Burnt Worlds (42 page)

Beside him, the Tassali made a face but said nothing.

“Sensors,” said Dillon.
 
“Anything interesting?”

“A lot of dark energy here, sir.
 
Nothing else of note.
 
Nearest star system is five light years away.
 
It showed a lot of activity, followed by death about seven hundred years ago.
 
Nothing else, sir.”

“Right,” said the Captain.
 
“The dark energy reading doesn’t match our chart, but then again the chart says there’s a star system here.
 
Let’s map everything, then head to that system five years away.
 
What number are we at?”

“It will be fourteen, sir,” said the Chief.
 
“Planet Fourteen.
 
Can we call it something else, sir?”

Dillon rolled his eyes.
 
“Okay Chief, I’ll bite.
 
What would you like to call the next planet we visit?”

Black looked up at the ceiling, squinting as she thought.
 
“How about ‘Bob’, sir?”

“Planet Bob.”

“Aye, sir.
 
Planet Bob.”

Dillon shook his head as the other crew members began to grin.
 
“Planet Bob, then.
 
But if anyone’s living there, you have to explain it to them.”

“Great, sir.
 
Thank you.”

The sensor tech looked up from his terminal.
 
“Scan complete, sir.
 
We’ve mapped everything there is to see from here.”

“Okay, let’s go.
 
Set course for Planet Bob.
 
Get us underway when you’re ready.”

“Aye aye, sir,” said Pakinova.
 
“Course laid, engines online.
 
We are underway.
 
Estimated time to Bob is six minutes.”

The stars once again stretched into lines, their colours shifting slightly toward blue, as the
Borealis
accelerated beyond light speed.

Chief Black left her terminal, walking over to the Captain’s chair.
 
“Sir,” she said.
 
“Permission to leave the bridge for coffee.
 
I’ll bring you one.”
 
She looked past Dillon, at the Tassali.
 
“Tea, ma’am?”

Amba smiled.
 
“No thank you, Chief Black.”

“Permission granted,” said Dillon.
 
“Carry on, Chief.”

The Tassali watched the Chief leave the bridge, and waited a few moments before leaning in toward the Captain.
 
“The Chief has been asking me about Lieutenant Atwell’s private affairs.
 
I said I could not divulge anything told to me in confidence.
 
I hope it will not cause any trouble.”

Dillon smiled.
 
“Yeah, she was fishing around with me as well.”

Amba looked at him.

“Uh,” he added, “I meant, she was hoping I would volunteer to tell her something.
 
Why, do you know what the Chief is after?”

The Palani woman nodded.
 
“I do.”

Dillon smirked at that.
 
“Great.
 
I won’t ask what it is.
 
But if it drives the Chief nuts, I’m in favour.”

Amba nodded.
 
“That seems to be a popular sentiment.”
 
She paused a moment.
 
“Also, I can tell you I am now at twenty-eight degrees.”

The smirk widened.
 
“Is that so?
 
How do you feel?”

She tilted her head from side to side. “I get tired very quickly.
 
Sometimes I feel a little dizzy.”

Dillon nodded.
 
“You’re much better company when you’re awake.”

“Thank you,” she said.
 
“I do not think I will get it much higher through meditation alone.
 
Though I have avoided it, I will need to keep using the medical armband that Master Seaman Singh provided.”

“The meds for your blood chemistry — how much do we have?”

She smiled at him.
 
“Head Mechanic Vish has modified the organic fabricator to produce simple medicines.
 
This is one of them.”

“I should give Sap a medal or something.”

Chief Black returned to the bridge, bearing two cups of coffee.
 
She handed one to the Captain, and returned to her post, smiling as she looked at her console.
 
“Who’s awesome?” she said proudly.
 
“Perfect timing.
 
Coming out of light speed, at Planet Bob, in five seconds.”

Dillon took a sip as he turned to look out the windows.

The stars all sprung back to points, as a planet leapt into view in front of them.
 
A flickering ring of grey was wrapped horizontally around the planet like a thin circle of smoke.
 

“Contacts!” called the Chief.
 
“Many contacts!”

“Full stop!” said Dillon.
 
Without looking, he reached down to put his coffee in the cup holder, but missed.
 
The Tassali swiftly plucked the mug from his hand as he let it go.

“Hundred-plus contacts sir,” said the Chief.
 
“Now two hundred and counting.”

The window display lit up with dozens of red targeting crosses.
 
Dozens more popped up as a numeric readout scrolled rapidly by.
 
The massive grey planet stopped coming closer as the ship came to a halt.
 
Yet more clusters of angry-looking red crosses lit up the display.

“Any of them looking at us, Chief?” asked Dillon.

Black leaned back, taking in the frantic warnings from her terminal.
 
“No, sir, doesn’t look like it.
 
Current count is now… seven hundred contacts, still counting.
 
Two main configurations:
 
cylinders and, uh, blobs.”

“Horlan,” said Amba.

“Okay,” continued the Chief.
 
“Count stops.
 
Six hundred and nineteen cylinder ships, plus two hundred and eighty-two Horlan.
 
All contacts, both sides, are wrecks.
 
Looks like there isn’t a single intact ship in there, sir.
 
Everyone kicked the shit out of everyone else.
 
Over two hundred million bits of debris.
 
Sensors are still counting.”

“Understood,” said Dillon.
 
“Confirm for me: anything moving under its own power?”

Black shook her head.
 
“Negative, sir.
 
Everything is just orbiting the planet.
 
No active power sources, as far as we can tell.”

“The planet?”

“It’s dead, sir.
 
The plague was here.”

“Plague, Chief?”

“Sorry, sir.
 
