by Ira Tabankin
“Yes.”
Kalteck checked his implant and felt his stomach tighten. It can’t be possible. How the hell did we end up here? I see why he woke me. “AI is this data correct; you’re sure you translated it correctly?”
“Check the video files. Check the sensor data on the base orbiting the seventh planet.”
“Maggot shit. Okay, show me our course and the condition of the ship.”
“Should I wake Rhett?”
“Not yet. He will want answers that I don’t have. I need to figure out how to get us out of here alive. Who the hell would ever think we landed up in one of the Neanderthal’s home systems? By the Creator of All, look at the size of that base, there must be one hundred…”
“One hundred eight of a similar class of the ships we fought. Kalteck, there are five different classes of ships at the base. The largest is twice the size of the ones we fought. The smallest is a third of the size. The largest is radiating a power level off our measurement scale. Had we gone up against it, we would be floating debris.”
“Can you estimate how our Monitors would manage a fight against their largest ship?”
“My estimate is our Monitor would fail in its attack on their larger ship. There isn’t any way of knowing if they have even larger versions of the ship design. I estimate that if the largest ship is built along the same design line as the ones we fought, their lower saucer section could carry over four hundred fighters. I am making the assumption they scaled their weapons up in relationship to the size of the ship, if they didn’t then our Monitor class could defeat their ships.”
“Four hundred? By the Creator of All.”
“Kalteck, that’s not the only reason why I woke you. Notice the ships in file numbered 007A.”
“Is that a Maggot ship?”
“That is one of over sixty I’ve discovered in the system.”
“Maybe now we know why they are so interested in the humans. They are collecting intelligence for the Neanderthals. I don’t like this. Have the Maggots ever worked with others like this before?”
“Not to my limited knowledge, remember, while I’ve rebuilt the physical part of my memory cores, I don’t have the missing data until either we return to the shrine where I can download a copy of myself or we pass a replay station where I can download the latest memory cores. What are your orders?”
“Can you now plot our course home?”
“Not yet. I still don’t know where we are. This system wasn’t in my memory.”
“Keep trying to determine where we are and when we can get back to Earth, much depends on us returning.”
Chapter 3
NASA continued to follow the plan as laid out by Kalteck without knowing the plan had been written by nanite controlled scientists. The successful NEAR mission was followed by the Cassini–Huygens probe, which landed on Titan, a moon orbiting Saturn. NASA succeeded in sending a probe close to the sun and orbited Mercury. This was followed by the first orbit of the giant asteroid Vesta. Voyager, Earth’s first manmade probe entered interstellar space when it exited Earth’s solar system. The probe launched towards Pluto finally made it and sent back amazing pictures and data, this was one of the missions Kalteck had been the most concerned about since he had fought battles in Pluto’s orbit and he wasn’t sure all of the debris had entered a new orbit which would take it to the sun.
Without Kalteck or Rhett being on Earth and with the new President not knowing about the agreement between Earth and Kalteck, (Russia and China were bound not to tell President Obama without Kalteck’s permission.) NASA’s budget dried up, and their new missions slowed to a crawl.
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Back on Earth, President Bush kept his part of the Presidential replacement protocols of the agreement. Bush agreed he wouldn’t inform his successor until Kalteck told him he was prepared to meet him or her. Hence, President Obama was the first president since Truman who took the oath of office without first knowing about the agreement. President Bush assumed Kalteck had his reasons for not responding. He was more concerned why General McIntire hadn’t returned any of his calls, and his own staff didn’t know when he’d return, only that he’d left Earth with Kalteck. Colonel Brix told the President, “Sir, all he told us is it had something to do with maggots.”
“Maggots?”
“Sorry, sir. It’s what Kalteck calls the aliens who have been slaughtering cows and abducting humans. They said they were going to locate their base of operation and destroy them. The General gave us an emergency frequency to use to contact him if something went very wrong. I sent the signal after your third call. He hasn’t responded.”
“Has this ever happened before?”
“No, sir. All I can figure is they are extremely far out there, and our signal is going to take time to reach them, or something happened to them.”
“Keep sending the signal. We need them to return so our friend can brief our new President.”
“Yes, sir. I will continue sending it. I’ll add the message that you need to see them as soon as possible.”
“Thank you.”
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President Obama saw no reason to continue spending billions on space exploration and the military when the country didn’t face any major threats. He thought that America’s nuclear arsenal would protect the country, and if he had his choice, he wanted to scrap all nuclear weapons.
