by Ryk Brown
“And from what I’ve seen, you’ve done a hell of a job getting the Tannans trained. They’ve racked up more than two dozen kills without a single ship lost.”
“Yeah, like I said, they’re a great bunch of guys to lead.” Robert sighed. “To be honest, I’m going to miss them.”
“Well, pack your bags, Bobert,” she said, handing him a data chip. “You’ve got new orders.”
“How much time do I have?”
“A shuttle will be here in three days to take you to your new command,” she told him, smiling.
“Command?”
“Yup. Dumar is giving you a frigate.”
“No shit?” Robert laughed.
“No shit.”
* * *
“If it makes you feel any better, we’ve already collected a ton of really good intel,” Gerard told Loki. “The ship movements and patrol patterns within the system alone are worth the risk.”
“I’d feel a whole lot safer if we had a jump drive installed in this thing,” Loki said.
“This thing is as fast as any ship they’ve got,” Josh chimed in from the other side of the makeshift crew cabin. “So as long as we go to FTL before they shoot us, we’re golden, right?”
Loki looked at Gerard, who said nothing. “Right?”
“Well…yes and no,” Gerard admitted. “Yes, any ship they might send after us would likely not be able to catch us. No, as in they might have FTL intercept weapons…something that goes faster than their ships…like their comm-drones.”
Loki looked concerned. “Wait, we’ve never seen any such weapons, so why would you think they would have something like that?”
“Makes sense to save something like that for defense of your most valuable asset. Better not to advertise such capabilities, lest your enemy knows what to expect.”
“And why didn’t you bring this up earlier?” Loki asked accusingly.
“Honestly, I didn’t think about it until just now,” Gerard admitted.
“Relax, Loki,” Josh said, getting up from his bunk. “We’re already deep inside their system. If they haven’t spotted us yet, they probably aren’t going to.”
“Until we come out of FTL, you mean,” Loki reminded him.
“Actually, I’m pretty sure they’ve spotted us by now,” Gerard said.
Both Josh and Loki looked at Gerard in surprise.
“Come on, guys. Surely you assumed they have some sort of passive FTL detection network? Sensors scattered throughout the outer edges of the system? Maybe linked to mini-FTL comm-drones to alert command of incoming threats?”
“Uh…then why haven’t they attacked us?” Josh wondered.
“We’re in one of their shuttles,” Gerard reminded them.
“Squawking a transponder code from a battleship that should be in the Tau Ceti system,” Loki exclaimed, “fifty-eight light years away!”
“Relax, I sabotaged the transponder,” Gerard said. “It only transmits an ID code at random, and at varying strengths and frequencies. Even then, only at random. To the Jung, it will look like the transponder is malfunctioning. Besides, we’re a single shuttle. We’re no threat. If they have detected us, I’m sure they’ll hail us after we come out of FTL.”
“And then what?” Loki wondered.
“I lie to them.”
“Solid plan, there, Gerard,” Josh commented, his tone dripping with sarcasm. “It’s almost time, Lok,” he added, heading forward.
“Is that seriously your plan?” Loki asked Gerard.
“Pretty much.”
“So, we come out of FTL, they ask us who we are and what we are doing. You lie, while we collect sensor data, then we go back into FTL, and hope they don’t chase us and blow us all to hell. That’s your plan?”
“Did you guys seriously not think about any of this before you volunteered for this mission?” Gerard asked.
Loki sighed. “Yeah, that’s how we usually make decisions.” Loki rose and headed forward to join Josh, moving through the hatch into the shuttle’s cockpit.
“We’ve got about a minute before we drop out of FTL,” Josh warned as Loki took his seat.
“And we become visible to every ship in the system,” Josh said as he donned his comm-set. “How many of them did you say you had already detected?” he called back to Gerard over his comm-set.
“Eighty or ninety…so far,” Gerard replied.
“Great.”
“Thirty seconds,” Josh warned.
“I can see that, Josh,” Loki replied.
