The Deep Dark Well

by Doug Dandridge

  “This same system can be used to open gates throughout the station. And only those gates which are intended for permanent operation need instrumentation and machinery at either end.”

  “So you can open gates whenever and wherever you want?”

  “Basically.”

  “How difficult is it to use this system?”

  “Very difficult, I’m afraid,” he said with a frown. “It is an art form, and takes years of discipline to achieve the fine control needed to open temporary gates with pinpoint accuracy.”

  “So we know what your station will be?”

  “Yes,” he said with another quick frown. “And I wish it were otherwise. I would not worry as much if I were on the spearhead of the assault.”

  “But you’re needed for CinC,” she said with a smile. “Neither you nor I can help the reality of the situation. We don’t have years.”

  “Of course we don’t,” he said. “But I wanted you to see where I was sweating it out while you were out there in space.”

  “OK,” she said. “Let’s go look at my station.”

  Chapter 18

  Don’t tell me that man doesn’t belong out there.

  Man belongs wherever he wants to go—

  and he’ll do plenty well when he gets there.

  Wernher von Braun (1912-1977)

  There were two of the ships, sitting side by side in the bay. She had never seen anything like them. They were not the biggest ships she had ever seen, though both of them must have massed double the Niven. They took the general shape of the other ships she had seen in this time. Frontal cylinders tapering to rounded noses, long pylon connecting to the ball of the inertialess drive. Overall about one hundred meters in length. The snouts of weapons thrust out from the nose of the ships, hatches for projectile weapons and missiles on either side, turrets of defensive weaponry here and there.

  The skins were what set them apart from the other vessels she had seen. Pure black crystalline structure, covering every surface of the vessel, even weapons' barrels. Light shimmered off of the black skin. Something about it seemed different. She looked back over her shoulder, trying to judge the angle of the lights behind her. A look back at the ship and she knew she was right. It was not the reflection of the light from behind her she saw in that skin.

  “Yes,” said Watcher, looking at her with a grin on his face. “That is not reflected light. These are both total stealths.”

  “Total stealths? What does that mean?”

  “These crystalline surfaces absorb all known forms of radiation. The on-board computer calculates the intensity and angle, and orders the skin one hundred and eighty degrees opposite of the impact point to reproduce it.”

  “So it’s invisible?”

  “Basically, even to computer enhancement.”

  “Quantum computer?”

  “Of course,” he replied. “They are the only systems that could handle that kind of information processing. Of course the invisibility is very fragile. If the skin is ruptured the ship will show a facet to the outer Universe until it is repaired.”

  “But it is self-repairing, like everything else around here?”

  “Again more or less,” he said.

  “Looks like his or hers models,” she said with a chuckle. “Which one is mine?”

  “They’re both the same,” he said. “It’s up to you.”

  “The one on the left, I think. By the way, what keeps it from being picked up on passive sensors? It has to have some heat loss, or is the pilot supposed to sweat it out.”

  “There is a heat sink,” he said. “A most unique heat sink. But let me show you aboard so you can see for yourself.”

  * * *

  First Watcher showed her the bridge. It was a compact chamber, with seats for a crew of four, though one could run the vessel well enough. She would spend most of her time here, and though she had fast learned the basic controls on the trainer at the wormhole control center, it still helped to get hands on so to speak.

  “She can do over a thousand gees continuous with inertial compensators,” said Watcher as she made herself comfortable in the seat. Her muscles relaxed as the seat molded itself to her form.

  “That translates to 9.8 kilometers per second acceleration,” he continued. “Or light speed in eight and a half hours, if that were possible in normal space.”

  “I know,” she said, her hands playing across the buttons that seemed so familiar to her, testing all systems for preflight. “Relativity would make even approaching light speed a much longer prospect. But say half-light in a little over four hours. This thing isn’t hyper capable, is it?”

  “No. The designers were more interested in a spy or quick attack vehicle that operated in normal space. If there was any need to move it to another system, it could be carried by a larger warship.”

  “You said one thousand gees continuous. Emergency is what?”

  “For up to three minutes you do ten thousand gees, 98 kilometers per second. That gives you a burst of 17,600 kilometers per second velocity addition.”

  “And if it’s pushed over three minutes?”

  “The system shuts down in one of two ways. The engine either gives out and you coast until repaired.”

  “And the other option?”

  “The inertial compensator gives and you’re splattered all over the back wall of the bridge.”

  “So if I’m smart I cut it within the safety margin,” she said with a sigh.

  “That would be best.”

  “Are you sure we have to do this?” she asked, the prospect of death now becoming very real to her for the first time. There were so many ways to die out there, in the space around the Donut, this near to the massive distortion in space and time it orbited about. And the computer, though it was hardwired not to harm sentient life, could probably find a few ways around that prohibition. Not the least of which would be in the crippling of her ship, leaving her to fall into the nonexistence below the event horizon.

  “You do not have to do this,” he replied. “But I must do something.”

