollow interior of the planetoid is deep under the surface, with native rock providing efficient thermal shielding. My sensors are at maximum to detect heat blooms of machinery and life, even at this range. From what we know, a Zunshu probe would not recognize these values.”
“Hiding,” Alexis Rusch said quietly. “They’re just hiding, and they’re doing it efficiently. The Zunshu wouldn’t detect this – it’s not loud or dirty enough. Mark?”
“Yes.” Mark was aghast, astonished, horrified, fascinated, at once. “You said you see the heat signatures of living beings, Lai’a. How many?”
“Approximately two million,” Lai’a said calmly. “Body temperature is too low, body mass is too small, for these to be Resalq or human.”
“Besides which,” Tor added, “the escape pods are one-shot. They’d head for the only planet with an atmosphere and liquid water – they’d have to. They couldn’t have known this existed, it’s too well hidden. And once they’d set down on the planet, they weren’t going anywhere without transportation … and I don’t think they’d get help from the natives. These guys went to ground so efficiently, they never came up again. Which is the only reason they’re still alive.”
“Someone got away from the homeworld,” Dario whispered. “Maybe the Zunshu missed a couple of the mines, in the outer system? Or maybe there were crews on a fleet of big asteroid miners. They went dark fast enough, hid among the rubble – cannibalized the ships, brought in resources and survivors from the other mines and outposts. Hydroponic food, recycled air and water, minerals from the rock itself, plutonium generators … twelve centuries later, they’ve built a decent population.”
Mark laced his fingers at his nape. “But there’s nowhere to go. Their home planet will need terraforming before its liveable again. They don’t have the technology to do the job.”
“They might,” Jazinsky argued, “if they’ve had twelve hundred years to sit here and think about this, develop whisper-quiet, clean industry. They just don’t want to do it because it’ll only advertise their presence to the Zunshu.” She leaned both hands on the side of the tank. “Lai’a, can you get into their computers?”
“Their computers are not online.”
“Not what?” Travers wondered.
“Not networked,” Rusch told him. “Not connected to anything. Discrete units working in isolation, or a few of them cable-connected. So, Lai’a, we can’t get anything out of their computers?”
“That is correct,” Lai’a affirmed. “Also, this culture broadcasts nothing. All information is cabled. This is wise, since Zunshu probes are known to monitor for comm traffic.”
“Can they passively receive signals?” Vaurien wondered.
“Structures do exist which could serve as microwave receivers,” Lai’a allowed. “Did you wish to make contact?”
The question effectively stopped the Ops room. The silence was profound as the Sherratts, Jazinsky and Rusch shared a mute conference, and Lai’a simp
ly waited. At last Mark said slowly,
“We could try. But you understand, the chances of being able to communicate will be small. We’ve no inkling of the morphology of these people, much less how their brains function – and these two factors govern the formation of language. We can’t even know if their comm works on similar frequencies to our own. It’s possible they wouldn’t even recognize a message from us as containing meaningful contents … and if they did know a message when they saw one, all it could cause is furore, at a time when we can’t stay here to offer anything from intelligent answers to assurances that the Zunshu won’t be back.”
The only outside contact this species had ever known, Marin thought, was Zunshu machinery and annihilation. If they were capable of identifying a message from an alien species, they were likely to prime every weapon they possessed, and open fire. Marin would not have blamed them.
“Leave it,” Vaurien decided. “We know exactly where they are. The Commonwealth can send an embassy, try fifty ways to make contact, decipher the language – God knows, terraform the planet for them if they can’t do it for themselves. But not now, and not us.”
“Agreed,” Shapiro said firmly. “Mark?”
“Oh, yes. This is unexpected, intriguing – and extremely dangerous. One could spend a whole career here! This is only the third intelligent species we’ve ever encountered. And most of us have one thing in common. We’re victims. We can return, leave a ship here for as long as it takes. For the moment … Lai’a, I believe we’re leaving.”
“Calculating a Weimann solution for the Orion Drift,” Lai’a responded. “Weimann exclusion threshold in 150 seconds.”
