Silver Search

by Rock Whitehouse

  FPI Development Lab

  Outside Lewistown, Montana

  Wednesday, August 4, 2078, 0715 MDT

  In an FPI workshop fifty feet below the top of a small granite outcrop, Lloyd sat alone with his boss and mentor Randy Forstmann. They sat on opposite sides of a steel work table, each looking intently at the SLIP system design drawings on their tablets. Lloyd had returned from ISC HQ late Monday, and they had spent all day Tuesday reviewing the signal data that the Tranquility site had reported. The evidence for enemy tracking via SLIP was compelling, but they struggled to identify the actual method, and knowing the depth of their own understanding, it was disconcerting to both of them that the answer wasn't immediately apparent.

  The polished internal components of a SLIP emitter/receiver lay scattered on the table between them. Finally, Forstmann looked up.

  "They said that Sigma was not fired on after the SLIP system was taken out."

  "Yes, I know that," Lloyd said, annoyed.

  "Do we know if the strike on Sigma's SLIP system removed the external apparatus from the ship?" Lloyd looked up at him, not understanding. Forstmann continued. "We've been thinking about this as an internal problem with the emitter, but what if it's a resonance within the external hardware instead? If the apparatus was damaged, that might explain how they were unable to find her once it was hit." Lloyd thought about that as he looked through the reports FleetIntel had provided him.

  "It doesn't say," he answered. Randy Forstmann pulled out his phone and called Ron Harris, asking him if they were aware of whether the SLIP had been damaged or not. The conversation was short.

  "He'll check with Powell, and if he doesn't know, he can check with the repair crew."

  "But that's two days!"

  "Yes, it is."

  Forstmann got up and walked to the other end of the room where a SLIP emitter sat on the floor. It was a sphere perhaps a meter in diameter, painted a dull black to blend in with the stealth coating of the ship. It was titanium, mostly, only a few millimeters thick, with a secret blend of other trace elements. They'd spent almost a year deriving the best alloy for this strange process. Forstmann himself was surprised it worked, as he considered the initial theory that Lloyd had proposed very unlikely to succeed. But he also thought it would be a critical technology if it did and so he funded the effort. And, it had paid off. As he stood there considering what might be the root of this problem, his phone rang. It was Harris. After another short conversation, he hung up and turned to Lloyd.

  "Powell can't say. There was a lot of damage to Sigma, but he doesn't really know if they hit the apparatus or not. They're going to ask the repair supervisor to check and let them know."

  "So, two days, at least," Lloyd responded with disgust.

  "Right."

  Lloyd, clearly frustrated, put down his tablet and crossed his arms. "We know the channel, or, we think we do —what if we just tried it ourselves?"

  Randy sat back down at the table. "I was thinking along those lines myself. If our theory is that the receiver is somehow resonating, then we'd need a low-power emitter to send the pulses and then a second set to try to detect the resonances."

  "We have most of what we need here, I think," said Lloyd. "We'll need to get the team up to speed."

  Forstmann reached for his phone, starting the cascade of phone calls and electronic messages that would bring twenty or more of the best physical science and engineering minds down on this small town.

  The last call was to the Calvert Hotel for rooms.

  Intrepid

  L143-23

  Friday, August 5, 2078, 1015 UTC

  Natalie Hayden knocked on the edge of the Chief Intel Officer's open door. Ben looked up, then stood as she came in, closed the door, and sat down.

  "Jesus Christ, Ben, stop acting like I'm your superior," she said with disgust.

  "Well, Lieutenant Hayden, that's kinda what you are."

  She shrugged. "Yeah, well, let's not do that in private, OK? "

  "Sure." He closed what he was looking at and leaned forward on his elbows. "So, what's on your mind?"

  "Tell me about Henderson."

  Ben made a frustrated face. "What, you, too? I got harassed the day I set foot on this ship about her. I'm sick of it. I —"

  "No, Ben," she said, cutting off his objections. "I understand that part. You were friends, I get that. Just tell me more about her."

