Starship Doi

by Alex Deva

  "Twelve seconds," said Doina, her eyes still closed.

  "And about five thousand kilometres from here," said Jing. "May God help my crew."

  And then, just as the remaining four missiles were engaged in four long, graceful arcs, Doi disappeared from their midst.

  It accelerated so quickly, it was impossible for their lasers to keep tracking it, so they powered down, entered stealth mode and awaited reacquisition.

  The starship disappeared from Jing's tactical display altogether, and then the Yǒngqì's radars found it again, all the way on the other side, standing right between the station and the two incoming missiles.

  One instant later, even as they tried to veer off, their icons were replaced by static crosses. Doi's defence field had destroyed them as soon as they'd entered range.

  "Is that your starship's defence system?"

  "Yes," said Mark.

  "The one that killed my floating crew."

  Doina opened her eyes and looked at the German.

  "We never intended for that to happen. Doi was just protecting against collisions."

  Tiessler nodded. "It was probably for the best. I'm not accusing, Doina."

  "Look," said Jing.

  The Cameron had distanced itself from the space station and was firing both its main guns towards the incoming missile, which was dancing around the aiming lasers. In addition, the space station had deployed its own cannons, which were firing wildly.

  The barrage of fire was broad and continuous, creating a field of high-speed bullets in front of the missile. The artificial brain inside the killing machine decided it was time for plan B as it changed course, trying to find a blind spot between the two cannons. The capabilities of the Eurasian cruiser and the space station had been programmed into its tactical algorithms, and it was their faults that those algorithms were trying to exploit.

  But that won the Eurasian cruiser about ten more seconds.

  "Come on, come on," whispered Jing, tensed up.

  "What do they have on the Cameron?" asked Mark.

  "Two laser-aimed fifteen-mils and some missiles," answered Tiessler.

  "Nukes?"

  The German looked up at him. "No," he said. "No nukes."

  "And the Monnet?"

  The other kept looking at him, already anticipating the question. "My ship is dead in space at the moment, mister Gardener. We barely made it here in one piece."

  "How about the station?"

  "Six fifteen-mils."

  "The Cameron's deploying its Pinions," said Jing.

  Six more icons appeared on the tablet's screen, labeled "CMN-P1" to "CMN-P6". The cruiser rotated out of their way, and they simultaneously engaged the missile with their own guns.

  After a few seconds of concentrated fire, during which over a dozen guns spent a few tons of ammo, the missile was finally defeated. They couldn't see the explosion, but Jing's powerful exhalation was enough.

  "Here we go," said Tiessler.

  And then, fifty-three Wings, twenty-four very similar Pinions, three American cruisers, one Eurasian intact cruiser and a slightly damaged space station, all opened fire.

  XLII.

  "You have to help us," said Jing.

  "Have the Yanks ever attacked like that?" asked Mark, standing up.

  "No. This is the first time they've been so aggressive."

  "Have you?" asked Aram.

  Jing looked at him. "Have we what?"

  "Attacked the Americans like this?"

  The Chinese was annoyed. "Of course not."

  "Please come with us," said Mark.

  "Where are we going?"

  "To our command room."

  Tiessler and Jing didn't wait to be told twice. They grabbed their tabs and got up. Toma got up too, and as Mark opened the door, Doina ran ahead. Aram brought up the rear.

  They quickly regained the vertical and, moving with speed, crossed through the airlock into one of the other spokes, and from there, entered Room One.

  Doina was already floating in the middle of the room, a half metre above the floor. The room was dark, and a sizeable projection filled most of it. In the centre, the space station with the Monnet still docked to it; the Cameron manoeuvring on one side, Doi itself flying slowly away from the battle, its energy field glowing with tiny explosions as incoming rounds attracted constant bolts of lightning.

  "Herrgott," whispered Tiessler, trying to take it all in.

  Jing circled the projection, even trying to put his hand in it.

  "This is beyond belief," he said.

  The biologist was awed, too. "How is this possible?" she asked. "How can we see ourselves? It's like you have a camera outside somewhere."

  "We're not using light," said Doina.

  Jing looked up at her, noticing for the first time that she was floating.

  "Wasai!" he exclaimed in surprise. "Not using light? What then?"

  "Later," said Tiessler. "We can see everything and that's good enough for me."

  "That's our defence field," said Mark, pointing out at the starship's egg-shaped protection. Normally invisible, it was now glowing with impact explosions.

  "Yes, I got that. Why are we moving away?"

  "Don't go away. You have to help us. My family is on that space station." Jing was pleading.

  Six tiny balls of fire departed from one of the American cruiser. "More missiles," said Doina.

  And then six more, from another one.

  Jing turned white.

  "There's no way we can face twelve missiles," he said. "No way. You have to help us. Please."

  He looked up at Doina much like Christians looked up at floating angels in their icons.

  "Please," he repeated. "I am begging you."

  "Mark," called Aram, loudly.

  The Brit sighed. He had hoped to keep Effo as a last resort, but he didn't see an option. They couldn't just stand by and ignore the slaughter.

