by Doug Farren
“Are you the one responsible for my cryptic orders?”
The two old acquaintances shook hands, Sorbith’s six significantly longer fingers wrapping Tom’s in a web of silicon and steel. After releasing his grip, Sorbith turned and headed for the ramp. “I am. I’ve been following your progress at the academy. When I learned you had made it to stage four I put in a request to have you sent here for your first assignment.”
At the top of the ramp, Sorbith reached out and hit the button to close it. Tom shot him an inquiring look that was ignored.
“Why me?” Tom asked.
“Before I answer, have your ship establish level one security.”
Using his biolink, Tom complied. The Orion responded by lifting off and hovering about 10 meters off the tarmac. The defense shield flicked on surrounding the ship with a silvery bubble of energy. The computer reported these events as they occurred. Finally, it said, “Internal recorders are off-line. Level one security established.”
“We’re secure,” Tom told Sorbith. “Will you now please tell me what’s going on?”
“I’ve been put in charge of solving the Army of Humanity problem,” Sorbith said. “Since you’ve had some experience with them, I thought you might like to be part of the team.”
Tom started down the passageway. Even though he could stand in one place for hours, it would feel better to be sitting down while they talked. Sorbith immediately knew where he was heading.
“I didn’t know the AOH was such a problem.” Tom said over his shoulder. “As far as I know, they’ve pretty much kept to themselves other than the incident at Shaular.”
“You seemed concerned enough to report the presence of one of their ships snooping around an old battle scene a couple years ago.”
“Only because of what they tried to do at Shaular,” Tom said.
“There are some who believe the AOH represents a significant threat to Alliance security.”
Tom paused in front of the door to his stateroom and turned around to face Sorbith. “I find that hard to believe.”
Sorbith gestured toward the door. “Let’s get comfortable and I’ll explain it to you.”
Tom keyed the door open. After supplying his guest as well as himself with a glass of juice, he settled into a chair and waited.
Sorbith made himself comfortable then asked, “Do you remember what happened at Shaular?”
“With great clarity,” Tom said. “The AOH showed up with a few ships, got their asses kicked, and left. They weren’t much of a threat back then.”
“What do you know about the AOH?” Sorbith asked.
“Not much,” Tom admitted. “I’d never heard of them until they showed up at Shaular. Captain Stricklen said they were some sort of terrorist group that existed at the end of the Terran-Tholtaran war.”
“I’m surprised. I assumed you would have researched them after Shaular, especially since you were able to recognize one of their ships.”
Tom shook his head. “There was a lot going on back then. I just happen to have a good memory for ship outlines.”
“I’m glad you do. Yours was only the third time an AOH ship has been spotted.”
“I guess I still don’t understand how they can be a threat,” Tom said, after a moment.
“You will by tomorrow,” Sorbith said. He drained his juice then continued, “The AOH showed up at Shaular immediately after the Komodo Dragon arrived. That fact alone indicates they had access to the Dragon’s flight plan. Seven of their ships were old LA-class destroyers that had been stripped of all military hardware before being sold. They were fully armed when they showed up at Shaular. The other six ships were of a completely unknown design. Nobody has been able to figure out who supplied them with their weapons or where the new ships where built.”
“I take it that’s part of the problem you’ve been tasked with solving?”
“Exactly. After appearing at Shaular, the AOH vanished. Soon after the war ended, I dispatched the Asimov to sift through the wreckage in the Shaular system hoping to find some clue as to who supplied them with their weapons. Somebody got there before us and nuked what little remained of the ships.”
“You think they knew about the Asimov's mission?” Tom asked.
“It’s very likely,” Sorbith replied. “Especially in light of what happened two years ago. The debris field you encountered on your way to Centralis was discovered a little over two weeks earlier. That’s why the passenger liner didn’t know about it. It was pure coincidence that you dropped out of stardrive when you did and found an AOH ship snooping around.”
Tom’s eyes had grown wide. “Wait a minute! You’re telling me the AOH has access to our secure communications? That’s not possible!”
“But the evidence cannot be denied,” Sorbith replied as he stood up. “They knew about the Komodo Dragon and its destination. They also knew about the Asimov's orders and the recently discovered debris field. Either someone is feeding them intelligence or they can decrypt our secure communications. That's why we’re having this discussion under level one security. I don’t want the AOH to know about our suspicions.” Reaching into his pocket, he produced a data crystal. “This should get you up to speed. Take a day and look it over then report to my ship tomorrow morning. The Tri-Star is parked at the South end of the field.”
Tom ordered the Orion to secure from level one security and land. Outside the ship, Sorbith turned and extended his hand. “I’m glad you decided to become a Peacekeeper,” he said. “Welcome to the team.”
“It’s good to see you again,” Tom said as they shook hands. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Chapter 16
The Army of Humanity (AOH): A terrorist organization that came into existence in 2050 soon after the announcement was made by Earth’s United Nations that it was planning to join the Consortium, the predecessor to the Alliance. The organization used violence in an attempt to disrupt the process. They believe humanity should isolate itself from all contact with non-human cultures to preserve the purity of humans.
