“I understand,” the Bose motile said. “I should be able to translate it for you.”
“I’d like you to try,” Wilson said. “It’s been bothering me ever since we found out what the Starflyer is. Suppose it was talking to another ship?”
“That’s unlikely,” Dudley Bose said. He’d inched his way closer to them as soon as Wilson started talking to the Bose motile.
Wilson pressed his teeth together, then smiled tightly. “Why’s that?”
“The flare emission was omnidirectional.”
“I imagine their ships would have remained silent during flight so as not to attract attention from whoever built the barriers,” Anna said. “Once the Starflyer had landed, it wouldn’t know where any of the others are. It would have to broadcast in all directions.”
“Which it actually didn’t,” the Bose motile said. “The Far Away star has a rotation of twenty-five days. As the flare only lasted for seven days, the signal was only broadcast across a relatively narrow sector of the galaxy, one that didn’t include the Dyson Pair; in fact, the star’s bulk would have shielded them from the signal.”
“Can we just examine the signal?” Wilson said. He was beginning to regret mentioning it. His e-butler accessed the national library on Damaran, and pulled out a recording of the signal.
They all waited while the Bose motile reviewed it. The initial flurry of activity in the lecture theater that had accompanied Qatux’s arrival was now dying down. Most of the technical systems were set up, Qatux and Tiger Pansy were talking together, Cat’s Claws remained on duty by the main entrance, Nelson maintained a number of his own security staff around himself and Paula. The only person Wilson couldn’t see was Mellanie.
“Simple enough,” the Bose motile said. “It’s basically an identity, which is MorningLightMountain17,735, followed by a short message: I am here. If any of I/us survive, contact me or fly here. The patterns are a very old form, but the content is easy enough to decipher, there is little ambiguity.”
“Did we ever detect another flare?” Anna asked. “An answer to the Starflyer?”
“No,” Dudley said.
“That doesn’t mean there wasn’t one,” the Bose motile said. “If another survivor picked up the signal, it could have used an interstellar communications maser to reply. Their ships were all equipped with them. The Commonwealth would never see that.”
Wilson was thinking along similar lines. “So we don’t actually know if there are any more of these alienPrimes at loose.”
“If one survived, it is logical to assume there could be others,” the Bose motile said. “Though I doubt there can be many; the Dyson Beta Primes had only just started building starships; they didn’t have the production capacity of Dyson Alpha when the barriers were established. The numbers would be small.”
“But if any of them landed on a world more useful than Far Away, there’s no telling how big their civilization is by now. Primes almost match the old nightmare of exponential expansion.”
“You should assume that the Dyson Alpha Primes had starships in flight as well,” Anna said.
“We are going to have to conduct an extensive search of stars in that sector of the galaxy,” the Bose motile said. “The problem could be more widespread than originally thought.”
“If Nigel Sheldon does initiate novas, the problem will be considerably reduced,” Dudley said.
The lecture theater’s main doors opened, and Oscar walked through. He caught sight of Wilson and waved happily.
“What the hell are you doing here?” Wilson said, smiling happily.
“I might ask you the same thing,” Oscar said after he’d collected his kiss from Anna. “You should have carried him off back to York5 and started a decent honeymoon,” he scolded her.
“Don’t think I didn’t want to,” she said wistfully. “So when did you get back?”
“About five hours ago.”
“Damn, I’m glad you’re okay,” Wilson said. “Are you reloading?”
“The Dublin is, yes. I’ve got another job.”
“What? Columbia isn’t being difficult about you being one of my placements, is he?”
“No, quite the opposite. Columbia is coming around to the idea the Starflyer might be genuine. I’ve been appointed as a glorified messenger boy.” He explained the Paris team’s mission. “Sheldon said you’d brief me on this little black ops setup you’ve got running here. Is that really a Raiel?” He was staring at Qatux.
“Yes, it really is,” Wilson said. “It’s called Qatux, and it’s agreed to help us root out Starflyer agents.”