  "Go," he said.

  Aram took off for the airlock.

  XLIII.

  They were spread across a million kilometres, moving ballistically at a hundred thousand kilometres per second, riding the gravity waves of various celestial bodies, graciously surfing them, tuning from one to the next, always forwards towards the little yellow star on whose orbit their beacon had called them.

  They were lined in incredibly long strands of tiny particles, barely a few hundred molecules each, spaced in hundreds or even thousands of kilometres between each other. Billions of such undulating filaments, they were rushing through space, each tiny bit communicating with the ones around it, forming the biggest living brain in the galaxy.

  By itself, each moving projectile was no more than that: a projectile. But there were quadrillions of them, and almost instantaneous communication between them, even across distances that were so incredibly vast relative to their own size, made them a single colony organism.

  Our enemy is already there, they thought.

  Yes, they answered themselves.

  Are we too late?

  We'll find out soon.

  They had a different nature from most bodies in that particular region of the galaxy. Very little around them matched their special characteristics. But that didn't matter to them; even so, they were more of a danger to everything else than the other way around.

  And they knew that. They knew that very well.

  As they approached their destination and the little yellow star kept growing and turning into the centre of a planetary system, they gradually tuned out of its gravity well and into the opposing waves of a distant black hole. By doing that, they decelerated; by decelerating, their particles came closer to each other, from thousands of kilometres, to mere hundreds. It did not matter, functionally; communication could easily be established between any two particles, no matter how remote from each other, as long as they were still part of a filament.

  The star system is just as we predicted, they said.

  Yes, they answered. And our beacon is on t
he third planet's orbit, just as predicted.

  That pleased them. The ability to predict cosmogony was their most prized asset, their unique attribute in the entire galaxy. It had never failed them.

  The beacon was still calling insistently. The particular tinge of urgency that it carried was associated with the sudden arrival of the Others; it was the way the beacon had been programmed. The original signal had meant that a local, space-faring civilisation had emerged, just as predicted, on the third planet; but that the Others had just beaten them to it could be disastrous.

  They were very odd, the Others. With their refusal to go too far out into space, preferring instead to send automated ships throughout the galaxy, and with their bizarre matter manipulation technologies... Couldn't they see how unimportant matter really was?

  And what an absurd approach to space exploration! Getting other civilisations to visit them, rather than going out and actually exploring!

  The impossibly huge filaments approached the third planet and immediately sensed the Others' ship.

  It was indeed a Blank, one of their automated, adaptable starships, ready to house and obey anyone it considered suitable for contact. It would've had a set of matter transmitters -- again, that sickly obsession with matter! It had probably already acquired its crew and was likely about to depart to the home of the Others.

  The Blank starship was on a planetary orbit. The filaments reached the large planetary satellite, where their trusted beacon had been hidden for aeons, and sent a self-destruct command to the device. They would have incorporated the beacon into themselves, but their nature did not allow it.

  On the surface of the Moon, under the petrified looks of laboratory technicians and in the view of several three-dimensional, high-speed, non-stop recording cameras, the tetrahedron collapsed into the finest dust mankind had ever seen.

  The filaments kept decelerating steadily, as they approached the third planet, swirling carefully to avoid all the satellites in its path -- natural or otherwise.

  And there was so much floating around that was not natural. Structures of all sizes and shapes littered the lower orbits. Some emitted various energy signatures; others merely reflected radiation. Some were moving under their own power, and others were simply dead matter. They observed everything with interest. They could easily take in the entire star system at once. But here, around the third planet, was where the really interesting things were happening.

  And the really dangerous things.

  The Blank starship had its Cub out. Folded over itself, it was flying at a short distance, and they observed it too, this time with military consideration.

  It wasn't flying very well.

  That was to say, it was continuously changing direction and attitude, as if its pilot had not yet quite mastered its controls.

  But then, the Blank starship wasn't very steady, either.

  Something was off, they decided. In a gracious ark of a hundred thousand kilometres, they swerved and started analysing the situation.

  The Blank starship had its static shield on. Thousands and thousands of very small objects were being destroyed by it every second, in bright flashes that gave shape to the otherwise invisible shield. They were ballistic projectiles, originating from other, much larger objects.

  Local ships, they thought. Crude and clumsy, but marginally functional.

  So, the third planet has its own ships.

  Could it be some sort of attack? Were the locals attacking the Others' starship? If so, convenient as it might have been, it wasn't a very successful endeavour. The Blank could easily withstand the projectiles, but more importantly, it could simply leave.

  Or could it?

  Was the Blank starship perhaps broken?

  It was next to impossible to disable a Blank ship. The Others had made them well, capable of taking very severe punishments.

  They observed further, with curiosity.

  Slightly larger, self-powered micro-ships were also travelling in the area. They had also originated from the local ships, if that was what those were. Some collided with each other, in reciprocal annihilation. Well, that seemed pointless... until they saw that all the micro-ships that destroyed each other were coming from the same groups of local ships.

