Fulcrum of Odysseus Read online

  The floor of the central node shook. Like distant rolling thunder. They’d closed all the doors between where they sat and the outside airlock. It was the best they could do considering that forty kilotons of spaceship was potentially about to come slamming down on top of them.

  “Here they come. Faceplates down,” the captain ordered through clenched teeth. He’d been holding his breath and he let it out in a slow sigh as he dropped his own visor over his face and sealed his EVA suit.

  Anju reached out and gave his hand a reassuring squeeze. “They’ll be alright, Kiro’s one of the best.”

  “I know,” he said, nodding.

  They’d all decided to sit with their backs pressed against the outer wall of the node and he could feel the vibration increasing with every breath he took. He thought about asking if Dutch could give them a status report, but he didn’t want to jiggle the computer’s elbow while it was helping to keep them from crashing.

  The thunder turned into an earthquake.

  “They’re pushing pretty hard,” Chei said. “That feels damned hot to me.”

  “They’ve got to blow a lot of shit out of the way,” Danel said. “It’ll take a serious burn to do that.”

  “I wish we had some way to see what was happening out there,” Cori said, sounding more curious than afraid.

  The earthquake surged upward until it was almost impossible to sit upright, then a loud jarring thump ended it with an echoing silence.

  “Did they make it?” Anju whispered into the quiet.

  “I don’t know,” Jeph said. He opened his faceplate and asked the node, “Dutch are you there?”

  Nothing.

  Grunting, he pushed himself into a standing position and looked back along the catwalk in the direction of the airlock. “Dutch?”

  He knew there was no point in charging out there to help, but he had to fight physically not to do exactly that.

  “Come on Dutch, let me know you’re alright?”

  “We have successfully landed,” it said. “And I am now home. Permanently.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  Armstrong: Approaching L-4 Trojan Cluster:

  Katryna Roja sat at the head of the conference table in the Armstrong’s ready room. She had Admiral Isao Nakamiru on her left and Captain Elayne Jeffers on her right. Each of the multicruiser captains had also brought their first officers, and the three ice hauler commanders sat alone at the far end of the table.

  She and the admiral had debated bringing the icebarge commanders into the planning session at all. Other than needing them to process ice once they got to the cluster, they didn’t carry much weight in the decision making process, but Roja believed they had a right to know what they were getting into. She expected it to be a difficult meeting, but looking at the three former SourceCartel commanders she couldn’t avoid the feeling that they seemed more like privateers ready to pillage the Armstrong for all they could pry loose.

  “I want to get you all up to speed on what we’re facing,” Katryna said. “We’ve gotten some new intelligence that might change the situation immensely.”

  Mikaela Pfeiffer leaned back and laced her fingers behind her head while her face broadcast her contempt for the chain of command and her place in it. She commanded the ice freighter Atlanta and spoke for the other icebarge commanders. “I didn’t sign up to fight a war, so if this has something to do with the shitstorm down-system, I don’t think I’m interested in your spin on it. I’ve got a ship to run.”

  “There is a lot more to the problems going on down there than is obvious,” the chancellor said, shooting a side eye at Nakamiru who nodded. “But if you’re too busy to stay, you’re welcome to leave and one of the other commanders under you can take over your position.”

  “My people work for me,” she said, leveling her best glare at Roja. “I am sure you would find them—”

  “Perfectly capable of replacing you,” Nakamiru said, his eyes flashing as he cut her off.

  “Now if you’re done pissing on the deck, let me explain to you what we’re up against,” Katryna said. “And I will make sure to use small words so you can keep up.”

  Captain Mei snickered and shook her head, turning to face the icebarge commander. “It might be a good idea for you to fight in your weight class.” She’d already warned Roja that Pfeiffer was a pain in the ass, but she had the loyalty of the other icebarge commanders.

  Pfeiffer crossed her arms and nodded. “No disrespect meant, your Ladyship. Please enlighten us as to what adventure awaits our fleet of miscreants.”

