Fian appeared next to me, and handed me a sealed carton. I looked down at it in confusion.
‘Food,’ he said, waving another identical carton at me. ‘Eat.’
I pulled off the lid, and felt the carton grow hot. Inside was what appeared to be stew.
Fian handed me a spoon. ‘It’s quite good.’
I tried a mouthful of stew. He was right. I hadn’t been hungry in days, but now I was starving. I ate my way to the bottom of the carton at high speed. ‘They didn’t have cheese fluffle?’
Fian expressed his opinion of cheese fluffle by making a rude noise, and nodded at the Earth Rolling News coverage. ‘Some people still haven’t made it into Ark. What are they doing? Still trying to get the family pet into a carrier?’
‘Some may not take the warnings seriously, or just not want to come because …’ I frowned, threw my carton in a waste bin, and made a frantic call on my lookup.
Fian stood watching me. ‘Something wrong?’
‘I hope not. What’s taking him so long?’ I cancelled the call, and made it again, flagging it as emergency this time. ‘Come on, Keon, answer your lookup or the next time I see you I’ll …’
Keon’s face appeared. ‘Is there a problem, Jarra?’
Things sounded very noisy wherever he was, so I raised my voice. ‘I just wanted to make sure you’d got Issette into Ark. I know she thinks it’s creepy and …’
‘Relax! We’ve been in Ark for four hours,’ he said calmly. ‘I was hardly likely to let Issette stay outside when the Military kept screaming it was dangerous.’
‘You might have decided it was too much effort to argue with her.’
Keon laughed. ‘I’m not nearly as useless as you think I am. I’m perfectly willing to put in effort on something important, I just think most people waste a lot of energy on things that aren’t. You’re a classic example, always insisting on doing things the hard way.’
I stuck my tongue out at him.
‘I have to go,’ he said. ‘There’s a wild party going on here, and Issette’s in the middle of it, alternating between being happy about our new Twoing contract and panicking about being in Ark. I don’t want her getting powered in an attempt to calm her nerves.’
I felt horribly guilty. I’d been occupied with my own problems and totally forgotten Issette and Keon were renewing their Twoing contract today. ‘I should have congratulated you both. Mutual joy!’
‘Thanks,’ said Keon. ‘I may bring Issette over to visit you tomorrow. We’re only about an hour’s walk away, and I’m sure archaeologists will be much safer company than Issette’s medical student friends.’
The call ended, and my lookup chimed with an incoming mail. That was the Military forces moving to alert level 3 as planned. There was less than an hour before portal lockdown would cut off Ark from the rest of the universe. Over on the Earth Rolling News display, the red numbers started flashing urgently.
Fian and I stood with the crowd, watching the numbers slowly count down, then suddenly both our lookups chimed again. I checked my mail, saw the Military had moved from alert level 3 to level 2, and looked around wildly to check the display on Earth Rolling News. There was still twenty minutes to portal lockdown, so why had …?
We headed for the Alpha corridor, and as soon as we were out of view of the crowd we broke into a run.
26
Fian and I tumbled into our room, and I yanked open my bag to grab my Military lookup. It seemed to take a couple of centuries to enter codes, and then an image appeared.
‘Oh nuke!’ I projected the image against the cavern wall. Normally, a light background is better for projections than dark, but in this case the dark of granite was perfect. The image showed the alien sphere surrounded by a glowing mist of swirling colours.
‘What’s it doing?’ Fian asked.
Fian might be the family failure, but he still knew an awful lot about science. If he couldn’t work out what was going on then I sure as chaos wouldn’t manage it. I patched in the command feed sound.
‘How much longer before we lose portals?’ asked the familiar voice of Colonel Torrek.
‘Fourteen minutes, sir,’ said a voice I didn’t recognize.
There was a short pause before the Colonel spoke again. ‘Analysis team, is your equipment still coping with the storm?’
‘No problems with the remotes, sir. We’re running multiple redundancy and merge on the data feed to eliminate interference.’