  And that explained everything.

  This is war, they understood.

  But what part do the Others play?

  Maybe they started it.

  Maybe they're playing one side against the other.

  Maybe they're prisoners.

  Well, that was an interesting thought. A civilisation that was so fresh in space, capable of imprisoning a Blank starship? Extremely unlikely.

  Maybe its crew is local and they're controlling the Blank.

  Well, of course its crew is controlling it.

  No, maybe they're actually controlling it.

  Another interesting thought. Could the Others have finally discovered a civilisation capable of assuming full, complete control of a Blank starship? Those starships have all got Automated Decision Makers. They never, ever yielded complete control to their crews. They merely appeared to do so. They could not be commandeered.

  Or, could they?

  This was a very interesting situation, and it presented a few interesting opportunities.

  So, maybe the crew was on one of the fighting sides and using the Blank as a warship.

  Why wasn't it firing, then?

  Maybe it doesn't need to, they answered themselves.

  Or maybe it can't. Or doesn't want to, they continued to speculate.

  Maybe the crew don't even know what a Blank can do, they thought with some amusement. That would be right in line with the Others' style. Send a highly advanced starship to an unknown civilisation, then let them try to discover its possibilities unaided. How stupid.

  For a while, they watched the battle with some interest, and then they decided to make themselves noticed.

  XLIV.

  Aram was pissed.

  His small ship was able to travel really, really fast, but because the battle was happening in a relatively small volume of space, he couldn't. Even so, the moves he did -- nearly instant accelerations to over four thousand kilometres an hour -- were sometimes making him dizzy.

  He had to move fast, because Mark had decided against openly using the cannon. Neither Effo nor Doi-the-ship were being actively offensive; the starship's static defence field was destroying all ordnance that came into contact with it, but Effo didn't have such a thing.

  Instead, Aram was reduced to simply dodging the hails of large calibre bullets that each and every American ship was sending his way. Their computerised aiming lasers were trying to lock on to his small ship, but Aram's flying made it impossible. Simultaneous three-axis rotations and extremely high-speed translations were beyond the capabilities of the mechanical turrets.

  But he didn't know how long he could keep this up.

  And the missiles were even worse.

  Long tubes, at least twice as long as Effo, were being launched by both Americans and Eurasians. At each end, they had four long, straight legs that formed a cross, perpendicular to the axis of the missile; and at the end of each leg there were three thrusters. A total of twenty-four thrusters were insuring amazing manoeuvrability, controlled by an extremely capable artificial brain.

  And he wasn't allowed to shoot them directly.

  What he did instead was approach them, very carefully -- the missiles could detect his presence and always tried to escape -- and, when he was only a few meters close, quickly destroy one or two thrusters. It wasn't easy at all to get so close and sneak in a couple of tiny, short-distance bursts of Effo's cannon, but it was all he could afford without appearing to take sides.

  He tried, as much as he could, to be indiscriminate in picking up the sides whose missiles he was disabling, but it was difficult.

  For one, he was under a nearly constant barrage of bullets, which could actually harm him.

  And for another, man
y of those missiles were actually aimed at himself.

  To make things even harder, sometimes disabling one or two thrusters didn't really disable the entire machine. If its very clever computer decided that it could still navigate with the remaining engines in order to destroy something, it simply factored in the malfunction and carried on.

  Aram had seen the missiles explode. He had seen what they were capable of. Once, when an American missile collided with an Eurasian one, the resulting explosion completely took out an American Wing ship that was a good few tens of kilometres away. He saw that ship explode with everyone in it, and he understood the true destructive power of those great flying tubes.

  He was quickly learning to master Effo, and he had noticed that Effo was getting used to him, as well. He'd discovered that he could concentrate on a target, willing it to be destroyed, then focus on the next one and then, double-tapping with his right foot, make Effo shoot both targets in extremely rapid succession.

  Of course, he was still trying to mask the fact that he really was using his cannon, so he only did this at very close range, but even so, it was better than nothing. And he hoped it made his actions even less conspicuous, or at least less believable, to both battling sides.

  Disabling those powerful, deceitful and intelligent missiles was terribly risky. He was constantly gambling that the computer inside the thing might decide to make the missile explode and take him out with it. Especially when he was duelling with the ones that had actually been sent to take him out. Only the fact that, smart as they were, they had never been programmed to chase something moving as fast as Effo gave him a little edge.

  Something else had happened during his accommodations flights in the asteroid belt. Something almost equally incredible. While getting used to him, Effo had scanned his memories and retrieved the runic alphabet that the Dacians had been using, together with the Latin one that the Romans had brought, as well as the Greek. The ship analysed them, compiled them, understood them, and then converted them into a new writing convention, an improved set of logograms that would have left any linguist astounded.

  And then, Effo taught it to Aram.

  He could now read. Well, not modern words, save for the little English he'd learned from Mark; but Effo was projecting flows of glyphs on the inside of his canopy, and he could understand them.