Mankind's Worst Fear

by David L Erickson

  “Unfreeze the bot, but keep an eye on it.” O’Brien looked up at the vid, though he knew Greco could not see him. “Greco, time to get inside.”

  “Yes, sir.” Greco backed slowly from behind the Plexishield, then appeared outside the non-pressurized dome’s access portal facing the ship. In two strides, he was out of visual. The bot signaled completion of the initial sequence.

  “You’re up, Colonel,” Clapton said.

  Staring at the vid with the silly notion he could influence the bot, O’Brien tried to recall the passcode. He should’ve memorized it.

  “Alpha, alpha, two, seven, seven, four, mary, omega, omega.” Captain Garson grinned. “Glad to be of service, Colonel.”

  O'Brien glanced at him and nodded, then tapped in the code.

  “The bot has confirmed the codes,” Clapton intoned, his eyes glued to the bot’s image. “Imputing final sequence...now.” Below, the airlock hissed, fading as the pressure equalized.

  O’Brien listened for the whine of the internal hatch opening and footsteps on the cargo hold ladder. He nodded when he heard Greco secure on the main deck.

  “Launch in progress,” Clapton reported.

  The ship vibrated as the main engines built toward lift off. Coolant motors kicked in, adding the distant hum of high-speed turbines. The faint aroma of synthlube reminded O’Brien of earlier missions.

  “Base plus two meters. Retracting stanchions.”

  For an instant, the ship wavered. Mechanical sounds intruded as the stanchions retracted into the hull.

  “Base plus four meters...base plus six meters...base plus six meters...holding at six meters.”

  “What’s the problem, Clapton?”

  “The bot’s stuck! Won’t let us build enough thrust to launch!”

  “Options?”

  “None.”

  “Do you have lateral movement?”

  Garson nodded. “I know where you’re going.” He pressed a red square on the con, turning it green, then grasped the pistol-gripped cyclic protruding from the right and slowly guided the ship sideways. “Going to be a big guess. I can't see the dome.”

  “You’ll know when you hit it.” O’Brien's knuckles whitened on the chair grips. If they failed to destroy the launch dome soon, the launch motors would burn out, stranding them. Seconds counted.

  Agonizingly slow, the ship slipped sideways until Garson eased back on the stick. The ship wobbled. He compensated, but the wobble increased. A jolt and the ship lurched upward.

  “Hold on to your hats, boys and girls!” Garson whooped. “Papas going to take this ugly plug for a ride!”

  In an instant, they were slammed into their seats. Emerging from the protection of the cliff’s shadows, the portal flooded the cabin with light, images of red dirt, the valley, a brightly lit globe retreating at hundreds of kilometers per hour. Battered by contradictory air currents in the stratosphere, the ship rocked and jarred for several minutes. Preparations for launch hadn't included launch window calculations, wind currents, and a hundred other factors, O’Brien reminded himself. Not that it mattered any longer.

  Wobbles became wild gyrations.

  “You...okay...Colo...nel?” Garson struggled to get the words out.

  O’Brien tried to grin, but he was having a time of it just holding his breakfast down. “No...t....usual...ly...this rough.”

  Back-dropped by the subtle hum of the reactors, a sudden stillness invaded the ship, but was abruptly interrupted by beeps and blips from the cons and the verbal stirrings of their passengers. Garson slapped the console, a broad grin creasing his face. “We’ve escaped the atmosphere. From here on out it’ll be like sliding on ice. Velocity is twelve thousand kph and climbing.”

  Freed of the planet’s gravity, they floated against their restraints.

  “That’s it?” Clapton looked surprised.

  “Nope. Just beginning. Shutting down fission reactor one, putting two on low power.” Garson slowly reduced fission reaction until he could safely shut down one reactor and idle the other. A subtle vibration faded. Illumination flickered and dimmed.

  “Ion drive online. Functioning within normal parameters. Standard rotation initiated. We should have gravity in about seven minutes. Until then, you can release and enjoy the experience.” Thumbs up, he looked like a kid finding a new speeder under the Christmas tree.

  O'Brien allowed a thin smile. “Glad you’re in such fine spirits, but the game is just now afoot. Better keep a sharp eye out.”

