by Rob Rowntree
“You are correct, Alan.” Conway appeared unfazed. “It’s true that, with the exception of yourself, the rest of us here are looking for the Peterson. Truthfully though, only Woodland and I knew that this was the system. Gibson and Shepperd played into my hands, giving me the right target after a few well placed suggestions. Luck that they happened upon the correct system, right?”
Shepperd said, “No luck involved. Just fine science.”
“Right, I’m beginning to see it now.” Alan stood, turned to Woodland and continued, “That wreck? How many ships did the navy send?”
Woodland said, “Five; two expeditions. We stopped then. Except for a small survey vessel looking for survivors, nobody’s been back in over one-hundred and eighty years.”
“Five ships lost and they didn’t return? I find that hard to swallow.”
“No, it’s true. The expeditions came here around the time of the Chaney uprising. Resources rerouted elsewhere and the secession of three growing colonies took over two years to quell. By the end of it, everything became a little fluid, messed up, and colony deployment ended. The papers on the loss of the Peterson got buried by circumstance and bad filing.”
“When the navy survey was here did they find anything?”
“As a matter of fact, Alan, they did. Three clouds of debris, the fourth ship impacted on an inner, airless rocky-world and the fifth, missing.”
Alan grinned matter-of-factly, “Then I’m guessing our friend out there is the missing ship.”
Moving around to the head of the table Alan pondered, “Okay so the navy’s interest is clear. What happened to your vessels and the Peterson? What’s out here? But you, Mr. Conway, I’m not too sure I believe your apparent altruistic motivations. You’re a hard-nosed business man. Long dead relatives and family trees?” Leaning closer to Conway, Alan said, “Come on now, what are you really after.”
Conway straightened in his chair.
“If you’ll retake your seat Alan. I’ll try to explain.” As Alan sat, Conway talked. “Originally our little group set itself up as a small, but hopefully effective historical society. Our aims were simple: Preserve the names of our ancestors and keep alive the spirit, the dream that sent the Peterson and ships like her out here. This mission remained a dream for many years, until I’d amassed enough capital to put it into motion. Once Maslov’s message arrived, I knew...”
Alan’s grin widened, “Oh, the message you received from Maslov is real enough and the search for the Joshua Peterson is probably for real too. I’m not buying this ancestor bull though. There’s something more here.”
Suddenly Conway stood. “That may be Alan, and you are entitled to your opinion. However, this discussion is over.
“Ladies and gentlemen, back to work if you please. Let’s go see what’s here.”
***
So what do I have?
A man who didn’t want to reveal too much, a crew who were scared.
The Peterson came to this system and discovered what appeared to be pastoral sentient civilisation. The majority of the Peterson’s crew visited the surface of a world and died. The ship vanished. The Solar navy lost five vessels in search and rescue missions. A relevant aspect Alan reminded himself, since they apparently met with tragic endings. Next, along, comes Conway and several descendants of the Peterson’s crew to mount a private expedition to find out what happened and while the navy no longer actively sought answers, they placed a man aboard to ensure that their presence was dually fulfilled. One big question: WHY?
Alan turned over on his bunk, his right hand idly scratching at his spore-ports. He felt the longing stir. Soon his medication would run low, and then end. Note to himself: Start rationing.
In the dim lighting of the cabin he sought and found a picture of Jimmy.
Taken at a time when Alan flew regular missions, the picture showed Jimmy pointing towards the 3D. Cosmic Journey played. Jimmy looked up at Alan beaming a smile. Alan’s uniform bore the emblem of Deepship crew, a galaxy overlaid with thin arcing lines. It represented the effort and urge to search, of journeys undertaken.
The solid image of the 3D caught his attention. Cosmic Journey: pure pulp of the best kind. High-jinks and punch-ups, ray guns and aliens, but at its heart some stories carried real depth. Alan didn’t recall this particular episode, but several humans cowered before imposing aliens. Beyond them, a larger creature loomed.