“Uh huh.” Oscar faced the Bose motile. “And that alien?”
“It’s a Prime,” Anna said with a laugh. “Our deadliest enemy.”
“The good news is that this one is harmless and on our side,” Wilson said.
“And the bad?”
“It’s yet another version of Dudley Bose.”
Alic ran the integration program one last time. The additional weapons mounted on his armor suit responded properly. Two particle lances on malmetal arms that were secured to the base of his spine rose up over his shoulders, and swung from side to side as his sensors ran a targeting program. They locked on to Vic, whose armor suit had almost doubled in size thanks to the backpack missile dispenser.
“Hey, careful who you’re pointing those things at,” Vic complained.
The particle lances retracted, folding back parallel to Alic’s spine. He was as anxious as any first-day recruit to fire them. He hadn’t known particle lances could be built so small, and even with modern power cells he didn’t have many shots. Of course, without the armor and malmetal he could barely pick one up, they weighed so much; he couldn’t imagine what they were made out of, solid uranium by the feel of it.
John King and Jim Nwan both had rotary launches on their forearms, with a flexible feed tube snaking around to their backpacks. Matthew Oldfield was carrying all the electronic warfare systems; there were so many sneekbots clinging to his suit, he looked like the king of the insects. Matthew also managed the cage, three large matte-black mobile cubes that should be powerful enough to hold Tarlo.
Alic was mildly impressed that the carriage floor could take their combined weight. He brought the management array systems up into his virtual vision. Midnight-black hands flicked over the control icons. Narrabri station traffic control responded with a transit authorization, and they started moving with a small judder.
“We’re on the move,” he told Oscar.
“Okay, I’ll inform Alster. He’s in the gateway control center. What’s Tarlo doing?”
“Li says he’s still up in the security room.”
“You sure you want to do this?”
“It’s not quite what I thought I’d be doing when I woke up this morning, but yeah.”
“Good luck.”
“Yeah, see you in fifteen years.”
Their speed built up as soon as they left the track maintenance division shed. The station force field curved overhead, a gray film smearing the sky. Above that, the Narrabri city force field extended from horizon to horizon, its apex reaching out of the troposphere. The borealis storms had died down now, though the highly charged atmosphere was still plagued by severe lightning storms. Brutal blue-white flashes rippled around the boundary of the city force field. Alic felt ridiculously safe underneath all that technological protection. The Primes had flung their worst at Wessex, and the Big15 planet remained secure. It made him confident for the future.
The carriage snaked over points every few seconds, clicking and rattling as it moved to a different set of rails, then switching again. Long trains slid past on either side, blurs of lighted windows. Up ahead, a long stretch of pale rosy light spilled out from the gateways to douse the myriad tracks. It had gaps in it, dark shadowy sections. Gateways to the Second47, Alic thought. They’d never shine their unique starlight here again. The knowledge made him sad.
“Anything new on Tarlo?” he asked Matthew.
br /> “No, Boss.”
“Okay.” He knew there wasn’t. Just had to do something to distract his nerves, which were far too jumpy.
The carriage lined up on the cliff face of gateways and carried on forward at a much slower speed. There were fewer trains running on this section of the station yard. They passed a GH7 class engine waiting on a siding; the massive machine only had five wagons attached, their pea-green metal bodywork caked in topaz sand thick enough to obscure their company logo.
His e-butler told him Daniel Alster was calling.
“You should be on the direct Boongate line in another couple of minutes,” Alster said. “Once you’re there, we will open the gateway and give you transit clearance. It will close thirty seconds after you’re through.”
“Right, thanks.”
“Good luck.”
“Looking good,” Alic told his arrest team. His heart started to beat a lot faster as the carriage squeaked and rolled onward.
