“The signal goes here,” said Chainer, clearly pleased with himself. “The divergence between our signal and theirs is just beginning to become significant given the distance we’re talking about, however, it’s not so significant that I can’t tell you with confidence what our heading will be.”
“I’m all ears, Lieutenant.”
“There’s a solar system a day and a half’s lightspeed travel away from us. In fact, there’s a cluster of solar systems. The signal ends there.”
“Have you been able to find anything more specific?” asked Duggan. “It would be good to know what we’re getting into.”
“Sorry, we’re too far out, sir. I can only recommend we exit lightspeed a long way distant and do the rest on the gravity drives.”
“That’s what we’ll do.” Duggan returned to his seat. “We’ll make the jump as soon as we’re at a safe distance from Frades-2.”
“There’s nothing hostile on the scans, sir.”
“We should have ample time to get away,” added Breeze.
“Let’s do it. Disengage the stealth modules and prepare for the jump. I’d prefer you to err on the side of caution when it comes to our re-entry into local space, Lieutenant.”
“Stealth deactivated. I’ll bring the fission drives up to speed as soon as I’m able and I’ll aim for four hours out.”
“That should be fine.”
They made their escape to lightspeed without incident and Duggan sighed noisily as soon as they made the transition.
“What is it?” asked McGlashan.
Duggan laughed. “For once, I’d prefer a longer journey time than we have.”
“It got pretty hectic back there.”
“You did exceptionally well, Commander,” he said. “I haven’t had the chance to say it yet.”
“Lieutenant Breeze played an equal part, sir.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Duggan said with a smile. “I’ll make sure the right people hear about what the two of you achieved.”
“If I need to do it again, can I put in a request for an additional pair of hands, sir?” she said. “They can graft them underneath the ones I’ve already got.”
“You did well enough with the two you’ve got.”
“While we’re on, can I put in a request for a single, additional hand, sir?” asked Chainer.
Duggan shook his head, wondering what nonsense was about to spill from the man’s mouth. “Why is that, Lieutenant?”
“So I can hold my coffee while I work, sir. I need to keep putting the cup down when I’m using the super-fars.”
“You do talk some crap, Frank,” said Breeze.
“That he does,” agreed Duggan. “However, he also performed well today, so I’ll forgive him.”
The AI-generated rota favoured Duggan and he didn’t have to wait long for an opportunity to take a break. His stomach rumbled and he could tell he’d burned a lot of calories over the last few hours.
The mess room was still busy, though some of the troops had dispersed to do whatever it was they wanted to do. Duggan caught sight of Braler – showing no sign of his injury - in one corner and was pleased to see the Ghast talking to Barron and McCarty. The better they communicated, the better they’d perform in pinch situations.
Ortiz was there, sitting alone at a table, her eyes lost in a distant stare. She was well-liked, but there was a fine line between command and friendship, which cut her off from some of the talk. Duggan knew what she was feeling since he’d been there himself. When she’d been a sergeant, the gap was smaller. Now he’d promoted her to lieutenant, the troops would be much more aware of the difference between them. He sat opposite with a tray of his usual steak and was pleased when she smiled at him.
“What’s that?” he asked.
“Chicken salad.”
He peered at it. “Not a bad impression of one, either.”
“The replicators get better every year.”
Duggan wasn’t fond of small talk. “The Ghasts did well,” he said. “If a bit eager.”
“I didn’t expect anything else, sir. Their methods are similar to ours. Those repeaters are good at close range.”
“Expect an extensive debriefing when we return,” he said. “There are many in the Space Corps who want to know about the capabilities of our new allies.”
“Are they hoping for failure?”
“Maybe some people are. The war lasted for many years and it’ll take time before there’s anything like acceptance.”
“I can understand. Out here in enemy territory there’s no choice other than to work together.”
Duggan took a deep breath. “Any regrets about promotion, Lieutenant?”
“There are some things I miss,” she said. “I don’t think I have regrets. I’m good at what I do, sir – it means I get to keep these poor bastards alive a bit longer than they might otherwise manage without me.”
“You’ve got your work cut out – we’re a long way from home.”
“This is home now, sir,” she said, indicating the walls around her.
“What about the ring you carry?”
“I’ll always have it with me. I can’t let the memories slow me down – I’ve got others to look after.”
“That you have,” said Duggan.
He finished his meal and returned to the bridge, an hour before his break was over. There was something about his conversation with Ortiz which left him saddened. Everyone needed a future, but she appeared ready to forsake her own. He didn’t know how to help, nor even if he should try. He shook the thoughts away and brought his attention to the matters at hand.
A few hours later, he conducted a short ceremony to remember the dead from the recent mission. It put him in a foul mood for the rest of the journey and he spoke few words to the others. Eventually, Breeze announced the imminence of their arrival.
Chapter Twenty-Two
“Whoa!” was the first word Chainer spoke when the Crimson switched onto its gravity drives. “What the hell is going on here?”
