The Stars That Beckon

by Kevin J Simington

  “Where are we going?” Zac asked.

  “The boss wants a word with you,” Leonidis replied.

  A moment later they came to a T intersection in the corridor and turned right. There were no labs in this section, just offices. Finally, they came to an open door with the signage ‘Dr Simon Wisecroft, CEO, Armstrong Research Facility’. As they entered the spacious office, Dr Wisecroft was finishing a com-call on his terminal.

  “Double the security team at the reactor site. And I want two security personnel stationed at the Genesis airlock at all times.”

  “Yes sir,” said the disembodied voice from the comm.

  Wisecroft leaned back in his chair and exhaled loudly. Noticing them, he said, “Ah, George. And Dr Perryman. You made good time. Please sit down.” He didn’t stand or offer his hand, and Zac sensed an undercurrent of hostility. As Zac sat in the chair opposite the desk, he noted how much older Wisecroft looked since they had met at a DANSA social function more than two years ago. Even so, he retained his sophisticated good looks. In his early 50s, he was tall and athletic, with a thick head of black hair with distinguished streaks of grey. But Zac also noticed how tired and strained he looked.

  “Dr Perryman, we have a bit of a situation here, and I think you can help us.”

  “OK ...” said Zac, with a puzzled expression on his face.

  “I’ll be blunt,” said Wisecroft, “because things are moving rather quickly.” His eyes drilled into Zac, and he leaned forward in his chair. “Where is your wife?”

  Zac blinked several times in astonishment and experienced a wave of anxiety. “What do you mean?” he asked.

  “I think my meaning is pretty clear,” said Wisecroft. “I’d like you to tell me where Annisa is and, more to the point, what the hell she might be doing right now.”

  Zac’s head was spinning. “I don’t understand. How am I supposed to know where she is? She’s been up here with you for the last two weeks. Are you telling me you’ve lost my wife?”

  Wisecroft leant back in his chair and stared at Zac. He glanced briefly at Leonidis, who had positioned himself in a standing position directly behind Zac’s chair.

  “OK,” Wisecroft said. “If that’s how you want to play it.” His eyes drilled into Zac. “Perhaps if I tell you what we already know, it might loosen your tongue a little.” He paused and gathered his thoughts. “This morning we became aware that six people had dropped off the grid: an engineer based at the reactor, another at the water extraction plant, a third based at the gravity generator, and two of our research scientists. They didn’t show up for their shifts this morning, and a search of the biomonitoring system shows that their biochips have all been deactivated sometime through the night.”

  “And Annisa is one of them?” Zac asked, his emotions reeling.

  “Yes,” said Wisecroft. “And I think you know exactly what is going on.”

  Zac felt his anger rising. “What? How the hell should I know?!”

  Ignoring Zac’s outburst, Wisecroft continued. “I’ve had a technical team examining the comm logs of each of the missing people. In the case of three of them—a maintenance officer, the reactor engineer, and your wife—they have sent and received regular encrypted messages going back several months. The incoming messages originated from a geosynchronous comm satellite over Nairobi, Kenya.”

  Zac spluttered, “You can’t possibly be implying ...”

  “Oh, but I am, Dr Perryman,” interrupted Wisecroft. “That is precisely what I’m implying. It’s a Caliphate satellite. Your wife has been sending and receiving encrypted messages with the Caliphate. Furthermore, we have discovered additional encrypted messages originating from the comm station in your apartment, coinciding with your wife’s periodic presence there.”

  “You think my wife is a UFO?” asked Zac, incredulously. “Some kind of Undercover Faith Operative for the Caliphate?”

  “That is exactly what I think.”

  Zac suddenly felt sick. Anger was replaced by shock and bewilderment. “It doesn’t make sense,” he said. “She can’t be ... I know my wife ... It’s not possible.” Zac’s mind was working furiously. “Besides, I would know ...”

