by Dietmar Wehr
Andreason wagged his finger at Ronson. “I see one flaw in that scenario. As soon as the Compact gets one of those power units, they’ll take it apart and reverse engineer it so that they can build lots more on their own.”
Ronson smiled. “I queried her on exactly that point. She told me that Aesirian power technology is so far in advance of anything the Compact races are likely to have that she doesn’t believe they’ll be able to reverse engineer it for a long time. Apparently the principle on which the technology works was only discovered by an Aesirian scientist by accident, and then it took her people another eighty-nine of our years before they figured out how to convert the theory into practical hardware. The manufacturing process needed to make those power units is itself an advanced technology that can’t be reverse engineered just by taking a power unit apart.” Ronson almost laughed when he saw the look of surprise not just on Andreason’s face but on the faces of the other members of the Committee. The look of surprise quickly turned to one of calculation. It had dawned on them that this was a whole new ballgame now.
“Well, well, that is good to know,” said Andreason. His expression when he looked at Ronson was now considerably more friendly. “I think I can safely speak for the other members,” —he said as he looked at them and saw them nod back— “that acquiring the ability to build our own versions of advanced Aesirian technology should definitely be our number one priority.”
With that decided, the rest of the meeting was over fairly quickly. Nakatomi invited Ronson back to her cramped quarters where they spent an hour talking about Val Ky Ree while consuming home-made alcohol. This was followed by 15 minutes of frantic sex. Two minutes after that, both of them were asleep.
Chapter Seven:
When Ronson woke up, Nakatomi was already gone. He got dressed thinking about how spoiled he’d become from being able to have a shower every day on Val Ky Ree’s ship compared to what the water rationing on Vesta allowed. He wondered if Nakatomi would become pregnant as a result of the previous evening. All women of child-bearing age were encouraged to have as many children as possible, and when she was already quite drunk she had told him that this was a good time to try. Marriage was no longer even an issue. Very few married couples happened to be off Earth when the asteroid hit, and the ratio of men to women was a depressing 2.3 to 1. Ronson considered himself lucky to have been chosen by Nakatomi as her partner for the evening, but he knew there was a very good chance that the two of them would not have sex again. By the time he was finished dressing, his hangover was making itself felt with a vengeance.
As soon as he got back to Spearthrower, he opened a communications channel to Val Ky Ree, making sure that the volume was turned down. “Troy to Val Ky Ree,” he said in a slow, low voice.
“I hear you, Troy but just barely. Can you speak louder?”
“I can, but I won’t. I have a hellova hangover.” When she asked him what that was, he spent the next five minutes trying to explain it.
“I’m still not sure I understand, Troy. My people were not affected by alcohol in this way, so this is all new to me. All I understand is that you feel badly and normal levels of sounds are disturbing. How soon will you feel back to normal?”
“Not nearly soon enough. We had a cure for this back on Earth, but it’s gone now, just like a lot of other things,” he said, finishing the sentence in a voice that was barely above a whisper. “But I do have some good news.” He told her about the meeting with the Committee and the consensus that the Colony should acquire an in-house ability to exploit Aesirian manufacturing and assembly technology.
“That IS the most logical course of action, Troy. I assumed they would see that. My repairs to the last turret are going well. If I can get more raw material, I should be able to begin manufacturing parts for the second repair system in about 24 hours. Assembly will have to wait until my repair robotics are finished with the turret. Perhaps some Aesirian music, at a suitably low volume of course, might help you feel better. Any requests, Troy?”
“I’ll leave the choice up to you, but please don’t pick something that’s supposed to be played loud.”
“You humans are strange creatures, Troy,” said Val Ky Ree.
The plan to begin the manufacture of a second repair system was modified slightly over the next several days. Val Ky Ree had enough repair capacity to work on more than one manufacturing and assembly project at the same time. Part of her system began replicating the repair system, and the other part began making power generators. After a week, there were enough power generators available to make a trip to a Compact station by Spearthrower worthwhile. By the time Spearthrower would return with, among other things, the iridium and other rare metals needed to build another small ship, the second repair system would be complete.
Ronson wanted to take Spearthrower to a Zeiss station in order to look for clues to their culpability for the Earth strike, but the Committee wanted this first real trading trip to go to the main Trior station, which was the most active trading station of any of the Compact races. After a half-hearted attempt to get them to change their minds, Ronson gave in to their wishes. Spearthrower would go to the Citanor Station belonging to the Trior. He would take two trainees with him. Both of them had already been given basic instruction on how to pilot Spearthrower, and this trip would provide some practical experience.
