by Meridian
“Affirmative,” Halliburton answered. Lear noted with approval Technician Halliburton’s efficiency.
She predicted good things in his future. A few gestures at his controls produced displays of a sunset over a chain of arctic islands, the sky darkening through shades of chartreuse to an impossible forest green; storms of mottled olive clouds blowing across a prairie; a hurricane over one of the tropical regions; wind blowing sand across an immense desert; snowfall on a mountain in the far north beneath a sky, pale and green, like sea salt.
Medical Specialist Jersey Partridge, looking on, could not hide his awe. “A whole new world. It’s incredible and so green.”
“And we’ll be the first to see it,” Lear said like a teacher addressing small children. “Zoom in on that city.” She pointed to a brown splotch on the western side of Meridian’s continent. Halliburton zoomed in on the city. It was a seacoast town, rising high and dense from a fan-shaped delta at the mouth of a continental river. The river forked into two branches that bracketed the city.
Lear stared intently at the city’s heaping buildings and wide boulevards. At one-meter resolution, there was not a lot of detail, but enough to convey an impression of monstrously huge towers and domes, half buried/half emerging from beneath the rubble of some vast earlier civilization of masonry and stone.
There was one mountainous tower at its center. “That one looks promising. Designate it as landing site Alpha.”
On Prudence’s flight deck , TyroCmdr. Redfire was looking at the same city as Lear. Redfire was a student of cities, a companion of cities, and they had revealed secrets to him that were hidden from more casual travelers and even their native inhabitants; out-of-the-way shops containing unexpected treasures, neglected alleyways and streets that provided surprising perspectives.
Now, as he stared at the display in front of him, Redfire knew that something was not right.
Viscerally, it was the lack of open spaces, of parks, of monuments, of differentiation among sectors, of decoration, and of links to other cities. Humans don’t build cities like that, he thought. Another oddity, his scans detected no aircraft, no satellites, no airborne technology of any kind.
He switched to an electromagnetic field scan, and was surprised to see energy pouring out from the top of the city, like lava spewing from a volcano. What was it? The waste from their central power source?
If so, they were monstrously inefficient, the energy spewing out was almost four times the rest of the city’s entire power output.
He checked another display. “Take a look at this,” Redfire said to Driver. “I believe the Merids are tracking our probes.”
“How do you know that?”
“I have a theory that their communications system phase-compressed photon bursts. I can’t read it yet, but I can detect it. The amount of communication taking place in each city spikes whenever one of our probes passes over.”
“Are they preparing a hostile response?”
“I don’t know yet.”
Driver nodded. “If they are going to attack us, I would prefer an attack in space to one in the atmosphere. Prudence has more speed and maneuverability in space.”
“They appear to lack any capability for space travel,” Redfire said, and yawned. “We’ll make orbit in about four and a half hours, and I need to process this. I think I’ll take a sleeper. Wake me up when we make orbit, or sooner if any excitement arises.”
“What kind of excitement?”
“Like an attack on our probes, mobilized ground forces, Ex.TC Lear exhibiting a natural emotion.
Anything like that.”
Driver nodded. Redfire rose and took the lift back to the main cabin. Lear and the other techs were gathered in the fore-cabin, itself a replication in miniature of the curving bridge of Pegasus. Lear was standing at the most forward station, next to a pudgy, slack jawed technician. He crossed to her. “I’m going to take a sleep period.”
“Very good. Sleep well.”
“While I’m gone, I suggest you analyze the photon pulse signals on the planet’s surface and try to isolate a decoding algorithm.”
“Photon pulse signals?” Lear asked.
“Let me show you,” he leaned over the station and accessed the probe telemetry. The pulses from the cities appeared like bursts of white bubbles. “Looks like someone is home.”
