by Craig Allen
“Oh, there’s certainly exotic matter inside,” Broward said. “Eight milligrams, if I had to guess.”
“Enough to make a battle cruiser go superluminal. Like the Kali.” Rodriguez gazed at the sphere. “Any idea where it’s from?”
Broward rubbed his chin for a moment. “Perhaps the Kali had an extra pod? That wasn’t uncommon for deep-space ships.” He ran his fingers over the pod. “From the shape and size, it looks identical to the ex-mat containers used years ago.” He carefully rolled the sphere over and pointed at the pod’s port. “Ex-mat is extracted from here, of course, but there’s no safety mechanism. Once you breach this port, you’ll reach the exotic matter. The newer ones have secondary flaps for safety. Still, this one is in amazing shape, given it was designed ten years ago or more.”
Rodriguez leaned back slightly. “Is it safe?”
“Oh, certainly.” Broward rotated the sphere so the pod faced away, which made Rodriguez shift. “The only time it was ever a problem was when the ex-mat pod was opened inside the distribution chamber too soon.” He gestured toward the twenty-meter half sphere in the center of engineering. “It’s because of a handful of accidents that we stopped using this design about six years ago. The newer ones negate such a possibility.”
“Damn.” Rodriguez rubbed his chin. “I knew it.”
“Admiral?” Cody asked.
“Think it through,” Rodriguez said. “We have a brand-new exotic-matter pod, the likes of which haven’t been made in years, and it contains exotic matter.”
“And someone tried to use it.” Cody chewed his lip for a second. “You believe the toads tried to use the chamber and then got rid of it when we threatened them.”
“That’s not the point,” Rodriguez said. “I can’t imagine they’d just leave the thing sitting on the ground somewhere. They’d hide this until they could figure out how to use it.”
“So they didn’t consider it important,” Cody said. “Which means they probably have more, probably underground somewhere.”
“And we’d never find it there,” Rodriguez said.
The planet was like a giant chunk of iron. Its circumference wasn’t much more than Earth, but it had a greater mass because of the immense iron core. The Washington’s scanners couldn’t reach more than ten meters below the surface because of the massive magnetic fluctuations and the metals in the ground. In addition, ex-mat containers were designed to shield the properties of ex-mat from the surrounding area and thus shielded most sensors.
Rodriguez pointed at the massive domed shape in engineering. “And if they’re inside spaceships, we’d never detect them.”
“But we’d detect gravimetric drives on spaceships.”
Rodriguez folded his arms. “Good point. The gravimetric scanners we have on the satellites orbiting this world will pick up any gravity drives. If they have exotic matter, they aren’t using it.”
“Satellites.” Cody waved a finger at no one in particular. “They’re all automated, right? To orbit and scan at regular intervals.”
Rodriguez shrugged. “True, but the pattern is highly complex. And even if they could decode it, they still couldn’t get a ship through without us noticing.”
“Well, let’s say they knew the pattern,” Cody said. “Could they find a hole? A window of opportunity where they could fly through?”
“Unlikely.”
Rodriguez called up a viewing globe at a nearby table. He entered a passcode, and a graphic of Kali appeared, showing the yellow ground, tinged with brown and red, along with the dark-red oceans. The simulation focused on the satellites placed there by the Washington. The simulation showed the satellites at an accelerated rate as they orbited Kali.
“Here’s the satellites’ pattern.” He waved a hand at it. “Be my guest, Doctor.”
Rodriguez stepped aside as Cody approached the viewing globe. He rotated the timeframe back and forth, searching for any holes big enough for a ship to get through. Nothing jumped out. Many birds were in orbit, all of them set to sound an alarm if they detected anything resembling a gravity wave greater than one-and-a-half g’s or any sort of power source. No way could even a hopper escape the planet without notice. Cody doubted a personal levitator could move along the surface without setting off an alarm.
Cody paused the simulation. No ship could get off the planet. That was certain. However, earlier, they had detected something on the planet, which was why they went down.
