Warrior Chronicles 2: Warrior's Blood (27 page)

“We knew that.”

“No. I mean they are completely liquid crystal. They seem to convert the entire mass of the planet to solid crystal first. Once it’s solid, the crystal converts to liquid. At that point, it is a non-Newtonian fluid.”

“You mean like the corn-starch stuff you can walk on?”

“Exactly. And it’s so viscous that we would have to hit it with a small moon to eject some of the crystal from the planet’s mass.”

“Which takes us back to the black hole stuff. Is it feasible?” Cort asked as he sat on the floor between the two wolves.

“No. Not without alien tech. We can create them easily enough. The trick is collapsing them. We can’t collapse one that is big enough to suit our purposes.”

Cort sighed without responding.

“Cort, can I change the subject?”

“When have you ever asked permission to speak your mind?”

“Could you give this up?”

Cort didn’t have to ask what Kim meant. “A year ago I could have. Before the aliens. But not now. That’s actually why I agreed to come to this time. I thought I would be alone here and Sköll and I would live out our lives in peace. Contrary to popular belief, no real warrior is a man of war. We only pick up our weapons to protect the things or people or ideals that are important to us. The warriors I have known dream of peace and of being left alone. We would be just as happy as explorers. Death may be the commodity we trade in, but it’s not who we are.”

Cort’s eyes changed and became distant in a way that Kim had come to recognize meant he was reliving some long past moment. “We fight because we have to, not because we want to. But when the time comes to fight, we do so with all of our being. So why did you ask me that?”

“I was going through the data we got from Speral. There’s a planet that was going be seeded, but the crystal started expanding in its direction so they left it alone. It is so beautiful Cort, and it is almost identical to Earth. It has ten continents, and its evolutionary stage is very early. It has small dinosaurs, Cort.” She went to the coffee machine and poured a cup into a ceramic mug Cort had given her. Turning around, she leaned against the counter and held the cup with both hands. “I don’t know. I was just dreaming, I guess.”

“Could we have the whole planet to ourselves? It would be nice until the crystal got to us.” Cort thought about Kim’s words. “Wait. Did the crystal change directions, or did it start expanding in an additional direction?”

“I don’t know. Why?” Kim knew she had lost the moment. Her warrior was back.

“If it changed directions, I want to know why.” Cort’s mind was stimulated now. “And I think I can get you some crystal without you giving me lip about it. Find out about the crystal changing directions, then call a conference. Include Speral in it. I’m going to go talk to Doc Black. Zandra, come.” 

Kim kissed Cort as he walked out the door with the big wolf right behind him. Coke whimpered as the two left. “I feel your pain, buddy,” Kim said.

--

Doctor Black listened to Cort’s idea before saying, “Yes, it would work. We can place the sensors at several depths all around the target planet. If I design the probes right, we will be able to collect data until the sensors are completely compromised. Crystal will grow through different substances at different rates, so I can probably fabricate some sort of a platform that will let you remain safe while collecting a sample.”

“Okay, get to work on it. Don’t worry about the conference. I will make your excuses for now.”

“Okay. This is a good idea, Cort. It shouldn’t have taken so long for one of us to come up with it.”

“I know. I’ll talk to you soon, Doc,” Cort said as he left the lab with Zandra in tow.  Back in his office, he sat down and started planning. Kim commed him to let him know what she had found out and that everyone was ready.  He logged on and immediately spoke to Speral.

“Speral, according to your records, the crystal growth changed directions after it arrived in the system you have designated as
Rosok
. Why did it change directions?”

“Cort Addison, the Rosok system is an independent system that has resisted joining into any kind of agreement with the Collaborative Government, so I cannot answer your question. I speculate that the dominant species of that system has developed a weapon which is effective against the crystal.”

“Tell me about that species, Speral,” Cort said.

“Cort Addison, it is a sentient species. That is all the information we have in our records. I will supply you with those records. Three attempts have been made to contact the species, but in every case we were destroyed by the system’s inhabitants.”

“Get me those records as soon as possible, Speral.  One more thing, do you still have your entry data for the system?”

“Cort Addison, yes we do. We have four data points within the system. Our original entry to the system was at the gravity-neutral point near the perihelion of the system’s single gas giant. We have data for that point as well as the three points where our vessels were destroyed.”

“How long does it take them to respond and destroy your ships?”

Speral closed her eyes and studied data as the others watched. “Gods, I would love to be able to do that,” Rhodes said.

“Cort Addison, the response time from system entry until measurable response varied, with that time decreasing with each deeper penetration into the system. Based on our data, the dominant species of the system uses a tachyonic particle net to detect system incursions. Because of the nature of that detection system and weapon response times, the system uses a sublight kinetic weapon system.”

Mike Rage asked, “Speral, why didn’t you use your defensive systems against the weapons?”

“Mike Rage, our defensive systems were not able to repel the weapons. I do not know why, as the composition and design of the weapon is unknown.”

Cort asked, “Speral, did you try to contact the system before or after the crystal attempted to attack them?”

