Family Law 2: The Long Voyage of the Little Fleet

by Mackey Chandler

  * * *

  Another week saw them sixty light years further from home and ready for another break. If there was any further discussion of the reverted schedule change Thor hadn't mentioned it.

  There were two small gas planets in the system and they divided to scoop fuel at each. The double star was hard to resolve. There was a lot of dust and gas down deep in the area of the stars. Gordon sent Sharp Claws off around the system, almost to the opposite side to do a radar scan and make sure they weren't overlooking a third star, especially a brown dwarf down in that mess. They also deployed their antennas and checked the next couple likely jump targets. They got exact bearings and distances and listened for artificial radiation.

  When they came back Captain Frost came in really close before he called High Hopes in low power mode. "There is all kinds of chatter and video, radar and some signal that I'm not real sure what is making it, in two of the three stars closest along our line of travel."

  "Wow. How would you compare them to the Bunnies?" Gordon asked

  "No comparison. This is like listening to Sol from the Centauri system. I doubt we can sneak in and stop short and look them over undetected."

  "How about sending the drone in?" Thor suggested.

  "And let them watch it turn and come right back to us?" Lee asked.

  "We could send the Retribution on a side stepping move to a nearby system and send the drone from there." Thor thought out loud.

  "That removes the problem one step, "Frost pointed out. "If something follows the drone back to them quickly that leaves them unable to rejoin us and vulnerable. I can't see risking the Retribution.

  "The Roadrunner can't carry the drone..." Brownie mused.

  "We need to stop and take time and map them," Gordon decided. "Rushing ahead was fine when nothing was that unusual. This is a big deal. We need to know what is around them. Maybe even what is behind them."

  Everybody sat pondering it for a few minutes.

  "Tell everybody in the fleet what's going on," Lee said. "We've gotten good ideas before and they deserve to know what's going on."

  "Make it so," Gordon told his com officer.

  "Let's build a map, like a cup around these stars," Frost said holding a true hand to illustrate. "It will take weeks, but we are only seven months out and planned on years if need be. This is big. We don't want to blow it. We can start with lateral explorations to systems with no chatter. I suspect we'll find systems with radio signals somewhere between here and the opposite side. Likely the active routes in and out of these two systems. I want to know both the jump routes in and out and the shape and direction of the civilization behind them."

  "I can't imagine a point of the spear frontier with so much noise, unless they stop and consolidate to a ridiculous degree before pressing on. I predict there won't be just one entry and exit route away from us. That would be even more conservative an expansion than Earth and I thought we were slow!" Lee objected.

  "Unless they have never found another race and figure they have all of time to take leisurely possession of the next system," Thor guessed.

  "Or they are like the Bunnies, with iron fist and don't move ahead past what they have taken the time to not just colonize, but make sure it is in complete control and subjugation," Lee said.

  "Brownie, consult with your colleagues on the other ships. Formulate a plan to do such an englobing map program, staying about two systems away from the occupied systems for a start. When we find another noisy system we'll go around it, building a 3D map until we can't go any further or reach the other side."

  "How many ships can we send out at once and how many must stay together for safety?"

  "The Sharp Claws and Murphy's Law can go out. As well as the Roadrunner. The DSEs are suited to exploring uninhabited systems, but I won't risk them unescorted into a potentially inhabited system. Use the speed of the Roadrunner to examine systems we are more confident we don't need a detailed survey, just a quick look, since they don't have much instrumentation. Can we have another antenna system fabricated for Murphy's Law? Ask engineering please, Frost."

  "We can do that sort of mapping," Brownie agreed. "However once we have examined the stars to about two or three systems away and checked their neighbors for emissions, then it will slow us down considerably, to jockey back and forth along an arch around the target star and back here to report. Four jumps out and back, five jumps out and back. Pretty soon it is a week out and a week back to look at the next. Too hard on the crew even if we wanted to spend all the time in transit. We'll need to move our base of operations, either in a line, trying to work around them, or if you want as complete a picture as possible of the sphere around these people you'd have to a spiral search." He illustrated, spiraling a finger tip around a clenched fist. "That would take a very long time."