  Garson tried to suppress a smile, with little success. “I’m sorry. I get such a kick out of lighting one of these things up that it...well, kind of makes everything else pale in comparison. Just a stick jockey at heart, I guess.”

  Despite the rigor of their passage through the atmosphere, O’Brien experienced the same rush of exhilaration. From twelve-story dead drops to sky diving, he graduated to slip stream gliding in primary school and took his first sub-orbital flight at fourteen. With mom and dad and a half-dozen uncles and aunts in the space industry, his mom had told his Colorado Springs graduation assembly that he was raised in space before his feet every left the ground. The memory faded, but its warmth remained. Would he ever see them again?

  “It got a little rough there. How we doing on fuel?” O'Brien asked.

  “Burned up a lot getting off the ground, but we’re okay. Reserves are down thirty-one percent, but I’d say we’re in the black.”

  “Good enough. ETA on Earth?”

  “That’s going to need some number crunching, Colonel. Best guess, a week for the ion drive to get us up to speed, then five to seven more, depending on where Earth is in relation to Mars. I wasn’t supposed to head back for another eleven days...the best launch window for several weeks. Took us only twenty-eight days to get here. Fastest trip ever.”

  “That’s quite an improvement.”

  “I can't imagine how our guys handled ten-month transits in those little tin cans back then. By next year, the Solar Explorer will do it in two or three weeks. You watch the NASA clips?”

  “Daily. Hull morphing," O'Brien shook his head. "electrostatic molecular realignment. Must have been a bioputer that dreamed that one up. General Bitteraine calls the damn thing sexy."

  "Yeah." Garson looked thoughtful. "Next thing you know they'll be trying stuff like that on humans."

  "Beam me up, Scotty? Not this century."

  "You never know, Colonel. You just never know what them dream boys are working on."

  "Have you onlined sensors?” Floating near the ceiling, Clapton had remained silent during the exchange.

  “They’re set to power up for two second bursts at twenty minute intervals,” O'Brien answered, cutting Garson off before he could respond.

  “You might want to kick them on again. I think we’ve got company. Look.” Clapton pointed at the vid.

  At first, O’Brien saw nothing, save the endless panorama of brilliant speckles dotting the blackness of the heavens. Then he saw it. A small, starless square appeared to be drawing nearer.

  "That's definitely not natural," Garson concluded. "Its course is too direct.”

  “Damn.”

  “Colonel?”

  “Clapton. Tell the others to secure.”

  “Yes, sir.” Pushing off with his fingertips, Clapton glided towards the hatch in an effortless dive. A veteran of seventeen space flights, all but the last one to the international space station orbiting Earth, he was no stranger to weightlessness. In a perfectly executed ricochet off the bulkhead, he slipped through the hatch and disappeared.

  “What do you suggest, Colonel?”

  “If they get nasty, we may have no choice but to fight back.”

  With what? That piss-ant laser cannon?” Garson cocked a brow in utter disbelief.

  “It isn’t much, but if they come close enough...assuming they don't destroy us outright, we might get in some lucky shots.”

  “Then what? We stick ‘em with a pin-prick and make a run for it?”r />
  “I’m winging it, Captain, just like you. You have a better idea?”

  “Shut down everything. Make this ship dead.”

  “And if that doesn’t work?”

  “Get in close and shoot ‘em with that piss-ant cannon.” A thin smile compressed Garson's lips and lent a twinkle to his eye.

  “You’re a vet aren’t you?”

  “Fought in the Afghan wars, Colonel. Flew FA-156s. Twenty-seven air-to-air kills, a couple hundred tanks and personnel carriers. Two hundred and forty seven missions total.”

  “We had the advantage there. Everything’s stacked against us here.”

  “Nothing like taking a ride into the jaws of death, eh Colonel?”

  “I’d prefer to feel damp, cool grass between my toes again.”

  “I hear you.”

  “Good. Shut it down.”

  Garson, keyed the intercom. “Ladies and gentlemen. We're being approached by a UFO. All systems are going offline. Please remain seated. We will be experiencing a period of darkness. Captain out.”

  “Well said.”

