The Eridani Convergence

by Alastair Mayer

  “Never mind. I guess it will keep until I get back to Sawyers World.” Carson had a hunch that there was more to the 82 Eridani system, and possibly others, than people suspected.

  CHAPTER 46: DELTA PAVONIS

  New Toronto, Verdigris, Delta Pavonis

  THE CARCHARODON DESCENDED through the skyweed layer over the port. It was thin today, giving plenty of visibility for Vaughan to see the rows of new ships lined up on the expanded apron beside the runway. It was a fine sight, but there should have been more. They should also be under cover. No wonder he’d been recalled. Just as well they hadn’t gone back to Tanith for what might have been a wild goose chase.

  Stinson eased the ship down and rolled it smartly off the runway onto an adjacent ramp. Apparently, there was a small reception committee waiting. They must have scrambled when they’d heard the Carcharodon was in-system.

  Vaughan took a minute to straighten himself up. One of his men opened the hatch and deployed the boarding ramp. A squad of the waiting men formed up in parallel rows, facing each other on either side of a path leading from the foot of the stairs. Vaughan was bemused; somebody must be nervous.

  He strode the hatchway and stood there for a moment, surveying the scene, before descending the stairway. The man who seemed to be in charge of the reception came forward to meet him at the foot. Vaughan knew him; he oversaw local operations. The man came to a sharp halt and saluted.

  “Commander Vaughan,” he said, “we’re glad to have you back.”

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  Aboard Razgon, orbiting Verdigris, a day later

  “Well, New Toronto is definitely out for a landing,” Jordan Burnside said, staring at the display and seeing the rows of ships parked at the spaceport. “And I think that’s the Carcharodon down there too.”

  Tevnar agreed, and said, “We can give Verdigris City a try. Or there should be small towns that have landing fields, if you want,” she said. “The only potential problem with that is that they might wonder why we didn’t land at one of the cities first. That’s the usual routine. Only locals come in direct from space.”

  “It would attract attention,” Burnside agreed. “Maybe you shouldn’t land at all.”

  “That’s a long trip for nothing, and I need to refuel.”

  “Is there somewhere else in-system you can do that? I’m guessing the Razgon isn’t equipped for a water landing.”

  “No, he’s not. But this ship was never at Harp City, and I don’t have to say we came from Tanith.”

  “It’s still a timoan ship. Vaughan would hear about it, and might make the connection. Do you have to land?”

  “No, the system has a gas giant with ice moons. I can refuel there if I have to.”

  Burnside decided to clinch the deal. “Bonus for the hassle of doing an off-field refueling,” he said.

  “Sold. We head back to Taprobane, then?”

  “No, I’m getting off here,” Burnside said, “then you go back.”

  “I though you didn’t want me to land. Make up your mind.”

  “I don’t. I’m going to jump. Roberts gave the retro-pack, remember?”

  Tevnar made a timoan head-gesture that signified rejection, raising her head sharply like a reverse nod. “You humans are crazy. Are you sure?”

  Burnside wasn’t enthusiastic about it, but it had to be done. The Velkaryans in New Toronto were clearly up to something, and Ducayne would need eyes and boots on the ground. There were other Homeworld Security agents on-planet, but the Velkaryans might well know them; he’d be a wild card. He still had his box of tricks, so he’d be able to make contact with any ship Ducayne sent back here. He told Tevnar, “Better to go now than later, so yes, I’m sure. I’ll give you a report you can give to Carson and Roberts to take back to Sawyer’s World. This is important.”

  “How do we do this, then?” Tevnar asked. “Do I just toss you out the airlock?”

  “Hah, not quite. First let me get my gear together and suit up. After that, can you kill the Razgon’s orbital velocity somewhere above my landing spot? I’ll tell you where.”

  “I can, but the Razgon will start to fall and enter the atmosphere.”

  “Right. It doesn’t have to be a full stop; I have the retro-rockets on the pack, and it has a heat shield. I just don’t want to push its limits. Once I’m out you can apply maneuvering thrusters until I’m clear, then go to full thrusters or warp out or whatever you think appropriate. That shouldn’t take more than a minute.”