“Admiral,” Cody said. “What about a transmission leaving the surface? A laser or microwave transmission.”
“We’d see that.”
“If it remained constantly active, sure.” Cody dialed the simulation backward until the time stamp was earlier in the day. It didn’t take him long to find the spot. “But what about a one-second transmission?”
Cody froze the simulation at a point just over the planet at the exact moment the Washington’s sensors had first detected the gravimetric anomaly. At that point, the satellites over the same spot on the planet were far enough apart their scanners didn’t overlap, far enough apart something could get through, like a signal.
Rodriguez leaned close. “My God.” He spun the simulation forward and backward. “There it is. That’s about an hour before the hopper vanished, too. But it’s only about a one-and-a-half-second gap.”
“I worked on encrypted communication systems in the civilian sector during the war,” Cody said. “We could cram a tremendous amount of information into a laser transmission burst of one-and-a-half seconds.”
“I bet that’s what Washington’s sensors detected.” Rodriguez pinched the bridge of his nose briefly. “Where the hell would they send a signal? And none of this explains how the hopper disappeared.”
“No, but maybe it explains why.” Cody pointed at the image. “They probably thought we were on to something and were afraid we’d find it.”
Rodriguez stroked his chin. “Still doesn’t explain how the hopper vanished.”
“True, but right now, this is the only clue we have.” Cody adjusted the image, zooming out until he could see the entire star system. “The window happened at dawn. As for the destination, I’m not sure. We’ll have to wait for them to make the burst again.”
Rodriguez rubbed his chin for a moment. “All right, let’s follow this. See where it goes. When’s the next signal?”
Cody rotated the simulation forward. “The next window is in a little under twelve hours.”
“They’re not going to do anything if we’re around to watch,” Rodriguez said. “They could pick us up from the ground with gravimetrics, and we’d never know they had them. Not to mention they could spot us visually with a powerful enough magnifier. We’ll have to hide somewhere.”
Cody remembered when the toads had attacked the Washington with copies of the old Kali ship. They had hidden on the far side of the moon.
“Here.” He pointed at the simulation. “The next time the gap appears, the transmission will be sent past their moon. If we hid on the dark side, we’d be able to trace the signal without them knowing.”
Rodriguez nodded. “Not bad. We’ll move the Washington to the far side of the moon and leave a hopper in orbit, which can track the signal while we maneuver away. It’ll be tricky. I’m sure the toads have set up sensors all around their moon.”
Rodriguez rubbed his chin then activated the wall comm. “Admiral, bridge. When was the last time we did a full sensor sweep of the moon?”
The XO responded, “About two months ago, a few days after the battle. We did scans of the surface but found nothing. There hasn’t been a reason to do so since.”
“Do it again,” Rodriguez said. “But passive only. We don’t want to tip our hand. Assume there’s something there hiding from us.”
“Understood, Admiral.”
“One other thing,” Rodriguez said. “Contact Camp Murray and send them everything we have on the missing hopper and the possible use of technology. Tell them we are investigating and
request instructions.”
“You know what they’ll say, Admiral,” the XO said.
“I do, but I want to make it official. Inform me when they respond. Out.” Rodriguez shut off the comm.
Cody gestured at the image of Kali, still hovering in the viewing globe. “They’re going to suggest you destroy all possible locations of technology, aren’t they?”
“Possibly.” Rodriguez reached over and shut off the viewing globe. “They’re more concerned about ex-mat falling into the hands of the toads and less so about actual technology. Our declaration that we would destroy them if they used technology was a bluff. At least, that’s how the UET Council saw things.”
“Until now?”
Rodriguez frowned. “That depends on whether or not the toads are experimenting with ex-mat. Since we can’t be sure of where all the technology is located, and the toads are in fact about to develop superluminal propulsion, we’re going to end up nuking a hell of a lot of the planet.”
“What if they try to stop us?” Cody asked.
“That’s why we’ll have to do it sooner rather than later.” Rodriguez clenched his jaw. “We should be nuking them now before they can prepare, if they’re not already prepared. And if the toads are prepared, we’ll definitely need the Spicans’ help.”
