Far Mantis

by Jim Henderson

  He then added, “Let’s get that drop tank ready, skim, and then jump. We’ll meet in the cargo bay about fifteen minutes after that.”

  They did just that. Elsbeth and Peter mounted the drop tank, they filled everything with fuel, and headed to the nearest jump point. Then they jumped for 729-ADX, the drop tank falling away as they did so.

  They convened in the cargo bay shortly after the jump, everyone in coveralls or sweats. Mantis’ telepresence joined them to observe and Ayah brought Euclidia since he might have some insights. Ayah still cradled Euclidia near her unburned breast, looking like a half-metal mother holding a metal infant.

  Peter had already lined up all of the crates and boxes, so they were easy to access. They went down the line, taking turns opening each one. Things then went into several piles. There was one for the Republic, one of trade goods to use to fund their operations, and a small pile for each of them.

  Elsbeth opened the first. “And we have material? Scarves?” The box was filled with brightly colored, patterned fabric. When she picked some up, it was about the size and shape of scarves or small shawls. Then she saw that some were more the size of throws or small blankets.

  Elsbeth said, “Okay, scarves and throws. Well, I’m taking one. I think this would look good draped around my tiny tail end the next time I’m on the beach and can’t be totally naked.”

  Raiza took a couple. “I think one of these would look nice in our cabin and one in our house.”

  Shao also took a couple. “They do feel nice and I could wear these.”

  Elsbeth took another and handed it to Peter. “Here, big boy. This might make a good loin cloth for you. That has possibilities.”

  Raiza took two more. “I think I’ll use a couple to decorate the galley.”

  Then there were small bolts of a silk-like material. Raiza took some for decoration and possibly clothes, Shao took some.

  Elsbeth nudged Peter in the ribs as she took some. “I think we just got us some new sheets.”

  There were some rare ores, strange clothes and hats, some books in odd languages, and several different kinds of pottery.

  There was also a small box containing several hundred small strips of gold, each about fifty grams.

  Ximon observed, “Once upon a time, this would have been worth a small fortune itself. But, it’s still worth a pretty penny.”

  Elsbeth reached in, took a few, and put them in her bra. “And still pretty.”

  Shao took a couple. “I’ve got some jewelry projects in mind.”

  Ximon also grabbed his share before another small box of various uncut gemstones was opened. Ximon quickly said, “Okay, just a few each. We need to make sure we have a cross-section for the Republic.”

  There were more ores and other trade goods. Then some well-preserved meat of some kind that Elsbeth thought disgusting, but Ximon found interesting.

  One box contained some simple tiaras that were obviously male and female jewelry of sorts. Raiza took one and brought it toward Euclidia, saying, “Something for you.”

  Ayah held him up, so his head was upright to receive it. Raiza placed it gently on his head.

  Shao added, “You are crowned, Sir Encyclopedist.”

  Razia brought up another tiara and placed it on Ayah’s head, “And Lady Nanny.”

  Everyone else politely clapped and Ayah appeared to smile despite her face being only metal.

  One crate contained bottles of some kind of alcohol that the humans passed around, trying the various bitter and sweet drinks.

  “That’s pretty tasty,” Elsbeth said, handing several bottles to Peter to add to their stack.

  Shao took a bottle and Raiza set a couple aside for the galley.

  Raiza warned, “Elsbeth, be careful with that—it has a high alcohol content.”

  Elsbeth put on an amused, surprised expression and said, “Oh, does it now?” while taking several more bottles.

  Finally, they had sorted through everything, having a lot of fun as they did so.

  Ximon was content and glad that everyone seemed happy. “Doesn’t look like we made out too bad on the deal.” He turned to Raiza. “Let’s take our ill-gotten gains and go take a good nap.”

  Ximon took her by the hand and they headed toward their cabin. Before they left the cargo bay, Raiza turned to Elsbeth and Shao and quietly said, “Duty calls.”

  The women broke into peals of laughter. Ximon wasn’t entirely sure why that was, but he didn’t care.

