The Vassal World (The First Exoplanet Book 2)

by T. J. Sedgwick

  “So what are your thoughts on using the new, improved FTL-gate precision?” asked Powell to Romero and Christina. His tone was relaxed as he felt the first signs of sleepiness after his long day and heavy meal.

  “Look, I think that the sending-aircraft idea may have some merit…” said Romero.

  “But…?”

  “...but, the current maximum FTL gate diameter limits us. So that means fighters and small bombers rather than the strategic bombers we’d like to send through. Second, the FTL gates still fail and need rebuilding after quite a small number of jumps, and that limits the number of drones we can send. Third, you've got to ask yourself how much of a chance they’d stand in airspace absolutely dominated by Korgax aircraft and anti-aircraft systems. I’m afraid, unless we jumped many hundreds of drones simultaneously in concentrated formations, then they’d simply be picked off one-by-one,” argued Romero.

  “Transiting them as a formation is probably not even possible at the moment due to the precision uncertainty – they’d be scattered across a 5km-radius sphere,” added Christina.

  “Right, plus we need something for homeland defence should these bastards invade Earth. All the signs from Gaia are showing they will. Our air force is depleted as it is,” he continued.

  “What about sending through cruise missiles? They’d fit the maximum gate diameter okay. How about sending through a few hundred Scimitars?” suggested Powell, feeling convinced there was some way they could use the FTL gate improvements to deliver the knock-out blow. He would keep pursuing his friend and colleague, Secretary of Defence, Romero, until all avenues were exhausted.

  “Again, Stephen, we’ve only got a limited number of transits and a limited number of gates. We could send some, that is true, but not hundreds. Time is running out and we don’t have the capability to produce many more FTL gates before LG-Day…” he said, as Christina interrupted. She looked like she had something urgent to say.

  “Sorry to interrupt, Diego, but here’s something for you...Do you know the maximum water depth we measured in the oceans on Gaia?”

  Blank looks, before Powell guessed, “Err, I know on Earth it’s about ten, eleven kilometres. Why?”

  “It’s a lot deeper than that on Gaia. The deepest place we found was 24km deep in one trench. The deepest abyssal plain, 18km. So...” she continued, as Romero went to interject, only to be headed off by Powell.

  “Don’t steal her thunder, man!” he said, smiling.

  “...So what about sending through a sub? A strategic nuclear sub? I’ve heard you talking about them...” she looked from Powell to Romero and back to Powell, hoping she’d not overlooked something obvious making her idea ridiculous.

  Nobody had considered using the FTL gate or drive in water before. It was initially designed for use in space. The more recent full-scale testing in Earth’s atmosphere had been a step-out since no one had been quite sure how the flow of air would affect it. As sure as the intended object got transmitted to another place, so did the air adjacent to the gate. Romero raised his eyebrows and looked to Powell, his expression saying: worthy of serious consideration.

  “Well, we’d be able to get all of our remaining nuclear subs through, even the Esperanza with a 13m beam. The effect of water at a thousand times the density of air rushing through is another consideration though,” said Romero, unsure of the precise effects of this.

  Christina had a better handle on this than he. “We know transiting something from an air-filled environment reduces the life of the gates simply because the amount of mass going through it is higher. Extending this idea to water would reduce the life still further, but isn’t it still worth considering?”

  “Certainly it is, and we’ll raise it in our next call home tomorrow,” replied Romero.

  Powell nodded smiling, “So let me make sure I have this right. Because the accuracy of the drive is +/-5km which is a lot less than the water column depth on Gaia we can send through our subs?”

  “Exactly right, Stephen,” said Christina.

  “What about the Korgax navy?” asked Powell.

  “According to the Outcasts – and our own intel confirms this – they no longer have much of a navy. Ever since they kicked the Outcasts off Gaia they’ve had no need and have diverted resources to the other branches of the military. So that’s a massive boon compared to transiting air force drones to Gaia,” said Romero. Almost forgetting the other key benefit, he continued, “And...and, the fact that our subs have survived, despite the orbiting Korgax fleet, shows they are undetectable!”

  “Man, if we can pull this one off it could be decisive in the Battle for Gaia!” exclaimed Powell, looking to Romero for confirmation.

  “It’s a fantastic idea, Christina,” he said, smiling at her, “But let’s wait and see what the strategists say. I have a feeling that only the USS Esperanza will make the difference though,” speculated Defence Secretary Romero.

  “Why so?” asked Powell.

  “Because every other sub – including those of the other major powers – use ICBMs…”

  “ICBMs?” asked Christina.

  “Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles – nuclear armed, multi-stage missiles that go up into space and come back down. A rapid way to get to target, but they’ll be seriously vulnerable to Korgax anti-missile defences.”

  “And the Esperanza? What’s so special about her?” she asked.

