First Principles: Samair in Argos: Book 3

by KOTCHER, MICHAEL

  Quesh looked up from his work, recoiling slightly from her face being in his display. He sighed. “Stella, I really hate it when you do that.”

  She smiled. “Well Chief, I don’t have a physical body to make footsteps on the deck plates, so unless you want me to start coughing a lot until you answer me, this is the best I got.”

  “What do you need, Stella?”

  “There’s a strange signal that we’re picking up on the edge of our sensor range that I’ve never seen before. I’ve had George analyzing it but we’re not really getting anywhere.” She pursed her lips. “I’m thinking this signal looks familiar, but I can’t place it with anything in the ship’s databanks.”

  He nodded. “Let me see it,” the engineer said. “Not really sure that I’m necessarily going to recognize anything…” He checked the signal information and frowned. “Well, this looks like a burst transmission from a satellite.”

  “A satellite?” Stella asked. “But there aren’t any satellites near us.”

  Quesh shrugged both sets of shoulders. “There has to be. Based on this data, it has to be within five hundred thousand kilometers.”

  “But I’ve had George run the finest grain scans possible and we can’t find anything.” Stella actually looked genuinely upset, and Quesh had to hide a smile. AI’s, he’d quickly discovered, especially this AI, hated puzzles that had no answer. It itched and festered and the AI couldn’t help but try to scratch.

  He nodded. “I’ll run it through a few analyzer subroutines,” Quesh told her. “See what I can come up with.” Then an idea came to him. “Get in touch with Mondragon. She certainly isn’t as big as we are, but her sensors are a bit more powerful. Milspec.”

  She beamed. “Great idea! I will.” Then she frowned. “It is only a frigate, though. Sensors aren’t nearly as good as they would be on a battlecruiser or heavy cruiser.”

  “And since we’re plum out of those,” he noted sardonically, “You and the engineers and sensor techs on the warships are just going to have to muddle along the best that you can. I’ll run these,” he said, gesturing to the display then he pointed one finger at her. “And you get in touch with Mondragon and get to work on the problem that way. Hopefully it will turn out to be nothing, but maybe you’ll find something.” And he gave her a look. “Andy you better keep the Captain in the loop about this, Stella. I mean it. He’s going to want to know.”

  She nodded. “Of course, Chief.”

  “Stella…”

  She held up hands in mock surrender. “I will!”

  “Good. Now git.” He waved his hands in a shooing motion. She saluted, smiled and vanished from the display. He shook his head and then set to work.

  “The AI over on the Grania Estelle was right, sir,” Ykzann reported after having done a few intense scans with Mondragon’s sensors. “There is a very faint signal being transmitted, and we’re almost on top of it. It isn’t on a frequency we normally monitor, which is why we missed it. But I’ve incorporated it into our standard sensor sweeps, so we won’t have that issue again.”

  Leicasitaj nodded. “Very well. Have you been able to isolate it?”

  “Yes, sir. It’s about eighty thousand kilometers off starboard and at a vector about two degrees above us,” the zheen said. “I’m feeding the vector to the helm, sir.”

  “Helm, change course,” the Romigani ordered. “If there is something along this vector, I want to find it. There shouldn’t be any satellites in this system, unless Captain Eamonn left them here.”

  “According to Stella on the Grania Estelle, sir,” Ykzann put in, “They did drop a comm sat in orbit on their first trip here, but no others. Anything we find, someone else put here.”

  “And the fact that we can’t see anything but only detected a faint trace means that someone went to a lot of trouble to keep it hidden,” Leicasitaj replied. “And that worries me.” He sat himself a bit more comfortably in his command seat. “Sensors, make sure you’re running continuous sweeps, as many frequencies as possible. Stay linked up to Grania Estelle and make sure you share your data, as well as their sensors. Ours might be more powerful, but theirs picked up the pulse in the first place.”

  “Aye, sir,” Ykzann said, waving his antennae.

  “We’ve got ships incoming, Leader,” the tech sitting at sensors said, sitting up straighter, taking his feet down off the console.

