Starship Alchemon Page 11

  Back then, she’d become fascinated by avant-garde artists and writers. She splashed random globs of paint on vintage canvases and wrote brooding poetry and dreamed of losing her virginity to Ryla Eun-Jung, the storm singer who’d died in the same shuttle crash that killed her parents.

  A solo day trip from her New Haven boarding school to an underground dreamlounge parlor in the Bronx made the sex fantasy possible. She’d programmed the liaison with the famed musician when he was thirty and deep in his squall period, incorporating thunder and oceanic wind sounds with lilting string ensembles. The setting was a villa on the Korean peninsula crafted from a customizable template and decorated with the works of Helio Age artists Marcel Duchamp and Henri Matisse.

  Programming a chance encounter at a nearby café, she’d had Eun-Jung invite her to the villa, where they’d made virtual love on the balcony of a second-floor bedroom in view of a beautiful golden waterfall.

  He’d proved a gentle lover. Although a part of her recognized that the kisses, caresses and ultimate penetration were happening only in her head, the impact of the encounter had been intense. Too intense, in fact. Not realizing that subcortical dreamlounge fantasies required well-defined parameters to prevent side effects, she’d left the Eun-Jung program open-ended, thereby providing a doorway for her deepest fear to slither into the virtual world. Upon climaxing, the reek had swarmed up out of its subconscious chasm. Screaming, she’d bolted from the dreamlounge.

  Three days later, having suffered flashbacks of the incident, she’d seduced a random boy at a local tavern in the hope that physical lovemaking would blot out the impact of the virtual.

  It hadn’t.

  Her thoughts returned to the present as she recalled the phantom woman’s latest utterance.

  “Coalesce and Target?” she asked. “Do you know what that means?”

  June and Faye looked mystified.

  “Dear, did you have some sort of psionic experience?”

  “No.”

  “Discussion can be healthy,” June prodded. “Whatever happened, you might feel better sharing it.”

  “I won’t feel better.”

  The crewdoc adopted a sharper tone. “LeaMarsa, this isn’t just about you anymore. I believe that this ship and its crew are being impacted by psionic forces. Your personal insights could be important for everyone’s sake, especially in light of the tragedy.”

  She knew who they were talking about. “How did the lieutenant die?”

  June and Faye looked surprised that she knew. They told her about his suicide and the containment melt.

  “I’d like to return to my cabin now.”

  “It might be better if you stay here for a while,” June said. “I don’t think you should be alone right now.”

  But I am alone. And I’m the only one who realizes that what happened to the lieutenant is just the beginning.

  CHAPTER 12

  “Move your right foot forward,” Jonomy instructed.

  Ericho could see nothing but a gray haze. The lytic’s words came to him from speakers inside the weighty headpiece.

  Link gear for general usage was lightweight. But for critical applications, including use aboard starships, psychologists dictated that the control suits be heavy and cumbersome. Supposedly, this induced an unconscious reaction, impressing upon the wearer the importance of their task. Bulky suits had been statistically shown to improve safety ratios and reduce accidents.

  Ericho strained to lift the leaden boot and drag it in front of him. The movement activated the servos, filling the helmet with a background hum and decreasing the suit’s weight to a less bothersome level.

  The interior of the visorless helmet came to life with virtual screens, letting Ericho know that the link was correctly positioned within the bridge’s multi-directional treadmill.

  “Captain, the robot you will be using is in downdeck port quarter, closet twelve.”

  Ericho mentally situated himself in the locale. “Got it.”

  The screens showed him a stereoptic view of the storage closet’s dim interior through the robot’s eyes. For all intents and purposes, he was now a hundred meters away from his body, inside the machine. The robot, covered in a rubbery skin, had inhumanly thin arms and legs that were stronger and more flexible than flesh-and-bone appendages. Rigel had attached extra radiation padding to protect critical areas.

  The head vaguely mimicked its human prototype, with eyes, ears, nose and mouth. Still, a link face would never be mistaken for a person. It was more like a bizarre cross between an early com satellite and one of those carved pumpkin heads used during Helioteer celebrations of some long-ago holiday.

