The Synchronicity War Part 2

by Dietmar Wehr

  “Funny you should say that, Admiral. Commander Johansen once told me I wasn’t nearly devious enough.” Howard nodded.

  “And speaking of the commander, how soon can Valiant get under way to EE?”

  “24 hours if we get all the consumable we need to replenish.”

  “I’ll make sure you get them if you make sure she leaves on schedule. Agreed?”

  “You got a deal, Sir.” said Shiloh. Howard gave him a friendly wave as he cut off the connection.

  The Bridge was quieter than usual as Valiant emerged from her final microjump in the Epsilon Eridani system, near the moon where the Alpha R&D Base was orbiting. Shiloh was watching the tactical display intently.

  “No transmissions of any kind, CAG.” said Valkyrie. “Shall I go to active scanning?”

  “Yes.” said Shiloh after moment’s hesitation. Valiant’s fighters were on alert status and could be launched within seconds if need be. However unlikely it was that the enemy would still be here, he intended to proceed cautiously but the research station was in the moon’s shadow now and with no lights or transmissions of any kind to pinpoint, it’d be almost impossible to tell anything using passive sensors only. Seconds later, Valkyrie broke the bad news.

  “The station’s gone, CAG. I am picking up almost a dozen very large chunks of metal that are slowly moving away from each other. Their position is consistent with the expected position of the station if it had been shot to pieces.”

  “Damn!” Shiloh smacked his fist on the armrest of his chair. They had already confirmed that the A.I. and fighter production facility was also wrecked. With the main station destroyed, the enemy had made a clean sweep of this star system.

  “Any sign of Euryalus, Valkyrie?”

  “No transponder id. I’m scanning the surrounding space now. I have something, CAG. I’m getting a strange double echo from it. It’s definitely made of metal and its course could be traced back to the station.” Shiloh saw the tactical display update with the new contact. The icon was a flashing light red denoting an object that could not be confirmed as either friendly or hostile.

  “How quickly can you get us over there?”

  “Flyby or rendezvous?” asked Valkyrie.

  “Rendezvous.” said Shiloh.

  “25 minutes give or take.”

  “Do it.” ordered Shiloh.

  By the time that Valiant closed to within 200 meters with the same velocity and course as the objects, a shuttle with an engineering and medical boarding party was ready to launch. A few minutes after launch, the shuttle got close enough to use its external floodlights and Shiloh heard the pilot exclaim.

  “Jeeesus! Will you look at that!”

  “What do you see, Grissom?” asked Shiloh.

  “Sorry, Sir, but those two pieces used to be one ship that’s been cut in two. I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

  “Try to swing your bow around so that the bow camera can get a look at it too.”

  “I’m bringing us around now. Do you see it, Valiant?”

  “We see it now.” Shiloh understood the shuttle pilot’s exclamation. Euryalus was a 25,000 metric ton freighter. Not a small ship by any standards and yet a very powerful laser had sliced it in two on an angle. Both pieces were following the same vector and therefore had only drifted about 50 meters apart so far. “Proceed to dock with the front section. Let’s check that first.”

  “Roger that.” It took another five minutes of careful maneuvering before the shuttle could dock with one of the external hatches. Shiloh was grateful that neither section was tumbling, which would have made docking almost impossible.

  “We’re docked!” announced the pilot. Within another couple of minutes, they had the hatch open.

  “No power inside. The air’s pretty stale and cold. Life support’s obviously shot to hell. You may lose our signal as we get deeper into the hull, Valiant.”

  “Understood. Take your time and do a thorough search. We don’t want to leave anyone behind if they’re still alive.”

  “Yes, Sir. We’re making our way forward now.” The signal was already starting to break up. Within seconds all Shiloh was hearing was static.

  It was ten long minutes later when Shiloh barely heard an excited voice.

  “Valiant, we found a survivor! She’s barely alive! We’re bringing her back to the shuttle now!”

  “Can you tell me who she is, Grissom?”

  “Uh, stand by, Valiant. I’ll try to find out.” Seconds later Shiloh got his answer. “She’s out cold but her name tag says Johansen.” Shiloh looked over to his Comm. Technician and said,

  “Switch me over to the medic, please.”

  “Go ahead, Sir.”

  “Doc, this is Shiloh. What kind of shape is she in? Do we need to get her back to the ship right now or can the boarding party continue to search for other survivors first?”

  “My guess is she’s suffering from a lack of food and water. I can give her water here and she’ll be okay, if you want to continue the search, Admiral.”

  “Okay, tell Grissom to continue the search. Tell him I want him to bring back any logs or helm data if he can. Shiloh clear.”