  It took Ben a few seconds to calm down and switch his response to the question Natalie was really asking.

  "So, what's your impression so far?" he asked.

  "She wants to look tough, a hard-ass, all business. But I wonder if that's how she really is."

  Ben nodded. "Well, she is the Captain, and she has to keep the crew at a distance to do her job."

  "True, but I just wonder what's behind it."

  "She's plenty smart, but grounded, practical. She's all about getting the job done, whatever that means, in the best way she can find. She's not that complicated."

  "What about her personal life? Married?"

  Ben frowned, wondering how much he should say, finally deciding public information was as far as he would go.

  "I can't say too much on that. After all, we talked a lot about things not meant to be shared. She's been divorced for a long time, but I'm not going beyond that. Don't let that get around."

  "OK, understood."

  Ben had some questions of his own. "So, is our boss The Great Senior Lieutenant Kirkland still pissed at me for, like, breathing?"

  "He misses your predecessor. They were really close—maybe too close—and it was a shock when Craig got booted off to make room for you."

  "Any advice?"

  "Just keep doing your job. I've known Jim since Freshman year at the U. He's fair and even-handed when it counts. He'll get over it eventually."

  "You're sure?"

  "He'd better. I guess Henderson already had him out to the woodshed once for some comment he made in the wardroom."

  "I didn't hear about that."

  "Jim told me about it afterwards. We still talk sometimes, and he was plenty mad."

  Natalie sat still for a moment.

  "What is it?" he asked.

  She spoke very quietly. "Is it true your wife bugged out the day after the attack at Inor?"

  "Where did you hear that?"

  "Rumor floating around."

  "Why do you or anyone else give a damn?"

  Natalie looked down, choosing not to respond to his anger that seemed to confirm what she had just asked. "I can't speak for anyone else. I'm only asking for myself."

  Ben looked at her for a long time, and she simply looked back at him, their eyes connected. After a couple seconds he broke the lock and glanced around the room.

  "Yeah," he said, choking a little. "Yeah, that's what happened. It's done now. I got the final decree before we left."

  "I'm sorry, Ben. That had to be hard."

  "Yeah, well, life goes on, you know? I'm doing much better now than I was before I came on board."

  "I'm glad you feel better."

  Ben leaned back in his chair, assessing the young woman on the other side of the desk with new eyes. "Natalie, what's all this about? What's really on your mind?"

  Natalie decided quickly to duck that question, at least for the moment.

  "You've been here a month already, did you realize that?"

  "Yeah, I can read a calendar," he said with a laugh.

  He waited for more, and when it didn't come, he decided to push her a little.

  "Nat, let's just admit right now that we get along great and it's been fun working together. Is there something else going on here you want to tell me about?"

  She looked up in surprise, smiling. "Too soon to tell. Maybe."

  Ben looked at her for a few seconds, feeling a door opening that he hadn't really expected to find. He smiled, feeling that whatever she might be thinking sounded good to him. Picking up his NETComp, he changed the subject.r />
  "FleetIntel says our first Sentinel has phoned home already. All nominal."

  "That's good news."

  "Yep. Ready for the deployment later today?"

  "Yes. The crew has the Sentinel on the cart already, and the RTG is attached."

  "OK, I'll be down in an hour or so to check it out."

  "Great." She started to get up.

  "Natalie," he said, changing the subject again. "We still have a lot of important work to do together. You have to know I like you, too, but let's not get too far ahead of ourselves, OK? "

  "Sure. Slow and steady it goes."

  He nodded his agreement as she rose and left, leaving the door open. He sat back, replaying the conversation in his mind. He kept coming back to a phrase from an old sci-fi show, resistance is futile, and wondered if he was already there with Natalie. He smiled to himself: There are far worse fates, pal, than to have Natalie Hayden across the table from you.

  An hour later they were together again, but now their heads were buried in the rear end of a Sentinel that refused to initialize.

