© Copyright by Simon Clive Hughes, All rights reserved.
To Marcelle, as always.
Prologue
15:20hr, March 17th, 2062
The attack had come with almost no warning, slamming them into safety webs that instantly extruded around them. Alarms shrilled through the control room as the ship acted to protect its crew.
“It’s some kind of energy weapon,” Crane shouted, “probably a vortex cannon.”
Although beam weapons expended much of their energy as they travelled through water, the effect was still akin to that of being hurled into a brick wall. Not that the Erasmus couldn’t handle it, but it was obvious that they were no longer running secretly, and that was a problem.
“Hold fire for now, launch countermeasures,” Bachmann rapped, “plot me an intercept and standby.”
“I’m on it, countermeasures away. OK, I’ve got them… they’re well above us, must have been lurking in that last canyon, shielded from our instruments when we transited. Looks to be a Lancer class. It’s got to be Shimuza.” Shimuza was a rival SuperCorp, infamous for spending more on industrial espionage than on its own R&D.
“Bloody poachers!” someone intoned.
“Alright,” said Bachmann, “Let’s do this. Beth, take her down, flank speed, I want to hug the bottom, nap of the earth.”
“Aye Skipper,” replied McKenna, sending the boat into a steep dive. The sub surged as their acceleration suddenly increased, with McKenna jinking to throw off any incoming ordinance. As they dove, the Erasmus changed its shape and profile, minimizing its cross-section to the enemy, also taking on a mottled colouring that matched the surrounding sea floor. While not completely invisible to scans, the sub’s hull could vary its apparent density to help camouflage her against the surrounding environment.
“There’s two of them,” Crane called, “Shit, I thought the other one might have been an echo.”
“Alright people, let's get serious here, I want a plot to get us the hell out of here with the minimum fuss and bother. Weps, your discretion on firepower, they've already declared their intentions.”
“Aye Skip,” said Crane, “I can give them a little pause, I think.” He assumed an odd expression as he concentrated commands to his neural implants, wirelessly communicating with the sub’s tactical systems. “OK, I’m laying a spread of chaff and pocket mines along our path as we go. I’ll launch a volley of nanotorps and we’ll see if they have the stomach for a real chase.”
A portion of the main screens showed a 3D plot of their trajectory within the trench, along with that of their pursuers. Bachmann could see the following craft, as well as their own nanotorps which were streaking back to intercept. Their intel on the Shimuza Lancer-class subs indicated that they were certainly not as up-to-date as the Erasmus, although if it came to sheer firepower, two adversaries might just be able to overwhelm and be a threat to them.
As they watched the screens, five of the six nanotorp traces blossomed too far from the enemy craft to do much damage. The remaining one got a bit farther, but it too exploded. “They’ve taken the torps out, that last one probably shook them up some though,” said Crane.
“Coop, do you see anything that we can use to get out of sight?” Bachmann asked his Science Officer. “If we can get deep enough I doubt they can follow too easily.”
Before the attack had started, Cooper had been surveying the trench for the anomalistic readings that had brought them here. He had continued to triangulate the strange signal readings, and now replied, “It looks like we’re coming up on a significant cave system off the port quarter. It’s not on any of the charts, but I see it from the gravimetric readings. It's also where our anomaly is.” He increased zoom on a portion of the main screen. “There! Look at that, no wonder we couldn’t see it from above… look how the overhang shields the opening. It’s huge, looks like a bloody cathedral!”
Bachmann studied the image with its overlaid data tags showing dimensions and other parameters. Yes, he thought, that should do the trick.
“OK. Beth, on approach, I want you to take us past it about 500 metres, but stir up as much sediment as you can and then circle back under the debris cloud and let’s take her inside. Coop, I want you to do a scan as we enter to get a better map of the interior. We’ve got to find a safe place.”
McKenna flared the Erasmus’s bow upward and directed intense thrust down into the primeval ooze of the seabed. Balancing the sub on its tail, she skipped it forward, kicking up immense quantities of sediment. Almost instantly, the Erasmus disappeared into the cloud. Yawing back around, she darted for the mouth of the cave, bringing the ship neatly to a stop directly within the cave’s gaping mouth.
“This will do nicely,” said Bachmann, “Slow ahead, let’s have a look at that channel to starboard. It looks to be the biggest. Coop, can you get us a map of that channel, please?”
“SSP launched and scanning,” said Cooper as a three-dimensional map of the cave interior began to build up on the displays. Extruded through the hull, Sonic Survey Pods (SSPs) were intelligent remote sonar devices that were used for mapping bottom contours and were ideal for instances such as this.
Bachmann studied the 3D map as it built up and then ordered, “Take us in, dead slow. We're hiding folks.”
0900hr, November 2nd, 2061
New London, Connecticut
“Captain Bachmann? Admiral Travers will see you now, sir.”
Bachmann looked up and nodded acknowledgement at the young woman, hoisting himself up and following her into the inner sanctum of the admiral’s office. The office was quite spacious, panelled with heavy, well-worn oak, the walls crowded with pictures, awards and citations. Large oils in ornate frames showing sailing ships engaged in epic battles contrasted with glass cases containing intricate scale models of sleek modern warcraft.
Behind a massive wooden desk, the masticated stump of a cigar clenched between his teeth, sat the imposing figure of Rear Admiral Horatio ‘Harry’ Travers. Travers came from a long line of naval submariners, his family history steeped in both wartime and peacetime service. The Admiral had been in command of the submarine development program and submarine school for over thirty years.
He looked up as Bachmann entered, saluted crisply, and stood at attention.
“Quincy, damn good to see you again!” he roared, returning the salute and motioning Bachmann to a chair. Bachmann doffed his hat and slid into a large chair in front of the desk.
“It’s good to see you too sir, it's been a while.”
“Yes, yes it has,” Travers replied, the cigar bobbing in his mouth, “three years by my reckoning, isn't it?”
“That’s right sir,” Bachmann offered, not wanting to expand on it any further. Travers studied him closely for a moment, then seemed to come to some decision.
“I’ve got something special that’s come up that I need a good man for,” he explained, “something that I think would be perfect for you.” Again he paused, Bachmann noticed.
He’s testing me, but I should have expected it.
The last three years had been a rough period in Bachmann’s life, brought on by a family tragedy that had thrown him into a period of grief and despair that he had fought through only by sheer manic work. But, it had been the perfect therapy for him and he had recently passed all his medical and psychological exams with flying colours. When the call had come in from Travers’s office, he had felt a surge of anticipation at the possibility of getting back to a sea command. Not that the past three years hadn’t been interesting and busy ones; he had been on the West coast, first at Bangor and then San Diego, seconded to work with the Navy’s design teams on the latest generation of large submersibles, and had been able to offer valuable input and advice.
Travers regarded him a moment longer, removing the cigar momentarily and then accurately spitting a gob of grey-green phlegm into an antique brass spittoon beside his desk. Again, he seemed to reach a cusp, and stuffing the disreputable cigar stump back into the corner of his mouth, he continued on.
“Our fearless leaders in GPC,” he rolled his eyes, “have been working with us here on some pretty new and exciting tech and I need someone I trust to take the lead on this one. You’ll be in command of a brand new research sub, first of its kind. We call it the Excaliber class. It’s like nothing we’ve seen before, with capabilities that boggle even my mind. The boffins have really delivered this time!
“She’s not a warship per se, but I think you'll be amazed by her capabilities. She’s also a lot smaller than the boats you’ve been used to, with a crew of six, plus yourself, of course, but we may need one or two civilian researchers along on the op too.
“I’ve arranged for you to spend the next few weeks with some of the design team while they finalize things, and with some of the potential crew candidates. I want you to ensure things stay on track and report back to me weekly on the progress. Make sure your sit-reps include your recommendations for the crew. Who goes will be up to you, but I want a trail for the bean-counters and nitpickers on the whys and wherefores of your decisions.
“This is going to be a very high profile mission within the company and there’s a lot riding on it. This new craft could be instrumental in locating new revenue sources, especially for the Pharma division. I don’t need to tell you the clout they have within GPC. The good news, for us, is that they have astonishingly deep pockets and believe me, we’ve had our grubby little paws in those pockets up to the elbows!” he finished, grinning.
“Now, as to the mission, besides the surveying tasks I’ve already mentioned, there’s something that one of our other boats picked up during some deep test dives that I want looked at. When I say deep, however, they were nowhere near the depth that we need to get to. They simply don’t have that capability... the Excaliber class, however, will just astonish you. We’ll be able to take her deeper than any other current submersible except for those clunky steel deep-sea research cans. This baby can run circles around even our own previous deep boats. I could wax on about it, but I want you to get the full skinny from the design group themselves. They deserve to get the credit, and to see the look on your face.
“However, bear in mind that what we’re about to discuss now is highly classified. Do you know Doug Ballantyne?”
“Yes sir,” replied Bachmann, “he was the Logistics officer when I was XO on Railfish. Good guy, very focused, very thorough.”
Travers sat forward and pushed a Comtab across the desk that showed an underwater terrain map with some unfamiliar false-colour-enhanced areas deep within a trench.
“This is what started it all. Ballantyne is CO of the Tacoma now, and during a deep dive in the Puerto Rico Trench, his Science Officer, Jim Cooper, whom you also know, happened onto an area where his gravitometer went wacko. He triple-checked the readings and they appear valid. There’s something down there that defies all logic. The Tacoma didn’t have the depth or manoeuvring capability to get any closer and we also didn’t want to be too overt and alert any of the competition, so Ballantyne had Cooper bring all the details on the anomaly back directly to me.
“At this point there are only six people who know about this: Ballantyne and Cooper, of course, myself, GPC’s science division’s head honcho Rudy Janos, and now you.” He sat back and looked at Bachmann, waiting.
“Sorry sir, I thought you said six people.”
Travers grinned around his cigar, and then dropped the bomb. “The sixth is your sister, Jessica.” He leaned back in his chair and put a foot up on his desk.
Jessica Bachmann was thirteen years his junior, and had dual doctorates in marine biology and geology, specializing in deep sea life and environs, especially the type of plants and animals found in drastically alien environments, such as the thermal vents and cold sinks found deep in the ocean trenches.
Bachmann was taken aback, but as he thought about it, he could see Travers’s logic in including her. Jessie’s knowledge could be a huge asset to understanding whatever the anomaly might be.
Travers took the revoltingly wet stump of cigar from mouth and examined it critically for a moment before pitching it into the spittoon. Bachmann knew that he hadn’t actually smoked for over ten years, but neither had he ever seen the Admiral without a cigar firmly stuck in the side of his mouth.
Reaching into his desk drawer, Travers pulled out a fresh stogie, unwrapped it and wedged it in place, then turned back to Bachmann and declared, “She’s on your team. Any issues?”
“No sir.” Bachmann replied evenly, but privately wished that he had a better grasp of the dangers they faced. Not that Jessie wasn’t fully capable of making her own decisions, but he was still her older brother after all.
With that, Travers hauled his foot off the desk, stood abruptly and extended a beefy hand to Bachmann, “Welcome to the team, Quincy. The yeoman outside has a car ready to take you to meet the gang. Good luck, Captain.”
Bachmann shook his hand firmly, saluted once more, and turned to leave.
1000h, November 2nd, 2121
General Products Corporation Oceanic Research Centre
New London, Connecticut
It took Bachmann the better part of a half-hour just to get through security, even with the additional credentials he’d received from Admiral Travers. Whatever was housed in this facility was rated significantly higher than top secret.
When he had finally run the gauntlet, he found a bemused Lieutenant Commander Jim Cooper waiting for him.
Old friends, they shook hands warmly and then Cooper lead him deeper into the complex. At each door, they had to swipe in using a special ID card that Cooper had presented to him.
“Don’t worry, you get used to it,” remarked Cooper, seeing Bachmann’s chagrin at the level of security.
“There must be some serious shit in here,” said Bachmann.
Cooper glanced at him and replied quietly, “Sir, you have no idea!”
Bachmann squeezed his friend's shoulder, murmuring, “Let’s keep things informal, Coop. With this small a group, we’ll be better off without the pomp and circumstance.”
“You bet, Skip.”
Bachmann grinned, ‘Skip’ was about as informal as Coop would get, but in reality it was a term of friendly respect that suited Bachmann’s intent perfectly.
They wound their way through a warren of corridors, past dozens of labs with esoteric names on the doors, finally coming to a small conference room where Cooper swiped his card and held the door open for Bachmann.
Entering, he heard a high-pitched “Oh my God!” and was immediately almost bowled over by an enthusiastic brunette.
“Hi Jessie,” he managed to get out before being enveloped in a bear hug that seemed to go on and on.
“What are you doing here, Big Bro?” Jessica Bachmann demanded, still holding him tightly. It had been almost two years since they had seen each other.
Bachmann finally held her out at arms length and with a quick glance around the room, taking in the others there, replied, “Actually, I think you guys are supposed to tell me.”
Cooper came to his aid by announcing, “Ladies and gentlemen, I’d like you to meet Captain Quincy Bachmann. Captain Bachmann is going to be the CO for our upcoming mission. I’ve had the pleasure of working with him several times over the years and I can tell you that we are extremely lucky to have this man leading the team, and more importantly, supporting us.”
He turned to Bachmann, and said, “Let me introduce you to our little group.”
1930h
Later that evening, the two Bachmanns sat back, each with a small glass of wine, enjoying the view. They had just finished a sumptuous meal that had left them both sated.
From their patio table, the view was indeed spectacular, a late sunset sky, deep mauve with high, wispy clouds of ochre and orange over a shimmering River Thames. Neither was bothered by the fact that the view was entirely false, cunningly projected in HD onto the small semi-spherical dome that enclosed their table. In reality, they were actually underground, still deep within the high security complex that housed the Excaliber project, in a restaurant aptly named ‘Visions’. Designed not just to provide a place for the denizens to have access to the wonderful food that the Navy was famous for supplying to its submariners, the restaurant also provided a place to securely discuss business while eating. Each room, some bigger than others, was completely secure, swept daily for bugs and fully isolated from adjacent areas.
The day had flown by for Bachmann, from the first meeting Cooper had escorted him to with the design team and senior technicians, to the following tours of many labs where they slowly introduced him to other personnel and more importantly, to some of the bewildering technology that was being incorporated into Excaliber. He hadn’t seen Jessie since, but she got word to him later in the day to rendezvous at Visions. It was their first real opportunity to catch up, and over dinner they had discussed only personal matters.
Jessie Bachmann, twenty-nine, was a trim, willowy brunette with close-cropped hair that seemed to fit her head like a stylized, spiky helmet. She, and all the others that he had met today wore the close-fitting, yet flexible ship's overalls that seemed ubiquitous within the facility. In the years since she and Quincy had last been together, she hadn’t aged, her brother saw, but what he did notice was a certain maturity that had not always been present before.
She sat back, returning his gaze for a moment and then asked, “So, are we overwhelmed yet?”
Quincy cracked a broad smile, and nodded slowly. “I’d say that’s a good word for it.”
“Well,” Jessie replied, with a lop-sided smile of her own, “don’t get complacent just yet, wait until you see what we’ve got in store for you tomorrow. This is just the prelim stuff to get you up to speed. The real magic is yet to come.”
Quincy took a small sip of his wine then leaned forward, his arms on the table, and asked her how she had become involved. She too leaned forward, unconsciously mimicking his body posture.
“OK, let’s see, I guess it was about three weeks ago now, I was out off the Philippines, off Palau?” here she saw her brother nod his familiarity of the area, as she continued, “I was down in the trench there looking at the areas around the subduction zones to see how the last shift affected the biology there.
“We’d really only just gotten a couple of dives in before I had this urgent message to return to Manila for a meeting. As you can imagine, I was well and truly pissed at having to cut short my trip, but they’d sent a friggin’ Navy jump jet for me, for God’s sake, so I couldn’t very well refuse.
“From Manilla they bundled me onto a SST direct to here and then straight to the Admiral’s office. Jesus, Quincy, I hadn’t even showered before I had to go in and face that old tyrant, and then it was all I could do to keep my eyes off that disgusting cigar bobbing about in his mouth!”
They both shared a laugh before she continued.
“Anyway, let’s just say that after scaring the shit out of me with all the top secret warnings, the old boy gave me enough data to pique my interest. From that point on, I’ve been ensconced here, getting more and more involved and interested by the moment. I’ve been working closely with Coop,” here she paused momentarily, and Quincy could see she looked a bit distracted.
“You know, I remember you introducing me to him a few years ago, but I hadn’t realized what an interesting guy he is... and attractive.”
“Anyway,” she continued quickly, “I still have no idea what this anomaly is that we’ve got to go and find, but Quincy,” and here she paused, and her face lit up, “Wait till you see the boat!”
November 3rd, 2121
General Products Corporation Oceanic Research Centre
New London, Connecticut
It was well past lunch before they actually got to the boat. The morning had been another almost endless parade of mind-boggling technical presentations aimed at getting him up to speed with an overview of the design principals of the Excaliber program.
About mid-morning, he had a brief meeting with Rudy Janos, who happened to be in the facility for a quick visit. They had discussed how important the anomaly might be as a possible source of new rare earth compounds for the company, and Bachmann had been impressed with Janos’s passion for the mission, and gratified at his enthusiasm at having Bachmann leading the team.