  Chapter Six: 729-ADX

  The 729-ADX system was a fairly uninspiring one. It had a relatively small, weak sun, and no planets of any size. All of the system’s potential planetary material was in three sizable asteroid belts relatively close to the mild sun. There were several dwarf planets among these asteroid belts. So, Ximon brought them out of jump not far from asteroid belt two and the largest dwarf planet therein—named unimaginably as 729-ADZ-2C. Their main intent was to jump through the system, but Ximon was determined to get some useful scan data.

  In an uncommon occurrence, Elsbeth was on the bridge when they came out of jump. Mantis quickly confirmed that they were in the right location, while Shao announced that there were no nearby hazards, and Elsbeth said that all systems were looking good.

  Ximon scanned the screens himself to ensure everything looked good. “Okay, we’re going to go in for some close scans of the planet 2C there and some of its nearby asteroid neighbors. Shao, please also conduct some scans of the sun. Mantis, please help with some long-range scans of the other belts. Let’s see if there’s anything interesting.”

  They advanced slowly toward and through the asteroid belt, scanning as they went. As they neared planet 2C, Shao’s scans and her attention became hyper-focused.

  “Do you have something?” Ximon asked.

  “Maybe. I’m getting some strange readings on a nearby asteroid.” Shao designated it on their shared screen. “Could you take us closer and do a circle around it?” She stared intently and put her scans of it up on the main screens.

  Elsbeth stepped closer and squinted at the screen. “What is that?”

  There was some kind of structure on the asteroid that was reflecting light strangely and casting odd shadows. As they got closer and changed their angle of approach, they could make it out more clearly.

  “Ximon, there’s some kind of artificial structure down there,” Shao said. “Closer, please.”

  Elsbeth almost yelled, “That’s some kind of friggin’ building!”

  “Mantis, what do you make of it?” Ximon asked.

  “Captain, it does appear to be an artificial structure. It measures approximately one hundred by fifty meters and some nearby sections of the asteroid appeared to be flattened, as if for a landing pad.”

  They got closer and did several orbits of the asteroid at different angles. There was, indeed, a sizeable building there, apparently carved into the asteroid, and there appeared to be two small landing pads near some large doors that could be for cargo or might even fit a small shuttle. There was an area of what appeared to be solar panels about one hundred meters away, the panels almost flush with the ground.

  “What do we have as far as signals or heat signatures?” Ximon asked.

  Shao ran some additional scan checks. “There are some power signatures in there. It’s certainly not what you’d expect from an active station, but they’ve got power. I can’t be sure on life signs.”

  “Mantis, try signaling them, all bands. Shao, try to build a rough map of that area.”

  The crew waited and kept watch, but there was no response to the hails.

  Elsbeth looked at Ximon skeptically and spoke like a mother urging caution. “Ximon, what are you thinking?”

  “I’m thinking that we have to go check it out, of course.”

  “Why, of course?”

  “Well, here’s some kind of space station that no one knows about. There’s no record of it at all, yet there’s power on.”

  “You know, that
could mean that someone’s there and they really won’t appreciate us bothering them,” Elsbeth said.

  “Inconceivable. It might be that it’s abandoned, or that they’ve gone for a trip, or that they’re sick and need our help.”

  Mantis said helpfully, “I do calculate that those are all probabilities, but Elsbeth’s scenario is also probable.”

  “That just means that we’ll visit very nicely…and we’ll wear armor and bring weapons.”

  Elsbeth rolled her eyes. “Well, I know you can’t do this without me. So, what’s the plan?”

  “Well, we sit down on that pad near that smaller door and knock politely—and if that doesn’t work…”

  “We blow stuff up?” Elsbeth asked, a dangerous smile creeping across her face.

  “No, then you use your engineering expertise to unlock the door. Then we go in and take a look around.”

  “So, who’s this we?”