‘Then I want to evacuate the fighters now. Portalling out is the problem, not portalling back. We can watch the situation remotely and send in whatever forces are appropriate. Threat team, am I forgetting anything?’
‘No, sir,’ said the unmistakable lazy tones of Mason Leveque.
‘All fighters portal immediately to Echo base,’ said the Colonel.
‘We’re portalling out now, sir.’ There were faint crackling sounds as Nia Stone spoke, the interference confirming my guess she was out in space with shift 5.
Fian reached for my lookup. ‘Can I just …?’
I missed what he did, but the words ‘Cdr Stone, Attack leader’ suddenly appeared in the top left of the display. These rapidly changed to ‘Cl Torrek, C. O.’.
‘Threat team, what’s your current situation analysis?’
The display informed us Commander Leveque, Threat team leader, was replying. ‘We still believe the sphere has automatically put up shields to ride out the storm. We predicted a 72 per cent chance it would take defensive measures to protect itself from the increased radiation levels in a solar storm. We were concerned it would move into low Earth orbit to use Earth’s magnetic field for shelter, an action indistinguishable from moving into closer orbit in preparation for attack. The fact it is holding position is, in itself, reassuring.’
There was a pause before Colonel Torrek spoke again. ‘Physics team is telling me the sphere is absorbing power in preparation for an attack, and I should order a pre-emptive strike.’
Leveque sounded quite bored by this suggestion. ‘Generating shields uses power, sir. It’s logical to make the shield convert background radiation into energy to replace that power.’
‘They’re telling me the rate of power absorption is too high to just maintain shields.’
‘The sphere has definitely used power for other things, sir, including course changes and meteor defence. Physics team are still arguing it arrived by long distance drop portal shortly before it was detected. Threat team disagrees since Jorgen Eklund’s work states it would be impossible.’
Fian and I exchanged glances at the mention of his great-grandfather.
‘Threat team believes the sphere has spent hundreds or thousands of years reaching Sol system conventionally,’ continued Leveque, ‘and must have been designed to take every opportunity to recharge its equivalent of power cells.’
The Colonel spoke again. ‘Threat team does not advise an immediate attack?’
‘No, sir. We do not.’
‘We will remain at alert level 2,’ said the Colonel. ‘Attack team confirm status.’
‘All fighter teams are launch ready,’ said Nia Stone.
‘Earth Africa solar array status?’
Fian’s gasp of alarm was loud in my ear. ‘They’re keeping a solar array active in a solar storm!’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘They may need it to attack the sphere.’
‘But what if they lose control and the beam starts tearing Earth apart?’
‘They’re prepared to blow up the array if necessary,’ I said. ‘Earth has four more. Shhh.’
The Earth Africa solar array control supervisor was talking. ‘Remote controls are fully functional, sir. Off-line mode is holding stable with four wings of the array disconnected. My people are standing by ready to portal in if we need more wings disengaged as the storm builds.’
‘Warn me at the slightest sign that off-line mode is breaking down. I don’t want any risk of spontaneous beam coalescence,’ said the Colonel. ‘Missile
status?’
‘Warheads are on final safety. Drop portals targeted and ready to fire,’ said the Missile team leader.
‘We have a Missile team?’ asked Fian. ‘Since when?’
‘Since right at the start,’ I said. ‘They’ve been stationed at Echo base, Adonis, all along.’
‘And now we wait,’ said the Colonel. ‘Physics team are sending me very creative comments about your sanity and ancestry, Mason.’
‘Quite regrettable of them.’ Mason Leveque sounded completely untroubled by the opinion of the Physics team. ‘However I appreciate civilians are unused to this sort of situation and may find it stressful.’
Fian made a choking noise. ‘While Leveque makes crucial decisions involving wars with aliens on a daily basis?’
I pulled a face. ‘These days, yes he does.’
‘How does Leveque stay so calm? Isn’t he human? Even the Colonel is sounding tense, and Leveque’s wife would be leading the fighters in an attack so …’
‘The Threat team have to stay calm and think. The Physics team seem to be having a major panic attack. If Leveque did that …’
‘Why aren’t the Physics team doing their own talking, instead of the Colonel relaying their messages?’
