by Dietmar Wehr
By the time the ship arrived at AG38, the crew’s grumbling about not enough R&R had stopped. The updated tactical display showed five transponder IDs corresponding to HRCN heavy cruisers. Steele had been briefed on the changes to Hara’s squadron since the battle with the RSN. Indomitable and Steadfast had been sent back to Caledonia and had been replaced with Vanguard and Challenger from Admiral Fletcher’s squadron. Relentless was still here along with three more battlecruisers, Conquistador, Chivalrous and Broadsword. Their IDs were not being broadcast, and Steele chuckled at the thought of the surprise any RSN Commander would get if he arrived and concluded that only five heavy cruisers were defending the system. With no alert signals or warning messages of any kind being broadcast throughout the system, Steele decided it was peaceful looking enough and ordered that the Diamond K begin squawking its ID signal. That would let Admiral Hara know who had just arrived.
“Okay, Helm, take us to the black hole wormhole and no rush. When we get there, we’ll deploy the new drones and see if they work as advertised. I’m heading to my quarters. Lieutenant Sanchez has the con. Wake me if we receive any messages.”
Steele finished his sleep cycle and was back on the Bridge after a quick breakfast as the ship approached the wormhole and just in time to receive Vanquisher’s Captain’s visual call to greet the new visitor.
“Hello again, Captain Steele. The Navy been keeping you busy?”
Steele joined the laughs from his Bridge crew. “Yeah, you could say that and hello to you too, Captain Lavrov. Is Admiral Hara still on board Vanquisher by any chance?”
“I’m sad to report that she has transferred her flag to Relentless. I can’t really blame her for doing that. I would have too in her position, but it was nice being her flag captain for a while. Now I’m just another fucking heavy cruiser skipper,” he said with exaggerated disgust that was meant in jest.
Steele laughed again. “And what does that make me then?”
“Oh, you’re more important than I am, Captain. Your ship actually has something to do while I get to sit here and play tollbooth operator although since we’re not expecting any merchant ship to want to use this wormhole, I don’t expect even to be able to do that!”
“Well, Captain, maybe it’s not the ship that wants to enter this wormhole that you should be thinking about but rather the ship that might come out of it.”
Lavrov lost his friendly demeanor. “I have considered that scary thought and thank you so much for reminding me of it, Captain Steele. All other things being equal, I’d rather be here on Vanquisher than conning a ship that’s going to explore that black hole system.”
Steele wanted to say the same thing but kept that thought to himself. “Well, you know what they say about a career in the Navy. Months of boredom interspersed with—”
“Moments of sheer terror, yes, I do know that wonderful expression. So, what’s the plan now, Captain? Is the Diamond K going to jump right down the rabbit hole?”
“Ah, no. We’re going to deploy an improved survey drone. This will be the first real test for them in a black hole system. If they work as advertised, we’ll get back a lot of useful data. My crew is getting the first one ready right now.”
Lavrov nodded. “Then I’ll leave you to it, Captain. I’d be fascinated to look at any data that your drones collect. It’ll give me something to do and who knows, I might just notice something that AstroComp misses.”
Steele shook his head sadly. “I wish I could accommodate you, Captain, but my orders prevent me from sharing our data with anyone not explicitly authorized to look at it. We wouldn’t want that data falling into hostile hands.”
Lavrov nodded. “Yes, of course. Feel free to call for a chat anytime, Captain. Perhaps we can play some chess while you’re here.”
“That sounds fine. Let’s start right now. Pawn to King Four.”
Lavrov laughed. “I’ll send you my move shortly by personal text message. Until later, Captain.”
With the channel now closed and the ship approaching the designated holding position near the wormhole, Steele turned command over to Lieutenant Sanchez and headed down to the hangar bay where XO Chilton was overseeing preparations for deploying the first drone.
Seeing the Mark Two survey drone with human technicians beside and on it, Steele was struck with how big that damn thing was compared to the Mark One version. Over twice as long and massing almost ten times as much, the Mark Two was almost big enough for a human to sit inside if there was space available. Chilton noticed Steele as he approached the group.
“Are we close to being ready to launch this sucker?” asked Steele in a casual tone.
Chilton grinned. “Yes, Skipper. We’re just going through the pre-flight checklist one more time to make sure everything continues to check out okay. I’d say, baring something unexpected, this bird should be on its way to the wormhole in about…twenty minutes or so.”
“Good! God, I hope the Mark Two does what it’s supposed to do. If we have to scan all the space around that black hole with the ship, it’ll take us months to check for all possible wormhole. Even if we can use both Mark Twos to help with that, it’ll still take far longer than I’d want. I wish we had ten of these things.”
“Roger that, Skipper.” Chilton looked over to one of the technicians was gave him the thumbs up sign. “Looks like we’re ready. As soon as she’s buttoned up, we can start the power-up cycle and move her over to the launch bay.”
“Very good, XO,” said Steele. “You continue to supervise down here. I’ll head back to the Bridge.”
