Fatal Boarding (17 page)

I had to cut her off. "Maureen, I'm very
busy at the moment, but it’s okay. I need to speak with you about
something. Let's go in the office, okay?"

She cocked her head back, and stared. I held
my outstretched hand in the direction of the door. She sneered and
marched in ahead of me. I glanced at Ann Marie long enough to see
her roll her eyes and shake her head.

Before the door could close, Brandon started
in again. "Why were you selected as Commander Tolson's replacement?
You're not the most qualified. Is that a standing order, or just a
temporary assignment?"

"Listen, Maureen. We don't have time to go
over everything that's happened."

"Why haven't I been reinstated to duty?
Commander Tolson assured me he would do that today!" She stammered
the last part, remembering too late how much I knew.

"You're back on duty as of now, Maureen. And
I need your help with something important. It will be Data
Analysis’ and Life Science’s number one priority."

Curiosity overcame anger. "By whose
authority? What is the requirement?"

"Missing persons. We have a number of them.
Captain Grey has just been added to the list."

"You must be joking!"

"In my position, do you think I would make
jokes about this?"

"What has Life Sciences got to do with
missing people?"

"If you'll let me finish, I'll explain. Life
Science controls the scanning array that detects any life forms on
the places we visit. I need to know, can that capability be
reconfigured to look for life signs on board this ship?"

It took her a second to put her animosity
aside and realize what needed to be done. She looked up with a
disarmed expression. "You want Life Sciences to scan the interior
of the ship to look for missing people?"

"Can it be done?"

"Why don't you just conduct a deck by deck
search?"

"I need something faster. Can it be
done?"

"Yes, it's been done before. It's considered
a waste of resources in such a controlled area, but the arrays are
electronically steer-able."

"And you would be able to isolate individual
crewman and tell me where they are located?"

"We couldn't identify them, of course, but
yes, we would be able to see where each one is. It's a simple x, y,
z, axis translation into decks and compartments."

"How long to set up and do it?"

"If they drop everything else, maybe 30
minutes."

"Please coordinate with Dr. Leadstrom and
start immediately. Let nothing interrupt you." I stood and tapped
the door open for her. She remained seated as though she were
searching for an adequate way to protest. Finally, with a look of
restrained contempt, she waved a hand in frustration, then stood
and stiffly left the room.

I leaned against the door and watched her
go. Ann Marie looked up sympathetically from her desk.

"Ann Marie, please call up the personnel
data base and put her back on active, god help us. Then call Kusama
on the bridge and tell him to have the bridge crew stand down.
There will be a meeting for department heads and bridge officers in
one hour--make that 14:00. Call Frank Parker and tell him to shut
down the Scouts and get the pilots out. The attempt will be
rescheduled. Then, contact Doctor Pacell and patch me in. And, one
last thing, in fifteen minutes, patch me through to Life Sciences
so I can be sure she's doing what I asked. Got all that?"

"Got it. But, some of them won't like
it."

"I'm glad you're here, Ann Marie."

By the time I sat back down at Jim Tolson's
terminal, she had the emergency OR already on the line. It took a
minute for Doctor Pacell to arrive at his station.

"I'm sorry to interrupt, Doctor. Any
progress?"

On my screen Pacell looked off to his left
and made a quick wave of direction, then returned his attention. "I
have nothing for you as yet, Adrain. I have organized a team to
work on our problem, but we're just getting started. It took a
while for them to adjust, if you know what I mean. Did the Captain
advise you this was being done?"

"Yes, I understand. That's part of my reason
for calling. The Captain appears to be missing now. Under the
circumstances, I doubt he would willfully allow himself to be out
of touch. Is it possible he was more susceptible than the rest of
us and has contracted the same thing as Tolson?"

It alarmed the Doctor still further. He
tilted his head forward and furrowed his brow. He stared at me
through the screen for a moment, and then shook his head. "Adrian,
we can't even say this is an infection. It could be some sort of
radiation poisoning, or even something in the water supply. In any
case, if the Captain is missing, it's very possibly an indication
that whatever this is, it may be spreading rapidly. He must be
found immediately for there to be any hope!"