The trip to the station was the first time that Ronson piloted Spearthrower on a trip through hyperspace. In actuality, it was the auto-pilot that controlled the craft through hyperspace, and Ronson was now able to understand the readouts that were shown in the Aesirian language. Learning that language would be the final step in the training process and would have to wait until the trainees were back at Vesta. Upon arriving in the Citanor Station star system, Ronson did the expected action and activated Spearthrower’s transponder beacon, which identified the ship as a human ship. The ship’s sensor suite, while not as powerful as Val Ky Ree’s, was still able to detect all objects within a radius of 34 million kilometers. Nothing would be sneaking up on Spearthrower. As the auto-pilot brought the ship to a heading for the station, Ronson waited patiently for the station to pick up the transponder ID and for instructions to claw their way back at the speed of light.
When the response finally arrived, Ronson was not surprised by its contents. Trior stations were part of the group of stations that had declared humans to be essentially persona non grata ie. not welcome there. While the agreement that defined the Compact stated that all member races had the right to send ships to all other member star systems, the status of humans as a race whose membership in the Compact was ‘pending’ was ambiguous enough that races like the Trior could claim that the right of visit did not apply to humans. The message wasn’t that blunt. Instead of saying ‘stay away’, it said that the human ship would almost certainly be attacked by other ships if the humans decided to dock at the station. Ronson showed the message to Franklin and Corwell, the two trainees.
“I guess that means we turn around and go home?” asked Franklin.
Ronson chuckled. “No. It means we’ll kick some alien butt if they try anything. I’m willing to bet the Trior have heard what we did at the Koron station, and they’re hoping that we can be bluffed into retreating due to the higher number of ships that are likely docked at Citanor. I’m going to turn up the tension a notch by asking for a list of docked ships and the races they belong too. And when I get it, if it has at least one Zeiss ship, I’m going to inform the station that I intend to attack the Zeiss ship if it’s still there when we arrive because of what the Zeiss did to Earth. That’ll rattle their cage, and we’ll see what results we get from that.”
The station refused to supply the list of docked ships. Ronson shrugged and sent his next message. Spearthrower would stand off of the station and observe ships as they docked or undocked. Any ship suspected of being a Zeiss ship would be destroyed, either before it docked or after it moved far enough away that the station would not suffer coll
ateral damage from the attack. The station took a lot longer in answering that message. By this time, it had come into range of Spearthrower’s sensor, which showed several ships undocking at virtually the same time in what looked like a panic withdrawal. Ronson asked Corwell to read the station response aloud while he kept an eye on the sensor readout.
“Citanor Station to Spearthrower. List of docked ships and owning races provided. No Zeiss ships docked at this time. Docking bay 39 is available for Spearthrower. Welcome to Citanor Station system.
“Wow, that was a big about face, eh?”
Ronson grinned. It was easy to identify Corwell as being originally from Canada because of the ‘eh’ that usually ended every question. That and the fact that Corwell was always very polite.
“The Trior know how to be tactful. Their willingness to accommodate other races is the reason that Citanor Station has the most ships visiting it of any Compact station. My guess is that their attempt to warn us off was partly pressure from the other ships docked there and partly a desire to cultivate some goodwill with us by warning us of the danger. Take a look at the list of docked ships. Any Zeiss ships listed on it?” asked Ronson.
“No. At least none of the ships are listed as belonging to the Zeiss. They could be supplying false information though, eh?”
“They could, but I don’t think they are. Let me put it this way. If I was skipper of a Zeiss ship docked there, I wouldn’t take the risk of being discovered and attacked. Far easier to leave the station now, put a few million kilometers between my ship and the station and wait for the pesky humans to leave. Okay, Corwell, you take over keeping an eye on the sensor readouts, and I’ll compose our next message with the information about the generators.”
It didn’t take long to compose a message containing the pertinent technical information about power output and the size and weight of the generator. While all Compact races had the technology to pull electrical power from the fabric of space-time, the Aesirian generator could produce almost 100 times as much power for the same size of generator. Ronson also listed the items that the Committee wanted in return, with a provision that anyone trading for a generator could test it before fulfilling the trade, and if the generator didn’t live up to expectations, Spearthrower would take it back and no one would be any worse off. There were ten generators and ten items wanted in exchange. When the message was ready, he sent it and leaned back. A quick check of the station’s docking list showed ships from seven races, including the Trior themselves. Ronson expected that at least three or four races would agree to a trade and then test out the generators, all of which had been thoroughly tested back on Vesta before being loaded onto Spearthrower. He wondered if any of those races would try to keep the generator without completing the trade. Part of him hoped that somebody would try it so that he could show off Spearthrower’s capabilities.
