by Mel Keegan
“Sounds like a world of fun,” Travers said acidly, but was ahead of Marin as they returned to the service lift.
Chapter Fifteen
Lai’a, Gojin Drift
Red. It seemed normal space was suffused with blood streamed from an open wound – the bright, arterial blood that spelled the end for some creature. Travers had seen the color often enough, while company medics scrambled to save lives. From what he saw here, he knew the literal translation – Blood Gate – was more accurate.
The Class 6 event gaped into normal space. Under heavy thrust, Lai’a was driving toward the freefall channel while the navtank display had just shifted from graphical to visual. Travers was looking at the realtime vid feed, and Operations had fallen silent. Only Ernst Rabelais spoke, and then only to murmur a very old profanity which was eerily apt. Bloody hell.
The color itself was no illusion. The illusion was in the human and Resalq tendency to interpret the color as a tide, an ocean, of blood. Reality spun, turned inside out and shrugged as Lai’a exited the event – the transspace drive scrammed, ineffective now, and the Weimann engines thrummed into life. Ship data showed all three reactors available, two online and delivering modest power as Lai’a shifted vector with almost unseemly haste.
The sky was misty with nebulosity, the atmosphere of a giant star thrown out by a supernova perhaps only a hundred years before. But another star was suffering its death agonies now, and not long before it would have been something very like the suns of Velcastra and Omaru. The bright, warm G-type star was bloated, crimson. It had the hue of blood, and its light flooded the nebula, creating fields of deep, rich red.
“Blood Gate,” Vaurien observed. “Very appropriate. And we’re way too close for comfort Lai’a – proximity.”
“The event opened just less than ten light hours from the perimeter of the red giant,” Lai’a said calmly. “At this distance, the star itself poses no great hazard. The danger is the feeding black hole which plays Naiobe’s role in this region, generating this Drift’s gravity storms. Its orbit has taken it close enough to the red giant for it to capture the star.”
The tank display shifted, and Lai’a switched to synthetic aperture imaging to pare away the nebulosity, afford a glimpse of the black hole. A fist seemed to seize Travers’s heart as he watched one of the last mysteries of the universe played out, lurid, naked, shameless as a citybottom hustler. The black hole was a wicked little thing, smaller than Naiobe though it would be growing rapidly as it ate the red giant, sucked up the nebula before it plunged on into its harem of supergiant stars. The comparatively tiny thing seemed to hold a monster on the tail of a short leash. It had teased a tendril of blood-red gas from the dying star, and it would not cease to feed until the bloated old sun was gone.
“The black hole is previously uncataloged,” Lai’a was saying. “Doctor Sherratt, I have assumed a vector to escape the Gojin Drift by sufficient distance to efficiently analyze this sky. Your priority is to determine, in physical terms, the precise location of this region in relation to the Deep Sky?”
“Gojin Drift?” Alexis Rusch echoed. “Did I miss something?”
“No.” Mark seemed to catch himself, drag himself back to work. “For cataloging purposes, Lai’a draws on a variety of terms and this one is most apt. The Rabelais Drift and the Orion Drift were obvious labelling choices. Orion 359 had been charted optically, using some of the biggest lenses in the Deep Sky, just nine years before my ships surveyed the region. This one … this one’s so far out, it’s probably been imaged as part of a wide-field plate, but if it was, it’s more than likely occluded by any number of other objects. It wouldn’t even be seen, much less charted. We’re the first from our world to see this, and the name Lai’a has chosen is very apposite indeed. The gojin is a snake native to Saraine, hooded like Earth’s cobra, and just this color; and if you notice the shape of the river of star-stuff being drawn out of the red giant –”
“A striking cobra.” Vidal whistled. “That’s wicked.”
“Dangerous,” Jazinsky added. “The storms are breaking way too close to the black hole for my liking. Lai’a, could you locate the black hole before you transited the gate?”
“With sufficient time to abort,” Lai’a affirmed. “This information was not provided by the Ebrezjim database. The Ebrezjim astronomers would have possessed it; it would certainly have been destroyed by corruption. Vector analysis demonstrates that Gojin, the black hole, is on the outward leg of its orbit. Future gravity storms will form progressively further from the red giant, Beta Gojin. In a century, navigation hazard will be minimal. In the meantime, I will drop comm beacons both in the driftway and here in the Gojin Drift.”