  Ericho could still feel his own body. Yet physical sensation felt distant, as if his flesh and muscles were in a deep sleep. A specially formulated atmosphere within the suit included an anesthetic that deadened certain nerve endings, maximizing the perception that his consciousness was inside the robot.

  The link incorporated a haptic system, enabling him to experience tactile sensation through the robot’s skin. He could also see, hear and smell anything in the machine’s immediate environment, as well as taste any object inserted into its mouth. He didn’t anticipate using that latter function, having no desire to taste white-hot irradiated matter.

  Bright light from a corridor filled his visual field as Jonomy opened the closet. He walked out of the closet and headed aft. After a few dozen steps, the telepresence felt natural. In reality, he would never step beyond the perimeter of the bridge treadmill, which constantly readjusted to keep him centered.

  “Radiation leakage has stabilized,” Jonomy said. “The cleanup pups are holding their own.”

  Ericho passed through an airseal to reach the section of corridor outside the containment.

  “Remember, captain, you are going to have to move fast once I open that door. EHO has created a pressure differential to minimize the corridor’s exposure. Even so, the Sentinel has determined that it will allow only two-point-five seconds for you to enter the lab to prevent escaping contaminants from exceeding manageable levels. Should you surpass that interval, the Sentinel will activate the sureshutter.”

  Ericho had never been chopped apart by pneumatic blades. He had no desire to experience the sensation, even in telepresence.

  He found himself wondering why the Sentinel hadn’t awakened in time to stop Donner from vaporizing himself. But even as he framed the question, he suspected the answer. As powerful as a Sentinel was, it wasn’t omnipotent. SEN was known to be at its weakest when trying to predict the actions of humans, especially those with behavioral quirks that put them at the extremes of psychological bell curves. Predicting the actions of a crazy bridge lieutenant no doubt posed as much of a challenge to a shrewd AI as it did to Ericho.

  “OK, Jonomy. I’m ready.”

  The heavy seal whipped open. He lunged through, twisting his neck sharply to the left. In response to the abrupt movement, the robot performed an inhuman act, rotating its head one-eighty degrees in order to show him a rear view of the door whisking shut as he cleared it.

  A second twist of the neck rotated the robot’s head back to its normal position. He surveyed the containment lab, or what was left of it. Even though he had an idea of what to expect, it was an eerie scene.

  The room was filled with a cloud of grayish smoke, which had been disturbed into gentle swirls by his sudden entrance. The robot’s eye sensors made a spectral adjustment, inserting a sequence of filters until he was able to see clearly.

  The center of the lab was gone – no consoles, no test equipment, nothing. At the spot where Donner had activated the Higgs cutter, a small molten pond bubbled where the flooring had been. Only the reinforced subfloor had prevented the red-hot mass from burning its way out of the containment lab and possibly through the hull.

  Overhead, the ceiling was badly warped, looked like a slab of mottled cheese. Walls had suffered similar damage. Cabinets and test canisters had melted into grotesque forms.
It took him a moment to realize that a pair of twisted stalagmites growing out of the deck had been chairs.

  The floor around the perimeter remained intact, although now bore a resemblance to the dusty lunar surface. The lab was silent except for a faint hiss emanating from the molten pond.

  “Quite a mess,” Jonomy said, his serene tone accentuating the understatement.

  “Smells bad, too.”

  A few sniffs of burned air was enough. Erich blinked his eyes at the link’s sight typer and disengaged the nasal function.

  There was no sign of Donner. Ericho was thankful for that. They were operating under the assumption he’d been instantly vaporized. Still, the bizarre forces unleashed in a melt could cause greater energy flashing in one direction. He’d seen a training video of a similar accident at a Pannis nuclear reprocessing plant. A worker had been only partly incinerated. The entire right side of her body, including arm, leg and half a head, had remained perfectly intact and eerily upright.

