“We create anonymous usernames on the forum,” said Bingwen, “ones that the Fleet can’t trace back to us, and we attack this memo. We write counterarguments and stress the importance of considering every viable possibility of the Formic command structure, including the idea of a Hive Queen.”
Mazer smiled. “As a superior officer, I strictly forbid you from doing any such thing.”
Bingwen squinted at him. “You’ve already done so, haven’t you? Built an anonymous account, I mean.”
“Don’t play innocent,” said Mazer. “You’ve been posting anonymously to the forum for a long time. At least, I’m 95 percent certain that one of the usernames I follow is you. And I’m pretty certain another username is you as well. Don’t give me that innocent look. Both of these anonymous individuals stopped posting about seven months ago, right around the time we boarded the transport and lost net access. Coincidence?”
“Actually, I have three usernames,” said Bingwen. “But they’re long neglected, so I should probably create a new one anyway. If you can trace them back to me, maybe someone else can, too.”
“Don’t tell me what your new username is or when you post. Never mention it again. In fact, the last word on the subject is that you will not pursue this and neither will I. Understood?”
“Understood,” said Bingwen.
“Good.” Mazer turned back to the forum on his display. “Now, sadly, this Hive Queen memo is only the beginning of our problems. We’ve been out of the loop for seven months, and most of it isn’t good. Take this, for instance.” He tapped a post and it opened on screen. “A month ago an IF warship fired on a Formic-seized asteroid in the Belt. Typically this is a relatively easy strike for us. The cocoons the Formics build around the asteroids are filled with hydrogen gas. Ignite them, and the whole thing blows up in spectacular fashion, as you know all too well. The asteroid breaks apart. The unfinished Formic warship being built inside is released prematurely, exposing all the builder grubs and Formic larvae to the vacuum of space and killing everything instantly. The IF gives itself a high five and moves on to the next target.”
“Why do I get the sense a big ‘but’ is coming?” said Bingwen.
“Because it is,” said Mazer. “The igniting of the hydrogen gas in this case wasn’t nearly as explosive as the IF expected. The cocoon vaporized, but the rock didn’t break apart, and no warship was released.”
Bingwen shrugged, unconcerned. “They blew the cocoon early in the mining process, before the tunnels had been dug and the asteroid had lost its structural integrity. Probably before construction on the warship had started, too.”
“That’s what the Fleet ship assumed,” said Mazer. “And believing their work done, they went on their merry way.”
“I sense another ‘but’ coming.”
“Fast-forward to one week ago,” said Mazer. “To the IF’s head-scratching surprise, they discover another cocoon around the same asteroid. Replacing the one they had already destroyed.”
“Weird. That would be surprising,” said Bingwen. “But I see two possibilities. A different crew of Formics, freshly arrived, orchestrated the construction of this new cocoon. Or, option two, the explosion didn’t completely kill the first crew of Formics and grubs. Maybe they were in the Formic miniship and protected from the explosion.”
“The IF ship made the same assumptions. But to make sure, they sent a team of commandos into the tunnels, only to discover that the tunnels had been sealed off with hullmat.”
“The Hive Queen is blocking access to the ship,” said Bingwen.
“And protecting her mining and builder worms and her larvae,” said Mazer. “She’s changing her strategy. She’s seen us blow up her asteroids, so now she’s instituting countermeasures to ensure that we don’t do it again.”
“That’s why the asteroid didn’t break apart when the Fleet first shot it,” said Bingwen. “The Hive Queen made the interior of the asteroid airtight. All the IF blew up was the cocoon and the hydrogen gas between it and the surface of the asteroid.”
“And everything beneath the hullmat was protected,” said Mazer. “Basically, this means our entire strategy to stop Formic ship construction is out the window. Because now we can’t simply fire on the asteroids, blow them up, and walk away. We have to send people into the tunnels to penetrate hullmat roadblocks. And then, once we’re through the barrier, then we blow the asteroid.”
