Connection (30 page)

[Twenty – eight minutes Robert. They will need to abandon their ships if they get shorter than fifteen minutes left without disarming. Good idea with the science fiction. They are some great ideas laid out.]

“They need to abandon their ships at fifteen minutes to give them time to get here if they are unable to disarm the self-destruct,” Robert said.

“You are in constant contact with your ship, aren’t you?” Beasley asked.

“Yep,” Robert replied.

“I like the idea. I have considered a space navy since I saw those aliens with you. I thought it was all fake ‘til I saw them changing clothes when you first arrived.”

“Really,” Robert said astonished. “Why then?”

“Besides Twlise being exotically beautiful – the similarity of their bodies and their delight and surprise at common clothes fastenings was too spontaneous.”

“Understand that but you said you considered a space navy then…why?”

“It really hit me that there were intelligent, technologically advanced aliens out there. We could travel there in a reasonable time. I realized that other aliens are probably out there too and we only had one interstellar ship. We would be the Polynesians or the Indians facing technologically advanced foreigners. That’s partially why I reluctantly agreed to go on this mission.”

“We can do something about that IF your people survive the next few minutes,” Robert said.

“Alpha three zero to Prometheus command. Disarmed ours…”

The first ship had disarmed their self-destruct with twenty-five minutes to spare. The others started calling in…Alpha two eight, three-one, two-five…until all but one of the smaller ships and the Prometheus had failed to call in. The Prometheus was five minutes away by radio and probably had several charges. Tod directed the shuttle, Skip, to jump near the Prometheus so they could evacuate the remaining six on board. It would be tight with the robots aboard the shuttle but the robots jammed together in a way that humans could not and needed no environmental support.

“Alpha two-nine. This is Captain Beasley. Abandon ship. I repeat. Abandon ship.”

“Captain. We disarmed the nuke and set it adrift. We’ve started on the explosives aboard but they are a bit different than…”

There was a flash of light from the direction of ship Aplha Two-nine and then there was just debris. Robert directed the returning shuttle to deliver the crew from the Prometheus and then have the robots retrieve the nuke.

We arrayed the remaining ships around the asteroid as Cassandra and Nemesis directed. We were going to use sustained laser strikes to focus on the materials that would be ejected off the surface. The numerous ships would fire at coordinated intervals and the ejecta would drive the asteroid into a new orbit.

[Robert. We will transmit the video to Earth. I will use this opportunity to relocate those finances of the uber powerful on Earth – good distraction. I have also been accumulating dossiers of the manipulation of Earth governments by the rich. Powerful political figures will have their intimate machinations shown to the world just after word dies down about the asteroid.]

“Begin rotation firing on my mark,” commanded Captain Beasley. “Mark.”

The lasers began firing from all the ships. The Cassandra and shuttle added their lasers to the others and the out-gassing from the asteroid was substantial. The cloud of debris attenuated the lasers and the Nemesis had to use its more powerful lasers to burn through and keep up the plume of ejecta. Little-by-little the asteroid was nudged into a new orbit. Three hours later the asteroid was declared to be on a ‘safe’ orbital path and the crews all cheered.

Congratulations were sent from numerous Earth sources and everyone could now stand down and remember the men that had given their lives in the destroyed ship. The files of the dead crew were sent and news stations also began receiving encrypted files detailing the conspiracy to steal the bias drive.

The Earth was safe was the first story. The back-story of another attempted subjugation of the Mars colonists and the attempted theft of the bias drive, were stories two and three. There was growing sentiment that the interstellar, bias drive was needed to protect Earth. Many people thought the government should have taken it no matter what stood in the way.

Robert and Captain Beasley were sharing a drink in Robert’s stateroom aboard the Nemesis.

Captain Beasley tilted his head to the side a bit, as he contemplated the fine dark rum in his glass. “You redirected the asteroid in the first place didn’t you?”

Robert held his glass up to the light and canted his glass to show the refraction of light through the ice and amber liquid. “Why do you say that?” he said lowering it for a sip.

