Robert Hartmann moved around the Pinta probe with a casual ease. He’d now been up to the Citadel more times than he cared to remember and had become an old hand at manoeuvring in zero-g. He was linked via his clip-on camcom to the man whose team designed the probe in the first place, Dr Adam Chesters. It was their two-year progress review of the build intended to make sure everything was being made per design. The camcom device, which was now universal for all crew on Citadel, was a one centimetre diameter clip-on badge, which Hartmann had positioned on the neck of his coverall. As well as voice capability, it had stereoscopic cameras and LiDAR imaging allowing 3D video to be transmitted and recorded. Chesters sat watching through a pair of virtual reality glasses back at WGA headquarters in Seattle. He saw everything Hartmann saw.
“So let’s start off with the progress summary, Rob, if you don't mind. Then we can get straight into my assurance checklist. William Trantham and his team will be joining us shortly—their meeting is just overrunning a little,” said Chesters. He had been keeping tabs on the realisation of his team’s design and there had been regular engagements with Hartmann during the build. But process was process and the assurance checklist was due.
“Sure, let’s do it,” the ever-motivated Hartmann said, smiling. He made even the most mundane work bearable—like assurance checklists. Definitely a fun, positive guy to have as a colleague, thought Chesters.
“So...” began Hartmann.
“Ah, hang on a second, I think they’re joining the conference now,” Chesters interrupted.
A delicate electronic ping announced the arrival of William Trantham, Mission Control Director, and his team to the video conference. Trantham was a veteran of fifteen previous unmanned missions. He started his career at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory over four decades earlier as a junior staffer on the Solar Probe Plus mission. That was before many of JPL’s functions became subordinate to the WGA Headquarters in Seattle. A dozen people sat in a meeting room around a conference table facing the camera. They were viewing the output from Hartmann on a big screen. At the centre of the group was the white haired gent with padlock beard who looked mixed Native American-European. The man spoke.
“Good afternoon, Rob and Adam, this is Will Trantham here at mission control centre in Seattle. Hope you can see and hear us clearly,” he said, somewhat superfluously given the high reliability of modern communications, even with low Earth orbit.
Trantham started working at a time when quality video calls, let alone 3D video calls, could not be taken for granted. But what he didn't know about unmanned mission operations wasn’t worth knowing. Hartmann and Chesters both confirmed visual and voice comms. After Trantham had introduced his team, Hartmann started his progress update.
“I’ll fly back a few metres so you can get a better view. There. Now you can see the whole of Pinta. Right, to summarise, there are eleven systems and a lot more subsystems: Structure, Skin including the re-entry shield, propulsion systems comprising manoeuvring jets, chemical rockets and FTL-drive…” said Hartmann.
He continued with the systems run down. “System number four is the Fusion Power Plant, next is Messenger microprobes, Fall Arresters comprising parachutes and airbags, Radio and Laser Comms, Sensors, Cloaking Field Generator, Computer Systems and AI and finally the three flying drones that will explore the planet.”
Regular plenary discussions about the various subsystems and mission requirements peppered the review. The slight, pretty but sharp featured graduate hire, Sarah Townsley, from Mission Control, cleared her throat in preparation for her question.
“Hello, Rob, I’ve got a question...” She stroked one of her stray dark ringlets away from her forehead. “Why are there only five Messenger microprobes? They’re tiny. Surely it’d be useful to have a lot more than five, wouldn’t it?”
“Hey, great question, Sarah. Yes, you'd think so wouldn't you? Why not have a whole stream of them giving us regular updates? I’m no expert on the inner workings of the FTL drive but I have asked the research guys the same question myself and here’s the answer I got. Their continuing lab trials of scaled down FTL-drives have shown that each time it fires it creates huge stresses in its body matrix. These seem to be a bit unpredictable in magnitude. So the short answer is that every time you fire the FTL drive there’s a chance of it going kaput.” Hartmann smacked his hands together as if to illustrate the point. “We’d really like our trillion dollar probe back, so we’ve restricted the number of messenger microprobes to five as that’s all we need. Remember, each one can store terabytes of data.”
With two years to go, Pinta was half-completed and was on schedule. The eight by four metre structural body was complete and some of the other systems had been installed. Focus shifted to the opposite side of the Assembly Hall and Santa Maria. The primary probe was just over twenty-five percent complete and would be ready in time for launch in 2061—three years’ time.
“Okay, any final questions before we pack up? Remember, as I said earlier, there’ll be a separate call to our rep in Gorshkov Works regarding the fusion plants. We’ll cover that when we call him,” said Hartmann, trying to cover his bases and head off any further questions. Even the irrepressible Hartmann was beginning to flag after four hours of presentation and discussion. Only glimmers of his usually abundant smiles were now surfacing. He was feeling hungry and caffeine-deprived and was hoping that he’d soon be able to satiate his needs back in the accommodation module.
“Yes, one question. More to Dr Chesters on the design side I guess,” said Trantham.
“Go ahead, Will,” said Chesters sitting a kilometre away in the same vast headquarters as Trantham.
“Curiosity really. I know we’ve got the whole stealth thing worked out with the panelling, stealthy shape and the cloaking field generator...”
