Day Twenty ∞ Wednesday night (PST)
MASSAGING THE BRIDGE of his nose, Gray drew a long, deep breath.
"Maybe you should lay off the porn on a school night?" Baldie commented from the station on his right.
Gray grunted and lifted a brow at him. "I was watching your wife. She's quite good."
Baldie snorted a chuckle and reached for one of the secure telephones blinking silently beside his new, slim-line monitor.
Grabbing his mug, Gray got up and headed for the refreshments hub. This was his third steaming refill in as many hours, black with no sugar. When he returned to the senior station, he paused and drank a sip as he swept his gaze around the large room. The operations base was manned by a full team of agents tonight, some night-shifters just in, others doing double shift, keeping eyes on several ops across the world. But he had only three operators including his senior agent Baldie monitoring the antimatter containment mission at the moment.
He raised his mug at Baldie who turned to him after putting down the receiver. "You know you've had too much Joe when you can smell it coming out."
Baldie grinned. "Just got word from our asset at Mount Palomar: the target's only just now risen into line-of-sight."
Gray grunted and took another sip as he scanned the multiple views displayed on the huge wall screen. He was beat but sleep wasn't even on the drawing board until he'd seen this phase through. Fourteen markers doing their mock training maneuvers on radar, a fifteenth just entering to rendevouz with the two SR-71s that soon needed refuelling. Three covert-satellite views and two infrared of the target, the failing, other-Earth factory now stabilized. The zoomed-in view of one end included one of the EBE ships. Barely a rice grain compared to the target, and it had grown wheels glowing almost white from antimatter on the infrared spectrum.
And a satellite image of the mysterious ancient orbiter that had inexplicably diverted from its polar orbit to station itself between his planes and the target... That told him it wasn't simply passively orbiting Earth. Someone, -thing, somewhere—if not in the solar system, then way beyond—was still monitoring this planet. It was an unknown, and he hated unknowns.
"Should I give the word?" Baldie asked.
Gray put down his cup, sat down, and scanned again. "What's our asset at Kavalur saying?"
"That it's the same as it's always been. Just there."
"Just keep eyes on it. Don't want to start something stupid." Turning the chair toward his upgraded console, he slid his finger on the rectangle next to the virtual keyboard, selecting one of the satellite icons on the impossibly flat screen. A duplicate of the end view filled his screen, now with two dark rice grains with wheels stationed at the tail end of the factory. He hesitated, uncertain of how to zoom in on the image on this new, futuristic system.
Then he remembered. "Eva, zoom in on SAT-9 feed."
"Affirmed," the too human-like computer voice said inside his ears, and the gray rice grains grew on his screen. "For your information, Admin, to zoom out or in, just pinch or spread your fingers on the pad."
Having that sultry tone so intimately close inside his skull sent a shiver down Gray's spine. An entertaining voice, but even the remote possibility that it could distract his trained agents during a critical operation was undesirable.
"Eva, can I ask you to change your voice?"
Baldie threw him a glance. "Seriously?"
"Yes, I can," the computer replied in Gray's head. "What kind of voice would you like?"
"Let me hear some samples."
"This is the sound of voice one," it said in a male voice. "This is the sound of voice two," a higher pitched voice said. "This is the sound of voice three," a more neutral female voice said. "This is the voice of—"
"Voice three." Gray spread his fingers on the virtual pad. "Can you raise the pitch a notch?"
"How is my voice now, Admin?"
"We'll go with that one."
"And here we were enjoying Eva's voice." Baldie sighed. "She was keeping us on our toes, you know."
Gray grunted. "Bet it wasn't just your toes." He lifted a brow at him but kept his eyes on the zoomed-in view of the ships. No longer like rice grains, they'd changed positions in relation to the factory. Seven white-clad figures left them and headed for the top surface, then one returned to one of the ships. The others exited the frame so he pinched on the pad to zoom out a little.
Let's see if you can— "Eva, I want my monitor to keep eyes on these subjects. Automatically. Can you do that?"
"Yes, as long as they are within the feeds available."
"Do it."
"Affirmed."
"Sir!" a younger agent called from the floor. "Anomaly on SAT-13!"
