by Dan Worth
‘Shit…’ she breathed. ‘ This is Progenitor Tri-Linear Script. So maybe this is a Progenitor ship?’
‘I don’t think so. That other series of patterns are the same as the ones on those pieces that Cox showed us back on Barstow, but here they appear in conjunction with the more familiar language. I think one has been incorporated into the other, as though it’s been borrowed somehow. It still doesn’t explain why the writing on those shards that Reynaud showed us back on the station only incorporated the single unfamiliar script and why it was only displayed in a two dimensional form which made no sense. Maybe it has something to do with them being removed from the ship.’
‘Perhaps the larger, linear script represents the backbone of the system with these other layers bolted onto it.’
‘Yes, something like that. Perhaps there is a direct relationship between the two languages, one feeding data to and from the other. This looks like something that came from a civilisation that was quite happy to incorporate other cultures. Not that that’s a bad thing of course. Perhaps these people were quite cosmopolitan in their era.’
‘Or perhaps they enslaved others. So how long do you think it’ll take to translate these patterns?’
‘The small ones, I can do almost immediately, but I’ve no idea what the larger ones signify. Perhaps decoding the smaller ones might give me a clue. It impressed Reynaud no end when I ‘suddenly’ understood some of the writing. Always play your cards close to your chest with people like Reynaud, Katherine. It pays to have an advantage.’
‘Hmm, I couldn’t agree more. Anyway, I’ll see if I can get an analysis of the hull material. Despite what Reynaud’s been saying, I’d like to see some sort of date for this thing for myself. Just a second.’
She reached for a bulky package strapped to the belt of her suit. With clumsy gloved fingers she undid the fastenings and removed a small, oblong, date analysis module from it. Cursing her gloved hands she held the device against the skin of the vessel then carefully pressed a few keys inlaid on its upper surface. She peered at the device’s small screen, the light from which illuminated her face inside the helmet of her suit.
‘Anything interesting?’ said Rekkid. ‘Please tell me that Reynaud was wrong, I’d love to see his face.’
‘No, wait… it’s taking a while, the software doesn’t recognise the materials. Hmm.’
‘Hmm? Well?’
‘It seems like the device is having trouble verifying the date. According to the readings, this ship is either five billion years old, or it was only built about a century ago.’
‘Try adjusting it.’
‘I have.’
‘What readings is it trying to take?’
‘Electron spin resonance, luminescence… I thought this thing might be crystalline… hell I even asked for a carbon date in case it was organic, cosmic ray bombardment shows the same thing too.
‘Let me have a look at it,’ said Rekkid, moving closer. He squinted at the device. ‘Well, I think I see the problem.’
‘Oh?’ replied Katherine, feeling a little foolish. ‘Let me guess, I pressed three keys at once with these great big gloves on.’
‘No, look at where the module touches the skin of the ship.’
She did so.
‘Shit,’ she breathed. ‘Even though I’m pressing the module against the ship’s hull, it’s not actually in contact with anything physical, but there’s a surface there, nonetheless.’
‘Rather unsettling.’
‘How is that possible, some sort of energy field?’
‘Maybe… there’s another possibility though.’
‘Go on.’
‘You and I both commented on the fact that this ship doesn’t ‘feel’ right, like it isn’t really here. You can feel it now. Its mere presence seems to upset your brain’s perception of it. The thing exudes a feeling of disorientation doesn’t it?’
She nodded in agreement.
‘It’s like that feeling you get when you see a star-ship jump to hyperspace… I could be jumping to conclusions here, but I think that this thing exists in multiple dimensions. It would explain why we can’t get proper readings from it, why it confuses our perception so much. Our brains did not evolve to think in more than three spatial dimensions. We see something that exists in more than that and we can’t fully comprehend what we’re seeing. I’d love to know why Reynaud hasn’t mentioned anything about this. Even if I’m wrong, the fact that we can’t touch the physical surface of this ship is… well it’s just a bit odd, isn’t it?’
