Tiona (a sequel to "Vaz") (35 page)

“OK,” Sophie said, leaving her seat reclined and wondering if she’d be able to sleep.
I’m in space!
she thought. She might be labeled an “astronaut” since she’d completed training, but she’d never been selected for a mission before. A lot of astronauts never were.

***

Riker sat in handcuffs out in the anteroom of Harding’s command center. When the general had him arrested, he’d expected to be taken to the post lock-up. He’d wondered how long it would take the military to assign him some legal representation. Somehow, he’d doubted that it would be in time for him to get the lawyer to do anything for the people in that saucer.

The MP that Harding had told to arrest Riker had put handcuffs on him and moved him to the back of the room away from the general, but then held him there, apparently waiting to be told where to take Riker. Harding had been highly distracted. First screaming at the NSA people for failing to block whoever had taken over the computer system. Then screaming at the ASAT section to reboot their computers.

While the ASAT computers were rebooting, the message about the illegality of firing on a civilian craft began popping up across the top of every screen in the room! Riker found it very hard to believe that someone on the outside could have overcome all the firewalls and NSA protection in that room so he looked carefully from computer to computer, wondering if he could figure out who was doing it from the inside.

As he looked at his own section he saw with some relief that the saucer had reached space. He’d continued tracking around the room trying to figure out who was hacking them. The NSA guys were the ones who likely had the programming chops. Riker noticed that the banner about the illegality of Harding’s actions was up across their screens as well. They all seemed frantic, but Riker had the impression they were trying to fix the problem, not causing it.

The next time Riker got back to looking at his own radar section a schematic was up on one of the screens that showed the saucer breaking orbit!
Where are they going? The moon?
With some relief he realized that the spacecraft was now well beyond attack by any ASAT systems as well.

Eventually, Harding realized that the saucer was out of reach as well. He addressed the room, “They’ve escaped for now, but they’re going to have to come back to Earth sometime. By the time they get here, I expect you guys to have blocked whoever’s hacking us and be ready to attack if they won’t listen to reason.

“Some of you are probably wondering whether that banner is correct. Yes, it is true that international law bans us from attacking civilians. However, it does not ban us from attacking terrorists or other
threats
to our country.
That
alien craft, and the technology it represents, poses an
enormous
danger to the United States of America. It is our duty, our
most patriotic
duty, to either bring it under control or eliminate it as a threat. Rest assured that I would not issue an illegal order to a man under my command.”

For a moment, Riker doubted himself.
Like many general officers Harding had powerful charisma. But then Riker thought of the ordinary appearing construction of the saucer. He steeled his resolve,
That’s
not
alien technology! We’d need a lot more evidence than we have to convince me that a professor, his grad students and their invention are a threat to these United States!

Shortly after that, Harding had noticed Riker with the MP at the back of the room. He stalked back to them and leaned his face in close to Riker, “I’m not just going to break you Riker, I’m going to send you to prison.” He turned to the MP, “Keep him in the cuffs and hold him just outside. I don’t want him blathering about.”

Since then Riker and his MP had been sitting outside Harding’s command center. At first Riker had been so upset he’d been practically shaking. However, when the reaction wore off, Riker’s drained emotional state and the exhaustion of the long day left him sleeping, leaned back against the wall in his chair.

He woke when the other door to the anteroom opened. He cracked an eye to see who it was, then came to his feet when he saw three stars on the man’s shoulder. More officers crowded the door behind him.

The lieutenant general dubiously eyed Riker and his handcuffs. “Why are you under arrest Major?”

Riker quickly glanced down at the general’s name tag and said, “General Cooper, Sir, I protested General Harding’s actions as I believe them to be illegal. He has sequestered me so that I will not interfere with operations.”

The general frowned, then lifted his chin interrogatively toward Harding’s command center and said, “What’s going on in there? My staff and I were all awakened by our AIs and found messages on our HUDs telling us that some kind of illegal military activity was going on here.”

Holy crap,
Riker thought
, our hacker’s fingers apparently extend far beyond the command center!
To General Cooper, he said, “Sir, I was the NORAD officer on duty when the spacecraft lifted from Raleigh two nights ago. General Harding co-opted me to his team so I was present when it launched again from Raleigh last night and again from the Caribbean tonight. It appears to me that only civilians, consisting of a college professor and two of his grad students, are on board. I objected to the fact that General Harding had Sidewinder missiles fired at them. Those civilians had done nothing to suggest that they posed a threat.”

During Riker’s little speech Cooper’s eyebrows had rapidly ascended. “A spacecraft?! Launched from Raleigh?! Why the hell haven’t I heard about this?!”

Aha,
Riker thought,
I thought Harding seemed like the kind to hide something like this from higher command!
“Sir, I sent what information we had up the chain of command two nights ago when it first happened. General Harding arrived very shortly after that and took control of everything to do with the situation from that point on. I had, of course, believed that he was keeping the upper levels of command informed.”

Cooper’s eyes bored into Riker’s for a moment; then he gave a sharp nod and stepped over to the door of the command center. Opening it only to shoulder width he said forcefully, “General Harding. A word please.” He stood there long enough to let Harding see his stars, then let the door slowly close itself.

A minute later, the door opened and Harding stood in the opening. His eyes flashed around the room at Cooper and the jumble of officers behind him. Then he focused on Riker. Eyes still on Riker, he addressed his words to the general, “Did the major somehow send you an alarming message Coop?” He turned his eyes to Cooper, “I apologize for not keeping a better watch on him.” Harding’s eyes flickered angrily to the MP, then back to Cooper.