Vaurien’s head came up at that. “Comm beacons will attract Zunshu attention.”
“Indeed they will,” Mark said bleakly. “And it won’t matter a damn, Richard, one way or the other, will it?”
The fist that had seized Travers’s heart squeezed. If the Zunshu were either forced or seduced into an armistice, their knowledge of beacons here was of no consequence; if they fought and were obliterated, the same … and if Lai’a were erased from the universe –
“Where in the name of anyone’s gods are we?” Vidal whispered. “Lex, you were always the astronomer. I remember the telescope you had, right on the edge of StarCity where every night was A-grade ‘seeing.’ I’d be asleep with the dogs while you were still fiddling with something, trying to get an image of a spark in the sky nobody else knew was there.”
She shivered visibly at the memory. “I don’t know, Michael. These are strange skies. I’m not recognizing anything at all … which is weird enough to make the hair stand up on my neck.” She took a long breath. “Lai’a, would you stream your data to Tech 2?”
“Certainly, Colonel,” Lai’a said affably, “but at the moment your efforts will be futile. To this point, I have matched no object in the accessible sky with any object in the astronomical databases of Resalq or humans. I am still waiting for deep scan data; it will be several minutes more before it becomes available.”
She had pulled a chair up to the workstation anyway, and her hands lay clasped by the keypad, knuckles white as bone. “And when you have your deep scan data you’ll triangulate between known pulsars and quasars. I know.”
“A few minutes, Colonel,” Lai’a assured her. “There is no need for you to review the datastream, unless you would be interested in some of the more exotic objects in this immediate region. Four double stars and two triple star systems offer considerable interest. May I draw your attention to the first trinary, Gojin 254 –”
It had already cataloged this sky, Travers realized. He followed Marin to the ’chef, let Curtis hand him a green tea with lime and mint over crushed ice, and dropped his voice to a murmur.
“This stuff makes me wonder if I have any brains left in my skull at all, or if Fleet beat them to pulp and I just never noticed.”
“Study.” Marin was restless, ill at ease, eyes wide, dark, in Ops’s companionable dimness where the brightest lights issued from screens, instrument surfaces and the navigation tank itself. “I had to do science, because as a kid I wanted carrier command. Even if you don’t enter Fleet on the science ticket, like Alexis, you need the basic credentials before they’ll let you through the door at officer school. For mere mortals, the only way to reach that door is to study hard during your rookie year and sit the exams for officer candidacy. If,” he added acidly, “you survive places like Malteppe, and the crewdeck high-jinx that made a basket case of Teniko.”
“You’d have done it,” Travers guessed. “It’s in your nature to do what you set out to. If you’d still wanted it, you’d have come back after the Argos. As a survivor, you’d have been fast-tracked into a command corps. Damn, you’d have been an XO by now, on pace to get your own ship. Me? I’d still have been a master sergeant. Nowhere else to go, once you’re king of the hill on the crewdeck. Damn, we might’ve been on the same ship.”
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nbsp; “So long,” Marin breathed, “as it wasn’t the Shanghai or the London.” He finished his tea in one draught and called, “Anything, Alexis?”
But her head was shaking. “Not yet. Lai’a?”
“The deep scan platform is still working. No matches.”
“Bloody hell,” Rabelais said for the second time. “We must be further out than we thought.” He and Queneau were standing close together, content to watch as Rusch frowned over astronomical images, Vidal tried to make sense of the navigational feed, and Vaurien busied himself with ship data. Lai’a would have done it all, but humans needed to be busy; and with nothing to do, Rabelais was anxious.
A shape moved at the armordoors. A low, husky voice called quietly, “Permission to enter your hallowed territory.”
Vaurien did not even glance his way. “So long as you mind your manners. Pull up a chair, do what you do.” He did not have to say the words – Travers heard them anyway, and so must Teniko: and stay the hell out of my way.