‘Bloody hell Rekkid, you really have to wonder what sort of level of technology is required to build something like this. If I remember my physics correctly, this sort of device is purely theoretical as far as both of our species are concerned. I think I read somewhere that the Navy tried something similar once in order to mask ships with a hyperspace field, but it kept annihilating the vessels concerned because the fields were too unstable.’
‘And even so, it required huge amounts of power. As far as I know, my species has never managed that little trick either. But this thing just seems to exist quite comfortably where it is. Yes, indeed. I think we should have a word with Cox. If we’re going to test my theory we need access to sensor equipment capable of detecting small space-time anomalies. We need the services of a star-ship.’
‘We’ll need plenty of evidence to convince him. I don’t suppose that there are any world-class quantum physicists hanging around?’
‘No, just two archaeologists with a tenuous hunch. Come on, let’s verify our results. We need to convince the Admiral that our hunch is more than just that.’
Chapter 14
In the days and weeks that passed as the Profit Margin travelled between the borders of Nahabe space and the remote Commonwealth star system of Hadar, Isaacs and Anita struck up a relationship of sorts. To his surprise, the girl was actually useful aboard ship. Aside from the obvious benefits she brought to his normally solitary existence, she had experience of space travel and star-ship maintenance, having apparently grown up aboard her family’s freighter caravan as it had plied the lucrative trade routes across the Commonwealth and beyond. She certainly wasn’t the wide eyed tourist he had taken her for at first. She even had a few yarns of her own to tell him after he’d tried impressing her with his deep space exploits. It seemed that her family had cut her loose for a few years before they set her to work in the family business with a ship of her own.
Isaacs decided to take her under his wing. He soon had her earning her keep, looking after the Profit Margin’s less critical systems and occasionally sitting up in the cockpit, keeping an eye on the ship as it powered through hyperspace.
He sat now at the ship’s main command console as it counted down the minutes and seconds until they jumped back into the shipping lanes around the moon system of the Hadar B’s largest gas giant, Beatty. He glanced over at Anita as she reclined casually in the opposite seat; her brown arms clasped around one folded knee. She flashed him a smile and brushed a strand of black hair out of her eyes.
It was funny, he thought, for the first time in a long while he was actually happy, after a fashion. During the day cycle, the ship’s gangways resounded to the sound of Anita’s cheerful voice and occasional singing as she worked, and even his jaded personality began to find her enthusiasm infectious. She made the ship feel like a real home for a change, instead of just a refuge. By night, she came to his quarters, still grimy from her day’s exertions and screwed his brains out.
Things, he reflected a little smugly, could certainly have been much worse. Quite what Anita saw in him, aside from a free ride, he hadn’t quite fathomed. But in any case, he intended to enjoy it while it lasted, however long that was. He strongly suspected it would be until they reached Hadar, and then that would be that. Either that or when he died from exhaustion.
The view outside twisted back into place - the pregnant banded orb of Beatty and the smaller, mottled, yellow-orange globe of the volcani
c moon Rhyolite replacing the rushing blackness of the hyperspace envelope. Isaacs checked the sensors, squinting at both local and system-wide displays. Anita saw him frown.
‘Something wrong?’ she asked.
‘Hmm? Oh, no not really,’ he replied. ‘There’s just a lot of military traffic in-system that’s all.’
‘I checked the system catalogue the other day, y’know, just to see where we were headed. There’s a base in this system between this star and the binary.’
‘Oh, yeah I know. Lot of ships though. Big ones too. Maybe it’s an exercise or something. Shit, there’s even one of the new Saturn class carriers.’
‘Maybe they came to hit the local pirate gangs. I shouldn’t worry. You’re not carrying anything you shouldn’t are you?’
‘With the exception of you, no I’m not.’
She laughed at that.
‘Still,’ he continued. ‘It makes you wonder what’s so special about this backwater system. Since when did a bunch of inbred miners warrant the deployment of this much firepower?’
