Hidden Empire (20 page)
Kotto looked confused, trying to deal with a question he had not thought about answering. “No… no, he left three days ago.
Had to go back to Plumas. I think he’ll be returning within a few weeks, though. I offered to take a packet from him, but
he said he’d bring it back.”
He absently tapped his chin and returned his attention to the designs of a self-contained hot-world settlement. “These new
techniques could open many formerly uninhabitable terrestrial worlds for Roamer settlement. Heavy elements and pure ores will
be very useful in our industries. With proper care and diligence, Isperos could be a gold mine for us … well, gold and other
metals.”
“And the beauty of it is that no other humans would ever want those worlds,” Jhy Okiah pointed out, eyes bright. The Speaker
watched the doubt play across Cesca’s olive-skinned face. “Perhaps I am not objective where my youngest son is concerned.
What is your opinion on the project, Cesca?”
Cesca studied Kotto’s boyish face. “One has to admit the risks, but also recognize the rewards. Could Isperos be much more
of a challenge than anyplace else we have settled?” She shrugged. “As long as the rest of Roamer society is prepared to help
shoulder the burden of this new colony while engineers and a few brave settlers take their first uncertain steps, then we
should make the attempt.”
Jhy Okiah looked up at the stone ceiling of the asteroid chamber, as if imagining the Rendezvous complex all around them.
“By the Guiding Star, if Roamers never tried to do the impossible, we would never have accomplished anything.”
O
nly a practiced eye could see the beauty of the skymine under construction at the slapdash facilities in the broken moons
of Erphano.
Burly Berndt Okiah stood within the transparent bubble-dome installed on the pockmarked moon. With the industrial station’s
low gravity and the enormous olive-and-tan gas giant filling the sky, Berndt experienced an odd shift in perspective: The
immense planet seemed
below
him, and he felt as if he were falling headfirst into the clouds.
Teams of Roamer constructors had descended upon the system’s rubble, analyzed the geological composition, then brought in
mobile factories to begin work. Automated smelters and ore-crunchers had devoured entire moonlets, processing rocks to leach
out necessary elements, extruding plates and casting components. Later, an army of construction workers removed the designated
components and assembled the giant industrial puzzle.
Occasionally, at construction sites within the boundaries of Hansa territory, some of the still-functional Klikiss robots
volunteered to perform hazardous space construction. They worked hard, asked no questions and took no payment, but operated
on their own schedules. Most Roamers, though, didn’t trust the mysterious ancient machines and preferred to do their own labor.
Since this was Berndt Okiah’s pet project, a skymine that he would own and manage, he had been here from the beginning, more
than a year. He had lived in austere encampments of underground chambers drilled into the small moons and then coated with
polymer walls. As the resources were chewed up, shipyards had grown like a forest. Tall girders, support derricks, and tether
cables held the skeleton of the Erphano skymine as Roamers added the metal flesh.
Though Berndt had confidence in his workers, he was still blustery and intrusive, watching over their shoulders as they assembled
the ekti reactors. His grandmother’s pet engineer, Eldon Clarin, had recently arrived with new plans and bold suggestions
to improve the systems. At first, Berndt had been put out by the sudden change in plans, until he realized the modifications
would require no more than a week and, if successful, make his new skymine more productive and therefore more profitable.
Berndt had promised himself and the Roamer clans that he would make a success of this operation. His grandmother had given
him an exceptional opportunity—though some claimed he did not deserve yet another chance—and he would not waste it. Berndt
had many things to prove to himself and to his people.
As he sat in the observation blister watching the final preparations, Engineer Clarin entered through the access tube. “I’ve
checked all the systems, Chief. The skymine is nearly ready for launch.”
The burly man nodded, scratching his square chin. “Still operating at ninety-seven percent of projected norms?” The engineer
looked surprised. “How did you know?”
“Because I checked them myself an hour ago. It’s my business to understand things aboard my new skymine.” Berndt’s physical
size and his reputation as a gruff bully clearly intimidated Eldon Clarin, but the engineer’s ease with mathematics and science,
his sheer intelligence, intimidated Berndt in turn. “Once the facility enters the Erphano cloud decks, we’ll have plenty of
time to do our shakedown. You will be staying here to verify all systems. Please?”
Clarin drew his brows together as if surprised at the big man’s demeanor. “Speaker Okiah requested that I stay for at least
two months.”
Berndt focused his gaze on the huge planet below so he could avoid looking at the man as he spoke, his normally gruff voice
sounding a bit nervous. “Engineer Clarin, I’d like to request a favor. While we are here, I would ask… if you might provide
me with some instruction?” For years, he had blustered and shouted to get his way; now it felt very strange to be making such
a request.
The engineer seemed surprised. “What is it you would like to know?”
“I want a stronger background in the functioning of the skymine, from ekti processing to the Ildiran stardrives. It’s my business
now.”
The engineer looked at his hands. “This seems rather… unusual. Berndt Okiah is not known for his scholarly pursuits.”
Berndt flushed. “That was in the past. I’m the chief of a new skymine. I should broaden my horizons.”
Outside, suited workers crawled over the hull of the factory suspended in the emptiness. He ran his eyes over the enormous
collector tanks for raw hydrogen and the geometrical reactors that processed and siphoned off the ekti allotrope. The big
skymine also had an upper habitation and support deck containing crew quarters, leisure chambers, and command centers.
After being constructed in place around gas giants, skymines were maneuvered to the clouds with powerful in-system engines.