During the day, he’d also gotten to spend some time with a couple he’d been introduced to at the first meeting, Gared and Iris Wheeler. Gared, another ex-Navy man was a propulsion expert who specialized in tending the twin ‘pocket’ fusion reactors that were used in the submersible. In his early forties, with close-cropped salt-and-pepper hair, Wheeler was a large man, who, like many large men, seemed to have a certain grace that belied his girth. He had been instrumental in the design and development of the revolutionary new drive and control systems and knew them intimately.
Iris Wheeler was a woman of almost the same size, and from the rear, could almost have passed for him, apart from her jet black hair, of course. Iris, who was also ex-Navy, and whose expertise with electronics and ship’s systems was already legendary in the service, was also an integral part of the design team.
Well-liked by everyone, they were irreverently, but fondly known as ‘the twins’. They had an immensely confident yet self-effacing manner that exuded an almost Zen-like calmness. Bachmann immediately liked them both, but oddly, he also sensed an air of melancholy about them.
Admiral Travers had emailed him a list of potential personnel that he had considered worthy for the mission, and along with Cooper, the Wheelers were on the list. Bachmann had already started to consider the crew roster, and the opportunity to include Cooper and the Wheelers was too good to pass up. It was rare indeed to be able to ship out with experienced personnel who had actually had a hand in the design of the platform. It was a great practical advantage, not be passed up lightly.
Later in the morning, he had observed another interesting potential candidate when they visited the Weapons test centre. Here, he had been introduced to Randy Crane, whose appearance belied the fact that he was also ex-Navy. Crane had numerous augmentations including piercings, tattoos and a bizarre head of hair that was capable of fluorescing in different colours and patterns. Bachmann learned that Crane had come to them from the Navy’s bio-drone program and had been twice decorated for his ability to surgically strike assets while minimizing casualties. Quite simply, he was the fastest, and yet the most accurate Weps officer any of them had ever seen. Watching him practicing with the sims, was both fascinating and chilling.
Because the cohesiveness of crew was of ultimate importance in a sub, Bachmann wanted to spend a bit more time with Crane before making a final decision, but his initial conversations with the young man seemed to indicate that he possessed the maturity and strength that Bachmann felt was necessary for consideration.
That left two positions still open: helm and support engineering. Over lunch, he and Coop had looked over the Admiral’s list together, discussing their choices.
One of the names, Beth McKenna, was familiar to Bachmann, although he had to stare at her photo and think for a moment before it fell into place. McKenna, was a slim, red-headed Navy pilot whose exploits with air and spacecraft were renown. Bachmann had met her three years earlier during a combined services op on the West coast, and had rarely seen the combination of coolness and absolute control that McKenna exhibited. Beth had distinguished herself many times, most recently in the Indo-US lunar conflict, in which she had been badly injured. When she had rotated back Earthside for recuperation and rehab, Admiral Travers had virtually hijacked her to the nearby Naval Branch Healthcare facility. Bachmann saw that she had recently been released and had preceded him into the program by just a few days.
He ran into her a few minutes later as he and Cooper were leaving the Mess Hall. She was just entering with Randy Crane, and the two of them were sharing a laugh. When she saw Bachmann, she came to attention and snapped a salute.
“Captain,” she greeted him.
“Hello Beth,” he replied, “at ease. It’s good to see you again. How are you feeling?”
“All fixed up now, sir, thanks for asking.”
“I’m glad to hear that, and please, let’s keep it informal here.”
“Aye aye, Skip, can do,” she replied with a smile.
Bachmann grinned back and excused himself, “Listen Beth, my schedule’s pretty full right now, but I’ll catch up with you later and we can have a chat.”
She replied, “That sounds great, I’ll be looking forward to it,” and then moved off with Crane.
It was close to 1600hr by the time they were ready to head deeper underground to the large area that contained the dry dock, wet dock and egress tunnel out into the river. It was here that the prototype Excaliber craft was waiting for their inspection.
On the way, he noticed McKenna sitting by herself at a terminal. Turning to Cooper, he said, “Coop, let’s invite her to join us. From what your group has told me about this beast and how it handles, I can’t think of another pilot candidate that would be better suited.”
McKenna joined them, trying hard to conceal a smile, and not quite succeeding. It was that indomitable spirit that Bachmann remembered, and knew instinctively that he had found his pilot. That left only the Support Engineer.
The next few hours were magical. Bachmann didn’t know who had the more fun, he and McKenna, who were simply wowed by the craft, or Cooper, the Wheelers and the design techs who almost fell over themselves to showcase their proud child.
1630hr, November 3rd, 2121
The ship, which he now learned was called the Erasmus, was a culmination of technologies and knowledge from the Navy’s long submersible programs, merged with the latest in leading-edge space and science research. With an overall maximum length of twenty-eight metres, and a maximum beam of seven metres, the ship was like nothing seen before. Everything about her was spectacularly remarkable.
The outer shell was Chitron, a bizarre composite of chitin, the long-chain polymer that was the main component of the exoskeletons of arthropods such as crustaceans and insects. This material was then combined with a nano-weave of graphene quantum-optical fibres that could alter the properties of the surrounding composite substrate. A product of the industrial giant Femtotronics (itself a subsidiary of GPC), it was another of the miraculous products of Ryuu Koch’s famous ‘BugWerks’ research labs.
Femtotronics, now almost 70 years old, had been a pioneer in the nano and femto technology fields. Building upon success after success, the company had quickly assumed a dominant position within the high-tech industry and military areas, and had firmly stood there ever since.
By flexing the surface charge through the Chitron, the outer shell could change shape (and colour), so that the ship could actually reconfigure external parts of itself to resemble a whale, or an elongated saucer, or a number of other non-mechanical objects. The flex-field was configured to set up a surface charge that created a micro-vacuum, similar to an airfoil, that pulled water at remarkable velocities across its surface while being almost silent, giving not just stealth, but underwater velocities that rivalled high-speed surface ships.
The hull was composed of three separate layers of Chitron, each separated by spacing filled with another of Femtotronics marvels, FlexFoam, a gel-like substance whose density could be locally altered upon command, providing buoyancy, trim and impact control. The Chitron was also self-healing, not only useful in the obvious sense, for damage control, but also because it allowed the airlock into the sub’s interior to become a contiguous surface once again when the airlock doors were closed.
The outer layer of Chitron contained a dense mesh of specialized sensors that allowed the ship to autonomously examine and understand its surroundings. It could, for example, automatically seek out thermoclines, the cold ocean currents that produced a negative sound speed gradient which would help to hide the sub’s sounds from pursuing craft. Chitron, due to the graphene, also exhibited a piezoelectric effect in which the movement of the passing water actually produced a current that recharged the internal battery system. Similarly, the hull could also act as a solar cell, again producing energy that was captured by the system.
One of the most attractive properties of the Chitron-FlexFoam combination, especially for a deep-sea submersible, was that increased pressure simply made its bonds stronger. Similar to lacing one’s fingers together with an egg suspended by its endpoints between the two palms, squeezing simply increased its strength. Impact trauma was absorbed and spread over the entire hull surface, making her a very tough nut to crack. This, along with the other breakthroughs gave the sub an astonishing depth capability, over ten-thousand metres, making it one of the few craft in the world able to live and work at this extreme depth.
The project was funded by a joint venture between the military and GPC, General Products Corporation. GPC, a ‘SuperCorp’, was a sprawling multi-national company that had fingers in practically every pie going, whether on Earth or intra-solar space, GPC’s presence was ubiquitous. In the present day corporate-driven economy, rival companies spent huge sums on research into new fields of possible product sources. The various world militaries, now almost entirely funded by the SuperCorps, helped with keeping these missions ‘legitimate’, although push-come-to-shove, their real involvement was to enforce and maintain intellectual property rights. The Military-Industrial Complex of old had firmly morphed the Industrial-Military Complex.
Almost every interior surface of the sub was capable of displaying images, and combined with the optical capture properties of the outer hull, could act as windows, so that they would have an unprecedented view of the sub’s surroundings, enhanced and displayed by the computer in 3D. The display surfaces were, of course, tied into the sub’s internal DataNet, which in turn interfaced with the quadruple-redundant quantum-opto computers and hyper-dense storage arrays. Any time the sub was within range of the surface SatNet, it auto-updated the onboard knowledge-base, giving them instant access to vast amounts of information. The ship also updated any data from GPC’s CorpNet, keeping them up-to-date on proprietary orders or information they might require. Personal communications tablets, comtabs, slaved themselves to the DataNet too, providing not only portable data access but also remote control capability of almost any aspect of the sub’s systems.
Deeply embedded into the ship’s neural network, the AI (Artificial Intelligence) was able to control all of the ship’s systems autonomously. Normally in a watchful, yet withdrawn mode of consciousness, it could be invoked by speaking the ship’s name, at which point it assumed a projected sentient presence, speaking with a curious old Dutch-tinged English accent, probably in honour of its namesake, the Renaissance classical scholar. Its never-tiring presence allowed the crew to operate the sub without requiring additional bodies to man all the watches. When a crew member moved out of their seat, the AI automatically assumed whatever task they had been doing.
As was usual for a submarine, the designers had managed to shoehorn prodigious amounts of equipment and amenities within the tight space. Bachmann was surprised to see just how much room there was for the crew. Moving aft from the bow control room (which included two small heads), was the computer room to starboard, and the airlock/escape trunk area to port. Then came the wardroom which included room for a large table, cunningly stowed exercise equipment, and an associated galley. Beyond the wardroom were two staterooms and a number of smaller cabins, followed by a sophisticated pharmacy/sickbay, then a large machine room which housed traditional tools and the ship’s nanomanufacuary.
Nanofacs, as they were known, were a logical technology extension of the early twenty-first century 3D printer technologies, along with the revolution in electronics in its move from silicon to graphene. Using software templates, and raw materials available in the surrounding environment, the nanofac could be used to produce almost any tool or machine they might require: replacement parts and even weapons. More critically, it also produced almost all of their consumables, allowing the boat almost unlimited underwater capability.
Aft of the machine room was another, larger airlock which gave outside access to both the machine room and the adjacent weapons/sensor storage and loading area. On a platform above the deck here, a sleek, tiny, battery powered helicopter was housed. It was an HMR-02 (Helicopter Mobile Reconnaissance) built by the Bell-Sikorski division of GPC, but known colloquially just as the ‘Humming Bird’. With six composite fold-out blades and an enclosed, shrouded tail rotor, it could carry two crew in a fore/back configuration. It was light, but armed with a laser-guided micro-cannon that could inflict a nasty sting.
The craft could be sortied out through the outer skin and be used for reconnaissance missions. One of the reasons that Bachmann had chosen McKenna was that she was rated for rotary craft, and would be the pilot for both the Erasmus and the tiny ‘copter.
Finally, at the rear of the craft was the reactor compartment. Because Erasmushad no conventional drive system, which would generally housed behind the reactor, it resulted in a smaller overall size vessel, while allowing more space in the other compartments. There were also virtually no manual mechanical controls as everything was fly-by-fibre. The nano-weave of quantum-optical fibres embedded into the hulls connected everything, and could autonomously find alternate paths should the need arise.
Any remaining space within the inner hull was packed with batteries and storage for items not easily forged by the nanofac, or for fresh foodstuffs.
February 4th, 2061
Bachmann leaned back, pushing the comtab away from him disgustedly. He was tired, frustrated, and more than a little disappointed. Two days ago, they had concluded a simulated three-day shakedown cruise, and he had a long list of issues to deal with. Worse, but certainly not unexpected, he had had to endure a chewing out by Admiral Travers over the schedule slippage.
Although he realized that he had been in the same situation before, it was different this time because the technology was so radically new that he often felt out of his depth. Worse, he had to replace one of the crew.
The Support Engineer that they had worked with for almost two months was simply not making the grade. Bachmann had worked hard mentoring the man, trying to correct his deficits, but a couple of incidents on the cruise had convinced him that a hard decision needed to be made. Getting up, he ran his fingers through his hair, then walked to the door, opened it and called the man in.
Later he found a quiet conference room and convened a meeting with the rest of the team to start addressing the issues.
“You know, quite a lot of these issues are just software based, so we can swat them down pretty fast,” Iris said, “I’ve spent the last two days going over the data and I’ve already made some recommendations to the code team. I’m meeting with them tomorrow to go over my suggestions and start the review process. Coop’s going to join us to help address the sensor issues, and again, we should be able to get back on track with a few days of hard work.”
McKenna had come into the meeting a bit late, having spent the morning qualifying on the tiny helicopter, doing practice touch-and-go landings on the base’s carrier simulator, a hydraulic platform that rose and dipped, pitched and yawed as a ship at sea would. Landing on a ship as small as the Erasmus was extraordinarily taxing, and McKenna was a perfectionist, so she was splitting her time to get as much stick time as possible on the tiny Humming Bird.
“Beth has been working with me on the helm and drive problems too,” added Gared, “most of them are calibration issues and I don’t expect too much trouble to iron them out.”
McKenna picked up the conversation’s thread and nodded agreement, adding, “Some of the glitches are really similar to the ones I’ve seen on the low-orbit fighters, and invariably it involves the control-feedback-loop routines. Fix those and I think you’ll find that many of the other issues will disappear, or at least it’ll be evident as to their cause.”
She hesitated for a moment and then said, “Skip, some of it’s me too. I’ve found that the sims can’t, or at least don’t properly recreate the control function when the water density changes, or when you get cross-currents. The propulsion paradigm is more like an airfoil rather than screws, so the software needs some tinkering. I’ve already spoken to the simulator code guys and they’re working with me to add more variability so I can up my game. I know I can do much better.”
It was this level of self-responsibility that Bachmann valued so highly in his crews. Anyone who automatically looked for blame elsewhere soon found themselves transferred. Responsibility was key to a successful crew. The smaller the crew, the more critical this became.
Crane had sat silently for most of the meeting, but now he spoke up.
“Skip, I’ve been talking with one of Rudy’s specialists and his cyber division has a new upgrade prototype they can fit into my implants. The new chips are smaller, and they run faster and cooler. More importantly, they’re multi-channel, so the multitasking is much, much better. I’d like your permission to give them a try.”
Bachmann had never felt comfortable with the idea of having too much hardware in your head, but it was an increasingly popular way for interfacing with systems that required high cognition speeds. They had all been fitted with their cochlea and iris implants for standard net interface. Crane’s implants, however, provided direct communications protocols with the Weps systems, and interfaced with the visual cortex to provide a HUD overlay that could show additional data over and above what the sub’s internal instrument displays showed.
Seeing Bachmann’s hesitation, Crane added, “The procedure is only a couple of hours and the setup and testing shouldn’t be more than a couple of days.”
“OK Randy, the decision is yours. Just make sure they don’t take out the wrong thing while they’re rummaging around in there.”
Crane grinned.
As they finished up and the room emptied out, McKenna approached him.
“Skip, with regard to the Engineering position, I know someone I’d like to recommend. She’s ex-Swedish Navy. I got to know her on Luna when I was testing the Shrike interceptors at the Clavius base. She just finished her last tour of duty and I know she was looking for something interesting.
“She’s a real magician with nanofacs, and she saved over a hundred lives up at Clavius when we had that issue with those shitty bulkhead seals. She’s got a way of looking at things that is truly out-of-the-envelope. And, I know she’d fit in perfectly with the team.”
Bachmann considered for a moment. A personal recommendation, especially from someone like McKenna held weight, and he needed to fill the position ASAP. He also had worked with the Swedes and he knew their programs and requirements were equally as stringent as their own.
“OK, Beth, I appreciate you letting me know. Can you send me her contact info?”
“Sure Skip, her name is Anneka Jenssen, and she forwarded her CV to me, so I can give you the full skinny.”
“I know that name,” Bachmann replied, “she was the one that came up with that workaround that saved the Solomon, wasn’t she?”
“Yeah,” McKenna confirmed, “that’s my girl! Ever met her?”
“No, but I know a bit of her reputation.”
McKenna grinned at him and turned to go. “You’re in for a treat,” she replied cryptically.
They spent the rest of the day running down issues and updating the project plan. At 2000hr, they finally broke for a late dinner and then adjourned for the day. Before turning in, Bachmann checked his email and found Jennsen’s CV. He spent some time carefully reading through it and the attached recommendations, noting that among her other accomplishments, she had completed the Swedish Navy’s submarine school at Karlskrona Naval Base. Because both McKenna and Crane had also graduated from the Navy’s sub course in San Diego, that meant that the entire crew would be highly qualified for the mission.
He finished his perusal of Jenssen’s CV and then drafted a request for her immediate transfer and sent it to Admiral Travers.
Three weeks later, they were ready to put to sea to test out the changes that the various software and hardware teams had worked around the clock to implement. Bachmann also now had his full crew complement.
Anneka Jennsen had arrived just two days after his request to Admiral Travers, and Bachmann now understood McKenna’s enigmatic remark. With the high cheekbones typical of many Scandinavian women, a svelte figure and shoulder-length honey-blonde hair tied in a ponytail, she was absolutely stunning. She also radiated a level of confidence, control and camaraderie that, coupled with her looks, made her an instant hit with all.
As team leader, it fell to Bachmann to brief her on the mission’s aims and requirements. He found her to be lightening quick on the uptake, asking shrewd, pertinent and penetrating questions. She was also a joy to be around, with a professional, yet familiar manner that he found both refreshing and charming.