Although Alan found handling his brother’s predicament difficult, even back then the brief moments spent with Jimmy always engendered a sense of stability. To be sure, the gulf between them intertwined with the guilt he bore, blocking any attempt at reconciliation, but those brief moments had felt like family, like he belonged.
Now...
Conway, Peterson, Woodland...
Sleep overtook him, pressing him down into a place of dreams. Conway ran before oddly shaped aliens, Woodland shot ray-gun blasts. Pickering cried and Stowe furiously painted the sky. Jimmy provided a high pitched voice over, “Alan my brother...”
Chapter Nine
Something Found, Something Lost.
Kiki sat with her back to the panoramic view, the starscape silhouetted her small frame, its illumination effectively creating a halo about her head.
Alan’s burgeoning compliment died in his throat as Kiki fixed him with her wide eyes. “Alan,” she said, “I’m pretty scared right now.”
Reaching out to gently hold her arm, Alan said, “I guess we all are Kiki. But until Gibson gets a message out there’s not much any of us can do.”
She didn’t respond. “Kiki, it’s a large system and we are very small. The navy’s survey vessel got in and out okay. We’ll be fine.”
“I hope so.”
Kiki’s continued distraction disturbed him. She appeared to be obsessed with avoiding any contact with other sentient beings which gave substance to Alan’s initial reasoning that she was somehow overcompensating for the death of Rosie. Baffling though, was the question of why her friend’s death should push this to the forefront of her mind.
“Kiki, listen to me for a moment.” Alan really wanted to help. “We don’t know what happened to those ships. There may be some sort of in-system navigational anomaly that caused them to malfunction, crash, whatever.” He could not bring himself to say that aliens might have caused the ships to disappear, but right now, for some reason he felt that that was what drove her worry. “It could be a combination of many things. Collectively, we can do our best to find out.”
Kiki sighed, a rueful smile arced, “You know Alan, before I came here I used to work the pap mines. Not on earth, but after the deep crude in Mars’s lower crust. People used to say that the pap produced there tasted different from the earth product. Twelve years is a while and do you know something, food produced from oil tastes like shit wherever it’s from. And like a lot of shit, the stuff that’s being dealt out here today tastes the same as bullshit I’ve heard before.”
Alan sat back. “I’m pedalling shit? Look—”
Kiki laughed, a nice sound. “Sorry, I guess all this talk of aliens and wrecks has affected me.” She ran hands through her halo of hair; face slightly turned to capture the light. Beautiful, Alan thought.
Kiki continued, “I’ve never had strong wishes for contact and I think it would be a rather undesirable happenstance. After all, the Solar System is stable, some say prospering. Earth, Mars and the belt cities are economically sound and then we have the Valhiem out in the Kuiper-belt. Crabs, seaweed and lichen I can deal with, but this...” She gazed out at the stars. “Random elements bring chaos. I don’t think we should have come.”
Light flushed through her gauzy hair and in the revised shadow of her face Alan saw her teeth bared in a flat smile. In that moment, a kernel of an idea formed. Kiki was a xenophobe. In which case her presence here didn’t make sense.
Alan rose from his chair, “Would you like a drink? I’m having one.”
“Yes please, I need warming up. If we are st
uck here, I might as well enjoy whatever life has left to offer. Whiskey, straight up, thanks.”
“No ice then?”
“Never touch the stuff. I read a story once where the victim’s murder was accomplished using ice-cubes. Ever since then I leave well alone.”
“Ice cube?”
“Yes. The villain very cleverly introduced poisons into ice cubes he’d made. When the ice-bucket ran dry he asked his intended victim if she was ready for a refill, introduced the doctored cubes to the bucket and made her drink. She selected her own ice which was a nice touch, but all of the cubes were contaminated. Dead from the moment she wanted another drink.”
“How did the murderer make sure nobody else took an ice cube? It would have been very difficult to explain another death.”
“He played the injured party and made sure all the remaining cubes went into his own glass. Distraught, he knocked them to the floor. The poisons evaporated with his tears. Misdirection. A villain’s best tool.”