Chilton’s prediction was correct. The Mark Two drone, designated as Bravo One, was on its way to the wormhole in 20 minutes. By this time, Chilton and all of the technicians had squeezed into the Bridge to watch the drone’s flight.
“Bravo One is ten seconds from entry,” said Ortega, the Helm Officer.
Steele checked the sidebar data. The drone was moving very slowly at only half a kilometer per second. That was done deliberately to minimize the energy needed to resist the black hole’s gravity when it emerged at the other end. But the low entry velocity also meant it would take almost 34 hours just to traverse the wormhole itself and that was fine with Steele. A few more hours spent collecting data in preparation for the ship traversing the wormhole seemed like a good idea to him.
“Entry in five…four…three…two…one…now!” The green icon representing Bravo One on the tactical display disappeared.
“Good luck, Bravo One,” muttered Steele to himself. He got up from his Command Chair and started walking for the exit.
“All you people can stay here if you wish, but I’m going to the Galley for a meal and a coffee. You have the con, Sanchez.”
Chapter Twelve
Steele was trying to figure out his next chess move, but his thoughts kept straying to Bravo One. Fifty-five hours had passed since the launch, and the drone wasn’t back. That didn’t necessarily mean anything terrible had happened to it. While the initial transit would take 34 hours, the trip back was expected to take less because the drone was programmed to enter the wormhole coming back with as much velocity as it could accumulate given the black hole’s gravity. Also, unlike the Alpha drone’s sortie, Bravo One would not simply turn around and come back as soon as it got there. As long as it could avoid being pulled into the black hole, it would carefully maneuver around the wormhole recording as much of the star map around it as it could see as well as collect other data. After 12 hours of data collection, it would attempt to enter the wormhole from the side opposite to the black hole so that the star’s gravity would increase its velocity instead of slowing it down. If nothing had gone wrong, Bravo One would have re-entered the wormhole roughly nine hours ago. The implied velocity for a transit that long was less than three kilometers per second. There was no way to know ahead of time if the drone could achieve even that modest pace. He told himself that concentrating on the game would make the time go faster and focused on the board. Lavrov was
an unorthodox chess player. It wasn’t so much that he was that much better than Steele but rather that he was much more unpredictable. He ignored obvious and seemingly favorable exchanges of pieces to shift his men across the board for no apparent reason. It reminded Steele of the comment a fencing master had made to him one time when he was watching a fencing match.
“The opponent that most frightens an expert isn’t another expert; it’s the amateur who doesn’t know what he’s doing and is therefore unpredictable.”
Steele had a sudden insight into a possible combination of moves that would let him checkmate Lavrov when the Bridge called.
“Captain here.”
“XO here, Skipper. Bravo One has returned. It’ll be in the hangar bay within ten minutes. It’s already transmitting its data.”
“Very good, XO. I’ll be on the Bridge shortly. Clear.”
The main display was showing a star map when Steele entered the Bridge. Chilton looked at him with a grin.
“We know where the black hole is now, Skipper, and you won’t believe how far away it is.”
“Try me,” said Steele.
“Three hundred fifty-five light years!”
At first, Steele thought he hadn’t heard the XO right. He was expecting some extremely large number, but 355 light years was not exceptionally far. If anything, it was shorter than the average wormhole distance. His surprise must have been evident in his expression because Chilton nodded. “Yeah, not that far as wormholes go. I was surprised too. I checked with what little data AstroComp has on wormholes and why they form. For a long wormhole to form between two super-giants or in this case black holes, there can’t be any similar stars within a Fibonacci thirty-eight percent of the length of the wormhole on either side of the direct path the wormhole takes. A better way to say that is if another super-giant or black hole is too close to the direct path, the wormhole gets diverted to it instead.”
Steele didn’t bother to let the XO know that he was already aware of that theory. It didn’t explain why the black hole was so close, but to Steele’s way of thinking, the explanation was much simpler. For any given super-giant or in this case, black hole, some massive stars were bound to be closer than others.
“Did it bring back any visuals of the black hole?” asked Steele.
“Ah, I’m not sure, Skipper. We have visuals alright, but there’s nothing in them that I would describe as a black hole. On the other hand, if the damn thing is only a few miles in diameter, which is quite possible, we wouldn’t be able to see it unless the camera was relatively close, probably too close to avoid being sucked in. Here’s what the drone did bring back.” He pointed to the display then manipulated his console so that the star map zoomed in. Steele looked closely and wondered if he saw something in the center or if he just imagined it.
“Douse the lights so that I can get a better look,” he said as he stepped closer to the large display. With the Bridge now dark except for the light coming from the display, Steele was now certain that there was something in the center. It almost looked like a tiny circle of shimmering light. For a moment he was puzzled as to why that would be but then realized that the circle of light was light from stars behind the black hole, that was being bent around the massive star. The phenomenon was called a gravity lens.