“Cort Addison, we made two attempts to contact the system inhabitants before the attempted incursion by the crystal. The final attempt was made after the crystal changed directions.”

“Speral, are you willing to revisit that system if we can ensure your safety?”

“Cort Addison, I would like to review your strategy before committing resources to that system again. What is your plan?”

“I don’t have one yet Speral, but I will soon.” Cort paused before saying, “Let’s move on for now. I took an idea to Doc Black this afternoon that he…”

The conference lasted thirty more minutes. Cort, Doctor Black, Chief Rhodes, Kim Point, and Speral all had homework to do before another conference the next day. Kim went to Cort’s office after the meeting and sat down across from him. “Do you have any ideas about this new species?” she asked.

“No good ones, but if they stopped the crystal it means one of two things: Either they know how to stop it, or the crystal doesn’t want them. Either way, we need to know the reason.”

“Yeah. Listen, Cort. I have a bad feeling about it. We are well on our way to stopping the crystal ourselves. This new species clearly wants to be left alone. I agree we need to know more, but I don’t want kick a hornets’ nest either.”

“I know, but we have to know why the crystal turned. Don’t worry though, we are a long way from making that move.”

“I’m glad to hear that at least.”

“I had a message from Doctor Black waiting for me after the meeting. He thinks he will have a set of sensors designed for us next week, and he’s already got an idea for a platform to work from, and the goal is to be ready for deployment in two weeks.”

“Do you have a target planet yet?”

“No, but I sent Speral a message asking her to find us one.”

“I hope it’s not our planet,” Kim said wistfully.

“It’s our planet now?”

“Yes. It’s our planet. Come home soon,” Kim said as she stood up. Bending over to kiss the top of his head, she asked, “I have you for two weeks, right?”

“Probably. See you in a bit.”

Cort met with Mike Rage about staffing and equipment qualifications and then commed Speral to get updates on the progress of the crystal infection. Before heading back to their quarters he took Zandra to the proving ground to run, where they ran into Jeff Pence. “Hey Jeff. How are you?”

“Good, sir. How is Earth?” Pence asked as he fell in beside Cort.

“Earth is good as well, and their dome is almost completed. It was odd being back in my cave again, though.”

“How is Mr. Dar handling everything?” Pence asked. “I hope it’s not too personal a question, sir.”

Running and talking lent an odd cadence to their conversation, but they were both used to it so Pence didn’t think anything of the long pause before Cort answered, “He is a strong man. That’s really all I can say because he’s not ready to talk about it. But he’s staying busy and focused. It’s not often that an amateur historian gets to design his own government. I think it’s a good distraction for him.”

“How so?”

“Back on my Earth, I had an uncle who ran cattle. He lost an entire herd of good cattle once. Over a hundred head as I recall, and he told me afterwards it wasn’t the first one that bothered him, even after he knew they were all going to die. It was the last one....” Cort paused again to allow his breath and stride to synchronize. “…that died that hit him the hardest. Dar is the same. As long as he has others to worry about, he will be able to process his grief in stages. so being governor of the Earth group will be good for him.”

“Okay, I guess I can see that.”

“I’m actually glad I ran into you, Jeff. Mike Rage and I were talking about you earlier. We are at a point where we need to start separating the military from civilian security. We think you would be a good candidate to head up the civilian side of that equation. Are you interested?”

“Absolutely. Thank you sir.”

Cort began to slow down as they approached the main entrance to the proving ground. “It’s not a given. You have to be approved by the three governors. I don’t think that will be a problem though. As they combine the three colony sites into the dome at Tharsis there will be a lot more for you to do. We are going to keep all three module sites crewed as well, so you will have to think about security staffing for Aeolis and Oxia. This site will still be the military home, and we will regularly rotate men to duty with the security team. We haven’t worked it all out yet, but that’s why we want to start things rolling. We want to have security in place when the military people start rotating off world.”

“I won’t let you down sir.” Pence grinned as the two men and Zandra left the proving ground.

--

The next morning Cort made breakfast before taking Kim to Speral’s ship. They were both wearing CONDOR suits and well armed. “I cannot believe it. Our first real date!” Kim said. “And it is to another planet! This will be a date for the ages.”

After they were aboard, Speral lifted off and transitioned to the solar system that had ‘their planet’ in the center of its habitable zone. She then joined them in the observation room next to what Cort assumed was the bridge of ship. “Kim Point, do you find the planet acceptable?”

“It’s... I mean... Oh...” Kim tried to find words for what she was feeling. The planet was just as she imagined it would be. The hemisphere she saw through the viewer was dotted with three continents that appeared similar in size to Australia, and Kim could see the edges of at least three more similar land masses. Two of the land masses below her were joined by an isthmus, similar to the one that joined North and South America back on Earth. From their perspective, the lower of the two great islands was traversed by what Kim thought was the planet’s equator. She remembered the studies she had read about the planet and knew that many of the two continents’ land species migrated across the bridge. In her mind she could almost see the animals moving around below them.