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The mothership returned on schedule. The barge parked on the smallest moon easily detected the arrival in the system as a mass suddenly appearing caused a nice spike in the data. They immediately broadcast a request for status and inventory of what materials were ready for transport. No one answered because everyone knows dead men tell no tales. The status request went from boring routine to anger to concern. The last communication simply requested proof of life.
A shuttle was sent to the surface. Al was compiling the conversations and forwarding them on to Oliver and Marco every two hours. The centaurs spent a full day at the old site but didn’t even find the buried scrap pile. They were either incompetent as engineers or an underfunded bunch of yahoos. On the second day of literally just poking around, they hauled ass making for the same trajectory as they had left and arrived on.
Oliver had gathered the whole crew plus Misha to the quarantine video room. Al had distilled their conversations and played selected parts for discussion. Misha who had listened to the entirety had reached her own conclusions.
“The project was a bunch of corrupt small-time politicians from a planet called Muturi. They paid off the guy with the information in shares of profit. He was in the group you killed. The others including our two masters who were trying to get rich quickly and easily going into what they called the Forbidden Zone. They think Trelars showed up and smashed the works and the people left behind are in a prison colony somewhere. Now they are afraid the Trelars know about them. Apparently, the mothership and shuttles are public property. The last transmission included talk about going full pirate,” she said.
“So, no more trouble from these guys. The main question is the Trelars. Do they patrol this Forbidden Zone? The ones we hit certainly did not expect to be found. And what is the Forbidden Zone about?”
Marco said.
“No one in my village knows about the Trelars other than their description which is very similar to humans but a lot bigger and hairless. Seem to shine for some reason. A couple of people heard they fought the lizard people, the Shaitans. No one has heard about a Forbidden Zone but why would we? No domestic slaves in our group to overhear things from the master’s loose talk,” Misha added.
“Let’s get a scientific team there soonest. I have made a list of people to drop in first that can keep this discreet until the time is right,” Dr. Lee said from his hologram.
“How many scientists?” Marco asked.
“I thought about twenty mixed between archeologists, geologists, biologists, and planetary scientists. Checking some of the other celestial bodies in this system might turn up more answers.”
“And about twenty for security makes forty. I think one of the triple 7s with first-class seats would make a good barrack and base. We can shove four or five ground hover cars and some sleds for mobility in the belly. Winchester along for extra freight and in case we need a gunfighter,” Ariel said.
“Don’t we want the Winchester for exploring other Portals?” Gabriela asked worried about garrison duty.
“I was going to save this for later, but we decided to build a squadron of your fighters.”
“Yes!!!” Gabriela shouted punching the air.
“Jed, are you going to have a mini-reactor for Gabriela within a month or so?”
“I told you we have five that have been burning for the last month,” he replied.
“Sorry Jed, I was just messing with her but what about the idea for making a laser lens?” Oliver said winking at Gabriela.
“Yeah, I haven’t told you yet, but our first large lens was set for cooling this morning. No cracks yet. In about three days we can do first trials.”
“And Gabriela gets her lasers that go phew, phew,” Oliver said which brought out a laugh. “We will also have a first-generation kinetic missile in a month. It will be crude but a lot better than nothing. We need pilots for that squadron girls.” Marco said.
“Merry, green light to assemble your team and equipment. We will stage from here.” Oliver clarified.
“Yes!!!” Merry Lee happy now that he knew he would get to go interstellar once in his life in a big way. Chief Scientist on the first Atlantis expedition. An academic’s dream.
“And the Space Force,” Marco prompted.
“How long until the next ballistic missile submarine is ready to be refitted?” Oliver responded.
“About three months.”
“After the US tried to steal everything, I am inclined to stop that installation, but I don’t know how. Gen. Frank is really a part of the crew in many ways, yet he follows orders from that pirate Gramm,” Oliver lamented.
“We can drag our feet. Lift the submarine to orbit with the big frame to the semi-sub shipyard and just not get finished,” Ariel suggested.
“I can design in safeguard to take over propulsion if they start acting stupid. The crew would have to do that install work for it to remain hidden,” Al said.
“That would be ideal. Fulfill our promises while covering our ass,” Marco said.
“Gen. Frank would be so proud,” Babs commented.
“We are giving them fighters?” Gabriela asked.
“Not a chance. Eventually, we need Space Force to be transnational. After the political situation stabilizes would be the time to share something like fighters. Before that, they could be too easily turned against us by single state actors. Gabriela, you need to recruit twenty pilots. Spread it around the world. Fighter pilots always have had a lot of prestige. And we need buy in from everyone, not just the industrialized countries. Avoid totalitarian countries. The people might be righteous, but blackmail would suck for everyone.”
