“Actually, yes,” I was relieved that she wanted to speak freely. Skippy’s plan for hacking the library was really, really dangerous and I really, really hated it. We also didn’t have a better alternative for hacking the library, or for preventing the first ship going through Skippy’s Magical Chain of Wormholes from signaling the two star carriers behind it.
She turned around and stepped down the ladder. “We have done some crazy shit, Colonel. This one?” She shook her head and I saw her shoulders shake. “I’ve never been more scared of anything.”
I knew what she meant. She wasn’t afraid for her own life, she was afraid that she would screw something up and be responsible for the destruction of Earth. I knew what she was thinking, because that is exactly what I was thinking. Had I ever been more scared of anything? Maybe not. Maybe that should tell me something. “Hey, you’ll do just fine.”
“I’m not worried about that,” she gave me a disparaging look. “We could both do everything perfectly, and still blow the mission. I don’t like this. Landing on a Maxolhx planet? This is way too much risk to take on. It’s your call, Sir, but…” She left the rest unsaid.
She was right. It was a hell of a risk. Skippy’s mad plan was for our Panther to fly into the Kulashant star system, wrapped tightly in a stealth field. When we got close to the planet, we would deactivate stealth, or make it look like we had. Skippy would identify us as a routine flight to inspect the outer perimeter of detection satellites, and assuming the strategic defense AI bought his line of bullshit, we were then supposed to just fly down to the surface, like our Panther was any other small spacecraft. Skippy thought he could persuade the local air traffic control AI to let us get fairly close to the buildings where the Science and Intelligence Ministry was located. It would be a quick touch-and-go landing, because if we actually set down to park the dropship, automated servicing bots would connect the Panther to ground power and begin routine maintenance. That would require us to open the doors, which was not an option.
Reed was right, there were way too many things that could go wrong.
The Valkyrie was parked next to the Dutchman, both ships surrounded by a cloud of little bots and the components they were adding to or removing from both ships. For the mission to Kulashant, we would be taking the upgraded Dutchman, because it would be flight-ready before our hulking battlecruiser. And because we only needed a starship for transport, not fighting.
Valkyrie had a lot more portholes than the old Dutchman did, actual windows made of diamond or some super-tough exotic material. Because I needed time to think, and because I wanted to be by myself, I wandered through our new battlecruiser, until I found a porthole in a part of the ship that had air, and wasn’t hazardous due to construction.
Our old star carrier already looked a whole lot meaner than it ever had. It was starting to look like a warship, rather than a glorified space truck. Some of the modifications would wait until we returned from Kulashant, if we ever did. Although the Dutchman was fairly close in terms of distances in spaceflight, it was far enough away that I couldn’t see details well with just my trusty old Mark One eyeball. Using my zPhone as a camera gave me a super-sharp view. I panned the camera past the new reactors, the new shield generators, new antennas for the proximity-defense sensor system, new particle-beam cannons for-
Antennas.
All those antennas.
“Holy shit,” I said to myself.
“Joe?” Skippy asked through my zPhone. Apparently, I had not kept my thoughts to myself. “What’s up? I heard you.”
“I have two questions for you, Skippy. Number One, how high does that disruptor field extend above the planet? Does it go all the way up to the spacedock?”
“Well, no. The field is a fairly thin layer around Kulashant. It can’t reach up to stations or ships in orbit, because it would disrupt delicate equipment up there,” he explained, and I heard the ‘duh’ implied in his tone.
“Outstanding. Ok, second-”
“If you are thinking I can use a microwormhole to hack into the spacedock’s AI, I already told you that is not happening. You should try listening some time, instead of-”
“I heard you the first time. The second question is simple: how does the spacedock get updates from the surface?”
“Um, facilities on the surface send signals, duh. Did you think they use pigeons to carry notes back and forth?”
