by Darren Beyer
The analyst nodded and moved to the holo screen. The image brightened and displayed a depiction of a survey ship tagged Gaussian Surveyor.
“As you know, the Gaussian was on a mission of first exploration to survey Rho Indi Six, a small, cold planet approximately nine hundred and fifty million kilometers from the star.” Peter used animated hand gestures to cover his unease. “The mission was timed to coincide with the planet’s closest position to Eridani. Rho Indi is forty-three light-years from Eridani and eighty-seven light-years from Earth.”
Ship statistics on the Gaussian flashed under the image of it on the holo screen:
Ship tonnage: 1100 metric tons
Crew: 8
Primary Power Plant: Tech Standard CF-50 Fusion–50 Megawatt
Secondary Power Plant: AvPower Model 2.5U–2.5 Megawatt, Nuclear
Inertial Drive: Cam Dynamics Model 1446Z Fusion Drive
Jump Drive: AI Mk VI v6.1
Sensors: AI Mk III
Weaponry: AI CD-03A Defensive Laser–Upgraded
Date Launched: Earthdate August 16, 2092
“The Gaussian’s hyperium coils were replaced in August of last year, with five jumps taken since, including the outbound to the Rho Indi system.”
The image shifted to a solar system with a yellow sun and six planets.
“We had no communication from the Gaussian for ten weeks after it arrived in the Rho Indi system and fired off its entry jump pod.”
A charred and damaged jump pod appeared, spinning slowly in the holo. The small devices contained a miniature jump drive and were used to send messages and data between star systems. This one had taken a shot.
“Sixteen days ago, the system defense boat Merlon, while on a training mission in the outer ring of our system, detected trace hyperium readings. Upon investigation, they found this crippled jump pod showing scoring and physical attributes consistent with a nuclear explosion. The transmission mechanisms and data ports were damaged. Merlon hugged it to us via high-g drone, and we received it nine days ago. An EMP damaged the common data store, but we were able to access position telemetry and bridge footage from the more heavily shielded core. The ship really took a hit.”
Jans winced, well aware of the bridge footage. Too late Peter realized his faux pas. He swallowed hard as his face turned crimson.
The holo displayed a depiction of the Rho Indi system. As the counter progressed at multiples of real time, the system rotated around an animated plot of the ship’s course.
“As you can see, the Gaussian’s jump was a standard insertion on an intercept trajectory to Rho Indi Six. Relative velocity, engine burns are all within normal parameters. At Earthdate June 23, 20:14:38 Universal Time, the Gaussian executed a series of three ten-second, point-five-g lateral maneuvers consistent with NMO avoidance. Through a combination of telemetry, the scarring analysis—” His voice took on the excited tone of an engineer putting his craft on display. “—and studying the manual of the model J7-C Jump Pod—or Mark 7—we know the acceleration of the ship at pod launch, the angle at which the explosion hit the pod, and, from the operations manual of the pod, the distance of the pod from the ship when the Gaussian was hit. We put it at about eight kilometers.”
“I don’t suppose you can tell us the serial number on the nuke, can you?” Jans tried to introduce a moment of levity. He was refusing to picture Sophia on the Gaussian bridge.
“Not quite.” The young man didn’t pick up on the attempt at lightening the mood. “If we had access to Coalition security files, we could probably tell which reactor the plutonium came from, but I doubt they’ll give them to us. We can tell you that it was in the five-kiloton range, based on the distance and level of damage. We can’t be totally sure because the pod was at the jump threshold when the helium wave hit.”
“Impressive work.”
The analyst beamed.
“Anything else?”
“Only that, based on the range from the Gaussian, we believe there’s a strong likelihood of significant debris remaining.”
“Survivors?” Jans was suddenly alert.
“We don’t believe that’s a possibility.” The analyst shook his head. “The explosion and its proximity to the Gaussian were such that emergency pods could not have survived the blast. The ship’s structural integrity is likely to have been severely compromised.”
