by Jay Allan
“Yes, sir,” Cortez replied.
“And advise Admiral Hurley to get another of her wings on alert…just in case we need to check out any potential warp gate sightings.” He knew the fleet didn’t need to deploy fighters to search for warp gates, but sending them out would extend the range of close inspections…and possibly speed up the process. And Compton wanted to move on as quickly as possible and get the fleet farther from X48. Just in case.
* * *
“Alright, we’re going to do the same thing we did in system X48.” Fujin sat in her chair, snapping out orders and fighting the urge to reach out for the throttle that wasn’t in front of her anymore. It was a habit that appeared to die hard, though she had allowed herself to think it was getting a little better. “The Lightnings will drop a series of scanner buoys and remain in position two hundred thousand kilometers from the planet. I know this system looks empty, but the truth is we’d have no idea if there was an enemy ship somewhere, powered down and watching us.” A little mental aid to keep her people sharp. Let them imagine an enemy Gremlin or Gargoyle, lurking in the empty depths, just waiting to strike.
She listened quietly while the Lightnings’ commander confirmed. Then she took a quick look at her display. “Wildcats, I want you to move into low orbit and do a north-south sweep around the planet. Thousand klick interval between birds.”
“Wildcat leader, acknowledged.” Bev Jones was almost as young as Fujin, and she hadn’t had her squadron command any longer than Fujin had been in charge of the wing. The two hadn’t met before Jones transferred over from Saratoga to take over the Wildcats, but they’d gotten along very well from the start. Both were survivors from shattered formations, and both had been thrust rapidly upward in rank as a result of the fleet’s losses. Fujin had to remind herself she outranked her new comrade…and to realize that affected the nature of the friendship she could allow to develop.
“Alright, Dragons, we’re going in on an east-west sweep at thousand kilometer intervals. Sending nav instructions now.”
She looked across the cramped cockpit toward Lieutenant Wainwright. She’d been trying to decide for weeks if her new pilot was even cockier than she had been when she’d first sat in that chair. She wanted to say yes—for all his skill, she could see how reckless Wainwright was, how overly sure of his own ability to overcome any danger. But then she remembered herself, back before the crushing responsibility had sharpened her focus…and she just wasn’t sure.
Before I watched my entire squadron destroyed, she thought grimly. Before all my friends died around me.
“Okay, Lieutenant…let’s go in and see what this planet has to show us. The rest of the squadron’s following our lead.”
“Yes, Commander,” the young officer snapped back almost immediately. A second later he pushed the throttle, and the fighter lurched forward at 3g.
The fighter zipped toward the planet, and after a few minutes, Wainwright cut the thrust, and Fujin felt the relief of freefall. Her eyes dropped to her screen, checking the velocity. Just over one hundred kilometers per second. “That means we’ll be in orbit in…”
“We will enter orbit in eighteen minutes, Commander.” Wainwright had beaten her to the calculation, and from the cockiness in his voice, he knew it. “The last three minutes ten seconds will be at 3g deceleration.”
“Very well, Lieutenant. Bring us in.” Fujin suppressed a smile. She wanted to be annoyed by the brash young pilot, but she saw too much of herself in him for it to stick. Fighter crews were a breed apart from most navy types. It took a certain personality to crawl into a tiny five-man vehicle and go blasting down the throat of a two-million ton battleship. The suicide boat crews fancied themselves the navy’s daredevils, but Fujin knew no one came close to the casualty rate of the fighter corps. Indeed, she’d seen it firsthand…and just a quick thought of how few of her Academy classmates were still alive was enough to prove the point.
She looked out through the polycarbonate front of the cockpit, watching the blue-white hulk of the planet grow as the ship raced toward it. Then she glanced down at the display, her eyes moving toward the small circle to the left. She had two planets to scout, and she knew her people had to be careful with their fuel. They had to make it all the way back to the outer system. If she miscalculated, she knew it would be a mess. Admiral Compton would send a battleship to pick them up. But the thought of standing in front of him and explaining why she had caused such a disruption was terrifying. Not to mention the fact that Admiral Hurley would have gotten to her first, and Compton would only get what little was left after the fleet’s strike force commander had torn into her.
She couldn’t imagine having to answer for such carelessness…and certainly not to Terrance Compton. No, she would not make any mistakes. She would scout these two worlds, and she would get her birds back to Midway…on time and without incident.
The planet was looming in front of them now, filling almost the entire view through the cockpit. “Decelerating in ten seconds…”
She felt herself reacting almost automatically to the pilot’s voice, leaning back into her chair, preparing for the shock of 3g. “Okay, let’s get the scanning suite online. No slip ups…we don’t have the fuel to go back and do anything again, so I want all of you to stay sharp.”
She felt the pressure of deceleration slam into her, and she focused on her breath, consciously sucking air into her lungs.
Yes, stay sharp…all of you. If I drop the ball, I have to answer to Admirals Hurley and Compton. If any of you screw up, you’ll have to deal with me.