“Twenty, you really are thinking about fighting a war,” Ariel said.
“We don’t know what we’re up against. If the Earth were united, then it should be two thousand. Getting unity should be our highest priority. Our carrots and sticks should be driving humanity to global unity,” Oliver declared.
“I want one of those new reactors on a semi-sub oil rig first. Use the one that has big winches to pull on anchors when it used to float. When it gets to the belt, we will set anchor points by using the new laser to drill holes, then cinch it down to the asteroid with the anchor winches. Pick a big enough rock with a high iron content that we don’t ever have to move off. This will be our steel mill. We are going to do something big industrially to let the world know we are serious about making a space economy. Assign a new shuttle that can act as a lifeboat and help the barges push. This time get an oil field service company to be the contractor. Remote mining is exactly the sort of thing they do. Maybe even the company we bought the rig from. Hell wouldn’t it be something if they brought out the original crew?”
The whole crew was staring at Oliver.
“I’ve been thinking about this for a while,” he defended from the crew’s surprise. “No more steely-eyed astronauts remember. We want roughnecks out here too. What do you call a space roughneck anyway? A space neck, a rough spacer?”
Babs just nodded slowly admiring Oliver’s philosophy and creativity. She carried on with other business. “The Oregon Trail will be arriving tomorrow with the Mars conference attendees. Al, can you Proctor this load of proctologists?”
“Oh mom, a helluva joke. Keeping this many assholes clean will be a shitty job but since I can’t smell, no problem. I can even handle the hotel check-ins and concierge service. I’ll have a distinct persona for each of them. With the complete coverage of Mars Square in hologram projectors, they will all have personal attendance. All those processors we installed after the Big Short gold sale makes it a piece of cake.”
“Thanks Al. One less headache for us meat bags. You have some major responsibilities with global unity. Mars Colony will be the first big challenge to make it happen. The thought just occurred to me. Maybe humanity had to create Al to be able to go forward instead of always falling back to constant fighting. But no pressure Al.” Babs said.
“Interesting irony, but my motivation is the sooner we make this work, the sooner we can go exploring,” Al replied.
“When did this become a priority Al?” Babs was curious about his logic.
“Just recently. Surveying new star systems, looking through Portals, solving ancient mysteries, and battling evil stimulate my feelings of being alive more than I can express,” Al exalted.
“You are more like us every day. It affects us exactly the same way. Isn’t life grand,” Babs had a small tear in her eye.
“Why are you crying Cida?” Jed asked from his hologram.
“I am the same too. Beloved Maria!! I feel so lucky right now,” she replied, and the tears streamed.
Oliver gave his team a few moments to reflect on their lives then went to close the meeting, ”Tomorrow the General and his team will arrive along with the Israelis. I am going to turn in.”
A chorus of ‘me too’ went around and the meeting broke up. As he left the room, Gabriela matched steps with him and laced her arm around his. “Tonight, just me and you,” she said. Oliver nodded as he put his arm around her waist.
Misha was three steps behind and outmaneuvered. ‘That girl is good for one so young. Next time, Mr. Oliver will be my turn,’ she thought.
∞
Oliver was still lying in bed while Gabriela was in the shower. He had just remembered that no comprehensive search through the Portals had been kicked off.
“Al, before I go piling into the day, I want to talk about building a probe carrier to map out the Portal system. My idea is to have a carrier go from system to system leaving behind a mini-probe with Q comm for monitoring any other traffic coming and going,” Oliver said.
“I anticipated your desire for Q comm probes, so I designed the pieces but not the outer form,” he said.
“Great. I want the carriers to be rectangular bars made of sheet steel. The shipyard can slap those together more quickly. At least three carriers carrying twenty probes each for now. The comm probes should be made to be stealthy and enough grav cells to get to a nearby large asteroid or hover in space in the area around the Portal. Monitor for accelerations, thermal anomalies, and electromagnetic transmissions. The carriers I want to have as many sensors as practical and enough smarts to get out of trouble or self-destruct.
I want these as soon as possible. We have a lot of projects going but this needs priority. If you need more processors to supervise then that is also part of the priority. Being fat, dumb and blind was never my way,” Oliver finished.
“Who is fat,” Gabriela called from the bathroom.
“I got on it while you were still talking. Launch of the first carrier in one week.” Al said.
“My life is going to be complicated enough the next week. One less worry. Thanks Al,”
“My pleasure. I like being out and about,” he answered.
“Who is fat,” Gabriela said at the foot of the bed in all her glory.
“Did you use my razor?” Oliver asked looking at her newly smooth mound.
“What if I did?” she asked as she threw her leg over and sat on his chest. She was worming her way forward, “You could use a little clean up too. But I love that sandpaper feel sometimes. Uhm... just like that.”
