by S. H. Jucha
After the greetings ended, the Pyreans turned to face the platform, and Jaktook led Kractik and the triumvirate to them.
Before Jaktook could make introductions, Kractik and he were joyously hugged by Aurelia.
Devon clasped forearms with Jaktook and then Kractik.
“Males,” Kractik simpered.
The triumvirate stood by while Jatouche and Pyrean acquaintances were renewed. They were confused that their statuses as Tsargit emissaries, clearly broadcast by their medallions, hadn’t granted them the attention they felt they were due.
“How is Rictook?” Aurelia asked. When she sensed the mood shifts, she said, “I’m sorry for your loss.” She laid hands on Jaktook and Kractik’s shoulders and sent a touch of sympathy and hope.
“So, is Tacticnok ruler?” Devon asked.
“She is, and she sends her best wishes,” Jaktook replied. “In your present circumstances, she’s precluded from journeying here, but we’ll discuss that later. Let me introduce your guests.”
Jaktook’s ear comm had briefly beeped, while he stood on the platform, indicating the translation apps had updated one another.
“These are emissaries from the Tsargit. They’re a triumvirate of Veklocks, Patrus, Opalus, and Pesart,” Jaktook said, indicating each of them in turn. Then he introduced Devon and Aurelia.
“We greet you in the name of the Tsargit,” Patrus intoned.
“We saw your kind when we passed through your dome,” Devon said.
“You’re an explorer?” Patrus asked.
“We both are,” Devon replied, resting a hand on Aurelia’s shoulder.
“Is this your female?” Patrus asked, noticing the manner in which Devon touched Aurelia.
The Jatouche winced. Lindsey and Tracy grimaced, and Sasha sighed in exasperation.
“My mate asks an indelicate question, as he’s prone to do,” Opalus quickly interjected. “We don’t know your ways, and we apologize for any slight or an indiscretion. We’ve heard that two of the explorers were Pyrean empaths. Can we assume that you’re one of them, Aurelia?”
“Yes,” Sasha replied forcefully, gripping her sister’s hand, “and she’s as powerful as I am.”
The Veklocks’ large orbs blinked at the adamancy of Sasha’s pronouncement. Opalus clicked her beak several times. It was meant to chastise Patrus for endangering their mission by annoying a Pyrean, who was both explorer and empath.
“Welcome to Triton,” Devon said, trying to refocus the conversation. “May we ask why you’re here?”
“We bring a communication from the Tsargit for Envoy Harbour,” Patrus announced. It was meant to sound official, but his squawking irritated Devon and Aurelia.
“You get used to it,” Sasha whispered in Aurelia’s ear.
Aurelia was anxious to test a new theory about the console’s operation, but Devon and she had needed participants. Those individuals were present, and she had a desire to teach Patrus a lesson in humility.
“Indulge me for a moment,” Aurelia said, stepping to the console. “Devon, I need the entries for panel seven-beta-two.”
Devon accessed his comm unit. When the virtual screen sprung from the device, he pulled up the recording of the glyphs that Aurelia needed.
In the meantime, Aurelia activated a panel and drilled down to the submenu responsible for producing a star field on the dome. She entered some well-versed glyphs into the panel’s projected screen, and the dome darkened. Overhead was a display of a partial collection of Messinants stars, which contained domes, or so it was believed.
“We’ve learned this from you,” Patrus stated. “Have you discovered nothing new?”
The manner in which Patrus spoke irritated everyone, including his mates. It had been Patrus’s turn to lead the triumvirate. Nonetheless, Opalus regretted acquiescing to his leadership for this delicate and critical mission.
“I wonder which star is yours,” Aurelia said sweetly and gazed overhead.
The Veklocks stared at the star field and then one another.
Jaktook and Kractik’s bushy tails rose excitedly in anticipation.
“It’s known we can identify the number of gates of a star by the minute projections that we can see in this display,” Pesart allowed, “but the numerous systems with the same number of gates make it nearly impossible to ascertain which star is ours. Mangoth of the Logar told us this.”
