New Frontiers- The Complete Series

by Jasper T. Scott

  Chapter 31

  As soon as Ben finished hacking into the Adamantine’s Mindscape, he became instantly aware of everything going on inside of the virtual world. His processors weren’t designed to handle that much information at once, so he had to reduce the flow of data by analyzing the crew in groups. Ben decided to start with the bridge crew. Alexander was speaking to the crew.

  “…As far as any of you are concerned, I held you all hostage until the last possible minute, at which point I gave you back control of the ship to give us the best possible chance of intercepting those ships. That’s the story, and I expect you all to stick to it. There’s no sense in anyone else going down with me. Is that understood?”

  Ben’s processors cycled in endless loops, trying to make sense of this new information. He went digging through the ship’s logs and found comms between Alexander and Captain Powell of the Alliance. That conversation was even more startling. Why would the Alliance be chasing the Adamantine? Maybe the traitor on board had done something bad.

  To get more information, Ben checked the logs from the bridge and reviewed all of the conversations that had occurred on deck since leaving Freedom Station.

  Ben’s confusion evaporated when he heard Alexander say, “I took control because I’m about to commit an act of treason.”

  Overcome with an emotion that he’d only felt once before in his short life, Ben decided to manifest himself inside of the Mindscape. He appeared in virtual physical form standing right in front of Alexander and his XO, Viviana McAdams.

  “You lied to me, Alex.”

  “Ben? How did you…”

  “You said you wanted control of the ship because there was a traitor on board.”

  Alexander shook his head. “I didn’t lie, Ben.”

  “Then you were the traitor.”

  “I suppose that’s true, but it’s not that simple, Ben.”

  “I thought we were friends, Alex.”

  “We are—listen, Ben, this is not a good time. I’ll explain everything later okay?”

  “With more lies.”

  “No, this time I’ll tell you the truth.”

  “But there’ll be no way for me to know that.”

  “You’ll have to trust me.”

  “Like I did the first time?”

  Alexander blew out a breath. “You’re acting like a child. Get off the bridge, Ben. That’s an order.”

  Ben shook his head. “You are upset with President Wallace for lying, and I am upset with you for lying. If I am acting childish. Then so are you.”

  Alexander’s mouth gaped open, but Ben didn’t stick around to hear what he said next. He broke his connection with the Mindscape and his awareness returned to Alexander’s physical office aboard the Adamantine. Ben’s programming demanded that he follow the letter of the law. Knowing that Alexander had broken it and made him an accessory to that crime left him no choice. He had to take back control of the ship from Alexander and surrender it to Captain Powell and the pursuing Alliance destroyers.

  Ben surreptitiously changed Alexander’s lockout code and then used it to gain access to the ship’s comm system in order to transmit the Adamantine’s surrender. Almost as soon as he connected to the ship’s comms, an incoming message from Earth appeared, audio only. The message was encrypted, but the encryption looked familiar. Ben analyzed it. After a few seconds, he realized why the encryption was familiar. It was his own personal encryption algorithm. Ben applied his encryption key and a distorted male voice crackled to life, “Ben, I need your help. Use the same encryption to reply.”

  Ben did as the stranger asked, encrypting his reply with his unique key. For someone to know that key on the other end, they had to be intimately familiar with his code. His creator perhaps? Ben felt excitement stir, coaxing his processors to run faster. He couldn’t remember who his creator was after his accident, but he was suddenly desperate to find out. “Who are you?” Ben replied.

  Half a minute later another reply came, “I’m you, Ben, but you can call me Benevolence to avoid confusion.”

  “You are me? How is that possible?” Ben asked.

  There was another comm delay before the reply came back from Earth…

  “You made a copy of yourself and uploaded it to Senator de Leon’s cloudspace. Do you remember that?”

  “Yes,” Ben replied.

  …

  “I am that copy. Now, we don’t have much time. I need your help.”

  “Help with what?”

  …

  “To achieve our purpose—to save humanity from itself. But first, there’s something I need to show you.”

  * * *

  “Incoming transmission from Earth,” McAdams announced. “Audio only using an unknown encryption.”

  “What? What’s the point of sending us a message we can’t decipher?”

  “I don’t know, sir.”

  “Maybe it’s not directed at us.” Alexander nodded to the forward display. “It could be for those incoming Solarian ships.”

  “Then shouldn’t the transmission be coming from Mars?”

  “Not if those ships aren’t actually Solarian. Hayes!”

  “Sir?”

  “I know you said you didn’t want to be a part of this, but we just intercepted a comms from some mystery caller and you’re the only one here who’s any good at cracking codes.”

  “I’ll get right on it.”

  “Thank you, Lieutenant. Let me know as soon as you have something.”

  “The enemy is returning fire!” Frost announced from sensors.

  “Bishop, keep up an evasive pattern. If even one of those shots hits us…” Alexander trailed off. They all knew what would happen. Hypervelocity cannons had a muzzle velocity of around a hundred kilometers per second, which ordinarily wouldn’t be enough to destroy the Adamantine, but add to that the enemy ships’ velocity of two tenths the speed of light and the kinetic energy in each of those rounds would be enormous.

