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“They’re watching us. I’m sure of it now.”
Cass and Phaedra were aboard the Enterprise, taking a break from the colonization and cataloging going on groundside. Phaedra, who had spent most of the past two weeks on the surface, was relishing the reduced gravity as well as the relative luxury aboard ship.
“How?”
“A few things. After seeing what they did to the large cameras, we switched to the small ones. But no matter where we put a camera, no matter how cleverly concealed, we never seem to catch any images of them. Other animals, insects, no problem at all. We’ve catalogued probably two dozen large mammalian and reptilian animals, about that many fliers, and maybe a hundred insects. No treecats.”
“That’s what you’re calling them?”
“It seems to fit. Technically they’re Felis eridani arboribus; we’ve never seen one on the ground; hell, we’ve barely seen them at all. Which is where we started, I think.”
“It is,” agreed Cass. “What’s your feeling?”
“I think they’re intelligent and are checking us out before approaching.”
“Intelligent? Not just cautious? And they approach us? Isn’t that backwards?”
Seabolt’s face showed her reluctant resolve. “I know it sounds crazy, but their behavior doesn’t match what I’d call rude animal awareness. Take the cameras, for example. If they were simply suspicious animals they might stumble across the camera, poke at it, then avoid it in the future. But we’ve been unable to get even that, which suggests they’re watching us place the cameras, watching us conceal them, and have figured out they want to avoid them.”
“They could simply be suspicious of them; cameras aren’t part of their natural environment.”
“You haven’t seen the cameras we’re using?”
“No.” She’d been too busy as XO to get down and dirty on the planetary exploration, much to her chagrin.
“These things are tiny, maybe a centimeter square and a couple millimeters thick, and they’ve got the adaptive camouflage on them. If you don’t see them being placed, you won’t find them.”
“It’s suggestive.” Cass took another sip of her ever-present cacao. “But hardly conclusive. They could be watching where you place them and avoiding the area afterwards, which is simply animal caution.”
Seabolt shook her head, her conviction growing. “It’s not that simple; why haven’t we caught them in any camera? We’ve seeded these trees according to protocol, covering every centimeter of open space, so we can get crossing shots and measurements. No animal will avoid every camera angle simply by accident, by blind luck. It takes planning, Cass, and...”
She broke off before she could finish her sentence. Cass, intrigued, didn’t let the silence grow.
“And what, Phaedra?”
“And telepathy. Look, Cass, we know the Freyr’s goats are telepathic, which suggests other animals should be too. While the treecats might know to avoid the places we put the cameras, they wouldn’t know what the cameras do unless they got the information from our minds. How else can you explain the total lack of imaging?”
“Telepathy just isn’t, I mean, it’s not, but then again, dammit!” Cass held the back-and-forth argument entirely with herself.
“Exactly,” agreed Seabolt.
“Okay. Let’s assume you’re right. What’s next?”
“I don’t know,” Seabolt admitted. “I’ve had Breena sit around and think happy, peaceful thoughts, since she was the one who made first contact with the Freyr’s goats. Nothing. Right now I’m sort of at a loss.”
“Then we table it.”
“But Cass! This would be a huge breakthrough! An extra-solar intelligence which is telepathic?”
“We table it,” Cass repeated. “If you’re right, they’re going to choose the time and place. Nothing we do will change it. Now, what about...”
After Cass finished with Seabolt, she checked in with Alley.
“How are things on the surface, XO?”
“Calm, for the most part. Construction of the groundside habitations is going well. We should beat all the deadlines.”
“Even the orbitals?”
Cass nodded. “Even the orbitals. Ataturk, Peter, and Sun Tzu have been instrumental in accelerating the construction of the Fjolnir. Motherlove’s got those three positively eager to remain behind. Jolly’s also been a huge help. I think he enjoys being the center of attention and realizes he’s going to have to have a, pardon me, habitable habitat if people are going to be able to be around him.”
“Are we going to run out of things to do?”
“No, Captain; the ‘wish list’ will give the ground teams enough to work on until sometime in the next century.”
“Good. Any more progress on your pet project with my newest Petty Officer?”
