Below

BELOW

BY

Kaitlyn O’Connor

© copyright October 2003 by Kaitlyn O’Connor
Cover Art by Jenny Dixon
ISBN 1-58608-332-5
New Concepts Publishing
www.newconceptspublishing.com

Chapter One

It might almost have been Earth. The globe below them was awash with ocean--80% to be precise--but the glow from the red sun that sliced through its atmosphere gave the waters below the eerie look of blood....

“An ocean of blood.”

Victoria glanced sharply at Captain Huggins. Seated before her at the console, his back was to her as he divided his attention between the viewing screen and the readout from the vessel’s probes.

After a moment, she realized he wasn’t telepathic. It was only a coincidence that he’d voiced her own thoughts. An involuntary shiver skated along her spine as she returned her attention to the viewing screen.

“Creepy, eh, Tory?”

It took an effort to keep her upper lip from curling in distaste, but Victoria Anderson was a firm believer in self discipline. She kept her expression impassive. She didn’t turn to the speaker. There was no sense in encouraging the man. Not that he could be discouraged. “Chilled,” she lied succinctly. However much she would’ve liked to dispute it, even to herself, she found the prospect below them unnerving.

“Right. Takes a bit to get the blood pumping after such a long hyber-sleep. I could warm you up a bit, if you’d like.”

This time Victoria didn’t bother to hide her distaste. “Do you mind?”

“Eh?” Jim Roach’s look was hopeful.

She gave him a plastic smile. “I’d like to hear the report.” She moved away from him, closer to the console, where the captain was pulling up a report from the computer. “What’s it look like?”

He frowned, but didn’t turn. “A bit more than tolerable, I’d say.”

Victoria’s lips flattened. She could see enough of the report to tell that barely tolerable might be an understatement. “They said the conditions were acceptable.”

Captain Huggins threw her a quick glance before returning his attention to the report. “It’s livable, if not hospitable. The construction crew seemed to deal with the conditions without any problems. Anyway, you knew the information the company had was sketchy.”

A flash of anger, quickly quelled, went through Victoria. He was right. She’d accepted the assignment, knowing how the company was ... knowing they hadn’t seen much beyond the find of the century. The crew’s survival was important to them, but only in terms of whether or not they survived long enough to mine the precious mineral that resided a scant 50 feet below that deceptively threatening surface.

It was deceptive, she told herself. Granted, this tiny system was at the very edge of the outer rim, light years from the beaten path. But several probes had been diverted to the planet to gather as much information as possible before the first landers were dispatched.

“You pick up on the beacon yet?” ‘Hugs’ Huggins asked his communications officer, Leigh Grant.

“Nothing ... Too much interference. Wait.”

“You got something?”

“Yeah. Faint. There’s ... Yes. Definitely. Looks like about 60 degrees starboard. Maybe 50 clicks. Good job, Hugs! You sat us down practically on top of it.”

‘Hugs’ looked anything but huggable, Victoria thought wryly. He was built in the general shape of a water bug....a pear shaped torso, arms and legs like skeletal remains

... no doubt from 40 years of shuttling around the galaxy and doing little beyond moving from his console to the hyber-chamber and back again. He’d probably spent two thirds of his life in hyber-sleep, which no doubt accounted for his youthful appearance. He didn’t look half his 68 years.

One would’ve thought the compliment would’ve pleased him, but he didn’t show it. In fact, he looked faintly alarmed.

Victoria felt another prickle of uneasiness as he glanced over his shoulder at the ground crew assembled behind him. His gaze finally settled on her. “You heard Grant. We’ll be docking shortly. Maybe you’d like to get your gear together.”

No way was Victoria going anywhere, but she could see his point.

“Roach. Get the crew below and ready the equipment for off loading.”

For a moment, he looked as if he would argue. Finally, he shrugged and gestured the crew out. He stopped as he reached the portal. “What about the tadpoles?”

Victoria’s lips tightened. Her eyes narrowed. “The what?”

He grinned, showing two rows of teeth in serious need of good hygiene ... or maybe they were beyond that. “You know. The slugs. Fish.”

She strode over to him. “That’s not only distasteful, it’s stupid,” she said, keeping her voice low. “They’re human beings....”

“Half,” he corrected, obviously unrepentant.

Victoria gritted her teeth and counted to ten. “Genetically altered.”

Again he cut her off. “To be half fish.”

Victoria counted to twenty. “We have to work as a team, Roach, or this isn’t going to work at all. Once this crew leaves, we’re on our own, and we’ll need everybody ... EVERYBODY to work together if we’re going to survive. I don’t give a damn what your personal opinion is of the project, or genetics in general. They’re telepathic, you fool. So you put that shit out of your head right now, and go down and tell the deep water mining CREW that we’re about to dock. You got that?”

“Yes, sir, chief! I mean, ma’am! ” He gave her a mocking salute and marched out.

Victoria glared at his back as he left. Where the hell the company had dug him up from was a mystery to her. If he had any kind of specialty at all, it was in being a royal pain in the ass.

It was hell trying to work with morons. There were half a dozen surface crew members, including her and Roach; almost four times that number of genetically engineered deep water mining crew who, despite the company’s reassurances about their psychological stability, were an unknown quantity; they were about to be dropped on a rock that was virtually uncharted; were a bare minimum of three months from any rescue team; and Roach was hell bent on stirring up trouble before they’d even been dropped.

She’d been assigned to oversee the work, not baby sit, and certainly not referee. Six month’s duty began to seem like a long, long assignment.

Dismissing it, Victoria turned her attention to the more immediate problem, returning to her observation position. She knew they must be getting close to the rig by now. “Any response to the hail?”

Leigh shot a look at the captain. A silent communication passed between them. “Nothing yet,” she responded finally.

