Omnipotence: Book I: Odyssey

by Geoff Gaywood

  Dr Schindler was lying face down in a pool of blood. A blade of some kind had entered his back just below the shoulder blade and passed through his chest. There was no pulse. As Henri rolled him over a piece of paper dropped from one hand. With growing trepidation Henri turned it over and saw just what he had dreaded – the word ‘PANDORA’.

  Brady was nowhere to be found.

  13

  Uneasily to the Threshold

  The discussion between Henri and Arlette that ensued early the following morning was ‘difficult’. As Henri described the events leading up to the discovery of Dr Schindler’s body, Arlette sat stone-faced at her desk, processing the input with profound unease. Finally she sighed and spoke soundlessly and anonymously by CTT through her earphone. Chang appeared barely two minutes later.

  “Colonel Bertin, bring Chang up to speed and then report jointly to Mission Control and tell them I want their instructions by return – that’s what, ten, say twelve hours? Call me as soon as you have completed your report and I will deliver my confidential views to them then. We are approaching our rendezvous with the LDST staging point and I am scheduled to address the crew at 10.00 hours tomorrow. Oh, and Chang, drop back here when we’re done with Mission Control.” Her eyes did not meet Henri’s as they left.

  * * *

  “Any response to the molecular scan from your home-base analytical team yet?” Julia asked.

  “No,” came Henri’s curt reply, “but they were understandably disappointed that we were unable to provide any direction from our own on-board analysis. Analysing data fields is a lot more complex than when you have the actual chemical compound in your hands. I don’t expect anything back this side of the wormhole.”

  “Do you think we should proceed with the transfer in the light of this uncertainty?” Julia had little doubt that the answer would be affirmative.

  “We heard this evening that Mission Control and the Commander are resolved that the mission is not to be deflected by isolated security issues. Whether we are this side of the wormhole or the other side is, in their view, just a technicality. We have to establish control and complete the mission. Sending the cavalry to our rescue is not an option.”

  A little grin passed across Julia’s face. The imagery seemed very quaint and very ‘Henri’. However, the pressure on him to get quick results was now further intensified. “So, we’ve got two bodies and an absentee. Where do you suppose Brady is?” she asked.

  “I see two possibilities,” said Henri. “He’s either a victim whose body has been removed because it incriminates the murderer in some way, or he is part of the plot and is in hiding.”

  “So where’s the video evidence?” asked Julia incredulously. “It hasn’t been hacked again?”

  Henri rolled his eyes. “According to our video monitoring records, Dr Schindler was never in his lab after we left last night, and Brady never left his post.”

  “This is intolerable, Henri. The system is useless. It’s hopelessly compromised.” Julia’s face was flushed with anger.

  Henri scowled. “They’re trying to re-programme it completely,” he said, “but the opposition is ahead of the game. It was never designed to be a criminal investigation system.”

  “Great! So we don’t know whether Brady is friend or foe? But how could a trained soldier, one of your trusted military detail, be on another side? Are our screening processes compromised as well? What the hell is going on?” She stared at Henri, her eyes flashing, and for an awful moment she wondered whether he was himself some kind of enemy agent, intent on destroying the mission and her most priceless dream with it. That seemed unlikely given his willingness to share critical information with her, but she made a mental note that she would never trust him entirely.

  * * *

  “Good morning, fellow crew members,” announced Arlette. “In just under thirty-six hours we shall be arriving at our LDST staging point and the pilots will be carrying out manoeuvres for the transfer to Omega 16. We shall be carrying out twenty hours of pre-transfer checks before the ship is locked down and transfer commences. Each of you will be familiar with the processes involved, but we will all be aware that this will be the first time in the history of our civilisation that humankind will enter another solar system. I will speak to you all again just before transfer, but in the meantime I ask you all to be absolutely meticulous in your preparation for this momentous event. Good luck.”

  No mention of the sudden disappearance of Dr Schindler and Brady. No apparent concerns about the success of the mission or the safety of the crew. Just pure Arlette Piccard focused resolve. Julia and Henri looked at each other, raised their eyebrows and shrugged, in almost perfect unison. It was an unspoken acknowledgement of the Commander’s coldly remorseless dedication to the mission.

  The crew was led to understand that Dr Schindler and Brady had been taken ill and put in isolation, but no details were released. Neither of them were involved in the transfer process, which preoccupied most of the rest of the crew, and few questions were asked.

  Working in total secrecy, the home-base analysis team assessing the molecular scan that had been sent by Henri Bertin had reached a preliminary conclusion that the substance in the micro-syringe was not a chemical toxin but a virus or a mixture of viruses. What properties this virus might have would be unknown until it had been synthesised, assessed and tested in a live animal context. It was going to be weeks, not days, before they would have an answer.

  Henri announced these findings the following morning at a grim-faced command meeting chaired by Arlette. Julia, Marcel and Chang sat in silence. Finally Arlette said, “Marcel, we must override the privacy rules and transform our video monitoring system into a robust and comprehensive surveillance capability. Get it done.” Marcel nodded. She turned to Henri. “How do you explain Brady’s disappearance?”