  "What the hell..." Ben said, looking again at a cluster of cables that looked fine but somehow had to be the source of the problem.

  "You sure it's in there?" Natalie asked, her face just a few inches from his. Ben shrugged, one arm inside the probe and the other holding his NETComp outside.

  "Seems like it, based on the plans." He pulled back out of the access panel, flipping to a different schematic. As he looked up, Joanne Henderson was looking hard at him.

  "Good Afternoon, Captain."

  "So, Mr. Price, what's the hold-up?"

  "It won't initialize. Lieutenant Hayden and I are trying to track it down now."

  "How long?"

  "Honestly, Captain, I don't know."

  Hayden came around from the other side of the Sentinel. "Could we swap it out for another unit?"

  Ben shook his head. "Not easily. Each unit is programmed for a specific location. We could try reassigning one, but it would take a while to transfer the configuration."

  "Something to take up with FleetIntel, Mr. Price," Henderson said, letting her frustration come through. "It would be good to just pull a chip or something and move it to the next one in line."

  "Agreed, Captain. Meantime, I need to see what's wrong with this one."

  Henderson frowned. "OK, keep at it. Update me in an hour. I don't want to stay here any longer than we have to, understood?"

  "Yes, Captain."

  She smiled. "Seems to me I recall some annoying Warrant constantly telling me to check my assumptions back when I was in Plans."

  Ben nodded. "Yes, ma'am, I recall him as well. Guess I should take my own advice?"

  "Yeah, and don't forget Pournelle."

  Ben smiled as he noticed the puzzled look on Natalie's face. "Ah yes, the relentless application of logic..."

  Joanne turned and headed back to the Bridge.

  "Pournelle?" Natalie asked.

  "Yeah, the writer. He had a saying that he kept repeating, more or less that all problems could be solved by the relentless application of logic."

  "Didn't Sherlock say something like that?" she asked as she pulled off yet another inspection panel. "Something about once you remove the impossible whatever is left must be true?"

  "Yeah, that's close," Ben responded absentmindedly as he flipped through the plans on his NETComp. He stopped and looked up at the Weapons Chief Tech.

  "Say Chief, you did this section on the RTG before you put it on, right?" The chief looked over at one of the young techs.

  "Patrick?" he asked.

  "Yes. At least, I think so..."

  His hesitation produced an ugly scowl on the Chief Tech. "You told me you did the procedure, Patrick. Did you or did you not follow the plan?"

  The frightened look on Dion Patrick's nineteen-year-old face was all Ben needed to see.

  "OK, Chief, I'll disconnect the RTG lines and we can re-check." As Ben half-crawled into the Sentinel to disconnect the lines between the power supply and the probe, he could hear the Chief giving Technician Patrick some pithy and explicit advice to remember the next time he had a critical task to complete. As Ben pulled back out of the opening, he saw Natalie's pained expression, clearly embarrassed that one of her crew had apparently screwed up. Ben flipped open the small control panel so he and Natalie could check the settings. They looked up at each other in surprise.

  "Switches look right to me," Ben said, handing the NETComp over to Natalie.

  "Yeah, looks right."

  The Chief and his young Tech also looked at the controls and agreed they were as specified.

  "Except the power ready light is out," Natalie observed. She turned to Patrick. "Last step is to verify the light is on. Was it?"

  "Yes, Lieutenant, it was on."

  Ben looked hard at the young man, then went back to his NETComp.

  "You're sure?" she asked again.

  "I am sure, ma'am. It was on." Natalie looked at Ben, who was still staring at the troubleshooting chart.

  "OK, Patrick, go open panel six and press the reset." It took a few seconds for the young man to get the right panel open and perform the reset.

  "Done, sir."

  "OK, I'll recycle the switches here and see what happens." It had been expedient to use the off-the-shelf RTG unit, but the flip side of that choice was the complexity in configuring it to run the Sentinel, something it was not designed to do. Ben went over the settings with the young tech and the RTG came online as expected. Ben reached back inside and restored the power and control connections.