  “Well, there’s safety in numbers, so I thought you, I, Raiza, and Peter would go. Shao, I want you and Mantis to keep scanning the area for a couple minutes. In about five minutes, you and Mantis’ telebot join us. So, why don’t y’all get dressed while I land our friend here and then we’ll go have some fun?”

  “Yeah, fun—a veritable laugh a minute,” Elsbeth said.

  Ximon set Mantis down gently and quickly joined everyone else in the galley. They each had on a space suit with a bullet proof vest added. Elsbeth had a small tool kit and a pistol. Peter had a shotgun, though his aim was terrible, and he’d only shoot if directly ordered to. Neither his brain, nor Raiza’s, were designed for the kind of predictive targeting that hitting a moving target required and both had an innate hesitancy to shoot humans or other creatures. Raiza had a medical kit and a pistol. Ximon grabbed a shotgun and a pistol. Raiza had laid out a suit, a vest, and a pistol for Shao.

  They all checked their suits and then each other. Only then did they open the airlock and advance toward the building.

  Ximon turned on the light and the camera on his suit. “Everyone, make sure you’ve got video rolling.”

  Elsbeth checked the door and used a signal generator to find the signal that opened it. Ximon peeked in. All looked quiet. The hallways were fairly low and narrow, there was no artificial gravity, and the lights were low. In the silence of near-vacuum, the only sound was their breathing. When they went in, only their mag boots kept them from floating around.

  Raiza checked some readings on her suit and said, “There is only a trace atmosphere, too thin to breath, and low in oxygen.”

  “You heard her,” Ximon said. “Masks stay on.”

  The crew clicked on the lights on their suits, letting a beam of light radiate from the side of each helmet, brightening the dark hallway. Each suit also had a smaller light on the left wrist, further lightening some areas, while leaving others in relative shadow.

  “What the heck?” Elsbeth said, pointing her light to one side of the hallway where small doors lined the straight corridor. “Was this place made by midgets?”

  Raiza said, “The hallways and doors are considerably smaller than one would expect in a human facility. Use caution going through the doors; your suits may catch on the frame.”

  Ximon added, “Also note that the doors are round. So, either they’re short and fat or—”

  Elsbeth interrupted, “They’re operating in zero G. They’re not walking through the doors—they’re floating parallel to the ground.”

  “I do note small hand holds strategically placed along the hallway,” Peter said.

  “Well, let’s check them out,” Ximon said, stepping closer to the first small door.

  Raiza was quite right, most of the crew had trouble going through the doors. They either had to squat and enter carefully, or they had to turn off their mag boots and float in.

  The first room contained little except hooks along the walls. On the hooks were some kind of small, lightweight spacesuits.

  Elsbeth held one up. “Unless this is super advanced material, there’s no way it could maintain pressure anywhere near what we’re used to, and it’s made for a kid.”

  Ximon tested the suit’s material. “Perhaps it stretches…a lot.”

  “Nice try, but no dice,” Elsbeth said, yanking on the fabric of one suit. “It looks like there are hooks for about thirty suits, but only eight are occupied.”

  Peter also found a locker that held small square tanks.

  “Those could be air tanks for these suits, but they’re tiny,” Elsbeth said.

  Raiza said, “Ximon, I’d like to conduct an experiment. Can I have five minutes?”

  Ximon nodded. “Stay here and do it. We’ll hit the room across the hall.”

  The room across the hall was mostly empty but had some kind of bench running along two walls and a cylinder about three feet high in the center. The bench had about a dozen small doors along the top.

  Peter opened one and noted a round flat opening about twenty five centimeters in diameter. He shined a light down it and said, “There is a channel running the length of the bench below these openings.”

  “Congrats, dear.” Elsbeth laughed. “I believe you have discovered the bathroom. Looks like they’ve got small butts too. Unless this is run by kids, we’re not dealing with humans.”

  They headed for the next room. As they did, Shao and Mantis’ telebot entered and caught up with them.