  “What? How many?” Leader Mogrin asked, sitting up. Unlike most of his crew, who were zheen, Mogrin was human, something that his crew would normally deride him for. But after his first day in command and when the chief tactical officer shot his mandibles off about how weak and soft humans were, Mogrin rushed him, wrapped one of his burly hands around the zheen’s neck and then used the other to tear open the tactical officer’s thorax. After that, no one dared defy their new commander.

  “Three, Leader,” Xoxix answered. “One warship, looks about half again as large as Sessilan, and two larger vessels. Look to be cargo ships, according to the spysat. One really big one, and one much smaller.”

  “Give me more than that,” Mogrin snapped.

  The zheen looked contrite. “Sorry, Leader. The big cargo ship is about a kilometer in length, probably a bulk hauler; the smaller one is a medium freighter of some type. Unknown configuration on both.” He chittered to himself for a moment. “Check that. The bulk freighter is in the data banks; it was uploaded from Ganges when Lord Verrikoth captured this ship. The bulk freighter is positively ID’d as Grania Estelle. It was under the command of Armsman Gideon Jax, and was supposed to be on its way to Amethyst. Actually, the Armsman was directed to take the ship there some months ago.”

  “Are they sending out proper beacon and recognition ID?” Mogrin asked, checking his own monitor. Sessilan was a captured Republic ship, a Ramza-class corvette. The design wasn’t new, twenty-seven years, but the ship itself was: Sessilan was only six years old. And although the battle with the Republic heavy cruiser hadn’t been the most uplifting of ventures, Lord Verrikoth had managed to pull a victory out of what might have been a crushing defeat. They’d lost a light cruiser, but they’d managed to save three Republic vessels and a lot of swag from the trading station, before they trashed it. Now his ship was all fixed up from the battle and he and his crew were dying for some action.

  “No, Leader,” Xoxix reported. “They’re broadcasting their ship names, and two of them, the warship and the bulk freighter are both showing IDs as belonging to something called ‘First Principles’.”

  Mogrin frowned. “Tell Toroj to hold position,” he ordered. “Whisker laser only, we don’t want to spook our prey. Are those ships giving any indication they’ve detected us?” The two pirate ships, the corvette and the cutter, were tucked behind one of the moons of the fourth planet, using the spysat to keep an eye on things. The sat was sheathed in the best stealth coating the Republic replicators could make, something that Mogrin wished he could cover all of Sessilan’s hull with. It would make his job a lot easier.

  “The frigate and the bulk freighter have gone active on their sensor sweeps,” Xoxix replied. “They’re banging away like mad with their active scans, but they’re not changing course. They’re still on a vector for the third planet.”

  “Keep an eye on them. They shouldn’t be able to detect our spysat and eventually they’ll calm down,” he predicted. “And when they do, they’ll get complacent and lower their guard again. Besides, our friends down on the planet will keep them plenty occupied. And then we’ll be able to move in and snatch up a few fat, juicy prizes. Hell, even if we can only get the small freighter, might justify this whole trip.” Mogrin leaned back in his chair slightly, a smile spreading across his rugged features.

  Chapter 19

  “Entering standard orbit,” Isis reported, pressing a few more commands on the helm console. “Done with engines.”

  “Thank you, Isis.” Eamonn pressed his comm key. “Ardeth, get your shuttles ready. Leave shuttle two up here, but take the other
four down. Make sure that you bring Saiphirelle’s security teams with you. I am not taking any chances.”

  “Understood,” the cargo specialist replied. “I’m already in the boat bay and I’ve got the security chief already loading her people onto all the shuttles.”

  “Very well. Keep me informed. Bridge out.” Vincent laid his head back against the headrest on the chair, looking at the overhead. “I really hope that these security measures are unnecessary.”

  “I think you’re making the right call, Captain,” George told him. “We want to keep our people safe. And the cargo,” he said after a moment’s reflection.