Covering his face with his hands, Jans rubbed his temples and forehead.
“There is one other thing,” the analyst continued almost sheepishly. “They were close to the bogey when it was first detected, just over fifty thousand kilometers. The Gaussian didn’t know anything was up until the sensor operator’s tests discovered it. Unless the ship was running blind—which seems unlikely—the attacker employed some sort of mass dampening field.”
Jans looked up through his fingers.
“That’s all,” Dagan said calmly. “I will follow up later.”
“Thank you very much.” Jans nodded. “Good work.”
The analyst turned off the holo screen. He nodded deferentially to Jans, who returned the nod. Dagan waited for the door to close before turning to Jans.
“Jesus, Danny,” Jans said under his breath. “Mass dampening?”
“The infiltration into our company has reached epic proportions. Now we know that some of it, at least, is related to our ship disappearances. This evidence of a mass-dampening field is the first outside of AIC and represents technology theft at the deepest levels. I’m afraid I’ve failed at my job. This is a young man’s game, Jans, and I ceased being young many years ago.”
“Danny, enough. I hired you specifically for your age and experience. A young man doesn’t have what you have in your head. As to the Gaussian, I’m beginning to see your side of the argument. Is Dauntless ready?”
“It is true, as I mentioned when you arrived home, that the jump coils are not tuned to my satisfaction. However, they are new, so, aside from burning more hyperium than normal, Dauntless is as ready as it ever will be.”
“Okay.” Jans sighed. “Let’s hear your plan.”
“Black op, as I mentioned.” A somber smile crossed Dagan’s face. “No one to know other than you, me, and the mission crew. Once Dauntless leaves, there will be no communication either to or from the ship.”
“Whom do you want for the lead?”
“I must have my best. The mission requires nothing less.”
“Raymus?”
Dagan pursed his lips and nodded. “Raymus.”
“Can we afford to have him out-of-pocket?”
“Most of his work is secondary and can be reassigned. There is one thing he has uncovered that might concern us, but it may be nothing.”
“What is it?” Jans sat up.
“Right now we are not so sure. All we have is a name: Operation Deliverance.”
Chapter 9
Earth
Mandi hadn’t planned on staying so long at the Zulu Reed Dance, but she also hadn’t planned on IsiZulu. The sour drink was supposedly low-alcohol Zulu beer, but that hadn’t stopped it from throwing her for a loop.
Cindi had offered to share her tent, and Mandi had been in no position to refuse. Now Mandi leaned back on a camp bed in the warm African twilight and closed her eyes to the sound of thousands of women still singing and chanting and dancing in the distance.
Her head was spinning when she remembered the message from her boss. Guiltily, she flicked her eyes to turn on her comm. The flashing text chat icon immediately drew her attention. Her heart beat faster.
Anonymous: Are you watching the news?
Connection terminated.
Her comm log showed that the message was hours old. She pulled up the GNN newsfeed and scanned headlines until she found “Nuclear Terror.” She accessed the article and watched the news feed.
“The Euramerican Coalition Investigative Services NSU, or Nuclear Science Unit, announced today the presence of weapons-grade uranium in the nuclear material seized during the fed
eral raid on a terrorist cell to thwart the nuclear terror plot near Washington, DC. The uranium is highly enriched to 85.6 percent with abnormally high traces of divalent europium, according to CIS analysis. Europium is rare in nature and almost never found—”
Mandi shut off the newsfeed and pulled up her previous chat with her anonymous source.
Anonymous: Just remember 85.6 Eu.
“Oh shit,” Mandi said under her breath as her mind raced. “Comm, access europium.”
Europium is a rare chemical element with the atomic number 63 and symbol Eu—
“Oh shit! Comm, dial the boss.”
Chapter 10
Eridani
The shadow of the helo played off the peaks of reddish-purple dunes, as the prop wash from its three ducted-fans kicked up fine sand in their wake. This was the Kuncane Desert, the largest desert on Eridani, barren and beautiful. Its shifting dunes were a sea of featureless red, their sandstone dust stretching to the horizon. Only the coastal mountains broke into a jagged purple landscape barely visible in the distance.