Both Gray and Baldie spun their chairs to face the wall screen. One of the satellite feeds showing the angled full length of the factory slid over to center-stage and expanded. At first Gray couldn't see what was different, but as the view zoomed toward the upper edge of the hull, he spotted an abnormal glow the shape of a column. It spread like a thinning cloud, covering the width of the factory and rising above it. On the full view of SAT-9, some of the small figures approached and stopped.
Before Gray could order a focus on the infrared feed and a full-spectrum analysis, streaks of white zipped through the misty layer.
∞
—The cluster of meteoroids, Selina's mental voice said. Most are beyond to bypass our intercept, including the larger ones of concern. We will make contact with the first few members of the dust trail in fourteen minutes... Some of you may want to witness the display.
"Most definitely!" Muzzy said.
Sighing in relief, Danny caught the floating container and passed it on to Eckstein in one fluid movement.
"Thank you, Blanc Aave," Mickmi said. "We can hold three more in this net after this one. L'or? How fare your side?"
"The same."
Danny scanned the remaining containers in a quick count as the two mechanical arms plucked a container from either end. "But we have eleven left," he said.
"The remainder we will secure inside," Mickmi replied.
They'd be traveling with antimatter inside the ship? Danny hadn't been expecting that. Then again, inside or outside, the difference in the risk involved was negligible.
"It is safely contained," Mickmi added. "The vessels will monitor the safety status of each one."
When the last six were secured, Mickmi and Lora checked the loaded nets as the men waited, each casually holding a container by a handle.
"Guess I'll see you later," Jagg threw at Danny before leaping off the factory hatch with another.
"Sure." Holding onto the last one by two grips, Danny backed outside into mid-'air', as Artemae approached. "You're not coming with us?"
Glimpsing an odd swirling movement from the wall far behind her, he tilted his head, squinting, but the closing hatch interrupted his view. The last thing he saw was Artemae's fingers wiggling bye-bye.
"Return to the vessels," Mickmi said.
Danny caught up with her. —That was easy peasy. He could feel her smile in response.
They followed Eckstein and Muzzy who were already on their way with their two containers, but then they came to a halt.
"What's wrong?" Danny stopped beside them and saw what they were staring at. No longer did the shape of Mickmi's ship remind him of a huge monarch cocoon, now it had a large underbelly. "Storage room?"
"Aye." Mickmi passed ahead of them.
"How can..." Eckstein seemed to be at a loss for words as Muzzy moved to his left for his chest-mounted experimental camera to take it all in.
"It grows as needed. It's already half-times longer than when I saw it the first time." Danny continued toward widening entrance. "I guess you can call it a living ship."
"Is it really alive?" Muzzy asked. "The damn thing looks like it's pregnant!"
Like a pregnant submarine. Danny chuckled at the thought. "In a manner of speaking, yeah, you could say it's alive." He entered after Mickmi, his boots making electromagnetic contact with the vessel floor.
"If you don't mind, ma'am," Eckstein halted next to Danny, "could you explain how that's possible?"
"I am afraid not," Mickmi replied. "I can only say that the artificial intelligence intrinsic to the vessel controls every cell of its being, not too dissimilar to how our unconscious controls every aspect of our bodies. This facilitates configuration adaptations needed over time."
The hull resealed itself behind Muzzy, and the external atmosphere indicator on Danny's HUD climbed from <<0%>> to <<80%>> before the translucent airlock shrank into the floor. Then a green indicator flashed on the HUD, okaying the retraction of the helmet.
"Please place the antimatter along the wall," Mickmi said. "Deymos will secure them."
"Space them out," Danny said as he positioned his container between Muzzy's and Eckstein's. "That's how they were stored in the factory." He watched them sink five inches into the floor, then returned to the airlock area.
Muzzy rejoined them, armed with his overloaded camera. As the hull reopened, the ship moved upward to just above the edge of the factory. The dark metal stretched out before them, gently curving down on either side.
"I have activated your personal shields," Mickmi said as the crew from both ships took off.
Danny followed and paused on the factory hull. Atlas headed to the left, while up ahead, Lora had also stopped, watching Jagg and the airmen approach Selina's glow. It hovered, spreading across the width and breadth of the factory as it rose, thinning in brightness. It seemed like she was complementing the quasi-shield extending from the ships.