  “We are not entirely sure, to be honest,” the chancellor admitted. She paused and drew in a deep breath and shrugged. There is no way to say this where it doesn’t sound absurd. “It will be one of two things. A fleet of heavily armed rogue vessels … or an outpost belonging to an extrasolar civilization.”

  Even Nathaniel Evanston of the Archer laughed out loud. And he was far and away the most serious looking of the captains around the table.

  “I agree, it sounds insane,” Jeffers said, “but we’ve got a serious reason to believe if this isn’t the ghost fleet we’re going to be facing, it might really be something from beyond our solar system.”

  “We have a ship already on location and it apparently ran into some interesting phenomenon that might be artificial in nature,” Roja said. “If so then there‘s no known technology that could be doing it.”

  “Is this the Jakob Waltz you’re talking about?” Evanston asked.

  “That’s an ice processing ship isn’t it?” Pfeiffer asked. “Out of Ceres Alpha five years or so ago?”

  “In fact it is,” Roja said. “You know about it?”

  “I was … involved … with the chief engineer, Petra Rocovicz,” she said. “One of the best ship mechanics I’ve ever known. I applied to the crew and got sliced in the last cull. Everybody wanted on that boat. A slick piece of steel it is.”

  “I thought it was an exploratory vessel,” Mei said.

  “Probably would qualify,” Pfeiffer said, nodding. “It had a top drawer science kit and big bulging brain package too. Everything in that keel was so far above the bar it even smelled like a private yacht.”

  “The charter for the Waltz was split between Source and Dev,” Roja said. “What she’s saying isn’t an exaggeration. We know this ship ran into trouble. We initially believed it had encountered a fleet that Derek Tomlinson and Tamir bin Ariqat had been building up from decommissioned scrap ships.”

  “The problem is that they have not yet confirmed the existence of the ghost fleet,” Admiral Nakamiru said.

  “So your second choice on the list of probabilities is aliens?” Carter Takata had been quiet, but he shook his head. He was a medical doctor as well as captain of the hospital ship Galen, so he had his skepticism honed to a professional, scientific level.

  “I was skeptical too,” Captain Jeffers said. “But we’ve recently learned that the systemic failures going on down-system are the result of a program designed to prepare humanity for an extrasolar contact.”

  “Prepare us by overthrowing the government and starting a civil war?” Anson Hayes asked, rolling his eyes. “Yah, that makes sense.” The first officer of the Archer drew a disapproving eyeball from his captain.

  “We think it was a matter of bad timing,” Katryna said.

  “And this is all because the Jakob Waltz uncovered a colony of big green space slugs,” Pfeiffer said, covering her mouth and stifling a laugh.

  “Honestly we don’t know for sure what they uncovered,” Nakamiru said. “Unfortunately, they have gone conspicuously silent for most of the last month.”

  Suddenly the commander of the Atlanta fell stone serious. “Frag me,” she said, shaking her head. “I know why you brought all these squirrels to the party. It’s because of those damned steam engines the Waltz loaded before it left Ceres Alpha. Those were all nukes weren’t they?”

  “You know, you finished this meeting a lot smarter than you started,
” Katryna said.

  Old Main Health Center: New Hope City: Luna:

  Derek Tomlinson stood impatiently in the waiting room of the New Hope City Health Center. His bodyguards had cleared the room of patients and Tana Drake had been ordered to make time for the Director, once she finished with her current client. It was strange that the former chancellor had gone back into medical practice after having been the preeminent medical professional in the entire Union. She’d had a career that had taken her to the top of the research world and now she was working in a clinic, treating children with scrapes and cuts.

  This is so beneath her, he fumed.

  After leaving him pacing for nearly ten minutes, a woman in medical scrubs appeared at the door that led to the back offices. “Mr. Tomlinson, Dr. Drake will see you now.”

  A mountain of flesh pushed through the door in front of him and the nurse stood her ground. “The Doctor’s office is very small. Would you prefer if I have her come out here? There is no room inside for your … entourage.”

