by Alex Lamb
‘Murder? In here? Are you serious?’
‘Very, I’m afraid,’ said Mark. He pointed. ‘Someone painted this chair with neurotoxins. Whoever sat down and rubbed their neck against it was going to take it in the …’
‘The proverbial neck?’ Venetia finished for him.
Mark nodded weakly. ‘Yeah.’ He didn’t appear to have much strength for wit at that moment.
‘How do you know it was poisoned?’ said Sam, peering at the crumpled velvet.
Zoe handed him the medical sampler. ‘See for yourself.’
‘This is bad news,’ said Mark. ‘As if we didn’t have enough trouble already. Someone’s going to wind up in coma till we get home.’
He shot Citra a furtive glance when she wasn’t looking. Ash was thankful for that, at least. Perceived guilt was following Sam’s preassigned path.
‘Can someone explain exactly what happened here?’ said Venetia. ‘Because it’s just weird. It’s all a little, you know, twentieth century. I mean, who tries killing anyone on a starship? Isn’t that, like, the most self-defeating crime anyone could possibly attempt? The surveillance alone—’
‘Except this ship doesn’t have it, remember?’ said Zoe. ‘Or hardly any compared to a usual Fleet vessel. Look, Mark and I came in here. He was about to sit down and then I smelled it. It took us another couple of minutes to figure out that someone had deliberately painted his chair with an undetectable neurotoxin.’
‘Wait,’ said Sam. ‘What did you just say? If it’s undetectable, how come you detected it?’
‘I have augments,’ said Zoe. ‘Vartian Institute tools to protect against chemical incursion.’
Sam shot her a wary look. ‘You never told us that.’
‘Of course not,’ she retorted. ‘I didn’t tell anyone on the ship. The Institute delivers information like that on a need-to-know basis.’
Ash suppressed the urge to guffaw. How angry Sam had to be right now. He wasn’t the only person on the ship shaping events behind the scenes. First Will Monet had gone around him, and now so had the lowly Zoe Tamar, a scientist with a predictability score of seven-point-three. He must be fuming.
Sam gave Zoe a frosty look. ‘So you were keeping things from us as well.’ His tone spoke volumes.
‘Of course,’ said Zoe tartly. ‘The Vartian Institute’s job is to prevent alien subversion, just like yours is to prevent Frontier security problems. If anyone aboard should understand need to know, Overcaptain Shah, it’s you. Do we ask you about your secrets?’
‘So,’ said Sam, ‘you detected it. Then what?’
‘Then Zoe went for the sampler,’ said Mark, his voice strained. ‘And that’s when we figured out the substance came from Citra’s lab.’
All eyes turned to Citra Chesterford. She glanced around at them with astonished contempt before raising her hand to point at Mark.
‘He did it,’ she said.
‘I’m sorry?’ said Zoe.
‘This is a ruse,’ said Citra. ‘He never meant to actually sit in that chair. The whole thing is a carefully constructed trick to frame me because of what I said and what I’ve figured out about him. It’s obvious.’ She shook her head, her face twisting with disgust. ‘I had no idea you’d stoop so low.’ Her voice warbled as she spoke.
Ash watched Mark’s expression close up in anger.
Citra turned to Sam. ‘You know this is true, don’t you?’ she said. ‘Tell them.’
Sam threw up his hands and managed to look upset. ‘Hey!’ he said. ‘This is an awful situation, but we can’t afford to make any assumptions about who did what here. For a start, Professor Chesterford, no one has accused you of anything yet.’
‘But that’s not how it looks, is it?’ she said. ‘It’d take a fool not to see that I’ve been set up.’
‘Nevertheless,’ said Sam, ‘when there’s a legal accusation of this severity, there can be no short cuts.’
Venetia rubbed her temples and looked worried. ‘Zoe, isn’t there some way we can bypass the security settings and access the camera logs?’ she said. ‘I mean, there has to be, doesn’t there? We’re not living in the dark ages here. All we need to do is reach the memory core.’
Sam shook his head. ‘Sadly, the security on this ship is watertight. That’s why we chose it. We were protecting against aliens. We never expected this kind of situation would arise.’