Cooper, eyes narrowed, said, “No
Alonzo
, the major
didn’t
notify me. My AI, and apparently the AI of everyone on my staff, woke us all up with a message that something illegal was happening here. Since I didn’t know
anything
was happening here, I decided I’d better come over and find out for myself.” He arched an eyebrow, “While I was driving over here, I got a call from the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Apparently the Secretary of Defense and the President got similar messages through
their
AIs. Now, I’ve been hoping all the way here that maybe, just maybe, some idiot teenager hacked our system and sent those messages. That would be bad, but I must say not as bad as having Major Riker here tell me we’ve been firing Sidewinders at civilian craft over the state of North Carolina!”

Red with fury, Harding grated, “Don’t listen to
that
son of a bitch! I can tell you…”

Cooper put a hand up and interrupted, “
Don’t
tell me that, tell me this. Did we, in fact, fire Sidewinders at a civilian craft over Raleigh North Carolina?”

Harding nodded, saying, “But…”

Cooper’s hand halted him again, “And this happened last night?!”

“Yes and…”

Cooper shook his head, “And I haven’t heard about it until now because…?”

“I’ve been waiting to settle…”

Cooper shook his head again, this time mournfully. He reached out and put a hand on Harding’s shoulder, “Al, I’ve been telling you for quite some time that you aren’t nearly as shit-hot as you think you are. Your dick surely doesn’t reach the floor like you imagine it does,” Cooper snorted sadly, “but you have managed to step on it this time.”

Cooper had Riker’s handcuffs removed and then he, Harding, and all of his staff officers moved out into Harding’s command center. Over the next couple of hours, he brought himself up to speed. He listened to Harding’s protests when they were brief, but cut him off when they were vitriolic. He relied on the NCOs and other officers, but paid more and more attention to Riker’s assessment of the situation.

At 0630 hours, looking very depressed, he called the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff from a corner of the room. Shortly after that Cooper removed Harding’s stars and had him escorted from the room in cuffs by one of the MPs.

The last thing Harding did as he left the room was to shoot Riker a glance that looked like it had been intended to flay skin.

***

Sophie woke suddenly on hearing the AI’s voice, “Acceleration will now decrease for turnover.”

The thrumming sound of the thrusters dropped off and the force holding her in her chair smoothly diminished until she felt like she was falling. She’d felt the sensation before in the “Vomit Comet,” but this felt more real somehow. For one thing there was none of the noise and vibration of a big plane going through the atmosphere. Just silence…

A gentle humming sound came on as the saucer started pivoting around. Stars moved over the canopy and Sophie’s straps tugged gently at her.

“Acceleration resuming,” the AI said. The thrumming started back up and soon Sophie felt like she was back at her normal weight.

Gettnor turned to grin at them. “I feel like a little more sleep. What do you guys say to a late breakfast?”

As Sophie drifted back off to sleep she mused that being a real astronaut was
nothing
like she’d expected.

When Sophie woke again and rubbed the sleep out of her eyes she found Gettnor looking at her. Gettnor said, “So far so good. The AI says we’ve got about sixty minutes to go.” Gettnor stretched, “I’m hoping you brought some good food, ’cause I’m starving!”

“Me too,” Marlowe said behind her.

“Have you tried to call the guys yet?”

“Let’s eat first; we’re still 63,000 kilometers away. Pretty far away to reach them with an omnidirectional radio.”

***

Zack floated, bleakly staring at the airlock and concentrating on the way his stomach seemed to be trying to eat his own spine. Ralph had stayed with him for a while after the suicide attempt. Zack could tell that Ralph had had second thoughts about saving Zack’s ass and thereby dooming his own. Now he’d left to go play with the big ion engine again. Some crazy idea about running more power through a single module to see if it would burn off whatever had been depositing on the electrodes.

Ralph had said stuff about how Zack should come along with him. When Zack had refused Ralph had said that he’d better not pull another “damn fool stunt.”

Zack suspected that Ralph actually had left him here alone just so he
could
have another shot at killing himself. That would be Ralph’s ticket home after all.

The airlock was the way to do it. Sure and quick. Zack worried that it was going to hurt, but unfortunately the morphine hadn’t worked.

With a sigh, he kicked across the small open space in Bellerphon and grabbed the handle of the inner airlock door. He spun the latch wheel and pulled.

It didn’t budge.

Zack pulled himself up to the small window in the door and peered out.

He barked a little laugh.

Ralph had left the outer door open. With vacuum out there, Zack wouldn’t be able to pull open the inner door.

Of course that wouldn’t work. Zack just told the AI to close the outer door. He peered through the window and saw it closing.

Then it stopped. The AI said, “Something is blocking the outer door.”

Zack looked out the little window again. There was a wrench jammed in the outer door.

Damn, maybe he
doesn’t
want me to finish the job?! Stupid SOB.

Zack pondered the options. He could put on his spacesuit, pump down the entire atmosphere of Bellerphon, open the airlock, take out the wrench, close both doors of the airlock, then tell Bellerphon’s AI to refill its living quarters before he popped his helmet seals outside. Problem was, it would take a
long
time to pump Bellerphon’s atmosphere down and Ralph might come back. It would take an especially long time since Zack should be careful to close up any decompression sensitive items before he pumped out Bellerphon’s atmosphere. If he missed something important, he could be killing Ralph along with himself.