“That asteroid wasn’t on a collision course with Earth until recently – about when you finished the Nemesis. How long did it take you to redirect that asteroid by yourself?”

“Don’t know what you’re talking about?” Robert said.

[Told you he was sharp.]

“You know the polls on Earth are leaning heavily to support the government in the actions they took to ‘acquire’ your bias drive. What are you planning? I think I know you a bit better now and I assume that you have some god-awful ploy to redirect public opinion just like you did that asteroid. By-the-way…my men think you hung the moon. I won’t try to dissuade them…yet. What’s up?” Beasley asked.

“Phase two,” Robert said and took another drink. “I would want the bias drive if I didn’t have it. Have you seen any reports where I tried to give it to the government? Have they mentioned those other ships they built with everything but the bias drive? Did you know those ships have my fusion power supply – they got that one from me and didn’t pay any licensing fees.”

“That doesn’t change the equation. The public wants the drive and they don’t have it. The fear mongers are just warming up on that,” Beasley said.

“That’s what I want. The corruption files are starting to decrypt now.”

“What could they show that would change anything?” Beasley said intrigued.

“They show who was bribed by corporations first of all. The public will see that certain politicians have been paid to influence votes and legislation. Then the legislation will be explained to show how the poor will be exploited by corporations.”

“That has always been the case,” Beasley said.

“What is new is we see the video and audio recordings of the rich and powerful as they explain what they plan to do to the poor and the colonists. They will see and hear them explain how they plan to control the masses and the governments. Anywhere there are electronic devices there have been surreptitious recordings by unscrupulous hackers.”

Beasley started laughing so much he snorted some dark rum through his nose. “Oh damn…that burns like hell. Friggin’ funny but oh that burns.”

[He gets it doesn’t he?]

Yes. He certainly does. How do you think he’ll respond?

[Eighty percent to leaning toward a space patrol. His men are about fifty-fifty right now.]

“Yes. Cassandra and Nemesis have been doing this…lots before I even knew what they were doing and they didn’t know it was ‘wrong’ per se – at first.” Robert took another sip and gathered his thoughts. “They knew others didn’t do it but they thought the truth needed to be shown. They didn’t like other people plotting to kill me and controlling my ships.”

“Didn’t like? Are you saying they’re sentient?” Beasley said.

“More so than many people I know…much more conscious and moral than most people. They both show compassion and ethics – that is more than I can say for any corporation or government entity.”

“It wouldn’t be hard to have more compassion than a corporation or government entity. Their only compassion is when it is in their interest to pretend to be compassionate,” Beasley said and sat there for a minute. “How would this Earth patrol choose leaders? Do you intend to put yourself in charge?”

“Sol Force,” Robert corrected since he meant to protect the whole solar system. “I think the rank and file should vote for a leader but time in service should count too. I think only those in the service should have a vote – similar to ‘being a citizen’ in Heinlein’s Starship Troopers. Makes sense I guess. I’d want an administrative role for planning and logistics. I think Cassandra, Nemesis, and Skip should have votes.”

“Whoa…really! Your machines would have a vote?” Beasley said.

“They’re sentient. They should have say so in what they have to do.”

“They could just duplicate others and then have a controlling vote,” Beasley said.

“It’s hard to get a sentient machine. A guy and gal get drunk; screw, and a few years later you have more voters…not necessarily sentient. It’s more difficult with machines. We should have a sentience test for humans…that would have eliminated many of our politicians, years ago. I wish Earth would just force politicians to pass the same citizenship test they use when citizens become naturalized. That way, they’d understand a little about how government is supposed to work.”

“Okay. Say we have this force. Where would we base it? Where would headquarters be?”

“Mars at first. We could probably train a lot on Earth if we didn’t have a headquarters there to raid. I’d like a planet with a heavier gravity than Earth for training but we may be able to find one closer than LesMa. Heavy worlders have advantages. We’d be welcomed on Mars at the start. It would bring in volunteers and work. We could fly them to Mars for retrofitting. We would replate the hulls of the ships already built on Earth.We’d give Earth the bias drive after we had a large enough protective fleet. We would need to be able to enforce non-exploitation. Corporations would try to run planets like old coal mining camps if they were allowed. They’d breed humans as indentured workers if allowed.”

