by F Stephan
Emily sat down next to him and closed her eyes while he browsed the letters they had received from Earth. Tasha, Wilfried, his sister, his parents, there was much news, some dark, some troublesome, and some happy. So few, he thought. Emily seemed to have received only one letter, from her uncle. She hadn’t volunteered more on this, and he had respected her privacy.
After a long hour, Brian’s unease grew. Something nagging at at him. At first, he distrusted his instincts, since he truly hated the elevator, but after a while, he became convinced there was more to his feelings. Before disturbing Emily or the pilot, who was absorbed with his goggles, he checked the flight parameters, accessible through the general commlink. The module was on its way down, still accelerating, with a green light given by the computer. The atmosphere was approaching fast, only an hour away, and the ripples on the cable would soon increase to become more than the mere inconvenience they were. He hated the way any disturbance on the cable down into the atmosphere amplified in a huge wave the shuttle would have to ride. He had traveled once on a boat and it was like a calm sea when leaving the harbor had transformed into a storm farther away. Some are space sick. I’m just seasick, riding this contraption. Then, an idea occurred to him and he nudged Emily awake with his elbow. “What, Brian?” She yawned.
“We’re still accelerating downward.”
“We’ll arrive faster.” She shrugged, still half asleep, and glared at him.
“And we’ll hit the atmosphere faster?”
Understanding dawned on her. A ship had to enter the atmosphere at the right speed and angle. Otherwise, it would be like crashing into a wall.
She closed her eyes again. “This isn’t right. Parameters aren’t green.” Further checks. “And our commlink is down.” They both looked up to the pilot, singing softly in the chair, and, exchanging a look, unbuckled their straps and rose out of their seats. Brian activated his nanites and gasped.
Holy crap. There’s a red mist of those poisonous nanites everywhere around the pilot and his chair.
He’s seen us. Stun gun at his side.
“Brian, you take the nanites. I take the pilot.”
The pilot has removed his goggles. Blood in his nose, eyes, and ears. His limbs distorted into grotesque forms. He’s losing control over his own body. Reaching for his gun to fire at us.
Focus. Focus. Counterattack. I can do this. Emily is on my left. Drawing fire out of the other passengers. I move right and upward. Send my nanites out. I’ve been fighting these red things for months. Time for revenge. A somber joy filled him.
Shot fired at Emily, she twists and escapes. He can’t aim. His hands are changing shape too fast. Emily can’t move closer either or he won’t need to aim.
Too many red nanites, I cannot fight them all. They’re so strong. Focus. There must be a control center. Something carried them on board. The googles. Some are still pouring out of it.
Send my nanites upward. The red nanobots follow. Powerful but stupid. Grab the googles. The pilot is turning back toward me. Electronics. The goggle is a communication link with ground operations. What if it’s used to control those things?
Emily has kicked the pilot—good! He’s dropped to the floor, he’s unconscious. The nanites are not stopping, they’re turning back on me as well. Scan radio frequencies. No signal, they’re moving closer. No signal, they are so close I can smell them. Signal. Found you, have I?
The nanites began to fall around Brian like an invisible rain, having lost their orders. Emily grabbed a vomit bag and quickly scoped them in. In a quick step, she flushed them into the waste compartment. The googles began to burn and fume. Passengers looked at her and Brian, stunned. The fight had lasted barely thirty seconds.
The pilot was still on the ground, his shape still deformed by the nanites running free in him. Not long until they take control of him to attack again. Both students went frantically looking for a medical kit. After a small eternity, Brian found it under the pilot’s central swivel chair. He grabbed a syringe used for nanite control and slammed it hard on the pilot’s chest, pouring all its content out in just a few seconds. The man’s shape stabilized. The nanites would remain paralyzed for a little while.
“Ladies and gentlemen, please remain seated. The pilot has suffered a nanite-induced spike of madness. We are pilots from the academy and will take over.”
“We’ve got no communication with the ground.” A trader in white-and-gold woolen clothes said. Two kids clutched at him, panic rising.
“Brian, go below and try to get the comm module on manual. I’ll take over the seat.” Before he could move, a cable wave hit the small ship and they were thrown in all directions.
“Everyone, seated and strapped!” shouted Emily. “Taz, help me.”
Brian found the trapdoor leading to the maintenance area and the loading deck. He enhanced his movements with nanites, trying not to use too much. He’d need them for a while, he suspected. Through his bracelet, he activated his commlink while looking for the communication equipment.
“Situation?” he asked Emily.
“We’ve stopped accelerating but no braking systems answer my requests. Thrusters, cable brakes, nothing.”
“Sabotage or hacking. Time to impact?”
“Twenty minutes. If we can reestablish contact, they may be able to restore the emergency brakes.”
Suddenly, Brian saw the gear he was looking for and swore.
“Talk to me, Brian. Give me some good news.”
“It’s burned down. Acid, probably, since we didn’t hear or smell anything. The last transmitting device was the goggles.”
She swore loudly. “New wave incoming in five seconds. Brace yourself.”
Brian flung himself on the ground, protecting his head with his forearms. The ripple came and sent him spinning through the cabin.