  “She’s latest generation and doesn’t use ICBMs. Stealth scramjet cruise missiles, and a helluva lot of ‘em. This baby could wipe out most of the enemy all by herself!” proclaimed Romero with pride.

  ***

  October 8, 2063: Outcast Underground Base, Exelon

  “When you told us about the idea last week, Admiral Sheldon had one immediate concern, Stephen...” said Vice President Jefferson on the EQP line to Powell, Romero and Christina on Exelon.

  “Which was?” asked Romero.

  “Which was that even though the precision to Gaia is now +/-5km and the sea water column is deep enough, these subs are rated to a few hundred metres at best,” replied Jefferson.

  Powell looked to Romero and Christina. Romero shrugged and nodded, looking slightly embarrassed to have not thought of it initially. Christina looked down, a little sheepish. If a sub were to be transited to a water depth of more than a few hundred metres it would be crushed by the immense pressure of the water bearing down on it. In fact, any rated operational depth on Earth would need to be downrated for Gaia due to the 12m/s2 gravity – twenty percent higher than Earth’s. To ensure the sub jumped into water – not into the atmosphere above the sea – the target coordinates would need to be at least 5km deep since the inaccuracy was no better than +/-5km.

  “So this is a bit of a showstopper then, isn’t it?” asked Powell. He felt disappointed at what could have been a winning move falling at this most obvious of hurdles.

  “Not necessarily…” said Jefferson, smiling. Romero’s ears suddenly pricked up, causing him to pre-empt the VP.

  “Has there been a breakthrough in precision? Can we strengthen our subs in some way?” he asked tentatively.

  “No, not a breakthrough – it’s only been a week since the last update. And there’s nothing like enough time to completely overhaul sub designs. No, the research team at Groom Lake think they have a solution,” revealed Jefferson. Christina’s grin grew into a full-scale smile as she started nodding in understanding of what Jefferson was about to say.

  “This is how they explained it to me: you know how when we transit from Earth into space around Exelon we get the out-rushing of air? Essentially the air, as well as the capsule we send people in, is being sucked through the singularity. Well here’s what it relies on: the same thing will happen with water. Now the disadvantage of this you identified yourselves – the mass flow of the water will reduce the working life of the FTL gate. But it’s also the solution to the depth problem,” said Jefferson, surprisingly well versed in principles he was explaining second hand. Testa
ment to his intellect and, Powell thought, his note-taking. VP Jefferson was a diligent note-taker.

  “Indeed…!” said Christina, continuing to nod, already knowing the answer.

  “By placing flow-meters around the FTL gate ring we can tell what water depth is the other side. As I understand it, if the water pressure on the Gaia side is higher than around the FTL gate on Earth, then there will be a flow of water towards Earth. And from the speed of the water we know how deep the terminal coordinates under Gaia’s sea is. That way we know if it’s too deep or not. If there’s no flow we know the water pressure is the same on the other side. If it’s a massive outflow of water from Earth then the terminal coordinates are probably above Gaia sea level.”

  “But doesn’t all this flow of water cut the life of the FTL gate?” asked Romero.

  “It does, but they’ve worked out a way to rapidly calibrate destination coordinates based on the flowrates – some sort of control system with a feedback loop. It still may take a few minutes to do this, depending on how lucky we are with the early attempts. Nobody knows why there’s still the inaccuracy. Hell, no one fully understands how the thing works. All I’m thankful for is that it does work!”

  “The calibration time will be because they need to wait until the flow rate stabilises to get a fix on the depth for each attempt,” added Christina. She understood the idea well and felt slightly annoyed at herself for having not thought of it. Nevertheless, she was pleased some bright spark researchers had.

  “So, did they advise where the best place for the underwater FTL gate would be?” asked Romero.

  “They drew up a shortlist and just settled on a location 40km due south of Mobile Bay in the Gulf of Mexico. At thirty-six metres water depth it’s shallow enough for diving operations, but deep enough to cover the large FTL gate and allow the subs through. There’s plenty of civilian maritime activity and thoughts are that we can disguise the loadouts on oilfield supply vessels. If the enemy gets wind of this they’ll blast everything to pieces from orbit. The alternative is submerging the loadouts near shore and towing them underwater; but that’s a far more tricky operation apparently – and slower too. The visibility should be bad enough to hide the underwater work once it’s started,” explained Jefferson.

  It seemed to Powell as if they had it all worked out already. Amazing how facing imminent destruction and being on a war-footing could ease the wheels of bureaucracy, he mulled.

  “Stephen, what I’ve laid out is the recommendation endorsed by the Joint Chiefs as well as the researchers here. We’ve already shared it with our allies under WGA protocols, but we need your endorsement to tell the Russians and Chinese. That is part of the recommendation as they still have operational subs we could really use,” said Jefferson.

  “Any objections, Diego?” asked Powell. “Christina?” he continued, out of courtesy more than anything else.