The skymines themselves would never leave their gas-giant homes, relying on cargo escorts to take away storage tanks of ekti.
The Ildiran propulsion system was based on direct physical movement, without resorting to exotic anomalies such as wormholes
or dimensional jumps. But the stardrive did produce a space-time ripple effect that, as far as Berndt understood it, relativistically
slowed time for the ship. Somehow, the stardrive maintained a “continuum memory” that allowed vessels to return to real space
very close to the proper frame of timeline reference. The effective result was to travel great distances in a short time span.
To the unschooled outsider it looked simple, though the actual mechanics were very complex. During their next two months together,
Clarin would attempt to teach Berndt the detailed systems.
Long ago, when the Ildirans had offered them the opportunity, Roamers had jumped at the chance to work the ekti-processing
stations. Ambitious clans had secured loans from the Ildiran Empire to lease their first skymining stations. Despite an initial
disaster on Daym, the Roamers turned the cloud-processing facilities into profitable operations. Roamers had copied the skymining
technology, then improved it and set about building other stations. They continued to expand as their ekti profits increased.
Now Berndt led Eldon Clarin through the tube to the suitup chambers. “Time for us to launch the new skymine. I want you with
me.”
Clarin looked surprised. “Me? But you’re the chief—” “It’ll look good on your résumé when you get back to Rendezvous.”
An hour later, the two men stood on a launching platform above the mineral-stripped excavation sites. Overhead, more rubble
and exhaust debris spread outward, devoid of useful metals. The navigation hazard would also serve as a smoke screen to hide
the activities on Erphano.
Work crews waited inside modular off-shift sheds while others floated outside with their heads pointed down toward the olive-and-tan
planet. Anchor cables kept the gigantic skymine from drifting away.
Berndt operated his suit radio. “Prime the maneuvering engines.”
Captains aboard the skymine worked controls on the upper deck. Berndt could see tiny figures behind the glowing bridge. Suited
workers stood on the observation platform high above the first reactor. Cowlings brightened as the drive reactors heated up
and the engines exhaled a hot breath of exhaust. A restless behemoth, the newborn skymine pulled against its tethers.
Berndt felt a thrill of pride as he gazed at the magnificent structure that would be his to command. He had never been present
at a skymine launch, though he had supervised an older facility for several years. His first skymine command had been on Glyx,
a facility that was already up and running with a veteran crew when he’d become chief. He had been more of a baby-sitter and
manager, not much of a leader. The Erphano facility, though, was both a big promotion and a big chance for him.
Some of the clans grumbled that Berndt Okiah had by now received all the chances a man could deserve. He had squandered them
in his youth, when he’d been overbearing, too full of himself. He understood his folly now. He couldn’t wait to bring his
wife, Marta, and twelve-year-old daughter, Junna, to work with him here.
Though he’d once harbored grandiose dreams of becoming the next Speaker, Berndt now realized he was simply not able to lead
all of his people or command so many resources. When younger, he had swelled his chest and demanded an important role in government,
though he’d never proven himself worthy of respect or responsibility. Such greatness was not possible for him, and that epiphany
had brought about a change in him.
At first, he’d been jealous of Cesca Peroni and her relationship to Jhy Okiah, but now he saw that she would be a more talented
Speaker than he ever could. Berndt regretted his brash actions and poorly thought-out plans, but after years of exemplary
service on the Glyx skymine and now with this new vessel under his command, he would become the best chief of any ekti-processing
facility.
With the engineer holding the support railings, Berndt disengaged the mobile platform and activated the putter engines that
lifted them to the towering skymine. Berndt cradled a valuable thin-walled container of pseudo-champagne, a traditional icon
the Roamers continued to use for the baptism of a new ship.
The mobile platform carried them up past the curved storage chambers and the broad, gaping mouth of the gaseous intake chute.
Clarin peered through his faceplate, amazed at the immensity of the vessel up close. Once the Erphano skymine dropped into
the clouds, few people would ever see its lower hull again.
He hovered beside the front ekti storage tank and, smiling, grasped the neck of the pseudo-champagne bottle. Weightless, he
knew that when the bottle struck the metal wall, he would recoil in the opposite direction, so Berndt gripped the support
railing.
He had carefully considered his words. “With great pride, I launch this skymine: pride not in myself but in the capabilities
of the Roamer construction teams that have built this marvel. And pride in my dedicated crew who will run the operations and
bring about a profitable status. Most of all, though, I launch this skymine with pride for what it symbolizes to the Roamers
and our ability to prosper where no one else would dare to venture. Let the Guiding Star take us to our destiny.”
He swung the champagne bottle. As it struck the hull, the glass shattered, and the pseudo-champagne exploded into the vacuum
of space. Thin glass fragments and boiling, fizzing, freezing clouds of carbonated liquid foamed outward, volatilizing like
a comet’s tail.
As applause and cheers echoed through the comm systems, Berndt Okiah took the mobile platform up to the command deck. He and
the engineer cycled through the airlocks and stripped out of their suits as the bridge crew hurried to congratulate them.
“Disengage tethers,” Berndt said, his first command issued aboard his new factory. The skymine lurched as the metal cables
detached from their anchor points. “Increase thrust to engines.”
The skymine eased away from the rubble, moving toward the clouds of Erphano. Berndt glanced back at the scarred construction
facility behind them, then turned forward, looking at the eye of the gas giant. The resource-rich clouds beckoned him, and
he decided that he would not look back ever again, only forward.