Within a few hours of first seeing the Erasmus, she had proposed immensely valuable modifications to the nanofac facilities, and went further to outline the changes to the software/hardware teams on how to best implement them.
With the change of personnel, over the next few days, Bachmann observed the crew dynamics carefully. Any qualms he had about introducing Jennsen to the team vanished as he saw her interacting easily with both the male and female crew members. She already knew Beth, and had struck up friendships with both Iris, and especially Jessie. In no time, the three women seemed to have one of those close relationships that men rarely understood. He noticed that sometimes during meals, when the three women often sat together, that they glanced at and appeared to be discussing him, a thought that made him strangely uneasy.
He also noticed subtle — and occasionally not so subtle — indications that some interpersonal liaisons were forming: Jessie and Coop, as he had suspected, were spending more and more time together, and Beth and Randy were often to be seen together. Where, years before, there had been a strict code of male-only crew within the submarine service, the intervening years had seen this somewhat draconian practice end, and mixed crews were now the norm.
February 26th, 2061
When they finally put to sea, it was a cold, grey, overcast morning, with sleet that obscured a surface of heavy, greasy swells. The Erasmus, however, was running submerged, through the long tunnel that had been built in the 2040s to provide a secure access to Long Island Sound. From here, they would pass between Montauk and Brock Island to enter the Atlantic. Then a sprint out to the edge of the continental shelf, and thence into deep water.
About 280 km out, they would descend into the Hudson Valley and follow it, checking out their high speed manoeuvrability in the canyons, until it emptied out onto the plain. From there they would steer east-southeast to the Caryn Seamount, then east-northeast to the Kelvin Seamount, swing north around its east side and then follow the chain of seamounts west-northwest, finally turning due west to meet the Hydrographer Canyon that would lead them back up and onto the continental shelf. From there, it was back to base, for a round trip of a little over 1,900 km.
This cruise, really their sea trial, was long enough for them to properly evaluate the Erasmus’s capabilities and finalize any niggling problems before their main mission got underway.
Part of the mission was to test out their various weapons systems. Even though they were not really a warship, Erasmus carried a formidable array of weaponry, ostensibly for self-defence, but should conditions arise, she could carry the fight to an enemy. Because, unlike conventional subs, Erasmus’s weapons were extruded through the hull to maintain the Chitron’s integrity, Bachmann had insisted that live tests be part of the trials. The rivalry between the SuperCorps was at a dangerously high level at the moment and it was not uncommon for skirmishes, even deadly ones, to take place. Quite apart from the safety of his crew, Bachmann had a responsibility to bring back the ship in one piece.
By just after lunchtime, McKenna was aggressively wringing out the ship in the twists and turns of the Hudson Valley. Out of necessity, they were all in their safety harnesses as she danced the sub through manoeuvres that even Bachmann was unprepared for.
“Jesus, Skip, this thing goes like a raped ape,” she exclaimed eloquently, grinning like a mad woman as the Erasmus responded to her every demand. She had them on the ceiling one minute clearing a upthrust crag, and then diving steeply, heeled far over to one side or the other as she tracked the canyons, mere metres from the walls. After a second high-G loop, Bachmann asked her to back off a bit lest they decorate the bridge with their lunch. Beaming from ear to ear, she throttled back, turned to Gared and Iris, snapped a salute and said, “You guys are awesome! This baby is one serious piece of gear! You’ve gotta be proud of her.”
They too, looked like Cheshire cats, Bachman noticed, and Iris answered for both of them, “Thanks Hon, we’re glad you like her!” She patted her husband’s arm and added, “My old man sure knows how to build ‘em, doesn’t he?”
“Oh, I think you might have had something to do with it too, Iris, the control system is just phenomenal now!” Beth retorted, and Iris performed a small bow — as much as her harness would permit — in acknowledgement.
Once they got closer to the end of the valley, Bachmann had Randy team with Beth to do some target practice runs. Over the years, the Navy had seeded the area with old cars for trainee submariners to use for sonar and weapons targeting. For Bachmann, this would be a crucial test of both the boat’s weapons systems capability, and also of how well the Pilot and Weps Officer worked together. Normally, the Science Officer would handle the sensors, including sonar. In a battle situation, however, especially with the speed of which the Erasmus was capable, he wanted the kind of team that was the norm in a fighter jet. He had taken advantage of the fact that both McKenna and Crane had this background and experience. His intent was to foster specialized teams within the crew, to use the best people for specific tasks. He gave them a ‘hunt and kill’ order and sat back to watch.
“Alright Weps, you ready for some yankin’ and bankin’?”
“You got it, Babe, let’s kill some cars!”
Over the next couple of hours, the rest of the crew sat clutching their chairs in astonishment. It was like watching some deadly cat-and-mouse game, but with the finesse and sheer beauty of a ballet. Time after time, Beth unerringly located their quarry, tersely calling out range and bearing info while Randy used a suite of weapon strikes to target the rusty hulks.
Because he controlled the weapons systems wirelessly with his implants, his hands were free and it was like watching a drummer doing an intricate solo. By the end of the practice, the crew was cheering them on with every hit.
Bachmann tried as much as he could to remain professionally objective, but in the end, he joined in with the rest of them. Any reservations he might have had about choosing these two were long gone. They worked together as if they were a dance team, and their speed and accuracy was simply unbelievable. On their first time out, they had achieved a perfect score.
Later that evening — even with their perfect score — Randy sat in Beth’s cabin and the two of them discussed their performance, analyzing what could be improved.
“You know, I’ve never flown — if that’s the right word for it — anything quite like this puppy. I would never have thought I could get these speeds underwater, let alone the manoeuvrability it has.”
“Yeah, you were really putting her through her paces! It’s not as fast as in space, or air, and the density difference really fucks up timing. I know you were anticipating as much as I was.”
“Absolutely! Compared to vacuum, its like flying through a goddamn marshmallow,” she said, slowly pushing out her hands, as if against a soft wall.
“Well, as good as it was today, there were no bogies on our ass, and the cars don’t fight back. I’m going to ask the Skipper if I can program a couple of drones to act as bad guys so we can have them play tag with us. Then we’ll see how good we really are.”
“Hell yeah, that’s a great idea! We should get the Skip to pilot one of them. I’ve heard some crazy shit about him. I know that on the op we were on together he pulled off some freaky targeting scenarios, and the guy’s as cool as a cucumber.”
“Yeah, the old boy’s definitely got the right stuff. You’re right, he’ll push us to the limit alright.”
“You just love a challenge, don’t you?”
“Like you don’t?” he grinned at her.
She beckoned him with a finger, “C’mere Weps, I’ve got a challenge for you!”
• • • •
McKenna brought the ship around in a tight, high-speed turn, her eyes scanning her instruments as the G-forces pushed her back mercilessly in her seat. She had dived to the deck, and was jinking back and forth between the crags and upthrust rocks, looking for the bandit.
Her senses were hyper-attuned. The instrument lights seemed almost too bright, their colours over-vivid; the switches and controls had a contrast and edge definition sharp enough to cut; the air she breathed was thick, chilled and smelt of death. The terrain sped by in jerks that alternated between too slow and too fast; the details so crisp within the intensely sunlit patches, and blacker than pitch in the shadows.
He was out there, she knew, the last of three that had surprised them, vectoring in low and then popping up suddenly and firing on her and her wingman. She had caught the sudden squeal of the proximity warning alarm and had instantly pulled down and away, circling back to port. Her wingman was not so lucky, and in her peripheral vision she saw the soundless conflagration and knew he was lost.
Ignoring the blue-green imprint at the side of her vision, she had brought her Shrike intercepter around so quickly that she almost blacked out, but her fire control computer immediately locked onto one of the Durga-class fighters and she thumbed her pulse laser. The beam lanced out and tore the Durga in half, and she quickly rotated to lock onto one of the others. The two remaining Indos split off from each other and she deked to follow the starboard craft, locked onto it and fired again. Another kill. She hit her comms button and transmitted a quick sit-rep, all the time scanning both visually and by instruments. The third bandit had disappeared… for now.
Just then, the proximity alarms started screaming again and before she could react, the missile impacted on her upper tail, tearing it away and sending the Shrike into a flat spin, like a maple key, corkscrewing its way downward. The fighter still had forward momentum, and in a sense, that’s what helped to save her. Rather than augering in, it bounced across the deep dust of the crater floor like a stone skipped across a pond, slowed, but then hit a boulder, up-ended and came to rest upside-down. By this time, of course, McKenna was brutally battered and unconscious.
When she finally came to, she couldn’t move and panic got the better of her. She began to struggle, and a scream rose up in her throat.
Suddenly, someone was shaking her and there was a voice saying, “Beth, Beth, it’s OK, it’s just a dream. Wake up, Babe.”
In the dim cabin light, she looked up at Crane, and a sob welled up and she clung to him as he stroked her hair, soothing her, releasing her from the terror.
• • • •
On their second day out, cross-training was the order of the day. Bachmann had Coop and Jessie concentrate on the sensor suite, working on the different instruments to identify various features on the ocean floor, doing analysis problems and checking the Nav platform.
He had Beth give him some stick-time on Helm by slaving to her controls from his Captain’s chair. Although he had spent time driving the larger SSNs, the Erasmus was like driving a high performance aircraft. He worked under her tutelage until she was satisfied he had enough knowledge and experience to pilot in an emergency. He also worked hard to keep a grin off his face, but didn’t always succeed… the damn thing was just flat out fun to drive!
Gared and Iris took turns working with Anneka. They each showed her their stations and controls, and she, in turn, spent time with them explaining some of the finer points of the nanofac facilities. As they were all engineers, they were a logical group to cross-train disciplines.
Later that afternoon, he spent time with Randy discussing utilizing the drones for some war game scenarios. McKenna noticed that he seemed quite interested when Randy suggested he thought the Captain might like to program and pilot the drones.
They had two drones in the weapons locker that would do, but Bachmann, without telling Crane or McKenna, wanted to up the game and quietly asked Anneka to follow him back to the machine room where he asked if she could have the nanofac spin up another drone for him. They sat together in the small console area, looking at the templates that were stored in the nanofac’s memory. Rather than just replicate the existing type of drone, he chose a different configuration that was much more stealthy, with higher speed and a longer reach on the laser system. He had a feeling that he’d need the additional capability if he was going to ‘fake out’ the Weps officer.
Sitting so close to Jennsen, he couldn’t help but be aware of her, the way a wisp of her amber hair curled down beside her ear; the small mole on her temple; the sweet, fresh smell of her. She too, seemed aware of his presence as they discussed his ideas, and she had a way of looking directly at him with her brilliant blue eyes that he found mesmerizing.
“How long will it take to fabricate the drone?” he asked.
“I can set it up right now and let it run overnight. It will be ready well before the morning.” She paused, “You know the nanofac has an outboard port, right? I could launch it discreetly at your command from right here. I sense you want to try to give our young dream team a good thrashing, right?”
He had to laugh, “Well, that remains to be seen, but that’s the general idea. I want to send this one out ahead of us on high stealth mode and then see what they’ll do while they’re also being harassed by the other two drones from the rear.”
“You’re an evil man, Captain,” she said, fixing him with another frank stare, one eyebrow rising. “Tell you what, I’ll program the nanofac to automatically launch it when it’s complete, and have it range ahead of us at say… two klicks?”
He nodded, “Perfect, have it just maintain station at that distance, hugging the bottom at about ten degrees starboard of whatever our heading is.”
As they finished up and got to their feet, she scrutinized him and said, “You know, you could use a trim. I’ll have you know that in addition to being a wizard with this beast,” she patted the nanofac console, “I’m also damn good with a pair of scissors. Why don’t you come back in an hour and we’ll try to get you shipshape?”
Bachmann ran a hand through his hair. It was getting longer than he liked. It was typical of submariners that most had extra talents that helped provide this and other types of on-board services. He accepted her offer, promised to be back and left her to work her magic.
At the ascribed time, he wandered back and found that she had set up a chair backing up to the small sink in the machine room. She ushered him into it, turned his collar down, wet and lathered shampoo onto his scalp. Jennsen was a skilled masseuse and for the next few minutes, Bachmann was in heaven. She rinsed him off, towelled most of the moisture out and then had him pull the chair forward so she could slide behind him. True to her word, she was an expert tonsorialist, and as he watched in the hand mirror she had handed him, she gave him an expert haircut. Finally, she rinsed, then towelled him dry, did some careful final snips here and there, and then began to massage his neck and shoulders, skillfully working out the kinks until he felt limp. At least most of him, he was embarrassed to realize. He was sure Jenssen could not help but notice, but she made no mention and he thanked her and retreated, saying he’d see her in the wardroom at dinner.
Because the Erasmus was such a small ship, they didn’t have the usual amount of crew that would normally work the ship twenty-four-hours in six-hour shifts. Having the AI allowed Bachmann to maintain a more reasonable twelve-hour on, twelve-hour off schedule. After they had had their evening meal, the crew’s time was generally their own, with some taking advantage of the compact gym facilities or entertainment systems in the wardroom. They were also free to study and work additional time at their consoles if they wished to.
Coop and Jessie spent an hour or so up on the bridge going over some of the survey data that they had gathered during the day. As they trooped through the wardroom on their way aft, they passed Bachmann, who was using the stationary cycle. He smiled and nodded at them as he continued his workout.
At Jessie’s cabin, Coop bid her goodnight, but she reached up playfully, grasped an ear and pulled him into the room.
“Jess…” he began, but she shook her head and replied, “I’m a big girl, Jim, and we’re both adults.” She closed the door firmly.
February 27th, 2061
The next day, the crew buckled themselves in tight in anticipation of another hunt and kill session. Bachmann had quietly notified Coop about his little surprise as he wanted the Science Officer to surreptitiously monitor all three drones in case Beth and Randy missed it and let it get too close. Again, it was all part of cross-training and having another pair of alert eyes never hurt.
Although he could simply have let the AI conduct the entire drill, running all the remotes, he wanted to be able to take direct control at any time, so he discussed his strategy with Erasmus. The AI nodded agreement and the two of them joined the others on the bridge.
Bachmann began the exercise by keeping the forward drone on station, running undetected. The other two drones took turns harassing the Erasmusunder the AI’s control, augmented here and there by himself. He let the team win a few before stepping up the game, bringing in the surprise third drone and applying some hide-and-seek techniques that he wanted them to learn. He momentarily popped it up above the floor and toggled its active sonar.
“Hello! Well, where did you come from?” exclaimed Beth when they were suddenly lashed by a sonar pulse from a quarter she had thought was clear. That was when Bachmann came in for the quick kill with one of the other two drones he had been sneaking up on them. When the ship acknowledged that it had been ‘killed’, he called a halt to the exercise to discuss tactics.
“OK, let’s analyze what happened. You lost track on one of the drones because you’re not thinking like submariners yet. When you’re out in the wild blue yonder, all you have around you is open space. Well, down here, you have to think differently. Sonar bounces off the drones alright, but it also bounces back from features on the sea floor, and from thermoclines and haloclines where the density and salinity of the water varies. I was able to keep a drone behind that port ridge and all your sonar saw was a bounce from the ridge. Don’t forget this… it’s important. You might need to do the same thing to evade an enemy.”
“There must be another bogie out there though,” exclaimed Beth, “I thought we only had two.”
“Surprise, surprise,” replied Randy, grinning at Bachmann, “that’s our second lesson… we shouldn’t have assumed. Shit, we don’t do it in the air, so we shouldn’t have done it here. Sorry, Skip.”
Over the next few hours, Bachmann ran them through a number of drills aimed at pinpointing any weaknesses and deficiencies. At the end of it, they had scored seven against Bachmann’s three. He had been able to trip them up early on, but they soon learned their lessons and he was unable to fool them any further.
Over the next two days, as they made their way along their route, they used the time to further hone their skill sets and to continue the valuable cross-training exercises. Bachmann watched them closely, making notes on a comtab not just about their performances but also about how the craft handled. He wanted to have a complete picture of both boat and crew by the time they returned to base. He would have to face Admiral Travers for a full brief as he knew the old man expected him to sortie out as soon as possible on their main mission. Bachmann also knew, however, that should he find significant issues, as long as he had sufficient data to prove it, the Admiral wouldn’t order them to sea without a proper resolution.
When they finally returned to Long Island Sound, transited the tunnel and docked, he had competed his report and was pleased that other than a few small details that should be easily dealt with, both ship and crew were ready for action.
Three weeks later, details attended to, they said their goodbyes, sealed the hatches, and the Erasmus slipped into the cold Atlantic waters once again. They had begun their mission.
15:40hr, March 17th, 2062
As the Erasmus entered the cave’s starboard channel, Coop added extra data layers to the 3D map, showing the gravitometer readings and analysis. The passage sloped downward, well under the surrounding seabed, showing several places where it looped back on itself while sinking lower, finally opening into a large cavern.
“Nice wide passage all the way,” Coop reported, “shouldn’t be any navigation issues. And there’s our anomaly, in that cavern, but I’m damned if I can think what it is. Erasmus, can you speculate on what it might be?”
“Well… ” the AI seemed to pause as if to consider things, “From what data the SSP is sending back, there seems to be some structure that completely spans the rear portion of the cavern. In fact, based on what I’m seeing, it seems to be a completely flat surface that extends into the surrounding rock a few centimetres. So far the data doesn’t seem to suggest any reasonable hypothesis I’m afraid, we’ll just have to have a closer look.”