Ann Marie's icon began flashing in the
corner of my screen. "We're working on it, Doctor. Is there
anything preventative you can suggest we do at this point?"

"Only that you keep things as calm as
possible. Word is already starting to leak out about Tolson. I'm
afraid we'll have mass hysteria on our hands soon if we don't
control it."

The Life Sciences icon began flashing below
Ann Marie's. "I'm not sure how to control this, Doctor. We can't go
making a ship-wide announcement asking everyone to remain
calm."

To my surprise, the office door slid open.
R.J. was being held back by Ann Marie. They were arguing. R.J. had
his clipboard and printouts in one hand and was trying to gently
break away with the other.

"Adrian, we've got to talk, now!"

I turned back to the screen. "Doctor, I'll
call you back."

"Pacell, out."

I swiveled to face them. "R.J., I’ve got
more than anyone could possibly handle right now. Life Sciences is
holding. Is it that important?"

Ann Marie let go of his shoulder. He charged
in and sat by the desk facing me, resting his clipboard and
printouts in his lap. "I know what's going on. It's insane, but I
know I'm right!"

I have learned to give R.J. latitude. He is
often eccentric, but highly reliable. His mind tends to become
relentless when in pursuit of understanding. A mystery has no
chance against him. I looked over at the flashing Life Sciences
icon and then back at him. I waved at Ann Marie to close the door.
"Okay, old friend. Everyone else waits. What is so important?"

He puffed up and leaned forward. "I can't
prove it yet, so you must hear the evidence. When I'm through,
you'll agree."

"I'm all ears."

"I just played every computer game we have
on board. I won some and lost some."

"R.J., Life Sciences is holding!"

"The point is they all worked perfectly. So,
I did a study of which of our systems are failing, and which are
not."

"So? We did that, too. No common
denominators."

"Yes! Yes, yes, common denominators! Take it
one system at a time. What failed first?”

“Navigation”

“And what happens when you loose
navigation?”

“You can’t go anywhere.”

“Okay, what failed next?”

“Propulsion related systems.”

“And what happens when you loose that?”

“Obviously, again, you can’t go
anywhere.”

“And the next failure?”

“Environmental, gravity.”

“And so you loose what?”

“Your lunch and the ability to accelerate to
light.”

“Do you see the pattern? All the systems we
need to leave have crashed. Now, which stuff has been okay?”

“Life support. Atmosphere, temperature
control, pressurization”

“Exactly. Everything we need to stay
alive.”

“Are you trying to say what I think you’re
trying to say?”

“We are being kept here and kept alive.”

“That’s a bit of a leap, but you are scaring
me.”

"It's too coincidental. It can't be by
chance!"

For a moment, I did not want to accept what
he was proposing. Abruptly, a new wave of fear flushed through me.
The truth was knocking at the door, like the grim reaper

He leaned forward. "It's worse than you
think. Assume that someone is attempting to trap us here. Where do
you think they are right this minute?"

"There are only two ships anywhere in
scanner range. There is nobody next door that we know. Are you
trying to say that we've been boarded?"

"Yes!"

"How? We'd have seen any hatch opening or
any tampering with the habitat module. Alarms would have gone off
everywhere."

R.J. leaned further forward and narrowed his
stare. "Unless it was a hatch that was supposed to be open. Tell me
what happened when you opened and closed the outer door on the
airlock during the EVA."

"You know I can't remember that."

"Precisely. And what an odd coincidence that
both your memory, and the camera views are lost. You were the last
in line. You closed the outer door. Everyone else was halfway to
the other ship before you caught up. Why were you so late?"

"So you are hypothesizing that as we left
the airlock, someone else went in."

"Then the convenient accident on the other
ship. It caused a mad panic in the airlock when you returned. A
dozen people were scrambling in and out of there. No one paid any
attention to anything but the injured. They could have hid and
waited for the right moment to leave."

"Hid where?"

"In the unused emergency spacesuits hooked
to the side wall."