Duggan could tell he was going to hear something important in the very near future. “Activate stealth as soon as available,” he instructed. “Weapons on full alert.”
“Yes, sir,” Breeze and McGlashan replied at once.
“What have you found, Lieutenant Chainer?” Duggan asked, resisting the urge to leave his seat. His eyes roved across his console, seeking reassurance there was nothing immediately threatening in the vicinity.
“This place…I’ve never seen the like before,” said Chainer. “It’s like the comms capital of the universe or something.”
“Speak plainly, man,” Duggan snapped.
“There are signals everywhere, sir. Coming here, or leaving to places an infinity away. Our backup comms is struggling to make sense of them and I’m sure we’re only seeing a fraction of what’s out there.”
“Stealth modules online,” said Breeze.
Reassured they were safe for the moment, Duggan rose and stood next to Chainer, wrinkling his nose at the steaming cup of too-strong coffee nearby.
“This is incredible, sir. Look at the traffic – it makes the New Earth comms hub look like two tin cans tied together with a piece of string.”
“The signals are coming from that planet there?”
“Definitely. I’ve had a little peek, but we’ll need to be closer before I can make much sense of it.”
“Give me a view of this solar system on the main screen,” said Duggan, looking at Breeze.
“Here you are, sir. Another one to add to our incomplete chart of the great Dreamer Empire.”
“An old, red sun with five planets, a few moons and not much else worth mentioning,” said Duggan. “Any sign of breathable atmospheres? Are these planets populated?”
“I would venture a negative to both of those questions,” said Chainer, not looking away from his screens.
“You’re not certain?”
“You’ll know as soon as I know. Here, check this out, si
r.”
New detail appeared on the bulkhead screen. The graphic of the third planet became highlighted in yellow, and countless thin orange lines stretched away from its surface until they disappeared from the edges of the display.
“Each one of these lines is a comms signal,” said Chainer. “They could be inbound or outbound and each one could potentially carry zettabytes of data.”
“There are thousands of them,” said McGlashan.
“And like I said, these are only the ones we can see. I’d expect any military signals to be much tighter and harder to detect.”
“You mean this planet might house the main comms network for the enemy’s military forces?” asked Duggan.
“No, sir, definitely not. You’ll notice that as the planet orbits the sun, some of the signals stop – deliberately stopped, I would say. They haven’t yet discovered a way to transmit directly through an entire sun, so when the planet is in the wrong place, the poor bastards at the far side of the sun won’t get their telephone calls.”
“Are you saying it’s part of a network?”
“I believe so. There might be six, ten, hell another hundred of these hubs across enemy space.”
“Can you get an estimate of how many others, based on which signals switch off and on?” asked Duggan.
“I thought you might ask that, sir. The answer is yes, but it’s going to burn the AI for a long time, plus we’ll need to be close enough to watch them and discover the switching pattern.”
“I don’t need a precise answer, Lieutenant. Get me something, even if there’s a wide margin of error.”
“I’ll get started, sir.” Chainer shook his head. “I can’t believe I’m seeing this. This is in an entirely different league to anything in the Confederation. These Dreamers have either been around a whole lot longer than us or they work a lot faster and harder.”
“This is the enemy we face,” said Duggan. “They brought the war to us and we have to fight back, regardless of their apparent superiority. I’ll bring us closer.”
Duggan took his seat and turned the Crimson towards the hub planet.
“If they’ve gone to the trouble of installing this comms equipment here, it makes me think we’ve arrived somewhere in the middle of their territory, rather than on the outskirts,” said Breeze. “It’s best to keep your comms network central.”
“That’s a good thought,” said Duggan. “It increases the chance their defences are weak.”
“Thinking long term, it also means we can drop into the middle of their space, while the Helius Blackstar only takes them to the edges of ours,” said McGlashan. “This might be the first significant advantage we have over them.”
“I’ve had another thought,” said Chainer. “Try not to fly through any of the transmission beams if you can avoid it. It’s unlikely to alert them, but you don’t know what alarms might be raised if there’s a temporary interruption in the signal.”
Duggan felt Chainer was over-thinking it in his excitement. Nevertheless, he acknowledged the advice though he didn’t have to take significant steps to alter his behaviour. There were many signals, but there was a lot of space for them to go through, ensuring there was little chance he’d accidentally pilot them into the middle of one.
The closer they came, the better the picture Chainer was able to paint. “The entire planet is studded with transmitters,” he said. “There are smaller ones every two hundred klicks and larger ones every thousand klicks, give or take.”
“How is it strung together?” asked Breeze. “They can’t function independently of each other, surely?”
“I’m trying to figure it out,” Chainer admitted. He waved to Duggan for attention. “Sir, I’ve sent you details of a new heading – there’s something I need to see.”
Duggan nodded and altered their course. Whatever Chainer was interested in, it was on the far side of the hub planet and coming towards them with the planet’s spin.
Chainer practically jumped from his seat “There!” he shouted. “They’ve got a main comms facility that’s hooking the smaller transmitters together.”
