Hex (4 page)

“Not that anyone in the Talus is likely to start any wars,” Andromeda said.

Long ago, the Talus had arrived at an elegant solution to the threat of interstellar war. Since the member races used starbridges to journey from star to star, with ring-shaped portals at both the embarkation and destination points creating the wormholes necessary for such jaunts, they agreed to equip those portals with keys. These small cards, which fit into a starship's navigation computer, contained frequencies for unique microwave codes that an outbound ship would transmit to the artificial intelligence controlling an embarkation starbridge. The AI would then relay the code via hyperlink channel to the destination starbridge, and if the AI at the other end recognized that code and authorized it, it would then allow a wormhole to be created and the incoming ship to pass through.

Thus, a vessel couldn't make the hyperspace jaunt unless it had an appropriate starbridge key for its destination, and the race who controlled the starbridge at that place could choose who received those keys and, therefore, who got to visit their worlds. Since the distances between inhabited systems were usually so great that it could take an invasion fleet, traveling at sublight velocity, a hundred years or more to reach its objective, this made surprise attacks all but impossible.

As a result, war was so difficult to wage that it simply wasn't worth the time or effort. Far easier to reach an accord with one's adversaries, or at least ignore them. So armed conflict between potential enemies was rare. Most races sincerely wanted to get along with one another, and even when first-contact situations occasionally went badly—such as when humans met
hjadd
—peace was nearly always seen as the first, and most preferred, option.

“True.” Harker nodded, understanding what she meant. “Even so, there's something about the
danui
that none of the other races care to share with us, even though they all seem to know about it. Something or someplace that the
hjadd
call
tanaash-haq
, which astroethnicists at the university tells us translates as ‘the living world.' ”

“ ‘The living world'?” Andromeda raised an eyebrow. “What the hell does that mean?”

Harker shrugged. “No idea... and the
hjadd
aren't telling us. Navy Intelligence has been trying to find out exactly what it is for quite some time, but only lately have they asked the merchant marine for help.”

Andromeda nodded. There was a long-standing rivalry between the Navy and the merchant marine that went back to the time that private operators started competing with government ships for right-of-way through Starbridge Coyote. Ever since Coyote had begun trading with the Talus, the merchant marine had become the Federation's most-widely-traveled ships. Although the Navy handled most of the diplomatic travel between 47 Ursae Majoris and the rest of the galaxy, if there was any group likely to ferret out info about the
danui
, it would be a merchantman's captain and crew. “I'm surprised you haven't come to me before,” she said.

“We would've, but you've been handling the
soranta
route the last couple of years. We figured that you probably wouldn't have learned anything more from them than we already have... which has been zero... so we didn't get in touch with you.” Harker shrugged. “Nothing personal, Andi”—Andromeda winced; she hated that nickname—“but the intelligence boys have been trying to let as few people know about this as possible, and...”

“I didn't need to know. Right.” Andromeda tried not to bristle, but this sounded like much the same sort of paranoia she'd had to put up with in the Union Astronautica.
So much for Coyote progressivism,
she thought sourly.

“Anyway, we put out the word that we wanted to open a dialogue with the
danui
, with the purpose of establishing trade relations with them, and eventually one of our other captains came through... Frank Lewin, of the
Bear's Choice
.”

“I know Frank.” Like most merchantmen captains, Frank also had a cottage in the Riverside neighborhood. They sometimes played cards together, along with other ship commanders or senior officers spending a little ground time between flights. “He usually alternates the Rho Coronae Borealis run with you, doesn't he?”

“Yes, he does.” An ironic smile. “I might have learned this myself, except that Frank's ship gets out to
Talus qua'spah
more often than the
Pride
does these days, and that's exactly what happened.” His smile faded. “But it wasn't from the
hjadd
or the
arsashi
or the
soranta
or any of the other usual suspects that we learned what we wanted to know, but from the race I would never have guessed... the
nord
.”

“The
nord
?” Andromeda gave him a skeptical look. “I never would have guessed either. Are you sure?”

Of the many races humans had met since joining the Talus, the
nord
were easily the most obnoxious. Resembling—and sounding much like—wild turkeys who happened to be six feet tall and had arms and hands where wings should be, the
nord
had lost their homeworld several years ago, when the rogue black hole known as Kasimasta, or the Annihilator, passed through their solar system. They'd managed to evacuate most of their population before Nordash was destroyed, and since then, they'd become something of a gypsy race, their ships traveling from one system to another, taking advantage of other races' hospitality until they inevitably wore out their welcome through what seemed to be innate traits of arrogance and argumentativeness.

“We're sure... It was the
nord
, all right.” Harker grinned. “They're a pain in the bum, but there's one thing you can say for them... They love our banjos.”

“I've heard that. Our banjos sound a lot like some musical instrument of their own. Most of them were left behind, though, when they had to evacuate their world, and the trees from which they were fashioned were on Nordash. So they buy banjos from us as an acceptable substitute.”

“That's right,” Harker said. “Only don't ever ask a
nord
to play a banjo for you. Not unless you want a migraine that'll last all week.” He became serious again. “Anyway, Frank traded them a container full of brand-new banjos, and during the exchange he learned something very interesting. The
nord
are no longer wanderers. The
danui
have recently given them permission to establish a colony on a world within their own system, and since then, the
nord
have been sending their people there.”

“Well, that's generous, I suppose.” Andromeda sipped her coffee. “But what does that have to do with us?”

“The
nord
captain told Frank that there may also . . . very probably, in fact... be another world in the
danui
system that would be habitable by humans. And that if we approached the
danui
emissary and asked nicely, it might give us the hyperspace key for their starbridge.”

