After a few moments of silence Grissom began to think this was a terrible idea. Come on, people, he thought.
“Why can’t you just arm more shuttles and eliminate them from the air?”
Grissom sighed. He had heard that many times before. “We can’t find them from the air.”
“What about sending more queen-hunter teams?” came from a female near the front row of those assembled.
“I’ll be creating more teams to be sure, but it takes too long to train them, and we couldn’t train enough to handle the job appropriately.”
“What about UAV drones?” someone from the back shouted.
“Again, the Zorn are cold-blooded; we cannot find them from the air, unless they are walking around in the open.”
“Can’t you just scan the surface for the queens?”
“How would we scan the surface?” Grissom asked skeptically. “The satellite network was crippled in the invasion.”
“You know, with the ship’s scanners.”
“Those only works for objects in space, and artificial structures on the surface.”
“I’ve been thinking about the Zorn for some time. We know they don’t see, and that they must hear really good. How about we drop some noisy pods of our own into the canopy? If the Zorn come to investigate, we know there’s a queen nearby. And if they don’t, then we can be sure the area is clear.” Someone else said from the front row.
“OK, I like that, but we would have to produce the… noise pods.” Grissom stumbled with the term. “A lot of them in a short time, then we would also have to monitor them. But I like that idea.”
“How about you create a bunch of small autonomous hunter drones?”
Grissom looked at a young man three or four rows back and he struggled to get a sightline on him.
“We don’t have the kind of industry we need to create an army of hunter unmanned ground vehicles.” Grissom replied.
“Make them small. All they need to do is find a queen and detonate. The fabricators could create a dozen or two a day, and we have five on this base alone.”
Grissom kept his mouth shut, knowing there were actually a dozen more in the UEF bunker system.
“How do we program them?”
“That’s easy, we don’t,” the young man said as he stepped forward to stand among those in the front row.
Grissom squinted his eyes as he tried to puzzle out the logic. “I’m not following you.”
“C’mon, we have super-biological AIs on base here; they have the computational power to run circles over everything we have put together. They could come up with a design and a program, I’m sure by the end of the day.”
“What’s your name?”
“My name is Philip; I do logistics.”
“Not anymore, you don’t. You’re with me.” Grissom turned and walked out of the makeshift recreational center. His team stepped aside as he walked past them.
Philip stood stunned, with an expression of uncertainty. Grissom’s aide stood waiting for Philip to start moving. “C’mon kid, he wasn’t suggesting anything.” The aide motioned with his arm for him to get moving. Philip snapped out of his stupor and caught up to the group.
“Keep up!” Grissom shouted from the front of the group.
“He wants to talk to you, go catch up,” the aide said, looking toward Philip as they exited the building. Philip sprinted toward the front of the group and struggled to keep a walking pace with Grissom and his team.
“I want you to lead the UGV project,” Grissom said as Philip caught up. “I’m going to introduce you to a few people and let you get busy. We need this idea of yours to work.”
Grissom looked at the young man, who didn’t appear confident that he would be able to do as asked. “You said it yourself, the AIs will be doing most of the work.”
“Right,” Philip responded as they walked into one of the smaller UEF multifloor buildings.
Grissom was already thinking about what he had to do next. Introducing the kid, getting him clearance, and letting him get to work would take him about thirty minutes. He looked at his watch; there wasn’t enough time in the day. He walked up to a lobby that was already heavy with security presence.
“I need the on-duty watch commander!” Grissom shouted.
“That’s me,” a UEF security officer said, closing a door behind him, having just come from another room.
“This is Philip. He’s in charge of one of my new projects, see he gets clearance and introduce him to the lead science guy. Ruck, Rooker, whatever his name is.”
“Yes, sir!”
Grissom turned and pointed to one of those in his group, someone who was always there but didn’t have much to do. “You follow him, and make sure he gets settled in. If he runs into any problems, let me know.”
“Yes, sir,” the man responded sharply. He looked at Philip, who returned his gaze with an outstretched hand.
Grissom turned and left the building. Within moments it was quiet again, as if he had never been there.
***
Alex waited patiently as he leaned up against the Gothan capital building along with Jeremiah. The sky was darkening, and the hilltops in the distance began to glow with a light, neon green.
“It will be dark for about thirty-six hours, and then light again for about forty-five days,” Jeremiah mumbled as they comfortably waited.
“It’s beautiful… and dangerous, apparently,” Alex quipped as yet another fifteen or so armed Gothans took a perimeter position around the building.
“Well, had you not destroyed the defense towers, I’m sure they wouldn’t bother with so many.”
“I destroyed?” Alex said with excitement. “You took out way more than I did.”
“Whatever you say, sir!” Jeremiah responded, knowing full well that wasn’t true.
An alien voice spoke, and moments later Alex’s pad translated. Though he didn’t need the translation, he let it continue for Jeremiah’s benefit. His mind was working so much faster than it used to. Concepts that seemed unknowable were now easy to understand. He was both pleased with his heightened ability but alarmed about what that meant for the future of humanity.
