Indra Station

by Joseph R. Lallo

  Things were sliding in that direction. Nothing he’d said, and a great deal of the questions he’d specifically avoided, clarified what the station was for. The information available even to this tiny surveillance office was stunningly comprehensive. Far more than it needed for anything as simple as a communication hub, or a traffic hub. When this station was online, it could easily serve practically every purpose an orbital facility might serve for a planet twice the size of Operlo, and then some.

  But things were missing. Despite seeming to be lined up as the primary link in the communication chain, the actual optimal arrival point from the interstellar corridor that VectorCorp maintained wasn’t anywhere nearby. It was almost ninety degrees off the orbital plain they were whizzing along. That smacked of avoiding orbital traffic.

  Then there were the power scales. The station’s power ratings, as very clearly listed on the vital readings that rotated through the “technical overview” screen, were ludicrously high. Multiple terawatts. She made notes to look up the sort of power requirements of a station of this size, but she was certain they would be minuscule compared to the sort of power this place seemed designed to channel. She scribbled Weapon?

  “You do all of the arrival and departure scheduling?” she asked.

  “The computer does all of it. Mostly I just hit ‘Okay’ a bunch of times to confirm it. Everything’s set up to require at least some human interaction. Codes and stuff.”

  She underlined Weapon?

  “How far ahead and how far back do these arrival and departure schedules go?”

  “Oh, we go all the way back,” he said, pulling up the schedule and rolling back through it. “All the way back to when the computer system came up, at least. Before I even got here. Back then it was all Patel Construction running the place. As for how far forward, I’m not really sure. I just look through the chunk between when I come on duty and when I’ll come on duty again.”

  He rolled the list forward. “Looks like it only goes about three days forward.”

  “And what are those blank entries?”

  “Beats me. There are always a few of those. I guess someone on the other shift sets them up. I always assumed they were just placeholders. Usually someone comes in at that time, but not always. Maybe that’s just when they have someone planned to arrive but don’t have a ship lined up?”

  “Who usually shows up at those times?”

  “I don’t know. There are three docking bays, and I only handle this one. The other two are automated. They always show up at those.”

  She pointed to the screen. “I notice my arrival isn’t a blank spot like that. It’s just not listed.”

  “Well, yeah. What do you take me for? I’m not going to leave a big marker listing when you arrived if I don’t want it on the record. Lucky me, I’ve got the access privilege to delete and disable logs.”

  She nodded and jotted down Officially unofficial. NDA meetings? After a moment, she added another underline to her weapon note.

  “Now, that brings me to the security,” she said. “That’s your specialty, right?”

  “Oh, sure. That’s my focus.”

  “Let’s hear it. What sort of precautions have you got?”

  “You name it. Video and audio surveillance through any high-traffic areas. Motion detectors through nonmachinery corridors.” He held up his slidepad. “Everyone’s got a work slidepad that’s got to be logged into periodically. It’s pinged whenever anyone enters or leaves an area. There’s an automatic timeout. Fifteen seconds unattended and the system locks back up. It’s actually sort of a pain.”

  “The slidepad has to be logged in periodically?”

  “Yeah. It’s… whatchacallit… a two-factor sort of thing. We’ve got these little dongles.” He waved his slidepad in front of a small valet-parking-style panel. It clicked open to reveal keychain-sized devices.

  “May I take a look?” she said.

  “Sure.”

  She stowed her pad and reached awkwardly into the cabinet to grab one. The dongle was about the size of her pinkie and displayed a lengthy code that flashed away every so often.

  “See, I’m not so worried about talking about this stuff, because the security is rock solid. That dongle has to be paired with a slidepad that’s logged in to the system and active. You’ve got to get through all of the security on the slidepad, and keep it active, and have the dongle. It’s like stacking three security systems on top of each other. Unbreakable.”

  As he counted off the hurdles it would take to break security, he brought up the access lists and security panels as though they were somehow his achievement. It was clear he was very proud of having control over this sort of a system.

  “I see…” She tapped the screen. “This whole access privilege part is just like what we’ve got at the network. But the sensors and dongles are way past what we use. Very impressive.”

  “Yep. Top-shelf security. Speaking of, I’ll take that dongle back.”

  “Of course,” she said, handing him a dongle.

  He replaced it and locked up the cabinet. “Strict rules, you know. Gotta keep them locked up.”

  “Of course. Whatever they’re planning for the station, it must be very important to protect it so much.”

  “I guess so.”

  “Say, I don’t suppose there are any other trustworthy employees I could interview?”

  “Hell no, Ms. Modane. You’re lucky I let you up here. Anyone else who finds out you’re here is likely to report you, and that’s a headache for both of us. Probably trespassing charges for you and a lost job for me.”

  “That’s entirely understandable. So I suppose that means it’d be best if I didn’t wander off.”

  “Oh, no. You don’t go anywhere without me.” He checked the time. “And really, I’d prefer if you were out of here before too much longer. Things get trickier if I fiddle with the logs on either side of one I don’t fiddle with. There’s a blank slot coming up in a few hours, and I’d like you out before then.”