  “Precisely,” replied Wisecroft. “Considering your own interest in that field, you would, indeed, know. Which brings us to you.” Wisecroft typed something into his console, and the wall behind him displayed an enlarged excerpt from a document. “I am sure you will recognise this, Dr Perryman. Your doctoral thesis. Let me draw your attention to some interesting statements. ‘The escalating hostilities of the 2040s and ’50s owed more to Western reactionism and racism than to any real threat from Caliphate leaders.’”

  “Yes, but that was just ...”

  “And then there is this: ‘Increasingly, the harsh restrictions and sanctions imposed by the Western democratic nations backed the emerging Caliphate nations into a corner from which their understandable response was aggression’.”

  “You’re taking my words out of context,” said Zac. “You can’t possibly think that I’m ...”

  “On the contrary, that is precisely what we do think.” Wisecroft punched a button on his console, and a picture appeared on the wall behind him. “This is a photo of you with Imam Aabad Bukhari, taken at a mosque in Nairobi, Kenya, in 2349. As you would be aware, Imam Bukhari is known for his extremist views. I also note that you are wearing traditional Caliphate clothing, and you appear to be getting on very well with the Imam.”

  Dan felt the colour rising in his face as his anger returned. “This is getting ridiculous! That was my research trip for my doctorate! Wearing traditional clothing was just a means of showing my respect. I met with a number of clerics while I was there, and every meeting was cleared with the DAN consulate.”

  “I’m sure it was,” replied Wisecroft. “It is said that the most effective way of operating under cover is to be out in the open.”

  Zac started to object again, but Wisecroft held up his hand. “Enough! We don’t have time for word games. Events are escalating.” He activated his comm. “Send Dr. Leibman in, please.”

  Wisecroft punched another button on his console, and a map of the world appeared on the wall behind him. The continent of Africa was covered in red dots. “Approximately 30 minutes ago, the Caliphate activated all their ground-based missile silos, as well as their missile-capable orbital satellites.” The picture on the wall changed to a 3D image of the Earth surrounded by at least 40 orbital red dots. “The Democratic Alliance of Nations has responded in kind.” The image of the earth changed again to a globe surrounded by as many blue dots as red ones. On the ground below, the South American continent was a mass of blue dots. “All DANSA bases and facilities are now in lockdown.”

  As he spoke, a side door to the office opened and a middle-aged, nondescript man in a white lab coat entered, carrying a small black case.

  Ignoring the newcomer, Wisecroft continued to address Zac. “Dr Perryman, we are on the brink of war; the precipice of mutual annihilation. At such a time we can no longer afford the luxury of humanitarian niceties. I believe you may have some information that can help us track down your wife and her co-conspirators, and perhaps circumvent a planned act of terrorism on this base. I cannot control what may be about to unfold on Earth, but I will do whatever it takes to protect the lives of the 900 people who are currently on this base.”

  Wisecroft nodded to his assistants. Leonidis stepped forward and grasped Zac’s head firmly in his hands as Dr Leibman removed an atomiser syringe from his black bag.

  “What are you doing to me?” exclaimed Zac. “I’ve done nothing wrong!”

  “If that is so,” said Wisecroft, “then you have nothing to fear. You will not be harmed in any way. We are not animals, I assure you. This is a perfectly safe but very effective psychoactive drug that suppresses your inhibition centres and stimulates serotonin and endorphin secretion. A truth serum, if you like. I’m told it is a very pleasurable experience.”

  Before Zac c
ould respond, Leibman quickly inserted the atomiser into Zac’s nose and pressed the electronic activator. A soft hiss could be heard, and almost instantly Zac’s brain seemed to explode in a burst of bright light. A warm pink glow descended upon his consciousness as he slumped in the chair. That was the last thing he remembered for several hours.

  When he finally came to his senses, he was no longer on the moon.

  5

  Elizabeth Canning stood at the head of the large oval table and looked at the worried faces of her colleagues. The fifteen men and women in front of her had been talking and debating vociferously a moment ago but had fallen silent and stood as she entered the conference room.

  “Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Please be seated.”

  She had just come from a troubling conversation with her daughter. “Mommy, I’m scared. Is there going to be a war?” Melody was 11 years old and a natural worrier, although until now her worries had centred around what she would wear to her friends’ birthday parties and, more recently, whether any boys in her class liked her.