  "I see your point," Gordon agreed. "I need a mug of coffee and to think on it a bit. They entered another silence so long Gordon was served his coffee.

  "We have two systems with chatter," Lee said thinking out loud. A few looked at her. "One is louder than the other. Are they more or less side by side to us?"

  "As near as matters," Brownie told her.

  "Hard to say if one is more important because it is louder, or if the direction from one to the other is the order explored. I think we should avoid a line drawn through the two search about ninety degrees away from that line. I bet we get further, maybe even a bit past them from here that way. Then if we go in and pay a visit from the side we won't be drawing a line straight back to our homes," Lee said.

  "That's a tentative plan, unless somebody thinks on it and improves it. Let's get the first phase done, start a disk, maybe with a slight cup to it and see if that changes the situation."

  * * *

  "It's ugly, but it will deploy in a half hour. It covers a minute of an arch, so you aren't going to pinpoint locations, but it has a heck of a lot of gain. And nothing on it you can't abandon if you don't have time to fold it up and secure it. If some aliens capture it they will probably wonder how somebody who built such a gods awful piece of junk managed to get to the stars."

  'Thank you, Mr Hillerman. Express our gratitude to Engineering for the speed. Perfection is indeed the enemy of good enough and we don't care how ugly it is."

  "I had to remove one fellow from helping. I won't say anything negative about him. When we do something that needs perfection he's a wonder to behold. But he looked ready to break down and cry at the crudity of this."

  "I assume you made sure it fits in Murphy's Law?"

  "Alas, that would have been much more difficult. It grapples on the hull, on one of the few places we don't have covered yet with other junk."

  "Very well done," Gordon complimented them, "Send them out. Now we wait."

  Waiting was hard. They had to keep a minimum weapons watch. There wasn't just a minimal orbital watch on the bridge, they needed enough of a crew to maneuver suddenly if one of their probes led something unpleasant back. The crews were limited in both repairs and recreation, because they were subject to a ten minute notice of acceleration. It was stressful.

  Chapter 7

  The Sharp Claws was back first. They explored three systems along a line approximately parallel to the line draw through the two systems of interest. The first from where the High Hopes waited seemed like a quiet system. Once inside they confirmed it was unused. They didn't do a radar sweep. If they decided to go home and not make contact, their use of radar so close would set a time limit on how long it would be before these people knew they had been sniffed around and mapped. They might still decide to quietly go away. The noisiest target system was still quite easy to detect from here.

  The second system was similarly bare. The target system barely detectable from here.

  The third system was noisy with natural radio from a turbulent gas giant. The inhabited target system was separated by forty degrees from a line looking back toward their base.

  "Entry burst!" Their com tech c
alled out. "Somebody entered the system from the direction of the star we are interested in. Call it eighteen hours ago. I'm seeing a strong drive signature, so they are vectoring away from us, back toward the way we would have gone on."

  "Any chance they'll see us?" their Captain asked.

  "None, they'll have left the system before our entry burst reaches them."

  "Well that terminates exploring this leg," their navigator said. "If they use this system for transits we can't risk running into them to look at the one beyond. Even if we pick a different star slightly off their jump route, we could run into one at random just crossing here."

  "Do you wish to stay and see the precise exit he takes?" the Captain asked.

  "No need. It will be some hours and we know the general vector."

  "Back we go then."

  The report was very interesting to Gordon. He held the Sharp Claws to hear the report from Murphy's Law, before releasing them to go down another track. They used the wait to scoop fuel. You can never have tanks too full.

  Murphy's Law found nothing in three systems. They now had two tracks opposite each other. The third system in each slightly forward of their track. The one an operational dead end. They sent them out again, opposite each other again, but rotated ninety degrees around the disk they were mapping."