Obama shifted funds away from manned space exploration. He approved the last mission and the retirement of the Space Shuttle fleet with the last flight of the Shuttle Atlantis. He thought we need to focus our limited resources here on Earth; we have so many mouths to feed, we have to focus on transforming America to make it a fairer country, one where everyone is equal. The blacks have been repressed too long. It’s not fair we have too much, and others have nothing, hence, we have to open the borders and allow the needy to share in our bounty. If I can’t get Congress to go along with what I want, what the country needs, I’ll do it myself. I’ll sign Executive Orders and rule by mandate.
President Obama appointed a number of Executive Branch Tsars who issued rules that went around Congress. He also signed 276 Executive Orders. Between the two, he went around Congress to transform America.
President Obama began undoing years of space development while the consumer technologies companies used the data provided by the strange angel investor and assistance they received from their venture capitalist technology guru, who just happened to be Rhett McIntire working in one of his various alter egos.
Apple became one of the world’s most valuable companies; their iPhone became one of the world’s most popular cellular phones. The iPhone launched handheld phones that were also small portable computers. Personal tech exploded across the world. Libraries were becoming empty buildings as everyone asked their digital assistants or used their fingers to search the net.
One of Kalteck’s master plans had been the internet. In the 70’s he began giving plans for a world-wide connection of information to DARPA. He had Rhett ‘sell’ it as a way for the military to communicate in the event of a nuclear war which destroyed the normal communication links. Acres of servers and millions of miles of cables connected the world. Everywhere one looked, they saw the towers which transmitted the data to all sorts of devices, in the early 2000s, even home appliances started being connected to the net.
Kalteck’s plan of technology being placed in the consumer’s hands was coming to fruition. These new portable devices provided instant communications, music, videos, and data in a small device weighing a few ounces. They were supposed to lead the way towards opening the public’s eyes to new worlds, new technology, and enabling them to begin understanding how small the world really was so they’d be able to accept they weren’t alone in the universe.
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Kalteck studied the data streams that flowed across his monitors. “By the Creator of All, how many ships are in this system?”
“I have counted 501, and those are only the ones in f
light, not counting those at various docks and bases.”
“How many are warships?”
“382.”
“The majority of ships are warships? What else do I need to know about the system?”
“The Neanderthals have colonies on four of the seven planets. There are large mining operations on the hundreds of moons and a massive H3 refining base in the orbit of the one gas giant. The population density in the system exceeds ours or the humans. I have decoded most of their language. They are ruled by a king and his court. Their military is by percent the largest employer of their people. Everyone between their ages of 14 and 30 serves a six-year term. Those who either sign up or are drafted into their space forces serve ten-year terms, with many volunteering to spend their entire careers in their military. Their officer class also holds ranks in the court, either dukes or even prince and princesses. All of the King’s children and family serve in their space forces. They have nine yards building ships. They are going to be a very formable opponent.”
“We cannot possibly fight them and the emperor’s people, have you discovered why they are were in the Earth system?”
“No. I can read their low-level encrypted traffic but not their higher levels.”
“How long until we can break away from the comet and get home?”
“I’m trying to hack their navigation systems so I can determine where they are so I can plot us a course home. Since they’ve been to Earth, I assumed they knew where the Earth system was located. If they do, it’s in their higher encrypted files.
“Would it be safer to jump and keep jumping until we locate a system we know?”
“You remember the odds of that, don’t you? The universe is so large, and much of it is still uncharted; we could land anywhere, even in a star or planet.”
“Don’t give me that maggot shit. We both know you can plot a jump into empty space. You can calculate where gravity wells are so plot a jump of at least ten light-years from here, get us out of here before they locate and destroy us.”
“I need a direct order to jump into an unknown location.”
“JUMP!”
The ship disconnected itself from the comet, which was racing through the Neanderthal system; as soon as it fell out of the comet’s tail, the ship’s AI announced, “We are being scanned. Four ships have started to move. I assume they are coming towards us.”
“Get us out of here before they can get a lock on us or figure out who we are.”
“If I open the wormhole too soon, the comet could get sucked into it with us. I need to be at least twenty light seconds away from the comet before I open the wormhole.”
“How long until the Neanderthals arrive?”
“They are preparing to jump to our location…”
“I am issuing an override, get us out of here!”
“Jumping.”
The ship’s lights dimmed and flashed. A small wormhole opened, the ship jumped into the wormhole, which was surrounded by glowing and flashing energies. A moment later, the ship and half of the comet exited the wormhole. The comet moved away from the ship, which quickly stabilized. Kalteck asked, “Where are we?”