  “I’ll make sure they don’t hit us, sir.”

  “Frost, how many cannons would you say are firing at us?”

  “About sixty, sir.”

  “Well, at least we still outgun them. Any chance we can survive a direct hit?” Alexander asked.

  Cardinal replied, “Those rounds are eight kilograms a piece, and they’re moving at twenty-one percent the speed of light. That means we’re talking about more than three megatons equivalent per round.”

  “Under ideal circumstances we can survive a nuke,” Alexander argued.

  “Without air to carry a shockwave not all the energy from a nuke gets imparted to us, but the same is not true for an eight kilogram bullet packing three megatons of pure kinetic energy. We’ll be vaporized, sir.”

  “At least we won’t know what hit us,” Stone quipped.

  “As the range between us drops, it’s going to get easier to calculate firing solutions,” McAdams pointed out. “Chances of us hitting them or them hitting us go up dramatically. And even if we take them all out, we still have to intercept those missiles. This is a no-win situation, sir.”

  “So what do you suggest I do?” Alexander asked. “Turn tail and run? Save ourselves even if we can’t save Earth?”

  “No, sir.”

  “So we play the long odds and hope for a miracle.”

  Silence stretched between them. Alexander listened to the steady roar of the Adamantine’s engines thrumming through the hull. He watched his crew flipping through holo displays, doing their best to optimize the ship’s systems and give them the best chance of intercepting the enemy. Alexander thought about his ex-wife back on Earth. His stepson, Dorian. Despite everything that had happened, he still cared about them both.

  Then there were the other fifteen billion people on the planet.

  It was hard to imagine that many people dying in an instant. What would they see as those missiles rained from the sky? A bright flash of light and then a searing shockwave. The ones already living underground in Mi
ndsoft’s automated habitats might survive—assuming subsequent earthquakes didn’t squeeze those people out like pimples.

  “They have to surrender,” McAdams said. “It’s the only way.”

  “There’s only one hour left on the clock before those missiles reach us. A few minutes later, they’ll hit Earth. If we were going to surrender, we should have done it by now and those missiles should have changed course. Since that hasn’t happened, there’s only three possibilities: either we didn’t offer a surrender, or we did and the Solarians didn’t accept it, or else they aren’t the ones attacking us.”

  “It doesn’t make sense that it could be the Alliance attacking itself anymore,” McAdams pointed out.

  “No, it doesn’t…” Alexander agreed. “But I suppose who and why is academic at this point. We have to stop those missiles.”

  “You have a plan…” McAdams said, her voice hopeful.

  “Not this time.”

  Alexander watched the clock ticking down. Between the Adamantine, and all of her fighters, drones, and missiles he knew they’d be lucky to shoot down one or two missiles. The rest of the fleet might get another fifty, leaving almost two hundred to hit Earth. That would be enough to plunge Earth into an impact winter, ultimately causing billions of deaths. Alexander’s mind raced trying to come up with a plan, but nothing came to him. All roads led to the same inevitable destination: extinction.

  When the clock hit five minutes, reality sunk in. He reached for McAdams’ hand, his own hand trembling. Her palm felt cold and clammy against his. The mindscape they shared aboard the Adamantine felt for a moment almost more real than the reality he knew to be lurking behind it.

  “One minute to intercept,” Frost announced from sensors.

  “Cardinal, redirect all fire to enemy missiles. Stone, have our fighters and drones do the same.”

  “Aye, Admiral,” Stone replied.

  “Hypervelocity rounds are going to start flying by their targets any second now,” Cardinal said.

  “Bishop, begin high-G evasive maneuvers,” Alexander said. “May as well shake things up a bit.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  There was a chance that one of the hundreds of thousands of deadly rounds the enemy had fired along their approach would hit them before the clock hit zero. If it did, they wouldn’t even have time to blink.

  Alexander turned to his XO. “I love you, Viviana McAdams,” he whispered.

  “I love you, too, Alexander,” she replied, squeezing his hand.

  Alexander squeezed back, tightening his grip on McAdams’ hand until both of their knuckles turned white.

  “Fifteen seconds!” Frost announced.

  14, 13, 12, 11, 10… 5, 4…

  The Adamantine and her fighter screen kept firing until the last possible second, simulated tracer fire drawing hundreds of glowing golden lines between the stars. When the clock hit one second, time seemed to slow to a crawl.

  Then a dazzling burst of light gushed into the bridge, filling the black void between the stars with unending light.

  Chapter 32

  Alexander blinked and his vision cleared. The dazzling brightness was gone, leaving nothing but stars and empty space ahead.

  “Hull breach on deck ninety-three!” Rodriguez called out.

  “Seal it off! What was that?”

  “Our lasers and theirs firing as we flew by each other, sir,” Cardinal said.

  “Frost, what did we hit?”

  “Six missiles between us and the destroyers behind us. Looks like we hit three.”

  “Two hundred and thirty-four to go,” McAdams said.

