“I’ll write an apology to Bobbie, I mean Guenivere, for leaving early,” said Bing.
“Please,” said the captain. “I’ll arrange for a car to take us to the spaceport in two hours. Everyone have your stuff together.”
***
The cargo doors were open when the aircar dropped them off. Hiroshi and Setta bent over their datasheets, enjoying the fresh air and unconstrained wireless. They popped to attention as the captain came up the stairs.
“Anything to report?” asked Schwartzenberger.
“Reaction mass and fuel topped off. Fresh food delivered last night. All inspections good,” rattled off Hiroshi.
“Good. I have the watch. Have both of you gotten the mate’s briefing on leave in the Fusion?” Both spacers nodded. “Then you’re on leave until midnight. We’re going to lift in the morning.”
At his wave they scampered up the ladder.
“Permission to be lazy, sir?” called Guo. He’d already hooked a basket onto the cargo hold crane.
The captain answered by dropping his duffle bag in the basket. Then he sat down in Hiroshi’s chair with his own datasheet. The flight plan requested the earliest non-emergency lift-off, twenty four hours ahead, and went straight to the Coatlicue gate. He expected approval in a few hours.
The datasheet lit up with the face of a grey-haired woman in a tan uniform. “Good morning. I’m Portmaster Tuen. Is this Captain Schwartzenberger?”
“Yes,” he answered, not bothering to conceal his surprise.
“I understand you’ve been too busy to follow the news the past few days—”
Ah, fame, thought Schwartzenberger.
“—so I wanted to explain why your flight plan is being rejected. The Navy has issued a grounding order for all civilian traffic. Several Betrayer vessels jumped into the system from Swakop. Until they’re removed the Navy wants all noncombatants out of the line of fire.” The Portmaster smiled sympathetically. “So I hope you’ll be understanding of the delay.”
The captain said, “I see. Yes, I’ll have to catch up. Is there any estimate for when they’ll lift the order?”
“I’m afraid not. There are still ships jumping in. I can reserve a conditional lift-off slot for you. I have one open at five hours after flight resumes.”
“We’ll take that, thank you.”
“Done. I’m sorry for the delay but I do hope you enjoy your extra time on Demeter,” said the Portmaster.
“Thank you. We will.”
Captain Schwartzenberger went up the ladder. He found Bing in the galley. The newbies had left it clean enough but she wanted everything arranged to her standard. “Did you send that note to Bob, Guenivere yet?” he asked.
“No,” said Bing. “I wanted to polish it some.”
“Good. Change of plans.” The door to Mitchie and Guo’s cabin was open. “All hands on deck!”
When all four of them were in the galley he explained the grounding order.
Guo pulled up a news summary on his datasheet. “There’s a probe, but they’re all in the outer planets. Nowhere near the shipping lanes.”
“It’s paranoia. That’s the military for you,” said the captain. “Anyway—new plan. We need to launch on five hours’ notice. Today we reinspect, make sure the ship is good. Then we’ll go to two on watch, rest on leave. Everyone sleeps on the ship. And if this goes on long enough we may let Guenivere take us to a play or something.”
***
Mitchie and Guo agreed to take turns picking what they’d do on leave. This became Guo selecting a show or museum and Mitchie choosing the restaurant. After an experimental lunch left their tongues numb from too much spice she decided on dinner at a Port District dive that made food simple enough to resemble Akiak home cooking.
Partway through the meal Mitchie spotted Hiroshi and Setta at another table. She would have waved to them if either had looked around. Instead they were focused on each other. By the gestures Hiroshi was telling pilot stories. Setta laughed appreciatively.
When she pointed them out Guo said, “I’m not surprised. They were locked into the ship together for over a hundred hours. It was fall in love or kill each other.”
Mitchie laughed and had another bite of her fish. The lemon flavor was strong—Akiak couldn’t grow anything tarter than apples—but she liked it. Guo speculated about the origin of some artifacts at that afternoon’s museum. She suggested some ways to research them.
She’d decided against dessert. The newbies hadn’t. She saw the server deliver it: an oversized ice cream shake with two straws.