She was surprised at the grim determination going through her mind, the rumbling avalanche she was ready to drop on any of her people who did less than their absolute best. She had come a long way from her days in the pilot’s chair, despite the relatively short period of time that had elapsed. The cocky young pilot that had been Mariko Fujin was gone, replaced by the serious officer and commander who had seen too many of her comrades die. In a vague and distant way, she had a sense of the pressure on Admiral Compton, the relentless, unending stress…and she wondered what kept him so focused, so in control. She couldn’t imagine herself in his place. For all the danger and hardship the fighter groups endured, she wouldn’t trade places with the fleet’s commander. She was grateful to have a man like Compton on Midway’s flag bridge…and she would show it by making sure her people did the best job possible.
She felt the pressure of three times her weight disappear, replaced by the relief of freefall. The ship was in orbit. “Alright,” she said, “Let’s do this. I want everybody spot on. This run’s going to be perfect, or I’ll have somebody’s head for it.”
* * *
“All vessels are in formation, Admiral.” There was a hint of tension in Cortez’ voice, and the officer was hunched over his workstation. Coordinating a warp gate transit for almost one hundred fifty ships was no one’s idea of an easy maneuver. In normal circumstances, Compton would have sent through a spread of probes to scan the area on the other side of the gate, just to be sure there was no enemy waiting in ambush. But the fleet had long ago used the last of its warp-compatible drones, so manned ships had to do what computerized probe would have.
“Captain Duke reports ready to transit, sir.” John Duke commanded the fleet’s fast attack ships, and he’d assembled a force of four of his vessels to do a scouting run into the newly designated X51 system. His force was less than a minute from the warp gate, and their transit would be virtually instantaneous once they entered the heavy grav field and reached the transit point.
When they got to the other side, they would be in another solar system, light years away from the fleet. They would conduct a complete scan and, if all went well, two of the ships would return through the gate and give the all clear…and Admiral Compton would give the final orders for the rest of the fleet to line up and begin transiting. It would take close to an hour to get all the ships through, and that was if everything went perfectly according to p
lan. Which it never does, Compton thought.
“Captain Duke is to commence his operation.” Compton had almost vetoed Duke’s inclusion of his flagship in the scouting party, but in the end he hadn’t. Duke’s men and women going through that gate deserved to have their commander with him…and if there was trouble waiting in the next system, Compton couldn’t think of anyone he’d rather have on the scene to deal with it than John Duke.
He had found himself becoming more reluctant to allow his top officers to take anything he perceived as a risk. He’d lost too many in the last year, and out here, in the depth of unexplored space, there would be no replacements. His people might find food, they could repair damaged equipment. They might even mine metals and build new ships if they ever found at least a semi-permanent home. But the men and women in the fleet were all there would be, at least unless they settled down somewhere, and a new generation was born. But that prospect, as unlikely as it seemed, still wouldn’t replace his key officers. Not for decades, at least.
But wars weren’t won by caution…he’d learned that fighting alongside Augustus Garret for so many years. The two Alliance admirals were renowned for their daring, for the incredible risks they often took to secure victory. And now he found himself choked with caution, nagged by a stubborn hesitancy he had to push aside with every command decision.
What happened in these systems? What battles took place here? Should we be going deeper into this? And if not, then where?
Mariko Fujin’s fighters had brought back a treasure trove of scanning data…and it all confirmed that both of the system’s habitable planets had once been heavily populated…and that some type of warfare had raged across their surfaces. The fleet had passed dozens of First Imperium worlds in the year since the fateful events in system X2, they had all been the same. Crumbling remains of an ancient civilization, one where the people seemed to have simply vanished. The buildings, the infrastructure were decayed by the passage of time, but there were no signs of strife, no indications of violence or warfare.
Until X48. The sole habitable planet in that system had clearly been a battlefield, and even now, 500,000 years later, the remains of the struggle were clear. And now X49 had two planets full of ruined cities…and more detritus of ancient war.
What is this? What is different about these systems? Why was there fighting here when we found no signs of any on the other planets?
Compton’s mind was awash with questions. Should his people press on, explore this strange war torn part of the Imperium? Or should he shun it, backtrack…keep the fleet in X48 until the farms had yielded their crops…and then go back the way they had come, and seek a route around the remains of this ancient war?
He tried to consider it from every angle, to analyze the scant data that was available. There was no clear decision. Either choice seemed like a coin toss, as likely to be a disastrous error as the right way to go. But he had to make a decision, had to choose a path…
“Commander, all ships are to prepare for transit. We’ll be going through as soon as we get Captain Duke’s report.” They’d be backtracking soon enough to pick up the expedition…so if they were going to see what lay ahead, now was the time.
Chapter Six
Research Notes of Hieronymus Cutter
I understand Admiral Compton’s previous refusals to allow my team to conduct exploratory missions on worlds we have passed. I am a scientist, a researcher…and I know I often find it difficult to look past that, to consider other concerns and points of view. It is a common criticism of academics, and not one without some validity.
I cannot imagine the pressure on Admiral Compton, the enormous burden he carries every moment. I have always respected him as a military hero, and later, as I came to know him personally, as a fair and just man, one who has saved us all from certain death, more than once. My admiration has only continued to grow.