Alan’s mind raced. Was she attempting to make a point here? He needed to get away and think. “The police would have found the poisons and then surely they’d have eventually caught the murderer. You can’t fool diligent police work.”
Kiki laughed, the sound echoing around the observation lounge. “It all depends upon the villain’s objectives. And of course in the story justice is served with the arrest of the villain. But by then the damage is done. He’s won.”
“You seem kind of happy with that.”
“Yes, I guess I am.”
Besides his reservations and Kiki’s apparent disturbed demeanour, Alan decided he was enjoying the moment. He sat next to Kiki and said, “You know, there’s nothing wrong in feeling scared. The unknown—”
She placed her finger on his lips. Their thighs brushed and she rose to meet his lips. Consumed by a released passion, Alan fumbled with Kiki’s clothes. Her fingers and hands responded, releasing buttons and clasps.
Skin tingling; the observation lounge became a dim blur: he fell into her welcome embrace, abandoning himself to deep seated primal urges. Alan recognised that his doubts and Kiki’s fear combined to release a shared need and unspoken desires. Like an ape in the dark African-night, Alan sought and found solace.
***
The data-well buzzed with active virtuals and information streams. Alan longed for blue-space immersion; in fact he craved the connection. The mundane interactions of virtuals were just too slow.
They’d been cruising towards the inner system at a constant one and a half G. The repaired attraction decking, helping everyone cope with the acceleration.
Two stellar bodies formed the gravitational epicentres of this system and data poured in; circular binary system, the stars, a yellow G2 and a smaller red dwarf orbited each other at a distance of 28 AU’s, each with tight planetary halos. Naturally, Conway chose to explore the yellow G2 first.
In-system orbited three rocky planets, two of them with atmospheres. At this distance the planets remained indistinct. However, armed with a multitude of data Alan felt sure he could dissuade Conway from his current course of action. Alan knew from experience that these worlds were unlikely to hold anything of interest.
Alan had arranged several passive search operations to sweep the system and had left them running. Sixteen hours of information lay in the holding buffer. Reaching in towards the nearest virtual he found solace in the search, the monitoring of the voyage inward, and enjoyed each data packet that came in, able to immerse himself in information. Thus engaged he didn’t have to think of Kiki, didn’t have to think of the implications of her veiled confession.
Admittedly he’d been stupid.
Kiki being a saboteur had never crossed his mind. Why would it? She could have been hurt too, picking up an extinguisher to help. It had elegance. Make herself look like a target. Poor Kiki, her friend dead and it could have easily been her alongside. The implication danced before everyone - somebody didn’t want the engineers around to fix any perceived problems. Yeah, and we all bought it.
Kiki stays around and, Alan thought, when we arrive she sabotages the engines and doesn’t care. Nobody goes home. ‘But by then the damage is done. He’s won.’ Isn’t that what she’d said?
Now though, any action on her part is redundant. The only question that nagged was why? Why didn’t she want the expedition to succeed?
Passive data rolled along the edge of a screen, nothing noteworthy. A couple of long-period comets fell down the gravity well, rings of debris, planets; the navy wreck, tagged and beaconed, tumbling away on its crazy orbit. There’d be bodies to recover. But later...
Text changed to red. Flashed. “What?”
Alan linked to Conway, “I’m coming to your suite. Make sure Woodland’s there when I arrive.”
Exiting the data-well he arranged for data to be available in Conway’s suite. Not that the information would surprise Woodland.
***
Striding into the suite, Alan looked at Woodland and Conway both seated in a sunken area near Conway’s panoramic window. The suite lights were dimmed and soft classical music, Stravinsky? played in the back ground.
“Thanks for coming.” Before they could respond Alan added, “And Woodland, I’d like to apologise for my outburst earlier.” Needless to say he had regrets. “I had no right to act the way I did and obviously you could never have known of the problem. I think I momentarily lost my grip, blame blue-space and everything.”
Pausing, Alan waited for an acceptance of his contrition. None came. Not that he should have expected one. Walking to the well stocked bar, he poured himself a scotch.
