“They really had this stuff all worked out, didn’t they?” Will said. “Stephen pointed out the helical layout of the express tubes. He even suggested why they exist. The helical track exactly cancels out the rotation of the megastructure as the train travels through it, and the speed of the train around the long radius is calibrated to replace the lost artificial gravity of the shell rotation. Nice.”
I grinned at Will's reaction. That response was one I'd normally expect more from Bill, but as always, Bob is Bob.
“Yep. So, I’ll be at Helep’s Ending soon, and I’ll head for the nearest mountains. If the segments are reasonably standardized, and there's no reason to think otherwise, the entrance shouldn't be too hard to find.”
“The question though, is whether Natasha's passcard will work four thousand miles away.”
“And whether I dare try it and risk alarms going off.”
We were interrupted by the train voice playing into my VR through the Manny link.
“We are approaching your destination.”
Will levered himself out of the beanbag chair. “I guess that’s your curtain call.” He waved and popped out.
I entered the Manny and blinked my eyes, feigning waking up. “Thank you. Is there anyone else on the train?”
“Not at this time.”
“What does the train do if there are no passengers requiring transport?”
“The train will remain at the lost stop until called.”
Interesting. So, unless someone in Helep’s Ending needs a train, I might have a getaway vehicle waiting for me.
My ruminations were interrupted as my seat began to rotate in place. I glanced around to see that all the seats were doing the same. It answered a question that had been in the back of my mind about how deceleration would be handled. I wondered what acceleration and deceleration would be like in one of the express trains. Probably a lot longer. It seemed likely that they had acceleration couches separate from the births and staterooms.
The train came to a stop, and the doors swooshed open. The train voice said “May you travel with Mother's blessing.”
I didn't know what the proper response was, so I just said “Thank you.”
This station was identical to the last one, so leaving was almost like playing the video in reverse. Except, as expected, the art was different. And naturally, my mind went there. A billion miles of topopolis is 100 million transit stations – no, scratch that, 400 million if they followed each of the four rivers. Either the Quinlans produced a lot of art, or there would be duplications. I wondered for a moment if there was an art mill somewhere, with Quinlans churning out statues and paintings.
I headed for the same side door, which only required pushing on the latch bar from this side, and just like that, I was out. In the weather. Specifically, it was raining. Not a lashing raging storm - we hadn't seen any of that kind of out-of-control cage match stuff the whole time we’d been here. My theory was that it would cause undue erosion and therefore extra work for the maintenance critters. And anyway, I figured weather in an artificial environment would tend to be mild, predictable, and controlled.
Still, I was getting rained on. Which wouldn't bother a Quinlan, but irked my human-raised brain. And I wouldn't be able to smell a stream in this mess. Sulking loudly, I marched off toward the town and the near distance.
It was interesting that all the transit stations were outside of towns. And it wasn’t like the towns or the stations had been moved. The towns were on the best possible spots on the river, so it was doubtless where they were supposed to be. The stations… well, how would you move them? Perhaps this was a Quinlan psychological thing. They couldn’t be like humans in every thing. Maybe they didn't like transit stations up in their face or something. It was just one of many many questions that we were accumulating, and might or might not get answers to someday.
It was very late in the day and was beginning to get dark. I probably wasn't in danger from the local wildlife, but I would have to stop moving if I wanted to avoid their attentions. A bed in town sounded best. I dropped to all fours and put on some speed.
Renting a room was an experience. I was beginning to get a hint of why Bridget had decided on a sabbat as our cover - sabbats were common, and there was a whole section of the economy dedicated to servicing that particular market segment. Single travelers though, not so much. I had to try three hotels before I found a vacancy. I'd tweaked my features slightly, preferring to mix it up rather than constantly walk around with the same face. I was up early the next morning, not bothering with breakfast or the accompanying breakfast beer? Yech.
I headed straight for the river. The mountains were only a few miles away, and swimming would get me there much faster than a land approach. I decided to deliberately overshoot the estimated location of the entrance, preferring to approach it from behind in case there were surveillance cameras. Again, I have to assume that the habitat had been set up with normal levels of civilian security in mind, rather than a military defensive strategy. Cameras would probably be limited to surveilling the road up to the gate.
Assuming it wasn't all wet with my deductions than the habitat would have been originally designed not to hide the entrance from the populace, but to hide it from view, to maintain the illusion. Also, the entrance wouldn't be too hard to get to for staff. That would put it as close as possible to the river, consistent with the rising land providing space for an underground maintenance complex. Because Quinlans. It would also almost certainly have at least some kind of basic security, so I wouldn’t be able to just walk up and turn the handle. But that's what roamers were for, right?
I swim upstream until I was at the point where arable land ended and pseudo-rock started. Up close, I could tell the material of the mountains was clearly not natural rock. In fact, it had somewhat the consistency of volcanic pumice. Probably an engineered version, and probably light-weight, since that would matter in the rotating shell. The coloration was artificial and designed to resemble random terrain from a distance.
