“Bradley to Cooper!” his communicator yelled, bursting back into life on the emergency frequency. “Just hold on. I'm coming.”
Looking up, he could see that one of the stars seemed to be moving, gradually growing in size as it dived towards him. He couldn't make out either Rhodes or Hunt, though his sensor display told him that they were safe in a low orbit. They could wait for a while. He would be crashing onto the surface in less than three minutes.
The thrusters finally faded away, only a few pulses of fuel left in the event he reached the shuttle in time. He hefted the corpse on his shoulder, looking at the opaque helmet, shaking his head. For thousands of years he had rested in peace on his ship, and now that he had arrived, his rest came to an abrupt end. When all of this was over, he had to be returned to whatever remained of the wreck.
As he watched, the point of light became a dot, slowly growing and forming into a shape, the long, winged bullet of the transfer shuttle. Glancing down at his watch, he shook his head. Two minutes to impact.
“If you don't get this right, Barbara, abort,” he said. “Don't risk everyone on the shuttle for me.”
“I'll get it right,” she replied. “Just hold still.”
The shuttle drew closer, the maneuvering jets firing in a series of controlled pulses to fly as close to him as it could, matching velocity and course. As the last minute of his life began, he used the last of his fuel to throw himself towards the airlock, his hand reaching for the handhold, making desperate contact as he slammed his hand onto the emergency release. Tossing the body in ahead of him, he swung inside, closing the hatch behind him and activating the override to keep them both in vacuum.
“Go!” he yelled, and the shuttle's engine fired, tossing him to the wall, knocking the breath from his body from the impact. The roar built for a few seconds, long enough to throw them onto a clear trajectory, before coming to a halt.
“That was close,” he said. “Thanks.”
“Next time, when I ask you to be careful, do as I say,” she replied. “Now get back inside, and we'll go and pick up the others.”
Shaking his head, he said, “Not yet. We've got an unexpected guest on board, and I don't think the oxygen would do him any good. Hopefully I've salvaged something from this mess.”
Chapter 2
Orlova stepped into the briefing room, looking around at the assembled officers. Cooper and Bradley sat next to each other in their customary positions, opposite Sub-Lieutenant Salazar, her Security Officer, and Lieutenant Harper, Intelligence Officer. At the far end of the table was Lieutenant Cantrell, who had effectively appointed herself as Tactical Officer before they left Yeager Station. As she took her seat, the door opened, and the remaining three officers arrived, all Senior Lieutenants. Frank Nelyubov, her Executive Officer, sat next to her, flashing her a quick, apologetic look, and Jack Quinn sat on the other side, his uniform the usual disheveled mess. Ambling in last was John Powell, Science Officer, carrying an armful of datapads that he dropped onto the desk.
“You know we have an integrated network,” Harper said, shaking her head. “If you need me to help set you up, you only have to ask.”
“Thank you, but no. I prefer to do it this way. It makes it easier for me to know where everything is if I can just reach for the right datapad.” Sliding them into a rough pile, he said, “Sorry we're late, by the way. My fault. I was still running an analysis on the soil samples from the bottom of the shoes.”
Nodding, Orlova said, “You all know the purpose of this meeting.” Tapping a control, she flashed up a starfield over the table, a red line showing Alamo's course up to this point. “For the last six weeks we've been charting unexplored space, looking for any clue about the not-men, and aside from some possible signs of mineral surveys, we hadn't found anything. Until this morning.”
“I've cross-checked with everything in our database,” Nelyubov said, “and that ship was definitely something new. No common design functions with the ships of that era we've encountered before, aside from the usual points of similarity that we can attribute to these ships being built for humans. Of one sort of another.”
“Who was he?” Cooper asked.
“Well,” Powell said, “From the DNA samples we've taken, it looks very much as if you managed to rescue the body of a not-man, Ensign. Though not quite along the same lines as the race we've been dealing with up till now.” Reaching across to a datapad, he entered a sequence of buttons, sending a pair of double-helix spirals racing into the air. “If you note the differences in the...”
“Short version, Professor,” Orlova said.
“Call them proto-not-men. A missing link between homo sapiens sapiens and homo sapiens novus. The body was around six thousand years old, and that in itself leads to some interesting questions. It doesn't fit the timeline.”
Nodding, Nelyubov said, “So far, everything we've found points to a destructive war ten thousand years ago, and an even larger one thirty thousand years ago. This could be the first evidence that there was at least some interstellar travel in the gap, and if the not-men, or their ancestors, were operating in space at that time, it raises a series of new questions.”
Cantrell frowned, and said, “That ship's a puzzle. It didn't look much like a warship to me. No serious hull armor, no signs of missile launch tubes or reflectors.” With a shrug, she continued, “I suppose the armament might just be something I can't recognize, but I don't buy it. There are only so many efficient ways to launch a missile.”
“I don't think it can have been a transport, either,” Powell said. “There isn't much left on the surface, but enough that we could get some sort of idea of the internal layout. No large cargo bays, no tanks. I suppose it could have towed something behind it, but I can't think of a way to make that work with any form of faster-than-light travel that we know about.”