I ignored him, both because I was on a roll, and because he hated being ignored. “Signals are received by antennas, right? So-”
Heighdy-ho there, filthy monkeys! Tis I, Skippy the Magnificent. I have lowered my standards to speak with you, so pay attention and-
Yes, you in the front there with your hand up. I’m sure you did just get out of the shower. You are still filthy. Ugh, have you ever smelled yourself? Whew.
Anyway, Joe would tell the story all wrong, making it sound like his big stupid self is the hero of the story. Tell me, who is the real hero? The monkey who has a random neuron fire in his brain and says ‘Duh can we do this’? Or the incomparably awesome being who has to actually make his moronically obvious ideas work?
Good answer. That’s right, I am the hero. So, I am telling this story. First-
Ugh. Yes, if it was so obvious, why didn’t I think of it? Because I have better things to do with my vast intelligence. That’s why I outsource the pesky details to monkeys. Are you happy now? Get yourself a juice box. Hopefully there is a cyanide flavor for you.
Just kidding!
Not.
Anywho, we flew the Dutchman to the edge of the Kulashant star system, and launched a missile that contained probes for- Oh, who cares about all the boring stuff? What my incredibly awesome self did was pack one end of a microwormhole in the stealth probes. Actually I used ten microwormholes in five probes, but monkeys don’t need those details. In each probe, one microwormhole was used to project a stealth field that is more sophisticated than the Maxolhx can even dream of. That is how I got all five probes through the overlapping sensor field and near the spacedock, that was a huh-yuge headache for me.
The missile got near the planet before it cut the probes loose. Two of the probes approached the spacedock’s main antenna for classified transmissions. I waited for a ship to pass between the spacedock and the transmitter on the ground, and moved the probes into position. The probes released the microwormholes and backed away, still wrapped in stealth.
The microwormhole that was eighteen meters away from the antenna, received signals from the surface. Those signals went into one end of the microwormhole near the antenna, and came out the other end of that microwormhole in a cargo bay aboard the Flying Dutchman.
The second wormhole had one end in the same cargo bay, with the other end less than a meter from the spacedock antenna. My shiny canister, which is not a beer can, was positioned between the wormhole event horizons in the cargo bay. I examined incoming message traffic, decided what I wanted the spacedock to read, and fed that to the antenna.
Here’s the tricky part. The signals traveled at the speed of light, and the microwormholes in front of the antenna were only seventeen meters apart. Light moves across a gap of seventeen meters in- oh, why am I bothering to explain math to you monkeys? It’s fast, that’s all you need to know. Aboard the Dutchman, I had to receive the signals, screw with the data however I wanted, and send the signal along so it would be received by the antenna at the exact same time it would have been received, if I had not intercepted it.
How did I accomplish something so mind-bogglingly incredible? Simple; I used pure, Grade-A awesomeness. Was it difficult? Well, I don’t like to brag, but-
Hey, you in the back there. I heard you laughing, you sound like a hyena with asthma. No juicebox for you.
What was I saying? Oh yeah. Awesomeness. It was super difficult even for me, because I had to-
Ok, I admit it.
I lied.
It was easy for me. Awesomeness is just what I do, it’s who I am. Which,
really, shows how amazing I am. Actually, I was bored during the whole thing, because Big Stupidhead Joe insisted that I turn over operation of the ship to Nagatha while I controlled the microwormholes, and most of my ginormous brain had nothing to do.
Well, not nothing. Joe did not need to know this, but most of my brainpower was busy working on my fantastic Broadway musical! And, because you have been such a wonderful audience, I will give you an exclusive sneak peek at the-
“Skippy!” I shouted again, in a panic. “SKIPPY!”
“Huh? What?” He sputtered.
“You blue-screened on us.” I flashed a thumbs up to Desai in the CIC, because she had been about to panic like me. “Did it work? Is everything all right?”
“Did what work? Oh, the wormhole antenna intercept thing. Yeah, of course. Duh. It’s me, you moron. See what happens when you forget to trust the awesomeness?”
“Hey, sorry. I was worried because I tried to talk with you, and you didn’t answer. It must have been super difficult, for you to be concentrating like that.”
