Scattered Suns (19 page)

Chapter 36—CESCA PERONI

Jonah 12 returned to its work routine. Teams doing double duty for several days would more than make up for time lost during the funeral for the former Speaker. Cesca thought they were throwing themselves into the effort in an unconscious attempt to honor Jhy Okiah, or maybe to keep themselves busy with something they could understand while the rest of Roamer society came to grips with the new order.

Tasks around the base were clearly assigned and divided. Though the Roamer excavators and processors were curious about the buried Klikiss robots, it wasn’t their priority. Cryoengineering specialist Jack Ebbe, one of the two men who had uncovered the robot tomb, had since been poking around at the site for several days, while his partner now stayed at the base to put together a small expedition. Ironically, only Cesca and acting administrator Purcell Wan had enough time to consider going to the other side of the planetoid.

Cesca hadn’t wanted to leave Jonah 12 with the old Speaker in such a fragile state, but now she intended to depart and search out other clusters of the outlaw clans as soon as the fast messenger ships came back. While she was waiting, she and Purcell would go inspect the group of buried alien robots.

The still-exuberant vapor miner Danvier Stubbs inspected the grazer, recharged the power cells and air tanks, added packaged food, then got a good night’s sleep before he announced he was ready to make the long journey. “By now Jack’s probably getting antsy,” Danvier said. “He’s been by himself digging around, setting up camp, stringing lights, and gathering data. I told him to come back here for the time being, but he was really excited by the find, and he can be pretty stubborn. You should try sitting in a grazer with him day after day—”

“Then let’s get moving,” Cesca interrupted the loquacious vapor miner. “He’s had time to do a lot of excavating over the past four days, and it’s a long haul to get there.”

She followed him outside the domes while Purcell hurried to catch up. The three of them easily fit inside the turtlelike vehicle, which was built to accommodate five people and extensive equipment and troubleshooting tools. Since it would be a lengthy ride, Danvier sealed the double airlocks and pressurized the compartment so they could remove their helmets.

The grazer set off, crawling across the dark iciness away from the glowing base domes. They bounced over the uneven frozen landscape and dodged swampy pools of liquid hydrogen lakes. Danvier rapped his gloved knuckles on the control panel. “These things aren’t built for speed, but they’re sure reliable.”

As a vapor miner, Danvier specialized in processing frozen gases to sift out usable elements and molecules. During the hours of traveling, he explained everything about his job in far more detail than Cesca wanted to absorb.

The two men had been on a routine ice-combing expedition when they’d found the robots. “We detected an inclusion in a frozen chamber, far enough away that nobody’d spotted it before. Since our sensors are designed to read mostly light elements with occasional spikes of rock or metal, we didn’t know what we were seeing. Jack’s best guess was that a heavy meteoroid had hit the ice, but the readings just didn’t look right to me.” Danvier grinned, as if expecting a pat on the back.

“What screwed up the result was a polymer sheath surrounding the tomb chamber, or whatever it is. The robots are sealed in some sort of bubble, walled off by an artificial membrane. Our sensors picked up the metals of their bodies and the polymers in the protective shell. I said, 'Jack, this is something awfully weird.' And for the first time all shift, he didn’t argue with me.”

His companion had a knack for keeping machinery functional even in supercold environments. Jack had stayed behind, claiming he wanted some time alone; Cesca could imagine he might want a day or two of peace from Danvier’s friendly but constant chatter.

“But why would Klikiss robots be sunk in cold storage way the hell out here?” Purcell asked. He had a habit of nodding when he talked.

The vapor miner shrugged inside his thin environment suit. “Hey, I’m not the administrator, Purcell. I just do things. You’re the guy in charge of explaining them.”

Purcell let out a long-suffering sigh. “I knew I wasn’t cut out for this job.” The base’s acting manager was in his late fifties. His dark hair had gone mostly gray, and he kept it cut short in a spiky, unruly mass. His eyebrows were heavy, but had retained their original dark color, which gave them extra prominence on his long face. “I wish Kotto would come back—he could probably figure it out.”

Cesca knew about Kotto Okiah’s short attention span, though. He had set up Jonah 12, then rushed to Theroc to work on rebuilding the world-forest settlement, then he’d hurried to Osquivel to study the hydrogue derelict. Some Roamers even joked that Kotto’s Guiding Star was a variable sun. Purcell was stuck here with the responsibility for the foreseeable future.

For most of a day, the vapor miner retraced his path to where he’d left his companion studying the mysterious enclave. Along the way, the grazer laid down a straight track across the frozen surface, grinding through rough patches and evening out lumps in the terrain.

Finally, when the slow vehicle came over a rise, they looked down on bright temporary lights the cryoengineer had strung around the dark entrance. It was an open vault like a crypt dug into the planetoid’s dead surface.

“Let’s see what Jack’s dug up down there,” Danvier said. “By now he should have all the answers for us.”

“I wonder if we can salvage any of those robots,” Cesca said.

“Jack and I expect to get shares, if you’re going to sell them.”