Mitchie said, “I can’t take it any more. That’s just too sappy.” She walked over to their table.
The youngsters didn’t notice her. She came to attention and snapped out in her deepest voice, “Is this professional behavior?”
Setta and Hiroshi instantly came to attention. Hiroshi’s straw had stuck to his lips as he stood. He spat it out onto the table.
Setta said, “No excuse, ma’am!”
The dive’s noise level kept this a private discussion. The neighboring tables were more annoyed by the knocked over chairs.
Guo came up behind Mitchie and wrapped his arms around her. “Relax, kids,” he said. “We’re just pulling your chain. You’re off duty and Joshua Chamberlain doesn’t have a fraternization rule.” He lifted Mitchie off her feet and turned around.
She didn’t resist. It was hard enough to not fall down laughing.
Once they were outside she leaned against the wall of the restaurant and laughed herself sick.
“That was mean,” said Guo.
“I know, but did you see the look on their faces? Like teenagers caught kissing.”
“Yeah. I think it’s cute.”
“She can do better. But, yeah, cute couple.” She looked at Guo’s unamused expression. “Am I an evil person?”
He pulled her to him. “Yes. You’re my evil person.” The kiss kept going on.
A Fuzie complained, “Don’t block the sidewalk” as he maneuvered around them. They ignored him.
Their datasheets harmonizing on “Blocking walkways is anti-social behavior, punishable by—” pulled them out of the kiss. Guo guided her down the sidewalk, keeping with the flow.
“Think we can find a quiet place to snog around here?” Mitchie asked.
“How about I take you back to our quarters and screw you silly?”
“Okay.” Giggle.
***
The cargo hold airlock was locked. Mitchie muttered as she turned the number wheels. “This is such a waste of time. I could get through this in three minutes without the combo.”
“Unlocking it triggers a beep on the PA,” said Guo.
“So? You can hear the hatch open from the galley anyway.”
“The beep’s loud enough to get Bing out of the captain’s cabin and into her own without anyone seeing.”
Mitchie stopped dead. “Seriously? How do you know?”
Guo gently pushed her out of the airlock. “I once skipped leave because I had a cold, but they thought I was off the ship.”
“Huh. So why haven’t they remarried?”
“Dunno. Never had the nerve to ask.”
“Oh, God. Now those two. This is turning into a love boat,” complained Mitchie.
“I don’t mind.” He held her hand as they walked across the hold. At the base of the ladder he let go. “You go first.”
Mitchie stuck out her tongue at him. “Fine, but don’t get a crick in your neck. I have plans.”
***
The next day one of Guenivere’s meetings was cancelled. She promptly swept up the crew in her aircar, leaving Hiroshi and Setta locked in again. Mitchie noticed they didn’t complain.
The teenager cheerfully explained her good fortune. “He runs a major subsidiary so it would be a protocol breach for me to meet with any of the lower executives before him. But he’s having union trouble—they’re pushing for three eight hour days instead of four six hour ones—and I
’m not welcome at that meeting. So now it’s playtime!”
A few minutes discussion sent the aircar into the Attic Hills, one of Demeter’s Protected Wilderness areas. She’d listed several other treats but seeing “the spot I go for beauty” intrigued them.
It was a tall waterfall in a narrow valley. There was no place the aircar could land without damaging plants, so they hopped out as it hovered. Two of her bodyguards led the way down the trail. Another walked with her. A pair ended the parade. There were more in the aircar, which circled protectively.
The only gap in protection Mitchie saw was not having anyone out on the flanks. The terrain made that impractical anyway.
The trail ended in a sloping dell ten meters above the rushing stream. Guenivere stood at the edge, making her security twitch. Now that they were out of the trees it was a beautiful sight. A narrow band of water came out of a cleft in the hilltop, falling straight down over a hundred meters. It poured over a jumble of rocks then rushed out whitely through a deep-cut bed. Grass and moss lined the overhanging banks. The trees going up the side of the valley wore their summer best. The hills blocked the sun. Only the top of the waterfall glowed before falling into shadow.