“That’s it there,” said Steele as he pointed to it. “Do we have any idea of how far away it is from the wormhole?”
“Only approximately Skipper. The drone was keeping track of the wormhole entrance as it started to be pulled into the black hole. The rate of acceleration and the approximate size of the black hole work out to a distance ranging from thirty-eight to fifty-six million kilometers.”
That seemed like quite a long distance to Steele. “What kind of acceleration did the drone experience after emerging from the other end?”
“Two hundred thirty-three Gees,” said Chilton.
“My God,” said Steele, “That much gravitational pull at that distance. No wonder the Alpha drone had trouble getting back. It doesn’t leave us a huge margin of safety when Diamond K goes through, will it, XO?”
Chilton grin had was now gone. “No, sir. Not much at all.”
Steele tried to come to grips with the implications of that data. Diamond K’s maximum acceleration was only 250Gs. Even if she shifted acceleration into reverse upon exiting the wormhole, her net acceleration away from the black hole would only be 17Gs. Ordinarily, that would be plenty, but the ship would also have residual velocity pushing it towards the black hole. If the velocity was too high, the ship might slide down the black hole’s gravity well far enough that the gravitational pull became more than 250Gs and the ship wouldn’t be able to stop its plunge into the abyss. And while AstroComp and NavComp could simulate the conditions upon exiting the wormhole, all the assumptions built into the calculations were based on theory. No one had ever gotten that close to a black hole to collect actual data on how steep the gravity well was. Bravo One had been programmed to avoid getting any closer to the black hole than it had to. The idea of risking the ship now scared Steele. He briefly considered aborting the whole mission and claiming that it was just too dangerous for the Diamond K. That option was tempting, but he knew what the counter argument would be. The black hole with its potential for many wormholes was too important to ignore, which meant that somebody had to go through and survey that system. The Diamond K had been upgraded specifically to conduct wormhole exploration and was, therefore, better equipped than any of the other ship types, some of which had even less acceleration capability. However, there was one craft which did have a higher acceleration.
“The missile boat,” said Steele, not realizing that he had verbalized his thought.
“Ah, what about the missile boat, Skipper?” asked a puzzled Chilton.
“It has an extra fifty Gees of acceleration to play with. It could let itself be gradually pulled deeper into the black hole’s gravity well to measure how steep the gradient was while still keeping an acceleration margin of safety.”
The XO didn’t bother to try to hide his horror at that suggestion. “Yeah, but…Jesus, Skipper, the crew of that boat will be taking one hell of a risk!”
“I know,” said Steele somberly. He was unwilling to order the boat’s assigned crew to undertake that kind of risk, and he wouldn’t blame them for flatly refusing to do it if he did order them. “That’s why I wouldn’t order anyone to do it. I’d ask for volunteers.” He paused with a sudden thought. “As a matter of fact, if we use the boat, I’ll pilot it myself and ask for one volunteer to monitor the equipment so that we get the data we need. One person by himself might be too busy keeping the boat from plunging into the black hole to focus on data collection.”
Chilton was slowly shaking his head. “I have a feeling that this is a bad idea, Skipper. Maybe there’s a less risky way. What if…” he paused to stare off into infinity while he pondered an idea. “Okay, how about this? We send the boat and one of the alpha drones into the wormhole together with the drone going first. When they reach the other end, the drone will manage its acceleration so that it’ll be slowly pulled down the gravity well. The boat will use its accel to hold position while it tracks the drone with radar. As the drone starts to fall into the black hole faster, the boat’s radar should be able to measure that rate of acceleration and the distance from the boat. With that data, AstroComp can calculate the steepness of the gravity well. The boat then comes back here.”
Steele tried to hide his relief. The XO’s idea made excellent sense and was far less risky. He still planned on piloting the missile boat himself but now was a lot more confident that he’d be coming back. Getting someone to volunteer for the co-pilot slot should be easier now too.
“I like that idea much better,” said Steele. “While you make sure the alpha drone can be programmed to behave that way, I’ll go talk to the boat crew first, and if none of them volunteer, then I’ll make the request to the whole crew.”
When the two missile bo
at crewmen arrived at the briefing room that Steele had decided to use and where told about the missile boat probe idea, it was clear they weren’t thrilled about volunteering. Both were shaking their heads emphatically.
“No, no, no,” said Lieutenant Jess Murphy, the pilot. “That’s not the kind of risk I signed up for. I’m not volunteering, and if ordered to do it, I’ll quit. How about you, Sergei?”
“Same goes for me,” said lieutenant Sergei Kasparov. “And quite frankly, I think you’re crazy to volunteer yourself, Captain.”
Steele crossed his arms and leaned back. “Well, if I can’t get another volunteer, then there’s no alternative but to take Diamond K through the wormhole, with everyone on board and try to avoid being sucked down the black hole’s gravity well with less acceleration capability than what the missile boat has. So, if using the missile boat is too risky for you, then you’ll both be taking an even bigger risk when we take the ship down the rabbit hole.”