“Well, done, Tyro Commander,” Lear said coolly. Redfire gave her a smirky salute. “Position Probe One to scan for phase-compressed photon pulses,” she ordered Halliburton. “Take probe four out of orbit and into the atmosphere. Program for biometric-scan. Set it down near landing site Alpha.” Eddie Roebuck wasn’t sure what he was supposed to be doing, so, every thirty minutes, he checked the ship’s manifest against the cargo inventory, just to make sure they matched up. He figured it was the kind of activity Tyro Commander Lear would approve of. Halliburton seemed to be impressing Lear quite well. Good for him, Eddie thought. Couldn’t happen to a jammier assol.
The others excitedly consumed every point of data the probes sent. It made him think of children on Solstice Eve. He did not share their excitement, Solstice had let him down far too often. If anything, every glance at the black and green sphere of Meridian filled him with foreboding. He could not shake the feeling that something dark and nasty was looking back at him.
Frankly, Redfire’s idea of a nap was appealing to him. Quietly, he slipped toward the rear of the ship, following Redfire, but not drawing attention to himself.
Meridian
On the surface of Meridian, those who governed the world had noted the arrival of four space vehicles into orbit. One had since descended to the surface. These were determined to be automated probes, of no significance in themselves.
However, it was postulated that the presence of these machines heralded the arrival of additional ships, a hypothesis borne out when a larger vessel entered orbit.
The masters of Meridian were eyeless, but they scanned the intruder in as much detail as their technology permitted. It was determined that the vessel carried sensors, armaments, and humanoid life forms whose heartbeats created faint vibrations on parts of the spacecraft’s skin, from which it was deduced that the life forms numbered seven.
It was soon determined that the spacecraft represented a useful technology without posing a significant threat. Those who governed Meridian were accustomed to complete control of their world. The addition of a small ship with seven humanoids on board was no threat to their world’s perfect equilibrium. They feared it no more than an ocean fears a drop of water. They feared it no more than a hurricane fears the flutter of a butterfly’s wings.
It was decided to extend an invitation to their visitor.
Prudence
Probe Four had plunged its long spiky nose into the middle of a meadow, its three large fins sticking out of the ground. The horizon behind it was nearly filled by the geometrical brown smudge of one of Meridian’s cities. Probe four extended tendrils into the ground, drew water and soil samples into an internal laboratory, and sent the results to the orbiting Prudence.
Lear watched the telemetry. “Technician Partridge. Set up the biological analysis protocol.” Partridge accessed a DNA/protein analysis program to see whether viruses or bacteria were present in the Meridian environment that would be deadly to the landing party. Then, he would analyze the protein structures of Meridian’s native plant and animal life to see whether they would be lethal or allergenic. Redfire appeared at the rear of the cabin, pulling on his mission jacket and brushing his hair with his fingertips.
“Tyro Commander Lear,” called Specialist Taurus, sitting at the tactical sensor station. “I’m getting a signal from the planet. It’s coming from the city you designated as Landing Zone Alpha.” Lear brought up the signal at her own station. “Direct it to the Lingotron for decoding.” The Artificial Intelligence inside Prudence’s BrainCore chewed on the signals for some seconds, then issued a report. Signal equates to binary code sequence variatio
n. 90 percent probability data received refers to ground coordinates, speed, vectors. A moment later, numbers began flowing across one of the displays.
“Landing instructions,” Lear exclaimed.
“Affirmative,” said Halliburton. “They lead to Landing Site Alpha.”
“Transfer them to the navigation computer. Lear to Flight Lieutenant Driver, stand by to receive landing coordinates.”
“Acknowledged,” said Driver.
“Very good.” She turned to Redfire. “We have confirmed inhabitation and technology. The prerequisites for first contact have been met. We should prepare to land.”
“I’ll concur, but we should proceed with caution,” said Redfire.
She touched her embedded comlink. “Flight Lieutenant Driver, proceed on the landing vector.
Landing Zone Alpha.”
“Acknowledged, Tyro Commander.”
Driver brought Prudence smoothly into the atmosphere with a gentle push of her gravity engine. The monitors inside the main cabin showed the pearlescent green, cloud-speckled curvature of Meridian resolve into sea, sky, and, in the distance, land. Driver cut speed, took pseudo-gravity off-line, and let the planet’s gravity lend them weight.