  “It sounds like you’ve done this before.”

  “I’m not saying.” He hadn’t actually, but he had been in a ship that had dropped someone else off that way.

  “You and your secrets. Very well. It sounds simple enough.”

  For Tevnar and the Razgon, perhaps. Burnside knew that was when things would start to get interesting for him. But it had to be done. “Then let’s get to it.”

  CHAPTER 47: TAPROBANE

  Epsilon Indi, planet Taprobane

  HANNIBAL CARSON HAD been on Taprobane now for two days, and he was anxious to get back to Sawyers World, but he and Jackie were waiting until Burnside arrived so they could all return in the Sophie.

  Meanwhile, He and Marten, when Marten wasn’t teaching class, had been carefully removing the dirt and impacted sediment from the Kapteyn’s artifact. The latter was, for now, kept secured in Marten’s office at Kangara University. They were also compiling a list of the different glyphs on the artifact’s control panel, if that’s what it was, and any such markings on interior components. Marten had already heard about the Belize find through rumors in the archeological community grapevine.

  “Do you think the Belize find may have something to do with the feathered serpent legends of the Yucatan?” Marten said.

  “It would fit,” Carson said. “A Kesh ship crash lands there, the survivor or survivors make an impact on the local culture. Although apparently, not on their written language.”

  “What about their spoken language?”

  “Not if it were just a few individuals and no prolonged contact.”

  “And yet . . . Give me a minute,” Marten said, and turned to his desk console. After a quick search, he turned back to Carson. “Yes, I thought so. The Quichean branch of old Mayan originated sometime around the estimated time of the Belize wreck. It’s centered around Belize and Guatemala. Quichean, K’iche’, Kaqchikel . . . Kesh? Coincidence?”

  “That’s a good question. But we know the Kesh were in the Middle East, or at least, Ketzshanass implied as much. Aside from the cuneiform-like script, none of the languages from there sound like that. Not that we heard much Kesh speech, and old Sumerian was logographic.”

  “Longer ago, and maybe the Kesh priest class didn’t speak it to the native riff-raff.”

  Carson had another thought. “Are there any timoan languages that might be similar?”

  “Not that I’ve heard of,” Marten said, “but there are a lot of clans out there. We haven’t cataloged everything. But there are no signs that the Kesh, or the Spacefarers, were ever here.”

  “Which is weird. Why not? But maybe the signs just haven’t been found yet.”

  Carson’s omni beeped at him before he could add anything. He glanced at. “Oh, Tevnar and Burnside are here. The Razgon is on approach to the spaceport. Let’s go meet them.”

  ∞ ∞ ∞

  “What do you mean, Burnside stayed on Verdigris. Why?” Contrary to what Carson had assumed, Tevnar had been alone on the Razgon.

  “He insisted. Said Homeworld Security might need an agent in place, and it would be easier for him to stay than send someone else. Something about parachuting now or having to parachute later. I have his reports for Ducayne.”

  “I guess Ducayne owes me for a new suit and retro-pack,” Jackie said, her tone flat.

  She was worried and trying to joke about it, Carson guessed. He ignored it. “But, starships at New Toronto? Do they expect that much traffic?”

  “Burnside thinks
they expect war,” Tevnar said.

  “Interstellar war makes no sense. The distances are too great, everything is three-dimensional, there’s no front. What is there to fight over?”

  Jackie had an answer. “Terraformed worlds. For Terrans,” she said, paraphrasing a Velkaryan slogan.

  “Oh, those bloody idiots. You may be right.” He shook his head.

  “Hannibal,” she said, “we’d better get those reports back to Sawyers World as soon as possible. The Sophie is fueled and ready to go as soon as you’re ready.”

  CHAPTER 48: HOME

  Sawyers World, Homeworld Security HQ

  JACKIE ROBERTS AND Hannibal Carson were debriefing in Ducayne’s office. They’d already discussed the artifact, and Malcolm Brown had eagerly taken Carson’s notes and gone off to compare them against what he’d compiled on the Belize artifact. Brown and Carson were convinced they were both of Kesh origin, From scans, the Kapteyn’s artifact included something strongly resembling a key component in the latest experimental gravity wave detectors. Jackie still didn’t see the point of that in a ship, instead of somewhere isolated from nearby influences.

