A Sudden Departure (April Book 9)

by Mackey Chandler

  Jeff nodded. "It makes sense when you explain it, but I'd have never thought of it."

  Chapter 19

  "This is Barney," Cook said. "He'll be general gopher and clean-up like you used to do, pretty much whatever needs done. You know the drill. I'll train him myself."

  "You don't want me to show him what I used to do?" Karl asked.

  Cook looked at him funny. "You're prep cook. That doesn't include supervision. Do you remember Aaron telling you what to do?"

  "I. . . seem to remember him telling me to do this or that a few times, yeah," Karl said.

  "If he did, it was because I told him to," Cook told him. "If he neglected to mention that it was an error. It's impossible trying to work for two bosses. If you need him to do something you ask me if I can have him do it. If I tell Barney to do something and you tell him different, figure it will be your butt meeting the meat grinder when I find out. Understand?"

  Barney looked dismayed at the confrontation.

  "Yep, I've got it a hundred percent, Cook," Karl agreed.

  Cook just gave him a stern look, and a very short nod, and went back to work.

  * * *

  "You're hiding something from me," Chen said to Jeff. "I thought we were on the same team. If you're not satisfied with my services time to say why, or even just – "Yes that's true." - and I'll find other work. It may not be as interesting and it may not even be as lucrative, but I assure you I can make at least my base retainer in the current market."

  "I have no doubt you can find other work," Jeff replied, "or form your own company before lunch. You already do enough side work to have a core business. I have a secret, but it isn't any displeasure with you that's making me keep it. Right now seven people know and it scares me that many know. You know the saying about how many can keep a secret?"

  "Yes, and it's extreme. It may be absolutely true, but we have to deal with the real world, not theoretical absolutes. I may not be the spy-master Papa-san is, but if I had to ask for a job title I expect I'd be your spy-master. Neither are we talking personal secrets. You are up to something. If you keep those kinds of secrets from me I don't want to work for you anymore."

  "Come over and let me tell you face to face," Jeff said. "No, better yet meet me at April's instead of my office. She has Gunny in there and I think it's even more secure. But bring your gear and sweep it before we talk."

  "You're not being melodramatic?" Chen asked.

  "I'm being paranoid, and they really are out to get me," Jeff said, holding his head still, and scanned with his eyes side to side. It fell short of funny.

  "OK, I'll meet you there."

  * * *

  Jeff called ahead to see if April was there. For once he'd have let himself in if she wasn't there, but both she and Gunny were home, and happy to have them.

  "Chen is going to quit if I don't tell him about the drive," Jeff told them, when he arrived.

  Gunny blinked, and ran that through his head again.

  "How is it, if he doesn't know, he is willing to quit over it?" It seemed a reasonable question.

  "He said I'm keeping a secret from him, and it offended him. He seems to feel I lack trust in him if I will keep a secret from my own primary intelligence officer. I simply don't have any other secret it could be. I'm not sure how he's on to me, but he is."

  "That's silly," April said. "It's not like you are married to him. People have secrets. If I just blabbed everything I know there would be all kinds of damage, people divorcing, partnerships broken, maybe a few people taking the airless stroll. Sometimes a little discretion keeps the peace. People even fix things and heal sometimes if some busybody doesn't expose everything in public where they can't back down."

  Gunny looked shocked, and then thoughtful.

  "I don't doubt it," Jeff said, "but I think keeping this secret now would do us more harm than revealing it. I value Chen, and bringing him in now lets us use him when we get to the ship testing stage. I'd have done so eventually anyway. He just didn't need to know quite yet."

  "Tell him that. It'll make him feel better," April said. She considered the time, went to the com and ordered lunch for five. This would probably take awhile and the extra was because Gunny was home. He'd eat doubles easily.

  Chen, when he came in, explained Jeff asked him to do a scan for bugs before they talked. He opened a small portfolio and went to work. April reminded him she had small two hunter killer bots loose in the apartment. She didn't want him zapping them by mistake.