  “I know. But I feel like we’re overreacting,” Eamonn replied. “I don’t like that we’re sending armed security teams down with our shuttles. We haven’t needed to do that before in any serious capacity, even after they had that reactor explosion.” He sighed heavily and rubbed his eyes with one hand. “And now, because of some twitchy remarks, I’m sending down most of my security contingent, armed for battle.”

  George shrugged. “I suppose if we show a strong enough front, if there is someone looking to start trouble, they would back off. I know I would if I saw a fully armed and armored lupusan coming my way.”

  Eamonn snorted and the other crew members on the bridge chuckled. “So would I.” He nodded, slapping his hands on the arms of his command seat. “All right. We have shuttles that are going down to the planet and apparently there’s some kind of signal out there that we’re trying to locate. Cargoes to load, sell and unload. Work to do.” He got up from the chair and headed for the hatch. “Set normal in port watch, second section has the detail. I’ll be in the wardroom. Mister Miller, you have the bridge.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  “Captain, I must say it is so good to see you,” Acheron Vall gushed, his image clearly showing the man. He was in the study at the makeshift government office at the fancy house. The governor himself, however, looked to be rather worse for wear. His suit was rumpled, he hadn’t shaved in a couple of days, in short, the man looked like hell. He did look relieved, however.

  “I’m glad to be back, Governor,” Vincent replied. “I have a full load of fuel and I am just aching to sell it to you.”

  He nodded, a little too quickly and enthusiastically, Vincent noted. “That’s excellent news. We’ve been having a serious shortage of He3 fuel.”

  Vincent frowned. “Yes, about that, Governor. I’m confused. When we left, I made sure that your He3 storage tanks were topped up. You also had shuttles and a fuel collector in the gas giant, all of which were perfectly functional. That should have left you with more than enough fuel to see to your needs until our arrival here, even if you were running everything full blast.”

  Acheron waved a hand. “Well, that’s neither here nor there. I’m just glad that you’re here and that you’ve got that load of fuel we need.” His eyes darted to the side and back to the screen.

  Vincent nodded slowly. “Is there something wrong, Governor?”

  “Wrong? Why would there be something wrong?” he asked. “I was just concerned that we would have to start rolling blackouts soon.” He looked off to the side of the screen again. “I’m sorry, Captain. I have another call coming in that I have to take. I’ll have my people make sure that yours are welcomed at the landing pads and we’ll have the currency ready for transfer into your accounts.”

  Vincent put a small smile on his face. “Of course. Duty calls. The shuttles should be heading down to the planet in the next half hour and I’ll be sure that my people are ready to receive your cargo handlers.”

  “Thank you, Captain,” the governor said, sounding enthusiastic again. The relief was pouring off of him, as though some bullet had just been dodged. Vincent wasn’t convinced it was just a metaphoric one. “Vall out.” And the screen went blank.

  Vincent looked over to the tabletop, where Stella was seated, cross-legged. “What do you think?”

  “He’s nervous about something, Captain,” the AI confirmed. “Pupil dilation, his rapid breathing, his appearance, all of it points to deception of some sort.” She pursed her lips and frowned. “I don’t know what he’s hiding or who he’s hiding it from, but he is hiding something.”

  “You think he’s lying to himself?”

  Stella blinked. “I suppose, Captain. I’m pretty good at reading people, especially humans, but I don’t think that’s it.” She threw her hands up and then let them fall. “I mean, I suppose he could be lying to himself about something, but why? The amount of stress in his manners and his appearance indicate that he’s being bothered by something big.”

  “Can you rescan the conversation we just had?”

  She nodded. “Done. What am I looking for?”

  “Can you tell if there’s someone else in the room with him while he’s talking?”

  Stella smiled. “Why Captain Eamonn, I am impressed by your devious nature. Tamara would be impressed.”

  He grinned at her. “Tamara is sneaky and she might have some tricks I’ve never seen before, but she hasn’t been making runs through the Argos Cluster for as long as I have. I can still teach her a thing or two.”

