by M. Alan Marr
Chaz sings along with the music. Dev immediately has a perfect idea and quickly enters a programming sequence in the computers. The outer bulkheads close. The wall panels suddenly start flashing all their data and graphics in beat with the music. The engineering panels display a sonic equalizer with several lines of colorful dynamic music analysis across the entire portside. Dev rounds about and enters another quick sequence at the navigation table that expands the holographic star field outward, beaming throughout the cabin. Chaz is wowed and sings even more enthusiastically. Dev turns a dial, setting the star field slowly rotating throughout the ship. The music is loud, the lights are flashing, the stars are turning. They just created a space-borne discotheque. Dev starts dancing now, and Chaz points to him each time the title line plays. They move and dance their way around the control deck. Now they’re both singing with the music, twirling around during the guitar interlude. As they near the end of the song, they are both laughing.
Chaz, winded, adds, “I love that song. It also fits our situation.”
“How so?”
“I have literally walked the moon with you.”
“Yeah, I don’t think they had Bellerophon in mind.”
“Hey, a moon’s a moon.”
Dev brings two food trays to the forward lounge where Chaz is seated, gazing outside. Soothing Tertian music is playing softly through the ship. No flashy lights, just open bulkheads, the stars, and for the last hour, the giant blue nebula.
“Dinner is served.”
“I meant to ask you, what’s that machine back in the pantry locker next to the capulus dispenser?”
“That’s a manna machine. It produces a sort of high nutrition wafer, for when your fresh stores are used up.”
“Manna . . . from Heaven—holy shit.”
“You’re going to learn some fascinating revisions to Human history.”
Chaz shakes his head. “The unsolved mysteries of Earth’s checkered past are starting to make a lot more sense these days.” Chaz marvels as he gazes out at a nebula. “What an amazing voyage. So much beauty out there.”
“Beautiful and very useful.”
Chaz turns to Dev. “How so?”
“That giant nebula is putting out a lot of neutrinos.”
“Doesn’t look that giant from here.”
“It is when you consider how fast we’re going.”
“Oh, yeah . . . So what do neutrinos do for us?”
“The thruster ports on the cruise engines become very highly charged on long flights. The alloy the ports are made of attracts neutrinos, which nullifies the residual charge. By clearing out the buildup, we can operate the cruise engines at a higher thrust setting. Any excess neutrinos will be stored and routed into the engine ports when we secure from cruise flight.”
“Wow, you really do have to consider every little thing, don’t you?”
“We’re a long way from home,” Dev says. “You have to consider everything. Flying next to that nebula also shaved off about an hour’s time.”
“Only an hour?” Chaz smirks. “In the grand scheme of things, it hardly seems worth the effort.”
“If your oxygen runs out fifty-nine minutes from Earth, that extra minute would come in handy.”
The smirk instantly fades. “We’re running out of oxygen?”
Dev laughs. “No, of course not. I was just making an allusion. Sometimes seconds count. Look what we did back on Lyra.”
Chaz considers the point. “True. If you hadn’t replotted the course, Adonis would have gotten there a day after the attack.” Conversely, Chaz says, “Adonis wouldn’t have been damaged.”
“But more people on Lyra would be dead. Including the guy you saved.”
“Oh yeah, there is that.”
“Machinery can be replaced. Lives can’t.” Dev can tell Chaz is now thinking about the Yeti and tries to divert his attention from that. “Uh, here’s another tidbit of useful information. See the light blue parts of the nebula? You can usually find concentrations of oxygen and nitrogen there. With just two of us on board, we have plenty of stored atmospherics, but sometimes you have to replenish underway, and it’s helpful to know what to look for. Especially if your long-range detection malfunctions.”
“You mean we could just fly in there and resupply our oxygen?”
“That’s right. The particle collectors take it all in. Scrubbers filter out any impurities, separate all the gasses, keep the stuff we want, and vent the stuff we don’t.”
“I’ll have to remember that.” Chaz thinks of another issue. “What about water?”
“We carry lots of water, but same thing.” Dev has a thought. “Remember when they were mating the fighter to the hull? You saw the hull panels indent?”
“Yes.”
“Those indentations were the outer walls of the water tanks.”
Chaz thinks a moment. “So . . . the water tanks must not have been filled to capacity because you can’t compress water.”
“That’s right. We lost come capacity because of the volume of the fighter mating, but the techs factored that in before they provisioned the ship.”
“So we’re carrying less water because we’ve got the fighter.”
“Correct. If we have to, we can make water from stored O2 and hydrogen, but it always tastes funny to me.”
Chaz laughs. “Well, you do have a refined palate.”
Dev slides the tray toward Chaz before the food gets cold. “I’ll make some, and you be the judge. I don’t know, manufactured water has a . . . metallic and synthetic taste to it.”
“That’s okay, I’ll trust your judgment.” Chaz looks at the tray. “So what are we having?”
“This is a sort of stew,” Dev says. “Made with our version of beef and root vegetables.”
Chaz tries a spoonful. “Mmm. The meat tastes . . . fresh.”
