The comm unit was connected to a stealthed Ford-Svaiter unit that held station a thousand kilometers above the asteroid’s surface. The S-V communications system, in turn, was tied into Proxima’s Starshot constellation, exploiting a vulnerability the older-model buoys on the outer rim were known to have.
This allowed Che to update the minister of state security in real-time, via encrypted signal sent directly to Eridu. He stood at attention as the connection was made, and when she appeared, he bowed his head once in deference.
“The laboratory is functional, Citizen Minister,” he told Rin Zhou.
“Excellent. You are in the location we discussed?”
“Yes, the same.”
Rin Zhou’s smile was conspiratorial. “I hear that area is rather difficult for An-Yang to police. I understand they have an issue with pirate raids on outer mining platforms to this day.”
Che returned her smile with a predatory one of his own. “A shame, isn’t it, that illicit activity has been reported to be on the upswing on the other side of the belt?”
“Indeed.” She inclined her head, her finger tapping out a slow rhythm against the top of her desk.
Che hated it when she did that. It was an affectation she used, the proverbial clock ticking down, to inject tension into every meeting. It was a power play, a subtle way of reminding those seated across from her who was in charge.
Her finger halted abruptly. “What about those you used to obtain the samples? Is there any way to trace the theft of the vials back to us?”
“Our agent who intercepted the vials killed the courier pilot. As for the other….” Che smiled confidently. “The person working for us inside the CID will be eliminated, and her notes destroyed. They have no idea she swapped the chiral material for us.”
“I had heard there were to be four vials. Is there any word on the whereabouts of the fourth one?”
“Not yet,” Che frowned. “Unfortunately, our agent on Leavitt was unaware of the number of vials the case was supposed to have held, and so he eliminated the courier without questioning him about it.”
“I trust you’ll do what you can to find that missing material. It wouldn’t do if that loose thread were to lead the Alliance back to us in any way,” Rin Zhou warned.
“Understood, Citizen Minister,” Che dipped his head in compliance.
“Very well. Do not forget your deadline. I expect regular progress reports from you. Are we clear on this?”
Che dipped his head once more. “Crystal.”
MERCER
Lower Warehouse District
Mercer Mining Torus
Micah timed Wraith’s exit from Scharnhorst space to occur at the same time the Starshot buoy nearest the mining platform fired its drives to adjust its heading. The buoy’s energy signature easily masked the small EM flare the ship’s Casimir bubble emitted as it dissipated.
Shadow Recon had been using the constellations’ orbital adjustments for as long as he could remember. They were an effective and readily available way to mask stealth insertions.
Access to the Alliance’s space traffic control system provided another method for concealing a ship’s EM signature. As Micah scanned nearspace around the buoy, he found exactly what he needed.
A large tanker was lumbering toward Mercer, its five-g deceleration burn conveniently strong enough to mask Wraith’s maneuvers. Micah tucked the Helios into the shadow of the larger and much noisier vessel, and followed the tanker in.
Up ahead, Mercer gleamed a dull gray against the blackness of space, a visual interruption that stood out among the tumbling stones of rock and ice that populated the fringes of the asteroid belt known as the Klintis.
{Transition complete,} Micah informed the team in the cabin.
Thad sent a two-click response, then followed it with, {ETA?}
Micah blinked through his overlay until the navigation screen popped up, showing time to Mercer. {Two hours, fifteen.}
{Copy that.}
Joining Thad were Asha, the team’s medic, and Boone, their sniper. Since Gabe was back on Ceriba, Thad had borrowed one of the guys from his former unit to round out the fire team. Micah didn’t know the man’s name; he’d just mentally tagged him as New Guy.
All four were gearing up, ready to slip onto the station once Wraith attached herself to Mercer’s outer hull.
A moment later, a diagram of the mining platform popped up on the ship’s net. Micah watched as Thad expanded it, rotating it until the service hatch where they’d insert into the torus was front and center.