  “I’m running through some scanning algorithms now,” Stella replied. Then she shook her head. “I can’t give much information, but yes, there is someone in the room with him. I can detect noise of movement and breathing, and not all that far away from the vid pickup. But as far as who’s there with him, that I can’t answer; I don’t know.”

  Vincent sighed. That was disappointing. Not the fact that Stella had detected someone, but the fact that she couldn’t give more information about whoever it was. “Nothing? Not race or species? Male? Female?”

  Her eyes narrowed, clearly she was giving it thought. Was she giving it a lot of thought? Enough that would warrant the five second delay, or was she just mimicking human behavior? “I’m detecting two other individuals in the room, aside from the governor,” she said. “There’s a seventy-two percent chance that one of those people is a human male. I’m afraid that’s only coming from the sound of the breathing. Aside from that? I can’t tell. There isn’t a lot of moving around, mostly just Governor Vall. I’m afraid I can’t get any more information than that. Not without more data.”

  “It’s all right, Stella,” Vincent replied. He’d known it was a long shot when he’d asked, but there was always a chance that the AI might be able to pull off more information from the recording. “I want to know what’s going on here, but so long as they keep buying our fuel and other parts, I guess it doesn’t much matter.”

  Stella frowned. “But doesn’t it matter, Captain? I mean, we don’t know what’s going on, but I know that you’re convinced that something is.”

  “You aren’t?”

  “There’s enough subjective evidence from the Governor’s demeanor, the fuel situation and the other individuals off camera on the call to give a reasonable probability that there is something ‘going on’, to use your phrasing, Captain. But whatever it is, how do we know it’s anything more than just internal political wrangling? How do we know that it isn’t anything underhanded, just factions vying for control?”

  Now Vincent frowned in confusion. “So if there’s political wrangling, and other factions are vying for control, you’re not concerned?”

  “You’re twisting my words around, Captain,” she replied, giving him a look and sticking out her tongue.

  Vincent sighed. “I think I need to have you remove that particular… affectation, Stella. It’s really immature.”

  “I know,” she said with glee. “It’s why I do it! It’s so fun.”

  “All right, so you were saying?”

  “Spoilsport,” she pouted. “All right. I am concerned that something is going on, Captain. But as you say, so long as someone down there keeps buying our fuel and our replicator time, I suppose as far as FP, Inc. is concerned, that’s the extent of what we care about. But I know you, Captain. And Tamara and the others on this shi
p and in this company. We’re not just corporate vultures, caring only about where the next credit is coming from,” Stella pointed out. “I know you care about people, about your customers and what people think about you and your crew. If bad people are starting to take control of the government here, I know you’re going to want to step in and do something.”

  Vincent thought about it for a long moment. Before Stella’s “birth”, before Tamara’s arrival, before Grania Estelle had been anything other than just an itinerant merchant ship, travelling from system to system eking out a living, he would have argued. Back then, it was too dangerous to care about other people, about anything other than making sure the payment came in, the fuel bunkers had enough seawater and the systems were patched enough to get the ship to the next system, he didn’t care who he was dealing with, what their politics were or who they did business with. Now, though… “We’re trying to be respectable now,” he admitted. “I don’t just represent myself and this ship; I’m representing the whole company. And it does bother me that I don’t know what’s going on in this system.” He took a long, slow breath. “I want you to dig into this, Stella. Get with Saiphirelle and see what the two of you can dig up about this. Don’t let it distract her from her primary duties, but make sure that the both of you find out what you can. I’ll keep talking to official sources from up here.”

  The AI nodded, getting to her feet. Why she did that, Vincent couldn’t tell. It wasn’t as though she was actually walking anywhere, and in fact he was quite certain that she was already working on numerous other projects while she was talking with him. Keeping the reactor under control, even with all of Quesh and Tamara’s fine tuning, required her constant presence. It was just another of many things that she did to maintain the illusion that she was a human girl, instead of an artificial computer construct. With a nod, Stella turned on the spot and vanished in a puff of holographic smoke and a rain of holographic glitter.