“Nah, it was easy-peasy.”
“Then why weren’t you answering me?”
“Um-”
“Shit. Were you doing something else that took your attention, when you were supposed to focus on the critical operation?”
“Well, heh heh, um, I’m going to plead the Fifth on that.”
“Plead the- the Fifth Amendment does not apply to beer cans!”
“It applies to people, Joe. Are you saying I am not a person?”
“I’m saying you are an asshole.”
“We can agree to disagree about that one,” he sniffed. “Anywho, the library file has been uploaded to the spacedock, and, um, let me check. Yup, the spacedock is pushing the update to the ships of the battlegroup. Score another one for the awesomeness of me!”
“Uh huh. When can you disengage the wormholes, and withdraw the probes? You said if they stay in place too long, the kitties may notice something is odd.”
“Well, heh heh, that might be a teeny bit of a problem. I can’t disengage until a ship passes between the antenna and the planet. Otherwise, the kitties will notice the momentary glitch in signal traffic. Unfortunately, traffic is pretty sparse right now. The next ship scheduled to arrive or depart, is not for another seven hours.”
“That’s no good!” In the CIC, I saw Desai shaking her head slowly. “You didn’t check that before you blocked the antenna?”
“No, because I didn’t have access to that data, until after I hacked the antenna, duh. Remember, this whole scheme was your idea. Before you ask whether I can hack into the dispatch schedule, and order a ship to depart early, the answer is yes, I can. I should not do that, because it will raise all kinds of red flags.”
“No, don’t do that. Shit. I guess we just wait?”
“Sure, we could do that. Except if I don’t disengage the microwormholes in the next ninety four minutes, the gamma radiation of their event horizons will begin leaking into local spacetime, and be detected by the spacedock, and any ship in the area. Those sensors are run by subminds, I can’t hack into them remotely.”
“Ok, let me think.”
“It would have been nice for you to think before we started this, Joe,” he scolded me.
What could Skippy do to prevent the microwormholes from being detected, and that wouldn’t cause the kitties to become suspicious there was something funky about their antenna? If he cut power to the antenna, even for a second, the spacedock AI would notice and send bots to investigate the-
“Hey, Skippy. The bots that perform maintenance on the spacedock, are they run by subminds?”
“It depends, Joe. Most of the bots are semi-autonomous. They take assignments from subminds, but perform the detail work on their own. Why do you ask?”
“Can you take control of a bot, or just give it a task, and move one of them in front of the antenna? Without making the spacedock AI suspicious that someone is screwing with the bots?”
“Hmm. Well, shit. That was rather obvious. Why didn’t you suggest that before?”
I gritted my teeth and reminded myself that we needed Skippy more than he needed us. “You can do it without attracting the attention of the AI?”
“Sure. Doing it now. I just caused a minor glitch in a power relay on the hull of the spacedock. A submind has dispatched the nearest bot to investigate, and its path will take it in front of the antenna. Three, two, one, and- Presto! Microwormholes have been shut down. I am backing the probes away now. Another triumph by Skippy the Magnificent. Gosh, I should compose an opera about me,” he gasped.
“Hey, I’ll offer you a deal. You trap that battlegroup outside the galaxy, and you can perform your opera in the galley,” I said with fingers crossed behind my back. I had not promised that anyone would attend the opera, and I hope that little shithead didn’t notice.
“Deal, Joe! Oh, you are in for a treat.”
“I’m sure I am, Skippy.” I knew I was in for a treat, because while he performed his opera, I planned to be in my cabin eating a Fluffernutter. He would be pissed at me, and I would deal with that when it happened. “XO,” I breathed a sigh of relief, and Desai walked around the partition onto the bridge. “We will wait until Skippy has all those probes out of their strategic defense sensor bubble, then jump away.” That would take several hours, because the probes could not maneuver fast while they contained one end of a microwormhole. That event horizon was being used by Skippy to project a stealth field through, keeping the five probes hidden. Once they were beyond the sensor coverage around the planet, he could shut off the microwormholes, and the probes would rely on their own stealth fields. The probes would run out of power within six days, plenty of time for them to go dark and drift forever. “We did it, again,” I would have grinned with satisfaction, but I didn’t have the energy.