  “But we could stay in the wormhole control center,” she pleaded. “There is room enough there for a lifetime of living. For an eternity if we are cunning. And we would be shielded from the attentions of the central computer forever.”

  “I know,” he said in sorrow. “And I would wish nothing more. But I have greatly sinned against the sentient species of the Galaxy. Even if it was not the personality I now possess, the last sight that many sentients saw was my laughing face as they were killed by orders issued by my voice. I must help their descendants to rise again, though I give my life.”

  “And you would attack the computer on your own if I didn’t help, though an individual assault would be hopeless?”

  “Yes. Though I knew I would die as soon as I left the station.”

  “Our odds aren’t much better if we work together,” she said. “I have never been afraid to die. I was always more afraid to live. But I want to live now.”

  “I want to live now too, my Pandora,” said Watcher in a low voice. “You are truly Pandora, for you have let the secrets out of the box. But I must make use of you to accomplish this mission, as long as you are willing to be used. You can say no, and I will try on my own.”

  “For certain death,” she cried. “I couldn’t live with that. I love you, though I will never understand you. I am incapable of understanding you. You are light years beyond me, a superhuman.”

  “I am human enough to love you as well,” he said, the little half smile curving his lips. “And I am human enough to not let you die alone, if that is what will be. I will be there with you, to save you or to die with you, if that is our fate.”

  Watcher’s arms enfolded her as she fell into them. His lips tenderly pressed to hers, in a kiss that promised undying love. A kiss that seemed to last forever.

  “I am sorry,” he said as he broke the sweet connection. “I must show you the rest of your command, and the t
ools you will use.”

  From hot to cold in an instant, she thought. But then he had been created to be that way, and she knew the feelings ran deeper than showed on the surface. He really didn’t want her to go, but she couldn’t run the wormhole gate control with sufficient artistry to succeed, and he would surely die during the first phase of the mission. While, with him operating the gate controls, only a mistake on her part or the actions of the central computer could lead to disaster. Only.

  Watcher took her hand as he disentangled their embrace, leading her from the bridge toward the rear of the ship.

  * * *

  Most of the stuff wouldn’t have fit her description of machinery. In fact, most of it looked like solid masses of crystal. She wondered how much of the equipment she had seen on the station was of similar construction, and how anyone ever repaired such machinery. Probably nanobots, she thought, working on the molecular level on machinery of a macroscopic construction.

  “I hope I don’t have to make repairs,” she said, her gaze falling on a quartet of large crystal globes suspended from the ceiling.

  “Those are the inertial compensators,” said Watcher. “If you have to repair them you’re dead in space.”

  “They’re smaller than I would have thought. How do they work?”

  “I’m afraid I would have to delve into physics beyond your time to tell you,” Watcher said. “Maybe later. I would love to bring you up to speed on our tech when we have time.”

  He led the way through another hatchway, into a large room that carried a number of large ducts and tubes. Pandi kept a wide berth of some of those tubes, marked as they were the universal symbol of hard radiation, unchanged since her time. Tube and ducts all led into the mirror surface of a wormhole, this one in a heavier frame than most she had seen.

  “This is the heart of the passive stealth system,” said Watcher. “Waste heat and radiation is conducted through here and dumped into the wormhole.”

  “Where does it go?”

  “Into the great heat sink in the sky.”

  “The black hole?”

  “Not directly into it. That would open up a suction that you wouldn’t believe. The entire ship would be pulled into it. But close enough to the event horizon that almost all of it gets pulled in. Almost nothing is radiated from beyond the skin of the ship.”

  “And I don’t have to stew in the heat and radiation the active systems of the ship are putting out around me.”

  “Correct,” he said. “Now let me show you your personal equipment.”

  * * *

  The main airlock and its commodious lockers were closer to the nose of the ship. Other vessels were nestled here. Much too large for what they had in mind. Watcher opened one of the lockers and pulled a space suit from it. Another locker revealed the armor that fit over the slender suit, while another revealed the backpack that completed the setup.

  “This is an armored assault suit,” he said. “It will give you quite a bit more protection than the suit you came on the station in.”

  “Probably completely invulnerable, right?” she asked with a smile.

  “Unfortunately we have yet to come up with anything invulnerable,” he replied. “Though we have come close. The armored panels that attach to the suit are made of the same superstrong materials as the station itself. The strongest material known to our science. It can withstand a hit from almost any kind of small projectile, as well as massive concentrations of radiation.”

  “And larger projectiles?”

  “Anything over a hundred kilograms traveling at high velocity would kill you from the energy transfer, even if it doesn’t penetrate the suit.”

  Watcher assembled the suit components as he continued the tour, pointing out the attributes of the assembly.

  “The suit itself will give you air and environmental control for up to sixty days,” he said. “It also recycles your water, and has a nutrient syrup that will feed you for several weeks, though it won’t fill your stomach.”