“Have we ruled out that they might have come from somewhere in this system?” Salazar asked.
“Three worlds, Sub-Lieutenant, and none of them even remotely suitable for supporting life, not now, and not thousands of years ago,” the scientist replied. “The resources in this system are nothing that could be found in any of a hundred other systems, many of which have more significant resources. I have run a thorough scan of the area, but I can't find anything.” Cracking a smile, he added, “Though I suppose I should add that I didn't find anything when we first arrived, and this ship was hiding in the shadows.”
“How long for a through check, to make sure we haven't missed anything else?” Nelyubov asked.
“A hundred and nine days, requiring seven hundred and ninety-one probes of various types, as well as overflights and landings on the planets in the system,” Powell replied. “There is no question in my mind that the ship was hidden deliberately, position where it would not be detected without a thorough search.”
“I agree,” Bradley said. “I was flying almost right for it, and I didn't spot it until I got close. If we hadn't been conducting that training run, we'd have missed it.”
“What about the suit?” Cooper asked.
“Well, the engineers are extremely interested, for a start,” Powell said, “but I presume you are wondering about the dirt on the soles. We'll have to give posthumous thanks to the lazy technician that did a half-hearted job of cleaning them, because he's provided us with our best lead. I'd expected to find that they came from somewhere in this system, but analysis told a different story.” He tapped another control, and the starfield reappeared, a jagged line running to another a star, just within jump range, curving back towards United Nations territory. “Marzanna, an ice world orbiting GCS 9-222.”
“Are you sure?” Orlova asked.
“Certain. We've got samples taken from the first exploratory mission, back in 2140. Perfect match. Someone from that ship was walking around on that world, six thousand years ago.”
Quinn coughed, and sai
d, “I know the world.”
“How?” Orlova asked.
“When I was helmsman on Gilgamesh, we operated out of that system for a few months, during the last year of the War, raiding some of the outer shipping lanes. There's a free port orbiting that world. At least, it was there then. I haven't been there in years.” His face deepened to a red, and he added, “The night-life was quite something, Captain.”
Nodding, Nelyubov added, “Never mind what sort of a reception we might get, we do need to refuel at our next stop. While we can use the refueling shuttle, it'll be a lot quicker if we can get dock facilities. Assuming, of course, the station is still in orbit. That shouldn't be difficult to check up on.”
“Even if it isn't, there's a ring system,” Quinn added. “Perfect conditions for refueling.”
“I'm not so sure about this,” Cantrell said. “We're dipping back into explored territory. And besides, if this system has already been explored, doesn't it seem likely that we're looking for something that isn't there?”
“Possibly, but the first expedition didn't know what to look for,” Powell said. “And if this station...”
“Spartacus Station,” Quinn offered.
“If it is like any free port I ever visited, they'll have discouraged any deep investigation of the area. There might never have been a follow up.” He glanced down at a datapad, and added, “The last expedition was interrupted by the declaration of war, and since then, we've got no record of any official visit. Aside from Gilgamesh, that is.”
“We didn't conduct any checks,” Quinn said, nodding. “As far as I can remember, none of us ever even went down to the planet. We spent most of our time up on the station, or working on repairs. There was this…,” he paused, looked around, and limply concluded, “but that isn't important right now.”
“Intelligence report?” Orlova asked.
Looking up from a datapad, Harper said, “Nothing special listed in my files. Just confirmation that there was a station there a few years ago, a quick visit by one of our agents on an undercover mission. It's a bit out of the way for us, to be honest. We're a long way from our territory.”
“But close to the United Nations,” Cantrell noted. “Our mission is secret, and this poses a risk that we might be discovered. There's a good chance that they'll have operatives on the station at the very least, maybe even an official presence of some sort. We can't be sure of a friendly reception. Or even any sort of reception at all.”
Powell shook his head, and replied, “Again, if it is like any free port I've ever visited, the last thing they want to do is discourage military visitors. They live or die on the money they can extract from tourists, and no-one spends like a spaceman on leave.”
Nodding, Nelyubov added, “The crew could use a rest, Captain. We've been on high alert since we left Thule. Further, there might be a chance to get some dispatches home, update the Admiralty on the status of our mission. Frankly, if I'd known about this facility, I'd have suggested we detour here anyway. If we can find something interesting out there, that's a nice bonus. As for security concerns, I suggest we cloak ourselves in a portion of the truth. We've been conducting an exploratory mission, and we're stopping off at Spartacus to refuel for the flight home.”
Cooper frowned, looked at Cantrell, and said, “I'm forced to agree with the Lieutenant. I'd like to know how an inert ship suddenly decided to throw itself down to the surface as soon as a boarding party arrived. We were careful not to interfere with anything, and certainly didn't touch any controls.”
“You think this might be a trap, a decoy?”
“I don't think we can rule that out.”