Coop glanced over his shoulder at Bachmann, shook his head and grinned. Bachmann raised an eyebrow and ordered them to keep proceeding.
“This is what we came for, so let’s go check it out. Weps, I want you to drop off a remote just inside the entrance to this channel and keep an eye out for the bad guys. It’s unlikely they can reach this depth, but I want to know if they find the cave, and let me know if your mines are triggered.”
“Will do, Skip,” said Crane as he had the boat extrude the remote, trailing a fibre-optic cable to enable its signals to reach them through the cave’s twists and turns.
The Erasmus followed the looping channel through a couple of turns and Bachmann ordered the exterior floods on so they could get a non-enhanced view in addition to the computer-generated display. What they could see, however, didn’t appear out of the ordinary.
Ten minutes and several switchbacks later, the passage began to widen and they emerged into the cavern. Bachmann ordered McKenna to advance into the centre and hold position.
“OK Coop, it’s your show now, see what you and the AI can make of what we’ve got here.”
With the exception of Crane, who concentrated on his tactical instrumentation, the others all shifted most of their attention to the main screens.
Cooper cracked his knuckles then leant forward and ordered, “Alright Erasmus, let’s bring all the sensors on line. I want to know what you’re seeing.”
The ship extruded several more probes and sent them forward to minutely examine the area using a regimen of scanning techniques. The display began to rez up to a high def view of the cavern’s interior, and with it the rear ‘wall’, which indeed stretched completely across the cavern, side-to-side and floor-to-ceiling.
Jessie was the first to speak, “Look at that, the surrounding walls and floor are showing all the fine detail you’d expect, but the wall, or what ever it is, is still fuzzy! Erasmus, can’t you resolve it?”
“I’m sorry, Jessie,” answered the AI, “I can’t seem to lock onto it. I can tell you that it is most certainly the source of the anomalistic gravimetric readings. The area surrounding it, where the wall meets the cave has a remarkably higher gravimetric index than normal. Even stranger, the surface seems to exhibit no gravimetric reading at all.”
“That correlates with what I’m seeing too,” said Cooper, “although I haven’t a clue why.”
“Skip,” Crane interjected, “the remote’s reported two of the mines have exploded… OK, I’ve got the sound of a hull rupture. One of them’s toast. I still can’t tell for sure whether our torps got the other one too though. Not much visually on any wavelength from the remote because of the diffraction from all the sediment still hanging out there.”
“Very well. Keep monitoring, I want to know the instant you pick up anything else.” He saw Crane nod assent.
Coop ordered the ship to slowly move one of the probes closer to the wall to see if they could get a better resolution. They watched as the probe’s return image filled the screen. Nothing seemed to change, the picture as indistinct as ever, then suddenly, the screen erupted in a gout of white and the feed disappeared.
“Holy shit!” It was Iris who had spoken for all of them, as they tried to blink away the green spots that were now imprinted on their vision. “Well, that was interesting. It’s gone, not even any debris.”
Her fingers danced across the controls in front of her and she brought up a window showing an image from one of the boat’s sensor arrays. As she zoomed in, they could see it was a recording showing the vanished probe slowly drifting toward the indistinct wall.
Magnified, the probe filled the screen as she advanced it frame by frame. Because of the lack of resolution of the wall itself, they couldn’t judge its proximity until the probe’s leading edges suddenly began to coruscate and disappear, then, three or four frames later, the sudden flare overwhelmed the sensors.
“Wait a minute,” ordered Coop, “pull back so we can see a bigger area around the probe and replay that again in slo-mo.”
Iris complied and they watched again. The replay showed much the same, albeit at a smaller scale. No blinding flash, just a faint sparkling as the probe impacted the surface, but there was a hint of something else too.
“Ah,” Iris said, “let me factor in the returns from the off-axis probes so we can get a better representation on the Z-axis.” She gestured on her board and the view suddenly acquired some of the resolution they had been missing. Now, when she replayed the recording, as the probe started to disappear, a series of concentric circles raced outward across the surface of the ‘wall’, just as if someone had dropped a stone in a pond.
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like that,” intoned the AI in a stunning example of understatement, which broke the tension, and for a moment, they all shared a hearty laugh.
Then the alarms started to shrill.
06:00hr, March 18th, 2062
Bachmann was lying in his bunk, in the Captain’s stateroom. Propped on one elbow, he gazed at the gentle curve of Anneka Jennsen’s cheekbone and the tiny, golden hairs on her neck where they descended into her collar. He could hear her slow, steady breathing, as she lay, still sleeping beside him.
After frantic hours of activity, he had had them all stand down to get some rest, the AI minding the ship. Crane’s remote had raised the alarm as it detected a massive explosion outside the cave mouth, and, in the moments that followed, before the remote had died, it displayed data that seemed to show that the entire rock overhang had been blasted way and was now blocking the entrance. They had raced back up the passage but even before reaching the mouth, had been stopped by the immense fall of rubble. The next few hours had been tense, as they used all the instruments they could to determine the extent of the blockage, and then discussed what alternatives lay open to them.
Blasting their way out was out of the question as the volume of debris was simply too great, and besides, the shockwaves, magnified by the constricted passage, would have been more than the hull could take, even if they retreated back downward to the cavern. Finally, Bachmann had them return the sub to the cavern.
There, they had spent another couple of hours discussing what might have happened, but of course, it was really moot, and their fatigue was evident. At that point, he had tasked the AI to continue passive examination of the cavern and the wall, and ordered all hands to turn in.
The accommodations in the Erasmus, although certainly not luxurious, were certainly more spacious than on conventional submersibles, where ‘hot bunking’ could be the norm for some crew. The six cabins were small, yet marvellously designed, accommodating a bunk with storage above and below, a pull out desk and chair, and a tiny moulded washroom, complete with shower. There were two larger staterooms, one for the Captain, and one usually reserved for VIPs, but to which Bachmann had assigned the married couple, Gared and Iris. These two rooms allowed for a larger bunk, more storage, a standalone table and chairs and a slightly larger washroom area. Should the need arise for more space however, interior partitions could be easily rearranged by the ship to combine adjacent cabins, similar to the way in which the crews of ancient sailing ships moved wooden partition walls within their hulls.
Not long after he had retired, Bachmann had heard a soft knock on his door, and upon issuing an invitation to enter, saw a figure standing outside, silhouetted against the dimmed light of the passageway. As the person entered, he caught a gleam of golden hair.
Anneka Jenssen closed the door, and crossed to the bunk. He could see by the light of the dimmed status screens that she was still in her ship’s uniform, as was he.
He recalled that shortly before they had sortied out, as Anneka and he had been the last to leave a briefing room, Jenssen had turned, stared hard at him for a moment with her intense blue eyes and then pulled his head down and kissed him firmly before turning, and exiting the room, her blonde ponytail describing a series of graceful arcs.
“Anneka…” he now began, but she put her hand gently over his lips, hushing him, gazed at him for a moment, and then climbed in beside him, turned on her right side, spooning her back against him, pulling his left arm over her and holding it with hers. As they settled into a comfortable embrace, he could feel the warmth of her body and smell the fresh fragrance of her hair. It took him a moment, but then he identified a faint hint of vanilla. Bachmann felt the tension drain out of him and they both fell into a deep sleep.
Hours later now, as he gazed down at her, he thought of Nicole. It had been over three years since her death, and he had not been with another woman since. Nicole had been killed while Bachmann was on a mission, and he had taken her death badly, throwing himself into his work with a fanaticism that finally drowned out all the sorrow.
Careful not to wake Anneka, he climbed from the bunk, grabbed one of the clean one-size-fits-all uniforms and padded across to the washroom, and into the shower. As he ran the stinging hot water over his body, he wondered what to make of this lovely woman who obviously wanted to be something more than just a shipmate.
He was shaving, a towel wrapped around his waist when the door opened and Anneka Jennsen, completely nude, grinned at him and then slipped adroitly past and into the shower cubicle. A surprised Bachmann looked back into the mirror, and seeing his deer-in-the-headlights look, broke into a wide grin himself. Finishing his ablutions, he fetched a clean uniform for Anneka, hung it in the washroom and then sat at his table with a bulb of coffee, looking over the status displays. Apparently, the AI had some news he wished to convey.
It always amused Bachmann that the AI seemed to want to explain things ‘in person’, rather than just presenting the report via the screens. There was still an argument going on as to whether AIs were actually sentient or just a product of clever von Neumann programming. Personally, he suspected the former, but it didn’t pay to say it too loudly. He’d had to extricate himself from several heated discussions on the matter, and now kept his opinion to himself.
He looked up as Jennsen exited the washroom, fastening her hair into the ponytail she typically wore.
“Thanks for the uniform,” she said. She studied him with those bluer-than-blue eyes and then inquired playfully, “How did you sleep?”
He smiled back at her. “Pretty good, thanks.”
“Only pretty good? Well, we’ll have to work on that, won’t we? Come on Captain, let’s eat!”
“Yes, Ma’am,” he replied, levering himself up from the table and following her to the door.
They exited into the passageway just as Jessie was passing, also on her way to the wardroom. Her eyes widened for a moment as she took them in and then gave them a grin and punched Bachmann’s shoulder good-naturedly, murmuring “About time!” as she passed. Bachmann had the good grace to blush.
The rest of the crew was already in the wardroom, helping themselves to breakfast, or what passed for breakfast, which was pretty much protein in any colour of the rainbow, cunningly disguised as traditional food. Bachmann helped himself to eggs and sausages, potatoes and more coffee. Once they were all seated, Bachmann ordered: “OK, Erasmus, let’s hear what you’ve got to say.”
The AI’s projected 3D persona popped into view in front of the main wardroom screen. Based on Hans Holbein the Younger’s 1523 painting of Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus, it was that of an older man in voluminous black robes with fur trim on the cuffs and collar, grey hair framing the sides of his face beneath some sort of black felt hat. It seemed so incongruous within the ultra modern surroundings that it always made Bachmann (and other crew members as well) want to laugh, but they’d discovered that the AI seemed to take this as an affront, and would go into a funk, so now they just smiled tolerantly and waited.
“While you slept, I’ve been busy,” the old man said, his face showing a mild distain, “and I can indeed offer some new and most interesting data.” Here he paused for effect, and then continued, “I found an area on the wall’s periphery where there is a small fissure leading to the area behind the wall. I was able to extrude a small remote beyond and into that cavity.” He reached up, pulled off the misshapen hat, scratched vigorously at his lank hair for a moment then adjusted the hat back on his head, continuing, “There’s nothing there. No evidence of the probe we saw disappear, nor any sign of an additional two I sent through as well. Also,” and here, he raised a hand, index finger extended, as if to emphasize the point, “I was able to ascertain that the wall, as we have been calling it, has zero thickness. It’s as if it doesn’t exist at all.”
Gesturing dramatically with one voluminously sleeved arm, he displayed his data on the screen for them to examine as he took a step to the side, rubbing his hands together and then critically examining his nails.
There was a moment of silence in the room as they looked over the information and then several conversations erupted among the group. Bachmann sat back and let the discussion continue, listening to snippets as they debated what they were seeing.
When the room fell into semi-silence, Cooper was the first to inquire: “OK, what are your conclusions?”
The old man looked up from his nails, fixed Coop with a beady eye and said, “Let me show you something else first.”
Coop looked over at Bachmann, rolled his eyes and shook his head. The Science Officer had a volatile relationship with the AI, but Bachmann sensed that the two of them secretly enjoyed the intellectual duel in which they engaged.
“I set the probes to monitor the water flow, using a microscopic view to track suspended particles. With matching probes on either side of the wall at exactly the same X-Y coordinates, I have observed that the water flows directly into the wall, yet no particles emerge from the other side.”
“Yes, yes,” interrupted Cooper, “but we already saw that whatever goes in gets destroyed.”
“Does it?” snapped the AI. “All we know is that the penetrating probe’s internal camera was overwhelmed, thus the blinding flash. All that the other data shows is that objects entering that plane do not emerge from the other side. I think that is significant.”
“In what way?” pressed Coop.
The old man swept his gaze slowly from face to face and then replied, “I think we’re looking at a gateway, a portal.”
In the silence that followed, they just sat looking at each other while a patient smile crept across the AI’s face.
“I think you’ll all agree that it’s obvious this is not some natural phenomenon, nor is it anything that we,” he gestured around the wardroom, “could have had a hand in.
“Also, examine the possible reasons that this structure would be located here. Clearly it was intentionally placed here by an intelligence exceeding our own, and therefore may be the first empirical evidence of an extraterrestrial civilization.”
“But for what reason?” asked Bachmann, verbalizing what they were all thinking.
“I would suggest for the purpose of transportation between this world and some other place,” said the old man.
March 21st, 2062
The last seventy-two hours had been busy. The crew of the Erasmus had spent considerable time during that period in exhaustively studying the ‘Portal’, as they now all called the anomaly.
There was also a good deal of soul-searching as they tried to come to terms with the fact that they were irretrievably cut off from the surface. Due to both the sheer depth, and the magnitude of the rockfall that had sealed them in, rescue was simply not possible.
Bachmann had summoned each of them to his cabin for a one-on-one discussion to gauge how they were bearing up. He wanted to explore the options open to them in a general meeting, but first needed to understand, in addition to the physical situation, what he might have to deal with from a psychological standpoint. The exercise was worthwhile.
Jessie came in first, closed the door and then came over and hugged him fiercely.
“Jess, I’m so sorry you’re involved in all this…” he started to say, but she immediately shook her head, raising a hand.
“It’s not your fault, Quincy, I’m the one who agreed to this, and before you had even arrived. Whatever happens, there’s no need for regrets.”
“Besides,” she said with her endearing lop-sided grin, “I might not have met Jim. That, Big Bro, is worth whatever happens. Hell, Quincy, they’re the best bunch of people I’ve ever had the chance to work with.”
She looked at him quietly for a moment and then remarked, “Dad would be proud of us, you know? We may actually go where no man has gone before. He would have loved that!”
Tyler Bachmann had been a Navy man too, one who had always pushed the edge of the envelope. He had been instrumental in advancing the limits of submersible technology and had been responsible for a number of significant deep sea discoveries. Before his tragic death during a submarine rescue mission, he had been an inspiration for both his children, guiding them to their present careers.
They chatted a bit longer, and then Bachmann asked her to send in McKenna.
Beth, always a forthright personality, seemed more annoyed that she wasn’t able to be putting Erasmus through its paces than with any psychological issues, although Bachmann thought he saw something she was repressing. She candidly discussed her burgeoning relationship with Randy, during which he learned from her that Crane thought that he was responsible for their entrapment because he felt he had laid his mines too close to the cave. Bachmann, familiar with the ordinances they had used, knew that the pocket mines had been deployed well above the cave and that they were neutrally buoyant, so that they would have remained where they had been dropped. Their yield was simply not enough to have caused the damage. Regardless, as Captain, it had been his decision and responsibility to respond to the threat, and he was able to talk quietly with the Weps Officer later and dissuade him from his fears. He saw the tension drain visibly from Crane as they discussed it, and he felt that here was one small victory for them, and right now, he’d accept any and all positives.
Gared and Iris were, as he had anticipated, remarkably serene. Just being around them seemed to be relaxing. They spoke more about their concerns for the others than themselves and Bachmann realized again how lucky he was to have them here.
During his one-on-one with the Science/Medical Officer, he mentioned that Coop seemed to be getting on well with Jessie, and was amused to see his friend looking abashed.
“Quincy…” Coop stammered, but Bachmann cut him off.
“Jim, I think that you two are great together. When I introduced you to Jessie a while back, I thought you guys might hit it off. I guess she just wasn’t ready then. I’m delighted you two are a pair. And although you certainly don’t need it, for what it’s worth, you have my blessing.”
He found Coop’s shy smile contagious, spawning one of his own. Then the two of them got down to business, discussing Coop’s psychological observations of the other crew members. Before he left, Bachmann asked him to have them all get a complete scan in the ship’s MedBed so that they had an up-to-date baseline on file to which they could refer if things went awry later. Coop agreed this was a prudent move.
Cooper left, and Bachmann, in examining his discussions thus far, was reassured that the crew were mostly calm and focused on what they might do, rather than grief stricken. None had significant relationships back topside, and the fact that there had been pairings between them with Jessie and Coop, Beth and Randy, and, of course, Iris and Gared, seemed to bring them tighter together as a group.
As he digested this, he realized he hadn’t included himself or Anneka. Perhaps because he was in command, and therefore had to remain aloof to a certain degree, or, if he was honest, perhaps because he still couldn’t believe the possibility of a relationship with this lovely woman.
He had left speaking to Anneka until last, probably to build up his courage, he thought wryly. When he invited her in, he was determined to be strictly professional, and yet, within a few minutes, she had him flustered. Not only that, but she was enjoying it. He stopped abruptly and sat there, looking at her. Quietly, she reached across the table and took his hands in hers.
They sat that way for a moment and then she said, “Quincy, whatever happens, we’ll face it together.”
Then, as if to clarify it for him, she added, “The two of us.”
Captain be damned, he thought, and pulled her into a tight embrace, kissing her the way he had wanted to for ages now.