He came in like a shadow, rolled a chair up to Tech 8, the most distant workstation, and deliberately tapped keys to pull up the data rather than addressing Lai’a or Joss. Marin glanced at him, and then at Vaurien; Richard’s head shook minutely, setting the whole question aside.
“Mechanically, we’re in excellent shape,” he said in a taut voice, as if for want of something to say. “All three drives are purring. Sublight engines are online, the transspace drive is dormant, the Weimanns are optimal. There’s a drone gang working on Number 3 reactor, routine maintenance; the drone fabrication shop is working, replacing eight units that were fried, making trivial adjustments to the hyper-Weimann while we were in transspace. We’re good. Barb?”
“It’s lucky I worked on my thumb twiddling skills,” she told him, “because Lai’a doesn’t need a human crew. You know we’re passengers, Richard. We’re along as guests.”
“Honored and welcome guests, Doctor Jazinsky,” Lai’a amended. “The presence of Resalq and human mission specialists on this expedition is not merely welcome, but highly beneficial. Each day I learn a great deal from continued interaction. Also, I am extremely aware of the hazards of confronting Zunshu mechanisms about which we remain ignorant. Should I fail to perform to requirement, I will urge Resalq or human participation.”
The statement was forthright, honest. Travers could almost hear Mark Sherratt in the AI’s intonation, its choice of words, and sure enough, when he angled a look at Teniko he saw a sneer on the misshapen face. Teniko had only contempt for the Resalq AI, perhaps for any AI which seemed to mimic life, consciousness, awareness. And for the engineers who designed such self-aware machines? Travers glanced at Mark, Dario, and Tor now. The Sherratts were studiously ignoring Teniko, but Tor Sereccio had seen the look on his face and was fuming. Only Dario’s hand on his arm restrained him.
“Object match,” Lai’a announced. “Taurus 465, class-B quasar, on the edge of normal deep scan resolution. Standby.”
“On the edge of resolution?” Rusch echoed in a tone of sheer disbelief.
“This is quite correct, Colonel, and I appreciate your astonishment.” Lai’a paused, then, “Object match. Eridani 119, the black hole.”
“A monster x-ray source that lights up the whole sky in that band,” Rusch said quietly. “You know it, Barb?”
“I should. I wrote a paper on it when I was doing Physics 401.” Jazinsky was watching the same datastream. “I’m recognizing the signature off it, but it’s so faint.” She spoke in a hushed whisper. “Richard, we’re one hell of a lot further out than we predicted. The gravity tide between Orion 359 and the Gojin Drift must transit some kind of deformation in transspace. For want of a better word, an old fashioned shortcut. We haven’t seen this before. Lai’a, were you aware of any ruck in transspace?”
“Not during transspace flight. Immediately upon entry to the driftway adjacent to the Gojin gravity well I took readings which appeared anomalous,” Lai’a said coolly. “Further readings proved these anomalies to be accurate. Little information regarding the transspace distortion is available at this moment; analysis is incomplete. Would you care to review it?”
“Yeah, I would. Let me have it at Tech 1,” Jazinsky said hoarsely.
The flatscreen had brightened when Lai’a added, “Object match: Draco 884, the pulsar.”
“Three for three,” Jazinsky whispered. “You can calculate our position from those. All right, Lai’a, where the hell are we? Put it in the tank.”
Travers’s mouth was dry as he watched the starfield rotating in the navtank, constellation lines forming up – tiny with distance, punctuated by icons marking the position of the known objects and, by inference, Hellgate itself. Their home gate.
“Oh, my gods.” Rusch’s voice was barely audible.
“Tell me,” Travers invited. “We’re not all astronomers.”
Taking a deep breath, Jazinsky straightened from the workstation and pulled both hands through the white-blonde hair, raking it back from her face, which was pale in the instrument lights. “From any reference point we understand, we’re in the constellation the Resalq call Lornala – I believe it means Scimitar. An observer on Velcastra would say we’re roughly in line-of-sight with the blue giant, Lornala 182, which is comparable to Orion 359, in terms of sheer distance from home. It’s a speck in Velcastra’s sky, not even visible against city lights. But we’re about forty-five thousand light years on the far side of Lornala 182.”