Cody wanted to argue, but doing so was pointless. The United Earth Treaty worlds, along with the United Earth Armed Forces, feared another prolonged conflict. They were still recovering from the Spican War, and if things went bad quickly, they’d have that prolonged conflict, and the outcome was not guaranteed.
“And what about the fliers?” Cody asked. “What will happen to them?”
“We’ll do our best to take care of them,” Rodriguez said. “My hope is we can stop it from getting that far, but if it does, we’ll try to relocate them.”
Cody didn’t like the reasoning. Relocating a species had never been done before, and for good reason. Placing humans on Kali, for instance, would require either the planet be terraformed or the human residents be altered to live in the environment, neither of which was simple, and they still didn’t fully understand the biology of the fliers or any creature on Kali.
He couldn’t do anything about that at the moment, except stay involved. “Admiral, when you send that hopper, I’d like to be on board.”
Rodriguez glared at Cody. “What the hell for?”
“We’re dealing with a communication system directly connected to Kali. Should we make contact with locals, I might be of use, given I’m technically the ambassador to this world. And maybe I could help translate the message if necessary. It’s what I did during the war, after all.”
“You translated Spican into English, as I recall.” Rodriguez gave him a look that would’ve made crewmen wither. “Is it that or the fact you just want to be involved because you’re worried what’s going to happen to the inhabitants of this world? I’m guessing the fliers, first and foremost.”
Cody grimaced, wondering if he was that transparent to everyone onboard.
“You need to work on your poker face, Doctor.” Rodriguez put his hands behind his back. “Fine, you can ride along in the hopper. And it’s only because I’m old and don’t care what the brass thinks anymore.”
“I always liked you, Admiral.”
“Be sure to mention that at my court martial.”
~~~
The door to Cody’s quarters slid open at his touch just as the comm in his ear rang.
He answered it with a gesture. “Dr. Brenner.”
“Lieutenant Sohe, Doctor. The admiral asked me to contact you.”
Cody noticed the shower was running. “In regard to what, Lieutenant?”
“We found something odd on the dark side of Kali’s moon,” the lieutenant said. “Looks like a satellite. I’ve sent you a file with details on the object and the mission.”
Cody mulled over that development. He wasn’t terribly happy his theory was proving to be correct. That meant the toads were up to something, which was just one more excuse for the UEAF to take them out before the toads became an interstellar threat.
“Thank you, Lieutenant.” Cody cut out the comm.
Sonja emerged, wearing one towel while drying her black hair with another. “Was that work related?”
“Of course. It never ends.”
Cody had heard over ninety-nine percent of the water on a ship was recycled, but with Sonja standing there in a soaking towel, he wondered how true it was. Maybe they pulled the excess moisture from the air as well as recycling what went down the drain. Then again, seeing Sonja in nothing but a towel made him forget about everything else.
“Tell me about it.” She dropped the towel she’d used to dry her hair on a chair. “I’m guessing that call was the reason I’m going out on a hopper tomorrow?”
Cody picked up a viewer and sat down on the bed. He read the file and saw that both Sonja and Bodin were cleared for the mission, including the pilot who’d evacuated them from the planet, Lieutenant Hayes. A few other names were on the list as well. At least Sonja would be there.
Sonja sat next to him. “Why do they always send us out?”
“We have experience with Kali.” Cody read through the file. They had been cleared for one hopper to be dropped into orbit in what was a complicated maneuver, from what Cody could tell. Then he saw the scan of the black, cylindrical object. “Oh my.”
“Yeah.” Sonja reached over and enlarged the image on the viewer. “If that’s what I think it is, we have a problem.”
The black cylindrical object was like nothing Cody had seen. It sat parked in synchronous orbit around the moon, like a cucumber hovering in space.
“That looks like a sensor array,” he said.
“Yep,” she said. “And Bodin’s not happy about it.”
“Why?”
“Keep reading.”