Before they rejoined the others, Anneka, ever practical, suggested that they consider having Erasmus reconfigure the cabin spaces to combine the rooms for couples. They were a different crew now than when they began the mission and Bachmann saw that this would help to reinforce the dynamics that had evolved, and given the present circumstances, they could all use a little extra solace. He keyed a channel to the AI, outlined the rearrangements and asked that they be made discreetly. Just before the AI signed off, he thought he heard a dry chuckle.
They all met in the wardroom, over dinner, to summarize the investigations they had made during the last three days. Bachmann had asked the AI to give the briefing as he had been collating the data from all of their individual researches.
The old man appeared, standing behind a projected podium and surveyed them solemnly for a moment before starting.
“Let me congratulate you on your efforts so far,” he said with a slight nod of his head, sounding both magnanimous and slightly superior.
“To recap then, we’ve gathered a good deal of physical evidence in addition to refining what we knew before, but I believe the most salient information is as follows:
“There appears to be what I’d describe as a safety mechanism that is invoked when an object begins to enter the field. As you know, we launched a tethered camera probe, hoping to see what occurred beyond the portal’s plane. What became obvious is that once an object starts into the portal, it is pulled through in its entirety. We were lucky that the fibre optic tether cable gave way. I conjecture that this behaviour is to preclude the possibility of an entering object from being cleaved in two by the field. Once you commit to entering the field, there is no turning back.
“What we did see from the camera, for a brief moment, before we severed the tether, seems to show an infinitely long, internally lit tunnel. It is also worth noting that we could also see nothing just inside, suggesting that whatever we have sent through does not simply end up just inside the field’s entrance. Finally, in the instant before the picture stops, a tremendous acceleration appears to take place. All of which seems to reinforce my original analysis that this is indeed some sort of portal to elsewhere.”
Here, he stopped and looked at them expectantly, seemingly awaiting their admiration. When Coop irritatedly waved his hand for the AI to carry on, the old man glared at him for a moment and then resumed.
“The data thus far seems to leave us with one reasonable hypothesis. However remote the possibility is, if our conjectures are correct that this is indeed a portal of some kind, I believe that it is our only hope of survival.
“I suggest we ready the ship as if we were going to expect battle, using maximum safety restraints and life support systems, shielding protocols and sensor scans. We would then briefly use the drive to give us sufficient momentum, then shut it down and drift forward to enter the portal. I don’t think we want to try to do any manoeuvring within the ‘tunnel’, as I believe that it would in all likelihood neither be possible, nor advisable. A device/mechanism/whatever-you-call-it as sophisticated as this would surely have automatic systems to ensure safe delivery. Nor do want to have too much residual velocity at the receiving end.
“If there are no questions, I’ll leave you to your deliberations.” With a last glance over the assembled group, he bowed slightly, gave a wistful smile and disappeared.
Silence ensued, which Bachmann eventually broke to issue some housekeeping orders. He finished by informing them of the changes he’d had the AI make to the living quarters and was rewarded to see nods of agreement and smiles.
“OK, other than housekeeping, I’m going to recommend we knock off until 0800hr tomorrow. I want you all to use the time to rest up and think about our options. Discuss it as you see fit, I’ll be available should you wish to talk to me privately. We’ll reconvene in the morning to vote on our course of action.”
Rising, he put out a hand to Anneka, and led her out of the wardroom. As the two of them exited, a brief round of applause broke out, and he felt Anneka squeeze his hand tightly as she followed him to their stateroom.
March 22nd, 2062
As was usual, Bachmann’s internal clock woke him early, but he remained where he was, basking in a warm, relaxed, satiated glow. Anneka was still asleep beside him, covers thrown off, her naked form glorious in the subdued cabin lighting.
He lay beside her, thinking of the evening and night they had spent together, alternating between making love, talking quietly getting to know one another, and finally sleeping in each others’ arms. Anneka was a perceptive conversationalist, and he had been surprised at how easily she elicited responses from him that he would not ordinarily have volunteered. He felt a deep comfort with her that he could only sum up as ‘home’.
As he reminisced, he realized that his own psychological frame of mind had changed during the past few hours. Whereas he had put on a brave front for the crew, which was what was expected of a Captain, he now came to the self awareness that he felt a contentment and commitment that he had not had yesterday. Whatever lay ahead, he was not alone, and that changed everything.
Anneka now stirred, looked up at him with sleepy blue eyes and inquired the time. When he told her, she murmured “Good,” and pushing him back, rolled over on top of him.
Sometime later, showered and dressed, they met the others in the wardroom. Bachmann wondered if he sensed an air of satisfaction and contentment between the other couples, or whether it was just his imagination. Regardless, everyone looked well rested and ready for what was to come.
He deliberately let them eat first and then, once the meal detritus had been cleared, addressed them.
“Well, you all know what our situation here is. We have few options. If the truth be told, I think we have only one option. Because this is too big a decision for one person to make, however, I want to put it to a vote.”
Non-plussed, he stopped for a moment and continued, “Frankly, I don’t know what we can do if anyone dissents, but I want this to be as fair as possible. I’ve set up the terminal at my bridge station to register a go or no-go vote to try our luck through the portal. Your votes will be anonymous. I’d like you all to vote on the matter and then return here. I’ve already cast my vote, so I’ll remain here.”
Silently, they rose and made their way forward.
Once they had all returned, he looked at the results on his ComPad, then turned to them and told them it was a unanimous vote to go through the portal. Before proceeding, however, he invoked the AI, and asked it to cast a vote too.
The old man looked surprised, and then, straightening his tunic and removing his hat, seemed to swell with pride to be included as a full crew member. As Bachmann had anticipated, he voted by saying, “Let us proceed, my dear friends!”
There was a moment or two while they all regarded each other silently, and then collectively they let out a sigh of relief. They were one, and they wanted to go forward.
“Alright, before we do anything else, Coop, I want you to put together a data file of everything we’ve done and discovered since we entered the cave. Dump it in a remote probe and anchor it firmly here outside the portal so that should anyone come across it in the future, they’ll have some idea of what happened to us. It might be a vain gesture, but a prudent one nonetheless.
“Next, let’s go over the ship with a fine-tooth comb. I want everything battened down tight. I don’t know what kind of stresses we’ll encounter, but I don’t want anything lying around loose. Rig us for ultra-quiet.
“I want all the safety equipment triple-checked to ensure their functionality. That includes all of the seats and harnesses especially. From the acceleration that camera seemed to show, we might be up against some heavy G-forces. I want everyone to have the maximum protection possible. We’ll also wear full survival suits. And, I know it’s a nuisance, but I want you all fully plumbed into the suits. I don’t want anyone getting up to go to the head while we transit.
“Gared, Iris, is there anything specific that you guys might need to do with the reactors or other ship’s systems to harden them further?”
The Twins looked at one another, and Gared spoke for both of them, “Nothing I can think of Skipper, the systems were built battle-hardened, there’s nothing further we could do anyway.”
“OK. Randy, make sure all the weapons are on safety and anything not in use is deactivated and lashed down ultra-tight. I want you to stay frosty. I know we’ve all heard the premise that an advanced civilization would be benign, but we haven’t a clue as to what we’ll encounter. Let’s be ready to act should we need to.
“Beth, once we’ve nudged her forward, I want you to make sure that the drive is neutral, but be ready in case we should need any manoeuvring. I think Erasmus is probably right about the mechanism being fairly foolproof, but regardless, let’s not end up being the fool.
“Coop, I want you and Jessie to monitor the hell out of anything and everything that happens. Make sure we record to triple redundancy. This is the chance of a lifetime to gather info, assuming we can, and I don’t want to miss anything.
“Anneka, please do whatever you need to to ensure that the nanofac and any of your support engineering equipment is stable and secure.”
Finally, turning to address the AI, he said, “Erasmus, please work with the crew to render whatever assistance you can. We’ll need your knowledge more than ever now. Also, I’d like to meet with you personally in my cabin when we break here.”
They all acknowledged his commands, and started to get up to carry out the tasks assigned. “One other thing,” he intoned, “if anyone has any suggestions, advice, or concerns, for anyone specifically, or for all of us, make sure you bring it up. This is not the time to hold back on anything, regardless of how insignificant you think it might be.
“Let’s get to it, and meet back here at 1400hr. I want to do a complete walk through before we go anywhere.”
As the meeting broke up, Coop waylaid him and asked to speak to him privately. Once alone, he looked troubled, prompting Bachmann to probe at the cause.
“I’m in a dilemma here, Skip. It’s an issue of patient confidentiality, but under the circumstances, I’m inclined to break it.” He looked at Bachmann and waited.
“Coop, whatever you think best,” Bachmann replied, putting the onus back on the doctor.
Coop sat silently for a moment and then began, “When I was looking at the baselines, the MedBed picked up something troubling. Gared has a carcinoma in his liver. When I broached it with him, he already knew about it and not only that, apparently, so did the Admiral. Seems Travers gave him the go-ahead for the mission as he was scheduled to have exploratory surgery after we got back to see what might be done. Now, of course, what chance does he have?”
They sat silently for a moment. Bachmann was torn. On the one hand he could understand Travers decision to let the man keep on with the mission, after all, it wasn’t an eight-month tour, but on the other hand, it was a calculated risk. He finally came to a decision, and just nodded silently at Coop.
“Thanks for letting me know, Coop. Is there anything you can do? Obviously we can’t count on any outside help in our present situation.”
“Other than pain management when it becomes necessary, we don’t have the equipment to do anything. It’s inoperable in the traditional sense anyway... That’s why nothing’s been done. The estimates he’s been given are for about six months before it’s incapacitating. This boat is so much his life’s work that the Admiral gave him the go ahead for this mission.”
Bachmann let it sink in. And now what was to be a six-week cruise has become one of unknown duration.
“OK, Jim, let’s just keep it between us for now. Thanks for letting me know.”
Retiring to his cabin, he found the old man waiting for him. He knew that other instances of the AI would be working alongside other crew members elsewhere on the ship.
He had been contemplating something all morning, although in point of fact, the idea had crossed his mind some days ago. He sat down and gestured for the old man to join him.
“I’ve decided that I want you to be physically present at all times now, not just when we invoke you this way. I know that you’re really always there in the background, but I believe that you have the same rights as the rest of us. You will certainly share the same risks, and I feel it is only fair that you assume an equal role going forward. You will occupy a station on the bridge with the rest of us.”
Seeing the emotion on the AI’s face, he stopped, looked at the old man and asked quietly, “How do you feel about that?”
“Captain, I’m honoured, and overwhelmed. You can count on me.”
“I will be,” Bachmann replied briskly, “you’re a valuable resource and I want all the crew to become used to having you around. One suggestion though: you might give some thought to updating your appearance a little.”
Although he wasn’t sure how this advice would be received, he was truly astonished to see the AI’s projection suddenly morph into Anneka Jennsen.
“Is this more to your liking?” asked a coy voice, startlingly like Anneka’s.
“That’s not quite what I had in mind,” he said, rather unsettled.
“Don’t worry, Captain, I was just teasing,” came the reply as the AI morphed back to its normal appearance. “Let me work on it, I’m sure I can think of something.” Rising, he bowed formally to Bachmann, then turned, shuffled across the cabin and vanished through the closed door.
March 22nd, 2062
At 1400hr, Bachmann entered the wardroom again and prepared to start his inspection tour of the ship. As he did so, another figure entered from the bridge, strode to an empty chair and sat down. Dressed in a ship suit, with close cropped blonde hair, the twenty-something figure nodded curtly at him and turned to face the others.
With wide-eyed surprise they recognized the face as a younger version of the old man they knew as Erasmus, the AI. Bachmann smiled at the figure and nodded his approval, then turned to the others and explained his decision and reasoning to have the AI manifest as a permanent member of the crew.
He was most concerned about how Jim Cooper would react, but was rewarded as Coop was the first to exclaim, “Welcome!” Similar greetings and approvals followed from the others, and he felt his anxiety melt away. Again, they were one.
The new Erasmus seemed to have gained a measure of humility as well as a new look. “Perhaps you could call me Des, now that I’ve had a facelift, so to speak” he said, smiling shyly at them, then returned his gaze to Bachmann and waited with an intent look on his face.
For the next three hours, Bachmann, accompanied by the AI and the relevant crew members spent the time combing the interior of the ship, checking and double checking that the Erasmus was indeed squared away to his liking. As most of the crew were submariners, or Navy trained, they all knew the importance of rigging for ultra-quiet, where any noise, even a small tapping, could be transmitted to the outside water and travel for kilometres. In addition, they all understood the intensely practical need to secure things properly to preclude them from becoming lethal objects in the event of a collision or from violent manoeuvres. Because of this, there was very little that Bachmann had to rectify, but the inspection tour was a necessity, so it was conducted with a very thorough scrutiny.
When they had concluded, they reconvened in the wardroom, where Bachmann addressed them again.
“Well, we’re as ready as we need to be, and you’ve all done a good job. However, there’s no point in departing before the morning, and since this may be our proverbial ‘last night on Earth’, I propose that we have a damn good dinner together and then take the night off. I happen to have bottle of excellent Scotch in my cabin and the drinks are on me.”
Their ‘last supper’ was a great success. Anneka had astounded them with what she could produce with the galley’s food processors and all of them had chipped in with their own culinary expertise (a common trait among submariners). Bachmann’s Scotch, although stretched among the eight of them, was well received and provided a nice glow.
During the leisurely, multi-course meal, the young Erasmus, newly christened Des, who obviously didn’t need to eat, surprised them when he conjured up a lute and regaled them with period folk songs, delivered in a high, sweet voice.
Bachmann sat back, his arm around Anneka’s shoulder, taking in the scene and thinking that this was something he had never expected to experience at the bottom of the ocean. The incongruity of it, perhaps along with the effect of the Scotch, had its effect, and he could feel a smile that kept creeping back across his face. He leaned close to her and whispered softly, “You know, I can’t believe the dire situation that we’re facing, but I also can’t think of anywhere I’d rather be right now.”
By about 2100hrs, they had cleared away the remains of the meal and tidied up the wardroom. By common consent, the couples bid one another good night and retired to their cabins. They would meet at 0700hrs in the morning for breakfast, and then start their odyssey.
When Gared and Iris returned to their stateroom, they entered and removed their ship suits, slipping into silken kimonos. Gared removed a rolled up tatami-like rug and laid it carefully on the open floor area, adjusting the integral heating elements for a gentle warmth. They then assumed a Lotus position, facing each other and began to meditate.
The interior of the small stateroom was austere, but as their soft chanting began, the walls began to show images as if they were in a small chalet in a Japanese garden. Iris had programmed Erasmus to show several Japanese themes triggered by the meditative chant they chose.
They had met some years before at the Diabutsu Buddha in Kamakura, outside Yokohama. Drawn to each other by virtue of their size, and the fact they were both in Naval uniform, they had spent the afternoon and evening together, discovering a mutual passion for engineering, and the Japanese culture. It was also the beginning of a relationship that they cultivated over the next two years until they were able to be stationed together, at which point they immediately married.
After a period of meditation, Gared arose and carefully extracted a beautiful and intricately carved wooden box from their storage closet. Opening it, he began to reverently remove a set of exquisite tea bowels, a pot, tea caddy, ladle and whisk. Arranging them on the tatami before them, he then filled a small container with water to be microwaved. On shore, they would have used a charcoal heater for this, but on a submarine, this was hardly possible.
Next, he solemnly began the tea ceremony, ritually cleaning the utensils, adding the powdered green tea to one of the bowls, then the hot water and then whisking to mix the tea and water properly. Finally, a gesture that allowed the floating leaves to remain at the centre of the bowl. As they shared a cup at first, they bowed to each other and then Gared handed the bowl to Iris, who slowly rotated the bowl so as not to drink from the front. She took a sip and complimented her husband on the tea, then handed it back to him. In likewise fashion, he rotated the bowl and took a sip. They repeated this ritual until the bowl was finished.
Finally, Gared made another bowl for each of them, and they relaxed from the formality of the ritual, getting more comfortable and sipping the pungent green tea. Their eyes locked over the steaming bowls, and in them, an observer might have read both tranquility and a quiet desperation.
Across the passageway, in the Captain's stateroom, as they lay in each other’s arms, Anneka was surprised to see tears in Bachmann’s eyes.
“Quincy, what is it?”
He shook his head fiercely, “Christ, Anneka, I’ve only just found you and here we are at the end of the bloody world!”
She gently wiped away his tears, pulled him into a tight embrace and replied, “No, no, my sweet love, this is just the beginning.”
March 23rd, 2062
Captain Quincy Bachmann, CO of the research submersible Erasmus entered the bridge and quietly stood surveying his crew.
The crew was arranged in a horseshoe shape: at the fore end, starboard seat, Beth manned the helm, carefully running through her status displays and checking her controls, flexing her hands in anticipation; to her left, Randy sat at the Weapons and Tactical station, and Bachmann saw that over his suit, he had donned one of his antique music tee-shirts. Reflected in his screens, Bachmann could see the shirt’s design: a rotating stylized mouse head with the legend ‘Deadmau5’ scrolling beneath it. He had learned early on not ask Crane about these shirts as it invariably involved high levels of music that Bachmann never quite appreciated.
On the port side, Coop peered at his own displays, occasionally lifting his eyes to the main screens that wrapped around the entire front section of the ship, showing computer-enhanced representations of her forward and side views (there was no light within the cave, nor at this depth anyway).