Here comes the ‘but’, thought Chesters.
“But, if we think there’s an advanced civilization, might they still be able to detect us? I mean, are we still detectable by any means known to science or is the probe totally invisible?” asked Trantham.
“Well, we’re certainly undetectable by anything we or our human rivals have. But we did consider this during the early design stage. If we’re propulsion-off, no comms and on passive sensors only with the cloaking field on there is a way we can still be detected.”
Adam really likes suspense. doesn't he? Trantham thought to himself.
“Gravity. If they have good enough gravimetric detection and we’re far enough away from the planet – which would mask our gravity signature – then, yeah, it’s possible,” Chesters conceded.
“But hey,” he continued, grinning, “with any luck it’ll be just like the pristine paradise they showed in that Discovery Channel documentary last night.” The TV show was full of speculation and made for entertainment more than anything. Chuckles were heard all around as they concluded the update.
***
August 22, 2058 Gorshkov Works, Severodvinsk, Arkhangelsk Oblast, Russia
How could I have been so unlucky? thought the youthful looking thirty-year-old Ethan Marsaud for the umpteenth time on his way to work. His driverless cab whisked him past a mother and her infant child begging on the dirty, rain drenched street. She looked fifty but was probably only thirty-five. Hard lives these poor wretches, he thought. If inequality was still an issue in the US, it was many times worse here in this grim, northern outpost of the oligarch-ruled Russian empire. ‘I could’ve been posted to anywhere—the US, Europe, New Zealand ... even China would’ve been better than here. The cold, the grey skies, the miserable people and the even more miserable food.’ Originally from Bordeaux, France, the metro-looking Fusion Dynamics contractor definitely stood out on the drab streets of Severodvinsk. He looked like he’d just been teleported straight from a Paris fashion show. This was his sixth month in what he considered a Godforsaken hellhole—its regimented rows of five storey apartment buildings and its ugly district heating pipes, which looped four metres high over every si
de turning and obstacle they encountered. Why didn’t these Soviets put them under ground? Why haven’t the Russians done a lot of things around here? he lamented. Quite a contrast to living in the US where Fusion Dynamics and Marsaud were based.
Things in this industrial city of one hundred thousand had only gotten worse since the fall of the Soviet Union seventy years ago. The population had once stood at over a quarter of a million. No wonder his American colleague, the WGA fusion reactor specialist, Ruby Mendez had quit two months back. She’d given her bosses an ultimatum: “Move me back to the States or I quit.” They’d valued her enough to allow her to get her way. Not so easy for me, thought Marsaud, making an ultimatum as a staffer’s one thing, but as a contractor I must do as I’m told. And here I am paying the price—all because the politicians are suddenly best buddies with the Ruskies. Anyway, Marsaud was still in serious debt from his seven years of higher education and needed the overseas allowances that his assignment brought in. His driverless car pulled up outside the chain link fence next to security at the entrance of the Gorshkov Works.
The miniaturised fusion power plants for the two probes were being built in Russia at the state-controlled Gorshkov Works in Severodvinsk. The decades old Cold War II was thawing and in the spirit of cooperation the reactor would be built by the Russians. They were to be shipped to the Citadel by Angara rocket out of Baikonur, Kazakhstan; once again part of the Russian empire. Russia’s smaller fusion reactors were slightly better than those produced by Western contractors with a higher power-to-mass ratio. The contribution of the power plants would offset some of Russia’s probe funding.
Marsaud trudged up to the guard box in his smart wool jacket and designer scarf and, after passing the security checks, made his way into the main entrance. Just in time to get an awful tasting coffee from the starkly lit canteen and a last minute update before his call to the WGA team in Seattle and the Citadel.
Marsaud went through the fusion reactor progress report with Seattle then Citadel – both were on schedule – no issues. He was not allowed to discuss anything sensitive as he did not have the equipment to maintain a secure connection to his WGA colleagues. In any case, his clearance wasn’t high enough to know anything except what he needed to in his job as technical liaison with the Russians.
Marsaud made his way back down to the clinical, space age looking factory floor where reactors one and two were in different states of construction. He heard a grunt then a higher pitched smack coming from the far end of the corridor that linked the offices and meeting rooms to the factory floor. The corridor was otherwise deserted and Marsaud softened his step and regulated his breathing, his ears pricking up in anticipation of further unexpected sounds. An angry, dominant Russian voice started soft and threatening then exploded in fury. There was a quiet, weak reply from another man in a begging tone. Marsaud was close enough now to hear through the thin, hollow-board door.
“Alright, alright, yes it can be done. We will do it. We’ll make the changes to the operating system,” said the general manager of the works, Georgy Kamkin. He was a doughy little bald man who seemed gruff, but Marsaud knew he wouldn’t hurt a fly.
“Good,” snarled the angry dominant man, “you’d better or you know what will happen. Now stop snivelling, you're supposed to be the plant boss, a leader of men. No one’s going to look up to you acting like this, you pussy.”
Marsaud heard a shuffle of feet. The dominant man’s voice changed to a more neutral but still utterly cold tone as if he were speaking to someone else in the office.
