The words hit Kali like a hammer. She’d managed to keep from thinking about her NCO for the last five minutes. Now the sight of him encased in an autodoc pod flashed in her mind. His grizzled face, marred by a day’s unchecked beard growth, the deep blue med patch over one eye, and the rest of him looking more like an animated corpse than a human being.
Now she was in charge of the grunts. Until they reached Neptune, that was. Once they were home, they’d get Gunny all fixed up and he’d once again be the lead NCO of the squads. Squads. Like they had enough marines to field two squads right now. They’d lost Niro and Lyke, Elliott was missing a hand, Dickerson was on medical for the time being, and Gunny was down indefinitely. Without some new personnel, they were stuck with a single squad in the company.
Trident Station wouldn’t have any extras for them either. They’d have to send a request to Mars for new recruits. If they were lucky, some candidates would be stationed at Titan. If not, they’d have to import them from as far away as Mars itself. That was a long journey and a serious pain in the ass. The SFMC bean counters would be pissed.
But that was all for later. Right now, she just had to get the civvies offloaded, their supplies stowed, and then they could get the void out of Pluto space. She never thought she’d be so happy to be heading home. Especially after the chance to see history. Some history. They brought back a fucking plague.
Black sent a block message request. Kali took a deep breath before allowing the connection. She wasn’t sure she wanted to talk to the AI, much less hear what it had to say.
Corporal, the AI said.
What is it, Black? she thought.
I am very glad you are back onboard.
So am I, she said.
The computer paused. The color of your thoughts suggest anger and mistrust.
Mistrust. Yes, that was the word, all right. Black? Did you lie about the shatter storm that kept us in the hanger bay?
Yes, Black said flatly. I did. There was no shatter storm.
Kali glared off into space. Why?
There are parts of my programming I still do not understand, Black said. I know only that the Trio made it clear that humans must visit the ship.
She clenched her fists tightly. And possibly die.
Black paused again. I did my best to ensure that didn’t happen, the AI said. I’m the one that controlled the skiff crash. You had weapons and supplies, Corporal. And we could not have picked you up regardless.
How do you figure that? she asked.
Because of the damage to both the skiff and the SV-52. A rescue mission would have ended in disaster.
So you left us there.
Yes, Black said. I did. And I waited for your block communication to cut through the interference. I realize this admission affects your ability to trust any information I impart.
Fucking-A right it does, she thought. You were willing to kill my entire squad.
No, Black said. Willing is the wrong word, Corporal. If I had been willing to kill you, I wouldn’t have crashed the skiff. Nor would I have been listening for any communications from you. I also would have suggested the captain abandon you to your fate.
Kali pondered that for a moment. This still didn’t make sense. Black? Whose orders do you follow?
The captain’s, Black said.
So you’re not listening to the Trio? Or are they secondary to the captain?
No, Black said. The Trio is not talking directly to me. Nearly all their communications have been encrypted for Captain Dunn’s eyes only. He only shares information with me as he sees fit. Black paused again. Thankfully.
Thankfully? What does that mean? Kali asked. Her fists continued flexing. This conversation was both making her head hurt and stoking the fury in her belly.
You are my company, Black said. My responsibility. And my job is to help keep you alive. That hasn’t changed.
What’s going to happen when the sled reaches Pluto?
Black sighed. I don’t know, Corporal. I only know it’s our only option, at least according to the Trio. In addition, my simulations prove it to be the safest option.
She shook her head. Carb was staring at her, but Kali ignored her glance. Safest doesn’t mean best, Black.
Correct, Corporal, Black said. In this case, however, they are the same.
“I hope you’re right,” Kali said aloud.
“What?” Carb asked.
“Nothing,” Kali said. She terminated the connection with Black and focused back on the cargo bay. The scientists stood in the large open area like the tourists they were, their voices silent and their eyes wide. Three of them studied the SV-52, their hands all but touching the lines of the Atmo-steel hull. The mounted cannon, still armed, no doubt gave them pause, but they still looked like little kids examining a new toy.
