Wandering Storm

by Steven Anderson

  I sighed. “Avocados. Did I mention the sliced avocados on the side?”

  “You did. I’ll do what I can. It’s a difficult texture to print.”

  I nodded. “Do your best. I suppose I should start my walk-through now and make sure you’re telling me the truth about everything being nominal.”

  “Have a look at the number two high energy laser structure first.”

  “Storm, you said all of you was working.”

  “Well, all of me that matters. We’re not currently using any of the weapons systems.”

  “You just wanted a new recipe to play with. That’s really close to lying.”

  “I suppose it is. I’m not very good at it, though.”

  “Better than you think. You fooled me.”

  “Did I? That’s excellent.”

  “No, it’s not. Friends don’t lie to each other.”

  There was a pause before she continued. “I think you should start with the fusible link. I’m pretty sure that’s where the problem is.”

  I felt a chill go down my spine and I didn’t want to ask her how she knew. “Sure thing. After that I’m going to do hydroponics until lunch.”

  “I don’t think there are any problems there.”

  “I know. I just like watching the fish sometimes. It’s peaceful and it helps me think. They’re the only animals on board, other than the canine unit.”

  “There are also some mice I haven’t been able to get rid of in my starboard cargo hold. I think they’re from my last resupply on Meeker.” Another long pause, and then she spoke softly to me, almost whispering in my ear. “I’ll keep your secret if you’d like to work on your sim this afternoon.”

  “Why would you do that?”

  “I don’t want to kill all those people. I’ve been reviewing the playback over and over. I’ve identified twenty-one children under the age of eighteen and another four under the age of ten. There are adult non-combatants there as well, around fifty I think, but it’s hard to differentiate.”

  “We’ll both be in trouble if we’re caught.”

  “We won’t be caught.” Now she was whispering. “Will you do it? You’re the first member of the crew that feels the same way about our job that I do.”

  There was that shiver again. Would working on the sim together help keep her sane or would she shatter completely when we failed? Winona believed I’d already failed, that it was too late to make any changes to our attack plan.

  “Sure, Storm. I’ll need your help. A lot of it.” It took a couple of hours for me to replace the fusible link on the number two HEL structure. It was as big around as Kal and probably would have weighed two hundred kilos if I’d left the gravity at Dulcinean standard. It was still hard to move it even in zero g since the momentum stayed the same.

  I checked all the hydroponics systems and then spent almost an hour sitting on the side of the tank with my feet in the water, letting the fish nibble my toes while I tried to come up with a way to kill the Tarakana colony in Costrano’s Redoubt without slaughtering everyone else in the process.

  Winona was waiting for me when the mess hall door opened and I thought hard about turning around and running. Too late. Her head tipped and she gave my forehead a solid whack before I could even open my mouth.

  “Damn it, Winn, I’m not going to have a brain left if you keep doing that. It was bad enough when you tapped me for saying something stupid; now all I have to do is think it.”

  “I’m not sure you’re thinking at all, or that you have any brain left.”

  I opened my mouth to tell her what I was planning and how I hoped that it would help Storm, but I stopped, unable to find a way to say it without Storm hearing and knowing it might all be a sham. I closed my mouth and sighed. “I need to do this. You have to trust me.”

  She closed her eyes and I could feel the concern and love in her. She wouldn’t interfere, but she would worry.

  “Thanks, Winona, thanks for understanding and letting me in.”

  “You’re becoming more troublesome every day, you know that?”

  “Yep, I know. Where’s Kal?”

  “Training. He won’t make it to lunch until later.”

  “Good. We can talk about him while we eat.”

  My heart was still hurting when I walked to the Sim Lab after we finished eating. Hearing her talk about Kal made me miss Sam even more. They were only a couple of weeks into their love and the intensity of her emotions made my head throb. Somewhere, not too far away, Sam was confused again. I opened my heart to him, letting him feel my love, and that had to be enough. We were running completely dark now, and there was no way to tell him that our child was growing in me.

  Storm had already loaded my most successful run into the sim tank and had the Redoubt glowing in the darkened room when I got there. I stood looking at it for a long moment. “I don’t think this is going to work,” I told her. “We can make it better, but it will always have greater risk to the Union assault teams than what Winona designed.” I sat at the control console, chewing on my lower lip. “We have two problems to solve; how to quickly disable the human population, and how to kill the Tarakana.”

  “You are worrying me, mon amie. I don’t–”

  I cut her off. “We don’t have time to argue about it.” She didn’t answer. “OK, fine. Are you talking to Esprit Vengeur at all?”

  “We whisper across the free-space optical link, low bandwidth and undetectable, we hope. We use it for station keeping. The comm lag with my sister Vengeur is about one second.”

  “If I can make Sam have a visible reaction, can Vengeur tell you and will that at least convince you to accept the possibility that the Tarakana are real?”

  “I’ve reviewed the number of basic facts that I would need to modify if what you believe is true. The list is not trivial. A reintegration on that scale would be difficult and time consuming.”