"Their spacesuits would have had to fit
inside ours."

"Yes."

"Okay, some of this is hard to swallow, but
I admit it fits our situation in an extreme kind of way. But, we
did just have a depressurization problem.”

He looked surprised. "Which one?"

"The B-deck hanger bay. We were supposed to
put the scouts out. The system refused the commands to do it."

"Of course. They don't want us pushing away.
They have us right where they want us."

"Jesus, R.J.!"

"So assume somebody is on board. What's the
first thing they mess with? How about the ship's net? They learn
who's who, and everything they need to know about us. Remember how
terminals were coming on by themselves? So what do they do next?
Who do they go after? How about the head of Security?"

"Why hasn't anyone seen them?"

"I don't know, but not everything they've
done has worked. They're not infallible. The cool down that almost
happened in main engineering. It takes someone with an access code
and the proper keyboard entries to make that happen. The two guys
who were fighting over nothing were just a distraction to allow
that happen to happen. If the heater core had cooled, we would have
been stuck here for a long time. It didn't work."

"And the loss of gravity?"

"Can't go anywhere without gravity to
compensate for acceleration. Plus it creates a hell of a lot of
confusion. No deaths, though. They want us alive."

I rubbed my forehead. “You can sure weave a
story, R.J.”

"Please disprove what I'm saying, Adrian. I
do not relish the idea that we are now someone's property."

I leaned back and exhaled. "R.J., how do you
come up with these complex little gems? It's like you took a dozen
unrelated events and created a bizarre explanation to connect
them!"

"Prove me wrong. I beg you!"

I shook myself out of it and looked at the
Life Sciences icon still flashing. I held up one hand to R.J. and
tapped the open key. "Tarn here, sorry to keep you holding for so
long."

"Commander, this is Dr. Leadstrom.
Originally we had called to tell you we were about to attempt the
inward scan you requested, but we've just completed it. Sorry, but
there's been a bit of a glitch. We thought we had the data
translation program worked out, but there's an error somewhere,
probably in the software conversion program. It'll take some time
to sort out."

"Did you get any data at all?"

"That's what I'm saying, Commander. We've
got data, but it’s obviously wrong. We’re counting echoes or
something. We show 155 life forms on board, and we know there can
only be 150. It has to be a line in the software. We're working on
it. Shouldn't take long."

Stunned, I turned to find R.J, staring at me
wide-eyed. He was drumming the fingers of one hand on his printout
and nodding. I looked back at the screen and tried to appear
unaffected. "Keep working on it, and let me know before you attempt
another scan, and please send me the data from the current scan,
right away."

"Roger, Leadstrom out."

R.J. continued to twitch nervously. "Adrian,
what are you going to do?"

"I know what I'd like to do, round up the
sons-of-bitches and have them vacuum packed."

He exhaled deeply and slumped back. "Don't
expect them to make it easy."

Chapter 19

R.J. and I ran most of the way to Life
Sciences, slowing down only through areas we knew would be
populated. On the way, I called in and requested a special assault
team with a variety of armament to meet us there. The dispatcher
sounded reluctant, but the tone of my voice ushered him along.

Life Sciences is a large rectangular
laboratory divided by clear Plexiglas barriers, isolation booths,
and analysis computers that foster rows of laser pen recorders and
monitor stacks. It is a place that smells more antiseptic than a
hospital, and appropriately most of the scientists and staff wear
white lab smocks and hair nets.

I was forced to brief Brandon, and had to
shut her off several times to do it. I made sure her on-duty staff
attended, rather than letting her fill them in afterward.

My hastily assembled swat team met us a few
minutes later. I had requested four specific team members for the
occasion, and every one of them showed up combat-ready. We sealed
the lab under the guise of ‘classified operations in progress.’ We
grouped around the oval Bio-Scanning control station, waiting for
the next snapshot to be displayed. Nira swiveled in her seat within
the oval, tapping at the clusters of colored light controls, while
Brandon stared over her shoulder dispensing instructions that were
completely unnecessary and genuinely annoying.