“Alexei we’re done—hail my car to the main entrance.”
Marsaud took this as his cue to take a few steps away and ducked into an office to his left that he knew to be unused. He closed the door slowly and sat at the desk as if he belonged there; head down but occasionally peeking up from the empty desk. Inside he was nervous as hell—he knew what could happen to people who overheard things they shouldn’t in twenty-fifties Russia. Disappearing inconvenient people had become rife as paranoia and a cold indifference to the happiness of the populace had built during the decades long Cold War II. Through the glass-fronted office, the Venetian blinds were half-closed, but he could make out the profile of two men as they passed swiftly by.
Nearest was a leather jacket wearing gorilla of a man. He had menacing testosterone shaped features. His nose looked like it had been broken and his shaven head bore at least one poorly sutured scar. The muscle thought Marsaud. Next to him and furthest from Marsaud strode a smaller, leaner man with a sharp, designer cut suit and swept back dark hair. His blue eyes looked stone cold—as though his soul was dead. Marsaud had seen him before, in a so-called news piece profiling the person before him. It was none other than Sergei Bekov, Director of Cyberwarfare at the SVR—the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service. “He’s a long way from home,” muttered Marsaud to himself, wondering what this was all about. Must be pretty important for Bekov to be here in person. I don't think it’s the reactor for the new container ship he’s interested in, he thought. The only other contract at the works was the manufacture of the power plant for a large nuclear powered merchant vessel being built in the nearby shipyard. What changes was Bekov demanding? thought Marsaud. He was a frightened young man at heart with no desire to get mixed up in this but knew he had a duty to say something to someone. He opened the door and turned left out of the unused office, away from the GM’s room, and said nothing.
The general manager of the Gorshkov Works, Georgy Kamkin, sat at his desk holding the framed picture of his wife and little daughter—his only child. Tears accumulated in his tired brown eyes, spilling over to make watery tracks down his cheeks. “How could these animals threaten you, my little girl and my beautiful Anna?” he whispered as if talking to the picture. Nothing was worth risking his family for so he steeled himself for what he had to do. It was a hierarchical organisation that he ran and he was ultimately disciplinarian when it came to following the orders of one’s higher-ups. No, the software engineers that reported to Kamkin would present no difficulty in doing what the SVR bastard, Bekov, wanted. The only fly in the ointment could be the pesky Frenchman, Ethan Marsaud. In Kamkin’s view, he’d been sent as a spy for the old, mistrusted rival, the Western Global Alliance. He didn’t need to act right away and he had an idea that might ensure the Frenchman’s compliance should he prove troublesome.
Sergei Bekov was a narcissist and psychopath. It was a perfect combination for making it to the top in the SVR and its brutal world of state-sponsored infiltration, interrogation and terror. After decades of war—both hot and cold—with the West the gloves had come off a long time ago. This was an organization where heartlessness and a cold detachment from human emotions was rewarded. Director Bekov was fast tracked to his position of power after being mentored since graduation by Roman Demenok, now state security minister. He revelled in the power he had over his fellow human beings and acted with near impunity. He sat in the front seat of the armoured driverless car with his security detail in the rear. As it sped its way to the airport he mulled over his orders to Kamkin. Fusion plant boss Kamkin was to ensure that the fusion reactor operating software was replaced with the doctored version from the SVR Cyber Warfare group. This had several backdoors built into it, which would allow a specifically tailored virus to infect the Santa Maria probe’s computer systems. The virus itself could not, of course, be uploaded until the WGA computer experts had run their anti-virus scans. And that would be after the probe was built. Kamkin had no access to the fusion reactor once handed over at the Alliance Citadel space station for integration into the probe body. That’s where their asset, Dasha Morozova, aka Jenna Perez, would become vital. Bekov took a moment to think about his elegant spy, Dasha. What fun he was going to have with her when she was coerced into his bed after the mission was over. This was all that motivated Bekov in keeping her alive after the mission—the knowledge that he’d be fucking her until he got bored and moved on to another unfortunate victim. The
director did this with any chosen woman or girl who was unlucky enough to come to his attention. Perk of the job, thought Bekov with a sneering grin.
***
August 23, 2058 SVR Headquarters, Yasenevo District, Moscow, Russia
“The backup Pinta probe will be more thoroughly tested by WGA engineers than the primary Santa Maria to iron out any deficiencies, sir,” said Bekov to State Security Minister Roman Demenok. They sat either side of the older man’s antique desk sharing a bottle of vodka. “So we have decided to leave Pinta with the undoctored, plain vanilla operating system for her fusion reactor.”
“And what of this plant boss Kamkin? Will he do as he’s told?” asked Demenok.
“Sir, I believe he will come through for us,” said Bekov, “I could see it in his eyes. When he does, this keeps it nice and clean as only he knows. The software engineers won’t be able to tell the difference between the doctored operating software and the plain vanilla version. Then we can ‘re-assign’ Kamkin,” said the self-congratulatory Bekov with a smile.
“And our asset in Seattle has her instructions?” enquired Demenok.
The First Exoplanet Page 5