Lower deck is calling the Palani bioweapon ‘the plague’.”

“Huh,” said Dillon.
 
“Close enough.
 
Okay, Chief.
 
Park us here.
 
Scan everything.”

“Aye aye, sir.”

The Captain reached for his cup, and Amba handed it to him.
 
She then walked across the bridge to look over the Chief’s shoulder.
 

Black looked up at her.
 
“Ma’am?” she said.

“Horlan ships emit a pattern of radiation when they are alive,” she said.
 
“I believe you call it ‘alpha’ radiation.”

Chief Black shook her head, glancing at Dillon.
 
“No radiation, Captain.
 
No alpha, beta or gamma coming from any of the wrecks, sir.
 
Ma’am.”

The Tassali nodded.
 
“Dead, then.”

“Captain,” said the sensors tech.
 
“Very extensive ruins on the surface.
 
Huge cities, lots of infrastructure, sir.
 
Also, scans show no dark energy here.
 
Charts say this place should have a high concentration.”

“Huh,” said Dillon.
 
“Thank you, carry on.”

The Chief looked over from her console.
 
“Looks like this planet was a big deal for the cylinder people, sir.
 
Enough infrastructure and urban space for billions of people, assuming human standards.
 
And they obviously fought like hell for the place.”

“Huh,” said Dillon again, distracted.
 
“Important planet, huge fleet battle.
 
But no attempt at repair or recovery.”

Amba and the Chief both looked over at him as he watched the window display, his eyes darting back and forth.
 
“The ships that could leave under their own power did so, and the rest were abandoned.
 
I’ll bet you,” he said, glancing over at the two women, “this was late in the war.
 
In fact, I’ll bet we’re very close to the cylinder homeworld.”

The Tassali looked out the window, as did the Chief.

Dillon nodded slowly.
 
“Yeah,” he said.
 
“Chief, scan everything here.
 
Then get us underway again, on our previous course.
 
We’re definitely headed in the right direction.”

-----

Cho woke up suddenly.
 
His cabin was dark, save for the bluish glow from the window and the stars outside, as well as the dim light from the terminal on his desk.
 
He blinked repeatedly, until he could make out the time.
 
03:31.
 
He frowned.
 
Nothing good ever happens at three-thirty in the morning.

He lay quietly, listening to the sounds of his cabin and the ship at night.
 
Distant footsteps beyond his door.
 
The occasional pop of a pipe shifting as it heated up or cooled down.
 
The rattle of the fan somewhere in the ventilation system.
 
Yesterday a second fan had begun to rattle somewhere, and it was exasperating the Captain to no end.

An idea had been forming in Cho’s mind.
 
He couldn’t get rid of it, and he certainly wasn’t going to get back to sleep until he checked it out.
 
He rolled out of his bunk, planting his feet on the floor and standing up.
 
He dressed, grabbed his datapad, and left his cabin.

-----

Lieutenant Atwell relaxed at the back of the bridge, as the night watch worked quietly at their consoles.
 
They had music playing, which helped the quiet hours go by.
 
Belanger, Roberts, Sharma and Schmidt had great chemistry and worked well together.
 
So long as the coffee was plentiful, the nights were pleasant; sometimes even fun.
 
If things began to drag, Atwell had access to a list she’d compiled, of the most obscure and absurd trivia she could find.
 
Sharma was very good at it; currently the other three crewmembers owed her seventy-four bottles of beer.

Everyone was startled when the comm speaker suddenly burst to life.
 
“Tech suite to bridge.”

Atwell glanced at the ship’s mechanical clock.
 
04:13.
 
She leaned forward and poked the console with one finger.
 
“Bridge here, this is Atwell.
 
What're you doing up, Cho?”

He was speaking quickly, his voice at a slightly higher pitch.
 
He sounded halfway between giddy and terrified.
 
“Atwell, could you come down to the tech suite right away?
 
I need to show you something.”

“On my way.
 
Bridge out.”

Atwell gave a shrug to Roberts’ inquisitive look.
 
“I have no idea what he wants,” she said.
 
“Is Lee or the Chief up?”

“The Chief is always up,” came a voice from the bridge hatch.
 
A freshly-pressed Chief Black stepped on to the bridge, stuffing something into her mouth and wiping the crumbs off her hands.
 
She mumbled through pastry and icing sugar.
 
“Did I miss something, sir?”

Atwell smiled broadly, shaking her head.
 
“No, Chief.
 
I’m glad you’re here.
 
Cho just asked me to head down to the tech suite for a moment.
 
The bridge is yours.”

Black nodded, chewing on her mouthful.
 
“Aye aye, I have the bridge.”
 
She wiped her hands on her pants, and walked over to the ship’s back counter.
 
Black opened the log book, and started looking for the pen.
 
She stopped, noting that Atwell was staring at her.
 
“What?” she said defensively, wiping her mouth on the back of her hand.

The Lieutenant began to blush, but laughed it off.
 
“Nothing, Chief.
 
Thanks.”

Black watched the officer leave the bridge, then picked up the ink pen and leaned over the log book.
 
“Nice girl,” she whispered to herself.
 
“Bit odd sometimes.”

-----

Atwell stepped into the tech suite, and found Cho alone at the rear terminal.
 
He was almost beside himself with excitement.
 
“Great,” he said.
 
“You’re here.
 
Thanks.
 
You need to see this.”

“Okay,” she said, sitting down in the chair next to him.
 
“What’s got you up in the middle of the night?”

Cho pointed to the screen, which showed some star maps.
 
“It’s that thing you mentioned yesterday, after Planet Bob, about how nothing was in the right place.
 
How both normal matter and dark energy were never where we expected them to be.”