{That’s our LZ,} the Marine said. {Dumps you right into one of the maintenance tunnels. Easy to breach, and less likelihood of anyone being around to see.}
Micah glanced over at the swarm of drones his copilot Yuki was controlling. {We on target to deliver the Heist?} He leaned over to tap on the icon that represented one of her drones. It was closing on the lumbering tanker ahead of them.
She nodded. A small ETA flashed next to the drone. {It should attach itself to their hull within the next few minutes.}
Micah eased Wraith back a bit, increasing the separation between the two ships, and then settled in to wait.
{Drone lock,} Yuki announced. {Unpacking the app now.}
Micah gave her a quick thumbs-up and then pinged the team. {Heist in progress.}
{Copy,} Thad replied.
Movement on one of the internal feeds caught Micah’s eye. He saw New Guy shoot Boone a questioning look.
The sniper just shrugged and looked away.
Getting much the same reaction from Thad and Asha, New Guy turned toward the cockpit. “Hey, what’s a heist?”
Micah grinned as Nina’s boot rocked his cradle. Will coughed quietly from the station across from Nina. The four of them had flown together long enough to know Yuki’s penchant for messing with new guys. Soldiers from the Unit were some of her favorite victims.
“A heist?” Yuki asked, swiveling her copilot’s cradle to face the main cabin. She leaned back and stretched her legs out in front of her. “Well, now, there’s a tale.” She lifted her eyes to the overhead as if in thought.
Nina snickered, and Yuki shot her a quelling glance. Micah didn't dare take his eyes off Wraith’s cockpit feed for fear he would lose it if he saw Thad’s expression.
Returning her gaze to New Guy, Yuki let out a long breath. “To truly appreciate the beauty of the heist, you have to understand that it comes from an old and storied tradition.”
“Really?”
Micah dipped his head to hide a grin.
“Really.” Yuki gave the new guy a solemn nod before settling back in to weave her tale. “It all began pre-diaspora, Old Earth, 20th century….”
“Can’t believe something that old would have any value to the Unit,” New Guy muttered disbelievingly.
Micah heard Thad clear his throat, and knew the Marine was using it to cover a laugh.
“Believe it.” Yuki leveled a jaundiced eye at Thad. “Now, where was I? Oh yes, Old Earth, twentieth century.” Her gaze returned to the overhead. “It was common in those days for thieves, criminals, and persons of ill repute—”
{Did she just say ‘ill repute’?} Thad’s voice sounded a bit strangled.
“As the story goes, back in those days, governments and private corporations used flat, two-dimensional video cameras to monitor vulnerable areas susceptible to being breached. A thief would have to overcome that in order to get past the security and take whatever it was he had come to steal.”
“2D image feeds are easy to disrupt, though,” New Guy said.
“They are, but if they wanted to pull off the perfect crime, and didn't want anyone to know that they’d ever been there in the first place, they’d hack the system, record enough of the feed to be believable, and then replace the live feed with their pre-recorded one.”
“Why not just have them get past the security guys by subduing them first?” New Guy protested. “There are any number of ways you could do that.
”
“Yes, but then they’d all be aware that something had happened,” Yuki said with an exaggerated patience. “And then it wouldn’t qualify as a heist. The perfect heist is never discovered. You enter, swap the item of value with a high-quality facsimile, and then leave with no one the wiser. And looping the video feed is the first step to doing that.”
“Okay, I can see that,” New Guy nodded. “But what’s the connection to the heist hack we’re using?”
Micah saw the smug look on Yuki’s face as she reeled New Guy in.
“Well, we’re, in essence, stealing their magnetic-field-monitoring system, and inserting what we want them to see. Our heist insinuates itself into Mercer’s systems the first time that ship out there communicates with Mercer’s space traffic control. It waits until the ship docks, and then once a hard-link is set up, slips itself inside the torus’s monitoring system, pretty as you please. They’ll be completely unaware their magnetic field pattern has been falsified to appear as though no disruption has occurred.”