Oscar simply couldn’t take his eyes off Tiger Pansy. She’d caught him staring quite a few times, and he’d managed to deflect her questioning gaze with a polite half smile. He knew it was getting close to rudeness now, but she was so out of place here her attraction was akin to a star’s gravity well. But then, would someone like her care about middle-class standards of rudeness? And what does that judgment say about me? Damn, was Adam right about what I’ve become?
“You’re going to have to stop that,” Anna said, and moved to stand in front of him.
“I know,” he mumbled awkwardly.
Her smile became evil. “If you’re a big fan, you should get over that shy streak and go ask her for an autograph.”
“Well, shucks, I guess I’m just too bashful.”
Wilson chuckled. “Stop letting her bully you, man.”
“Advice from the henpecked husband. Great, just what I need.”
Wilson’s tranquillity chilled rapidly. “Oh, hell,” he whispered. “Dudley Bose is on the way over. Both versions. The human one looks pissed.”
Oscar resisted the impulse to turn around. “Time to make a break for it?”
“Too late,” Anna said through gritted teeth and a broad false smile.
“Captain Monroe.” Dudley’s imperious voice cut right through Oscar’s residual good humor. He turned and summoned up a smile. “Dudley. I understand you’ve reacquired your memories.” His gaze flicked to the tall alien with its odd stalklike tentacles. It unnerved him to see something resembling an eye on the end of one bending around to return the gaze. This was worse than locking stares with Tiger Pansy.
“Yes, you bastard,” the human Dudley spat. “I got my memory back. So I know what you did to me.”
People nearest to them hushed up and stole some circumspect looks.
“Problem?” Wilson asked politely.
“Like you care,” Dudley sneered. “You who left me there to die.”
“You make it sound deliberate,” Anna said.
“Well, wasn’t it?” Dudley demanded. “You just kept telling us to go farther in. All the time: Just a little bit farther, Dudley. Go on, find out what’s around the next spiral. This is really interesting. And we trusted you.”
“I never said that,” Oscar insisted. He was racking his memories of those frantic last minutes by the Watchtower. “Your comrelay failed as soon as you entered the tunnel.”
“Liar! You knew MorningLightMountain’s ships were on their way. I’ve seen the official recordings; the whole ship was panicking. Yet you let us carry on. You dumped us like we were garbage.”
“If you’d really accessed the original recordings you’d know we busted our balls trying to reestablish contact,” Oscar said with tight anger. “Mac and Frances put their asses on the line to try to get you back. It was you that ignored protocol; you should have come back as soon as you lost contact. If you’d paid the slightest bit of attention to your training you’d have known that. But, oh no, you were too busy playing up for the unisphere media to bother with training like the rest of us. The Great Discoverer off to further the frontier of human knowledge. You’re as ignorant as you are arrogant, and that hideous little combination is what plunged us into this war.”
Wilson hurriedly stepped between them. Oscar was annoyed. He would have liked to have smacked Dudley right on the nose, and to hell with how bad it would make him look.
“Enough, the pair of you,” Wilson said. The tone of command was perfect. Oscar felt himself scowling at what he could see of Dudley, but still backed off. I’ll be damned, how did he do that?
“We clearly need to go over what happened to establish exactly where the communications failure occurred,” Wilson continued. “But this is not the time or the place.”
“Pha.” Dudley waved a hand in disgust. “Official inquiry by a navy already discredited. Did you prepare the whitewash answers before the President fired you?”
A now furious Oscar sidestepped around Wilson. “Part of the training you missed while you were mouthing off on talk shows was how to recognize impossible situations. You should have wiped your memorycell and suicided as soon as you were captured. Where did MorningLightMountain get the stellar coordinates for our planets, eh? Your mind! You’re not just a traitor, you’re a coward with it!”
Dudley went for him, fists raised. The Bose motile hooked a thick curving arm around his torso, preventing him from reaching Oscar.
Wilson pushed Oscar hard in the chest, shoving him back. A quick pushing match followed before Oscar’s heat withered in shame. “Sorry,” he mumbled, mortified to find that Anna was helping to restrain him as well. “He just gets to me.”