At first the words refused to make sense to Travers. They rolled around in his mind’s ear while he blinked at Marin, Vidal, Vaurien, waiting for perspective to hit him. When it did, his body raced from cold to hot and back to cold in as many seconds.
It was Jon Kim who said in a small voice, “Does somebody want to tell me what all that means?”
The Ops room was silent until Vaurien said in a curiously calm tone, “Lai’a, if you were unable to insert back into transspace, how long would it take you, at long-term sustainable speeds, to return to the Deep Sky?”
“Approximately twelve years,” Lai’a said without hesitation, “assuming no mechanical issues. On a flight of such duration, however, technical difficulty is inevitable. An estimate of fifteen years would be more reliable, and twenty would not be unreasonable.”
“Shit,” Vidal muttered as Travers’s heart performed a double-thump and the pulse drummed in his ears.
“Drop a comm beacon, Lai’a,” Vaurien said in the same measured voice which perhaps only Travers and Jazinsky knew was a mask for feelings too turbulent to be acknowledged. “It can’t do us any harm here. And speaking of comm, you got anything on the highband?”
“The sky is noisy across a wide comm spectrum, Captain Vaurien,” Lai’a reported. “The Zunshu bands are highly active. I have pinpointed eight probes in this region. Two local to the Gojin Drift came online when they registered my engine signature. They are passive monitoring devices of an unfamiliar type, and transmitting at this moment. The language is not the same as that used by the core AI of the Kjorin stasis chamber. The gist of the data in transmission is unknown, but is likely a report of an unknown vessel of a technology previously not seen in this region, plus coordinates. Should we linger here, we could expect to be assaulted.”
“We’re not staying,” Vaurien said icily.
“In addition,” Lai’a went on, “several comm bands below those used by the Zunshu are busy with undirected transmission consistent with public broadcast. I have been recording since I exited the Drift. The microwave signal uses unfamiliar signal encryption and compression; the origin is alien. Analysis has begun. When reliable data is available, would you like me to stream it to your quarters, Doctor Jazinsky?”
“You read my mind,” she muttered.
“And mine.” Mark paused. “The public broadcast you’re receiving … do you have direction on it?”
“At least eight star systems,” Lai’a told him, “suggesting a homeworld and seven colonies.”
“None
of which,” Dario said hoarsely, “seem to have been hit by the Zunshu – or they wouldn’t be transmitting. They’d be obliterated.”
“The source systems are quite distant,” Lai’a added. “It is important to remember, these signals have been en route for decades. The originating worlds might easily have been obliterated long ago. Four other stars in much closer proximity to the Gojin Drift are entirely compatible with those of the transmitting worlds. These are anomalously silent; none is broadcasting on any band, even basic radio. It is entirely possible these worlds are razed. Would you care to cruise them, Captain Vaurien, Doctor Sherratt?”
For a long moment Vaurien hesitated, looking from Mark to Barb and the Sherratts. “How long, Lai’a?”
“Six days to circuit three of the four.”
“Too long.” Mark lifted a brow at Dario and Tor, and both nodded. Mark frowned into the tank, where data scrolled far faster than Travers could hope to follow it, even if he had understood the content. At last Mark said musingly, “If the signals you’ve been recording are public broadcast, and you’ve captured a wide enough sampling of them, when you’ve cracked the data encryption, there’s a good chance the answers will be there. A documentary, educational and fictional programming. You might find references to lost frontier worlds, or a war with the Zunshu, perhaps ongoing hostilities.”
“If it’s a war, these people could be winning,” Queneau muttered.
“Are they?” Jazinsky was less sure. “The Deep Sky is just as bright with the same kind of comm traffic, Jo. We just haven’t lost major worlds yet, but until we seeded the swarms to guard the exit-lanes out of Hellgate, we could have lost them any day. You want to call that winning?”
“Maybe,” Queneau was frowning at the Resalq. “We’re doing better than the ancients did.”
“A hell of a lot better,” Tor agreed acidly. “We got shit beaten out of us, and we never did squat to hurt the Zunshu.” He was restless, edgy, impatient. “Mark, if we’re not going to go look for ruins, we need to get out of here.”