“Heist,” New Guy muttered, shaking his head and turning back to check his gear. “Damn, that’s some real shit….”
A private connection sprang into existence between Thad and the flight crew.
{Who wants to wager how long it’ll take New Guy to spread that tall tale once we get back?} Nina asked. {And how long will everyone let it go before someone lets him in on it? The hack’s only called a Heist because the Navy’s official designation for the app is HE–1ST.}
{You know I don’t take sucker bets, cher,} Thad replied.
{Hey, if New Guy’s going to give me an opening like that, I’m taking it. Besides, my version’s a lot more interesting than the truth,} Yuki retorted.
{Not gonna argue,} Micah told her.
A notification snagged his attention as the tanker docked.
Yuki passed the HE-1ST’s program over to Will, who tied the hack into Wraith’s systems status display. Its icon showed amber with a ‘pending’ status flag beside it.
Moments later, the telltale flickered to green.
The heist had successfully inserted itself into the torus’s monitoring system and taken a snapshot of its magnetic field signature. It then synched with Wraith’s SI, isolating the Helios’s approach vector. At the appropriate time, it would send a cancellation wave to counteract the ripple Wraith would cause in the magnetic lines when she intercepted Mercer’s field.
No disturbance, no intruder.
{We’re a go.}
At Will’s words, everyone sprang into action. Micah nudged the ship to the edge of the no-wake zone and cut her drives, drifting silently through the torus’s artificial magnetosphere.
While the ship closed on the station, the team moved aft toward Wraith’s hatch, and Nina and Will monitored the surrounding area for any indications the ship’s disturbance of the magnetic field lines had been noted, despite the heist hack.
The hatch Thad had flagged grew as Micah used thrusters to close the distance, while matching the rotational speed around the torus. He brought the ship to within a few meters of the hatch and sent Boone a visual.
The sniper was alone in Wraith’s airlock, his drakeskin suit sealed for vacuum. Boone acknowledged receipt of the feed and then cycled the ship’s airlock, exposing himself to space.
Micah spared a quick look at the feed to confirm the man’s tether had him secured to the ship. He saw the Bravo Charlie in Boone’s hands, and knew the sniper was ready to make his move.
{Closing now,} he told him.
{Copy,} the other man replied.
Although a Bravo Charlie wasn’t technically a weapon, the breaching canisters still fell under the sniper’s purview. Once he affixed the BC to the hatch, the breaching program would subvert the torus’s security system, convincing it that the hatch remained securely closed.
Only then would Micah bring Wraith into physical contact with Mercer.
He waited while Boone reached out, secured the canister to the hatch, and then reeled himself back in. Micah waited for the BC to signal a positive lock before easing Wraith ever so slowly toward the torus’s hull.
The moment the BC flipped from amber to green, he feathered the ship to a stop, the two hatches aligned perfectly. Wraith’s surface barely kissed Mercer’s skin, but it was enough. The seal clicked into place.
{Done. You’re up!} Micah told the team as he locked Wraith’s systems into station-keeping mode.
As always, separating himself from such a deep merge felt a bit like surfacing from a bottomless pond. His viewpoint flipped, his eyes no longer tied into Wraith’s sensors, but once again his own.
As the ship’s interior came back into focus, Micah unwebbed and stood. With Wraith now sharing Mercer’s centripetal force, down was now ship’s starboard in the main cabin. The cockpit operated independently on its own gimbal and so was already positioned properly, but the rest of the ship needed a bit of tweaking.
Will handled it, sending the commands to restructure the cabin’s modular walls and surfaces to reflect the new orientation.
It was something the Navy had worked out ages ago, sheathing its ships’ interiors with ActiveFiber surfaces. Structures like interior walls, seating, and even plumbing were rearranged by simple programming.
Micah caught Thad at the hatch just before the Marine stepped through into Mercer.
“Good hunting,” he told the man. “Let us know if you need anything.”
“Will do, Navy.” Thad sent him a quick nod and then sealed the hatch behind him.
Now, all the crew could do was wait.