“The only substance that penetrates hullmat is the NanoCloud that Lem Jukes developed,” said Bingwen.
The NanoCloud was a swarm of nanobots that supposedly “unzipped” the hullmat molecules by breaking apart their ionic bonds. In practice it looked like magic, like the hullmat was dissolving into nothing.
“NanoCloud is the answer,” said Mazer. “No question. But it’s not designed to be handled by marines in narrow Formic tunnels. It’s designed as a projectile. The current delivery system is a missile that fires pellets of NanoCloud at the surface of a ship. Like a shotgun blast. The individual pellets adhere to hullmat and create a type of mini-dome beneath which the NanoCloud is released on the hull. Then it essentially dissolves the hullmat by breaking it apart.”
“So what are the marines in these tunnels doing now?” Bingwen asked.
“They’re asking for help,” said Mazer. “They’re posting on the forum and asking for ideas on how an individual marine might safely carry and use NanoCloud to penetrate the Hive Queen’s roadblock countermeasures.”
“Has anyone suggested anything worthwhile?”
“A few proposals are trickling in, but nothing that shows great promise. The problem with NanoCloud is that it doesn’t discriminate. It will unzip anything made with silicon, including a pressure suit or the visor of a marine’s helmet.”
“Do those things have silicon?” Bingwen asked.
“I don’t know,” said Mazer, “but that’s the first thing I’d wonder if I were a marine being asked to handle the stuff out in the vacuum of space.”
“How can we help?” said Bingwen.
“We can’t until we understand how NanoCloud works. That’s our first objective. I’ve checked our stock records here at GravCamp. There are eight canisters of NanoCloud shot capsules in the armory.”
“What are you suggesting?” said Bingwen. “That we stroll into the armory and ask the quartermaster to give us a barrel of NanoCloud capsules to play with? No chance of that working.”
“Agreed,” said Mazer. “We’ll need to acquire them a different way. Do you have a backpack or a bag in your quarters that you can carry them in?”
“You want me to steal from the armory?” said Bingwen.
“Not steal,” said Mazer. “Borrow. Surreptitiously. I’d do it myself, but I’m confined to quarters, and I suspect this is a job better suited for Rat Army.”
“You’re not supposed to know our secret name.”
“We were crammed in the selenop for a long time. You and Nak don’t always talk quietly.”
“Assuming I’m able to acquire a few capsules of NanoCloud,” said Bingwen. “Then what? This stuff could be volatile. If it eats through silicon and we unleash it in the space station, it could eat a hole in the wall.”
“NanoCloud isn’t a chemical,” said Mazer. “They’re nanobots. They turn off and on. We learn to control them before we handle them. Borrowing NanoCloud is probably one of the last steps here. The first being learning how to manipulate it and what the delivery system should be for an individual marine. This is involved. Lots of steps. You’re going to need all of Rat.”
“This is insane,” said Bingwen. “We haven’t even been here half a day, and already we’re robbing the place and planning to buck orders from CentCom.”
“We’re fighting a war, Bingwen. Just because we’re essentially in prison doesn’t mean we stop fighting.”
CHAPTER 6
Imala
Of the hundreds of technological advances achieved immediately prior to and during the Second Invasion, the g
reatest of these from a military and sociological perspective was, without question, the creation of the ansible. Developed in secret by a team of engineers gathered by Ukko Jukes, the Hegemon of Earth, the ansible was based on principles of philotic theory, which, prior to the First Invasion, were given little serious consideration within the scientific community. The central hypothesis is that all objects in the universe, regardless of size, are interconnected by philotic strings, and that paired subatomic particles across vast reaches of space can influence each other instantaneously.
During the First Invasion, as theories regarding the Hive Queen gained wider acceptance, particularly the belief that she could communicate with all of her children instantaneously via philotic strings, efforts to develop a communication device based on those principles began in earnest.