“A magnificent individual,” Devon remarked fondly, and Aurelia smiled at him.
“Still, I wonder if this would help,” Aurelia said. She played an audio file of Pesart’s last remarks, which she’d recorded. Then she accessed another subroutine on the same panel, glanced at Devon’s comm unit screen, and entered the sequence of glyphs.
Within the dome’s display, a yellow line originated at the star with the faint circle, which marked Crimsa, Pyre’s star, and shot across the galactic field. It connected to a second star, marked it with a circle, and then proceeded to zigzag through more stars until it encircled a final system.
“Yes, I think that would be your star,” Aurelia said, gazing evenly at Patrus.
Sasha laughed and clapped her hands. Lindsey and Tracy grinned. The Jatouche chittered their amazement, and the triumvirate’s beaks clattered in consternation.
Devon kissed Aurelia’s cheek and whispered, “It worked.”
For the console’s open submenus, a series of glyphs had to be accurately entered to keep a panel’s projected screen online. Aurelia and Devon found one of their entries had been accepted, meaning the panel stayed active, but nothing had happened on the star field. Finally, Devon had asked Aurelia to repeat her entries.
“That’s it,” Devon had said excitedly. “With this query, the console is tracing the origin of a speaker, who’s within the dome.”
When Aurelia frowned at him, Devon said, “You can’t see it because you’re entering the glyphs and the projection responds too quickly. What I saw was a yellow line suddenly encircle our star and then the display returned to the usual dim outline.”
“You think it’s an operator check to ensure the routine is working?” Aurelia asked.
“That’s one explanation,” Devon allowed. “We need another language spoken within this dome to test the theory.”
Their theory had just been proven correct, and their audience’s reactions ranged from impressed to astounded.
“Aurelia, is that our star that’s circled first after Crimsa?” Kractik asked.
“It would have to be if our understanding of this subroutine is correct,” Aurelia replied.
“How was this done?” Pesart asked in amazement.
“The answer is all around you,” Aurelia replied, indicating the glyphs cut in the deck.
“We would wish to learn this and anything else you could teach us,” Opalus requested respectfully.
“Before we can educate you on these techniques,” Devon replied, “we would need the envoy’s permission.”
Despite Devon being male, Jaktook could have licked his cheek for his diplomatic response.
Opalus leaned toward Aurelia, focusing her orbs along her long beak. Then she said, “Clever of you to entice us with a demonstration of your new skills. Now might we meet with the envoy?”
“I can call her,” Aurelia remarked, as if Harbour resided below deck instead of on the JOS, the Jenkels Orbital Station.
“Wait,” Tracy interrupted. She regarded the triumvirate and asked, “Where are your vac suits?”
Patrus regarded his mates and then asked, “Why should we need them?”
Aurelia, who was a spacer like Tracy, said, “We land a shuttle out on the plains. We drive a rover this way, and we cross from the dome’s airlock to the rover.”
“And it’s cold in between,” Tracy added with a friendly smile.
“You have no way of reaching your shuttle without encountering vacuum?” Pesart asked. He was incredulous at the Pyreans’ rudimentary infrastructure.
“We’ve been busy with more i
mportant things, like saving our planet,” Aurelia retorted. “You do see these stacks of crates? They’re courtesy of the Jatouche who’ve been kind enough to befriend us.”
“These are the final set of intravertors that His Excellency, before his passing, promised the Pyreans,” Jaktook explained.
Pesart’s eyes roved over the huge stacks of crates. His scientific mind struggled with the concept of intravertors, a common alliance tool, being used on a planet. “Why would the planet require the extraction of so much energy?” he asked.
“Surface heat,” Jaktook replied.
“How is that possible?” Pesart pursued. “We understand the Pyreans occupy domes on the surface. If the planet is volcanic, domes shouldn’t be possible, and intravertors would be an inadequate solution.”