“I know,” Wilson said; his arm was still draped loosely over Oscar’s shoulder, muscles tensed in case he needed to push again.
It was an image mirrored by Dudley and the Bose motile, who were walking in the other direction. Dudley managed to look back, and screwed his face up in rage.
Oscar sucked in his lower lip, trying desperately to resist the temptation to start it all up again. Anna and Wilson were both pressing in close.
“Come on,” she murmured. “Let it go. Down, boy. Calmly.”
“All right.” Now thoroughly embarrassed, Oscar held his hands up in surrender. “Backing off. Doing yoga; some balls like that.”
Anna grinned. “Never knew you had it in you.” Her lips puckered up in a mocking pout. “Soooo macho.”
Oscar just winced. “Don’t. Please.”
Wilson gave him a rueful grin, then sobered. “You know, much as I dislike Bose, that is a worryingly big discrepancy.”
“The Starflyer agent?” Oscar guessed.
“My first choice. Damn, we really are going to have to sit at a table with the little shit and listen to what he has to say.”
“Better off with the motile. It doesn’t look like a permanent walking hissy fit.”
“Hey, behave.” Anna punched him on the arm.
“Ow.” Oscar rubbed at the pain, then noticed Tiger Pansy standing a couple of meters away. She had an avid grin as she chomped away on her gum. “You guys,” she said with shrill admiration. “You’re so intense. Really.”
“What the hell is that?” Adam asked.
The sensors that the Guardians had planted around the approach to the Boongate gateway were showing a single dilapidated old carriage creeping forward onto the main Boongate line.
“It’s the type of carriage the station maintenance crews use,” Kieran said.
The sensor image wobbled, then expanded. Kieran was focusing the camera on the carriage windows. There wasn’t much to see. A yellow light illuminated the interior of the carriage, diffused by the grimy glass. There were dark humanoid shadows moving around inside. Bigger than the average human. Much bigger.
“Bradley?” Adam asked. “What do you think?”
“It seems an unlikely vehicle for the Starflyer to use. On the other hand, because that’s not what we’re expecting…”
“It does have a small cargo han
dling ability,” Kieran said. “How big does it have to be?”
“I don’t know,” Bradley said.
Adam shook his head. He really didn’t like that carriage. It was wrong, and he knew it. But he couldn’t work out what it might be doing.
Sensor data such as it was filled his virtual vision. The carriage certainly didn’t have a force field. But there were some large power sources inside, five of them. And its communications link to traffic control was all standard.
He touched the icons of the small combat team they’d hidden out near the gateway. “Get ready,” he told them.
“If it’s the Starflyer, it will be heavily protected,” Bradley warned.
“I know. Call Burnelli, get her to find out what that is.” He took his armor suit helmet from the cab’s console where it had been lying, and locked it over his head. A hundred meters in front of him, the shed doors began to slide open.
***
“Sir, the navy team is in position,” Daniel Alster reported.
“Okay,” Nigel said. His virtual hands pulled the wormhole activation code from an encrypted store, and sent it to the Boongate gateway control center.
“Confirm activation code,” Alster said. “We’re opening it now.”
“Get them through as fast as you can, Daniel, please.”
“Yes, sir.”
Nigel shifted the gateway control center data to a part of his virtual vision grid where he could monitor it. In front of him, the doors to the lecture theater opened automatically for himself and Nelson. “They’re going through,” he told the security chief.
“I hope it’s worth it.”
“With confirmed Starflyer agents in custody, Columbia will fall into place without a fight. That makes it worthwhile.” Nigel scanned across the auditorium floor to see the various groups. He was halfway to Qatux when Mellanie intercepted him, with an uncomfortable-looking Hoshe in tow. “We’ve got to get some people back from Boongate,” she said.
“Excuse me?” He couldn’t help glancing over at Oscar, who was in a huddle with Wilson and Anna. Oscar looked up expectantly.
“There’s a Senate Security team stranded there.”