“Good, we’re here in plenty of time,” said Guenivere. She invited her guests to lay on the grass and chat while they waited, though she didn’t say for what. She had questions for her rescuers, ones specific enough to show her father’s influence had obtained detailed dossiers on each of them. Some questions hurt more than she realized. Guo jumped in to talk about Jefferson Harbor’s cargo fire, sparing the captain.
“And Michigan . . .” Guenivere turned shy. “Is it true you’re a secret agent?”
“No,” answered Mitchie. “I’m just an agent. No secrets left.”
“Do you think you made a difference?”
Yes, she considered saying, I was instrumental in destroying your Navy’s best ship and killing several thousand people, some of them from Demeter. “Everything’s uncertain in intelligence work. I just do my duty as best I can.”
Guenivere nodded then looked at the waterfall. “It’s almost time.” The sun had crept farther down the waterfall. Now it approached the spray at the bottom.
Everyone watched as the spray threw out a rainbow. First a fragment arced out. It grew until it spanned the valley, a perfect spread of colors.
“Thank you,” said Captain Schwartzenberger. “That’s lovely.”
Guenivere nodded and kept watching.
“Miss, Director Singh has confirmed for dinner,” said a bodyguard.
“Of course,” said Guenivere. The parade went back up to board the aircar.
***
Two more days of being grounded eroded Schwartzenberger’s patience. “It’s so damn stupid! If they’re afraid of an attack on the planet they should be ordering us off it so they have less to protect. Grounding civilian traffic is bureaucratic—”
Michigan’s datasheet chimed with a connection request. She grabbed the excuse to escape the captain’s rant. Once safely in her cabin she pressed ACCEPT. Chetty Meena’s face appeared on the sheet. Maybe I should’ve checked who was calling first.
“Hello, Michigan. It’s good to see you again,” said the analyst.
“Chet. You’re looking good. It’s been a while.” It wasn’t the first time Mitchie had been back to his planet since they met either. Why was he contacting her now?
“Are you free for dinner tonight? I’d like to talk with you about some things.”
“I’m married now.” Mitchie didn’t think he was asking for a date, the body language was wrong. But best to get that out up front.
“Oh. Um, congratulations. Bring him along. I’d be happy to meet him. And another good mind could be useful.”
“So this is business, not pleasure?” asked Mitchie.
“I was hoping for both. But if it has to be one, business. My business.” Chetty analyzed AI threats for the Fusion Navy. DCC Intelligence gave the reports she’d stolen from him high ratings.
Fusion Counter-Intelligence could be setting a trap for her. Better to know for sure. “We’d be delighted to come. Where do you want to eat?”
“The Institute has a lovely patio on the west side. Several restaurants deliver there.”
Mitchie downgraded the trap hypothesis. FCI could be crude but they’d come up with a better site than Chet’s office. “I’ll grab my husband and we’ll head over.”
***
The Operational Analysis Institute didn’t skimp on overhead. The patio had wooden furniture, padded chairs, and barbots supplying drinks. Lush trees scattered the light of the setting sun. To Mitchie’s relief, Guo and Chet finished introducing themselves without finger-breaking handshakes or any other dominance rituals.
Once food selections were out of the way Mitchie asked, “What’s the occasion? You’re too tense for a social visit.”
Chetty let out a nervous chuckle. “I’m under orders. The director told us all to find some better explanations or find somebody who could. You have a different way of looking at things. I’m just glad you’re on Demeter.”
“I’m not,” said Mitchie. “I’ve seen enough AI attacks to last me the rest of my life.”
“Are they going to attack Demeter?” asked Guo. “The news is very vague.”
“I’ll answer that,” said Chetty. “I need to tell you so you can help. But there’s some paperwork first.”
The forms appeared on their datasheets. Mitchie gleefully perjured herself by promising to never share Fusion Navy data with any unauthorized individual. The system accepted her promise. Her identity must still be filtering through the Fusion’s chain of command. Guo thumbprinted where she did without reading it.