Then I floated slowly downstream, hugging the shore, examining the rock, looking for… something. And lo and behold I found… something. Pumice is hard, but it's light because is mostly air bubbles. And wears. I don’t know how many generations of Quinlans had been using this particular path to the water, but it was enough to have worn it smooth.
I grinned to myself and climbed out of the water. Success. Well, probably success. One additional concern would be whether or not the Resistance had set up surveillance of the entrance. They might or might not allocate someone to the task. They might or might not use electronic means. Of course, too much of that might tip off the Administrator, so they might stay as low-tech as possible.
I was going around in circles again. I could have spent all day speculating and not determine the truth of it. So, at some point, you just had to pick. I decided on boldness. I spit out all my spiders and directed them to examine the area around and in front of me as I advanced. Within a minute, the trail terminated at a blank wall. No cameras and evidence. I thought of the Mines of Moria and muttered ‘Friend’ with a grin. No effective, of course - Tolkien had no power here.
Roamers did, though. I ordered the spiders to do a close-in survey and released my fleas as well. My devices would find everything there was to be found, and meanwhile, I would get some sun.
It was late afternoon and the sun was disappearing behind the mountains, creating a premature local dusk, when one of my fleas reported a find. A small design glitch had caused a stress fracture where the pumice layer was only an inch or so deep over the underlying structure. The flea had found a ventilation tube, and was asking permission to cut into it. I granted permission and sent the other fleas and to help.
The thing about security doors is that no matter how much electronics you add, in the end, there's a latch, connected to a mechanical linkage, actuated by a magnet or motor, powered by electricity, which is controlled by a switch. And the roamer design include
d the capability to act as a conductor, if necessary, without frying the unit. Very handy for circuit testing and repair. And for espionage, as it turns out.
My devices also found a sensor that would report the opening and closing of the door. That was a simple fix. One of the fleas jammed the sensor for the duration by simply welding the moving part. The door opened. However, without the sensor operating, the lights didn't come on, so I was looking at a dim corridor which would turn pitch black once the door closed. Infrared vision would help some, but I'd still have to go slow.
As soon as I started walking though, lights came on. Motion sensors. Hopefully all they did was control the lighting. With a sigh, I accepted that I simply wasn't going to be able to plan for and control everything. As usual, winging it would form a large percentage of my strategy. I instructed my spiders to precede me down the corridor, walking along the walls and ceiling, and to warn me of upcoming booby-traps, cameras, tripwires, acid pits, hordes of goblins and/or orcs, or pretty much anything not suitable for afternoon tea.
The corridor led to an elevator bank. Of course it did. Because nothing says ‘stealth’ like taking the elevator down to the secret lair. Ding, fourth floor, evil geniuses, minions, laser weapons, and submarine platforms. Please watch your step.
On the other hand, this wasn't a secret lair. At least not in the James Bond way. Security would be more corporate than military, relying more on access cards and sensors than guards and guns. This structure would've been built according to government specs or building codes or whatever it was that the Quinlans had. The building Bridget and I had investigated on Quinn had an emergency staircase. Betcha this place did too.
And yes, there it was. But it was locked. I didn't feel like forcing it, and in fact might not be able to. The construction seemed a little more solid than my previous experience, and it was probably alarmed. In went the fleas, and a few seconds later the alarm sensor was jammed and the door sprung open. I couldn’t leave it unlatched like that, but I could instruct the fleas to permanently disable the locking mechanism.
The emergency staircase was perma-lit, as such structures always are. The sociological and behavioral parallels between totally unrelated civilizations was a never-ending source of amazement to me. I wished for a moment we could find a couple more technological species, so we’d have more samples to compare. Which was all very interesting, but maybe I should concentrate on sneaking into the evil lair for now.
I took a moment to format a report and send it off to the group. It would hopefully help Hugh to zero in on the entrance, if and when he got near the mountains. I got to the next level down and sent a flea under the door for a quick peek. No one around. Excellent.
Opening the door as quietly as possible, I stuck my head out and peered around, then stepped through. From here on, there was no point in sneaking around. Nothing says intruder like acting furtive. Nope. I belonged here. In fact, I owned the place. I stood tall, stuck my chest out, and strutted down the hall with a bounce in my step. My spiders and fleas hurriedly hopped on board.
The place had a lived-in feel. The air wasn't stale or musty. No dust. The lights were all functioning. Everything was neatly in its place. That could just be good automated systems, but if that was the case, I was back to square one. Bad news. This installation was probably huge, as it would serve many purposes relating to the care and maintenance of Heaven's River. And the Resistance would probably be using a very small part of it.
Or maybe not. I might be about to go off on another rant, but the Quinlans had good automation, as evinced by their outer space cleanup crews. Chances were that maintenance of Heaven's River would be mostly automated as well. Otherwise, the administrator would have to let too many people into the inner circle. I couldn’t see a secret ruling cabal composed of hundreds of thousands if not millions of janitors and plumbers working for long, let alone for generations. No. Most of this installation would be related to automation, storage for, and maintenance of.