  “I don’t suppose you’d be able to get me a water then? I’d been holding off, hoping maybe I’d see the crew cafeteria or something. I’m getting awfully dry.”

  He gave her a long, measuring look. “Okay…” He warily tapped the lock screen control. “I’ll be right back.” He opened the office door and drifted out.

  The very moment he was out the door, she slapped the Unlock Screen control. A log-in screen appeared, listing the personnel in range of the console. Her guide’s name was present, but color coded yellow. Not quite out of range, but getting there. She tapped Log In.

  Enter security code, the screen prompted.

  She slid her pad aside to reveal a dongle she’d palmed. Michella’s father had taught his girls a fair number of questionable skills before his untimely demise. One of the more useful of them had been his rule about theft. If you want something, always take two. It was amazing just how many people would stop looking once they got one back from you.

  With skill honed by years of typing lengthy notes, she entered the code. The system woke up, but a notification bubble popped up almost immediately.

  Please activate slidepad. Automatic log-out in fifteen seconds.

  She flipped open the access list he’d shown her. She’d taken great care to search the screen while he was talking. It took her all of five seconds to spot the “Add Device” button she’d seen when he was bragging. She tapped it and a tool tip advised her to apply the new device to the reader. She quickly swiped her own slidepad over the clearly marked sensor.

  Stand by.

  She held her breath. The log-out countdown was getting awfully close to running out.

  Accepted.

  The countdown vanished.

  “Okay. The security system is more user-friendly than Lex’s ship. That says something.”

  She scrolled through the data, glancing out the window of the little office periodically. She saw her ho
st find his way to a crew cabinet to fetch her a drink.

  Her searching quickly established that he had loads of access. Since her own slidepad was considered one of his devices, she had the same level of access now. That said, his personal access level was limited to his roles. Though she could find plenty of data drives on the network, she couldn’t access any of them. Rather than waste the maybe forty seconds she had left on trying to find things that had been hidden, she instead focused on things she knew he had access to.

  She dragged sensor logs, crew manifests, arrival and departure schedules, and everything else he’d shown her onto her slidepad. Just as he pulled the door open, she logged out and backed away.

  “We had iced tea. Is that okay?”

  Michella huffed. “Just what the doctor ordered,” she said.

  #

  Michella managed to keep him talking for another forty minutes before he started to become visibly impatient for her to take her leave. She was forced to use a delay tactic straight from a toddler’s playbook. She’d gotten him to escort her to the bathroom facilities. It turned out they were in an alcove just one access door away from the docking bay.

  “Ugh…” she said, gazing at the assortment of tubes and sockets that made up the bathroom on a space station. “Hundreds of years in space and this is still the best we can do?”

  “Do you need a manual? Lining things up is kind of tricky, and if you get it wrong, there’s a lot of cleanup,” he said.

  “I’ll manage,” she said. “A little privacy, please?”

  “Oh, right. Sorry.”

  She would have preferred a locking door or at least a sturdy stall, but even in a station this large, space was at a premium. She had to make do with a thin curtain to keep her hidden from prying eyes.

  When she heard him move to the end of the hall, she got to work. By her count, she could get away with five minutes before he was likely to come knocking again. That wasn’t much time to work out what, if anything, should be done.

  Her eyes flitted across page after page of data she’d purloined. She’d been lucky to get through their security, but it seemed, even with access, it was better secured than she would have liked. He was a technician. If she were trying to undermine the operation of the station, his access level might have been useful. He could open the maintenance tubes on the ship, activate and deactivate surveillance, and do loads of other useful stuff. But he didn’t have access to anything that would actually answer her questions. What was this place? Why had this place been made?

  The access list kept calling her back to it. Those blank lines in particular were flashing red beacons that something was being covered up. It wasn’t proof of misdeed—there were plenty of good reasons for a corporation to have entries like that. But if they were trying to do something, those slots were good candidates.

  She flipped back and forth between the last few weeks. There were definitely patterns. Then it struck her so hard she slapped her forehead for not thinking of it sooner.

  “He’s got access to the surveillance video,” she hissed.

  She scrolled to a blank arrival slot and pulled up video from the automated docking bays. They were, annoyingly, blacked out during those times, but a bit of flicking through nearby cameras earned her a brief but undeniable glimpse of a familiar woman in sharp business attire. Preethy Misra.

  “I knew it. Whatever this place is, it has the boss checking up on it regularly… Which means it’s all but certain she’s due to arrive any minute,” she whispered to herself.

  Further searching proved, to her dismay, that any videos of the contents of those meetings were either unavailable or locked behind an access level her host lacked. If she wanted to know what was happening here, and thus if there was anything shady about it, she’d need to find a way to listen in on one of those meetings. But that might mean remaining in the station for hours longer than she’d intended, and she was already being ushered out the door.

