Earth Song: Twilight Serenade Page 26

  She picked up her display controls and the center of the council chamber, over the table, became a huge holographic display. The map she’d designed the night before came up showing the space lanes between their worlds and their enemies’ locations. The proximity to their enemies was plain to see.

  “Second was to develop commerce outside of the portal network, with the help of our allies. And for this, as the other goal, we needed ships.” Minu used the control again. “We’ve succeeded far, far better than we thought possible!”

  The display changed, the galactic map dropping to a tiny size to one side. It was replaced with a stylized shape of an Ibeen.

  “We now have eight Ibeen back in service and being crewed by the Beezer, as per the agreement I’ve made.” The Ibeen on the display split into eight in a line. “The Beezer will use them for commerce and to aid in any supply efforts we have.”

  “We’ve salvaged three more Kaatans like Lilith’s.” Another representative of the Kaatan appeared, splitting into four. “They are not yet operational. Crewing and controlling them is considerably more complicated than the Ibeen.”

  “We now control five Fiisk heavy battlecruisers.” Another ship appeared, and split as well. “We have one fully operational, thanks to a salvaged Kaatan. The ship itself was not salvageable at the moment, but it maintained a combat intelligence. The first we’ve found.”

  She spent a few minutes describing the Fiisk to the assembled council members, including their use and firepower in comparison to the Kaatan class ship of the line.

  “The next finds are the most extraordinary. We salvaged two Kiile class carriers. They were in excellent shape, only lacking CIs and raw materials.” The ship appeared large and rotated for their view. “No fighters were aboard. However before returning the Rasa technicians were able to get the fabrication plant operational, in at least a limited manner. And we also now know what the component blocks we kept finding on junk piles are for. They feed these fabricators, which apparently were only in use by the Lost.”

  “And lastly, at the final location we’ve explored, we found a ship of incredible power. One of only five ever built, according the Lilith. A Guul class dreadnought.”

  The Guul came up and she spent a minute describing the ship’s mind boggling dimensions and its use, as a siege and defensive weapon of almost inconceivable power.

  “And finally, we salvaged the gunboat complements of all the Fiisk and the carriers. Sixty-six in all, ten of which returned with me. A very formidable complement.”

  Minu looked around the room at the councilmembers, evaluating their reactions. They varied from appreciative nods to wide eyed amazement. She could see clearly the one negative reaction. Jasmine Osgood stared at the summary screen showing all the ships, mostly warships. The frown on her face was both deep and profound. The director of the science branch was from the Peninsula tribe, and they were known for the disdain of the military.

  “Now we get down to the hard details,” Minu said. “Even though we have all these ships secured and can bring them all to operational condition, we cannot crew them.”

  “Why not?” Dram asked, the first to speak.

  “The same reason we couldn’t operate the Kaatan worth a darn until Lilith was brought out into the world. There are no CIs.”

  Minu gestured and Lilith stood up in the antechamber. She moved slowly and carefully under the room’s full gravity. Her standard black Chosen jumpsuit still looked loose on her. “I’d like Chosen Lilith Groves to continue the explanation.”

  “I am a combat intelligence,” Lilith told them without fanfare. “When my mother took command of the Kaatan it was stored in an advanced firebase along with many more. The ships, as is routine, is stored without CI. The CIs are basically specialized artificial intelligence programs optimized for operating a starship or its systems. When initialized they are assigned a task and that will be their purpose for the rest of their operational lifecycles.

  “Lacking a CI to make the necessary decisions for running my ship, the medical intelligence improvised and modified my brain.” She gestured and the display showed a medical scan of her brain. The healthy brain tissue was instantly discernable from the dozens of little blocks of cybernetic computer implants. “The purpose was to both increase my mental capacity and to allow for seamless integration into the ship’s computer systems.”

  “All that to act as a CI?” Jasmine asked. The look on the woman’s face told Minu that she’d never realized the extent to which Lilith had been modified.

  “Yes,” Lilith said. “Discussing the procedure with the CI we now have running Fiisk Prime, and its review of my combat performance suggests I am superior to the AI combat intelligences in every quantifiable way. The only way I seem to fall short is in raw response time. But I can handle more tasks than a CI, and anticipate tactical situations better. The CI said my creativity was a fusion of a CI and a biological operator.”

  “So can we operate these ships without CI?” Gregg asked. The question was a plant by Minu.

  “Operate?” Lilith asked. “Yes. With any amount of efficiency? No. Certainly not in combat. We’ve created crew and command interfaces for the Ibeen which allows them to be operated with a crew of forty.”

  “That’s not too bad,” Ken Benedict, Minu’s head of training.

  “The Ibeen used to operate almost completely autonomously,” Minu said. “They used an unusual version of the CI that was incapable of offensive weapons use. And the Ibeen is a rather uncomplicated ship to run.”

  “That is an understatement,” Lilith added. “The Kaatan is the only warship which used just one CI. The Fiisk requires two, the Guul five, and the Kiile six!”

  “Six?!” Dram said, shaking his head in amazement.

  “The CI were assigned different tasks. There was some overlap, but those programs allowed almost inconceivable amounts of tasks to take place with very few operators.”