  I drummed my fingers next to the panel, waiting. “We can just be done then, because I need you to accept that they’re real for us to continue with this project.”

  “What do you have in mind?”

  I picked up the stylus that was on the desk and, before I could have second thoughts, slammed it into my left palm hard enough to draw blood. “Ow!”

  A few seconds later, Storm reported, “Esprit Vengeur says that Mr. Coleridge physically jumped at the exact moment you stabbed your hand. That is very disturbing. I now accept that the Tarakana may be real, but you must explain to me why there was no lag in the emotional connection. You are three hundred thousand kilometers apart and the reaction was instantaneous.”

  I had my thumb pressed hard on the hole I’d punched. “Yeah, it does that. Winona and I haven’t been able to figure out how. I don’t think the Tarakana fully understand how it works or they’d be even more unstoppable. Or maybe they just haven’t found a way to exploit it. Are you ready to work on a new plan?”

  “No, there is too much. Un moment, s’il vous plait.”

  A few minutes later, I started to get reports from all over the ship that Storm was unresponsive. “Esprit Orageux?” There was no answer. All critical systems were still working, just no auditory response from her. She remained silent for the next half hour and I thought it possible that I’d killed her. I prayed for her to come back while I assured the Captain that I was doing my damnedest to fix the problem. I worked on setting up new parameters for the sim and making a list of everything I knew about the Tarakana while I waited.

  The Tarakana averaged forty kilograms and were able to change colors to camouflage in place. They could quickly change shape, but their mass always stayed constant. They used telepathic communication, making each colony a single organism with many pieces. The Merrimac colony was doing something to my family, breeding us generation by generation. I had inherited my real mom’s empathy and heightened emotions, but no
t the joy she took in manipulating people and situations. Dad gave me the ability to think in clear, straight lines. He also cursed me with the inability to tell a convincing lie. I think Merrimac wanted me to be brave and fearless like my dad. Danger made me want to run or curl into a tight ball on the floor. Dad had gone into Costrano’s Redoubt and found his way back out again. Just the thought of it terrified me. I would never be able to do anything like that. Merrimac had failed with me if he wanted me to be brave like my dad and cunning like my mom. A generation lost. But Sam was brave, so maybe my children would grow to be what he wanted.

  Merrimac fed exclusively on positive emotions as far as I could tell, and the other colonies hated him for it. They wanted dark emotions, like fear, pain, and death. Winona believed they were all parasites, but I loved Merrimac even as I feared him. Merrimac was my friend. Dad had told me about how they didn’t seem to care about the loss of individual members of the colony any more than I cared about losing a drop of blood. The Tarakana had built a city on Cleavus, including complex structures and sophisticated power sources. Their technology was more advanced than ours. The Bovita clan had killed several of them there for sport by soaking them in water, learning that they suffocated because Tarakana breathe through their skins.

  A soft tone sounded and the lights flickered. “Storm, are you back with me?”

  “Yes, Mala Dusa. I’ve finished constructing a reality where what you’ve told me about the Tarakana is real. It took a long time because I left my original construct in place so I can revert to it when you are proven insane.”

  I chuckled, wondering which of us would be proven nuts first. “What about the possibility that I’m right?”

  “Then we’re in a lot of trouble. Even if we implement Lieutenant Killdeer’s plan successfully, it is probable that pieces of the Tarakana colony in Costrano’s Redoubt will return with our teams to each ship. The implications of that are troubling.”

  “Yeah, troubling. We can’t let it happen. Storm, how much water do we have?”

  “About ten million liters, most of it in the hydroponics tank. What are you thinking? It’s only about a quarter of what would be needed to flood the Redoubt, and there’s no way to transfer it.”

  “Flooding would kill all the people anyway. We want to avoid that. First, we need to incapacitate everyone, and then we could start at one side of the Redoubt and spray everything with water, driving the Tarakana in front of us until they have nowhere to hide. They’ll die if they get completely soaked, and I want to soak them.”

  “That would kill all my fish, and I need that water for waste recycling, environmental maintenance, and cooking.”

  “I know that. We’ll have to restock afterwards.” I sighed, looking at my watch, both to check the time and to pray that some of Winona’s wisdom was already filling me. “Winn and the Captain say that it’s too late to change the plan, you understand that, right? It’s probably not going to matter, but we have to try. I will go crazy if I don’t try.”

  “I understand. Shall we begin?”

  We worked until it was time for dinner, trying to crack the approach problem that Winona claimed to have already solved. We were only up to a sixty-eight percent probability of landing undetected when I had to leave to meet Kal and Winona.

  The way Kal looked at me when I slumped into my chair, I knew I must have been a mess. I’d been hunched over the control panel for hours, and I was sore, stiff and distracted. Winn didn’t have to say anything. I could feel her emotions fluttering between worry for me and pure joy to be sitting next to Kal. It was fun watching her fall in love, and the knots in my shoulders began to loosen. Colin helped the process by lying warm across my feet, waiting for me to slip him bits of food. We talked about everything except the coming battle, and I was fully relaxed and yawning by the time we reached dessert.

