Countdown Amageddon (The Spiral Slayers Book 2)

by Rusty Williamson

  The tram departed smoothly and for many minutes traveled through tunnels, branching first to the left and then upward then right, all the while gaining speed. They rushed from the tunnel into the open. The tram was racing along a rail mounted to the wall just below the ceiling high above Uptown, Anderson’s own not-so-little city. It was a breathtaking sight.

  Uptown catered to the hundreds of daily sightseers who came to see the Northern Lights as well as those with flight layovers, vacationers, conference attendees and the thousands employed and living on the station.

  Far below, the glittering city stretched off until the station’s curvature caused the top and bottom to merge. Beneath him, Adamarus could see walkways crowded with people, grass parks with trees and ponds around which children played…above them, pigeons flew in lazy circles. There were all manner of shops and other businesses and, of course, lots of art and entertainment: galleries, tours, upscale restaurants, bars and nightclubs.

  Adamarus soon realized that all of the walkways were packed and there were dozens of trams speeding along the walls—all of them seemed full. He turned to Morris, “You’ve got a full house.”

  Lt. Morris turned, “Yeah, the station is jammed…it’s due to the briefing you’re attending as well as a couple of conferences.”

  Adamarus looked out over the busy little city. Uptown took up the largest chamber of the central sphere section—fully one half of the central level with the other two chambers for employee housing and an industrial area. “How many?”

  “Ah, yeah…just over three thousand…last I checked anyway. The hotel filled up yesterday.”

  Adamarus tried to relax and enjoy the view. With everything going on down on Amular’s surface, he was not really looking forward to the three-day affair. However, he realized that it was important and was determined to focus and get the most out of it. He wondered if anyone he knew would be attending. “Do you know how many people are attending the briefing?”

  “A hundred and eighty or so…at last check.” Morris smiled, “Yeah…here it comes, the best view in Uptown.”

  The tram followed the curve of the wall and the rest of Uptown came into view. It spread out over the curved inner surface of the sphere. At the far end The Anderson Suites, the station’s only hotel, came into view. The structure spanned the entire back wall and rose from the floor 500 feet to the ceiling.

  The ceiling provided the little city with its ‘outdoor’ day or night-time lighting. It was made up to look like Amular’s bluish-purple sky with fluffy orange-white clouds or, at night, stars. It was evening; the sky was darkening, the faux stars coming out…below the city was aglow.

  The Anderson Shipyards was a large central sphere with a structure at the bottom—its huge docking bay—and another even larger structure at the top—the external construction and repair docks. The entire complex was held in place above Amular’s North Pole between its major tourist attraction, the amazing Northern Lights created by Iceis’ thick solar wind.

  A diagram on the wall of the tram caught Adamarus’ attention. It showed the sphere section’s tri-shell hull, which protected the sphere section’s interior. Each of the three outer shells were hollow structures 100 feet thick, each divided into multiple sealed and pressurized sections and, all three shells could be independently rotated. If anything breached the sphere, the outer shells quickly revolved to seal the breach.

  Like everyone, back at the academy, Adamarus had seen videos of the construction and testing of the Anderson Tri-Shell hull. A complete blowout of even the largest chamber—Uptown—could be sealed in 30 seconds regardless of the damage to the tri-shell or the interior. The outer shell would rotate until the damaged area was over an undamaged section of middle shell thus sealing the compromised chamber. If an object passed completely through the station, then the inner shell would rotate to cover and seal the exit hole.

  The system was a brilliant yet simple design and one of the safest systems ever devised for spherical structures in space. It had been put to the test 12 years ago when a ship in a pressurized-dock in the upper sphere level blew up, ripping away all three levels of the hull. It was a blowout meaning that the chamber’s atmosphere was almost instantly sucked into space. However, before anyone was sucked into space, the tri-shell reacted instantly and sealed the huge breach in 22 seconds. Out of 327 workers in the chamber, there were only eight deaths and half a dozen injuries—all from the explosion, none from the decompression.

  Well, they couldn’t be safer—in fact, it was said that one was safer than being on the planet’s surface. Especially right now, Adamarus thought wearily.

  They arrived at The Anderson Suites and got Adamarus checked in. Then Morris said he’d return in three days to transport the Admiral back to his ride.

  Adamarus went up to his room on the top floor. It was a VIP suite with a fantastic view. What a waste, he thought, knowing he’d not be spending much time there.

  He ate dinner and had a couple of drinks at Sky’s Edge—the restaurant on the roof. It was wonderful. Afterwards he wandered back to his room, showered, set a wakeup and turned in, falling asleep immediately.

  ---

  Amular, Axis, the capital…

  It was 11:30 p.m. President Wicker, Vice President Hollingsworth, Secretary of State Fisher and Secretary of Defense Barrington were gathered in the capital’s situation room, watching the teleconferencing screens come to life with the other members of the inner-circle. The emergency meeting had been called only half an hour ago—short notice this late at night, but everyone showed up except Adamarus who was at Anderson for the final Defensive Buildup Briefing. Wicker saw no reason to wake him before the first day of the briefing.

