by B. V. Larson
“A pity,” I said, but despite the anger I was feeling, I realized I’d at least managed to finally engage her in a real conversation.
I saw her out. When she’d gone, I up-ended the half-empty bottle of sparkling wine. The nerve of the woman! She’d pushed and pushed until I’d been forced to push back.
I was left wondering what she might have demanded next if I’d agreed to stop seeing Chloe. She’d said something about Grantholm girls—maybe she’d have asked that I start courting one of her own daughters.
They were not ugly women, but they had questionable track records in terms of romance. All of them had been married more than once—unions which hadn’t lasted. They were pushy like their mother, twice my age, and my cousins by blood. The entire idea was preposterous.
I soon fell into a deep sleep and dreamt of women in black gowns demanding things from me. In the morning, I awoke groggy but determined.
A shower and a careful morning routine improved my mood dramatically—but I was still determined. Lady Grantholm wasn’t going to treat me like an errand boy on my own ship any longer.
-8-
It took a full week to find the exit out of hyperspace. In the end, we’d managed to map out the polynomial curve and plotted our way to our destination. Only a nine-degree variation in our course was required to hit the exit squarely—but after travelling a billion kilometers, such a small variance made a great deal of difference.
“Steady on,” I ordered. “Helmsman, you’re speeding up. I ordered no acceleration on the final approach.”
“Sorry sir,” Rumbold replied. “I must have missed that point in the briefing.”
Frowning, I looked at him in surprise. “Rumbold? How did you get back into that chair? Where’s my pilot? Did you do away with her?”
“I was simply next on the roster, sir,” he said without looking over his shoulder at me. “She must have stepped out and called for a replacement. Perhaps she’s not feeling well. Hyperspace can do that to people—or so I’ve heard.”
“Hmm,” I said thoughtfully. Once had been a coincidence. Twice… Rumbold must have pulled something to get his rump back into the pilot’s seat on both the entry and the exit from hyperspace.
Slightly annoyed, I considered ordering him below decks and summoning my regular pilot. After a moment’s further consideration however, I dropped the idea. After all, he’d done well when we’d entered the bridge initially. Technically, that made him the most experienced living pilot in Star Guard when it came to steering a vessel through the dangerous transition into hyperspace.
What concerned me now, however, was our successful exit from the ER bridge. We had no idea where we’d end up. If rapid course adjustments were to become suddenly necessary…
“All right,” I said. “You can stay in the pilot’s chair today. But if any more roster changes are made on future occasions, I’ll bust you down to swabbing decks with a power-mop.”
“Understood, Captain,” he said with visible relief.
“Time, Yamada?”
“Displaying it now. Our calculations should be correct to within a two-second span.”
One of the alarming things about hyperspace was the tendency of the entry and exit points to shift during flight. They were hard to find in the first place—and they were moving targets.
We watched as the timer ticked down. Now and then it froze for two or three seconds, recalculating. At other times it jumped forward a few heartbeats. It was disconcerting.
“Requesting permission to increase speed by five percent, Captain,” Rumbold said. “We’re going fast enough to puncture the barrier, but we’ve got very little margin. If it shifts away just as we reach the point of no return—”
“Permission denied,” I said smoothly. “I want to be able to maneuver when we come out if we have to evade something.”
“Understood, sir.”
After watching Rumbold for a few moments thoughtfully, I looked over at Zye. “Lieutenant, I want you to keep an eye on our pilot. If he fails to perform in some way, you have my permission to intercede and take over his station.”
“A wise precaution,” she said.
Rumbold muttered something I didn’t catch. He kept his hands on the controls and his eyes on the screens.
Then suddenly, the clock surged forward. It went from forty seconds to seven. Everyone on the command deck gasped.
“There!” Rumbold shouted. “A huge shift!”
“Yes—but the exit moved closer to us,” Zye said. “So far every shift has brought it closer.”
“You can’t count on that…” he muttered.
There was no more time for talk. We hit the barrier a few moments later and broke through into normal space.
The process of exiting hyperspace was somewhat more jarring than what one experiences when entering. I think it was mostly a psychological thing. Going from a universe full of stars to a dark vacant place was less alarming than switching from blankness and quiet into the swirling maelstrom of our home universe.
What riveted the attention of everyone on the deck was the looming presence of a vast, orange-colored star. It was close—too close.
“Prepare for evasive action,” I said.
“Which way, sir?” Rumbold asked.
My crew was already trying to come up with answers in this regard.
“Durris, give him a course,” I said, trying to sound calm. The gamma radiation readings were already on the rise. The star would cook us if we got too close.
My XO had the in-flight duty of operating tactical navigation. That meant he was in charge of deciding our short-term flight path. He worked with his screen making rapid calculations.
“The star’s corona is venting from the northern pole,” Yamada said from the sensor boards, “I’d recommend we dive south.”
“Sir, there’s a planet-sized body in that direction,” Durris said. “It appears to be artificial in nature.”