Barstow Station traffic control slotted them into their approach patterns and the Profit Margin landed aboard the orbital facility without incident, the freighter being finally berthed in one of the docking bays clustered around the wheel shaped station’s central hub.
They collected their things from the ship and took the elevator outwards along one of the four arms that linked the hub to the habitation ring. Before they had left the ship, Isaacs had taken time to query the local station network as to the availability of hotel rooms aboard and by chance found a double room in a cheap hotel a short walk from the elevator exit.
The room was basic but comfortable, and the view from the small windows looked out over the grimy cityscape within the habitation ring whose jumble of boxy structures curved out of sight around the inner surface.
Isaacs dropped his bag and stretched out on the bed, making a mental note to get comfier bunks for his ship as Anita busied herself with unpacking.
‘So, what now?’ he said. ‘You going to stick around for a while longer?’
‘Uh huh,’ she replied distractedly. ‘Maybe I can help you find your wife? I’d like to meet her, I think.’
‘Yeah, I’m not sure she’ll appreciate that,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘I might have some explaining to do, although… come to think of it, it would go some way to making us even.’
‘She really fucked you around huh? With the money and everything?’
‘Yeah, and the rest.’
He’d confided to Anita on the way here the situation between himself and Anna one night after the two of them had got drunk aboard ship. Their break up, her shadowy existence since then and what he’d uncovered so far about her new circle of friends. It had felt good to talk to someone, though he’d left out the part about why she had left him. Some things he didn’t feel like talking about. He hadn’t been drunk enough to divulge that one.
Anita held up a t-shirt, frowned at the creases and slotted it onto a hanger.
‘So, what’s our next move? You going to meet someone here?’
‘I think someone’s supposed to meet me,’ he answered, staring at the ceiling. ‘Though I don’t know who.’
‘So how are you supposed to recognise them?’
‘Beats me. I guess I’ll know when I see them or when they get in touch. Anna’s people probably have the spaceport watched, so I bet they’ll know I’m here.’
‘So…’
‘So we wait.’
‘What, here? Can’t we go out and see the station?’
‘I suppose. Looks like a bit of hole if you ask me.’
‘I’ve seen worse. Come on, let’s find somewhere to eat. I fancy something other than the food you have on your ship.’
‘I’m a man of simple tastes.’
‘I’m surprised you taste anything if you eat that bland shit all the time. Come on. Let’s get showered and changed and we can go eat.’
‘I not really into dates, you know.’
‘Me neither, but I’m starving. Come on get in the shower. You stink. You’ve had those ship overalls on for a week.’
‘I have not…’ He began to protest, and then saw the look on her face. ‘Alright, fine.’ He said, pushing himself up off the bed. ‘In the shower I go.’ He paused on his way to the bathroom. ‘Care to join me?’ he added. ‘I think there’s some ancient rule about couples and hotel rooms. Besides, water’s scarce on the station and it’d be a shame to run two showers.’
They left the hotel and walked together down the main central thoroughfare around the station. Isaacs cast a sceptical eye over his surroundings. He’d been in some fairly crappy parts of the Commonwealth in his time, but this place really did reach new levels of decrepitude. Many of the buildings seemed as though they hadn’t been cleaned since the station was built and the streets were strewn with rubbish. Rats and other vermin scurried in the alleyways amidst the piles of decomposing refuse.
Anita seemed strangely at home here. Or at least it didn’t bother her visibly. She seemed her usual cheerful self. He guessed she was impressed just by being somewhere new. Part of him envied her naivety.
‘So, where shall we eat?’ she asked brightly.
‘Not around here that’s for sure,’ Isaacs replied. ‘I do have some standards. Hey, watch it!’ A drunken miner on leave stumbled into him in an effort to rejoin his friends at the take-away across the street from the bar he’d just exited. The man mumbled an apology and winked lecherously at Anita.