“Anne? No, nothing solid. I’ve been too busy to really get into any brainstorming with her, but as we move beyond the deadlines I should have more time.”
“Tell me a little more about this whole idea. In small words, please, XO.”
“Well, it comes out of a mistake we made in thinking about warp drive.”
“A mistake?”
“Nothing to worry about,” Cass assured her. “But you know how all the starships have navigational shielding?”
“Right, to prevent damage to the ship while we’re traveling in warp.”
“Exactly. Turns out, we don’t need them.”
Alley wrinkled her face.
“You lost me already, Cass.”
“Sorry. The logic was sound: hitting a micrometeor at a thousand times light speed would ruin anyone’s day.”
“Undoubtedly.”
“What Anne noticed is we haven’t hit anything.”
“Nothing?”
“Nothing. And that’s a statistical impossibility, so she started digging into the records and found we’d actually passed through a huge quantity of space detritus in our travels. Or, more accurately, it passed through us.”
“By the Goddess...! And we didn’t notice?”
Cass got enthusiastic. “No, because we were out of phase!”
“I’ve heard that before. Where?”
“It’s what the warp field does, puts the ship out of phase from the rest of the universe.”
“And Gigluk...?”
“What Anne figured out, or I should say is still figuring out, is if we can choose where to enter and leave ‘real space’, we should be able to choose when we enter and leave ‘real time’.”
“Time travel?”
“Time travel,” confirmed Cass. “Eventually. If she can work out the details.”
“I don’t want you using my ship as a test bed for time travel, XO. Not before it’s all figured out.”
“No, Ma’am. We won’t. What I was thinking wasn’t time travel as such, Captain, simply...”
Alley held up a hand to stop her. “Tell me after you’ve worked it out and can put it into simple sentences.”
“Aye, Ma’am.”
“Oh, XO, I heard something about Van Leeuwen.” Anna Van Leeuwen was scheduled to be captain of the Pioneer when it commissioned and was temporarily assigned to Enterprise as Third Officer, getting on-the-job training.
“Problem, Captain?”
“No, no problem. At least, it isn’t a problem yet. Seems she’s been spending all her off time down on the surface, everything except her sleep period.”
Cass started to speak, thought better of it, then rethought. “I can’t see it being a problem, Captain, as long as she’s keeping up on her duties and rest.”
“No, but what if we run into an all-hands emergency and she’s on-planet?”
Cass saw the potential issue and considered it before shaking her head. “I still don’t see the problem, Captain. We’re well within portal range of the surface, so we can recover her and any other personnel in minutes.”
“Fair enough.”
Alley waited for Cass to see the issue she hadn’t raised. She wasn’t disappointed.
“I’ll have a chat with her, though. She ought to go through channels, if only to provide an example for her crew.” Cass checked her ‘plant and nodded. “It’s been a while since she was a subordinate; it’s probably habit for her to do what she wants, when she wants. Don’t worry, Captain. I’ll take care of it.”
“Good. Anything else?”
Cass actually hesitated. “One more thing, Captain. It’s personal.”
“Go on. You are allowed to have personal needs, XO.”
Cass was still reluctant but she continued in a rush. “The girls want to go to the surface. I’ve stalled them so far, but I’m running out of excuses, and the only way I can figure to keep them out of trouble is to go down with them and supervise. Closely.”
“So you need a day off?”
“Ideally, Captain.”
“Make the necessary arrangements. Who you want to pull into your watch?”
“I had been thinking of Van Leeuwen until you mentioned her issues. Her shift would be short, but Ensign Cornell could cover the conn, and I know Chastain would be available for consult.”
Alley juggled personnel in her mind. She knew everyone aboard, but she had to admit Cass, in her role as XO, knew them better. One of the challenges of command.
“Sounds workable. Makes even more sense now; I can have Van Leeuwen under observation for a shift and maybe have a quiet word with her too, Captain to Captain-to-be.”
“Really?” Cass couldn’t hide her relief.
“Really. I’m not an ogre, Cass. Not even that much of a hardass, not when my XO has everything running like clockwork.” She beamed a wicked smile at Cass. “Have fun on the surface with the girls.”
“Aye aye, Ma’am!” Cass snapped off a salute before returning a grin to Alley.