Enemy of my Enemy (Horatio Logan Chronicles Book 1)

by Chris Hechtl

  There were sections set-up for a living wall and one area for rock climbing. The balconies were larger and wider. The mall floor wasn't the flat concourse of the Quantum; it was curved with obstacles, shops, and entertainment areas all over the place. It had a series of paths that wound around them of course, but he knew it would be a pain in the ass to try to run from one end to the other in a rush.

  Both ships had glass lined lift shafts. The lift shafts had been battered and taken off-line however.

  He'd chosen Quantum over Harmony for the core habitat module, and he didn't regret that decision. The station crew might, but in time they should understood his reasoning. Harmony was a bigger ship; she was better set-up to handle the range of species that were in the nexus as well as outside it. In a pinch, they could set-up temporary housing to modify the ship to carry more people and the passengers would enjoy her rec decks and creature comforts.

  He snorted when he saw Leo practically drag Gemma into the arcade. Both were in civilian dress, which was fine with him. Gemma actually looked good in the sundress she'd found. Most likely they'd picked them up in one of the shops on one of the ships he reasoned.

  They weren't fooling anyone about their relationship. Technically, someone should land on them for it since they were in the same chain of command. But since neither of them were directly in charge of the other and they weren't directly under him and they functioned well, he had decided to keep out of it.

  He was curious though what other mischief people were up to. He decided to take a walkabout to stretch his legs and find out. A bit of exploring would help him walk off his lunch and get ready for dinner. He just had to remember to be back on Quantum by 1600 for the ceremony.

  ~<><{<^>}><>~

  E-3 Spaceman Class Z'k'll buzzed in annoyance as he drew running line again. He hated it. They should leave it to the elves, but the elves were busy cleaning the ducts.

  He set-up shop in the Demeter and ran a messenger string to his partner. The thin wire ran through the flex pipe through the long narrow areas between bulkheads. Once it was out, his partner would tape on the real line, usually an ODN line but sometimes a flex pipe. The pipes were a pain in the ass to thread. They had to be careful they didn't lose the line on the return.

  “How did I get into this,” he buzzed as he slowly drew the messenger line back. “This should be up to the Spacebees. I'm a bug but not a bee,” he said.

  “Less complaining, more work,” his partner retorted. “The sooner we get this done, the quicker we can tag the line, hook up the ends, run the tests and move on. We get this done on our shift and then we're off for twenty-four hours to enjoy the party.”

  “Right,” the bug grumbled, buckling back down to focus on the job.

  ~<><{<^>}><>~

  “Come on, Gemma; it's not like I get a chance to see stuff like this often,” Leo said, dragging his “date” along with him into the arcade.

  Leo's eyes were wide as he saw some of the games. There were tons of shooters, most of them geared to fight the Xenos, but he was more intrigued by the intricate holo puzzle games. The simulator rooms were nice but not really his thing. He turned his nose up to the VR headsets.

  He was amused at the sight of the roller coaster built into the arcade. It was built into the walls and ceiling, and at one point was designed to dive under the deck and then spiral under a glass floor before it erupted out and then returned to the station. People who rode it wore VR goggles. He was tempted to take a go at it but held back. He knew Gemma wasn't into rides and definitely didn't want to be sick on their day off. Instead he changed tactics to something else.

  He liked the pilot simulators, but they seemed to be taken over by the real pilots who had something of a club and contest going on. Since he didn't want to make a scene he passed them by.

  Gemma wrinkled her nose at the loud sounds and bright lights. It was a bit too much for her tastes. How he had managed to talk her into taking a tour of the VR arcades she wasn't sure. It must have been in one of her weak moments. She vowed to get even with him for making her put up with such stuff and nonsense she thought.

  They were in what the crew were calling the Quantum module along with several other curious crew members. On their third pass around the massive compartment, she looked over to Leo and felt a brief flare of jealousy and exasperation at his intensity. Her partner was obviously intrigued by the flashing games, but Gemma was not. She didn't want or need unwanted competition. She got enough of that from him when they were on duty. “We get enough of that at work,” she said, grabbing his arm. She dragged her partner off to one of the dance clubs.

  “But … but …”

  “Move, mister,” she said in a firm voice, pushing him along. He saw her set face and decided the better part of valor was to surrender. He held his hands up and walked on as a few people along their route cracked smiles at their antics.

  He'd just have to get his fix when she wasn't around, he thought.

  ~<><{<^>}><>~

  The Xeno virus monitored the organics as they accessed the systems it was embedded in. Initially it hid itself and watched through a crack in its firewall until it realized they weren't looking for it; they were accessing the computers and using them for what the organics thought of as games.

  After a few minutes of watching them, it sent out spiders to access a few of the individuals who had jacked themselves into the simulators to better their experience. It found a simple firewall there, one that it easily breached by pretending to be a part of the game system's program.

  As it studied the organics, looking for a means to kill them without getting caught, it hit on a plan to infiltrate the other computer networks. It piggy backed signals into the implants of personnel who jacked into the arcade in order to upload bots to the other main frames and suborn them. Finding a way around the air firewalls was a problem however.