  The electrochromic wall was gone except for a few shards hanging from the ceiling like frosted icicles. Ericho stepped through into the containment. The damage wasn’t as severe; the wall likely had absorbed a good amount of the melt’s initial burst of ravaging energy. Test equipment drooped from the ceiling but the canisters and their mechanized appendages appeared intact.

  In the far corner, beside the hatch that accessed the airlock chute, lay the organism. Bouncy Blue had lost its distinctive coloration. The gelatinous skin was badly charred.

  “No signs of metabolic activity from your sensors,” Jonomy said. “EPS calculates a ninety-nine percent probability that the fetal organism is also dead.”

  Ericho heard a crackling sound behind him. Startled, he rotated his head but there was nothing there.

  “Sensor burnout,” Jonomy explained. “I have shifted the system over to the secondaries.”

  The sound hadn’t come from behind Ericho but had originated within the robot’s head. Telepresence had its quirks.

  “I have received an update from the Sentinel. It has determined that even the small amount of radioactive contamination leaked into the corridor during those seconds the door was open is unacceptable. It will not permit the door to be opened again.”

  “Got it.”

  SEN’s decision wasn’t unexpected. Even if the Sentinel permitted an exit, the intense heat and radioactive isotopes ultimately would cause severe damage to the robot. Should they embark on the plan to open the outer airlock and eject the entire mess into space, it would be dispatched as well.

  “Any suggestions for moving Bouncy Blue’s carcass outside the ship?” Ericho asked.

  Hardy had made the request in the strongest possible terms. Dead or alive, he wanted the organism transferred to the external ecopod for their return to Earth.

  “Can you open the hatch to the airlock chute from inside?” Jonomy asked.

  Ericho examined the lock’s control panel. It didn’t look damaged, but its status lights were dark. He tried a keyboard reset. Nothing.

  “Automatics must be burned out. I’ll attempt a manual release.”

  He disengaged the windup lever from the mechanism. But when he applied the robot’s considerable strength and tried to crank the handle, it wouldn’t budge.

  “The heat must have warped something,” he concluded.

  Rigel jumped into the discussion. “I know how we can purge the containment and still salvage Bouncy Blue. One of us does the EVA, opens the outer lock, plants the explosive at the inner lock. But before we trigger it and purge the mess, we cut a small hole through the inner lock, reduce the pressure differential. That way when we blow it, the purge will be less forceful. It should enable Bouncy Blue to be snatched with a net as it flies out.”

  “Such a maneuver carries a high-risk factor,” Jonomy said. “EPS calculates–”

  “Not if we do it right,” Rigel snapped.

  But Ericho agreed with Jonomy. It sounded dangerous. He wasn’t about to chance using a crewmember for such a stunt. Still, they might be able to implement the plan with the second link robot or one of the repair pups outfitted for extravehicular ops.

  He broached the idea. Jonomy was skeptical.

  “Pups are not designed to handle the contingencies that could arise during such a complex task amid a debris field. There is another issue. Whether carried out by a link or a pup, the Sentinel might perceive the venting of a compartment as a threat to the vessel’s integrity.”

  “That’s crazy,” Rigel said. “SEN would never do that.”

  “Historically, Sentinels have taken a dim view of purges, no matter what their purpose, since they often result in unforeseen side effects.”

  “Sentinels aren’t stupid,” Rigel argued. “Ours isn’t going to stop us from ejecting a hot mass.”

  “For the moment, we’re not doing anything,” Ericho said. “Let’s debate this later and focus on the task at hand.”

  “Captain, I am reading unusual voltage surges in the robot’s power modules. Have you suffered any damage, such as being struck by a falling object?”

  Ericho ran his hands across the thick shoulders. Tactile sensation through the finger pads detected nothing out of the ordinary.

  “Everything feels OK.”

  “The malfunction rate may be creeping higher than initially calculated. The robot’s demise may happen earlier.”

  “Worst case?”

  “Less than two hours.”

  “All right. Anything else you need me to do in here?”

  “No. It can continue essential monitoring without your presence.”

  “I’m coming out.”