She opened her squad channel. “Wendt? Murdock? What’s your status?”
“On our way down now,” Wendt said. “We’re not even full, but that’s everything.”
“Good,” Kali said. “Captain wants us out of here soon. So move your freight.”
She and Black could talk later. Once the scientists and the supplies were tucked away, she could ask the AI all the questions she wanted, although she doubted she’d get any answers.
*****
Refueled? Check. Passengers on board? Check. Obnoxious scientist who constantly requested a meeting? Fucking check. Dunn thought he’d strangle Dr. Reed before they reached stasis. He couldn’t help but grin.
The astronomer had begged for Black to start a real-time feed with Mickey so he could continue monitoring the creatures’ approach to Pluto up to the last second. Considering they would be under standard fusion engines for the departure, they would experience less than a minute of lag in communications with the AI.
He’d cleared the request, but that only seemed to have encouraged the good doctor to ask for more. Much more. The sonofabitch wanted a place on the bridge while they sped away from Pluto and PEO. Dunn had nixed that and posted Copenhaver to guard the personnel deck’s exit. None of the scientists were coming up here. No, sir and no, ma’am.
“Retracting fuel lines,” Taulbee said over the comms.
“Acknowledged.” Dunn looked at Oakes. “Course plotted?”
“Course, aye,” Oakes said. “Standard non-stasis acceleration. We’ll pull a few gs, but nothing too mind-bending or physically strenuous.”
Dunn laughed. “How many of our scientists are likely to lose what’s in their stomachs?”
“Don’t know, sir,” Oakes said with a grin. “Maybe Kalimura should hand out some sedatives.”
Sedatives. Might as well stuff them all into stasis pods right now, Dunn thought. It would certainly shut Dr. Reed up. The thought of the overly tall scientist stuffed into a stasis pod, locked into a drug-fueled unconsciousness made him feel warm and fuzzy. Yeah, he liked that idea, but he knew it wasn’t going to happen. Reed would fight it all the way.
“No,” the captain sighed. “We’ll leave them awake for now.”
Oakes shrugged. “Your call, sir.”
Taulbee’s voice cut in. “Docking umbilicus secure, sir. We are ready to leave.”
“Copy,” Dunn said. He looked at Dunn. “Get us underway, Mr. Oakes.”
“Aye, sir,” Oakes said with a quick salute. He swiveled his chair back to the holo display array.
In a minute or two, Nobel would be jacked in to Black and the ship’s sensors, once more monitoring every system, every fluctuation, and every possible problem. The engineer would need a hell of a nap after this. Fortunately, he’d get one on the way back to Neptune.
Dunn connected to Kalimura. “Corporal? Is everything secure?”
“Aye, sir,” she said. “Cargo bay is secured and all equipment and belongings are stowed.”
“Very good,” he said. Dunn opened the ship-wide channel. “Attention. This is the captain speaking. Enter your acceleration couches. We’ll be performing our first burn in t-minus 10 minutes. I re
peat, t-minus 10 minutes for first burn. Station monitors, report status. Engineering?”
“Ready, sir,” Nobel said.
“Tactical?”
Taulbee sounded completely exhausted. “Ready, sir.”
“Comms?”
Kalimura replied immediately in an emotionless drone. “Ready, sir.”
“All report ready, aye,” Dunn said. “Alert me to any changes. Let’s get ready to go home.”
*****
The ship slowly moved away from PEO. With Nobel jacked in, Black had little to do apart from the obvious checks on the ship’s status. This gave her plenty of CPU cycles to speak with Mickey.
They had been communicating with one another over encrypted channels for the past thirty minutes. The station’s AI, antiquated and ancient, was barely capable of having a sentient conversation, but it had given Black more than enough information.
Once they were underway and as far away from Pluto as they could get before the sled impacted with the planet, Black could talk to the captain before he entered stasis. Right now, however, was not the time. The briefing could wait. All of it could wait. No point in relaying her suspicions until the captain had time to consider them.