The actual ansible took on a number of iterations throughout the war as engineers learned how to build smaller and more intricate systems to influence and track the paired particles. The number of ansibles in use, however, remained relatively low throughout the war. Only one in thirty ships had one. As a result, a ship fortunate enough to possess an ansible would typically serve as the communications vessel for the fleet to which it belonged, sending and receiving instant messages to and from CentCom.
Due to the secrecy surrounding the ansible and the Hegemon’s desire to safeguard the technology solely for military use, each ansible was housed in its own room on a ship. Only one individual, known as the communications officer, was given access and allowed to operate the ansible. This policy proved to be a great frustration to many captains, who were unaccustomed to and bristled at being denied entry to any room on their vessel. Any captain who violated these regulations, however, was quickly removed from his or her post, and all infractions ceased.
The Hegemony was so protective of the technology that the very word “ansible” was classified. Instead, officers were ordered to refer to the ansible either as “the device” or “the quad,” a fictitious name that falsely suggested an object of four equal parts. Despite these efforts at clandestine nomenclature, the term “ansible” was often used among senior staff.
—Demosthenes, A History of the Formic Wars, Vol. 3
* * *
Imala hovered in the ship’s hydroponic garden, pruning dead leaves from the tomato plants and trying to ignore the discomfort in her abdomen. Pregnancy had proven far more agonizing than she had imagined, especially now in the third trimester, with her womb so big and rotund that every activity in zero G was an exercise in awkwardness.
Insomnia didn’t help matters. Imala’s body screamed for sleep. And yet as soon as sleep shift rolled around, the baby would start kicking and shifting and pressing down on her cervix, as if the little stinker was determined to keep Imala up and moving. Tonight was no different. Imala had tossed and turned for a while down in the ship’s fuge before finally giving up and coming to the garden, hoping that a little physical labor would tire her out so severely that she’d fall asleep despite the baby’s movements.
Yet working alone in the garden while most of the ship’s crew was asleep meant that Imala’s mind was free to wander and worry. She couldn’t help herself. The ship was five to six months away from the nearest medical facility, and Imala was keenly aware of the dangers of giving birth on an isolated warship this deep in the Kuiper Belt. What if something went wrong with the delivery? What if the baby had complications and needed special neonatal equipment to stay alive, equipment that wasn’t on board the Gagak? What if the baby required an operation? What if, what if, what if.
A few weeks ago, she had mustered all her confidence and buried those fears, convincing herself that all would be well. The ship had an IF doctor among the crew, after all. Not an obstetrician, of course, but a doctor nonetheless, which counted for something. And Rena, Imala’s mother-in-law, had helped deliver nearly two dozen babies over the years as a midwife among her asteroid mining crew. That too gave Imala extra comfort. And then there was Imala herself, who by virtue of some stubborn maternal protector instinct, was simply not going to allow anything to happen to her child.
But now, eight months into the pregnancy, with the delivery fast approaching, all the doubts she had entertained early in the pregnancy were once again surfacing and taking root in her mind. Her child, this innocent, fragile person inside her, this symbol of her love for and union with Victor, might not survive.
The worst part was that she couldn’t share her concerns with Victor. She couldn’t ask him to carry this burden with her. He likely didn’t even know that she was pregnant.
She laughed quietly at that. A laugh that turned immediately to tears. It was so absurd. So ridiculous. Her husband didn’t even know she was pregnant. She had watched him climb into a zipship and rocket away without either of them aware that something was growing inside her.
She reached over to the next plant and began searching for the dead leaves.
If only I could just crawl into a sleep sack, she thought, like everyone else and sleep in zero G.
But no, Imala had to sleep in the fuge, the spinning center of the ship where she could experience a full G of gravity. It was strange to sleep on a mattress again, to feel the weight of her body sink into the foam and springs. She had been sleeping in zero G in a sleep sack for so long that lying down on a mattress now felt foreign. Her arms, so accustomed to floating effortlessly beside her, now flopped about like limp eels—sometimes even striking her in the face when she adjusted her position. How did people sleep this way? How had she slept this way for so much of her life?