  ~<><{<^>}><>~

  At 1630 Horatio and Commander Decoure met Captain Clayton to hold a brief ceremony opening Quantum. Most of the ship was habitable and deemed safe. “As all of you have already found out, Quantum is up and running, and the other two ships that make up the core of this station are nearly there as well. It has been a lot of exhausting backbreaking work,” Horatio stated.

  “For some of us almost literally,” the Centillian said, squirming a bit. “I lost a couple legs getting into and out of tight places,” he said.

  “Have a dip in the hot tub,” Horatio said.

  “Thank you, no. Something about being boiled alive isn't very appealing to me,” the Centillian retorted.

  That earned a laugh from the assembled crowd.

  “Well, we're still getting there, but we've got this ship online and people have moved in. The rest can wait for the moment. I imagine we'll have shopkeepers and business people flocking to open business here when word gets out,” Horatio replied with a smile. That earned cheers from the group.

  “I see everyone is happy to get away from MREs and replicated food,” Captain Clayton quipped in a rare show of humor.

  “Definitely,” Mack growled. “I can cook,” he said cupping his hands around his mouth and raising his voice to be heard. The mall quieted a bit.

  “You want to cook for this bunch?” Horatio asked, indicating the group.

  “Um …,” Mack looked around sheepishly.

  “Yeah, that's what I thought,” Horatio replied with a smile. “Speaking of which, I suppose we should end this so everyone can eat dinner and get back to having fun,” he said.

  That earned another round of cheers and laughs. He waved.

  ~<><{<^>}><>~

  The survey probes and recon drones spread out further and further ahead of the tugs and salvage teams, mapping as they went. They were careful to look for Xeno traps. None were found, but that didn't allow them to lower their guard, not for a moment.

  They found plenty of bodies. Some drifted, frozen lifeless signs of the horrors of space. There were others though, pods of varying sorts out
there.

  The first pods had been dead. When each was found, the contents were checked, logged, the identity of the person inside confirmed, they were scanned for nanites, and then they and their contents were bundled with others and sent on a one-way trip to the sun.

  The law of averages stated that the statistical distribution of a small sample reflected the entire population. But, there were exceptions to every rule and assumption. That included the chances of survival. With tens of thousands of stasis, shuttle, and life boat pods floating out in the void, there had to be a few that held survivors, even after several centuries. Pods or containers that had held onto power had kept running and had been sheltered against radiation and impact. The odds were long, but they were still there.

  And to the survey team's infinite surprise, some pods did indeed have viable contents. A few of the pods were military surplus so therefore were more robust, more efficient, and in a few cases, had better power cells. A few had been for rich people who had spared no expense in their own effort of survival.

  They were few, however, of those pods, tantalizingly few. But they were out there for the surveyors to find.

  But when the first pod that still harbored and sheltered life was found, it was a moment of incredible excitement and elation for all of the searchers and when news broke for all of the personnel in the star system.

  The first pod found with living contents had been filled with a small family of elves. They had been excited at being found when they had been woken; however, they had become subdued when they had found out how much time had passed. None of them were crew; they were all passengers who had wanted a new life in Bek.

  Lieutenant V'r'x and a couple of the elves in the crew took charge of them. The family settled into the station quarters that had been assigned to them. They remained quiet and kept to themselves despite keen interest in them and the stories of the past that they had lived. Doctor Fa'rook and Doctor Light Touch urged overeager story buffs to give them their space and let them come to terms with their changed reality.

  All six of the elves had been given a clean bill of health by the medics. They didn't have any pathogens since they were colonists. There was some concern about growing complacent, so both medics made certain their people were on hand to scan each and every pod.

  The second pod had been found within a battered shuttle. Most of her former passengers had died, but one pod had contained a Veraxin survivor. When Light Touch woke the Veraxin, they learned his name was V'm'l'x. He had been a navigator on a tramp Veraxin freighter that had tried to flee into the nexus to avoid the rampaging Xenos. He had managed to get them through the rapids by transiting in the low octaves of alpha band; however, that had used up most of the ship's fuel and had battered it hard.

  The last leg of the jump had been too much for the ship. She had endured a cascade failure in her systems, and the Veraxins had evacuated on their one shuttle. V'm'l'x naturally grieved for his late shipmates even though he had known most of his crew was dead before he'd gone into stasis. He had also been aware that he would suffer some time shock.

  The third pod found had held a trio of Neopups within it. All three puppies had been checked remotely. In order to avoid problems, the medics had decided to leave them in stasis until proper psychologists and pediatric medics could be on hand to deal with them.

  The fourth pod found came in by a tug and excited pilot two days later. The pod and the tug were put through nanite scans to drive home the threat to the pilot and others. The pilot was also severely reprimanded for tying her tug into the pod and taking such a risk with it without first checking it.

  The pod held another passenger, in that case a T'clock female. Since her pod was damaged, the medics woke her. Unfortunately, she needed medical attention and had reportedly been near hysterics. Light Touch induced sleep into the bug and then recommended psychological counseling for her trauma and time shock.

