by Bobby Adair
I turn to see Phil emerging from the ship, and smiling as he spots me.
Awkwardly climbing out of the ship behind him is Nick.
They’re letting the Gray wander the base?
Guessing the question in my mind, Spitz nods toward Phil and his companion. “Notice something different?”
I look again. The tick is wearing a wide black collar. “And that is?”
Spitz digs in his pocket and hands me what appears to be an overly bulky wristwatch with a long strap. “Put this on. You can wear it outside your suit, right by your d-pad.”
I look at the watch. There’s no display for the time.
“Phil has one, too. If at any time, the Gray is more than one hundred meters distant from both of these actuators, the collar around his neck will detonate and send a blast of shrapnel through his skull. The explosion shouldn’t be powerful enough to harm anyone nearby as long as they aren’t too close, but afterward, there won’t be much left of the Gray’s head but wet particles and mist.”
I nod as I wrap the band around my wrist.
“On top of the proximity sensor, it contains a grav switch and a manual switch.” Spitz points to three robust buttons. “You can operate the grav switch mentally, but you know that. To trigger the manual switch, depress all three buttons. The order doesn’t matter. That way you can dispose of the Gray if it becomes necessary. I’ll have a tech connect it to your undergarment’s biosensors later today. Once that’s done, if the collar can’t receive a life signal from either Phil or yourself, the Gray dies. So don’t leave your wristband lying around if you want to keep the Gray alive.”
“You know Phil won’t kill it.” It’s not a difficult deduction to make. “I think he’s too close to it already.”
“That’s why you have the second watch.”
“And you didn’t tell Phil about my mine?”
“No,” Spitz tells me, “but he guessed. Or rather, he probably read it from Gustafson’s mind when she presented him with his wristband.” Spitz’s eyes turn flinty serious. “Phil is being allowed to keep his Gray because Gustafson believes what Phil will learn from it may lead our species to a quantum leap forward in our use of telepathy. The disagreement among our policymakers on this point is stark. Gustafson had to pull in every favor she was owed to get her way. You see, Major Kane, our dilemma is that Gray has seen not only the Free Army base on the Potato, but he’s also seen our installation. The risk we’re taking by allowing it to live is beyond measure. In effect, we’re betting everything.” Spitz grabs my arm and squeezes to emphasize his point. “Make sure it never gets close enough to another Gray to share what it knows.”
I accept the responsibility with a nod. “There’s no way I’ll put all of this at risk for the life of one Gray. You can put those worries to rest.”
Phil is within a dozen paces.
“I’ll leave you to talk with Phil.” Spitz points at the Turd. “Come over when you’re finished, and I’ll walk you through the enhancements to your ship.”
“What about my platoon?” I ask.
“All fine. They’re quartered nearby. I’ll take you to them after we finish here.”
Chapter 31
Phil hugs me. It’s apparently an awkward new ritual in our relationship, made more so by the fact I’m still wearing my orange suit.
Pulling myself out of Phil’s embrace, I notice the Gray keeping its distance. “I don’t think your new friend likes me.”
“You killed half his pod. That’s the closest analog to a family a Gray has.”
It was a bad day to be a Tick.
I keep the thought to myself. Nevertheless, the disappointed expression on Phil’s face tells me he probably intercepted it. “What’s the story with Penny, Brice—”
“Don’t worry,” Phil cuts me off. He points two fingers randomly. “These people don’t appear to be hiding anything from us. They are what they seem.”
“Penny is scouting, then? With Brice and Jablonsky?”
Phil nods. “Jablonsky will radio the reports back to Blair. When they finish, they’ll come back here to meet up with us.”
“The ship they went out on?” I ask. “Will they be in danger if they run into trouble?”
“I guess they didn’t tell you that part?”
I shake my head and silently wait for the next part.
Phil grins. “They didn’t mean to tell me, either.” He glances over at the Gray. “I know you’d prefer that we kill him. Trust me on this, Dylan. Please. I know what I’m doing. Nick and me, we’re bonding on a level you might understand if you tried. You wouldn’t believe what it’s like. Together, we’re so much stronger than alone.”
I’m apprehensive. No, suspicious is a better word.
I reach over and take hold of Phil’s wrist, putting a declarative finger on the detonator strapped there. “Will you be able to do what’s necessary if it comes to that?”
“It won’t.”
“Don’t be naïve. Anything could happen. Will you be able to exterminate the Tick if we are captured?”
“Call him by his name, okay?”
“He doesn’t have ears, Phil.”
“He understands more than you think.”
“Because you understand.”
“Even without my help. Nick. Call him that, please?
I groan and nod. “Will you be able to do what’s necessary if it comes to that?”
Phil ignores the question again. “I’m learning from him.”
Disappointed Phil won’t answer my question, I flatly ask, “How so?”
“Their history for one. How to better understand telepathic communication for another.”
I don’t try very hard to hide the derision running through my thoughts.
Phil steps away from me and shakes his head.
Crap.
I didn’t say anything, and I’ve gone too far anyway. “I’m sorry.”