  But now they were talking about Burnside’s reports, which Ducayne had partially shared with them. They had both been on Verdigris not that long ago. Tevnar had also briefed them on her experiences with Burnside in that system. Ducayne was worried about the ship-building.

  “I don’t get it,” Ducayne said. “To manufacture warp pods you need some pretty high-tech equipment. Although some of that is dual-use, which they have been importing. We just didn’t think they were that far along.

  “High-tech equipment like that for making fusors? They use the same sort of massive monolithic integrated circuitry and nanochannels as warp pods” Jackie said. As a starship owner and pilot she understood how both were put together, at least at a high level.

  “Exactly like that, yes,” Ducayne said.

  “Could they re-purpose equipment for manufacturing fusors to make warp units?” Carson asked. His background wasn’t as technical as Jackie’s or, apparently, Ducayne’s.

  “To a certain extent, yes. But there are also specialized components and materials, you’d still have to get those from somewhere else,” Ducayne said.

  “Components for the warp pods, or components for the machines to manufacture them?”

  “The former would be easier,” Ducayne said. “The parts are small, but the equipment to make them would be a major shipment. Not something you could fit aboard the Sophie, for example. A C-class or bigger. But even the small parts . . . well, cargo is inspected.”

  Jackie knew better. “Not always,” she said.

  “Well, no, but machinery usually gets at least a cursory check against the manifest.”

  “What about coffee?” she asked.

  “What?” Ducayne looked puzzled. “Sure, let me start the autochef.”

  “No. I mean shipments of coffee. Roast coffee often skips the quarantine.”

  Ducayne looked at her sharply. “How is it usually shipped?”

  “Crates containing sacks of beans a few kilos each. Sometimes in half-kilo bags for retail. I had a few crates of those on my run from Skead to Tanith. Tau Cetan coffee is easy to find a broker for.”

  Ducayne frowned. “You could fit a number of sub-assemblies in something the size of a half-kilo coffee bag. Even more interesting things in a twenty-kilo sack.”

  Roberts suddenly remembered her conversation with David Tefera when he’d delivered the coffee. “The Cerulean Cloud,” she said.

  “The what?”

  “Class C cargo hauler. My old co-pilot Andrei Sarsfield and his partner Ben I-forget-his-last-name are the owner-operators. Did a run to 82 Eridani a month or two back, and my coffee dealer on Skead mentioned they would be hauling a load to Verdigris sometime after I left Tau Ceti. You don’t suppose . . . ?” Roberts trailed off, wondering just what it was she did or didn’t suppose.

  “How well do you know him? Or his partner?”

  “Andrei and I flew together for about a year, and I’d known him off and on before that. I trusted him. I wouldn’t expect him to be involved in anything shady, and have no reason to think he sympathized with the Velkaryans.”

  “What about his partner? Ben, you said?”

  “I only met him the once, and he seemed a little hostile. I assumed it was because he and Andrei were more than just business partners, and that he might be jealous of me. Not that he’d have any reason to be; Andrei was never interested in me that way.”

  “Hmm. Possibly. Or there may have been some other reason.”

  Jackie realized something else. “Oh! Do you suppose there could have been contraband in the shipment I took to Tanith?”

  “Did you inspect the cargo?”

  “The crates were sealed; the documentation was in order. Why would I? It was an on-spec consignment, it wasn’t even for delivery to a specific person.”

  “Tell me how that works,” Ducayne said.

  “I land, send the docs to the local port authority and invite them to come inspect the cargo before offloading. Then anything I’ve carried on-spec, meaning I hope I find a buyer for it, gets entered into the net. There’s an auction site where brokers can bid on the incoming cargoes, and also offer outgoing on-spec cargoes. It’s like any on-line auction, really.”

  “So, what happened with your cargo?”

