“Volatiles?”
“Elements usually in gaseous form at room temperature. You know, like nitrogen, hydrogen, carbon dioxide, water. A consortium set up orbiting hydroponic platforms on the primary inner planet. They grow enough food to supply the station, the vessels passing through, and a lot of the Unity Fleet’s needs.” He opens his pod and checks the contents. “Best thing about this system is when it was found, there wasn’t anyone home. The Unity Sphere claimed it without a fight. Pretty rare these days.”
Especially on settled worlds, like my own, where syndicates are in place and running things their way. And willing to die resisting the Unity Sphere’s encroachment. “Without a fight is good.” I nudge my pod near the sled, then examine its contents. The trencher inside will need assembly. “What about this outpost? How long has it been here?”
“I think it was built alongside Chalico Station. Some sort of research platform, originally. It was here before I got here, anyway. I know it’s changed hands a few times since then. Not sure who the last owners were, but I’ve heard rumors.”
“What rumors?”
He hesitates. “That the people who were here when the Fleet attacked were not very nice people.”
“Oh?” I think of the byveri separatists and their weaponized chall. Now those weren’t nice people. “So who? Another group opposed to the Unity Sphere?”
“I don’t know for certain, but the rumors mentioned that the Unity Sphere no longer has to worry about the terrorcruise. You know, the Black Diamond?”
I go still. Every pilot across the starlanes knows about the terrorcruise. The Black Diamond specialized in the hijacking of a vessel while it was underway, usually while in darkspace. No one could say for certain how they accomplished their crimes, with all the security and safeguards in place on their targets. But they hijacked over a dozen vessels. None have ever been recovered intact. And of the poor souls on board, whether they were passengers or crew, less than a quarter were freed unharmed. No pilots.
Each of the Black Diamond’s terrorcruises sent shockwaves across the Unity Sphere. The Sphere’s primary purpose was to safeguard free passage among the starlanes. Encourage trade, migration, integration. Until the terrorcruise hit, Unity Sphere was considered strong. It had overcome a number of attempts to prevent its creation or encourage its dissolution. But the terrorcruise shook it to its very core.
Had the Unity Fleet not found the Black Diamond’s base and pulverized it when it did…
I face Geen. “This was the Black Diamond’s hideout?”
He smiles. “According to rumors. But the Unity Fleet and the Unity Sphere have clamped down on that information. All that Leader knows is one day they showed up and clustered this outpost until nothing remained.” He waves at the battered ceiling. “Well, except for this skeleton.”
I look around again, as though seeing the rubble for the first time. I remember our walk through the corridor. The hatches for all the rooms had been jammed opened. Plasma clusters would not have done that. Armed troopers scouring the base for survivors certainly would have.
No wonder Leader erected the Faraday curtain. If a Unity Fleet patrol detects us, we’re all dead. They would not hesitate to cluster us.
Breathe. We’ll be fine. Leader’s planned well. Relax. Breathe.
Somewhat irritated, I ask, “You didn’t think to tell me this before we set out?”
Though his suit obscures the movement, I’m pretty certain he shrugs. “We both need the credits. And your part is relatively simple. You could probably accomplish it half asleep–though I hope you stay awake.” He hisses laughter. “My part is a bit more involved, but I’ll be done within the next two days if I hurry. Easy credits, my jey-ke. Credits we both need.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but I cannot. My tiy-ke is correct. We need the credits. More than that, I need to know I can still pilot. If I’m ever allowed a license again, I need to know I can still do the job. No other employment has stuck since the chall attack. I have a distant hope that if I can get the sled back into the freighter, maybe the leader will find a use for me on some other job. No matter how small.
And this operation gives me purpose. Meaning. It can’t all have been for nothing.
But the Black Diamond… The terrorcruise…
I cannot wait to leave. It’s going to be a long three days.
I’m not sure now the credits will be worth it.
* * *
Carrying pods, Geen disappears through the hatch at the hangar bay’s left back wall.
