Dark Running (Fourth Fleet Irregulars Book 4) (81 page)

Over several days, though, opinion did come round, just as it had amongst the dakaelin themselves, as the point was reiterated that the Revellin were, themselves, a civilian-led society, as weird as that seemed to Samartian eyes, with civilians in important roles even on their ship, and one of the three people
they
would be leaving here a civilian diplomat, too. It had also been realised that if they wanted to find out as much as they could about the Revellin’s science, they were going to have to send scientists. It was all very well leaving it to the Revellin to provide them with information and bringing it back for their scientists to study, but as they had already discovered, starship officers might not understand the information that was being given, so wouldn’t know what questions to ask.

The final choice, therefore, was for two military officers and two scientists.

Three of them were unknown to the Fourth, though all four were already household names on Samart. Their ambassador would be a woman called Sennet, a retired dakael who held an equivalent status to that of a former system president. She was greatly honoured on Samart even by their standards of reverence for the dakaelin.

The other military officer would be Caldai Genave, the only one they knew, from his meeting with Martine. There was a small, embarrassed admission in his profile that he was, in fact, an intelligence officer, an investigator with the Samartian equivalent of the Fleet’s Internal Affairs.

The first of the scientists was a doctor, Jebrin, who had been undertaking key role in contact with the Fourth right from the start, unbeknownst to them, as he’d been called in as one of Samart’s leading experts in infectious diseases. He had been advising on quarantine procedures and had been involved at an increasingly important level as first contact had progressed.

The final member of the team, Citizen Cerale, was also the youngest, at thirty one. She was a shipyard engineer, professionally, working at one of the yards which built and maintained the Samartian fleet. The ‘hobbies and interests’ section of her CV revealed that she was a dedicated amateur astronomer, a very unusual pursuit on Samart, while the range of subjects she’d studied for personal interest ranged from astrophysics to genetics. The Samartians didn’t give her IQ, because they didn’t measure that in the same way the League did, but it seemed probable, from her range of interests, that she was a natural polymath, and quite possibly in the range the League would consider a genius. Simon’s eyes lit up at that, particularly when he saw that she was petite, white-blonde and pretty.

At a rather more elevated level, however, the Fourth was pleased. They would have done their utmost to make this work, whoever the Samartians had sent, but this was a team Alex might well have selected, himself.

As they had come to expect with Samartians, once the decision
was
made and announced, action followed soon. It was just a day and a half later that they carried out the exchange, in itself one of the most important undertakings of the mission.

This time, it was Misha Tregennis herself in command, with Tina Lucas along to help, and to bring the shuttle back. The Fourth would have preferred to leave the shuttle there, seeing no reason why it couldn’t be parked beside the biodome, but the Samartians were evidently uneasy about the ongoing presence of an alien craft in their system, so Alex had agreed that they would bring the shuttle back to them. Jace Higgs was piloting, and Chief Petty Officer Martins was going with them, too, to help set up the biodome. The Samartians had asked for him specifically, too – to their eyes at least, he was the ‘least human’ looking of the Heron’s crew, with his squat high-grav physique. His bone structure and musculature was so dense that he looked Neanderthal, small eyes dominated by a heavy brow. He got startled looks even from groundsiders on League worlds where the Chiellian genome was rarely seen, and it was apparent that the Samartians found him physically repellent. At the same time, though, they were fascinated by him, amazed by the revelation that his people too had been created by the Olaret. They had decided that this made his people and theirs ‘like cousins’ and Martins had stepped up to doing his bit to foster that relationship.

Alex tried not to watch the shuttle vanishing off the edge of their scopes. It wasn’t the last time he would see them, after all. One of the first things they would do as they set up the biodome would be to install the interface which had been built especially for them to link up with Samartian comms. Once they had done that, they would be able to send signals right out to the ship, albeit with an hours’ time delay. Alex would be able to see for himself that they were safe, and it had been agreed with the Samartians that they would wait for a further two weeks, Samartian time, before they left. That would give both teams time to settle, and time to pull out, too, if it was found not to be working out for any reason.

Things got very quiet on the Heron, though, once the shuttle had gone. Just about the only topic of conversation was where the shuttle was now and what they would be doing – their progress was followed on the ops board schedule with as close an interest as if people could actually see them. At the point where it was known that they should be landing, Buzz put a simulation on the notice board, too, so people could visualise what was, or ought to be, happening right now.

The Samartians had given them a landing zone on the third moon of their eighth planet, right out in the outer reaches of their system. It was a freezing, airless world with no gravity to speak of, and it had no Samartian presence on it whatsoever. They would have it entirely to themselves, as the Samartians’ own exo-quarantine facility was being built, or rather adapted from an existing base, on another moon in orbit around planet six.

Everything had been planned and agreed, here, in minute detail, right down to the speed of approach and which way the shuttle would be facing when it landed. The Samartians had already left their supplies ready to be collected, though their team would be sent out by their own drone-ship in a couple of days. Once they landed, the Fourth’s team would unload the biodome – a simple enough thing to erect, though spectacular for anyone who hadn’t seen anything like it before. The eight-berth dome was packed into a container not much bigger than a cargo crate. Once placed in the agreed location, rock-bolts would fire into the ground to secure it, then the case would pop open with a small explosive charge, slamming up like an enormous airbag. Floor and walls would inflate from a high pressure canister within the case, achieving structural integrity in something under two and a half seconds.