“Just let us know if we need to do anything while we’re at sub-light,” Josh reminded Gerard. “Like, go back to FTL.”
“My finger will be on the button and ready, that’s for sure,” Loki added.
“Understood,” Gerard replied.
“Five seconds to dropout,” Loki announced.
“Please, Loki…” Josh said.
“Three…”
“Enough with the countdowns.”
“Two……one…”
The shuttle’s mass-canceling fields shut down, and the ship reverted to its normal sub-light speed.
“FTL fields have shut down,” Loki reported. “We’re now traveling at twenty percent light.”
“Passive sensors are online,” Gerard announced from the cabin over their comm-sets. “Whoa. I’m getting tons of detail about their homeworld. Holy crap! Look at that moon! It’s got some sort of man-made ring encircling it.”
“Encircling the moon?” Loki wondered, finding it hard to believe.
“The whole damn thing,” Gerard affirmed. “It’s some sort of space port, or shipyard… I don’t know what it is, but it’s huge. How are we looking up there?”
“I’ve got at least fifty ships on the traffic display,” Loki replied. “So far, nothing is turning toward us.”
“Jesus,” Gerard continued to exclaim. “Their world is very heavily populated. I’m seeing very little open space. About forty-percent of the surface is covered with water, most of it deep oceans. But their continents are literally covered with cities. There’s got to be at least a hundred billion people on that world.”
“Ships, Gerard,” Loki reminded. “All we care about are ships.”
“Wait, we’re being hailed,” Gerard warned.
Loki suddenly felt his mouth go dry.
Gerard said something in Jung over the comms, which neither Josh nor Loki could understand. There was a pause, then Gerard spoke in Jung again, this time saying a lot more than before.
“What the hell’s going on?” Josh asked.
“They asked who we are, and why our transponder wasn’t working properly,” Gerard explained.
“What did you tell them?” Loki wondered, his finger hovering over the button to engage the FTL fields.
Gerard again spoke in Jung over the comms. The exchange lasted more than a minute, with several pauses as he listened to the incoming messages. Gerard’s voice began to sound tense, his tone becoming more adamant, as if he were arguing with someone.
Josh and Loki stared at each other, too afraid to speak. Loki looked at the time display on the center console. “We’ve been out of FTL for one minute, now,” he warned. “Talk to me, Gerard.”
“Stand by!” Gerard said quickly, immediately returning to his conversation in Jung over the comms.
“Fuck,” Josh swore. Even his nerves were starting to frazzle.
Loki kept his eyes on the traffic display, watching for any sign that one of the many ships on the screen was turning to intercept them.
“Okay!” Gerard exclaimed. “Go to FTL!”
Loki quickly scanned his display, checking that they had a clear line out of the system before pressing the button to activate the mass-canceling fields. A few seconds later, the shuttle slipped back into FTL, but Loki kept his eyes on the traffic display, just in case.
“What the hell just happened?” Josh demanded.
Gerard came through the hatch, coming to stand behind Loki. “I told them we we
re on a scientific survey mission of the Oort cloud, comparing the composition of objects from varying locations. When they asked about our transponder, I told them we were having problems with our comm-stack. I even started messing with the voice transmission to make it garbled.”
“What the hell was all that arguing?” Loki wondered.
“They wanted us to return to port for repairs, but I told them that if we didn’t finish the survey now, all of our results would be skewed and we would have to start over. I told him that we couldn’t afford that type of financial setback. He wasn’t buying it at first, so I made up a bunch of stuff about how I wouldn’t graduate, and my family would disown me… Blah, blah, blah. I promised we would return in four days, after the last leg was completed.”
“And he bought all that crap?” Josh asked, amazed.
“I don’t know. That’s when I had you go to FTL.” Gerard said. “I guess we’ll find out soon enough.”
Loki shook his head. “Next time the captain offers us a mission, Josh, just shut the hell up, will you?”
* * *
Jessica’s mouth dropped when the door opened. Standing before her was Synda, baby in hand. “Oh, my God!”