Even at the speed Spearthrower was travelling, it was almost three more hours before the ship was holding position in front of docking bay 39. The bay was open and looked very similar to the bays at the Koron station. Val Ky Ree had programmed an option into the auto-pilot that would pivot the ship and back it into the bay. Ronson decided to use that option. When it worked perfectly, he let out a sigh of relief.
By this time, he already had three trade offers. Two were for the same item and he decided to try a long shot. He sent a message to those ships telling them that the two of them had made identical offers and that whichever one could also offer information regarding who had engineered the asteroid strike on Earth would get the trade. The third offer was accepted, and the station’s loading system proceeded to unload from Spearthrower a container with one generator, to be reloaded onto the ship belonging to the Hydrasine race. The Hydrasine had a reputation for trying to avoid fulfilling their part of trades whenever they thought they could get away with it. Ronson was certain that they would try something. While he waited for them to make their move, he got responses from the other two ships. The ship belonging to the Krell race said that it was common knowledge that the Majenta were responsible; the Majenta ship claimed that the Krell were responsible. The long shot had failed. After some more dickering, Ronson managed to get the Krell ship to shift its offer to a different item on the human list, and both offers were then approved.
As soon as the third generator container was off the Spearthrower and on its way to the Krell ship, Corwell tapped Ronson on the shoulder. “The Hyrasine ship is initiating undocking procedures, Skipper.”
“Have they sent those pseudo-gravity plates they promised?” asked Ronson quickly.
“Nope, and they still have our generator too, the fuckers!”
Ronson couldn’t help grinning even as he manipulated the controls to get Spearthrower ready for action. When Corwell got excited or angry, he unconsciously dropped the ‘eh’.
“Spearthrower to Station. The Hydrasines are attempting to leave without completing their trade offer. Spearthrower will be executing an emergency undocking. Open the bay doors.”
The response was almost immediate. “Station to human ship. Safety protocols prohibit more than one ship undocking at the same time. Spearthrower wait until Hydrasine ship has cleared the area.”
Ronson could see Corwell’s expression of outrage become even more pronounced. Franklin looked mad as hell too. Ronson winked at both of them. This was becoming too much fun!
“You mean like those three Zeiss ships you let undock from station at the same time when we demanded the docking list, Station? Yes, we were able to detect those three ships. You have ten seconds to open the bay doors, Station. I’m not going to ask again.”
“You’re not going to fire the torsion beam at the doors, are you?” asked Franklin.
Ronson shook his head. “No. I’d like to, but it would invite reprisals against Earth Station. The ten seconds are up. Here we go!”
Spearthrower leaped forward and crashed into the docking bay doors that shattered into dozens of fragments. Ronson was surprised that he hadn’t felt any vibration at all. It hadn’t been much of a risk really. The bay doors were only thick enough to hold an atmosphere if one should be required, whereas Spearthrower’s hull was armored, and that armor not only added to the ship’s mass but also reinforced the hull’s structural integrity. Hitting the doors with the ship was like an elephant hitting a paper barrier. The now very excited voice of the station traffic controller erupted over the com channel in a torrent of partially translated curses and threats.
Ronson turned down the volume and said, “Auto-pilot, power up torsion beam and prepare to track ship undocking from bay 27.” The auto-pilot’s electronic voice acknowledged.
As the ship changed its vector to line up the weapon on the now fleeing Hydrasine ship, the auto-pilot said, “Tracking is closing on target. Torsion beam is now powered up.”
“Fire as soon as torsion beam is locked onto target,” said Ronson in a calm voice.
It was just seconds later when the auto-pilot said, “Weapon has fired. Target has been destroyed.” Ronson took note of the fact that the station traffic controller, who had continued venting anger at the human ship, suddenly stopped talking.
“Spearthrower to station. We’ll be returning to the station. Please assign another docking bay to us. We offer one of our generators to your station as compensation for the damage we caused.”
After a pause that couldn’t have been more than five seconds, Ronson heard the now much calmer controller’s voice. “Two generators as compensation demanded by us.”
This time Ronson waited at least five seconds before speaking. “We’re having difficulty hearing you, Station. It sounded like you refused our offer of a generator. If you don’t want one, we won’t force you to take it. Can you repeat your last message?”