But I wonder now if he has become too cautious, too driven by the urge to avoid risk whenever possible. Indeed, I too feel the fear everyone in the fleet does, the strange aloneness we try to ignore but can never banish entirely from our minds. We are now unimaginably distant from any others of our kind, utterly lost with no hope of return. Even for a human like me—introverted, nearly misanthropic in many ways—it is difficult to escape the coldness of being so far from home. It affects every thought, inflames every fear.
No, I cannot fault the admiral for erring on the side of caution, yet, I wonder now if we have made a great mistake not risking additional expeditions. For this world is not at all what I expected, and we lack the information to truly understand what happened here. I find myself wishing for more data on the other planets of the Imperium, for a frame of reference that would allow me to truly begin to understand what happened here so long ago.
The cities we found on the world back in system X18 were ancient and abandoned…but the only destruction we found was that of decay, of time’s relentless march. But this world is different. It was far more massively developed, clearly once the home to a truly enormous population. But, most inexplicably, its people appear to have died not in some mysterious way, but in a truly momentous battle. The signs of war, of carnage and destruction, are everywhere…even after the passage of so many millennia.
The mystery of the people of the First Imperium, the builders of the robots and artificial intelligences we now struggle to defeat, has long defied attempts at explanation. The ruins in system X18 show no signs of strife, but here we are surrounded by the scars of war. So, what is the answer? What happened to these great ancients, beings that strode across the stars when men were still animals, struggling to survive?
30 kilometers south of “Plymouth Rock”
X48 – Planet II
The Fleet: 144 ships, 32,799 crew
“I can’t explain it. As far as I am aware, no colony has ever found soil conditions like this.” Sophie Barcomme looked out over the plain. There were two large mechanized planters moving slowly off to her right. And to the left, where her people had begun the operation, she could actually see tiny shoots poking above the ground, where seeds had been planted just three days before.
The tech team had assembled the massive planters in less than twenty-four hours, a miraculous technical feat by any measure. She’d initially expected them to have plenty of time to build the giant machines, at least two weeks while her people treated the planet’s soil. But her tests had produced astonishing results. The soil was fertile as it was, perfectly balanced to produce Earth crops.
Hieronymus Cutter wasn’t a biologist by any measure, but he understood the ramifications of Barcomme’s discovery. In the century and a half since mankind had discovered the warp gates that allowed interstellar travel, almost a thousand worlds had been colonized. But in almost every case, the local plants had proved to be unsuitable as food, not necessarily poisonous in every instance, but with chemical structures that defied human digestion and nutrient absorption. Imported Earth crops had been planted by the early settlers, but they had all died within days, unable to adapt to the alien soil. Botanists quickly developed methods to enrich the alien soils, allowing the colonies to grow the food they needed…and saving mankind’s expansion into the stars from stillbirth.
But the soil of X48 II was as perfectly balanced for Earthly plant growth as the home world’s richest farmland. Barcomme had been stunned when she read the results of the initial tests…and so disbelieving, she’d run them four times before she accepted the results. And then, just for good measure, she asked Cutter to take a look.
“I can’t explain it any better than you, Sophie.” Cutter was staring down at a ‘pad, looking at charts showing the correlation between Earth soil norms and those of X48 II. The lines were so closely aligned, he could barely tell them apart. “I’m afraid this is not my area of expertise, however. I know the basics of soil treatment operations and the underlying science, but it would overstate my knowledge to suggest I am familiar with colonial norms. Have there been any prev
ious examples of planets that sustained Earth crops without soil enhancement?”
“There are three colony worlds with native plants that serve as human foodstuffs. And two more with natural soil capable of supporting limited growth of transplanted Earth crops. But in all cases, the compatibility is marginal. The native plants will provide calories, but are still poor from a nutrient standpoint. And the Earth vegetables grow poorly, with substandard yields.” She paused and looked at Cutter. “This is the first time we have encountered a world where Earth crops grow as well as they do at home, at least without first treating the soil.”
Cutter turned and looked out over the nascent farm sprawling around them in all directions. “Did you conduct soil tests on the planet in system X18?” He angled his head back, looking again at Barcomme.
“No,” she replied, a hint of confusion in her voice. Then, with more assurance: “You think other First Imperium worlds would show the same results?”
“Perhaps,” he said. “Some…or all.”
“What are you suggesting, Hieronymus?”
“I’m not suggesting anything yet. But I find it hard to accept that this is a coincidence, don’t you? That the first world we’ve ever found with Earth-like soil just happens to be a First Imperium planet a hundred warp jumps and a thousand light years from Sol?”
Barcomme just stood and looked back at Cutter, silent, a thoughtful look on her face.
“The normal enrichment process…” Cutter paused, just for an instant. “It has both chemical and biological components, right?”
“Yes,” Barcomme answered. “It is customized for each world, based on initial conditions, but generally we introduce both specific chemicals and elements that are lacking, as well as genetically-engineered bacteria in most cases.”