It would take rather longer to set up the life support system, but no more than half an hour. This was, after all, a survival dome, designed for use in a crisis. Ease of use and rapid set up were essential, with the life-support unit so simple that even a civilian could figure it out. There were only so many ways you could plug it into the dome’s systems, after all, and even the dumbest civilian might be able to work out that you put the big red tube into the big red hole and the green power cable into the green power socket. Furniture, such as it was, would inflate along with the dome, and it would be the work of minutes to bring in the crate which held all the extra fittings like bunk frames and a galley station. They would bring in the comms link, too, and Tina Lucas would be setting that up while the others installed the fittings and started to bring other supplies over from the shuttle. This would be the longest part of the job, as the Fourth had provided everything that they could think of in quantities to last the three of them for a year and a half, so the shuttle was packed to capacity with food, toiletries and clothes, sports equipment, medical supplies and a comprehensive entertainment pack.

That would be broadcast live, on Samart – or as near to live as the government was prepared to go. News management had been timed to catch up with actual events at the point where the Fourth’s shuttle came into the system, minus one hour. There would be a one hour delay, always, between what was happening in the dome and what the public saw, giving the authorities time to see what was happening first and, if they felt it to be necessary, stop the footage going out.

As far as the Samartians were concerned, though, that
did
count as ‘live’. Their holovision hit new viewing records as people watched the coverage of the shuttle entry, landing and dome-building from one of their own ships filming it from orbit round the moon. The moment they were waiting for, the moment they’d been promised, was to be able to see
inside
the dome, as soon as the comms link went live.

They got to see that at the same time the Fourth did. Fascination with watching the aliens was at such fever pitch that the dakaelin were obliged to put out a request on the media, asking people on the night-side of the planet to turn off lights and all unnecessary appliances, as the burden on their global power grid was unprecedented.

In the dome, however, they were oblivious to that. The first pictures that went out showed them still busy setting up, though Tina called everyone over as the link went live.

Misha did the official greeting, with due gravitas, but it was Jermane who set the tone – while Misha looked authoritative and Murg looked solemn, Jermane Taerling was beaming all over his face, giving the camera a happy wave and ‘Hi, hello!’

Jace Higgs’s friendly grin and ‘How do?’ went down a storm, too – both he and Tina were already familiar faces to the Samartians, from previous reportage of Tina’s visit to their contact ship and Jace’s role as pilot, bringing people back and forth. For some unaccountable reason, Jace’s casual ‘How do?’ had caught the public fancy. One of their top entertainers had made a joke about it and it had swept the planet as a comedy catchphrase. Seeing him actually there, in their system, saying it, thrilled and delighted the Samartians in about equal measure.

‘This is just extraordinary,’ Buzz marvelled, seeing from the coverage the Samartians were sending them that pretty much the whole planet was glued to holovisions, either at home or gathered in public places to watch on giant screens. The mood was very definitely celebratory, with quite a lot of crowds wearing weird ‘alien’ make-up and waving home-made banners with a welcome from whatever their city or town was called. There were official banners, too, distributed by the Dakaelin and prominently featured in the coverage, announcing
We no longer stand alone!

‘If this was happening on a League world,’ Buzz observed, ‘we’d be looking at pandemonium, right now – supermarkets being looted, cities in gridlock, riots breaking out. And these people have far
far
more reason than our own worlds to be afraid of aliens – just incredible, that they’ve gone from ‘all aliens are hostile invaders’ to ‘Hicksburg welcomes the Revellin’ in just a couple of months.’

‘We can learn a lot from them about information management, that’s for sure,’ Alex said. ‘Though it’s different, of course, on our worlds – no way
to
hide an alien ship turning up on our scopes. Not even the most ferocious media slap-down would prevent that getting out by word of mouth. The authorities here have total control over what the public gets to see and hear about.’

Buzz gave him a teasing look.

‘You sound as if you approve,’ he observed, and chuckled as Alex gave him a speaking look.

‘I am, of
course
,’ Alex said, much on his dignity, ‘one hundred per cent committed to the principle of a free media, and I have every respect for the independent challenging role they play in our society.’

Buzz grinned, but said no more, seeing that Misha Tregennis was about to speak to them, chivvying everyone back to work and then looking into camera with the manner of an officer making a report.

‘All green, and as per schedule, skipper,’ she said, and Alex smiled, though he had already been able to see that for himself.

It took them just under two hours to finish setting up the dome, organising all the supplies within it, and to load up the supplies the Samartians had left on the lunar surface. Only when they had done all that did the two parties separate, with handshakes all round and several hugs. Tina, Martins and Jace headed back to the shuttle. Then they took off, with no more ceremony than a flash of salute, and headed away leaving Misha, Jermane and Murg in sole possession of their castaway base.

Twenty Eight

Eleven days later, the Heron carried out another salute to Samart, and departed.

It felt like wrenching themselves away – not just from the people they were leaving behind but from Samart, too. Everything they had been working for ever since Alex had opened their orders on departure from Therik, felt as if it was coming to an end.

Of course they knew it wasn’t. They were still deep within Marfikian-controlled space and had a difficult navigation through nebula to accomplish before they would even be safely back across League borders. They had a great deal of work to do, too, finessing the translation matrix and writing up analyses of the masses of information the Samartians had provided.