‘Actually, that’s not completely true,’ said Zoe. ‘We might be able to do it.’
Ash’s heart skipped a beat.
‘And how would you do that?’ said Sam. His tone leaked scepticism. ‘Is there more you haven’t told us?’
Zoe shot him a sour look and explained. ‘While we didn’t bring messenger drones, this ship still has the firing tubes for them and all the accompanying data support. Logs are automatically passed from the core to the memory caches in the docks. Dock security still runs on Fleet standard, not the diplomacy lockdown the rest of the ship uses. It wasn’t upgraded because there weren’t any drones to make the modification worthwhile. We don’t have direct access to those docks, of course. However, we could send a robot up there to interface with one of them. We’d have to fake something to make the robot look like a messenger drone, but that shouldn’t be too hard.’
Ash knew what they’d see. They’d see him painting the chair. They probably wouldn’t even bother winding back as far as his conversations with Sam to figure out why. And Sam wouldn’t let them. Ash wondered how Sam had ever convinced him to play along. He understood how Citra had to be feeling at that moment: trapped and appalled. His heart hammered in his chest as if demanding to be released. He looked across at Sam with newfound loathing and watched as his boss calmly assessed their options.
‘How long would that take?’ said Sam.
‘Mocking up the interface would be the hard part,’ said Mark. ‘Maybe a couple of hours, max?’
‘It’s not a matter of time,’ said Venetia.
‘It is for me,’ Mark replied. ‘That’s why I’m already on it.’
Sam blinked at him. ‘Really? That’s convenient. I hope you’ll remember to keep an open feed on that process throughout, so we can make sure you’re not tinkering with it.’
‘Of course,’ said Mark curtly. ‘Check your view profile. I’ll have the final attachment to the dock done with everyone in here so there can be no doubt I didn’t touch it first. You can break the seals yourself.’
‘Okay,’ said Sam grudgingly. ‘Under the circumstances, then, I have to admit that the security lapse appears justified.’
Ash ground his teeth and struggled for something to say. The only thing he could think of was a full confession. The awful knowledge of the entire plot sat in his mouth like a bolus of burning food, begging to be spat into the world. He drew breath to speak.
Sam beat him to it. ‘In the meantime, we should get the whole story straight,’ he said. He shot Ash a significant look as if reading his anxiety. ‘Zoe, do you think you could point out the substance in the lab you believe was used?’ He turned to Citra. ‘And Professor Chesterford, do we have your permission to examine your lab? To see if there are any traces of intrusion, for instance?’
Citra managed to look freshly affronted, but nodded. ‘If that’s what it takes.’
‘Is that strictly necessary?’ said Venetia. ‘I mean, if we have the profile of the compound, isn’t that enough?’
‘Not if we don’t know where it came from,’ said Sam. ‘If Citra has been framed, wouldn’t it have been easier to do without sneaking into her lab? Another sample could have been smuggled aboard somehow.’
‘Under Fleet maximum security conditions?’ said Venetia. ‘You think so?’
‘Why not? I could have done it,’ said Sam. ‘Did you think of that? My point is that we have yet to determine guilt here. Until we have clarity, we’re all under suspici
on. And the more we learn, the faster we’ll get this horrible business cleared up. Okay. To the bio-lab, please, everyone. I think it’s better if we go together, don’t you?’
Sam ushered them all up the ladder to the main ring of the habitat core. Ash let the others go up before proceeding, leaving only Sam behind him. As Sam came up, Ash noticed him pulling the emergency sedative gun from the wall and clipping it to the back of his ship-suit. He wondered what the man had in mind this time. Sam didn’t appear to care that Ash had spotted him. Nevertheless, Ash decided to keep a close eye on Sam in the minutes that followed, just in case he was the intended target of the gun.
They all made their way around the central ring-corridor to the bio-lab. Citra held her elegant profile high throughout, as if considering the entire business beneath her. She led them into the small room and pointed at the fold-out wall-case where the reagents were stored. Sam positioned himself behind her.
‘Please show us where that compound is kept.’ he said. ‘Anyone see anything unusual here?’