They all looked at me. Already, I could feel a gravitational tug. We were within the star’s reach. Soon, that would make maneuvering more difficult.
“Dive south,” I ordered Rumbold. “Head for the artificial construct. It’s probably located there for a good reason.”
The ship swooped sickeningly. Rumbold wasn’t sparing any power. Fortunately, Defiant had plenty of it.
The next half-hour was harrowing, but we managed to get ourselves onto a stable flight path. We skirted the star, decelerating continuously. Our target was the strange structure that sat locked in a synchronous orbit below the star’s southern pole.
By the time we felt our situation was no longer immediately dangerous, we’d made a series of discoveries about the alien system.
“There are no records of this star system in our Earth documents,” Yamada said with certainty. “To our knowledge no one from Earth has ever been here before.”
“How far are we from the Solar System?” I asked.
“About thirty-five light-years,” Durris answered for the navigational team. “As far as we can tell, this is Gliese-32, a star system marked for exploration, but which was never definitively scouted before the Cataclysm.”
“Well, start recording people,” I said. “Sensors, what do we have?”
“It’s an odd system by any measure,” Yamada said. “There are apparently no large planets. There are only asteroids and planetoids. The star itself is mildly unstable. It’s ejecting gas in regular intervals—serious flares.”
That concerned me. It was a storm of flares that had jumbled our network of ER bridges more than a century back in our star system. If this star was unstable, wouldn’t it possibly disrupt the local bridges in this region of space? The most alarming thing about that possibility was the thought that we might be trapped here, unable to backtrack through the same route to Earth.
I mentioned none of this to the crew. They were smart people, and they could interpret the data as well as I could.
“I assume the artificial planet is built
in that location for a reason?” I asked.
“Yes,” Yamada answered. “It’s in the Goldilocks zone, well-placed for liquid water to form on the surface. Even more significantly, it seems like the flares never travel in that direction.”
Nodding thoughtfully, I got out of my seat and began to pace. “Makes sense. They came here and found a dangerous star. With nowhere to land, they built their own home in the one spot that’s calm within this stormy system. The question is: why didn’t they keep traveling? Surely, there must be better systems than this one to colonize.”
“Sir?” Yamada asked me, “I’ve got the standard greeting file queued-up. Should I begin broadcasting to the artificial satellite?”
My lips compressed tightly. This was a big decision. “I’m going to have to ask you to hold that option for now. I think we should know more before—”
“You’ll do no such thing, Sparhawk!” shouted a voice from the rear of the command deck.
Everyone looked. It was Lady Grantholm, and she was almost trembling with rage.
“I thought we had an agreement,” she said loudly. “You fly the ship, and you let me handle the diplomacy. I think no one can argue that thus far, I’ve upheld my end of the bargain.”
“This isn’t about a bargain, Ambassador,” I said. “We’re talking about the safety of this ship and crew. We don’t know anything about these locals. They could be aliens. They could be hostile—”
“They most certainly will be if you don’t broadcast our peaceful intentions!” she said. “Imagine this situation from their point of view. An unknown ship has just appeared in their system. Without a moment’s hesitation, this ship targets their meager satellite and heads directly toward it. Worse, we haven’t said a word in greeting.”
She’d made good points, but my instincts told me to proceed with caution.
“Madam,” I said, “let me investigate further. If we see no sign of hostility—then…”
“Captain, I would like to see you privately,” she demanded.
With a sigh, I followed her into the adjacent ready-room. We sat across from one another.
“Here’s what I’m willing to do,” she said when we were alone. “I’m going to allow you to save face—this time. But don’t test me again.”
Blinking, I offered her a drink. “Allow me? Do I have to remind you who’s in command of this ship, Lady?”
She smiled wickedly. “The ship, yes—but not the mission. Here are my orders… Our orders.”
She handed me a computer scroll which I took dubiously. I read for a few moments, and I felt a chill settle in my guts.
“I see,” I said.
“You read it all?”
“Just the pertinent parts.”
“I’m authorized to take direct command of this mission, in every detail, if there is a diplomatic crisis brewing.”
“There’s no diplomatic anything yet,” I said. “We haven’t even determined if there’s anyone alive on that station. They’ve made no transmissions, no attempts to talk to us.”
“As the interloper, that’s our obligation, not theirs,” she said. “As to the definition of a diplomatic crisis, the person who’s tasked with making that determination is me.”
“Yes… as I said, I read it.”
“You accept my authority in this situation?”
“It seems I have no choice. But let me ask you: how did you get such an order authorized and approved without my knowing about it?”
“That was part of the conditions by which I agreed to go on this suicidal mission,” she explained. “You didn’t seriously think I was going to play the elderly aunt in the back room while my nephew ran the show, did you?”
“Now that you mention it, that sort of role did seem out of place for you.”
She nodded. “I see we understand one another at last. Now, let me explain to you how we’re going to proceed. You’ll go back onto the command deck alone and order Yamada to start transmitting the diplomatic greeting. I’ll exit through the other door and move back to my quarters. If the natives in this system respond, I’ll return.”