“They’re going to disable the array before the gap between the satellites opens, in case it does an active scan prior to the satellite window.” Cody started to smile. “Oh. Bodin is going to lead the team to dismantle the sensors.”
Sonja adjusted her towel. “I used to do that during the war. A hopper coasts in and drops off you and your fire team. Sometimes it’s just you. You maintain lidar camo at all times on your suit and on the hopper you use to drop your marines into space. You use maneuvering jets on your suit to get close, but nothing gravity related, and then deactivate the sensor buoy.” She ran her hands over her short hair. “Good news is that Spican probes were nothing like that. That looks more like one of ours.”
“Yeah, I’ve seen them before, back during the war.” Cody ran a thumb over the image. “The toads probably copied it from a design they found in the UEAF Kali and built it themselves.”
“So no Spicans.” She pondered the image some more. “Can’t say I miss chasing those things down… or anything else about that fucking war.”
“Well, I for one am glad you made it.” Cody leaned over and kissed her, but she barely responded. Uh oh. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah.” Her tone indicated it wasn’t. “I mean, nothing bad.”
“Other than a planet full of sentient creatures out to kill anything that moves, including us?”
She chuckled. “Yeah, but that’s not it.”
“So something is bothering you.”
Her lips started to form the word “no,” then she stopped. “I don’t want to talk about it right now.”
“Fine.” He would figure it out sooner or later—unfortunately, that was likely to be later. He pulled off his shoes. “Maybe we should get some sleep before the big day.”
Sonja narrowed her eyes, a grin creeping onto her face as she removed her towel. “I’m not tired.”
Chapter Seven
“Stand by for drop.”
The voice echoed throughout the hopper. Cody also heard it through the speaker in his inner ear. He took several deep breaths, trying to calm down. Though he had nothing to do during the dr
op itself, he was still a bit uptight. He wondered how many missions a person had to go on before getting used to the jitters.
Outside the canopy, Cody could make out the interior of the launch tube. Soon, it would drop the hopper, then the hopper would drop Bodin and his fire team.
Cody sat in a small seat just behind Sonja, trying to stay out of the way as much as possible. His job was to watch, at least until if—or when—a signal was sent from the planet. Lieutenant Hayes sat in the other seat, leaning back with his hands behind his head.
“You got this, Gunny?” Hayes asked.
Sonja checked the chronometer. “Never dead-sticked it before.”
“You won’t have to just yet,” Hayes said. “And if you do it right, then you won’t have to at all.”
It was the second time Sonja had taken the stick during a hopper flight. Cody remembered she’d had experience flying during her civilian days. He wondered what Admiral Rodriguez would think of a gunnery sergeant piloting a hopper instead of a more experienced lieutenant. Rodriguez wasn’t going to find out from Cody, of course.
“I’d rather I was you, Gunny.” Bodin’s voice piped in over the comm. “I gotta drop my ass into orbit and hope I don’t go splat.”
Cody glanced back into the hopper bay. Bodin had his hand on top of his space helmet. Behind him sat three more nervous marines. Cody could appreciate that. Before the Spican War, when he’d done drops from Earth’s orbital ring as a sport, he had heat shields. Also, once in the atmosphere, he opened a parachute. Bodin didn’t have the luxury of an atmosphere if something went wrong and he overshot that satellite.
Cody missed those days.
“You’ve done it before, Sergeant,” Sonja said.
“Doesn’t mean I have to like it.”
The Washington’s communications officer spoke over the comm. “Drop in three… two… drop.”
Abruptly, the launch tube ejected them into space. The artificial gravity inside the hopper made it feel no different than if they were sitting still. At first, Cody saw only stars through the cockpit canopy. Then the Washington loomed into view. The Daedalus ports where the struts would extend were large enough the hopper could almost fly inside. One section bristled with graser ports and torpedo tubes, and behind that were her maneuvering jets, which themselves were wider than the hopper. Cody eyed the gun ports carefully, hoping they were off-line. Each graser could induce a gamma-ray emission powerful enough to vaporize the hopper.