by Dan Worth
‘I see,’ replied Rekkid slowly.
‘We think that whatever the Arkari are withholding from us about the portal will come to light in the logs of those ships, assuming that they are still intact. Armed with that knowledge we intend to seize control of the portal and use it for the good of the Commonwealth.’
‘That’s rich,’ said Katherine sceptically. ‘You mean you want to use it as a weapon?’
‘And for exploration of course.’
‘Of course.’
‘However control of such a device would enable us to bypass the Empire’s lines of defence and strike at their core systems. The war could be over in weeks rather than months or years.’
There was an uneasy silence whilst Pearson examined his notes and connected his datapad to Rekkid’s computer and Rekkid continued to stare levelly at the two agents.
Ramirez coughed. ‘I have a question,’ he said. ‘Does anyone know where the wormhole inside that thing leads?’
‘A good question,’ Katherine replied. ‘And no we don’t know. We sent a ship through, or more correctly Rekkid’s ship decided to go by itself. It never came back.’
‘I’m sorry?’ said Rochenko.
‘Perhaps I should explain. What we do know is that the portal was constructed about five billion years ago by a race known as the Progenitors who used it to flee this galaxy. Rekkid’s ship contains a stored personality of a member of this species, as does the portal itself. The portal remained dormant and hidden to outsiders until an earlier Arkari star-faring civilisation discovered it around a million years ago and used it to exile the half of their society that lost their civil war. This was the embarrassing secret that Rekkid and I discovered in the log, it’s all there,’ she gestured at Rekkid computer.
‘The Arkari lost all knowledge of the portal when their civilisation collapsed, but then they re-discovered it about ten thousand years ago after it was accidentally re-activated by a member of Maranos’s native population… and something came out. We don’t know who or what exactly. However we do know that they were hostile and that the Arkari only succeeded in containing them after a fierce battle. The events were subsequently recorded by the Dendratha and it became the cornerstone of their religion.’
Chen looked at her incredulously for a moment.
‘You found out all this yourself?’ she said sceptically.
‘No, much of the ancient history prior to Arkari civil war was told to us by the entity that controls the portal.’
‘I see, and why would it do that?’
‘To impress us I think,’ said Katherine. ‘Maran seems drunk on his own perceived greatness.’
‘He’s quite mad you know,’ said Rekkid. ‘The poor bastard’s been locked up in that thing for longer than our own star systems have existed, able to observe the universe but hardly able to interact with anything outside of the structure of the machine itself. I’d go so far as to say he was psychotic.’
‘That thing,’ said Steven, ‘let a K’Soth Inquisitor chase Katherine and Rekkid until he caught them and questioned them. It could have stopped the whole thing at any time but it let it happen simply to amuse itself.’
‘Steven’s right,’ said Katherine. ‘Maran’s insane. He now appears to believe in the godhood that the Dendratha bestowed upon him, including taking the name they gave him. He kept ranting on and on about how all this – the war I mean – was only the beginning and kept mentioning others.’
‘Others?’
‘Yes, I don’t know if he was just trying to frighten us, but he went on and on about the terrible things that he claimed live in this galaxy and who talk to him from time to time. It sounded like the apocalyptic delusions of a lunatic but after all we’ve been through lately, I was inclined to believe him.’
‘Make no mistake,’ said Rekkid. ‘Maran is dangerous. He holds all races in contempt and he will not co-operate. Your science teams would do better to find a way to shut that thing down or destroy it, rather than use it. We will consent to help you excavate those ships, but only in the hope that we can find some way to stop Maran before it’s too late, before he does something terrible.’
‘Such as what?’ said Pearson.
‘I think that whoever came through from the other side of the wormhole before is still there and I think that he intends to let them through again.’
‘You don’t know that,’ said Ramirez.
‘I have my suspicions,’ Rekkid replied.
‘In any case, the dig will start on the younger of the two vessels tomorrow,’ said Pearson. ‘Understand that this operation is of the utmost secrecy. You are to tell no-one. Please read and sign these agreements to that effect,’ he added and pushed a set of forms toward Rekkid, Katherine and Steven. Steven looked puzzled.
‘What do you need me for?’
‘Ordinarily you would be sent home, however due to the extreme secrecy of this operation and your prior experience of the subject at hand, you will be required to assist Professor Cor and Doctor O’Reilly. You will be placed in charge of their personal security at all times. We’re giving you a second chance Agent Harris. Your report on the events on the surface of Maranos during the battle was of great use to us and it seems that you placed yourself at great personal risk in order to protect these two. Think of this as a reward.’
Steven looked somewhat surprised for a moment, and then signed.
‘If you’ll now come with us to the Brunel we can hand you over to the engineering team who will be running the dig. The briefing will begin in an hour. I’m sure you’d all like to know how we intend to unearth a ship buried deep under kilometres of dust.’
‘If I could just have a word with Agent Harris,’ said Chen. ‘In my office, in private.’
‘Sure,’ said Rochenko. ‘Harris, do as the Admiral asks.’