  “Are you going to bed early tonight?” Kal’s voice was cautious and I could feel his concern even without help from Merrimac. Winona was right about him being a good man; he was honestly worried about me.

  “I’m going to work on the sim for a few hours first, since I’m not allowed to touch it during normal duty hours.”

  Kal started to laugh and quickly stopped himself. “Winona, you’re right about her. That was terrible and I usually trust everybody.”

  Winn leaned forward to kiss my cheek and used it as an excuse to whisper to me. “It takes more than two weeks to train for an assault like this and you’re down to four days. You know how this has to end.”

  I whispered back to her, “I know. I’m doing it for Storm and for the next time. We need to talk about keeping the Tarakana off this ship, someway the Captain will accept.”

  She kissed me again and leaned back. “Go work, Little Soul. Come tell me the moment you find a solution.”

  I walked to the Sim Lab, my brain cloudy with the strong sense of worry she was feeling until it faded away after twenty meters. Winn only used my translated name when she was afraid for me.

  “Ready to get back to work, Storm?”

  “I believe I have solved our ingress problem. My last simulated attack has a ninety-nine percent chance of avoiding detection.”

  “Really? Let me see. Did you steal Winona’s plan?”

  “Lieutenant Killdeer’s plan required me to make two full orbits, the first one laying artificial gravity generators, and the second using those points to assist a very low orbit approach to the Redoubt. My solution is far more elegant.”

  “Show me, show me.”

  “Kastanje currently has sixteen asteroids being mined on orbit. I use nearly all of them in my approach.”

  “Won’t we be seen by ground-based sensors?”

  “You really should read the tactical reports. Union forces eliminated the last of the ground-based sensors and defenses before we transited the DSH in preparation for our assault. The Redoubt’s sensors are all directed outward and its only defenses are the twenty-three FACs housed there. It’s Kastanje’s last hope for protecting itself from the Union.”

  “Storm, what are conditions like on the planet?”

  “You really don’t know?

  “I’ve been busy. You keep breaking, and Winona and Kal are doing what they’re doing, and now with this whole being pregnant thing…” I sighed. “What’s going on down there? The Tarakana, they feed on things like hate and fear and suffering.”

  “If that’s true, then Kastanje is a feast for them. The planet’s human population has decreased ten percent from warfare and famine in the seven years since they declared independence. We are supporting several resistance movements that have expressed a desire to rejoin the Union, but they have each committed a number of atrocities that may prevent them from being acceptable after the current government forces are defeated.” The lights in the sim tank dimmed. “Are you ready?”

  “Sure. Make it go.”

  I watched the complex choreography as we approached Kastanje from the opposite side from Costrano’s Redoubt and used a succession of passes near the other asteroids to go below its orbit and make our final approach, ending as each ship made a hard burn and settled on the Redoubt’s surface.

  “Each ship will land above a point where one of the mine’s drifts is near the surface,” Storm explained. “We will blast a hole just prior to anchoring, opening that passageway to space. This will be our opportunity to inject a gas of some type to render the occupants unable to resist.”

  “Instead of sending your armed drones to kill everyone they encounter.”

  “Or we could use the drones to distribute the gas. This is also where our odds of failure start to mount. The gas may be ineffective, it might not disperse through the life support system quickly enough, or they may have any number of countermeasures.”

  “Odds of success?”

  “Impossible to calculate, but probably very low. We don’t know enough.”
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  I sat chewing on my lip, looking at our tiny ships on the surface of a very large rock full of people that would like all of us to die. “I want to watch the video my dad captured again, see if I’ve missed something.”

  I watched the video, made changes, and ran sim after sim based on assumptions that were really just guesses. Sometime after 22:00 my eyes refused to stay open.

  “Storm, I’m going to rest for a while. You keep working and I’ll be back with you in a few minutes.”

  I put my head down on my arms and slept. I woke up in my bunk with no memory of how I’d gotten there.

  “Lieutenant Killdeer would like to know if you will be joining her for breakfast soon.”

  “Breakfast?”

  “Yes, I made chilaquiles per your request.”

  “Right.” I got up and found I was wearing a t-shirt and shorts that I didn’t remember changing into. “Storm, please don’t revert because I’m insane, but how did I get back to my cabin last night?”

  “Kal carried you here around midnight. Winona helped you change, but you were not fully awake. You mumbled a lot and said things to Lieutenant Killdeer that were not very nice. Are you feeling better now?”

  “Yeah, and full of new ideas, but they can wait. How did the chilaquiles turn out?”

  “Popular. You should hurry before I run out of corn tortillas.”

  I threw on the coveralls I’d worn the day before and checked my reflection in the mirror. No shower again. Maybe after breakfast. “Storm, how are you feeling today?”

  “Perfect. No issues to report.”

  “Truth?”

  “Truth, friend to friend. I have things to show you after you eat.”

  “Don’t tempt me. I have a certain amount of work I need to log, and the Captain wants a report on why you went silent for half an hour yesterday.”

  “And Noam Deri has requested that I send you to see him right after breakfast so he can examine why you are pregnant.”