‘I suppose he doesn’t trust them on the command channel. If he has to give an extreme order, he won’t want civilians arguing.’
Fian pulled a face. ‘I don’t think I want to know what you mean by extreme.’
I wished I didn’t know either. The General Marshal himself had gone on formal record stating Colonel Torrek was authorized to take any and all measures necessary to protect humanity, and everyone knew what that phrase meant. If it was necessary to save humanity, then Colonel Torrek would give the command that Tellon Blaze had given about Thetis. He’d order the Military forces to nuke Earth to cinders.
Back in the tactical meetings, I’d been convinced that could never actually happen. Neither the General Marshal nor Colonel Torrek thought Earth was disposable, or the Handicapped mattered less than other human beings.
Here in Ark, I was far less confident. If Earth turned into another Thetis, then Colonel Torrek might have no other choice, but I knew he’d stay and die with the rest of us even if he had the chance to escape.
If the worst happened, if Colonel Torrek did have to say those words, then I hoped I wouldn’t hear them. Even if I did, I’d probably have less than five minutes to panic about what was going to hit us. There were a chaos lot of missiles on standby at Echo base, Adonis, so it would be over mercifully quickly.
Major Rayne Tar Cameron of Command Support team spoke. ‘Interference from solar radiation levels is at medical safety limits. Earth portal network is entering five minute lockdown sequence.’
Down in the main hall, the portal lights would be flashing green. No new portals could establish, and existing ones would close down when the lights turned amber and then red. There was no way for any of us to leave Ark now. I didn’t usually suffer from claustrophobia, but I was suddenly very aware of the solid rock surrounding me.
‘Threat team, you still think lockdown is the critical moment?’ asked Colonel Torrek.
‘Yes sir,’ said Leveque. ‘If the sphere is hostile and actively observing us, it will detect the network shutting down, and should immediately attack to make the most of its window of opportunity. We would expect either a move into closer orbit in preparation for an attack on Earth, or a pre-emptive strike on Earth Africa solar array. Any incoming alien portal signals would be timed to coincide with that.’
‘Ark team, evacuation status?’
‘We’re at 99.3 per cent,’ said the Ark team leader. ‘Fractionally better than predicted.’
There was silence for a while.
Fian groaned. ‘If I’ve influenced the Military into not attacking the sphere, and this goes badly … Maybe Gaius Devon was right after all. A pre-emptive strike would give us the best chance of taking it out.’
‘Gaius Devon is an idiot. Attacking the sphere would have been a stupid move. It’s friendly.’ I said the words with as much conviction as I could, and hoped like chaos they were true.
A computerized voice started counting down the last few seconds of the portal lockdown sequence. I held my breath during the last ten of them, watching the image of the alien sphere for any threatening change or movement. Nothing happened. A minute passed, five minutes, and still nothing.
‘No immediate reaction then.’ Colonel Torrek’s voice was heavy with relief. ‘Threat team, when do you predict the next danger point will be?’
‘We may have an interesting moment at lockdown plus fifty-seven minutes,’ said Leveque, ‘but I emphasize this prediction is far from reliable. We assumed the sphere had recharged its power cells during the previous solar storm, tried to estimate its power usage since then, and calculate when it will regain maximum power.’
‘And what happens at that point?’ asked the Colonel.
‘There are two possibilities, sir,’ said Leveque. ‘The first is it attacks. The second is its rate of power absorption drops to match the level required to maintain the shields. The second possibility is obviously to be preferred, and would strongly indicate it does not have immediate hostile intentions.’
The command channel went silent. Fian stood up, wandered restlessly around our room, and pulled aside the curtain for a moment.
‘It looks like everyone is still down in the main hall,’ he said.
‘I expect Playdon is keeping them out of our way.’
Fian came back to sit next to me. ‘I know this sounds a bit trivial in the circumstances, but I wish I’d brought some food cartons up here. I’m hungry again.’