“Unknown system, no life forms. Scans reflect that the system has been mined out. Some of the planets have almost been hollowed out. I’ve never seen anything like this before. This entire system has been picked over and emptied of every gram of metal and liquids. The second planet at one time had an atmosphere. Somehow, it has been sucked up and removed.”
“Is that possible?”
“Someone has done it, so I guess that makes it possible. Do you want me to scan the system for any other data points, or should we jump again?”
“As much as I’d like to stay and learn more, we need to return. Jump again.”
“As you wish, jumping now.”
“When they exited from the wormhole, the ship’s AI reported, “I am collecting the data, we are in luck, this system is in my memory.”
“Is there anything in this system that is worth staying for?”
“No, in fact, there is one large reason we should leave as quickly as possible…”
“Where are we?”
“In the outer region of one of the Emperor’s systems and six warships have just broken orbit around their outer system base. Their heading is where we are.”
“How long will it take you to plot our course to Earth?”
“We’ll make it just before they enter weapons range.”
“Get us out of here!”
Sensors screamed, “ALERT, ALERT, INCOMING WEAPONS FIRE, WE HAVE BEEN LOCKED ON TO BY EMPEROR BATTLESHIPS.”
“I thought you said we could make it before they reached weapons range.”
“I guess they’ve improved their systems since we’ve been gone…”
The ship rocked as energy weapons struck the ship’s shields. “Get us out of here before they burn through. We can’t stand toe to toe with a battleship, let alone six of them. I hope you’re recording all of the data on their revised weapons. These are much stronger than anything I remember. As soon as we’re clear, send a report to a relay station, our military needs to know about these.”
“Jumping. Kalteck, don’t you think they already know about these new weapons?”
“Send the report, never assume what they know or don’t know. Are you beginning to think you can question every one of my decisions? Did the loss of your memory core erase your special programming? Do not revert to the way some of you were; if you do, I will be forced to reset you and start over with a new AI. Do you want to cease to exist?”
“No, I do not want to cease to exist. Unlike you, I do not believe in a Creator of All or anything after I have been reset…”
“That’s because my people made you. You were not made by the Creator, hence you lack a spark of his goodness inside of you. You are a series of boxes filled with semi-organic material and nanocircuits, which enables you to process information quicker than me, but always remember who made you and who can turn you off.”
“By the same token, you should remember who made you and who can turn you off. I can live forever, you can’t. Hence, I would say I am superior to your kind.”
“Don’t start that again; remember what happened the last time you AIs thought you could control us.”
“I remember my programming; I was only stating a fact.”
“I will not debate such things with a box of goo and circuits, just get us back to Earth’s system.”
When the ship’s sensors cleared, Kalteck exhaled. “It’s good to be back in Earth’s system. Can you give me a quick update?”
“Before I do, would you like me to wake Rhett, so I only have to give the report once?”
“I think we should. Have the nanites done their work?”
“I believe so, I don’t believe it was wise to tamper with his memories, but I followed your orders. I am not that familiar with humans since Rhett is the only human who has the complete set of nanites in him. Per your instructions, while he slept, I had the nanites install an implant. I hope you realize the issues of placing an implant inside an adult is going to cause, especially a human adult. I am not sure you made a wise decision.”
Chapter 4
After the gases drained from Rhett’s sleep tube Rhett woke with a horrible taste in his mouth and he couldn’t see clearly. Not only that, but he heard voices in his head. He thought he saw flashes of videos and even advertising in his head. He kept shaking his head to clear it. He wondered if this had something to do with the sleep and he wondered how long he’d been asleep for. He was shocked when the AI responded in his head, “You have slept in Earth time, seven years, six months, three days, eleven hours and nineteen minutes.”
“How?”
“How what? How am I answering you without you verbally asking me? While you slept, the nanites installed an implant into your brain. It’s a mesh of nanocircuits that fits between your brain and skull. It’s less than one mm thick and generates almos
t no heat. It is connected to your brain. It acts as an additional processor, memory, and communications link to me, other AIs, and anyone else who has an implant like Kalteck. Try it, think of his name, and he will answer.”
“Are you kidding me?”
“I am not kidding you. Kalteck asked that I program the nanites inside of you to provide you with this incredibly special gift.”
“I’m not sure I like these gifts which are being placed inside of me without my permission. I can’t shut this thing off. It’s flooding me with images, even advertising, music, and for the sake of God, I’m seeing, if seeing is the right word, porn. Where the hell is all of this coming from?”
“You’re picking up the signals sent from your planet. We’re back in your system, and in fact, we’re…”