  “Everyone seems to be here,” Wicker said when all of them were conferenced in. “Thank you for joining us. Also, please welcome Shelly White,” he looked over at the screen she was on and nodded at her. “I’ve granted her Red Raven Security level access. In most cases, she knows everything before we do anyway.” There was some tired laughter—many of them were a little shocked by the president’s announcement.

  Shelly was the leading news anchor for the GSN Evening News and unquestionably the most popular and most trusted newswoman in the star system. For this reason, she had been added to the inner-circle almost at the beginning to help break the news of the Loud and their star system’s destruction to the general population. She had not, however, been granted any kind of security access—that had just changed.

  In addition, all of them had realized that the news leak that the alien ship had been detected and was on its way was just about everything that the Red Raven Security level hid from the public anyway.

  Wicker looked to Woodworth, “How are things in Hillcrest?”

  Woodworth rubbed his eyes, gathered himself and said, “Well, it’s quiet right now, though the place looks like a war zone.”

  “And the count?”

  Woodworth knew immediately what was meant, “Three dead, 74 injured. We were lucky, Mr. President.”

  Wicker ran a hand over his tired face, then looked around the room, “Is everyone up to speed with Dr. Radford’s spiel?” Assents came from everyone. “Only one other city turned violent—Lakeside. Twenty-seven injured. Thousands are still in the streets here in the capital and in six other cities.”

  “Mr. President,” Shelly White interrupted. “Excuse me, but I must ask: Is it true about the alien ship and is there any truth to what Radford is saying?”

  Wicker looked at her, too tired to be angry at the interruption. “Yes and no, respectively, Shelly.”

  “My God,” She muttered.

  Wicker continued, “I’ve just learned that because of Radford’s actions, many workers involved in the defensive buildup are striking until we agree to Radford’s little test. I don’t have to tell you that this could easily turn into a disastrous setback. We cannot allow this to happen. Nor can we afford to send the Loud ships away to perform his little test. We need solutions, people.�
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  Wicker looked to Bradford Donnelly, the astrophysicist, “Dr. Donnelly, is there any scientific problems with Radford’s theory—some way to knock it down?”

  Donnelly cleared his throat, “Do you mean any scientific problems not involving top secret information?” Donnelly had Black Raven Security and so he knew everything. He also knew that the room was filled with people who had different security levels and knew different things. He was being very careful.

  “Yes, that is exactly what I mean. Let me make it clear right now that we cannot and will not release anything else covered by raven security…not to any individuals and certainly not to the public at large.”

  Donnelly nodded. “I completely agree.” He looked down, shuffling some unseen papers. “Okay. Yes, actually there is a slight problem. Furthermore, the problem is a…particular one.” He had everyone’s attention. “We can be reasonably sure that the approaching aliens cannot and do not know that any member of the Loud species is here.”

  Wicker brightened, “And the doctor’s theory says that the aliens are on their way here because the Loud are here.”

  Donnelly held up a hand, “Yes. However, that said, because of our radio and video signals, we can be absolutely sure that, like the Loud, the alien knows that we humans are here.”

  Wicker’s fingers went to his temple and rubbed it, “And, so…”

  “And so,” Donnelly continued, “if, as Dr. Radford says, the Loud and the approaching aliens have been at war, it is reasonable to believe that even though the alien can’t know the Loud are here, they would probably want to come here anyway just to check. After all, they would know that the Loud would know of us and we are so close together it would be likely that the Loud might visit.”

  “I see,” the president said.

  “And there’s more,” Donnelly said. “This test that Radford proposes…well, we can also be reasonably sure that the aliens could not detect the Loud ships leaving the system—at least not until they are a lot closer.”

  “How close?”

  Donnelly shook his head, “That’s impossible to answer really, but I do not see any way that a Tachyon scope—and of course that’s what they’d need—could detect the Loud ship's drives from their current distance. How close…maybe ten light years…though perhaps five is more reasonable. We might be able to detect the Loud ship’s drives from one light year out, but only if we knew exactly where to look.”

  “So,” Wicker said slowly, “this problem does not knock down Radford’s theory. It instead says that the alien would come here to check for the presence of the Loud and, if the Loud left and they did not find them here, they might just leave us alone and be on their merry way.”

  “Correct,” the scientist replied.

  Wicker looked around at everyone. “Everyone in this room has Red Raven Security so you can speak to that security level,” he said carefully. Actually, everyone in the room had at least Gray Raven security and some had Black Raven, both secret security levels above Red Raven, except, that is, for Shelly White. Ergo no one could present any information covered by Gray Raven or higher Security. “Can anyone think of any other ways, any other facts that we can use to discredit Radford’s theory?”

  Everyone thought that over. Having Gray Raven Security, all of them except Shelly knew that the alien’s actions had been observed in other galaxies and that the aliens attacked any intelligence they encountered on their way to their eventual target, the galaxy’s central black hole—their primary goal—to cause its explosion.

  A minute passed, then Leewood spoke up, “Not directly and not positively at this time, however, the aliens will implicitly take hostile action against us when they pass through the ice cloud. They will drag in enough comets to destroy all the inner planets. In addition, implicit hostile actions are taken by their close passes of two of our gas giants. The course they’ve held to all along ensures this.”