Then Danny noticed Mickmi's marker on his HUD hadn't moved from its spot at the bottom of the display. She remained in front of her ship so he turned back. He sat down on the ledge in front of Deymos' entrance, drew a couple of sips from his straw, and patted on the space beside him.
—Rest your legs, Mi. On second thought, that was funny. There was no tiring gravity, plus the servomechanisms in the spacesuit assisted with all strenuous activities. He grinned. Sit with me.
As she sank down beside him with an amused smile, something flashed up ahead, and he snapped up his head. The first few streaked through the layer of mist and vanished before they made it through.
"Wow," he breathed.
It turned into an intermittent lightshow zipping down above the men, moving closer as they travelled through space, a meteorite shower never touching the factory hull.
"Most no bigger than sand grains," Mickmi said thoughtfully. "Space dust particles."
"Yeah..." Danny lifted his gaze in wonder as it approached overhead like a sparkling drizzle. "Enough to burn up before making it through."
A person marker appeared behind his position on the HUD. Before he could turn to look, Artemae's voice sounded inside his ears.
"I love shooting stars!"
Pink streaked over his head as Artemae leaped out of Mickmi's ship. Tilting her helmetless head, she watched the display for a moment, her hair waving like seaweeds in the ocean. Then she turned to face them with a perturbed expression.
—Did I say that appropriately? Danny heard her say inside his mind.
He chuckled. "Sure. So does my sister. Gina would've loved this."
Artemae brightened at that. "I remember her."
Huh? "But you've never met."
"Met, no. But I was always there," she waved her finger in a circle, "hovering around."
Oh? Danny frowned in thought. He recalled some weird, dark mist hanging around Mickmi the first few days. Had that been her?
Artemae winked and turned to Mickmi beside him. —I have a suggestion.
Lora sailed across to join them. —I have been thinking about what we should do with the plant.
"As have I." Mickmi gestured at them. "L'or?"
"The plant is stable now," Lora said, "we should bring it with us instead of scrapping it. It will give us a jumpstart on raw materials for the mother vessel."
"Agreed." Mickmi turned her gaze to the unsuited girl.
"But that's what I was going to say!"
—Artemae...
—I know, Artemae grinned, Mother. I'm just being a girl. Can't I just be a girl sometimes? It's fun! She winked at Danny, then switched to a more serious tone, "We can salvage it. I've already dismantled and teleported the maintenance and manufacture bots into storage. I started ten thousand nano-replicators on the breakdown process of the plant 106 minutes and 25 seconds ago. Their replication period's at 219 seconds so they've almost completed processing the interior already, interior walls, the Control Core and computer system, most of the floors and support structure."
"Oh," Danny mumbled as he watched Atlas approach from the left edge of Nightstar 4. So that's what the swirling wall was about. She'd started at it while they were still unloading the antimatter.
"Exponential conversion," Lora commented, nodding.
"Yes! And most of the raw material mined as well. We'll have plenty of aluminium, and a good selection of minerals from the raw materials. I can't report on the exact quantities until that's fully processed, but we've got the usual iron and nickel, and good amounts of cobalt, gold, hydrogen, irid-, magnes-, osm-, pallad-, platin-, rhod-, and ruthenium. Best of all, we're getting ready-made titariad steel to start hull growing with. There's 1,715.3 square meters worth of it in the plant hull. That's equivalent to 67 billion, 905 million, 779 tho—"
Mickmi lifted a hand to halt her. "Thank you, Artemae. No need to report in such detail."
Artemae pouted for a moment, glanced at Atlas, then ploughed on, "—ousand and 889 nanoreps. Not counting the exposure-activated hull sealant. We'd get a lot more titariad if the hull were completely solid... The nanoreps will start on it in 386 seconds. Since we'll have 158 times more nanos than the hull will produce, it'll be done in a," she snapped her fingers, "and Nightstar will be completely nanotized. Then they'll just use their PGF to follow us." Her chest heaved as if she was taking a deep breath after a long discourse, even though there was no air and she hadn't once opened her mouth to speak.
"What's up?" Jagg leaped in slow-motion from the hull to Lora's side. "That's one helluva closeup show."