“I see it,” said Breeze. “By which I mean I can read the power spikes on the surface. This is big.”
“You might want to stop the ship while we have a think, sir,” said Chainer. “I wouldn’t like to approach without giving due consideration to the possibilities.”
Duggan brought the warship to a halt and tapped into the sensor feed Chainer was studying. “That’s a huge installation,” he said.
“Seventy square klicks,” said Chainer. “We’ve got bigger military bases, but I’m sure this is nothing other than comms we’re looking at on this planet.”
“Astorn,” said Breeze. “I just had the AI generate a name for us.”
From this distance, the image was grainy and it wavered on the screen. Duggan didn’t need a clear view to reach a swift conclusion. “This is going to be a tough nut to crack.”
“I think it’s beyond our capabilities,” said Breeze. “Or to be more precise, I think we’ll be taking an enormous risk if we take a head-on approach.”
“There is a total of sixteen mid-sized power generators,” said Chainer. “Those are the square buildings you can see in two clusters of eight. Each is approximately a third the volume of a single one of those pyramids they kept dropping around Confederation space. There are three larger buildings, which I imagine house the central control and monitoring, as well as several dozen transmitters.”
“These low buildings could be anything,” said Breeze. “We don’t know our enemy well enough to be certain.”
“They house troops,” said Duggan with confidence. “They’re too similar to the buildings on the Frades-2 installation.”
“In that case, they have thousands stationed there,” said McGlashan.
None of this was what concerned Duggan the most. He did a mental count of another type of building in the base. “Approximately fifty structures that bear an unmistakeable resemblance to surface missile launchers.”
“Not small ones,” said Chainer. “They’ve likely got good range and speed.”
“Plus this,” finished Duggan, running his finger along a four-kilometre shape off to one side of the installation.
“A heavy cruiser,” said McGlashan.
“All hidden away beneath an energy shield,” added Breeze.
“What are our options?” asked Duggan.
“Move on or Planet Breaker,” said Breeze without hesitation.
“Planet Breaker,” said McGlashan. “If we can knock this hub out, we’ll have given them a good kick the balls.”
“Lieutenant Chainer, what do you think?”
Chainer scratched at his stubble, as if he wanted to say something without being quite sure what it was. “It seems a shame to blow it up without coming away with something first.”
“What do you mean?” asked Duggan, his curiosity rising.
“Just think of the information flowing through that place, sir. Not only details of their lives and their civilisation, but locations and maps. Each of those signals has a destination and if we could find out where, we could build a picture of their space and their planets. The war has only started, yet think what we could do if we knew exactly where they lived.”
Chainer’s growing enthusiasm rubbed off on Duggan. “How do we get that information, Lieutenant? Their base may as well be impregnable. The signals will be heavily encrypted. How can we pull this off?”
“I don’t know, sir.” His face brightened. “I can think of a way to attempt a partial victory.”
“In the circumstances, a partial victory would be an excellent result.”
Chainer became animated, as he often did when talking about comms technology. “If we ignore the main base and instead focus on some of these other transmitters covering the surface, we may be able to steal the information which flows through them. I mean specifically these larger ones which appear every thousand klicks. They’re likely to fe
ed the data into a number of the smaller transmitters. If we could tap into that data and then escape, we can trawl through it at our leisure.”
“Are these secondary and tertiary transmitters likely to be garrisoned?” asked McGlashan.
“I should imagine so,” said Chainer. “I very much doubt they’ll be unoccupied.”
“How do we steal the data?” mused Duggan. “Would I be correct in thinking we’ll need something with a high storage capacity?”
“We usually rely on the suits for that sort of thing,” said McGlashan.
“We’ll need something with a much greater capacity than a spacesuit,” said Chainer. “Assuming you want to steal more than a nanosecond’s worth of data.”
“The ship’s core,” said Duggan quietly.
“We can’t pick up the AI like it was a briefcase, sir,” said Breeze. “It’s behind several hundred tonnes of bulkhead and requires tools and equipment to reach.”
“I’m not talking about the Space Corps computer,” said Duggan. “I mean the Dreamer core.”
“We can reach that?” asked Breeze incredulously.
Duggan stamped on the floor with his feet for effect. “It’s about two metres below us. I have authority to eject it from where it’s housed.”
“Couldn’t we simply land and then run a cable or something?” asked McGlashan. “Instead of removing our only method of getting through the wormhole? I mean, what if it gets damaged?”
“A cable won’t work,” said Chainer. “We still use cabled interfaces in some of the Space Corps kit, but we’re unlikely to be able to plug in to the enemy’s comms units as easily as that, even assuming we had several hundred metres of appropriate cable. It’ll be far quicker and easier to stick the core a metre or two away from their data source and suck it up wirelessly.”
“Is this definitely feasible?” asked Duggan. “If we took the Dreamer core away from the ship and placed it close enough to their comms unit, we could make a copy of their data?”
Terminus Gate (Survival Wars Book 5) Page 15