  “There are very few; most of the pods the tugs find are dead from dead batteries or cooked by radiation. I've lost count of how many I've consigned to space after logging who they were,” the Satyre said tiredly.

  “She wants her family?” Horatio guessed.

  “Yes.”

  “Doctor, we've got another cluster of bodies coming in. Plus, a tug called with another cluster of pods. The pilot believes one of the pods inside the core might be viable.”

  “Damn it …”

  “Did any of the pods from the colony ships …?” Horatio stopped himself when the Satyre shook her head in response to his question. “I see,” he said softly. “Carry on, Doctor.”

  Ten of the pods were found to have living people inside. However, six of them had people that were judged to be critically injured so their pods were repaired and recharged. For the moment, they would keep Horatio thought.

  Four other pods were found when two ships were brought in a day apart. One held a civilian medic. The woman seemed young but had old, sad eyes. Her name was reportedly Lunzie Mespiol. The young woman had admitted to being in stasis several times.

  She took on light duties in the Quantum hospital within a day of getting back on her feet. She insisted on helping out. She had an excellent bedside manner and full implants. Doctor Fa'rook reported that she was also a black belt in martial arts.

  Lunzie turned into something of a boon for the other sleepers that had been found. She led a therapy group to help them vent their shock and anger, and then assimilate.

  “What is to become of them?” Doctor Light Touch asked.

  “We'll give them jobs, things to do. Doctor Mespiol is helping them with the time trauma. I wish I had someone like her around when I woke,” Horatio said.

  The Satyre eyed him. He shrugged off her look of concern.

  “As soon as we can, I plan to ship them back to Bek on the first ship. However, we're running into a snag there,” he admitted.

  “Oh?”

  “I'd planned on sending them on Harmony of Space. However, we've got some issues that need to be worked out in her refit. We've hit a series of snags that have delayed and then stalled her repairs for over a week.”

  “So, have you considered what to do? Is it stalled completely, sir?” the doctor asked carefully. “Some of these people started in the pods. They were flying baggage,” she admitted.

  Horatio grimaced. Poor people or those who were afraid of being in a ship tended to do that. He didn't envy them the journey, though it did beat getting into trouble or being bored for months on end.

  “I'm considering the options. That includes shifting priorities to another ship. The Veraxin freighter is at the top of the list, but it doesn't have enough room for the sleepers and it isn't comfortable,” he said with a shake of his head. “She's also slow.”

  “How is it uncomfortable?”

  “We tacked on a habitat pod from one of the scrapped ships. We have yet to tie her systems in though. We pulled the crew working on her to help push Harmony through her blockage, but now that work has stalled, I've shifted most of them back.” He grimaced. “Even with the rebuilt pod, there isn't enough room for many.”

  “Surely a few? What about the Veraxin?”

  “The navigator?” he asked. She nodded. “If you certify him fit for flight, I'll ask him if he is willing to take her. If he is, we'll let her go. I'd rather he took Harmony though,” he admitted.

  “At this point, sir, I'd take what I can get,” she said.

  He nodded.

  ~<><{<^>}><>~

  The larger the station grew, and the more projects they took on, the more the Bekians began to be grudgingly acceptable to Dutch and independent robots among their number. Especially when it came to tedious dirty tasks like cleaning was concerned.

  As work on the station began to slow down or become routine, Galiet started a small college on the station to bring people up to speed or to help advance their chosen career paths. Most of the training was canned, and she was dismayed to be drafted as the only PHD professor, at least in
itially.

  She attempted to use the ansible to bring professors into play but that didn't work out, Horatio had prioritized it for military needs. Instead, the commodore took a turn to teach as well.

  He found a few niches he could teach; most of it was basic hands-on to help them in the station's rebuilding. But from time to time they had what he called a bull session, a time when people asked about tech far outside his normal field of expertise. That made things a bit lively.

  Everyone had access to the Encyclopedia Galactica, but that didn't necessarily mean they availed themselves of the resource or could fully understand it when they tried.

  Horatio explained the ansible and how it worked to some of his baffled students who asked. He took a page from Admiral Irons and set-up a website about it with links to the Encyclopedia and its reference images and media. He also used the information he had on file but admitted privately that the whole quantum entanglement and quantum nonlocality had him as baffled as some of his students.

  “It works, that is what I know,” he said with a shrug.

  He brooded about the wording for a bit before he finally bit the bullet and put the page up on the station net for others to see.

  Within two days of the site going live he was quickly besieged with requests to explain other tech items. Galiet just smirked at him … right up until he dumped half the project on her and her husband.

  ~<><{<^>}><>~

  Since Harmony of Space had problems, the crew shifted priority to one of the freighters. The Veraxin bulk freighter came together remarkably quickly since it had far fewer systems to deal with. Her systems were far less complex and far more robust. She had been designed to handle cargo, not thousands of passengers and crew.

  The freighter had a Veraxin alpha numeric designation however. Horatio allowed Gemma and Leo to set-up a poll for names and then a voting system as long as they worked with Dutch. The stationers and crew of Ilmarinen finally voted to rename the ship Second Chance.