Aft of Coop on the port side were three more stations, the first occupied by Jessie, and next to her, the young, blonde Des. Bachmann saw Jessie intensely scrutinize some data she had on the display before her, then, with that quick, lop-sided grin he knew so well, watched as she made a swiping gesture to move it over to on the comtab velcroed to her thigh where she began making notations. Des sat calmly watching his display as it cycled through status readouts at blinding speed.
To the starboard side of the bridge the Propulsion and Engineering stations were manned by the Twins. As Bachmann watched, he saw Gared murmur something quietly to Iris, who stifled a laugh and nudged him with an elbow. Anneka was seated at the Support Engineering console to Iris’s right. Bachmann’s eyes lingered on her profile a moment longer and then he came forward and settled himself in his Captain’s chair, a raised platform within the horseshoe. As he sat, the chair flowed against him, conforming to his body, ready to shield and cushion him against any sudden movement. From here, he controlled one of the most audacious and powerful underwater craft ever produced. A vessel they were about to test to its limits.
“Status report?” he inquired. One by one, they reported that they were ready, looking at him expectantly. He gazed back at them solemnly for a moment, and then began to issue his orders to each of them. He finished by addressing the AI.
“Des, because I’m not sure how this might affect us humans, I want you to be ready to assume command should we become incapacitated. Hell, I’m not even certain that it might not affect you too, but we’ll just have to take the chance.
“If we do have issues, then it may be up to you to try to stabilize things and then do what you can to attend to us. You have an undeniable speed advantage that may be critical, so I leave it to your discretion.”
The AI nodded assent, “Understood Skipper.”
“Alright, this is it. You each know what to do. Good luck to each of you. Beth, take her in.”
McKenna nudged the throttle to give them some forward inertia, and then cut the drive. As each of them unconsciously held their breath, the ship drifted slowly toward the portal’s field. Bachmann tensed, and then they entered the field.
What he felt was an instant, intense cold, as if he had suddenly stepped out into a deep mid-west winter, then he seemed quite unable to draw a breath. Strangely though, he seemed not to need to breathe.
What he saw was a vast tunnel, whose dimly lit walls glowed a colour that seemed to be close to ochre, and yet he knew he had never seen that exact colour before. Probably no human had. Instantaneously, they surged forward, and the tunnel became a constantly changing panorama of light, shapes and colour, scrolling by at insane speeds. They followed a torturous path that seemed to jink back and forth, yet with no apparent physical effects he could feel. It was as if he was encased in a densely viscous liquid that absorbed and cushioned him from the violent movements to which they were being subjected.
On and on, they plunged into the shaft. Unbidden, the thought of Alice in Wonderland popped into his mind, and involuntarily he laughed. What he heard, however, was a long, low, distorted sound that bore no resemblance to a human laugh.
At several points during their headlong flight, he saw other tunnels that diverged off to one side or the other flash by them, and in some cases, they dove off what seemed to be the main path and entered another of these passages as they continued to careen along.
Several times, Bachmann saw something flash past them in the opposite direction, no more than a streak. At one point, a small, amorphous shape swiftly overtook them then suddenly dropped back and paced them for a time, slowly spiralling around the Erasmus, as if examining her. The ship, if that was indeed what it was, looked as if it was made of some living material, perhaps coral, although it was difficult to tell as it seemed stretched and indistinct, almost as if he were seeing it through a thick glass bottle.
Their companion strobed them brilliantly, displayed a series of coloured patterns along its sides, then strobed them again before streaking off ahead of them. Bachmann wondered if the thing was actually a ship, or some automated monitor patrolling the tunnels.
Unexpectedly, they came to an instant abrupt halt, again, with absolutely no discernible physical effect. For a brief time, they appeared to hover, rotating slowly, and he saw that they were at a junction of multiple tunnel openings that led off in all directions. The image of a giant colander came to his mind, then, like a shot, the ship dove into one of the openings and they were hurtling off again.
He found that with a great deal of effort — it was like swimming through thick gelatin — he could slowly turn his head and just make out the others around him. They appeared as indistinct, ghostly figures that had bright coruscating auras surrounding them. All except the AI, whose projected image could not be seen at all.
On and on they rushed, their headlong flight seemed to last for hours, past innumerable branches and junctions until suddenly, there was an intense flash of brilliant blue-purple light and they were through.
As with their entry to the portal, he experienced the sudden, chilling cold, then an intense tingling sensation that rippled through his entire body. It was like a full-body orgasm without the pleasure component. Suddenly, they seemed to be released from their stasis and returned to normal.
The ship hung in water, with just a hint of residual forward motion.
“Fuuuhhhck!” someone intoned, long and low, followed by nervous laughter and a collective sigh.
Bachmann looked around, taking in the scene on the bridge. Everything looked exactly as it had before they entered the portal.
“Is everyone OK?” he asked, hoping he sounded normal and in command. They each nodded agreement or answered him briefly. The AI stared back at him with a look of complete wonder, then he too nodded slowly.
March 23rd, 2062
They were encased in darkness, except for the area immediately surrounding the ship, where the enhanced-vision cameras showed a sea bed similar to the one they had departed from.
Bachmann snapped off a string of commands.
“Beth, no sudden movements, but check your systems. Very gently, bottom the boat and match the hull to the surrounding terrain. I don’t think we’ve attracted any attention so far. Let’s keep it that way for now. Check passive sonar and all sensors. I want to know if we’re alone. Then see if the Nav systems have any idea of where we are.
“Randy, bring all the weapons back on line. Let’s be ready if we have to.
“Des, assuming your monitoring systems were continually running, check on what they recorded. There must be a portal here too. I want all the data you can get on it immediately. Let’s capture anything that might be going on as the process winds down… if indeed it winds down. Start your analysis.
“Coop, check our bio readout data, I want a quick sit-rep on how we’ve all faired. I know I feel fine, but let’s dig deep. I need to know ASAP if we require any medical intervention. As soon as we get a bit more stabilized, you can run us through your MedBed for a full scan.
“Jessie, check whatever is in range to get a feel for our environment here. Who knows, maybe we’re still on Earth, just somewhere else. Get whatever you can to help us confirm that one way or the other. I don’t want to move the ship until we’ve gotten a better idea of our surroundings.
“Gared, Iris and Anneka, please check your systems thoroughly and report status.”
The crew sprang into action. They had all just experienced something completely unique and indeed mind-boggling, yet their demeanour was calm and methodical as befit the professionals they were.
As they started to report back, it was apparent that the ship, despite the tremendous forces that they had endured had suffered no damage whatsoever. All of their systems seemed nominal. Coop’s bio-instrumentation indicated no trauma of any kind, although he quickly polled the crew verbally as to their feelings to confirm this.
Jessie reported that her initial brief survey seemed to show similar surroundings and microscopic life forms — there was nothing significantly larger nearby the ship — but that the water showed an unusually high salinity, certainly higher than in the cave they had left.
The sensors — including their passive sonar — indicated nothing within range of the ship that might be a threat. As Bachmann had suspected, they were probably at a similar depth to that of the portal in the cave, but beyond that, the Nav systems couldn’t tell them much. They would have to surface to get enough data to reset the platform, if that was even possible. What they did confirm, however, was that the same anomalistic gravitometer readings were present near this portal.
Satisfied that they were in no immediate danger, Bachmann now turned to the AI for his report.
Des spun his chair around, his fingers laced together just under his chin, a look of disbelief on his young face. He sat still, looking back at Bachmann for a moment before speaking.
“I’m sorry, Captain, I’m just finding the data hard to reconcile.”
He stared at Bachmann a moment longer then dropped his hands to his lap and began his report.
“Well, I think the most interesting thing is that according to our chronometers, our ‘journey’ lasted all of thirty-two seconds.” He was quiet for a moment, with a slightly far-off look, before continuing, “As I replay the data, I see the chronometers suddenly reduce rate to an almost infinitely slow crawl. This would seem to indicate a time dilation effect was involved, which in turn would suggest that even if we are indeed somewhere else still on Earth, that the travel time was almost instantaneous.”
“And if we’re not on Earth…” began Cooper, but the AI quickly pointed a finger at him took up the thread again.
“Yes, Coop, and if we’re not still on earth, then perhaps it implies velocities of multiple light-speed! Consider that it takes the Sun’s light 8.443 minutes to reach the Earth. Thirty-two seconds, even at light speed would only take us 9,593,360 kilometres. That’s only 4.64% of the closest distance between the orbits of Earth and Mars. I would submit that in all likelihood we are not still on Earth, or even in our solar system.”
They all sat silently for a moment before Des continued, “I assume you all witnessed to same things I did during the transit — long stretches of tunnels with numerous branches and junctions?” He surveyed them, seeing their affirmative nods.
“It would appear that we have discovered, and successfully transited some vast interstellar transport system. Interstellar, or perhaps even inter-dimensional.”
“You’re talking about a linkage between branes, is that right?” asked Anneka.
“That’s certainly one possibility. There’s been conjecture of ‘wormholes’ that might allow one to slip between parallel branes.”
“And we just slipped through a stream into another world,” exclaimed Beth.
“Ridin’ the slipstream!” chimed Randy.
“Well,” Bachmann began, turning to Jessie and Anneka, “let’s spend some time doing some observations before we move from here. I want you two to work on finding out whatever you can about our environment. Do as full a geological survey as possible. Gared and Iris, please do a full systems check. Beth and Randy, would you please assist wherever you can. Let’s be sure that our little adventure in the ‘slipstream’ didn’t damage anything.
“Coop, let’s have everyone go through the MedBed again and do a diagnostic comparison to our baseline. We need to see how it might have affected us as well. We'll meet back in the wardroom in four hours.”
When they met again, Coop asked to go first, and Bachmann could tell he was excited about something.
“Well, I have something fairly monumental to tell you, and I have permission to disclose something previously confidential.” Here, he looked at Gared, who beamed and nodded.
“It appears that the slipstream, in addition to being a transport system, is also able to diagnose and repair our bodies!” He stopped here, in the stunned silence, then continued, “Gared here had an inoperable carcinoma in his liver, but after repeated scans, I see no evidence of it. His liver has been repaired and is in absolutely perfect condition.”
At this point, Iris broke down and was instantly surrounded by the other women who consoled her, while the men gruffly congratulated Gared. When order was restored, Coop continued, “In fact, I observed changes in all of us, some subtle, some not, indicating that we have been, for lack of a better way of putting it, ‘tuned up’. Conservatively, I’d say that we have probably been given an extra twenty years of lifespan, perhaps even more!”
Des took up the conversation, “If we consider that part of the mechanism for the slipstream is to, in effect, digitize whatever passes through it, then perhaps there are filtering routines for things like cancer cells and other non-optimal biological conditions. It would serve to isolate potential pandemics. What’s remarkable is that this must be universal, or, even more astonishing, that whoever built it had human-like DNA. Either that or else that they have had contact with humans at some point in the past. Difficult to believe, given the placement of the portal... unless there is another portal somewhere on Earth more accessible.”
“Alright, what else have we learned?” Bachmann asked.
Jessie now took the floor. “Well, I doubt this is going to be a surprise, but we’re not on Earth anymore, Toto. The gravity here is about 0.7 Earth normal. You’ve probably noticed it as you’ve been moving around. Kinda feels like you're a bit off balance… bouncy?” There were some nods here.
“The salinity levels are above what we’d consider average too, and the temperature for this depth. We’ll know a lot more once we can surface and do a proper recce, but for now, I’d say we’re on a smaller world, probably closer to its sun than Earth, or a hotter sun than Sol.
“We’re still too deep at the moment to see much, but I have seen some life forms that were attracted to our lights that are unlike anything I know of on Earth. Here’s some shots of one that is particularly interesting.”
Here, she showed a video of what resembled an octopus, although it had too many arms, and eyes, three of them, on extended stalks. “To save you trying to count,” she added, “it has twenty-two arms. The three eyes are interesting…” she trailed off.
“Who knows what else we’ll find. It’s going to be like visiting the zoo for the first time! What we can tell about the surrounding sea floor and underlying geology doesn’t raise any particular concerns,” she finished.
Gared and Iris reported that they could find no issues with any of the ship's systems, everything was operating within normal limits.
“Well,” Bachmann said, “let’s take a break for half an hour and get some lunch and then we’ll take her up cautiously and have a look around up top.”
They adjourned and Bachmann and Anneka went to their stateroom. No sooner than he had closed the door, Anneka turned to him and he could see the way her face lit up that she had something important on her mind.
“What is it?” he inquired.
“Something utterly surprising and unexpected: I never told you, but I can’t have, or rather,” she looked at him with an expression of wonder, “I couldn’t have children. But now…”
He took up the thread, “And now you can, the slipstream fixed the problem? Anneka, that’s wonderful!” He honestly wasn’t sure how he felt about it, given their circumstances, but he knew this was the right response.
“Yes, yes there’s no longer any problem.” She could read him however, and added, “Jim has started me on birth control, but Quincy, if and when the time is right, we can have children!”
Her excitement was contagious, and Bachmann realized that deep down, he had always hoped that one day he could have kids. He swept her into a fierce hug and the two of them clung to one another.
“Hell,” he said, “if we make it back, it’s a deal. And if we don’t, maybe one day we’ll consider raising a family here, in the new world.”
With everyone mustered into place, Bachmann first ordered a locator probe dropped at the portal to help ensure they could find their way back to it, if and when the need arose.
“With no GPS, we’ll have to rely on navigation by sight, at least until we can get the inertial platform re-calibrated to local stars.” He paused, then added, “I just hope to God that the atmosphere is clear enough to see stars. For that matter, we’d better hope that there is a breathable atmosphere!”
That was a sobering thought. They could last a long time on the ship, but without an atmosphere, existing on this planet would be an extreme hardship.
“There’s a fairly normal concentration of oxygen in the water, not too different from what I’d expect at this depth, and the fish we’ve seen certainly show evidence of gills, so I’d be surprised if its too much different from Earth,” Jessie said.
“We might also assume that since the portal makers connected to Earth and that they were able to repair our bodies, that this planet, might support similar life.” Des added. “Or, perhaps the system is set up to only route travellers to destinations whose environments can support them. You’ll recall that we were routed through many branches and junction points during our journey. Maybe those decisions were based on human life requirements.”
Bachmann nodded, “Let’s hope that our assumptions are correct. Beth, take her up, but slowly, I don’t want to attract any unwanted attention. Randy, Weps off safeties, but fire only on my direct order. Coop, you and Jessie pay close attention to the sensors. Coop, please concentrate on the tactical side of things, Jessie, you watch for life forms and changes in water conditions that we need to be mindful of, such as currents and thermoclines. Des, please make sure you map all the data as we go.
“OK, let’s go up and take a look around.”
Beth eased the Erasmus into motion and they started to climb through the vast depths toward an uncertain future.
The first few thousand metres were uneventful, but at six-thousand, the Erasmus suddenly veered to starboard as they entered a remarkably swift current.
“Whoa,” Beth remarked, “it’s like we just got chucked into the river!”
“Bring her back around and go against the flow, Beth, keep us ascending close to as straight above the portal as possible.”
Jessie mapped the current as they lifted through it, the three-dimensional representation painted on the Erasmus’s displays. “It’s a good size, probably more than eight-hundred metres in diameter! Flowing roughly west to east from the magnetic pole, speed is forty-six knots. If we have get somewhere in a hurry, this is the autobahn!”
“I’ve got a huge contact port side above us,” barked Coop, “closing fast! Doesn’t seem metallic though, no propulsion noise. Maybe a whale or something similar.”
“Very well, it’s unlikely that it can hurt us, but Jessie, get ready with the lights so we have a look at it if it comes close enough.”
They continued to ascend, waiting as the contact closed on them. Suddenly, out of the gloom, a huge, toothed head appeared, followed by a thick neck which transitioned to a body that seemed a cross between a whale and an ichthyosaur. The creature slowed and tracked beside them, regarding them with three great eyes, one on either side of the head and one on a stalk that grew out of its forehead.
“Look at that,” Jessie cried excitedly, “it looks like a Kronosaurus, only with tri-nocular vision again. Completely unique... I wonder what advantage the third eye has?” she mused, “Maybe it works on a different wavelength, infrared perhaps.”
The behemoth tracked in close and nudged them with the side of its blunt head, rocking them slightly, then, apparently deciding they weren't food, peeled off and disappeared into the gloom.
Soon, they were surrounded by thousands of luminous shapes, similar to squid, that jetted to and fro around the Erasmus as they pulsed their membranes, fantastic coloured lights blinking on and off along their bodies. They seemed to be attracted to the Erasmus, and started to cling to the craft’s outer surfaces in greater and greater numbers, beginning to obscure their outside view. Bachmann had Iris run a gentle electrical charge over the outside skin, and the creatures suddenly leapt away from the ship, looking like a neon fountain.
“Trippy!” Crane intoned, watching the display in awe.
They continued their ascent, passing through one-thousand metres, when Coop suddenly said, “We’ve got surface traffic above us!”
The craft creaked and hummed softly, sliding down the trough of the lugubrious swell, then labouring upward to meet the next crest. Every now and then, a wave would break against the bow and the spray would surge over the prow, immediately beading into a thousand iridescent droplets that ran chaotically across the deck, coalescing and pooling like liquid mercury and then disappearing into the scuppers like snakes down a burrow.