“Come on, Ensign,” Powell said. “Your wife said it herself. We only stumbled across that ship by chance. If someone did hide it in that orbit, that just makes it more important that we go and take a look. Whatever their mission was, we know that it revolved around Marzanna, and we know that they were on their way home when they died. They must have been.” He gestured at the map, and said, “We know next to nothing about this region of space, except that the not-men came from somewhere in this general direction.”
“What makes you think their mission was important?” Harper asked. “For all we know, it was a simple survey flight, an exploratory mission just like ours.”
“They were attacked,” Powell said. “The images we have of the outer hull, taken from the shuttle and the boarding party, make it quite clear to me that at least some of the damage sustained by that ship was man-made. I suppose it is possible that they scuttled the ship themselves, but that seems unlikely.” He pulled out another datapad, and said, “The body you found, Ensign, had experienced significant trauma before he died. A broken leg, skull fracture.”
“Not to mention that they'd trapped the ship,” Quinn added. “That suggests to me that there is something on board they don't want us to find. Something pretty damn important.”
Nodding, Orlova said, “Worst case, this detour will allow us to refuel and resupply at a friendly port, and give us a chance to send some messages home. We'll conduct a full investigation of the system, and Jack, I want you to prepare a briefing on everything you can remember about the station. If you were there for months, that ought to be quite extensive.”
“Probably something in the Gilgamesh logs, as well,” Nelyubov added. “I'll prepare a precis for the crew.”
“Professor, is there any reason to delay any longer in this system?” Orlova asked.
“I don't think so,” he replied. “Our team on the surface has done about everything it can. There just wasn't that much left after the impact, but we've taken a good selection of samples and secured the site for a later visit. We're clear to leave the system as soon as you order.”
“Ship status, Frank?”
“All nominal,” Nelyubov replied. “Ready to go. We'll be on dry tanks when we get there, though.”
“Maybe we should refuel here,” Cantrell said. “There are some good ice chunks out in the far Trojan point we could use. I know it would take a couple of weeks, but...”
“Not looking forward to the bright lights, Lieutenant?” Harper asked, a cheeky grin on her face.
“In my experience, leaping too quickly tends to mean that those lights are incoming balls of plasma. I just don't like the idea of being stranded in a system if something goes wrong.”
“Noted,” Orlova said. “Nevertheless, given that we want to be on our way again as quickly as possible, I think we'll choose the speedy option.” She glanced up at the clock, and said, “Pass the word to all hands that we will be leaving the system in thirty minutes. Is there anything else?”
“I don't think so,” Nelyubov said, and no-one in the room moved to contradict him.
“Then dismissed, everyone.”
The officers rose to their feet, filing out of the room, Salazar leading the way in animated discussion with Harper, while Powell seemed to be trying to get details of the better drinking holes from Quinn. Cantrell lingered at the door, turned for a second as though about to say something, before changing her mind and heading down the corridor. Nelyubov remained, still in his seat, as the door closed on the last of the others.
“I thought I'd better stay a while,” he said. “Joe Kibaki can handle the egress as well as I can, and I somehow got the impression that you might want to talk.”
She nodded, and said, “Cooper and Cantrell are right, damn it. All of this does seem a little convenient. If it wasn't that finding that ship must have been a fluke, I'd be expecting a trap.”
“And now?”
“I'm still expecting a trap. We didn't have more than a few minutes to investigate the vessel before it crashed into the planet. Someone is hiding something, and we have no means of finding out want. Except diving back towards United Nations territory, and I agree with Cantrell again. I don't much like being stuck in a system needing to refuel e
ither. Normally we'd have options, we'd be able to escape and evade for a while, but this time we're at the mercy of a station that may or may not still be operating.”
He shrugged, and replied, “There aren't any safe choices, out here. Space Kraken might be waiting for us at the system we'd been planning to head for, waiting to chew us up and spit us out when we arrived.”
She shook her head, a smile forming on her face, and replied, “Space Kraken? That's the best you could come up with?”
“Best I could do on such short notice. If you're that concerned...”
“No. The whole purpose of our mission is to seek out the location of the not-men. We know that they were settled somewhere out here in the wake of a great war, and we've finally got some evidence that they were spacefarers at some point in the past. Anything we can learn about them is valuable, but if we can find the location of their homeworld.” She paused, shook her head, and said, “Then this expedition comes to a successful conclusion a lot earlier than we expected, and we can return this way with a fleet and settle this mess once and for all. Before they can launch another attack.”
Nodding, Nelyubov rose to his feet, and said, “I'd better come up with a search pattern for the planet. There must be something in the database I can use to get started, anything to save a little time when we get there. At least we can narrow it down a little.” He waved a datapad, and said, “According to this, there's only one planet in the system. Just a ball of ice in the middle of nowhere.”
“A more important nowhere than anyone there thinks,” Orlova said, looking at the starfield. “Think of it, Frank. Someone else, not unlike us was out here ten thousand years ago, doing exactly what we are doing now. Strange, isn't it.”
He nodded, and replied, “I wonder...”
“What?”
“I wonder if someone will be coming this way ten thousand years from now, and wonder about us?” He shook his head, pushed his chair under the table, and said, “I'd better be getting to work.”
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