I link my forearm plate to the trencher pod and retrieve the assembly instructions. Although I’ve done this before, the one I worked on previously was a little different. Following the directions will ensure I get this right the first time–the way I’ve trained myself, as a pilot’s mistake can have devastating consequences. I take the parts out, one at a time, then close the pod and nudge it beneath the sled where I can find it later.
Step by step, I assemble the device.
I’m not proud of the way I jumped to conclusions regarding the list. I should’ve trusted it was just an oversight. Unexpected, to be sure, but a simple oversight. I’m playing an important role. The leader wouldn’t just discard me. I need to stop thinking in that regard.
It’s just... My chall addiction has left me feeling unwanted. Without a place. Adrift.
I used to enjoy a light sprinkle of chall on my grains at breakfast–it put a tingle on the tongue. The byveri separatists chemically concentrated that bite, grew it in a big vat, turned into a fine dust. Those compacted micro-particles got into an affected kavax’s blood, influenced our bodies to create proteins that stung our minds rather than our tastebuds. And those micro-particles found places to hide within our bodies. That was the most damaging part.
The Sha-Ho and human scientists say they’re working on a micro-particle flush to rid us of our curse. Say the research won’t just benefit the kavax. But it’s slow-going. Been half an annum already. And the immediate need diminishes with each passing death.
The vast majority affected have resumed their lives. There’re few like me, where seizures directly impact our ability to make a living. Vehicle drivers, transportation drivers, one or two surgeons. As far as I know I’m the only surviving pilot affected. But in total we are less than one percent of the victims.
The vehicle drivers can operate on limited licenses, as long as they remain in well-regulated areas, like the larger cities on my birth world. Most of them worked in such environments already. The transportation drivers have it a little harder, but they can work in pairs with someone unaffected. Cross-country and inter-country transportation gigs are seldom done by a single individual anyway. As for the surgeons, if and when a seizure hits, they can always depend on robotic assist, if they weren’t doing so before. And they’re seldom alone in an operating theater.
But as a pilot…
Sure, the vast majority of systems are automated. As long as I’m coherent I can enter a flight solution. Plot a destination. The vessel can usually find its way to drop beacons and enter the starlane, make the jump to darkspace, drop to lightspace, then dock itself. But by regulation, a pilot needs to be at the helm, under control at all times. The AI cores provided by the Sha-Ho, and improved by the humans, still aren’t ready for solo flight–outside of deep space missions, which are usually unmanned.
Far too often things just go wrong on the pilot’s deck. It’s usually something simple, like an inner airlock hatch improperly sealed, a navigational beacon momentarily transmitting data that’s unexpectedly off, or something else rather innocuous. But in each situation there needs to be an organic intelligence at the helm. Someone to ask questions, make decisions, give orders.
If I’m in the throes of a seizure, that can’t be me. And since my seizures are unpredictable and cannot be controlled by medicine at the moment, that leaves me banned. Cast out. Adrift.
When they tried to reintegrate me, I was offered a position at a teaching f
acility. I even attended the first three weeks of the training course, learning how to plan a syllabus and give lectures. But at that point, I’d only been a pilot for ten standard months. Hardly enough time to get my toes wet. I’d piloted a variety of craft, on short and long hauls, taking assignments to just gain the experience. Without a full annum of official duty, I couldn’t really market myself as a pilot, especially to students who looked for experienced pilots to teach them. Also, I discovered I’m uncomfortable speaking in front of others. I’m better off the one learning rather than teaching. After the third week it became clear this wouldn’t be a good fit.
The Sha-Ho and the humans who came to help did try their best. I stuck with different jobs for weeks at a time. Sometimes a seizure at the worst possible moment gave the employer the opportunity to say things just weren’t working out. Often, my seizures resulted in damaged equipment, injured co-workers, or late deliveries. Other times I would seize on the way to work, end up in a hospital, and things crumbled from there.
My aptitude testing said my best fit was in the pilot’s chair. Nothing else came close. But as time passed, it became clear that I was no longer qualified for even remote-piloting assignments. My random seizures were just too debilitating. They’re getting better–or, well, lessening in occurrence and severity. But where I sit, even the quickest, least harmful seizure is too disorientating and worrisome.