Chen would remember that meeting well, she could hardly erase the memory of the expression of utter contempt that filled Steven’s face. She wondered at the time what on earth she was doing in speaking with a man that she had kept telling herself she had such little respect for. She found herself unable to resist the opportunity. There were some things that she needed to say, though perhaps subconsciously she just wanted to taunt him with her success. He was the first to speak almost as soon as they closed the door behind them.
‘So, you made Admiral eh?’ she nodded. ‘Well Michelle, it’s what you always wanted isn’t it.’ The last sentence was framed as a statement, rather than as a question.
‘I worked hard for this post Steven.’
‘Yes, I’m sure you did,’ he sneered. ‘But you’re a well connected woman Michelle; it seems that you have friends in high places.’
‘How dare you! I’ve damn well earned this promotion! You think taking on those K’Soth ships was a walk in the fucking park?’
‘No, but what I want to know is how you ended up here in the first place. How come after you slaughtered all those civilians at Urranakar you got away with a slap on the wrist whereas my career got flushed down the fucking toilet?’
‘I don’t know. I never hid anything from the investigation.’
‘Maybe not, but someone must like you Chen. I hear that the Navy always sticks up for its own. I saw you all over the news by the way.’
‘I worked hard to restore my professional reputation, before I was hand picked to lead the incursion into this system by Admiral Haines himself. They must have had faith enough in my abilities not to cast me aside.’
‘Well that figures. Haines must have known he’d have Kojima foisted upon him. I guess he wanted a personal attack dog to savage the enemy and ensure the success of the operation.’
Chen smiled. ‘I do believe you just paid me a compliment Steven.’
‘Michelle, I never doubted your abilities as a commander, you know that. It’s your morals I have a problem with. You never cared much for anyone but yourself. You made that pretty clear when you and I broke up. You use people until they outlive their usefulness, or until
you get bored of them.’
‘That was a long time ago Steven, I can’t believe you still hold it against me. People change, I’ve changed.’
‘Oh? So who do you care about then, other than Admiral Michelle Chen?’
‘There is someone.’
‘Who? Which poor sucker are you fucking now?’
She looked at him with disgust. ‘That’s nice, you always were charming Steven.’
‘There is someone isn’t there? Who is it, Haines?’
‘You think I got this job that way? Don’t patronise me. It’s none of your of your business who I have a relationship with.’
‘It’s one of the crew isn’t it?’ he scrutinised her reaction. ‘Isn’t it?’
‘It’s none…’
‘It is isn’t it? Who? That Commander of yours who follows you around like a puppy? I’ve seen the way he looks at you.’
‘Al’s a good man. Twice the man you ever were Steven.’
‘Yeah I bet. The poor bastard doesn’t know what he’s let himself in for. I guess you’ll toss him aside once you’ve sucked the life force out of him eh?’
‘Why don’t you grow up?’
Steven ignored her, he was quite enjoying this. ‘So what then, have you two been carrying on in secret on this ship, hoping no-one would find you out like a couple of kids behind the bike sheds?’ He studied her face: she looked as though she were about to have him thrown off the ship.
‘Don’t try and cheapen everything. This past year has been difficult for me. Al was a great support both personally and professionally. He’s a fine man and a good officer. It just happened, that’s all. I’m not sorry that it did either.’
‘Yeah, he seems like a regular super hero. I bet he rescues kittens out of trees too in his spare time eh?’ She didn’t react to his jibe. ‘Look Michelle, why did you call me in here? You know that we always argue, more now than ever. What did you want?’
She perched herself on the edge of her desk and looked at him fiercely.
‘Believe it or not, I didn’t ask you in here so that I could gloat.’
‘Oh really? You could have fooled me.’
‘Will you let me finish?’ she snapped. ‘I wanted to apologise.’
He eyed her disbelievingly. ‘You? Apologise? This has to be a first. For what?’
‘Look Steven, I know you and I don’t see eye to eye on most things, but that doesn’t mean I want to see you die. I should have got you and your friends off that planet before the K’Soth arrived, and for that I’m sorry. I made a mistake and it almost got the three of you killed.’
‘Well, we could have just as easily died up here. Frankly I’m surprised that you survived, having heard the reports of the battle.’
‘It’s just that I wasn’t prepared to listen to you. I’d been told that you were consorting with traitors and spies and I believed it, and my first thought was how to hurt you. So I had you all arrested. As it turns out, the accusations were groundless. So I apologise.’
‘You weren’t to know. I hate to admit it, but maybe if we had been spies you’d have been doing the right thing.’ He sat himself in one of the chairs in front of her desk. ‘But it always comes down to this doesn’t it Michelle? You always lose your temper at critical moments and that’s when you make mistakes, sometimes fatal ones.’
‘I remember the way we used to argue with one another.’
‘Yeah, but at least no-one but us got hurt then.’
Chen said nothing for a while. She ran her hand through her hair and sighed.
‘How was it, down there on the planet?’ she said quietly.
‘How was it?’ he replied. ‘It was hell, that’s how it was. It was a massacre.’
‘Kojima was a fool. He should never have ordered Simonov onto the surface to hold that position, never. I begged him to assume a higher orbit, but he wouldn’t listen to me. We tried to stop that War Temple but we were too late. At least we cut off the landing before they could get all of their troops down there.’