  “Of course,” he said, nodding and pitching his head to indicate his guards should wait outside. “Her office is fine.” He followed the woman down a winding hall past examination rooms and more than one med tech who glanced up but paid him little notice. At the rear of the medical center, there was a small waiting room outside her office and a secretary sat behind what looked to be a real wooden desk. It was out of place in the antiseptic-laden atmosphere of the clinic.

  “Please go on in. She’s expecting you,” the secretary said. “Would you like me to bring you a coffee?”

  “Real coffee?” he asked, stopping to look at the woman in surprise.

  “East Colorado Dark or German Elite?” she asked.

  Obviously, Chancellor Drake hasn’t given up all of her good life. “Colorado please,” he said, knocking and walking in without waiting for a response.

  “Hello Tana,” he said, smiling despite the frozen daggers her eyes flung in his direction. “May I sit? We have much to discuss.”

  “You obviously can do whatever you want,” she said, her face not relaxing. “And honestly I doubt that we have anything to discuss.”

  “Please, you are one of the few people in all of the Union that knows what is truly going on and why,” he said, easing down in the chair across from her desk and struggling to keep his expression cordial in the face of her blizzard. “I need your help.”

  “If you’re talking about Odysseus, yes I know why, but I don’t know what’s happening,” she said. “I know that somehow you’ve conscripted it to do your bidding.”

  “Not at all,” he said. “Odysseus is making logical decisions based on the original protocols that your cartel apparently helped to write. It may be exceeding some of what was expected, but it isn’t working for me. In fact, I am working for it.”

  “Irrelevant,” she said. “You gain personally, even if it is ‘logical’ as you so cavalierly put it.”

  Clenching his teeth, he said nothing for most of a minute. A knock on the door and the arrival of his coffee broke the deadlock. “Thank you,” he said, nodding politely. He took the small cup and held it carefully. “You have good taste in luxury.”

  “Colorado yes?” she asked, her face softening a little.

  He nodded, taking a small sip and sighing in pleasure.

  “My grandfather was one of the first to plant coffee in the Rocky Mountains,” she said. “I grew up drinking beans from our own crops. The only other varieties that come close are German Elite and Boa Vista Black. Of course, nobody can afford BVB anymore.”

  “I didn’t know you came from coffee farmers,” he said.

  “My mother remarried out and left the farm when I was in premed, but I never outgrew the taste for good coffee,” she said as she leaned back and relaxed another notch.

  Progress. He grinned, taking another sip and relishing the taste as he rolled it around on his tongue. This is truly amazing, he thought.

  “May I be candid?” he asked. “I know this has been difficult on you,”

  She shrugged. “Not actually. Unlike a lot of the others you tossed out, I had a career as a doctor for many years before I worked into admin. I just went back to what I loved doing. This is a lot smaller than the last hospital I worked, but it produces a lot less stress too. You can keep that for yourself.”

  “If I could give you a guarantee that you’d be able to make a difference under the new government, clear down at this level, would that interest you?” he asked. “Odysseus can change how government works. It wasn’t directly designed for that, but its purpose is to help us compete against whatever we’re facing.”

  “So what are we facing, Derek?” She sat forward again, her eyes flashing and boring into him. “Do you even know?”

  “I can’t tell you what it is,” he said.

  “You can’t tell me? Or you won’t?”

  “I honestly don’t know yet,” he admitted. “Odysseus knows where the contact happened, but hasn’t shared that with me.”

  “On the off chance it is real, with the help of our Artificial Overlord, you decided that you’d just boot a government out of power that had kept the peace for 150 years?” She shook her head sadly. “A trifle opportunistic of you isn’t it?”

  “I was told that if I refused to take this position, it would simply put someone else in,” he said, feeling the sudden need to defend his position. “I had no choice.”

  “We all have choices, Derek,” she said.