“The planet’s problem isn’t volcanic in nature,” Jaktook replied. “If you have any further questions on this subject, I suggest you speak to Envoy Harbour or Her Excellency Tacticnok.”
“The discussion of intravertors can wait until later,” Opalus interrupted. “Might we speak to Envoy Harbour now?”
-4-
Traitors
Liam Finian, the new topsiders’ commandant, which included spacers and stationers, had met with Jessie Cinders and Harbour. They’d proposed to him that the JOS recompense the Belle for a series of services — transport from Triton of the Jatouche and intravertor crates, hosting the Jatouche engineers and techs, acting as the assembly site for the intravertors, and storing the assembled intravertors until deployed by the launch platform.
During the discussion, Jessie and Harbour had relented on their request. Instead, they said they would pursue a course of petitioning the Review Board. They stated it was unfair to lay the matter on the new commandant’s desk.
Liam didn’t know whether to be relieved that he didn’t have to deal with the issue or be insulted that they didn’t think he could handle it.
The previous commandant, Emerson Strattleford, had committed suicide, although there were a few who didn’t accept that conclusion. He wouldn’t have allowed the matter of the Belle’s reimbursement to get out of his control. In fact, he would have been required to keep his hands on it. That would have been the directive of Dorelyn Gaylan, a downsider family head, who’d paid Emerson for his services to the families.
“You’ve enough to do,” Liam muttered, when Jessie and Harbour left his office. He’d picked up his comm unit and called his lieutenants, Cecilia Lindstrom and Miguel Rodriguez.
“Sit down,” Liam requested, when his direct reports entered his office. “We’ve some department cleaning to do.”
“The families’ accomplices,” Miguel volunteered.
“Exactly,” Liam replied.
“We can track them by their comm calls to the downsiders,” Cecilia suggested.
“You’d have to monitor everyone in security,” Liam replied. “We can’t legally do that without obtaining a blanket warrant, and the Review Board won’t grant us that.”
The threesome was quiet, while they considered their options.
“We need a legitimate method of uncovering the suspects within our midst,” Liam encouraged. He regarded Cecilia, who was the digital comm trace expert.
“If we can’t target individuals, either singly or en masse, how about we track volume? That should be legally benign,” Cecilia offered.
“Volume?” Miguel inquired. “As in the number of calls to downsiders over a given period?”
“That’s the idea,” Cecilia replied.
“Would the suspects stand out?” Liam asked.
“I’ve no idea, but we won’t know until we try,” Cecilia said, lifting her hands as if to say that’s my best idea.
“Monitoring volume doesn’t violate security members’ rights,” Miguel offered.
“But will a critical difference in volume statistics enable us to get warrants from the Review Board?” Cecilia asked.
“Good question,” Liam admitted. “I’ll talk to Captain Stamerson and see if higher volume contacts with downsiders will qualify for warrants.”
After the meeting broke up, Cecilia hurried to her office. At her desk, she triggered the door lock and darkened the windows. She plugged her comm unit into her monitor and accessed the secure data banks of the JOS comm center.
Cecilia spent the next few hours writing code, which she inserted, to identify by day and time the comm calls of security personnel to the domes. There was only one trunk line to monitor. Any topside call to the downsiders traveled through the El’s cable.
An elevator car, residing on one of the JOS terminal arms, transported Pyreans and material between the station and the domes. The car rode on a cable woven from threads. They were created by isolating liquid-state benzene molecules into a formation of zigzagging rings of carbon atoms in the shape of a triangular pyramid — a formation similar to that of diamonds.
The El car and its cable forced the JOS to maintain a stationary orbit over the domes, which it achieved via its enormous engines. It was one of the primary purposes of the YIPS, the Yellen-Inglehart Processing Station, to provide the extensive amount of reaction mass necessary to fuel the JOS engines.
Every day after Cecilia planted her code, she checked on the progress of the data. She believed she’d have to wait about a month to amass a significant statistical difference. But within ten days, she had what she needed. What surprised her was the number — not the number of calls but the number of individuals.