She had no choice, however. Gravity was good for the baby’s growth and development. Necessary, even. Cells didn’t divide as quickly and as regularly in a zero G environment. Humans had evolved with their feet on the ground, and thus the development and delivery of human offspring required gravity as well. Gravity was our friend. Birthing a baby in space disrupted the entire process.
Still, to go from zero G to a full G in a day, with a baby inside her, was like changing who she was. Shedding one skin and putting on another. One minute she was floating, the next minute she was like a stone balloon trying to get her feet under her. It was almost a blessing that Victor didn’t see her this way: ankles swollen, chin thick, face plump; even her fingers felt chunky.
Rena often told Imala how beautiful she was, that there was nothing in the universe as lovely and perfect as a woman with child. But even though Rena was probably being genuine, it sounded to Imala like a lie, like pity.
Imala pulled a wilting leaf off the vine and stuffed the leaf into the compost pouch on the wall.
The garden was a tube-shaped space with plants rooted in the walls, their vines and leaves growing inward toward the center, as if reaching for Imala, begging for her attention. A pole traversed the room from end to end, like a fireman’s pole through a cylindrical jungle. Imala gripped the pole to steady herself. Her other hand, when not plucking a leaf, rested on her stomach, as if cradling the baby and keeping it inside her, away from a world ill-equipped to receive it.
She wondered what the Formics would plant if they took Earth. Did they have a fruit like tomatoes? Their fauna was so unlike our own that the prospect seemed unlikely. Their plants had evolved using a different protein structure, perhaps even harnessing light in a way that no Earth-born plant ever could. An alien version of photosynthesis, maybe. That’s why the Formics had scoured southeast China, burning away the landscape and peeling back all biota. Their plants couldn’t thrive alongside ours. Earth had to be reborn, the old harmful biosphere burned away so a new one could emerge and take its place, one more accommodating to the Formic species. Otherwise the Formic young could not survive.
The young.
Imala smiled sadly to herself. There I go again. Try as I might to take my thoughts elsewhere, they somehow always return to children. Her child. The only child that mattered.
“Can’t sleep?”
Imala started, releasing the tomato vine she had just
grabbed, and turned toward the sound of the voice.
Rena hovered at the exit, steadying herself at a handhold, her baggy sleepwear rumpled and unkempt, her white hair unruly, as if she had just floated out of her sleep sack. “I don’t want to be the annoying mother-in-law who nags you all the time, but you do need sleep, you know.”
Imala smiled and tucked the dead leaves she was holding into the compost pouch. Rena was so much like her son Victor—or perhaps it was better to say that he was like her. So much of who he was he had learned from his mother. They both seemed to possess a sixth sense, some secret ability to detect whenever Imala was feeling particularly glum, even when it happened in the middle of the night.
“Believe me,” said Imala, “if I could sleep I would. I tried for two hours before I came up here.”
“The offer still stands,” said Rena. “I can give you a mild sedative. It won’t hurt the baby.”
It was the third time in as many days that Rena had offered Imala a sleep aid, and for a moment Imala considered it. If Rena said it was innocuous it almost certainly was. And didn’t Imala deserve to sleep? How glorious it would be to close her eyes for eight hours and not be awakened by every slight shift the baby made. What a gift that would be. Even the thought of it nearly brought Imala back to tears. Damn the tears that came so easily now. It seemed like everything invited them.
“I know you want to do this naturally,” said Rena. “I know you’re worried that a sleep aid might slow the baby’s heart rate. But if you’re utterly exhausted, that’s not healthy for the baby either. Your body is one with hers. Trust me, this is my granddaughter we’re talking about. I wouldn’t give you anything that might hurt her.”
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