  “I think he may be hidden somewhere in the annulus between the ship’s hull and the operational quarters – either dead or alive,” said Henri slowly. “We have no video monitoring cameras in there and it would not have been difficult to force an entrance to that area. Building on that theory, it could be that more micro-syringes or other materials are being stored there.”

  “Have you conducted a search?”

  “We have conducted a comprehensive search of the interior of the ship, but we cannot access many sectors of the annulus without burning through the inner skin.”

  “How long do you need to conduct a thorough search?”

  “Two weeks,” said Henri.

  “Two weeks?!”

  “Yes. It has to be systematic from top to tail, and I have to be able to maintain a security capability at all times. Assuming we have a malevolent agency on board, we have to assume that they will make it difficult for us as soon as it is known that we are burning holes in the ship and searching the inaccessible areas.”

  “And supposing he is hidden somewhere else?” enquired Arlette.

  “It’s possible we have missed him,” replied Henri, “but I doubt it. We are continuing to explore all possibilities. However, I cannot leave security uncertainty in such a large area of the ship. If there is a malevolent agency on board with the intention of disrupting the mission, then it will be using a clandestine base somewhere, and the only possible location is in the annulus of the ship.”

  “Very well,” said Arlette. “You can take any action you deem necessary once we have cleared the transfer. Marcel will be responsible for ensuring the physical integrity of the ship while you are carrying out your work. How do you read the preliminary conclusion of the home-base analysis of the micro-syringe contents?”

  “An unidentified virus is a serious threat while it remains unidentified and we must be very vigilant,” said Henri. “I have alerted the medical centre to be prepared to isolate patients immediately if unfamiliar symptoms are presented. Since we haven’t seen anything unusual since the death of Major Kazarov, which was clearly related because of the Pandora message, it does not look as t
hough we have any immediate prospect of an epidemic arising from this micro-syringe. Of course, we are now completely dependent on home-base to identify the virus and recommend treatment. I’ll feel a lot better when we get their final report.”

  “OK. Chang, how do you rate the threat?”

  Chang leaned forward and engaged the meeting. “One of the identified risks of a mission which is to land on unexplored territory is the possibility of alien infections. We have an excellent capacity to deal with that threat on board, despite the loss of Dr Schindler,” he said, “and anything that originated on our home planet should not pose too serious a threat. The only problem we have is that we don’t have a biological sample. I support Colonel Bertin’s analysis and his proposed action, and we are fortunate that he had the foresight to get a molecular scan sent off to home-base as promptly as he did, but we do urgently need the surveillance system revamp.”

  Arlette leaned back in her chair. “It is our destiny and our duty to be the first human beings to pass through a wormhole into an otherwise inaccessible part of our galaxy,” she said. “Every member of the crew has been vetted and found to have the skills and attitudes necessary for a successful mission of this kind. If we have any bad apples on board, we must outsmart and contain them. With the exception of Colonel Bertin and his team we all now need to focus on the forthcoming transition. Thank you.”

  As they filed out Marcel said, “Can we please meet in my office right away. The section heads are already waiting and I would like to go through the transition process with all of you one more time. Obviously none of the previous discussion is to be shared with them.”

  “Do you have any specific concerns about them?” asked Julia, somewhat surprised. Marcel herded them into his office and closed the door.

  “Look,” he said, “the only people on board with access to the kind of resources required to hack into our surveillance systems and sustain an effective hiding place on board are the section heads. If there is a conspiracy going on, I’d bet heavily that one of them knows a lot more about it than we do.”

  “Agreed,” said Henri. “Please watch the body language, yours and theirs, if the welfare and whereabouts of Schindler and Brady come up. Cohen, the medical director, will handle any questions about them that arise.”

  They filed into the adjacent conference room, and the eight waiting section heads scrambled to their feet.

  “Good morning,” said Marcel with an expansive smile. “Since we are about to embark on the most exciting adventure in history so far, I thought we could all share our thoughts on what we shall be doing for the next thirty days and what we expect to see and feel. Yev, would you please give us the basics.”

  Yevgeny Kusnetsov, Chief Scientist, rose to his feet with an air of professorial dignity, presentation remote in his hand, and grinned broadly. “As you all know, we have reached the threshold of the LDST, which is our acronym for localised distortion of space–time. It originated from here,” he said, directing his pointer at a photo of an irregular, pock-marked lump of rock on the screen.

  Julia looked, consciously soaking up the rich tones of his Russian-accented English.

  “This was Proteus, a geologically inactive chunk of fifty thousand trillion tons of rock, ice and methane, which had been doing very little for our solar system until it was converted by the ISEA into an LDST. Now it looks more like this.” A diagram of a curved, almost kinked, blueish tube with flared ends appeared, nestling in a background of stars. “Of course this is just a projection of what the math tells us it’s like. A gravity wave picture looks like this.” The picture showed a shimmer of light around a black dot, just off to one side of the tube. “Don’t worry about the black dot; it just tells us the gravitational field is rather intense as we pass it at the midpoint of the LDST.” He chuckled. No one else did.