The helo slowed to a hover above a prominent rise. A torrent of sand billowed from under its belly, curling out around and above the craft, engulfing it in a cloud of red. The helo set down carefully and slowed its engines to idle. Behind it, the thick cloud of dust dissipated on the ever-present Kuncane wind, lending the sky a fleeting lavender tint.
Jans opened the helo side door and slid off his seat onto the powdery sand. His feet sank in. Warm air—not hot, but crisp and clean—filled his lungs. This was one of the few places on the planet free of the aroma of pollen. The cloudless sky, a royal blue imbued with its rich color from the sun’s white light, contrasted with the red sand. Jans looked up and smiled, spreading his arms. Sophia loved the Kuncane Desert.
The dark-haired woman behind Jans jumped out of the helo, carrying in her hands a wide, thin board curled up on both ends. Laughing, she gave Jans a shove, so that he lost his balance and slid downslope, plowing through the powdery red sand. She lowered her goggles, dropped the thin board, and stepped on. Mag-locks held her feet in place as she launched herself down the face of the dune.
“Whoop!” Her exultant cry carried back to him on the wind. She carved wide turns down the steep dune, picking up speed with a plume of reddish dust tailing behind her. Jans shook his head and smiled. She had such natural grace, a creature at home in the glorious red and purple-tinted landscape.
Jans crawled back into the helo to retrieve his own board. When he emerged, the dark-haired woman was riding up the face of another dune to slow gradually at the top and disappear over the opposite side.
Jans followed, but he couldn’t quite make the peak of the dune. He disengaged from his board and struggled through the shifting red sands, nearly crawling to the edge at the top. Sand blew into his face. The woman had already made the next dune and was gone from sight in an instant. Jans yelled after her, but his voice was lost on the wind. He stepped onto his board to follow. The mag-locks securing his feet, he sped down the dune and up the face of the next. Only barely making the ridge, he carried little speed and bogged down in the valley beyond. He removed the board and labored to reach the next ridge.
When he finally pushed over, gasping from the exertion, the woman was gone. The tracks from her board were nowhere to be seen.
He screamed for her, but there was no response.
***
With a start, Jans sat up in bed, jerking his head toward the empty pillow beside him. Sophia had never shared either this room or this bed. The suite hadn’t been finished when he’d left Eridani. Yet he still felt as though she were there. He still slept on only one side of the bed, leaving the other side tidily made, as though waiting for her to return from a late night in the lab. Outside the window, Ascension hovered high in the night sky like a beacon, hiding Jans’ secret world.
Sleep had not come easily over the past few days. He wanted to think that the unfamiliar surroundings of his recently finished suite atop AIC Tower had something to do with it, but he knew better. The dreams kept coming.
Jans rose and walked to the expansive floor-to-ceiling windows. The new suite sat directly under the transparent dome atop AIC Tower. The plastiglass curved up high overhead to an unfettered view of the Eridani sky. The suite was Spartan in its layout and design. Jans hated clutter and preferred minimalist furnishings. One piece of artwork dominated the otherwise empty walls: opposite the outer edge of the suite, a centuries-old Hindu temple carving. It had been brought from the East back to England by the British East India Company in the eighteenth century. Beautiful in its intricacy, the wooden masterpiece depicted a multitude of sexual positions, common with Indian artwork of the era. Jans was always amused that his grandparents had passed it down to him. The expense of ensuring its safe journey to Eridani had been staggering.
Jans glanced up at the transparent dome. The sky was dark, stars not yet washed away by the Eridanian sun. Only the few rays of light above the horizon intermittently caught the waves on the Cadissian Sea. Almost directly overhead, Ascension shed its pink-hued light, by which Jans made out vague shapes of the shoreline and hills just inland down the coast. Below him, New Reykjavik was awakening. The inner ring of monorail was washed in white light, illuminating what would be the first extra-solar mass transit system. A few auto cars traversed the spokes of the city's roadways.