  Nothing for three systems out on either leg showed any signs of activity.

  * * *

  "Lee predicted we wouldn't get far along the line drawn through the occupied stars. That has proved true in one direction. It is inconclusive in the other. Shall we take the time to go further out the side showing no action? Or shall we move our base of operations along one of the two tracks opposite from each other, that show clean three systems out? Gordon asked.

  "The later," Brownie recommended, "but how do we choose between them?" he asked.

  "Fortunately, I have a device for automating this decision." He pulled a Fargone Dollar piece out of his purse. "Heads we go down the leg the Sharp Claws took. Tails we rotate and start new legs." The bright disk spun in the air and was snatched by a true hand. He slapped it on the back of the other hand and kept it covered. "Will you witness what it is carefully, so nobody thinks I pulled any shenanigans?" Brownie got up and attended him closely. It was heads.

  * * *

  It was another five systems before they heard signals ahead. That put them along an arch almost even with the systems they were working around. So they were about ninety degrees around the globe they were outlining from the original system in which they'd heard the racket of civilization.

  "Should we make an entry from this angle, or try to come in from behind them?" Thor asked.

  "I admit we don't have enough data points to work from," Gordon told him. "But you said you admire my analysis of situations on minimal input. The image I get in my head is we are looking at a plane or maybe a little bit of a cone poking up at this system. Behind that star their civilization probably knows most of the stars and safe routes between them. If we come in from here, from the side you might say, it's believable. If we get around behind them and enter they may be wondering how the heck we got inside what they see as their territory. Does this make sense so far?"

  "It does," Brownie agreed. "They might look at our entry point and say: "No way, they are trying to fake us out."

  "Indeed. So I am disposed to come in from here. I'm just not happy that we only know one way out of here if it becomes our escape route. I'd like the Sharp Claws and Murphy's Law to explore a jump route out of here generally back toward home and away from this civilization's side of the sky. Once you are in that next system explore two more jump routes from it before you come back. If we need to run from these people we'll have several different ways to go."

  "And when you come back fuel up before we go in, so we are all topped up." Thor said.

  "And rested. I want every advantage we can get. So two days after the Sharp Claws and Murphy's Law get back, we go in."

  "All of us together?" Captain Henry from Murphy's Law asked.

  "Yes, this isn't a planet of Bunnies. Whatever is making that much noise is a space faring civilization. Not just these two systems, but since Sharp Claws saw that transition, we know they have star flight or are visited by someone who does. I want to go in looking like a we are from a serious civilization, not somebody stretched to send out a single small ship and no reason to be too humble, if you take my meaning. There is going to be a lot of something on the other side. A living planet maybe. Certainly traffic, local or interstellar. Maybe mining and fuel operations. I want to look like somebody worth talking to and not someone to bully."

  "Then let's pop in all together like you trained us and show a little style," Brownie suggested.

  "Exactly. And Roadrunner will ungrapple and stand ready to head home after transition."

  "See you back here in a couple days," he told Captain Henry and Captain Frost, "and we'll fuel and rest and in four to five days we see what we've found."

  * * *

  "Everybody secure? Base crews on missiles? Damage control suited up? Engineering no systems down? All your clocks agree Sharp Claws?"

  The confirmations filtered back. The Sharp Claws navigator muttering, "All four."

  "Slaved to Brownie's marks, boost and jump. The others were rehearsals," Gordon told them.

  * * *

  "Record as many channels as you can," Gordon ordered. "We'll be able to translate them later, I hope." There was a lot of chatter.

  "Luke, let me know as soon as you have the video format figured out. Brownie, there's too much traffic here to rush insystem. Bring us to a stop from moving further in. G and a half max, we don't want to look panicky. They may have some traffic rules we'll mess up if we proceed. Retribution, you have the most powerful radar. Take a good look around, not a single pulse and then shut it down."