Even
Alkath orbit, 2140 AD, January
The attaché had worked late, disturbed by the dispatch she had received, sleep evading her. When morning finally came, with the sun rising over the ocean, she settled on her couch for a quick nap. That was just when the alarm shook her.
“Yes.” She fought to regain consciousness.
“Madam, sorry to disturb you.” She didn’t know the voice well. Not one of her close advisers.
“Don’t be sorry,” she snapped. Anyone waking her on the emergency line was bad news. “Tell me what’s happening?”
“It’s the elevator, Madam. We have lost communication with the shuttle. We have run all emergency protocols and nothing is working. The procedure says we must contact you in that case, Madam. There are other weird things as well.”
“Weird. What do you mean?”
The woman was clearly afraid, out of her comfort zone. “The shuttle didn’t break. The fail-safe should have engaged and stopped it. Instead, it has kept accelerating.”
“Impact?” The image sprang to her mind, clear and vivid. A bullet smashing against a glass wall, exploding, killing all passengers and breaking the cable as well. The cable would fall into the ocean, create a tsunami, earthquakes, and potentially impacting the planet’s ecology. There had been plans for this, ever since the Ancients had built the star elevator. While talking, she rose and went to the console at the rear of her flat.
“Twenty minutes, Madam.”
“Very well. Your name?”
“Natrel.”
“Very well, Natrel. This line is entirely yours until the situation is solved. You’re cleared of all other tasks. Anything happens on the rail, you tell me immediately.”
“Yes. Understood. What will happen if they impact?”
“They won’t.” Then, she repeated it, for herself. “They won’t.”
She spent ten minutes checking the situation and trying to hack into the shuttle. Everything had been too well planned. There was no way in, even with the enhanced capacities from her console.
She woke up the council, informing everyone of the situation. She had the go-ahead within t
wo minutes.
She said slowly, “Activation code. Despair is over us, stars are aflame, and the ancient doom is upon us. Clean the skies and let us live.”
A voice answered with a forgotten Ancient accent. “Defense protocol activated. Target acquired. Confirm cleaning?”
Tears in her eyes, mourning for the innocents on the shuttle, she mouthed slowly, “Let the sky be rid of the doom.” The console blipped its confirmation.
Four thousand klicks above the planet, an Ancient satellite awakened to the activation code. Its nanites had kept it in pristine condition over the ages. It took it only a few minutes to orient itself and find the shuttle. During that time, it built a plasma bolt, all its energy converging into it. When the bolt was ready, the satellite sent it spinning toward the shuttle. It would melt the metal-based ship without hurting the diamond cable. The Ancients had devised it as a cleaning tool for the space elevator. At last, it would fulfill its mission.
Once this was cleared, Even turned back to search the skies. Someone had to have organized this, and they couldn’t be that far away. She activated more of her Ancient satellites and launched the full tracking network. For such an attack, they must have been close. Ages ago, she had made a promise to protect and not to kill unless in self-defense. Today was a day to strike back. There was another code requested by her console, but she sent it this time with a vicious grin. He’d have a surprise. His little sister had learned to fight. When she had finished, she sent a message to the hyperspace relay. She had a friend to warn.
Emily
Alkath orbit, 2140 AD, January
“Brian, I can separate us from the cable. I found the controls for that.” Emily was subvocalizing to her friend, not wanting to put more strain on the already panicked travelers.
In her mind’s eye, she saw Brian panting on the floor after the wave had hit them. He was thinking hard on all alternatives. “During a wave, could we create a sufficient angle to avoid the atmosphere?”
“No, we can’t escape or bounce back. The only chance would be a reentry procedure. It would be hard on everyone, but we would survive.”
“So, what you need is the right angle. We need to separate when the wave makes us face Alkath on the right angle.” Brian surmised her own idea.
“We don’t have any navigational instrument we can trust. There’s no way we can obtain it.”
“Not if I go down in the observation dome and tell you when to blast out.” She knew he was scared to death of the drop to the planet. There was no other way and he knew it as well.
“I’m going to kill our acceleration, you’ll be in null-grav if it can help.”
Aloud, she ordered, “Taz, emergency procedure. You’re my backup here. Everyone, brace yourself. I’ve got a plan. We’re going to launch any minute now.” Knowing she had a plan quieted the passengers down a little. Taz sat between the two kids, holding them tight, nanites active. Their father and another adult took their places on both sides.
On a 3-D screen, Emily tracked Brian’s action in the hold.
Hidden behind a security hatch, he had found the internal ladder to the mechanical area. Someone had hacked the electromagnetic bolt, and it didn’t open at his override command. Wordlessly, he took a small metal box from among the crates and hurled it with all his nanite strength down to the lock. It broke in a loud clang and he forced himself through the tunnel the force had created. On one side, darkness pierced by stars, on the other a blue ocean. He flipped and moved toward a blue dome.
Four minutes later, she felt Brian’s mind at the edge of her consciousness. Direct contact, mind to mind. They had done it twice before, but she had always feared this invasion of her privacy, this connection so close and intimate. She’d never let anyone that close before, she couldn’t afford to. But now, she had to, or they would die. She opened her mind and, with her nanites, reached for Brian.