Eckstein and Tillman weren't far behind, and Selina's mist contracted to a coherent body of light, her human form partially distinguishable.
"I think I got some good shots," Muzzy said as he aimed at them from above.
Mickmi rose, looking around at everyone. "Thank you, gentlemen. We have completed the critical first step of our mission. Atlas, have you something new to report?"
"The situation below remains unchanged. Fourteen planes still maintaining circuits. And that one unknown. Still no sign of threat but I wouldn't take it for granted, princess. We're crossing the Atlantic now, we'll be approaching the Americas. What's our altitude?"
"We're at 667 kilometers now," Artemae replied.
"Nightstar 4's descent has slowed significantly," Mickmi said.
"There are intercontinentals with apogees high enough to take out targets at over 600 kilometers," Atlas said. "If we're done here, let's get out of orbit most ricky-tick."
"Asap," Tillman added. "Better not give them the remotest reason to shoot us into space oblivion if we enter US airspace."
"Just say it, man," Jagg said. "Smithereens."
"Thank you, Atlas," Mickmi said. "Gentlemen, we shall head for the Moon now. Take the opportunity to eat, rest, and refresh yourselves. Our expected time of arrival is in eighteen hours."
∞
"They're moving," Baldie said.
"I can see that." Gray strode to the center of the oversight floor to watch the wide-screen feeds. Now the focus was on SAT-10 where one of the wheeled rice grains travelled across the facing flank of the antimatter factory at a snail's pace. "What's the target's dimensions?"
"Three hundred meters by 75, sir," one of his men on the operations floor answered.
They must be inspecting the hull again. Gray scanned the other satellite feeds on either side, then his gaze was drawn to the vastly improved thermographic view. Earlier, the only points of interest had been the light blue figures at work, moving hundreds of green objects highlighted by near-white core—all in clear crisp colors unlike what had been possible before the system upgrade. The factory itself had displayed a steady dark blue, with a central area shifting to green. That area had disappeared almost a half-hour ago. Now, as the purple rice grain passed by, the blue appeared to be moving into a darker shade.
"Eva, focus on SAT-13 infrared," Gray said.
"Affirmed," the neutral female AI voice responded, and the two feeds exchanged places.
On the larger view, the exaggerated colors appeared to flicker, but Gray couldn't pinpoint anything specific.
"Eva, zoom in on left of center quadrant."
"Affirmed."
"Eva," Gray said as the section of the surreal factory hull filled the frame, "there's no need to affirm everything I say if I can see your response affirming my request."
"Setting changed as requested, Admin."
Now he could see flickering specks of purple and black breaking up the dark blue. "Do you know what's causing that?"
Baldie turned to look at the wall screen. "No... Seems like the temperature is dropping further."
"Yes, but look at the pattern." Gray stepped down on the main floor to get closer to the wall screen and squinted at the infrared display. "No structure's thermic descent happens like that. It's like..."
The mottled patches of black grew, squeezing out the blue and purple to merge with each other until the whole screen turned black with a few specks of light breaking through.
"Eva, completely zoom out infrared."
The full view showed the two bright-wheeled purple rice grains at far right, the remainder of the frame filled with a black void speckled with the familiar splatter of stars.
"Sir!" one of the operators on the floor called out. "The asset's gone!"
"What the..." Gray muttered, scanning the other satellite feeds as Baldie rose from his seat, staring at the screens.
There was no factory, no structure at all.
"Eva, give me maximum available zoom on the infrared!"
More and more stars became visible until the frame stopped. Gray scrutinized it for several seconds. The bright specks weren't quite as bright as he expected, clusters of their heat signatures slightly dulled and brightened intermittently as if obscured by some swirling cloud. Then they returned to their usual brightness.
"Admin," Gray heard inside his ear, "I have received a transmission for you."
Oh? "Go ahead." He turned around to meet Baldie's questioning gaze.
"Mister Gray." Gray recognized the EBE queen's voice. "This is Mickmi Lepantra Wamba. I can advise you of the successful removal of the antimatter. No material from Nightstar 4 shall enter your mesosphere. We proceed on the next phase of our mission now."
— ∞ —
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