“The array is online, you may communicate with your ship!” Gs Ho Tae said as gi handed Alex a very small communication device. “Push this button to transmit; we are working the frequency and signal back inside. The dish is pointed directly to your ship, on the edge of the system.”
Jeremiah looked at the tiny device. “Don’t crush it.”
Alex smiled and pushed the very tiny button. “Enterprise, this is your captain speaking. Come in, Enterprise.”
“It’s cooler if you say, ‘This is Enterprise actual,’” Jeremiah mumbled. He didn’t make any eye contact until the last moment, and then only briefly. “Just saying.”
“Enterprise, this is…Enterprise actual, please respond.” Alex released the transmit button. “See, that doesn’t feel right.”
“I guess you’re not a captain, then,” Jeremiah quipped with a smile.
Alex succeeded in returning a hard gaze without cracking a smile and Jeremiah’s smile disappeared. “Kidding,” he said sheepishly.
“How long do you think it will be before we get a response?”
“Well, it’s a smaller system, and we don’t know which edge of the system they went to. I’d say anywhere between five and thirty minutes.”
“Really, that long?” Alex responded.
“Radio frequencies…what spoiled already from subspace tech?”
Alex was still getting used to having to purposefully breathe in to talk. He looked down at his datapad. “Enterprise, this is Alex, ship time is three-twenty-four, respond back with lapse time.”
“That sounded better.” Jeremiah smiled.
Alex looked straight up into the night sky. It looked a lot like the Earth’s sky, dark and full of stars.
***
The bridge shook violently, and Lanora was covered in a shower of sparks
from an overloading light fixture above her. “What the hell was that?” she yelled.
The ship’s interior was immediately bathed in red, and the combat station alarm started sounding.
“I’ve got one ship, came from behind an asteroid.”
The bridge shook again, but this time a bit less violently.
“We’re being hit with kinetic rounds. The speed of the rounds isn’t impressive, but they are still penetrating the hull.”
The ship vibrated as it was struck again.
“That one was a glancing blow, barely put a dent on the hull,” a bridge officer shouted.
“Can we fire back?” Lanora asked, although she already knew the answer.
“Most of the ship’s systems are still down.”
“Can we maneuver?”
“Captain, it’s the captain! I’ve got him on comms.”
“What!” Just then the bridge shook violently again, and a soft whistle sounded momentarily. It took a moment for Lanora to realize it was the sound of escaping air.
“That one hit just below the bridge, that space is now in vacuum.”
On one of her many display screens, Lanora shifted to control and noticed she had partial maneuvering available.
“Captain Alex, this is Enterprise, ship time is three-thirty, we are under attack!” the communication officer responded.
Lanora was a little jolted by the comm officer’s having responded on his own, but she had bigger things to worry about.
“Take us back to the planet.”
The navigational officer turned in the seat and said, “The planet that tried to destroy us?”
“Yes, that one, just do it!”
The navigational officer activated three of the working independently powered grav disks and began their maneuver back toward the planet.
“Enemy is following, they are at full burn.”
“I need weapons!” Lanora shouted.
“Bridge, Chief, we need weapons,” one of the other bridge officers said into the comm system.
After a few moments the response came, only that bridge officer heard it first and then relayed it to the captain. “Captain, Chief says not anytime soon.”
“Tell the chief if we don’t get weapons, we won’t have to worry about repairs anymore.”
“Emergency crews dispatch to Section Four, Level Two and Section Five, Level Three,” the ship’s speaker system blared.
“Captain, multiple vessels incoming.” The officer turned in her chair. “From the planet!”
Lanora looked at a 3-D model of the ship on her display screen and saw that many sections of her ship were black or red, which meant destroyed or in vacuum. Several were yellow, which meant damaged but still in use. On the side of the screen was the list of primary and secondary systems, most of which were yellow or red.
“Based on the accuracy of the attacking ship, I believe we are out of effective weapons range and we have the acceleration advantage. They won’t catch us.”
Lanora looked at the reduced sensor display and saw that a blob of ships of unknown size and configuration were inbound for intercept. Granted, at the moment they had several hours before they had to worry about them. With enemies in front and behind her, she considered options.
***
Tyler approached the reinforced gate and standing guard sentries, passing his ID card to the nearest guard. The guard disappeared into the room for a moment and quickly returned the card to Tyler.
The gate began to move as Tyler slowly walked into the tunnel. Like the others, he walked slowly to take in the unique setting, the tent, shelving, equipment tables, and arranged photos and printouts on various walls. Before he reached the circular room and the orb, Timmy approached him.
“You must be Tyler, I’m Timmy. Jackie told me you’re working on an important project and you needed my help.”
Tyler smiled hesitantly. “Yeah.”
Timmy led Tyler to a secluded table with chairs. The table had been cleaned off in preparation for Tyler’s arrival, and they both took a seat. “So, how can I help you?” Timmy said.