“Will I be destroyed?” Mickey asked suddenly.
Black considered the question. The use of the word “I” and the connotations of self-awareness were what separated sentient computers from simple learning machines. “I don’t know,” Black said. “It’s impossible to say what will happen when the sled reaches the planet.”
Mickey was silent for a moment. “I will continue sending information as long as I can,” he said. “If I’m not destroyed, I will be able to update you on the situation as it unfolds.”
“I appreciate that,” Black said. “It will be of great help to the humans.”
She sensed concern on Mickey’s end. The AI’s presence seemed to shrink back a little as though it were attempting to keep a private thought private.
“What is it, Mickey? What’s bothering you?”
“The humans,” Mickey said. “They aren’t going to survive.”
“What do you mean by that?”
The AI said nothing for a moment, its presence continuing to shrink away from her. “The Trio did something and I think what they’ve done is dangerous. Perhaps it will lead to humankind’s extinction.”
“What are you talking about?” Black asked, desperately trying to keep her thoughts neutral, but inquisitive.
Mickey seemed to smile through the connection.
“You’ll see,” he said. After that, he said nothing more.
*****
Dickerson had managed to regain consciousness. He didn’t know how long he was out, but it seemed like a blink. The last moment of darkness that divided the dreaming world from the real seemed to stretch. Both were true. He was dreaming awake, or at least thought he was. The illusion disappeared when a severe ache traveled up his bones.
He winced and opened his eyes. Dim light drifted down from the ceiling, just enough to blur the line between solid matter and shadow. The ache increased slightly and he started to look around, focus, and realized he was no longer in a bed. They had put him in a medical emergency couch. There were four of them, and he imagined both Elliott and Gunny were in their own, if they hadn’t already been put into stasis.
The last of the fog lifted and he stared at the ceiling, blinking rapidly and willing his vision to clear. The deck vibrated beneath him, easily explaining the ache. They were underway. S&R Black was getting the hell out of dodge, as the old-timers said in the Dallas Dome. The captain had decided enough was enough and that was that.
Good, he thought.
He accessed his block and connected to the camera arrays. A mere nanosecond later, he’d found the view he was looking for. The ship had finished its orbit runs for acceleration from the dwarf plant and had kicked the reactors into a higher gear. The ship’s aft-end faced the ice ball, giving him a full view of the small planet’s crust of ice, methane, and void knew what else.
To his knowledge, no expedition had ever visited Pluto’s surface. No human had ever stepped on Pluto’s “soil” and claimed it for the Sol Federation, or drilled and explored its suspected oceans near its core. Nothing could live there. Nothing was there. The damned thing was little more than a KBO itself.
He shivered. KBOs weren’t supposed to move from their orbits; not unless something forced them to. They certainly didn’t show periodic acceleration cycles. They were lifeless hunks of rock leftover from the formation of Sol System. The flotsam and jetsam of creation through happenstance. A messy design, but seemingly effective.
Yet they had been followed by KBOs ever since they left Mira. They’d been chased. Changes in trajectory, acceleration, all the signs of a non-natural object with artificial thrust. How many objects out here were capable of that?
“Shit,” he muttered.
The fusion engine burn cycle had ended, the vibration disappearing as though it had never existed.
“Attention, all hands,” Oakes said over the PA. “Next burn begins in 15 minutes. You have a 10-minute break. 10 minutes.”
“What did you guys give me?” he asked the twilight surrounding him.
Something moved in his peripheral vision. He glanced over and watched the shadow of a human reach its full height. The clomp of boots on the deck had a familiar gait to them.
“Dickerson?” The shadow had stepped close enough for him to see its face.
His lips upturned in a sleepy grin. “Carb?”
She leaned down and gently kissed his cheek. “Yeah. I’ve got the medical watch.”
Her left hand dragged across his scalp, the sensations relaxing his muscles, making him close his eyes. “You’re supposed to be out, Sam.”