  Ericho took a final look at Bouncy Blue’s charred remains and disengaged from the link. As consciousness reverted into his body, he had a grim thought. He might go down in history as the man blamed for destroying the greatest discovery of the millennium.

  CHAPTER 13

  There were places on the Alchemon that felt bad. LeaMarsa disliked the hydroponic gardens, with their claustrophobic conglomerations of submerged plants and twisted piping. The twin lander hangars and the storage pods, cold spaces filled with dark shapes, made dreariness tangible. And the containment lab…

  She’d thankfully never have to go there again.

  Still, none of those places were as disturbing as the dreamlounge. Yet here she was, standing in the largest of its four pods, a space that appeared to have limitless dimensions. A golden desert swept out before her to a distant mountain range, its flanks splotched with organic green, its molasses-hued peaks framed against a cloudless sky.

  The illusion extended past peripheral vision. Only when she turned around did the vista morph into drab curving walls and a plain airseal, revealing the pod’s actual dimensions at a mere twenty-five square meters. The pod was also programmable for multiple subcortical hookups, enabling individuals to share the same fantasy.

  LeaMarsa would have refused to take part in such a hookup, which would have required donning a sensor cap like the one worn during her ultimately terrifying Eun-Jung seduction. Fortunately, it was being utilized in a simpler fashion. The desert holo was one of thousands of archived vistas, none of which required subcortical linkage.

  Nevertheless, the multisensory scene made her uncomfortable. She heard the wind stirring up sand and whistling through spiny cacti. A warm breeze touched her face, so dry it sucked the moisture from her lips. It wasn’t the scene itself that bothered her but the fact it wasn’t real, that illusion trumped the reassurance of physicality. Her grip on reality seemed to be growing more tenuous. Counterfeit environments tended to make her more aware of the reek lurking in the depths.

  But this ceremony had to be endured. Her shipmates already viewed her with suspicion and alarm. It would be perceived as an unforgivable insult if she couldn’t tolerate a funeral.

  The seven of them stood in a semicircle facing the desert. LeaMarsa was at one end beside June, who wore the ceremonial blue suit of a Pannis medical officer.
Next was Faye in a long black dress, her body stiff and her eyes locked into an unreadable stare.

  Ericho occupied the middle position. Like June, he was in formal attire, a black and gold captain’s outfit brimming with medals and commendations. He looked older and more tired than LeaMarsa could recall. Beyond him stood Rigel, Alexei and Hardy, also dressed in their finest.

  Ericho cleared his throat. “We’re ready, Jonomy.”

  A ball of hazy white light took shape above the distant mountains. Music faded in: a full orchestral melody of Pachelbel’s ‘Canon in D Major’. LeaMarsa had read that back in the Helio Age, the music had been popular for weddings. It and the desert vista had been listed as favorites in Tomer Donner’s personnel file.

  The ball of light moved slowly toward them and morphed into Tomer’s face. The holo must have been recorded long ago or else had been artistically enhanced, for the image didn’t match the man that LeaMarsa had come to know over these past nine months. He had a full head of hair, and his face seemed warm and relaxed, suggestive of someone at peace with himself.

  Ericho began the ceremony. “We gather here to honor the spirit of Tomer Donner, Class Four bridge officer of Pannis Corp, lieutenant of the starship Alchemon. Born forty-four standard e-years ago in the former Third Israeli Republic. Trained at the Pannis schools in Holbrook-Hastings. A graduate, with honors, of the Academy of Primary Sciences…”

  The face in the sky grew larger as the captain continued the eulogy. LeaMarsa found herself caught up in the power of the event. Tragedy. Although the current experience of that feeling was rooted in Donner’s death, she was reminded of the psychic turbulence she’d gone through on Sycamore’s surface when they’d discovered the creature.

  Ericho concluded on a personal note. “Tomer Donner had his troubles, his demons. And obviously those demons were partially the cause of his demise. I couldn’t honestly call him a close friend. But I will to choose to remember him on better days, as a loyal shipmate and as a man dedicated to fulfilling our mission.”