  "We also have a broadband radio that listens constantly for the sort of bug that saves up data and then transmits it in a short pulse."

  "That's good," Chen agreed, but continued. "This last test is something new," Chen said, holding up a small box. "Your bots scan for changes, but this simply is simply a camera that looks for unusual small dots or bumps. It's similar to a sky watch camera to find asteroids."

  He walked around with it on a stalk, scanning the entire living area. April was just as glad he didn't ask to go into their private rooms. She still desired some privacy.

  The machine alerted in the kitchen, and zeroed in on the wall behind the counter.

  "What do we have here?" Chen asked, and leaned on the counter edge. There was a tiny oval dot on the bulkhead. "I'm going to zap it before I collect it if that's all right?"

  April nodded an OK.

  Chen got a device like a chubby pistol with bell on the business end. When he pressed the switch on the back it charged with an audible whine that soon passed above human hearing frequencies. When a green light lit up beside the switch he didn't hesitate. Chen put it over the little bump flush to the wall and triggered it.

  It was still clinging there when he removed the EMP machine. He leaned close and looked at it with a pocket microscope. "I think it's a little darker."

  Chen put a sticky note below it on the wall, folded it over creasing it and lifted it back up. He flicked the offending bump off with a pen knife and laid it on the counter. Twisting the barrel of the microscope to a higher magnification he examined it again, frowned, and applied the blade of the tiny knife to it.

  "Can you tell what it is?" Gunny asked.

  Chen drew his lips in a thin line and blushed.

  "I'm pretty sure it's a tomato seed," he admitted.

  Everyone laughed but Chen.

  "It's funny, but it wouldn't have been if it was a little bot," April said. "Honestly, better safe than sorry."

  Chen at least smiled at that.

  They returned to the couches, Chen packing his gear back up silently.

  "I understand your feelings," Jeff started. "I'd have eventually revealed this to you when I needed your help on the matter. At most a matter of weeks."

  Chen inclined his head to acknowledge that, but he wasn't assuaged yet.

  "Where to start?" Jeff said, and raised his fist to his chin tapping it in frustration.

  "Have April tell me if you can't," Chen suggested. "I assume she knows. She's often displayed the ability to be succinct."

  Jeff blinked at that and gave April a permissive wave.

  "Jeff figured out what Weir knew, improved it, and we have a star drive. We've already been to Alpha Centauri. We're going to keep it secret, get out there quickly, and snatch all the best real estate we can lay our grubby little hands on."

  Chen gasped, laid his hand to his breast like a shocked maiden instead of a master spy.

  "My God, the sheer chutzpah of it." It left him boggled.

  "Yes, April does have an economy of form when she tells a story," Jeff allowed.

  "I forgive you," Chen said.

  "Well that's big of you," Jeff allowed. He seemed a little peeved.

  "I knew you were smart, but this. . . is just too much."

  "Oh, I'm not all that smart. Weir conceived the actual theory," Jeff admitted. "I just was aware of some aspects of reality he hasn't had opportunity to learn."

  "I'll guard this most carefully," Chen promised. "Nothing we do
should hint at it."

  "Well, we have to actually build a ship. The only sure way to keep it secret would be to do nothing, but as much as practical we'll hide it, yeah," Jeff agreed.

  "It doesn't surprise you he wants to keep it secret?" April asked.

  Chen regarded her like she was insane.

  "Are you kidding? I'm a spy. Keeping secrets and prying secrets out of others is what I do. Secrets are power if they have real value. I thought you of all people would understand that. Not the sort of secrets children and fools create just to have a secret. This secret has tremendous power. Jeff understood that immediately without anyone having to tell him. Just the aspect he wants to exploit now is tremendous. To acquire holdings, worlds! Before anyone else has the ability."

  "But Weir, or somebody using his work is going to catch up eventually, and they'll have all the fame of being credited with the discovery," April pointed out.