  “As a result of our slow but steady acceleration since we left lunar orbit, we are now travelling at about 3,000 km/second, or just one hundredth of the speed of light. However, we shall be in for the most extreme roller-coaster ride in history, because we are going into geodesic free fall through the centre of the LDST, allowing our momentum to carry us through to the other side. This will not cause you too much discomfort since we will all be in our ergo-couches and will not feel more than 5G at any part of the ride. Any questions so far?”

  “Yes” – it was Hannah Cohen. “Please remind us non-physics geeks what geodesic free fall is, and what we can expect to happen to our bodies when we pass through the midpoint. Won’t we suffer from the sudden reversal of the direction of a very intense gravitational field?”

  Kusnetsov smiled. For a moment he was tempted to ask one of the engineers to explain how general relativity works, but he’d been there before and had been made to run the gauntlet for treating his colleagues like first-year students, particularly the women.

  “Geodesic free fall is the path taken by a body travelling at a constant velocity following the curvature of space–time,” he began. “An object of large mass like a star or a planet bends the space–time around it, just like a bowling ball sitting on a trampoline. If you roll a marble towards the edge of the bowling ball at just the right speed and direction, it will follow a curved path around the bowling ball and then continue across the trampoline, somewhat deflected from its original path. The path it follows around the bowling ball is called a geodesic – that is the path of equilibrium given the initial speed and direction of the marble, its mass and the mass of the bowling ball. If you are sitting in a spaceship going past a very massive object like a moon, and you do not fire your boosters to change speed and direction, you will follow a geodesic and will be in a natural equilibrium with your surroundings. In other words both you and your spaceship will be weightless.”

  Kusnetsov paused and looked at Hannah for assurance. She nodded.

  “As we go through the wormhole we will be moving on a geodesic that is very strongly influenced by the singularity that controls it. You are right that we will be subject to very high rates of acceleration as we approach it. However, so will Prometheus and everything in it, so nothing will be pushing you on or holding you back. You will remain comfortably weightless throughout. And, yes, this applies when we pass the midpoint. We will all decelerate together and feel nothing. The only time you’re going to be anything other than weightless is when we fire the boosters to align the ship for entry, and again to slow us up on the other side. That will be controlled to a maximum of 5G, which is when you will need to be in your ergo-couches.”

  “How come we’ll be weightless? Will local gravity not be maintained?” Freddy Jones, Farmyard Director, looked worried. “And won’t the orientation of the ship have to change?”

  “Yes, I beg your pardon. The ship will be weightless – we will be subject only to the induced gravity that we choose to have on board. We’ll go in head first. The ship’s orientation will change only when we spin her through 180 degrees and fire the boosters to slow her down on the other side. But on-board gravity will be maintained during that process as well.”

  “How long is this going to take, and what will we see?” asked Julia.

  “We’ll burn the boosters for four hours at each end” came the reply. “The rest of the ride will take ten days. As for what we’ll see, well, we’ll be travelling at 26 per cent of the speed of light at our fastest point, but we all know that light will still be reaching us at the regular 300,000 km/second, so what we will see is red shift from those stars that we are travelling away from and blue shift from those we are travelling towards. I think it’s likely to be rather colourful. Yes, Genes?”

  “We don’t need to bump into anything at 26 per cent of the speed of light, and we don’t have brakes,” came the drawl from the back of the room. “How can we be sure that something or someone won’t be coming the wrong way?”

  “Nice one, Genes.” Kusnetsov was still smiling. “The communications satellites at each end continually monitor anything that goes in and out. They also
carry quite an impressive military capability and can knock out just about any extraneous object that might wander into our path. Anything as big as an asteroid on a potentially threatening course would have been picked up long ago and would have caused a mission re-schedule. Any other questions?”

  There were none. Marcel rose to his feet. “Thanks, Yev. You all have your specific responsibilities in the context of the transition. Otherwise it will be business as usual except during the burns. Keep me informed of any equipment anomalies – we don’t need any avoidable surprises for the next couple of weeks. Thank you.”

  In a couple of minutes Marcel was back in his office with Julia, Chang and Henri, and the door closed behind them. “Wow, that was painless!” said Julia. “Did anyone pick up anything untoward?” There was silence.

  Finally Henri said, “Yes.” They all turned to him. “The whole thing was about the basics of the transition, stuff they’ve all heard before. The only time that a question could have been asked about Schindler and Brady was when Marcel asked ‘Any other questions?’”

  “And?” said Marcel.

  “All eyes were then on you, Marcel, clear and attentive, with one exception.”

  Julia turned her head slightly to one side. “Who?”

  “Genes.”

  “It’s hardly conclusive,” said Chang. “Aren’t you trying a bit too hard to find something?”

  “Yes, I am trying hard,” shot back Henri, “but if you had been watching as closely as I was at that moment, you would have seen that he was the odd one out.”

  “OK, just supposing you are right that Genes has an agenda we don’t know about, what should we do that we’re not doing already?” Chang apparently had a certain respect for Henri’s intuition.

  “I’m just going to monitor his movements very thoroughly,” said Henri. “I’m going to make sure that I can account for his whereabouts every minute of the day, and I want you all to watch him carefully whenever you are working with him.”