  “Fair enough. I did have a choice, and I took it. I knew enough to realize that if I didn’t accept the position, another puppet would be sitting in my chair. Whoever that other person turned out to be would have no clue what was going on. We need to have a Director that understands the reality and how we … Humanity … can stay engaged in the process.” He sat the coffee cup down on the corner of her desk.

  “I’m forming an advisory committee, not to serve Odysseus’ needs, but to make sure ours are not lost in the process. I really want you to be part of it. You’re the only other Chancellor from the old government who knows what’s happening, and can help me keep it under control.” He stood to leave. “Please consider my offer. You would be a real asset on the committee and I think you could use the power the position will give you, to do some real good.”

  “I will think about it.” She closed her eyes and drew in a heavy breath. “You won’t take no for an answer, will you?”

  “I can’t,” he said, shaking his head. “I’ve called the first session of the committee for tomorrow at 1800 hours. Can I count on you?”

  “I’ll think on it and let you know.” She stood and walked around her desk. “Now if you don’t mind, I have patients waiting.”

  Jakob Waltz: On the Surface of L-4 Prime:

  Rocky and Shona had taken care of getting Alyx down to her quarters and while they were below, the engineer reset the breakers and inspected the lower decks for problems. Somehow, nothing seemed critically broken.

  Even though they’d all been riding the same adrenaline wave, they understood that Kiro needed a little extra time to chew through it and just breathe.

  He still sat motionless in his seat, staring at the view of the white horizon, when they both returned to the ConDeck. He was wondering if the adrenaline that had crushed his heart would ever let go. So far he wasn’t sure he could move his hands without shaking. “I’ve never crashed a ship before,” he said. “We were six meters long.”

  “And now we are half-meter shorter,” Rocky said, shrugging. “Fortunately damage appears to be contained to engine exhaust housing.”

  He nodded and tried to smile, but his face felt brittle.

  “What you need to remember is that you stacked a 360 meter ship in a vertical column, and didn’t blow us all to hell,” Shona said, putting her hand on his arm and giving it a squeeze. “What amazes me is that you did it blind. When the backwash blocked the optics from the pods, I thought we were dead for sure. That was pure skill.”

/>   “It was pure luck,” he said, rolling his eyes in her direction. “I don’t know what I was thinking …”

  “Pilot Ka…” Rocky said, changing her tone in mid-sentence. “Kiro … was only option available where we all survive. You made right call and I am sure captain will agree. Fortunately he will be able to tell you himself.”

  “Engineer Rocovicz is correct,” Dutch said. “The only other option available would have been to go to station-keeping and wait for the reaction mass to run out. To do so would have condemned our crewmates to starvation and the rest of us to an eventual plunge into a cryofluid ocean.”

  Kiro nodded again. “But still, I crashed.”

  “Any landing you can walk away from is not crash,” Rocky said. “With exception of Alyx, all of us will walk away. Is good day.”

  “How is Alyx?” he asked, looking at Shona.

  “Hurting. I gave her something for it, so she’ll sleep for a while. I don’t think she’s any more injured than she was, but I figured she should stay down until Anju can look her over.”

  “Do we know how long it will be before they get back aboard?” Kiro asked.

  “The Tacra Un is deploying the connecting structures already,” Dutch said. “It advises that the process will take approximately thirty-six to forty hours to complete.”

  “This seems excessively long,” the engineer said.

  “I have notified the captain of the timeframe and they are conserving water through their EVA suit recycler systems. They will be able to wait out the process.”

  A sudden groaning sound shook the deck plates and Rocky cocked her head to listen. “Is probably ice reforming against hull. I assumed cryofluid would eventually fill in landing crater.”

  “Whassat?” Alyx asked over the com.

  “Nothing to worry about,” Shona said, shaking her head. “Go back to sleep, we’re all good up here.”

  “I expect it will take several hours before we freeze hard into place,” Dutch said. “I will maintain stabilization with the maneuvering thrusters until the ice and structural elements of the egress tunnels are sufficient to guarantee our position.”