For a few moments, Andromeda was speechless. Feeling the coffee mug about to slip from her hands, she leaned forward to carefully place it on the table. “You're joking,” she said at last, then shook her head. “No, I'm sorry. I didn't mean it that way. What I meant to say was,
they're
joking, and
you
fell for it.”

Harker neither smiled nor frowned. “No, I'm not kidding... and neither is Frank, or the
nord
, or even the
danui
. As soon as Frank let our people know what had been said to him, our Talus emissary went to see their Talus emissary, and the
danui
confirmed what the
nord
told Frank. Yes, there's a world in their home system that's human-habitable, and we're welcome to it.”

Andromeda opened her mouth to respond, only to discover that she didn't know quite what to say. In the four hundred years that humankind had been exploring space, only one unoccupied world capable of supporting human life had been discovered, and that was Coyote. Every other planet humans had found or visited either required survival gear to cope with differences in atmosphere and temperature, or—as in the case of Sanja, the
soranta
homeworld—was already inhabited by oxygen-nitrogen breathers. Fortunately, Coyote's population was still small enough that no one expected to be bumping elbows with their neighbors anytime soon. All the same, though, the Navy had made the discovery of another world suitable for colonization a high priority.

“And that's it?” she asked. “The
danui
have a habitable planet in their home system, and they're willing to let us have it?” Harker nodded. “Just like that? No questions asked?”

“Only a couple of stipulations. We agree not to engage in hostile actions against them or any other races we may find there, and also that we accept their terms for future trade negotiations with them. But from what George Jones has told us, there's no one there whom we'd consider to be an enemy, and all they want from us is the same thing that they want from everyone else... raw materials like iron, copper, zinc, silicon, and so forth.”

“I see.” Andromeda slowly nodded. “And I take it that we've been given the planet's coordinates along with the starbridge key.”

“The key, we have. George Jones said that the coordinates will be given to us once one of our ships makes the jump.” Harker frowned slightly. “And that's something of a puzzle right there. Because, according to our data, there's not a lot in the
danui
home system, let alone planets habitable by us or anyone else.”

He looked at his datapad again. “Display HD 76700 system diagram,” he said loudly, and George Jones vanished, to be replaced by a three-dimensional schematic of a solar system. It was remarkably simple: a midsized star, with a single planet in a close yet highly elliptical orbit around it.

“HD 76700,” Harker continued, reading from his pad's screen. “Type G6V star, same spectral class as 47 Uma but just a little larger, located 214.9 light-years from Coyote.” He pointed to the sole planet circling the star. “In the early twenty-first century, optical inferometry found a small gas giant in close orbit around it. Since its semimajor axis is a little less than .05 AUs, that means HD 76700-B completes an orbit of its primary about once every four days.”

Andromeda nodded. Hot Jupiters, while freakish, were not uncommon in the galaxy. They were usually gas giants that evolved in the outer reaches of a solar system, only to have their orbits gradually deteriorate over time. When that happened, the planets began long, slow falls toward their primaries, death spirals that took millennia to complete.

“Are you sure you've got the right system?” she asked. “I mean... look, I'm not an astronomer, but even I know that habitable worlds of any kind aren't usually found in the same system as a hot jupe. The whole system gets destabilized.”

“Our people thought of that, too,” Harker said, “but the
danui
insist that this is their home system and that more than one habitable world exists there. But it's still strange as hell... Overlay HD 76700 remote image.”

On top of the schematic diagram, a two-dimensional photographic image was transposed: the
danui
star, a small white blob brighter than the tiny dots of light in the background yet surrounded by a nimbus the color of verdigris on rusting copper pipes.

“That's what we see when we point a telescope at their system,” Harker said. “We see their star, all right, and although HD 76700-B is too small to be seen directly, we know its there because of the gravitational effect it has on its primary. But if there's a planet located within a 1-AU radius, we can't make it out because of this thing”—he pointed to the nimbus—“which appears to be some sort of dust cloud or planetary nebula.”

“A dust cloud?” Andromeda peered closely at the image. “Within 1 AU? Wouldn't that make any planets within the system... ?”

“Uninhabitable?” Harker finished. “Yes, at least that's what the science boys at the university told me when I checked with them.” He paused. “But if there's no habitable planet anywhere in the system, why would the
danui
tell us otherwise? The
nord
, too, for that matter.”

Andromeda absently tapped a forefinger against her lips. “I think I know where this is going,” she said at last. “We've been given an awfully nice horse. Now someone needs to check its teeth, and that's why you've come to me.”

“I was rather hoping that you'd say that.” Harker smiled. “The Navy is reluctant to send a cruiser on a first-contact mission to a race as touchy as the
danui
. It might be seen as a hostile action, and they don't sound like a race we want to risk offending. On the other hand, you're a merchantman captain who also happens to have previous experience with survey missions. Your ship is designed for this kind of assignment, and you still have people in your crew who've done this sort of thing before.”

“So have you, Ted.”

“I'm too old for this sort of thing...”

Andromeda laughed out loud. “And I'm not?”

“A gentleman never inquires about a lady's age.” Harker gave her a sly wink. “Besides, everyone knows you're barely eighteen.”

“Is that in Earth or Coyote years?” She couldn't stand flattery, particularly when it came to her age. And since a year on Coyote was three times longer than one on Earth, the second guess was a lot closer to the mark than the first.

“Point taken.” Harker shrugged. “Truth is, after the time I took a ship closer to Kasimasta than anyone thinking straight had a right to do and still live, I swore an oath to Emily that I'd never undertake a hazardous mission like that again. That's why I'm handling a milk run to Rho Coronae Borealis when I'm not flying a desk.” A pause. “Besides, aren't you the one who just told me that she's bored?”