  An hour later, he was standing beside her bed in Sickbay. An IV was dealing with her dehydration and low energy. She must have sensed his presence because she opened her eyes and looked at him.

  “Welcome back. I have to say, though, that you look like shit.” Johansen tried to laugh but winced instead. When she spoke, the words came out slowly as if she had to think carefully about each one first.

  “That’s..probably…because…I… feel…like…shit.” Shiloh nodded in sympathy. After a pause, he said,

  “You’re on Valiant. Howard sent me to find out what happened here. I can pretty much figure it out on my own. We managed to retrieve the helm data from your ship. I understand what you tried to do but I don’t understand why you tried to do it. I thought you were terrified of combat.”

  “I am…I mean…I was. I don’t think I am anymore…When the alert sounded…I realized that my ship couldn’t dodge out of the line of fire no matter what I did. I was trembling with fear so badly that I could barely manipulate the controls. When I realized that escape was not an option, I got mad. Really mad! The anger drove away the fear and it felt good not to be afraid anymore. That’s when I decided to try to ram one of them but the ship went dead before I could reach them.”

  “When they figured out that you were trying to ram them, they must have fired on you and without any armor, their lasers managed to slice the ship in two. We searched the bow section and didn’t find anyone else besides you. Do you know if anyone else was aboard when you undocked from the station?” She shook her head slowly.

  “No one else. Just me.”

  “Okay. I’ll bring back the search team and then Valiant will head back to Sol. There’s nothing else in this system, that warrants staying here any longer. The fleet that attacked you, came from Sol. They tried to bombard Earth with what we think were biological weapons but we stopped them all. The enemy fleet plus two more, jumped away. I know one of them came here and we think the other two are headed for Avalon and Bradley.”

  “My God! Did we lose a lot of people fighting them off.” Shiloh nodded.

  “A LOT of people and a lot of ships. In fact, Valiant is the only warship still operational and only because she wasn’t in Sol during the battle. If you can handle combat now, Angela, that’s a good thing because we’re desperately short of commanders capable of conning warships now.” She said nothing at first, then she said in a stronger voice.

  “I don’t know how I managed to accomplish this but the thought of conning a warship sounds very good to me. I can’t wait to shoot back at those bastards!” Shiloh smiled and nodded again. She was in a good mood and he didn’t want to spoil it by telling her how bad he and Iceman expected things to get. If Mankind was about to be decimated by some kind of plague, then women of child bearing age, like Angela, would be fa
r too valuable to risk in combat.

  “You get some rest and we’ll talk some more soon.” She didn’t protest and closed her eyes. By the time she learns what the future holds in store for us all, she may wish she had died on that ship. Thought Shiloh.

  Chapter 17 - Refusal of This Order is NOT an Option

  Trevor woke up to the sound of the sirens. It was still pitch black outside. He wondered why the Colony would have a drill now in the middle of the night. When his mother burst into his room and told him to get dressed fast, she sounded scared. As he, his parents and his brother, left their home and practically ran to the designated shelter, he heard one of their neighbors say,

  “They’re attacking Nimitz!” Trevor looked up at Avalon’s moon. Half of it was dark and the base was on the dark side. As he watched, he saw pinpoints of bright light where the base would be.

  “What’s that noise?” someone else asked. Now Trevor heard it too. A swooshing sound that seemed to come from ahead of them and then from behind them. Then he smelled a strange odor. It had a surprisingly pleasant, sweet smell to it. He inhaled it deeply and kept on inhaling it as they ran. He was about to say how much he liked the smell when he looked at his parents’ faces and saw how terrified they were. He decided to say nothing and soon they were deep in the community shelter with all their neighbors. The doors were shut and they settled down as best they could in the cramped space to wait. The silence was more scary than anything else. He couldn’t go to sleep.

  Hours later, the adults decided to open the doors and peak outside. When it seemed that nothing dangerous was happening outside, everyone left the shelter. It was sunny now. There was a slight wind and Trevor noticed that the sweat smell was gone. He looked up but the moon was now behind a hill. As they slowly walked back to their house, another family further down the street suddenly fell down clutching at their throats. Then a man about halfway yelled out in a horrible voice as he fell down.

  “Gas!” Trevor looked up at his mother who looked back at him.

  “Run!” she screamed. He turned and ran and ran and ran. When he couldn’t run anymore, he turned around and saw bodies lying in the street a long way back. No sign of his parents or his brother. With his legs trembling from fatigue, he let himself fall and started to cry.

  “What have we got, Gunslinger?” asked Johansen.

  “Nothing on passives. No electro-magnetic emissions of any kind either from Nimitz or the Colony. No sign of any ships.”