“Tyro Commander Lear, Tyro Commander Redfire, you better look at this,” said Conda Taurus. She drew their attention to a trio of sensor returns, ahead of Prudence, and closing quickly. “Tactical shows three craft on an intercept course.”
Redfire brought up a schematic of the ships. Spheroid in shape, with broad spiky bands dividing them into hemispheres. “I am scanning nuclear fusion propulsion, energy-pulse and kinetic weaponry.”
“I don’t think we need to assume they’re hostile,” said Lear.
“I’m not assuming anything,” Redfire responded.
“Have you attempted to make contact?” Lear asked Taurus.
“Negative.”
Lear plugged herself into the communication systems. “This is Goneril Lear, representing the pathfinder ship Pegasus of the former Commonwealth Colony Worlds of Republic and Sapphire. Anyone hearing this message, please respond.”
“I wouldn’t expect an answer,” Redfire told her. “No life signs; the interceptors appear to be automatons. The intense radiation I’m reading would make it impossible for a pilot to survive.”
“Targets closing, now at 4,000 km. Estimated time to interception, 6 minutes,” Taurus reported.
A call from the flight deck. “Driver, here. Tracking three unidentified targets on intercept course. Shall I evade.”
“Negative,” said Lear.
“Lingotron has a translation on the signal from Alpha Landing Site,” Halliburton reported. He displayed it.
THIS IS CENTRAL AIR TRANSPORT REGULATOR. FOLLOW LANDING INSTRUCTIONS PROCEED WITH
INTERCEPTORS TO LANDING AREA.
“No greeting, just purely functional information,” Redfire observed.
“I have visual on the landing area,” Halliburton reported. Redfire and Lear looked up at the monitor.
Thousands of meters below, still hundreds of kilometers away, the city appeared as a huge tan-gray smudge. Purplish rain clouds hovered over the city center, dousing it with a steady stream of water.
A moment later, a shape buzzed by the ship, the low bass note of its engine throbbing through the air.
“Interceptors in range,” Redfire reported. “Surrounding Aves in a delta formation. Putting defensive systems to standby.”
“Hold! The escort craft are not exhibiting any hostility,” Lear said.
Redfire took another look at their “escort.” It almost seemed like it was chewing up the sky in its metal teeth. “Za, and her sister’s just as pretty as she is,” he muttered. “We should maintain a tactical alert Situation 2… strictly out of caution.”
“All right,” she conceded reluctantly. “But no first use. Commit weapons only if we are attacked. Mr.
Halliburton, Signal Pegasus that we are landing.”
Redfire looked again at the sphere. It was not the kind of thing that would shoot at them. It was the kind of thing that would explode next to them, taking out both ships. If he sensed a power build-up to critical, then to hell with no first use.
Prudence flashed over the plains of the southwestern part of the continent as the city rose on the horizon. Her crew had seen the towers of Alexander on Republic, 2,000 meters high, but even those would have gone unnoticed in the huge city that spread before them on the vast plain. It was one thing to observe from space that a city covered 10,000 square kilometers, quite another to be flying over it, dwarfed by its enormousness. Pegasus itself, passing above the city, could not have put even a tiny corner into shadow.
Redfire whistled low. “I saw the long-range scans, but they don’t prepare you for a city this…”
“Not a city,” Lear interrupted. “A giant arcology.”
“A what?” asked Med. Technician Jersey Partridge.
“Arcologies,” Lear explained. “Urban habitats housing tens of millions of people in a self-contained environment. We tried them on Republic, but they didn’t work out.” Redfire filled in the blank because he didn’t think Lear would. It was one area of Republic’s History more familiar to Sapphireans. “After the fall of the Commonwealth, some Republic City-States tried to consolidate their populations into arcologies, to conserve fuel and other resources. Within a few years, the stress of living in close quarters under tight control caused many of their inhabitants to become unhinged. Internal violence reached levels we can’t even imagine. The authorities responded by clamping down even tighter, causing even more violence. The cycle repeated until several of the arcologies collapsed into anarchy.”