‘Yeah, it seems like there’s some better places up ahead. Some proper restaurants and cafes,’ she said, ignoring the man and pointing up the street where indeed, the buildings did seem a little cleaner. Holo-signs in a handful of languages winked luridly through the stale air.
‘Good,’ grunted Isaacs. ‘It could hardly get much worse. That place we just passed stank worse than a K’Soth’s arsehole.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Believe me, I know. Took me days to get the smell out of the heads on the ship… long story.’ He dismissed her quizzically amused look with a wave of his hand.
Eventually they found a place that looked cleaner and more frequented than the others and served Mexican food, or a variant thereof. In any case, the food was good, plentiful and cheap, even if the guacamole did give Isaacs pause for thought. Well, at least it’s green, he thought. He sat back sipping his beer and watched Anita as she finished the last of her king size burrito. She certainly did have quite the appetite for a woman of her stature, he mused.
‘So Cal, what attracted you to this life?’ she said through a mouthful of food.
‘Hmm?’ he replied distractedly.
‘You know, living out of space port bars, eking out a precarious existence and all the rest.’
‘Oh you know… I think I always wanted to be a pilot. Ever since I was a kid. I used to listen to my Grandpa’s war stories and I think I worshipped him a bit. Always wanted to see the stars I guess.’
‘You were in the Navy weren’t you?’
‘Yeah, I was for a bit.’
‘How come you left?’
‘Oh well…’ he paused. ‘It… didn’t really work out for me I guess. I suppose I don’t suit the military life. I don’t take orders well, you know.’
‘Mmm I figured.’ She seemed to be scrutinising him. Smart kid. She could tell he wasn’t being straight with her.
‘Anyway, I didn’t fancy working for one of the big haulage concerns or the mining corporations, so Anna and I decided to make a go of it freelancing. We did pretty well for a time before it all fell apart. We had some good times too. Some of the crazy shit we pulled over the years…’ He laughed ruefully.
‘You really loved her, didn’t you?’
‘Yeah, and I fucked it up. Well, I suppose we both did. Still, it was better than working in some fucking office back home on Mars like my Dad did all those years for Orion Shipping before they downsized him without so much as a thank you. Chrys
e Planetia must be the dullest, blandest suburb in the fucking Solar System. I couldn’t wait to get out; ran away to join the Navy.’
‘Poor little rich boy. You wanted adventure?’
‘Yeah. I think my Dad was kind of proud of me actually, in a way. I had the guts to break the mould and strike out on my own. Something he never did. Anyway, you’re one to talk, Little Miss Gap Year. Mummy and Daddy going to buy you your own ship when you return?’
‘Yeah,’ she replied and grinned. ‘A big, pink, chauffeur-driven shiny one.’
‘I can picture it now.’
‘Nah. Seriously, it’ll be a while before they trust me with my own freighter. There’s a whole bunch of stuff I need to learn first. I’ll probably second for my Dad for a year or two until I learn the ropes.’
‘That shouldn’t be too hard. You grew up with this stuff.’
‘Yeah I know. But I guess I took most of it for granted. Besides, I spent most of my time from the age of five in school on Elysium whilst they were hauling stuff around the Commonwealth. I just spent the summers aboard ship. I think I fell in love with space though. There’s something about the…’ she struggled for words, ‘the perfect, terrible beauty of it all. I mean, that gas giant outside, it’s a ball of toxic gas, crushing pressures and thousand-kilometre-an-hour hurricanes… and it’s beautiful. The clouds, the ring systems…’
‘You could look at it all day.’
‘Exactly.’
‘Yeah, you’ve got it bad kid. Just like the rest of us haggard spacers. Why do you think you see old pilots still at the controls of their ships even though they’re way past retirement? Even though they’ve made enough money to stop? It’s ‘cause they fell in love with galaxy. Some of us just belong out here.’
‘But you see something else don’t you?’ she said, her eyes narrowed as she regarded him.
‘What do you mean?’
‘I’ve seen it your eyes these past few days. Space scares you a little, doesn’t it?’