It was a dun-coloured, lozenge-shape, with a metre-high extruded rail around the perimeter of the slightly convex deck. In the forward-middle, a low half-bubble-shape extruding from the deck formed a raised cabin area. It was smooth and seemingly new, belying the fact is was centuries old. Only close examination of its edges would reveal the telltale signs of age.
The solitary occupant sat almost motionless, swaying only gently with the boat’s motion. It seemed almost asleep, but then suddenly cocked its head and turned astern. Rising, it stood, easy in the swell, looking out behind the craft. For long minutes, it stood like this, scanning the sea, then locked onto something.
The speck resolved to a V-shape, high above the surface, but descending, closing with the boat. As it drew closer astern, the graceful gossamer wings cupped the air to slow it and it gently flared to a perfect landing on the rear rail of the cabin.
It cocked its head at the occupant, fixed it with three bright eyes, and croaked, “No sign, no sign.” Then, unfurling its wings again, it turned them carefully into the sunlight so the cells on the upper layer could recharge its power cells.
The occupant patted the ancient machine’s head fondly and murmured, “Well done, Foamrider, we’ll try again later on.” Next, he held the amulet on his right arm under the bird’s head to retrieve the search data. Returning to the craft’s interior, he studied the patterns and diagrams that appeared on the glassy screen set into the amulet’s surface, then tapped a few commands and held it close to the screen before him in the cabin.
The thrumming became louder, changing to a lower, more aggressive pitch as the G-field altered and the craft rose higher above the surface and increased its forward speed.
His name was Q’westral, the One Who Waits. He was one-hundred-and-twenty-two, yet still hale and alert of mind. He was tall and rangy, bipedal and fairly humanoid, with an ovoid hairless head perched atop broad shoulders. His face was well weathered, with a broad, almost lipless mouth; a flattened nose and two large, bright yellow eyes. A third, eye, darker in colour, perched atop a short stalk of flesh that protruded from the crown of his forehead. His muscular arms ended in slender hands that could have been mistaken for human had they not been more like tentacles, with no discernible joints, not to mention the additional digit. He wore breeches and a many-pocketed vest of some leather-like material.
It had been two days since the amulet had alerted him that the Gate had initially been activated. At first, he had thought that it was a mistake, and that the amulet would rescind the warning. After all, it had been many years since any of the Gates had been used, and the last time was still a constant, worrying wound. When he had told his wife, he could see both dread and hope on her face.
They had escaped with their lives from the last incursion, their two grown children enslaved, probably dead, along with virtually all of their family, friends and neighbours. The Outsiders had been merciless, leaving only misery and slaughter in the village. He had been far out at sea at the time, his wife with him for a rare occasion, and so they had been undetected and thus spared. That is, until they returned to find the appalling scene and to bury what dead remained and care for the three survivors as best they could until they too finally had to be buried. It was from them that they had learned of the fateful encounter.
Now, another Gate had been used, a different one this time, one far out to sea, in the depths. He had known of this gate, but not that it was still operational. He’d queried the amulet as to the information it had on the gates and been shown that there were four Gates known to it, only one of which had been used in recent history. This one was far to the east, high in the mountains near the continental divide. It had been this Gate that had disgorged the Outsiders nearly five years ago.
They had come in a flying war machine that was capable of devastating violence. Violence that they seemed only too eager to visit upon one and all.
Q’westral was the last of a long line whose lineage stretched back to beyond the Tekhno Era, when the planet had enjoyed a golden age of knowledge and prosperity. They had been an important hub on the SlipNet, welcoming and trading with other visitors from other civilizations transiting via the Gates. His family had worked for the Gate Authority for many generations.
For reasons lost in antiquity, the planet had ceased to be as important, and the trade flow had eventually moved elsewhere. The Gates became used less and less, but a form of the Gate Authority carried on, more or less as a guild, with the knowledge being passed from father to son. They remained skilled in the knowledge of the Gates in order to be ready should the SlipNet become active again. He was the current ‘One Who Waits’.
Over time, as things had failed on their world, strife had broken out in many regions, with some quite deadly conflicts that had poisoned great swaths of the planet. Here and there, what was left of the population had had to relearn the old ways in order to survive.
Now, there was little evidence of the technological heights that they had attained, other than some smart buildings in towns that had been far enough away from the conflict zones and the odd machine that still worked.
Some of the machines were useful, such as the G-Sled on which he was currently riding, and Foamrider, the surveillance mek, both of which had limited mind and functionality. Others ranged from benign and helpful, with normal intelligence, to some that were devious and violent, and were best avoided.
He had lost a brother, and almost his own life some years back when they were exploring one of the nearer coastal cities. It was to be a quick reconnaissance because they were on the fringe of the radiation no-go zone. There were six of them on the G-Sled and they’d been scouting the nearby buildings for artifacts that might be useful when they had stumbled across the mek, half buried beneath a pile of fallen stonework.
It had shown no sign of life as they struggled to lift the heavy stones entrapping it, but as soon as they had it free, the mek sprang to life and darted away from them on its G-field. Its deadly beam weapon had been damaged by the rocks and flailed in its mounting, but nonetheless splashed vivid destruction about. Within seconds, the beam had cut two of them in half, including his younger brother, J’ameral, before it tore through the mek’s own lower section and sent it crashing to the ground.
The surviving members of the expedition left hurriedly, lest they attract more unwanted attention, going far out to sea before commending their fallen comrades to the deep in a somber ceremony.
Gazing out at the endless swells, he could still see J’ameral’s face and remember his young brother’s wit and ingenuity with machines and artifacts. As he stood, seeing, yet not seeing, a two-metre triangular dorsal fin broke the water nearby, breaking his reverie and sharpening his attention.
He could see the dark shape below the surface angling in toward the boat, then pacing alongside it. It was one of the large predators that inhabited these waters and although as large as the boat itself, was rarely cause for concern. Unless you happened to be in the water with it, at which point things became quite exciting. As he watched the fin slicing through the swell, leaving only a feather of foam to mark its passage, the boat’s screen and his amulet chimed out simultaneous warnings.
There was something coming up beneath him.
First Contact
“Stop ascent, hold us steady!” snapped Bachmann, “Coop, what have you got?”
Cooper studied his instruments and announced, “It looks like a smallish surface craft, probably about six-metres long by about three-metres wide. Not very streamlined, looks more like a floating box from underneath. Strange wake pattern, almost non-existent, as if it’s hovering above the surface somehow. Virtually no plant noise at all, maybe just a low humming sound.”
“Alright, let’s just hold here and see what it does. Des, I want you to launch four of the reconnaissance drones, but guide three of them out underwater about half-a-click before you surface them. Let’s get a triangulation survey before we go anywhere. I want the forth drone to surface about 500 metres from that vehicle and hover about 10 metres up. Then slowly, approach that craft and maintain station within 30 metres”
“Aye Skip,” said the AI, “drones away.”
“Its stationary, now,” said Coop, “might know we’re here. There’s certainly nothing else around here… seems too convenient to be a coincidence, doesn’t it?”
“Weps, keep frosty, but don’t do anything unless on my order,” Bachmann said. “Des, how are we doing with the drones?”
“Just about to surface them, Skip. Should be up in the air in a moment and I’ll start collating the returns.”
On the surface, the four small drones released their floating antenna packages, each with a slim fibre optic line that trailed back to the Erasmus. Next, their six independent rotors began to whir into life, lifting the small devices aloft. As they rose above the heaving surface, they each transmitted a variety of telemetry to their respective antennae and thus to the Erasmus where a 3D video image built up on their screens.
They could see the craft almost immediately, and as they zoomed in on it, they could see that as Coop had surmised, it was indeed stationary, holding position just slightly above the wave crests.
Des maneuvered the forth drone with deliberate slowness over the remaining distance and then held it in a static position aft of the hovering craft. Then, with a collective intake of breath, they watched in awe as the occupant emerged from the overhang of the cabin and stood on the back deck looking up at the drone. With unhurried deliberation, it spread its arms, palms out and open and solemnly bowed its head.
“Holy shit!” Jessie whispered, “Does that look like a gesture of welcome to you guys too?”
There followed a rather noisy couple of minutes as the crew of the Erasmus all seemed to speak at once, with Bachmann finally calling order to quiet them down.
“OK, hold it down. We’ve got some decisions to make here rather rapidly. Des, I want you to pull the other drones in closer and do a full sensor scan for anything that might indicate weaponry, etc.”
Des fed commands to his board and began to get more imagery.
As they watched, the humanoid then gestured with one arm first toward their stationary drone and then to what appeared to be a small, silvery pterosaur perched on the aft railing. The ‘bird’ unfurled delicate-looking wings, and after a moment of instability as the winds caught its wings, rose smoothly into the air and let the wind carry it back close to the drone. Here, it slowed, carefully circling the drone, allowing them a close-up view of it before it headed back to the boat.
“Look at that,” cried Jessie, “It’s mechanical. And three-eyes again!”
“I’d suggest, Captain,” offered Des, “that we’re looking at a drone, or something similar in purpose. Also, I see nothing that might be a threat here, no obvious ordinance.”
As the ‘bird’ settled back on the boat, the humanoid again pointed to it and then to the hovering drone, which Des, on Bachmann’s order, had now edged closer to the boat. Next, it made an unmistakable gesture beckoning the drone, and stepping back, pointed to an open space on the deck.
With a quick look to Bachmann for confirmation, which he received, Des slowly piloted the drone so it hovered just over the boat for a moment, to see what would happen, but again the occupant repeated the welcoming gesture and Des settled the little machine on the deck. To avoid possible injuries, he spooled the rotors to a stop. With the drone sitting on the deck, they had a good view of the interior cabin and could see an electronic screen showing data of some kind, although obviously none of the characters made any sense.
The alien stood still for a minute, and then squatted down and examined the drone, cocking its head and pursing its mouth as it surveyed it from various angles. Then, with a curiously human motion, it nodded its head, pointed to the mechanical bird, then to an amulet on its wrist, then from the amulet to the screen in the cabin, and finally at the drone. It then folded its legs under it and began to speak softly to the drone.
After a moment, it then arose and again it spread its arms, palms out and open and bowed its head again. Then, with another nod to the drone, entered the cabin and took a seat in front of the main screen.
Another flurry of conversation erupted in the Erasmus as they digested this incredible scene and then Bachmann turned to Des and asked, “Obviously we’ve recorded all that… is there anything remotely recognizable linguistically?”
“I’ve been analyzing everything since we began recording, but I’ll need more time to work on it. It’s not much to go on, unfortunately,” replied the AI.
“Skip… look!” Coop blurted, “It’s moving again.”
As they watched, the alien came over to the drone, looked directly into the lens for a moment and then slowly picked the machine up, turned back into the cabin and placed it gently on the seat before the cabin screen. Then, it gestured from the drone to the screen and started to manipulate its amulet. Nothing happened for a minute as the creature continued to work on the amulet’s controls, but then the main screen flashed and cleared. Next, a sequence of graphic characters started to appear, rapidly cycling through screen after screen with increasing complexity.
“Ah ha,” cried Des, “here we go… those are math principles and relationships. Houston, we have a primer!” A look of pure joy spread across his face. “Captain, this may take some time…” he offered, then he seemed to go into a trance as the data continued to flash past, almost too fast to decipher.
They watched the incoming data feed for a while, along with views from the other cameras showing the cabin. The alien seemingly pleased with the progress, moved over to a low bed, lay down and went to sleep. Bachmann decided that was a good idea and suggested they eat and then try to get some rest. He ordered Des to have the three remaining drones commence an outward spiral search pattern to map their surroundings, and then let the AI know they were retiring and to wake them if needed.
In the wardroom, over dinner, they were all eager to discuss and speculate on what they had seen. First and foremost, they talked about the alien; that is was humanoid; that it was obviously intelligent, and that there was a level of technology that seemed both advanced and somehow antiquated.
Jessie and Coop were discussing the alien’s appearance and mannerisms, while McKenna and Crane talked quietly about contingency plans and possible strategies for evasion should it become necessary.
Gared and Iris remarked on the craft’s technology:
“There’s no discernible heat signature, no exhaust plume, and no external evidence of a power plant,” said Iris.
“And there was no spray from any kind of downdraft coming from underneath it either,” added Gared.
“Plus, it was holding absolutely geostationary, rising and falling with the swells, but holding rock steady… it must have some kind of GPS capability,” his wife remarked.
“And it just so happened to be located directly above our position, and that of the Portal,” said Anneka quietly. “That, plus the operator’s actions, cannot be coincidence,” she said, looking directly at Bachmann.
He had been sitting back listening to his crew, his team of experts, and now pushed his plate away and sat forward, elbows on the table with his fingers laced together under his chin.
“Yes, I think it’s obvious ‘he’ was expecting us. That may bode well for us.” Then he added, “I hope.”
Face-to-Face
Early next morning, the crew assembled on the bridge to plan their next moves. Bachmann gave the floor over to the AI to bring them up to date on what he had learned.
Des swivelled his chair around and leaned forward, elbows on the chair’s arms, fingers laced together in his lap.
“I’ve been able to make quite a bit of progress,” he said, “we’re lucky that the ship’s memory banks are so vast, and that we have the equivalent of the sum of human knowledge, including extensive files on linguistics and language roots. The ‘primer’ appears to be specifically tailored for ‘first-time’ contacts, so we’ve really lucked out.
“While there are some similarities to Earth languages, including some that are identical, interestingly enough, it is for the most part something new, at least to us. I’ve been able to assemble a reasonable number of words and phrases that should at least get us started. I also,” and here he gave a shy smile at Anneka, “was able to have the Nanofac spin up some wearable units, like glasses with earpieces that will interface with your implants and the ship’s systems. They should be able to allow realtime simultaneous translation. Of course, you don’t really require them as your implants can handle the job nicely, but I’ve also manufactured two units that should fit our friend up on the surface, so it seemed easier for you to have one too. Your unit will also allow us to do video/audio capture of what you see. With a bit of luck, and a bit of time, my heuristics routines should be able to improve the vocabulary and give us a much better experience.”
Here, he leaned back in the chair and swivelled his head as if to ease an aching neck… a curiously human gesture for a non-corporeal being. Then, sitting forward again, he crossed his arms and continued, “I’ve also learned a few, fascinating facts! First, we are now on the planet Peponis, which is almost the same as ‘peponi’, the Swahili word for ‘paradise’! Whether that is a co-incidence or not is difficult to say, but I find quite interesting as it coincides roughly with an area that we regard as the birthplace of human civilization. Following that slender thread of speculation, we might also wonder if there is another Portal somewhere in Africa.
“Regardless, Peponis seems once to have been a major ‘terminus’, if you will, on something referred to as the ‘SlipNet’, which as we know from first-hand experience, is a method of connecting disparate locations in space. What I now know is that this SlipNet is actually a vast interstellar transportation system, far beyond what I had imagined.
“From what the primer tells, it appears that Peponis was once an important hub on the SlipNet, and enjoyed great favour and prosperity. Now the following information seems to have been amended to the primer by, shall we say, less skilled hands.
“Sometime happened about three hundred years ago, things went badly and for reasons not given, the SlipNet traffic dropped off dramatically, causing economic chaos. In the wake of this global crisis, several deadly conflicts broke out, killing billions and poisoning large portions of the planet. Essentially, they bombed themselves back into, or close to the stone age. Obviously some technology still exists and still operates, but on the whole, it seems fairly dire.
“Our friend up top appears to have the job of manning, if I may use that term, the Portals, or Gates. Notice that was plural. His technology, and by that I mean the craft and his amulet, allow him to monitor the Gates and this explains why he is here… to greet us.
“He’s still there, by the way. Did a spot of fishing for his breakfast earlier and is now apparently waiting for us to make an appearance.”
“What did the other drones pick up?” queried Bachmann.
“The Eastern-most one found a coastline about two hours flight time from here. I’ve had it mapping that immediate area and there’s evidence of a habitation, but as yet no other ‘people’.
“I let the other two go outward for about four hours... open ocean only, before re-tasking them to divert back to the coastline to map north and south from the village. Fortunately, we had a nice clear night and I was also able to map a good portion of the skies. There is a pole star evident, and I’ve begun to reprogram the inertial guidance platform. From my early calculations, we seem to be somewhat north of the equator.
“So far, we, and our friend above, seem to be the only people here. No other ships, either on the water or in the air. There’s a ton of very large sea life though. The drones spotted lots of bioluminescent wakes evident on the surface. We won’t starve here. Oh, and the atmosphere is very breathable, there’s a slightly higher oxygen concentration, twenty-four percent, versus Earth’s twenty-one, but nothing to worry about.
“Notwithstanding the fact that this guy’s ancestors nuked half the planet, I recommend we surface and begin a dialog.”
Bachmann looked at the eager young man for a moment, and then said, “Des, you’ve done a hell of a night’s work,” and then grinned as a blush spread across the AI’s face.
“One further thing, Captain,” Des replied with an urgent tone, “I wonder if it might be prudent for my persona to make first contact? The ship could easy project me outside, and there’d be no danger to any of you that way.”
Bachmann considered for a moment, but discarded the AI’s well-intentioned suggestion, saying, “He’s come all the way out here to meet us personally, I think we should return that trust. Des, maybe you can give us a demo of your translators?”
They spent the next hour getting prepared, and then finally had a few minutes alone. Anneka came hard into Bachmann’s arms, clinging to him with a ferocity and strength that shocked him.