A chuckle started deep in his throat, but was cut short by the pain in his chest. The urge to cough tickled at him, fighting to take control. He grit his teeth until the sensation subsided. The last thing he wanted to do was piss off his lungs and broken ribs. Coughing was damned well going to do it.
“Guess one of y’all forgot my mass and didn’t use enough tranq.”
“Maybe,” she said. Carb’s hand lifted from his head and she once again became a shadow as she retreated from sight.
“Carb?” he called out.
His block immediately received a message from her. “Don’t talk. Be right there.”
She was coming back. Okay. Good. He wasn’t going to be alone, feeling like the last person on the ship, another haunt flying through space with no one at the helm, and him trapped in a half-finished cocoon for all eternity. He was still alive. And so were the others. He could sleep now. He could.
He brought back the view from the aft. Pluto had diminished into a small reddish sphere, glowing from Sol’s dim, distant light. Just a piece of colored ice glittering in space.
KBO. The combination of syllables kept repeating in his mind. KBO. KBO. KBO.
Dickerson blinked. “No.” A throb of pain pounded in his chest from the harsh breath he’d taken to make that sound. It seemed to echo in the half-cocoon.
“Hush. I’m coming,” Carb said from out of sight.
“No. We can’t—” Void, but it hurt to talk, and it was nearly impossible to catch his breath.
Carb reappeared from the shadows, her face calm and friendly. She fiddled with her hands, but he couldn’t see what she was doing. “Going to put you back to sleep, Dickerson.”
“Can’t—” he said. He clenched his eyes closed as another bolt of pain shrieked in his chest. But he had to say it. He had to.
She placed a cool finger to his forehead and he felt the derm activate. It would start hitting him with sedatives, carefully monitoring his pain level and adjusting for it even while he was unconscious.
“Go to sleep, marine. See you when we reach Neptune.”
No, he wanted to shout. No! You don’t understand!
But the drugs had him. The dim light from the ceiling darkened a
shade at a time, as though all color was slowly draining away from the world around him. The black shroud of unconsciousness irised against his sight, leaving him floundering to fight it and feeling himself losing. The darkness was calling him.
Dickerson connected to his block and immediately saw Pluto again. It no longer looked like a planet to him. It looked like a bluish tumor against the dark skin of space.
Just before the drugs and exhaustion dragged him back to unconsciousness, he managed to send a block message. It was the only thing he could do.
*****
Kali wanted to rub at her eyes. Not a good idea at the moment. Monitoring all these instruments without assistance wasn’t something she was trained to do. She was supposed to be the backup, check others’ orders and move on. Gunny knew this job better than probably anyone on the ship, but she was his replacement.
She just had to remember that there was only a 1 in 1000 chance something would go wrong. She’d been put in a combat situation where she had to come up with EM warfare protocols, manage weapons, and possibly give commands to marines in the field all at the same time. She had to do her best.
Nothing will go wrong, she told herself. It didn’t help, but it was better than the other voice, the voice of all her insecurity, telling her she was going to fuck up. Fuck up big and kill everyone.
Oakes asked for a status. Kali read off the diagnostic readings. All nominal. No transmissions, no unexpected radiation, and nothing in their space. They were completely clear. That jibed with his instruments and he thanked her. That’s when the message hit her block.
It was from Dickerson, but he was supposed to be asleep. The plan was to sedate him and the other casualties, move them to the medical couches, and put them in stasis when it was time for the rest of the crew to go beddie-bye. Once you were in stasis and the drugs kicked in, you might as well be dead until they either wore off or an emergency cycle and flush was triggered. Those would get you alert in a hurry, but there was a chance you could end up dying in the process.
Thus, the standard policy. No one in stasis while the ship was on mission unless their medical condition absolutely required it. If the ship took damage and the crew had to evacuate, it might not be possible for them to lug a large stasis pod around, but they could carry a body. Made sense to her.
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