  Jon Burris on com spoke up. "Most of the radio traffic seems to be in system about thirty degrees to our right. When you point a telescope at that area there is a planet. I don't know yet if most of it is from the planet or from around it."

  "What sort of modulation?" Gordon asked.

  "I see at least some FM that looks to be audio, some very high density video and radars too."

  "Champion William, tuck yourself behind the Retribution relative to that area with all the radio traffic and Sharp Claws get behind us. Put Roadrunner behind Murphy's Law too. If they don't have very good radar and paint us hard with high frequency stuff, they may not see how many ships we have. I'd be just as happy to keep them guessing until we see how friendly they are."

  "Give me a high sign when I have a live mic, FM at moderate power, aimed at that area, but not too narrow a beam. I'll say a few words rather than wait for video. If they have anybody even moderately bright they'll say, 'Hey, that's speech, but it isn't any language we know.' And figure out we have no clue what to do. It buys us some time until we can do video."

  Burris turned in his seat a bit to look at Gordon and made an elaborate pointing gesture to cue him.

  "This is the deep space explorer High Hopes and escort vessels. Commander Gordon speaking. I know you aren't understanding a word I'm saying, but it should register as some alien language. You'll be looking back and translating this soon enough I'd wager. We'll transmit video as soon as we figure out how you like to view it. We'll wait to try to talk to you before we come closer. We have no idea of your traffic rules and don't want to create hazard. Now we'll sit and be patient awhile," he made a chopping motion to Burris.

  "Send that twice more, with five minute pauses in-between."

  It would be a bit over two hours until the wave front of their entry hit the planet. The number of signals that came back almost four hours later was overwhelming. All different power levels and some obviously narrowly aimed. It was certainly different than the Bunnies' initial silence.

  "Make sure the recordings of this new chatter are time tagged and labeled to differentiate them from stuff we heard before the
y became aware of us. A lot of the current stuff has to be responses and more importantly, some might be instructions, some inquiries," Gordon guessed.

  "Some of them might be, Docking at our space station? Visit Alpha, the best casino and restaurant in the system, mention this transmission for a free gaming chip! The finest cuisine and drinks for every species and palate!" Lee predicted.

  "Heh, I hope so," Thor said grinning. We can give some of our rabid gamblers leave. I bet the house won't take IOU slips against their claim shares."

  "It will take awhile for somebody to come out to us," Gordon said. "Or explain sufficiently on video how we should approach. Let's stand down to the alter-shift bridge crew, not a stripped orbital watch, but minimum crew to get under way quickly. Weapons watch can stand down all but one greaser crew and a missile tube slaved directly to the bridge board. No need to keep a loading crew standing there. Thor, I want either you or me in the duty bunk behind the bridge. With orders to rouse us if there are any big developments."

  "I'll take it," Thor volunteered. "It's none too big and I fit better. Go to your cabin where you can stretch out and get some decent rest."

  * * *

  Gordon awoke feeling rested. Looked at the corner of his wall screen, the time showed in dimmed numbers in the corner. Two hours to shift change. It was amazing nobody found reason to wake him up. He stretched and scratched. Thor was right, his own bed was a luxury. Breakfast sounded like a good idea. He went in his shower stall, one of two private baths on the vessel, and set the head to maximum pulse. That would reach all the way through his fur to the skin and still have enough power to be invigorating. He smiled remembering the first time Lee had encountered a Derf shower. He'd heard the water start, a squeal, a thud and ran in to find her sitting to the back of the tub, butt bruised by the fall and a huge raw water jet abrasion on one shoulder. The next day it had been yellow with purple highlights and they'd had to keep ointment on it to fight infection and supply a slowly infusing pain reliever.

  He slathered a conditioner on, otherwise his fur stood up all over with an effect that wasn't very pleasing. It reminded him of some show dogs he'd seen on Earth long ago. Blow dried and fluffed out. With a fancy bow added somewhere too. Not his style at all.