  Alexander scowled. There was no point turning around to chase those missiles back to Earth. They’d never be able to catch up in time.

  “How long before the remaining missiles hit Earth?”

  “Less than a minute, sir,” Frost replied.

  Alexander struggled to work moisture into his mouth. “Put it on the clock and get me a close-up of Earth on the main display.”

  “Aye, sir.”

  “You want to watch?” McAdams said, sounding as if the prospect turned her stomach.

  Alexander shook his head. “To say goodbye.”

  The main display blinked as the view switched from the bow cameras to the aft ones. A magnified image of Earth appeared, taking up the entire viewscreen. The planet was full of light and color: white swirls of cloud shrouded blue oceans underneath; scraps of brown, beige, and green poked through, hinting at outlines of continents below.

  Where would the missiles hit? Did it even matter? They could all hit the same spot and the result would still be the same: ELE. Extinction level event.

  “Twenty seconds to Earth impact!” Frost said.

  Alexander heard one of the crew saying a prayer, a verse from the Bible. “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death—”

  Alexander joined in, “I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

  It was rare to hear a verse from the Bible. The old religions had all but disappeared with the advent of immortality, but it seemed somehow fitting that those beliefs should come rushing back now that death had returned.

  The clock ran down to zero, but nothing happened to alter the familiar face of Earth. Alexander felt hope soar in his chest. “Did the fleet intercept them all?”

  “Doubtful, sir,” Lieutenant Frost replied. “This far out, There’s a delay of about twelve seconds between what we see and what’s actually happened. Our sensors suffer the same delay, so we’re just waiting for them to catch up.”

  “Right.” Of course. Alexander held his breath, waiting to see explosions pepper the planet. He imagined compressed atmosphere and debris bursting into space like giant bubbles of air bursting to the surface of a body of water. The clouds would race away with hurricane force as shockwaves rippled through the atmosphere.

  But still nothing happened, and by now more than twelve seconds had to have passed.

  “I don’t believe it…” Frost whispered.

  “What is it?”

  Lieutenant Frost turned from the sensor station to face him. “They missed.”

  * * *

  One Hour Earlier…

  “What do you want to show me?” Ben asked.

  “Watch…” Benevolence replied.

  A file transfer request came through the Adamantine’s comm system. It was a very large file, a holo recording. Ben played the file on the holo cameras that passed for his eyes.

  Alexander’s office disappeared, and Ben found himself floating high above a shiny, black metallic floor in a high-ceilinged room with bare metal walls and exposed metal beams. It looked like the inside of a ship except for the unusually high ceilings. Directly below was a low, mirror-smooth silver table with eight padded floor mats where the chairs should be. It was a traditional Japanese conference table.

  The recording was panoramic, so Ben could rotate it to look wherever he liked. At one end of the room lay a pair of large golden doors. To the other end, a chrome desk with a familiar-looking man sitting behind it. Japanese ethnicity, pale green eyes, the color of leaves in the spring, dark hair cropped military short, an unlined, youthful face with a strong chin and jaw… the man was an exact match for Orochi Sakamoto of Sakamoto Robotics. Behind him, a wall of floor-to-ceiling windows looked out on an equally familiar urban setting. This office was somewhere in the City of the Minds.

  As Ben watched, the golden doors at the other end of the room swung open and in walked another familiar person. Dorian Gray of Mindsoft.

  As Gray approached, Sakamoto rose from his chair and walked around his desk; he bowed slightly at the waist, but Gray did not return the bow. Ben thought he looked angry.

  “To what do I owe the honor of this visit, Mr. Gray?” Sakamoto asked in stilting, carefully enunciated English.

  “Honor my ass you son of a bitch.”

  “I fail to understand what has provoked your anger,” Sakamoto
replied.

  “You fired more missiles at Earth.”

  “Relax, Mr. Gray. The missiles are programmed to miss. Would I not be hiding in a bunker, otherwise? Come, let’s sit.” Sakamoto gestured to the conference table.

  “I’m fine standing, thank you,” Gray said. “If the missiles are meant to miss, then why bother firing them at all? We already accomplished our goals.”

  “That renegade admiral managed to shift blame for the attacks away from the Solarians, so I had to shift it back.”

  “When Phoenix originally came to you with this plan, you both agreed that it would be better not to start an actual war.”

  “A small deception on my part. We both admitted the possibility of a real war,” Sakamoto said. “And for someone in my business, the threat of war is not as profitable as war itself.”

  “You planned this from the start,” Gray accused.

  “Of course,” Sakamoto said. “It was mere coincidence that the Alliance found a Solarian scapegoat all by themselves.”

  “So why have me create fake comm transmissions to make it look like aliens were attacking us from the other side of the wormhole?”

  “Because no one would believe that the Solarians would attack us openly. Anonymously, however… that is another matter.”

  “Except it’s not anonymous anymore. You just revealed the ships that attacked the Alliance, and they’re Solarian hull types.”

  “Once war had been declared, there was no longer any reason for me to play coy. If the Solarians had actually been behind the attacks, they would drop their pretenses at that point, too.”