“We don’t raise our livestock with bio-treated grains or chemicals.”
Since there are two people on board, naps are taken in shifts so someone is always on watch. Chaz, still too excited to sleep, insists Dev get some shuteye. Dev, exhausted from the last couple days’ work, agrees and goes below deck and climbs into one of the sleeping berths to fully recline. This means leaving Chaz alone on the control deck to monitor the ship. Were Dev flying solo, he could only nap briefly on the forward couch, so being able to actually lie down in a berth right now is something of a luxury. Dev briefs Chaz on what to do if anything happens, and the next series of events that should automatically take place over the next few hours. Chaz promises he will wake him if anything even smells wrong to him (and then has to explain it’s just an expression).
The ship reenters a large deep space trough again and will remain in the void at least until tomorrow. The alone time has Chaz walking up and down the aisle looking over and studying the various systems, trying to pick up as much on the job training as he can. Now he is the Observer, and for the time being, Recon Commander. There is no sensation of day or night in space, despite the perpetual blackness and stars. And unlike on Adonis, where the lighting on the ship had been adjusted for the time of day, the Recon ship’s lighting remains steady, contributing further to the absence of circadian cues. The long windows surrounding the control deck reveal only the blackness of deep space. And the view is truly deep. There are stars, but far fewer than what you see in regular space, or the shallows, as Dev calls it. Sure, stars are out there, but the Human eye can only see so far. The light of all the stars in the galaxy you see from Earth took eons to get there. Here in the trough, in a fast-moving ship, there is no fixed point for millions of years’ worth of starlight to coalesce. Gone is that familiar tapestry of constellations and stars of the infinite universe. Out here, it’s just infinite, with only the brightest stars barely peppering the vast emptiness.
Chaz quickly realizes there is a palpable loneliness to deep space. The vastness of it all makes one feel very alone. Part of it is just the knowledge that in deep space you are far away from e
verything. Chaz’s brief philosophical journey into the loneliness of spaceflight is interrupted by the autopilot, which signals a soft tone and increase of thrust. Chaz moves over to the pilot station to observe the change. The engine efficiency just increased, thus the increase in available cruise thrust. The holographics table plots an auto-speed course that will take maximum advantage of their present position. Chaz sees the course line bears down the middle of a very long trough of deep space, far from any stellar influence. According to the numerical display, the next turn will be in a few hours. Dev will be back on duty by then.
With little else to do, Chaz prepares a cup of capulus and makes himself comfortable in the forward lounge and continues reading his pad on basic Recon systems. He reads, but for some reason, can’t seem to fully concentrate on the material. Instead, he pulls out his Ti-Phone and opens an e-book.
The idea of curling up with a good book to forget his troubles seemed like a good idea in theory, but in practice doesn’t pan out. He is still alone in deep space and can’t seem to shake this feeling of total isolation. Chaz tries to read, but ends up checking his chronometer every few minutes. The Tertian chronometer doesn’t even show the current time in a format he can relate to. Instead, it shows a ratio between time elapsed and time remaining; the left side numbers increasing, the right side digits decreasing. As for the actual time of day, Chaz has no idea. His watch is sitting in a box in Dev’s bedroom in Bari. Even his Ti-Phone is registering the same time format. For whatever reason, not knowing the time is making this weird feeling that much worse. “Concentrate, Chaz,” he says to himself. He takes a deep breath and forces himself to read, but even the slightest chirp of a computer diverts his attention, as if something horrible is about to happen. What is this heightened sense of paranoia? Chaz goes back to his book and realizes he’s now read the same paragraph over and over. Frustrated, he tosses down his phone and stands. Chaz runs his hands through his hair and then approaches the forward windows. He watches outside for something, anything, but only sees emptiness and far away clusters of stars. It is an odd sensation. For some reason, a shiver runs down Chaz’s spine, feeling as though any second something scary would appear out in the dark. He tries to shake this irrational fear-for-no-reason feeling. Another sound somewhere in the ship almost startles him. Why am I so jumpy? Chaz returns to the holographics table to study their course. Best to try to concentrate on something.
Dev’s Ti-Phone wakes him two hours later. He returns to the control deck and sees Chaz on the couch trying to sit comfortably, and looking very uncomfortable doing so.
“You okay?”
Chaz stands up, relieved Dev is back. “Yeah.”
Dev nods. “It gets a little lonely out here.”
Chaz takes a breath. “Yes . . . it does.”
“I should have warned you about that.”
“Actually, I’m kind of glad I figured it out on my own.”
“What did you figure out?”
“That it feels strange being in the middle of a vast nowhere.”
“That’s it, exactly. You want to get some sleep?”
“Um, no. Right now, I’d just like to have some company.”
“You’re doing fine, Chaz.”
“I suddenly feel very under-qualified to be here.”
“Not so, Chaz. It’s just a phenomenon you’ve had no experience with. TransCon isolation is new to you. It’s a form of claustrophobia.”
“Claustrophobia is of closed-in places.”
“Like being in a tiny ship in a great void?”