Conway stiffened, “Help yourself why don’t you.”
“Thanks, thanks very much.” Ignoring Conway’s comment he joined them.
On the coffee table tablets showed Alan’s data. “I see you’ve already seen my information. Passive’s have revealed a mystery; although from your looks I don’t sense any surprise.” He sipped from his glass. Then: “Oh, I get it.” He aimed his next comment at Woodland, “You navy types already know about these.” He emphasised the tablets, trying to jab his point home.
Woodland looked at Conway, and then at some unseen gesture said, “That’s right. We, the navy that is, found six objects of high mass orbiting the star between the second and third planetary orbits. More detailed data provided size and dimensions. Each of the objects possesses similar design and all appear suffused with large quantities of metals. They spin about their axes and are all equidistant around the primary.”
Woodland relaxed gesturing at the data, “We don’t know what they are, or what they’re for. Haven’t been able to get near. No, that’s not quite true, we never had the time to examine them, our ships didn’t last that long.”
That’s right where I want to go. It’s where the mystery lies.
Glancing quickly at Conway then back to Woodland, Alan said, “Look, spectral analysis of the selected planet’s atmospheres show rich concentrations of sulphuric acid and carbon dioxide in one, a nitrogen heavy atmosphere in the other. I’ll grant that one of the planets may harbour algae analogues or bacteria, but that’s about the best you are going to get. We should go look at the objects, even if it’s from a distance and with remote sensors or Space Remotely Operated Vehicle’s.” His tone rose a pitch, “You guys must feel it, the sense of destiny, awe? We have to go see.”
“Haqiqa will be here some time,” Conway said, making a point. He cleared his throat and continued. “ Why hurry? We’ll take things more easily; try to remain as intact as possible.”
Woodland said, “Alan, I was as excited as you when I first saw this, but the fact remains that nobody has got close enough to discover anything of value. One of our vessels did manage to pass-by, but quite soon after we lost contact with her. She’s probably one of those metallic smudges that used to be the pride of our fleet.”
“Okay, okay. I see your point but I’m also sure we aren’t going to find any aliens on these tw
o lumps you’ve chosen to send us to. The answers lie, some at least, with those objects, and that is where our efforts should lie.
“A proposition for you: Why not let me outfit a Space Remotely Operated Vehicle. I could launch from here and we can go study the planets while our little buddy takes a look-see around an object.” A pause, more surreptitious looks between the two. “Oh, no. Don’t tell me that your navy already did that.”
Woodland’s puzzled expression slid from his face and Alan thought he detected a hint of sudden understanding. Woodland said, “No, the navy didn’t do that, Alan. What I’m trying to say is that not much information made it out.” He shrugged, glanced at Conway. “I for one can’t see any harm in sending over a remote while we continue with our survey.”
Conway stood, finished his drink. “Right Alan, I think you just got yourself a deal. Aliens are in this system somewhere and we are going to find them. Inform me when your mission is ready to go.”
On leaving the suite, Conway ordered the music’s volume up a notch or two.
Alan sipped his drink. Perhaps he’d been too quick to act, wrong to have allowed his temper to flare. Woodland’s bruised cheek looked angry.
Woodland swirled his drink, watched bubbles fizz. Wearing a grin, he said, “Alan Abrams, you have quite a right hook, sir, and not a modicum of fighting ability.”
Alan studied him, “Bars fights are bar fights, whether it’s Navy or Merchant Marine. You learn it, live with it.”
“I guess I should let it go. You were grief stricken, right? By the possible lack of future contact with your brother, right?” A smile plus nod emphasised Woodland’s next comments, “Okay man, I’ll buy that. But if there’s a next time,” Woodland stood and moved by Alan. The smile disappeared, a piercing glare replaced it; “It’ll end badly for you. Do I make myself clear?”
Alan didn’t react. Years of male dominancy games had taught him one thing, never show your hand. Woodland hesitated, pulled a small envelope from his tunic pocket, “You may find this useful when it’s time to programme the SROV’s AI. I’m out of here; you’ve got some late night reading.”