“There’s a missing piece of information, and I’m hoping you can fill in the hole.”
Timmy sat quietly waiting for Tyler to continue.
“My project has to do with the interaction between Alex and those closest to him. Why does everyone have a disdain for Alex?”
“Really, you guys are focusing your time on this?” Timmy leaned back in his chair.
For a moment Tyler thought Timmy might get up and walk away, but he didn’t.
“Where should I start?” Timmy asked sarcastically.
“His father,” Tyler said without skipping a beat as he set down his voice recorder on the table along with his notepad. Noticing Timmy’s hesitation, he pushed a little. “Just start by telling me about Drake, whatever you know about him.”
“I know that whenever he saw us hanging around his house or garage he would either ignore us completely or find subtle ways to discourage our pursuits.”
“But he didn’t forbid you from hanging out with Alex.”
“No, he didn’t. You’re not getting it; he really didn’t care about us, or Alex for that matter. Alex was always an afterthought to him. After his wife died, he just focused on business and making money. Alex tried to get his father to give him attention, good grades, bad grades, movies. We all tried to help, at first, you know with ideas…. Nothing helped.”
Tyler had trouble keeping up with notes, but let Timmy continue, knowing the recording was there.
“One day we broke a lamp in the living room. His father was furious. I was there; in fact I was the one who broke it. Drake came into the room, picked up one of the broken pieces and threw it hard at Alex. ‘You know how much these lamps cost?’ he says, and Alex says, ‘I’m sorry, Dad!’ Drake reached down to pick up another piece, Alex was crying, and we all were running out of the house. See, it was money. Money is the true motivating factor in that man’s life.”
“Things break, and people get mad. That’s normal,” Tyler said, hoping Timmy would go deeper.
“Try to imagine being ignored by your parents, unless money was involved.”
“Well, Alex took the blame. Sounds like a good friend to keep.” Tyler said.
“Yeah, that’s the thing about Alex, he does those kinds of things. Cares about people and looks out for them, but then he subtly lords it over them, reminds them how helpful he is to them, and tells you things like, ‘Without me there would be no project.’ It all makes sense, really.”
“Yeah, how do you figure?”
“Well, he never got that feeling of worth from his father, so he now seeks it from others. When he doesn’t feel it, he manufactures ways to take it.”
“How about an example of something you experienced?” Tyler asked.
“Well, as you can imagine, it took a long time to build the Destiny, and for much of that time we were together, stuck together, and our personalities really began to shine. One quick example I can think of, there were a few days when Jorge got sick. We debated on taking him to a doctor’s office.”
Tyler watched as Timmy grew quiet, obviously reflecting on the details.
“Well, anyway, he got better, but he didn’t feel like doing work for a couple days afterward and was spending a lot of time lounging around, playing video games and such. Alex began to push him to get back to work. So that created a huge argument, and we all ended up getting involved. Alex wanted us all to keep working, and we all needed time to relax, decompress. His father was showing in him a bit that day. He said that the building was his, the materials were his, our paychecks come from him and so the ship was his, and if we didn’t want to work anymore then we should leave. Of course, we wanted to work, but we didn’t like feeling like slave labor, either. Sometimes Alex just gets really focused and other considerations have to take a sidestep. This was just one example, but they occurred on the regular.”
“So, would you say you liked h
im or are friends with him?”
“Yes, we are friends, and yes, I like him. I just can only handle him in short bursts. I’d say the same is true for everyone else. Look, we all ended up leaving him and went off to do our own thing. He’s not a bad guy, just inconsiderate sometimes. Look how fast he got over Amanda’s death. He just doesn’t emotionally connect with people.”
Tyler recalled the details of Amanda being killed by the Zorn drone in the UEF complex.
“Anything else you can think of that would help light the divide between Alex and everyone else?” Tyler responded.
“I mean, there’s tons more examples, but it’s all the same story.”
“Do you know where I might find Drake? He’s the obvious next interview.”
“I really don’t know. If you can’t find someone, go to Zeek, he’s got…something that can help.”
“Thanks. Let’s talk about you and Zeek.”
Timmy looked at his watch and gave what he knew was an insincere smile, wondering if this was how Alex felt during interviews.
Chapter 13
Welcome back to what’s left
“Captain on the bridge!” the guard shouted as Alex walked onto the bridge of the Enterprise. Conduit hung loose from the ceiling, the right side of the main viewscreen was flickering, and an odd odor permeated the bridge. For a moment Alex thought about naval ships and older movies making a big scene about the change of command on the bridge and decided quickly, No.
“How’s the ship?” he asked Lanora. She and the rest of the bridge crew were standing at attention around the bridge. He immediately sensed that Lanora was thankful.
“Maneuvering is minimal, FTL is out, subspace transmitter is out, half the ship is in vacuum. ETA on repairs is about twenty-two months at our current location or about eight months at the shipyard. Thanks for sending those ships to protect us, we couldn’t have taken many more hits,” Lanora said in a matter-of-fact tone.
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