“Thank you. Let me show you the operational situation.” Chetty’s datasheet projected a map of Demeter’s system. Brightly colored markers swarmed on the edge. “A massive swarm from Swakop jumped in at twice the normal radius. They’re just sitting on Coeus’ leading Trojan point fiddling with asteroids.”
Guo frowned. “Could they be dropping a dinosaur killer?”
“No. They’re moving them, but not far. We think they’re building something but can’t figure out what. So if you have any ideas we need to hear them.” Chetty started an animation. Asteroids were pulled from their orbits, parked tens of thousands of klicks away, then disassembled into growing disks. They were in a rough cylinder, narrower at one end.
Mitchie and Guo studied the images as they repeated. Dots. A whole bunch of dots to connect, she thought. She turned the datasheet to view it from different angles. I have seen something like this.
She looked up into the trees to try to pull the memory. Cold, just visiting. One of the stops on her shuttle route. The northernmost, Morainetown. Which stayed connected to the planetary net with . . . “It’s a paraboloid antenna,” said Mitchie.
“Antennas are wire, or flat surfaces,” said Chetty, his face twisted in confusion.
Guo had lit up when she named it. “It fits,” he said. “Technically the paraboloid is a reflector. The antenna sits at the focus.” He pointed at a cluster of dots at the narrow end. “There. It transmits radio waves which get focused into a narrow beam by the reflector.”
“Where is it pointed?” demanded Mitchie.
Chetty ran a quick calculation. “Near here. Aha. Demeter will pass through the axis of the shape in six days.” He took a deep breath. “It’s an info attack. They’ll be beaming subversion code at our network.”
The Diskers nodded agreement.
“I’d better call in your idea.”
“Don’t name us,” said Mitchie.
Guo added, “Just give us the money.”
Chetty smiled and contacted his director. “Sir, I have a possible explanation.” He briskly described the concept.
“Good thinking, Chet. I’ll take that straight to the Navy.”
“Thank you, sir.” When his datasheet went dark Chetty looked up at them. “Well, we’ll see if the
Navy takes it seriously.” A deliverybot scooted up to the table. Chetty took out the trays and served everyone.
Dinner conversation stayed with harmless topics. Chetty was fascinated by how different Mitchie and Guo’s childhoods had been. Akiak didn’t have the total connectivity of a Fusion world. Communities developed quirks and traditions of their own.
He was most amazed that Guo’s town existed at all. “There was really arsenic in the water?”
“Some,” answered Guo. “You’d have to drink lots of it raw to get poisoned. Naming the town Arsenic Creek warned all the newcomers to be careful.”
“Wasn’t there someplace safer to live?”
Guo shrugged. “There’s plenty of places with clean water where you’d starve or freeze in the winter. The lead mine made enough money for us to survive.”
They watched Chet try to wrap his mind around the idea of working to stay alive, instead of receiving more life guaranteed with your stipend deposit. “But, drinking bad water . . .”
“We filtered it,” said Guo.
“Also, they wanted to stunt their kids’ growth,” quipped Mitchie. “It let them fit into the mines better.”
“You’d have been perfect for the mines,” shot back her husband.
Chetty distracted them with an offer of dessert.
The trio dawdled over their cheesecake, glancing at Chetty’s datasheet in hopes it would light up with a response to their idea. The actual answer came from above.
Demeter street lights drowned out most of the stars. There were still dozens visible above the patio. Mitchie noticed the new lights first. She looked up at the flicker at the edge of her vision. The first blue plume was joined by others until they outnumbered the stars.
The men followed Mitchie’s gaze up. “I guess they agree,” said Guo.
Chetty held his datasheet over his head to capture the sight. “Agree, and scared by it.” He put the sheet back on the table and did a calculation. “That’s the Demeter Home Squadron. A visible symbol of the Navy’s determination to protect us. Really it’s ships that just started their shakedown, or need an overhaul, or are waiting to be scrapped. It’s where they put spacers no captain wants. The dregs. Now they’re headed for the Trojans at fifty gravs.” Chetty drank down the rest of his wine. “Damn I wish I was going with them.”
Torchship Pilot Page 12