  “Thank you. It was a prepared speech.”

  O’Brien snorted, and rechecked his own harness, then concentrated on the shadow moving towards them at astonishing speed. The lights blinked out, followed in seconds by the console. A moment later, the ion drive shut down and the gentle flow of warm air ceased.

  Clapton returned, his movements unnaturally loud in the stillness. A sharp snap resonated as he secured, then all that could be heard was the rustle of cloth and the men breathing. Through the porthole streamed what little illumination there was. Those below were in total darkness.

  Minutes passed as the shadow drew closer. Below, Myer whimpered, stifled a cry. Tammer calmed her with a hushed whisper. The ship still rotated slowly from inertia and since the viewport comprised only a narrow slit, the shadow was only visible a third of the time: larger with each revolution. It was close enough now for them to see pinpricks of color. Beside him, Clapton’s breath quickened. O’Brien was certain the others could hear his heart hammering in his chest. The shadow blinked out. One moment there, the next, nothing.

  “Whew! That was close.” Garson sounded vaguely disappointed.

  “This time. But why?” O’Brien was relieved the alien ship had missed them, yet bothered by how it could appear from nowhere.

  “Maybe because our ship is made entirely of non-metallic composites, Colonel.” Clapton leaned back and stretched his arms above his head, then dropped them on the rests with a distinct thud. “Without a power signature and nothing metallic to lock onto, they apparently can't see us.”

  Garson nodded. “A super big thank you to the designers.”

  “Still doesn’t solve our problem, Captain.” The close encounter had alerted O’Brien to variables he hadn't considered. “Earth is millions of kilometers away and our only means of getting there brings the aliens down on us. We might get away with playing cat and mouse, or we might not. We’ll wait a few hours, then fire up the reactors for four or five seconds. If that doesn’t get them back here, we’ll bring the ion drive online. It’ll take us a lot longer to get home, not using the main motors to get us up to speed, but it’ll produce a smaller signature.”

  “It might not work next time,” Clapton said, “this new ion drive casts a twenty-five thousand square kilometer magnetic net. Might look like a neon sign to them.”

  Garson shook his head. “The field is so dispersed it could easily be confused with background radiation. We can do random sensor scans a few seconds at a time. Damned hard to pick a low-power signal out of the clutter with anything we've got. Don't know about them though." A shrug and Garson turned back to his con. "Or it may draw them like catnip. Any way you look at it, we can't fly blind.”

  “We may not have to, Captain.” During the long trek to the Mars Explorer, O'Brien thought of such matters, but this brief encounter provided a data windfall that affected his perceptions of the alien race. Conclusions could be drawn.

  “You know something, Colonel?” Garson cocked a brow.

  “I noticed when it appeared, space rippled, like a puddle of oil disturbed by a small stone. We should scan for spatial anomalies.”

  "Next time they come by..." Garson's fingers danced across the con, setting O'Brien's plan in motion. “...we’ll find out if it works.”

  “That’ll have to do. You've got the helm." O'Brien pushed back on his chair and the back tilted. "I'm going to grab a few winks.”

  “Sure, go ahead, Colonel. I'm too keyed up right now to sleep anyway.”

  O'Brien noted his hesitation. "And?"

  "I understand protocol in this situation." Calm, without a hint of reserve, Garson looked away for a moment, then leveled his gaze on O'Brien. "I'm the Captain of this ship, but the others see you as their commanding officer. I defer to your leadership.”

  The issue had to come up. “Accepted.” There was no reason to belabor the point.

  Besides, he was more interested in the alien’s ability to move undetected through space. He worried that nothing they could do would get them safely back to Earth. His chair elongated. He stretched out, but sleep was the last thing on his mind, despite his comment to the contrary. He needed to think, free of the distraction of conversation.

  *****

  The ship was under power again. Garson had fired up the ion drive and the subtle vibration woke O’Brien from a light slumber. Faint illumination spilled from the viewport and Garson's vid. O’Brien heard movement and quiet conversation on the lower deck. There was Tammer, trying to keep his voice low, and Myer, her gentle laugh a sure sign she had overcome her initial terror and was adapting well.