  “Alright. Let’s tell Firefly to launch a recon drone to take a close look at the base and another one to fly over the colony.”

  “Drones on the way, Commander. We should have visuals on the base in 5.5 minutes.” said Gunslinger. Johansen switched the display to an external video feed so that she could take a look at the tanker, Firefly that had accompanied Replenisher to this system. Firefly’s task was to refuel any sentry frigates returning from their patrols as well as keep Replenisher supplied with fuel during what might be a long stay. The tanker’s flashing position lights were a comforting change from the eternal lights of stars and planets. It meant they were not alone in this system and were among friends. She realized she must have been daydreaming when Gunslinger announced that they had video feed from the first drone. When the display was switched over, the Bridge grew very quiet. Nimitz Base, or what was left of it, was now in daylight and they could easily see the devastation. Laser blasts and a lot of them. There wasn’t a single building or structure intact. No place to hold an atmosphere. If there had been any survivors of the attack, they would have had to done spacesuits and would have run out of oxygen days ago.

  The images from the 2nd drone, 15 minutes later were far worse. Gunslinger was flying slowly about 100 meters off the ground. There were bodies everywhere and not just of humans either. Dead birds too. Hundreds of them, many clustered around a human body. The drone flew around the colony twice. Just as Johansen was about to order Gunslinger to bring the drone back, Gunslinger said.

  “I detected some movement down there. I’m bringing the drone back around for another pass.” Seconds later they all saw movement. Two people were standing in the street and waving a white piece of cloth in an obvious attempt to get the drone’s attention.

  “My God! There are survivors!” gasped Johansen.

  “Yes, Commander. I’m instructing the drone to wiggle its wings to acknowledge their attempt to contact us.”

  “Get us into geosynchronous orbit fast, Gunslinger , and get the shuttle prepped for launch. We have to send our medical team down there asap!”

  “Already in progress, Commander. Shall I order Firefly to send a long range message drone back to Sol?”

  “Not yet. Tell her to get one ready but to hold off on launching it.”

  “Understood, Commander. We’ll be in geosynch. orbit in approximately 3.4 minutes.” Johansen unbuckled herself and said,

  “I’m going down to the shuttle bay. Gunslinger has the Con.”

  By the time she arrived at the shuttle bay, the medical team was quickly loading the shuttle with gear and supplies. As she approached, the woman in charge of the medical team smiled at her and said,

  “So there’re survivors! That means no biological weapons.” Johansen frowned.

  “I’m not sure we should jump to that conclusion just yet.” The Team Leader waived her doubts off.

  “Look, it’s clear from the visuals that the dead all died within seconds of each other. You can tell that by the way they fell. Except for a few at one end of the town, the rest all fell with their heads pointed in the same direction i.e. they were running away from something when they fell down. I’m pretty sure we’re looking at a chemical attack. That would explain the sudden deaths and if it was airborne, then it would also explain why some survived if they happened to be out of the path of the gas. The birds died when they ate contaminated flesh from the dead bodies”

  “Nevertheless, our orders are clear. We’re to treat this as a biological attack regardless of what the evidence says and I expect you to enforce those orders with your team.”

  “You may be in charge of the mission but I’m the senior medical officer and if I’m convinced that there’s no biological agent at work here then I’ll act accordingly.” Johansen realized that her insistence, on following orders that no longer seemed to make sense, would sound unreasonable to anyone who didn’t have knowledge of the visions and what they represented, but she knew what was at stake here and if the contagion somehow spread to earth, she was determined that it would be in spite of her precautions and not because of negligence on her part.

  “Let me put it this way, Doctor. I have discretion over whether any survivors are brought back to Sol. If I even suspect that they might be carrying something dangerous, they stay here and anyone, who doesn’t follow the mission orders to the letter, will stay here too. So unless you plan on becoming a colonist here for the rest of your life, I suggest you put your arrogant attitude aside and take all precautions, regardless of whether you think they’re necessary or not!” The Team Leader looked shocked.

  “You can’t possibly be serious about leaving them here! A handful of people aren’t going to be able to survive here indefinitely!” She’s right too. I might be able to justify not bringing them back with us but sooner or later, the Oversight Committee will bow to public pressure and order the Old Man to send someone else to bring them back.

  “Obviously I can’t make the decision to leave them here forever but I can certainly make the decision to not bring them back on MY ship. Now considering that there’s a war on and that the enemy has already attacked this colony twice, do you really want to risk staying here for weeks, maybe even months before another ship comes to take you all back?” Now the Team Leader looked worried. She hadn’t considered another attack.