Soon the Eridanian sun would rise. Work below would resume throughout the growing city. High overhead, the New Reykjavik space station was in the final stages of its first expansion. In extended orbit, two of AIC’s newest system defense boats were undergoing their space trials. Mining operations extracting everything from iron to platinum dotted Eridani’s surface, feeding manufacturing plants. Everything was progressing well, but Jans couldn’t shake the void inside him.
Sophia should be here.
A chime and a flashing icon in Jans’ comm indicated an incoming call.
“Danny, a little early for you, isn’t it?”
“I am sorry, Jans. The morning’s jump pod from Earth just transmitted its news payload. We might have a problem—”
Jans straightened abruptly.
***
“Europium is a rare element, metallic in composition. It was discovered by French chemist Eugène-Anatole Demarçay in 1901 and given the symbol Eu on the Periodic Table.”
“You may skip the historical components, Peter,” Dagan interrupted, motioning to his analyst, the same young man with the uncombed hair and thick-rimmed glasses.
“Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.”
“It’s all right, Danny.” Jans lifted a hand. “This is good research.”
“Europium is a rare earth element—” Peter cleared his throat. “In fact, it’s one of the rarest in the universe. It is not found in nature as a free element. Rather, it is contained in a variety of materials, including uranium. It is used in many applications, ranging from industrial lasers to quantum memory chips. And it is found in almost all uranium ores, including that harvested at our U-2A mining facility here on Eridani.”
“However, not just here, correct?” Jans glanced at Dagan.
“Yes, sir, I’m getting to that. You see, with most rare earth elements the relative concentrations hover within a narrow band. However, with europium it’s different. It’s called the Europium Anomaly. Its concentration in another material can either be enriched or depleted, based upon temperatures and pressures at the time that the planetary crust formed in any given location. On Earth, we find primarily uranium with trivalent europium in enriched concentrations. On Eridani, the crust formed very differently, so uranium with divalent europium prevails in much higher concentrations than on Earth. It is this divalent europium that was found in the uranium sample seized in the terrorist raid.”
“How rare is uranium containing the levels of europium indicated in the news stories?” Jans didn’t like where this was headed.
“That trait would be quite rare, sir. Jupiter’s moon Titan has some u
ranium deposits with enriched divalent europium. There are smaller, scattered deposits in other systems as well. But there are none with our levels of europium.”
“Does the presence of these levels of europium in the uranium definitively point to us or possibly to one of the other sources you mentioned?”
“That in itself, no. Nuclear material has what is called in nuclear forensics a ‘nuclear signature.’ This signature contains a myriad of traits. Trace element composition is only one. We also have to look at ratios of radioactive isotopes, such as uranium two-thirty-eight to two-thirty-five. Many things combine to give investigators a good idea of the origin of a sample. However, uranium with the level of europium mentioned in the news is really only found here on Eridani.”
“Okay.” Jans sat back. “Thank you again for your excellent work.”
The young analyst glanced at both Jans and Dagan. Jans nodded his approval and gave a brief smile. Peter returned the nod and left the room. As the door closed behind him, Jans looked at Dagan.
Dagan returned his gaze without expression.
“You’re right, Danny. We do have a problem.”
Chapter 11
Earth
“Welcome back,” Mandi’s producer said sheepishly, looking up from his desk. “You know I appreciate this.”
“And I told you, it’ll cost you.” A corner of Mandi’s mouth rose into a grin.
“I know, I know.” He leaned back in his chair. “I’ll get you back on vacation the instant this mess quiets down. For now, I need you to focus on law enforcement.”
“Excuse me?”
“There was a shootout in the house in Alexandria where they raided the terror cell. One CIS agent was injured. As of now we don’t have an ID, and I need someone to bulldog that angle.”
“When I said it will cost you, I didn’t mean giving me back my vacation. That’s understood. I mean I need latitude to work a source.”