“You have thought about this haven’t you? How would we change the minds of those on Earth? They wouldn’t just give away those ships,” Beasley said.

[He said ‘we’.]

Caught that.
“We won’t be able to change human nature and I expect armed ships from some nations to challenge us in the not-too-distant future. They will not want to give control. We also have to assume there are other, interstellar, technological civilizations out there. We may find a vibrant civilization on the first exoplanet we get to? That means we better have as much protection as we can get. You wonder how we will get control of those already built Earth ships. You wonder how we’ll start this organization. You have some of the answer already. Let me finance it initially. Let Cassandra and Nemesis distribute the incriminating evidence against the corporations and governments. We will have to discredit many officials.”

Beasley polished off his rum. “You want me to try to persuade my men to join this Space Patrol – what ARE you calling this thing? Earth Defense? Sol Force? Kobe’s Rangers?”

Robert laughed. “I bet they’d be Beasley’s Boys but I like a name like Sol Force. We would be the protection for Earth and any future colonies – not just Earth. We’d have to be self-supporting too. We’d need engineers and scientists in all the fields. We’d sell technology and resources to fund the Force.”

“Sol Force – SF. Decent…not great, but decent. I take it the pay would be high with perks for lifers.”

“I was thinking life extension treatments and advanced training. Cassandra and Nemesis have some good ideas from successful programs used by different groups and nations. You start assessing your troops. Educate them to the corruption that sent them here to die and see what sort of following you can stir up. I’ll start social media blogs on Earth suggesting different things and see what gets traction. We are close to acquiring those ships already.”

“Really?” Beasley said and motioned for a couple more fingers of rum.

                                                                        ****

“Hey Andrew. Have you ever heard of SF Industries? I heard they just bought us out. I can’t find jack about them on the web. These ships we’ve been building have room for that new drive system they’ve been trying to get. I thought we were toast when the

F-35 production was stopped.”

“I’m glad someone bought us. Have you seen stock prices since that corruption information began surfacing? Did you see the videos of our local senators being bribed? Those crooked bastards have been selling tech from these ships to China and India. Our manager gave info to the Russians. Wonder if they’ll lay us off and sell off what we have…I hate that.”

                                                                    ****

,

Steven Weathers was a good post-doc at Brown University. He hadn’t gone anywhere after his PhD defense however…couldn’t get a job. He guessed it was the competition and his research topic. He had thought that electrostatic flow boundaries would have piqued the Navy’s interest. It certainly had military applications if they understood what he had been talking about. The Chinese and Indian universities were cranking out a ton of top-notch graduates though. His job searches and the encrypted response from one of those had led him here.

The receptionist at the desk looked more like a decathlon athlete than any receptionist he’d ever seen. He was about to ask her if he was in the wrong office when she spoke.

“Steven Weathers. Right on time. Pleased to meet you…my name is Jacqueline. Friends call me Quellie.”

“I’m Steven,” he said as he awkwardly held out his hand and blushed realizing she already knew his name. Idiot, he thought but she just smiled and walked him into a small office with a desk and two comfortable chairs.

“Mister Dillingham will be here in just a moment,” she said and left.

Steven looked around the room and realized it wasn’t what it seemed. Several microcameras appeared to be in the ceiling moldings – probably different frequencies. He looked at the arms of his chair and looked underneath the arms – heart rate and temperature sensors. He started looking around the edge of the desk and saw the innocuous vapor sensors. Humm – he thought. Probably measures CO
2
and oxygen…sophisticated…interesting.

A tall man walked in a few seconds later. He was in plain clothes but there was something about him…he walked proud and tall. Steven’s dad had been career military. This guy gave off the same vibes. “How is this tied to the military?” Steven asked.