Amazingly to Ash, he appeared to be the only one noticing what Sam was up to. The others had their attention riveted to the stupid cupboard. He added misdirection to Sam’s long list of disturbing skills. Ash took a quick step back as Sam silently reached for the sedative gun. He held his breath.
Suddenly, the lights turned red. A shrieking siren cut the air and threat indicators started spilling up the wall-screens.
Ash couldn’t help but grunt in surprise.
‘What the hell is that?’ said Venetia, glancing about.
Zoe stared into space as her view-field kicked on. ‘It’s the Photurians. They’re here.’
Mark turned and bolted for the bridge with Zoe close behind him. Sam took his moment and slammed the gun into Citra’s back. She gasped as the drug filled her body.
Venetia stared at him in shock. ‘What the hell are you doing?’ she exclaimed.
‘Get out of here!’ Sam told her firmly. ‘Get to your station, quickly! The last thing we need now is someone hysterical dividing the ship’s attention again. This whole investigation will have to be resolved later.’
Venetia just stared.
‘Go!’ he shouted. ‘We only have minutes!’
Reluctantly, she turned and fled the room.
‘Ash,’ said Sam. ‘Don’t leave. Help me strap Citra’s body down. We may need to manoeuvre at any time.’
Ash took Citra’s arms and led the way as they steered her back to the med-bay.
‘This is fucked!’ he whispered to Sam as they struggled with her body. ‘I quit. I’m sick of this shit. I’m telling Mark how to stealth the hull.’
‘Don’t you fucking dare,’ Sam growled.
‘What’re you going to do, try and hit me?’ Ash sneered. ‘I’m a fucking Omega roboteer. I’ll deck you before you can blink. You think you’re so fucking scary. That shit outside is scarier than you will ever be.’
‘Listen to me, you cyborg clown,’ said Sam as they struggled through the med-bay hatch. ‘This mission is bigger than either of us. Our lives are irrelevant here.’
Ash laughed. ‘No shit, Sherlock. But guess what? Your precious plan is already fucked, in case you hadn’t noticed. Those Nems out there have left your script. There was nothing in your plan about a crying kid with exploding hands.’
‘Irrelevant,’ Sam snapped. ‘Don’t you get it? The attack has to go ahead. We’ll never have another chance.’
‘No. I don’t get it. What I do get is that you’re fucking crazy and I’m done. I never signed up for murder.’
‘Actually,’ said Sam, ‘that’s exactly what you signed up for.’ He slammed Citra’s sleep-case shut.
‘Go fuck yourself,’ said Ash. ‘This whole thing is beyond broken and it ends here.’
He turned and made his way quickly to the bridge, with Sam right behind him.
10.4: MARK
Mark jumped into the Gulliver’s helm-arena and surveyed the drone swarm. Panic gripped him. Though the ship had warned them just seconds before, the Photurians already had almost every viable exit vector in the system covered. And they were moving fast – nearly twice the speeds he’d seen at Tiwanaku.
‘How?’ he said.
While their backs were turned, the tiny system had gone from empty to hosting more than fifteen thousand warp-enabled drones. The experimental hull shapes had vanished, replaced by ones built for business. They resembled giant silver pollen grains a hundred metres wide.
Zoe opened the comms channel from the lounge.
‘We came through the arrival spike with minimal damage,’ she said. ‘Most of our sensors were retracted. We got a good scan of the light-profile, though.’
‘Take a look at this,’ said Mark, and posted her the bad news.
She fell silent, watching the coordinated surges of warp spill around the sky that surrounded them, locking them in.
‘Can they see us?’ she breathed.
‘I don’t think so, otherwise we’d be dead already. It won’t take them long to find us, though. They’ll have the system perimeter totally enclosed within twelve minutes. This place isn’t big.’
‘Then let’s go!’ said Zoe. ‘Now!’
‘We can’t,’ said Mark. ‘We’re still tethered to the asteroid with half the ship’s guts hanging out. It’ll take me at least that long to pack up even if I leave robots on the rock.’
‘So we’re trapped,’ said Zoe, her voice cracking.