  The president nodded. “Good point. We might need something better though, and something that can be absolutely demonstrated now. If they were going to just check for the Loud’s presence and if they intended us no harm, they could change their course, avoiding the ice cloud and the gas giants.”

  Leewood said, “Maybe we don’t have to completely knock down Radford’s theory. Maybe we can compromise. In that case, the items we have might be enough.”

  Wicker said, “Go on.”

  “Even if Radford’s theory were correct, there is no way to know that the alien won’t attack us. That is to say, there is no way to know if the alien will turn away from Amular and chase the Loud if we perform the test and send them away. And we cannot test this now, but must wait until the alien is almost here. Everyone will realize that we cannot gamble the fate of our species on guesses. Therefore,” he raised one finger, “everyone will see that the defensive buildup must continue until we can perform this test.” Leewood held up his other hand, warding off objections. “Please bear with me.” He looked around and saw that he had everyone’s attention.

  He continued, “As for sending the Loud away for the test,” he raised a second finger, “it won’t work for certain until the alien is within the ice cloud, and by then, they will be passing through it, dragging thousands of comets with them, and by doing so, will have taken hostile action against us. Therefore, we agree to the test with the condition that the aliens have taken no hostile action, all perfectly reasonable.”

  “What if the aliens avoid the ice cloud or somehow pass through it without dragging thousands of comets in-system?” Wicker asked.

  Leewood came back, “I think we all know that isn’t going to happen. They’re on a course that they are not going to change, but if they do, perhaps by then we can run the test. In any event, that’s over 120 years from now.”

  Wicker nodded.

  Leewood continued, “Finally, we have a little icing, the subliminal messages were overkill—Radford didn’t need them, he messed up. Those secret messages backfired on him and it will hurt him.”

  Everyone thought on that and started nodding. Finally, Wicker said, “Yes. I think that will work. We’ll go ahead and release all Red Raven data—the leak did that anyway. We’ll agree to the test, but explain how the test cannot work until the aliens are inside the ice cloud. The action of passing through the ice cloud will demonstrate hostile action, doing away with the test. In addition, we’ll explain why, regardless of what may happen, the defensive buildup must continue. Does anyone see any problems with this?”

  No one did.

  Harrington turned to Donnelly and asked, “You said that the one problem with Radford’s theory was a particular one. What did you mean?”

  Donnelly nodded, “Yes, it’s as if someone looked at all the facts and all the players and figured everything out perfectly, however, they equated the facts and players to things on planet. They did not take into account the vast distances between the stars. They did not realize that there was no way the alien could know that the Loud were here, nor realize that the alien could not detect the departure of the Loud ships until they were much closer.”

  During the meeting, Bugs had remained silent.

  ---

  As the sun rose, all around Amular, more Radford town meetings started up—most were standing room only. In addition, crowds of demonstrators began to reform in many of the larger cities as well as the capital city of Axis. Finally, about eighteen percent of the workforce did not show up for work.

  However, the government was busy as well getting out the word that President Wicker would address the star system at 1:00 p.m. with a message that would be open-minded and try to appease everyone. People were also asked to keep demonstrations peaceful, and fortunately, they did.

  ---

  In the morning, Adamarus had breakfast in his room then made his way to the hotel’s basement where the government conducted all classified briefings. The large room was about half full with people finding seats, getting settled in or getting coffee and pastries.
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br />   Surrounding the presentation stage and rising at a gentle angle were long curved tables and chairs divided by a wide aisle up the center.

  He scanned the room for anyone he knew or perhaps a gathering of naval officers but came up empty so he walked toward the front, spotted an empty seat in the fifth row on the right side and took it.

  He had time to get coffee and a roll before the briefing started…as usual, with a briefing…on the briefing.

  It was during the first break when among all the other chatter, he heard her voice. He looked to the left and there was Evelyn Angelina Eden, head of the Hideaway Shipyards. She was on the first row on the left. She was laughing at something the handsome muscle bound marine sitting to her left was saying. He had his arm almost around her shoulders. A tall naval flyboy on her right said something and she turned to him and laughed.

  She looked great. He was annoyed that she was being assaulted from both sides and enjoying it so much—well, not his concern, right?

  Still, he chuckled unhappily—just great—and forced himself to try and focus on his PDA and the notes he’d been making. However, the flirtatious chatting and laughter between the three continued to make its way through all the other chatter and he couldn’t get any traction. Then, it seemed to stop.

  Thank you! Okay…finish this and this then…I’ll go over and say hello, he thought and scrolled up to the first unfinished note that had concerned…

  “Hey…”

  A hand rested on his shoulder and he froze.

  “…I’ve been trying to get your attention all morning.”

  He looked up into Evelyn’s beaming eyes and smiling face—she didn’t look just great, she looked…spectacular.

  He automatically placed his hand on hers, “Evelyn. Actually I just noticed you and was getting ready to come over and…ah, rescue you.” Her hand felt warm, her skin soft.

  “Oh, how I wish you could. Tomorrow let’s sit together, okay…I mean, if you don’t mind.”