‘Well for that I’m grateful. Those of us who survived had a hell of time coping with the ones that made it.’
‘Yes, I read your report on the fighting. You’re a braver man than maybe I ever gave you credit for Steven. I’ll grant you that at least. Maybe there is some hope for you after all.’
He gave a short laugh.
‘What so funny?’ she asked.
‘I was just thinking the same way about you.’
‘Oh?’
‘You held this system against ridiculous odds and you’re still alive. I can’t help but admire that. You were right, you have changed. I’d say you’ve learned a little humility. You’ve learned to apologise for yourself at least, you should do that a little more often. Look,’ he said spreading his hands. ‘You and I will never get along, but at least I think we respect one another a little more now.’
Chen nodded slowly.
Steven got up and started for the door. ‘I ought to go,’ he said. ‘Rekkid and Katherine will be waiting for me. One more thing,’ he added as he reached the door. ‘Learn to control that temper of yours, it could get you killed one day, and I’d hate to see that.’
With that he turned and left. Chen let out a long sigh.
The trio sat and listened to the briefing aboard the Brunel. The operation to recover the buried vessels was certainly an impressive undertaking, though it turned out to be merely a modification of existing salvage procedures.
The Brunel was capable of acting as a recovery craft and as such carried with it the necessary equipment to salvage vessels that had made controlled crash landings on planetary surfaces or had suffered some catastrophe on takeoff. Modern shield and anti-grav technologies meant that it was conceivable that a vessel could survive the deadly plunge from orbit.
Inevitably of course, such incidents would often involve the vessel plummeting into a body of water or other liquid and as such, the wreck would need to be carefully lifted from the sea bed intact. This was especially true if the crew inside were believed to be still alive.
The Alreda Sea was a little different however. Though the dust that formed it flowed like a liquid, it was considerably heavier than water and as such it would prove much more difficult to lift the Arkari craft through it without snapping them in two. The engineers had decided to try and lift the younger of the two wrecks first. Survey data from the Darwin had shown the vessel to be better preserved due to its more recent construction and thus more likely to withstand the possible errors of the first attempt. The older ship would be lifted once they had fine tuned the procedure.
The undertaking was no less impressive for the relatively routine nature of its execution. An assessment of using ships in such a dusty environment had been made and the risk had been deemed to be acceptable compared to the potential rewards. A day earlier, when the weather was at its calmest, the Brunel had dispatched four Atlas class heavy lift cargo vessels. Each of these ships was as least as large as the Mark Antony. Consisting largely of engine, they were specifically designed for ferrying unusually bulky or heavy loads to and from orbit. Slung between two massive engine blocks, their cavernous cargo bays each held a salvage rig which they deposited at the edge of the Alreda Sea, leaving the rigs hovering on their anti-grav motors like miniature floating cities.
Each of the rigs was built around a fusion reactor akin to those found aboard starships. This drove a series of powerful field generators and tractor beams, as well as keeping each rig afloat on its anti-grav motors. The rigs also contained a complex of control rooms, engineering facilities and laboratories as well as an accommodation block for their crews.
The four rigs would act in unison. Now deployed and ready they began to form into a rectangular formation a kilometre and a half long by three quarters wide, just slightly larger than the dimensions of the buried vessel. Having done so, they flew slowly out over the sea of dust towards the spot directly above their quarry. Their progress over the rolling static waves was eeril
y quiet.
It took the rigs about half a day to reach their destination. Once in place their crews set about tuning the field generators and tractor beams for the task ahead, fixing the exact position of the buried ship and assessing the density of the millions of tonnes of dust that lay on top of it. Its weight was still the biggest problem.
Eventually the engineers hit on a solution, they would not attempt to lift the dust out of the way, nor would they try to pull the ship through it. Instead the rigs’ field generators would be used to gently agitate the dust particles around the ship as it was slowly lifted, in such a way that the dust would flow down and around the gradually rising vessel. She could then be boarded and examined.
Katherine, Rekkid and Steven had the entire process explained to them in the main briefing room aboard the Brunel via a series of animated holographic projections and a large display screen. The room was under tight security. They should tell no-one. The engineers involved in the project had also all been sworn to absolute secrecy. They were, after all, stealing the property of an allied power. A ten thousand year old Arkari ship was still considerably more advanced than even the most modern ships of the Commonwealth Navy. Agents Rochenko and Pearson had not touched on the subject, but it was plain that the advances in ship design that the wreck might yield could be invaluable to the Navy, aside from any records it might contain.
Briefing over, they were led straight from the room through the labyrinthine gangways of the Brunel to the waiting transport shuttle back down to the surface.
The interior of the small vessel was cramped. Rekkid, Katherine and Steven sat side by side as the shuttle plunged through the rapidly thickening atmosphere towards the Alreda Sea. The ambient noise in the cabin from the entry gave them a little privacy.
‘What do you think about this, Rekkid?’ said Katherine. ‘Are you having the same doubts as me?’
‘What, such as: If the Arkari didn’t quite want to kill us before they sure as hell will now?’