Fear. Fire and hell. They would crash and explode or pierce the atmosphere and burn on the long drop. He reached the dome and positioned himself, tracking the diamond cable in front of him. He focused all his nanites on the task in front of him while fear swelled inside him.
Emily was computing, as fast as she could. She felt him, following her own calculation, focusing his mind to double check her numbers.
Brian was head down, facing the rushing planet, all senses enhanced to monitor the incoming ripples on the cable. His fear of the drop was overwhelming.
Emily couldn’t help him face this. She focused on timing the separation exactly. The next wave arrived, and the shuttle rode it, its angle toward the planet changing as it did. This is just like surfing. Have to rise at the right time. In her mind, she heard Brian count down: “Five, four, three, two, one!”
At her command, sealed joints blew up between the shuttle and the two rings that ran along the cable. With the force of the explosion, the shuttle took on a new course, flying of her own. The passengers cried out in pain during the shock. Harnesses broke, and people flew through the cabin. A middle-aged woman landed in a crash with her arm oddly twisted. Taz groaned but the kids stayed in their seats. Their father collapsed at their side, his arm still around them.
Brian
Alkath orbit, 2140 AD, January
Emily’s countdown echoed in Brian’s mind. Five. He rechecked her reasoning and confirmed the time before splitting. Four. He grabbed the ladder, three, blocking his arms and legs on it. Two. One. He closed his eyes and clenched his teeth.
With a horrendous sound of metal tearing apart, the shuttle began to fly freely toward the planet, leaving only its metal connection to the cable. From the dome, Brian saw a plasma ball intercept the cable and the part of the shuttle still anchored to it. In a blaze of fire, all that remained was destroyed.
“Wake up, Brian, wake up.”
He was lying on the metal floor on the transport deck. Taz was above him, an empty syringe and food in his hand. “Eat. You need more energy.”
“Thank you. How are we doing? Have I lost control?” he replied hoarsely. Did he use antinanites on me?
“We have escaped immediate destruction. Now, we need to slow down. I need your help. I’ve injected you with concentrated sugar for quick energy.” Taz was forcing himself to speak slowly. Brian could feel it but could do nothing to accelerate his thoughts. He began chewing the bar. Sugar? He wouldn’t last long on this.
“What for?” His vision was unfocused, his ears ringing. “Why don’t we use the reverse thrusters?”
“Because the electronic release is jammed beyond repair.”
Brian thought bitterly, They took no chances on us.
Taz pointed to a handle two yards away. “I can’t operate the manual release alone.” The release is only used during repair and with a powered suit.
Brian’s body ached everywhere. Yet, he had no choice. Slowly, every muscle screaming, he rose, helped by the older man, gulping food faster now, and walked to the big handle. They began manually breaking the ship.
Even
Alkath orbit, 2140 AD, January
“Madam, madam.” The incredulous and joyful tone in the voice of the operator brought Even out of her tears.
“What?” Her answer was thick with emotion. She had ordered the shuttle destroyed, damn it.
“The shuttle has separated, Madam. They are not on the cable anymore.”
In front of the attaché, the antique console projected a 3-D of the empty cable, cleaned by the plasma bolt.
“Where are they?” Even just couldn’t believe it. Her mind reeled against the idea.
“Acquiring data.” Even began her own search. “They launched on a new course. New impact and crash in twenty minutes. No, wait. They’re activating the emergency thrusters.”
“What? Why didn’t they do it before? Before even leaving the cable? Do we have any communications with them?”
“No. They are sending irregular bursts. The electronic release isn’t responding normally. I don’t know why or how.” The operator’s
voice trailed but Even knew immediately.
“Manual release. They are on manual!” she exclaimed.
“Can’t be, Madam. You can’t do that.”
“They can if they use their nanites and push their bodies a bit. That’s what they are doing. Update me on the trajectory as soon as you can.”
Five minutes later, a serious voice called her. “They’re going to crash on our planet. The parachutes should get on the ground alive.”
“Where? Tell me they’re landing on water.” Even was praying now, the words in a fast sequence in her mind.
The answering voice was sad. “No, Madam, they’ll land on the mainland. No other options from where they are. They’ve escaped just to die.”
“Update the trajectory to this line. The next steps are on me.”
“Madam? No one can go there.” Stern, reasonable. The operator was perfect for her job.
“Special forces can. Thank you for all you’ve done. I’ll come back to you once I have news on this.” She was damned if she would let them die like this. She sent a quick order to her assistant Azal’am and focused back on her console.
Brian
Alkath orbit, 2140 AD, January
“Brian, Taz, come back up. I need you here now.”
Brian’s hands were a red gash of blood. They had to combine all their nanite strength to release the emergency thrusters, and even like this, they could only manage short bursts. His already abused body wasn’t meant to bear this effort. He wrapped his shirt around his hand and staggered upward. Behind him, the door clanged shut and Taz sealed the compartment.
“What are you doing?”
“Just another protection against decompression. We don’t have enough space suits. They’re useless for us when attached to the rail. In our present condition, this is better.” Taz pushed past Brian, leading the way.