  “So how many to crew the ships without these CI?” Jasmine asked. “If it’s forty per CI, that’s only eighty to run a Fiisk, right?”

  “No,” Lilith said. “The CI running the Ibeen are underutilized, while those running the Fiisk are being used at peak capacity. Using the experience my mother got from operating the Kaatan prior to my birth, we’ve estimated the minimum crew necessary to operate a Fiisk, even at minimal combat effectiveness, is a thousand.”

  “That’s a lot,” Dram said. “Five hundred per CI?”

  “More or less,” Minu said. “We haven’t tried to model that against the much larger ships. The Kiile might be less, the Guul is likely a lot more.”

  “And these crews will have to be trained to interact quickly, efficiently, and under all sorts of unimaginable circumstances,” Lilith explained.

  “So, what do you have in mind?” Bjorn asked, right on cue.

  The discussion over about crewing the ships, Minu pushed on to what was, to her, arguably the biggest issue. And considering their reaction to her plans for crewing the ships, that was quite a statement.

  “The final ghost fleet we located is within a nebula we’ve named Aether,” Minu said and the galaxy map returned. Complicated computer schematics and human brain mapping fell away into the background and faded away.

  “The ghost fleet was left by the retreating Lost task force on a trajectory taking it deep into the heart of this nebula. We initially believed it was to hide the salvageable ships. And considering this is where we found the Guul, that seemed probable.

  “Our final determination though is that they were sending the salvage to rendezvous with the star system we found orbiting the magnetar at the center of the system. The star has been named after the nebula, Aether.”

  The map zoomed in to show the nebula, then in for more detail on the star itself.

  “Aether, as my father decided to call it,” Lilith started, managing to sound both informative and annoyed at the same time, “is a somewhat unusual magnetar in that it’s rotation is slower than normal,
only twenty-two minutes in duration, and its gamma ray bursts are limited to a plane of the stars eclipse.

  “The three planets found in orbit are mostly outside the gamma ray emission plane. Two of them are only in those planes for very short times, and when they are within it their orbits pass between the emissions.”

  “Are you saying the star system was designed?” Jasmine asked.

  “There is no doubt of that,” Lilith replied. “If not intentionally designed, the worlds were moved to their current locations. We know perfectly well The People were capable of this. You are standing on a world that proves it.” She paused to let that sink in. “Moving on, one of the two worlds is the remnants of a gas giant. It was named Asgard. It is determined to be very rich in certain rare elements only found in the center of massive gas giants.

  “The next world was named Niflheim. It is the closest of the three planets to the star, and is often bathed in gamma ray bursts. It is, however, a mineralogical treasure-trove and also stocked with abundant radioactives.

  “The final planet was named Midgard, and it is within the star’s lifebelt, or as human scientists name it for some unknown reason, the Goldilocks zone.” A few people chuckled around the room and she looked up, her face registering suspicion.

  “Later,” Minu said. “Please continue, Lilith.”

  “Very well. The planet Midgard has a standard life bearing oxygen/nitrogen atmosphere with a midrange stable temperature of 17 Celsius. On the colder side for your species, but tolerable.

  “The predominant radiation it gets is infrared, however there is sufficient blue wavelength to allow unaided moving about during planetary day. The planet has a stable biosphere sufficiently diverse enough to feed humans. This includes all normal types of life from microbial up through complicated multicellular animals.

  “Lastly, we found numerous cities, infrastructure, and operating farming and wildlife harvesting systems capable of supporting, at current operating levels, more than a hundred million beings.”

  “It’s a damned turnkey colony,” Bjorn exclaimed.

  “Yes,” Minu agreed. “And I intend to turn the key.”

  “What you are suggesting,” Jasmine said, holding up a hand, “is against Concordian law.”

  “Yes,” Minu replied, turning to face her. “It’s called squatting. The only thing is, this world doesn’t exist in the Concordian database.”

  Dram spoke up. “I’ve reviewed the law along with some Chosen experts. There does appear to be a precedent. A species can claim a world if they are the first to find it.”

  “But you said the Lost apparently built this, and that suggests all these structures as well,” Ken pointed out. “And to what end?”

  “We don’t know,” Minu admitted, holding her hands wide. “We only know there is no evidence anyone ever lived there. In addition to the ground side infrastructure, we believe mining systems are in place on both Niflheim and Asgard, and we found a firebase in orbit similar to the one in Enigma. Except this one has no ships. We’ve reactivated it with the EPCs from Dervish. Its ship handling and light repair systems are currently being utilized to work on the ships we’ve salvaged.”

  “So what are you here asking us for?” Dram asked. “We obviously can’t provide enough crew, even in an optimistic plan.”

  “We’ll still need crew. Lots of them. In fact, I intend to review the possibility of creating a new military branch.”

  “Black navy?” Ken asked.

  “Why black?” Minu wondered.

  “Well, in the old days a navy that operated in the oceans was called a blue water navy. So what you are talking about would be either a space navy or black navy. I just though space navy sounded too much like sci-fi.” Minu shrugged.

  “So if that wasn’t your primary worry, what then?” Dram persisted.