Phil recovers from the unspoken rebuke. “It’s okay. No, not okay, but I understand. I’d rather know what you feel than guessing at things you hide.”
Realizing I need to be much more careful with my thoughts, I ask, “The things I hide, you can’t see those?”
“No.”
“Honestly?”
“You know I’m being honest.”
He’s right. I do. Looking for a way to change the subject off of me, I go with, “You’ve always seen through people’s words, right? You always understood what they really felt.”
Phil nods. “Always. Now, with Nick’s help, the clarity of other people’s thoughts is coming through like I thought them myself.”
I purse my lips and scratch my chin. “Do you think that’ll have an impact on your relationships with other people?”
Phil shakes his head. “Knowing a truth isn’t that different than believing one. People are who they are. Just because I see them more clearly doesn’t mean I have to feel differently about them. Just because I see past their public façades doesn’t mean I have to despise the complex, mixed up human underneath.
I don’t know how to respond to that, so I move on. “You said Penny, Brice, and Jablonsky won’t be in danger.”
Phil shakes his head. “I didn’t say that exactly.”
“Okay, you implied they’d be safer than I’m afraid they will be.”
“That’s true.” Phil has some bit of information, and he’s enjoying teasing me with keeping it hidden.
“Just tell me. If you’re reading my mind, you know how suspicious I am of these people.”
“They didn’t plan to tell me, but with Nick’s help, I picked it up from Dr. Spitz when he and Gustafson were interrogating me.”
“And the mystery is?”
“They’ve figured out stealth.”
“Stealth?” I start spinning through a thousand sea-changing scenarios. “Are you sure?”
“Spitz confirmed it after I questioned him.”
I laugh. “Was he surprised when you read it from his mind?”
A smile creeps slowly across Phil’s face. “He was speechless at first, but it was Gustafson who was the most shocked.”
“Is that when they realized how good you are?”
Phil is embarrassed. He’s not used to compliments. “Maybe I realized it then, too, though Gustafson was already drilling me about how much I was capable of.”
“Before we run off on that tangent,” I ask, “tell me about this stealth technology. Are we talking about gravity stealth?”
“Exactly.” Phil glances down at Nick. “Grays’ awareness of the universe is shaped more by their sense of gravity than their sense of vision. It’s the sense they use to resolve the existence and characteristics of distant objects. Spitz’s stealth makes their ships nearly invisible to a Gray.”
“And Grays really can’t see it?” Hard to believe.
“They can’t unless the ship is too massive. Their stealth tech can only do so much.”
I don’t think this stealth business is entirely true. We didn’t see them exactly when they captured us, but we knew they were there.
“They were attacking us,” Phil argues.
It occurs to me I didn’t say anything. “Dammit, Phil. If we’re going to talk, let’s talk. Don’t respond to my thoughts. You’re creeping me out.”
“Sorry.”
I sigh.
He explains, “We saw the ships because they were attacking, burning heavy g’s to catch us, and coming in close.”
Makes sense.
“If they go slow, and keep distant, they’re nearly impossible for a Gray to see.”
I switch back to my original concern. “The ship that Penny, Brice, and Jablonsky rode out on, it’s a stealth ship?”
“Yes, scout ships. Small and light. Fast, but not armored and not armed.”
“Because they have to keep the mass down for the stealth to work?” I ask.
Phil nods.
I point toward the Rusty Turd. “Is that what they’re installing in our ship?” I’m hoping we’re not too massive.
“No,” he answers, “Ours is too big. The grav lens is too heavy.”
Oh, well. “Let’s go see what Spitz is doing to the Rusty Turd.”
Chapter 32
We find Spitz near the aft end of the ship, standing among the drive array plates which were formerly mounted in a conical housing thirty feet across.
“Did you guys take out every plate?” I dodge heavy discs arranged in rows on the hangar deck, and at first, I think my clever line is a joke. I realize quickly it’s not.
Spitz smiles widely. “Yes.”
“Why?” It’s not an accusation. I’m curious. “Were they all damaged in the attack? Are you testing them?”
“No.” Spitz kneels down beside one.
Phil and I do the same.
He points to a scattering of small deformations on the surface. “This plate functions, yet you can see it suffered when the missile debris struck it.” Looking around at the other plates, he says, “Three don’t work at all, another half-dozen show some damage.” He stands back up. “All in all, they are functioning well. My people have already tested these. We’ll replace the damaged plates and start remounting and aligning them in the drive array tomorrow.”
“Good.” I don’t know what else to say. My eye is drawn to all the techs working inside the drive array cone, at least ten. “What are they doing if all the grav plates are already out here?”
“Fabricating new mounts.” Spitz walks toward the cone. “You see, the static mounts installed when your ship was constructed at the Arizona shipyard are prone to imperfection.” He turns to look at both Phil and I. “You may have noticed when you were flying her. Imperfect performance, maybe.”
Phil laughs.
I can’t help but laugh, also.
“With dynamic mounts, we can adjust the angle of each plate on the fly. All controlled by an onboard computer-enhanced drive system.” Spitz points at a nearby ship of a type I haven’t seen yet. It looks like it’s in a similar state of disrepair. “We’re cannibalizing that one for parts. It’ll save us time.”