“How does this sequence of events improve the situation?” I asked.
She shrugged. “Your crew will see you giving orders. I’ll have vanished. Don’t you think that’s better than having me standing there like a harpy, looking over your shoulder to make sure you’re doing it right?”
I had to admit, she had a point there. I accepted her conditions as I had no other easy options.
Returning to the command deck alone, I gave the orders. The transmission began. It left me with a hollow, worried feeling in the pit of my stomach.
If I’d had a leg to stand on, I’d have defied her no matter what the orders from Earth said. As Defiant’s Captain, I had the right to safeguard her crew and her hull.
The trouble was, the local population had shown no sign of hostility as of yet. I was therefore honor-bound to follow Grantholm’s orders.
As soon as the situation changed, however, I vowed to realign the rules more to my liking.
-9-
No one questioned my orders to begin transmitting the diplomatic address. Using a dozen languages and a hundred binary protocols, the canned message spoke of universal peace and harmony. It requested a response from any and all listeners every minute or two, providing long pauses in between. During these intervals Yamada waited tensely for any hint of a reply.
Nothing came back to us. Not even a blip.
A full hour passed, after which Lady Grantholm returned to the deck in irritation.
“What’s wrong?” she demanded. “That message was crafted to elicit a sure-fire response. It’s been tested on dozens of cultures and political factions. It never fails.”
Yamada spoke first. “Perhaps they’re not human.”
“Preposterous,” the ambassador scoffed, advancing to lean on the railing and leer in frustration at the forward screens. “We’ve never met an alien species capable of building something like that artificial structure. We’ve found nothing but a few bugs and plants.”
“Maybe everyone aboard is dead,” Zye suggested.
Grantholm turned toward her. She nodded thoughtfully. “That stands to reason!”
She wheeled on me next. “Sparhawk, your Beta is a thinker. I see now why you’ve so wisely added her to your team.”
“I’m glad you approve,” I said dryly.
She walked to the forward screen and examined the data carefully. “I’m no expert,” she admitted, “but this system looks like a deathtrap to me. One unexpected flare-up from that star could have licked this station—just once mind you—and turned it into a giant microwave oven.”
Such an explanation had already occurred to me. The thought was cringe-worthy, but I couldn’t deny the possibility.
“Well then,” I said, “what should we do next? Diplomatically speaking, I mean?”
“We’ll keep broadcasting the message,” she said, looking at me thoughtfully. “What do you think we should do tactically?”
“We’ll approach the station in a non-threatening fashion. We’ll keep our gun ports closed and our engines at half-power. Hopefully, they’ll respond before we reach them. If not… I suggest we investigate the station.”
“Board a derelict structure?” she asked, impressed. “Perhaps the Grantholm blood is strong in your veins. We were explorers once, you know.”
In my memory of family lore, the Sparhawks had discovered just as many worlds as had the Grantholms back in the days of family-financed expeditions. I decided not to bring that up, however.
“We’re in agreement, then,” I said. “Steady as she goes, helm.”
Lady Grantholm retreated from the deck after exacting a promise from me that I’d contact her the moment the situation changed.
“Looks like you’ve hammered out a working relationship with the old battle-axe,” Rumbold said when she’d left. “If you don’t mind my saying so, sir.”
“We understand o
ne another,” I agreed. “Is there still nothing in the way of a response, Yamada?”
“Nothing sir. Not even a—hold on.”
I spun my chair to face her. She placed her hands on her headset and tilted her to one side. Her expression was one of intense concentration. I could tell she was trying to pick up an auditory signal and trying to ignore competing sounds.
“Are they saying something?” I asked after several long seconds.
Yamada shook her head. “I’m not sure.”
“Zye, tap into Yamada’s feed. In fact, pipe it to everyone, please.”
A moment later I joined them, listening to the raw data stream. All I heard was a tinny knocking sound. As if a hammer was tapping on sheet metal.
“What’s that? What kind of a feed are we picking up?”
“It’s not a transmission,” Yamada said. “I’m pinging the surface of the structure with low-powered lasers. The surface appears to be vibrating rhythmically. Every few seconds, the entire structure shakes a little. I don’t understand it.”
“So, these noises are an interpolation of what it sounds like on the orbiting station?”
“Right. If you were standing inside the structure, you’d hear something like this, only much louder.”
Turning back to the forward screen, I magnified the image to its maximum. The shape was that of a spinning polyhedron. There were two hundred and forty facets to the structure, each of them a triangular plane. Viewed as a single entity, the station looked almost spherical.
As we watched, it slowly twirled around. We watched for a full minute before something significant changed.
“Captain!” Rumbold shouted. “One of the facets—it’s an opening. Something small is coming out of it—a whole bunch of somethings.”
From this distance it was hard to be sure about what we were looking at, but it was undeniably true that there were small objects coming out of the station. A black, triangular mouth had yawned open, and it was spitting out items with regularity.