“Nine?” Miguel asked in dismay.
Liam and his lieutenants were meeting again to discuss Cecilia’s findings.
“Yes,” Cecilia replied. “The data is unequivocal. The majority of security personnel made no downside calls during the ten-day period. A few individuals made about two in the same time. Nine initiated or received an average of three downsider calls per day. For those nine, that’s a fifteen-to-one ratio against our second group of most active personnel.”
“What did Stamerson say?” Miguel asked.
“The captain said warrants to monitor the lines of any suspects would depend on the data collected,” Liam replied. “I think we have the proof he needs.”
“We might have another problem,” Miguel said, with a worried expression. “I expected Cecilia to identify maybe two or three suspects, not nine of them.”
“What’s your point?” Liam asked.
“Where do these nine individuals work?” Miguel queried.
“Oh,” Cecilia uttered. “He’s right. We’ve no idea where these people are located.”
“Oh, for the love of Pyre,” Liam exclaimed. He’d been so focused on discovering the traitors in security’s midst that he’d failed to keep the larger picture in mind. “We need the warrants to keep this investigation legal,” he continued. “Otherwise, we can’t prosecute them to the full extent of the law. That means the warrants must be entered in the Review Board’s system.”
“And what if one of these nine is assigned to that department?” Miguel finished.
“Then all nine would probably receive a heads-up from their dome handlers and either disappear downside or commit suicide,” Liam offered.
“Is there a way around this?” Cecilia asked.
“What data points do you have on the nine?” Liam asked.
“Date, time, and comm IDs of each call,” Cecilia replied. “I didn’t access any of the comm IDs to determine the owners. The system would log me, and I didn’t want my access to predate the warrants.”
“Good! Keep it that way,” Liam said. “We resume this discussion tomorrow,” he added, dismissing his direct reports.
* * * *
Captain Henry Stamerson, the head of the Review Board, walked through a series of corridors until he reached the familiar hatch of the Miner’s Pit. It was early evening, and he expected the Pit to be doing its usual booming business. Mashing the red oversized button on the wall, the hatch rolled aside, and Henry walked into the spacers’ favorite haunt.
; Maggie May, an ex-spacer and now the Pit’s manager, hurried over to greet Henry.
“Your dinner companion is already here, Captain,” Maggie said congenially. “Right this way.”
Maggie adroitly threaded her way through the close-set tables, and Henry slowed to say hello to the spacers he knew.
Liam sat at a corner table, and Henry quietly took a seat opposite him.
Maggie examined the serious faces and said, “You two let me know if you want anything.” Then she disappeared into the throng of diners.
“You asked for an off-the-record meeting, Liam,” Henry said. “What’s this all about?”
“I need warrants to monitor the calls of nine security personnel without entering the warrants in the Review Board’s system,” Liam requested bluntly.
“Perhaps, you’d better start from the beginning,” Henry said. “This sounds like a long story, and I’m hungry,” he added, and he signaled Maggie.
After they’d ordered, Liam explained what he and his lieutenants were attempting to do. He opened his comm unit and displayed Cecilia’s stats.
Henry was perusing the data, when the food and water arrived. As they ate, Henry continued to scroll through the information.
“First question,” Liam asked between mouthfuls. “Do we have a clear case for warrants?”
“I would say so,” Henry replied.
“Second question. Could you authorize the warrants verbally? I could record your voice on my comm unit,” Liam offered.
“I understand your reason for not wanting the warrants recorded,” Henry said, “but a warrant’s request requires me to convene the board.”
“Here’s something to think about, Henry,” Liam said, after taking a long drink of water. “What if one of these nine works for the board or sits on it?”
Henry stilled his objection. He pulled out his comm unit and accessed the list of board members. Each name was tagged with their comm ID. He scrolled through Liam’s data and compared Cecilia’s nine high-volume comm IDs to those of the board members in his contact list.