  Her expression dropped when she realized it might potentially be possible to manage such a feat, but it would require some help.

  She fumbled in her bag for her hands-free device, then thumbed through her slidepad’s settings to try to connect to the SOB. It took three tries, and even then gave her a lousy connection. Something about the station must have made connections flaky. But she finally linked up, and, via the ship, she contacted Ma.

  “Hello, Ms. Modane,” Ma said after barely a moment of negotiating the connection. “The time is 7:04 p.m., are you—”

  “Ma,” she whispered insistently. “I have some questions and I don’t have time for small talk.”

  “How may I help you?”

  “I need to know how to work the SOB remotely.”

  “May I ask why you require this information?”

  “No, you may not. I’m in a hurry.”

  “You seem to require a great deal of low-level knowledge of Lex’s ship’s operation without his knowledge and with no evidence of his consent. Additionally, you have not been behaving with a level of courtesy sufficient to inspire trust or acquiescence.”

  “If you want, ask Lex if I got permission, but all I’m asking for is control of the ship remotely.”

  “What task do you require the ship to perform?”

  “I need it to undock on its own and then move to a distance where it won’t show up on scanners. I’ll eventually need to get it to come back, too.”

  “Processing… Please acknowledge the software install request on your slidepad.”

  She glanced down in time to see just such a request appear on her screen. She authorized the install with her thumbprint. A pair of quick progress bars filled, and she was presented with a childishly simple UI. There were just two buttons. One marked “Undock and Hide” and the other marked “Recall and Dock.”

  “Pressing the indicated button will cross-link your slidepad with the SOB system, providing you with the capability to communicate as though aboard the ship until all standard undocking procedures are complete, at which point it will utilize stealth procedures to find an unobserved vantage. The second button will provide a similar procedure in reverse. Please be aware that both buttons require an unbroken communication chain to the SOB to function.”

  “Fine, fine. Thank you.”

  “Please remember your scheduled—”

  Michella closed the connection, then turned to the gadget that took the place of a bathroom in zero-g. With a few well-placed tugs, she dislodged some connections that were clearly not meant to be removed, then sanitized her hands and pulled the curtain aside.

  “Thank you so much for the hospitality. I, uh… I may have broken it.”

  She saw his expression drop, even from the end of the corridor.

  “How broken are we talking about?” His tone showed a suitable level of trepidation, considering there was a better than average chance a canister of human waste had just emptied into a low-gravity environment.

  “Just this thing here. It came out when I tried to hang it up,” she said.

  He gave it a look, then gave her a look. She’d seen it a thousand times, the look of a man fully and eagerly capable of believing that, through some sort of distinctly feminine form of incompetence, Michella had broken something that no sane person could break by accident. It used to rankle her that this particular ruse worked too well, but after the number of times she’d been able to get an extra few unsupervised moments due to it, she’d decided it was an acceptable evil.

  “Can you fix it?” she asked.

  “It’ll take a minute, but this is no problem.”

  “I guess I’ll just head over to the ship then?”

  “Yeah, that’ll work. It’s not like you can get into any trouble, all the doors are locked. Board your ship. I won’t be a minute, then I’ll get you undocked.”

  She gave him the look of relief she knew he was hoping to see for his chivalrous act of plugging in two sockets, then turned to leave
.

  “Hey!” he said sharply.

  She turned and kept a carefully measured look of calm on her face.

  “Yes?”

  “Don’t think I didn’t notice what you were trying to do.”

  “What do you mean?” she said, now struggling a bit more with her charade.

  He held out his hand. “You owe me twenty-five thousand credits.”

  “Oh! Right, right. Where was my mind?”

  She dug through the terribly mixed-up contents of her bag and found the five chips she owed.

  “Can’t pull a fast one on me,” he said.

  “That’s for sure,” she said with a smile.

  She tugged herself along the wall while he did his thing. All the cameras nearby would still be off since she wasn’t supposed to be here. She hung a left instead of a right as she came to the end of the corridor and propelled herself as quickly as she could while checking the station layout she’d stolen off the system. There was only one door leading farther into the bowels of the station. She very nearly smashed into it, carried by her momentum and haste toward it. A sweep of her slidepad with its recently upgraded access privileges shifted its lock indicator from red to green. The door slid open and she darted inside.

  The corridor beyond was dimly lit, clearly not the sort of place they expected anyone to linger. After ensuring the local cameras were still disabled, she shut and locked the door behind her. Handholds were fewer and farther between here, but she traveled far enough down the corridor to find a tangle of wires and pipes to tuck herself behind. She braced herself with her legs and checked the slidepad.

  “Here goes nothing,” she said.

  Michella tapped the undock button on Ma’s app. The screen shifted to a poorly compressed video feed of the interior of the SOB. Her journey farther into the depths of the ship had degraded the signal quality even more, but it was good enough for her to hear the attendant bid her farewell and punch in the departure sequence. The ship turned itself over to station control and was maneuvered out the bay door. Once there, it pivoted and piloted itself into the distance.