“Jessica!” Synda greeted. She switched to a more hushed tone, suddenly remembering she had a baby in her arms. “It’s about time.”
“I’m sorry I couldn’t get away for the birth,” Jessica apologized. “Work.”
“That’s okay,” Synda assured her, stepping aside to let her in. “We are a bit out of your way, and all.”
“Naw, only forty-seven light years,” Jessica joked. “I thought you were having twins?” she said as she closed the heavy wooden door behind her.
“Esma is sleeping,” Synda said. “This, is Ania.”
“Well, hello there, Ania,” Jessica said, greeting the child in hushed, cooing tones.
“This is your auntie Jessica,” Synda told her child. “You want to hold her?”
Jessica was suddenly nervous. “Uh… I don’t know.”
“Come on,” Synda teased. “What are you afraid of? You’re spec-ops.”
“They did not teach baby-holding in spec-ops,” Jessica said. She stared at the infant in her mother’s arms. “Oh, what the hell. She is adorable, after all.”
“Yes, she is,” Synda said, carefully handing the child to Jessica. Ania began to cry as her mother transferred her to Jessica’s arms. “That’s right, support her head with your hand, just like that,” Synda instructed.
Jessica cradled the infant carefully, pulling her in close to her body, being very careful not to squeeze her too hard.
“You see, it just comes naturally to you,” Synda said encouragingly.
“I don’t know about that,” Jessica replied. She gently bounced the infant up and down. “It’s okay, Ania. I’m your mommy’s friend, Jessica.” After a few moments, the infant stopped crying.
“You see? She likes you,” Synda said.
“Kid’s got good taste,” Jessica replied. She looked down at baby Ania, who was staring back up at her with big green eyes. “What pretty green eyes, you have,” Jessica cooed. “Yes, you do.” Jessica looked at Synda. “How long ago did you deliver?”
“Three weeks,” Synda replied, taking a seat on the couch. “Right on the due date. The Tannans have this stuff down to a science. Apparently, everyone here delivers right on time.”
Jessica could feel the trust in the infant’s eyes as she looked up at her, the child’s green eyes wide with curiosity at the stranger holding her. “She’s amazing,” Jessica whispered, as she took a seat on the couch next to Synda. “She’s so quiet.”
“And she’s the noisy one,” Synda commented.
“Are they identical?”
“Similar, but not identical. Esma’s hair is a little darker, and her eyes are more gray than green. I think Esma’s face is a little wider as well, but apparently no one else does. Would you like to see her?”
“Isn’t she sleeping?”
“It’s time to feed her anyway,” Synda said as she rose. “I’ll be right back.”
“Uh…” Jessica’s eyes widened as Synda left the room, leaving her alone with baby Ania in her arms. “Okay. I’ve got this, I suppose.” She looked down at Ania. Her eyes were starting to close. Jessica hummed a lullaby. Ania closed her eyes, and drifted off to sleep in Jessica’s arms. For the first time in her life, Jessica had an inkling of what the maternal instinct felt like.
A minute later, Synda returned carrying baby Esma. “This is Esma.” Synda placed the baby down in her lap as she sat, uncovering her breast to feed the infant.
“You weren’t kidding,” Jessica said. “She is quiet.”
“Very,” Synda said as she started to breastfeed Esma. “To be honest, I think I got lucky with these two. I’ve heard stories from some of the Tannan mothers.”
“I just can’t believe you have two babies,” Jessica exclaimed in disbelief. “One seems like it would be a lot of work…but two?”
“It’s tiring, yes,” Synda agreed, “but it isn’t work. At least, it doesn’t feel like it. Work is something that you don’t want to do, but must do. This… This is love. You do it because you want to do it, because nothing is more important to you than being with your children, and taking care of them. It is simply what you do. Who you are. I don’t know how else to describe it.”
Jessica looked down at the sleeping infant in her arms. She was so peaceful and content, wrapped in her little blanket, safe in the arms of another. “I think I understand,” Jessica admitted.
* * *
“This has been the longest four days of my life,” Loki groaned as their shuttle came out of FTL.