Venetia clipped in next to Zoe and pulled out her touchboard. ‘Where are they?’ she said. ‘How are we looking?’ Her face fell when Zoe passed her the data. ‘They’ve adapted,’ she said.
‘My thoughts exactly,’ said Mark. ‘At Tiwanaku I had a clear speed advantage. Not any more. If we try to make it out of here at a dead run, they’ll pick us off before we’re far enough out to go superlight.’
‘Why are they so different now?’ said Zoe. ‘What’s going on?’
‘We don’t know that they are,’ said Venetia. ‘Remember, Tiwanaku had millions of these things in a huge range of different shapes. They had months to build them. Maybe they just picked the ones they hadn’t yet reshaped and sent them our way. Or perhaps all those modifications weren’t as stupid as they looked. Maybe they were design experiments.’
Zoe frowned into her view. ‘I have Yunus’s display up and I’m seeing incoming comms on the diplomacy channel.’
Mark piped it in.
‘Human vessel,’ said the swarm, ‘make yourself visible. We come in peace.’
It had a new voice. This time, it sounded unpleasantly like Yunus Chesterford.
Venetia shot Zoe a horrified look. ‘Now I’m glad Sam knocked Citra out again,’ she said. ‘She wouldn’t want to hear that.’
‘He did what?’ said Zoe.
Mark wasn’t sure how to feel. His doubts about Citra had evaporated the moment she’d accused him. Her reaction had been so instantaneous and so grounded in loathing that something inside him sealed up the moment he heard it. What was the point of reading subtle motives into everyone’s actions when there was someone in the room who obviously wanted him dead? He didn’t like Sam’s choice of solution, but on the other hand he was glad he wouldn’t have to worry about her for a while. He had enough on his plate.
‘We are here to prevent any future misunderstanding,’ the swarm told them smoothly. ‘We offer only harmony and efficiency. Your integration will be painless and clean.’
‘Well, that clinches it,’ said Mark. ‘I’m definitely in. Anyone else?’
‘That message scares me,’ said Venetia. ‘Notice their use of language? That’s changed, too. They’re getting smarter. Or better attuned to humans, at least.’
One of Mark’s tactical SAPs pinged him.
‘I just received a predictive analysis,’ he said. ‘With eighty-seven per
cent probability, they’ll start closing in as soon as they have the exits locked down. They’ll pick their way over every rock in this system until they find us. That gives us six hours at the very most. Is there anything good about this situation?’
‘Maybe,’ said Zoe. ‘Maybe. We have a signal match for the arrival spike. It’s definitely a warp-burst and they’re not showing a trail, which confirms my theory. I’m scanning their arrival vector for the transporter ship. If we can damage it, the Photurians won’t be able to follow.’
‘Except we don’t have any weapons,’ said Venetia. ‘And we’d have to get to it without dying first.’
Mark glowered the wave of bright points stealing across the tiny star system and felt hunted. For whatever reason, the universe appeared to have it in for him. It galled him that such apparently simple creatures should be further up the galactic food chain than he was.
‘These robots are stupid,’ he said. ‘They still think efficient integration sounds appealing to us. There has to be a way to outsmart them.’
‘You want a diversion, then,’ said Venetia. ‘A lure.’
‘Yes,’ said Mark. ‘Exactly. If we had any messenger drones, I’d use one of those. We can give thanks to the mighty IPSO senate for fucking that one up for us.’
Zoe sat up straight. ‘I have a solution!’ she said. ‘Or part of one. We repurpose one of the drones you picked up for me at Tiwanaku.’
‘How?’ said Mark. ‘That was all debris. You can’t build a working drone from that.’
Zoe smiled. ‘Can’t I? What do you think I’ve been trying to do for the last four days? How else do you imagine I’ve been figuring out how they work?’ She slid a window showing her work to his sensorium. Amazingly, she’d pieced together more than half of the kit necessary to construct a working device. ‘It’s all in pieces at the moment, of course, but give me half an hour. We could fill in the bits we don’t have with equipment from the ship’s stores.’
‘Would it actually warp?’ said Mark. ‘Gravity drives aren’t something you knock together in minutes.’