“I doubt we can reprogram a Klikiss robot like you would a compy,” Purcell said. Roamers had little to do with the enigmatic black machines that occasionally appeared on Hansa worlds. The ancient robots had been created by the long-vanished Klikiss race and then uncovered by Ildirans more than five centuries before. “Weren’t the first robots found on an ice moon in the Hyrillka system? Maybe we’ve discovered another cache like that.”

Leaving the grazer up on the rise, the three donned their helmets again, cycled one at a time through the small airlock, and trudged across the icy ground. Earlier, Danvier and Jack had broken through the piled layers of methane and hydrogen ice, then cut through the protective polymer shell that blocked the entrance to this grotto.

While working here alone, the cryoengineer had applied chemical illumination strips along the walls and powered a small portable generator to keep himself comfortable. Leading the way, Danvier ducked unnecessarily as he entered the opening. “Hey, Jack! You have company!”

The cryoengineer responded over their helmet comm systems, “I hope you brought somebody important. You won’t believe how extensive this is.”

“I brought the Speaker herself, and Purcell. Is that impressive enough?”

“It’ll do.”

The tunnel looked as if it had been burned with acid, cut out of the ice and then fused. Danvier ran his gloved hands over the passage walls. “No question that it was artificially cut. It’s like the robots made a nest for themselves.”

The three walked around the curve, and Jack waved at them, shining a bright suit light. “Come, look at this. There must be more than a hundred of them in here. The chamber goes farther back than I can see.”

Cesca drew a quick breath when she caught sight of the black metal sculptures of fearsome beetles standing upright. The cryoengineer knelt to tinker with the exoskeleton of the first Klikiss robot. Other motionless machines stood in frozen ranks behind it.

She came closer. “I’ve never seen one of these before, certainly not up close.” The flat headplate had an angular outline with hints of a crest and comblike side vents. A cluster of dull, smooth sensors covered the black matte of its face, like the eye group of a spider.

“Their systems are remarkably well preserved,” Jack said, tinkering with an opening in the ellipsoidal body core. “Even in this cold and after what must surely be centuries, they all appear functional.” He grinned through his faceplate. “I tell you, we can learn a lot from these things, if we take one apart.”

Purcell said, “Kotto would be drooling over this.”

“I’m sure he’s perfectly satisfied with that hydrogue derelict,” Cesca said. “You’ll have to take a crack at it, Jack.”

“I wouldn’t turn down the opportunity.” With a handheld thermal lamp, the cryoengineer warmed the ice that covered an exposed part on the Klikiss robot’s torso and adjusted what seemed to be control diagnostics until he caught an unexpected flicker of light, a spark of activity. “Shizz, I don’t know what that was, but jump-starting these things might be easier than I thought.”

Suddenly the robot’s cluster of glassy eyes lit up, burning red in the cold tunnel. The machinery hummed. “Hey, that did the trick.” Jack stood up.

The geometrical head turned. The humming grew louder. Behind it, a second robot and then a third also began to stir. Scarlet optical sensors brightened as they focused on the suited man in front of them.

“Okay, now what do we do, Purcell?” Danvier said, standing behind Cesca and the acting administrator. “We’re about to have a situation here.”

“I, uh, I defer to the Speaker.”

Before Cesca could say anything, the first robot shifted its body. Access ports in the front of its armored torso cracked and then slid open, revealing several mechanical arms that were tucked away inside the protected core.

Jack leaned closer. “Now that’s—”

One of the clawed arms shot out of its socket like a rapidly fired piston. It slammed into Jack’s faceplate, smashing through. The front of the cryoengineer’s helmet burst open with an explosion of vented atmosphere that turned instantly to steam. The robot’s pronged arm rotated like a furious drill. Blood, skin, and bone sprayed outward in a shower. Jack didn’t even have time to scream.

The awakened Klikiss robot lurched on a set of stubby fingerlike legs. Behind it, two other active robots began to move. From deeper in the storage tunnels, myriad sets of red lights began to shine like the eyes of a dragon waking up from a long sleep.

Danvier stumbled forward screaming, far too late to rescue the cryoengineer crumpled in a bloody mass on the icy floor. In an instant the vapor miner realized his own danger as the first three robots scuttled toward him. Before Danvier could turn, each extended a nightmarish set of articulated robot arms tipped with various sharp tools and manipulators. The Klikiss robots closed around him as he tried to scramble away. His boots skidded on the slick floor of the tunnel.

Everything happened in the space of a heartbeat. Seizing him, the robots clawed, tore, and pummeled. They ripped Danvier’s suit, slashed the protective fabric, crushed his helmet. Unlike his partner, the vapor miner had plenty of time to scream until the robots cut off his suit transmitter.

Cesca was already grabbing Purcell’s arm to yank him out of his shock. “We’ve got to get back to the grazer!”

While the robots finished their swift butchery, dozens more stirred from their paralysis and began to move, setting off in pursuit.

Chapter 37—KOTTO OKIAH

Alone aboard the intriguing hydrogue derelict, Kotto had only KR and GU, his two technically rated compies, for company. Though his fascination with the alien technology did not wane, the complete lack of clues—even about where to start—was frustrating. Since this was a spaceship, there had to be complex machinery embedded somewhere, but he could find no moving parts.