  “Well,” she said, “that’s at least one concern off my mind. If I can’t finish this job in two weeks I’ve failed.”

  “I’m glad your sense of humor is still with you. The helmet gives you complete active and passive sensor arrays, with full computer support. The suit also incorporates a full inertialess drive unit within the backpack. It makes the suit into a miniature spaceship for all intents and purposes.”

  “How much like a miniature spaceship?”

  “Full maneuverability, with up to fifty gees acceleration for a half hour or more. Or an emergency burst of three hundred gees for ten seconds. Inertial compensators can take more, but the power rating won't. You would be on emergency power after that kind of burst.”

  “So save it for the last moment. I got it.”

  “Now this is a particle beam rifle,” he said, pulling a large, submachine gun sized weapon from a locker. “Not allowed on the station.”

  “Damn. Yet another rule to be broken. But why would a particle beam be forbidden from the station.”

  “This weapon fires two separate beams of particles,” continued Watcher, as if he were teaching a recalcitrant child. “This blue trigger fires a beam of charged negative matter. Able to eat through anything, as the negative matter will cancel out an equal amount of matter.”

  “And the red trigger?”

  “A beam of pure antiprotons,” he replied. “Extremely dangerous, and also able to destroy any material object. These switches control the flow. For negative matter it allows you to blast through with a pinhole, or a hole large enough for your own transit. For antimatter you can destroy an insect, or set off a kiloton blast.

  “These insulated magnetic conduit tubes attach to the storage tanks I will affix to the backpack of the suit. The outer emergency lever on the buckle here will jettison both tanks with inertial drive charges, to get them away from you as fast as possible. Maybe fast enough to allow you to survive, in the case of a rupture.”

  “If negative matter ruptures, I have a hole eaten through me,” she said. “Better to have the antimatter rupture. Then I won’t know what happened. What is the inner lever on the buckle for?”

  “That is your final fail safe. It locks the suit into a rigid mode that will cushion the effects of most detonations. At least as much as possible.”

  “So my flailing limbs won’t break, huh?”

  “Right,” he replied. “You never cease to amaze me. In many respects you are more intelligent than the sentients I was used to.”

  “Probably because I had to think on my feet all my life. Your humans were too civilized and docile. Those of my time would have probably fought a little harder.”

  “You are probably right. And the wild humans of this time as well. Now let me show you the weaponry on the ship itself. You’ll need something a little bigger than this toy to breach the skin of the station.”

  * * *

  “OK, I think I can handle this thing. It’s amazing how much information that thing implants in your brain.”

  “Just waiting for you to make the physical connection for them to come out,” said Watcher. “You have complete emergency protocols programmed in as well. They’ll come to the fore if you need them.”

  “And the computer will never know I’m coming, until it’s too late.”

  “Don’t get too much of an attitude,” he said. “As soon as the access hatch to this bay opens the computer will know that something is up. It has the skin of the station under continuous surveillance, and even a fifteen second delay, the best you can expect, will not be enough if you do something that gives your position away. The decoys may keep it busy for a few moments.

  “Move fast and sure, with enough curves and deceptions to throw its best guess off. It will have repositioned the graviton projectors by now, and nothing you have will stop them from collapsing your vessel if they get a lock.”

  “What’s the second ship for?”

  “That’s for the cavalry,” he replied,
the little smile back on his face. “Let’s just hope it arrives in time.”

  Pandi locked her arms around him and pressed her lips hard to his. This might be their last kiss, she knew, and she meant it to be memorable, even if the memory was only to last for another hour or so.

  “I will come back to you,” she said as she broke the embrace.

  “And I for you,” he replied, wiping a tear from one eye. “Now we need to concentrate on business.”

  She walked him from the bridge to the access lock. She watched his back as he strode across the chamber. He turned and waved before he went through the hatch. She raised a fist into the air in salute.

  “Victory,” she called at the top of her lungs.

  “Victory,” he yelled back, before ducking through the entrance.

  * * *

  Pandi was secure in her chair, all systems powered up, when the signal from Watcher came through. They would communicate through a wormhole com link, totally secure and instantaneous. The wormholes had changed technology beyond anything her time had imagined.

  “All ready at this end,” he said through the holo link.

  “I’m ready as I’ll ever be,” she replied. “Let’s do it.”

  Her hand pressed the panel configuration control. Up came the display on the board, controlling the bay hatch. Her fingers danced across the touch panel, in the sequence determined to get her out of the bay in the fastest possible time. Docking clamps opened with a light thud. The ship backed out of its berth, swinging easily to point its nose toward the hatch, which was now sliding open.

  A dozen drones, all emitting the signals of a standard ship of the same configuration as her own, sans stealth systems, sped through the opening as soon as it was large enough to allow a ship like hers to exit. They moved in different directions, some at minimal acceleration, some at emergency burst.

  One of the drones collapsed and exploded out in a millisecond. Targeted by the graviton beams. The others moved out of sight in an instant. She hoped they did their jobs well.