I might–might–find work as a pilot’s aide, working under constant supervision, never sitting in the pilot’s chair for the primary responsibilities. But that would be a hollow employment. The kind of supervisory assignment often left to the AI cores on vessels large enough to warrant this position.
I still receive assistance, in the form of free healthcare, food, housing, and a small stipend. So does Geen. But with his aptitude, he was able to return to work within weeks after the attack. He treats his assistance mainly as a bonus. Mine? It’ll run out eventually. I’m just one of those sad-sack cases, as Mr. Tremp called it. And the credits weren’t really enough for me to maintain my previous standard of living. Only an apprentice pilot’s wages could do that. Wages that would increase in size in step with my career advancement.
The free food is palatable, if not without keen flavor–and I’ve been warned against sprinkling chall on anything. I’ve bunked in better dormitories when I was at the pilots’ academy. Without gainful employment, I can’t hope to improve the lot of either.
Having my life so destroyed smeared any vision I might’ve had for my future. Having just entered my third decade, I’ve far too many empty annums ahead to contemplate. I have to find my place, work that I am fit to do and have the aptitude for. But no matter what I try, where else I work, my thoughts always return to the pilot’s deck.
A place where I am forbidden now.
I think my caseworkers were happy to see me leave when Geen and I took off for this operation. We kept our training sessions secret, using a facility past the city limits. A place probably unknown to those overseeing the chall victim aid program. He arranged the travel and the training–him having known Leader before probably made it easy. I’m confident I’ll be able to keep my improved finances secret from my caseworkers upon my return–assuming I make it that far.
I decide to not think of that now. My focus returns to the moment. Two days ahead, the end of the operation, is too far to contemplate.
The assembled trencher stands as tall as my suit’s chest plate. It maneuvers on eight spidery legs ending in claws designed to clamp onto even the roughest of surfaces. Its blades, edged in a micro-diamond and micro-laser arrangement, can spread wide enough to tackle obstacles roughly two standard meters in diameter–twice as wide as my bulky suit at the shoulders. The leader’s mapping of the hangar bay must have revealed the size of trencher required. I’ll plug it into the sled to give it all the juice it needs. As it’s working, its blades will squeeze together relentlessly, with some sawing or lasing. It may take five minutes, it may take an hour, but eventually the blades will slice through whatever they’ve been tasked to cut.
I stand and face the hangar bay opening. A few taps on my forearm plate overlays the data from the beacons onto my faceplate. Obstacles above and below are highlighted in blue. The front of the sled is off to the right relative to the opening, and facing the back wall. I’ll have to spin it around before starting back to the freighter. Using my forearm plate I map out the obstacles I’ll need to remove for that first maneuver. Then I walk to the center of the back wall. There, I mark the remaining obstacles. Data stored, I return to the trencher.
It skitters noiselessly as it follows me to the first obstacle–a lump of rubble that must’ve turned molten in a plasma cluster blast, splashed off the back wall, then congealed into a misshapen lump slightly taller than my suit. It’s a mixture of asteroid rock and the outpost’s skeleton–the same as a lot of the other obstacles poking from the floor. I instruct the trencher to cut it to a height at my suit’s knees. The trencher circles the congealed lump, analyzing it, then stops a quarter of the way back around. Its legs spread wide, with the front two feet clamping onto the obstacle. The blades spread apart, then the central arm nudges forward until it’s just touching the obstacle. On either side now, the blades come together, squeezing as they cut. A timer appears in my faceplate and begins ticking down.
The blades will finish in twenty-seven minutes.
I watch the trencher for a minute, then walk to the next obstacle. It’s not as tall or as thick, and shouldn’t take nearly as long. Then I go to the sled. From a tool pocket on its underside I remove a harness with straps a hand’s width wide and made of a tough dark fabric.