Still clutching him, she spoke up into his ear, “Everything I see about our alien up there implies trust, but I can’t seem to get a lock on things anymore…” she held him at arms’ length and looked searchingly into his face.
“You’ve got me reeling…” she stopped suddenly as she saw the alarm etching his face. “Quincy, I’m fine. I didn’t mean it that way. I just have this terrifying feeling of need. No, not passion, but pure, tender, warm affection.” She regarded him again, not speaking, and then finished, “It’s terrifying because I’ve never felt it before, and it’s because of you. I love you.
“Please, please, take no chances. I know how important it is to establish contact…” she trailed off, then shook him gently, pulled his forehead to touch hers and intoned, “Go do your duty and then come back to me safe and sound.”
Finally, Bachmann gave the order to surface.
The Erasmus rose slowly upward, surfacing just aft of the hovering craft. As they broke into the bright morning air, Bachmann could see the alien regarding them from the rear deck. It raised a hand and then made the familiar beckoning motion, inviting them closer. Then, with a gesture on its amulet, the craft settled to the surface of the water so that they could tie the boats together more easily.
Bachmann had decided that he alone would first venture out, and armed with his, and the alien’s translator, he entered the airlock, sealed the inner hatch and had the ship open the outer door. As he emerged, a slap of spray greeted him, soaking the front of his shirt and giving him a quick dose of humility. He grinned self consciously, saw that the creature had a similar expression and watched it give a motion remarkably like a shrug.
The alien then bent and picked up a rope that it heaved accurately to Bachmann, who caught it and secured the Erasmus. They repeated this operation at the other end of each craft so that the boats were now lashed securely as one platform. Then, the moment truth arrived… the alien held out a hand and Bachmann grasped it and stepped aboard.
Captains Courageous
As Bachmann’s foot made contact, his mind was working on multiple levels: he was aware of the remarkable turquoise water all around them and its strong salty tang, detectable at the back of his palate; the diaphanous layer of mist, still burning off in the morning's warmth, diffusing the sun’s rays to layered sheets of gold; the strange, leathery feel of the creature’s hand, the tentacles rather than fingers, the extra digit; the fact that they were of a similar height; the not-unpleasant, powdery smell of the alien; the comfortable way they both stood in the swells, looking at each other.
For Q’westral, it was a similar process: the visitor’s craft with its strange-looking surface; he saw a being that was unique, not known to him through Gate lore; the all-over clothing that seemed remarkably flimsy, and the pouch slung from its shoulder; the close-cropped fur on its head; it’s soft-yet-hard hand with the strangely segmented blunt, pink digits; its two metal-coloured eyes that held his with a firm conviction.
They remained still for a moment then nodded, and released each other’s hand. Bachmann realized he had been holding his breath, and slowly started to breathe again.
Stepping back into the cabin, Q’westral gestured for his new companion to take a seat. Bachmann followed him in under the canopy and as he moved to sit, his eyes took in the simplicity of the craft… no, that wasn’t quite right, was it? The control screen set into the dash was evidence of advanced technology, yet his critical eye could see weathering and wear along the edges of boat's surfaces that would indicate that the craft was in fact, quite old.
Sitting down on the comfortable bench, he watched as the alien moved to sit a metre or so away from him, eying him expectantly.
“I sure you won’t understand this,” began Bachmann, “but I would like to thank you for meeting us.”
The alien cocked its head slightly, regarding him with its three eyes, and then replied, “Welcome visitor, I am Q’westral.”
Of course, Bachmann heard nothing that seemed intelligible, and raising a finger, pointed at his pouch, and then slowly opened it and removed the two translators that Des had prepared. He held his up first and then put it on. The ‘glasses’ weren’t actually for correcting any eyesight issues, but allowed video projection overlays that could interface with each other unit, and wirelessly with the Erasmus’s computer system. A slim wand descended from each arm to a position just over the ears. Reaching back into the pouch, he removed the model that the AI had designed for the alien, using measurements extracted from the 3D video capture by the drone.
The alien seemed to understand, and giving a grunt, reached out to accept the unit, turning it in its hands, examining it critically and then carefully putting it on its head as Bachmann had done.
Now, thought Bachmann, another moment of truth. Watching his companion closely, he pointed to himself and said, “My name is Quincy Bachmann. I am from a planet we call Earth. We came through the SlipNet. Thank you for meeting us.”
As he spoke, the translator issued aural equivalents in the local language, as well as showing some graphic images keyed to certain words and phrases.
Q’westral’s eyes widened, all three of them, Bachmann noticed, as this process took place, and when Bachmann had mentioned his name, an image of the man was shown, then a graphic of Earth from space, then finally the symbol for the SlipNet that Des had programmed from the primer.
As all this happened, the other crew members of the Erasmus watched a number of feeds that Bachmann’s glasses, the ship and the drone presented. Each had a measure of awe, trepidation and hope. The conversation was subdued as they witnessed the historic event of Mankind’s first recorded meeting with an extraterrestrial species.
“The body language is remarkably ‘human’, isn’t it?” suggested Des, “Although perhaps that’s to be expected from a bipedal humanoid whose race has a history of contact with numerous other species. Perhaps there’s a subset of gestures that’s almost universal.”
Anneka’s heart had finally ceased pounding as she had watched the meeting, growing cautiously more optimistic, and less worried about Bachmann. The engineer in her allowed her to view the unfolding drama with a critical eye; the naval officer appreciated both the significance and the danger of the encounter; while as a woman, she was torn between feelings of immense pride and terrifying worry about Bachmann. She had just met this remarkable man... she couldn’t stand the thought that something might happen to him.
On the boat, the alien spoke again, and Bachmann heard, “Bachmann, from Earth, I am Q’westral of Peponis. Welcome, friend.”
The next few hours were magical. Once the preliminaries were complete, Q’westral and Bachmann spent time expanding their mutual vocabulary and understanding of the immediate situation. It was then time for the crew to meet the Peponian, so they transferred to the G-Sled, adorned in their cosmetic but superfluous translators, and Bachmann was able to perform the introductions.
Jessie could hardly contain herself, studying the alien as surreptitiously as she could without giving offence. Bachmann could see her scrutinizing and classifying the different features of its anatomy. Coop too, was fascinated by the Peponian, but was equally amused by Jessie’s intense observation.
Bachmann watched the alien closely as he presented each crew member, especially the women. What reactions he saw in general seemed to indicate that the female body shape was not overly unknown to him. He did note, however, a definite fascination with Anneka’s blonde ponytail.
As he presented Anneka, she regarded the alien with her intense blue eyes, and then, murmuring, “Q’westral, we are honoured,” she then repeated his welcoming gesture of peace: arms out, palms up, head bowed. The Peponian was obviously moved by this and issued a thick grunt that confounded the translators.
Bachmann had held back any mention of Des, partly to preclude having to explain a projection, and in part because a tickle of caution urged him to keep the AI secret, at least for now.
Adversary
The fear had begun to gnaw at him again, like some rabid animal. It bit deep, like a rusty saw blade grating across his bones, bringing a palpable, sour taste to the back of his throat. After all this time, the signal that he had been dreading for nearly five years, had been detected. A Gate had been used… they were no longer alone here.
They had been safe here, a predator at the top of the food chain, so to speak, able to take as they needed, subjugating the few ragged pockets of indigenous peoples to provide them with goods and tithes to sustain them.
When they had first arrived in this back-water world, almost forgotten on the SlipNet, he had realized that here was the perfect hiding place. Over the intervening years since the planet had ceased to be a hub of commerce and the subsequent wars that had raged, the level of technology had declined so radically that his single ship was more than sufficient to conquer and control anyone he encountered. Now, all that might be in jeopardy. A Gate had been activated.
From the command chair on the bridge of the Blade-class fighter Scimitar, Paell Talas surveyed the terrain as they approached the ruins of the village that clung to the steep cliff.
“Irise, talk to me,” he growled, his hands convulsively gripping and releasing the seat’s arms, “Anything?”
The female he had addressed was his second in command, and his current partner. She kept her eyes on her instruments but shook her head negatively, replying, “Nothing. It’s dead. Not a sign of life anywhere.”
“You’re sure this is the right heading for the Gate’s signature?”
“It’s the only habitation anywhere near along the line of the signal. It has to be here somewhere.”
Skeln, the Scimitar’s navigator, ventured, “We were here not long after we first arrived. We wasted the place but there were only a few natives here, even then. We killed the older ones and took a few kids as I remember. Doesn’t look like anything’s changed since then.”
“Thank you Skeln, I can remember back that far too,” Talas snapped sarcastically.
The navigator’s eyes narrowed but he clenched his teeth and stifled his retort. Commander Paell Talas was not one to argue with. They had all witnessed his temper; a temper that had boiled into a savage enough rage that three former crew members had not survived it. It was that merciless rage that had given him his command, and ultimately it was that rage that had sent them into exile, hunted and despised.
The deadly conflict of which they had been a part had ended, but with them on the losing side. The savagery that had made him one of the most feared adversaries, had seen him ostracized, a fugitive from the judicial enforcement of the new regime. Rather than submit to their tribunals, and a probable death sentence, he and the crew had fled, fighting their way into a SlipNet Gate, and after several jumps, eluding their pursuers.
They had wandered for months, from one planet to another, looking for sanctuary, only accidentally discovering Peponis, an out-of-the-way, discontinued destination, long flagged as too dangerous for visitation.
Their species, originally from the planet Borunda, were very close in form to human (in fact closer than the Peponians), and from a distance they would have passed as human. It was this close similarity in physiology that enabled Peponis as a valid SlipNet destination. Up close, however, the differences were quite obvious: hairless, squat bodies with an epidermis of copper/rust-coloured fine pebbly scales, similar to that seen on geckos. Their eyes, too, were more like a reptile’s, with a vertical, elliptical black pupil set in a deep red iris. Exaggerated brow ridges took the place of eyebrows.
Borunda was a world similar to both Earth and Peponis, its indigenous people on a technological level perhaps twenty years in advance of Earth, and, of course, well in advance of the current state of Peponis. They too, had only fairly recently discovered that their system had portals that connected to the SlipNet. In their case, only eight years prior, the Borundans had stumbled across a Gate on their second, smaller moon.
As it was the military that had made the discovery, ample resources were made available to commence exploration. The first ship never returned. The second expedition was orchestrated differently, with an emphasis to make the vessel plainly non-military. They had been routed to a planet, Lennah, that embraced new members of the SlipNet community, and as such, had given them the current state of knowledge of the system.
According to the Lennah, the origins of the SlipNet were still unknown. Dating of the Gate materials indicated that those portions of the system were millennia old. The originators, simply known as ‘The Streamers’, had evidentially been an ancient civilization, or more likely a group of civilizations that had devised and implemented the system. Whether there had once been a flourishing, multi-dimensional meta-civilization, linked by this vast conveyance apparatus, was simply conjecture. That it remained and was still in use merely hinted at the staggering engineering feat which The Streamers had wrought.
Now, beyond the practical knowledge of actually using it, no one knew the underlying mechanism, or how it operated. The extent of the current knowledge was limited to the fact that the system would auto-route if no input was given, a sort of random choice option, and that it would not route a traveller to a habitat which would not physically support it. It was not known if these limitations could be overcome with programming.
One of the most valuable things the Borundan expedition had obtained was an ancient and much annotated digital map of routes and destinations that had been explored by the Lennah, or by other worlds that they themselves had encountered. That and the fact that specific routings could be programmed by the simple method of displaying a specific list of route symbols on an external area of the transiting vessel.
Because the military had control over the Borundan portal, and due to Talas’s placement within the command structure, he had knowledge of the system. Grasping its strategic importance, and as a realist, seeing that the conflict was not going well, he had obtained a copy of the route map. It had taken a couple of lives, but he knew the importance of having access to the routing map and the methodology it used. More lives were taken when they assaulted the forces guarding the gate itself, but, they had escaped.
The Gate through which they had finally emerged on Peponis was high up on a mountainside, strung between two distinctive rock pillars that stood like guardian titans, the portal itself almost invisible between them, seemingly just a rock-face. They had arrived here to encounter a Peponian seemingly awaiting them and broadcasting the Primer. Talas had been instantly suspicious, and had moved the Scimitar to a higher, more inaccessible location where they landed, and like the crew of the Erasmus, had been able to discern the Primer’s message, and the ship’s computers had devised a rudimentary method of communication. He had taken the ship back and landed it on the flat mesa beneath the Gate, and commenced a dialog with the Peponian ‘manning’ the portal.
In point of fact, it was more a subtle and clever interrogation, with the Borundan giving away little while ascertaining that the Peponian was some sort of hermit whose job was to welcome any visitors, and that the nearest settlement of any size was at the base of the mountain, on the shore of the deep lake there and the vast river which eventually emptied to the sea.
The Peponian’s amulet was evidently connected to the Gate somehow, and that, unfortunately, was cause enough to Talas, that it, and its gentle and guileless wearer be destroyed. They had then commenced a high-level reconnaissance of the area to determine the state of affairs and possible resistance before conducting a raid on the nearby settlement. Ranging outward in a spiral grid from the Gate, they had gathered intel that confirmed, as the Primer had shown, that this once-flourishing world was now mostly dead, still ravaged by radiation levels that were tolerable only for short periods.
The largest settlement was the one far beneath the Gate, and although it had once been quite large, was indeed only inhabited by a less than a hundred or so people. Farther up and downstream, a few smaller villages could be seen, again with very few indigenous, and in fact many were completely deserted.
Oddly enough, they had discovered a few machines, meks of some kind, that were still functional, some of which had actually fired upon the ship, at which point Talas ordered any that were found to be instantly targeted and destroyed.
Realizing that there was a possibility that a larger settlement might be found at the river’s delta, they had followed the watercourse and ultimately ended up at the mostly-abandoned city where Q’westral and his small group resided.
Intrusion
“Captain,” Des’s voice whispered quietly in Bachmann’s ear, “The drones are picking up a bogie incoming toward the village, about 14 kicks out, 2,000 metres altitude, speed approximately 200 kph.”
Bachmann quickly turned away, toggled the translator off and whispered back, “OK, drop the drones to treetop height and keep tracking. Get whatever intel you can, we’re on our way. Stay out of sight for the time being.”
He turned back to the group and broke in, “Q’westral, excuse me but we are picking up an aircraft approaching the village near here. Do you have knowledge of this?”
They could instantly see the alien blanch, a mask of shock, then his face hardened and he said, “Enemy, very bad enemy.” He looked at Bachmann, and the human could plainly see the question there... Can you help me?
The rest of the group had already started toward the Erasmus, and Bachmann addressed Q’westral. “You will be safer with us, come my friend,” gesturing him to follow them.
Q’westral turned back momentarily into the cabin and issued a command with his amulet and Bachmann saw the display suddenly go dead. They then quickly cast off the painters and transferred to Erasmus, Bachmann leading the way.
Once on the bridge, Bachmann motioned Q’westral to the chair at the empty station just aft of Anneka, who helped to buckle him in. He then began giving orders: “OK, monitor the drones as long as we can before the antenna pack fibres run out, I want to know as much as we can before we lose contact with them, then program them to land and go to standby. Secure all stations and dive the boat. Make your depth 100 metres, flank speed for the village… ” he consulted the chart on his comtab, “Heading 034 degrees.”
Q’westral grabbed the arms of his chair as the Erasmus dove beneath the surface, transitioning from the rocking of the swells to a steady, downward direction, the sudden burst of speed pushing him back into the chair’s embrace. He shot a look at Bachmann and received a firm, reassuring nod.
“What’s our time to intercept the coast?” he enquired.
Coop glanced at his NAV screen and replied, “At flank speed of 90 knots, we should cover the 12 km distance in just under five minutes.”
“OK, but let’s take it slow when we approach the shelf… we’ve got no charts of this area and we don’t know the depths there.”
Q’westral had been straining to follow the conversation and, in tribute to Des’s programming of the translator, had correctly surmised Bachmann’s concern.
“The water is deep right to the edge, deep, good for ships,” he told Bachmann.
“Thank you, Q’westral,” he nodded to the Peponian, then addressed the crew again.
“Beth take us in as fast as you can, but keep us submerged. Slow at a kilometre out… Weps, I want a submerged launch of four Archerfish missiles when we slow. Have them spread out randomly a hundred metres or so from each other and then hold 10 metres down and await orders.
“Once we get into the inner harbour, here,” using his comtab, he gestured, showing them on the main screen where he meant, “I want an antenna pack launched so we can contact the drones again. Get them aloft the second they’re on line again, but keep them just high enough for us to get coverage. They’re small enough and stealthy enough to be easily missed. I want firing point solutions on that bogie for all missiles. He didn’t need to add, “As well as from the Erasmus.”
“Q’westral,” Bachmann asked, “What can you tell me about this enemy and their ship?”
“They have much anger, they kill without feeling. For no reason. They have powerful weapons, energy weapons. Kill from afar.”
“What are they after?”
Q’westral looked at Bachmann and said simply, “Me. Me and my wife.” The last word was choked out.
Bachmann saw Anneka glance at him and saw the look on her face. It was a mixture of horror and fierce determination. He too, could instantly relate to the emotion of potential loss, now more than ever. He gritted his teeth and swore to himself that they would do all they possibly could to help.
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