Shortly after the end of the Terran–Tholtaran war, a little over 25,000 AOH followers calling themselves Purists purchased five old cargoliners, converted them into rudimentary colony ships, and headed off into space. A few months later, they returned with word that a new home had been located. After taking on additional supplies, the ships departed carrying an additional 28,000 Purists. A little over a year later, the ships returned one last time.
Word spread quickly that the ships would never again return to Earth and Purists from all around the world flocked to the debarkation centers. The influx overwhelmed the capacity of the cargoliners. A group of multimillionaire Purist supporters leased two significantly larger ships to accept the overflow. Loaded with a startling array of supplies, the small fleet left Earth and vanished. The location of the Purist colony remained unknown until a Shandarian mining scout came across them 15 years later while mapping an unexplored system. The colonists had named their world Safa, an Arabic word meaning Purity.
Safa is a planet hovering on the edge of its star’s habitability zone. A typical hot summer day at the equator would boast a temperature of five degrees Centigrade. Their primary export is a slow-growing tree well known for the density and quality of its wood. The planet’s cold climate and slightly higher gravity of 1.14 times Earth-normal, force the trees to produce a dense, hard, beautiful wood treasured throughout the Alliance.
According to the information on the data crystal, Safa had very little industry. The planet didn’t have the facilities to maintain, much less build, a starship of any sort. This fact had been verified by three separate deep-scans; two of them performed by the military and one by a Peacekeeper task force. The planet was under constant watch by a small swarm of satellites just in case the scans had missed something. So where did the AOH get their ships?
Sorbith had embarked upon a grand search in an attempt to answer this question. There was a small army of investigators, mostly ma
de up of Peacekeepers, going through the records of every manufacturer capable of building advanced military hardware. They were looking for the tiniest discrepancies in inventory, manufacturing capacity, and the flow of funds. Although their investigations had uncovered a few instances of overcharging and several cases of outright fraud, nothing pointed to the AOH.
One of the most disturbing findings involved the purchase of the seven LA-class destroyers. The money appeared to originate from a well-known mining firm based on Earth. But when that firm’s records were searched, no matching financial transaction could be located and the mining company adamantly denied having bought the ships. Banking transactions were always encrypted, transmitted on secure communication channels, and included checks and balances to prevent fraudulent transactions from occurring. Yet, here was a deposit, a very sizable one, with no corresponding withdrawal. The money seemed to come from nowhere. Multiple audits failed to identify how the transaction had been carried out because other than that one single instance, the books seemed to balance. More than one accountant had thrown up their hands in defeat after trying to solve the problem.
There was also significant evidence showing the AOH had access to the military’s ultra-secure communication network. How else could they have arrived at Shaular so quickly? How else would they have had time to nuke the remains of their destroyed ships in the Shaular system? How else could they have found out about a newly discovered debris field so soon? Convinced the AOH had infiltrated their organization, the military asked the Peacekeepers to conduct background checks of all personnel who might have access to the network. It was a daunting task.
After the summary, the report went into the details of every phase of the investigation. As far as Tom could tell, Sorbith had done a superb job. He spent the entire day going through the report taking frequent breaks to give himself time to assimilate the information. There was no doubt the AOH had an unknown number of warships at their disposal. The ships were of unique design built at an unknown location and operating from an undiscovered base. They appeared to have the ability to intercept and decode military communications traffic. But what was the purpose of it all? What was the AOH planning?
By the time Tom went to bed, his head was swimming.
The next morning, he unloaded his tricycle and drove over to Sorbith’s ship. As soon as level one security was established, Tom said, “I understand the mystery presented by the AOH but I still don’t agree they're a threat to the Alliance. As far as I can tell, they're a small group of secretive terrorists with no clear agenda. How can they possibly be a threat to the Alliance?”
“The purchase of the LA class destroyers is one reason,” Sorbith replied.
“I don’t follow,” Tom said.
“They have the ability to manipulate our financial system,” Sorbith replied, sounding a bit perturbed. “The financial transaction used to purchase the destroyers should not, in theory, have been possible. Yet it happened. If they wanted to, the AOH could create economic chaos by flooding the banks with transactions like that.”
“Yet they haven’t.”
“No, they haven’t,” Sorbith said. “And nobody seems to know why not.”
“So how can I help?” Tom asked. “What do you want me to do?”
“You are a communications specialist,” Sorbith said. “The military is convinced they have spies in their organization. I disagree. I believe the breach is somewhere in the vast interconnected network of communication relays spread throughout the Alliance. That’s where you come in.”
“Me? According to your own report, the military has checked and double-checked the communications network and has verified it’s secure. What more could I do?”
“I want a fresh set of eyes on this. You know a great deal about military communication systems without being an expert in the operation of the relays. By learning how they work, you might see something the experts have missed. As a Peacekeeper, you have access to all information concerning the design of the network. Look for weaknesses, points of entry, anything that might be overlooked. The experts who’ve certified their systems are too involved with them. As an outsider, you might be able to spot something they’ve missed.”