  “I want to begin a colonization effort on Midgard. And since it won’t be public knowledge that we have space ships until after our appointment with destiny on Nexus, I want to bring over Chosen, soldiers, and some dependents.”

  There was a few minutes of discussion. Minu reminded everyone during the discussion that they were all that remained of humanity. And as just how efficiently the T’Chillen had nearly wiped the Rasa out of the universe.

  “As long as we’re only here, we’re vulnerable.”

  Finally there was a consensus in Minu’s favor. She heaved a great sigh without letting anyone else see.

  “So how do you move that many people back and forth?” Jasmine asked. “Your daughter already said that there was a risk of ships being spotted going in and out of the nebula.”

  “Oh,” Minu said, “that part is easy.” She pulled the item she’d retrieved from her safe out of its pocket and held it up for them to see. “And really cool.”

  Sanctuary Island, Plateau Tribe Territory

  Through most of dinner Minu had talked nonstop about the plans for the flight back to Aether. Aaron let her go until the main course was done and she went to get desert, key lime pie.

  “We haven’t talked about what we’re doing on this return trip,” he said.

  “I thought that’s what we’ve been talking about all night,” Minu laughed. But as she put the ancient plate that once belonged to her ancestor in front of Aaron she saw the look on his face. “But that’s not what you’re talking about…”

  “No,” he admitted. “I was talking about myself and Mindy.”

  “I’d just assumed we were all going.”

  “But is that the kind of place for a baby to be going?”

  Minu glanced at the guest room where the nursery was set up and Mindy was sleeping peacefully. She thought about it for a long moment. Long enough for her to sit with her own plate and take a taste of the pie. It had been a welcome home gift from Gregg’s wife, Faye, and it was awesome.

  “She was born in space, dear.”

  “Not by your choice. You wanted to get home to have her, you told me as much.”

  Minu nodded in silent agreement. She had no choice but agree. “I have to go out,” she said. “I’m the only one that can use the device.”

  “You could teach Gregg or Kal’at to do that.”

  Minu thought again and slowly shook her head. “I could, but I won’t. One because I’m not one hundred percent certain how to use it until I start the process. Two is that I need to be there and make sure the rest of what I need to happen is happening.”

  “I don’t know if I agree that it needs to be you.”

  They finished their desert in silence then Aaron helped clear the table and do the dishes, as was their custom when on the island together. They didn’t speak again until they were sitting out on the porch under the stars. She’d dug another wooden recliner out of the storage shed after they’d married. Like hers, it had been made by Mindy Harper’s husband five hundred years ago. Minu thought it might even have been his very own.

  “We haven’t had many arguments in our years together,” Minu said as they watched the dark disk of Remus racing behind the blue-green circle of Romulus.

  “Only a couple,” he agreed.

  “So I don’t want to turn this one into an argument. I can’t order you to go. I wouldn’t even if I could. And I can see your point about taking Mindy with me. Every fiber of my being wants to, but it makes more sense to keep her here with you. I’ll only be gone a few weeks.”

  “That’s a very long time for a newborn.”

  Minu looked away and sighed. “You’re not making this any easier.”

  “It shouldn’t be easy.” She just stared off into the night. Somewhere a few howlers were barking at each other, but they could hardly be heard over the song of night birds. The ecology was continuing to change.

  “I need to go,” she said, “and I’m going.”

  “I understand,” he said. Then he got up to go inside. “The baby and I will wait here.” He stopped and leaned over to kiss her on the forehead before closing the door behind him.

  Minu sta
yed out until Remus was gone behind the house and Romulus was well into the night sky. Even though he was her husband, she was the First, and she didn’t want him to see her crying.

  Chapter 32

  Julast 22nd, 535 AE

  Planet Midgard, Aether System, Galactic Frontier

  The Kaatan slid into orbit around Midgard with Ibeen Alpha and Theta close behind. Four Eseel flew in close formation around them. As Lilith had warned, the tactical jump with the two Ibeen proved difficult. So difficult the Kaatan made two jumps instead.

  “It is an unnecessary risk,” Lilith had finally decided. So they’d taken an extra day to move the transports through one at a time. Carefully and with deliberation, as the ship’s master had required.

  The flight from the arrival point within Aether’s system and Midgard was less than an hour, even by the plodding speed of the Ibeen. Minu floated in the CIC with Lilith, most of one wall of the circular space projecting space ahead of the ship, and the orbiting planet to the other side. The planet was a monochromatic painting, dark and beautiful.

  As they orbited the firebase came within view. When she’d left a month ago there was only a couple ships docked to the firebase, now there were dozens. Many were Eseel being gone over, but there were plenty of the capital ships as well. All their salvaged ships not under crew were there. All except the hybrid Fiisk and the Guul.

  The Fiisk was watching system defense. It orbited just outside the stable jump point, sensors ever vigilant outward where a dozen of the Eseel constantly drifted quietly. The Guul floated less than a kilometer from the firebase, two kilometers of metallic death dimly shining in Aether’s blueish light.

  One of the Ibeen continued to the firebase, the other stayed in formation with the Kaatan as it set up a stable orbit. A shuttle arrived a few minutes later carrying her security detail.