“Thank you, Dr. Spitz.” I don’t know what else to say. They’re losing a ship so my crew can have a better one.
He shrugs it off. “With the dynamic cone shaping, we can optimize the shape of the gravity field for sub-light speeds. The ship will be more efficient. Better still, where it makes the most difference, we can dynamically shape the field for light speed.”
“I like what I’m hearing,” I tell Dr. Spitz. “I assume you’re not doing this just to improve the mileage.”
“Heavens, no,” he answers. “The fuel savings we’ll talk about momentarily. The primary driver for dynamic shaping is performance.”
I smile widely.
“With the drive array enhancements and the others we’re making to the ship, and with the oversized reactor already in the Rusty Turd—” Spitz grins so widely that he can’t talk through it.
“What?” I ask.
“We’ve never put a reactor this large in a vessel of this size,” he reveals. “Theoretically, your ship might pull twenty g’s of sub-light acceleration.”
I’m dumbfounded. The twelve g’s we had already was pretty spectacular.
“And faster than light?” asks Phil.
“If the reactor performs as we expect—” Spitz is reluctant to continue, but his excitement forces him to tell us his hope. “If the reactor improvements behave as expected, this ship might make 18c.”
No Trog or Gray cruiser we know of will do more than eight times the speed of light.
“Eighteen?” Phil is awed.
I am, too.
Spitz proudly nods. “Theoretically, when we’re done, this might be the fastest ship in the solar system.”
“With no requirement that we stay in the solar system.”
Neither of the two finds my joke funny.
I laugh, giddy over the ridiculous performance upgrade my ship is receiving. I nudge Phil. “We may have to give it a new name.”
“Phoenix?” he suggests.
“Trite.” I’m not enamored with it.
Phil shrugs. “We’ll think of something.” He looks over toward Dr. Spitz. “How did you figure out all this stuff so quickly? I mean, this ship was built on earth, not here.”
Spitz looks smugly at Phil. “I designed it.”
Chapter 33
I turn to Phil, too surprised to make my own guess about Spitz. “Is he lying?”
Phil shakes his head.
“Obviously, there’s a lot going on I don’t understand,” I admit.
Spitz pats my shoulder. “I’ll be happy to answer any questions you have about our contact with earth after we finish here. In short, I’ll tell you we have a network of people terra-side for coordinating our effort to recruit talent.”
Given the colonization effort, it makes sense. “And the stealth ships?” I’m making a guess. “You use those to ferry people from earth to Iapetus? That’s why the Grays don’t know about any of this?”
“That’s correct.” Spitz smiles at me like I’m a good student. “We share information with certain governments on earth when we have something of value to give them. The design for this ship was created by my team but couldn’t be built here, so we gave it to earth.”
“Why couldn’t it be?” I ask.
“Everyone has resource constraints,” says Spitz. “Our mineral mining capability here on Iapetus is limited. Our ability to import ores from the asteroid belt and Kuiper belt is even more limited, given how much attention moving large masses around the solar system would attract. Then there are the politics of resource allocation that have bedeviled humanity from the beginning of time. We have to allocate according to our priorities. Colonization wins. I want to build more warships, however, I’m not allowed to. We all have to do what the boss says, right?”
I can’t help but laugh at that. My boss is a prickly Potato Queen who spends her time checking off items on her secret agenda and misallocating our resources as well.
“This ship with its grav lens,” says Spitz, “required so much metal for construction it was never approved. Not wanting to waste the work we put in, we smuggled the plans to groups of earthbound shipbuilders in several countries. Of course, each country modified the plans according to the whims of their engineers, subject to their resource allocations. Unfortunately, earth’s shipyards were unable to produce the vessels with the precision they required. The rash of catastrophic failures and underperformance is proof enough of that.” He pauses to take a breath. “Not one of the final designs incorporated all of the ship’s features. Let’s go inside.”
Moments later, we’re all standing on the bridge in a space much more crowded than it was before.
“A bit more cramped,” admits Spitz.
I notice the walls and deck. “You increased the shielding.”
“Yes.” Spitz moves over to the pilot’s seat and sits. “Extra layers of alloy steel, and another layer of grav plates.” He points to an obtrusive refrigerator-size lump standing in the center of the bridge’s space. “All of your ship’s new computers are located inside. The extra shielding is in place to protect them as much as the bridge crew. The slightest damage to the computing systems will cause the ship to malfunction, possibly with catastrophic results. If we had more time, we’d install a backup system in one of the forward cabins, however, time is a factor.”
I nod, but don’t succumb to the temptation of asking for a backup system. I suspect that alone might cost me another week I can’t spare.
“One of the systems controlled is the fusion reactor. Much like the benefit of the improvements to the drive array, a computer control system on the reactor allows us to burn less hydrogen while delivering more power.” Spitz smiles.
Time for me to make a big guess. “More than a little?”
“A lot more power. As far as I know, no ship has ever been constructed with such a favorable ratio of reactor output to ship mass. Who knows? One day, if we all live long enough, we might see ships top 50 or 100c. Can you imagine?”