Tom tried to scratch the back of his head but encountered only the smooth surface of his headpiece. “Any suggestions on where I should start?”
Sorbith shook his head. “None. I’ve given you the problem and that’s all I want you to start out with. The rest is up to you." He paused for a moment, then asked, “How much do you know about the Terran-Tholtaran war?”
The abrupt change of subject surprised Tom. It took him a moment to shift mental gears. “A little bit, history isn’t my strong point. Why?”
Sorbith scratched his chin with his inner thumb. “A few months ago, I was eating lunch in a small restaurant. An elderly Tholtaran walked in, looked around and then went over and sat down with a Terran of approximately the same age. This struck me as a little odd since they were both old enough to have lived during the war and such people aren’t usually friends.”
“So you listened in,” Tom said.
“I was curious,” Sorbith replied. “The Tholtaran was visiting Earth for the first time. He was in the restaurant to visit the Terran who had befriended him while he had been a prisoner.”
“I didn’t think we took any prisoners,” Tom admitted. “From what I recall, the war was pretty much one-sided.”
“The first battle of Olympus was a defeat for the Tholtarans, a fact that has confounded military historians. Prisoners were taken. Although the reunion was interesting, it’s the conversation that followed that’s more important. The Tholtaran said he was a member of the bridge crew of the assault fleet’s command ship. He swears there was supposed to be a second fleet. It even appeared on their tactical data display.”
Sorbith paused and looked at Tom. “Let me guess,” Tom said after a moment. “There was no second fleet.”
“Precisely." Sorbith abruptly stood up and started pacing. “If this is true, the Tholtaran government would have acted quickly to suppress this tidbit of information because it meant that someone had managed to penetrate their command and control network so thoroughly that they could fake the presence of an entire fleet of vessels.”
Tom’s mind was racing. The Tholtaran C&C network back then was supposed to have been impenetrable and unjammable. But why would someone go to the trouble of breaking into the Tholtaran communications network only once? If such an ability existed then how did the Tholtarans win the war? Tom expressed his doubts to Sorbith.
“I would discount this except for one more piece of historical fact,” Sorbith said. “The Tholtarans have always claimed that Terrans started the war when they attacked outpost 418. Terrans claim the Tholtarans initiated hostilities by attacking Olympus. The physical timeline supports the Terran claim yet the Tholtarans adamantly deny having ordered the attack.”
“So the Tholtarans are covering it up; making it look like we attacked first.”
“There are many witnesses who all claim they saw the order from the Tholtaran Supreme Fleet Commander directing the fleet to attack Olympus. But no record exists in any Tholtaran database of such an order. The Tholtarans claim Terrans initiated the attack and the fleet was merely defending itself. The only logical explanation is that the order to attack was faked.”
Tom was stunned. If Sorbith was right, then the Terran-Tholtaran war had been deliberately started. But by whom and for what reason? More importantly, could they do it again?
Chapter 17
A few days after arriving on Earth, Tom received a message from Lashpa. She had arrived on Glish and was doing well in her new position. “This is a very interesting planet,” she concluded. “I think you would enjoy yourself here.”
"Of that, I have no doubt," Tom said, smiling.
"Sounds like a great place for a vacation," the ship said.
"I'm not sure it's the sort of place a Peacekeeper should go."
&n
bsp; "As long as you act responsibly, there’s no place you can’t go. Just because you are a Peacekeeper does not mean you are no longer allowed to enjoy yourself."
Tom composed a brief reply telling Lashpa about his first impression of Earth as well as his surprise to be working with Sorbith. “I wish I could tell you more about what I’m working on at the moment,” he said, “but it’s classified at the highest level of security. I miss spending time with you. Take care.”
Tom spent his first week on Earth going over the military’s independent security evaluation. It appeared to be very thorough and covered all aspects of the entire communications network. It was a huge report. The evaluators had focused on the most likely points of entry for a would-be attacker. The communications network was incredibly complex and spread out over hundreds of thousands of cubic light years of space. There were millions of interconnected transceivers.
Virtually all communications were encrypted at the point of origin. All Alliance military traffic utilized a common encryption algorithm that was periodically changed and transmitted to every transceiver in the network by a few dedicated central computers. Each member race also had its own encryption algorithm for private messages. The evaluators assumed that only the main Alliance network had been penetrated. If this were the case, in order to gain useful intelligence, they would have had to have access to the primary hubs.
The primary hubs acted as the central dispatchers for interstellar communications. Their incredibly powerful transmitters and sensitive receivers handled the vast majority of all interstellar data, both military and civilian. A system of deep space relay stations routed the beamed signals to their final destinations. The only way for someone to gain significant access to the network would be if the hubs were compromised and the encryption algorithms were known. Based on this assumption, the evaluation team focused their attention on the hubs.
The team reasoned that if someone had tapped into the communications network, there would be signs of such activity in the primary hub computers. The millions of lines of programming code needed to direct the hubs was compared against the master copy and found to be unaltered. Weeks of monitoring the data stream failed to find any anomalous activity. The internal security routines were examined and found to be adequate. The team concluded that the primary hubs were secure and the military should be looking at their personnel.