Fuck. Damn. Crap. Jack wondered what other profanities would fit something so monstrous as the Isolation Globe of the Arbitors. “Okay. So that’s what the shield and the globe are. How the hell can something that power-hungry sustain itself? Forever? Can’t be a fusion reactor cause—”
“Cause it would run out of fuel,” Max finished gruffly. He crossed thickly-muscled arms and looked around the rest of the crew. “Well, Archie and me, we think Dark Energy powers it.”
“Wow!” cried Nikola.
Jack winced. His math skills had cratered once he got past trigonometry. Calculus was a loss. And the stuff called tensor and scalar math was another world. Which this Dark Energy sounded like. He looked left to his Chief Astronomer. “You know what they’re talking about?”
His Czech partner looked to him, lifted her sandy brown eyebrows and said, “You don’t know what Dark Energy is?”
Her innocent tone was a ruse. They had spent enough time together that she damn well knew he had no clue. On the last star trip he had had a hard enough time understanding Archibald’s excitement over learning from the Melagun researcher Atarksis how Dark Matter was at the core of the grav-pull drive. Which at least had given them the key to making their own grav-pull drives. Once Dr. Cumberland produced enough with her accelerator to fit into the globe that lay at the center of the triangular tube framework that made up a grav-pull drive. And when Archibald began blathering about how WIMPs were Weakly Interacting Massive Particles at the subatomic scale, he blanked out. “No, madam sky geek, I do not know what Dark Energy is. Something important?”
She winked at him, her pale blue eyes a part of her that had sucked him into dating her when they still worked at Charon Base. “Well, it’s just seventy percent of existence. It is also the reason why our universe is not just expanding, but speeding up that expansion.”
Oh. He had studied basic astronomy while at home with his Mom, Dad, Elaine and Cassandra. That Remote Tutor course had included the basics like the age of the universe, the beyond counting number of galaxies, and how thousands of exo-planets had been detected around other stars in a small part of the Milky Way galaxy. Which meant there were billions of habitable planets in the galaxy. A fact further documented by the Hunt star holo of the Nasen predators. “Okay. So Dark Energy is a big deal. Uh, how does it relate to Dark Matter? I think I recall some digipaper I had to read that said it was why our galaxy’s spiral arms had not flown apart as they rotated around the black hole at the core of our galaxy.”
“Good student,” she said, her tone patronizing but also loving. Looking to the rest of the crew, she held up a clenched fist. “First, we’ve known since last century that our entire universe is made up of three things. Dark Energy, Dark Matter and normal planets and stars.” She wiggled one finger free. “Latest cosmology computations say the universe is made up of 68.3 percent Dark Energy, 26.8 percent Dark Matter and 4.9 percent normal matter like stars and planets and comets. Clear?” Jack nodded with the rest of the crew even though he already felt lost. Nikola raised another finger. “Second, while we now know Dark Matter is made up of WIMPs, courtesy of Archibald’s work with Atarksis, we have no idea what Dark Energy is. Except that it continually flows into our universe from somewhere.” She held up another finger. “Third, the Lambda-CDM model of cosmology says Dark Energy is equivalent to the cosmological constant, which is also called vacuum energy.” She smiled as nearly everyone looked confused. “Stick with me. Vacuum energy is the key detail. In order for the universe to appear ‘flat’ rather than curved, it needs a constant inflow of vacuum energy so the outer boundaries of the universe are always being pushed outward. This expansion is due to the Friedman-Lemaître-Robertson-Walker metric that means—” She stopped when Jack grabbed his head and grimaced in pain. She held up a fourth finger. “Okay. Forget the math. Dark Energy is equal to vacuum energy. Vacuum energy is what keeps the universe expanding. Plus, even though the density of Dark Energy is small, it stays the same density throughout the universe. It never gets less even as the universe gets bigger. Which means Dark Energy permeates all of space and is available to be tapped.” She looked to Archibald. “Which I gather is what you think the Arbitor knows how to do?”
“Just so, young lady.” The Physicist looked to Max. “Your turn.”
Their Engineer looked to Nikola, then grinned boyishly. “I won’t hold up my fingers. Bottom line is, if we are to figure out a way to kill the ship shield of the Arbitor, we need to find a way to test out our theory that Dark Energy powers the Isolation Globe and the ship shield. If we can find a place where Dark Energy is being used, maybe Archie and I can figure out a way to block access to that energy. Or maybe increase it so the device overloads and blows up.”