“Yeah. I don’t know why, it didn’t happen last time.”
Dev chuckles, “You were too impressed to be worried. Just as you noticed the subtle shift when the onboard gravity kicked in, the more you see, the more you notice. Every new experience will open the door to another one.”
Chaz smiles. “You are a very good teacher, Commander, sir.”
Part of the next day is spent on instruction in the cockpit of the fighter, accessed through the small airlock in the lower deck connected to the aft center canopy of the fighter. Dev is able to activate many of the systems in the fighter without firing up the engines or moving the ship from of its mated position. The holographic navigation course from the Recon ship is repeated on the fighter’s active navigation display, so Dev can maintain watch while he talks to Chaz about the weapons systems.
“Pulse shots, beam generators, missiles, and finally, projectile guns.”
“Projectile guns?” Chaz says. “Like bullets? Seems kind of basic.”
“They are. Generally, projectile guns are used when energy weapons may cause damage beyond your target. I don’t know if you remember, but I used the projectile guns when we were pointed at Lyra. The projectiles are plenty deadly, but an energy weapon inadvertently fired at the surface can cause a lot of collateral damage at the point of impact.” Dev adds, “Also, Brigands can be very slippery. Their gravitational field can cause energy weapons to bend and miss. And missiles can be outmaneuvered if they’re fired too far away. Sometimes projectile guns are your best option, even out here.”
They return to the control deck of the Recon ship and continue their discussion.
“What determines whether your energy weapons bend?”
“A lot of variables, but it depends on the stability of the field output of the individual Brigand. They are frustratingly non-standard. They all look alike, but their individual behaviors can be all over the map.”
“Is that a good or bad thing?”
“Well, sometimes it’s good. If their field is unstable, you can often destroy them with a single shot. On the other hand, they usually send their most sturdy ships when operating far from home.”
Chaz thinks a moment. “So we have to treat every Yeti like they’re going to bomb the planet, don’t we?”
“Yeti motherships are the ones equipped for orbital bombardment. Brigands only have energy weapons. Make no mistake, those weapons can certainly do a lot of damage, but bombings like we saw on Bellerophon were done by the motherships. But the good news about the motherships is that they’re fairly vulnerable and they tend to cut and run, rather than risk being destroyed. And they’re nowhere near as maneuverable as the Brigands.”
“What’s the down side?”
Dev programs the holographics table to bring up the Yeti files. The navigation display is transferred to the workstations, and the Yeti data begins to populate. “Downside is they usually have a swarm of Brigands surrounding them.” Dev explains further, and the computer pulls up appropriate images and animation. “Yeti motherships are more like mobile docking platforms. They rely on their Brigands for propulsion.”
“You mean the same way we can use the fighter’s engines to drive the Recon ship?”
“Exactly.” The computer generates a hologram of a Yeti mothership, a tall generally thin rectangular structure with slightly convex sides, dotted with imbedded docking ports. The graphic adjusts as Dev describes it. “They anchor their Brigands in key positions on each side of the structure. Fleet Intelligence determined it takes a minimum of four Brigands anchored for propulsion duty. Six if they want to approach compression speeds.”
“They can compress?”
“Not exactly. They can trigger a compression-like burst, but it’s not sustainable. Undocked Brigands can do it better, but only in short segments.”
“So, if you take out the anchor ships, is the mothership a sitting duck?”
“Yes, however, they rarely ever part with those anchor ships. They seem to run those ships in series, creating a pretty strong gravity well. If you damage an anchor ship, it can be jettisoned and replaced by any available Brigand. And when a Brigand has to return to base to rearm, one of the anchor ships can deploy for combat while the other ship takes its place for propulsion duty. It’s actually a brilliant system.”
“Sounds like a hornets’ nest.”
“Yes. Another troubling aspect of Yeti motherships is that they are fairl
y simple designs. Our warships are complex feats of engineering. Yeti motherships are not.”
“In other words, they can build motherships faster than you can build warships.”
“Much faster.”
Chaz considers the threat. “Do you think the Yeti will come?”
Dev takes a few moments to consider this one because he knows how important his answer is. “Earth obviously poses no threat. The Yeti might not know that. They likely see all of us as technologically aligned. But there’s a reason the Yeti went there in the first place. I was never convinced it was a random crash in the Himalayas. I think that was their intention all along. At the same time, Earth doesn’t really have anything the Yeti need. At least, as far as I know. But there’s a reason they conquered Triangulum. There’s a reason they staged the attack as they did . . . I just don’t know what their next move is.”
Chaz shakes his head. “Why didn’t they attack Trieste? Why stop at Bellerophon? I mean, they obviously had a mothership in the system. Communications were down. The Admiralty was scrambling for information. Why?”
“Trieste is very well-defended. A mothership arriving in orbit would not go unnoticed. You saw all those fighters on the flight line. The Yeti wouldn’t have stood a chance. They attacked assets. If they had taken out the Citadel on Bellerophon, our pipeline of officers would have been cut in the short term. That suggests they’re thinking long-term. The fact that they attacked Cygnus is also curious.”