SYNTHETIC INTELLIGENCE
Center for Infectious Diseases
Montpelier, Ceriba
Addy watched the Center for Infectious Diseases’ headquarters complex grow larger in the shuttle’s forward screens as they approached the outskirts of Montpelier. The sleepy suburban town was four hundred kilometers outside the capital city of St. Clair. As they neared, she could just make out the new wing that had been added to accommodate Project Rufus.
Up in the cockpit, she could hear Katie Hyer’s energetic tones as the pilot conversed with Montpelier Tower. The few words Addy could make out indicated they were cleared for approach to the shuttle pad atop the Center’s main building.
Chief Warrant Hyer was one of deGrasse’s few survivors; Addy owed her life to the chief’s actions that day. She was Task Force Blue’s newest and youngest member, and had been brought in as a flight engineer trainee. Since its construction had been held up—typical Navy, Addy thought with amusement—the team had been putting her through training, so she was fully mission-qualified as a backup pilot, as well.
“We’ll be landing in a few,” Hyer called out. “Colonel Valenti says I’m assigned to you today. Wherever you need to go, you just let me know.”
“Thanks, Chief,” Gabe said. “I think we’ll be here a while.”
The pilot considered his words, running a hand absently over her short-cropped, blue-tipped fuzz. “Soon as you’re inside the building, I’ll go find a place to park. Just ping if you need me.” Hyer brought the shuttle to a stop and cracked open the hatch.
Heat radiated off the Center’s roof as Addy and Gabe stepped out into Montpelier’s summertime air. Blue skies were dotted with puffy white clouds. A warm breeze brought the smells of freshly cut grass. The pastoral environment seemed at odds with the urgency of their situation.
They crossed the few steps to the rooftop doors, cool air blasting Addy as her ID token granted them access. It heightened the contrast between the sun-drenched rooftop and the dimly lit vestibule.
The lift doors were open, with a car waiting to whisk them to the main lobby. It was empty save for a lone individual seated on a cushioned bench. Recognition flared in the woman’s eyes as she spied Gabe.
“That’s Harper,” he said as she strode toward them, her long hair fanning out behind her, stirred by the brisk pace.
“Agent Alvarez,” she said, and then turned to A
ddy. “I don’t know if you remember me, Captain. We met once, on deGrasse. I helped Sam get out of there before—”
She broke off as Addy held out a hand. “There are precious few of us who are members of that particular survivor’s guild. I’m glad you’re on our team.”
Harper gave her hand a quick shake, and Addy motioned them both toward the lobby’s security kiosk. Once cleared into the building, another bank of lifts took them up to the more secured section that housed Project Rufus.
The NSA wing was protected by a much more stringent security system. Once the three were processed through, Addy led them to her office. One side of the hallway was lined with clearsteel walls that allowed them to see into each room as they passed. She paused in front of the first one and rested her hand on the transparent pane.
“Welcome to Project Rufus. Behind these walls lay everything that remains from deGrasse,” she stated flatly. “As a precaution, Admiral Toland’s ordered the work halted while we investigate the theft of those vials.”
The proof of that was easily seen. The room before her was dark, the only thing she saw in the clearsteel was a soft reflection of her own features. She could thank the Akkadians’ recent actions for the dark circles she saw smudging the hollows beneath her eyes.
She pushed away from the wall and turned down the hallway that led to her office. As they entered, she said, “Grab a seat while I access everything we have on the theft.”
Gabe snagged a pair of chairs, dropped them in front of Addy’s desk, and motioned for Harper to take a seat.
“Quick lesson on the differences between the three containment levels,” Addy said. “Biosafety Level Two is for moderate hazards. Access to L2 is restricted, but all you need is to glove in a nano coating before you enter.” She pointed down the hall. “It’s on this same level, through a pass-coded entrance. We have two labs, and an observation room.”
The Chiral Protocol – A Military Science Fiction Thriller: Biogenesis War Book 2 (The Biogenesis War) Page 9