  The Sentinel came to life.

  "OK, so?" Natalie asked.

  "Beats the hell outta me, Lieutenant."

  "Can we trust the damned thing?"

  Ben shrugged. "Let's give it another couple hours before we release it. If there's anything really wrong, we should see it in that time."

  Joanne Henderson was not happy about the delay, but she understood Ben's reasoning. She trusted Ben Price well enough that if he had asked for another whole day, she'd have agreed to it. He was well aware of her confidence in him, and equally aware that he had to respect that part of their relationship and never ask for more than was really necessary.

  Hansen Family Farm

  Near Lancaster, Ohio

  Thursday, August 5, 2078, 0930 EDT

  It had been several months since Carol was last home. She'd spent several days there recuperating just after they returned from Inor. With the trip to Beta Hydri on the horizon, it would be some time before she had another chance. She'd hardly finished asking before Terri Michael ordered her off the ship with two days off.

  Early the next morning Carol packed a small bag and headed for the subcar station just a block from the BOQ. After thirty years of effort, the build-out of the nationwide subterranean transportation system, nicknamed the 'subcar,' was probably 80% complete. The ability to provide simple, on-demand services without the traveler needing to own a vehicle was a major factor in its acceptance by the general public. It was efficient, far safer than surface automobiles, and while public, the cars were small, and travel was still private. As she approached, the subcar station doors opened, and she stepped into the elevator. Fifty feet later, she stepped out onto the platform where a car was already waiting. She slipped into the well-padded front seat, closed the door, and inserted her Fleet ID card into the slot on the panel.

  "Good morning, Lieutenant Hansen. Your destination, please?"

  "The farm."

  After a moment the route was calculated and cleared by the system control center.

  "Ready," the car reported.

  "Depart."

  The car moved silently away from the station. Carol decided not to pull out her NETComp to work, or listen to music, or watch a movie. She just settled back in the seat, closed her eyes, and tried to visualize the farm as she remembered it. There was only the slightest sensation of speed as the car sped along on magnetic rails through the
carefully bored and smoothed tunnels, the rails powered by the heat of the planet below. She felt the slight deceleration as she approached a main junction in the tunnel network. The car swung gently left and soon settled into the next segment of the trip. A moment of acceleration and all was silent again. Two hours later she was at the station near home and her mother was waiting.

  Now happily dressed in her oldest jeans and work boots, topped with a well-worn SFU t-shirt and wide-brimmed hat, she sat on the white rail fence overlooking a sunny paddock, squinting out at the older man in front of her, leading his horse in exercise. He was shorter and heavier than she recalled, but with the same lively eyes that radiated laugh lines. But they weren't just laugh lines. They were built one by one, day by day, by early rising and late retiring, days spent in the hot sun and bitter cold of the farm. There was a lot of automation now, but even with the latest equipment, there was still a need for the farmer to be present, to see with his own eyes what the instruments told him, to walk the corn or bean or soy fields himself. There really was no substitute for the experienced, learned eye of the man, or woman, whose name was on the gate.

  Her mother Laura stood outside the fence next to her, leaning against the top rail, a generous cowboy hat shading her graying hair and face now almost as lined as her husband's.

  Carol's father completed the last lap with Sirius, then let him free and walked back to the fence.

  "You know, Carol, I still don't get it," he said with a shake of his head.

  "Fleet?"

  "Yes, Fleet. With your grades, you could have done anything you want. Maybe something, you know, safer. Something a little closer to home."

  "Ols! Now, don't you push her!" her mother called to him.

  Carol smiled slightly, inclining her head. "But Dad, I am doing exactly what I want."

  He looked her in the eye for a long moment. "I worry, Carol. I worry every night."

  "I know you do." She looked down, rocking her legs back and forth as she sat on the top rail, then raised her head again. "I can't tell you not to. But just know that I am where I want to be."

  Her father nodded reluctantly. "I suppose..."