The by-play between them set Victoria’s teeth on edge. “I’m in charge of the mission. Do me the courtesy of responding directly to my questions.”

Again the silent communication between the two at the console. Apparently, they’d been flying together so long, telepathy wasn’t necessary.

“Dead air,” Captain Huggins replied shortly.

“Could they all be down below?”

“Not likely. There’s supposed to be a surface crew on duty at all times, unless a storm forces them under. The sky’s clear though.”

Victoria studied the sky skeptically. The atmosphere looked like mud from where she was standing. Dimly, in the distance, she caught a glimpse of shining metal. “There!”

Captain Huggins glanced at her and then followed the direction of her pointing finger. He frowned. “Looks like debris. Maybe they had a blow?”

They’d dropped low enough they were skimming little more than a few meters above the waves. Victoria saw now that there was an alarming amount of debris bobbing in the water. She focused her gaze on the horizon. “That’s it! Jesus Christ! What the hell!”

The habitat/mining rig had been under construction for over a year. The construction was to have been completed months ago. The last she’d heard, it had been reported 95% complete. Even from this distance, she could see it was a hell of a long way from that. Briefly, she wondered if somebody had just hedged on the numbers, or if it was even the main habitat she was looking at, but she realized fairly quickly that the size alone was evidence it could be nothing else.

It was the main rig all right, but something had battered the hell out of it.

Leigh shot a panicked glance at the captain. “Hurricane, you think?”

He shook his head. “Can’t tell at this distance.”

“They didn’t report anything?” Victoria demanded.

“We haven’t heard from the ground crew since mid-way,” Captain Huggins said reluctantly.

“Between Kay and Zeta Station?”

He looked uncomfortable. “Earth.”

Victoria fought a round with her temper. “You’re saying we haven’t heard from anyone on the rig in six months and you didn’t think it was important enough to wake me up and tell me about it?”

Huggins spared a moment to glare at her. “It was reported to the company. The company checked it out and gave me a go.”

“Where’s the report?” she asked tightly.

“In your quarters.”

Victoria strode from the cockpit and down the corridor to her cabin. A ten minute search unearthed the one page report—make that one paragraph. ‘Communications tower down. Proceed. Report repairs.’

Victoria wadded the report into a ball. They didn’t have a damned clue of what they were walking in to.

The company had already sunk billions into the project and had yet to pull the first ton of ore. It wasn’t likely they were going to pull the plug for something that could easily be explained away as equipment malfunction. She should have known that.

They could’ve diverted a damned probe, though. If they’d bothered to, they would’ve seen it was a hell of a lot more than equipment failure. The communications tower wasn’t just down. It was gone.

Feeling a fluctuation in speed, Victoria took a deep breath and dismissed her frustration. Purposefulness took its place. They were going to be caught up in repairs for months. If there was any money to be made, she was going to have to get the crew into high gear the moment they off-loaded.

And there would be money. She was determined on that. With her pay plus the bonus they’d offered for every ton she brought in over quota, she’d be able to retire from the company within two years if she could make it through two tours here. Six on, six off and then another six on. After that, if she lived through it, she’d be able to pursue her dream, find a quiet little homestead on the back side of nowhere and concentrate on perfecting her skills as an artist—particularly sculpting.

She’d had no confidence she had the talent to become a successful artist, which was why she’d accepted the fact that she’d have to earn a living and consider art no more than a hobby until she could afford to do otherwise. The upside to putting it on hold and building a nest egg first was that it wouldn’t matter whether she was talented enough to make a living at it or not. She could do it for the sheer joy of it. If she sold anything, fine. If she didn’t, she was still going to be OK.

It had seemed worth it to take high risk work that would ensure she could launch her career in art while she was still young enough to dream, but it was a goal she’d shared with no one. Even the mention of ‘retiring’ before thirty, to pursue a career as an artist of all things, would have landed her in the company shrink’s office for a psych evaluation. She might just as well claim she wanted to marry and stay at home to rear children. She wouldn’t be considered any more maladjusted.

As far as she was concerned, however, it was not only crazy to consider a full fifty with the company, it was downright suicidal. Whatever they might think, she had no intention of being stuck working for the damned company until they managed to get her killed on one of their low budget, high yield enterprises.

As usual, her focus on her ultimate goal brought her roiling sense of frustration under control. Leaving her quarters, she made her way down to the lower deck to check the crew’s progress.

As she strode along the upper corridor, something skated through her mind, almost as if someone had caressed her.

Victoria paused, looking around, certain at first that someone actually had touched her. She was alone though.

Except in her mind.

Raphael.

Irritation surfaced. With an effort, she closed her mind to his inquisitive probing. He had no right to intrude on her private thoughts, but he was beginning to do it with increasing frequency. She wondered if that meant he was growing stronger, or....

She dismissed the thought before it had time to fully form.

The project had hinged on a revolutionary genetic experiment. Genetic manipulation was almost as old as space mining and colonization. It was the most practical way to go about both mining and terraforming. A ‘perfect’ world was one in a million, or maybe a billion. Most of the worlds they’d found were fairly close to useable, but certainly not prime real estate. Genetic manipulation allowed the companies to ‘acclimatize’ miners and terraformers to the conditions, which minimized the danger to the workers and, purely coincidentally, also lowered the company’s expenses, since they didn’t have to supply the workers with environmental suits. It also enabled workers to produce better since they weren’t hampered by bulky suits and oxygen tanks, another plus on the side of the company, who seemed to suffer no moral or ethical qualms about the fact that the workers that underwent the genetic manipulations were generally doomed to live out the remainder of their lives on the planet they were designed for since very few ever earned enough money to pay to be acclimatized to Earth’s conditions once more.