  "Bah! A pox on fame. Even if Weir gets a big public spectacle and politicians hanging medals around his neck, a few hundred years from now what do you want to bet the history books say – "Unknown to them at the time, citizens of Home were already among the stars." It will all come out when they get out there and find you sitting on the choice parcels."

  "I hadn't thought that far ahead," April admitted. "Just so we can hold it when they find us. I don't want to be like the Indians, who must have looked at each other in amazement when the Europeans marched ashore and claimed where they already lived."

  "You know how to prevent that," Chen said. "If the Indians had meet the Europeans on the beach with repeating rifles, and informed them they had a very strict immigration policy, things would have been a bit different, don't you think?"

  "Yeah, but they were fragmented in tribes politically too," Gunny objected. "Or they might have resisted even without superior weapons.

  "Indeed, fix either shortcoming and we might be speaking Iroquois," April speculated.

  * * *

  Happy sent another secure message.

  The same two gentlemen are pressing me with a soft recruit. There are definitely two factions. One appears to be academics and civil servants, the other military or ex-military. Both see Mars as an ideal place to pursue a social experiment in isolation from the less desirable people of Earth. Just not the same experiment. They don't have a neat category for me. The military fellow has intimated I will have to pick a side to get anything done on Mars. It's going to be an interesting assignment. - Happy

  * * *

  Chen called Jeff and April. "Weir's ship was big enough they had to bring it up from Dave's shop in two sections. I'm sending the feed to you. They've joining them now."

  "Not much of a cabin," Jeff said after awhile. "I'd say they intend to jump out and pretty much turn around and come back. Make a few observations and take some pix sufficient to verify it to everybody."

  "Which we neglected to do," April reminded him. "We could do another run just to document we're first if you want. The Chariot returns from an Earth run tomorrow and has a three day lay-over."

  "I'm content," Jeff said.

  "I'm wondering if he'll do any kind of a press release of his intent before he jumps out," April speculated, "or if he'll do a round trip and then announce they succeeded?"

  "He's going to announce he's making the attempt." Jeff said.

  "Why would he do that?" Chen asked. "He knows the drone jumped out, but this vessel is untested. Wouldn't it be embarrassing if it fails with everybody watching?"

  "I have serious doubts he has enough fuel for a quick repeat. With all the horrid lies and pranks so prevalent in the news feeds, if he makes the claim, and can't demonstrate the capacity to do it again quickly before witnesses, he'll lose all credibility. He won't be able to muster an audience a couple months later."

  "You think he'll do it pretty soon then?" April asked.

  "Within the week. Perhaps after a little testing or an orbit to orbit shake-down cruise."

  "Now that this big job is done, has Dave got back to you about starting our project?" April asked hopefully.

  "No, but he may be holding the shop space open to do revisions, if they had some radical design work he might not trust," Jeff speculated.

  "That would be expensive," Chen pointed out.

  "I don't know what their ultimate source of funding is," Jeff said, "or how much depth it has, but so far they haven't had to skimp on anything."

  "Maybe I should have been looking into that," Chen decided, belatedly.

  "Maybe I should have asked you," Jeff said.

  They both turned and looked at April without saying anything.

  "How would I know?" April said, looking dismayed at their attention.

  "But she didn't say she doesn't know," Chen said, suspiciously.

  "I noticed that," Jeff said, nodding.

  * * *

  Jeff didn't need Chen to give him a heads up the next day. His bots went nuts dropping a whole series of alerts on him for a long list of key words and phrases.

  James Weir, space ships, trans-lunar, star flight, Alpha Centauri, Engenharia Assustadora, Brazil, faster than light, Home, final frontier, even science fiction.

  The newsies examined it from every possible viewpoint and interest, no matter how tenuous the connection. The effects on economics, politics, religion, and previous historic moments in spaceflight. The history of flight from hot air balloons and the required interviews with Flat Earthers, Alien Astronaut Cultists, and Apollo Deniers.

  A few made fun of it just in case it was all an elaborate hoax, and there were several interviews with experts who flat out declared it was impossible and people would never overcome the immense distance to other stars, that perhaps a robotic explorer might someday return from such a trip, but so far in the future there might not be humans to know it.