  “It was roasted beans, so they skipped quarantine. I got a buyer almost as soon as I put the cargo on-line. Some brokers have software that watches for things they’re interested in.”

  Ducayne was still frowning. “Then even though there was no designated recipient, someone in the know might reasonably expect that particular buyer to be ready to pounce on the cargo as soon as it was listed. Is that a fair statement?”

  Roberts had to reluctantly concede that it was. She hated the thought that she might have been played. If the cargo had been inspected and contraband found, she’d be protected by both her courier rating and the fact that the crates had been sealed before being brought aboard, although it would have meant an uncomfortable few days to get things cleared up. But . . . “Could they, though? What if more than one person was watching for that kind of cargo?”

  “The recipient could have put in a high bid limit, or someone could have hacked the auction software to give them an edge.”

  “Shit. Shit shit shit!” Jackie balled up her fists. “I’m an idiot.” She slammed her left fist sideways against the arm of her chair.

  “Hey, Jackie, relax,” Carson said. “We don’t know that you smuggled anything. It could have been just coffee.”

  “And I thought Tefera was just some space-struck farm-boy with stars in his eyes.”

  “Maybe he is.”

  “He knew an awful lot about the business, though.”

  “He’s anxious to learn,” Carson said. “Or his folks want him to learn everything he can about the family business. Plenty of innocent explanations.”

  She looked at him. He had a point, but in her experience with Ducayne, innocent explanations tended to be discounted. “Thanks, Hannibal. I know you’re trying to make me feel better.” She looked at Ducayne. “You don’t really believe that, do you?”

  “It’s never about what I believe or disbelieve,” he said. “It’s about what the evidence is and all the different things it could point to.”

  “That sounds like something you would say.”

  “Carson would tell you the same thing about his field.”

  “He’s right, I would. Same thing I tell my students.”

  “Come to that, it’s what my flight instructor told me about the instruments,” Jackie said. “But I find the connection between David Tefera, coffee shipments, and places where Vaughan and the Carcharodon are, to be just a little too much of a coincidence.”

  “Maybe Vaughan just really likes his coffee,” Ducayne said, but his grim expression and tone said that he also thought it too much of a coincidence.


  ∞ ∞ ∞

  Hannibal Carson thought they were done, but Ducayne turned toward him.

  “You have some unfinished business here, too,” Ducayne said. “That interview we talked about before you left?”

  Carson wondered what he meant, then remembered. “Oh, about Pete’s Peak. Right.”

  Ducayne winced and glanced at Roberts, who hadn’t been dismissed.

  “Oh,” Carson said, realizing his faux pas. “Jackie knows. She’s been in both pyramids and met the Kesh too.” He fished his memory for the phrasing. “I figured she had a need to know.”

  Ducayne looked down at his desk and shook his head, then up at the both of them. “No harm done, I suppose. Anyway, I made contact with Doctor Finley. He agreed to a meeting.”

  “What? How? I thought he was pretty much a recluse, and Sawyer forbade me to mention her.”

  “I didn’t need to. It turns out his daughter, Roberta, is the VP of Sales for Maclaren Arms. We do a lot of business with them; I asked for a favor.”

  “So, is there a date set for this?” Carson asked. He had a lot of questions he wanted to ask Finley about his peak, or pyramid. No doubt Finely would have a few of his own for Carson. But, “You didn’t know when I would be back.”

  “No, that’s why we left it open. Whenever you want, unless he has a prior commitment then.”

  “Great!” Carson said, then remembered the last time he had visited one of the Anderson crew. “But I want a driver. I’m not taking an autocab this time.”

  Jackie looked at him and, grinning, asked, “How do you feel about bikes?”

  EPILOGUE

  Elsewhere, time and location uncertain

  RICO OPENED HIS eyes, or thought he did. The darkness didn’t change. Rico wondered about that. There had been the firefight at the Denver Spaceport, to give Brown a chance to . . . he had gotten away. Rico had seen the ship lift, then everything had gone dim. He’d been shot. Several times. The memory came back all the way and Rico realized where he was. In a traumapod. Again.