“Republic did not have the luxury of atmosphere and climate that Sapphire did,” Lear said defensively. “Considering the finite limits of our shipboard environment, we or our descendants may have something valuable to learn from the Meridians.”
A shadow fell over the cabin. Redfire called to the cockpit. “What’s going on?” Driver reported back calmly. “We are proceeding toward the city center. We’ve entered a sort of landing corridor, approximately 200 meters wide with tall buildings on either side.” He sounded less concerned than his fellow crewmen, flying in the shadow of those gargantuan buildings and occasionally passing under enormous pipes and conduits.
Driver’s voice was suddenly punctuated by the determined rat-a-plan of rain on the canopy. “We’ve encountered precipation. Our velocity is 200 meters per second. ETA at city center, 59 seconds. … Oh, and the escort ships have departed.”
Redfire checked his scanners. The escort ships had peeled away and were heading upward, away from Prudence. He checked the other tactical sensors. Whether missiles, kinetic, or energy weapons were tracking the ship from the ground, he could not be sure.
“There’s no people down there,” said Spec. Taurus.
“Neg, I’m reading millions of life signs,” Partridge responded.
“Za, but do you actually see anyone outside? Look. There aren’t any streets or parks or anything down there. Everything is closed off. It’s like Republic, but this planet has a good atmosphere. Why are all the people inside?”
“Maybe it’s the rain,” Halliburton suggested.
A message came from flight deck. “It looks like its going to be a tight fit. If everyone has moved forward, I’m going to reconfigure Prudence for a smaller landing profile.” Lear responded. “We’re all forward, proceed.”
Structures on Prudence’s wingblades and fuselage drew inward. Her full cargo bays limited the extent of the reconfiguration, but when the reconfiguration was complete, Prudence was six meters narrower, and four meters shorter.
“We’re here,” Driver announced as Prudence passed under a long series of enormous, polished-metal arches and into the base of a towering structure in the center of the city. The construction was more mountain than building. Its foundation would have covered the City of Alexander. Its summit was above the rain clouds.
> chapter eight
Pegasus Main Bridge/Primary Command
“Could I possibly have some more light?” Keeler demanded. Primary and auxiliary lighting were still out, and the only illumination came from emergency handheld lighting units that lights shook and danced as the crew fixed them into position. It made Keeler think his next order should be to have everyone start telling ghost stories.
“Commander William Randolph Keeler, we need to talk,” the voice from nowhere repeated insistently. Its tone was flat and androgynous; Keeler assumed it was coming through a processor of some kind in order to hide the speaker’s identity. “We need to talk/interface/communicate/exchange information.”
“Well, the auto-thesaurus still works. If the comlinks are down, where is that coming from?” Keeler demanded.
“It’s coming from the Command Center Sound System,” American answered from the Ops Station.
“How? Nothing else is working.”
“I would like to be able to tell you, sir, but I cannot.”
“Well, figure it out.” He pointed to the forebridge, where a young specialist was pointing an elaborate astrolabe through the observation dome. “Who is that kid and what is he doing?”
“Technical Specialist First Class David Alkema. He’s trying to acertain our current course.”
“Did I order him to do that?” American shook her head. “Well, it seems like a good idea, anyway.
Specialist, do you know where we’re going yet?”
Alkema lowered his instrument. “I can confirm we have completely reversed course and are leaving the Meridian system.”
“Leaving for where?” Keeler asked.
“Our current course will return us to the exact point at which we exited hyperspace.” Alkema put the instruments and star charts away. “There’s nothing else I can do here. With your permission, I’d like to join one of the engine shutdown teams.”
“Go to,” Keeler sighed and Alkema exited, downloading the PC-1 datalogs and verification codes into his datapad as he approached the rear hatch.