Jack held up a finger. “The Nasen star chart! Recall Nalik’s holo? The one that showed a star system with planets, then the same location surrounded by an Isolation Globe? We need to find out where that place is. Or another Isolated system near us if that one is hundreds of light years away.”
Archibald nodded slowly, his manner thoughtful. “Good idea. We do not control the movements of the Arbitor. But we do know there are 14 systems in the Orion Arm that are Isolated. This Nalik should be able to tell us where they are and how far away.”
Cassie frowned. “Okay, so we find an Isolated system. We go there. We try to kill that Isolation Globe probe. If we figure out how to do all that, what next?” She fixed hazel eyes on Jack, her manner peremptory.
He winked at her. “If we confirm Dark Energy is the source of power for both the shield and the Isolation Globe, and we figure out how to collapse it, well, then we find a way to make the Arbitor come to us. So we can do this.” Jack picked up a fork from the picnic cloth, held up a grape in his other hand, and speared the grape with the fork.
“Yeah!” growled Maureen, doing an arm-pump in the air.
Jack wondered what it was that made the woman so ferocious. Was it her adult kids and grandkids? Something that had happened during the war? Could it be the fact his grandpa had died in a kamikazi strike on a Unity frigate and she felt guilty for surviving the war? But how could he find out without drawing a slap or worse from the woman? “First things first. We now know what we need to find out from Nalik the Nasen. Next, we travel to an Isolated system. Which could take awhile. Then again, we have two sub-fleets on their way to check out two possible home stars for the Arbitors. Vigdis and Helena.” He looked to his buddy. “Max, I know you and Archibald will be busy trying to figure out a way to create new Dark Energy, or interfere with it. But it would be nice if you can discover a way to increase our Alcubierre speed. Four light years a day is okay. A lot faster would be better. Might give us an edge when confronting this Arbitor.”
Their genius of applied Alien tech gave a shy smile. Then Blodwen kissed him on the cheek, which brought a blush under his rad-tan. He looked around at their crewmates. “I’ll work on it. Got another week or more until we get to Zeta Serpentis. After that, it could be a hundred light years or more to this Isolated system. Which is more weeks of work for the two of us. We’ll figure out something.”
Jack had no doubt the two of them would. Archibald’s creation of the Higgs Disruptor weapon that caused any matter to lose its gravitational attraction to other particles had been amazing. It gave them a second master weapon in addition to the antineutron antimatter beam that had killed Menoma’s spaceship during the Alien’s last-ditch effort to support the Unity space navy in its battle against Jack and his fleet. But neither weapon was of any use against the Arbitor. Until they could collapse or kill this shield. He held up his half-empty glass of lemonade.
“A toast! To our two big brains!”
Around the group glasses were lifted, toasts were repeated, smiles showed on every face. For now, they had an idea of what they faced and the hope they could overcome it.
And hope was all that any human needed.
♦ ♦ ♦
Two weeks later the fleet exited Alcubierre at 40 AU
north of the ecliptic plane of the star Zeta Serpentis. Its white glow was a welcome sight. Jack checked the front screen’s true-light imagery of the star’s seven planets. Above the planets were the faces of his other ship captains. They were Hideyoshi, Gareth, Minna, Ignacio, Akemi, Júlia, Aashman and Kasun. Each captain waved at him, nodded or looked attentive as was their personal manner.
“Nikola,” he called back over his shoulder, “remind us of the basics for this system.”
“Right.” He heard the tapping of her fingers on her Astro and Big Eye reflector scope panels. “Zeta Serpentis is an F3V star. While its diameter is just 1.3 times that of Sol, its brightness is six times that of Sol. Which is why the habitable comfort zone begins at 2.58 AU out from the star.” She paused as the numbers she cited showed up in a table at the far left side of the screen. “In other respects it is a normal main sequence star.”
“What about the planets your Big Eye is showing?” Jack prodded.