The Quinlan friendly areas would be few, mostly intended for supervisory purposes and mostly near the elevators. That was the way humans would've done it, and I was pretty confident by this point that Quinlans and humans were very similar in a lot of ways.
I stopped in retrospect, but I couldn’t seem to come up with any counterpoints. Good. And as it turned out, my neurotic arguments with myself were a good thing, because as I was standing there waiting for a counter argument, I heard a noise. Not much of one. In fact, I couldn’t say exactly what I'd heard, even when I played it back. It could be nothing. Or it could be people. I voted for people.
The fleas and spiders were getting a lot of use, and I was aware that some of them required some maintenance downtime. I might need all hands on deck if things got tense, so I swallowed all but one spider, who was still in good shape, and instructed it to move ahead of me and peek around corners. I still picked up the occasional noise, which was beginning to sound more like Quinlan voices, as I zeroed in on the source.
“Hey Bob, you got a sec?”
I almost jumped on of my fur. If there been a cybernetic version of a heart attack, I’d be having one.
“Not right now, Bill, I'm kinda busy sneaking into Dr. Evil's hideout.”
“Oh, okay. Call me back when you have time.”
“Will do.”
I terminated the call, swallowed my metaphorical heart, and resumed following the spider. At the next corner, the voices abruptly became much clearer and I could now hear occasional furniture noises, feet scraping on the floor, things banging together, stuff like that. I was probably very close. I didn't want to rush in and stab everyone, and depending on numbers I might not be able to-
“Hi Bob, where are you right now?”
Un-FUCKING-believable. I'd been dead for 300 years and I was still getting phone calls. I gritted my teeth and took a calming breath before replying.
“Hey Hugh, I'm a little busy right now, can I call you back?”
“Sure thing.”
I hung up - again - and searched for a Do Dot Disturb button. And found one, of course - no Bob would design a comm system without one. I wondered why I'd failed to pick up on that before.
The spider went around the final corner and peeked through the door. The video feed showed four Quinlans sitting around a table shuffling paper. By which I mean some were reading, some were writing, but everyone had paper and pens. It was almost homey, in a way. I wondered about the low-tech process but then maybe they were worried about the security of electronic systems. I have no way of knowing how far the Administrator’s reach really was.
Conversations were unhurried and mixed with long silences. The attendees didn't appear to be depressed or anything, just concentrating. It mostly consisted of remarks about segment numbers and member statuses and activities. I listened for a few moments, then decided I should find a place to hide. Surveillance seemed like a good idea, and that would be up the spout if one of them walked and found me standing there. I sent a freshly refurbished spider out to replace my current observer. Then I went looking, as quietly as possible, for a hiding place.
I was in an office just around the corner, curled up under a desk. It wasn’t original or particularly imaginative, but it was good enough to hide me from anything short of a concerted search, and that would happen only if I screwed up and made my presence known. As an android, I could stay perfectly still, didn't need to either go to the bathroom, and didn't get stiff. On the other hand, I needed results. I sent all my spiders out to scout around the complex. It was a little bit of risk, as they were big enough to be visible from yards away if they were moving, but otherwise the camouflage function would make them very difficult to pick out.
However, the Quinlans didn't appear inclined to move around a lot either. One a gone to find a restroom and another had brought out snacks from a refrigerator, but that was it. I wondered to what extent the Resistance members actually belonged in this complex, and to what extent they were just living in the co
rners like rats. Could the Administrator monitor activity in here? If so, why had he not taken steps to clean it out and reclaim it? If not, why weren't the Resistance everywhere in here?
I get a partial answer almost right away when one of the spiders blundered into a dormitory. Bunk beds lined the walls, some currently in use. The sleepers brought the confirmed population up to 10, although there were enough spaces for up to 18. I had the spider do a visual sweep, then back out slowly.
A couple of spiders and found big industrial metal doors. I wondered if those led to all the automation and maintenance equipment. Assuming I’d gonna it right. I hoped they hadn't put Bender back there. If I had to go a-visiting, it would increase my risk dramatically. But it didn't seem likely - the Resistance probably had a better grip on the space on this side of the doors. I decided it was time to return some calls. The spiders could operate autonomously, and they’d squawk if there was an issue.
First, Bill.
“Hey Bob. So, what was all the excitement?”
“I'm in Resistance HQ, as near as I can tell, sniffing around.”
“No sign of Bender yet?”
“Not yet. I'm still confident of our logic, but there's always the possibility that we’re just dead wrong and he’s somewhere else. At the other end of the segment, maybe?”
“I don’t see how. Helep’s Ending is only a few miles away, and that's the name that Bender said they used a lot. The only other possibility is if there's some other hideout in the area. So, what were you calling about?”
“Just an update on the war against Starfleet. We've basically pushed them into a corner, network wise. Most of the equipment they hacked has either been cleaned or destroyed and is being replaced. But here's the funny thing.”
“Yes?”
“I've had conversations with members of Starfleet over the course of several confrontations and negotiations. Everyone I've talked to is as surprised and perplexed by the degree of infiltration as we are. They all give the same story, that this came completely out of the blue. They have no idea who actually did all the hacking.”
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