  He gathered Doomes, Paider and Greco were playing poker. Greco raised, Paider and Doomes folded. The ruffle of cards, the rules for the hand laid out, and O’Brien swore he smelled a cigar. No, he was sure of it.

  “You smell that?”

  “Colonel?” Garson looked over at O’Brien, his brow arched. Clapton was between them, but leaning over the con.

  “That aroma.”

  Garson chuckled. “Oh, yeah. Tammer's a smoker. Brought a box of Cubans with him. The guys asked if they could share a stogie. Doomes thought it might lend a reassuring air of normality. Give ‘em something else to focus on for a while.”

  “The alarm?”

  “Offline...and they’re using a collector.”

  “I was wondering about that. Didn’t know it was allowed.”

  “With more and more civilians in space, the International Space Consortium relaxed the rules. Doesn’t apply to government ships though, so you wouldn’t have known. This ship and my services, I’m reserve Navy, were leased from Galaxy Freightways out of Houston.”

  “That’s why you handed me command authority.”

  “Yeah, mostly.” As if to add emphasis, Garson nodded, then leaned back, his arms on the chair rests, and faced O’Brien. “Before you ask, its twenty-one sixteen, six hours since we ran into the aliens. Current velocity is forty one hundred kph and increasing exponentially. I purposely left the grav-motors offline. Our rotation is seven rpm and grav is roughly point one-five Earth norm.”

  “Scanning?”

  “Clapton brought it online a minute ago. He’s running three second scans at eight minute intervals.”

  With more than a hint of relief, Clapton announced his findings. “First sweep is negative, Colonel.”

  “As much as expected. Let’s hope it stays that way.”

  “Amen,” Clapton agreed.

  “Garson. I’ll take this watch. Why don't you go below and unwind. Catch a nap if you like. This will be a long, long trip.”

  “Thank you, Colonel. I’d like to get in on a couple hands.” Garson released and pushed himself gently upward, but the feeble gravity developing as the ship’s rotation slowly increased arrested his momentum. His fingers nudged his chair back, sending him to one side, his motion poetic as he straightened his bent knees and gently landed on
the deck. Gracefully he turned about and stepped off slowly to keep from breaking contact with the deck.

  “I’m going to join him, Colonel,” Clapton said.

  “Sure. Not enough up here to do anyway." The corners of O'Brien's eyes crinkled. Not likely we'll bump into anything"

  “Thanks.”

  “Oh, by the way, how do they keep the cards from floating away?"

  "Wafer magnets."

  "Makes sense." O'Brien waved him off. "Enjoy.” For the first time since the incident, O’Brien really looked at Clapton. The younger officer's respect for him was expressed in the cock of his head and the confidence in his smile.

  “That I will, Colonel.” He snapped his release and with the grace of someone born to space, languidly somersaulted over the back of his chair and, with knees slightly bent, landed lightly on his feet. Surging gently off the deck, Clapton stretched, twisted, and with a carefully executed push off the bulkhead, reached the hatch and floated out of sight.

  For now, all O’Brien had to do was monitor the sensors and make sure they remained on course at a steadily increasing velocity. Clapton followed Garson below, and soon the level of conversation grew as Tammer and Myer agreed to join the game as well.

  The air of normality was reassuring. O'Brien nodded and upped his estimate of their chances a smidgen. For a short while, he listened absently to their light banter, and wrinkled his nose at the cigar's sweet, earthy perfume. He turned to the con and opened an oral log file. There was much to consider, most based on nothing more substantial than speculation. One thing he knew for certain. The aliens, whoever or whatever they were, wanted humans dead. It was upon this fact that he based all his assumptions of what they must do to avoid another encounter with the murdering sons-a-bitches.

  08:45 Hours, August 15, 2057

  Alarmed, O’Brien pushed up the ladder to the command deck, scraping his knee on the hatch frame as he burst through. Not realizing the gee-force was stronger than earlier, he hit the deck hard. “Damn, what gives?”

  “We’ve come upon a comet. It looks like the big boy, a rock the size of a Jupiter moon, broke up ages ago and created a debris field thousands of kilometers long and a few hundred wide. Had to use the thrusters to keep from smacking into the lead one.”