More tapping and an overhead plan view of the system appeared in a split-screen depiction. “As we saw before, there are seven planets orbiting the star, with two asteroid belts. One belt is between planets two and three, while the second belt lies between planets five and six.” A second split-screen took shape. It showed the half-illuminated disk of a planet, with the silvery white of a large moon lying near it. “This is the inhabited planet two, known as Hunt Forever by its Nasen people. It is located at three AU, well inside the liquid water ecozone. No other planet is inside that zone, though planet three is at its outer edge. Planet four is a rocky ice ball. The three outer worlds are gas giants of various sizes. The air of Hunt Forever is an oxy-nitro mix similar to Earth’s, but with fewer pollutants. My Big Eye scope imagery shows an icy north pole and icy south pole, with the blue of oceans in several places. Which is the most we can know at this distance. The closest we got last time was 42 AU, where the comet Hot Blood orbits out beyond planet seven.”
Jack looked to his right. “Elaine, bring us up to date on what your Sensor scans show for neutrino sources and grav-pull ships?”
His older sister looked up and spoke. “Autonomous, overlay my system Sensor feed atop Nikola’s scope image of the system. Display fleet ships as red spots. Show other grav-pull ships as yellow spots. Fusion pulse drive ships are to be green. Process!”
“Processing,” said the dry voice of the Uhuru’s AI computer. “Completed.”
“Damn!” muttered Maureen from where she sat between Jack and Elaine.
Jack felt the same as he had the last time they’d seen this imagery. A feeling of being outnumbered. A total of 51 grav-pull ships showed as yellow spots, with just twelve fusion drive sources shown in green. Stationary neutrino sources were present as white spots on Hunt Forever, on its moon, at three spots in the first asteroid belt, on the Mars-like planet three, in orbit about the gas giant planets five, six and seven, and at Hot Blood. The nine red dots of the fleet clustered above the system imagery. The front screen also showed multiple overlays from NavTrack, the gravitomagnetic sensor, passive infrared and ultraviolet sweeps, and local synthetic aperture radar. As before, this predator system was busy with the traffic normal to a species involved in exploiting the resources of their home star system.
“So,” called Blodwen from her Sociologist post behind Max, “do we head for Hot Blood?”
“Maybe.” Jack looked rearward to his SETI translator. “Denise, what do you pick up in AV channel emissions? Maser traffic? Microwave search scanning? Any other EMF systems active in Zeta Serpentis?”
His linguist genius looked down at her Comlink panel, then gave a low whistle. She looked at him, her green eyes wide. “Captain Jack, my instruments are showing 483 AV channels at signal strengths from 5 kilohertz up to 300 gigahertz. Other EMF emissions at 1,000 gigahertz are likely microwaves, some of which match to moving ships. There are maser emissions suggestive of a diginet that links every computer in the system. Which is obvious from the grav-pull ship traffic patterns.” She again looked down at her Comlink panel. “There are also radio emissions from the three gas giant planets that are natural. It’s everything we detected before.” She pulled one red braid into her lips and began chewing on it.
He gave her a thumbs-up. “ComChief, activate the neutrino comlink. Set it to the frequency Hilok used in our talk on Mathilde. And have the motion-eye fix on me. Maybe we can get an invite to Hilok’s home on Hunt Forever.”
“Activating,” Denise said, her freckles bunching up as she smiled at him. “The motion-eye is focused on you.”
Jack released his seat restraints, grabbed his sword Old Roy and stood up. “Hilok of the Northern Pack, I am Jack Munroe, Pack Leader of the humans. This time my call comes from north of your system. My Pack includes nine ships and captains, all of whom you met during our earlier Trade visit to Hot Blood.” Jack rested the long steel length of Old Roy in his left hand. “We have come to Zeta Serpentis to make new Trade with you. We met with the Arbitor and have questions. Perhaps you and your daughter Nalik can assist us. When we spoke earlier, you invited us to visit you at home. On Hunt Forever. Is that possible, or do you wish to meet with us at Hot Blood?” He waited for a neutrino Come-Back response.
Which happened in three seconds.
“Hello Pack Leader Jack Munroe.” A wolf-like Alien with the legs of a giraffe stood in a yellow, stone-walled room. Standing nearby were Hilok’s two adult children, Sator and Nalik. A fourth Nasen reclined on rainbow-colored cushions in the back of the room, just below a stone window that looked out on a rocky ravine. He wondered if that was Hilok’s wife, mate or partner or whatever the Nasen called their lifemate. All of them wore the usual leather body straps festooned with Tech devices. The Alien spoke in his natural language of sharp screeches, barks, moans and yelps. Which the Comlink panel translated into English, thanks to Denise’s SETI algorithm-crunching of their AV broadcasts. “Explain what help you need.”