“We did,” Desai agreed. “Now it’s on to the next impossible task.”
I slapped a hand across my face and mumbled into it. “You, Simms, Adams, and Chang. Why do all of my executive officers delight in reminding me how tough this job is?”
“Because that is our tough job, Sir,” Desai wasn’t smiling either.
Four hours later, the probes were drifting away from Kulashant, on a course that would take them above the plane of the planet’s orbit. They were drifting away from the local wormhole, in a direction no Maxolhx ship was likely to fly. With Skippy certain the libraries of the Battlegroup’s ships had been properly infected, we jumped the Dutchman away.
CHAPTER THIRTY SEVEN
“Hey, heeeeey, Joe,” Skippy’s voice had that raspy, slurred quality when he drunk-dialed me that night. The effort of controlling the microwormholes near the antenna had been rough on him, and he had warned me his matrix needed reconfiguring, or whatever the hell he did. The result of him rearranging his brain was his higher-level functioning was impaired for a while. The result of that was him waking me up in the middle of the freakin’ night. “Hey, duuuuude. You awake?”
“No.”
“Oh, sorry, man. Didn’t mean to disturb your sleep. Um, you sure you’re not awake?”
“Pretty sure, yeah,” I threw the pillow over my head.
It was useless, he only spoke louder. “I ask because it sounds like you are awake.”
“Crap!” Throwing the pillow down by my feet, I gave into the inevitable. “If I listen to you for, like, five minutes, will you leave me alone?”
“Huh? Oh, sure, sure.”
He was silent for a while. Too long, suspiciously long. I could feel my ability to fall back asleep fading away as the tension bothered me. Finally, I couldn’t stand it any longer. “What is it?”
“What is what?” He asked, sounding distracted.
“The thing you wanted to talk about?”
“I thought you were asleep?”
I face-palmed myself with both hands.
“Hey!” He shouted. “You liar, you weren’t asleep at all.”
From behi
nd my hands, I muttered “Can you just tell me what is so important?”
“Oh, yeah, I remember now. I was working on a sort of Physics for Monkeys handbook, to catch your scientists up on all the stuff they are wrong about. You know I still can’t tell you monkeys anything really important, and your brains would explode anyway. But, I am giving it a shot anyway.”
“That’s great, Skippy, thank you. Uh, how about we wait until morning for me to review this book, Ok?”
“Review? Why would you- O.M.G. dude. Did you think I want you to read my physics book? That is-” his voice dissolved into laughter. “Oh, that’s a good one.”
“Asshole. You woke me up to laugh at me?”
“Oh, sorry,” he took a moment to finish chuckling, and his words became slurred again. “To dumb down my book so monkeys can understand it, I read some of the classics of children’s literature. It was aaaaawesome, dude.”
“That’s great, Skip-”
“I have a question. You know the Doctor Seuss story ‘Green Eggs and Ham’?”
“I vaguely remember it, yeah. What about it?” I wondered whether green eggs were somehow a good metaphor for higher-dimensional physics.
“Well, I think there’s something I don’t get about that book.”
“Like what?”
“That Sam-I-Am guy? He’s kind of a dick, Joe.”
“Uh-”
“The hero of the story does not want to try green eggs and ham.”
“Well,” Saying ‘well’ was a way to stall while my foggy memory searched back to when my father had read that story to me. “But in the end, the guy does try green eggs, and he likes them, right?”
“He says he likes green eggs and ham, but maybe he did that just so Sam will leave him alone. Sam badgered him into doing it, Joe. That’s harassment.”
I flopped the pillow back over my face and groaned, my voice muffled. “I think you’re reading too much into the story.”
“Really, Joe, really?”
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