“Quite a conundrum, GU,” he said.

“Yes, Kotto Okiah. That is an appropriate use of the word.” When the engineer first reported his confusing observations, the little compy had inadvertently introduced him to the new term. For all his technical expertise and years of practice in cutting-edge projects, Kotto had not been familiar with the word. Maybe it was because the eccentric Roamer inventor and engineer had never before been faced with such a baffling scientific challenge. A conundrum.

The small hydrogue sphere hung like a microscopic jewel high above the ring plane of Osquivel. It had been damaged, its alien occupant killed during the EDF’s brazen military attack—apparently, one of the only hydrogue casualties of the great battle.

“The candy store is open for business. What should we try first?” Kotto rubbed his gloved hands together, wishing he could pressurize the artifact so he could work in a shirtsleeve environment, but the systems were a mystery. He didn’t even know how to close the hatch yet. At least
closing
it would probably not be traumatic for poor GU, who had been hurled into space by the unexpected explosive opening of the sphere.

“There’s so much here to understand.” He looked around at the strange shapes, the smooth panels, the odd inverted geometries. “We need to figure out a way to defeat these ships.”

“We will do our best to assist you, Kotto Okiah,” KR said from his station. “However, compies are limited to straightforward analytical processes.”

GU added, “Intuitive leaps are reserved for our human masters.”

Pacing in his environment suit, Kotto said, “Just help keep my mind on track. How to fight against a hydrogue ship—that’s the question. Don’t let anything distract me from the main objective.” That was one of his weaknesses: A fascination with
everything
led to perpetual distraction.

“For instance, I’d love to figure out the propulsion system these hydrogue ships use. Warglobes are fast long-range spaceships, but they don’t require ekti.” He touched the uneven knobs and protrusions of an alien technical station that looked as if it had been made by pouring molten glass. “And these controls aren’t like anything I’ve ever seen—not human, or Ildiran, or even old Klikiss technology. Just understanding the embedded liquid-metal electronics would open up possibilities for—”

“Is this an instance in which we should tell you to focus your thoughts on the primary objective, Kotto Okiah?”

Kotto stuttered to a halt, then cleared his throat. “Yes...exactly. On the other hand, let’s not be too rigid. No telling where a given line of investigation might lead. We have to think outside the box, to use an old phrase.”

“It is a conundrum,” GU said.

“Don’t be a show-off.”

Kotto stepped in front of the flat trapezoidal panel surrounded by strange symbols, destination coordinates similar to those used in ancient Klikiss transportals. How could the vanished insectile race and the incredibly strange hydrogues have anything in common? Had one race obtained transportal technology from the other?

Hoping to make the connection, Kotto had reviewed the small amount of available information published by Hansa scientists. Before the trade embargo against the Big Goose, Roamers had downloaded all public-access technical reports. However, as best he could tell from the documentation, the Hansa scientists didn’t know how the transportals worked either.

He read the discovery papers written by xeno-archaeologists Margaret and Louis Colicos. Recently, a quiet but reputable researcher named Howard Palawu had been given the task of analyzing the alien transportation system. He’d had a habit of posting his thoughts and conjectures in daily logs for anyone who chose to read them. The entries had ended abruptly, though, and Kotto learned that Palawu himself had vanished through a Klikiss transportal.

Now, as he stared at the transport panel and the symbols, GU walked up to him. “You are wool-gathering again, Kotto Okiah.”

“Wool-gathering? What’s that?”

“Thinking unrelated thoughts, becoming lost in a reverie irrelevant to the task at hand.”

“Did someone upgrade your vocabulary program?”

“Wool-gathering is a common, though somewhat archaic, phrase. Would you like me to give its derivation?”

“No. You’re right—I was distracted.” He sniffed. “But if we figured out how to control the transportals inside warglobes, we might be able to open up a gateway to...a black hole. Wouldn’t that be amazing? The drogues could be cruising along in search of Roamer skymines to destroy, and suddenly a black hole falls right into their living room. Hah!”

“That would certainly be destructive to the enemy ships, Kotto Okiah,” KR agreed. “However, it seems an unlikely prospect.”

Kotto smacked his gloved fist on a curved diamond protrusion inside the central chamber. “I haven’t learned anything yet! The hydrogues are so...
alien
. And hydrogue thought processes created this technology. That makes understanding it much more complex.”

Battered GU turned his golden optical sensors up at Kotto. “Then perhaps a simple solution would be more effective than a complex approach.”

“GU, if I could think of a simple solution, I would. The only thing we figured out so far was how to open the hatch.”

Suddenly struck with an idea, Kotto stared at the research compy. GU’s colorful polymer skin was still scratched and discolored from when the derelict sphere had been breached. The compy had been shot away in a wild and uncontrolled flight...

Kotto’s face lit up. “By the Guiding Star, maybe that’s good enough! It would be like a...a doorbell. A can opener! All we need to do is open the door when the drogues least expect it.”

“An effective weapon?”

“Absolutely!”