  “No, sweetheart, of course not,” Elizabeth had assured her. “No one wants another war, not even the people doing silly things at the moment. Everything is going to be all right. There’s nothing to worry about.” Elizabeth had stroked her daughter’s unruly head of red hair and held her close.

  “If there isn’t going to be a war, why are we here? And why couldn’t Daddy come, too?” Melody had asked. She had still not accepted her parents’ separation and couldn’t understand why they couldn’t still be a family.

  “I just needed to meet with some people, and this was the best place to do it. Daddy will be fine. He’s very busy, but you can see him again as soon as we get back home.” Elizabeth had given her daughter a kiss on the cheek and said, “Now I want you to do your schoolwork, please. Rowena will look after you, and I will be on the next level up, in a meeting. I’ll be back down to tuck you into bed tonight.”

  They were deep underground, in a strategic command bunker a few kilometres west of Wellington, New Zealand, having flown there from Macapá, Brazil, overnight. The Wellington command bunker had been set up decades ago for just this sort of crisis, and the Caliphate was believed to be unaware of its existence. It was probably the safest place in the world right now, but Elizabeth knew that if they couldn’t stop this madness, there would be nowhere safe on the face of the Earth.

  Seated in the conference room now, Elizabeth glanced towards the lean, grey-haired general immediately to her left. “General Armitage, what’s the status?”

  The general activated the wall screen at the far end of the room, and a map of the world appeared. “Madam President, Africa is lit up like a damn Christmas tree. Every one of their silos is now fully armed and on a hair trigger. Their satellites too. We’ve responded in kind. The whole world looks like it’s covered in fairy lights.”

  Elizabeth looked at the map of the world. The blue lights indicated that their own thermonuclear weapons outnumbered the red lights, but not by much. “If the worst happened, how effective would our sentry satellites be in neutralising their rockets?”

  Armitage leant forward. “Our lasers have to hit the rockets in the first half of a rocket’s flight, before it deploys its warheads. Each rocket has up to a dozen nuclear warheads, of about 1 megaton each. Once deployed, the warheads scatter over hundreds of square kilometres, and they would be just two damn small and there would be too many of them for our sentries to target.”

  Elizabeth persisted, “So, would we be able to neutralise all their rockets before the warheads deploy?”

  Armitage looked uncomfortable. “Not all of them, Madam President. Best-case scenario, maybe 75 percent.”

  “What’s the worst case?”

  “Worst case, we might only be able to get a third of them.”

  There was a moment’s silence around the table as everyone digested that news.

  Elizabeth looked towards her Head of Intelligence. “Eli, what have you got for us?”

  Eli Goldstein leaned forward in his seat and spoke with his usual clipped precision. “Madam President, as you know, yesterday’s coup lies at the heart of current developments. The assassination of the moderate caliph, Hasib Farooq, has brought the extremist Aabad Bukhari to power. To put it bluntly, the guy is a lunatic. We’ve been tracking him for years. He is a committed jihadist and believes that he has been raised up to finish what they started three centuries ago. I have an excerpt from a speech he gave three months ago.” Goldstein pointed a remote control towards the wall screen and Bukhari appeared, speaking at some kind of outdoor rally.

  “For too long we have tolerated the wickedness and unbelief of infidels. We have slept with snakes. We have made deals with scorpions. But no more! The Great Prophet calls us to rid the world of the pestilence of unbelief. We will cleanse the world with fire! We will visit the vengeance of Allah upon all who deny him, to the praise of his name!”

  Goldstein froze the recording. Bukhari was depicted with spittle flying from his lips and the light of fanaticism burning fiercely in his eyes. The room was silent for a moment as they all stared at his face.

  The president broke the silence. “So, this madman has his finger on the button. Is he just posturing? Has he made any ultimatums?”