‘Me too.’ I sat watching the seconds tick by. ‘Leveque reminds me of Keon.’
Fian frowned, obviously thinking that over. ‘I see what you mean. They have the same lazy approach to life, but Leveque is a lot more intelligent.’
‘I’m not so sure. Keon can be scarily bright sometimes. Those laser sculptures of his, for example. He’s not really artistic. Laser sculptures are very technical, so he gets by with pure intellect.’
‘Maybe.’ Fian changed the subject. ‘If nothing is happening for a while, we could finish our earlier conversation. The one about your impact suit problem.’
I groaned. ‘We already finished it.’
‘No we didn’t. A Military psychologist would have a lot of experience with similar problems and …’
I turned and pinned him down on the sleep sacks. ‘No! I refuse to discuss psychologists at a time like this.’
‘But you …’
I kissed him to shut him up, but the second we broke off for air he was off again. I was still trying to kiss Fian into submission, when a voice spoke on command channel. ‘Fifty minutes since portal lockdown.’
Fian and I were brought back to reality. We exchanged guilty looks, sat up, and paid attention.
‘Seven minutes until Threat team’s next predicted crisis point,’ said the Colonel.
‘I re-emphasize this is of dubious reliability,’ said Leveque. ‘We could only estimate the number of times the sphere had to fire its meteor defence while out near …’
He broke off. The shield around the sphere had suddenly changed, the pulsating colours vanishing to leave a clear white light.
‘Stand by everyone,’ murmured the Colonel.
‘Evidently we over-estimated the number of asteroids,’ said Leveque. ‘Power absorption calculations are in progress.’
Tension gradually eased over the next five minutes, after which Leveque spoke again. ‘The sphere’s power absorption has dropped significantly. We therefore assume the sphere is now at maximum power. The lack of offensive action, although not definitive, is very encouraging.’
‘In which case,’ said Colonel Torrek, ‘I’m taking alert level down from 2 to 3. Attack shift 5, you can stand down. Go eat, drink and sleep. If we don’t get any more excitement, then shifts 3 and 4 will stand down in one hou
r. Nia, it’s up to you when you take your break.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ said Nia Stone. ‘Since we’re keeping half the fighters on launch standby throughout the emergency, I’ll opt to command the combined fighters of shifts 3, 4 and 5. Commander Tell Dramis will command shifts 1, 2 and 6.’
Nothing happened for the next couple of minutes, and Fian looked at me. ‘It seems pretty calm now. Dare we go and eat?’
‘I think so. If anything happens, alert status will go back up to level 2 and we’ll get mail to warn us.’
We headed back down to the main hall. There were fewer people around now, so presumably some teams had gone to bed. Playdon inevitably came to check what was happening.
‘It’s still going smoothly, sir,’ I said. ‘We thought we’d eat.’
He nodded, and Fian and I went into the side hall with the food tables. I got our drinks of Fizzup, while Fian sorted through the cartons.
‘This isn’t cheese fluffle, but it sounds as if it includes cheese.’
I accepted the carton of not cheese fluffle. We went back into the main hall and sat on the floor by the wall to eat. Dalmora, Amalie and Krath came to join us.
‘Where are Cassandra 2?’ I asked.
‘They all went next door,’ said Amalie.
‘Next door?’ asked Fian.
‘There’s another big hall like this just down the linkway, with a huge party going on.’ She paused. ‘Oh they’re back.’
I looked around and saw the Cassandra 2 team had met a face painter. Rono was unmistakable, his top emblazoned with the words ‘RONO AND THE REPLAYS’, but I was less sure about the rest. I thought that Stephan was the lion, who was making growling noises and mock pounces at the rest of the team. Maybe he wasn’t so quiet and retiring after all.
‘Playdon!’ Rono called. ‘We’re going to bed. We’ve got a gig in twelve hours time.’
‘Unless I manage to smash his guitar first.’ The face of the speaker was painted in complex blue spots, and his ears were delicately pointed and furry, but I recognized Keren’s voice.