“Warmest greetings to you, Pack Leader Hilok of the Northern Pack,” Jack said. “We come for Trade in knowledge similar to what your Nalik shared with us last time. And to share our Arbitor meeting results. Where do you wish to meet with us?”
The Alien stared at him with two yellow eyes arranged on either side of a long carnivore head. A pair of flexarms emerged from the wolf’s broad chest. His friend’s short-furred body was covered in contrasting bands of red and yellow that ran the length of his frame, making him resemble a long-legged zebra. With sharp teeth. A white tufted tail lifted alertly. The Alien’s two furry ears angled forward. Hilok blinked long black eyelashes. “Since this Trade is solely between your Pack and my family Pack, you may come into our system and orbit above my home compound. It lies at the edge of a deep gorge cut by the largest river of our northernmost continent.” The Alien’s purple lips pulled back from the white canines that filled his carnivore mouth. Was it an attempt at a smile? “My son Sator is eager to Trade for new interactive combat video games. Do you have such with you?”
Jack smiled, then nodded, a gesture Hilok had learned from their last encounter. “We do! They are new to you. They include space combat games like Wing Commander, Starlancer, Tachyon: The Fringe, Freelancer and Freespace.” He gestured to Maureen. “They are favorites of my Combat Commander, lady Maureen.”
“Progenitor!” whinnied Sator as he moved forward with Nalik. “I must have them!”
Hilok stomped his right claw-foot, which stopped the advance of both children. “Your eagerness for these Human combat games is well-known to your mother and I. Gather the jewels you earned through combat challenges with other Packs. You will need them.” The larger male gripped the jeweled chest strap that ran under his flexarms with the thumbs of each claw-hand. He tilted his head. “My daughter Nalik enjoyed the neutron star survey and Dark Matter research shared by your Nikola during your last visit. Do you have new astronomical data that will repay Nalik’s sharing of her knowledge with you?”
Jack bit his lip. There was no way he was going to share
the Dark Matter data of Atarksis. Behind him Nikola unlocked her straps and walked up to stand beside him. She put her right arm around his waist and looked up at the motion-eye. “Pack Leader Hilok, while we have data on star systems occupied by new members of our Freedom Alliance, perhaps you will be repaid by our sharing of a new weapon. It is called a Magpulse Bomb.”
“Crap,” growled Maureen from behind them. “Gal, we should keep that secret!”
Jack agreed. But it was too late. The offer had been made. “Hilok, we also bring more hot sauces and elk steaks in our cold lockers.”
The Nasen leaned forward. A purple tongue flicked out to lick his canines. “This Magpulse Bomb, what does it do?”
Nikola waited for his okay. Which he gave with a hip bump. “This bomb sends out a magnetic impulse in one direction. Any ship contacted by the pulse loses all onboard controls. Circuits are burned, melted or wiped clean of the ability to work.”
Hilok blinked several times. “A useful device if one wishes to salvage a Hunter’s ship. Or an automated weapons platform. The Trade of such information to us will surely suffice for Nalik’s sharing of her Arbitor datafile.”
Jack let the tip of Old Roy fall down until it rested on the steel plates of the cabin floor. He rested both hands atop its round pommel. “Good. Mostly we seek information about Isolated systems. And about the Arbitors. Beyond what your Nalik shared when we spoke during my call from Mathilde. Plus, we also offer a vidrecord of our recent encounter with the Arbitor MakMakGor.”
Hilok’s tail swished from side to side. Which Jack knew indicated eagerness. “The basis of a Trade exchange exists. Pack Leader Jack Munroe, your ship Uhuru and the other eight ships of your Pack are invited to visit my world of Hunt Forever. We will emit a maser locator signal to guide you to my compound. Come to us in a single Lander ship. Be warned, though, our home world is protected by a shell of automated weapons platforms. The platforms support neutral particle beams and lasers. Any launch of a torpedo or other craft from your nine ships will result in the destruction of the torp and the launching craft. Accepted?”
Aliens Vs. Humans (Aliens Series Book 4) Page 8