At the obstacle, I stand opposite the trencher and loop three of the harness straps around the chunk about to be cut free. The trencher also has a grip, a ninth leg extending from the top of the machine. But I’m going to make sure this chunk, once free, doesn’t pop to the ceiling and become an obstacle in itself, or skitter across the hangar bay and damage anything.
Gripping the harness, I search for a place to nudge the chunk once it’s free. I see a place in the back corner where, if I turn the chunk upside-down, I can fit it into a pile of rubble. Adhesive should hold it in place.
Six minutes remaining on the timer, I return to the tool pocket and find a squeeze-gun tube of adhesive, which I clip to my left thigh. I return to the trencher.
The chunks trembles as the two blades grind together. It pops from the stump. My suit’s servos help me keep it under control, despite its mass–in real gravity, it’d probably weigh more than me and my suit combined. I wait for the blades to fold back, then instruct the trencher to release the chunk. Its ninth leg retracts, leaving the chunk under my control.
Moving slow and careful like when I helped assemble the pocket, I float the chunk to the space in the back corner. I flip it, then nudge it into position. It fits better than expected. Two squirts of the adhesive and it stays in place. I free the straps and return to the trencher. Together we move to the next obstacle.
I repeat the process. Another obstacle down, this one cut through in sixteen minutes. The next takes forty-five. Sometimes the trencher’s cuts are smooth, flat, and simple. A couple times the blades are angled, and repositioned halfway through. I’m uncertain why the trencher decides two cuts are necessary–maybe the metal within the rock is thicker or tougher than expected. But obstacle after obstacle, the way becomes clear to spin the sled and center it in the hangar bay.
The work is slow and tedious.
My over-reaction to my missing chores and my resulting anxiety bring to mind my sessions with Mr. Tremp. These memories help relax me. He was my primary therapist, beginning a standard week after the attack and continuing for several months. He tried his best to find me gainful employment when I was healthy enough to resume work. I believe he believes I tried my best. I did recognize his frustration with each job I lost. But he never seemed to grow tired of me, unlike the others.
“I know you’re in a
dark place now, Sen Brayn,” he said. “But you must remain optimistic. Keep a positive outlook. You’ve survived a terrible attack where thousands died. You fought this long where others succumbed. Yes, it looks bleak now, but you kavax are tough little bastards. You’ll find it in yourself to pull through. I’m here to help you.”
Of my therapists, only Mr. Tremp calls us tough bastards. Only he gets angry with us, and sad and jolly and a variety of other emotions, where the others remain stoic, like automatons.
Ironic, since most humans consider us automatons.
As the trencher blades begin cleaving into another obstacle, bobbing lamplight at the hanger bay’s far end catches my attention. Two of my fellow mates emerge from the corridor. They move to a stack of pods, snag the top two, and disappear back the way they came. Based on the number of pods that have gone missing, I assume the work back wherever they are is going well.
I recall what Geen said about our job. We’re here to salvage components. Geen’s job is to prepare equipment to handle that salvage. I consider what kind of components might be left in a destroyed outpost such as this. Whatever they are, they apparently need a lot of equipment and at least two days’ time to reach. He also mentioned there are drones here to help transport these salvaged components to the hanger bay. That means whatever they’re salvaging must be small enough to fit through the corridors, even as damaged as they are–if they are.
My thoughts twirl. Certainly by now the Unity Fleet has picked through these ruins and removed anything deemed valuable. And maybe even innocuous stuff, if this was indeed the Black Diamond’s lair, to discourage ghoulish souvenir hunters picking through the rubble. Even demolished, this outpost is important enough to them they established a base here in this out-of-the-way system. They’ve gone to great lengths to keep the history of this outpost under wraps.
So what could possibly be left to salvage? At such great risk to those doing the salvaging?
The outpost lacks power. That the pseudo-gravity isn’t working says so. Like so many stations and vessels across the Unity Sphere, this outpost was probably powered by micro-cores, which also produce the gravity in everything off-planet. My eyeridges bunch together. The micro-cores might be gone–most certainly were gone. But the components holding them in place...
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