  The fact that some of the experts had doctorates in sociology or were diploma mill reverends didn't keep the newsies from hanging on their every word.

  "He's going for it today?" April asked, coming in to look at the main screen divided up with a half dozen feeds.

  "They did a transfer and lunar orbit while we were sleeping" Jeff told her. "A French ship met them in lunar orbit. Now they announced they will be leaving in a a couple more orbits and doing a Centauri transition."

  "The French fueled them up," April said with certainty.

  "Quite likely," Jeff agreed. "Why don't you order some breakfast couriered in and we'll have it before we watch them jump?"

  "What's to watch?" April asked, but she was working the menu on her pad. "We had our drone much closer when their drone jumped out, and there wasn't that much of a flash in visible light. Nothing spectacular to see from here or the moon. I suppose a good telescope could pick it, up if you could track him.

  "They've arranged with a research radar on the backside to track them live and report when they disappear," Jeff said. "That's the feed in the bottom left corner."

  "That must be some radar. How far would the radar on the Chariot be able to see them?"

  "If they are emitting to act like a transponder works, quite a long distance. But if you mean from the bounce as a dead target, not far at all. Even if they have a pretty good cross section, or carry a corner reflector a few thousands of kilometers," Jeff said.

  "We're going to need much better radar visiting other systems," April insisted.

  "That's not going to happen until we have a lot more auxiliary power, and can direct it all into a huge array. We can't even think about that until we have a much bigger ship."

  "That's scary," April said. "We're going to have to go in strange places almost blind, relying on passive scan to see planets and stuff."

  "Telescopes," Jeff agreed. "At least we have some decent automated search programs for the optics. Asteroid tracking has driven that tech to be quite advanced. On the other hand, when we go into a strange star system, I'd rather not shout and tell anyone we're there until we have done a good passive scan."

 
; "Hmm. . . "

  "Hmm, what?" Jeff demanded.

  "Someone or something?" April asked.

  "If they're smart enough to listen for radar transmissions I'll grant them personhood."

  "You think that's a possibility?"

  "At Centauri? No. If anyone visited Centauri I imagine they'd have been through here, since it's so close. Out further yeah, we better plan on it," Jeff said.

  "That raises a lot of questions," April said. Apparently some of them bothered her.

  Jeff made a rolling motion with his hand to invite elaboration.

  "What if they're not friendly?" she worried.

  "I wasn't planning on going unarmed," Jeff said. "I hadn't thought about it before, but our first visit with the Chariot we were armed, if somewhat lightly."

  "But I bet Weir isn't."

  "Well no. First of all he couldn't afford the mass. Second of all it's a Brazilian flagged vessel even if it was built here. Dave wouldn't arm them outside L1."

  April's pad made a light >ding<. "Breakfast is on the way," she announced.

  * * *

  Jeff usually wasn't a fussy eater, but when he saw he had a bagel he poked it with one finger distastefully and made a face.

  "What? You don't like bagels?" April asked. "I got it because I got the fake cream cheese from the moon and jam. They go together. I'm still learning things about you."

  "I like real bagels," Jeff allowed. "Not an over cooked dinner roll with a hole punched through the center in a pathetic attempt to make it a bagel."

  "How long has it been since you tried one?" April asked.

  "Years, since we first came up here. I would have been eleven. I had real bagels on Earth and was sorely disappointed with what I was offered here."

  "Honest, they've learned how to make them," April said, despite his skeptical face. "They're enough trouble to make right that they only make them a couple times a month. You shouldn't give up on something forever just because it doesn't work out once. Try it. If you don't like it I'll finish it for you. I consider them a treat."

  Jeff took a bite, not bothering to add anything, and chewed. It was a good sign he needed to chew. "It does have a crust now," he admitted. "And much firmer." After a second bite he started loading it up with cream cheese and jam. "Much improved I admit. It's been so long since I've had one the memory fades, but this seems close to the real thing."