  Then Raiza spoke up, “I’ve pressurized one of these suits. It definitely fits a creature about 1 meter tall with a slight build. Its pressure and breathing mix are both roughly one tenth of ours. It would appear they have a significantly different physiology.”

  Elsbeth said snarkily, “Oh, ya think?”

  “Yes, Elsbeth I do so believe. I would not deceive you.”

  Elsbeth did a face palm on her helmet as Raiza caught up with them. She brought the doll-sized, pressurized suit with her so they could all see the apparent size. When they moved on, she simply pushed it so it floated back into the storage room.

  The next room held seven metal racks about two meters high and one and a half meters wide. They vaguely resembling bunk beds with no mattresses. Where a mattress might be there was simply a rubbery bag-like structure attached at either end to the frame and with an opening along one edge. They almost looked like cocoons.

  Raiza said, “I believe these are sleeping areas for use in zero G.”

  Their suit lights shine around the room as they continued their search.

  “You know what I’m NOT seeing?” Elsbeth said as her light flicked from one wall to the next. “Any lockers, closets, or clothes. Did these things walk around naked?”

  “It is possible and highly efficient as long as the ambient temperature is within their comfort range,” Raiza said. “Alternately, there may be concealed storage areas that we’re not seeing.”

  The room across the hall was nearly identical but did not have the little ‘cocoons’ in most of the racks.

  Elsbeth said, “Well, we’ve seen the closet, the bedrooms, and the bathrooms. What’s next, the kitchen?”

  She proved to be prophetic. The next room was slightly larger, gleaming white, and had a lot of hand holds attached to the walls, floors, and ceilings. Along one wall there was long bar of some sort. The wall nearest the door was covered with about two dozen plastic trays about twenty by forty centimeters.

  Ximon looked at the bar. “Looks like a cafeteria. What do you think? Do tables come out of the floors or walls?”

  “I think this is all made for zero G,” Elsbeth said. “I doubt there are any tables.”

  Shao pulled a tray off the wall. “Yeah, I’m betting they just grab a tray, get some food, and then hook their feet into a handhold/foothold.”

  Raiza examined the bar more closely. “It appears this would hold several different food substances, presumably in some kind of containers that would allow consumption in zero G.”

  As they walked out, Ximon said, “Kitchen—check.”

  Th
e next room was considerably larger and had several rows of terminals of some kind, with larger screens on the walls. Some of the screens became active when they approached, but the layouts were strange, the contents were apparently all in another language, and they could find no keyboard or other interface.

  Ximon scanned the room, looking for anything familiar. “Look around. See if you can make out anything.”

  They all wandered around, looking at different displays and messing with the ‘desks’ to see if they could get any response. They eventually found that there were four switches of some kind around each screen. It wasn’t at all clear what they did, but each switch looked like it might have as many as nine settings and touching them caused the screens to change.

  After a couple minutes, Elsbeth said, “I can’t tell what it is, but I’ve got a few screens that show levels of something. However, I can’t tell whether it’s today’s weather, the level of plutonium, or the amount of piss in the bathroom.”

  “Hey, I’ve got one that appears to be some kind of status screen.” Shao said. “I think it’s showing multiple items along one face of the asteroid.” She pointed at the screen eagerly. “See, that looks like it might be the solar field. These other dots are just single points but could be sensors, radios, or something.”

  “Okay, so we’ve got the command room,” Ximon said. “Mantis, can you make out the language?”

  “It does not appear to match anything in my data banks. I will gather all available information and try to interpret, but it will probably take several hours before I have anything substantive.”

  Peter helped Mantis by systematically stepping through all setting combinations on each screen so the telebot could take images and setting information. It was hard to tell, but it appeared there were several dozen different screens or screen combinations.

  Ximon made a last look around “Okay, we’ll probably have to come back here and see what we can figure out.”

  The next room initially appeared to be empty. All the walls resembled stainless steel. However, upon closer examination, they noted that the far wall had a grid pattern of lines or seams about one meter apart. As they got closer, they saw that each ‘grid square’ had a small screen in the center.