  Ramona Ortega, Secretary of State, spoke up. “Over the last 24 hours, the Caliphate have shut down all diplomatic channels. They have not responded to any of our requests for dialogue. We simply don’t know what they want. We are continuing to send your message of peace and goodwill, Madam President, but at this stage we have no idea if Bukhari is even listening. Furthermore, an alarming number of UFOs—Undercover Faith Operatives within the democratic nations—have gone off-grid. Many of them have been under surveillance for some time, but within the last 24 hours their biochips have either been deactivated or removed, and they have completely disappeared.”

  “What is it they actually want?”

  “World domination,” responded Ortega. “I know it sounds clichéd, but there is no other word for it. The jihadist teachings proclaim that it is Allah’s will that all infidels—that’s us— must either convert or die. For centuries mainstream Muslims have simply overlooked or interpreted those portions of their scripture differently, but Bukhari and his followers seem determined to carry out those instructions literally. Mankind’s expansion into space in recent centuries has added further fuel to the fire of their religious zeal. They believe that Allah created mankind for this planet only, and that by leaving it we are showing our disrespect for the home he gave us. They believe that the devil is inspiring us to leave the Earth.”

  Elizabeth Canning stared down the length of the table, the wheels of her mind spinning. She stood to her feet, and everyone at the table began to stand as well. “No, no. Please sit. I just need to move. I think better on my feet.” The president began pacing up and down the room, with every eye following her. “What would happen if Bukhari was removed from the equation?” she asked.

  Ortega spoke up again. “With Bukhari neutralised, the most likely candidates to replace him are all moderates, and none of them want war. The most likely scenario is that Bukhari’s removal would result in immediate de-escalation.”

  The president continued pacing for a moment and then stopped opposite John Duggan, Director of Regional Security. “What’s our ability to mount an op, John?”

  “Madam President, we have a long gun already in place in the capital. He’s a long-term deep-cover operative who could be activated immediately. Bukhari’s over-confidence is making him a soft target. He is moving freely around the capital, including public appearances at prayer services several times each day. If we have a green light from you, the situation could be resolved within the next few hours.”

  Elizabeth looked around the table. “Comments? Does anyone have a better suggestion?” No one spoke, all eyes glued to the president. She moved back to the head of the table, where she stood in deep thought for a moment. “John
, you have a green light. General Armitage, we will remain at Level 5 alert, but I don’t want anything done to further aggravate the situation and force Bukhari’s hand. No asset movements. No drone launches. We need to sit tight and hope Bukhari is listening to our communications.” She took a deep breath and said, “That’s all for the moment. We will reconvene in one hour. By then I want ...”

  The sound of an alarm interrupted her, and footsteps could be heard running in the corridor beyond the door. The president pressed a button on her desk, and the wall to her left became transparent, revealing the sunken operations centre below them. Dozens of people seated at monitors were all speaking urgently into their headsets, while others were running and yelling. The enormous live status screen on the far wall showed what they all feared. Dozens of curved yellow lines had begun to rise from the red dots covering the African continent and from other red dots in orbit. At the top of the screen, the three words they had hoped never to see, flashed ominously in red: ‘Multiple Launches Detected’. As President Canning ran from the conference room, someone behind her muttered, “God help us all!”

  6

  Even centuries after its invention, the thermonuclear fission-fusion bomb was still the most efficient means of killing the maximum number of people in the minimum amount of time.

  In the sky above Rio de Janeiro, a one-megaton thermonuclear warhead travelling at 21,000 kilometres per hour registered that it had reached the optimal height of one kilometre above the city. An initial tiny explosion took place within the warhead. One millionth of a second later, a single neutron collided with the nucleus of a Uranium 235 atom, splitting the nucleus into two and emitting 200 million times the energy of the neutron that had impacted it. The reaction also released three more rogue neutrons, which then impacted other U235 nuclei, splitting them and instigating an exponentially accelerating chain reaction. Within one ten-thousandth of a second, the fireball created by the growing fission explosion was 200 metres in diameter and had a temperature of 100 million degrees Celsius, six times hotter than the sun. After five seconds the fireball was nearly two kilometres in diameter, engulfing the central part of the central business district below. The many thousands of people in the heart of the city were simply vaporised. Buildings were obliterated, steel was melted. Nothing was left.