“It’s not over, yet,” Josh warned. “Not until the fat lady sings.”
“Would you stop with the old Earth idioms already?” Loki demanded. “What the hell does that mean, anyway? ‘Until the fat lady sings?’ Really?”
“It is getting kind of irritating, Josh,” Gerard agreed, as he stared out the front windows of the shuttle.
“Where are they?” Loki wondered. “They’re supposed to already be here, waiting for us.”
“Anything on the sensors?” Josh asked.
“Nothing.”
“Shut down everything,” Gerard instructed. “Go completely cold. A single passive sensor only.”
“How are they going to find us?” Josh wondered.
“Just do as he says, Josh,” Loki insisted, as he started shutting down systems.
“We’ll see them when they jump in,” Gerard explained.
“They were supposed to have already jumped in,” Loki repeated.
“That’s what’s got me worried,” Gerard said. “There’s got to be a reason they’re not here.”
Loki turned and looked at Gerard. “You think there might be a Jung ship in the area?”
“It’s possible.”
“Unbelievable,” Loki mumbled as he continued shutting down systems. “We fly all the way through the Jung system without a problem, only to get picked off on the far side on our way out.”
An alert beep sounded.
Loki glanced at the sensor display on the center console. “We’re picking up something.”
“A jump flash?”
“Nope. No flash.”
“Is it a Jung ship?”
“I don’t know,” Loki admitted. “Seems kind of small. I suppose it could be a patrol ship of some kind. It didn’t come out of FTL, though. It just appeared, as if it came out of nowhere. Wait… It’s gone again.”
“Steer toward it,” Gerard instructed.
Josh turned to look at him. “What?”
“It’s got to be the boxcar.”
“How do you know?”
“You said it wasn’t big enough to be a Jung ship…”
“A Jung ship that we know of,” Loki corrected.
“Anyone out here would see us come out of FTL.”
“There it is again,” Loki said as the sensor display
beeped a second time. “Ten degrees to port, five down relative. About two kilometers. Damn, it’s gone again.”
“I’m telling you, it’s the boxcar,” Gerard insisted. “Steer toward it.”
“And if it’s not?” Josh wondered.
“If it was a Jung patrol ship, it would be hailing us, or firing on us,” Gerard insisted. “It wouldn’t be flashing in and out as if trying to hide.”
“There it is again,” Loki said. “It is on the same course as us, a little slower.”
“You see? They’ve been out here waiting for us, running cold. They saw us come out of FTL on passive, so they’re signaling us by turning something on and off.”
Josh sighed. “Works for me,” he said as he initiated a turn to port.
Loki continued watching the monitor as Josh adjusted the shuttle’s course to intercept the unknown object. “There it is again. And it’s gone. Wait… It’s back…and gone. Back, gone…”
“Three flashes,” Gerard realized. “They flashed us three times, after they saw us turn toward them.”
“I don’t like this,” Loki said. “We’re closing on them, and we can’t see them.”
“We’re too far from any source of light.”
“How far are we?” Josh asked.
“Based on the object’s last position, course, and speed, about three hundred meters, and closing fast,” Loki warned.
“Well, whatever it is, we’ll know shortly.”
“Wait until you’re within one hundred meters, then turn on your forward floodlights,” Gerard suggested.
“That’s barely going to give us room to decelerate,” Loki protested.
“I can do it,” Josh insisted.
Loki took a deep breath and sighed, resigning himself to whatever fate had in store for them. “Two hundred meters.”
Josh continued staring out the front windows, into the black void.
“One-fifty.”
“I’m right, you’ll see,” Gerard assured them.
“One hundred,” Loki announced. “Forward floods coming on.”
“Firing deceleration thrusters,” Josh said. He looked out the windows again, still seeing nothing but blackness. “I’m not seeing them.”
“They’re still too far out,” Loki warned. “Fifty meters. Oh, shit! I’ve got their directional approach beacon! Two degrees down, one more left! Twenty-five meters!”