  “No, I think the more subs we can get through the better. Obviously, there’d need to be a priority of transit if we only have the time and resources to build one subsea FTL gate. Esperanza first, followed by the most capable of ours, the Royal Navy’s and the Indian Navy’s subs with non-WGA subs last. If we can follow that as an outline then I’m good with it,” concluded Romero.

  Christina said nothing, just a brief shake of the head: nothing to add.

  “Okay, let’s go ahead and tell the Russians and Chinese. Need-to-know basis only, of course,” added Powell.

  “Certainly,” confirmed Jefferson, “leave it with me.”

  ***

  October 10, 2063: Office of Sergei Bekov, Head of the Foreign Intelligence Service, Russian Government Emergency Bunker under Central Moscow

  “Sergei, as I am sure you know already, I have authorised the sailing of SSBN Vladimir Putin to the location of the American subsea FTL gate once it’s built. It will not be ready until January – so no need for her to set sail yet,” said Russian President, Roman Demenok, to his long-time protégé.

  Bekov’s network of spies had informed him, via multiple avenues, of the despised Westerners’ plan well before they’d been officially told.

  “Yes sir, I know about the Putin. They want her in on the invasion of Gaia and as many SPETSNAZ as we can muster. Nice of them to invite us to the party eventually, sir. I suppose the Putin was our ticket in,” said Bekov, sardonically.

  “Now now, Sergei, I’m sure they always planned to tell us at some point, but I have to admit they are a little on the slow side. Right, back to what I want from you…” continued Demenok. Bekov’s focus sharpened at once – nothing mattered more to him than satisfying his master’s wishes and thereby enhancing his grip on the greasy pole to the top. Demenok was aging and he wouldn’t be around forever. The even older Minister for State Security – Bekov’s immediate boss, Dmitry Marinov – would soon be put out to pasture and he’d be there to replace him. Such was Bekov’s close relationship with the President that he routinely circumvented Marinov in any case. Old, irrelevant fool, he thought, maliciously.

  “...I need you to advise me how we can best benefit from this information. As usual, the Westerners have, so far, cut us out of their alliance building with the aliens they call the Outcasts. Apparently they have been kowtowing with their little fish-faced friends for months now, while we’ve been left here to ponder our fate. They want us to take in the World’s displaced, but they tell us little of their plans for Earth’s liberation and the asteroid,” Demenok said, growing angrier with every word.

  “Do you mean what bargain we can strike with the Westerners, if they...now we, are successful in the Battle for Gaia? How can we best leverage others with this information – our allies in Latin America, non-aligned nations? Dare I say it...the Korgax?”

  “Sergei, I know this kind of thing is your forte. The only other thing I can say is: everything is on the table, Sergei. Everything.”

  Chapter Eleven

  December 14, 2063: GNN World News Centre, Atlanta / United Nations Building, New York City

  News anchor, Dana Alessi, wore a fitted, business-like black dress as she continued to give details of the mass exodus from the Tropics – some of it planned, some of it disorganised chaos. She stood by a large one-piece video-wall showing stylish infographics explaining how many poor souls had upped sticks and where they were going. It was a sanitised political map, full of pretty coloured arrows and stick-men – each one representing one hundred thousand lives. The good-looking, high-cheek boned thirtysomething stroked a few strands of her, otherwise perfectly coifed, hair behind her ear and continued, “So the graphic tells the story so far: just two months until impact and the exodus has not gone well. As it stands, pledges have reached only 140 million of the 1.9 billion that are eligible for resettlement.”

  A bar chart made up of people icons counted up the 1.9 billion, then the 140 million beside it.

  “As the latest figures from the UN show, even 140 million is wishful thinking. That report, released today, estimates that only 27 million have been relocated, with projections reaching only 43 million by the impact date. That asteroid collision date is Valentine’s Day, February 14, next year. However, sources tell us that the Korgax will divert the asteroid and seize all land between the Tropics of Capricorn and Cancer just prior to that date. They want Earth, and the asteroid is there to persuade us not to attack their fleet again as we did during Operation Stellar Shield.”

  A third bar appeared with blue-coloured figures depicting the relocated 27 million. Red people icons on top made up the total the 43 million final estimate. The height of the bar looked puny in comparison to the total registered for resettlement – 1.9 billion. The message was grim: only around two-percent of eligible people would be evacuated in time for the presumed Korgax ground invasion and seizure. Nobody knew what they had planned when they arrived – or when exactly. They could divert the asteroid and attack later, but that didn’t make any sense. Whatever happened, all the evidence so far had convinced people that the invasion woul
d be disastrous however it played out.

  The infographic was replaced by stills of refugee camps, crying children and stern-faced border guards.

  “Routes out of tropical areas have been gridlocked for weeks now as people clamber to escape. It’s thought that hundreds of millions have dispersed into the countryside, with many guerrilla training camps having been set up in the Amazon basin, the jungles of Africa, Borneo and Sumatra.”